Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Mike has always been a fan of motorsports. It doesn’t matter what kind exactly; he likes them all as long as it’s on four wheels (any racing that happens on only two wheels is too much for his heart to handle) and going fast. Whether it’s going in ovals, they’re doing laps where they have turns going both left and right, or if the cars are driven by people with death wishes finishing hour-long etappes through the desert.

But just being a fan simply didn’t feel like enough. He wanted to immerse himself in a way that just can’t be done by stalking the Reddit pages, opening every notification from his Twitter account, or liking the Instagram stories about wins or Indy 500 losses.

So he found himself a job where he still gets to do all of those things, but also interacts with at least some of the people who work their ass off to land on the podium if Lady Fate will let them have it.

Really, his life is not much different now; he just has a few more phones, a lot more passwords to protect, and a posting schedule your local rich-white-influencer-in-their-30s would be jealous of because the social media freelancer they hired just can’t manage to ‘get on top of things’.

Or at least, those had been the words one of his friends used when they had been ranting once more about how bad their client was. Truly, a cocktail with her was all the motivation Mike needed to know he shouldn’t go into freelancing.

Signing the contract was easy enough once he saw the terms and conditions. Sure, the pay wasn’t that great, but he quickly realized that unless he was going to be able to win races himself, there were very few positions in the sport that paid well. Picking up his branded polos wasn’t a punishment either, and his coworkers seemed nice enough.

And now he’s here, at day three, wondering if he’s about to regret this job after all.

“You understand?” Maisie asks him, smile soft, but her face exudes an air that screams business. She has fluffy, sun-bleached hair and cheeks that show dimples whenever she laughs, but Mike also sees how her eyes darken when any higher-up decides he can cut her off, and the way she straightens up and makes her point without ever raising her voice.

She’s good at her job.

Mike might also have a crush.

He has always had a thing for the intimidating ones.

That crush might just turn into nothing if Mike is really understanding this right.

“Just, just see if I’m getting this right,” Mike stumbles over his words, “Not only are we expecting to be competitive this year, but it’s also looking like Kimi, who was just a rookie last year, will be the one to take it away?”

“Right,” Maisie confirms, “Toto isn’t happy about it and keeps acting like they have equal chances, but most of us know better. It’s so awkward in the big team meetings now, so it’s really hard ot get the right footage sometimes, so we might have to work together to get the stuff we can actually post online without having all the fans accusing us of sabotaging one of our own drivers.”

Maisie looks calm, sure of her story, and Mike gets this.

Truly.

It’s just that this isn’t the insane thing. A rookie outperforming his senior teammate, who everyone expected to finally bring back glory to Mercedes, might be unusual, but that’s nothing worthy of making Mike this uneasy. If anything, it’ll ensure that the interactions with their social media content will be higher than they’ve seen in recent years.

“Got that, won’t bring it up anywhere near any of them,” Mike confirms, eager to get back to his point, “But are we allowed to talk about the way I got a folder pressed in my hands today with notes on what Max Verstappen content I’m allowed to post, with a four-page analysis on how to achieve the narrative the team has in mind, and what posts Kimi doesn’t mind providing content for?”

There is a beat of silence.

“Is this all just so we might increase the chances of Max ever considering joining us, or is there a hidden agenda to gain content we can turn around and use against him at some point?”

“No!” Maisie is quick to answer, looking around hastily as if they’re not in a soundproof meeting room with just the two of them. “And make sure you don’t joke about that with Kimi, he’s kind of…”

Mike watches how Maisie tries to find the words to express whatever this delicate situation is, and he’s suddenly reminded of how not-gone his crush is, because there is no way anyone should look so cute in a work meeting.

Fuck, he really needs to stay professional.

He can’t be distracted by his coworker when he’s trying to understand if his other colleagues might just be insane, even if just slightly.

“Protective of the idea of Max,” Maisie finally settles on.

“Protective of the idea of Max,” Mike echoes the words, even though they feel hollow and strange coming from his mouth. It’s as if all those words suddenly lose their meaning just because they’re in this strange order he can’t wrap his head around.

He decides he might as well go along with it and be prepared for tomorrow, since this seems like it might become a recurring topic on any meeting agenda.

“Has he always been?”

“Last season it was definitely the idolisation any rookie has of the current champion, but you could see him change over the season,” Maisie tells him. Mike is honestly shocked by how honest and open she’s about all this, so he decides to be too.

“So we are just going along, hoping it will help Toto’s agenda and make Kimi happy? Post what fits the ‘this is how we get Max’ agenda, and we’re fine?” Mike asks, because really, there has to be something he’s not seeing here.

And he’s aware that he should be lucky Maisie is who she is, because he has a feeling not many other people would’ve liked such a tone from the newbie.

Still, even though he noticed that Maisie seems to like him, he isn’t ready for the way she snorts at his question.

“You think it’s easy?” Maisie asks, but it’s quite clear that she’s not actually curious to know his answer. “I thought it was easy too, until it’s 2 am, the entire team is drunk because they celebrated a podium, and you go through hundreds of pictures trying to find the one in which Kimi looks at Max without a face that screams like he’s ready to devour him. He’s young! You’d think he would be blushing and stuttering and awkward with his idol, but instead, it took him only one season to turn into this impossible flirt that keeps inserting himself next to Max, doing everything to make Max look at him! I’ve had sponsors concerned about the branding becoming too woke, others inquiring if Max is indeed going to Mercedes, and the number of dating-related jokes we get as comments is enough to send someone’s grandpa to the grave.”

Maisie’s storm of words suddenly ends, her spotless hair a little messier, herself a little out of breath, and it seems like she just realized she had ranted to him. It’s the first time Mike has seen any ounce of unprofessionalism from her; in the previous days, she had definitely shown her personality, but had always managed to keep that air of professionalism.

Now it seems like the frustration caught up with her.

And if he’s honest, he’s thankful for it.

He doubts any of the meetings scheduled in his Outlook agenda for the next week have the explicit cause of the four-page-long guide on the agenda. Part of him wonders how long it would’ve taken if he had to discover all of this by himself.

Stay on topic, he tells himself. The speculating can wait.

“Okay,” he tries, drawing out the last syllable, “Then, do we have a plan on how we’ll survive this season?”

—

There is no plan.