back on track

54. the one with a lot to talk about

While my mum was busy catching up with Mick rest off us moved on to the living room finally gaining my dad's attention. He was a bit taken back by the amount of people in his house all the sudden but he knew Carlos, which made it easier for him to work with it and in no time he was talking to him leaving Lando, Emma and I standing in the middle off the room. My parents had never yet to meet Lando, but they didn't seem to notice that he was here or that he was someone they didn't know.

"Hey where's Vik?" I asked knowing that he would be thrilled to see Lando at least. "I thought he would be home this week?" I asked. I hadn't seen him either in a good amount of time so I had been kind of excited to see him.

"Oh he went to the store" my mum told me as she walked to us with Mick who was smiling as I whispered sorry to him. 

"Oh, I don't think we have met" my mum then turned her attention to Lando standing next to me. He took a quick step introducing himself to my mum shaking her hand but was pulled into a hug quickly which did get him a bit off guard. I shook my head to my mum. She had a tendency to be a bit touchy with, well everyone.

The door opened just in time and I was greeted by very surprised Viktor.

"Uhm hello" he said slowly taking in the sight in front of him. My mum all over Lando, Carlos and my father and then there was Mick. Viktor and Mick used to be great friends but then I quit and Mick stopped visiting us and Viktor started to be so busy with all his own things. I was pretty sure that the two hadn't seen each other in good ten years. 

It had been hour of catching up and chatting away before my mum announced that dinner was ready. She had had to make some extra food to be able to feed us all but gladly she loved to cook. Carlos and Lando had been little straddled by the fact how well my family knew Mick but at least so far they had kept all the questions to themselves. It was weird, to say at least, seeing all these people in my home. Mick had been here before but I never thought that he would be here again not to even think about the two other F1 drivers.

"So how did this happen?" My mum asked me as I helped her to set the table. The guys were doing something with Vik and I finally had time to talk with my mum alone.

"They just showed up" I let out a small laugh. I wasn't really sure myself how all this had happened. "I'm going to last two races with them, but I'll be back for Christmas" I told my mum who shook her head.

"To think that little more than year ago you wouldn't even talk about racing" she smiled. She never was one to love the sport, was it go-karting or single-seaters, but she had seen the change in me once I had given up that part of my life and I think she was happy seeing some parts of my younger self that had died with my racing career. I was too. I felt so much more free and myself again. I knew that quitting hadn't taken everything from me and I had learnt to love so many things after that, but it was still my first love.

I gave my mum a warm smile. There was a lot of things that we didn't agree and it had been a problem when I was younger. A big one, there was times that we just couldn't deal with each other, but we had learnt to respect those things and realized that we didn't have to be the same and it was okay not to see eye to eye in everything. And right now I felt like we were in a good place. 

"So when are you leaving?"

"This weekend" I nodded. "I was thinking that the guys could stay in our cottage?" I asked approval to my master idea. They wouldn't have to pay anything and they would get a great nature experience here in Finland. Just kidding, our cottage was like ten kilometres from our home and modern, so it was like a second home to us.

"That's a good idea" she agreed. "But let's eat now" she then rushed me to get my friends.

Walking into Vik's room, I found all five of them laughing at something. Leaning on the door frame looking at them, I smiled a real smile. It was just perfect. Even Emma was there looking all relaxed and part of the group just like my brother as well, and it really made me happy.