I swallow. “Yes.”
Cameron motions to my camera, cutting me off. “Quali on Saturday determines the order of the race on Sunday,” he tells the lens. “Fastest driver gets pole position—that’s the best spot up front. There are three sessions, knockout style, with the slower drivers eliminated as we go. Drive a fast lap, move on. Got it?”
“Got it.” No wonder Arthur had been in a good mood earlier. He gets to drive as fast as he’d like, surrounded by cheering fans.
“Here.” Cameron grabs a spare headphone set from his desk. “This’ll let you hear Arthur and me. We should be the only two on the radio, as long as Holmes doesn’t butt in.”
“Wait, the team principal can also—”
“Hold on.” He holds up two fingers, pausing me, listening to his headphones. “Sorry. Gotta go. Oh, and this.” He pulls a can of ginger ale out of thin air. “It’ll settle your stomach. My first race made me throw up.”
I smile, taking my gifts, and don’t bother pointing out that he was probably eleven at the time. After finding the only open chair in a back corner, I slip the headphones over my ears, ignore the uncomfortable pressure nipping at my glasses, and blink.
It’s… quiet.
Blissfully, perfectly quiet. Gone is the noise from the crowd and the music and the staff, canceled out completely by the headphones, leaving me with only Cameron’s and Arthur’s voices.
“How are you doing?” Cameron asks.
“God, it feels good,” Arthur replies, and it sounds like he’s saying that right into my ear. Slightly disoriented bythatparticular sensation, I shift my camera until it’s braced against my shoulder, then point the lens at Cameron’s back. The shot’s okay. Frames him nicely with the screen.
“It’s good to be back in the garage,” Cameron continues. “Life-affirming.”
“Try being back in a car,” Arthur laughs.
They talk like an old married couple. It’s kind of adorable. But then a deeper whine cuts through the headphones, the noise ricocheting off the grandstands, buildings, garage. The first car is out on the track. My eyes find a screen that shows a more aerial view of the pit lane, and I lock on to the image of Arthur’s dark orange single-seat car purring as he waits for his moment—his number 9 painted in white across the car’s angular nose, a praying mantis of an automobile.
“Think now’s the time,” Cameron says. “Ready?”
“Born,” Arthur answers.
Hold on, I think. This isn’t really happening. Arthur can’t compete in a race. He won’t take it seriously enough. He’s too much of a risk taker. This can’t be safe for him, or the mechanics, or any of the other drivers who are already out there, driving too fast for my liking—
Arthur’s out of the pit lane, and then his car springs forward so quickly that it rips the breath out of my lungs. I’ve never seen anything move that fast in my entire life. It’s like it vanishes out of existence.
No, not it.Him.
Out of nowhere, any remaining idea that I understand Arthur is whisked into the dirty air, left behind in his wake. That isn’t the snarky, temperamental man that I’ve argued with. That’s—he’s someone else. From behind the lens, I watch as Arthur guns each straight shot like a stallion down a single field of grass, barely braking enough to take the corners, the red light on the back of his car blinking off and on. I keep the camera on his spot on the screen around and around and around—and I get it, then. Why he’d asked me when the last time I felt alive was, on the first day we met, when I’d said Formula 1 is only about going fast.
Today, out there. In the car, in front of packed grandstands, on live TV.
Arthur isn’t just breathing or existing.
He’s alive.
Perhaps being addicted to this level of adrenaline isn’t healthy, but then he starts another, quicker lap, and he’s moving faster than a human being was ever meant to move. It must feel like a trade-off. He was already born into fame and chaos; if he goes fast enough, he can outrun that feeling, leave it in the dust. For a Formula 1 driver, physically outrunning your emotions might be possible.
An excited voice I don’t recognize fills my headphones. I think it’s somehow an announcer. “A whopping start from King as he’s back in the driver’s seat for Ignition Energy Drink Racing! Note here how Bianco’s on softs on this fresh Silverstone Circuit. It’s an audacious move from one of our favorite audacious drivers.”
Audacious? I lean forward, camera following, my pulse pounding. “In front of King is Jean Baudelaire for Leone Racing, and see how quickly Bianco is catching up to that honey-gold Leone lion,” the announcer buzzes. “We knew King would come out attacking, but if he catches up to his old teammate too fast, they both might end up in the grass.”
What? He’s right next to the gold blur on the screen.
“Don’t get too cocky,” Cameron says. His voice has switched tones from earlier. This Cameron is all concentration.
But then there’s Arthur, his short rumbling words in my ears. “We’ll see.” His voice is different, too. Concentrated and tight.
“Take Maggotts and Becketts like you want to live until tomorrow.”
