86. FIRST PERSONAL ACHIEVEMENTS

/Max/

“When I thought I couldn't wait to see all his worst sides, I really meant it, but I didn't know what I was saying. Especially because I think one of the things he's referring to is this... 
I've been ready for at least fifteen minutes now, if not more, and I'm beating every level of this stupid game on my phone, the kind I play when I need to kill time and have nothing else to do. 
But he doesn't seem anywhere near finished with his preparations, seeing as he's still trying on clothes like a maniac. 
- Charles, we're just going to dinner, it's just the two of us, and we'll be wearing hats and fake glasses to avoid being recognized... 
Not that that's a deterrent. 
- I know we'll be wearing the hat, because without it I'd be even further behind than I am now... 
I raise my eyebrows and stare at him in amazement. More than now? 
- Charles, you changed three times and spent three hours looking at each of them. What exactly is your definition of 'being behind'? Could you be even further than now? No, because you don’t look ready now... 
Charles completely ignores me and just when he seems confident about the outfit and I'm holding my breath hopefully, he huffs, shakes his head and changes his shirt. 
At this, I roll my eyes, huff and throw myself down on the bed where we fucked earlier. 
- If this is one of your worst sides you were talking about, fuck off, you don't need to show me all of them! 
Charles doesn't even laugh. 
- Oh, you'll get used to it, baby… - and with this, I understand he doesn't intend to hurry up and that my complete boredom doesn't bother him in the slightest. 
You and your 'baby' are such an asshole! You 
cancel me out every time you call me that; I love when you do it, but I'll never tell you!
- I’m hungry! - I reply, resting my head on my hand and propping up my elbow. 
- Yeah, me too, but I have to find the right outfit, considering I don't want to be recognized, so I can't be too flashy, but I also don't want to be a walking shit! It takes balance!
- I’ll give you the balance! If you don't want to be too flashy, put a bag over your head! If they notice you, it's because you're too hot and a foreigner!  
Charles is about to retort, but then stops, realizing I'm right, tilts his head to the side and pouts. 
- Likewise, what I'm wearing must look good on me! 
- Even a garbage bag looks good on you! Let's go eat! 
I keep grumbling until he gets me to make the final choice, and I know full well that the answer is truly a trap, because if I say something wrong—that is, something that goes against his current idea—he'll end up changing again. So, praying to all the saints in heaven, I choose a shirt and, after pointing to it, I hold my breath in anxiety and terror while he looks at it a bit longer before nodding and bowing his head. 
- Yes, I actually preferred this one too, but I wasn't sure; you know, sometimes I'm not objective with myself! 
I actually don't hear his entire sentence because I'm already out of the room while he's speaking. 
If he does this every time we go out together, I'll strangle him!

The photos in the hidden folder on my phone scroll according to the movement of my thumb on the display, and it moves a bit like an automaton. 
Only after a while of performing this lazy and melancholic reminiscing activity, do I realize I'm quickly going through the photos where he's not present. To be safe, I put them all in the hidden album, but in reality I took more photos of him than of what we visited, which I was relatively uninterested in. 
Now that the vacation is over and I'm having this boring waiting period where I have nothing to do, instead of playing Sims as I usually do or something else that is my favorite pastime—video games in general—I felt like looking at the photos I took here with him. 
Leaving there was awful, a real piece of shit, but it was easier to stay in the same hotel for the same job. 
Now the F1 season is starting again, so whether you like it or not, I'll see him more easily and regularly. We could plan short vacations like this one again, assuming Kelly doesn't force me to be her boyfriend. 
I don't think about it in advance, I never do, but when I checked into my new hotel room for the usual four days of the race, and I was alone without him grumbling about something he thought wasn't right, or without him reeling off his detailed and precise schedule for the day, I felt deprived of an essential part that had been with me for these past three days. It's strange, it seems like it's always been this way, but if I think about it, it was only a short while, and yet I got used to it so quickly and so well that it seems like a lifetime. 
A short time together, the first between us, and yet as soon as it was over I missed him. 
Him, his explanations of everything we'd be doing, how much time we'd have for certain things, all the time wasted getting ready to try on dresses three hundred times at the last minute, his orders, his complaints and his constant photos of everything, especially us. 
That obsession with photos together. 
He sent them all to me and I filed it all away in the "us" album.
It's so sickly-sweet to call it that, yet when I had to write a title, I didn't know what else to put. It seemed like the only logical thing to do, and maybe it was, but I felt like an idiot. An idiot who now feels a sinking feeling when he reads that "us." 
I miss those three days, and maybe I miss him even though I can just text him and we'll see each other right away. I don't know what it is, maybe because it was our first time together, or maybe because we were just Charlie and Maxie, not the Leclerc and Verstappen of F1. We were two guys together, a perfectly normal gay couple. 
I liked that normality, maybe that's what I miss. Now I'm the special one for the whole world again, but I miss the way I feel when I'm with him. Normal and myself, yet at the same time special to him. 
The photos he took of me flash before my eyes and make me smile, I stop and look at myself trying to understand what he found so exciting in those shots that he jumped when he took them. I don't understand it, I don't see anything special about me; the photo itself may be beautiful, but I don't understand all that enthusiasm. 
The photos I took of him fill a large part of my gallery and make me smile tenderly. He's photogenic, he always looks good, but that's all thanks to him. 
I'll never tell him or he'll get a big head. 
Thinking about it, I'm reminded of his talk about narcissism. People who like themselves tend to take pictures or want to be photographed. Yes, I think that's true: I’m not, I don't like myself, but it's no mystery. I don't see anything special about me. 
I've had so many women because I was an F1 driver, otherwise I wouldn't have had anyone. Before I reaching fame, no one paid attention to me. Furthermore my father always insulted me; he never paid me a compliment for any reason, and in the end I cared more about what he said than my mother, who tried to counterbalance, but not living with her, was difficult to do so.
Charles is different; he lost for a guy who constantly argued with him and provoked him. I knew I was good at it and I teased him, realizing there could be fertile ground between us, although the numerous doors slammed in my face further buried my ego, convincing me that it's true that I'm nothing special anyway. 
I don't think this is a constructive conversation to have. I know I don't like myself and I don't want to be photographed for that reason. There's not much to say. It's just the way it is. 
I move on and when I get to the photos we took together, my stomach sinks while a wave of heat makes my eyes burn insanely. I sigh and stare at the photo of us in front of the aquarium for a long time; for a moment, it's like being there again, embraced together with the sound of the water from some open tanks, the filters cleaning them, and the distinctive scent they emanate. His hand clasped around my waist, his scent so perfect, not too sweet but not too harsh. A Charles-style perfume, as meticulous as every other detail. His waist, slender but not frail, beneath my hand, and us so happy to be somewhere together. 
It's bullshit, just a stupid photo together in a place I didn't even care much about, but now I miss it and I'd love to be there again, just as I miss the Fort, the Tree of Life and the camels. Or dromedaries, for goodness' sake. 
I smile as I think back and look up, rolling over in bed annoyed by this emotion that momentarily took over. 
His speech about evocative photos comes to mind. He's right. It's like being there again, and when 'there' was so beautiful not because of what you saw but because of how you felt in that moment, it's like going back and feeling the same things. 
It's almost like being there with him again.
So I sigh again, roll over onto my stomach on the bed and rest my elbows, returning to my phone and the photos; with a goofy smile I look for the other photos where we were together, and even though I'm there too it doesn't bother me anymore to see myself in a picture. Because those were moments when I was happy, and from my goofy face you can tell I was. Happy as ever. Like I hope to be again, and for a long time. 
This thing about the photos, actually—I have to give him credit for that—isn't bullshit at all. 
Just as I have my phone in my hand, it vibrates with a message; I open it immediately without reading who it is, convinced it must be Charles just because I was thinking about him. Maybe the boy is telepathic!
Instead I'm disappointed to read that it's my father, and as soon as I find out, my stomach tightens in a knot and the annoyance rises spontaneously. I don't know, I'd deluded myself that winning the World Cup would make things better, that I'd freed myself, but instead everything is still the same. He's still on me like a fly on shit. 
'I want you fired up! This is the year that matters most, not the one of the first World Cup, but the next one! If you suck this year after the way you won, you'll be finished!'
A sudden and unexpected burst of laughter comes over me, seeing how long the message is, even though he took the time to write it in its entirety. He knew that if he recorded it, 99% of the time I wouldn't hear it, and he wants me to know what he's saying. 
Strange that he hasn't called me. 
Thanks, Dad, for reminding me that one way or another I suck, and that mine will always be a fight not to prove I'm the strongest, but simply to show that I'm not a loser. 
The difference is subtle but significant. 
My mood is about to take a serious nosedive, but as soon as I realize it, I see that classic black hole opening up beneath me, I open the folder I was looking and click on the first photo that appears, the last one we took together. 
One of me and Charles, which he insisted we take before we left the hotel room, before we moved into this one. 
It made me laugh because when he wanted to take it, I was almost out and he yelled as if I'd forgotten something important, so I automatically reached into my pocket to see if I had my phone with me. Of course I did. I turned around and he was there in front of the window, twisting around with his phone with the internal camera activated, his arm outstretched in front of him trying to find the best light to photograph us. I waited rolling my eyes, sick of his obsession, but when he found the right position, he called me with a peremptory "hey!" I was expecting, but wanted to hear it because, in the end, I really like being so desired for his favorite activity. 
So as soon as he did, I didn't take offense at his rude way of imposing his will on me—for a change—but I joined him positioning myself under his open arm as he directed me where to stand. I did it laughing with amusement and the photo came out perfectly; I had a full smile, my eyes lit up.
- Did you want to miss the last selfie? - he asked, shocked. 
- For goodness' sake, how dare I? - I replied mockingly, and he laughed pushing me away. 
I relive the behind-the-scenes story of this last photo with ease and pleasure, and with a sigh I feel myself smiling in the same way. 
He's right, he's right about a shocking number of things, and since he's right about that, I wonder if he's actually right about the rest, too. 
He insists there's something behind my childhood that involves my father, which is why he wants to know everything, even though I don't know what he means by "everything." But maybe he's right. Maybe there are things I don't see because I'm too involved. I don't know. 
After all he's right about photos helping to evoke beautiful moments, moments you can remember on your own, but which with a photo you actually relive better, more actively.
And it's true that a narcissist loves taking photos, while a non-narcissist hates them. But maybe this isn't accurate. 
Non-narcissists are indifferent to photos, but it bothers me. But maybe it's not the photo itself that bothers me, but rather looking at myself. 
Since he likes to psychoanalyze me, I could ask him what he thinks, but I believe it has to do with my father's lack of praise. I'm used to being corrected or told I should have done better. Even when I'm perfect, I never really am. 
I'm the worst at self-analyzing, but I can read the clues Charles has been throwing at me for some time now; I'm not an idiot. 
So I go back to my previous point. If he's right about certain things, maybe he's right about others too. I should be talking to him instead of keeping everything inside, locked in a hotel room alone about to officially start a new F1 season.
He'd be happy to hear me.
Even though, as I leap out of bed with a burst of unusual vitality, I ask myself why I would want to. Why would I want to delve deeper and learn certain things about myself that I don't know? There's a reason I don't know them. 
But as I open the door with the keycard and slip my phone into my pocket, I answer myself in the same way for the umpteenth time. 
If Charles insists on this, maybe he's right. He's had it for a lot of things, maybe he has it for this too. I don't want to ask him anything, I just want to give him some rope when he throws me the bait. Instead of ignoring him and running away, I'll grab and pretend to take the bait. Let's see what he gets out of me. At this point, I'm even curious.”

/Charles/

“Usually, for the two of us, officially starting the new championship was like resuming our 'not yet relationship': it was exciting also because of the open discussion with Max that had never been brought to a conclusion. Now it's different. 
Now the championship is starting, but I perceive it as work and fun, since I'm doing something I like and enjoy, however there are no other implications because now I'm with Max, finally, and instead of teasing each other to see who gives in first, we'll work on finding a balance between being lovers and being rivals. 
It's a new situation that intrigues and excites me, but it's not like before. 
The feeling is different. 
Now I'm calm and at peace, completely relaxed. I feel completely different and I don't know if I really am or if it's just me, but I have no performance anxiety, neither for my car nor for Max. 
Now I'm calm. 
Reuniting with the guys fills me with joy and euphoria, they know that in the end, that famous night in Abu Dhabi, we got together, but I never told them the details, I've never been the kind of guy who goes into too much detail. 
Only when Carlos texted me to see if we were traveling together to Bahrain on the same partner jet with the Ferrari, did I have to tell him we'd be back together, but that I'll manage getting there on my own, because I'd be there first. 
I didn't want to go into too much detail, but Carlos understood and immediately texted me, 'Max?' It was a rhetorical question. I replied with a smiley face and he said: 'So, everything's fine.' I confirmed. 
'Great.' 
We're not two friends who confide in each other, but I get along well with him; he's a cheerful, fun and positive person, but also very competitive. This brings out a side of me that I'd been suppressing until now, but I realized it when we recorded something together for Ferrari. 
Seb was like that too, but perhaps more brotherly or paternal towards me, except for when he sulked at me during that period. So my true side didn't come out, but with Carlos and the recordings we do for Ferrari it definitely comes out, and while I let go of my worst, most competitive side, I have fun, and he loves to tease me. 
I'm not the only one who feels different; once we finished the today’s recording, where we had a lot of fun—with me trying to surpass him at all costs—Carlos asks me about it, and then I realize it's true. It wasn't just my impression. 
- I see you different from last year. 
I look at him while the car takes us back to the hotel, where we have the rest of the day free. 
- Different? 
Carlos shrugs simply, checking his messages. 
- More relaxed, more at ease. 
I stare at him in a daze, even though he doesn't take me into consideration anymore, struck by his words. So it's true, I really am. 
I smile with satisfaction as a strange warmth warms my chest. Satisfaction? 
Satisfaction with myself? 
- Yes, actually, I think I am. - I admit, more to myself than to him. 
- The power of love! - with that Carlos gives me a mocking look again, making me laugh, and I nudge him with my elbow. 
- Idiot! 
He laughs and continues teasing me as I answer back, fired up like a match, but fundamentally amused and relaxed. 
We don't take long to reach the hotel, the car stops and we get out; soon we're reunited with the others who were free today; almost everyone will record the content tomorrow morning; we did it today because we had more. 
Lando is there with his faithful George and Alex; it's almost impossible to find them separated. If Lando isn't with George and Alex, then he's with Max, and speaking of him, it's strange that he's not with them. Since he has free time, he usually enjoys spending it with them, unless he brings along family members, friends, or Kelly and little Penelope. I doubt they'll come to Bahrain for the first GP of the year. Usually they come to Europe or particularly important races. The first of the season is, but if they had come, he would have told me and he doesn't like having them travel alone. 
I check my phone to understand why he's not there. Do you think his father came by surprise? But we had Max's jet, and what would be the point of coming on Wednesday? Maybe you'll come on Saturday and Sunday, watch qualifying and the race... 
For a moment, as I join them, the idea that Jos might be there to ruin all the magic we've built up over the past few days depresses me, but the cheerfulness of Lando, George and Alex, who hadn't seen me yet and couldn't wait to officially congratulate me, distracts me.
I'm immediately assailed by their jokes, pats on the back, and even a few excessive and inappropriate hugs—Lando, of course. 
I was planning on texting Max to ask where he is, but then I forget to keep up with these debauched people, joined by Carlos who fuels their idiocy by explaining how surprisingly excited I was for today's recording. 
- You can see it all over his face that he's in love!  
At this outburst from Lando, who obviously had to exaggerate otherwise it wasn't him, I'm about to throw water in his face, but I hold back only because I see someone coming from the end of the corridor, from the elevator area. 
As soon as I realize it's Max, I light up and completely forget about bullying Lando, who shouldn't talk bullshit by saying I’m in love. Love is still too big a word, I don't want to be forced to say it before I'm sure. I've never loved and now it can't be that easy. It's not enough to be with the person you've wanted for ages. I don't think that's all there is to love; I expect to feel something unique and special, so I don't want to say I love Max just because everyone starts saying it for me. 
But my head goes blank, my mouth closes: Max completely captures my attention and any remaining sanity. 
I forget everything and my brain focuses exclusively on him and the tense, dark expression he has as he comes out of the hallway. As soon as he sees me among the others sitting at one of the tables in the hotel bar, he immediately lights up, and as he does, I relax. 
For a moment I was afraid his father really was there; It was a fleeting moment, I felt the same tension as him. 
Our eyes meet while the others laugh and joke among themselves, always with me as the subject. 
I give him a quick wink from a distance, or at least I try since I'm not capable of it seeing that my whole face scrunches up and I'm not veiled at all. 
Max returns the wink, his smile improving. In an instant he sits down with us, joining in the exaggerated din that this bunch of idiots are making. 
- Oh, here's the groom! - a predictable welcome. I roll my eyes hoping no one hears us, I look around with a moment of paranoia, but I don't notice if there's actually anyone nearby listening because Max's raspy, scratchy voice immediately replies clearly.
- You’re all invited to the wedding! 
And what could he do but put himself on their level? 
I blush staring at him wide-eyed as he even moves Lando, who's next to me, to sit at his place, and I don't even know what to blame him for or get angry about anymore. 
So brazen? 
Is this how we're going to deal with this F1 year in public? 
For a moment I wonder if I should take him and the other idiots in perspective, but as everyone takes on roles—best men, bridesmaids, ring bearers and so on—a familiar voice distracts me from this moment of personal despair. 
- Max, are you getting married?
My heart is in my throat, someone heard us, what am I going to do? But then I see Seb's smiling: I haven't updated him and I doubt Max has, but I think he's one of those who somehow knows things before anyone else. Maybe before us. 
- Yes, with his brain, because he finally found it! It was lost at birth, and after winning the world championship, he found it again! He’s marrying that one!
I don't know how I came up with this quick joke, but I'm damn proud of it, especially when I hear everyone laughing. It was spontaneous, just like I was before with Carlos.
In these months I felt at peace only with Max and I thought he was the only one capable of making me relax and be totally myself, but now that the magic continues and extends in general, I think it's something else. 
Getting together with Max triggered something that was holding me back. Now I'm fine, I'm fine in general even beyond him; obviously I'm better if he's here with me, but it's not a magic that's limited to him. 
We keep laughing and Seb stays standing with us to fuel the nonsense. He's assigned the role of celebrant because of course he is, he's like some kind of guru, but then when he turns and sees Lewis approaching, the one I assume he's been waiting for, he lights up and points at him with his chin. 
- Oh, but he's more perfect than me for celebrating something, he's the man of faith among us! 
Lewis's faith is well known, and everyone agrees. The funny thing is that even though we haven't specified whose wedding it is—because obviously we didn't mean Max and his brain—Seb seems to have understood. 
Discussions that drag on for a while as if they were sensible, but in reality they're completely meaningless. 
Lewis greets everyone with a kind smile, happier with George, then a little more hastily with Max. Understandable. I think they'll see each other again now after that famous race and the awards ceremony. 
Everyone holds their breath a bit and stares at them. Max smiles almost reverently. I know him well and I can distinguish every type of smile he gives, and the one he flashes now for Lewis is different. In the end, however, as always, the Englishman's diplomacy is commendable and he says nothing. It's as if that burning event, burning for him obviously, never actually happened, even though we know how hard it must have been. No one knows if he'll ever win his eighth world championship, the record-breaking world championship. Perhaps his last? 
So many things come together, and some of them we don't even know. 
Rumors are that Lewis disappeared from social media completely for a long time and that he's been considering retiring from racing, but we know nothing for sure. 
The moment between them is brief, however. He politely asks how we're doing and how our holidays were. The others ask him the same and he responds with a generic "good." Then Seb, who had been watching him attentively, seems to pick up on the invisible signal and invents something he needs Lewis to do somewhere, and Lewis is happy to follow him and "help." 
Not everyone knows about them; Max and I know, but those who don't know, suspect it. Theirs is clearly a very close relationship, like that secret everyone knows. 
No one comments; we watch them walk away, and for a moment I wonder if Max and I will be like this in a few years. 
Always united, always one, always perfect together. 
And now? What are he and I like? 
I glance at him absentmindedly without realizing it, and he returns my gaze. We smile at each other without much thought, a totally instinctive smile, and the others whistle, mocking us, someone gestures that they need a vial of insulin for a sugar overdose. I throw an ice cube at the funny guy, pulling it out of my glass, and it hits Lando on the forehead, leaving a well-deserved horn mark. He laughs, of course, and so do the others. 
I don't know what was wrong with Max; it was obvious he had something, starting from the fact that he wasn't here with them waiting for me. But the important thing is that as soon as he saw me, he went back to his usual self, the one I want him to be. The happy, cheerful and carefree one. I want him to be well and have no more shadows, and if seeing me puts him at ease, I'll try to be on his radar as much as possible.

As we get in the elevator together to change and meet up with the others for dinner, I ask him pretty sure. 
- You heard your father, right?
Max, taken aback, as if he hadn't expected me to have realized it so quickly, just by a fleeting glance upon his arrival, says a vague: - Huh? 
- You had a dark, tense look on your face when you arrived. 
- But it was just a moment, how did you manage to see me from that distance and such e brief moment?" 
He doesn't deny it, but he stalls. I know him by now. The elevator rises and quickly reaches our floor, the doors open and we get out still talking. 
I shrug, downplaying my special gift. 
- But you heard him, right? What did he say? - I insist on preventing him from deviating again. 
He slows down, looks at me, unsure of what to say, whether to talk about it now or not, and I realize he'd come looking for me to vent. 
Damn the time that it's not in our favor. I bite my lip in annoyance and he smiles shaking his head, shrugs at the same time. 
- Maybe later. Anyway nothing special, the usual bullshit.
I understand that he won't talk about it now, but it's just been postponed, that he finally wanted to do it on his own, it's just that we were distracted and "kidnapped." But it will happen, and when he wants, and everything will be perfect and propitious, I won't let him slip away.
I'll be there and I'll be ready.”

NOTE: I imagine Charles as I described him at the beginning. I think he's every boyfriend's drama (for him I was inspired by my sister)! 
I wanted to give both Max and Charles a moment of reflection to sort out the new situation and the various small changes that have occurred or are about to occur. 
I also love having them interact with their friends and F1 teammates; I often use them to show their evolution, since it's a fic about that too. 
Thanks to everyone who reads and comments on the fic. See you next time. Kisses, Akane