Connections (F1 story)

Chapter Sixty: Lights Out All Out

JOYEUX NOËL!

Have a wonderful Christmas and I shall upload the final chapter as soon as possible.

Please remember to vote, it would mean a lot for the penultimate chapter- so, so much.

Anyhow, I'd better get back to wrapping! Enjoy.

Seb looked emotional, as did the whole team. It was his last weekend with the guys, although behind his initial expression you could sense the excitement he was feeling to move to his idol's associated team. Ferrari.

The Yas Marina circuit looked spectacular both day and night, with the initial set up and promo days flew by. Now, it was Saturday and qualifying was about to take place.

"Stop fretting for goodness sake, that is my job!" I turned to Paul and placed my hand on his back to stop him from shaking. He was a nervous wreck.

"Pff, who's fretting?" He dramatically looked around the garage. "No one is fretting, no one at all."

"Paul?" Lizzie questioned, bursting in to stand by the personal trainer's side.

"AH, fuck." Paul leapt up before forcing himself into a fit of laughter. His acting was worse than Daniel's.

"I just came to say that I'm pretty busy with Christian until late this evening, so I'll meet you back at the hotel then." The blonde smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

"Yeah, yeah...that's coolio." Coolio?

"Have you taken something?" Lizzie asked looking across to me, I shrugged.

"Nope, just need to go and look up some time for the thing...for the thing. Plane y'know thing, thing?" And Paul walked off. He was unbelievably jittery.

"Where's the nearest coffee machine?" I remembered to exhale as Lizzie pointed left.

"I'm coming with you." And she grabbed her bag before joining me. We had a ten minute break, also known as our lunch hour.

Here, I had to keep the biggest secret that I had ever been let in on from my best friend. Not much of an ask.

---

"I still can't believe this year." Lizzie and I were sat in one of the hospitality areas sipping our coffees, and judging by the state of Paul, I was incredibly tempted to ask for something a little stronger.

"At the start, I was scared." I admitted, sipping my drink. "Scared of the whole concept more than anything."

"It's been totally different to 20-13, that's for sure." I watched as a smile played on her lips. If that personal trainer chickens out, he and I were having words. Mainly consisting of two big ones...deluded would be one.

"I thought you'd hate me; I just rocked up from nowhere and within two months I was reluctantly pushing Daniel off of me."

"What actually happened that night? You never told me." Lizzie looked me directly in the eye, and I knew that I was not escaping this one.

"All of it?"

"All of it." she prompted, moving my drink away from me.

"Okay, I'd had a bit to drink at the team meal, but that didn't stop me from noticing that Daniel still wasn't smiling." I paused, pretending to think, of course I knew exactly what happened next. "I mean it was throughout that whole weekend, especially when I brought it up in the car but I couldn't put my finger on the exact expression at the time."

"I'm listening..."

"Anyway, I was on my way back to the hotel to change my shoes. Me, being me, was looking around at all of the buildings et cetera when I heard him ending a phone call, it was extremely abrupt and he looked cut up."