Back To You (Sebastian Vettel)

Chapter 20: Failure

As the store closed on Sunday, Mariska decided to visit Gia's house. She wanted to stay there for one night. She brought kardinalschnitte, an Austrian cake which was made by her mother and herself for Gia and Adelina. When she had arrived, she knocked the door. She smiled as she heard the footsteps from the inside of the house.

"Mariska!"

"Hi, Aunty Lina!" Mariska immediately hugged Adelina.

"Come in."

When both of them entered the house, Mariska gave the cake to Adelina. "Aunty Lina, this is for you and Gia."

"What is this?"

"Kardinalschnitte."

Adelina smiled widely. "Ah, thank you so much. Gia must be very happy. This is her most favourite cake."

"That's why my mom and I made it," Mariska laughed a little.

Adelina brought her immediately to the living room. Just after Mariska sat down, Gia came to the room. "Hi, you've arrived."

"I have! I bring something for you," Mariska said.

"What's that?"

"Your favourite, kardinalschnitte," Adelina answered her.

Gia immediately ran into Mariska and hugged her. "Aww thank you so much, my baby!"

Mariska laughed at Gia's behaviour. "You're very welcome, my gorgeous Georgia."

Then, Adelina left them to the kitchen as she wanted to cut the cake and also cook for their lunch. She also asked Mariska to take whatever drink she wanted inside the fridge.

"Gia?"

"Hmm?"

"I need to tell you that today is the race day."

Gia frowned. "Race day?"

"Yes, there is Formula 1 race today. The German GP."

Gia's heart was suddenly beating faster. She didn't know that there was an F1 race on that weekend and it would be held in Germany, Seb's home race. "Oh, I didn't know."

"Tobi was the first to tell me. Then, when Seb came to our bookstore, right after you came to the office room, I talked to Seb. I-"

"You talked to him?" Gia cut her off. She still remembered how she snapped at Mariska for teasing her to talk to Seb after Bernadette left and she still felt ashamed and guilty for doing so.

"I did. He apologized to us as his girlfriend broke the rule there. And I said that it was fine, as it was her first visit to our bookstore."

Gia's mood suddenly changed as Mariska mentioned Bernadette. His girlfriend. But she didn't blame her though as she was just explaining. "Did you talk about something else?"

"He confirmed that there will be the German GP this weekend. And I wished him luck for the race. And he was asking about you too!"

Gia got surprised with that. "What did he ask?"

"He asked me how we can be friends and also how we started to build our bookstore. I told him that we both studied at the same university. And then, I also told him that you come from Heppenheim but after your father passed away, you wanted to move to Vienna. And after you moved, we built the bookstore together," Mariska explained.

Gia was quite nervous when Mariska mentioned her hometown. She was a little sure that her best friend, and also Tobias, still didn't know that Seb was also from Heppenheim. If they knew, they must be asking about that to her a long time ago, she thought to herself.