Doriane Pin (jeddah, Race 2) / Sassoferrato "the Madonna In Sorrow"

doriane pin (jeddah, race 2) / sassoferrato "the madonna in sorrow"

Got That Tingle on Your Tongue

Chloe Chambers x Alisha Palmowski, 1.3k

Chloe raised an eyebrow in a way that Alisha might describe as flirty under other circumstances. Not these circumstances, though.

“Showing me your Spotify library? What did I do to earn this exclusive look into the mind of Alisha Palmowski?” Again, under other circumstances, Alisha might’ve described her tone as something along the lines of flirtatious or playful. But in this situation, teasing would be a better descriptor. You know, the platonic, amicable kind of teasing.

“You earned it by virtue of sharing a simulator with me,” she said as she curtsied with an exaggerated flourish.

Or, in which two dumbasses come out to each other and fangirl over Rina Sawayama

Title from Flavour of the Month by Rina Sawayama

Read on AO3 or below ⬇️

*** disclaimer: i know about nothing about simulators or how teams schedule their use. everything about them in this fic is completely made up***

Alisha yawned, trudging her way up the steps of Campos Racing’s headquarters. It was 8:00 AM, which was quite early for a Saturday morning in her opinion. Especially a non-race weekend Saturday. But she was scheduled for a full day of sim work, and the earlier she got her start, the better she could take advantage of falling into a good work flow.

She heard the patter of footsteps over her shoulder and turned to find Chloe jogging to catch up with her. “Morning!” she called out.

“Morning,” Chloe replied as she fell into stride next to Alisha.

“You ready for this?” she asked as they scanned their employee passes for entry.

“Of course,” Chloe said with some enthusiasm, though the bags under her eyes betrayed the fact that she also wished their session had been scheduled a bit later.

They made their way to the simulator room in a comfortable silence. As they walked, Alisha realized that they had never done a sim day together, just the two of them. Sometimes they were scheduled for individual sessions, while other times all three of them were scheduled at the same time. But Rafaela was out with a bad case of food poisoning, meaning that it would just be her and Chloe today.

“Do you like listening to music while you’re on the sim?” She asked idly as they arrived at the sim room. She never bothered bringing it up when it was the three of them, figuring it would be too difficult for all of them to match their genre and volume preferences without anyone having to compromise. But two people might be able to come to an agreement. She set her backpack on a chair, opening it up to pull out a small speaker.

Chloe blinked, staring at the speaker. “No… I’ll be so honest, the thought of listening to music in the simulator never even occurred to me.”

Alisha shrugged. “It’s okay, we don’t have to. It helps me focus, but I know for some people it does the opposite.”

“No, I would love to!” Chloe insisted. “I’ve always liked listening to music while I work. I just never realized you could do it in the simulator. I guess I always assumed it wouldn’t be allowed, like when you’re taking a test in school.”

Alisha contemplated the idea. “Well sim work is more like sports practice than a school test, isn’t it?” she offered.

“Huh.” Chloe sounded stunned, like she couldn’t believe that the thought of listening to anything in the simulator had never occurred to her.

Alisha felt a little bit of pride; she was usually the one taking inspiration from Chloe, so it was nice to return the favor for once. “What kind of music do you listen to?” she asked.

Chloe shrugged, finally breaking out of her stupor. “Depends on what mood I’m in. I’m fine with whatever you want to listen to.”

“Well my music taste is also varied,” Alisha said as she opened the Spotify app and passed her phone to Chloe. “And I don’t want to be rude. So tell me what sounds good to you.”

Chloe raised an eyebrow in a way that Alisha might describe as flirty under other circumstances. Not these circumstances, though.

“You earned it by virtue of sharing a simulator with me,” she said as she curtsied with an exaggerated flourish.

Chloe giggled, and Alisha was glad that the girl’s eyes were too busy scanning the collection of playlists to notice the blush spreading across her cheeks.

A moment passed in silence before Chloe gasped, eyes snapping up to meet Alisha’s. “You like Rina Sawayama?”

Green flag. Green flag green flag green flag.

“To say I like Rina Sawayama would be an understatement,” Alisha declared solemnly. “I am her biggest fan.”

That seemed to strike a competitive chord within her teammate. “You cannot possibly be a bigger Rina fan than me,” she argued.

That was hot. Really hot. Still, she couldn’t let the slight against her status as Rina’s number one fan go unrefuted.

“Well I’m a fellow Brit, so I have first dibs.”

Chloe scoffed, crossing her arms. “Well I’m a fellow Asian.”

Alisha hummed. “Compelling argument, but I’m a fellow gay.”

Shit. That wasn’t supposed to come out. No pun intended.

Damn her competitiveness.

Chloe seemed to choke on whatever argument had been forming on her tongue, and for a moment, Alisha thought she was well and truly fucked. And then:

“Well… so am I.” Chloe wasn’t making eye contact and her voice didn’t sound as confident as before, but there was no mistaking what she said.

A feeling erupted inside of Alisha. Several feelings, in fact: awe, amazement, nerves, extreme joy, possibly a little bit of horror, and, of course, the unmistakable sensation of gay panic.

The feelings were accompanied by a wave of nausea, and Alisha could only hope that her face hadn’t turned that telling shade of red that had exposed her oh so many times in the past.

“Oh….” Definitely not the right thing to say when someone comes out to you, but it was just about the only response she could manage at the moment.

“Yeah.” Chloe also looked a little nauseous; at least they were both in the same boat.

Alisha straightened her back (again, no pun intended). “Well then we’re even,” she said with as much dignity as she could, holding her head high and sticking her hand out for Chloe to shake. “Shared custody?” she proposed with the assuredness of a business woman offering a deal that the other person couldn’t refuse.

Chloe raised an eyebrow, amused. “Shared custody of Rina Sawayama?” Her arms were still crossed over her chest.

Alisha kept her arm extended. “Of course,” she said, as though it were a perfectly sensible thing to say. As though Chloe’s skepticism at her invitation was preposterous.

Chloe pursued her lips, trying to hold back a laugh and match Alisha’s serious demeanor. “Shared custody,” she agreed, taking Alisha’s hand. They shared a firm and business-like handshake that was in no way intimate or romantic and did not make Alisha’s hand tingle when their skin made contact, thank you very much.

Chloe did her very best to keep a straight face as their handshake lingered, but it didn’t take long for her to crack. She bursted out laughing as she doubled over and her hand slipped out of Alisha’s.

Alisha wasn’t sure whether she was relieved or disappointed. Probably both. Such was the nature of gay panic.

She unlocked her phone, connecting it to her speaker She pressed shuffle on Rina’s artist page, and Flavour of the Month started filtering through the speakers.

Chloe straightened back up, mouth stretching excitedly into an “o” shape. She looked exactly like the shocked Pikachu meme, and yeah, it made Alisha’s heart flutter.

Chloe pointed a finger to the ceiling. “Banger!” she roared before starting to sing along as she wandered over to her sim seat.

In the back of her mind, Alisha’s practical self started to feel the first inklings of worry. Having a crush on a coworker was never a good idea, and the slight infatuation she had felt toward Chloe when she woke up that morning had officially bloomed into a crush over the course of just one conversation. But her spontaneous self teamed up with her fun-loving self and her gay self to silence the practical voice‘s warnings. After all, it wasn’t every day she found out that her cute teammate liked girls and had good music taste. So she ignored the cacophony of bickering voices in her head and started to sing along.

Gave you a taste of what you want

Mint chocolate, scoops of bubblegum

Taste so sweet, you couldn’t get enough

I, I was your flavor of the month

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go read it chloe chambers alisha palmowski

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