I never cared much for gossip — at least, not until it was about her.

We met on a rainy Thursday in Monaco. I’d just wrapped a long day at the simulator, hair still messy under a cap, and I was craving something warm. She was behind the counter at a small coffee shop tucked away in a side street I didn’t usually take. When she looked up, she didn’t smile right away, just studied me with eyes that seemed to know things I didn’t.

It wasn’t until later that I learned everyone else seemed to “know” her too — or thought they did. My mate texted me that night: Careful, she’s trouble. Then another message from someone in the paddock: Heard you were with her? Bold move.

They all talked like she was a headline they’d read, a warning they believed. But they didn’t see her laugh when I told a bad joke. They didn’t know she drove an ancient Fiat because it “had character,” or that she secretly painted race cars in watercolour just to unwind.

The first time I asked her about the rumours, she shrugged. “People like to tell stories,” she said. “Makes them feel closer to the truth.”

I didn’t push it. I figured if she wanted me to know, she’d tell me.

Over the next few weeks, I found myself thinking less about what people were saying and more about how she made me feel — like the noise faded when she was around. She came to a race once, standing quietly in the back of the McLaren garage, her hair tucked under the cap. When I crossed the line, she was the first face I found, even before the engineers.

It wasn’t perfect. Sometimes I’d catch whispers when we walked into a restaurant. Sometimes she’d go quiet for days when the pressure got to her. But I realised I’d rather stand in the middle of a storm with her than be somewhere calm without her.

One night, as we stood on the balcony of my flat, Monaco glittering below, she turned to me. “You really don’t care what they say?”

I shook my head. “No. Because they don’t know you. Not like I do.”