Work Text:
The sudden sound of water slamming into tile makes him jump, even though he knows it’s coming. His nerves are on edge, his senses still painfully raw and unbalanced. His entire body is a tangled snarl of tension, and standing here now, in the aftershock of euphoria, against the aftermath of a heavy adrenaline crash, he just feels tired.
He doesn’t want to do this here, where rogue memories and whispers of what could’ve been – what almost was – skitter about in the shadows of the ceiling. But ‘here’ is also away from curious eyes, from the fire-fly flicker of too many cameras and the announcers’ tower of Babel, away from the cherished but overwhelming exuberance of his family. Besides which, he is today very far from home – and as with all religions, there are certain rituals which must be observed, irrelevant of location.
Still, the shower at home is better, with the familiar yellow ducks on the curtain that his mother insists are for Spritle but which are really for her – another strategic invasion of color in a house with enough shadows of its own. He misses too the crack in the wall from Rex’s balled fist the night he’d flipped over in the straightaway, a red smear of overconfidence not two feet from the checkered tile. That crack has become like a prayer stone; he’s memorized its contours with increasingly knowledgeable fingers, retracing its lines when he thinks of adding a few cracks of his own.
But this isn’t home. The flawless expanse of tile is cold beneath his bare feet, the stainless-steel swan-neck spigot alien and strange. Still, the water’s hot and strong, its steady patter a gentle hand-down from the thunder of the race track, and he finally allows himself to close his eyes as he’s enveloped by the damp, steamy mist.
There’s so much to wash away tonight.
He starts with his hair. He takes his time working in the shampoo, coating each helmet-mashed, sweat-slick strand, using his nails to dig down deep. Then he ducks his head beneath the steady jet stream and lets it all wash away. First, he concentrates on the throbbing spot just behind his ear where he slams down on the breaks too hard, wheeling the Mach 6 into a tailspin, choosing to scrape her side into the wall rather than sacrifice any more speed. The impact jolts him badly, so hard that the helmet’s hardly a failsafe; he snarls a cruse as he bites his tongue, the ugly word coated in bitter blood as Sparky barks anxiously in his headset – but thank god there’s no blood from his head injury, thank god it can’t run in his eyes, and he lets it all slide down his tense shoulders, broken up insubstantial by the suds, pooling about the drain – gone.
The next part is a little harder.
It takes a few successive rinses before he can dislodge the feel of foreign fingers, snarled tight and painful in his hair. The memory is as sharp and insistent as the tug against his protesting scalp, the aching muscles in his neck wrenched harshly to the side, fingers ghosting along his jaw, still sore from the sickening crack of knuckles on flesh, the grated snag of the locker door digging painfully into his back. His lips are bruising as they’re crushed in the ultimate pantomime of intimacy, and even though the pain in his elbow when it connects with the razor-blade curve of foreign ribs is satisfying, it’s not enough. He tastes blood, different blood, though still caused by his own carelessness. He’s worn naïveté like a shield all this time, but it’s made him complacent, and now he’s paying the price. It’s not the bruises, the scratches, that are the problem – he’s dealt with similar all his life. It’s the intent behind them – different from before. More dangerous, more ingrained, and he scrubs viciously at the phantom sensations, scabbing them over with new, more innocent bruises.
And eventually, these, too, trace one last, lingering touch along the ridges of his spine, swirling about his ankles, cloying, oozing – and then they’re gone.
Speed braces his forehead against the tiled wall, forcing his breathing to even out, concentrating on the slick dampness and waiting for the shadows to recede. Then he inhales – once, twice, searching out stability – and begins again.
As he dabs carefully at the discolored smears marring his tanned skin, he can’t help but wonder when racing became something more than two hands on the wheel of a flying car. He knows he’s done something good today; upset the balance, broken the rules, restored some measure of integrity to something he’s always cherished. But he also knows that that in of itself isn’t enough. The imperfections on his body will heal much more quickly than the blemishes to his sport, and he feels tired, wonders how much further it will have to go. So far, the sacrifices have included much more than a shattered family, shattered cars, shattered pride – he wipes angrily at his lips with the back of his hand, trying to let the steam ease away his embarrassment, his rage. He’d kissed Trixie with those lips earlier, and that was right – his best girl, his best friend. What had happened earlier wasn’t right at all, but he could take it. But what if it hadn’t been his lips? What if it had been hers?
How far would this have to go?
Speed grinds the bar of soap against his taunt shoulder blade, scrubbing viciously as he wonders what will happen if water isn’t enough this time.
The door to the shower room suddenly clicks shut – he isn’t alone anymore. Speed tenses warily, holding his breath as he tries to squint through the haze.
“Relax, Speed – it’s just me.”
Racer X’s voice echoes strangely along the cavernous walls and through the hissing water, picking up an almost desolate quality that Speed’s never heard before. Distorted by sound and steam, the other man is barely more than a ghost blurred just beyond recognition, just beyond Speed’s sight. The younger racer doesn’t relax.
“I figured you’d be long gone by now. Come back for your socks?” The words are simple, innocent enough, but there’s a measure of accusation to Speed’s tone that doesn’t go unnoticed. X chose to take part in one family ritual, and his appearance here now suggests knowledge of another. If ghosts really want to fool anyone, they need to remember to stay hollow and indistinct – but it seems X has left his white sheet at home.
He doesn’t bother with a response now, just continues to advance soundlessly in the billowing steam. “You’re going to get wet,” Speed warns, because X is still clothed in all except his tuxedo jacket, and because he’s not sure what else to say.
“Mm. That’s usually what happens when one encounters water.”
Suddenly all too conscious of his own nudity – embarrassed to be caught without clothes or shields – Speed turns back to the wall. “If you’d wait outside, we can talk. I’m almost done here.” He wants to add that the locker room is for Grand Prix racers only, but he can’t bring himself to be quite that petulant. Yet.
“No, you’re not.” And Racer X is somehow right behind him. Speed jumps when he feels calloused fingers lightly touching his back, even though he’s expecting it. He doesn’t flinch away, but his breathing grows ragged, wary. “You haven’t washed here yet,” X murmurs, tracing the invisible lines of worry and stress – slammed against the lockers so hard it knocks his breath loose in his lungs, slammed against his car seat so hard it knocks the light loose in his eyes – that only the two of them can see. “Or here.” X drops a feather-light touch to the bony curve of his hip crushed tightly in a bruising grip as it’s jerked upward into foreign heat, so hard it hurts when Trixie braces herself against it later, her arms thrown joyously around his neck. “Or here –“
But Speed turns before the touch can land, a challenging look in his too-bright eyes. “Are you suggesting that I’m fragile?” he asks – or at least, that’s what the words ask. The defiant tilt of his head is asking something else entirely.
“You’re alive, aren’t you?” X murmurs in response; his arched eyebrow replies, So what are you going to do about it? And isn’t that just so typical, for him to answer every inquiry with another question?
For a long moment, both racers are very still. The water has soaked X completely through, the material of his white shirt now flimsy and translucent against the plain of his chest. His hair sticks in long, damp tendrils to the contours of his face, softening them, making them less solid and distinct. It’s easier to see other lines, other angles in their place now, and Speed knows he’s come to a crossroads.
This ritual is all about choice, after all; what to keep, what to ingrain, like permanent ink on skin – and what to let wash silently down the drain.
Speed lays a cautious hand on X’s damp shoulder and finds it solid. He’s not a ghost. So now Speed has to decide what he really is.
In the past couple of months, Speed has run a very hard race with facts; the corruption of the racing world, the injustice of money-hungry officials, the callousness of racers willing to sell their souls for gold – the realization that purity and determination are easily broken down by sheer, brute force. He lost that race. But when he and his family invented a new truth, personified in the sleek, polished lines of the Mach 6, he found the strength to conquer everything.
The hand resting on X’s shoulder shifts to curl at the base of the taller man’s skull, and when Speed stands on tiptoe to kiss him, they both have their answer.
When they finally pull away from each other, Speed doesn’t blush; he merely presses the bar of soap into X’s hand. “I can’t reach it all by myself,” he says quietly, turning back to face the wall.
“No one can,” comes the equally hushed response, and X sets about firmly washing Speed’s back.
Quietly, without ceremony, they make their choices; everything else is, quite simply, washed away.