Will We Stand Still

Chapter 23

Marylinde sat in her car, staring ahead in disbelief. This had not just happened. She was not standing in the middle of the track, missing the entire rear of her car. Although that wasn't entirely true, she still had one rear tire attached to the car, but only by what seemed to be a string.

Again. Again it was a crash with Yuki. Who else could it have been? Every altercation or crash Marylinde was involved in, so was Yuki. Marylinde was yet to crash with any other driver since making her debut.

To make matters worse, they were in the final fifteen minutes of free practice three and Marylinde knew the extent of her damage would mean she would most likely be unable to participate in qualifying. She would have to start from the final place on the grid. If even being able to start from the grid and not the pitlane.

Her head couldn't gather the strength to see even the slightest bit of sunshine. It wasn't uncommon for engineers to perform a miracle. Even with the littlest of time, engineers could sometimes do a lot. Max for example had once crashed on the formation lap in Hungary but could start the race thanks to his engineers who had fixed the car in time and he finished the race in second.

Who knew what was possible for Marylinde.

"I'm fine," Marylinde said through gritted teeth. she was nothing less than furious with Yuki and couldn't help but let it out on Matthew by sneering at him. He had been asking at least three times already whether she was alright, but she hadn't answered. She immediately disconnected the radio. "Stay calm. Walk away from Yuki. The session is red-flagged, I can just walk over the track away from him." She told herself as she started to climb out of the car. She looked over in Yuki's direction and saw him looking right at her. She didn't need to see his face to see he was just as angry as she was. Everything else in his body gave it away: his clenched wrists, his tensed-up shoulders.

Marylinde turned around, away from Yuki. The last thing she needed was to get into a heated argument or throw hands.

The walk back to the pit lane took her a good ten minutes, even though she was walking at a high pace. Why did he have to crash into her at the back of the circuit? When she got to the garage, she got a couple of pads on her back from teammates but everyone knew not to say anything to agitate her even further. Or it would be most likely the last thing they would ever do.

Yuki however, did not share the sentiment as he stepped right in front of Marylinde. He had hopped on the back of a scooter and had arrived at the garage long before Marylinde had.

"Just step aside Yuki, there are cameras here and I am not going to let you blow all the fuses in front of them." But Yuki didn't care. He remained where he stood, anger written all over his face. "I will not repeat myself, Tsunoda," Marylinde said in a low voice making it almost sound like a growl.

"Why did you purposely crash into me?"He asked, arms crossed in front of his chest.

"For goodness sake! You were the one who ploughed your car in the back of mine."

"You stamped on the brakes!"

"I did not! I just didn't put my foot on the throttle!"

"You wanted for me to crash into you, didn't you. Just like you purposely kept me from setting a final qualifying round in Imola."

"To be fair, that was because someone was bitching about how he 'needed the tow or else they would get a bad result. I was in turn for a tow. We are in the same car! I needed it as much as you did. So no, I did not purposely try and make it so that you couldn't set a new lap, I wouldn't compromise the team like that, but I certainly did enjoy hearing you didn't get through because of it because you are a little whining bitch who behaves as a kid would do in his first year of go-karting. Not someone who has been in Formula One for more than one season."