Lights Out • 1 • Formula One ✔️

Chapter 110

I love Charles Marc Hervé Percival Leclerc and I never want to stop saying it. I would scream it from the rooftops, for all of Brazil (and the world) to hear, if I hadn't had lost my voice the day before the first practice session. The sore throat even continued into the Friday and it didn't go unnoticed by the rest of the paddock.

One of the main culprits for the constant pestering and teasing was of course Max. Charles had told Pierre, who felt inclined to tell the Dutchman for 'humour purposes, mon petit navet'. I was too grumpy about the fact that I could potentially be coming down with an illness to see the funny side of things after the third jab. Most of the drivers whom I was friendly with seemed to find the whole situation hilarious, my future teammate especially. At every comment, he was howling with laughter. Whenever I tried to speak, he made sure to imitate my squeak over-dramatically. Max was much worse, though.

In addition to the mocking and pestering, Max brought it upon himself to theorise all of the ways that I could've gotten a sore throat and lost my voice. Not all of his theorise were PG (everyone enjoyed those ones, in particular).

"Maybe an all-powerful being answered my prayers and finally shut you up?" Max teased, nudging my side with his elbow as the others drivers filed in for our evening meeting. It was a get-together onsite so that we could discuss the track and whether there were any issues that should be brought forward to the FIA about racing conditions. This was far more informal than any debriefing session and it often ended with me feeling significantly better about the rest of the weekend.

"You're a dick," is what I attempted to stay, but it came out as a mixture of squeak and air. Max, knowing full well what I had said (or at least implied), cupped his hand around his ear and leaned closer.

"Hmmm? What was that? Did you say you lost your voice after sucking Charles's-" I clamped my hand tightly over his mouth to halt his sentence with a scowl on my face. This boy knew exactly how to push all of my buttons. Charles just sat in the row ahead of us and turned with an amused smile on his face. His mood seemed to have improved since we confessed our feelings for each other, especially his attitude towards Max.

I was about to reply, but Esteban took a seat on my other side. "Oi! You're supposed to be resting your voice, culotté." I inhaled deeply, knowing that he was right. I needed my voice to speak over the team radio. The practice session I had today only proved that my voice was important as it made giving data that technology couldn't pick up extremely challenging. There was a lot of guess work on Emanuel's behalf to try and interpret my squeaks which were altered by the usual voice distortion.

To be honestly, there wasn't much point being at this meeting since I wasn't able to talk. It was mostly just to get a chance to see where other people were having issues and if I experienced anything similar. For me, I found that the curb at turn two seemed a bit higher than previous seasons, and I had lost a small bit of front wing to it when I turned in a little too sharply. Although it probably wouldn't be an issue during the practice sessions and qualifying, if you happen to be battling during the race at that spot, sudden understeer from a damaged front wing can be costly.

For the meeting, we sat with our teammates. The plastic chairs weren't the most comfortable things to sit on however we were banned from using wheelie office chairs after an incident before I had arrived in the sport. Apparently it involved Sebastian Vettel and Daniel Ricciardo racing each other through the paddock and breaking almost ten thousand pounds worth of equipment. The stuff of legends.

"Is everyone here?" Lewis asked, standing up from his seat to scan the small room. He nodded in satisfaction after muttering up to twenty under his breath and walked to the large whiteboard at the front of the room. "Cool. Would anyone like to start?"