#wanna take this one step further and intertwine my love of f1 into this but idk if that's too specific or not | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

starlightseb · 5 years

Text

life in the fast lane • dele

Word count: 1616

A/N: I wrote this piece a while ago and never really thought to publish it but I have reread it and actually enjoyed it so I thought I would share. fyi Flora is a completly fictional character who is a Formula One Racing Driver because we all want to live in a world where there is a female f1 racing driver 🤷🏽‍♀️

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Dele nervously rubbed his hands together as his girlfriend, Flora, approached him wearing her brightest smile. She was ecstatic at the fact that her boyfriend was finally able to make it to a race weekend and watch her do what she loves most: racing.

Dele, on the other hand, was nervous about the whole situation. He had never been to a grand prix before, he had never even watched a full race until he met Flora. On TV, the cars were not as loud, as quick or as dangerous as they looked in real life.

Flora had just completed her first practice session of the weekend where she ran a few race and qualifying simulations before the real competition starts the next day. Dele watched on from his little area in the garage, joined by two or three other people who he presumed were the family of Flora's teammate. Every so often, he would hear the cars wizzing past the main straight. He winced every time he heard that noise, thinking of the speed that the cars were going at. His eardrums were beginning to ring with the noise of it all, especially when Flora's teammate came in to change tyres and the engine started again.

A middle aged man wearing the familiar blue uniform, approached him with a wry smile.

"You should probably put these on, otherwise your ear drums will be ruined by the end of the day." He offered Dele a pair of headphones, decorated with the brand of the racing team on them.

"Oh, thanks." Dele gratefully accepted them and noticed just how much more pleasant it was with the headphones on.

"You wanna come see the cars?" The man asked, noticing that Dele was trying to get a peek of the cars going down the main straight through the garage,

"Okay?" Dele nodded unsure if he really wanted to witness the 300mph cars hurtling towards a corner but he just had to see.

He followed the man across the pitlane and onto the pitwall where Simon- Flora's race engineer who he met earlier- smiled at him. Dele nervously returned the smile before turning to the gap in the pitwall. The man gave him an encouraging smile, which drove Dele on to take a peek through the gap.

A pink car, which was more to be described as a pink smudge as it wizzed past Dele, make the ground shake slightly as it passed. He looked at the man, horrified.

"Flora is just coming around the final corner." The man leant close and shouted in Dele's ear.

Dele whipped his head around quick enough to see Flora flawlessly take the final corner and start to accelerate towards the end of the lap. His heart hammered in his chest as all he could picture was her car carrying that speed into the corner following the straight and heading straight towards the barriers and tyres.

However, it didn't. Instead it slowed down significantly and turned into the corner and out of Dele's sight. He breathed a sigh of relief and turned to the timing screens above him. Flora's name stood proud at the top.

"Looks like you were her lucky charm." The man giggled next to him.

Dele laughed awkwardly but he felt sick. Sick with nerves. He didn't realise just how dangerous this sport was. Sure, he had seen all the crashes on TV and it did make his heart beat a little bit faster whenever Flora attempted to overtake someone on track but witnessing these cars today, made it real to him. This wasn't just something that was made for TV, this was real and it could seriously injure someone if they just kept going at that speed.

So when Flora stepped out the car at the end of the session, all in one piece and still top of the timing sheets, Dele sighed a sigh of relief.

She took some time to talk to her engineers and her teammate before approaching her nervous looking boyfriend.

"Hey." she smiled at him, placing her helmet under her arm.

"Hi." Dele replied, forcing a fake smile.

Flora narrowed her eyes at him, noticing how uncomfortable he was. Instead of questioning in front of everyone, she gently placed her gloved hand on his arm.

"You want to come with me to my driver's room? I need to change out of this stupid race suit." Flora offered. Dele simply replied with a nod and followed Flora behind the garage and into her small driver's, which was still a little messy.

"Fancy catching some lunch before my next practice session?" Flora asked after she closed the door and placed her helmet on the little desk in her room.

"Sure." Dele sighed as he sat on the sofa and hugged the pillow to his chest. He hated the fact that she had to go back into that death machine again. He didn't know if he could cope with another two hours of worrying if she was going to hit the wall or not.

"You sound distant. What's up? The engineers weren’t bothering you with car stuff were they?” Flora removed her racing gloves and began to undo the top of her racing suit.

"No, I don't think most of them even noticed me. I just didn't realise what it was like." Dele sunk further into the sofa, feeling vulnerable and stupid for being this sensitive over Flora driving a race car.

Flora turned around and wrapped the sleeves of her race suit around her waist and placed her hand on her hip. "Realised what?" she frowned at him.

Dele put his head in his hands. "I hated seeing you drive that thing."

Flora looked taken a back and hurt by his words. She opened her mouth to speak but Dele cut her off, noticing her expression and feeling guilty.

"No, not like that," he persisted, sitting up straight and clamping his hands together for emphasis. "The cars are so quick and I- I'm scared you are going to get hurt." he mumbled the last part, staring at the floor.

Flora's face immediately softened as she picked up her helmet and sat down next to her boyfriend.

"Del?"

"Yeah?" Dele hesitantly looked up and stared at her.

"Try and punch this." She placed the helmet on his lap.

Dele looked at it strangely, then at Flora and back to the helmet before lightly hitting it with his fist.

"Oh come on. I know you're weak but you can punch harder than that." Flora teased before slamming her own fist against it.

Dele copied her actions and winced in pain as the helmet caused him more pain than he did to it. There was no scratch, no dent, nothing on the helmet to suggest that he just punched it. However, his knuckles were already red.

"Did you just want me to hurt myself?" Dele asked with a smirk, rubbing his knuckles slightly.

"Well yes," Flora laughed and took Dele's now 'injured' hand and lightly ran over the red knuckles with her hand. "but also because I wanted to show you how strong my helmet is. I'm safe as long as I have my helmet on. And you see these?"

With her free hand, Flora pulled out her balaclava from her helmet and gestured to the dark blue fabric covering the upper part of her body.

"There are fireproof so even if my car goes up in flames I will be fine."

Dele's face dropped at the mention of her car going up in flames. "It can go on fire?"

"Only if something goes horribly wrong with the engine but I can get out the car in seconds and the marshals will get the fire out as quick as possible." Flora reassured him, bringing his knuckles up to her lips and lightly pecking them.

"But what if you do get hurt?" Dele frowned as he asked the question, bringing their intertwined hands closer to him.

"If I get hurt, the medical car is always on standby and ready to come out. They will be there as soon as they know I am hurt and they are highly trained professionals so I will be in good hands." Flora explained. Dele nodded in understanding, feeling slightly better than before.

"I'm sorry." he mumbled, hugging the pillow close to his chest again.

"No, I'm sorry. I should have talked you through all this stuff before you came here. My parents had the same reaction when they saw me drive in a F1 car for the first time, and they watched me drive in the lower formulas for years. I should have known it would have been a massive shock for you." Flora gently runs her hand down Dele's arm.

"I just don't like you being in danger. I want to pull you out of that car when you are in it and hug you so that you won't end up in the wall." Dele pounted as he crawled closer to Flora and wrapped his arms around her.

“Del, I wouldn't. I'm a bit sweaty." Flora laughed as she tried to pry his arms off of her.

"You hug me all the time when I'm sweaty after games." Dele mumbled into her hair.

"Only briefly, plus I need to get changed right now so I can relieve my hungry stomach." Flora chuckled, hitting Dele's arm so he would move.

"Fine." Dele sang, finally letting her go. Just as Flora goes to stand up, Dele manages to grab ahold of her arm again. "Only if I get to watch you get changed."

Flora turned and looked at him, unimpressed. "Can I have sad and worried Dele back please?"

#football imagine #footballer imagine #dele imagine #dele alli imagine #spurs imagine

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