the speed of love

chapter six • maple syrup

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I'm staring to think I just race for the opportunity to travel everywhere.

It's the day before the race weekend at Canada starts, and I'm spoiling myself with maple syrup.

"Holy God, this is soo good." Kiya says though a full mouth of maple syrup.

"You're just eating it plain??" I say through chuckles

"Yeah, take it like a shot!" She says.

"Yeah, cause I do a lot of those!" I retort.

"You're crazy." Kiya says.

We both start laughing, when Pedro comes over and sits down at our table.

"Hey guys." Pedro says awkwardly.

Me and Kiya make eye contact.

"What's.. up?" I say.

"Nothing. Just hanging" Pedro says.

time skip

My alarm rudely wakes me up the day of qualifying. I shove my head further under the covers and snooze the alarm.

I take a deep breath, thinking about the day ahead of me. Free practices 2 and 3 and, qualifying. I finally make my way out of bed, and step out onto the balcony. More rain.

I close my eyes.

I can't control the weather, or Pepe for that matter.

The sun is shining through the clouds as it is raining, and there is fog on the ground. Luckily, I got a hotel extremely close to the track, and I can already see preparations happening for the race.

I just have to drive an amazing race. Show them I'm back.

I close the sliding door to the balcony, and walk into the main room of my hotel suite. I wrestle my suitcase for my team kit, and grab my duffel bag for my excess amount of gear.

Practically running out the door, I go down to the main lobby. I always like to be the first at the track. Empty track walks are my favorite.

I grab a bike from the hotel, and pedal off to the circuit less than a kilometre away.

I make it to the entry gates, where there are already people lined up. I quickly peddle past the gates, and go into my team garage. There was a quick turnaround from the Formula One Canadian Grand Prix, so the track is still being cleaned, pits are being cleaned and garages are being cleaned as well.

I set my bike outside of the garage and make my way to my driver's room. I throw my duffle on the bed and beelined it for the track, making sure I'm there first there.

The track is tranquil, even though there is only four hours until the first session of the day. I walk in a racing line, feeling how the texture and grip takes in the slight drizzle of rain.

My track walk gets interrupted by a phone call. I slide my phone out of pocket and see an unidentified number. I'll answer anyways.

"Hello? Who is this?" I say.

"Hello, is this Mack Tallard?"

"Yeah, this is he." I say confused.

"This is Jonathan Wheatley, the sporting director over at Oracle Red Bull Racing."

My stomach drops.

"Uhh, hi Jonathan..?" I say shocked.

He chuckles through the phone, "Don't be scared, hah, you should be excited. We're adamant on offering you a spot in our driver's academy for the upcoming Formula One season."

My mouth is gaping. "Holy crap." I say, "Wait sorry, yes! I would love to accept." I recover.

"As you probably know, we were recently at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, and we are here now, since we have a bye week. We are excited to see you race."

"I'm excited to race! Is there uhh.. a chance I could meet with you?"

"I was actually about to try and organize that with you, we have a temporary HQ up here in Canada we can use for situations like these." He continues.

"That would be amazing!" I respond enthusiastically.

"Really, your championship win in your first season of Porsche Cup is the kind of work ethic we need here at Red Bull. Christian said he hadn't seen a young man handle a car that well since Max Verstappen in his karting days."

"Well, thank you! Uhh, sorry but I think I have to go now." I say sheepishly.

"No worries Mack, we all know you have things to do! I'll send out an email chain with Christian on it to iron out some details."

"Alright thank you so much! Have a great day!" I respond nervously.

He hangs up.

I sigh.

Now I have to perform well.

Even though it has been two weeks since my crash, I still feel side affects. Later, while I was in the hospital, the team got the reports back from my car dashboard, and the I suffered a 46g's crash. It has really taken a toll on my ability to race. But, long term injuries are not uncommon with crashes of this nature.

I had been continuing my walk and pacing when I was on the phone, so I had almost completed my one lap for my track walk.

My head is pounding. My vision hurts. Red Bull looking at me added an extra layer of stress to this weekend.

I head back to my garage where I need to start getting ready.