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Ring ring ring ring!
Four rings, not that Max Verstappen was counting or anything, that it takes for Charles Leclerc to pick up the phone on this lovely Thursday morning. The Monégasque sun is coming in brightly off the harbour into Max’s kitchen windows, and he takes a sip of his tea (green) and puts the phone on speaker.
“Max, hey! How’s it going?”
Max is already smiling at the phone as he listens to the voice answer. Granted, Charles is probably only a few floors above them in the apartment complex they share, but Max really can't be bothered to do anything about that as it is.
“Charlie! I’m good, how are you?” Max grins. He glances out rhe window and wonders if Charles is doing the same.
“Pretty good! It’s good to hear from you, what’s new?”
“Actually a lot, that's what I'm calling you about,” Max replied. He swallows the question he’s about to ask, then summons it again because heck if he didn't call with a purpose.
“Yeah? Tell me.”
Right then, once again Max feels his heart beat a little softer at Charles’ response. Even over the phone, there’s something so captivating about the Monégasque man’s voice that makes Max want to listen and listen for hours on end. Really, he has- Max isn’t exactly above putting on a few old interviews with Charles, just hearing him speak sometimes. Max has decided it's just like a podcast.
“Well, Charlie,” Max says brightly, “I feel the issue at hand would be better discussed in person. Are you free and in Monaco?”
“Ahh…” a moment of silence, presumably Charles checking his calendar, “yes, I am.”
“Does 2:30 work for you to meet at the café by the second pier?” Max asks (pleasesayyespleasesayyesplease-)
“That's perfect! I'll see you there!”
Max chuckled and nods. “I'll see you there, Charlie.”
Goodness, if he could end a spoken sentence over the phone with some heart emojis, he would…
__
Max got to the café first and took the liberty of ordering for Charles as well, a half sweet matcha like he knows he likes. Seb gave Charles some mockery about this a few years back, and Charles’ only defence had been to say he didn't care, because matchas were just fantastic and everyone should try at least one (and that's why Seb drinks matcha too nowadays). For himself, Max simply ordered a black coffee.
“Max!” comes the familiar exclaimation from a man walking in the door.
Max is delighted, as he always is in Charles’ presence, and gets up to meet Charles’ hug.
“Charlie, so good to see you,” Max laughs as Charles pulls him into a warm hug. “How's your summer?”
“Oh, Max,” Charles sighs, “I almost adopted a cat.” And he leaves it at that, huh?
“Cat!” Max exclaims. “Why didn't you!”
Charles shrugs and shakes his head. “Didn't want to leave it alone or with a sitter all the time, yeah? I figured it'd just fall in with all your cats, anyways.”
Max grins. “I’d take care of your cat if you had one.”
For a moment, Max could be convinced he saw Charles blush at such a notion, but he's telling himself none of it was real. It’s much easier to do it that way. Surely Charles just has naturally rosy cheeks and soft gazes- he’s full of them today, right?
“Right, Charles, I did have a question,” Max adds, “and I want you to actually think about it, yeah?”
“Of course,” Charles smiles in a way that further melts something else in Max.
Max pauses, watching Charles closely as he thinks about what he wants to ask. He’s spent nights awake about this, thinking, planning, praying it would work. Surely, surely it would work- right?
“I want you to do NLS with me.”
Charles is quiet.
Max is watching expectantly as Charles simply leans in closer, raising his eyebrows with a curiosity Max didn’t quite anticipate.
“I’ve only got Dani in right now,” words come spilling out. “He was how we got in, and it’s okay if you say no, but I’d really like you on my team if that’s possible.”
He looks Charles up and down, searching for any sign of a response from the silent man. Charles looks softer than Max had anticipated, which, in hindsight, is understandable. It’s not like Max just invited Charles out for brunch, he asked him to take a fundamentally career altering step. That said, he didn’t propose marriage, so could Charles please give an answer?
“I’d…” Charles begins thoughtfully, gazing back at Max, “really like to do that.”
Max’s face lights up as he can relax again and he leans back in his seat. “Charles!” he exclaims in delight, patting the other man on the shoulder. “So, are you in?”
Charles still looks a bit less excited than Max would like, almost a bit sad. Unsettling, to say the least, for Max, but that’s… whatever.
“Max, I can’t,” Charles replies sorrowfully. “It’s in my Ferrari contract, I can’t drive with other teams,” he says. He looks truly pained by this, and Max almost regrets asking before he sees Charles’ face again and remembers he’s still glad he even tried.
“Ah… really?” Max stammers. “I’m sorry, mate, didn’t mean to make you sad about it.”
“No, no, no,” Charles shakes his head, “it’s alright. It’s a really restrictive contract anyways, I didn’t sign it expecting much… freedom. You don’t even know the extent of what they have control over in my life, it’s crazy.”
"Yeah?" Max asks. "Like what?"
Charles looks up, chuckling without any humour in his tone. "I'm not allowed to wear specific outfits or colours in the paddock, I can only date women they've thoroughly vetted, I have to walk specific routes, I have to post on a regulated schedule on my Instagram, they check what comments and posts I can like, all that kind of stuff. All so I'm the perfect image of the prancing horse."
Max blinks. "You walk... specific routes?" he smiles in amusement. "Mercy, Charles, what on earth is that for?"
"They want me only on the good cameras," Charles grins. He sinks back into his seat and looks out the café harbour with a distant expression. "I knew what I signed up for, though. Can't complain."
Max nods slowly, at a loss for how to even answer that. Sure, he's got some stipulations on his Red Bull contract- drink a lot of things in Red Bull cans (even if it's not Red Bull), wear team gear, don't be an idiot, but it's not that extreme. Suddenly, it makes a lot more sense to him about how bland Charles can be online, compared to what Max knows of him, and the mannerisms Charles has in the paddock despite his general aversion towards others acting the way he does. These were the lives they chose when they were young- Max had the whole world in his hand, and Charles was always going to Ferrari. Quite literally, Il Predestinato.
"How much am I allowed to ask you about your contract?" Max asks lightly. He's got... a few notes, after all.
"It's more about how much I can answer," Charles grins with a small sparkle in his eye, not quite joyful but not negative at all.
Max laughs and nods but he's just looking at Charles. He really does need to work on that problem of his of tuning out sometimes when Charles speaks and just looking at him. It's a fabulous sight, in Max's opinion, but it gets to be devastating in press conferences when Max finds himself entirely devoid of focus and wondering what he could do to burn away the rest of the room, just to leave him and Charles. He thrives on their conversations, shared thoughts, the little touches after a race.
A handshake after getting out of the car.
A pat on the back before the race.
The awkward little group hugs they have to do on the podium for that final photo, the ones Max tries to inch away from as meticulously as possible whenever George is on the podium.
Max really hates being touched, actually. It makes him shiver all down his spine, like he’s gotten irreparably damaged for just a moment. When people tap his shoulder before a race, he loses his breath a bit. Please don’t touch me.
Over the years, though, he’s come to trust Charles. They actually have a quite close physical relationship. Charles is a touchy person, more so than Max would generally be comfortable with, but Max is alright when it’s Charles. He grew up with Charles holding his hand and giving him hugs all the time as they were kids and teenagers, and it’d be more unsettling if that stopped out of nowhere.
Granted, Charles doesn’t hold his hand anymore. He does give good hugs, though. Max went to a counselor for a few months about his social anxiety (general hate for people, really- as Jean Paul Sartre said, hell is other people) and the counselor said Max needs to find the people he’s trusted longest. The first person that came to mind was easily Charles, a constant in his life. His dad and sister, they were… in an out of the picture, to say the least. His mom was great, but she always seemed too worried to fully engage with Max. His friends didn’t keep up with his racing career. As most connections do, those friendships fell to the wayside once they realised that people grow up.
People kept growing.
By the grace of God, or possibly His wrath in other contexts, Charles was almost always in Max’s racing league. The first year they found each other, they were six years old. Most of the older kids called Max a complete prick, but this didn't click with Charles, so he called Max his hedgehog. Max called Charles the French boy, which amused him much more than it did Charles.
The next year, they showed up again together and avoided each other. It was pretty easy, other than times where the team would push them together. Unwillingly, they did find themselves sitting together in the garage some days giggling about the previous season.
The following year, they were eight and Max learned that their birthdays were sixteen days apart. Charles was absolutely delighted by this, and they had their first joint birthday party. Nobody else came, because nobody wanted to play with Max and Charles had secretly not invited anyone so that he could just play with his friend. They had the whole cake to themselves that day, and they wouldn't have changed a thing.
The next year was awful. They weren’t in the same league, and their track hours rarely matched. When they did, it meant Charles just had a chance to high five Max as he was leaving, and Max got to leave a bit of candy in Charles’ garage locker. They didn’t have much fun that year, needless to say.
They were done right the next seven years. They were back on the same series and schedule, and perhaps to a bit of Charles’ family’s… influence, they didn’t get separated again. Their first season together again, they were ten, and Max signed with the Red Bull development program when they were seventeen. The growth of their relationship in that period, Max feels it could only adequately be called immeasurable.
Max got used to the feeling of Charles’ hand in his own. He knew how Charles would whisper in the late night when they’d stay together before a race. He knew how Charles liked to make his pasta, and he learned the exact recipe. Sweetest of all to Max, he remembered the shine in Charles’ eyes whenever either of them ended up on the podium. The rivalry was real, sure, but Charles really was happy to see Max happy. There’s a few inchidents they don’t talk about, but they pale in comparison to the years of joy Max felt at Charles’ side.
Yeah, it feels justifiable to say Max trusts Charles with his life.
They're silent a few comfortable moments more as they watch the harbour in deep thought. Both have very different ideas of how a shared NLS team would work, actually.
Max? He thinks it’d be pure bliss. His closest friend over the years, the man he fully lets himself be a dork around, and they'd be working together. Mercy, imagine- telling Charles the car is running hot as they switch out, helping buckle him into the seat with one last glance saying hey, good luck! You’re going to do amazing! I’m cheering for you!
Charles imagines it’d end like Nico and Lewis.
He turns his head to look at Max, who seems lost in the afternoon sky. “Do you want to be teammates one day?”
Max replies quite simply, “Yes.”
Well, that’s that.
Charles smiles faintly and nods. He looks back out to the cloudless sky and watches a pelican swoop into the harbour to come out empty handed.
“Me too,” Charles breathes- not just because it’s only a thought for them to share, but because it feels like if he says it, any chance of it coming true would break as easily as it had come together.
“Hey, are you busy for the rest of today?” Max asks suddenly. Charles looks at him for a moment, thinking, and then shakes his head.
“I don’t think so, how come?”
“Spend the day with me,” Max says, expression devoid of any anxiety Charles thinks he would have asking the same question. “We can… I don’t know what we do, just do it with me. Like when we were growing up, yeah? Remember terrorising all of Monaco together?”
Charles giggles and nods, because of course he hasn’t forgotten why they’re banned from half the petrol stations in France. “I’m with you,” he grins. “Wherever you want to go.”
Max really likes the words ‘I’m with you’ coming from Charles.
__
They’ve hit a flower shop, yacht, and two more cafés by the time the sun is setting, and they’re on their third lap around the perimeter of Monaco talking something about a book Charles read a while back that he really recommends to Max. It’s some nice book with a nice name Max would forget otherwise, but he’ll clearly remember Confessions of a Mask by Yukio Mishima because Charles said so.
Right about now, Charles would do that thing people do where they check their watches and say oh my, look at the time! This trick has served him quite well over the years of escaping PR stunts, but Charles has no intention to escape Max. All the better when Max asks whose apartment is closer.
“Mine’s just right here,” Charles nods towards his complex. “Do you want to go in for a cup of tea?”
“That would be nice,” Max nods. “Thanks, mate,” he smiles, because he really can’t control how he shows his joy at this point. He forgot about the NLS thing earlier, and he's got six missed notifications from Dani asking if Charles ‘said yes when you proposed’.
Something about twenty years of friendship has it feeling completely natural half an hour later when Max is sprawled across Charles’ sofa in shorts and a t-shirt he borrowed from Charles that does, in fact, smell delightfully like the Monégasque man. They pulled up old reruns of a sitcom neither of them particularly like and turned down the volume once it stopped being funny. Max lies against Charles’ chest now, Charles running a hand through the golden hair like it's his right. For all the world, Max thinks, it looks completely natural.
The episode ends and the room is illuminated in silence, as is the pattern every twenty minutes or so, which has Max falling asleep. He drifts asleep towards Charles with a delighted purr, like the cat Charles didn't adopt.
“Charlie…”
A faint voice rises from Max, not weak but rather just… sleepy.
“Yeah?” Charles smiles down to his friend (friend).
Max looks up with his eyes half shut and a hand in the free one of Charles.
“Hey, I love you.”
Charles really doesn’t have to think about this one. No contractual obligations, restrictions, preventations. That’s easy.
“I love you too.”
“No, I mean, like, I love you love you,” Max murmurs, gazing straight up to Charles. “Since we were kids.”
Charles can feel his cheeks very clearly turning an offensive shade of red as he tried to cover up the wide smile on his face with his hands.
“I remember when I know,” Max notes. His voice sounds suddenly ethereal, an almost echoing tone in the musicality of his whispers. “When we were fourteen and I had that big shunt. You came over and made me dinner because my parents weren’t home, and we watched In & Out, which was a timely choice if you ask me.”
“I just wanted to take care of you the same way, make sure nothing ever hurt you or took away your joy. I’d give the world for you, Charlie.”
Charles looks at Max in complete for the second time today.
This time, it’s followed by a crashing hug when Charles tackles Max further down on the sofa and buries his face in the warmth of Max’s shoulder.
“I love you, I love you, I love you so much,” Charles whispers joyously. “Mon Max, mon monde, tous les jours je t’aimerais.”
Max isn’t going to let him go, never once. Charles loves him. Loves him without the podiums, trophies, teams. Loves him despite the family, moods, rivalry.
And Max himself, he loves every part of Charles, always has. He wants to protect Charles, trust him, hope with him. He wants to be there in the ups and downs as Charles has always done for him.
Well, Max knows a functional amount of French and he did just hear Charles call him My Max.
That's all they need, right?