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“Oh yeah, woooooo! Let’s give it up for Pierre’s fantastic anti-presentation-skills about who on the grid would survive the longest on a deserted island! Yup, Oscar definitely makes sense. And Checo, nice presentation-making skills!” George beams as he talks. He’s holding a microphone plush and standing next to his Apple TV in the living room. Various grid drivers are sprawled out across his couch or random folding chairs, generally just having a good time.
It’s George’s birthday, also known as ‘The Annual Day Where Most of the Grid Comes Together and Does Something Involving Powerpoint Presentations Because of George’s Weird Fondness For Them.’ The past four years have all been normal Presentation Nights, but this year, George has hit on a new idea. He proudly calls it, Anti-Presentation Night – with the same premise as the original, except that someone makes the presentation and then a randomly-chosen someone else has to present it.
The evening has been shaping up to be good so far. They’re only missing 3 drivers this time. Pierre in particular, who always delights in George’s birthday parties, has amassed at least 3 more pieces of blackmail on Lando and Esteban each. He’s having a great time, and the pressure is off of him personally, having just finished giving Checo’s presentation.
He bows with a flourish and walks calmly back to his folding chair. “Thank you, thank you. Yes, I am quite proud of the atmosphere that I have managed to create in the studio today.”
“So then, Pierre, now it’s time to see who’s going to do your presentation!” George sticks his arm into an upside-down hat filled with paper slips of names and prepares to pluck one out. He turns to face the other drivers. “And may the odds ever be in your–”
“Wait,” Pierre says. He leans towards George and whispers in his ear. “I actually only made my presentation with one person in mind. Please pick Charles just this once for me, you won’t regret it,” he whispers.
George eyes him with some curiosity and mutters back, “Normally I wouldn’t bend the rules, but whatever, your presentation was funny and it’s my birthday after all. So sure.”
Pierre steps back and returns to his seat, smirking. He is such a good friend. The drivers around him eye his devious look in concern.
George makes a half-hearted attempt to rifle through the hat. He grabs a random slip, holds it up for 2 seconds upside-down, shouts “CHARLES!!!” and then tosses it back in randomly. Pierre rolls his eyes. He could at least make an effort to pretend it wasn’t planned, but whatever, he should just be grateful that George agreed.
Charles shoots Pierre a wary look and slowly rises from his spot on the couch. He’s really not bad with presenting, Pierre notes, but Pierre’s expression and interaction with George just a minute ago probably seemed suspicious enough. He makes sure to shoot a sweet, innocent smile back, and Charles narrows his eyes further.
Someone’s phone buzzes – Max’s. He slides it out of the pocket of his jeans and glances at it.
“Be right back, I have a quick call to take,” Max says, getting up from his spot on the couch and heading out the back door. Meanwhile, Pierre signs into his Google account on George’s laptop and open Google Slides. Yes, technically it’s a Powerpoint-specific Presentation Night, but he figures that the spirit of the actual content is what really counts, anyhow.
“Before we begin, this one goes out to – oh, what a coincidence – you, dear Calamar!” Pierre says offhandedly, in a fake-surprised voice.
“.... Merde. What did you do? ”
“Yeah, what’s the topic?” Alex chimes in, looking invested.
“Oh, actually, Charles’ area of expertise.”
“… ”
“Not to worry, it’s just about Max, and how he’s sooooo incredible and all,” Pierre says casually, shrugging. He is inwardly cackling and bracing for Charles’ response. The nearby drivers’ reactions are to start talking immediately, nod in approval of this topic, or laughing wildly. Mostly the third part, though.
“... You did not ,” Charles hisses in disbelief, outrage, and then betrayal. He glares at Pierre and shakes his head. “You did not! I trusted you!”
“Well that was silly of you, Charles,” Pierre remarks heartlessly and cheerfully as he redoubles his efforts to connect his laptop to George’s Apple TV.
“I am never doing this again with you guys, I clearly can’t trust anyone here,” Charles bemoans. He looks somewhere between close to tears now and looking absolutely mortified. Honestly, Pierre kinda feels bad for him, but then again, he’s also sick of all the lovesick yapping and longing eyes he has to bear every time Charles and Max breathe in the same air. At least this will finally send a clear signal (hopefully, at least) and will resolve years of pining. That is, unless Max somehow is incredibly, insanely oblivious, or he totally overthinks it. Ah, the elaborate mating call, rituals, and courtship of Charles and Max in their natural habitat. Observe. Pierre sighs and massages the bridge of his nose.
“We all know gushing about Max to us is your second nature, Charles. This presentation will be as easy as cake for you,” Alex snorts.
“Lower your voice!” Charles hisses furiously. His eyes dart towards the back door. Alex snickers to himself. Most of the grid looks absolutely caught in delight and anticipation, chatting animatedly amongst themselves and occasionally jeering playfully at Charles.
Charles’ face is starting to match the precise shade of his Ferrari hoodie. He looks like if he could strangle Alex, duct tape his mouth, address and poorly deny any allegations, and then toss him out the 2-story window, he would gladly do that and more. He turns to George for salvation, but is cruelly met with him still laughing his ass off the most of them all.
George looks like he literally died and ascended to heaven – Pierre has literally never seen him look happier. Like, not even on the podium at his maiden GP win.
“Dude, words cannot express my gratefulness (“gratitude”, Charles corrects bitterly, crossing his arms) for your birthday gift. Best present ever, entirely paid off,” George practically sobs, voice cracking in emotion. He opens his arms for a hug from Pierre, which Pierre distractedly accepts before returning to trying to get his laptop to comply and AirPlay the slideshow.
Continuing his drama queen angst era, Charles paces a corner of the room, drags his hand over his face and laments to himself, “What have I done to deserve this?”
Carlos overhears him and snorts. “I hope you meant that rhetorically, because I am so done with the amount of times that I have been your unwilling confidant in the Ferrari garage for, ‘the latest thing that Max said to me’, or about whether I think you should open a Twitter stan account for Max or not, or ‘oh if you were Max would you appreciate this outfit’?” Pierre nods in agreement – he knows that Carlos and himself understands each other’s pain wholeheartedly, having gone through similar experiences. He thoroughly approves of this public, shameless outing of Charles’ habits.
Charles makes a noise of utter betrayal but doesn’t even bother with a verbal response anymore. Pierre is starting to legitimately fear how much blood has rushed to Charles’ face at this point. Is that… Healthy?
“Whatever, I guess I have to just get this done before Max comes back then,” Charles practically heaves, finally standing up and taking what looks like a Walk of Shame to the TV screen. They all clap and shout enthusiastically to hype him up. Pierre is furiously jamming away at the laptop keys, praying to any higher being up there that the AirPlay will work.
Just on time, Max strolls back into the living room and says, “Hope I didn’t miss anything, guys!”
The living room dissolves into hysterics and unintelligible glee at the timing. Max stares blankly, completely bewildered by their reactions.
Charles takes the opportunity to make a frenzied, last-ditch attempt to escape but gets detained at the front door and dragged back in a fireman-carry by Pierre, kicking and cursing passionately and violently in French all the way. “What?” Max asks, looking concerned. His eyes follow Charles’ journey back. Charles hurls out a particularly nasty curse concerning Pierre’s entire future bloodline, which Pierre scoffs at, unimpressed. He’s heard that one from Charles before already. “Charles, are you okay? Did they do something to you?”
“Yes,” Charles chokes, unable to meet Max’s eyes. “Let me go!” Pierre drops him unceremoniously next to the coffee table, in front of the empty TV screen. Charles hisses something in French under his breath and flips him off.
As if on cue, the Apple TV immediately follows suit and the AirPlay finally starts working; the title slide of the presentation is now projected and clearly visible. Lando falls out of his folding chair howling with uncontained pure chaotic glee at the look on Max’s face at the presentation title screen: WHY MAX IS THE 10/10 WHOLE PACKAGE , in Times New Roman, italicized, underlined, capitals, font size 80, perfectly centered, and then towards the bottom in tiny and perfectly rounded Comic Sans, produced by Pierre for an idiot, presented wholeheartedly by Charles . There are various emojis scattered around the slide: eggplant emoji, water drop emoji, hot red-faced emoji, pepper emoji, unhinged emoji, sparkle emoji, hot red-faced emoji, and the like.
The whole room swivels around to look at Max’s expression. He is not living in the moment with them. He’s absolutely motionless for a couple seconds. His eyes flit from side to side, taking in the slide in all of its glory. The background is Ferrari red. There is an immaculate piece of fanart of the two red-faced and smiling as they talk to each other.
He looks dumbly at Charles, who is similarly speechless and has an acute combination of regret at coming to Anti-Presentation Night, fury at Pierre, and a hint of anxiousness present in his pretty eyes. He carefully avoids returning Max’s gaze.
Max looks around. He looks back at Charles and the title slide. He blinks furiously. Finally, his brain comes back online and he turns to Pierre. He. “Is this a joke?”
“No,” Pierre answers calmly.
Charles covers his face for a split second, uncovers it on second thought, and then immediately lunges for Pierre’s throat. Someone calls, “The girls are fighting!” Pierre makes a desperate break for it and vaults over the couch as Charles stands still, clearly considering his next moves and fueled by rage and nervousness. His eyes track Pierre’s every move vengefully. He starts to swear in French again as he slowly stalks towards Pierre, who grits his teeth and reminds himself that it’s in the name of true love that he’s risking his life.
Max is still staring at Charles and mouthing Pierre's “no” to himself silently. He’s starting to look vaguely hopeful.
They have to take a quick break because George is firmly convinced that someone is going to piss themselves in laughter during the presentation without a breather to cleanse some of the energy in the room first. During this time, Charles tries to make no less than three (3) excuses (unsuccessfully) about why he has to leave right this instant, and then seemingly accepts his fate and lays face-down on the carpet. Then he grabs his bag in a way that he thinks is surreptitious (it really isn’t) and coolly starts for the door. Lewis looks back at the others, stands up, and throws a relaxed thumbs-up to indicate, ‘I’ve got this.’ Then he hurries after Charles, who is only a few steps out of the living room.
“But Charles, what if you hurt Max’s feelings by leaving rather than just doing the presentation?” Lewis whispers quietly, pretending to look concerned, when he catches up.
Charles looks horrified at the possibility and immediately plants his ass back down.
Lewis smiles triumphantly to himself and exchanges a quiet, victorious high-five with Nico Hulkenberg.
“How did you do that?” Kimi whispers, awed. Lewis just winks mysteriously in response. “Max,” he simply offers as an explanation. Kimi nods like that makes sense.
“Okay, I think we’re finally ready for Calamar to begin, right?” Pierre asks from the back corner of the living room (for his personal safety), barely ignoring the cold, cold stare that Charles is levelling at him from the front.
“Disclaimer I am, uh, so sorry for anything I say here, and Max, you’re really incredible and I was forced into doing this, so please don’t think I’m weird,” Charles says awkwardly and quietly, shifting from one foot to the other. Pierre watches as Max slowly nods and attempts to smile encouragingly, but it comes out kind of dampened by how in disbelief he still looks.
He hasn’t said a single word out loud after Pierre’s blunt one-word mic-drop. Pierre just knows there is an absolute chaotic mess going on in Max’s head as he processes and the hope is his heart grows.
Furthermore, now that Max seems semi-conscious again and hasn’t expressed disgust or a negative emotion yet, Charles untenses a bit. Pierre nods. ‘ A good sign ,’ he wisely decides.
Anyhow, Pierre clicks his little Apple TV clicker thing and it goes onto the next slide with one of those stupid 3d-cube transitions. It’s ridiculous and he loves it. “Okay, so uh…” Charles looks at the screen for a moment and squints. The cursive font and layout is ridiculous. “I can work with this, actually.”
He begins to stumble through awkwardly reading off of the bullet points, and then stops. “Pierre, this is so wrong. Max did not pull an incredible overtake at this 2013 karting event on Joyner of all people. He pulled one, I have to admit, on me , and it was gorgeous . Heaven-adjacent. Like, seriously, how can a guy be so brilliant with everything? Skill, looks, personality, work ethic, all ,” Charles complains, pacing in front of the screen. He begins to carefully analyze specific examples of Max’s post-race banter with other drivers and notes his growth from the early karting days.
“You tell ‘em!” Alex howls from the back of the room. Charles ignores him and continues to speak, slowly gaining confidence. He spins around and waves his hand in gestures as he speaks. He’s barely even glancing at the slides now, just vaguely sticking to the topic of the bullet points and often veering off into cute little side rambles about random details about Max.
It would be cute, if a) it wasn’t grossly lovesick behavior and if b) it wasn’t so long. Seriously, Charles’ presentation just goes on and on for what feels like half of an eternity. The longest presentation from before this has been a mere 9 minutes total in comparison.
“Can you elaborate on your opinion about his personal color palette and how it fits him?” Lando yells from the back of the room, like a joke. Beside him, Oscar is silently holding up his iPhone and recording.
“I would absolutely love to expand on that, actually, thank you for reminding me,” Charles says, grin so unhinged and genuine that half of the grid actually kind of shrinks back, terrified and awed. Before anyone has truly mentally prepared themselves for it, Charles is deeply immersed in the material. He’s in the flow state. He’s so in that Leclerifying state right now that Pierre is convinced that he can actually feel some kind of passionate energy physically flowing from Charles and suffusing the entire house with sappy pink-filter vibes. This absolutely has the same energy as an incredibly important, passion-filled 17th-century historic battle speech.
Pierre sneaks a look at Max and is about to start crying in joy. The man somehow still looks absolutely flabbergasted . He’s currently pinching himself and all. His face goes blank. He looks like he’s permanently stopped functioning. He’s muttering something to himself in Dutch. And, oh, his face is incredibly red by now too. Honestly, are Charles and Max still trying to overtake each other off-track, just now to discover a never-before seen shade of red? Well, Pierre allows, if you’ve been deeply, deeply oblivious for your entire life about how someone who you’ve known since you were 8 years old might like (love!?) you back, it might take a little time to get over seeing it as an impossible dream. But Max looks pleased and touched, too, by Charles’ continuous stream of nothing but kind and gushy words to say about Max. Plus, Charles' presentation skills are effortless – he’s taking the somewhat silly slides and morphing them into something deeper, somewhat more-developed, and somehow even sweeter.
It’s not until 7 minutes later after Lando’s interruption, Charles still making new points on the same slide, that Carlos actually raises his hand and desperately asks, “I can’t believe I have to ask this, but is there a time limit? I don’t think we’ll ever get to the next presentation if the Leclerifying continues” (Pierre suddenly remembers that there is literally 15 slides and that they are on SLIDE 6. The temporal sacrifices to be made to get these two idiots together…).
Charles stops to catch his breath a bit and takes a sip of water from a bottle that Pierre absentmindedly tosses to him. His eyes shine with confidence. Yup, totally in the flow state. He’s an absolute natural at understanding and talking about this topic – what a way to essentially confess. Pierre waits impatiently for George’s response.
“No, no,” George gasps, in a mixture of laughter and shock. “This is literal gold. This is my favorite memory of the year so far.”
“Even over placing on the podium or winning a Grand Prix?” Oscar muses wryly. “I entirely agree about the value of this, though. This is such high-quality blackmail. Everyone thank Pierre for his crazy successful plan.” Lando has taken over securely recording to give Oscar’s hands a break.
“It’s not successful until they seal it with a kiss,” Pierre mutters to himself, but nods solemnly and accepts the chorus of ‘thank you’s from everyone.
“Can I get back to it, guys? Hello, interruptions?” Charles sulks. “It was getting good.” And then he realizes that the subject of this very presentation is also listening, and he rushes to clarify, “Not that I didn’t think the first part of this slideshow was good! In fact, I – Pierre! Why on earth did you go to the next slide? I haven’t even gotten to the…”
Over the course of the presentation so far, Pierre observes, Max’s face has gone through a definite journey. Shock, realization, disbelief, suspicion, feeling touched, more disbelief, stronger-than-usual lovesickness, and full investment in the presentation. Actually, it’s more of a non-linear timeline – his face keeps on cycling through these emotions (definite highlight on disbelief and lovesickness ). But, pleased, Pierre notices that his face is lingering a lot less on disbelief now and more on blooming realization and hope, if the small quirk of his lips and red ears is anything to go by.
These two idiots better get their shit together now and get me a nice bottle of wine after this for all the pining that I’ve had to endure , he thinks viciously to himself. He watches as Charles’ face lights up as he edges closer to the screen and rambles on about how Max makes great alfredo pasta.
“Charles, that’s not even remotely relevant to the focus of this slide!” Carlos yells from 4 folding chairs over. Charles flips him off without missing a beat but somehow smoothly switches to rambling about how incredible Max’s overtake was from this other one specific karting event from when they were teens, and then he compares it to a Grand Prix from two months ago where Max did something very similar. His eyes are shining. Somewhere in his heart, Pierre admits grudgingly that, yes, they are cute in their mutual adoration slash absolute obsession for each other. When Charles moves onto talking about Max’s hair that day, though, he immediately takes it back. They are absolutely sickening. Seriously, Charles, was that day not 9 years ago?
“–But I haven’t even gotten to part of the crux of the matter, yet,” Charles continues on. He finally goes to the next slide and quickly skims it, face heating up slightly at one of the post-race photos. “This slide is way too shallow, so I’ll just ad-lib. I remember that at one specific fan-meeting event, two years ago, I saw Max being super patient and kind to a fan who had social…”
Pierre zones out. He knows what specific anecdote Charles is bringing up; he’s well-versed in Max-related things compared to most of the grid, courtesy of being Charles’ best friend. After countless times of hearing the same thing, he knows Charles’ exact take on it (and if he’s wrong, it’s 95% of the time literally what he said but more positive). So really, he’s the perfect wingman in carefully creating these slides for Charles. But, in fact, being an expert matchmaker is how he pulled a simple yet epic, time-proved strat: make some of the slides purposely vague or shallow.
Pierre knows that if you’ve ever given a good presentation in school before, you know that the slides can’t be too detailed or it will seem like you’re simply reading off without true knowledge of the material. With his sweet enthusiasm and rambling and adding of details or indignation at how short or “badly worded” some of the bullet points on the slides are, Charles is unintentionally making it very, very clear to Max that he genuinely has an interest in him. An interest that would be quite frankly concerning, if Max didn’t wholeheartedly, obviously reciprocate the very same feelings just as much. On top of that, having a low-quality presentation is basically just a trait of Presentation Nights, so bonus for that. Pierre grins and pats himself on the back mentally for his intelligent plan.
“I just want to add that none of this was planned,” Pierre interjects out loud, randomly, to be clear. Charles doesn’t even seem to hear him. Some of the captive audience’s eyes flicker to him briefly.
“Mate, we all know that Charles knows what he’s talking about through and through,” Alex rolls his eyes dryly and yawns. “This was initially really, really funny, but, uh, I think you underestimated Charles on this topic. It–”
“I didn’t underestimate him at all,” Pierre interrupts, making eye contact. They stare at each other wordlessly for a moment. Pierre hopes that Alex can see how much suffering and long hours of listening to Charles yap that he has had to go through first-hand.
Understanding kindles in Alex’s eyes, along with deep, deep respect. He nods and claps Pierre solemnly on the back. “Brilliant. We all salute you for your public service towards finally bringing their weird pre-courtship era to a close.”
It’s when Charles gets to the thirst photos slide (self-explanatory) that Pierre has to draw a line (he was probably drunk when he added that slide, to be honest – oops). He tries to immediately skip to the next slide, but the clicky slideshow pointer isn't working. The ‘next’ button on the little remote in question is 100% stuck. The laptop is across the room right now. Pierre frowns and slowly rises from his seat, making frantic motions for Charles to cease talking for the time being and direct the topic to some other incredible, mind-blowing quality of Max. ‘ Please, have some modicum of public decency and stop talking about his abs ,’ he hysterically prays in his mind. Charles has a remarkable ability to yap on and on about Max’s physical attributes, and as a best friend, it’s his duty to not accidentally embarrass him too much in front of almost the entire grid. Hm, maybe he should have thought out whether this slide was a good idea or not more –
At the same time as Pierre, Max stands up, jaw set in grim determination. He’s got Charles’ bag slung over his shoulder now. Collective gasps sound from everyone. Charles turns to fully face Max, eyes widening like a deer in headlights. He stops talking, mouth wide open mid-speech. Somehow, his eyes go even wider with alarm when he presumably remembers the current topic of conversation.
“Um, hi Max?” He squeaks, suddenly shy. The room goes quiet.
Without a word – although his face is steadily reddening – Max reaches out, gently grabs Charles’ hand with his own free one, and then starts to speed-walk towards the front door.
“...” It is so quiet that the drivers can practically hear the mental duet of giddy celebration and screaming in Charles and Max’s minds. Suddenly the room explodes in cheers and wolf-whistles.
Max hurries on, getting marginally faster. He’s practically sprinting, still dragging Charles by the hand, as he opens the door, shouts “Happy birthday George,” and then books it out with Charles. Pierre practically trips over his own feet to race to the door, still slightly ajar, with everyone else following, completely invested. They’re all talking over each other and babbling in surprise and hilarity and general relief that Max has grown a pair after so many years. The drivers cram through the doorway for a look and spill out onto the porch. The pair is already in the front seats of Max’s fancy car (Pierre thinks to himself that thank goodness Charles just took a fancy Uber here, so he doesn’t have to drive his car back separately). Pierre squints at the tinted windows and makes out the pair, still furiously blushing and equally, completely absorbed in their conversation.
For a moment, Charles catches Pierre’s eye and shows an expression of heartfelt thanks. Then he narrows his eyes, draws a finger over his throat, and mouths a few choice French curse words, probably for making him go through all that. He ends with a wink. Pierre only has the time to open his mouth to respond before Max floors it and the car disappears.
“… Did that really just happen?” Fernando finally asks, looking baffled.
They head back in, all quiet and trying to understand what just went down. Suddenly George turns to Pierre.
“Mate, you are a genuine legend,” he states.
They all start to talk at once. “I can’t believe it! They actually got their act together!” “Oh my god, what a fever dream, did you SEE when Charles literally started to talk about Max’s–” “This is one of the most memorable Presentation Night so far and you cannot change my mind .”
“It made me feel as single as a brick, but 5 out of 5 stars on Yelp,” Lando adds.
Oscar shoots him a look. “I’m literally your boyfriend,” he says in exasperation.
“Nothing personal, Osc, dear,” Lando returns sweetly, grabbing Oscar's hand easily and rubbing circles into it. “But Charles is so enamoured and chatty about it that the most perfect pair of soulmates in the world would feel somewhat single hearing him vent about it, for,” Lando checks his watch, “Almost an hour.”
“It was only an hour? I literally thought it was three and a half, I swear I almost fell asleep five times,” Yuki groans.
“Okay, um, now that that is over and my efforts have finally paid off… How about the next presentation?” Pierre suggests.
They continue onto the next slideshow. It’s, coincidentally, about who would make the best pairs of platonic spouses on the grid. Pierre snorts as any mentions of Charles or Max are hurriedly taken out to avoid any chance of arousing the other’s wrath. Somewhere else, between bouts of making out in the parked car, Charles has to stifle a sneeze.
--
“What have I helped into existence,” Pierre whispers in horror, mostly to himself. He’s mingling with the other drivers at a set for a new Grill the Grid video before shooting starts, but right now, his attention is unwillingly turned to Max and Charles being lovey-dovey with each other 3 feet away from him. It wouldn’t be that big of an issue if Pierre could just turn around and ignore them, but they do not realize how loud their conversation and casual acts of affection are. Especially because Pierre is currently single.
“Okay, but can we just talk about how you literally thought that getting them together was going to get Max and Charles to be less annoying about each other? Now they’re somehow, dare I say even more insufferable, and still really pining for each other somehow despite being in a committed relationship,” Carlos complains, coming up behind him.
“Charles has definitely been a lot happier since they’ve gotten together, though, so I’m happy for him, I guess,” Pierre says reluctantly but fondly. Yes, Calamar is an important person to him, even if he makes fun of his best friend sometimes.
Carlos nods in agreement and then adds, “I bet they’ll get married within a year, though.”
“Oh, a marriage bet?” Pierre grins. He watches the two engage in a warm conversation and Charles giggle at something that Max has said. “You’re on. A month.”