"Light out and here we go"

Obviously, I couldn't hear that line from the commentor, just made it up in my head and thought it would add the drama to my race today. My eyes catch the faint flicker of green light and then like an arrow released from its bow, I fly.

The world narrows to a tunnel of noise, colors and adrenaline. Jeddah feels dangerous and small under my tires, all sharp edges and unforgiving walls. I match the violence of Jeddah with my own muscle memory, let my body remember what my mind refuses to think about and try to just enjoy the ride.

There is always a moment - right when my heart skips a beat, the engine starts to roar, the light lost its redness – that I feel like falling. Gravity doesn't get a hold of me anymore. I think of nothing at all. An empty mind, an opened vein.

Instinct takes over before my mind has a chance to interfere with something as fragile as survival. There is no room for mistake in Jeddah. "Beauty" has never been a word to describe this track. One slip is all it takes to erase an entire race.

Even the air feels thin, scraped clean by speed. Every lap is a negotiation with danger, and I have always been terrible at negotiating.

The first few laps settle into a rhythm – brake, turn, push, turn again, throttle, breathe, water. Oscar's voice lingers somewhere in the back of my mind and no matter how hard I tell myself to let it go, to completely ignore that sound, my feelings just don't obey any order I give out.

I think about him while racing at over 300km/hour. I hate that I do think of him, that he lives in the back of my mind, uninvited, in the middle of the race. And still, a traitorous part of me wonders if he thinks of me too.

"George behind, closing the gap. Try to avoid him and keep the pace" – my engineer warns me through the radio.

"Got it. Will try" – I reply calmly, eyes already looking for his black Mercedes in the rearview.

He's been creeping on me for a few laps but now the danger is real close. His presence brings pressure, so much that I feel myself stop breathing. He wants my position and he wants it here, in this dangerous turn.

It never comes at surprised to me that George is stupid, since I have known him half my life, but stupid is an understatement for this situation when he chooses to overtake me right here. He dives with optimistic so reckless it feels like one of his terrible party jokes. Predictable, still unbelievable.

My front right slams into his. Right side damaged.

He has got enough space to either brake or bail out. But it's as obvious as daylight - crashing into me is his choice.

The car twists violently, the rear snapping as if yanked by invisible hands. Must be Hulk hands to damage the car that much though. The impact hits with a force that drives the oxygen out of me, force translating straight through carbon fiber and bones.

For a moment, there is silence.

My mind, my ears, my head couldn't hear a single sound as the world was put on mute.

A thin trail of smoke curls in front of my eyes, my hear starts to beat again. Fire must have started from somewhere but right now I have got no idea where it could be.

"You doing fine, mate? Talk to me Lando!" – my engineer demands, panic bleeding into his voice.

The world is titling. Nope, just me.

"Engine off. Kill everything. Do it now Lando" – my engineer is still shouting through the radio, trying to grab a piece of my attention.

Smoke keeps rising, thicker now, curling around my vision. I unbuckle the seat beat as fast as possible. I inhale some of that goddamn smoke I'm sure, otherwise there's no way to explain the blurriness in my eyes.

I push myself upward out of the car.

The dizziness slams into me a second time - sharper, heavier – as if it has reached somewhere else in the back of my skull and decides to stay there a bit for fun. I stumble against the halo, trying to make sense of the tilt beneath me, still remember the way to climb out of the car I have known like the back of my hand.

My boot slips on a piece of shattered wings and before I can even steady myself, a tiny flare of heat brushes the lower cuff of my racing suit. It's no big deal, and if I were in the right state of mind, it would have been nothing.

But I am not.

So I jump up a little bit too fast, hands off the halo to put out that fire.

I tumble downward - graceless, utterly betrayed by my own limbs – and there's a split second where time slows down just enough for me to realize: I am about to fall on my ass in front of every camera on earth, this scene will be broadcast international and I will be a meme.

Ouch.

The ground smacks me with cold, brutal finality. Pain flares across my tailbones, sharp and humiliating. The smoke still curls at the corner of my eyes but now I have a different kind of agony – knowing that every single page on social media tonight will be filled with that damn picture of me falling out of my car.

Last season, Charles Leclerc DNF'd at Dutch Grand Prix and sat on the side road. I can't count how many times I have laughed at those pictures of him, or send memes in group chats or secretly liked and commented about that moment online. Now this is the perfect time to prove karma is a real bitch. I can already picture the drivers' group chat tonight, where I am the center of it all, and obviously not for winning this race.

A marshal is already there, asking me those same old questions which have been asked to anyone who got involved into a crash.

"I am a bit dizzy. Please just take me back to medical room now" – I don't want to spend any other second on the side of the road, looking at other drivers driving slowly by as they are trying to check on me.

Fate really knows how to play me. It was not enough for me to crash, get a DNF race without points - but that I had to crash and perform the world's most dramatic ass-plant.

In front of the entire grid.

In front of every F1 fan with wifi connection and every single soul who happens to be here today.

In front of Oscar.

Oscar will replay this in his head for months. Bring it up in every interview we do together. Smile when he does it.

God, can I just die here?