Redemption's A Bitch - 18. Live Together In Another Land

“You remember when we used to do this when I was a kid?” Kieran lifted the tail of the fiery red Honda and began to reverse out of the trailer.

“Yeah, I do. It was a damn sight easier with only one enormous fluffy dog. Hey Shadow,” Brian ruffled the husky’s ears as he turned to Robin, “for some reason, dumb-shit here used to insist we sleep in the van and eat in cheap cafés.”

Kieran glanced over his shoulder at his trainer.

“That’s what everyone else did! Anyway, you always got a hotel room, after the legs…”

“Yeah, yeah,” Brian waved him away, “other people had to sleep in their vans ‘cause they were poor. You don’t wanna be getting up with four hours sleep, and your back aching from sleeping on a crap air bed if you can help it.”

Robin frowned at Kieran as he began to manhandle the Kawasaki out of the trailer too. His own bike hadn’t seen any action in weeks, not since the first session at Brands Hatch, and Kieran wondered if he’d ever have the time to ride it again. Mark smith had been all too happy that his new rider’s schedule had been almost fully booked with pre-race testing and training.

“I think our hotel is really nice.”

“You think the hotel is for our benefit?” Hayley smiled, lifting her son from his travelling car seat and onto her hip, “Oh honey, no. That’s for you.”

Kieran wished, rather suddenly, that he was already in his helmet, because then he wouldn’t have to answer Robin’s querying expression. He ducked behind the Kawasaki, pretending to fiddle with the pedals and hoping everyone lost interest in him.

“Hey,” Kieran didn’t get a chance to turn around, because Robin simply draped himself over his shoulder and hugged him hard, “as long as there’s a bed. Love you.”

Robin had been the one to decide he too was coming on the circuit trip. After a discussion with his parents that Kieran hadn’t been present for, and a second blazing row with his sister that Kieran had made a conscious effort not to overhear by shutting himself in their room with the dogs and a film about formula one racing with the volume turned up, Robin had laid on Kieran’s bed with his butt looking perky and inviting, wearing nothing but his best smile and asked if he could come too. Kieran hadn’t had a moment of hesitation, because the idea of being away from Robin for any real length of time made him unhappy. They had only spent one night apart since the wedding, and to Kieran it had been torture.

While Kieran had loaded the dogs and his single small holdall of clothes into the Mitsubishi, Shastan had stood on their front step with a mug of hot chocolate and small smile. Kieran felt the hair on the back of his neck prickle: he could always tell when his cousin was holding back from saying something.

“Speak up ‘cus. It’ll be too late once I’m gone.”

“This is a big thing you’re doing,” Shastan sipped his hot chocolate, “I’m proud of you.”

“Shas, it’s only circuit training. The race isn’t until the middle of next week.” Kieran frowned at his only blood relative. “You are coming right?”

Shastan abandoned his mug and stepped across the driveway with bare feet to hug his cousin. Kieran hugged him back, hard, shocked for a second at how much he had missed the man he’d grown up with. For a small moment he felt pathetic, a grown man missing his cousin, but Shastan half-ruffled and half-stroked his hair in the manner he’d done since Kieran had first arrived, and Kieran decided missing his cousin wasn’t silly at all.

“Of course we’re coming. Have I ever missed a single race?”

“No,” Kieran smiled happily.

“That’s not why I’m proud of you. You’re going to go spend your days and nights with the boy you love who says he loves you back,” Shastan was grinning, “and I’m so happy for you.”

“You are?” Kieran was surprised.

“Yes!” Shastan cuffed his shoulder, “oddly enough, it makes me happy to see you smile, you great oaf. It might have caused a few, disagreements here and there, but he could be the Sultan of Brunei and I wouldn’t care a jot if he made you happy. Speaking of which,” Shastan looked past Kieran to the main gates, “I think he might have taken a few leaves out of your book. Good luck ‘cus.”

“Thanks…” but Kieran had been distracted the moment he’d seen Robin, the image of the boy seared into his heart, making his skin burn fire-brand hot and his pulse race.

Robin was standing at the gate with a holdall like his own, wearing bike-friendly black leather boots, fitted bootleg blue jeans, the navy t-shirt printed with the faded out motorsport image over the chest, and a black leather motorcycle jacket. Kieran dialled the gate without ever taking his eyes from the boy who ran his fingers through his wavy hair and half-jogged down to meet him.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” Kieran paused to touch the soft sleeve of Robin new jacket. He smelt like the inside of the Alpine Star leather outlet, and Kieran couldn’t help but grin. “You trying to look like me?”

Robin punched his arm, then fisted his fingers in the front of Kieran’s shirt and kissed him hard.

“Like that’s even possible.” He stuck his fingers in the front pockets of his jeans and stood back to pose for his boyfriend. “I figured if we were gonna be hanging around race tracks, maybe I should look the part,” he turned around slowly, “will I do?”

Down boy.

But…

Say something, you idiot!

“Y-yeah…” Kieran wasn’t sure he’d ever stuttered before in his life, but his heart was trying to smash its way out through his ribcage, “You’ll do grand.”

Robin bit his lower lip and swished his hips as he grinned happily.

“Thanks, babe,” Robin hopped up on tiptoes to kiss Kieran’s slack lips. Kieran was equally shocked, appalled and delighted when Robin snuck a hand between them and squeezed appreciatively. “You gonna be alright to drive with that?” he whispered in Kieran’s ear. “Let’s go!”

Kieran had watched Shastan waving them off in a daze.

As Kieran pulled on his leathers, slotting his chest protector plate into position, and glanced back to where Robin was even now fussing each of the dogs, making sure they had water and toys for the day ahead. He had Inu and Suk on a long leash each, while Vuka and Shadow went into the open trailer without fuss to watch, chew rawhide and laze around on their beds. The dogs liked Shastan well enough, but they had never warmed to anyone else. Even Brian still acted pretty formal with them, but Robin had the huskies literally eating out of his hand and hanging on his every word with twitching tails. Kieran had never known them to take so well to anyone.

By the time he had warmed up the bike, Ben had arrived in new overalls with his bright green tool box. Dylan had stayed at Thruxton to work with the main rider, but Ben had been pleased to come along with Kieran’s team on his fast paced tour. It was as though Brian wanted Kieran to ride every circuit in England before his race.

“How’s she doin’?”

“He’s grand,” Kieran drew up and craned over the cowling to look at the front tyre. The racing slicks were sturdy, but they didn’t have a lot of miles on them with the way he drove. “I’m gonna need another set.”

“Right on it, Tristan”

Kieran hopped off the bike and pulled the lifts into position. He wasn’t racing, and time wasn’t of the essence the way it often was with tyre changes. As Ben came back with the tyres, he frowned softly.

“He?”

“Sure,” Kieran shrugged, taking the front tyre and the socket gun, “I call all my bikes ‘he’.”

“Makes sense I guess,” Ben shrugged, as though these were the sorts of conversations he had with riders all the time. “Most of the other riders I work with are straight, so the bikes are female. Yours are male.” He fell silent for a moment, nothing but the familiar clicking of the ball-bearings between them. “Can I ask a question?”

“Shoot.”

“How the hell do you go about talking to a guy like that? He’s so… shiny.”

Kieran grinned, and glanced back at his boyfriend. He was walking the two huskies along the pit line on the other side, chatting to them and taking in the scents and sounds of the race track. For a moment all Kieran could see was the young man who loved him, shared his bed, and smiled when Kieran came out of the shower, dripping water all over the carpet. It was hard to remember, almost hurt to remember, it hadn’t always been that way. Ben was right, Robin was hard and shiny, spiky and sharp edged if you touched him wrong, and Kieran realised if he wasn’t, there was no way his heart would now feel so full. He clamped the visor down over his face.

“You gotta have a lot of patience and a lot of guts.”

Robin turned and waved as Kieran pulled away from the pit, and then the world faded out as he lost himself to the bike.

*

Locking down through the Allard turn, pushing the Kawasaki down low to the corner, he straightened up and gunned down the short straight section towards the complex and took the right-left-right at the fastest speed he could. The bike wobbled as he came up, but Kieran was ready, pulled up the front wheel and rammed every single powerful horse down onto the tarmac before speeding towards the Noble corner. He went round in fourth gear, his left knee, elbow, and shoulder inches from the ground, speeding by at over a hundred and twenty miles an hour. But there wasn’t time to focus on that, because he was up, wrenching the bike to the right hand side and swinging around the long arc of the next turn.

Training and self-preservation had him drifting towards the outside line as the next corner approached, but Kieran kept gunning the engine, pulled in and dropped suddenly to the right, squealing through Church corner as close as he could take the bike to the white line of the edge. They opened out over the long interior curve, and Kieran felt everything slow: the bike, the pistons hammering away, his heart beating in his ears, the tread of the tyres over the asphalt, all of it in infinite detail and slow motion as they built speed. There was one more set of corners, another little evil configuration designed to make a rider drop his speed. Kieran didn’t like dropping his speed.

At the Club Chicane right-left-right, Kieran had watched every other driver drop down to around fifty-five miles an hour, but Kieran hadn’t gone that slow on a track since he was a kid, and he wasn’t going to start now. He didn’t brake, but rammed the corner, knowing everyone thought him completely insane. As he switched the bike he braked hard, nearly lifting the front wheel to make the final bend, and as soon as the bike was down again kicked it hard and rode out the rocky tilt that threatened to throw him off. He’d done the lap, so he sped down across the grid again as his time flashed up on the scoreboards.

He could practically hear Robin screaming from the stands.

*

“And here we are at the Thruxton race circuit for this, the sixth leg in the MCE insurance British superbike championship. We have good clear weather for the day, the track is cold and there’s not a great deal of wind, and we would call this perfect racing weather. And the big news here today is that the Lloyds GB Moto team relief rider Tristan Toyne has qualified fastest, putting him in pole position ahead of his teammate Chris Walker. Ellison of course was injured back at Brands Hatch and we have heard he is making a very good recovery, and is wishing his team well from the comfort of the hospital.

“This is a very tight track, for those of you who don’t know it intimately: two point four kilometres, eleven corners, including two very tight sets of three, the Complex and Club Chicane, one a quarter way in and one right towards the end. Ladies and gentlemen this is tuning up to be a great race here today with all thirty riders out on the grid. The bikes are getting into position, final checks being made by the mechanics, and a fair few riders posing on their machines for photos.

“There’s Tristan Toyne at the front in the green and white leathers. At just twenty-four he is one of the youngest riders on the track here today, incredibly he has come out of retirement at an age before most riders even start being able to access this kind of level of the sport, in order to compete here today. Very easy to spot ladies and gentlemen, as we hear he insists on having a fully blacked out visor on his helmet, and by that amazing, and some would say dangerously long, braid of his.

“The horn sounds, and everyone needs to be clear off the grid now, the rider’s snapping their visors down and engines up, ready for the gun. It’s going to be a tight race, there are a few firm favourites out there today: Dan Linfoot riding for the green and black Kawasaki team is expected to do well, and Josh Brookes of Milwaukee Yamaha also looking very strong in training.

“And they’re off! It’s a very quick circuit this one, and some say that it’s all about your position in the start-up. There’s Bridewell near the front, letting his team mate travel in his slip stream through the first section… and Tristan Toyne, the wildcard of this race as many have called him, popping a wheelie right off the line and gunning his engine around that first corner. A young, aggressive racer, coming right out in true form and leaving no disillusions about what kind of race this is going to be for him.

“Coming out of the Complex the pack is looking good, and oh! A huge slip from Waters and he and the red and white Yamaha go sliding across the grass. The bike is slowing, he’s sitting up and that’s Joe Waters out of the race. He will not be happy with that. Back at the front things are looking good for Tristan Toyne. He’s a few lengths ahead of the others, looking nice and tidy as the bikes swing through Noble and go up a gear towards the next corner. Toyne’s team mate Walker has pulled out of the slipstream of the Tyco Suzuki, ridden there by John Hopkins and is making a climb up the pack. Reports have been coming out from the Lloyds team for the last few weeks saying the drivers get on well and there have been no grudges between them, but that doesn’t mean Walker is going to let Toyne have all the glory.

“But Toyne is out in front and looking strong and I don’t see any way that anyone is going to take him if he keeps riding like this.”

*

Corner, lean.

Pull up, breathe, corner, lean.

Switch; one, two, three; breathe.

Think of Robin, the shape of his lips saying your name, asking to be called Sparrow.

Corner, lean hard, push, change gear; breathe.

Find the centre line, stay there; breathe.

Don’t think of the others. The circuit is empty apart from you. Ride.

Cut close on the corner, switch, push, lean, ram the bike forwards; breathe.

Change gear, heartbeat, breathe, turn.

Hazel eyes shining and smiling. The pride of him, the cheek, the unashamed desire: to wrap his arm around your waist and introduce himself to race officials and other riders as your boyfriend. The way they look at you when he kisses you, straddling your bike, like they can’t work out if they’re angry or jealous. The way he says your name: like you’re a god. His god.

Corner, lean.

You belong to him.

Breathe.

*

“He’s done it!”

The stands erupted with screaming and cheering, the pit too, and Robin grinned, running out from the screen where he had watched ninety percent of the race, to the front of the pit. The bikes couldn’t brake safely to a stop in such a short distance, and Kieran had gone across the line at some incredible speed. When he turned up on the grid again, he parked up just as he would outside the garage, shaking his long braid out of his helmet. Robin didn’t give him time to even drop the kick stand on the bike, and Kieran was ready.

“Kieran!”

Kieran wrapped his arms around the flying Sparrow and kissed him hard. His heartbeat had slowed during the race, that glacial space where whole thoughts happened between pulse-thuds, but now the adrenaline had caught up with him and he was running a million miles an hour.

“You did it lad! Well done!”

“Superstar!” Brian slapped the arms of his wheelchair, “you had it in you after all!”

“Aye that’s right.” Dylan was quick with the stands, holding up the back of the bike so Kieran could actually climb off. “He did well for you, lad?”

“Yes. Thank you.” Kieran was panting, still holding Robin tight against his chest. He kissed his boyfriend again and looked at Brian, “how many?”

“You won boy!” Smith shouted happily.

“Three,” Brian understood the question. Kieran had asked it after every race, from the moment he’d had his own first crash. He knew where he’d placed. After all, the track in front of him had been blank and empty as new road the whole way round. “No real injuries though, sprains and bruises and a potential cracked rib. They all got up and walked away.”

“Good.” Kieran let go of the last breath he’d been holding onto, and then he grinned hugely. “I won!”

“Yes you did babe,” Robin glowed, “is it like formula one? Are they gonna drape you with leaves and flowers and you’re gonna spray everyone with champagne?”

Kieran kissed him again. If there had ever been a doubt in his mind, there wasn’t now. He couldn’t give this up.

“Kier!”

“Shas!” Kieran hugged his cousin hard, “what d’ya think? Hi Becca.” Kieran was too euphoric to care, his smile fixed to his face regardless of his cousin-in-law’s half-hearted wave. “Isn’t he a beaut?”

“Kieran, I was so wrong…” Shas sounded like a man on the verge of tears

“Shas?”

“I never should have made you give it up. You were great.”

“I love you too ‘cus.”

Half an hour later, standing atop the podium with his leathers around his waist and a Lloyds GB Moto Kawasaki t-shirt thrown hurriedly over his bare chest, Kieran raised the big silver trophy into the air and shouted wordlessly at the sky as the crowd erupted. Not everyone was happy he’d won, but no one could deny how well he had won. Even Walker had slapped his shoulder as he rose up to his own third position spot and said that no one had ever deserved to win so much.

Robin was in the back of the celebration, arms folded, looking smug and proud, and one look in his hazel eyes had told Kieran that just for tonight he would be able to get anything he wanted. Which was good, because all Kieran wanted was to kiss his Sparrow in the soft warmth of the big hotel bed until he passed out. Then tomorrow, they’d go home.

He grinned up to the clear air and bright clouds.

I was born to do this.

*

“Kieran, what are we doing here?” Robin slipped out of his red helmet halfway through the question and so Kieran got part of it in his ear and part muffled by the padded collar of his motorcycle jacket.

Kieran dropped the kickstand on the Ducati and placed his own helmet on the still warm seat. They’d driven until they were just out of town, a little dip between two hills on the opposite side of the city from Kieran’s house. The land they’d driven up to had a view of the sea, the waves crashing up against a beach hidden by the cliffs, but the rear of the city was only just over the ridge, and they could be back by The Waterfront or The Eagle in ten minutes. He watched Robin looking around the rolling field, nothing but green grass, half an old broken down wooden barn, a dirt and gravel track, and small woodland. When Kieran wrapped an arm around the little Sparrow’s waist, the boy turned to him with a frown.

“There’s nothing here Kieran. Why are we here?”

“It’s yours.”

“What?”

Kieran kissed his cheek and smiled.

“The land, it’s yours. Full-on open planning permission, as long as you don’t build over three stories,” Kieran smirked. It was amazing what could be accomplished if you paid off the right people.

“Build?” Robin stared at him, “what do you mean, build?”

“A house,” Kieran was confused. “Two and a half acres, it should be enough right?”

Robin flung himself at his boyfriend, and Kieran wrapped his arms tight around his Sparrow’s narrow waist. The kiss had him seeing stars.

“Kieran!”