I think about that a lot. What would it change, knowing Pai? I want it more than anything. ‘Yeah.’ And just because the curiosity gets me, ‘Would you?’
‘Would I …’ Shantal looks away, towards the coastline. ‘I never said I had anyone …’
I can feel the melancholy filling the space between us. Ihadto go there. Guilt heavy in my stomach, I lie down, staring directly into the sun, the picnic blanket warm against the back of my perpetually sore neck. Voice soft, I whisper to her, ‘I’m sorry.’
Back when I first met her, I remember thinking I wanted nothing more than toknowabout Shantal. To know her reasons, know why she looked at Ipanema that way. As I watch her now, following my motion and lying back on the blanket, I start to very slowly find out why.
For a moment I don’t think she’s going to say anything. She’s gazing up into the sun just as I am. We’ll burn our corneas out like this. But she turns to me, and her eyes are heavy with tears. She tucks a curl behind her ear with a sigh. ‘I’d give everything I have, Darien. For my sister.’
Her sister.
Someone she grew up with, did everything with. I picture two little girls with matching hairstyles chasing each other around a park or kicking around a football. I always wanted a brother, though I never got one. Would have killed to have somebody to share my life with.
‘My mom says the same thing about my dad.’ My chest is suddenly tight with grief for her, even though I’ve experiencednone of it, and can scarcely call back my own. ‘That’s why we moved to America. He’s everywhere for her in Rio. She never found anyone else, either. Said if Pai wasn’t there by her side, no one else would be.’
‘That is just how it feels.’ Shantal’s hair brushes my cheek as she struggles to put the same damper on her emotions as she has always done. But she can’t do it this time.
I watch her eyelashes flutter like the paper-thin wings of a butterfly. ‘I was spoiled by Guyana and by my family’s love. When we came to England, I lost Guyana. And when Sonia died, she took all the love with her. All of it, every last drop. And so if someone were to shackle themselves to me, Darien, I’m scared I would have no love left to give.’
My heart aches so hard that I can physically feel it. Is this what my beautiful mother went through, what I know nothing of?
I remember something my mom said once, in one of the fleeting moments when she was able to talk about Pai. They were few and far between, but this, I can recall clear as day.
‘Once you’ve felt so much for someone and they leave, all you wanna do is feel that again.’
I don’t know what’s in my head, but I reach out and wrap an arm around her, and she leans into me. I want to close the distance between us and take away everything that’s hurting her. I don’t want her to ever, ever feel a shred of pain again. I’d fight off the first person that so much as attempted to cause her the slightest harm. I know we’re humans, all of us, breakable by nature, but if anyone deserves to be free from the threat of breaking, it’s Shantal. It’s always going to be Shantal.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Darien
Monaco – the jewel in the crown of F1, concealing dangerously sharp turns and narrow tracking – was a race I’d been waiting for during this first half of the season. It tests your mettle to the limit – are you just another kid with fire in his belly, or are you willing to go the extra mile? In an interview after his first win, Miguel called it a siren song: luring you in with its pretty architecture and picturesque streets, and then hitting you with a corner so sharp you can barely see it coming. The quick gear changes and abrupt turns are menacing, but Miguel and I have trained hard to perfect these movements. We leave Monte Carlo with a perfect one-two, and even though I’m P2, I bag an extra point for fastest lap.
Canada, Spain and Hungary, subsequent race weekends, fly by after that, and I bring home one more win and two podiums. It’s looking optimistic heading into the halfway point of the season. Miguel and I are tight up in P1 and P2 for the title, which is great, but there’s still that little voice in the back of my headgreedily growling for more – for the WDC. I’m pushing as hard as I can … and I’m trying my best to avoid the growing concern regarding the arm. Celina’s aware that it’s been bothering me in the car, and I’ve been trying to ignore it, but she gave me a dire warning after a particularly chaotic race in Hungary.
‘Darien, you have to understand.’ She looked at me with that disappointed adult look in her eyes that people direct towards misbehaving kids. ‘With every second you race, you’re worsening an injury that never properly got to recover. Just know that the second the pain gets too much for you, I’m pulling you out of the car.’
It doesn’t seem long till we end up in England – Shantal’s home – for the final weekend before summer break, and a walk around the track bright and early on a Thursday morning. Silverstone, unlike Monaco, is all about speed. As one of the fastest current circuits, it can be both exciting and disastrous to race around, but I’d prefer to keep it exciting. React and act at the same time. I can do this.
‘Isn’t this the only race you’d ever watched before you came our way?’ Miguel teases an excited Shantal as she walks between us. The default walk is made a bit more special by the fact that today, Shantal has asked to join us. We couldn’t say no, and I couldn’t resist a chance to do something special for her while she’s atherhome race.
Shantal’s hand brushes mine softly, her fingers intertwining themselves in mine. It happens so naturally; I don’t even realize it until she squeezes my hand with a smile. ‘Yeah, just Silverstone.’
‘Oh, you’ve not seen any of theTriple Crown races?’ Miguel makes a dramatically appalled face, pausing to turn to Shantal. ‘I mean – I take it back, you did see Monaco this year. That’s one of three jewels in the Triple Crown. Puts you in the history books for good.’
‘Okay, so maybe I’m uninformed on the sport,’ admits Shantal, ‘but I’ve tried to do research. The Triple Crown: that’s the Indy 500, Le Mans and Monaco – correct? You win it, you join the ranks of legends.’
‘You pass on that one.’ I tip my head in a challenge. ‘Okay, so what about Silverstone? How come drivers love it here?’
‘Just look at how the track lets you really push the car.’ She grins. ‘High speed, high intensity, everything multiple times faster than half the other tracks on the schedule. Absolute insanity, of course, but exactly your thing.’
‘You’ve come to know me too well.’
The trainers give us directions on the turns, Louie addressing Miguel while Celina gets on my case. I remember all the aggressive muscle-control exercises the trainers had us doing for those first couple weeks, the adaptive simulation program we’ve been doing before each race, the resultant tick-up in our times so far. I’m hoping it’ll work its magic on one of the tracks where quick reaction matters most; you only have so much time to respond to threats when you’re moving faster than the average race. I’m also hoping that however abrupt these reactions are, my body – my arm – will be able to withstand it. Above all, I need my mind at 100 per cent.
Silverstone is a test of will. On this track, if you’re not willing to pull through on any move you make, you’re screwed. As fun a race as it is, the turns are quick, the Gs brutal. ‘Commit,’ Celina would always tell me when I was starting out in Formula 1 at Heidelberg. ‘If you’re not gonna commit, you fall through, you fall off, and you’re done.’
I’ve had problems at Silverstone before, though. It was all the interviewers could talk about today, and it’s all they talk about every year I’m here.
