#f2 2021

When you walked into work in the Hitech Grand Prix building this morning, you didn’t expect to be playing the fucking newlywed game with your crush. And if you’re being honest with yourself, crush is a light way to put it. You were head over heels for your F2 teammate and best friend, Liam Lawson. There was just something about the New Zealander that always had your heart racing, your legs buckling, and your stomach dropping.

So when you were directed into the garage for a ‘different background’ from other videos you had done with Liam, your stomach lurched. Here this gorgeous man was, in all his Kiwi glory, hair waxed back but falling out of place, jeans hugging the toned curves of his legs and ass and giving you a glorious view of his bulge, and the fucking blue sweater. The same blue sweater he had worn the last time the two of you did a video that had reduced you to a stuttering mess when you first saw him.

But now it is worse. So, so much worse. He was standing in a garage. Around cars, and tyres, and grease, and all of the inanimate objects you found so sinfully appealing, and he was just right in the middle of it looking like that. You just about turned around and walked right back out.

“Mighty Mouse! There you are. I was starting to think I’d have to be the brains and beauty of the operation.” Liam called once he spotted you, and suddenly you remembered why you had never tried making a move on him. He treated you like a little sister. Nicknames like ‘kiddo’ and ‘mighty mouse’ were a regular occurrence, and they never failed to make you squirm.

“Well, you struggle to be anything but the brawn, and I think I’m even starting to overtake you there.” You teased, pushing yourself to stay casual, platonic, familial. There was so much opportunity to flirt with him, but the few times you had tried were brushed off, so you had given up many moons ago.

“Ouch Princess, that hurts.” Liam mocked, his hand cradling his chest and you couldn’t help but wonder how it would be to fall asleep against his chest, curled up after a rough night of-

“Who’re you calling princess, princess?” You shot back, cutting your thoughts off before they continued developing and became an issue. Liam laughed, his arm slung around your shoulder while the two of you walked over to the team that were in charge of running your activity for the afternoon.

“Ok, I don’t know if you guys have heard of it, but this game is called Mr and Mrs, one of you will have a whiteboard and wear headphones while the other tries to guess what the answers to the questions you’re writing down are. Make sense? Ok, great, let’s do an intro and go from there.” One of the guys explained quickly, and you began having flashbacks to an awful 80s game show called The Newlywed Game, and blushed profusely. Having you and Liam in a video titled ‘Mr & Mrs’ was sure to get the fans going, and you couldn’t blame Hitech’s PR plan.

You and Liam settled into the wheely chairs from the office next door, Liam positioning himself in frame of the camera and fixing his stupidly perfect hair when you came barreling toward him with your chair, legs tucked up high so you didn’t cop a chair arm to the knee. Liam screeched when you finally hit him, almost toppling off the chair in surprise while you spun slowly, laughing freely as you did so.

Liam looked over at you, your head thrown back in carefree laughter, the yellow sundress that covered your body made you look radiant, and he was sure he had never seen a sight so beautiful before. Your laughter calmed down, and as you looked over at him, he couldn’t help but send you a lovestruck smile, his eyes dopey with admiration. You blushed slightly, laughing as the team asked if you could do the intro again, but actually introduce what you were doing.

Liam slid out of the frame, and you followed his movements as you could tell a fierce battle was about to commence. Kicking off the ground with force, you tucked your legs up onto the chair again, spinning into Liam so fast, you couldn’t actually see his face before you crashed into him. The two of you exploded in laughter again, laughter and smiles were common between you, and Hitech’s Instagram was full of photos and videos of you and Liam smiling at each other, or doubled over in laughter, clutching onto each other.

“Hi, I’m Liam Lawson, and this is Y/N, we drive for Hitech in Formula 2.” Liam began once you had slowed down your laughter. He kept a firm grip on the arm of your chair, holding you close and still, as your chair really liked spinning around.

“And we’re here to play Mr & Mrs, another game in our long series championship to see who the better teammate is.” You finished, gesturing to yourself subtly, but Liam caught it and pushed your chair away jokingly. As much as you loved the man and wished you could be more, you wouldn’t give up this relationship you have with him for something that might work.

MR & MRS | EDIE-BABY

“Liam, what is Y/N’s favourite colour?” The same guy from before asked, one who Liam still didn’t recognise due to the facemask and hat he was wearing. Nevertheless, he held up a whiteboard where the question was scribbled in messy writing, three multiple choice answers written waiting for not only Liam’s, but also your answer. You had airpods in your ears, connected to the blaring music playing from one of the Hitech employees’ laptops, a whiteboard in your hand that you quickly scribbled out an answer to.

Liam looked over at you, holding the whiteboard to your chest protectively so he wouldn’t cheat, but there was really no way that he could.

“It’s not an answer listed here, but her favourite colour is a light brown. She always says it calms her down because it reminds her of a cafe she went to once back home.” Liam spoke, watching you as he answered. You didn’t hear a word he was saying, bopping your head along to the 2000s hits pumping through the earphones. Liam pulled one of them out, his head nodding over to the camera while you proudly turned the board around, thinking you had gotten one over on Liam.

“My favourite colour is light brown, because it reminds me of the Brew Cafe in my hometown, and it brings a really nostalgic and calm feeling.” You stated, watching the faces of the employees morph from business to shock. You looked over at Liam, who had a smug smile on his face while he listened to your answer.

“There’s no way you could have known that!” You protested, glaring accusingly at the dirty blonde. He laughed in response, and you couldn’t have felt happier in any given moment. Not even the top step of the podium could compare to the warmth spreading in your chest. Little did you know, Liam was feeling the exact same way.

“Y/N earphones back in, Liam your next question. What is Y/N’s favourite song at the moment?” The same guy asked, yet this time there were no multiple choice answers. Liam’s eyes widened, turning to look at you to think of any songs he had heard blasting from your speakers or earphones recently, or something that you had ranted excitedly to him about. He spoke to himself, mumbling about artists and songs he could remember falling from your lips. You twirled a piece of hair around your finger, thinking about the answer to the question, when suddenly it hit him.

He had to wait a few moments as you were slowly writing down your answer, still not 100% sure of yourself. It was only after you had taken an earphone out that you jumped, furiously rubbing out the answer on the whiteboard and writing a new one, looking much more satisfied with the new answer. The team counted down, and as Liam spoke, you almost dropped the whiteboard.

“Feeling Something Bad by Ellise. She’ll start singing it randomly when she concentrates, which is usually a giveaway to what songs she's been listening to recently.” Liam said his answer so confidently that it made you feel as though you were inferior because he knew your favourite song and it took you a decent minute to think of it. Liam got another point as he had gotten two of your answers right, and you were starting to feel competitive.

“Alright Liam, who does Y/N get along with best in the F2 paddock? Oscar Piastri, Dan Ticktum, or you?”

“Oh, oh. Well, she hangs out with Oscar a lot, but I don’t know if she would say they get along better than we do? Like, she’s closer with Oscar but we get along best, if that makes sense? I don’t think it does. I’m gonna say Oscar because I don’t want to be rejected, but I really hope I’m wrong and that she says me.” Liam rambled, finally deciding on Oscar, and when you were told to turn your board around, Liam’s heart sank a little. You had written Oscar, and as you began trying to defend yourself, Liam waved it off and laughed to hide the disappointment in his eyes, but you could see it clear as day. You tried to move on like he did, to keep playing the game like you didn’t hurt her best friend and crush.

You began trying to cheer the Kiwi up, dancing along to the songs playing, and occasionally belting out the chorus. He was laughing along, finally joining you to sing when you were screaming the lyrics to Promiscuous, dancing all around the garage and trying to pull him up around with you. While you were dancing with some of the employees off camera, being recorded for Instagram, Liam was still in frame of the main camera, a fond smile on his face, and anyone who had looked at him could see that he was completely and utterly whipped for you, but you were too caught up in Nelly Furtado to see it yourself.

It was your turn to answer questions now, passing Liam the whiteboard that had a little love note written on it.

I’m going to crush you.

You wrote, and Liam thought it was adorable how competitive you got in trivial games like this, but it always made him try even harder just to give you some semblance of a battle.

“Y/N! How old was Liam when he started karting?” The guy you had begun to think was not an actual Hitech employee asked. The three ages to choose from scribbled on the whiteboard. You studied them for a moment, and could see Liam in the corner of your eye writing out his own answer.

“He was seven, because I remember him telling me that there’s regulations in New Zealand that you can’t race go-karts competitively until you’re seven and then won the race.” You explained, remembering the story he had told you easily, it was one of your favourites, purely because of the joy on Liam’s face when he recounted it.

He turned the board around, showing the exact answer you had given, and he gave you a cheeky smile in response to your silent gloating about getting a point. There was nothing cuter in his eyes than you getting so worked up about a game.

“What is Liam’s pre-race superstition?” Before the board with the question and possible answers came up, your mouth blurted out the answer you already knew all too well.

“He gets in the car from the left.” You practically yelled, and Liam looked at you with wide eyes, not hearing your words but seeing the excitement at knowing the answer.

“How did you know that?” One of the Hitech PR asked as her main priority was to stir up more rumours about the two of you, as it was always good for the team’s press.

“Because I’m just as superstitious about getting in from the right side, so when he found out, he asked the team if we could switch around how our cars are placed in the garage so that we could meet in the middle, do our little ritual, and then get in the car from there.” You explained, watching as Liam wrote down his answer with no idea of the words you were saying.

When Liam turned the board around, he explained the exact same story you had, and you giggled when he finished, showing off a proud smile before putting the pieces together that you had already run the same spiel.

“It’s quite cute that the two of you explain things using basically the same words.” That same PR lady stated. And you almost rolled your eyes, almost. But you caught Liam blushing slightly, and a small, stupid part of you began jumping up and down, because not only did someone think your relationship with Liam was cute, but he blushed at that.

“It happens when you spend so much time with someone. I’ve started picking up Kiwi slang, and he’s learning some of my slang. You don’t realise it until you say something to someone when he’s not there and they’ve got no idea what I mean. It’s so normal for Liam to always be by my side, and me by his that when I’m with other people it feels weird.” You started on a ramble, something you were known for. And then just would… not… fucking… stop. The press officer looked satisfied, but as you had finally gotten your mouth to stop moving, you were scared to look over at Liam.

“Whenever she’s not within arm’s reach, I feel like I’m missing something.” Liam spoke quietly, and you gulped as you heard his words. The man was going to kill you, surely. This little production crew didn’t give a shit about your blossoming romance though, as they hurried you through to the next questions. You and Liam barely looked at eachother, your answers shorter and much more vague than they were before. You just wanted to get out of this chair and go freak out in an empty office somewhere.

“Well, the winner of this round is Liam, which means he has officially overtaken Y/N in the Hitech championship. How do you guys feel about this one?” The producers asked. You would usually have felt a bit of a blow to your chest finding out you had been beaten in two ways, but you truly couldn’t think of anything except your proximity to Liam.

“I think we found out a lot, and I’m glad to finally be ahead in the championship. I think it’s the only time I’ll ever be able to beat Mighty Mouse in anything.” Liam chuckled, reverting back to your ‘little sister’ nickname because he felt like the distance would help him process his emotions.

“Hey, you already beat me in height, age, and supercar experience, you gotta let me have something.” You whined, you looked over at Liam with a pout and puppy eyes, unintentionally making his heart pound out of his chest.

“Well you’re the cuter one of the team, and you’re a hell of a lot smarter than me, so I’d say you’re winning enough. Plus you’re higher up in the drivers standings than me.” Liam replied, leaning closer to stare into your eyes, barely two inches between your faces, you blinked slowly, afraid that any sudden movements would scare him away.

His large hand reached up, tucking a stray piece of hair behind your ear, then coming to rest at the side of your neck, his thumb resting on your jaw.

“I don’t think you realise what you do to me.” You mumbled, leaning forward very slightly to nudge your nose against Liam’s. His breath hitched, eyes boring into your soul in a way that made you freeze.

“It can’t be any worse than what you do to me. Looking as beautiful as you do, all I want to do is hold you, keep you close, show you off to the world, and I want to call you mine. I want to take you home and show you around my hometown, I want to introduce you to my parents, to take you to parties with my friends, I want to curl up in your apartment watching Harry Potter movies, and I want to dance around the kitchen with you at 2 in the morning making pancakes. I want to live my life with you.” Liam confessed, and for a few moments, you felt as though you couldn’t breathe.

You lurched forward, balling your fists up in that stupid blue sweater and pulling him closer. Liam’s eyes closed instinctively as your lips met, the coconut lip balm you applied before you came into the office was shared on your tongues, Liam’s exploring your mouth with vigor. You had never imagined him to be this passionate, this intense. But you had no complaints, his hands tugging you forward until you fell onto his lap, legs slotting in beside his own to straddle him on the wheely chair.

You broke away for a moment to catch your breath, eyes surveying every square inch of Liam’s face to commit it to memory. He truly was a gorgeous man, and you hoped you would get to see him like this many more times to come. He caught the look in your eyes and dove back into your lips, his teeth capturing your bottom lip in a bruising grip, a whimper escaping your lips before someone clearing their throat interrupted you.