COLLISION COURSE - Lando Norris [ff]

Twenty-Three

Qatar would be a sprint race. It was a weekend format she did not quite like, and it often was more challenging for the drivers both mentally and physically.
So, getting back on track and putting in some extra sessions with her personal trainer seemed like a good idea to her. She had spent her time in Monaco after the race in Japan a week before. The results had been satisfying for both Nyck and her, however, she had hoped to challenge McLaren more as the British constructor had a start on them in the championship already. Lando’s points in Singapore and their struggles to find balance in the car while keeping their heads down in the high, tropical temperatures and the humid weather had passed the Italian team down by a length.

She feared that it might happen again as their engineers were still in disagreement about how effective their upgrades after the summer break had been. The performance clearly had been on a high before their adjustments and changes.

Her feet carried her faster. She loved to take the route along the coastline when jogging in the afternoons. It had been one of the few things that actually got her out of the hole she was in lately.

Since her sister’s birthday party, Lando had not texted her.
She had seen him type before, especially late at night when she did not find rest again. She figured that he might have been sleepless too, but after McLaren’s 2-3 finish in Japan, he had not even picked up the phone after nine.
Christina had found herself staring at his profile picture, framed in a circle in the upper corner, and hoped for a simple ‘online’ to pop up.
Nothing.
Her fingers had hammered angry texts or little, hopeful notes, heartfelt apologies and monologues about how miserable she felt into the keyboard. A second later, the bar was empty again and she would let her thumb slip off the backspace.

She had cooked herself delicious dinners, met up with Caroline and Josephine more often than usual, went shopping and did not buy anything before sinking back into the sofa in her apartment and waiting for another day to end.

She wished, she would know what to write him. There was nothing she could have said though. Their relationship had been so clear yet so undefined the entire time that there was not a single, rational message she could have sent.
They were everything and nothing at the same time.
And it let her head hurt.

The sun to her left was already on its way to meet the horizon right above the shimmering sea. The evenings were usually the hardest for her to handle, so she would leave the house when it was still warm and bright outside, and the Mediterranean heat would leave a tingling sensation on her tanned skin.

She did think a lot about Lando and Nyck, her friends in Monaco and the UK, about her career and how much she wanted to succeed at what she loved most. Her head had been going on in infinite spirals about the same topics over and over again, so she had decided to pull her mind out of the dense fog and clear it up with race preparations. She had been so focused on nothing else but training, eating properly and taking care of herself that her physician had asked her multiple times if she was doing alright. Christina had nodded, smiled and rested her head back on the daybed. An hour later, she had come home and dropped herself back onto the sofa and hoped that she would finally sink into the cushions and disappear in the softness of the fabric, watching the contours of her body dissolve into mottled gray.

None of that would happen though.

She grabbed her phone from her runner’s belt when it started to buzz. There was a call from Josephine incoming.

Christina raised her eyebrows in surprise. Her friend hated calls. She would always text even if it was important things or simply ones with a deadline coming dangerously close.

She cleared her throat and accepted the call before pressing the device to her ear, “Josie?”

“Fuck, Chris! I am so fucking happy you picked up.” Her voice sounded stressed and faded from tears.