The Chequered Flag || Lando Norris

27 | I Have a Feeling

I woke up and grabbed my phone, laying it on my stomach as I rubbed the exhaustion from my eyes. I had not slept well at all.

I looked at the text I had gotten last night and chuckled to myself.

Hey! It's your boyfriend's "boyfriend" (George if that's not clear). Thanks for the congrats! I also thought this might be a good time to give you my number just in case you ever need it for something. I don't know what for, but you never know. I also took the liberty of collecting a couple other numbers of people who wanted you to have them. I'm assuming Lando has given you basically nobody's number, so, per usual, I will correct his forgetfulness. Anyway, sorry for the long message, but I hope you have a good night (or day. I feel like Lando said you're in the States right now).

Below it there were more than just a couple numbers. George had sent me Alex's, Charles', and Carlos', as well as Carmen's.

I smiled to myself and texted him back.

Always happy to cheer you on, it's easy when you do so fucking well. Your performance yesterday was actually insane. Beat your 2022 teammate! And don't even try to deny it, we all know they're gonna pick you. Anyway, thank you for the numbers, I really appreciate it. And apparently you are a good listener because I am in the States right now. Take care of your boyfriend 😉

I decided to text Carmen as well.

Hey Carmen, it's Cami! George gave me your number, so I thought it was only right that I returned the favor and texted you before I had time to chicken out 😂

I sighed and pressed send. I drafted up similar texts to Alex, Charles, and Carlos as well and sent them before I let myself think about whether or not what I had written was too awkward, and spent way too long drafting up a two sentence text that would end up being almost exactly the same as the original one.

. . .

After a disappointing and fairly uneventful race and rest of my stay at Bomma's, I boarded my flight back to the UK.

I had exchanged very few texts with the rest of the drivers since George had given me their numbers, but I had spent a lot of time talking with Carmen over text.

She told me about what to expect during a race weekend and the media attention. She also suggested that I kept my Instagram account private, especially while I was still studying and didn't want to see any unnecessary hate that could distract me.

I ended up making a list of the pros and cons of having my relationship with Lando be public on my flight back home.

. . .

A couple days after I landed, I was at Lando's house and Max was trying to help me get better times on the sim. I had been getting better and better, but it still wasn't nearly as good as I wanted to be.

"You are aware it's gonna be impressive to him if you can jump in and immediately whip out a lap like that, right? He's not expecting you to be at his level. He is a driver you know. He's bound to be better than you." Max said when I groaned as I put in a time on Spa a second off Lando's best time.

"It's not just about impressing Lando anymore Max. It's much more than that, I want to see how good I can get, and I know I can do better than this." I replied in a serious tone.

Just then, my phone started ringing and I clumsily got out of the chair and ran to it to see who it was. My eyes went wide when I saw the name of the casting company for the movie I auditioned for. I quickly answered it and listened to the voice of the woman on the other side of the line.