Sometimes Goodbye's the Only Way

Home : Stories by Zippit : The Chase Series : Sometimes Goodbye's the Only Way

Summary: It ends here, it ends now, and it’s goodbye.

AUTHOR: Zippit
EMAIL: zippit@cryptoffic.com
RATING: PG
SERIES: The Chase Series
CHARACTER: Dale Earnhardt Jr/Kevin Harvick implied, Kevin Harvick/DeLana Harvick, Dale Jr POV
CATEGORY: General/Romance/Angst
COMPLETED: July 20, 2008
WORD COUNT: 914
DISCLAIMER: If you recognize anyone in this piece, I am in no way affiliated with or know them personally. I am neither making a profit nor plan to do so. This is nothing more than an exercise in fiction. This is a result of an overactive imagination and I claim no truth to these words.
BETA: Thanks to Catw00man for the beta. All other errors are mine.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This boy ain’t mine, but evidently he loves to vacation here. He’s such a sweet one it’s hard to resist him so I indulged the poor heartbroken boy. Takes place after Chase story #10 - Twisted Reflections.
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Late November 2005

Too good to be true. It’s always too good to be true. No matter what happens in my life it never turns out the way I want. Snatched away before I can really even begin to enjoy it. Racing with Daddy, having a Championship contending team, and now even Kevin. Everything I’ve ever wanted gone, just like that. It’s just not in the cards. Never seems to be. Always only just a taste then it’s gone into the ether, and I don’t blame him. Not one bit.

The minute “John Paul” came out of his mouth I knew. Maybe it’s something in racing families or something that draws that type of family to NASCAR, but there’s no remedy for the pain that comes when you lose your Daddy, your hero. None at all. Maybe it’s just the nature of the sport with the way tragedy always lingers in the wings, waiting for the time when it can swoop in and claim its next victim. Or maybe it’s something else entirely. Either way, all you can do is hold on to everything that makes your world. And...that means the end of mine.

Sweet perfection and I should’ve known it wouldn’t last. Just like everything else it was too good, too perfect for me to hold on to. My life is measured in the quicksilver slipping through my fingers. Measured in what I don’t have versus what I do have. Plans for us, plans for me and him, gone, evaporated into the air.

The moment I believe, the moment I open myself to the possibilities...they’re snatched away. Not cause of something I did, it never is.  It’s always out of my hands. I know somehow it’s supposed to be this way because I know Daddy never wanted to leave, not like that. Not with Kelley still mad at him. And Teresa was just doing her job splitting my team up and giving me Michael’s even with it being our best season ever cause me and Tony Jr. had been fighting too much. And Kevin? If he hadn’t gone, I’d have pushed him.

Was too much like a dream and someday it won’t hurt. Somehow it won’t feel like someone scooped out my heart and left it out for the vultures to eat. There’s still Australia, still memories to be made without him. There’s still a fresh start. There’s a lifetime ahead for forgetting because that’s what it amounts to. Lifetime of forgetting, lifetime of living on, lifetime of learning to let go and move on. I’ve done it all my life. What’s another thing to add to the list? We all got regrets and at least I got perfection for a few fleeting weeks.

That’s what I got to be grateful for. Not everyone gets the chances I got from racing to family to friends and lovers. If only time could stand still, but that’s the catch-22. It never does. Not for anyone and the thing is time always speeds up when you least want it to. You can only enjoy the time you got the best you can as life comes rushing towards you. That’s the lot in life and sink or swim, puncture in your dream or not, you’ve gotta go on. Can’t let it swallow you whole because then you ain’t living and that’s what we’re put on this earth to do. Live.

So that means I’ve got a vacation to plan. Maybe it won’t be anywhere exotic this year. Someday, but not this year. Promised the boys something fun and didn’t they always say something about the Bahamas? Warm sandy beaches, exotic views, and ladies to keep our minds off what we have to go back to. Lonely beds, empty home, memories burning every place I touch. Torture, sweet fucking torture. At least I’ll be busy. Busiest schedule in NASCAR, most popular driver, everyone wanting a piece of me like I’m some exotic commodity and not a human being. So I’ll let them tear me apart, searching for the moment when it won’t hurt like an open wound.

So I guess this must be what it’s like to have your heart well and truly broke. First true love? I was a late bloomer, didn’t get the first taste of it in high school like everyone else around me practically did. Fell in with a group of friends and we stuck to ourselves. I don’t know. Don’t care, just want it to get better, want it to stop hurting. Because it’s over. Well and truly over, there’s a chance, but it’s the slimmest chance in hell. And it’s never gonna come true because by this time if I haven’t learned, I should stop dreaming when it comes to anything that I can’t dictate through on track performance. It’s out of my hands. Done and gone and I should just accept it. But...I can’t. When am I gonna get my fairytale ending? When am I gonna get the ending I’ve always dreamed of? Is it ever gonna come or should I put that hope on the shelf with the rest of ‘em?

They say good things come to those who wait. Haven’t I waited long enough? Ain’t it about time I started making my own luck? How much you wanna bet that even if I started trying it’d end up the complete opposite of what I wanted. It’s life and it fucking sucks. That’s why it ends here, it ends now, and it’s goodbye.

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Zippit - zippit@cryptoffic.com