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Chapter Forty-Three

Darien

A fter the break, it’s no secret I’d rather be with Shantal the entire weekend than sit in the car and lock in for my drives.

Spa week is a test. Now, Shantal’s workload has lightened significantly, and it’s mine that’s gotten heavier. I dart around doing promos, meetings, briefings on the probability of all kinds of Championship outcomes and what I need to do to get there, interviews, car checks, you name it. The last time we spent more than ten minutes together, alone, was probably at the karting track in Rio. I text her whenever I get a second, feel the tingle of anticipation in my stomach when my phone vibrates in return, hide a smile in whatever meeting I’m sitting through. But it’s not comparable to having her by my side during it all.

And then, with less than twenty-four hours till race weekend, I realize that with a little elbow grease and a lot of roping in my mechanics, there may just be a way that’s possible.

It takes us a good part of the night before the qualifier in Spa-Francorchamps to get everything together, but we get it done, and at some point I practically pass out from exhaustion. Next morning, I’m up bright and early for practice, shovelling waffles in my mouth at Hospitality before heading down to the track.

I find Shantal on the pit wall as usual, already looking through projections for the weather with Afonso. My hands are literally shaking, I’m so nervous. What if she doesn’t like it? What if it’s too much? What if I’m—

‘Darien!’ She turns to me with a bright smile. She looks a lot better than I do: better rested, tribute to her stringent schedule. She’s wearing a black skirt and the usual team shirt, her hair pulled into a tiny ponytail at the back of her head. ‘Look. The temperature is brilliant today.’

Afonso shifts the monitor my way, and I let out a low whistle. She’s right – the numbers look just comfy enough to drive with minimal deg, which means we can allow ourselves a pretty lax tyre strategy for the day.

Okay. I’m distracting myself from the task at hand. Get it together, Dar .

I swallow hard. ‘Uh, Shantal. I wanted to … wanted to show you something?’

She hops out of her chair with a look of curiosity. ‘Oh, am I excited. I hope this isn’t another pit barbecue, you know. It’s far too cold here for that.’

‘I promise, it’s not.’ We walk into my garage, where the car sits on its own, still no crew to be seen. It’s fairly early, but I’ve gotten everything in order.

I reach across her to the tool cabinets and grab my steering from the top of one of them where I’ve haphazardly perched it. I don’t know exactly what to say, so I hand her the entire thing.

‘Wha …’ Shantal’s confusion turns to concentration when she turns it around, to the spot on the back of drivers’ wheels where there is usually a name and number over the glossy carbon fibre. Here, I’ve decided to leave out my name. I’ve written hers. Shantal is printed across the steering in easy, loose cursive. Her cursive, ripped from a photo taken back at the start of the season, when she’d signed her name on my copy in shimmering silver Sharpie marker.

She runs a slim finger over the swoops and curls in each letter. Her eyes flick up to mine, full of burgeoning tears. ‘What is this?’

‘Oh, man, Shantal, I didn’t mean to make you … don’t cry,’ I plead, taking her face in my hands. ‘I’m sorry, I’m—’

‘You do so much for me,’ she whispers, still clutching my steering wheel. ‘No one has ever … Why do you do it, Darien?’

‘Because you’ve already done so much for me.’ I feel my own eyes starting to go watery, my own chest tightening. ‘Listen, Shantal, I want you to know that this is all my cards on the table. You stuck with me through every second of that hellish recovery. I’ve never met anyone so loyal, so radiant. I’ve gotten to watch you come out of your shell, to watch you smile again. I’ve learned just how strong you are. And to tell you the truth, I’m in disbelief. I’m telling you, I can say all these things, but I’m going to pull through. So I want you to drive with me.’ I brush my thumb across her cheek to push away an errant droplet, and I tap the cursive script on the steering wheel. ‘Every lap.’

I don’t know what I expect, but Shantal sets the steering back on the cabinet, leans in and presses her lips to mine. It’s all my answers; it’s everything I need to know. She pulls away, and she hugs me tight, and I hear every single word when she says quietly, ‘That would be my honour.’

Getting into the car, I feel the kind of euphoria I’ve never, ever felt behind the wheel before. My fingers brush Shantal’s name on the steering, and a new kind of motivation, something bigger than myself, fills my body. I drive not because I have something to prove, not because there is a pay cheque at stake, but because this is one of the first things I ever learned to love.

I win at Spa on Sunday.

My fastest lap time, 1:45.348, is an all-time track record.

I’ve never driven like that in my life.