Chapter Text
The engine rumbles to life under me, revving up with each light touch to the gas pedal. The smell of gasoline and burnt rubber fills the air, a familiar scent I've come to associate with home and belonging. I take a deep breath, adjusting my helmet one last time as I line up on the grid box, making sure I have not even a hair out of place. My gaze is locked on the lights, still blacked out as everyone else takes place behind me but I can't afford to miss the cue. My closest rival is in the grid box next to me, I know he's doing the same, I know his heart is likely racing. I've heard that's what happens to humans when they get an adrenaline rush, I can't remember the sound of my heartbeat though.
My attention is quickly brought back to the race as the lights overhead begin going red, all the other cars around me revving their engines as we all get ready. The lights are out, my launch isn't what I wanted, but still, I'm ahead of Santiago and that's all that matters to me. I keep my head down as I speed into turn 1, watching the cars around me for any opportunity to gain a position or two. A car ahead locks up and goes off, I take the chance to weave through the pack. Through the next few corners the rest of the pack falls away as I work into the back of the car ahead, who I can only assume is Robin Wulf.
Checking my mirrors, I can see the vibrant blue of Santiago's PfielTech car fading backwards quickly, giving me the chance to focus on chasing Wulf for 2nd place.
“Gap to Wulf .76, DRS available. Let's go get him, Luc” Elio's voice crackles through the radio. Our car is looking significantly better than it did during the qualifying session yesterday, the pace is better and I'm thankful to have the grip we were struggling to find before.
I weave intricately through the corners, taking a less optimal racing line in attempt to force Burke to make a mistake. It would likely be my best chance at making an overtake. The McLaren car has been looking superior to us all weekend, better speed, better traction. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think they had found some way to beat the system. I do, however, know better. Of course I do, Robin Wulf is an amazing driver, he is having the weekend he deserves in a car he deserves for all he fought and clawed last season. Still, I find myself quickly closing in on the rear end of the McLaren. I don’t quite get the chance to overtake before Wulf peels off into the pit lane.
“You’re new race leader, head down. Show them what we’re made of” A grin slides across my face at the words, sometimes it still amazes me how in sync Elio and I are despite this being his first season as my race engineer. I guess it must come down to our similarities in thinking, the similarities in our passion for the sport. It could also be the bonding, Elio’s idea, of course. He had insisted on it before even the start of testing. Daily runs, dinners, the occasional night in a club. I have to admit it made us a lot closer, even if spending so much time with someone significantly younger than myself. He is a nice kid, incredibly smart and quick-witted.
With the field open in front of me, I no longer need to worry about being in the dirty air of the McLaren, or getting close enough to overtake. The only thing I need to focus on now is pushing, getting a good gap ahead, and trying to get a safe pit gap to Wulf. I find myself back to the racing line again, getting good enough lap times in to build the gap behind from 1.8 to 2.4 within 4 laps. Not enough yet, but Wulf will likely be closing in soon on fresh tires and I can feel my tires starting to go. I relay the feeling to Elio, and the next lap, I’m pulling into the pits.
2.9 seconds.
I’m back behind Wulf where I was before, the plan to try to clear him didn’t go to plan. The pitstop wasn’t bad, necessarily, but not where I needed it to pull it off.
I end up finishing second, not quite able to catch Wulf in the McLaren. I hit the steering wheel as I begin my cooldown lap, frustration building. I still wave to the fans in the grandstands as I pass, still act professional over the radio, but inside, I’m furious. I had a chance to win, I know I did, even after the pitstop I had gotten so close, but I couldn’t quite make it. The other McLaren pulls up next to me in front of the 3rd place board in parc fermé, because of course he does. My face pulls into a grimace under my helmet as I climb out.
Out of the corner of my eye as I get weighed, I watch Wulf do I little celebration on the top of his car. Good for him. I’d probably be more happy for him if I wasn’t so upset with myself for not pulling off an overtake despite having almost the entire race to work towards it. Cosmo Helzer, my team principal, claps me on the back. It doesn’t hold the same weight it does when I win, doesn’t hold the same emotion. Instead of ‘Good Job’, it says ‘Next time’. I force a tight smile as I tug my helmet off. It isn’t a bad race result, I know that, but this year is supposed to be my year. My championship. I pull the balaclava and sweat band off, running my hands through my hair and opening the water bottle set out for me with a deep sigh.
It’s just 7 points, I try to tell myself. I’m still leading the championship, I still finished ahead of Santiago, and it's still early in the season. Still, the hit hurts. I know it’ll be all I’ll hear about, all I’ll read for the next 2 weeks until the next race. Every interview, every media outlet. It’s never about how vastly I outscore Grey Bradshaw, my teammate, never about the overtakes I manage, or the points I do score. It’s always about my possible downfall, gets more views that way I guess, the drama.
The champagne never tastes the same on the second step, sometimes I wonder if they use a different brand, a different proof, something cheaper. I drink it nonetheless, not even bothering to spray the McLarens in lieu of chugging the alcohol from the bottle. It will likely come back to bite me, but in the moment I don’t care. I just want to go back to my hotel and sulk, but I still have an evening of media duties before I even get to the team meetings and the inevitable parties the team will try to drag me to. A good result for the team, of course they are happy. I know I should be too, but I can’t find it in me to be happy. The disappointment is still too fresh.
Media is brutal as always. They never stop. ‘What happened out there?’, ‘Was there anything you’d do differently?’, ‘Mclaren are quickly catching Vent in the Constructor’s, are you concerned?’. I just wish it would all stop. It’s always the same thing, it never really changes once you get to the top. Always about what you did wrong, your faults, never what you did well.
When I finally get back to my hotel room, I’m absolutely dead on my feet. I haven’t even turned my phone back on yet, not ready for the onslaught of media and messages. The quiet is nice, finally away and able to process everything better without a microphone being shoved in my face to capture every single one of my emotions before I even realise I’m feeling them.
Reluctantly I start my phone back up as I get changed, thankful to finally get out of the teamkit I felt like would be sewn permanently to my body had I not taken it off when I did. I can hear my phone going off where I’d left it on the bedside table across the room, but I ignore it to take a shower, desperate to get the grime of the day off my body and hoping it’ll wash the stress away with it.
It feels easier to breathe the second the warm water begins to cascade down my body, as if I’ve finally broken the state I had been in since I crossed the finish line. I take a few moments to just breathe, running my hands through my hair as I tilt my head back under the spray. A moment of solace, alone with my thoughts and nothing but the sound of the water hitting the walls and floor of the shower.
It is nice sometimes, having time to just think, to process without worrying how it will look for everyone that could see. No one will see me here, I can be sure of that, and with that knowledge I can finally stop acting like the second place finish isn’t killing me. I can finally let myself feel. I want to scream, want to punch a wall. The win had been so close, I could see it, could almost reach out and touch it. I didn’t get it though. I can almost hear my father’s voice in my head, my mother’s, both screaming that I should’ve won. I tug at my hair as I wash it, my chest tightening with the anxiety and guilt that fills me inexplicably. No one has outright said anything negative, no one has told me I did a bad job, I didn’t do a bad job. Still the guilt tears through me as I aggressively shut off the shower, quickly getting to work drying my hair. I’ve been ready to go to sleep and forget about this day for hours now, my frustration and exhaustion beginning to bleed into all of my actions.
When I enter the main room again, my phone was still going off, causing me to sigh. I want to just ignore it, at least until morning. I probably could, it’s unlikely that any of the calls or messages are from my team. The way the phone continues buzzing with messages, though, tells me I won’t sleep if I don’t respond soon. Reluctantly, I make my way over to the bedside table, about to turn it on to check it when there’s a loud knock on the hotel door.
Shit.
Maybe it was my team.
I set my phone back down, sighing deeply as I quickly make my way to the door. I didn’t need to give any of them any more reason to reprimand me.
The face I’m met with when I open the door surprises me, I straighten my posture instinctively.
Santiago Gonzalez.
The man looks as surprised as I feel, his hand still in the air like he was about to knock again before I opened the door. My brows furrow at him, watching his posture straighten out when mine does. I catch a bag in his other hand.
“Tiago” The nickname has stuck through our friendship since we’d first met in F3, my tone saying it has grown less friendly in that time. We had been friends for years, as we both worked our way through the feeder series. I had even fought for him to get a seat when his family started struggling too much to pay for another year in F2. That friendship shifted significantly last year, however, during our first close battle for the constructor’s championship. Neither of us had been close enough to the driver’s title, that was won by Wulf last season, but Foxx was still struggling as a rookie to find his footing enough for McLaren to be constructor’s contenders.
I watch a grin spread across Santiago’s face, his hand finally dropping as if the nickname had broken the face off we seemed to be having.
“Lucky” Ugh. That damned nickname he refused to drop. I had always hated it, it was ridiculous and made fun of my name. Still, as he lifted the bag he had been holding and I recognized the name on it, I stepped aside to let him in. “I brought food. Maybe we could have the movie night?”
Oh.
It is the first Sunday of the month. We had dropped the tradition last season when tensions rose, I thought it would be even less of an option with the title fight possible this year. We had been teammates in F3 which had led to us becoming closer. There were so many nights we would sit in the hotel room, usually one of us having snuck into the other’s, talking about making it to Formula 1. It was of course the dream for everyone in F3, but even back then I knew that if I made it to F1, Santiago would too. Eventually, one of those nights we made a pact that the first Sunday of every month we would have a movie night. It was easier before I had made it F1 before Santiago, we started doing it over the phone when it landed on race weekends.
That all ended halfway through last season, though. We stopped spending any time around one another away from the track, couldn’t stop arguing once the pressure got too great, we didn’t even text once over the winter break. I eye him warily for a moment, wondering if this was maybe a way to get into my head or maybe trying to get team secrets out of me. I hate that this was what it had come to, I should be able to take the obvious olive branch for what it is. I know that no matter how much Santiago and I fought last year, no matter how competitive either of us are, we would never go low enough to play mind games. We both want to win, sure, but we want to win fairly.
“You finish in.. 7th, no?” I change the subject instead of answering but already on my way to sit on the hotel bed, motioning for Santiago to join me. Neither of our results were ideal, but his much less so. I have no doubt his phone is going off as much as mine, much for a different reason, however. Maybe this would be good for the both of us, better than moping alone in my hotel room.
“Sì, not my best result” His tone is awkward, much less at ease than the last time we did this. I guess I’m partially to blame for that. Still, he makes his way over to sit next to me on the edge of the bed while I look for a movie to put on. Only a small hum escapes me in response, his words making me feel guilty for being so upset about a second place finish. He had had a much worse day, from what I heard he was having a lot of balance issues.
His posture is stiff when I catch sight of him out of the corner of my eye, his head hung and his eyes downcast, still tightly clutching the bag of food in his hand. I sigh a little, trying to focus on my search for a movie, but my mind wanders to why, all of a sudden, Santiago has decided to revive the tradition.
“I.. can not find a movie. Do you have idea for movie?” I just don’t feel like choosing a movie, that’s it. Though, the way Santiago relaxes at the familiarity, it feels a little easier to breathe for the first time since I crossed the finish line hours ago. He reaches to take the remote out of my hand, and I find myself handing it over without hesitation. It shouldn’t be this easy, considering how long it’s been and the stress of the championship battle to come looming over us. Still, I reach out to take the bag of food from Santiago so he can search for whatever movie he clearly already had in mind, placing the bag between us.
“It is burgers, I thought it was a safe option. You.. still like burgers?” His words sound so nervous that it almost hurts, the guilt from pushing him away beginning to build. I know it was my fault, I was the one that began ignoring his texts, his calls, started avoiding him. I saw him as a distraction last season, my races worse when I had spent time with Santiago before. He doesn’t deserve that blame, though. It was never his fault.
“Yes, burgers are good” I assure, my voice barely above a whisper. Burgers were good, he was right about them being a safe option. A safe food, simple and good, but it showed how much he still remembered. I assume he found a movie while I was getting lost in my thoughts when he reached to dig through the bag of food. He hands me one of the burgers wordlessly and turns back to the movie. Whether he is just excited about the movie or fears that too much closeness will cause me to push him away again, I’m not sure. I don’t have much time to dwell on it, either, as I unwrap the burger.
Cheese, grilled onions, and aioli but nothing else. A specific burger that always made me feel better after a hard day, a comfort food of sorts. My eyes flicker to Santiago for a moment, but he is too transfixed on the movie so my gaze falls back to the burger. The average burger place near here wouldn’t have the means for this, he would have had to look around. Not only that but he remembered after all this time, and on top of that noticed I was down about a result that wasn’t even something to be upset over. A shaking breath escapes me as I take a bite of the burger.
Yeah.
This is what I’ve needed. I didn’t even realize it, but Santiago did. Just like he always used to, that stupid silent understanding. I shift a little closer subconsciously, getting comfortable. I see Santiago glance at me briefly, before he shifts a little closer in return. Neither of us said anything, but neither of us had to. A quiet night with a good movie and food that says a million unspoken words. By the end of the night we are laughing and joking like we used to when we were younger, when things were easier.
Maybe sometimes it can still be that easy.