Backroad Fate

Chapter 27

              (Madison's point of view)

             Saturday, Feb. 14 

     It's an hour before the Sprint Unlimited and Denny is really nervous. 

             7:45 p.m.

  They are starting the opening ceremony. Which is pretty amazing.

            7:55 p.m.

  It's time for the drivers to get into their cars. I have Sophia in my arms and Denny has Taylor. He gives Taylor a kiss, then Sophia, then me. 

               "I love you guys." He says to us. 

               "We love you, too. Good luck." I said to him.

          Green Flag:

     Denny's mom took Sophia and Taylor back to the motor home, so I could watch the race. Boris is up here on the pit box with me. I'm really getting the hang of this PR thing. I love it. We had a couple of really good pit stops. 

        Checkered Flag:

   Denny ended up finishing 19th. But his teammate Matt Kenseth won. So he wasn't too upset about the finish. After about an hour of doing interviews and finishing the press conference  Denny finally came back to the motor home. 

     One week later- Thursday Feb. 19:

     Denny is racing in the second Budweiser Duel race.

    8:25 p.m.

    Time for Denny to get into the car. We do our normal ritual before he gets in. Denny and Danica got into a wreck during practice. She had to go to a backup car and he didn't. She was angry because she thought he crashed her. I'm here to tell you, he doesn't race like that. If she's got a problem she can come to me. 

   3 laps to go:

    Denny was running ninth and he was coming up on Danica. He better watch out, I thought. She's like a school bus, got to give her room. Suddenly, Danica got loose and went sideways. She spun with Brian Scott and Bobby Labonte. They then spun into the grass.  Oh gosh, I thought. She's gonna think Denny wrecked her.  

    When the race was over I climbed over the pit wall, prepared to talk to Denny. Then, Danica starts rushing at him.  Yelling at him, and pounding on his chest. 

     "Seriously." I thought to myself. "She loves drama. If she can't race when someone is within 2 feet of her, then she needs to get out of NASCAR and racing, altogether. Then I hear her play the "I'm your friend" card and I thought to myself, "Really, this isn't middle school." 

     Then Tony Stewart comes into the argument and says watch the video. Are you serious right now. He did not wreck her. Just because she gets loose when someone gets close to her, doesn't mean we should give her  10 feet of room all the way around the car, the entire race. I went up to Denny, "You handled that well." I said to him, still a little angry. He just looked at me, and said, "Come on, let's go back to the motor home." 

   At the motor home:

   Danica got to her motor home at the same time we did. While she got off her golf cart she looked at me and rolled her eyes. 

     "You got a problem with me?" I asked her, Denny looked at me, "Stop." He said. I looked at him, and decided I should just let it go, but while I was walking towards the door to the motor home, I turned around. 

     "You know what... I'm not gonna stop." I walked towards Danica who was still looking at me. 

     "If you think everyone on that race track's gonna give you room, then you've got another thing coming. If you can't handle this kind of racing then I suggest you go race bumper cars."

    Denny grabbed my arm, "Come on Maddie. She's not worth it."

    Danica looked at me with a smirk on her face. "I seriously doubt you can race like I do. "

    Denny looked at Danica, "You shouldn't have went there." He said, knowing how serious I was about racing. 

    I got in Danica's face, "I know, for a fact, that I can race better than you." 

   Denny looked at me. "Come on. Let it go."

  "No. She thinks she's better than everyone else and I'm sick of it." I yelled. 

  Danica looked at me, "Fine, you're on. Let's race." 

  Denny sighed and let go of my arm, "You've got to be kidding me." 

   (Denny's point of view)

  Danica looked at me, then back at Madison. 

 "We'll race tomorrow." Danica said.

 "Alright." Madison replied. 

   Madison walked past me and towards the motor home. I grabbed her hand and she looked at me. 

  "What?" She asked me.

  "Come with me." I told her. 

  "I'm not apologizing to her." She said.

  "I don't want you to." I told her. 

  She gave me a shocked look. 

  "What?" I asked her.

  "I would've thought that you would want me to apologize."

  "No, I don't. I want you to go out there tomorrow and beat her." I said to her, smiling, but still serious.

....... "You're kidding, right?" 

  "Nope." I replied, starting to walk and still holding her hand. 

  "Where are you taking me?" She asked, confused. 

  "To Joe." I replied, knowing she would freak out. 

She stopped, "Joe... as in Joe Gibbs?"

 "Yeah. But call him Coach." I said to her. 

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