Chapter 2

I push the bathroom door open and see a cluster of three girls all wrapped in their bathrobes and still shaking off sleep while they wait for the next open shower stall. I’m going to be late. Damn that Violet Bleu. This is all her fault.

I pull my 500X up on its stand out front of my grandparents’ barn and step up onto the front porch. It’s a lovely breezy afternoon and the door to the house is standing wide open. As I reach to twist the knob of the screen door I see her again, unmistakable even peering through the tightly-woven wire mesh that’s supposed to keep the pests out.

As I walk in, Violet looks up to meet my gaze. I wait for her to mumble some sort of halfhearted attempt to assuage her guilt and repair the rift between us. But her lips say nothing. Instead, she raises her hand to her chest. She has it clenched into a fist as if she were finger-spelling the letter A. She circles it around once.

I stare in disbelief. Could it be that Violet has learned a bit of my language in her latest attempt to alleviate her guilt? That seems so far fetched that I don’t even want to entertain the thought. Then I watch as she circles around twice more. “I’m sorry,” she says quite clearly. “I’m sorry.”

That’s it, just I’m sorry, but I honestly don’t know what to think so I just stare at her with my mouth agape. Violet looks at me for a few seconds, her big brown eyes wavering. But when I offer no words in return she shifts her gaze to her shoes and simply shuffles out the front door.

“You can’t hold a grudge forever Red,” Grandma signs. “It’s not healthy.”

I skirt around the issue of Violet by pulling the moon pie and RC Cola from my backpack and placing them on the dining room table. “What big eyes you have, Grandma.”

“Oh Red.” Grandma steps over and wraps me in her warm embrace.

While Grandma is bound and determined to squeeze a little love into me, Grandpa pokes his head out of the kitchen and finger-spells the word Jambalaya. And with my chin still resting on Gran’s shoulder I nod slowly and show him my broad smile.

“Big race this weekend,” Grandma signs as she releases me.

I nod as I watch her unwrapping her moon pie. “You’ll spoil your dinner,” I sign.

Grandma just smiles and tears a big bite out of her sugary treat.

It’s Saturday and I’m out in my element again, on the track. Though this time it’s not a leisurely jaunt at my grandparents’ farm, this time it’s at State U and I’m lined up in the starting gate. I squeeze the clutch in and twist the throttle a few times. I feel the goose bumps rising on my skin as the beast at the heart of the 450R rumbles between my thighs.

At the five second mark, every muscle in my body is coiled like a spring as I focus my mind and wait for the gate to drop. I know that Grandma and Grandpa are here in the stands to cheer me on. I also know that Violet is with them, that somehow she convinced Grandma that she should tag along.

It doesn’t bother me so much when she’s up in the stands, at a distance. In truth she does take good care of my grandparents, and I think a lot of it is off the clock. Violet always seems to be there, day or night. I’m starting to think that there may actually be a decent human being hiding in there somewhere.

But I push that thought to the back of my mind as I rev the engine. I only have room to concentrate on one thing right now and that’s getting a good start in this heat, pushing me to the front of the pack and that much closer to beating State U and adding another trophy to my wall.

Fortune smiles on me today as I drop the clutch and rocket out of the gate heading for an early lead. I missed the holeshot, but I’m second in a small cluster of three riders as we head into the first turn. I ease back just a little as I see the rider out front struggling to keep control. Conditions on the track are tricky today.

I watch as he continues pouring it on, and sure enough he’s gone wide and heading for the wall. In a poof of hay and dust, he’s down and now I’m the one out in front. I promise myself I won’t make the same mistake as I head into the first jump.

The machine under me powers up the hill and soon I am flying through the air. I imagine Grandma and Grandpa’s cheers as I keep the momentum, sailing through the next two jumps. And Violet Bleu. I wonder briefly if she’s cheering, but I push the thought out of my mind and bring my concentration back to the race.

A quick check of my peripheral vision shows no other riders on either side of me, but races are not won by the timid so I pour on the speed through the series of whoopdies that await me. The back end of the bike is wild at the end of it all, but I still manage to maintain control.

I ease off the throttle, slowing as I see the hairpin turn approaching, but quickly realize that I’ve miscalculated and that I’ve got too much momentum. Way too much. Try as I might, I can’t keep my bike from breaking loose and I find myself rushing headlong for the wall.

Oh shit, I’m going to crash. That’s the last thought in my mind before everything goes black.

I have another one of those hyper-realistic dreams again. There is a smell of antiseptic and the rhythmic pulsing and clicks of strange vibrations coming from all around me as I head into a long white tube. I’m not sure I want to be here, but I’m strapped down and there are pads on either side of my head that keep me from moving anything other than my eyes.

Right now all my eyes can see is a narrow strip of white light inside a dark tube, but I do recall the earlier sight of Grandma and Grandpa with concerned looks on their normally carefree faces. Violet was standing with them and she looked worried too.

I blink and then suddenly I’m out of the tube and into the light. There’s the smell of sautéing vegetables all around — onions, peppers and celery with a little hint of garlic and the spice of cayenne — the delicious savoriness more than overpowering the clinical antiseptic.

When I wake from my dream I’m back in my bed. Well, not exactly. I’m not in my dorm room anyway, I’m in my bedroom at my grandparents’ house. Grandma is smiling down on me.

“What big eyes you have Grandma,” I manage to sign with some effort. It seems that every move I make is accompanied by a twinge of pain to some degree.

Grandma turns her head and her lips move. She’s calling out Grandpa’s name, and if I’m not mistaken, Violet’s too. My suspicions are confirmed as Grandpa comes shuffling over with Violet Bleu on his arm. Or maybe it’s the other way around, maybe he’s being supported by Violet.

The three of them gather around my bed.

“Hello Red,” Grandpa signs.

Violet signs a timid “Hi” as well.

I turn my gaze to Grandpa. “So is she part of the family now?” I ask.

“Be nice,” Grandpa says. “She’s been taking care of you.”

“The neurologist only agreed to release you after Violet said that she’s certified and that she’d be here to keep an eye on you,” Grandma puts in. “Otherwise you’d still be stuck in the hospital.”

“And hospital food is no match for mine,” Grandpa says. “I guarantee.”

I smile, and though it still hurts more than just a little to move my head, I turn my gaze to Violet and raise my fingers to my chin to sign “Thank you.”

“She says thank you dear.” I watch Grandma’s lips as she translates for Violet.

“I know,” Violet’s lips say to Grandma. And then to my surprise Violet faces me, touching her fingers to her chin and pulling her hand away as she returns the same sign to convey, “You’re welcome.”

I am stunned for a moment that she understands me, so when she reaches to take my hand in hers I don’t pull away. And when she squeezes, I squeeze back. She’s certainly trying, I’ll give her that.

But then reality sets in as my head begins to throb again. “What happened?” I ask.

“Concussion,” Violet says, in English this time. “And a few contusions. And some strained muscles in your back.”

My eyes go wide. Sounds serious.

“You’ll be fine though,” she assures me. “You just need rest so your body can heal.”

“Thank you,” I sign in response, knowing full well that she understands me now. And in what I can only describe as a sudden loss of my sanity I reach to take Violet’s hand in mine and pull her down for a hug.

“I told you she was nice,” Grandma signs as I lie there with Violet’s body pressed to mine in a warm and lingering embrace.

I smile and stick my tongue out at Grandma, to which she just throws her head back in a laugh before turning to leave Violet and me alone in the room.

Violet helps me to sit up in bed as Grandpa comes in carrying a steaming bowl of vegetable gumbo that I realize now is the same delicious smell that has been haunting my dreams. I raise my hand to my lips to sign “yum” as Grandpa hands the tray off to Violet who gets it set up on the bed.

“Thank you,” I say to Violet. And I don’t even try to dissuade her as she takes the spoon in her hand and brings some gumbo to her lips to blow across before moving it to my mouth. I let her do it two more times before my pride gets the best of me and I gently touch my fingers to her hand. She gets the message and I tuck into the rest with the spoon under my own power.

It is while I’m enjoying that delicious gumbo that Violet begins her confession by signing “I’m sorry.”

The rest is in English, but this time instead of feigning the inability to understand I watch her lips intently. I get the feeling that she’s wanted to say this for a while, and I realize that I haven’t exactly made it easy for her to start.

“It’s not you, it’s me,” she says, whatever that’s supposed to mean. I bring another steaming spoonful of Grandpa’s gumbo to my lips and blow across it.

Violet’s looking at me with wavering eyes again and signing “I’m sorry” over and over.

She pauses for a moment, lowering her gaze, so I place my hand on her arm and give a little squeeze. That’s when the words start tumbling out.

“I’m sure that sounds like a line, but I’m serious. I mean it. It’s not you, it’s me,” she says again. “In high school I had a total crush on you. I mean how could I not? You were this big star — larger than life with a wall full of trophies to prove it.

“Everybody knew your name. I knew your name. I wanted you to know my name. Oh, I would have given anything to have a girlfriend like you.”

Why didn’t you say something? My mind screamed as I slowly brought the spoon to my mouth again. Why did have to you turn on me instead?

“But I knew what my parents would say, Red. Mommy and Daddy would certainly not approve of me bringing a girl home to meet the family, no matter how famous she might be. So when you said you had feelings for me, I freaked. I pushed you away. And I kept pushing.”

I thought you hated me, so I hated you back. And after a while I got pretty good at it.

“I’m sorry, it was stupid and immature. I know that now. I guess I just didn’t know how to deal with it at the time. I suppose you could say my upbringing was traditional, or conservative — oh hell, let’s just not mince words — it was homophobic.”