Running Wide Open by Lisa Nowak Page B

deserved all the help I could give him. I went down to the pits at the end of the night and asked him if he wanted a sponsor.”
    “And all this time I thought it was because I was driving a Dodge,” Race said.
    “Well, that didn’t hurt,” Kasey admitted.
    Race tipped his Pepsi glass at me. “Just so you’ll know, having people track you down to offer you sponsorship doesn’t happen very often in the racing world.”
    Like I cared. “You’re crazy,” I said, stealing one of his fries.
    “Yeah,” Race grinned. “And you know something? Your mom knew that when she sent you to live with me.”
    Robbie snickered.
    “It woulda been a better story,” I said, “if the Pinto had exploded.”

Chapter 5
    Race slept like a cat in a coma the next morning, but I woke up feeling like I’d swallowed a porcupine. It made no sense. There was nothing to envy. I didn’t give a damn about racing, and it wasn’t like my uncle lived a glamorous lifestyle. So why did I feel snarky about last night?
    I fixed some breakfast then turned on MTV, not bothering to lower the volume when Ozzy cut in with Bark at the Moon . Race didn’t twitch. Didn’t anything faze him? I inhaled the cereal then retreated to my room to find something to alleviate my boredom.
    Reading would’ve been my first choice, but none of the books I’d brought were new, and I wanted something fresh. Until I started school or figured out how to get to the public library, I was out of luck.
    Nintendo would’ve been my second choice, but Mom had rendered the machine useless when she’d confiscated my games as punishment for drinking out of the milk carton. She was always over-reacting like that, and Dad never did anything to stop her. He’d just hide behind his newspaper while she reamed me a new one then grounded me for three weeks for not wiping up the orange juice I spilled on the counter.
    I rummaged through my boxes in the closet and came up with a dartboard and a handful of shuriken. Cool. It had been a long time since I’d gotten any practice.
    I hung the dartboard on the closet door, lit a cigarette, and stepped back to take aim. The expertly balanced oriental throwing star whizzed through the air, penetrating the board. Thwack !
    The noise startled me, and for a second I hesitated. Not even my uncle could sleep though that. But when I thought about last night—how popular Race was, how everyone at the track seemed to love him—something dark stirred inside me and I wanted to wake him up. I followed with a second star, and then a third.
    “What the hell’s going on back there, Cody?”
    “Nothin’, Speed. Don’t let it concern you.” The darkness swelled as I thought about my uncle’s flawless driving skills, and his hot crew chief, and little Robbie Davis worshiping the ground he walked on.
    I threw another shuriken.
    “Cody!”
    I threw a few more.
    “Please, kid. I’m trying to sleep.”
    “Don’t let me stop ya, Speed.”
    “My name’s not Speed.”
    A moment later, Race appeared in the doorway, looking ridiculous in only a pair of U of O Fighting Ducks boxers. His hair stuck up in tufts, and his eyes smoldered with annoyance.
    I let fly with a shuriken before pulling the cigarette from between my lips. “What’s wrong with Speed?” I asked, flicking the ash at a cereal-encrusted bowl on the dresser. “It’s just as good a name as Race.”
    “God, kid, do you have to hassle me so early in the morning?” He glanced at my Beer, it’s not just for breakfast T-shirt. “And don’t you think you could find something a little more appropriate to wear?”
    “Nothin’ in your rules about a dress code,” I said. “What the hell kind of name is Race, anyway?” I let loose with another star. It missed the board and penetrated halfway through the thin paneling of the closet door. Race winced.
    “Grandma and Grandpa didn’t actually name you that, did they?”
    I knew they hadn’t. But nobody would be caught dead with his real