Lightning
Chapter 2

 

After living together for a couple of months, I woke up one morning to Janice's puking her guts out. I waited for her to get in bed before I asked, "Are you ill, or are you pregnant?"

"What if I was?" she said throwing it back at me.

"Well, I would be very happy, but I would also be very worried," I replied.

"Why would you be worried?" my sister asked back.

"Well, you know — siblings having babies, and stories of babies with birth defects of some kind — that kind of worried," I explained.

"Well, I'm not pregnant — it's probably a reaction to the Chinese food from last night. I think it was the Crab Rangoon. Boy - you sure jumped to a conclusion there, Ryan. Do you want to have babies with me?" she asked crawling back to bed.

"Well, er ... I think I do," I said clumsily.

She's 30 and I'm 25, and we've fallen in love with one another because my Volkswagen was hit by lightning while we were in it. Since then we have been lovers, living together in the house we both grew up in.

After finding that my Volkswagen was the same car that my Dad, Jim Douglas, had raced in the 60s, I had a mutual respect for both the bug and my Dad.

He had mentioned that his old buddy, Tennessee Steinmetz, used to talk to the racecar before every race. He also had said that he first met Mom driving his racecar around as his every day car.

I had the VW bug stripped back down to its pearl white paint job. It cost some money but was worth it. Jan commented on how cute it was. We were still in bed together every night. The result our first night with each other was growing inside her belly, causing her to radiate like nobody's business.

We had pooled our resources and were enjoying each other's company very much. When we turned 30, which my sister was already, we got an inheritance of two million dollars. I asked Jan for a loan.

"Why," she asked.

"I want to race the car!" I said.

"That little bug — it seems like a waste of money," she said.

"I promise you — I'll pay you back every penny."

--

I spent time and money on the car, boosting his undercarriage a bit, and tweaking the pre-mix. Herbie didn't seem to mind a bit. He kept thing's quiet when Jan got near or in the car. I guess you could say that we had a secret from her. The annual 50-lap race at Laguna Seca was coming up, the same race my dad won in '68.

There was a race to get into the field called the El Dorado. I did all I knew how to get Herbie ready for it. It was mandatory to have a second person in the car with you. I asked Jan, and she thought I was being ridiculous.

"I'm a pregnant woman — what part of dangerous don't you understand," she said to me.

"Herbie and I won't let anything happen to you — Please?" I said getting done on both knees.

"The way you talk about that VW is really kind of creepy, Ryan!"

"You'll do it?" I asked still on both knees.

"You silly goose — how can I say 'No' to the father of my baby, I'll do it — but you must be careful, all right?"

"Sure will, beautiful — thanks!" I said grabbing her legs from where I was causing her to laugh out loud.

--

The day before the race, I had to do a practice run, by myself, in less than two minutes. After all the Spiders, Mazda's, Aston Martins and Corvettes did the circuit at 1:57 or faster, I got on the course for my turn.

Jeremy Clarkson, Randy Pobst and Steve Millen laughed as I got my car to the line.

"Hey Ryan, did you replace the hamsters inside the engine?" Randy said causing his race buddies to laugh really loud.

I decided to let Herbie do my talking. I revved the engine — Herbie blinked the inside lights telling me to get ready. This track was 2.238 miles; with eleven turns, including the legendary 'Corkscrew' at turns 8 and 8a. There was a 300-foot change in elevation between turns 8 and 9.

The light was red. When it turned green, I started. Herbie was great anticipating the turns and handling the 'Corkscrew' like a champ. When we zipped past the start finish line, I saw the time at 1:52 flat. I raised my fist through my open window. Herbie seemed ready to compete — I knew I was!

I pulled into the pit area, to cheers from Jan and her best friend, Ginny!

The announcement came over the PA, "That Beetle just broke the all-time speed record for a car in its class at 1:51.73 — the 59th fastest lap ever here at Laguna Seca - Let's give Ryan Douglas a big hand folks. I hope it has the recovery powers to come back tomorrow."

 
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