𝚂𝙷𝙾𝙾𝚃 𝚃𝙾 𝚃𝙷𝚁𝙸𝙻𝙻 ,, formula 1: drive to survive

39

( on screen interview with charles leclerc, scuderia ferrari)

"....yes, i slept with her. yes, it was a mistake. yes, we are still friends what else do you want me to say?"

2021 Season

AZERBAIJAN GRAND PRIX

BAKU, AZERBAIJAN

WHAT HAPPENED IN BAKU

PART TWO

"I need to leave."

Dakota pushed through the hordes of people, fending off tears. What the fuck have I done?, she thought to herself. Fuck!

All she could think about was what she had just put on the line: her job, Yuki's job, her reputation, her grandfather's legacy, the chance she might get her heart broken down the line.

After she dated Ilies, Daktoa had tried. She really had. 

She tried dating normally again, like a regular person, but her schedule made it impossible and he broke her heart anyways, leaving Daniel, Lewis and Checo to pick up the shattered pieces of her self confidence and her faith in herself. 

That was the day she said she would be fine on her own, the day she said she could manage not dating until she reached a point in her career where she could safely say that settling down was something that she wanted.

Yuki Tusnoda was not a part of that plan.

"Fuck!" she shouted, walking straight into another person.

Charles Leclerc reached out quickly, steadying the mechanic on her feet as she swayed on her stilleto heels.

"I hate these goddamn shoes." She muttered before reaching down and sliding them off  her feet. The shoes had been a gift from Virginia, who believed more in fashion over practicality.

"Sit down, Dakota." Charles suggested, his hand on the small of her back as he ushered her towards the bar. "How much have you had to drink?"

"Not enough." She was buzzed, but not tipsy.

To forget the mistake she had just made, she would need to be blackout drunk.

"Sorry about your race earlier, Charles. That was shit luck, you should have been on that podium with P."

Charles shook his head, trying hard not to think about the crash. The feeling of the car crumbling against the barriers.

The problems Ferrari were supposed to have fixed.

"It is what it is." He sighed, flagging down a bartender. "But you were brilliant out there. I heard some of the radio recordings. You have what it takes Mac, and today you proved it. I don't know why you don't believe in yourself more."

"Because I'm young and this job is so public and high profile and I don't know what the hell I'm doing even though granddad trained me for this from the day I turned nineteen and signed my first fucking contract."

"So why aren't you with the team?"

Because I'm a coward who can't face my fucking feelings for our rookie?

"I have my reasons." She answered simply, knocking back the tequila shot that was placed in front of her almost as fast as it was placed on the countertop. 

She almost immediately asked for another one. Charles shot her a confused glance, wondering what could possibly be affecting the crew cheif. He had never seen her like this, although he knew this likely wasn't the first time she was losing grip on reality. 

Dakota McManus was a delicate creature, and the only person who truly understood her was Pierre Gasly. Charles had always wondered why they never got together, but Dakota insisted that Pierre and her were better suited as friends, platonic soulmates, if you will. And then Pierre told him about Yuki, and things made sense.

"Sebastian did incredible today, especially in that shitbox that Stroll Senior built." Dakota tried to change the subject, focusing on Baku's unlikely success story: the Aston Martin podium. But her heart really wasn't in it tonight.

What she wanted was to spill her guts about Yuki, and all of the conflicting emotions that just made her migraines so bad that some mornings, she didn't even want to get out of bed. 

She and Charles kept knocking back shot after shot, each of them feeling emotions they couldn't describe, situations that they couldn't put into words. It was a dangerous game that they were playing, one that would come back to haunt them both one season later.

Dakota needed to drink. But the last time she drank this much, she did something stupid.

Daniil brought the vodka, they were on his balcony listening to Metallica. She had kissed him. More than once. Lines were toed, loneliness was her weakness. He was five years older, and he knew her so well. That's part of why he had let her stay with him after Kelley was out of the picture.

 She needed to feel needed.

And she was about to make another really stupid choice because she felt like somebody else needed her. Somebody else could make Dakota feel needed.

And that's when she kissed Charles, cutting off his rant about Mattia Binotto midsentence, not caring who else could see.

Her head was fuzzy, her feelings incomprehensible.

She just knew she needed to forget about Yuki Tsunoda.

Daniil Kvyat had always told her that she needed to relax, and she never forgot the times that he and Pierre had insinuated that the lack of romance in her life might have been a problem, something she needed to remedy.

"Let me take you home." Charles suggested after they parted. "Mac, you're wasted."

"So are you, Leclerc." She insisted. "We've both had as much to drink as each other. And I think I handle my tequila better than you do."

"We'll see about that when we try to walk out of here."

"Try me, Il Predistano."

"Your Italian as atrocious."

"And you don't get Australian slang."

"Sod off."

"Oh, that one you remember."

They continued drunkenly meandering through the dive bar, leaning on each other for support. Mac's  feet ached from the high heels. she was refusing to put them back on. The cold floor against the soles of her feet was grounding as they walked out into the chilly Baku night, Charles draping his suit jacket over Dakota's exposed tattoo-covered skin. He took the shoes from her, dangling the stilettos from his fingers.

Mac swayed on her feet, and Charles, unsteady enough on his own, reached out to steady the Australian. Her dress had ridden up, and Charles' confused, alcohol addled mind only had sinful things to say about the lavender-plant tattoo on Dakota's thigh, and the other bits of skin that he could see.

He had never felt anything for Dakota before, he could assure you. And he still didn't. But that night, something about the European liquor in his mind warped his way of thinking.

And that's when he kissed Dakota, unaware of the paparazzo waiting in the wings. The one who would later be paid off by an employer to keep it hush hush until they said so.

A paparazzo who followed them back to Charles' hotel and waited outside, stealing a damning photo through the sheer curtains of the Ferrari driver undressing the mechanic.

He would give the pictures to the highest bidder, which ended up being whoever wanted to end Dakota Elaine McManus' career the most.