The Undercut | Max Verstappen

chapter 2

Max's POV.
Spa, Belgium.

I can't believe I'm doing this. That's the only thing that kept playing over and over inside my head. Drive to Survive was hard enough already. The last thing I wanted was to be the center of attention even more than I already was. Despite what my usual demeanor might suggest, I hated being in the spotlight when it wasn't about what I did inside a racing car. If it was possible to suddenly become one of those 'faceless driver' edits that fans made online, I think part of me would want to do it.

The other part was the inner egotistic son of a bitch that every single one of us racing drivers had inside of them. We could lie all we wanted. But we liked the attention. We craved the recognition, the screams, the cheers, the podiums and the trophies. It made us feel validated, valuable, important. Some of us just enjoyed the whole zero-privacy less than others, is all. But at the end of the day, my career was the only thing that mattered in my life at this point, it was all I knew, the only thing I'd ever been good at, for better or for worse. So if this was the only way to appease the people who made it possible for me to do my job, I was going to comply.

However, no one had told me that with the deal there was the most stubborn human being I'd ever met included. And hell, here I was thinking nobody could possibly be even more headstrong than myself. Well, color me shocked when I met this girl. And by this girl, I mean the journalist in charge of my documentary.

Sure, I'll be the first to admit that it was possible that we hadn't gotten off to the greatest start. And okay, maybe part of it had been my fault. But that didn't give her the right to give me the cold shoulder for the remainder of the day, did it? We were supposed to work together. I needed us to work together, especially since she was in charge of how I'd be perceived. Of course, I couldn't care less about what the press thought about me. But I did care about how this whole thing had to look in the eyes of Red Bull Racing execs and investors alike.

So there we were. I was sitting on a chair in my driver's room. The view from my window providing a rather average sight to act as background for the video as I tried to feign confidence. It was no secret that I hated media duties. But I barely knew these people, and Christian expected me to lay myself bare to them like it was nothing? Hell no, that's not how it worked. Not with me. I cleared my throat pointedly, staring right at her as she adjusted all of the papers she had scattered on her lap, and I realized that she was far worse than I was at trying to hide my nerves. She was shaking slightly, which clearly showed this was her first time doing a project like this. Great, a rookie.

With the cameras not rolling and a few hours ago, she had seemed ruthless, overconfident and self-assured. Now, as they neared the moment when the director would say 'Action', she didn't seem so sure of herself anymore. This was going to be a long day if she ended up being nothing more than a blabbering mess. Yet at the same time, part of him would sincerely relish in seeing some kind of weakness from the girl who had so clearly over-reacted (in his opinion) to his words earlier that day.

"Alright guys, everything ready? Let's get ready, remember your cues. 3, 2, 1, Action!" Nicholas said. And it kind of reminded me of those Behind the Scenes YouTube videos that production companies would put out to promote their upcoming films.

It didn't feel right. It felt fake to have an entire camera crew craft a family friendly, more acceptable version of myself that I'd barely recognize, just to be able to keep my job. What did that mean for me? Wasn't I good enough already? Hadn't I proved myself enough? Now wasn't the time for that internal debate, suddenly filling Micah Weiss' eyes on me after asking me a question I hadn't heard.

"Um, sorry? I didn't catch that." I said honestly. Causing her to roll her eyes and sigh slightly.

"If you're not going to take this seriously I don't think—" she started.