Burning Heart // CL16

Four

London, week before Imola Grand Prix 2022

"Looking hot, Lacey," Kiraz comments as she checks out my outfit for the nightclub were being paid to attend.

"Grazie tutti," I mutter with a smile as I check myself in the hall mirror, flattening the body on dress out against my curves. The dress was a strapless red bandage styled one with a sweetheart neckline, very short...very slutty but what else was a 22 year old to wear when promoting a club? I'd paired it with LV heels but had already instructed Kiraz to make sure that she had trainers packed for both of us for later in the night. Kiraz was similarly wearing a short dress but it was a halter neck, blue and white tie dye patterned one from a partnership with a brand I forget. Kiraz understood OF and did it a little but she preferred brand deals and partnerships with clothing, makeup and things like that over OF for a form of income. Which I understood and did sometimes - but I preferred the independence of OF, all it relied on was me.

"I swear to God if you begin speaking another language in front of my mum I will kill you, she's still obsessed with you teaching yourself Portuguese while I can't remember a single word in Turkish..." she groans at the response and I chuckle as I finish touching up my makeup before passes me my oversized leather jacket.

"Teşekkürler," [Thank you] I say with a smile and watch her resist throwing her phone at me due to my use of the common Turkish phrase which I had learned very quickly to suck up to her mum. Before she can get annoyed at me though I wrap my hand around hers and lead her out to the car that is waiting to take us to the event, pointing Dylan back to his bed as we leave.

It was only two hours, then my obligation was over and we could come home and order burgers or something instead of standing in a club that we didn't really want to be in with people we didn't care about. We'd bitch about all the fake people that were kissing our asses. It was weird...I didn't even really understand how this was a 'job'. One day I was just posting about my life at NYU and then I was making videos on it and streaming...then decided to take a shot with OnlyFans and everything blew up. I was invited on podcasts and to Fashion shows and the rest was history...

I make sure to look like I'm having fun as we get to the club in Soho, smiling for the cameras as we walk in, hand in hand - serving as each others safety blankets. Kiraz was similar to me - Turkish heritage but she came from a wholesome family life, her mum was a successful lawyer and her dad was the CEO of some big magazine conglomerate in the US - she had no siblings but her parents loved each other and they loved her. When we met, they loved me too and it was comforting to have a second family that made sense, nice to see relationships working when both people were decent and in love.

The club was alright - nothing crazy but ended out being a good enough night out and we stayed until far later than we had anticipated as a few of our other friends from the 'modelling' world were there so it was naturally considerably more tempting to stay. We danced, had a few drinks and largely caught up with people I hadn't seen for the last month because I had been half way around the world. I posted stories per the agreement I made with the club and when it hit four in the morning, Kiraz and I both decided that enough was enough and bid our friends goodbye, smiling once more at the cameras as we left hand in hand, in appropriately worse wear than when we arrived.

When we got home and kicked off our heels and settled on the sofa with Dylan and some blankets, ready to chat some more shit and watch a movie as we ate the burgers we were about to order. That's why I pulled the phone from my jacket pocket, ready to check the menu of the burger place around the corner and instead was greeted with an Instagram notification letting me know there was a message waiting for me in my Instagram DMs. This was weird because I had very tight settings on my account, only set to only allow messages from people that I followed. Recently, that meant Ferrari drivers and their girlfriends but it could be anyone, I tell myself as I let the Face ID do it's magic. Messages had been exchanged between myself and Isa but I hadn't had any interaction with anyone else, Marian occasionally reacted to stories but that was it.