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vetteltea · 29 days

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── ˙ ̟ 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝟏 !! ᴰᴿ³

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠(𝐬) :: daniel ricciardo x younger ! fem ! reader

𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬 :: in which it would’ve been fun, if danny allowed himself to be the 1

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭 :: 10.3k

𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞 :: takes place at the start of 2018, with daniel still driving for red bull and having max as his teammate

𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐦𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐝...

A SCHOOL GIRL CRUSH. That's what your father called it whenever it was brought up into conversation, followed by a disapproving glance in your direction. Though, you supposed you couldn't help it. It was intimate. It was like your own little game. You'd push Daniel to his breaking point, push him close to the edge and wait for the point where he would crack. Only he never did. You were armed with your youth, a recklessness and an arrogance that tells you you can have what you want.

Daniel knew he shouldn't have encouraged it. But fuck, you were just the prettiest thing he had ever laid eyes on in his entire life. Ever since the pair of you had first met, and you flashed him a flirtatious smile, placing your hand on the muscle of his bicep, he knew he was fucked. You were young, and you've always looked at him with those adoring eyes that made him feel like he didn't need P1 or any trophy, to be a winner. It was addicting. You were addicting, he soon realised, like a drug he couldn't get enough of but would kill him it he gave it a chance.

Daniel also knew it was his job to stay away from you. After all, he was older. He was the one people would expect to be responsible, to maintain the distance between the two of you, to uphold the boundaries. After all, you were just passing the peak that dipped you into your twenties and he was closer to venturing into his thirties. But you were compelling and beautiful and infectious in a way that made it impossible for him to stay away. But he still tried.

God, you didn't make it easy for him. You may be young, but you're not stupid or naive. You are aware of how easy it is for a woman to gain power of a man through the way she looks, through the way she reacts to him and the way she watches him react to her. Perhaps that was why you were always the one to fasten his helmet before each and every race, pressing a gentle kiss to where his jaw would be. Perhaps that was why you congratulated him at the end of every race, no matter his result or position. Perhaps that was why your touch lingered just a second too long to be considered appropriate between two people with an age gap like yours, and perhaps that was why you would angle your body close to him every chance that presented itself. You pushed Daniel, he pulled you in. You push further, he pushes you away. It's intimate. It's your own little game. Seeing how far you can push him before he has to push you away, only for him to pull you right back. The pair of you would dance along the line of inappropriate and unprofessional - you just enjoyed seeing how far you could push Danny, your Danny, before he would snap.

He tried to maintain those boundaries, to be responsible enough to push you away. But God, you consumed him with a need that bordered obsession. And every time he pushed you away, you'd come back. He supposed it was your youth that brought this stubbornness and the idea of pushing Daniel to his breaking point brought you a sense of excitement that made you more dedicated than ever before.

The sight of you in the Red Bull Motorhome was not unusual. Being the eldest child of Christian Horner meant that no one batted an eye at your presence anymore. After all, you had been following your father around paddock after paddock since he became the team principal for Red Bull way back in 2005. Most of them have watched you grow into the young woman you are today, treating you like family.

Your favourite race has always been Monaco. The scenery is beautiful and the heat mens that sundresses are essential for that type of weather. The white of your dress is a stark contrast to the darkness of the garage. The only indicator that you should be there is the pass around your neck and the array of red and orange flowers that closely mimic the colours of the iconic Red Bull logo. You can feel your father's eyes digging into your back as you walk closer to where Daniel sits, head down, with his headphones on. His helmet sits besides him and he is so deep in thought that he doesn't notice as you pick it up and sit down beside him.

Daniel's eyes catch the tanned skin of your bare legs, noticing the indentations on your inner thighs that are a lighter colour. He thinks your stretch marks make you look more beautiful, if that was even possible. You smile at him, that cheeky, slightly lopsided grin that has him baring his teeth back at you with a wide smile that mimics your own. You hand him the bottle of water you'd been drinking out of, watching in awe as he brings it up to his lips, and the way his adam's apple bobs in his throat as he swallows the liquid.

"You know we've basically just exchanged saliva, right?"

"In your dreams, sweetheart," Daniel turned his head to gaze at the younger girl beside him, the corner of his lips twitching upwards into a smug smile

"They're already full of you, Danny," You teased the older man with a smile.

"Be a good girl and help me with my helmet, yeah?" Daniel doesn't even realise he's used the words before they slip from his lips. He gauges your reaction, watching the way you clench your thighs together but relax so quickly that he wonders if he imagined it. You stand up from your spot beside him and stand between his legs.

He tilts his head to look at you and what a sight. Daniel forces himself to release a shaky breath at your closeness, his head centimetres away from the gentle, supple curves of your breasts. He forces himself to stand up, hands slipping toy your waist and pushing you away from him to maintain a respectable distance. It's his job, he reminds himself, to protect the both of you. You only pout your glossy lips at him in response.

"You're gonna do great," You tell him with a beaming smile, allowing him to push you away as he didn't remove his hands from where they were situated on your waist. You're relentless in the way you tease Daniel and everyone can see it. The entire motorhome is aware of your crush on Daniel Ricciardo. At least that's what they call it. They believe it to be some school girl crush, like your father, that's developed from a sense of admiration and teenage hormones. If only they knew it was more.

You may tease Daniel, but despite all his better judgement, he returns the favour. Such as your current situation, where his hands sit comfortably on your waist, slipping down to your hips where his grip tightens and he gets off on that little intake of breath you force yourself to inhale. His touch is always firm on your skin, reminding you that however much you tease him, he will always be in charge of your little dynamic. His hand sits heavy, yet soft, on your back at the same time, slipping lower until the side of his pinky edges the curve of your rear. And especially in the way he always makes a show of telling you thinks, bending down to whisper in your ear, his lips tauntingly brushing the skin and his hot breath prickling the skin of your neck.

Daniel tells himself he's doing the right thing by keeping you an arm's length away. But in reality, his body craves for your to be close. His larger than life personality and his love language of physical touch is enough for him to justify the way he acts with you. But you've got him hooked, like a narcotic. You know this because he's never once asked you to stop. He knows he should, and he knows he could. And you know it too. But he never does. You know Danny, your Danny, and you know about his desire to be responsible and self-righteous. But you also know that he's addicted to you, and the thought of you fixating your attention onto someone else, say...Max, for example, made him want to run him of the track, Grand Prix and podium be damned.

You had done that once, a little experiment that you performed last season. Max had just clenched a solid victory in Malaysia and you were the first person to congratulate him when he returned from the race. You had run towards the Dutch winner, hugging him tightly and pressing a kiss to his cheek once you had finally got his helmet off and telling him how proud you were. Max could do little more than hold you close, pressing a kiss to your head as he basked in the afterglow of his victory and having a beautiful girl in his arms. Daniel would never admit it if anyone asked him, but the sight of you in Max's arms made him fucking livid. He was always the first one you congratulated. You would fling yourself into his arms and he would catch your weight, wrapping one arm around your waist as you pressed gentle kisses to his cheek, mumbling over and over about how incredible he was. If it wouldn't have gotten him a fine and potentially rid him of his P3 finish, he would've decked his teammate then and there, right outside the motorhome.

He knows that it is selfish, to stake his claim on you knowing full well that nothing can, or will, ever come from it. He knows. But he does it anyway. He's far too intoxicated by your presence to even entertain the idea of losing you, but his guilty conscience and desire to be responsible means that he will never let himself have you either.

"Maybe if you win, we can celebrate over dinner, maybe a few drinks," You grin at him, knowing full well that he will do nothing but reject your offer with a smile. That's what he always done. It's the cycle that never seems to end and it pains Daniel that he has to hold you an arms width away at all times - but he knows better. And it's his responsibility to maintain the distance.

"Oh sweetheart, maybe one day, when you're old enough, I'll go on a date with you," Daniel chuckled lightly, patting one of his hands against the flesh of your hips. His grin only widened when he watched you shiver under his touch.

"You promise?" You pouted your glossed lips at him and jesus, he wanted to kiss you so badly. But he held himself back and stayed still, choosing only to shake his head at your response. You even went as far as to hold your pinkie out to him, offering one of your sacred pinkie promises.

"I promise," Daniel wrapped his pinkie around yours and quickly scanned his eyes over the rest of the garage before bringing your joined hands to his lips, where he pressed a soft kiss. The pair of you kept your pinkies intertwined too long to be considered appropriate for what should've been a pinkie promise. But having Danny close made you lose any sense at all.

And this time you break ritual. You stand on your tiptoes, Danny's hands still gripping your hips as you press a kiss to his bare cheek, eyes shining at him with so much adoration that it makes his heart skip a beat.

"Y/N..." The way he drags out the syllables that encompass your name makes it sound like a whine. But you know better. And you know Danny. It's a warning, that you're pushing him too far with how gentle you're being, with how close you are, with how you're breaking your ritual.

It's rare for him to call you by your name, always resorting to one kind of pet name or another. Each and every one makes your heart clench tightly in your chest. Sweetheart. Angel. Doll. Sweets. You know he's serious when he uses your name, and you know to not push further. Those are the rules of the game.

And so, you don't push. Instead, you help him get his helmet on and zip up his racing suit, allowing your hands to linger before you wish him one final "good luck" before he gets into his car.

𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐝, 𝐲𝐨𝐮'𝐫𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐠𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐚 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐰...

Daniel claimed his victory in Monaco and you couldn't have been happier for him. You were there once the raised finished for your post-race rituals. You were gazing up at him during the podium ceremony, so much devotion in your eyes that it made him want to jump down from the podium ceremony and take you there and then. But he held back, as the ever responsible man that he is.

The other good thing about Daniel's victory meant one hell of an afterparty. Your father had no doubt already retired from said afterparty, already back at the hotel and most definitely on the phone to your loving stepmother. On the other hand, the bad part about Daniel's victory was that it was a struggle to get him alone. Danny was always the life of the party and everyone seemed to magically gravitate towards him, as though his mere presence was enough. And it was.

But you had seen the way his eyes kept slithering back to you. He had to do a double-take when you first arrived, clad in something that was too minimal for him to class as a dress. The dark blue accentuated the dip of your waist and the curve of your hips. The neckline hung low, giving everyone a generous view of what the boss' daughter was hiding. But you didn't care about them. The only person that mattered was Daniel. And the only thing that mattered about Daniel was the way that he had been looking at you from the moment you walked into the club. You sat alone by the bar, occasionally stirring your drink as you awaited Daniel's inevitable appearance.

It wasn't until the guy from the other end of the bar had ordered you a second shot that Daniel made his way over. He was quick to remove the shot glass from your hand and hold it out of you way.

"Danny..." You all but whined and God, it sent a surge through his body and a pool of heat start to blaze in his stomach. Daniel placed a hand on your thigh, keeping you steady on the bar stool as you attempted to stand and chase after the shot glass he had taken away from you.

"Easy there, sweetheart," Danny let out his signature laugh, tightening the grip he had on your thigh as you continued to wriggle on the bar stool. Your skin was flushed red and eyes wide, radiating a youthful innocence that made Daniel's jeans tighten. He could've help but think if this is what you looked after sex, if you looked this good in your post-sex glow. "I think you've had enough."

"You just won the Monaco Grand Prix, and yet you're so frigid," You rolled your eyes jokingly at the Australian, before trying one last time to reclaim your drink from his hand. It failed. Instead, you placed your hands on top of Danny's, who had still yet to remove his own from the skin of your thigh. He didn't say anything back for a moment, too busy attempting to swallow the lump in his throat that had formed from him thinking about how soft the flesh of your thighs feel under his calloused hand, what it would feel like to have them wrapped around his head as he feasts on you like a starved man. Danny would be willing to bet that you taste as sweet as you look, and twice as addicting as you already are.

"Someone's gotta make sure you're behavin', sweets," Danny told you with a smile, reinforcing the common theme of him being the responsible one out of the two of you, the one with the most self-control. But with the way you were looking at him, he wanted to throw his self-control out the window and have his way with you on the countertop of the bar. But you deserved better. You deserved better than him.

"'M always good for you Danny," You mumbled under your breath, finger delicately tracing the veins in his hand and marvelling every time he flexed his hand over your skin.

"No you're cruel," Daniel removed his hand from your thigh. "Absolutely diabolical."

"Danny-"

"Don't Danny me, angel. Showin' up here in your little dress," He looked at you the same way a lion would at a lamb, but you weren't as innocent as a lamb, and you knew exactly what you were doing to him. His tongue slipped out to wet his chapped lips as he looked down at you, dark eyes glazing over every inch of your skin that you'd put on show. That you'd put on show for him.

"Wore it just for you," You shrugged your shoulders purposefully, making one of the thin straps of your dress fall down your arm. "What do you think?"

"I'm not drunk enough to call you sexy, doll," Daniel shook his head, pulling the strap back up to sit on your shoulder. But you hadn't missed the way he gulped when he caught sight of the tops of your breasts. "But you're gonna get me in trouble if you keep lookin' at me like that."

"Better make it worth it then, right?" You stood up from the bar stool, tipping your head up to meet Danny's eyes. They had darkened so much from their usual deep brown that if someone was to ask, you would've told them they looked more black than brown. Daniel inhaled you as you slithered your arms around his neck, pressing your bodies impossibly closer to the point where he could tell you weren't wearing a bra with your dress. You fingers tugged at the curls of the nape of his neck before standing on your tiptoes and pecking the corner of his mouth, close enough to his lips that he could taste the honey in your lip gloss.

"God, you're killin' me," Daniel tipped his head back as you giggled at his reaction, knowing full well that the Australian driver had no intention of resisting your advances. You doubted he even had the ability to at this point. Your favourite Danny appeared when he was buzzed. He was more open and daring with his touches, allowing you to believe that there was something more going on than harmless flirting with the way he sought you out, called your name and held you close.

"You could always tell me what you want, maybe I can help," You slip your hands from around his neck and allow them to trail down his chest, feeling the ridges of his muscles, dragging your manicured nails over the skin of his abs in a way that makes him shiver with pure desire.

"I shouldn't want what I want, sweetheart, I can't do it," Daniel shook his head, sobering up just enough to remove his hands on your hips. He was older than you. You deserved a future where you didn't have to be tied down by a man who was starting to want children while you were in the peak of your youth. So Daniel would accept the teasing, and the flirting, but he would never let it go beyond that to protect you.

"Not my problem then," You removed your hands from his body and Danny hated himself for the way that he missed having your hands on his body. You stood up from the bar stool and Daniel had to force himself to leave his hands dangling by his side. "Enjoy your night, Danny."

The way you say his name makes the heat pool in his stomach overflow and he is forced to watch as you down the shot he intended to keep away from you, throw him a wink, and then launch yourself into the crowd.

It only takes a few seconds for him to lose you on the dance floor but it takes him a few more seconds to rid the thought of your swaying hips and how your ass would feel against his pelvis as he thrusts into you. He loses you, and he forces himself to lose the thought of you too. He shouldn't want you. He can't want you. And it's never going to happen. At least, that's what he tries to convince himself.

You spend the rest of the night with Max, in a separate corner of the club, necking your weight in tequila and any other form of alcohol you could get your hands on. The night was spent with Max's arm around your waist, his hand cool against the bare skin of your back. But he wasn't Daniel. His grip didn't tighten when you pushed your luck. He didn't pull you in until you were pressed against his side. He didn't press sloppy kisses to your forehead and cheeks until you were almost begging him to kiss you. Max wasn't Daniel. The Aussie in question watched you from the other side of the club as you stayed by Max's side, arms wrapped around his waist as the two of you danced the night away. Max had a hard race, failing to set a Q1 time and then coming P9, so he deserved to unwind. Daniel just wished that it didn't have to be with you.

Your eyes connected with Daniel's for what felt the millionth time of the night. The Australian couldn't take his eyes away from you. So much so that he was sure someone had noticed by now. If they did, no one said anything. You stood up straighter, leaning further into Max to whisper in his ear, giving Daniel the perfect view of where your dress had ridden up your thighs. "He's looking at us again."

"He's looking at you, schatje," The Dutch rolled off his tongue effortlessly. You had been begging Max to teach you to speak Dutch since the two of you had first met, but you never had the patience. Max couldn't blame Daniel for looking at you like he wanted to take your clothes off, the Dutchman was pretty sure that most men in the club probably felt the same way. Your skin was flush against his as the two of you continued to dance, drunk on tequila and spirits and the desire to let loose for just one night.

"Can you blame him?" You threw your head back with a laugh, almost losing your balance if it had not been for Max pulling your body into his, wrapping his arms around your waist to hold you steady while the pair of you laughed. Daniel stared at the scene from across the bar. There was no excuse, no reason for him to be angry. Not really. He knew full well that you would much prefer to be dancing with him than with Max. Sure, Max was older than you too, but not to the extent that he was. There was only a year and a few months between you and the Dutchman. Max would be a better match than him anyway, Max could give you more than he ever would.

𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐰𝐞 𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐝𝐨𝐧'𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 𝐬𝐨?

Daniel had been the one to get you back to your room after you and Max were too dunk to navigate your way to your hotel room. The Australian drier had planned on getting a relatively early night but when he saw how drunk you were, he couldn't bring himself to leave the club without making sure that you got back safe and unharmed. After all, that's what a responsible adult would do, right? Not just someone who was in love with you but couldn't admit it to themselves, and especially not to you. You deserved more.

Max had been escorted to his room by one of the younger engineers and Daniel had taken the job of taking you back to your room. You hadn't spoken to him since the club and you were now too drunk to remember why you were even annoyed at him in the first place.

You watched as Daniel used the keycard he had bribed the receptionist to give to him to let the pair of you into your room. He had picked up your clutch when you all left the club, knowing you were too buzzed to remember if you had even brought one. He knew how you hated losing things, it stressed you out. Daniel perched himself on the end of your bed as you stood in the entrance of the room, not sure how to go about the man you...had feelings for...being in your hotel room. This was a line that you had never crossed before. Daniel smirked. "You gonna stand there all pretty and ignore me, baby?"

"I could never ignore you, Danny," You smiled at Danny, your Danny, but it didn't reach your eyes. He held out his hand for you to take, coaxing you to sit beside him on the bed. The last thing he needed was you passing out and smacking your head on the floor. And from the way you were swaying, he could tell it wouldn't be long until you lost consciousness for the night.

"How are you feelin'?" The Aussie asked, clearly amused at your ditsy state.

"Drunk," You rested your head against his shoulder, and Daniel nearly melted at the sight. He was used to the flirty part of you, the part of you filled with youthful arrogance and recklessness. This was a softer part of you that he very rarely saw, but this was the part of you that he craved most. It was the part of you that made him feel loved. "Very drunk, and my heart hurts."

"Your heart or your head, darlin'? Very different things," Danny placed a hand on your thigh, begging himself to ignore the way you pressed them together with a flush painting your cheeks, He loved seeing you like this. Drinking stripped away your confidence and showed your true, much shyer personality.

"Both, but my heart always hurts when you look at me like that."

Daniel felt his chest tighten.

"Oh baby, c'mere," Daniel looked at you pitifully as you shuffled closer to him until you had practically crawled into his lap. Your thighs rested on either side of his, your core hovering over the tent of his jeans. Daniel sucked in a breathe, dirty scenarios seeping into his head that all started with you being on top of him. You buried your head into his neck, inhaling the scent of his cologne that made your body sag with comfort.

"Danny..." You whined his name, lips brushing the shell of his either before attempting to snake down his neck.

He shook his head, pushing you back by your collarbone. "I'm drunk but I'm not drunk enough to fuck you, especially not when you can't think straight."

"Do I at least get a kiss goodnight?" Your tone sounded so sincere, as though that was all you wanted from the man. "If you're not gonna fuck me, it's the least you could do."

"You want me to kiss you goodnight, sweets?" Daniel smirked, allowing his eyes to wander up the column of your throat, imagining what it would feel like to have his hand wrapped around it as his lips bruised the sides of your neck for everyone to see. His settled his gaze on your lips, that had lost theist gloss over the course of the evening but still somehow shined in the dim light.

You pursed your lips, looking down at him with a doe-eyed expression that couldn't have contrasted further from the dirty words spilling from your mouth. "Might help me move on if I can accept that you're never gonna be inside me."

"Fuck, doll," Daniel threw his head back as he felt his jeans becoming increasingly tighter, causing his breathing to hitch. The way that you laced your hands into the curls at the nape of his neck and had begun to tug at them certainly didn't help. "I'd ruin you, and that doesn't seem very fair to every other fucker that wants you."

"I only want you, Danny."

Those words would echo his head for the rest of his life, your voice like a sweet melody that would keep him going. He hated wanting what he couldn't have.

"If I'm gonna fuck you, you're gonna be sober, and so am I," Daniel felt slightly guilty for saying that as he knew he would never allow himself to get close enough to you for that to happen, no matter how far the teasing went or how much he wanted you.

"Does that mean I can have my kiss goodnight?" You smiled up at him, not catching the deceptive tone in his previous words. You craved to know what his lips would feel like pressed against yours.

"Stop pushing your luck, angel, and get in bed," Daniel shook his head with a grin as you clambered into the large double bed in the centre of the rom. He wanted nothing more than to lie down beside you and allow you to curl up into his chest, to allow himself to press a sweet kiss to your lips in a gesture of goodnight. Instead, he helped you to tuck the covers around your body before leaning over to kiss your forehead. That was the closest he would allow himself to get.

And fuck, did it hurt.

The Australian slipped out of the room in silence, closing the door behind him and pretending not to hear your sniffles as he walked down the corridor to his own room.

𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐲 𝐝𝐞𝐟𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞, 𝐢 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐞, 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐞𝐧𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡 𝐚𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐞...

The news had been leaked earlier than expected. Daniel had signed the contract that solidified his seat with Renault at the start of August and the announcement wasn't due to be made until the start of September. Instead, someone had leaked the information of Daniel's move to the media on the race day for the 2018 Belgian Grand Prix. In his defence, Daniel was fully under the impression that he would have more time to speak to you about the move, that he could explain his reasonings for moving in more detail. He was fully unaware that the news had even been leaked until you managed to slip into his driver's room before the race, something you were used to but had never been shy about before now.

"Angel," Daniel couldn't help but grin when he saw you. He hadn't seen you since before the start of the summer break, with you returning to your abode in London to see your beloved dog and Daniel returning to Australia to spend some quality time with his family. The Australian driver stopped his attempt to zip up his race suit and made his way over to you, arms outstretched for a hug and clearly missing the look on your face.

You stepped back so far that your back was pressed against the door to his driver's room, effectively trapping the both of you in there until you had the conversation. "Don't."

"Baby, what's wrong-"

"You're leaving?" The words slipped out of your mouth before you could stop them. You cringed at how pathetic you sounded, how childish you sounded.

"I guess that cat's out of the bag," Daniel chuckled, thankful he didn't have to hide it from everyone anymore.

"This isn't funny, Daniel," You didn't laugh, you just shook your head with a straight face and Daniel realised how serious you were when you called him by his first name. He was never Daniel with you, he was always Danny, he was your Danny. "You didn't even tell me."

"It's not something I wanted to share," Daniel shrugged his shoulders, trying to remain nonchalant. The terms of his contract meant that he couldn't share the news of his signing with anyone that it wouldn't immediately affect. It would affect you direction, Christian Horner's daughter, but he couldn't say that to his new team. That would open a can of worms that would destroy his career and your reputation. So, he suffered with not telling you. Although, the look of betrayal on your face may have made opening the can of worms worth it. Maybe.

"Does Max know?" You asked him. He stayed silent. That was all the confirmation you needed. "And my dad?"

"So you just didn't want to share it with me?" It felt like a slap to the face. Although, perhaps this is what your father had warned you against since the beginning. Perhaps you were as young and naïve as Daniel had implied you to be, naïve enough to think he would stay at Red Bull and continue to race with them with you. For you. Perhaps it's childish for you to be so upset about his departure from the team, but it hurts you more than it should for a mere flirtation and schoolgirl crush. It was more than that, it always had been. Although now you were second guessing yourself, perhaps it had all been in your head all this time, perhaps it had all been one-sided and he feels nothing for you at all. Perhaps he carried on with you out of pity.

It feels like a betrayal. It's stupid, and it shouldn't, but it does. And that doesn't make it hurt any less. It doesn't feel like he's leaving the team, it feels like he's leaving you. Perhaps that's how Danny sees you, a selfish brat who thinks everything is about her. Perhaps that's why he's abandoning you, so he doesn't have to face the repercussions of your flirtation now he knows your feelings for him are real.

You couldn't be further from the truth.

"It's not like that," Daniel tried to step closer to you but you held your hind up in protest, warning him to keep his distance. "Besides, it's not life I'm leaving. You'll still see me around the paddock."

"It won't be the same and you know it," It feels like your heat is beginning to sink into your stomach and no matter how hard he tries, you refuse to meet his eyes. "What if it's not enough?"

"It'll have to be, Y/N," He said. And there it was. Your name. No pet name. No angel, no sweetheart, no doll, no sweets, no baby. Just Y/N. Daniel was pretty sure he could hear your heart splinter in your ribcage as you swallowed your tears down. You refused to let him steal any dignity you had left in this situation. "You're not just talking about the move anymore, are you?"

You shook your head. "No."

"We're fri-"

"If you say the word friends, I swear to God," A bitter, teary laugh passed through your lips. The word felt like vermin in your mouth, like something that didn't belong there. "We're more than that Daniel, and you know it, no matter how hard you try to deny it. We're not just friends and the entire grid knows it."

Daniel only scoffed in reply. "The entire grid thinks your a silly little girl with a crush on an older man."

"And what do you think?"

"Maybe one day, kid," Daniel nodded pitifully. "When you're older."

You wished he had never answered your question in the first place. You bit your lip to hold back the tears that were now ready to start flowing, nodding in acknowledgement at him before opening your mouth one last time. "I'll see you around."

"You're not gonna help me with my helmet-" You disappeared out of the door of his driver's room before the Australian could even finish his sentence. Daniel felt his heart pang in his chest, rattling through his bones as he relived the look on your face. It was clear that you felt betrayed by his actions, and he couldn't blame you, but he had hoped you would understand. He tried to tell himself that some distance would be good for the two of you, it would allow you the freedom to try and find someone your own age instead of toeing the line of being ruined by a man nearly 7 years your senior.

That's what he told himself throughout the entirety of the Belgium Grand Prix, as he pushed the car to its limits. With no pre-race ritual and the memory of the look of betrayal in your teary eyes, Daniel Ricciardo DNF'd out of the Belgium Grand Prix. His fellow drivers joked it was the absence of his lucky charm, of you, that had caused the Australian driver to suffer such misfortune. Max didn't say much to him the entire race weekend. There had been a growing tension between the two regarding who was first and second driver, but Daniel had a feeling that Max's stand-offish behaviour wasn't about that. It was about you.

You weren't there for Daniel when he returned to the Red Bull motorhome and everyone seemed to keep their distance from him now that the news had broken. Hell, you weren't even there to congratulate Max on his P3 finish, nor where you at the afterparty. He knew he couldn't approach your father to ask for your whereabouts. Christian knew of your blatant attraction to Daniel, but he just assumed it was a harmless, schoolgirl crush that you would get over at one point or another. The Red Bull principal had no idea that as much as he tried to resist, Daniel had been encouraging your advances under the table, leading you to believe that something real was going on between the two of your. The Australian driver couldn't get you out of his head, but he also knew he could never admit the ways he thought about you.

𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐦𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐨𝐦𝐞...

The first thing you had done after leaving Daniel was head straight to your father and tell him you wanted to go home. Being the ever loving father that he was, Christian managed to get you on the next flight out of Belgium and back to the UK, where you resided in your London apartment. You hadn't even had chance to say goodbye to Max, you just sent a quick text explaining the situation and telling him that you weren't sure when you were going to return to the Red Bull motorhome and that you weren't truly sure if you would return before the end of the season.

Your father could tell that was something wasn't right with how quickly you had requested to leave after the news had come out. If that wasn't enough indication, the shakiness of your voice, the tear stains and the smudged mascara were big enough indicators for him to realise that there was a problem. You had told him that you didn't want to talk about it and you just wanted to go home and take your mind off everything.

That didn't work. You found yourself watching the race from the plane. For Max, you told yourself, but you couldn't help but let your eye slip to number 3, RIC. You turned your phone off after a while, not wanting anything more to do with Formula one for a few days while you wrapped your head around what happened with Daniel.

The flight wasn't a long one, not like the ones you were used to. But even then, those ones didn't even seem like long flights because you had Daniel by your side for every one of them. That wouldn't happen anymore. You didn't realise how integrated he had become in your life for a mere flirtation. Perhaps your own feelings had come back to bite you in the ass. The real kicker? Coming home to your dog, Badger. You remembered the way your father had shook his head with disapproval when you announced the name of your new dog but Danny had just laughed. I'm honoured, kid, he had said, ruffling the hair on your dogs head with an irresistible grin.

"Why does it feel like a breakup, Badge?" You asked him, feeling crazy for talking to your dog in the first place. That's what it felt like. A breakup. Your thing with Daniel was always unspoken but you could've sworn it was mutual, it had to have been with the tenderness he touched you with. Perhaps it was all in your head. Perhaps you were naïve. And innocent. And childish. It was easier to tell yourself that he was abandoning you, and so you did.

Your dog whined sadly, as though he too missed the presence of his father-figure. Badger had even accompanied you to the Australian Grand Prix during the prior F1 season and had formed a close attachment to the Aussie driver. Like mother, like son. Daniel had taken Badger to his ranch, allowing him a sense of freedom that he lacked in London, and your dog had loved him from there onwards. There were times where you thought that Badger may have preferred Daniel to you.

The next few hours were absolute hell. Daniel tried to contact you. He had left multiple messages, strings of apologies, questioning your whereabouts, asking to see you. You ignored them all. The only messages you could bring yourself to reply too were Max's and your father's. Both were checking that you were okay and had landed safely, with Max's containing the extra promise of driving Daniel off the track next race if needed.

You didn't have the heart to reply to any of Daniel's messages. So you didn't. You didn't even open them so that he couldn't tell you were blatantly ignoring him. Although, he had probably figured that out by now anyway. See? Childish.

The part of you that tells you that you know Daniel, tells you that he isn't abandoning you, despite you being under the imprecision that it was always his intention renew his contract with Red Bull. That part of you, the adult part, the part that has been blatantly in love with Daniel Ricciardo since you had met him, tells you that he's making a move for his career, and it has nothing to do with the way he feels about you. The realistic part of you, the part that has been blatantly in love with Daniel Ricciardo since you had met him but knows that he won't go further with you, tells you that you're being selfish.

The competition between Max and Daniel was heating up. The only way for Daniel to be able to properly compete with Max for the champion title and simultaneously relieve the staff of the tension was to make a career move. Here he was, attempting to save his career in Formula 1, and there you were making it all about you. The childish part of you tells you to ignore him because he's leaving you and nothing will be the same. It felt like your brain was tearing itself into pieces, the different parts of your mind wanting different things. At least they all had something in common, they wanted Danny.

It was a good thing your brain did have a reasonable part to it. Especially when the pictures, surfaced on Twitter the next morning. You didn't even need to read the caption to show what had happened. It was clear. Striking. Unmissable. It made you want to be sick. The picture showed Daniel leaving the club and god, he looked good. Although what didn't look too good was the fact his arm was around the waist of another woman, holding her close as he whispered something in her ear as the two of them appeared to leave the club together.

You barely had enough time to make it to the bathroom before you were sick into the basin.

Your phone was strewn on the floor as you sat by the toilet, the pictures staring back at you in an almost taunting matter. The part of you that thought you knew Daniel was silent. The realistic part told you that he obviously didn't return your feelings and it was just a bit of fun to him. What made the feeling worse was the woman's outfit. She just so happened to have been wearing the same skimpy little dress that you had worn after Daniel had won the Monaco Grand Prix. He had refused to fuck you in it, but you doubted he had done the same to her. You always had been a child to him, a toy that he could play with until he got bored. Perhaps you were too desperate for love to realise it.

The woman's name had been added into the threads, with clearer pictures of them leaving the club together, of them kissing outside the club. You couldn't blame her. She was beautiful. You couldn't help but notice the lack of stretch marks glaring obviously at the camera, none on her arms or on the skin of her thighs. Her waist was smaller than yours too, and someone she pulled off the sacred Monaco dress better than you ever had. The worst part was that Daniel had no reservations about kissing her, about joining hands with her in public.

A quick google search of the model's name brought up her age in bold digits. They echoed through your head as you felt the nauseating need to be sick again.

23.

And then you realise.

Perhaps it wasn't your age that was the problem for Daniel.

Perhaps it was just you.

𝐢𝐟 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐚𝐝 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐝𝐢𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐛𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨𝐝𝐚𝐲?

The end of the season crept closer than anyone would've expected. Lewis brought home the title of World Champion and Max had just missed out on third place to Kimi by two points. Daniel had been sixth in the driver's standings, but as the reason drew to a close, he found himself caring less and less.

It had been radio silent from you since the Belgian Grand Prix, since Daniel had taken a model back to his hotel room purely because of the dress she was wearing. She had reminded him of you, and that was why he slept with her. Or at least, he tried to sleep with her. The encounter didn't end on good terms after Daniel had let your name slip from his lips multiple times while her lips were wrapped around the shaft of his cock. She left after that, and Daniel didn't blame her.

It wasn't until the next morning that he realised that someone had seen them leave the club together and had posted about it online. That meant you had seen it. The look on your father's face when Daniel went to him, enquiring of your whereabouts, your wellbeing, if you were coming back before the end of the season. Daniel never realised how much you had integrated yourself into his life until you left it. There were no more walks around the paddock to calm his nerves, you no longer would sneak sweet treats in for him and Max without their trainers seeing it, there were no more pre-race of post-race rituals. There were no more kisses on the cheek in good luck or congratulations.

He missed you.

You were all he could think about. He had tried to contact you but had received no reply. He had even taken to asking Max about you and whether Max could convince you to talk to him. He assumed it was a no, especially after his several close calls with the Dutchman that nearly meant him crashing into a wall several times. He assumed it wasn't an accident.

But the Formula 1 2018 season came to a close, and he still hadn't heard from you. The first time he saw you since Belgium was a NYE party for the drivers and their partners. Ans ir just so happened to be the evening of your 23rd birthday.

Daniel came alone.

You came with Max.

Before the sweeter pet names and terms of endearment, Daniel used to call you sunshine. Every time he saw you, you seemed to light up the room with a glow. And the NYE party was no different. You looked radiant, a tight black dress enveloping your much slimmer figure with Max's arm draped around your waist, holding you close as the pair of you laughed with Charles and his girlfriend.

11:47pm

Daniel watched you as you threw your head back with a laugh, Mac turning to look at you with the exact same expression on his face that Daniel always held whenever he looked at you. It was a known thing, that Max had always had a crush on you. He had since his debut. But, he managed to accept the fact that nothing would ever happen - you were too infatuated with Daniel, and Max just wanted you to be happy.

11:50pm

There were ten minutes until the end of the year, and until you turned 23.

He tried to manoeuvre his way through the crowd in order to access the bar. He figured he would need something a bit stronger if he was going to with Max parade you around in front of his face all night. And you had yet to even look his way. Daniel didn't even know if you knew that he was there.

"Daniel!" Charles greeted the Australian, dropping his arm from around his girlfriend's waist in order to offer Daniel a hug. Max felt your whole body tense as the smile on your face seemed to waver slightly. The four of you had managed to find a table to sit down at before the Australian had joined you. Daniel reciprocated Charles gesture, but the Aussie kept his eyes fixated on you the entire time. Your attempts to avoid his eyes amused him. So much so that he allowed a chuckle to escape through his parted lips, making your eyes shoot up to meet his.

"Hi," Daniel breathed out, a warm smile on his face that made your heart clench painfully in your chest. He sounded so happy to see you. It had been over two months since you had last seen him, and you missed him. You missed everything about him, but his actions had proved that he did no deserve your presence.

"Daniel," You nodded at him, your voice soft, but still acknowledging his presence. He felt like his heart was in his throat as he waited for you to say more. You didn't. You just looked at him with what appeared to be a dismissive look on your face, how could you not when being faced with the man who effectively shattered your heart into a million pieces.

Daniel's not sure what he expected from you. He expected you to frown at him, to ignore his presence, to throw your drink on him, to scoff, to walk away. He wasn't expecting the dismissive tone to your voice and the uninterested look on your face. Daniel instantly decides that he would much rather prefer your anger to your indifference. At least then you would give him the time of day.

He looked at his watch.

11:56pm

Max coughed and spoke up in an attempt to alleviate the awkward silence and attempt to help you escape the situation. "Do you want another drink, schajte?"

Daniel couldn't help but frown at the term of endearment that Max had granted you, knowing full well the Dutchman hated them.

"I'll come with you," You smiled gently at Charles and his girlfriend, excusing yourself to follow Max to the bar. You didn't spare the Aussie another glance, knowing that if you did, you would accept his apology and go back to being at his beck and call.

Daniel stares at the half full glass that was still sat on your coaster. He knew what was in it because he knew you. He tried to ignore the pitying glances that Charles and his girlfriend seemed to throw in his direction as he sighed and allowed his gaze to linger on your retreating figure, especially with Max's hand on the curve of your waist - where his should've been.

He looked at his watch again, to see the numbers about to hit the stroke of midnight.

"3..."

"2..."

"1..."

"HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

And all of a sudden, Max pulls you close, effectively trapping your body between his own and the bar as he drunkenly slanted his lips on top of yours. The kiss didn't last very long, but the Dutchman still held you close as you leaned your forehead against his. He tasted bitter, like strong spirits that made you wince slightly.

Daniel stood on the other side of the club and was forced to watch the entire thing happen. He wanted nothing more than to take you in his arms and tell you how much he loved you. But he wasn't selfish, and you deserved so much better than what he had to offer you. He loved you enough to know that, which is why he felt his heart break when Max Verstappen, his teammate, pressed his lips to yours.

"Fijne verjaardag," Max had taught you enough Dutch since the season had ended for you to know what his words meant. Happy birthday. You smiled at him, a drunken flush painting your cheeks in a scarlet hue as you breathed out shakily.

"Happy new year, Max," You pecked his cheek again. A sense of bitterness rang through your bones as the words fell from Max's lips. For the first time since you had known him, Daniel Ricciardo wasn't the first person to wish you a happy birthday. And you started to wish for your birthday to be over before it had even truly begun.

𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐢𝐟 𝐢𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐦𝐞...

"I'm pretty sure the birthday girl isn't supposed to be sat outside on her own," An all too familiar voice reverberated off the walls of the narrow street, carrying itself to your ears like a solemn melody you wished to forget. You didn't even need to move your head to figure out who had followed you out of the club. The same person who had been craving your attention all night.

Daniel.

"It doesn't matter," You shook your head with a gentleness that Daniel had missed, but you refused to look at him. Instead, you kept your eyes fixated on the blackened sky, watching the constellations shine across the abyss. "They're not here for me."

Daniel felt his heart break slightly in his chest as he realised how lonely you sounded. He had missed you, far too much than to deem appropriate. All he wanted to do was to take you home and allow you to curl up into the safety of his arms, so that he could protect you from the rest of the world. "Doesn't mean you can't still have fun-"

"I thought you'd already left," You couldn't help but interrupt him, trying to remain nonchalant while revealing that you had been keeping tabs on him throughout the night, even despite your attempts to ignore his entire existence.

The Australian driver looked bewildered. "What?"

"I thought you'd already left. Y'know, without saying happy birthday," You blamed your drunken state on how easily the words fell from your lips and then instantly cursed yourself for how pathetic you sounded. Wishing for a happy birthday from the man who broke your heart.

"Do you want me to leave?" A part of him expected you to say yes, to tell him to leave you alone and never speak to you again. Another part of him craved for you to tell him no, to tell him to stay with you and take you home with him, even though he would never entertain such a request. The other part of him didn't know what he expected you to say.

"I don't know, Daniel," You shrugged carelessly, as though his presence meant nothing to you. Although, the sparkling of tears in your eyes forced him to believe that you wanted him to stay, to not be alone. Daniel's heart ached at the way his name, his full, name fell from your lips. He had never been Daniel to you.

"Danny," He corrected you.

You arched your brows. "What?"

"I'm Danny," He affirmed again, as though his fall name falling from your lips made him feel a sense of unbridled disgust.

"Not anymore," You forced yourself to smile sadly at him. He looked so beautiful under the lights from the club. The fluorescent hues of red and blue bathed his skin until it looked like he was sparkling. Perhaps it was the myriad of drinks that he had necked down after seeing you with Max, but his eyes were wide and his pupils dilated a little more every time he looked at your. Daniel Ricciardo was the most beautiful thing you had ever seen in your entire life. You just wished he felt the same about you.

Daniel didn't answer. Instead, he walked over to the street curb that you had perched your ass on and sat down beside you, thighs pressed against your own. He tried not to frown or show the way his chest tightened as you shuffled away from him, just enough for him to notice, in order to put some distance between the two of you. Silence hung dead in the air between the two of you. Daniel didn't know what to say and you didn't have anything to say to him. You could feel his gaze burning into the side of your head.

"You're allowed to love me," Your voice was so much softer than Daniel thought he would never deserve. It wavered as you spoke, every crack matching the ones in both of your hearts. "I hope you know that."

"I can't, sweetheart. I just can't," He would never allow you to bring yourself down by dating him. You both knew that he could. He was leaving at the end of the season, no longer bound by a Red Bull contract, no longer bound by having your father as his boss. There was less stopping him than ever before, but in your eyes, he still found an excuse to let you go.

"Is it me?"

"God, no," Daniel couldn't have beam more aggressive with the way he shook his head.

"Then what is it?" You felt so pathetic, begging him to give you a reason why you couldn't be his, why he couldn't be yours.

He gave you the same reply as always. "You're too young for me, kid."

"Then why would you lead me on for so long?" You hoped, longingly, that Daniel would tell you what you wanted to hear. That he had loved you for as long as you had loved him. But those weren't the words that fell from his lips.

"Honestly, I thought you would've gotten over your silly little crush by now," He replied. The words felt like acid on his tongue. Stinging, bitter, painful. He swore he heart your heart shatter with his words. And truth be told, speaking them shattered his own heart. He knew that whatever was going on was more than some silly crush, some meagre infatuation that would pass with time. Daniel love to be around you. His body craved it. You were his good luck charm, you were his pre-race ritual. The words fell of his tongue in a string of lies that he would make him hate himself for the rest of his life. "Baby, it was just some fun."

You deserved more than him, he reminded himself. And so, he forced his expression to remain neutral as he shattered your heart into a million pieces.

"Oh."

Daniel tried to wrap an arm around your shoulders but you simply shrugged yourself away from his touch. "Y/N..."

"No, it's okay," You shook your head, wiping the tears that were beginning to fall with the back of your hand. "I just really need to go."

"Happy birthday, Y/n," Daniel nudged his knee into yours gently in a desperate attempt to get you to look at him.

"Thank you, Daniel," You nodded your head. There was still a hope burning in your chest that perhaps in a few years, when you were older, more mature, that he would chose you. And you couldn't stop yourself from letting those thoughts slip from your mouth and hang dead in the air. "Maybe in a few years, you can learn to love me."

"I don't think so, kid," Daniel shook his head in reply. He loved you enough to know that he would never be enough for you, and that it was time to let you go.

"I am worth loving, Danny," She stood up from where she had been sitting on the sidewalk and smiled sadly at him, eyes dull and dead. "I just wish you thought so too."

𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐟𝐮𝐧 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐞.

𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞 :: this is a longer one that i kinda poured my heart into so i hope you enjoy it !! mirrorball part two is currently being written up for those waiting. in the mean time, please enjoy this <3

513 notes · View notes

vetteltea · 29 days

Text

This does NOT BELONG TO @virgol0gy. THIS BELONGS TO @lxclerc.

I’m sorry, but it is the lowest of the low to steal somebody else’s work. Something that someone has spent so much time, effort, energy and love into. Being inspired, fine. But STEALING THE ENTIRE FIC?

You seriously need to take this down and apologise. This is disgusting.

── ˙ ̟ 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝟏 !! ᴰᴿ³

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠(𝐬) :: daniel ricciardo x younger ! fem ! reader

𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬 :: in which it would’ve been fun, if danny allowed himself to be the 1

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭 :: 10.3k

𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞 :: takes place at the start of 2018, with daniel still driving for red bull and having max as his teammate

𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐦𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐰𝐞𝐝...

"You know we've basically just exchanged saliva, right?"

"In your dreams, sweetheart," Daniel turned his head to gaze at the younger girl beside him, the corner of his lips twitching upwards into a smug smile

"They're already full of you, Danny," You teased the older man with a smile.

And so, you don't push. Instead, you help him get his helmet on and zip up his racing suit, allowing your hands to linger before you wish him one final "good luck" before he gets into his car.

𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐝, 𝐲𝐨𝐮'𝐫𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐠𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐚 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐰...

It wasn't until the guy from the other end of the bar had ordered you a second shot that Daniel made his way over. He was quick to remove the shot glass from your hand and hold it out of you way.

"'M always good for you Danny," You mumbled under your breath, finger delicately tracing the veins in his hand and marvelling every time he flexed his hand over your skin.

"No you're cruel," Daniel removed his hand from your thigh. "Absolutely diabolical."

"Danny-"

"Wore it just for you," You shrugged your shoulders purposefully, making one of the thin straps of your dress fall down your arm. "What do you think?"

𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐰𝐞 𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐝𝐨𝐧'𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 𝐬𝐨?

"How are you feelin'?" The Aussie asked, clearly amused at your ditsy state.

"Both, but my heart always hurts when you look at me like that."

Daniel felt his chest tighten.

"Danny..." You whined his name, lips brushing the shell of his either before attempting to snake down his neck.

He shook his head, pushing you back by your collarbone. "I'm drunk but I'm not drunk enough to fuck you, especially not when you can't think straight."

"Do I at least get a kiss goodnight?" Your tone sounded so sincere, as though that was all you wanted from the man. "If you're not gonna fuck me, it's the least you could do."

"I only want you, Danny."

Those words would echo his head for the rest of his life, your voice like a sweet melody that would keep him going. He hated wanting what he couldn't have.

"Does that mean I can have my kiss goodnight?" You smiled up at him, not catching the deceptive tone in his previous words. You craved to know what his lips would feel like pressed against yours.

And fuck, did it hurt.

The Australian slipped out of the room in silence, closing the door behind him and pretending not to hear your sniffles as he walked down the corridor to his own room.

You stepped back so far that your back was pressed against the door to his driver's room, effectively trapping the both of you in there until you had the conversation. "Don't."

"Baby, what's wrong-"

"You're leaving?" The words slipped out of your mouth before you could stop them. You cringed at how pathetic you sounded, how childish you sounded.

"I guess that cat's out of the bag," Daniel chuckled, thankful he didn't have to hide it from everyone anymore.

"Does Max know?" You asked him. He stayed silent. That was all the confirmation you needed. "And my dad?"

You couldn't be further from the truth.

"It won't be the same and you know it," It feels like your heat is beginning to sink into your stomach and no matter how hard he tries, you refuse to meet his eyes. "What if it's not enough?"

You shook your head. "No."

"We're fri-"

Daniel only scoffed in reply. "The entire grid thinks your a silly little girl with a crush on an older man."

"And what do you think?"

"Maybe one day, kid," Daniel nodded pitifully. "When you're older."

𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐦𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐭 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐨𝐦𝐞...

You barely had enough time to make it to the bathroom before you were sick into the basin.

A quick google search of the model's name brought up her age in bold digits. They echoed through your head as you felt the nauseating need to be sick again.

23.

And then you realise.

Perhaps it wasn't your age that was the problem for Daniel.

Perhaps it was just you.

He missed you.

Daniel came alone.

You came with Max.

11:47pm

11:50pm

There were ten minutes until the end of the year, and until you turned 23.

He looked at his watch.

11:56pm

Max coughed and spoke up in an attempt to alleviate the awkward silence and attempt to help you escape the situation. "Do you want another drink, schajte?"

Daniel couldn't help but frown at the term of endearment that Max had granted you, knowing full well the Dutchman hated them.

He looked at his watch again, to see the numbers about to hit the stroke of midnight.

"3..."

"2..."

"1..."

"HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐢𝐟 𝐢𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐦𝐞...

Daniel.

The Australian driver looked bewildered. "What?"

"Danny," He corrected you.

You arched your brows. "What?"

"I'm Danny," He affirmed again, as though his fall name falling from your lips made him feel a sense of unbridled disgust.

"Is it me?"

"God, no," Daniel couldn't have beam more aggressive with the way he shook his head.

"Then what is it?" You felt so pathetic, begging him to give you a reason why you couldn't be his, why he couldn't be yours.

He gave you the same reply as always. "You're too young for me, kid."

You deserved more than him, he reminded himself. And so, he forced his expression to remain neutral as he shattered your heart into a million pieces.

"Oh."

Daniel tried to wrap an arm around your shoulders but you simply shrugged yourself away from his touch. "Y/N..."

"No, it's okay," You shook your head, wiping the tears that were beginning to fall with the back of your hand. "I just really need to go."

"Happy birthday, Y/n," Daniel nudged his knee into yours gently in a desperate attempt to get you to look at him.

"I don't think so, kid," Daniel shook his head in reply. He loved you enough to know that he would never be enough for you, and that it was time to let you go.

"I am worth loving, Danny," She stood up from where she had been sitting on the sidewalk and smiled sadly at him, eyes dull and dead. "I just wish you thought so too."

𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐟𝐮𝐧 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝'𝐯𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐞.

#I’m so SO MAD

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vetteltea · 1 month

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something so real about @vinvantae seeing me play spider-man non stop

#for real #spider-man is consuming me

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vetteltea · 1 month

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carlos sainz following his victory at the 2024 australian grand prix: "hard work pays off and life is sometimes crazy"

#CS55 my angel #I’m not over today #mack this is perfect #CS55 #Carlos Sainz

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vetteltea · 1 month

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well, it’s finally happened (again). the worst possible thing to any writer.

someone has taken the work of so many writers on tumblr and put it on wattpad. without our permission. despite the many fucking reminders we have always had that our work is not to be distributed or put anywhere else - I don’t understand why people do this. I suppose I should be happy that at least credit has been given… but I’m so angry that the work has been taken and compiled somewhere else without any permission. It is so infuriating - and this has always been the one thing that will make me stop writing here because people don’t know how to respect creators or have basic decency.

aprilshowers234 on wattpad has put up the work of so many of my friends so I’m tagging my writer friends to check if their work was also put up without their knowledge - @percervall @monzamash @monzabee @libraryofloveletters @vamossainz55 @userlando @norrisleclercf1 @szobosz @scudevils @vetteltea @jamminvroomvroom

I’ve already put in a copyright notice, but I honestly feel so helpless and terribly upset about this. if you’re a reader, I would love for any help to report this shit and get it taken down. Thanks 🥺

#bruh #can’t catch a break

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vetteltea · 2 months

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Daddy Bearman: Hi, I’m Ollie’s dad. My son is racing for Ferrari—

Charles, Lewis, Max, Seb, Carlos, Entire Ferrari Team, Literally Every Other Driver:

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vetteltea · 2 months

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I’ve just spent the last hour reading this, and I’m broken. The greatest love story of our time and it’s taken me so, so long to…here’s my live reactions.

I love you so much, Mack. I love you I love you.

said something stupid, instead of 'i love you.'- c.leclerc

can't we just act like we never broke each other's hearts? pairing: charles leclerc x female reader word count: 26.9k (my bad fr fr) warnings: 18+ minors dni, protected sex, oral sex, google translated french. tw: charles' 2022 season (including france) a/n: this is something, that's for certain. good or bad is yet to be decided. I'VE MOVED BLOGS! if you enjoy this and are looking for more, follow me @formulaforza

You’d texted him two weeks before the season opener. It was short, simple, and a huge overstep, one you promised yourself years ago you’d never make. Do you have any extra paddock passes? He’d said yes, and you begrudgingly asked if you could have an extra, if you could bring a guest, a boyfriend, Michael. He’s a big fan, of Charles and of Formula One. I really want to impress him.

Michael’s been impatiently itching to meet Charles since he spotted a photo of the two of you in your living room. You thought you’d taken them all down before he came over, but, you missed one. He’s sort of a Ferrari fan-boy, an Italian whose transplanted himself to Monte Carlo. You’d been putting off the meeting as long as possible, forced to consider if Michael actually liked you, or if he just wanted to know Charles. It wasn’t easy, to keep them apart. It was winter break, and Charles was in Monaco too much to be easily avoided. There’s a lot of verbiage that is used to describe home, vast is not one of them.

You feel strangely out of place with someone else to look after in the paddock. Ferrari hospitality had been your home away from home for years now, the way you followed him around the globe like a helicopter parent that first year he wore red. The paddock was always different, but maintained a comfortable familiarity, recognizable faces, names, buildings and colors. Michael was wide-eyed and curious and you smiled at the way the sun bounced off his hair, the excitement he couldn’t contain when amongst the chaos you’d become accustomed to. His presence, though, felt intrusive on something that had, for so long, been just yours.

Arthur’s familiar voice calls your name, over the bustling hum of different important and wealthy figures. You grin when your eyes meet his, stand up from the leather sofa you’re seated on, give him, and Pascale, big hugs. Charles told me you brought someone? She asked, voice sweet and curious.

Her tone was contrasted by Arthur’s quip asking where your arm-candy had run off to, wiggling his brows and searching the room for a man he’d never seen. He’s oblivious to the glare Pascale shoots into the side of his head.

You explain that he’s in the bathroom, check your watch. “Have you seen Charles today?” It’s not like him to not stop by and say hello, to check in and make sure you’re still enjoying yourself–or that you’re still capable of pretending you are. You wonder if he’s avoiding you, annoyed by the presence of your guest, a guest he doesn’t know. It’s unheard of, you asking for passes. It’s literally never happened. You’d asked about the possibility of one for yourself, back when he was with Sauber, and he’s maintained that you have an open invite since.

“We were just with him.” Arthur says.

“How is he?” You ask, because he might be mad at you, but also because you know him. His brain works like clockwork. Two hours before a race, right now, he’ll be doubting himself, doubting the car, doubting himself again. In his moments of downtime, before he’s swept up into the chaos of it all, his brain will pick itself apart with nervousness. You think it’s endearing, his nerves. They remind you that he’s still Charles at times where he feels so grand and invincible.

“He’s good.” Arthur says, because between crucifying jokes and mockings of his big brother, Arthur idolizes him. He’s none the wiser to Charles’ anxieties and insecurities because he’s never looking for him, blind confidence in the man he’ll never admit is his biggest role model. You look to Pascale, who understands the depth of your question, and get a reaffirming nod.

Arthur diggs two sticker tags from his pocket, full grid access. “For you.” He says, fastening one onto your lanyard. “And for the boy.” He holds out the other, presents it like a crown jewel. You sigh, snatch it from his hand and shove it into your pocket. You hate watching races in the garage, with all the hyper-wealthy motherfuckers who buy their way in. You always feel like you don’t belong. Like, no matter where you move, you’re always in someone more important’s way. Your limbs don’t feel like your own, unable to settle, so close to the comfort of your best friend yet miles away from his occupied mind.

“What’s going on?” Michael asks, airy tone in direct conflict to his hand on the small of your back, tense with envy. He’s silently laying claim to you, reminding you who you belong to, and you almost laugh at the thought of someone being threatened by Arthur. Charles, you could see. Charles, you’ve had that argument about before. Arthur, though? Arthur, who slept with his ratty blanket until he was sixteen, who lost not one, but two pet goldfish in the span of a year. Arthur, who is very happily in love with the sweetest girl to ever grace this Earth.

“C’est lui?” Arthur asks, tone bored. “Il est vieux.”

“This is him.” You say, through gritted teeth, introduce them all formally and sit by as an observer in their conversation. The lowlight was Arthur’s mention of grid access, and Michael’s giddiness at watching the race in the garage. You knew then that you’d be uncomfortable well into the night.

You end up in the garage during the driver’s parade. “Don’t touch anything.” You told Michael, the same warning Charles had given you the first time he brought you through a garage. The warning you give was less for your boyfriend, and more for you, who is desperate to run a hand over the red chassis, to memorize every detail of it. If you do, you might feel more comfortable when he’s inside, might be able to pretend you understand the concepts he casually mentions over dinner.

You squeal like a child when you see Isa, hugging her tight and spilling all the details of your lives since Abu Dhabi last year. You introduce her to Michael, who says he’s a big fan of Carlos. Joris tugs on your ponytail, appearing with Andrea, who kisses your cheek, tells you Charles is going to be so happy to see you in the garage. You roll your eyes.

Charles is heard before he is seen, a loud laugh, a familiar voice calling out your name as soon as he turned the corner. He’s probably just as surprised to see you in here as you are uncomfortable about it. When you hug him, the knotted waist of his overalls digs into you awkwardly. “You’re warm.” You say, peeling your body from his sweaty form.

“It’s hot.” He says, runs a hand through his salty hair.

“They shouldn’t make you wear all this during the parade.” You said, and he shrugged it off, asked where your guy was. You look around, search the garage for him. He can’t be far, and surely he’s gawking from one corner or another. If not at the sight of Charles Leclerc, Formula One driver, than at Charles, a man, whose hand hovers just behind the small of your back.

Two hands, two separate distinctions. One, possessive and impossible to ignore. The other, protective, almost goes unnoticed. For a few breaths, your shoulders are relaxed, but then his hand is gone, shaking Michael’s. “Good to meet you, Mate.” Charles says, and the whole place feels like a straightjacket again.

– –

You stand next to Isa, your hands wrapped nervously around each other’s the entire race, watching monitors and listening in on the headsets. “Carlos says the cars have it this year.” She says, while the guys are lining up in their starting spots. It feels like everyone at Ferrari has been chasing it, whatever it is, for a decade. Every year is the year, and every year, you’re begging Charles not to base his self-worth on a bad race or a bad season. You’ll believe in him until your last breath, but your glass of Ferrari is never going to be half-full.

Charles and Max, Max and Charles, Charles and Max. They flip flop positions lap after lap. When it seems like he’s settled in, you allow yourself to breathe. The universe has never allowed him comfort, though. Enter, safety car. The replay is on the screen, and your heart pangs for Pierre, watching his dash go black in system failure. Your heart aches for Charles, though, and the forty-six laps of hard work that was erased just like that.

Max races like Max, inching closer and closer to Charles, practically lining up next to him. You’re rearing up for a dogfight, but Max fucks up. You don’t know what he did, why he did it, and it doesn’t seem like anyone else does either. It doesn’t matter, though, because Charles is gone. Something in you settles, sure and confident, even if it’s not over yet. You hear murmurs, celebrations, Max is retiring. Charles is going to win.

A Ferrari one-two to start the season. Your smile is so big your cheeks ache. Under the lights, watching him up on the top step, listening to your national anthem, you allow yourself to hope, to buy into the hype everyone else is swearing by.

His skin shines brighter than his smile, sparkling with whatever lemon-lime soda they’d filled the champagne bottles with this year. You have a momentary lapse, consider what his skin would taste like, sweaty and sticky and sweet. Michael’s presence, his arms caging you in between him and the barricade, assures that the thought is nothing more than a passing one.

He hugs you when he makes the rounds, being whisked away to whatever media responsibilities he had to fulfill before he heads to the debrief. Sweat and seven-up soaked, he’s running on pure adrenaline, squeezing you so tight you struggle to breathe.

– –

You shower back at the hotel, wash his hug down the drain with the rest of the race anxiety. He takes everyone out to dinner late that night; Arthur, Lorenzo, Pascale, Andrea, Joris, Michael, and you. It’s a tradition. No matter how late or early in the day it happened. A podium, a celebratory dinner. Like always.

The air is light, happy conversations flow from smiling faces, filling the room with laughter and excitement and hope. You’re sandwiched between your boyfriend and your best friend. Charles’ arm throws itself around your shoulder when Lorenzo retells a story meant to embarrass you. Michael reacts accordingly, hand on your thigh, fingers digging into your skin. They’re fighting over you and only one of them knows it.

Charles is engaged in conversation, and you’re pretty sure you’re going to have bruises in your leg by the time you go to sleep tonight. You nudge Charles’ foot with yours, his head turns before his eyes, lingering on Andrea and the conversation you’re pulling him from before he's searching your eyes curiously. You shrug your shoulder, and as if noticing it’s there for the very first time, he drops his arm onto the table and returns to the conversation.

He must’ve showered, changed, and hurried here. His hair is still damp, and you want to play with it. Curl the long pieces around your finger and play with the short pieces at the nape of his neck. You soak up his presence as much as you can, knowing it’s going to be several weeks and several races before you see each other again. Crazy lives and crazy schedules that won’t feel normal again until break. You both take care to cherish the times you do get to spend together these days. You’re not twenty-one following him around the world anymore.

“Merci.” You say, at the end of the night. “For everything.”

He shakes his head, shoos your words away like they’re unnecessary, like you shouldn’t be thanking him for pulling strings. “Ton jouet garçon parle-t'il français?” He asks quietly, just for the two of you to hear. You roll your eyes, shake your head. “Il aest assez fan de moi.”

“Tu l’aime bien alors?”

“Non.” He chuckles. “Je ne l’aime pas. Pas pour toi.” He says it matter-of-factly, annoyingly so and without any elaboration.

“Heureusement, que tu n’es pas ma mère.”

“Heureusement.”

It’s Miami when you see him next. Hot and humid and sunny, once more. Windy, too. Big gusts move the palms, gluing your hair haphazardly across your face before you tie it back, blowing his shirt tight across his chest. “How’s grandpa?” He asks at lunch. You’re sat across from him on the expansive patio of a waterfront restaurant, waves crashing against the cement beams below you, a seagull running around on the wooden planks in search of fresh crumbs.

After Bahrain, Arthur wouldn’t drop the salt and pepper allegations, pushing until he found out Michael was seven years older than you. None of the boys have referred to him as anything but a grandfather since.

“Oh, that?” You say, nonchalant, like you can’t be bothered when you very much were. “He liked me too much.” Translation, he wanted me on a leash.

“He liked you too much.” He repeated, smile tugging on his lips. “Please,” He gestured to you, “Élaborer.”

“You never liked him, anyway.” You say into the rim of your water glass, taking a long, cold drink. The condensation from the glass drips down your wrist, forearm, off your bent elbow and onto your bare thighs, just past the hem of your sundress. The glass makes a heavy clunk when you set it back on the tabletop.

“Oh, I loved him.” He laughed. “He was just wrong for you, chou.”

“You barely knew him.”

“After he left you alone in the garage?” He leans back in his seat, gestures harshly across his throat and clicks his tongue. “There was nothing to know.”

“You leave me alone in the garage.” You remind him and he’s quick to jump in.

“I do not.” He leans forward, elbows on the table, animated. You smile, he smiles. “I leave you with Arthur.”

“You do not!” You laugh, protest without thinking, without needing to. The memory of each and every race you’ve spent in the garage is burnt into your memory. Every second feels like a second and a half. There are no distractions, it’s just you, in the way, and him, flying around in a death trap at a million kilometers an hour.

He tries to argue, insist he would never leave you alone if he thought you were uncomfortable. You don’t want to hear it, though. If he does leave you under the watchful eye of someone, they have always done a pretty shitty job at looking out for you. “Whatever.” He finally concedes. “Who’s on the radar now?” Nobody, you tell him. Going to be single for a while.

“What are your plans tonight?” He asked over the phone. It was the middle of the decade, the start of your first year at University. The longest you’ve been away from home and the only time he’d been there without you.

Jules had died that summer, and the sun had felt dimmed since. You spoke to Charles almost every day, but you were in no rush to get back home. It was ironic, Monaco reminding you of Jules, you finding an escape from the memories in France. It should be the other way around, but, logic has never had much hold over grief.

“I have a presentation, remember?” He listened to you revise for it, mindlessly picking apart your notes, adjusting even the most minute details, for hours last week. You cried when the ancient printer in the library wouldn’t fulfill it’s only earthly purpose, and he patiently calmed you down, stayed with you on the phone until you fell asleep that night. He never acknowledged it, and you were grateful for it.

“That’s tonight?” He asked, sounded defeated.

“Yes. Why?”

“I miss you.” He said, and you nearly crumbled into a little ball on the street. “I was going to come see you.”

You hesitated for a moment, tried to remember just how messy your apartment was, sized up your outfit. You didn’t want him to go telling stories to your parents of a disheveled daughter drowning somewhere just below the surface in France. You wanted to be put together when you saw him again, be the rock you were before you left.

Generously, you would say you fell somewhere in the grey. “Come, then.’ You told him. “You can pick me up.”

– –

Nearly three hours later, after the conclusion of your presentation and his mind-numbing drive, he’s parked a short walk from your university building, waiting for you. “Sulut.” He said.

“Hey.” You replied, climbing into the passenger seat. “How was Portugal?” He’d just gotten home and you’d been too busy with school to check any race results. Plus, you always liked hearing his recounts of races more than Google results.

“How was your presentation?” He asks, doesn’t answer your question.

“Good.” You smiled, buckled your seatbelt.

Last season, before last summer and before Jules, you couldn’t get him to shut up about racing. It was all he ever wanted to talk about. He could be winning races or embarrassing himself on track, it didn’t matter, he’d talk your ear off. Now, he’s a lockbox with a combination that changes every day. You talk and you talk but nothing is really said, not anymore. You use each other’s voices to drown out the ones in your heads, to dull the pain, if even briefly.

Growing up, it had always been your three families. Your fathers were best friends, had known each other before they knew their wives. You vacationed together, spent holidays together, had monthly family dinners and walked to the bus stop together. All of you kids were the same ages. Not planned, completely coincidental, they’d always say. You didn’t buy it, Arthur was the only one without a match, poor kid, the permanent brunt of jokes and the forever baby brother.

“I don’t know my way around here.” He says, hand on the back of your headrest, backing the car out onto the road.

“I do.” He smiles. Oh, how you missed his smile. All perfect and pretty, just like the rest of him, only happier.

You arrive in Spain early, with him. There’s optimism after Miami, Charles is back on track, back to believing he deserves the title and then some. You all spend the entirety of Monday in La Barceloneta, soaking up as much tranquility and Spanish sun as you can.

Someone is knocking–pounding–on the door of your hotel room. The sun has barely risen, pouring through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting hard golden shadows on the entire room. “Fuck.” You groan, rubbing sleep from your eyes, dragging your feet the entire way to the door. When Charles had said, we’re going to spend all day at the beach, you thought he meant midday, at the earliest. “What?” You say, met with Arthur’s annoyed face.

“You could sleep through a freight train.” He says, and you flip him off.

“You could have called me.” You say, yawn, stretch your arms out above your head. He rolls his eyes, and it gets under your skin in a way only a little brother can manage. You wish you had a shoe to throw at his stupid face.

“Charles did. Three times.” He holds up a matching amount of fingers and you nod, that sounds like something you’d sleep through. “Are you ready?”

Deep breaths, deep breaths, don’t lunge at him. “Do I look ready?” He looks you up and down and you can actually see the gears turning in his head, all three of his brain cells working overtime trying to convince him to keep his mouth shut. “Don’t answer that.” You say, stop him before your eye starts to twitch. “Give me half an hour.”

You knock on the door to Charles’ suite forty-five minutes later. Messy ponytail that you barely brushed, swimsuit, shorts, cotton button-up, entirely too large tote bag slung over your shoulder. Lorenzo answers, “Good morning, sunshine.” He says, all sing-songy and stupid. “Sleep well?”

You walk straight past him into the suite. You think your entire room could fit in his living area. You walk through it, past Joris and Arthur, engaged in a heated conversation, and Carla, who looks about as sleepy as you do. Charles is leaning against the kitchen counter, eating a bowl of something colorful. “No coffee?” You say.

Mouth full, he answers around his spoon, “I don’t drink coffee.”

“But, I do.” You say, grab a sliced strawberry from his bowl, eat it in one bite.

“Feel free to make some.” Lorenzo chimes in. You flip him off, too, pouring coffee grinds into a paper filter and starting a pot. Lorenzo grabs a strawberry from Charles’ bowl too, and the metal spoon promptly collides with his arm. “Ay!” He yelps, tries, and fails, to jump away from the cutlery. “You let her have one!”

“She scares me when she’s tired.” He says, and you take another one because you know you’ll get away with it. He points the spoon at you, warningly. You wink, pop it in your mouth and he smiles, chuckles into the breakfast.

– –

You fall asleep on the cabana bed in your shorts and bikini top, cotton shirt unbuttoned and laid over your face like it’s going to block the light out. You wake up when you’re hit with a bottle of sunscreen. There’s a possibility whoever threw it didn’t realize you were asleep, but the seam lines on your legs lead you to believe you’ve been relatively stationary since laying down here.

You pull the shirt off your face, sit up, disoriented from the nap. “You’re going to burn,” Charles says, rubbing the lotion into his face. “You have pink cheeks.”

“No, I don’t.” You say, but lather up anyway, ask Carla to reach the places you can’t.

The first drinks of the day come with lunch, a round of beers. Corona with lime. You keep yourself paced for the first couple hours, a 1:1 ratio between liquor and water. You maintain the slightest of buzzes, one that you really only feel when you catch yourself giggling too hard at one of their stupid jokes. It’s not the beer that takes you out, you’ve spent your entire life trying to keep up with Charles and his professional-drinker friends. It’s not the Sangria, either, however fun that is to sip. It’s the shots. It’s always the cheap tequila shots that do you in. You feel them too late, don’t realize you’re tipsy until you’re shitfaced. You’ll learn one day. One day, but not today.

You and Charles are sent to find tequila, and you walk down the beach until you find a bar that looks like it’s got decent shit. “I like you like this,” You say, toes sinking into the wet sand, cool water washing over your feet with each crashing wave.

“Like what?” He asks, squinting through the sun to see you. You left your sunglasses at the cabana and he gave you his to wear. They were big on your face and you thought if you moved too quickly they’d fall off into the sand. His linen shirt whips in the wind, his hair is sticking up in all directions, greasy with sunscreen. He glistened with sweat and coconut lotion, beautifully sunkissed.

“Just.” You shrug. “Happy.”

“Awww,” He teases, throws an arm around you, makes you miss a step and trip into him. He smells like summer and sandalwood and fresh, warm towels. “So sweet.”

At the bar, you order and he pays. Licking the salt off the back of your hand, you down the shot, pucker your lips around the lime, and set off back toward the rest of the group with a handful of shot glasses. It’s harder to carry them than you thought it would be, both of you fighting laughter when a bit of alcohol spills out of the tiny glasses, moving quickly over the burning sand. Back with everyone, you take another shot, no salt this time.

The next round is broken up by something sweet and fruity. Joris takes a picture of you and Charles drinking them, arms intertwined like newlyweds at their wedding reception. You hope it doesn’t end up on social media, uninterested in a weekend full of online death threats.

Another round of shots follows soon after, and then another. Not a single water has been sipped in hours. “We should go swimming.” You declared, unbuttoning your shorts and wiggling out of them. “Before we’re too drunk.”

“We’re not getting drunk.” Lorenzo says. Carla laughs from Arthur’s lap.

You shrug. “I am.”

“You already are.” Charles laughs into a beer bottle. “No deeper than your ankles.” Fuck you, you mouthed, walked backwards towards the sea. You wade out until the waves splash against your chest. On the beach, Charles is unbuttoning his shirt and tossing it on the cabana, taking off his sunglasses. You feel hot in the chilly water.

“My babysitter!” You laugh when he’s within earshot, slowly cutting through the water to you.

“I told you ankles.”

You shrug, form first with your hands and push them against his palms. “I’m not drunk.” He pushes back, laughing, you are. You shake your head, move your hands from his and run them over your hair, gather it to one side, twist the water from the ends. “The water is sobering me.” You lower yourself, sinking down until the salt water tickles your chin.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” You look up at him, probably with blown, tipsy pupils.

“I don’t believe you.”

You hum, dipping your head back into the water. “You never do.”

“I always do.” He says, and you laugh at the immediate contradiction like it’s the funniest thing you’ve ever heard. You might be drunk.

You cut yourself off after that, until you can eat something and drink a non-alchoholic beverage. You won’t let yourself get sober, because then you’ll be passed out on someone’s shoulder by sunset. You won’t get trashy, though. It’s a race week, anyone could see him, take a picture with him, a video with you in the background. When you’re together, whether you like it or not, you’re a reflection of him, a public display of the type of people he wants to associate himself with. Tipsy and fun is cute and carefree. Trashed and blacked is messy and irresponsible.

You’re trying to hold your composure in the taxi, resting your head, and eyes, on the window. The guys picked a restaurant while you and Carla were using the bathroom, and now you’re making Charles read you the menu. He’s doing it in butchered Spanish, trying to pick out the words and meals he recognizes.

“Is there tapas?” You ask, smacking his chest with the back of your hand.

“There is tapas.” He confirms.

You almost cry, laugh instead. “My god, I could kiss you right now.”

“You are so drunk.” He chuckles, and you bite your fist, sink into your seat, wish you could fake it better. Have fun and let loose without embarrassing him.

“Je suis désolé.” You whisper, drop your head the other way, onto his bicep. He adjusts, moves his arm so it’s around you, runs a hand over your hair. He doesn’t ask you what you’re apologizing for, knows that you’ll tell him anyway. “Pour être embarrassant.”

“Chérie,” He says into the crown of your head, a soft kiss before continuing. “You could never embarrass me.”

– –

The sobriety returns during dinner, bringing a pulsating headache with it. You drown your sorrows in delicious, cheap food, and drink an entire pitcher of water by yourself. When you leave, on the street outside, a band is playing in front of a fountain. You all stop, gather around and listen, sway to the lyrics you can barely understand. Joris is taking pictures of the band, Arthur is spinning a giggly Carla around. Charles grabs your hand, twirls you around and dances with you under the orange street lights. You rest your head on his chest.

“You should sing along.” The vibrations from his laugh soother your aching head.

It feels like a scene from a movie, like every other person in the city fades away into obscurity and it’s just you and he swaying on the cobblestone street. You’re so close to him, can’t be much closer, wish you could be. If you could, you’d crawl inside him, inspect his brain and the beautiful way it thinks, admire the way he sees the world. You know it’s special. Everything about him is magnificent, from the tallest hair on his head to the soles of his feet, every birthmark and fallen eyelash in between.

Slowly, your sway has come to a stand still, and he’s staring at you with dopey, tired eyes. It should be illegal, the way he;s looking at you. His sightline jumps all over your face. Your right eye to your left, your nose to your lips. They linger there, on your lips, and then he’s staring into your soul, searching for something. Can I kiss you right now. Give me a reason not to. You don’t know what he wants you to silently speak. If you knew, you’d tell him.

A cat-call whistle snaps both of your heads to Lorenzo. “Get a room!” Arthur yells, pretends to gag. Carla smacks his chest a little too hard to be playful.

The gap between you and Charles is only a few inches larger, but he feels unreachable, eyes glossy and avoiding you. “Fuck off, mate.: He says, drop a bill into the band’s opened guitar case.

– –

Sunday is a nightmare. There’s no way to sugar coat it or make it sound prettier than it is. Andrea grabs you from hospitality, throws his pass around your neck because nobody is going to stop him from getting into the garage. He keeps you at an arms length for the entirety of the short walk.

The car is already stopped in front of the garage, he’s climbing out. His posture is defeated, depressing. You wonder if you’ll be able to say the right words or if he’s just going to want to yell. A few people give him encouraging words, pats on the back, a hug. They’re already asking him to go to the media pen, to feed him to the sharks like a bucket of chum. He moves past them all, gets his weight taken and bee lines it to his drivers room.

Andrea nudges you in his direction. You stay in play, your feet frozen. You don’t know what to say. Go on, he says.

Fuck.

You knock on the door softly, nothing. Opening the door just wide enough to squeeze through it, you find him sat on the floor. Knees bent, arms locked and resting on them, fingers intertwined. His back is against the edge of the couch and his head is hung low. He doesn’t look like himself.

“What?” He says, rigid, doesn’t even bother to look in your direction.

“Do you want me here?” You ask, and his eyes shoot over to you. He looks exhaustingly sad and sorrowfully tired. You wish you could make it better, rub Neosporin on his cutes and stick a race car bandaid over them. Promis the wound would get better and know you were telling the truth.

“Stay.” He says, so you close the door behind you.

You sit on the couch, awkwardly scooch yourself over and around him, a leg on either side of his body. His head rests on your knee and your fingers toy with his hair, soaked with sweat. You don’t know how long you sit like that, just that it’s long enough for someone to knock on the door twice. You stay seated.

“You should change.” You finally say, after the third set of knocks noticeably lacks the patience of the previous two.

“Yeah.” He says, and you both stand. “Don’t go home?” He asks when you’re already halfway out the door, when you’re already looking at Mia in the stairwell. You look over your shoulder, nod, smile, and leave the door open for her to slide in and get to work.

You wait on the stairs, take a deep breath before re-emerging into the chaos. Carlos is still fighting for the podium and you don’t want to drag the mood to the Marianas Trench. It’s just so, so hard to see him hate himself.

Energy is low, morale is lower, but you stay seated in the back of the garage. When the race is over, you head back to hospitality, linger in his room there. Your phone is dead, abandoned on the floor and you lay on his massage table, staring aimlessly at the ceiling. Everything replays on the blank canvas. The perfect lap the day before, his pole position. The sparkle in his eyes and the lightness to his voice. A great start and a commanding lead and a quick pit stop and then he’s slowing down, Andrea is grabbing you and hurrying you across the paddock strip.

Your presence scares him, makes him jump when he opens the door. “Fuck.” He says. “I thought you went home.”

You don’t bother to look up at him, to sit up. “You asked me to stay.” You listen while he shuffles around the room. His presence means the presence of others, and it’s not long before Andrea is there, picking up your phone and placing it on your stomach. His brothers are gone, Carla too. Joris lingers, the silent, unrelenting support of a friend.

“Are you hungry?” Charles askes, and you turn your head to face him. His expression is as tired as his voice.

“Are you?” You aren’t, but you can be if he is.

“No.”

“Me neither.” His eyes narrow, trying to decipher if you’re telling him the truth or if you’re being agreeable. He hates it when you do that, when you tell people what they want to hear instead of what they need to, instead of the truth. “Serious.” You reaffirm, and he returns to packing up his things.

You just watch him. There’s nothing else to do, but, you want to live in his head, know what he’s thinking and feeling and fighting. You relish in any hint towards those emotions, from the way his shoulders hand to the way he zips up his backpack.

“Come,” He says, extending a hand, pulling you to your feet. He grabs his sunglasses from their comfortable position on the collar of his shirt. It’s dark out. He just wants to hide the disappointment. There are still people lingering on the track, after all these hours. On your way out, he stops and talks to Pierre and Esteban. About what, you don’t listen. You don’t ever want to talk about this race again, want to leave it in the past. Head down, focused on the things yet to come. When Charles is ready to move on, Pierre gives him a heavy pat on the shoulder and a hug, one of the largest displays of encouragement any of these guys are capable of giving to each other.

It must be so strange, you think, hoping for someone’s success and failure simultaneously.

Fans are still here, too. He holds his head high and takes pictures and signs everything, makes them all feel loved and appreciated. Nobody is any the wiser to his inner turmoil, to the way he wil pick apart every single aspect of the race and internalize it, use it as fucked up motivation. He’s silent when he’s not interacting with the stragglers. You, Andrea, and Joris all trail behind him, engaged in quiet conversation about Monaco; the race, sleeping at home, the always surprising strangeness of a race you could watch from your bedroom window. Ahead, he holds out a hand to you, and you take a hurried couple of steps to match his pace.

“You okay?” You ask. He nods. “Anything but?”

Anything but, a term you’d coined after Jules’ accident, when all anyone ever wanted to talk to you guys about was how you were doing, what you were feeling. The constant retelling, reliving, reassuring everyone you were doing okay when you were far from, it was almost as painful as losing him. Anything but is invoked, and the other has to change the subject, ignore the elephant in the room, no matter how big it is.

A soft, sad smile tugs on his lips, silent gratitude, and he squeezes your hand tighter, barely so. “Yeah.” He says, and you go on about the haircut you’re thinking about getting once you’re back home in Monaco, asking if he thinks bangs are an option on a face shaped like yours.

– –

You’re flying to Monaco with Charles, and the rest of Ferrari, early tomorrow morning, so your small group deciding in the hotel lobby that the night will be made better by liquor, probably isn’t the wisest of decisions. You do it anyway.

You all behave, careful not to get tipsy. Andrea reminds Charles he still has to train tomorrow, and that keeps him from going too far. The rest of you are just following his lead.

He insists on walking you back to your room at the end of the night, even though Andrea and Joris both swore they’d get you there safe. She’s a runner when she’s drunk, he’d said, and you scowled. “Not since I was sixteen!” You defended, insistent that you didn’t need anyone; Joris, Andrea, or Charles, to walk you to your room. It’s not like you’re lost and drunk somewhere in an unfamiliar city. It’s a five-star hotel and you had all of one floor to travel between.

He doesn’t even say anything on the walk he’d insisted on being present for. Your footsteps echo off the carpeted floors, bouncing between the thin walls and reflecting off the sleek, minimalist artwork. He has a beer in his hand, something from the hotel bar, priced entirely too high for the quality, you’re sure. Each time he brings it to his lips, the glass clinks against the ring on his pinky finger.

He’s flushed, beautiful as ever, and you wished you were an overpriced bottle of beer; your sweat on his skin, the cold ring contrasting his warm, calloused hands. Those soft, pink lips on you, the way they almost were this week. They almost were, you keep telling yourself, you weren’t imagining it. “Charles.” He raises his brows, silently tells you to continue. “It,” You hesitate. You falter, because it’s not too late to say nothing, to bask in the silence a little longer. You can still stop yourself, shove the thoughts deep down and abandon them somewhere in the back of your mind. Curiosity, desperation, something sparked by the green in his eyes and the red on his shirt and the condensation on the bottle, it all gets the best of you. “The other night, it felt like you were going to kiss me.”

“Hmm.” He hums against the lip of the bottle, finishing off the last of the drink. There’s a long pause. You, waiting for him to say something, memorizing the strange pattern on the carpet. Him, saying nothing. You reach your room, hold the key card up to the lock. The silence is amplified by the shifting electronic gears and you’re pushing the door open. “Are you going to ask me?” You blink. “If I was going to kiss you?”

You exhale. Long and slow, do you want to know? “I haven’t decided yet.” You finally say. I’m not ready for this to get flipped on its head, you could’ve said. I love you too much to like you, you could have said. You didn’t. “Nuit, Charles.” You say instead, disappearing into the darkness of your room.

“Bonne nuit.”

“I’ve decided against the bangs.” You tell him in the grocery store around the corner from his apartment, leant against one of the doors in the refrigerator aisle. He’s waiting for a text back from his nutritionist, trying to figure out what he’s going to cook on the boat tonight. It’s family dinner night, and he’d volunteered to host, which meant he volunteered you to host on his yacht

“Good.” He says.

“You told me they would look good.” You laugh, wonder if he even remembers the conversation or if your words were just the backing track to his overthinking.

He shrugs. “You’re supposed to stop me from looking like a fool.” He laughs at his phone screen, turns it off and slides it into his pocket.

“My favorite thing about you is that you’re a fool.” He says, pulling open the door you’re leaning against, moving you with it. That’s not very nice, you said as he piled two packages of chicken breasts onto the groceries already in your hands.

“Chicken. Brave.” You add, reminiscent of the last time he tried cooking chicken on the water. It’s a good thing there was a fire extinguisher on board, and saying anything else would break the oath of secrecy you were sworn to.

“Ha, ha.” He mocks. “Not funny.”

“You know what isn’t funny?” You grab another pack of chicken, just in case. “Telling me bangs would be good.”

Good luck this weekend, the cashier tells him when you’re checking out. Break the curse, yes? Charles laughs, because he’s a good sport, and agrees. You hate all the curse talk, it pisses you off, more than it does him. The conversation around it gets worse every year, every time he doesn’t win at home.

They love him so much here, he’s their poster-boy during their poster-week, they don’t mean any harm by it, but it still gets under your skin. Curse this, curse that. Fuck off, shut up about it already. Everyone knows his Monaco track record, can everyone please find anything else to talk about?

– –

He finishes fourth, and it feels somehow worse than last year’s DNF. SO close, only to be screwed by the same shit as last week. You drink your weight at the club that night because maybe a lack of sobriety will make it sting a little less.

“You are not wearing that.” Lorenzo says when you walk out of your building. You groaned, looked down at your outfit. It was slinky, but slinky is what everyone wears to the club, especially during the grand prix.

You settle for a blazer, tell him to suck your dick, and fill the pockets so you can abandon your purse. You start off at a smaller club, one that transitions from a restaurant after dark and has intimate, smaller tables. You’re there for a couple hours, eat something and get buzzed. Predictably, you meet up with half of the grid at Formula One’s favorite club, where you have a bigger section and a bigger group and get a bigger buzz.

“I can’t wear these anymore,” You whined, stopping to lean against the wall of a building to take off your heels. Your feet were blistering, and the thought of having to continue the walk with them on was dreadful. Charles carries them because you keep dropping one without realizing it. It’s not your finest moment, but, you only threaten to jump into one bush on the nearly fifteen minute walk. Overall, a strong showing on your part.

You lose Charles at Jimmy*z, dancing with friends and strangers and other drivers and their parties. You’re drinking Negroni’s, and you aren’t sipping, occasionally splitting it up with a shot whenever someone suggests it. That’s when you see him again, when he’s putting a double shot of something expensive in your hand. I shouldn’t, you say, because you're teetering close to the line of embarrassment. He rolls his eyes, fully inebriated. Shiftfaced, if you will. “Shut up and take a shot with me.”

You do, it goes down smoother than water.

“That’s good!” You say, examininging the glass.

“I know.” He deadpans, and you both laugh. Sober Charles is one of the funniest people you know. Drunk Charles is the funniest person you know. He’s so unserious in everything he does–the way he talks, dances, expresses emotions, there’s nothing not funny about it.

The club comped the table and a few bottles of champagne for the publicity that comes with having half of Formula One partying under their roof. In exchange, a manager is trying to wrangle Charles’ section into a group photo. You were standing back, laughing at them all failing to maintain any semblance of sobriety, all logic and composure out the window three drinks ago. Charles and Arthur are yelling your name, yelling at each other, looking for you in the strobe lights. You move, hope he doesn’t see you. He does, locks eyes with you, dopey smile, summoning you with this come-hither motion, his middle and ring finger calling you to him. Even drunk, you notice the gesture, the subtle curl, twitch of his long fingers.

Fucking, hell. Flushed cheeks burn bright and you’re grateful your hair is down, covering your undoubtedly matching ears. He almost kissed you. He did. You’re not crazy, he knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s too smart not to.

You smile, lips pursed, and shake your head. It makes him pout, and then he’s yelling your name, gesturing you over with the rapid movement of his entire arm. His other hand is smacking Arthur’s face, trying to rile he and Carla up. It works, and now half the group is yelling your name, so, you give in. Celebratory cheers leave their mouths and the boys share a near-miss high five. Charles grabs the back of your head, pulls you under his arm in one fail swoop. You hone in on his cologne. Tom Ford Tuscan Leather, no doubt. His signature night-out fragrance, the one you and Lorenzo nearly peed your pants laughing at when Pascale bought it for him a few years ago. The hints of raspberry and amber wood, the ones nobody can smell unless they’re this close to him, make you dizzy.

“You smell nice.” You say, and he just looks at you, lowers his head to talk directly into your ear. You look beautiful, he says, and you might be sober. “Don’t say that to me.” You laugh, smooth down your hair.

There’s a real possibility at least one of the twenty people in the photo were actually looking at the camera.

At some point in the night, you end up in the bathroom with Carla for an evening debrief. You don’t realize how drunk you actually are until you’re staring into your hazy soul in the bathroom mirror. It’s an out of body experience, truly, you’re watching this conversation from the astral plane.

“Fuck.” You say, looking to Carla, who appears to be having the same experience as you. You both burst into a fit of laughter, the hunched over, sore abs, red faces, threat to the integrity of your bladder-type laughter that doesn't require anything to actually be funny. “I have to work tomorrow.” You say, trying to catch your breath. You work from home, she reminds you, and you’re both laughing again. “Je t’aime.” You slur, overwhelmed by the alcohol and emotion. “Beaucoup.”

“Non,” She giggles. “Je t’aime le olus.”

“You look.” You hiccup. “So pretty, I hate you for being so pretty.” Carla shakes her head at her own reflection, adjusts her top, checks herself out. You pat the sweat off your forehead and wipe under your arms with toilet paper from a stall. “Arthur is so, super lucky.” Another hiccup. “You are so pretty. So nice and pretty.”

“No, you are so pretty.” She laughs. “Charles is lucky, and he doesn’t know it.” Charles, Charles, Charles. You don’t want to talk about Charles and his stupid face and stupid smile and stupid fingers and stupid skin. “I should call Michael.” You say, digging your phone out of your jacket pocket.

“You should not.” She laughs, but you’re already searching your contacts for his name. “Nope.” SHe says, snatches your phone from your hands and holds it out of your reach.

“Carla.” You hiccup, pleading and pouting.

“Nope.” She says, putting the device in the bag that hands around her body.

– –

“This is my song!” You yell, quickly downing the shot in your hand, entire body vibrating with the bass pouring from the speakers.

“We should start a band.” Someone says, and Charles laughs.

“We should!”

“You’re my best friend.” You tell him, stumbling over your own feet without even taking a step. His arm reaches out as a stabilizer, just in case you need one.

“No,” He laughs. “You’re my best friend. More-er.” That’s not a word. You shake your head.

“I could play the drums.”

“I know we’re drunk, but, like. I love you.” You slur, test the waters of shifting your weight from one foot to the other. Another stumble, another hiccup. “I’d do, like, anything for you.”

“I know.” He says, but you can’t hear his voice over the music. “I love you.” He adds, smacking Lorenzo on the arm to get his attention, to draw him out of band practice planning. “She’s my best friend!” He says.

“I know!”

“I love her.”

Lorenzo laughs. “We all know.”

“We should take a picture!” You suggest to Charles, and he agrees. “I don’t have my phone. Someone stole it.” He gives you a puzzled look, concerned, grabs your elbow like you’re going to float away in the crowd and asks you to clarify. You just shrug. I have it, dumbass. Carla laughs, takes a picture of the two of you, doesn’t give you your phone back.

The next time you see him, you’re sat at the table having one of those drunken moments of emotional, existential crises. Your fingers twiddle with the fake eyelashes you peeled from your lids minutes earlier. “I’ve been looking for you.” He says, heavily drops into the space to your right, slings an arm around you.

You’re always under his damn arm, you never realized before just how often you’re here. Not that you don’t like it, it’s just an observation, confusing and emotionally charged, but an observation nonetheless. He’s so relaxed, completely slouched into the rich leather, legs spread wider than they need to be, the arm that’s not around you resting on the back of the booth. He’s watching everyone else, observing the different people with sleepy eyes and heavy lids. When he talks to you, he turns his head all the way, cranes his neck so he’s speaking into your ear again. You don’t turn your head, you’d be too close. “I have a secret to tell you.” He doesn’t whisper.

“What?” You laugh, settle into his side, into the laxity of it all.

He opens his mouth to speak, pauses, rests his forehead on your temple. “I forgot.” He chuckles. You hiccup. You both laugh.

Your eyes are closed, tired and so, so comfortable. You might fall asleep here, despite the loud noises and loud music and loud heartbeat. “You were going to kiss me in Barcelona.” You say, liquid courage forcing the words from your mouth like vomit. It isn’t a question. It doesn’t need to be.

“I kiss you often.” He says, a weak defense, and kisses the crown of your head. “See?”

You’re not crazy. He was going to kiss you. He was. “Charles.” Your voice is quiet, strained and scratchy and serious. You don’t open your eyes, can’t look at him when you demand an answer, a confirmation.

“I was.” The admission is suffocatingly delicate, like he might go for it, right then. His hand might grab your face and guide you to him. You’re ready for it, you think, as ready as you’re ever going to be for everything to change.

You don’t have to worry about it, to think about it and dwell on if he’s going to do it. He doesn’t. He just rests his head on yours. Your thoughts race faster than your heartbeat, and you wonder if he can feel your temples pulsing.

2013, family dinner. You’re in your room, hiding out for as long as possible, uninterested in the family events. Very teenaged girl of you, in all regards. Charles burst through your door, no knock, no warning. You didn’t even know they were there yet. Luckily for you, nothing incriminating was happening. He was quite the snitch back then, a real tattletale, especially if you were the one getting in trouble.

“I have something to tell you.”

“Unless it’s that you’re going to turn around and leave my room, I don’t care.” You’d said, annoyed by his presence. At sixteen, your relationship could best be described as friendly enemies. He was always around, especially when you didn’t want him to be, and he was always the golden child. Perfect in school, perfect on the track, perfect son, perfect friend. His existence was infuriating and because you were so close in age, everyone always wanted you to be the best of friends.

As a teenage girl, it was evolutionarily impossible for you to go alone with what everyone else wanted. You had to rebel, to run against the grain. Charles and you were not friends, and you did not care about what was going on in his life.

“Single-seaters.” He said with a dumb smile, leaning on his hand against your dresser. You take maybe one step between your bed and his arms, hugging him tighter than you had since you were children. Okay, maybe you did care about his life. There are some things even evolution can’t change.

“With who?”

“I thought you didn’t care?”

“I don’t”

His smile grew. “Fortec.”

You half-screamed, half-laughed, hugging him again, somehow tighter. “I’m so happy for you, Cha.” You said, with a level of sincerity you hadn’t used in years, especially with him. You thought for a moment you might cry, that he would make fun of you for it, that you’d do it anyways because you were so happy for him.

“Don’t tell anyone, I’m not supposed to say anything.”

“Who knows?”

“Like, nobody.” He’s giddy, it’s almost cute. Almost.

“Jules?” You ask, even though you think you already know the answer. Jules is God to Charles, this untouchable, invincible figure that represents the culmination of all his own dreams. He was the first person, you expect him to say.

“Not yet.” He told you before Jules.

You’re traveling in the weeks after Monaco, jet-setting around the world for your own career. It’s not until France that you see him again. You beat him there, actually, opting to spend some time visiting friends from University nearby, taking a bit of time to enjoy yourself and relax. Despite what everyone in your Instagram comments thinks, race weekends are not a holiday. The nerves and anxiety and heightened emotions you feel during one is so stress-inducing that the work week feels like a week in the Maldives.

Love you, always proud. You texted him moments after he won in Austria, along with a picture of you and the drink you were having in celebration in your hotel room.

You were a little bummed you couldn’t be there, celebrating with him. He really needed that win, and you could only imagine the weight it lifted off his shoulders. It’s been a while since you saw him genuinely happy on a Sunday night.

Love you, too. You suck. He texted back seven hours later, reiterating the sentiment the entire time he was home in Monaco and you weren’t. When you jokingly suggested he come to France early, you were met with the threat of being blocked.

– –

You spent the weekend with Pascale, spending every day at the track trying to out-anxious each other. You don’t know how she sleeps, Charles and Arthur both doing this shit. You’re a nervous wreck and she barely flinches.

“You remind me of myself a lot.” She tells you. Your knee is bouncing anxiously under the table you’re eating at. “Your mother, of course, but. Selfishly, I see the good parts of me in you.”

You’d always wished Pascale was your Mom, growing up. You have a great mother, you love her to death, but she was your mom. She had to discipline you, she had to put her foot down. Pascale didn’t have to do those things, not with you. She could be cool and carefree and spoil you because she was a bonus parent, not an actual one. If you grew up to be all kinds of fucked-up, she could wash her hands of you. Your mom couldn’t do that.

You’re so lucky to have her as your Mom, you would say to the boys. They’d say the same thing to you.

“You’re going to make me cry.” You say, picking at your cuticles.

“Chérie.” She says, grabs your hand, stills your anxious fingers. “Je suis nerveux rien qu'à te regarder.”

“I don’t like Monaco.” You say. “No room for error.”

“You don’t like any track.” She chuckles, releases your hands. You put them in your lap and go back to picking at the skin. “Not when the boys are out there.”

She’s right, you’re squeamish when you watch Arthur and Charles, don’t think you’ll ever get used to it. Charles loves to make fun of you for it, has videos saved on his phone of you, caught on the television cameras, captured by friends, that one time you were in the background of a Drive to Survive episode. He laughs and laughs at them, but when he watches Arthur, he’s just as bad as you are.

It’s different, when you love the driver. When you love them more than the sport, more than the team, more than nearly any other person in the entire world, every corner feels tighter, every straight feels faster, the whole thing feels like a narrowly avoided death sentence.

“I don’t know how you do it.” After Jules, how you do it after Jules. After Anthoine, after hugging a grieving mother and watching your son drive on the same track.

“I love watching them race.” She says. “I hate it, but I love it. All a mother can hope for her children is that they are brave enough to achieve their dreams.” They’re brave because of her, because of Hervé and because of her. They raised all three of their boys to be strong and brave and kind, and when Hervé passed, she picked up the pieces of her boys and glued them together again, built them up stronger, braver, kinder than before.

– –

You don’t see him for a while after the race, don’t know if you want to. He’s been eerily calm all when things have gone wrong all season, at least when you’ve been around. It’s only a matter of time until he loses his cool, until he snaps. That radio call? Snapped like a glowstick. He’s angry, at himself, at the car, at the team, at the world. There’s nothing anyone is going to be able to say or do that would make him happy, neutral even. It’s going to be all pity-party and hushed curses until he gets some rest and resets.

Behind the garage, when you’re finally leaving, he hugs Pascale tight. Her hand runs comforting circles on his back, and then it’s your turn to be suffocated. He squeezes you like it’s the last time you’re ever going to see each other, hangs on like gravity is pulling him in the other direction. “Anything but.” He said. “All night.”

You nod. “My mom sent me a video of Gi playing with the dog today.” You spoke of your niece, of Charles’ goddaughter. If anyone could hit his soft spot, it was her. “Do you want to see it?”

“Yeah.” He said, and when he watched her stumbling around the park, when her innocent belly laugh and giddy screams spilled out of the speakers, he actually smiled, might have even let a little laugh slip. It’s impossible not to, really, with that little girl.

He walks in relative silence back to the driver's lot, just listened to you go on and on. You feel nauseous, watching him put on a smile and interact with fans, laugh and take pictures and make children’s days by just existing. It must be such a strange life, a miracle his head hasn’t gotten ridiculously big.

– –

At the hotel, you can tell he’s still pissed. Rest, reset. He’ll be himself in the morning. You exchange goodbyes in the elevator, you’re on a different floor than him. You expect it’s the last you’ll see of him until summer break. He leaves for Hungary early in the morning and you’re driving back to Monte Carlo with Pascale tomorrow afternoon. You expect, because he’s knocking on your door an hour later while you watch L’Atalante on your laptop.

The light from the hallway is almost blinding in contrast to your dark room. “Hi.” He says, in running shorts and a t-shirt, bare feet. “L’Atalante?”

“How do you-”

He smiles. “You’re predictable.”

“What do you want?” You say through a yawn, shocked he makes out the words at all.

“Can I watch it with you?”

You sigh. “Charles.” You were minutes away from falling asleep, from putting this day behind you. Now, your feet are so cold on the floor it hurts and you’re becoming increasingly conscious and awake with each passing moment.

“Please?” He asks, voice small and broken. Fuck. You hold open the door, because you’re weak when it comes to him. You’d let him treat you badly if it meant he’d treat you. “You know there’s a giant TV right here, no?”

“I like my computer.” You say, crawl back into the bed, sit up against the million pillows. He flops down next to you, on top of the comforter because he runs hotter than a fireplace. When he’s finally done moving around, shifting until he’s nice and comfortable–sorry, he said–you press play on the movie.

“I love this part.” He says.

“You hate this movie.”

“I do not.” He does. He complains every time you watch it, says you need to find a favorite movie that’s in color, that doesn’t have random cat montages, that the main love interest has too many glaring red flags. Watch it with rose-tinted glasses, you told him once, threw a piece of popcorn at his head. “This is my favorite part.”

“No, it’s not.” You laugh. “You hate this part.”

He laughs, too, sweetly and softly, into his own shoulder. “I love it.” You shush him, shove his shoulder because he can’t even say it with a straight face. He doesn’t stay quiet for long, and it’s clear he came here to talk, not to watch the movie, but he tries to pretend. “You need to come to more races.” He says, his head resting on your arm. “I don’t like it when you’re not here.”

“Okay.” You say, only half-listening. It’s your favorite movie.

“Today sucked.” You paused the movie. Blinked twice, hard, frustrated because it;s your favorite movie, but he’s your favorite person.

You look at him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” He reaches over and unpauses it, adjusts so he’s sitting up, too.

You pause it again. “I think you do.”

“I don’t.”

You close the laptop, set it on the bedside table and flip on the lamp. “I don’t know how to make you feel better right now.” You say, stand up, pace the room. It sounds like you’re admitting your defeat, expressing disappointment in yourself with a half-hearted apology.

He stands up, too, follows you for a step but then you're still. There’s something unfamiliar painted across his face. Exhaustion, anger, desperation–you can’t pinpoint it. Urgency. You realize its urgency when his hands are on your face, thumbs dancing on your jaw, eyes darting between yours. Urgency.

He was going to kiss you. He is going to kiss you, you think, and you’re going to let him. He can use you as a distraction, if he needs to. You can kiss it better, you’re sure you can. His forehead rests on yours, the tips of your noses bumping against each other, shuddered, broken breaths. Your lips are so close, jaws slack, sharing the air. You’re dizzy. Dizzy and hot and then he’s kissing you. The taste of his tongue, the scrape of his teeth, the softness of his lips, it’s all so new, so butterfly-inducing. He smells like himself, whatever soap he always uses when he’s traveling. It’s crisp and clean and you want to lick it off his skin.

He’s the one to pull away, but you open your eyes first. “Sorry.” He says. You smile, kiss him again because you’re not sorry, wishing you could crawl inside his mouth and build a home there behind his beautiful, sharp, white teeth.

Your name sounds like a symphony when he says it, all dopey and sing-songy, hands firmly on your waist. “Don’t look at me like that.” He says, laughs into your mouth.

“Like what?” You ask, innocently.

“Just. Fuck.” He shakes his head, one of his hands slipping under the hem of your shirt, open and flat, exploring the vast bareness of your back. “You.”

“Me?” You giggle at his words, the stumble of them, cheeks hot and flustered. You shouldn’t be nervous. It’s Charles. You know him like you know your own hand, but, he’s never been yours, not like this. Your hands have never searched him like this, fingers never tugged on his hair with lust and longing, never felt the scratch of his stubble on your skin.

“Yeah,” He says into the crook of your neck, leaving a flurry of open mouth kisses in the space between your jaw and your collarbone. “You.”

“We shouldn’t.” You say, even though you’re helping him out of his shirt. “We should stop.”

“Do you want to stop?” He asks, his fingers stalling on the buttons of your pajama top.

“We can do this, right?” You ask, because you need his reassurance. You don’t need honesty. You know the truth. You need to hear what you want to hear, for him to tell you if it’s safe to jump, to fall aimlessly into the unknown. You need him to lie to you. “Can we go back to normal after this?”

“Ouais.” He says, and even though you don’t believe him, you think he believes himself. “Retour à la normale.”

“Okay.” You say, and he’s unbuttoning your shirt again. If his mouth didn’t feel so good on you, if his big hands didn’t send shivers up your spine when he ran them up the sides of your body, you might have thought a bit harder about what normal is for the two of you.

His hands do make you shiver, though, and he’s looking at your body with these sweet, drunk eyes, sliding the shirt off your arms and letting it pool on the ground with his.

You’re dropping to your knees on the cold floor next to the bed, pulling his shorts, his underwear, down with you. While he steps out of them, kicks them to the side, you admire him, toned and tanned and so, so pretty. You want to memorize it in case it’s the last time you see him like this, take notes on every freckle and muscle and defining feature under the harsh light. You need to feel him everywhere, to taste him, to make him feel as good as he looks.

He’s already hard, cock twitching with lust and adrenaline and arousal, all for you. Your work is cut out for you. You tease him, whisper profanities and place soft kisses against the skin of his upper thighs. “You make me crazy.” He says, you take him in your mouth, and he goes momentarily stiff before he relaxes, lets your fingers and your lips work in tandem to pull your name from him.

“Fuck.” He says, tastes like sex, sweet and salty and manly. His hands knot into your hair, pull it back into a haphazard ponytail that only loses shape as you continue. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He repeats, rutting into your mouth, fucking into your throat. You swallow around him, hollow your cheeks and he lets out this whimpered, wounded sound, forces your mouth off him. “Don’t do that.”

“You don’t like it?” You ask, take him in your hand, stroke over the slick of your spit, kissing the base of his cock and looking up at him with these big, saucer eyes.

“No,” He shakes his head, drags a hand over his stubble. “You’ll make me come.”

You swipe your tongue in one long stripe, swirl it around the head of him, smile. “That’s the point.” You say, filling your mouth with him again, sinking until he’s hitting the back of your throat, gagging you, tears prickling at the corners of your eyes.

He says your name like he’s battling to reason with himself, his grip on your hair tightening, pulling you off him again. You pout, and he rolls his eyes, shakes his head. “Tu es mauvais.”

“Ç’est vrai.” You roll your thumb over the tip, mindlessly, really, looking at him and waiting for him to speak. You’re an addict, already. It’s just so pretty.

“Want to last for you.” You’re not even standing and your knees are unsteady underneath you. You look at the floor, your forehead on his thigh, and laugh. You laugh harder than you should, just out of shock and disbelief. “What?” He laughs, too.

You’re standing, he’s helping you stand. “Who would’a thought?” You can’t stop giggling, cock your head to the side and try not to smile. “You and me?”

His tongue is in his cheek, eyes rolling in such a bratty way. You wonder if he can see how swollen your lips are, all because of him. Your mouth feels empty without him there. “I hate you,” He says with a smile, and kisses you.

Your knees buckle at the edge of the bed, and it’s too easy, the way you’re both on it without ever parting lips for more than a hasty breath. He moves you around like a doll, gentle and effortless in his removing of your shorts, of your underwear, in the manipulation of your positioning on the soft mattress.

He’s kissing you, sucking bruises into your collar, marking you like there’s any possibility you’re not already his. It’s hazy and intoxicating, him exploring your body, taking his time as he trails down your collar bone, through the valley of your breasts, hot, sloppy breath on your stomach, on your legs. You’re almost disoriented by it all, the natural comfort, the familiarity of him in a place so unfamiliar to his touch. He kisses your clit, you watch him, feel his hot breath on you, jaw slack and eyes glazed over. It makes you hot, makes your whole body flush and shiver.

“Putain, t'es chaud.” He curses, smiles at you from between your legs. His fingers splay over your hip, his thumb dragging itself over you, parting your lips with the slick of you, amused smile tugging on his face. “You’re so wet.” He says, moves up to kiss you.

“Sorry.” You whisper into his open mouth.

He shakes his head, mumbles something incoherent, kisses you again. “It’s hot, chérie. That you want it.”

“Want you.” You say, and he slides a long finger inside you, surprised whimper escaping from your lips into his open mouth. He curls it into you, crooks it at just the right angle and you writhe against the sheets. You can’t believe he’s got you like this, that you’re a mess for him over a single finger.

He moves back down your body, another trail of nibbles and kisses before he laps at you, swirling his tongue around your clit in a way that’s almost painfully good, curling his finger into that same spot. When he slides in another, you’re a goner, moaning out his name like it’s the only word you know.

“Let go.” He says. Your eyes are pinched shut in an attempt to keep yourself at bay for just a while longer. His eyes are glued to yours when you can finally open them.

You shake your head. “I’m not.” You start, stopping short to compose yourself when your leg twitches, shakes in applause of his work. “No ego boosts.” You sputter. He laughs against you, the vibrations of it blinding, a whole new sensation that spreads fire over your skin, sends you over the edge with little warning.

He doesn’t stop, not for a second, when you come. His fingers maintain their rapid pace even as you tense around him, his tongue, his lips, suctioned to you as your body tries to wiggle away. “Charles.” His name leaves your lips in a shudder, your thighs trying to close in on his head, the hand that isn’t inside you holding you open for him.

He works you over, skilled fingers and skilled mouth, coaxing you through another, louder this time. He leaves you catching your breath, restless, incoherent, shaky on the crisp white sheets and two orgasms ahead.

He’s so satisfied with himself, licks his fingers clean and grins and kisses you some more, just because he can. Because, it’s all gone to shit and the unspoken, unwritten rules of your friendship have gone so far out the window, they’re in another country. Maybe they’re in Hungary already, or waiting for the two of you on summer break, in Monza, hell, they might even be Abu Dhabi, there’s no telling.

“Do you have a condom?” You ask.

He freezes, strong arm holding him over you, caging you in. His eyes shut hard. “No.”

“You didn’t bring one?”

“When I came to your room, I didn’t.” He sighs.

“How gentlemanly.” You quip, wiggle out from underneath him. He flops back onto the bed, apologizing. You grab his t-shirt from the floor and hold it up to cover your body, he chuckles at that. “Apologize if I don’t have one.” You say, rifle through your backpack. Your leg shakes under you while you try to balance, squatting in front of the bag. You hope he notices, sees what he’s done to you without even filling you up all the way.

“Why would you have one?” He asks, just as you find the little package at the bottom of your bag. You turn on your heels, still bent over, condom wrapper in your teeth and look at him with narrowed eyes.

“Do you really want me to tell you?” You ask around the wrapper.

He thinks about it for way longer than should be required. “No.”

“Yeah.” You nod, dumbfounded, and stand back up.

“Really, with the shirt?” He asks, laughing about it again.

“Salope!” You say, drop the shirt, throw the condom at him. “Put this on yourself.”

“I don’t even like you.” He says, rips open the wrapper with his teeth and slides it over his cock. It hurts, almost, how badly you want him inside you, how empty you’ve felt since he took his fingers out.

“Don’t do that, you’re going to make me come.” You mock his earlier words, puff out your lips, raise your brows, a knowing glance.

“I was.” He defends, and you straddle him, wrap your arms around his neck.

“No, you weren’t,” You kiss him, his hands explore the curve of your ass, fingers dig into your hips, push you down so you grind against him, spread your wetness over him.

“Okay.” He says with a smirk, lust riddled and completely enthralled by you, one hand moving to thumb at your clit, start chasing another release for you.

“Okay.” You repeat, barely a whisper, lift yourself up enough for him to line himself up with you. You sink down slow, savor the burn of the stretch, wish it was the first time anyone had ever done this to you, that you could belong to him and only him.

“Fuck.” He says into your shoulder, kissing and sucking a purple spot into the flesh there, his hands splayed across your back, warm and strong and dragging across the hot skin. “Si bon.” Every inch of your body can feel him, hungry for more, the insatiable urge to hear his moans, to make him whimper, make him feel how you feel.

You grind your hips against his, chasing an unachievable leverage, a static inducing friction. Your foreheads rest on each other and your noses collide roughly in the sweaty, steamed, hitched breaths.

You’re obsessed with the way he watches your bodies, eyes glued where he disappears into you. You never want to hear anyone else say your name, not after hearing the way he says it while he’s inside you. “That.” He says. “Love that.” You do as you’re told, eager to please, hungry for him to finish. “Es-tu proche?” You shake your head, because you are, but he’s closer.

In a swift movement, he flips you over, switches your positions, slides back inside you. Even when he’s manhandling you, using you as a device for his pleasure, strong and without thought, there’s something gentle about it, something that anchors you to him.

He fucks into you with deep, measured thrusts. The new position, the new angle, it drives you fucking crazy, your back arching off the bed, grinding onto his fingers in the selfish chase of your own high. “Charles. Fuck.” I know, he tells you, shaky, pace reduced to an erratic grind. I know, baby, and you’re coming again, biting into the muscles of his strong shoulders, wet and warm and so fucking full of him.

“I’m.” He whispers into your neck, nibbles on your ear. He pulls out and you whimper at the loss. “Where?” He asks, pulls the condom off, jerks himself with those long, veiny fingers. You smiled, devilish. You wanted, needed, his cum in your mouth.

He’s too close to be gentle, now, to take care and take time. He’s desperate, it’s so fucking hot. His hands are on your head, knotted into your hair, holding you steady so he can fuck your throat. You gag around him, dizzy, hazy, eyes forced shut because everything is white and on fire. “Look at me.” He says. You do, and he has a fucking smile on his face, lewd and practically pornographic.

You hum, pleased with the state you’ve got him in and then he’s bottomed out, still and stiff, coming down the back of your throat, chanting your name like a prayer.

– –

“What am I supposed to do with these?” You laugh into the bathroom mirror, after a shared shower, delicate fingers examining the fresh bruises he burned into your skin. “I’m spending the day with your Mother.”

He’s drying his hair with a towel, laughs. “Nobody thinks you’re La Sainte Vierge.”

You move through the bathroom, back into the bedroom to retrieve your pajamas from the floor. “And what is that supposed to mean?” You tease, returning, tossing his clothes on the counter.

“It means,” He hums, wraps his arms around you, hugs you from behind. Your knees are weak and wobbly, his chin resting on your shoulder, looking at each other in the mirror. “Tu es belle, jeune et amusante.”

“Je suis amusante?” You ask, try to bite back a smile, fail.

“Très.” He says, nuzzles into your neck.

He sleeps in your room that night, wakes up early, shuffles around the bathroom, the light pouring out. His movement stirs you, his heavy feet roaming around the silent room. “Go back to sleep,” He says, kisses your hair, and the heavy door locks behind him.

Tired, from the weekend, from him, you let yourself go back to sleep. You should’ve got up and kissed him, you think. Really, truly kissed him, while the rules still didn’t apply and things weren’t back to normal. Whatever normal is for the two of you.

“What?” You said, spit, when Charles called you for the third time within five minutes. The first Monday of summer break, he’s in Monaco and you’re in France, a thousand kilometers, an hour and a half flight, away. More specifically, you’re standing in the corridor of your office building, meters away from the door you’d just stepped out of, the meeting you had to excuse yourself from leading because your phone won’t stop ringing and surely, something must be wrong.

“Hello to you, too.” He says, and you can hear the smile on the other end of the line. “Where are you?”

“Work.” You say, inspiringly calm. Fuck, she’s at work, you hear him say to someone. “Can I call you back in a bit?”

“Oui, désolée.”

“Ne sois pas.” You force a smile, like he can see it, and hang up, shut your phone off completely before returning to the meeting with an apologetic grimace claiming family emergency.

You call him back an hour later, after the conclusion of your meeting and then some, pushing past the heavy glass doors to your office building and out onto the street, the breeze blowing your hair into your mouth as you step between two buildings. He answers, but it’s just shuffling on the other end, hushed, muffled voices. “Are you there?”

“Oui, oui. Une seconde.” He says, far from the speaker. More shuffling before a proper greeting. “You’re on speaker.”

“What are you doing?” Shopping, he says, moves the phone, how’s work? You have to put a finger in your other ear to hear him, between the sounds of the city and the chatter on his side. “It’s fine.” You say, drag out the vowels because you’re bored, because you wish you were with him. He’s always so relaxed on summer break, so content and breezy and fascinating. You haven’t seen him since he was kissing your hair goodbye in France. You need to know if you can actually return to something normal.

“It’s fiiineee.” He mocks, laughs with whoever else is with him. You smile, all toothy and stupid. “Coming home today?” You can hear the hope in his voice. You’ve been here for less than twenty-four hours, it’s an unusually short trip. Most times, you’re here for a minimum of a weekend, almost always more. He shouldn’t be expecting you.

“Yeah.” You check the time on your watch. “In a few hours.”

“You want to come on the water tonight?” He asks.

“La Mala?” Of course, he says, like it shouldn’t even be a question. “With?” He speaks to someone else in Italian, you think you hear Andrea say something, and then Charles’ voice is louder, off speaker, you assume.

“Lorenzo and some camera guys. We’re doing some… comment dire, day with my life?”

“I don’t know.” You hesitate, because the last thing you want to do is be one of three people, to be on display somewhere on Instagram or Youtube or wherever the video they’re making is going. You love him, but the attention is overwhelming and you like to stay as far from it as possible, especially when you’re nervously sorting out the normalcy of your relationship.

You took a photo of him once, with a fan, just walking around the city. You weren’t even in the photo, didn’t say more than two sentences to the guy he was posing with. And yet, when he posted it on Twitter, said Charles was with some girl, posted a screenshot from your Instagram and said her, he was with her, you had a full inbox begging to know if you were dating Charles, calling you obscene vulgarities, threatening you. You weren’t even in the fucking picture.

“It will be fun.” He says. “I haven’t seen you since france.” Exactly, you haven’t seen each other since France. Just over a week. It’s chump change for the two of you, at least it was, before his spit dripped down your thigh and he came in the back of your throat. Now, a week is the opportunity for an awkward plant to take root, grab onto you and make everything weird and uncomfortable and wrong/ “We’re having pasta.” He says, can sense your uncertainty, knows it sweetens the deal.

“No chicken?”

“Never again.” He laughs. “You’re coming?”

“I guess.”

“You guess.” God, he is a child, truly. “Call me when you land, yes?”

“Yeah.”

– –

You can’t remember the last time you felt so nervous to see him. Sitting on the edge of the concrete landing, watching him cruise in on a little boat full of strangers, it’s almost worse than watching him race. Do you have to say something? Is he going to say something? Do you ignore it? That’s the agreement, right? Everything goes back to normal. Normal, normal, normal.

He looks like he’s been in the sun all day, cheeks pink and rosy, the blue of his shirt mellowing him out, making him glow. A God, Heaven shining down on him, presenting him to you like a gift. You hate that you have to share him with anyone when he’s like this, especially with strangers, with people who don’t know how lucky they are to see him like this.

“Did you miss me?” He calls out when he’s within earshot. You stand up, take your shoes off because there is no way that boat is making it all the way to you.

“Who called who?” You say, and he laughs.

You hopped off the landing into the shallow water, walked out to the boat on your tip-toes, trying to keep the bottom of your pants as dry as possible. You had a change of clothes in your bag, but, even a minute in wet pants is too long. He helps you into the boat and you introduce yourself to the strangers pointing cameras at you.

This was a mistake. It doesn’t even take the distance from the landing to the yacht for you to realize that. So fucking uncomfortable, cameras in your face, recording your conversations, watching the way you look at him. You can already see the comments calling you pathetic, calling you a whore, calling you a bitch.

It is pathetic, you remind yourself when your hand is on his, stepping around him, moving from one boat to another. They will think it’s pathetic and they’ll be right.

There’s more production people waiting for your arrival, waiting to take your place next to Charles and capitalize on the fleeting light and beautiful scenery. It’s unusual, there’s nobody here. You introduce yourself to them, too, because it feels strange not to.

Once you’re onboard, you change in the guest suite. Sweats and a hoodie because the sun is setting, dusk settling on the horizon, bringing in wind with the tide. Bowl of pasta in your lap, mindless television playing, you lounge on the couch, watch Charles do an interview on that stupid little boat, rocking back and forth like a buoy on the open water.

You want to reach out and grab his hand, hold it still, stop him from pulling his fingers and twisting his rings because then nobody will know he’s nervous, that he’s off balance. “What do you think they’re talking about?” You ask, pulling Lorenzo’s attention from the television. “He looks nervous.”

Lorenzo laughs, quiet, under his breath. “You.”

You don’t turn back, know your face is going to give it away, can feel the blood rushing, the skin of your cheeks boiling. There’s no way he knows, right? Charles didn’t tell him. He wouldn’t. Lorenzo has no idea how close his joke hits, how deep the knife cuts. He’s just an older brother, living with the sole purpose of embarrassing you. “What?” You say, force out a laugh and almost choke on it.

“Kidding.” He says, and goes back to whatever is on TV. Your eyes stay on Charles, though, infatuated with the way the wind runs its fingers through his hair, the way it tugs on his shirt and inches the boat closer and closer to the yacht, to you. You stare so hard he can feel it, catches your eyes mid-sentence, smile pulling on his words. You’re convinced the upturned corners of his lips can lift even the lowest of spirits. He winks, and then he’s back in the conversation like he never missed a beat.

Charles has made fast friends with the crew long before you got there. You wonder if they know each other, if they’ve met before. Light words flow with the waves, your body relaxing at the loss of the cameras, put aside to enjoy the experience, to breathe in the moment. His pull is gravitational, even through the strange tension and the awkwardness of the unknown. In your uncertainty, you linger just out of his reach, now comfortable enough to participate in their conversations. He catches you staring off into space, into the vast, starry sky, silently identifying the constellations above you. He pulls your mind back to your body with the tap of his foot on your outstretched leg. With what has to be the softest smile to ever grace this beautiful Earth, he calls you to his side with careful eyes and a subtle nod.

You scooch closer to him, half-expect his arm to lazily drape itself around you because that’s what always happens. It doesn’t, and a pit of something grief-like settles in your chest. Instead, your arms hang at your sides, upper arms gracing each other every time one of you even thinks about breathing. Your hands are knotted in your lap, thumb examining the texture of your palm, fingers tugging on each other with agonizing anxiousness.

You were so naive to think, even for a split second, that you would go back to normal. THe tension you thought would settle has only become increasingly taught.

“You okay?” He asks. You nod with a weary smile. A lie, and he knows it. “You worked all weekend?” He continues to prod, ignores the conversation happening around you like it’s just the two of you in a bubble.

“No, just today.” You said. “Meetings all day.” You don’t look at him, eyes focused on your hands, popping knuckles and digging nails into your palm. You can’t remember the last time you were so unsettled in his presence. “I got a huge logo redesign deal.”

“Of course you did.” He bumps your shoulder, jolts you. “You’re the best they’ve got and they know it.”

“I’m not the best one there.”

"Maybe not the most confident.” He laughs, reaches into your lap and grabs your hands, stilling them like a patient partner would do. “But definitely the most talented.” He squeezes your hand tighter, and you slide your fingers between his, envelope his hand in both of yours like you’re the one doing the comforting, squeeze back, thank you.

Your head falls to his shoulder, sigh like you’re carrying the weight of the world, like you’re moments away from breaking down into a pile of ash, blown away with the breeze. A new normal. Maybe that’s what you’ll have to do, create a new normal that’s just as sweet as the old one. When the only options are a life of awkward anxieties or one without him in it entirely, a new normal doesn’t seem so sad.

�� –

He gets stopped seven times on the walk from the berth to the parking garage, takes careful time to be kind, especially to the kids. He’ll never not stop for a child, making their grabby hands, freckle faced days time and time again. You’re a good guy, you say after the fifth, know it’s the last thing he wants to do after his long day. I don’t know how you do it.

He shakes his head, sighs. “Le strict minimum ne fait pas de moi un bon gars.”

“You go beyond the bare minimum.”

He shrugs. “The bar is in Hell, I suppose.”

You take the train to Monza, hunkered over your laptop for the entirety of the ride, working. You weren’t planning on coming in until late Friday night,but Charles asked you if you’d get on the next train, if you’d come with him to sponsorship dinners and obligatory events in the leadup to the weekend. Please, he’d texted. Sayingno, doing anything but getting on the 6 am departure this morning, didn’t feel like an option.

You texted Isa for three hours trying to figure out what the dress code was for these events, planning out your outfit. All you could get from Charles was, I don’t know, I’m wearing a blazer, probably. The last thing you wanted to do was stick out like a sore thumb, draw anymore attention to yourself or embarrass him. Underdressed, overdressed, you don’t know which is worse.

You check your phone, scroll through social media and pick at a meal from the dining cart. You’re met with the same stuff you’ve been seeing since that stupid Monaco Vlog on Charles’ YouTube channel. The general consensus amongst all the strangers who know you so well, is that you and Charles are dating. I want this. They way they look at each other. Couples who are best friends make me melt. A friend told you those should make you smile, they don’t, because you aren’t dating. You aren’t dating and he’s going to see them and everyone wants to know everything about you and someone asked on a bikini picture how good Charles was in bed. None of them made you smile.

Does she know she’s the third choice? Not smiling. Charles, serial monogamist or serial cheater? Not smiling. You’re a whore. You’re a slut. I hope you die, bitch. No smiles.

They stung, they made you cry at your reflection in the mirror, private your accounts, limit your comments. They were everywhere, in your Instagram DMs, your Twitter mentions, your TikTok ForYou page. It was suffocating.

Charles was trying his best to check up on you, which only made it all worse. You wanted to believe he wasn’t seeing them. He was just making sure your head was above water, and it was those best intentions that got you invited here, you assumed. It’s easier to keep an eye on you when you’re with him.

It was a good idea, a good effort, for sure. It was a miscalculation, though, Charles seemingly forgetting just how much attention he has to give to strangers at these events. In a room full of people, dressed in your best cocktail attire, sipping a martini and watching people fight for his attention, you can’t remember feeling so alone, so on display.

Everyone knows, or thinks they know, you’re Charles’ girlfriend. You’re a bigger extension of him than ever. Side-stepping cameras won’t cut it anymore, they’re hungry to judge you. Look who Charles brought, what do we think of her? Look what she’s wearing, how she speaks, how she stands. They hate you, you’re sure of it. You aren’t classy enough for this scene, not sweet enough, not pretty enough. You aren’t important enough.

“How are you doing?” Isa finds you leaning on a tall table, poking your olives around your drink with the toothpick they were originally skewered on.

“Are these things always this weird?” You ask, voice laced with hope that there is a learning curve, that there is some top-secret strategy she can give you so you don’t feel so shitty and deflated again tomorrow night.

She laughs. “You’ll get used to it. But, yeah.”

“Any advice?”

“Threaten a sex strike if he leaves you alone for too long.” Your eyes go wide, shocked by her words. She just shrugs, downs the remainder of her drink. “Works every time.”

“Charles and I. We’re not. We–” You stumble over your words, and she looks at you with raised brows and a grin that makes you think Charles might be blabbing to the whole grid. “We’re not sleeping together.”

“Aren’t you, though?”

“Did Charles say something?”

She smacks her hand over her mouth, muffling her laugh. “No, but you just did!”

You nod, jaw clenched, tongue running over the front of your teeth. You’ve been so paranoid that Charles was going to tell someone and you’re the one who can’t keep their mouth shut. “It was once, and you can’t tell anybody.” You whisper, sharp. “Not even Carlos.”

“I’m going to tell Carlos.”

“You can’t.” It comes out as more of a plea than an argument. “He’ll say something to Charles, and then Charles will know I told someone.”

She says your name so sweet and patient, like you’re a preschooler about to get a passive-aggressive scolding. “I’ve never seen two people look like they want to fuck more than the two of you. If Carlos says something, it won’t be the first time someone has vocalized it to him.” It’s a horrifying thought that burrows all the way to your bone marrow. You’ve always thought you were so good at hiding it.

You’re drowning at this party, under the waves of lingering and prying eyes. It’s been an hour since you’ve spoken to Charles, forty-five minutes since you’ve seen him. You pull out your phone and delete all your social media. This is so much worse than wallowing about death threats in the comfort of your own bedroom with the familiarity of your favorite ice cream.

– –

You’re doing your hair when he knocks on the door. Impatient, impatient, impatient. You don’t answer, he keeps knocking, over and over again. “What?” You say, sharper than warranted, opening the heavy door with as much force as it will allow.

“This is what you’re wearing?” He says, walks right past you and into your room. You’re not in the mood for his humor today.

“That’s really funny, coming from you.” You say, go back to the bathroom, hairspray your hair, pull a few face framing pieces out from the low ponytail.

“I look great.” Says the man who hate-crimed an entire country with his jeans in Monaco, who is cosplaying as a banana this weekend.

“Did you dress yourself?”

He appears in the doorway of the bathroom, leaning on it, looking annoyingly handsome in his suit jacket and white button up. “I did.”

“Oh,” You lock eyes with him in the mirror, put on a phony smile, fingers digging through your makeup bag on the counter searching for eyelash glue. “How nice for you.”

You watch him check his wrist in your peripheral, opening the cardboard lash box and pulling them out, carefully applying glue to one. “What aren’t you ready?” He asks.

“I’ll be ready at five.” You said, setting the falsies on your lash line, trying not to make your concentration face because you know he’s watching.

You put glue on the other lash. “We’re leaving at four-thirty.” Your head snaps up from the task at hand.

“You told me five.”

“I did not.”

“You did.” You say, continue putting the lash on before the glue dries because you don’t have another set with you. Quicker, this time, because apparently you’re running a half hour behind.

“I told you it starts at five.” He says.

Oh. He did tell you that. “We have to be there when it starts.” You say in unison, your foggy recollection becoming clear.

“Wonderful.” You laugh, to nobody at all.

“Are you okay?” He asks, and it feels earnest, makes you laugh harder while you hove all your makeup back into the tiny cosmetics bag. There’s no way he’s that clueless, you think, blink hard in the mirror a few times, size up your hair and makeup.

“No, I’m not okay!” You say, toss the bag onto the counter with a heavy noise. “I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to do this.” You push past him in the doorway, stop in the little hall between the bathroom and the bedroom, next to the mini fridge and Keuring-clad kitchenette, sigh at the ceiling so you don’t cry, don’t ruin your makeup. You’re already running late, no time for tear streaks. “I feel like a fucking idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot.”

You scoff, don’t even know why you’re angry, so emotional, why every nerve in your body feels supercharged. “You do a great job of letting me feel like one.” You don’t mean it, not really. You say it anyway. You know it will hurt him, and you’re tired of hurting alone.

“What did I do?”

“Nothing.” You say, hoist the ironing board out of the wardrobe. “You did nothing.” You don’t bother setting the legs up, just lay it across the bed.

“What was I supposed to do?” He asks, grabs the iron from your hands and fills it with water in the kitchenette sink, sets it on the iron board, plugs it in and turns it on. You did through your suitcase for your dress and blazer, shaking them out like they’re dusty old relics rather than something you’d bought just for this.

You don’t know what to tell him. You can’t summarize all of your emotions into something succinct and comprehensible, especially not while you’re in the middle of feeling them. Everyone wants me dead, everyone is staring at me, I know I’m not good enough for this. I want to be good enough for this, to make you proud, but it’s so hard. “You left me alone last night.” You say, roll your eyes and take the tears with it. Elaboration feels like a giant, insurmountable, unachievable challenge. “You left me alone last night.” All you can do is repeat yourself, stare at the dress in your hands, examine the stitching like your life depends on viewing the heather grey fabric at a microscopic level.

You can’t look at him, know he’s going to be staring at you with soft, sad eyes. You see him look at you like that and it’s game over. You’re not leaving the hotel tonight, not making it to that event. You’re going to cry yourself a bath, melt into a puddle of your own tears.

“I’m sorry.” He says.

“Don’t be.” You flatter out the dress on the ironing board. “You’re doing your job.” You move the iron in hard, quick lines over the fabric.

“I’m still sorry.” He’s behind you, wrapping his arm over the front of your chest, pulling you back against his chest in some kind of strangely affectionate reverse-hug. It feels to right, so you squirm from his grip, keep at the hasty ironing.

“Don’t feel bad for me.” Flip the dress, iron the other side. “I can hold my own in a room full of strangers.”

“I know you can.” You hate the tone in his voice; proud, almost. You’re not his to be proud of, even if everyone else seems to think you are.

“Can we just?�� You look at him for the first time since he dropped the time bomb on you. “Anything but?” He nods. You nod, switch the dress out for the blazer.

“I like this jacket.” He says. You look at the outfit, grey dress, green blazer, white accessories. You thought it was too Christmas-y, the red accents on the bottoms of your heels and the red of your lip. It’s Ferrari red, Isa convinced you, very subtle. “You look good in green.”

“Green is my favorite color.”

“I know.” He laughs.

“You know.” You yank the iron cord from the wall and pull your top over your head without thinking. You meet his eyes, and they don’t dare to waiver from yours. You nod, an I really just flashed you nod, sigh, pick up the dress and walk past him into the bathroom. “You can stare, Charles. I have good boobs.” A laugh from the other room while you step into the dress, pull the straps over your shoulder and leave the back unzipped. “And, you’ve literally been inside me.” You add for good measure. He coughs, chokes on his own laughter.

Leave it to anything but to abandon one elephant and pick up a new one. “We’re talking about that now?”

You smile at your reflection in the bathroom mirror, wonder if he can hear it in your voice, if he knows you that well, listened to you speak so intently for so long that he can pick out minor fluctuations like that. “Talking about what?”

“You are.” He pauses, you tug on the hem of your dress and it doesn’t give any. You thought there was more fabric than there is. “Are you on something?” You can hear the smile.

“I haven’t been not talking.” You say, coming out of the bathroom, ball of pajamas wadded up tight in your hand. He tracks you across the room, back exposed, while you put the clothes in your bag. You walk back to him, pull your ponytail to one side, gesture for him to zip up the back of your dress. You suck in before he does it, even though the dress fits.

“You’ve been telling people?” He says, his warm fingers gracing your skin, sending goosebumps up your spine. This never would have happened before, you lie to yourself. You’ve been blushing everytime he looked at you since you were in high school.

“Maybe.” You say quietly, bit the smile off your bottom lip when his fingers linger at the top of the zipper. “Have you?”

“No.” He says, and when you turn around his eyes trail up your body slowly, taking your permission to stare as gospel, soaking up every inch of you with unabashed eyes.

“I told Isa.” You say, shove an earring through your lobe.

“You.” Your words pull him back from the glossy eyed size-up with a chuckle. “You told Isa.” The other earring, and then you clasp a necklace, wish you had the nerve to make him do that, too.

“Accidentally.” You add, pull the blazer on, tug on the dress again. Still not budging.

“Does that mean I can tell someone?” He pretends to mess with the settings on his watch. Pretends, you know, because his watch is never wrong. He changes it as soon as he’s in a new location. That watch has been right since his plane landed.

You sit on the edge of the bed, put your heels on and wonder if the red bottoms are really with the pain and suffering. “No.”

“Are we going to talk about it?” He asks, follows you to the bathroom where you’re already twisting your tube of lipstick, painting them a dark, lustful red. Ferrari red, a dark, ferrari red.

“We’re running late.” You close the lipstick, put it into your handbag and clasp that shut.

“We are.” He says, and you’re already tugging the door open and gesturing him out. “I’m sorry for not looking out for you last night.” He says in the middle of the elevator ride. “Really.”

“Don’t.” You say. “We agreed, anything but.”

– –

Anything but, you agreed, but he’s silently apologizing all night. You’re not out of arm’s reach for more than a few minutes the entire night, and when you are, he’s got eyes on you, eyes on the bathroom door, eyes on the back of the head of whoever blocks his sightline. He finds you in the crowd every time. The green, he says, I just look for the pretty girl in green. “Don’t say things like that to me.” You told him, even though it makes you warm and fuzzy and grateful when he says it, when he’s there every time you look for him.

“Questa è la tua ragazza, no?” Mattia says to Charles when he introduces you. You’ve met him before, always in passing, though, so it’s a safe assumption to think he won’t know you.

“Qualcosa del genere.” Charles says, thinks you don’t catch it, pulls you closer to his side.

“Che cazzo significa?” Mattia asks, and all three of you laugh with varying levels of awkwardness, too much to say for anything to be whispered in the unsaid.

By the end of the night, you've spoken to more people than you can count and done so in three languages, four, if you count the butchered Spanish class Carlos held with you. You’ve been confused for his girlfriend a dozen times, and somewhere along the line his corrections progressed from just a friend, through no correction at all, to yes.

“Why did you say that?” You asked the first time he did it.

“They’re going to think what they want to think.” He said. It felt like a cop-out answer.

You don’t know if you’re more affected by his presence or if the hoards of strangers are, but it seems like everyone is more interested in what you have to say instead of just staring you down. Calling yourself comfortable would be quite a stretch, but, the room tonight feels a little less like a fishbowl and a little more like a cocktail party.

You love watching him on stage, really love it, him addressing the audience. You almost burst into laughter, the customer service voice that transcends industries and languages and is something you never get to hear from him. He oozes confidence, talking and laughing with the MC and Carlos and Mattia. He’s so pretty under the hard lighting, it makes all his features look sharper, more defined, somehow. Heaven-sent.

When he comes back he says he’s hot, takes off his blazer and hangs it from the back of his chair, rolls up his shirt sleeves. It’s very grassroots political, very, mind-numbingly attractive. “How are you doing?” He asks, takes a sip of your drink because his is empty, maintains insightful, careful eyes and contrasts them by wriggling his brows over the lip of your glass.

“I’m good.” You say, nod and smile so he knows you mean it.

“Really? He sets the glass back down on the tablecloth.

“Really.”

– –

You’re at the track early Friday morning, watching Arthur’s practice session with Carla. You haven’t seen him race nearly as much as you’d like to this year. In Bahrain, you didn’t come to anything except Charles’ race, so scared about bringing Michael along. No Imola. You wish you could have been in Silverstone, watched it on your phone at work with the volume on level one. The only time you’ve actually seen him race in person was in Barcelona, and you were basically hungover that entire weekend. Hungover, and trying to convince yourself Charles was going to kiss you.

You were going to watch him as much as you could this time around, make up for all the ones you missed. That was one excuse for staying away from Charles. The other, everything the two of you did felt emotionally charged. You’re either wishing you could wring his neck, or wishing you could nuzzle into it. Sometimes both. A lot of times, both.

You grab lunch with Carla in general hospitality and then sneak your way into the Paddock Club’s pit lane walk to blow some time. Charles is doing his warm up, probably playing football or doing neck exercises that could be in the director’s cut of a Fifty Shades of Grey film. Carlos, though, Carlos is talking to some engineer about something or another, and you catch each other’s eye. He smiles, looks away, and does a double take, furrowing his brows. You just shrug, make him laugh and shake his head.

“Heard you were being sneaky today?” Charles asks when you’re leaving the track. Someone ahead is taking pictures of him, one of the regulars, one you recognize but don’t know. He’s the one that always asks Charles for a smile and is responsible for half the pictures in his living room.

You step several feet to the side, remove yourself from the frame, out of the shot. Arthur laughs. No free food for anyone, not even the ones he likes. It’s going to be a long time before you volunteer yourself to be tormented online.

He says your name, the photographer, and it startles you because you don’t know him. He shouldn’t know your name, you’ve never introduced yourself to him. Charles looks in your direction, holds out his hand and even though you don’t want to take it, don’t want any pictures of you two walking hand-in-hand, you also don’t want to leave him hanging like that in front of a camera. So, you take his hand and let yourself get pulled back into the shot. Maybe they’ll never see the light of day, you can only hope. Surely, a million other things will be more interesting than this.

Mr. Photographer, Kym, Charles calls him. Kym asks your opinion on the yellow, and Charles laughs because you haven’t been shy with him about your distaste for them. You know Ferrari is really pushing it, though. “I think they’re great. Very avant garde.” You lie.

Yellow not a favorite color? He asks, says your name again.

“She thinks yellow is a coward’s color.” Charles says, laughs with Kym the photographer. You cringe, even though he’s right. “She likes green.”

– –

You wake up miserable on Saturday, spend the day in your hotel room with the shades drawn and the do not disturb sign hanging from the door handle. Flu symptoms, someone from Ferrari, someone worried about Charles’ possible exposure, delivers a rapid test to your door. Negative.

You have your phone playing on the lowest possible volume, still too loud, if you’re being honest, and listen to Arthur’s Sprint Race, to FP3, to Quali.

I thought you didn’t have it in the straights, you mustered up the nerve to text him. Pole, right? You weren’t positive where anyone was starting tomorrow, too many penalties. If you had to bet on being right about one, though, it’s that Charles is on pole. You’d bet on that blind, though.

We don’t, he replies an hour later. Extremely timely for him, especially on a race weekend. How are you feeling?

Like shit. Even with the brightness all the way down, your eyes still yearn to be clawed out when met with the LCD screen.

Sorry.

You wallow, pick at the entirely too expensive meal from room service, take a few too many Advils because you’re pretty sure this bug will kill you before the liver damage gets a chance. You nap, you shower, shiver and shake, and nap some more. COnsider scoping your brain out and squeezing it until it pops, your pulse making your temples bulge.

Your phone lights up the dark room. You don’t know how long you’ve been staring at the ceiling, forcing your eyes closed until galaxies and oil spills of color paint themselves across your eyelids. It could be eleven in the morning. It could be eight at night. Will you answer if I knock?

You say yes, figure he’s still at the track. He’s not.

A single, quiet knock on the door, he couldn’t have used the force of more than a single knuckle. Your eyes are squinted shut when you open it, hand shielding your eyes. He laughs, just as quiet as his knock, slides into the room and pulls the door closed as fast as the slow-closing hinges allow.

He puts the back of his hand on your forehead. You search to make out his features in the pitch-black darkness. “I’m dying.” You say, pitiful.

“You’re not dying.” You think he’s smiling, can hear it, even with congested sinuses and clogged ears.

“I promise I am.” Your voice is so nasally and muffled and sick.

“Poor thing.” His voice is half an octave higher when he mocks you.

“Did you just come here to be mean?”

“No. I came to check on you.”

“Consider me checked.” You said, crawling back into bed. Even with your hands moving wildly in front of you in the dark room, you still run into the side of the bed with a thud. “Don’t laugh.” You warn, and he tried his hardest not to. You read once that orgasms can cure headaches. Briefly, you consider the logistics of it.

Not worth it, you decide. You’d rather have your brain explode all over the walls of this dark room than make things any weirder, leave more feelings and emotions to linger in the shadows of the unknown. “Sommes-nous bons?” He asks, and your face controls into a twisted mess. No way is he doing this now. No way.

“Pourquoi ne serions-nous pas bons?” You mutter, after much hesitation.

“Je ne sais pas.” He says. “Vous vous sentez loin.”

“Je suis là.” You lie, and reach your hand out. He finds you in the darkness, or you find him. You find each other, that’s all that matters, really. You move in the bed messily, tangling the sheets and comforter with your legs, pulling him with little force onto the bed. “I’m here.” You repeat with your head on his chest, rising and falling with each breath. You don’t say it because you mean it, you say it because you know when his thoughts are on the verge of becoming all consuming. You say it because the last thing he needs to be thinking about this weekend is if you’re distancing yourself from him. You might know him better than he knows himself, you think sometimes.

When you wake up in the middle of the night, you’re feeling alive, less corpse-like. He’s not in the room anymore.

You wonder if it’s possible to distance yourself from Charles, or if your lives are so completely and utterly intertwined that it’s too late for that. A life lived together too long to make distinctions, you think. Nothing is yours, not really.

Fight or flight, you will freeze every time. You can’t take the leap, have the hard conversations. If you do it, and it goes terribly wrong, crashes and burns brighter than the sun, there’s no walking away, no picking up the pieces and putting yourself back together again.

When you were young, your Mother once told you she thought you and Charles were each one half of a puzzle–incomplete without the other. You’re lucky to have him, she told you, people spend their whole lives looking for the other half of their puzzle.

You always found comfort in it. Now, you think maybe you and Charles are two separate puzzles that have been combined into the same box. Sure, they could be sorted, but pieces are probably missing, stolen by time or never there to begin with. The only way to sort each other apart would be to dump it all out on the table, slowly rebuild from the corners in, constantly checking the box to make sure that piece is a piece of you, not him. Nobody has time for that task, not even the people who love the puzzles, not even the puzzles themselves, so you sit on a shelf all mixed up until the end of time.

He came to see you on your nineteenth birthday. Drove in from Monaco to the apartment you were renting with University friends. Four bedrooms, six people, two emotional support cats, low ceilings, broken fire escape, one bathroom, and a pantry full of cheap alcohol.

When he arrived, there were significantly more than six people, the pantry full of liquor was a kitchen full of liquor, and you were dancing on a table, drunk in a way only a nineteen year old is on her birthday. Even sloppy and shitfaced, you could make out the distinctive tone of his holler over the hoots of the rest of your cheer squad.

You’d laughed, giddy and loud, jumped off the table and threw yourself into his arms. “Vous êtes ici?!” You yelled into his ear, adjusting the strap of your top.

“Je suis là.” He said, at a sober volume. “Bon anniversaire.”

“Merci!” You laughed, hiccuped. “Buvons!”

He should have been playing catch-up, but you’d never let a friend take a shot alone. A gruesome mistake you learned when you were curled over the porcelain toilet bowl two hours later.

He had your hair knotted into a shitty ponytail, too loose, the part of your haircut meant to frame your face falling victim to the contents of your stomach. He rubbed his hand on your back, like a parent would, and told you it was going to be okay. You spit, laughed into the toilet because he was always so annoyingly sweet to you. You looked over your shoulder and told him so. You’re too sweet to me, you said, he looked at you all sober and earnest and chillingly, and then you threw up again.

You rallied, though. The birthday girl always rallies. You smoked a cigarette from the perch of your bedroom window and listened to Charles talk about some girl and lecture you, going on and on about how you really shouldn’t be smoking. It’s quite bad for you. You wondered what would happen if you threw yourself out the window, if it would hurt more than his bashful words about her. It’s only the third floor. It won’t kill you. Hearing him say her name and blush one more time might, though.

Jealousy is ugly on you. You realize that in the weeks that follow, and decide that until you have the balls to say something to him, to take charge, you don’t get to be jealous of who he spends his time crushing on. Jealousy is for women who lose, and you’re not even playing, not even on the team.

It’s a good thing you do, put it behind you, because he brings her to the family cabin you spend Christmas at every year. He warms her hands in his and kisses her under the mistletoe hung in the entryway. At the end of the week, he thanks you for being so kind and warm and welcoming to her. You smile, hug him. Anytime, you told him, cry yourself to sleep for three days thinking about how happy he is.

She’s too good for you was the nicest thing you ever said about her. It was a lie. Nobody is too good for someone as sweet as him.

You see him next in Austin, a late birthday celebration in the land of unfamiliar accents and oversized portions. The losing battle for the championship is over, Max won in Japan and sat in some stupidly oversized armchair in the cool-down room. It’s ridiculous, honestly, I’m glad I didn’t win, he told you. You went along with it even though you know he’d give an arm and a leg to look like a fool in an oversized armchair in a cool-down room in Japan.

Despite that, because of that, whatever, the pressure is off his shoulders a bit, the need to perform at superhuman level lowered. He seems lighter when you hug him.

“I did a hot lap with Brad PItt.” He tells you.

You laugh at the absurdity of his life, follow him on his walk up the paddock. “And?”

He shrugs. “Tires were shit.” His typical day at the office might be batshit insane, but he’s always going to be Charles–little boy who loves cars-Leclerc.

“Tires were shit.” You repeat. “That's all you got for me?”

“He didn’t speak much.” Make him speak, Charles. It’s Brad fucking Pitt, you would’ve said if it was a few months earlier and things were normal and deadpan and sarcastic between the two of you. You roll your eyes instead.

– –

“You guys should not let them do this.” You tell the girl working the counter at Austin’s–an amusement park in, you guessed it, Austin, Texas. Americans are incredibly creative, you’ve come to learn. “They’re going to kill each other.”

She can’t be making more than minimum wage–seven U.S dollars and twenty-five cents an hour–but there isn’t any amount that is enough to deal with this crowd in karts. Two of the most competitive men on the planet, egged on by each other and by the group of guys in line behind you trying to pay for your group’s tickets.

Do not let them pay for you, you told Charles and he nodded, told you he knew, paid for everyone’s tickets. At any moment it feels like a little red dot is going to appear on your head and Ferrari is going to take you out. They won’t be thrilled to discover both their poster-boy and Disney prince were out late the night before a race, even less thrilled when they find out Charles and Carlos were risking injury in search of cheap thrills with strangers.

You and Isa share a laugh, feel like mothers chasing toddlers around at Disneyland. We should do that, we should do this. Oh! Look at that, we can’t leave without doing that.

You watch them ignore the teenager telling them the rules about the karts, telling everyone not to run into one another. It’s just the four of you; Charles, Carlos, Isa, and you. You know they’ll be crashing into each other before you get through the first turn.

They argue about if they’re fighting for first or fastest lap, flip a coin and throw a fit about the results, play rock-paper-scissors to come to a decision. They lap you and Isa–the rule followers who don’t exceed the speed limit–fly around the track at a speed you didn’t expect anyone to be able to pull from the cheap karts.

Carlos wins, Charles contests, says he’s going to formally protest it. Then, they want to switch to two-seater carts, so you and Isa are passengers to their reckless driving. Charles wins that round. Carlos and Isa leave after that, claim they’re tired. You and Charles stay for a meal.

“It’s a pre-podium celebratory meal.” You said.

“You’re going to curse me.” He groaned.

For the first time in what feels like a lifetime, a meal shared with Charles is awkward, stiff. Before today, you’d barely spoken since Monza. Your social media was still full of death threats, or so you’d been told. The apps have yet to be redownloaded, it’s not healthy for anyone to see that kind of stuff.

This is how it happens, you think. How lifelong friendships fall apart. There isn’t a separation spot that you can pinpoint and say yes, this is where it all went to shit. It’s a gradual separation, a day without a call, a week without a text, a month without speaking. Slow, steady, and sure, until eventually, you live separate, untangled lives.

“So,” He says, eats a fry. “That big work deal?”

“Yeah.” You nod, cross one leg over the other on the cold metal chair. “It’s good. Almost done, I think.”

“I’m sure you killed it.”

“Yeah.” Uncross the legs. “Thanks.” Cross them again. The positioning of your legs isn’t the problem, the cold metal chair that doesn’t sit evenly on the floor and rocks when you shift your weight isn’t what’s making you uncomfortable. The food is good and the drinks are cold and your waitress is a sweetheart with a southern accent and long blonde hair.

Y’all came from the race? She asked. We were busier than ants at a picnic all weekend. You told her yes. I like y’all’s accents, and that was the end of it. He couldn’t get away with that interaction anywhere else in the world.

Everything is perfect, but you’re still uncomfortable. The problem is him. The problem is you. Everything breaks under enough pressure, even unbreakable things.

“I miss you.” He said, because the closer your bodies are, the further away your minds wander.

“I’m here.” You lie.

He sees right through it. “No, you’re not.” Any possible defense would be weaker than the lie, so you don’t bother, sit in suffocating silence and pick at your fries. “Things have been weird since we slept together.” It was a mistake, you brace for the impact of it. Sleeping with him wasn’t a mistake, not for you. It was everything that has followed that was the issue. It should have been the end of a chapter, a closing book, one way or another. Instead, you’re writing an epilogue and flying by the seat of your pants, stumbling over your words and forgetting characterizations and just trying to make it to the next page. You should be in a new book entirely–a book without him or a book with him on every page.

It was a mistake, you brace and brace but it never comes. He doesn’t say it. The other shoe doesn’t drop. He just looks at his hands, twists his rings on his fingers, pops his knuckles. “I don’t know how to fix this.” He speaks, finally, and it reminds you of when he kissed you, when you didn’t know how to make everything better.

More silence, until you’ve both cleaned your plates, until Mary-Grace, the sweet talking southern-belle, sets the check down on Charles’ side of the table, until you watch him google how much gratuity he’s supposed to leave because he’s always scared he’s going to mess up tipping when you’re in the U.S.

Distance is good, you think. Distance. People need distance. “Abu Dhabi is going to be my last race.” You whisper.

He laughs almost, sliding his card into the leather folder and setting it back on the edge of the table. “It’s going to be everyone’s last race.”

“My last race for a while, Charles.” My last race, ever, you think, if distance goes the way you think it will. “I’m going to–I think we.” You sigh. “We need some space, I think.”

“No. Don’t be stupid.” He shoos your words, brushes them under the rug.

“We can’t fix it. We both know we can’t–”

“--I don’t know.” You speak over each other, building a Jenga tower of lies and one-ups until you finally snap into a different language.

““--Doit-on vraiment continuer à prétendre que tout va bien?”

“I love you.” He blurts, cuts you off like it’s some grand admission, like you haven’t been saying it to each other since before the word love had any sort of connotation to it, back when it was just something people said to each other. The distance, it doesn’t mean you don’t love him. You’ll always love him, he’s Charles. You just. You need to breathe, and you can’t catch your breath when he’s around.

“I love you, too.” You say, like you have a million times before, like you’re almost offended he thought any of this meant you didn’t love him.

“No, no.” His voice is desperate, pleading with you to understand something you’re clearly missing. Surely, he doesn’t mean. “How do you… je suis amoureux de toi.” You clench your jaw and blink, and you’re pretty sure one eye closes before the other.

“Don’t say that to me.” You say. Not, I’m in love with you, too, even though you are. You’re trying to put yourself first here, trying to objectively look at your life, at the things in it that are hurting you. Mixed signals, hurting you. Death threats, hurting you. Unwanted attention, hurting you. The common thread is him, you need to separate yourself from him and he’s saying the only thing that could make you waiver.

“Pourquoi pas?”

“Because.” You dig your shaky fingers into your leg, burrow them into the denim. It’s going to bruise, you don’t care, so will this conversation, so will walking away. “You don’t mean it.” Shake your head, lip quivering like a little girl who got hurt on the playground. He does mean it.You know him well enough to know he does, which only makes it that much fucking harder. “And I’m not going to say it back.”

You love him so much, more than oxygen, maybe. You’d throw it all away for him, your heart would let you lose yourself if it meant making him happy, if it meant being with him. You’d stay off social media and pretend nobody was wishing for your death. You’d sit at awkward dinner parties and watch races with limbs that didn’t feel like your own. You’d do it all, if your heart was in charge, because you love him, and can’t fathom losing him.

Space. Space will make it better, ease the sting of unspoken feelings and heavy words and stupid little games. Space will wash the salt from the wound.

He says your name like a plea, a desperate prayer, bloody knees and lit candles. You say nothing, too much internal conflict to sort out to verbalize anything.

The drive to the hotel is deafeningly silent. You can hear the tires of the rental car on the road below, can hear his feet on the pedals, the grind of his teeth because he’s angry at you. He’s angry and he doesn’t want to be. In love with you and he doesn’t want to be. You understand it well, recognize your own emotions being reflected back at you. If you listen hard enough, you convince yourself you can hear the traffic lights changing colors.

You fly home commercial the next morning, skip the race, hear about his podium three days later from a friend.

You don’t go to Abu Dhabi.

You don’t go to November, or December’s family dinner. He doesn’t text you, doesn’t call, makes no attempt at playing phone tag.

You skip Christmas at the cabin, find out after the fact that he’d done the same thing.

“Ça devient ridicule, chérie.” Your mother tells you over the phone. “Vous agissez comme un enfant. Vous l’êtes tous les deux.” You’d just told her you were skipping your dad’s birthday party. I have to work, you lied. I’ll bring his gift by the house next week. It was the straw that snapped her back, it would seem. “Vous serez ici demain. Pour papa. Il ne t'a rien fait.” She said it sternly, and if you were sixteen you might have been intimidated by it, might have listened.

You told your sister after you got off the phone with Mom that you wouldn’t be there, told her as a heads up, so she knew the shit-show of slamming cupboards and passive aggressive comments she was walking into tomorrow.

Go to your dad’s birthday. He texted you for the first time in months. I won’t go.

I’m an adult. There’s no way to send a message like that without sounding like a child.

I wish I could see my dad on his birthday. Nobody does the guilt-trip like he does. Go. I promise I won’t be there.

Charles is scarily close to your Dad. Growing up, Charles–hell, all of the boys–they were the sons your dad never had, the ones he didn’t realize he wanted. It was infuriating, sharing him. And then Hervé got sick, and then he was gone, and your dad became a father figure for the boys. It was slow, and subtle, but it happened nonetheless.

You were the one who blew things up, who demanded space and time and distance. If anyone should suffer because of it, it’s you, not him. You should be there.

Not more than you. You disagree, but he’s impossible to argue with without being face-to-face.

I can be an adult. You say, even though you aren’t so sure you can be. We can both go.

– –

You lingered in your apartment, wondered if he was really going to show up, if you were actually going to get in the car and drive over there, if it was too late to say you’d caught Covid or something.

You change clothes seven times. Seven, because you want to look good, but not like you tried to look good. Effortlessly glamorous and classy and sophisticated. You don’t know why, it’s not like he’s the one who wronged you. If anyone should be spending extra time in the bathroom today it should be him, he should be trying to prove you wrong, to show you your mistake in walking away.

It wasn’t a mistake. It was the biggest mistake. There were two very distinct sides to the coin. You’re back on social media, back to living your life without death threats and constant judgment. You haven’t spoken to your best friend in months, have no idea what he’s up to, don’t know anything more than his millions of followers. You miss him, but you don’t miss being Charles Leclerc’s friend, Charles Leclerc’s girlfriend. You like having your own name, being a person with traits that go beyond knowing him. You hate not seeing him, not being with him, worrying that you’re going to run into him around any corner. It’s a small, congested city. He could be any of the faces in the crowd.

You get to your parents house after your sister and your brother-in-law and your niece. The house smells like pasta sauce and your mom’s flowery candle–the one that is teetering awfully close to potpourri and death and elderly woman. The Bianchi’s aren’t coming–they thought the party was next weekend, called and apologized three different times in the past forty-eight hours, according to your dad. The Lecelerc’s are yet to arrive.

You slip into comfortable conversation with your family, Mom is right, you aren’t avoiding any of them. You help her out in the kitchen, get yelled at for tasting the sauce, chase your niece around the house, fulfill your duties as the fun aunt, sneak her candy from the jar in Dad’s office and swear just enough that she might call the dog a bitch.

Arthur and Pascale get there first, before Lorenzo and Charles. They’ll be here late, Pascale says to someone, not you. “My brother is an idiot.” Arthur says when you greet him with a tight hug. You haven’t seen him since Monza, either.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” You say. You haven’t seen him, but you’ve spoken to him, congratulated him on moving to F2, offered to take him out to dinner the next time your schedules lined up. Drama with Charles wasn’t going to stop you from celebrating the closest thing you’ll have to a baby brother.

You almost forget he’s coming. Almost, and then he’s knocking and walking through the door with a small, gift-wrapped box and an expensive bottle of wine, charming smiles onto everyone’s face with just his easy presence. He looks good. He always looks good, but damn, he looks good in that sweater and those jeans and his glasses–he should wear his glasses more, you’ve always thought. He doesn’t hug anyone, and you wonder if it’s so he doesn’t have to hug you. Instead, he hoists Gigi up into the air and steals her seat on the sofa. It’s his seat, unassigned, but assigned by years of occupying it at every family function. Gi wants to lay claim to it, but she’s just as happy on Charles’ lap as she is curled up in the corner seat of the sectional.

You keep meeting his eyes, snapping them back to the ground every time. It’s sad, if you think about it too long. You were right,the two of you are too entangled. There’s no separating you, not with ties that run so deep, not when you and Charles are just pieces of a giant web of people. There are a million invisible strings and unseen connections that intertwine every member of your family and every last one of your friends.

You’re painfully cordial. He helps your mom serve dessert, hands you a plate with a corner piece of cake and your favorite ice cream, doesn’t have to ask you like he does everyone else. You don’t even know how he knows your favorite flavor of ice cream, why he remembers that you love the corner piece of cake.

You thank him, tell him the wine he brought is good and overpriced. I’ve missed being judged for every purchase I made He said, and you told him he couldn’t get rid of you that easily. It’s weird, the weirdest, because he did get rid of you pretty easily.

“I’m going to F1. Sauber.” He told you in his kitchen while the two of you were washing dishes. You dropped the forks into the dishwasher with a spattering of clangs.

“Really?” You asked, a glaring absence of excitement in your voice. You knew it was coming, everyone knew it was only a matter of time, a talent like his is destined to get to the top. You knew it was coming, but, still, you selfishly and silently hoped it wouldn’t work out. He was yours, and you wanted to keep him to yourself, hated how much you already had to share him with the rest of the world. Gone for nine months of the year, away from home and away from you, it will be so lonely.

He’s happy to leave you behind, overjoyed, even, and you struggle to come to grips with it, struggle to separate the emotions he’s feeling about achieving the dream versus the ones he feels about leaving you. It feels like the end of the world to your young and naive heart, like nothing is ever going to be the same, like you’re losing another person you love more than life.

– –

It was the beginning of the season, he hadn’t been home in almost two months, was in the middle of a double header, China and Azerbaijan, you think. You were just trying to survive to Monaco. He’d never been so busy, you’ve never missed him so much.

Your roommates were having a party, and you were working late. When you got home, his favorite song was playing through the apartment. You don’t know the name, aren’t even sure about the artist, but you know every word, learned them all against your will. Listened to him sing it under his breath while he cooked and scream it during long car rides and blast from his headphones so loud you were worried he’d have hearing damage. He was always, always, singing this song, and you were always, always, asking him to turn it off.

You wished he was here right now, singing it out of tune and thinking he’s a popstar. You wish you could begrudgingly sing it with him. Instead, you grab a snack from the pantry and lock your bedroom door and put in your headphones, play your music so loud you can’t hear the party on the other side of the door. Tune it out, turn off your longing for him with it.

You can’t wait until you graduate, until you can pack everything up into a little suitcase and spend all of your money and follow him around the world, can’t wait until you never have to miss him again.

Come see me. He texted, a month after your Dad’s birthday, right before pre-season testing in Bahrain. He’s already there, or so you can piece together from the text, from the attachment in the subjectless email he’d sent you. Plane ticket, two, actually. Nice to Dubai, Dubai to Muharraq. Both first class.

No. You replied. Get a refund.

See you tomorrow night. You hated the cockiness of the reply, hated more that you were already packing a suitcase. He didn’t even ask if you were working, didn’t check to see if your schedule was clear or if it was even something you wanted to do.

I’m not your booty call.

Trust me, I know. He said. Ma vie serait tellement plus simple si tu l'étais. Well, he’s not wrong about that one.

Your sister drives you to the airport. “I think I’m in too deep.” You told her. You two have never done shallow, she said. You promised to protect yourself, to prioritize yourself, and to text her updates whenever you had them.

You wished your life was as simple as hers, a good job and a husband and a perfect baby girl. Big family parties and plenty of babysitters for date night and a village that loved and supported everything they did. She had the perfect family, had all her ducks in a row and her shit situated. “I love living vicariously through your insane life.” She said, and you kissed her cheek goodbye.

– –

You follow his instructions, feel like you’re on a delusional scavenger hunt. Board the plane, land in Dubai, board another plane, land in Muharraq, get on the bus, talk to Azim at the front desk of the hotel, he knows you’re coming. Azim isn’t there. He works the night shift, apparently.

Azim is not here. You texted your sister.

Who is Azim?

They call Azim, he answers, and it’s all sorted out when the day-shift manager hands you a key. You wonder what Charles had told Azim. There’s a girl coming, be discreet. It doesn’t seem like him, none of it seems like him. Azim, I’m drunk and tired and invited my best friend, who claims to need space from me, to my room. Please let her in. That felt like more of a possibility, felt like it would confirm your suspicions, that he doesn’t want you here. He wants you, of last year, here. You, of France, likely.

You’re not having sex with him. Not happening, you won’t fold, not even if he asks nicely. It would solve nothing, and has already fucked up enough of your relationship. If you suck his dick again, you won’t be able to be cordial at birthday parties, he’ll forget what kind of ice cream you like, and neither of you will ever be seen at the christmas cabin again.

When you get to the room, the suite, you find there’s two bedrooms. Maybe he wasn’t looking for France, maybe he got into the room and saw there was another room and had a momentary lapse where he thought, you know who would enjoy being here? He bought the tickets, sent the text, and by the time he realized what he’d done, it was too late to back out.

You’re replying to emails on the couch when he walks through the door. That redesign deal, after months and months of back and forth about something as small as the shade of one pixel versus another, is finally launching this weekend. You’re trying to make sure everything is in order, putting the final bows on the project and making sure no ends are left loose.

“Hi.” You call out, in case he forgot he invited you.

“Hi.” He says, appears in the lamp-lit room all comfy in that one sweatshirt you’ve always loved on him. “Are you watching L’Atalante?” He asks, moving past you and into the kitchen. It’s too normal. Eerily so, the plane might have passed through the z-axis or something and now you’re in an alternate timeline where none of it ever went sour.

“No.” Everytime you watch it you think of him. Not in the cheesy, God, I love him and he is such the main character in this love story, way. In the God, I love him and wish he was here to make fun of me for loving this movie, way. “Haven’t watched it in a while.”

“Shame.” He says. “I liked that movie.”

You don’t feel like humoring him about this again, vividly remembering exactly where it got you the last time. Really, you could blame all of this on that fucking movie. If you never watch it, he never asks to come in, you never have sex, and everything is happy-go-lucky between the two of you. “How’s the car this year?”

“Don’t know yet.” He says, pulls a bottle of water from the fridge, the seal snapping when he turns the cap. “Why aren’t you watching L’Atalante?” He takes a drink.

“I told you.” You say quietly, unfocused on your words, fingers rapidly moving across your keyboard.

“No, you told me you haven’t watched it.” He says, flops down onto the couch. “I want to know why.”

“I don’t know, because I haven’t felt like it.” You tell him, a little more annoyed this time. You haven’t watched the movie. A lot of people don’t watch their favorite movie all of the time. “Why do you care so much? Did you call me out here to play anything but?”

“I called you out here because I miss my best friend.”

“You don’t know me, anymore.”

“It’s been a few months, not a few lifetimes.” Even then, he’d probably still remember the corner piece of cake and his hand would probably still hover behind you protectively and find you in the dark rooms and the crowded rooms. You know no amount of time could make you forget his favorite song, or at what point in his day he gets nervous, what he needs when everything is going wrong, and the way he can sober you up with one look. “I still know you. I still love you.” You sympathize with it, relate to it, because nothing is as hard as trying to unlove another person, you’ve come to learn. “I miss my best friend.”

Don’t break. I still love you, Charles. Don’t break. I miss my best friend, too. Don’t break. Don’t break. “We can pretend for a weekend.” He says. “Just, be normal again. Be us again.” Us. There is no us. Don’t break.

It’s not like it’s an argument you can just apologize and move on from. He can’t apologize for loving you, for needing to vocalize it. You can’t apologize for loving him, for not being able to take the leap. Normal, normal sounds so good.

Can we go back to normal after this?

Yeah. Back to normal.

You never should have let yourself believe him. You wonder if he loved you, then. If he knew when he said it that it was a lie. You can’t remember when you knew you loved him, like really, really loved him. It was gradual, you suppose, a combination of time and sweetness and jealousy, of grief and joy and innocence. At some point, you were forced to face the sobering reality, but, you don’t know how long you’ve loved him like this. Does he remember a moment, or was it gradual for him, too?

“Back to normal.” You said. The ultimate game of anything but, the final boss of your friendship. “Just for the weekend?”

“Whatever you want.” He says. “We can do whatever you want.”

Don’t break. Do not break. “Okay,” you crack, and then, with the force of your entire heart, “yeah.” You break.

A long time ago, before the gradual realization, you thought Charles and you were platonic soulmates. Today, can you go back to that? To the platonic love. Was there ever a fork in the road, a wrong turn, a path where you end up somewhere else, or have you always been destined to end up like this, in a hotel room, in a foreign country hiding from the rest of the world and pretending everything is light and breezy and comfortable when it’s far from.

– –

It’s Monday morning, and your weekend together is over. It was a shorter adjustment period than you could have predicted, like relatives who don’t see eachother but once a year. It’s awkward hellos and bombed small talk until suddenly one of you makes a joke and it’s like you were apart for minutes instead of months.

You go to this tourist attraction together, the Tree of Life. It’s a four-hundred-year-old tree that’s like, ten meters tall or something. It sits alone in the middle of the desert and nobody knows how it’s still alive. It’s a spectacle, according to Google, and was nominated to be another wonder of the world. Someone says its roots run fifty meters deep, and it sticks with you, the idea that there’s so much beneath the surface. You wonder if the tree had a companion four hundred and some odd years ago, if it always imagined spending every day with the companion tree, if their roots were tangled fifty meters below the surface. The tree is gone, now, but maybe its roots are still there, fifty meters down, all tangled up in the roots of this tree.

It’s probably not from the Garden of Eden like they claim, and there’s surely a scientifically sound explanation for where the tree is getting its water from in the middle of the desert in a rain-less country. It’s just a big tree, destined to dry up and fall over and burn with the rest of the planet. It’s just a big tree, unless it isn’t.

Does the tree know if it’s special or if it’s just that? You don’t know if what you and Charles have is something special or if you’re just something, but, then again, you aren’t a tree. Maybe the tree knows. Maybe you know. How does a person know that they know?

Charles seems to know, to think you’re worth his unrelenting patience, deserving of the corner slice and the color green, of the stars and the sand and everything in between. He understands you, and he still seems to know, to declare with confidence in the rush of a sports bar in the middle of Texas that he loves you. He’s sure enough that he skips Christmas because you thought space would make everything better, doesn’t tell you that you’re wrong even when you so obviously are, doesn’t stop loving you when you push him in the opposite direction.

You’ve never been that sure about anything, you think.

“Looks a bit lonely, doesn’t it?” He offers into the dry air, taking a picture with his phone. You hadn’t thought of it as lonely until he said something, viewed it as possessing an other-worldly strength and unmatched level of determination. The tree never told its companion it loved it, the tree kept to itself and eventually, learned to live alone in the sand.

You shook your head. “It’s strong.”

“You can be both.” The tree can be both, he’d meant to say, because the Tree of Life is not a metaphor. It’s just a tree.

– –

The weekend, the game of anything but, the avoidance of the World’s biggest elephant, is over. It’s Tuesday, now, breakfast from room service in the suite, awkward tension filling all the available space, compromising each molecule at an atomic level. He’s wearing a red t-shirt, because he always is, and it sits on him so nicely, looks so comfortable on his skin. You’re wearing a yellow pajama top and the silky material is charged with static and clings to you in all the spots you wish it wouldn’t.

How do you know when it’s real? You had texted your sister in the middle of the night prior, two-twenty-three if you remember correctly. You couldn’t sleep, had a bad dream–couldn’t decide what was worse, the nightmare while you sleep or the nightmare when you wake.

You don’t. She replied at a normal hour, when normal people wake up after going to sleep at a normal time. You never know for sure.

That’s fucked.

“I booked a flight home last night.” You told him, picking at the plate of eggs in front of you, the fork scraping on the ceramic plate like nails on a chalkboard, your teeth clinking against the metal everytime it was in your mouth. Just, wrong. In every possible way.

“Why?” He asks, takes a drink of orange juice, a new quirk, you think. He always used to complain about the pulp getting stuck in his teeth. Don’t be such a princess, you’d tell him and he would roll his eyes, drink the remainder of the glass just to prove he could do it without complaining.

“The deal was a weekend.” You say, pretend you’re not conflicted, regretting buying the ticket, admit you’re running away again. “The weekend is over.”

“You’re just going to leave again?” He nods, reassures himself through the sentence, wipes his mouth with a cloth napkin. “Not even going to talk about it?” You stay quiet, teeth clicking against the fork. “I–you are. God, you are so–”

“–Anything but.” You invoke it like a constitutional amendment, like a prophecy, like an unbreakable law.

“Oh, va te faire foutre.” Your head rears back, but you don’t let it sting, know you deserve it. “We’re not doing Anything-fucking-but.” It’s been a long time since he was angry with you, openly like this, cussing you out. He’s scary when he’s angry at you, because he’s always calm about it. Raises his voice, maybe, but never yells at you. You wished he’d scream sometimes, it would be easier to read.

“This weekend was really great, Charles. I don’t want to ruin it.”

“I just. I don’t understand.” He runs his hand over his stubble, deep in contemplation, trying to analyze you, make sense of you. Good luck, you want to tell him. “I love you. I really, really fucking love you. Je sais que je ne suis pas fou. Vous le sentez aussi.”

A single, heavy tear falls from the corner of your eye. You wipe it with the rough cuff of your jacket before it can trail down your face. The inside of your cheek is bleeding, you think, because you can’t feel the pressure from your teeth but you can taste copper. “I’m scared.” There, you said it. You admitted it, exhaled it with the weight of the world, vomited it into his lap.

His lips are tight in their frown, eyes red and glossy like he’s going to cry, too. He laughs, though, a sad and defeated chuckle. “You think I’m not scared?” He asks, voice fighting against itself not to crack. “I’m scared as hell to want you.”

He’s scared? But, nothing scares him. He’s fearless, you’re frightened. Unflinching and hesitant. Gutsy and cowardly. Nothing scares him, not even his own mortality. You’re supposed to believe that you, of all people, you, scare him? Impossible, you think.

“I didn’t tell you for fun.” He continues. “I told you, because it was eating me alive. I was so scared to tell you, thought I would ruin us. Mais tu partais, et je ne pouvais pas te perdre. Je ne pouvais pas.”

Why, why, why is this so fucking hard for you. Sixteen-year-old you, twenty-year-old you, twenty-five-year-old you. Every version of you is screaming at you, we’ve loved him forever, this is all you’ve ever wanted from him. They kick your shins and gut-punch the breath from your lungs and scrape their nails behind your eyes. They are furious, because for longer than you can remember every wish–shooting stars, birthday candles, fountain pennies, fallen eyelashes, dandelions, and ladybugs–they’ve all been for the same thing. The very thing being served to you on a desert platter, all you have to do is pick up the fork.

“Tu as peur?”

“Pétrifié.”

Pick up the fork. Eat the corner piece of cake and savor every bite. Be scared. Be terrified that the world is going to take something pure and wreck it. Be scared, but do it together. Pick up the fork.

“I love you, too.”

You feel strangely out of place with someone else to look after in the paddock. Ferrari hospitality had been your home away from home for years now. The paddock was always different, but maintained a comfortable familiarity, recognizable faces, names, buildings and colors. He was wide-eyed and curious and you smiled at the way the sun bounced off his hair, the excitement he couldn’t contain when amongst the chaos you’d become accustomed to.

“Ask before you touch, please.” You told him, his hand in yours, the same warning Charles had given you the first time he brought you through a garage.

He is heard before he is seen, a loud laugh, a familiar voice calling out your name as soon as he turned the corner. “Hi.” You beam.

“Hi” He says, kisses you, runs his hand through the boy’s hair. “Quoi de neuf, Crevette?”

“Il fait chaud, papa.” He says, with poor enunciation and the dramatic waving of a little hand, fanning himself. Charles nods, hoists the little man onto his hip, whispers something in his ear. A private conversation between the two of them, you don’t dare intrude. “Dis-sa.” Charles says, repeats it when he’s met with a giggly belly laugh.

“We go.” He says, in little, butchered english with a thick french accent. It’s easier to decipher a babble.

Charles laughs, quirks his brows at you, shrugs. “We go.” He backs away from you slowly.

“We go, where?” You say, laughing, too, because you can’t not laugh at your little boy’s giggle. It’s too pure, cracks even the toughest exteriors. Charles looks to his mini-me. “Où allons-nous mon amour?”

“La crème glacée.” He says, beams at his father.

“You coming for ice cream, Maman?” Charles asks, holds out his free hand because it’s a rhetorical question. He’s looking at you with the eyes that make you sober and find you in any crowd, but he doesn’t have to have eyes on you to know you’re coming. “Do you think they have Maman’s favorite flavor?” He asked.

“Ouais. Ils l'ont eu."

#READ THIS NOW #READ IT #FUCK #CL16

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