Give Them Hell

Learning From NASCAR

Nikki

"Are you being serious?" Dallas asks as we walked along the beach.

It was March and raining and miserable but Dallas always had a thing for these kind of days. She had her hood pulled up over her brown hair and her sleeves pulled down over the palms of her hands.

The inky waves crash against the light sand tempestuously, I think a storm is coming. Every once in a while Dallas will stop walking and throw a rock as hard as she can into the waters, it doesn't do much against the seething Pacific Ocean. Or earlier Dallas ditched her Chuck Taylor's are ran barefoot towards the waters so she could feel the ocean on her feet.

Dallas Andrews is definitely one of a kind.

"Yeah I'm being serious, what's your biggest dream?" I ask again and her lips twist into a smirk.

"Marry David Bowie." Dallas tells me and I laugh.

"Isn't he gay?" I wonder and she shrugs. "I'm pretty sure he's dependant on cocaine as well."

"Everyone is flawed, Frank." She says simply.

"You're obsession with David Bowie confuses me a little bit, especially as your boyfriend." I admit and she laughs.

"He's just Bowie, he's different and completely himself. I respect him for that." Dallas explains. "I don't want into his pants or anything--let me revise my previous statement. I want to have a conversation with David Bowie, I want to talk to him about his life and what drives him. I want to be able to see the world through his eyes."

"Anything else?" I wonder as thunder rolls above us and Dallas grins.

"Play rugby nationally." She admits and I smile.

"Of course." I say and she nods.

"How about this? Drive the biggest, fastest Ferrari that Italy makes." Dallas offers and I smile.

"You are insane." I say and she nods.

"Oh honey, I know." She agrees and I laugh.

"Baby, you had a panic attack when you drove my car. My car doesn't top out at one hundred and ninety miles an hour." I remind her and she rolls her eyes.

"Frank, I'm only fourteen. I have time to learn how to drive." Dallas tells me and I smile.

"Fair enough." I agree.

It took me almost a week to figure it out but I finally figured out the perfect second first date to take Dallas on. She's always been into cars like Dallas wanted to rip apart the piece of shit car that I drove to see if she could figure out what was wrong with it. But this one time she talked about Ferraris and I didn't forget about it.

I got it organized where we can race these brand new 1984 Ferrari 288 GTOs on this track outside of town. Having these cars around Dallas is like talking dirty to her inner speed demon and I can't wait to see her reaction.

"You could tell me where we're going, Nik." Dallas says as I drive and I smile.

"And what? Ruin the surprise?" I ask and she rolls her eyes. "You're going to love me for this." I assure her and she smiles.

"I'm trusting you on this." She admits.

"You should do that a bit more." I laugh and grab her hand. "What are you thinking about?"

"Remember when we got kicked out of the roller rink?" Dallas wonders and I laugh.

"Yup."

It was like our third date or something like that. Neither of us can skate all that well so I'm not quite sure why I thought this was a good idea. Dallas and I tried our damnedest to skate for about an hour before we found something else that was fun to do. We found a broom and we'd trip people up with the handle. We were asked to leave and never return.

I pull up to the track and Dallas looks over at me confused and I grin. We get out of the car and I grab her hand, we walk through the building and to the track that's out behind. It's a quarter mile drag strip with two Ferraris sitting in the lanes, one is red and the other is black.

"You said you wanted to drive the biggest, fastest Ferrari that Italy makes, I introduce to you the 1984 Ferrari 288 GTO." I say and she lights up.

"Zero to sixth in about four seconds, zero to one twenty five in fifteen seconds flat." Dallas spurts information and I smile.

"You did your research." I say. "You see, I'm in the market for one of these and I want to see which one is the better one." She looks over to me and I hold up the keys. "Care to help?"

"Yeah!" Dallas beams and I laugh.

"This is the way I see it to figure out which is the faster car, we race the best of three but we trade cars after the first race to see if you is clearly better than the other." I say and she nods.

"Loser buys Diary Queen?" She asks and I nod.

"You are a genius." I say and she laughs.

"Oh honey, I know." Dallas says and pulls me towards the cars. "Come on." She says happily.

Dallas is definitely a better driver than she was at fourteen and she handles these sports cars with an insane amount of skill. She beat me in the first and third races with the red Ferrari so that's the one that I'm going to buy. After the races we get out of the cars and she runs up to me.

Dallas hugs me tightly and I laugh, I kiss the top of her head and hug her back.

"Thank you so much for this." She says quietly. "Thank you for remembering this about me."

"It's kinda hard to forget." I admit. "I've been in love with you for eight years."

She looks up at me and smiles. I bend down to kiss her lips and I feel Dallas smile against my mouth. I'm not kidding when I say that I'm in love with her. I never thought I could fall in love at eighteen, I thought I was too young to fall in love but I did. Dallas pulls back and I smile.

"I owe you Dairy Queen." I say and she laughs.

"That you do." She agrees and I grab her hand.

"Come on." I say and start to walk back towards my car. "Where'd you learn to drive like that, anyways?"

"My grandfather watches a lot of NASCAR." Dallas admits with a laugh.