Fake It - OP

Chapter 5

"You want to explain to me again how you're now dating, but not dating Oscar, freaking, Piastri?" Ange asked for about the hundredth time this morning.

It was Saturday, and the two of us had spent our morning together before heading to the paddock for qualifying. After my shower last night, Ange hadn't let me sleep until I had explained the night's events not once, but twice to her. It had seemed since we had woken up she had forgotten all about those explanations and had demanded over our breakfast this morning that I had explained it again. It was now the early afternoon and we were both headed into the paddock. I lifted my badge to the scanner, walking through security and Ange followed closely behind me after scanning hers. 

"Oscar needs help with looking more permanent and settled in his home life to keep his job a bit more secure at McLaren. The whole Alpine situation I guess didn't look good for him. Plus, you're ditching me for Caleb, so I get to travel with him in exchange," haphazardly I looked around the paddock trying to find a face I may recognize from last night.

"Well, way to throw me under the bus," Ange mumbled, not as jokingly as I had hoped. "I'm not trying to abandon you, you know that? Caleb offered you the basement suite in his house, you could move to Hawaii with me."

"Look," I said, grabbing her hand to stop us both from walking. "You and I have been a travelling duo, and I can't fault you for settling down and being all happy and shit with your man." I tried to make light of the situation by adding a bit of humour to my tone but Ange didn't look as impressed. "But I'm not ready for that yet, I have no plans, no career, why not make a deal with him? It will be one of those stories I'll tell my grandchildren one day and they won't believe it happened."

"I just can't believe you're going through with it," Ange said as we made our way to the hospitality section of the paddock. "Yeah, he's an F1 driver, and yeah his friends seem nice but have you stopped to think yet that he's still a stranger? You met him yesterday and you're planning on running off with him."

"You and Caleb ran off together when you first met." I replied lamely, "He was still a stranger then."

"I had you for backup!" Ange said, a bit of anger coming through in her tone. "I'll be on the other side of the fucking planet in case things go wrong."

I cased a huff. Ange had a point, but she wasn't making me second guess myself. I had made the decision sober, which was always a good start. And yeah, it may be a bit stupid but I would like to think that Oscar is genuine. And his friends do seem to want the best for him. If all goes south I could always book a ticket to Hawaii, or back to Calgary and my parents.

"I'm going to be fine Ange. I can always back out of it and become yours and Caleb's basement twenty-ager with no life and no income." She rolled her eyes at that and squeezed my hand. "This is meant to be a celebratory trip for the two of us, let's enjoy it." I made the point of adding. 

Ange could worry about me later, today and tomorrow I just wanted to spend with my best friend. Ange squeezed my hand twice and smiled at me as we headed off down to the Ferrari hospitality.

I pulled out my phone from my bag and pulled up Isa's contact information, sending her a text that we were nearing the hospitality. She replied quickly, saying that she would come and get us and it wasn't two minutes later the beautiful blonde was coming out the front doors.

"Morning!" Isa greeted me, offering me a side hug which I reciprocated, genuinely happy to see her again. I heard a few camera shutters click and thought nothing of it. Isa held her hand out to Ange as a greeting. "You must be Ange, Blake mentioned you last night, it's great to meet you."

"Great to meet you as well, I hope Blake didn't tell you anything too nasty about me," Ange said, her normal joking tone returning while she shook Isa's hand.