Unchained Melody (Daniel Ricciardo)

She saved me

"What do you mean? Why are you on an orange car? Is that the McLaren?" Ayla asks Daniel after seeing him on the picture where he's definitely not driving for Red Bull.
Ten years ago the McLaren wasn't orange, it was silvery gray with red because Vodafone designed the livery for a year.

"Well, yeah it's the McLaren." Daniel answers her.
"Since when are they orange? You know what, it doesn't matter. Why are you driving for McLaren? When did you leave Red Bull?"

She has so many questions, about everything, but right now she just wants to know why Daniel would choose McLaren over Red Bull. Surely the Woking based team has been doing alright for the last years, or at least the years she remembers, but in her mind it's still Jenson and Lewis driving the McLaren. She's not eager to find out what happened in her favorite sport in the ten years she can't remember.

"Well Lewis left for Mercedes in 2013, then Perez joined McLaren and in the years after that some others obviously came and went. Jenson retired in 2017 after the team had a few rough years. They went for the orange color in 2017 as well, although not as orange as they are now, or I should say papaya." Daniel starts to summarize the last decade of McLaren.

Ayla snorts.
"Papaya? That's freaking orange! Anyways how did you get there? Is Red Bull doing bad and McLaren winning?"
"Not exactly. Seb and I both left Red Bull last year."

"What?! Did Seb leave as well? But why? He didn't retire right?"
Of course Ayla knows drivers switch teams often enough, but she likes things to stay as they are and it's very weird to hear that even Seb isn't with Red Bull anymore.

"Seb got an opportunity to sign for Ferrari, so he decided to go for it. He's doing pretty good. His team mate is Charles Leclerc." Daniel explains.
"Hm ok, well I get that. Ferrari is just one of those teams a lot of drivers want to be a part of. I don't know who Charles Leclerc is though." Ayla digs her mind to figure out if she ever heard that name before, but it doesn't ring a bell.

"He was probably still karting in 2012. So Seb left and I got a really good offer from Zak Brown to join McLaren and I just thought it was a good idea." Daniel sighs. If only he knew how bad that idea would turn out in the end, he would have stayed with Red Bull.
"Zak Brown? Who is he?" She has heard that name before, but she doesn't know when and where.

"He is team principal for McLaren." Daniel tells her.
"What happened to Martin?"
Martin Whitmarsh is the team principal Ayla knows, at least he was there in 2012.
"He got ousted."

Ayla takes a moment to process the information she got so far. Of course a lot has changed in ten years, but for her it's still a bit difficult to comprehend that she has a ten year gap in her memory.

"So who are driving for Red Bull now?" She would like to know. Especially as she apparently works for the team.
"Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez." Daniel tells her.
"Verstappen? Is that Jos' son? Is he just as bad as his father?"

Daniel chuckles, of course she knows Jos Verstappen who once was a F1 driver himself.
"Max is good, he's very talented and he won the championship this season. And he pretty much won the constructors championship on his own as well. You and Max get along very well, both don't take shit from each other and I think he appreciates you for not kissing his ass like a lot of other people do."

Ayla laughs, that does sound like her. Everybody always thinks she's a kind hearted, sweet girl, which she is. But she also speaks her mind and doesn't care if you're a world champion or not. She grew up in the world of formula 1, surrounded by arrogant men who think the world revolves around them. She's not impressed by that or the attitudes they can give her