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At nine years old Jillian Holtzmann still attended public school (her parents would begin to homeschool her in two years due to the school's lack of understanding of Jillian's particular learning style). She lived only a few blocks away and was allowed to walk to the school without either of her parents, provided her neighbour and best friend Alexander walked with her. Alexander was in the year below her at school, but they spent every second that they weren't in class together.
The pair walked hand in hand into the school yard. Alexander was always a little embarrassed at holding a girl's hand. Jillian didn't even seem to register anything about the action. She was just a very physical person and loved to be in contact with the people she liked. As the came up to the notice board by Alexander's classroom Jillian just about pulled his arm from its socket.
"Alex!" she exclaimed in utter glee.
She freed his hand from her grasp and leaned against the notice board with both hands. The notice that had captured her attention was pinned just a bit higher than her eye line. She stood on her toes trying to read what was printed on it (she'd only noticed the clip art picture on it). She quickly gave up on her attempt to make herself taller and tore the sheet from the board.
"Jillian!" admonished Alexander, rubbing his shoulder.
Jillian glanced at him from the corner of her eye, daring him to continue telling her off. He didn't.
She read silently. Alexander gave up.
"What is it Jillian?" he asked her.
She turned to him with wide eyed excitement, "It's a go kart race!"
"Oh," asked Alexander, curiosity mildly awoken.
"Yeah," Jillian went on excitedly, "You get to build your own go kart and enter it in the race, oh! It's a downhill slope! Alex! You do it in pairs. We have to enter this! Please enter this with me. I'll build it and everything, all you have to do is show up. Please, please, please, please! Please Alexander!"
She spoke so rapidly that Alexander could barely understand what she was saying. But he did know one thing when it came to Jillian Holtzmann, when she asked you to do something, there was only ever one answer.
"Yes."
"Really?"
"Yes, okay, sure," repeated Alexander.
"Yes!? Thank you! Thank you! This is going to be so much fun!" Jillian bounced up and down.
One of the big kids, a ten year old, walked past and snickered at her.
"What?" Jillian challenged.
"Go karts are for kids," the big kid replied.
Jillian looked down at herself, then at Alexander, then back to the big kid, "We are kids," she replied.
The big kid snorted, "Whatever," she turned on her heel and left.
At that moment the morning bell rang.
Jillian and Alexander disbanded to their separate classrooms.
The pair met back up again at lunchtime. Alexander was already seated at their table in the cafeteria when Jillian came rushing in, her arms laden with paper.
She threw herself onto a chair opposite her friend, dropping the papers unceremoniously down on the table.
Alexander sipped his milk thoughtfully as he picked up a sheet and looked at it. What was passably a blueprint for a go kart was scribbled out onto the paper in blue marker.
Jillian leaned over to see which plan he was looking at, "Oooh, that's one of my favourites," she said, "what do you think?"
Alexander surveyed the messy stack of paper, some of which had gone into his lunch tray, "When did you have time to do this?"
"During class," Jillian replied simply as she attempted to sort out her design in order of most to least viable.
"Jillian," Alexander groaned, "you didn't get in trouble again, did you?"
Jillian shrugged, "Got a lunchtime detention, but it was totally worth it."
Alexander stared at her for a moment, "This lunchtime?" he clarified.
Jillian nodded, "What do you think of this design, I think I can make some sort of engine for it, to give us extra speed," she pointed at the sheet she'd placed on the top of the pile.
"Jillian," Alexander said, "are you seriously skipping detention right now."
"It's not mandatory," she replied.
"It is."
"Really?"
"Yes."
"Oh," Jillian put down the design, "What do they do if you don't show up for detention?"
Alexander shrugged, "I don't know, but they probably don't let you enter the school's go kart race."
"Oh," Jillian hesitated, "okay..Well, you look through these and put them in your bag when your done. I'll get 'em off you after school. I'll probably just - "
She was cut off by a very red faced teacher calling her name, "Jillian Holtzmann!"
"Good luck sweet talking your way out of this one," murmured Alexander.
"I'll manage," replied Jillian as she slipped off her chair and headed toward the teacher, "I always do."
And she did.
Two weeks later, the day of the race had finally arrived. Jillian and Alexander had spent every afternoon in her parents' garage working on their go kart. Alexander had sat
off to the side and tried to offer helpful suggestions. Jillian's dad had insisted that he be the one to operate the (what he deemed) 'dangerous tools'. For the most part he did, but Jillian was pretty confident that she could operate them too, and minus one minor mishap (that was amended with a bandaid) she could. Jillian designed and put in a small engine all on her own (she hadn't told her dad she was doing that, for fear he might try and butt in).
At last the big day had arrived. Their red and lime green (Alexander and Jillian had each picked a colour) go kart sat at the top of the small incline. There was only 500m of distance between them and the finish line, and with Jillian's homemade engine, they were confident that they could win this race.
Jillian had done a quick check on all the other go karts. She came back to Alexander, a skip in her step.
"Not only in ours the best looking," she sung, "but it looks like it's the only one specifically designed to conquer this slope, we got this Alexander."
Alexander was about to reply when he was interrupted by an adult shouting through a megaphone.
"All contestants to their vehicles, all contestants to their vehicles!"
Alexander donned a helmet and climbed into the go kart. Jillian stood behind him. She was in charge of starting the engine and pushing the kart off. Alexander was the designated driver.
"On your mark!"
Jillian started the engine.
"Get set!"
She braced herself.
"GO!!!!!"
Jillian ran the kart to the start line and let go with an almighty push.
"GO ALEXANDER!!!" she screeched as the go kart sped down the slope.
Alexander was zooming off at an incredible speed. He reached the finish line in a matter of seconds. He kept going.
"Woh-oh," said Jillian, eyes wide.
She took off running down the hill, "Alexander, pull the brake!" she shouted as she ran.
She was vaguely aware of the announcer telling her to get off the road, but she cared too much for her friend to obey.
She watched as Alexander swerved the kart and hit a tree side on.
"Alex!!" she screeched.
She kept running, only slowing when she saw a hand waving. He was okay. She slowed to a stop as she reached the remains of their go kart.
"Alexander, you kay?" she asked.
He nodded, a little shaken.
"What went wrong?" she mused, mainly to herself, she tried to inspect the remnants of the engine.
Alexander cleared his throat. She looked at him. In his hand was the hand brake that she had installed on her own. It was no longer attached to the vehicle.
Jillian bit her lip, "My bad."
Alexander shrugged, "Did we win?" he asked.
Jillian's eyes lit up, "Yes!"
She helped him up and the pair ran towards the judges table to collect their prize - a big gleaming trophy.
They went home empty handed, apparently it was against the rules to put an engine in their go kart. Jillian had tried to explain to the judges that, in her words, "That's stupid" but to no avail.
"Hey," said Alexander, trying to cheer her up, "we were the only ones with an actually cool go kart at least."
"Yeah," said Jillian forlornly.
"And, you were the only person there who was smart enough to build your own engine!"
Jillian smiled at him.
When they got to Jillian's house she explained to her parents why they had not come home with a prize. Her parents agreed that it was, indeed, stupid and her mother left the house a few minutes later, after calling Alexander's parents and inviting him to stay over.
Jillian's mother came back with a plethora of, what she called, 'victory sweets' for their 'victory sleepover'.
Jillian and Alexander celebrated harder than an eight and nine year old had ever celebrated in the history of ever (Alexander's words).
That was the day that Jillian learned that she wasn't always going to get the approval of society, but she could always find love and friendship and, yes, even victory in the people she held close to her.