Soumya raises her Aviators over her head. "Tanay signed the contract."

I grab the sipper from the bench, popping open the straw before attempting the best imitation of contemplative confusion. "That's... unexpected."

This discussion is what I've been waiting for. I sign a timeout to my lawn tennis partner across the court. The sun shines brightly this fine morning, warm and tender against the backdrop of the fiery hot anger Soumya embodies.

"Unexpected, my fucking foot. You convinced him to sign the contract with Ferrari."

"Give me one good reason why I'd do that."

If she simmers down her anger, she'll be able to list three in total. But she's too consumed by her victim role in the F1 politics this season.

"Because you think Merc is responsible for you not winning the championship title on your last ever race and what better way to weaken the darn team than poaching off the star player!"

While that may be partially true, that was hardly a strong enough revenge to be pursued. "Shouldn't you be thanking me in that case? It's finally your time to shine, kid."

I wipe the sweat off my forehead. Her nose flares and arms ball into fists. There are solid reasons to justify her anger. Obviously, I'm enjoying this too much.

"I know I'm not the one jispe sabke bets hai, KB. I couldn't even make it to the podium in the last race. The sponsors are withdrawing and now, without Tanay, our team will simply dissolve before even proposing to renew my contract."

F1 is a heartless sport. You know what else is heartless? Business. This situation sucks for her, yes, but only temporarily.

"You still have till the end of this season," I tell her honestly.

She's not satisfied by my advice. Conflict of interests holds me back from assuaging her. I mean, she's a F1 driver. She can deal with this, can't she?

A frustrated sigh leaves her lips as she puts her shades back on. "I'll see you when I see you then, I guess."

In the wake of her stomping away, my assistant—that's not Mia—comes running to the court.

"Mr. Mehra is on the line. It's regarding the proposal."

Spare him, he's new. He doesn't know the uptight idiot like we do. I wipe the sweat with my wristband before bringing the phone to my ear.

"It's too gaudy a commitment," Vansh jumps straight to the point.

Gaudy is the last word I'll use to describe the sport. "That's why you'll just have to be the silent partner. Baaki ka tu mujhpe chhod de."

"Karan it's a very heavy investment that I can see failing. Upar se the star driver of the team signed up with Ferrari, didn't he?"

"Because I told him to. Maine hi bheja Tanay ko dusre team mein. Trust me, it's going according to the plan."

The week following the night at Mia's, I realized that things in life could hardly be mutually exclusive. I can't just turn off the racer part in me and instantly switch to the business tycoon side.

But I can tell you this: I'm good at both.

Okay, may be that's a slight exaggeration, but bear with me. Crisis is just an opportunity if you flip the coin. Racer or not, if Merc's falling apart, Karan Bahl can still save the day.

But my dearest friend sounds skeptical. "Does this have anything to do with your sis—"

"Vansh, business tera passion hai, racing mera," I speak before he can drag unrelated matters into the picture. "I would have done this alone but you know my Dad wouldn't vote in my favor. The board wants someone they can trust."

"Fine," He speaks after a drawn breath. "I'll look over the proposal one more time. But I'm counting on you to build the team, Karan."

"Gary has rebuilt the team from scratch yet again and here we have Merc's newest racing driver for next GP's lineup–Karan Bahl, ladies and gentlemen. Karan, how are you feeling today?"

So many people. So. Many. Fucking. People. It was hard to concentrate, especially when the final lineup for the next championship was pounced upon me not more than two hours ago, and I was already in front of an audience, that I lacked the numerical vocabulary to count, all waiting for my reaction to the official statement.

It was all so sudden that I couldn't believe this was happening. I was in. Not just the third driver anymore. But one of the drivers. I didn't have to sit out another year for my chance. Was this really happening?

I felt a nudge on my arm. Tracy Hudgens, our PR manager, gave me a pointed smile. Right, the reporter was waiting for my answer.

"Good, very good. The spirits are very high today, it's a good day."

"It sure is, definitely," The reporter commented. "But do you think it was a wise decision to announce the new line up right before the final race of this championship? Does it have anything to do with Francis Beethowen's tweet last night declaring that he is going to join Ferrari next season?"

Ah, the trick question. Tracy had groomed me for this one. Subtle laughter, charming smile. "Uhm, no, I don't think indulging in a tweet war is on the agenda, so nope. It might be Francis' last race with the team but we all know he's an honest team player."

I couldn't stand that son of a bîtçh. Him leaving the team was a blessing. I couldn't be happier about the decision.

The crowd cheered, flashes went off, and the journalist fired his last question. "Well, that's amazing. Also, do you think Merc's last minute decision to have you on the team has anything to do with the new sponsors coming in just in time?"

"We're actually out of time now," Tracy hopped in before I could form a response. "Thank you for your questions."

She led me back towards the office, warding off any more reporters. That was weird.

"What's that about?" I popped the question once we were out of public earshot.

"Nothing," She shook her head. "We're simply avoiding all sponsorship related rumors until next season. Tezi requested it."

Tezi was the up-and-coming energy drink company that was our rumored sponsor. "Cool."

"I assumed you knew."

She was checking if I'd read her email. I hadn't. "I didn't get the time to get to emails last night. My bad." Her puzzled expression prompted me to ask, "What, is there a change in management?"

"No," She shook her head. "We're adhering to the clauses. No change in management. I thought you knew about this."

"How would I have known about it?" I was still processing the information.

"It was your request, was it not? It's in the document."

"Is it?"

She gave me an incredulous look, chuckling in the end. "KB, you're playing with me, aren't you?"

I should have read the damn email. Humoring her, I pulled out my phone, tapping till the document opened up on the screen. It was nearly a hundred pages long—no way was I reading that.

"Of course I'm kidding," I said nervously instead.

"Right, okay," She laughed. "Gary's calling me, I'll see you around."

"Toodles."

I had scrolled to the last page by the time Tracy left. Just as I was about to close it, my eyes landed on the initials that were undersigned. They weren't difficult to recognize, considering I grew up imitating it on report cards and PTM notes. Big, bold, and slanted 'PB'.

No. Fucking. Way.

_____

Namoshtaii!

Random thought of this week: I've been binging Modern Family lately, and I was wondering how come there is no Indian adaptation of this series. Obviously Gloria and Jay's relationship will be a little hard to portray, same goes for Cam and Mitch I guess, but like, even Friends and The Office have been reshot for the Indian audience, right? And then it dawned on me, that may be it has... Like, do you remember this show called Parvarish that aired on Sony nearly a decade ago? It was about two families who were related, one super rich, one middle class, and the story revolved around raising teenage kids. I may be wrong, but I think Modern Family may have inspired that show, and if it did, they did a pretty good job because it must have been entirely re-imagined. 

Anyways, welcome back to our little corner on Wattpad. I hope you're doing well. It feels like everyone has grown so much since the last time I updated or was active here. Are you still in school or are you in college now? Any new life hack that you learned recently? Do you still want to be who you wanted to be six months ago? Who's your favorite music artist now? Have you heard Tum Jo Mile? Is it just me or does it low key sound like Gerua? 

Also, let me just take my sweet time to get emo and thank everyone who DM'ed me on Instagram and other platforms, with kind messages and update requests. Super grateful to have readers like you. Y'all deserve cupcakes. Swadhin on Instagram shared these super cool memes on dil the other day and I just had to share them:

Big thanks to ughhmaybeits_Titli for the wonderful banner art. I had a completely different scene written when I requested this one but that scene just wasn't sceneing in the grander scheme of things so I had to scrape it but I didn't want Titli's hard work to go in vain, so we're just gonna pretend that it's Mr. Mehra in his office, waiting for Mr. Bahl's new secretary to connect them. Cool? Cool.

Read, vote, comment, promote!

~Shubhodiya