She giggles at a particularly unflattering picture of Raff getting towed back to the garage after his failed qualifying attempt. Julian nudges her leg with his foot, eyebrows raised to ask what she’s laughing at. She shows him the photo; he smirks. They start sharing tidbits of what they’re looking at or working on (Clarke was right, he’s drawing a lizard. It’s his parents’ pet lizard, and its thorned head comes up to Clarke’s hip) every few minutes, and if it feels too easy—if it feels like they’re glossing over the rocky ground between them, like there’s something disingenuous about a peace that only holds so long as neither of them is speaking, well—she glances at the camera and reminds herself that this isn’t real. They’re working toward something real, though, and that’s a balm to her soul.
At some point, it seems dumb to keep leaning over to show him her holoscreen and then sit up again. She lies down on her back, head toward Julian, knees hooked over the arm of the couch, holding her screen above her face where she can easily tilt it to him. He takes it out of her hand to get a closer look at something, and she closes her eyes and laces her fingers together over her ribs when he doesn’t give it back right away.
—
She wakes warmand groggy. It takes a few minutes to orient herself, her brain always slow to fire up again after a nap—because that’s what this was, a nap. She fell asleep in Julian’s prep room.
She fell asleeponJulian.
He’s stretched out along the couch, one foot planted on the floor, the other dangling off the cushion at an angle. Clarke’s lying on her side, her back pressed up against the back of thecouch. Her head is pillowed on his thigh. Her top arm is looped around his leg, her handfartoo close to his dick for comfort.
His fingers are in her hair. Not moving, not gripping, just…resting there.
Clarke goes from sleepy-calm to the polar opposite of sleepy-calm.
She forces herself not to move quickly. She cranes her neck back at a glacial pace, eyes just barely slitted open, until she can see his face.
He’s asleep. His head is propped against the crux where the arm of the couch meets the back. His neck’s going to be sore when he wakes up.
Okay. She can get out of this. She just has to be careful about it; he’s a light sleeper.
She tries to push herself upright with the arm that’s trapped underneath her, but that’s all pins and needles. She tries contracting along the top side of her body, but doesn’t have the leverage needed against his heavy hand on her head. She’s going to have to use her free hand, but the only place she can plant it is on the sliver of cushion between his splayed legs, and—
“Hey.”
Julian’s voice is low, raspy with sleep. Clarke curses internally and looks at him again, this time a million percent more aware of how she has to look all the way up the line of his body to get to his face. The strong curve of his thigh, the angle of his hips, the spread of his chest, the span of his shoulders.
She is not thinking about the subtle bulge at the front of his sweatpants. She isnot.
Her hair falls into her face, dislodged by his fingers. He tucks it behind her ear, then keeps moving his hand down, fingerscoming to rest along the side of her neck. His thumb traces forward along her jaw. Every touch leaves a flare under Clarke’s skin. Clarke could—
There’s a lot Clarke could do right now. She could climb into his lap, knees pressed into the cushion on either side of his hips. His hands would grip her waist, spread across the small of her back, control the rhythm just like he’d done on the dance floor at Thierry’s birthday. He’d get his fingers in her hair again, tight at the nape of her neck, pulling until her throat is exposed and he can put his lips and teeth and tongue on her. His other hand would slide around to the front of her belly, toy with the drawstring of her pants, dip under the elastic.
This is the exact sort of thing that can’t happen if they’re going to be friends. They can’t have moments that remind them of what they want but can’t have.
A loud, deliberate knock on the door has both of them scrambling. Clarke shoves away and slams against the opposite armrest; Julian jerks himself into a sitting position and grabs for his fallen sketchbook, setting it over his lap just as the door opens.
“Hey, guys,” PK says, eyes on the ceiling. “Time really flies, huh? We’re all done, so—”
Clarke bolts.
Julian lets her.
19
A big part of beingsuccessful in Formula Zero—in any professional sport, really—is the ability to compartmentalize. You need to be able to block out everything else, no matter how distracting or upsetting or intoxicating, and focus on the task at hand.
Clarke isgreatat compartmentalizing.
Prep for the Iskret Singularity Grand Prix goes off without a hitch. Her warm-up lap feels smooth. She and Amira recap race strategy on their way out to the grid: Clarke’s starting in the middle of the pack, P8, and will try to hang out there for the first ten or so laps. The race leaders are the usual suspects, and Clarke’d be stupid to try to pass them before seeing how they’re going to handle the first few variables. If they’re flying conservatively, trying to keep the average pace down because this track is daunting, Amira will give Clarke the green light to overtake. If they’re going hard, Clarke’s to try to keep up and then capitalize on any mistakes or hesitations.
Maki’s abnormally quiet as he clips Clarke in and runs through her checks. The five-minute siren sounds just as they’re wrapping up the final step, confirmation that Clarke’s biometrics feed is working.
“Strong and steady,” Maki says, reviewing the data on his display. “Need anything else?”
This is the part where Clarke saysNope, all clear, and he untethers to jet away. Today Clarke pauses and waits for him to look at her instead of the display. When she’s sure he’s watching, she moves them both to a private radio channel.
It’s notreallyprivate. Yves, Amira, practically anyone could drop in, and anyone looking at the comms dashboard will be able to see that Clarke and Maki aren’t on the crew channel anymore. They have to make this fast.
