Page 19 of The Fast Track

Alarmingly, my throat tightens and my eyes sting. Not again. I can’t be known as the crying girl.

Dietrich stares, his arms still crossed. “Well?”

“You’re right.” I swallow my pride and blink back the crest of tears threatening to break free. “And this is why I need your help. Would you please, please reconsider?”

8.

Milton Keynes, United Kingdom

I’m standing in the frozenfoods aisle of Central Oriental, the solitary Asian grocery store in Milton Keynes, when my phone rings.

Frank.

My insides swan dive. He never calls, especially when it’s only two days after a race and drivers are recuperating. I know exactly what this is about.

“Hullo, Justine. How are you?”

“I’m good. How are you?” I make obligatory small talk, crossing my fingers. My last interaction with Dietrich burns in my brain—my dressing-down, my last-ditch appeal. His race engineer had barged in to discuss track conditions before he could respond to my groveling.

“So.” Frank coughs. “It appears we have may have, er, overextended Dietrich Lange’s commitments.”

The embers of desperate hope that maybe Dietrich took pity on me and changed his mind sputter out. I was alreadybracing myself for this answer, but part of me still longs to crawl into bed and not come out for a long, long time.

On the phone, Frank is going on about how Dietrich no longer has time to mentor me, but they’ll try to squeeze me into the schedule of Jack Florent, Orbital’s other F1 driver.

“Yeah. Cool. Jack’s great. Can’t wait.” My cheery tone sounds fake, even to me.

Mom stops combing through the shelf of frozen fish balls and gives me a curious look. “Who was that?”

“Frank. They had to switch my mentor. Dietrich Lange’s scheduling got messed up.” I regurgitate Frank’s excuse, grateful he’s at least letting me save what little face I have left.

The bag of fish balls Mom was putting in her shopping basket tumbles to the ground with a loud, icy smack. “Dietrich Lange did what? This doesn’t have anything to do with Austria, does it?”

“I don’t know,” I lie, staring hard at the off-white linoleum floor and hoping Mom, for once, will let things go. It was bad enough finding out I got dropped while hiding in a smelly changing closet; I really don’t want to recount the humiliation again, especially to Mom.

“It has to be,” Mom mutters to herself. She places her grocery basket down and roots through her purse. “Those F1 drivers all have PAs up the wazoo; there’s no way anyone bungled scheduling that badly.”

“Mom, what are you doing?”

She whips out her phone. “They can’t discontinue yourmentorship because of one unlucky race. I’m going to call Frank and clear things up.”

Panic whirls in my stomach. “Mom, I can’t be known as the driver whose mommy calls her team principal.”

“Larry McCombe speaks to Frank all the time.”

Pat’s father is the ninth-richest man in Canada and pays Orbital five million dollars a year for Pat’s seat. “No offense, Mom, but you don’t have the same pull.”

“You never know unless you try.” She starts dialing. “I’m sure we can clear this up.”

“MOM.” My voice booms across the store. A grandma with permed curls shakes her head and scoots away, muttering under her breath in Cantonese about kids these days. “Dietrich Lange clearly has much better things to do than mentor an F3 driver. You calling Frank isn’t going to do anything other than embarrass me. For once in your life, please don’t do anything. I’m sure there are ‘outfit of the day’ pictures for you to Photoshop or something.”

Mom slams the freezer door shut. “Your attitude is lousy. Do you know how much I’ve invested in your racing career? All the hours to maintain your press, your schedule, your sponsors? Do you think I enjoy living in a city where I don’t know a soul?”

I know I shouldn’t say anything. Mouthing off to Mom never ends well. But something about the past few days—the horrendous Feature Race, Dietrich dumping me, or the five containers of Sour Cream & Onion Pringles I’ve been secretly drowning my sorrows in—has me feeling bold.

“Whatever.”

Mom swells up like a trim middle-aged Asian bullfrog. The last time I saw her this mad, I was fourteen and told her I didn’t care about school; I didn’t need it anyway to be a race car driver.