Chapter 21

SATURDAY, JUNE 1, 1991

Time was running out before I would turn 15. Sure, it was more than a month away, but we had a lot of work to do to get the racecar ready to go.

I was up early Saturday. Mom cooked a fantastic breakfast, as she’d left some bread out the night before to get crusty, then made her signature french toast with it. It’s a hell of a way to start your day, full load of sugar and all.

Josh and I loaded up, and mom drove us to grandpa’s shop. Today would be a little different, as mom was going to spend much of the day in the shop getting my safety gear ready to go.

Grandpa was waiting in the shop with a fresh cup of coffee when we arrived. The car was facing out the shop door, hood and panels off, waiting for a heart transplant.

“Mornin,’” grandpa drawled to all three of us. “Little Josh, we’re gonna put you to work today.”

Josh grinned and ran to grandpa for a hug. Fortunately, mom had brought plenty of toys for Josh to play with out in the dirt, so he’d hopefully be out of our hair.

Mom busied herself with some boxes of gear, and I moved to help her.

The plan for the day was to get the engine put into the car, plumbed, and fired. That meant I needed my seat in place, with safety five-point harness installed. Mom was working on getting the five-point harness out of it’s packaging and looking through the instructions.

Grandpa was simply waiting for old Louie to show up with the engine. He had already put the brakes and brake lines in the car, and had bled the system. A sprint car has a solid rear axle, and generally one brake just left of the quick-change case. Then another line goes to the left front caliper. The right front generally has no brake. If you’re careful, you can set the brakes properly and let them help you corner the car with the right touch, or at least set the car up to corner. Some frown on that, but high-banked bullrings like the one we planned to race practically required it.

We’d just set the aluminum seat in place to where I found it somewhat comfortable in the crowded cockpit when Louie pulled up in his old Dodge pickup.

Grandpa and Louie exchanged pleasantries, and grandpa slid an old cherry picker over to the back of the old Dodge. Louie already had a chain crossing the top of the manifold on the small-block Chevy engine, and grandpa hooked the cherry picker up to it, hoisting the engine into the air.

I helped grandpa maneuver it over to the car, and we turned the engine around and actually moved the light car around a touch to make the new powerplant fit between the rails. Grandpa slowly dropped the engine in place. It was mean-looking, a black cast iron block with custom valve covers that said “Ross Racing Engines.”

Grandpa got a couple of bolts set in the front and rear motorplates and unhooked the cherry picker, rolling it away.

Louie ambled around the car best he could to hook up fuel lines to the cast aluminum Hilborn injection manifold, and brought a set of eight tall stacks with air cleaners to set into the intake. Grandpa handed me the power steering pump, which would bolt to the back of the motorplate, inside the cockpit with me. Then the fuel pump would bolt to it. Both units would run off the back of the camshaft, getting power from the motor itself.

I was fiddling with the power steering pump when I noticed an issue.

“Grandpa, come look at this.”

He leaned into the cockpit and studied the back of the camshaft.

“Ah shit,” he complained.

“Louie, there’s no spud on the back of this cam.”

“What?” Louie complained.

He ambled over and leaned into the car from the other side.

“Well shit,” he cursed. “I think I used a cam from a late model engine.”

The two older men knew exactly what to do. I was lost.

“So, what do we do?”

“Engine has to come back out,” grandpa complained.

“I’ll take it back to the shop and swap the cam. Won’t take more than an hour.”

We reversed our course once again, and pulled the engine back out of the car and into Louie’s truck. Grandpa went with him to speed up the process.

Mom stayed with me, and we installed the five-point harness and were working on the right side window net when the older men returned.

Being the smartass I am, I checked the back of the cam myself before helping them hoist the motor out of the pickup again. It did indeed have a spud in place to drive the steering and fuel pumps.

We worked quickly again to get the engine in place. Grandpa bolted it all in, set the yolk to the driveshaft into the back of the crank and busied himself with the coolant system. I was tasked with bolting the pumps in place again. The task created a spaghetti of hoses, fuel and power steering, right between my legs. Not comforting.

Once Louie had fuel lines in place, he bolted the drysump oil reserve in place at the front of the motor. Grandpa had the hoses running to the radiator in place, and added distilled water.

He’d tell me later it was a little less likely to boil out. For now, he was fussing around with the throttle linkage. We needed to be able to set it so that when I matted the throttle pedal, the engine was wide open. We also needed it to run idle without a foot on it when we warmed up the motor. This required a couple of springs attached to mounting points on the intake. I sat in the car and tested the response to the pedal while grandpa and Louie watched where that moved the linkage, and how far it opened up the manifold.

It was getting downright close to the moment of truth. Grandpa had me fill two fuel cans with five gallons of methanol from a big barrel he had just purchased. Then I popped the cap to the fuel tank, grabbed a big funnel and carefully added ten gallons of the eye-watering fuel to the fuel cell.

Grandpa was bolting a freshly painted black header to the left side of the engine. It snaked around itself to bring the hot exhaust of the left bank of cylinders into one four-inch pipe facing the rear of the car. There was no muffler. This thing would be loud.

I kneeled on the other side of the car and hand-tightened the right header in place. Grandpa came around and tightened it up with a ratchet.

This was the moment of truth.

Grandpa had about an hour’s worth of advice he gave me in three minutes. “Slip it into gear before I push you off. Watch the oil pressure gauge, flip the ignition switch on when it comes up to the mark. Turn on the fuel valve and it should fire. Once it fires, keep it running but slip it out of gear. If you can’t get it out of gear, shut the fuel valve off. If you panic, turn the ignition off.”

I nodded in understanding as I put my fire suit on again for the first time since I took it home. It was mostly royal blue, with a white front and white and red panels down the side of the legs. The back was also white, but had “Miller Concrete Construction” in red lettering. “Ross Racing Engines” covered the front, with my name and an American Flag over my heart. A nice touch.

Together, we pushed the racecar out of the shop and down the short driveway to the gravel road. Even little Josh pushed at the chrome push bar protecting the tail tank. It looked like a half-assembled car, missing a hood, several panels and the front and top wings.

I took the steering wheel off and handed it to mom, something that would become a habit over time, and climbed into the seat. Next, I clicked the belts into place. We’d already set them to where we needed them. I clicked everything in place, securing my arm belts together. Mom tightened the belts a little more than I felt was necessary, but I accepted it. She then handed me my helmet, which I popped onto my head and raised the shield. No tearoffs would be required today.

I thumbed the nylon belt through the rings and my helmet was set. Mom handed the steering wheel back to me and I clicked it into place.

Mom tapped me on the helmet. “Be careful,” mom intoned as she gathered up Josh to get him out of the way.

Grandpa lined up his front bumper with the car and pushed me down the road a few hundred yards before he backed off and let me attempt to turn the car. Even dead, without power, the car was loud. Creaking and groaning and every stray speck of gravel made noise as it hit the car. I rolled a little to the right, slowed down plenty and took a sharp left turn, the only turn this kind of car likes to make. It was quite an effort without power steering. I couldn’t quite negotiate a full turn, so grandpa had to get out of his truck and help me back up, then helped me lock it into gear. We got lined up, grandpa pulled around me and made his own three-point turn, then snugged the front bumper up against the push bar.

I was ready to become a sprint car driver. This was my moment.

Grandpa hit the gas and shoved the car forward. I held onto the steering wheel and watched the oil pressure gauge. It wasn’t coming up. I realized why when I noticed the left rear tire was skidding along, instead of turning over, which would engage the engine.

I waved forward with my hand out the side of the car, bidding grandpa to speed it up a touch.

He did, and the tires broke loose, turning the engine. I watched carefully as the oil pressure shot up, reaching the mark in seconds. I gave it a two-second delay in my head, then turned the fuel valve open and hit the ignition switch.

“RAAAAANT!” My God it was loud!

The engine fired and I could feel the car pull away slightly from the pickup. Grandpa backed off immediately. The car was fussing and chugging and popping on occasion, and so I gave it just a little throttle and it responded instantly, lurching forward. Keeping my wits about me, I reached to my right to pull the lever up to pull the car out of gear.

It wouldn’t budge. I yanked for all I was worth, but it was stuck in place. As the car reached where I should turn to the shop, the car was not out of gear to coast up in place. I kept the car straight on the unused road, still pulling at the shifter lever for all I was worth. As I rolled well past the shop, I decided I would need help, or an adjustment.

I turned the fuel valve off and listened as the car starved itself of fuel and chugged to a stop. I flipped the ignition back to off moments after the car quieted.

Grandpa pulled his truck next to me on the road with a laugh.

“You missed the driveway!”

“It won’t come out of gear!” I complained.

He backed up and pulled his truck behind me, just in case someone did come down the road.

He reached into the right side of the car, rocking it back and forth a bit and tried to work the lever. He did get it out of gear after great effort.

“Yeah, it’s pretty sticky,” he admitted. “I’m going to shove you forward again, then back off. See if you can turn it around again.”

We got the car facing the shop once again. Grandpa drove around me in the truck and drove back the shop.

I sat in the relative silence of the racecar, stranded on the side of a gravel road in the middle of nowhere. The sun was shining and a solid breeze was blowing the long grass in the ditches. I could feel the first trickle of sweat roll down my neck.

A few minutes later, grandpa was coming back, with mom in the truck as well. He rolled past me and turned around again, bringing his truck up behind the sprint car.

He sprayed some lubricant into the flexible shaft that housed the shifter mechanism, as well as down around the quick change rear end. Then he forced the lever up and down, trying to work the lube through the system.

It seemed to work, and he had me do the same. The lever pulled up and down much more easily.

I locked the car into gear, and grandpa jumped into the pickup once again. He lightly tapped the push bar with his bumper, and we were off once again. He got up to speed more quickly, and the rear tires stopped sliding over the gravel and started turning the engine. I carefully watched the oil pressure once again, and turned the valve open a few moments after it came up to the mark.

With a flick of the ignition, the car came to life again.

“RANT, rant, rant-rant!”

I could feel the car pull away from grandpa again, and I pulled it out of gear as soon as I felt the engine would keep running. It did, but I was never going to be able to coast all the way back to the shop. No worries, grandpa gently nudged the car forward and I let him shove me all the way to the shop with the engine still running.

I turned down the short driveway into the construction yard and the car squealed to a halt in front of the open shop doors as I applied the brakes. Old Louie ambled over to the right side of the car, checking the oil pressure.

With the car stopped in place, the air was acrid inside the car. Unburnt methanol was surging through the exhaust, and had a sharp odor. The freshly painted header pipes were smoking hot, and the paint was burning off with a rank odor. My eyes were watering inside the cockpit. I wondered if it would be this toxic in the driver’s seat all the time. The car was loud, vibrating and shaking a little from the engine, and for lack of a better term, alive. The car was alive.

Louie grabbed the throttle cable and gave a couple of sharp tugs, spooling up the engine with a ferocious growl. This engine was an absolute beast. Sure, I had a Mustang with a 390, but this Chevy 358 was built to race, and it was a sharp piece. Plus, the car weighed maybe 1,500 pounds. The power to weight ratio was insane.

Louie made a quick adjustment to make the engine idle a touch faster, then told me I could climb out. I unbuckled and climbed out the top of the frame. I pulled my helmet off and wiped my watery eyes.

Mom looked on with a smile. Josh’s little eyes were bugged out of his head, and he had his palms cupping his ears to drown out the thunderous racket of the racecar.

Grandpa and Louie were busy with the car, watching the temperatures and pressures and making little adjustments to the throttle cable. Grandpa produced a timing light and set up at the front of the engine, and made a few adjustments as well. The rough-running beast started to tame just a bit as these older gentlemen massaged and tweaked the car into a more rhythmic and pleasing song.

Of course, Louie tugged the throttle cables a few more times to clear out unburnt fuel, and the noise drove little Josh to dive for mom.

We all chuckled at that, but the car was noisier than a damn jet engine, the exhaust taking a few short turns through the headers and right out into the open air, nothing to muffle the sharp sound of methanol explosions driving the pistons downward in anger.

After a good 20 minutes of burn, grandpa shut the fuel valve off and the car revved up slightly before starving itself of fuel, and shut down.

I felt like I could suddenly hear again. The soft breeze blowing, birds chirping, Josh giggling.

We rolled the car back inside the shop for the day.

Later, grandpa showed me how to change the oil filter and check it for signs of trouble like metal filings, then Louie pulled the valve covers off one last time to “check valve lash.” I wasn’t sure what that meant at the time, but it looked like a job he’d be doing himself.

“If we had to, we could race tonight,” grandpa lamented.

“Sorry I’m not old enough yet,” I complained.

We all had the bug pretty bad, and we wanted to go racing.

Mom was satisfied with the safety equipment and headed home with my gear. We thanked Louie, and he ambled back into his old Dodge to go back home.

I went to the races with grandpa that night. He tried to give me more advice, and we actually went into the pits after the races to talk to a few people he knew.

They already seemed to know I was going to be racing soon.

“Hang some yellow caution tape off that push bar, so we know it’s the kid,” one driver teased.

“You’ll know who he is when he’s sliding around you,” grandpa laughed.

I just grinned good-naturedly. I wasn’t ready to brag, but I didn’t want to seem standoffish either. I knew from any other sport that getting intimidated now would make this that much harder for me. The car itself, the track, already both intimidating. I didn’t need to add experienced drivers to the equation just yet.

Grandpa brought me home, and his excitement for the next few weeks was palpable, and infectious. I couldn’t wait to turn 15 and hit the dirt track.

I slept well, but dreamed of racing. It was a fitful sleep, and I woke up more than once after crashing the car in my dreams.

SUNDAY, JUNE 2, 1991

Sundays. My Own. Yadda, yadda.

The bill came due for my Friday afternoon off. I had to help dad grind corn. Not a labor-intensive process, but we had to run the grinder and haul short trips from the feed wagon to the commodity shed, with enough ground corn to feed the cattle for the week.

We were done with that before mom and dad headed off for church with Josh in tow. I grabbed a shower after they left. The family was back by 11 a.m.

It was going to a be a hot day, so mom didn’t want to get the kitchen heated up. She put together a Sunday dinner salad. Dad grilled steaks from our own farm. Mom sliced them on the bias and tossed the hot meat with tender greens, fresh chunks of blue cheese, cherry tomatoes and croutons. It hit the spot. I made sure there were no leftovers to be had.

I wanted to settle in to watch Cubs vs. Expos, but I should never have tried. While I hadn’t worked much that Sunday, our phone would get quite a workout.

First up on the blower was Beast. He wanted to know if I wanted to cruise with him and Tree in the late afternoon. That sounded OK. He wanted pasta at Pizza Land and would pick me up around 5. I said that would work.

I barely hung up the phone before Mikey was on the line. He mostly just wanted to chat, but the grind of work and taking care of his younger siblings was getting to him. I told him my plans for later, and called Beast back to make sure he picked up Mikey first. He could use the time with friends.

I made it almost all the way to the couch before the phone rang again.

“Hello?”

“Dork,” Shelby teased.

“Who you callin’ dork, dweeb?”

“How was your weekend?” she asked.

“Well, it’s Sunday, so it’s only half over,” I teased.

“I’m bored,” she huffed. “Horses are taken care of. There’s nothing to do.”

“It’s Sunday. Sundays are supposed to be lazy. In fact, the phone has been ringing since I got done eating Sunday dinner, I’ve been trying to be bored.”

“Am I disturbing your boredom?” she cackled.

“Nah, you’re fine. You know you can always call.”

“How kind of you. Now entertain me. Tell me about your week.”

I regaled her with tales of tutoring, baseball practice, a trip to the pool to re-establish my stake on Deedee, and the Friday night gathering.

“I’m surprised you weren’t invited,” I suddenly realized, vocalizing it to her.

“I was,” she said shyly. “I just didn’t feel like going. I like Lea and Autumn, just not always who they invite.”

“Well, you missed out on seeing me, since I was there,” I said humbly. “And boy did you miss out on some shocking tales from Autumn.”

“She called me. She said she knew I’d hear it from you if she didn’t call me first.”

“Then I don’t know how to cure your boredom if you already know everything,” I teased.

“I know everything,” she said flatly. “You don’t.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, Autumn has it bad for you,” she said plainly. “She thinks that’s why she came out of her shell Friday night. You were there. She didn’t expect it.”

“One of your best friends?” I took it in stride. I wasn’t particularly attracted to Autumn, but she wasn’t hard on the eyes, just painfully shy and bone skinny. She certainly had room to develop.

“One of my best friends,” she complained. “Well, another of my best friends.”

“Who else?”

“Ugghhh!” she complained. “I’m not saying. Just promise me that if you and Deedee break up, you’ll talk to me first before you dive in with anyone else. There’s a lot for you to sort out.”

“I don’t have plans to leave Deedee anytime soon.”

“Lexie,” Shelby warned. “Remember Lexie is involved. Anything can happen.”

“Yeah, too true. But things have been going very well lately.”

“You, um, go all the way with her yet?”

“Uh, no,” I admitted. “Maybe could have Friday night with different plans, but um, monthly visitor, I guess.”

That was awkward to explain.

“Yeah, yeah, I AM a girl, I know how that works. When are you going to?”

“I dunno,” I hedged. “Of course I’d like to, but I’m not pressuring her. I think she wants to, but other than that night at Mitch’s, it just hasn’t all come together.”

“I see,” she responded sagely.

“What do you see?”

“She’s probably not quite ready, or questioning you,” Shelby added.

“Could be,” I admitted. “But again, I’m not pressuring her. She’s pretty patient with me and I feel like I should be patient with her. I shouldn’t have to wait much after her birthday at least,” I brightened.

“When’s that?”

“December 6th.”

“That’s a long, long time. Especially for you!” she giggled.

“Maybe she has plans for MY birthday,” I brightened.

“There you go,” Shelby giggled. “She’s waiting for fireworks.”

We both laughed at that.

“OK, so are you entertained?” I asked theatrically.

“Not quite yet. What did you do Saturday?”

“We pretty much finished building the racecar, and we started the engine.”

“What’s that like?”

“Well, it’s not like a street car. You have to push it off with a pickup truck to get it fired. Then grandpa and Louie toyed around with it until they made it purr.”

“Who’s Louie?”

“Oh, Louie owns the engine. He builds race engines. He and grandpa raced all over the country back in the day. Now they wanted to have some fun, so I get to drive.”

“I asked my parents to take me to your first race, and they said they would,” Shelby added.

“Awesome! I know I’ll have someone cheering for me at least.”

“You think that will be a problem for you?” she chuckled.

“I dunno,” I admitted. “Who knows if I’m any good?”

“True,” she admitted. “You might finally suck at something.”

“There are plenty of things I suck at,” I grumped.

“Name one thing?”

“Being your best friend,” I said flatly.

“That’s not true at all,” she argued. “I can’t imagine a better best friend.”

“I have a lot of work to do in that area,” I countered. “I promise I’ll do better.”

“You don’t have to. There’s nothing you need to do.”

“Bullshit,” I said softly. “You’re always there for me and I’m not always there for you. That’s not fair. That’s not enough. I have to get better.”

“Jake, I don’t feel that way. You ARE there for me, you just ... You just have more drama than I have,” she giggled.

“That might be true,” I was forced to admit. “But still, even now, I’m telling you all about me, and you’re not telling all about you.”

“There’s less to tell,” she emphasized. “I had a boring weekend, remember?”

“You didn’t have to. You could have been out Friday night. It would have been fun.”

“Yeah, maybe,” she admitted.

“It’s going to be a long summer if you don’t get out more. We’re only high schoolers once. When I have my license, I plan to be out all the time.”

“You’re probably right.”

“Of course I’m right,” I beamed.

We ended the call and I caught a little of the game from the couch. The Cubs actually won, but hadn’t looked good in a few weeks. Could be another long season, but you get used to that as a Cubs fan.

When 5 p.m. rolled around, I was ready and waiting for Beast. He was only a little late, likely due to picking up Mikey first.

The ominous-looking black Monte Carlo rolled up, with speakers blaring. Tree opened the passenger door and hopped out to let me in behind him. Our relative heights meant I’d probably never sit in the front of this car unless it was just Beast and me.