When it Rains | Daniel Ricciardo

Chapter 26 - Take it in

"Yes, he does! He told me himself... Well sort of, but Nico told you that Dan liked you after the whole thing with Mike and from what you've told me about your day together it sure seems that way... Not even your brother slept in the same bed with you after.. well, you know..." Jen said pulling her feet towards her on my couch, looking uncomfortable.

I had been alone in my place for about 3 months now and I still wasn't used to it. Besides the being alone part, it was becoming very expensive, not that I needed a lot of money, but my mom always told me to have at least 3 months salary for just incase. 'You never know what might happen', she would say; I was down to one month's salary and it really bugged me.

I had been researching other flats in the area for less, but nothing had caught my eye and to be completely honest I didn't really want to move. This house had history, memories... I needed to start looking for other ideas, maybe even a housemate like I mentioned to Daniel that evening. 

Spain seemed like so far away now and I was having trouble piecing together my feelings about everything that's happened since the breakup - that's why Jen had practically forced her way onto my house an hour ago.

She said she was done with my moods wings and late-night phone calls when I had a million things on my mind and couldn't settle. 'I know I'm your best friend and all, but I can't listen to you questioning your existence anymore. We're going to drink. We're going to get absolutely wasted and you're going to tell me what you won't let yourself think, that's the only way we're going to fix this mess that has replaced my confident best friend'. We were two bottles of red in at this point.

"Jen, nothing happened. That's the point! He spent an entire day and night with me and then the whole night in the same bed and nothing happened. He either knows about Mike and lost interest or he was legitimately just spending time with me as a friend and you and Nico are reading into things and filling my brain with nonsense!" I huffed out at the end

I was getting so annoyed again, was everyone just trying to find a silver lining for me in every situation because of what happened with Ryan? Like they're too scared to give me the hard truth because I might break? It was obvious that Daniel if he did at all, to begin with, lost interest in me. 

We had hardly spoken apart from the race weekends where we were forced to see each other because of the job and when Nico would bring him along for lunch or a coffee. The boys hadn't been back to the factory in over a month and a half so there was no time for family dinners here either.

Daniel had called me - as promised, later that week that we had in between Spain and then again before Monaco to check-in, but he seemed distracted and if I'm honest with myself I didn't make the phone calls anymore enjoyable... 

The minute I left the airport in Spain I missed him, I came home and I played the entire day with him through my head over and over. Every time I looked at my phone I checked for a message from him and when there was nothing -  my heart sink, I was completely distracted at work and reduced to torturing myself with extra-long runs. Wherever I was something reminded me of him and then a second later reminded me of how things had just fizzled out, so when I spoke to him I was awkward and short. I didn't really bring anything to the conversation and he picked up on it and gave me the same attitude or maybe it was vice versa.

I had a feeling he had found someone else to distract himself at home with and only called me because he had given me his word. After that, I felt guilty and would text him every other day, but when he would only reply the next day or hours later, I stopped, what's the point? 

If he wanted to speak to me there was no excuse. 

He would make a plan, we always did. 

It saddened me to think that finally after everything we'd gone through, after spending quality time together everything went to shit. Did he feel like I had rejected him that night on the beach because after the interruption I made no move to resume the moment?