Chapter Thirty One - Flash Floods - No Stopping for 5 Miles
Having the doctor tell us that Corinna was going to be okay was fine, but dammit I wasn't satisfied. Somehow until I saw her myself, I knew it simply wasn't going to sink in that she was really okay. I don't imagine anyone else felt a darn bit different.
Not only that, but the idea that somehow she had carried an 'unfinished' fetus inside her skull for eighteen years simply blew me away. It was creepy. It was weird. Mostly though it was slightly sickening to me. I'm not sure why, but the very idea simply sent shivers down my spine. For some reason I instantly had thoughts of some stupid horror movie. Somehow I had thoughts of a second person inside my own skull who suddenly 'came alive' and took over my body. Talk about the stuff of nightmares; this was it! Simply for my own sanity, I had to ask about the doctor some questions and get the facts.
I held back slightly as everyone else filed out of the room and looked at the surgeon as respectfully as I could. When we were alone, he raised his eyebrows and looked at me questioningly.
"Dr. Wolchuck, was that unborn fetus still alive in some way?" I croaked, my voice simply not functioning correctly.
"Oh no." He shook his head. "The human body would never allow anything of that sort. What the body does, is to try to destroy any foreign body that happens to intrude within itself. If that proves impossible, it will then attempt to form a shell of sorts around the foreign object; you could say that it surrounds the object with scar tissue, because in reality, that's what it is. It forms a barrier, which is a simple method of self protection that the body employs. That, is exactly what happened in this case; the body isolated the object, then it carried on with it's own development. Something of this sort could exist without a problem in most areas of the soft tissue of the body and cause no problems. There would simply be a lump of isolated scar tissue resting in place which had no effect on the body itself. The only difference in this case was the fact that this foreign body was inside the skull and affecting the brain."
"Well then, why did you have to operate on Corinna if she'd had it there with no major trouble for eighteen years?"
"Ahh." He glanced at the door and then back to me. "In this case the shock of the subject's impact from her fall appears to have caused the foreign body to shift. Because of that, it created pressures on new portions of the nervous system. It was causing some problems now and there might well have been a possibility of far greater problems in the future. Over and above that, there were several notes in her files of headaches, erratic behaviour and nausea at times, so I wouldn't say there had been no previous effects. This operation should relieve much of that."
He paused and I could see the tiredness on his face.
"I'm sorry to hold you up, doctor." I apologised. "But how would this 'papyraceus' thing cause her to act erratically at times?"
"Oh yes, that issue. Because of its position, it very well might have caused many such things. The position it was in would have placed pressure on a multitude of neural endings and even minor shifting could have caused behavioural changes." He sighed and glanced at his watch. "I'll try to explain, but I'm going to have to keep this short because I'm very tired. There is a lining inside the skull which acts as a cushion to prevent the brain from being injured as we move around. The cushioning effect is created because that lining is like a sponge which is filled with fluids. The papyraceus object in this patient's case was partially imbedded in that cushion, so it was never solidly fixed in any constant position. It could shift its position somewhat. Even the effects of more or less liquids being absorbed by the patient's body could change the pressures it exerted. Her moods might well have changed if she drank more or less water during a day, or if she drank any coffee, or alcohol, or any other diuretics. If she drank those, the cushion would be reduced because of dehydration and that would cause a change in the object's pressure on the various neural endings. In fact it is even possible that strenuous exercise could cause the object to shift and press on a neural cluster causing a drastic change in her mood."
"Just one last question, Doctor; just how big was this thing?"
"Oh, it was a severely flattened semi-spheroid, approximately six centimetres across and about a little more than two centimetres thick. We had retained it for further study, simply because of its rarity, however Mr. Coulter appears to have reservations about that for some reason. Would you happen to have any ideas about that?"
"Not really." I shrugged my shoulders. "All I can think of is the idea that somehow he thinks of it as an unborn child."
"Hmm, I suppose that makes sense, but if it had been a single child, it would never have lived. His wife would have suffered either a spontaneous abortion, or a stillbirth. I wonder if he understands that?"
"I wouldn't know if he understands that in his heart, Doctor. I think in his case it may be an emotional thing and I really don't believe I'm the person to try to explain it to him. However, thank you for your time and thank you very much for your work."
"Oh, you're welcome and good night." He sighed as I moved toward the door.
"Good night, Doctor."
I found the others, back in the waiting room.
"Where have you been?" Wil demanded instantly, his face screwed into a deep frown.
"I was asking the doctor a few questions." I sighed and flopped into a chair.
"And, what did he say?" Carissa asked sitting down next to me.
So I tried to explain, but first I took the time to tell them that I really wasn't certain that I was getting everything right. Considering the fact that I'd only spoken to the doctor for a few minutes and really didn't understand all the things I was talking about, I thought I had done a relatively decent job of it. For me the fact that the object had been dead and had been surrounded by an isolating barrier was all I wanted to know. Everything else I had asked about had been unnecessary information, but had simply satisfied minor questions that the doctor's explanation had brought to mind. Unfortunately everyone had questions that I couldn't answer, so I suggested they might want to ask Dr. Wolchuck anything else themselves. I did warn them that it might be best to wait until he was less tired.
After a short discussion about my talk with the doctor, Mr. and Mrs. Coulter set off to talk to the nursing staff, wanting to find out if and when they could see Corinna. Meanwhile Carissa and I both decided to phone home. I was going to call Mom and Carissa wanted to call her Uncle Frank. Both of us thought we should pass on the fact that the operation was complete and that Corinna was recovering.
Mom didn't really have much news for me, other than the fact that everyone was sending their wishes for Corinna to get well soon. Of course she hinted that everyone missed Wil and me already. I managed to get him to talk to her for a moment, then just before he hung up, Dad must have asked to talk to him as well. After a short time, Wil called me back to the phone, explaining that Dad had something to ask me.
It seemed that the hydro and phone companies had both finished their surveys all the way past the ranch and to the previously surveyed section nearer Jason Dumfries' ranch. As well, George and Bob, George's dad, had gone up to the cabin to measure it and the barn for all the supplies they'd need to run in power. On top of that Bob had found a small used stove and fridge that he felt would do fine for the cabin. He suggested that we buy them, then he'd service them before taking them up and installing them at the cabin. I hinted that Mom might have a look at them and if she felt they were decent, we should get them.
After Dad and I said goodnight, we all went looking for Carissa's parents.
It turned out that the nursing staff weren't nearly as adamant as Dr. Wolchuck about family visitors being in Corinna's room with her. In fact we all got in to see her for a few moments, even if we had to go in one at a time. We all had to wear a surgical mask and slip a paper gown over the top of our street clothes. On top of that, each of us was escorted in by a nurse and each person was only allowed to stay in the room with her for a few moments.
When it was my turn to go in, I was really surprised at how she looked. Even to my untrained eye she seemed to look better than she had the night before. Somehow she looked more peaceful, almost relaxed and resting easier. Perhaps part of the reason for that appearance was the fact that both of her eyes were uncovered now. Although her nose and both cheeks were bandaged, it seemed she had far fewer bandages around her head. To be honest, there might have been even more tubes and wires than the night before. I didn't even notice those. I was more interested in the relaxed look on her face.
I wasn't sure about the others, but while I was there, I reached out to hold her hand and talked to her quietly for a few seconds. I didn't know what the nurse who had come into the room with each of us thought of that, but I wanted to do it just in case Corinna could hear me. If she could hear me, I wanted her to know we were all there and that we all cared about her.
I found out afterward that it was the right thing to do. After we had all seen Corinna, the nurse explained that there were times when patients grew restless after the trauma of a major surgery. Even if they were sedated, it sometimes helped to have a friend or a relative at hand to speak to them calmly and quietly. Of course when she asked if one or more of us would be willing to stand by through the night, we all volunteered. In fact we made arrangements that one of us would stand by at all times for the next day or two, at least until Corinna regained consciousness. With that in mind we put our heads together to work out a schedule for that night.
Actually Mrs Coulter didn't want to leave the hospital at all that night, but John insisted that she needed to get some sleep. In the long run, Mrs. Coulter took the first shift, until one in the morning, so Mr Coulter would take us all back to the motel while she stayed behind. Then he'd come in at one in the morning and stay until four. Wil would ride in with him and drive Mrs. Coulter back to the motel, then Wil would leave the keys to the car with Carissa and me. We would come in at four and let Mr. Coulter drive back to the motel to rest. Both Wil and Mrs. Coulter wanted to take over at nine or ten, but by then we expected everyone would be up and around. The nurse did warn us that Corinna would be kept sedated for at least forty-eight hours. She suggested we might arrange for someone to have an afternoon nap, because she would probably ask us to do the same thing the next night.
I think the first day after Corinna's operation, the five of us were almost too willing to be standing by in case we were needed. Carissa and I had been at the hospital at four in the morning, but by seven, Wil was there, offering to relieve us. He hadn't been able to sleep, so he'd left a note for Carissa's parents and had walked the two miles to the hospital.
We did let him take over for an hour then and went to have breakfast, meeting Rashid, the man who worked with casts, just as we were walking out the front door of the hospital, We were heading for the same cafeteria we had eaten at the day before while he was just going to work. He paused long enough to say good morning and to renew his offer of cleaning my casts, then he hurried away.
As we were eating, Carissa and I discussed the idea and decided that as long as at least two other people here to stay with Corinna, I'd go see Rashid sometime that day. It turned out that when we went back to the waiting room, Mrs. Coulter was there as well as Wil. She was quite willing to stay there with Carissa while Wil went to have some breakfast and I went down to see Rashid.
I had a bit of difficulty finding the room where Rashid worked, and when I did I was really surprised at the way he acted. He was suddenly all business and other than asking me questions about what I had done while wearing the casts and how they had felt while I was working, he said very little. Most of the time I spent with him that day, I was talking and he was cleaning and wiping the casts or making notes about my experiences. His attitude surprised me, but when I mentioned it later, Mr. Coulter simply smiled and explained that what I'd noticed was the difference between private and work related discussion.
Each of us took our turns at standing by and talking to Corinna that day, but as well as that, we all took breaks and saw something of the city. Since we expected to be involved for at least two full days, we knew we each had to take some time away from the boredom of simply sitting around and trying to be upbeat while we were with Corinna.
In actual fact the hospital kept Corinna sedated for almost sixty hours, but somehow, we managed to have someone at the hospital at all times through the long wait. All five of us simply pitched in, even if we had other things we would rather have been doing. In fact Mr. Coulter had to drive back home the second day to take care of some business. However, he was back that night and stepped back into the rotation as if he hadn't gone anywhere. He asked Wil to go with him so that they could alternate behind the wheel and each have a rest.
After Corinna was taken off sedation, the only time one of us wasn't allowed in the room with her was when medical procedures that needed privacy prevented it. In fact due to the mental state Corinna was in when she did awaken, the hospital asked one of us to be available to sit with her at any time. Somehow it had managed to slip my mind that she had originally been rushed to Edmonton because she'd attempted to commit suicide. Luckily both Wil and Mrs. Coulter were there in the room with Corinna when she first opened her eyes and found herself in the hospital. By the time that Carissa and I came in to see her, Corinna had been calmed down and was acting somewhat closer to normality. The hospital staff warned us then that she would be on medications for some time and that she would be staying in the hospital for up to a month. After that, because she had attempted suicide, the law required that she be transferred to a facility where she could undergo a psychiatric evaluation before she'd be allowed to return home
Once Corinna seemed to be settled into a more stable temperament, we all sat down and had a discussion about who was going to stay in Edmonton to be with her. Both Mr. and Mrs. Coulter were heavily involved in the business back home. Wil really felt he wanted to be there, but he also had farming problems on his mind and didn't want to leave everything to Mom and Dad. I knew I should be back at the ranch because I felt Beth shouldn't be left alone there. The only person who was really free to stay all the time was Carissa and I knew that although I'd miss her, I had to go along with that fact.
In the long-run Carissa stayed in Edmonton, but moved to a less expensive motel that had a two-bedroom suite with kitchen facilities. For three days each week and on weekends, Mrs. Coulter stayed in Edmonton. Mr. Coulter headed home for three days, swapped with his wife for two, and they had weekends to spend together in Edmonton. When all the arrangements were made Mr. Coulter asked me if I'd mind taking the time to drive Carissa's jeep up to Edmonton when I drove home in my car. That meant she'd be able to get to the hospital much easier. Wil bought an old beater pickup while he was in Edmonton and we headed home, but planned our lives so we could each come to Edmonton for a day or two each week. The final arrangement meant there were always at least two people, and often three, available to spend time with Corinna.
Needless to say, the next month was a total wipeout for me. I was so busy, it felt like I needed a twin to help me keep up to the schedule I was trying to maintain. By the first week of August of that year a tremendous amount of work had been done on the ranch.
We now had electricity in the house, the barn and the chicken coop. We had a telephone in the house and had built a tiny office with an extension line for the phone in the barn. Beth and I had done a tremendous amount of work on the fencing along the creek to keep the cattle from breaking down the creek banks. We had even fenced off the lowland area from the drier rangeland. On top of that we had all the buildings and the garden in tip top shape. Wil, Tom, George, Beth and I had also cut, raked and baled the hay from more than five hundred acres on the dryland and nearly two hundred acres of the lowland portion of the upper section of the lease.
When it came to animals Beth and I were almost overrun with additions. The sow had raised eight piglets that we had to wean and feed. Actually we sold all but two of them as weaners and planned on feeding those two for the summer, then butchering them in the fall. The broody hen had raised ten chicks from her first batch and Beth had set another hen who raised eight chicks. Since we were only keeping them for eggs at that time, we decided that was enough for that year.
As well, Beth had bought two more mares and a yearling colt, all of them decent quality Quarter Horse stock. I traded my Thoroughbred gelding for a Quarter Horse mare who was in foal and I bought a second mare as well. That meant our horse herd now numbered eight animals and seven of those were mares with at least three of them in foal.
On one trip to the hospital to see Grampa Bender, Dad and I had gotten into a discussion with him about cattle. Somehow he convinced us that we needed to expand the herd. We ended up using some of the ranch funds and arranging to buy several head of Polled Shorthorns with the idea of eventually trading off or selling the Herefords that Grampa Bender had been raising previously. By the time we got those two dozen Shorthorns home, after herding them the twenty miles from the ranch where we'd bought them, Beth had one of her horses as well as the Collie working the cattle like old pros. Even the young mare I'd ridden did darn well.
Because of the number of trips Wil and I were making to Edmonton, Beth and I had decided to buy the jeep we'd borrowed from Frank Dolens. That meant Wil and I didn't have to be away from home at the same time because he could use my car for the trip; Wil's beater pickup had engine problems and Tom was working on it in his spare time. Since the jeep was mostly to be used on the ranch, we used ranch funds to buy it. Then I had to teach Beth how to drive it. She was just barely fifteen at the time, but there was no reason she couldn't drive on the trails and rough roads that ran across our private land.
Of course, the stock car was sitting there all this time, needing a driver. Frank Dolens, Tom and George all gave me a rough time about it every time I saw them, but I refused to drive it in a race while my hand and foot were still in a cast.
We were talking one day and Frank said something like "You know I'm always having someone ask where that stock car I gave you went and I have to go into a long explanation."
"That's like that crazy cop show." George laughed. "You know the one, 'Car 54, where are you?' You could always tell them the truth, that we're all waiting for Chris's foot to heal."
I looked at Tom and winked. He grinned at me, then we both turned to Frank.
"Frank, you wanted to put a classy paint job and some ads on the car before we start racing, didn't you?" I asked. "My casts come off in two weeks, so this might be the time to do it."
"If I'm going to have the car painted, it needs a number. Have you guys picked one yet that isn't in use at Pine Lake?"
"George just did." Tom chuckled.
"He did?"
"Unh huh, he used the number 54." I grinned. "Put that in big letters on both doors and the roof. Just in front of the numbers, but in smaller letters, paint in the word 'Car' and below the number paint the word 'Where' and the capital letters 'R' and 'U.'That ought to make it all clear to folks that we're just there for the fun of it. Since the car and I have never raced before, we don't know if we can even finish one race, but we plan on trying and having fun while we do it."
He stared at me for a minute, then he broke into a big laugh.
"Damn, that's a good one." He chuckled after a minute. "I'll have one of the boys come out with the trailer and get the car next week."
The week that I got my casts off, Corinna was moved to a private facility for mental evaluation and the family couldn't be with her. That meant Carissa came home. It was also the McAdam twins' birthday and Beth had been invited to spend the weekend with them. Frank's crew had the stock car all painted and ready to go that weekend, but heavy rain was forecast. Thankfully that meant the race at Pine Lake was cancelled for Sunday. Everything considered, I thought that was wonderful because it meant Carissa and I were home alone.
I don't think we managed to make up for all the loving that we had missed out on during Corinna's convalescence, but we certainly tried. Of course we did spend part of the weekend with me showing Carissa all the work we'd done around the ranch. But, since it rained all day Saturday and most of the day on Sunday, we did spend a lot of our time inside. And actually, we did find the bedroom to be the most comfortable room in the cabin.
Okay, I'll admit it. That weekend we were preoccupied with sex. We made love before breakfast, before doing the morning chores, before lunch, before doing the evening chores, after eating our evening meal and before going to sleep at night. By the time Monday morning came we were both slightly tender, but a lot calmer.
The weather had broken by Monday morning and the day dawned bright and clear. After we'd done the chores and come back to the cabin, we noticed it had a rather pervasive odour. In Carissa's words, 'It reeked like a cat house on the morning after a busy night.' So, since Beth hadn't come back yet, we decided to open the doors and windows to air it out. While it was airing out, we thought it might be an idea if we cleaned up a bit too. Since that suggested the idea of going for a swim, we made up our minds that we needed to have a picnic. Carissa made up a picnic lunch, and I wrote a note to leave on the screen door for Beth, telling her that we were taking a few hours off.
At about eleven in the morning we headed for the swimming hole. After two days of rain the trails were a mess, but in the jeep we made it to the pond just fine and spread a blanket to eat our lunch. After that we sat and talked as I drowned a worm for while. At least that's what Carissa claimed I did, because the fish certainly weren't biting. After an hour or so we did have a swim, then we lay in the sun for a while to dry off and relax.
It was really strange in a way. We had a thousand things to talk about, but I think we were just as happy simply lying next to one another. The previous two days we'd spent as much time as possible having sex, but that day we spent most of our time simply touching each other, as well as hugging and kissing at every opportunity.
It was about three in the afternoon when we packed everything up and headed back to the cabin. We wanted to get most of the chores done early because Mom and Dad wanted us to drop down home to eat with them. Beth wasn't at the cabin yet, so we did the earlier chores, then had a quick wash, changed our clothes and drove down home.
As we were driving along Carissa was noticing all the improvements to the access road and I told her about the deal with the hydro and phone companies. She chuckled and shook her head, telling me that everyone else fought with the phone company to get service and with hydro about the slowness of their installations. It seemed that she had expected it to take a year or more for us to get electricity and a telephone installed, but we'd managed to get both of them in less than a month. I just grinned and shrugged, telling her to ask Dad what he had done to get them moving.
When we got to the home farm, Beth and the McAdam twins were sitting on the front steps. Mom and Dad were out on the porch too.
"Hi everyone." I called as I hopped out of the jeep. "What's up?"
"Where have you two been?" Beth jumped up. "I've been calling the cabin every half hour since before noon."
"Well the way the weather was for the last two days, we felt like getting out of the cabin, so we went down and had a swim. Why, what was so important?"
"We were trying to get hold of you to let you know that Frank Dolens wants you to race the car at the Pine Lake track tonight at seven. Tom and George are coming by to pick us girls up in a little while. Dad was just wondering about driving up to see if you two were okay."
"Oh." I was rather nonplussed. "What about supper?"
"It's ready to eat right now." Mom laughed. "We don't know what the big deal is, but we think Frank may have set up some sort of advertising thing or a special race or something. I take it that this is a complete surprise to you too, is it?"
"Yep, but track is going to be a mess after all the rain we had."
"Actually, Wil rode up with Frank earlier today and he says the track is in good condition. It's a dirt track, but the soil is quite sandy, so it has good drainage. Besides, Charlie Wells, the owner of the place, said they didn't get that much rain yesterday. It was a lot worse the day before." Dad explained. "By the way, if you are going up to drive the car, your mom and I would like to come along. "
"Well, what do you think Carissa?" I asked her.
"Oh, come off it." She laughed at me. "I can see your blood pumping and your adrenaline rising already. Do you think I'd stand in your way to really race that old wreck? Let's eat and get going."
Up until she said that, I had been starving hungry. As soon as I realised I might actually be racing in that old dirt track car, my appetite simply disappeared. In fact my stomach tried its best to tie itself into a knot. And that was a real shame.
Mom had cooked fried chicken, new potatoes, fresh peas and corn on the cob from her garden. Everything we were eating had been grown on the farm and I could hardly taste any of it.
Suddenly my appetite had right out the window and along with it went my bravado about being a good driver. For the first time in my life I was worried about my judgement and about my skill as a driver.
"What's wrong Chris, you're not eating much?" Mom asked. "Thinking about the race already?"
"In a way." I nodded, trying to think of an excuse. "I really don't think I should eat too much before driving. The track might get a bit chewed up when we're racing because of the rain and if I get shaken around too much, I'd hate to get sick to my stomach or something, especially in front of a crowd of people."
"I never thought of that. Is the car that bad on a rough track?" One of the McAdam twins asked.
"Hah, you should have seen him the first time he tried out the car." Carissa laughed. "He got jarred around so much he was green when he got out of the car."
"I'll tell you what Chris. I'll pack a few pieces of chicken and some other things so you can have a snack afterward, how's that?" Mom suggested.
I just nodded, taking a last bite of chicken from a drumstick, then drinking the last of my glass of milk and going outside to sit in the fresh air on the front porch. I'd hardly sat down when Dad came outside and sat down near me.
"Nerves?" He asked.
"Yeah, it's like getting on a new horse in a horse race, wondering if the horse is going buck, wondering if it's going to be fast, wondering if you're going to fall off, that sort of thing." I managed a weak smile. "It's times like this that even I worry that I think too much."
"I don't think you're thinking too much, but you might be thinking about the wrong things." He sighed deeply and paused for a second, as if to get his thoughts together. "I've seen you do things with a car or a truck that I would have thought were completely impossible. So in the first place, don't worry about your driving ability. Then too, I've seen Tom and George pore over that car from end to end. If there was ever anything wrong with it, they found it and they fixed it. So don't worry about that either. After mechanical things, the next most important parts on that car are the tires. Frank just put new tires on it from front to back. So don't worry about those. I'm sure you can handle any kind of problem with the track surface because I've seen some of the roads you've driven on. So the only worry left is the other drivers. They're out to win, but so are you."
"Yeah, I know all that, Dad. It just isn't helping much right now." I shook my head. "Let's face it. I've never driven on a real race track with anyone else trying to race me. I've seen others do it, but I've never done it. The only thing that's going to help me feel better is to get into that car and try it. Until then, I'm going to be wound as tight as a 'G' string on a banjo."
Just then I glanced up and Tom pulled into the yard, parking between the jeep and my car. Tom and George's car had always looked a lot like mine, both of them were blue with a white top. The main difference had been in the chrome strips and the details. They must have been working on the cars though, because now both of them looked almost identical. In fact both cars looked so good it looked almost like they had been repainted to look identical.
As the two guys hopped out of the car, they had grins on their faces a mile wide. As I watched them, they both whipped out what looked like cops' hats and put them on their heads. On the front of each hat was a label, it read 'Car 54' and it was done in gold on the blue hat. I couldn't help myself. I broke into a laugh at the idea of them wearing those at the race track.
"You ain't seen nothin' yet." Tom laughed. "Just wait until you see all the stuff Frank has done. We know you aren't going to be able to drive well tonight, you're going to be laughing too darn much. He's gone completely frigging overboard."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, to start with, look at our cars." Tom pointed. "He started out by matching them up as much as possible and he had the stock car painted the same colours. It's the same blue with a white top, only it has white doors like a cop car and the number is painted on that. He's even got a rotating red light that goes on the roof of the car for the practise runs before the race. He wanted to have it there all the time, but the rules prevent that."
"Jeez, what are the cops going to say about all this crap?" I was still chuckling.
"Hey, where do you think he got the hats and the light and stuff?" George hooted loudly. "The cops helped him find them and they're going to be there tonight, for cripes sake. They think it's a hoot."
"You're kidding me?"
"Nope, I was talking to one of them last night and he was saying that he'd love to get all the guys to race on the track instead of on the road. And you know, I've got to agree with him. Just look at what Ray did to this car." George frowned at me.
"Well that was a little different. Ray's an idiot and I still think he did that intentionally."
"Yeah, you're right there." Tom agreed with me. "Say how long will it be before we can go? Standing around yammering like this is cutting into your practise and hot lap time."
"The ladies are getting ready, Tom." Dad said quietly. "Don't get your shirt in a knot."
"Sorry, Uncle Willard. I'm just a bit excited about getting underway."
"I understand, fellas. I'll go see if I can get them to hurry." Dad said as he went inside.
Dad had only been inside for a moment before everyone came out and we were able to get into the cars to go. Once we were in the car and on the way, I realized that the butterflies I'd felt in my stomach before were almost gone. Perhaps it was just that now we were driving toward the track, or else it was the bit of comic relief that the guys had given me, but whatever it was, my confidence was coming back.
If Frank and the guys wanted to go out and have fun, that was fine, I'd join in. But, if I was entered in a race, then fun or not, I darn well intended to do my very best to win.