The girl looked into her mirrors to make sure she saw it right, but there was no way she could be mistaken. There was only one team that had a bright orange car and that was hers. This meant it was her teammate that was catching up with her.

They both hadn't pitted yet and she just prayed the team would get her in first. Preferably before he had caught up with her.

Norah had to defend from the boy for two laps, barely managing to keep him behind when the freeing words finally came over the board radio.

"Okay, box this lap, box this lap."

Norah let out a relieved sigh as she drove into the pits, just before the boy could overtake her. The stop was fast and before she knew it she was ready to race again, with fresh tyres under her car.

Lando must have been struggling with his tyres as well because she came out of the pits right behind him.

Despite knowing she could challenge him for a position she didn't. It was a wiser decision to warm up her tyres properly first, besides that the boy would be in the pits in no time anyway and with her fresher tyres she could drive towards the number five.

The girl had indeed charged towards the Red Bull that was now in fifth place, but had to spare her tyres. This allowed the British boy that was currently in P7 to show up behind her for the second time that race.

Norah was struggling, her tyres were basically gone and Lando didn't seem to have the same problems.

He wanted that sixth place just as bad as she did and he was going to get it too. He dove to the inside line. Norah had to steer away from him to avoid crashing into him and barely made the corner. What the hell?

He was in front of her.

"Shit!" Her exit sucked because of the de-tour she had to make, but somehow stuck close behind him. He was defending the inside line aggressively so if she wanted to pass him she had to go around the outside.

She could do this.

She had done this a million times. Lando always was protective over the inside line, so if there was anything Norah was good at it was overtaking around the outside.

She took a deep breath, before braking as late as possible. The corner was almost cut, but she managed to get past him. However, he was still in DRS range and she'd had this game with Max already. His tyres were newer and she knew she wasn't going to be able to keep doing this until the finish line. "Well, fuck me."

The boy was closing in on her with his DRS when a yellow light started flashing on her steering wheel. She automatically reduced her speed and started grinning.

She made it, she fucking made it. There in the gravel stood to beautiful yellow cars, if she could kiss both drivers right now she would. She wasn't sure if they had collided or not, but frankly, she didn't care.

There was no way they could get two cars out of the way before the end of the remaining laps, but the blissful feeling went away when she looked at the cars. They weren't damaged. They had an engine failure and guess what. She had the same engine as them.

Norah just hoped her car wouldn't go down to have the same fate as theirs.

-

"Yes, yes, yes. Oh my god. I did it! We did it!"

"Haha, you got it kid. Congratulations!"

She looked to the side to see Lando driving next to her. He gave her a thumbs up with a nod of his head. She returned the gesture with the biggest grin ever present on her face.

Norah finished in P6 in a car that barely was able to get into the points and she did it all on her own and upon that out-performed her teammate. She was satisfied. The girl was proud of her performance, proud of herself. If only her dad would be too.

Climbing out of the car she quickly looked around but was left disappointed when her father was nowhere to be seen. With a frown, she pulled off her helmet. Where was he?

Norah scoffed when he saw him sitting at the bar in their hospitality and put her helmet down harshly.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me." Slowly she pulled off her gloves, eyes still fixed on her dad who was talking with the bartender, probably drunk after drinking for the entire race.

Her eyes moved to the somewhat smaller boy standing in front of her. When she felt a tap on her shoulder.

"You were really good, congratulations." Lando softly smiled at the girl while sticking his hand out.

"Thanks, you weren't so bad yourself." Norah grinned, shaking his hand to accept his congratulation.

"Oh, I know I was amazi- oh my god, what happened to your wrist?" The boy grabbed her arm carefully to study the painfully present bruise.

"W-what? Oh, it got trapped between the door." Norah quickly pulled back her hand and pulled her sleeve over her bruises. As she tried to hide the clear hand shape of the bruise. 

"How did you manage to do that?" Lando smirked. "I knew you were a klutz, but that's just simply dumb."

The girl looked at her feet and let out a forced laugh "Yeah, hehe"

"Wait, hey! Did you just call me dumb?"

Lando shrugged. "Guess I did, what are you going to do about it?"

Walking backwards following his PR officer he smirked. Clearly satisfied with successfully annoying Norah. The girl shook her head while smiling at herself, maybe he wasn't that bad?

"What are you doing?" the Brit's head snapped up, frozen in her track she looked at the all too familiar shoes of her dad. His cold voice was enough to send shivers down her spine.

"Nothing..." She could smell the booze coming from his mouth from where she was standing. Her suspicion was confirmed by that. He hadn't even seen her race. He was too busy throwing alcohol down his throat.

Knowing her father was drunk and didn't see how well she did made her nervous. The lines usually became extra blurry when he was drunk.

"Well, better get going than huh? We don't want you to make a bad impression with the press, do we?"

He was so close now that the intensity of the smell made nauseous. Made her hold her breath, desperate to avoid the all too familiar smell. She closed her eyes shut as her legs started to feel like they could buckle from underneath her every second.

"No, I'm sorry dad."

The girl opened her eyes again when the smell started to fade and let out the breath she was holding. A soft sob escaped her throat as her legs finally gave in. she prepared herself for the hit to the cold hard pavement, but it never came. Instead, someone caught her.

"Wow, you're alright?"

Norah wasn't. Norah was everything but alright at that moment, so the only sensible thing to do was to throw her arms around the person and sob, cry her eyes out and not caring about anything around her. She wasn't even sure in whose arms she was. She just needed to get it out after pretending to be fine for too long.

"Uhm, okay..." He wrapped his arms around her looking up at his PR officer mouthing 'help' before rubbing her back. Luckily it happened at a quiet part of the track without any cameras near or they both had some explaining to do.

"I'm sorry I'm la- Oh my god, Norah?" Bryan crouched down to her level, sending an apologetic look at the driver and his PR officer.

"Hey, kid, little one, I need you to calm down okay. It's going to be fine. Just let go of Charles, please. He needs to go to his interviews"

-

She was so happy smh :(

for everyone that isn't catching on. Norah's father is both physically, but mostly mentally abusive. Norah is afraid of her father, but the fear of being alone is larger and that's the reason she stays with him even after turning eighteen. Both have their reasons ( I'm not saying any excuse is valid when abbusing someone) and you'll find out eventually, if you can't wait I do have a Book that's called 'meet the people' in which I give you some intell on my Original characters ( It may contain spoilers tho) 

word count: 1459 
publish date: 15/05/2019