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ribuless · 9 days ago

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WHAT IF CARCAR REALLY HAD MAGNETS BETWEEN THEM

/or a stuck together au

“It’s like Eat Pray Love,” Carlos says.

“I’ll be honest,” Guanyu says. “Neither of you remind me of Julia Roberts much.”

“Please just,” Oscar massages the bridge of his nose, “point to a place on the map. Any place.”

“Why China,” Guanyu presses. Of course he’s curious. “Why not Spain or Australia?”

“Neutral ground,” Oscar says quickly.

“Ah I see,” Guanyu says. “You can’t agree on a spot, right?”

“I keep telling him,” Carlos says, always with the over-the-top gesticulating. He tries it with both hands first, then realizes Oscar’s being all sorts of petty and weighing his left arm down on purpose where they’re joined, so he continues gesturing eagerly with his right. “Come to Madrid!” He nearly smacks Oscar in the nose with his hand. Oscar scowls. “We have so much good food. I can show you all the things, but no! Piastri will only agree to get sunburned on Australian sand. We have beaches in Spain, too!”

“Guanyu,” Oscar urges, “a place, now.”

“Here,” Guanyu says, index finger plopping down. Like some cartoon scene, both Oscar and Carlos automatically lean in to squint at the map, and bump their heads against each other.

“I hate you.”

“Hard same.”

“Lijiang is actually a famous honeymoon destination,” Guanyu says.

“I hate you,” Carlos says.

“Hard same,” Oscar says.

“Hey.” Guanyu grins like this entire situation is wildly hilarious. Maybe it is, for everyone else. Oscar kinda wants to jump into the sea, but Carlos will only drag him down, their uncoordinated conjoined limbs tangled and thrashing. “You guys asked me to choose. Look, don’t you want to see pandas?”

Carlos makes some sort of shocked noise. Oh, for the love of—Oscar groans. He knows when someone’s just bought something.

“Carlos wants to see pandas,” Guanyu says, sounding far too delighted. “Chengdu’s like a fourteen-hour drive from Lijiang, that’s totally doable.”

They stare at him blankly.

“Oh my god. Chengdu, you know? Research base for giant panda breeding? Panda capital of China?”

Twiddle-Dum and Twiddle-Dee: “Ohhhhh.”

“Yeah, now you got it. In between, you can hit a dozen other places and never grow bored.” Guanyu taps his finger along the map, tick, tick, tick. “So why not? Complete the journey. Transform into Julia Roberts.”

“And break the curse,” Carlos says solemnly.

“Break the curse,” Oscar repeats miserably, but with his left hand, goes to look up flight tickets on his phone.

They discover that the only way they can pull on extra layers is if they yank themselves apart with all their might, creating just a sliver of space between their elbows. It’s painful. Oscar never wants to have to do this again.

“Now,” Carlos yells, and in a flurry of movement Oscar gets his coat on before their elbows snap back together.

Ow, ow. Oscar’s eyes are watering. He suspects Carlos’s is doing just the same.

“Okay, okay,” Oscar says. “Now your turn.”

Carlos waves him off. “I’m not cold.”

Oscar opens his mouth to argue, but Carlos is already dragging them off toward a sign with a car on it. The rental cars are left-hand steering, and it dawns on both of them at the exact time that Oscar will be doing all the driving, with the way they’re stuck to each other.

“No fair,” Carlos moans, as Oscar fist pumps the air. It would be too childish to stick his tongue out at Carlos. So he doesn’t.

A part of Oscar’s a spectator to all of this. Watching with his mouth hanging wide open, some disembodied shade looking from outside in, as his own body purchased tickets, packed a luggage (with Carlos in the same room), and boarded a plane. None of this makes sense. Getting into a car with Carlos, firstly. Then with the added condition that both of them have to clamber in from one side, before Carlos can climb over the middle console into the passenger seat. Fourteen hours of this, huh? He’s going to give Guanyu hell when they get back.

If, they make it back. Oscar guesses it’ll be two hours before they attempt to murder each other. You don’t go road tripping with people you can’t stand. It’s the one and only sacred rule of road tripping.

“I think I saw this in Final Destination.”

Oscar, zoned out staring at the road, manages a stupid, “What?”

“You know that pileup where everyone dies?”

“Everyone always dies in Final Destination.”

Carlos rolls his eyes, shakes their joined elbows for emphasis. “The scene where the logs fall off? A lot of screaming? A lot of swerving? All because they were stuck behind a logging truck?”

“Carlos.” Oscar takes one deep, deep calming breath. “Are you asking me to overtake?”

“If you can, yes,” Carlos says, like Oscar’s the one being thick. “Go on. I’ll help you hold the wheel steady.”

Oscar cranes his neck and glances around the side of the truck. The opposing lane seems clear, not a headlight in sight. What the heck. You can take the driver off a track, but he’ll still want to race.

“Woo!” Carlos yells, as Oscar zooms around the steadily plodding truck. A little clumsy, with Carlos almost overcompensating the steer as they merge back into the right lane, but successful, nonetheless. No one dies.

Mismatched hands on the wheel. Adrenaline spiking for just a few seconds of speed. Oscar finds himself wearing a grin to match Carlos’s. Maybe they’ll cut it down to thirteen and a half hours like this.

“Guanyu was right,” Carlos says thoughtfully.

Oscar’s got his nose buried in a helpful English guide. A sense of ambitious adventure appears to have overtaken them. He wants to hit at least three lookout points today. “About?”

“Look,” Carlos points in some vague direction. “All the couples.”

“Huh,” Oscar says. “That is a lot of couples.”

No one pays them any mind. They haven’t been recognized since they stepped foot here. For all intents and purposes, they could just be another one of those peaceful couples, milling about.

Well. Peaceful, would be a bit of a pipe dream.

“YOU CAN PLAY GOLF AT JADE DRAGON SNOW MOUNTAIN.”

“Carlos,” Oscar hisses. “Quiet.”

“You can play golf,” Carlos repeats, softer but no less excited, eyes larger than two sparkling coins, “at Jade Dragon Snow Mountain!”

Oscar snatches the guide back from Carlos’s hand. “I’m pretty sure I just read that the mountain’s considered holy.”

“They let people play golf on a holy mountain,” Carlos says for the third damn time. “I love it here.”

“We’re not playing golf,” Oscar says.

“Oscar,” Carlos says, dismayed.

“You have one hand, remember?” Oscar wriggles their stuck arms, a reminder he didn’t even know Carlos would have needed.

“Riiight,” Carlos says, shoulders drooping.

“We can still see the mountain though,” Oscar says, is alarmed at the tiny skip-hop going on in his chest when Carlos brightens again. Doesn’t take a lot to keep this guy happy. That’s, good for him. That’s good.

They decide the cable cars up are too much hassle, with the queues already stretching out for hours. The mountain’s basically viewable from anywhere, so Oscar steers Carlos toward Old Town. Where he discovers that Carlos is terrible at haggling. Absolute nightmare. He hands over money to anyone who so much as gestures him over. The singular tote bag Oscar brings starts to get filled with random trinkets, from fans to calligraphy pens.

“What’s this,” Oscar says, when Carlos shakes his head as Oscar prepares to pack away two wooden charms in the shape of a very rotund cat.

“Not for keeping,” Carlos explains. “They’re for wishes. We hang them up in the temple.”

“Oh,” Oscar says. Carlos had gotten one for him too. “I didn’t think you believed in these things.”

“I don’t,” Carlos says quickly, before looking away, like he’s afraid Oscar will laugh at him.

Oscar chews at his lip. He didn’t mean to suggest it was silly. It’s a little unfair for Carlos to think so lowly of him. If they could, this is where they’d walk their separate ways and browse different shops, long enough for the awkward tension to diffuse. Come back refreshed and recharged for more time spent in each other’s company. No such grace, here.

The stream whispers as it flows by the stone-paved path. The wooden house clusters look as if they’re linked, hand to hand, a never-ending line all the way to the top. Everything here’s older than Oscar, older by years and years and years.

“I keep an amulet in my helmet,” Carlos says. His eyes wander around like he’s sightseeing. “I don’t know why I lied.”

“A little belief can’t hurt,” Oscar blurts out, just so Carlos would stop looking so wounded. “That’s what I always say.”

Carlos nudges him. “You never say that.”

Above them, a thousand colorful prayer flags blow gently in the wind. Wooden charms as numerous as the birds adorn the roof of the temple. Wishes for health, prosperity, family. Oscar tries to peek at what Carlos is writing, only for Carlos to shove him away so violently that they both fall over.

Oscar laughs as Carlos strains to keep his charm out of prying reach. No easy task, both of them being joined and all.

May the new year bring surprises and joy. For my family and friends, good health always. For myself—

Oscar wrenches his gaze away. Some things aren’t for anyone else to know.

He watches Carlos hang his charm up carefully. And then Carlos waits, back turned as much as he can, for Oscar to write his own wish. It’s simple. Fast car, many wins. Happiness. Oscar ties his somewhere near Carlos’s. Closes his eyes and listens to them jangle together.

For myself, patience.

Oscar’s pretty sure he’s dying. He’s pretty sure this is what dying feels like.

“I thought,” he gasps, in between gulps of warm tea that only makes things infinitely worse, “I told her not spicy?”

Carlos is cackling like the unhelpful asshole he is. “This is not spicy.”

When you explore some place new, local recommendations for food are a must. Oscar’s seriously reconsidering Travel Tip 101 when he gets fed hotpot that turns his tongue worryingly numb.

“Well, it is a little spicy,” Carlos concedes. “But nothing I can’t take.”

“Isn’t Spanish food not spicy?”

“It’s not,” Carlos says. “Actually, I wasn’t good at taking spice until after I started driving.” He fans exaggeratedly at Oscar’s overheated mouth, like that could even help an iota. It’s so Carlos it’s endearing. Shit. “I only started putting hot sauce on all my trainer’s meals because everything tasted so bland.”

Oscar coughs, wiping at his leaking nose. “It burns,” he moans.

“There, there,” Carlos says, mock sympathetic. “Don’t cry.”

“Seriously.” Oscar blinks rapidly, is it affecting his eyeballs too? His pulse thuds like the hoofbeat of a runaway horse. “How are you not even sweating?”

Carlos winks at him. “They don’t call me chili for nothing.”

“You’re the worst.”

“Aw,” Carlos says, and finally puts himself to some use by waving down a server, and sweettalking her into bringing a pitcher of iced water over.

Oscar calls first dibs on the shower, claiming the need to wash the spice out of his pores. Carlos rolls his eyes but acquiesces, gallant about it for once. They force themselves not to make it awkward. Pull apart for just long enough to slip their clothes off, eyes everywhere but on each other. Carlos stands outside the curtain as Oscar tries to shampoo and soap himself down in the narrow tub with one hand.

When it's Carlos's turn: “Oh my god,” Oscar says. “Carlos, are you using soap for your hair?”

“I’m trying to be quick,” Carlos says, voice disembodied even though he’s right next to Oscar. Separated by the thinnest sheet of translucent nylon. The shadow of Carlos is unmistakable in the light. The broadness of his shoulders, the tapering of his waist. “So you do not stand outside for forty-five minutes like I did.”

“I didn’t take forty-five minutes!”

Carlos laughs, the cackle now almost familiar. “And how are you knowing I’m using soap? Are you peeking?”

“I hate you,” Oscar says, waits for Carlos to return with a Hard same like they’re in on the same joke. Waits and waits until Carlos emerges from behind the curtain, not fifteen minutes later, lips still sealed together like withholding some secret.

As designated shotgunner, with no say in the matter, Carlos is in charge of the GPS and the AUX cord. After the second album of Enrique Iglesias, Oscar relegates him to Captain of Pointing Out Exit Signs Only. Carlos pretends to pout about it, but he reclines his seat, as far back as their joined elbows will allow. Closes his eyes, limbs loose, all relaxed. He looks so good like that, when he’s as easy as easy can be.

Oscar swallows the click in his throat back down.

“I feel bad,” Carlos murmurs, sounding like he’s close to drifting off. “You’re doing all the work.”

“I don’t mind,” Oscar says. He’s getting real good at one-handed maneuvers now. Hah, maybe this will be beneficial on the track. “I hate getting driven. I rather do it myself.”

“Control freak,” Carlos says.

“Yeah,” Oscar admits. “A little bit.”

When Oscar dares to look over at Carlos, there’s a smile curving his lips gently up. They didn’t magically learn how to talk to each other. But it’s a start, trading little morsels of information like passing notes in school.

One of Guanyu’s other suggestions had been Emei Mountain, boasting an altitude of over three-thousand meters and some ridiculous number of stairs.

(Sixty thousand, to be precise. Oscar had opened his mouth to complain, but Guanyu had responded with a report of the monkeys that lived in the mountain. There came that dazed, excited noise from Carlos again, and Oscar knew it was a lost cause.)

Jet-lag’s working in their favour, and they’ve arrived before the tour buses can deposit too many people for them to stomach. Ambitions are dampened when they realize climbing’s harder when surgically joined by some unknown force at the elbow. When Oscar lifts his left leg, his right arm wants to go, which means Carlos’s left arm needs to go, which means Carlos’s right leg needs to lift. They clunk around clumsily for the first chunk of steps, griping and critiquing each other’s technique. The fog rolls in and laps at their ears, and for a while, there’s nothing much to see.

An elderly lady pressures them into an early lunch, and Carlos gives in effortlessly, like always. It ends up being the best thing Oscar’s eaten since coming here. They fight over the last slice of barbecue pork, and Oscar wins, by virtue of being slightly better at using chopsticks.

By the time they’re halfway up, they’ve got climbing down to an art, limbs moving like clockwork around the constriction. Carlos takes advantage of their newfound skill to increase their pace to a march.

“Carlos,” Oscar’s not ashamed to beg. “Please, won’t you stop and look at the monkeys.”

Carlos laughs at him and calls him slow. Because Carlos is crazy, he’s taken off his light sweater even in this weather, and the threadbare white shirt he’s wearing leaves little to imagination. Chest hair, nipples. Oscar looks away before he can be caught staring. The fog’s given way to some amazing views. Rich vegetation, more trees than Oscar’s brain knows what to do with. Beautiful things all around.

Carlos’s face swims into view. “Come on.” The tugging at the elbow doesn’t hurt as much as it did before. “To the top! There are giant golden statues!”

The statues are indeed golden. And they are indeed giant. The largest one weighs six hundred and sixty metric tons, according to the pamphlet. Larger, surely, than the feeling expanding in his lungs.

“Look, Oscar!” Carlos points with their joined arms, all delight.

“Yeah,” Oscar says. Quickened pulse from the strenuous activity, and he wills it to settle. Control freak. “I’m looking.”

Designated phone time on the bed is an hour long. Oscar uses it to text his mum, sift through photos from the day. With how close they’re forced to be, it’s hard to get a picture without a body part of Carlos making its way in. Oscar finds he doesn’t quite mind. He’s got one of the cloudless, blue sky, the backdrop for the Leidongping cable car station. Carlos is pointing at something again, his finger situated artistically right in the middle of the lidless eye of the sun.

Guanyu’s the one who got them into this mess, so he probably deserves a photo update. Oscar sends it over WhatsApp and receives an O-M-G!!! in return, along with nine panda emojis.

No pandas, we’re not at Chengdu yet, Oscar types.

Honestly, I’m surprised you even made it this far, Guanyu says.

Wow, thanks

Oscar squints, rereads Guanyu’s message.

Wait, you were the one who gave us this itinerary!

Hahaha, is all Guanyu says, followed by multiple peace sign emojis.

加油!

Oscar has to google translate that, learn that it means to add oil. To go for it. Go for what?

“Teto says he wishes he was here too,” Carlos says sleepily, looking up from his phone.

“Teto’s out of luck,” Oscar says, ignoring the flash of something hot and possessive down his spine.

He plucks Carlos’s phone out of his willing fingers. Reaches over Carlos for the pull chain of the lamp. Beneath him for just a second, Carlos shifts, comfortable, cozy. Oscar gets the ludicrous notion that if he were to collapse down, right now, Carlos’s body would welcome him.

Shit. How long until they come apart?

Click, off go the lights. Meekly, Oscar makes his way back to his designated side of the bed. Carlos mumbles a soft Good night. More intimate than he could ever mean. Oscar mumbles something back, and satisfied, Carlos closes his eyes. He likes sleeping on his side. Coincidences of coincidences, so does Oscar. Carlos falls asleep faster though, and it gives Oscar a lot of time to stare without accusation. Trace the planes and slopes of Carlos’s face before he drifts off himself.

At long last. Chengdu panda base.

After jostling with the crowds to watch the pandas tumble around for their food, then tumble around to play, then tumble around to sleep, Oscar turns to Carlos.

“Well?”

“Eh,” Carlos makes a see-saw motion with his hands. “It’s a little anti-climatic.”

Oscar barks out a laugh. A joined body part, three shared showers, thirteen and a half hours in a car together later, and Carlos still surprises him. He really doesn’t do Oscar well on a neurochemical level.

“Isn’t this what you came here for?”

“I thought it was,” Carlos says. It’s no longer only their elbows touching. Now it’s bicep to little pinky, pressed up against each other like puzzle pieces which fit slightly crooked. One long, unbroken line of heat. “I thought—”

Carlos tapers off. Oscar waits.

“Well, it’s the journey that counts, right?”

“Uh huh.”

“They’re very cute, too.”

“Uh huh,” Oscar says. “Pictures or Guanyu’s never going to believe we made it here.”

Oscar takes one of Carlos with a sleeping mama panda in the background. He’s halfway through checking if it’s any good when Carlos grabs the phone.

“Come here,” he says.

It’s not easy arranging themselves together and catching a panda as well, but heck, didn’t they climb sixty-thousand stairs with some careful coordination? Carlos holds out the phone with his right hand, smooshes their cheeks together. The scrap of Carlos’s stubble against his skin—that’s, there’s a new sensation, in every way possible.

“Say panda,” Carlos says.

“Panda,” Oscar says, the same way he would say, Alert, or Danger, or Abort. His cheeks are going to show up pink in the photo. And Carlos will notice and say something completely asinine—

“Hee hee,” Carlos says. “Your eyes are closed, Oscar.”

Once they get enough panda souvenirs to shower the grid, the rest of the day passes in the laziest of fashions. They’ve hit their goal now, so there’s no need to rush. Oscar actually bothers to look through Yelp for restaurant options, and after all his hard work, gets yanked by Carlos into some random alleyway with plastic stools to eat hand-pulled noodles.

Meandering like leaves on an easy stream down the folk and culture street, the promise of a hot shower eventually calls to them. Oscar, gentleman that he is, lets Carlos go first.

Oscar stares unblinkingly at a water spot on a tile as Carlos hums and soap himself, as easy and as relaxed as if he weren’t stuck with Oscar listening to the way the water hits his skin. The first time in the shower, when Oscar had unwittingly brushed his hands over his dick, he’d jumped, then stood still for a whole minute, waiting for Carlos to call him out on it. It’d felt forbidden, with Carlos standing not two inches away.

To Carlos’s credit, he doesn’t punch Oscar when the curtain is pulled back, with a force that can only be described as resolution. He only yelps like a little pup, clapping his free hand over his chest, before the hand trails self-consciously down.

“I’ll help you shampoo,” Oscar says. “It’s faster this way.”

“Well,” Carlos says, “if it’s faster.”

They’re staying at the Shang this time, and there’s fancy shampoo smelling like bergamot and orange. Oscar douses Carlos with half a bottle, squeezing too much out by accident. He keeps bumping his hand into Carlos’s while they attempt to scrub. The lather gets into Carlos’s eyes, and Oscar has to try and hide his smile while Carlos whines piteously. It’s not actually faster in any way.

“There, there,” Oscar says, in a similar tone as to when Carlos had observed Oscar leaking copious fluids over hotpot. “Baby.”

Carlos makes a face and pretends to start crying again, and something terribly fond constricts the entirety of Oscar’s ribcage.

Towelling each other dry is a whole new learning curve, just like putting clothes on, and driving one-handed, and climbing stairs. They’re looking at each other this time, too. That’s also new. Huh. Carlos is very, very gentle as he dries the back of Oscar’s ears. The kind of gentle that speaks of someone having done this for him before, resulting in an insistence in getting this right. Oscar gets all warm, even with the water cooling rapidly on his skin.

“Phone time?”

“No need,” Carlos yawns.

It’s Carlos that leans over this time for the light switch, even though Shang’s posh enough to have light switches at both sides for easy access. Carlos hovers over Oscar for a suspended moment, and Oscar sucks in a breath, straining with anticipation. The head pat is unexpected, but enough for now.

Satisfied, Oscar closes his eyes.

“Hey!” Carlos exclaims. “Oscar, we’re free!”

“Whuh,” Oscar says blearily. He’ll never acquire Carlos’s habit of waking up at eight.

“Look, look,” Carlos says, all childish delight. He waves his arms in front of Oscar’s face. Both his arms.

“Hey!” Oscar says, shooting up, suddenly awake.

“Yeah!”

“So all we needed was a shower?”

“Oscar,” Carlos says disapprovingly. “It wasn’t just a shower. We wrote this on prayer cards.” Oscar doesn’t point out neither of them wrote this on a prayer card. “We climbed a mountain. We saw pandas!”

“And took a shower,” Oscar says.

Carlos sniffs. “Have it your way.”

“Fine, fine,” Oscar says. It’s too early to be feeling all warm and crumbly, like the center of a freshly baked pie. “It was the journey that counts, yes?”

“Yes,” Carlos nods. “Maybe. Maybe it was something I—we had to learn. In preparation for. For—”

May the new year bring surprises and joy. For myself, patience.

Their hands are no longer joined, but Oscar takes Carlos’s, and presses a quick, dry kiss to the backs of his knuckles. Carlos is so surprised he lets him.

“Ah,” Carlos says, voice trembly and a little hopeful. “What happens now?”

Oscar looks down at their hands. Going through all of this to separate, only to choose to stay touching. There’s something about a journey being full circle, but Oscar doesn’t want to finish that thought for fear of actually transforming into Julia Roberts. And anyway—

“Now we drive back.”

They’re not near done, yet.

#carcar #😭😭😭#what a perfect situation for these two #this is so sweet #萌得有点想死 #chengdu happens to be the gayest city in china btw

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ribuless · 2 months ago

Text

A dog is wandering the streets of Monaco. Oscar sees him when he's out for a run, pushing through the last bit before he's home. The dog seems familiar somehow, skittishly weaving through the crowds of people. Oscar narrows his eyes. Its coat is warm brown, a colour Oscar remembers from somewhere, spotted with white. The name tumbles out of his mouth before his mind makes the connection.

“Piñon!” He shouts and Piñon looks up and freezes. Oscar's only seen this dog on Instagram, so it's impossible that he recognises Oscar, but for a moment Oscar feels like he can see his owner's familiar scowl every time he's forced to acknowledge Oscar's existence.

“C'mere boy,” he tries and Piñon stays stuck to the ground for a long moment before he comes over, warily looking at Oscar all the way there.

“Are you lost?” Oscar asks and Piñon gives him a look that Oscar would say means are you really stupid enough to expect me to answer?

“Whatever,” Oscar mutters and pulls out his phone to text Carlos. I think I found your dog? He sends, snapping a pic to go with the message. Carlos hasn't been online since this afternoon. Oscar looks at his status for a few seconds, but it doesn't change. Your dog who is not like other dogs, Oscar almost texts after it, but it feels weird acknowledging something Carlos said–or didn’t actually say, but got dunked on for online. Not to mention it's basically admitting Oscar's Instagram page recommends him Carlos content. So instead, he pockets his phone and reaches out a careful hand. Piñon looks at Oscar doubtfully and lets Oscar scratch him behind the ear for half a second before he leans away.

Oscar rolls his eyes. Figures Carlos's dog is just as difficult as he is. “Alright then,” he says. “Come with or stay here, see if I care.”

He walks off and doesn’t look back. Oscar’s just wondering why exactly he’s choosing to be offended by a dog when Piñon appears, sullenly following Oscar home. *****

Piñon is one of the most well-behaved dogs Oscar’s met in his life. He comes up to Oscar’s apartment and just paces the living room uneasily before he sits down stiffly next to the couch. Whenever Oscar tries to pet him, he just gives Oscar the stink-eye and leans out of reach, which Oscar has to admit is kind of hilarious. He stares at the cut-up chicken breast Oscar puts on a plate in front of him and then eats it slowly and neatly, one piece at a time. Oscar tries to amuse him a few times, rolls a tennis ball his way, but Piñon just curls up on the floor, tucking his nose between his front paws. Carlos still hasn’t been online and doesn’t answer when Oscar calls him.

Near midnight Oscar gives up. He crouches down in front of Piñon, who eyes him warily.

“Wake me up when you need to pee, yeah?” He says and Piñon just stares at him. He’s a very strange dog. “And don’t chew up my couch.”

This time, when he reaches out, Piñon makes a noise that almost sounds like a sigh and lets Oscar stroke his soft head.

“Good boy,” Oscar says and Piñon blinks up at him with his big, brown eyes. “Sleep well, yeah? We’ll call Carlos again tomorrow.”

*****

Except Piñon’s gone when Oscar wakes up. “Fuck,” Oscar says. He thought he locked the door before he went to bed, but clearly he didn’t. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” With dread in his chest, he finds his phone and hovers his thumb over Carlos’s contact before he presses call. “Oh,” Carlos says, when he picks up. “Sorry, yeah, Piñon is back.” “Um,” Oscar says intelligently. “He’s–what?” “He, uh,” Carlos pauses. “He showed up back home. Thanks for looking after him.”

“He walked–out of my apartment. And back home,” Oscar says faintly, just to confirm. “Does he do that often? Wander around on his own? Not very responsible pet owner behaviour, mate.”

Carlos doesn’t bite, just sighs. Somehow, Oscar can see him in his mind’s eye, scrubbing the back of his neck. “No, he just–with the contract negotiations, it has been–”

“What do contract negotiations have to do with your dog?” Oscar asks. This conversation is getting weirder and weirder.

“Nothing,” Carlos quickly says. “Absolutely nothing. So. Thank you, for, um. Keeping an eye on–on Piñon.”

“Okay, um, no problem?” Oscar says and then the call disconnects. Alright then. Very strange.

*****

Barely a week’s passed when Oscar comes back from another run and a familiar figure is wandering around along his route.

“Not you again,” Oscar says and Piñon looks up, patters towards Oscar, looking up at him with his big, sad eyes. “Where’s Carlos, boy?”

He just sits down at Oscar’s feet as Oscar fumbles his phone from his pocket. Again, Carlos hasn’t been online for hours. Oscar texts him anyway, but doesn’t wait for a response.

“Very weird that he goes off-grid like that, buddy. If he’s in the mob you have to tell me,” Oscar says and Piñon makes a huffy noise and nudges Oscar’s leg. “Okay, not funny, apparently. Where do you want to go?”

Piñon starts walking and Oscar follows. He takes the route along the harbour, stars reflecting in the quiet water, the coastline dotted with lights from boats. It’s a nice night, a nice route. Oscar only notices Piñon’s led them back to his own apartment when they’re rounding the corner to his apartment block.

“That’s some good memory,” Oscar says and Piñon’s tail wags, just once, a neat sweep from left to right. That evening, he still fussily eats the improvised mince meat Oscar serves him and doesn’t go on a rampage in Oscar’s apartment, just curls up at Oscar’s feet as he watches a movie.

“Hey boy,” Oscar says quietly when it’s really, really time to turn in. “Bedtime. You’re sleeping here, alright? Wake me up when you need something.”

Piñon wags his tail again like he wants to tell Oscar got it and curls up again, tucks his snout between his front paws. Oscar makes sure he locks the door this time and goes to sleep. He has a dream that he hears Piñon’s nails tick against his hardwood floors and suddenly, the sound changes into that of the gait of a man. The next morning, Piñon’s disappeared again. For a long moment, Oscar frowns at the lock on his front door before he texts Carlos.

Did you teach your dog to pick locks?

He’s a special dog, Carlos just sends back.

Not like other dogs

You could say that

*****

Two days later, Piñon is waiting at Oscar’s front door when he comes home.

“Hey buddy,” Oscar says. “Come on in.”

Here again, he sends Carlos and then puts his phone away to charge in another room. Piñon’s good company, more now that he has apparently decided he trusts Oscar. He puts his two front paws up on the couch and looks at Oscar questioningly.

“Aw, whatever,” Oscar says. “Come on up.”

Piñon’s tail wags and he jumps on the couch, curls up in the middle. He quietly watches as Oscar fires up the Playstation and gets schooled at FIFA by some middle schooler from Iowa. Only after Oscar turns it off, he unfurls and scoots closer.

“Oh,” Oscar says, surprised. “Yeah, come here.”

Very gently, Piñon puts his head on Oscar’s knee. He doesn’t react when Oscar rests a hand on his warm neck, just closes his eyes and lets Oscar pet him in long, slow strokes from the top of his head to the middle of his back. When Oscar brings out a bag of treats and a bowl of dog food later that night, he blinks and Oscar shrugs.

“What, you’re here all the time anyway.”

His sullen demeanor returns when Oscar rips open the bag of treats and waggles one in front of Piñon’s face.

“C’mon boy, sit,” Oscar says and Piñon scowls. “Oh, don’t be such a baby. You’re a good boy, aren’t you? Sit.”

Piñon plops his ass down with a look that seems to say happy now? He does take the treat from Oscar’s fingers, very carefully.

“Shake,” Oscar says, holding out his hand. Piñon looks to the side and up in a gesture that’s so Carlos when he’s annoyed that Oscar can’t hold in a laugh. He does, then, offer Oscar one of his paws.

Oscar tries to remember which commands he taught his dogs in Australia. Down, heel, fetch. Rosie always used to do the cutest thing when he told her to beg, put up two of her front paws and if she didn’t get a treat that instance, collapsed dramatically.

“Beg,” he tells Piñon. For a long moment, Piñon doesn’t do anything. Then he drops to the ground, puts his head on Oscar’s feet and lets out a long, low whine. It’s such a pitiful sound Oscar instinctively crouches down, running his hand over Piñon’s head.

“It’s okay,” Oscar stupidly says. “Good boy, yeah?”

Piñon butts his head against Oscar’s hand until he resumes petting him and wags his tail.

That night, Oscar locks the front door and takes the key with him into the bedroom, puts it under his pillow. He’s not even surprised, really, when a noise wakes him up in the middle of the night and Carlos is sitting on his couch, dressed in a pair of Oscar’s old running shorts, left to dry on the radiator.

“Hey Piñon,” Oscar says.

“It is–” Carlos scrubs the back of his neck. “I don’t know why it happens. Only that it does when I am–stressed or–I don’t know. It has not happened since I was in my first year of F1, but now with the contract negotiations–”

“Inconvenient,” Oscar says and Carlos scowls, stands up. He paces the living room in a way that’s so Piñon Oscar feels weirdly fond about it. “How are you going to handle it when we’re back racing?”

“I don’t know,” Carlos snaps. “It is just–somehow my body thinks being a dog is more relaxing than being a human, so every time I’m stressed I turn into–and when I think about what to do when I am back in the paddock makes me even more stressed and it is–I don’t know, okay?”

“Maybe–” Oscar says and then snaps his mouth shut before he says the weirdest thing he’s ever said in his life.

“What,” Carlos says warily.

“No,” Oscar says. “It’s a bad–it’s not even an idea.”

“At this point,” Carlos says, striding up and down. “I am willing to entertain even the stupidest–”

“What if you act like a dog,” Oscar says and regrets it immediately. “When you’re–hey, don’t give me that look, I said it was a bad idea.”

“That is the dumbest thing you have ever said,” Carlos says loftily. “And it is not for a lack of–”

“You’re not being a very good boy right now,” Oscar says, just to be annoying, but Carlos freezes and–oh Jesus. Oscar’s going to do something so fucking stupid. He considers not doing it, but that’s Carlos, for Oscar. Somehow his proximity turns Oscar into the dumbest idiot alive. Oscar stands up and Carlos swallows audibly. His wide eyes are locked on Oscar’s face, hands balled into fists along his side.

“Sit,” Oscar says.

Carlos drops to his knees. They stare at each other. Slowly, one hesitating step at a time, Oscar goes to stand in front of Carlos.

“Shake,” Oscar says and holds out his hand, palm up. Carlos’s jaw moves once, from left to right, expression tight, before he raises his hand and puts it in Oscar’s.

“Good boy,” he says and Carlos closes his eyes, jaw tensing like he’s trying to hold in a sound before it cuts out of him anyway, a drawn-out, low whine. When he opens his eyes again, he looks so anxious Oscar wants to reach out and put a hand in his hair, pet him

“Remember the next command?” Oscar says and Carlos nods shortly. “Go on, then.”

“You have to,” Carlos says. He looks mortified, but powers through. Something very tender and raw strikes at the centre of Oscar like lightning. “Say it.”

“Okay,” Oscar says, quietly. He squeezes Carlos’s hand before he drops it. Carlos’ entire body is straining, like he’s anticipating the release of tension. “Beg." Bonus:

#carcar #omg #gonna think about this for a whole month

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