Deep Breath | Daniel Ricciardo

Part Sixty-Three

Friday went by quickly at the paddock. Daniel got in some good laps in the free practise and managed to land P3 for the sprint on Saturday. I hadn't seen him much in the day, everything was so much busier on a race weekend, plus I was avoiding having to talk to his parents and now the rest of his family without him with me.

I managed to grab lunch with Lauren and we had a much needed catchup. Even though we spoke everyday either via text, call or face to face it never felt like enough. It was the same with Daniel, no matter how much time we got together it still was never enough.

We'd left the circuit together and we'd planned to meet his family in our room at 8pm. We were doing room service tonight. We were all so tired, us from work and his sister had spent all day and the previous night travelling with 3 kids to get here. They'd come up for this race as it was Daniels birthday and they were going to have a holiday with Grace and Joe for a few days after.

I was anxious but after I'd met Michelle and her husband I felt much more relaxed. I didn't eat much which was noticed by Daniel, but he held back the comments. We spend time talking about Daniels childhood and early racing career in the beginning but I ended up being a big hit with his niece and nephew after their initial happiness of seeing Daniel.

I'd spent the rest of the evening on the floor playing with Isaac, Isabella  and Ivy. Well Ivy was less playing more watching her crawl around seeing as she was only 10-months old. Isabella and Isaac seemed to have taken a real shine to me and I loved kids. I had a nephew of my own who I adored. It made me sad to think of not seeing him for nearly 8 months.

They seemed to love anything to do with Daniel and cars. Isabella had all the Disney characters like Mickey and Minnie but in cars and was showing them to me explaining all about them. Simultaneously Issac was showing me his cars from the Pixar movie to me and trying to get me to race him. "Guys leave Libby alone for a second, she can't play with you all night," Michelle said to the kids.

"They're  ok," I smiled as Isaac jumped into my arms and hugged me.

"I like you more than Daniels other girl." Issac added. It kind of stopped me for a second, I mean obviously he had shown other partners to his family. I just didn't expect to talk about it with his 7 year old nephew. So I just smiled in response and Daniel reached out to me and gestured for me to sit next to him.

"You ok?" He asked and I nodded back. I pulled myself off the floor and sat next to him on the sofa. Ivy pulled at my legs and tried to climb up as soon as I sat down. I pulled her up onto my lap and she cuddled into me. "So have I just totally lost you to the kids now or what." I smiled down at the little face smushing her self into my chest.

"Your retirement plan is so not going to work on her," Michelle said to Daniel. I looked at Daniel and her confused. His face didn't seem like he wanted this brought up. "He doesn't want kids till he finishes in F1, and with how that's going it will be years!" She laughed looking at me and I just smiled back. "You however look like a complete natural, he always falls for the ones with a good maternal instinct" she added.

"I think kids are a while away, we've not even been together that long," I replied trying to keep my cool. I'd always wanted to be a mom, I knew I wasn't in a place for it right now but I didn't want to wait until it was too late. I mean I was only 26 but I would've thought I'd want to have a baby by the time I was 30. I also got worried about what Daniel leaving f1 would be like, who would I work with, I only ever saw myself working for him.

I wasn't listening to the conversation until Daniel kissed my cheek and brought me back into the room. Ivy had fallen asleep in my arms and the other two looked drained. "Looks like it's time for bed ," Grace said standing up.

"Can I sleep with you uncle Dan," Isaac asked, Daniel had told me about this. Usually when he come for a race weekend he sleeps with Daniel in the hotel room one night. He'd normally kick anyone he was with at the time out of the bed and have Issac with him. But he had said wasn't doing that this time, he'd made it clear to me how much he hated not sleeping next to me.

"Not this time bud, I've got someone else in bed with me now."

"He can," I added, "well I mean he could sleep in a pullout next to our bed?"

"No he'll be fine," Michelle said and pulled him over to her.

"Please mom, I want to stay with Dan and Libby".

"It's fine," I smiled at Michelle and she said "ok," to Isaac.

"You sure ," Daniel asked, I just nodded in reply.