Race day. Norah didn't feel the nerves she felt last race. All she seemed to feel was determination. She wanted payback for what had happened in F2 last year here.

She was racing in front of everyone, leading the race with a comfortable gap. She was ready to start the season on a good note, staying champion like the year before.

It was unfair, but Norah knew she would've to do good this season for any team to even consider her. If she was a boy she would probably already be racing in formula one, but she wasn't and the sad truth was that females and males weren't equal in this sport.

When a boy became champion his first season in F2 he would be promoted to F1, but being a female you, unfortunately, had to double prove yourself, so that was what Norah was doing. Proving herself to all the formula one teams that not choosing her last year was a great mistake.

However, she didn't start the season as a champion as she should have, because with only a handful of laps to go her engine began to stutter. Before coming to a full stop. She should have won the race. There was no denying she would have won that race, wasn't it for her car. There was a decent gap between her and the number two in the race- she wasn't sure if It was Norris or Russell.

The worst part of it all was that at the end of the season she only had seven points short to finishing as champion. Seven points she would have had if it wasn't for that race.

Starting seventh was great, especially because Lando was only in ninth position after Grosjean got a penalty for ruining his qualifying lap. Starting seventh gave Norah a weird sort of strength. She knew there was a big opportunity to get points here, even though the track in the dessert wasn't a place the McLaren was usually good at.

Norah listened with a half ear to her father's speech about scoring points, when he grabbed her wrist snapping her out of her thoughts.

"Are you even listening to me? You know how important this is!" Norah swallowed away the familiar feeling, it wasn't fear anymore it was acceptation. She knew exactly what was going to happen if she wasn't in the points after the checkered flag which only made her more determined.

However when her dad didn't let go and harshly yanked at her hand to get her closer to him her tears betrayed her, pooling up in her eyes ready to spill over. She steadied her breath looking at his feet before replying. "Uhm, yeah I know. I'm sorry."

"Sorry won't cut it if you mess up like you did last week." His words usually hurt more than his actions, but when he finally let go there was already forming a bruise. Norah automatically pulled her sleeve over her wrist to hide the blue hues.

The girl quickly nodded. Still not daring to look her father in the eye. Wiping away the tears forming in her eyes.

"I understand." She muttered.

"What was that?"

"I understand, dad." Norah repeated now louder upon feeling his cold glare. There was something about his demanding eyes. They had her frozen.

Today was the day she would prove that his barely existed trust in her was not misplaced. That she had the talent she needed to be successful in the sport.

Today was the day she would make her father proud.

Norah was barely an adult and her dad had still a lot of power over her. She had promised herself that when she turned eighteen she would leave her dad and never look back, but she couldn't. She just simply couldn't leave one of the two people she had left in her life. Even with him in her life, she felt lonely and she could barely imagine how it was without him in it.

It wasn't great having him in it, but not having him in it felt like it was impossible. Norah needed his validation. She needed him to be proud.

She needed him. Period.

Lando had watched the ordeal with a close eye. Totally giving up on listening to his engineer after a minute. From were Lando was standing it looked like a normal parent-daughter conversation. Merely a pep-talk for his beloved daughter.

This did something to the boy himself. His dad never came to visit his races anymore. He hadn't since a little after his first formula two race. He probably was too busy working anyway.

Little did he know that Norah wished her dad wouldn't be with her. She had started racing because her dad basically forced her to. She continued racing because she liked it. Though when her mom passed away in a car accident the last thing the girl wanted was to step in something 'similar' to what killed her mother.

Her dad wouldn't let her quit, told her she was too far in now. That she simply couldn't, because if she did all the extra shifts he and his wife had taken for her would go to waste. He played on her guilt.

Ever since the girl hadn't enjoyed racing as much as she used to. She hoped that when she turned eighteen her father would let her be an adult, would stop interfering with her life, but that wasn't the case. If anything he kept a closer eye on her to make sure she wouldn't tear apart her contract.

Despite being an adult the girl still felt like she was seven. When her dad would scream drunken words at her at the top of his lungs. She simply couldn't escape his grasp.

Sitting in her car only reminded Norah of the carefree times she had as a kid. Enjoying karting while her mother was excitedly cheering her on. She missed her. Sitting in her car, she was sitting in her car and if she didn't snap out of it she wouldn't get points. She needed points. She needed him to be proud.

When her father let her go she had a total of two and a half minutes before she had to be in the car. When she glanced over to the cars on the grid she could see how almost every driver was already seated in theirs or busy getting into it.

Norah scurried over to her car and put on her helmet and gloves, before practically jumping into her car. Her engineer could be heard over the board radio.

"Okay, we know we're not as competitive here, but nonetheless were hoping for some points. Please be careful, we want our car to come home. We're on strategy 'B' we'll let you know if anything changes. Focus on defending the good position your already in."

"Copy"

After the formation lap, the girl rolled her car in place, taking a quick glance in her mirrors to see the orange car of Lando. She was going to do this, she was going to beat him.

One by one the lights turned on, before switching off altogether. Norah's start was like she was used to it, better than anyone else's. She wasn't planning on overtaking someone at the start, but Magnussen didn't expect the rookie to have such a good start and didn't even defend as she sped past him.

He tried to get the position back, but soon enough was under attack from his teammate and abandoned the fight.

She was in P6

"Nice one, keep your head down. Focus on maintaining the position, please."

"Yep, will do"

The car felt amazing. She no longer felt like a mid-fielder as she got closer to the Red Bull of Max Verstappen. She knew he was known to be some sort of a risk-taker, but even she could see he had changed and matured.

She quickly looked into her mirrors to see if she was under threat of anyone and was pleasantly surprised to see she had at least a two-second gap.

She was getting closer and closer to the rear of the Red Bull. The girl knew she promised she wasn't going to take any risks, but the girl had a racing spirit. If she even had the slight possibility of overtaking someone she was going to try.

Norah was within a second of the Dutchman now and kept pulling closer and at the end of the long straight, she put her car alongside his. Driving around the outside she slightly out-braked him. Giving her the opportunity to pull away by just a little. She was now in front of him, but definitely not save.

On the next straight he would have DRS on her and she doubted she could take him, an experienced formula one driver, on. She tried though. This time she had the inside line, bumping wheels on an occasion, but nothing was damaged. This was the fair racing she enjoyed. Good competition.

Max had a better exit and started pulling away again. She was still within a second though and she was persistent. So in the next DRS zone, everything repeated itself again and she was in front. This probably happened another three times until her softer tyres were graining away and she had to let him go.

Despite giving him back the fifth position the girl was satisfied, that was until a familiar orange car appeared in her mirrors.

-
I'm splitting the race in two because it'll be too long otherwise :3

I just wrote the last chapter, I'm debating on posting it just all in once, but like nah. yk? 

Fun fact: with my original posting schedule this wouldn't have been published until 04/06 hehe. (That's frikking june) 

Word count: 1603  
Publish date: 15/05/2019