Chapter Text
Shane is known for his composure, on and off the track. He’s methodical and precise, knows everything there is to know about racing. He's been deemed the driver with the highest racing IQ for a reason, promoted out of the Mercedes junior team at seventeen and promised to the public as the next generational talent in Motorsport. And he is, a generational talent, a prodigy, maybe. He has the records and trophies to prove it
Considering all of that, you would think the press would have something relevant to ask him.
Shane, obviously, we need to ask you about the incident with Rozanov. What’s your take on the contact made at turn four? Any ill will there? Did it look intentional from where you were sitting?
You would be wrong
Shane had to swallow the irritation that threatened to spill over his usual calm and measured demeanor.
It’s the same song and dance as always.
Red Bull vs Mercedes,
Rozanov vs Hollander.
They’re foaming at the mouth for it, to pit the two most promising drivers against one another.
See, Ilya Rozanov is somewhat of a prodigy himself. It makes Shane’s life exponentially more difficult.
Shane doesn’t know if the incident was intentional, all he knows is that the maneuver was, as the commentators have coined, classic Rozanov. Which really just means it was risky and aggressive and skirting the lines of legality.
The Russian menace they call him, which should speak for itself
Why don’t you go ahead and ask him if it was fucking intentional? Is what Shane had wanted to say. Of course he didn’t, at least not in those words. Still, he could feel his clipped tone getting away from him, something that doesn’t happen often, most often when Rozanov is involved.
Now in their third season in formula 1, it’s not the first time Shane has had an incident with Rozanov. It’s not even the fifth or the sixth. Rozanov doesn’t give positions up easily and neither does Shane. So, yes, they’ve made contact on the track before, though perhaps never as spectacularly as they’d done today. He knows there will be a session about it later, full of slow motion footage and the narrated opinions of his engineers and technicians. Right now, though, all Shane is left with is a racecar with a mangled front wing, almost as mangled as his pride.
Shane had lost five positions due to the incident, teeth rattling at the impact, car lurching violently into the gravel. Rozanov, of course, had zoomed by with minimal damage, and had gone to fucking podium.
And somehow, Shane is the one that had ended the morning with an assemblage of microphones shoved in his face
He can still feel his cheeks blazing with annoyance, even as he trudges through the paddock back towards the Mercedes garage. He would’ve podiumed, he knows he would’ve. The car had felt good, the pace was there, if only it weren’t for—
“You look pretty in all white, Hollander”
Shane turns to see the man himself leaning against one of the walls, body relaxed and contorted into the stance of a winner. There’s a smirk on his lips, syrupy and infuriating. You would think he belongs here with the way he’s lounging around. Which he doesn’t. Shane isn’t even sure how he was allowed in
“Rozanov”
It’s perturbing how boyish he looks with his curls plastered on his forehead like that. It shouldn’t be allowed, Shane only ever looks like a drowned cat after a race.
“Pretty sure your garage is one hundred feet in the opposite direction”
“Aww, Hollander, you keep up with where my garage is?” His lips are pink and wet, probably sticky from the champagne he just watched LeClerc shower over him on the raised stage of the podium
“It’s the one with the massive picture of your face, pretty hard to miss” Shane deadpans, yanking at the collar of his racing suit. The suit is different from his usual black and teal, designed for the Canadian Grand Prix, for Shane’s home race. An all white body with red maple leaf accents on the sleeves. Special edition, two of a kind, his mother had snapped enough pictures that you’d think he was getting ready for prom when she’d seen him in it and—
If Shane doesn’t get this suit off his body in the next five minutes, who’s to say he won’t murder Rozanov here, in the middle of the Mercedes garage, in front of all his mechanics and engineers? He thinks it would probably be warranted. Ilya Rozanov is the only asshole who would come all the way down to the opposite side of the paddock to twist the knife
“Heard you had some nice things to say about me”
“Did I?”
He’s still yanking, feeling around for the fastening and finally pulling it free and away from his sweat-sticky throat. He wishes they would let them at least take a shower before hounding them with questions about ‘what could’ve gone better out there’
He pulls his arms out of the offending suit next and lets the top of it drop to hang past his waist. The disappointment is no lesser with the thing half off of him, but Shane will take what he can get
“You said I was great driver”
Shane snorts. Of course Rozanov has already seen the track interview. Shane is barely back from the press tent but he isn’t surprised. Rozanov is always like this, coiled and ready to pounce, like a shark scenting the water for any sign of weakness
“You literally won the championship last year”
“Yes I did”
“So you’re obviously at least a competent driver. This cannot be news to you”
“It is not”
Shane is confused and unsure why this conversation is even happening. There hasn’t been any gloating yet, which is odd. Is this… is this some kind of demented attempt at an apology? Probably not, considering the very noticeable absence of both I’m and sorry. Besides, Rozanov doesn’t really do apologies, he’s known the man enough time to know that
“Right” Shane continues, convinced by now that there will be no apology for nuking his home race “-and did you miss the part where I said that, when things aren’t going your way on the track, you lash out with unnecessary anger and borderline violence?”
Rozanov blinks “eh, no, did not get that far, was boring, stopped watching after you said I was great driver”
“That’s literally the first thing I said! And it was a segue into saying what I actually meant, which is that you’re a psychopath”
“Segu-? Hollander I have literally no idea what you are saying right now”
Shane throws his hands up, feels even closer to murder than he did five seconds ago
See, the thing about Ilya Rozanov is that he tastes like cigarettes and gum. Shane shouldn’t know that, but he does. He knows it in a way that is concerning to his mental health. Some days, it’s frankly all he can think about. Ilya Rozanov tastes like cigarettes and gum. Cigarettes and gum, cigarettes and gum, cigarettes and—
Shane isn’t the only person in the world to know this (not by miles) he’s aware of Rozanov’s… reputation for sleeping around. Shane has witnessed it first hand, has heard about it through other drivers, has seen it in the press, the endless legions of women Rozanov recruits to keep him company. And yet—cigarettes and gum— it had felt like a groundbreaking thing to know.
The knowledge had come as an accident. If you could call getting tipsy at a club and pouncing on your archnemesis an accident.
He wasn’t even meant to be there, at that club. He wasn’t fond of clubs or drinking but, having just lost the championship to Rozanov, the alternative of sitting in his empty hotel room with his thoughts hadn’t seemed particularly appealing either. So Shane had let himself be dragged along with the gaggle of drivers to a dark and noisy club. It had been fine for a while, the sharp burn of the alcohol blurring the edges of the loss into something blunt and rounded, something easier to swallow. Then it had only made it worse. Then he had only felt clumsy and ridiculous and he needed—
His mistake had been thinking he was alone, or being tipsy enough not to notice the curled smoke of a lit cigarette already polluting the only quiet space in the overbearing noise.
It’s a bit embarrassing to consider how quickly it happened, how easily Shane had given in to the frighteningly ardent impulse. He wasn’t even that drunk, really, and Rozanov had done little more than put out his cigarette against the stone of the balcony, saying something along the lines of ah, Hollander, come to congratulate me on my big win? and, well, then it was almost an act of magic how Shane had ended up with his tongue down Rozanov’s throat. The bad kind of magic, obviously.
It was the same bad spell that had possessed Shane to pull Rozanov in closer by the collar of his ridiculous silk shirt, that had made him moan into Rozanov’s minty acrid mouth. Shane can admit to himself now that the spell had less to do with actual magic and more to do with the secret attraction that Shane has been harboring for his rival for enough years to consider it embarrassing.
He’d tried to fight it, of course he had, convincing himself that it was nothing, that it was adrenaline and the near obsessive need to beat the man that had Shane constantly thinking about the Russian driver. Thinking of the way his curls fell into his eyes when he let it grow out too long. Thinking of how his navy blue compression shirt contorted to his body. Thinking of his strong hands gripping the steering wheel of his stupidly fast car…
It’s nothing. I don’t even think about him that often—But there was just something about the broad span of Rozanov’s shoulders, about the way his voice curls around his taunting words, something about the terrible slant of his clever mouth that has led Shane down the dark path of muffling his moans against his fist and spilling cum all over the tile of his shower—imagining that awful awful combination—on more than just a single occasion. It’s not something he’s proud of, okay?
Just like he isn’t proud of what had happened after, staring wide eyed at Rozanov, panting and not speaking, the taste of gum and cigarettes needling his tongue
Shane had, more or less, bolted out of there like a bat out of hell.
The rest of the offseason had seen him spiraling into an uncontrollable panic over having kissed his archrival (kissed hadn’t seemed like an appropriate enough word for the encounter. He swears he’d felt Rozanov at his fucking tonsils, his tongue so deep that Shane had made sounds that he’s never—)
Shane has always had more than an inkling that he was into men. He… noticed them more than he did women, it was just a thing, not something he had time for anyways and he’d never thought of any of the other drivers in that way, obviously. Except for— well, except for Rozanov. And even that wasn’t—he couldn’t
For the handful of months that were allotted for him to relax, Shane had alternated between convincing himself that it wasn’t that bad to deciding that maybe he should just quit formula 1 altogether, change his name to something less recognizable, and move to some remote corner of the world to live off the land and fade into obscurity.
He had wound himself into a tight ball of anxiety, trying to focus on his conditioning and mostly failing at appearing focused and normal. The logistics of fucking off and becoming some kind of hermit were a bit too convoluted, but he had to do something, he was going crazy. He could text Rozanov maybe? Smooth things over before the new season started? He could probably find his number in the drivers group chat that he kept perpetually muted.
Shane had considered the idea for approximately five seconds. What would he even say?
Hey man, about the other night on the balcony, I have no idea what possessed me to stick my tongue down your throat. Lol. Sorry about that, let’s forget it happened, yeah? See u next season 🏎️💨
Yeah, absolutely not
In the end though, the spiraling had been for nothing. All it had taken, once he and Rozanov were back in the chaos of the paddock—grazing shoulders on the press conference couch and fighting for points on the grid—was a simple suggestion that Shane had no recollection of that night in that ostentatious club to get Rozanov to never mention it at all.
It was a strike of genius that he doesn’t even remember having. All he really remembers about it is the look on Rozanov’s face when he’d said it, after the first quali of the season, huddled with a few other drivers, Rozanov standing directly opposite to him in the gaggle of excited chatter and easy banter.
And you, Hollzy? Had said one of the Alpine drivers Don’t think I’ve ever seen you drink anything other than that nasty ginger soda
Yeah, man Shane had said, rubbing at his neck sheepishly and pretending not to notice the overbearing weight of Rozanov’s gaze definitely had a few too many, that nights all a fucking blur, I barley remember getting home
Rozanov’s brow had been furrowed and there had been a heated, pointed kind of look in his blue eyes once Shane had casually glanced over to where he was still standing, watching him, not even pretending to be participating in the conversation
Rozanov hadn’t said anything after that, nothing outside of his usual cocky, rage baiting routine
And Shane was relieved, he really was, as relieved as he can be with such a relentless piece of information wormed away in his brain. Cigarettes and gum, what an odd thing.
“Why are you here, Rozanov?” It’s probably better to get to the point, he only has a few more minutes before any murder happens
The other driver smirks and shrugs “Came to make sure my rival is in one piece. Cannot have you injured before I have chance to beat you in Miami, not so fun to win if I am not winning against you”
“How sweet” Shane snarks
Rozanov pushes off of the wall. Instead of just leaving, he makes a show of stepping closer, unnecessarily circling Shane, getting close enough to whisper in his ear before he walks out and back towards his own garage, where he should’ve been this whole time— “hm, no, you don’t want sweet, Hollander”
What the fuck does that mean?
Shane feels himself flush, grateful that Rozanov is no longer there to see it
He shouldn’t be thinking about this. He needs to focus, to put all of this behind him. He has a race to win in Miami
He still thinks about it later—when he’s finally washing the disastrous day off his skin, when his hand snakes down the flat plane of his stomach, lower, towards where he’s aching— the sound of Rozanov’s voice in his ear
Miami goes off without a hitch. It’s a 1,2 for Mercedes and Bizet never sounds better than it does when Hayden’s laugh is ringing in tune with it at Shane’s ear. They won, they did it, Shane is back in the lead, his arm is slung around his teammate’s shoulders on the podium, his team is cheering underneath, pressed against the barriers like a barley contained avalanche, the champagne is cool and sticky at his neck, and all of it would be so much sweeter if it weren’t for Rozanov.
Rozanov, who is smiling so widely from the left side of the podium. P3, lifting his trophy for the cameras, his grin lopsided and pleased and so fucking pretty
It’s distracting
They take the mandatory podium picture, Rozanov’s arm opting to snake around Shane’s waist instead of over his shoulder in a way that has Shane’s pulse quickening in his throat. He wonders, a bit hysterically, if anyone else is seeing this. He reasons, shortly after, that—of course they are, they’re literally being photographed. There’s nothing too strange about it though, is there? just two archrivals pressed together from hip to knee
Shane mentally smacks himself at the train of thought. He needs to get it together. He’s supposed to be putting all of this behind him. The season is only beginning and he can’t keep spiraling at every mention, sight, and contact with Ilya Rozanov. So they kissed, once, what’s the big fucking deal? Shane has kissed people, some people, and Rozanov has surely kissed people, many people. That’s all there is to it. Rozanov thinks he forgot anyways. Rozanov has probably forgotten all about it himself. He obviously hasn’t told anyone, which Shane can admit to being grateful for. In fact, Rozanov probably had a private laugh about it in his penthouse suite, probably in the quiet moment after whatever beautiful woman he took home that night dozed off, exhausted and sated from getting fucked by the formula 1 championship winner. He probably let out a small, incredulous breath and shook his head at the memory of the clumsy kiss. Shane had probably tasted like some gross combination of tequila and second place and Rozanov has probably forgotten. Which is fine. Which is good
They take a million pictures and shake hands with the endless stream of people that are owed handshakes from the podium drivers before they’re finally being escorted down for press. The press is always easier when you’re stepping down from the podium and Shane lets himself relax. He showers and changes and finds himself still buzzing with energy once they’ve made it to the post race event. It’s the adrenaline of racing at 200 mph, he reasons, or the excitement of winning, it has nothing to do with how Rozanov had watched him in the cooldown room, like he knew something he shouldn’t. Cigarettes and gum, cigarettes and gum—
He can usually skip these things but Miami, the city of sunshine and endless partying, makes their presence mandatory.
Rozanov is there, of course, already flirting with a beautiful woman by the time Shane pretends not to notice. He accepts a perspiring glass with some kind of liquor sloshing inside of it and makes it a point not to look over to the dark corner that Rozanov has occupied with his model or actress or whoever. He focuses on looking directly at the person speaking to him. He probably ends up staring too hard and looking like a wierdo, mingling has never quite been his forte
Shane doesn’t want to drink and so he doesn’t, thinks he’s learned his lesson where alcohol is concerned. He nods and smiles and wonders how many of these fancy cocktails it would take for him to drag Rozanov away from his current stiletto-clad predicament.
That doesn't even make sense and he shouldn’t be thinking it.
He holds on to the same glass as the hours tick by, feeling it get sweatier as the ice sphere finishes melting into the amber colored liquid
Hayden seems to be having a great time, following along with conversations in a way that Shane always finds difficult, especially in crowded rooms like this. Noise has always been different on the racing track. It has always grounded him like few other things do in his life. This kind of noise, though, this noise is hard to filter, it always makes him feel like he’s not hearing the right things.
Shane decides to leave the networking to his more capable teammate and opts instead to find a quiet space to clear his head for a bit.
Shane figures, later, that what happens next is his own fault. Maybe he hasn’t learned his lesson after all
“Hollander you are obsessed with balconies, I think” for a serious, professional athlete, Shane almost squeaks at the unexpected sound of Rozanov’s voice. Fuck
This, at least, means that Shane had been doing a good job at ignoring Rozanov. He had ignored him so well that he hadn’t noticed him sneak away onto yet another balcony. Shane had stood there already for a few minutes without even noticing Rozanov was there, hiding behind his cloud of smoke.
See? He could definitely do this whole ignoring thing
You’re here too, he bites it back, it sounds too much like he’s agreeing, like he hasn’t forgotten the last time
Shane darts a look towards Rozanov, trying to relax against the alarm bells ringing under his skin, trying to sound casual and unbothered “Rozanov, drunk already?”
He’s not. Shane knows he’s not. He’s noticed that Rozanov rarely indulges at sponsored events
“Not drunk, celebrating” Rozanov says easily, stomping out his cigarette under his polished shoe. A nasty vice, one that Rozanov does indulge in. Probably more often than he should. Shane wonders if he shouldn’t be more annoyed that he has to compete this hard against an athlete that smokes
“Celebrating third place?” Shane quips, unable to stop the words from coming out of his mouth. He really shouldn’t engage with Rozanov, he knows this. But that’s the whole problem, isn’t it? He just can’t seem to help himself.
It’s been that way for forever, really, ever since they were ruddy cheeked kids in karts, certainly ever since they were both promoted to F1 as rookies on opposing teams.
Rozanov blinks, studies Shane’s profile for a moment before snorting a laugh “All this polite Canadian boy bullshit” he says, gesturing in Shane’s direction “but you are not so different than me, Hollander, only satisfied when you win”
“Fuck you, I am polite” Shane scoffs “And yes, I’m satisfied I beat you, sure, especially after that shit you pulled in Montreal”
Rozanov leans his forearms on the railing of the balcony. He looks out at the skyline, the expression on his face is complicated, as if Shane has told him some riddle that he’s working too hard to decipher
“Only satisfied that you beat me?” Rozanov finally asks, though why he requires the clarification, Shane has no idea “So if you were P19 and I was P20 you would still be satisfied?”
Shane isn’t quite sure why he feels the need to answer so honestly. But he does. He thinks about it for a moment before he says— “In a way, probably”
Because it’s true, because it's always better when he beats Rozanov, when he catches the other driver looking at him with the intensity of someone who knows it’s only ever just the two of them competing for the top spot. Just one person, just one person standing in the way of being the best in the world. It’s exhilarating, it makes Shane feel…well it makes him feel this, this magnetism, this borderline obsession.
He doesn’t add any of that though. He thinks maybe he doesn’t have to. He thinks Rozanov knows, that he understands
Rozanov nods as if he’s heard him. His index finger taps on the railing absentmindedly before he turns fully towards Shane.
He looks, once he’s taken a step closer, like he solved the riddle, or just decided he doesn’t care about the answer
I should get back to the party, Hayden is probably wondering where I am. The words are stuck in his throat. He doesn’t say them. He doesn’t say anything. Shane stands there helplessly, letting it happen, letting Rozanov step even closer. Somewhere, just under his skin, wanting it to happen
“You do not like me” Rozanov says, once he’s close enough that Shane would hear him if he whispered “Media says it, team says it, you say it”
It doesn't seem like something Rozanov would do, recite well-known and well-documented facts for fun. Shane could google either of their names and find thousands of articles that would tell the same story. Red Bull vs Mercedes. Rozanov vs Hollander. It’s all everyone ever wants to talk about
No, but that’s not it. Rozanov is getting somewhere, inching towards a well-thought out point
“But, see, I think it is opposite” Rozanov says, drawing even closer. Shane should step back, he should leave, he really should— “I think you do…like”
Shane doesn’t step back. Shane doesn’t leave. He shudders, feeling like a wobbly deer who’s caught the eye of the big bad wolf.
Rozanov smirks at the shaky, affected falter in Shane’s breathing. There’s a glint in his eyes that looks triumphant, that looks like it says—you won first place but I won too, I won too. Look at what I won
It should make Shane angry, that look in his eye
“Like…what?” Shane whispers, closing his eyes at the feeling of Rozanov’s hand brushing his own on the cool railing of the balcony. When had he leaned on it like that? Why is he clutching it so tightly?
“Hmm, this” Rozanov leans in slowly, licking into Shane’s mouth with the appetite of a predator that’s finally locked its jaws around its prey. His lips are insistent and unrelenting and Shane feels his mouth open wider, eager for the intrusion of his rival’s tongue. He feels his hands snake up Rozanov’s neck, pawing at his curls, not trying to escape, no, not trying to put distance between them, the two most promising drivers in Motorsport. Trying, instead, to get closer
They kiss for what feels like a long time, or not enough, until Rozanov pulls away, only far back enough to whisper against Shane’s spit slick lips “I think I will go to bed early tonight”
Shane takes a steadying breath, has to physically restrain himself from leaning forward again, chasing the taste of cigarettes and gum
“Yeah?”
Rozanov hums softly
“1221”