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Was it a particularly good race for Charles? No. But it was a good race for Lewis and as a result a good race for the team, so they had decided to go out for drinks; a celebration for Lewis, maybe a consolation for Charles.
It was too cold out in Montreal for any of Charles’ usual shirts that he wears so he slipped a hoodie on with his usual jeans. Lewis was dressed better than him but Charles was too cold to worry about that anyway. The club is as packed as it can be on a Sunday night when the group finally makes it inside. Charles beelines for the bar while the rest spot people they know from the other teams and go over to say hi.
“A vodka soda, please.”
The bartender takes in Charles’ request with a slight hint of amusement. Perhaps he recognises Charles and watched the race and so now is putting two and two together as he prepares the drink. It shows up in front of him five minutes later.
“Plain vodka soda?” a deep voice to Charles’ left says. “Somebody had a bad day.”
It’s a man, Charles registers in the dim lights. He has curly hair and is wearing a smirk on his face like he’s able to read Charles perfectly.
“You could say so.” Charles takes another sip of his drink. It does not taste very good but that’s not something Charles is after tonight anyway. He just needs to get through the night, hopefully get drunk enough to pass out, then catch his flight back to Monaco in the morning.
The bartender places two drinks in front of the strange man then. The strange, curly-haired man thanks the bartender as he picks up both glasses. “I would stay and ask but I cannot leave my husband alone so I will have to go. I hope the vodka helps.” Charles nods in response as the man walks away, smiling at someone in the crowd.
Must be nice, Charles thinks as half his drink disappears, to have someone to love like that. Charles didn’t have anyone with him there, that’s why he’s sitting alone at this bar drinking his sorrows away. The voice in the back of his head tells him this isn’t very healthy but who cares, Charles is allowed a light dose of wallowing before slipping back into his uber-optimistic mindset.
He orders another drink—a gin and tonic this time. He sips on it as he scrolls through his phone, looking at updates posted by other people. And because he is feeling slightly self-destructive tonight, he pops over to Twitter as well. As expected, there are people criticising his moves during the race, demanding to know why he was so far behind his teammate who scored a podium, why he’d been so weak all weekend. He scrolled and also saw a number of tweets from people defending the kind of race he had, stating how it was the best possible result this weekend. The alcohol in his bloodstream however makes him more inclined to side with the ones calling him trash. He hears another voice to his right, but this one makes him pause.
Someone’s speaking in French.
Either the one and a half drinks Charles has had have gone straight to his head and he is now hallucinating French in his vicinity, or he has somehow teleported to Monaco. Is this Jimmyz? Are they already in Monaco? Wait, did the Monaco Grand Prix already happen?
“Hey, are you alright?”
Charles blinks and the man’s face comes into focus. His eyes are soft, and he has many, many freckles on his face. Ooh, is the first reaction that Charles’ alcohol addled brain gives.
“You speak in French or was I hallucinating?” Charles blurts out in French even though the man clearly spoke to him in English. Of course Charles was just hallucinating French.
The freckled-man laughs softly. “Don’t worry, I was speaking in French.” Well that’s a relief for Charles.
“I swear I am not that drunk, but I felt it was better to check just in case.”
“Yes, of course.” The man pauses then as he takes Charles in. “Do I know you from somewhere? You look familiar.”
Ah, yes. The classic ‘I think I have seen you somewhere’ line that people use to pretend like they don’t know exactly who Charles is. It’s a Grand Prix weekend too, of course.
“No, I don’t think we’ve met,” Charles replies. The freckled-man doesn’t take his eyes off Charles though. It’s another ten seconds before something seems to click for him,
“Oh wait, are you a Formula 1 pilot?”
Though Charles has heard many versions of that fake realisation before, it sounds convincingly genuine this time.
“Yes. We had a Grand Prix here today.”
“Yes! I saw you on the TVs in here! Are you Charles?”
Charles nods and smiles. “Yes. Nice to meet you. Are you a fan?”
The freckled man slips into the seat across from Charles. “No, sorry. I don’t really watch any motorsports. My husband, though, loves cars and so I recognised the names Ferrari and McLaren. We came here with our friends a couple hours ago and they were playing the race on the TV so I was kinda following along. I think the Mclaren’s got eliminated? So after that I was just watching the red cars.”
Great. Someone’s first impression of him is one of the worst races he’s had in years. “I apologise, I wasn’t very entertaining today.”
The freckled-man chuckles. “Oh it’s alright. I don’t understand the sport anyway. You could’ve told me that you somehow won and I would’ve still believed you.”
Charles shrugs as he downs the last bit of his gin tonic. The man turns to the bartender in the meanwhile and asks about some drinks. The ones he ordered, probably. Charles also orders another gin tonic.
“You said you are here with friends?” Charles asks the freckled-man just to continue the conversation. He doesn’t really mind now if this is some fan who is pretending, he just feels nice to talk in French.
“Oh, yes. It was my turn to get the drinks.”
“Oh. I shouldn’t keep you then.”
“No, no you’re fine. It feels nice to be able to use my French, you know? My friends and husband mostly talk in English, though my husband sometimes also talks in Russian. Not a lot of French though.”
“Well I am glad to be of service then. Although if you’re looking at me and thinking that I am French then let me correct you. I am Monegasque.”
The freckled-man squints and tilts his head. “So you’re from…”
“Monaco,” Charles finishes the sentence for him and the freckled-man makes a sound of recognition.
“So you are native then? Didn’t move there for the yachts and the tax-free life?”
It makes Charles laugh. “No, no. People still think I did even though me and my family are native to the country.”
The bartender interrupts their conversation then as he brings the freckled-man’s tray of drinks. The freckled-man, however, is more interested in the conversation. Charles should ask the freckled-man his name at some point.
“I’m sorry, I never asked you your name,”
“Oh, it’s Shane. Shane Hollander.”
“I am Charles Leclerc,” he says as Shane shakes his hand.
They talk a little more. Charles finds out that Shane isn’t just some random fan and is actually a very serious and very accomplished hockey player, and then apologises for not knowing who Shane is because he doesn’t really keep up with a lot of normal sports. Shane, thankfully, laughs it off.
They don’t realise how long they’ve been talking and are in the middle of sharing funny stories about their respective dogs when someone clears their throat very loudly. Both Shane and Charles turn their heads in the direction where the sound came from. It’s the curly haired man from earlier in the night.
He says something to Shane in a language Charles can’t quite pick up and then in English, asks if Shane is going to come back to their table.
“Sorry, I was talking to Charles here and forgot about the drinks.” He then turns to Charles with a wide smile, points to the curly haired man and says, “Charles, this is Ilya, my husband.”
Charles is a polite man so he holds his hand out to greet Ilya. But Ilya does not take his hand. Instead, he responds with a flat, “Nice to meet you.”
“Charles here was telling me about his collection of cars. I think you two will have a lot to discuss about that,” Shane continues with a hint of excitement in his voice as Ilya continues to stare at Charles. “Did you know some of Charles’ old F1 cars are displayed in the Prince of Monaco’s collection?”
“Hmm, good. But we should go now, Shane. Sveta wants to leave soon so we should go say bye.”
Whoever this Sveta is, the news of her departure seems to be very serious judging by the expression on Shane’s face, who immediately stands up. “I’ll have to go now, but it was really nice meeting you,” Shane says with a genuine smile. “I’ll ask my mom, maybe she can even get me into your garage as a guest for a race weekend some time.”
Charles does not mind the idea as much as he thought he might. “That sounds great. I can talk to my team as well about it. It will be nice.”
“See you around then. And good luck for your next race! I’ll watch if I can.”
Ilya practically drags Shane away from the bar, continuing to stare daggers at Charles as they both walk away. Strange.
—
The hangover isn’t as bad as Charles thought it would be. He drags himself out of bed on the fifth alarm, and orders a good, greasy breakfast on room service before looking through his notifications. Out of all, there are a few notifications of Instagram DMs which catch his eye.
Ilya Rozanov
ilyaroz81
stay away from my shane
he is married yes?
happily married
to me
Charles blinks a couple of times just to make sure he’s reading he message right.
Ilya Rozanov
ilyaroz81
stay away from my shane
he is married yes?
happily married
to me
um, good?
i’m happy for you?
Charles is about to exit the app when the typing bubble pops up.
Ilya Rozanov
ilyaroz81
stay away from my shane
he is married yes?
happily married
to me
um, good?
i’m happy for you?
yes we are very happy
so do not get any ideas in your french brain
mate i’m monegasque, not french
whatever
you speak french so you are french
??
your husband also speaks french?
does that make him french too?
no my shanya is perfect
he is not like you
evil french
mate it is way too early for this right now
and i am hungover
i am not french
and i am not interested in your husband
if that is what you’re insinuating
you ask him out on date yesterday
i don’t think i did?
yes
said you will invite to race
he told me later
as a friend? not on a date?
you can come too if you like?
yes i will
cannot trust my beautiful shanya around you
evil french man
please stop calling me french i will throw up
good
???
what did i even do to you?
nothing yet
but i will be watching you
charles marc hervé perceval leclerc
your name is long and stupid by the way
what did you stalk me overnight?
is research
very important
ok
well i’m gonna go now
my breakfast is here
pls be assured that i am not trying to steal your husband
good
do not try
i will not let you
got it 👍
There are thankfully no more texts. Charles locks his phone before dropping it on the bed. What an odd, odd interaction.