Chapter Text
When Sonny had said he’d be watching, Joshua hadn’t actually believed him. He’d thought it was something like intimidation, maybe incentive to do better, some kind of go-get-‘em-champ bull——not an actual threat. Really, he forgets all about it until Bahrain, March second.
He finishes the race in eleventh, just barely short of earning a point, but at least in front of Cortez. Barely. Two seconds is better than nothing. Still, he’s sour enough after the race ends that he barely says goodbye to the team before sulking back to his hotel room and blasting himself with steaming water. He doesn’t consider checking his phone——doesn’t want to see what headlines and fans are saying about him and APX——until he misses so many calls it almost buzzes off of the table that holds the television.
At a certain point, phone preservation wins out over his bad mood, and he picks it up to see who’s been trying so hard to get ahold of him. Cash has called him ten times, and Joshua guesses he shouldn’t be surprised by that. Managers will do that, he assumes. He doesn’t know; he’s never had another manager. There’s a text from his mom wishing him good luck because she wasn’t there to tell him in person, about five messages from Jodie asking where he went and is he okay, and Joshua pretty quickly decides he’s not reading all that because what’s when he notices another message from a contact he has saved as Old Man.
That’ll be Sonny, then.
The message——quite literally Sonny’s only text to him——consists entirely of one emoji with a disappointed expression on its face.
Rude, Joshua thinks, and then figures it’s a good enough response and sends it Sonny’s way. A moment later, Joshua’s phone buzzes again. Sonny’s sent a frowning emoji.
That one, Joshua doesn’t dignify with a response.
***
Sonny doesn’t text him again until the ninth, Saudi Arabia. It seems fitting enough that Joshua places ninth. Cortez doesn’t bother placing, or finishing for that matter. He spins out in the fifteenth lap and slams into the wall so hard that the car won’t drive.
When Joshua checks his phone, there’s a thumbs up waiting for him from Sonny. Not exactly respect, but it’s… something. Better than a frown. That’s more like it, he texts back, then pockets his phone.
The race isn’t particularly one worth celebrating, but a few of them end up drinking in good spirits afterward. They were planning on drinking either way, they’re just lucky enough to be in a good mood. This way, he’s finding himself smiling and talking with Cortez and some of the younger crew members instead of yelling at Cortez and sulking into his drink.
In the middle of his beer, he pulls out his phone to see one new message from Sonny.
Culd say the same 2 u.
Apparently, when he’s not communicating entirely in emojis, Sonny texts like a teenager on a flip phone. If Joshua hadn’t seen Sonny’s phone last season, he would have probably taken Sonny as the kind of person to actually have a flip phone. He doesn’t seem to have much of a use for one, save for sending vaguely passive aggressive text messages. No social media presence from what Joshua and Cash had been able to tell——and they’d searched for a while.
Plenty of pictures of him, plenty of people on twitter saying… frankly obscene things, but no accounts of his own. Sonny really had been telling the truth when he said it wasn’t about the publicity. Joshua can’t say he’s disappointed by it, maybe irritated is the right word, though he’s not sure he can put his finger on why.
“What’s your problem?”
Joshua looks up at Cortez, who is halfway through his beer and staring down Joshua like one does a particularly irritating classmate in their 8th year English class. “What?”
“You look like you’re about to smash your fucking phone,” Cortez says. Jodie, who is sitting next to Cortez, leaning into his space so much her head is practically on his shoulder, nods. If Cortez minds the fact that she’s encroaching, he doesn’t mention it.
“You know,” Joshua says, and flips over his phone, screen side down. “Media.”
“Tell me about it,” Cortez says exasperatedly, and rolls his eyes. “Actually, don’t.” He knocks back a swig of his IPA. “Just drink.”
Joshua does.
***
He places seventh in Australia. Could be better, could be much, much worse. Regardless of his place in the race, Joshua finds himself compulsively checking his phone as soon as he has his hands on it again.
For three hours, Sonny doesn’t text. Joshua doesn’t want to admit he was looking forward to it, and he won’t, but he feels the sinking in his chest all the same. Reading articles about the race doesn’t help, and he’s just about to get off of the couch and throw his phone to the side so he can go for a run to try and clear his mind when his phone finally buzzes.
It’s a smiley face.
You’re late, he responds.
Srry buzzes back almost immediately. Fell asleep.
Joshua frowns. Old age catching up to you?
Sonny sends a shrugging emoji. Sumthin lik that.
***
Joshua will be the third person to admit that Japan could have gone better. The first would be Ruben, and the second would be Cortez. That’s half because he believes it, and half because he thinks Ruben will move him to first seat if he sucks up hard enough. However much he him and Joshua may or may not be in agreement about their performance, it doesn’t stop them from having what basically amounts to a screaming match after the race ends.
It some of it must end up broadcast, because five minutes after he and Cortez are pulled apart and dragged out of a public area, Joshua hears his phone buzz. He pulls it out of his pocket and looks at the message.
Wtf r u doing?
Joshua just shakes his head and drops his phone back into his pocket.
“What are you smirking at?” Cortez snaps. He’s still got a glare on his face; if you looked up bitter in the dictionary you’d probably find a picture of his face.
“I’m not smirking,” JP replies, and then it’s his turn to glare too, because here comes publicity——he never can remember her name——to cart him and Cortez back into the fire for a few comments on what they’ve just done.
They manage. Cortez seems fired up enough to do most of the talking for them, so Joshua just nods and smiles and pulls out his phone to check it under the table halfway through questions. He types a one-handed response to Sonny’s text: my job. He’s just about to flip the phone back over and pretend like he’s paying attention to Cortez when his phone vibrates again.
Don’r look @ ur phone when ur on tv, buzzes into the chat. Its unprofesh
Not finishing the word you’re typing seems unprofessional as well, but Joshua isn’t going to be the one to tell Sonny that. Not like Sonny would care.
Are you watching me? Joshua types.
Takw a wld guess
Joshua rolls his eyes, and glares at the camera before he can think better of it. He mouths asshole, and hopes it hasn’t cut away from him just yet. His phone buzzes again.
:(
Serves him right.
***
China. First place. His first real win racing, and all Joshua can think about is whatever Sonny is going to send him.
He does the celebrating regardless. Pops the champagne, yells and jumps around and grabs the trophy and all those things. It feels good, he doesn’t know if he’s ever felt elation quite like it. He’s the best in the world, at least for the moment. That’s what Ruben had said, anyway. Joshua likes the sound of that.
Apparently, best in the world earns him a celebratory emoji in a party hat. Cute.
Way 2 tie it up, Sonny texts after another minute. 1 mor & u have me beat.
Joshua smiles. next week.
Ill believe jt whn I see it.
come to Florida, Joshua texts. we’ll get you a good seat.
Ill think ab it, is Sonny’s response.
“Who has you smiling like that?” His mom asks. She has this weird smile on her face, like she knows something that he doesn’t.
Joshua lowers his phone. “Huh?”
“You’re texting some girl——I know that look.” She pats him on the shoulder conspiratorially.
“Mom, I’m texting Sonny.”
The expression on her face immediately drops. Joshua doesn’t know if he’s ever seen his mom switch moods so quickly. “What?”
“Sonny,” Joshua repeats. “Sonny Hayes. The driver from last season? Old man?” He sticks his phone in his pocket. “Won our race last season?”
“I know who he is,” Joshua’s mom says, and then she goes quiet. It looks like she wants to say something else, but she just presses her lips together tightly in a frown. “And I don’t like that look anymore.”
Joshua finds himself laughing. “What are you talking about?”
“You’re usually a smart boy,” she tells him. “You know.”
Joshua doesn’t, but they leave it at that.
***
Joshua finds himself stressed all the way through Miami’s practice and qualifying. He tracks Ruben down on their first day there, asks if he’s heard from Sonny.
In response, Ruben just laughs, and says Sonny hears from you, not the other way around.
Things don’t get much better from there, because they’re slated to start last after qualifying, and that doesn’t matter anyway, because he taps tires with one of the Haas drivers in the middle of lap twenty and spins out into the wall. The impact rattles his head a bit, bashes his legs against the car hard, but he’s with it enough to pull himself out of the vehicle without too much trouble.
He’s sulking in the pit by the time the race gets to its midpoint. It’s almost a relief when his phone buzzes, the noise gives him an excuse to look away from Cortez’s valiant but futile attempt to hang onto seventeenth place.
The message that Sonny has sent this time is entirely comprised of an emoji reminiscent of Edvard Munch’s The Scream.
It’s quickly followed up with R u k?
Then: Sounded bad
Joshua swipes his phone open and types his response one-handed. What, like you’re worried?
Yes, is Sonny’s response.
I’m fine. Then, because apparently he’s a mean person, he follows that up with You’d know if you were there.
Sonny doesn’t respond at all.
***
He doesn’t text after Emilia Romagna, where they pull out second and third somehow. Turns out driving angry isn’t the worst thing you can do for yourself, no matter what Ruben tells him after he gets off the track.
“That’s how people get hurt,” he’d said, and Joshua had just rolled his eyes.
“That’s how Sonny got hurt,” he’d been his response, and he’d regretted it immediately after seeing the expression on Ruben’s face. Ruben hadn’t dignified that with a response, and had turned away to talk to Cortez instead.
Fine by Joshua, gives him more time to check his phone and be upset, which is exactly what he’s doing when Cash walks past.
“I need your help with something,” he says, which prompts Cash to stop.
“Alright,” he responds, and looks up from his phone. “What do you think we need? Interview, sponsorships, trying to find a better team next season——“
“I want to find Sonny.”
Cash sighs and goes the extra mile to pinch the bridge of his nose like Joshua’s managed to give him a headache already. “What? Why?”
“Just curious where he is.” He’s been checking news sites and American race listings almost obsessively to see if anyone knows anything, and come up entirely empty. As far as he can tell, Sonny’s last race was three weeks ago. Since then, nothing. It’s not like Sonny to take a break from racing.
“Ask him.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“He might not answer.”
“He’s ghosting you,” Cash says after a second’s thought, with an irritatingly amused expression on his face. Joshua’s face must convey the truth the matter, because Cash’s smile only gets wider. “You got ghosted by a 60-year-old homeless man, and you’re upset about it.”
“He didn’t ghost me, I don’t think he even knows what that is.” Joshua crosses his arms. “And I’m not upset about it.”
“This is exactly how you acted when Kelsey dumped you senior year.”
“It’s not,” Joshua says defensively. It is, he’s realizing, with utter horror, but he’s not ready to admit that yet. And he’s definitely not admitting it to Cash, that’s like admitting defeat.
“This is embarrassing,” Cash says, and shakes his head sadly, exaggeratedly. “Mate, just text him. Or better yet, forget about him.”
Joshua won’t be doing either of those things.
(Later that night, he finally manages to find Sonny, albeit a very pixelated version of him, wiping out thirty minutes into tearing up a figure eight track in Mississippi. When he crawls out of his sideways car, he’s got a smile that’s visible even in the shitty phone video that Joshua’s been watching. It’s the best thing he’s seen all day.)
***
Monaco comes in what feels like the blink of an eye. Qualifying feels like it takes all of five seconds, though he’s acutely aware that his actual lap time is far slower than that. Third to last in their start slot. It’s not nearly so bad as it looks because he manages to pull himself up four positions in the first few laps, but it could be better. It could always be better, and the announcers never stop reminding him——and everyone else——of that.
It’s a bad race for him. He doesn’t run off the track, or manage to hurt himself or anyone else, but the whole time he’s on the track he’s just frustrated. In the end, they pull out two points, but just barely. Better than nothing, but still not what they need, and some part of Joshua can’t help but wonder if they would have done any better with Sonny there——in the other car, or on strategy.
Sonny, who still hasn’t texted him by the time he’s about to leave the pit. On his way out, he spots Kate, and pulls her aside.
“You have Sonny’s number?” He asks. She raises her eyebrows at him.
“Yes,” she says, a bit of confusion in her voice.
“Can you text him?”
“I’ll give you his number.”
“No, no.” Joshua sighs. Now that he’s saying it, this sounds incredibly stupid. “I have his number. I just need you to text him, and tell me if he responds.”
“What for?”
“Doesn’t matter what for.”
“I think it does,” Kate says, and now she’s giving him a Look with capital L.
“Just——forget about it,” Joshua tells her, and then turns on his heel and leaves the room as quickly as he’s able.
What the hell was he thinking, asking her that?
***
Joshua can’t sleep the night before the Canadian Grand Prix. He’s not usually an insomniac by any means, but he can’t seem to make himself lay down for longer than a few minutes at a time. He’s tired, but not a sleeping kind of tired, more of a stressed type of tired that doesn’t let you sleep.
He’s busies himself with combing the internet for activity from Sonny, and he’s just about to give up altogether, because apparently Sonny has dropped off the fact of the fucking earth, when his phone buzzes.
K8 told me 2 txt u appears at the top of his screen, and Joshua stops pacing when he notes who the text is from. Not that he needs to read the ID, he doesn’t know anyone else who texts like Sonny. Sometnin happen?
Joshua types a message, deletes it, and finally retypes and sends it before he gives up all together. Did you see Monaco?
Sonny sends a thumbs up. Then a smiley face, and maybe Joshua just has a soft spot for Sonny, but it makes him smile.
I thought you’d stopped watching, he types, and sits down on his bed as he sends the message.
U wish, Sonny texts. Then, a second later: good luck tmrrow.
The next day, Joshua takes second. When he does, Sonny sends him another smiley.
***
Joshua hasn’t been consistent. He knows this, the team knows this, anyone watching the races knows it. If you’re betting on APX, you really don’t know what you’re betting on.
This seems to be the main topic of conversation from the announcers before the start of the Spanish Grand Prix. They’re coming down on him harshly, which he guesses is to be expected. He can’t exactly fault them for anything they’re saying when it’s all 100% true. He needs to find some kind of consistency. Ideally, he’d be consistently winning, but he’ll take consistently staying on the track at the least. Some days, it seems like it’s not a proper race unless either he or Cortez spins out. That’s the running joke, anyway. People seem to love it.
Joshua is not one of those people. He actively dislikes it, even more so when it’s a joke that turns out to be accurate.
He spins out in the 27th lap, and knocks an Alpine racer off of the track with him. The front of the other car is ruined, but the extent of the damage to the Apex car is the tires, and a scuffed part at the back of the car. Nothing he can’t come back from, as long as he manages to get the car back to the pit, which he does. Not before losing 12 seconds though. He finishes the race, at the least, but the only thing stopping him from coming in last is Cortez.
Not a good look.
When it’s all said and done, Sonny sends him a crying emoji.
Don’t worry, Joshua texts back. I’m fine.
He watches for the next three minutes as Sonny starts typing, stops, and then starts again.
I’m glad you’re okay.
Since when does Sonny text in full sentences?
***
Austria goes infinitely better than Spain had. They get a good seat after qualifying, and the track just feels easier. Maybe it’s just because they’re in a new place, and it feels good to put the last track behind him, but regardless of what it is, the race ends with them in lucky number seven and eight.
Instead of a typical text message waiting for him when he finds his phone again, he finds a voice memo. That’s new.
“Shit, dagnabbit, how do I turn this off?” Starts things off, which isn’t really a great sign. “Forget it.” He hears Sonny sigh. “Good job JP, way to knock it out of the park today. Smiley face, thumbs up, whatever the fuck. Bye.” Then there’s about seven seconds of dead air, accompanied by the occasional staticky noise as Sonny tries to end the message.
Joshua saves the voice text, and then just spends a solid ten seconds staring down at his phone, like that’ll illuminate any of what he just heard.
What’s with the voice memo? He texts back.
Accident, is the response that Joshua gets. I touched the wrong thing. How do I send this comes in a second later.
You alright?
After five minutes of radio silence, Joshua’s phone buzzes again. Nvr btfer .