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Hot Lap Chapter 8: Zandvoort

Word Count: 17k

Summary: Paige wishes it were just a front, just something she needed to do to save face. But she’s part driver; it’s a concrete section of who she is. Right next to the need for speed, the craving to be a winner at all costs.

Authors Note: This begins a new arc for our friends. I’m grateful to everyone who is reading this story; I hope you enjoy it. I also want to say a big thank you to the people who take so much time to brainstorm, proofread, chat, and give feedback to me as I work on Hot Lap. Especially @nellstark and @buffalo1221.

From “A Beginners Guide to F1 Slang”: ‘Dirty air’ is created by the odd vortices of air spinning off the back of a leading car and reducing the efficient airflow over the wings of the following one, giving it a performance disadvantage by reducing downforce. Clean air is when a car is out on its own, with a nice, undisturbed airflow passing over its wings, providing good downforce.

Hot Lap Chapter 8: Zandvoort

The first time Paige hears someone else talk about Azzi Fudd, she’s fourteen years old. She’s in her room, in the house, with the view that looks into the Oak Tree. The same Oak she’d nearly broken her wrist climbing down two months ago when she wanted to go to a party and Geno said hell no.

It ended up being fine. Paige was grounded for a week, but she’d gotten to kiss Tara, so really it was all good.

Tara isn’t her girlfriend or anything, but she’s sweet and fun to hang out with. And she’s a good kisser.

She’s laying on the bed, tossing a football up and down because it’s an easy repetitive motion while she texts back and forth with Tara. The girl is cute but literally terrible at geometry, and they have a test coming up.

“Alright, welcome to another episode of Dirty Air.”

Paige consumes as much content about Formula 1 as possible - because she loves everything about motorsport and because she’s walking the up ramp to the start of her career. She’s about to start on the national carting circuit, now that she’s finally aging into F4. It means bigger opportunities, better tracks, more exposure. It’s a platform for Paige to finally get onto the scene.

“We’re Syd and TP.”

It’s not impossible that she could end up in F1 one day. It’s her goal, her dream, and now she’s taking more and more steps that will actually put her on the path to make that a possibility. Far fetched, sure. But possible.

She loves the chatter about it. Formula 1 is getting more and more popular in the US, and there’s a boom of content. Podcasts and blogs and so much more. None of the kids at school are that into it — neither is Tara — but it’s still what Paige eats, sleeps, and breathes. Even more so than she always did before.

The Dirty Air podcast is one of the best. She thinks the hosts are hilarious and they actually know their shit about racing. But they also like to gossip. So it’s the best of both worlds, really. She always listens when it drops on Tuesdays.

“Listen bro, I was at Mercedes the other day —”

“—Humble brag—” TP interrupts Syd.

“One hundred percent,” Syd laughs. “I will brag all day every day. I was also at McLaren last week, do you remember? No but for real, I was at Mercedes to do our interview for today with Mercedes Chief Strategy Engineer Maya Moore, which we had a great fucking conversation let me tell you.”

Paige blinks. She always pays special attention to anything about Mercedes.

“I can’t wait,” TP laughs. “I just can’t wait. She’s such a legend.”

“Total legend,” Syd agrees. “We talked about her experience at Alpine and winning the world championships there with Elena Delle Donne, what the transition has been like now that she’s at Mercedes. I think what makes her so good and I’ve thought this for a while now, but talking with her really confirmed it; she really thinks like a driver. And we talk about that so stay tuned for the second half of today’s show.”

Sweet, Paige loves those kinds of interviews.

“Who else did you meet at Mercedes? Sue Bird hanging around?”

Syd laughs. “Bro, I fucking wish! Nah, didn’t see Team Principal Sue. Everyone’s favorite, right? Nah, we just walked around the engineering floors and I got to see a bit of the public parts of the factory.”

“That’s dope,” TP drawls, and Paige can’t help but smile. TP is hilarious. “Who else did you meet? Anyone cool?”

“Neither of the drivers, though I got to meet some of the F2 prospects.”

“They’ve always got a great young talent coming up at Mercedes, gotta respect that attention to the pipeline.”

“Thousand percent,” Syd agrees. “You know, oh my god, I do have to say, I met this really smart girl. Her name is Azzi. She’s the Fellow for this year.”

Paige is instantly on alert. She blinks at the ceiling.

“Alright,” TP hypes. “Do you think it’s like, the most competitive internship in the world?”

“They’d have thrown my application right out, that’s all I’ll say,” Syd says, laughing. “But like for real, all those folks are geniuses.”

Her heart is beating just a little faster. What a surprising thing to happen on a Tuesday. Paige holds the football still, all her attention on what her headphones are delivering.

“Did she give you any inside scoop? She writes their blog, right? I would say that I agree with so many of her assessments. Like I don’t know what the editing process is over there or how much she writes herself, but like. Spot on, girl.”

“No, she writes all of it,” Syd says.

“Really?”

“Yeah, it’s something we were talking about with Maya, and she’s like wicked smart, bro. Like crazy smart. I was like give me a hot take they won’t let you put on the internet.”

“What’d she say?”

Paige appreciates TP; she is also extremely interested in learning this.

“We were just going over the strategy from the last race and talking about how hard those racing lines were with the wind. Yo, let me tell you. This girl says she doesn’t think there’s ever a reason to abandon the racing line. She says if you’re good enough, you can always find it and keep it.”

“I mean, that’s bold for an engineer.”

“So bold, right? But she backs it up, man. Let me tell you.”

“Did Maya give you any dirt on the Ferrari mishap?”

“No, girl, I was like, trying to pick up crumbs.”

That’s all they say before they move on to all the other subjects. Paige pauses the podcast and runs slider back a minute. She closes her eyes and listens to the full intro to that part of the conversation again.

Damn. Azzi Fudd. Again and again she comes up.

She’s so sharp. Her tweets are so smart. Paige doesn’t have any idea who she is, really, or what she looks like or anything about her personally. She exists in this space where Paige feels like she kinda knows her but actually, doesn’t at all. It’s strange.

It feels different than the way people are with celebrities, like athletes or personalities. Paige doesn’t know how, couldn’t list the differential. It just feels different.

The podcast continues to play. Paige keeps half an ear on it as she reads a text from Tara, as she responds, as she eventually succumbs to the need to do her algebra homework. But she goes back, later, before bed. Listens to it again.

There’s never a reason to abandon the racing line. If you’re good enough, you can always find it and keep it.

It’s not that Paige writes it in her notes app, or includes it as one of her mantras. But it slips inside; in her brain, in her foot, in the way she grips the gearshift. It’s there.

August 29 - 31: Zandvoort: Netherlands: Dutch Grand Prix

Amsterdam has always been one of Paige’s favorite cities. She likes the canals and the prevalence of stroop waffles, the dismal weather and the food scene.

“You know, it’s wild — I’ve never had Indonesian food,” DiJonai remarks as they walk by another restaurant.

“Colonization,” Paige supplies, adjusting the lay of her pink jacket; she doesn’t even need Azzi to be physically present to ensure her opinions are represented. “The Dutch East India Company ruined a lot of the world.”

“Figures,” DiJonai mutters.

“Indonesian food’s delicious,” Paige adds.

They continue walking the cobblestone streets alongside the canal. Paige’s stomach rumbles with hunger at the sharp smell of fresh frites being fried.

“That’s where Phee and KMac are staying,” she says, nodding toward the fancy mansion across the canal. “The Waldorf Astoria.”

“Yeah, I definitely see why you chose to sleep in a trailer instead of a five star luxurious mansion,” DiJonai deadpans.

“I mean, Phee and KMac are both World Champions. Plus, it’s a nice trailer,” Paige argues, but she knows it falls on deaf ears. Nobody understands her preference for the motorhome. Paige is chronically misunderstood.

And even after the break —- maybe even because of it — after the villas and experiencing the luxury of what her name can buy and get gifted, Paige hasn’t changed her mind. If anything, she’s doubling down. She may have affluence now, but she’ll do everything she can to cling to normalcy. A life without an abundance of money is all she ever knew.

“Left up here,” she murmurs, glancing at her phone.

They’re on their way to an investor dinner, this time with some billionaire Italian tech titan Diana wooed last year. Paige doesn’t understand why Diana — a billionaire — needs to recruit other billionaires to fund Team Lamborghini when she could write the check herself and not have to deal with other people’s nonsense. But that must be why Diana is a billionaire and Paige is not.

Capitalist systems are about keeping money centralized, she can hear Azzi saying. That’s the myth of the free market.

Sue Bird sent Azzi to an investor dinner exactly one time and never repeated the mistake.

At least Paige has DiJonai with her. That’s another great part about being an F1 driver; she doesn’t have to take her medicine and suffer alone if she doesn’t want to.

“What a drive in Budapest, Paige. Masterful.”

Fernando Barzetti is broad shouldered and tall; he wears a custom suit and hand stitched leather shoes. He gives Paige the absolute ick. All the Lamborghini merchandise — the cars, the shirts, Paige — bear his company’s stupid yellow logo.

“Thanks,” Paige says, enough of her mouth moving to imply a smile. She doesn’t want to revisit Budapest with these people; soul sucking money grabbers. But this is what she’s been brought in for; to let them sidle up and get close to the raw power.

“You must have been so disappointed,” Barzetti’s wife, Catriona, says. She’s at least fifteen years his junior, if Paige were to hazard a guess and be generous. “But what amazing teamwork! I always thought of it as such an individual sport until I met Fernando. He’s absolutely mad about racing,” she adds with a laugh.

“What Italian man isn’t,” Fernando booms, and laughter breaks out from their group almost on cue.

“Best sport in the world,” Paige says, because Catriona is still looking her way. “But I guess I’m biased.”

There’s a look in Catriona’s eyes that makes Paige simultaneously feel good about herself and a tad bit nervous.

Eventually, the pre-dinner drinks transition into actual dinner. Paige and DiJonai have been split up since Paige is the main attraction and DiJonai is basically the lion tamer. Disgust bubbles in Paige’s belly but one shake of DiJonai’s head keeps her from making a scene. She wonders if it were the same for DiJonai when she was with Delle Donne. If it made Elena as out of sorts as it makes Paige, to be separated.

Diana’s there too, of course. She’s seated directly across the table from Paige, outfitted in her usual black blazer. Her eyes don’t linger, but Paige can feel the weight of her attention, knows she’s on display. Or onstage.

“Wine, miss?”

She shakes her head at the waiter. “Sparking water, thanks.”

Next to Diana, the Italian billionaire orders another scotch. His wife orders a white wine, her eyes flicking to Paige every few seconds. But Paige ignores the looks and keeps an ear on the conversation that the man is carrying on with Diana, even as she does her duty and engages in chit chat with some of the other rich assholes seated at the table.

“...bad business, really. The euro’s losing weight every day to the yen. Fucking unacceptable.”

All of it is an eye roll.

Paige hasn’t had a moment alone with Diana since arriving in the Netherlands and it's making her anxious. She wants a read on the dynamic, needs an opportunity to try and see what card Diana’s going to play next.

Because Paige understands enough about life in Formula 1 — the money, the power, the game — to know she can’t outsmart or outmaneuver her Team Principal. Best she can do is to try and win a hand now and then to show that she can hold her own.

How successful she’ll be at that is anyone’s guess.

Diana’s telling a story about her summer break; she and Penny did not go to the moon as Paige jokingly hypothesized back in Budapest.

They took the kids to Antarctica.

“What about you, Paige? How was Sardinia?”

“Healing,” Paige says with a grin, playing Diana’s game. She may be a rookie but she’s still a pro. She’s still got nerves of steel. “It was good to relax.”

“You needed it,” Diana chirps, faux-kindly.

It’s a show. It’s all a show.

“Our Paige here was racing with a broken rib in Budapest,” Diana says to the folks who can hear them. Their immediate table mates all make sounds of shock and concern, a layered chord of spurious sympathy. Barzetti the billionaire nods his head in commendation.

“Tough girl,” he approves. “Do what it takes to win, right?”

Sadistic fuck.

His wife leans forward, the already low cut of her dress forced to push the laws of physics in restraining her implanted breasts.

“That must have been so painful,” she all but coos.

She’s blonde, like Paige, but the hue is so bright it verges on neon. A beacon, a distraction; the diamonds at her neck sit heavy. Everything about her seems fake. Paige is willing to bet her cunt is like plastic. Smooth and dry. She has an inexplicable urge to squeeze this woman’s lip, to see if filler pops out like edamame from its shell.

“It wasn’t too bad,” Paige says, instead of giving into her urges. “I wanted to race.”

“Too damn bad about your record at the Hungaroring,” this motherfucking billionaire grouses. Half his scotch is already gone. “Set me back a bit because of it,” he announces with a laugh, like Paige’s sole purpose in life is to pad this man’s pockets.

“But a win for the team,” Diana deflects with a smile. Her eyes are focused on Paige; her thumb and middle finger spin her wine glass slowly. She’s got expensive taste, Diana.

“Spirito Toro,” Paige holds her glass a few inches above the table in mock salute. The bubbles in her water crackle and pop at the movement.

“Hear, hear,” the billionaire echoes, his voice booming. “Spirito Toro. A win’s a win.”

Diana taps her glass to his but she salutes Paige before she takes a sip, her eyes gleaming in the low light of the restaurant’s attempt at setting the mood.

Dinner takes fucking forever. Paige ignores her nutritionist’s advice and orders the fillet, rare and expensive; she’s desperate for the taste of blood. She talks about the history of Amsterdam with the couple sitting next to her and the safari that the man on Diana’s other side recently went on. She wants to vomit when the talk turns to the upcoming French elections, and excuses herself to the bathroom before the dessert course is served.

But she stops at the restaurant bar on her way back, well out of sight from the private dining room.

“Two shots of tequila,” she requests. “Whatever your best blanco is.”

She’s breaking her own rules for race weekend, but she needs fortification or she’ll never make it through this godforsaken dinner.

“Make that four,” Diana says, materializing and stepping into the pocket of space next to Paige. She doesn’t look over as she drums her long fingers on the marble bar top.

Paige steels herself; she mentally pours cement into her spine and slows her breathing. She clears her mind, pushes away any thoughts of Azzi or what happened in Budapest. She needs all the focus she can have around this woman.

“You need to get better at this,” Diana says, her voice low but conversational. It’s not a reprimand. If anything, it sounds like an amused observation. Like she’s giving feedback to a child.

“If you wanted people charmed, you should have asked for Soni,” Paige replies, mild and unbothered. She doesn’t have her sights set on management. Fuck this noise.

“You think you’re cute?” There’s delighted gratification in Diana’s tone; she loves this. Paige can tell.

But being a driver means you have to be good at the game. And Paige is the best. On and off track.

“You tell me,” she drawls in response. “You’d know better.”

Diana does laugh at that. “He’s disgusting,” she agrees, like she’s responding to a comment. “But he’s a necessary evil.”

“You hurting for money?” Paige glances over lazily.

“I’m looking at the future,” Diana corrects, and Paige thinks there’s a strain of honesty woven deep into that statement. “It can’t be all about the now.”

The bartender pours their shots from a beautiful bottle of Clase Azul, the warm lights of the bar reflecting on the white ceramic. He provides each of them with their own bowl of lime wedges. The shot glasses are ice cold in her fingers.

“To Zandvoort,” Diana offers.

The ting as their glasses clink is satisfying, and the tequila’s so smooth it barely burns. She casts about for some kind of small talk.

“You see any penguins, in Antarctica?”

“Yeah,” Diana says, nonchalantly. “We slept on a glacier one night. Little guys got curious in the morning. The kids loved it.”

What is this woman’s life?

“So. How was Pompeii?”

Pompeii, Diana’s asking. Not Sardinia.

“Old,” Paige bites out. Fuck, she’s out of her depth. Every time she thinks she can play this game and at least be a good matchup, Diana puts her on her ass.

“Never one for ancient ruins myself,” Diana muses, her tone slightly mocking. “I’d rather look ahead than dwell in the past.”

Paige can only watch with the sinking feeling of being overtaken on track, as Diana tosses back the second shot and pulls out her wallet to lay three hundred-dollar bills on the bar.

“Don’t fuck the wife,” she adds, stealing Paige’s second shot glass and smoothly downing it as well. She leaves Paige at the bar without another word.

“Jesus Christ,” Paige mutters, signaling to the bartender. “Yeah I need two more, please.”

She’s in over her fucking head.

—--

After three weeks apart and an ocean of angst brimming between them, Paige’s first time seeing Azzi at Zandvoort is massively anticlimactic, given that they’re seated across the table from each other in a strategy session in a room full of engineers.

It’s Paige’s own fault, since she was late getting to the paddock gym and DiJonai was unimpressed. Nai made Paige spend an extra ten minutes running at peak speed, so Paige had to rush through a shower and doesn’t slide into her chair in the strategy session until two minutes past the hour.

It means she doesn’t have the time to properly spiral about it in advance, to plan and pre-plan and overplan. She doesn’t have the opportunity to get herself set. To make sure she can back up the promise she made in her voice note.

“Okay, let’s talk through the tyre report,” Azzi says, acknowledging Paige with a distracted nod. It’s probably the best that Paige could have hoped for. It’s a relief, at least, that she’s not pissed about the lateness; hopefully the way Paige is sweating and red faced because she ran from the motorhome indicates her commitment. “Pirelli went very soft for the tyre line this weekend. The C2, C3, and C4. Jana?”

Jana, Queen of the Nile and of bullshit, opens her binder with a decided thwack. “Yup, yup, people. Pirelli fucking sucks, these tyres are total shit-”

“Jana,” Azzi sighs, rubbing at her temple, “focus.”

“Right. Sorry, boss. So the C4’s are gonna degrade fast, like super fast, like faster than KK when she sees a spider-”

“Fuck you, Jana-”

“You screamed like a little boy, this morning-”

“The tyres,” Azzi interjects, bringing them both back to the point.

Paige loves the Lamborghini girls — the engineers that Diana has brought on and empowered in the garage and on the strategy teams. They’re young and bright and wickedly smart but they’re also fun in the way that the brains at Mercedes weren’t.

“Indeed,” Jana says, nodding sagely. “So. Pirelli is saying twenty laps, but like, no way-”

“I think they could go twenty,” KK argues.

“Bro, are you blind?” Jana scoffs. “Look at these temp degradation graphs-”

“Yeah but these are CYA numbers-”

“What are CYA numbers?” Paige interrupts. There are a thousand acronyms in aerodynamic engineering; she can’t place that one in relation to tyre degradation times.

“Cover your ass,” Azzi supplies dryly. Her tone implies this is not the first time she’s had to explain it to someone.

“Love it,” Paige grins. “Absolutely,” she agrees. “Fuck Pirelli.”

“That’s what I’m saying,” KK and Jana chorus in unison, and then immediately high five each other.

“Jinx,” KK shouts.

Paige adores the two of them. This is definitely what Azzi’s personal hell looks like.

As Jana and KK’s “conversation” devolves into something else, and Kelis and Gandy jump in, Paige takes the opportunity to look across the table.

And Azzi — who looks inexplicably tired even though the entire sport of motor racing has been on a literal three week break — stares back at Paige helplessly. A touch of humor hangs about the corners of her mouth, and she rolls her eyes and shakes her head. Paige bites back a smile, helpless to fight her enjoyment at seeing Azzi navigate the personal dynamics of her team. Leadership didn’t come easily to Azzi, but Paige thinks she’s found her way.

One meeting turns into two, turns into three, turns into the FIA mandatory press conference.

Which.

Paige hasn’t had a chance to get her head ‘round how to act with Azzi so she certainly has no fucking idea what to do if she runs into Sabrina. But some god out there blesses Paige, because Sabrina’s not in her press group. Instead, Kah and Cam are seated on the couch when Paige arrives.

“Hey!” Cameron’s smile is enormous as she greets Paige.

Paige leans in to dap them both up, already mentally calculating what the vibe will be. Cam has a sunny disposition most of the time, and Kah will say everything as efficiently and dispassionately as possible. It’s as good a mix as Paige could hope for; it’s easy to take the middle ground.

“How was Sardinia? I saw Kate and Soni earlier, they said it was awesome. Did you have fun?”

God bless Cam, who never has a bad word to say about anyone and can make any situation better. Paige can’t handle that kind of sunshine all of the time, but she’s genuinely fond of the bubbly statuesque blonde who has a hilariously aggressive case of roadrage. Kah, of course, ignores both of them as Paige recaps the trip with enthusiasm and asks about Cam’s break.

“I went home for a bit — home stretch of wedding prep and all that.” Cam’s engaged to some finance guy who still lives in California; Paige has met him a few times and he’s nice enough, but they run out of conversation topics in about three minutes flat.

“Still planning to say ‘I do’?” Paige jokes. Cam has the insane idea that she can gather everyone for her nuptials in December, like any of them will want to be around each other once the season ends in Abu Dhabi.

“Angela Davis says marriage is about domination. It reinforces the economic and social subordination of women,” Kah offers, as if that’s in any way helpful, looping into their conversation in the most depressing way.

“You been talking to Azzi again,” Paige sighs.

“She sent some new recs,” is all Kah offers on that subject. She and Azzi often had their heads together, though they refused to call their trading of suggestions and titles and subsequent conversations a book club.

“I mean, yes, obviously, historically marriage has been an institution that has trapped women — especially Black women,” Cam sputters, “but Ben and I have a foundation very based in equality. And equity.”

“She’s baiting you,” Paige sighs, waving off Kah’s comments, because sure enough, Kah is grinning at Cam like a cat that caught a canary.

“Girl should know what she’s getting into,” Kah objects, her hands up, transforming into the picture of innocence.

“Like you have any idea what she’s getting into,” Paige rolls her eyes.

“I don’t know that “getting into” it is the right mindset,” Cam tries to interject. But she’s too sweet when she’s not in a car, so it doesn’t do much to re-center the conversation.

“I know more than you,” Kah laughs at Paige. “Miss twenty-year old phenom.”

“I’m twenty-four—”

“Still a fuckin’ youngin,” Kah says, her face unimpressed. “You’re too young to get married,” Kah tells Cam, who looks genuinely distressed at the way the conversation has diverted. “You should fuck more people. Live a little. Break some hearts.”

“This is not helpful advice,” Cam says.

“Be more like Paige,” Kah adds, threading whatever needle she thinks is going to sew the discussion together.

It’s Kah, so they aren’t arguing, it’s just her spitting what she believes are facts and trying to stir the pot. She’s got her own goddamn ledger for how the world works and a different kind of math to add it all up.

“I hesitate to ask.” Cameron’s confusion is apparent, but Paige’s bullshit meter is starting to ding.

“Ignore her—”

“She spent her break with Nastya,” Kah says, and Paige wonders what the actual punishment would be for leaping across the couch and punching her. She makes money now, she can afford a steep fine.

“I did not spend my break with Nastya—”

“You saw Nastya over break?”

“No - well, yes, but—”

“Girl I know we’re on the same internet,” Kah admonishes Cam. “You need to reprogram your algorithm.”

One of the F1 media coordinators appears then, with microphones for each of them; Paige breathes a sigh of relief. She’s never been so glad to take questions from the press before. She shoots Kah one last dirty look before turning to fully face the press corps and pasting her public smile on.

“Paige, how are you feeling about the Budapest results now that you’ve had some distance?”

So the press questions are equally asinine.

Paige reminds herself that she’d still choose the media over Kah’s mind reader bullshit. She tries to form her face into a genial smile. “Same as I felt when you asked three weeks ago, Tom. It was the most successful outcome for our team. That’s all that’s important.”

And really, it’s the truth.

Paige wanted that win — of course she did. She’s an F1 driver and the Hungaroring has delivered her victories before. But she’s proud of their strategy execution, of their teamwork, of her own actions. There’s no use in soaking in the discontent.

The bomb from Diana is different. It’s wounded her; an open, festering sore that Paige feels with each breath she takes. But even with the pain, with the infection that’s setting in, Paige is glad she knows. It feels even more self sacrificing, really, to be so resentful and still determined to keep her new promise. And Paige is nothing if not a martyr inside her own head.

“You’re sitting in second place in the Driver’s Championship, just six points behind Caitlin. Given the difference, and what a win would have done for you in the standings, did Diana say anything to you about the outcome?”

The world is obsessed with team dynamics, with the inner workings of the F1 network. There aren’t enough drivers to provide endless speculation so personalities become even more important. The F1 media are always hungry for division and alliances.

And everyone knows Diana Taurasi is a personality.

But so is Paige.

“She told me good job on not fucking up,” Paige shares with a sly grin.

Everyone laughs. Even Kah, who grins and nods at Paige, proud.

“Keep on pressing, rookie.”

—--

Paige and Nika get some time to put their heads together that afternoon; they huddle in a quiet corner of the garage out of direct sight from CD, who’s been looking for Paige. They aren’t exactly whispering but they’re not trying to invite others into their conversation, even though Paige can see Jana lurking around — likely trying to get through her task lists before Azzi wanders through.

She’s sitting cross legged on top of a tool cabinet; Azurá, the head of engineering in the garage, is always yelling at her about it but Paige has been sitting on tool cabinets for most of her life, she’s not going to change her ways now.

“I think the modeling is wrong.”

She squints at the readouts in her hands, tipping her head as if that will make the projection arcs make more sense. Everyone’s always surprised at how good she is with modeling, with the math of it all, but Kathy taught high school physics and Geno made sure Paige started learning the day she moved into the house. Kathy sat with her at the kitchen table every night, patiently grounding Paige in kinematics, Newton’s Laws, friction — even while Paige was learning basic geometry in the local elementary school.

“It’s not,” Nika replies without even looking over. She’s messing around with the calculations on lap times and the write up from the weather team back at the factory.

Paige turns the pages to see the arcs from a different angle. “It’s too fucking gloomy about traction.”

“Don’t be a baby.” Nika doesn’t even look over.

“It completely ignores my instinct to go fast and assumes I’ll wait too long to get back on the throttle. Tell them to rerun it with a more aggressive pickup.”

“No.”

“Twin,” Paige whines.

“Go play in the simulator if you don’t believe it,” Nika suggests. “So you can see for yourself.”

Paige will not. She studies the briefing binder in her hands, glancing down to see the charts that are attached for each figure. Velocity, air quality, engine data.

“Oh for god's sake,” Nika laughs. “It’s literally showing you that earlier throttle is going to cost you more on the next corner than you’ll be able to gain at the turn and then you’ll be fucked down the straight.”

Easy for Nika to say. She’s not the one that’s got the most powerful engine built for a human to drive humming between her thighs.

Paige loves it, obviously.

“I still think the modeling is wrong.” It’s not and Paige knows it but she feels like being a baby and she’s not going to ask Nika for coddling.

Nika sighs and hoists herself onto the cabinet next to Paige. “You’re right about it being conservative and how it’ll feel okay, but that’s in clean air. Those rear temps are gonna spike,” she reminds Paige. “It’s going to be too late for you to adjust on the correction. The factory folks have been saying all week that the dirty air is going to hurt more than anyone thinks it will.”

She pauses, eyes scanning over the charts. “You could move off the racing line if you get into trouble,” she suggests slyly. “Just a quarter car width.”

Outrageous.

Paige snorts. “You gonna present that idea to Azzi, then?”

“No way, that’s fun for you to do on your own,” Nika laughs.

“Azzi’ll kill you,” Jana supplies unhelpfully from where she’s digging through a packing crate, clearly chewing bubble gum and eavesdropping. Paige glowers at her as Nika chuckles lowly.

“She won’t,” Nika teases.

Jana snorts. “Duh, because Paige is too scared to try it.”

The audacity. Those are fighting words. Paige glares at her, mouth open in outrage.

“I am not scared of Azzi.”

KK enters the garage, likely coming from one of the engineering rooms judging by the stack of blue binders in her arms.

“Yo KK,” Jana bellows. “Paige says she’s not scared of Azzi.”

KK bursts into laughter, like Jana’s told a particularly hilarious joke and not merely lied through her teeth. She’s really abusing her excellent combination of beauty and brains.

“Aww, delusion be with you now and forever, my friend,” KK says with a bow of her head, winking at Paige.

“Y’all are the fucking worst,” Paige complains. “I’m not scared of Azzi.”

“Sure you aren’t,” Nika murmurs.

“Oh like you aren’t scared of her?”

Nika shrugs, unbothered by the implication. “Azzi’s my boss. I’m allowed.”

“Yeah. Yeah!” Jana agrees. She’s gone through the crate and her brow is furrowed as she consults the checklist on the clipboard in her hand. There are a hundred lines with checkboxes and she’s only halfway through the list. “It’s normal to be scared of your boss,” she adds.

“But Azzi’s not scary,” Paige admonishes them. And it’s true. Azzi isn’t scary. She’s brilliant and efficient and lovely.

“You hurt your head in addition to your ribs in Mexico City, girly pop?” KK wanders over and deposits the binders into Paige’s lap. Doesn’t even ask if she can put them all there.

“Bro,” Jana adds, surveying Paige like she’s particularly dim. “Azzi’s terrifying.”

“She’s not!”

Jana and KK exchange looks with Nika who only smiles.

“Then why are you scared of her?” KK asks, arching an eyebrow.

“Bro, like I said, I’m not,” Paige defends herself.

She watches as Jana curls her lip and raises her eyebrows at Nika. “Was it always like this? How did you deal?”

“Worse, probably,” Nika supplies. “But Azzi wasn’t calling her races back then, so, you know,” she waves her hand, “different dynamics.”

It’s super cool that they’re just talking about her shambles of a love life. Just right in the open, no respect for her at all. Paige takes a deep breath and remembers that she has no reason to get agitated or out of shape.

The sigh Jana lets out implies she’s been suffering for years instead of a measly eight months. If she really wants to know how hard it could be for her, she should talk to Kiah Stokes at Mercedes. Paige smiles just reminiscing about it.

Jana reaches for her water bottle and chugs a few gulps; Paige would be truly shocked if it contained actual water instead of an energy drink.

“Ok, since you’re stupid,” Jana allows, “I’ll explain. We are scared of Azzi because she’s the smartest person on any team at Formula 1. She’s so sharp and she thinks ten steps ahead and you can’t bullshit her and she’s brilliant. AND she’s an incredible leader. And beautiful.”

Jana holds her hand over her heart and looks away dreamily. “The way she invests her time and energy. I want to be her when I grow up. And it makes disappointing her all the worse.”

“Okay, but that doesn’t—”

“You,” Jana overrides her, coming back to the moment and pointing her long finger in Paige’s face, “are scared of Azzi because you’re in love with her.”

The garage goes silent around Paige; her brain puts everything on mute. The number of people who can just say it out loud seems to be increasing at an alarming rate.

And the folks who can say it are getting farther and farther in proximity from people Paige either trusts or has some stronger connection to, for better or worse. It feels different coming from Jana. From someone that Paige likes and respects, but who falls neatly into the category of coworker or colleague.

The reality of that hits her squarely in the chest, even if she doesn’t understand why it feels so impactful. Everyone knows. Paige is aware of that. She is.

That’s why Sophie said what she did.

Why Diana can twist Paige up.

But people don’t talk about Paige’s reaction time being prodigious for nothing.

“Nah, bro,” Paige laughs, infusing just enough bravado into her voice that it’ll hopefully detract from the way she feels cracked open for everyone to see. “I’m not scared of Azzi.”

It works, but the snort that KK lets out is insulting. She doesn’t even try to stifle it. Paige sees Jana unsuccessfully try to bite back a grin.

Beside her, Nika bites her lip.

Outrage.

“What?” Paige looks over at her in betrayal. She doesn’t know why she expected differently. Loyalty means nothing these days. Friends can stab you in the back without a second thought. Eh tu, Nika?

“Oh come on, Twin,” Nika appeals, like rationality is something that could come to Paige.

“I can’t believe this,” she protests. “I’m not scared of her.”

“Okay,” Jana says, easy as anything. She and KK exchange another look.

Paige has a bad feeling about it. Her spidey senses are tingling.

“Prove it then,” KK says. “I’ll bet you five hundred euros that you can’t defy Azzi.”

Fuck. Paige really should have seen that one coming.

—--

She’s sitting in the simulation room just before dinner, running a full session with the team at the factory in her ear.

“Push harder on throttle this lap at Turn 5.”

The words are quiet through the comms, even though Paige doesn’t have any of the audio enabled for car noise or crowd.

“Okay,” she hears halfway through the lap, “lift at Turn 12.”

Simulation sessions like this are helpful. Paige doesn’t mind doing it in the sim, even if it’s annoying. It gives the engineers the data they want to play with, and she’d much rather follow their never ending directions and deal with their constant nitpicking it in the simulator than have to do it in the actual car.

Twenty minutes later, the team head at the factory in Sant'Agata calls an end to the session. He thanks Paige for being such a good sport, and she does one more lap in peace and quiet, just to get a run on qualifying simulation.

Soni’s waiting for her turn on the sim when Paige gets out; she’s holding an iced coffee that’s almost gone, the cubes clink together as she takes one last suck of the straw.

“Yo,” Soni greets. They were stuck in the same meetings for most of the day.

“I think dealing with bullshit is an acquired skill,” Paige says.

“For sure,” Soni agrees. “One that atrophied during break.” She pauses, tips her head a little bit. “Heard you found yourself in a pickle.”

Paige rolls her eyes. “Glad to know it’s made its way around.”

“It didn’t,” Soni assures her, as if that’s the problem. “I think it came through our private grapevine.”

Nika to Georgia to Soni, then.

“Have fun,” Paige says, nodding towards the simulator. She leaves Soni there and wanders through the administrative hallways. She’s got half a destination in mind, and it materializes when she pops her head into the main engineering room.

Azzi’s pouring over the schematics for the fuel pump with the girls from the factory team who brought the new parts over. They’re crowded around the table on all sides, their heads close together as they talk and point. Azzi’s got a red felt-tipped pen in her hand, making notes on the enlarged copy paper; the cap is held between her teeth.

“Hey,” Paige announces herself. “I just finished with the sim team.”

Azzi narrows her eyes, no doubt expecting a barrage of requests that she’s absolutely not going to grant — a lower ride height and fuel usage for practice sessions, just to name a few — so Paige smiles in what she hopes to be a convincing manner. Judging from Azzi’s expression, she’s largely unsuccessful.

“Do you have a second to talk about lap windows?”

It’s always satisfying to surprise Azzi; she blinks a few times, recalibrating. “Sure.”

She gives a series of instructions to the people around the table and stands up, her bones audibly cracking. Azzi does a little stretch with her arms and Paige resists the urge to lecture her about poor posture. The urge to run a hand down her spine and press.

“What’s up?”

They walk out of the conference room and Paige immediately decides to steer them toward the hospitality suite, her heart hammering like Thor himself. This is their first time alone since Budapest. She can feel the memory of that simmering between them, luxuriates in feeling her body soften all over and inside too. Circumstances can vary, can change the dynamic between them, but Paige loves being the object of Azzi’s attention. That hasn’t changed in all the time they’ve known each other and it certainly doesn’t seem like it’ll change any time soon.

“I’ve been thinking about the tyre compounds,” she admits, centering her thoughts on things that Azzi will actually want to engage about. And shit that they genuinely need to talk about.

“It’s going to be rough,” Azzi agrees. “Thermal degradation, not just wear and tear. Like being in the desert.”

Jana may be a dramatic busybody but she’s not wrong about Pirelli being fuckheads most of the time. Paige knows it’s true and so does Azzi, even if she won’t publicly admit it.

“You think pushing early is going to cost us more than we can gain?”

Azzi frowns. Paige imagines that she can see her brain working; fast like a racing engine, her thoughts and calculations moving like the pistons inside the cylinders. She’s brilliant, of course, but Paige always has to remind herself — and remind other people — that Azzi’s not a machine. She’s a human, a person; she needs rest and nutrients and sunshine just like every other person.

“I think the thermal degradation is going to be worse than they think it will be,” Azzi admits.

The hospitality suite has a nice set up going for the afternoon; pastries, fruits, little parfaits. Paige snags a muffin for herself and puts a danish and a yogurt in Azzi’s hands out of habit; as expected, Azzi’s too deep in thought about tyre wear to even notice.

“Really? Like we’ll have trouble with the compounds sliding?” She asks it around a bite of her muffin, then grabs two bottles of water with one hand and leads Azzi out of the suite.

“The C4’s are going to give us hell in Sector 2,” Azzi answers. Her brain’s already on the track, Paige can tell.

“You want to run opposite to whatever Soni’s going to do?”

The teams do that, sometimes, just to hedge their bets. They’ll run their drivers on different strategies to cover all the bases. That’s never been Azzi’s thing — she’d rather make proactive decisions based on data than to throw noodles at the wall to see what’ll stick — but Azzi’s not the lead strategist for Team Lamborghini. She’s just in charge of Paige.

“No,” Azzi shakes her head. “I want to make a plan and execute. I think we can make pace and protect tyres. It’ll be work for sure, but let’s see what can be done.”

We. We. We.

It feels like we, when she and Azzi can talk like this. Maybe Budapest did more to repair them than Paige even realized. Even if learning that Azzi sought out Diana to join Team Lamborghini threatened even more damage to their relationship.

But Paige has emotionally grown — at least a little bit — and she made a promise to Azzi that she intends to keep. Because the conversation with Lili stays in her head; Azzi’s her favorite person, and it’s time that Paige actually showed her that.

“Let’s touch base after FP2,” Azzi says. She’s already got the danish hanging half out of her mouth, scrolling through the unread messages on her tablet, flagging things for follow up like she’ll ever go back to respond.

“For sure,” Paige agrees. They’ve entered the garage, the hive abuzz with activity. In the far corner, Nika’s typing on the computer and barking instructions at her assigned minion. “Thank you,” Paige adds, quietly, sensing her window narrowing. “For Budapest.”

Azzi freezes. She’s not looking in Paige’s direction so there’s no opportunity to read anything her eyes are saying.

For a moment, Paige worries Azzi’s going to say something stupid, like don’t worry about it, or, worse, it was nothing. And that would be tough for Paige to take because she does worry about it and it wasn’t nothing.

But to Paige’s surprise, Azzi doesn’t say anything. She nods, though — a jerky little bobble of her head — and to anyone else it might not be enough, might not suffice. But Paige takes the gesture to be everything.

She takes it as Azzi acknowledging how important what happened in Budapest was to Paige. She might not be ready to talk about it, or even to look Paige in the fucking eye, but it’s there between them.

And Paige wants to say thank you for the acknowledgement so she does the kindest thing she can think of and changes the fucking subject.

“Has strat team talked about doing double stacks at all this weekend?”

Paige hasn’t had to double stack before, because F2 and F3 teams only have one driver. Given the lap times and pit stop windows at Zandvoort it’s not an uncommon occurrence to bring both cars in together for a pit stop.

“It’s come up,” Azzi confirms, “but nothing decided. I always feel like it’s risky. Too much can go wrong.”

“Can we do a trial run during FP1? I haven’t had to do it before, and I want a go at being the second car.”

“Of course,” Azzi agrees. “Already on the agenda for the strat-ops meeting this afternoon.”

“Great. Thanks.”

Paige wants to ask about the voice memos, about Azzi’s break. She can’t think of a chill way to do it so she might as well just be obvious.

“You have a good break?” She says it as casually as she can. It’s probably not that casual. Not if the glance Azzi tosses her is any indication.

“Yeah,” Azzi shrugs. “It was fine. How about you? Italy, right?”

“Sardinia,” Paige murmurs. “With Nika and Soni and Georgia. And the Haas girls.”

She wonders what Azzi would say about Veronica and Kate — a relationship not explicitly against any rules but taboo all the same.. And Paige intentionally leaves out the part about Alessandra. Because why invite displeasure? They’re talking so nicely.

“It was really good,” she says instead. “Got to relax. Rest the rib. Lamborghini let me have the Huracán EVO Spyder,” she adds, and of course that catches Azzi’s interest, just like Paige knew it would. Her eyes light up.

“For real? Oh that must have been sick,” Azzi enthuses, finally perked up. “How’d she sound?”

“Gorgeous,” Paige smiles, nerding out. “Drove like nothing else, too. The throttle whine was unreal and the acceleration actually felt like a track car.”

“You get to do some good driving?”

“Some, they had hills and I was on my own the second week so I took her out a bunch. Rib was feeling way better by then,” she mentions, just in case Azzi decides to go full Hulk again about the rib recovery. She’s unpredictable like that.

But Azzi clearly doesn’t give a shit about Paige’s rib now that she’s been presented with new information about a high performance car.

“Did they keep the rear steering?”

“Yeah, I could really feel it at lower speeds—turn-in’s sharper than you’d expect for a convertible.”

“What about the horsepower?”

God, Azzi’s such a gearhead. Paige doesn’t get wet about that at all.

Paige shrugs. “Same power as the coupe—naturally aspirated V10, 630.”

Azzi smiles, a genuine grin that lights up her face. Paige’s stomach flutters at being the person to put that expression there.

“That sounds amazing,” Azzi says; there’s a look in her eyes like maybe she’s also thinking that if things were different, she’d have been riding shotgun with Paige in the Spyder.

She’d be riding Paige’s fingers is what she’d be riding.

“You get up to speed?”

“Nah,” Paige admits, regret lacing her tone. “Tapped out at 144 kph. Didn’t wanna become an international headline.”

“For the best,” Azzi agrees.

The vibe is so nice that Paige is reluctant to walk away and leave their conversation. Being around Azzi like this feels like pouring Gorilla Glue over the cracks in her heart. The new ones and some of the old ones.

“Diana went to Antarctica,” she offers, desperate to keep engaging. “They like, slept on an iceberg or some shit. With penguins.”

Azzi shakes her head in disbelief. “Rich people,” she complains with a roll of her eyes.

Yeah. Page agrees with that.

“I’ve got to meet Dorka and Caroline,” Azzi sighs. Paige wonders if she’s imagining the reluctance she hears in Azzi’s voice. Maybe she’s projecting.

“Cool,” she says, starting to turn away, like she already has a destination in mind. She doesn’t. “I’ll see you later.”

“See you,” Azzi echoes.

Paige forces herself to walk forward. She meanders through the garage until Azzi’s out of sight.

“Smooth,” Jana comments, from where she’s standing at the counter highlighting different data readouts in one of the tyre binders.

“Shut the fuck up,” Paige growls.

“The little bitches room is that way,” KK points with a snicker. “I accept Revolut and Venmo, by the way. Whichever you prefer. I’m accommodating like that.”

“But if it’s Venmo you need to do the conversion first,” Jana instructs. “The dollar’s still low against the euro.”

Paige glares and stalks off without another word, ignoring the high five that KK and Jana exchange.

The engineers at Mercedes would never.

—---

3:22

…It’s wild to be here again. For F1. I remember our first time at Zandvoort. The internet was so shitty in the hotel and your mom kept calling because your brother got his nose pierced. It was like full on Fudd family chaos. And Sabrina’s rears were sliding all over the place and you were in such a mood. God, all I remember about my first year in F3 is being so fucking nervous, I was like bricking it every single weekend. And then Stef got that bug bite on her cheek, and me and the engineers on the F3 team thought we were so hilarious because….

—--

Free Practice 1 is scheduled to start at ten on Friday morning.

Paige is clear on the plan, on the data sets and lap windows the strat ops team wants. She and DiJonai make their way from the driver room to the garage, talking quietly on their walk about the recovery session that Paige is booked into; she’ll go into the city tonight and come back to the track to sleep.

“See how your body feels after this,” Nai advises. “Then we can decide about adding cryo. Might make FP3 and Qualifying go easier tomorrow.”

Paige nods, sure that a cryo session would feel good and still dragging her heels about committing. But she needs to; even though they did a lot of work in St. Moritz, she doesn’t feel quite back to form. The rib injury really fucked up her plans for summer break training.

As Nai helps with the helmet and Nika comes over to strap Paige into the car, KK runs over and steps into their pocket of space as well.

“Azzi says we’re gonna do double stack after the first tyre change,” she shares, extending a hand to help Paige. “We’ll wait for a good window and pull you in. Soni will be in front.”

“Good,” Paige nods. “Who’s calling?” She swings a leg over the side of the car and slides into the cockpit. It’s like being inside a glove, like the car is moulded around her.

“Jana’s gonna call,” KK grins, clearly proud of her friend.

Paige nods, also impressed. Calling a double stack is a great opportunity for Jana, even if Paige is annoyed as fuck with her — and with KK — over their stupid observations.

“I’ll try not to fuck it up for Jana,” she says with a smile.

Then Nika’s the only one she can see, bent in close to mess with the safety harness. She arches an eyebrow at Paige as her fingers dance across the straps, tugging and testing to make sure there’s no give.

“You remember the first time we raced here?”

Nika smiles. She has gum in her mouth, she always does; an oral fixation almost worse than Paige’s.

Her hair had been shorter, their first time in the Netherlands. The result of a bad haircut given to her by some cousin that was in cosmetology school. Paige’s hair had been box blonde because paying for professionally dyed hair had still been laughably out of the budget. They’d hardly known each other then — it had only been a few weeks into the F3 season.

“I remember you vomming in the bushes outside the paddock,” Nika teases.

“Interesting. I remember you having a sneezing fit and getting snot on your shirt,” Paige recalls.

But what she remembers most, what stands out from that first time at Zandvoort, is how connected she felt to Nika. It had been Zandvoort where Paige first understood just how important Nika was going to be to her.

“Have a good run,” Nika rumbles, and the statement feels more like a prayer, the way it always does.

Paige salutes her, then looks forward, ready to be guided into traffic.

—--

The bet isn’t front of mind while Paige is in the car.

It’s not gone from her brain, but it’s not where her concentration is. Not with Nika yapping in her ear about tyre temps and dirty air readouts, and everyone and their fucking mother trying to get a flying lap in for no good reason so early in Free Practice 1.

“Ease up and coast,” Nika instructs.

Paige follows direction. She’s not going to defy orders just because of the bet. That would be stupid. She’s got to wait for the right moment, for the right gap. Because Paige may be a lot of things, but a bad driver isn’t one of them; she’s not going to make a dumb choice just to keep five hundred euros. If she’s going to go against orders, or go against what Azzi wants her to do, she’s going to do it when it’s worth doing. When she actually disagrees.

“Great, Paige. We’re going to box next lap. Try and pick up pace just a little bit. We want you in a five second window behind Soni.”

“Copy.”

The double stack goes beautifully. Paige gets in good position and follows Soni into the pit lane, cruising in behind her for new tyres right as she’s released. Nika and Azzi are at the pit wall, turned around in their chairs to watch. Paige only really sees them as she’s coming into the pit and sliding in behind Soni.

“Oh that was great,” she crows into the radio as she exits. “Well done everyone. Thanks for the trial run.”

She’s got one under her belt, at least, if they need to do it on Sunday. Paige is comfortable in the car; she could have done it spur of the moment if it was needed in a race, but she feels better for having a dry run.

Practice makes perfect her father used to say, when she would go home for a week or two as a pre-teen and not want to do her reflex exercises.

But she did them. She always ended up doing them.

Paige knows how to prepare.

—--

Preparation only takes someone so far, she learns.

Because Paige walks into the strategy room later that day, after Free Practice 2, taking pride in her laps. She came in first — though it doesn’t really matter or mean anything from a practice session — and it’s got her feeling good.

“Yo,” she calls to Azzi, a smile already blooming on her face. “I gotta question for you.”

Azzi looks up and her face is pre-annoyed.

Pre-annoyed with Paige specifically. It’s a look that Paige is intimately familiar with, after so many years devoted to her favorite pastime of rage baiting Azzi.

“Are you involved in whatever stupid bet is going on?” Azzi asks, her eyes narrowing. “I don’t know what it's about but I assume Jana and KK are involved.”

“No,” Paige lies, scrambling for nonchalance.

“Okay then,” Azzi nods. She looks down at the schematic, for a moment, and then back up at Paige.

She can’t let it go. Paige is fucked.

“How dumb is it?” Azzi asks.

“Don’t know what you mean,” Paige pretends cluelessness.

“Very dumb, then,” Azzi surmises.

“Extremely,” Paige sighs, put upon.

She almost feels bad, given that it’s clear Jana and KK tread upon Azzi’s last strings of patience on a regular basis. Paige truly wishes she didn’t have such an urge to encourage them.

Alas, she can only be herself.

“What was it you wanted?” Azzi’s already distracted again, her nose buried in the schematic.

“The tyres felt good,” Paige improvises. “Just wanted to tell you that.”

“Good,” Azzi mutters. “I think we can push in FP3 tomorrow. I’ll talk to Dorka about compound strategy across teams.” She makes a note on her tablet, as if she’ll ever be able to find it again.

Paige can see Kelis writing down the same thing on her own tablet; she meets Paige’s gaze and then looks back down.

Once, back in Brackley, Azzi complained about her phone being slow. Paige had a theory it was user error and when she stole Azzi’s phone to check, it turned out Azzi had every app — every single one on her phone — open and hadn’t updated it in years.

“Cool.”

Paige doesn’t run away, but it’s a near thing.

—--

She’s fucking about with a quick run of Blitz on Fortnite, taking satisfaction in ruthlessly killing pre-teens, when Nai pops her head in.

“Yo, don’t you have your drivers meeting?”

“On it,” Paige assures her. “Leaving in two minutes.”

“Yeah, that’s when the meeting starts.”

So she runs down the paddock and ends up catching Kate. The Haas garage is all the way at the end because they were the worst team last season, though with Kate and Veronica on board now they’re steadily making gains. But it means that Kate and Veronica are either late or leaving for any obligations earlier than anyone else would.

“Cathy’s on one this week,” Kate warns as they take the stairs to the admin offices at the circuit.

“Just my fucking luck,” Paige grumbles.

And sure enough, the meeting has already started and Cathy glares at them as they walk in.

“I’m so sorry we’re taking valuable time from your day,” she calls to them as they take their seats. “But please do try to be on time.”

“Sorry,” Paige tips her head in deference. Mock apologies have gotten her through worse than this.

She slips into the seat in front of Soni and turns around to shoot her a dirty look.

“I told you I was leaving and you said ‘gotta merc this kid first’,” Soni reminds her in a whisper, her face the picture of innocence. She had her hair done over break so it falls in long gorgeous waves and it’s given her a big head. Literally and figuratively.

“Blatantly untrue,” Paige accuses under her breath.

Soni kicks the bottom of Paige’s chair twice and Paige reaches back to slap her ankle. Except she misses and gets Cam “Daddy Long Legs” Brink instead, and the surprise of it makes Cameron accidentally knock over Aliyah’s water tumbler, which gets Marina’s backpack wet and that gets Marina yapping at Sophie with misappropriated blame — though nobody is going to correct her — and then, of course, Sabrina turns around to tell Sophie to shut the hell up.

Cathy continues to glare at Paige, as if any of it is Paige’s actual fault.

It is.

KMac sighs something about goddamn rookies and Veronica goes in on that with another I’m not a fucking rookie comment and the entire meeting gets derailed for a few minutes.

“Did all of you lose your brains over the summer break?” Cathy snaps.

Everyone blames Paige.

—--

Paige wakes up on Saturday to Soni letting herself into the motorhome and jumping on the bed. She’s gotten really fucking bold in their friendship; Paige misses when everyone thought she was a hotshot and didn’t have any friends.

“Why,” Paige groans.

“Guess what I heard,” Soni says, uncaring that she’s just woken Paige up with her bony fucking knees. She’s holding two iced coffees but Paige knows better than to assume one is for her.

“I don’t care.” But she rolls onto her back anyway. “What if I were naked.”

Soni’s eyes flick down, taking in Paige in her sports bra. “You kind of are naked.” She doesn’t sound impressed.

“I could be more naked. I could have had a girl in here. Or been getting myself right.”

“Yeah. I guess that’s a possibility. Far fetched, but possible.”

Paige throws one of the pillows at her. Soni ducks it without any effort.

“Marist isn’t making you come right,” Paige says, referencing Soni’s boyfriend. “You should still be in bed.”

“It’s like seven-fifteen,” Soni says. “And he’s not here this weekend, he’s back in season,” Soni reminds her. She frowns. “I think I need to order a new vibrator.”

“How did we get here,” Paige wonders, staring at the ceiling. But she pulls one of the remaining pillows behind her head to prop herself up just a little bit.

“I was at the coffee cart,” Soni says, “the good one.”

“Which one is the good one?”

“The one at the end of the paddock, down by Haas. So you have to really want the good coffee to walk all the way down there.

“Why would they put the good coffee all the way at the end?”

“To separate the espresso enthusiasts from the sad girls who need caramel in their caffeine to love themselves.”

Paige hasn’t even looked at her phone yet. She wonders if there’s an emergency, if there’s some new piece of news that’s hit the world before she even had the opportunity to open her eyes. That’s how it happened in Abu Dhabi. It’s made her a little jumpy every single race weekend since then.

So she looks at Soni with expectation, one knee pulled up to make herself more comfortable. She’s never had this kind of intimate early morning interaction with someone she’s not fucking, except maybe Nika. Soni’s literally in her bed.

“What’s up.”

“Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi had a fight.”

Paige stills. The pulse sounds extra loud in her ears, all of a sudden.

“Start at the beginning.”

“It happened at the paddock,” Soni says. “Late. After the driver's briefing. I heard Katie Lou and Tiffany Hayes talking about it. They didn’t see me though. Well, they did see me but I had my airpods in but I was only pretending to listen to music.”

Katie Lou is Sabrina’s Nika. Of course, nobody’s like Nika, but Katie Lou fulfills the same role and does the comms for Sabrina during a race. She did it for the driver before Sabrina, too. And Tiffany Hayes is an engineer in the Mercedes garage. She’s a little nuts, though Paige tries not to think uncharitably about her. Unique is the world Azzi always used.

Unhinged is what Paige would have gone with.

“Like fight-fight or their usual weirdo rich person banter.”

“Fight-fight,” Soni confirms. “Like bad enough that apparently Sue left the paddock and didn’t go to the Mercedes sponsor dinner last night. That’s how pissed she was.”

“They get along really well,” Paige says, confused. Because it’s true; Sue and Diana have always been friends. They’re competitors, sure, but they have an undercurrent of friendly banter. They’ve vacationed a few times in St. Tropez together, with their families. They’re such good friends, in fact, that when Paige got face to face with Sue after declining the Mercedes F1 offer, Sue had just laughed and said to go see DT, she’s expecting you.

“Yeah, well, they didn’t get along last night. Apparently voices were raised. It was about Azzi.”

Paige’s blood freezes.

“Nobody knows what about Azzi, though,” Soni adds, sensing that Paige has been lost to the swell of her emotions. “It seems like everything was mostly fine during the day – they would have both been in the Executive Sports Briefing yesterday morning. But then I don’t know. Something happened last night.”

“Azzi’s a big bargaining chip for Diana,” Paige says. She doesn’t get nervous on track, and she doesn’t let people bully her or bait her off the tar, but she also doesn’t fuck around with people talking about Azzi.

“Yeah. Her biggest bargaining chip, probably,” Soni agrees. “Also, rumors are everywhere that Sophie’s losing the seat at Red Bull too,” she adds, “but who gives a fuck about that. I’ll throw a party. I bet everyone would chip in. Cam says that Jewell makes really good guacamole.”

If there’s one single, solitary thing that Paige hates more than Azzi coming to Lamborghini and ruining all their plans for a happy life, it’s that by doing so she’s put herself squarely in the crosshairs of a pissing match between team principals. Which is a dangerous place to be. Especially for someone like Azzi, who’s never been adept at or interested in playing political games.

“How sure are you?”

Soni hesitates. “I went to Sabrina,” she admits. “Because I wanted to know. And she wouldn’t say anything. Which kinda says to me…”

“That it’s definitely the truth,” Paige finishes for her, and Soni nods.

“And Sabrina was pissed,” Soni tells her, voice lowering a little bit even though they’re the only two people in the motor home, given that she’s perched in Paige’s bed and Paige is only wearing boxers and a sports bra. “Like so fucking furious, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen her that angry.”

“Azzi spent her break with Sabrina,” Paige blurts, because keeping it in doesn’t feel like it’s possible.

There’s part of her that feels badly — she hasn’t even had this conversation with Nika, with her Twin — but it’s not like Paige found out through any secret channels. It was on an Instragram carousel, for fucks sake.

“Or part of her break,” she allows. “I don’t know the details.”

Soni narrows her eyes. “They friends like that? I hadn’t realized.”

And that’s the thing, isn’t it.

“No. They aren’t. They weren’t.”

Maybe they’re best friends now. Maybe Azzi left Mercedes so she could be with Sabrina because they were secretly in love and spent all that time pining for each other under Paige’s nose. Maybe the sky is neon green and Haas will win the championship this year.

Too bad Paige has never met another human as heterosexual as Sabrina Ionescu. The love triangle idea would have legs if not for that.

“Get up,” Soni directs. She hands Paige the second iced coffee and stands up. “We have strat in forty-five and you can grow some ovaries and ask Azzi what the fuck is going on.”

She’s so mean, Paige is such a saint for putting up with such treatment. First from the girls in the garage — including Nika — and now from Soni.

“I don’t even like coffee,” Paige reminds her, as she does often.

“I know,” Soni says, soothingly. “I’m trying to help you become a better person.”

—--

The garage is already bustling when Paige and Soni enter from the paddock. Engineers and engineering assistants are scurrying around, clipboards and headsets and tablets abound. She and Soni split up — Paige grabs their tablets and Soni goes for the updated logistics binders — and they both walk into the conference room with their haul, exchanging a binder for a tablet.

Azzi is already seated, talking quietly with Caroline and Dorka, but she glances up as Paige and Soni walk in, sliding an agenda across the table silently.

She looks…fine. Not at ease, because it’s a race weekend and Paige can’t imagine a world where Azzi has any kind of happy-go-lucky attitude when they have to compete, but she certainly doesn’t look twisted into knots or like she’s got any additional worries than normal. Maybe she did see Gabby over the break. Gabby always had a way of re-centering Azzi.

“We waiting for Diana?” Soni asks it nonchalantly, as it becomes apparent that the rest of the engineers are gathered.

“No, she’s caught in meetings,” Dorka says, casual as can be. Like it’s a normal occurrence for Diana to miss the Saturday morning strategy session. “Alright, people, let’s get started. We’re running different strategies for FP3 this morning. Caroline, then Azzi. And then Azurá has some updates from the factory team.”

The strategy for Free Practice 3 isn’t all that interesting; go fast, check the fuel load on turns, figure out how the car can do in dirty air when people are going a little faster. Paige listens well and writes down anything that feels of high importance, but mostly she just lets the information wash over her.

“Paige, any discomfort yet? If we need to do any kind of padding again we absolutely can.”

She looks up at Dorka’s question. “No. No discomfort.”

“You sure?” Dorka’s asking like she’s checking boxes off; beside her, Azzi looks amused. She knows the truth.

“Yup.”

“Alright, keep us in the loop on this,” Dorka says. “We want to make sure we aren’t sending you into a relapse on anything.”

“Paige would rather have her rib amputated than have padding in the seat again,” Soni says, unhelpfully.

“We’ll keep that in mind for Suzuka,” Dorka mutters. Paige makes a mental note that Dorka will not be an ally when the time comes. From the way Azzi’s looking down at her notepad and smiling to herself, she’s clearly clocked the same thing as well, only the opposite.

“What’s the differential in dirty air on tyres?” Paige hasn’t seen any data that has given such indications and she’s been looking through the binder readouts since the meeting started.

“We won’t have that until after qualifying,” Dorka says, and she holds a hand up as both Paige and Soni begin to complain. “One of the sensors was malfunctioning yesterday so that’s why it’s not included in your data readouts. I cannot measure the difference myself with a thermometer so this is where we are. If you have additional concerns, I suggest you take them up with Diana yourselves during your one-on-ones.”

Soni looks genuinely annoyed, and Paige feels similarly. “So what’s the plan to mitigate during qualifying without the data?”

Dorka looks up, her eyebrow arched. “I guess you’ll just have to drive fast. Okay. That’s all for today.”

“I’ll… talk to Georgia,” Soni says very quietly as she and Paige gather their things. “She always has an ear to the ground.”

“If she comes to me I reserve the right to put her in a headlock,” Paige warns Soni.

The two of them don’t have much time to linger; they’re sent to get ready for FP3. Paige stretches first, by herself, and then again with DiJonai to incorporate resistance. They talk casually about recovery and what Paige needs to do at night to prepare, but all in all she feels pretty good.

“How’s your rib today?”

Paige isn’t impressed. “Was there a meeting? Everyone seems to be wondering.”

DiJonai shrugs. “Might be that people are worried about you because they, you know, care? Or they could be protecting their millions of dollars in investments.”

“So what am I to you, then,” Paige asks. “An investment?”

“You’re a pain in my ass,” DiJonai responds, ever sweet.

But after she gets Paige stretched and into the race suit she takes the water bottle and goes to fill it with some ice water, telling Paige they’ll meet up in the garage.

It leaves Paige alone in the hallway for a brief moment, until Azzi comes around the corner. Also by herself.

Paige is blessed by God herself. Absolutely favored.

“KK and Jana are deciding how to split some kind of prize pot and figuring out what they want to spend the money on,” Azzi says, her voice airy as she tosses the information at Paige like it’s a grenade and she wants to see how Paige’s body will react.

“Damn they’re bold,” Paige mutters. “How are the youth so confident?”

“KK’s your age,” Azzi reminds her.

“My confidence comes from my abilities on the track. KK’s comes from being born of pure chaos.”

“Wouldn’t it just be easier to tell me what this is about? I know you’re involved. They’re obviously involved — I’m sure they’re the origin point, actually. You know I’m going to find out anyway, probably.”

It’s not a long hallway, so they’ve realistically only got another ten seconds until they’re in the garage. The cacophony is already starting to permeate.

Paige just shrugs. “Eh. Chances are high you get distracted by a data sequencing model,” she says. And it’s meant as a cute little line but it’s also ninety-nine percent accurate, which is higher than the data sequencing models allege to be.

“I’m laser focused on this,” Azzi warns her.

“Better not let Diana find that out.” They’re engaging in what Paige might call banter, if she were to put a name to it, and the ease of slipping into old patterns feels so comfortable.

“You’re really not going to tell me?” Azzi sounds surprised. Like she does assume — correctly, probably — that she could get Paige to tell her anything.

“Ask KK and Jana,” Paige says with a smile.

She almost pushes to ask if Azzi knows what Diana and Sue were fighting about, but Azzi’s smiling and the moment feels too nice to ruin.

Because she looks so, so beautiful, in the morning light. Her curls are freshly washed and they’re springy, not frizzy, even though they’re pulled into a high topknot. Her Jordan’s are, as always, on her feet — it’s qualifying day, after all — and she’s in the three-quarter length leggings which show the curve of her calves. She missed a spot shaving on her shin, and the short hairs there catch the light in the rare sunspot that’s above them. It’s perpetually grey in the Netherlands, so Paige doesn’t know why the Dutch included skylights in their hallways around the racetrack paddock.

Paige lets herself imagine for one quick moment, what Azzi would look like in the mysterious purple dress. The shape wasn’t visible on the hanger, but it was long and slinky. Probably didn’t have back; Paige would take a lot of pleasure in kissing down Azzi’s spine.

“You like the Lamborghini girls,” Azzi says, her voice fond; it’s not an accusation but it falls somewhere past the vicinity of an observation.

“I like that they drive you crazy,” Paige says honestly, allowing the grin to take over her whole face. They must look like loons, smiling at each other as they walk into the garage.

Past Azzi, Paige can see Diana standing on the pit wall talking with Nika and Georgia, as well as a few other engineers.

“Have a good FP3,” Azzi says, leaving Paige by the door.

“You too,” Paige says, too quiet for Azzi to hear as she walks away.

—--

There are no revelations that come out about the fight between Diana and Sue or anything regarding Azzi. Soni comes up with a blank and Georgia isn’t able to pick up any gossip on the paddock — which means it really is kind of a secret. Azzi’s demeanor doesn’t change at all. In fact, she’s so pleased with Paige’s runs in FP3 that Azzi begins the debrief with a smile.

Heaven.

Diana is somewhat scarce but that isn’t all that uncommon; team principals have a lot of fucking bullshit to deal with. So Paige bides her time and makes it through the rest of the morning. She tells DiJonai to let her know if there’s any weird chatter about the paddock and she tells Nika what happened in between bites of bitterballen that she takes from the hospitality suite and eats quickly so DiJonai doesn’t see.

DiJonai does see and she promises Paige retribution in Monaco after the race. Whatever. Paige will sweat off the calories in the car on Sunday.

The main meeting space is full of people coming and going when Paige wanders by an hour after qualifying. She’s still in her overalls, though they’re unzipped to the waist, a Nike branded towel slung across her neck to help collect the sweat and the Lamborghini hat on backwards.

“Good job,” Diana says as she walks down the hall. She’s wearing boots with heels and it gives her a few inches on Paige, which feels disconcerting. “P2 is better than we were hoping for this weekend.”

“Thanks,” Paige says, but she’s half distracted by the tablet in her hand. “The upgrades McLaren’s bringing are going to make it difficult out there.” She tips the screen to show the comparison graphs to Diana.

“Do what you can do,” Diana shrugs. “We’re bringing a bigger aero tweak to Monza next week, we’ll close whatever gap opens up there.”

“Monza?” Paige raises her eyebrows. Given everything, she assumed any big changes would wait for North and South America.

It’s the first moment they’ve had alone since the dinner. The one-on-one that she usually has with Diana prior to qualifying got kicked because of a tyre pressure issue on Soni’s car, so it wasn’t the usual afternoon of saying how she feels or where her head is.

If Diana’s feeling agitated, or if she has any lingering frustration after the fight, Paige can’t read it on her. She seems a little tighter than usual, maybe, but nothing that someone would be able to pick up on if they weren’t looking for it. Like Paige is looking for it.

“We’re leading the Constructors’ Championship, Paige. I’m not looking to bring home second place this year. We’ll bring upgrades to keep ourselves ahead.”

“I’m feeling good about tomorrow,” Paige says. “I know this isn’t our strong circuit, but I’m ready to work.”

Diana nods, curtly. And then she’s off, leaving Paige in a cloud of money and the lingering scent of a power war.

—--

“Maybe they fought about the pipeline,” Nika suggests that night, when they’re gathered for dinner with the other girls.

Paige doesn’t love Azzi or what happened being the topics of conversation, but she’s quickly learned that nothing can keep Soni or Nika from hashing everything out like a scripted procedural show.

“Diana doesn’t care about the pipeline,” Georgia disagrees. “FIA haven’t even granted Lamborghini an F2 team. What could they be arguing about with that?”

They’re seated at the picnic table set up between Soni and Paige’s motorhomes. With the sun about to set, the temperature has come down a little; it’s pleasant enough to sit outside and enjoy the evening.

“It wasn’t about the pipeline,” Paige says. “Georgia’s right, Diana doesn’t give a shit about F2. Not until the this team has won.”

“And we will win,” Soni says. She and Paige tip the tops of their waterbottles toward each other. Nika and Georgia roll their eyes in unison.

“Spirito Toro blah blah blah,” Nika sighs. “This is a mystery and I want to know the answer.”

“What could they be fighting about yesterday,” Paige wonders aloud, though her voice is so low it’s really just muttering to herself. “Like, this weekend of all times.”

“First weekend back from break,” Soni supplies.

“If something came up in the Team Execs meeting why would they have fought at night about it?”

Georgia’s not wrong. The timing is odd. Paige frowns.

There are a thousand things that could have happened. Paige isn’t self-centered enough to think that she and Azzi dominate Diana or Sue’s thoughts at all moments of the day; both of them are trying to win, trying to lead teams to win a championship where millions of dollars are on the line.

But to fight over Azzi. Yesterday. Today. That’s the wrench in the plan.

“And we don’t feel like we can just ask Azzi about it,” Georgia adds, a statement more than a question.

Paige shakes her head. Sharp. Deliberate.

“No. Things are…” she bows her head, rubs at the back of her neck. “Things are…good this weekend. With us. Between us.”

She doesn’t say anything about the audio notes, because that feels incredibly private. All of it feels private, really. Paige would have preferred to suffer in silence about all of it, to keep herself hardened to the outside world.

But Georgia looks earnest. And Soni looks emotional. And Nika looks like she always does, but Nika doesn’t wear her emotions on her face.

They care. And that matters to Paige.

“I don’t want to rock the boat with Azzi,” she adds. “And we’re not gonna solve this, so let’s move on.”

All of them nod, and Georgia immediately perks up. “I know it’s bad karma, you don’t need to tell me, but I’m bloody thrilled with all these rumors about Sophie.”

Soni snorts. “God it would be great to not have to deal with her bullshit.”

The conversation devolves from there, as everyone rushes in to give their two cents. And there’s a lot to talk about because it’s the topic of the weekend; Red Bull has been meeting with young drivers and all the chatter on the internet is about Sophie fighting for her seat.

Paige has no opinion on the matter. Even though everyone is entitled to their own unique personal opinion.

—--

Race days are serious.

It’s not rainy but it’s grey; Paige checks the weather that was updated in the internal app, relieved that there’s such a low chance of rain. She slips out of bed, yawning as she stretches. She has her routine, the things that she needs to do to feel prepared.

And Paige wants to win. She always wants to win.

She wakes differently than she did yesterday. Yesterday brought thoughts and concerns. Revelations that answered nothing and created more questions.

That’s not today.

She’s methodical in her preparation, as she always is.

She takes out the diamond studs in her ears, attaching the backs to the post. They’re simple, the kind of jewelry that Paige can wear all the time - a gift from Azzi when she won her first F2 championship. She places them in their own little pocket of her jewelry case, next to the gold ring from Nika – their first championship together, back in F3 — and across from the other two pieces; an antique sapphire ring with gold detailing and a delicate little charm bracelet.

Paige showers, brushing and pulling her hair into a braid, and pulls on her clothing the same way. She doesn’t put lotion on her face because it’ll sweat out in the car and drip into her eyes, but she does smear chapstick across her lips and take a moment to meditate.

It’s not superstition, it’s habit. It’s hard work put into practice. It’s just how she does it.

By the time DiJonai knocks on the door, Paige feels well settled. She’s got a good read of the car this weekend, she’s feeling comfortable. The strategy sessions have gone well, implementation has been successful. Zandvoort might not be the circuit most aligned with Lamborghini’s car model, but they’ve had good pace. Good enough pace that Paige qualified P2. It’s not pole position, but it’s second on a weekend nobody thought would be as much of a success.

“You ready?”

DiJonai looks similarly focused. She’s suited up in the Lamborghini polo, a pair of aviators atop her head as she focuses on making sure Paige’s hydration bottle is prepared.

“I’m ready.”

—--

But it’s not all serious, it’s not every moment that needs to be. Paige brings pastries for the engineering girls —- arranged by the hospitality suite — but it’s a radical enough act to inspire adoration.

“Damn. You really gotta death wish,” Jana says, chewing a cherry danish. “Eating so close to the garage.”

“If Azurá catches us, I’m a hundred percent throwing you under the bus,” Kelis says, her eyes wide. She reaches in for a blueberry scone.

“Chill. Azurá loves Paige,” Nika lies. She’s got her little espresso cup, content with a liquid breakfast. She probably already ate a tree’s worth of bananas; Nika will tell anyone who’ll listen that Potassium is the secret to health.

“I’ll take the heat,” Paige promises. She arches an eyebrow at KK, a come hither glance that would make lesser lesbians pant.

“I don’t want your suck-up pastries,” KK says with a scoff. “You’re in this.”

“I got no second intentions,” Paige promises, a snake smile on her face. “I always pay my bets. And my debts. But I’m not going to need it.”

Kelis looks back and forth between them, eyes the size of saucers. She was an intern last year; the same kind of fellowship that Azzi had at Mercedes back in the day. Apparently Azzi took a liking to her and plucked her from the program, re-mapping Kelis’ entire career path with what probably amounted to barely more than an email.

“I can’t be here,” Kelis announces. “I can’t lie for shit, and Azzi’s digging around.”

She goes off, comes back, takes the pistachio donut, then re-exits.

“It’s cool that she’s in love with Azzi and not you,” Jana comments. She’s unashamedly drinking a Monster to wash down the danish.

“Chill, she’s sweet,” Paige says. “And everyone should be in love with Azzi,” she admits with a smile.

“You really are the most lovesick idiot in the world,” Jana says, aghast. “I can’t believe I thought you were cool.”

Paige laughs though the spike of discomfort. “I am cool. I’m just also this, I guess,” she says honestly. “It’s a dichotomy. I got layers.”

“A regular onion,” Nika mutters.

They talk for a bit since Paige doesn’t have obligations for another ten minutes, but they’re interrupted by — surprise, surprise — Azzi walking by.

“What is that smell it’s like sugar — Jana!”

Azzi’s face is aghast. She groans and closes her eyes, like that’s going to erase the picture right in front of her.

Jana holds her hands up, the shoulders of her polo stiff as she does. “Yo, it was Paige.”

Fucking traitor. She’s got cherry jelly all over her thumb.

“Raspberry tartlet?” Paige offers the platter to Azzi with the sweetest smile she can manage.

“There is a ten million dollar car beyond that wall,” Azzi lectures them. “A crumb could cause catastrophic damage to the engine and more importantly, Azurá would kill you. And then me. And then you again.”

But Azzi smiles as she takes the proffered cookie. Paige asked the kitchen to make them specially. She didn’t mention to them that Mercedes used to have them in rotation.

“I’m not going to save your asses if you’re caught,” Azzi says. She surveys the group of them with suspicion, clearly thinking about the bet that she “doesn’t know about” and nobody will cop to. She narrows her eyes in concentration, sweeping over each of them for a second. When she can’t locate a weak link, she harrumphs and wanders off.

Jana sighs. She glances at Paige and a wicked smile curls across her lips.

“I guess it’s nice to know that Azzi’s scared of someone too. You aren’t alone, Paige.”

“Bro, it’s raceday. I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to treat me with respect.”

“Being aggressively right with your elders is showing respect.”

Paige is going to enjoy taking five hundred euros from these two. She’s absolutely going to collect on it. And she’ll do something like host a happy hour for everyone but the two of them.

—--

She obviously loses the bet.

The race goes about as well as any of them could have hoped. Good start, good pace, good pit stops.

But it’s hard. It’s really hard.

Paige is slipping all over the place in the dirty air. Keeping the racing line means she’s doing her absolute best to control the tires, and it’s a slog. She doesn’t have the brainpower to divert to thinking about the bet, but its presence is there, in the back of her mind. Thrumming under her skin.

She can move off the racing line and it’ll earn her a little bit of a breather on the turns. She’ll lose an iota of pace and it wouldn’t make a difference in the long run, probably. But she doesn’t. She can’t bring herself to do it.

In an easy moment — because eventually Caitlin gets a good enough lead and Paige is ordered to let her go, thereby clearing the air — she wonders what other drivers would do in the same situation. Not the bet, not the situation of gambling for Paige’s dignity, but generally.

Sabrina would do precisely what she wanted. She would make the decision look like something she was committed to, it wouldn’t be a mumbled apology. I’m focused on keeping position, she’d say. Not on losing two tenths. We can discuss in debrief.

And it’s not just because she’s a veteran, a world champion. That’s the easy out, the obvious give.

Because Soni would say no as well, Paige thinks. She’d say it sweetly and she’d be a little apologetic, but she’d do it. I’m struggling with grip. I’m moving the racing line for a few laps. Help me manage pace between turns.

But everyone knows Azzi wouldn’t like that. Would never give up two tenths just to make things a little easier. The racing line is the racing line.

What people don’t know but Paige does, is that Azzi privately thinks holding the racing line is really the mark of how good a driver is. If you can hold it, if you can streamline your race and make your time spikes as consistent as possible, she’s got just a little more respect.

It’s worked into the strategy as efficiency, officially, but Paige knows it’s more than just doing things by the book. More than about following the map.

And she can’t move off the racing line.

Paige started second and she ends P2, because even though McLaren have pace, they fuck up Marina’s pit stop and didn’t have good qualifying laps. Caitlin takes P1, which means the gap between them widens to fourteen points. Thankfully, Soni breezes through in P3, and Sophie ends just outside the top ten, which means she doesn’t take any points home for Red Bull. The chatter about her seat will only increase over the next week.

Paige and Soni stand nicely for the anthem, then douse each other in champagne. She shakes it out of her hair like a wet dog, her skin already sticky. On top for the day, Caitlin is all robotic smiles, and the Red Bull team celebrates below — but P1 when your second driver doesn’t even make the points isn’t enough of a boost for your team. Red Bull adds twenty-five points to their standing in the Constructors’ Championship, but Lamborghini adds thirty-three, keeping them in first place and widening the gap with McLaren.

After the ceremony, after press and a quick shower and sponsor obligations, Paige pops into the engineering debrief.

“Tyres were shit,” she says, and Jana raises her eyebrows in satisfaction. They fistbump in silence. “I lost traction on the front left too quickly.”

“Same for me,” Soni chimes. “But without dirty air I had a much easier time in Sector 2.”

“I really couldn’t say,” Paige laughs. It’s not dry or sarcastic, but it’s an acknowledgement. “Dirty air made it hard to combat understeer.”

There’s a brief moment that KK’s eyes flick up and meet Paige’s across the table. Jana very specifically doesn’t look up from her lap output chart.

They all know what happened. Paige had the opportunity to evade dirty air by sliding off the racing line and she didn’t take it. And at least five people sitting at the table know why.

—--

The masseuse is finishing up when Nika pops in. She’s being flown to Sant'Agata tonight so she can be at the factory bright and early tomorrow; with no week off between races, there’s no time to be wasted.

“Feeling okay? Rough ride out there.”

Paige shrugs. “Tired,” she admits. “Coming back from vacation, I guess.”

Nika snorts. “It’s not an office job.”

“Nah, it’s way better,” Paige agrees.

The best thing about Nika is she always knows what Paige needs. She doesn’t give platitudes or try to hype Paige up. The events of the day, of the weekend, they’re seeping into Paige’s bones. She’s got to wake up with them tomorrow, crystalized into the marrow of her bones. Heavy.

“You drove a good race,” Nika says. “A lot of things went well this weekend.”

“I know. Thanks.” Paige reaches for the fist bump and Nika doesn’t leave her hanging. “Safe flight,” Paige says, because that’s what they started saying early in their time together and it became their thing.

“You too. Heading with Caitlin?”

“Nah, catching with Phee tonight.”

And then Nika’s gone and Paige is left to her own devices. She packs her bag, her movements slow. The private airstrips get busy, this time of night. All the money leaves right after the race, if they aren’t staying for celebration. For P2 and P3 Lamborghini isn’t throwing any kind of rager, so Paige is still heading out tonight but has to wait; Phee says they got bumped down the airfield queue.

Paige has almost forty-five minutes to kill before she and Phee are scheduled for their car to the airstrip, and she opts to kill the time outside.

She does the conversion on 500 euro to dollars — Jana’s right, the dollar fucking sucks, capitalist pigs ruling the world — and then sends the money via Venmo. They’re going to America soon anyway, might as well start thinking in USD.

It’s a strange feeling of personal failure, because she knows all she had to do was move off the racing line. She just chose not to. Because she hated the idea of disappointing Azzi, of going against what she’d want her to do just on principle.

It makes her feel more pathetic than she’s been in a few days.

It’s dusk out, which is nice. Paige pops her headphones in and picks a post-race playlist she curated specifically for this kind of mood. Where not winning the race still means winning the day; an uneasy sort of success. Music helps a little, and she wanders about with medium pace, not making eye contact with anyone she passes, or lingering to chat.

Mac Miller features heavily; enough pep and beat to feel like celebration but not enough hype to feel like a winner. Paige skips some songs and repeats others, curating the music to match her mood, working to adjust her mood to match the music.

She rounds the corner to the pick-up lot and sees Azzi sitting on a bench, one knee hiked up. She’s got a duffle bag at her foot, a backpack at her side, and a cigarette dangling between her fingers, her phone lit up as she tries to type with just the thumb on her other hand.

“Hey.”

Azzi looks over, surprised. She’s still wearing the polo and her leggings. She hasn’t showered or shed her skin the way Paige has. She doesn’t look comfortable. Certainly not cozy.

There are people around them, waiting a few feet away here and there, talking in small groups or on their phones as they wait for the team-organized rideshares. Paige nods at a few of them, but she takes the few extra steps to get nearer to Azzi, to sit on the bench beside her.

Watching Azzi take a drag isn’t nice. She holds the cigarette to the side with the hand farthest from Paige, like maybe removing it from Paige’s line of sight will have an impact on how she reacts.

Paige closes her eyes and breathes out the urge to ask why and say please stop. She feels annoyed for a half second, that Azzi spent so many years smoking joints and that stupid bowl that she named Bilbo Baggins because she always loved The Hobbit and she thought the pun was funny. Maybe if she hadn’t been such a pothead switching to cigarettes wouldn’t have been easy. Paige glances over, sees Azzi scratching at the knee of the nylon-spandex blend of her leggings. Azzi doesn’t look over.

So it’s out there; Paige sighs.

“Who told you?”

“Kelis, obviously.”

Paige chuckles. “You’re abusing her crush on you.”

“I’m nobody’s mommy figure,” Azzi shrugs, unrepentant.

She gives Paige a side look, her eyes probing. Bracing for impact, probably.

Because they both know Paige hates losing. But Paige has made and broken promises to herself too many times in the last year to fail at another round of self improvement. She just sighs, long and deep, and kicks her foot against the one Azzi has on the ground.

“It’s okay.” Paige rolls her neck. “I’m okay.”

“It was an easy bet,” Azzi says, like she can’t help herself.

“Yeah,” she shrugs, unapologetic. “I shouldn’t have made it.”

“You’re not scared of me.” There’s surety in Azzi’s voice. She’s not looking for answers, or probing on assumptions.

“No,” Paige responds quietly. She links her fingers together, rests them across her stomach. Tries to form her lips into a smile. “But maybe I should be.”

Maybe it would be easier, she means.

Azzi ignores the personal flotation device that Paige has thrown.

“You know I think posturing and the showmanship of drivers is asinine,” she says, matter-of-fact. “And I know there’s a whole part to what you do that I don’t have insight into. Because I don’t care,” she adds, like she wants to be especially clear about that.

Paige snorts. “Yeah, I know.”

Azzi’s never given a shit about the personas the drivers adopt, about the way they all have to be top dog and flaunt their power and ability.

And Paige wishes it were just a front, just something she needed to do to save face. But she’s part driver; it’s a concrete section of who she is. Right next to the need for speed, the craving to be a winner at all costs. Losing has never been easy to take. Losing by choice makes it all the worse.

“But I wouldn’t blame you. I wouldn’t think less of you. We’d hardly lose more than a few tenths and you’d have had traction, if you’d just told me about this stupid bet I’d have told you to do what you needed to do to win it—”

“Azzi,” Paige cuts her off. She looks over, waits for the beat it takes Azzi to meet her gaze. “I’m a big girl. I made my decisions.”

It feels like the moment elongates as the words settle between them; it’s not rushed, not the frenzied pace that everything else is during a race weekend. The air is rich with implication, with history, with all that happened before. Azzi doesn’t ask why Paige made the decisions she did.

“You drove really well today,” is what Azzi says, finally. She takes another drag of the cigarette.

Paige wants to ask if the cigarettes are an all the time thing. If Azzi lets herself have one a day, or if it’s more; is it a pack every few days? Every day? She doesn’t ask, though, because if the answer isn’t one that feels palatable then it’ll make it harder to stick to her intentions.

“Thank you.” The moment feels like it's too full, and Paige doesn’t want to end on any kind of note that feels unfinished, so she nods her head toward one of the sprinter vans that pulls into the roundabout; there’s a sign in the window that says ALPINE. “You waiting on a team ride?”

Azzi shakes her head. “I’m flying with Diana. We have a call with the factory team about the upgrades they’re bringing next weekend.”

Does Azzi know what the fight was about, between Diana and Sue? Does Azzi even know about the fight? Two questions on the tip of her tongue and a hundred more tucked into the recesses of her mouth, the base of her brain, the dip of her spine. Paige wants to know all of it and she wants it now.

Will they talk about more than the upgrades coming to the car on the plane ride? There’s a lot that brims between them, between Azzi and Diana; just because Paige doesn’t know the depth of it all doesn’t make it a secret.

Just makes it none of her business.

It takes everything that she has in her to stand up, to introduce space between them. All she wants is to sit next to Azzi, to curl into her. Azzi used to debrief with her after every race; she’d get the data readouts from Stef in F3, and then from Stewie when Paige moved up to F2. Azzi would sit with Paige on the plane ride back or at night on the Monday after a race and go over everything together. It became Paige’s favorite way to wind down from a race weekend.

She can’t believe she ever took Azzi’s time for granted.

“I’ll leave you to it, then,” she says. One step. Two.

“I’ll see you in Monza,” Azzi replies, in lieu of saying goodbye.

“Monza,” Paige echoes with a nod.

She turns her back and walks away.

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