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Becoming still – physically still – was a skill Lightning was in an active process of learning. And quite frankly he was sick of trying. Scolded as a child for fidgeting, punished as a teenager for overdue homework and adored by the internet for a quirky personality as a young adult. It was a mess he no longer could be bothered to untangle. Lightning had two speeds, on and off.
When Lightning was on it was full steam ahead. Raring to go at seven am, rushing through his day or simply devastatingly productive on a certain task. When Lightning was off…the entire world shut down.
Dishes piled up, the mental effort and the dirty cutlery too much to handle. His entire day spent lounging on the couch scrolling through his phone waiting for something to jumpstart him. If it wasn’t for training, there would be days he wouldn’t leave home. It happened once. He couldn’t leave the house because his racing shoes were upstairs and the idea was too much. Doc thought he was depressed and took him on a week-long holiday in New York.
This isn't even taking into account the impulsivity. He liked to call it an expensive taste, growing up poor meant that he never had anything. But the bulging bank account allowed Lightning to buy whatever he wanted at the drop of a hat. It would be easier to call it an expensive taste if his garage was spilling over with sports cars and expensive shoes. But a Nintendo Switch, Dungeons and Dragons Dice, a fucking water colour set?
Yeah…Lightning didn’t question this part of his life. It was just something he accepted. Everyone has a quirk. But why does this one have to be so exhausting?
-
Lightning never expected to seek out Filmore’s weed that everyone knew about but no one asked. But the solution came to him late one night after an entire week of taking apart a motorcycle he bought on eBay. He had never…ever…wanted a motorcycle. But some guy on Tik Tok was showing his bike and it looked so cool that it kind of just happened. In Lightning’s defence he had managed to learn the mechanics pretty quickly. Only now the motorcycle was working and he was lying awake with nothing to occupy the nothingness in his mind.
Which is how Lightning ended up wandering the warm street barefoot when the glow of Filmores bungalow caught his eye. He’d never smoked pot, stayed away from all that thanks to the trailer park he grew up in. However, he was running out of patience with his own head.
–
Fillmore’s laid back personality vanished as soon as Lightning asked. He set aside his own joint and his haze lifted with a concerning clarity.
“You’re eighteen yeah?”
“Filmore my birthday was last month, I’m twenty,” he laughed nervously.
The hippy proceeded to instruct him how to inhale without smoking out his lungs and quickly took it away after Lightning took a hit. In hindsight Filmore was actually looking after Lightning. In the moment Lightning was all too happy to just let the weed swamp his mind and relax the fizzing beneath his skin.
–
The drug left Lightning’s system overnight but the sleep certainly did him good. Even Doc noticed the pep in his step.
“You’re chipper,” he commented over coffee at Flo’s.
“I went for a walk last night, like when it was dark, because I couldn’t sleep and I have not slept that well all week.”
“Doc smiled before glancing out the window and the motorcycle parked up outside. “I have no idea how you managed to get that thing done in ten days.”
Lightning shrugged nonchalantly. “Once I started, I couldn’t stop. Couldn’t do anything else. Do you reckon Sarge wants it? I don’t really know what to do with it anymore.”
It struck Doc as an odd thing, to suddenly dismiss the item you just rebuilt by hand. “I suppose he might be interested. But you just finished it, surely you’ll take it for a ride.”
Once more Lightning shrugged. “Maybe. Once I finished it I kind of got bored with it.”
“Bored? In ten days?”
He threw his hands in the air. “What is your problem? I built it, I’m done with it.”
Doc raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Alright, Alright. Just curious.”
The confrontation made Lightning uncomfortably aware of his impulsive behaviour. It wasn’t something he questioned because now he had the money to throw around, he didn’t have to second guess himself before typing in his credit card. And now it seemed other people were questioning it before he was.
-
It was meant to be a one off .
It was meant to be a one off .
Lightning didn’t expect the need to be high again. The race had been good. A cruisey third place. But it had left a shadow. The day’s stress and anxiety had left him on edge, twitchy even. It followed him to the after party, the anxiety and twitchiness. His leg bounced when he sat on the couch, his fingers tapped against the bar.
Worst of all, every so often a shiver would run up his spine. The frustration began to eat away at him, the self directed anger that he couldn’t socialise . If it weren’t for his renowned quirky personality and dazzling smile Lightning would have been rejected long ago.
So when the waft of weed met his nose, temptation that was never there crept into the back of his mind. Had he not gotten high with Filmore weeks ago, he would not have considered it. Now it felt like all Lightning could do was chase the feeling that being high gave him. It was the stillness and quietness that he never knew was missing.
At the end of the day, it was scary how easy it was to give in.
-
A cool leather shoe poked him roughly. Lightning cracked his eyes open and through the bleariness a familiar shape bent down.
“Do you know who I am?”
“Doc?” He mumbled grasping at straws. The silence seemed to affirm his guess because familiar hands were pulling him to his feet. Between the floor and the Hornet, Lightning isn’t sure what happened but Doc is buckling the seat belt around him. Although the gesture seems comforting, Lightning gets the feeling it's from a place of duty rather than love.
It is silent as he slowly becomes more perceptive of his surroundings whilst Doc drives away. Eventually the underground carpark beneath their hotel enclosed them. Neither made a move to leave.
“I don’t know who you are. Right now I’m sitting in a car with someone who looks like Lightning McQueen, but has done something I’ve never thought he would do. And I don’t think I’ve ever been so disappointed.”
Never in his life did Lightning think that words could hurt him like that. Like Doc just did. The car was suffocating, the walls closing in around him. Despite his swaying head he scrambled from the Hornet, falling to his hands and knees on the pavement. Before Doc could say anything Lightning was stumbling from the car park, choking back sobs. At the exit ramp he dropped to his knees, his stomach expelling all its food. Whatever he had smoked had not set well. Snot mingled with tears and bile around his face but it didn’t matter.
Because Doc was disappointed in him.
“C’mon breathe kid,” Doc murmured over his shoulder. He produced a handkerchief and gently wiped his mouth around Lightning’s hiccups. He shivered against the cold concrete floor.
“m’ sorry,” he whimpered.
“It’s okay, we’ll talk later. I still love you.”
Lightning pitched forward into Doc’s knees with a sob.
-
Waking up was not as pleasant as the last time Lightning got high. Least of all because he knew there were hard conversations ahead. At some point Doc had managed to get him into a clean shirt but he had evidently decided lying on the bed long ways was not as good as lying with his legs hanging off.
As usual, Doc was reading the paper on the hotel balcony. Gingerly, Lightning joined him but it seemed Doc was not going to start the conversation.
“Can we just get this other with?”
Doc folded the corner of the paper down. “You can start.”
Inevitably, Lightning began to fidget.
“I…I don’t know what you want me to say.”
Across from him, Doc sighed and put the paper down and leaned back in the chair. “You could start with why. Why did you do something that could put your entire career at risk, yourself at risk?”
Okay, direct line of questioning. Thanks, Doc.
The fidgeting became worse and that horrible shiver ran up his spine and into his neck again.
“Sometimes – well, most of the time, the world feels too slow and other times it feels too fast. And when it’s going too slow, I feel like I'm running on the express train and no one can keep up with me. Because I’m going through every train station faster than everyone else, I feel like I don’t really fit. But when the world is too fast …it’s like I’m paralysed.”
Under the intense gaze of Doc, Lightning felt like he had to just keep talking.
“I smoked weed with Filmore once. Once. A month or so back. Didn’t intend to but I took a single hit, felt great, nothing nasty. Last night, I was stressed. Felt like I was on the off beat. Twitchy, shivers up and down my neck. Someone was smoking and…I don’t know. Maybe it was too much, maybe it was bad weed. Before I knew it, you were kicking me.”
It was a tense silence as Doc scrutinised Lightning. Within a matter of words, his attention had shifted from Lightning’s clusterfuck to something else.
“Too fast…too slow. That’s interesting.” Lightning met him with a blank stare. “The shivers in your spine, the fidgeting.These sort of sound like stims or tics.”
Confusion was plastered across Lightning's face. “But…the only people who have those are like…autistic or have tourettes. I don’t have either of those. It’s nothing – it’s just a thing .”
“Is there any history of mental illness or disorders in the family?”
He shrugged, not ready to explain the shit show of his parents.
“Okay…well. I just… I don’t know what I’m saying except for I don’t think you’re exactly neurotypical.”
“Neurotypical?” Lightning asked hesitantly.
“Someone who doesn’t have any mental disorders.”
-
When Lightning got diagnosed three months later with ADHD, Doc kicked himself for not seeing the signs. For overlooking the cortisol releases 1 , for not seeing the faux confidence thinly disgusing low-self esteem, the impulsivness and the fucking executive dysfunction. It killed Doc to think how far Lightning had to go before he got help.
With diagnosis came low points, but never once did Lightning use it as an excuse. Only as an explanation. The low points were hard, but knowing there was a reason , not that he was just broken made it so much easier. Eventually the medication helped once they figured out his dosage. Lightning would be lying if he didn’t cry into Doc’s shoulder when he finally realised the uphill battle he was fighting his entire life, suffering through a brain that chased dopamine over responsibilities.
Forgiveness was never second guessed by Doc. It pained him to remember what he said to Lightning.
“I’m sitting in a car with someone who looks like Lightning McQueen, but has done something I’ve never thought he would do. And I don’t think I’ve ever been so disappointed.”
However, he did put his foot down about smoking pot once Lightning finally got on medication. A long process lay ahead of managing the constant hunt for stimulation. Lightning was learning new things about himself, managing a world through new eyes.
One day he would tell Doc the history of his mother’s mental illness and father’s disposition for a drink. Right now, he was just happy having someone by his side as he figured out how to live.