You Can’t Go Back

Home : Stories by Catw00man : You Can’t Go Back

Summary: Reality can be a cold, hard truth.

AUTHOR: Catw00man
EMAIL: catw00man@cryptoffic.com
RATING: PG
CHARACTER: Martin Truex Jr, Martin POV
PROMPT: Taming the Muse #47 (#22 for me) - Conclave
COMPLETED: June 14, 2007
WORD COUNT: 2,108
DISCLAIMER: I own NOTHING and am affiliated with NO ONE mentioned here. Not the drivers, not the teams, no one. This is all fiction and fun. In other words...NOT REAL, NOT REAL, NOT REAL. ;-)
DEDICATION: I’m giving this one to Zippit because who knew I could write this boy again. I still am putting the blame on you somehow.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This takes place the day Dale Jr announced he was joining Hendrick Motorsports. WOOHOO!!! This kinda ended up being a bit of a cathartic fic for me for a variety of reasons. I just hope I did Martin justice. I’d love to know because I haven’t had him for a long time.
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Lake Norman, June 13, 2007 - 12:02pm

It’s official.

Yeah, I know it was “official” before but, now it’s for real.  Really, real.  Junior and I are no longer teammates.  As of the end of this year…he’ll be a Hendrick boy.  Though, to be honest, in every way that matters, he’s already there.

Reach for the remote as I watch someone who used to be one of my closest friends pump his fist happily and hug his new boss with a smile I haven’t seen in years.  I don’t need to see this.  I don’t want to see this.  I don’t want to really have to believe this has all happened.  But I have no choice.  It’s done.

Turn off the TV and head to the kitchen for a beer, the irony not lost on me that Budweiser is now my brand of choice.  He’s left his stamp all over all of us in ways I’m sure I don’t even realize yet.  But I will.  With everyday that he’s gone I’m sure I’ll find something else, some other thing that he did or said or took care of that I didn’t even realize.

Open my beer and take a long drink, the taste evoking memories of parties and times I just don’t want to remember so I push them back.  I need to be in the now.  I need to push these feelings away because what was won’t help me here.  Junior is really gone and I’m the new poster boy of DEI.

Has the world gone insane?

Lean against the counter and shake my head as I pick at the label on the brown long neck bottle in my hand.  Until now, I didn’t really believe he would go.  Oh, I know he told the world a month ago it was over.  But part of me still held out hope he and his step-mother would somehow find a way to patch things up.  It was just a stupid family feud and nothing so trivial is worth dismantling an empire.  And then when I won--not like it felt like a win--I thought just maybe, maybe he might change his mind.  We can win here.  We will win here.  But I should have known this had nothing to do with wins.

This had to do with Dale Earnhardt Jr. and what he wanted.

But I still hoped.

Last week it finally happened.  I finally found my way to victory lane in Dover, a place so close to my hometown.  It should have been perfect.  It should have been huge.  It should have made a difference in something.  But to be honest, I think it was mostly forgotten.

I’m not blaming anyone for that.  It’s no one’s fault that the day of my win, in the middle of my race, that the sport’s founder passed away.  It was just a chance occurrence mixed with so many others that ended up causing a checked flag to just be another flag.  Even the party was…flat.  Oh, Junior tried.  He had all the boys there and we all drank until we passed out.  But so much of it felt like we were going through the motions of what we were supposed to be doing.  The magic was gone…and it has been for a long time.  I just didn’t want to see it.

Take a long drink from my beer and grab another from the fridge before turning and heading back through the living room to the back porch.  Slip outside and gaze over the lake as I settle myself into a chair.  It’s warm today, and very, very bright.  But I don’t feel like looking for my sunglasses so I just turn my chair so that I’m in the shade and wait for my eyes to adjust.

I like this house.  It’s so much more than I ever expected to have, but sometimes…it feels a little too big, a little too lonely, especially when Sherry isn’t around.  I’ve only been here a year, taking my place on Lake Norman with half of the field, but sometimes it just feels…strange.  Sometimes I miss the sound of the surf and the salt in the air.  It’s just too hot in North Carolina.  Too bright.  And sometimes I can’t help but get homesick.

Close my eyes and for a moment I try to remember the smell of salt and fish and sweat that defined my early life.  But instead I’m reminded of the other place that I really felt comfortable…at least for a little while.  I remember parties and fun, four wheeling and mud and beer, never too much beer.  I remember crashing wherever I fell down and not having a care in the world but making the race on Saturday.  I remember a camaraderie I’d never known outside of my family and a freedom I’d never dreamed.  Part of me wishes I could have that back.

But as I found out last Monday night…you just can’t go back.  We aren’t all a bunch of kids anymore and no matter how hard we try to capture those fleeting months of carefree fun…it’s just not the same.  We can talk about the old times, reminisce, even try to get the same gang all together again.  But it’s only memories.  And as much as I love reliving all of that every chance I get, part of it makes me hurt at the same time because…it’s not the same.  And it never will be.

Take a long drink and slowly open my eyes, squinting at the bright Charlotte sun, my eyes still not completely adjusted to my surroundings.  I wonder, will I ever feel completely comfortable in my own skin again?  Will I ever be happy with the now and stop trying to relive the past?  Finish off my first bottle and reach for the extra I brought with me.  Open it and realize as the warming beer rolls over my tongue that I won’t.  I can’t.  Part of me will always long for those days when everything was new and everyone was just…happy.

We were all still getting to know each other then.  I was the inexperienced rookie and there was no shortage of people around me to pull me in and make me feel at home.  I felt like I could do no wrong, and Junior was a huge part of that.  He brought me down here, gave me a ride, a place to stay and endless encouragement and advice.  I owe everything to him, and I know it…even though so many people don’t realize that.  But…that’s just me.

I don’t think people really understand the real me, the me that’s locked inside.  When I was growing up, work was its own reward.  If you were out on the fishing boats you didn’t have time to pat yourself or anyone else on the back.  If you did well you fed your family.  Everybody knew it.  No one needed to kiss your ass and tell you how wonderful you were.  If someone helped you, you rewarded them with your own sweat and hard work.  You didn’t run around and sing their praises.  Your actions spoke for you.

But that’s not how it works here, and I didn’t even know.  I thought that winning races and championships was the ultimate tribute to the faith Junior and Teresa but in me.  I didn’t know I was expected to publicly kiss ass and worship at his feet.  I’m not Jimmie Johnson.  I don’t wear my heart on my sleeve.  But that doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings.

Scuff the toe of my shoe on the concrete of the porch where the light meets the shadow.  I should be in flip flops.  That’s what everyone wears here.  But I’m not really like everyone else am I?  That’s the point.  I don’t know how to be.  That was made completely obvious on Trackside this week in Pocono.

Lean my head back in my chair, still squinting slightly at the sun, and sip at my now warm beer.  I can’t believe, of all the people they could choose to have me share the stage with that they chose “Happy” Harvick--someone who I doubt has ever had a problem expressing any feeling ever.  He makes it look so easy, the way he grins and never seems to be at a loss for words.  Love him or hate him you have to have an opinion and he obviously relishes every bit of it.  I guess it’s no wonder that someone as out going as he is wouldn’t understand me.

“You need to be more excited,” he told me with that same grin and all I could do was shake my head.  How could he know that the race in Dover was one of the biggest days of my life?  I can’t even describe the relief, the validation, the liberation that winning that race gave me.  But huge shows of emotion have no place where I grew up.  Hard work was its own reward.  There wasn’t always time for a celebration when there were things that needed to be done so you just put on a straight face and went back to work. 

But it didn’t mean you didn’t feel.  At least…it didn’t used to.  But sometimes I wonder if maybe I’ve spent too much time wearing masks that I’ve forgotten who I really am.  Honestly, I can’t even remember that kid I used to be, the one who could get so excited.  I was so, so young and that was before a lifetime of responsibilities that changed me on a fundamental level.  So many years of holding myself in check and now…now it’s just who I am.

And sometimes I hate it.

I wonder, does Junior even know how much of an impact he had on my career, or my life?  Does he have any clue how much his friendship has meant to me?  I think about the last few years, when success turned into adversity and he had to focus on himself instead of his friend.  He had the stress of not winning and missing the Chase, of having his crew taken away and replaced.  So, so much has changed.  He finally had to stop living for fun and I think that’s when we drifted apart.

He was the one who always kept everything going.  He was the expressive one, the life of the party, the one who orchestrated it all.  I was just one color in the brilliant mural of his life.  I could never hold things together on my own.  So when he turned inward, I just stood by, offering my silent support.  Now I wonder if he ever really felt it.

I never pushed him to share anything with me, never asked for more than he freely gave.  I thought that was what a good friend did, but now I’m not sure.  I look at the distance between us, a chasm that was never there before and I wonder if I helped dig it. 

We don’t talk much anymore, and I can’t help but wonder if that’s somehow my fault.  I worked so hard to be successful for him as well as myself but I’m afraid that maybe I let something precious slip away.  I think back over the radio shows I’ve done and remember the easy way all the other guys get along and I just…don’t know how to do that.  And he’s stopped pushing me for it. 

I remember time back at his house where we talked about everything, or maybe I should say he told me everything.  He told me about his plans for Chance2 and JR Motorsports.  He told me about how he wanted to expand his land and build Whiskey River.  He shared it all.  But he didn’t share this.

Clandestine meetings and shop tours I only heard about third and fourth hand are what gave me the indication he was even leaving DEI.  Until an hour ago I had no clue he’d turn traitor and run off to Hendrick.  I didn’t know anything.  Somehow I guess I still thought he told me everything, even though he had no reason to.  Maybe that’s why I honestly thought he’d come back.

But he’s not.

And there is no going back.

Drain the rest of my beer and finally push out of the chair as my eyes have just now grown accustomed to the light.  But it doesn’t matter.  I can’t sit here anymore.  I need to move on.  I need to find my own way.  I just hope that somehow, someway, my once close friend can still be a part of it. 

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Catw00man - catw00man@cryptoffic.com