Reviewing priorities - Sebastian Vettel

52. The day after

Valeria woke up the following morning feeling absolutely destroyed. She had got quite drunk the night before and her head was pounding. She turned around to see Seb sitting up on the bed, his back leaning on the wall, reading up on his phone screen.

'good morning, beautiful. How's the head?' he asked, smiling.

'Bad. Why do I always end up being drunk on the first weekend of winter testing?' she joked.

'Here. I got you this when I went for breakfast with Fab.' He said, passing her tinfoil wrapper. Valeria opened it to find a bacon sandwich.

'I love you.' She said.

'me or the sandwich?' he asked her.

'the sandwich... then you' she teased him. 'you seem to be in a better mood than I am' she stated.

'Vale, I'm heart-broken, sure. But I kinda prepared for this treatment last year. I still can't believe you've done what you've done... for me!' Seb had a long sleepless night, tossing and turning, annoyed about the whole situation, but also thinking back to the 2019 season and how he had felt like he had been pushed away, a little bit at a time.

'mate, I'd do even more than that. I can find a job, somewhere, I guess. Or I'll start something up. I'll have a think during the week, but NOBODY is allowed to treat you like that. Not my world champion' she smiled.

'You know you don't need to work if you don't want to' Seb started. 'I mean, don't settle for anything. Look for something that drives you.'

'I know, you're right' she kissed him 'I mean...' she took a deep breath 'maybe I could take a couple of years off... you know?' she hinted. She had a drunken dream the night before of her and Seb being at home with a couple of little ones running around and she had felt a real sadness when she realised it was only a dream.

'You can do whatever you want, my love' Seb told her.

'Because, I was thinking.. you know... I'm 29 now... maybe it's time to settle down' she hinted again. She felt weird spelling it out. 'maybe, we could move on to the next step' Seb finally understood what she meant.

'are you sure?' he asked, trying to contain his beaming smile. He felt like he had been ready to have a child with her since they started going out.

'Yeah, what better time? I just got fired, I have nowhere to be' she chuckled.

Later that day

Seb and Fabian had gone out with Antti on a training afternoon. Valeria had laughed out loud when she got offered to do the same and she had politely declined after having realises the Finn was actually serious.

She was sitting in her bedroom, going through pictures of her year at Ferrari. She had told "the three musketeers" of Pietro, Domenico and Giorgio about her leaving but didn't tell them the real reason why. They seemed genuinely upset.

Valeria smiled at the pictures she had decided to collate together in an Instagram post. She chose 'the last goodbye' from the hobbit soundtrack to accompany it.

Many places I have been, many sorrows I have seen, but I don't regret nor will I forget all that took the road with me...

To these memories I will hold, with your blessings I will go to turn at last to paths that lead home. And though where the road then takes me I cannot tell we came all this way but now comes the day to bid you farewell.

I bid you all a very fond farewell. She captioned it and posted a story. She rested her back on the sofa, feeling empty from all emotions.

A few minutes later she was called back to earth by her ringtone. Daniel was facetiming her.