Work Text:
Are you ready' Are you ready for this
Are you hanging on the edge of your seat
Out of the doorway the bullets rip
To the sound of the beat
Another one bites the dust
Another one bites the dust
After almost everyone in the paddock knew about the affair between Russell and Verstappen, the two of them had fallen into a subtle but stable relationship. They didn’t talk about love, and they didn’t talk about sex either, but on certain busy nights they would sneak away and end up in the same hotel room, lying in the same bed, their bodies tangled into strange shapes like two signatures sprawled across a poster.
Like right now.
Russell had finished showering first. He leaned against the headboard with his legs stretched out, silently scrolling through his phone. Verstappen had just come out of the bathroom, roughly towel-drying his dark blond hair, then climbed onto the bed with practiced ease and rested his head on Russell’s long thigh.
It felt comfortable. Verstappen was very satisfied.
But his head was heavy, and the moisture from his half-dry hair was seeping through the fabric onto Russell’s thigh. Russell was not satisfied. The dissatisfied Russell freed one hand, patted Verstappen’s shoulder, and asked why he hadn’t dried his hair.
“It’s fine, it’ll dry soon. I won’t get a headache,” Verstappen automatically interpreted this as concern and waved his hand even more contentedly.
Russell rolled his eyes. “Get up.”
Verstappen didn’t understand but obeyed, sitting up. Russell put down his phone and used one hand to lift the hem of his own sleep pants. Verstappen’s face lit up with delight and he happily started to pull down his own pants, only to be swatted by Russell’s other hand.
“What are you doing?” Verstappen asked, a little aggrieved.
Russell didn’t answer. He simply pointed at his own thigh. Verstappen looked and saw a red mark on Russell’s thigh—clearly left by his own head. Even though he had only rested there for a short while.
Verstappen scratched his head. The culprit could only apologize and then wriggle up to the headboard to sit beside Russell. Russell waved it off, indicating it was nothing, and picked up his phone again.
“What are you looking at?” Verstappen felt it was miserable to be next to the person he liked and only be able to play on his own phone, so he made conversation.
Without looking up, Russell said, “Reading how people online are cursing us.”
Verstappen was puzzled. “Us? We haven’t done anything lately.”
“Oh,” Russell explained, “me and Kimi.”
Verstappen felt a twinge of jealousy at that “us,” but he couldn’t say anything in rebuttal. After all, they were teammates, while he was at most the boyfriend—and one who couldn’t be made public. He really wanted to storm into the Mercedes area, kick open the team principal’s office door, and announce, “George and I are together,” just to scare Toto half to death. But he was also afraid Toto would be thrilled and immediately try to recruit him to Mercedes. So he could only mutter, “Fine.”
Russell didn’t notice Verstappen’s rare complicated mood and continued scrolling through his phone, sighing as he read.
Hearing Russell sigh, Verstappen immediately decided to set aside his own overthinking. “Why are they cursing you?” He automatically ignored that someone else was being cursed too.
“Everything. Anything can be used against you.” Russell’s tone was calm. “Of course, I definitely have areas where I’m not good enough.”
“They can pick faults in everything you say,” Verstappen found it absurd. “Besides, why care about them? It’s just because your chances of fighting for the championship have increased this year, so they’re scrutinizing every little detail.”
“Yeah,” Russell nodded. “I know. But the problem isn’t just the journalists.”
There were also themselves.
Norris lay on the hotel sofa with one leg hooked over the armrest and the other dangling on the floor. His posture made him look like a jellyfish washed ashore—limp, boneless, and unwilling to move. His phone vibrated on the coffee table. He didn’t reach for it. It vibrated again; he rolled his eyes. On the third vibration, he finally stretched out his arm like a lazy cat and hooked the phone over.
After the Mercedes junior driver achieved several astonishing consecutive victories, the group chat “Looking Forward to the Day Toto Explodes on the Spot” had new messages. It was Antonelli.
“Who can tell me why George isn’t replying to my messages? He told me before that ‘it’s all in the past,’ I moved on, but he hasn’t. What kind of moving on is this?”
Looking at the text, Norris pictured Antonelli’s young face in his mind. It was a face caught between boyhood and adulthood, always carrying an irrepressible ambition and drive. There was no malice directed at anyone, yet it always made Norris feel suddenly ten years older.
Albon was the first to reply to the awkward question. He asked Antonelli: “Have you tried walking up to him and talking to him directly instead of just messaging on the phone?”
Kimi Antonelli: “No. He looks like he doesn’t want to see me.”
AA23 (Not Answering Calls Means Busy): “fine”
Norris thought Albon was right. But he also felt that if he were Antonelli, he wouldn’t walk over either. Not because he lacked courage, but because there was too much to face afterward—Russell’s blue eyes that always carried inquiry and thought, and the invasive cameras that followed them everywhere. Norris turned over and buried his face in the sofa cushion, letting out a muffled sigh.
He recalled a post-race media pen. He could see, on the other side of the crowd, Russell surrounded by reporters, wearing that perfect PR smile like a mask, speaking in a tone as precise as a calibrated instrument: “We still need to analyze the data” and “I believe the team will work better together going forward.” Norris stole a glance at Russell’s side profile. His driver’s sharp eyesight let him notice how tightly clenched the other man’s jawline was, like a bowstring being slowly drawn taut. He knew Russell would not lose control in front of the cameras, even as the world kept throwing frustrating jokes at him. But if a person could face such shitty experiences and never lose control, it also meant he was constantly suppressing his suffering soul on the edge of breaking.
Antonelli walked toward the Mercedes garage from the other direction. It was called “the other direction” because Russell had already gone one way. Now the whole world expected them to head toward the same finish line, secretly hoping they would run each other over.
Antonelli’s life had been planned almost entirely for racing—more precisely, for winning in racing. But he did not secretly rejoice at the prospect of standing beside his teammate’s defeat to claim victory. He was neither a psychopath nor a sociopath. The harmony he once shared with Russell had not all been calculated. But the paddock was like this: it gave Antonelli boos, cheers, surging adrenaline, and fleeting vanity. When he gripped the steering wheel, he couldn’t think of anything else.
Were others the same? Antonelli sometimes wondered. Was Verstappen like this too?
Verstappen.
This year he didn’t have a car worthy of his talent. Throughout the season he had almost become an insert like “Where is Max Verstappen?”—a strong but background presence.
He had another way of existing. Norris and Albon had seen Russell’s phone wallpaper change to a silhouette of two people. Norris had collapsed in a dramatic cry, saying you two have really become like this, while Albon immediately defected and declared his support for their relationship. Not to mention the people who had seen Verstappen enter Russell’s hotel room. So when Antonelli’s team radio exploded, some were quietly watching Verstappen’s reaction in the Red Bull garage.
For example, Norris. But Norris didn’t know what Verstappen was thinking. He felt he might never know. But he knew one thing: Verstappen wouldn’t show any reaction. Not because he didn’t care, but because he knew this was between Russell and Antonelli. Just as Russell would never interfere in anything between Verstappen and his rivals.
Norris felt quite pleased with his analysis of how the two of them interacted, convinced he had them completely figured out. As he thought this, he opened his chat with Russell.
The last messages were still from after that terrible retirement. He had sent “You okay?” and Russell replied with “Yeah.” One word. Norris replied “I’m not okay,” and Russell sent back some inexplicable emoji.
Norris thought for a moment and sent: “George, if you’re not going to reply to Kimi, at least tell me you’re not sulking.”
The reply came quickly.
George: “I’m not sulking. I’m just thinking.”
Lando: “Thinking about what?”
George: “Thinking about how to win.”
Norris stared at the short sentence for a long time. He had composed a whole bunch of comforting and teasing words in his chest, like a thick wool scarf prepared for winter, now stuck in his throat as something warm and itchy. He thought, Sure enough, it’s George. That’s so George.
Norris held the phone above his face and typed a long message:
“George, I want you to know that ever since you and Verstappen started dating, I’ve had to think about what I’d do if something went wrong so I could comfort you. Otherwise I’d go crazy. Because you’re my friend, and my friend is going through something I don’t know how to help with but want to help with. But I never thought I’d have to comfort you about on-track matters, because I know you can handle it. Anyway, even though I can only be here, on this end of the phone, every time I see you, I can let you know I’m here. Not as a teammate, not as a rival. Just as Lando.”
After sending it, he felt a bit corny, but imagining Russell might find it ridiculous or embarrassing gave him a subtle mischievous pleasure.
About a minute later, Russell replied: “We’re not dating.”
Norris rolled his eyes: “Is that the point?”
Norris stopped playing the sincerity game with Russell. He picked up his phone and sent a message in the group chat:
“Friends, I’ve decided I’m not doing anything today. Today I’m going to lie on the sofa, stare at the ceiling, and think about nothing. Don’t look for me.”
Piastri: “Received”
AA23 (Not Answering Calls Means Busy): “Whose sofa?”
Nor: “FYI, my apartment has a sofa”
AA23 (Not Answering Calls Means Busy): “Then you can come to my place. Lily made tiramisu.”
Norris hesitated for three seconds. Then he got up, put on his shoes, grabbed his keys, and walked out the door.
Fate toys with everyone.
Even if one is called the child of fortune or destined for greatness, it doesn’t mean their good luck lasts forever.
The moment he turned off the team radio, Antonelli thought the anger would continue indefinitely. But it didn’t. He removed his helmet; sweat-soaked hair stuck to his forehead, sticky like a restraint he couldn’t shake off. He sat in the cockpit without moving. The engineer was saying something in his earpiece—probably comfort, probably data. The words fell like water droplets on a hot stone, hissing and evaporating, leaving nothing behind.
When he climbed out of the car, his legs felt weak. After the adrenaline receded, a huge void remained—like an empty lot after a rainstorm, where perhaps only dampness would linger. He passed Russell’s garage. The race was still going on.
The race wouldn’t stop just because any one of them left.
By the time he returned to the hotel and washed away the sweat and exhaustion that bound him, the void was still there. Antonelli changed clothes and lay on the bed.
The hotel room was large. So large it felt absurd. All the emptiness became a silent accusation, making him condemn himself, condemn his failure or impulsiveness. He stared at the ceiling as distant voices began replaying in his mind.
He remembered something from who knows how long ago. His memory was exceptionally good, especially for anything racing-related—he could recall lap times down to the decimal places—but this incident was blurry. Maybe because he didn’t want to remember it, like certain math formulas.
It was beside a simulator. Russell had said to him, “Your setup yesterday was too aggressive. The third sector will push the front.” At the time he had replied, “I know.” Russell might have smiled and continued, “You know and you still did it?” while he confidently said, “I wanted to test where the limit is.”
Russell had rebutted him.
What had he rebutted? Antonelli began digging through the corners of his memory. He suddenly really wanted to know what the older teammate had said with a smile amid the faint scent of coffee.
Then his brain, honed by racing, did its job without failing like today’s race. Russell had said: “Testing the limit isn’t done in the simulator. It’s on the track, on the last lap, when you’re not sure if the tires still have grip but you still want more. That’s where you’ll find it.”
At the time, Antonelli had thought Russell was talking big. A man who hadn’t won a world championship yet, teaching him how to find the limit? But now, lying on the big hotel bed and staring at the brand-new white ceiling, he suddenly realized Russell was right. The limit wasn’t in the simulator. It was after the team radio was turned off, before the helmet came off, in the moment you looked at your own hands and asked yourself, “Can I still give a little more?” But that moment had destroyed his race.
His phone lit up. It was the alarm Antonelli had set himself, reminding him of the team meeting tomorrow morning. Looking at the words on the screen, he suddenly found it funny—the world was still running normally, letting bad luck fall on one person after another. The sun would rise tomorrow, the meeting would start on time, and the engineer would hand him a cup of coffee and say, “Kimi, let’s look at the third sector data today.” Everything would continue as if nothing had happened.
But Antonelli knew some things had already changed.
He turned over and opened the chat with Russell. The last message was from three days ago. Russell had sent a file; he replied “Received,” and Russell sent a thumbs-up emoji. That was all. Businesslike, clean, the kind of exchange between two people who didn’t seem close.
Antonelli sat up and stared at their chat. He typed a short line, so short it was like a baby bird that had just learned to fly, its feathers not fully spread, jumping out of the nest.
“George, are you asleep?”
Sent. Then he waited about two minutes. During those two minutes, his heartbeat was as fast as the final flying lap of qualifying. He started to regret it. What was there to say? Celebrate that he had finally gotten a long-awaited podium? That would seem fake. Express his distress after the retirement? That would be too weak. Russell hadn’t sought anyone’s comfort after his last retirement.
While he was regretting, the notification sound for a new message rang.
GR: “Not asleep. What’s up?”
Antonelli stared at the words, his fingers hovering over the keyboard. He really didn’t know what to say. He kind of wanted to say, “About what I said on the radio earlier, I didn’t mean it.” But that was a lie. He did mean it. And it was a lie that had come too late. He also wanted to say “Sorry.” But what came after “sorry”? Could they pretend nothing happened? Impossible. And he didn’t want to appear weak or overly friendly. After thinking, he typed another line.
“I want to ask you a question.”
GR replied immediately: “Ask.”
Antonelli slowly but without hesitation sent the message: “When you heard my team radio earlier, you knew which one I meant. What was your first thought?”
This time the reply was slower. Antonelli could see the “typing” indicator appear, disappear, and appear again above the chat.
Finally, a short answer appeared on the screen, quietly glowing in the darkness of the night.
Russell said, “You’re braver than me.”
Antonelli put the phone down on the bed and covered his face with both hands. He didn’t cry. His eyes were dry, but the void left by the adrenaline in his chest was filled with a painful, swelling feeling with no outlet. He thought, George Russell really is hard to deal with. He could hide all his sharpness behind a decent smile, then at the moment when gentleness was least expected, offer that unreasonable gentleness.
Antonelli picked up the phone and typed a long message:
“George, what I said at the time, and many things I said afterward—every word was sincere. I really felt you were holding me back, I really felt you should move over, I really felt you weren’t fast enough.”
After sending it, he placed the phone on his chest and lay down. This sentence might be even more offensive than the team radio itself. But what else could he do? Antonelli didn’t want to say comforting lies to gloss things over.
After who knows how long, the phone vibrated again.
“I know.”
Of course Russell knew. He recalled the hotel room after the Montreal qualifying, when he and Verstappen were curled up together. They had already talked about this topic back then.
It felt a bit strange to discuss his relationship with another man with his boyfriend, but before they were lovers, they were rivals in the same arena, and before that, longtime friends. There was nothing they couldn’t talk about. And Verstappen would definitely understand.
It was also a late night. Russell’s phone lit up. He reached for it. It was Albon sending a message in the 19Rookies group chat.
“Did you listen to Kimi’s team radio?”
Followed by a second message.
“I bet Lando has already looped it who knows how many times. He told me it’s ‘an Italian young artist’s improvised angry rap.’”
“He told me not to send it, but how could I not. George, I’m snitching—I heard him and Oscar arguing that if you replaced Kimi’s radio with Verstappen’s voice, would you laugh?”
Russell looked at the messages and was silent for three seconds. Then he laughed out loud.
Verstappen heard the laughter, leaned over to take a look, and said, “Doesn’t Lando have his own boyfriend to worry about?”
“Temporarily none. So he comes to worry about other people’s,” Russell said.
Verstappen pouted in mock regret.
“You should know what he said on the radio,” Russell said, turning off the phone screen.
Verstappen put his own phone down too. The green lap time numbers on the in-car display still seemed to be jumping in front of his eyes. He recalled Antonelli’s voice—young, with a clear Italian accent in his English, full of obvious dissatisfaction.
Verstappen didn’t reply immediately.
“What do you think?” Russell asked.
“Do you want me to say ‘he was right’ or ‘he was wrong’?” Verstappen tried to read the room and said something stupid.
“Neither. I want to hear what you think.” Russell was satisfied with the attempt and granted amnesty.
Verstappen leaned back against the headboard and adjusted the angle of his pillow. By now his hair was half dry, and a few strands stuck up in the light like straw in sunlight.
“He’s just too eager. He wants to win too badly,” Verstappen could only tell the truth. “Can’t be helped. Who doesn’t want to win?”
Russell nodded. “I know.”
“Then why are you still bothered?”
Russell didn’t answer right away. He lowered his head and looked at his hands resting on the duvet. His fingers were long with distinct knuckles, quietly placed there like a tool temporarily set aside.
“I’m not bothered,” he said. “I just thought… his voice. You know? That kind of…”
“That ‘I deserve better’ feeling,” Verstappen finished for him.
“Yes,” Russell said. “Exactly that… he feels he’s been wronged. He feels he’s right.”
Verstappen didn’t deny it. He was silent for a few seconds. The window wasn’t closed; the wind outside made the curtains billow and deflate. “You used to feel that way too,” Verstappen stated the fact.
“I know,” Russell said. “So when I heard his voice, I heard my past self. Then I couldn’t help but wonder—was I like that to others back then? So… grating?”
“Not grating,” Verstappen corrected. “Just a bit impatient.”
Russell turned to look at him.
“A bit impatient,” Verstappen repeated. “Like a car with a good engine, good brakes, and new tires. But the driver keeps flooring the accelerator and wants to exit the corner before even reaching the apex. He knows he’s fast, but he doesn’t know there’s something called ‘waiting’ between ‘fast’ and ‘winning.’”
“You were like that too,” Russell pointed out.
“I was even more impatient than him,” Verstappen admitted frankly. “When I was nineteen, if someone blocked me on track, I wouldn’t complain on the radio. I would just crash into them. Then go back to the garage and argue, or even fight.”
In Russell’s mind flashed the image of a young Verstappen, fresh helmet off, storming into the other driver’s garage red-faced, with everyone unable to stop him. That image overlapped with the person currently leaning against the headboard with messy hair and speaking slowly, creating a strange sense of unreality.
Russell felt the weight of time, but it came with a sense of happiness. He said, “At that age, we all felt the world owed us something. Not because we were greedy, but because we hadn’t gotten it yet. People who haven’t received it don’t know what receiving feels like. And anger is easier than waiting.”
Verstappen nodded. “You’re a philosopher.”
“I’m not,” Russell laughed. “He’s just doing what all young people have done. It’s… the gift of youth, not a disease deep in the soul.”
Verstappen turned to look at him. The light from the side outlined Russell’s profile softly. Those blue eyes weren’t looking elsewhere; they were fixed on some crease in the duvet.
“That sentence you just said,” Verstappen said, “was completely philosophical. No, it could win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Bertrand Russell.”
Russell felt flattered but said, “Don’t flatter me.”
“Russell!” Verstappen felt he had made a shocking discovery. “You even have the same surname. You’re family!”
Russell laughed so hard he temporarily forgot about the team radio.
In the hotel room after the Spanish Grand Prix, Russell and Verstappen were once again lying in bed together.
He glanced again at the chat interface with Antonelli, turned off the phone, and rolled over to face Verstappen. In the darkness, he could only see the other’s general outline—shoulders, neck, the line of his jaw.
“Max.”
“Hm.”
Russell reached out and found Verstappen’s hand in the dark. He laid his fingers over the other’s, one by one, as if counting something.
“Kimi just messaged me,” Russell said.
Verstappen’s outline shifted slightly. Russell’s phone was now face-down on the duvet. His eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness, and his other senses became sharper. The steam from the bathroom hadn’t fully dissipated; the air was still a little humid, carrying the indistinct coconut or almond scent of the hotel shampoo.
Verstappen didn’t respond. Silence fell, settling on their joined hands. He didn’t ask what they had talked about. He knew that after the notification sound earlier, Russell had only picked up the phone briefly before returning to the darkness. It probably hadn’t been anything particularly deep or pleasant.
When Verstappen looked at Antonelli, he often saw himself—the version of himself who hadn’t yet won a world championship, sitting in the Red Bull cockpit, feeling like the whole world was blocking his path. Had he said similar things back then? Done similar things? He probably had. He definitely had. Because at that time he hadn’t thought much about it. He just wanted to win. Winning was everything. What came after winning could be dealt with after he won.
Hey, I’m gonna get you too Another one bites the dust How do you think I’m going to get along Without you, when you’re gone? You took me for everything that I had And kicked me out on my own Are you happy? Are you satisfied? How long can you stand the heat?
“You know,” Verstappen said, “sometimes I feel the paddock isn’t a place that makes people better.”
Russell listened to the words, trying to make out Verstappen’s features in the darkness.
“It doesn’t reward kindness or humility. It only cares about who crosses the line first.” Verstappen stated calmly, “So everyone becomes a bit of an asshole to some degree. Some hide it well, some don’t. Some know it, some don’t.”
“Which kind are you?” Russell changed the subject.
“I don’t hide it and I know it,” Verstappen said proudly.
Russell couldn’t help laughing. “Then what kind am I?”
“You hide it pretty well and you have self-awareness,” Verstappen offered flattery.
Russell accepted it but tried to argue. “But isn’t that too absolute? Can’t people change even if they realize it?”
“You can’t change it,” Verstappen said. “Just like Kimi. You know what he does when he’s drunk?”
Of course Russell knew. The paddock had enough stories about Raikkonen’s drunken antics to fill a hard drive. But he didn’t interrupt Verstappen.
“He’s done a lot of ridiculous things. But when he gets on track, everyone shuts up. And Rosberg and Hamilton, you know. Isn’t that the paddock’s fault?” Verstappen scooted closer to Russell, his voice lowering. “So George, you don’t need to worry about what kind of person Kimi will become. He’s already changing. You can’t stop it. You can’t teach him. He’ll figure it out himself.”
“What if he never figures it out?” Russell asked.
“Then he won’t become world champion,” Verstappen said firmly. “Only people who understand who they are can become world champions.”
Russell didn’t refute it. In fact, he felt Verstappen was right. The paddock was a place of survival of the fittest. People constantly offered up their youth and lives here. It wasn’t a place where virtuous or noble souls shone. Many times everyone was an asshole. The paddock didn’t believe in tears, nor in proxies. It didn’t even believe in merit or hard work.
“You told me so much today,” Verstappen’s voice grew even softer, “because you care about him.”
Russell didn’t deny it.
“You treat the younger generation like a little brother,” Verstappen said. “I saw what Vesti said.”
Russell tightened his grip on their joined hands. “Vesti is a good kid.”
“He is,” Verstappen squeezed back, warmth spreading from his palm. “I like him. Because he likes you.”
Russell laughed and leaned toward Verstappen’s shoulder, breathing in the faint coconut scent on him.
“He wasn’t smarter than you back then,” Verstappen continued on the topic of Kimi.
Russell stopped laughing but didn’t interrupt.
“But he is braver,” Verstappen said, somewhat non sequitur. “But that’s because he has more things behind him.” There was no mockery or ridicule in the words—rather, something close to respect, but softer.
Russell let out a short laugh, like a match struck and immediately blown out. “I really wasn’t brave,” Russell said. “But I still don’t want to become someone I don’t want to be. You too, Max. You’re not those people either.”
Verstappen didn’t reply. From a young age his father had told him, “If you don’t win, you have no value.” He hadn’t said no, because he was afraid of what would happen if he did. Maybe beatings, maybe verbal abuse. But those weren’t what he feared most. What he feared most was that his father would abandon him. He hadn’t experienced anything else. It took him a long time to realize that kind of treatment wasn’t fair. When he realized it, he felt he had already become something completely different.
“Sometimes,” Verstappen said, “I wonder, if my father hadn’t been like that, would I still have become the person I am now? Then I feel maybe I shouldn’t think about it.”
Russell listened. He knew Verstappen wasn’t complaining, just stating a perception long sealed away, one he himself was reluctant to face. Like a letter pressed at the very bottom of a drawer, paper yellowed, ink faded, but the feelings inside had never truly disappeared.
“You won’t become someone else, Max,” Russell said. “You are you. Your father is your father. You don’t have to forgive him. You can also understand yourself. These two things don’t conflict.”
But Verstappen said, “Maybe I am this kind of person. There might be some flaw in my soul, and that impulsiveness is the real me.”
Having pronounced this judgment on himself, Verstappen closed his eyes. Russell couldn’t see clearly in the dark, but he could feel the other’s steady breathing. The gentle night wrapped around them like an old, well-worn piece of clothing, soft and comfortable.
“No, Max,” Russell continued. “You’re not that kind of person.”
“Hm,” Verstappen acknowledged he was listening but didn’t indicate agreement.
“You’re not,” Russell stubbornly repeated.
“I think Antonelli is the same. Maybe something is missing in his soul too. After all, we all know he has been planning for F1 victory since he was a child,” Verstappen continued as if he hadn’t heard Russell’s rebuttal.
“No,” Russell almost whispered, but his hand gripped tighter. “And you said something wrong earlier about Antonelli.”
“Which part?” Verstappen stopped criticizing himself and Antonelli and asked earnestly.
“You said he wasn’t smarter than me back then. He’s much smarter than I was,” Russell’s voice came from the darkness, carrying a faint smile. “At least he knew what he was saying on the radio. Back then I didn’t even know what I was angry about.”
Verstappen didn’t laugh. He fumbled in the dark until he found the back of Russell’s head and ruffled it, imagining messing up the other’s usually meticulous hair and amusing himself with the thought.
“Go to sleep,” Verstappen said contentedly, thinking he would fall asleep imagining a messy-haired Russell.
Russell didn’t respond. He thought again of the rivalry between Rosberg and Hamilton. He and Antonelli didn’t have that originally deep affection, so they definitely wouldn’t ferment into bitter hatred. But he also didn’t want to assume the tragedy of those two former Mercedes drivers would replay between him and Antonelli.
He was even less willing to accept Verstappen describing him and Antonelli as people with inherent, irremovable flaws in their souls. He felt it was just the desire to win. He had that urge himself. Antonelli was still so young. Faced with the chance to become world champion, who wouldn’t be tempted? Before falling asleep, listening to Verstappen’s breathing, he thought in his heart that he couldn’t let his lover fall into such self-doubt.
He knew language wasn’t the best defense tool on this night, so Russell leaned in and gave Verstappen a kiss.
Even if the paddock was a jungle of survival of the fittest where the losers ate dust, he would not let their relationship shatter. Russell thought, I want to preserve everyone’s dignity and win fair and square.
There are plenty of ways you can hurt a man
And bring him to the ground
You can beat him
You can cheat him
You can treat him bad and leave him
When he's down
But I'm ready' yes I'm ready for you
I'm standing on my own two feet
Out of the doorway the bullets rip
Repeating the sound of the beat