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As he taps the keycard to open his hotel door, Max wonders if George will already be sleeping. A part of him wishes he was, if only because that means he was okay enough to forget his horror show of a race. Another, bigger part of him hopes to catch him awake, instead, driven by an uncomfortable mix of worry and protectiveness, by the need to make sure George is alright.
Max has of course gone through his own hellish day, but he’s so checked out when it comes to the new regulations and the shitbox he’s stuck in this year that he genuinely doesn’t even feel mad about it, just mildly annoyed.
George, though.
Max had caught a glimpse of him in the media pen, giving an interview to the bloodthirsty reporters from Sky Italy. He’d expected George to look upset, but the redness around his eyes, which were still visibly shiny, and the way his voice came out a bit cracked had made Max’s heart squeeze with concern. He had kept his cap on, something that he didn’t do very often, and Max was pretty sure that it was an attempt to hide just how affected he was by the results of the race.
Obviously, George wore scent blockers at the paddock, but Max was sure that if he could have smelled him, he would have found that the usual earthy sweetness had turned bitter, too.
He’d asked GP about George’s race – by now, there’s a tacit agreement between them, and his engineer always checks on Max’s omega so that he can report anything of note to him. ‘I don’t think there was much more that could have gone wrong,’ GP had summarized, before giving him a quick rundown.
The door unlocks with a gentle click, and Max tries to be as quiet as possible entering the room, which is illuminated by the weak, warm light of one of the bedside lamps. He blinks a few time, waiting for his eyes to adjust as he toes off his shoes and drops his backpack on the floor.
When he spots George, curled up on his side at the far end of the bed, still wearing his black team hoodie and sweats while lying on top of the covers, it almost makes him want to run over to him, his alpha screaming at him to do something to make this better.
Knowing George sometimes just wants space after a particularly bad day, he holds himself back. George is turned away from the light, but Max can tell he’s awake from his messy breathing pattern.
‘Hey,’ he whispers, taking a few steps forward. ‘Can I join you?’
‘Yeah,’ George replies, his voice wobbly and just all wrong. After a second, he sniffles.
Max lets out a deep sigh, relieved at not being pushed away when George needs him. Wordlessly, he crawls onto the bed and slots himself behind his omega, immediately wrapping both arms around him and squeezing tight, pressing a gentle kiss to the back of his neck.
‘We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,’ Max murmurs, nosing at George’s nape and finding, unsurprisingly, that his scent smells as upset as he sounds.
George doesn’t answer for a couple of minutes, his breathing growing louder and more shivery as he tries and fails to hold back his tears.
‘It’s okay, schat, you can cry,’ Max tells him, rubbing his cheek against the scent gland that sits at the base of George’s long neck in an attempt to comfort him.
George shakes his head. ‘I’m sick of crying,’ he says, his breath hitching on a choked off sob. ‘It makes me feel weak.’
‘George, you’re not weak. Don’t buy into that bullshit, please, baby. Anyone would be upset in your position, and if you need to cry about it, then you fucking cry about it, alright?’
It seems like all George needed was permission, because as soon as the words are out, he turns around in the circle of Max’s arms and breaks down into raw, ugly sobs that wrack his entire body.
‘Shhh, it’s okay. Let it out, baby, you’re okay,’ Max tells him, gently, one hand cradling the back of George’s head as it lays on Max’s chest.
He cards his fingers through George’s curls, continuing to hum reassurances as he waits for the worst of it to be over, making sure to envelop George with his own comforting scent.
It takes longer than usual for George to calm down, and it’s killing Max to see him this defeated. There was a time when he would have worried, but would have also secretly thought that George was making too big a deal of the situation.
Now, however, he knows every nook and cranny of George’s being, and he understands perfectly why today’s particular scenario cuts him so deep.
George had confessed to him, tangled together on Max’s couch in Monaco as they watched the sun rise, that one of his biggest fears was that he no matter how good or how dedicated he was, it just wasn’t in the cards for him. It wasn’t a lack of self-belief, but rather the looming fear that he wasn’t one of fate’s golden boys.
He’d told Max about Sakhir, about how he’d known he could win that race, he’d driven like a winner and done everything absolutely perfectly despite the odd circumstances, and then two freak accidents had wrenched it all away from him.
‘If I’d won then,’ George had told him, a haunted look on his face, ‘everyone would have taken it as a sign that it’s in my destiny, you know. With some people like Lewis, like you, everyone just sees you and knows instantly that there’s no way you’re not going to win. It’s like the fabric of reality itself bends to make sure it happens no matter what. And I – I know I'm good enough to win a World Championship, but it feels like if I’m to do it, I’ll have to fight against lady luck herself.’
Although he had absolute faith in George, Max had got what he meant, thinking of the three years George had spent driving the slowest car on the grid when, as Sakhir had shown, he could have been fighting for a championship already.
Max also knows that, no matter how rational he tries to be about it, George looks at Kimi and he sees someone reality will absolutely bend for at the first opportunity.
After hearing GP’s recount of the race and thinking back to the young alpha’s car being miraculously fixed in Australia and George’s battery dying in the middle of qualifying in China, it’s easy for Max to understand why the first three races have shaken George up this much, basically a manifestation of his deepest worries, no matter how tough his skin is - and George is as tough as they come.
‘The worst part,’ George sniffles, nosing blindly until his face is buried in the crook of Max’s neck, right on top of his scent gland, ‘is that everyone can see it. And I don’t mean those cunts who just dogpile on whoever they hate most that season. Just – it’s obvious.’
Max runs his hand up and down George’s back, waiting until he feels him relax a smidge.
‘You’ve had pretty shit luck these past couple of weeks,’ he says, calmly, careful not to spook George. The omega scoffs, but he doesn’t interrupt. ‘I mean, your entire career you’ve of course not been the luckiest driver out there.’
‘Tell me about it,’ George grumbles. It fills Max with relief that he can feel George pout against his skin: if he’s feeling up to acting a bit bratty, that probably means the worst has passed.
‘I get it, yeah? I really do. But it doesn’t matter.’
‘But it does matter, because –‘
‘You don’t need luck. George, baby, you’re so talented and so hard-working and you’ve always had so much faith in yourself, and that’s what people see when they look at you. At least, the people who matter. That’s what I see when I think about your pretty face, alright?’
George goes quiet at that, clearly mulling it over. He presses a few small kisses on the side of Max’s neck, sighing softly when it makes Max’s scent stronger.
‘I know that, I do, and I try to put it past me, but sometimes I just can’t. You can’t win a championship if your car is the only one constantly having issues.’
Max scratches his scalp delicately, smiling a little when it makes George shiver pleasantly.
‘I of course can’t promise you your car won’t have any more issues, or that you won’t have abysmal fucking timing with a safety car. All I can say is that I believe in you. Completely. And if things keep not going your way, I will find this lady luck and put her on her head in the wall. With a lot of, uh, what was it you called it? Borderline violence.’
It makes George snort, tension slowly leaving his shoulders and back as he lets Max cuddle him.
‘Maxie,’ George whispers, a while later.
‘Hm?’
George rolls back a little so he can stare at him with those soulful doe eyes. Fuck if being looked at like that doesn’t make Max want to give him everything without fail. ‘I don’t want you to leave Formula 1. I know you hate these regs and you have a bad car, but… please, don’t leave before we’ve fought for a championship.’
Warmth spreads in Max’s chest at the sweet, almost shy request, and yet – it’s a promise he knows he can’t make right now. George knows it too, if the way he looks down and bites his lower lip is any indication.
Max reaches up, cradling his face with his hand and swiping his thumb across the apple of his cheek. Ridiculously, it makes George blush, his scent turning deeper, lovelier.
‘I told you how I feel about it, schat,’ he says, softly. ‘But I promise you I’ll try my best to adapt so that can happen, okay?’
George nods, nuzzling Max’s hand and planting a kiss to the palm of it. ‘Okay.’
Max pinches his cheek affectionately. ‘Okay.’