Chapter Four

“You gonna stick by me?”

“Maybe…”

**

“Maybe,” she says, and we both know that she’s lying. If I didn’t know her well enough to see the teasing in her eyes, I might worry. But I know Letty almost better than I know myself. I don’t know what I’d do without her.

Letty saved my life, and she doesn’t even know it.

She used to be a total pain in the ass, when she was little. I remember the first time I really noticed her. I was fifteen. My dad had gotten a line on this ’69 Charger, and said I could help him rebuild it, said it might even be mine when I got my license. It was supposed to be a father-son bonding activity or something. I think he was trying to make up for Vince not being able to come around that summer. Vince had been my best friend since third grade, practically lived at my house. But that summer, his mom had a new boyfriend, a cop, and he’d gotten the grand idea that Vince ought to go to this military camp, thought he had a problem respecting authority or some shit like that. So Vince was gone for most of the summer. Then Letty started hanging around, hiding behind the big elm tree. She was a scrawny kid, looked like she was about seven or maybe eight, with matted black hair hanging down her back and big, dark eyes that always looked like she thought someone was about to hit her. I pretended not to notice her, but I did. Honestly, I hoped she’d get tired of watching us and decide to leave. But she didn’t.

Sometimes I would get into fights with my dad about Letty. I didn’t understand why he let her hang around all the time. I remember we had the same exact conversation over dinner for nearly a week. “She’s got her own home, doesn’t she? Why’s she have to hang around here? Why d’you have to let her?” I would demand, my voice rising with every question.

“Letty doesn’t really have a home, Dom,” my dad would explain, quietly. “I know her mom’s boyfriend, know the kind of man he is. Any house with him in it is no place for a little girl to be.”

And that was all he’d say. Finally, I got tired of arguing about it over and over again and just stopped mentioning Letty at all. Like if I didn’t talk about her, and didn’t think about her, maybe she’d just disappear on her own. She didn’t. Eventually, she started helping us out with the car instead of just watching, and I got used to her always being at the house. I just ignored her, for the most part, though.

That all lasted about three years. It only took six months to finish building the car, but Letty kept hanging around. That was an amazing car. Nine hundred horsepower. My dad raced her every so often, and one time she did the quarter-mile in nine seconds. Nine seconds. Amazing. He didn’t race her very often, though, had a different car he took to the track. He raced about once a month, and we would usually all go with him. Sometimes, though, it was just Letty and me. She was actually a pretty cool kid to hang out with. We had fun when it was just the two of us, even though I still didn’t talk to her much when Vince or Mia were around. Funny, seems like every memory I have from my dad racing, Letty’s there. I don’t really remember anything from before she started hanging around. It’s like Letty was always there, always part of my life. The only race she ever missed was my dad’s last. I remember wishing she had been there with me.

After my dad died, I went a little crazy. I couldn’t go home, couldn’t be reminded that he wasn’t around anymore. I don’t even really remember where I went, what I did. All I know is that a week after the accident I almost literally ran into Kenny Linder, the guy who’d clipped my dad’s bumper and caused the accident. I hit him, and I didn’t even realize there was a wrench in my hand until I saw all the blood. But it felt so good to hit him. I couldn’t stop. Over and over again, until I could barely raise my arm at all, it was so tired.

Then, I ran. I went home, but no one was there. Just boxes. I couldn’t go to Vince’s place. His mom had ended up marrying the cop, and even in my daze I knew the last thing I wanted to do was run into a cop. I ended up at Letty’s - almost passed her house, but then I recognized her mom’s car sitting out in front. Letty came out almost as soon as I got there. I think she was surprised to see me. She even looked happy, almost. As happy as she ever looked when she wasn’t working on a car or watching a race, anyways. I grabbed her, hugged her as tight as I could, and all I could think was that this was real. Nothing else was, I tried to tell myself. Letty was real. And as long as I was with her, I thought, it meant my dad was still alive, waiting for us to get home so we could leave for a race, or so we could help change the spark plugs or fix the intercooler or the fuel exhaust or the supercharger or change the tires.

I remember asking her where Mia was, but I don’t remember if she answered. And I think I told her what I’d done, but I’m not sure if I really did or not. Maybe I just imagined it. What I do know is that she didn’t pull away from me. She made some sort of shushing noise at me, and it actually calmed me down a little and I started thinking everything would be okay. But then the cops showed up.

I had just turned eighteen, and I wouldn’t see Letty again for two years.