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Colorful spots swam around him. Shapes and silhouettes had turned into a blur. His eyes sharpened to read the circuit and calculate meters instinctively: if you don’t start turning here, you will crash; if you don’t start pressing the brakes, you will crash; if you stop now, you will never reach them.
He had to surpass the two cars before him. This was the last lap, his last chance - but it was easier to reach than it was to pass. They left no opening for him to move forward. The Mercedes took the lead, the McLaren attempted to overtake it, and both occupied the track, stealing the show hand in hand.
Nagi gritted his teeth, obsessed with the competition at the front. He needed for one of those two to win, for one to deviate and create space. He just needed enough margin, as soon as there was enough margin…
“Hiori is two seconds behind,” the radio informed.
The red and blue car flashed in the corner of his eye.
Nagi had to increase his speed, multiplying those seconds up to double or more. His dream couldn’t be over. It wouldn’t end here. He was sweating under his gloves and tightened his hands on the wheel.
He could already feel the trophy slipping through his fingers.
On the last turn, the rivals closed on each other and abruptly veered to the right, out of the way, the wheels of the McLaren ending up on top of the Mercedes. The miracle happened right before his eyes, and somehow Nagi couldn’t really believe it until he heard those five words: “ITOSHI AND ISAGI ARE OUT!”
He drove past it. No smoke rose in spirals. The sky remained blue — clear now that the rain was over. No red flags were raised, and Nagi was allowed to continue. He had to continue, did it with more kilometers per hour than before.
Through the radio, he was reminded of Hiori’s Red Bull hot on his heels. It didn’t matter anymore, because, with the other two competitors out of the race, Nagi was crowned the winner. There was enough space for both him and Hiori on the podium.
As cheers broke out, he could only pick up one of his team engineer’s voices on the radio, Chris Prince congratulating him. “You did it, Nagi! Great race, man!”
The excitement buzzed under his skin.
Nagi Seishiro was fire. Subtle at the beginning, growing stronger as years passed, and at times dangerous, all-consuming. He could destroy everything.
Nagi slowed down and stopped the car. Laughs echoed on the radio, and maybe they were his because his chest was rising and falling, and his cheeks hurt. Finally, victory was back in his grasp. With 25 points for the Italy Grand Prix, he got closer to the top two, the real competition.
Even if no one could see past those two, he was not going to be left behind.
Someone helped undo his belt, another person took the wheel away to make room, and hands pulled him up. Suddenly Nagi was out, swallowed by claps and hugs, pats on the back. In a matter of seconds, he was on the podium with the flower crown around his neck, shaking the champagne bottle as was tradition.
To his right, Hiori. To his left, Tabito. The cork shot out, and foam bathed them all; flashes went off. For the first time in a long time, Nagi smiled at the cameras.
During the interviews, his head was elsewhere, although it was easy to answer anyway because he only had to be honest. Those with the harsher and longer questions were the idiots who crashed, taking their rivalry to the extreme this season, which meant Nagi could finish quickly with the press.
He said his goodbyes to his team and got in his car, followed the route to his hotel. What were 5 kilometers when he’s already driven more than 306 today? Luckily, his legs hadn’t cramped up.
While he pressed the elevator’s buttons on his way to his room, he wasn’t thinking of anything but the glory, the so far-fetched dream that didn’t seem impossible anymore. Overall, he was satisfied with his performance, ignoring any errors he may have had during the race. He had won, after all. Nagi didn’t need to focus on mistakes right now. He needed water instead, maybe a hug, definitely a nap. He had a flight to catch the following day.
With those things in mind, he hadn’t been prepared for Reo’s sour mood. He should have expected it, though, because, in comparison to his fans, Reo never ignored Nagi’s mistakes when he believed they had been dangerous.
Reo used to believe Nagi Seishiro was destroying him. Consuming him.
His hands were trembling with restrained anger and fear. Nagi was familiar with the expression and the stance, Reo’s panic, his overflowing feelings.
“You’re gonna kill yourself,” he said with a frown. He didn’t scowl anymore, didn’t snap. Reo was familiar with Nagi’s recklessness too.
If they were a little younger and a little more impulsive, Nagi would have gotten slapped, would have pushed Reo against a wall in defense. Then, they would’ve had an explosive fight before kissing and having sex, against that same wall or on the bed, toying the line between love and hate like many times before.
Mikage Reo could be dangerous too . Pure fuel, gasoline. He used to corner Nagi and make him yell, make him push back in ways that were strange to him — lose control.
You’re so fucking reckless! What if Loki hadn’t moved, huh? You think you’re so sneaky, but this ain’t fucking bumper cars!
Shut up, Reo. I know what I’m doing.
Asshole.
Know your fucking place. Put your hands on me again, and I’m out, understood?
You’re the one who’s squeezing my fucking hand like an animal, jerk.
’Cause, you jumped me! I’m not a horse for you to tame. Remember that.
No, nobody ever tames you, right? You never know when to stop, Seishiro, stubborn as a mule. That’s what you are! A damned mule that could have been blown into stupid little pieces today!
They would have dissolved into kisses and groans, pulling, pushing, moaning, yelling.
Reo would have bitten him hard as a punishment. His fingers would have dug unforgiving, painting red streaks on Nagi’s back, marks that would itch under the fireproof suit. Then, for a few hours, he would fuck with hatred, though his legs would wrap around Nagi as if he were afraid to let go; and he would pant insults under his breath, refusing to beg or praise like he usually did when they made love.
Then he would lock himself in the bathroom to cry, frustrated by his own reaction, by their fight, and it would take thirty or fifty minutes until he felt put together again. He would come into the room apologizing, I didn’t mean it, I would never say those things about you and mean them, I’m sorry I said that and Nagi would apologize too, I didn’t want to worry you like that, I fucked up, you were right. They would melt into hugs and caresses where Reo’s hands would say, please don’t go, don’t die on me, and Nagi’s kisses would mean we’ll be fine.
They would have fallen asleep and acted like normal the next day.
But that was an old song by now, played so many times it wasn’t worth dancing to anymore. Nagi took off his jacket, “you weren’t there,” he argued, eternally patient with Reo in a way that could only be a product of years together.
“I don’t need to see you do it live to know you’re doing it”, Reo replied, “the last curve, in the 40th lap, with that rain… how could you speed up like that? You almost made contact with Karasu, almost .”
Anyone else wouldn’t have noticed from their screen, but Reo wasn’t anyone else; he wasn’t even just a fan. He raced with Nagi for three years, lasted one in F1 — not enough to make a mark on the sport, but enough to know how Nagi’s world operated; that world that seduced him so young only to spit in his face with an accident. He knew better than anyone how a short moment of contact could lead to losing control of the vehicle.
Nagi stripped off his shoes. First, his left, then, his right, backwards. Reo never took his eyes off him, but he never raised his voice either. He learned not too long ago. His jaw was tense, and his words were sharp anyway. Nagi was well aware he was upset.
“I measured the distance.” Barely sped up. In this sport, stepping on the gas was a matter of when, a fact. Seconds made the difference.
“Liar.” Reo spat, looking away, unable to bite his tongue in time. Liar, liar.
You’re going to die, and I’ll stay here, crying for you like an idiot!
Sometimes he had nightmares about the accident. It hadn’t been his first crash, and if he were still racing, it wouldn’t have been his last. But when Chigiri’s car turned upside down, and Reo was unable to stop in time, crashing into him, their careers were over. Chigiri because of his leg and Reo’s because he saw his friend that way, smelt death too closely, and destroyed the car his team had worked so hard on.
Nagi had no idea what Reo felt, what he saw or remembered. He simply rubbed his back whenever Reo threw up on the toilet at around 2 am, lulled him back to sleep, and never asked. He loved him too much to ask.
And Reo loved him too much to tell him to quit Formula 1.
“Nothing happened,” Nagi finally said, approaching Reo for a hug. Unsurprisingly, Reo avoided his touch by stepping back. “Well, whatever you want,” Nagi shrugged.
Yet Reo followed him to the bathroom, venting while they moved around the room. He complained but always followed, and he criticized Nagi but never missed a race.
“Oh, nothing happened today, but something might happen in fifteen days when the next Prix starts. ’Cause, you’ll win at all costs, won’t you?”
“You wanna come?”
“What for? I’ll jinx you.” He said, leaning on the door’s frame while Nagi washed his face. Reo looked tired in the reflection. “Your team doesn’t want me there.”
Nagi looked at him in the mirror, serious. “If I win the next Prix, I’ll have a real chance to be world champion. I don’t give a shit what they want.”
Reo didn’t like the motorsports environment anymore, but deep down, he still enjoyed racing. He kept up with the drivers, the competitions, the constructors. Usually, when Nagi came home after training or a race, he asked for details and peppered Nagi’s face with kisses as the driver spoke. Nagi wanted him by his side, and really, Reo wanted to be there for him as well.
Reo sighed, “and if I distract you?” By being so anxious.
“You won’t” Nagi dried his face with a towel, “you’re the only one who hasn’t forgotten I’m third right now, you know?”
“No one’s forgotten.”
“They have,” Nagi shrugged again. Since the season began, no matter how many points he made, he kept biting the dust, ranked under Rin and Yoichi. And all the cameras were on them, fan favorites. “Doesn’t matter. The rivals of the season, huh? I’m almost back in the game, Reo, two more victories, and I’ll be number one.”
It was Reo who approached him this time, hiding his face against Nagi’s back, both arms hugging him tightly around the waist like the red belt of his car. “I know you will.”
Even if he had been popular and promising the year prior, Nagi had been buried in everyone’s memory as they began to focus on Yoichi this season — the guy that after being in F2 for a year now dared to challenge the current F1 World Champion, Rin.
Nagi should be challenging them both for the title, and even if they didn’t see him, he was going against them.
Reo turned him around to meet his eyes. Calmer, gazing lovingly. “You’re going to win, Seishiro. You’ll bring that trophy home.”
“No more second places.” Nagi was ready to take another place on the podium. He cared little if others would find such an ending disappointing for the season. “And I’ll give you that Ferrari, the one that will shine purple in the sun.”
Reo rubbed his shoulder and put both arms around his neck. “I can buy myself a Ferrari, Sei.” He reminded him.
But back in the day, Reo had said that once he was world champion, bound to Ferrari by contract, they would have to change their policy on the color of the Ferrari and let him drive one with his signature color.
That’s not gonna happen, Seishiro had replied. Ferraris would forever be red.
Then I’ll win as many trophies as I need until I get it, Reo had promised.
“If I win, you’re winning with me,” Nagi reminded him, leaving a kiss on his forehead.
Reo shook his head, too gentle to be angry anymore. “You can’t win if you die, Sei, be more careful next time.”
It was like asking a wild bird not to fly. It was futile. In a race, adrenaline skyrocketed, and Reo was familiar with the distorted logic that corroded the driver’s mind, a little more, just a little more thoughts moving them to step on the gas. He pleaded for Nagi to be more careful anyway. But Nagi didn’t promise he would; he never lied to Reo, never would.
“When was the last time someone died in F1?” he asked instead, stroking his partner’s waist. “Let me drive at my own pace, okay? I was upside down last time, and nothing worse happened, alright? Ruining the car isn’t in my plans either.”
Reo seemed to doubt, but he stared at Nagi, who was so confident and relaxed, and Reo could recall his own voice years ago telling his father all the security measures so that he would let him race. F1 wasn’t as dangerous as it used to be, and Nagi was prepared for bruises, sprains, or concussions. On the other hand, Reo had to remember not all cases were meant to end like Chigiri’s.
Sometimes, he felt stupid for defending his dream so much, all to give up so easily. Nagi gave him a sweet kiss on the lips to comfort him as if reading his mind. He’s talked this over with both Nagi and his therapist. The trauma didn’t make him fragile.
Reo huffed out a laugh. He was smiling, and they were okay.
“You’re sick. You like the speed, the danger, the power,” he said slowly, flirting a little, purring. “And I’m sick in the head because I like you .”
Nagi spoke against his lips, noses brushing each other. “You met me like this, I beat you in a race, and you couldn’t look away ever since. You’ve always known I was nuts.”
“Poor me, hooked on such a passionate asshole.” Reo grinned. “At this point, I think I’ll die of fright before you do because of the races.”
“Nothing’s gonna happen, told you already.”
Nagi let himself be kissed when Reo got on his tiptoes, and he licked his lips, tasting his partner. When they parted, he felt as if he were on a cloud, soft. “You can’t die until you marry me.”
“Wow, Seishiro,” Reo laughed, touched, “but we’re not getting married until you retire.”
“Then I’ll survive my races, and you’ll survive your fears, sounds fair?”
“And you’ll stop doing risky maneuvers, okay?” He brushed his face tenderly, his brow. His smirk reminded Nagi he was dealing with a Mikage. “Or would you rather be penalized and lose points?”
Nagi rolled his eyes at the teasing, “I don’t cause crashes; there’s nothing to penalize me for.”
Sometime in the past, Nagi was very indifferent to the rules. He believed that if he continued to be the fastest and if people moved when he forced them to, everyone would make it out alive. So, just like in love, his motto was that all was fair in war. As a result, young Nagi used to be very arrogant, escaping danger by a fraction.
Chigiri’s accident also changed that, causing Nagi to be more disciplined. His dream couldn’t end so fast, and no one should put Reo through that situation again.
Reo took him by the neck and brought him closer to his mouth. He was enticing, turned tantalizing when they fought, and like teenagers in love, Nagi still wanted him in any context, couldn’t keep his hands away. Even when they were drivers, he always knew Reo would make a wonderful businessman one day because he knew exactly how to make people say yes to anything.
His breath grazed Nagi’s skin, “Can I punish you for scaring me today?”
Nagi shook his head no, grabbed him by the hip to glue him to his body, and heard him laugh in reply. “You should reward me for coming first.”
“Ah, yes, you finished first,” though he wouldn’t have if Rin and Isagi hadn’t crashed. Nagi was the fastest today, and they were clumsy, unable to finish. “You’ve won in Monaco, Brazil…, and now Italy.”
“Hungary in a month and finally Great Britain, the promised land.”
They would be back to their modern English house that sometimes Reo couldn’t leave because, in comparison to Nagi, he had a company to manage. Reo thought that was their home, their little love nest. He didn’t know that for Nagi, England, Japan, the hotels and the jets, they could all be homes as long as they had Reo.
Reo was beautiful to him, more than the first Ferrari Nagi saw back when he was in F3, more than the models and the trophies, more than any material thing like the millions. Nagi didn’t notice him when they first met, Reo was just the red car he had passed, but he wouldn’t know what to do without him now.
On the other hand, Reo couldn’t stop thinking of him from the moment they met. He teased Nagi about it a lot. With only a glimpse, I knew you were a gem, a hidden treasure.
Once, half-naked in their bed, while Reo kissed Seishiro’s moles, he confessed something like: My heart stopped the moment you passed me, and it’s been beating harder ever since.
So romantic.
You must have thought, ‘who’s that fucking rookie’, Seishiro whispered, because if he were in Reo’s place, that would have been his train of thought.
But Reo wasn’t Seishiro. Instead, he left a kiss on Seishiro’s shoulder as he sighed.
I wasn’t jealous. I thought, wow, this finally gets fun.
“There’s a lot we have to do once we’re back.” Reo let him know. “And sorry for freaking out when you came. You know how this whole thing makes me feel.”
“Yeah, I know, and you weren’t freaking out,” Nagi smiled at him. They knew now which things weren’t worth complaining or fighting over. As Reo smiled back, Nagi said, “so, will you be at the pit for the Hungary Grand Prix?”
“I’ll have to fix my agenda and everything else. Want me to be there all three days or just for the race?”
“Come with me on Saturday and Sunday,” Nagi asked, “you’ll be my good luck charm.”
His boyfriend began to laugh, eyes crinkling with it. “Oh, don’t pretend you don’t know; everyone says I’ve given you bad luck in the past. Think it over.”
Nagi shook his head. Fatigue was progressively settling on his body. He moved to the bed before tiredness turned his legs into jelly. “How could you be bad luck? I’ll have a bigger motive to win knowing you’re there. You can’t go back to the hotel with a loser; your family name is too big for that.”
Even if Nagi wasn’t especially funny, he knew how to make his partner laugh, so Reo followed him to bed and laid there with a smile from ear to ear. “Don’t you remember Portioma last year? Everyone said it was my fault for attending.”
“False. Everyone said it was because we fucked the night prior, and you know some athletes are supposed to abstain from that stuff before a competition.”
“Oh god, shut up.” Reo laughed.
“That’s why I said….” Nagi pulled him closer by the hand, moving Reo under him. “We should only have celebratory sex. And I’ve just won, mind you.”
Reo let Nagi get on top, but instead of kissing him in the greedy way that promised a good fuck, he brushed his hair and scratched behind his ear. “Uhm, but you must be so tired…” he said, hitting the target.
“Touché.” Nagi fell to his side, arms too weak to keep himself up. His profile was perfect, but Reo could only appreciate it for a second because Nagi soon turned to look at him. “You can still touch me, you know? Do anything you want to me.”
Reo grinned, “I want a hug right now, wanna fall asleep with you and make sure you’re here, and you’re real, okay champ?”
“Ugh, corny” Nagi scrunched his nose, even though his chest filled with happiness, heart fluttering like a butterfly. “Come here, told you to do anything you want, didn’t I?”
So Reo clung onto him and rested on his chest, listening to the beats behind his ribcage, the steady breathing, all those signs that made Seishiro alive. He put his life on the line every time, addicted to sensations impossible to obtain outside of racing, and sometimes Reo needed to hold him in his arms to remember he had him, that Seishiro wasn’t an illusion.
Not like that time when he was losing his consciousness in the car, hearing Chigiri’s pained screams, the engineer trying to keep her composure as her voice rose in his ear — Reo! Reo, are you okay?! —, and seeing Seishiro when he closed his eyes, the image of Seishiro just like he had met him; same uniform, same hair and bored expression. Reo had been thankful that he was the last thing he would see.
When he opened his eyes, Nagi was the first thing he saw as well, standing in a corner, red-eyed. He wasn’t an illusion then — he was better, solid, the man of his dreams.
Go back to sleep. I won’t leave your side until tomorrow, I promise.
“I love you,” Reo told him, an always welcomed reminder. Nagi could die any day, and he had to die knowing he meant everything to Reo, or Reo would never forgive himself. “Sleep well. You deserve it.”
Two more competitions and the season would be closed, over with. Reo’s worries would slip away until next year.
As much as he adored Nagi, the driver, the unstoppable force he fell in love with, Reo missed the lazy streamer he woke up next to every day. The same Nagi that would add sugary treats to their grocery list when he wasn’t watching.
Because Nagi was fire . In or out of the cars, he burned, shone, while Reo was gasoline.
Reo fell asleep thinking of Seishiro’s soft smile, and Seishiro kissed his forehead, closed his eyes to see the next Prix and his boyfriend on the pit, cheering for him. He dreamt of the same that night and hoped it would become real.
There was a time their heat was unmanageable , not so anymore.
Now, Nagi kept him warm.
And Reo? He kept him going.