max verstappen x fem!driver!reader
summary yn can't keep hiding her true feelings towards max
wc 1,6 k (i was supposed to keep it short for this one but oh well)
warnings this one angsty as fuuuck, reader kinda sucks sorry
a/n first post of this series omg i'm so excited!!!!!! i haven't written in a while so this may not be the best of my works but this is still one of my favorites <33 also english is not my first language so...yeah
YN sighed as she pulled the balaclava off and immediately ran her hand through her sweaty hair, attempting to make it look decent. Once again she was finishing behind Max. The Dutch looked back at her as he got down from the top of his car and gave her a sweet smile, she tried her best to reciprocate that smile but it probably looked as fake as it felt.
She couldn't really pinpoint when her rotten mind had started to harbor these feelings towards the man she loved.
YN's first encounter with Max occurred when they were barely teenagers, amid the noisy circuits of karting competitions. There was something captivating in that lanky and slightly awkward teenager that drew YN to him like a magnet. As time went on, their bond deepened, among endless talks of shared dreams that seemed unreachable at the time.
The first time Max kissed YN, she felt in heaven, enveloped in a kind of excitement she had never known. It didn't take long before he asked her to be his girlfriend and she accepted thinking life couldn't get better than that.
The mutual decision to keep their relationship under wraps seemed obvious, a conscious choice made as they started their parallel journeys into Formula 1, that was not the kind of attention they were seeking.
She felt true happiness for Max's overwhelming success, she truly did, at least at the beginning.
But YN found herself caught in the shadow of his success, a place she hadn't anticipated occupying. Eventually every podium celebration and victory lap, served as a bitter reminder of the expectations she was failing to meet. She couldn't acknowledge these feelings so she masked this resentment beneath a facade of congratulatory smiles and kisses. The press was no help. They endlessly compared their careers and although YN had managed to get some satisfying results, she was nowhere near Max's level. They ate it up, it gave them good headlines to pit them against the other. They were the embodiment of a tantalizing narrative ā two very young drivers with great success in the lower categories, shared dreams and a seemingly unbreakable "friendship", both coming into F1 with good teams and high expectations but only one of them was reaching those expectations. It was a good story, sure. But the story was tearing YN apart.
Perhaps the tipping point arrived with a very specific headline, its words forever etched into her brain: "Max Verstappen: Vettel reincarnate." With each syllable, YN's throat constricted, her stomach twisting into knots. Max seemed to effortlessly get everything she ever yearned for, now he was getting put at the same level as her biggest idol and inspiration which proved to be too much to handle for her. And with each of his accomplishments the poisonous seed of envy took root within her heart.
It was so contradictory, when she finally admitted it to herself. She loved Max more than she loved herself and maybe that was the root of the problem, her own insecurities and bruised ego. But it was becoming impossible to fake a smile every time she saw him on that top step. She knew it wasn't true but she almost felt like Max was out to get her.
She hated Max. And she hated herself for that fact. How could one harbor so much love and hatred for someone at the same time?
She was loosing her mind, her fragile facade crumbling under the weight of her emotions. Of course the ever attentive eyes of the press and the fans noticed the way her once adoring glances towards Max were now replaced with icy stares. How she couldn't even make the effort to raise the corners of her mouth whenever Max complimented her skills or her racing. His tenders words of admiration which once felt like a warm summer breeze began to feel like bullets grazing her already wounded skin, they felt like mockery. It was only a matter of time until Max started noticing this too.
Something was clearly happening, and that's why he found himself knocking on her apartment's door late at night, the echoes of the particularly hard weekend YN had endured still reverberating through his mind. The bitter taste of failure and disappointment still lingered on her lips. YN had struggled with the car and couldn't even make it out of Q2, and Sunday's race offered little reprieve, finishing in a P11 that tasted of unfulfilled expectations. While, of course, Max had made a brilliant pole position and had won the race, once again making everyone worship the ground he walked on. He hadn't seen YN since the race finished. She flew back to Mónaco that same night without even letting him know and without even asking if he wanted to fly back with her, which was the case almost every weekend. Max wasn't stupid, he could tell something was up with her lately, the distance she was putting between them, he was loosing her. And he loved her too much to let her go without a fight.
The door creaked open, YN's figure against the dim lighting within. Her jealous eyes clouded with heavy feelings. She stepped aside wordlessly, allowing Max to enter, her silence was louder that any word could ever be.
He carefully walked in, the all too familiar environment of his girlfriend's apartment suddenly feeling cold and foreign. Max was tense before taking a seat on the armrest of her couch. His heart felt heavy, he already wanted to cry. He had trouble getting the words out, something that had never happened in the years he had known YN. What had they become?
He swallowed dry before finally finding his voice. "I think we need to have a talk." His gaze was pleading for her to meet his eyes, but she kept staring at her shoes.
She froze at his words and her fingers tightened around the edge of the table she was leaning against. She could tell this conversation was coming, yet she dreaded the flood of emotions threatening to consume her, scared of the things she could say.
"What is it, Max?" Her voice was strained, an inner battle developing inside her, trying to control her emotions.
"You know what it is about, schat." Her jaw tightened at the pet name, now it somehow sounded condescending, even though deep down she knew that wasn't true. "YN something's been bothering you lately. I know it. Please talk to me."
YN's heart clenched painfully at his words, her resolve crumbling under the weight of her own inner turmoil. How could she even begin to articulate the burning envy and resentment that coursed through her veins every time she looked at him? How could she admit out loud to hating the man she loved more than life itself?
When she finally looked up and met his stare she felt the monstrous feeling that had been gnawing at her conscience completely engulf her and she wasn't in control of her own words anymore. Her eyes burning with a contradictory mix of longing and loathing. "Are you seriously asking me that, Max?" Her voice trembled with suppressed emotion.
Max recoiled at the intensity of her stare and her tone, a sinking feeling at the pit of his stomach by the anticipatory feeling of his world crumbling down completely. "YN, I..."
"You know damn well what's going on." YN's voice cracked with emotion, her words laced with a bitterness that made it unrecognizable to both of them. "You have everything, Max. The wins, the championships, the adoration of the whole fucking world. Everything I ever wanted, you took it for yourself." She knew she wasn't making sense, the words were spilling out of her mouth before she had the time to catch them.
Max's heart constricted with an unfair amount of guilt. "YN, I... I had no idea you felt this way."
"And why would you?" She retorted, her voice rising with each word. "You're too busy basking in your own glory to notice how much it's killing me to be constantly compared to you." That wasn't his fault, and she knew it. It was the pure and evil hatred that consumed her that was speaking those words.
He felt like he had been punched in the gut. "I'm sorry." He shouldn't have to apologize for what he accomplished after years and years of hard work, yet he did, the fear of loosing her bigger than the need to acknowledge his self worth.
The hurt mirroring in his eyes was obvious, her tone softened before she spoke again. "You don't have to apologize, Max. You deserve it, you deserve it so much. I know that and you should too." She took a sharp breath in. "But knowing that doesn't change how I feel. I...I hate you."
He looked at her, stunned. His heart plummeted to his stomach. Her words hung in the air, heavy with the weight of their meaning.
"I do. I hate you Max. I hate you for being able to get everything I've only ever dared to dream of." She couldn't believe she was admitting it to Max's face, breaking the heart of the man she claimed to love.
Max felt as though the ground had been ripped out from under him, the sting of her words cutting deeper than any wound ever could. "I can't believe you're saying this," he mumbled, his voice chocked.
"I wish I didn't have to Max but I can't bear to keep lying to your face. I wish I could just pretend like everything's okay, like I'm still happy for you. But I can't, I'm sorry." YN's voice cracked with the weight of her confession, tears streaming down her cheeks as she looked at him with a strange mix of love and loathing. "I love you too much to keep lying to you."
The silence was sepulcral, years and years of shared moments full of love completely destroyed by the sick envy that had infected YN.
But the truth is, their love was doomed from the beginning.