Babydoll ||Charles Leclerc

Old Habits Die Screaming.

August 18, 2022

The early morning alarm, the early run and then the intense meetings that took up the whole day. The media asked the same questions over and over again, and after a while you started to give the same answers. After the meeting was over, I went back to the Alpha Tauri garage to get my bike ready. After putting on my helmet and fixing my clothes, I went out of the garage and saw Carlos was waiting for me.
"Now you can't ride without me?" I said with a grin. He fixed his helmet and winked at me, I got on my bike and we rode slowly around the track together. People passing by looked at us and smiled.
"What shall we eat tonight?" he asked right next to me. I quickly looked over my shoulder to see if there were people around.
"Carlos! Someone could have heard!" But he didn't care and continued riding his bike.
"Don't worry, nothing will happen." After a bit more cycling we went back to the team garages. While I was getting ready I wondered for a while if I should wait for Carlos, but when I came out of the paddock I saw that he was already waiting for me, so I quickly got in the car without being seen by anyone. The car ride was quiet, and as soon as we got home we had dinner and went to bed early. Tomorrow was qualifying so we had to get up early. The next day when we went to the paddock, we got out of the car together, we didn't care who saw us together. But the person who walked past us made me freeze on my feet. Carlos's hands gripped my waist tighter as Charles walked past us as if he had never seen us. He didn't take his eyes off Charles for a second as his jaw clenched. Did he think I still hadn't made up my mind?
I held his hand tightly and let him lead me to my team's garage, kissing my forehead before he left. When I entered the garage there was a strange atmosphere around, no one was looking in my direction, everyone was making a strange effort not to look in my direction. At that moment our team principal came in. He was angry, as soon as he came up to me he got straight to the point.
"How long has this nonsense been going on?" he said while preparing to throw fireballs at me with his eyes.
"What nonsense?" I said, pretending not to know. Of course it didn't work.
"What was that theater you were putting on? How long have you been sleeping with the rival team's driver, Annabelle?" he said, louder this time. I blinked and stared at him for a while. He could have asked how long we had been lovers. But what the hell was sleeping with him? How could he ask that?
"My private life is absolutely none of your business," I said in the same harsh tone, frowning.
"It is if you go in front of the cameras holding hands like that!" he yelled. "Look, I don't want to pry into your relationship, but you can't do that. There are rules, you can't just hold hands in front of the cameras. I thought Carlos knew about this, you should have told us in advance. Do you really think they're going to make you both compete? This could cost you your career." He kept yelling. All I could do was stand there and grit my teeth in anger.
"Do you really want to end your career? For that man?" This time he looked at me with contempt.
"Are you done?" I said as I continued to stare at him.
"Yes," he said as he crossed his arms.
"Fine, I'll leave my resignation at your office after the race."