I choose the safest route of response. ‘That was good.’
March 2024
Formula 1 Season
Chapter Twenty
Shantal
Bahrain, first race of the season, dawns on us quickly – like,really quickly.
‘Let’s go, plane leaves in two hours!’ Miguel yells in his biggest Barça matchday voice, banging on all our doors bright and early on a Monday morning. I think I’m going to cry. I’ve never been the most chipper of morning people without a coffee (which I realize I need badly), and I can barely figure out how to roll out of bed, a situation that is exponentially harder knowing I’ll need to be on a jet in a couple of hours.
I’m an unhappy mess, with tangled hair and eye bags heavier than my luggage. Someone’s rented limos that we get to take to the airfield, and it’s so bad that I miss the first one with the three trainers, hopping into the second with the drivers. It’s all very posh in said limo, except that I couldn’t care less, and Henri’s bouncy enthusiasm isn’t curbing my irritation.
‘Whoa, there’s champagne!’ he yelps, grabbing himself a flute and pulling the entire bottle out of its bucket of ice.Miguel shoots him a look of slight judgement from where he sits, lounging with a bag of fancy little peanuts.
‘Hey there, buddy.’ Darien chortles. ‘Easy on the bubbly. You’ll throw it all up the second the plane leaves the ground.’
‘Are you even legal, dude?’ Miguel adds with a raised eyebrow.
Henri fumes for all of three seconds before giddily getting back to his champagne.
‘Wake up.’ Darien throws a peanut at me. His aim is unfortunately true. It knocks me right in the forehead.
‘Hey!’ I whine around a great big gulp of my coffee. ‘Iamawake, thank you very much.’
‘You’re not a morning person,’ remarks Darien.
‘Oh, he’d love to know.’ The snort that escapes Miguel’s mouth is ridiculously loud. Even the limo driver glances at his rear-view mirror with disdain. ‘Sorry, Hen, but I think your girl’s been looking for a guy who could grow a beard the entire time.’
‘I can grow a beard!’ Henri tries, but the laughter in the limousine almost drowns him out.
‘I believe you,’ I tell him with a tired drawl and a defensive clearing of my throat. ‘But I’m not looking for beards, no beards, any kind of beards.’
‘Yet she’s all eyes for another man.’ Miguel clucks his tongue dramatically, shaking his head for that little extra sting.
I almost fling my coffee cup his way at that, but Darien glows pink. It’s quite funny to see how he gets. Regardless of the flair and the murals and the dances and the funk songs to his name, he’s really not hard to fluster.
Seeing him off his game like that definitely wakes me up, if not the barrage of peanuts.
I chug the last couple of sips from my coffee with a contented hum, rubbing at my eyes. Darien’s shoulder nudges mine, and Ilook up to see the most precious smile on his face. He’s as tired as I am, but rather than bleary, his eyes are full of admiration. For what, I am not totally sure, but he says to me, ‘You ever realized something?’
‘I’ve not got enough brain power for that right now,’ I tell him with a yawn. ‘What did you realize?’
‘I dunno.’ He shrugs, gesturing to my almost-empty cup. ‘Just that we need to get you bigger coffees.’
‘Tell me about it,’ I groan into the depths of my depleted caffeine supply. ‘I need more. I need to start drinking those Jolt Simply Strawberry things.’
‘Don’t do it.’ Darien shivers so obviously that I feel his entire body do a funny little wiggle beside mine. ‘Jeez. It gives me the goosebumps just to think about it. You know how much sugar is in those things? You think they end up all pink like that ’cause of nature?’
‘That’s kind of thereasonI need those things.’
‘Oh, yeah. I heard if you drink an entire case, it’ll give you a heart attack.’
‘Heart attacks are not funny, Darien.’ I elbow him in the ribs, and he makes this obnoxious wind-knocked-out sound.
‘I didn’t say they were!’
