#i need to visit the netherlands

[twyftwyt]

i’m trying to be normal about this photo…

credit to: parasite_ash on tiktok

[theemporium]

[4.1k] when a last minute team meeting takes them to amsterdam, lando decides to take the opportunity to see what his teammate is like under the influence. (smut)

part two to this blurb that spiralled into landoscar smut somehow

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It happened in Amsterdam. 

With a new sponsor on the rise and the team desperate to lock down the deal before the new season started, Lando and Oscar were asked to fly out to the Netherlands a few weeks before the car launch. It put a small damper on both men’s winter break plans, the last few days of freedom they had before they dived into work mode for the new season—but ultimately, neither boy complained. 

Oscar had felt bad for having to cancel your plans, knowing how excited you were about planning a few days for the two of you to spend some time alone together—away from the world, away from everyone. In all honesty, it was what he was looking forward to the most. He knew Formula One was different, that he would be busier than he ever had been in his life, but it never prepared him to be away from you for so long. 

So yeah, he was pretty fucking bummed about having to cut the trip out of his plans but he invited you with him to Amsterdam in hopes the two of you could make the best out of a bad situation. 

After all, Zak had only wanted them for a day or two, to just sit in meetings and play up some charm and confidence to give the sponsor the last push they needed to sign the deal with McLaren.

And, by some luck you swore was from a higher power, the deal had been negotiated and signed after a very long, tedious meeting. 

But Oscar didn’t complain, he couldn’t complain when it meant that he would have more time alone with you in a country he never really had the chance to explore beyond the race tracks and most famous sites.

It just seemed like Lando had a similar idea.

“I got the perfect place to check out,” Lando insisted as they walked out of the busy office building they had been stuck in for the last few hours. “Martin recommended it, said it was insane and a necessity to check out when we were in the city.”

Oscar tugged uncomfortably at the collar of his shirt, but the boy’s words had him intrigued. “And he’s never taken you before?” 

“Said it was best to visit in the off-season,” Lando replied, and the smile spread across his face did little to reassure Oscar’s suspicions about the mysterious place. “Bring your girl too! She will love it, Oscar. You both will.”

He raised his brows. “And you’re not going to tell me?”

“Be a little adventurous, Piastri,” his teammate teased, lightly nudging his shoulder as they headed towards their team-appointed cars. “Dress nice. We leave at eight.”

“I haven’t even agreed to anything,” Oscar pointed out, but the Brit didn’t seem all too bothered as he waved his teammate off before climbing into his car. 

Truthfully, it shouldn’t have surprised Oscar that you were up for the night out. Lando’s mysterious words intrigued you as much as they intrigued him, and you both trusted Lando enough that he wouldn’t be stupid enough to drag you somewhere dodgy. Hopefully. 

So, Oscar tried to push away the voice in the back of his head that said he should have asked more questions. He was a Formula One driver, he was used to control, he was used to always being the one in charge of his own fate. It felt weird to leave everything in the hands of Lando, even if he trusted his teammate more than he did with most people in his life. 

“Relax,” you murmured to him as you stepped between his legs, your hands resting on his shoulders as he waited for Lando to message he was waiting downstairs. “It’s one night.”

“I know, I’m excited,” Oscar answered honestly as his hands rested on the back of your thighs, trying not to think about the pretty, little dress you had slipped on for the night. He could have sworn he had never seen it before. A part of him was tempted to cancel the whole night and stay in to truly appreciate the dress. “It’s just the idea of Lando being in charge of everything…”

“Hm, you say that as though you don’t worship the ground he walks on,” you teased, smiling in amusement at the way his cheeks burned pink.

“I do not!” Oscar grumbled, but he was smiling back. “Okay, I do a little. But it’s Lando…he’s my first teammate in Formula One. He is just—”

“I know,” you murmured with a smile, leaning down to peck his lips. “And he cares about you. So relax and trust the fact that he was excited to check this place out with you.” 

The place in question—the one that Martin insisted Lando needed to check out—turned out to be something straight out of a Bond movie. 

Oscar hadn’t even managed to catch the name when Lando had muttered it to their driver, a giddy smile on his face as he turned back to look at you and Osacr in the back seat. He was excited, buzzing in his seat as he rambled off about random topics could barely even keep up with as he watched the city pass by in a blink through the window. 

It was an exclusive club, not very well-known but a local treasure to those who knew of it. One of those places in movies where you knocked on a steel door and grumbled out a password. The kind of places that you expected to feel dodgy and cautious and like you were making the biggest mistake for stepping into the establishment. One of those places that two high-profile athletes should definitely never be caught in. 

But Lando just turned to him, that stupidly huge grin on his face as he threw an arm over his shoulder and dragged him inside. 

“Relax, Piastri, nobody is gonna care who you are in here!”

And honestly, the thought shouldn’t have been as appealing as it was to him.

But despite the many warnings he received about stepping up as a Formula One driver, Oscar never really wrapped his head around how famous he was. He had his fair share of internet spotlight on him throughout his career, he was used to being recognised every once in a while. But being a Formula One driver—a McLaren one, nonetheless—was a whole new level.

People stopped him in the streets and asked for photos. His face was blasted on huge posters in airports and cities he hadn’t visited before. Every aspect of his life was constantly under a microscope now. He had fans and followers all around the world, not just from his home country. He had a level of fame he couldn’t even conceptualise. 

He had a level of fame he wasn’t even sure he wanted. 

His whole life he just wanted to drive. He just wanted to get behind the wheel and achieve the dream he had been chasing after since he was a young boy. He just wanted to do what he loved, what he had been passionate about since before he could even remember. 

It just came in a package deal with having more attention that he preferred, so the very idea of stepping foot into this exclusive club and nobody caring he was Oscar Piastri? Yeah, that sounded really fucking good.

Your arm wrapped around his biceps as you followed the Brit deeper into the club. It was dark—darker than a usual club—with red-tinted lights surrounding the place, adding a soft hue that was just enough to see a few steps ahead of you. The music thumped through the building, like the bass lived in the walls as it sounded throughout the place. 

There was no bar. And the dance floor wasn’t really a dance floor. It felt like a stage, placed right in the middle of the room for people to ogle and observe. The whole place was surrounded in these dimly lit booths, large enough that they almost felt like a room. 

The whole place was fucking weird and nothing like he expected. 

And maybe that was what thrilled Oscar about the whole situation. 

“Where do we order our drinks?” He had asked as they made their way to the far left corner, the furthest place from the door. The surrounding booths were empty but Lando still chose the one right in the corner as he flopped down onto the large cushioned sofas. 

He watched as you and Oscar took the seat across from him as he grinned. 

Oscar raised his brows. 

“We are in fucking Amsterdam,” Lando snorted, something glinting in his eyes that even the dim, red lights seemed to pick up. “You don’t come here to get shit-faced drunk, Oscar.”

You laughed, shaking your head. “You brought us to your dodgy club to get stoned?”

“Best in the city, baby,” Lando said, the smile on his face widening as he leaned back against the cushions, comfortable and settled with his legs spread a little wider than he usually would. “A little birdie told me Oscar was the kind of man you wanted to smoke with.”

Oscar raised his brows. “You sound surprised by that.”

“Let’s just say there aren’t many sides to you that I don’t think I’ve already seen,” Lando answered with a simple shrug before he raised his hand, catching the attention of a waitress Oscar didn’t even notice was walking by.

And maybe it was immoral. Or sneaky. Or whatever you wanted to call it. 

Maybe it wasn’t the most truthful way to experience it but Lando Norris was a fucking curious man and the opportunity fell right into the palm of his hand. Because Logan Sargeant’s words had been ringing in his head like a loop since that night in the club, his eyes being opened to a whole new side of his younger teammate and he wanted to see more. 

He wanted to know who Oscar Piastri was under all the layers he seemed to put up when he was sober.

And with the team dragging them to Amsterdam and Martin having told him about this club with the assurance that it suddenly wouldn’t be plastered over the front page in the morning that they were indulging in recreational drugs before the season started…well, Lando couldn’t just ignore it, could he?

It wasn’t noticeable at first and, for a brief moment, Lando wondered if the American was just pulling his leg about the whole situation. He wondered if Logan had just seen his shock to clingy, touchy Oscar when he was drunk and needy and thought it would be hilarious to just add fuel to the fire that night for his own amusement. 

Because one joint in and Oscar seemed like he had hours ago in the meeting room, dressed in a fancy suit and looking slightly out of his comfort zone. 

But time passed and the edges of his own brain began to feel fuzzy, and Lando started noticing it. He noticed the way Oscar seemed to squirm in his seat, the way his eyes lingered on your mouth as you took a drag from the joint. He noticed the way Oscar’s arm had dropped from around your shoulder to his hand firmly being placed on the bare skin of your thigh instead. He watched as Oscar pressed his body close to yours until there wasn’t an inch of your side that wasn’t touching his.

And then, Oscar was leaning in, his lips skimming past your ear and instantly dropping to your neck like he didn’t even care Lando was there.

Lando couldn’t even bring himself to feel all that guilty as he watched the display, something deep in his gut twisting in desire.

Your eyes fluttered shut as the boy’s lips latched onto your neck, a small sigh leaving your lips as he began to press soft, open-mouthed kisses along your skin. His hand squeezed your thigh, gripping onto it like it was a lifeline as he continued to kiss lower and lower until his lips were brushing against the fabric of your dress. 

“Oscar,” you murmured as you raised your hand, fingers threaded through his hair but the boy didn’t stop as he nosed the edge of your dress, his lips dangerously close to your cleavage. 

“Want you,” the Aussie murmured, something like a whine sounding from the back of his throat as he nipped the fabric with his teeth. “Please.” 

“Baby,” you choked out a noise, your eyes snapping open like you finally seemed to remember Lando was there. You felt breathless as your eyes met his, the dim light making it difficult to read the expression on his face but you could have sworn you saw something quite like desire in his gaze. “Lando is—”

“Not complaining,” the Brit finished for you, his voice a little rougher and even he wasn’t sure if it was from the smoking or the sight in front of him. 

Oscar blinked as he lifted his head, his cheeks flushed and his eyes a little red. He looked at you before he shifted his eyes to Lando, his gaze dragging over his teammate. He should have removed himself from you, should have pulled his hand away and slid away—but he remained exactly where he was. 

“Don’t be shy, Oscar,” Lando murmured, and something in the Aussie’s chest sparked. “You wanna touch your girl, then who am I to stop you from making her feel good.”

“You gonna watch?” Oscar asked. 

“Do you want me to leave?” Lando retorted. 

“No.”

Lando’s smirk slowly widened. “Yeah? You two gonna put on a little show for me?”

Oscar blinked before he turned to look at you. His whole body felt like it was on fire, like there were flames coursing through his veins and burning him alight and he never wanted to stop. But as he looked at you, eyes glossy or not, one word from you and he would stop this whole thing, regardless of his own feelings on the matter.

You were his first priority. You were always his first priority.

“You wanna, baby?” He murmured, just low enough for it to only be heard by the two of you. 

“I think,” you swallowed thickly as your eyes traced over your boyfriend’s face, as the bubbling desire and strong urge to clench your legs together washed over you with the heat of Lando’s gaze on you. “It would be the polite thing to do.” 

Oscar tucked his bottom lip between his teeth. 

“Show him how good you make me feel,” you murmured as his grip on your thigh tightened in response. 

And when you couldn’t resist anymore, your eyes snapped over to where Lando was sitting. There was something thrilling about the sight, something your fuzzy brain couldn’t begin to comprehend but your body sure as hell did. There was something about him sitting across from you both, legs spread and eyes focused on the two of you as he watched in silent appreciation. 

It felt dirty. It felt wrong. It felt like the last thing the three of you should be doing in a random club in Amsterdam. And yet, none of you wanted to stop. 

Lando watched in delight the way a choked gasp left your lips as Oscar tugged the neckline of your dress down, as his lips attached to the newly exposed skin. Your hand moved back to thread through his hair, tugging softly as he pulled your dress down until your tits were exposed. 

He watched as Oscar let out a groan at the sight, as his lips wrapped around your nipple. He watched as your head fell back, your boyfriend’s name a breathy moan past your lips as he continued to nuzzle himself between your tits. 

“Would’ve never taken you as a tits man, Oscar.” Lando’s voice was rough and low, something that shouldn’t have made the whole situation hotter but it did. “Can’t blame you though, can I? Your girl has such pretty tits, would be a crime to ignore them.”

A whine sounded from the back of Oscar’s throat. 

Lando’s eyes fell from your flushed face to the hand on your thigh. He watched as Oscar continued to push the hem of your dress further up until he got impatient and allowed his hand to slip beneath the skirt. He watched as Oscar groaned something incoherent against your skin, as you shifted your hips enough for him to pull your panties down your legs with a speed that was almost impressive. 

He hardly had time to blink before he felt the soft thump against his leg, as he looked down to see your panties balled up and now resting on his lap after Oscar had thrown them. 

Lando let out a dark chuckle, his head falling back. “You little shit.” 

But Oscar didn’t pay him any attention. Oscar didn’t pay attention to anything but you and the feeling of you beneath his lips and touch. His brain was fuzzy, his thoughts were muddled and all he knew was that he really, really fucking wanted to taste you. 

Yet, you didn’t seem to share Oscar’s one-track mind.

“Not fair that we’re the only ones who get to have fun,” you murmured, your eyes watching him closely as Lando eyed the pair of panties, seeming to contemplate so many racing thoughts in his head before he reached for them. “Maybe I want a show too.”

Lando’s eyes found yours in the dark. “Yeah?” 

“Mhm,” it was a little high-pitched as Oscar’s thumb pressed against your clit. “Yeah. Please.”

He let out a groan. “Still so fucking polite when he is all over you.”

You weren’t even sure where the spark of confidence came from—maybe from the way he was watching you and Oscar so eagerly—but your mouth opened before you could stop yourself. “Jealous?” 

“Maybe.”

You swallowed thickly, your fingers tugging on Oscar’s hair as you watched Lando’s hand drop to the obvious bulge in his pants. “Of who?”

His smirk widened. “Both.” 

“Shit,” you whispered, an embarrassingly high-pitched noise leaving your lips as you tore your eyes away from the older driver before your whole body burned up.

“Look what a good boy he is,” Lando commented, watching as Oscar littered soft kisses all over your chest and collarbone as his fingers pressed small circles against your clit. “Barely even touched you and he’s humping the sofa.”

Oscar’s cheeks burned hot.

“Bet he’s obedient,” Lando continued as the sound of a zipper echoed through the booth, as the rustling made it clear to both of you what he was doing. “Such a good listener, aren’t you, Oscar? Just wanna make everyone happy, hm? A team player.” 

Oscar finally lifted his head, his eyes glossed over like he was drunk off lust and desire alone.

“You gonna listen to me, baby?”

He nodded.

“Gonna do what I say?”

He nodded again, his eyes locked on the way Lando palmed himself over his boxers with one hand as he held your panties in the other.

A slow smirk spread across his face. “Get between her legs, baby, I know you’ve been dying for a taste of her probably since she put on that lil’ number.”

And Lando was right. He was obedient. It was almost like his body was moving under a spell as he shifted, as he slid off the couch and settled on his knees on the carpeted floor instead. It should have felt wrong to have his back to Lando, but instead the idea that the boy’s eyes were locked on him whilst he touched himself (even if Oscar couldn’t see) thrilled him more than it should have.

His hands palmed your thighs before he slowly spread your legs, as he pushed the fabric of your dress until it pooled at your hips and exposed you. A whimper left Oscar’s lips as he tugged you closer to the edge, as one hand pushed your thigh back whilst the other guided your leg over his shoulder. 

He looked up at you, his cock twitching in his pants at the silent plea in your eyes for him to do something, to give you what you wanted just as bad as him. And his eyes never left your as he leaned down, tongue pressed against your soaked cunt as he licked upwards in one thick, broad stroke. 

“Fuck!” 

Lando couldn’t help himself as his hand slipped beneath the waistband of his boxers, as he squeezed the length of himself before pulling his cock free of any restraints. 

Lando couldn’t help himself as the hand fisting your panties wrapped around his cock, as he let the lacy fabric run against his sensitive tip and resisted the urge to buck his hips. 

Lando couldn’t fucking help himself as he stroked his cock, his eyes locked on the way you panted and moaned and grasped the cushions around you as Oscar worked between your legs. 

A part of him wanted to get up, to close the distance between him and you both. He wanted to walk over, he wanted to thread his fingers through Oscar’s hair like you had done before and guide him. He wanted to watch the boy lick and kiss and suck your needy cunt until his face was dripping. He wanted to whisper just what a good fucking boy Oscar really was as he made you come, as Lando watched you come. 

But the other part of him liked this—this twisted sense of power. He liked the fact he could sit back and watch, like it really was a show you two were putting on for him. He liked the idea that this went beyond something any of you understood, the way the two of you were so eager and pliant and obedient for him. 

He liked that he could sit back, your wet panties fisted around his cock as he watched the two of you moan and squirm and desperately try and look pretty for him. 

And you did. You both looked so, so pretty for him. 

And you sounded so pretty too when you moaned out his name instead of your boyfriend’s. The way your back arched off the couch, your face scrunched up in pleasure as Oscar held your hips down. The way Lando could hear the way his teammate was groaning against your pussy, see the way his hips shifted like he desperately needed some friction against his aching cock. 

It was the prettiest fucking sight Lando had ever seen. 

“That’s it, baby,” Lando groaned. “Come for Oscar, let him taste you, yeah?” 

You nodded dumbly, far too lost in your own pleasure to even understand what he was saying. 

“Bet you’re so fucking hard,” Lando continued, his eyes locked on the way the muscles in his back shifted through his shirt. “Bet you could come just from hearing her moan, huh?” 

The whine Oscar let out told Lando everything he needed to know. 

“That’s it,” Lando groaned, his fist tightening around his cock as he felt his stomach clench as he neared the edge, as he neared his own orgasm. “Gotta finish the show f’me, hm? Gonna be good for me, yeah?” 

You chanted out Oscar’s name as you finally came, shaking and squirming as he held your body against the cushions and continued to suck on your sensitive clit. And when you couldn’t take any more, you lightly pushed his head away to see his expression: flushed cheeks, hooded eyes and glossy lips that you wanted to kiss so bad. But a shifting movement caught your eyes, your gaze moving down to look at the dark patch spread across the front of his boxers. 

“Just tasted so good,” Oscar murmured, not even ashamed or embarrassed at the mess he made. 

And then your eyes shifted to look at the boy across the room. 

He leaned back against the cushions, his chest moving up and down with soft pants. His trousers were pushed down to pool mid-thigh, his boxers just above them and his cock was still fisted in his hand, covered by your panties and his own come. It shouldn’t have been so attractive. 

“I think I prefer this Oscar much better than drunk Oscar,” Lando eventually commented, something quite like a smug grin on his face as he looked between you both. 

There was a tension in the room, one that none of your fuzzy brains could really grasp onto just yet. But it was there and it was overwhelming and suffocating and you each had half the mind to hope this night never ended. 

You didn’t know what would happen after tonight, but you knew until then, the hidden club in the depths of Amsterdam would keep your secret—the secret that maybe all three of you wanted something more than a night fuelled by lust and weed. 

.

[bunnys-kisses]

hello, could i get nanaimo bars with a martini and glass of water on the side with Max Verstappen? also love your little bakery it’s such a cute idea and love your work too!

bakery menu

want to suggest your own order? check out the menu! there are tons of prompts for you to choose from to customize your order! and thank you for this lovely person for submitting an order!! i have still been under the weather, but i'm glad that i can finally get back into the groove of writing!

nanaimo bars ("who's my pretty girl? c'mon say it.") + martini (mafia au) + glass of water (aftercare) served by max verstappen (formula one)!

cw: smut/pwp, mafia au, aftercare, librarian!reader, lingerie, gentle sex, size difference/kink, missionary, max is in love, mafia boss!max

you remembered the first time you felt max's gaze on you. most would've froze at the feeling, like getting ice in the back. but, instead you turned around from the shelf you were in front of and asked, "do you need help looking for something?"

it had been the first time in his adult life that max actually felt a little intimidated. he could easily dispose of you, you had recently moved to the netherlands and had no real social circle. but, you leveled your gaze at him. it was so kind, that it left him a little scared. people were rarely kind to a man like max.

if he had taken off his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves, you would've seen the kind of man he was. instead he cleared his throat against his fist and said, "i was wondering if there was a pay phone, my car has broken down and i was always told that libraries were good at helping people." he smiled at you.

you looked at him briefly and said, "alright then sir, we don't have any pay phones. but we have a phone at the front desk you can use. just let me finish up here and i'll be happy to help you."

he then followed you akwardly as you took the elevator with the empty book cart in tow. he even offered to push it for you as you led him to the front desk. you didn't even notice the small whispers and lingering gazes on the both of you, instead you got the phone and held it out to him to dial.

max knew from that moment on that you were going to be a part of his life. in any capacity he could have you, at an arms length or bone crushingly close. and over time, the more you saw of him. you thought the closer the better.

now even after three years together, the lion of holland was still in your space. when he could, he'd visit you at the library branch you worked at. he'd linger around you until it was time for your break. then you two would have lunch together in the small room in the back, amongst the stacks of returned books.

by year three, you knew who max was. he didn't try to hide it from you, he was very honest about it all. what he had done, but you in return simply asked, "if we ever broke up, would you kill me for leaving?"

and max shook his head quickly and said, "no. i could never, even if you were the one to stab me in the back. i could never harm you." and you accepted him. as long as you could still work at the library, you'd love him with all your heart.

even though your job was less than dangerous, but max worried about you being so available to the public. you knew that max kept tabs on you from time to time at work, you had become familiar with the men of max's circle. and sometimes they'd sit at the library. you simply just continued your work.

but on fridays you got to go home early, so you quickly grabbed your belongings and headed into the car. you threw yourself in the passenger side and pulled him in for a soft kiss. he took you by the face and made a soft noise into the kiss.

"someone missed me." he remarked with a chuckle as he placed his hand on your thigh, giving it a good squeeze.

"i was looking forward for today all day. it came in yesterday, and it felt like my shift went even slower than usual!" you sighed dramatically before you giggled at the feeling of your lover's lips on your neck.

"i know, i know. this gift you bought and didn't tell me what it was. you know i don't like secrets. or surprises." he gripped at your thigh for a moment.

you held his strong jaw in your hands, and beamed at him, "it's not easy to keep secrets from you, max. i usually don't keep them, but i wanted this to be special for you. since you're leaving for england in a few days."

"i know, my treasure." he sighed, "but i promise to bring you back something. as a thank you for waiting for me to come home." he leaned in once more to kiss you softly on the lips.

dinner left you feeling anxious, once you were finished you left your boyfriend in the living room while you scurried off to the bedroom to get changed. you felt your pulse quicken as you pulled out the large black box from under the bed.

you got dressed quickly. it wasn't anything too special, it was a white mesh bra and panties, with embroidered details on it. what made it stand out to was not that the embroidery was of flowers or something sweet, but rather lions. something strong and powerful, and your lover was known as the lion of the netherlands, so it was only fitting.

the stockings you wore were a similar colour and before you knew it, you had opened the door to your bedroom and called out, "max, you can come in now!" before you shut the door and almost tripped over yourself getting to the bed. you sat down and tried to pull off a sexy pose, but ended up looking silly.

so you sat there on the edge with your feet dangling just above the floor, you kept your shoulders back to highlight your breasts which were barely covered by the embroidered designs. it was either this or a collar with max's name on it.

the door opened and max stilled in the doorway at the sight of you. his heart leapt as he admired your beauty. the air got caught in his throat and he coughed a little bit. he then said, "you're beautiful."

and you got flustered at his simple words. usually you felt a little insecure, the shape of your face, the size of your eyebrows, the softness of your stomach. you were a librarian, not a model. but max looked at you like you belonged on the cover of vogue.

he approached closer, he started to undo his button up. his chest was so exposed, lined with tattoos that were symbols of his past. he swallowed as he dropped the expensive shirt onto the floor. he worked his belt off and soon he was in nothing but briefs as he got into bed with you. those strong arms wrapped around you with his nose in your hair.

"this was your little surprise, schat." he said in a low tone, his large hands roamed your body, "this was what you had bought for me. thank you, thank you, thank you." he kissed at the side of your neck and you moaned a little bit. you felt the heat in your gut.

"i wanted to make it special for you." you said as you looked into his blue eyes. you beamed at him with your hand on his bare chest, "see they have little lions on them!"

he chuckled and leaned in for a sweet kiss, "it's perfect, my love." he could feel the thump of his cold heart as he smothered you in another kiss. his fingers found the tiny waistband of the underwear and pulled them down.

"i love you, max. all of you, every last scar and tattoo, every last inch of you. i'm lucky to love you." you giggled when he grazed a calloused thumb across your clit. you moaned a little bit and leaned into his touch.

your lips touched once more and his hands found the clasp of the bra. he groaned against the kiss and his erection throbbed against his briefs. he wanted you, this little surprise was beautiful.

the smartest woman he knew also happened to be the more beautiful. he could recall many times you'd bring him a cheesy romance novel and read it to him while he basked in your warmth.

"i love you." he said as he got you onto your back fully. his hands lightly palmed your breasts before he got up on his knees and between your legs.

he eyed your curves, bare in front of him. he palmed himself through his briefs before he got them off with a little help from you. both pairs of hands on his torso and soon he was nude. back between your legs, his hands roamed his thighs for a moment as he got your legs around his waist.

"you're beautiful." he said, "so beautiful." he leaned over you and kissed you on the lips as he slipped his cock into you. every time he had sex with you, or rather made love to you, it felt like a dream.

you blushed a little and wanted to cover your face, you squirmed a little bit at the sweet words that came from your lover's mouth.

"who's my pretty girl? c'mon say it." he coaxed out of you as he thrusted against you.

you said meekly, "i'm your pretty girl."

he chuckled and planted both hands on either side of you for a good angle to thrust his hips against you. he felt the thrill of pleasure in his head as he moved against you. oh, you looked divine. he said softly as he moved his hips against you, "je bent zo mooi, ik wil alleen jou."

you blushed a little bit, "really, no one else."

he shook his head before he leaned in for another kiss, "no one. no one else ever. since the moment i saw you at the library, i knew that i had to be with you."

the praise left a curl in your gut as the two of you moved together. the kisses were deep and you felt the warmth of your lover around you. you panted between the kisses, your heart leapt at the feeling of him so close to you.

"i could never hurt you." he said, "i'd rather skin myself alive then you be without. you are my world, the thing that keeps me human. that i still have a heart."

you replied softly, "max, you've always been human." you pulled him in for a soft kiss as you wrapped your legs around him more. you two moved against one another, you giggled between moans.

"you are my beating heart, my treasure.' he said softly as he continued to move against him. the pleasure was pin pricks across his skin as he thrusted up into you.

you moaned against him, feeling the tug in your chest from his kind words. you knew that max was a dedicated man, when he set his sights on something he'd see it through to the end. that didn't stop with just work, he wanted to make sure that he gave you the perfect life.

and you didn't ask for much, you enjoyed your job and all you needed was his love and support through anything you wished to do. as you kiss once more, you felt his warmth against you.

the two of you moved against one another, you then kissed passionately. his kisses lingered on your skin, he gripped onto the bed under your back and he groaned a little at the sensation through his body.

"please."

"mine."

"forever, my dear. i'll keep you in my heart forever."

his words were honey in your blood, you felt the thrill of him in your body as you clutched onto him.

"i love you."

"i love you too."

you clutched onto your lover's shoulders. your strong, handsome lover. one of the scariest men in the country, if not the continent. he could kill anyone if he so desired, but with you, he was so loving and sweet.

he was your man, and despite all the fear he could instill. he loved you, and that love was felt in every thing he did for you. you kissed him deeply once more as you climaxed. you moaned into the kiss and he continued to thrust up into you. a few more steady thrusts of his hips and he finished inside of you, in the process pulling you in for a deeper kiss.

he slowed his pace and said, "my beautiful girl. please, please let me love you forever."

you pressed a kiss on the small scar on his cheek, an act of sweetness as you replied, "of course, always. you and i are together till you get tired of me." you giggled.

he pulled out and laid down next to you. he draped a heavily tattooed arm across your middle and gazed at you with love in his eyes. his breathing started to even out. he wiped his forehead free of sweat with his other hand before he snuggled further into your side.

he peppered your face with kisses, asking you quietly if you were alright. if you needed anything. he was the king of after care, even when the sex was as gentle as it could be.

he worried for you, as you worried for him.

you looked at him and smiled. there was a sparkle in those blue eyes. he then closed them and stayed close to you. he sighed contently.

"thank you for the gift. i almost tore them off of you, but i want to see them on you again. if i'm the big scary lion, then you're my lioness." he linked his fingers with you then kissed the top of your hand, "now and forever more." <3

[astrobiscuits]

Astro obs part 9

🐌 The planets in your 12th house indicate your sleeping style:

Sun in 12th house - their sleep schedule is extremely messed up; for them, daylight hours = nighttime hours and vice versa, so they have trouble being themselves during the day; their true self comes out at night

Moon in 12th house - goes to sleep very late; full moons have a special effect on these people; their intuition is more clear at night; as kids, they probably slept a lot with their mother

Mercury in 12th house - loves texting/calling people late at night; they might journal their thoughts before sleep because they overthink a lot and it helps to clear their mind or maybe they just like to relax by reading a book at night

Venus in 12th house - cares a lot about getting their "beauty sleep"; sleeps with sleep masks on, buys expensive bed lingerie, skincare night routine might be very important; loves sleeping in general lmao

Mars in 12th house - enjoys working out before going to sleep, can go to sleep angry because they tend to get into conflict more at night than during the day

I have Uranus in 12th house and i can be both a light sleeper or a heavy sleeper, depending on where i am. For example, when i'm traveling, during the first night i wake up several times, but from the second night on i sleep like a baby lmao. Another thing would be that i can't sleep in a quiet car but i don't have any problem sleeping during a thunderstorm

🐌 Mars in fire signs (Aries, Leo, Sag) and Mars in 3rd house individuals love riding motorbikess

🐌 While Mars in 9th house peeps would probably love to go on a world tour on their motorbike. The sign ruling their 9th house represents the countries they would love to visit (i'm aware that some of these can only be visited by plane, take it with a grain of salt): 

♈ in 9th house: Ireland, Poland, Japan, Zimbabwe

♉ in 9th house: Cuba, Paraguay, South Africa, East Timor

♊ in 9th house: Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Montenegro

♋ in 9th house: Canada, USA, Bahamas, Argentina, Slovenia, Madagascar

♌ in 9th house: Hawaii, France, Italy, The Netherlands, India, South Korea, Peru, Bolivia

♍ in 9th house: Switzerland, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Vietnam

♎ in 9th house: Belgium, Portugal, China, Equatorial Guinea, Lesotho

♏ in 9th house: Panama, Spain, Turkey, Arab countries (Saudi Arabia, UAE), Palestine, Lebanon

♐ in 9th house: Finland, Lithuania, Romania, Tanzania, Thailand

♑ in 9th house: UK, Germany, Czech Republic, Australia, Camerun

♒ in 9th house: Greece, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka

♓ in 9th house: Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Mauritius, Saint Lucia

🐌 I have a feeling Pisces Suns like to spend their time in a garage lmao. Mostly because their opposing sign, Virgo, would hate to spend time in a garage due to how dirty it can get.

🐌As a 7th house Sun who's been in love for almost a year now (haha, are we surprised, ofcours not; i'm not even in a relationship with him but ugh we're so perfect for each other), i realised that Sun in 7th house people tend to behave differently with their partner when they're in a healthy relationship vs when they're in a toxic one

Sun in 7th house in:

♈ Aries in a healthy relationship: empowers their partner, knows how to balance me time vs us time in a healthy manner, encourages their partner to take safe risks

♈ Aries in an unhealthy relationship: impulsive, impatient, selfish, dismisses their partner's feelings, often controlled by rage, prone to abusing their partner

♉ Taurus in a healthy relationship: veryyy generous (their love language is gift giving), accommodating to their partner's wants and needs, cooks for their partner

♉ Taurus in an unhealthy relationship: stubborn af, hard to please, focused more on the material gain from their partner rather than the love they share

♊ Gemini in a healthy relationship: curious, always lightens the mood of their partner by cracking up tons of jokes or telling them funny stories, knows that communication is key to everything so they're not afraid to discuss serious topics, teaches their partner a lot of random stuff

♊ Gemini in an unhealthy relationship: superficial, doesn't have a problem moving on from their partner to another person in a matter of seconds, if they're still in school/college, then they prioritize studying over their partner

♋ Cancer in a healthy relationship: nurturing, knows how to balance babying their partner vs being babied by their partner, emotionally vulnerable, feels safe enough to present their partner to their family early on in the relationship

♋ Cancer in a unhealthy relationship: if they don't trust their partner, they tend to become emotionally closed off to hide their deep sadness; defensive, but if their partner attackes them, then they'll hide, worries excessively, avoids presenting their partner to their family

♌ Leo in a healthy relationship: treats their partner like the king/queen they are, keeps their ego in check so it doesn't interfere with the relationship, if they've got artistic talents (music, acting, art etc.), they'll show their love for their partner by performing in front of them

♌ Leo in an unhealthy relationship: egocentric, shows off their partner/relationship too much out of pride, often feels entitled in the relationship and wants to be put on a pedestal by their partner

♍ Virgo in a healthy relationship: selfless to a healthy degree, remembers every lil detail from every casual conversations with their partner just to please them, remembers every important date and plans ahead for it, takes care of their partner when they're sick

♍ Virgo in a unhealthy relationship: critical, overfixates on past hurts and mistakes that their partner made in the relationship (often times their partner doesn't even remember those things because they're usually not that serious), loves their pets more than their partner

♎ Libra in a healthy relationship: romantic, charismatic, truly values their partner and the relationship with them, acts fair in the relationship, teaches their partner lovingly about the importance of honesty, truth and a healthy give and take dynamic in a relationship

♎ Libra in an unhealthy relationship: doesn't prioritize the relationship; instead, they flirt with others despite being in a relationship, emotionally detached, cold and calculated in their current relationship

♏ Scorpio in a healthy relationship: loyal, loves their partner deeply and intensely, but without suffocating them, keeps their partner's secrets like they're a locked safe box with no public access

♏ Scorpio in an unhealthy relationship: obsessive, manipulative, seeks to dominate their partner, displays stalkish behaviour in the relationship, liar

♐ Sagittarius in a healthy relationship: exposes their partner to various cultures, belief systems and philosophies to expand their mind and form their own opinion on certain topics, loves freely but is still able to maintain a long-term relationship, improves their partner's mood, usually brings an element of surprise and excitement to the relationship

♐ Sagittarius in an unhealthy relationship: travels in order to avoid dealing with their partner, parties a bit too much, doesn't take the relationship seriously

♑ Capricorn in a healthy relationship: loves their partner in a mature, serious and secure manner, doesn't shy away from improving their partner's social status and/or career if they can, discusses plans for the future (getting married, having kids, adopting pets, buying a house) with their partner early on in the relationship, they make time for their partner, despite the fact that they're busy most of the time

♑ Capricorn in an unhealthy relationship: displays no emotions or physical affection in the relationship, has a hard time communicating their thoughts with their partner, settles in a relationship for the wrong reasons (money/kids/safety/"i'm getting old and i need to have my life established"), prioritizes work/career over their partner

♒ Aquarius in a healthy relationship: flexible, makes their partner's dreams and aspirations come true (whether they're related to the relationship or not), has got a very open-minded attitude towards their partner's opinions, lifestyle and identity, takes the time to become friends firsts with their future partner because they value a relationship built on solid foundation (often times their partner is also their best friend), knows how to balance couple time vs time with friends

♒ Aquarius in an unhealthy relationship: displays wishy-washy behaviour, emotionally detached, prioritizes their friends over their partner, seeks online validation from strangers and acquaintances to fulfill their needs

♓ Pisces in a healthy relationship: sensitive to their partner's emotions, knows how to balance wearing their heart on their sleeve vs hiding their emotions in unfavourable circumstances, always honest with their partner

♓ Pisces in an unhealthy relationship: prone to drown their relationship problems and sorrows in alcohol, drugs and meds for mental health issues, runs away from problems instead of dealing with them with their partner, displays dishonesty to a fault, prone to self-sabotage

[landograndprix]

woman ✾ l.n - ii

❧ you love max, you really do but your little brother has been getting more on your nerves each day as he tries to set you up with one of his friends.

❧ verstappen!reader who's older than max so if age gaps freak you out, don't read 💀

❧ prev part – next part

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y/nverstappen

📍 Monte-Carlo, Monaco

liked by kellypiguet, landonorris and 178,672 others

y/nusername only valid reason to visit Monaco if we're being completely honest 🥐

tagged: kellypiguet

view all 462 comments

maxkellyp y/n taking her aunt duties very serious

bott_ass where to apply to have you as my sugar auntie? asking for a friend?

zhou_ey time to have your own babies 😍

y/nverstappen I'm actually good with being the wine and sugar aunt for now 🍷

zhou_ey that's a pretty cool job too!

kellypiguet bring her home before dinner? 😂

y/nverstappen what do you mean, we're already on our way back to the netherlands, this my kid now.

lewham44 still a better mother figure to p than kelly 🤡

landonorris I know a few spots in Monaco you can't miss 😉

fewtrelllando spot number one: my bedroom

carlito55 lmao @.fewtrelllando jail for you 😭

dandoo mate, this is a post about her niece and you're flirting with y/n or making and attempt to do so? 😂

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y/nverstappen posted to their story

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landonorizzzz

liked by 563 others

landonorizzzz lando in Monaco last night after the GP ❤️

view all 188 comments

norr4slan screaming crying throwing up 🤯

lanlan frothing at the mouth..

norstappen wait a damn minute, was that y/n verstappen?! 😭

norrizzfour yeah but if you look closely she's just walking past with her friends and kelly lol they probably all went to the same place

maxiell nah my girl is avoiding him for real 💀

landoscar oh my god he's so pretty 😍

supermaxv MOTHER AND LANDO?

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y/nverstappen

📍 Monte-Carlo, Monaco

liked by charles_leclerc, maxverstappen1 and 199,752 others

y/nverstappen Monaco dump 🇲🇨

tagged: sannetje, maxverstappen1, kellypiguet

view all 988 comments

dannyricric man I'd do anything to live a life like this

tom1967 she's living off her brothers wealth..

dannyricric I'm pretty sure she makes enough money herself to live a life like this. 🙄

julieeeexo you and sanne served absolute cunt on the grid! 🤩

bobnorriz not the picture of the charles, max and lando podium :')

kellypiguet was really nice to have you around this weekend, we should definitely do this more often, P absolutely adores her auntie 🥰

Comment liked by y/nverstappen

charles_leclerc it was very nice we got to hang out together☺

Comment liked by y/nverstappen

sharllekler this guy makes me cringe so hard but it's so endearing, like did he pull all his girlfriend's by being awkward? 😭

sixteenleclerc girl have you seen y/n? She's got something that'll make most men awkward as fuck

victoriaverstappen so sad we couldn't join you two this year

y/nverstappen we should already plan for next year then 😉

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y/nverstappen

📍 Amsterdam, the Netherlands

liked by landonorris, kellypiguet and 201,432 others

y/nverstappen protect your peace 🌸

view all 999 comments

bananaclerc hey, yes, hi..I'd like to be you 😭

norrisoscar I've only known this woman for a week but I'm already obsessed with her

keirarobins do I spy new products for the store? 👀

y/nusername keep an eye open 😉

zhou_ey I don't know if I want to be you or if I want to be with you 😭

sannetje is that my hat?

y/nverstappen don't know what you're talking about..

sannetje sure..

landonorris I need that candle

maxv1 boy go to her store lmao, this is no webshop 💀

landonorris 🔥

grussell63 man I really thought you had more game than this..who taught you this, Charles? 😢

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taglist

@hockeyboysarehot @beatricemiruna @starwarssavy23 @be-your-coffee-pot

[ssavaart]

In 2013, I did this painting during my "art nouveau/copying everything Alphonse Mucha-phase"

6 years ago, a nice chap from the Netherlands named Jochem Cats asked me if he could use my art for a mural.

A few weeks later... he sent me these photos.

I need to go visit it one day. It's in the Hague in Netherlands at 't Achterommetje

How cool is that? My art is on a wall somewhere in the Netherlands.

[pelova4president]

Shadows are to protect IV

Victoria Pelova x Putellas!Reader

shadows are to protect I, II, III

summary~ You finally get your happy ending.

So you disappeared. You booked a flight to The Netherlands and didn’t tell anyone. You wanted to see the country Victoria talked about so much. The little cafes and restaurants she visited when she was there.

You built your own little world, a bubble where no one could hurt you and you couldn’t hurt anyone you cared about. You wouldn’t mind living here. Everyone did their own thing and there were dogs and parks everywhere.

De Oranje Leeuwinnen were playing a few days after you had arrived and you couldn’t let the chance of seeing Victoria play in front of her own people slip.

The stadium was absolutely packed. The orange shirts with the names of female players on them and red, white and blue flags on everyone’s cheeks. Even though Spain had won the World Cup there wasn’t this much attention for the Spanish team. It was something you were jealous of.

It’s been days since you disappeared, Alexia hasn’t texted or called you yet and you were grateful for that. She never knows what’s going through your head but if you don’t reach out in a situation like this, she knew she had to leave you be. She’d be there if you wanted to talk and you didn’t really desire that the past few days. But now you did.

In the hopes that she would pick up in the middle of the day you called. You sat in a little bakery somewhere in The Hague and it felt like the right time.

Three rings had gone by before you got someone on the other end of the phone. “Hola hermanita… Hola?” she said. “Ale, you got time?” you asked her. You heard her laugh, “Not really but you know i’ve always got time for my pequeña princesa.” you could imagine the big grin on her face. You groaned at the stupid nickname. She knew you hated it when she called you that.

“Whatever, i’m talking about like at least an hour. I’ve got a lot to tell you.” you said taking a sip from the overpriced latte. “Sí, i’ve got time for you.” she sighed.

She knew you probably had a lot to talk about. Alexia hadn’t really pushed you to talk about it because she knew you weren’t a great talker and if you really wanted to and if she needed to know, you would tell her.

And so you told her everything, about going to Arsenal and how it had been the first few weeks. How it wasn’t your home and how you felt so so lost there. You told her about Alessia, that she had your heart and she broke it just like that. That you didn’t really want to come out of bed the days after and that that was the reason why you visited her when you did. And about Victoria Pelova, the girl that has been nothing but good to you. Alexia laughed at that, she knew you’d get along, that’s why she told you to give the girl a chance.

“I’m in The Netherlands now Ale, i don’t know what to do now.” You sighed into your phone. “Joder hermanita, you already know what to do. I already know you got your ticket to the game. Dile que la amas.” Alexia always knew what to say. Sometimes it was nice to have a big sister that can tell you what to do. “And next time we play against England, just know i’ll get back at Russo.” she deadpanned. And a sister to protect you.

You had texted Victoria good luck before the game. ‘Hey Vicky, i just wanted to let you know i’ll be at your game today. Please listen to the voicemail i’ve left you a few days ago. Ik hou van jou, je kan het.’ you sent her.

Sitting on the third row you got a pretty good views of the game. It wasn’t a really important game or anything and the chance the orange team won was very high so you weren’t that nervous for the brunette.

In the 17th minute Brugts scored from the penalty area and not long after van de Donk scored too. The first half ended in 3-0.

As the players walked to the changing room you looked for Victoria. When you finally found her eyes, hers were already focused on you. Your lips formed an apologetic smile and you waved at her. She gave you a little smile before disappearing into the tunnel.

The second half went even smoother for the home side. Esmee Brugts got her hattrick and Damaris and Roord scored one each. It was the 88th minute when Kerstin Casparij made a dribble forward. She passed two midfielders and made a perfect cross. The white ball landed on Vic’s foot and she volleyed the ball into the corner of the net.

It was just an Euros qualifier but for you it was much more. You knew today was now or never. It was 8-0 but the crowd was just as loud as it was when the first goal was scored.

The game was over and you saw the team do their lap around the field. You loved how involved they were with their fans, especially the kids. Victoria was somewhere at the back, still signing a little girl’s Arsenal shirt when Damaris spotted you and ran towards your section.

You knew the player well. Damaris used to play for Spain but decided to move to the Dutch team and you got why. She was the first one to do something about the Spanish management and you admired her for it. Your ex-teammate climbed over the fences and when she finally got to you she was out of breath. She gave you a hug and greeted you. “Don’t tell Vic i know but she listened to your message before the game. She’s been sad all camp and doesn’t want to listen to anyone. Just wait at our hotel and i’ll get you in.” she told you before sprinting off again.

So now you were waiting on the orange bus full of players to arrive at some fancy hotel in Amsterdam. You looked like a stalker, dressed in all black with Victoria’s black hat and hoodie on.

After fifteen minutes of waiting the Dutch team finally arrived. All the girls walked past, well everyone except for Vic and Dama.

Damaris walked towards you with two bags in her hands, one with 21 on it and the other with number 17. Victoria walked behind her, confused as why she was carrying her bag inside until she saw you.

“Victoria, you better figure this out because i know you want her and she wants you, okay?” she told the girls strictly. The Arsenal player nodded silently and stood still in front of you.

“Did you hear the voicemail i left you?” you asked her. Her eyes weren’t focused on you but on the big neon letters of the hotel. The blue light was shining on her, making it look like she coloured her hair blue.

“Yeah. I got it, so tell me then, what happened?” her eyes traveled to your face. It was hard to read her at the moment.

“When i came into Arsenal i didn’t know anyone and i was scared and tired of being alone. Alessia helped me at that time until she didn’t need me anymore. One evening i found out she had a boyfriend all along. I was having a hard time after that and went to Alexia for a few days when you texted me.” you smiled at the thought of her text, she really did help you. “Alexia told me to give you a chance and i’m happy i did because you mean so much to me. I don’t think i would be playing football anymore if it wasn’t for you. And then Alessia didn’t like that, she kissed me that evening when you saw us but i told her that i didn’t want her. I swear. I only want you. Te amo, Vicky.” you pleaded.

You were still standing before her, you took your hat off and your right hand was in your pocket while your left was fidgeting with the strings of the black hoodie. “Say something, please.” you begged the brunette. Her silence was killing you.

“I’m sorry. I should’ve just let you explain but i didn’t. It’s just that when i heard Alessia talking to you and then kissing you..” Victoria sighed.

“I get it, you shouldn’t say sorry for that. Can we try again, i really want us to work out.” you smiled.

Victoria’s signature smirk appeared on her face and she leaned in for a kiss. “por supuesto cualquier cosa para ti” she grinned into your neck. “You’ve done your Duolingo sí?” you laughed at her.

“I did, just for you. And maybe just a little bit for when i meet your sister, got to make a good impression on La Reina hmm?” she teased.

A/N finally done!!! I don’t even know how this whole series was planned but this is it, happy ending and all

[sunshine-theseus]

Breaking Records or Breaking the Internet? | Vivianne Miedema x Reader

Words: 2.5k

Summary: COVID doesn’t exist, Viv didn’t have to undergo another knee surgery, I’m basing the main character off Arnie Titmus (I love her sm) but I am also just making shit up

Warnings: not proofread

Your first Olympics had been 2012 in London. Barely 15, you emerged from the water an Olympic record holder with your first piece of Olympic gold weighing on your neck. As a young girl from a rural town in Tasmania, you hadn’t expected to make a career out of swimming, but with every competition, every new medal, every regional, national and world record that you claim, it begins to feel real.

As a young girl from rural Tasmania who grew up extremely religious, you hadn’t expected to reach all these milestones with the girl of your dreams.

It was unclear how and why Vivianne Miedema showed up to your 200m Freestyle final swim at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. The rest of her team was surely back at the hotel or walking the streets of Tokyo, but here she was. Your eyes were drawn to her in the bright orange jacket all Dutch athletes had to wear, talking enthusiastically with Dawn Fraser, both of them pointing at you as you wait for your name to be called at the podium.

“With a new Olympic Record, 1st place is Y/N L/N!!” The voice echoes throughout the hall before cheers erupt from every corner. With a smile you bend to accept the medal that placed around your neck, then your eyes return to the unanticipated duo.

After congratulating your competitors and talking to family and friends, you make your way over to them. Dawn is pulling you into a hug and praising you before a word can escape your mouth, before turning to the tall dutchie next to her who has a tight lipped but kind smile.

“This is Vivianne Miedema. She’s a big fan of yours.” Of course you knew who she was. You were a big fan of her’s.

“It’s so lovely to meet you. You’re probably my favourite non-Australian player. I can’t wait to watch your game against Zambia.”

“You’re coming to the game?”

“Of course.”

Many, many people had caught that interaction, followed by your long talks on the pitch after her games or beside the pool at other record-breaking swims. The natural development from the internet was speculation about whether you were a couple. At the time you certainly weren’t. Strictly new friends.

But then you showed up to more Netherlands and even an occasional Arsenal game, and she showed up to more swim meets. The conversations last longer, the touches lingered, the glances toward each other’s lips increased. Everything was just more… intense.

So one fateful day in 2022 during your (short) off-season, you decided to visit her in London. It wasn’t a surprise technically, you just decided to arrive a few days earlier than planned and surprise her at the game. There was something telling you, you needed to come early. So Caitlin had sorted out your ticket and happily gave you a lift from the airport to the stadium.

-

Viv easily spotted you during warm up, with your hair in the same messy bun it had been for the past day and a bright orange ‘Miedema’ jersey adoring your torso, one that she had personally given to you after her first 2020 Olympics match. She happily made her way over to you, swinging her leg back and forth to mimic the exercise she was supposed to be doing as she grinned the same grin you’d found yourself stuck admiring time and time again. But it didn’t quite meet her eyes the same way it always did. Something was brewing.

“I can’t believe you’re here. You weren’t meant to arrive until Monday.”

“Couldn’t miss a big game, could I? Is- is everything okay? Something seems off.”

“Yeah, yeah of course why wouldn’t it be?”

“Your smile doesn’t reach your eyes today.” your hand rests on the side of her head, thumb stroking the spot beside her eye which is usually occupied by crows feet that show much love and joy she has.

“I don’t know. I’ve just felt off all week. I was going to ask Jonas to take me off the roster this morning but I don’t want to through everyone off. I’m sure it’ll be okay.”

“If you’re sure liefje.” You press a kiss to the palm of her hand and send her back down the tunnel, anticipation and worry burning in your gut.

-

Lyon was up 1 by the end of the first 45 minutes of normal time, but there looked like hope for the English side during the extra 3 minutes. Viv was playing well in midfield. She wasn’t as strong as usual, but it just looked like she was taking it easy; making open passes and wasting no time in passing the ball to the next player.

But then she makes a run to meet Lia, trying to grab the ball from her feet.

She kicks.

She misses.

She falls.

She doesn’t get back up.

Blood pounds in your ears and you wait in bated breath as the medics assess her knee.

Her knee.

She’s shifted onto the stretcher, but you don’t see any more as you rush out of the family and friend’s section and demand a security guard take you to see her, flashing your badge. This was the bad feeling. You both knew something would happen and ignored it. It almost felt like you fault.

The doors crash against the brick walls, and you speed walk down the hall to the medical room where Viv is laying quietly while the medics do further assessment. They ask questions and she answers in short, quiet breaths.

“It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

“It’s unstable.”

“I can’t walk on it.”

“It popped when I fell.” No no no no. You whisper the three letters before anyone in the room can even think them.

Suddenly all eyes are on you. The medic’s eyes are apologetic and shocked at the arrival of a new voice, but Viv’s are tired and welled with tears. She looks so broken. So you sit in the seat next to her head and take one hand in your own while your other lifts to stroke through her hair.

“It’s going to be okay.” you whisper in her ear.

“I can’t do this. I can’t do this.”

“I’m right here it’s going to be okay. I’ve got you”

~~~~~

About 2 months after the initial injury on a particularly difficult night for the Dutch, you found yourselves huddled up together in her bed watching Friends for the second time. Neither of you were talking but you found yourself staring at Viv while Chandler continues to ramble on about how much he loves Monica. Soulmates destined to be. And then you found yourself staring into Viv’s cloudy grey eyes, slowly leaning in. You waited for Viv to stop you but she says and does nothing, so you let your lips meet. It’s a delicate kiss, just two people who have been in love with each other for years, finally professing their feelings.

There was no conversation about what that kiss meant for you two, but it seemed to be an unspoken decision that you were now together. You slept beside each other, kissed at every opportunity, and supported one another through everything. You were in your own private world.

The recovery process proved to be difficult but you hadn’t left Viv’s side for a moment, officially announcing you were taking a break from this swimming season for unforeseeable amount of time. But the injury had taken a big toll had been her mental health. Most days she didn’t want to get out of bed, let alone leave the house, and every day you were to expect multiple apologies for being difficult to take care of.

Every bad comment was met with a kiss and a promise to stay by her side until you were absolutely no longer needed.

-

Viv made her return almost a year after the injury, coming on late into the second half, only to score two goals against Tottenham. You cheered as loud as you could, and smiled widely when she sent a hand heart your way in celebration. You’d agreed to keep your relationship private in terms of it’s development. Most journalists who had asked about it had been told you were taking care of a dear friend and had been looking for a chance to take a year off anyway, so the timing lined up. But she couldn’t help but silently give thanks to the person who had gotten her through it all. Who brought her back

~~~~~

You managed to make it back to training in time to decently prepare for Paris qualifiers. You’d kept up doing almost daily training during your time in England, but nowhere near the extent you were used to as the multiple time World and Olympic Champion under Boxall. Seven straight months of hard work, day in and day out, and you’d be in shape for qualifiers, and in perfect shape to take on the best of the best.

Everyday consisted of 4-6 hours in the pool and in the gym, a session in the early morning and another after lunch, a nap, and then a long call with Viv while you ate dinner and she had lunch. It was hard being away from her after spending a whole year beside her. The bed was cold, the house felt empty, things just weren’t the same. But you both knew it needed to be done.

-

By the time early July came around, you genuinely felt like you were a new person. Before the year long break things had begun to feel tedious and swimming was losing it’s meaning. You were still performing as the best in the world, but it was automatic. But now everything felt… right.

And the qualifiers showed it.

You broke your own world records multiple times with ease, and every round made you feel alive again. There was no Viv in bright orange to cheer you along this time but you knew she’d be proud. And she made sure you knew she was with every nightly call, proclaiming her love and support for you.

-

Viv accompanying you to Paris was a well kept secret between the two of you. In the days leading up to your first races, you wondered around the village texting her, desperate to know what she was doing out in the city. More often than not, the answer was that she refused to see any big sites without you, waiting until you are completely done to explore the city of love.

She was in the crowd of every race without fail, the same bright orange jacket she wore the first time you met. Your ear was trained to hear her and your eyes knew where to look, she would be sitting in the exact same seat every time. The proud smile on her face made your heart flutter and it takes everything within you not to run up to her and kiss her after clambering out of the water.

Halfway through the swimming events you’ve managed to rack up five golds and once again break your own world records, barely skimming off 0.2 seconds each time.

Then it came to the big finale. You were known for your short distance swims. 100m and 200m freestyle and butterfly were your dominant fields, but you were adamant to at least try and land on the podium for the 1500m freestyle beside Katie Ledecky.

It was a shock to you, your coach and most of the nation when you had passed through the qualifiers, and then you qualified for the semis. Now you were on to the final. You’d never been this nervous in your career and all you wanted in that moment was a hug from your girlfriend, but you needed to lock in.

You’re lined up in the tunnel.

Your name is called.

You’re standing behind the podium for lane 7.

You’re on the podium in position.

The whistle blows.

You’re submerged in the water.

The rest of the race is a blur. One lap becomes 10 and 10 becomes 20 and then suddenly you’re onto the last 50 metres. Just 50 more metres. You have no idea if you’re in front or if you’ve fallen behind, but you push until your hand slides against the ceramic tile of the pool wall.

Gasping for air, you pull off your goggles and look around the pool. Most other people are finished, but you have no clue for how long, and the final swimmer slots in beside your no more than 20 seconds after. You don’t expect a big victory as you all turn to the board, waiting for the results.

“In second… lane 4, United States of America, Katie Ledecky!” the room echoes with cheers and shouts of confusion. Second? This is her race. This is what she’s known for. Who could possibly have beaten the Katie Ledecky?

“And with a new world and Olympic record of 15:20.34, lane 7, Australia, Y/N L/N!” the screams are deafening as the crowd and your competitors alike cheer for you.

You hug and thank each of them, before making your way to the podium where you receive your gold. Tears stream down your face as photos are taken from all angles, and you pull Katie and Anastaysia up beside you, recognising their efforts. But all you can think about is Viv, waiting impatiently against the barrier for a moment of your time.

The happiness and excitement keeps building up within you as you’re finally freed from media, and you run to your girlfriend, grabbing her face and kissing her. In the back of your head you know this will be making news headlines everywhere in all of an hours time, but you don’t care. How could you? It’s the perfect way to celebrate all your hard earned success. Kissing the love of your life.

“I love you so much. I’m so so proud of you liefje.” She pecks your lips again.

“I couldn’t have done it without you, lieveling.”

~~~~~

You get to leave the village the next day, and you’re thankful to leave the Styrofoam mattresses and cardboard bedframes behind. Your hotel’s king sized bed with a memory foam mattress, completed with the warmth of your girlfriend’s arms is the only upgrade you could ask for. She presses kisses to your shoulder as you scroll through twitter, many fans of both yourself and Viv sharing words of adoration and happiness for your now public relationship as pictures of your kiss spread across the internet.

When Viv picked you up from the village to take you to breakfast at a small Parisian café down the road from the hotel, you both decided to officially, officially, announce the fact you were together. You took photos together throughout the day, her kissing you on the cheek, your hands being held between you, the way you looked at her. Anything of the two of you. You turned it into a collage and posted it to Instagram.

Y/N_L/N

@ y/n_l/n “breaking records and breaking the internet in the same week. there is no on else I’d rather do it with than the love of my life. Ik zal je in elk leven vinden.” (I will find you in every life).

This was the life you wanted to live. Forever. With Viv.

[outsideratheart]

Decisions, decisions (Alexia Putellas x reader)

A/N: Chapter 2 in the Legacy series

You wish you could say you had been able to put your departure from Ajax to the back of your mind as you prepared for and played the World Cup with The Netherlands. The team had made base in Paris for the last two games of the tournament. It was a city you had always found peace in whenever you visited.

So far The Netherlands had reached the semi finals after beating Japan in the round of 16 games thanks to two penalties from you and then you beat Italy in the quarter finals with goals coming from you and Viv. Most of the world hadn’t seen you play with you playing in the Dutch league but this tournament it seemed that everyone had eyes on you.

The semi final was something that you found incredible difficult. Madgalena Erikkson did a very good job at marking you, in fact you had less touches in that game that you had in any other game throughout the tournament. It didn’t matter though because Jackie managed to score in the 99th minute, a goal which you somehow assisted. It was a goal that would send you to the World Cup final. As you embraced the woman that had been stuck to your side the entire game, she whispered something in your ear that you didn’t expect.

You’ll make my job hard next season if you go to arsenal.

It wasn’t public knowledge that you planned on leaving Ajax. The fans had doubts every summer transfer window because they knew you deserved to play at a higher level but you never gave then any reason to think you were planning on leaving them. 

A few days later the team had a day off and whilst you did spend the day with them, you were ready for some time to relax so you and Viv went back to the hotel with the promise that you will meet back up with the team later for some food.

A couple of hours later you no longer want to be alone so you to go to Viv’s room 

“Are you ready for the final?” Viv asked as the two of you took refuge in her room.

The national team were your family but they could be a bit much sometimes and Viv shared your need for peace when things got too hectic. She could also tell something had been bothering you but she wasn’t one to push when you weren’t ready to talk about it. 

When Viv gets only a hum in response she notices that you have your attention on the phone in your hands. It was obvious that whatever you were reading made you feel uneasy because your eyebrows furrowed, something that happens when you’re thinking deeply.

“Y/N” Viv’s words fall on deaf ears. It is only when she throws Flip at you do you look up at her before going into the bathroom.

Something was definitely wrong. Your eyes were glassed over. 

There on your phone was the headline that sent your thoughts running a hundred miles an hour and led you chest to feel like it was being weighed down by an anvil.

JOHAN CRUYFF’S DAUGHTER TO FOLLOW IN HER FATHER’S FOOTSTEPS.                            WILL SHE SHINE BRIGHT OR SETTLE IN HIS SHADOW?

Viv knew the struggles you had been facing and whilst Barcelona was a dream she knew you had been struggling with thought of being in a city that held such strong memories of your father. 

There was a sense of betrayal in your gut. You wasn’t sure if it was someone within your management team, Barcelona or Arsenal but now the world was talking when you wanted this topic to remain silent.

When you re entered the bedroom it felt smaller than before. Viv didn’t know what to say and within seconds her decision to comfort you is taken away from her because Danielle and Lieke come barging in. Both of them, oblivious to what they were walking into, make it clear that you are to rejoin the team. Viv tries to tell them that you aren’t feeling it but you cut her off.

“Actually I have somewhere else to be but it’s on the way so I’ll walk with you” 

The three Dutch women give you a shared look. You didn’t have any media or appearances because today was the mandatory day off so where could you possibly be going.

The four of you walk along the streets of Paris for twenty minutes before you bid your farewells. Viv and Danielle didn’t know the significance of the hotel you were stopping at but Lieke did. 

“This is where some of the Spain girls are staying. Are you going to see anyone in particular?” Lieke knew this is where some of her friends are staying. Their World Cup journey may have been over but they were still football fans and they wanted to support their club team mate in what could be one the biggest games of her career. Lieke of course thought there could be other reasons but whenever she brought it up she got shut down very quickly.

“A friend” you reply was short and gave very little away.

It wasn’t a lie. You were going to see a friend, you just wasn’t stating which Spanish player you were going to see. Whilst Danielle had your attention, Viv told Lieke about the article that had changed your mood drastically. Your best friend has a feeling who you were going to see given that you had kept very close eyes on a certain Catalonian during the tournament and said woman had been pestering her for your phone number but she didn’t want to get involved. Lieke knew she would have to let this play out organically even if it would be painful to watch.

It’s save to say Lieke had to do a double take when she saw a group of familiar faces walk past her. 

“Lieke!” 

“Alexia” 

She wasn’t who Lieke expected to see on the streets of Paris. If Alexia was here who had you gone to see at their hotel. It is pure coincidence that her club team mates were on their way to a restaurant close to hers so they walk together. 

“I saw the article. How is she?” 

Alexia had put herself in a difficult position. She wanted to be your team mate but given her own loss she wanted to make sure you were ok. She couldn’t imagine what it must be like to have strangers constantly remind you of the person you have lost.

“That depends on why you’re asking. Do you want to know because part of you cares or because you want to know her decision?” 

The brunette regretted the way she interrogated you that night is Barcelona. Even though you offered her a fresh start, she hated to think that you saw her as Joan Laporta’s spy. Even if you didn’t sign for Barcelona she hoped that you could be friends.

“Lieke, I told you I’m sorry for what I did in barcelona and to answer your question, I’m asking because well, because I care about her. she—“

“Ale are you talking about Y/N again” Mapi comes out of nowhere “You know if you like her then you should ask her out. Don’t pry Lieke for information”

“That’s not what I’m doing” Flush floods Alexia’s cheeks.

“Y/N’s ok, I think” Lieke ignores Mapi’s teasing and answers Alexia’s question “She‘s actually at your hotel. I thought you might have been going to see you but you’re here” 

Alexia wonders why your best friend thought you would be with her? 

“Why would she have come to see me?”

“Alexia you are Barcelona and between you and me, I think she is leaning towards joining us. You also know the pain she feels on a daily basis” 

Alexia rarely spoke about her father but the loss was known within the team. 

“I would be there for her” she barely knew you but this much she was certain on.

“I know you would”

Meanwhile you sat in the lobby of a hotel you had no right to be in. You needed to speak to someone that knew you but that you didn’t have any responsibilities with, at least not yet. You had kept in contact throughout the competition, both been the outside perspective that the other one needed.

Now you had to remember which room she was in and pray that you don’t rub into any of her team mates. You wasn’t in the mood for pleasantries.

401, 402, 404 and then 405, her room. You knock quietly hoping not to interrupt anything or risk waking her up if for some reason she is asleep. After knocking for the third time with no answer you take it as a sign that you showing up uninvited wasn’t a good idea. When you are half way down the hallway you hear the door opening.

“Y/N is that you?” The Spanish accent is thick but easily understandable.

“I was just leaving, sorry to bother you”

“Don’t be silly, come in”

“Thank you Tana”

It felt strange to be in her hotel room and you didn’t know where you should sit so you choose to stand against the TV unit.

Both of you wait for the other to speak which leads to silence. It’s not exactly comfortable but it’s not awkward either. A few seconds pass and both of you start laughing to fill the empty space.

“It got out” 

“I saw. Are you going to say anything” Aitana asks and she gets a shake of a head in response.

“I just want to play football. It’s all i‘ve ever wanted and now I’m a story”

The small Catalonian hands you a bottle of water out of the mini fridge.

“Can I ask you a question as friend and not as a player?” You ask her.

“You mean a player who plays for Barca?” The look she receives gives her the answer “Right now I’m your friend”

“Before I start I want you to know that I haven’t made up my mind yet but if I were to sign for Barcelona would they be able to get over my last name?”

Your team mates up until now had always let you be your own person. Ajax and the National team meant a lot to your father but you were never compared to him within the team. One of the reasons why is because they met him. The got to know Johan the supportive father but in Barcelona they only knew or knew of Johan Cruyff the legend, the man who invented Barcelona football.

“Your last name means something to the club and the team. If you sign for Barcelona you will become a part of our family. Some of the girls may freak out at the beginning. They will ask you questions about him but they mean nothing by it”

“You didn’t. I’ve known you for a few years now and you never asked about him even though I know you are a huge fan. You wear his number for god’s sake”

“I am huge fan of your fathers but when Barcelona first asked me to work with the foundation and work with you, that is what really excited me. I am a Y/N Cruyff fan first and a Johan Cruyff fan second”

“That’s not true” you laugh at her effort to make you feel better.

“It’s an even tie. I guess what I’m trying to say is I got to you know you as a person. At the minute the girls don’t know you like I do but once they do I promise they won’t see you for your last name”

“Ok”

“Ok? So does that mean you’re coming to Barca?” The young midfielder couldn’t help herself. She wanted you to come to the team for more reasons than one.

“Nice try. I have a few weeks to make my decision”

Not wanting to overstay your welcome given that you weren’t invited in the first place, you thank Aitana for listening before bidding her farewell.

“We are going to Ibiza after the final. If you want to you could join us and get to know your my team mates you know just in case you join us. Feel free to invite some of your friends too”

“I just might take you up on that offer Aitana. Thank you again. I’ll see you in a few days, maybe”

“Good luck for the final”

If only her well wishes worked. The Netherlands end up losing 2-0 in the final against the United States. It was a heart breaking loss but you chose to focus on what you could learn from the game and be proud of the fact that you made the World Cup final in the first place. It would hurt for a while but you could think of worse places to wallow than in Ibiza with your closest friends and those that could soon be your new team mates.

[httpsdana]

or maybe prompt 70 because i just saw you already did prompt 37 with jude(?)

Family Love~Xavi Simons

*Pictures are from Pinterest*

I ended up writing both requests because ik some xavi girlies need to be fed. enjoy <3

request from here

master list -> part 2

players/drivers I write for

70-"you really love her, don't you?"

Xavi and y/n were visiting his parents in the Netherlands, since it has been a while since they visited them.

y/n was helping Xavi's mom, Peggy, with the food in the kitchen, having a chat and catching up with each other.

"I hope Xavi isn't giving you a hard time" Peggy said, her voice hinting that part of her was joking and the other was serious.

"oh no. he's the sweetest" y/n said, smiling to herself at the thought of her boyfriend.

"he's treating you well right? i wouldn't want you to be treated badly, even if it was my son" she said, her tone worried.

"he treats me like a queen. i wouldn't want to be with anyone else" she replied, making Peggy smile.

"that's great. he really loves you, you know" she said, making y/n smile.

"yeah I know. and I love him so much too" she replied.

As they continued their chat, Xavi stepped into the kitchen, wrapping his arms around y/n's waist from behind.

"I missed you" he mumbled into her neck, pecking her shoulder softly. She chuckled silently, her head turning to kiss the top of his head.

"me too. but I'm making food with your mom right now so don't distract me" she warned him, making him pout

"mom can I steal my girlfriend for a bit?" he said, a bit too sweetly.

"yeah of course we're almost done anyway" his mom said, making him smile widely.

Before y/n had the chance to say anything, Xavi has already pulled her out of the kitchen, walking her to the bedroom they were sharing.

"why'd you do that" y/n said, a sly smile on her face.

Xavi dropped down on the bed, pulling her down with him. He laid on top of her, his head buried in her neck

"I missed you" he murmured into her neck, his arms wrapping tightly around her waist, like he's afraid of letting her go.

y/n smiled, running her hand over his perfect braids, which she had done to him before coming to his parents house.

"l missed you too baby" she mumbled, pressing a kiss on the top of his head.

Their moment was interrupted by a knock on the door. It opened slightly, his dad peeking his head inside.

"hey you two. dinner is ready" he said with a smile.

"we'll be there in a second" y/n replied, while he nodded, stepping out of the room.

Xavi looked up at y/n, a pout on his face as his grip tightened.

"I don't wanna go" he mumbled, his lips pressing on her jaw

"well I'm hungry so I'm not staying here" she said, already getting up. He groaned, letting her get up as he flipped over, his face buried in the pillow.

"come on love. we can take a nap after dinner" she said, grabbing his hands to pull him up.

He stood up lazily, looking down at y/n with a loving gaze that never seems to leave his eyes when looking at his girlfriend.

"can i, at least get a kiss? I know you won't let me even hold your hand down there" he said, the pout never leaving his face.

y/n chuckled, grabbing his face and pulling him down to press a kiss on his lips. Before he had the chance to deepen the kiss, she pulled away, giving him a look.

She grabbed his hand, pulling him with her down to the dinning room.

Dinner was nice, Xavi was speaking with his parents about his upcoming matches, while y/n just listened to him, their hands holding each other under the table.

Soon after dinner, y/n and Xavi had helped his mom cleaning the dishes, Xavi too excited to go have a nap, when suddenly, his sister Kenza entered the kitchen.

"y/n. we haven't done anything together yet. do you have anything now?" she asked, her voice soft and excited.

y/n looked at Xavi, who gave her a look telling her to not go with his sister, but y/n had promised his sister she would hang out with her.

"no I have nothing. we can hang out for a bit" she said, making the 10 year old girl smile widely before giving y/n a hug and running to her room.

"sorry love. I promised her to hang out and I didn't have any time all day" she said, walking over to her boyfriend who was pouting.

He wouldn't look at her, turning his head to look away from her. She smiled at his childness, grabbing his face to make him look at her. His pout was still there, refusing to give in.

y/n leaned in, kissing his pout a few times. He couldn't help the smile that curled up his face, but then he masked it up with a fake angry look.

"I'm still mad" he said, crossing his arms over his chest. y/n chuckled, pulling him down by his neck, giving him a long loving kiss.

"I'll make it up to you I promise" she mumbled against his lips, making him smile.

He nodded, letting her leave to meet his younger sister in her room

"so what're we doing?" y/n asked, sitting down next to Kenza on her bed.

"Last time Xavi got here, he got me a small make up kit, I was thinking we can do each other's make up?" she said, her tone excited and a wide grin on her face.

y/n nodded enthusiastically, following the little girl to her small mirror

"I can also get my make up bag? I've got some new cool stuff I haven't tried yet" y/n said, making the girl nod her head while clapping her hands.

y/n rushed to her room, getting her make up bag from her suitcase.

She started first by Kenza's make up, putting on her face some of her make up. The little girl had suggested a make up look with a bold eyeshadow and y/n couldn't say no to her excitement.

The two girls sat in the room, laughing at some stories said by both of them about Xavi. y/n adored Kenza, she was like a little sister she never had. And y/n was like the older sister Kenza never had.

As y/n was applying some powder on the girl's face, Xavi walked by the room, hearing the laughter of his favorite girls.

He stood at the door, seeing how y/n was smiling at his sister, doing her make up and enjoying her time with her. It made him smile widely, seeing how his girlfriend was like his sister's best friend.

He leaned against the door frame, a wide grin on his face as he admired his beautiful girls.

Meanwhile, his dad came and stood by him, looking at the girls laughing before turning to look at Xavi

"you really love her, don't you?" he said, looking at the girls again

"more than anything" he mumbled, never tearing his gaze away from them.

"she's a keeper. don't let her go" his dad said, putting his hand on his son's shoulder

Xavi smiled, turning to look at his dad

"never" he said, before looking back at his girlfriend.

[alpaca-clouds]

Public Transport COULD Be Great

Americans visiting Europe, especially those more left-leaning Americans, will always be so impressed when it comes to our public transport. And it does not matter where they visit here. Netherlands? "Amazing Public Transport!" France? "Amazing!" Germany? "Amazing!" Even in the UK they will be impressed.

And I kinda get it. While once upon a time the US made a conserted effort to get people moving via train, that has been almost two centuries ago and by now they just decided that people having cars is making more companies more money, so who needs cheap public transport? And while I personally actually kinda liked the public transport on the east coast while I was visiting the US... Yeah, I am well aware that the east coast (especially the area between New York City and DC) is not quite representative for the US.

However, here is the thing: If you ask most Europeans about their public transport... Well, we'll complain as well.

Because they fucking ruined it!

See, here is the issue, in a lot of parts in Europe, at some point or another the government privatized some or all of the public transport. This hit some countries like the UK especially hard, but Germany was hit also quite a lot.

Because of that a lot of things happened that happened when you try to use capitalist logic onto something that cannot work under capitalism.

For example a lot of rails have been removed in areas where it was not "cost efficient" to run trains. Or if they have not been removed, they are at least no longer used. In Germany you will find that in the area where I am living (North-Rhine-Westfelia) we have somewhat good running public transport. Meanwhile a friend of mine is living in former East Germany. And something you gotta understand about former East Germany: After the reunification a lot of people from East Germany tried to move away from there, thinking they would do better in "West Germany". So you will find a lot of mostly empty villages and towns there. And you know what does not pay under capitalism? Right: Running trains to fairly depopulated villages and towns. So... This friend is forced to use a car all the time. Because the next train station that is actually still in use is 45 minutes by car away.

Sure, technically there is a bus running through her village... It comes 3 times a day mondays to fridays, 2 times a day on Saturday and not at all on Sunday. Also to reach the aforementioned train station, the bus connection would take her almost two hours.

Now mind you: There is a train station about 10 minutes by car from her. But that one has not been in use for almost 20 years. Because, again: It just does not pay. It is not profitable for the company, so it is no longer in use.

And here we get to the issue: Public transport is an amazing thing... But we see again and again, that it really only works in those cases where it is state-run and paid for with taxes. As soon as it is privatized it will just not work. Because, well... In general public transport really is not a thing that will be paying for itself. It is fairly expensive, and to keep it profitable you need to keep raising the prices. (As a German: Believe me, I know!)

Not to mention that company policies will lead to weird stuff happening with the trains. Here in Germany? Well, the biggest train company (that is kinda partly state-owned, but not state-run, so it is run under capitalist ideas) has promised their investors that the trains will not be as delayed as before. But given the piss-poor state in which the rail network is, this is just not feasible. So, what will they do? Simple! If a train gets too delayed they will just cancel it. Will that fuck everyone travelling over way more than letting the train delay for 20 minutes? Yeah. But they do not care. They only care about the investors.

And this is the general issue.

For public transit to work, you need to design the transit network to serve the people - and not to make money. Because it does not matter that there are only some old people left in some depopulated little town in eastern Germany or western England... Those old people deserve to be able to get from their depopulated little town to the next big shopping center and cultural center as well.

As long as you do not design the stuff with those people in mind...

Sure, it is better than no public transport. But it still sucks.

[moo-siala]

I STILL LOVE YOU — MAX VERSTAPPEN

PAIRING: max verstappen x ex-wife fem!reader

SUMMARY: max’s ex wife finds out he’s getting married again

CONTENT: mentions of divorce, angst, sadness, cheating

NOTE: get ready to cry. i did while editing it + this is a repost from my old blog too but this one got slightly revised. some errors got fixed but it’s not 100% proof read.

As y/n sifted through the mail, she noticed a white envelope with "y/n verstappen" written in gold letters. frowning in confusion, she carefully opened it. the moment she saw the contents, she felt her heart shatter. it was a wedding invitation—specifically, an invitation to max’s wedding.

“max and eleanor request the pleasure of your company to celebrate their wedding” was written on the card in gold and black letters.

y/n felt her eyes water and closed the envelope. this could not be happening, she thought. but it’s not like her and max got divorced yesterday.

the divorce was due to his racing career. he wasn't as present as y/n and the children needed him to be, which led to constant arguments, fights, and tears until their marriage ultimately ended. this happened over three years ago, but she still couldn't understand how he had moved on so quickly. perhaps her difficulty in understanding stemmed from her own inability to move on.

she had tried everything, and by everything, she truly meant everything. she had met new people, gone on countless dates, and even ventured into the realm of online dating, hoping to find a connection that might help her move on. but nothing seemed to work. none of those men were him. some were good, hardworking, and loyal, but there was always something missing. each new encounter only served to highlight the void he had left in her life, the irreplaceable presence she couldn't seem to find in anyone else.

"mama, why are you crying?" a soft voice pulled her back to reality. "hey, i’m not crying, i just have an allergy," she chuckled, hugging leon, one of her seven-year-old twins. "julian and i are ready but he is helping emma with her bag," he smiled, hugging her back.

leon and julian were twins—practically mirror images of max. thet shared the same face, the same eyes, and the same cheeky smile that always managed to light up a room. meanwhile, emma was a carbon copy of her mother, with the exception of her blonde hair and blue eyes, inherited from her father.

the twins were only four years old when the divorce happened, and emma was just two. the process was far from easy, but both parents made a concerted effort to minimize the trauma for their children. they navigated the difficult path with as much grace and cooperation as possible, ensuring that their young ones felt loved and secure despite the upheaval. the priority was always the well-being of their children, and they did their best to shield them from the worst of the pain.

“mama! we’re ready!” julian and emma ran out of their rooms with bags in hand, “hey, be careful!” she laughed, “we’re ready!” julian exclaimed and emma giggled, “that’s good, oma will be here in no time” y/n hugged the children, or like max likes to call them, their cubs.

the doorbell rang, signaling sophie’s arrival.

about a week ago, sophie had asked if she could take the kids on a little trip to a lake she had visited with a friend near the city. after looking at the pictures, y/n couldn't say no. the children would love it, and she knew how much they enjoyed spending time with their grandma.

when she got pregnant, max suggested that it would be better to move back to the netherlands so the babies could be surrounded by family. she didn't hesitate and agreed with his proposal. while she loved Monaco, nothing could compare to having her family nearby.

when she looks back at those memories, she’s thankful that she chose to come back. she doesn’t know what could’ve been of her if she had to go through the divorce all alone in monaco.

she walked over and opened the door, smiling warmly. "hey!" she greeted, pulling sophie into a hug.

"how are you doing, sweetheart?" sophie asked, hugging her back as she stepped inside. y/n knew exactly what she meant. "i’m good," she replied softly, her smile gentle. sophie nodded, giving her a sympathetic look just as the three mini verstappens ran over to their grandma, hugging her legs and making her laugh.

"oma!" they exclaimed in unison. "who’s ready to go to the lake?" their oma asked, eyes sparkling. "me!" the cubs chorused excitedly.

they said their goodbyes as she helped sophie put the kids in the car.

“i’ll let you know when we get there” she told y/n, “sounds good, and send pictures, please” y/n smiled in return, “i will. and honey, if you need anything, just give me a call” she pulled her into a tight embrace, “i know, thank you, soph” “no problem”

—

ass the dedicated mother she was, or as max fondly referred to her, the lioness, y/n found herself feeling oddly restless whenever her children were away—simultaneously bored yet remarkably productive. with them gone, she efficiently organized weeks of work and meticulously cleaned the entire house. completing her chores left her with a sense of satisfaction, prompting a leisurely shower before descending to the kitchen to prepare a meal.

while deeply focused on cooking, the doorbell rang unexpectedly. perplexed, since she was only expecting sophie’s visit that day, she set the knife aside, quickly washed her hands, and hastened to answer the door.

“uh, hey?” she said opening the door, “hey, how are you?” max asked, “i’m good. your mom already left with the children so…” “i’m here to talk to you, can i come in?” he asked, “sure…” nodding, she opened the door a bit more for him to come in.

“are you busy?” he asked after you closed the door, “not really. just cooking” she walked back to the kitchen, max followed.

max sat in one of the stools as he watched her wash and chop some vegetables for the salad she was preparing.

“what did you come to talk about?” y/n looked up, his blue orbs finding her beautiful eyes, “i wanted to know if you got the…” “the wedding invitation? i got it today in the mail” she nodded, her tone coming out a bit dry even if she didn’t mean to sound that way.

“are you mad?” he asked, “why would i be? congrats, by the way” she said, adding her favorite vinaigrette to the salad, “don’t be like that…” he sighed, “like what? am i not supposed to congratulate you now?” her eyes found his once again.

“you know exactly what i mean, y/n” he said, “i don’t know what you mean and i’m not in the mood to fight. i’m tired and hungry, so can i please enjoy my salad?” she asked and he scoffed, “i can see it in your eyes, y/n. there’s something you’re not telling me and i want to know what’s going on” he sighed, “we’ve been divorced for almost three years, but remember we were married for four before that”

she felt her eyes water but quickly wiped the tears away.

“i’m okay, max” y/n said while grabbing a glass and pouring some juice in it, “you’re about to cry, tell me what’s going wrong, i want to help” he softly said, and that’s when she broke.

"i don't know max, maybe the fact that once again i'm the one who's going to be all alone?" her voice broke, "the fact i'm the only one who's going to come back to an empty home when the kids are spending time with you? or maybe it's the fact that for some reason i can't move on with my life but everyone else can! you did, why can't i?" by now, she were a crying mess.

move on? he never moved on. his family knew it, his friends knew it, everyone knew it, he knew it.

he was never able to move on from her, the love of his life—the woman who lifted him up when he was feeling down, who cried tears of pride after almost every race, the woman who showed him a new depth of love when he became a father, and the woman he lost because he messed up.

seeing her crying broke his heart, but it also gave him hope. hope that the woman he deeply loves, loved him back still, even if it was just a little bit of it left.

he liked eleanor. she was good with the kids and kind to y/n, but she wasn't her, and she never could be. eleanor, younger than him and eager to settle down, was someone he found comfort in, at least temporarily. he went along with the idea of marriage, thinking he had nothing to lose, until the day she poured her heart out to him. it was then that he realized eleanor could never replace the deep connection he had lost with his former wife.

"i never wanted that divorce," he said softly as he walked over to her. "and you think I did?" she sniffed, wiping away her tears. “you asked for it..." he began. "because I got tired of giving you signals and second chances that were never taken, max," she sighed, her voice heavy with emotion. she looked up at him, hoping he would understand the weight of her words.

max felt like shit, to say the least. hoy could he be so dumb? how could he throw away his family and the love of his life just like that?

“please give me one last chance, i promise i’m not going to fail you and the cubs again”, he sat next to y/n on the couch, grabbing her small hands and squeezing them softly, “max, you’re getting ma-“ “if you don’t want me to get married i won’t. i just need to hear you say it”, he interrupted her.

y/n was in utter shock to say the least. could he really be serious? the gravity of his words hung heavy in the air, leaving her struggling to comprehend the reality of the situation.

“i am serious. you know it” he said, almost as if he could read her mind, “please baby girl, i need to hear you say it”, he pleaded, staring into her eyes.

y/n took a deep breath.

“maxie… please… please don’t get married” she softly said, eyes watering and lips trembling. max sighed in relief and hugged her tightly, “i’m never letting you go, ever again” he grabbed your face and kissed her softly.

“i hope you stick to that promise” “you know i will, schatje”

[allthingslinguistic]

Summer 2024 travel plans and Language Guinea Pig Diaries

In August and September, I'm doing a bunch of travel to various European countries. In order, they are:

Glasgow, Scotland for World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon), where I'll be on a panel about Languages as World-Building and doing assorted meetups

Helsinki, Finland for the Societas Linguistica Europea annual meeting

Tartu, Estonia for a colloquium talk on Applying Linguistic Methods to Linguistic Communication at the University of Tartu and a two-part workshop on lingcomm for participants of Methodological Excellence in Data-Driven Approaches to Linguistics (MEDAL)

Nijmegen, Netherlands for some meetings with linguists

Florence, Italy to visit friends

Madrid, Spain for the publication of the Spanish translation of Because Internet by Pie de Página

I hope to run into lots of interesting people at these events! If you're already in one of these places and I know you, including from the interent, feel free to reach out and see if we can fit something in!

This whirlwind list of events and places has also gotten me thinking: this trip is going to be a fun chance to learn some more about some languages! I'm already fairly familiar with Spanish and Scottish English (I doubt people will speak much Broad Scots to me with my Canadian accent), and I'm confident on my ability to brush up on them by a bit of exposure and possibly watching a relevant movie on the way there, but the other four languages are going to take a bit more doing. Here's my initial situation, in order of familiarity:

Italian - I studied it for two years in undergrad and spent about a week in Italy shortly thereafter, and by the end of the week I was finally beginning to feel like it was starting to "click" but then I haven't really touched it since then. So I feel like it would come back with exposure but I wonder if there's something I could do in advance to help it come back sooner/faster rather than taking the whole week of being there again

Dutch - I went through the whole Duolingo tree on rapid-speed back when you could skip through lessons for new material only and not practice drills over about a year in 2019-ish just for fun and as an excuse to look up lots of Germanic roots (I studied German before I knew any linguistics so it was fun to triangulate there). Never actually been anywhere Dutch was being spoken but I did find I could get the gist of youtube videos about linguistics in Dutch so it probably needs "activation" similar to Italian

Finnish - No background except for a few linguistics factoids (case! vowel harmony!), and that it's a Uralic language (related to Hungarian but not to any of the Indo-European languages, so this is a fun chance to learn some things about a language family that's unfamiliar to me)

Estonian - Also no background, also Uralic, clearly the fun thing to do would be to learn enough bits of Estonian and Finnish that I could compare them with each other (also since I'm meeting with linguists in both countries, this would be a fun topic for small talk conversation)

At the same time, there are a lot of language learning strategies floating around out there, and I have two nearly matched pairs of languages on this list: Italian and Dutch, both of which I am pretty good at cognate languages for and have studied some a while back, so I could test two activation strategies, and Finnish and Estonian, both of which I have essentially zero familiarity with, so I could test two strategies for getting somewhere near a basic functional ability.

I have about a month until I start this cycle with a flight to Helsinki. One month, four languages. What could possibly go wrong?

Here's my tentative plan so far:

Activation, Italian and Dutch - I'm pretty sure what I need for these languages is largely as much audio imput as possible (given what's feasible around like, all the other things going on in my life). I've decided to aim to watch one or two youtube videos in Italian per day, focusing on relatively concrete, daily life topics (such as gelato making) and to listen to one episode of a podcast in Dutch per day, aiming to get through the back catalogue of Kletsheads, a podcast about multilingual children.

Why these strategies? Well, I'm meeting up with linguists in the Netherlands but not in Italy, so it makes sense to try to learn more linguistics vocab there. Also, I'm curious about the effect of medium between video and podcast: will being able to see people talking and what they're talking about have much of an effect on how much I can understand? Will I find it easier to integrate one or the other of watching videos vs listening to podcasts into my life at a practical level? Plus, will concentrating on a single, more academic topic vs watching a scattered, unsystematic list of videos have effects on my vocabulary?

Basic function, Finnish and Estonian - I'm probably looking for some phrases to say to people in shops and restaurants and the ability to pronounce things written on menus adequately and match heard words/placenames to written versions on signs. I started doing a very minimal one lesson a day on Duolingo for Finnish in January, when planning for this trip started, for the very simple reason that I was already familiar with Duolingo and it doesn't have Estonian, so I decided to just start by doing a thing I was familiar with until I got around to doing more research. I've been casting around trying to figure out a source of basic Estonian phrases online when a friend mentioned learning French on tiktok, so I searched for "learn estonian" and voila! I think I'll also aim for a video or two of Estonian phrases per day but I want to do more rewatching than with Italian or Dutch, since I'm aiming to remember specific common phrases. So maybe one rewatched video and one new video, per day? They're shorter on tiktok than on youtube.

Why these strategies? This is a comparison of Duolingo's more systematic approach with lots of repetition and gamification and word-by-word translation in a relatively sterile environment versus a more organic and free-styling approach with more grounding in real people and faces and full phrases where I'm not really trying to understand the individual words. There are lots of factors to compare and it's not a completely fair comparison since I started Duolingo in January and I only thought to start the TikTok idea this week, but hey, learning anything still counts as progress.

Summary: I have four languages, each focused on a different app: YouTube, my podcast app, Duolingo, and TikTok. Hopefully for the video apps, this will help their algorithms kick in and start recommending me further useful videos. The difference between the two video strategies is that for Italian, I'm watching monolingual videos that are aimed at people who already speak Italian and just want to learn something about the topic, whereas for Estonian, I'm watching bilingual videos aimed at English speakers who want to learn some words or phrases in Estonian.

Am I going to get these four languages mixed up? Probably! I'm hoping that choosing a different app/strategy for each is a little bit helpful on that front.

Do I think these strategies are optimal? Probably not! But I'm aiming to choose things that feel relatively clear to implement consistently, rather than getting bogged down in researching language learning methods instead of actually getting exposure to the languages. I'll probably do a basic "look up some key phrases and try to learn them" a day or two before entering each place too. And maybe shift other aspects depending on how things are going, stay tuned!

At any rate, I figured it would be more fun to blog about my attempts to use myself as a guinea pig for a few different language learning strategies here than to just do it in my own head (and hopefully help me with staying motivated). And maybe people will have tips of either language learning strategies that have worked for you in general or specific ideas for these particular languages, so this is the beginning of a series that I'm calling #Language Guinea Pig Diaries and future posts will also be posted under that tag!

[19ndonboy]

illicit affairs - mason mount

words: 3.4k

A/N: this is my first imagine, be nice please. of course miss swift inspired me to write something. also, i’d really appreciate if i could receive feedback on this. thank you

you and mason had been best friends for as long you can remember. it was kind of like a love at first sight in a kids who have so much to discover way. you two met in primary school. you were on your way to lunch when a boy running without looking in front of him in the corridor shoved you. your food your mother had cooked you was all over the floor before you could even realize what happened. mason, who saw it all unfold, gave you his food. after much pleading from his side with you being too shy to refuse, you ended up sharing the sandwiches his mother had lovely made. until this day, his brother lewis never missed an opportunity to tease him on how big of a gentleman he is since his youngest age. 

neither of you would have thought you would be here years later. visiting the netherlands to see him play for vitesse, mason never missing the opportunity to score a goal and do the celebration you two created when you were in maths class. 

cheering for him when he scored his first goal for his beloved club, chelsea. the club he would talk to you for hours hopelessly dreaming about stepping a foot on the green rectangle at stamford bridge.

the day he lifted the champions league felt more like a dream to you than him. you often found yourself thinking about how he would be one of the biggest footballers in the world when he was playing football on your school’s playground during the lunch time. little did you know he actually made it. 

all these moments made you grow closer and closer each year that went by. you would go on holidays together with your mutual friends, he’d come to pick you up after uni or work whenever he had the time to. he even drove at 2am when you called him in tears after breaking up with your boyfriend of 8 months and listened to your rambling until you could see the sunrise emerge from the windows, having forgotten to close the blinds the night before.

you don’t remember what led up to the night you found yourself wrapped in his bedsheets after a birthday party at a club. you blamed it on the alcohol that day. a month later, you blamed it on a defeat from chelsea’s side. before you knew, two weeks later, he was in your bed. that time, your boss was the one to blame for letting out his nerves on you. sure at some point, you two needed to act like the adults you were and came to the conclusion that you could have sex when you two wanted to. 

it was easier for him considering he didn’t have much time to go out but he also didn’t want to put his trust in a girl he would know for two hours and half. that was the safest option. on the other hand, you guess you agreed to the deal because it was less tiring than going on dates with douchebags you found on the internet. what a deal that was… no strings attached. these were the three words he repeated approximately ten times. 

it’s been six months since you started this friends with benefits situation. no one in your mutuals friends is aware of this. you do your best to hide it from them, not wanting to be bothered with questions. he would just leave 5 minutes before you at parties and would wait for you in his car 200 meters away from the club’s entry. mason and you have always been close. you would always find his arm around your shoulder while talking to a friend or a teammate. you would often hustle your arm around his when weather gets colder outside. also the perfect opportunity for him to hold your hands to warm them up. these were the things you always did as best friends. yet lately, to this long list, you added lingering touches from his side on your lower back, his hand on your thigh in the car or so in front of your friends. something they quickly noticed. 

they always saw you as more than friends. to them, it was so obvious and they couldn’t understand how you would still deny it. the way he was always worried about you when you were in a club and he couldn’t find you anymore in the big crowd on the dance floor. the way he would always crack a joke in a public, yet you would be the only one he’s looking at to make sure you found it funny. the way he would already have his eyes on you before you even made it to the room. the way he would be the first person you’d run to when you have had a bad day at work. the way you would hug him a little longer than all your other friends when saying your goodbyes after a night out just so you could inhale his scent that always made you feel safe and at ease. the way your grip around your glass would tighten every time a girl would flirt with him in front of you.

the way your jaw is clenched right now as you seated on one of reece’s sofa. 2 feet away from you, here you have mason and a beautiful woman. why would you lie. she’s got long legs, brown shiny hair you only see on tv and a bright smile everyone could fall on their knees for. who were you compared to this woman. you feel like exploding every time you hear him laughing, even more when he throws back his head while laughing.

a weird feeling settling in your stomach thinking you were the only one who could make him smile this much you could perceive his eyes crinkle. that feature you loved so much, yet you despise it with everything you have right now. how naive had you been, you thought. you hated how much your friends’ words got into your head to the point you believed every one of them. because here you were seating between kai and ben, both of them joking about something you can’t even recall of, too busy paying attention to mason and her. it shouldn’t hurt this much, yet you can feel like your heart is ripped apart when she rests her hand on his thigh and he doesn’t budge.

no strings attached

hours passed by since you arrived at reece’s party and you only had one wish. to leave. you can see the clock ticking on the white wall to your left. it’s now 1am. to be honest, this is the only thing you’re paying attention to, at least trying to. you didn’t even notice reece sitting next to you until he nudged you with his arm. a playful smile plastered on his face until he saw your eyes full of sorrow. you wanted to get up and leave the moment you saw his grin replaced by a frown. you wanted to scream and tell him to stop looking at you with so much pity in his eyes. is this what you inspired to all of your friends present here? 

“hey what happened to the girl who loves to prank everyone with me during parties” he said with a pout, concern plastered all over his face. “not tonight… i’m tired” you answered, guilt written all over your face, which quickly went noticed by your friend. he’s one of those people who probably know you more than you know yourself. so he automatically knows it would be no use to ask what’s the matter when he already knows the answer is his chelsea and england teammate. instead, he does just as you needed in that moment. he proves you he’s here for you ready to talk to him when you will be ready but while waiting, he’s doing everything he can to crack a smile on your face by telling stories you already heard over and over again. making sure never to mention mason in all of them, both of you knowing he was the main part of every one of them though.

weeks had passed since that party. he ended up leaving with the girl he had passed the whole time with. to say it hurt when you saw them both leave without him even acknowledging you would be an understatement. this night led to the conclusion you were never more than sex between a win and a draining training session. you heard through some of his chelsea teammates how mason was having lots of fun with different girls on different nights. it physically became exhausting hearing about him wandering around london as if he never cared about you. what happened to all those times he would compliment you or tell you how you’re the best thing that happened to him. 

you distanced yourself from him and all your mutual friends. if he wanted to act like nothing ever happened between you two, with no explanation on this behavior changement, then so be it. as much as it hurt you, you couldn’t be arsed going out with your friends if it meant seeing him. eventually, you passed time doing activities that would keep your thoughts at bay. you spend more time at work, more time taking walks around in parks, reading books with your hot chocolate in your favorite café because you always hated coffee. and as much as it hurts deep inside you, you had never felt this amount of peace as you do right now. maybe mason wasn’t meant to be part of your life and you started to accept it.

until you saw him on a saturday night. he hadn’t noticed you yet, too focused in his heated conversation with ben. seeing him wave his hands everywhere made you wonder what was the topic of their conversation but it wasn’t your business anyway so you drifted away and went over where sophia and the girls were. a few meters away, oblivious to you, you were actually the person they were talking about.

mason feels weird to say the least. he misses seeing you almost everyday, having you on the phone when one of you couldn’t make it to each other’s place. he misses telling you about his day but most of all, he misses holding you in his arms. the weird feeling in his stomach he would get when he hears your laugh. this is when it hit him. he fell in love with you, so hard it scared him. and when he’s scared, he does the worst thing he could do. especially to you, he knows how complicated it is for you to trust people, being so used to them leaving you when you need them the most. he promised to himself he’d never do that, yet he was the reason your heart was aching now.

anyone could read the pain you ignoring him caused. ben felt sad for his friend but he couldn’t stop himself from telling him off on how badly he treated you lately. he wasn’t aware of your situationship you two shared, even though he had his suspicions something happened at some point. “i never thought you were this stupid mate. you fucked up. i shouldn’t even be telling you this but it’s so obvious to everyone she loves you. the way she’s with you, we’ve never seen her like that with someone else. sort this out or you’ll lose her.” ben said, which caused mason to drop his head and look at the floor. 

he knows he fucked up real bad, he knows it when he doesn’t get his favorite text every night with a random song she loved on that day. weird to others but to him, it meant the world knowing she would share something so intimate to him. he knows how much she loves music but also how much she keeps to herself, making her feel like she’s in her own bubble with her music. yet, she let him in and he wasn’t so sure he was still welcomed there now.

too engulfed in his thoughts, he didn’t hear what ben said until his friend reminded him how one manchester united footballer had once slide in her instagram dms. he wanted to tell his friend how he was well aware of this, remembering how irritated he was after finding out. yet he didn’t have the time as reece interrupted their conversation, informing them you were back within the group. 

what hurt him the most was what came after. he went to your side, fiddling with the end of his shirt, displaying how nervous he was to see you after what felt like an eternity to him. however, he wasn’t expecting you to greet him with so much indifference. as if he was some kind of acquaintance to you. so that was it? he had ruined the best thing he ever had in his life just because he couldn’t act like the adult he was and face his fear of loving someone, you. after this interaction, you went back to your conversation with the girls. leaving him standing there until he collected his thoughts and went to see his teammates.

hours passed with no sign from mason. you later found yourself at the bar, talking with a guy present at the party. he was nice to talk to and was funny. but he wasn’t mason. you were having a battle inside your head telling yourself not to think of him and just enjoy the moment. but that was quickly interrupted when you felt a hand grip your wrist and drag you away towards the backyard.

he couldn’t be arsed seeing this guy flirt with you. the sight of you laughing to whatever that man said was driving him wild. surely he couldn’t be that funny. the thought of you being with someone else other than him made him want to throw up right there. seeing your hand on his thigh was the last straw though. he felt his blood boil, it made him so jealous, he could feel his heart squeeze uncomfortably in his chest. 

as soon as you stepped a foot in the backyard, you removed your arm from his grip. he was taken aback by your reaction, not being used to you refusing his contact. he swears you could hear his heart beating so fast in his ribcage in this moment. 

“what’s your problem now?” you exclaimed, surprising him by your angry tone. “i miss you” was the first thing that escaped his lips, not even having the time to think twice before spilling those three words. and as much as you wanted to hear those words, you were so mad at him. how dare he?

“tell me you’re joking please. you started it. what we had, you ruined it. i should have never slept with you. look at this idiotic fool that you made me. i fell in love with you, so bad it hurt. and you were doing god knows what with all those girls knowing damn well i would hear about it. what i had with you, i can’t have it with anyone else.” he opened his mouth wanting to speak but you immediately stopped him saying “but the worst thing is that i still love you”. your voice breaking at the end. 

until then, you had managed to stop your tears from falling but they were now falling on your cheeks, blurring your vision. next thing you knew, mason had his arms wrapped around you, holding you so tight. minutes after you calmed down, he was cupping your face with his hands, wiping your tears away with his thumbs. 

“i’m sorry. i have no excuse for everything i did these past weeks. i acted like an arsehole. i don’t even deserve you. what we had, i wouldn’t want it with anyone else. i was so scared. i fell for you too, i was scared i couldn’t give you what you deserve so i started seeing other girls thinking my feelings would go away but it just got worse. i don’t even remember their names. but that was so stupid and i never want to see you cry because of me again.”

you attentively listened to every word he had to say. how bad you wanted to forget all of this and have him back in your life just like you had him by your side for years. but you couldn’t. deep down it hurt too much and you couldn’t let him come back in a flash. if he really loved you as he claimed it, then he would have to prove it with more than words. too many times for your liking, you forgave people only for them to stab you in the back later. 

and he knew that. with a smile, you turned your back to him and left him standing there dumbfounded. surely, he was expecting every reaction but this one. but he knew you like no one else does. and therefore, he couldn’t give up on you, this is not what you wanted. 

he was by your side for the rest of the night, always checking up on you to ask if you were okay but never in a way that could make you feel stressed. 3 am arrived quickly and the only thing you could dream of was your bed. to your utter surprise, mason was waiting for you by the door after you said your goodbyes to everyone, promising them you will see them soon again. you accepted his proposition to take you home, you couldn’t say no to his puppy eyes anyway. the second his car left the porch, taylor swift’s music was blasting in his car. you turned your head to his direction to be met with a grin on his flushed face. he knew the way to your heart, you thought.

if it wasn’t for the little voice telling you to make him earn you, your hands would already be cupping his cheeks, your lips on his. 

after a 25 minute drive, you made it home. he took you to your door, leaving after kissing you on the forehead, not wanting to go inside and overstep. he made sure the door was closed and waited for you to tell him you were in bed just like he had asked to. both of you feeling your tummy flutter when you opened your window to wave him off. finding him standing next to his car waiting outside, you felt like 16 years old again when you two would go on cinema dates, as friends.

eventually, 3 days later, you were on a different kind of cinema date. this time, it was at his home, in his cinema room with big blankets all over you and your favorite food. you wouldn’t have it any other way right now. 

never did he stop with those attentions and improvised dates in the next weeks. he took you home from work when he had a free afternoon. he would always send you a morning text to wish you a nice day and a goodnight text. you would sometimes receive phone calls during the day because he ‘misses your face’ as he would say. you missed his too. you could even feel butterflies erupt in your stomach whenever he’d send you a selfie, however you would never admit it. 

there was this day. he took you to portsmouth as you two were feeling homesick and were tired of the hectic life in london. you probably hadn’t been this happy in months, and judging by mason’s look, he could say the same. you felt at home, in this city but mostly in his arms as you were standing on the harbour, reminiscing the good old days. you felt at peace. how wrong were you thinking back then that maybe this man wasn’t meant to be in your life. 

you could cry out of happiness when you collected your thoughts and saw him staring at you, with a look you had never seen before. he must have seen the same one on your face, as his lips made his way to yours in the most loving way possible. pulling away seconds later to regain your breath, he murmured “can we always be this close?”.

his breath fanning over your mouth, you chuckled before putting your arms around his neck and kissed him again. 

tag: @mountpulisic

[agendabymooner]

closure ! max v. x ofc (hearth sister!ofc)

“it wasn't right—the way it all went down. looks like you know that now.”

summary: sylvie just wanted to prove that she was good enough for the red bull racing team, but everything that had to do with her history with max seemed to get in the way of her determination— and she made sure that he knew that.

content warning: panic attack (and its triggers), use of explicit language, mentions of absent father figure, j*s verst*ppen 🤢, christian horner, frenemies to lovers (ish), confrontational text messages (max and sylvie), max being oblivious to her mental state, mentions of max’s childhood (not detailed)

note: as someone who struggled to find peace at certain situations, I know what it’s like to struggle in asking for help. please remember that there are people that are more than willing to give you the support that you need.

(i may not be able to update any of the smau works for the next two weeks as i am out of town and i only have my ipad with me. i normally do the layouts on my computer. i’ll try my best!)

enjoy xx

masterlist

2016 Spanish GP

If fate worked like this all the time, she might as well jump off the cliff if any of her peers asked for it.

She had been pulled out of her lectures for the week only for her to sit and watch how the racing teams operated. She could only roll her eyes when Christian Horner recommended she should have her presence be known in the paddock and the track as she prepared to work in an F1 team.

Sylvie already knew how everything worked; she was going to be a driver, for fuck’s sake. She had been trained for it. She grew up attending the race weekends because of her father and grandparents. She knew everything now. Hell, she even had Toto Wolff for an in-law (practically). He could just rerun everything to her if she needed to remember.

Christian Horner clearly had a different intention towards her visit. He claimed that she needed to relive the experiences in the garage, the media pit and the hospitality. But she knew the truth.

She had a rapport, her history in the academy was obviously discussed to Christian at some point. How Christian never mentioned anything about her departure from the program to her sister, who now held parts of Red Bull and the other two teams, she never had an answer for. It wasn’t a secret to most. At least to those who were there the day she left.

Tilly was in the Mercedes area, leaving her little sister in the Red Bull hospitality as she listened to nothing. She felt so alone and isolated, her urge to go to Mercedes was overwhelming. But it wasn’t as if she could; Christian had already told her off about her role and position in the company.

It didn’t help that Max Verstappen, donning his number 33 shirt, was in the same building. He was quite adamant on keeping her company but she constantly avoided him, slipping out of his sight as soon as his eyes settled on her.

She found excuses, most of which had something to do with Daniel Ricciardo. The Australian hadn’t minded though, knowing that she felt uncomfortable being around other people especially around Max. Daniel never minded her excuses, instead making up a lie that’s believable to others. Just so she could escape.

Max’s family was there that weekend. Obviously, she knew his mother and Victoria, his sister. Max and Sylvie, the two 18 year olds, were practically soul twins. Born on the same day, grew up together, and had been attached to the hips since the day they could crawl— they were friends, no one just knew what had happened. His mother had always asked Sylvie’s mum about her and how she’d managed to let her friendship with Max dissipate like that. Victoria missed having Sylvie over for tea whenever she visited the Netherlands, asking Max about what he had done to let Sylvie go like that.

Jos Verstappen was a different story. He never liked Sylvie, only holding a certain amount of respect for Julius Hearth and Blanche Ford Hearth. He always wanted Max to be successful at motorsport and this meant that nobody could be as equally good as his son. Not especially when Max’s ability matched Sylvie’s. He always claimed that hanging out with “that girl” will simply distract Max.

Even if he nodded at his father’s direction, Max continued to be friends with Sylvie, spending more time together whenever she and her family would fly and meet with his family.

At the ripe age of 12, Max admitted to her that she’s the closest thing that he had to an imaginary friend. Like he was forced to grow up before he could even walk. She was the one who would pull up the PlayStation whenever he failed to please his father for the tournament of that time. Jos never liked her, but he didn’t know exactly what could’ve made him dislike her. Sylvie didn’t like him, either, because she couldn’t believe that she was the one who’d have to give Max the childhood that he deserved. There are times when she wished she could simply spew out the foulest words and lump him with her own father. Well… she had already considered him a shitty father, and there’s no changing of opinion now.

So for Sylvie to see Jos in the paddock, basically keeping his eye on his son like a pestering hawk? Yeah, she turned away from their direction.

Then another group of people came, the same arrogant smile all over their faces. They taunted her.

She could remember her last week at the academy, when she had enough. These boys questioned her abilities on the track as soon as she started, trying to get her to quit as soon as she could. She didn’t care about them, because whenever they’d race she remained on the top of their level. They hated her because of it. Then on her last day, she was left to be called a name that didn’t even fit her…

“Snake Sylvie!” Matt Bauer was what she called Max’s bitch. He never liked Sylvie and had always wanted to be in Max’s family’s good graces. Alongside him were Max’s two other friends. These three were the same incompetent fucks who never ended in Formula 2. Thus, ending their racing careers early. They were doing fuck knows what these days. Which was quite hilarious, if you were to ask Sylvie, because they were the ones who kept telling Max to “Keep working” or “toughen up and get the first place.”

She couldn’t remember their names when she met them again that weekend, her eyes were already blurry from the tears as she shoved her way through them. “Where are you going?! We’re just going to catch up, babe!”

She didn’t even stop, her feet speeding up as she attempted to wipe her tears away. Her lips let out a stutter of excuse me as she pushed her way into where the Mercedes garage was.

Second free practice didn’t start anytime soon and Sylvie was thankful for that. It, however, never stopped the camera by the engineering station from capturing the sounds of a sobbing girl and an image of her nearly soaked Red Bull shirt as she ran inside. Had she been stronger than this, she wouldn’t have ran to Toto.

As if he knew someone was coming his way, Toto Wolff immediately took his headphones off and turned. His face etched with worry as Sylvie wrapped her arms around his broad figure. She was hysterically sobbing and shaking, her tears almost soaking his white shirt as she kept her head tucked in his chest.

“Can we stop the camera? There’s an obvious situation going on in here and we need a moment,” Sylvie couldn’t hear his voice as it was something more of a rumbling noise. Meanwhile Toto’s stern expression made the cameraman do as he was told. “Hey, schwester, are you okay?”

She was relentless, sobbing as she kept her head down and her arms tightly wrapped around him. She couldn’t speak. Not breathe for that matter. It felt like the last day of the academy all over again. Having no voice felt like she was just as defenseless once more.

“Sylvie, do you want me to take you to your hospitality?” Her bloodshot red eyes, still tearing up, stared into his dark ones as her lips quivered and her head shook left and right. “Do you want your sister?”

Toto knew that the Mercedes hospitality was nearer to the Red Bull area than the Mercedes garage. So for her to go this far just for comfort… something told him that she didn’t want to stress out the pregnant woman and that she needed more than her sister.

He pursed his lips, feeling helpless as he kept an arm around her shoulder as they walked out of the garage. He nodded at his engineers as if he was letting them know about leaving for a moment.

He did his best at comforting her. Rubbed her back, shushing her quietly and gently leading her to the hospitality. People outdoors had gotten a glimpse of her situation and began to speculate, which forced her to hide her face once more as Toto glared at them.

“Come on, schatzi,” inside nobody had batted an eye on her. And instead of speculating, certain people merely looked at the two with concern. What the hell happened, they probably asked themselves.

She was too busy crying and hiding her face away that she hadn’t realized Tilly was already approaching the two. Sylvie didn’t look up until she heard, “What happened, bello?”

“She came to the garage,” Toto said quietly, looking down at his in-law with concern as he said, “she couldn’t say anything because she’s having a hard time breathing.”

“Oh, lovie,” Tilly whispered empathetically, her delicate figure reaching out to hug her little sister, “I’m sorry to hear that. Come, let’s sit down, yes?”

Sylvie could barely think throughout the process of moving from one place to another. They reached the Mercedes motorhome and found themselves in a private room, Sylvie’s lips were swollen and her tear-stained cheeks were red.

She wasn’t even aware that Toto left until his tall figure returned with two bottles of water in his hands. He simply placed it down on the empty table and exchanged looks with his girlfriend. They couldn’t even find a way to help her out of this.

“Listen, Sylvie,” the girl’s sobbing subsided for a moment as Toto said, “I will come back. Okay? I will check and make sure that you’re alright, but I have to go.”

“Yes, go,” Tilly nodded at him, “I’ll be here. Thank you for taking her to me, mon amour.”

“Alright, I’ll be back as soon as I can,” Toto murmured as he leaned down and pecked Tilly’s lips. “I love you.”

“And I love you,” Tilly smiled ruefully, her eyes trained on her little sister as Toto moved to stand and hug Sylvie. Sylvie could only hug his waist, not wanting to let go but had done so anyway.

“Take some time to breathe, lovie,” Toto said for the last time before he left hesitantly.

Nobody but the two were inside the motorhome, thankfully. Sylvie would be so embarrassed to cry in front of other people— as she had done so ten minutes ago. The silence was interrupted by Sylvie’s sobbing. Tilly couldn’t help but wrap her arm around Sylvie’s shoulders, trying to occupy as much space as a pregnant woman could. God, this was the only thing that she didn’t like about her pregnancy. She wasn’t able to comfort her sisters or anyone as much as she’d like to do.

The model couldn’t even think or try to let out a single word, only crying in her sister’s arms as she listened to her shushing. It didn’t take long until the tears dried up. Her energy drained from crying too much over some fuckers who couldn’t even make it to the podium. Them, and that one person would be able to do that on Sunday.

With exhaustion washing over her, her sniffles turned into something more silent as she shut her eyes. It didn’t take long for Tilly to notice this as she stood up, giving more space to the girl on the couch. “Get some rest, lovie,” Tilly said quietly, brushing Sylvie’s hair away as the girl drifted off to sleep.

She really didn’t like being here in Spain.

—

Argument just outside the motorhome was what had woken her up. It was normal to have frustrated drivers or team principals throw a bitch fit, but hearing an argument was a different story.

Her eyes stung from opening after her post-crying nap, her feet meeting the floor as she popped the lid of the bottle open, her parched body taking in the water that she swallowed.

She liked eavesdropping, she really did. She liked to provide her own input even if it’s not needed— she was nosey and everyone knew that. But what she had gone through just about an hour or so ago made her lose the energy and motivation to be her usual self.

It didn’t stop her from walking closer to the door and listening in to whatever argument was going on.

“She’s here to observe and work, she’s not here to spectate,” that was Christian Horner.

“But she’s not feeling well, Christian, she has to rest,” now that’s her favourite in-law. Not really in-law.

“Look, I get that you’re looking out for her but you have to understand,” Christian hissed, “she’ll be signing with Red Bull as soon as she graduates. I cannot have her working with the team if you’re constantly mollycoddling her just because you’re the closest that she has to a father figure. This is a professional work setting, Toto, and she needs to be disciplined to be a part of it.”

“Disciplined, in what way?” The sternness on Toto’s voice could kill, unless you’re just as stupid as Christian as Sylvie heard a scoff coming out of the Red Bull team principal’s mouth.

“Everybody’s going through tough times,” Christian said, “so what? Most of us are moving along anyways. Don’t treat her like a child and make exemptions. She’s never going to learn how to toughen up from it.”

“Hey!” Another voice rung out as the door opened slightly, making her step back as she heard an exclamation of, “That girl was distressed after she left your area— the place where she’s supposed to feel comfortable working in. It’s not her responsibility to bear the problems that are clearly happening within the area of your control, so don’t you tell us how to accommodate if you can barely take care of it. Alright?”

“Fuckin’ prick,” the door slammed shut as Sylvie’s figure remained frozen, her eyes watching as they met Lewis’ dark ones. He smiled gently and asked, “Hey. Are you feeling better now, sweetheart?”

She didn’t respond for a moment after she heard Toto say, “Just give it a rest. She’ll work on what she has to do, just let it go for now. Speak to Tilly, if you would like.”

“Don’t worry about them,” Lewis pulled her back to the couch and sat with her. He leaned back as he joked, “Lovers’ quarrel is what’s going on between the two.”

She chuckled quietly, unable to keep her facade. The laughter fell eventually as she muttered, “I didn’t mean to create such a scene. I’m sorry.”

“What? Hey, girl, no,” Lewis felt his heart break at her words as he reached and rubbed her shoulder for comfort. “Don’t be sorry for snapping. It’s brave of you to keep it together in the first place.”

“I really didn’t mean to make a big deal out of it,” her voice cracked as she tried not to cry. Thinking about it was exhausting and saddening. “It’s just— there’s—“

“It’s okay, take a deep breath,” Lewis told her softly. She did as she was told. Many would say that it’s a rare thing to happen but Sylvie listened.

“There’s just people,” Sylvie explained quietly, not looking at Lewis as she murmured, “I haven’t seen them for a while and… I felt so uneasy. Like it’s the final nail in the coffin. I didn’t want to make a big deal because it was at Red Bull. Nobody’s in there. Toto, you and Tilly are in Mercedes.”

“Sorry we couldn’t be there,” Lewis told her sympathetically. “But it’s a good idea that you went to the garage as quickly as you did. Now look, even Christian’s facing Toto’s wrath.”

“I don’t want to think about it anymore,” Sylvie whispered shakily, shutting her eyes close as she sighed, “I just want some closure.”

The next few days were dreadful. She hadn’t wanted to go back to England as much as she did that weekend.

The people she never wanted to see were there. The sad part of it was the fact that Max would continue to be a part of her life and job, whether she liked it or not. She’d have to tolerate him, no matter how much shit she had gone through because of him and those people around him. This was the second time she had seen him and felt so angry. It was like her life was a race. It starts out very well, with her at the pole. But then she crashes the moment she tries to take advantage and overtake.

On Sunday, Max landed in P1. Sylvie watched him pop the cork of the Moet out and showered his fellow podium winners with it. The text that she then received and sent spilled everything that had nothing to do with champagne. But rather explained how she ended up leaving the academy after that damn open tournament four years ago.

Max complains a lot, he could admit, but he never felt so guilty as much as he did when he practically berated her through a series of text messages. He always demanded answers to things that he believed had explanations, and he wouldn’t stop until he got it. But sometimes he wished his relentless demands were silenced by his conscience.

He felt extremely guilty and upset. It wasn’t because Sylvie Hearth refused to give in to his demands, but rather because her answers explained her hatred and anger. It wasn’t just any anger. It was an ounce of hatred and a lot of anger directed towards him.

Because really, he was the reason why Sylvie never turned out to be the first woman to become a Formula One driver. She never got the seat in Red Bull Racing and Max had gotten it instead. Now he understood why she would refuse to speak to or look at him as if they were childhood best friends and act like they were strangers.

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Erik van Haren, De Telegraaf, Netherlands: “Max’s qualities as a driver are beyond dispute. Just look at his consistent performance curve and the way he always challenges himself, every weekend. What I also like about him as a reporter is that as a person he is broadly the same as the 16-year-old boy I interviewed for the first time in early 2014. He is not afraid to give his opinion and really stands for something. Especially in these times, with all the reactions on social media, I really appreciate that.”

Mervi Kallio, Viaplay, Finland: “The dominance of Max Verstappen this season has been amazing. He has had the best car of the grid but he has also operated in such a great level. He is mentally so strong and the self confidence that he reflects shows that nothing can stop him. Verstappen could be a Finn – less talking, more driving. He is truly a legend already.”

Nate Saunders, ESPN, US: “Max Verstappen has been so remarkable this year. One of his standout traits is how unbothered he seems by his own greatness – at points this year it’s been as if he hasn’t really understood what all the fuss is about. Verstappen has grown into such a well-rounded driver – aggressive when he needs to be, patient at others, which hasn’t always been the case. A driver so confident in his abilities, matched with Red Bull’s car, and you have the unstoppable force we’ve seen all year.”

Ben Hunt, The Sun, UK: “There are so many highlights to pick from this season for Max but for me, the performances that have largely gone unnoticed have been in qualifying. There is a trend in the media of labelling any pole lap ‘a mega' – but his final attempt in Monaco really was. He was on the limit in the final sector around the Swimming Pool and Rascasse, hitting the barriers on two occasions, and just managed to pip Fernando Alonso. It was brilliant, edge-of-the-seat stuff.”

Mariana Becker, Rede Bandeirantes, Brazil: “When Max adopted the middle path to his emotions as a more mature road to follow in life, he made my life difficult. In his interviews, triumph is not golden, defeat is not death. Through my Brazilian eyes, it was hard to detect any sense of extra pride about his recovery from 15th to 2nd position in the grid in Miami, his unbelievable pole in Monaco, his 10 consecutive victories… For him, there is no need to overstate the obvious. But in this case, ‘Max’ is no overstatement.”

Julien Billiotte, Autohebdo, France: “Max is a genius and has been among the all-time greats in my book for a long time. Besides the obvious, I like his off-track persona, especially the way he is not afraid to speak his mind all the while remaining a fairly approachable, down-to-earth guy. Of course, Verstappen is no longer the grid’s ‘enfant terrible’. He has grown more statesman-like but you can’t help but feel an aura of contained aggressiveness around him. The newly-crowned triple world champion always makes you think twice before asking what could be a silly question. His sharp mind and quick wit won’t miss a beat and you will soon find yourself a bit rattled. Like all the top athletes, Max forces you to raise your game.”

Frankie Mao, Formula Vision, China: “I remember the first interview with him on a quiet Wednesday afternoon ahead of the 2015 Chinese GP. I was genuinely impressed by how he was so pure as a racing driver when describing the Shanghai International Circuit which he was visiting for the first time. Eight years on, despite having slightly short of 50 wins in his pocket, he remains arguably the most unfiltered driver on the grid – in his world where only racing and the ultimate victory matters. Thanks to his achievement on the track, he’s becoming that kind of role model that the new generation would look upon around the world.”

Sandra Baumgartner, Sky Sports Germany, Germany: “In addition to his exceptional talent, speed and ambition, Max now has composure, calmness and the ability to take a back seat. He still has a hot temper, but he has it under better control than in previous years. He is very popular in Germany. Of course, as a Dutchman he is our neighbour, but the Germans appreciate above all his honest and down-to-earth manner. Especially in German, his answers in interviews sometimes sound harsh, but that is simply his captivating honesty, he doesn’t embellish anything, he is simply straightforward. That’s the only thing he hasn’t changed, and I think he should stay that way.”

Jonas Hüttel, Ekstra Bladet, Denmark: “My favourite thing about Max is how straightforward he is. As just recently in Qatar when he was explaining how he didn’t want to be voted sportsman of the year in The Netherlands because such awards didn’t make sense to him. Dutch and Danes are similar that way. We are very direct. You can only admire his driving this year. It’s practically impossible to make as few or no mistakes as he has done. He will never be the most popular driver in Denmark but Max has one thing going for him. The mechanic who straps him in before each session is Ole Schack, a Danish Red Bull legend who has been with the race team since day one. We do like to see him do well.”

Steve Jones, Channel 4, UK: “Max has looked at the 2023 season with the same focus The Terminator had for Sarah Connor – utterly relentless. It’s been equal parts astonishing and terrifying seeing him lay waste to the competition. Out of the car he’s a lovely chap. In it – he’s a monster. I love it!”

Luke Smith, The Athletic, US: “What’s struck me about Max this year is just how relaxed he has been. He’s seemed more at ease than ever. I’ve enjoyed press conferences with him discussing ‘The Max Verstappen Podcast’ (and his dislike of podcasts), or Lando Norris breaking his trophy in Hungary. Even on the bad days, like in Jeddah or Singapore, he’s been calm and still a joy to chat with, still staying generous with his time. I’ve learned as much about Max the person as I have Max the racer this year. In both cases, what you see is very much what you get.”

Edd Straw, The Race, UK: “Max does extraordinary things behind the wheel of a racing car, which harnessed to his exacting relentlessness when it comes to refining it technically makes him a formidable driver. But he somehow manages to keep what can be an overwhelmingly complex sport amazingly simple, which comes over off-track with the matter-of-fact way he talks about his craft. That ability to sift what matters from the noise is at the heart of his brilliance and surely makes him one of the most single-minded and laser-focused racing drivers there has ever been.”

Roberto Chinchero, Sky Sports Italia, Italy: “Max is a pure racing talent. He has never been one of many, and never will be. This season has bored many people, especially those who expected what they had seen in the first part of 2022, but it was the same for the best F1 drivers. Opposing supporters might not love him, but at the same time they secretly dream to see him one day to drive for their favourite team.”

Phil Horton, Autoweek/New York Times, US: “From pre-season testing it was clear Max was going to win the title, but few expected it to be wrapped up so early, and with such dominant statistics in terms of victories and laps led. He has always had the raw speed, but now he has vast experience, allied with the assurance that he has long since achieved everything he wanted in Formula 1 – and more. Yet, as Red Bull boss Christian Horner outlined, he retains a voracious appetite not just to succeed but to dominate. That complete grip on Formula 1 hasn’t been entertaining, and sadly up front it has been a rather mundane season, but that’s on Verstappen’s opponents.”

Luis Vasconcelos, Formula Press/Sport TV, Portugal: “When a very gifted driver, with tremendous working ethics, gets his hands on the best car in the field and doesn’t have a team mate that can challenge him, you get what Max is doing now – complete domination of a season. With that success, we’re getting a more relaxed Max when he’s out of his car. His will to win, though, hasn’t changed, his performance in Suzuka being proof of that, as he was keen to prove Red Bull’s doubters wrong. But when things don’t go his way, we still get some flashbacks of a much younger Max – emotional, volatile and brash. He’s just 25 after all, so maturity will come with time.”

Julianne Cerasoli, UOL, Brazil: “It felt uncharacteristic to see a calm Max in Baku after being outperformed by Checo all weekend. He was happy, having understood how to get more out of the RB19. It was the first time I saw Max OK with losing. After that came 10 consecutive wins! In Qatar, he celebrated entering the triple world champion club by reminding us he can finally ‘speak in equal terms’ with his father-in-law Nelson Piquet next time he goes to Brazil. Fair.”

Albert Fabrega, DAZN, Spain: “Max has been always considered a huge talent in Spain and it is no surprise to see him winning his third world title. He has progressed a lot since his early years in F1 when he was Carlos Sainz’s team mate in Toro Rosso and he has deserved this crown more than anyone else. I can’t see any weak points in him. A lot of determination, talent, concentration and a perfect understanding of the tyres and car are a big part of his success. But like many of us, I would love to see him racing and competing elbow to elbow with the big names of the sport. He is a racer and I’m sure he is also looking forward to moments like these again.”

Michael Lamonato, Fox Sports Australia, Australia: “In a straightforward season, Verstappen has faced only one antagonist: speculation that rule changes ended his victory streak in Singapore – and, by extension, the implication his dominance was somehow unearned. But in his media call in Japan that week there was no anger or frustration; he was all calmness cool determination. Then he obliterated everyone on the track. It was a clear insight to title-era Verstappen. He doesn’t need adoration but does demand respect. And it’s respect he certainly deserves.”

Tobi Gruner, Auto Motor und Sport, Germany: “I still remember my first Interview with Max in Mexico 2015. He was a Toro Rosso rookie, still a bit shy. Short answers only. Let’s say it wasn’t the most exciting interview ever. Eight years and three titles later his answers are still short, but he’s much more confident and outspoken. Efficiency is paramount on and off the track. A pure racer. German fans appreciate his effort to talk German in the TV pen and that he prevented Lewis Hamilton from breaking Michael Schumacher’s championships record in 2021. But now he’s chasing it himself.”

Sandor Meszaros, Formula.hu, Hungary: “Max’s 2023 dominance is a historic achievement. What makes it particularly special for me is the fact that he is doing it in a natural way while after all these successes, he is still the down-to-earth guy who is always available for his fans. He has a huge fanbase in Hungary and is inspiring many youngsters for karting. Funny, that even though our Hungarian is one of the nicest and most colourful languages of the world, after all his victories this year, we are nearly out of praising words! Bravo, Max!”

Reporters on Max this season🩵