Page 135 of Knot So Fast
It's never stopped me.
RAIN LINES AND REVELATIONS
~KIERAN~
We pick a floodlit kart track outside town, the kind of place that stays open until three AM for people who need their adrenaline fix after dark. The recent squall has left the asphalt slick and shining, creating perfect mirrors in every depression where the rain has pooled. The floodlights turn the water into liquid silver, and the whole track looks like something out of a video game—too perfect to be real, too dangerous to be safe.
Auren's already in her kart by the time I finish my safety check, her helmet a custom job in deep purple with silver lightning bolts that catch the artificial light. She's wearing racing overalls that she must have had stashed in her car—black with neon pink accents that make her impossible to miss even in the dark. The way she sits in the kart, completely relaxed but coiled with potential energy, tells me everything I need to know about her skill level.
I let her tuck under my bumper for the first three laps, watching how she handles the rain line. Most people make the mistake of following the dry racing line in wet conditions, but water changes everything. The normal apex becomes a skatingrink, the usual braking zones become suggestions rather than rules. You have to completely rewire your brain, find grip where it shouldn't exist, trust surfaces that look treacherous.
She's tentative at first, feeling out the limits, testing how much throttle she can apply before the rear steps out. I stay close but not too close, giving her space to learn but ready to react if she loses it completely. The karts are responsive in the wet—twitchy and demanding, punishing the slightest error with immediate consequences.
By lap four, she's found her rhythm. I watch her adjust her line through turn three, going wider on entry to square up the exit, using parts of the track that would be suicide in the dry but offer precious grip in these conditions. She's learning with every corner, adapting with the kind of instinctive understanding that can't be taught.
Then she makes her move.
Late apex through the hairpin, using my momentum against me as I'm forced to go defensive. She squares the exit perfectly, getting better drive onto the straight, and suddenly she's alongside me going into the chicane. The move is aggressive but clean, using every inch of track available without putting a wheel wrong.
She scythes past with a confidence that makes my chest tight, and as she pulls away, she throws up a fist pump that absolutely wrecks me. It's pure joy, unfiltered and genuine, the kind of celebration that comes from doing something you love at the highest level you can achieve.
We run another twenty laps, trading positions and pushing each other harder with each passing minute. She's fearless in the wet, finding grip where physics suggests none should exist, her kart dancing on the edge of adhesion in a way that would terrify most people but seems to energize her.
When we finally pull into the paddock, she's out of her kart before I've even killed my engine. She hauls her helmet off in one smooth motion, and her hair spills out like a waterfall—jet black at the roots transitioning to magenta and purple, wild from the helmet and the humidity. She spins in place, arms spread wide, laughing at nothing and everything.
The neon signs from the track's concession stand reflect in the puddles around her, creating pools of pink and blue and green light that make the whole scene look like something from a music video. Her eyes are brighter than the pit lights, that unique purple-blue catching every color and reflecting them back transformed.
"God, I needed that," she says, still breathing hard from the exertion and the excitement.
"You're insane in the wet," I tell her, pulling off my own helmet. "That move through the chicane was borderline suicidal."
"But it worked," she grins, and I can't argue with that logic.
We decide to take a break, both of us soaked with sweat despite the cool night air. The track has a small restaurant attached—nothing fancy, just the kind of place that serves comfort food to adrenaline junkies who need to refuel after burning through their body weight in nervous energy.
We order nachos that arrive looking like a heart attack on a plate—butter chicken instead of regular ground beef, which is a choice I wouldn't have made but turns out to be genius. Sour cream and guac fighting for space among cheese that's probably fifty percent oil. It's disgusting and perfect and exactly what we need.
The beers are so cold they hurt going down, condensation immediately forming on the bottles in the humid air. We've claimed a corner booth where we can see the track through thewindows, watching other drivers navigate the wet conditions with varying degrees of success.
I'm wearing jeans and a black henley that's probably too casual for what might be considered a date, but Auren doesn't seem to mind. She's changed out of her racing overalls into ripped jeans and a crop top that shows a strip of tanned skin that I'm trying very hard not to stare at. Her hair is pulled back in a messy bun, and she looks relaxed in a way I rarely see her at the track.
"Why do you love it?" she asks suddenly, gesturing toward the track with her beer bottle. "Racing, I mean. What is it about being out there that makes everything else fade away?"
I consider the question, rolling my beer between my palms as I search for words that might make sense.
"The track is where I learned to breathe again," I admit, surprising myself with the honesty. "I grew up in a strict household. Like, military-level strict, except instead of push-ups for punishment, it was disappointed silences and carefully worded reminders about family legacy."
She shifts closer, giving me her full attention in that way she has that makes you feel like you're the only person in the world.
"My older brother was the 'mess up,' as my parents would call it," I continue, the words coming easier now. "Got a girl pregnant at seventeen, dropped out of university, became a tattoo artist instead of a doctor. So everything had to be perfect for me. I was the backup plan, the one who had to restore the family honor or whatever."
I take a long pull from my beer, remembering those years of suffocating expectations.
"Even when I accomplished things—graduated top of my class, got into medical school, completed my residency in half the usual time—it was always one thing after another. Neverenough. Get better grades. Make better connections. Find a more prestigious position."
"Sounds exhausting," Auren says softly.
"It got to the point where I'd done everything. The medical degree, the honors, the achievements any typical parent would be proud of. But then came the next set of expectations—find a pack, find an Omega, have kids, continue the family line with appropriately successful offspring."
