Luke was thinking about Lauren, wondering if they’d get back together. He didn’t tell his dad he missed her and thought about her all the time. Maybe she was going out with someone else. The possibility of that bothered him. He remembered seeing Mike Keenan talking to her in the cafeteria, but decided not to dwell on it any further.
He heard something that distracted him-something big and fast coming toward him, crashing through the field. He thought he heard his dad’s voice now, but couldn’t make out what he was saying, like the wind was blowing it away. He picked up his bow, nocked a Zwickey broadhead.
He saw a buck in the row, coming right at him. The deer cut left and he lost it. He ran right, saw the buck appear again and disappear, zigzagging toward him. He was running along the edge of the cornfield. Luke heard the deer and saw it taking down stalks as it charged toward him. He tried to draw the bowstring, but his hands were shaking and he couldn’t breathe. He felt like the strength had been sucked out of him. The deer was close now. Twenty yards. Ten. And then it went left and ran by him, darting into the woods.
Luke felt helpless at the moment. And stupid. He took a breath and tried to relax. He couldn’t believe it. Maybe the best chance he’d ever have to shoot a whitetail, and he couldn’t do it. His dad had mentioned it, a condition called buck fever that afflicted hunters and now he knew what it felt like.
His hands were steadier now and he sucked in air. Regained his strength and pulled the bowstring about halfway to see if he could do it. And there, coming down the row right at him, was another buck, a bigger one, and he remembered his dad saying, “Deer are color-blind, but they’re good at picking up movement. So when you get in your stance, be as economical as you can. Don’t move any more than you have to. Pull straight back.”
And that’s what Luke did. Stood balanced, in full draw now, centered the buck in the crosshairs of his sight. He saw his dad closing in behind the deer, just a glimpse before he released the arrow and followed its trajectory, hitting the animal in the meaty part of his upper body above the shoulder. The whitetail stopped running, stumbling now, staggered a few yards and fell over. Luke ran toward the deer, pumped, excited. As he got closer, he could see it was still alive, trying to get up, but couldn’t, laying on a bed of trampled cornstalks, black eyes watching him. He looked for his dad, who had been close behind the deer, but didn’t see him.
Owen could see the buck struggling to get up as Luke approached, not knowing it was bleeding to death, the broadhead having gone through its heart, blood pumping out, a dark purple-red. The deer had about five minutes before everything would shut down.
Owen wasn’t in much better shape, sitting in the dirt, propped up by cornstalks, the ground cold and wet under him, a corncob digging into his back. It was strange: he didn’t feel the arrow that had gone through the buck and somehow had hit him, the carbon shaft buried in his chest up to the white fletching. His shirt was soaked with blood and more blood bubbled out of his mouth as he tried to breathe. He knew he was in trouble.
Luke saw him now and ran over, falling to his knees, too stunned to comprehend what he was seeing. He dropped his bow, slipped off his backpack. “God, what’d I do?”
He had tears coming down his face.
Owen said, “Luke, listen to me. It isn’t your fault. Just get help. Tell ’em they’ve got to bring a helicopter in.”
Luke got up and took off, running.
Owen looked at the whitetail that would’ve dressed out at about two hundred pounds, the animal still trying to find its legs, movements becoming less pronounced, and then no movement at all.
How odd was this? After racing cars for twenty years going two hundred miles an hour in the tight confines of the racetrack, he’d only been in three accidents and wasn’t hurt too bad in any of them. Although Kate would most likely have disagreed, taking care of him for three months while his injuries healed after Talladega in ’94. She said it was the grumpiest she’d ever seen him. He said, “What do you expect, I’m missing a third of the Cup season.”
Owen remembered it like it was yesterday. He was on lap 256 when Dale Senior came up behind him and must’ve taken the air out of his spoiler. Dale may have nudged him a little, too, but didn’t bang him intentionally. In any case, Owen spun into the wall at about 205, rolled four times, smashed into the catch fence and landed upside down near the entrance to pit road. He was airlifted to the hospital. Broke his right ankle and his left wrist and was in a coma for two days. When he opened his eyes, Kate was sitting on the edge of the bed next to him, a look on her face like the day Luke was born.
He said, “You like watching people sleep, is that it?”
She said, “I must,’ cause that’s all I’ve done for two days.”
He thought he was in his bedroom at home till he looked around and said, “Where in hell am I?”
“Citizens Baptist Hospital, Talladega, Alabama,” Kate said. “Remember hitting the wall and then rolling four times?”
He didn’t. Not then. But it came back to him within a week. It also helped to see it on videotape replay, confirming what he suspected. Big E’s black Monte Carlo coming up fast behind him, Dale trying to make up for penalties for driving too fast on pit road and having too many crewmembers over the wall on a pit stop.
Owen was leading at that stage of the race, but didn’t get into another racecar for three months, and did it over Kate’s protests.
“Are you out of your mind? You’re lucky to be alive. Here’s what’s left of your car, in case you forgot.”
She handed him a picture that showed wheels and tires, pieces of sheet metal and a roll cage-the thing that saved his life.
“And here’s what’s left of you,” she said, indicating his casted limbs and hospitalized condition.
Owen remembered saying, “I’m a racecar driver-this is what I do.”
His third wreck involved an altercation with a young aggressive driver named Teddy Hicks. Owen was going into turn three at Martinsville Speedway, lap 127, when Teddy’s Ford banged his rear fender and sent him spinning. Owen did two 360s, spun off the track, but got it under control and kept going. He’d been in second place and finished eighth. Hicks was black-flagged and disqualified for rough driving.
After the race, Owen confronted Teddy in the pits. “I don’t know what you’re doing out there, but if you can give me a reasonable explanation, I’m willing to bypass this whole deal and move on,” Owen said, giving him the benefit of the doubt.
“What I was doing was taking you out of the race, old man.” Teddy grinned.
Owen stepped in now, threw a big left hand with some weight behind it, caught Teddy full on the side of his face, wiping the grin off and sending him down on the asphalt drive. Owen figured that was the end of it and started walking away. He didn’t see Teddy pick up an impact wrench, but he felt it break his collarbone that took a year to heal. Owen didn’t press charges, but Teddy lost his Cup ride, got booted off the circuit. No one would touch him after the assault. He heard Teddy was driving on the dirt tracks for a while and then disappeared from racing.
Owen was tired. He closed his eyes now and hoped when he opened them he’d see Kate sitting on the edge of his bed.
SIX
Celeste put the bottle of Cold Duck under her arm, holding the handles of the plastic bag in one hand, opening the car door with her other hand and getting in.
Teddy said, “Get my candy bar?”
Celeste said, “What do you think?”
“I knew,” Teddy said, “I wouldn’t be asking.”