I did not write about the way my hands had shaken.
I did not write about the sound his voice made when he crossed the line.
I did not write about wanting to be anywhere else.
The words came cleanly, efficiently. Muscle memory honed over years of doing this when it mattered most.
When I finished, I read it once, twice. Checked the data. Verified the lap counts. Then I uploaded the file to Apex’s system and waited for the confirmation banner.
Filed.
Around me, the room emptied. The celebration continued elsewhere.
Jonathan texted a few minutes later.
JONATHAN:Where did you disappear to?
WALLY:Writing.
JONATHAN:Of course you are.
I closed the laptop, finally allowing myself to feel the absence.
There would be time later, or there wouldn’t. That was always the bargain.
For now, the story was out in the world.
I realized that Michael Hirsch’s strategy might work. Transparency instead of secrecy. Higher standards instead of compromised ones. The kind of solution that looked simple until you had to execute it under pressure.
But watching Jonathan handle his victory interviews with grace and intelligence, seeing the way he balanced personal emotion with professional responsibility, I thought together we might be capable of the harder path, if we didn’t flinch when it demanded more than either of us wanted to give.
Once Michael spoke to Thea Blackwood, probably before the next race, the complications would escalate. Questions about objectivity, scrutiny of every article, the constant balance between personal feelings and professional standards.
The night air outside felt shockingly cool against the heat still humming under my skin. We didn’t speak as we walked. There were cameras everywhere, fewer than before, but still enough that we kept a careful distance, like strangers whose paths just happened to align. He led, I followed, our steps echoing faintly on concrete that hours earlier had carried the sound of history being made.
We looked around as we approached the columned portico, and we were careful to take our own elevator. Inside his room, the door shut with a soft, final click.
Jonathan stood there for a second, his back to me, shoulders rising and falling. The noise drained out of him all at once. Not collapsing, just… emptying.
Then he turned, and the composure he’d worn all evening cracked clean through.
“I don’t think I’ve stopped shaking,” he said, almost surprised by the words.
I pulled him into my arms. He clung to me like gravity had suddenly doubled, his forehead pressed into my shoulder, breath uneven. Sweat, champagne, engine oil, the smell of the day clung to him.
“You won,” I said quietly, the words finally safe to speak.
A sound escaped him that might have been a laugh or might have been something closer to a sob. His hands tightened at the back of my shirt.
“I kept thinking,” he said, voice muffled, “if I let myself believe it before the flag, it will all disappear.”
I leaned us back against the wall, grounding both of us. “It didn’t.”
For a while, that was enough.
When he lifted his head, his eyes were bright and unfocused, like someone who’d been awake too long or moving too fast for too many hours.
“Stay,” he said, not a question.
