"Are you for real?" Max lashed out at George, tired after a 6-hour flight to Monza.

He stood at the center of the hotel room, looking ahead. Before him stood a king sized bed. He dropped his bags in anguish and descended into the nearby armchair.

George approached him, brows furrowed in irritation.

"Max, do you think it was my intention to make us sleep in one bed?"

"I don't know, maybe this is one of your mind games, Russell." Max dropped his head on his hands and took a deep breath.

George stood next to him, arms crossed. The whole situation was absurd -- after three years of rivalry-slash-oocasional sex, and Max still never stays with him. The teams, tho, decided that because of lack of places the two teams had to be placed in one hotel. No one even suspected the thing that went on between them, and thank god, but this didn't make the situation less embarrassing.

"Listen, Max, we don't have to- ugh- lie next to each other. The bed is huge and we could think of some sort of wall between. I don't want to wake up with your stubble in my face, thank you."

Max groaned and picked up his bag, throwing it onto the right side of the bed.

"We do not have any choice. This is my side, you take the other, got it, Russell?" Mx dared not say his name out loud because he was afraid that he would let go, would forget that nothing tied them together except for mutual sexual desire. Oh, how wished he for a chance to have a tiny sliver of hope that something would become of them, but no. George is too perfect, too planned. He has no room for uncertainties in his life, and especially for Max.

"I could sleep on the floor. I don't want you complaining tomorrow, Max." George replied.

Even though the concern for Max never slipped out, his heart was full of it. He resisted the urge to tell him outright: "I care about you. You're not nothing to me, Max, and-"

He hadn't really thought if anything after that, to be honest. His rationality never let him dream too much, lest George forget what they were.

Just fuck buddies, not even friends or acquitances, even though sometimes George let the truth slip between sleepy mumbles when Max lay beside in his afterglow, thinking slowly, barriers broken.

"Won't your back hurt?" Max looked up from his phone.

George was still nonchalant outside, in his rumpled shirt and short pants, looking better than when he wore that PR appropriate smile on his face along with team polo and brands plastered to it like it was cast with branding iron.

"It is none of your business, Verstappen. I would not dare interrupt your beauty sleep unless I want to hear no end of your complaints." His irritation sounded dragged-out and unnatural, as if he was forcing those poisonous words out of himself.

Max stood up and took a step forward, hesitant.

"Your back will hurt and my ears will wilt from you whining. Just lie down and sleep, no big deal."

George opened his mouth to shoot another snarky remark at him, but stayed silent, and sat down on the other side.

His shoulders limped, heavy, and he opened his rucksack to take out a pair of pants and a t-shirt. With trembling hands, he left for the bathroom, the click of the lock separating him from Max.

Three years of almost regular sex, and they still were not close enough to change in front of one another. Max had to admit that not everything was this way once. Before Qatar two years ago, they used to kiss gently -- not biting into each other's lips like now; they used to make love to each other, not restraining from kindness like now. But it had passed, gone with the wind, and all because Max could not keep his mouth shut.

He took of the dirty red bull polo and slid under the covers, turning off the lamp from the bedside table on autopilot. His mind couldn't stop giving him flashbacks of that night they fought off track, violently, sucker punches thrown left and right. There was no rules, no dignity: only an animalistic desire to rip each other's throats.

Max had said many things that day, but one particular phrase had burned in his mind like a mark of shame.

"You ruin every person you encounter, you manage to poison them with your venom, like a fucking snake waiting for it next prey."

It would have been poetic if not the implication: since then, Max had realised, that truly, he was not shouting at George, but rather at himself.

For ruining the only good thing he had, for biting harsh like a dog with rabies, like a lion let loose.

His heart ached with the familiar pain that followed him every time he had been next to George.

Wasted potential.

Maybe... Maybe they could have been something soft, full of love, something real. Maybe they could wake up next to each other, kissing sloppily in the morning sun. Maybe they would cook together, George with his absurd passion of British breakfast. Maybe Max could hold himtightto his chest, listen as the other's heartbeat reverberated through his skull, but no. It existed only in his delusional version of reality that he had imagined in his head.

Suddenly, he felt warm hands on his shaking back, gentle and caring. They rocked back and forth, occasionally touching his hair. Why... Why was he shaking? Max brought a hand to his face only to feel... tears.

Honest and unrestrained tears, slipping free from under his eyelids, and the hands on his back...

They were George's.

He jumped up, turning to Russell, who froze in confusion on the center of the bed. Max's heart raced, blood pumping through his ears like the metallic heartbeat of the car in the race.

Thum-thum. Thun-thum.

"Max. Max, do you hear me? Are you alright?" George reached out, noncaring about the hostility in his eyes, because there was one more thing he saw in that deep blue.

Deep sorrow.

As soon as he exited the bath into the dark room, he heard a soft whine from the bed. Max's back was shaking with something that looked like- genuine sobs.

George didn't even think. He didn't think about their relationship, the fight, the venom in Max's words, the violence off track, he just acted. He knew that no matter that Max will push him away and this could be their last night together, he had to help him.

Even if they fought. Even if Max said painful things and George retaliated with insults, uncaring of all bad nights when Max left without saying goodbye.

George took Max's face into his hands, gazing into the dark waters of his eyes. Incredible gentleness took over Max's features, as if he thought about something that made him feel loved and safe. It was showing.

George bitterly chuckled inside, knowing, that it definitely were not the vain moments of love between them, yet whispered still:

"Max, answer me, please. I-"

"I am scared, Max, and I'm worried" was left silent.

Max looked away, eyes down, but didn't try to get out of his gentle hold.

He gulped nervously.

"George... I am so fucking sorry, I was- I was an idiot. I don't mean anything, George, you're the best that happened to me. You are the joy in every race weekend, the reason I haven't quit yet. You did not destroy us, I did. And- And I'm so- Sorry, I can't- Will you leave me now?"

The words stung his throat as they reached his mouth, finally crawling free out of his chest. Max made himself smaller, closed his eyes not to see the disgust in George's eyes, preparing for the hit...

But it never came.

The room was silent, only his snuffles cut through. The next moment Geirge was hugging him like he was something precious. Like he didn't deliver the final blow to them, like...

"I need you, Max. I need you so much, and I love you. I always thought that you hated me after that day. I did what I had to, but I was ignorant. And then I turned hopeless for us. I thought- I thought- It was over. But now I see that we both hurt each other and suffered the guilt in silence instead of opening up. I- Max, I-"

George surely was about to rant about his guilt and other self-destructive bullshit, Max knew that, so he took action.

He gently pressed his lips to George's, conveying both sorrow and happiness, love and hate, admiration and fear.

It was so them: running away, convincing that no hope was left, and then finding it in one another.