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George has grown out his hair since the last time they saw each other. At least two inches. It curls over his temples and around his nape, styled to perfection. George is always ready for pictures, shirts pressed and skin glistening in the sun.
“Fucking ridiculous,” Max mutters, taking a swig of his drink. Red Bull, except it’s spiked with vodka because there’s no way he’s getting through today without a pick-me-up.
That, and he’s getting tired of chugging Red Bull after all these years. Sometimes he debates switching teams just to drink something else.
“What is?” Charles asks beside him, squinting against the sun even though his shades are nestled in his perfect curls.
“Russell.”
“Hm? Oh.” Charles shields his eyes with his hand. “He is still legally a Verstappen, you know. Hasn’t changed it.”
“I know that.”
Obviously Max fucking knows that. It’s right there on George’s Wikipedia, George William Verstappen, né Russell. He doesn’t really know what to do with that. No one actually calls George a Verstappen in the professional world, branding and all that, but he used to answer his phone calls with that name, signed his legal documents too.
Used to call himself Mr. Verstappen, curled under Max’s arm and giggling at their matching rings.
They never had that discussion after, what George would do with his name. He never brought it up and neither did Max, out of respect. It’s George’s name, after all, legally. His son’s name too. It wouldn’t be fair to either of them.
The relief that hits Max when he checks George’s Wikipedia and the name stays the same, George William Verstappen, well, that’s weird too. He can’t stand the sight of his ex-husband most days, but they were in love once and maybe a part of him misses that.
So the name stays.
George stays too, ubiquitous in Max’s life. Always there, somewhere in his peripheral vision. That’s what happens when you have a child together, Lando told him once, clapping him on the shoulder with a sympathetic grimace.
He’s right, is the thing. There’s no avoiding George’s face in the billboards and the magazines, his creaky laughter haunting Max every time he opens Instagram and his feed updates to a Variety interview.
He doesn’t know why he still follows those accounts.
And yet, he could’ve wiped his hands clean after the divorce if it weren’t for Kimi. Instead, he has to force a smile on his face whenever they FaceTime to discuss sleepover schedules and pretend like he’s not burning up inside whenever George’s name gets brought up during media day.
It doesn’t help that social media is all over them. A highly publicized relationship results in a highly publicized divorce and any interaction they have ends up plastered on the internet. Even now, Max is highly conscious of the phones aimed at where George is sitting with the other spouses, the only man in a sea of women.
He’s just as beautiful, though. The guys used to call him a WAG, jeering whenever Max would arrive with George on his arm, slim and tall and long-lashed. Fucking Bambi.
“You know they’re going to want pictures,” Charles comments neutrally, finally sliding his sunglasses on. It was starting to piss Max off. “Like a happy couple.”
They always do. Max doesn’t know why it’s so fascinating for people, the two of them standing next to each other. Maybe they’re expecting them to fight, as if George’s iron cast PR training would allow him lose control like that. No, arguing’s reserved for when they’re behind closed doors.
“Oh, he’s coming this way.”
“Of course he is,” Max says, pursing his lips together.
George walks like he’s on a fucking catwalk even though all he’s doing is crossing a field of grass with dawdling toddlers. Max doesn’t know how it’s possible for George to be slimmer than he was last time they saw each other, but he looks like a toothpick in a Tommy Hilfiger jacket.
“Charles,” George greets with a polite smile, all grace and closed lips. His eyes sharpen when he turns to Max but he’s so collected it makes Max want to mess him up a little. “Max.”
“Mr. Verstappen,” Max says and regrets it immediately. Charles glances at him but Max keeps his eyes on George. His smile has gotten a little stiffer.
These are things Max can still tell about George, like how he’s lost weight because his agency is a fucking prison and Max is no longer there to tell them to fuck off. Or how despite his tailored suits and white teeth, George is a needy loser who cries too easily and likes picking fights with Max despite it.
The world doesn’t know anything about George, not like Max does.
“Very mature,” he says. “Kimi needs to spend the weekend with you, I’m flying to Shanghai for a shoot. Is that okay? I’d take him but the hours are too long and his nanny’s on vacation.”
Max exhales through his nose. Is that it? “Yeah, that’s fine. I’ll pick him up. Text me the time.”
A camera shutter goes off. George’s smile wavers. “Alright, great. It’s great seeing you, Charles.”
“You too, mate,” Charles says, cordial. They were never best friends, but Charles liked George a lot. The most out of any of Max’s partners.
With a final glance, George walks off. It’s hard not to watch him go, but Max is used to hard. That’s what their entire marriage was after all.
____
The first time they meet George’s hair is short and his teeth a little crooked. He’s not quite yet the supermodel he’ll become only a couple years later, but Max is a little breathless regardless.
Someone introduces them, probably Horner or someone else from the team, at a gala Max has no interest in. He’s been wrangled into a suit, no tie, and his hands itch for the steering wheel of his baby.
George is the only interesting thing that night. He’s the only thing Max remembers when he looks back years later. A breath of fresh air, funny and a little endearing in his awkwardness, lashes so long Max can’t quite tear his eyes off them.
Max isn’t known as a womanizer by the public, but that’s because they don’t know what he does when the cameras are off. It’s easy to sneak off with George, only because they’re both men and no one expects two men to be doing anything suspicious together.
It’s not the night they get together, no. That comes later, with a bouquet of roses and sweaty hands at an awful restaurant that only offers food the size of peas. This night Max lifts George onto the sink in an accessible toilet and jerks them off with a tight fist around them both until his hand is coated in white.
His pants carry wrinkles for the rest of the night from where they were rucked around his thighs and his smile is smug. The girl he’s dating texts him for a picture and Max tells her he’ll call later.
He doesn’t tell her he cheated, because he may be an asshole but at least he’s gracious about it.
____
It’s not Max’s decision to invite George for Silverstone, that’s all his team. They wanted cute footage of Kimi, of family man Max, which… he’d rather not use his own son as PR fodder to make him look better, but he doesn’t get to spend enough time with him as it is, so he agrees.
That means, of course, that George is there too, carrying Kimi on his hip and pausing for selfies every now and then, constantly and annoyingly tiptoeing into Max’s awareness.
“Couldn’t have worn anything else?” he snipes at him when George finally settles in the Red Bull garage. “Had to make sure all the eyes are on you, huh.”
George smiles at him, sickly sweet. His jacket is a Merc one, some custom Lewis merch that was probably gifted by the man himself. It’s a statement, as much for Max as it is for the cameras.
He’s not here for Max.
“Mercedes is my favorite team, you know this, Max,” George drawls, full of shit. He’d never watched a single race before he started sleeping over about a month into their… whatever, curled up in Max’s lap while he reviewed old races and talked to GP on the phone. Hell, Max had to keep pointing out which car was his until George figured out they had numbers on the front. “Hold your son, please, I need to make a call.”
Max takes Kimi, tickling at his tummy and making him giggle. “At least Papa dressed you well. Where’d he find a Red Bull onesie, huh? Should we put you in the car? You gonna win the race for daddy?”
“Daddy,” Kimi garbles, chubby fingers trying to grab onto his hair.
Max smiles at him, soft. “Yeah, bud. Missed you too. Too bad about the other Verstappen, no?”
__
Getting a divorce not even a year after adopting a baby means they’re probably not winning any Parent of the Year awards, but despite the headlines, Kimi wasn’t an impulsive decision made solely to fix their relationship.
They’d talked about it a long, long time, researched it even longer, and even now, Max can’t bring himself to regret Kimi, no matter how guilty he feels for whatever daddy issues being toted around between countries and houses is going to cause him in the future.
And while his feelings may be complicated and currently largely negative towards his ex-husband, George is still the other father of their child and thus it’s Max’s responsibility to take care of him, of them both.
That’s why, when George calls him one night, slurring and obviously swallowing tears, asking him to come pick him and Kimi up from the side of the road, there’s not a world in which Max can say no.
It doesn’t even cross his mind to suggest for George to call a tow, a taxi, anything. He shoves his feet in his sneakers, gets his keys, and sets out to drive the couple hours over the border of Italy, George’s location blinking on the GPS the entire time.
__
George is crouching by the car when Max arrives, door open and Kimi peacefully sleeping in his seat. There’s vomit on the ground, shivers racking through George’s body.
He looks miserable.
It’s the middle of the night and he’s throwing up in a gas station parking lot with a toddler to take care of, of course he looks miserable. And out of all the people, he called Max to come help him. It’s almost funny that their last interaction was George calling him a dickhead with a smile on his face in front of the Silverstone cameras.
“Only you, Georgie,” Max murmurs with a sigh, crouching next to him. The back of George’s neck is warm and sweaty under his palm. “How are you feeling?”
George shakes his head, spitting on the ground. His voice is gravelly when he answers, “Quite bad, thanks. Can you– Is Kimi–?“
“He’s alright, he’s sleeping.” Max wraps an arm around George’s waist and urges him to his feet. “How ‘bout we get you inside so you can sleep it off, hm?”
George sways, eyes glassy and face pale. His fist is weakly clenched in Max’s shirt and Max isn’t sure he’s even aware of it. “Yes, please. Thank you.”
He has to be out of it if he’s being this polite. It’s bad luck he caught the bug in the middle of a long trip. Max’s stomach swoops in a sudden, dizzying drop when images of the car wrapped around a tree or crushed against another intrude in his mind, George and Kimi hurt, or worse–
Max blinks.
They’re fine. Kimi is sleepily snuffling in the backseat and his… his ex-husband is leaning against him, smelling like vomit. They’re safe.
He hauls George to the passenger seat of his car, a sensible family car suitable for babies, one that they purchased together. He leaves his own car there, he’ll call someone to pick it up later.
Or he’ll just buy a new one. Right now he doesn’t really care what happens to it.
George passes out pretty much immediately after Max pulls out of the parking lot, the low hum of the car and the darkness outside lulling him into restless sleep against the window. Maybe Max should’ve gotten him a bag or a bucket or something in case he vomits again.
He should’ve brought a blanket too, George keeps shivering. What the hell do you do for a stomach bug? Pepto-Bismol?
Max pulls over the first opportunity he has, wrestles out of his jacket and tries to drape it over George the best he can, tucking the ends under the seatbelt so it won’t slide off. He checks on Kimi, still peaceful and chubby-cheeked, dressed in a beanie and matching mittens.
Of course George would dress him up like he’s heading to a fashion photoshoot for babies. Max smiles faintly. He has no idea what daily parenting with George looks like. He’ll never know. They’re separate entities now, passing around a baby as if he’s not the culmination of years of partnership.
Well. Max turns the blinkers on. Sunday nights always did leave him introspective.
__
George rouses an hour or two later, when they’re almost home. Well, not George’s home. Anymore.
He mumbles something unintelligible.
“Hm?”
George mumbles again and Max thinks he hears Kimi’s name somewhere in there. “He’s fine, he’s sleeping. How are you feeling?”
“Like shit,” George croaks, shifting and groaning.
Max glances at him. “You sound shit.”
He can hear the eyeroll in George’s voice, no matter how hoarse it is. “Yeah, well. I almost sound like you.”
“That’s what I sound like to you? No wonder we divorced,” Max says and finally the car rolls to a stop, safely in his garage. “Alright, we’re here. You need help getting up?”
“No,” George replies but Max is already reaching over the console to unbuckle his seatbelt. “Seriously? Wait, is this your coat?”
“Who else’s?” Max gets out the car, George painstakingly doing the same on the other side, but Max busies himself with unlatching Kimi from his seat so he doesn’t have to watch. “You have bags in the back? I’ll get them after I’ve taken Kimi inside.”
George sniffles pathetically into his sleeve and shakes his head. Max’s jacket is draped over his shoulders and his hair is wild and tangled. He doesn’t look much like a model right now, more like roadkill Max picked up from the side of the road. Or a hooker.
That could be a fun roleplay.
“Don’t be silly. Give him to me, you take the bags.”
Max hesitates, gently bouncing Kimi in his arms. “You sure?”
“Max, I have him ninety percent of the time, you think I haven’t had to feed and change and rock him to sleep through all kinds of flus and viruses?” George says, impatient. He makes grabby hands towards Kimi. “Give.”
“You don’t have him ninety percent of the time,” Max mutters but hands the toddler back. “You make me sound like a deadbeat.”
It’s like the moment George has Kimi in his arms, his entire body relaxes, the furrow between his brows smoothing out. His cheek is pressed against the soft wool of Kimi’s hat and for a moment, he doesn’t look ill or disheveled. He looks like a dad.
Max’s heart clenches. If there’s one thing he’ll never regret, it’s giving George a child to love.
“Right,” he says abruptly, hoarse, before clearing his throat. Weird. “Let’s go inside then, we all need our beauty sleep, no?”
____
It rains the night Max proposes.
It catches them by surprise when they’re walking home, soaking them before either of them realize to run for cover. They’re not prepared for it, George in a short-sleeved button-up and Max in a sweater that at least covers his arms.
It’s been a pleasant night, a dinner reservation at a fancy five-star restaurant that serves oysters and beef tongue. After, they’d crammed side by side into rickety chairs in front of a corner store, splitting a bag of dried mangos and a Red Bull, a chocolate donut for dessert that George took a nibble from and then gave to Max to finish.
Max doesn’t really understand the point of fine dining, not even after years of attending dinner parties and dinner meetings and dinners with friends, dinner with sponsors, dinner with CEOs, on and on and on. He’s more than familiar.
The portions are tiny, the food is ridiculous, the prices are outrageous – not that he needs to look at the cost of really anything anymore.
He prefers a fat cheeseburger with onions and pickles, maybe some bacon stuffed in between, not whatever… foie gras is.
It’s George’s thing, though. He loves the ambiance, the selection of fancy wines and the low chatter in the background as the waiter walks them through each course. It’s like the smaller and odder the meal is, the more excited he gets.
So while Max spends enough time in fancy restaurants in itchy shirts with awful company, he makes sure each anniversary, George gets to dress up and cut a duck liver in half. It’s not that bad, sitting opposite him and watching the flash of his white teeth, the red in his cheeks.
The convenience store is George’s idea, probably for the same reason the restaurant was Max’s.
The rain is cold and sharp on his skin, but it’s hard to feel annoyed when George tugs him by the hand, giggling and blinking water out of his huge eyes. He lets himself be led wherever, grasping tightly onto George’s fingers like he’ll slip away at any moment, George’s laughter ringing in his ears.
They’re drenched and shivering by the time they get inside, Max tripping over all the shoes George has left lying around while trying to find a matching pair for his outfit earlier. It’s all worth it when he gets George on the bathroom counter, knees digging nasty bruises in his ribs and wet hair dripping water all over the floor.
It’s there, in that bathroom with muted rain banging on the windows and the dryer rumbling in the background, that Max pops the question, impulsive and reckless like he always is. George is too lovely on that counter, naked and soft and a little damp, thighs prickling with goosebumps under Max’s hands.
“Marry me.”
The fingers trailing ticklish lines over Max’s shoulders pause. “What?”
From George’s mouth it sounds more like woh, lilting into a higher pitch at the end and it’s so– so fucking–
“Shut up,” Max says and kisses him. He swallows the giggles and curves his fingers around the bony knees trying to squirm away, keeping them firmly around his waist. George’s body shakes in his arms. “Stop laughing, come on–“
“But what did you say?” George asks, holding Max’s face in his hands. His smile is sweeter than candy. “You just said something.”
Max had a proper plan in mind, ideas of doing it after a race, a big and grand gesture that would make George happy and the center of attention, and after, Max could ask again when it’s just them two surrounded by candles and roses, private and intimate like how Max wants it. A win-win.
Except now he’s gone and blurted it out and there are no cameras, no candles, only the looming threat of folding clothes and feeding the cats. Fuck it. He can do it again later, pretend it’s the first time and show George off to the reporters with an actual ring on his finger.
He noses against George’s flushed cheek, breathing in the smell of water and coconut. He speaks the words between presses of lips against George’s jaw. “Will… you… marry… me?”
George leans back, studying Max’s face with his bottom lip trapped between his teeth. Max stares back, unblinking and certain. Soft relief blooms over George’s face and he pulls Max in again, skinny arms wound around his shoulders. “Yes. I can’t believe you’re asking like this, but yeah. Yes. I will.”
____
Max has almost forgotten the entire ordeal by the time he pads into the kitchen the next morning, shirtless and scratching at his chest. The sight of George stirring something over the stove is a sobering one, a quick reminder that yeah, his ex-husband slept on the other side of the wall from him the entire night.
With his hip cocked to the side and Max’s old basketball shorts slung low – he had his luggage with him, why the hell did Max offer him his own – he looks like he never left. Like Max is transported into the past when George was his fiancé and cooked breakfast every morning.
“Get down, Sassy, bad girl,” he’s saying, shaking a spatula at the cat tiptoeing on the counter. “Does Max let you walk all over the counters these days? You were never this naughty before.”
She missed you, Max thinks.
“Leave my cat alone,” Max says instead, voice still raspy. He realizes too late he’s shirtless. “Why are you cooking? You were vomiting yesterday.”
George glances at him over his shoulder. “I feel better today. And I was hungry.”
Max peers into the pan. Sausages and bacon straight out of Max’s fridge. George doesn’t eat meat in the mornings. “Right. Make me a plate, then, while you’re there.”
George mutters under his breath, but reaches for the cabinet with the plates. It’s so natural, like the layout of the kitchen is still ingrained in his muscle memory, and Max shouldn’t think like it anymore but the reminder of what they used to have stings sharp in his chest.
While George spoons the bacon onto a plate – a plate, just one, he’s so predictable – Max pulls out a container of the salad Rupert has him eating these days and sets it in front of his ex-husband. “Here, it’s chickpeas.”
George brightens, prying the lid off the Tupperware. “Chickpeas? Pickled onions?”
“Pickled onions,” Max agrees. Suddenly, the sight of George in his kitchen, waistband of his boxers peeking from his shorts and Max’s salad clutched in his hands, it’s too much. He grabs the plate George made for him. “I have to do some work now, don’t bother me unless it’s about Kimi, yeah?”
“I don’t even care that you’re being a dick right now,” George says behind him. “I’ve been craving chickpea salad for weeks.”
“Why don’t you make some instead of coming over to steal mine?” Max shoots back.
George flips him off.
____
The divorce comes out of nowhere. Well, kind of.
They’ve been fighting often, even more after the new addition to their family. George is harried more often than not, carrying Kimi everywhere and getting anxious when Max has him. He’s obviously overstimulated and trying to push through the crying and the tantrums and the nights when neither of them get any sleep.
Max tries to tell him to chill the fuck out and go out, take a fucking week to just lounge by the pool if he needs, Max can take care of Kimi no problem. George refuses and picks a fight about that too.
So, obviously they’re not alright, even if they’re still fucking almost every night. Max needs to channel his frustration somewhere, and George can’t sleep unless his anxiety about Kimi is fucked out of him.
Still, Max never expects George to pull out the divorce card like he does. They’ve always fought, always been a little unconventional in their relationship, this should be nothing new. George drives him up the wall, but he’s George.
They’re fighting about something again, neither of them even know about what, when George says it.
“Maybe we should just end it then.”
Max freezes. “End what.”
“This, us, the marriage.” George looks spiteful, a manic glint in his eyes. “Obviously it’s not working anymore.”
Max’s ears start ringing and that’s about all he remembers from that night. Or, well.
Mostly he just doesn’t want to remember anything else from that night, because after, he says all kinds of things that make George cry and then George says some back and somehow, somehow, they end up fucking right there in the kitchen, nasty and rough and mean.
It’s not even satisfying, it doesn’t feel good, but this is how they’ve always been. Sex means many things for them and in this case, it’s a mixture of both wanting to hurt and wanting to be close.
At least it is for Max. Fuck knows what the demon scratching bloody lines in his back is thinking.
George sounds almost terrified when he holds a finger to one of the bruises on Max’s neck when they’re finally done and both of their voices are gone. “Are you leaving?”
And Max is tired, he’s tired of it all, but most of all, he just wants George to be okay again. Be happy again. The kid didn’t fix them, so maybe this will.
That’s why he says yes and ignores how George goes pale. Maybe he’s expecting George to take the words back, maybe he’s not. It doesn’t even matter, because George never does. He lets Max go and throws a random spatula at his back as a final goodbye.
The next time they see each other, it’s with both of their lawyers present.
_____
Max stares helplessly as his ex-husband poses with his car, splayed over the nose wearing nothing but a Red Bull jacket and low-slung jeans.
“Why does it have to be my car,” he says faintly, horrified that his baby’s being rubbed all over by a supermodel. “Why does it have to be him? He doesn’t even like this team.”
Anna glances up from her tablet, distracted. “Uh, well, you know. People love the story. We get a lot of engagement when he’s involved. Put him in your merch and show a little skin, well. Sold.”
Show a little skin, his ass. George’s entire stomach is out, no shirt under the jacket. His abs glisten with something and since Max has intimate knowledge of how those abs usually look, someone’s had to rub oil or something on them. The way he’s lounging on Max’s car doesn’t help the situation either, the long line of spine subtly arched and–
Max rubs a rough hand over his face and turns away. “Whatever. Put my ex-husband on my website, let him sell my clothes, why not. My next contract, I’m putting in a new clause. No George.”
Later, after Max has had to film a video guessing different circuits by their sounds, George finds him packing up. He’s dressed up properly, thank God, loose trousers and an actual shirt this time, his face red like he’s just rubbed all the makeup off.
“You’re dropping me off, Verstappen,” he announces like it’s already decided. “I’m staying at the Hilton.”
Max sighs, shouldering his bag and following after George. “Taxis work great here, did you know?”
George throws him a look. “You’re here. Why would I get a taxi?”
And okay. That’s all it takes, really. Max is awfully and pathetically spineless. George says, Max does.
__
George fiddles with the radio, the AC, flips the visor down to check his hair. Max grips the steering wheel and resists the urge to tell him to settle down.
“How’s Kimi?” he asks instead. “Is he at your parents’?”
“Sandra’s with him. She’s been sending me updates, he’s fine. I’m flying out tomorrow, sorry to miss your race.”
Max snorts and thumbs at the worn leather under his palms. “No, you’re not.”
George is quiet for a moment, then shrugs. “I did use to like watching you drive. Didn’t really understand anything, but. It was hot.”
“Uh-huh,” Max says, casting an incredulous look at him. “That’s why you’d fall asleep whenever I put on a race.”
“Hey, I’d have really hot dreams,” George laughs, and he’s looking at Max mischievously, tilting his head down so his lashes are lowered and it’s… fucked up that Max still recognizes that look, that George is still utilizing it, that it even still works.
“Don’t,” he says immediately, reaching to slam George’s visor closed for no other reason than to do something with his hands other than maybe strangling his ex-husband. “Cut that shit out.”
George has the nerve to pout. “I wasn’t trying to do anything.”
“You were batting your eyelashes like a girl.”
“Does that turn you on?”
Max’s stomach turns. “George–“
George laughs, high-pitched. His fingers tremble when he goes to change the station again, the tips of his ears red. “I’m kidding! Gosh, what’s a little teasing between exes?”
They drive to George’s hotel in silence, somehow oppressive even with the pop blasting on full volume. At some point, some male singer – Max thinks George used to like him, but fuck if he remembers the name – starts singing about heartbreak and George’s face does something complicated right before he jabs the button to turn it off.
The car rolls to a stop. Neither of them move.
“Are you–“ George starts, hand jerking to scratch at his lip. “I mean. Would you like to come in?”
Max inhales, deep, exhales even deeper. He can’t quite get the air he needs. “George–“
“Not like that!” George interrupts and Max really needs to tell him to stop doing that. “Just. Sandra’s supposed to call about Kimi soon and he’d really like to see you, probably. He misses you.”
“Does he?”
“Yeah, he keeps asking after Daddy. I show him your pictures sometimes, because of, you know, the time zones and your races. I can’t always call.”
“You should’ve told me. I would’ve… I would’ve answered, or visited more. Even if it’s middle of the night where I am, you can still call me.”
“Yeah?”
Max blows out air and rubs a rough hand over his face. God, he’s tired. “Yes. I’m probably a shit dad, right now, but you also… you need to give me the chance to be better. Or, shit, I don’t know what I’m saying right now, sorry–”
“No, you’re right,” George rushes to agree. “You’re right. Come inside and we’ll call Sandra. You can talk to him.”
“Okay,” Max says and feels a strange frisson slithering down his spine. He hasn’t been alone with George since the last time they slept in the same bed, still married, but that’s alright. “Okay. Let’s go.”
__
Talking to Kimi mostly means nodding along to his babbling and making funny faces until he’s giggling. He won’t even remember any of this in a few years, but Max’s heart still aches when he points at the phone and screeches out a mixture of daddys and Mahs, because he can’t say the letter X but for some reason really likes trying.
It was always a no-brainer, Kimi staying with George. With Max’s career and Kimi’s age, splitting custody and visitation fifty-fifty just wasn’t an option, but Max sends enough alimony and child support to make up for it.
Now, he’s wondering if he’s been a deadbeat, if he should’ve tried harder to see his child. He could never be so exhausted that he couldn’t take a quick flight between triple headers to go home.
Not home. To George. They used to be synonymous, but not anymore. It’s difficult to remember the distinction when he’s sitting on the same bed that George has slept in, the imprint of his head on the pillow and the scent that lingers.
George is puttering around in the tiny kitchenette attached to the suite, obviously listening in but pretending to be busy. If Max closes his eyes, he can almost pretend he’s waking up to his husband making him breakfast.
He ends the call with Sandra and leans back on the bed, watching George take a peek over his shoulder. “You can come out here, Jesus. I was hardly discussing top secret stuff with a toddler.”
George fiddles with a glass of water when he crosses the room to sit next to Max. “I just wanted to give you some privacy. Um. I’m flying out tomorrow, but if you’re not busy, I could call you? From home, so you could say good night to him.”
Max stares at the carpet, soft under his socked feet. From the corner of his eye, George’s legs. His knees are tucked together, bare toes curled into the fibers of the carpet. His feet are long and narrow, toenails clipped and cuticles neat.
Max has dug his thumbs in the soles enough times to know they’re soft, almost like a baby’s. He doesn’t know why any of that feels relevant right now.
“I would like that,” he says quietly. “I miss him too, when I’m gone.”
George hums, crossing one ankle over the other. The bones there jut out, delicate under thin skin. It scares Max sometimes, looking at them, like if he bangs his ankle hard enough he’ll shatter the bones.
He always liked to kiss them when George’s legs were splayed over his shoulders.
“Are my feet that fun to look at?” George huffs out a laugh, but it’s soft, a little embarrassed, a little inquisitive.
Max turns to look at him. It’s difficult to remember why they ever divorced when it’s quiet around them like this, the lights dim and George’s feet so vulnerable. It’s easy to forget the nastiness George is capable of, how Max is no saint either.
Right now George’s face has lost the sharpness it so often carries when he looks at Max these days. His lips are soft and slightly parted, his shoulders bony and broad under his shirt with the top buttons undone.
This George isn’t the George who accused Max of cheating while their baby struggled to latch onto a bottle, who locked Max out of their house after a meeting ran late and Max had forgotten to text him.
Maybe that’s why he does the dumbest thing he could possibly do and leans in to kiss George.
George chokes, jerks back with eyes as wide as saucers, so wide he looks like an alien. Max used to find his eyes unnerving, hated the way they blinked and stared. Hot shame licks up his spine. George didn’t expect to be kissed, he didn’t invite Max up here for that.
And once again Max is the desperate one, the pathetic one who calls and calls and begs and loses the guy anyway.
“Max–“
“Can we not?” Max grinds out, leaning away. “Just, fuck, let’s forget about it. It doesn’t mean anything, I just thought–”
“I’ve been seeing someone,” George interrupts, quick and out of breath.
Max breathes in, out, in, out. Buries his face in his hands. He can feel his pulse in his fucking temples. “Okay.”
“I should’ve told you. I’m sorry.“
“Yeah,” Max tries to say but barely nothing comes out. “You should have.”
It’s not even about kissing a taken man, even if the thought grates so bad he wants to shatter a few plates. He’s fucked married women before, way before George entered his life and ruined him for anyone else. Hell, he wasn’t even single when he and George first met. He doesn’t feel guilt.
It’s the humiliation of not knowing. Of sitting next to George in the car and thinking – assuming, hoping – that George was flirting with him. That he was just as fucked and ruined as Max has been, when all the while he has someone waiting for a goodnight call.
“Is it serious?”
George is quiet. His breathing is shaky and sniffly. Max can’t even look at him. “I fucked up, Max. He’s a good guy, thoughtful and sweet and good with children. He’s a… I don’t know, a casting director for this one show, I can’t even remember anymore.”
Max grits his teeth. “Great, keep telling me all the ways he’s fucking perfect.”
“That’s the problem,” George whispers, and when Max glances at him, he’s staring down at his hands, fingers anxiously picking at the skin around his nails. “He is perfect and I hate it. He wants to make it official, wants to meet Kimi too. He’s in London right now, and I–“
He swallows, turning his huge, glistening eyes at Max. “And I’m here, with you. In a hotel room, alone, knowing damn well I want to fuck you.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Why not?” George demands, suddenly determined. “It’s true. Look at me.”
He tries to wrestle Max’s hands away from his face, grasping at his wrists and tugging. Max resists only for a moment, knows he could easily overpower George and toss him on his back, but lets him win anyway.
George’s eyes are so, so blue.
“It’s a bad idea,” Max croaks out, unable to stop himself from touching George’s cheek. “You need to tell me to fuck off. We can forget about this, we never have to bring it up again.”
“I don’t want to,” George says, jutting his chin out. “I want to kiss you.”
Max tightens his hold on George’s face and tugs him closer, capturing his lips in a bruising kiss. George moans into his mouth and almost whacks Max in the face with how wriggly he gets, clambering all over Max’s thighs to press every part of their bodies together.
George hasn’t changed at all since the last time they did this. He still smells like vanilla and can’t stop making little sounds that go straight to Max’s groin and he still tastes so fucking sweet.
Max rolls them so George is pinned under him, splayed against the white sheets like the devil himself, a mess of contrasting colors and angles. His cheekbones are sharp, his lips soft. He makes Max’s life hell and looks like an angel.
“Stop,” Max grits out. George’s wrists feel fragile in his hands. “We should not do this.”
“You kissed me,” George argues, petulant and whiny. Still, he’s pliant under Max, doesn’t try to wriggle out. “Just for one night, Max, come on.”
Maybe George can scratch the itch and never think about it again, but Max knows he’s already fucked for the rest of his life. Everyone thought George was the clingy one, always hanging off Max’s arm and posting constant dumps of them sunbathing on a yacht or holding hands over a candlelit dinner – and sure. George is all that.
Was.
But Max has always been the desperate one, trying so hard to impress the pretty model, to wow him with his racing and failing miserably. George’s blank look when he first tried to brag about his P1 was both humiliating and arousing.
Even now, when the sight of George fills him with itchy irritation, he still wants him. He can’t stand when George’s picture comes across his timeline but still he pauses, reads the article or scrolls through the comments of his selfie, whatever it is.
George and him aren’t good for each other. Fucking isn’t going to make them better.
“Go home to your boyfriend,” Max says softly. “Let him meet Kimi. I will not say anything about tonight.”
George’s eyes glisten in the dim. His chest heaves up and down, up and down.
“Fuck you,” he whispers and yanks his arms away. Max doesn’t let him. “Max, let me– If you’re not going to–“
Max grits his teeth. He’s trying so hard to do the right thing, so hard. At the same time, here’s George underneath him, closer than he’s been in months and he wants Max. He wants Max. The thing about Max is that he considers himself a pretty good guy, a pretty good husband and a pretty good dad, at least when George isn’t pissing him off, but most of all he’s selfish.
He was selfish about George when they started dating and he didn’t want him meeting the other drivers on the grid because he knew they’d see a pretty boy holding Max Verstappen’s hand and try to convince him to try someone older, someone with a championship.
He was selfish when they got married and Max told him to take his last name only because it fulfilled some masculine desire to possess inside him.
He was selfish when they divorced because he fucked George while he cried and kept telling him to get out, and then left him there with cum dripping out of him and the papers basically signed.
He's selfish now because he doesn’t actually want to let go of George and let him go to his man, his new man who probably treats him nice and gives him everything he could ask for. He has given George anything he’s ever asked for, including the very fucking divorce he wanted.
“If I just… one more time, if I give it to you one more time, are you going to be satisfied?” he asks, squeezing George’s wrists. “You’ll go to your man and you’ll stop fucking with my life?”
George blinks up at him with a petulant frown on his face that hides none of his eagerness. “I have never fucked with your life, Verstappen.”
Max scoffs. “All you ever do is fuck with my life. Verstappen.”
It takes a moment for him to realize George’s shivering isn’t because he’s cold. The hardness pressing against his thigh definitely isn’t because it’s cold. “Are you seriously turned on because of that? You like fucking with my life that much?”
George glares daggers, tries to knee him in the groin. Max grunts and wrestles him down again. “It’s because of what you called me.”
“Your name? Oh. My name.”
George smiles at him, sickly sweet and entirely fake. “It’s like we never even divorced at all.”
And that turns you on?
Max kisses him. There’s not much else he can do. He presses George into the mattress and takes his mouth, rough and full of teeth. George opens up for it like he always does, legs unfurling and taking their rightful place around Max’s hips.
He’s never passive when they do this, no. He surges against Max, bites at his tongue and his lips and when Max draws away, attacks the underside of his jaw. He’s a fucking animal, and Max wonders if his new man can take it, if he’s ever as hard as Max is now, if he knows exactly how George likes it.
They fuck like they’re fighting that night, George on his elbows and knees and Max’s hips slapping against the backs of his thighs, George on his lap with his hands on Max’s knees, George on his back when he loses his strength and Max has to handle him like a ragdoll.
At some point, their fucking loses its antagonism and it’s slower, softer. George is half-way to falling asleep when Max comes for the final time, so spent that only a pathetic dribble comes out. George isn’t even hard anymore.
When Max tries to pull out, to go and clean himself up, maybe leave, George locks his arms around his shoulders and refuses to let go.
“Tomorrow,” he mumbles, eyes closed. “You can regret this tomorrow. Just… not right now.”
Max thinks of Kimi, chubby fingers and red cheeks, how he’d cried for the first time in years when their little baby was placed in their arms, how he and George were already cracking at the edges at that point, how they’d done their best for their boy regardless.
Regrets mean nothing to him.
He lays back down, wonders why the hell they’re still running circles around each other like this. He draws lines in the sweat shining along George’s spine. “How long are we going to keep doing this?”
George shifts, doesn’t answer.
__
Max wakes up next morning to George frantically smacking him in the stomach, phone against his ear. He props himself up on an elbow, stilling George’s hand with his own. “What?”
George angles the phone away from his mouth. “Kimi’s ill.”
Max blinks the sleep away from his eyes, suddenly alert. “What?”
“Can you say anything else?” George hisses at him and slides out of bed. He hops around the room, phone pressed against his shoulder as he wiggles his perky ass into underwear he’s picked up off the floor. They’re Max’s and also dirty, but he figures he’ll let George wear them for the time being.
While George talks with whom Max assumes is Sandra, he texts his team about missing media day and then goes to the bathroom to take a quick shower. When he gets out, George is fully dressed, hurriedly shoving clothes into his suitcase. It’s very obvious he’s running on less than four hours of sleep.
Max stops him by his arm, tugging him away from his packing. “Go take a shower.”
“What, no, I have to go home, I told you Kimi–“
“Andrea is with his nanny and will be just fine,” Max interrupts. “Cancel your flight, we will go in my jet. You need a shower and boxers that don’t smell like sex. You can nap more in the plane.”
George blinks helplessly at him. “But Kimi–“
“Is he dying? No? Then he is fine. You cannot take care of our baby if you’re like this. Go shower.”
George blows out a breath, shoulders slumping as some of the manic energy bleeds out of him. He looks down and shuffles his feet. “Oh, these are your pants. Ugh, that’s disgusting, Max, why are they stained?”
“You were touching me over them last night, if you remember.” Max rolls his eyes and lets go of him. “Go.”
George goes, muttering complaints as he does, stripping naked and disappearing behind the bathroom door. The shower turns on after a minute and Max exhales, looking around him.
Fuck, all his clothes are at a different hotel.
__
George sleeps on the plane, but only after Sandra sends him pictures of Kimi peacefully napping, nose snotty but otherwise fine. He’s calmer when he wakes, cheeks darkening when Max laughs at him.
“I don’t like being away from him,” he defends himself as they make their way through the tarmac. Max is carrying both of their luggage while George arranges for a car on his phone. “I also slept with my infuriating ex-husband not five hours beforehand, I obviously wasn’t in my right mind.”
“Ouch,” Max drags out sarcastically, hand on his heart. “You were quite pathetic, I agree. How does it feel to be a dirty cheater now?”
George turns to shoot him a glare, eyes still crusted over with sleep. He doesn’t look as ferocious as he probably thinks, more like a disheveled lamb. “You would know. You weren’t single when we first met if I recall correctly.”
“That wasn’t serious,” Max dismisses. Like he wouldn’t step out on the most serious relationship of his life for George. Character flaw. “You should end it with your man, if he’s not satisfying you properly. The way you were acting last night tells me you’re not getting enough.”
George’s ears turn red and he doesn’t respond. “I’m taking the passenger seat.”
Max shrugs. “Whatever you want, dear.”
__
There’s something about sitting on the couch, George’s couch, and watching his ex-husband gently bounce their fussy child in his arms, shushing him and pressing his cheek against dark curls.
George is a natural at being a dad and that feeling comes over Max again, the one that tells him he should have this every day, he should be able to wake up and see George and Kimi like this every morning.
“Daddy,” Kimi warbles, hands reaching for Max. He’s snotty, the poor baby, his fingers sticky when George hands him over and they latch onto Max’s cheeks. “Love Daddy.”
Max smiles at him softly, glancing at George who takes a tentative seat next to him. “Love you too, buddy. You feeling a bit sick still?”
Kimi nods miserably, poking at Max’s nostril. Max takes the tiny fist in his own, marvels at how his rough hands can cradle something so small and fragile. “That’s alright, we’re here now. Did you miss your Papa, huh?”
“He missed you too, Daddy,” George says, tickling at Kimi’s chubby stomach, refusing to look at Max when he tries to make eye contact. “I’ve told you before, every night before bedtime it’s just Daddy Daddy Daddy, it’s like that’s all he knows how to say these days.”
“You feeling a bit jealous?” Max asks, smirking. “It’s just because he doesn’t see me very often.”
George scoffs, his jaw clenching. “It’s not about that.”
“What is it about?”
George is quiet for a moment. “I’m not trying to… I’m not trying to screw up your life here, Max. That wasn’t why I slept with you.”
“No, you just wanted to see if I was still into you because you cannot handle me moving on.”
“No!” George shoots up, agitated. Max pats Kimi’s butt and tucks him against his neck so he can keep watching George pace around the room. “I– Well, no, I don’t want you to move on, obviously, but it’s not an ego thing, it’s just…”
Max waits for him to keep going, scoffing when he doesn’t. “We are finally having the talk, then? So, talk.”
George stops in the middle of the living room and his mouth twists into that ridiculous pout, his hands on his hips. It’s as if Max were transported to twenty years into the past when his mother would scold him just like this.
George’s eyes are glassy, blinking away unshed tears.
“You don’t make it very easy, sitting there and judging me, you know. I haven’t been the perfect husband, but neither have you.”
“Yes, we are both very bad for each other, this is not news,” Max says, rolling his eyes. “Didn’t use to be that way. Doesn’t have to be that way now. We aren’t even together anymore, there is no reason for any of this.”
“You’re seriously telling me you don’t miss it?” George challenges. “Being together, whether we’re fighting or not. I didn’t make you fu– frick me, you wanted that too.”
“Obviously I wanted it,” Max sighs, rubbing at his face. “This is also not news, I never wanted to break up in the first place. You know that, that is why you keep taking advantage of the fact that I still want you.”
“So then how come you didn’t fight me when I asked for a divorce?” George bursts out, voice breaking and tears finally dribbling down his cheeks. “It was never supposed to go that far, I just wanted to, to…”
Max’s own voice sounds like gravel when he speaks. “You wanted to hurt me? I wanted the same, of course. I’m not always going to sit there and let you do whatever you want just because I love you. I didn’t want the divorce but you asked and I was tired so I said yes. You could have refused at any moment.”
George stares at him, eyes red-rimmed. “Well, when you said yes, I didn’t want to be the… the pathetic loser who grovels at someone’s feet who doesn’t want them anymore. You seemed so eager.”
Kimi snuffles against Max’s ear, halfway asleep, and God, Max loves his kid more than anything in this world, but right now he wishes he had his hands free so he could either hit or hold George. Maybe do both.
“If you could not see I still wanted you, you’re an idiot. I fucked–“
“Max!” George snaps.
“–fricked you – he’s literally asleep, George, fuck’s sake – the night you brought the divorce up, what about that says I do not want you anymore?”
“I don’t know,” George moans pathetically, burying his face in his hands. “Max, I don’t know. I always feel stupid and embarrassed when it comes to you and I keep making stupid decisions. You know that.”
Max decides to put them both out of their misery. He crosses the few feet standing between them and pulls George into his side, tucking his face into the side of his neck that isn’t occupied by a toddler.
George shudders and wraps his arms around Max, his hands snaking under his shirt until they’re pressed against the bare skin of his back. “I’m sorry.”
Max closes his eyes and breathes in and out. He has no idea how to feel about anything right now, the entire situation is so comically ridiculous it kind of makes him want to go to sleep and not think at all.
“I think,” he murmurs, sliding a hand down George’s trembling back, “us two are made for each other.”
George laughs wetly in his neck. “Maybe you’re right. The man I’ve been seeing, he’s boring. Perfect and boring. I didn’t realize I was so awful until you weren’t there to be awful to me right back.”
Smugness sparks hot in Max’s chest. He’d like to see that man deal with George’s attitude after his waxer accidentally rips some skin off. He’d run for the hills, but not Max, of course. “You will end it with him.”
“Yes,” George whispers, stepping back and wiping at his nose with the back of his hand. “God, I’m just like Andrea right now, this is disgusting.”
It’s sexy, actually, George all messed up and snotty and red-eyed. Max is going to put Kimi to bed and then he and George are going to fuck their feelings out until there is nothing more to say.
“Maybe our divorce can still be overturned,” Max says, pushing George towards the bedrooms by the base of his knobby spine. “Like we never divorced in the first place, like you said.”
George sniffles and goes without complaining, looking lost without a child in his arms. “I’m not sure it works like that. Who said anything about getting married anyway? What if we end up breaking up again? I can’t look at our friends in the eyes and tell them I’m divorcing the same man a second time. I’d be humiliated.”
“Good luck telling them we’re back together to begin with,” Max snorts and then hesitates. “Are we?”
“Are we what?”
“Back together.”
George looks at Kimi, sleeping and blowing snot bubbles in the crook of Max’s arm. His eyes trail over to Max, past his chest and up his face. “You know, the two of you like this, it’s…”
He smiles briefly, touching his cheek. “I go to sleep every night and dream of this, Kimi with both of his fathers, and for a moment I feel so complete, only to wake up disappointed because your side of the bed is empty. This is how it was supposed to be, us and him. Not… him and I and sometimes you.”
Max reaches out to fit his hand around the curve of George’s ass and pulls him closer. George comes without protest, fitting into the circle of Max’s arms like he never left. Kimi’s back is tiny when George splays his palm over it.
It’s reminiscent of the photos still hanging in Max’s bedroom wall, them and Kimi, even tinier back then, embracing against the setting sun.
It’s lunacy to assume they’re just going to be a happy family now, history has proved time and time again they’re quite incapable of keeping peace very long. Still, maybe they’ve gotten the worst out of the way.
Now Max knows to never listen if George threatens divorce again. He’ll just shove his fingers in his mouth and fuck him harder until he forgets to even think about ridiculous shit like that.
“Are you going to go crazy again once the honeymoon hormones wear off?” Max teases hoarsely. “Just trying to figure out if I should run away while I still can.”
George smacks him in the shoulder. “You like me crazy.”
“We got divorced because of your crazy.”
“And now we’re back together. Take me as I am or move on,” George says and pats him on the cheek. “Now stop hogging my child.”
Max watches him steal Kimi from his arms and coo under his breath while carrying him to his bed, full of plushies and toys. His sheets have the Red Bull logo printed on them, Max notes with a snort. For all George tries to piss him off with his Mercedes obsession, he’s always made sure Kimi grows up to be a daddy’s boy.
Yeah, Max is never moving on.