Chapter 30
Chapter thirty
Laney
Hit and Run
He has a slipped fucking disc in his lower back. The moron. But honestly, I don't think I would have stopped if he hadn't thrown himself at me. And if I hadn’t stopped, I wouldn’t know everything I know now.
"Hola Mamá," Miguel says with resignation as the door to his room opens. He called her on our way in while I drove his truck using my eyebrows to communicate my instructions.
Miguel’s mom is a petite woman and the picture definition of abuela. Silvery hair pulled back in a bun at the back of her head. A bright orange maxi dress. A crocheted bag made of daisy squares and a flood of words tittering from her mouth.
"Ay, Miguelito," she starts. "It was only a matter of time before you did something to get yourself hurt. How did it happen? How did you get here? Why isn't there an IV? Where's the X-ray? Are they sure your head is okay? Do you need a CAT scan?"
"Mamá, it's alright. It is just a slipped disk and a bruised tailbone from a fall."
"How did you fall? Oh heavens, did you get hit by a car?"
"Not a car..." he leads and shrugs as he flicks his gaze to me.
That's when his mother turns and sees me standing in the corner of the room.
"?Caramba!" She places a hand on her chest. "Are you Laney?" Her eyes grow wide and her smile even wider as she steps over and pulls my hand into hers.
"Yes ma'am." I say timidly. How much has Miguel told her about us? Am I just the girl he's training, a fellow colleague on the circuit, his bedmate? Friend? More? Less?
I have been spiraling since his confession. I hate that my chaos invaded his control. I hate that I relied on him to guide me, that I couldn't do it myself. He just let me put more and more pressure on him to plan my training while he’s trying to get himself ready for the Deca next spring.
And then his confession that I’m his source of happiness?
It’s too much.
I'm barely responsible for myself. I can't be responsible for his mental state too.
Miguel's mom turns to him while still shaking my hand. "?Ella es hermosa!" She turns back to me. "How hard did you make him beg to be your boyfriend?"
"Mamá!"
"Oh hush," she bats away his protest. "You get up and stop me."
Miguel’s head falls back to the pillow with a puff of air expelling from his mouth.
"It is a pleasure to meet you." She stands a little taller. "I am Marisol Herrera Garcia."
"It's nice to meet you." I say through a tight smile. "I’m just going to…"
With a thumb hooked over my shoulder I start to back out of the room.
"Laney, wait, please, don’t go. I’m sorry." Miguel lifts a hand out as if he’s going to grab a tether and drag me back to him.
"I know, me too." I keep my eyes on him even though I can feel his mother’s gaze following my every move.
"Laney." Miguel pleads.
"I’ll talk to you later." I try to keep the emotion out of my voice. But it’s getting harder and harder to hold back the tears. "Mrs. Garcia, it was nice meeting you." I lift my palm in a flat wave and make my exit.
The harsh metal on metal screech of curtains opening and closing grates against my nerves as I retreat down the busy hospital corridor. Each machine beep and nurse call button tone bangs against the door I’m trying to keep my emotions locked behind.
I bounce on my toes as I wait for the automatic doors to open. Why are they so slow? Don’t people need speed and efficiency in emergency departments?
Gulps of fresh air finally fill my lungs. Well, fresh is relative. I’m standing in the middle of a congested city block, next to a busy line of traffic pulling in and dropping people off at the hospital. But the air isn’t sterile and I think that’s the key.
Miguel’s apology, from the ground at my feet, while he was in major pain, was about his past. His drug use. I saw the pill bottle the first time we were together and didn’t think about it again since.
He’s not using them now.
Why would I hate him because he misused them years before I even knew him?
No, the thing causing my insides to feel like they’re collapsing in on themselves is that he turned down a sponsorship opportunity on my behalf without talking to me about it.
I thought I had it made. I had a partner who not only supported all the effort TP takes, but understands how to excel in the sport. And one who wouldn’t get in my way.
I turn on the sidewalk and head east. There’s a park behind the hospital with benches and a view of Lake Shore Drive, and the lake beyond. Dazed steps get me to my destination and I take a seat.
"I thought he believed in me. I thought he loved me." I mumble to no one. Dee is in the middle of her work day, I can’t call her and derail everything she’s working on.
I’m all alone.
Hot tears pool in my vision and my nose stings with emotion.
I know what an unsupportive relationship looks like.
I saw the toll it took on my dad. The lingering look he’d give my mom before leaving on long runs on Saturday morning.
I heard my mom’s mumbled complaints while he was gone.
The fights over race fees. Her asking when it would be her turn to be selfish.
With Miguel in the same sport as me, I figured he wouldn’t see the training and the dedication as selfish. And, I don’t think he does.
A derisive laugh tumbles from my lips. He is training me for free for fuck’s sake. He is giving me so much of his time and energy.
And his heart! He’s given me his heart. And I’ve given mine to him.
But still, he got in the way of me getting what I want.
He turned down a sponsorship for me.
How could he do that? I might have come to the same conclusion because Stan seems like a total hairy butt crack but, still.
There’s only one person who can help me understand how you can love someone and still hope they fail.
I stare down at the screen as it rings, wondering if it’ll even connect.
"Hello Laney!" My mom’s voice rings clear.
"Hey Mom."
"Everything okay?" She asks right away.
With a sniffle I answer, honestly, "I’m not sure."
"Okay, well, are you safe? Are you hurt?"
"Yeah, I’m sitting on a park bench. I have a question."
"What is it?"
"How come you hated Dad’s running career?"
It’s quiet on the other end of the phone. After a beat I hear her long inhale and exhale. "I don’t think I hated it. I resented how much he loved it."
"What do you mean?"
"Hold on." She mumbles something to someone else and I hear the background noise on her end shift until it’s quieter. "I’m glad we’re having this conversation, Laney, I hope you’ll understand. I’m going to do my best, but I’m only human."
A reluctant chuckle escapes my lips. "I get it Mom."
She inhales and exhales. "I struggled for a while after you were born. I didn’t feel like myself. You know I stayed home those first five years with you and your dad went to work. He’d be gone, morning until night. And he’d come home tired from work, change into running clothes, and leave again.
"But I was tired too, taking care of an infant then a toddler all day is hard work. Then on Saturday mornings he’d disappear for bike rides, for hours. I needed a break. I needed my husband. And he picked running over me, over us."
She pauses while I observe the leaves trembling in the breeze coming off the lake. My nerves feel equally rattled.
"It’s not logical. And it was probably immature.
But I began to resent it. I cast his sport as the enemy.
Your dad made it clear he never planned to give it up so it became the other woman in our relationship in a way.
It was easier to blame training, and how much he loved it, for my unhappiness than to dig down and discover why I was feeling unhappy in the first place. "
"Mom…"
"Laney, honey, I’m sorry you felt like I didn’t support your dad.
You’re thirty now, and only recently did I realize how depressed I was back then.
I’ve learned a lot about myself in the last few years.
And your dad and I did some therapy while he was sick.
That’s when I realized how bad things had been. "
"I’m sorry Mom."
"Why are you sorry? Darling, you did nothing wrong. I’m a human who didn’t have the right set of tools to handle everything going on in my head. But it’s getting better."
I let her words settle in.
Somewhere along the line of your life your parents become human. They become dynamic and multifaceted. I’m well aware both my parents were imperfect. But I am now realizing I didn’t give either of them room to change.
I realize the space I want her to hold for me and my racing is the exact space I’ve blocked by pushing her away.
"I’m sorry for holding a grudge against you." I say. "And for being so snotty about choosing running when I got older."
My mom chuckles a little on the other line. "Are you kidding? Sure, I’ll admit at first I had a pity party for myself. You had been my ride or die for so long on Saturday mornings. We used to go to the farmers market together and Dad would meet us. Do you remember?"
"Yeah, I do. He’d complain that we didn’t save him a cinnamon roll."
"And then you’d pull one out of the bag for him."
I smile. "He always acted surprised."
"He was so fun-loving. And he’d be on his runners high.
It was like he couldn’t contain his smile.
" She pauses. "When you started going on the Saturday runs and rides with him, it left me aimless for a bit. I think the first summer, I’d stay in bed until noon. Then the next summer I tried going to the market on my own. It was different but you and your dad would meet me afterwards and we’d get some of the family time we used to share.
"Honestly Laney, I think I was lonely."
"Lonely? How so?"
"It’s an odd thing to admit to being lonely with a husband and a kid but I was.
I wanted to be wanted. I wanted to feel like your dad picked me.
That he prioritized me over himself. And that’s pretty egotistic to say out loud, but it’s what I felt.
" She laughs. "This is not the direction I expected this conversation to go.
All you did was ask me one little question! "
"It’s not a little question. It was a big one."
"Yeah, I suppose it was."
We’re quiet for a moment. Another question screams to be asked. I don’t want to push it, I don’t want her to shut down.
But I am pursuing my TP pro card because I promised my dad I would, I need to know where his head was at.
I need to know why he asked me to carry on the legacy of a sport that tainted his marriage.
"Did you and dad clear this up before he died?"
"Yes. He told me about the diagnosis, and then immediately said he was sorry for not clearing things up between us sooner. Laney, we weren’t perfect, not even close, but we did love each other."
"Okay." I believe her even as the word comes out tight through the emotion in my throat.
"And we loved you." I sniffle and nod even though she can’t see me. "I saw the article about your race."
"You did?"
"Yeah, congratulations on the record. And, I am so proud of you for not giving up when your shoes fell apart. Most people, myself included, would have thrown in the towel."
"Yeah, well, I’ve got something to prove."
"You do?"
"Yeah, it’s up to me to prove that it’s worth it."
"That what is, Laney?"
"The time, the money, the effort. That everything I put into training is worth the outcome."
My mom is quiet for a moment. She clears her throat. "But do you love it?"
"Racing?"
"Not just racing, the training too."
"Yes." I whisper because anything louder is blocked by the thick taste of what I think is pride.
"Then you’ve already proven everything you need to. Loving it, waking up and wanting to do it, that’s the definition of success."
Tears roll freely down my face now. I sniffle and wipe the snot on the back of my hand.
"Is it? You really think that?"
"Yes, my love for your dad was clouded at times by my jealousy. Mostly, I was jealous he had a passion to love in the first place. I would have hated anything he chose to do on Saturday mornings. Could he have managed it a little better, made more of an effort to resolve the tension between us, sure. Like I said, we weren’t perfect.
But I still kissed him good night and chose to live my life with him every day.
"Your dad never wanted to be a professional athlete after the Olympics. He loved his job at the plant and he just loved to run."
"Really?"
"Really. He got a small purse a few times early on, before you were with us. But then after that, he raced for the hell of it."
I laugh. "It can be hellish."
"So, what brought all these questions on?"
I take a deep breath. "Miguel, my boyfriend, he turned down a sponsorship offer without telling me about it."
"Ah, I see. And, did he have his reasons?"
"Yes." I can almost hear her nodding on the other side of the country. "And," I grumble. "I understand his reasons. He means well. I just don’t like him deciding for me."
"That’s completely reasonable." My mom’s support fills my chest with warmth.
"I think I understand how you can be angry with someone but still love them."
"It’s kind of a mind bender isn’t it?"
"Yeah."
"So, what’s your plan?" Mom asks.
"I’m not sure."
"Again, completely reasonable."
"Right." I laugh. "Hey Mom?"
"Hmm?"
"Thanks."
"Of course Laney.” She says gently. She clears her throat then asks, “When’s your next race?"
"Three weeks."
"You qualified after the last one, so is this just to keep you sharp?"
"Essentially. And, wait, you know I qualified?"
"Laney, you’re my daughter. I’m paying attention to your results. I can only imagine how hard you’re working. I’m proud of you."
"Thanks Mom." Another call comes in and my phone vibrates in my hand. Through the cracks on my screen I recognize the name on the caller ID. "I gotta take this. But, I love you Mom."
"Love you too, Laney."