DEEP BREATHS | lando norris

CHAPTER 23

ILMA

"Vic?" I ask silently with my voice all shaky and uneven. My breath is making the little clouds in the cold air but I don't really feel the temperature right now. I don't feel anything at all to be honest. I feel numb. So numb. I almost don't feel the phone I'm handling in my hand.

"Where are you?" she asks me back, already sensing that something bad has happened. I need anybody right now actually. But I called her because she's the closest one for me. Lando is out of reach for me now. It's not possible for me to call him.

I give Vic the address and hear her telling me to stay on the line so she can calm me down and help me, escaping the panic attack. I breathe at the tempo she tells me to, listening to her calming voice but everything is so new. Feels like a bunch of new wounds that would be too hard to stich up. Fuck. I'm so stupid for letting him so close to me. I'm so, so, so uterly dumb.

I see Vic's Ferrari Pista 488 parking in front of the bench I was sitting on. She immidiately stops the car and gets out of it to help me. She wraps one of her hoodies around me and until that moment I hadn't realised how cold I was. I felt her comforting me as we walked together to her car. I took the passenger's seat, fastened my seatbelt and just started to cry again. I hear her getting on the driver's seat, starting the car and talking to me again. It's so late at night. I don't know what time it is actually.

"I'm so sorry if I woke you up." I start off with a stuttering voice but she cuts me off.

"Don't. I'm always here for you no matter what time it is or what happened. Want to tell me now or later?" she looks over at me for a short period of time because she has to keep her eyes on the road.

"Let's get to your place, please." it's all I manage to say but she understands me fully. We ride to her hotel with a silent Taylor Swift music in the background so we wouldn't be sitting in uncomfortable silence.

Vic reaches out for some shoes from the backseat and passes them to me. I change into them, being more than gratefull for her thinking of that. We both get out of her car and with her arm making me feel a little bit more safe and understood on my shoulder. We get into the elevator and later to her room, which she closes on the lock so nobody could get in. She passed me some oversized clothes to change into and waits for me on the bed.

As soon as I have changed and too my make up off I just go on the bed and hug her tightly. I hide my face in the material of her hoodie on her shoulder, while she caresses my back to comfort me and swings slightly from side to side.

"The best day of my life turned into my worst." I mutter, wiping my tears off wuth my hands. Vic passes me the tissues from somewhere but I don't know this hotel room at all yet.

"Whatever it was it's not your fault. I'm here to listen. If you don't want to talk it's also okay. I'm just here to support you, Ilma." she smiles a bit to make me feel even more comfortable.

"I have to tell you. I just have to..." I say in a bit louder voice as I gain the confidence again, even though I know that as soon as I will start telling the story I will cry again.

So I tell her it all. I tell her that we were in kind of good, friends with benefits, relationship. We kisses a few times, flirted but didn't really define the thing between us. Then I told her the weeks and a half that happened but it was rather chill. I started to get used to Fabio, start trusting him, slowly. I told her about the plane make out and hoe he acted differently.