Post #415106 by Cammo on Thu, Oct 23, 2008 7:34 PM

**Race Day

Part 1**

It was the last week of my senior year at high school and some strange things had been happening.

Hard to describe, but there was this general feeling of doom and destruction. The whole world of school and home was coming to an end, and a lot of kids just didn’t have too much in front of them. It was all over for them. They’d have to put those fake smiles on and walk out into the world with nobody to blame or rely on anymore. It was sobering as heck.

But more to the point, the senior class was getting a bit out of hand. There were parties that went on all night, kids were not turning in any work of any kind, the guy beside me in math class was asleep for the whole class and nobody noticed, girls were dressing really strangely, you’d see odd things happening at night and first thing in the morning. I think one girl was trying to sleep with every male teacher on staff and had worked her way through about half of them.

Tuesday of the last week had come and gone. I was walking out to the car after school and noticed something more odd than usual. It seemed like every senior was standing in a big crowd in the middle of the road. They were jostling around, waving their arms, yelling. I went over to the group.

“What’s going on?” I asked Roscoe.
“Race day,” he said.
“What the fuck is Race Day?”
“Y’know, the big Race.”
“What big race?”

“Don’t you know? I thought you’d be in it for sure.” He looked at me like I was the crazy one, “It’s the big end-of-school race. I think Maggie’s putting it on.” Maggie was like the head organizer for just about everything that happened. Big gal, strong, big voice. Maggie.

“You gotta pay something?” I asked, getting more interested all the time.
“I don’t know. It’s Maggie and her friends’ show.”
“You going?”
“Nah. Mom’s using the Scout.” Roscoe looked a bit ticked off.
“That sucks. Lemme see what’s happening.”

I walked into the thick of it. People were yelling out names, and there was Maggie right in the middle of it, writing stuff on a clipboard, handing out envelopes. She looked busy, but I managed to ask her if I could sign up, yes you can, and if you’re signed up Cam you need two passengers, a navigator and a riddle man.

“What’s a riddle man?” I yelled. This was getting complicated.

“We give you a riddle, you solve it and you drive to that spot. We give you another riddle, and it goes on to the finish.”

“Where’s it finish?”

“That’s what you have to find out!” she laughed. “First one there wins! It’s a Road Rally!”

“You IN?” Richard asked. And he looked right into my eyes. I know a dare when I see one. And Richard had beaten me on a ski race last January, so it didn’t take too much brains to see what he was really asking.

Cause Richard was the fastest witted bastard I’ve ever met. And he loved speed sports. His reflexes were right there every time. His dad was a motorcycle racer back in the Indian days. His brother Peter had died in a motorcycle accident a few years before, and the dad had actually outlawed motorcycles in the family after that. There were still cars, though, and Richard took every turn squealing in his girlfriend’s car, the speedometer disconnected to fake her dad out at the end of a night spent humping and making runs up to Abean County and back. He was slick and dangerous, strong as hell, played great guitar, always wore a leather jacket before they became popular and combed his black hair neatly. He looked exactly like “Reggie” in the Archie comics. Richard.

What he meant is, I’m gonna beat you again. Remember that ski race that started on top of Mount Tremblant, he was saying, remember how it started with 8 guys and ten feet down the first double diamond slope everybody wiped out but me and you? And remember how you wiped out too, but actually rolled out of the fall and kept coming, three seconds behind and then we took two routes, you following the trail and me cutting off trail and tracing a line down the middle of the powder at the base of the chairlifts, using the lift towers as turning slaloms, illegal as hell but fast on the crunchy top on a powder base? Remember that? And at the bottom you thought you had beaten me by taking the side of the mogul trails, the flat parts beside the trees and just tucking and heading straight down the run, torpedo style? But you got to the bottom, so aching and tired you couldn’t stop, banked the snow, tried to stop, but finally just laid down and slid in to a stop? And there was me, Richard, at the bottom already, first place, and I looked down at you and said

“Where you been,” nonchalantly?

“Yeah, I’ll sign up.” I said, looking right at him.
“Good. I’m in too,” Richard said.