Speedway Girl

I crawled on top of him, mashing my breasts against his chest and smothered him with kisses, in between repeating,"Yes."

"Shoot," he somehow was able to pause me with a tease, "San Solomon is pretty far from Pasadena. That's going to make dating you kind of hard."

I laughed, "Dating? We never actually went on one, but we are way beyond that. Dr. Talbot, would you honor me and live in sin by moving in with me?"

"Living in sin? My word. Wellll I suppose. For a little while, temporarily...," he reached for something hidden somewhere on the nightstand and brought a ring in view. "... until we make it official. Will you marry me?"

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Epilogue.

Talbot and I took a post race season vacation to the Virgin Islands, but that trip also became our private engagement celebration. I got us a place I knew of with a private beach where I could tease Talbot endlessly going without a bathing suit, though the suit I would sometimes wear was almost no suit at all.

We married in the Winner's Circle at the Riverside Speedway and the reception was held in the auto shop. It was certainly big enough, and when we moved all the cars out of there for the party, there was room enough for the 300 guests. Our existing, heavy-duty security was also a plus, keeping the paparazzi penned away.

Beth actually planned the whole wedding and helped me pick out a dress. She was so helpful and nice about the whole thing, that I finally had to do something about my behavior, going all the way back to when I met her. At one point I cornered her, "Beth, I hope you accept my apology for the way I've treated you. You've been nothing but good to Dad, and me even, that you didn't deserve all the attitude I gave you. I'm sorry."

"Sweetie," she responded sincerely, "Your father loves you, so I love you. You got a raw deal not growing up around your mother. I know that I'll never be your mother, I'll never try to be a substitute, but I could be your friend. A very good friend if you let me."

"I'd like that," I honestly replied.

Talbot moved in with me, even before the wedding, and it was great. We would fight now and again, not much differently than when we were kids, but it was never mean. We never said anything so terrible to each other, even in the heat of the moment, that we wished we could take back. We also never went to bed angry with each other. That may have been the key for us going long like we did.

The year after I got my new car, I crushed it all season long without any incidents. I pulled out an Unlimited Championship Series points win with a razor thin margin over Jeffy. My dream came true after all. As unlikely as it all seemed.

The next season Jeffy took it, and I came in second. The top 10 drivers for that season, though, were all real close behind us. The season after that, Jeffy and I finished points 4-5, I got three wins and finished mostly in the top 5, but it was nothing like before. The lock we had on enjoying wins had passed, the races were now much more competitive for the win even though Talbot had made my car even faster than that first one.

The whole field got faster. Pretty sure I know how and why, some of which is fact, and a lot from speculation after hours and hours of Talbot and I talking it through, trying to figure out what was happening.

To start with, I have to cover what was happening inside the fan base, and this part was actually fact. Our sponsor lent their PR crew to conduct interviews, surveys, and review merchandise buying trends. As it turns out, I did collect a nice size number of fans who wore T-shirts with my car, number 88, and sometimes my likeness on it. As I continued to win, the data showed that I wasn't really well liked by the majority of the fans, but I was tolerated. I didn't look like the typical fan and I didn't have a penis, the two biggest factors. The data further showed that if I wasn't the Outlaw's daughter, I would have been mostly hated.

This next part is speculation, with a few whistleblower tips lending credence to our theory. I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt that disgruntled fans did not influence what happened, but what the syndicate really wanted was parity. Close race finishes for more excitement, and spreading out wins to more than a few drivers for wider merchandise sales distributions. That season where I was dominating, when the syndicate would inspect my team's cars for pre-race safety and post-race rules conformity, someone was taking notes.

Though Talbot had patents filed on all of his innovative modifications and upgrades, it isn't too hard to work around a patent when an engineer gets to look under the skirt and understand the intent and theory. More ways to skin a cat, so to speak, as long as they got a good look at the cat. On top of all that, there were a lot of machine shops that had their hands on Talbot's designs, very lucrative plans if they were to be e-mailed to anyone with a lot of cash of which our competition had lots of, despite signed non-disclosures.

Whatever the case, I raced only one more season after Dad retired, and then I hung it up too. When Dad went out, it was a party. His career was celebrated with endless documentaries of old interviews and race footage, and a lot of fanfare. When I hung it up, I could almost hear the collective sigh of relief from racing enthusiasts around the country, though my fan base was sad and I got a lot of nice things said about me from them.

However I looked at it, I was proud of my achievements and that history will show that I was a good driver. Nobody can take that away from me.

I surely had many more years of racing that I left on the table, and I want to be honest in the fact that Talbot had nothing to do with my decision to retire. Wait a minute. That's not entirely true. Since it was his sperm that fertilized my egg, then I guess he's culpable enough. I wasn't unhappy about it, we had decided to start a family together and my love of driving ebbed as my wish to celebrate my connection with Talbot grew by having a baby. He gave me two more too, the final total: two girls, one boy.

My love of racing never drained completely. When Jeffy's son started in Class 2, I was his racing manager and kept the job even after he moved up to the Championship level. Another family racing dynasty was born and I got to be part of that.

Dad moved into the broadcasting booth and his commentary was fun to listen to. His personality plus a rich library of stories from his past just elevated his legendary status. Looking back though, he always loomed larger in my eyes as a father than as a race legend. He was a good, loving father and Talbot told me he wanted to model his own role as a father through a combination of Dad and Pop.

What I saved for last is over the subject of my loving husband. The good is that every day, he impressed me more and more, and our love grew exponentially as well. I could feel it. Just when I thought I couldn't learn any more about the guy, he'd do something that made my heart skip a beat. He really was a terrific father to our children and he was a doting, loving, faithful husband. He was always thoughtful and kind to me, an unlimited depth of little gestures and words that never let me forget that he loved me and our family. Not to mention he kept me in stitches with his stupid jokes and one liners, and even our kids grew up thinking he was the funniest person on Earth.

The nightmares though. His PTSD. It never really went completely away. It did get better. A lot better over time, but it was always there and I would sometimes have to rock him back to sleep in my arms. Overall though, he slept a lot better. He once told me that I was key to that, and that once we started sleeping together in the same bed every night that the number of incidents dramatically decreased. I believe him, I would know if he was lying.

It might be because every night I would wait for him to fall asleep first, then I'd whisper to him. "Dream nice dreams, dream of us together, because we're going to be together forever. Whatever you dream, know that I'm all right, and I am that way because you filled my heart with your love. Sleep well, darling. I love you."