singapore was one of the hottest race weekends of the year, if not the hottest. even as a night race, the amount of sweat your body could produce was insane. a driver could lose up to two kilograms in weight just from sweating. if that wasn't exhilarating enough, the g-forces from the tight and twisty corners put a lot of pressure on your body.
that meant that ria had to put in extra work in the weeks leading up to the race. more strenuous workouts, getting increasingly longer and harder as the days went by. of course, nothing could emulate the track conditions as well as being on track did, but she felt like she could firm the stress.
"come on ria, we have things to do and ice baths to get into." dionne guided a hesitant ria through the paddock.
"we already did an ice bath challenge, though." ria whined.
"that was different. it's singapore, you have to have ice baths." dionne grumbled.
"alright. it's just getting into it and being filmed, right?" she clarified.
"then a few fan questions. that's it. dionne said.
ria finally got to the mclaren garage after much convincing, only to be greeted by oscar as soon as she walked in.
she ignored him, much like he had her.
she made the decision to go in in her shorts and workout bra, a typical gym set like what she wore quite often around in singapore.
"so do i just get in?" she asked dionne.
the room they were in was quite small, with both of the baths cramped next to each other.
dionne nodded in response to ria's question, and her and oscar both stepped into their respective ice baths.
she shivered and yelped as she indulged her full body into the water, bar her face.
oscar whimpered at the sensation, a sound ria would never be able to get used to. it sounded so . . . majestic coming from his mouth.
no. he wasn't hers anymore. he made that very clear. she made that very clear.
but that didn't stop her from missing him. missing how he talked to her, his lips on hers, his touch, his warmth, his body, his soul.
snap out of it. she thought to herself.
but she couldn't. no matter how hard she tried to erase him from her mind, he was always there. some little part of her brain always thought about oscar jack piastri.
***
the battle during qualifying was intense, and slightly difficult to watch.
liam got through to q2, and everyone in the alphatauri garage was ecstatic.
but what none of them expected was for both red bulls to be out qualified by liam. both red bull cars ended up in the drop zone, and both couldn't salvage a lap time good enough to get through to q3. so, here they were.
disaster. q3 was a disaster. ria had set a lap time to secure her position in p2 behind carlos, and many tried to best her but they couldn't. including the likes of lewis hamilton and fernando alonso. oscar, on the other hand, only set his first lap time to get him to p5. it's alright, he could recover and set another one near the end of the session, right?
wrong. lance stroll crashed only metres behind the finish line, red flagging the session after the time had finished and oscar was on his final flying lap, with the first two sectors purple. oscar was only a turn behind stroll, and cursed into his radio as his lap was aborted only seconds before the end.
"fuck! fucking hell, man. that was a big one. is he okay?" his anger turned to worry as he saw the state of the absolutely totaled car in his rear view mirrors.
"yep, he's alright. big impact on that one. but he's responding, and he looks like he's gonna get out in a bit. that was an amazing start of the lap, oscar, i wish you could've finished it." his race engineer only reminded him of his pain.
as he entered the mclaren garage, the last thing he wanted to do was see ria's face. unfortunately, the universe was just against him today, so hers was the first face he saw.
he noticed her look of pity, which quickly switched to one of nonchalance.
no words were exchanged. not even a sorry for his lap. or a congratulations for her p2. nothing.
conversation resumed with the hustle and bustle of the garage, and his interaction with her slowly slipped to he back of his mind as he stood with his engineers to analyse some lap data.
***
on sunday, oscar's recovery drive was astonishing. he made his way past both mercedes and his teammate, to land him in second. he fight with carlos for a bit, but the spaniard had a lot more experience, and oscar was wary of battling him into a corner due to what happened at spa.
after the long, hot race, oscar stood second place on the podium, ria on the opposing side, with carlos separating the pair. when she sprayed the champagne, she only aimed towards carlos, and oscar aimed at whoever else was on the podium.
the party that night consisted of a lot of drinking. some sorrowful, and some celebratory, but drinks were drinks. ria lined up shot after shot, ready to let herself go, and she did. she didn't remember much of the rest of the night, except liam faking her back to her hotel at the end of the night.
