What's Wrong With Him?

"Max!"

Max stops walking and turns around where Daniel comes running.

"Hey." says Max when Daniel is standing next to him. "Hey." says Daniel. "What's wrong?" asks Max.

They have both just finished in the media pen after the race.

"Do you know what's wrong with Lando?" asks Daniel and Max looks at the media pen and he looks for Lando. When he has found the boy he keeps looking at him.

Lando has not been the Lando that everyone knows in recent months. This Lando was quiet, often grumpy, not open to start a conversation, very hard on himself and he shuts himself out from everyone. What everyone noticed is that when he is in front of the cameras he acts differently. For example at the drivers parade, he talks to everyone there and laughs, but as soon as they are away from the cameras the smile disappears and he walks away from them.

Lando had big expectations after the MiamiGP, everyone knew that. But they, his friends, had expected that there would be a weight lifted off from his shoulders, but he wanted more. More than that was possible at that moment. He made several mistakes in the races after that. But the race in Austria and Hungary let Lando fall more and more out of their grip.

In Belgium, almost no one could get in touch with Lando. He was at the drivers parade, but he was standing with Alonso and Hulkenberg, with his back to the others.

Then they had the summer break and then Lando disappeared completely from the radar.

But in Zandvoort, everyone noticed several things.

He looked tired, he talked to the people he was supposed to talk to, but no one else. Oscar noticed especially how Lando pretended that everything was fine, but the smiles were fake. He saw it.

Lando won the race that weekend, but there was hardly any smile to be seen and he was very hard on himself. He named the mistakes he made, but not the 22 second lead over Max.

Lando's friends were worried about him, that was clear.

"No." says Max, shaking his head. "But I'm worried. This isn't Lando and it's even worse than before the summer break." "Exactly. I was just standing next to him doing an interview and I was listening to him too. You can guess." says Daniel and Max nods softly. "Were you able to get in touch with him after Zandvoort?" asks Max, but Daniel shakes his head. "I flew here with him, together with Alex and Oscar. But we couldn't get in touch with him. He said he was tired and he put on a headset and he sat in the back of the plane." "And they didn't hear anything either?" "No, not even Oscar." "What do we need to do?" asks Max, but Daniel shrugs his shoulders. "I have no idea Max."

~~~~

Daniel had tried to talk to Lando, but without luck. After the team photo, Lando had packed his things and flown home in a private jet.

Daniel bites his lip as he looks at his phone. He wants to create a group app to ask if anyone knows anything. He knows everyone is worried and maybe they can keep each other updated. He just has to press confirm and then the group is created.

Will Lando mind?

Daniel sighs and he presses confirm and then he gets the group app on screen.

Lando

Daniel added Max, George, Alex, Charles and Oscar.

George:
?

Daniel:
I'm doing this since I'm getting more and more worried about Lando. I want to ask if anyone had contact with Lando and maybe knows a little bit what's going on?