Engines roared like thunder across the grid, the smell of fuel and burnt rubber thick in the air. The championship came down to this: you and Lando, two cars, one trophy. Cameras loved the way your helmet tilted toward his on the grid, like you could burn through his visor with nothing but the weight of your stare.

He gave you that infuriating smirk, the kind that always made the fans swoon and you grit your teeth.

“You ready to lose?” he asked over the radio, his voice sharp but playful.

You clicked your radio on, voice low enough it was almost a purr. “I don’t lose. Not to you.”

The lights above flicked red, one by one. Adrenaline hammered through your veins. And then you both heard it — the rev of engines, yours and his, overlapping, snarling, like two beasts locked in a cage fight.

In your mind, the words echoed like a pulse:

Bad, bad news One of us is gonna lose I’m the powder, you’re the fuse Just add some friction.

The lights went out. Go.

Your Ferrari leapt forward, tires screaming, the power surging through your chest like lightning. Beside you, his McLaren did the same, neither of you giving an inch. Wheel to wheel, sparks flying where your tires nearly touched, it felt less like racing and more like foreplay with fire.

On Turn 1, you squeezed him wide, but he refused to yield. You could practically see the defiance in the way his car edged closer, daring you to back off.

“You’re playing dirty,” he breathed over comms, voice sharp with tension.

“Funny,” you shot back, “so are you.”

Lap after lap, the world shrank until it was just him and you, trading overtakes, trading risks, trading the kind of glances across the paddock that had mechanics whispering. Rivalry wasn’t just on track. It was in the way he brushed past you in press conferences, in the way his hand lingered an inch too close when the two of you were shoved together in podium photos. Everyone could feel it — the friction, the fire, the fact that you and Lando Norris couldn’t exist without colliding.

Final lap. Final corner. Tires locking, exhausts roaring. You could feel him breathing down your neck, his McLaren’s shadow swallowing you whole.

One of you was going to cross the line first. One of you was going to walk away shattered.

And in the split second before the finish line blurred into a scream of cheers, you thought it didn’t matter which of you won — because the real addiction was this: the chaos of him, the danger of you, and the beautiful inevitability of the crash.