Hate You - LN

13

Lando finishes eighth. Two places behind Oscar but the team is happy around me. Double points on the first weekend of the year, and Lando's shoulder survived it. I suppose I'll see to what extent a little later, but for now, I let myself celebrate with the team. Charles finished second and I know he'll be frustrated with that. But Max was fifteen seconds ahead, not much more he could've done. I sent a quick text to Charles, congratulating him and asking him to tell me all about it on the flight to Saudi tomorrow. He and I were on the same flight.

"Gah!" Someone slammed their hands down onto my shoulders and I jumped. "Whatever you did help Lando Devin, great work!" I was Zak, a crazed smile on his face. Realizing it wasn't my father, my muscles relaxed. "He couldn't do the long runs in testing, and he just did the whole damn race!"

"I barely did anything Zak, today was all him."

Zak nods, still smiling and squeezes my shoulders before releasing me and running over to who I think was Lando's race engineer. More congratulations travel through the garage and I mind my own business and stand out of the way. At Aston Martin staying out of the way was a habit. As nice as Lance and Fernando were, as well as most of the mechanics, the head physio, Jake, whom I worked under was a bit of a hardass. He liked shoving me into corners so he could do all the cool stuff. He wanted the congratulations and the gold stickers stuck to his forehead. I don't need someone else's approval of me to feel like I am valuable. Honestly, I couldn't care less.

The garage quieted down after about twenty minutes and all that was left in the now-closed garages was the hum of the fluorescent lights above me, and the mechanics who were disassembling the cars.

"All right." I started. Both Oscar and Lando's mechanics turned to face me, a look of confusion on most of their faces. I was standing between the two sides of the garage so I could see them all. "Anyone with aches and pains come forward now. And don't lie and say your back doesn't hurt." I pointedly looked at one of the older mechanics whom I saw often favoured his back. "Or try and hide an injury, I'll know and I'll make fixing it uncomfortable next weekend in Saudi when you can't have alcohol to numb the pain."

One of the mechanics coughed. Another laughed but most smiled. A man with short well-groomed facial hair stood up from behind Oscar's car. He was easily over six feet tall. "Lando said you were a hardass," he said. His tone is light and sarcastic. A wide smile pressed into his cheeks.

I shrugged. "Lando says a lot of things, usually when he's pissed off at me."

"He said you were good at your job though."

I tried to hide my surprise. I had just assumed Lando talked shit about me to almost everyone on the team. "I am."

Another mechanic, I noticed the lone female in the garage spoke up. "I've got an issue with my knee you could look at. I ruined the joint playing soccer in university." Her arms, bare due to the t-shirt she wore were covered in tattoos, her black hair pulled up into a ponytail.

"My elbows fucked." Another spoke.

"Shoulder."

"I tweaked my hip in testing and it's still got an ache to it."

A few more people spoke up and I nodded once the room's noise died out. "Great, well I'm not going to take anyone away from their work, so whoever isn't doing something for the next five minutes you're first."

The tall mechanic who spoke first pointed to the girl covered in tattoos. And I looked at her. She got up and followed me down a short hallway and into the equally as small medical room. It was entirely overkill for physio, but if one of the drivers needed fluids or collapsed after getting out of the car, the team doctor would have everything they needed until the paramedics arrived.