#sunday jorge

[lustfulcat]

Official holiday art! The gift that keeps on giving!

[sorblr]

secco sunday is almost over in my timezone </3 and i've been too sleepy/busy to make art BUT i do have yesterday's super scuffed doodles

i found secco's jorge joestar design by chance (haven't read the book yet, but i'll get to it 10000x faster now that i know secco's in it) and my jaw dropped

it's a little bit tricky to draw and get right but i really like the design a lot so i'll def do some more eventually

i have projects i'm overdue on and i take forever actually making art but my dedication to producing stupid little doodles of this stupid little man does not falter

[sagubulan]

Sunday would be an epic the musical fan

[virtuouslibertines69]

"There’s so much I haven’t told her lately, about how quickly my soul is aging, how it feels like a basement I keep filling with everything I’m tired of surviving." - Philip Schultz, from The God of Loneliness: Selected and New Poems; “It’s Sunday Morning in Early November,” Art by Jorge Mascarenhas

[radioprinz]

Preview: Santiago Cabrera as Jorge Sanchez in The Cleaning Lady Season 3

Gifs coming soon

stay tuned

[batsplat]

Between Marc’s 2015 Cota qualifying and his 2019 Brno qualifying which one do you find more impressive. (Also, what made him such a good qualifier cause if I’m remembering correctly vale and Jorge are tied for number of career poles at 64 or something and Marc has 94 I think, did his riding style just suit fast 1 lap times?)

oh, I'm definitely more of a 2019 brno type of girl. 2015 is a fun bit, great sense of drama with the propped up bike and the sprinting and all that, good job keeping his head under pressure. but fundamentally once he gets to the line in time to do his lap, it's not all that surprising he pops it on pole at one of his specialist circuits. still, cool visuals with the bike buckling under him and everything, got the novelty value going for it. brno 2019 is more fun because it is genuinely just an exceptional performance even by his standards, and the whole session is enjoyable to watch with everyone unsure about what the right tyre call is. when they say it's started raining again!! people taking their umbrellas out while marc is clinging onto that dry line... when he does another lap and goes even faster... idk, I do enjoy a proper good mixed/wet performance anyway, that one was definitely memorable. it's also the session where he pisses off alex rins, prompting rinsy saying that marc doesn't respect other riders, so it gets an automatically boost for me in causing some much-needed drama

as for why he's such a good qualifier - well, you mention the record vs valentino and jorge, but given the respective scopes of their careers I don't think it's quite right to group them together. the tiers basically go casey/marc, then jorge somewhere in the middle, then dani/valentino at the bottom. (also, I have the ghost of jorge lorenzo on my shoulder telling me to set the record straight: he ended his career on 69 poles to valentino's 65.) not to be facetious, but the reason why marc was so good at qualifying is that... well, look, he's just an incredibly gifted rider. he's fast. or so I've heard. you wouldn't really describe him as more of a saturday than a sunday man either - he was just very well-rounded. both marc and casey were very adept at throwing the bike around the circuit whatever the conditions... just kind of that x factor that allowed them to consistently hustle up a fast lap in every situation. if anything, it's valentino who was the outlier here in terms of career achievements vs qualifying prowess - he was the one who was just such an exceptional racer that any slight shortcomings as a qualifier only ever cost him later in his career (where his qualifying did begin to drop off, but that is also an age/format thing). obviously still a very good qualifier by normal standards... it was just never his forte. valentino had a career long preference towards harder tyres (which is partly a height + weight thing in terms of getting heat into the tyres), plus he was generally at his strongest late in races when the grip of the tyres has gone and it was a lot more slippery for everyone. his working process was also a bit more... hm, incremental. languid, shall we say. than marc's and especially casey's, who of course was always the guy who was fast everywhere immediately. the way valentino went about things, he was more prone to pulling some pace out of the bag last minute - plus prioritising race set-up, playing to his strengths and banking on a decent qualifying result to be enough to keep him in the mix. and jorge's somewhere in the middle where he WAS very good at stringing together a fast lap and was also super consistent about putting that thing on the front row - just not casey/marc good - because... well, in this rather potent group of riders, that's roughly where he falls by most metrics

bit more talk about this here, but in terms of actual stats... here's how it shakes out (this is just for premier class starts and is already a little out of date for marc, I'll update some of these spreadsheets once the season's done)

and just for seasons where they were top five in the championship standings, to limit it to the broadly competitive seasons

obviously you still have to apply a little context here - for instance it'd be fair to say that casey had tougher competition on average in qualifying than either marc or valentino. but like. just to give you a broad sense of where they're at

[spockvarietyhour]

[spicyseal]

Thank you Pope Francis.

As a lesbian trans woman, religion can be a difficult subject for me. I was raised Catholic, and I always viewed Jesus’ teachings as lessons that people should protect the marginalized, accept those different from them, so on and so forth. When I realized I was trans I started to fear the idea of going to church. I began to feel unwelcome in communities which are supposed to be welcoming of all people. I still feel uncomfortable with the ways in which so many people use religion to justify their hate and to harm others. I still feel anxious at the thought of going to church. Pope Francis, though, helped me feel more welcome in the Catholic faith.

He taught humility, mercy, and compassion. He spent his time as Pope advocating to protect the oppressed and condemning the oppressors. He fought for the LGBTQ community, women, immigrants, just about every group who have been marginalized in our world. He criticized capitalism, and welcomed socialists and communists in the church. He stressed the need to protect our planet from climate change. He committed the church to the abolition of the death penalty. He apologized to indigenous peoples for the harm the church dealt them. Francis focused on helping the poor and fought for social justice.

I still of course have disagreements with the church on issues, and I still don’t feel entirely welcome in an environment which has for so long justified hate and bigotry, used religion as a weapon. But Pope Francis made me feel more welcome in the church, and reminded me that Jesus’ teachings of love and acceptance are what I believed in from the start. Pope Francis helped me realize that I can be Catholic without agreeing with some of the church’s actions and teachings. That what’s important is uplifting and defending marginalized communities. Pope Francis made me feel welcome as a trans woman.

It’s fitting that Pope Francis’ final full day on the Earth was Easter Sunday. He was a man who exemplified the mercy and love that Jesus preached, and his last day on Earth was the day Jesus was resurrected. May Pope Francis rest in peace. I hope his legacy will continue to comfort people the way he comforted me, and I hope his work will continue to push the Catholic Church in a progressive direction.

[intosnarkness]

Several Sentence Sunday

thanks to @dreamtigress for the tag, as always!

From the opening to Ch6 of Private Myths, which is so early in the draft process that I refuse to promise this will be in the final BUT

The book that he grabs is a ratty old paperback, water stained and dog eared. It's old enough that Kaz doesn't actually know where it came from, only that he found it on his bookshelf one day like it had always been there. There’s a drawing on the front of a Zemeni man on horseback, firing guns at an unseen assailant. A half-kruge cowboy novel, the kind of pulpy, pre-teen nonsense that Jordie used to have a whole shelf of back on the farm. The kind they might have burned for warmth, when things got bad.  Carefully, as though disarming a delicate alarm, Kaz flips the pages of the book open. Near the back, carefully pressed between two illustrations of the frontier, he finds the flower. It's desiccated and smashed flat from time and weight, the colors drained and the spiky petals of the blossom have gone too brittle to touch. But he pulled it out of his hair six months ago, and he has to keep looking at it every so often to remind himself that this is real. What is happening to them is real.

[davecortel]

Spent the Easter Sunday with my friends @ The Island Nature Spring in San Jorge, Samar

[tilbageidanmark]

(See all the other memes I’ve made..)

[thesingingrevolution]

Rest in Peace Pope Francis 🕊️🤍

[roennq]

One more:

Happy Birthday, Santiago Cabrera!

Characters played by Santiago Cabrera

[watercolor-hearts]

It's the second week of the RPF Summer Camp, so here's my rec list with some really great fics. ❤ I tried to tag everybody but sadly I don't know everybody's Tumblr usernames, so if your story is on this list and you'd like to be tagged, please let me know. (Same goes for if you want me to remove your story/stories from the list.)

If you read any of these stories, don't forget to kudos/comment/bookmark to support the author and motivate them to write more. ❤

The worries of a brother by @ray935sworld

Luca & Vale, Marc/Vale • 2,3k • accidents • worry • fear • comfort • brothers

forwards beckon rebound by @honeyvettel

Pecco/Luca • 1,7k • non-sexual age play • emotional hurt/comfort • mental breakdown • set after lemans 2025

But I Wanna Stay With You Until We're Grey And Old by Anonymous

Pecco/Bez/Fabio • 2,4k • alpha/beta/omega dynamics • cuddling & snuggling • comfort no hurt • secret relationship • mating bites

If We Can’t Stop The Bleeding, We Don’t Have To Fix It by Anonymous

Pecco/Bez/Fabio • 15,5k • alpha/beta/omega dynamics • miscarriage • accidents • grief/mourning • polyamory

Unspoken Truths by @nympheny

Pecco/Luca • 7,4k • trans male character • coming out • love confession • internalized transphobia • (emotional) hurt/comfort

ami, amiche, amore by @ray935sworld

Bez/Marc, Pecco/Luca • 5,6k • de-aging • fluff

Skin To Skin by @fredwardart

Pecco/Bez • 0,4k • tooth-rotting fluff • forehead kisses • minor references to nudity

I’ll Force You To Heal. by Crazy_Shark

Marc/Vale • 2,4k • mental health issues • mental breakdown • self-harm

Loving by F1_rabbit

Bez/Luca • 0,1k • bad dream • comfort

we saw you from across the bar, and we really dig your vibe by @camilleisback

Aleix/Jorge, Pedro/Fermín, Aleix/Jorge/Pedro • 6,6k • non-famous • swingers • unresolved romantic tension • shameless smut • threesome • first time • yacht sex

high humidity by @certainstarfishllama

Marc/Vale • 12,2k • complicated relationships • idiots with feelings • reconciliation

A parting gift by Anonymous

Bez/Edo, Bez/Marianna • 2,7k • inanimate object porn

I have your back by @akane-likes-purple

Pecco/Jorge • 2,4k • sickfic • fever and food poisoning • established relationship • fluff

Through the glass by ToniPeperoni

Aleix/Jorge, Aleix/Jorge/Maverick • 1,5k • accidental voyeurism • masturbation • smut

will you make me feel better? by Anonymous

Pecco/Bez, Pecco/Domi, Pecco/Bez/Domi, Bez/Domi • 1,1k • domestic fluff • polyamory

Breathe In, Breathe Out by @obscurereferencegenerator

Pecco/Domi • 2k • hurt/comfort • fluff

team bonding activities by @camilleisback

Bez/Jorge • 4,6k • drunken flirting • smut • porn with plot • blow jobs • anal sex

First time lucky by @camilleisback

Pecco/Bez • 5,3k • sickfic • hurt/comfort • smut • hand jobs • implied/referenced cheating • fluff • idiots in love

[podfic] Sunday Pharmacy by zuihitsu

Marc/Vale • podfic • sickfic • mild hurt/comfort • masturbation

gesundheit by @certainstarfishllama

Pecco/Bez • 3,3k • mild hurt/comfort • fluff • pre-relationship • sickfic • comfort

Fortune’s Favour by blue_and_grey_petals

Marc/Vale • 3,2k • mixed media • social media • grider • blind dating • brotherly shenanigans

Normal and Cool by @obscurereferencegenerator

Pecco/Enea • 3,2k • boypussy enea • slight hurt/comfort • well meaning dumbass pecco

Midnight wishes by blue_and_grey_petals

Pecco/Bez • 0,4k • fluff

warm in your arms by @certainstarfishllama

Pecco/Bez • 0,8k • australian gp 2024 • hurt/comfort • minor injuries • established relationship

Actually, This Time by @obscurereferencegenerator

Marc/Vale • 2,3k • hurt/comfort • accidental drug overdose

When you need a little love, I got a little love to share by firetruckyeah

Fabio/Maverick • 1,3k • motorcycle crash • angst with a happy ending • (emotional) hurt/comfort • panic attacks

[mariacallous]

Sede vacante. The Holy See is vacant.

Pope Francis, the first Latin American pontiff in history, died at age 88 on Monday at his residence in Vatican City. Born Jorge Mario Bergoglio in Argentina, he led the Catholic Church for 12 years.

Francis was hospitalized for 38 days in February for double pneumonia. His doctors later revealed that he had had two close brushes with death. Francis was discharged from the hospital a month ago and had made several public appearances since. Most notably, he attended the Vatican’s celebrations on Easter Sunday. “Dear brothers and sisters, Happy Easter,” Francis told the crowds, before being driven across St. Peter’s Square on the popemobile, waving at the faithful. In hindsight, it was a fitting send-off for a pontiff who had become the people’s pope.

At times like these, the ways of the Vatican can appear mysterious. What happens after a pope dies? Who governs the Holy See? And how is a pope elected? Most non-Catholics are probably trying to remember the plot of the 2024 movie Conclave right now.

All eyes are now on the camerlengo, or chamberlain, Cardinal Kevin Joseph Farrell. He will run the Holy See until a new Holy Father is elected. No time is wasted after the pope dies. His body is quickly embalmed and then put on display for three days in St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City.

Next comes the funeral, which also takes place in St. Peter’s Basilica or, if the weather permits, just outside, on St. Peter’s Square. The dean of the College of Cardinals always presides over the ceremony. Giovanni Battista Re, the current dean, has served in the Curia since the 1960s. If anyone knows how to compose a homily, it’s a man who has seen the deaths of multiple popes.

Since the beginning of the 20th century, popes have been buried in the ornate grottoes beneath St. Peter’s Basilica. But, in 2023, Francis decided to break with protocol. He will be interred in St. Mary Major, a basilica in the center of Rome, because of his “great devotion” to the Virgin Mary.

Although the official mourning period for the pope lasts nine days, the process for selecting a successor starts as soon as he has drawn his last breath. As the Italian proverb goes, morto un papa, se ne fa un altro. When a pope dies, another is made. In other words, not even the vicar of Christ is irreplaceable.

The new pope is chosen by conclave, the papal election dramatized in the hit film. It occurs roughly two weeks after the pope’s funeral. Only cardinals under the age of 80 can take part in it. This means that, out of a current total of 252 cardinals, 138 will pick the next leader of the Catholic Church—a global institution with more than 400,000 clergy members and 1.3 billion lay Catholics.

The conclave occurs in the Sistine Chapel, beneath a ceiling painted by Michelangelo. The doors are locked, and the cardinal electors can have no contact with the outside world. During this time, they are supposed to let the Holy Spirit guide their decision. Concretely speaking, it works like this: Cardinals are given a piece of paper with a header in Latin that reads simply, “I elect as supreme pontiff,” and they write down the name of their chosen candidate below.

To win, a candidate must secure a two-thirds majority. Until that happens, voting continues. Only one round is held on the first day of the conclave, but after that, up to four rounds can take place each day.

While the conclave is à huis clos, the outside world watches closely. The cardinals have only one way to communicate their progress: a chimney on St. Peter’s Square, connected to the Sistine Chapel. When a vote is inconclusive, the cardinals burn the ballots. In a separate furnace, they add chemicals to produce black smoke. When a pope has been elected, they burn the ballots one last time; this time, the smoke turns white. Habemus papam.

Conclaves vary in length. In 2013, Francis was elected after only 24 hours. By comparison, it took cardinals five days and 14 rounds to choose Pius XI in 1922.

Though the conclave is the final act in “making” a pope, what happens before matters, too. In the days leading up to it, the dean of the College of Cardinals convenes general congregations. All the cardinals, regardless of their age, take part. General congregations provide an opportunity to discuss the direction of the church and the qualities that the next pope should have.

The whole process is akin to politics, just swap the dark suits for bright red soutanes. “If history teaches us anything about papal conclaves, it is that the Holy Spirit is far from the only influence at play,” said Jessica Wärnberg, a historian who has conducted extensive research in Vatican archives and written a book on Rome and the popes, titled City of Echoes. She added that it has always been political. “Historically, major political powers, such as France and Spain, worked hard to sway voting. Today, factions are shaped along more ideological lines.”

But campaigning for the papacy is nothing like campaigning in a liberal democracy. For one, it’s very hush-hush. There are no leaflets or campaign ads. For another, cardinals eyeing the papacy are never open about their ambitions. Instead, they rely on allies to quietly drum up support. Subtlety is the mot d’ordre.

That’s not to say Vatican politicking isn’t ruthless. Think Game of Thrones but without the bloodshed. Various factions in the church push their champion. But if he isn’t able to garner enough support, a champion is ditched without mercy, no matter how preeminent he might be.

And, just as in Game of Thrones, it isn’t immediately clear who will win in the end. This is especially true of the upcoming conclave. “All bets are off when it comes to predicting who will succeed Francis,” said Philip Shenon, a former investigative reporter at the New York Times and the author of Jesus Wept, a new book on the modern church. “There’s no obvious front-runner.”

One reason why is that Francis completely overhauled the College of Cardinals. He appointed 110 out of the 138 cardinals who will vote in the conclave. That’s nearly 80 percent. The catch: Many of them come from far-flung corners of the world. They have spent little time together and therefore barely know one another.

Who wins is thus anyone’s guess. “It might be somebody very exotic, since many cardinals are from the other side of the world,” said Frédéric Martel, the author of In the Closet of the Vatican, an investigation into homosexuality in the church that draws on 1,500 interviews, including with prelates. “In fact, it might be a big surprise,” Martel added, “since nobody will have known of the sociology of the new conclave!”

This hasn’t stopped all of Rome from buzzing about the papabili, or the “pope-able.” For Martin Palmer, the CEO of FaithInvest, an NGO that works closely with the church, and a member of the Vatican COVID-19 Commission, the next pontiff will come from one of two factions within the church: He will belong either to “the right wing” in the United States and Africa or to the more liberal “Francis appointments” in Asia and Africa.

On the right, Palmer identifies Robert Sarah, a 79-year-old cardinal from Guinea, as a papabile. Sarah has long been in the mix to succeed Francis. A former prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, the Vatican department overseeing the Latin Church’s liturgy, he is the anti-Francis candidate.

A traditionalist heavyweight who doesn’t pull his punches, Sarah has echoed the white-nationalist Great Replacement conspiracy theory. Europe, he said in 2019, is at risk of being “invaded by foreigners, just as Rome has been invaded by barbarians.” As he sees it, the continent is locked in an existential battle with the Islamic faith. “If Europe disappears, and with it the priceless value of the Old Continent, Islam will invade the world, and we will completely change culture, anthropology, and moral vision.”

Without surprise, Sarah takes a hard line on homosexuality. He has slammed Francis’s decision to allow same-sex couples to receive sacraments. And he has likened “homosexual and abortion ideologies” to “Nazi-Fascism and communism.”

Another conservative contender, Palmer said, is Raymond Burke, a 76-year-old cardinal from the United States. Best known for his love of the cappa magna, Burke is as outspoken in his statements as in his fashion choices. He has repeatedly criticized Francis—so much so that the pope took away his subsidized Vatican apartment. The American papabile has close ties to the Make America Great Again movement. For many years, he was an ally of Steve Bannon until the two fell out. Still, Burke remains a power player in U.S. conservative Catholic circles.

In the age of Trump, however, that may be a liability. Palmer, who was recently at the Vatican, said that “the negative impact of Trump around the world has significantly cast a cloud over right-wing American rhetoric. Burke and by implication Sarah are seen as tainted by their association with Trump-style politics.”

As a consequence, a staunch conservative like Sarah or Burke may not have the numbers to win. “Sarah and Burke have zero chance—or as many chances as Trump to win the Eurovision,” Martel quipped. “They are ultra-right-wing and ultra-marginal figures. It’s a joke!”

Shenon put it more diplomatically. “Well, conservatives could try, and they probably will,” he said. “But when the doors to the Sistine Chapel are bolted shut, there just aren’t that many of them in the College of Cardinals—at least not enough of the rock-ribbed archconservatives who would vote for a candidate who would reverse Francis’s legacy.”

The next pontiff, Shenon predicts, will at least maintain some degree of continuity with Francis. “Whatever happens, it’s fair to assume that the next pope will not have a dramatically different vision of the church’s future,” Shenon said. He believes that the cardinal electors appointed by Francis “doubtless feel great loyalty to Francis’s progressive legacy.”

Among them, Shenon identifies Cardinal Pietro Parolin—the Holy See’s secretary of state since 2013—as an “obvious candidate.” The 70-year-old Italian prelate would respect the late pope’s agenda. He has said Francis’s reforms were “the action of the Spirit, [so] there can be no U-turn.” If the cardinal electors are looking for a safe pair of hands, someone who knows the Curia and can safeguard Francis’s achievements, then Parolin is their man.

In a similar vein, Martel points to Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, the 69-year-old archbishop of Bologna. Zuppi has Francis’s trust. Crucially, as the head of the Italian Episcopal Conference, he’s also popular with many prelates.

But if they want a bolder choice, then cardinal electors could go for the Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson. The 76-year-old is the chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and Social Sciences. He has long been ranked as a papabile, even though his star has dimmed after he fell out with Francis. But don’t count him out, said Palmer, who has worked with Turkson and thinks that “he really speaks for the engaged African Church.”

Palmer also thinks that Cardinal Luis Tagle, the former archbishop of Manila, has a serious chance. Hailed as the “Asian Francis,” Tagle is a progressive. He backed Francis in his drive to protect the environment and his plans for a more inclusive church. “My vision for a synodal church is a church that rediscovers this wonderful gift of the Spirit given to the whole church in Vatican II,” Tagle said in 2023, referring to the Second Vatican Council, which modernized the church in the 1960s and has been attacked by conservatives ever since.

The Filipino prelate has also taken a more compassionate approach to doctrinal matters, deploring the “harsh words that were used in the past to refer to gays and divorced and separated people, the unwed mothers, etc.”

At 67, Tagle is young by papal standards. Francis was elected at 76, Benedict XVI at 78. If he does become pope, then he would have the time to enact sweeping reforms. “In recent years, Francis has seemed pretty convinced his agenda—and the spirit of Vatican II—will survive his papacy,” Shenon said, “which is why he keeps insisting with a smile that his successor will call himself John XXIV.” John XXIII was the pope who initiated Vatican II. Tagle could well be the kind of successor Francis envisioned—perhaps even taking the name John XXIV.

If neither conservative nor liberal factions manage to win enough support among the cardinal electors, then a compromise candidate may emerge. “Historically speaking, divided conclaves have often favored ostensibly neutral candidates,” Wärnberg said. “A papabile with a lower public profile, such as the careful and erudite Cardinal Peter Erdo of Hungary or the reserved and pragmatic Cardinal Anders Arborelius of Sweden, could, therefore, emerge.”

In recent months, another ostensibly neutral prelate has shot up to the top of the papabili list: Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem. He’s Italian but has spent most of his career in Israel. This means that he isn’t associated with the Curia and remains something of a blank slate.

On many key issues, Pizzaballa has kept his cards close to his chest. And when he hasn’t, he has sent signals to both liberals and conservatives. With liberals, for instance, he backed Laudato Si, Francis’s 2015 encyclical on environmental justice. But Pizzaballa is also open to the Latin Mass, prized by conservatives. “The cardinal is very meticulous in liturgical celebration and has no problem with the traditional Mass,” David Neuhaus, a former patriarchal vicar for Hebrew-speaking Catholics in the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, told National Catholic Register.

Despite being only 59, Pizzaballa has plenty of political experience. In 2014, he orchestrated the “peace prayer” in the Vatican Gardens, a landmark summit between Francis, then-Israeli President Shimon Peres, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Similarly, Pizzaballa has tried to strike a measured tone over the Gaza war, talking both about the horrors of the Oct. 7, 2023, massacres and the suffering of the Palestinian people.

Another compromise candidate could be the Canadian Cardinal Michael Czerny. “If the conclave is looking for a safe caretaker pope to ease the transition from the dynamism of Francis, Cardinal Czerny, the cardinal at the head of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, is also a possibility. Quiet, efficient, and running the Laudato Si Dicastery, it is his dicastery that will guide that most radical of encyclicals,” Palmer said. “But don’t expect the church to be quite so on message about climate or the environment post-Francis.”

Conclaves aren’t an exact science. With a few exceptions, they are notoriously difficult to predict. The papabili seldom get to sit on the throne of St. Peter. The Italians have a proverb to that effect. Chi entra papa in conclave, ne esce cardinale. He who enters the conclave as pope leaves it as cardinal.

[le-chevalier-au-lion]

#FF0000: rosquez [t]

Valentino had been—thinking. He is having fun, really, this season despite Jorge’s general existence a few meters away. And he likes races in the US, its plastic artificiality, people’s way, way, way too white teeth and loud laughs and exaggerated sports passion. Bringing home a podium is always good.

A little less now, sure, because he knows he can win again. Knows he’s going to, eventually; it isn’t like he can do anything else with Yamaha. But Valentino won’t forget Ducati kicking his legs from under him—wishing that the bike would just fucking work for one weekend over two fucking years.

So, he’s happy. Enjoying himself, even if the club is gritty and cheap and stuffed, sweat sticking to his throat and dripping down his back to his underwear, his beer lukewarm.

Until he catches Marc weaving through the crowd, that is.

Getting up is a split-second decision. One moment, Valentino is sitting with his mechanics, ignoring them shouting over the music. The next, he’s prowling, drink abandoned, his crew calling after him.

He ends up catching Marc close to the bar. Grabs him by the wrist. Marc’s skin is fever hot, and he sways in place when he swings around to look at him.

“Honda is being stingy with you. This place is shit,” Valentino says, flashing a smirk.

Marc—honest to God—cackles, and the pulsing lights wash over his face, over the ugly openness of his honking laugh. Like this, Valentino can see him, really see him. The fritz of champagne and beer sizzles in his stomach, heavy out of nowhere.

Marc had been with a girl, is the thing. Maybe more than one. It’s there, on his bottom lip, on his chin—smeared lipstick. Red and very bright. Bit waxy.

Cheap, probably.

“No, no, it is fine,” Marc leans in to shout into his ear. “We’re barhopping!”

He says it in English, clumsy, his accent rolling each r hard, cutting sharp on the ing. It’s, frankly, ridiculous.

And his breath is hot, damp. Reeks with alcohol where it brushes against his cheek. Marc is swinging with the beat of whatever shitty synth pop they’re playing, so Valentino needs to steady him, a hand on the small of his back, fingers hooked on his belt loops. He feels mean, though—suddenly. Not a pleasant sensation.

His smile turns harsh. It’s like holding a knife between his teeth.

“Are you even old enough to drink here?”

Valentino wants Marc wrong-footed, wants to prod at him until he winces or—well. But Marc only shakes his head, beaming, crucially still covered in lipstick. There’s some on his collar too. And another drippy, blurred mark on his throat.

“Nope! But Honda, ah—” He makes an exaggerated gesture for passing money around, almost trips over himself.

Marc ends up knocking into Valentino, all wild-eyed, sloppy with drink. Their chests are brushing. Valentino—it hasn’t moved an inch, that prickly, unkind feeling, thorns going down his throat when he swallows.

This close, he can smell Marc—sweat, champagne, something sticky and too sweet and overly feminine. It’s cloying. Nauseating along the stench of way too many people packed together, writhing or dancing

It grates on Valentino’s nerves for the first time in his life, that there are so many people out on a Sunday night—Monday morning, whatever, it’s even worse if it’s already Monday. He has no idea why.

“Ah, ah, underage drinking, bribery?” Valentino waggles his eyebrows in mock reproach, counting on his fingers. Marc immediately straightens—tries to, at least. Christ, alright. “You’re being bad. Very naughty.”

There’s something about Marc, in his too shiny eyes, in the stubborn way he juts out his jaw. His bottom lip wobbles, though. “It’s my first win.”

“First time going out without your dad too, I guess.”

He mouths along Valentino’s words before they dawn on him. Blinks. Scowls.

Valentino doesn’t give him time to answer. It’s easy now, to try and make him squirm. “Allora, did you sneak out of your hotel room? Told your dad you’d stay with your brother—what’s his name—and play video games?”

Marc ducks his head to the side, lips pressed together. It’s hard to say for sure, but Valentino thinks he’s flustered. Blushing. A nice, girlish pink—a lot more proper than the red on his mouth. Goes along with his tanned skin better.

It needles under Valentino’s skin. Everything does—Marc, and lipstick, and the club, and the girl, maybe girls, and Marc again. He can feel his hands prickling.

“Can’t miss out, hm?” He slides his tongue over his teeth, watches Marc watch him with his usual shamelessness. “When will you get the chance to get sucked off in a dirty restroom again, right? The smell of piss is, ah, an experience.”

Marc warbles in a breath. “It isn’t like that,” he protests weakly.

Valentino raises an eyebrow. It is very much like that—he remembers Donington Park well enough, in 2000, how he’d crawled back to his hotel room at 8 in the morning horribly, horribly smug.

He reaches down between them. Marc jolts, sucks in his stomach on an instinct, his eyes huge, like a baby deer’s. His belt is done all wrong, crooked, too loose, the lip hanging out. The button of his jeans is open. At least, he thinks, less amused than he makes himself look, he remembered to zipper up.

Valentino tsks. “I think it is,” he says, shaking his head, pretending to be oh so disappointed. “You’re being reckless. What will the journalists say when they catch you like this? You don’t want a scandal.”

Marc is frozen in place. Valentino catches his throat bobbing when he plays his button hole, threading his finger into it.

“You’re making fun of me,” he manages to say. It’s a reedy, sullen thing.

He barks out a laugh. “Not too much, you’re still here.”

Maybe it’s the waste of it all getting to him, scratching under his skin. Marc is heavier than him, already more muscular. With the right bra, he might look like he has a nice pair of tits. And there’re his eyes, almost demure, long lashes fanning over his cheeks. And his mouth, too—pretty, insolent. Stained with some random girl’s lipstick.

So Valentino thought about it. Only a bit, in his defense. Hard to not, when you have something so eager one step lower than you on the podium. All that adoration…

The cut of his jaw is too sharp, and his voice too deep, but if you look at him right, or gag him with something, it’s just like fucking a woman in the ass.

Valentino clicks his tongue. Taps low on Marc’s stomach, feeling it jump under his touch. “Am I making too much fun of you?”

He speaks slowly, almost thoughtfully. Whiplash hits Marc like a slap on the face, and he hesitates for a moment, scrambling for words. His gaze keeps sliding down, to where Valentino is touching him. It’s not hard, to figure out what he wants.

“No, it’s—I’m having fun,” he says, almost too quiet to hear.

The words are scorching against the side of Valentino’s face.

“Odd idea of fun.”

Marc laughs again, like Valentino is absolutely hilarious. Or like he’s drunk. Valentino isn’t—drunk, that is—but he isn’t thinking, either.

He licks his thumb, then has do it again—his mouth tastes dry, like something has died inside it. Marc stops laughing. It’s the easiest thing in the world, to brush away the sloppy kiss mark on the hollow of his throat. Straighten his collar. Rub at his chin until it’s clean too.

The lipstick was cheap. It comes off just like that.

“What are you doing?” He asks, breathlessly, in a rattle of Spanish.

Doesn’t move one inch away, of course. Valentino grins.

“You had a little something on your face,” he shrugs, “I’m looking out for you.”

“Thanks,” Marc manages to croak out.

But there’s still—on his mouth proper. He wonders, idly, out of his own body, how easy it would be to wipe that off too. With his tongue, maybe. How easy it would be to go from that to getting his hand inside Marc’s jeans right there.

He doesn’t want to. In this light, now that it isn’t so smudged, Marc could be in makeup. Really. The waxy red glints.

“There.” Marc is trembling in his hold, like a live wire. Valentino trails his finger over his lips, too light. “You don’t want to meet Honda looking like a whore, do you?”

Marc makes a strangled noise—Valentino thinks he does. He can barely hear anything through the pound of blood of in his ears, over the thrumming line of heat between the pad of his thumb and his cock.

“I—”

“You should go. Enjoy your night,” Valentino cuts him off, very magnanimously. “It is your first win, no?”

Marc nods, dazed. Maybe—maybe when he wins again.