verstappenverse library

Your throat tightened so quickly it hurt.

For one awful second you could only stare at him waiting for something else, a flicker of regret, a sign that he had spoken out of frustration rather than meaning it, but nothing came. His expression remained unreadable, already turning back towards the monitors as though the conversation was over.

You blinked twice and gave a small nod, because pretending to agree felt safer than letting him see how deeply he had cut you. Then you walked past the engineering desk without speaking, keeping your shoulders straight and your gaze fixed ahead until you were safely out of sight, where no one could see the tremble in your chin or the tears gathering behind your eyes.

You didn’t say another word for the rest of the day.

You avoided him for the rest of the weekend.

During team meetings you took the seat furthest from his. In briefings every answer you gave was clipped, addressed to your engineers never to him. You didn’t look his way once even before FP3 when you caught him watching you through the reflection in the garage mirror as you pulled your balaclava over your head. You saw the way his gaze lingered almost as though he wanted to say something, but you turned away before he could.

Then qualifying came and everything got worse.

You locked up into Turn 12, the front tyres protesting as the car skidded just wide enough to cost you two tenths through the final sector. Two tenths that might have been enough to save you. Instead your name dropped to sixteenth as the clock ran out, leaving you stranded in the garage and eliminated in Q1.

By the time you had climbed out of the car the headlines were already writing themselves.

RED BULL’S LATEST RISK FAILS TO DELIVER.

MAX’S NEW TEAMMATE CRUMBLES UNDER PRESSURE.

It didn’t seem to matter that you weren’t actually his teammate, not yet at least. You were still only a junior driver, loaned out for unknown period of time during Isack’s injury, a slight test for the future so you could find your feet without the full weight of Red Bull pressing down on your shoulders. The media had already decided what you were supposed to become though and every mistake was treated as proof that you would never be ready for it.

Max’s comment had only lit the match.

Now the entire paddock seemed determined to watch you burn.

Over the next couple of weeks you began to notice a change in Max, it was easy enough to dismiss at first. He no longer offered unsolicited advice over the radio or hovered beside your engineers while they picked apart your laps. Instead he kept his distance, watching from across the garage whenever he thought you weren’t paying attention.

You did notice but you just simply refused to acknowledge it.

In the hospitality tent you kept your headphones on and your head lowered over a sheet of telemetry, pretending to study the same sector analysis you had been staring at for nearly twenty minutes. The numbers had blurred together long ago, but concentrating on them was easier than looking around and risking another encounter with him.

The chair beside you scraped against the floor and your shoulders tightened before you could stop them. Max sat down without asking, close enough that the edge of his knee nearly brushed yours beneath the table. For a moment, he said nothing, then a Red Bull energy bar slid across the page, covering the corner of the graph you had been pretending to read.

“Eat something.”

You pulled one side of your headphones away from your ear and stared at the bar. “I’m fine.”

“No you’re not.”

His answer came quickly, but there was none of the coldness or impatience you remembered from the last race. Only a quiet certainty that made your chest ache in a way you didn’t want to examine. You moved the energy bar aside and returned your attention to the data sheet. “You don’t need to worry about me.”

The silence that followed was uncomfortable, settling between you like wet concrete. Around you the hospitality suite carried on as normal cutlery clinking against plates, team members laughing near the coffee machine, someone discussing something as mundane as the weather two tables away, but the space between you felt strangely separate from all of it.

Max leaned back in his chair and released a breath, it wasn’t the irritated sigh you had grown used to hearing from him, he sounded tired, defeated, almost. When you finally glanced at him guilt sat heavily in the slope of his shoulders. His elbows rested against his knees, hands clasped loosely together as he stared down at the floor.

“I saw the headlines,” he said at last.

Your fingers tightened around the edge of the paper.

“And I know I made them worse.”

You looked away before he could see the flicker of hurt cross your face. “Forget it.”

Before he could reply you pushed your chair back and stood, Max reached for your wrist, calling your name as though he could stop you, but you pulled away without looking at him and walked out.

Max stopped keeping his distance after that.

At the next debrief he walked into the crowded conference room passed several empty chairs and took the seat directly beside you. You told yourself it was nothing, but when he did the same thing at the following session and again the day after that it became impossible to dismiss as coincidence.

Each time he arrived he would set his tablet down beside your notes and settle into the chair as though sitting anywhere else had never crossed his mind. While engineers filled the room and sector times glowed across the screens, Max remained at your side, listening more closely when your laps were discussed and quietly following every piece of feedback you were given.

He never tried to force a conversation, he simply listened, occasionally leaning closer to point out something on your screen or quietly asking one of your engineers to bring up a different lap comparison.

Then he began appearing in your garage after his own sessions. He would arrive with the sleeves of his team shirt pushed up to his elbows and an sheet of telemetery tucked beneath one arm, walking straight past the cameras and curious mechanics. Sometimes he had barely climbed out of his own car before he was asking for your telemetry.

It was strange, watching him study your laps with the same fierce concentration he usually reserved for his own. He replayed your onboard footage, compared steering traces and questioned your engineers until every small inconsistency had been pulled apart.

One evening, long after most of the paddock had begun to empty he stood beside you at the engineering desk, scrolling through a comparison between your fastest lap and the one that had been abandoned after a lock-up.

“This isn’t a braking issue,” he muttered.

You glanced away from the screen. “That’s what they keep telling me though.”

“They’re wrong.”

His tone was so blunt that one of your engineers looked up from the opposite end of the desk. Max either didn’t notice or didn’t care. He enlarged the tyre data and tapped the front-left trace with his finger.

“It isn’t coming up to temperature quickly enough. Look here.” He dragged the laps side by side. “You’re turning in expecting the grip to be there, but it isn’t. Then you’re compensating by braking later on the next lap which makes the lock-up worse.”

You studied the graph, following the lines he had highlighted. Once he pointed it out, the pattern seemed obvious.

“You’re chasing grip that the car isn’t giving you,” he continued. “You could drive the corner perfectly and still lose time.”

You looked at him instead of the screen.

Max noticed after a moment, his hand still hovering over the tablet. “What?”

“Why are you doing this?”

The question came out more quietly than you intended.

His expression closed slightly, and he turned his attention back to the data. “Because someone needs to.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

His jaw tightened.

You waited, unwilling to let him escape behind another graph or technical explanation.

Finally, Max lowered the tablet onto the desk. “Because I should have said something useful that day.”

You said nothing.

“I knew you were struggling with the car,” he continued. “I knew the balance was wrong, and I knew you were already blaming yourself for all of it.” His eyes stayed fixed on the screen, as though looking at you would make the admission harder. “I could have helped and instead I made you feel like you didn’t belong here.”

The familiar ache returned beneath your ribs.

“And now you think fixing my setup will make up for it?”

“No.” His answer was immediate. For the first time since you arrived he met your gaze fully.

“But it’s something I can do.”

You didn’t know how to respond to that. Part of you still wanted to be angry. Anger was usually easier. It created distance between you, kept his words sharp enough in your memory that you wouldn’t risk trusting him again.

But Max was making it difficult to hold on to, especially when he kept showing up. Every evening, once the media duties ended and the garage began to quiet, you would find him waiting near your engineering station. Sometimes he had two coffees balanced in one hand. Sometimes he had already loaded your onboard footage before you arrived. He never asked whether you wanted his help anymore, but he never acted as though you owed him anything for it either.

On Friday evening, you returned from a meeting to find him leaning against the desk, your more recent data already open in front of him.

He glanced up as you approached.

“Come on,” he said, pushing himself upright. “Get your notes. We’re going over Turn 4 again.”

You folded your arms. “We went over Turn 4 yesterday.”

“And you’re still losing a tenth on entry.”

“You’re very annoying.”

“I know.”

There was the faintest hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth, gone almost as soon as you noticed it. He picked up the laptop and started walking towards the back of the garage, clearly expecting you to follow.

For a moment, you remained where you were. Then you reached for your notebook and went after him.

It wasn’t until a media scrum a few races later that you understood just how much things between you had changed.

You stood behind the taped barrier beneath the harsh paddock lights, waiting for your turn while three different press officers attempted to keep the restless crowd of reporters moving. Your helmet bag hung from one shoulder, and you had already arranged the usual answers neatly in your head: the car was improving, the team was working hard, and you were taking everything one session at a time. Each response was measured, harmless and carefully constructed to give the journalists nothing they could twist into another headline.

A few feet away Max was halfway through his own interview when one of the reporters asked him about you.

“What do you make of her recent improvement? She seems to have found something over the last few races.”

You lowered your gaze, preparing yourself for the usual vague endorsement. Something about promising pace or needing more time. The sort of harmless answer drivers gave when they didn’t want to say anything at all.

Instead, Max tilted his head and squinted at the reporter as though the question had irritated him.

“She’s quick,” he said. “People forget how steep the learning curve is at this level. She’s had to learn a new car, a new team and tracks she’s never raced on before within a few weeks with everyone waiting for her to make a mistake. Give her time.”

Your grip tightened around the strap of your bag.

The reporter glanced down at his notes, a faint smirk pulling at his mouth. “It was a fairly rough start, though. You must have had doubts after the opening rounds.”

Max’s expression changed immediately.

“You ever driven a car at three hundred and twenty kilometres an hour while half the world watches your onboard and waits for you to get something wrong?”

The reporter’s smile faltered. “Well obviously not, but—”

“No?” Max interrupted, his voice still measured even as his eyes narrowed. “Standing here criticising her is easy. You’re very comfortable judging something you’ve never had the ability to do yourself.”

A murmur moved through the press pack, cameras shifted towards him, microphones lifting higher as everyone sensed the possibility of a headline. Max didn’t elaborate. He didn’t soften it with a laugh or look towards the press officer for rescue he simply handed back the microphone and stepped away from the barrier. He passed close enough that his shoulder nearly brushed yours, but he never looked at you.

You remained frozen in place, staring after him while the reporters around you whispered to one another and your press officer called your name for the second time.

For weeks Max had been helping you quietly, behind closed doors and dimmed garage screens where no one else could see, this was different, there had been a hundred cameras pointed at him, and he had defended you anyway, you wondered briefly whether guilt was still the only reason he kept showing up for you.

You found him alone at the back of the Red Bull motorhome after the race. The celebrations had already begun downstairs, your engineers opening bottles and passing around plastic cups because eighth place ordinarily meant very little, but today it meant everything. Your first Formula One points. A small mark beside your name on the championship table that proved, at least for one weekend, that you belonged there.

Max had disappeared shortly after the podium ceremony.

You found him slumped into the corner of one of the black leather sofas, still wearing his team kit, one ankle resting over the opposite knee. His phone was in his hand, but he didn’t appear to be reading anything. His thumb moved aimlessly over the screen, his expression distant in a way that made you think he had come there precisely because he didn’t want to be found.

He looked up when you entered.

“Congratulations,” he said, his voice quieter than you were used to hearing from him. “Your first points.”

You stopped a few feet from the sofa. “Thanks.”

Max studied you for a moment. “You don’t look very happy about it.”

“It’s not really enough still.” You shifted the strap of your bag higher onto your shoulder, reluctant to let yourself feel proud of a result that had fallen short of what you wanted.

“You scored your first points,” Max continued. “That should be celebrated. It isn’t easy and you shouldn’t act like eighth means nothing just because you wanted the podium.”

“I wasn’t planning on celebrating eighth.”

“No?” The corner of his mouth lifted faintly. “That’s disappointing. I was hoping I might finally get a smile out of you.”

Your eyes met his, and the warmth in them caught you off guard. “You’re not that charming.”

“I didn’t say I was.” His gaze dipped briefly down before returning to your eyes. “But you’re still trying not to smile.”

You looked away before he could see that he was right.

“You drove well,” he added, the teasing fading. “You stayed out of trouble, managed the tyres and took every chance when it came.”

The praise should have felt good, but it left a strange pressure beneath your ribs because you could still remember when his opinion had been the one you cared about most, before his words had hollowed you out and taught you not to look for his approval.

You nodded, unsure what else to offer him. “The changes helped.”

Max understood what you meant, the hours spent studying telemetry, the late evenings dissecting corners and the coffees left beside your laptop before early briefings.

His mouth tightened faintly. “They helped,” he agreed. “But you still had to drive the car.”

You could hear the muffled celebration below you, bursts of laughter rising through the floor whenever the doors opened. You considered leaving. You had already started to turn when Max placed his phone face down on the cushion beside him.

“Wait.”

You stopped.

He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, eyes fixed somewhere near your feet. There was tension in the movement, as though the words had been sitting inside him for weeks and he still hadn’t worked out how to say them.

“I meant what I said that day,” he began.

Your entire body went still.

“Not like that,” he corrected quickly. “Not in the way it sounded.”

A humourless laugh escaped you. “Is there another way to interpret ‘maybe this isn’t the place for you’?”

He looked up then.

There was no anger in his expression and none of the defensiveness you had expected. He looked exhausted in the way someone looked when they had been carrying the same regret for too long and had finally realised there was no painless way to put it down.

“No,” he admitted. “There isn’t.”

You folded your arms over your chest, more to protect yourself than anything else.

“I was frustrated,” he continued. “With the car, with the team, with myself. Everything had gone wrong that day and then you walked into the garage looking so…” His voice faltered, and he glanced away. “You looked completely crushed.”

The memory returned with painful clarity, the heat beneath your race suit and the silence from the engineers. Max’s voice following you through the garage.

“And so you decided to make it worse?”

“I knew that feeling,” he said. “I knew exactly what was going through your head because I’ve been there. I know what it feels like when everyone is watching, when one bad session becomes proof that you’re not good enough and when every person around you has an opinion about whether you deserve to be here.”

He leaned forward, resting his forearms against his knees. His hands clasped together so tightly that his knuckles had begun to pale.

“I knew how much you were already blaming yourself and instead of helping you I gave you another reason to.”

You looked down because holding his gaze had become too difficult.

“I told myself I was trying to warn you,” he continued. “That maybe you needed to understand how brutal this place could be before it swallowed you but that isn’t what I did. It isn’t how it came out.”

“Why?” you whispered.

Max inhaled slowly.

“Because I was scared for you.”

You looked at him again.

His gaze remained fixed on his hands. “I know what this place does to people. I know what it did to me when I was your age, everyone tells you that pressure makes you stronger, but sometimes it just makes you believe you’re only worth something when you’re winning.”

His jaw tightened, the words becoming more difficult with every sentence.

“I could see you starting to disappear into it, every mistake or headline, every time someone questioned you—like it proved something. I wanted to tell you that it didn’t. I wanted to say that you’re allowed to struggle and that one bad session doesn’t mean you don’t belong here, you’re allowed to question whether you want to be here and that doesn’t mean you don’t care.”

A broken breath left him.

“But I didn’t know how to say that… in fact I said the exact opposite.”

The tears came before you could stop them, stinging at the corners of your eyes. You blinked quickly, but one escaped anyway, slipping down your cheek before you could turn away. His expression crumpled so briefly you might have missed it if you hadn’t been watching him. He swallowed hard, eyes shining as he looked down at the floor again.

“I’m sorry,” he said. His voice shook now, stripped of every trace of the certainty he carried in front of cameras. “I know saying it doesn’t undo anything. I know helping with the car doesn’t make it better, but I am so fucking sorry for making you feel like that.”

You stood there for a long moment. Part of you had imagined this apology countless times. In some versions, you shouted at him. In others, you told him exactly what his words had done to you and walked away before he had the chance to answer, but now that the moment had arrived, anger wasn’t the strongest thing you felt.

It was relief. Relief that he understood. That he hadn’t forgotten it the moment the words left his mouth, that every evening he had spent beside you had meant something more than obligation.

You crossed the room before you could overthink it and lowered yourself onto the sofa beside him. Max watched you carefully, almost warily, as though he didn’t trust himself to hope.

You shifted closer and gently rested your head against his shoulder.

For several seconds, Max didn’t move. Then his body softened beside yours, and he released a long, unsteady breath as though he had been holding it since that first Friday afternoon.

His head tipped carefully against yours.

You never said the words I forgive you, but when Max’s hand settled beside yours on the sofa, his little finger brushing tentatively against your own you didn’t pull away.

By the time the paddock reached Austria Max had become woven so thoroughly into your routine that neither of you seemed capable of remembering when it had happened.

He was there during the quiet hours before briefings, leaning against the counter in hospitality while you waited for your drink, and again late in the evening when the garages began to empty and the conversations around you softened into the tired murmur of engineers preparing for the following day. What had begun as Max helping you understand an unpredictable car had become something far less structured. Some evenings you still spent hours studying telemetry and comparing onboard footage and on others the laptop remained open and almost entirely forgotten while he told you stories about his early years in the sport or tried to convince you that his terrible movie recommendations were somehow your fault for listening to him.

Whenever you climbed out of the car after a session your eyes would drift instinctively towards his garage. At dinner you saved the seat beside you before you had consciously decided to do it. When something went well Max had somehow become the first person you wanted to tell, even when he had already been watching the entire thing unfold.

The team had started to notice and the reporters had certainly noticed, but neither of you acknowledged it.

After qualifying seventh in Austria you found Max near the back of the garage, studying the final timing screen. He had claimed pole by less than a tenth and should have been preparing for the media pen, but his attention shifted towards you the moment you approached.

You stopped beside him and folded your arms, allowing a deliberately smug smile to form.

“You’re welcome.”

Max glanced towards the screen and then back at you. “For what?”

“Pole.”

His eyebrows lifted. “My pole?”

“You were losing time through Turn 6 yesterday. I told you the wind was pushing the rear around on entry.”

“You said it felt like it ‘might be windy tomorrow’.”

“And then you went faster.”

A smile spread slowly across his face. “So now you are taking credit for my qualifying?”

“Only the successful parts.”

“What about the rest of the lap?”

“That was acceptable too.”

Max laughed, a warm sound that caught the attention of one of the nearby mechanics. A few months earlier you would never have spoken to him like this, you would have analysed every word before saying it and waited anxiously for some indication that he approved. Now you simply enjoyed the way his eyes brightened whenever you surprised him.

“Well,” he said, turning his body fully towards you, “thank you for securing my pole position.”

“You’re very welcome.”

“And congrats on seventh.”

Your smile softened. “Thank you.”

There was no joking qualification attached to it. Max did not point out where you had lost time or suggest that you might have placed higher with a cleaner final sector. He had never treated your progress like something he had created, even after all the hours he had spent helping you, when you did well the achievement remained entirely yours.

“You looked confident out there,” he said.

“I felt better.”

“I could tell.”

Something in his tone made warmth rise beneath your skin. “Were you watching?”

“I’d finished my lap.” Max’s gaze travelled over your face, amusement softening into something more intent. “You make it very difficult not to watch you.”

Your press officer called your name from the entrance to the garage before you could decide how to answer. You glanced towards her and then back at him, reluctant to let the moment end.

“I have to go.”

“I know.”

Neither of you moved immediately.

“Try not to lose the lead tomorrow. I would hate for all my coaching to be wasted.”

“I’ll do my best.”

“You should, I have a reputation to protect now.”

Max shook his head, still smiling as you turned away and you could feel his eyes following you until you disappeared into the corridor.

The race unfolded more perfectly than anything you'd allowed yourself to imagine.

You gained a place before the first corner and emerged from the opening lap in sixth, the car balanced beneath you in a way it rarely had been at the beginning of the season. Max led several seconds ahead, but for once you weren't thinking about him or the expectations attached to being part of the same programme. Your focus narrowed to the car in front, the gap on your steering wheel and the calm instructions coming through your radio.

During the first stint you remained close enough to fifth to force the driver ahead into using more of his tyres than he wanted. Your engineer suggested extending the stint, trusting that you could maintain the pace while the others began to struggle.

It worked. You emerged from the pits later with clear air and tyres fresh enough to attack. By the time the strategy settled you were running fifth with fourth place less than three seconds ahead.

There had been a point earlier in the season when fifth would have felt too valuable to risk, you would have protected the result, terrified that wanting more might cost you everything. That instinct still whispered at the edge of your concentration, but it no longer controlled you.

With eight laps remaining you began closing the gap. The car ahead defended into Turn 3, forcing you to abandon the first attempt, but you stayed close through the middle sector. On the following lap, you positioned the car more carefully through the final two corners and pulled alongside before the braking zone.

For a fraction of a second your front-left threatened to lock.

You kept your foot in and trusted the car to hold.

The two of you swept through the corner together, but you had the inside line for the next turn. By the time you accelerated fourth place was yours.

Your engineer’s voice erupted through the radio.

“That’s P4! Great move. Absolutely fantastic.”

A breathless laugh escaped you inside your helmet. “That was close.”

You crossed the line three laps later in fourth, with Max taking the victory several seconds ahead.

The result registered slowly as you completed the cooldown lap. It wasn’t a podium, although you could almost touch one now, only three drivers had finished ahead of you and for the first time that knowledge felt exciting rather than cruel. You hadn't inherited the position through retirements or luck. You had raced for it and taken it.

When you returned to parc fermé your team were waiting against the barriers. Hands reached towards you as you climbed from the car, mechanics cheering loudly enough to be heard over the engines still arriving behind you.

You'd barely removed your helmet when someone caught you around the waist.

A startled laugh left you as your feet lifted briefly from the ground. You knew who it was before Max could set you down, his arms still loose around you and a victorious grin covering his face.

“Fourth,” he said.

“First,” you replied, looking up at him. “I suppose you managed without too much trouble.”

“I had excellent coaching.”

His hands remained at your waist and yours had settled instinctively against his shoulders. Around you cameras clicked continuously, but Max appeared entirely unconcerned by the attention.

“That overtake was brilliant” he said.

“Wha-How?”

“Because I was watching.”

“You were leading.”

“I had a gap.”

“You used it to watch my race?”

Max’s eyes moved over your face, his voice lowering despite the noise surrounding you. “I told you. You make it difficult not to.”

In the garage you had been able to blame the electricity between you on adrenaline from qualifying. Here, with his hands still resting against your waist and his attention fixed entirely on you there was nowhere for either of you to hide.

A member of the podium crew called for Max, he glanced reluctantly towards the stage and then back at you.

“You need to go,” you told him.

“Stay for the podium.”

“I usually do.”

“Stay where I can see you.”

Your heart stumbled, you tried to cover it with a smile. “Planning to dedicate the win to your coach?”

“Maybe.”

Max gave your waist one final squeeze before stepping away. The absence of him felt immediate although his gaze remained on you until someone placed a cap in his hands and steered him towards the podium.

When Max lifted the trophy he found you beneath the stage almost instantly. Champagne had dampened his hair and darkened the shoulders of his race suit, but his attention settled on you with such certainty that several photographers turned to follow his line of sight.

You raised your eyebrows and mouthed, You’re welcome.

Even from a distance you saw him laugh.

It was much later before the two of you managed to escape the celebrations.

The paddock had begun to quiet when you found Max on the terrace behind the motorhome, he had changed into a clean team shirt although his hair was still damp from the champagne. His trophy sat on the table beside two bottles of beer, catching the last of the evening sunlight.

“You abandoned your own party,” you said as you stepped outside.

Max turned towards you. “I was waiting for someone.”

“Your coach?”

“She’s becoming very demanding.”

You walked towards him and accepted the bottle he offered. “Success changes people.”

“So does finishing fourth apparently.”

You leaned beside him against the railing. “I was delightful before.”

“You barely spoke to me.”

“You deserved it.”

“I did.”

The ease with which he accepted it removed any sting from the exchange, he looked out over the paddock for a moment, his shoulder resting against yours before turning his bottle slowly between his hands.

“You should be proud of today.”

“I am.”

Max glanced sideways at you, checking for any sign that you were only saying it for his benefit.

You smiled. “I really am.”

His expression warmed. “Good.”

“I wanted the podium.”

“I know.”

“But I didn’t leave feeling like fourth was a failure.” You looked down at the bottle in your hands. “That’s new.”

“You’ll get one soon.”

The certainty in his voice made you laugh. “You sound very sure.”

“I am.”

“What happens when I do?”

Max’s gaze shifted towards you. “When you do what?”

“Get a podium.”

He considered the question with exaggerated seriousness. “You stand on the stage. They give you a trophy. Usually there’s champagne.”

You turned until your hip rested against the railing, facing him properly. “I meant what happens afterwards.”

Understanding flickered across his face.

“Are you asking me to plan your celebration?”

“I’m asking whether you intend to be there.”

Max’s smile became more private replacing the teasing expression he'd worn moments earlier. “I intend to be there for all of them.”

The answer caught you off guard.

“All of them?” you repeated.

“Your first podium. Your first win.” His eyes remained on yours. “Whatever comes after that.”

The future opened quietly between you, carried in words that could still have been about racing if either of you needed them to be.

“You’re planning quite far ahead,” you murmured.

“I spend a lot of time looking at data. I can recognise a trend.”

“And what trend is that?”

“You keep getting closer.”

“To the podium?”

Max stepped nearer, leaving only a narrow space between you. “That too.”

Warmth climbed into your cheeks, but you resisted the instinct to look away. The confidence you had found in the car seemed to follow you here allowing you to hold his gaze and enjoy the rare moment in which Max appeared to be the less certain one.

“So,” you said, stepping slightly closer, “when I get my podium how exactly are we celebrating?”

His gaze dropped briefly to your mouth.

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“Whether you’re still pretending you don’t know what I want.”

Your pulse quickened, but you managed to keep your expression composed. “Perhaps you should explain it to me.”

Max laughed under his breath. “You’re enjoying this.”

“A little.”

“This was much easier when you were nervous around me.”

“You hated it when I was nervous around you.”

His expression sobered. “I do like this version better.”

Months earlier his opinion had shattered something in you. Now he looked at you as though your growing confidence was not merely something he had witnessed, but something he treasured.

“You helped.”

“You did the difficult part.”

He moved closer until his shoulder brushed yours and lowered his voice.

“Get the podium.”

“And then?”

“Then you won’t have to ask whether I’ll be there.”

You smiled. “Still avoiding the question about the celebration.”

“I already told you. It depends.”

“On whether I know what you want?”

“Yes.”

You tilted your face towards his, leaving so little distance that you felt his breath catch. “I think I’m beginning to work it out.”

For one suspended moment you thought he might kiss you.

Instead Max reached up and tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear, his fingertips trailing lightly along your cheek. The restraint in the gesture made it feel more intimate than rushing forward would have done.

“You drove beautifully today,” he said.

There was no joke to hide behind now, you let the praise settle without dismissing it.

“Thank you.”

His hand lingered against your cheek before falling slowly.

When you eventually returned inside Max placed his palm against the small of your back and guided you through the doorway. Several team members looked up, one of them smiled knowingly before returning to his conversation.

The podium felt close now.

Whatever waited after it felt closer too.

Tom doesn't count. Tom knew for exactly four days before he very calmly explained that he wasn't ready, that they were young, that he had a tour starting in the autumn and a life that didn't have room in it for diapers and 3 a.m. feeds, and that he hoped you'd understand. He'd said it like he was declining a second helping at dinner, already halfway out the door before he'd even finished the sentence.

You haven't told anyone yet, your mum or your siblings, not your friends not even you best friend which infuriatingly happens to be one of the most photographed men in the world, a fact that has made hiding a pregnancy from him feel like trying to hide a fire from a smoke detector.

Max Verstappen notices everything, it's one of the most maddening and most comforting things about him.

You met him six years ago, doing data analysis for a sponsor activation within the sim racing commuinty that quickly turned into a real job that turned into something you never expected, being one of the handful of people Max actually trusts to tell him the truth, paddock politics and PR spin be damned. He started texting you about things that had nothing to do with work. You started being the person he called after bad qualifying sessions, before the team got to him, before he had to put the press face on. Somewhere in six years of garage benches and late-night flights and him falling asleep on your shoulder on the team plane, best friend became too small a word, even if neither of you had ever said so out loud.

So when you straighten up from the bathroom sink and find him leaning against the corridor wall outside, arms crossed, eyes already narrowed at you, you know you're in trouble.

"Bad coffee," you say before he can ask.

"You've said that three times this week." His voice is light, but his eyes aren't. "You hate the coffee here. You've hated it for years. You've never once thrown up over it."

"Maybe it's extra bad this week."

"Maybe." He doesn't believe you. He's too polite or too scared of the answer to push further right now, but you see it somewhere behind his eyes, a little flicker of something filing itself away. Max doesn't forget things, he just waits for the right moment to bring them back up, usually when you're least prepared for it.

You think you've gotten away with it.

It happens properly three days later in Barcelona, in the kind of heat that makes the tarmac shimmer and turns the garage into an oven. You're standing at the back wall with a tablet in your hand trying to focus on lap times when the world tips sideways and goes white at the edges.

You don't remember deciding to sit down. You remember the floor coming up faster than you expected and a hand catching your arm hard enough to bruise and Max's voice very close to your ear saying your name like it's the only word he knows.

When the garage swims back into focus you're sitting on an upturned tyre with your head between your knees and Max is crouched in front of you, one hand still gripping your arm, the other hovering like he doesn't know where it's allowed to land.

"Hey. Hey, look at me." His voice is low, urgent, stripped of all its usual easy charm. "What's going on and don’t bullshit me."

"I'm fine, I just—"

"Don't." It comes out sharper than you've ever heard him say anything to you, he catches himself and softens. "Please don't tell me you're fine, you went white as a sheet and I had to catch you before you hit concrete, something is wrong and you've been hiding it for weeks and I’m done pretending."

The garage is loud around you, impact wrenches, radio chatter, someone laughing two bays down, but right here in the small space between the two of you it's gone very quiet.

You could lie again. You've gotten good at lying these past two months, but looking at him at the genuine fear carved into his face, at the way his thumb is moving in small unconscious circles against your wrist like he's trying to keep you tethered to the ground you find you don't have it in you anymore.

"Not here," you whisper.

He doesn't argue, he just stands and pulls you up gently by the hand he refuses to let go of and walks you straight past his engineers, past a PR exec who opens her mouth to ask something and gets a look from Max that closes it again, out through the garage doors and into the motorhome, into his driver's room and shuts the door behind you both.

The silence stretches, you sit on the edge of the small sofa and he crouches in front of you again, exactly like before, except this time there's no test sitting face-down between you. This time it's just you and him and the truth sitting heavy in your throat.

"I'm pregnant," you say.

You watch it land on him in stages. The flicker of shock. The fast, involuntary glance down, like he's checking, like some part of him needs to see it to believe it. Then something that looks almost like relief, because at least now he has an answer and then fast on its heels something that looks like hurt.

"How long have you known?"

"Eight weeks."

"Eight weeks." He sits back on his heels, dragging a hand through his hair. "Eight weeks and you didn't—" He stops himself, exhales hard through his nose. When he looks back at you, the hurt is still there, but he's pushed it down replaced by concern. "Okay. Okay. Does Tom know?"

You laugh, but it isn't really a laugh. "Tom knew for four days and then… then… he told me he wasn't ready to be a father and that he hoped I'd understand and then he left." You rush through the end.

Max goes very still.

"He left?"

"There wasn't a scene if that's what you're picturing. He didn't even raise his voice. He was completely reasonable about the whole thing. Just—" Your throat tightens, tears threatening to break the surface and you hate how much it still costs you to say it out loud. "Just decided I wasn't worth staying for.” You looked down at your stomach. “Neither of us was."

Something moves across Max's face that you've only seen once before. A controlled, simmering anger, banked low because he refuses to let it run him.

"I’m going to need a minute before I say anything about him," he says tightly, "because right now everything I want to say isn't something you need to right now."

"I'm not going to fall apart."

"You don't have to be strong in front of me." He reaches up, and his hand finds yours, lacing your fingers together with a gentleness that doesn't match the tension still sitting in his jaw.

That's the thing that finally breaks something loose in your chest, the loneliness of two months carrying this on your own hurts, but the fact that he said it like it was true, like it had always been true, like there had never been a version of your friendship where you were supposed to perform for his benefit.

You cry, for the first time since the bathroom floor in April. Max doesn't say anything clever or comforting, he just moves to sit beside you, pulls you against his chest and holds on, one hand splayed warm against your back his chin resting on the top of your head letting you shake apart in the quiet of his driver's room while somewhere outside an entire Formula 1 paddock carries on without either of you in it.

He doesn't ask you to explain anything else that day, he just asks, quietly into your hair, "What do you need?"

"I don't know yet."

"Okay." His arms tighten slightly. "Then we'll figure it out together, starting now."

Together. It's such a small word for the size of what it does to you.

The weeks that follow rearrange themselves around that word.

Max starts showing up later to things, leaving earlier, finding excuses to be wherever you are for how ever long he can. He learns with the focus he usually reserves for braking points and tyre windows, which smells make you sick (jet fuel, the factory coffee, weirdly his usual deodorant, which he switches without complaint or explanation) and which foods you can actually keep down (plain crackers, ginger tea he starts carrying in his backpack like contraband, the bland pasta from the catering truck that nobody else will touch). He starts parking himself between you and the worst of the garage noise during the bad mornings, an unspoken human buffer, and develops a low, particular tone of voice he only uses on you, the one that says I see you, I'm not going anywhere, you don't have to ask.

You tell your mum first, then your friends, both of who cry and hug you and ask with the same raised eyebrow exactly what Max's role in all this is. You don't have an answer yet. You're not sure you're allowed to want one.

You don't tell the wider paddock yet, work, pregnancy, and formula 1 don't usually share a sentence, and the thought of cameras and questions and the mix of yours, Max’s, and Tom’s names dragged into headlines makes your stomach turn worse than the morning sickness does. Max doesn't push you he simply absorbs the burden of secrecy alongside you, covering for you in team meetings, redirecting a curious journalist's question at a press conference with the kind of smooth deflection that makes you suspect he's been practicing in the mirror.

What he won't let you do is go to appointments alone.

"You don't have to come to this one," you tell him before the twelve-week scan, the words coming out more uncertain than you mean them to. "It's just a scan. I can text you after."

"I'm coming." He says it the way he says things about race strategy he’s already decided on, not up for discussion, simply decided. "Unless you don't want me there. If you don't want me there that's different I'll respect that, but if the only reason you're trying to talk me out of it is because you think you're supposed to spare me the inconvenience don't… I'm not inconvenienced. I want to be there."

You don't try to talk him out of it again. He holds your hand in the small white ultrasound room, and when the technician turns the screen and there's suddenly a heartbeat filling the speakers, fast and fluttering and real, you feel his fingers tighten around yours, hard enough that you glance over and find him with his jaw locked tight, eyes glassy, trying and failing to look like a man who is simply being supportive of his friend.

"Max."

"I'm fine," he says, in almost exactly the tone you used on him in the corridor weeks ago and you both hear it at the same time, and something that isn't quite a laugh and isn't quite a sob escapes you both at once.

It's a slow, careful thing, what grows between you over the following months there’s no lightning-strike moment but a hundred small ones stacked on top of each other. The way he starts resting a hand low on your back without seeming to notice he's doing it. The nursery furniture he "happens" to be browsing online one night when you fall asleep on his sofa and wake to find the laptop tilted carefully away from you, like he's embarrassed to be caught wanting this as much as he apparently does. The night you wake from a nightmare about being left again, about doing this all alone and call him at 2 a.m. without really meaning to and he doesn't ask a single question just says "I'm coming over," and is at your door eleven minutes later eyes still half-asleep and folds you against his chest in the doorway until your heart stops trying to climb out of your throat.

You don't talk about what it is. There's an unspoken agreement to let it exist in the undefined space between friendship and something more, both of you too careful or too scared to be the one who names it first and risks shattering this fragile, good thing you've built.

It's Tom in the end, who forces the conversation neither of you have had the courage to start.

He resurfaces near the end of your second trimester a single message out of nowhere asking if you're "doing okay" with a casualness that makes your hands shake with something closer to fury than grief. You don't reply. Max is there when it comes through, sees your face change, and reads the message over your shoulder.

His expression doesn't do the controlled, banked-anger thing this time, it just goes hard and flat.

"He doesn't get to do that," Max says. "He doesn't get to disappear for months and then text you like he's checking in on a colleague."

"I know."

"Does he get to know anything? About this baby? About you?"

"I don't know," you admit. "I think… I think I'm allowed to decide that later, not today."

Max nods, jaw working, and then, "Can I say something, and you don't have to answer right away?"

Your pulse picks up. "Okay."

"I'm not telling you this because of him." He sets the phone down on the table between you like he wants nothing not even a screen between you both for what he's about to say. "I've felt this way for a long time, before Tom, before any of this. I told myself it didn't matter, because you were happy and what kind of person makes that about himself." He exhales. "But I'm not in this because I feel sorry for you and I need you to know that because I think some part of you might be scared that's what this is."

"Max—"

"I love you." He says it simply, the way he says true things, without performance, without flourish. "I think I have for a long time. This isn't me filling a gap Tom left, this is just… this is what I already felt and I had to tell you."

The room goes very quiet, outside, you can hear the ordinary sounds of an ordinary evening, a car passing, someone's television through a thin wall and none of it touches the small, suspended space the two of you are sitting in.

"I'm scared," you say, because it's true, and because he's earned the truth from you a hundred times over by now. "Of… of doing this again. Trusting someone with this and being wrong. You’ve given me no reason to, you’ve been everything I could ask for, now and even before everything… but I am scared, thats the truth."

He reaches over, careful, slow, and brushes a strand of hair back from your face, his palm settling against your cheek the way it did once before. "I'm not going anywhere. I'll be here when it's hard, when it's three in the morning and the baby's crying and neither of us has slept. I've had months, years of proof that this is what I want and I will keep proving it for as long as you need me to."

You don't surge forward this time, the way you might have once in some other version of this story. You move deliberately, giving yourself the time to be sure and when your lips finally meet his it isn't desperate, it's quiet, like something settling into the place it was always going to end up.

He kisses you like he's been waiting a long time and is in no hurry now that he doesn't have to wait anymore. One hand stays gentle against your cheek; the other finds your waist, careful of the small swell of you that wasn't there when this friendship started, that has somehow become the reason it didn't stay just a friendship after all.

When you finally pull back, foreheads resting together, both of you a little breathless he laughs, disbelieving and joyful in a way you've rarely heard from him.

"What?" you ask.

"Nothing. Just—" He shakes his head slightly, eyes not leaving yours. "I used to think I'd have to wait for some perfect moment to tell you, I never expected it’d be like this… but it always going to be you."

You press your hand over his, where it still rests against the curve of your stomach and for the first time since you saw those pink lines on a stick at two in the morning the fear that has lived in your chest for months finally lets go.

"Just us then," you murmur.

"Just us," he agrees. "All three of us."

Your hair was messy, falling across your cheek. Your feet were tucked under his thigh for warmth. You were wearing those ridiculous holiday pajama pants covered in tiny Christmas trees despite the fact that it was April because you claimed they were your comfiest pair.

Max had smiled when you came out wearing them.

He was still smiling now. It was such a small thing, so ordinary, and so painfully normal that it shouldn’t have meant anything at all and yet as he looked at you curled against him, your breathing soft and even, your hand resting loosely on his stomach like even in sleep some part of you can’t be apart from him. The thought came before he could stop it.

I could do this forever.

It settled inside him with a strange kind of weight. Max had never been the sort of man who dreamed about weddings. He had spent his entire life chasing speed, control, precision. His future had always been measured in lap times and contracts, in championships and calendars, in the next race, the next season, the next thing he needed to prove.

Marriage had been something distant and abstract, something other people thought about. Something that might happen one day, maybe, if life ever slowed down enough for him to consider it, but with you asleep in his arms, in Christmas pajamas in the middle of spring, mumbling something unintelligible when you shifted closer, it did not feel distant anymore.

It felt terrifyingly close.

His throat tightened.

Max Verstappen was also not afraid of much. He’d spent his whole life staring fear down at three hundred kilometres an hour, daring it to blink first, he knew pressure and he certainly knew risk. He knew what it was to carry expectation so heavy it could crush someone weaker, but this was different. This was not fear of losing a race. This was fear of wanting something so badly that losing it would break him.

You sighed softly in your sleep, your fingers twitching against him.

“Max,” you murmured, barely audible.

He froze.

Then, slowly, his arm tightened around you. “Yeah,” he whispered, though you were not awake to hear him. He pressed his lips to the top of your head and stared at the TV.

Yeah.

He could do this forever.

The second time the thought came it was less gentle. It was a random Tuesday evening, the kind neither of you would ever remember for any obvious reason. There was no race or event to attend, a quiet weekend just the two of you in his kitchen, music playing quietly in the background and Max stubbornly insisting he actually could cook.

He could not.

That much became clear twenty minutes later when something in the pan began sticking in a way that looked permanently damaging. You stood beside him, arms crossed, watching with open delight as he attempted to scrape whatever he had made from the bottom.

“Max.”

“It’s fine.”

“It’s smoking.”

“It’s not smoking.”

“Well it literally is smoking.”

He glanced down at the pan, then back at you. “A little bit.”

You burst out laughing and took the spatula from his hand before he could make it worse. “You're actually useless,” you teased, nudging him aside with your hip. “How do you drive an F1 car but can’t flip a pancake?”

Max leaned against the counter and crossed his arms. “The car does not stick to the pan.”

You scraped at the burnt mess, shaking your head. “You’re lucky you’re good at other things.”

He smirked immediately. “Like what?”

You glanced at him, ready to tease him he could see it in your face, you were going to say something smug, something ridiculous, something designed purely to annoy him, but then you paused and your expression shifted. It softened in a way that caught him off guard, your smile fading into something quieter.

“You’re good at making people feel safe,” you said.

It's not what he expected.

Not even close. People had called him a lot of things throughout his life. Fast. Relentless. Arrogant. Aggressive. Brilliant. Difficult. Champion. They had analysed him, criticised him, praised him, turned him into a headline and a debate and a weapon depending on who was talking.

But safe?

That word had never belonged to him. At least he had never thought it did, but you said it so easily, like it was obvious. Like there was no doubt in your mind that when you thought of safety, you thought of him. His fingers twitched against the counter.

“You think that?” he asked, quieter than he meant to.

You looked back at the pan, suddenly shy, as if you had not expected the words to come out so sincerely.

“Yeah,” you said. “Of course I do.”

Of course.

Max didn’t know what to say so he said nothing. He just watched you rescue dinner from his failed attempt, still teasing him under your breath, still moving around his kitchen like you belonged in every corner of his life.

Later that night when you were curled beside him on the sofa, one hand absentmindedly tracing patterns across his arm while the television played in the background he pressed a kiss to your temple and lingered there longer than usual.

You hummed softly. “What was that for?”

“Nothing,” he murmured.

But it wasn’t nothing, it was the first time he understood that loving you was not just about wanting you. It was about the version of himself he became around you. A man who could be gentle, who could be trusted and a man who could be someone’s safe place.

The third time there was no escaping it.

Austria had been awful.

The kind of race that left frustration burning under his skin long after he had climbed out of the car. A mechanical issue had thrown everything off instead of fighting where he should have been fighting he had spent the afternoon managing damage, swallowing anger, forcing himself through interviews while every question felt like salt in an open wound.

By the time he got back to the apartment he was exhausted, he was worn down, irritated, and in no mood to talk to anyone… but then there was you.

You were on the couch with a blanket over your legs, a cup of tea in your hands, the lamp beside you casting a warm glow across the room. You looked up when he came in and you didn’t flinch at the expression on his face, you didn’t rush toward him with pity and you didn’t launch into some rehearsed speech about how it was okay, how there would be other races, how he had done his best.

You just looked at him.

Knowingly.

Max sighed and dragged a hand over his face, and dropped onto the couch beside you. You set your mug down without a word and shifted closer, tucking yourself into his side, your fingers found his hair threading through loosely.

“Want to talk about it?” you asked.

He stared ahead. “Not really.”

“Okay.”

That was it. No need for him to explain the anger sitting heavy in his chest when he barely understood what to do with it himself. Max closed his eyes and you rested your head against his shoulder, thumb brushing slow, soothing lines over the back of his hand and in the quiet, with the city outside and the race behind him and you beside him it hit him so clearly that he almost couldn’t breathe.

This was forever love.

The kind of love that didn’t demand he become easier to handle before it stayed or the kind that sat beside him in the aftermath. The kind that knew when to speak and when to be quiet and the kind that made forever feel nothing like a trap and more like a promise.

Max turned his head slightly, looking at you. You were still watching the television pretending not to notice the way his emotions had shifted beside you.

I’m going to marry you he thought.

The certainty of it should have scared him.

The truth was it did scare him a little, but not enough to make him run from it.

You glanced up. “You okay?”

Max looked at you for a long moment.

Then he nodded.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “More than.”

He bought the ring two weeks later.

That part should've been simple.

It was not.

Max spent an embarrassing amount of time looking at rings online, then decided online was useless because the photos all looked the same, then went to an actual jeweller and immediately regretted not bringing someone with him. His mother would have known what questions to ask. His sister would have told him if he was picking the wrong style. His friends would have been unbearable but probably helpful in the way people were when they were too nosy for their own good.

Instead Max stood in front of a glass display case, staring at diamonds while the jeweller patiently asked what style his partner liked.

Max opened his mouth.

Paused.

Then realised he knew everything and somehow nothing.

He knew how you took your tea. He knew which hoodie of his you stole most often. He knew the exact face you made when you were pretending not to be annoyed. He knew how you liked your toast, which side of the bed you slept on, the films you watched when you were sad, the songs you played when you were getting ready, the way your voice changed when you were trying not to laugh.

But ring style?

He could hear your voice in his head, teasing him.

You should know this Verstappen.

So he tried.

He looked at delicate ones. Bigger ones. Classic ones. Modern ones. Ones that looked too much. Ones that looked too plain. He frowned at every single option until the jeweller must have started to wonder whether he was trying to plan a robbery.

Then he saw it and all the noise stopped, it wasn’t the biggest ring in the shop or the flashiest, but it looked like you. Elegant, warm, unique, quietly impossible to look away from.

Max stared at it.

“That one,” he said.

The jeweller smiled. “Would you like to see it?”

Max nodded, but he already knew.

The moment the box was placed in his hand, the future became more real, not a thought on a sofa or a feeling in a kitchen or a promise made silently after a bad race.

A ring.

A question.

A life.

He kept it in his jacket pocket for three days before he worked up the courage to do anything with it and then, because he was Max and he had overthought it so much he decided he needed more information.

Which was how he ended up suggesting a shopping trip.

You stared at him from across the kitchen like he had announced he wanted to take up ballet.

“You want to go shopping?”

Max kept his expression neutral. “Yes.”

“With me?”

“Yes.”

“On a weekend?”

“Yes.”

You narrowed your eyes. “Are you dying?”

He rolled his eyes. “No.”

“Have you done something wrong?”

“No.”

“Are you about to do something wrong?”

“No.”

“Then why are you willingly stepping into a mall?”

Max grabbed his car keys before you could interrogate him further. “I just think we should look around.”

“Look around?”

“See what’s new.”

“You want to see what's new?”

“Maybe get you something nice.”

Your suspicion deepened. “You're being very weird.”

“I'm not.”

“You are.”

“Are you coming or not?”

Of course you came, you were too curious not to.

Max tried to be subtle once you got there.

He was not good at being subtle. He steered you past clothing shops too quickly, pretended to be interested in shoes for approximately thirty seconds, and then somehow found himself pausing outside every jewellery store you passed, glancing at the displays like a man attempting espionage with no training.

You noticed. Still you played along at first, mostly because watching Max Verstappen attempt at casual behaviour was one of life’s greatest joys.

At the first jewellery store he stopped in front of a display of bracelets.

“These are nice,” he said, too stiffly.

You looked at him. “Are they?”

“Yes.”

“You wear the same three things every day.”

“For my mother,” he said quickly.

“Your mother.”

“Yes.”

“You’re buying your mother a bracelet?”

“Maybe.”

“Max, her birthday was months ago.”

“I can buy her things at other times.”

You hummed, looking back at the display. “That is true.”

He relaxed slightly.

Then ruined it immediately by saying, “What about rings?”

You almost laughed.

“Rings for your mother?”

He froze.

You watched the panic flicker across his face and had to bite the inside of your cheek.

“Maybe not for my mother,” he muttered. “Just generally.”

“Generally,” you repeated.

“Yes.”

You let him suffer for another few seconds before smiling sweetly. “Sure. We can look at rings generally.”

Max exhaled like he had just survived a near Q3 miss.

He asked what you liked and tried to sound indifferent. Failed. He asked whether certain shapes were nice. Whether yellow gold was better than white gold. Whether you thought some rings were too much or too simple, at one point he even made you try one on, claiming he was just curious how it looked on a hand.

“A hand,” you said.

“Yes.”

“Any hand?”

His jaw tightened. “Just try the ring.”

So you did and the second it slid onto your finger something changed in his face. His eyes softened, his mouth parting slightly as if the sight had knocked the words out of him. For a moment he forgot to pretend this was casual. Forgot the shop and the weak excuses, the ridiculous cover story about hypothetical jewellery.

He just looked at your hand.

At the ring.

At you.

Your heart kicked hard against your ribs.

Then he cleared his throat and looked away.

“Looks fine,” he said.

Fine.

You nearly kicked him.

By the time you stopped for coffee, Max was tense enough that you were starting to wonder whether he might propose in the middle of the café out of sheer panic.

Instead he got distracted by at a football merch store opposite and wandered over to look at something in the window after leaving his jacket draped over the back of the chair beside you.

His phone buzzed in the pocket. You glanced at it instinctively, more to stop it vibrating off the chair than anything else. You reached for the jacket intending to push it more securely onto the seat. That was when the small velvet box slipped from the pocket and landed in your lap.

For a second you didn’t move.

You stared at it and your whole body went still. There was no mistaking what it was, no possible other explanation or bracelet-for-my-mother lie that could save him now.

A ring box.

Max had a ring box.

Max had bought a ring.

Yes he had been almost blindingly obvious all day but part of you hadn’t truly believed it yet. Max was going to propose to you.

Across the café Max was still looking at the merch display, completely unaware that your entire world had just tilted on its axis. You picked up the box carefully like it might explode.

You didn’t open it. You wanted to. God, you wanted to, every part of you was screaming to see it, to know, but you didn’t, because as much as you wanted to see the ring, you wanted Max to show it to you more. So you slipped it back into his jacket pocket just as he turned around.

He came back to the table, suspiciously pleased with himself for doing absolutely nothing and dropped into the chair opposite you.

“What?” he asked, frowning at your face.

You blinked. “What?”

“You look weird.”

“I look weird?”

“Yes.”

“Really after today?”

His brow deepened. “What does that mean?”

“Nothing,” you said quickly, lifting your coffee. “Absolutely nothing.”

And so began the longest month of your life.

At first it was funny. Max had a ring. Max was going to propose. Max who could overtake anyone around the outside without blinking apparently could not ask one question without nearly short-circuiting.

You found it sweet… for about three days. After that it became torture, because once you knew you couldn’t unknow it.

Every time his hand brushed his pocket your pulse jumped. Every time he looked at you a little too long you thought, this is it. Every time he suggested dinner, a walk, a drive, a quiet night in, your entire body went on high alert.

And every time he didn’t do it.

At dinner he would reach into his jacket and then freeze when the waiter appeared with the wine list. At home he sat beside you on the sofa, unusually quiet, his knee bouncing, his thumb rubbing over your knuckles as if he was trying to memorise the shape of your hand. You thought he was going to ask then. He looked like he was going to ask then.

Instead, he swallowed and said, “Do you want a tea?”

You stared at him. “Tea?”

“Yeah.”

You wanted to scream.

Then there was the scenic overlook. That one nearly ended you. He drove you out at sunset, which was already suspicious because Max wasn’t one for spontaneous scenic drives unless there was food or a race car involved. The sky was all pink and gold, the air warm, the view beautiful enough to make your chest ache.

He stood beside you, one hand in his pocket looking more nervous than you had ever seen him.

Your heart pounded.

You waited.

He looked at you.

You looked at him.

The moment stretched.

Then he said, “Nice view.”

You almost shoved him off the overlook.

By the end of the month you were ready to explode.

He kept checking his pockets like he expected the ring to have vanished. He kept staring at you like he wanted to say something and then stopping himself at the last second. The worst part was that he seemed genuinely distressed by his own inability to do it, like he wanted it to be perfect so badly that every ordinary, lovely, perfect moment became something he could ruin by overthinking.

You understood.

You really did.

But you were also losing your mind.

That night you were sitting on the balcony of your shared apartment, pretending to read while actually watching Max pace back and forth inside through the glass doors. He looked ridiculous. Beautiful, but ridiculous.

His hair was messy from how many times he had dragged his hand through it. His mouth was set in that focused line he usually wore before races. His hand kept going to his pocket, then away from it, then back again.

You narrowed your eyes.

No. Not again.

Absolutely not.

You had given him time, you had given him romantic lighting, you had given him silence, privacy, sunsets, dinners, sofas, soft mornings and calm evenings.

You stood up, slid the balcony door open and walked inside.

“Max,” you called.

He froze mid-step.

Then he turned slowly, eyes wide. “Uh. Yeah?”

He watched you approach like you were race control about to hand him a penalty.

You planted yourself in front of him. “Are you going to propose to me or not?”

His mouth fell open. For a second, nothing came out.

“I—”

“Because I know you have a ring,” you continued, throwing your hands up. “I found it in your jacket last month.”

Max looked horrified.

Then betrayed.

Then horrified again.

“You found it?”

“Yes.”

“In my jacket?”

“Yes.”

“And you didn’t say anything?”

“I didn’t do it on purpose. I wanted to be surprised!”

“You wanted to be surprised,” he repeated, incredulous. “So you decided to confront me?”

“I wanted to be surprised when you actually did it,” you laughed. “But you keep not doing it.”

His face flushed. “I was going to.”

“When? When we’re eighty?”

“I wanted it to be perfect.”

Your frustration softened slightly, but only slightly.

“Max,” you said, quieter now. “I don’t need perfect.”

He looked at you.

The room went still around you both. You stepped closer, your voice losing its edge.

“I don’t need some huge speech and I don’t need a perfect view or perfect timing or whatever version of this you’ve built up in your head. I just need you.”

All the panic, all the tension, all the overthinking seemed to loosen at once. His shoulders dropped and his eyes softened. Then, before you could say another word, he reached into his pocket.

Max dropped to one knee right there in the middle of the living room.

Just him.

Just you.

Despite all your impatience, despite the fact that you’d known for a weeks, despite the fact that you had literally forced the moment into existence your eyes burned with shock and awe.

Because there it was.

The ring.

The question.

The future you had been waiting for.

Max looked up at you and for once the man who always seemed so sure of himself looked completely undone.

“I had a speech,” he said.

A laugh broke out of you, wet and shaky. “Of course you did.”

“I did,” he insisted. “It was good.”

“I’m sure.”

“I forgot all of it.”

You covered your mouth, smiling so hard it hurt. Max huffed, but his eyes were bright too.

“So I’ll just say this.” He took a breath, his voice roughening. “I love you. I love you when you make me watch shows I don’t understand. I love you when you wear Christmas pajamas in April. I love you when you call me useless in my own kitchen. I love that I make you feel safe. I love you because you make my life feel quiet in the best way. You make me feel like I have somewhere to come home to no matter what happens.”

Your chest tightened. He swallowed.

“You’re my best friend,” he said. “You’re the biggest pain in my ass. You’re the person I look for after every race, good or bad. You’re the person I want beside me when everything is loud and when everything is normal and when nothing important is happening at all.”

Your tears slipped before you could stop them.

Max’s hand tightened around the ring box.

“I don’t know how to make this perfect,” he admitted. “I've tried all month and I kept messing it up because nothing felt good enough, but maybe that’s because it’s not about the place or the timing or the speech.”

His voice softened.

“It is just about you and me and the fact that I want forever with you.”

You pressed a hand to your chest.

“So,” he said, looking up at you with a nervous, crooked little smile. “Will you marry me?”

For one second, you let him wait, only one. Mostly because after the month he had put you through he deserved at least that much.

Then you grinned.

“Yes.”

Max blinked.

“Yeah?”

“Yes, of course Max.”

The relief that crossed his face was so immediate and so overwhelming that you laughed through your tears.

“Thank fuck,” he breathed.

“Very romantic.”

“I’ve been stressed.”

“I noticed.”

He took your hand, sliding the ring onto your finger, the second it settled there both of you looked down. It fit perfectly. Max stared at it for a moment then looked back up at you. “You really found it last month?”

You nodded.

“And you didn’t look?”

“No.”

His brows lifted. “Really?”

“I wanted you to be the one.”

His thumb brushed over your ring finger and his mouth parted slightly before he stood. Then he kissed you, deep and relieved and full of every word he had been too nervous to say before. His hands came to your waist, pulling you close, and you smiled against his mouth because he was still trembling slightly.

“You took so long,” you whispered.

He groaned, dropping his forehead against yours. “Don’t start.”

“You took forever.”

“I was trying to make it special.” He pulled back enough to glare at you, though the effect was ruined by the smile tugging at his mouth. “You're engaged to me for two minutes and already bullying me.”

“I was bullying you before.”

“Yes,” he said, kissing you again. “I know.”

You looked down at the ring once more, twisting your hand slightly so it caught the light, it was so beautiful, but more than that it was his too. Chosen by him, carried around nervously by him, hidden badly by him, almost offered so many times by him. You loved it more for every failed attempt.

Max watched your face carefully. “You like it?”

“I love it.”

His shoulders relaxed. Then you added, “Almost as much as I love the fact that you tried to pretend you were buying rings for your mother.”

His face dropped. “I panicked.”

Max held your hand, thumb brushing over the ring like he needed to keep checking it was real, you leaned into him resting your cheek against his chest, after a moment he wrapped both arms around you.

“I could do this forever,” he murmured.

You just smiled, because now he would.

Max had finished third that day. Third. It was hardly a disaster. He had been annoyed about strategy, about balance, about a lock-up that had cost him time in the first stint, but when he came back to the garage and found you waiting there he had smiled.

He had pulled you into his arms, kissed your temple and muttered, “Long day.”

You had rubbed your hand over the back of his neck and whispered, “You still did amazing.”

He had grumbled something about not wanting amazing, wanting first, but he had leaned into you anyway. So no you didn’t think much of the comment.

The second time you noticed more.

Monaco was supposed to be fun. It was one of your favourite races to attend, even though Max always complained about the current celebrification of it all. You loved the narrow streets, the balconies, the impossible glitter of the harbour, the way the whole weekend felt like it existed in some strange, historic bubble.

Max had qualified poorly after a messy final sector. Then the race had been worse, you can’t overtake here at the best of times but the car looked like it wanted to fight him at every corner.

He finished seventh.

By the time you got back to the motorhome your phone was already burning with notifications.

You told yourself not to look.

@f1_tea: Max when his girlfriend is there: fighting for his LIFE

Max when she’s not there: untouchable

make it make sense.

@orangearmy: She seems nice but the stats are getting scary now.

@rbrupdates: Races attended by Y/N this season: P3, P5, P7

Races missed: P1, P1

Interesting…

@maximylove33: Red Bull need to ban her from the garage I’m sorry.

You stared at that one a little longer than the others.

Ban her from the garage.

Your chest tightened, but you forced yourself to laugh under your breath because it was absurd. It was social media. People said anything online. They blamed girlfriends, mechanics, fans, helmets, haircuts, cats, moon phases.

It didn’t mean anything.

Still when Max came into the room, damp-haired and exhausted, you locked your phone before he could see. His eyes flicked to the movement immediately.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” you said too quickly. “Just tired.”

Max studied you for a second, blue eyes narrowing with that sharp, quiet attention he always had when something felt off. He might have been blunt with the rest of the world, impatient with questions he didn’t like, but with you he noticed everything. The forced smile, the tucked-away phone, the way your shoulders sat too high. He crossed the room and sat beside you.

“What’s happened?”

You blinked. “What?”

“Don’t do that.”

You looked down at your hands. “It’s nothing.”

“Y/N.”

“It’s just stupid fan stuff.”

Max exhaled through his nose, already irritated, never at you, but at the invisible crowd of people who seemed to think loving him meant they owned every part of his life.

He reached for your phone. “Show me.”

“No.”

His expression softened at once, that was somehow worse, the anger you could handle but the softness made your throat close.

“Mijn liefje,” he murmured, quieter now. “What is it?”

You shook your head. “They’re just saying I’m bad luck.”

Max stared at you, then he let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “That is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.” You didn’t say anything and so he shifted closer, his knee pressing against yours. “I could drive into a wall by myself and they would find a way to blame you if you were standing three countries away.”

You laughed, but it came out weak.

“I’m serious,” he said. “You’re not bad luck.”

“I know,” you said, but neither of you quite believed that you meant it.

The third time was Austria.

You loved Austria because Max loved Austria. Even before the weekend started he was lighter there, still intense and focused, still Max, but happier. The sea of orange in the grandstands always did something to him even if he pretended it didn’t.

You wanted that weekend to go well for him more than anything.

Instead qualifying was messy and then the race unravelled.

A poor start again then a strategy gamble that didn’t pay off. A late-race battle that left Max furious over the radio and fifth at the flag.

You didn’t need to check your phone to know what people were saying. You felt it before you saw it.

In the garage people were careful around you, no one was outright rude, you didn’t think anyone would dare be rude, not openly and certianly not around Max, but there were glances. Tiny pauses. Conversations that dipped quieter when you walked past.

You told yourself you were imagining it. Then you heard one of the junior PR assistants whisper, “It’s going to be a nightmare online again.”

Someone else said, “Honestly they should just keep her away for Silverstone. Not because it’s real, obviously, but the optics… the comment sections are getting brutal.”

The optics.

Your stomach dropped. You stood frozen in the corridor outside hospitality, one hand still on the door you had been about to push open.

The first voice replied, “Yeah. It’s becoming a thing now.”

A thing.

You were becoming a thing.

You're Max’s girlfriend. The person who holds his hands all night when he's too wired after races to sleep, the person who knows exactly what he needs before early flights, the person who watched him be too hard on himself again and again and loved him through it all.

Now you’re reduced to a thing.

A bad-luck narrative.

A problem to manage.

You stepped back before anyone could see you.

Silverstone was the next weekend. You had planned to go. Max had asked you three times if you were sure you wanted to come because he knew the British media could be brutal, and you had kissed him in the kitchen and said, “Of course I’m coming.”

He had smirked at that, pulling you closer by the hips. “Good. Then you can watch very carefully.”

Later, sitting alone in bed waiting for Max to finish on the sim you felt something inside you twist.

What if you went and he didn’t win or missed the podium again?

What if everyone was waiting for it?

What if even the team didn’t want you there?

By the time Max came to bed you had fixed your face. His hair was a mess and his expression stormy, but when he saw you the storm eased.

He came closer, his hand finding your waist automatically. “You okay?”

You looked at him, at the tiredness in his face, at the frustration he was trying to swallow because he didn’t want to bring it to you and you couldn’t do it. You couldn’t add yourself to the list of things he had to handle.

So you smiled.

“Yeah,” you said. “I’m okay.”

Max did not win Silverstone.

But you weren’t there. You watched from home, sitting cross-legged on your sofa in one of his hoodies your phone face down on the cushion beside you.

He finished second after a late safety car, close enough to make it painful.

When he called you afterward, his face appeared on your screen still flushed from the race, hair damp and eyes tired.

“You should've been here,” he said.

Your chest ached.

“I watched.”

“It’s not the same.”

“I know.”

He frowned. “Why didn’t you come again?”

You had told him you weren’t feeling well, it wasn’t entirely a lie. You had felt sick every time you imagined stepping into the paddock and seeing everyone wonder if you were going to ruin his weekend just by existing.

“I told you,” you said. “Headache.”

“For four days?”

“It was a very committed headache.”

Usually he would have laughed but he very pointedly didn’t.

“Y/N.”

You looked away from the screen. “Max.”

“What is going on?”

“Nothing.”

“You’re lying.”

You swallowed. “I’m just tired.”

He watched you in silence and for one terrifying second you thought he was going to push. Max was stubborn. He hated being shut out, especially by you, but then someone called his name in the background.

His jaw tightened. “I have to go,” he said reluctantly. “We’re going to talk later.”

“Okay.”

His voice softened. “I love you.”

You closed your eyes for half a second.

“I love you too.”

After the call ended, you turned your phone over.

You lasted eight minutes before checking socials.

@f1girlies: She wasn’t there and Max was back on the podium. Coincidence? 👀

@mv1nation: Not a win but better than last week. Keep the pattern going.

@paddockspy: Red Bull garage seemed calmer without Y/N there, just saying.

@verstappening1: I don’t hate her but if she loves him she should stay home until the championship is safe.

If she loves him.

That was the one that got you, because of course you do.

You loved him so much it terrified you sometimes. You loved him when he won and when he didn’t. You loved him when he was impossible after bad races, pacing hotel rooms and replaying overtakes in his head. You loved him when he was soft in the mornings, half-asleep and clingy, pulling you back into bed with a grumbled “five more minutes” even though he was always the one with the schedule.

You loved him enough to wonder whether loving him meant removing yourself.

The thought was unbearable so you did what people always did when something hurt too much you tried to make it logical, you told yourself it was temporary. Just a few races. Just until the noise died down.

Until Max won again.

And he did.

Hungary.

You stayed home again, claiming work, though you had finished everything by Friday afternoon and spent the entire weekend watching coverage with a knot in your stomach.

Max won.

Dominantly.

The internet exploded.

@f1tea: Y/N absent = Max win. Third time lucky. I fear the curse is real.

@orangeprophecy: Someone send her flowers and also keep her away from the paddock please.

@mv1updates: Max has won or come 2nd at every race she hasn’t attended this season btw.

@paddockwives: Imagine being such bad luck your boyfriend performs better when you’re not there.

You stared at the screen until the words blurred. You watched him smiling up there, happy and champagne-soaked, feeling like the whole world thought your absence had helped put him there.

Max called you after.

You didn’t answer.

Then he texted.

Max: Where are you?

Max: I wanted to see your face.

Max: Schatje?

Max: Are you asleep?

You stared at the messages until the screen went dark. Then you cried so hard you had to press the hoodie sleeve against your mouth to keep quiet even though there was no one there to hear you.

A few hours later you replied.

You: Sorry I fell asleep. I’m so proud of you. You were amazing.

The typing bubble appeared almost instantly.

Then disappeared.

Then appeared again.

Max: Thank you.

Max: I missed you.

You squeezed your eyes tight.

You: I missed you too.

Spa was where everything broke.

You weren’t going to go, in fact you had promised yourself you wouldn’t. Hungary had confirmed it, hadn’t it? He was better off without you there. But Max had been strange all week, he wasn’t angry or even mad, but he was quiet. He kept asking if you were coming, casually at first, then less casually.

“You love Spa,” he said over dinner one evening, pushing vegetables around his plate like they had personally offended him.

“I do.”

“So come.”

“I have some things to do.”

“What things?”

“Work things.”

“You can work from the hotel.”

You gave him a look. “Not everything can be done from a hotel Max.”

He leaned back in his chair, eyes fixed on you. “You sure?”

In that moment you hated how well he knew you. You hated that you had built a life with someone who could tell the shape of your lies before you even finished speaking. Excpet you didn’t really hate it, because really it was part of the million reasons why you loved him.

“I just can’t this weekend,” you said.

Max’s mouth pressed into a flat line.

“Okay.”

That was all he said.

Okay.

Later when you were brushing your teeth you heard him on the phone in the bedroom, his voice was low and irritated.

“No, I don’t care what they’re saying.”

A pause.

“I said no.”

Another pause.

Then, sharper, “Because she’s my girlfriend, are you stupid?”

You froze, toothbrush still in your mouth. His tone changed after that, quieter but no less furious.

“You think I don’t know what people are saying? Of course I know.”

Your heart slammed against your ribs.

“I’m not asking you to manage her. I’m asking you to shut it down.”

Silence.

Then Max said, “If anyone in the team has made her feel unwelcome I’ll find out.”

You stepped back from the door and a strange panic rose in your throat. Somehow instead of making it better, it made you feel worse because now he was worried and he was distracted. Now you weren't only bad luck you were also a problem.

So the next morning when Max left early for training you booked a last-minute flight to Belgium.

You told yourself you just needed to prove something to yourself. That you could be near him and not ruin anything. That the world was not actually keeping score.

You arrived on Saturday and stayed hidden. It was pathetic really, you wore sunglasses and a cap low over your face, sitting in a quiet hospitality corner you knew cameras rarely reached. You didn’t tell anyone except one security guard you trusted, who looked at you like he wanted to ask questions but wisely chose not to.

Qualifying went badly. Not catastrophically but badly enough. A mistake in Q3. A snap of oversteer. A lap that should have been pole but turned into fourth. You felt the garage change around you before the session had even ended.

Then you heard the buzz of a message, but it wasn’t to you. It came through on the screen of a team tablet someone had left on the table beside you, a notification from a group chat flashing bright before disappearing.

But you saw enough.

Is Y/N here? Because this is going to become a whole thing again.

Your whole body went cold.

A second message appeared.

Can someone please make sure she’s not around tomorrow? Max doesn’t need the distraction.

The distraction.

For a second you couldn’t breathe.

Not bad luck this time.

Worse.

A distraction.

You stood up so fast your chair scraped loudly against the floor but no one seemed to notice, or maybe they did and pretended not to. You left before Max got out of the car and by the time he called you were already on your way back to the airport.

“Where are you?” he asked, hearing the noise around you.

“At home.”

“No you’re not.”

Your silence betrayed you.

Max’s breathing changed.

“Y/N.”

“I came for qualifying,” you whispered.

There was a pause.

“What?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Why are you sorry? Where are you I’ll come—”

You closed your eyes, and the tears slipped out anyway. “I shouldn’t have come.”

Max went very quiet.

“What do you mean? Did someone say something?”

“No.”

“Please don’t lie to me.”

“Max, please.”

“Who said that to you?”

Your voice broke. “Everyone.”

The word came out small.

Humiliating.

And then you couldn’t stop.

“Everyone says it. Online, in the comments, in the paddock, your team, everyone. When I’m there, you don’t win. When I’m not, you do. And I know it’s stupid, I know it isn’t real, but then I come and something goes wrong and people look at me like I brought it with me and it feels real.”

Max said nothing.

You wiped your face with the heel of your hand.

“And then today I saw a message. Someone said to make sure I’m not around tomorrow because you don’t need the distraction.”

His voice, when it came, was low and rough.

“Who?”

“I don’t know.”

“Who, Y/N?”

“I don’t know, Max. I just saw it.”

Another pause.

Then he said, “Where are you right now?”

“The airport.”

“I’m coming to you.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“You have a race tomorrow.”

“I don’t really care.”

“Max this is exactly the—.”

“No,” he snapped, and you flinched even though he wasn’t angry at you. It was as if he felt it anyway, because his voice softened immediately. “No, listen to me. I care about the race. Of course I care but not more than you.”

“I don’t want to be something you choose over racing.”

“You’re not something I'm choose over racing,” he said. “You’re my world. That’s not the same thing.”

“But what if I make it harder?”

“You don’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yes, I do.”

“How?”

“Because I drive the car,” he said, blunt and immediate. “Not Twitter or the team or the fans. Me.”

A sob caught in your throat. Max breathed out shakily.

“Schatje,” he said, softer now. “You think I win because you stay home?”

You couldn’t answer.

“You think when I am in the car I‘m faster because you’re sad somewhere without me? You think I don’t put every single ounce of effort into the race no matter what.”

The words hit you hard enough to hurt.

“No,” you whispered. “I know you do”

“That’s not what you’re saying.”

You went still. “I just don’t want to hurt you.”

“You are hurting me by disappearing.” Max rarely said things like that, it wasn’t because he didn’t feel them, but because feeling them out loud had always been hard for him.

“You don’t answer after races,” he continued. “You lie about work. You say you’re sick. You look at me like you’re already leaving and I don’t know what I did wrong.”

Your chest caved.

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Then why am I being punished?”

You broke. Right there, in the corner of an airport lounge, with people walking past and announcements echoing overhead, you pressed your hand to your mouth and cried.

Max stayed on the phone. He didn’t fill the silence with useless comfort, he just breathed with you until you could speak again.

“I saw the comments after Hungary,” you admitted. “Everyone was so happy you won without me there and I was happy for you, I was, but I felt like I wasn’t allowed to miss being there. Like the best thing I could do for you was stay away.”

Max cursed softly in Dutch.

Then he said, “Do not get on that plane.”

You sniffed. “What?”

“Don’t get on it… please. I’m sending someone to bring you back.”

“Max, no.”

“Yes.”

“I can’t walk into that paddock tomorrow.”

“You can.”

“I can’t.”

“You can,” he repeated, steady now. “Because you’ll walk in with me. And if anyone has something to say then they can say it to my face.”

The next morning you woke up in Max’s hotel room. You had planned to come back, talk to him, then hide somewhere until the weekend was over.

Max had other ideas. He had met you at the hotel entrance himself, even though it was late, even though he had meetings, even though everyone would have told him rest mattered more. He was wearing sweats and a hoodie, hair messy, face tight with worry.

The second he saw you, he crossed the lobby and pulled you into his arms.

Hard.

You’d whispered, “I’m sorry,” into his chest.

He’d answered, “Stop saying that.”

Then he took you upstairs, gave you one of his shirts, made you drink water and got into bed beside you fully dressed because you were crying too hard for either of you to pretend sleep would come easily. At some point in the night you had woken to him gently taking your phone from your hand.

“No more,” he murmured.

“I wasn’t looking.”

“You were going to.”

You hadn’t argued.

Now in the grey morning light Max stood at the end of the bed already dressed in the team kit, watching you carefully.

“You don’t have to come ,” he said.

Your stomach dropped and he saw your expression change immediately.

“No,” he said, moving toward you. “Not like that. I just mean you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. I would never force you, but please don’t not come because of them.”

You sat up slowly. “Do you want me there?”

Max looked almost offended.

“I always want you there.”

Your eyes burned.

“But I under—”

“I want to come,” you said.

His face softened.

“Okay.”

“I’m scared.”

He sat on the edge of the bed and took your hand. “I’ll be there.”

You finally smiled, small and private.

“There she is,” he murmured.

The paddock noticed. Of course it did. You arrived with Max, his hand firmly intertwined with yours, his expression giving absolutely nothing away except the very clear message that anyone with an opinion should reconsider having it near him.

Cameras turned and whispers started and you felt them against your skin like heat.

Max did not let go of your hand when you passed photographers or when you entered Red Bull hospitality, or when two members of staff glanced at you and then quickly away. In fact he tightened his grip.

“Max,” you whispered.

He leaned closer, eyes forward. “I’m behaving.”

“You’re walking like you’re about to commit a crime.”

Inside the garage, the air felt strange. Then GP looked up from his station and smiled at you.

A geuine smile.

“Good to see you,” he said.

Something in your chest loosened.

“Thanks,” you said softly.

A few minutes later Laurent came over, his expression was professional, but gentler than usual. Max stood beside you like a guard dog.

“Y/N,” he said. “Glad you’re here.”

You weren’t sure if Max had spoken to him. Judging by the slightly haunted look behind his eyes he probably had. In fact you had a feeling he had a spoken to a few people.

GP cleared his throat. “For what it’s worth I’m sorry if anyone made you feel otherwise.”

Your throat tightened. “Thank you.”

Max’s jaw flexed. That, apparently, was him continuing to behave.

The race was chaos. Spa always was. Rain threatened, then disappeared, then threatened again. Strategy shifted every few laps. The start was messy, the midfield dangerous, the radio tense.

You stood in the garage with headphones on, heart pounding so hard you could feel it in your fingertips.

Max climbed from fourth to third.

Then third to second.

Then, with twelve laps to go, he hunted down the leader.

The garage barely breathed.

You watched the timing screens one hand pressed to your mouth as Max closed the gap lap by lap.

A defensive squeeze, and then Max went around the outside with the kind of impossible bravery that made your stomach drop and your heart soar at the same time and reminded everyone exactly why he was the best.

The garage erupted.

You didn’t move.

Not until GP’s voice came over the radio after the chequered flag.

“P1, Max. That’s P1. Great job mate.”

The sound that left you was half laugh, half sob.

On the screen, Max’s car slowed on the cooldown lap.

His radio crackled and his voice came through.

“Yes! What a race!”

Then.

“Is she there?”

The garage went quiet and GP glanced over at you, smiling.

“She’s here mate.”

Max breathed out.

“Good,” he said.

A pause.

Then, clear enough for everyone to hear he added, “Tell her she’s my good luck charm.”

Your face crumpled.

He had made sure they heard. He had made sure the world would hear too.

By the time Max got back, you were trying very hard not to cry and failing miserably. He climbed out of the car, pulled off his helmet, and looked for you before anyone else.

He pushed through the crowd and reached for you. He was sweaty and champagne-less, but the second he reached you none of that seemed to matter. He wrapped both arms around you and lifted you clean off your feet. Cheers erupted around you, cameras flashed, and for a moment it felt impossibly cinematic, like the final scene of a film. You buried your face in his neck, holding on as tightly as he was holding you.

“You’re incredible,” you whispered.

His hand spread across your back.

“We did it.”

You shook your head. “Max—”

“No.” He set you down but didn’t let go. His eyes locked on yours, intense and unflinching. “Listen to me. I don’t ever want to hear you say you’re bad luck again.”

Your lips trembled.

“I mean it,” he said. “If I lose, its because of racing. If I win, its because of racing. But you? You are the person I want to come back to after both.”

The tears spilled over. He wiped them away with his thumbs, not caring that cameras were catching every second.

“I’m sorry I disappeared.”

“I know.”

Later after the podium, after the anthem, after champagne and interviews and a hundred people trying to pull him in a hundred directions, Max posted a rare photo. It was a picture someone had taken in the garage just after the race. Max still in his race suit, arms around you, your face hidden against his shoulder while he pressed a kiss to the side of your head.

The caption was simple.

My good luck. Always.

The internet, predictably, lost its mind.

@f1tea: MAX SAW THE COMMENTS AND SAID ABSOLUTELY NOT.

@verstappenfiles: Curse broken. Everyone apologise.

@mv1nation: Never calling her bad luck again. I fear he will personally fight us.

@paddockspy: Max Verstappen hard launching a defence of his girlfriend was not on my bingo card but I support it.

@orangearmy: “My good luck” I’m crying he loves her so much.

You didn’t read most of them. Max made sure of that.

That night back at the hotel your phone stayed on the bedside table while you sat between his legs on the bed, his arms wrapped around your waist, his chin resting on your shoulder.

The trophy sat on the desk across the room. Max had barely looked at it.

“Do you want to celebrate?” you said softly.

“I am.”

“You’re sitting in bed.”

“With you.”

You smiled faintly. “Very wild.”

“I’m older now.”

“You’re twenty-eight.”

“Exactly. Ancient.”

You laughed and felt him smile against your neck. For a while neither of you said anything, then Max’s arms tightened around you.

“I need you to promise me something.”

You turned slightly. “What?”

“If you ever feel like that again you tell me.”

Your chest tightened.

“Max—”

“You tell me. Even if you think it is stupid. Even if you think I have more important things. Especially then.”

You looked down at his hands, warm and secure over yours.

“I didn’t want to distract you.”

“You’re allowed to need me.”

After a moment, you whispered, “I promise.”

He kissed your shoulder. “Good.”

You turned in his arms to face him. He reached up and brushed a strand of hair away from your face, his touch gentle in a way the world rarely got to see.

“You are the furthest thing from bad luck,” he said again.

This time you believed him.

“I know.”

His eyes searched yours and then he nodded, satisfied.

Outside somewhere far below, fans were still singing, the city was still buzzing. The internet was still doing what the internet always did, loud and frantic and hungry for the next thing to tear apart or worship, but in the quiet of Max’s hotel room none of it reached you.

There was only him. His steady hands and his heartbeat beneath your palm.

You stared at his contact for a minute.

Absolutely not.

No.

There had to be someone else. You scrolled up. Then down. Then up again. As if your contacts might rearrange themselves and present a better option. They didn’t.

You watched as your battery dropped to two percent.

His name sat there, annoyingly available… annoyingly useful.

You knew that he was probably awake and it annoyed you that you knew he would be. Max had always had the worst sleep schedule of anyone you’d ever met. If he wasn’t at a race, in the gym, or chatting with engineers, he was on his sim rig until some ungodly hour, barking into a headset, swearing in Dutch and acting like an online race in the middle of the night was as important as a world championship.

You could practically picture him now, hoodie pulled over his head, hair a mess, face lit by the glow of three monitors. One hand on the wheel, the other probably reaching for an energy drink he definitely shouldn’t be having at nearly three in the morning.

The thought made something familiar and irritating tug in your chest.

You and Max had known each other for years, long enough that the sharp edges between you had worn into something strangely comfortable even if neither of you would admit it.

At first he had been impossible. Blunt and arrogant. Too competitive for his own good. The kind of person who could turn anything into a contest, from lap times to who got to the paddock café first. You’d met him through mutual friends in the racing world, and within twenty minutes he had corrected something you said about GT racing with the kind of smug certainty that made you want to throw your drink at him.

You had called him unbearable.

He had called you dramatic.

That had been the start of it.

Years of bickering followed. Max making sarcastic comments whenever you walked into the Red Bull garage. You rolling your eyes whenever he pretended not to care what people thought. Him stealing chips from your plate without asking. You hiding his cap once before qualifying and watching him lose his mind for ten full minutes before giving it back.

You wouldn’t call it friendship, it was something more annoying than friendship, something with a lot of history and not enough honesty.

“You two flirt like you’re trying to kill each other,” Lando had once said, grinning behind his bottle of water.

“We do not flirt,” you had snapped at the exact same time Max said, “As if.”

Maybe you had caught yourself looking at Max for a little too long when he was focused, jaw tight, eyes narrowed, his whole body wired with impossible concentration. Maybe he had once put a hand on your lower back to guide you through a crowded afterparty, and maybe the warmth of it had stayed there long after he’d moved away.

Maybe there had been a night in Monaco years ago when you’d both ended up outside on a balcony, tired of noise and people pretending to be more interesting than they were. You had argued about nothing for fifteen minutes and then somehow talked until sunrise.

He had looked at you differently that night. Then, the next morning, he had acted like nothing happened.

That was how it always went with Max. One step closer, two steps back. A strange almost, a constant nearly. A tension you both buried under sarcasm because sarcasm was easier than admitting anything real.

Which was precisely why calling him now felt like handing him a loaded weapon.

You could already hear him.

Really? You got stranded? How do you even manage that?

You closed your eyes.

The phone blinked at one percent again.

“Fine,” you whispered. “Fine… but if he’s smug, I’m hanging up.”

You tapped his name before you could change your mind.

The line rang once.

Twice.

Your heart thudded harder than it should have.

“What drunk dialling now?” Max’s voice came through low and, yes, smug. “Didn’t take you for the type.”

Instant regret. You squeezed your eyes shut and leaned your head back against the seat. “Don’t flatter yourself Verstappen.”

“Then why are you calling me at…” he stopped, “…2:47 in the morning?”

You glanced out of the window.

Still nothing.

“I’m stranded,” you said.

Another pause.

“Stranded?”

“Yes.”

“As in… emotionally?”

You would have laughed if your nerves weren’t stretched so thin. “Physically, Max.”

“Right.” His tone sharpened slightly. “Where?”

“My car died. I don’t know where I am. I think I took a wrong turn.”

The background noise on his end changed, less amused now, more alert.

“What do you mean died?”

“What do you think I mean? I mean it made a terrible clicking noise, refused to start and now it’s sitting here dead!”

“Okay, okay. Where are you?”

You swallowed and looked down at the dash as though the car might provide an answer. “I took a wrong turn after dropping Poppy off, and then my phone started dying, and now I’m on this empty road with no charger and no idea where the nearest anything is.”

“Can you see anything?”

You peered through the windscreen at the faded sign half-hidden near the bend. “There’s a sign. Something like… Mont Angle? Or Mont Aville. I can’t properly see it.”

“What can you see?” he repeated, firmer now. “Any houses? Signs? Junctions? Anything.”

You sat up straighter, thrown slightly by his tone, and squinting through the windscreen. “A field. Trees. A broken fence. There’s a small signpost near the bend but I can’t read all of it. And there’s a mile marker, I think. B-something.”

“Can you send your location?”

“I can try, but if my phone dies—”

“Try.” He interrupted.

You quickly opened your location, fingers clumsy from cold and panic. The screen lagged and for one terrifying second, it froze completely.

“No, no, no,” you whispered.

Then it loaded and you sent it to him.

“Did you get it?” you asked quickly.

Silence.

“Max?”

“I got it,” he said.

Then the call went quiet again, except for the faint sound of movement on his end. A drawer opening, something being shoved aside, the sim rig audio cut out abruptly.

“Lock your doors,” he said.

“They are locked.”

“Check.”

You frowned. “I’m not five.”

“Check.”

Something in his voice made you do it without arguing and you pressed the lock button again.

“They’re locked.”

“Good. Don’t get out.”

“I wasn’t planning to go for a scenic walk.”

“I’m serious.”

“I can tell,” you said, softer despite yourself.

There was a beat and when he spoke again his voice was lower. “Stay on the phone with me yeah? For as long as it lasts.”

Then you heard keys. You suddenly felt embarrassed, pressed your lips together, unsure what to do with the warmth crawling into your chest. “You don’t have to.”

“You called me.”

“I know, but I mean… I can call someone else.”

“With what battery?”

You didn’t answer.

“Exactly,” he said. “I’m coming.”

“Fine.”

“Fine?”

“I called you because you’re the only idiot awake at this time.”

“And yet I’m the idiot coming to get you.”

You leaned your head back, eyes closing for a second. The car felt too quiet around you. “I didn’t know who else to call.”

“It’s okay.”

For some reason, that was worse. You opened your eyes and stared out into the dark. “Don’t sound so pleased about it.”

“I’m not.”

“No?”

“No.” His voice changed again. Rougher, almost irritated, but not at you. “I don’t like that you’re there alone.”

Your chest tightened, he said it like your safety mattered to him in a way that didn’t fit neatly into the version of your relationship you both pretended to understand.

“Well,” you said lightly, because light was easier, “I’m not exactly thrilled either.”

“Why are you even out there alone at this time?”

“I told you. I dropped Poppy off.”

“And you didn’t stay at hers?”

“She had an early flight. I didn’t want to be a bother.”

“You are unbelievable.”

You frowned. “Excuse me?”

“You would rather drive alone at almost three in the morning than inconvenience someone.”

“You’re making it sound like I planned to be stranded.”

“No,” he said, and you heard a car door open on his end. “I’m saying you do this thing where you act like needing help is a criminal offence.”

Your mouth opened, then closed. Outside wind brushed against the side of the car rattling faintly through the trees.

“I don’t do that,” you said, but it lacked force.

Max gave a short, humourless laugh. “You do.”

Max Verstappen who had made a career out of acting like nothing scared him, who had rolled his eyes at you more times than you could count was getting in his car at almost three in the morning because you had called.

“How far are you?” you asked.

“Twenty minutes. Maybe fifteen if I ignore the speed limits.”

“Please don’t die trying to rescue me from my own car.”

“I am not dying. Also this is not a rescue.”

“Oh? What is it?”

“A retrieval.”

You stared at the phone. “I’m not luggage.”

“You are currently stranded on the side of the road and need collecting. Sounds like luggage.”

“Remind me to never call you again.”

“You say that like you call me often.”

For a moment the familiar rhythm returned, the back and forth, the easy bite, the verbal sparring that had always been safer than saying anything with weight.

You listened to the sound of his car through the phone, the faint rush of speed, the occasional click of his indicator. It was strange hearing him like this, Max breathing quietly on the other end of the line, driving through the night because you were scared and trying not to admit it.

“You still there?” he asked after a while.

“Yes.”

“Good.”

“You keep checking.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

His answer came too fast. “Because your phone is dying.”

You smiled faintly despite yourself. “Right. That’s the only reason.”

“You want a better one?"

“Depends,” you said, voice quieter now. “Do you have one?”

Max didn’t answer immediately. For a moment there was only the road noise on his end and the nervous beat of your own heart.

Then he said, “I don’t like not knowing if you’re okay.”

You looked away from the phone like that might make the words easier to bear. “That sounds dangerously close to concern.”

“I am concerned.”

You swallowed. Max rarely said things plainly unless he was annoyed. Or certain. There was something disarming about hearing it without sarcasm wrapped around it.

“Oh,” you said, because apparently your brain had stopped working.

He huffed softly. “That’s all you have?”

“What do you want me to say?”

“I don’t know.”

“Thank you for your concern, almighty racing prince.”

“There she is.”

You smiled, but it faded quickly. Your eyes drifted to the dark road again.

“Max?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For calling.”

His reply was instant. “Don’t.”

“But—”

“No. Don’t do that.”

You frowned. “Do what?”

“Apologise for needing someone.”

The words settled hard in your chest. You looked down at your lap. Your hands were cold, fingers curled tightly around the phone. “It’s just… I know we’re not exactly—”

“What?”

“Like this.”

“Like what?” he asked.

“You know.”

“I don’t.”

“Yes you do.”

“No,” he said, voice lower. “Say it.”

You loathed him a little for that. For making you be the brave one when you were sitting in a dead car in the middle of nowhere and already feeling exposed. You rubbed your thumb along the edge of your phone. “We’re not exactly the kind of people who call each other when something goes wrong.”

Max was quiet for long enough that you wondered if the call had dropped.

Then he said, “Maybe we should be.”

You stared at the screen still somehow hanging onto one percent, still somehow alive, as if even your phone had decided it needed to hear what happened next.

“Max,” you said carefully.

“I know.”

“You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“Yes I do.”

You almost laughed. “Still arrogant.”

“Still right.”

The corner of your mouth twitched. “You’re impossible.”

“You’ve said.”

“I’ve meant it every time.”

“I know,” he said. “But you still called.”

You looked out of the window again, but all you could see was your own reflection. Wide eyes. Tense mouth. The expression of someone who had spent too many years pretending she didn’t feel anything just because the alternative was too complicated.

“You were the only one I knew would be awake,” you said.

“That’s why you called?”

“Yes.”

“But not the only reason.”

You didn’t reply. Max exhaled through his nose. You could imagine him gripping the steering wheel, eyes fixed ahead, jaw set the way it always was when he was pushing too hard.

“I’m not trying to make you say anything,” he said after a moment.

“That’s a first.”

“I’m serious.”

“I know.”

Then you said, barely above a whisper, “I knew you’d come.”

The line went quiet. Your pulse thundered. You wished immediately that you could take it back, but not really, because some part of you had always known that beneath the snark, beneath the stubbornness, beneath years of pretending not to care Max would come if you really needed him.

“Yeah.”

That one word did more damage than a confession.

Finally headlights appeared in the distance. At first you thought you imagined them. Two faint beams cresting the bend far down the road, cutting through the darkness like a promise.

Your fingers tightened around the phone. “I see headlights,” you said.

“What side?”

“Behind me. Coming from the bend.”

“That’s me.”

Relief hit so suddenly your eyes stung. The car slowed as it approached, sleek and dark and unmistakably Max’s. It pulled up behind you with a controlled sharpness, headlights flooding your rear-view mirror as the engine cut off. For a second neither of you moved, then his voice came through your phone one last time.

“Stay there.”

The call ended. Your phone died immediately after, screen going black in your hand.

Max was in a hoodie and joggers, hair messy, face set in a hard line. He looked like he had left in the middle of whatever he’d been doing without a second thought, no cap or jacket. Just keys in hand and concern written plainly across his face before he managed to bury it.

He walked to your window and knocked once as you unlocked the car. His eyes moved over your face, your shoulders, your hands, like he was checking you for damage.

“You okay?” he asked.

You nodded. “Yeah.”

His jaw flexed. “Really?”

“Yes, Max.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

Only then did some of the tension leave his shoulders.

He looked away, dragging a hand through his hair. “Jesus.”

You blinked, surprised by the raw edge in his voice. “I told you I was fine.”

“You told me you were alone on a dark road with a dead car and no battery.”

“Well. When you say it like that.”

He shot you a look and you gave him a weak smile.

Max crouched slightly beside the open door, one hand braced against the frame. “Do you know how stupid that was?”

Your spine stiffened. “Excuse me?”

“Driving alone at this time with no charger.”

“Thanks. I really needed a lecture.”

“I’m not lecturing.”

“You absolutely are.”

“I’m saying you should have called earlier.”

“My car died five minutes before I called you.”

“You should’ve had a charger.”

“I usually do.”

“Usually doesn’t help now.”

You glared at him. “Are you always this charming when rescuing people?”

“I told you, retrieval.”

“You’re unbelievable.”

“You’re the one stranded.”

“And you’re being insufferable about it.”

For a second, his mouth twitched, then his eyes softened. “I was worried,” he said.

You went silent and Max seemed to realise he’d been too honest. He looked away, jaw tightening, gaze fixed somewhere over the roof of your car.

“I mean,” he added, too late, “it's not exactly ideal.” He straightened, glancing towards your bonnet. “Pop it.”

You raised an eyebrow. “Do you actually know what you’re doing?”

He gave you an offended look. “I know cars.”

“You know Formula One cars.”

“Still counts.”

“This is a very sad little road car.”

“I can see that.”

“You said it.”

You popped the bonnet and got out, wrapping your arms around yourself as the cold hit properly. Max immediately looked at you.

“Where’s your jacket?”

“In the back.”

“And you didn’t put it on?”

“I was a bit busy trying not to be murdered by the countryside.”

He rolled his eyes but moved before you could protest, opening the back door and pulling your jacket out. Instead of handing it to you he stepped close and draped it around your shoulders himself.

The movement was quick but his hands lingered at your collar, tugging the fabric closed around you.

You looked up. He was close enough that you could see the faint shadows under his eyes, the sleep-creased side of his face, the focus in his expression that had nothing to do with engines or racing or winning.

“Better?” he asked.

You nodded. “Yeah.”

Neither of you moved, the cold air curled between you and his hands dropped away slowly.

Max cleared his throat and stepped back. “Bonnet.”

“Right,” you said quickly.

He inspected the engine like he could forcce it into behaving. You stood beside him watching with absolutely no useful input. After a minute he sighed and lowered the bonnet.

“What?” you asked.

“I think it’s the battery.”

“I told you it was dead.”

“I meant the car battery.”

“Oh.”

He looked at you.

You looked back.

“Don’t,” you warned.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You were thinking it loudly.”

“I was thinking many things.”

“Like?”

He wiped his hands on his joggers, glancing once down the empty road before looking back at you. “Like I’m taking you home.”

Your stomach gave a small, stupid dip at how easily he said it.

“You don’t have to do that.”

Max raised a brow. “Your car is dead. Your phone is dead. And you're standing on a road that looks like the opening scene of a crime documentary.”

You roll your eyes.

“I can wait with you until recovery comes.”

“At three in the morning?”

“You’re here now.”

“Yes,” he said simply. “So get in my car.”

You gave him a look. “Bossy.” The corner of your mouth twitched before you could stop it.

He pulled out his phone. “I’ll call someone to sort the car. You can deal with it tomorrow.”

You looked back at your car, sitting abandoned under the weak glow of his headlights. “I hate leaving it.”

“It’ll be fine.”

There was something steady in his voice, something that made it hard to argue so you didn’t, you just pulled your jacket tighter around yourself and nodded.

“Fine.”

Max’s expression softened a little, like he knew that was the closest thing to surrender he was going to get from you.

He opened the passenger door for you.

You stared at him. “Are you seriously doing the gentleman thing?”

“Get in before I change my mind.”

“Too late. I expect princess treatment now.”

He snorted. “You are a nightmare.”

“And yet you came.”

The words slipped out lightly, almost teasing.

But Max didn’t answer straight away he just looked at you, the humour fading from his face.

Then he exhaled through his nose. “You’d have done the same.”

You paused, fingers resting on the open car door. “Would I?”

Then, almost too quiet to catch, he said, “Yeah. I think you would.”

You didn’t know what to say to that.

It was warm inside his car, and smelled faintly of his hoodie, his cologne, and the late-night world he seemed to exist in better than anyone else. Max shut the door walked around to the driver’s side and got in.

You glanced over.

He kept his eyes forward. “Don’t say anything.”

“I wasn’t going to.”

“You were about to.”

“I was going to say thank you.”

His hand rested on the gearshift for a moment before he looked at you.

“Okay,” he said. “You can say that.”

You smiled faintly. “Thank you Max.”

His gaze flickered over your face, just briefly, before he turned back to the road.

“Yeah,” he said, quieter now. “Anytime.”

Anytime.

You turned your head towards the window, watching your dead car shrink in the side mirror as he pulled back onto the road. For once the silence didn’t feel like a fight and behind the wheel Max kept both hands steady, driving you home like it was the easiest thing in the world to come for you when you needed him.

You made room for his life before he even had to ask. You bent around the complicated edges of his world so naturally that, after a while, Max stopped noticing how much you were bending at all.

It was refreshing. Comforting, even. Being with you never felt like another obligation waiting for him when he got home. You were warmth, quiet, peace… but it also made it easy for Max to coast.

Because when you said you didn’t need flowers, he believed you. When you told him birthdays weren’t a big deal, he took your word for it.

When you said you didn’t mind that his attention was always half-distracted by Red Bull, his sim rig, his phone, or whatever new team crisis was unfolding in the background, he didn’t stop to wonder whether you meant it. He didn’t ask himself if you were genuinely fine with being loved in the gaps, or if you had simply learned to make your wants small enough that they never became inconvenient.

He didn’t notice that every time you said, “Don’t worry about it,” you were teaching him that he didn’t have to.

Until he saw the way your smile dimmed at Daniel’s girlfriend’s birthday party.

The boat was filled with champagne and noise, a private Monaco affair organised by Daniel, of course, because no one else could make a birthday party feel quite that excessive and still somehow charming. There was a neon sign glowing above the bar, a curated playlist that seemed suspiciously full of songs Daniel liked more than his girlfriend did, and custom cupcakes with everyone’s faces printed on them. Max didn’t even know you could do that.

You sat beside him with a drink in hand, your shoulder brushing his every now and then as the boat rocked gently against the water. To anyone else you looked perfectly fine, but Max had started paying closer attention now.

Your laugh came half a second too late, your smile faded too quickly, and your eyes kept drifting back to the couple across the deck.

Daniel’s girlfriend had her arms slung around his neck, his jacket draped over her shoulders, and a glittery tiara with Birthday Girl written across the front sitting slightly crooked on her head. Daniel kept adjusting it for her, grinning every time she swatted his hand away, and when she leaned into him, he kissed her temple without seeming to think about it. Thoughtless in the best way, like loving her out loud was simply instinct.

“You made it!” Daniel said, pulling Max into a hug before turning to you with even more enthusiasm. “And you look amazing. Seriously, come on, look at you.”

You laughed, a bit surprised, and looked down at yourself like you hadn’t expected anyone to notice.

Max noticed that.

Daniel’s girlfriend came over next, glowing, happy, adored. She hugged you tightly and thanked you both for coming, then turned to show you the bracelet Daniel had bought her. It was delicate and expensive, the kind of jewellery Max would never have picked out on his own because he would have convinced himself he didn’t know what he was doing and given up before trying.

“He surprised me with it this morning,” she said, beaming. “And he pretended he forgot my birthday for, like, ten minutes, which was evil, but then he had breakfast set up on the balcony.”

Daniel, overhearing, lifted his glass. “Romance is alive and well ladies and gentlemen.”

Normal Daniel. Loud, teasing, affectionate Daniel, who made a spectacle out of caring because he had never been embarrassed by warmth in the same way Max sometimes was, but then Max looked at you.

You were smiling. Of course you were smiling.

You were always polite. Always kind. Always good at being happy for other people, even when something inside you was quietly aching. There was something different about it then, something Max had never noticed before because he had never had reason to look for it.

Your smile didn’t quite reach your eyes.

You didn’t look devastated, you didn’t withdraw your hand from his arm or go quiet in a way anyone else would pick up on. You just looked at the bracelet on Daniel’s girlfriend’s wrist, then at the flowers, then at the wall of photos, and for half a second your expression morphed into something almost wistful.

Max felt it like a punch he had no right to react to.

The conversation moved on around him. Daniel was talking about the cake, someone else was laughing about how long it had taken to get the decorations right. His girlfriend was telling you how Daniel had been secretly planning it for weeks, badly, apparently, because he almost exposed himself several times.

You laughed at the story.

You said, “That’s really sweet.”

Max heard the softness in your voice.

For the first time all night, Max looked at the party properly. He looked at the flowers. The photos. The custom menu cards with her name on them. The cake Daniel had apparently taste-tested three times because the first one “didn’t feel like her.”

Then Max looked at you.

You were standing beside him with nothing from him except your own practiced understanding.

No flowers.

No post.

No planned birthday dinner he hadn’t rescheduled.

No little public signs that he was proud to love you.

No evidence, really, that Max Verstappen had ever looked at the woman beside him and thought, she deserves to feel chosen.

His stomach twisted, because suddenly he remembered your last birthday with a clarity that made him feel slightly sick.

He had been in Milton Keynes for simulator work. He’d called you late, later than he meant to, and you had answered in bed, face lit softly by your phone screen. You had smiled like you were happy just to hear from him. He had apologised again for not being able to be there. You had said it didn’t matter and he had promised to make it up to you. You had said, “Don’t stress, honestly. I had a nice day.”

Had you?

Had you really?

Or had you said that because it was easier than admitting you had wanted him there?

He thought about the flowers you always claimed not to need. The birthdays you said weren’t important. The dates you never demanded. The posts you never asked for. The attention you pretended not to miss.

Beside him, you glanced up. “You okay?”

Max blinked, pulled out of his thoughts by the gentleness of your voice. That made it worse somehow, even now you were checking on him.

“Yeah,” he said, too quickly. “Fine.”

You studied him for a moment, clearly not convinced, but you didn’t push. You never pushed. You simply nodded and looked back towards the others, your shoulder brushing lightly against his sleeve.

Max hated that too. He hated that you gave him space even when maybe he deserved pressure.

He hated that you had made yourself so easy to keep that he had forgotten keeping you was still something he had to actively do.

For the rest of the night, he couldn’t stop watching you.

He watched Daniel’s girlfriend pull you into photos, watched you laugh as someone handed you a party hat you refused to wear for about ten seconds. He watched you compliment the decorations, watched you ask questions about the planning, watched your fingers lightly brush over one of the flower arrangements when you thought no one was looking.

You liked flowers.

Of course you liked flowers.

Maybe not in the over-the-top, expensive, social-media way, but you liked them. He could tell by the way you touched the petals carefully, the way your face warmed when Daniel’s girlfriend told you Daniel had chosen them because they reminded him of a dress she once wore in Monaco.

Max stood there, silent and increasingly irritated with himself.

How many things had you convinced yourself you didn’t need simply because he had never offered them?

How many wants had you softened into jokes so they wouldn’t feel like demands?

How many times had you made yourself smaller around his life and called it love?

Later, when everyone gathered around the cake, Daniel made a speech. A terrible speech, because it was Daniel, so half of it was jokes and the other half was him pretending not to get emotional. Then he spoke about how his girlfriend made his life better. How she put up with him. How she deserved more than one night of being celebrated, but he hoped this was a decent start.

Everyone laughed.

His girlfriend cried.

You smiled.

Max felt like the worst boyfriend in the world.

He complimented you in private, usually quietly, usually after you’d done something for him. He told you he loved you, yes, but often in bed, or before hanging up, or in passing when one of you was leaving. He assumed you knew. He assumed choosing you privately counted the same as making you feel chosen.

On the drive home you were quieter than usual.

Your head rested against the window, city lights sliding over your face in brief flashes. Your heels were in your lap because you had taken them off the second you got in the car, and your fingers played absently with the strap like your mind was somewhere else.

Max kept glancing over. Usually he liked quiet with you, it was comfortable and easy, you didn’t need to fill every silence.

Tonight the quiet felt full of everything you weren’t saying.

“Did you have a good time?” he asked eventually.

You turned your head, smiling faintly. “Yeah. It was lovely.”

Lovely.

The word sat between you.

Max swallowed. “Daniel did a lot.”

“He did,” you said, and your voice was warm. “It was really sweet.”

There it was again. That careful admiration.

Max’s hands flexed around the steering wheel. “You like that kind of thing?”

You looked at him properly then, brows lifting a little. “What kind of thing?”

He shrugged, trying to sound casual and failing. “All of it. The flowers. The photos. The big party.”

You looked away and gave a small laugh, the kind that tried to make a truth sound harmless. “I mean, I don’t need all that.”

Max’s chest tightened.

That wasn’t what he had asked.

“I didn’t ask if you needed it.”

Your fingers stopped moving against the shoe strap and for a moment you said nothing. Then you looked down and smiled again, but this one was worse than the one at the party because it was meant only for him, meant to reassure him, meant to protect him from feeling bad about something he had already done.

“I just think it’s nice,” you said carefully. “For her. Daniel clearly put a lot of thought into it.”

Max nodded once, jaw tense.

Thought.

That was the word that stayed with him.

You didn’t need a private room full of flowers or a custom cake or a wall of photographs. You probably didn’t even want something that big, but you wanted thought. You wanted evidence that he had paused, considered you, and chosen to make you feel loved on purpose.

Max, who could analyse tyre degradation over fifty laps, who could remember tiny setup changes from races years ago, who could spend hours perfecting a sim lap by half a tenth, had somehow convinced himself he was incapable of remembering to buy you flowers.

“I should have done more for your birthday,” he said.

You went very still.

The car felt smaller suddenly.

“Max…”

“No,” he said, because he knew that tone. He knew you were about to let him off the hook again. “I should have.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not.”

You exhaled quietly and looked out of the window again. “I told you it was fine.”

“I know you did.”

“Then why are you bringing it up?”

Because I finally saw your face, he wanted to say. Because I finally realised you have been asking for so little that I stopped giving you even that and I do not know how to forgive myself for not noticing sooner.

But Max had never been good with words when they mattered most.

So he said, “Because I think you say things are fine when they're not.”

Your mouth pressed together. That tiny movement cut through him more than any argument would have.

You weren’t angry, but part of him wished you were. Anger would have given him something to meet, something to fix, something loud enough that he couldn’t ignore it, you just looked tired and that was worse.

“I don’t want to be difficult,” you said after a while.

“You're not difficult,” he said immediately.

You gave him a small, sad smile. “I know. I just mean… your life is already a lot. You have so many people needing things from you all the time I never wanted to be another thing on the list.”

“You are not a thing on the list.”

“Aren’t I?” you asked softly.

Max didn’t answer fast enough, once again words failed him, he hated himself for that.

You turned your face back towards the window, and the reflection showed him the truth he had been avoiding all night. You weren’t crying or making a scene. You weren’t asking him to turn the car around or apologise in some grand dramatic way. You were simply sitting there beside him carrying a hurt that had clearly existed long before tonight.

He figured you’d be home from your errands by now.

Probably curled up somewhere in the apartment, wearing one of his hoodies like you always did when he was away for more than a few days. Maybe on the sofa with your knees tucked beneath you, scrolling mindlessly through your phone, or half-watching one of those comfort shows you liked to put on in the background while you waited for him. The thought came easily, warmly, and Max found himself smiling before he had even opened the door properly.

He liked coming home to you.

He liked the small signs of you scattered through his space. Your shoes by the door, your hair tie abandoned on the coffee table, your mug in the sink because you always forgot to rinse it. Your presence had softened the apartment in ways he hadn’t realised he needed, turning it from somewhere he slept between races into somewhere that actually felt like home.

The apartment was quiet when he stepped inside, but not empty.

Max kicked off his shoes and shrugged out of his jacket, already turning toward the living room when he heard your voice from the bedroom. Then he heard your best friend’s name, and realised you were on the phone.

He didn’t mean to eavesdrop. He was about to call out, to let you know he was back, but something about your tone made him stop before the words left his mouth. So he stayed quiet, halfway down the hall, one hand still resting against the wall.

“I’m not upset he did all that for her,” you were saying. “It’s sweet. It is.”

There was a pause.

Max’s body went strangely still.

He knew, instantly, what you were talking about.

“It’s just…” You exhaled shakily. “He’s never done anything like that for me.”

The words hit him hard. Max stared at the floor, heartbeat slowing into something heavy and uncomfortable.

“I don’t ask for much,” you continued, and your voice was smaller now, like you were embarrassed to even say it out loud. “I know I don’t. I never wanted to pressure him or make him feel like he had to go out of his way when his life is already so much. I thought if I was easygoing and low-maintenance, it would make things easier on him.”

His throat tightened.

“But sometimes—” Your voice broke so softly he almost missed it. “Sometimes I wish he’d do something without me having to ask.”

Max’s fingers curled around the edge of the wall.

He could feel every careless assumption he had ever made beginning to turn over in his head, one after another, each one worse than the last.

You didn’t care if he forgot plans, if he came home distracted, if he said he would make it up to you and then didn’t, because something else came up and you smiled like it was fine.

“Maybe I enabled it by alway saying I was fine... but I don’t need grand gestures,” you went on, voice wobbling now. “I know that’s not really him, and I don’t want him to be anyone else. I don’t want a big show just for the sake of it, but it would be nice to feel special sometimes… to feel like he thought about me without me having to ask.”

Max’s chest ached.

He looked toward the bedroom door, but he couldn’t move.

“I just want to know he wants to do those things for me,” you whispered. “Not because he’s apologising or because someone else did it first… because he loves me enough to notice.”

Max couldn’t breathe properly.

He hadn’t known.

He really hadn’t known.

He thought you meant it when you said you didn’t care about birthdays, anniversaries, flowers, or all the romantic things he had always been bad at. He had thought that was part of what made you you. Unbothered by the kind of performative relationship stuff he had never known how to do properly.

The conversation ended a few minutes later.

He heard the soft rustle of sheets then your footsteps moving across the bedroom floor. Max reacted too late, still trapped in the weight of what he had heard and only barely managed to step back into the hallway before you came out.

You stopped when you saw him.

For one awful second, neither of you said anything and then he smiled and wrapped you in a hug pretending like he hadn’t heard a word.

That night Max sat alone in the dark of the living room for a long time, head in his hands. He couldn’t bring himself to move, couldn’t bring himself to do anything except sit there in the silence and let every word he had overheard replay in his head until it felt carved into him.

He kept hearing your voice.

“to feel like he thought about me without me having to ask.”

He pressed the heels of his hands harder against his eyes.

God.

How many moments had you swallowed your disappointment before he could even notice it was there, dimming yourself down just to be easier to love?

It gutted him.

You hadn’t asked him for the world. You hadn’t asked him to become someone he wasn’t. You only wanted to feel considered. Somehow he had made the best thing in his life feel like she had to be grateful for whatever was left of him at the end of the day.

You deserved fireworks, even if you were the kind of girl who said she didn’t need them. You didn’t want more from him. You just wanted to matter enough for him to give it anyway.

You didn’t expect anything to change.

Max was always kind, attentive in the ways he knew how to be. He noticed when you were cold and passed you his hoodie without making a big thing of it. He reached for your hand in crowded places because he liked knowing exactly where you were. He remembered how you took your coffee, which side of the bed you preferred, the shows you put on when you needed background noise. He loved you. You knew he did.

So when he suggested you take a weekend off together “Somewhere quiet, just us” you didn’t overthink it. You figured he wanted to disappear for a couple of days, somewhere without cameras, team radios, sponsor obligations, or someone asking him about tyre degradation.

It wasn’t until you stepped onto the lakeside dock in Switzerland that you realised something was different.

The cottage was small but charming, tucked away by the water with warm wood walls, soft cream blankets, and floor-to-ceiling windows that made the whole place glow with the late afternoon light. It wasn’t flashy, it wasn’t the kind of place chosen to impress anyone, it felt private, thoughtful, almost painfully intimate.

Inside there were your favourite snacks arranged in the kitchen. Your favourite wine chilling in the fridge. Your comfort blanket folded over the armchair by the window. Your favourite book was already resting on the bedside table, the old, worn copy you had once told him you reread whenever your head felt too loud.

You frowned, turning slowly back to him. “Did you… did you set this up?”

Max leaned against the doorframe, hands in his pockets, trying for casual and not quite managing it. “Maybe.”

You narrowed your eyes, sceptical. “What’s going on?”

His smirk softened a little. He just looked at you and there was something unusually careful in his expression, something that made your chest tighten before he had even said a word.

“I listened,” he said.

You blinked. Max glanced down briefly, like the words felt awkward in his mouth, but when he looked back up he didn’t look away again.

“I didn’t realise how much I’d taken for granted,” he continued quietly. “How much you gave by never asking. You made it easy for me, but that doesn’t mean I should’ve stopped trying.”

Your throat tightened.

“Max…”

“No, let me say it,” he murmured, taking a small step closer. “You always said things were fine. That you didn’t need flowers, or birthdays, or plans, or all the extra stuff and I believed you because it was easier because it meant I didn’t have to think about whether you were only saying it so I wouldn’t feel bad.”

You swallowed hard, looking away before your face could betray too much.

He walked you further inside, his hand warm at the small of your back, and that was when you noticed the little table by the window. It had been set for two, facing the lake as the sun began to lower behind the mountains. Candlelight, flowers, two plates, homemade pasta that looked slightly lopsided and very clearly like his doing, and a little folded note beside your place.

You stared at it for a second before picking it up.

In his messy, all-caps handwriting, it said:

I SHOULD HAVE MADE YOU FEEL SPECIAL BEFORE NOW. I’M GOING TO DO BETTER.

Max’s face shifted immediately, concern cutting through the nervousness. “Schatje…”

You shook your head quickly trying to laugh it off, but your voice came out thin. “I wanted to be cool,” you whispered. “I wanted to be the girlfriend who didn’t care about all that stuff. I thought if I asked for too much then I’d just become another pressure for you.”

Max stepped closer and cupped your cheeks, his thumbs brushing away the tears that slipped out despite your best efforts.

“You are the most important person in my life,” he murmured. “You always are.” His voice dropped softer, rougher. “I wish I could give you the world and I’m sorry it took me this long to show it.”

You looked at him then, really looked at him, at the nervous set of his mouth and the careful way he held you, like he understood now that easiness was not the same thing as not needing anything.

Then you finally kissed him.

Later that night you were curled against his chest with the fireplace crackling softly in the background, the cottage wrapped in that quiet, golden kind of warmth that made everything outside feel very far away.

Max had one arm around you, his hand resting beneath the hem of your sweater, fingers tracing slow, absent patterns against your skin.

You smiled into his shoulder, cheek pressed against the soft fabric as you listened to the steady beat of his.

“So,” you mumbled, voice sleepy but teasing, “is this a one-time gesture or…”

Max’s chest moved beneath you as he chuckled. “Oh no.”

You tilted your head slightly. “Oh no?”

“No,” he said, tightening his arm around you. “You’re getting so much romance now it’ll annoy you.”

You looked up at him trying and failing not to smile. “Really?”

He nodded solemnly, like he was discussing race strategy. “Really. I’m talking airport reunions. Flowers for no reason. Random poetry.”

“Poetry?” you repeated, laughing already.

“Bad poetry,” he corrected. “Very bad. Rhymes way too much.”

“Oh, God.”

“And a cheesy playlist,” he added, completely serious. “Maybe several. One for the car. One for when I’m away. One with songs you’ll make fun of me for.”

You laughed properly then, burying your face in his neck as warmth spread through your chest. It was never about the playlist, or the flowers, or whatever terrible poetry Max Verstappen might attempt in the name of love.

It was that he was thinking about it. That he had finally understood the difference between you not needing to be spoiled and you still deserving to be cherished.

Max turned his head and pressed a kiss into your hair. “I’m serious,” he murmured, quieter now. “I don’t want you wondering anymore.”

Your laughter softened. You lifted your face again, looking at him through the firelight. “Wondering what?”

“If I think about you,” he said. “If I notice. If I care enough to try.”

Your throat tightened, but this time the feeling wasn’t painful. Max brushed his thumb along your cheek. “I do,” he said. “I’ll show you better now.”

For a moment you just looked at him, then you leaned in, pressing a slow kiss to the corner of his mouth before tucking yourself back against him.

“That sounds perfect.” you whispered, smiling against his neck.

Whether it had been the missed dinner in Monaco or that interview he had done where he brushed off a question about you and your marriage so bluntly that it left your stomach twisting when you watched it back online. Maybe it had been the way you had snapped at him when he got home, already defensive, already tired, already carrying weeks of tension with him like a storm cloud.

From there it had just grown. Every conversation became a fight. If you asked if he was coming home at a certain time, he heard accusation. If he asked why you seemed distracted, you heard criticism.

You both knew exactly where to press, exactly which words would sting the most, because love like yours came with that dangerous knowledge. There was no cruelty like the kind that could only come from someone who knew every soft part of you by heart, and the worst part was that neither of you seemed capable of stopping it.

By the time Max left for the next race weekend things had become so tense that you barely kissed him goodbye.

He had stood in the hallway with his bag by his feet, waiting. You had leaned against the kitchen counter, arms folded.

“That’s it?” he asked, voice already edged.

“What do you want me to say?”

His jaw tightened. “I want you to act like you actually care that I’m leaving.”

A laugh had escaped you before you could stop it. “You already know I care but maybe I’m tired of begging for scraps of your attention every time you come home.”

Then it had spiralled, because of course it had, by the time the door shut behind him the air in the house felt scorched, he didn’t call that night and neither did you.

During the race weekend you exchanged only the bare minimum, a clipped good luck before qualifying, a quick congratulations after the race.

So when Max landed back home late Sunday evening, exhausted from travel, still buzzing faintly from adrenaline and media obligations and the hollow ache of too many things left unsaid he was braced for another cold welcome.

He unlocked the front door and stepped inside.

“Hello?”

Nothing.

The house was dim and quiet.

His brows pulled together.

Usually, even when things were bad, there was some sign of you. A light on upstairs, music playing softly from your phone in the bathroom, a mug left abandoned on the kitchen counter. Something.

He dropped his bag by the door and moved further inside, pulling off his cap.

“Y/N?”

Still nothing.

A flicker of irritation sparked first, because lately irritation always came easiest. Had you gone out without telling him? Before he had just gotten home?

Then he saw it.

Your wedding ring.

It sat on the kitchen island, catching the warm overhead light, unmistakable and motionless and completely, horribly wrong.

Max stopped dead.

For a second his mind refused to make sense of what he was looking at. It was just a ring. Just something you must have taken off absentmindedly.

But no.

No, because you never took it off and left it there.

His chest constricted so fast it almost felt physical. A brutal tightening beneath his ribs, a sudden ringing in his ears he crossed the room in two strides and picked it up.

It was yours. Of course it was yours. He knew every tiny detail of it, every glint, every curve. He had slid it onto your finger himself, both of you too young by most people’s standards and not caring even a little, his hands shaking with emotion and the absolute certainty that loving you had been the least reckless part of his life. People had called it early, impulsive, too much too soon, but standing there with you all those years ago, watching that ring settle onto your finger, Max had only ever felt one thing.

Right.

Now it was sitting discarded on the counter like something forgotten.

His throat went dry. Had you left? The thought slammed into him with enough force to make his knees feel weak. His gaze darted around the kitchen as if the answer might be written somewhere, some clue hidden in plain sight. Then he noticed your handbag was gone. Your keys too. His pulse kicked harder.

He reached for his phone immediately, calling you before he had even fully thought through what he was going to say.

It rang… and rang… then voicemail.

“Fuck,” he muttered, hanging up only to call again.

Voicemail.

His breathing had turned shallow now, panic creeping in through the cracks of his anger. He opened your messages, scrolling back through the sparse conversation from the weekend as if he might find something there he had missed. Some warning. Some goodbye hidden between the lines.

Nothing.

He called again.

This time you answered, slightly breathless. “Hello?”

Max nearly snapped the phone in half with how tightly he was gripping it. “Where are you?”

A beat of silence. “What?”

“Where are you?” he repeated, harsher now, unable to keep the edge out of his voice. “I’m home. You’re not here.”

“I know you’re home, your flight tracker said you landed.”

That should have reassured him, maybe, but it only sharpened the confusion clawing through him. “Then where the hell are you?”

You exhaled. “I just popped out, I’m on my way home now.”

“Popped out,” he repeated incredulously. His eyes fell back to the ring in his palm. “You left your wedding ring on the kitchen counter and ‘popped out’?”

There was another pause.

Then, “Oh.”

Oh.

That was all you had to say? Oh?

Max laughed once, but there was no humour in it. “That’s your answer?”

“Max, I was in a rush.”

“In a rush to do what?”

His voice came out colder than he intended, but beneath it was something desperate he couldn’t quite hide.

You hesitated for a fraction too long and then you said, “I was just meeting Luca.”

Something ugly flared immediately in his chest.

Luca.

Of course.

Luca, your longtime friend from before Max, the one person he had never quite managed to like despite knowing, logically, that there had probably never been anything between you. Luca who texted too often and always seemed to appear whenever things between you and Max were rough. Luca, who made Max feel irrationally territorial in a way he hated.

“You’re meeting him?” Max asked flatly.

“Yes.”

“At night.”

“It’s 6pm.”

“You left your ring behind to go meet another man.”

“Do not do that,” you snapped, your own temper sparking to life now. “I forgot it because I was late, not because I’m making some symbolic statement.”

He looked down at the ring again, still cold against his skin. “It looked pretty symbolic.”

“Well, it wasn’t.”

The silence on the line turned taut.

Finally Max said, quieter now but somehow more dangerous, “Come home.”

You let out a disbelieving breath.

“I’m already on my way,” your tone had turned icy. “I’m not a child Max. I’m allowed to go out and see my friends.”

“I didn’t say you weren’t.”

“No you just called me sounding like I’d committed a crime.”

“Because I came home and found your ring discarded on the counter.”

“It was not discarded.”

“It looked fucking discarded.”

You made a frustrated noise. “This is exactly what I mean every conversation with you turns into this.”

He shut his eyes, deep down he knew you were right. He knew it the second the words left your mouth. What had started as panic had twisted almost instantly into accusation, jealousy, anger, because lately that was all either of you seemed capable of giving each other.

Still the image of your empty finger and Luca waiting somewhere beside you was enough to keep his temper lit.

“What were you even doing with him?” Max asked.

Another pause. Then, carefully, “Talking.”

His grip tightened again. “About us?”

Silence.

Something hot and humiliating curled under his skin. “So now your friend is giving you advice about our marriage?”

“No,” you said, exhaustion bleeding into your tone. “He’s listening because every time I try to talk to my husband we end up shouting.”

The truth of it landed like a blow.

For a moment neither of you said anything.

Then you spoke again, softer this time. “I’ll be home soon.”

The line went dead. Max stood motionless in the kitchen for several long seconds, your ring still in his hand.

The house felt too big around him.

He should have put the ring back on the counter. Should have gone upstairs, showered, cooled off, waited for you to get home. Instead he sank down onto one of the barstools and just sat there, staring at the gold band in his palm as though it might explain how the two of you had ended up here.

He thought of your wedding day.

Of the way you had looked at him when he slid the ring onto your finger, eyes bright and wet and full of so much love it had made his chest ache. Of the way you had laughed through your tears when his hands shook. Of the private promise he had made to himself then, that no matter how difficult life became, no matter how demanding racing was, he would never let himself take this for granted.

Yet lately that was exactly what he had done, not because he did not love you. Christ, that had never been the problem.

It was because he loved you so much that every fracture between you felt unbearable, every criticism cutting deeper, every perceived distance sending him straight into defensiveness. He had been tired, stressed, stretched too thin, and instead of reaching for you he had pushed you further and further away.

He had let pride do the talking.

For the first time in weeks, maybe months, Max let himself really feel how close he had come to losing you.

The front door opened about twenty minutes later. He looked up immediately. You stepped inside, hair slightly windswept, your expression guarded the moment you saw him sitting there in the half-lit kitchen waiting.

Neither of you spoke at first. Then your eyes dropped to his hand.

To the ring.

Your face changed instantly. “Max—”

“You forgot it,” he said.

Your shoulders sagged, some of the fight leaving you at once. “Yes. I forgot it.”

He nodded once, but his voice was rough when he asked, “Did you know what I thought when I saw it?”

Your lips parted, but no answer came.

“I thought you’d left me.”

Something in his expression must have gotten through to you then, because the defensive set of your shoulders softened. The tension in your face cracked.

“Max…”

“I walked in and you weren’t here and that was there.” He held up the ring slightly. “And I thought that was it I thought you were gone.”

You swallowed hard.

“I didn’t leave you,” you said quietly.

“But you could have.”

The honesty of it hung between you.

You moved further into the kitchen, slower now, careful, like approaching something wounded. “Luca just asked me to meet him because he was nearby. That’s all. He knew things have been bad and he wanted to check on me.”

Max’s jaw tightened at the name, but the jealousy that had burned so bright before now felt secondary to everything else. “Did you tell him everything?”

“No.”

He looked away.

You took another step closer. “I wasn’t running away from you.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me where you were?”

A tiny, sad laugh escaped you. “Because lately even telling you I’m going to the shop turns into a fight.”

That stung because it was true. Max dragged a hand over his face. “I know.”

You stared at him for a long moment before saying, “When did we get like this?”

He let out a slow breath. “I don’t know.”

“We used to be so good. Great.”

“We still are,” he said immediately, then corrected himself, voice cracking slightly, “Or we could be. We should be.”

Your eyes filled properly then and Max hated that. Hated being the reason tears existed on your face at all.

“I’m tired,” you whispered. “I’m so tired of fighting with you.”

The words nearly undid him because they echoed exactly what had been sitting in his own chest for weeks. He stepped closer now too, until only a small space remained between you.

“So am I.”

You looked up at him, chin trembling. “Then why do we keep doing it?”

Because it was easier than saying I miss you. Because anger was simpler than admitting hurt. Because loving you this much made every distance feel like rejection.

Max had never been especially elegant with emotion, and the truth often came out blunt and raw instead.

“Because I think you’re slipping away from me,” he said, then took a deep, shaky breath. “And every time I feel that... I get angry before I let myself admit I’m scared.”

His thumb rubbed unconsciously over your ring. “And then tonight I came home and thought maybe I was right.”

Your eyes dropped to the band in his hand, and when you spoke your voice was shaky. “Max I’m scared too.”

You gave a watery laugh, wiping quickly under one eye. “I feel like I can’t reach you anymore. When you’re home, you’re tense. When you’re away, you’re distant. And every time I try to tell you I miss you it somehow becomes a competition about who’s been hurt more.”

He flinched, because that was true too.

“I didn’t meet Luca because I wanted to replace you,” you continued softly. “I met him because I needed to talk to a friend and I forgot the ring because I was running late and my hands were wet and dirty from watering the plants outside before I left. That’s it. That’s all it was.”

The absurd normality of that, watering the plants, rushing out, forgetting something important in the chaos, made Max feel suddenly foolish and unbearably relieved all at once.

He laughed quietly then, once, more like an exhale.

You frowned slightly. “What?”

“I nearly lost my mind because you were watering plants.”

To your surprise, a tiny smile tugged at your mouth. “Yes. Very glamorous.”

He shook his head, stepping the rest of the way toward you. “I was jealous too.”

“I noticed.”

“Of Luca.”

“I definitely noticed.”

His mouth twitched despite everything. Then his expression turned serious again. “I don’t want to be like this with you. I love you so much.”

Your smile faded into something much softer. “I love you too.”

He looked at the ring in his palm for one last moment, then reached for your hand.

You let him take it, your fingers trembled slightly against his, he slowly slid the wedding band back onto your finger. The sight of it settling where it belonged made something deep in his chest loosen.

His thumb lingered over it. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly.

“For what?”

A humourless little laugh escaped him. “Most of it.”

That pulled an actual laugh from you, small and teary and beautiful enough to ache.

Max’s hand moved from yours to your face, fingertips brushing your cheek like he was remembering how to touch you gently. “I’m sorry for making this house feel like a war zone. I’m sorry for anytime I chose being right over being kind and I’m sorry that you had to talk to someone else because I made it too hard to talk to me.”

Your eyes closed briefly under his touch.

“I’m sorry too,” you whispered. “I’ve been angry for so long that sometimes I start a fight before I even know what I’m actually upset about.”

He gave a slight nod. “Then maybe we stop.”

Your brows knit. “Just like that?”

“No,” he said honestly. “Not just like that but maybe tonight we stop trying to win.”

That made your face crumple in the saddest, sweetest way, because that was what it had become, wasn’t it? Two people who loved each other desperately, trying to win arguments nobody was surviving. You leaned into his hand then and the gesture was so familiar, so heartbreakingly tender that Max’s own eyes stung.

“I missed you,” you admitted quietly.

He let out a shaky breath. “I missed you too.”

Your hands came up slowly, resting against his chest. “You really thought I left.”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t.”

“I know that now.”

“I wasn’t going to. I would never.”

At that he looked down at you, searching your face as if he needed to be absolutely sure.

Then he bent his forehead to yours.

“You can’t leave your ring on the counter like that,” he murmured.

A weak laugh broke out of you.

“It nearly killed me.”

“Poor baby.”

He huffed a laugh against your skin, and for the first time in what felt like forever, the sound did not catch on broken glass.

You smiled against his chest and he pulled back just enough to look at you properly and Max, who could fight wheel to wheel without flinching, who could stare down cameras and critics and rivals with perfect composure, felt almost unsteady from the weight of that simple look.

So he kissed you, it wasn't a desperate or angry kiss you had sometimes shared in the middle of arguments, all heat and frustration and unsaid things. This was gentle, his hand stayed cupped to your cheek, the other at your waist, holding you as if he had learned tonight exactly how fragile even forever could be.

You kissed him back with a small broken sound, and when he felt your hands clutch at him more tightly he deepened it just enough to say everything he had been too proud, too stubborn, too hurt to put into words.

When you finally pulled away, both of you were breathing unevenly. You rested your forehead against his again and gave a tiny, exhausted laugh. “We still need to talk about everything.”

“I know.”

“We’re not magically fixed.”

“I know.”

“You’re still dramatic.”

His eyes narrowed slightly. “You left your ring on the counter.”

“I was watering plants.”

“Terrorising your husband.”

That made you laugh properly, and Max thought he might spend the rest of his life trying to earn that sound again every day. He wrapped his arms around you then, pulling you fully into him and this time you came without hesitation.

You stayed like that for a long time. Just standing in the kitchen, the quiet weight of each other, the ring back on your finger, and the fragile but undeniable feeling that maybe this was how you found your way back, by choosing to stop treating love like something to defend yourself from.

After a while, your muffled voice came from where your face was pressed into his shirt.

“For the record, Luca says you’re very intimidating.”

Max’s hand stroked slowly up and down your back. “He’s right.”

“And a little possessive.”

“He’s also right.”

You tilted your head up just enough to grin at him. “Good. At least you’re self-aware.” Your smile softened. “You’re the one I came home to. Always will.”

He bent and kissed your forehead. “Good.”

Your eyes softened instantly. You reached for his hand and laced your fingers through his, squeezing once. He kissed you once more and led you out of the kitchen with your hand in his and your ring glinting softly under the light, both of you knowing there was still work to do, still wounds to mend, still long conversations waiting, but for tonight it was enough to know that neither of you would ever walk away.

You never expected the dread to hit like this, sharp and sudden, tightening in your chest until it feels hard to breathe. The music is suddenly too loud, bass thudding through you like a second heartbeat, rattling your ribs. Strobe lights fracture the room into blinding snapshots of faces, hands, and heat. Bodies press in from every direction, the air thick with sweat and perfume and something sour beneath it all. You feel swallowed by it.

You think your phone buzzes in your purse. The sound is faint, almost imaginary, but it makes your pulse spike anyway. Your hands are shaking too badly to dig it out, fingers clumsy, nails scraping uselessly against fabric.

You don’t see him approach.

One second you’re dancing with your friends laughing too loud and the next there’s a body behind you too close, breath warm at your ear. A hand closes around your wrist, not tight enough to bruise, but firm. Possessive. Like he thinks he’s entitled to you.

You freeze then twist away. “Get off,” you say, sharp and clear, trying to pull your arm back.

He laughs like it’s a joke you’re both in on, like you’re being dramatic. His grip tightens and moves to your waist, just enough to make your stomach drop.

“I said no.” Your voice comes out louder this time but it’s brittle at the edges.

You try again. He still doesn’t listen, only pulling you closer. Something cold washes through you, anger, fear, instinct, you wrench your arm free and stumble backward, heart hammering so hard it actually hurts. You shove through the crowd, muttering apologies you don’t mean, shoulder clipping strangers as you push toward the bathrooms, toward the edge of the room where the lights dim and the music dulls to a distant roar.

Your hands are shaking so badly you almost drop your phone when you finally get it out. You don’t think, don’t hesitate, your thumb moves on muscle memory alone.

Calling: Max ❤️

The screen glows in the dark and you can only hope he picks up. It rings once. Twice. Long enough for your chest to tighten with the thought that he won’t—

Then—

“Y/N?” His voice is rough with sleep, low and warm, the way it only ever is when you wake him up. “Everything okay?”

The sound of it nearly undoes you and you suck in a breath but it comes out uneven anyway, your voice cracking around his name. “Max…”

He’s awake instantly, you can hear it in the rustle of sheets, the soft thud as he sits up too fast. “What’s wrong?” he asks already moving. “Where are you?”

“There’s—there’s this guy,” you manage, words tripping over themselves as the fear catches up to you. “He won’t he wouldn’t leave me alone. I told him no. He grabbed my arm.” Your grip tightens on the phone, knuckles white. “I—fuck, Max, I don’t know what to do. I just wanted to go out for a bit. Sorry I’m being stupid.”

“Where are you?” The softness vanishes from his voice, replaced by something sharp and precise, like a blade being drawn every syllable is urgent.

“Bar Lux. Near the square.”

“I’m already in the car,” he says, and you know it’s not an exaggeration. You hear keys, the scrape of a door, the solid slam of it shutting. “Go find security now. Tell them someone touched you and you need a private room. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

The speed of it all leaves you dizzy.

“Max—”

“Don’t hang up,” he cuts in quicker now, but gentler too, his voice dropping back into something steady. “Just keep talking to me. Can you do that?”

You nod even though he can’t see you, throat tight. “Yeah.”

“Good,” he says. “Start walking toward the front. Can you see the exit?”

You push through the crowd phone pressed hard to your ear like an anchor. The music feels distant now, muffled under the sound of your own heartbeat. You don’t see the guy anymore, but your body hasn’t caught up to that fact and your pulse is still racing, lungs still tight as if he’s right behind you.

“There,” you murmur. “I see it.”

“Good girl,” Max says softly. “Find security. You’re doing great.”

You spot one near the entrance and tap his arm, your hand shaking. “I need help,” you say, forcing the words out. “Someone grabbed me. My boyfriend’s on his way.”

“You okay?” he asks. “Come with me.”

Max hears all of it, checking in, making sure the bouncer is actually leading you somewhere safe. It already feels like he’s here, that you’re not alone, that nothing else matters right now.

You’re led down a narrow corridor into a small office, the door clicking shut behind you with a sound that finally lets you breathe. You sink onto the worn leather couch, legs weak, adrenaline buzzing so hard your fingers feel numb.

You lift the phone back to your mouth, voice barely above a whisper. “You still there?”

“Always,” Max replies without hesitation.

Nine Minutes Later.

The knock on the door is sharp and loud.

“Security said my girlfriend’s in here.”

You know the muffled voice before the door even rattles in its frame.

Your hands fumble with the handle, fingers still a little numb, and when you pull the door open his eyes find you instantly, like the rest of the room doesn’t exist. They sweep over you in one quick, devastating pass the smeared mascara beneath your eyes, the way your arms are folded tight around yourself, the faint tremor running through your legs now that the adrenaline has nowhere else to go.

His chest rises with a harsh breath.

Then he’s moving, he crosses the room in two long strides and pulls you into him so fast it steals the air from your lungs, arms wrapping around you like he’s bracing for impact, like he’s afraid if he loosens his grip even for a second you’ll vanish. You don’t hesitate you fold into him, bury your face in his chest fists twisting into the soft fabric of his hoodie as if anchoring yourself there.

The scent of him hits you all at once, clean laundry, sleep, warmth, something unmistakably Max and it settles your nervous system in a way nothing else has managed all night. Your breathing stutters, then slowly evens out.

“Fuck,” he breathes into your hair, voice low and raw. “Are you okay?” He pulls back just enough to look at you, hands still firm at your sides. “Did he hurt you?”

“No,” you say quickly, shaking your head. “I—I got away before he could. He just… wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

You feel it immediately the way Max’s body goes rigid, the tension snapping tight through his shoulders, his jaw clenches hard enough you can see the muscle jump.

“I swear to god,” he mutters, anger curling dark and dangerous beneath the words.

You shake your head again, lifting a hand to his chest like you can physically keep him grounded. “I’m okay. I just I—I got scared.”

“I’m here,” he whispers. “He’s not going to touch you again. I promise.”

Your fingers grip the back of his shirt as you try to breathe through the panic.

That’s when his expression shifts, the fury doesn’t disappear, but something softer edges in around it as his hands come up to your face, gentle now, thumbs brushing under your eyes as he tilts your chin up so he can really see you.

“You shouldn’t have had to call me like that,” he says quietly.

“I didn’t know what else to do,” you whisper. “I panicked. I just—I needed you.”

His eyes soften at that, the sharp edge of his anger giving way to something fierce and protective. “You did the right thing,” he says without a second’s hesitation. “I just hate that anyone made you feel that way.”

You nod, once, then again and that’s when it breaks the tears come without warning, slow at first, then heavy and unstoppable, spilling over like your body has finally decided it doesn’t need to be strong anymore.

Now you’re here, safe. In Max’s arms. Everything you’ve been holding back comes rushing out.

A quiet, broken sound leaves your throat as you press closer to him, your face buried against his chest, shoulders trembling as the sobs continue. Max doesn’t say anything at first he just tightens his hold around you, one arm firm across your back, the other hand moving in slow, steady circles soothing you one breath at a time.

He lets you cry, lets it happen without trying to stop it, without asking you to explain or be okay faster than you are.

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs, voice low and constant against your hair. “You’re safe.”

Back at your apartment Max doesn’t let you out of his sight for a second.

He follows you from room to room like a quiet shadow always close enough to touch, as if the simple act of being near you is the only thing keeping the night from catching up again. When you change he hands you one of his shirts without a word. It’s soft and oversized, the hem brushing your thighs smelling faintly of him in a way that makes your chest ache with relief. You hadn’t realised how badly you needed that small, familiar comfort until it settles over you like a second skin.

You sit on the edge of the bed and Max comes with you, positioning himself behind you, legs bracketing yours, arms wrapping around your waist. His chin rests on your shoulder, his presence solid and warm at your back.

“I feel so stupid,” you murmur, eyes fixed on your hands twisted together in your lap.

“You’re not,” he says immediately, the words firm enough to stop you mid-thought. “Don’t ever say that.”

“I thought I’d be fine,” you admit quietly. “I didn’t think—” Your throat tightens and you swallow hard. “I didn’t think I’d feel that scared.”

Max exhales slowly, his forehead coming to rest against your shoulder. You feel the weight of it, the warmth. “I felt like the ground dropped out from under me when I heard your voice,” he says, voice low and honest. “I don’t think I’ve ever moved that fast in my life.”

You lean back into him, letting yourself be held, your fingers finding his and lacing together like they know exactly where they belong.

“I should’ve come with you,” he whispers, regret threaded through every syllable.

You turn your head slightly. “No, Max. You needed rest. You can’t be with me all the time. That’s not healthy anyway.”

“I know,” he says quietly, tightening his grip just a fraction. “But I still wish I’d been there to stop it from happening at all.”

The silence that follows is heavy but gentle, filled with the soft sounds of breathing, the city humming faintly beyond the windows after a moment you turn in his arms just enough to look back at him.

“I’m really glad you picked up,” you say softly.

He gives you a small smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, something almost broken and deeply sincere. “There’s no universe where I wouldn’t answer your call.”

Your chest tightens, you lift his hand and press a kiss to his knuckles. “You always make me feel safe.”

His voice drops to a whisper, serious and unwavering. “I’ll never let anyone hurt you.”

You know he means it.

The first time he noticed you was because you challenged a guest lecturer mid-slide, correcting a statistics reference without any notes of your own. Your voice was steady, your logic air-tight, and your confidence? Frankly it pissed him off and intrigued him all at once.

Max who had skated through high school with one eye on the racetrack and the other on, well, anything else wasn’t used to someone like you. You didn’t just want the best grades you wanted the last word. You asked sharp questions and always had your hand halfway up before the professor even finished theirs.

He’d scoffed the first few times, a quiet huff of amusement he didn’t bother hiding, muttering sarcastic asides just loud enough for you to hear. You noticed of course and instead of letting it slide, you met him where he stood firing back with remarks that were casual on the surface but razor-sharp underneath.

He questioned your conclusions. You dismantled his assumptions. He smirked when you spoke, you raised an eyebrow when he did. Debated theories with polite smiles stretched just a little too tight. Every exchange felt like a chess move, each of you convinced you were three steps ahead, neither willing to give an inch.

The whole department knew. You were that pair the two brightest minds in the cohort, locked in some kind of cold war disguised as group projects and passive-aggressive seminar debates. You corrected each other’s grammar, challenged each other’s citations and rolled your eyes so often people swore it was choreographed.

What no one ever said out loud was how charged it all felt. Too much eye contact. Too much attention. Too much care taken in proving the other wrong. You didn’t argue like people who were indifferent you argued like people who were deeply invested.

You were oil and water. Fire and ice. Except sometimes… it felt more like magnets.

Max started showing up to every lecture. Every single one. Even the early morning ones he used to blow off. He started reading ahead, making points just milliseconds before you could raise your hand. Started watching your habits what journal articles you cited, what theory you leaned on, how you constructed an argument. His notes were full of your name not in hearts, but in bullet points.

When he joined your study group for finals week Charles gave him a look that said don’t lie to yourself, but Max just shrugged and muttered something about “strategic positioning.”

And you? You acted like it didn’t matter like you weren’t already two Red Bulls deep when he walked into the study room, hoodie half-zipped, hair tied up, and that same infuriating glint in his eyes that said you ready for round three?

“You know,” you muttered, eyes red-rimmed from hours of revision, “you’d be slightly more tolerable if you stopped treating every group project like it was a Formula 1 race.”

Max didn’t look up from his laptop. “And you’d be slightly more tolerable if you didn’t treat every class like a UN debate.”

You scoffed. “God, you’re so—”

But your voice cracked maybe it was the lack of sleep or the caffeine crash or the sheer absurdity of the two of you breathing the same air for more than three hours. You let out a tired laugh instead and so did he and for the first time the silence between you wasn’t tense. Charged, yes, but not with resentment.

He wasn’t the arrogant show-off anymore. You weren’t the untouchable perfectionist. You were just two overachievers clinging to your final brain cells bound together by sleepless nights, shared textbooks and whatever strange gravitational force kept pulling you back into each other’s orbit.

The rivalry didn’t end after that study room truce it simply evolved, twisting itself into something murkier and harder to define. You still clashed in group projects, still battled for control of every joint presentation, still raced each other to claim the last available study pod in the library like it was sacred ground, but the sharp edges had dulled.

What used to be pure irritation gave way to flirtation disguised as snark. Your signature eye rolls didn’t land with the same venom anymore they lingered edged with a smile that betrayed more curiosity than contempt. Max once so committed to outpacing you academically seemed far more invested in getting under your skin in other ways.

Text messages shifted from cold corrections to provocations that made your face flush in lecture halls.

“Your stats are wrong in slide four.”

evolved into—

“Your stats are wrong, but I can’t say I minded the presentation.”

You should’ve been annoyed. You tried to be. Then he’d sit beside you in the seminar you used to dread, his leg brushing yours beneath the table as he whispered some barely-relevant comment about a new theory just to watch you smirk despite yourself. You’d roll your eyes and he’d grin like he’d won something.

Maybe he had.

Between the late-night debates and early-morning study sessions, the rivalry stopped being about grades it became a language fluent only between the two of you. A rhythm. A game you both kept playing, not to win anymore, but to stay in each other’s orbit.

The thing about orbit is… it only works if there’s gravity.

Max couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment the line between rivalry and something else began to blur only that one day, before he even realised, it was gone. One minute you were his competition the person he measured himself against and the next… you were something entirely different. A variable he hadn’t accounted for. A constant he couldn’t ignore.

He knew that every time you walked into the lecture hall hair slightly damp from the rain, earbuds still in, eyes already scanning the slides his stomach did this ridiculous flip he couldn’t control. He’d tell himself it was nerves, adrenaline, caffeine, but it kept happening. Even when you weren’t competing. Especially when you weren’t.

Then he started noticing things. The way your fingers tapped absently on your notebook when you were deep in thought, like you were willing the answers to flow from pen to page. How you always pulled your sleeves down over your hands when the air conditioning made the room too cold. The way your laughter sounded like a reward after a long debate, like something earned. The way your smile, when aimed at someone else, left an ache in his chest that felt suspiciously like jealousy.

Yet he never said anything.

Not when you were huddled together, trading scribbled flashcards and drinks like contraband.

“This better be your best work, Verstappen,” you muttered, dropping your head against the wall. “Because if I tank this exam because of you I’m haunting your graduation photos.”

He smirked.

“Max,” you warned.

“Relax,” he said, flipping a card lazily. “I colour-coded the topics. I even used the highlighters you hoard.”

You lifted your head. “You did not.”

“Check the edge.”

You did and your mouth twitched into a smile before you could stop it. “Okay fine you’re not entirely useless.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Coming from you that’s practically romantic.”

Not when you both stayed past midnight in the library surrounded by a chaotic fortress of textbooks muttering incoherent sentences about methodology while half-lucid from exhaustion.

“I swear to God,” you hissed, “if this printer jams one more time I’m launching it out the window.”

“Can you launch something that heavy?” he asked, watching you from the floor with an amused smile.

“Try me.”

“You know,” he said, tapping the cap of his pen against his knee, “you’re kind of terrifying when you're stressed.”

You shot him a look. “And yet you keep voluntarily studying with me.”

“I guess I have a death wish,” he said with a shrug.

Not even when you handed in that cursed 14,000-word essay two minutes before the submission window closed and collapsed on the floor beside him, breathless, eyes sparkling with triumph and fatigue. You’d looked at him then and for a second Max thought maybe you felt it too. That something had changed.

Then, turning your head slightly toward him, you added softly, “Hey thanks for staying up I know I’m a pain in the ass during crunch time.”

He turned his head too. “You’re always a pain in the ass.”

You shoved him lightly.

“But,” he added, voice quieter, “I like when it’s you here.”

That got your attention. You looked at him, blinking slowly. “What?”

He shook his head quickly, eyes darting away. “Nothing… don’t let it go to your head.”

You nudged his shoulder with yours, deflecting the sudden rise of heat in your cheeks.

Max for all his boldness in the rest of his life still said nothing because you were still his rival. Still the person who made his blood boil and his thoughts race and he wasn’t sure he was ready for that to change.

Not even when your head, heavy with exhaustion, dipped onto his shoulder sometime around 3 a.m, the library long since emptied of anyone but the two of you and the occasional overworked janitor. You hadn’t said anything just leaned into him slowly like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Max didn’t dare move.

Didn’t breathe too deeply. Didn’t shift an inch. He just sat there, spine tense but heart thrumming like a live wire beneath his hoodie, the soft weight of you pressed against him like a secret. His hand twitched, instinctively wanting to reach for yours or tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, but he stopped himself because touching you like that would make it real and he wasn’t ready for that not yet.

Instead he closed his eyes and let the moment stretch. Let the quiet settle over him like fog. Let the warmth of you sink into his bones in a way he didn’t understand but couldn’t bring himself to pull away from. You smelled like vanilla and the fabric softener he now associated with your jumpers. You mumbled something unintelligible in your sleep and he had to bite his lip to stop himself from smiling.

As the clock ticked past 3:17 a.m., Max sat there in the dim, fluorescent glow of the study pod, utterly still, barely blinking, holding onto that sliver of closeness like it was something fragile.

He didn’t want to win anymore. He just wanted to stay right there.

The moment the final exam ended the room erupted in cliched chaos. Pens dropped, chairs scraped back and the energy in the lecture hall that had been dead for weeks snapped back to life like someone had flipped a switch.

People were hugging and grabbing backpacks like they were sprinting from a burning building. You were among them grabbing your friends, spinning them around like you'd won a war because it had felt like one long, bloody battle of projects, library turf wars, 3 a.m. breakdowns, and Max Verstappen being the academic thorn in your side at every turn.

You didn’t even know where he’d sat in the hall but you knew he’d been there. You’d felt it like always, that quiet awareness, that hum in your chest whenever he was near.

Five hours later the bar was loud and sticky, full of energy and bad decisions. Someone had lined up tequila shots with alarming enthusiasm. You’d stopped counting after four.

Then... he walked in.

You spotted him instantly shirt pushed up to his elbows, hair still a mess from running a hand through it too many times, eyes scanning until they landed right on you. Your heart, which had no business doing anything but celebrating stuttered in your chest.

Max Verstappen, annoyingly smug and unfairly pretty even under harsh bar lighting made his way toward you like the noise and crowd didn’t exist. You watched him come, breath caught halfway between a laugh and something else. Something unspoken. Something that had been sitting between you all year.

When he stopped in front of you, you grinned. Emboldened by freedom and tequila.

“Maxy!” you exclaimed, slapping a palm against his chest. “You made it!”

He caught your wrist gently, before your hand could drop. “Barely,” he said, voice warm with something you couldn’t name.

You swayed toward him not quite steady, not quite subtle. “We should celebrate,” you murmured, gaze hazy but locked on his. “We survived hell.”

“I thought I was your hell,” he said, smirking.

You didn’t even blink. “You are,” you said, tipping your head to the side. Your words hung there suspended between tequila-laced breath and the too-loud music, and suddenly the air around you felt too still.

Your smile faded just slightly because now his eyes were fixed on you in a way that made your pulse flutter, and you weren’t sure if it was the drinks or the way his thumb brushed gently against the inside of your wrist but your whole body went still. Max’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. He didn’t let go of your hand.

“You’re drunk,” he said, quietly. Not accusing just... wary.

“A little,” you admitted, blinking slow. “But not enough to forget this.”

Then you reached for him.

Fingers curled into the collar of his shirt, pulling him down before he could second-guess, before you could.

You kissed him.

For one horrible second he didn’t move. Just stood there, stunned, breath caught in his throat. You froze, panic flooding in, the sting of embarrassment already curling in your chest but then his hands found your waist, firm and certain. Max kissed you back like he’d been holding himself together for months, and now he was finally allowed to break.

It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t sweet.

It was fierce. Desperate almost, full of frustration and adrenaline and the unbearable tension of months spent toeing a line neither of you wanted to admit existed. His hands gripped your hips like he was anchoring himself. Your fingers wound into his hair tugging just to feel him react. His mouth was warm, demanding, familiar in a way that made your knees weak.

You kissed like people who had fought over everything except this. When you finally broke apart panting, flushed, hearts galloping like finals had started all over again your forehead fell against his. Neither of you spoke at first there was too much in the air, too much behind the kiss. Too much that couldn’t be undone.

Finally, you whispered, breathless, “What now?”

He didn’t pull away. Didn’t smirk or deflect or say something clever. He just looked at you and for once Max Verstappen looked vulnerable.

“Now,” he said, voice rough, “I tell you I think I’ve been in love with you since week three.”

Your eyes widened. “Week three of what?”

“Of everything,” he murmured. “Of this. Of us. Of you standing at the front of the hall correcting the professor. Of you rolling your eyes at me in every seminar. Of the first time I made you laugh. Of watching you fall asleep next to me in the library and wishing I could tell you.”

You stared at him, suddenly sober in all the ways that mattered.

“Max—”

He kissed you again before you could finish and this time you kissed him like no one else in the room even existed.

The next morning you woke up to a text from Max:

So… do I have to beat you in another debate to kiss you again?

You grinned still half-buried in your duvet and typed back:

Just bring me coffee.

Ten minutes later there was a knock at your door. He stood there coffee in hand, you were still wearing his hoodie from the night before and he was wearing that stupid, smug smile on his face that said he knew exactly what he was doing.

“Peace offering,” he said, holding out the cup. You took it fingers brushing his your heart doing that traitorous little flip again.

This time when he leaned in you just kissed him slow and easy like maybe this was what you’d both been fighting for all along.

“You’re kind of scary,” he admits, but it’s warm, teasing.

“I’m efficient,” you correct. “And clearly the only reason you’ve ever made it through airport security.”

There’s a pause. Then he laughs full-bodied and genuine.

“What would I do without you?”

“It’s a scary thought.”

“You don’t think I could manage on my own?” he says, mock-offended.

“I don’t think you could tie your shoes without my help.”

He hums thoughtfully. “Debatable.”

“Is it?”

You can hear the smile in his voice before he speaks again. “Touché.”

Working for Max Verstappen wasn’t in your five-year plan. Or your backup plan. Or your blackout-drunk in Ibiza plan.

But somehow you’re here, personal assistant, calendar wizard, social media wrangler, part-time therapist, and full-time fire extinguisher. On any given day you’re organising press conferences, rejecting offers from another gin brand who want Max to be their new face, and reminding him that ignoring the stewards is generally frowned upon.

You’re the one who handles all the chaos that surrounds Max, the media, the meetings, the endless parade of appearances and dinners and fake smiles. You schedule his life down to the minute, including what time he should eat, when to leave for press, and how to avoid women with Instagram bios that say “F1 obsessed.”

He’s a womaniser, flirtatious to the point of reckless. Models. Influencers. There’s always someone, always something, and it’s usually half-dressed and hanging off his arm before you’ve even finished your first espresso. You’re the one who fields the follow-up texts. The ones that say “Can you tell Max I left my earrings in his hotel room?” or “I think we really had a connection.”

You delete them. Like you delete everything that doesn’t fit neatly into the carefully managed image you’ve built around him.

Because that’s your job.

To clean up the mess.

To stay calm.

To stay separate.

He, predictably, doesn’t appreciate it. Not really.

He’s a handful. Several, really.

And you’re very, very good at handling him.

Which is probably why he won’t let you go.

“You know you’re not my prisoner,” you tell him one evening as you both recover from a brutal double-header. You’re sunburnt, jet-lagged, and your phone is still buzzing with notifications from a fire you put out six hours ago..

He’s sprawled across the sofa in his Monaco apartment, arms behind his head, still in Red Bull merch, hair slightly damp from the shower. “You say that but every time I try to hire someone else, they run screaming.”

“What’s that got to do with me? That’s because you ask if they know how to make tequila sunrises mid-interview.”

He lifts a shoulder in a lazy shrug. “It’s a fair question.”

“You don’t even drink tequila sunrises.”

He cracks one eye open. “No, but you do.”

You pause, turning your head slightly. “Wait. Are you… screening assistants for their compatibility with me?”

“Maybe.” He turns fully now, propping himself up on one elbow, suddenly more alert. “Got to keep the standards high. Wouldn’t want to hire anyone who can’t handle the real boss.”

You blink. “Me?”

Max grins. “Obviously.”

You roll your eyes, but before you can fire back he adds quieter, almost absentmindedly, like the words slip past his usual filter: “There’s no replacement for you anyway.”

Something in your chest stutters but you don’t let it show. You school your face into practiced neutrality while your pulse leaps. Max of course doesn’t even notice. He’s already found the remote, casually flipping through channels like he hasn’t just lobbed a live emotional grenade across the room.

You lean back into the cushions hiding the smallest of smiles.

“Damn right there isn’t,” you murmur.

He doesn’t hear you.

The thing is Max isn’t dumb. People sometimes think he is, because he’s flippant and flirty. Because he plays the part of the Dutch lion with the messy hair, the lazy grin, the couldn’t-care-less attitude. He shrugs off press drama and forgets half his scheduled meetings.

But Max? Max sees everything.

He just doesn’t always let on and the way he treats you is proof.

You get the best hotel rooms. You’re the only one who can yell at him without consequence. You have access to all his passwords (except one, which is suspicious and probably his gaming PC). He listens to you in ways he doesn’t listen to anyone else.

It’s not romantic.

It’s just… Max.

And it drives you mad.

Because you know how he is with women. Beautiful, disposable women who orbit around him like moths to fire. Girls who laugh too hard at his jokes, who post his watch on their story, who mistake proximity for permanence.

They see the world champion, not the man who carries stress in his shoulders like cement. Not the man who forgets to eat on race days unless you shove a protein bar into his hand with a death glare. Not the man who texts you from airports he doesn’t remember flying to just to ask if he packed socks.

Yet when he talks to you? There’s this something in his voice. A softness. An unspoken trust. Like you're not just his assistant. Like you're something else.

But he never says it and you’re smart enough not to ask.

You’re fixing his tie.

Again.

“Max,” you say with the patience of a teacher and the soul of a martyr, “this isn’t a hard skill to learn you know.”

He’s smirking, of course. Standing in the middle of his Monaco apartment, one hand buried in his pocket, the other scrolling aimlessly on his phone.

“But that’s why I have you,” he says, not even looking up.

You tug the knot tighter than necessary. Not tight enough to actually choke him but it’s a close call.

“You can’t rely on me for everything.”

“Can and will.”

Now he does glance down, eyes amused and warm, the corners of his mouth tilting upward in that lazy, infuriating way he’s perfected over the years.

You sigh, stepping back to assess your handiwork. The tie is perfect. Centered, crisp, symmetrical. Because of course it is. You did it.

You grab the printed event invite off the kitchen island and slap it lightly into his chest. “Charity gala. Black tie. Actual grown-up behavior required. And Max?”

He raises a brow.

“You’ll need to show up on time.”

He gives a lazy shrug, fingers closing over the invite without even looking at it. “You coming with me?”

“I wasn’t planning on it,” you reply, already moving toward the kitchen to clean up the mess he left behind.

“But you plan everything,” he says behind you.

When you turn he’s closer than he was a moment ago. His voice drops, soft and low, the air between you suddenly weighted and still.

“Wouldn’t be the same without you.”

It’s infuriating.

And disarming.

And very Max.

He just grins, all teeth and trouble.

By the time you arrive at the gala you’re already regretting your decision to come.

Not because of the event itself your dress is beautiful, the champagne is cold, and the venue is glittering in a way that makes everyone feel more important than they actually are. You’ve already charmed two sponsors Max will absolutely forget by morning, and your heels haven’t started to blister yet.

No. The problem, as always, is Max.

He’s magnetic in the way that only men who know they are can be. All ease and confidence, effortlessly weaving through the crowd with his trademark smirk and too-expensive suit, stopping to offer shoulder squeezes and half-hugs to women whose names he definitely doesn’t know. Flirting like it’s part of his job description.

But every few minutes he glances back at you.

Like he’s waiting for something.

Approval? Amusement? Jealousy?

You’re not sure, and you hate that you’re even wondering.

You’re posted up by the bar when he finds you again. He appears at your side like he always does quietly, confidently, like he belongs there.

“You haven’t danced,” he says, offering his hand without preamble.

You arch a brow, sipping your drink. “Neither have you.”

“Well,” he says, head tilting just slightly, “let’s fix that.”

You hesitate. His hand stays out and his expression shifts. An echo of sincerity that rarely surfaces in public.

So you take it.

The music is slow. Old-school. Something classic that wraps around you both like silk.

Suddenly he’s closer than he’s been all night. One hand on your waist, the other holding yours gently, like he's afraid to startle you. You’ve touched Max a hundred times, fixing his mic, dragging him by the sleeve, slapping his arm when he says something stupid.

But this?

This is different.

His thumb brushes across your knuckles not by accident.

“You look beautiful,” he murmurs.

Your heart stutters. You glance up at him too fast, too unguarded and that’s when you feel it. That terrifying tilt in the air between you, the way something shifts out of place and threatens to become something else entirely.

So you do what you always do when things start to feel like something they’re not supposed to.

You break it.

“It’s just a dance,” he says lightly, forcing your gaze to him.

Max doesn’t let go. Not entirely, but you feel the change the slight pause, the faintest shift in pressure at your back, the way his fingers curl.

You keep talking. Rambling now, trying to plug the leak in your chest.

“No it’s not just a dance. You don’t understand, because you’re… you. And everyone knows who you are, how you are, with women… and that’s fine, that’s completely fine. But me… I’m your assistant Max. You’re my boss. I’m supposed to be on the schedule. Not on the dance floor with you.”

He’s silent. Really silent. That rare kind of Max Verstappen quiet where even his breathing seems to slow. Where you know, you know, he’s listening and trying to understand.

“You’re not just dancing with your boss.” His voice is lower now. “You’re dancing with me.”

You stare up at him. Your brows furrow. Your stomach flips.

“Exactly,” you whisper. “That’s worse.”

A beat. Then he chuckles, dry and quiet. “Is it?”

“Yes,” you say, the word leaving your mouth with more force than intended. You step back before he can stop you, before the moment pulls you in too deep.

His expression flickers like you’ve genuinely hurt him and maybe, in a way, you did. But you don’t say anything else. You walk away instead.

Because if you don’t…

You might stay.

And you’re not sure what that would mean.

Back in Monaco a few days later things go back to normal.

Almost.

The routine is still the same, early meetings, sponsor calls, team briefings, the endless churn of a season that never truly pauses but he isn’t. Max is quieter, less reactive, less Max. His usual flirtations have faded into something far more restrained, almost cautious, as if he’s holding something back without fully knowing what it is.

And you? You’re working harder than ever not to notice.

You tell yourself it’s fine. That you prefer it this way, less tangled, less confusing, less like something you don’t know how to name, but there’s a heaviness to it now, a tension that lingers in the spaces where his jokes used to live.

You can’t help but wonder if you broke something.

By the time you arrive in Zandvoort the chaos swallows everything else.

The Dutch fans are out in full force, loud, loyal, relentless. There’s orange smoke in the air, Max's name on banners and caps, entire families dressed in matching team merch. It’s overwhelming in the way all home races are, but this one more than most. The pressure is different here. He is different here.

You see it in the way he moves through the paddock head high, expression exact, every step calculated like he’s walking a tightrope in front of the world. He’s calm, but not relaxed. Controlled, but not comfortable. You know him well enough to recognise the strain in his shoulders and the slight twitch in his jaw when another camera gets shoved too close.

You keep your head down, buried in logistics: finalising his press schedule, adjusting sponsor timings, scanning incoming weather reports, and fielding yet another round of phone calls from people who can’t take no for an answer. You’re on your third Red Bull and halfway through reworking the team’s outbound travel manifest when someone taps your shoulder.

You expect an intern. Maybe a member of security.

You do not expect Charles Leclerc.

He’s standing just behind you, hands casually in his pockets, the grin on his face irritatingly sun-warmed and relaxed. He looks far too at ease for a man who just stepped off a media gauntlet.

“Hey,” he says, eyes flicking over your screen before settling on your face. “You look more stressed than usual.”

You offer him a polite, practiced smile the kind you keep in your back pocket for drivers who aren’t yours. “That’s because I’m currently doing the work of three people while also trying to stop a certain driver from throwing jabs at Max in front of a live mic.”

Charles chuckles. “You should transfer to Ferrari. Our drama is internalized.”

“Tempting,” you say, your voice dry.

He laughs again, leaning against the wall beside you, arms folding as he studies you. “You know, I never see you relax.” There’s a beat, just long enough for your guard to slip half an inch. “We should change that.”

You blink. “Sorry?”

You weren’t expecting that. Not from him, not today. It’s not that you’ve never been flirted with in the paddock God knows the ratio alone makes that inevitable, but this is Charles and for once you're the one caught off guard.

Before you can find a response another voice cuts through.

“She’s busy.”

You turn and immediately regret it.

Max is standing behind you, arms folded, expression unreadable but sharp around the edges. He’s close not quite in your space, but close enough to make a point and he’s staring at Charles like he's considering whether to shove him into the nearest wall.

“Am I?” you say, your tone frostier than you intended.

Max doesn’t look at you. His eyes remain locked on Charles, his stance radiating a quiet, simmering challenge.

Charles raises his hands in mock surrender, his grin unfading but softer now, more cautious. “Okay, okay,” he says with a small laugh. “Message received.”

He pats your shoulder lingering just for a moment and walks away. You feel Max track his every step until he disappears around the corner. Then you turn to him.

“Seriously?”

“What?” he replies, tone flat.

“‘She’s busy’? Really?” You cross your arms. “Do I work for you, or do you own me now?”

He shrugs, as if the answer is obvious. “You do work for me.”

You stare at him. “Right. And I also have free will. Which means I get to decide who I talk to without your permission Max.”

He doesn’t flinch, but something shifts in his jaw. “Charles knows what he’s doing.”

“So do I.”

You let the words hang there, heavy and deliberate.

He doesn’t respond.

You take a step closer, eyes narrowing. “Say it.”

His brow twitches. “Say what?”

“That you didn’t like him flirting with me.”

He scoffs, defensive now. “I didn’t like him distracting you.”

You tilt your head. “Try again.”

Max opens his mouth, then closes it. He looks away, blinking hard like the sun’s too bright or the conversation too dangerous.

Right there in the silence, in the refusal, you get your answer.

He won’t say it.

Because if he does, everything changes and neither of you are really ready for that.

Not yet.

Later that evening you don’t come to his hotel room to go over press notes in person.

You almost always do. Even when you’re tired, even when he’s late, even when you both pretend it’s strictly business and not the quietest part of his day.

This time you email them.

Just a PDF. No notes in the body of the message. No dry comment about the journalist who always misspells everyone’s names. Not even your usual "please read this before tomorrow, don’t make me chase you" line.

He stares at the attachment, unread, the cursor hovering over it like maybe if he waits long enough you’ll show up after all.

You don’t.

He frowns and picks up his phone.

Calls you.

It rings until voicemail.

He tries again.

Still nothing.

He lowers the phone, jaw tight, thumb hovering over your name as if the third call will fix it.

It won’t. Because this is how you operate when you’re pissed, professional, polite, perfectly distant. You don’t yell or sulk you just shift into autopilot and stop giving him anything extra.

No reminders. No soft glances. No quiet sarcasm that only he gets.

Just the job.

Max, for all his victories, all his trophies, all his press-trained composure feels like he’s losing.

You don’t speak to Max the entire next morning.

Not really.

You respond when necessary because you have to, but it’s short and clipped, eyes on your tablet or phone or anyone but him. You’re professional.

And he hates it.

You can tell by the way he keeps glancing over during meetings, like he’s waiting for a joke or a sideways comment that never comes. His knee bounces through the strategy debrief. He forgets his water bottle. He asks a question someone already answered ten minutes ago.

After the final media round-up, you hand him a neatly typed itinerary and don’t wait for a thank you. You’re already halfway out of the hospitality tent when you throw over your shoulder, “Flight’s at seven. Be packed on time.”

“Wait.”

He sounds... hesitant like the word caught on the way out. You turn slowly, folding your arms ready to remind him that you still have fifty unread emails and no patience left but he looks genuinely uncomfortable which is uncommon.

“I was out of line yesterday,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck like it physically pains him to admit it.

You raise an eyebrow but say nothing.

“I know I don’t have the right to tell you who you can and can’t talk to. I just—Charles is…” He exhales sharply, searching for the right words like they owe him money. “He flirts with everyone. I didn’t think he should be doing it with you.”

You blink once. Then again. “Why?”

Max falters. His eyes drop for a second and when they lift again there’s something unguarded in them.

“Because you’re not…” He trails off, swallowing like the sentence got stuck somewhere between his mouth and his chest. “You’re not like them.”

You study him carefully, resisting the urge to cross your arms tighter. “What am I like then?”

He shrugs, helpless in a way that’s rare for him. “You know me.”

You look at him for a long time, long enough to feel the edges of your frustration begin to soften because he means it. Even if he doesn’t know what to do with it.

You let out a slow breath. “Let’s just forget it.”

Max doesn’t move. He looks like he wants to say more but as always he stops just short. You shake your head and walk away, the tension lingering behind you like smoke.

You’re not sure if he’s convinced.

You’re not sure you are either.

That night alone in your hotel room you lie in bed longer than you mean to, scrolling aimlessly on your laptop rereading emails you’ve already answered. At some point you check your phone one last time before you put it on charge.

There’s a new message from Max.

Just a photo.

Your favourite snack the one brand you always complain you can’t find here sitting neatly on your desk in his motorhome.

You stare at the screen for far longer than necessary.

You forgot to put it on a plate. I taught you better.

His reply comes immediately.

Thought I’d leave you something to scold me about otherwise I might miss it.

You don’t sleep well after that, but when you do drift off, you dream of him.

You should’ve known. The moment Max mentioned “just a small thing” on his yacht between races, you should’ve known.

You should’ve blocked off the date in his calendar, faked a scheduling conflict, pretended the boat had mechanical issues. Hell you should’ve burned the entire Monaco marina to the ground.

Instead you nodded because you were tired. Because it was late and he looked at you with that grin, the one he wears right before doing something reckless and deeply annoying.

And now?

Now you’re standing on the top deck of his floating monument to excess while EDM thunders through your skull, champagne pours into the sea, and someone truly is trying to light a cigar with a firework.

This isn’t a party.

It’s a disaster.

And you're part of it.

“Max!” you shout, pushing through a crowd of strangers, models, vaguely European tech bros, influencers who’ve filtered their faces into the same perfection.

Someone offers you a suspicious looking drink. You give them a look so cold it could freeze the Mediterranean.

You find him eventually near the bar of course. Halfway through a bottle of something so gold it probably shouldn’t be drinkable, laughing with unbridled energy.

He sees you.

And he smirks.

Bad sign.

“You’re here!” he calls over the music, all bright eyes and flushed cheeks.

“How drunk are you?”

He grins wider. “I’m celebrating.”

You glare. “What are you celebrating exactly? Your complete inability to respect any boundary I set?”

His smile falters. Just slightly.

You’ve been firm with him before snippy, tired, annoyed but you’ve never snapped. Not until now.

“I asked for one thing,” you continue, voice low but lethal. “No big party. No cameras. No press. No footage that I have to spend the next week cleaning up or spinning into something palatable for your sponsors.”

He tries to laugh it off. “Come on, it’s not that bad—”

“Max someone is filming an OnlyFans collab on your stairs!”

Max blinks.

“And I just got a message from your sponsor liaison asking if you’ve officially pivoted to a career in nightclub management.”

“Okay,” he says, straightening. “Okay, I’ll—I’ll fix it.”

You laugh and it’s not nice. “You won’t. You never do. You apologise make a joke promise to do better and then you forget by morning.”

He frowns. “Don’t be dramatic—”

“Dramatic?” You stare at him, stunned. “Do you think I enjoy this? Do you think I want to spend my life putting out fires you set? Cancelling meetings because you’re too hungover to stand? Rearranging entire weekends because you feel like playing captain on your floating ego trip?”

He opens his mouth, but you’re not done. Not even close.

“I have spent years of my life making yours easier. Cleaner. Simpler. And you keep acting like the world owes you something just for showing up.”

His expression shifts. Defensive. Confused. Hurt.

“I’m done Max.”

He stills. Completely. “What?”

“I quit.”

The words come out steadier than you expect, but the air around them changes like something’s been dislodged in the center of your universe.

Max laughs once short and disbelieving. “Very funny.”

“I’m not joking.”

That silences him. You watch as the fight drains out of his expression.

“I—” he starts, then stops. His eyes search your face like maybe there’s a version of this where you're bluffing.

You say it again.

“I’m done.”

Then you see it like you’ve pulled a single thread and suddenly the whole fabric of his world is unraveling at the seams.

“You don’t mean that,” he says, voice thinner now. He’s not posturing anymore. He’s barely holding it together. “You always say that when you’re mad.”

“I’ve never said that before.”

He swallows hard. “So what—this is it?”

You shrug, even as your throat burns. “You’ll be fine. You always are. You’ll hire someone else. Someone who won’t push back every time you act like the rules don’t apply to you.”

“No,” he says, quickly. Too quickly. “No I won’t.”

“Max—”

“I can’t do this without you.”

The air stills.

His voice is different now quiet and hoarse, almost boyish in its honesty.

“You think I’d function without you?” he says, stepping toward you there’s nothing arrogant in the way he moves. Just desperation. “You think I’d remember to eat? To breathe?”

You don’t answer. You can’t.

“You talk to me like I’m a person,” he continues, “not a headline. Not a paycheck. You don’t care what they think. You care what I see. What I feel. You make me show up. Not just on the track but here.”

He’s close now. The party hums behind you like a distant world you’re no longer part of.

“I know I act like I don’t notice but I do.” His jaw tics. “I see everything you do. Every crisis you fix. Every time you deal with the shit I create and still somehow look at me like I’m worth something.”

You blink too fast. Look away. You can’t cry not here. Not in front of him.

Max reaches out but he doesn’t touch you, won’t, but his hand hovers like he wants to, as if he doesn’t know if he’s allowed.

“Please don’t go.”

His voice is barely audible now. Just you and him and the ache you’ve been ignoring for far too long.

“I can’t lose you,” he says. “Not you.”

You don’t quit.

Not that night.

Not the next day either.

There are at least seven different moments where you almost do. Like when you’re up until 3 a.m. fielding calls from media, sponsors, and one very irate PR rep who uses the phrase "brand suicide" twice, or when you’re forced to sort through tagged Instagram stories showing Max grinning next to a man who brought an albino snake to the yacht.

But you don’t quit.

The press coverage is messy, but it’s manageable. The headlines are brutal, but you’ve weathered worse. Damage control becomes your entire personality for 48 hours straight.

Max shows up to a sponsor event. On time. Wearing the suit you picked. Sober. Hair styled.

When he’s asked about the party, about the chaos, about the videos that went viral he doesn’t deflect or smirk, he doesn’t make a joke about being “young” or “Dutch.”

He just says, clear and steady. “It got out of hand. I’ve learned from it.”

You almost drop your phone.

The next time you see him he’s slouched on a couch in the motorhome wearing sunglasses indoors like a hungover rockstar and holding a cup of something hot with all the enthusiasm of a man gripping poison.

“You’re not fired,” you say, setting his briefing packet on the table beside him.

He doesn’t look up. “I should be.”

“You’re not.”

This time he does glance at you. Over the rim of his sunglasses, his eyes meet yours.

“Why’d you stay?” he asks.

There’s no sarcasm or deflection just the honest question. A little lost.

You pause. There are a hundred reasons you could give. Because the whole team needs you. Because you love your job. Because walking away felt a lot more impossible than staying.

But none of them are the truth.

You hesitate, then answer quietly. “Because you matter to me.”

Max stares at you for a long beat and then—

He smiles, it’s not his usual smirk. Not cocky or smug or teasing. It’s soft a little unsteady around the edges.

It stays that way for the rest of the week.

No more parties, no more headlines, no chaos. He listens more and shows up to everything early which is frankly unsettling. He still pushes your buttons. Still forgets to charge his phone. Still asks if the catering crew can “just once” serve stroopwafels for breakfast, but it’s different.

You’re not sure what it means, only that for now you’re still here and so is he.

It’s been a week since the yacht party. Seven days since you nearly walked away from Max Verstappen. From your job. From whatever fragile, unspoken thing has been humming beneath the surface between you for far too long.

He’s been… different. Not in some dramatic, overnight transformation way he’s still Max, still occasionally infuriating, still drinks Red Bull for breakfast like it’s water and forgets his lanyard at least once a day but something has shifted.

No more brushing off your reminders with a smirk. No more groaning when you hand him briefing notes. He shows up early. He wears what you recommend out without comment. He sits in strategy meetings and asks questions instead of zoning out halfway through.

Most notably he doesn’t flirt.

Not with models.

Not with heiresses.

Not even with the stewardess who accidentally-on-purpose dropped her hotel key into his lap.

It’s unsettling. What’s worse is the way he looks at you now. Like he’s waiting. Watching. Like he’s afraid to push, but even more afraid to be shut out again.

He doesn’t crowd your space, doesn’t bait you into conversation the way he used to but every time you’re near walking past him in the garage, passing him his schedule in the motorhome, adjusting his earpiece before media he’s there, tracking you like he’s trying to memorise you in case you do disappear.

You don’t make it easy because the truth is, you’re still mad. Not in the white-hot yelling kind of way. That’s passed. This is quieter. More dangerous. You’re mad because he made you care too much because you think he might actually mean it the apology, the softness, the please don’t go, and now you don’t know what to do with that hope.

Worse still: you’re scared.

Because if he keeps this up, if he keeps acting like someone who could be serious, someone who could make space for you, not just as the person who organises his life, but as something more then you just might let your guard down.

Max doesn’t always understand half the things you do. He doesn’t know how you manage four calendars, so many time zones, and still remember to order his mum’s birthday flowers with a handwritten card in Dutch. He doesn’t know how you can sit through hours of briefings, bookings, and back-to-back calls and still have the presence of mind to pull him aside and remind him to breathe.

He knows this… he almost lost you, and it scared the hell out of him. That moment on the yacht when you said “I quit” with your voice steady and your eyes too bright it stuck in his ribs like shrapnel. He’s never seen you walk away from anything. Not a mistake. Not a crisis. Not him.

Something about it broke the rules he’s been pretending don’t exist.

He doesn’t know what to call this thing between you. The pull. The ache. The way he can feel you in the room before you speak, but he knows he can’t afford to lose it.

It’s the paddock walk in Sao Paulo and media is swirling like sharks. Max is flanked by his Red Bull team, walking with quiet confidence as cameras flash and fans scream from every barrier. You're behind him, checking notes, earbuds in, filtering out chaos like always.

Someone sponsor guys walks beside him. Polished. Annoyingly perceptive.

One of them nods toward you as he walks alongside Max. “She’s very good. Efficient. Not a lot of assistants that can handle as much.”

Max just nods, focused ahead.

The guy smirks. “So… what is she to you anyway?”

Max stumbles. Just slightly. Blinks.

The man doesn’t notice. Keeps talking. “Girlfriend? Or is this like a long con assistant-with-benefits situation?”

Max stops walking.

The team slows.

The man looks confused. “What—did I say something?”

“She’s not a long con,” Max says, his voice flat.

The man raises his eyebrows. “So… girlfriend?”

Max opens his mouth but nothing comes out.

Because he doesn’t know how to answer. Because you’re not his girlfriend. You’re not just his assistant.

You’re not just anything.

You’re everything.

You notice it later, in the way Max is quiet through the entire strategy meeting. How he doesn’t argue when the tyre compound is changed last-minute. How he nods absently through the briefings but keeps glancing at you when he thinks you’re not looking. His knee bounces under the table not like he’s impatient, like he’s unraveling.

Afterwards you’re packing up your things halfway through sending a message to the press team when he clears his throat.

“Can I talk to you?”

You glance up. “Now?”

He nods.

You follow him down the corridor, past media personnel and catering carts, until he slips into a small side room off the hospitality unit, quiet, air-conditioned, the faint scent of stale coffee and printer paper hanging in the air. He closes the door behind you, doesn’t turn around right away.

You wait with your arms crossed. Guard up.

He paces once. Twice. Then stops.

“I froze,” he says, suddenly. “Earlier.”

You blink. “What?”

“When that guy asked what you are to me.”

You don’t answer just lower your arms slightly. He runs a hand through his hair, frustrated. “I should’ve said something… but I didn’t know how to explain it.”

“You don’t have to explain anything Max. I work for you. That’s the end of it.”

He turns toward you. Takes a step closer. His voice drops. “Is it?”

You hate him a little in that moment. For asking. For hesitating.

For almost being ready and still not getting there.

You shake your head, tight and slow. “Don’t ask questions you’re not ready to answer.”

He doesn’t move. Just looks at you, jaw clenched, hands at his sides like he doesn’t know if he’s supposed to reach for you or let you go.

You turn to leave and then his hand wraps gently around your wrist. Not pulling. Holding you there.

“Don’t walk away.”

You look down at where his fingers touch your skin then up at his face. His eyes are wide open.

“I need you,” he says. “I’m trying. I want to try.”

The silence that follows is thick. Heavy enough to buckle your knees.

You pull your hand free softly.

“I know Max.”

Then you leave, because if he doesn’t know what you are to him yet…

He’s not ready.

You’re not going to fall for someone who’s still figuring out if he can catch you.

The woman across from you in her perfectly tailored blazer, and the kind of calm that came from putting out media fires for a living nodded without hesitation. She looked like someone who had said no comment more times than she’d said her own name.

“Max’s performance on the track is untouchable,” she said crisply. “But off-track? Let’s just say he’s not winning popularity polls.”

You tilted your head, suppressing a smile. That was putting it mildly. Max Verstappen’s driving was legendary. So was his reputation for being blunt, intense, and selectively allergic to charm.

“And you think I’m the solution?” you asked with a small laugh.

“You’re respected, mature, scandal-free. You stay out of drama. Your fanbase loves you. When people see you they think elegance. You’re the kind of woman people see and say, ‘She has taste.’ If you choose Max maybe the world will too.”

You let the compliment sit in the air for a moment before leaning back in your chair, tapping a neatly manicured fingernail against the rim of the glass. The water didn’t help. The contract still felt absurd.

“And what does Max think about this?” you asked, eyes lifting from the print to study her expression.

There was the briefest pause, half a beat, just long enough to catch.

“He’s… not opposed.”

You almost laughed. That was PR for he hates this but knows better than to say no. You’d been around enough egos, both onscreen and off, to recognise the diplomatic dodge.

“And if there’s no chemistry?” you asked, watching her closely. “What then? I can act, sure, but I don’t sell what I don’t believe in.”

She blinked, just once, before her lips twitched at the corners, surprised, maybe, but not displeased. You weren’t what she expected.

“You’ll meet tomorrow,” she said. “Private setting. No press. No team. Just the two of you. We want you both to feel comfortable before anything goes public.”

You nodded slowly, eyes drifting back down to the contract.

A role with no script. A story with no control over the ending. You weren’t sure if it was reckless… or just real enough to be interesting.

Either way the curtain was about to rise.

You arrived first.

Of course you did. It was a neutral meeting point an upscale private lounge tucked inside a nondescript hotel in Monaco. Elegant but discreet. The kind of place built for millionaires to be invisible. No entourage. Just you and the low hum of the espresso machine behind the bar.

You didn’t sit. You didn’t want to look too eager. So you stood near the window one hand curled loosely around a glass of water, the other resting lightly against your hip. Composed. Professional. Curious, but not overly optimistic.

When Max entered the room you didn’t need to turn around to know it was him. His presence moved the air. He was taller than you expected. Broader too. Dressed in all black, t-shirt, jacket, skinny jeans, like he didn’t want to be noticed but couldn’t help it anyway. He carried himself like someone always a few seconds away from being somewhere else.

His eyes found you immediately.

No handshake. Just a small nod. Measured.

“You’re early,” he said.

You raised your eyebrows slightly, tilting your head. “So are you.”

He let out a short exhale. Not quite a laugh. He walked over and took the seat across from the one you hadn’t yet occupied, legs spread in the way men always sat when they felt unbothered. Except he was bothered. You could see it in the way his fingers tapped once then stopped. In the way his jaw worked like he was biting back a thousand things he didn’t want to say.

You sat down slowly. The silence between you settled not awkward, but deliberate.

“So,” you said, voice light but not flippant, “should we talk about how we want to do this?”

Max looked at you for a long second. Then, finally: “I’m not good at pretending.”

You leaned back slightly. “Then we have a problem.”

“I didn’t ask for this,” he said, tone even but firm. “I just agreed to listen.”

You met his gaze, steady. “Same.”

There was a beat of silence. Not hostile. Two people with matching reluctance and a complete lack of context for each other.

“I read the brief,” he said after a moment. “You’re... a good image.”

“Thanks,” you replied. “And you’re a great liability.”

That surprised a short huff out of him, almost a laugh if you squinted.

You crossed one leg over the other, still watching him. “Look I’m not here to change you. That’s not the job. The job is convincing people we like each other.”

Max’s gaze flickered down to your hands, then back to your face. He nodded slowly, considering.

“I don’t know you,” he said plainly.

“You don’t need to,” you countered. “Not yet, but if this works, they’ll think you do.”

That seemed to land but he still didn’t look convinced, but he wasn’t walking out either.

“I thought you’d be different,” he said, voice lower now, more curious than cold.

You blinked. “Me too.”

Another pause. Then, softly almost like a concession: “Maybe this could work.”

You didn’t smile but your voice gentled a little. “Maybe.”

Across the table Max gave you one more glance, this one lingered just a second longer than the others.

The agreement was signed. Paparazzi photos arranged. PR talking points delivered.

It was all so clinical. So transactional.

You’d done this before image management, brand partnerships, a carefully constructed public narrative dressed up as something intimate. But this was different.

This was Max Verstappen.

Your name trended with his every week now.

“Hollywood It-Girl Dates F1 Bad Boy.”

“PR Stunt or Real Romance?”

“She’ll dump him before Monza.”

The headlines followed a predictable arc: curiosity, skepticism, ridicule. Then came the dissection. Every glance between you was analysed in slow motion, every offhand comment, every lack of public affection, all used to prove the same thing manufactured. Hollow. A PR stunt, barely held together with contract terms and glossy red carpet appearances.

You expected the noise.

What you didn’t expect was Max Verstappen showing up early to your first “casual” dinner to “get to know each other better” and standing to pull out your chair when you walked in.

He didn’t greet you with the smooth charm you were used to no smug grin, no camera-ready quip. He just stood, quietly, and nodded like a pilot might to someone who’d just boarded the plane. Respectful. Distant. Watchful.

“I didn’t know what you’d want to drink,” he said as you sat. “So I ordered both still and sparkling.”

Still and sparkling.

A tiny gesture.

And yet telling.

You’d been prepared to carry the evening, light banter, small talk, steering the conversation like you did on talk shows. But he didn’t give you that version of himself. He didn’t offer a performance. He didn’t need to be entertaining or even likeable.

He just... was.

He listened when you spoke, really listened. Didn’t fill silences with rehearsed anecdotes or pre-approved stories. He didn’t flatter you with falsities, didn’t try to match your fame or your charm. He watched, considered, responded.

And slowly something like friendship took root.

You started to find his name already at the top of your inbox when you reached for your phone in the mornings. You sent each other memes. Dry commentary from opposite ends of the world. Video clips. Silence, sometimes but never the heavy kind.

He didn’t talk to you like a fan and you didn’t treat him like a project.

One night after a Red Bull event ran long he texted you from the team van:

Max: You looked bored out of your mind.

You: Was trying not to die inside. You?

Max: Considering retiring mid-season just to avoid another crypto speech.

You’d laughed and thought, this is easy.

It became normal, after that. The check-ins. The private jokes.

Then the night before your press schedule for your most recent movie begins, just when you were curled on your hotel couch rehearsing press answers with one eye on the muted TV, your phone lit up.

Max: Good luck tomorrow. Bet they all cry at the end.

You stared at the screen for a full thirty seconds before replying.

You: You watched it?

Max: You think I fake-date people without research?

Your laugh startled you.

Not because it was loud, but because it was real. Unguarded, warm, snuck out between layers of controlled calm like sunlight through blinds.

The world thought they knew Max Verstappen, ruthless on the track, aloof off of it, emotionally untouchable unless he was yelling over the radio or stonewalling an interviewer. You’d thought that too in the beginning. You knew how this worked. The PR team sold the chemistry, the tabloids ran with the drama, and both of you benefited. Simple.

But then came the tiny ruptures in the persona. Max not only asking what kind of water you liked but remembering it. Ordering your favourite food the way you took it without being told twice.

Noticing how you rubbed your thumb against the edge of your ring finger when you were anxious and quietly moving the dessert menu into your hands during high-pressure media events as a distraction.

He never made it obvious. Never coddled. Just adapted.

He knew how to read a room, not as a showman, but as a strategist. He picked his moments like he picked overtakes: deliberate, sharp, unavoidable.

He sent you the post-race data link before you even asked for it when you expressed interest.

He corrected a journalist, not rudely, just firmly when they tried to pin you with the “distracting girlfriend” trope after a weekend loss.

“She doesn’t distract me,” he said simply. “A bad car does.”

That was the thing he never tried to impress you. Never tried to win you in the way people usually did. No peacocking. No bragging. Just quiet competence, and a strange, unwavering steadiness that left you constantly off balance.

You were used to men who overcompensated. Who postured. Who turned your relationship into content. Max did none of that. Somehow it meant everything.

He was soft-spoken unless provoked. Sarcastic, but never unkind. Sharp, but never cruel. He read articles all the way through before he talked about them and if he didn’t understand something he admitted it without ego.

He was precise, not just on track, but in life. In the way he folded his napkin after eating, the way he looped his headphone wires before dropping them in his bag. The way he texted in full sentences. The way he asked you real questions and waited for real answers.

Worst of all?

He was funny.

Not “celebrity funny.” Not late-night-soundbite funny.

He was mercilessly funny.

Dry, quiet, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it humor that slipped past your defenses before you had time to steel yourself.

During race weekend lunches he would lean over barely audible and mutter quips to you. You’d choke on your drink and Max would only sip his water, eyes forward.

It happened again and again. A well-timed eye roll at a press event. A subtle impersonation of a team principal’s hand gestures during a debrief. Once he made a single comment about your ex’s fashion choices and had you howling in your dressing room mirror for ten straight minutes.

You’d spent years perfecting your poise. Training yourself to be composed. A cool, collected image that could survive red carpets, wardrobe malfunctions, social media avalanches.

But Max Verstappen was undoing all of it without even trying.

And the scariest part?

You didn’t want him to stop.

You were still his “girlfriend” for the cameras. Still wore the right outfits and stood in the right place during paddock walks, posed together at sponsor dinners, smiled for the press like professionals playing their roles, but underneath the surface between press calls and red carpets something had changed.

It started in the quiet spaces. The ones that weren’t meant to be shared. He let you see his routines. The odd little rituals he kept to stay sane: how he always lined up his shoes next to the hotel closet door before sleeping. How he rewound old karting footage on his iPad before race days, not to analyse it, but to remember something simpler.

“I used to think I was so fast,” he murmured once, the screen playing a grainy clip of nine-year-old Max tearing through a corner.

You glanced over from your spot on the hotel bed, legs tucked beneath you, script pages in your lap. “You look like a little menace,” you said, smiling. “You always drove like you had something to prove.”

He turned his head toward you, serious now. “Didn’t I?”

The words hung between you for a beat longer than expected.

Later you let him watch you rehearse while he helped you read lines.

It wasn’t something you shared with many people. You hated being observed in that raw, unpolished space, without makeup, without lighting, just you and the script and all your fears about not being good enough.

Max didn’t critique. Didn’t ask questions. He just sat cross-legged on the floor beside the couch, elbows on his knees, eyes steady.

“You’re cute when you swear,” he said quietly when you dropped character mid-monologue and cursed under your breath.

You blushed despite yourself. “That’s not in the scene.”

“I know.” A slight smirk.

You rolled your eyes and threw a pillow at him. He caught it without flinching.

You started talking more, not small talk, but real conversations. Late at night usually or in the quiet between commitments. Once in the back of a sponsor car crawling through downtown Monaco traffic, he asked, “How do you handle it? I mean you have it way worse than me… the invasion of your life I mean?”

You turned toward him, surprised by the softness in his tone.

“I don’t,” you said honestly. “I just wait until I’m alone. Then I scream.”

He gave a low, startled laugh. “Does it help?”

“Not really.” You looked out the window. “But it makes me feel like I have some control. Even if it’s just over the volume.”

He nodded like he understood. Another night you found him sitting on the floor of his driver room, back against the wall, headphones in. He didn’t hear you enter at first. You almost backed out quietly but something in his posture made you stay.

When he finally looked up he just pulled one side of his headphones off and said, “Do you ever feel like people are just waiting for you to crack?”

You hesitated, then sat down beside him.

“Every day.”

He didn’t speak again for a while but his shoulder leaned a little into yours.

You showed him a script you'd started to write, a messy, unfinished thing you’d been too scared to send to your agent. You pushed it across the table with no explanation, heart pounding in your throat.

Max read in silence for fifteen minutes, eyes tracking steadily across the pages. You expected him to skim maybe even fake it. He wasn’t the type to read, let alone care about formatting or character arcs.

But he didn’t skim.

He leaned forward halfway through, one hand resting on the page like he was anchoring himself to it. No comments just small shifts in his expression that told you he was actually thinking about it.

“This is good,” he said. “Really good.”

You exhaled slowly, surprised by the lump in your throat. “Yeah?”

He flipped back a few pages, tapped his finger against a section you already knew by heart. Page eleven littered with little x’s next to the text.

“You’re not cutting this part right?”

You blinked. “Why?”

He shrugged, still scanning the line. “I don’t know. It just... hits.”

Then he looked at you.

“I’d keep it.”

You realised then that Max had never been cold. He’d just never been given warmth without agenda. Not from sponsors, not from the media, not even from the people who claimed to care about him. Everyone wanted something, his win, his brand, his attention, his name.

But you?

You gave him warmth without asking for anything in return and he quietly, slowly gave it back.

It wasn’t grand gestures or whispered confessions. It was the way he noticed when you hadn’t eaten and slid a protein bar into your bag without a word. The way he stayed up late after a double-header flight just to read a new scene with you. The way he always made sure there was a quiet moment just the two of you before any big public event.

One evening after a long day of filming for you and media for him you sat on his hotel balcony, legs up on the railing, hair damp from the shower.

“I forget sometimes.”

“Forget what?”

“That this isn’t real.”

You looked at him. “You mean… us?”

He didn’t look away. “Yeah. I mean… no. I mean—” He exhaled, frustrated. “You’re easy to talk to.”

Your heart thudded. “Maybe it’s not supposed to feel fake.”

“Or maybe we’re doing a shit job keeping it fake.”

You sipped your drink to buy yourself time. “Does that scare you?”

He hesitated. Then, in a voice quieter than you’d ever heard from him, said: “Yeah. But not in the way you’d think.”

You turned your head toward him slowly. “How do I think?”

He didn’t smile. Just held your gaze.

“That you’ll leave when the contract ends.”

The silence was heavy.

You reached out and touched your fingers lightly to his knee.

Silverstone was louder than usual, not just with engines or commentary but with people pressed tight against the paddock barriers, voices rising over one another as if volume alone might earn them relevance. Phones were already lifted, recording before anything had even happened, everyone waiting for the moment that could be clipped, shared, and torn apart online before the day was out.

You were walking beside Max when it happened.

“He’ll cheat on you before the season ends!”

The words were thrown with careless confidence, the kind that comes from knowing you’ll never have to face the person you’re talking about. Max slowed, then stopped entirely, his body going rigid in a way you recognised now, not explosive, but controlled, like something coiled too tight beneath the surface.

You reached for him without thinking, fingers wrapping around his wrist before he could turn toward the sound.

“Not worth it,” you murmured, stepping closer.

For a second you thought he’d pull away. Instead he looked at you his expression stripped of the practiced neutrality he wore in public.

“Doesn’t it piss you off?” he asked quietly.

The question surprised you, not because of the words themselves but because of who they were directed at. He wasn’t asking rhetorically or brushing it off the way he usually did; he was checking in, almost hesitant, like he wasn’t sure he was allowed to care if it bothered you too.

You let out a soft breath that turned into a small, rueful laugh. “That’s not something I have space to think about,” you admitted.

His eyes searched your face as if he were bracing for you to take it back. When you didn’t, he nodded once and let you guide him forward again, back into motion, back into the noise, though something about the way his hand stayed close to yours suggested the moment hadn’t passed as easily as he pretended.

The next day, it was the press who noticed first.

The event wasn’t even tied to him it was yours, scheduled during track time, weeks in advance, the kind of appearance you’d done a hundred times without incident. Clean lines, neutral colors, an image built carefully over years of never giving anyone a reason to doubt you. You’d made a career out of being untouchable, scandal-free, the safe bet.

Which was why the Red Bull cap on your head caused such an immediate shift in the room.

It wasn’t styled for effect or half-hidden behind sunglasses; you wore it plainly, like it belonged there, and the cameras reacted before the journalists did. A murmur moved through the crowd, curiosity sharpening into something more pointed.

Halfway through the interview, someone finally asked what everyone was thinking.

“Some people are calling this a very calculated PR move,” the reporter said, gesturing vaguely toward you. “Is the support you’re showing Max Verstappen part of the arrangement?”

“No,” you said without hesitation. “He doesn’t do anything halfway, not on track, not in life. That’s the kind of person I’ll always support.”

You didn’t deflect. You didn’t smile it away or soften the answer with something noncommittal. Instead you looked straight into the camera aware of exactly how that stillness would read when the clip circulated. The silence that followed was heavy with attention, the kind that only comes when someone says something unexpected and means it.

Later Max found you tucked into a quiet corner of the hospitality unit, scrolling absently through your phone while the cap rested on the table beside you. He leaned against the counter, arms crossed, watching you for a moment before speaking.

“You didn’t have to do that,” he said.

You glanced up. “Do what?”

He nodded toward the phone, then the cap. “They’re already spinning it.”

You shrugged, unbothered. “They always do.”

“That wasn’t neutral,” he added after a beat. “You’re usually neutral.”

“I know,” you said, meeting his gaze.

He studied you the way he studied a circuit before a risky lap, thoughtful and intent. “You’ve never had a scandal,” he said quietly. “Not one.”

You tilted your head, a faint smile tugging at your mouth. “I suppose there’s a first time for everything.”

“They’ll come for you,” he said, not warning so much as stating a fact.

You didn’t hesitate. “Let them.”

For a moment he didn’t speak at all and when he finally did his voice was lower than before. “Why?”

You considered the question, because the honest answer wasn’t simple and because it mattered that you didn’t cheapen it. Somewhere along the way between late-night conversations, shared routines, and the slow erosion of the rules you’d agreed to you’d stopped thinking about optics and started reacting on instinct.

“Because I don’t like it when people decide who you are without knowing you,” you said finally.

Something in his expression softened, the tension easing out of his shoulders as he exhaled like he’d been holding his breath for years.

The cap stayed on the table between you, neither of you moving it away, and for the first time it felt like the world wasn’t just watching a storyline play out but witnessing a choice being made.

By that evening the clip had already gone viral. Just twelve seconds of you in a plain white blouse, hair tucked behind your ears, a Red Bull cap pulled low, saying one simple thing into a mic:

“That’s the kind of person I’ll always support.”

It had been clipped, reposted, re-captioned. Twitter was ablaze.

#MaxApologist

##RideOrDie

#PRRelationshipMyAss

Some praised you. Called it refreshing. Said it was about time someone in your position said something real.

Others... were less kind.

“Crazy how fast she torched her image for a man who’s never even smiled at her in public.”

“Supporting Verstappen? Girl blink twice if you need help.”

“Another actress mistaking obsession for passion. How original.”

Max hadn’t brought it up again, but you could tell he’d seen it, he was quieter than usual, measured in a way that meant he was trying not to make it worse for you. In the past maybe you would’ve done the same, shrunk back. Waited for the press cycle to move on. Let the silence cover it like it always did.

But this wasn’t a headline you regretted.

So when the interviewer at your next press junket smiled too widely and said, “You’ve certainly sparked conversation do you want to clarify your comment about Verstappen?” you didn’t hesitate.

You didn’t fidget. You didn’t throw PR-speak at the fire and hope it would put itself out. You just leaned back slightly.

“I don’t think there’s anything to clarify,” you said, voice calm but unmistakably firm. “I said what I meant.”

The reporter blinked. “There’s been a lot of backlash to your relationship.”

“There usually is when a woman has an opinion,” you said with a small smile. “Especially when she says something supportive instead of silent. God forbid we defend someone who’s been written off before he even speaks.”

She opened her mouth, maybe to soften the moment, maybe to pivot. You didn’t let her.

“And for the record,” you added, “Max Verstappen works harder than anyone I’ve ever met. He’s focused. He’s precise. He lives and breathes his sport and he cares about the people around him, and if people are offended that I respect that… that says more about them than it does about me.”

There was a beat of silence. The kind of silence that meant everyone in the room knew this part wouldn’t be edited out.

Later, after the interviews, your manager pulled you aside, half-exasperated, half-impressed.

“You know we’re going to get emails.”

“I know,” you said.

Back in the paddock Max found you on the upper terrace after qualifying, Red Bull colours still peeking out from beneath your jacket, hair messy from the wind. You heard him before you saw him, the heavy tread of racing boots on steel.

“They’re saying you went off-script,” he said, voice unreadable.

You turned around. “Did I?”

A small smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. “Apparently.”

You tilted your head. “Does that bother you?”

He shook his head slowly. “No. I think I’ve just… never seen someone fight for me when they didn’t have to.”

You looked at him for a long moment, something slow and heavy unfurling in your chest.

“Well,” you said softly, “maybe it’s about time someone did.”

Max didn’t answer right away just stepped closer and rested one hand on the railing beside you.

The online noise was still raging. The headlines were still twisting your words into whatever shape suited them but for the first time you didn’t feel the need to correct the narrative.

The premiere wasn’t meant to be a big deal.

At least that’s what you told yourself.

It wasn’t a blockbuster. No major studio campaign. Just a quiet indie film you’d worked on quietly throughout the past year, made on a shoestring budget with a director you believed in. It was personal, messy and intimate and sharp in all the ways you weren’t allowed to be on red carpets.

Your team hadn’t even wanted you to do press for it. “Too niche,” they’d said. “Doesn’t fit the current branding.”

You came anyway wearing the simple black dress the costume designer gave you on wrap day with your hair pinned back.

The theatre was crowded but not glamorous and that should’ve made it easier.

It didn’t.

Because as the lights dimmed and the opening credits rolled you felt your chest tighten the way it always did when it was your name up there. When it was your voice, your face, your work laid bare for the world to judge.

The audience disappeared. So did the noise.

Until—

A familiar voice, low and certain, right behind you.

“Hey, this seat taken?”

You turned.

Max was standing at the end of your row. No Red Bull jacket. Just him black button-up, jaw tense, eyes locked on yours like he’d been looking for you all night.

You blinked. “I though you had media?”

“I left as soon as I could.”

“Max—”

“I wanted to be here.”

His voice wasn’t loud, but it landed firm and steady, completely unshaken by the stares he’d drawn walking in. He didn’t care about the whispers or the phones or the fact that everyone in the room now knew what you’d both spent months pretending not to feel.

He dropped into the seat beside you like it had always been his.

You stared at the screen, but you didn’t see it. Not anymore. You felt him beside you his shoulder brushing yours. Halfway through the second act, your hands found each other in the dark, his thumb brushing against your skin like a reminder: You’re not alone.

When the film ended the applause started slowly then built.

You stood with the rest of the cast for the Q&A, lights hot on your face, nerves clawing at your spine. Someone asked a question about a difficult scene. Someone else brought up the emotional tone. The final question came from a young woman in the third row, her voice hesitant.

“What made you feel safe enough to tell a story like this?”

You hesitated. The crowd waited.

Then you glanced at the far edge of the theatre at Max, standing off to the side now, arms crossed, watching you like there was no one else in the room.

You smiled.

“Someone showed up when it mattered,” you said. “And sometimes that’s all it takes.”

Afterwards outside the theatre he waited by your car. You walked toward him in the quiet buzz of post-premiere traffic, heels clicking against pavement, nerves settling now that it was over.

“You left Zandvoort,” you said softly, coming to a stop in front of him.

“I did.”

“You hate missing track time.”

“I do.”

You searched his face trying to read between the lines, but for once he didn’t make you guess.

“I wanted to be here,” Max said. “Not because it’s in the contract, because it matters to you. And you matter to me.”

You looked up at him, heart stumbling in your chest and then before you could gesture to the car or make a light joke he spoke again.

“I love you,” he said, simply.

You exhaled. Laughed, even quiet and breathless and completely overwhelmed. You reached up, fingers brushing his jaw.

“Say it again,” you whispered.

His mouth curled, just a little. “I love you.”

“I love you too.” you beamed back at him.

“I’ve been waiting to hear you say that.”

“I’ve been waiting to believe I could.”

This time when he kissed you, it wasn’t an apology or a secret or a performance.

It was a promise.

Six Months Later

The article wasn’t front-page gossip anymore.

Just a small mention buried in the lifestyle section of a major publication. No wild speculation, no screaming headlines. Just a photograph Max and you walking through airport security side by side, duffel bags slung over shoulders, caps pulled low.

The caption read:

“Still together. Still private. Still unexpected.”

You’d laughed when you saw it. Not because it was wrong but because for once they’d finally gotten it right.

The truth was there was nothing performative anymore. No curated posts. No press obligations. You hadn’t done a joint interview since the fake dating contract had quietly expired five months ago not that anyone ever officially announced that it had.

But you’d stayed.

And so had he.

There were no grand declarations now. Just the little things. His passport tossed on your kitchen counter. Your scripts left folded open on his sim rig desk. His toothbrush in your drawer. Your name saved in his phone with a small heart at the end.

Max had learned how to open up and you’d learned how to let him.

You still kept things quiet. Neither of you owed the public anything more but when fans caught a photo of you at a race, pressed into the corner of Red Bull hospitality with a pair of sunglasses and your chin tucked into Max’s hoodie the internet didn’t explode.

It exhaled.

“I think they’re just… happy,” one tweet read.

“Imagine that. Something real.”

That night curled up on the couch legs over his lap you read it aloud to him.

Max glanced over from where he was skimming a strategy brief. “Weird,” he murmured. “Not being accused of cheating, faking, or ruining your life.”

You raised a brow. “I think they might just see you... like I do.”

He smiled, slow and sleepy. You pressed a kiss to the corner of his jaw and he leaned into it like it was instinct.

Outside the world kept spinning. Races would be won. Movies would premiere. Commentators would speculate. Fans would guess. But inside your quiet little world on couches and plane rides and track walks and film sets you both knew what was real.

You let out a breath, tired and frustrated. This isn’t the first time it’s happened, this sense of talking to him and somehow still being alone in it. For the past few weeks you’ve been knee-deep in wedding prep, florists, colour schemes, tasting menus, venue walkthroughs where you try to picture the two of you standing side by side, promising forever, but lately that image feels harder to hold on to.

Max floats in and out of it all, more like a guest than the groom. He smiles when you ask, nods when you insist. Says whatever you want.

At first you thought it was sweet, he wanted it to be your dream day, but now it feels like it’s not ours at all. Now it just feels lonely.

You push up off the couch and walk into the kitchen just to have space to breathe. You’re not crying. Not yet. Behind you, you hear Max finally putting his phone down. “Wait, what’s wrong?”

You laugh once under your breath, but it’s humourless. “You really don’t know?”

His footsteps follow, slow and hesitant. He leans against the doorway. “I… I figured you were just a bit stressed.”

You face him. “I am stressed Max! Because I’m planning a wedding. Our wedding. But you act like you couldn’t care less.”

His brows furrow. “What are you talking about? Of course I care.”

“Do you?” Your voice is sharper than you mean, but it’s too late to soften it. “Because every time I ask you a question, about music, the food, the ceremony you just say ‘whatever you want.’ Like none of it matters to you.”

He blinks. “I just want you to be happy.”

You shake your head. “I get that, but that’s not what this is about. I am happy, especially with you. I just… I want you to show up. To be here and care.”

He runs a hand through his hair, exhaling hard. “I am here. I said yes to whatever you wanted because I trust your taste. I thought that was a good thing.”

“Trusting me isn’t the same as caring.” Your voice wavers, and you hate that it does. “I’m just asking for effort. I don’t want to feel like I’m marrying someone who doesn’t even care about the day we start the rest of our lives together.”

He looks stunned, caught between guilt and confusion.

You drop your gaze, your voice lower now. “If you don’t care about the wedding… why are you even marrying me?”

Silence. Like the whole world holds its breath.

You glance up at him, and his expression crumbles.

“Hey—no,” he cuts in, shaking his head like he can undo your words by force alone. “No, don’t say that. Please. Don’t. You can’t think that, I—fuck—I’m not good with this stuff.”

You wrap your arms around yourself, trying to keep it together. “Then help me understand because right now it feels like I’m the only one who’s in this… like you’re just… watching from the sidelines waiting for it to be over.”

He crosses the room in two strides, hands reaching for yours. “Hey. Look at me.”

You do, reluctantly. His eyes are full of something raw now, not distant at all.

“I didn’t realise I was hurting you,” he says, voice cracking slightly. “I swear, I just… I thought the best thing I could do was let you make all the decisions I'm no good at this stuff anyway. I figured it’s your day, well, our day, I know that, but I wanted it to be everything and anything you've ever dreamed of. I didn’t think you needed me to weigh in on napkin colours or desert menus if it wasn’t important to me. I thought giving you space meant I was helping.”

You blink back tears but don't respond yet.

He continues. “I didn’t want to accidentally ruin it by pushing for something you didn’t like because it’s not about what the day looks like to me. It’s about you. About us. I don’t care if we get married in a palace or a car park as long as it’s with you I’m in, and it will still be the best day of my life because it’s the day I get to call you mine forever.”

The sincerity in his voice disarms you completely. Your chest aches and the tears sting a little more now, not from frustration, but from how badly you wanted to hear this.

You exhale slowly. “Oh Max I appreciate that, it's really sweet and I feel that way too… but still I wanted this to be something we did together. Not just something I do and you show up for. I don’t need you to pick the napkins. I just need to feel like you care. That you’re excited too.”

He steps closer, gently cupping your face. “I’m excited,” he says softly. “I’m so damn excited. I think about standing at the altar and seeing you walk down the aisle and I—I can’t even describe what I feel.”

A smile finally breaks onto your face.

“I just didn’t realise,” he continues, “that trying to stay out of the way was making you feel alone in this. I’m sorry. I’ll do better. I want to do better. Just… tell me where to start.”

You stare at him for a long beat, watching the flicker of desperation in his eyes. Then you grab his hand and tug him back toward the couch.

“We’re redoing the seating chart,” you say, pulling your laptop open.

He groans dramatically, collapsing next to you. “Please not the seating chart.”

“Max!”

He grins and nudges your shoulder. “I’m kidding, I’m yours for the rest of the day. Let’s do this.”

You lean your head against his arm, and for the first time in weeks it feels like it’s not all on your shoulders. You feel like a team again, and that, more than the flowers or food or the napkins is what you needed all along.

The next few days are different.

You notice it in the smallest ways. Max starts asking questions, about vendors, cakes, what the venue looks like at night. He sits through meetings even when they run long. He doesn’t scroll through his phone. He listens. He shows up.

Somehow it makes everything feel a little lighter.

You still do most of the planning because let’s be honest, Max Verstappen doesn’t care about peony arrangements or antique gold-rimmed charger plates, but the difference now is he wants to understand why you care. He asks what you like about things, watches your eyes light up, and then smiles like he’s filing it away in some internal archive labeled how to love her better.

It's a late afternoon after a final dress fitting when you come home to find the apartment empty. There's a note on the counter in his messy handwriting.

Back in an hour. Don’t peek in the guest room. Seriously. I’ll know. – M

You blink curiosity immediately piqued but you listen. Barely.

He returns later with a smug smile, takes your hand, and says, “I want to show you something.”

When you reach the guest room door, he pauses.

“So… you said you wanted this to be ours, not just yours,” he says slowly, scratching the back of his neck. “And you were right. I wasn’t helping before. I thought being hands-off would make things easier for you, but I get it now it made you feel alone. So I wanted to contribute something.”

You look at him, heart fluttering. “What did you do?”

He opens the door. The room has been transformed into a mini wedding planning den, pinned photos, timelines, sticky notes, samples, but the centrepiece is a giant cork board covered in polaroids and printed photos of the two of you through the years.

Race weekends. Lazy mornings. Monaco rooftops. That blurry selfie from your first trip together when he still had his arm awkwardly half-around you, not yet sure if he could hold you close.

At the centre of the board in simple script:

"Our Beginning. Our Middle. Our Forever."

You stare in disbelief, hands pressed to your chest.

Max glances at you nervously. “I know you’ve been doing most of the work and I probably still won’t be great with choosing the appetisers or whatever, but this part? Us? That’s what I want to build. A reminder of what we’ve already made together.”

Your lips part, overwhelmed.

He pulls a small envelope from his back pocket. “Also… I may have secretly booked the string quartet you love, and the jazz trio for cocktail hour. And your favourite patisserie from Paris? They’re doing the cake.”

Your head snaps up. “What? How did you even—?”

“I made some calls.” He shrugs. “Annoyed a few assistants.”

Your heart aches in the best way. You walk toward the photo board, tracing a few edges with your fingers. “I can’t believe you did all this.”

He wraps his arms around your waist from behind. “I can’t believe you’re marrying me.”

You turn in his arms and look up at him, voice soft. “I never wanted perfect Max. I just wanted the you I always knew was there the one who cares, who always shows up.”

He leans down to kiss you, slow and gentle.

“I’m here,” he murmurs. “All in.”

“I love you so much,” You press your forehead to his. “And you picked the cake?”

He smiles, mischievous. “You can change it still of course, but I wanted you to be sure that I know you. And I told the baker if she cries when she tastes it it’s the right one.”

You laugh through your glossy eyes, shaking your head. “You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m in love,” he says. “And I can’t wait to marry you.”

Right there in a cluttered room filled with memories and colour-coded sticky notes, it finally feels like everything is falling into place not because it’s all perfectly planned, but because he’s in it now. Heart and soul. Always.

He had invited Harry.

He’d invited him.

Stupidly, maybe, naively. He told himself it was for the kids that they’d feel more comfortable seeing them getting along, that including Harry would make Max the bigger person.

He’d even said it out loud, in a strained laugh over the phone a week ago.

“If he makes them happy he should come. It’s fine.”

He’d repeated it until he believed it. Until today.

Because the moment he saw you walk in beside him, wearing a smile that wasn’t for Max he felt something fracture.

You used to look like that with him before it all cracked apart. Before the exhaustion and pressure and distance turned love into silence. Before the calendar swallowed him whole. Before you stopped waiting.

It hadn’t been a brutal breakup… at least not in words. You’d tried to keep it civil, no screaming, no slammed doors. Just two people standing in the wreckage of something they didn’t know how to save.

You were both so young when the kids came. So in love, but so unprepared. Max was chasing podiums and records, you were chasing normalcy, stability, sleep. You tried to wait for each other, but the gap kept growing. Eventually you stopped reaching across it.

You had always promised each other you’d stay a team for the kids, and you had. Shared custody. Weekend swaps. School pick-ups. Text threads about tooth fairies and fevers and bedtime routines.

He hadn’t expected the ache to linger and never leave.

He hadn’t expected it to live in him like a second heartbeat.

He definitely hadn’t expected it to get worse when you moved on.

At first it was innocent, your son mentioned Harry over dinner one night.

“Harry lets me stay up to watch Star Wars. He knows all the names!”

Then your daughter chimed in.

“He makes pancakes shaped like animals.”

Max had nodded pretending it didn’t gut him, but it only grew. Weekend after weekend. Drop-off after drop-off. And Max… Max stayed stuck in the amber of what-ifs.

What if he’d just come home more?

What if he’d fought harder?

What if you both hadn’t let go so easily?

The mentions didn’t stop. Harry became a regular feature in their stories, trips to the park, school pick-ups, Sunday morning cartoons, inside jokes Max wasn’t part of. They talked about him like he’d always been there.

That’s what hurt the most, not that they liked him, not even that they talked about him, but that it started to feel normal.

The first time your daughter called him “funny like Daddy,” Max had to excuse himself from the table to breathe. The comparison wasn’t cruel. She wasn’t replacing him, but it felt like a slow, inevitable shift like the tide pulling his place in their world further and further out to sea.

He hated himself for how jealous he was. It wasn’t Harry’s fault. The guy wasn’t overstepping. He was good with the kids. Max had no right to be bitter not when he’d been the one who left gaps in the first place. Gaps that needed filling. Routines that needed soft hands and warm smiles and someone who was actually there.

Max had always loved being a father but in building his career he’d watched someone else quietly start building a life with his children.

Somewhere along the line he’d stopped being the one who knew your coffee order, who had a key to your front door, who made the you and the kids laugh until they couldn’t breathe.

Harry wasn’t the enemy.

He was just there.

Filling spaces Max had once taken for granted, maybe that’s what scared him the most. That the ache might not just be about what he lost but about what he might not get the chance to hold again.

Today, today was a knife to the ribs.

The kids clearly adored him. Harry was patient, kind, involved.

And you…

You were supposed to be glowing for him.

Not someone else.

Max had been staring too long he knew it, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away and that’s when he saw it, just for a moment, something shifted.

Your smile faltered.

You laughed at something Harry said, but your eyes didn’t sparkle. Your fingers fidgeted with the hem of your dress and when Harry stood up and leaned in to say something in your ear, you stepped back. Just an inch.

But Max saw it.

He always did.

You were trying. You were good at that. You always had been. Polished. Graceful. Pulled together, even when everything inside was falling apart.

Max knew you. He knew the difference between your real smile and your carefully constructed one. His jaw tightened. Somewhere behind him someone was calling his name, a mechanic, maybe, a camera crew waiting. He didn’t care.

He didn’t want you to be unhappy he would never wish that for you, but for the first time in months Max let himself wonder if maybe you weren’t as far away as he thought.

The feeling that started blooming in his chest wasn’t bitterness, it wasn’t resentment, it was something softer. Riskier. While the rest of the world saw a perfect little moment Max saw the crack in the picture and for the first time in months… he let himself feel something dangerous.

Something he’d been too scared to let himself feel again.

Hope.

One month later.

The house was quiet but loud in that oddly comforting way it only ever was when the kids were there, soft laughter still echoing faintly down the hallway, the smell of cookies lingering in the kitchen, toys half-forgotten on the couch. It was Sunday afternoon, sunlight spilling across the floorboards in golden patches, and Max was sitting cross-legged on the rug watching his daughter try to braid her doll’s hair while his son built a lopsided Lego tower beside her.

He should have been relaxed. It had been one of those rare, easy weekends, no tantrums, no rushed phone calls, no hurried schedules. Just them. Just his little family. But something itched at the back of his mind, a faint unease that had started Friday night and hadn’t gone away.

They hadn’t brought up Harry once.

Not at dinner. Not during the bedtime stories. Not in the car when they usually told him about all the things they’d done that week. No mention of movie nights, or pancakes, or the little inside jokes they’d picked up.

At first he thought maybe they were just distracted but as the hours passed the silence became too loud to ignore.

He didn’t want to push. He never wanted the kids to feel caught between two worlds, even if he sometimes did. But the question had been buzzing around the back of his mind since Friday night, and now it slipped out almost without him realising.

“So,” Max said casually, keeping his tone light, “what have you guys been up to lately? Any fun stuff with Mum this week?”

His daughter looked up from her doll, thoughtful. “We made cupcakes on Tuesday. Mine had pink icing.”

“And we went to the aquarium,” his son added, reaching for another box of bricks. “Mummy let us feed the penguins.”

Max smiled. “That sounds great.” A small pause. “Was it just you three… no Harry?”

His daughter looked up from her doll, her small face serious in that heartbreakingly grown-up way kids sometimes had. “Mummy said he’s not coming around anymore.”

“Mummy said they’re not boyfriend-girlfriend now. Just friends.” She pronounced it carefully, like she was repeating something she’d heard word-for-word. There was no sadness in her tone, just simple acceptance, the kind that comes from children who trust the world to make sense again eventually.

The words hit Max with a dull thud, knocking the air out of him. He set his mug down before he dropped it, staring at the floor as if it could give him answers.

Max’s chest tightened, but he kept his face calm. “Did she say why?”

“She said she was sorry,” his son said, focused on his toy. “She told us Harry still cares about us, but he won’t be coming over anymore.” The Lego tower fell apart as his son let one of the bricks slip through his fingers.

Max swallowed, trying to keep the emotion from cracking through. “And… how do you feel about that?”

His son shrugged. “It’s okay. We just like being here with you anyway Daddy.”

The words were so simple, so unfiltered, that for a moment Max forgot how to breathe. His throat burned and he had to blink fast to clear the blur in his eyes.

He reached out, pulling them both into his arms, their small bodies warm against him, their laughter muffled against his shirt. He kissed the tops of their heads, letting the weight of the moment settle somewhere deep inside his chest.

“Daaaad!” his son whined dramatically, twisting like a worm. “I’m building a garage! You’re squishing it!”

“Yeah!” his daughter chimed in, legs kicking against the edge of the couch as she clutched her doll like a shield. “We’re busy!”

Max grinned, not letting go. “Nope. Too bad. Come here you little menaces.”

They shrieked with laughter as he pulled them into his lap anyway, arms wrapped around both of them in a playful bear hug. His son tried to wriggle free, pretending to struggle, while his daughter began giggling uncontrollably as Max tickled under her arm.

They wrestled like that for a few more minutes all soft hair and socked feet and half-finished Lego tumbling to the floor until the energy slowly fizzled out and the room settled again.

His son rested his head against Max’s chest, breath coming in little huffs. His daughter curled against his side, fingers still tangled in her doll’s dress. Max looked down at them, one on either side of him, and felt something loosen in his chest. Something old and heavy and aching that had been there for far too long.

He kissed the tops of their heads once, then again and held them close for just a moment longer, listening to the echo of their laughter still lingering in the room.

“I love you guys,” he said quietly, voice thick.

“Love you too Daddy,” his daughter mumbled, already half-asleep.

That night after they’d fallen asleep he stood in the hallway beside their rooms and stared at them for a long time, the faint hum of the city outside blending with the soft rhythm of their breathing.

The news shouldn’t have shaken him the way it did. You had every right to do what you wanted romantically. Every right to end things, to start again, to choose whatever made you happy and yet all he could think about was the way your smile hadn’t quite reached your eyes the last time he saw you and suddenly that whisper of hope he'd felt in the paddock didn’t seem foolish at all.

It felt like something real.

Something worth waiting for.

When you picked up the kids on Monday morning you’d said barely a word. Just a tight-lipped smile and a tired look that didn’t belong to the same woman who used to light up the world around her. You’d kept your sunglasses on even though it was cloudy, and your voice had been gentle but distant when you told him what time you’d be around next.

He’d wanted to ask, to reach out, but he didn’t. You weren’t his to try and save anymore. Except maybe you always would be.

It was Monday night when the text came. He’d just finished dinner, dishes still sitting in the sink, when his phone buzzed softly on the counter.

Hey. Can I call you?

For a moment he just stared at the message thumb hovering over the screen then, without thinking twice, he pressed call. You picked up on the second ring your voice quiet, raw around the edges.

“So I guess they told you?”

Max exhaled slowly, leaning back against the counter, his heart thudding in his chest. “Yeah… they did.”

There was a pause, long enough for him to hear you breathing, the faint catch in your throat when you tried to speak.

“You okay?” he asked finally.

Another silence, then you said softly, “Yeah. I think I knew for a while. I was just holding on for… for comfort, maybe. The idea of someone being there, of not being alone.”

He understood that better than he wanted to admit. “Yeah,” he murmured. “I get that.”

“For the kids?” Max murmured before he could stop himself.

A small, fragile laugh filtered through the line. “Yeah. They liked him. I thought that if they were happy that could be enough and maybe I could be too. That maybe I owed it to them to try and make it work,” you went on, your tone measured, like you’d rehearsed these words a few times already.

“But they don’t need him,” you said after a long pause, and this time your voice trembled. “They already have an amazing dad and I think I… I just needed to be honest with myself.”

Max pressed his palm to the counter, grounding himself, eyes burning, the city outside blurred and distant.

You broke off, and for a moment, all he could hear was your breath catching slightly, like you were trying to steady yourself. “I wanted you to hear it from me… before they said anything.”

That made him look up, though there was no one to see it. “You did?”

“Yeah,” you said. “I didn’t want it to sound like gossip coming from them. I wanted you to know that it wasn’t messy, or ugly, especially with the kids involved.”

Max’s chest tightened at that, not out of triumph, but out of something gentler.

“Thanks,” he said quietly. “I appreciate that, but please don’t worry, I know you always put them first.”

You exhaled slowly, and for the first time since you’d called there was a touch of warmth in your voice. “I figured I owed you that much.”

“You don’t owe me anything,” he said automatically, though the truth was it meant more than he could put into words.

“Maybe not,” you replied. “But I still wanted to.”

“How are they doing with it?” you asked.

“They’re okay. They’re really okay.”

You sounded surprised when you let out a soft breath. “Good.”

“They’re resilient,” he said. “They’re also a little distracted. I might’ve promised them ice cream for breakfast next time.”

That earned a real laugh from you. “Dangerous move.”

The kitchen was silent except for the faint hum of the refrigerator, the world outside his windows still and heavy. He didn’t know what it was, your voice, the silence, or the sudden clarity that seemed to fill the space between them, but something inside Max clicked.

Maybe it was the quiet exhaustion beneath your words that sounded so much like his own. Or maybe it was the realisation that no matter how much time had passed no one could ever really take your place.

“Come over tomorrow… when the kids are at school.” he said, his voice rough.

You hesitated. “Max…”

“Not for the kids,” he added quickly. “For us.”

The silence stretched, a breath held between two people who had once promised forever and then lost it somewhere along the way.

Then you whispered, almost too softly to hear, “Okay.”

For the first time in years Max felt like something broken inside him might finally be ready to heal.

It wasn’t overnight.

There was no grand romantic gesture, no dramatic kiss in the rain, no sweeping declarations that instantly erased the years of pain and miscommunication.

No coming back together was quieter than that.

Slower.

Earned.

The first time you came over after the call Max wasn’t sure what to expect. He’d spent the whole day trying not to overthink it, rearranging pillows that didn’t need moving, setting out mugs and then putting them away, checking the time every ten minutes like it would stop the twist in his chest. You weren’t just dropping the kids off. You weren’t coming over for any reason that had a tidy label.

When you finally arrived standing just inside his doorway with your hands clasped tightly together Max froze.

You looked... unsure. Like you were bracing yourself for something, or maybe waiting for him to say the wrong thing so you could turn around and walk back out. That look, that quiet, guarded tension was so achingly familiar it knocked the breath out of him. The same one you used to wear when everything between you was held together with duct tape and silent hope. When love didn’t feel like enough, but you didn’t know how to let go yet.

Max opened his mouth. Thought about saying hi, or maybe you look good, or even just I’m glad you came but nothing landed right. So instead, he gave you a small, uncertain smile and stepped back to let you in.

He made tea, because it was what he used to do after long days and the memory of you curled up on his couch with your hands around a chipped mug made the kitchen feel less cold.

You sat across from him at the kitchen table, cradling the mug between your palms like it was something delicate. For the first ten minutes, the conversation stayed safely tethered to the kids, school drop-offs, missing socks, the Halloween costume your daughter had changed her mind about three times.

But the air was tight. Your shoulders didn’t drop, your tea barely cooled, and every time you looked at him, your mouth opened just a little too long before you spoke, like you were swallowing words before they could make it out.

Max couldn’t stop watching the way your thumb traced circles against the ceramic. The way your mouth twitched a small, unconscious tug of muscle that always came when you were trying too hard to hold something back.

Finally after a silence that stretched just long enough to sting, you set the mug down with a soft clink and looked up.

“I think…” Your voice caught, and you took a breath. “I think I’ve been lying to myself.”

Max didn’t speak.

“Telling myself I was over it. Over us. That I was fine. That I’d moved on.”

You gave a small, bitter laugh one that sounded like it had collapsed under its own weight.

“But when I see you with them Max… just being there. Just you. The way they look at you, the way you look at them...”

You shook your head, like it was still hard to admit out loud.

“I realised I’ve been trying to replace something that was never finished in the first place.”

He didn’t know what it was your voice, or the truth in it, or the silence that followed but something inside him cracked open.

He cleared his throat. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

You looked down fingers curling around the hem of your sweater like you used to do when you were unsure of your own feelings.

“I didn’t know how,” you admitted. “I kept thinking… once I let go, once I said we were done, I didn’t have the right to ask for anything more.”

“You never needed to ask,” he said quietly.

“I miss them when I’m not with them,” you whispered. “But I missed you too. In all the little places I promised myself I’d stop looking.”

Max turned his face to the window. The city lights beyond the glass blurred into indistinct shapes, the world soft and far away.

His throat felt thick. His hands curled slowly into fists against the table.

“I’m not the same guy you left,” he said after a beat. “I never stopped wanting to be better for them. For you.” His voice shook just a little. “I’ve just been hoping, every single day, that maybe… it wasn’t too late.”

He wanted to feel relief and he did, somewhere deep down but mostly what flooded him was everything he hadn’t let himself say. The months of watching Harry slip into a space that used to be his. The ache of hearing your kids talk about someone else’s pancakes, someone else’s laugh, someone else’s presence at the dinner table.

He hadn’t hated Harry, but he’d resented him for getting the version of you and your life Max had spent years trying to save and had still lost.

“I used to see him with them, with you,” Max said finally, voice low, unsteady, “and all I could think was… that should be me.”

His eyes flicked up to meet yours. “Not just the bedtime stories or the walks in the park. It was the way you looked at him sometimes like you were really trying and I told myself I was happy for you. That I should be. But it…” He trailed off, jaw tightening.

“It gutted me.”

You didn’t speak. Didn’t interrupt.

Max exhaled, shaking his head a little, more to himself than to you.

“And I couldn’t ever blame you for it,” he said, quieter now. “Because I’m the one who let us fall apart.”

“We both let it fall apart,” you said. “Neither of us knew how to ask for help until it was already broken.” You looked down at the table, blinking slowly. “So no… you don’t get to take all the blame.”

Max who had spent so many nights sitting with that ache, turning it over like a stone in his hand just nodded.

Neither of you said everything you wanted to that night. There were too many years layered between the words, too many scars that hadn’t fully faded.

You didn’t jump into each other’s arms.

You circled one another, careful, cautious, the way people do when they’ve known what it’s like to lose.

Max started showing up more not just as a father, but as himself.

He stopped asking for extra days with the kids and just… stayed. He lingered after drop-offs, offering to help with bath time, with bedtime stories, with forgotten homework. At first you were hesitant. You’d both worked so hard to set clear boundaries. To not blur the lines, but somewhere between the quiet Monday nights and the shared routines the lines began to soften.

He hadn’t become someone entirely new he was still Max. Still driven, still focused, still chasing podiums with the same fire that had once made it impossible to slow down. But now there was space between the race weekends. Space that he was learning how to fill, not with distractions or distance, but with intention.

He made time. Not by sacrificing his goals, but by carving out room for the things that grounded him and you could see the difference, not in grand declarations, but in the quiet moments. The steady presence. The way he asked how you were, and this time actually stayed in the moment long enough to hear the answer and work through it.

And you… you let him in.

One night after dinner at your place, the kids already asleep upstairs, you found yourselves sitting on the living room floor surrounded by old photo albums. You hadn’t planned it. One of them had asked to see baby pictures, and after they went to bed, neither of you had the heart to put them away.

There was one photo your son curled up on Max’s chest, your newborn daughter tucked into your arms, both of you looking exhausted and impossibly young.

You’d stared at it for a long time before saying quietly, “We really tried didn’t we?”

Max’s voice had cracked when he answered, “We did.”

There was no bitterness in the silence that followed. Just a kind of wistful honesty. A shared memory of something that had once been good and the ache of having let it go.

Now there were new moments, soft and small, building something that felt even more fragile because this time, there was no illusion of invincibility. You both knew how easily things could fall apart.

He started making you breakfast again the way you liked it, even though you never told him. He remembered. He always remembered.

You texted him more when the kids were being particularly cute or particularly impossible, and he started texting back just to ask if you were okay, even when they weren’t with you and you did the same.

One Friday night after putting the kids to bed in his Monaco apartment, you stayed a little longer. Long enough for him to open a bottle of wine. You sat out on the balcony together, the city glittering below, the late-summer breeze lifting strands of your hair from your shoulders.

His voice was low, rough around the edges like he’d been holding the words in for too long.

“I never stopped loving you, you know.”

It hung in the air between you like a secret finally set free.

You turned your head slowly to look at him. He wasn’t watching you, his eyes were on the skyline, jaw tense, hands wrapped tightly around the stem of his wine glass.

You leaned into his side, resting your head against his shoulder, letting your fingers brush against his just enough to make his hand twitch.

“I know,” you said softly. “Me neither.”

His breath caught, barely audible, and then you felt his arm slide around your back, tentative at first, then firmer.

You didn’t kiss that night.

You didn’t need to.

Weeks later and the late afternoon sun cast a golden hue across the school parking lot, the kind of light that softened everything. Max stood beside you on the curb, hands tucked into the pockets of his hoodie, sneakers scuffing the pavement as he watched the flood of children pouring out of the school doors.

You were there, right beside him.

Not as an ex.

Not as a co-parent.

Not as two people pretending to be fine.

But as something real again.

The drive over had been quiet, you’d smiled at him when he stopped for your favourite to-go drink. He’d reached across the centre console and brushed your hand with his thumb at the red light. These small things had become your rhythm again, familiar, tentative, sweet.

You saw the kids before they saw you, your daughter’s unmistakable bounce as she tore across the playground, schoolbag flapping wildly behind her. Max barely had time to brace himself before she launched straight into his arms.

“Daddy!” she squealed. “You’re here too!”

You laughed as she wiggled out of his arms and came to you, arms wrapping tightly around her, lifting her off the ground.

Max crouched just as your son came into view, his backpack slung low and eyes already lighting up at the sight of both of you.

“Hey little man,” Max grinned, ruffling his hair in that way that always made him grin.

He smiled wide, but then his expression shifted into something Max had seen more and more lately, suspicion. Sharp. Thoughtful. The kind of calculating squint only children could pull off with conviction.

He looked between you and Max, his small brow furrowing.

“Is Daddy your boyfriend again?” he asked, voice dead serious.

You froze just slightly, the question hanging in the air like the slow toll of a bell.

Max met your eyes, searching, checking. This had been your worry. Not media fallout. Not gossip.

The kids.

Always the kids.

You nodded slowly, keeping your gaze on them. “We’re trying again,” you said, voice soft but steady hoping they’d understand.

For a heartbeat no one said anything.

Then your daughter let out a delighted shriek, all energy and limbs, and your son’s face broke into a toothy grin as he shouted, “Yessss!” before throwing his arms around both your legs.

Laughter spilled out of all of you, and Max felt something loosen in his chest, like an old knot finally coming undone.

It was chaotic and loud and unfiltered, two little people unable to contain their joy. They didn’t ask why now, or what had changed, or if it would last.

They just knew they had you both.