Chase You -1- Formula 1

87. Can someone please explain what happened to the plot. Please.

For Ferrari, and Charles more specifically, the second half of the season started extremely well. An amazing sight for the many Tifosi and the Italian anthem sounding all over the circuit of Monza. It was another race win for Charles, much to my surprise. I really thought Lewis in his Mercedes was going to catch up.

My race went less well, no race win obviously. On the bright side, I didn't crash. However, I struggled quite a lot with passing the others after a horrendous qualifying session. The Saturday was a traffic hell. I was unable to reach Q1, which was strange because I usually got better lap times than this. With Monza being one of my favourite circuits, I hated the whole Saturday and I stayed disappointed for the entire day or so. Which kind of annoyed Joey, with who I discussed my session afterwards. P14 wasn't the worst place to start, I just expected better of myself. Failing was simply not an option anymore. I never wanted to be a disappointment to anyone ever since karting. I had never caused a crash in single-seaters until Silverstone this year, and usually, I just drove at the top of my game. So some people might consider p14 good, like my teammate who must have got a slower car, I didn't like it for myself. I mean, if George started there I'd be more than proud, I preferred to reach Q1, as a minimum.

As I said before, traffic paradise messed up my lap. I tried to make up for it in the race itself, even though overtaking got a bit hard. I managed to get up to P9 and score two points for my team. Lando was pretty happy with my awful performance since McLaren closed in on us in the constructor's championship. There was still a pretty big gap and no one expected us to do this well. However, I got a few people on my side of the team craving success, mainly my fault. They also had high expectations and I wanted to keep our advantage. Even though I wouldn't be driving for this team next year, a higher position in the championship provided us with more money to improve.

Speaking about not driving here next season, I still questioned if I'd be driving next year. The Ferrari might've been fast, but the negotiations went super slow. Bethari tried her hardest to get Mattia to sign, again I had no clue how. There was no structure whatsoever and I started wishing I didn't have such high demands at the start. More money, even more money, Joey as my engineer... if these things stopped Ferrari from signing me, I'd never express my standards again. It could be considered foolish, for that matter I was still a rookie that got a little impatient (desperate more likely) to make things official with Ferrari.

"I just don't get it anymore," I sighed, rushing my hands through my hair. I talked to Kate in my drivers' room concerning my potential future at Ferrari. Very smart to talk to a Mercedes mechanic about the rival team, great move Dais. "Is it so hard to sign a bunch of papers?"

"It's Ferrari! They're idiots," Kate stated as if it were obvious. "Believe me, I worked there." She looked through a few containers on my desk and picked my pasta salad. It was cold so I refused to eat it. "Pasta should be warm by the way."

"Duh." I rolled my eyes. "That is why it's still standing there, no way I'm eating cold pasta." Kate shoved the meal away from her and scrunched up her face. In the meantime, I picked an outfit comfortable enough to travel. The flight I booked would leave this evening. "Back to my story, I want that damn seat."

"Trust me, everyone and their grandma knows you want that seat," Kate crossed her arms and leaned against my desk or table, the name depended on what it functioned as at certain times. It was mainly just used to stack stuff upon. "They're idiots if they don't sign you, but you never know. Do you have a backup plan?"

"I've received a few calls..." I admitted. I hadn't spoken about it with anyone to be honest, nor did I consider even respond. Since Ferrari was where my loyalties laid. Not to forget I was part of their academy. Kate raised her brows and waited for me to proceed. "I laughed my ass off when I heard the voicemail."