Forza Ferrari

incoherent noises hnng happy holidays

usual rpf disclaimers

Marc is thankful he knows how to install snow chains. This weather fucking sucks.

In the east, it's kind of just ugly, relentless drizzle, occasionally dipping into storm. The kind of storm that you get caught in by surprise, the rain suddenly thudding against the windowscreen, driving you inside, laughing as you shake the drops from your jacket, and the fire crackles to life in the grate. In there, in the warm, curled up on the couch, falling asleep to a grating accent murmuring nonsense.

In Piedmont, where he should've been all the this time, it's slushy grey snow. It's icy winds that make the mere thought of leaving the house unbearable. It's the cold soaking through your clothes until you shiver, even through layers of fleece and goose down. It's an ugly kind of weather. 

Maybe that's why he went.

Not who was waiting for him by that fire, murmuring that nonsense, stoking those flames.

Not him.

He'd never tell Dovi that.

Hence why he didn't exactly... tell him, where he was going. Well, if he'd told him he was going to Urbino, he would've asked why there, so he told him he was going to Bologna. 

His phone crackled into life through the phone speaker. Incoming Call, Andrea.

"Hey."

"Hi baby, how far out are you?"

"Not far out now, maybe twenty five minutes? I had to stop and put the snow chains on."

"Okay. You hungry? I'm making ravioli ris e coi." 

"Yeah, save me some if you could."

"Will do. Love you, see you in a bit."

"See you in a bit, ciao."

Valentino can't cook. 

He cackles and overdoes their vincisgrassi, arguing that they'll drink so much wine that it won't matter, and even burnt Italian is better than anything Spanish. Marc leans over his shoulder, wrinkling his nose at a lack of something and an abundance of something else, just to be chased out with a large knife. 

They both still eat it, no matter how much longer it takes to chew. Vale because he grew up on it, Marc because Vale made it.

Andrea can. It's a particularly impressive talent of his. He makes a home kitchen feel like a one-man circus, a hive of activity to rival michelin chefs. 

At theirs- home, he dangles his legs over the counter like a kid and hums to whatever music Dovi has playing, occasionally feeding him back on salt content, or sweetness, or spice. 

He can be over the top a little sometimes, but it's something he takes pride in. 

Valentino will pull an ancient recipe out of his ass, make it with only half the ingredients and bake it wrong.

And Marc himself? He can cook just fine, he's just not always good at remembering to eat. 

December 24th in Italy. He's gotten used to Christmas here. 

While he's more of one for a family holiday, and Piedmont is terribly devoid of his mother, father, and Alex, he doesn't mind it too much. Dovi is, after all, his husband, and that's legally defined as family. 

Valentino has a family. His girls, and her. His her.

He's "met" her exactly twice, and both were  awkward and/ or forgettable. The first was when she dropped one of the girls' jackets in the Assen paddock, and her hands were too full to crouch down and pick it up. Marc grabbed it and handed it to her, too quick for either of them to think too much about it. 

The second was at San Marino, maybe 72 hours after he'd had sex with her boyfriend in their bed. She seemed not to mind him too much, just flashing him a brief smile after they looked at one another at the same time. It was probably also the first time he truly felt guilty. Especially since Andrea was talking to him at the time.

Marc is calcified in his ways now. He couldn't break off what he has with Valentino. Valentino would have to do it. 

He never would, he knows he never would because he's told him. 

"I want us to stay like this forever." 

"What, in the bath?"

"Mm, no, idiot. Us."

It will come to an end. Marc just doesn't know when. Maybe next year, when he beats his championship record, maybe the year after, when he retires, maybe even the year after that, when he does eventually marry the mother of his daughters.

"I couldn't cheat on her if we were married."

It clearly wasn't something he'd meant to say aloud. It was the tail end of a conversation about marriage, one struck after Valentino had complained about Marc's wedding ring digging into his hip. He was half asleep, face in a pillow, probably thinking he was out cold too.

Marc'd teased him about his commitment, or lack thereof, and Vale had just laughed it off with something like  "The free trial hasn't run out yet." and it had ended there. 

"I couldn't cheat on her if we were married."

If he was ever going to get married, he'd break it off with Marc. So, basically, he was the one keeping them unwedded. Even worse, he apparently held himself to a lower moral standard than Valentino, because he was happy to cheat on Dovi, his fucking husband.

He'd squashed that thought down pretty quickly. 

Marc's overnight bag hung off his shoulder, heavier than it was when he was sent off days earlier. Valentino had gifted him wine as a Christmas present, among.. other things. 

He insisted it would be funny to take it home and have Andrea drink it. Funny wasn't really the word anyone else would use.

He had little apparent respect for Marc's husband, taking him more as a joke, and occasionally as an object in his way when he wanted to see Marc. He didn't respect their marital bond at all. Yet, again, Marc wasn't exactly setting a great example.

Marc reluctantly took the bottle. 

"I can't believe they called you into the factory this late in Christmas." Dovi hummed and hugged him close, pressing a kiss into his snow-tipped hair and helping his bag off his shoulder. 

"Just something I messed up on the paperwork, it means I wouldn't've been able to enter next year." At that, Dovi pulls a jokey close-call type expression. "Andof course, I had to meet some investors while I was there." 

"Mm, evil corporate bastards."

"Hey, they were your evil corporate bastards not so long ago." 

"God, don't remind me."

"They did give us some wine though." He pulls the bottle out.

"Marche IGT rosso? Did they run out of wine in Emiliga Romagna?" He laughs and turns it over in his hands. 

Vale, the bastard. That had to be deliberate. Or maybe it was Marc's fault for not checking the label. Or maybe it was Marc's fault for sleeping with another man.

"I'm gonna go dump my bag upstairs and wash my face, okay?"

"Yeah, this is nearly done, you're all good."

Marc jogs up the stairs and pulls his phone out.

You could've been subtler with the wine.

~Not my style ;)

I know.

~When am I seeing you again?

I only just got back.

~And?

~When

Whatever race you're next at. 

~See you in February

If you were to ask Andrea how long he'd known, he'd say he doesn't really know. Maybe a couple months. In reality, it had been about two hundred and thirty seven days since he first suspected something, and when he caught the scent, he didn't let it go. 

It was the little things that mattered. Clothes smelling of a different fabric softener when he came back, missing on race weekend evenings, senseless excuses for travelling away from home just a little too often. Like fucking miswritten paperwork.

If it was anyone else, any other man, even any other rider, he would've confronted Marc immediately- forgiven him of course, given an apology, and they could move on.

But not Valentino Rossi.

Andrea fills two clean wine glasses with the Red, set to the side of the steaming plates.

Not the man he was once desperate to kill.

Not the man Marc had nearly killed himself over. Dozens of sleepless nights, vomit stained bedsheets and bathrooms, weight shared between a young Alex and a slowly aging Andrea.

Marc had gotten better, and along the way, he'd picked, he'd made a choice, and he'd picked healing. He'd picked improvement. He'd picked Andrea.

But Marc was never really his, Marc can't be anyone's. You can give a wild animal food and water and shelter, but in the end, it still chooses the raw instinct to hunt and chase and run free. 

He might've picked Andrea, but it was never going to be anyone but Valentino. It never could be. 

"Have you done veal with it this time?" He's stripped down to one of their velvety white robes, the ones they stole from their hotel room on their last anniversary. They have them hanging up on the hook by the bed, so neither of them have to get properly dressed to make morning coffee. 

Marc has aged much more gracefully (mostly thanks to his strenuous and sponsored skincare) than anyone else Dovi can think of. Warm light dances on his cheeks and casts sharp shadows down his jaw, sculpting him into something ethereal.

He smirks at Andrea, bottom of the robe swaying at his mid-calf as he makes his way to the table. 

"Fucking tease." He murmurs, pressing a kiss gently to his lips and slipping a hand around his waist. 

Marc pulls back. "Veal?"

"Of course."

He smiles. "Good." And kisses him back. 

If there wasn't fresh pasta warm and waiting, Andrea would've said 'Screw dinner' and undone his robe, slid his hands under it and helped him out. He would've pulled him over to the couch, laid him down gently and fucked into him 'til they were both drowsy and panting, food cold on the dinner table. He would, just to delay the inevitable. To feel Marc one more time, without the bright yellow elephant in the room that will undoubtedly follow them wherever they go after this. 

But it's about five hours from Tavullia to here, and Marc doesn't eat on the road. He hasn't been fed in a while, and he'll be starving. 

"C'mon. I wanna see if the wine pairs well."

He did punch Valentino once, actually. It felt fantastic. March 2016. Circuit of the Americas. A good thunk to the face. His right eye was ringed purple and his cheek swollen. Marc bubbled up with laughter at the TV footage of him trying to hide the bruising in Dovi's motorhome and curled into his side as he talked about it. 

"You tired?"

Marc promptly stifles his yawn and shakes his head. 

"Sureee. lt's pretty early, baby. Did you really get so tired from here to Bologna?"

"Team stuff drains me." He waves a hand dismissively in the air. "What are we doing tomorrow?"

"We could go into town with the dogs amd watch the music?"

"Sure. Have they got Rafael and Alessandro playing again this year?"

"Mhm. Hope Rafael will leave his fucking guitar at home though."

Marc laughs and scrapes the last bit of ravioli filling onto his fork. 

Two hundred and thirty seven days is a long time to know your husband is cheating on you and not say anything. He hasn't even made a snarky hint about it. It's a bit of a lesson in self-control, if he had to draw a positive.

But maybe two hundred and thirty seven days is long enough.

"This stuff is pretty nice actually." Marc picks the glass up and swishes it around, watching the liquid whirlpool before taking a sip.

"Mm," Dovi stares down at his own full glass. "You should ask Valentino for some more next time you go." 

He makes a little choking noise and replaces the glass a little harshly, clanging it against the ceramic as it goes.

"Sorry?"

Andrea picks up the two empty plates and cutlery and starts loading the dishwasher. Back to Marc, like a coward, he says: "I'm sure he's got plenty."

 There's silence. Then his chair scrapes. 

"How long?"

"Since May the second." 

Facing him in this moment is different to how he expected it would be. Marc looks kind of blank, a little lost for words.

"I uhm, I-I didn't expect it to go on for this long. It started as a one off thing and.. I wanted to say something, really, but, it's-"

"It's Vale. I know." 

Both of them knew it could only ever be Vale. Marc doesn't know why, why this grasping obsession won't relent, even after years of strangling it, stamping on it, hoping it bleeds out. He only knows he was weak enough to let it take hold again. 

Andrea knows why.  

"Fuck." Marc breathes, and hangs his head. 

Even a part of Andrea admires Rossi.  Even after all he put his husband through. 

Anyone with any sense of respect for the sport itself has a part of them who will put aside personality, and view Rossi as a faceless virtuoso who can do things on a motorcycle that lesser men simply cannot. Wave away the charm, the brand, the looks, Vale himself, and you still have the man, glued to the tank of a roaring beast, able to make it sing like prairie wolf. Because there's riding a bike, there's racing a bike, and there's whatever Valentino Rossi does. 

Which is what many men, nearly every other  on the planet, cannot.

Including Andrea.

Not including Marc. 

And that's probably why. 

If you grew up idolising God, and he gave you a throne next to his, would you say no?

"It's okay. I understand that with him- with anything like that- it's more than it looks like. More complicated." He curls an arm around his shoulders, and Marc tips his head into Dovi's chest.

"He's sorry," Comes muffled from Marc's mouth. "For everything."

"I know." He isn't. Andrea rubs his back and mumbles into his hair. "Are you?" 

Marc pulls back, wet eyelashes flicking and fluttering. He can't look Andrea in the eye.

"He makes me happy."

"I know."

"So do you."

"I know."

Marc's breath hitches and he finally looks him in the eye.

"I don't know what to do."