Julien hobbles over to the bathroom and furiously scrubs at his hands with the perfumy hotel soap. Once enough of the cum is gone, he hops in place, dragging his briefs and jeans up his hips and fastening them.
“What are you late to?” Rafael asks when Julien passes.
“Uh, it’s nothing.” Julien pats his pockets. Wallet, phone, room key, paddock pass. Everything’s accounted for. “Hey, thanks for tonight. See you tomorrow?”
It’s a rhetorical question, so Julien doesn’t wait for an answer before he bolts out the door. He jogs down the hallway and elbows the elevator’s down button a bunch of times while he types fervent apologies to the group chat.
They’ve probably already started without him. Julien’s such a dick.
Safe inside his crummy hotel room, Julien doesn’t even change before he throws open his laptop and grabs his headset.He has to log in to the faster-but-expensive hotel wi-fi, but hopefully he’ll make the money back with the stream.
“Hey guys,” he says, unmuting himself. “Sorry I’m late.”
“Five pounds to Mick for guessing Romeo would sound fucked out when he finally joined.”
“What?! I don’t sound—” Julien coughs, clearing his throat. “Is that better?”
“Still sounds a little hoarse, buddy. Was he hung?”
“Oh fuckoff!I didn’t even suck his dick.” Shit. They always trick Julien into talking about his personal life. “I was at dinner.Alone.”
The guys all laugh, and Julien manually shuts off their active race to start a new one.
“Hey! I was winning that!”
“Who cares about Vegas? It’s Australia week and the start of a new season. Any bets on the race? Or the championship, while we’re at it?”
Julien pulls up Albert Park as the chat floods with everyone’s predictions. Though he’s usually able to ignore it, his eyes catch on the feed every time his own name pops up.
“Chat is betting on another Sam win,” Kevin reads off.“Wow, they really hate Julien.”
“DNF by the first turn?”Mick reads.“That’s a rough prediction, chat. He’s not bad, he’s just fuckin’ slow.”
“You’re in Australia, right, Romeo? You should stop by the Ferraro garage, give the kid some pointers.”
Julien swallows around the lump in his throat. What did he expect? They talk shit about the drivers every week. It’s kinda the point. “What would I even tell him? Use your fuckin’ brakes? C’mon.”
“This guy makes a good point—’If Thomas wasn’t the golden child of Ferraro, Julien would’ve been dropped as a reserveby now. He learned on outdated machinery and hasn’t done anything notable in three years.’”
Well, fuck that guy.
Julien has won tournaments. They just happen to be online. Under a pseudonym.
It still counts.
They line up for Qualifying as Mick, Kevin, and John continue to read aloud every comment they agree with.
Luckily, Julien isn’t the only driver people are betting against this weekend. Laurent and Matt get the usual reaming, and even Santiago seems to be struggling for support after last season.
“Wait, Romeo should be nuked before we start. You can’t have the best driver in the best car.”
“That’s usually how it works, though.” Julien still exchanges his randomly-assigned Red Boar for something a little more fair. “How bad are we thinking? McLean? Or are you so threatened by little ole me that you need me in an Ashton Marvin?”
“Ashton,”they say in unison.
Julien selects the dark green car with a grin. “Thought so, you cowards.”
“You look terrible.”
