LDR Ch 38

Although his assistant said he would handle it, he had to avoid a situation where the other party would later sell the story to the press and claim that the person in the back seat did not even show their face.

That being said, he should have just left the clean-up to his assistant and headed to the circuit himself. In the first place, it was an accident that could not even be called a contact, to the point that the other party did not even understand why they had to come to the hospital. And the fault was on their side anyway.

Just as he was contemplating whether to just leave a message for his assistant and go, his assistant happened to come out.

“A new car has been arranged and is on its way, and Mr. Turner also asked for your location in the middle of it, so I let him know.”

“Okay.”

How could the timing be so terrible? If he did not show his face at the Grand Prix right after having an uncomfortable conversation, would it not seem like Leo was avoiding Harrison? Even though that was not his intention at all. Although Leo had said that he could no longer sincerely support Harrison’s work, he had no intention of acting as if he were protesting.

Then, just as he was about to get up from his seat, he suddenly saw an unbelievable face through the corridor hidden by the wall.

“What…”

Before Leo could react in any way, Harrison came right up to Leo and knelt on one knee in front of him to meet his gaze. At the same time, his hands, as if to check everything in front of him, gently cupped Leo’s cheek, and then scanned his shoulder, waist, knee, and leg, one by one.

“Are you okay?”

“Why are you here?”

After the simultaneous questions, Harrison carefully cupped Leo’s cheek. Through the distance of a single layer, the pale warmth and faint tremors were felt as they were. On top of that, his skin, pale as if it would collapse at any moment, was intensely scrutinizing Leo.

“They said you were in an accident, so.”

Leo looked at Harrison, not knowing what to do.

“Did no one tell you it was nothing serious?”

He was originally supposed to arrive at the circuit before the start of qualifying, but it did not seem like he would be able to, so he had already sent a message to the team. He had also explained that it was nothing serious. But Harrison, in fact, was in a hurry. The interviews would have been over by now, but it was still time for the debriefing. But considering the time it took to get here from the circuit, it was not even certain if he had finished the interviews.

“I heard, but they just said it was a small accident, and that you were at the hospital and they didn’t know when you would be back, so I…”

The end of his sentence trailed off, as if he did not even know what he wanted to say. Harrison, is this kind of person. Even when he was told he needed a cast on his arm, he had postponed treatment and competed, but at the news that Leo had a small accident, he had dropped everything and rushed over.

Leo looked at Harrison quietly for a moment, then finally said.

“You should have called.”

Harrison suddenly lowered his gaze. He knows how much fear Harrison has for the safety of those around him. Knowing all that, he had been thoughtless. No matter how minor, no matter that it was an incident that could not even be called an accident, he should have been the first one to let Harrison know. He should have told him himself before he found out from someone else.

Leo dares not know what he means to Harrison. But he knows that whatever he thinks, he means more than that. Even though they had fought, even though he had spoken as if demanding proof of his love, he had never really needed proof.

He had never wished for proof that Harrison would really give up everything and choose him, especially, not this kind of proof. He had never even thought of a test, since he already knew what choice he would make.

“I did call, but.”

His voice suddenly broke off. Their gazes met again.

“What if you didn’t answer?”

Leo looked at those eyes for a moment, unable to say anything. Those eyes that reflected only him.

Leo was not there by his side at that time. But, he knows the situation. When the breaking news first came out, Jude’s condition was not known. There were testimonies that he was unconscious, there were articles that his condition was serious, and there were interviews that he had looked as if he were already dead when he was found.

And Harrison, had kept calling his hyung’s phone. Because he wanted to hear his condition directly. Even until he finally arrived at the hospital himself, he had ceaselessly, called a number that reached nowhere.

“I’ll answer.”

That was the reason why Leo, no matter how angry he was, would not avoid or ignore his calls without a word. Because he did not want to make him recall that experience in the slightest.

“I’ll always answer your calls.”

Leo continued firmly.

“I’ll answer no matter what, so don’t think about things like that.”

Leo had resolved a long time ago that he would die later than Harrison, no matter what. He could not even imagine the sight of Harrison being left behind.

“I’m really okay, and I just came to the hospital with him in case he sells a story about me. No one was hurt.”

“Okay.”

At the small reply, Leo asked calmly.

“Did you finish your interviews before you came?”

“Yes. But you weren’t there when I went back to the garage. I asked Simon, and he said you were at the hospital, so.”

“Did you tell anyone before you left? What about the debriefing?”

“I left without doing the debriefing, but Simon did tell me to just go.”

That was a relief, at least. How irresponsible would it have looked if he had left without a word. It was even more so because he knew Harrison could really do that when it came to Leo’s matters. Leo quietly took Harrison’s hand.

“Let’s go.”

“Okay.”

The hand he held was still trembling slightly.

Harrison, who could not participate in the debriefing, instead had a brief discussion with his engineers, including Manuel, and Leo contacted Simon to tell him that he had met Harrison and that it was really nothing serious. Simon was understanding, saying that it was better for him not to be there if his mind was going to be elsewhere anyway.

After they had each sorted out their situations and returned to the room, Harrison, who was sitting on the sofa, stretched out his arm. As he approached, that arm naturally wrapped around his waist, and he gently rested his face on his stomach. Leo placed his hand on the back of Harrison’s head, which was leaning against him, and gently stroked his hair.

“Leo, it’s not that I didn’t talk about Jude until now because I wanted to hide my feelings from you, from other people.”

At the voice that finally came out, Leo flinched. The tone was no longer filled with avoidance, nor the defensively decorated aggressive energy from before, but was just quiet.

“I just, didn’t know how to explain it.”

Leo then gently stroked the hair under his palm again.

“I know.”

There was a time when he had wanted to hear his honest story, but he had never wished for himself to be the one to create that opportunity.

But in the end, the reason Harrison is talking about this now is because he thought Leo might have been hurt, he reacted strongly to it, and Leo caught him. Because he could not hide it anymore. As if confessing.

“Leo, I’m just.”

He wanted to see the face that was leaning against him, but he did not have the confidence to actually face it.

“I know there’s something wrong with me too. This isn’t normal, what I’m doing. I know.”

After the indefinable emotion, a quiet voice continued.

“I can’t let go of things.”

At the plain sentence, which left no room for interpretation, Leo just stroked his hair, no different from before.

From a long time ago, Harrison had not been fond of changing things. When he was karting, he did not particularly want to move up to a higher category. When he came to F1, he did not particularly want to change teams even though he knew it was not a team he should be in. He did not want to leave McLaren even though he knew his career would end if he stayed. And he had rejected a move to Ferrari, which would have at least brought him glory even if a championship was not certain, because he did not want to leave his current team.

The same applied to his daily life. Even when he moved out, he got a house near his family home. He does not leave England even while being harassed by paparazzi and taxes. He still uses the car he was gifted as soon as he got his driver’s license. He goes to the same stores he always goes to, spends the same daily life with the same person, and never initiates the severing of anything.

“I was curious, why you can’t love me as I am.”

The toneless voice seemed both empty and as if everything was jumbled and pressed down.

“I haven’t changed. I’m the same as when you first loved me, so I just couldn’t understand why you said you couldn’t anymore.”

The face that was leaning against him suddenly lifted its head and met his eyes.

“But it wasn’t that I couldn’t understand, I just didn’t want to admit it.”

Leo looked at those soft, deep eyes, and brushed his neat eyebrows with his hand.

“I know it’s stranger that nothing has changed in 8 years.”

He had a lot he wanted to say. But he could do nothing but caress that warm heat.

“It’s natural to change, and it’s a problem not to change.”

He wanted to say that he loved him as he was, he wanted to tell him how much he loved his unchanging aspects, and he wanted to say that he had never thought of it as a problem. But, he knew that Harrison already knew all of that. And that it had come to this anyway.

“But still Leo, I don’t love you like that.”

The gaze that quietly met his held no wavering, no hesitation.

“It’s not that I just keep loving you because I originally loved you, it’s not that I keep loving you because I can’t let go of things, it’s not like that.”

“I know.”

The only thing that came out was that short word, but he could not add anything else.

“Leo, you make me happy. Nothing else but you, if it’s not you, nothing…”

Unlike the neat eyes looking at him, the voice that trailed off had no conclusion. The expression on the face that had grown so much over the years looked like a child’s. As if lost, or as if he did not even know what he wanted.

“Of course I love racing, being in the car, it’s exciting, I look forward to it, and I’m happy, but happiness, if I can distinguish between happiness and other emotions.”

The naively direct and innocent words continued without concealment.

“What I really feel happy about, is when I’m with you.”

Those words had never been hidden, so everyone knew, and on the blind gaze that seemed as if there were no other options, on the gentle but desperate warmth, he suddenly wanted to cry.

“Harry, what I really hated, was that the most important thing to you is me.”

Very occasionally, he had thought. What would be left of you if I were taken away?

“If it’s related to me, for me, you’d do anything.”

It is not that he thinks Harrison lacks a sense of self. In the first place, he could not have become a driver if that were the case. It is just that, to Harrison, there are many things more important than himself. Racing, represented by his passion and goals, is more important than his own safety, and Leo is more important than that.

“You’re more important to you than you are.”

Why, since when, did people start wanting someone who would give up everything for them? Why did they come to consider that romantic? He just could not understand. I, do not want my love to give up everything for me. I have never wished for him to consider me more important than himself.

Nevertheless, 8 years of time had created this change. Sacrifices and compensations grow larger over time, and gradually encroach upon life. To the point that when you notice it, you cannot even admit it.

“Because, I had grown cold to this sport since some point, and I just followed you around the circuits because I loved you, and so you ended up compensating me for that instead. That compensation grew larger and larger, and now, it has become you yourself.”

Their gazes met, and for a moment, no words were exchanged.

“Do you want to leave?”

At the question that finally came out, Leo just answered.

“I don’t know.”

Leo did not even know what leaving meant in the first place. Leo had been here from the beginning, and had always been by Harrison’s side. But, in what way, to where, how.

“Harry, the reason I quit being a driver was because I knew that place wasn’t my place.”

The story he had never told until now, a story he probably had no intention of ever telling, was smooth even though he himself had not expected it.

“Of course I liked being in the car, and being on the podium was even better, and I loved winning.”

The Leo of that time was different from Harrison. Of course he liked racing itself, but his goal was winning. Unlike Harrison, whose goal was racing itself, he loved winning.

“But I preferred looking up at the podium from below with everyone else, rather than looking down from the podium.”

Leo loved winning, but he realized then that he loved watching people win just as much. He loved the quiet and desolate tension of being alone in the narrow cockpit, but he had realized that he actually loved the atmosphere of entering the pit lane and working together, surrounded by everyone, more. Leo knew that he loved winning, but he loved creating and watching victories more.

“So I quit. Because I knew there was a place I could love more.”

He had once heard a mechanic in the paddock say that he would be happy even as a caterer or a logistics manager, as long as he could be in this world. That if he had not been hired as a mechanic, he would have tried again for another job.

But Leo is not that kind of person. Leo, is the kind of person who has to be in the place he can love the most.

“Is that not by my side anymore?”

And at the question that followed, Leo answered in a low voice.

“You know what I told you before.”

Instead of pressing for an answer, Harrison just listened to Leo’s voice.

“The thing I said about how you’d say it’s a car, so it can’t be helped, even if I got into a traffic accident.”

His gaze met his at those words. His own image was transparently reflected in the soft-colored eyes.

“I’m sorry for saying that.”

At the subdued voice, Harrison suddenly pulled Leo a little closer to him.

“Leo, don’t do that.”

The words continued with his gaze still looking up.

“Don’t try to get away from me.”

The definitive words, the calm tone, the desperate eyes, none of it matched. So Leo did not even know where he should look.

“Please.”

At the single word that followed, he suddenly choked up.

“It’s not that I want to…”

He wanted to raise his voice, he wanted to say nothing at all, he wanted to be calm. But what actually came out were fragmented words that could not be gauged.

“Harry, I, anymore, any longer, I really…”

His heart pounded suffocatingly, as if it were being squeezed tight, in the coldly settled air.

“I can’t love racing anymore.”

At the sentence that reached him as if it had burst out, Harrison suddenly lowered the hand that had been wrapped around Leo’s waist. Leo remembered the expression Harrison had made, and the words he had said, when he had first said this. The voice that asked if it was because of him.

“It’s not because of you. It’s just, I can’t anymore. I don’t know either. You’ve always been in danger. But compared to the past, this is the safest era. So it will get better in the future. The regulations will be strengthened, and technology will improve. I know that too. You won’t get hurt, and even if you do, it won’t be serious.”

What was the reason he had first loved? He had felt destiny before he even knew the concept of destiny.

“But, I can’t seem to believe it.”

If he could not refuse the beginning, why did he continue to love? Even though there had been so many opportunities to stop.

“It can get less dangerous, but it will never be safe. If that day comes, no one will watch F1 anymore.”

The questions led to other questions. Had I, ever felt that I wanted to continue loving? Not just loving because I loved, but had there been a time when I had decided to continue loving in spite of everything.

“So I, can’t do it anymore. I can’t support you knowing all that, I can’t do it anymore.”

The answer is simple. Such a moment had never come until now, and he had finally faced that moment. And Leo, at that crossroads of choice, could no longer choose love.

He can no longer support him. The sport he had loved his whole life is no longer lovely. The excitement is nauseating, and he feels guilty about the anticipation.

“I don’t look forward to watching it anymore, and I hate everything surrounding you.”

He had come to hate everything that made Harrison go out on the track again. The fame and name inherited from his family, his outstanding talent, his sensational backstory, his stable sponsors, his eye-catching looks, all of it. Everything that had established this kid in this world.

“But still, I couldn’t tell you to quit, so I just wished you would get broken.”

The emotion of that moment continued to remain. He does not know how to shake off its remnants. Even now.

“I wished you would get broken, sincerely, I thought that. I really sincerely wished for that.”

Leo suddenly felt Harrison reach out his hand and gently caress the area around his eye.

“So that you couldn’t go out on the track.”