“I’ll bet you don’t even look in a mirror anymore. You’ve been locked away since, well, you know. Five years, Pat. What happened sucked, but it’s time,” said Nick.

I nodded as my cousin stepped closer. Ash from his cigarette burned my nostrils.

“You ever gonna talk again? I keep forgetting what your voice sounds like. Ya know, sometimes grandma watches videos from old Christmases. She cries, but I don’t think it’s because of your mom. It’s because she hears your voice in the background. I’m just sayin’.”

I shrugged. Swatted away more smoke.

“I’m giving you this job as a favor to your dad. The pay’s a hundred, but I’m keeping twenty. Call it a cousin tax.”

I gave a timid thumbs-up. Nick shook his head.

“Last thing. No freakin’ out when you hear the motors. Two-strokes. Loud. You’re eighteen now, not a kid. Can’t be scared of noise that can’t hurt you.”

But I wasn’t afraid of the noise. I was afraid of what came after. The gun reports. Pop. Pop. Pop. My mother’s weight pressing me down into the scalding asphalt. The cool white line of the Stop & Shop parking lot against my cheek. I looked at Nick, who was staring into my flashback. He turned away. I followed him to my spot on the dirt racetrack. He handed me a yellow flag and told me to only use it if a rider crashes in the middle of the track.

Five hours into the race, I pulled off my sweat-soaked T-shirt and tied it over my nose and mouth to filter the dust. My eyes already felt like 100-grit sandpaper. Nick hadn’t mentioned the dust—just the noise. Two-stroke dirt bikes screamed, begging for throttle—or mercy. The noise clung to my skull, even between races. As I counted all twenty-two motors harmonizing through my section of track, I had to dig my feet into the dirt to keep from drifting back to that grocery store parking lot, but the ground was loose, fluid. I thought about her limp body on me. She was the last person I touched.

Riders and their 300 pounds of Pittsburgh steel and Japanese plastic ripped corners, flinging earth like machine guns, pulling me back to the present. Their fingers curled unnaturally around throttles, feeding air and gas into combustion chambers, hurling bodies toward dirt jumps that could turn man and metal into wingless condors. I wanted to leave.

Dust continued to rise, lighter than air. A taupe cloud so thick I had to close my eyes to see. Each rider, throttle pinned, launched blind into it. Only the whine of motors and hum of tires said they were still airborne. A one-foot-deep, ten-foot-wide mud puddle waited just beyond the jump. No fear. I wanted to be them. Free.

Gasp. Click. The sound of 300 pounds launching into ether. Then braap-braap—the throttle firing. Another bike left the jump. Then another. And another. Gasp. Click. Gasp. Click. braap-braap! braap-braap! I held my yellow caution flag taut against my stomach like it could shield me, protect me the way mom did. Her faded yellow scarf tickled my neck as blood pooled beneath me. I counted the seconds. Shrieks about an active shooter. Screeching tires. Shouts for 9-1-1.

The riders, blinded, breathed dust and exhaust, saw only trophies, thought only of lap times. They didn’t see me. Only dust. Ego. Motors. I wanted to be their mind. Think for them. Pull the throttle. Shift their weight. Stay in the moment.

Each race, I counted them. Twenty-one. Twenty-two. I timed them. Ninety seconds passed between rider one and rider twenty-two. Like in the parking lot, pinned under her, counting seconds to stay alive. Until I ran out of air. Dust thickened lungs.

Another lap. The same—except rider twenty-two nodded at me. Pink jersey. Purple helmet. The only female in the field.

Next lap. Dust thicker. Twenty-one. Then an outline of twenty-two saluting me midair.

Lap six, rider twenty. Twenty-one. Then twenty-two again. A thumbs-up like she was a child feeling wind from a rolled-down car window for the first time. I mirrored it.

Another lap. Nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. Then twenty-two blew me a kiss and vanished into the haze. I waited, the same way I did under her body—counting, holding my breath, waiting for the next pop.

Gasp…no click.

BRAAA—K-k-krrch—ptt. Thud. Metallic clang, clatter. The rattle of plastic fenders snapping loose. Groan of gears. The slap of carbon fiber body armor. Sloshing water. A human grunt. Wob-wob. Wob-wob.

Silence.

Twenty-one engines in the distance. Approaching. Eighty-five seconds.

Nick said use the flag if a rider was in the way. But what if no one could see the flag? I stepped toward the dust and was back in the parking lot. The man in red rolled mom off me, touched the warm muzzle of his black pistol to my nose. “She put me in jail. Took my life from me,” he said. “I wanted to take you from her. She took that from me, too. You’re just like her. Coward.”

I dropped the flag and climbed the seventeen-foot ramp. Slid down the other side. Still counting to myself. Sound muffled. No way out. I wanted to cry. Cry for her. For help. I opened my mouth. My throat was grit. Nothing. I couldn’t remember how to scream. Like the part of me that knew how was still laying in that parking lot.

On my knees, I felt for bike parts. Or a body. My middle finger grazed something sharp. Plastic. A fender? Sixty-seven seconds. My hand struck something solid. I traced upward. Pain shot through my arm like a viper strike. I jerked back from a hot motor. I crawled forward. My left hand found a boot. Empty. Fifty-four seconds. My knuckles hit something round. A helmet. Split. Sticky. Bile rose. I coughed through the burn. My seared hand skimmed water. I plunged it in, let it soak. Something tangled between my fingers. I pulled. It held. Hair.

I reached deeper. Lifted a head. Cold. Still. Twenty-eight seconds.

I held her in the dust storm. I thought about the man in red. His words. The way he ended me. His smirk. I did want to be like her. I was her. I wanted the caution flag to wrap around us. Protect us.

Eighteen seconds. The buzz of engines pierced the cloud.

I dug my feet into the mud and pulled. Something popped in my shoulder. Pain surged from neck to hand. Seven seconds. My right arm was limp. Dirt and tears fell from my eyes.

I blinked through the mud, at her face, at the blood pooling under her. I wrapped my arms around her like a caution flag. She was warm.

Still counting.

Gasp. Click.