The Photographer

(6) Imola

"The good news is there's a vacancy...." Iris picked her camera up and inspected the lens for a second as she spoke.

"And the bad news?" Ben asked.

She picked up a small microfibre cloth and began to gently wipe the lens, spotting what looked like a small fingerprint on it, "the bad news is that it's not for Aston Martin but it's a full time contract until the end of the season with the travelling team of the catering department, I found it online."

"So of it's not with your team then who's it with?"

She looked at her phone where it laid on the desk, Ben probably wasn't going to sound quite so enthusiastic when he heard which team it was. "McLaren," she grimaced as she said it, ideally her husband wanted a job with the same team and definitely not McLaren. He hummed in reply and she knew he'd pulling a face and that he'd be disappointed.

But to her surprise he seemed interested, "well, it's a way into F1 and it means that I'd still get to see more of you than I do now, we'd be able to travel together and maybe share a hotel room."

"So you're interested?"

"Yeah, I think I am."

She shook her little cleaning cloth and then put her camera down on the desk, "I'll email the details to you and the link to the page to apply for it, you'll have to attach a copy of your cv too so make sure it's up to date."

"Yes m'aam," he giggled and she knew he'd be taking the piss and saluting at the phone.

"And don't hang about, I've been told jobs for the travelling teams don't come up very often," she added with a smile.

"I'll do it now, I'll check my cv and get my application sorted before I head to mums for lunch."

Standing up she went over to the window that looked down on the paddock, "good," she replied while wondering what Seb was doing right now.

"I hope I get it, I'd love to be able to see more of the world with you," Ben sounded so hopeful that it made her smile; she'd love to see more of the world with him too, they'd always wanted to travel the world but had never been able to afford to take a year out to go travelling.

"The sooner you apply, the sooner you could be flying around the world with me," she smiled, looking back at her phone just as someone tapped quietly on the door. "I've got to go Ben, I'll call this evening, ok,"

"Ok. Love you babe."

She loved how heartfelt he always sounded when he said he loved her and she picked her phone up from her desk and caressed the side of it as if she was stroking his face, "love you too."

With that the call ended and she looked behind her to see Neil standing in the doorway. Neil was head of media and PR and was technically her boss. He was around ten years older than Iris with short dark hair, a moustache and short goatee beard.

"Just to let you that Norbert's here and Seb's not always keen on having his father on the team's social media feeds," he warned her, "so if you can avoid getting him in the frame that would be great. Thought I'd better let you know in case no one has mentioned it before."

This was kind of surprising as she knew that Seb's father was regularly pictured on social media by fans and photographers, though he wasn't usually featured too often on the team's feeds. "No one's said before, so thanks."

"Cool, I'll leave you to get on," with that he left and Iris gathered what she'd need before heading out herself.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was cool and rainy as she headed out on to the track to find the two groups of people in green undertaking their track walks. She pulled the hood up on her rain jacket, having her camera meant that she wouldn't always have her hands free to carry an umbrella. She spotted Seb and his team first and behind them, walking with Antti was Norbert. Remembering what she'd been told, she got ahead of the group and carefully got everyone except for Norbert in the shot.