⌞ the chain ⌝

⌞ twenty-one : parallels ⌝

"I would never. You did great work. We'll go over tapes when you get back in."

_

I sat on the floor of the garage. Zak and Damon were going back and forth on my performance for today. Zak was saying that I was supposed to stay behind Lando but Damon was arguing that there was nothing said directly during the session. I didn't think it was fair. I was supposed to be celebrating my work but this was only making me feel worse about everything.

"Psst."

I looked up to see Lando gesturing me to follow him. I got up as quietly as I could, following him out of the garage.

"Lando, where are we going?"

"I want you to meet my friends and all the other drivers."

My anxiety sparked. I was so nervous. What if they didn't like me? What if I was going to be pushed out because of who I was? My hand went up to my necklace, twisting it around in my fingers as we walked. Lando didn't say anything but he seemed happy enough as he led us toward a group of boys. Two boys waved at him and we walked over there first.

"George, Alex... this is Lula."

The boys looked at me. They were both taller than Lando and me. One of the boys, the tallest one, was blonde and everything about him reeked of British. The other boy was a bit shorter but he was still pretty tall and was tan with dark hair, he looked to be some kind of Asain. He was the one who held out his hand first. I took it and gave it a firm shake.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Alex."

"Pleasure."

"Oh, you're French. That's cool."

"You're British."

The three boys laughed and the blonde held his hand out. "George Russell."

"I passed you on the first lap."

"Uh... yeah."

I internally hit myself for that. My social skills seemed to completely disappear and I knew the gang back home would be laughing at me for how I was handling this but I didn't know how to act here. Was I allowed to make jokes? They weren't my friends or anything. I wasn't sure what went and what didn't. But that was interrupted by a guy walking up to us.

"Hello, gents."

"Jem."

I raised an eyebrow as I looked up. So that was Jem. He was tall and the compression hugged his lean body frame with his dark hair. He smiled at me and I gave a quick one back.

"You must be Eilulia."

"Lula," Lando spoke for me.

"Didn't realize she couldn't speak, pip." He looked at me. "He speak for you?"

"No, and you don't have to be an ass about it."

Jem raised an eyebrow at me but all I could see was the three boys I'd met before smiling like this wasn't something that happened. Did people fear this guy just because he was a Redbull driver? At this point, I was happy I didn't take the Redbull seat. Being teammates with this guy would have caused me to go clinically insane.

"Well, now I see why you're already in the top five for your first race."

"You know nothing about me."

"Then give me the pleasure, princess."

I felt the urge to smack that smirk off his face but I kept myself cool. I didn't need to get myself kicked out or off the team before my first race. He was just a jerk, I've handled enough of those.

"Or you could just focus on fixing whatever issue you have going into the turn so you don't lose time. It'll cost you a race pretty soon."

George and Alex snorted, Lando just looking at me like I had beat the shit out of his bully. And I realized that's exactly what this was. This dumbass was a bully and he was trying to scare me off. No way this was going to sit right with me.

"We'll see how it goes, princess. See you on the track."

I scoffed as he walked off, turning back to the other boys. "We hate him, right?"

"So much." Alex shook his head. "But that was cool."

"You handled that so freaking awesome. Like, super awesome."

George and Alex nodded in agreement with Lando. I smiled as I realized I might have just made some more friends. Maybe this wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. But now I had a new drive. Sure, I still needed to prove myself but to do that, it meant personally taking down Jem Wright. That was at the top of my list.

_

"Sounds like every class A dick that comes up in racing."

I rolled my eyes as I moved some of my stuff around my hotel room. Nico had been listening to me rant about this kid for the last hour and was now gossiping back with me.

"Well, true. But god. I want to hit him so bad."

Nico snorted and I turned down the volume on my headphones so it wasn't so loud. "You can't do that but you can prove him to be an ass on the track."

"No duh, I am going to talk with Damon about it in the morning. See if I can get permission to go past Lando to beat him."

"Wait, what? Why do you need permission?"

I shrugged as I folded up my clothes since we would be leaving a bit after the race. "Team orders. Lando is in the running for the championship and I just started. There's no way I can catch up for points so it's mostly just about learning."

"No, absolutely not. No. Is Damon letting you race?"

"Yeah?"

"Good. You are not getting pushed to the side because of stupid shit. You should be allowed to race at your best."

I was a bit confused about why Nico was being so direct about this. I hadn't kept up with what was going on in F1 as much as I usually did. I'd been so busy with training and everything but I knew something was going on between Lewis and Nico. I thought maybe it was something close to what I was going to.

"Ni, is something going on with you and Lew?"

There was a sigh. "Don't worry about it, little racer. Focus on racing."

"I'm just worried..."

"Don't be. Everything will work out the way it should."

"Alright. Well, I should get some sleep."

"Sleep well, Lilyvine. We'll all be cheering for you."

He hung up the phone and the music played in my ears again. It was the soft sounds of Sleeping, at Last were there to help with my anxiety but I couldn't completely ignore the way I felt knowing that my fathers weren't doing well. I didn't want to lose anyone else and I knew they weren't going to leave me if something happened but the thought of them not being happy made my heart hurt.

I shove it to the side. I had a race to win.

_

"Alright Lu, P4." Damon handed me a cup of coffee as we sat in the garage. "How do we go about this?"

"Focus on the first turn, I don't want to lose positions. Then keep my position for as long as I can, then in the last half to quarter needs to be focused on moving up."

"That's my girl. I did tell Zak we're not doing team orders. He didn't like it but he agreed."

"I'm going for Wright."

He raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"He pissed me off yesterday."

"Then let's get him."

He helped me to my feet as I set my coffee to the side, doing our quick little handshake I forced him to learn during training. I looked across the garage at Lando and he gave me a quick smile, I smiled back while brushing my finger against the side of my nose, and he did it back. Our little good luck to each other.

I made sure I had everything I needed before I followed Damon to the car. He helped me into it, leaning down to whisper something to me. "Get 'em down and don't take your foot off that pedal."

I nodded and he tapped the top of my helmet before walking off. I adjusted in the seat a bit, focusing on the seventeen on the front of my car. I could see Jem sitting in his car a few feet away from me and my blood started to boil. If nothing else, I was going to beat him. If nothing else, within the next few laps, I was going to catch him or push myself to the limit trying.

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a/n: cliffhanger bitches. hehehe. but like, real question. would you all like another another fic and if so, what are we thinking? i will take all recommendations. romance or not, i am down for it. but hehe. as always, love it or don't :p