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It doesn’t take long for Charles to find the clip. It doesn’t take long for Charles to find the clip because he is the reason why Max doesn’t have a fifth championship under his belt, no fifth title to hang from his neck like a shiny new addition to his choker of teeth.
He watches the clip a few more times because he’s a masochist, and all that. He listens for the crack in Max’s voice. For the way his breath hitches over Charles’ name, the closest to delicate that Charles has ever heard him.
There’s a soft knock on Charles’ hotel room door, and then the loud beep of his door unlocking. It opens slowly, and Charles watches as Max appears in the doorway, his hair a damp scruff from his shower, his eyes sleepy.
“Hey,” says Charles, putting his phone down. Max doesn’t answer. He crosses the room in a few long steps, shedding his shirt and his shorts as he goes, and drags himself into the bed. Charles makes room for him, as he always does. Shuffles them around until Max’s face is pressed against his shoulder, their arms tangled around each other, messy as heart lines.
“I think I’m sick,” says Max mournfully after a moment, and Charles exhales softly, almost a laugh.
“You did hug my mother even though she’s been sniffling all over the place.”
“Bless you,” Max grumbles. “That’s my mother also that you’re talking about.”
Charles smiles into Max’s hair. Max seems like he might be halfway to dozing already, but then, suddenly, he says, “I’ve changed, haven’t I?”
Oh.
Charles pulls away slightly to peer down at Max’s face, but the angle has Charles going slightly cross-eyed, so he gives up and rests his cheek against Max’s head again.
“What do you mean?”
“If this had been me four years ago, I’d be inconsolable.”
Oh.
Charles hums, noncommittal.
Four years ago, before Max had won his first championship title. Four years ago, when he became the most controversial figure in modern-day motorsports.
Four years ago, when Charles realised that it takes a different kind of beast to be a winner.
Two points.
“I’m sorry,” he says quietly, and this time it’s Max coiling his head back to squint up at Charles.
“What the hell are you sorry for?”
For a lot of things, Charles thinks. For not being good enough, for being a rival that’s hardly giving Max any work, for –
Well.
“You dragged that shitbox into P4,” says Max, with that sort of incredulity that he brings to every conversation he finds nonsensical. Which – is a lot of them. “No offence, but that car has no business being anywhere near a podium, and certainly not while both the McLarens were in the running.”
But. But.
“But here you are,” Max continues, softer. “Lando’s won it. Good for him. No point thinking too much about it anymore.”
“You overcame a one-hundred-point deficit," Charles huffs. “There’s actually quite a lot to think about.”
“Yeah,” says Max, “but I did too little, too late. Could have won a couple more races, or got a couple more fastest laps. If I’d done this, or that, it’s – it’s whatever, right?”
“If your mum had balls, she’d be your dad,” Charles recites quietly, and Max laughs.
“Yeah,” he says, so, so fond that Charles wants to be sick. He doesn’t deserve fond.
It’s not even like he was in the running for the championship anyway. This is a grave that was dug a long time ago for him, but – but not for Max. Not for Max, who should have been out, who wasn’t, who never will be, whose only chance slipped away at the last moment.
“It’d be one point if I’d had the fastest lap too,” Max muses, and Charles scowls, shoving lightly at Max’s arm.
“Let me have my points, speed demon. If you think any more about this then I’m going to suffocate you with a pillow. And I will steal all your cats. And Nino.”
Max splutters something ungraceful as Charles shoves them around enough that they’re under the covers and lying down in a sleeping position. Max blinks when he gets a mouthful of duvet, and suddenly Charles feels guilty.
“Do you –” He swallows. “Do you really want to talk about it?”
Max watches him. His eyes are bright, but tired. He’s probably talked the race to death, already, what with all the interviews and the journalists swarming the paddock. Charles wonders if he’ll ever have to deal with the hell that is the media. On the scale that Max does, anyway.
But he’s used to that. Four-time World Champion, and all.
“No,” Max says finally. “Not right now.”
“Okay.”
Max shuffles around some more until Charles’ head is tucked up against Max’s jaw, the steady thrum of his pulse just inches away from Charles’ mouth. His mouth full of biting teeth, lolling tongue. Max squeezes his waist twice. The familiar motion makes Charles’ gums ache.
“Goodnight,” Max mumbles, already halfway asleep.
“Goodnight.”
As Max’s breathing evens out, Charles continues to think. He thinks about his contract with Ferrari, about the years he’s spent there with nothing to show for it. His eyes burn. Max has changed, yes, because he’s been World Champion four times over. He doesn’t have anything left to prove, not if he doesn’t want to, only that he’ll only get better and better whilst everyone else struggles to even get their feet on the first rung of the ladder.
But Charles has all the world to prove. That he hungers, still, that his tongue is fat with it, that his teeth have only grown sharper over the years.
Max snuffles. He squeezes Charles tighter to his body. Then his arms relax.
Charles is hungry still. It gnaws at him, through flesh and bone, and it will continue to gnaw at him until he’s hollow all the way through, not just in the cheek and in the heart. He knows he’s lost more weight than his team, especially his trainer, anticipated this season. He doesn’t really know why, except maybe –
Maybe occasionally he eats a little less than he’s supposed to, when he’s sick of losing, sick of trailing just short of the podium, sick of spinning out, spinning away, when the hunger tears clean through him and he’s sick to his fucking stomach of not being enough to drag Ferrari’s stupid car to the podium, let alone to a win.
“Charles?” Max squeezes his waist gently, again. His voice is all rough and scratchy even though he’s only been asleep all of ten minutes.
“Mm,” says Charles, closing his eyes against Max’s throat. Max pulls back slightly, and Charles tightens his grip on Max’s back. “Don’t,” he whispers, a shard, a fragment. Max hesitates, but relaxes back into Charles’ hold.
“Next year,” he murmurs. “Next year it’ll all be yours.”
They said that last year, too. And the year before, and before, and before.
Why can’t there be an after? After I win the championship. After I learn to say I love you without thorns scratching up my insides. After.
Charles blinks, and his lashes are wet. Max holds him closer. He doesn’t try to speak. Charles wouldn’t know what to say, anyway.
Max doesn’t lie, a tiny, hopeful part of his brain pipes up. The voice sounds an awful lot like Charles did before –
Before.
But Max doesn’t know everything, the other part of his brain argues. The logical part. The part with the anxiety, and the overthinking. Charles exhales, slowly, slowly.
“I want to win,” he whispers. “I want it so much it might be killing me.”
Max doesn’t answer. Charles knows that it is because he understands. He understands because they are the same, they sharpen their teeth on the same tracks, they are the same beast. They hunger the same.
The only difference is – Max isn’t starving anymore. Instead, the pit of his belly grows wider; it makes room for victory so that he’ll never be stuffed full, he’ll never be soft-bellied and slow, only continuing to whittle away at the records until there’s no records left to break.
Charles has been starving for so long.
He used to want to win for his father. For Jules. Selfishly, perhaps, he wants to win for himself, too.
Maybe the other difference is that Charles bleeds rosso corsa, and that Max, no matter how hard he tries, will never know how hot it runs, how much it feels like fire is lighting him up from the inside out whether he wins or loses. Because Max will never bleed so violently. Because Max would win in any colour.
Charles doesn’t realise that he’s been digging his nails into the soft flesh of Max’s lower back until Max makes a faint, pained sound, and immediately Charles moves his hands away, stammering his apologies, but Max only reaches around with one arm to pin Charles’ hands back down.
“It’s okay,” Max says in a low voice. “I’d rather you do it to me than yourself.”
Oh.
It’s not like –
It’s not like Charles self-harms or anything, but – but sometimes –
It’s the same as the food, right? His thighs are soft, they’re hidden, they can take the blunt-sharp drag of his nails occasionally, the same way he could stand to miss a couple of meals every now and then, whenever the race has been particularly bad. Max had noticed the first time they’d had sex. He’d asked about the scars, as caring as he always is, and Charles hadn’t known how to explain them away. Eventually, he’d burst into tears.
Yet another thing – a first, no less – that he’s ruined.
“No,” Charles whispers. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
Carefully, Max tilts their heads so that they’re looking into each other’s eyes. “Then don’t hurt yourself.”
Like it’s so simple. Like Ferrari would let him.
It’s not even him that lost the championship. Fuck.
“I’m sorry,” Charles trembles. Max hugs him again, more fiercely this time.
“Never apologise for losing,” he says quietly, understanding everything and nothing all at once. “Apologise for not trying. Apologise for your mistakes. But don’t apologise for others’.”
Charles weeps. On the night where Max Verstappen lost out on his fifth championship title, Charles Leclerc cries in his arms.
When Charles eventually comes to, his face is puffy and swollen. Max’s hand is stroking up and down his back gently, and it makes Charles want to fall asleep all over again, but Max has noticed that he’s awake, and then Charles is being carefully rolled halfway onto his back so that Max can peer into his tired eyes.
“Good morning,” he says. Charles just makes a whiny sound and buries his face into the pillows again. Max laughs at him, then sneezes. Thankfully not at Charles, but Charles still complains up a storm as Max paws at the bedside table blindly for a tissue.
“Are you actually sick?” Charles slurs into the pillow, and Max just responds by sneezing again.
“Maybe getting that close to a championship is bad luck,” he grumbles. And then –
Everything comes flooding back. How Charles failed to get himself on the podium, and how he failed to get Max a championship. Max notices. Of course he notices.
“I’ll order breakfast.” His voice is unreadable as he eases his body away from Charles’. And Charles feels cold without him, but he just curls into himself, keeps his mouth shut. Cold is the least of his issues. Cold is nothing when it feels like everything and everyone is slipping out of his grasp.
He hardly hears as Max calls the hotel restaurant and orders their food. Or – maybe he does, but nothing penetrates the cotton of his ears.
He wants to be well, he thinks with a familiar twist in his stomach. He wants to be good. Good enough to be a World Champion, good enough for another World Champion. Max hangs up the phone, then his arm tentatively comes around Charles’ waist again. God. How long has it been since he’s hesitated around Charles?
When will he stop ruining things? Races and relationships and champions and championships and –
He’s crying, again.
“Schatje,” says Max, sadly.
Charles doesn’t want his fucking pity. He doesn’t want anything, but he also wants everything, because he’s greedy and he’ll never rest without it filling his belly. And he’s still crying.
“Don’t cry, schat,” Max pleads. “There’ll be other championships.”
Yes, and there’ll be other winners, too. Maybe Max would prefer one of them over Charles, the failure.
Maybe he should quit while he’s ahead.
And just as quickly as that thought enters his head, it goes again, gone on his next breath, because Charles may shout and scream and cry when things don’t go his way, but he doesn’t quit.
His father would be appalled.
“Charles,” says Max.
Charles opens his eyes. When had he closed them?
Max is kneeling in front of him on the floor, perpendicular in Charles’ vision. He looks so sad.
Charles makes people sad.
“Je suis désolé,” he whispers, because he doesn’t think he can swallow all the syllables of English right now. Max strokes his hair gently.
“For what, baby?”
Charles swallows.
“Pour la course,” he mumbles. “Et le titre.”
Max strokes his hair some more. “In English?” he murmurs.
Charles pushes himself upright, bringing the duvet as he goes and wrapping it tightly around his shoulders. Max stands too and sits down next to him. “I’m sorry for not doing better in the race,” he says numbly. “And for you not getting the title.”
Max shrugs, so unbothered. Charles wouldn’t be like that, he thinks viciously. He thinks he’d kick and scratch and cry if he was only two points away. “Not your fault,” says Max lightly.
“But –”
“But nothing.” Max turns Charles gently so that they’re facing each other properly. “Why are you acting like you owe me the championship?”
Because he can’t win it for himself, so he might as well win it for someone, right? But he can’t say that, not without that horribly pitying look of disappointment appearing on Max’s face, so he shrugs listlessly instead. Max gets that look on his face anyway.
“One day, schat.” And then he says nothing more.
Eventually, Charles gets over himself enough to drag himself out of bed and pick at the breakfast that Max ordered. He’s not all that hungry, but Max is looking at him a little beadily, so Charles shreds the poor croissant to pieces and dutifully stuffs it into his mouth when he feels Max watching. When he’s about halfway through the croissant and nearly finished with his tea, Max asks, “What do you think of the new regulations for next season?”
They’d made a rule, before, that they wouldn’t talk about future seasons before they were done with their current one. Charles had almost forgotten how quickly Max can move on from a season. He shrugs, tears at his croissant some more. “How I felt about these ones, I suppose.” He is lying. The new regulations are shit, every driver knows this already, but his car, for once, is not. He will take whatever wins he can get. His croissant is nearly inedible. “I will learn to drive the car.”
“But will the car let you drive it?”
Charles wants to say it’s a stupid question. It’s not.
“Ferrari will give me a car that can start, at least.”
“You hope,” says Max, with more bite than Charles was expecting. He gives up on his croissant.
“Ferrari will not listen to me whatever I say,” he says blandly. “So what is there to say?”
Max frowns. The twitch of his mouth makes Charles’ chest ache. Charles knows what he’s thinking. Charles also knows that Max knows his opinions about giving up on Ferrari and the rosso corsa dream, the dream that has haunted him and Jules’ and his father’s memory. But Max continues speaking anyway.
“You know that every team on the grid would fight demons for a chance to have you drive for them, right?”
“And yet,” Charles says through gritted teeth, “the team I am with now will not fight for a chance to win.”
“That’s why you should –”
“No.”
Tifosi and loyalty go hand in hand. And Charles – he is not just a tifoso, he is tifosi itself, he is the Red Sea embodied, and he thinks it may be his greatest flaw.
Max lets the conversation die there. He clears the empty dishes, finally taking pity on Charles’ depressing croissant to stack the plates up messily on one side of the coffee table.
“We should go on holiday,” says Charles blithely, watching Max’s hands pile up the cutlery and empty glasses deftly. “Go skiing, maybe.”
“You’re terrible at skiing.”
“So are you,” snipes Charles, which is just – objectively not true, neither of those statements are, and yeah, he keeps up to date with Red Bull’s random-as-fuck side quests, okay, but the banter is easier than whatever the fuck was happening just now.
“Yeah, okay.” Max finishes his slightly precarious chinaware pile and slumps back in his seat. “But don’t you do your training camps in the mountains? You really wanna go for fun as well?”
“Hm. True. Perhaps somewhere with more sun, then.” Max pulls a face.
“As long as I don’t burn again.”
“Ah, why not? Mon petit homard.”
Max scowls at him. “I know enough French for that, putain.”
“Ooh, the lobster has claws.”
“You little shit.” Max whips out the cushion behind him and lobs it at Charles, only narrowly missing his head.
“Tu connard!” Charles launches out of his seat and they tussle like children, Charles shrieking when Max very nearly bites his fingers off, Max wheezing when Charles jams his elbow into his ribs in relation. Then Charles manages to hook his elbow around Max’s neck and bear down hard enough that Max squeaks rather embarrassingly and slaps his arm out in defeat.
“Ha!” Charles crows, like a child. “You can’t win forever, Verstappen.” He releases Max’s neck, but Max is already twisting to look at him, his face suddenly sombre.
“No,” Max says softly. “I can’t.” He slips out of their little pretzel-like twist and faces Charles properly. “Why are you so upset about me losing? And be honest.”
Charles turns the words over in his mouth. He could smooth them out, so they come out round and clean like marbles, or he could say them as they are, so that he might cut his mouth on the way. His tongue feels swollen.
“It should have been one of us,” he says eventually. “It wouldn’t have been me, so it should have been you, at least.”
Max’s brow creases. “You don’t think Lando deserves it?”
“I think his car deserves it,” Charles says blithely, and then he says again, “It should have been one of us. It should have been me in 2022, if Ferrari had wanted to fight for it.”
Something smooths out the furrow of Max’s brow. He understands now, maybe. Maybe he understands now that Charles might not treat Max like a god, but Max is good as, his name etched into motorsports history for generations to come, and maybe gods do not win or lose, per se, but gods need believers. He has the Orange Army, Charles supposes, but he could have more.
They were supposed to win together.
There will be others, someone will say inevitably, but Charles wanted this one. He wants all of them, wants like a petulant, spoilt child, wants with all the greed of the Bible.
He wants, he aches.
Max doesn’t make any empty promises this time. Perhaps this time, he knows that words are nothing but ash and air. He simply gathers Charles into his arms, and they sit together to watch the sunrise.