Free Now- Lando Norris

8. Here We Go Again

Lando had never been in such a hurry to get away from everyone at the end of a race as he was that weekend. His answers in the media pen after the race had been short, bordering on abrupt, and the second he'd finished he'd taken off back in the direction of McLaren. He kept his head down, brushing straight past anyone who tried to stop him to speak to him, and didn't even slow his pace a fraction until he was safely back in his driver's room with the door closed firmly behind him. Then he clicked the lock into place, to make doubly sure that no one tried to follow him.

It hadn't been a terrible weekend, in fact this time last year he probably would've considered it a pretty good weekend, but it wasn't what he wanted to start the season off. He'd qualified fourth and finished fourth, Max in third just ahead of him. It may only be the first race of the season, but it already felt like an omen for how the rest of his year was going to go. He'd had a small sliver of hope left that perhaps their car might be miles ahead of where the other teams were, that maybe he could have a good start to the year and it might give him some motivation to keep going.

But instead it had been an entirely underwhelming weekend, and one that hadn't left him any more motivated than he had been when he'd arrived. The media pen had just been filled with questions about how he'd missed out on the championship the year before, what was he hoping to do different this year, what had he been working on to do better this year. He hadn't really got any answers for those questions.

His phone started buzzing not long after he'd got back to his room, he pulled it out of his pocket and took a quick glance at the screen to reveal it was his Dad calling him, probably wanting to know where he'd run off to and if they were heading back to the hotel yet. He just ignored it, waiting until it rung out. He knew his dad was going to suggest they do something to cheer him up, that they should go and get dinner or something, but all he wanted to do was be left alone.

The phone started buzzing again, seemingly relentless, as his dad tried again. Lando watched it ring, waiting for the call to end before he picked it up. He quickly typed out a text to his dad, a lie saying he'd got things he needed to do before he could leave and he'd catch him up. He wasn't entirely sure if his dad was going to buy it, but he didn't really care if he believed him or not. He just wanted to be left alone for a few hours. He could make up a better excuse later if he needed to.

It only took a couple of seconds for his Dad to reply, saying that he'd head back to the hotel but suggesting Lando let him know when he got back so that they could go and get dinner together. Lando had replied, saying he'd let him know, even though he had no intention of actually going through with it. Once he got back to the hotel all he was going to do was shower, crawl into bed and try to forget about the whole thing.

What he really wanted to do was get on a plane home and crawl into his own bed. Although the idea of the long flight home was far from appealing, the thought of being back in his own home and not having to see anyone for a while definitely was. It wasn't an option though. He had to be in China ready to race again in a few days, the season well and truly back underway, and with it any chance to have a few days to himself was well and truly gone.

He'd hung around in his drivers room for long enough that by the time he left, the paddock was as quiet as it ever got. There were still a few photographers and fans hanging around here and there, but the large majority of the crowds had left, allowing him to slip through the paddock and back to the car relatively easily. He'd stopped for a photo with a kid who he realised had probably been waiting for quite some time in the hopes of catching him, pulling his own cap off his head, signing it and leaving it with the kid after they'd had a photo taken.

He'd taken a bit of a weird detour to get back to his hotel room, the main aim being to avoid the crowd of McLaren staff that were gathered in the hotel lobby, presumably all planning to head out for dinner somewhere. The last thing he wanted to do was get caught up in that and have to come up with a reason why he didn't want to go out and celebrate Oscar's podium with them all. So instead, he'd ducked down a service corridor and then taken a ridiculous number of flights of stairs to get up to the high floor his room was on, making it there successfully with no one seeing him. From there, it only let a short dash down the hallway before he was safely closing the door to his hotel room behind himself, locking the door in case anyone had any ideas about coming to find him.