𝕄𝕆𝕋𝕀𝕍𝔼. || Lando Norris

✨Part-57✨

The last few weeks of December flew by and so did January, they were well into February now. Lando had become less petulant but more quiet.

His friends hadn't seen him since December, he had thrown himself right back into work after celebrating Christmas with his family. It really put things into perspective for him, if Claire wanted him she would come back to him.

Now he was in Barcelona, soaking the sun in. It was officially the start of testing season, he decided to fly down to Spain just a little earlier so he could go around and explore the place.

Much against his wishes, he was right now being dragged to a yacht party by his friends. He didn't realise what a downer he had been until Carlos, the grandpa friend was begging him to come have fun.

He stood on the deck of the yacht, soaking the sunshine in while people around him danced under the influence of booze. A girl from the crowd walked towards him and made attempts to pull him into the circle where his friends were dancing.

"No thanks I'm happy here." He resisted.

"Oh gosh, what's a girl got to do to get you to dance with her?" She laughed.

"I don't dance."

"Then let's talk." She leaned on the railings.

He noticed Max slide in behind the girl, gesturing to him that she was hot. In all fairness, she was just his type. But what difference did it make? He was far too drained from things that had been happening to even try to pursue something new.

He walked into the seating area on the deck, his friends and the pretty girl followed. She sat close to him, literally pressing her hips to his side while the rest of his friends gathered around.

"You didn't really talk after I said let's talk." She looked at him.

"Alright then, let's talk! Do you want to see my baby?" He pulled out his phone.

A look of confusion ran over her face, all his friends looked at him funny too. The table had gone silent, no one said a word.

"Your... baby?"

"Yeah! My baby, we named her Ophelia." He beamed showing her an old picture of them together.

"She's-she's really cute." The girl smiled.

"Yeah she is." He continued chatting away and showing her more pictures of his baby girl.

"Everyone here seems to have met her except for me." Max huffed.

"You'll meet her... soon I hope." Lando gulped. Max's words had caught him off guard, they had reminded him of his reality, Ophelia would have turned 5 months old a few days ago, she probably babbled a lot now and he wasn't going to get to see or hear any of that for a long time, maybe never.

***

"Yes mom, I've let her down on the play mat with her toys. Now go teach the youth our nation!" Claire laughed ending the call.

Ophelia had taken after her dad, she loved smiling. It filled Claire's heart with so much warmth to see her baby just kick around, babble and laugh. She noticed Ophelia had caught hold of one of the many tabloids that remained scattered around the house.

Claire had subscribed to them out of boredom, she freed it from Ophelia's hand and instantly regretted it.

WHERE ARE THE CELEBRITIES VACATIONING?

Spotted: Canada's sweetheart Giselle Harlow cosying up to Formula One star Lando Norris.

The text was followed by a series of images where Claire could see Giselle sitting a little too close to Lando, it made her uncomfortable. She could see them smiling and talking away, she didn't know if she should laugh or cry, because once she did say that he was going to be on a yacht with someone who  was hot and not pregnant.

She was fighting back tears, it didn't help Ophelia was tugging on her hair and babbling away, trying to reach out for the tabloid.

"No my little squirt, we can't chew on paper. Even if it's a picture of dad." She sighed.

She felt like all the work she had done so far, all the crying, the healing and everything that followed it had come undone in one moment.

She didn't want to be sitting on the floor, holding her baby and crying about this. She needed a distraction, she needed something quick.

Lando was moving on, and so should she. But it was easier said than done, she was literally raising their baby that resembled him in so many ways. Sometimes she couldn't even look into the eyes of her own child because they reminded of him.

And here he was, already past it like it never even happened. She was sniffling, Ophelia looked at her in confusion and tried to reach for the tabloid again.

"No! Stop doing that!" She said it more sternly than she meant to, as a result of which the little girl burst into tears.

"Oh no no my baby I'm sorry." She soothed Ophelia giving her kisses.

Her phone rang, it was Sonya. She shifted Ophelia to her other hand and placed her between her arm and hip. Much to her disappointment, Ophelia had yanked the piece of paper and now was enjoying crumbling the paper.

"Hello Little mustard how are you doing?"

"Had lunch, almost had a meltdown and made my baby cry. How about you?" She sighed.

"Just got done with dinner...We need to talk about you, what happened?"

"Okay, so this whole 70s housewife lifestyle of cooking for my family, cleaning for them, looking after my baby and then reading magazines in my free time has grown on me." She laughed.

"It's honestly a choice, if you like it you can continue living like that! Walk me through the magazines you've been reading."

"Okay you're going to hate me," she sighed putting Ophelia down to play with her toys, "I subscribed to like four tabloid-"

"You were the one who called them nonsensical garbage and screamed and cried when they were all in your business!" Sonya said.

"Will you hear me out? I'm cancelling them all, I literally made my baby cry because of them."

"What happened?"

"Okay, so one of the tabloids featured an image of Giselle Harlow, she's this Canadian model."

"Oh I've seen her on Instagram, she's really pretty!"

"Yeah that she is, there were pictures of her and Lando on a yacht you know, doing pretty people things..."

"Go on."

"And that made me feel like I was falling apart all over again, truth be told I'm not fine."

"Right now seems like a good time to say why I called."

"Sure, tell me!"

"It's been ages since we saw each other, papa's going to Bahrain and asked all of us if we wanted to come with him."

"That sounds wonderful!" She looked at her baby, who was smiling at her, "but I don't have the money."

"Did I talk about money? I only want to hear a yes or no. Alia and Nicky are coming too!"

"My heart says yes but my head says no, I can't leave my baby alone."

"You're by going to? Ophelia is coming too! Just say yes already!"

"You know what?" She said thoughtfully, "I deserve this. My life has been a mess, not even the quirky oops my life is so chaotic. It's been a train wreck. Yes Sonya! I'm coming!"

"Perfect! The girls reunite in Bahrain!"

"With a new addition!"

"Yes! Claire's little Eclair!"