Unwritten Endings [Daniel Ricciardo]

The first date

Weekend went by quickly, and a minimal conversation was shared between me and Daniel, me sending pictures to prove to him that I was cheering on him from the sofa this weekend, and him texting me shortly to tell me how much he missed me.

I could now understand why Daniel got frustrated, and why he kept his messages short and with not much energy put into them. When seeing him on the tv-screen, before he jumped inside the car, he looked drained. And even though he managed to get a better qualifying this weekend, making his way all through to Q3, and the result of the Sunday's race getting him into the points, I knew somewhere that it still was a sore position to end up with, even though he finally got a better result than his teammate.

Daniel had once told me that if he couldn't get on the podium, he still tried to make sure that he was quicker around the race than his teammate, the very one person he always tried to beat as they both drove in the same car, with the same opportunities. Which made me hopeful to see at least a slight smile from him when I would finally see him again.

Plus, in a couple of days we would finally go out on our first date. I had no idea where we would go, how to dress or what kind of food Daniel had in mind. If he had even planned on us two going out on a restaurant that is.

When Daniel had called me after the race, he first had planned out on us two going out the day after, straight after he would be back in Monaco. But I had told him no, I wanted him to get some rest, especially as I had seen the tired eyes of his. So after a small argument between us, nothing heated, we eventually agreed on Wednesday, when Daniel had been able to get at least two days to rest and sleep off the stress of being on the go for two weeks now.

And I still had no idea where he would take me, and it excited me as it frightened me at the same time. I had never been a fan of surprises, and I always liked to live my life planned to every single detail. Something I had always struggled with, being the planner of my friend-group that always found myself annoyed when things didn't go as planned.

But it was a habit that my bosses always liked, because it made me extra careful with getting the details as good as possible, with everything I did. Luckily, I had grown to learn to keep that habit more for work than in my free time. And if Daniel didn't want to tell me about his date-plans, then I wouldn't spill millions of questions at him to get more information.

Because if it was one thing I had learned about Daniel these weeks I had known him, he surely was my complete opposite. Like, he clearly liked to have things planned out in details, knowing every step, every turn and every braking point in life and at the racetrack. But there was a bigger part of him that seemed to enjoy life as it came to him, even with the heavier days, he still found things to smile for.

Which was something I liked about him, how we had so much in common, but still being complete opposite with other things. Something I clearly needed in my life, to learn more about myself and about life itself.

---

As I was literally pulling strands of hair from my head in pure frustration when I couldn't figure out how to go further with my project with showing a new jewellery brand the streets of Monaco in a couple of months, I knew it was time to pay a visit to my boss. He, if anyone, had the best network with contacts in this country, and I knew that I had to get better with asking him for help even if it was a sore spot for me to admit, that I still hadn't managed to find a decent partner to help us with an event we were having with this certain company.

With the bigger brands having most of the grounds here, it came to my knowledge that it was rather impossible to get people interested to help this company out, which was also the reason to why I agreed on taking this project in my hands. I had always enjoyed the smaller companies that needed our help, rather than the bigger ones that already had a big network to get help from. Of course, it wasn't the cheapest to hire us for help with the marketing, but no matter how big or small, every single one who contacted us would get the same good service as possible. And I had never walked home from work with any customer to be disappointed with us, instead, they often came back in the future.