#midfield!reader

You roll your eyes goodnaturedly, “Acting like you haven’t received, like, five rounds from the girl in the blue top.”

Gabriel raises a brow, the corner of his lip curling with amusement. “Ah, but I am in a very committed relationship to my girlfriend.” His eyes flick back to the guy that the server pointed as the gift sender. “You are not seeing anyone.”

You roll your eyes, and even with the music and the flickering lights, you can tell the entire table of rookies seems to focus on your response. Gabriel, in particular, has taken a liking to teasing you over your love life. Or lack thereof.

“He looks like he wants to ask you to dance,” Kimi grins. He’s not exactly sober—though you’re really not one to talk. If anything, Kimi has simply taken full advantage of Monaco’s legal drinking age.

Besides Kimi, Isack toys with the straw in his empty glass. He looks pensive, if not a bit tired. As you’ve come to find out in the first months of the season, Isack’s a bit of a lightweight. You think he might still feel haunted by the last time you went out as a group—when he ended up vomiting inside your purse to avoid spilling his guts on the Uber’s floor. The walk to your respective rooms was filled with a teary-eyed still-drunk Isack rambling apologies in a hard to follow tangle of French and English, all despite your insistence that it’s fine, really, I didn’t even like it that much anyways.

The next day, you found a newer model of your purse waiting for you at the lobby. You also found that Isack had trouble meeting your gaze for the rest of the flight back. Looking at him now, under the orange-turned-pink hue of the lights, you notice that Isack still isn’t meeting your gaze. You wonder if he’s still embarrassed—you wonder what would be the best way to tell him that you didn’t care in the first place, that it’s fine, that all you want is for him to feel relaxed around you again.

“Don’t pressure her,” Isack says, and for a moment you think you’ve imagined it, words almost getting lost to the music. His back isn’t as stiff as before, the alcohol helping him loosen up a little. He looks at Kimi, but the Italian boy just raises his brows smugly, like he knows something.

“I am not,” Kimi insists. “But if no one is dancing with her, I don’t see why she shouldn’t dance with him.”

Isack’s frown sets.

“Maybe I just don’t feel like dancing,” you say relaxedly, shrugging your shoulders as you unconsciously hand Ollie your gifted drink. He accepts it eagerly.

“Everyone loves dancing.”

“Kimi.”

“Chiedile di ballare,” he insists, and you immediately dislike the fact that you’re among the minority drivers in this table that don’t speak Italian. Even Gabriel—who you know for a fact doesn’t speak Italian—looks too smug for your liking.

Isack’s jaw tenses. He returns his gaze to his empty glass, straw pushing around the ice. Kimi grows bolder at that, leaning forward. His mouth opens to add something else, but you beat him to it.

“I’m not indulging him,” you say, with an air of finality.

“Oh?” Gabriel asks, brows arched smugly. “Any reason why?”

“Yeah, like fifty. But I think I’ll settle for he’s probably trying to use me to get to you guys.” All four boys seem to pause at that, turning to you equally confused. Clueless, the lot of them.

“I think that’s the other way around,” Ollie says.

You roll your eyes, not annoyed, but unsurprised. “Right. He’s been staring at the lot of you for a while. Who knows? Maybe any one of you is more of his type than I am.”

“You are not giving yourself enough credit,” Isack says, and you’re almost surprised to find those big brown eyes on you. He doesn’t look away—not immediately, anyway. Maybe he is a little drunk. “You are a driver too, you know. He would be lucky to have your attention,” he says bluntly. Kimi nudges him with a laugh, and Isack’s cheeks redden—or maybe it’s the club lights. You’re not sure.

“Yeah?” you test. “I’ll go one step further—I bet that if he finds the courage to come up, he asks for a picture with you within the first minute.” You shrug. “Guys just don’t find it nearly as interesting or impressive when I’m the driver, let me tell you.”

Isack frowns. “You are talking to the wrong guys, then,” he says, like it’s obvious.

“Am I?” you ask, just to tease, to test whether Isack is drunk and confident or being earnest. “Who should I be talking to, then?”

Someone clears their throat behind you. The entire table perks up, and when you turn, you find the guy that had been sending drinks your way. He’s still cute up close, handsome even.

Not your type, though.

You realize that he has been talking for a beat, and you blink back into attention. “So, you wanna dance?” he asks, British accent distinct.

You can feel all four pairs of eyes snapping back to you like little pinpricks at the back of your neck. You smile apologetically. “Sorry—we’re actually leaving soon.”

He takes it in stride, nodding his head. “Oh, no worries.” He stuffs his hands into his pockets, before his gaze swivels to your side. His eyebrows tick upward. “Hey, you’re Ollie Bearman, right?” He cracks a nervous smile. “Can I get a picture?”

Gabriel loudly snorts into his drink, earning a startled glance from the guy. You can see Isack, Kimi and Ollie alike struggling to keep a straight face.

You smile brightly. “Do you want me to take it for you?”

He nods eagerly, looking much more excited now than he did when he was asking you to dance. “Oh, yeah,” he starts, already handing you his phone, “that’d be mint.”

Kimi’s shoulders shake as he tries to hide his laughter.

You’re not quite sure who’s hotel room this is. Nights out with your rag-tag band of rookies usually end at the club, where you all end up catching a cab or calling an Uber back to your respective hotels. You get a decent night’s sleep. And early next morning, you all pretend like you’re not ridiculously hungover for the flight home.

Tonight is shaping up to be the exception.

You think maybe it was Gabriel—though it might’ve been Kimi, who got invited to this room afterparty of sorts and roped you all into it. You spot Doriane by the balcony window, so you figure you must be correct. Mercedes actually does a lot of promos with their F1 Academy drivers, so both of them have been growing friendly throughout the season. You wonder whether you should bring it up with your team.

It’s a quiet murmur when he asks, “You okay?” You tilt your head up, and find that you’ve been leaning against Isack’s shoulders. When did that happen? “You’ve been zoning out for a bit.”

“M’good,” you say, inhaling deeply before nuzzling your head back onto his shoulder. “Just tired.”

Maybe a little socially exhausted too. You’ve lost sight of Gabriel—maybe for the better—with Kimi and Ollie spread somewhere across the room. There’s smatters of familiar faces, faces whose names you can’t quite recall, scattered between the furniture. A few influencers, a few motorsport drivers. Still, it’s dying down, with fewer and fewer people still roaming around.

“Maybe it’s time we head back,” Isack says, and he also sounds tired, strung out. It’s been a demanding week, and you don’t particularly feel like staying up til sunrise.

You turn quietly, lips pressed against the sleeve of Isack’s white shirt. You feel him stiffen under you as you complain, “I need to find Gabriel,” you groan.

He furrows his brows. “Why?”

You grumble. “Because Alpine and Sauber rented rooms in the same hotel, and I made him promise we’d go back together.” Stupid, in hindsight. Especially since Gabriel usually has a lot more stamina than you do for these sorts of events.

You can feel Isack’s hand gently settle around your waist as you move to stand up, offering some sense of stability. Miraculously, you spot Gabriel moving up to the table with a green glass bottle in hand.

“Gabi!” you call.

He looks up, arching a brow, and you can see in his slightly sluggish movements that he’s also far from sober.

“O quê?” he asks.

“Quero—quero voltar ao hotel,” you say, Portuguese clumsy with alcohol.

“We can’t leave now,” Gabriel says, like it’s obvious. He shows you the bottle in his hand—empty—as if that explains it. “We’re about to play.”

Your nose scrunches. “Play what?”

You shouldn’t have asked. At the very least, you shouldn’t have looked at Gabriel when you said it—because all it took was for him to see the annoyance in your face to take it as an opening to drag you towards a circle of people. They’re all sat on the floor, familiar and unfamiliar faces. Gabriel strides to the center and places the bottle there.

“Is this spin the bottle?” you ask, looking up at Gabi as he takes a seat next to you. On the opposite side of the circle, Isack sits down on the last open spot next to a grinning Kimi.

“What are we, children?” Gabriel rolls his eyes with a devious smile. “It’s truth or dare.”

“Much classier,” you respond dryly.

He clicks his tongue, dismissive. “Você vai gostar.”

“Uh-huh. Veremos isso,” you reply, sounding thoroughly unconvinced.

To be fair, Gabi is not that far off—for a while, it is entertaining. Kimi is dared to text Toto saying that his mum is on the fence about letting him drive next week because he’s failing Maths. Isack is asked who his favorite teammate has been during his time in the Red Bull—and he’s promptly booed when he gives the cop out answer of Pepe Martí. Ollie is dared to attempt a handstand, which, as expected, ends poorly. Doriane is asked which drivers she misses most from F1 Academy—and no one is really surprised when her immediate answer is Abbi Pulling. For a dare, you’re forced to text Pierre whether he found his buzzcut had any aerodynamic advantages when driving.

And though you’d never admit it—yeah, maybe Gabriel was right and this is more fun than you expected.

“You are all so soft,” Aurelia says, bringing her plastic cup to her lips.

“I agree,” Kimi says, leaning forward to spin the bottle. “Next person it lands on is obligated to choose dare.”

The bottle spins in a blur of emerald green, progressively slowing until it ultimately lands squarely on Isack.

“What? That’s not fair!” he says, accent thicker. “You changed—”

“Rules are rules,” Ollie says with a loose shrug, and you’re too far away to catch the mischievous glint in his eye. He leans closer to Kimi’s ear, shielding his mouth with his palm as he whispers something to him. If his growing grin is a giveaway of anything, Isack’s not gonna have it easy. Both Ollie and Kimi glance at you simultaneously.

You don’t like it.

“I dare you… to kiss someone in this room,” Kimi says, and Isack stares at him like he intends to sear a hole into his skull.

“What?” he repeats. “I am not going to—”

“C’mon, Isack,” Ollie urges, leaning back against his palms with a laguidness that seems completely opposed to Isack’s tensing back. “Be a good sport. You already saw me nearly split my head against the table.”

Reluctantly, Isack stands up, earning a few whistles from the people around. He flushes, cheeks tinged with a pretty pink color. His gaze catches on Gabriel for a split second, but before he can step forward, the Brazilian boy shakes his head. “Don’t look at me, I am taken.”

Then, as if on instinct, Isack’s brown eyes fall onto you. Your stomach feels tight, fluttering with something you can’t bring yourself to name. He swallows sharply, doing another scan of the circle of people. Influencers, drivers, strangers. He finds you again.

Isack ducks closer to you, kneeling down to be at your level. Your heartbeat thunders in your ears. More whistles, louder this time—

It’s a punch in the gut, realization. You’re the safe option. The only person he can really call a friend that isn’t actively seeing someone. Someone who won’t use this for clout. Someone he knows—someone who’s safe.

Your heart is still racing, but the butterflies in your stomach turn to stones. Oh. Disappointment is a bitter water.

Isack’s hand gently cups your cheek, and you can feel his breath fanning against your nose. He looks nervous from up close. Anxious. Trying to play it off. But his touch is tentative—and when you meet his gaze again, something shifts in his brown eyes. Something you can’t place, but feels remarkably similar to a barely concealed disappointment.

You hold your breath when Isack leans closer, eyes fluttering shut.

You feel the press of his lips against your cheek. He pulls away just as quickly, as if your skin has somehow burned him.

Kimi groans loudly, shaking his head, “Aw, come on mate, that is not what I—”

Isack sits back on his spot, muscles taut and jaw tense. “Don’t push it.”

Your breath still trembles a little, adrenaline still overflowing inside your body. Your mouth feels bitter. Like biting into a fruit, only to find out it’s spoiled.

Besides you, Gabriel side-glances at you once. Twice. Three times. He isn’t nearly as subtle as he thinks himself to be. From there on, the night wraps up as a blur. Eventually, Ollie, Gabi, Isack and you decide to wrap up the night while Kimi stays behind alongside Doriane to go up to their respective rooms.

Ollie and Gabriel wait by the sidewalk, phones open on the Uber app. Isack stays back by your side, both of you sitting against the limestone stairs of the hotel.

He’s been quiet. Quieter than usual. This time, you’re the one not looking at him. Despite the alcohol, despite the exhaustion, your mind feels like it’s running on overdrive. His kiss on your cheek still ghosts on your skin. Is it you? Is that why he didn’t want to kiss you? You fold your arms over your chest, staring at the floor like it’ll give you an answer.

“Sorry if I made you uncomfortable earlier,” Isack finally says like a murmur, a mumbled confession.

You furrow your brows, looking back at him. “What?”

He scratches his cheek, quiet again for a beat. “The… the dare thing. I should have asked you first.”

You’re not sure whether to laugh or not. Your stomach still feels all tangled up. His big brown eyes peer back at you, as if seeking forgiveness. “You just kissed my cheek, Isack.”

He swallows, and he looks like he wants to turn away. Like he wants to pretend this entire conversation never happened. Instead—

Instead. His eyes flicker downwards, finding your lips and lingering for a second. Two. He inhales sharply, licking his own lips when he meets your gaze again.

“Yeah,” he says, a little out of breath, “but I wanted to do more than that.”

Your heart catches in your throat. The glow of orange streetlights illuminates his face, softening his expression. His nose. His eyes. His pouty mouth. “You did?”

He nods hesitantly, then more confidently. “I always do.”

You can see it in the way he holds his breath, the way his whole body seems to brace for impact—like he’s waiting for rejection. For you to turn him down.

You’re the one cupping his cheek this time. Isack freezes on his spot as he blinks at you.

“Isack,” you hum.

He swallows, voice barely a whisper. “Yeah?” He’s a breath away from you now.

“Relax,” you say, and you bring your lips against his. It takes him a moment to reciprocate, but the second he does, you can feel him smiling against you. Your hand falls away from his cheek, and instead reaches for the collar of his shirt, as if you’re not physically close enough to you already. His tongue swipes against your bottom lip. You melt into him.

You hear the shutter of a picture and a flash of light. When you and Isack fall apart, you find Ollie with his phone pointed at you, while Gabriel narrows his eyes at you.

“I can’t believe Kimi missed it,” Ollie says, texting him the picture.

Gabriel clicks his tongue, annoyed. “You just couldn’t wait until we got back, could you?” He types something on his phone. “Now I owe Ollie money.”

And maybe you’d be annoyed at that. But Isack scoffs a laugh and presses his head into your shoulder, flustered. His hand feels warm around your back. You lean your head against his. Maybe. Maybe you could get used to this.

a/n: wrote an alternative game to truth or dare because a better version occurred to me when i had already written this one <3

You could’ve gotten used to that—Isack’s slow inhales and exhales like a lulling beat, luring you into sleep. That is, before Gabriel decided to shake the two of you and drag you into the circle of people.

“Sometimes I can’t stand you, Bortoleto,” you mutter as you’re forced to sit next to him. Isack, on the other hand, is called over by Kimi and Ollie on the opposite side of the circle. For a moment, it almost looks like the two other rookies and Gabriel share a look—something mischievous, something you definitely do not want to get roped into.

“So, what is this, exactly?”

“It’s…” Gabriel pulls a face, turning to Rafaela, who sits next to him with a bowl in front of her legs. “Como se chama isso mesmo?”

“Correo de brujas,” Rafaela responds, and you realize that there are slips of paper inside her bowl.

“Correo de brujas,” Gabriel repeats, as if that explains it.

“Right. So, again—what is this, exactly?”

Apparently, it’s a game Gabriel learned from Franco a while back. Witches’ mail. There’s an empty bottle at the center, and whoever it lands on, has to take a dare from the bowl.

“Kind of like Truth or Dare,” Rafa explains from her spot, “Except it’s only dares, and they’re not exactly… soft.”

Even then, it doesn’t start off too hard. Isack is asked a Fuck, Marry, Kill with team principals from the grid. Gabriel is dared to spell his phone number just by moving his ass in the shape of the digits—all while everyone tries to guess what each one is. At some point, Kimi and Ollie are made to share a gummy bear between their teeth and try to split it in half with just their mouths.

And you won’t lie—you are having fun, laughing at the expense of others. It’s funny, hilarious, even—up until the bottle lands on you.

One of the boys from F2 whose name you can’t recall hands you the bowl. You pull one slip of paper dramatically, unfolding it and quietly hoping it’s not something too ridiculous.

You squint at Rafaela’s handwriting. “Um. It says… which one do you want?” You turn to Gabriel. “Does that mean I get to pick?” But the two Brazilian drivers sitting next to you are grinning too widely for it to be anything remotely easy for you.

“Nope,” Gabi says, standing up to grab a chair and drag it to the center of the circle. He’s still looking too smug when he pats it twice, gesturing at you. “Take a seat.” You do so reluctantly, while Gabriel puts his hands on his hips as he does a quick scan of the room. “Does anyone have, like, a bandana?”

One of the girls from F1 Academy—Courtney, if you’re not mistaken—opens her purse and pulls out a scarf. “Does this work?”

Gabi nods, reaching for it with a quick thank you. He moves to stand behind you as he ties around your eyes, making sure it won’t slip. You reach up to touch it—it’s silky, soft. Maybe you should ask Courtney where she got it from. “There.”

“Is this what you people are into, now?” you ask, shifting on your chair. You hear a few people laughing, your vision entirely obscured.

“You cannot see anything, yes?” Gabi asks, his voice sounding farther away now. You hear rustling.

“Nothing at all,” you quip.

“Good.” He clasps his hands together, making you flinch. “Okay, this game works like this. I have three foods in my hands. One,” he pauses, so you imagine he’s raising it and showing it to the circle. “Two,” you hear murmurs. “Or three. Which one would you like?”

You roll your eyes under the scarf. “But I can’t see them.”

“Exactly.” God, you can hear the smugness in his tone. Why are you friends with him again? “So, what will it be? One, two or three?”

You gnaw at the inside of your cheek, not quite understanding why you suddenly feel a spike of nervousness. You try to shrug it off. “Um. Two.”

You hear Aurelia laugh against her palm, and you can only pray that’s a good sign.

“Alright.” Gabi’s voice grows closer. “Where do you want it?”

“Excuse me?” you turn to him, and you hope that, despite the scarf tied around your face, he can still tell that you’re glaring at him.

“I’m going to point to three places, you have to pick one. Do you want it here.” You realize a beat to late that he’s not actually going to touch you—ergo, you have no clue to which places he’s pointing at. “Here,” you shift in your chair as you hear someone laugh. “Or here?”

“…The third one.”

“Alright.” The sound of air hissing feels too close to your ear, followed by a cold substance landing against your neck.

You visibly flinch, surprised. “Gabriel!” you snap. The sweet, sugary scent of whipped cream is near immediate.

Gabriel is doing a poor job at stifling his laughter. Before you can protest, Rafaela pipes up, “That’s too little,” and you hope that wherever you’re aiming at, you manage to flip her off. He chuckles and shakes the can again, before promptly placing more whipped cream on your neck. You shudder.

“Fuck you two, by the way,” you say, which just earns you a few laughs. You’re still not sure where this is all going, other than Gabriel and Rafaela seem to be having the time of their lives.

He takes a step back. “Okay. Now, for the last part—who do you want to take it off you?”

“I’m sorry, did you say who?”

He shushes you, and you can hear him wandering around the circle, footsteps slow and casual. Even blindfolded, it’s like you can see all the eyes glued to him, expectant. “Do you want… one,” people around the circle whistle loudly as Gabriel points to them. “Two,” the noise grows louder, followed by scattered sounds of amusement and excitement. “Or three?”

“Um,” you stammer, palms sweaty. You rub them down against your jeans, hoping it’ll rid you of this lingering nervousness. “I don’t know, uh… two?”

You don’t hear what Gabriel says—or more so can’t over the whistles and teasing. You can feel someone approaching your seat, but pausing just a step shy of you. Your body feels warm, too warm, like you’re suddenly aware of all your nerve endings and connections—like a livewire. There’s a moment of silence, where you’re still sat, blind and clueless, before Rafaela calls out, “Ah! You can’t use your hands.”

Tentatively, a hand gently moves your hair aside. From his scent alone, you can tell it’s not a girl. His breath fans against your neck for a second, and you stifle the urge to move the blindfold. You hear him breathe in once, as if bracing for impact, before his tongue darts out against the scoop of whipped cream resting on your neck. His lips feel warm and soft, tingling against your skin. You inhale sharply. He pulls away, before both Rafaela and Gabriel protest simultaneously.

“No—you’re not done.”

“You have to clean it all off.”

You hear a small, barely audible huff of frustration that feels remarkably familiar. Then, his lips are on your neck again, slow, careful. A part of you wonders if he can feel your pulse jackrabbiting against his teeth. Your breath feels uneven when he lowers his head a little, aiming for the whipped cream that has slid onto your clavicle. You stifle a shiver. Everything feels magnified without your sight—the hand still holding your hair, the warmth of his lips on your skin, his tongue working against the white dessert, the brief feeling of his teeth.

For a moment, you’re certain you stop breathing.

He licks one last stripe across your neck, before finally pulling away.

The whistles and catcalls aimed at him that follow are deafening, even more so with your sight gone. Still, you hear Kimi’s voice tangled in there somewhere—though what he says, exactly, you don’t manage to catch.

“Okay, now you can take the blindfold off,” Gabriel says.

You reach up for the scarf, trying to hide the initial unsteadiness of your hands. Your heartbeat is ringing in your ears, pulse still a few beats too quick. Even the dim lights of the room feel blinding for a moment as you blink in an attempt to get accustomed to them again. You’re blushing. You know you’re blushing, and you hate it.

Staring at you with the most irritating self-satisfied smile ever is Gabriel. He grins. “Now, you have to point out who it was—but, if you get it wrong, you never get to find out the truth.”

Your throat is dry, the feeling of lips against your neck still ghosting over your skin. It’s hard to focus on the people around you, some friends, some co-workers, some strangers. You don’t think Gabi would’ve chosen a complete stranger. He’s an annoyance, but you’re still friends. You’d like to think that there’s at least some boundaries he’d be willing to respect.

Your gaze flickers from Gabriel to Rafaela to your fellow rookies to—Isack. Isack, whose cheeks are looking noticeably pink. He licks his lips somewhat nervously. You freeze. Just a split second. Because, by the corner of his mouth, you can see a speck of sugary white cream.

Your skin burns like it has been set alight.

“Um,” you stammer. You glance besides Isack. “Aurelia?”

She grins, and all three Brazilians start clapping and laughing. “Now you’ll never know!” they chant, the rest of the group joining in. “Now you’ll never know!”

Big brown eyes meet your gaze. Isack looks about as flustered as you feel. Clumsily, you move to spin the bottle, which thankfully lands far in the opposite direction. The spot next to Isack is empty now, and you quietly thank that the attention is off you when you move to sit next to him.

Isack’s posture immediately stiffens, all traces of exhaustion gone from his face. He drums his fingers against his knee, suddenly all too aware of your presence next to him. Warmth blooms in your chest.

“Isack,” you whisper.

“Yeah?” he asks dazedly, voice pitching higher. He coughs, red still splotching his cheeks.

You lean closer to him, and you don’t miss the way his eyes immediately flick from your eyes to your neck to your lips. He might actually look more wrecked than you do. Something akin to sunlight melts through your chest. Confidence—maybe something better than that.

Your thumb brushes against the corner of his mouth, and his breath hitches. He swallows, throat bobbing. You tilt your head, bringing your thumb to your mouth as you lick off the last speck of whipped cream.

“I like it,” you hum, trying to bite down a smile as you watch Isack, frozen on his spot, tips of his ears turning bright red. “It’s sweet.”

a/n: okay so correo de brujas isn’t played exactly like this, but since almost everyone that answered my last poll said they hadn’t heard of the game i figured it would be fine <3 power of fanfiction at all. the whipped cream one though? very much real let me tell you.