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somethin' stupid  ⸻  isack  hadjar  x  reader  .

featuring  isack  hadjar  ,  friends  to  lovers  ,  university  au  ,  isack  being  a  down  bad  simp  ,  very  rusty  french  and  google  translated  italian  <3 word  count  9.5k author’s  note  literally  no  one�� asked  for  this  but  i’ve  been  obsessed  with  isack  lately  and  this  is  the  result  !  loosely  based  off  a  poem  i  read  a  million  years  ago  on  this  website  called '8 ways to say i love you' .  unfortunately  you  truly  never  escape  what  you  thought  was  romantic  at  age  13  !  dedicating  this  one  to  @spiderbeam —  eve  ,  thank  you  for  getting  me  into  this  man  in  the  first  place  .  i  fear  you  have  my  heart  and  all  my  isack  fics  <3  as  always  let  me  know  what  you  think  ,  it  helps  me  so  much  to  get  feedback  from  you  all  about  what  you  like  and  don’t  like  !  title  is  from  somethin’  stupid  by  frank  sinatra  .

one: spit it into her voicemail, a little slurred and sounding like the shot of whiskey you downed for courage. feel as ashamed as you do walking into work in last night’s clothes. wake up cringing for days, waiting for her to mention it.

Isack is forgetting something. He has to be. Because even through a hangover that feels like a jackhammer pounding directly into his skull, there is still an awful tugging in the back of his mind, like his brain is trying to remind him about something vitally important. 

He rolls over, squinting at the harsh morning light filtering through the blinds, to discover he never made it to bed. No, his face is pressed against the scratchy cushions of the living room couch, mouth dry and tasting vaguely like rum and regret. 

Rum. He blinks hard, a memory swimming up through the haze in his head — Pepe returning from his first class of syllabus week last night with a brown paper bag in hand and a devilish smile on his face. He’d claimed one of his fellow comms majors had told him if you mixed Rum Chata with Fireball, it tasted exactly like Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Isack didn’t even like sweet drinks, but that was your favorite cereal, so of course he had to try it, if only so he could tell you about it the next day. 

He groans and pushes himself upright, immediately regretting the sudden movement as the room spins around him. There’s a concerning stain on the worn carpet that wasn’t there the night before, and Ollie’s shoes are swinging lazily by their laces from the ceiling fan. The thought of you is stirring something in his brain, too. You hadn’t been there the night before — despite the fact that it was the first week of class, your thermodynamics professor had assigned you a particularly vicious problem set due at midnight — but you’d wormed your way into his drunken mind anyway. It happens more often than not, he supposes. Gabi’s put together a slideshow montage of all his intoxicated rambles declaring you the most perfect girl in the world that he’s started threatening to play for you if Isack doesn’t make a move before graduation. 

He’s still thinking about you when his phone buzzes from somewhere below him. He has to dig through the couch cushions, shoving aside loose change and a half-eaten sleeve of Triscuits before his fingers close around it. The screen has a thin, jagged crack across it that wasn’t there the night before, but he can still make out the notification from you on his lockscreen:

daily grind at 10:15? senior year deserves an extra special treat, i’m buying :~)

That must be what he had forgotten. Your coffee tradition. Rain or shine, hungover or sober, you always met at the Daily Grind for complicated sugary drinks before your first class of the semester. It was one of the few things in your friendship that was undeniably sacred. 

He glances up at the time. 10:13. Merde. He’s already dialing your number, rehearsing an apology in his head and a promise to be there as soon as he can, but the phone stops ringing and he gets your voicemail.

“Hey, it’s me. Obviously I don’t have my phone right now, but leave a message after the beep and I’ll get back to you! Or you can just text me like a normal person.”

Oh. Oh no. No no no no no.

Hearing your voicemail message — now that is familiar in the worst way. A sick wave rolls through his stomach, part hangover and part nauseous realization that drunk Isack might have done something really, really stupid. He winces, pulling up his call history, already half-knowing what he’ll find. 

Sure enough, there’s one outgoing call to you at 1:54 AM, and the memory clicks into place like the final piece of last night’s twisted puzzle. 

“Hiii,” he’d slurred into the phone, head lolling against the sofa. “C’est Isack. I — you know that, obviously. Your phone probably told you that! I’m — I’m drunk. And I wish you were here tonight. Wish you were here every night, en fait, but especially tonight. Pepe made Cinnamon Toast Crunch but, like, drinks. I know it’s your favorite and — you would have loved everything about it! As much as I love everything about you. I love your laugh, I love your face, I looooove you. Putain. I am going to regret this tomorrow.” With that he’d hung up the phone, immensely pleased with himself, and fallen asleep. 

Well, drunk Isack had been right about one thing, at least. Sober Isack is definitely regretting it. He’s been trying to figure out how to tell you that he likes you basically since he met you, and now he’s gone and done it in the most ridiculous way possible. 

His stomach twists, and it’s definitely not the hangover this time. It’s too late to cancel. You’re probably already there, sitting at your usual table by the window and ordering him something disgustingly sweet. He has no other option but to show up.

His mind fills with increasing dread as he gets ready. He considers faking his own death, but that seems like it might raise more questions than it answers. Plus, his friends would probably find a way to resurrect him just to kill him again for being such a total coward.

“You look like shit, Hadjar,” you say cheerfully as he stumbles into the seat across from you fifteen minutes after you’d agreed to meet. His hair is still damp from the world’s fastest shower, dark sunglasses hiding bloodshot eyes. 

He smiles shakily back at you as you slide a coffee that looks like diabetes waiting to happen across the table to him. You’re acting surprisingly normal for someone whose best friend crooned a love confession into their voicemail in the middle of the night. Maybe you hadn’t even listened to it. Maybe you thought it was a butt-dial and deleted the entire thing. “Blame Pepe. He got me hammered last night.”

“I’ll excuse the lateness just this once,” you reply, face breaking into the smile that’s been ruining his life since freshman year. “Was it worth it?” 

“Jury’s still out,” he says, taking a cautious sip of his drink. As he predicted, it’s absolutely revolting, a sugar rush in a cup. “Mon dieu, this is disgusting,” he groans. “What the hell is it?”

“Cinnamon Toast Crunch latte,” you say, biting your lip, and Isack spits coffee all over the table between you. 

He’s still spluttering when you start talking again, eyes fixed on the table between you. “Look, I know you were drunk when you left that message,” you say, twisting a strand of hair around your finger, “and I know drunk people say stupid things they don’t mean sometimes.”

“Yeah,” he breathes, heart sinking into his stomach. He had meant it, he thinks, but he’ll let you draw the incorrect conclusion if it makes you happier. If it means he gets to keep being your friend, to keep you in his life in whatever way you’ll allow. 

“So I’m not going to hold the whole ‘I love you’ thing against you. But if you really love my face, you should probably ask it out on a date, or something.” 

His head snaps up, almost too afraid to believe he heard you right. “Vraiment?”

“Vraiment,” you confirm, flicking a gaze up at him. Your eyes are bright, hopeful. “Do you want to take my face out, or what?”

You take a sip of your coffee like you’re trying to be nonchalant about the whole thing, but you’re drumming your fingers against the cup the way you always do when you’re in your own head. You’re nervous, Isack realizes. You want this as much as he does.

“I really want to take your face out,” he says, voice hoarse, and you just smile. 

You both finish your coffee, and afterwards he walks you to the engineering building for your class. Since it seems to be a good day for getting what he wants, he holds your hand as you go. He’s only hoping to brush against your palm, to feel the electric buzz of your skin against his, but instead you weave your fingers into his, squeeze his hand tight. 

When he looks down at your hand, intertwined with his, he’s already thinking about how he can say it to you again without fucking it all up. 

two: sigh it into her mouth, wedged in between teeth and tongues. don’t even let your lips move when you say it, ever so lightly, into the air. maybe it was just an exhalation of ecstasy. 

“Okay, seriously, if you laugh at me, I’m gonna break up with you,” you say, voice muffled behind the bathroom door, and the butterflies erupt in Isack’s chest all over again.

The first date had gone well. Better than well. It had gone kind of flawlessly, actually. So Isack took you on a second. Then a third. It’s wonderful — he keeps expecting you to say no, to say you’ve made a huge mistake and you’re better off as friends, but it’s been nearly two months now and you just keep matching his level of enthusiasm.

Your first Halloween together is no different. Halloweekend has always been a blur of mixers and parties spent side-by-side with you, so Isack wasn’t expecting anything new now that you were officially together. But you’d asked him one night a few weeks ago during a study session, ankle twisting around his under the kitchen table, what couples costume the two of you would be wearing this year. Isack had been so thrilled by the idea that you would publicly identify yourself as his girl that every single cheesy couples costume he’d ever seen over the years had flown out of his mind completely. He’d locked eyes with the vintage Mercedes poster he’d hung on their living room wall, and to his absolute horror, blurted “Brocedes,” which even to his lovesick mind sounded like the stupidest thing he’d ever said.

To his unending delight, however, you’d agreed without a second thought. Which is how he finds himself dressed as Lewis Hamilton in a Mercedes race suit and a Pirelli cap, waiting for his Nico to work up the courage to make her way out of the bathroom.

“I’m not going to laugh,” he assures you, teal sneakers squeaking against the floor as he wipes his palms on the suit. “Come on, mon coeur. Let me see.”

The door creaks open hesitantly, and there you are, the fluorescent bathroom light framing you from behind. Your hair is slicked back, tousled just so. The white suit hugs your body, and you have it unzipped just low enough to show off the soft line of your collarbones and the swell of your chest. 

Isack’s eyes drag down your body, unable to tear his gaze away from you. You’re unreal. 

“Fuck,” he breathes. It’s pretty much the only word he remembers at this point. 

You lean against the door frame, glossed lips curling into a soft smile. “Well? What do you think?”

“I think we’re going to be late to this party,” Isack says, voice rough around the edges. 

He crosses the room in two strides, pulling you into him by your hips. You loop your arms around his neck, threading your fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck, and when you tilt your head up to kiss him, it feels like his world is exploding into a million pieces.

He still hasn’t figured out a better way to tell you how he feels about you. It’s strange, in a way; before you started dating, the situation felt wildly romantic in his head, like something straight out of those chick flicks you watch religiously and he pretends not to like. Two friends, madly in love with each other without having the nerve to admit it. Your relationship, though it was practically perfect in every other way, had complicated things. Isack wants to be the guy who sweeps you off your feet, not the creep who tells you he loves you after a month and a half. 

But now, with his teeth scraping impatiently against your collarbone and you breathing his name into his ear like it’s a prayer, he can’t imagine not saying something. It escalates quickly, as it always does with the two of you: he’s hauled you up onto the edge of the sink, and your legs wrap around his waist as he drags his mouth back up your neck to meet your lips. You taste like your strawberry lip gloss, and when you slot your tongue into his mouth it makes his head spin.

“I love you,” he whispers against your mouth. It’s caught somewhere between a gasp and a moan, just a sound you could mistake for pleasure if you weren’t listening closely. You don’t react, just kiss him again so deeply he feels he might drown in it. A small noise escapes the back of your throat, one he wants to make you replicate over and over again, and he’s sure then that you didn’t hear him.

It’s probably for the best. He wants to be sure that when he does work up the courage, you’ll know, and there will be nothing to keep you from believing him. Not alcohol, not desperation, not the heat of a perfect, stolen moment. So he presses the words into the column of your neck, murmurs them into the cut of your collarbone. He traces hard little hearts into your hips with his thumbs. Your suit begins to slip off your shoulders, exposing the teal strap of your bra, and Isack thinks he might have legitimately died and gone to heaven.

That is, until the door swings open behind him with a dramatic bang. 

“Che schifo,” Kimi yelps, scandalized, covering his eyes with his hands. “Isack, your room is right there.”

You pull back from Isack, a laugh bubbling in your throat as you hike your costume back up your shoulder. Your gloss is smudged, cheeks flushed pink, and Isack thinks he’s never seen you look so beautiful, even if he does want to melt into the floor tiles right about now. 

“Sorry, Kimi,” you chirp, not even having the decency to look flustered. “Isack got so turned on by the thought of Brocedes that he just had to have me.”

“I did not,” Isack protests, cheeks scarlet. “Kimi, we were just —”

“This is a communal bathroom, Isack,” his roommate interrupts, frowning. “Don’t get me wrong, I am happy you two finally figured it out, but… we wash our hands in that sink.”

“You’re a menace,” Isack hisses under his breath to you, and you giggle, smoothing your hair.

“We’re late anyway,” you grin, hopping off the sink. “Don’t worry, Kimi, won’t happen again.”

He lets you pull him out of the bathroom, watching as Kimi closes the door behind you. “We can pick that back up later somewhere with a little more privacy,” you whisper into his ear, and he stumbles over his own feet. It’s embarrassing the way he can tell his eyes are lighting up at your words. He sends a small thank you to the universe that the fabric of the costume is thick. 

“Yeah,” he mumbles as he watches you walk to the door, hips swaying. “I’m definitely holding you to that.”

three: whisper it into her hair in the middle of the night, after you’ve counted the space between her breaths and are certain she’s asleep. shut your eyes quickly when she shifts toward you in askance. maybe you were just sleep whispering.

The bed feels far too narrow to fit the both of you, the old-fashioned radiator in your room is clanking so loudly he’s worried it might explode, Isack’s arm is going numb where it’s trapped under your head, and there is absolutely no place he’d rather be.

He’d picked you up at the airport earlier that day — your flight was meant to land in the afternoon, but he’d shown up nearly forty minutes early, pacing excitedly around baggage claim until you descended down the escalator. You were wearing the hoodie you’d stolen from him before winter break and your biggest smile, and you’d jumped into his arms with such force that he’d dropped the homemade welcome sign he’d made, poster board fluttering to the floor. 

Since then, he’s been pretending personal space is a concept he’s never heard of. Hand on your thigh in the car, an arm around your waist as he carries your suitcase into your apartment, fingers tracing through your hair as you lay in bed curled into his chest. He can’t keep his hands off you. It’s as if the two of you were separated for three years, not three weeks.

“You’re unusually quiet,” you observe, one leg thrown lazily over his waist as you scroll through TikTok. 

“Just thinking,” he shrugs, flicking his eyes over your screen. You’re watching one of those kitchen restock videos you like, the light of your screen illuminating your face in the dark room.  

“Dangerous activity for you,” you tease, eyes bright. He grabs your waist and pulls you in, blowing a raspberry into your neck and laughing as you squeal and squirm away from him. “What’s on your mind, Hadjar?”

What’s really on his mind is how warm and comfortable he feels with you, how the sharp, persistent ache in his chest that he’d been feeling since winter break started has finally subsided now that he’s back in your presence. “How I survived three weeks without you hogging all the blankets,” he says instead. 

You gasp and narrow your eyes, but there’s no heat to it. “I do not hog the blankets,” you protest, pulling more of the comforter towards you.

“Sure,” he counters, pulling it back. “And I don’t have the shin bruises to prove that you’re also a sleep-kicker.”

“Those could be from anything,” you say primly. He gives you a look of pure disbelief, and you both dissolve into giggles, foreheads pressing against each other. 

Before leaving for winter break, he’d thought that everything would feel the same way it did when you were just friends. Despite the different time zones, the two of you had managed to talk every day — texts about everything from the prize he won in a Christmas cracker to the dog at your New Year’s party wearing a sparkly hat to his mom’s endless questions about when his copine would visit Paris. It was nice. He was happy, but it wasn’t enough. Not like it used to be. 

When you were friends, even in the years that he’d harbored his frankly all-encompassing crush on you, missing you had been manageable, a dull ache he could soothe with a voice memo or a quick call. But this had been different. Deeper. More essential to his being, somehow.

Every time he slid into his childhood bed, he’d glance over at the empty pillow and be struck with the visceral feeling that you should be there. He’d caught himself saving up stories to tell you, photographing random things because he knew they'd make you laugh, declining invitations from his lycée friends because he'd rather spend the evening talking to you than going out. You’d fallen asleep twice during your marathon daily FaceTimes, and both times Isack had stayed on the line just to listen to you breathe, feeling foolish and smitten and wondering when exactly you’d managed to make yourself feel like home to him. 

Suddenly worried that he won’t be able to keep himself from saying exactly that, Isack breaks the laughter with a clearly fake, very loud snore. 

“Baby,” you giggle, poking him in the side as the radiator clangs particularly violently. “Stop. I’m trying to sleep.” 

There’s some level of truth to that; it’s nearly 2 AM, and the two of you have been curled up in your bed since the early evening. But clearly, neither of you have been trying very hard to actually rest, too excited to be with each other again to let your eyes close. 

“You have a funny way of showing it,” he huffs, pressing a kiss into your temple. “You’ve been talking for, like, hours.”

“Fine,” you reply haughtily, wrinkling your nose up at him. “Look at me, totally asleep.” With that, you tuck your face into the crook of his neck, eyelashes fluttering against his skin, and go silent. 

He listens to the slow rhythm of your breathing, feels the way your chest rises and falls against him. He wants to follow you into sleep, but it’s evading him. There’s something playing on his mind — the thought that with every day he spends with you, he’s falling deeper into something he only thought he understood before. He’d been so sure he loved you back then, but this is something else entirely.

Maybe it’s the darkness, or the feeling of you in his arms again, but he’s feeling bold. “Je t’aime,” he whispers into your hair. And then you sigh, snuggling closer into his hoodie with a soft, instinctive movement. 

Isack freezes, heart hammering against his ribs, and slams his eyes shut like he can pretend he’s sleep-whispering. Counts the seconds between your exhales until he’s convinced your movement was a coincidence, and he can bide his time some more.  

When he says it for real, you’ll be so blown away by how suave and gorgeous and charming he is that you won’t hesitate to say it back.

four: buy her flowers. buy her chocolate. buy her a teddy bear, because that’s what every romantic comedy has taught you. take her out to a nice restaurant where neither of you feel comfortable and spend the whole night clearing your throat and tugging at your tie. feel like your actions are more suited to a proposal than the simple confession of something you’ve always known.

It’s Valentine’s Day, and Isack has a plan. He’s been thinking about it for weeks. He made a reservation in advance at Maison de Lumière, the only restaurant near campus that required anything more than jeans and a sweatshirt. It had taken three calls and a small bribe to one of the hostesses, but he’d finally managed to secure a table. He didn’t have a suit, so he’d had to borrow Gabi’s. It’s miles too big and hangs loosely off his frame, making him look a little bit like a kid playing dress-up in his dad’s closet. He bought flowers — not from the grocery store, but real long-stem red roses wrapped in pink tissue paper that cost more than his weekly laundry budget. He’d even picked up a heart-shaped box of chocolates from the campus bookstore, at the last minute throwing a little stuffed bear into his cart that he almost immediately regretted. 

None of it is his vibe, really. He’s not used to grand romantic gestures. But you deserve everything he’s planned and more, even if it does make him feel a little ridiculous and out of place. And maybe, if everything goes absolutely perfectly, tonight can be the night that Isack finally tells you he loves you.

That is, until you get to the restaurant, and he realizes this is going to be a total disaster. 

You look so beautiful that Isack trips over his feet multiple times trying to open the door for you. Then you’re seated at a table by the window, which should feel romantic but really feels like the two of you are on display. There are several sets of silverware on the table for some reason, and the glasses are heavy crystal that Isack is afraid to touch. The bear sits on the windowsill like a fuzzy chaperone, its glassy eyes staring at you.

The waiter drops off menus in thick leather folders, giving you a ten-minute explanation of the special holiday prix fixe menu. Isack orders the cheapest wine on the list, and the waiter scoffs but obliges. When he finally leaves the two of you alone, silence weighs on the table like an uncomfortably heavy blanket. 

“So,” you say, drumming your fingers against the stem of your water glass. 

“So,” he agrees, trailing off. 

Then the two of you speak at the same time:

“This place is —”

“You look really —”

You laugh, but it’s not your laugh, the familiar sound that makes Isack’s heart flip. It’s stilted, forced. “Sorry, I was just going to say this place is… nice.”

“Thanks,” he says politely, straightening his tie for the fifteenth time, but he can’t keep the frown off his face. Nice. It’s careful. It’s a word designed to be meaningless, to hide how uncomfortable you are, and Isack can feel his perfectly planned night slipping through his fingers. 

It’s torture. Actual, literal torture. In three years of friendship and seven months of dating, you’ve never run out of things to say to each other. You talk constantly about classes and professors and the weird guy in your freshman dorm who collected vintage lunch boxes and whether aliens existed and what you’d do if you won the lottery. You flirt ridiculously and tease each other relentlessly. You send each other stupid memes at 2 AM and argue about linear algebra with the kind of intensity that comes from finding your mental match in another person. 

But tonight, surrounded by white linen and overpriced menu items and the soft classical music whispering from hidden speakers, Isack has nothing. He takes a sip of the wine, immediately wincing at the taste. 

“Isack,” you say gently, touching his wrist across the table as he forces a swallow. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but… this sucks, right?”

He blinks. “What?”

“This,” you say, waving your hand through the air at the restaurant, the pristine tablecloth, the overly perfumed candle flickering between you. “All of this. We both hate this. This isn’t us.”

For the first time all night, Isack feels like he can actually breathe. “Yes. Mon dieu, yes. This is horrible. The wine is horrible. I thought I was the only one.”

“No,” you laugh, and it finally sounds real. “You’re definitely not the only one. The waiter keeps looking at me like I’m going to smuggle the silverware out in my purse.”

He snorts, pulling at his tie until it loosens around his neck. “I’m so sorry, mon coeur. I thought… I don’t know what I thought. I just wanted to give you the Valentine’s Day you deserve, something fancy and romantic and —”

“Awkward and uncomfortable and completely wrong for us?”

“Yeah,” he sighs. “That.”

“I love that you wanted to do something special,” you say, and Isack’s brain short-circuits somewhere around hearing the second word of your sentence. “But I don’t deserve all this. I deserve you. The real you, not whatever tie-wearing, wine-drinking version of you that you think is going to impress me.”

You love that he wanted to do something special. Love. It’s the perfect opening. Three simple words that had been circling in his head for months, waiting for the right moment to be dropped. 

He opens his mouth to speak, finally working up the courage to say exactly what the entire night is for, but you beat him to the punch. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

A half hour later, the two of you are pressed shoulder to shoulder on the hood of Isack’s beat-up Honda with a twenty piece nugget box and two Slurpees between you. Your dress is hiked up around your thighs, bare leg pressed against his, the stuffed bear sitting in your lap.

You lean your head against his shoulder, taking a long sip of your Slurpee. “Next year, maybe let’s skip the fancy restaurant.”

“No complaints on that,” he allows, taking a bite of a nugget. “That bottle of wine basically wiped out our date budget for the rest of the semester, by the way.”

You laugh as the cool February wind picks up, and without thinking Isack takes off Gabi’s jacket, wrapping it around your shoulders. You smile up at him, makeup smudged slightly at the corners of your eyes. “Now that’s romance. Happy Valentine’s Day, babe.”

Isack sighs happily, wrapping his arm around you. He’d spent so long planning what he thought was the perfect night. The flowers, the chocolates, the overpriced dinner, the teddy bear, all because that’s what movies and romance novels and r/Relationship_Advice said you were supposed to do when you loved someone.

But now, with chicken nugget crumbs on his fingers and the taste of blue raspberry in his mouth and your laugh still echoing in the crisp air of the parking lot, he thinks maybe it’s this.

five: blurt it out in the middle of an impromptu dance party in the kitchen, as clumsy as your two left feet. when time seems to freeze, hastily tack on “in that shirt” or “when you make your award-winning meatballs” or, if you are feeling particularly brave, “when we do this.” resume dancing and pretend you don’t feel her eyes on you the rest of the night.

There aren’t many rules Isack has for your relationship. Why bother, when everything is perfect without them? It’s not like you need a set date night, since you hang out with each other all the time anyway. He likes PDA. He would rather die than tell you who you could or couldn’t talk to, and he thinks you’d probably laugh in his face if he tried. Your relationship has always been one guided by what feels right in the moment, and Isack feels awfully right pretty much every time you’re around him. 

There is only one rule set in stone: the Infinite Playlist. A certain list of songs, subject to additions but never subtractions, that the two of you are forever required to dance to. It had started before you were dating, back when Isack would have taken any excuse to watch you smile, to have a private moment with you. Your relationship only solidified the tradition. It doesn’t matter where you are, what you’re doing, or who you’re with. The first few notes of a song would play, and the two of you would drop everything to dance to it. 

“What Makes You Beautiful” comes on in the grocery store aisle? Ditch the cart, because the two of you are finding an area open enough to perform your fully choreographed routine. “Alors On Danse” plays at a frat party? Hopefully you aren’t talking to anyone important, because that conversation is coming to a swift end. 

Normally, Isack loves the Infinite Playlist. Today, he wishes Lando had played anything else.

It’s a classic, unseasonably warm day, the first one of the spring semester. It feels like everyone on campus is outside, textbooks open to pages they won’t read and Frisbees cutting lazy arcs through the air. Your friends are sprawled on picnic blankets on the lawns, idly chatting. Maya and Chloe are passing around a thermos of jungle juice. Ollie has his laptop out, allegedly to work on his thesis, but he’s mostly just scrolling through his Spotify queue.

You’re sitting under a gnarled old oak tree, back stiff against the rough bark and knees pulled into your chest. Isack settles on the grass about ten feet away, trying to make eye contact with you, but you are very deliberately avoiding his gaze, pretending to be absorbed in your multivariable notes. The air between you is charged with all the things you’d said to each other three days ago, heavy with all the silence that had settled between you since.

The argument hadn’t been anyone’s fault, really — just a silly miscommunication, something that should have ended fast and early. But you almost never fought, and you weren’t used to it, both too stubborn to back down and admit it was stupid so you could move on. Halfway through the argument, Isack had said something careless, something that stung, and you’d stormed out of his house with flushed cheeks and teary eyes. Now, everything is tense and uncertain between the two of you, too quiet and too sharp. 

You’re still pointedly ignoring him when Lando pushes Ollie away from the laptop, proclaiming loudly that he absolutely needs to hear a certain song before the sun sets. Seconds later, the telltale bassline of “Get Low” starts blasting through the speakers, and Isack’s stomach drops. You may have been in a fight, but unfortunately, the Infinite Playlist hadn’t gotten the memo.

His gaze snaps to you, instinct winning out over pride. When you slowly lift your eyes from the papers in your hands, he feels a little surge of hope in his chest. After a second of uncertainty, he stands, finding an empty strip of grass, and motions you over. 

He wants to make you laugh. He wants to be over the top, or ridiculously bad, or anything that will break through the stoniness in your face. 

Slowly, almost too slowly, you warm up. When he tries the Sprinkler, you barely look at him, just tapping your toe against the grass. He Dougies, and you move a little bit closer. By the time he resorts to the Shopping Cart, you’ve loosened up enough to give him a snort of laughter. He reaches his hand out, and you take it, letting him twirl you straight into his arms.

“Je suis désolé,” he mumbles into your ear, holding you against him.  

There’s a pause, where you don’t say a word. “‘M sorry, too,” you sigh, and the relief that rolls through him is overwhelming. “That was so stupid.”

“So stupid,” he agrees, dipping you just because he can, because you’re talking to him and the world feels right again. “I don’t like fighting with you.”

You giggle as he drops you, pulls you up again. “Me neither. Let’s not do it again, yeah?”

He tucks a stray piece of hair behind your ear, as you grin like the last three days of cold shoulder could melt away just from the sheer force of your smile. “Deal.”

You rest your hands lazily on his shoulders, moving your body against his, and he presses a kiss to your neck. “Missed this,” he murmurs against your skin, hoping you know he doesn’t just mean the dancing. 

“Missed you,” you retort, and he wraps his arms around your waist, pulling back just enough to look at you. Your cheeks are pink from the sun, eyes bright, and his chest feels very tight suddenly. 

“I love you,” he blurts, and the relief he’s feeling shifts immediately to horror when you falter, feet slipping in the grass as you look up at him, something awestruck in your eyes. Before you have the chance to respond, he pulls you in by your hips, flush to his body.  “—r sweet moves,” he finishes lamely, heart pounding in his chest. “I love them. Very classy, mon coeur.”

You laugh brightly, squirming against him. “Classier when you aren’t trying to grind on me, Hadjar.” 

You don’t say that you love him, not then. The moment had passed. His cowardice had made sure of that. But he feels your eyes on him still, warm and hopeful, and he knows that another song, another moment will come soon enough.

six: write her a letter in which the amount of circumnavigating and angst could rival mr. darcy’s. debate where to leave it all day – on her pillow? in her coat pocket? throw it away in frustration, conveniently leaving it face up in the trashcan, her name scrawled on the front in your sloppy handwriting. let her wonder if you meant it.

By the third morning of spring break, Isack starts thinking about forever. 

The beach rental is chaotic, to say the least — eight twenty-somethings in three bedrooms with one working bathroom, Maya and Gabi holding backflip contests off the porch into the deep end of the pool, an ever-growing pile of sandy towels that no one wants to take to the laundry. 

It’s also kind of perfect, though, mostly because Isack gets to wake up every morning in a room with you. The sheets are mismatched and smell a little like the sea, and the bed is practically child-sized, barely big enough for the two of you to fit. But none of that matters as much as the fact that every time he wakes up, your legs are tangled into his, face mashed into his chest, hogging the entire comforter with your hand curled over his waist like you’d reached for him in the middle of the night and refused to let go. 

It feels like playing house, at first. But then Isack starts letting himself imagine a world beyond the crappy Airbnb, a future where he never has to start his mornings any other way, and the domesticity of it all is doing something frankly dangerous to his heart.

So he writes.

It’s not supposed to be anything serious, at first. Just a way to get all the feelings out, scrawled into the back of his physics notebook and kept to himself. But the words keep coming, looping over themselves as he tries to put shape to the feeling in his chest. 

Mon coeur,

We’ve been together for almost eight months now, and I keep thinking I should have said this already. I’ve been trying to find the perfect moment, the perfect words, practically since we started dating. But maybe that’s the problem. Maybe there is no perfect way to tell your girlfriend that she’s the most important thing in your life. 

There’s this thing in physics I’ve been thinking about a lot called quantum entanglement. You probably know the concept, but in case you don’t, subatomic particles can get magically tied together, and when they do, each particle’s quantum state can’t ever be described again without the other. The particles’ fates get inextricably linked together, no matter how far away they are from each other.

I think I’m entangled with you, mon coeur, because I can’t see a future without you in it anymore. I want to wake up with you every morning, no matter how many times you kick me in the shins while you sleep. I want our toothbrushes to keep sitting next to each other on the counter. I want to keep dancing in the kitchen with you to the Infinite Playlist. I want to keep hearing you try to speak French to me. I want to keep making fun of your terrible French. I want to keep thinking about forever with you in a way that should scare me, but doesn’t at all. 

I guess what I’m trying to say is I love you. Je t’aime. In English, in French, in whatever language you want to hear it in. 

He reads it over three times, stomach churning. It sounds pathetic, desperate, like something from a lovesick teenager and not a very mature twenty-year-old who really should have figured out how to express this to you by now. 

But it’s also true. Every word of it. 

“Baby, get down here!” your voice floats up the stairs, and Isack rips the paper out of the notebook and shoves it into the pocket of his shorts frantically, like somehow you’ll be able to see it from a floor below him. He heads downstairs, where chaos is already in full swing. Pepe is chopping up what feels like a thousand oranges for mimosas, and for some reason, there’s batter on the ceiling. 

“Thank god, our resident Parisian is awake,” you say, reaching for him as soon as he enters the kitchen. “Do you know how to make French toast? Because Chloe’s vision is not translating into reality.”

The letter feels like it’s burning a hole in his pocket all day. He keeps looking for the right moment — nearly gives it to you on the beach while you’re reading, before Kimi interrupts to show you the shells he’d collected. He thinks about sliding it over the dashboard as he watches you drive into the town center for groceries, singing along to Fleetwood Mac with the windows rolled down so you can smell the salt air. Maybe he can leave it somewhere you’d find it by accident, like a secret saved just for you.

On the other hand, the thought of you actually reading it kind of makes him want to throw up. 

When he tries to get rid of it, though, he can’t quite do that either. It feels like he’s crumpling up your relationship, all the things he knows he loves about you. So in the end, he settles for leaving it in the kitchen trash, neatly folded on top of an empty twelve-pack box and stained popsicle sticks, content in the knowledge that he has more time to figure out how to say everything he feels. 

You’re all on the porch outside when shit goes sideways. The sun is beating down, your legs draped lazily over Isack’s lap as you play Uno with the boys. Gabi’s just won, and he’s being unbearably annoying about the whole thing.

“Alright, I should take out the trash before we make dinner,” you say absentmindedly, putting down your cards and unfolding yourself out of your chair, sauntering inside. 

Isack doesn’t quite register the danger at first. Then it hits him. The trash. His letter. Your name on the front, scrawled unmistakably in Isack’s handwriting. He jolts upright so fast his chair tips over behind him.

“Merde,” he mutters, already scrambling across the deck, splinters digging into his feet. He shoulders past Ollie in the doorway, heart pounding in his ears so loud in nearly drowns out the chorus of confused voices behind him.

By the time he gets to the kitchen, breathing hard as if he’s just run a marathon, you’ve already found it. You’re holding the letter gingerly between two fingers, like you’ve picked it off the top of the trash, and Isack is so unbelievably fucked. 

“Did you mean to throw this away?” you say, voice unsteady.

“I —” he starts, then stops, running a hand through his hair roughly. “It’s, um, nothing. Just trash. Yeah.”

After he finishes stammering through the world’s worst explanation, you look at him for a long moment. Then at the letter. Then back at him. 

“Okay,” you say quietly, and drop the letter in the trash without unfolding it. You tie the bag off, pulling it out of the can, and walk out the side door without a backward glance. Isack stands in the kitchen, listening to the door creak shut behind you with the sinking feeling he’s just made a big mistake.

Dinner, predictably, is loud, full of overlapping conversations and splinters off the old patio furniture. Isack barely hears any of it. You’re sitting beside him, laughing at the story Gabi is telling about the guy next door and his snorkel mask, but there’s a tightness to your smile that hasn’t gone away.

You don’t bring it up. You don’t act weird. You still steal bites of pizza off his plate and brush your fingers over his knee when you reach for your Coke bottle. But he’s known you long enough to know you’re still thinking about it, to know he hasn’t gotten off the hook just yet. 

“Just tell me one thing,” you say later in bed, voice soft and a little hesitant, fingers tapping against his thigh. “Was it something bad? About me?”

Isack stiffens, rolling over to look at you with wide, panicked eyes. “No, mon coeur,” he says gently. “No, never. Je te le promets.”

You nod slowly, biting your lip. “Okay. I trust you, I just — sorry, I just keep thinking about it. What would you write and then throw away?”

You’re looking up at him like you know what the letter said, or maybe like you hope you know, and the air between you turns sharp with potential. He wants to tell you. The words are right there, crowding at the tip of his tongue. He opens his mouth, and then he closes it again.

He’s scared. Scared that if you don’t feel the same, it’ll all fall apart. Scared that if you do, it’ll make everything real.

“It was nothing important,” he lies, and pretends not to notice the way your face falls just a little.

seven: wait until something terrible has happened and you can’t not tell her anymore. wait until she almost gets hit by a car crossing against the light and after you are done cursing at the shit-for-brains cab drivers in this city, realize you are actually just terrified of living without her. tell her with your hands shaking.

“Latte for Isack?”

The Daily Grind churns with the desperate energy of finals week, the scent of stress nearly overpowering the espresso aroma, but Isack keeps pushing his way through the college-age customers hunched over their laptops with dark circles under their eyes. Your robotics exam started just about three hours ago, which means you’ll be stumbling out of the engineering building any minute now. With any luck, Isack will be there with a coffee for you, ready to hear all about it. He’s planning his Best Boyfriend Ever acceptance speech in his head already. 

He picks up the cup from the barista, at the last minute buys one of those lavender honey scones you always stare at through the display counter but never purchase because “twelve dollars for a pastry is capitalism at its worst, Isack, even if it does taste like it’s made by a baby angel.” He doesn’t have the money for it, not really, but imagining the excitement on your face when you see the bag is enough to have him forking over his credit card. His bank account is crying, but some things are worth being broke for. 

He’s just across the street from the engineering building when students begin streaming out like survivors escaping a shipwreck. He scans the crowd until he spots you, hair piled on top of your head messily and shoulders slumped. Still beautiful, even after an hours-long grueling exam. He holds up the bag, knowing you’ll see it before you see him, and your entire face lights up, exhaustion melting into relief. 

“Baby, what are you doing here?” you laugh, hands cupped around your mouth so he can hear you across the street. You’re half-jogging towards him in your eagerness, entirely focused on him and the promise of comfort he represents. So focused, in fact, that Isack sees the cab before you do, the yellow blur cutting through the intersection headed directly for you.

Isack freezes. He tries to scream, to warn you, anything, but the sound dies in his throat. In the entire universe, the only thing that matters is the ear-achingly loud honk of the horn and the startled look on your face. 

You, thankfully, don’t freeze like him. You jump back, cab just kissing the edge of your shin, backpack swinging through the air and clattering back against your side. 

The car doesn’t stop. It doesn’t even slow down. The whole thing is over in a second. But to Isack, the second stretches forever, and in it he can see everything that could have happened, the way his life could have split open in a single, terrible instant.

You stare after the car, dazed, and Isack is moving before his brain can catch up with his body. Not to you, not at first — he’s running halfway up the street, screaming obscenities after the car’s receding tail lights in rapid French about the driver’s ugly mother, the size of his dick, and how terrible he is at pleasuring his partner. 

“Hey. Hey, Isack, it’s okay.” You catch up to him, place a hand on his arm, gently, and all the rage inside of him snaps. 

“Ce n’est pas bien!” His hands are trembling, something hot pricking at the back of his eyes. “He could have killed you.”

“It was my fault,” you say softly. 

Isack pulls you into a tight, desperate hug. He can’t stop seeing it every time he blinks: the cab’s tires squealing on the street, your sneakers jumping back, the bumper brushing against your leg.

He buries a hand in your hair, no doubt filling it with snarls and tangles, and breathes in the familiar, warm scent of your shampoo. His cheeks feel wet, for some reason. “He should have been more careful. Il aurait pu te tuer. You could have died.”

“I didn’t die,” you say, wrapping your arms around his neck and soothingly stroking his shoulders. “I’m okay, Isack.”

“You could have died. I could have lost you,” he repeats, and the words come out horribly strangled thinking about the prospect of a world without you in it. No more forcing him to taste-test your seasonal lattes. No more watching stupid Netflix romcoms because they make you laugh. No more slow dancing in his kitchen, swallowing your laughter with kisses when he steps on your toes. It wouldn’t be a life worth having.

“I love you,” he sobs into your hair. “Je t’aime, et tu aurais pu mourir. I love you.”

You run your hands through his hair, holding him as tightly as he’s holding you. “Isack, babe, you have to breathe. It’s fine. I’m right here, mon coeur.” Your accent is as terrible as ever, but you’re solid and breathing and alive against him, and he lets out a rattling gasp. “See? I’m right here. I’m okay.” 

“Right,” he croaks, voice hoarse as he tries to catch his breath. “You’re here. You’re here.”

“I’m here,” you confirm. “Everything is okay. I know you’re panicking, but I’m fine. You don’t have to be scared. I’m right here.”

“Okay,” he breathes after a moment, pulling back and slowly disentangling himself from you, even as every molecule in his body protests at the distance.

You wipe your thumb gently over his cheekbones, brushing away the tears, and he presses his face against your hand like a cat. Desperately seeking your affection, your touch, any reminder that you’re still here with him. You smile at him, wobbly but real. “What’s in the bag?”

“Scone,” he manages to choke out. He’d nearly forgotten he had the bag at all. It’s ridiculously crumpled, fuchsia paper crushed between white knuckles. His fingers ache when he unclenches them. 

“Really?” you ask. “The one from Daily Grind? Baby, you didn’t. That’s so sweet! You know I love those. Can we go back to my room and split it?” Even though he can tell you’re rambling, trying to distract him, your smile is enough to make him forget a little bit. So he sniffles and lets you lead him across campus, rubbing soothing circles into his palm the entire way home. 

It’s not until later in your room, watching Star Wars and eating his half of the scone as you comb your fingers through his hair, that Isack realizes you didn’t tell him you love him too. You assumed he was panicking, which was true, but it didn’t make the feelings any less real.

He loves you, and you don’t believe him.

eight: say it deliberately, your tongue a springboard for every syllable. over coffee, brushing your teeth side-by-side, as you turn off the light to go to sleep – it doesn’t matter where. do not adorn it with extra words like “i think” or “i might.” do not sigh heavily as if admitting it were a burden instead of the most joyous thing you’ve ever done. look her in the eyes and pray, heart thumping wildly, that she will turn to you and say, “i love you too.”

The air smells like champagne and summer. Graduation day is a blur — sweaty hugs on the lawn, too-bright flash photos where at least one of you is sure to be mid-blink, parents crying as they watch their kids grow up. 

Isack cheers, stomping his feet wildly, as you cross the stage to receive your diploma, tassels blowing in the breeze and smiling into the crowd megawatt-bright. After the ceremony, Ollie pops a mini bottle of champagne and nearly takes out his macroeconomics professor with the cork. Kimi runs a lap around the quad, Doriane screaming bloody murder on his shoulders. Pepe cries twice, once because the dean mispronounced his name during the ceremony and again when Isack presents him with a photo of the two of them from freshman year move-in day, all gawky limbs and awkward smiles.

The party starts as soon as your caps hit the ground. Isack’s house is spilling over with friends who don’t want to say goodbye just yet, dancing barefoot on the patchy backyard grass with beers sweating in their hands. There’s music pulsing through an overamped speaker, loud laughter echoing between the trees. You sit on his lap on the leaning porch steps, sipping from a Solo cup and pressing a sloppy kiss to his cheek when Chloe takes a Polaroid of the two of you. It comes out a little blurry, but Isack slips it into his phone case anyway. 

By the time afternoon bleeds into evening, the two of you slip away from the party, too full of sentimentality to be around anyone except each other. For once, Isack doesn’t have a plan in mind, too content with your hand in his as you walk one last slow loop around campus. The brick paths you’ve worn down over four long years. The benches you’d studied on outside the dining hall, trading smuggled cookies with your head in his lap. The hill you’d sledded down together freshman year, when Isack took one look at your flushed cheeks and pretty smile and realized what he was feeling wasn’t just friendship.

“Oh, the fountain!” you cry delightedly, tugging his hand hard towards the stately stone fixture as you near the main quad. It’s a campus tradition, passed down through generations of sleep-deprived undergrads. Legend has it if you jump into the fountain with your sweetheart, you’ll always find your way back to each other. “Isack, we have to do it, come on.”

You set off across the quad, barefoot and heels swinging from your fingertips, but Isack stays, because every single place on this campus is a memory that leads back to you, and he starts to have the feeling that this very moment is what it’s all been building to all along. 

“Mon coeur?” he calls out from behind you, hands shaking in his pockets. When you turn back to look at him, the setting sun is painting your skin golden, the sleeves of your gown billowing in the wind, and it takes all the breath out of his body. Four years of friendship, nearly a year of dating, and you still have the ability to make time stop for him. 

“Yeah?” you ask, tilting your head with a curious expression, and he knows. 

“I love you.” 

He doesn’t say it drunk, or panicking, or praying for you not to really hear it, or with the desperation of someone trying to stop the clock. He says it with the quiet certainty of someone who’s been waiting way too long.

“I know,” you say, eyes sparkling. He waits for you to continue, heart in his throat, but you just grin smugly at him. 

“Non,” he shakes his head as he walks towards you, smiling despite himself. “Not fair. You cannot pull a Han Solo unless your life is at stake. Actually, you cannot pull a Han Solo at all —”

You swallow his outrage with a kiss, pulling him in by the tie and knocking his cap askew. “I love you too,” you say against his lips, as his hands come to rest on your hips. “Really.”

“I know,” Isack breathes out, dizzy with it, as he tugs you towards the fountain. “Really.”

The fountain isn’t deep, water only reaching to mid-calf. But it’s shockingly cold for a June day, the spray raising goosebumps on Isack’s arms. You shriek with laughter as you follow him in. “Oh god. Not one of my best ideas,” you gasp at the sudden chill, the hem of your gown trailing in the water around you. 

“What do you mean?” he grins, pulling you so close he can see the water droplets on your lashes. “It was a perfect idea. Now we’ll always find our way back to each other.”

You loop your arms around his neck, pressing up on your toes and kissing the corner of his mouth. “That would imply I’m planning on losing you in the first place,” you say, and Isack is hit with a wave of affection so strong it nearly makes his knees buckle.

“I love you,” he breathes out again, spinning you in a slow circle. “I’ve been wanting to say it for so long.”

You crinkle your nose at him, grinning ridiculously. “I love you too. But why didn’t you?”

“I was trying to plan out the right moment,” he admits.

And then, almost shyly:

“Turns out any moment with you is the right one.”

[papayareads]

i am unwell.

my kink is karma ⛐ 𝐋𝐍𝟒 & 𝐎𝐏𝟖𝟏

you laugh, sharp and hollow. “at least i have talent.” lando doesn’t flinch. doesn’t rise to it. just says, very quietly, “then why are you so scared of me?” ⸻ part two of the pushing it down and praying series. read part one here.

ꔮ starring: billionaire!oscar piastri x actress!reader x rally driver!lando norris. ꔮ word count: 10.5k. ꔮ includes: smut, romance, drama. alternate universe: non-f1. mentions of food, alcohol; profanity. oral [f]/face-riding, semi-public sex, p in v, soft dom!oscar. sugar dating dynamics, tension tension tension!!!, probably inaccurate rallying mechanics, jealousy is a disease and mc is #terminal. title from chappell roan’s song of the same name. don’t like, don’t read. ꔮ commentary box: i will be honest: i didn’t realize people were actually reading this series that closely until i catalogued the asks following up on part two 🤕 a month later, here’s the newest installment!!! whew. buckle in, folks.. 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

You don’t see Oscar for the next three weeks. Not in person, anyway.

You’re in production mode now, slipping into early call times and late-night rewrites, blinking awake in cities that don’t remember your name. You barely have time to feed yourself, much less pine. Still, the gift arrives.

It’s couriered. No note, no flourish. A box, thick with understated weight, the kind of packaging that lets you know it’s expensive before you even open it. Inside: a rose gold Cartier bracelet. Slender and custom.

It catches the light when you hold it up, quiet and shining. There’s a small engraving on the inner clasp. An ‘O’ for ‘Oscar’. 

You stare at it for a moment longer than you mean to. You’re used to this—the curated luxury, the way he sneaks himself into your life through silk linings and subtle metal. And yet. There’s something about this one that unsettles you. Too personal. Too coordinated.

It feels… strategic.

You slip it onto your wrist anyway, watching the way it hangs off your skin. Pretty. It is, objectively, very pretty. But it also feels like a tracking device. A stake in the ground.

The suspicion rises before you can stop it. You hate yourself for it, but you reach for your phone anyway. Your thumb hovers, then types. Lando Norris.

The internet doesn’t make you wait. His name pulls up a flood of rally photos and interviews, shots of him behind the wheel, windswept and sharp and brighter than any twenty-something-year-old has the right to be.

You scroll for all of fourteen minutes, and then there it is. 

A photo taken just a few days ago. Lando at some event, standing a little off-center, all half-grin and awkward posture. Your eyes go straight to the bracelet on his wrist. White gold. Cartier.

Your stomach goes cold.

You zoom in, even though you already know.

It’s the same. Same design. Same curve. Same quiet opulence.

You shouldn’t care. You do.

Your fingers move before your pride can stop them.

You [10:03 PM]: is this a fucking joke to you

You [10:05 PM]: matching bracelets after the van cleefs????

You don’t expect a quick reply. Nonetheless, it comes almost immediately.

OP [10:06 PM]: Not exactly matching.

OP [10:07 PM]: His has a P engraving.

P for Piastri. Your phone dings a third time. 

OP [10:10 PM]: Two halves of the whole.

You stare at the screen.

You don’t reply. You close the text, the photo, the tab. You slide the bracelet off your wrist and walk over to your wardrobe. You open a small drawer near the back, one lined with old scripts and older grief, and place the bracelet inside. You shut it away. 

There. Let Oscar feel the silence this time.

You tell yourself you’re done. That the bracelet was the last straw, that you’re reclaiming your energy, your boundaries, your entire damn narrative.

An hour later, you’re looking him up again. 

Lando Norris. The name sits in your search bar like a bruise you can’t stop pressing. You always have been a bit of a masochist, haven’t you? 

At first, it’s shallow: old interviews, race day clips, blurry candids of him ducking under barricades and wiping sweat from his neck with a crooked grin. He talks with his hands. He laughs too easily. He shifts in his seat like he’s allergic to stillness. There’s a boyishness to him you hate yourself for noticing. A kind of vulnerability that doesn’t quite match the Cartier.

You keep going.

You start pulling threads, not loudly, not recklessly. You know better than to throw blood in the water. You ask questions in passing. Mention his name in the kind of tone that makes people think you’re just curious. You avoid the types who’d delight in gossip and instead find the quiet ones, the ones who owe you favors or know better than to speculate.

And eventually, you get your answer.

There’s been a new investor at M-Sport.

Oscar. Not directly, of course. Through one of his dummy corps. But the signature is there if you know where to look, and you know.

It hits you with a bitterness that starts behind your teeth. Oscar didn’t just gift him a bracelet. He bought his team a lifeline. M-Sport’s been circling mediocrity for years, always a step behind the giants like Toyota and Hyundai. Not anymore. Suddenly, they’re in the conversation. Suddenly, Lando’s not just pretty. He’s backed.

You slam your laptop shut so hard it rattles the stack of scripts beside it.

Your phone buzzes. Another message from Oscar. It’s the fifth one this week. You haven’t opened any of them. You haven’t returned his calls.

There’s a twisted satisfaction in knowing he’s reaching and getting nothing back.

You sink into the couch, fuming in that quiet, corrosive way you’ve perfected. It isn’t jealousy, but the insult. The choreography of it all. You were first. You were real.

And now, you’re matching accessories with a rally boy who probably still uses hair gel unironically.

You sit there, letting the silence thicken around you until your breathing evens out again. Oscar can keep texting. You’re not about to answer. 

With a twisted, perverse sort of satisfaction, you think to yourself: you don’t owe him shit. 

You expect to run into Oscar eventually. That’s how these things go. The industry’s a small, incestuous orbit, and he moves through it like gravity. You’re ready for him—the immaculate suit, the smooth deflection, the unnervingly sincere gaze.

You’re not ready for Lando.

He shows up at the gallery opening like a badly timed plot twist. You spot him across the room, halfway through a laugh that dies the second he sees you. He’s dressed like someone else picked his outfit. Tailored and effortless in a way that almost makes you forgive the Cartier. Almost.

You stiffen. He does too. It’s like watching two cats notice each other from across a rooftop. Before either of you can retreat, the press swoops in.

“Photo together? Just one! For the sponsors, darling, smile!”

You smile. You’ve done it a thousand times. You could do it in your sleep.

Lando stands beside you, the warmth of him brushing your bare arm. You pose like you don’t want to commit a crime. The cameras love it. You can already imagine the headlines. Stars align: Rising actress and rally driver spark buzz at modern art benefit. 

You give good angle. Lando gives decent jawline. The flashbulbs go off like gunfire. And then the crowd shifts, thins. It’s just the two of you again, too close.

“You look nice,” Lando says, then winces. Like it’s something he regrets immediately.

You angle a cool grin his way, just in case somebody’s looking. “Please don’t.”

His brows twitch. “What, be polite?”

“Pretend we’re anything other than collateral damage.”

That earns a beat of silence. Then: “You really hate me, huh?”

You take a sip of your champagne. It tastes like it was bottled out of spite. “Don’t flatter yourself,” you say through your smiling teeth. “I don’t think of you at all.”

Lando’s jaw ticks. “Is that why you asked around about me?”

Damn. You really have to start sorting through your sources. You sip from your champagne again before laughing once. Sharp, humorless. “I did my due diligence. Oscar tends to invest in things he shouldn’t.”

“Right,” Lando drawls. “Because you were such a sound investment.”

You turn your full gaze on him then, smile carved neat. “At least I didn’t come with training wheels.”

Whatever soft thing might’ve lived behind his eyes disappears. “You don’t know anything about me,” he says. 

Without missing a beat, you answer: “And I intend to keep it that way.”

You brush past him, your heels clicking, clicking, clicking on the sterile tiles of the art gallery.

Later, in the back of the town car, your phone lights up. Oscar has sent over a photo of you and Lando on the event carpet with nothing but a question mark. Even you have to admit: it’s picture perfect. Your posture and Lando’s smirk. 

You stare at it—the photo, the text, the implication—then you press your phone’s side button until the screen goes black. The pettiness, you decide, is still the only language you’re fluent in.

Oscar shows up on set without warning.

No text, no call. He merely materializes at the door of your trailer, all pressed slacks and stormcloud energy, standing like he owns the air around him. Which, technically, he might. There’s a singular knock, then the handle turns as if it never mattered whether you wanted to see him or not.

You don’t look up from the script in your lap.

“No visitors allowed,” you say flatly. “Unless you’re bringing lunch or a better third act.”

Oscar shuts the door behind him, calm in that unnerving way of his. But you’ve learned to read the tension in his jaw, the precise hold of his posture. He’s angry. Not loud-angry. Controlled-angry. Which is worse.

“Three weeks of silence,” he says, voice clipped. “You think that’s cute?”

You finally glance up, arching an eyebrow. “Cute isn’t in my contract.”

He steps closer. You hold your ground, even if your pulse is already tripping.

“Was it Lando?” you ask, too sharp. “Did he go crying to you about our little hallway chat?”

Oscar’s eyes flash. “You think I need him to tattle?”

“Wouldn’t be the first boy you needed him ‘stead of me.” 

That does it. Oscar crosses the space between you in a breath, fingers cupping your jaw with a precision that’s more command than comfort. You open your mouth to spit another line, but he swallows it whole—mouth on yours, sudden and searing. There’s nothing tentative about the kiss. It’s all teeth and reclamation. The taste of him is familiar and infuriating.

You kiss back because you’re not better than this. Because you’re worse.

You reach for control out of instinct, out of habit. Hands slipping under his jacket, trying to pivot the moment like you always do. But he catches your wrist.

His grip isn’t hard. It’s decisive. The kind that says: no.

He pulls back, just enough to speak against your lips. “You had it last time,” he says, voice low, as he speaks of control. “It’s my turn.” 

The room spins, and Oscar lifts you onto the table like it’s nothing.

Scripts scatter. A water bottle clatters to the floor. Your lipstick rolls off the edge and lands with a hollow thunk. You open your mouth to bitch about it, already halfway into a withering remark—

But his palm covers your mouth.

It’s far from cruel. It’s more firm than anything, like he’s daring you to keep talking.

His other hand is already pushing up your skirt. The drag of fabric over your thighs, the scrape of his knuckles against your skin—it’s fast, practiced. He tugs your underwear down without ceremony, lets it fall somewhere to the side like he doesn’t need to remember where it landed.

You try to speak again, something muffled behind his palm, something mean, probably. 

But then Oscar drops to his knees.

You freeze. Just for a second. Your head tips back when you feel him—mouth hot and unforgiving, tongue finding you with that unerring precision you hate that he still has. That no one else ever did.

The edge of the table digs into your spine, but you don’t care.

Your fingers go straight to his hair, threading, twisting, yanking. Hard. “Fuck,” you grit out, eyes squeezing shut. 

Oscar hisses into you but doesn’t stop. His grip tightens around your thigh, bruising now, anchoring you to the table as his mouth works you open. Every pass of his tongue is confident. Aggressive. He’s not trying to coax. He’s trying to conquer.

You tug harder. Maybe out of defiance. Maybe because you want to test if he’ll really take it.

He does.

He groans into you like the pain feeds him. Like your fury only turns him on.

You grind against his mouth. You can’t help it. The wet sounds fill the trailer, obscene and perfect, your breath catching every time his tongue flicks just right. You brace one hand on the table behind you, the other still twisted in his hair, anchoring yourself to the man who showed up uninvited and is now unraveling you as if he never left.

There’s a knock at the trailer door.

Sharp. Professional.

You freeze—just barely—but Oscar doesn’t.

He presses in harder, tongue curling wickedly, a low hum vibrating against you. It might almost be a laugh. 

“Hey!” Renee, your manager, calls from the other side. “They need you for press in five. You dressed yet?”

You slap at Oscar’s shoulder. He doesn’t move. You tug his hair, sharp. He moans into you instead. Bastard.

Somehow, you manage to pry his hand from your mouth. You clear your throat, try to level your voice. “Yeah!” you say shakily. “Just—changing now. Be out in a sec.”

There’s a pause.

“You okay?” Renee asks. 

Oscar grins against you. You can feel it, curling wickedly as he mouths at your clit. You grip the table edge so hard your knuckles ache.

“Fine,” you grit out. “Wardrobe’s just being a bitch.”

Renee huffs. “They always are. Hurry up, babe. I’ll stall.”

Her heels click away.

Silence returns—just your breath, hitched and uneven, and the filthy sound of Oscar’s mouth still working you over like he didn’t just make you lie to your manager.

You look down. He’s already watching you.

Half of his face is slick, chin shiny, eyes smug.

“You’re evil,” you breathe.

He drags his tongue across his lower lip, slow and deliberate. “You didn’t tell me to stop.”

You shove at his shoulder. He lets you push him back, laughing under his breath as he lands on the couch, sprawled like a man who knows he’s about to be punished and is counting the seconds.

You climb over him. Grip the back of the couch. Straddle his face like it’s owed.

“You want a show?” you murmur, looking down at him.

He doesn’t answer. He just opens his mouth.

You lower yourself slowly, deliberately, your skirt still hiked up, your thighs shaking from everything he's already done. He groans into you, hands clutching your hips now, no more games.

This time, you ride his face like it’s vengeance. Every drag of your hips, every twist of your body, is selfish. Focused. Desperate. You chase your own high with the single-mindedness of someone who knows what they want and isn’t above taking it. Your thighs tremble under the strain, knees digging into the cushions. Your grip on the couch back goes white-knuckled, nails digging into the upholstery. You’re close. Too close. But you don’t want to stop.

Oscar groans into you, mouth relentless, tongue ruthless. He’s always been good with his mouth—knows exactly how to weaponize it. He palms your ass with one hand, spreading you open, guiding your movements like he’s the one riding you. 

The other hand snakes between your legs. Two fingers dipping in without warning, sliding deep. They curl just right, just enough to make your vision blur.

You gasp, head snapping back, a hand flying to his hair to steady yourself. He groans again as you tug, and it only makes him hungrier. More determined.

He fucks you with his fingers while his mouth works your clit, slick and insistent, and it builds fast. Too fast. Too sharp. Your body pulses around him, breath caught in your chest.

You try to pull back, try to breathe, to pace yourself—but Oscar growls, low and dangerous, and yanks your hips down hard against his face.

The pressure snaps something in you.

You break. Loudly.

Your body jerks, the orgasm ripping through you so violently it almost knocks the air out of your lungs. You cry out, thighs clamped tight around his head, soaking him completely, shaking with the force of it. It’s raw. Brutal. Unfiltered. You forget yourself, forget him, forget everything that isn’t the way he has you undone.

You collapse forward, trembling. Muscles weak. Boneless. You slide off his face, breathing hard, already reaching for him, already ready to be fucked within an inch of your life—to be filled, stretched, ruined in the best possible way.

But he’s already standing.

He moves like nothing happened. Calm. Collected. The shift from giver to ghost happens fast. He straightens his shirt with one hand, the other casually wiping your slick from his face with the back of his wrist.

It hits you like a slap.

You stare up at him, lip parted, chest still heaving. There’s a flicker in your expression. Something softer. Almost hurt. You don’t even mean to let it show, but it does. That half-second of vulnerability before you can pull your face back into a mask.

Oscar sees it.

Steps in close. Presses a hand to your jaw, thumb brushing over the heat in your cheek like he’s marking it. 

Then he kisses you. Not rushed. Not filthy. It’s firm, solid, certain. Like he’s reminding you he could be gentle if he wanted to.

“You’ve got media," he murmurs against your lips, breath still warm, voice steady.

You swallow hard.

It would almost be tender—could almost pass for care, for something real—if not for the last thing he says. His voice drops low, clipped and sharp.

“Don’t ignore my texts again.”

He leaves in the next breath. 

Door swinging shut behind him like he never came in. Like you imagined it. Like none of this will show up on the call sheet.

You stand there, flushed and aching, panties somewhere on the floor, lip still bruised from his kiss.

You walk to the mirror. There’s a shake in your knees you don’t want to admit.

You pick up your lipstick.

You begin to fix your face like you aren’t wrecked from the inside out.

Against your better judgment—and definitely against your better mood—you find yourself at the Acropolis Rally in Athens. 

The dust settles like a second skin, the air sharp with engine exhaust and testosterone. You’re not sure what’s more absurd: the fact that you’re here researching for a potential role as a mechanic—a mechanic, Renee, really?—or the fact that you’re being escorted into the M-Sport garage like you belong.

Renee beams like she’s landed you the role of a lifetime. “It’s good PR,” she insists, nudging you past a cameraman. “Everyone loved the photo. You and Lando looked like a story.”

You wanted to burn that headline. You wanted to torch the entire narrative down to ash. The only story you and Lando are is a goddamn horror story. 

The rallying service park is rougher than F1 paddocks. More sweat than silk, the glamour peeled back to reveal grit and gravel and duct tape holding things together. It smells like burnt rubber, hot metal, and ambition. The mechanics shout over revving engines. Somewhere, someone blares Greek rap from a speaker zip-tied to a tent pole.

Lando’s leaning against a folding table when he spots you, sunglasses perched low on his nose. He’s mid-conversation, laughing with someone from his team. The moment he sees you, the sound drops out of his mouth like a missed gear.

Perfect.

You make your rounds: polite smiles, nods of recognition, half-curated charm. You pose beside a tire stack for a team photographer. You ask one of the engineers about torque distribution like you know what you’re talking about. You lean into your role, whatever it is today.

But when you catch Lando alone, half-shadowed by a stack of spare tires, you seize your moment.

“There are cameras everywhere,” you warn him lowly, sharp as flint.

He doesn’t even flinch. “You telling me how to play to a crowd now?”

You grit your teeth. “I’m telling you to play your part.”

His eyes drag over you, unapologetic, heavy-lidded.”"Didn’t realize I had a part. Thought I was just the plot twist.”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” you scoff. “You’re a subplot at best.”

Still, when you step back out into the open, he falls in line beside you. Places a hand at the small of your back, his touch just light enough to be proper. He steers you through the press like a gentleman. Like he cares.

You hate the way your body remembers the shape of him.

“Smile,” he murmurs through gritted teeth. You do. Barely.

The sun is brutal, glinting off chrome and carbon fiber. Your heels sink slightly into the gravel. A photographer calls your name. Someone shouts for Lando to give you a kiss. You both smile, ignore, burn. 

Someone from a local outlet asks the question like it’s a joke, but it lands like a dare: “Are you two dating?”

You both laugh again. Loud. Too loud. Your voices overlap in a clumsy crescendo, ringing false under the Greek sun.

“Good friends,” you manage, still smiling.

Lando throws in, “She just likes the way I drive.”

You elbow him. It looks playful. Feels like punishment.

He smiles for the cameras, but his jaw is tense. The heat swirls around you both, humid and mean. You can feel the unspoken bristling under the surface of every gesture.

You keep smiling. Through the heat, through the noise, through the sharp ache of playing second fiddle in someone else’s circus. You keep smiling. It’s the only thing that hasn’t betrayed you yet.

You watch Lando race from the M-Sport viewing tent—if you could call it that. It’s more of a canopy strung up with zip ties and hope, the folding chairs mismatched and creaking beneath their occupants. The monitor is grainy in the Greek sunlight, radio chatter low but constant. Still, there’s an energy that hums through it all. Static caught in your teeth.

It’s different, seeing him drive in person. 

You’d spent a night or two spiraling through highlight reels and fan edits, but the screen never captured the sheer brutality of it. How the gravel spits behind his tires like he’s in a war with the road, how the voices cut through the cockpit with surgical precision. 

Lando’s co-driver is Carlos Sainz Jr., legacy in every syllable. He calls notes with a calm that borders on poetic, but Lando’s response is pure instinct. Malicious, even. You tell yourself not to chalk it up to your presence. You fail.

You lean against the barrier, arms crossed, sunglasses perched. Renee’s a few steps behind, chatting up a junior engineer. Around you, the crew watches with the intensity of people who’ve bet more than money on the outcome.

“Fourth split’s good,” someone says near your ear. “We might pull a podium.”

You don’t contribute to the conversation. You just keep watching. Lando drives like he’s got something to prove. 

Hyundai and Toyota lock out the top two, but M-Sport’s number four car slides across the final time check in third. The team whoops. A mechanic throws his cap in the air. You clap, because you’re supposed to.

Lando climbs out of the car covered in dust and triumph. He peels off his helmet, runs a hand through his flattened curls, and scans the crowd. His eyes find yours. Briefly. No smile.

You give him the kind of nod that says: I saw. That’s all you get.

He nods back.

You turn before Renee can say anything smug. You don’t want to admit that he was brilliant. That he looked good doing it. That it stung a little to watch.

He’s already won too much in your eyes. You’re not about to hand him anything else.

Back in the car, air-conditioning on full blast and the Greek dust still clinging to your calves, Renee starts up again.

“One more thing,” she says, flipping through her iPad. “I swear, just one. Tiny. A post-race debrief. A fake coffee run. You don’t even have to speak. Just look... approachable.”

You let your head fall back against the seat. “Approachable is not in my contract.”

“I’m serious,” she says. “People are obsessed. The chemistry. The tension. That laugh.”

“That was us trying not to commit homicide in public.”

“Exactly,” she chirps. “So electric. Method acting gold. We spin it like research for the mechanic role. You’re investing in your craft.”

You groan. You’re ready to say no, ready to fake illness or sudden scheduling conflicts or a tragic allergy to overexposed PR stunts. But then, scrolling through your phone half-distracted, you pause.

There it is.

A blurry, poorly cropped photo of Oscar at some keynote event in Palo Alto, wearing a suit so sharp it could slice through tech stocks. The headline is meaningless. Some trite praise about young billionaires disrupting the scene again. But the comment section has already clocked it.

A hickey. Just visible above the crisp white line of his collar.

Your first thought is disbelief. Then bile. You’ve never marked him. Not where people could see. Not where he could pretend to be anything other than polished and untouchable.

And now Lando, baby-faced and barely housebroken, is laying claims?

You zoom in. It’s unmistakable. Not even tabloid trash can fake the shape of possession.

Oscar will get it scrubbed. That’s what he does. PR teams, SEO flooding, legal emails. The photo will vanish like it never existed. Like it was never meant to reach you.

Which makes it worse.

You stare at it until your vision blurs, fingers white around your phone.

“Fine,” you say, voice like cracked ice. Renee startles. “Set the thing with Lando. Whatever it is. Make it tasteful.”

You don’t mention the article. You don’t mention Oscar. But your voice is already a loaded gun, waiting to land on a target.

Renee grins. “You’re going to be brilliant.”

You already know that. It’s what you’re afraid of.

The museum is one of those cold, echoey affairs. White walls, marble floors, climate control so aggressive you wish you'd brought a sweater. You’re dressed for the cameras: cream trench, silk scarf knotted around your throat, sunglasses pushed back into your hair.

Lando, to your immediate irritation, is dressed like he’s wandered in off the street. Black hoodie, trainers, hair still damp from a morning shower. You wonder if he owns a mirror, let alone knows what a curated aesthetic is.

Renee trails behind with her phone, pretending to be part of the art-viewing public. You and Lando drift from painting to painting, toeing that thin line between civility and something sharper.

“You know,” you murmur, tilting your head at a particularly bleak oil portrait, “this was painted during the artist’s blue period. Which isn’t just about color. It was a response to trauma.”

“Oh?” Lando says, not looking at the plaque. “What was trauma? Choosing that scarf?”

You give him a brittle smile. “Charming. Really. No notes.”

“No need,” he replies. “You already take up all the space in the room.”

You keep moving. The cameras catch your silhouettes against brushstrokes and oil, the illusion of elegance hovering just barely intact. It goes like this for a while. You needle him about contrast and composition; he counters with jabs about snobbery and phoniness.

Then, when you’re sure you’re out of earshot, you speak, low and mean: “You left a mark on him.”

Lando freezes. You clock it instantly. Not smug. Not proud. Tense. “Was that your idea of a trophy?” you murmur. “A little branding, like he belongs to you now?”

He says nothing. His jaw ticks. That, more than anything, makes your blood buzz.

“Aw,” you coo, all mock-pity. “Are you in trouble now? Is daddy cross with you?”

His hand finds your elbow. Gently, but firm enough to steer.

“Hey—” you’re protesting, but he ignores you.

He pulls you behind a velvet rope into a roped-off corridor of under-restoration canvases. No cameras. No crowds. Just sterile quiet and the distant hush of HVAC.

“What the hell is your problem?” he demands, low and breathless. “Seriously. Do you want to ruin me, or just piss me off?”

You look at him, eyes sharp, pulse hammering. 

You jab a finger into Lando's chest. Harder than necessary. “You want to know my problem? You. You’re the problem. You’re not even worth the tax write-off.”

His hand shoots up, fingers curling tight around your wrist. It’s not painful. You almost wish it were. Instead, it’s hot and firm and infuriating.

“Careful,” he mutters. “You don’t want to say something you can't walk back.”

“Fucking try me, pretty boy.��

Your breath comes up shallow, all sound swallowed by the sealed-off corridor. The art behind you is cracked and crumbling. You’re vaguely aware of the absurdity—arguing with a man who shares your sugar daddy over half-peeled paint and humidity sensors.

“You think you matter to him?” you hiss. “You’re just a new toy. A shiny thing he can point at in meetings and say, ‘See? I have range.’”

Lando steps in. He’s close now. You can smell the faint trace of cologne, citrus and petrol. His gaze is molten. “And you think you’re different?” he drawls. “That you’re not just another pet project?”

You laugh, sharp and hollow. “At least I have talent.”

He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t rise to it. Just says, very quietly, “Then why are you so scared of me?”

You open your mouth to fire back. 

Lando cuts you off with a kiss.

There is no softness, no sweetness, no epiphany crashing down. It’s teeth and tongue and months of coiled resentment snapping loose all at once.

Your hands slam into his shoulders, maybe to push, maybe to steady. His grip slips from your wrist to your waist, dragging you in like he hates you and needs you in the same breath.

You should stop. You want to. Instead, you bite his lip harder than necessary.

His answering growl rattles through your ribs.

Your scarf ends up bunched in his fist. His hoodie rides up where your nails dig into his side. You’re pressed against the wall now, the marble chill bleeding through your coat. He kisses like he drives. Reckless, hungry, like the next second doesn’t matter as long as this one burns.

It’s loveless. It’s furious. It tastes like jealousy and something uglier beneath.

When his hand snakes up under your coat, groping at your breast through the silk of your blouse, you make a noise you don’t recognize. Your retaliation is swift and punishing: your palm glides down the front of his hoodie and grabs his semi through his jeans.

He hisses into your mouth. You swallow the sound.

“Thought you said you could handle this,” you hiss.

His teeth graze your jaw. “You think I can’t?”

Another kiss, sloppier now, like you’re both too angry to aim. All heat and friction, tongues clashing, hands clutching like you’re trying to bruise each other into silence. His hips roll forward, a broken rhythm, and you meet it with a twist of your wrist that makes him grunt into your mouth.

Your coat slides off your shoulder. He pushes it back up. You slap his hand away.

He bites your lower lip.

You shove him. Just once, hard in the chest. He stumbles back, chest heaving.

You don’t say anything.

Neither does he.

You both just breathe. Hard, heavy. Wrecked. 

It takes you a second to straighten. Another to re-knot your scarf, smooth your skirt, run a finger beneath each eye to check for mascara smudge. Lando does the same—tugs his hoodie down, rakes a hand through his hair like that’ll fix anything.

“We tell no one,” you say at last.

He nods. “Obviously.”

You glance at him. He’s still flushed. Lips swollen, eyes sharp. You’re not sure what you expected—some declaration, maybe. An apology. A punchline.

Instead, you both turn and head back toward the exhibit, the silence between you humming with something brittle. The kind of secret that bruises from the inside out.

You don’t feel guilty.

Not even a little.

Oscar’s main penthouse is glass and concrete and impossible views. You’ve been here before, more times than you can count. You know where the light switches are without looking. You know which kitchen drawer hides the wine opener, which closet hides a rotation of designer coats he swears he never wears. And yet, the space still feels like a showroom—untouched, curated, clinical in a way that tries to pretend it isn’t. A living catalog page.

Oscar makes it warmer. Or at least he used to. The illusion of comfort, of closeness. He’d walk barefoot through this place as if it belonged to him and you both. Pour you coffee in the morning like you hadn’t spent the night arguing. Run you a bath, pretending you weren’t already halfway out the door.

He kisses you in the elevator. Doesn’t wait. Hands on your hips like he’s grounding you. Or maybe claiming. You don’t bolt. You kiss him back, instinctually. It’s breath and oxygen all at once. Like you’re climbing him out of muscle memory more than anything else.

By the time the penthouse door swings open, you’re halfway out of your dress. Oscar shoves the rest of it off you with the kind of efficiency that makes your breath catch. His mouth finds your collarbone, then the slope of your throat. You dig your nails into his back, hard enough to leave marks.

Not guilty.

You’re on the kitchen counter. Then the arm of the sofa. Then the wall beside the piano no one plays. He fucks you like he’s making a point. Like you’re the point. Like he still knows every way to unravel you. You let him. You match him, beat for beat, breath for breath, your movements sharp and unyielding, his grip bruising.

Not guilty.

There’s lube somewhere, probably. Then none. Then your legs are shaking and your thoughts are hazy and Oscar is muttering something filthy into your ear about how much he missed you, his pretty little actress, his one and only girl. You pretend you don’t hear it. You pretend it didn’t catch on the softest part of your chest and pull.

Not guilty.

You’re in bed after, limbs tangled, hair damp with sweat, your pulse still erratic. Oscar is propped up on one elbow, watching you like he hasn’t already had you half a dozen ways tonight. Like he’s trying to memorize the look on your face. You hate how familiar it feels.

“You’re quiet,” he says plainly. “Where are you right now?”

You turn your head towards him—a sunflower to the sun. He’s trying for casual, but his brows are drawn, the line between them carved deep. His thumb brushes your arm, soft as a breath.

You don’t answer.

Instead, you lean in and kiss him. Hard. Deep. Like that might erase the question from his mouth. Like you can redirect the conversation with teeth.

He doesn’t ask again.

You tuck your face against his throat, exhale against his skin. Let the silence stretch.

And you don’t feel guilty.

You’re not sure if he’s trying to make up for something, or if this is just Oscar remembering how to play pretend—but two nights later, he takes you out. Not to some loud gala or a hyper-exclusive club, but to dinner. Just dinner. The kind with candlelight and a white tablecloth and a single wine glass already waiting by your plate.

The place is somewhere between elegant and forgettable. Tucked behind a florist on a narrow street in the 7th arrondissement. You only know it because Oscar sent you a drop pin with a message that simply read: Wear the dress from Rome.

You do.

It’s still soft with memory, silk clinging to your hips like it remembers the way he used to look at you. You wore it once in July, walking through Vatican museums hand in hand. The illusion of coupledom, then. Just like now.

Oscar stands when you arrive. Pulls out the chair for you. His hand lingers at the small of your back. He orders for you like always, but checks first. You nod. He says something about the Bordeaux being strong tonight. 

You almost ask if he brought Lando here last. Instead, you smile and agree that yes, the wine packs a punch.

Dinner is five courses. Rich in texture and impossible to pronounce. You manage most of it. Oscar watches you eat as if it’s an act of intimacy. You think maybe it is, in his books.

He tells you about a new deal. Something with fintech. He talks in code, like you’re the only one smart enough to decode it. He knows you aren’t in the mood to talk shop, but he tells you anyway, because this is his version of sharing.

You rest your chin on your hand and let the candlelight play tricks on your expression. You laugh when he says something dry. You don’t touch your phone once.

There is no mention of Lando.

Not from him. Not from you.

For an hour and a half, it almost feels like the old days. The time before there were labels. Before matching jewelry. Before boys with hickeys and press photos and jealousy you don’t want to call that.

Oscar pays in cash. He takes your coat from the hostess. He doesn’t offer you his arm on the walk to the car, but he does press his hand against your lower back again. Brief. Familiar. A whisper of warmth.

The car is waiting. Blacked out windows. Classical music humming low like a heartbeat.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” he asks, when you’re tucked inside.

You pause. Look at him. Try not to ruin it with your mouth. “You almost had me convinced,” you say, everything you mean to say barely restrained. 

Oscar smiles, slow and knowing. “Almost?”

You turn to the window. The city blurs past. 

“Almost,” you repeat, voice barely above a whisper.

You don’t look at him again. You don’t have to. His gaze burns into your side profile, hearing everything you’ve yet to say out loud.

The car doesn’t take you back to the penthouse.

Instead, it winds down unfamiliar streets until the city gives way to something flatter, edged in the muted glare of halogen lights. You glance up from your phone. Outside, there’s nothing but a sparse parking lot framed by sloping concrete and two parked cars.

One of them is Oscar’s Mercedes. The other, you don’t recognize.

“New acquisition?” you ask dryly, peering out the tinted window. The door unlocks with a subtle click.

Oscar doesn’t answer right away. Just slides out of the car and circles around to your side, hand outstretched as if this is some sort of romantic reveal.

You take his hand, stepping out in your heels, the pavement cool beneath your soles. There’s a hush to the place. The kind that clings around secrets.

“What is this?” you ask, narrowing your eyes. “You taking me somewhere to bury the body?”

“Don’t tempt me,” Oscar says, lips tugging into a faint smirk.

You open your mouth to press further when the rev of an engine slices through the silence. A moment later, a motorcycle comes into view, its single headlight cutting through the dusk. The rider leans into the curve before coming to a smooth stop beside you.

Lando fucking Norris.

He takes his helmet off. His curls are damp with sweat. For a moment, he looks like he might say something to you. But his face lights up the moment his eyes land on the unfamiliar car.

“No fucking way,” he breathes, striding over like a kid on Christmas morning. “Is that—? No.”

He circles the vehicle like it’s holy. You finally get a better look.

The car is sleek, low to the ground, painted in a shade of silver that borders on chrome under the artificial light. It’s a McLaren Sabre, no—a W1. One of only a handful in the world. Custom plates. Still with the dealer sticker clinging to the inside of the windshield.

Your stomach turns.

“Is it yours?” Lando asks, barely containing his grin.

Oscar hums noncommittally.

“You bought this,” you say, flat.

“He earned it,” Oscar responds patiently.

Lando spins around, wide-eyed. “Are you serious?” he sputters. “Oscar, this is—this is over two million. This isn’t a car, it’s a fucking spaceship.”

Oscar smiles like it’s all very ordinary.

You feel your pulse spike. Not from jealousy, not exactly. Something thornier. The kind of emotion that makes your chest feel tight with confusion, disbelief, a weird sense of betrayal.

Because you’ve been here before. Staring at something gorgeous and wondering how it managed to cost so much without anyone ever asking if it was worth it.

Oscar slides an arm around your waist. You stiffen.

“Say thank you,” he murmurs to Lando, tone warm but threaded with expectation.

Lando meets your gaze for half a second. There’s something unreadable there, a flicker of something unsure, maybe even guilt. Then he looks at Oscar and grins.

“Thank you. Seriously,” Lando breathes. “This is insane.”

You say nothing. You watch the light bounce off polished chrome, wondering when, exactly, the price of desire became so blinding.

You think, for a moment, that the spectacle is over. Lando’s practically vibrating beside the McLaren, already halfway to unlocking the door like he might vanish if he doesn’t touch it soon. You’re just about to excuse yourself with a snide remark and a practiced smile when Oscar says, casually, “Take it for a spin.”

Lando’s head jerks up. “Wait, seriously?”

“She’s warm. Street-ready.”

You cross your arms. “You had them prep it?”

Oscar shrugs. “Why not?”

Your eye twitches. Not for the first time, you contemplate the merits of leaving Oscar Piastri to rot. 

Lando is already opening the door, sliding into the driver’s seat with the same reckless ease he brings to everything else. He grins at the dash like it’s a lover he’s just met.

“Don’t get too cozy,” Oscar says lightly. “We’re following.”

Lando glances up. “What?”

Oscar nods to his Mercedes. “We’ll be behind you.”

You raise a brow. “We?”

Oscar turns to you, smile sharpened to something that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Passenger side,” he says. “With me.”

You hesitate, pulse spiking. “This your idea of an encore?”

“It’s an intermission,” he replies. “Get in.”

You glare at him, too tired for charm and too wired to hide your irritation. “You just had to ruin a perfectly good night, didn’t you?”

“I thought you liked dramatics.”

“Not when I’m the one being upstaged.”

His eyes flick over your face like he’s cataloguing every reaction. “You’re not.”

“Tell that to McLaren poster boy over there,” you spit. 

You make to turn away, but Oscar catches your wrist. “Get in the car,” he repeats. 

You hate how calm he is. How unbothered. You hate that you still respond to his voice, even as you try to shoot back, “And if I don’t?”

Oscar glances toward the McLaren, where Lando is now leaning against the door, watching you both with idle curiosity. Then back at you. “Then Lando wins by default.”

You swear you’re going to kill him one of these days. “This is a race?”

“Call it a demonstration.”

Your laugh is sharp. “Of what, exactly?”

“Control,” says Oscar. 

That gets you moving.

You stalk over to the Mercedes, heels clicking against the pavement like gunfire, and slide into the passenger seat beside Oscar. He joins you without hurry, settling behind the wheel with infuriating ease. You clip your seatbelt in with more force than necessary.

Lando starts the McLaren with a roar, pulling ahead a few feet. Just because he can. 

Oscar glances at you, one hand on the wheel. “You good?”

You don’t look at him. “Drive.”

The engine growls to life, smooth and deep like a predator purring.

You know exactly what this is.

It isn’t just a race. It never is with him.

The city unfolds like velvet, slick and dark, lit only by the occasional streetlamp or the blur of another car’s headlights as Oscar cuts through the night.

He’s not speaking. Neither are you.

You’re strapped in the passenger seat, arms crossed tight and throat tighter. The hum of the Mercedes beneath you is smooth and steady, but there’s a bite in how Oscar takes the corners. Like he’s punishing the road for something you’ve done.

You imagine Lando up ahead, gleeful and smug in the McLaren, probably pushing it to its limits. You picture the way his fingers must be tight on the wheel, the little grin that plays at his lips when he knows he’s in control. The car’s probably hugging every curve of the road, tail flirting with the edge of traction. 

You can see it. You hate that you can see it.

You hate more that you understand it.

Because you’ve felt it, too—that kind of joy. Not in a supercar, no, but in the gifts that felt like spells. The rare first editions, the impossible-to-find lipstick shade used by a 1960s French actress you once offhandedly mentioned loving. The Cartier box with its velvet lining, its subtle weight.

Oscar’s always known how to buy affection. It was just easier when you were the only one on the receipt.

So you decide to make him suffer a bit.

Your hand slides over the center console, featherlight at first. Just a breath of contact. Then your palm settles over the front of his slacks. Warm. Steady. Dangerous.

Oscar tenses. “Don’t.”

You ignore him, fingers moving with practiced indifference. Calculated irritation, rendered physical.

“This isn’t the time,” he says sharply, jaw clenching as he shifts in his seat.

You smile without looking at him. “You sure? You were the one who wanted to demonstrate control.”

His breath hitches as you press harder, slow and deliberate. The fabric of his slacks shifts beneath your touch, no longer smooth with composure.

“You’re going to make me crash,” he mutters.

“Then pull over.”

You watch the road ahead, unconcerned. Your fingers curl with intent. You can feel him hardening beneath your hand, despite the way he grips the steering wheel like it’s the only thing tethering him to restraint.

He doesn’t pull over right away.

But eventually, he swings the car back into the lot where it all started.

The McLaren is already parked.

Lando is leaning against it like a victor, arms crossed, head turned toward the direction you’ve come from. He doesn’t smirk. Doesn’t wave. He just watches.

Oscar kills the engine.

The silence crackles. He turns to you, not with heat, but with something colder. A kind of warning.

“Don’t weaponize me,” he says with a sort of edge that might be anger, if Oscar Piastri were capable of such emotion.

You tilt your chin, still breathing through the last remnants of that high. “Didn’t think I could.”

Oscar doesn’t reply. His hand slides off the wheel. He unbuckles his seatbelt, slides out his door, and comes over to your side. 

He drags you out with a grip that doesn’t bruise but brooks no argument. Your heels hit the pavement with a click that sounds far too loud in the stillness of the lot.

Lando straightens from his lean on the McLaren. He clocks the way Oscar moves you, the simmer just under the surface. His arms loosen at his sides. Expectant. Curious. There’s a flicker of wariness in his eyes. He senses it. He knows, now, what punishment might look like in Oscar’s books. 

Oscar doesn’t slow. Doesn’t give you a second to ask what this is.

He marches you to the front of his Mercedes, then he bends you over the hood.

Cold metal bites your thighs. The shock of it cuts through the leftover haze of your pride. You brace your hands on the curve of the hood, breath catching as you feel his palm slide up the back of your leg.

Your dress hikes.

Panic flashes hot and sudden. Your head snaps around. “Oscar—”

He leans in, mouth brushing your ear. His voice is low. Steady. “It’s private. I made sure of it,” he breathes. “No cameras. No foot traffic. We’re alone.”

You still.

He presses closer. “You have your safe word.”

Your heartbeat calms. Not all the way. But enough. You give the smallest of nods, relinquishing control. Trusting, wholeheartedly, that Oscar is a man of his word. 

He straightens.

Then calls out, sharp and clear: “Lando. Here.”

The older man flinches, then obeys. His footsteps crunch softly over the gravel. You keep your head low, pulse in your throat, the position humiliating and electric.

Lando stops just behind you.

Oscar doesn’t look at him. He only nods at the hem of your dress and says, “Hold this.”

There’s a beat.

Then Lando’s fingers are brushing your skin, tentative but obedient, lifting the fabric up and away. Exposing you. Holding you open.

The night hums around you, charged and brutal.

Oscar moves behind you. He doesn’t waste time.

One hand spreads you open, steady and assured. The other slides between your legs, fingers finding your heat with an ease that’s infuriating. You gasp despite yourself, forehead dropping to the curve of the car. Your breath fogs against the painted metal, the contrast of hot and cold cutting through you like a wire.

He hums. Approving. “Still so fucking tight,” he bites out, low and almost reverent.

His fingers start to move. Slow at first. Intentional. One presses in, curling just right, testing your give. You try to stay quiet, bite down on the noise that builds in your throat, but your hips twitch anyway, betraying you. Always betraying you.

He adds another, the glide merciless and smooth. You hiss, the sound sharp and broken. The burn is exquisite.

Oscar’s voice, clipped and cool, commands: “Lando. Mouth.”

There’s a beat of hesitation. Then Lando’s hand is over your mouth. Warm. A little unsure, but firm. You feel the slight tremble in his fingers, the stiffness of his posture as he settles into position.

Your eyes widen, breath flaring hot and desperate against his palm. You don’t look at him—you can’t—but you feel his presence, tethered close behind you, breath stuttering every time you moan.

Oscar works another finger in.

Three now.

Your knees nearly buckle. You whimper into Lando’s hand, the sound muffled and raw.

“Good girl,” Oscar drawls, dragging the words out like a velvet threat. “So hard-headed, and still so sweet underneath it.”

Your thighs tremble, helpless against the pressure building low in your belly. Your nails scrape against the hood, looking for something to ground you, but there’s no anchor strong enough.

He thrusts his fingers deeper, scissoring you open, making sure you feel every deliberate inch. Every twist and curl. “Look at her,” he says, not to you. “Mouthy little thing, always barking back. But when you get her like this—”

His palm presses hard against your clit, grinding down while he fucks you with his hand. “—she melts.”

Lando’s hand twitches against your mouth.

His breathing’s gone ragged. Your own chest shudders, barely able to contain the heat tightening through your spine.

“You agree, don’t you?” Oscar asks. “She’s pretty like this, isn’t she?”

Lando chokes. “Yeah.”

That’s all he manages.

You clench, involuntarily, the sound of Lando’s voice pushing you closer to the edge. It’s too much. Too many hands. Too many eyes. Your body doesn’t know who to react to first.

Oscar stills inside you, fingers rooted deep. You can feel his grin before you hear it. When he laughs, it’s low, and dark. Maybe a little cruel. Maybe a little delirious. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he says. “You like it when I talk about you like you’re not even here.”

You make a muffled sound—furious, desperate, and humiliatingly close to begging. Oscar gives you one deep, punishing thrust of his fingers.

“You keep squeezing me like that, baby, and I’ll think you like being shared,” he says. 

Then, softer. Almost sweet. “Bet you’d let him take you right here, wouldn’t you?” Oscar coos. “After everything. After the way you fight me, claw at me, talk back. You’d still open your legs for him if I told you to.”

You shake your head, a denial that barely lands. But your body’s already answering for you, hips tilting back into his hand, the wet, obscene sounds between your legs impossible to argue with.

“What do you think, Lando?” Oscar asks, tone casual but laced with fire. “Think she’d let you ruin her if I gave the word?”

Lando doesn’t speak. But you hear his breath catch, feel his fingers twitch.

You arch, caught between shame and something worse: the undeniable throb of want.

Oscar chuckles again, and it curls hot and heavy in your stomach. He presses his fingers in deeper, curls them again, and your vision goes white at the edges. There’s nowhere to run. No angle to hide. You’re held in place.

Oscar’s fingers slide out of you slow. Too slow.

The sudden emptiness is unbearable. Your hips twitch toward nothing, chest tight with need. For a split second, you’re wild enough to think about begging Lando—his hand still over your mouth, his breath shallow somewhere behind you—just to keep you filled. Just to hold the shape of it.

But then comes the click.

Oscar’s belt. The metal, the leather. The way it slices the quiet of the parking lot. You squeeze your eyes shut. 

There’s a rustle, the sound of fabric shifting, being shoved down. A zipper. A sharp inhale.

Then Oscar speaks, low and unreadable. Something quiet, just for Lando.

The hand at your mouth twitches, then lifts. You gasp in your first breath, ragged and hot.

And Lando’s fingers are suddenly in your mouth.

Two of them. Just like that. No warning.

Your jaw parts around the intrusion, a half-formed curse curling behind your tongue. Your teeth scrape against his knuckles, the barest hint of a threat. A warning.

But then Oscar pushes into you.

All of him. All at once.

You moan around Lando’s fingers, the sound muffled and obscene. Your body arches off the hood in one hard line, instinct and surrender colliding like a spark. You suck Lando’s fingers in deeper to keep from screaming.

Oscar doesn’t stop. He presses in slow but unrelenting, dragging the stretch out, letting you feel it.

Behind you, Lando stutters out a curse.

Somewhere beneath the pleasure, the power, the dizzy, dripping ache—you smile against his hand.

It’s nice to know you can still bring men to their knees.

You let Oscar fuck into you.

Each thrust is a warning. A punishment. A claim. Oscar doesn’t hold back, hips snapping forward, cock hitting deep and deliberate. Your nails scrape across the curve of the Mercedes, trying to hold yourself up against the sting of it—the pleasure, the pace, the way he splits you open like he’s owed this. 

It’s raw, unrelenting, and entirely by design. Each snap of his hips pulls a whimper from your throat, a low, breathy sound swallowed by the roar of blood in your ears. You barely register Lando moving until you feel his free hand.

The other is now pressing your shoulder down against the hood. It’s solid and stabilizing, just on the right side of being rough. His fingertips tremble slightly against your skin, betraying nerves he doesn’t speak. You can feel the tremor of his restraint, the electricity dancing up from his palms. There’s hunger in his stillness, reverence in the way he holds you steady.

He doesn’t let go.

You shudder, every nerve lit and overstimulated, your body fighting the urge to arch back, to push harder into Oscar’s merciless rhythm.

Oscar groans behind you, low and smug. “You feel that, baby? That stretch? That’s what happens when you act out.”

You moan around Lando’s fingers, still stuffed in your mouth, pressed between your teeth. Saliva slicks your chin, drips to your collarbone, but you don’t care. You’re too far gone to care. You’re trembling, half-wrecked already, and nowhere near done.

“So pretty when you can’t talk back,” Oscar mutters, voice ragged. “Bet you like this, huh? Bent over, put in your place. Bet you dream about it.”

He picks up the pace. Harder. Sharper. Every thrust drives you forward, makes the metal groan beneath your weight.

“What do you think, Lando? She look good like this? Think she’s learned her lesson yet?”

Lando doesn’t answer right away. His silence is deafening. You can hear him breathing heavily, can feel the heat of it ghosting down your spine. The sound alone—ragged, uneven—almost sends another wave of heat through you.

You finally turn your head, eyes wet and half-wild, lips parting to taunt or beg or both.

And freeze.

Lando’s fingers are still in your mouth, but his lips are locked on Oscar’s.

The two of them, mouths slick and open, kissing like they forgot you were between them. Tongues, teeth, groans vibrating against your back. It’s filthy. Brazen. Unapologetic. There’s no gentleness to it, only a kind of desperate hunger, like they’ve both been waiting too long to admit how badly they needed this. 

Something ugly twists in your chest.

Jealousy. Rage. Something hot and sharp that makes your eyes sting and your throat tighten. A knot of emotion that you refuse to name, not here, not now. You don’t want to admit how much it hurts.

You tighten around Oscar without meaning to, the swell of emotion crashing against the low, coiling heat in your belly. Your body betrays you. 

Oscar pulls back from Lando with a gasp. Oscar is looking down at you, now, eyes a little wide. Like somehow you’ve managed to surprise him. “That get you there, baby?” he croaks. “You gonna come for me? Huh? You gonna finish while he watches you fall apart?”

You try to spit something back, something mean and cutting, something to make them both feel the knife-edge of what they’ve done—but all that leaves your throat is a guttural sound, ripped raw by the orgasm already breaking.

You come hard.

Slammed open by sensation, your body convulsing around Oscar, your knees buckling, fingers curled into the metal of the car like it might keep you from floating away. Lando’s grip on you tightens, keeps you grounded, keeps you real. The tension in your thighs snaps, the wave overtaking you in crash after crash, a storm that refuses to pass.

Oscar curses behind you, the pace of his thrusts faltering for just a second before he grits his teeth and drives forward again. Like he can fuck the jealousy out of you. Like he can outrun the feelings he swears don’t exist. Like he can drown you both in the madness of it. You feel split wide open.

You hate them both.

You hate the way they do this. The way they control the tempo, the room, the air. The way they touch without asking. The way they both make you want more.

But you love this.

God help you, you love this. You love the chaos. The hunger. The game. And worse than that—you love that you never know who’s going to break first.

Oscar finishes with a grunt, buried to the hilt, fingers digging into your hips like he’s afraid you’ll disappear. The warmth of him spreads hot and thick inside you, and you clench around it instinctively, a whimper escaping past Lando’s fingers still ghosting your lips.

It’s involuntary, that flutter of muscle, the greedy way your body tries to keep him. A reflex carved from too many nights of knowing exactly how this ends.

You think that’s it.

It’s not.

Oscar slips out only long enough to drag his fingers through the mess he left behind—then pushes them back in. You jolt forward, a sharp gasp ricocheting off the hood of the Mercedes. “F-fuck—” you hiss, the word bitten out around Lando’s fingers. 

Oscar doesn’t relent.

Two fingers, then three. Precise. Brutal. His movements are relentless, curling just right, grazing that devastating spot with each thrust. 

Your slick spills down your thighs, and you’re soaked again, somehow, impossibly. Your body raw and twitching, every nerve ending screaming and protesting, every muscle tight and trembling. Overstimulated, overwhelmed, undone.

Lando watches from too close, his face flushed, pupils blown wide with lust. Without instruction or preamble, his hand cups your breast, thumb brushing over your nipple through your dress with shaky reverence. 

You let him. Because it feels good. Because Lando’s hands are large and calloused, and it gives you something to focus on outside from the way Oscar’s fingering you to next week. 

Lando breathing hard, mouthing at Oscar’s neck between strokes, trying to ground himself. Trying not to come from just watching.

Lando looks at you like he doesn’t know whether to worship or beg. You’re too far gone to warn him.

“Sensitive little thing, aren’t you?” Oscar coos against your ear. His breath is hot, and his tone carries that vicious affection that makes your stomach twist. His fingers remain merciless, scissoring open, pushing deeper. “Can’t even take it. Soaked for us and still trying to hold it in. You love it. You fucking love it.”

You arch, body trying to outrun it, but he holds you in place with one hand on the small of your back. No escape. Only sensation.

“Lando,” he says, voice sharp now. Commanding. “Kiss her.”

You’re already close again, everything rushing up too fast, too soon—but that stops you cold. The order, the implication. The edge it carries.

Lando falters.

Oscar adds, voice smooth and cruel, “Go on. You did it at the museum.”

Silence detonates.

You freeze. Rigid as stone.

Lando pulls back, mouth parting like he wants to speak. He doesn’t. His hand slips from your chest. The heat in his face is no longer arousal. It’s shock.

Oscar keeps working on you like nothing’s happened. Like he hasn’t just cracked the ground open beneath both of you. Like he hasn’t twisted the knife.

You clench around him again, more from instinct than desire, but your body doesn’t care. The orgasm crashes over you with the precision of a well-timed ambush. Sharp. Trembling. Devastating.

You moan into the car hood, one arm buckling beneath you. The metal stings your cheek, grounding you while your world shatters for the second time in minutes.

Oscar finally slows, fingers easing out. He rubs the mess across your inner thigh

You’re trembling. Wrung out. Chest heaving. You don’t even know what expression your face is holding anymore. You just know it’s toomuchtoomuchtoomuch.

He kisses the back of your shoulder, the bare skin between your dress and spine. An apology at best. A warning, really, if you thought about it. 

“Alright,” says Oscar. “That’s enough. Clean up.”

He straightens his clothes, belt cinched tight again, every button done up like he didn’t just gut you open for sport.

“We’re settled now,” he says coolly. 

You don’t believe it for a second.

And when you look over your shoulder to glance at Lando—impossibly hard in his jeans, expression betraying the guilt you’ve kept at bay—

You don’t think he does either. ⛐

[papayareads]

i must have died and went to heaven (or hell tbh)

WHAT in the actual fuck have you done i´m a sucker for the truly phenomenal realness in kaes writing like:

He slows, the bastard.

i felt that theres so much more to say about this story but my brain is fried with the pure hotness

watch this be the wrong thing ⛐ 𝐎𝐏𝟖𝟏

“say it again,” he murmurs, pressing against you. “say thank you, oscar.” (or: unbeknownst to you, the person you’ve been sexting might just be somebody you know.)

ꔮ starring: oscar piastri x reader. ꔮ word count: 5.7k. ꔮ includes: smut, romance. profanity. pwp-ish, soft dom!oscar, sexting, guided masturbation [f], oral [m], praise & degradation, p in v. title from (and fic inspired by) gracie abrams’ risk. commissioned!!! 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

To cut him some slack, he had been honest from the very beginning.

You joined the app on a Friday. Not a rock-bottom Friday. Not a tipsy one, either. Just—a Friday. Grey sky, lukewarm coffee, inbox full of half-asks and ghostings. The app was called Velour. Marketed as ‘the thinking person’s thirst trap.’ A place for people who allegedly read books before they fucked. Where bios quoted Rilke and still managed to ask what color your panties were.

He had no face, no name. Just ‘O.’

A location that blinked Melbourne like a dare, and five black-and-white photos that managed to say everything and nothing at once. Cropped close. A mouth, a hand, the outline of a shoulder. A pair of thighs in compression shorts that frankly should have been illegal. You’d stared too long at that one. There was no context or caption, only the unspoken promise of ruin.

You told yourself you were there for amusement. For attention you could throw away. You uploaded one photo. Jaw turned, mouth parted, collarbone exposed. Let them wonder. Your bio read: said i wouldn’t do it. look at me now. 

Then you swiped. And swiped. And swiped. Until you found him. 

You hovered on the profile longer than you meant to. He had athlete written all over him—but in the subtle way. The kind that didn’t need to shout. The kind that let the shape of a thigh do the heavy lifting.

You matched in under an hour.

He messaged first. 

O: You look like you'd break hearts for sport.

You: only on weekends.

O: Lucky it’s Friday, then.

The rhythm established itself fast. Snark edged with suggestion. A kind of conversational sparring that hummed beneath your skin. He was quick. Dry. Almost too confident, but not in the overcompensating way. In the way of someone who knew what they looked like when they made you come.

O: What are you wearing?

You: what makes you think I’m wearing anything?

O: God, you’re going to be a problem.

You: that’s the hope.

You asked once, joking, if he was some kind of model. He wrote:

O: Not professionally. But people look.

So, yes. He never lied.

It’s partly on you. You never asked for a face. The not-knowing made it worse. Better. More dangerous. Your imagination filled in the blanks with reckless confidence. His voice, when he finally sent a voice note, was low. Smooth. A little amused, a little deliberate.

“Say please,” he’d said in jest, and you replayed it a couple of times in the dead of the night.

You hadn’t swiped on anyone since. Not once. Not when you were bored. Not even when he took twelve hours to reply and you told yourself you didn’t care. The messages became a fixture. A heartbeat.

You’d catch yourself reading and rereading his replies like they were scripture. One hand between your legs. One word in your mouth. You never told him how far he’d gotten under your skin. He never asked.

You should have known.

Maybe not at first. Not in the beginning, when it was all thigh pictures and veiled threats and that smirking voice note that made your knees go warm. But later. Somewhere between the third and fourth night he sent you a recording at two in the morning, voice dipped low and rough with sleep—or maybe just want.

“Touch yourself,” he had murmured. A rasp. Something peeled open. “Slowly. I want you aching first.”

And you did it. God, you did it. Hand slipping under the waistband of your sleep shorts like muscle memory, breath catching as you recorded something back—a whispered thank you, half a whimper. A photo, too. Of the aftermath. Of what he could reduce you to. 

You’d never been this person before. Not with strangers. Not even with the ones who weren’t strangers. But something about O made it feel less transactional. 

It wasn’t just about the sex. He told you little things in the witching hours, when neither of you could sleep and your phones became lifelines.

O: Had a girl once. Didn’t work out.

You didn’t ask why. You didn’t have to. The way he wrote it told you enough. And more: 

O: Got a place in Melbourne. Not there much.

You: why not?

O: Work. Travel. Same old.

He never said what he did. You didn’t ask. 

There were nights he’d vanish. You’d tell yourself not to care. You’d go to the gym, go to sleep, try to fuck someone else and never follow through. And then he’d reappear with a two-minute audio clip that would leave you soaked and shaking.

You remember one in particular. The voice, deeper than usual. Accent thicker. Like he’d stopped pretending to be anonymous.

“Good girl,” he said after you sent him a recording of your own. Barely a whisper, just the sound of your breathing, your fingers, his name almost slipping out. “That’s it. Bet you’re so fucking wet right now. You always are for me.”

You should have known.

But you were sleep-deprived. Starved. Touch-drunk on someone you’d never seen, never held, and yet felt like you already knew.

Three days later, he asked if you wanted to meet.

O: You still up?

You: always for you.

O: Meet me. Tomorrow night. Your side of the city.

You: you sure you want to break the spell?

O: I want to see you fall apart in person.

You stared at the screen for a long time. Your mouth dry. Your legs already aching. You typed and deleted three different versions of yes before you landed on a simple thumbs up.

He sent a location pin as a reply. 

A restaurant. Not far. Not loud. Expensive enough to say this wasn’t just about sex, but discreet enough for you to wonder what you were getting into. 

You charged your phone. Shaved everything. Told yourself this was just another night. That you wouldn’t be disappointed, wouldn’t be shocked. That he could be some balding tech bro or a failed actor or worse, and you’d still survive it.

But deep down, you knew.

Maybe not the whole truth. You knew, instead, that this would ruin you one way or another. 

On the day of, you see him before he sees you. Or maybe he sees you first and just pretends he doesn’t. Either way, there’s a lag. A beat suspended between knowing and not-knowing. Then he walks over.

Baseball cap. Hoodie. Sunglasses, even though it’s dark inside and no one here gives a shit. Dressed like a man trying very hard not to be looked at, which, of course, makes everyone look twice.

He takes the seat across from you.

You stare.

Not at the mouth, which you’ve imagined. Not at the hands, which you’ve dreamt of. Not even at the jaw, sharp and familiar. No.

The eyes.

That’s what does it.

You exhale. Slow. Controlled. “You’re joking.”

He lifts the menu. “Hi to you too.”

“You’re fucking joking.”

“I’m really not.”

“Oscar Piastri?” you say it low, like a curse. He flinches anyway.

“Technically,” he says, adjusting his cap, “I never told you I wasn’t.”

You scoff. Sharp. Disbelieving. “Oh, fuck off with that.”

“Did I ever give you a fake name?”

“No,” you admit. “Just a letter. Like a Bond villain.”

His mouth twitches. Not quite a smile, but close. “Did I lie about where I live?”

“No.”

“Did I say I wasn’t Australian?”

You fold your arms. “So that’s the bar, then? You didn’t technically lie, so everything’s fair game?”

He sets the menu down. His hands are steady. “I didn’t lie,” he repeats, quieter now. More serious. “I just didn’t say everything.”

Your gaze narrows. “And what, exactly, were you omitting?”

He shrugs, like it's nothing. Like it's obvious. “That I’m me.”

“You are,” you agree flatly. “Which is exactly the problem.”

He tilts his head, a mockery of innocence. “How do you know who I am?”

“Don’t bullshit me like that,” you huff. 

“I’m not bullshitting anyone.”

“You drive for McLaren. You’re on billboards. You’re on TikTok. You're on the back of some guy's hoodie literally right now,” you say, jerking your chin toward a fan near the bar. “I live in this country. Everyone either wants to marry you or throw eggs at your car."

He smiles, crooked. “And you?”

You pick up your water glass. Raise it halfway to your mouth.

He watches. Waiting.

“Do you love me or hate me?” he rephrases. 

You sip. Let the silence stretch. Let it smolder.

He doesn’t know, you think. He doesn’t realize he’s already made you come four times with just his voice. Doesn’t realize you still keep one of the recordings saved under a boring filename, like MeetingNotes.mp3, so no one ever asks.

You swallow. Set the glass down gently. “Ask me again after dessert.”

His grin sharpens. He leans forward, arms braced on the table, voice low and amused. “If dessert’s anything like your last voice note,” he stage-whispers, “we’re both fucked."

You just smile in response. A little cruel. A little inviting.

Dinner is—annoyingly perfect.

The food is forgettable. The conversation, less so.

Oscar is better in person than you want him to be. Wry. Self-contained. Polite, but not boring. He orders sparkling water and something seared. You get pasta you won’t finish. He doesn’t talk about the car, or the team, or what it’s like to be twenty-something and publicly dissected. 

Instead, he tells you about the time he forgot his passport before a flight to Singapore, about a hotel in Japan where the toilet kept playing jazz, about how he once learned to cook for his ex and now only knows how to make three elaborate dishes he no longer eats.

Sometimes, when he hits the punchline, his voice dips. A cadence that slides lower, smooths out. The accent thickens. Familiar. Unmistakable.

It hits you like a bruise. He’s used that voice on you. You grip the stem of your glass a little tighter, and he notices. 

“You’re staring,” he says lightly, not looking up from his plate.

You arch a brow. “So are you.”

He shrugs, barely containing a smile. “Only fair.”

The rest of the meal passes in rhythm. You say something cutting. He volleys it back. There’s a pulse beneath every word. You can feel it in your knee bouncing under the table. In the way he keeps adjusting his sleeves, his watch, the angle of his posture.

Then, without ceremony, he calls for the bill.

It arrives like a closing chapter. No questions asked. No pretense. The decision already made.

He walks you to the curb with one hand in his pocket and the other brushing yours just enough to make your pulse trip. He doesn’t ask where you’re both heading. 

Neither of you speak on the cab ride. Tension coils in the silence, warm and anticipatory. Your thighs press together. His knee bumps yours once and neither of you moves away. He watches the city roll by. You watch the reflection of his jaw in the window.

By the time you get to your building, you’re drowning in it. Want. Nerves. That stupid, low ache he used to pull from you with nothing but a breath in your ear.

He follows you up without asking. You unlock your door with hands that only barely shake. Step aside.

He enters like he’s been here before, like he owns it. Maybe he does. A little.

You close the door behind you. Lean your back against it. Heart banging like it wants out. Oscar turns. Looks at you. Doesn’t move.

“You gonna kiss me,” you ask, voice too steady, “or just stand there like a fucking statue?”

His mouth curves. Slow. Measured. “Was waiting for the invitation.”

You walk toward him with something sharper than grace. Hunger dressed in confidence. He doesn't step back, but doesn't reach first.

You kiss him like it costs you.

Because it does.

Oscar kisses you like he’s starving.

Because he is.

Your hands find his jaw. His neck. The hair at the back of his head. His grip lands on your waist, then your hips, then your ass. He pulls you closer, and it’s like gravity itself rearranges.

You already know he’s going to be your favorite mistake.

The bedroom is darker than you left it.

Oscar doesn’t ask to be led. He walks in like he knows the way—flicks the light on low, toes off his shoes, rolls up his sleeves. You pause in the doorway. He glances back.

“Are you going to hover there all night, or…”

You arch a brow. “Or?”

Oscar grins. It’s lazy and confident, the way you’ve seen in those Instagram reels where he’s being sprayed with champagne. “Or you can come show me how grateful you are I didn’t bail.”

You scoff, but your feet move anyway.

He reaches for you halfway across the room, tugging you close by the waist. Hands hot and steady. When his mouth brushes yours again, it’s rougher. His tongue dips in like he owns the space. Like he’s checking if it’s still his.

You pull back just enough to speak. “You think you’re cocky enough for both of us?” you breathe. 

“Oh, sweetheart.” That damned accent. Uncut. All bite and heat now, slinking down your spine. “You haven’t seen cocky yet.”

He kisses you again. Deeper this time. His teeth scrape your bottom lip, and your knees nearly buckle. His hand slides between your legs, cupping through your clothes. You have to bite back a groan. 

He freezes. Pulls back just enough to murmur against your mouth. “Christ. You’re soaked.”

Your face heats. You go to swat his hand away, but he catches your wrist, fingers curling around it tight. Not painful. Commanding. “Don’t.”

The word lands like a struck match.

You glare up at him. “Don’t what?”

He steps back, dragging you with him until the backs of your knees hit the bed. Then he lets go. “Lie back,” he commands. 

You don’t move.

He tilts his head. Patient. Dangerous. “C’mon. You know how this goes,” he says. “I’ve heard you. Watched you.”

Your throat tightens. Heat curls, low and shaming. “You want me to—”

“Touch yourself, yeah.”

He says it like a challenge. Like a dare. Like he already knows you’re going to.

You hesitate. Try to find some footing in wit. Pride. Something. “Bit arrogant, aren’t you?”

Oscar raises one shoulder in a shrug, then steps back and lowers himself into your desk chair, spreading his thighs like he’s settling in for a show. That stupid fucking hoodie still on. That face calm, unreadable, but eyes already locked to your hands.

“Not arrogance if I’m right.”

You sit. Slowly. Let the silence drag.

His tone softens. Just a notch. “You want to stop, say it. I’ll go.”

You don’t.

You stretch out against the mattress, spine arching, one hand brushing up under your dress. Slowly. Testing.

His breath catches. Just barely. But it counts.

You pull your dress up. The air bites at the wet heat between your thighs. He sees it. Sees all of you now, bare and hesitant and trembling despite the attitude.

“There we go,” he murmurs. “Attagirl.”

You flush hard.

His voice, when it comes again, is the same one from the recordings.

Low. Measured. Laced with that accent that makes you ache in places you didn’t know could ache. The kind of voice that doesn’t ask. It tells. Demands. Wraps around your spine and pulls.

“Start slow,” he says. “Middle finger first. You know where.”

You hesitate. Maybe on principle. Maybe out of spite. His gaze doesn’t waver.

You part your thighs, breath trembling, and slip your hand between them. Skin already flushed, hypersensitive. One touch and you’re jolting like you’ve been struck. There’s too much heat. Too much memory. Too much of him already lodged inside your head.

The way he looks at you like you’re art and ammunition at once. Something precious. Something dangerous. His to admire. His to detonate.

He leans back in your chair—your chair—and makes it his. Arms crossed. Legs spread. Casual dominance wrapped in a stupid McLaren jacket. 

“Perfect,” he murmurs, just above a whisper, just enough to sting. “Now pull those pretty little panties to the side, yeah?” 

You slide your finger through the slick heat pooling between your thighs, pressing in just enough to tease. Not enough to satisfy. Not yet. You arch, a quiet curse slipping through clenched teeth. You can feel your heartbeat everywhere.

“God,” you hiss. “Please—”

He cuts you off with a look that’s amused, stern, and fucking devastating. “Don’t beg. Not yet,” he says. “You’re the one who got yourself off without me all this time. Show me how.”

You want to hit him. You want to kiss him. You glare instead, but your hand doesn’t stop moving. Faster now, the slick sound of it filling the room.

Shame and arousal knot together. Coiling.

Oscar’s next command slices through the air like a whip. “Two fingers.”

You obey. You hate that you do. You love that he knows you will. You slide in a second finger, walls clenching around the stretch, breath catching in your throat. You’re wetter than you thought possible—your body a traitor, your pride fraying at the seams.

The sounds you’re making now are shameless. Gasps. Moans. Pleas that you swallow back before they fall.

Oscar watches like a critic. Like he’s appraising a performance he commissioned.

“Fuck, look at you,” he drawls. “Dripping all over your sheets like a filthy little thing.”

Your eyes squeeze shut, shivering from the inside out.

“Open your eyes,” he snaps. “I want you watching me while you fall apart.”

You listen. And you’re close now—so close your legs twitch from the tension, the ache curling under your skin like fire. “Holy shit,” you breathe, and Oscar takes it as a sign to dole out his next order. 

“Faster. Come on,” he prompts. “Fuck yourself like you mean it.”

You don’t think. You just do. Obeying the voice that’s ruined you so many times before. Your wrist strains and your body trembles; everything else disappears.

He tilts his head, that cruel smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “What’s the matter? Need my cock already?”

You whimper. It escapes you before you can bite it back. Your wrist stutters. You wince.

His eyes flash, sharp. “Keep going. I didn’t say stop.”

“Oscar—”

“You’re so greedy, aren't you? Want me to do all the work,” he taunts. “Want to lie there, all needy and wet, and be ruined. But you can do this. You’ve done it before.”

You’re a breath away now. A single exhale from breaking. Everything inside you is wound tight and aching for release. A sob crawls out from the back of your throat as you go back to pumping your fingers into your sopping cunt, trying to chase pleasure for the man coaxing you towards it. 

Oscar softens, just slightly. Just enough to make it worse. 

“Good girl. Come for me,” he says. “Come just like you did the night I told you to come on your fingers and thank me after."

And you do.

It hits like a wave—sudden and brutal. Your whole body locks, jerks, shatters around your own hand. You sob his name. Mouth open, eyes wide. Locked on his.

You’re still twitching when he lunges.

Oscar’s mouth catches yours mid-breath, swallowing your shudder. It’s not gentle. It’s selfish. Desperate. The kind of kiss that tastes like claiming and salt and the bruised edge of your own name.

You gasp into it, and he’s already over you, under you, everywhere. All teeth and hands and heat. Fingers slick from your own body. Tongue pressing past your lips as if he owns the next breath you’ll take.

Clothes disappear in pieces. Dress shoved up, then off. His shirt peeled from his skin. Fingers catching in your straps, tugging them down your arms. He kisses the hollow of your throat, then bites the underside of your. Your hips squirm as he presses a thigh between them, pinning you down, rolling against you. It’s clumsy, chaotic, intimate in a way that feels dangerous.

“Fuck,” he hisses into your mouth. “I’ve thought about this. So many times. You like this part, don’t you? Being spread out. Slick. Shaking. Waiting for someone to make you come again.”

You try to speak, but he steals your answer with another kiss. Deep, consuming. He doesn’t let you come down. He only keeps pushing, talking, layering heat over heat until your mind goes foggy with it.

“You know what got me off the hardest? The idea of your fingers deep inside, while I talked you through it. And you were doing it. Weren’t you? Playing along like a good little whore. Sending me photos. Moaning my name like you knew it already.”

His hand slides down your side, grazing your breast, your ribs, the trembling dip of your waist. He palms your thigh, pushes it open wider.

“Oh my God,” you manage to choke out, just as he moves back to strip away his clothes. 

Shirt, pants, briefs. It’s almost clinical, the way he undresses. Efficient. No hesitation. No shame.

And then he’s there. Gloriously there. Pale cock standing at attention, with an angry red tip leaking like a faucet. 

You blink. You stammer.

It’s the first time you’ve seen him like this. Hard and flushed and heavy, thick veins along the shaft. And it’s—bigger than expected. Realer than you let yourself imagine.

Your breath catches. Your thighs tense.

He notices. Oscar’s voice drops, losing some of its edge. It’s not gone, but it’s muted. Softer. Measured.

“You alright?” he asks, cocking his head. There’s a gentleness to his eyes that makes your heart ache and your clit throb. “You can tap out. I mean it. I won’t be mad.”

Your mouth is dry. Your thighs are wet. You nod, then, realizing you need to say something out loud, you whisper, “I want this. Want you.” 

The moment stretches. A beat. A breath. His hand brushes your knee, the gesture grounding. Patient.

His smile returns. Slow. Wolfish. “Good,” he hums, “because I’m going to ruin you.”

He crawls back over you, dragging the head of his cock through your slick folds, teasing your entrance but not pushing in. Yet.

“Gonna fuck you slow first,” he murmurs, voice thick. “Make you feel every inch. Then I’ll fuck you the way I’ve been thinking about since the first time you sent me that little audio message. You remember? All breathless, whispering thank you like you were praying.”

His fingers dig into your hips, holding you steady as he shifts forward.

“Thought about you with your legs spread, touching yourself just like I told you to. Thought about bending you over this bed, and making you say please until you cried.”

You do. You remember too well.

“Say it again,” he murmurs, pressing against you. “Say thank you, Oscar.”

Somehow, you manage to choke it out. “Thank you, Oscar,” you whimper. 

Finally, finally, he begins to press his tip in. It’s a stretch that borders on unbearable. His jaw clenches. Your mouth falls open. Nails scrape along his shoulder blades, searching for purchase.

He groans into your neck. “That’s it. Let me in. Let me fuck you open.”

You can’t speak. Can’t think. Only feel the drag of him, the weight of it, the way he fills you up.

Oscar braces a hand beside your head, breath hot against your cheek. “You’re so fucking tight,” he grunts. “You were made for this. Made for me.”

You arch. He presses deeper, and deeper, until there’s nothing left between you but the slow, obscene drag of his cock inside your cunt. There’s the sound of your own breathing, ragged and real.

There’s the knowledge—shared and silent—that there’s no going back from this.

He finds a rhythm quickly. Like he’s been mapping it in his head for months. Maybe longer.

Each thrust is deliberate, brutal in its consistency. It’s as if he’s trying to etch himself into the softest part of you, and he is. You know he is. You feel it. Over and over. A litany in motion. Sharp hips, sharp tongue, sharp wit. The shape of him inside you becoming a kind of prayer.

“You look so good like this,” he rasps, breath hot against your throat. “Fucked open. Finally where you belong.”

It’s filthy. Cruel. Exactly what you thought you wanted. Your body flinches. Tighter around him. Unintended. A tell. The smallest betrayal.

His hips stutter mid-thrust. He watches you, eyes narrowing, brain ticking. Calculating. When he smiles knowingly, it’s the kind that feels like danger wearing a soft edge. Something mean with manners.

“Oh,” he says slowly. “Is that what does it for you? Not when I call you my little whore, but when I say you look good?”

You glare, trying to keep your dignity intact, your breath steady. “Fuck you.” 

“I am fucking you, pretty girl.” 

You clench down again. Oscar chuckles breathlessly, the sound low and mean.  “There it is again,” he murmurs, rolling his hips slowly, the grind unbearably deep. “Tight little squeeze. Your pussy’s telling on you, darling.” 

You hate him. You don’t. You want him. You want more. Want it mean, want it sweet, want it all at once. Contradictions melting in your gut.

He leans in, presses a kiss to your temple. Tender. Too tender. A cruel kind of affection. It makes your stomach turn in the best way. “You’re perfect, you know that?” he whispers in a tone that borders affection. 

Your body sings. It sings around him. Like a lock clicking open. Like truth breaking skin.

Oscar makes a low sound in his throat, equal parts reverence and smugness. The sound of discovery. “Fuck, sweetheart,” he groans, suddenly gentle in voice but not in pace. His hips are snapping hard. “You want to be worshipped? Want me to treat you like a princess?” 

You want to scoff. You can’t. Your pride’s still here, somewhere, buried under want. But your thighs are trembling.

You’re panting. Clutching. Tethering yourself to whatever's left. Oscar’s right there, relentless. Praising you like a prayer whispered between thrusts. As if every compliment earns him another inch.

“So tight. So fucking perfect.”

“You’re taking me so well. Never felt anything like this.” 

“You were made for me, baby. You’re—hng—sweetest pussy I’ve ever had.” 

Your orgasm builds again. Tangled. Tense. Threatening to snap.

He sees it. Feels it. The way your body contracts. The small, high-pitched sounds spilling from you. The way your hand grips his bicep like it’s the only thing keeping you tethered to earth.

“Not yet,” he says, a command. “Stay right there. Want to feel you fall apart. Want to watch it happen.” 

He slows, the bastard. His pace turns into deep, dragging thrusts that leave you gasping. He draws it out until it hurts—the pleasure of it all. Until you’re clawing at him, not to escape, but to survive.

“That’s it,” he breathes, brushing his mouth against your jaw. “My good girl. Always so good for me.”

You’re on the edge. Hanging by a thread. Every nerve ending tuned to him, to this.

You just look up at him—eyes wide, mouth parted, vulnerable in the worst way. The best way. “Can’t hold it back,” you whine. “Oscar, ‘m gonna come.” 

“Do it,” he relents, voice going impossibly soft as he hits that spot inside you. The one that has you seeing stars. “Good girls deserve to milk me dry.” 

He doesn’t stop when you start to fall apart.

If anything, he leans into it. Presses harder, deeper. Riding the tension as it breaks, then crests again, then splinters entirely. Your body spasms beneath him, dragged mercilessly through the folds of pleasure, like he’s determined to wring you out. Thorough, precise, and just a little cruel.

You’re gasping. Boneless. Trying to anchor yourself to anything real, anything solid, and finding only him. His hand on your hip, his chest against yours, his mouth, half-sharp, half-sweet, pressing whatever it wants into your skin.

“That’s it. That’s it,” he says, breath unsteady but voice still maddeningly in control. “Look at you. Look what I do to you.”

He slows, but not because he needs to. Because he likes watching you twitch. He lets you linger in that overstimulated afterglow, lets the echoes settle before pulling them forward again.

You think that’s it. That he’ll fold you against his chest, that his mouth will find the shell of your ear and whisper something soft, foolish, post-coital.

But no. Oscar lifts his head. Reaches to brush your hair from your eyes with the back of his fingers as if it’s some gentle courtesy, not a prelude.

“Still good for me to get what I want?”

His voice is not tentative. Instead, it lies in wait. The kind of question that’s already half-answered.

You nod.

“Use your words.”

You swallow. Find breath.

“Yes.”

A corner of his lip tugs upward. Something hungry flashes in it. Then he moves—rising off you with that lithe, economical grace, hands guiding your hips as he shifts the angle, presses your thighs apart again.

Rougher, now. Faster. His control returns in the shape of momentum. Your body, pliant and bruised with bliss, meets each thrust like instinct, like muscle memory. It’s overwhelming, but you don’t want him to stop. You want to be unmade properly. To see what he looks like when he breaks, too.

When he pulls out, you chase the loss. He catches your chin between his fingers, leans in with eyes that are just a little darker than earlier. “Mouth.” 

You blink, then nod, repositioning with something close to desperation. Knees beneath you. Lips parting.

He slides in with a groan that cracks somewhere at the edges, one hand cradling the back of your head, the other tightening in your hair. “Fuuuck. Just like that.” 

You hum, or try to. He shudders, thrusts just hard enough to hit his tip in the back of your throat a couple of times. Your eyes water at the feel of it, but he’s already gracefully at the end of his rope. 

When he finishes—hard and fast, hips twitching, voice fractured into a curse and your name—it feels less like an ending and more like something earned. Like gravity finally catching up to the fall.

He stays there a moment longer. Fingers softening. Breathing out your name like it tastes good in his mouth.

He pulls out after a moment too long. He’s still catching his breath when he sees it: his release, smeared at the corner of your mouth. Glossing your bottom lip. A thin, obscene line trailing down your chin like spilled sin. 

You’re blinking up at him, fucked-out and glassy-eyed, still breathing through parted lips. And it ruins him. Just absolutely levels him.

“Jesus Christ,” he groans hoarsely, reverently. “You look—”

He doesn’t finish the sentence. Doesn’t need to. You can see it in the way his hand runs over his face, like he’s trying to scrub the image from his mind and failing gloriously.

He kisses you, then, but not with hunger. It’s something slower instead. Grounded. His thumb catches the mess at your lip, and he hums when you let him wipe it away. He’s tasting himself, tasting you. Taking it all in.

There’s something almost delicate about it, which would be surprising if you didn’t already feel like the floor had dropped out from under you somewhere between his praise and the way he came undone in your mouth.

He pulls back with an exhale. Presses his forehead against yours. Murmurs, “Where do you keep your towels?”

You’re brain is still just a little too foggy to process. “What?” 

“Towels,” Oscar repeats, nudging your nose with his. “Or wet wipes. Or a cloth. Just—anything that won’t make me feel like I’m letting you marinate in me.”

You bark out a laugh. “Didn’t realize you were the aftercare type.”

“I’m not a monster,” he deadpans, dragging a hand through his hair as he sits up. The movement pulls every line of his body into view. Long, clean limbs. Defined stomach. The faint blush of exertion still clinging to his skin. You stare. You don’t mean to.

Your eyes follow the flex of his back as he stands. The easy confidence in the way he moves across your space like he’s lived in it. Like he belongs. He doesn’t. That’s the problem.

You rattle off a drawer, a shelf, the hallway linen closet. He listens, nods, and disappears from view.

And that’s when your mind begins to spiral.

Because you just fucked Oscar Piastri. 

Let him talk you through your orgasm. Let him ruin you, mouth and body and everything soft in between. Let him see you like this—open, loud, desperate.

What the fuck were you thinking?

He’s a goddamn risk. You know that. You’ve heard the warning signs. The drowning metaphors. The stories that end in fire. But you did it anyway. Jumped, swam, sank. Let him into your bed, your life. 

It doesn’t have to mean anything, you reason. It could be a one-off. 

But then—

Oscar comes back. Warm cloth in one hand, clean towel in the other. He settles beside you, nudging your legs open gently so he can clean you up without asking. It’s matter-of-fact. Unflinching. Weirdly intimate.

He says nothing at first; he only takes care of you like he means it. Then, as he pulls the blanket up around you both, he kisses your shoulder and murmurs, low and cocky: “Give me twenty minutes, and then we can go again.” 

You laugh. It bubbles out of you before you can stop it, warmth spreading across your chest like sunlight you weren’t expecting. Dangerous. Disarming.

You press your face into the pillow and mutter, “Asshole.”

He grins against your skin. Doesn’t deny it. Doesn’t promise anything else. But he wraps an arm around your waist like maybe he’s not done with you. Not even close.

Against your better judgment, you find yourself hoping he’s telling the truth.

Maybe it’s too soon to say it.

But God, you might just love—the risk. Not him. Surely not him.

Right? ⛐

box, box!!! ⸻ i am currently taking commissions for donations made to philippine typhoon relief efforts. read more on where to donate & how to request.

[papayareads]

paging doctor russell ⛐ 𝐆𝐑𝟔𝟑

across the room, you laugh at something one of the junior nurses says, and george doesn’t look. he just keeps writing. keeps working. keeps pretending he didn’t feel that one laugh like a suture being pulled a little too tight across his ribs.

ꔮ starring: emergency physician!george russell x emergency medical technician!reader. ꔮ word count: 11.2k. ꔮ includes: romance. alternate universe: non-f1, alternate universe: hospital. depictions of blood, injuries; mentions of death, food; profanity. feelings realization, sunshine vs. grumpy trope, medical terms i’m not 100% sure about (all inaccuracies are mine!!!), alex & lando haunt the narrative. ꔮ commentary box: i had webmd open for a vast majority of this fic, but i’m bouncing off the walls because it’s genuinely been a while since i’ve liked something i’ve written the way i enjoyed this!!! was inspired by this instagram reel, which i’ve been thinking of since it first came out *checks smudged handwriting on palm* over fifty weeks ago. bwoah. dedicated to @hello-car-fandom, whom i love from the bottom of my hypothalamus 🫀 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

♫ waiting room, phoebe bridgers. slow dancing in a burning room, john mayer. there she goes, the la's. every breath you take, the police. lovers rock, tv girl. i look in people's windows, taylor swift.

The first sign of your arrival is not the siren. It’s your voice.

“We brought you a gift, doc! Thirty-two, male, witnessed syncope on the football pitch. GCS fifteen but woozy, borderline hypotensive, sweaty enough to make you think he just left the sauna instead of Sunday league.”

George doesn’t look up from the tablet in his hand. He doesn’t have to. He knows that voice. Knows the cadence, the pitch, the infuriating little smile you fold between your words like some sugar packet in a bitter espresso.

He taps through the patient chart in front of him with surgical precision, then finally lifts his gaze.

You’re already halfway through wheeling the gurney in, bright-eyed and annoyingly chipper, like A&E is your own personal stage and George is a very grumpy audience.

“Unresponsive?” George asks, eyes flicking to the patient.

“For about ten seconds, maybe twelve,” you reply, checking the IV line. “Eyes rolled back and everything. Bit dramatic if you ask me.”

George arches a brow. “You say that like you haven’t had three syncopal episodes from dehydration this summer.”

“Oh, darling,” you sigh, feigning affront as you tuck a loose glove into the bin, “I swoon artfully. There’s a difference.”

He doesn’t laugh. He just gestures toward the trauma bay. “Let’s get him on the monitor. Vitals?”

You rattle them off like it’s a grocery list, which it might as well be, given how many patients the two of you have bounced between over the last year and a half. George has memorized the rhythm of your handovers, the sly curve of your mouth when you say something deliberately out-of-pocket, the moments your eyes sharpen beneath all that sunshine.

When you first started at Silverstone Tow Hospital, he thought you were unserious. Too smiley. Too flirtatious. Like you mistook the emergency department for a cocktail party and your gurney was the hors d’oeuvre tray.

But then he watched you intubate a twelve-year-old on the roadside with blood on your boots and no backup for fifteen minutes. He hasn’t underestimated you since.

Not that he’d ever say it aloud. God forbid you get wind of the fact that he actually respects you. You’d never let him live it down.

George pulls on a pair of gloves and begins his primary survey, steady hands and a steadier voice. “Can you squeeze my fingers?” he asks the patient, who blinks groggily and manages a weak grip.

“Good,” George murmurs, then adds with a glance at you, “Better grip than you had last Friday when you tried to carry a loaded stretcher alone.”

“You wound me,” you gasp, dramatically placing a hand over your heart. “I was being efficient.”

“You were being a liability.”

“A sexy liability,” you wink.

George sighs. Loudly. It’s the kind of sigh that could rival the windstorm from a helicopter rotor.

And yet, the corner of his mouth twitches. He hates that it twitches.

You lean against the wall, arms crossed, watching him work. Not interfering. Never that. You know when to back off. When to shut up. It’s another reason he’s grown used to you, despite your penchant for disrupting his carefully cultivated calm.

“He’ll need fluids, maybe a 12-lead to rule out arrhythmia,” George mutters, mostly to himself.

“Already gave him a litre in the rig,” you say. “No meds. He wasn’t brady. Ticked all the boxes for heat syncope.”

George hums in acknowledgment.

Behind the clinical notes and monitors, there’s still a flicker of something between you—like the static hum between radio stations. It never quite lands on a clear frequency, but it’s persistent.

You push off the wall and head for the doors.

“Page me if he codes,” you call, already halfway out, “and Doctor Russell? Try not to miss me too much.”

He doesn’t respond. He’s too busy logging vitals. Too busy being professional. Too busy pretending he wouldn’t miss you if you were gone.

Later that day, George’s break lasts precisely nine minutes and thirty-seven seconds.

He knows this because he’s timing it. Not out of some obsessive need for control (although Alex might argue otherwise), but because peace in this place is fleeting. A single moment of quiet is like spotting a unicorn in the car park: beautiful, improbable, and probably about to be run over by a trauma alert.

He’s sitting in the staff lounge with his trainers kicked off, scrubs wrinkled at the knees, and a half-warm coffee balanced precariously on his knee. Across from him, Alex Albon is trying to solve a crossword with the same concentration he reserves for stitching up toddlers who think bike helmets are optional.

“What’s a ten-letter word for self-inflicted misery?” Alex mumbles.

“'Healthcare,’” George replies dryly, taking a sip of his terrible coffee.

“Was going to say ‘dating you,’ but yours works too,” Lando Norris says as he slides into the lounge, tossing a bag of crisps onto the table and nearly knocking over George's coffee in the process.

George doesn’t flinch. He's long since accepted that relaxation around Lando is a contact sport.

“‘Dating you’ is only nine letters,” George points out. 

Lando lets out a beleaguered sigh. “I’m dyslexic.” 

Alex chimes in. “Doesn’t work like that,” he says without looking up from his crossword. 

They’ve known each other since medical school, the three of them. Lando, the overgrown golden retriever who accidentally passed his trauma certs with flying colours because he thought the practicals were a game. Alex, the mother hen with a penchant for stuffed animals and neon Crocs. And George, the one with the spreadsheet brain and a carefully laminated five-year plan, now crumpled somewhere beneath the weight of A&E rotations and god complexes.

“Do you mind?” George gestures at his drink. “This is the only hot beverage I’ve had all week that hasn’t been coughed into.”

“You’re welcome for the company,” Lando grins. “Anyway, someone had to check you hadn’t died of having a stick up your arse.”

“I persist. Alive, caffeinated, and annoyed.”

Peace reigns for another thirty-two seconds, then comes the knock.

More accurately, it’s a rhythmic tap-tap, tap-tap-tap on the door that sounds suspiciously like the beginning of a knock-knock joke.

Lando perks up immediately. George just closes his eyes. 

“Please be maintenance,” he mumbles like a prayer. “Please be a power outage. Please be literally anyone else.”

The door creaks open.

“Sorry to interrupt your boys’ club,” you chirp, leaning against the frame with all the casual elegance of someone who’s very much not sorry. “Lando, we’ve got a lift request from the transport team. Need your charming muscles.”

“Ooh, are they finally letting me do something fun?” Lando springs up like a Labrador hearing the word ‘walk.’

George exhales through his nose. “Define ‘fun’.” 

You beam at him. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

George opens his mouth, thinks better of it, then takes a long, scalding sip of coffee instead. Alex watches the exchange as if he’s observing a nature documentary.

“By the way,” you add, turning to George with mock sincerity, “I love what you’ve done with your hair today. The angry middle part is very in right now.”

“Thank you,” George deadpans. “I was going for ‘mildly electrocuted.’”

“Nailed it,” you singsong.

Lando slings an arm around your shoulder as you both exit. “We’ll bring you back a souvenir,” he calls to Alex.

George mutters, “Bring back silence.”

As the door swings shut behind you, peace returns. Briefly.

Alex waits exactly three beats. Then, “So, your girlfriend—”

George doesn’t look at him. “She’s not my girlfriend.”

“You know that’s not a denial, right? That’s a thesis statement waiting for peer review.”

“Albon.”

“Fine, fine.” A pause. With faux-innocence, he goes on. “But if she were, it would explain why you let her get away with calling you electrocuted and still looked vaguely pleased about it.”

George gives him a look that could curdle milk.

Alex just hums and returns to his crossword for self-inflicted misery. “Still going with ‘healthcare,’ by the way,” he chirps.

The doors to A&E swing open with all the subtlety of a brass band, which can only mean one of two things: an actual emergency. or you.

George glances up from a chart with the wariness of a man who has already seen too much today—and it’s only 3 P.M.

It’s you.

You’re wheeling in a teenage boy holding his arm like it might detach at the elbow. He’s pale, clammy, and muttering something about handlebars and gravity being a scam. Behind him, you wear the kind of grin that usually precedes emotional devastation.

“Delivery for Dr. Russell,” you half-yell. “Fifteen, male, possible dislocation, probable concussion, definite liar. Says he ‘didn’t cry at all.’”

George steps forward, jaw tight. “Bay three,” he says. “Watch the IV line.”

That’s it. No sarcastic quip. No annoyed eye-roll. Just instructions.

He doesn’t even look at you as he starts assessing the patient. You push the gurney into place, watching the mechanical efficiency in how George moves—like he’s running on fumes and caffeine, but hasn’t realised he’s out of both.

He asks the kid to rate his pain. The boy says nine. George grunts to himself like that’s generous.

You wait until vitals are logged and the chart handed off before you say, lightly, “Did I miss the staff memo on replacing your soul with sandpaper today?”

George doesn’t bite. Not really. “Busy shift.”

“It’s always a busy shift.”

“Well, maybe I’m just tired of your running commentary.”

There it is. A little too sharp. A little too true. You tilt your head, all playfulness evaporating in the same way George disappears into his work when he’s had too much.

“Okay,” you say. “What’s actually going on?”

He pulls off his gloves with more force than necessary. “Nothing. Just—a million things. One of the new juniors froze during a code. We’re short a nurse. And I haven’t had a meal that didn’t come out of a vending machine since Thursday.”

Your mouth opens, like you’re about to offer one of those terrible, hopeful reassurances. But then you stop. You nod. “Got it.”

No pep talk. No sunshine-injected optimism. You just back off. It’s unnerving. George watches you leave with the faint guilt of a man who kicked a puppy.

He doesn’t even remember falling asleep. One minute, he’s sitting in the corner of A&E during the lull between codes, head resting back against the wall, and the next—

He blinks awake to the harsh light overhead and the too-familiar hum of machines.

And a coffee.

It’s sitting next to him on the floor. No note. No name. It’s merely a takeaway cup with condensation beading down the side and a lid that’s slightly ajar like someone checked it before leaving it there.

He frowns at it, sniffs it. Too sweet. He can already smell the sugar from here.

He takes a sip anyway. It tastes like vanilla syrup and a not-so-subtle apology.

He drinks the whole thing.

Two days pass. Not that George is counting. He’s just acutely aware of time lately, that’s all. Of how hours bleed into one another here, fluorescent lighting washing out everything except exhaustion and the persistent buzz of pagers. The A&E moves on, undeterred, chewing through bodies and paperwork with the grace of a woodchipper. George has learned to adapt.

And yet, when you wheel in your next patient, it takes him a second longer than usual to look up.

Maybe because you’re humming. Cheerfully. Like you’re in a baking show intro montage and not pushing a man with a suspected tibial fracture across a blood-stained floor.

“Ankled himself trying to do a backflip off his mate’s shed roof,” you announce, absolutely zero judgment in your tone, which almost makes it worse. “Landing was not ideal.”

“I thought it was gonna be sick,” the patient groans.

George can’t keep the wry tone out of his voice. “And instead you were sick on the lawn. Congratulations.”

You snort. “Be nice, Doctor Doom. He’s suffered enough.”

George leans in to examine the leg. The swelling is impressive. Purple and angry-looking, the kind of injury that practically demands an ice pack and several poor life decisions reconsidered.

You lean in, too, pointing something out on the patient’s shin. And then you pause. A beat. Another.

You shift slightly closer. Just enough.

“You smell like... vanilla,” you say, a little too fast. Then you balk, as if realizing this is not a conversation to have above a suffering patient but it’s too late to back down. “Coffee. I mean—obviously. Not just vanilla, that would be weird. But like. Coffee with vanilla. Like that coffee. From…”

Your voice tapers off like a train derailing in slow motion. George keeps his eyes on the patient’s leg.

“Astounding deduction, Sherlock,” he says to you. “Should we check for a concussion?”

You scowl. The patient laughs, then winces. George finally glances up, just for a second. You’re flushed. Slightly. It’s rare. He catalogues it like a specimen under a microscope.

“It was too sweet,” he says simply.

You cross your arms, recovering. “So you didn’t like it?”

He wraps the ankle expertly, voice steady. “Didn’t say that.”

Another beat. The patient’s eyes flick between the two of you, looking increasingly like he regrets .

George double-knots the bandage, then says, almost casually, “Whoever left me that lifeline probably saved someone from getting yelled at for breathing too loudly, so.”

You smile. Poorly hidden. It creeps in around the edges of your mouth like sun through blinds.

“I’ll pass the message along,” you say.

George stands. “Please don’t. That would be humiliating.”

The patient groans. “Can someone just tell me if my leg’s broken?” he snipes. 

“Probably.” George pats his shoulder. “But the emotional trauma will heal first.”

You bite back a laugh, and George, despite everything, doesn’t bother hiding his ghost of a grin.

It’s Lando who brings in the next patient.

Which should not feel strange. Except it does. A little.

Enough for George to register it before burying the thought under a blanket of professionalism and blood pressure readings. Like noticing your favourite mug is missing from the break room and pretending that it doesn’t bother you, even as you drink from a chipped one instead.

Lando barrels into A&E, unfazed and unaware. “We’ve got a special tonight, folks! Fourteen-year-old male, non-verbal, autistic, presented with seizures en route. Vitals stable-ish, parents panicked, and he’s currently very much not a fan of flashing lights.”

“Right,” George breathes, already motioning to a quieter bay. “Let’s dim the overheads and lose the chaos. Lando, you’re not helping.”

“Helping is subjective,” Lando says, grinning. “I bring vibes.”

George doesn’t dignify that with a response. He sets his jaw and gets to work.

The kid is seizing again by the time they get him on the bed. It’s brief, controlled quickly with a low dose of midazolam, but the boy’s mum is crying and George finds himself talking more gently than usual. He guides. He grounds. He keeps his hands steady, like the calm at the eye of a storm.

And still—he thinks of you. Of how you’d have cracked a dumb joke to loosen the tension. Of how you’d crouch low beside the stretcher and make a paper crane out of a vomit bag just to get a scared kid to smile. Of how your voice could find a way to sound like music even in the middle of controlled chaos.

He doesn’t think about you until he does. Once it’s all over, George figures he needs a breather. 

The hospital roof is technically off-limits. Which is why George doesn’t go there.

Instead, he steps out the side door to the loading bay. Fresh air, in theory. Reality: a gentle breeze of antiseptic, petrol, and damp pavement. Still better than whatever recycled tragedy is waiting inside. His lungs expand, grateful for anything that isn’t the scent of bleach or stress sweat.

He doesn’t expect to see you there.

You’re crouched low beside one of the ambulances, the metal bulk of it casting a long shadow. Your uniform is rumpled, hair messier than usual. You’re rolling something between your fingers.

For a second, he thinks it’s gauze. Maybe tape. It isn’t, and George can’t help his indignation. 

“Seriously?” George says, voice dry. “You’re in healthcare. That’s borderline treason.”

You glance up, unsurprised. “It’s a singular cigarette. I get one per year.”

“Like some sort of self-destructive birthday wish.”

“Exactly.” You don’t light it. Just keep rolling it back and forth between your fingers, thumb pressing along the seam like muscle memory. “Haven’t decided yet if I’m cashing it in.”

George leans against the wall, arms crossed. He should go back in. Someone is probably bleeding or coding or arguing about discharge papers. But you’re unmoving in a way that prickles at him. A warning light blinking in his peripheral vision.

“Rough call?” he asks, aiming for ninety percent of what hits healthcare professionals the hardest.

You don’t answer right away.

“The kid,” you say finally, and some perverse part of George thinks bingo. “Lando brought him in. Reminded me of someone.”

George doesn’t ask who. He just nods once, like he’s flipping a page over in his mind.

You let the silence stretch. A silence with shape, with edges. It feels more honest than talking.

Eventually, you sigh and pocket the cigarette. Your hands linger at your sides, as if unsure what to do now that they’re empty. “Don’t worry, Doctor Morality. Your lungs are safe for another year,” you breathe. 

“That makes it sound like you’re doing me a favour.”

You glance at him sideways. “Aren’t I always?”

It’s a joke. Light, flimsy. But your smile doesn’t quite reach your eyes. Your voice wobbles just enough that George clocks it. And your hands—your hands are still shaking, just a little.

He doesn’t press. Doesn’t offer platitudes or pressure or a shoulder to cry on. He just shifts slightly and nudges his shoulder into yours, solid and brief. An anchor. 

He doesn’t time being around you.

The two of you walk back into A&E without speaking.

Which is strange, because usually, you speak. Or whistle. Or tap your pen against the side of the gurney like it’s a snare drum and the trauma bay is your stadium.

But now you’re just quiet. Not heavy with it, not brooding. Focused. Composed in a way George hasn’t seen since the one time a patient tried to throw up directly onto his lap and you, ever the opportunist, tried to offer him a bib. (He hadn’t laughed. He’d wanted to. Still bitter about that.)

The same kid Lando brought in is now settled in Observation. There’s a line of vitals on the monitor. You’re checking on the patient’s IV when George catches himself watching. 

You crouch to talk to the boy’s mum again, your voice low and steady. You’re good at this. Too good to be reduced to punchlines and irreverent banter, though you seem to enjoy both.

“You’re staring again,” comes Lando’s voice, practically skipping over with delight. He’s balancing a chart, a coffee, and his overgrown ego in both hands. “Kind of romantic, in a broody-Edward-Cullen-meets-urgent-care way.”

George scowls. “Don’t you have vitals to misread?”

“Rude. Accurate. But rude.”

George flips to a page on his notebook and starts writing, refusing to rise to it. This is normal. All of this. Standard. Routine. The chaos of medicine is the constant; what you do with it—the way you carry it—that’s the variable. You’re the variable.

Across the room, you laugh at something one of the junior nurses says, and George doesn’t look, doesn’t look, doesn’t look. He doesn’t have to. The sound slots into the noise of A&E like a missing puzzle piece. Everything’s loud, but it’s not the same kind of loud without you.

He just keeps writing. Keeps working. Keeps pretending he didn’t feel that one laugh like a suture being pulled a little too tight across his ribs.

George barely has time to wash the dried blood off his hands before there’s another shout of, “Incoming!”

You burst through the A&E double doors like you’ve just kicked them down yourself—hair wind-tossed, adrenaline in your eyes, and pushing a stretcher with the determination of a woman who has seen too much.

“Fifty-two-year-old male, syncope with hypotension, responsive to sternal rub but GCS fluctuating,” you rattle off, crisp and sharp. “History of cardiac stents, recent flu-like symptoms, likely dehydration-induced vasovagal—”

“You gave him fluids?” George interrupts, already reaching for the chart you’ve half-filled.

“Yes,” you snap. “He was dry as hell and crashing.”

“If this is cardiogenic, you could've overloaded him.”

You plant your hands on your hips. “And if we waited, he’d be flatlined in the ambulance bay.”

It escalates quickly.

George, always a slow burn until he’s not, bristles. “You don’t get to gamble with a heart like this and hope for the best. You call it in, you wait, and you don’t play doctor.”

You stab a finger into George’s chest. “I called it. You didn’t pick up. And I’m not playing anything, Russell. I made the call. That’s the job.”

The patient groans between you, a breathy whimper escaping his lips like a ghost too tired to haunt. Somewhere across the trauma bay, a heart monitor bleeps with awkward timing, like a laugh track in the wrong scene.

George looks like he’s ready to hurl the nearest clipboard.

“Oi,” Lando’s voice slices through, no grin in sight. “Enough. He’s not dead yet. Maybe stop yelling over him like he’s not here?”

George’s fingers twitch at his sides. You exhale through your nose, sharp and practiced.

You both move as you should. 

It’s clinical. Cold. Efficient. You hook up the leads while George places a central line. You call out vitals while he orders labs and adjusts the oxygen flow. No more words. No more fire. Only two people trying to outpace a ticking clock.

Somewhere between blood cultures and a second bolus, George sees it.

The pulmonary edema he feared isn’t there. Lungs are clear. JVP normal. The heart’s pumping sluggishly, sure, but it’s a volume issue. Not pump failure. 

You had been right.

And he’d said things. Horrible things.

You don’t play doctor.

He wants to swallow the words, scoop them off the floor, and shove them back in his mouth like bad medication. But they sit there. Festering.

You don’t look at him as you help wheel the patient toward cardiology. You just walk beside the bed, hands on the rail, back straight, eyes forward.

George follows in silence, wondering when, exactly, he stopped deserving the benefit of your doubt.

He catches sight of you near the locker corridor as he’s leaving Resus. You’re uncharacteristically still, sat halfway on the bench. Half out of your uniform, scrolling through something on your phone with a vague frown. The bright overhead lights make everything look sterile. Skin, fabric, emotion.

He slows. You’re usually gone by the time he ends his shift. Still mid-banter with Lando or one of the nurses, tossing sarcasm like candy. But today, you’re pulled in, civil. George hates how well he recognises that it’s his fault.

“You’re clocking out early,” he says, pretending he’s only mildly interested. “Very unlike you. No second wind? No miraculous five-minute recovery followed by another four-hour shift?”

You look up with a small smile that doesn’t quite land. “Shockingly, I have a life. Plans. You ever heard of those?”

He smirks, but it’s stiff. “I’ve heard rumours of them.”

“Wild concept, I know.”

You shove your phone into your bag and stand, zipping your jacket up. Something about the mechanical precision of the motion makes him wince.

“Listen,” George starts. Then stops. Then tries again. “About earlier—”

You wave him off with a too-bright shrug. “Don’t worry about it. Water under the bridge. Heat of the moment. White coat syndrome. All of it.”

“No.” George’s voice is firmer than even he expects. “I’m not going to let you just file it away like paperwork you don’t want to do. You were right. I was wrong. And I said things that were—”

“Accurate to your character?” you offer dryly.

“Unfair,” he finishes. “Arrogant. Patronizing. I don’t want you to have to assume an apology. You deserve a real one.”

You stare at him. Not mocking. Not disbelieving. Just taking him in.

Then, in the softest tone he’s ever heard from you: “Thanks, Doctor Russell.”

He opens his mouth to say more, something vaguely poetic and wildly inappropriate for a fluorescent-lit hallway.

But you reach out and squeeze his arm gently. “I’m going to be late,” you say, like it’s both a reminder and an escape hatch.

He nods. You pause, just long enough to let a real grin flicker across your face. “Don’t think this means you’re off the hook for being a tosser.”

And then you’re gone, leaving. Jacket swishing behind you. The faint scent of your soap or your shampoo—or maybe your presence—still lingering in the air like static.

George exhales and rubs his hands over his face.

He is, categorically, not off the hook. A part of him is convinced he’s been hooked on you since the day he met you. 

It’s Lando again.

George doesn’t sigh, doesn’t frown, doesn’t even blink longer than necessary. That’s growth, frankly. In the beginning, he would’ve asked where the hell you were within three seconds. Now, he simply listens to Lando’s brisk summary—dislocated shoulder, rugby pitch, remarkably foul-mouthed teenager—and goes through the motions.

But George does check the ambulance bay.

Once. Maybe twice.

Purely out of habit, he tells himself, like muscle memory. Like an old injury that still aches when it rains.

You’re not there.

He makes it through the consult and discharge, and then, because he is a grown adult with impeccable time management, he wastes his entire break wandering the hospital like a man with a mission and no idea what the mission is.

The staff lounge is empty. The stairwell is empty. The vending machine near paediatrics is, insultingly, both empty and mocking. He loops around back toward the elevators and debates just going outside for air, when he spots movement near the maintenance corridor.

You.

Sitting on the tile floor, one knee drawn up, sleeves shoved to the elbow. You’re trying to open a packet of sterile wipes with your teeth, which George considers a crime against both medical protocol and common sense.

He rushes in. “What the hell happened?”

You freeze like a schoolkid caught smoking behind the bike sheds. “Hi, Doctor Russell,” you say with a half-hearted wave. 

“Don’t deflect.” He crouches down. There’s a gash along your leg, not deep but angry and swollen, like it’s been scrubbed hastily and not dressed at all. “Is this from that seizure case?”

You hesitate just long enough.

“Jesus,” George mutters, already reaching into his coat pocket. His fingers tremble slightly around his penlight, which is unhelpful, since this is not an eye exam.

“It’s fine,” you say quickly. “Just a scratch. I didn’t want to make a thing of it.”

“You work in an actual hospital.”

“Yeah, well,” you shrug, wincing as the motion pulls your skin. “Pride’s a hell of a drug.”

The thing is, he gets it. The stubbornness. The instinct to downplay. The razor-thin line between strength and stupidity that every single person in this godforsaken field has danced along at some point.

But that doesn’t mean he likes seeing you bleed.

George isn’t sure when exactly he starts hovering—but one minute you’re brushing him off with a wince and a half-hearted smile, and the next he’s throwing your arm over his shoulder and grumbling something about how you’re obviously concussed if you think you’re walking back on your own.

You protest, of course. Loudly. Colorfully.

“This is humiliating,” you hiss, clutching at the lapel of his coat like it might drag you underground.

“I warned you not to be reckless,” he says, ignoring the way your weight shifts unevenly against him. “This is me, exercising restraint.”

You mutter something unkind about his bedside manner.

He wills himself not to smile.

Halfway through the hallway, the two of you run into Alex.

Alex, who takes one look at the situation—George with his hair mussed and his hands full of EMT—and has the audacity to whip out his phone.

“Smile!” Alex sings.

George flips him off with a flair only a man at the end of his shift can manage.

His office is technically a converted supply closet with a window the size of a postcard, but it has a clean sink, a worn couch, and a locked cabinet of supplies, so it’ll do.

You settle on the couch with the exaggerated care of someone trying not to swear audibly. George crouches in front of you, glancing at your leg. A shallow gash, nothing dramatic, but it’s bleeding enough to stain the cuff of your trousers.

He cleans it in silence. You watch him.

He’s thorough in that George Russell way: antiseptic, gauze, the gentle press of fingers that aren’t as clinical as they should be. He doesn’t say anything when you flinch. He only works with precision, like the rest of the world can wait its turn.

“You’re being really gentle,” you murmur. “Is this because you feel guilty?”

“No,” he says, deadpan. “This is because I’ve taken the Hippocratic Oath, and unlike some people, I take it seriously.”

You laugh, sudden and sharp, and it loosens something in him.

“That so?”

“Yes. ‘First, do no harm.’ It’s not just a slogan we slap on mugs, you know.”

“I’ve seen you slam back coffee from that very mug you’re judging.” 

“And I’ve seen you try to climb into a moving ambulance. Shall we call it even?”

A beat. Then your smile softens. “Thanks,” you say, “for this.”

He tapes the last bit of dressing down and looks up at you, close enough to see the faint lines of fatigue around your eyes.

“You don’t have to thank me.”

“I don’t want you to assume my gratitude, Doctor Russell.” 

He hesitates. Something about the inside joke, the way you look, the cadence of your voice—it undoes him. “You can call me George,” he says, “when it’s just us.”

Your gaze flickers to his, something unspoken shifting in the air between you.

“George,” you amend, and it sounds a lot like the beginning of the end. 

That was not the moment where George realized he might be in love with you. 

That was just another Tuesday. A very average, paperwork-stuffed, understaffed Tuesday where someone clogged the staff bathroom and a patient tried to name their newborn ‘Matcha.’ Business as usual.

It wasn’t when you brought him coffee the next morning, either. Still too sweet, still not his order, but you’d scribbled a crooked smiley face on the cup like a seven-year-old. He drank it in four sips between patients, barely registering the taste, except to note that the bitterness was more tolerable than usual. Possibly the smiley helped.

It definitely wasn’t when you fell asleep in the ambulance bay on a slow night, curled against the wall like a stray cat who’d finally found a patch of sun. You had your arm draped over your eyes and were snoring softly, one shoe half-off. George stood over you for a full minute before covering you with his jacket. It was clinical, he told himself. Preventing hypothermia. Protecting team morale. You would’ve done the same for him, probably. Maybe. Unless you were feeling particularly annoying, which, in fairness, was half the time.

It wasn’t even when you called him by his first name again, during some offhand moment when it was the only the two of you in a hallway. The way you’d said it—soft, like it was an apology and a dare in one—should’ve knocked something loose in him. Something fundamental. Nada. George, in all his emotionally constipated glory, simply nodded and muttered something about sterile gauze and infection risk.

It was like watching a man dodge a grand piano falling from the sky only to trip over a pebble.

The Moment happens on a Thursday.

It’s loud. Everything always is in the A&E, but today especially. Alarms beeping, a child screaming bloody murder over a scraped knee, someone vomiting in the corridor while a porter yells for backup. There’s a guy swearing loudly about the NHS being a conspiracy and someone else trying to light a cigarette under the fire alarm. George is elbow-deep in an electronic chart, trying to remember whether “elevated troponin” still means what it used to, when he hears your voice.

“Coming through! Trauma, blunt force to the head, suspected internal bleeding!”

It’s your usual pitch. Businesslike, brisk, just this side of shouting. But George looks up—and his heart promptly forgets how to function.

You’re covered in blood.

Not a little. Not a dramatic splatter across the collar. This is full-red, horror movie special. It’s Jackson Pollock’s lesser-known ER period. It’s on your sleeves, your chest, your throat. Your gloves are slick with it. There’s a smear on your cheek, just beneath your eye, and a fleck in your hair.

George is on his feet before he’s aware of it. “Are you—”

He stops himself. He’d sounded too panicked, so he tries again. (He does not sound any less panicked.) “Are you bleeding?”

You roll your eyes like it’s the dumbest question in the world. But there’s a crack in your voice. Just a little one. Like the adrenaline hasn’t quite worn off yet, and the corners of your calm are fraying. “What? No. It’s his.”

You jerk your head to the gurney you’re wheeling in, and only then does George notice the patient. Pale, moaning, a makeshift pressure dressing applied with the kind of brutal efficiency that only EMTs and war veterans can muster. There's a splint fashioned from what looks like a clipboard.

Still, George doesn’t look away from you until he’s sure. Absolutely, undeniably sure. His chest is a vice.

George clears his throat and moves to the patient’s side. “Right. Let’s work, then.”

And you do. He does. Like his brain hasn’t just rewired itself in the span of three heartbeats.

Because it wasn’t the blood, not really. It was the split second before you spoke, when he thought you might be hurt and every single thing inside him tilted wildly off axis. Like someone opened a trapdoor beneath him and he freefell straight through.

That was The Moment.

George Russell, congratulations. You absolute idiot. You’re in love. 

Not the Hollywood, Netflix original kind. The kind where you keep checking the back of someone’s neck to make sure they’re still standing. The kind where one smear of blood across a cheek turns you into a man on the verge of cardiac arrest.

It’s inconvenient. It’s absurd. It’s probably going to end in disaster. But it’s true, and it’s there, and George is suddenly no longer the smartest man in the ward.

George is pretty sure there’s a clinical term for what’s happening to him. Some kind of emotional arrhythmia, maybe. A persistent fluttering of the heart followed by full-body embarrassment. Unfortunately, there’s no ICD-10 code for ‘realized-you’re-in-love-with-your-colleague-and-now-you-don’t-know-how-to-function.’

Which is why he finds himself lurking by the vending machines, awkwardly holding a protein bar like it might offer divine insight. Across from him, Alex and Lando are mid-discussion about a guy in Resus who, quote, “tried to vape with a chest tube in.” Normal Thursday things.

“Hypothetically,” George begins, and he already hates himself for it, “if someone—not me, obviously—realized they might have... feelings... for a colleague…”

Alex squints. “What kind of feelings? Like, homicidal or the other kind?”

“The, uh, softer kind.”

Lando looks delighted. “Oh no.”

“Again, not me. Just a friend,” George says, very unconvincingly.

There is a long, weighted silence in which George begins to regret all of his life choices that led him to this point. “Okay,” Alex says slowly, using his talking-to-kids voice. “What does your ‘friend’ want to do about these “feelings’?”

George exhales through his nose. “Well, he might be considering saying something. But only if it wouldn’t jeopardize, you know, the professional relationship. Or make things weird. Or make her stop bringing him coffee, which I—I mean, he—looks forward to more than is probably healthy.”

Lando raises an eyebrow. “So your friend wants advice on how to confess his undying love without losing access to his morning caffeine dealer. Got it.”

“It’s not undying,” George grunts. “Just... persistent.”

Alex, to his credit, tries to stay serious. “Well, what’s the worst that could happen? She says no?”

“Yeah, and then I have to see—he has to see her every day and pretend he doesn’t remember how she looked covered in blood but still cracking a joke about dry-cleaning.”

“Hyper-specific,” Lando notes.

Alex hums in morose agreement. “Unusually vivid.”

Without breaking eye contact, Alex reaches into his pocket and produces a crumpled fiver. Hands it silently to Lando. 

“What is that?” George asks, bewildered. 

“Bet,” Lando says, grinning. “On how long it would take you to crack. I had ‘blood-related epiphany’ on my bingo card.”

George flips them both off. Simultaneously. Ambidextrous rage.

Alex pats him on the back. “Look, Georgie, just talk to her. Worst case, she mocks you gently and turns it into a punchline. Best case, she likes you back and you die of happiness or something.”

“People don’t die of happiness,” George deadpans.

“You could be the first.” 

The vending machine whirs as his protein bar drops. George takes it and contemplates the absurdity of modern romance blooming between bodily fluids and fluorescent lighting. Whatever happened to normal courtship rituals?

George decides he can’t confess. Not yet. 

That would require a heart-to-heart, and George is currently operating on a strict no-vulnerability-before-coffee policy. But he can ease into it, maybe. Start with a breadcrumb. An amuse-bouche of affection. Nothing too dramatic. No grand gestures. 

It begins when you wheel in a patient like you’re leading a parade—only instead of confetti, there’s vomit and the faint sound of someone retching. The patient looks like they’ve been on the losing end of a pub crawl and an ill-advised kebab. You’re narrating the symptoms with your usual dramatic flair, throwing in theatrical pauses for effect as if you’re presenting at the BAFTAs.

George, mid-chart, looks up, and it’s like the sun breaks through the fluorescent lighting. Which is ridiculous. It’s just you. Covered in bodily fluids again. He stands, lets instinct and professional training take over while his brain yells nonsense like, Tell her she’s competent! And possibly radiant!

The patient has tachycardia, low BP, and an unfortunate tendency to gag every time George says the word ‘appendix.’ You and George work around it, finishing each other’s assessments like some grotesque waltz. You even hand him a clamp before he asks for it.

Once the patient’s stabilized and the chaos has retreated to a low simmer, George clears his throat. Here it is. Time for the breadcrumb.

“You, uh,” he starts, eyes on the floor. Then he looks up, directly at you. “Handled that really well.”

A pause. You turn to him. Slowly.

“Thank you?” It comes out like a question, like you’re suspicious he’s about to follow it with an insult. Fair enough. George’s love language thus far has mostly been sarcasm and passive-aggressive vitals charting.

He waves it off, already backtracking. “I’m just saying. It was... efficient.”

You’re smiling now. It’s soft and a bit uneven, like it surprised even you. You open your mouth to say something else, but a nurse calls your name, and just like that, you’re gone.

George stares at the empty space where you were, wondering how something as basic as a compliment made him feel like he was fifteen again and trying to flirt with the headmaster’s daughter using Latin root words.

He shakes his head and returns to his chart, scribbling down vitals with far too much pressure. Step one complete. Sort of. He’ll call it a win. Or a draw. A medically supervised draw.

George doesn’t think he’s bad at flirting. Not in theory, anyway.

In practice, however, he’s apparently incapable of communicating anything more than “I respect your clinical acumen” and “that pressure dressing was very efficiently done,” which, as it turns out, is not the universally accepted preamble to romantic intrigue.

You’d think it would be easier. God knows he’s trying. He’s been workshopping his tone, casually leaning against things (unsuccessfully), and once, in a truly pitiful moment, tried to smile at you in what he assumed was a rakish fashion and nearly bit the inside of his cheek clean through.

Today, you wheel in a cyclist who’d gone arse over handlebars on an uphill climb. Your voice is animated, already mid-sentence with the nurse as you guide the stretcher in, and George’s heart does the stupid thing again. The thing where it skips like a faulty EKG and then settles back into a rhythm just off enough to make him feel like he’s maybe catching something.

“Helmet took most of the impact,” you say, pulling gloves on. “Some superficial lacerations, possible concussion, vitals holding steady. He’s all yours, Doctor Russell.”

He doesn’t know when Doctor Russell started sounding so good coming from you, but it does today. 

George gets to work. Efficient. Focused. Or, you know, pretending to be. You’re watching, as you always do, eyes alert in a way that makes him feel vaguely scrutinized and somewhat flattered. After everything’s stabilized and the cyclist is off for scans, George clears his throat.

“You were good in there,” he says.

Your head tilts, amused. “I’m always good in there.”

Right. Of course you are. He scrambles.

“No, I mean—you’re good. In general. The way you handled the bleed was—clean. And fast. I admire that.”

Slowly, a grin begins to unfurl. “George,” you say, tone mock-gentle, “are you trying to flirt with me using vascular trauma praise?”

He makes a sound. It is not dignified. And so: new plan.

A few days later, another patient. Something mundane, ankle fracture from a stairwell slip. You roll them in with your usual unbothered flair, chatting as if this were a grocery run. George pretends not to notice the way your hair’s come loose from its usual bun, the way your sleeves are pushed to the elbows, exposing your forearms.

He says nothing as you run through your report. Patient is stabilized. Bandaged. Sent for imaging. The moment hangs there, lazy and loose, like a paper lantern.

George breathes in. Then out. Then: “You look really nice today.”

Silence.

This time, you sound more than surprised. You sound disbelieving. “What?” you squeak. 

He wants to dissolve into the linoleum.

“I mean—you do. It’s not relevant to the case. Obviously. But it’s true. That’s all.”

You stare at him like he’s just declared himself heir to the throne of France.

“Well,” you say after a moment, a bit breathless. “That’s… very kind. You look nice too. For what it’s worth. The scrubs are doing things. Not bad things.”

Now it’s George’s turn to stare.

You both stand there, blinking at each other, mutual fluster painted across your faces. Lando, passing behind with a chart, mutters, “For fuck's sake,” and keeps walking.

George says nothing. He’s too busy recalibrating the entire universe.

George has it all planned.

It’s not elaborate. This isn’t Grey’s Anatomy. There’s no flash mob, no Post-It notes, no soft indie music playing while he bumbles through a declaration in the rain. But there is a plan. Or, at least, the shaky skeleton of one.

Step one: find you. Step two: say something charming and suave. Or, failing that, something intelligible. Step three: ask you out. Casually. Breezily. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world and not the thing that’s been keeping him up for three consecutive nights.

What actually happens is this:

He finds you, yes. Tick. Step one. You’ve just offloaded a patient and are engrossed in paperwork, hair tied up in that chaotic bun that does things to his blood pressure. You greet him without looking up. “If you’re here to steal my pen again, I’m going to file an HR complaint.”

“No, I—” George clears his throat. “I was wondering if you wanted to, you know. Grab something. Later. To eat. Together. If you're free.”

Your brow furrows. “Oh. Yeah, I’m starving. I haven’t eaten since, like, 7 A.M.”

There’s a hopeful flicker in his chest—

You keep talking. “We could swing by the canteen before it closes. I just need to update the chart first.”

Oh. That’s not—well. Not quite what he meant.

But you’re already slinging your bag over your shoulder, tugging him toward the lifts like this was your idea in the first place. George glances down at his invisible note cards (read: internalized disaster plan) and burns them all in effigy.

You grab a prepackaged sandwich and a sad-looking banana. George gets a tray because he is committed to the bit. When you start heading for the exit, he stops you.

“We could, uh—sit? Just for a minute.”

You arch a brow. “In here?”

“Why not? It’s got… chairs. And tables.”

You laugh, which is both a victory and a curse. George pretends not to hear how stupid he sounds.

You both settle across from each other, a laminate table between you that has seen the worst of humanity in spilt soup and rehydrated lasagna. For a few seconds, it’s awkward. Utterly, blindingly awkward. You unwrap your sandwich too loudly. George stabs at his potatoes with unnecessary focus. It’s so quiet, the flickering of the overhead light becomes a main character.

Then you snort.

“This is ridiculous,” you say. “It feels like detention. Like we’ve been caught doing something bad and now we’re being punished with egg salad.”

George cracks a smile. “To be fair, the egg salad is punishment enough.”

You grin at him across the table. Something in your face softens. “I like this, though. It’s stupid, and weird, and feels like we’ve dropped into a badly written episode of The Good Doctor. But I like it.”

George stares at you, heart doing the jittery thing again. He thinks, wildly, that he’d eat egg salad for the rest of his life if it meant he could have moments like this.

“Me too,” he says, and it’s not smooth or clever, but it’s honest.

The dinner continues, such as it is. Two overworked professionals hunched over trays of food that only technically qualifies as nourishment, under the flickering lights of the A&E canteen. George is very aware of how tragically not-date this is. 

A romance conducted beside a vat of grayish mash and aggressively boiled peas. If this were a film, the director would be fired. Or knighted. Hard to tell these days.

He stabs at another potato halfheartedly. Says, out of nowhere, “What’s your favorite color?”

You pause mid-banana chew. “What?” 

“Color. Just—what’s your favorite one?” He tries to sound casual, as though this is something he routinely asks colleagues over beige fish fingers.

You tilt your head, narrowing your eyes. “Are we playing twenty questions now?”

“No. Maybe. Oh, bollocks. Humor me for once.” 

A beat. Then, to his complete shock, your face lights up. “Forest green. Like—deep, mossy green. Like enchanted woods, not traffic lights.”

George feels something ridiculous flutter in his chest. He blames the sodium in the canteen soup.

“That’s oddly specific,” he says.

“You asked.”

He clears his throat. Stares at his peas like they’ve personally offended him. “Alright. Favorite animal?”

“This is dangerously close to an icebreaker sheet from Year 7.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t go to many sleepovers.”

You laugh at that, and it hits him square in the sternum. He decides he wants to make you laugh again. Forever, if possible.

“Otters,” you declare. “Because they hold hands when they sleep. You?”

George considers this. “Elephants. Big ears. No notes.”

You laugh again, and he tries to memorize the exact cadence of it.

More questions follow. Book or movie? (You say both.) Sweet or savoury? (Depends on your mood.) Weirdest scar? (You lift your sleeve to show the faint line from a bike accident when you were eight. He squints at it, and somehow that feels like something sacred.)

Your pager goes off mid-sentence. You glance at it, and your mouth twists.

“Damn. GSW coming in.”

George nods. Tries not to look too disappointed. “Right. Go save a life, superhero.”

You rise, tossing your half-eaten dinner in the bin, then glance back at him with a regretful smile. “This was fun. Like, weirdly fun. Thanks for the pop quiz.”

He gives a half-wave, watching you disappear down the corridor.

When the door swings shut behind you, George exhales. He stares at the empty seat across from him, the ghost of your laughter still ringing in the fluorescent air.

He hasn’t let himself want things for a while. Not properly. Not tenderly.

But right now, he wants, wants, wants.

George should have known that not all good things hold. 

Really, he should’ve carved it into his desk or tattooed it on the inside of his wrist. Maybe then he wouldn’t be caught so flat-footed by the universe’s penchant for whiplash.

Because it’s the very next shift.

He’s sorting through discharge summaries—his pen running dry halfway through a sentence, because why wouldn’t it—when the doors burst open. You’re pushing a stretcher with one gloved hand and applying compressions with the other. There’s another paramedic shouting vitals, a family member wailing in the background, but George doesn’t register any of it.

He sees you.

You’re not smiling.

You’re not doing that thing where you narrate injuries like a game show prize. No dry jokes. No lifted eyebrows. There’s blood on your chin. You don’t notice.

“Fifty-eight-year-old male, found unresponsive,” you say, eyes not leaving the chest you’re compressing. “Unknown downtime. We got ROSC en route, but he’s bradycardic again. Might be circling the drain.”

George is already moving. The room responds like muscle memory. Crash cart, monitor leads, adrenaline. There’s shouting, counting, paddles. 

The heart rhythm flatlines. George calls time of death.

And that’s that. No miracles today.

You stand at the edge of the room afterward like a ghost, gloves bloody and still half-on. George watches you stare blankly at the wall, the pulse line still dancing on the monitor with no heartbeat to trace.

“Come on,” he says quietly.

You don’t ask where. You just follow.

George’s office is too bright and too quiet. He flicks the light off. You sit down on the small, lumpy sofa in the corner like you’re not sure your legs will keep holding you up. George shuts the door and leans against it, unsure of what to do with his hands. Or his guilt. Or his heartbreak.

You sigh. It’s long and low and rattling, like a pressure valve giving up.

“That one got to me,” you confess in a murmur. No bravado, no shields.

George sits down across from you, on the floor. Not too close. Not yet.

“You did everything right,” he offers, knowing full well it’s the most useless sentence in medicine.

You nod. “Doesn’t mean anything today.”

Silence again.

And then you say it—simple, small. “Hurts less, having someone to sit with.”

George can only a manage an equally soft, “Yeah.” 

He means to say more. Something about how he gets it, how he’s grateful too, how he doesn’t know when this started mattering so much. He doesn’t. Instead, he just lets the grief spool out between you, a kind of shared vigil.

For the first time, it feels like neither of you is alone in it.

There is no grand epiphany with swelling music and slow-motion glances across the trauma bay. Instead, the truth seeps in like IV fluid through a catheter line. Slow and steady until suddenly everything’s changed and it’s already too late to stop it.

He really is in love with you.

It settles within him sometime after the code, after the paperwork, after the office silence where sadness spooled like spilled saline between you. You wipe your face. Straighten your spine. You bounce back like the shift doesn’t still have its claws buried in your chest. Because you have to. Because you’re only as good as your last patient.

He watches you laugh at a nurse’s joke two bays down. There’s still a smudge of blood near your collarbone, and George wants to both wipe it away and preserve it. Frame it. The absurd, mundane poetry of survival.

He’s in love with the way you still get his coffee order wrong. Religiously. It’s become a thing now. You hand him something caramelized and sweet with foam art resembling roadkill, and he drinks it anyway. Every time. He even looks forward to it. Like some deranged Pavlovian response to artificial vanilla.

He’s in love with the way you blush when his compliments actually land. Not the professional ones. Not “clean intubation” or “efficient tourniquet placement.” No, it’s when he says you look good with your hair up. Or that he likes your laugh. The words often tumble out like they’ve slipped on a wet floor, and you always stare at him like you can’t believe he said it.

Sometimes you say his name like it means something. Soft, like a secret, like a hand brushing over piano keys. Sometimes your touch lingers at the small of his back, brief and deliberate. Sometimes your eyes find his across the chaos of a double trauma call, and it feels like you’re the only two people in the room who know how the world ends.

George can’t help but wonder—hope, maybe—if you love him back. 

Just a little. Just enough. Enough for it to survive inside these sterile walls, between bloodied gloves and outdated vending machines. In the lull between codes. In the breath held between one life and the next. 

George sneaks up to the rooftop like he’s committing a felony, not just being a bit of a rebel with his badge still dangling from his neck and his trainers sticking faintly to the stairwell landing from someone else’s spilled energy drink. It’s been a shit day—unrelentingly so—made better only by the fact that you were in it. 

You, with your crooked grin and that ridiculous laugh that escaped when he joked about the broken CT scanner sounding like a dying whale. He thinks about that now. The way your mouth tilted up in spite of the chaos, how the sound lodged in his chest and reverberated through twelve hours of relentless code blues, admin errors, and one spectacularly misguided intern who stapled their own glove to a chart.

The rooftop is off-limits. The signs say so in bold, threatening font. That doesn’t stop anyone. It’s the worst-kept secret in the building: the unofficial sanctum for overworked medics, chain-smoking porters, night-shift romantics, and whoever else needs to pretend they’re alone for a while. George figures he deserves ten minutes of illicit fresh air and a protein bar with all the emotional nutrition of a soggy cardboard confession.

He pushes the heavy door open with a creak that sounds louder in his head than it probably is. The sky greets him in hues of orange and pink, like someone up there got carried away with a watercolor set. And—

You’re already there.

Of course you are. Perched on a cinderblock like it’s a throne, wind teasing the edges of your hair, hospital fleece draped around your shoulders. A shoddy cape for a reluctant superhero. You’re rolling your unlit cigarette between your fingers with the kind of focus usually reserved for bomb defusal. You look like you’re waiting for an answer that hasn’t arrived yet and probably won’t.

“Oh,” George says, eloquent as ever. A master of language. Shakespeare reincarnated. “Fancy seeing you here.”

You look towards him, surprised for only a half-second, before snorting. “We have got to stop meeting like this, doc.” 

He ambles toward the edge, careful not to make it look like he’s following you (he is), and squints at the city skyline, smeared in dusk. Rooftop etiquette dictates at least a full minute of silence. You’re both seasoned enough to observe it.

Then, glancing sideways, he nods at the cigarette. “Your patients weren’t that bad today.”

You shrug, but it’s the kind of shrug that says you’re carrying more than your standard trauma kit. “No one bled out on me, if that’s what you mean.”

“Then what’s that for?”

You glance at the cigarette like it just appeared in your hand, as if you’re not sure whether it’s a prop or a ritual. “Habit. Reflex. A bit of both. It’s stupid,” you say, too fast and too blank, which means lie, lie, lie.

The question escapes him before he can think better of himself: “Can I have it?”

You balk. You actually freeze, as if trying to verify that the George Russell—type A, cross-training, vitamin-supplementing, caffeine-policing George—is asking to hold a cigarette.

"What? You?"

“I need to do something with my mouth,” he says, dry as ever, “or else I’ll say something incredibly stupid.”

You raise an eyebrow, eyes flicking with interest now. “Like what?”

And George thinks—well, he’s already here. Emotionally bruised, wind-chilled, heart thrumming like it’s trying to page someone. There are worse places for truth to fall out of your face.

“Like how I’m in love with you, maybe,” he says. “That sort of stupid.”

There’s a beat. A heartbeat. Another. Time hesitates, maybe on purpose.

You stare at him for what feels like several eternities squeezed into a few seconds. Then your lips twitch, and you say, voice low and warm and without a hint of sarcasm, “I have something you could do with your mouth.”

And you kiss him.

George, in typical fashion, had not planned for this.

He planned for stat doses and catheter malfunctions, for awkward consultant encounters and broken vending machines. He planned for blood sugar crashes and night shifts and the exact millisecond he could reasonably abandon his shoes in the locker. But this—your mouth, your words, the way his heart is trying to chest-thump its way to freedom—this wasn’t in the risk assessment.

So, when you kiss him, he doesn’t immediately kiss you back.

Not because he doesn’t want to. Christ, he wants to. No, his body just took a full three-second sabbatical. All systems stunned into a temporary shutdown. His lips stay still, his hands useless at his sides, like he’s running a particularly slow diagnostic.

You pull away.

The shift in pressure is sudden. Your brows are halfway up your forehead, a confused little wrinkle forming between them. “I—I thought—” you’re stammering, and it occurs to George that you think you did something wrong. “God, sorry, I thought you—”

But he doesn’t let you finish.

His hands are on your waist, and then your back, and then he’s kissing you like he just remembered how lungs work. His mouth is warm and certain and a bit clumsy, like he’s making up for lost time and poor reflexes. You laugh into him, your shoulders shaking as his chest bumps yours, and he pulls back a fraction just to smile at you, really smile, teeth and all.

“That was a delayed reaction,” you say, breathless and grinning.

“I panicked,” he says, forehead resting against yours. “My brain bluescreened.”

You giggle again, this time softer, like you’re trying not to wake the sleeping city beneath you. “I love the sound of your life, you know.”

“What does that even bloody mean?” 

“Your laugh,” you clarify, eyes dancing. “Your bitching. Your bad jokes. Your rants about surgical notes. It’s stupid, but every time I crashed through those double doors with some poor sod bleeding out, I was hoping I’d get to annoy you. Just to hear you.”

George lets out a huff, overwhelmed by the idea that someone might find his chaos endearing. “If you keep kissing me like that,” he says, lips brushing against yours, “I might even start smiling on purpose.”

“Dangerous territory, doc,” you tease, tracing the edge of his collar. “People might start thinking you’re nice.”

“I’ll always be nice to you,” he replies, and kisses you again, because he can.

It’s not cautious. It’s not gentle. It’s not even neat. It’s two overtired medics smashing timelines together, trying to carve a moment of softness from the jagged edges of the day. The cigarette has fallen from your hand, landing between you with the finality of a dropped scalpel.

George forgets every chart, every protocol, every night he spent wondering if he was imagining it all. Turns out, you were right there with him, too. 

The first sign of your arrival isn’t the siren. It never is.

It’s your voice. Bright, theatrical, and a little too loud for seven in the morning, like you’ve mistaken resus for a West End audition.

“Morning, team! Got a present for you. Forty-six-year-old male, syncopal episode on the building site. GCS fifteen now but gave us a scare. BP’s low-ish, but he swore it’s just ‘cause he skipped breakfast.” 

George doesn’t look up right away. He’s pretending to finish reading a patient chart, but really, he’s buying time to wipe the smile off his face. He’s trying not to look like someone who spent half the night kissing the woman now wheeling a gurney into his trauma bay.

He finally lifts his head and finds you already halfway through wheeling the patient in, hair slightly wind-tousled, mouth smirking in a way that should be illegal before caffeine. You toss him a look. The kind that says, Guess who’s had three hours of sleep, a protein bar, and still managed to be the highlight of your morning?

“Skipped breakfast?” George says, arching a brow. “So did I. Should I be horizontal and woozy too?”

You tilt your head. “You’d be cuter if you were.”

“You would know, I’m sure.” 

You shoot him a grin that’s too practiced to be anything but genuine. It lingers in the air between you two like static. Like a held breath. Like a secret you’re both absolutely rubbish at keeping.

On the surface, nothing’s changed. You’re still infuriatingly cheerful. He’s still emotionally constipated. The emergency department is still a chaotic blend of human frailty, malfunctioning air conditioning, and that one porter who always smells faintly of tuna. But there are cracks in the professional facade now. Glances that last one second too long. Shoulder brushes that aren’t entirely accidental. Conversations held just a decibel lower than necessary. Everything dialed to just under suspicion.

Like when he moves to the trauma bay and you follow, ostensibly to assist, but really just to be near. He doesn’t complain. He’s not stupid.

You rattle off vitals and hand over the case while George begins his survey, his gloves snapping on with practiced efficiency. But your fingers graze his wrist when you pass the chart. Not necessary. Not entirely innocent. Not the first time.

He clears his throat. “Anything else?”

“Yeah,” you murmur, a little softer now. “Dinner tonight. Not the canteen. My place.”

George’s heart thuds in a way that has nothing to do with caffeine deficiency or impending cardiac arrest. He doesn’t look at you. He doesn’t need to. That warmth is crawling up the back of his neck again, and if he meets your eyes, the whole department’s going to see the truth written on his face like a neon sign that reads, Completely Gone for Her.

“Text me,” he says below his breath, which is code for yes, obviously yes, and also: if I could, I’d kiss you right here beside the sharps bin.

You wink. It’s obnoxious. He loves it.

Then you’re gone, disappearing through the swinging doors with a rustle of fleece and a final glance thrown over your shoulder. He catches it, because of course he does. He catches everything now.

He finishes assessing the patient, notes the improving vitals, and hands off care to a junior. His hands are steady, his tone neutral, but his brain’s still up on the rooftop, in the echo of your laugh, in the way your mouth curved before you kissed him, in the cigarette that never got lit and never hit the ground.

The ambulance bay’s already teeming again. Another shift, another flood. Somewhere, someone’s yelling for more gauze. Someone else is panicking over a febrile toddler. Life, in all its messy glory, continues its noisy march through the ED.

But George feels lighter. Like something’s been recalibrated. Like he’s found a frequency worth tuning into.

And yeah, it’s complicated. Secret. Probably inadvisable. HR would have a coronary. Maybe even two.

But when you say his name now, even across a crowded trauma bay, it hits different.

Like a promise.

Like something worth breaking the rules for. 

EPILOGUE. 

The breakroom is a kingdom of expired yogurt and broken dreams. The vending machine hums like a dying animal. Someone’s half-eaten banana loaf has been fossilizing on the counter for three days. 

In the middle of this domestic horror scene sit Alex and Lando, two overcaffeinated gossip goblins in scrubs, staring intently at a laminated 3x3 bingo card.

“You can’t count the shoulder touch twice,” Alex says, pointing with the precision of a man who has lost three bets to Lando and refuses a fourth. “That’s one square. One. No multiplying affection like it’s mitosis.”

Lando kicks his feet up on the table, nursing a diet soda with the reckless bravado of someone who absolutely has not read the department email about the rat infestation. “I can if it was the left shoulder and then the right shoulder. That’s a full-body commitment. That’s basically foreplay in George language.”

Alex snorts. “Please. George’s version of foreplay is re-alphabetizing his medication cabinet.”

“And yet,” Lando says, dragging out the words like he’s narrating a wildlife documentary, “there he was. Letting her brush his elbow for a full two seconds yesterday. Right by the central line trolley. I timed it.”

“You timed it?”

“With my watch.”

Alex sighs and jots something in the corner of his clipboard. There are tally marks, a sketch of what might be George’s brooding frown, and a doodle of you wearing a cape.

“Fine,” Alex concedes. “‘Elbow linger’ gets a square. But only because I caught them emerging from the janitor’s closet looking suspiciously winded after ‘restocking gauze.’”

“George still tried to pretend he had a leg cramp,” Lando mutters, eyes rolling skyward. “They’re exhausting.”

“Deliciously exhausting,” Alex corrects. “Like a seven-course meal of denial.”

They both lean over the bingo card.

Top row reads:

George crashes a gurney while distracted

They show up with matching coffees ‘by coincidence’

Prolonged eye contact during a code blue

Middle row:

Overheard giggling behind curtain 3

Shared umbrella in the rain

George refers to her as ‘my paramedic’ and immediately chokes

Bottom row:

She steals his pen and keep it

They get caught kissing in a wardrobe by Q3

George admits he “might be fond” of her while under anaesthetic

“Alright,” Lando says, popping the cap off his highlighter. “What’s the wager? Winner gets the good parking spot or free lunch for a week?”

“Winner gets to officiate the wedding. Loser has to do a night shift with Alonso.”

Lando pauses. Measures the stakes. Nods, sage and serious. “You cruel, glorious bastard. You’re on.”

They shake on it. ⛐

[papayareads]

THE CLINIC ACROSS THE LANE PT1 | AA23

an: so, we've now opened a new world within the world, this is set in the same universe but in a different setting - so we are parting ways with the likes of max, oscar, lando, isack and franco and starting something new in this small village. i hope you guys like it, i think this installement in the series is the longest one, its 14.8k words in total lol

wc: 7k

summary: alex was a village vet with thirteen cats, too much tea, and not much surprise. she was an ex-army medic chasing quiet and found him instead. between pub quizzes, first aid kits, and a horse with opinions, something bloomed. they didn’t mean to fall in love, but as always, the village always knew before they did.

part two | uniformed hearts series

ALEX HAD A FEW ODD WAYS OF STARTING HIS DAY, but this had to take the cake.

It wasn’t the weather, though the usual thin drizzle had crept in through the loose kitchen window frame again, leaving the stone sill damp and the faint smell of wet earth lingering in the air. Nor was it the ancient boiler grumbling its last beneath the floorboards, rattling in protest against the cool June morning.

No, this time the peculiar charm came in the form of a large horse’s head sticking itself squarely through his open kitchen window and helping itself to the leftovers in his sink.

Alex stood there, barefoot, mug in hand, hair doing as it pleased, and stared at the intruder as it cheerfully mouthed an abandoned bit of toast.

The horse, unfazed by its discovery of breakfast, flicked one ear, snuffled the teabag lying by the mug tree, and began eyeing the washing-up bowl with dangerous curiosity.

“Well,” Alex said, voice rough with sleep, “you don’t see that every day.”

He set his mug down and stepped closer, palm out. The horse, a sturdy cob, likely gelded, grey with a winter-rough coat, smelled of rain, damp leather, and grass. It regarded him with mild interest, then withdrew its head with a faint wet slurp against the sill, leaving a smear of moisture and crumbs in its wake.

Alex leaned out the window and looked around.

No halter. No rope. No human.

Just the usual stretch of gravel drive leading to the lane, the quiet hedgerows, the mist-softened outline of the fields beyond. He glanced toward the paddock fences in the distance, but they stood empty, old Mr. Featherstone’s lot, and his mare had been put down last winter.

Frowning, Alex rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. Whoever this stray belonged to had some explaining to do. He hadn’t seen loose horses wandering the village since the summer fair two years ago, and that had ended with a child’s balloon being spectacularly burst by a startled Shetland.

"Right then," he muttered, tugging on his boots by the back door. The cob had wandered off across the gravel, nosing a flower bed. "Let’s find your person."

He grabbed a spare halter and stepped outside, the cold air biting at his bare arms. The horse glanced at him lazily and flicked its tail.

“Come on, thief,” Alex said, looping the halter gently over its neck. “Time to go home.”

The cob followed without protest, hooves clopping softly against the stones. Alex led it down the drive toward the road, glancing both ways. The village lay still and quiet, save for the distant bark of a dog and the hush of wind in the hedgerows.

And then, a flicker of movement up the lane, opposite his place but a little further along.

A figure, coat flapping open over what looked like pyjamas, hair tied messily back, trudging up and down near a broken fence line. She kept stopping, peering between the posts, searching the verge as if expecting something to pop out of the hedge.

Alex watched for a moment, curiosity pricking. Not Mrs Dobbins, wrong shape, too young. And not any of the regular dog-walkers.

New, then.

He shifted the lead rope in his hand and cleared his throat.

“Looking for this, by any chance?” he called gently across the lane.

The woman turned, blinking against the pale morning light. And just like that, the mystery of the toast-thieving horse was solved.

Alex shifted the rope in his hand as the woman turned towards him, squinting into the grey light. For a moment they just looked at each other across the narrow lane, the quiet of the morning settling between them.

Then she stepped forward, her boots scuffing the gravel.

“Ah. So that’s where he got to.” Her voice was warm, but dry with sleep, and unmistakably American.

Alex raised an eyebrow, glancing at the cob standing patiently at his side, nosing the pocket of his coat.

“Friend of yours, is he?”

“Unfortunately,” she said with a soft huff. “Fence post snapped overnight. He decided to go on an adventure before I could fix it.”

Alex gave the horse a gentle pat behind the ear. “Broke into my kitchen, helped himself to my toast. Good taste, if nothing else.”

The woman let out a low groan. “You’re kidding.”

“Wish I was. Came face to face with him over the sink. Nearly choked on my tea.”

She ran a hand down her face. “Great. First week here and I’m already terrorising the neighbours.”

His mouth twitched. “American?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Recently retired.”

Alex tilted his head, eyeing her with mild curiosity. “You look a bit young to be retired.”

A corner of her mouth quirked. “I’ll take that as flattery. Army medic. Served a little over eleven years, all told. Came out at the end of last year.”

“Medic, was it?” he said, thoughtful. “And now you’ve traded the battlefield for this.” He gestured vaguely at the quiet lane, the hedgerows, the distant roll of wet pasture.

“Something like that.” She glanced at the horse, giving the lead rope a tug. “He’s the reason, actually. Retired military horse. My brother served with the cavalry on an exchange tour here, I met this one while visiting. Couldn’t quite leave him behind when I decided to move.”

Alex gave the cob another gentle look. “So you brought him back to the countryside to live out his glory days in peace and breakfast theft.”

“Seems like he’s adjusting faster than I am,” she muttered.

For a moment, neither of them said anything. The drizzle softened the lane to a blur; a blackbird flitted from the hedge, unseen but singing.

“You’re in Willow Cottage, then?” Alex asked finally.

“Yeah. Moved in last week. Still unpacking. Still figuring out which switches do what. And obviously still sorting the fencing.”

He gave a low chuckle. “You’ll get the hang of it. Though you might want to reinforce that paddock before he decides to sample everyone’s breakfast up the lane.”

“Good advice.” She tugged the rope gently, coaxing the horse closer. “I’ll get him out of your way. Sorry about the kitchen raid.”

“No harm done.” Alex shook his head, amused. “Not every morning starts with a horse at the sink. Makes a nice change, actually.”

She smiled faintly, tired, but real, and turned to lead the cob back towards her gate.

Alex watched until the woman and her thieving horse disappeared behind the hedge and the old timber gate creaked shut. The quiet of the lane settled again, the soft spatter of rain against the gravel returning to fill the space where voices had been.

He stood there for a moment, fingers tapping absently against the lead rope still looped in his hand.

American. Recently retired. Army medic. Not what he’d expected for the old Willow Cottage, it had been empty for so long, half the village thought it’d fall in on itself before anyone bought the place. And now here she was, pyjama-clad, hair a mess, dragging an ex-military horse around like it was perfectly normal.

He shook his head, faint amusement pulling at the corner of his mouth.

"Welcome to the neighbourhood," he muttered under his breath.

He tucked the rope over the gatepost and turned back towards the house, slipping into the warmth of the kitchen. The window was still smeared where the cob’s damp nose had left its mark; the sink looked dishevelled, crumbs everywhere, mug half-full of cold tea.

Typical.

There was a gentle thump from the hallway. Then another. He paused, listening. The third thump was followed by a muffled yowl.

“Alright, alright,” he called wearily. “I’m coming.”

He set the kettle boiling again before making his way down the hall towards the back room, what the village gossipers called 'the cat room’, though Alex refused to admit such a ridiculous name out loud.

As he opened the door, a sea of eyes turned towards him. Thirteen cats, all in various states of lounge and sprawl, blinked at him from shelves, windowsills, the tops of cupboards, and the patched old sofa in the corner. There was a soft chorus of greeting mews, plus one impatient swat from Goosie, the British shorthair who ruled the others with quiet menace.

“Morning, your majesty,” Alex murmured, dropping a handful of biscuits into her dish first. “Don’t start a coup while my back’s turned.”

He made the rounds, filling bowls, checking water, scratching the odd chin as he went. MooMoo, one of the persians, followed him closely, purring like a chainsaw. A fat tortoiseshell flopped dramatically onto his boot.

“You lot get lazier every summer,” he muttered.

Once the cats were placated, he crossed the yard to the small stable at the back of the property. His two horses, Tinky and Snow White, stood quietly in their stalls, flicking ears at the sound of the door.

“Morning darlings,”

He checked them over with the ease of habit, fresh hay, clean water, a quick feel along their backs and legs. No trouble, no stiffness. Just quiet, familiar breathing in the dim light of the stable.

And then the last stop, Otto. His scruffy, half-deaf collie, who’d long ago claimed the worn armchair in his office as his throne. He thumped his tail as he stepped in, blinking at him with fogged old eyes.

“Come on, you old bat. Work to do.”

He clipped his lead on gently, not that he ever needed it, and gave him a careful scratch behind the ear. Otto huffed, licked his hand once, and padded after him towards the clinic door.

He switched the sign to OPEN, flicked on the kettle again, because he let the firs boil go cold, and leaned against the counter, watching the drizzle run lazy lines down the big front window.

His mind wandered back to the woman up the lane. American. Army medic. Moved here for... what, exactly? Peace and quiet? A new start? Dragging a half-retired military horse across the Atlantic didn’t exactly suggest a woman in search of rest.

He frowned thoughtfully, scratching at the stubble on his chin.

Interesting.

Behind him, Otto gave a soft sigh and settled by the heater. Somewhere in the house, a cat yowled at nothing in particular.

Another quiet morning. Strange, but quiet.

Just the way he liked it.

The day unfolded the way most of Alex’s did: quietly, steadily, without fuss.

Mrs Langley brought in her spaniel for its booster jab and spent fifteen minutes telling him about her neighbour’s ugly new conservatory. Old Mr Priestly shuffled in with his cat, a cross-eyed Siamese with a permanent sneer, and muttered darkly about the price of flea treatments. A farmer from up the hill dropped by with a sheepdog that had somehow managed to gash its leg chasing rabbits. Nothing dramatic. No panicked calls. No escaped livestock.

Just the quiet rhythm of village life. The way Alex preferred it.

By four o’clock the drizzle had faded to a damp mist, and he stood by the counter in the front of the clinic, scribbling notes in a file, Otto snoring gently at his feet. The 'OPEN' sign still swung on the door, but he doubted anyone else would bother him now.

Or so he thought.

The bell above the door gave a sharp jingle.

He glanced up, and there she was.

Still slightly scruffy, hair wind-stirred, coat zipped halfway up against the damp. But this time, no horse in tow. Instead, she held out a small paper bag awkwardly.

“I brought biscuits,” she said. “The cashier at Waitrose said these would be a nice gift.”

Alex stared for a moment, then let out a low laugh. “Good God. How much was the military pay out? Waitrose?!”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s the only shop in town.”

“Not if you drive out ten minutes. Tesco. And you can get yourself a Clubcard, too, proper village survival kit, that.”

That made her laugh, a real one this time, light and unguarded.

“Right,” she said, setting the bag carefully on the counter. “I’ll remember that. Clubcard and budget biscuits. Got it.”

He grinned, wiping his hands on a tea towel. “These your peace offering for the toast incident, then?”

“Partly. Mostly I’m here for advice.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “About the horse? Or about local grocery options?”

“Both, actually,” she said, smiling faintly. “I’ve never lived this far out before. Thought it’d be quiet, slow, you know. Fresh start. But no one mentioned broken fencing, escape artist horses, or mysterious kitchen raids.” She hesitated. “I could use a proper vet’s opinion. About him. About the set-up at the cottage. You know, whether I’m about to do everything wrong.”

Alex leaned on the counter, eyeing her with quiet amusement.

“Well. Can’t have you running a loose cavalry unit up and down the lane every morning. Might scare the postman.”

She smiled, but something in her shoulders eased, just a little. Like asking had cost her something.

“I’d appreciate it,” she said softly. “When you’ve got time.”

He glanced at the clock. Day done. Otto still snoring. No emergencies.

“I can come up after tea,” he offered. “Have a look round. Make sure your fences will hold next time he fancies breakfast.”

She nodded, looking genuinely relieved. “Thanks. And please don’t do what my auntie did and keep the biscuits in the cupboard, even if they are overpriced.”

He picked up the bag and peered inside. “Jammy Dodgers? Waitrose finest, no less. Bloody luxury.”

She huffed a laugh. “Like I said. Poor planning.”

Alex smiled, already reaching for the kettle behind him. “Stick the kettle on too, if you want proper village advice. Can’t solve fence posts without tea.”

Her grin widened. “I’ll remember that.”

With a small wave, she stepped back out into the lane, leaving the bell to jingle softly behind her.

Alex shook his head, still half-smiling, as he opened the bag and plucked out a biscuit.

American. Army medic. Waitrose biscuits.

What next?

Otto grunted in his sleep, unimpressed.

"Don’t worry, old boy," he murmured. "Looks like the quiet life just got interesting."

Later that evening, after tea and a half-hearted sandwich, Alex swung by Willow Cottage as promised.

The lane was soft with mist, the hedgerows heavy with damp, and the scent of earth and wet leaves hung in the air. He tucked his hands deep in his pockets as he crossed the gravel road, Otto padding quietly at his heel.

The cottage sat back from the lane, half-hidden by a tumble of old roses and hawthorn. A low stone wall ran round the little front garden, crooked in places, lichen-softened, as if the years had gently nudged it out of shape. The house itself was classic countryside: pale, worn brick under a slate roof, windows small and square with old glass that caught the lamplight from within.

Warm light glowed behind drawn curtains; smoke curled lazily from the chimney. Someone had lit the fire.

For all its rough edges, the bit of sag in the porch, the mismatched roof tiles, it looked lived in. Like someone had finally come to wake the place up after years of quiet sleep.

She opened the door before he could knock, a fleece thrown over her shoulders, mug in hand.

“You’re a man of your word,” she said, stepping back to let him in. “Come on, boots off, though. I just scrubbed this floor.”

“Bossy, aren’t you?” Alex muttered, toeing off his boots with good-natured grumbling. “Must be the army training.”

“Old habits.” She grinned and padded ahead of him into the kitchen.

The inside matched the outside: old, low-beamed ceilings, stone flagged floors, walls painted soft cream. A battered old Aga sat warm in the corner, humming gently. The scent of woodsmoke and tea hung in the air. Half-unpacked boxes stood by the dresser, books, picture frames, a bundle of horse tack, but everything else was strangely tidy. Cosy.

“This is better than I expected,” Alex said, glancing round. “Most new folks in the village leave half their house in cardboard boxes for six months.”

She snorted softly. “Can’t stand mess. Never could. I’ve done enough sleeping in tents and field hospitals, nice to have walls that don’t flap in the wind.”

He smiled faintly, eyeing the mug in her hand. “Tea?”

“Coffee. Habit.” She shrugged. “Old army trick, stay awake, stay alive.”

Alex made a quiet, understanding sound and nodded towards the back door. “Right then. Show me the damage.”

She led him out to the paddock behind the cottage. The fence was rough, some posts leaning, one clearly snapped clean through where the cob had made his escape. Alex crouched beside it, fingers tracing the break.

“Rotten at the base,” he said. “Old wood. Surprised the whole thing didn’t come down. You’ve got spare posts?”

“In the shed. Came with the house.”

“Good. I’ll show you how to set them properly tomorrow. For now...” He tugged at the loose wires. “We can lash this well enough to keep him in overnight. But you’ll need to do the rest this week.”

She nodded, watching closely as he worked, sleeves pushed back, hands steady.

“You do this a lot?” she asked.

“Fences? Only every time Featherstone’s cows get loose.” He shot her a sideways look. “They like to visit the bus stop. No idea why.”

She laughed under her breath. “Sounds like the village’s livestock’s as badly behaved as mine.”

“Cheaper, too.”

Between the two of them, they tied and braced the fence as best they could in the fading light. Her cob watched lazily from the shelter of the stable, chewing hay and showing no signs of guilt.

“He knows he’s in trouble,” she muttered.

“Of course he does. They all do. They just don’t care.”

When they were finished, she led him round to the garage to show him the tool pile. He stepped inside, and stopped short.

There it was: a hulking, shiny American 4x4. Black, spotless, built like a tank.

Alex stared.

“Good God,” he said, half laughing. “What the hell’s that doing here? You’re in England, not Montana.”

She flushed slightly, folding her arms. “It came with me from the States. I couldn’t bear to leave it.”

“On country roads? Are you mad? You’ll be scraping both hedges every time you leave the drive.”

She grinned. “I survived armoured convoys in Kabul. I think I can manage the B3154.”

He chuckled, shaking his head. “You’ll terrify the villagers. Mrs Langley’ll think the Yanks are invading again.”

“She’ll get used to it.”

“Doubt it. You’ll hear the muttering in the post office soon enough.” He gave the bonnet a tap. “Still, fair warning. Tesco car park’s a squeeze. You might have to park on the moon.”

She smiled, leaning against the doorway, arms loose at her sides. The faint lines of tiredness had eased from her face.

“Thanks for helping with the fence,” she said softly. “And for not charging me for toast theft and breaking and entering.”

He waved a hand. “I take payment in biscuits now, apparently. Waitrose finest, and no less.”

Her quiet laugh warmed the dark little garage.

For a moment, neither of them moved. The drizzle thickened outside. The smell of damp earth and hay hung in the air.

“You’ll settle in,” Alex said at last. “This place’ll suit you. You’ll see.”

She met his gaze, steady, clear.

“I hope so,” she said.

And for the first time, he thought maybe she meant it.

After Alex had left, boots crunching down the gravel, dog trotting faithfully at his side, the cottage fell quiet again.

She stood in the doorway for a moment, watching the drizzle soften the shape of the hedgerows, the faint red glow of his porch light across the lane. Then she shut the door gently and leaned her back against it, breathing out slow and deep.

So. First proper neighbourly chat done. No major disasters. No awkward silences. Just dry humour, fences, and Waitrose biscuits.

It wasn’t a bad start.

She padded back into the kitchen, tugging the fleece tighter round her shoulders. The cob, stupid creature, gave a soft whicker from the paddock, content now the fence was repaired. At least for tonight.

The kettle was still warm on the Aga; she filled a mug and sat at the old scrubbed table, cradling it between her hands. The scent of peppermint tea curled up into the lamplight.

Home. Strange word. Strange feeling.

Six months ago she’d been in Florida, sweating under the sharp sun, filling out discharge papers and wondering what the hell to do with herself. No more bases. No more orders. No more brothers-in-arms calling her 'Doc' with that tired old smile.

Just... quiet.

England had seemed like the cleanest slate she could find. New country. New start. The old cottage had been cheap, too many repairs, too far from the city, and no one sane wanted to deal with a half-broken ex-military horse and a pile of army kit.

But she’d wanted space. Distance.

She sipped the tea, staring into the steam.

Across the kitchen, her phone buzzed against the windowsill. She leaned over, thumbed the screen, and smiled softly.

Logan.

FaceTime. Typical.

She answered and his familiar face filled the screen, sleep-creased, hair sticking up, t-shirt twisted at the neck.

“Hey,” she said. “Sleep well?”

He groaned. “I’m not twelve, you know.”

“Could’ve fooled me. You look like you’ve been dragged through a hedge.”

“Because you called at dawn earlier, genius. Time difference, remember?”

She grinned. “Could’ve silenced your phone.”

“Nah.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Wanted to make sure you hadn’t burned the cottage down yet.”

“Not yet. Though the horse tried.” She rolled her eyes. “You didn’t mention your stupid rescue cob had a criminal streak.”

Logan laughed, head tipping back against his pillow. “Old habits. He’s been breaking fences since Afghanistan. Guess he missed the action.”

“Well, he nearly ate my neighbour’s toast this morning. Out the kitchen window.”

His grin widened. “See? Perfect guard horse.”

“Perfect pain in the ass, more like.”

She leaned her elbow on the table, letting the quiet of the kitchen settle round her. Logan’s familiar face, the distant murmur of his apartment in the background, it all felt a million miles away now.

“How’s it really going?” he asked, softer.

She hesitated. Sipped her tea.

“Alright,” she said at last. “Quiet. Cold. British.” A faint smile. “Neighbour seems normal enough. Bit sarcastic. Owns too many cats.”

“Sounds like your type.”

“Shut up.”

“Is he single?”

“Goodbye, Logan.”

He laughed, hands up in mock surrender. “Just asking. Gotta keep your standards high, sis. Even in the middle of nowhere.”

She shook her head, smiling despite herself.

“Get some sleep, baby brother.”

“Stop calling me that. You’re only older by two years.”

“And I’ll lord it over you forever. Goodnight, Logan.”

“’Night, Doc.”

The call ended; the cottage slipped back into gentle silence. She set the phone down, watching the rain bead on the dark window glass.

This place was strange. Old. Heavy with quiet.

But maybe that’s what she needed.

She stood, finished her tea, and checked the back door was bolted. The cob shifted in the paddock, the fence holding firm.

Across the lane, the faint glow of Alex’s window still burned behind the hedge.

A tiny spark of company, in a quiet world.

She smiled softly and turned out the light.

The days slipped by gently.

By Wednesday, the cottage smelled of woodsmoke and coffee instead of damp plaster. The kitchen was unpacked, the stable swept clean. The cob, still a walking disaster, had taken to standing at the gate like a sentinel, watching the lane with mild suspicion.

She’d met the postman. And Mrs Langley, who leaned over the low garden wall and asked bluntly whether ‘the American’ was planning to keep livestock or just the one horse who thought he was a dog.

At the little village shop, she’d been served by a boy no older than sixteen who went wide-eyed when she opened her mouth and said “hello” in her unmistakable drawl. He gave her the wrong change twice, hands shaking.

“I’m not dangerous,” she’d murmured, bemused, counting coins on the way home.

It was quiet. Odd. But manageable.

And then came Tesco.

It was Friday afternoon when she’d finally caved and made the drive out, past fields and hedgerows, dodging tractors and elderly ladies in tiny cars that refused to hit thirty miles an hour. Tesco loomed on the edge of the next town, its wide grey car park mostly empty in the drizzle.

She was halfway down the tea aisle, staring at a wall of strange British brands and wondering what the hell ‘PG Tips’ even stood for, when a familiar voice drawled behind her.

“Looking for the Waitrose section, are we?”

She glanced round.

Alex stood there, trolley half-filled with cat food and apples, his usual dry smile curling at the edges.

“Funny,” she said. “I was just wondering which of these won’t taste like boiled socks.”

He chuckled, nudging her with his shoulder. “PG’s safe. Yorkshire Tea if you want to survive round here. The rest’s just for tourists.”

She plucked a box of Yorkshire Tea from the shelf, tossing it into her basket. “Noted. Local survival tip number twenty-three.”

He grinned. “You’re learning.”

They wandered the next aisle together, milk, bread, jam, his easy familiarity making the wide, bright shop feel less foreign. Every so often a villager passed by, giving a slow glance. Mrs Langley’s sister. The butcher’s wife. Two elderly men from the pub.

Their eyes flicked to her, then to him.

The glances were small. Nothing cruel. But noticeable.

She caught it. Of course she did.

Alex leaned in, voice low, amused. “Get used to that.”

She raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“The looks. Suspicious Americans come round these parts so rarely. You’re exotic. Like the circus pulling into town.”

She huffed a quiet laugh. “Doesn’t bother me.”

“Good. Because they’ll be doing that for a while yet. Old habits.”

“I’ve had worse stares in worse places,” she said simply, dropping butter into the basket. “Trust me. This is nothing.”

He gave her a sideways glance, thoughtful, quiet.

“You’ll fit in. Eventually. Once they realise you’re not here to buy the manor and turn it into a golf course or something.”

She snorted. “Is that a common fear?”

“Oh yes. Americans and developers. The village’s two great enemies.”

They rounded the corner to the pet food aisle. Alex threw in three more bags of cat biscuits with the air of a man feeding a small army.

“Twelve cats, right?” she said.

“Thirteen now. Stray’s moved into the barn. He refuses to leave.”

“Soft touch.”

“Don’t tell anyone.”

She smiled faintly, watching him stack tins of dog food. Strange man. Strange place. But it was nice. In a quiet, slow way.

At the tills, Mrs Featherstone gave her the once-over, sharp gaze from behind the self-service counter. Alex caught the look and raised his eyebrows.

“She thinks I’m leading you astray,” he murmured.

“She thinks I’m leading you astray.”

He grinned. “Good. Keep them guessing.”

Outside, the drizzle had faded into cold grey light. She packed her boot carefully, the giant 4x4 swallowing shopping bags like peanuts, while Alex loaded his battered old estate car next to her.

He straightened, gave her a small, familiar smile.

“You’re doing alright,” he said. “Settling in.”

She met his gaze. Steady. Calm.

“Trying.”

And for a moment, in the damp car park, with the smell of rain and petrol, it felt like maybe this new life might not be such a mistake after all.

The week rolled on in the slow, familiar way country weeks did.

Mornings of tea and feed buckets, Otto padding by his heel, the cats trailing like tiny shadows. The clinic filled with its usual parade of ailments, sheep with hoof rot, a limping collie, the Featherstone’s ancient spaniel who had once again eaten something it shouldn’t.

But between the rounds and the paperwork, between the endless boiling of the kettle and scraping mud from his boots, he saw her.

Little flashes of her new life, unfolding quietly across the lane.

Once or twice he’d driven past and seen her out by the fence, sleeves rolled, hammer in hand, mending the wood they’d patched together. Another time she was dragging hay bales from the stable to the paddock, grumbling softly to the cob, who followed her like a guilty dog.

But the thing that caught him most, made him slow in his step by instinct, was when she rode.

He’d passed on the track that cut behind her land and seen her in the field beyond, astride the sturdy cob, sitting straight and still in the saddle.

Careful. So careful. Like the horse might shatter if she moved too fast.

No rough heels. No sharp hands. Just quiet patience. The kind you only learned when you’d seen worse things than spooked horses.

He didn’t call out. Just watched for a moment, letting his breath fog in the air before continuing on with his journey.

By Friday, the thought had rooted in his mind.

If she was going to stay, and she was, if the growing woodpile and the mended fence were any sign, she might as well do it properly.

So that evening, after shutting the clinic and bribing the cats with early supper, he crossed the lane and rapped smartly on her door.

It opened, warm light spilling out onto the porch.

She stood there, surprised but not startled, wiping her hands on an old cloth. Smelled faintly of hay and coffee.

“Right,” he said, straightening his collar. “We’re doing this properly now. Full force. No half-measures.”

She raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“If you want to be a local, properly, not just the mad American with the fence-breaking horse, you’re coming to the pub quiz tonight. Friday tradition.”

She blinked. Then smiled slowly. “Pub quiz?”

“Mandatory. Like rain and parish council leaflets.”

She folded her arms. “What do I wear?”

“Clothes.”

A dry grin tugged at the corner of his mouth as he turned on his heel.

“I’ll be back in twenty minutes,” he called over his shoulder. “Don’t make me drag you out.”

Behind him he heard the soft sound of her laugh, low, quiet, genuine.

For the first time in a long while, the old lane felt like it was waking up again.

Twenty minutes later, true to his word, Alex was back at her door.

The porch light flickered gently in the breeze, the faint scent of woodsmoke curling from the chimney. He rapped twice on the frame, boot tapping quietly against the old stone step.

The door creaked open.

He blinked.

She stood there, skirt brushing her ankles, a soft, simple top beneath her jacket, sleeves pushed to the elbows. Not the army fleece or the battered jeans he’d grown used to. Something quieter. Warmer. Like she’d stepped straight out of some old village painting.

He tipped his head, smirking.

“Blimey,” he said. “You really do look like a proper villager now.”

She glanced down at herself, tugging the edge of the skirt. “I look ridiculous. I should change—”

She turned, but he caught her hand before she could go.

Firm. Gentle. Warm.

“Nope. Come on,” he said, voice soft but certain. “You look good.”

She stilled. Looked up at him. Something quiet flickered in her eyes, surprise, maybe. Or amusement. But she didn’t pull away.

“Come on, Yank,” he teased, giving her hand a small tug. “Pub quiz awaits. Can’t have the locals thinking you’re afraid of a pint and a badly worded question about 1970s cricket.”

She laughed under her breath, low and easy, and stepped out into the night beside him.

The lane stretched quiet and dark, the faint glow of the pub’s sign just visible down the hill. The cob shifted in the paddock, watching them go.

They walked side by side, hands brushing now and then, boots soft on the gravel.

For once, Alex thought, the old farmhouse behind him didn’t feel quite so much like the edge of the world.

The pub was already full when they arrived.

Warm light spilled onto the pavement, the low thrum of voices and the clink of pint glasses rising into the cold village air. Inside, the familiar scent of ale, old wood and something vaguely resembling pie wrapped round them like a blanket.

Alex gave her a sideways look as he pushed open the door.

“Last chance to run.”

She smirked. “Not likely.”

Heads turned as they stepped in, the usual Friday crowd giving curious glances over their pints. Mrs Featherstone near the fire, knitting something violently pink. Old Roger from the post office pretending not to stare. Even the barman paused in polishing glasses.

Alex dipped his head in brief greeting, steering her gently towards an empty table near the window.

“Right,” he said, sliding into a chair. “Rules are simple. Don’t shout the answers. Don’t argue with Barry, he runs the quiz and holds a grudge like nobody’s business. And for God’s sake, don’t order the scampi. You’ll regret it.”

She grinned, sitting opposite. “Got it. No scampi. No shouting.”

“Good girl.”

The quiz sheets arrived, and Alex nearly choked on his pint when he read the theme scrawled across the top in Barry’s terrible handwriting.

"Military History & Medicine".

He glanced at her, eyebrows raised.

She stared at the sheet. Then slowly, her mouth curled into a grin.

“You’re kidding,” she murmured.

“I swear I had nothing to do with this.”

She picked up the pen, spinning it between her fingers. “Oh, they’re doomed.”

And they were.

The first round was child’s play, dates, names, old British wars she’d clearly memorised half a lifetime ago. She scribbled down answers before Barry had finished the questions, leaning close to Alex to mutter little facts about field hospitals and strange 19th-century surgical tools.

By the time round two hit, "Famous Army Medics", Alex was grinning into his pint.

“You’re terrifying,” he said under his breath.

“I have niche skills.”

“Niche? You’ve just taken down the entire village’s combined brainpower in twenty minutes.”

Across the room, murmurs were spreading. Mrs Langley shot them a deeply suspicious look. Barry frowned at his sheet like it had betrayed him personally.

When the final scores went up, the pub gave a collective, disgruntled groan.

Team: 'Yank and a Redcoat!' — 48 points.

Everyone else — 28 or less.

Barry cleared his throat at the front.

“Well... surprise winners tonight, eh,” he muttered, eyes flicking between them. “Prize is... uh...” He reached under the bar and produced a bottle of questionable red wine and a battered box of biscuits.

“Congratulations. I suppose.”

She stared at the prize, eyes wide. Then laughed. Really laughed, head tipped back, shoulders shaking.

“Oh my God. We actually won.”

Alex leaned back in his chair, smug as anything.

“Told you. Proper villager now. Beating the lot of them at their own game.”

“Military history,” she said, wiping her eyes. “You couldn’t make this up.”

“Fate,” he said solemnly. “Or Barry being lazy and printing last year’s quiz by mistake.”

She giggled, shaking her head, clutching the sad-looking prize like it was gold.

Around them, the grumbling softened, curiosity replacing suspicion. Old Roger raised a pint in grudging salute. Mrs Featherstone muttered something that might have been “good on her” under her breath.

Alex grinned.

“See? You’re halfway local already.”

She smiled back, warm and real.

“Not bad for my first Friday night.”

“Next week’s theme is usually ‘British sitcoms of the 80s’, mind,” he said. “You’re on your own for that one.”

“I’ll start revising.”

They shared a quiet laugh, the pub light soft round them, the rain tapping gently on the window.

For the first time in a long while, Alex thought, Friday night at the Dog and Duck was actually fun again.

The weeks slipped by.

Her little patch of land, once a quiet blank slate, began to gather shape, fences mended, the old stable scrubbed until it smelled only of wood and hay, the paddock flattened by the steady tread of the cob’s hooves. The feedroom was stocked, the tools hung neatly on old nails. Every small chore done, piece by quiet piece.

The house, too, softened. The kitchen smelled of fresh bread now, the bakery in town did decent rolls if you got there before ten. The old Aga creaked to life on chilly mornings. Her boots lined the back door. A basket by the hearth collected gloves and scarves.

Even the villagers were beginning to nod as they passed, cautious nods, but not unfriendly. Mrs Langley had dropped off marrow from the allotment. Roger had grumbled something about fence wire and offered a length he’d ‘forgotten’ in his shed.

And then there was Alex.

She’d seen him most days, in some fashion, driving past in his battered car, waving across the lane, bringing Otto to nose round the fence. The pub quiz had broken something loose, softened some edge between them. He’d knocked twice since with spare feed buckets and fence nails. Once to ask, very dryly, if she knew her cob had ‘liberated’ itself again and gone grazing in his orchard.

It was quiet. Good.

And yet, the quiet had edges.

One cold Saturday afternoon, wrapped in an old jumper with tea steaming beside her, she rang Logan.

The call picked up on the second ring.

“Hey, sis.”

“Hey. Sleep well?” she teased gently.

A grunt. “Still not twelve.”

She smiled. Familiar. Steady.

They talked for a while, about the cob’s latest escape attempt, the strange British love of hedgerows, Alex’s thirteen cats. Logan laughed, quiet and warm, but she could hear something else beneath it.

When the silence stretched, she prodded softly.

“Alright, Logan. Spit it out.”

He sighed.

“I’ve been... uh. Thinking.” A pause. “I don’t really know what’s left here for me.”

Her heart squeezed, but she kept her voice light. “Big news, that.”

“I mean it.” Another quiet breath. “I keep looking at the calendar and realising... there’s nothing holding me here anymore. No one left. No job I care about. No one waiting at the door when I get home. Just quiet.”

She knew that feeling. Knew it like old scars.

“You could come here,” she said gently. “There’s plenty of space. Plenty of fields. You’d like it.”

He laughed, soft but unsure. “I don’t want to intrude on your new life.”

“Don’t be silly.” She smiled, twisting the tea mug in her hands. “The villagers won’t want another Yank, they barely tolerate me, but I want my brother.”

Silence. Warm. Thoughtful.

“You mean that?” he asked softly.

“Of course I mean it.” She glanced out the window, to the low shape of the cob grazing beyond the fence. “Come and build something here. We can be odd foreigners together.”

Another pause. Then, lighter.

“Do they have beer?”

“Bad beer and good tea. Take your pick.”

He laughed properly this time.

“I’ll think about it.”

“You’d better.”

And when the call ended, and the quiet returned, it felt less sharp. Less hollow.

Maybe this little village would have space for two lost souls after all.

It wasn’t easy for Logan to finally take everything apart and bring it together again in the small town, but he did it.

A month of selling, packing, sorting. Of throwing away old army gear, donating books no one read anymore, shutting up the quiet flat he’d barely called home.

When she’d told Alex about it, half nervous, half hopeful, he’d simply said over his tea and said, “I’ll drive. I know the roads better.”

And so he had. The old Land Rover that he complained drove the wrong way around, cleared of feed sacks and tools for once, made the run to the station early on a damp Tuesday morning.

She stood by the gate when they returned, jacket tight round her, mug warm in her hands, watching for the cloud of road dust down the lane.

It came, slow and steady, wheels crunching on the gravel.

Alex pulled up with the usual grumbling rattle, leaning out the window.

“Your stray’s arrived.”

Logan climbed out of the passenger side, tall, travel-tired, hair sticking up in odd directions from the train. His bag slung over one shoulder. His old, familiar grin in place the moment he saw her.

“Hey, sis.”

She smiled. Big, warm, real. “You made it.”

“Not dead yet. Though that driving,” He threw a thumb at Alex, “questionable.”

“I warned you,” she said with a laugh.

Alex snorted, slamming the door. “Ungrateful, the both of you. Could’ve left him at the services for a sausage roll and a flat coffee.”

Logan grinned wider. “I’d have made friends. Probably got a job at the Greggs.”

They laughed, all three, and for the first time in a long while, it felt easy. Like something old slipping quietly into place.

She hugged him tight, breathing in the faint scent of old army jacket and train carriage.

“Welcome home.”

He squeezed back. “Let’s see if the village survives two of us.”

Alex swung round the back of the Land Rover, hauling out Logan’s battered bag. “I give it a week before Mrs Langley starts a rumour you’re both CIA.”

“Two Yanks in the same village?” Logan said, raising an eyebrow. “Suspicious.”

“You’ll have to win them over like she did,” Alex muttered. “Pub quiz’s next Friday. Start revising.”

Logan shot his sister a look.

“Pub quiz?”

She grinned. “Don’t argue. It’s tradition.”

Alex dropped the bag on the step with a thud.

“Right. You two can catch up. I’ve got a dog with suspected fox mange and a sheep that hates me waiting at the clinic.”

He gave her a sideways glance, something warm, familiar, then pointed a finger at Logan.

“Behave. Or I’ll set Otto on you.”

Logan mock-saluted. “Yes, sir.”

As Alex tramped back to his place, she turned to her brother.

“Well?”

He looked round, at the house, the paddock, the low hills fading into the mist.

And smiled.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I think I can make this work.”

to be continued...

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[papayareads]

THE FIELD BY THE QUAD PT1 | IH6

an: HAPPY 3K TO ME! thank you guys for supporting my silly little hobby, i love you guys from the deep depths of my heart, i did this thing where i googled 'visualise 3k people' and the amount of people it showed me was crazy, thank you all for your support <3

summary: isack plays rec football and studies medicine on his good days, on his bad days he flirts with the first aider while she patches him up. he thinks it'll all just go away until he realises, they’re assigned the same hospital placement the very next week.

wc: long i forgot to check

part two | uniformed hearts series masterlist

ISACK NEVER MEANT TO PLAY FOOTBALL AT UNI. He wasn’t that type. Not the loud, confident medic boys who could swap lectures for pub pints without blinking. Not the ones who swaggered onto the pitch like it was the centre of their lives.

He’d signed up by accident, more or less. A coursemate needed an extra for the IMS team trials “Just fill in, mate, no one cares if you’re shite” and Isack, ever unable to say no, had gone along in worn trainers and an old track top that still smelt faintly of his dad’s aftershave.

Somehow, he’d made the cut. Midfield. 

Now it was spring term, the field by the quad turned to patchy green and mud, and he was still playing. Still showing up, kit bag slung over his shoulder, headphones in, pretending he didn’t hear the whistles and the shouts and the rowdy teasing in the changing rooms.

He preferred studying. The quiet click of library keyboards. The thin black lines of anatomy diagrams, memorised until they sat behind his eyelids. Heart valves, nerve pathways, fascia layers. Clean. Understandable.

But there was something about the pitch he couldn’t quit. The way running flattened the noise in his head. The way time slipped different out here, the sky wide and soft above him, the hum of the university behind the hedge line.

Isack adjusted the strap of his bag and squinted towards the quad. The usual crowd was gathering, smokers, backpack-clutching freshers, couples wrapped in scarves. He tugged the collar of his sweatshirt up, hands deep in his pockets, head ducked.

His mum would hate this. Playing football when he should be revising. Getting injured, maybe. Bad for the future, she’d say, bad for the hands, bad for the brain.

She wasn’t wrong.

The last knock to the head had left him dizzy for days. Concussion, mild. Cleared by the clinic nurse with instructions he hadn’t fully listened to, mind fuzzy, too full of pressure to remember properly.

He rubbed the back of his neck, warm even in the chill air.

Brilliant.

A familiar voice cut across the quad, dragging him back.

“Oi, Isack, are you bringing the ball or what?”

He blinked, startled. Kimi, his mate, waving from the pitch.

“Coming,” he muttered, adjusting his bag and heading for the field, boots scuffing the paving stones, heart ticking faster than it should.

The changing rooms smelt like old sweat and cheap deodorant. Someone had left the window cracked open but it barely dented the stink of damp kit and grass.

Isack shoved his bag into the corner, tugged off his sweatshirt, and crouched to tighten his laces. The boots were still caked with last week’s mud, the pitch never drying properly this time of year.

Kimi clapped him on the shoulder as he passed. “You awake today, Frenchie, or am I carrying midfield on my own?”

“Still more awake than you,” Isack muttered, tying the last knot tight.

The others laughed, low and easy. Sami was already lacing up, mouth full of flapjack, and Pepe sat swinging his legs like a restless kid, shin pads jammed in half-crooked.

Coach stuck his head round the door. “Two minutes, lads. Don’t leave your brains in here.”

Kimi grinned sideways nudging Pepe. “Yours never made it out of the womb, bello.”

“Piss off.”

The usual noise. Familiar. Safe.

Isack pulled on his bib, grabbed his water bottle, and followed the others out into the cold.

The field was squelchy underfoot, bare patches showing yellow-brown where the grass had given up for winter. The quad stretched quiet behind the hedge, the library windows throwing pale squares of light.

“Right,” Coach barked, clapping his hands. “Quick warm-up. Then match. No hero tackles, lads, save that for when you’re on the bloody telly.”

Isack jogged out, the cold air biting at his throat. His legs felt stiff, brain fuzzed from too many late nights revising. But his body knew the drills. Stretches, sprints, side steps. Move, warm up, focus.

The thing that he loved about this was that it wasn’t proper serious. Not a league match. Just IMS scrimmage, course against course, bragging rights on the line. But it still mattered enough. Shouts and curses, the thud of boots on turf, the slap of the ball against damp leather.

Isack stayed wide, moving into space. He wasn’t the fastest, but he read the game sharp. Caught the passes no one else saw. Slipped the ball on, clean, simple.

“Nice, Isack!” Kimi called, breath misting. “Good shape!”

It went on. Cold seeping into sleeves. Mud splattering up calves.

Then, the ball came loose centre pitch. Their forward missed the catch. Isack darted in, twisting, foot to the leather.

A shoulder slammed him from the side. Hard. Too hard.

His head snapped. The sky spun sharp and pale and fast.

And then ground.

A dull, wet thump.

Everything muffled.

He lay still, cheek pressed to the cold turf, breath short and strange.

Voices blurred above him.

“Isack—”

“Shit, mate—”

“Stay down, don’t move—”

And then she was there.

Kneeling beside him.

His guardian angel

Warm hand on his shoulder, steady. A quiet voice, low, calm, threading through the noise.

“Hey. You with me? Can you hear me?”

He blinked. The sky jittered. Her face swam into view, bright eyes, soft mouth, the faint scent of antiseptic and soap and fabric softener.

Beautiful.

Oh no.

“Yeah,” he mumbled, and then, because his brain was clearly working on its own: “Hi. You’re very pretty.”

A small breath of laughter, surprised. “Concussion, then.”

He squinted. “What gave me away?”

“Charming the medic while flat on your back is usually a sign.”

Her hand rested light against his jaw, turning his head gently. Checking pupils, probably. But all he could think of was how close she was. How warm her fingers felt against his skin.

“Can you sit up?”

“I don’t know. You’re very distracting.”

A quiet huff of amusement. Careful fingers at the back of his head now. Checking for cuts.

“Right. Let’s sit you up slowly. Ready?”

He let her guide him, world tilting, stomach flipping like he’d stepped off a kerb wrong.

“Better?” she asked softly.

“Dizzy. But still pretty.”

A pause. He thought she might roll her eyes. But when she spoke, her voice was still calm.

“Keep talking. Let’s make sure that brain of yours is still working.”

He breathed in slow. Mud and cold and the quiet thread of her perfume.

“Name?” she asked.

“Isack.”

“And course?”

“Medicine.”

Her smile ghosted at the corner of her mouth. “Figures.”

“Why?”

“Only med students flirt while concussed.”

His chest wobbled with a laugh. The field swam sideways. She steadied him without fuss, hand firm on his shoulder.

“Let’s get you off the pitch.”

“Your wish is my command,” he murmured, grinning stupidly.

She shook her head, but her hand stayed gentle. Careful. Real.

And as she helped him to his feet, the pitch spinning, his brain light as paper, Isack realised with slow certainty.

He was completely, utterly doomed.

She steadied him under the arm, gentle but firm, as they shuffled awkwardly off the pitch. His boots skidded a little on the slick grass and he gave a soft curse in French under his breath, half tripping over his own feet.

“Careful,” she murmured, one hand at his elbow. “Don’t make this worse. You’ve got enough trouble up top as it is.”

He grinned sideways at her, eyes still dazed, still faintly glazed with that post-knock fuzz. “What, you don’t think this is my normal charming self?”

“I’d hope not,” she said, half laughing. “Otherwise you’ve got bigger problems than concussion.”

They reached the sideline. Someone shoved his water bottle into his hand, but he didn’t bother drinking, just blinked at her like she was the most interesting thing on the field.

“You’re very pretty,” he said again, earnest this time. Like it had just occurred to him fresh.

She sighed, amused, crouching to open her first aid bag. “God help me. Why are you all the same when you get a head knock?”

“I’m not like the others,” he insisted solemnly. “I’m French.”

Her mouth twitched. “Not just French I’d assume by that surname of yours.”

He beamed. “See? You notice me.”

“Just pure deduction skills. And the curls." He grinned and she shook her head, biting back a laugh. “Right. One more time. Name, course, year?”

“Isack. Medicine. Final year. Single. Available.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Not on the form, sunshine.”

“Should be.”

“Mm. Emergency contact?”

He winced, like that brought a clearer thought to the surface. “Not my mum. God. Don’t call my mum. She’ll kill me. ‘You play football to hurt your head? I send you to university for this?’”

That actually made her laugh, proper this time, light and warm in the cold air.

“Then who, Casanova?”

“My flatmates.” He fumbled in his pocket, dragging out his phone, waving it at her like a confused pensioner. “Here. Call Lando or Franco. They’ll come.”

She took the phone carefully, thumbs flicking through. His lock screen was cracked, typical, but not locked. A background picture of a dog wearing sunglasses made her pause.

“You’ve got a weird dog.”

He grinned, lopsided. “He’s my cousin’s. His name’s The Biscuit.”

“Of course it is.”

She scrolled through his contacts, thumb steady, brain ticking. There they were.

I.C.E. Lando Flat I.C.E Franco Flat

She tapped Lando first. It rang twice before a groggy voice picked up.

“What do you wannnnnnnnnntttt Isack?”

“Hi. Not Isack,” she cut in smoothly. “He’s fine. Sort of. Took a head knock on the quad pitch. Bit concussed. Can you or Franco come pick him up?”

A pause. A muttered curse. “Bloody hell. Yeah, alright. Where are you?”

“Field by the quad. Near the main hedge line on campus.”

“Got it. Ten minutes.”

The line went dead. She slid the phone into her pocket.

“Your knight in shining armour is on his way,” she said lightly.

“Good lad,” Isack murmured, rubbing his temple with the heel of his hand. “Tell them to bring snacks.”

“Maybe wait ‘til you can walk in a straight line before you eat, Romeo.”

“Call me that again,” he grinned. “I could get used to it.”

“Delirious and cheeky. You’re a treat.”

He leaned sideways, still squinting at her, like he couldn’t quite believe she was real. “What’s your name?”

She smiled faintly, packing away the first aid kit. “Not how this works.”

“Not fair.”

“Life isn’t.”

He made a soft, pitiful noise and flopped back onto the grass, muttering something in French that she didn’t catch but sounded miserable and dramatic.

She stood, brushed mud off her knees, and waited.

Lando and Franco wouldn’t be long.

Good thing, too. She had a feeling this one was going to be trouble.

She was right, they didn’t take long.

Lando arrived first, jogging across the quad with his fleece half-zipped and an expression that said he’d been dragged out of bed or off the sofa. Franco trailed after, phone already in hand, recording like some cheap documentary crew.

“Oh, mate,” Franco grinned, flipping the camera round. “Look at you. Flat on your culo, flirting with the medic. This is going straight in the group chat.”

Isack squinted up at him from the grass, dopey smile stuck to his face. “Lando you’re pretty too.”

Lando snorted. “He’s gone.” He glanced at her, raising a brow. “Sorry about him. He’s normally not this charming. Or this unconscious.”

She huffed a soft laugh. “I gathered.”

“Proper concussion, was it?” Franco asked, crouching beside her, still filming while doing his natural paramedic checks. “You sure he’s not just found religion? Or love at first sight?”

“Concussion,” she said firmly, packing the last of the first aid kit. “Classic. Flirty, confused, thinks he’s a poet.”

Lando watched her with mild amusement. “He’s going to hate himself later.”

Franco grinned wider. “Oh, he is. Can’t wait to play this video at his wedding speech.”

“Stop... filming...” Isack muttered, reaching weakly for Franco’s phone and missing by half a mile.

“Not a chance, Shakespear,” Franco chuckled. “This is golden.”

Lando crouched by his other side. “Come on, lover boy. Up you get.”

“You’re very pretty,” Isack said to the girl as Lando and Franco got him up. “Very distracting. Are you an angel?”

Together they heaved him gently upright, one arm slung over each of their shoulders. Isack let his head loll against Lando’s chest, eyes half-lidded, sighing like the world was too bright and unfair.

“Don’t tell my mum,” he slurred faintly. “She’ll kill me.”

Franco patted his cheek, grinning. “Don’t worry, mate. We’ll just tell the whole uni instead.”

She stood, brushing mud from her knees, watching them with the faintest smile.

“Thanks,” Lando said to her, properly this time. “For putting up with him. And for this.” He gestured vaguely to the mess that was Isack.

She shrugged, amused. “Part of the job. Try to keep him awake till you get home, yeah? He’s loopier than most.”

“We will,” Franco promised, smirking. “Might let him serenade the neighbour, though.”

Isack groaned softly. “You’re evil.”

“Love you too, mate.”

Lando rolled his eyes, steering Isack towards the path. “Come on, prince charming. Let’s get you home before you propose to someone.”

The following morning Isack woke with the dull, slow throb of a headache sitting right behind his eyes. Not sharp, not screaming, but enough to make the world feel slightly sideways.

The flat smelled of burnt toast and washing powder. Voices drifted from the kitchen, low and suspiciously amused.

He groaned, dragging a hand over his face, blinking blearily at the ceiling.

His head hurt. His neck ached. His legs were stiff from too much running and not enough sense.

Slowly he sat up.

The voices paused.

When he shuffled into the kitchen, hair sticking up at the crown, hoodie half pulled on, socks mismatched, both Lando and Franco turned to look at him.

Staring. Grinning. Like cats who’d just eaten something they weren’t meant to.

Lando sat at the counter, tea in hand, smile slow and wicked. Franco was sprawled at the table, phone resting flat in front of him, already lit up.

“Morning, sunshine,” Lando said, far too bright.

Isack squinted. “Why are you both looking at me like that?”

Franco grinned wider, tapped his phone screen. “You don’t remember, do you?”

Isack frowned, the headache pulsing behind his eyes. “Remember what? Did I say something? Did I throw up?”

Lando chuckled into his mug. “Oh, you said something, mate.”

Franco wiggled the phone. “Wanna see?”

A bad feeling settled in Isack’s stomach. Cold, slow, creeping.

“What did I say?”

Franco hit play.

The video filled the screen.

There he was. Sat on the pitch, looking dazed and blissfully unaware of the shame to come. Grinning like a fool. Staring at someone off-camera eyes soft and drunk on concussion.

“You’re very pretty,” Video-Isack said, dreamy and slow. “Very distracting. Are you an angel?”

Isack groaned aloud, face dropping into his hands.

“Oh my God.”

“Wait,” Franco grinned. “It gets better.”

On the screen, “Don’t call my mum. She’ll kill me.”

Lando laughed properly now, choking on his tea. Franco beamed like Christmas had come early.

Isack slid down the cupboard door onto the floor, hoodie hood yanked over his face.

“I can’t go back,” he muttered.

Lando grinned. “Back where?”

“Uni. IMS. The pitch. The field. The library. Anywhere. Out of this flat?”

Franco cackled. “You’ve made history, mate. You flirted with the medic like it was Love Island. On camera. In front of everyone.”

“I can’t go back,” Isack said again, voice muffled, hands gripping the sides of his hood. “I can’t even look at anyone. I need to move. Change name. Country. Life.”

Lando smirked, sipping his tea. “You’d better stay. She was fit.”

Isack groaned louder.

Franco kicked his foot gently under the table. “She laughed, you know. Really laughed. Thought you were cute. You might’ve done yourself a favour.”

“Stop talking.”

“Laughed when you called her an angel.”

“Stop.”

Lando stretched, smug. “Honestly, mate, she’s going to remember you forever. The weird, med student who tried to propose after a concussion.”

Isack let his head thunk gently against the cupboard door.

“I hate both of you.”

Franco grinned. “Love you too, Romeo.”

Lando raised his mug. “To the most tragic love story IMS has ever seen.”

“Kill me.”

“Later. After you go back to uni.”

Isack groaned, dragging the hood lower over his face like it might swallow him whole. The kitchen tiles felt cold through his joggers. His head throbbed gently in time with his heartbeat, or his shame. Hard to tell.

Franco prodded him with a toe. “Come on, drama queen. You’ve survived worse.”

“No,” Isack muttered. “No, I haven’t.”

Lando snorted, setting his mug down with a clink. “Well, you’ll have to survive this. You’re back at uni today, remember? Placement lists come out this morning.”

Silence.

Isack froze.

“...what?”

Lando grinned slow and cruel. “Yeah. Thought you’d forgotten that bit. Final-year placement briefs. Eleven o’clock. Today.”

Isack groaned again, louder this time, letting his head thunk properly against the cupboard door, wincing when it hurt. “No. No, no, no.”

Franco leaned back in his chair, folding his arms, pleased. “Oh mate, you’re actually going to have to face people.”

“I can’t go,” Isack said miserably. “I can’t go back. They’ll have seen the video. Or heard. Or both. I’ll be the concussion flirt boy. Forever.”

Lando shrugged, unbothered. “Could be worse. At least you didn’t throw up on her shoes.”

“I’d rather have thrown up.”

Franco laughed, bright and shameless. “You have to go. What if you’re on placement with her?”

Isack groaned so hard it came from his chest. “Don’t. Don’t say that. Don’t even speak it into the universe.”

“Statistically possible,” Lando said helpfully. “Small cohort. Same course. Same rotation lists.”

Isack pulled the hood tighter, breathing shallow and panicked.

“I’ll swap. I’ll fake an injury. I’ll fail the year. I’ll do anything.”

“You won’t,” Franco grinned. “Because you care too much. You’ll go. You’ll suffer. We’ll laugh. All will be right with the world.”

Lando stood, stretching like a cat, mug dangling from his hand. “Get dressed, lover boy. Coffee’s on. Placement sheets go live in an hour. Best be there, wouldn’t want to miss the news.”

Isack whimpered faintly. “I want to die.”

Franco smirked from the table, phone still open, still on that cursed video.

“Don’t worry, mate. If you pass out in front of her again,” he winked, “I’ll record that too.”

Isack buried his face in his sleeves.

The universe, and his flatmates, hated him.

And the worst part?

He actually did have to go back.

Campus felt wrong.

Maybe it was the headache. Maybe it was the weight of Franco’s video still sitting in the group chat like a loaded gun. Maybe it was the lads from IMS, loitering outside the lecture hall doors with fresh coffees and wide, knowing grins.

Isack tugged his bag strap tighter over his shoulder, head low, hoodie up, trying to disappear.

It didn’t work.

“Ohhhh, lover boy!” someone called.

He winced.

Sami grinned from the steps, holding court with three of the other IMS boys, all grinning like foxes round a bin.

“Didn’t know you had it in you, mate,” Sami laughed, shaking his head. “Very smooth. ‘You’re an angel’, real romantic, that.”

Isack groaned softly, stepping past them.

One of the others smirked. “She was fit though. First aider. Nice catch.”

“Shut up.”

They hooted, elbowing each other, grins wide.

“Gonna fake another concussion to see her again, yeah?”

Isack turned, glaring. “If I get concussion again it’ll be because I threw myself down the stairs to escape this conversation.”

They laughed harder. Bastards.

The lecture theatre door creaked open. The course lead, Dr Ellis, stood waiting, clipboard in hand, her expression the polite tolerance of someone who’d taught too many years of final-year med students and knew better than to care about rumours.

“Inside, please. Timetables out, pens ready.”

The boys filtered in, still sniggering. Isack trailed behind, stomach sinking.

The lecture theatre smelt of dust and carpet cleaner. Light flickered on the old projector screen. Isack slumped into a seat halfway down, pulling his laptop from his bag with slow, miserable care.

Dr Ellis cleared her throat.

“Right, everyone. This is your hospital placement briefing. Year finals, final rotations. When I call your name, stand. I’ll confirm your hospital and placement partner for sign-off.”

Isack blinked. Placement partner?

The universe was always cruel to Isack, and he has a feeling he knew exactly where this was going.

She started reading names.

“Sami Meguetounif. St George’s, Surgery. Partner, Ellie Singh.”

A rustle of paper. Sighs. Scribbling.

“Andrea Kimi Antonelli. St Mary’s, Paeds. Partner, Josep Marti.”

Isack chewed his lip. His name was coming. His hospital was coming.

And then—

“Isack Hadjar.”

His stomach flipped. He stood slowly.

“North End General. A&E rotation.” Dr Ellis said without looking up. 

Franco’s hospital. Brilliant.

“And... placement partner...”

She scanned the sheet.

And then she said a name.

A name he didn't recognise which made it all too worse.

Isack stiffened. Heart sank somewhere past his knees.

From the far side of the room, movement. A shape rising slowly from the seats.

It was her.

The first aider. The girl from the pitch.

She stood, quiet and perfectly still, expression unreadable, eyes scanning the room, and landing, inevitably, on him.

Their gazes met.

Isack wanted to die.

No, worse. He wanted the floor to crack open, swallow him, bury him in the ancient foundations of the med block until graduation.

The room felt too small. Too bright. Too loud with the sound of Sami's quiet wheezing laugh two rows behind.

Dr Ellis ticked the sheet. “Good. You’re confirmed. North End General. A&E. Report Monday morning. Together.”

Together.

Forever.

Isack sat down very slowly.

His hands were cold. His face, hot. His soul? Gone.

“Perfect match, mate,” Sami whispered behind him, grinning. “You’re gonna spend six weeks with your angel.”

Isack closed his eyes.

He was so completely doomed.

Monday arrived cold and grey, the sky stretched thin and flat over the city.

Franco leaned in the kitchen doorway, fleece half-zipped, car keys dangling from one finger.

“Come on, chico. You’ve got doom to face.”

Isack groaned into his coffee. “Can’t I just die quietly here?”

“Nope. Come on. I’ll give you a lift. You don’t want to be late on day one.”

Lando snorted from the table. “He’s gonna fake fainting before they even hand him a lanyard.”

“Shut up,” Isack muttered, grabbing his bag.

The drive to North End General was short, but Franco filled it with cheerful, unhelpful advice.

“Right. Avoid the lifts in B wing, they smell like old plasters. If you need toilet paper, the store cupboard by Resus always has stolen packs. And if you want to impress anyone...”

He glanced sideways, grinning.

“...best coffee’s on the third floor. Little staff kitchen by the surgical wards. Only place with decent beans. Tell no one.”

Isack groaned softly, head thunking against the window.

Franco chuckled. “Relax, mate. You’ll be fine. Try not to call her an angel again. Or do. Could work. Nurses love drama.”

“Drop me off,” Isack muttered.

Franco swung the car round to the front entrance, tyres bumping the kerb.

“There you go. Go on, Romeo. Go meet your Juliet.”

Isack grabbed his bag and stepped out into the cold, heart sinking fast.

Because there she was.

Waiting.

Leaning against the wall by the front doors, bag slung over one shoulder, ID clipped to her fleece. Headphones half tucked into her jacket. Watching him arrive.

Of course she was early. Of course fate wanted him to suffer properly.

Franco grinned, leaning across the seat.

“Try not to faint in front of her this time, yeah?”

Isack glared over his shoulder, cheeks burning, before dragging himself towards the entrance.

Her eyes followed him the whole way.

Brilliant.

Just brilliant.

Placement had officially begun.

And Isack Hadjar was already doomed.

Isack swallowed hard and made himself walk towards her.

The front of North End General loomed behind her, glass doors hissing open and shut, and she stood in the cold like she didn’t feel it, calm as ever, bag slung over her shoulder, hair tucked into her coat.

Her gaze lifted as he approached. Quiet. Unbothered. Like she’d been expecting him.

“Hi,” he said, voice rough from nerves and sleep.

“Morning,” she replied, mild.

He shifted, the strap of his bag tight in his fist. “Um... about the other day...”

She tilted her head slightly. Waiting.

“I just... I wanted to say... sorry,” he muttered. “For the... you know. The angel thing. And the pretty thing. And the... smell thing. I’ve been mortified ever since.”

A small smile tugged at her mouth. Barely there, but real.

“It was entertaining,” she said simply.

He winced. “That’s worse.”

She huffed a quiet laugh and pulled a folded sheet from her bag.

“Here. Placement briefing. Found some spares by the desk.”

He took it, grateful for the distraction, and then read.

His stomach sank.

“Wait—” he glanced at her — “this says we’re on a weekly rota.”

She nodded. Calm. Like this wasn’t ruining his life.

“One week I supervise you,” she said lightly. “Next week you supervise me.”

His heart sank clean into his shoes.

“And it’s starting with me supervising you?”

“No.” She smiled properly now, quiet and knowing. “It’s starting with me supervising you.”

Of course it was.

The universe hated him.

He groaned softly, staring at the paper like it might change if he looked hard enough.

“I can’t believe this,” he muttered. “I have to report to you all week. While you remember every stupid thing I said on that bloody pitch.”

She shrugged, amused. “I think ‘you smell nice’ is my personal favourite.”

Isack covered his face with the sheet, wishing it was big enough to hide behind.

“Please tell me you’ll let me forget this by Wednesday.”

“No promises.”

He peeked at her over the top of the paper. She was biting back a smile. Definitely enjoying this.

“I am never living this down, am I?”

“Nope.”

Isack sighed, defeated, heart thudding gently under his lanyard.

First day. First shift. First disaster.

And he wasn’t even inside yet.

They started in A&E, of course. Where the lights were too bright and the floors too clean and the smell of disinfectant clung to your hair no matter how many showers you took.

She led the way through the staff entrance, badge swiped, door hissing behind them.

“Locker room’s that way,” she said, nodding. “Ten minutes to change. Then handover.”

Isack trailed after her, awkward in his new blues, lanyard still stiff, ID badge catching on his hoodie string.

The first morning passed in a blur of noise and clipped voices.

Handover was fast, doctors rattling off obs and notes, nurses barely glancing up from charts. She stood steady at his side, pen tucked behind one ear, eyes sharp but calm.

“Stick close,” she murmured. “Don’t get lost.”

He nearly tripped over a trolley trying to keep up.

By midday he’d done obs on six patients, reset the ECG machine twice, and dropped a blood pressure cuff on the floor.

She watched him with faint amusement the whole time. Never cruel. Just quiet. Like she knew he was trying too hard and was letting him get on with it.

“You keep checking your hair in the glass,” she said softly, passing him in the corridor.

“I do not.”

She raised an eyebrow.

His ears went pink.

“Maybe a bit,” he muttered.

By day two he’d learned her rhythm.

How she held the obs chart low against her hip. How she checked the IVs twice before adjusting. How she crouched to patients’ eye level when they were scared.

How she smiled when she thought no one saw.

He caught himself watching too long more than once.

“Focus, Frenchie,” she murmured as he stared past the bed rail. “You’re supposed to be learning.”

“Sorry.”

She smirked, barely. “Distracted already.”

By Wednesday, it was worse.

He’d spilled saline down his front, tripped on the sluice door, and bumped into the crash trolley, all before tea break.

She passed him a wet wipe without a word, eyes shining with hidden laughter.

“Better now?”

“I hate this place,” he muttered, mopping his chest.

“No you don’t.”

He didn’t. It was awful. And perfect.

Thursday was quieter.

They sat on the low wall behind the staff entrance, cold air sharp against their scrub sleeves. She sipped tea. He picked at a sandwich he wasn’t hungry for.

“I haven’t said anything weird today,” he announced.

“Yet.”

He sighed. “Progress, though.”

She glanced sideways, half-smiling. “Definitely.”

Friday was the real killer.

A crash call halfway through the shift. She ran. He followed. Fast.

“Stay behind me,” she said, low and certain, as they reached the side ward. “Just watch this time.”

He did. He watched her fold into calm efficiency, gloves on, compressions counted, words crisp and sure.

He watched her save someone.

Properly save them.

When it was done, and the room settled, she peeled off her gloves, eyes finding his over the mess of wires and discarded packaging.

“You alright?”

He swallowed. Nodded.

“Good.”

And that was Friday.

By the end of the shift his feet hurt, his back ached, and his brain was soup. But when she handed him the new rota, he managed a real smile.

“Your turn to supervise next week,” she said softly.

He stared at the sheet.

“Oh God.”

She smirked. “Don’t worry, angel boy. I’ll behave.”

His face burned. “You’re never letting that go, are you?”

“Not a chance.”

He groaned into his hands. She laughed, properly this time, low and warm, and for the first time since the field by the quad...

Isack grinned.

Properly.

Maybe doom wasn’t so bad after all.

The second week was worse.

Because now he was meant to be supervising her.

“You’ve got to tell me what to do today,” she said on Monday, handing him the obs sheet with infuriating calm. “Placement rules. You’re the lead.”

Isack groaned quietly into his sleeve. “I can’t supervise you. You’re better than me.”

“Probably.” She shrugged, teasing. “But rules are rules.”

The rotas didn’t lie. His name listed as ‘lead student’. Hers as ‘supervised’. It was the worst prank fate could’ve played.

Tuesday was mostly obs and cannulas and gentle mocking.

“You forgot to hand that form in,” she said softly as they passed the nurse’s station.

“I knew that.”

She raised a brow. “Did you?”

“No.”

She smiled, patient as ever.

Wednesday, they worked late. She sat beside him in the quiet staff room at two in the morning, finishing paperwork while his brain melted into his tea.

And then Thursday arrived.

It started with dull paperwork and bed moves. Then handover, then bloods. Then Franco appeared.

Isack had just come off rounds, dragging his feet down the main corridor when he spotted them, Franco and this new girl he wouldn't stop talking about, standing by the nurse’s station, laughing over takeaway coffee cups.

“Franco. You’re actually here early for once. Did someone threaten your life?” He wasn't dignified with a response. “Well, this is nice. Haven’t seen you this quiet in... ever.”

Franco pulled a face. “I’m always quiet. I’m thoughtful.”

“You’re never quiet,” Isack said, laughing. He glanced at her, smile warm despite the sinking feeling in his chest. “I think you’re the only one who’s managed to keep him quiet this long. Congratulations.”

Her cheeks pinked slightly. She tucked a loose bit of hair behind her ear.

His pager buzzed suddenly, sharp and annoying.

He sighed. “Ugh. They need me in resus. I’d best go before they send someone to drag me.”

A voice called down the corridor. Clear. Bright.

“Isack! You’re late!”

He winced, turning.

“There we go,” he muttered, rolling his eyes. “Wish me luck.”

He jogged off towards Resus, heart still stupidly thudding, catching Franco’s quiet laughter behind him.

By Friday evening, Isack was practically glowing with quiet relief.

The last note had been written. The last obs double-checked. The last patient turned safely over to the night shift team.

His week of supposed ‘supervising’ her was finally, mercifully, over.

He slipped his pen into his pocket, glancing sideways at her as she signed off the final chart.

“Done,” he murmured, half smiling. “Thank God.”

She looked up, calm as ever, folding the papers neatly into the file.

“I think we deserve a drink,” she said lightly, “for making it through the week with you.”

He blinked, surprised. “Oh. I, uh... I don’t drink.”

She smirked faintly, brushing a bit of hair back from her cheek. “Lemonade it is then.”

He stared for a moment, thrown.

“You’re serious?”

“Course. There’s that pub round the corner. The Fox and Fir. Five minutes’ walk. We’ll sit in the garden if it’s quiet.”

He hesitated. Not because he didn’t want to, he did, very much, but because no part of this week had felt real and now she was asking him for lemonade in a pub like they were normal people who hadn’t started this whole thing with him flat on his back calling her an angel.

“Come on, Frenchie,” she teased softly. “One drink. You’ve earned it. Barely.”

He huffed, smiling despite himself, scrubbing a hand through his hair.

“Alright,” he muttered. “Lemonade. But you’re buying. Hazard pay for putting up with me all week.”

She shook her head, amused, slinging her bag over her shoulder.

“Dream on. You owe me for the ‘smell nice’ comment. First round’s yours.”

He groaned softly but fell into step beside her as they headed out through the staff entrance, the door clicking shut behind them, the late spring air cool and clean after the stale hum of A&E.

The city outside was quieter at this hour, the worst of the rush fading. Pigeons scuffed along the kerb. The pub lights glowed warm against the grey evening, The Fox and Fir’s old hanging sign creaking slightly in the breeze.

“Table by the window,” she said, nodding as they neared. “Good view of the road. And an escape route if you panic.”

He rolled his eyes but grinned, nervous and quiet and stupidly pleased.

“Lemonade,” he muttered again.

“Lemonade,” she agreed, smiling, pushing open the door.

She returned a moment later, sliding into the seat opposite with her own drink, something pale and fizzy. No fuss. No drama.

For a minute neither of them spoke.

The light from the street outside caught in her hair as she glanced sideways, smiling faintly.

“So.”

He blinked, dragging his gaze up from the glass.

“So?”

She sipped her drink, watching him over the rim. “You don’t usually flirt with every first aider, do you?”

He felt the tips of his ears warm.

“No.” He ran a hand through his hair, shoulders hunched. “I don’t.”

“Mm.” She leaned back slightly. “That obvious?”

He sighed. “It’s not really my thing. I don’t do that. I was concussed. I barely knew where I was. I thought you were—”

“An angel?” she teased gently.

He groaned, tipping his head back against the seat. “God. Don’t remind me.”

Her laugh was soft. Not cruel.

“It was funny,” she said lightly. “And new. You’re not the type.”

He peeked at her. “What type am I then?”

She shrugged, smiling faintly. “Quiet. Careful. Head down, books first. The ones who notice everything but say nothing.”

He flushed, surprised. “I’m not that bad.”

“You are,” she said warmly. “But it’s not a bad thing.”

He traced the edge of his glass with his thumb, thinking.

“I was... nervous, I think,” he admitted softly. “Not of you. Of... everything. The match. The team. Studying. Final year.” He huffed a breath, quiet. “I’m not built for all that. Loud rooms. Big noise. So when I knocked my head... I think it all just... slipped out. All the things I’d probably never have said properly.”

She watched him carefully. Thoughtful.

“You mean you’d never have said I smelled nice if you weren’t concussed?”

He groaned again, covering his face with both hands. “Please. Mercy.”

She laughed. Properly this time. Warm and low and real.

“I liked that part,” she said softly. “It was honest.”

He peeked through his fingers, smiling despite himself.

“I swear I’m not usually like that,” he muttered. “I don’t go round embarrassing myself in front of strangers on football pitches. Or... staff rooms. Or Franco.”

“Franco's told me everything.”

“I know,” he sighed. “The whole hospital probably knows.”

She shook her head gently. “Not everyone. Just me.”

Time passed before he'd even noticed, he got to actually know her, ask her questions about herself that didn't revolve around the IMS game. Before he even knew it the clock struck 21:30.

“Gotta head home,” she said softly, standing and pulling her bag over her shoulder. “Housemates will be wondering where I am.”

Isack stood too, dragging on his jacket. “I’ll walk you. If that’s alright.”

She tilted her head, half smiling. “Thought you didn’t do that either. First aiders, walking girls home...”

He gave a quiet laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. “Must be the head injury. Makes me even more polite.”

She smirked, amused, and together they slipped out into the soft, cold evening.

The streets were quiet, the air damp and still. Their footsteps echoed gently off the pavement, bags swinging, breath misting in the glow of the streetlamps.

It wasn’t far, two roads, a turn past the old corner shop, but Isack found himself wishing it was just a little longer.

They reached her gate, the little brick wall with its chipped paint. She paused, hand on the latch, glancing back at him.

“See you later,” he said, smiling awkwardly. “I mean... Monday. Placement.”

She grinned, stepping inside.

“See you on Monday, angel boy.”

He groaned softly, but he was smiling.

“Please let that go.”

“Not a chance.”

She disappeared up the path, the door clicking softly behind her.

Isack stood there for a moment, hands in his pockets, breath fogging gently in the cold, grinning like an idiot.

Maybe this wasn’t doom after all.

Maybe this was something else entirely.

When Wednesday came around, Isack knew something was off.

She wasn’t herself.

He noticed it the moment he came through the staff entrance, the usual low murmur of morning handover, the faint hum of coffee machines, and her sitting on the edge of the low bench by the lockers.

Not in scrubs yet.

Still in her jeans and an oversized black T-shirt, some brightly coloured graphic across the front. An odd little shape, bold lines, sharp edges. He squinted at it.

“...You like anime?” he asked, dropping his bag onto the bench beside her.

She looked up, blinking, tired but amused.

“Oh. No. Just a random graphic tee I got online.”

His face fell slightly. “Oh. Right.”

A small smile tugged at her mouth.

“I’m kidding,” she said softly. “I love Jujutsu Kaisen.”

His head shot up.

“No way.”

“Way.” She sipped from the travel mug in her hand, eyes warming. “I watched season two twice.”

“You’ve got to be joking,” he said, properly grinning now. “That’s... actually my favourite. Wait, who’s your favourite character?”

She leaned back against the locker, lips curving. “Nanami. Obviously. Best man. You?”

He gasped, mock offended. “Gojo. Has to be Gojo. Icon.”

“Overpowered show-off.”

“Exactly!”

She laughed, soft and rough-edged, and then broke into a tiny cough, turning her head away.

Isack’s smile faded.

“You sound awful.”

“I’m fine.” She sniffed, waving a hand. “Just a cold. I’ll change in a minute.”

He frowned, studying her face properly now, the slight flush in her cheeks, the glassy edge to her eyes, the sniffle she kept trying to hide behind her sleeve.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he said gently. “You’re ill.”

“I can’t miss placement.” She rubbed at her nose. “I need the sign-offs. I need to pass this year.”

He hesitated, glancing round the quiet locker room, then leaned in closer, voice low.

“If you don’t tell anyone, I can sign you off. Say you were here. No one’ll know.”

She raised an eyebrow, faintly amused despite the tiredness in her eyes.

“Isack Hadjar. Are you suggesting I commit placement fraud?”

He huffed, smiling. “No. I’m suggesting you don’t faint in triage because you’re too stubborn to rest.”

She smirked, sniffling again.

“Tempting. But I’ll stay. I’ve got a box of tissues and enough paracetamol to kill a horse.”

He gave her a look. Quiet, fond, worried.

“Idiot,” he muttered.

“Nanami would still go to work with a cold,” she said, grinning weakly.

“Gojo wouldn’t.”

“Gojo’s irresponsible.”

He sighed, shaking his head, but the smile stayed, soft and small.

“Come on, then,” he said gently. “Let’s get you changed. I’ll do the heavy jobs today. You stay behind the desk. Deal?”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re going soft, Frenchie.”

“Maybe.”

But he stood beside her, waiting, quiet and steady, until she hauled herself up and headed for the changing room, the faint scent of eucalyptus balm and paracetamol trailing behind her.

The shift wore on.

And so did she.

At first, she managed. Took obs, filled charts, fetched dressings. She moved slower than usual but not so anyone else would notice.

Except him.

Isack watched it happen piece by piece. The quiet coughs into her sleeve. The way she leaned on the nurse’s station when she thought no one was looking. The soft sniff every few minutes, so tired she barely bothered to hide it.

By lunchtime her face was pale and her eyes dull. She rubbed them with the back of her hand like a child, blinking hard, breathing shallow.

“You alright?” he asked gently, passing her a fresh obs sheet.

“Fine.” She sniffed, voice rough. “Fine.”

He didn’t believe her.

By four o’clock she’d stopped pretending. Sitting behind the desk now, chart forgotten in her lap, head resting against the cabinet.

Isack knelt beside her, quiet as anything.

“Hey,” he said softly.

She blinked blearily at him.

“You’re done,” he murmured. “Go home.”

She sniffed, frowning. “I can’t—”

“You can.” His voice was low, warm, impossible to argue with. “You’ve done enough. You’re half-dead. No one here’s marking you today. I’ll sign you off. I’ll even forge your signature perfectly, scout’s honour.”

She let out a tired little laugh.

“Promise you’ll do my signature right?”

“Promise.” He smiled, soft and crooked. “I’ve seen you write it on ten charts. I could copy it blind.”

She sighed, closing her eyes for a moment.

“You’ll cover the end of the shift?”

“I’ll do everything. Notes. Obs. All of it.”

“Such a hero,” she muttered weakly.

He crouched there, steady, gentle.

“Go home. Get tea. Blankets. Nanami wouldn’t want you collapsing in A&E.”

She smiled, barely.

“You’re the worst supervisor ever.”

“I know.”

A pause.

“Thanks, Frenchie.”

His chest warmed stupidly.

“Anytime, angel.”

She laughed, eyes shining but her laughing fit every quickly turned into a coughing fit. Slowly, carefully, she stood. He helped, hand at her elbow, steadying her. She didn’t argue.

“I’ll text when I’m home,” she murmured.

“You’d better.”

She smirked, tired but grateful, and shuffled off towards the changing room, dragging her bag behind her.

Isack watched her go, heart soft, chest warm, already planning the forged signature in his head.

For once, breaking the rules felt exactly right.

Isack finished logging the last obs and shut the chart gently, leaning against the desk with a quiet sigh. The ward had calmed. The noise of shift change buzzed low in the distance, but here, for once, was stillness.

A shadow moved beside him.

Franco.

Leaning on the counter, arms folded, grinning like he’d been watching all along.

“You’ve gone soft,” Franco said, smirking.

Isack didn’t even flinch. Just glanced sideways, calm as anything.

“Don’t act like I haven’t seen you giving the nurse in bay four puppy eyes all week.”

Franco’s grin faltered, just for a second.

“Didn’t you just volunteer to look after her dog?” Isack added, deadpan.

Franco rolled his eyes, straightening. “That was different.”

“Right.”

“Completely different.”

“Sure it was.”

Franco sighed heavily, shaking his head, but the smile tugged back at the corner of his mouth.

“Look...” he muttered, fishing in his pocket. “If you’re that bothered, go check on her. Take the car.”

He held out the keys.

Isack blinked. “You’re offering me the car?”

“Yeah, well.” Franco shrugged, casual. “You clearly won’t relax until you know she’s not dead on the sofa. Might as well save you the pacing. Bring it back clean or Lando'll have us both.”

Isack stared at the keys, surprised warmth curling in his chest.

“You’re sure?”

Franco grinned, wide and smug. “Tell her I said hi.”

Isack rolled his eyes but took the keys, slipping them into his pocket.

“Go on then, Romeo,” Franco said, waving him off. “Before you write her a get well soon card or something tragic.”

Isack smirked, grabbing his bag.

“Thanks, puppy eyes,” he muttered, grinning as he headed for the staff exit.

Behind him, Franco chuckled softly, shaking his head.

“Hopeless,” he said under his breath. “Both of you.”

As he made his way out of the ward, he noticed Greggs was still open. Barely.

He stood at the counter for far too long, eyes flicking helplessly between the displays.

“Soup,” he muttered. “Cold cure. Maybe.”

The woman behind the till raised a brow.

“Chicken roll?”

“Yeah. And... um... cheese bake. Sausage roll. And a doughnut. I don’t know what she likes.”

By the time he left he had a bag so full it crinkled with every step, warm and smelling faintly of pastry and soup.

The drive to hers was quiet. Streetlights slipping by, the sky darkening soft and low.

He parked outside the little terrace, bag in hand, heart stupidly thudding, and knocked gently on the door.

It opened a moment later.

And there she was.

Hair loose and mussed. An oversized grey oodie drowning her frame. Tissue stuffed under her nose, red-rimmed eyes blinking blearily at him.

“Sorry,” she croaked, voice thick and rough. “State of me. Grim, isn’t it?”

He held out the bag.

“I didn’t know what you liked,” he said softly. “So... I got everything.”

She blinked. Then laughed, hoarse and surprised, warm despite the cold.

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Probably.” He smiled, gentle and sheepish. “Soup. Roll. Cheese bake. Sausage roll. And... a doughnut. Maybe two. I panicked.”

She laughed again, holding the bag to her chest like treasure.

“Best panic shop ever.”

He shrugged, stepping back a little, hands in his pockets.

“Can’t have you starving. Or worse. Eating those microwave noodles you like pretending are proper food.”

She gave him a look, tired, amused, soft.

“You’re ridiculous,” she said again, but quieter.

And she didn’t close the door. Instead she hugged the Greggs bag to her chest, sniffling faintly, eyes tired but warm.

“Uh... do you want to come in?” she asked, stepping back. “I’ve got a lot of food to eat now, apparently.”

He smiled, soft and a little shy. “Sure. Only if you promise to share the doughnut.”

She snorted, the sound thick and bunged-up, and led the way inside.

The house was small, warm, full of quiet clutter. A blanket thrown over the sofa, a half-finished jigsaw on the coffee table, more pairs of shoes than he could count.

She dropped the Greggs bag on the side and flopped onto the sofa with a groan, dragging the blanket round her like a cloak, oodie sleeves swallowing her hands.

“Come on then, Frenchie,” she muttered, patting the space beside her. “Can’t eat all this alone.”

He sat carefully, pulling off his jacket, settling beside her. Close but not too close. Her hair smelled faintly of lemon and cold balm.

They unwrapped the haul, soup, rolls, the suspiciously squished doughnut, and ate quietly, the telly humming low in the background.

At some point she pulled up Netflix, thumbed through without asking.

Jujutsu Kaisen. Of course.

When the soup was gone and the doughnut shared and the blanket stretched half across his lap, she leaned her head against the cushion, eyes half-lidded.

“Thank you for this,” she murmured softly.

He glanced down at her, smiling gently.

“What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t?”

She didn’t answer.

Didn’t need to.

But she looked away, the smallest shift in her face, quiet, fleeting, like something sinking in her chest. Something he didn’t see.

The episode flickered on. Voices and colour and soft blue light filling the room.

She pulled the blanket higher, curled closer, head against his shoulder.

He stayed still, heart quiet and warm, watching the screen but not really seeing.

And somewhere in the middle of the next episode, her breathing slowed.

Soft. Even.

Asleep.

He smiled, small and stupid, careful not to move, the weight of her head against him like the nicest trouble in the world.

Outside the window, the city lights blinked.

Inside, the world stayed still.

Just the two of them.

And nothing else.

to be continued...

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[papayareads]

RULES WERE MADE (TO BE BROKEN).

You got the job most people only dream of—or fear: PR managing Max Verstappen. From the start, it was pure hell. You cared too much and talked nonstop. He didn’t care at all and barely said a word. You were total opposites. But under his tough exterior, you started to see a side of him no one else did.

pairing. Max Verstappen x PR manager! fem! reader.

warnings. age gap (22/27), 11,1k words, workaholic! reader, grumpy x sunshine -ish, forced proximity, christian horner, max being an ass, redbull! yuki cameo, lando cameo, teasing, suggestive (make out), possessive! max, vulnerable! max, angst.

YOU KNEW WORKING FOR MAX VERSTAPPEN WOULDN’T BE EASY. Everyone had warned you—he was quiet, serious, and didn’t like anyone telling him what to do. You were ready for him to be distant, maybe a little cold. But you weren’t ready for how much it hurt to feel completely ignored.

During the team-building days before the season, things were tough. You tried your best to get to know him, asking questions and offering help. But Max barely said a word to you. Sometimes he wouldn’t answer at all. He’d glance at you like he didn’t even understand why you were there. Every time you tried to be helpful or friendly, he just brushed you off, and after a while, you stopped trying so hard.

By the end of the second day, you were already regretting every decision that had brought you here. You found yourself silently cursing Christian for assigning you to Max and not Yuki. Yuki, who actually remembered your name. Yuki, who made you laugh, who teased you in a way that felt like friendship instead of dismissal. He would’ve made your job easy — or at least bearable. But no. You got Max Verstappen. And Max Verstappen made sure you felt like you were nothing more than an annoyance.

───

It was a loud, messy afternoon after the race, and sixth place was nothing close to what Max, or anyone on the team, wanted. From the moment he stepped out of the car, shoulders tense and jaw locked, you knew this was going to be difficult. The frustration rolled off him in waves—quiet but obvious. You’d seen enough drivers after rough races to recognize that look.

You spotted him as he left the driver’s room, weaving through the chaos like it didn’t exist. “Max!” you called, raising your voice above the buzz of crew chatter and camera clicks. You had to practically jog to keep up, clutching the talking points you’d spent your lunch break rewriting. He didn’t look at you—not even a flicker of acknowledgment. Just stared down at his phone, fingers scrolling, face blank. You rushed alongside him, trying to sound firm and helpful instead of desperate. “Okay so—maybe don’t go too hard on the team. Just say it wasn’t our day or something like that.”

He didn’t even glance over. Just muttered coldly, “I know what I’m doing.”

You blinked, biting back a sigh. Of course. Max Verstappen always knows what he’s doing—even when what he’s doing is about to make every post-race article a PR nightmare. You rolled your eyes, but silently. No point in arguing. Not here. Not now. He walked off without another word, and you were left trailing behind, unsure why you’d even bothered.

The media pen was buzzing—drivers giving interviews, team personnel running interference, lights flashing in all directions. You stayed back, pressed against the barrier like an extra on a movie set.

“Max, tough weekend for you, how do you feel?” the interviewer asked, tone casual and open.

You held your breath, praying for a miracle—or at least a scrap of restraint.

But Max didn’t pause. Didn’t consider. His voice was flat. “Yeah, car was slow. Pace was basically non-existent.”

Your eyes widened immediately. Seriously? That’s what we’re going with? You’d rehearsed smoother phrasing, softened the language, handed him options. But here he was—going rogue, again. You threw him a look from behind the cameras, silently pleading for damage control. He saw it. Brief eye contact. Just long enough for you to feel the chill of his piercing blue stare. And then—

“Practically everything went wrong,” he added with a dry, sarcastic smile.

The interviewer blinked, surprised. Probably expecting something a bit more... polished. But Max didn’t wait for a follow-up. He turned and walked away like the microphone had offended him.

You exhaled slowly, gripping your tablet tighter. Your shoulders sank. Everything you’d tried to do today—every note, every reminder, every suggestion—had been tossed aside with that smirk.

He stormed back into Red Bull garage, jaw locked and shoulders stiff, the tension practically radiating off him. Cameras had barely stopped rolling, but his pace said he was done with everyone—and everything. You followed him in, heart pounding, anger rising faster than you could contain it. You weren’t just irritated. You were exhausted.

The buildup over the weekend, the briefings he ignored, the rehearsed lines he dismissed—it all came crashing down with that one post-race interview where he blamed the team. The team that worked day and night to give him a competitive car. The team you were trying to protect with your carefully crafted words.

“Max—what the hell!” you snapped as you walked behind him, voice trembling with emotion. It wasn’t loud enough to cause a scene, but it wasn’t quiet either. Desperate. That’s how it sounded. That’s how you felt. Desperate to be heard, desperate to matter in a job where you were constantly treated like furniture—there, useful, but never acknowledged.

He didn’t stop. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t give you even a glance. Just kept walking, like you were background noise. That silence cut deeper than any insult.

You pressed forward, refusing to let it go. “Can you tell me why you blamed the team?” you asked, trying to keep your voice level. “You did the exact opposite of everything we talked about. Everything I prepared.”

He finally responded, scoffing like your words annoyed him. “I told them the truth,” he said. Then added, like it was just a casual fact: “And I don’t need your help.”

Something cracked inside you. Your nails dug into the edge of your tablet, breath caught in your throat. All the hours spent organizing media schedules, coaching his phrasing, smoothing the tension between him and the press—every ounce of effort you’d poured into making his life easier was suddenly stomped on with seven careless words. You weren’t asking for praise. Just respect. Just a sign that he saw you. And this? This was him looking right through you.

“Yeah, because Max Verstappen never needs help, right?” you said bitterly, voice thick with sarcasm. You laughed—a sharp, humorless sound that surprised even you. It didn’t feel like a joke. It felt like letting go of something heavy. Like peeling off the last bit of patience you had left.

Then, without even a flicker of hesitation, he reached his driver’s room, yanked open the door, and slammed it shut behind him—so hard the walls shook. The echo rang out through the garage. And you just stood there, breath stuck somewhere between fury and heartbreak, your pulse pounding like you’d been the one dragged through a tough race.

───

You were seated in the Red Bull HQ conference room well before the meeting was set to begin—because unlike certain driver, you actually took this job seriously. The room was quiet, save for the soft hum of laptops and shuffled papers. A few early arrivals hovered near the coffee machine, chatting about strategy and data points, but your mind was somewhere else. You’d barely slept. Max’s post-race disaster had left your inbox overflowing and the internet buzzing with half-truths and angry fans. You weren’t just tired—you were drained.

The door creaked open, and you turned, half expecting Christian or one of the senior staff—but instead, Yuki walked in, eyes bleary, hair tousled from sleep, holding two Red Bull cans like peace offerings. He looked as tired as you felt, and somehow that made you smile. Sliding into the seat beside you, he gave you a soft, warm smile and greeted you like a friend—not like someone doing his job.

“Hey, Y/n,” he mumbled, voice thick with morning haze.

You raised an eyebrow, watching as he nudged one of the cans toward you. “You want one?” he offered, holding up the pink one without hesitation.

You took it instantly, fingertips brushing his in the exchange. “Thanks,” you muttered. “I really need that.” Your voice was lower than usual, weighed down with exhaustion and something heavier beneath it—disappointment, maybe. Frustration.

The room slowly began to fill—engineers, strategists, logistics coordinators—everyone filtering in, settling down, preparing for another round of analysis and problem-solving. But there was no sign of Max. Of course. Yuki noticed too, glancing at the empty chair a few spots away where Max was supposed to sit. He took a slow sip of his drink before turning to you, face genuinely curious. “So... how’s work going?”

You paused for a moment. You could’ve lied. Could’ve shrugged and given a vague, polite answer. But instead, you let your shoulders drop a little and sighed. “Terrible,” you admitted, almost laughing. “I spent all night cleaning up Max’s mess online.”

Yuki made a sympathetic face, leaning back in his chair. “Sounds rough.”

You nodded, clutching your drink a little tighter, exhaustion weighing heavier now that you’d said it out loud. “Honestly? If he pulls that stunt again, I’m throwing him out the nearest window.”

Yuki burst out laughing, the kind of laugh that was half shock, half pure entertainment. His shoulders shook as he turned to you, eyes wide with amusement. “No way you just said that,” he grinned, nearly choking on his drink. “That’s going in the season highlights.”

You smiled, despite everything. It felt good to be heard. Even if your threat wasn’t exactly real, it was nice to imagine. Yuki didn’t judge—he just understood. And in that moment, he made you feel like maybe you weren’t the only one dealing with Max Verstappen’s chaos.

Christian stepped into the conference room, clipboard in hand, his usual sharp gaze sweeping across the space. “I think we can get started,” he said, voice steady and slightly clipped, like the morning coffee hadn’t quite kicked in yet.

Everyone was settled, files opened, laptops humming—but one chair remained stubbornly empty.

His eyes landed on it. Then flicked to you.

“Where’s Max?”

It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t even particularly stern. But it was definitely aimed at you.

You straightened in your seat, pretending not to feel the squeeze of pressure tighten around your ribs. “I—uh, I texted him earlier,” you replied quickly, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear like it helped you stay composed.

You didn’t. You hadn’t. You’d thought about it. But part of you wanted Max to feel the weight of being late. Of making everyone wait. Of walking through this building like he didn’t owe anyone—even you—a single thing.

Christian didn’t push. He simply nodded, turned back to the whiteboard, and began. But that empty seat lingered.

Suddenly, the door swung open with a soft thud, drawing half the room’s attention. Max walked in like he hadn’t delayed the meeting by ten minutes or left everyone waiting—not a single hint of stress on his face.

“Sorry, traffic,” he said casually, with the same tone someone might use when brushing off a missed text. He dropped into the empty seat directly across from you, stretched out like it was any other Monday. Then, as if you were the only person in the room worth noticing, he looked straight at you—and smirked.

It was effortless. That irritating, smug little curve of his lips that had already ruined your morning once. You rolled your eyes, quietly scolding yourself for expecting anything different. Yet despite yourself, your pulse betrayed you. A tiny spike beneath your skin. A thump you wished hadn’t happened.

Christian’s voice became background noise, lost beneath the buzzing in your chest. You caught bits and pieces—something about tire degradation, aero updates, strategy laps—but none of it stuck. You couldn't focus. Not with Max sitting directly across from you, eyes trained like he wasn’t just attending a meeting—he was watching you. Studying every flick of your lashes, every curve of your expression, like the room was just white noise around the tension stretching between you. You glanced up once, casually—or tried to be casual—and met his gaze. And damn. That split second sent a jolt through you so sharp, you nearly forgot your own name.

You looked away fast, fingers tightening around your laptop as if it could shield you from whatever the hell that moment was. But your heart didn’t listen. It thumped harder, quick and uneven, ignoring your brain’s demand to get it together.

Then Christian spoke again, more pointed this time. “And now—something about PR,” he said, glancing toward you briefly before letting the topic settle like a trap waiting to spring.

Your stomach dropped. Shit. Shit. Shit. You weren’t ready. Not for a call-out. Not with Max watching you like this. You braced yourself for public blame, the kind that would slide under your skin and stay there.

Christian turned toward Max instead, calm and collected. “Max, why did you say the car is shit?” he asked, voice unnervingly neutral.

Max leaned back, barely phased. “I didn’t say it was shit,” he replied, cool and sharp. “I said it’s slow. Which is true.”

His tone wasn’t defensive. It was decisive. Unbothered. Like he knew exactly how much chaos his words caused, and didn’t care. But still—his gaze flicked to you again, just for a second. Like he wanted to see how you reacted. Like he knew you were the one who’d stayed up late, patching up the mess behind the scenes.

Christian’s words landed heavier than you'd expected. “But Max, you have a PR manager for a reason,” he said evenly. “Maybe it’s time you actually listen to her.”

You blinked, taken aback. Support like that—especially in front of everyone—was rare. You sat up a little straighter, pulse quickening, not sure if you were grateful or terrified.

Max shrugged, unfazed. “I listened,” he said. “I just didn’t agree.”

You stared at him. Listened? The word echoed in your chest like a bad joke. No way he was spinning it like that.

You let out a scoff, sharp and breathy, more laugh than amusement. “Listened?” you echoed, leaning forward a bit. “You ignored me like I was damn invisible. You didn’t even look at the notes I gave you.”

Max raised a brow, looking almost genuinely confused. “You gave me any notes?”

You stared at him. For a moment, you couldn't tell if he was messing with you or just unbelievably dense. The question echoed in your ears, hitting like a slap wrapped in cluelessness. You’d sent him documents, bullet points, color-coded media strategies—he’d walked right past all of it like it was invisible. Just like you.

You gave a small laugh, dry and sharp, the kind that didn’t carry any amusement. “This is ridiculous,” you muttered, voice dipped in irony as you leaned back in your chair. Arms crossed, face tight, eyes refusing to meet his again. If you didn’t take a breath soon, you might say something you couldn’t take back.

The atmosphere in the room felt like it had gained weight—every breath a little heavier, every shift in a chair echoing louder than it should. Christian glanced between you and Max, his eyes flicking quickly like he was doing a mental risk assessment. The silence stretched, awkward and sharp, until he finally broke it with a clipped conclusion.

“Alright,” he said, tone carefully neutral. “I think we’re done for today. We’ll continue next time.”

Relief surged up your spine before the words were even finished. You pushed your chair back, the legs scraping softly against the floor, and stood before anyone else had the chance. “Thank god,” you muttered under your breath, voice low but dripping with sarcasm. It wasn’t meant for the room—it was meant for him. And maybe, just maybe, Max knew that too.

As you headed for the door, your laptop still tucked under your arm, you didn’t look back. Because if you did, you'd see him still sitting there, eyes following you, silent again—but somehow, no longer indifferent.

After the meeting, the rain poured harder than the forecast had warned, you stood outside Red Bull HQ under canopy, your phone in one hand, your patience draining in the other. Uber kept glitching, canceling, rerouting. It felt like the universe was adding insult to an already exhausting day. You clenched your jaw, thumb hovering over the screen, mentally preparing to walk if it came to that.

And then—footsteps. Fast and confident.

“What are you waiting for, schat?”

You looked up, blinking through the rain. Max. That stupid grin curved across his face like he hadn’t just made your work life hell ten minutes ago. You froze for a second, eyes wide, trying to process what he’d just called you. Schat? The Dutch word hung in the air like a mystery—was it sweet? Was it mocking?

“Trying to order an Uber,” you said, more bitter than you meant. You didn’t owe him charm. Not after the weekend you’d had.

He stopped a few steps ahead, glanced back with an arched brow, and looked at you like he was studying something he hadn’t really noticed before. He hesitated for just a breath—then offered, “I’ll drive you.”

Your heart stuttered. “You don’t have to—” you began, unsure what shocked you more: his offer, or how fast you started calculating whether this was a good idea.

Max took a step closer. The rain trickled off his jacket in soft rhythms, and the expression on his face shifted slightly—no grin, no sarcasm. Just... Max. Almost real.

“Y/n,” he said, voice lower now, and something about the way he said it made your breath hitch. His Dutch accent wrapped around the syllables with unexpected warmth, like he'd known your name longer than you'd realized.

You blinked again, trying to pull yourself back down to earth. He knew your name? And he cared enough to say it like that?

You glanced out toward the rain—relentless, sheets of it pouring like the universe was proving a point. Yeah, no chance you were walking home in that. With a resigned nod, you followed Max to his car. Naturally, it was a sportscar. Sleek, low, ridiculously impractical for weather like this, but still somehow perfect for him.

You slid into the passenger seat, the soft leather cool against your skin. Instantly, your brain started spiraling. What the hell did I get myself into? Riding home with Max Verstappen after a workplace meltdown wasn’t exactly the kind of Monday you planned when you woke up.

As he started the engine, he shot you a sideways glance, amusement playing at the corners of his mouth. “You don’t have a car?” he asked, teasing, the chuckle just beneath his words.

You scoffed, clicking your seatbelt into place. “Some of us are still finishing exams and weren’t born with a steering wheel in hand.”

That got him—he laughed, a real one. You couldn’t help but glance his way, slightly stunned that your sarcasm actually landed. He turned the wheel smoothly, merging out onto the wet road, still smiling.

“I don’t even have the license,” you admitted, throwing him the confession like it weighed nothing, but secretly hoping it didn’t make you sound too helpless.

He raised a brow and flicked his gaze between you and the traffic. “Wait—what? How old are you?”

You looked down, feeling your cheeks flush as you tried to play it cool. “Twenty-two.”

His expression shifted with a flicker of surprise—eyes narrowing slightly, head tilted as if recalculating something. You couldn’t tell if it was good or bad, but it landed with a strange weight in the silence between you.

“You’re younger than I thought,” he said finally, voice clipped—cooler than expected, almost neutral.

You felt yourself tense, unsure what to make of it. “Is that a bad thing?” you asked, trying to sound casual, but the awkward edge in your tone betrayed you.

He was quiet for a beat, then shook his head. “No. God, no,” he said, his voice softening a little. “You just... don’t act like it.”

You blinked, surprised by the honesty. Max glanced at the road, then back at you, his gaze thoughtful. “You’re responsible. You work like you’ve got something to prove every minute. Like you’re holding everything together.” He paused. “That’s not what I expected.”

You turned toward the window, suddenly aware of how warm the car felt. Something about the way he said it—like he’d noticed. Like behind all the sarcasm and cold interviews and slammed doors, he’d seen something more.

───

Christian Horner had a special talent—ruining your day with a single sentence, casually delivered like it wasn’t about to upend your entire afternoon. And today? He’d done it again. Media training with Max Verstappen. Because clearly, after the last race weekend, someone needed it—and lucky you, it fell on your plate.

You sat down on the couch in one of the lounge rooms at HQ, laptop open, trying to look more prepared than you felt. Across from you, Max slumped lazily into the opposite seat, legs stretched out, expression already halfway to bored. You cleared your throat and tried to keep your voice professional. “Alright, let’s pretend I’m a journalist. You’ll honestly answer my questions like it’s a real interview.”

Max rolled his eyes in that signature way that made you want to throw a pillow at his head—but he didn’t argue, so you took that as reluctant compliance.

“Okay,” you said, tapping your notes. “Tough qualifying, Max. What went wrong?”

He didn’t even hesitate. “The car. The strategy. The pace. Pick one,” he replied flatly.

You let out a groan, slouching deeper into the cushions. “Seriously?”

Max turned slightly, the faintest smirk tugging at his lips. “You said answer honestly.”

“Yeah, but ideally not like you’re trying to start a war with your own team.”

He leaned back, arms crossed casually. “I’m not starting a war. I’m just telling it like it is.”

You gave him a look, unimpressed but trying not to laugh. Because honestly? This was going to be a long afternoon.

You clicked your pen like it was a buzzer on a game show, then leaned forward with your best impersonation of journalistic gravitas. “Alright, let’s try again,” you said, voice teasing. “This time, maybe without triggering a full-blown existential crisis in the team.”

Max didn’t even blink. His posture remained perfectly unbothered, stretched out on the couch like he was posing for a magazine shoot instead of being dragged through media training. The faint smirk on his face said he was still half-convinced this entire session was a waste of time—but the fact he hadn’t bailed yet? You counted that as a microscopic win.

You slipped into character, flipping open your notes. “Next question: Critics say the team isn’t performing to its usual standard. What’s your response?”

Max sighed, dramatically. His eyes wandered toward the ceiling like he was searching for divine intervention—or maybe just patience. “Critics talk,” he said flatly. “That’s their job. My job’s to drive.”

You tilted your head, unimpressed. “And the team’s job is…?”

He shot you a lazy glance. “To give me something worth driving.”

You narrowed your eyes. “Max,” you warned, your tone balancing on the edge of a plea. “Please. Can you take this seriously? It would make both of our lives so much easier.”

He raised an eyebrow, that grin creeping back. You leaned forward, voice dropping to an urgent whisper. “Triple-header’s coming up. And if you keep pulling the ‘truth bomb’ stunt in front of journalists, Christian is going to murder both of us.”

Max chuckled at that, finally sitting up a bit. “You think he’d start with me or you?”

You didn’t hesitate. “You. No hesitation. But I’m collateral damage, and I’d rather not be.”

For the first time that afternoon, Max looked mildly reflective. Maybe, just maybe, you’d gotten through a layer of Verstappen logic. Not all the way—but far enough to keep going.

He groaned, dropping his head back against the couch like he was physically pained by the exercise. “Just ask me something interesting, Y/n.”

The way he said your name—casual, almost bored, but unmistakably deliberate—sent a tiny jolt down your spine. Just ask me something interesting, Y/n. It wasn't the words. It was the low flicker in his voice, the lazy confidence in how it rolled off his tongue. You hated that it got to you.

You leaned forward slightly, lips curling into a devilish smirk. Fine, he wanted interesting? You could do interesting. “Alright,” you said sweetly, too sweetly. “What’s your favorite position... on the grid?”

There was a split-second pause—a hiccup in the air where his brain caught up with your words. His eyes widened, just enough for you to savor. Got him.

But Max recovered quickly. Of course he did. The shock melted into a smirk, slow and deliberate, the kind that made your stomach twist in ways you didn’t care to admit. “Top,” he said smoothly, voice dipped in smugness. “Who doesn’t like to be on top and dominate?”

You rolled your eyes, but the grin was already tugging at your lips. You hated that he could do this—shake off any curveball, turn it into flirtation, and leave you questioning who was really in control here.

You leaned back slightly on the couch, letting your eyes travel across him—not subtle, but not exactly discreet either. With a teasing smirk tugging at the corner of your lips, you said, “You look like a top.” Your voice was playful, but your eyes watched him carefully, waiting to see what that comment stirred in him.

Max’s reaction came just as quickly. He gave you a knowing smile, that slow, signature smirk of his. He nodded, leaning into the moment, but his tone stayed dry and amused. “That’s not exactly the kind of question a journalist would ask,” he said, voice low, eyes flicking toward yours with faint amusement.

Yeah, maybe it wasn’t the most professional question. And yeah, maybe you knew that. But the truth was, you’d asked it because you were curious. Because the line between work and whatever this was had started to blur somewhere around his third smirk and your second eye-roll.

You gave a light shrug, keeping your tone casual. “You have to be prepared for every kind of stupid question,” you replied, pretending to scan through your notes even though you hadn’t looked at them in minutes.

You blinked at him, not entirely sure if you heard that right. He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, a playful glint in his eye that told you he knew exactly what he was doing.

“It’s my turn now,” Max said with casual confidence.

This was supposed to be media training. Professional. Straightforward. Something Christian forced both of you to do so you could avoid another PR disaster in the paddock. And yet, here you were—sitting across from him, your notebook forgotten in your lap, wondering when exactly the lines had started to blur.

You narrowed your eyes, lips twisting into a smirk as you tried to stay in control. “I’m the one asking questions, and you’re supposed to be responding. That’s literally the point.”

Max shrugged, undeterred. “Just one.”

You hesitated, then nodded slowly, thinking—what’s the worst that could happen?

He didn’t miss a beat. “Do you like it fast and rough or slow and steady?”

Your eyes widened, heart thumping once in confusion and amusement. You opened your mouth to respond, but closed it again just as fast. You knew he was talking about racing. You knew that. But the way he said it—the timing, the tone, the look—it was obvious he was deep into whatever game you were now playing.

You raised an eyebrow, leaning back in your seat to give yourself space to process what had just happened. “That’s the question?” you asked, voice calm but cautious.

Max nodded, looking way too pleased with himself. “It’s racing-related. Technically.”

You snorted, shaking your head as a grin started to creep across your face. Technically. That word was doing a lot of heavy lifting right now.

Whatever this was between you—it was far from professional. And clearly, he wasn’t about to let that fact slide.

You didn’t flinch. You leaned forward just slightly, eyes locked with his, and delivered your answer without a shred of hesitation. “Fast and rough,” you said, voice smooth and deliberate. “I like adrenaline.”

The air in the room shifted. Not awkward—not even close. It was weighted now, humming with something electric. Max’s trademark smirk flickered, briefly replaced by something you couldn’t quite name—surprise, maybe, or intrigue. His gaze dipped to your mouth and then back to your eyes, studying you like he was trying to decide whether this was part of your game or a glimpse of something real.

Then, slowly, the smirk returned. “Yeah,” he said quietly, almost like a confession. “I had a feeling.”

You swallowed. Not because you were scared, but because the intensity made your chest tighten. Maybe it was the way he said it, or maybe it was the way he was looking at you now—less like a colleague and more like someone who’d just been challenged and didn’t hate it.

You let out a breath and shifted back in your seat, clearing your throat. “Okay,” you said, trying to reset, ignoring the fact that your pulse had kicked into overdrive. “This is far from professional. Let’s get back to it.”

Max groaned dramatically, flopping back against the couch like a rebellious teenager. “But media training just started to be entertaining.”

You rolled your eyes, but the smile tugging at your lips betrayed you. “Entertaining isn’t the goal, Verstappen. Surviving Christian’s wrath is.”

───

Life had a twisted sense of humor, and today, it was clearly having fun at your expense. First, your flight got delayed. Then—just when you thought the worst was behind you—it got cancelled entirely. No rebooking options that made sense, no clear plan. Just a vague apology from the airline and a sinking feeling in your gut as you stared at the departure board.

And then came Max.

“You can fly with me,” he offered, as casually as if he were inviting you to grab coffee, not hop aboard his private jet. You blinked, unsure what to say at first. Since when was he this... generous? Suspiciously thoughtful, even. You hesitated, half wondering if this was some kind of setup, some twisted Red Bull prank. But then reality kicked in—trying to find another ticket would be expensive and exhausting. And honestly, who in their right mind would choose a cramped economy seat over champagne-smooth leather and a guaranteed takeoff?

So you said yes.

When you arrived at the foot of the jet’s stairs, struggling with your oversized suitcase filled with enough essentials for a three-week storm tour, Max didn’t just watch you struggle. He stepped forward, no hesitation, and reached for the bag.

“Let me help you,” he said, already lifting it like it weighed nothing.

You didn’t protest. Didn’t make a joke or shrug him off. You just nodded, silently stunned by how effortlessly kind he was being. And damn—he carried it like it was filled with feathers, not your entire wardrobe and backup skincare routine.

Inside, the jet was calm and impossibly luxurious. You settled into one of the plush seats while Max casually took the one across from you. He didn’t say much, but his glance lingered for a beat longer than necessary, like he knew you were still trying to figure out why him, why now.

And maybe—just maybe—you were starting to wonder what this unexpected kindness actually meant.

You flipped open your laptop the second you settled into the seat, fingers already flying across the keyboard. No surprise there—you had work to do, deadlines breathing down your neck like they’d booked the seat next to yours.

Max stood up from his seat across the cabin and wandered over to the mini fridge, glancing at your screen like it offended him personally. “You’re working again?” he asked, pulling out a bottle of water.

You barely looked up. “Have to,” you replied, voice muffled under the weight of responsibility. It wasn't glamorous, but it was necessary.

He crossed the space between you and handed you the bottle. “You’re dehydrated. And annoying,” he said matter-of-factly.

That got your attention. You raised an eyebrow, genuinely confused. “Why am I annoying this time?”

Max leaned against the armrest with a smug smile, clearly enjoying himself. “Because your flight got delayed, and I had to rescue you. Obviously.”

You scoffed, cracking open the bottle with a roll of your eyes. “Rescue? You offered, Verstappen.”

His smirk widened. “Still counts as heroism.”

You shook your head, trying not to smile. Honestly? You were grateful. Just maybe not ready to admit it out loud. Not yet.

Max reclined in his seat, arms stretched out, posture relaxed—but his eyes were focused on you. “So tell me,” he said casually, “what’s our plan for media day?”

Our? You glanced up from your laptop, a little stunned. Since when did he include himself in your chaos? Did he genuinely care, or was this just a new form of boredom disguised as engagement?

You groaned, dragging your hands down your face, the screen in front of you a mess of updated schedules and clashing time slots. “I honestly have no idea anymore,” you muttered. “For whatever reason, the internet finds your interviews hilarious. Like meme-worthy hilarious.”

Max gave a lazy smirk, clearly proud of that detail. “Means you’re doing your job right. Try being happy about it, for once. Christ.”

You narrowed your eyes, shooting him a look. “Yeah, well, fans might love it. But sponsors? Christian?” You gestured to the list of formal press obligations with a sigh. “They want charm. Structure. A version of you that isn’t rolling your eyes and casually threatening a mic.”

One second you were neck-deep in emails and sponsor schedules, the next—wham—your laptop was sliding across the cushioned bench like it had just been yeeted into early retirement.

You gasped. “Max!”

He stood there, completely unbothered, hands in his pockets and an unmistakable grin creeping across his face. “You work way too much,” he said, like this was a public intervention. “Live a little.”

You rubbed your temples. “I have to work. It's literally my job.”

He shrugged, already sitting down across from you with maddening calm. “How about a game? Would you rather.”

Your eyes narrowed immediately. Of course. You already knew where this was going. It wasn’t his first attempt to derail professionalism with something vaguely chaotic—and probably flirtatious.

“Are we fifteen?” you asked, rolling your eyes dramatically.

“Maybe,” he said, winking. “But a very charming fifteen.”

You sighed, then glanced at your poor abandoned laptop. “Fine. One round. But if you say something dumb, I’m sending you to media day with a clown suit.”

He just smirked.

You already knew what kind of game Max had in mind. The moment he suggested playing, you saw the spark in his eyes—the one that always meant trouble. So if he was going to push the boundaries, you figured you might as well meet him there, head-on.

You leaned in a bit, let your voice drop just slightly, and gave him a question that didn’t tiptoe around anything. “Would you rather win Monaco,” you said, letting the pause stretch, “or hear me moan your name?”

It was bold. No soft teasing or half-jokes. You went straight for it, watching carefully as the words settled between you like a fire waiting for someone to strike the match.

Max froze—not dramatically, but just long enough for you to notice that brief flicker of surprise. His usual smirk came back quickly, though. “I already won Monaco,” he said, his voice lower than before, eyes never leaving yours. “So you know the answer.”

And you did. The way he looked at you now wasn’t casual or cocky—it was focused. Serious, but laced with something warmer. Something heavier. You hadn’t expected him to lean into it that hard. You were teasing, half testing the waters, and suddenly it felt like you’d dove straight in.

You shifted in your seat, trying to ignore the way your heart was beating faster. It was just a stupid game, right? Something to pass the time midair? But Max didn’t blink or change the subject. He was sitting across from you like he had all the time in the world and every intention of seeing just how far this moment would go.

Max’s gaze lingered on you a little longer, that same familiar glint in his eyes—not just mischievous, but daring. If you were going to throw heat his way, he wasn’t just going to absorb it. He was going to throw it right back.

You watched him carefully as he shifted in his seat, the playful glint still tucked behind his expression—but now wrapped in something darker. “Alright,” he said, voice low and slow, like he was choosing every word with purpose. “Would you rather…” He leaned forward just a little, eyes locked on yours. “Have me whisper in your ear everything I want to do to you—while you're stuck trying to act normal in a crowded press room… or actually be somewhere quiet where I can do it all, no distractions, no interruptions?”

The cabin felt warmer suddenly. Not just from the air, but from the spark curling between the two of you, creeping along every inch of space like tension disguised as oxygen. You knew exactly where this game was heading, but something about how he asked made your breath stick for just a second.

You tilted your head, heart racing beneath a cool exterior, letting your smile stretch slow. “Press room,” you answered, calm and direct. “Without a doubt.”

His eyebrows lifted, surprised—but impressed. “Really?”

You nodded, voice lighter but still confident. “There’s something about keeping calm while everything inside is shaking.“

Max didn’t move. Didn’t laugh. Just exhaled, slow and quiet, as if your answer hit harder than he was expecting. His gaze flicked briefly down your throat before returning to your eyes, darker now, lit with curiosity and something else—something bolder.

“Damn,” he murmured, voice low. “You really like adrenaline.”

You shrugged lightly, heart thudding but face calm. “Told ya.”

───

Media day was in full swing. The press room buzzed with noise, reporters ran on caffeine and chaos, and yet somehow—you and Max had slipped away into the quiet of his driver room. It was strange how comfortable it felt, how naturally you fell into this rhythm together. You’d been spending more and more time like this lately, and even if it wasn’t exactly “professional,” neither of you seemed eager to question it.

You stood up from the chair while Max lounged on the couch, stretching out like he owned the place. Trying to shake off the warm, soft comfort that came from being around him, you cleared your throat and attempted to sound official. “Okay, so… you’ll tell them we made some upgrades,” you began, trying to stick to business.

But Max had other ideas.

His hands slid around your waist and settled low with familiar ease, pulling you closer until you were standing right in front of him, practically pressed against his chest. His eyes locked on yours—those piercing blue eyes that always managed to throw you off balance. You stumbled on your words but pushed through anyway. “And… uh, we have high hopes for a good result.”

He hummed, quiet and deep, clearly more interested in you than any PR script. His palms squeezed softly, and you weren’t sure if this was how a driver and his manager were supposed to act—but at this point, you didn’t really care. It felt good. Comfortable. Exciting.

“Max,” you sighed, trying to sound serious again, but your voice came out softer, breathier than you wanted. “Please, just don’t screw this up out there.”

He tilted his head, that familiar teasing smirk starting to grow. “And if I don’t?” he asked, his voice playful but full of intent. You already knew where this was going. He always pushed just enough to make you blush, but never far enough to cross a line you hadn’t invited.

You matched his energy, reaching for his jaw and tilting his face up toward you with a sweet smile. “Then maybe… you get a kiss,” you said, pretending to be innocent even though the heat in your chest said otherwise.

Max groaned quietly, deep and rough, pressing his head back into the couch as if the sound alone could cool him down. “Fuck, Y/n,” he breathed.

You flashed him a smile and reached for both his hands, pulling gently as you coaxed him up from the couch. “Come on,” you said, voice light and teasing. “We’ve got work to do.”

Max let out that familiar groan—low, deep, laced with lazy reluctance. And okay, maybe it shouldn’t have sounded that good, but it did. You still had hold of his hands, fingers loosely tangled with his, and it wasn’t until you stepped toward the door that you realized neither of you had let go.

As he stood, still tethered to you, he gave a quick smack to your ass—casual, playful, completely in character.

You turned instantly, half laughing, half scandalized. “Max!” you hissed, eyes wide.

He raised an eyebrow, smirk tugging at his lips. “Motivation,” he said simply, like it was the most logical excuse in the world.

You shook your head, cheeks flushed, but the smile stayed. Somehow, despite the chaos of media day outside, everything inside this driver room felt way too good to leave behind.

The room was packed—journalists, flashes, a quiet buzz of anticipation. Max sat at the long table, mic clipped in front of him, posture relaxed but sharp. You were off to the side, scanning through the media agenda, trying not to let your mind wander to how his hand had been on you less than twenty minutes ago.

A reporter leaned in first. “Max, some sources say you’ve made upgrades to the car—what can you tell us?”

Max glanced your way for a split second before answering, voice steady. “Yeah, we’ve made a few changes. Nothing crazy, but enough to feel the difference. We’re optimistic.”

You felt a flicker of pride. You’d fed him that line earlier—and he nailed it.

Another voice chimed in. “So expectations are high?”

Max shrugged. “We’re aiming for a strong result. That’s always the goal, isn’t it?”

Then came the curveball—innocent sounding, but loaded. “Max, you seem happier lately. Different. Something changed?”

Your stomach flipped.

Max didn’t miss a beat. He leaned slightly into the mic. “Good company helps,” he said casually, eyes drifting to you just long enough for your cheeks to burn.

A few chuckles echoed through the room. Someone muttered something about ‘mysterious influences.’ You felt every camera lens tilt just slightly in your direction.

You swallowed, smiling like you didn’t just feel the temperature spike in your skin. Max didn’t elaborate. He didn’t need to. That one look said more than any statement could.

You waited in Max’s driver room, pacing a little, nerves buzzing under your skin like static. It wasn’t just the adrenaline from the media day—it was what had just happened. Max had done it. He’d actually followed your script. No sarcastic remarks. No thinly veiled jabs at strategy. Just clean, focused answers. Polished but still him. For the first time in weeks, you didn’t feel like you were putting out a fire the second the cameras stopped rolling. And if anyone had earned a reward, it was him.

You’d promised him a kiss if he behaved. And Max Verstappen never forgot a promise.

The door creaked open, and there he was. That cocky, slightly sweaty post-interview version of him that knew exactly what he’d done. He looked at you like he’d just clinched another world title—satisfied, smug, and devastatingly handsome.

“So,” he said, closing the door behind him, his voice like velvet over gravel, “how was I?”

You raised an eyebrow, arms crossing over your chest. “Perfect,” you said, fighting a grin. “Didn’t get us cancelled for once. I’m almost proud.”

He tilted his head, amused. “Almost?”

You shrugged, casual, even though your heart was beating a little too fast. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

Max took a slow step forward. Then another. “You promised something,” he murmured, tone dropping low. “I didn’t forget.”

You swallowed, pulse skittering. He was close now—too close—and your brain was screaming a thousand things at once. But your body moved on instinct. Without thinking, without overanalyzing, you leaned up and kissed him.

At first, it was soft—almost unsure. A simple brush of lips, like testing the temperature of something you already knew would burn. But then Max deepened it. His hand slid around your waist, firm and certain, pulling you flush against him as his mouth moved against yours like he’d been waiting for this. Like he’d imagined this.

And when his tongue brushed against yours, a spark lit through your chest. It was messy and heated, breath catching, hearts racing.

“Fuck—schatje,” he groaned, the Dutch word curling from his lips like something sinful, voice thick with want.

You pulled back slightly, trying to find breath, your fingers curling into his shirt. “We probably shouldn’t be doing this,” you whispered, lips still brushing his.

His eyes were dark, locked on yours, breath uneven. “Probably not,” he said, voice gravelly and quiet. “But I don’t care. I’ve wanted this since the first time you yelled at me.”

You didn’t pull away. Instead, your hands slid from his hair down to the back of his neck, tangling in the damp strands as you pressed your body flush against his. Max’s breath hitched, and his grip on your hips tightened, his fingers digging in just enough to make you shiver.

You would never have expected to be kissing Max Verstappen—especially not like this. Not this messy, heated, desperate way that made your head spin and your heart slam against your ribs.

His lips moved against yours with slow, deliberate hunger, as if savoring every second. You could feel the heat radiating from him—dangerous, fierce, magnetic. Your heart hammered like you’d just crossed the finish line, and yet your body felt like it was already on the starting grid, revving for more.

Max’s hands slid lower, tracing the curve of your waist before slipping beneath your shirt. Goosebumps rose in their wake. You swallowed the sharp intake of breath that threatened to escape and tangled your fingers tighter in his hair, pulling him closer.

“Damn, you’re such a mess,” he muttered against your lips, voice filled with need.

“Yeah?” you teased breathlessly, daring him to push further.

His answer was a low growl as he deepened the kiss, tongue sliding against yours with a possessive insistence. One of his hands slid under your shirt, tracing fiery lines along your ribs, sending shockwaves through you.

Your legs weakened, and you leaned harder against him, craving the full weight of his body. For a moment, the world outside that cramped driver’s room vanished. No deadlines, no cameras, no expectations—just the two of you, tangled and reckless.

Suddenly, a sharp knock at the door sliced through the charged silence. Fuck. Not now. Not when you were finally breaking through all the walls between you two.

“Max?” The voice outside was cautious but firm, almost reluctant to interrupt. “Christian needs to talk to you—about the upgrades or whatever.”

Max’s eyes darted to you, a flicker of regret crossing his face. He didn’t want to stop—not yet. You could see it in the way his chest rose and fell unevenly, the way his fingers twitched near your skin like he wanted to hold on just a moment longer.

Reluctantly, he took a step back, breaking the kiss. His breath came out in a rough sigh, and he ran a hand through his hair, frustration clear in every movement.

“God damn it,” he muttered, voice low and filled with irritation—not just at the interruption, but maybe at himself, too.

You bit your lip, feeling the sudden chill in the room where warmth had just lived. You wanted to say something to keep him there, to tell him it was okay to break the rules, but the knock came again—more insistent this time.

Max glanced toward the door, then back at you, his expression softening just a little. “We’re not done,” he promised, voice rough but full of meaning.

Thank God. Because you could do this all day. Every stolen moment, every heated breath—it was addictive, intoxicating. And somehow, despite everything, it felt like the only place you truly belonged.

───

The paddock was unusually quiet. The hum of the mechanics working on the car in the background was the only real noise, but even that felt soft—like the whole space had taken a breath. You and Lando sat shoulder to shoulder on the pit wall, not saying much at first. There was comfort in the silence, in the way old friends could drift back into rhythm like no time had passed.

He nudged you with his elbow and held up his phone, screen glowing in the fading afternoon light. “Found something,” he said with a grin.

You looked, squinting at first—then laughed out loud as the image came into view. A younger version of the two of you, captured mid-party. You were nineteen, still in uni and barely getting by on instant noodles and caffeine. He was twenty-three, already driving in F1, messy-haired and wide-eyed without his signature mustache. His arms were wrapped around your waist, yours around his neck, both of you drunk and loud and absolutely fearless.

“Oh my god,” you said, shaking your head with a laugh. “That’s us? We look like babies.”

“Babies with no sense of limits,” Lando added, chuckling. “I completely forgot how wild that night was.”

Your laugh came again, freer this time. God, it felt good to just be. To exist outside of schedules and pressure and drivers who refused to listen to a single suggestion unless it came wrapped in sarcasm. With Lando, it was easy. Familiar.

And then, as if the temperature around you dropped five degrees —

You felt it. That presence.

You didn’t even need to turn.

You just knew he was there.

A slow, sinking awareness pulled at the back of your neck, your spine prickling like it always did when you were being watched. But this was different. This wasn’t the curious glance of a journalist or the buzz of a fan nearby.

This was him.

You turned — hesitantly — and your gaze met Max’s from across the pit lane, standing just inside the shadows of the Red Bull garage.

He looked like stone.

No smile. No smirk. Just unreadable eyes and clenched jaw, arms crossed against his chest as he stared. Not at Lando. Not at the phone.

At you.

His gaze didn’t flicker. Didn’t soften. If anything, it darkened slightly when Lando leaned in again, still laughing at the memory, utterly oblivious to the shift in the atmosphere.

Max took a single step forward, slow and controlled. The shadows moved with him. And when he finally spoke, his voice cut through the air like a blade.

“What’s so funny?”

His tone was neutral — too neutral. The kind of calm that came just before a storm. You knew that voice. You’d heard it on the radio before, right before he overtook someone like it was personal.

Lando didn’t pick up on it. Of course he didn’t.

He turned the phone toward Max, grin still wide. “Just some quality throwback content,” he said. “Your PR girl used to be a menace, apparently.”

Max’s eyes dropped to the screen. He didn’t blink.

Didn’t move. For a second, he just stared.

At your nineteen-year-old self. Glitter. Laughter. Lando’s arm around your waist. The unfiltered freedom in your eyes.

And something in his expression shifted.

Not rage. Not jealousy, exactly.

Something more primal. More controlled. But deeply territorial.

When his eyes flicked back up to yours, it hit you like a punch. The way he looked at you — like he was suddenly seeing something he hadn’t before. Or maybe like something he’d tried to ignore had snapped into focus.

You opened your mouth, unsure what you were going to say — maybe a joke to cut the tension, maybe an apology for something that shouldn’t even feel like a betrayal — but Max beat you to it.

“Actually, Y/n,” he said, voice calm but clipped, “I wanted to ask you about briefing. Can you come with me?”

There was no bite to his words. Not exactly. But there was something far worse.

Control.

That infuriating Verstappen brand of calm that masked everything he didn’t want to say. A chill passed down your spine at how precisely measured his tone was. Like he’d rehearsed it in his head while watching you laugh with someone else.

You nodded automatically, the grin you wore seconds ago now frozen and out of place. Before you could say anything, Max had already turned on his heel and started walking toward the Red Bull garage — like the photo, the laughter, and the very idea of you smiling with someone else had never happened.

But you saw it in the set of his shoulders.

In the stiffness of his walk.

Something had gotten under his skin. And he wasn’t hiding it well.

“Fun’s over,” Lando muttered beside you with a half-laugh, trying to make light of it. But he wasn’t totally clueless — there was something cautious in his eyes now. Like he could sense the shift too.

You exhaled through your nose, a tight smile tugging at your lips as you glanced back at him.

“You tell me,” you said softly, before turning and following Max.

Each step toward the Red Bull garage felt heavier than the last. Not just because you knew you were heading into another round of tension — you were used to that by now — but because this was different.

This wasn’t about strategy or PR or media.

This was personal.

The door closed behind you with a quiet click, sealing the tension into the small space. Max didn’t turn around. He stood with his back to you, shoulders stiff, gaze locked somewhere far ahead like he was thinking too fast to speak. You crossed your arms, unsure whether to push him or wait it out. There was something heavy in the air between you—something you hadn’t felt before. And that feeling only grew when he finally broke the silence.

“You didn’t tell me you knew him before you even knew me.” His voice was low, quiet, but sharp—like he was trying not to sound jealous, and failing.

Your eyebrows pulled together in confusion. What was this about? Just a photo? You blinked, trying to make sense of his sudden mood shift. “It’s not important. At least I thought so. But yeah, we were in the same friend group when I was teen.” You fought the urge to laugh, because honestly, it felt ridiculous. It had been years ago, long before Max had shown up in your life, long before he’d started looking at you the way he did now.

He finally turned to face you, his eyes locking onto yours. There was something cold in his stare, something stubborn. You didn’t hesitate. “You’re jealous.”

He scoffed, but the snort didn’t carry conviction. “No, I’m not.”

You stepped forward, tone steady but biting. “You are.”

Max’s jaw flexed, and you could see it all over his face—the tension, the twisting thoughts he wasn’t saying. You didn’t back down. “You saw a picture from when I was nineteen, and now suddenly it means something? When the only one I think about now is you.” Your voice raised with frustration, sharp and clear and honest.

He didn’t answer right away. He just looked at you, long and quiet, and then said—voice lower now, but laced with something bitter, something wounded—“You were with him. Before me.”

Your breath caught. Not because of what he said, but how he said it. Like it changed everything. Like it erased all the moments between you now. You matched his tone without flinching, cold and unapologetic. “And you’ve been with how many girls before me? Don’t be a fucking hypocrite, Max!”

Before he could respond—before you let the emotion swallow you whole—you spun around and slammed the door behind you, the echo cutting through the hallway like a final punctuation. Your chest was tight, your heart pounding, and part of you already knew this wasn’t over. But for now, you needed space. Because whatever this was, it had turned into something way bigger than a photo—and it was clear neither of you were quite ready to face what it really meant.

───

The day before had been silent. You skipped qualifying completely—no messages, no check-ins, no playful banter in the garage. You were still furious with Max, and the idea of seeing him made your stomach twist. Instead, you sent over the PR briefing and interview notes. No greeting. No sign-off. Just attachments. Strictly business.

Max read the email more times than he’d admit. It wasn’t about the documents. It was about everything you didn’t say. The coldness of it followed him through the sessions. Your absence was loud, louder than any team radio or engine rumble. Even when surrounded by chaos, he felt it—like the air wasn’t quite right without you in it.

Now it was race day. You showed up because, despite it all, this was your job. It mattered. Max mattered. But the energy was different. Muted. You avoided him, stuck to your corner of the garage, kept your words minimal. You told yourself you didn’t care. Told yourself you weren’t watching every lap with clenched fists.

Then lap 36 happened.

He was flying. The race had gone beautifully—smooth overtakes, flawless pace, every moment a reminder of why he was one of the best. And then Russell. A reckless move. A snap of contact. Max's car sliding helplessly off-track, metal grinding against barriers.

Your breath caught as the screens lit up with replays and panic. The adrenaline in the garage spiked, people swarmed into motion, but you couldn’t move. All you saw was Max, climbing slowly from the wreck, helmet still on, body language stiff with anger and disappointment.

Max stormed into the garage, frustration written all over him. His movements were sharp and angry—the way he yanked off his gloves, threw his helmet onto the table without a second thought, and ran a hand through his messy hair like it hurt to keep it still. The race had gone up in flames, and you could see it was eating at him from the inside out. But the moment his eyes locked onto you, everything shifted.

“Oh, someone decided to show up,” he muttered, bitterness thick in his voice. It was a knife straight to the chest. His words didn’t just sting—they surprised you. Like somehow you were part of the crash, like your absence yesterday had thrown him off-track. It felt completely unfair.

You stood still, trying not to flinch. “Well, I work here, so?” you replied, your voice calm, even though your throat tightened.

But Max wasn’t done. His tone rose, sharp and cutting. “And still being completely useless! Why didn’t you were yesterday?!”

You froze. He didn’t just say that. He did not just say that.

“Excuse me—” The word came out shaky, your voice trembling with a mix of anger and disbelief. You could handle pressure. You could handle being the punching bag when tension was high. But this? This crossed a line.

He stepped forward, anger cutting through his exhaustion now. “Yeah! All you do is scoff at me. Always something wrong. Always something I do wrong!”

You stared at him, heart pounding. You knew he was angry. You knew he had every reason to be upset after a crash like that. But turning it on you—lashing out like you were the reason—was something else entirely. There was no excuse for this. No adrenaline high or stress level that made it okay.

You wanted to hold back, to stay composed. But it was too much.

You stepped toward him, voice louder now, raw and furious. “Honestly? Fuck you, Max! Fuck you!”

The words echoed off the walls of the garage, hitting both of you like a slap. You didn’t wait to see his reaction. You turned around and walked away, fast, ignoring the stunned silence that followed. Your hands shook. Your chest burned. And as you left him standing there surrounded by broken race plans and bruised pride, you didn’t look back.

The hospitality suite felt colder than usual, too quiet despite all the movement outside. You sat tucked away in the corner, arms wrapped around yourself, legs trembling. Tears streaked down your face, even though you tried to hold them back. You didn’t want to cry—not over Max, not after everything. You told yourself he wasn’t worth it, that you should let it go. But no matter how angry you were, it didn’t change the way your heart felt when you thought about losing him. Working with someone else? Standing in the paddock without his voice in your ear, teasing or stubborn or sweet? It just didn’t make sense. You’d gotten used to him. Worse—you’d let him in.

You didn’t hear the door open, not at first. Just a soft voice cutting through the stillness.

“Y/n?”

You turned your back quickly, wiping at your cheeks with shaky fingers. But the tears wouldn’t stop. You didn’t want him to see you like this—broken, shaken, raw. Not after the things he’d said. Not after everything he threw at you when all you’d tried to do was help.

Max’s footsteps were careful, slower than usual. Like he was scared to step too close. “Y/n—” he said again, breath catching as he saw your face. His voice cracked, panic slipping in. “No, no, fuck… please. Don’t cry. Fuck…”

You sat stiffly, eyes locked on the untouched plate in front of you. You couldn’t even remember what was on it—only that it gave you something to stare at so you didn’t have to look at him. Your shoulders felt tight, your hands clenched uselessly in your lap, and even though tears had finally stopped falling, your face still stung from letting them.

“Y/n, please,” Max said, his voice soft, shaky. “I’m sorry.”

You didn’t respond. Didn’t move. Not even when, from the corner of your eye, you saw him lower himself to the floor—right in front of you. Knees down, eyes searching for a way in.

Max Verstappen. On his knees. That alone made your breath hitch. Max didn’t kneel. Max didn’t beg. But right now, he was doing both.

His palms rested gently on your knees, his touch light, unsure. “I just… I was pissed,” he said quietly, words tumbling out in pieces. “I missed you yesterday. Then I didn’t see you before the race and it… it messed me up more than it should have. And then Russell hit me and—I snapped.”

You still didn’t speak, but your eyes finally flicked toward him, just for a moment.

“You’re not useless,” he added, voice firmer now. “You’re the only person who keeps me grounded in all this shit. I was an asshole. I know it.”

And for a second, everything stopped. The ache, the shouting, the broken race weekend—it all paused. Because this version of Max wasn’t the one people saw. This was raw. Honest. Vulnerable. And maybe that meant he trusted you with something no one else ever got.

Just when you were about to respond, he leaned forward and let his forehead rest gently in your lap. “I’m not good at this,” he whispered. “This love thing. But I’m trying. I’m trying to be the best I can for you… schat.”

Your fingers moved on instinct, brushing softly through his hair—familiar, messy, real.

Then his voice broke again. “I love you.”

Your heart skipped. He said it. He said it first.

The words hung between you both, heavy and fragile, like they might crack if spoken any louder. You still hadn’t fully stopped shaking—your hands clenched just enough to keep your emotions from spilling over again. Max was still knelt in front of you, head in your lap, fingers curled gently around your knees like he was anchoring himself there.

“Please, Y/n,” he murmured again, voice hoarse. “Say something.”

You hesitated, letting your gaze drift toward him. And then, finally, you looked—really looked. His eyes were the same piercing blue, but they were swollen, rimmed in red. The sharpness they usually carried was gone. What you saw now was desperation. Sadness. Remorse.

And love.

Your chest tightened, but your voice still came, quiet and uneven. “You hurt me… Max,” you said, each word pushing through the walls you’d built over the last twenty-four hours. “But I just can’t imagine not being with you. I can’t imagine not… loving you.”

His breath caught like a sob, and he lifted his head to meet your gaze, searching your face like he needed confirmation that you truly meant it. “You love me?”

You let out a trembling breath. “More than anything.”

───

The sun was barely up, but you walked into the paddock with a calm heart for the first time in days. The weight from yesterday hadn’t vanished, but it felt lighter—easier to carry. You scanned your pass at the gate, the familiar beep sounding like the start of something new.

Max was already waiting just past the entry, leaning casually against the wall. When he saw you, that signature smile tugged at his lips—warm, soft, the kind of smile reserved only for you. The anger was gone. Replaced by something gentler.

As you walked toward him, you felt it before it happened—the shift in the air, the pull of his presence. And then, without a word, his fingers slid into yours.

You froze mid-step, startled by the quiet intimacy. It wasn’t part of the plan. Not the media-safe version. You turned slightly toward him.

“Really?” you asked, half teasing, half stunned.

He looked down at your joined hands and then back up, eyes steady. “Everyone needs to know you’re my girl,” he said with zero hesitation.

Your heart melted right there on the spot. Max could be brash, reckless, impossible—but when he cared, he didn’t hide it. And that line? That line meant two very real things.

First: you loved him more than you’d ever dared to admit out loud.

Second: PR was about to explode—again.

Because Max Verstappen? Max Verstappen was a walking PR disaster.

But he was your disaster.

babs radio ! IT’S HEREEE!!! Ladies and gentlemen, i present to u my longest max fic !! (yet)

[papayareads]

i´m in love.

not only with oscar osc.

but with @cherrypickedchaos.

Mildly Reckless

What begins as a punishment becomes something far more dangerous feelings. When Scout meets Oscar on a speed awareness course, she’s not expecting much beyond Comic Sans and soul death. But five hours of awkward icebreakers, laminated role-play sheets, and slow-burning tension later, she’s left with something she can’t shake. A story about missed exits, emotional detours, and falling in a thirty zone.

Genre: Slow Burn, Contemporary Romance, Found Family Vibes, Banter Comedy, Soft Angst, Formula 1 RPF, Slice of Life with Fast Cars, Enemies-to-Lovers-if-you-squint

NSFW Warning: 18+ Explicit sexual content, Oral (f. receiving), Unprotected sex, Praise kink, Mild emotional angst, Intimacy anxiety, Speeding (obviously), Sarcastic commentary on road safety education

Inspired by: Little Bit More by Suriel Hess

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Hell was bland, grey, and filled with stackable chairs and fluorescent lights. The devil wore a chunky cardigan and drank Diet Coke at 9 a.m. Her name was Janet. She knew this because she was here, sentenced, it seemed, for speeding. Along with the rest of them. Their sins varied in style, probably, but the result was the same: a Wednesday morning in purgatory, seated in the function room of what was technically a hotel but felt more like an insurance office that had given up.

It was 9:13 a.m. The course was meant to start at 9 sharp. Two people hadn’t arrived. Janet, all teeth and hand gestures, was deep in conversation with a woman who looked like she’d backed over a hedgehog once and still thought about it at red lights. She was nodding solemnly. Her name tag said Tina.

There was a boy in the corner, not part of the horseshoe of chairs Janet had so lovingly laid out. He looked about twelve, had his hood up, headphones in, and was sneakily vaping like he thought no one could see him. The occasional puff of watermelon mist betrayed him. He looked up once to scan the room, made brief eye contact with Scout, then looked back down like she’d passed and failed a test at the same time.

Another man, maybe fifty, maybe the kind of man who was always fifty, sat at the very front of the horseshoe but had twisted his chair to the side. He kept checking his watch. Every now and then, he chuckled softly to himself, like the universe had played a joke only he understood. His name tag said Gary. It felt correct.

She didn’t sit. She hovered by the door like someone deciding whether to attend a funeral or just walk into traffic. No chair had called to her. They all looked equally bad.

Then the door burst open. A woman stumbled in, all apologetic breath and car keys clattering. She looked exactly like the sort of person who had a full panic attack about snack day at school.

“So sorry,” she said. “I got held up on the school run, honestly, I was this close to just-”

Janet interrupted with a noise that was half sympathy, half a dolphin’s mating call. “No rush! You’re absolutely fine, we haven’t started yet. Still one more to come.”

Gary chuckled again, louder this time. It wasn’t clear if it was at the woman, or the state of society, or just some joke he’d made up in his head five minutes ago. The newcomer, Leah, according to her sticker, sat down next to Gary, still unpeeling herself from her coat and offering whispered apologies to no one in particular.

Three minutes later, the final door opened. This one came with an accent.

“Sorry, terribly sorry, traffic was a nightmare.”

He was tallish. Early to mid-twenties. Australian, unmistakably. Tan like someone who’d once lived near a beach and now missed it in a way that showed on his face. He looked like someone who usually got places on time.

“It’s no worries at all,” Janet said warmly, like he’d just offered to resurface her driveway for free.

He smiled, polite, tight, and found the empty chair beside Leah. She had no idea where to sit now. The horseshoe was almost full, save for the chair between the vape kid and Tina. She made eye contact with neither of them and slid into place like she might disappear if she didn’t make a sound. The circle was complete: Gary, Leah, the Australian (no name tag yet), the Vape Kid, herself, and Tina.

Janet clapped her hands together. “Right! Now that we’re all here, let’s get started!” No one cheered. Gary chuckled. “We’ll start with a little icebreaker!” Janet said, picking up a dry-wipe marker like it was a weapon. “Say your name, and one interesting fact about yourself. I’ll go first, I’m Janet, obviously, and I once played a dead body on Casualty!”

No one asked follow-up questions. The marker squeaked on the board behind her as she underlined WELCOME like that might make it true.

“Gary?” she prompted, her smile a hostage situation.

Gary sat up like he’d been waiting for this. “I’m Gary. I’ve met Jeremy Clarkson three times. He follows me on Twitter.”

Janet nodded. “Interesting!”

Leah went next. “I’m Leah. I have five kids under twelve. I haven’t slept in what feels like six years.”

Janet made a high-pitched noise of admiration. “Amazing!”

The Australian gave a faint smile. “Oscar. I, uh,” he looked mildly alarmed by the question “I’ve never eaten a crumpet.”

Everyone turned. Gary looked personally offended.

“Ever?” Leah asked.

Oscar shrugged. “Not intentionally.”

Janet clapped anyway. “That’s a brilliant one, thank you, Oscar!”

The kid in the corner looked up briefly when his name was called. He tugged a single earbud out. “Ty,” he said, voice dry. “I once got banned from a Wetherspoons for doing a wheelie on a chair.”

Silence. Then Tina laughed. “That’s brilliant.”

Gary muttered, “Icon,” under his breath. Tina gave him a thumbs up.

Janet made a sound like she wanted to laugh but didn’t know if she was allowed. Then it was her turn.

She looked at the floor. “Scout,” she said, because it’s the nickname she responded to nowadays. “And I once got told off by a vicar for loitering in a graveyard.”

Janet smiled like she didn’t know how to process that. “Lovely,” she said, with uncertain enthusiasm.

Then Tina, who beamed. “I’m Tina. I make miniature Victorian dolls’ houses. For rats. Not real rats, not live ones, obviously! That would be awful.”

“Fascinating,” Janet breathed. Just like that, hell had officially begun.

“Now,” Janet beamed, “let’s get into the meat of the course.”

She couldn’t tell if Janet meant that literally or spiritually, but either way, she felt a quiet dread settle in her stomach. Janet dimmed the lights, one side of the room went dark, the other stayed buzzing, and clicked her remote. The projector whirred like a dying hamster. A title slide appeared in full Comic Sans: “THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SPEEDING” beneath a stock photo of a speedometer doing 170.

Gary let out a sound between a scoff and a laugh. “Subtle,” he muttered.

“Now, I want us all to have a little think,” Janet said, strolling across the front like she was doing a TED Talk at a sixth form. “Why do people speed?”

Ty leaned further into his hoodie. The vape came out again. No one said anything.

“Let’s just call them out,” Janet tried again. “Why do we, as a society, speed?”

Gary raised his hand too early, clearly prepared to deliver a manifesto. Ty blew a smoke ring so tiny it vanished before it existed.

Leah raised a hand, hesitant. “Running late?”

“Brilliant,” Janet said, typing it into a Word doc projected onscreen. The font was still Comic Sans. “What else?”

Tina added, “Lack of awareness?”

“Perfect,” Janet nodded.

Gary raised a hand, slowly, like he was being sarcastic. “Because sometimes the signs are hidden behind trees and the councils are cash cows with speed cameras.”

Janet paused. “Interesting perspective.”

She looked down at her notes, where she had written nothing. Oscar sat perfectly still, arms folded, legs stretched out, like he wasn’t here at all.

“Scout?” Janet asked. “Any thoughts?”

She looked up. “Because we think we’re better than we are.”

The room went still.

Janet blinked. “Could you say more?”

“No.”

Oscar looked at her then, sideways, just a flicker.

Janet cleared her throat. “Right! Let’s move on to our group exercise!” Groans. “We’re going to do a little scenario analysis. You’ll be paired up. Don’t worry, no one’s being graded!”

“I work better alone,” Gary said, loud enough for no one to challenge it.

Tina turned to Ty, who immediately put both earbuds back in without comment.

“He’s a Scorpio,” she said, and moved on.

She didn’t move. Janet began shuffling pairs like a wedding planner on a budget.

“And you two,” she pointed at her and Oscar “why don’t you work together?”

Of course. Janet handed them a laminated sheet titled “SCENARIO 3: PASSENGER TENSION” Oscar took it wordlessly. They scooted their chairs a few inches closer, like strangers forced to share a table in a busy café.

Scout read the brief. “‘You are driving with a friend. They are late for a job interview. They tell you to go faster. You’re already doing 36 in a 30 zone.’”

She looked up. “This feels like GCSE drama for adults.”

Oscar cracked the faintest smile. “Worse. There’s no stage crew to hide behind.”

Scout straightened the paper. “Fine. I’ll be the one driving.”

“I figured.”

She cleared her throat. “Okay. So, we’re driving.”

“Where to?”

“Job interview.”

“Right.”

He folded his arms. “I say: ‘Can’t you go faster? We’re going to be late.’”

She turned toward him, eyes narrowed. “You’re not the one who’ll get points on your licence.”

“That’s very selfish of you.”

“I’d rather be selfish than unemployed.”

“Are you always this dramatic?”

“Are you always this calm?”

Oscar blinked. “Yes.”

Scout paused. “Fine. You win.”

Janet clapped from across the room. “How’s everyone doing?”

Oscar raised a thumb. Scout slumped back in her chair. “I’ve learned I’m not cut out for role-play therapy.”

“You were quite convincing,” he said.

She looked at him. “You didn’t sound Australian when you were pretending to be British.”

“I contain multitudes.”

They lapsed into silence again. Janet moved on, inspecting another pair like a disappointed substitute teacher.  Leah was earnestly reading her scenario out loud like it was GCSE drama. Gary was shaking his head at her with theatrical despair.

“That’s not how braking works,” he muttered.

“It’s a metaphor, Gary,” she replied, and he looked genuinely wounded. As the task wrapped, people shifted in their seats, some stretching, some yawning.

Oscar leaned in slightly, voice low. “Just so you know,” he murmured, “you’d have made a terrible getaway driver.”

Scout turned to him, surprised. “Because I wouldn’t speed?” she asked.

“Because you’d argue about it the whole way.”

She smiled, despite herself. The ice cracked. Just a little.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

“Alright, let’s break for lunch!” Janet called out, as if she were dismissing a primary school assembly. “Be back in thirty minutes and remember, it’s not optional!”

Scout was already on her feet before the sentence ended. She wasn’t hungry. Not in any way food could solve. Mostly, she just wanted to be somewhere with no chairs in a horseshoe and no one trying to make Comic Sans look authoritative. She didn’t look at anyone as she left, slipping her coat on in the hallway, key fob in hand like a weapon. Her car was parked in a far corner of the lot, a slightly battered Toyota with a passenger door that didn’t open from the inside.

Rain had started, the kind that wasn’t dramatic enough to be aesthetic but just enough to make everything damp and cold and a bit existential. She reached her car. And then she heard footsteps behind her.

“Are you running away,” Oscar said, “or just very keen on sandwiches?”

Scout didn’t turn around at first. Then she did. He stood there, coatless, of course, holding a plastic bag with what looked like a sad supermarket meal deal inside. He blinked rain off his eyelashes like it hadn’t occurred to him that water was wet.

“I’m allergic to icebreakers,” she said.

He nodded solemnly. “Tragic. You’ll never survive corporate training.”

“I don’t plan to.”

There was a pause, not awkward, but deliberate. “You heading somewhere?” he asked.

“I was going to eat in my car,” she said, “like a deeply mysterious loner. Possibly while listening to true crime.”

Oscar looked at her car. “Your passenger door doesn’t open.”

“Nope.”

He tilted his head. “I’m curious but I’m scared to ask.”

“You should be.”

Another pause. He held up his bag. “I’ve got a packet of Quavers and a chicken wrap that claims to be ‘peri-peri’ but smells like betrayal. You want half?”

Scout eyed him. “Are you offering me half your wrap?”

“I’m offering you half a social contract.”

She considered that. Then popped her boot and gestured with a nod. They sat on the edge of the boot, legs dangling, staring at the rain dripping off the edge of the roof. He tore the wrap down the middle like a peace treaty and handed her the larger half without comment. They ate in silence for a few minutes. Not companionable silence, not yet, but something less hostile than the chair circle.

Eventually, Scout said, “You don’t talk much in there.”

“I do when it’s useful.”

“And when’s that?”

Oscar wiped his hand on a napkin. “Not during Janet’s PowerPoints.”

Scout smirked. “You’re very understated for someone who committed a traffic crime.”

“I was doing 38 in a 30.”

“Criminal mastermind.”

He shrugged. “What about you?”

“Roundabout incident.”

He waited.

“I took five laps,” she said eventually. “Missed my exit. Got... distracted.”

“By what?”

She didn’t answer. He didn’t push. “I was called ‘reckless’ in the citation,” she added. “Which I actually find a bit flattering.”

Oscar cracked a grin. “You don’t seem reckless.”

She looked at him. “You don’t seem like someone who’s never had a crumpet.”

“I’ve lived a very sheltered life.”

They watched the rain for a bit longer.

Scout said, “You know this doesn’t mean I like you, right?”

Oscar nodded. “Noted.”

“But I’ll take your Quavers.”

“Conditionally or permanently?”

She looked at the bag. “Let’s see how the afternoon goes.”

And they sat there, on the edge of something, or maybe nothing, waiting for the clock to run out.

They went back in when the rain got mean. Neither of them said it was time; they just stood up at the same moment and walked silently back through the side door. As Scout and Oscar walked back in, Tina was showing Janet something on her phone, “Yes, that’s the tiny chaise lounge. I sewed the cushions myself. For scale, here’s a matchbox.”

Ty had returned to his exact pre-lunch position, hoodie up, vape discreetly palmed. Leah was unwrapping a boiled egg from clingfilm, looking mildly apologetic about the smell but still doing it anyway. Gary stood by the coffee station, aggressively shaking the machine and muttering “bloody decaf” like it was a slur. The room had changed slightly, seats pushed out of alignment, condensation clinging to the windows. Janet was already at the front, holding a stack of reflection worksheets and what looked like an overly ambitious flipchart.

“Welcome back!” she chirped. “Hope you’re all fed and full of fresh perspective!”

No one answered. The final stretch began with a video. It featured dim reenactments of car accidents and a voiceover so gentle it was unnerving. There was a child’s shoe in one scene. Everyone got quiet. Ty actually took his headphones out. Leah made a soft noise that might have been a sniff. Gary crossed his arms harder. Scout felt nothing, which, alarmingly, felt like something. Oscar sat still the entire time, too still. When the lights came back up, he blinked slowly, like it hurt.

Janet launched into the finalactivity with a little too much bounce. “You’ll now write a short reflection,” she announced. “Something meaningful you’ve taken from today.”

Gary sighed. “This again.”

Tina whispered, “I’ve actually found this quite helpful.”

Ty rolled his eyes so hard it was audible. Scout stared at the page. Oscar didn’t pick up his pen. Janet floated between them like a shepherd of the emotionally reluctant.

“You don’t have to write an essay,” she said gently. “Just a truth.”

Scout started to write something sarcastic. She paused. Then scribbled it out. Wrote nothing instead. After ten long minutes of half-inked honesty and crossed out lies, Janet collected the papers like someone harvesting awkwardness.

Then she beamed. “And just like that, we’re done!” There was a shuffle of relief. Gary bolted upright. Leah gathered snack wrappers and car keys. Ty was already halfway out the door. Scout lingered just long enough to watch Oscar pick up his coat. He nodded at her, small, professional, like a mutual understanding had been reached but not named.

She nodded back.

Janet clapped again. “Drive safe, everyone!”

Scout stepped into the hall. Her car key was already in her fist. Oscar was behind her, a few paces back. She turned slightly.

“Did you write anything?” she asked.

He met her eyes. “No.”

She didn’t smile. But she didn’t leave, either. Outside, the rain had stopped. The air felt like it was waiting for something.

Scout said, “See you never, then.”

Oscar considered that. “Maybe.”

Then he walked past her, quiet and unreadable, like a man with a secret he hadn’t decided to keep yet. Scout watched him go. Then got in her car, turned the key, and didn’t drive off for several minutes.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Five months later, the pub was full of limbs. Elbows knocked into shoulders. Pints sloshed onto polished wood. Someone was already singing, and it was only 8:04. It was only the start of the busiest weekend of the year, Friday of the F1 Grand Prix weekend, and Scout was three seconds from pulling a pint over someone’s head. She never gave a toss about racing. She worked weekends anyway. And she hated anything with fan chants.

But in Cattle End, the pub ten minutes from Silverstone with sticky floors and trophy photos no one had dusted in two years, it became a zoo this time of year. Mechanics, PR girls, overly confident lads with lanyards. All of them thirsty. They were down two, maybe three staff. No one could agree how many.

She glanced at the kitchen. Sarah had bailed an hour before her shift even started, claiming she “felt a spiritual fever.” Scout was still unclear if that meant an actual illness or a horoscope issue. Either way, it left her short-staffed and borderline homicidal. The dishwasher was broken. The chef had gone home sick.

Scout, whose actual job title was bartender, was currently operating as waiter, barback, line cook, floor manager, and therapist to a man who had spilled gravy on his jeans and was blaming the lighting. She hadn’t stopped moving for hours. So, when a new group strolled in, laughing too loud, already half-drunk, she barely clocked them. Just more noise. More backs-of-heads. Until one leaned over the bar.

Short curls. Cocky grin. “Two lagers, and do you have anything that isn’t mid?” He was grinning at her like he expected her to laugh. She didn’t.

Scout grabbed two pint glasses without answering. Standard issue twats. She could do this on autopilot.

The curly one turned slightly. Called over his shoulder, “What do you want?”

And that’s when she saw him. Standing half behind the loud one. Not drunk. Not grinning. Just watching her. Oscar.

Scout froze for exactly half a second. Long enough. He didn’t look surprised. Just like someone trying not to blink first. The lights were warm. The air was loud. And still she heard the beat of recognition like it was its own sound.

Five months. And here he was. In her space.

Scout placed the two pints down harder than necessary. “Anything else?” she asked, not looking directly at either of them.

“Yeah,” Curly said, oblivious. “Another pint, whatever he’s having.”

She looked at Oscar. He was still watching her.

She raised an eyebrow. “Do you drink? Didn’t strike me as the type.”

That startled Curly. “Wait, you two know each other?”

Oscar blinked, just once. Then: “We did a speed awareness course together.”

Curly cackled. “Oh, that’s rich.”

Scout looked at him properly. “You still haven’t had a crumpet?”

Oscar smiled, slow and quiet. “Not intentionally.”

Scout poured his pint. Silence, almost delicate, as the beer filled the glass. Behind her, someone dropped a fork. A man shouted “Oi, Darren!” with no further context.

She slid the pint over. “On a scale of one to absolute hell, how bad is being out with Curly?”

“I’d take Janet’s PowerPoints.”

Curly gasped. “Wow. Betrayal. In public.”

Scout cracked a smile, thin but sharp. “If I bring you a bowl of chips, will you promise to tip?”

“I’ll tip anyway,” Oscar said.

“I’ll believe it when I see it.”

And just like that, the thread tightened. Not a reconnection. Just a second loop. In a different setting. In her territory. Scout turned to the fryer, didn’t say goodbye. But her heart was louder than the bar. And she felt his eyes on her back, for a moment too long, before he returned to the big group he’d entered with.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

By midnight, the pub had softened. No more crowd noise. Just the occasional clink of glass. The slow sigh of tired wooden beams. Scout had sent the rest of the staff home. She told them she had it covered, which was true. Sort of. Mostly, she wanted to be alone. Or as alone as one could be with three strangers finishing the dregs of their pints at the far end of the bar. She moved through the space slowly, cloth in one hand, glass in the other. Clearing, wiping, resetting. Restocking the crisps behind the bar. Mechanical. Hypnotic.

She overheard them, even when she wasn’t trying. The curly one, Lando, apparently, had a laugh that rang like mischief. He’d said something about “Osc always pulling the quiet card until it’s too late.”

So that was his name here. Osc. It suited him, somehow. Fewer syllables. Less room to pin down.

By 12:30, it was just the three of them left. Her, Osc, and Lando. The pub had dimmed down into golden quiet, only the emergency lights glowing behind the bar. They drifted toward her, finishing their pints, as she wiped the countertop near the taps.

Scout didn’t look at them at first, but the silence stretched just long enough to feel like invitation.

“You guys here for race weekend?” she asked, trying to make conversation if only to keep herself from sleepwalking through the motions.

Lando scoffed. She didn’t know why. Oscar, Osc, leaned on the bar, eyes still just as unreadable. “Yeah, actually. We’re two of the drivers.”

She blinked. “You’re what?”

He didn’t smile. Didn’t blink. Just waited. Lando grinned like it was a magic trick.

“I thought you were joking,” she said, slowly. “You’re both too tired looking to be famous.”

“Thank you,” Oscar said dryly.

“I meant it as a compliment. Kinda.”

There was a pause. Lando finished the last inch of his pint and said, “Osc wanted to talk to you.”

Oscar closed his eyes. “Jesus, Lando.”

Scout tilted her head. “Well, I’m flattered.”

“Don’t be,” Oscar muttered. “He’s ten drinks in.”

“I’m eleven,” Lando corrected. “But go off.”

Scout smiled, turning to grab three shot glasses out of a drawer. “You two are being a bit risky, hanging out in here when you’ve got a race tomorrow.”

Lando grinned. “Only if the FIA gets wind of it.”

Oscar looked at her. “You’re not going to rat us out, are you?”

“Depends on if you tip.”

Oscar smirked. “Still conditional?”

“Always.”

She set the glasses down and said, “You know how to play cards?”

Lando perked up. “I love cards.”

Oscar looked at the clock. “Shouldn’t you be working?”

She looked around the empty room. “Technically? I was meant to shut at 11:30. But, you know. Felons welcome.”

Oscar sat. “You’re calling us felons?”

“You’re on thin ice,” she said, shuffling a battered deck that had been under the till since Christmas.

They played Shithead. Lando won the first round by pure chaos and claimed he was “mentally undefeated.” Oscar was suspiciously good at strategic folding. Scout played like she had nothing to lose, which she didn’t. After the third round, Lando got up to use the loo, swearing he’d be back in two minutes and warning them not to rig the deck.

Oscar leaned back slightly in his chair. Scout rested her chin on her hand. “So Osc.”

He gave her a look. “You said that like it’s a threat.”

“It’s just funny. You’ve got a nickname. Like a real person.”

“Devastating,” he deadpanned. “I thought I was going for elusive.”

“You were,” she said. “And then you sat in my pub with Lando Norris.”

Oscar looked at the empty pint glass, then at her. “I didn’t know you worked here.”

“I didn’t know you were anyone.”

They sat in that for a second. Then he said, “Do you always offer card games to your customers?”

“Only the famous ones,” she said. “I heard you’re very important.”

“Extremely,” he said. “World’s most well-behaved felon.”

She smiled. “You’re a better liar than I gave you credit for.”

He looked at her properly now, not flirty, not smirking. Just curious. Like she was a crossword clue he’d finally figured out.

“You ever think about that course?” he asked.

“Only when I drive through roundabouts,” she said. “So, a lot.”

Oscar laughed, low and surprised. Scout bit back her grin.

He shook his head. “Still reckless?”

She shrugged. “Still a mystery.”

Lando returned with dramatic fanfare, announcing that he’d dried his hands with paper towels like “a real grown adult.”

Scout dealt the next hand without comment. But her hands shook just slightly, Oscar noticed.

Last game came and went with no fanfare. Scout flicked the lights up slightly, enough to signal the end. Lando took the hint, eventually. He stood, stretched like a cat in denim, and gave her a lopsided smile.

“You’re a legend,” he said. “You should run a team. Or a cult.”

“I’ll consider both,” she said, deadpan.

He saluted, wobbling slightly. “Night, Osc.”

Oscar gave a nod. “Don’t fall into a hedge.”

“No promises.”

Lando stumbled out, the bell on the door giving a pathetic little jingle behind him. Scout began the end-of-night ritual: lights down, chairs up, till shut, back door bolted. Oscar didn’t hover, but he didn’t leave either. He stood by the bar, hands in his pockets, watching her move with purpose. Like she’d done this a thousand times.

When she clicked the final deadbolt and turned toward the front door, he spoke. “You good getting home?”

She nodded, pulling on her jacket. “Yeah. That one’s mine.” She pointed to the car parked under the only working streetlamp. The battered Toyota, still a little damp from the afternoon drizzle.

He followed her gaze, then nodded.

“You two getting back okay?”

Oscar smiled faintly. “Yeah. The walk will do him good. Sober him up a bit. Might save him from a hangover tomorrow.”

Scout slipped her keys from her pocket. Then paused. It hung there for a second, that sense that something was supposed to happen next, but neither of them knew how to start it. Oscar shifted, like he might not say anything.

“Can I?” He hesitated. “Can I get your number?”

She blinked. “Like, now?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Or later, when I come in pretending to order chips and ask awkwardly in front of ten people.”

Scout snorted. “Fine.”

She gave it to him. The most awkward dictation imaginable. He typed it in with care, not repeating it back, just trusting he got it. She didn’t ask if he’d actually use it. He didn’t say he would. There was just silence, for a beat. Not uncomfortable. Not quite.

Their eyes held. A moment pressed flat between them, heat and static and something they weren’t naming.

“Osc! I think I stood in a puddle that wasn’t a puddle!” Lando’s voice rang out from the dark.

Oscar sighed. “Duty calls.”

Scout bit her lip, trying not to laugh. “You better go rescue him. Before he ends up on a TikTok.”

Oscar turned toward the door, paused, then looked back. “Goodnight, Scout.”

“Night, Osc.”

She walked to her car, turned the key in the lock, climbed in. The engine rumbled to life. The streetlamp above her flickered, as if unsure whether to stay awake.

Her phone buzzed. One message. You’ll be watching on Sunday, won’t you?

No name. Didn’t need one. Scout stared at it. Then smiled. She rolled the window down, just a crack.

And honked the horn, one loud, sudden blast. Lando screamed. Oscar laughed, full-bodied, caught-off-guard laughter, and turned to look back at her. She drove off, still smiling. Didn’t reply. Not yet.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

It was 3:30pm and the bar was a war zone. Beer was flowing. Chips were burning. Someone was shouting about track limits like it was a personal betrayal. Scout was moving fast, ferrying glasses and dodging elbows, but still, every few minutes, her eyes darted up to the corner TV. The Grand Prix. Silverstone.

She hadn’t planned to watch. Honestly, she barely understood the rules. But the screen was unavoidable. And she kept checking it. Every. Single. Time.

“Hey,” she called to one of the other bartenders, breathless between taps. “What team do Lando and Oscar race for?”

“McLaren,” he shouted back. “The orange one.”

Scout nodded, which made sense, the lads on Friday had been in head-to-toe papaya. But it still felt ridiculous. Them? First and second? She looked up at the screen again.

Lando: P1. Oscar: P2. Both flying.

The whole pub roared as Lando crossed the finish line. Then again, seconds later, when Oscar followed. Scout just laughed. Half disbelieving, half proud, and she wasn’t even sure why.

An hour later, once the noise dipped and she had a second to breathe, she took out her phone and typed,

So, you’re actually good at it, huh. I thought you were just tall and humble for fun.

She hit send, then went back to work.

He showed up twenty minutes later. Still in team kit. Hair a little messier than usual. Flush in his cheeks like the adrenaline hadn’t quite worn off.

Scout blinked when she saw him. “You’re supposed to be celebrating.”

“I will,” Oscar said, stepping up to the bar. “But it wasn’t an easy day, and I wanted to make a pit stop.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Fuel or attention?”

He smiled. “Told you I’d come back.”

She folded her arms. “You want something?”

He nodded. “A prize.”

Scout leaned forward slightly. “You didn’t win.”

“Harsh. I came second.”

“No prizes here for second.”

He tilted his head. “What if I win the next one?”

“You’ll get your prize.”

He grinned. “That’s in Belgium. Three weeks.”

She raised an eyebrow. “So?”

“So, can I have something to tide me over till then?”

Her smile didn’t come all at once. It crept in, slow, sly, like she was weighing something. Then she stepped closer, just enough to narrow the space between them. His breath caught, or maybe hers did.

Without a word, she leaned in. Not dramatic, not fast, just close. Her lips brushed his cheek, barely, a fraction of a second longer than casual, far too deliberate to be nothing. Warm. Intentional. Like a promise if he was brave enough to take it that way. When she pulled back, she didn’t say anything.

She didn’t have to.

Oscar blinked. Then exhaled like he’d just taken pole. “I guess I have to win now.”

Scout smirked. “You better.”

He glanced back toward the door. “I have to go. It’s Lando’s home win, and the team’s English, so, PR and pints await.”

“Go,” she said. “Be charming.”

“You’ll be here?”

“I work here,” she said. “Felons and race winners welcome.”

Oscar hesitated. “Text me?”

Scout shrugged. “Maybe.”

They smiled at each other, wider than either of them meant to, and then he was gone, swallowed up by the street, by the crowd, by the team. Scout looked at the cheek she’d kissed. Then went back to work. Still smiling.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Scout was on break, eating chips behind the pub. Her phone buzzed. Oscar. She didn’t answer right away. He called again.

“Twice?” she said, when she finally picked up. “Bold.”

“You gave me your number.”

“Didn’t say I’d answer.”

“You honked at me.”

“You asked if I’d be watching.”

A pause. Then a smile in his voice. “Touché.”

They talked for twenty minutes. About nothing. His flight. Her boss. The pub cat that only showed up when it rained. He asked what she was doing.

She said, “Trying to eat chips in peace, but you’re making it weird.”

“Should I hang up?”

“No,” she said. “You can keep being weird.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Friday. He sent: Got followed for going 31 in a 30. Nearly had flashbacks to Janet.

She replied: Was it the haunting spectre of Comic Sans? Then: If you get banned again, I’m not writing to the DVLA on your behalf.

They sent memes. Screenshots. A photo he took of a roundabout and captioned “Still haunted?” She replied with a grave emoji and a rat in a dolls’ house.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Ten days before Spa. It was late. Past 11. Her shift had just ended. She got the request while changing out of her uniform in the pub office.

“Why do I see pipes?” she asked when she answered.

Oscar flipped the camera. He was lying on a hotel room bed, phone above his head. He looked half-asleep, hair sticking up.

“You always answer FaceTime like you’re about to arrest someone,” he said.

“You always call like you forgot how phones work.”

She settled into the armchair, shoes kicked off. “How’s training?”

“Hot. Loud. Lando’s playlist is 70% Calvin Harris. I’m losing my will to live.”

She laughed. “You’re very dramatic.”

“I’m the oldest child. Let me have this.”

He asked how the pub was. She said a man ordered a beer at 10:59 and then asked if they had “any gluten-free Scotch eggs.”

Oscar winced. “Jail.” Then he said, quieter, “I like your voice.”

She didn’t know what to say to that. So, she said, “I like yours better when you’re tired.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

One week before Spa. She got a text first: Call when you’re free? She did. But it wasn’t Oscar who answered.

“HELLO, THIS IS OSCAR’S SOCIAL COORDINATOR,” Lando shouted into the mic.

Scout snorted. “God help me.”

“He’s busy being emotionally repressed, so I’m doing outreach.”

Oscar’s voice, “Give me that.”

Lando again, “Just confirming your attendance at the Post-Belgium Celebration Gala.”

“I haven’t RSVP’d.”

“You’re a VIP, babe.”

Then muffled fighting. Oscar finally took the phone back. “Sorry,” he said, breathless.

“You guys sharing a room or a personality?”

He smiled. “Not meant to be, but Lando hasn’t heard of privacy. So, tragically, both.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Night before Spa. He was calm. Focused. But lighter than she’d seen him.

They talked for half an hour. He asked if she was working. She said yes, covering for Sarah again. She asked if he was ready.

“I came second last year,” he said. “I want to win it this time.”

“You better.”

“For the trophy?”

“For the bragging rights,” she said.

He smiled. “Not even a kiss?”

“Earn it.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Race day, he won. Max second. Lando third. Scout was mid-shift, still behind the bar, when her phone rang. She ducked into the stockroom, the cold air biting at her arms.

“Hey,” Oscar said. Breathless. Grinning, she could hear it.

She leaned against a crate of cider. “So, you do know how to win.”

Oscar laughed, warm and unguarded. “I can’t wait to see you.”

This time, she didn’t pretend not to hear him.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Monday night. The pub was quiet, finally. Chairs stacked, lights dimmed, floor sticky in some places no matter how many times she mopped. Scout had just locked the front door when a shadow passed the window, and then a knock. She opened it half an inch, squinting into the streetlight.

Oscar. Wearing the same grin he’d had on screen. His hair still a little too neat, like he hadn’t fully exhaled since Sunday.

“I won,” he said.

She leaned against the frame. “You did.”

He stepped inside. The air between them changed, familiar now, but not safe. Nothing about him felt safe anymore. Not in a dangerous way. In the I might say yes to anything you ask me way.

“You came for your prize?” she asked, locking the door again behind him.

He glanced around. “I mean, I did get a pretty decent trophy.”

“Yeah,” she said, teasing. “But mine’s more valuable. No ribbon.”

He looked at her then, properly. “Come on a date with me.”

She blinked. “Just like that?”

He nodded. “You said if I won.”

She smirked. “So technically, this is me keeping my word. Not me actually wanting to.”

He smiled. “Sure.”

But he didn’t drop it. And neither did the tension. His hand found the back of his neck. He looked down for a beat. “I leave for Hungary on Wednesday.”

Scout nodded, quietly. “You racing again?”

“Yeah. But,” he hesitated. His voice cracked just slightly. “But I don’t want to wait another week to take you out. I can’t just keep texting. I want to be near you. I want-” He stopped. Cleared his throat. “Come with me.”

She laughed. Sharp. Nervous. “Are you serious?”

“I know it’s last-minute. Insane. But I don’t care. I’ll book everything. I just,” He stepped closer. “Please come.”

Her voice caught. “Oscar, I’d have to ask my boss.”

“Ask him,” he said. “Beg him. I will if I have to.”

Scout stared at him, breath shallow. Every second stretched out like elastic. Her fingers twitched.

“If he says yes,” she whispered. “I’ll come.”

That was it. That was the switch. The room changed temperature. Oscar looked at her the way people look at wishes they’re afraid to make. Their bodies pulled together, slowly, then all at once. They stopped inches apart. She touched his face, light, reverent. Ran a thumb over the arch of his eyebrow, the edge of his jaw, the corner of his mouth.

“You have a very handsome face,” she murmured. “Does it get you everything you want?”

“Almost,” he whispered.

She kept tracing. Her fingers were shaking. So were his.

“I want to do something,” he said, voice low. “Something really stupid.”

Their faces were so close now, their breath catching in the narrow space between. Scout let her fingers trace the shape of him, the curve of his cheekbone, the tension at his temple, like she was trying to remember it.

She whispered, “Kiss me.”

Oscar blinked, eyes locked on hers. “Are you sure?” he asked, voice low, trembling at the edges. “Because if I do, I won’t stop thinking about it.”

She didn’t let him finish. Her hand slid around the back of his neck and yanked him down, sharp, certain. It was everything. Not neat. Not slow. Just hungry. Familiar. Like they'd been waiting, and they had.

It was breath, warmth, and mouths catching against each other in messy, perfect rhythm. In the middle of it, they grinned. Just for a second. Teeth grazing, lips curling, breath hitching, that helpless, dizzy laugh you only make when your entire body knows it’s right.

Oscar kissed her like he’d been holding his breath for weeks and only now remembered how to exhale. Like she was the thing he was late for and willing to crash into. All the moons, and stars, and weeks, and seconds they hadn’t been touching, gone.

When they finally pulled apart, slowly, reluctantly, his forehead rested lightly against hers. She was still catching her breath when he murmured, soft and wrecked and smiling, “I am so unbelievably screwed.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

The next day, just after the lunch rush, Scout leaned against the stockroom doorframe with her phone in one hand and her best “don’t make this a thing” face ready.

“Can I ask you something weird?” she said.

Her boss, Pete, mid-forties, balding, usually seen arguing with the fryer, looked up from the rota.

“Is it about rats in dollhouses again?”

She blinked. “No. It’s sort of a last-minute thing.”

Pete raised an eyebrow.

“I’ve been asked to go to Hungary,” she said, trying not to sound like someone losing her mind. “Just for a few days. I know it’s short notice, but I covered all of Sarah’s shifts last month, including the one with the broken glass fridge, so I was wondering if-”

Pete held up a hand. “Scout.”

She stopped.

“You can go.”

She blinked again. “Really?”

He nodded. “You work your arse off. Just bring back a fridge magnet.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

She called Oscar on her break, pacing behind the bins, breath catching even before he picked up. He answered on the second ring.

“Scout?”

“I asked.”

Oscar went quiet. “And?”

“I can come.”

There was a pause. Then a very loud cheer in the background.

“Was that Lando?” she asked, grinning.

Oscar laughed. “He’s been invested.”

Another voice shouted, faint but audible: “Tell her I’ve already packed her snacks!”

Scout rolled her eyes, heart hammering. “So, Hungary.”

Oscar’s voice dropped, warm and giddy. “Hungary.”

They didn’t hang up for a long time.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

The pub was closed. Chairs were upturned on tables. Lights half-dimmed. The till drawer was open, spilling pennies like it had given up on being useful.

Scout stood behind the bar, zipping up a battered overnight bag. It was too small, too worn, and definitely not big enough for the five outfits she’d crammed into it.

Across from her, perched on a stool and eating crisps like she’d been hired to sabotage her, Sarah watched with mild judgment.

“You’re flying to Hungary,” she said between crunches, “for a man.”

Scout didn’t look up. “He’s not just a man. He’s a Formula 1 driver.”

Sarah snorted. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise the specific category of hormonal collapse.”

Scout zipped the bag harder than necessary. “It’s not like that.”

“Right. So, you’re just travelling across the world to support your casual driving acquaintance in his pursuit of very fast circles.”

Scout paused. “Yes.”

Sarah raised an eyebrow.

Scout sighed. “Okay, maybe it’s slightly like that.”

Sarah beamed. “There she is.”

Scout tossed a clean bar towel at her. “Wipe that smug off your face.”

Sarah dodged it, victorious. “You like him.”

“I never said I didn’t.”

“You like like him.”

“I’m leaving the country. You can’t make me talk about this.”

Sarah leaned forward. “Do you trust him?”

Scout blinked. That wasn’t where she thought the conversation was going. She considered it. Seriously. Then, “Yeah. I do.”

Sarah nodded, satisfied. Then dropped a pub coaster into Scout’s bag. “Souvenir offering. For the speed demon.”

Scout glanced at it. “Charming,” she said.

Sarah stood, brushing crisp dust off her jeans. “Just make sure he knows you’re more than a pit stop.”

Scout smirked. “You’ve been saving that one.”

“Days,” Sarah admitted.

They hugged. Briefly. The way they always did when neither of them wanted to say anything sappy.

“I’ll cover your Friday shift,” Sarah added as she grabbed her coat. “Don’t die.”

“Don’t call in sick,” Scout shot back.

“No promises.”

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

When Oscar knocked, she was still trying to shove the zipper closed with her knee.

“Ready?” he asked, peeking in.

She looked at her bag. “Technically.”

He offered to carry it.

She narrowed her eyes. “I have arms, Piastri.”

He raised his hands in mock surrender. “Just trying to be romantic.”

“Try less.”

At the airport, Lando was already there, wearing sunglasses indoors like a celebrity and someone hiding from their own hangover.

“Didn’t think you’d actually come,” he said, grinning.

“She’s not imaginary,” Oscar replied.

“I never said that,” Lando lied, obviously.

Scout rolled her eyes. “Are you always like this, or just around strangers?”

“I’m like this professionally,” he said. “You’re welcome.”

They landed in Hungary on Wednesday evening. The sun was setting when they reached the hotel, a sleek modern thing with cold white lights and a lobby that smelled too expensive. Oscar checked them in. Lando vanished upstairs, claiming urgent business with room service.

Oscar led Scout to her room. He reached for her bag again.

“Don’t,” she warned.

He didn’t. Outside her door, they hovered. There was still a thread of something from that kiss, the tension of it, the spark it left in the air between them.

Oscar scratched the back of his neck. “I’m in the room above. I was thinking, tomorrow might be better for the date. Today’s a lot.”

Scout nodded, relieved. “Yeah. Gotta work up to being charming.”

“You’re already charming.”

“Tell me that again when I’m not sweating from two airports and a Hungarian taxi driver who played only Pitbull.”

He smiled. Their phones buzzed. Lando. Dinner? My room? Low-stakes vibes. No trousers necessary.

She read it aloud.

Oscar groaned. “He’s going to wear a kimono again, isn’t he?”

Scout grinned. “Shame. I was going to break out my floor-length ballgown.”

Oscar leaned against the doorframe. “Takeout and cards sound okay?”

“Perfect.”

Lando’s room looked like a teenager had been given a minibar and one million pounds. Takeout bags lined the windowsill. There was a deck of cards mid-shuffle, a giant tub of ice cream no one admitted to ordering, and four hotel robes in various states of disarray. They played Uno. Lando made up new rules every five minutes. Oscar quietly destroyed them both. Scout spent most of the night laughing and eating chips with her fingers.

At one point, Lando fell off the bed trying to prove that he could plank and reshuffle simultaneously. Scout looked at Oscar. He looked at her. That smile again, quiet and shared, like an inside joke they hadn’t told anyone yet.

It was late when they left. Oscar walked her to her door, neither of them quite ready to be done with the day. Outside her room, they paused.

She turned to him. “Thanks. For this. All of it.”

He shook his head. “You being here makes it better.”

She opened her mouth, to joke, or deflect, or say something that didn’t feel like a confession, but he leaned in first and kissed her. Not rushed. Not like the first one. Slower. Sweeter. More sure of itself.

When they pulled apart, neither of them moved away.

Then Oscar whispered, “Goodnight, Scout.”

She smiled. “Goodnight, Osc.”

He walked down the hallway. Didn’t look back. She watched the lift doors close behind him. Then stepped inside her room, heart in freefall.

She dropped her bag in the corner and sat on the bed; fingers pressed to her lips. She lay back, staring at the ceiling, completely and utterly confused, and happier than she’d ever admit out loud.

Scout lay on the bed, her thoughts a storm of the moments that had just unfolded. The kiss played on a loop in her mind, Oscar's touch lingering on her skin like the faint scent of his cologne. She knew she should be sleeping, but the buzz of electricity from their encounter kept her eyes wide open.

Her phone lit up the darkness as she reached for it, her fingers fumbling over the screen. She found his name and hovered over the message icon, contemplating whether this was a good idea. The clock on the nightstand ticked away the seconds, each one louder than the last. Finally, she typed out a message, trying to keep her words casual, her thoughts anything but. "Hey, Osc," she sent, "Can't seem to get some shut-eye."

Her screen remained dark for what felt like an eternity. The anticipation was palpable. And then, a soft vibration, the digital lifeline connecting them once more. "Me neither," he replied. She felt a smirk tug at her lips, his confession a warm embrace in the solitude.

Their conversation grew, the texts a dance of double meanings and playful innuendos. "What's keeping you up?" she asked, her pulse quickening as she waited for his response.

"I can't get the taste of you out of my mind," he wrote. The innocence of their friendship had officially transformed into something new, something thrilling.

Her cheeks flushed at his words, and she felt the warmth spread down her neck. She replied, "You're not exactly making it easy for me to sleep either."

Their digital banter grew bolder, their words a delicate balance between friendship and the beginnings of something more. "I can’t wait for our date tomorrow." Oscar sent.

Her heart skipped a beat. "Me too," she confessed, feeling the weight of their unspoken feelings grow heavier.

The conversation grew quiet for a moment, the gravity of their words hanging in the air like mist. And then, "Would it help if I sent you another goodnight kiss?" he asked.

A smile curled on her lips. "I'd like that."

The next message was a string of kissing emojis, and she couldn't help but laugh softly to herself. It was a simple, sweet gesture that somehow felt as intimate than the actual kiss they'd shared.

Their messages slowly became less frequent as sleep began to take them, sweet dreams of lips and kisses and future dates flooded their brains.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Thursdays were media day. Lando and Oscar had offered to take her to the paddock, but with a warning. “It’ll be boring. Lots of cameras. No flirting allowed.” Scout had smiled politely and waved them off. She had no intention of spending her first day in Hungary watching two grown men talk about tyre degradation.

Instead, she hiked. Found a trail that wound through hills and ruins, where she overheard a local guide tell a story about a miller who was cursed by his ungrateful wife. She kept walking, found another monument with a different miller, this one tragically drowned. She ended up by a fountain named after neither of them.

By the time she got back to the hotel, her shoes were muddy, her phone was full of photos she didn’t remember taking, and her calves were absolutely done with her.

She stepped into the shower, sun-tired and glowing. When she got out, a text was waiting: Done for the day. 7 okay for our date?

She replied: See you then.

7:00 sharp, he was at her door. Oscar, in a proper shirt. Slightly wrinkled. Hair still damp from his own shower. Smiling like he wasn’t sure if he should be nervous.

“You look nice,” he said.

“As do you,” she replied.

They walked to a small restaurant Oscar had Googled weeks ago and bookmarked, just in case. It had string lights and mismatched plates, and the table wobbled if you leaned too far left.

The date started stiff. Two people who talked all the time suddenly unsure what to say. But then she made a joke about the cursed miller wife, and he pretended to be horrified, and she called him dramatic, and he said, “You make me dramatic,” and just like that, they found the rhythm again.

Their food came late. The wine hit early. They kept leaning toward each other, without meaning to. When the bill arrived, she reached instinctively for her purse.

“Split it?” she said, casual.

Oscar looked scandalised. “Absolutely not.”

“You don’t even know how much mine was.”

He took the bill. “Doesn’t matter.”

“That’s not very feminist of you.”

“I have a larger income,” he said simply. “I can afford dinner.”

She rolled her eyes. “Brat.”

But when he didn’t budge, she let him pay. Quietly.

He folded the receipt, set it aside, and looked at her, really looked at her.

His mouth thinned into something unreadable. “Has anyone ever taken care of you?”

She blinked. Then laughed softly through her nose. “No one can stand me long enough.”

He didn’t laugh, “I will, if you’ll let me.”

They walked back to the hotel slowly, limbs loose with wine and warmth and something unspoken crackling under the surface. At the front entrance, he turned to her.

“I had a nice time,” he said.

“Me too.”

He leaned in.

She pulled back half an inch, mock-serious. “I had garlic.”

Oscar blinked. “Stop being difficult.”

He kissed her. Small, at first. Barely anything before he pulled back. Scout opened her mouth to say something. But he devoured her before she could. Hands in her hair. Her hands grabbing his jacket. A laugh caught between them. His mouth finding hers again and again like he’d missed it during the sentence he’d paused to breathe.

They stumbled through the hotel lobby. Giggles. Glances. Trying not to trip over each other’s feet. When the lift doors opened, he kissed her again. They reached his room; they barely made it inside. She didn’t even notice the door click shut.

Their mouths never parted. The air between them shifted, oxygen traded for heat. Every movement after that was urgent, like they’d both been waiting too long and were afraid the moment might slip away.

He kissed her like he was starved for her, like every second he wasn’t touching her was a second wasted. Her hands slid under his jacket, his fingers tangled in her hair, their mouths moving like they didn’t know how to stop.

They stumbled to the bed, knocking knees and giggling between gasps for air, but never once letting their mouth’s part for long. It wasn’t smooth. It wasn’t choreographed. It was real.

Clothes began to peel away, shirts tugged, jackets thrown. Her fingers fumbled at the hem of his shirt when she paused, just slightly, her breath catching.

“I don’t normally do this,” she whispered, “not on the first date.”

Oscar stilled. Instantly. He took her hands in his, gentle and grounding. His eyes found hers, searching.

“We don’t have to,” he said softly. “Not if you don’t want to. It won’t change a thing. You are,” his voice caught, “utterly gorgeous. This date’s been incredible. You’re already everything.”

She stared at him, trying to measure the weight of it. Then lifted her chin. “Do you want to?”

He laughed, quiet and breathless. “Are you kidding?” His thumb traced over her knuckles. “I want you in my brain, in my bed, on my lap, under me, above me. I want your hands on me. I want to be ruined by you. I haven’t stopped thinking about it. You deserve more respect than I could show you in one night, but I want to try. I want to worship you.”

He breathed in, eyes locked on hers. “I want a lifetime of nights between your thighs, but even that wouldn’t be enough. But I won’t move. I won’t touch you like that unless you ask me to.”

Scout didn’t move. Didn’t blink.

Just stared at him, trying to memorise his whole face.

And then, finally, so quiet she could barely hear herself, she muttered, “Fuck it.”

She pulled him down onto the bed, over her, their mouths crashing again like they hadn’t already been kissing. She kissed him in sporadic, frantic pecks, her hands sliding into his hair, down his neck, across his back.

“I want you,” she whispered between kisses. “I want you.”

He didn’t hear it at first. But when he did, when the words finally registered, he froze just long enough to pull back, eyes wild and wide with disbelief. Then he grinned.

He reached for the hem of his shirt, lifting it, but her hand flew up, stopping him.

“Let me,” she said. Her voice made his knees go weak.

Her fingers brushed against the warm skin of his stomach as she slowly dragged his shirt upward, exposing the taut muscles beneath. His breath hitched when her nails grazed his ribs, light as a whisper but enough to make his body tremble. She took her time, savouring the way his chest rose and fell faster with every inch of fabric she peeled away, until finally, the shirt was over his head and discarded somewhere in the shadows of the room.

His hands hovered at her waist, desperate to touch but still holding back, waiting. She smirked at the restraint in his grip, the way his fingers twitched against her hip like he was fighting himself.

Her fingers traced the dip of his collarbone, then dragged lower, following the ridge of his sternum. Oscar exhaled sharply through his nose when her thumb brushed over the hem of his trousers, his whole body tensing like a bowstring.

"Scout," His voice was rough, barely a sound.

She silenced him with a kiss, biting his lower lip just hard enough to make him groan. His hands finally moved, gripping her waist like she might vanish if he didn’t hold on. The heat of his palms burned through the thin fabric of her dress, and she arched into it, craving more.

His mouth left hers to trail down her throat, teeth scraping lightly over her pulse point, hands sliding down her thighs, gripping firmly as he pushed her flat on the bed. The sheets were cool against her bare skin as he settled between her legs, his breath hot against her inner thigh. He pressed an open-mouthed kiss there, teeth grazing just enough to make her gasp.

She tangled her fingers in his hair, tugging lightly, but he didn’t rush. He took his time, lips trailing higher, achingly slow, until his tongue finally flicked against her. A sharp inhale. A shudder. His name tumbled from her lips, half curse, half plea. He groaned against her, the vibration sending sparks up her spine.

Her back arched off the bed as his tongue circled her, slow and deliberate, like he was mapping every tremor, every hitched breath. His hands pinned her hips down when she tried to move against him, fingers digging in just enough to leave faint marks.

"Oscar," His name shattered in her throat as he sucked lightly, then soothed the spot with the flat of his tongue. She could feel him smiling against her, the arrogant bastard, before he did it again. Her grip on his hair tightened, pulling hard enough to make him groan, but he didn’t stop.

Her breath came in ragged gasps as his mouth worked her with slow, deliberate strokes, each flick of his tongue sending shocks of pleasure curling through her. She arched, thighs trembling, fingers tightening in his hair.

His fingers joined, pressing in just enough to push her over the edge. She came with a choked cry, back bowing off the bed as pleasure crashed through her in waves, sharp and relentless. His mouth stayed on her, drawing it out, until she was shuddering, wrung out, her grip on him going slack.

His lips left her skin reluctantly, trailing back up her body with slow, open-mouthed kisses, her hipbone, the dip of her waist, the flutter of her ribs, each one leaving her shivering.

When he reached her mouth again, she could taste herself on his tongue, dark and intimate, and the realization made her whimper against his lips. His hands slid beneath her, gripping her backside as he pulled her flush against him, the rough drag of his jeans against her bare thighs sending another shudder through her. She hooked a leg around his hip, grinding down, and his groan was ragged, his forehead dropping to her shoulder.

“Scout,” His voice was wrecked.

Her hands slid down his chest, nails scraping lightly over his abs as she reached for his belt. The buckle clinked, loud in the quiet room, and Oscar shuddered as her fingers worked the button of his jeans.

“Fuck,” he breathed against her mouth, hips jerking when she palmed him through the fabric. She kissed him again, slow and deep, swallowing his groan as she finally freed him, her fingers wrapping around his length in one smooth stroke. His breath came ragged, forehead pressed to hers, lips parted as she moved her hand, slow, then faster, twisting just the way that made his thighs tense.

Her fingers tightened around him, stroking slowly, teasingly, as his breath came in ragged bursts against her neck. He shuddered when her thumb swiped over the head, his hips bucking helplessly into her grip.

“Scout,” His voice was rough, pleading. She kissed him, swallowing his groan as she guided him between her thighs, the tip of him pressing against her heat. His entire body tensed, muscles coiled, his forehead dropping to hers as he fought for control. Then she arched up, taking him in slowly, inch by inch, until he was buried deep inside her. A broken sound tore from his throat.

Her eyes widened in surprise, feeling him stretch and fill her completely. The sensation was a perfect mix of pleasure and pain that she craved. She didn't pause, though; she started moving, her hips rolling in a rhythm that sent shockwaves through her. Nails dug into his back, leaving faint marks as she held onto him.

His hands found her hips, his fingers biting into her flesh as he began to move with her, matching her tempo and deepening the penetration. Their kisses grew more frantic. Her breath was hot against his skin, her moans muffled by his mouth. His grip tightened, his hips moving faster, driving into her with a desperation that she could feel in every pulse of his cock. The room spun around them, the only sound their ragged breathing and the slap of skin against skin. Her nails scratched down his back, leaving trails of red, and she pulled away from his kiss to bite his earlobe, her teeth grazing the sensitive flesh.

The world exploded into white-hot pleasure as she came, her body spasming around him, her legs tightening reflexively to hold him deeper. He groaned, his own release following swiftly, pulsing inside her as he emptied himself into her. They clung to each other, their breaths mingling as their hearts raced in unison, lost in the aftermath of their shared passion.

As the tremors subsided, they lay there, entwined and panting. He kissed her neck, his hands stroking her sides in a gentle, soothing pattern. She turned her head to smile at him; her eyes glazed with satisfaction. He leaned in, capturing her mouth in a soft, lingering kiss that spoke of tenderness and love, a stark contrast to the raw need that had driven them only moments before.

The room was quiet, save for their breathing. Oscar’s forehead was still resting against hers, their noses brushing, his chest rising and falling in time with hers. One of her hands was still tangled in his hair. The other was resting flat against his shoulder, where she could feel his pulse racing under her palm.

Neither of them moved. Neither of them spoke. Until Scout broke the silence, breathless.

“Well,” she murmured, “you’re not bad at that.”

Oscar let out a quiet laugh, voice still wrecked. “Thank you. I do try to be a generous host.”

She smiled, cheek still pressed to the pillow. “You’re very courteous. 10/10. Would attend again.”

“You’re ridiculous,” he said, eyes crinkling at the corners as he kissed her temple.

“You started it,” she muttered.

His hand slid down her side, fingertips trailing her skin. “Are you okay?”

She nodded into him. “Yeah. You?”

He kissed her again, this time on her shoulder. “Better than okay.”

They lay there a little longer, her legs tangled with his, his fingers drawing aimless shapes on the small of her back. Every now and then, she’d shift, and he’d sigh like he’d forgotten how to breathe without her touching him.

After a while, Scout whispered, “I can’t believe I’m in Hungary.”

Oscar looked up, propping himself on an elbow. “I can’t believe you said yes.”

“I didn’t expect any of this,” she admitted. “Definitely not you.”

He smiled softly. “Why not me?”

“Because you’re” she paused. “Stable. Grounded. Emotionally literate.”

Oscar blinked. “Those are bad things?”

“No,” she said quickly. “Just unusual, for me at least.”

He laughed and buried his face in the pillow beside her. “God, your bar is so low.”

“Tragically.”

They both laughed, tired, breathless, that loose-limbed kind of laughter that only happens when you feel completely safe for the first time in a long time.

She shifted closer, draping a leg over his hip. “You know you’ve ruined all future dates for me now, right?”

Oscar smiled against her skin. “Good. That’s exactly what I was going for.”

They fell quiet again.

Eventually, he said, softer, “Do you want to stay?”

She blinked. “Here?”

“In my room. Tonight.”

Scout hesitated, not out of doubt, but because the question felt bigger than it sounded.

Then she nodded.

“I’d like that.”

Oscar exhaled, relieved. He pulled the covers over them and settled behind her, arm draped around her waist, their bodies fitted together like a habit they hadn’t known they’d already started forming. They didn’t say anything else. Didn’t need to.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Sunday. The sun over the circuit was brutal, and the grandstands were a sea of colour and noise. Scout had never been to a race before. Not properly. Not with a lanyard. Not with an actual reason to care. But she cared now. God, she cared.

She stood in the paddock behind the pit wall, half-hidden in borrowed sunglasses, chewing nervously on the straw of a water bottle she hadn’t drunk from in an hour. Her McLaren pass felt strange around her neck, like it belonged to someone else, someone important. Someone official.

Oscar finished third. Podium, yes. Not a win.

She watched from the screens as he stepped up, face unreadable. The champagne came out. Max and Lando sprayed him from both sides, and he winced, laughing, lifting the bottle over his head like it didn’t weigh more than his body.

He looked happy. Sort of. But she could see it, the slight edge of disappointment in the way he shook hands, the second-long pause when he looked out over the crowd. Still.

It was a podium.

Scout clapped quietly as the ceremony ended, but it didn’t feel like her place to be loud about it. This was his world. She was still learning how to stand inside it without knocking things over.

She waited near the back of the hospitality tent, sipping that same untouched water, until he finally reappeared, damp hair, suit unzipped to the waist, champagne-sticky and flushed from heat and adrenaline.

He spotted her immediately. Grinned. Not the smile he gave the cameras. Hers.

“You’re late,” she said.

He walked straight up to her and pressed a quick, unapologetic kiss to her cheek. “I was working.”

“Not very hard,” she teased. “Third?”

Oscar groaned dramatically. “You wound me.”

She smiled. “Still proud of you.”

He looked at her, properly, like the noise of the paddock dropped out for a moment.

“Did you watch the whole thing?” he asked.

She nodded.

“And?”

“You looked hot,” she said.

Oscar’s mouth twitched. “That’s your takeaway?”

She leaned closer. “Also, your left turn into the final sector was sloppy.”

He blinked. “You don’t even know what that means.”

“I do now,” she said, smug. “Lando explained it over toast.”

Oscar narrowed his eyes. “You’ve been talking to Lando without me?”

“He’s the funny one.”

Oscar let out a soft laugh and shook his head. “I need a shower.”

“You smell like second-hand Prosecco and regret,” she agreed.

“Come with me.”

“To the shower?”

“To the room.” He gave her a look. “For moral support.”

Scout took his hand.

“Only if I get to wear the medal.”

“It’s not a medal.”

“Then I’m not coming.”

Oscar smiled and tugged her through the tent, hand in hers, as if the podium hadn’t mattered, as if this moment did more. And maybe it did.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

It had been a month. Four weeks of texts and late-night calls. Of stolen weekends and voice notes. Of seeing Oscar’s face more often through her phone screen than in person, and of laughing at photos Lando sent with no warning.

The “Piastri Pics” folder on her phone had twenty-six images now. Oscar mid-yawn. Oscar with a protein bar. Oscar blurry in a golf cart, wearing a hat too big for his head.

Sometimes Lando captioned them: “He’s doing promo and pretending not to hate it.”

Other times it was just: “This gremlin yours?”

She replied with memes. Sass. Sometimes with photos of her cat wearing tiny hats.

Oscar had texted, I miss you, one night after qualifying. She hadn’t known how to reply. So, she sent a selfie of her eating cereal in bed and wrote, patience is a virtue.

One morning, her phone rang. Sarah.

Scout considered ignoring it. She didn’t have the energy for actual conversation. But she knew Sarah, if she didn’t pick up, she’d get fourteen increasingly dramatic texts, and one meme about emotional repression.

“Hey,” Scout answered, voice half-wrapped in a yawn.

“You’re alive,” Sarah said, triumphant. “I was beginning to think you’d eloped with him. Do I need to call the embassy?”

“You say that like it’s not a perfectly viable plan.”

Sarah gasped. “Oh my god, you’re smitten.”

“I am not.”

“You are. That’s your ‘my heart’s doing weird things, and I don’t like it’ voice.”

Scout groaned and buried her face in the pillow. “Why do you know me so well?”

“Because I watched you once get genuinely emotional over a perfectly golden onion ring.”

Scout cracked a laugh.

Sarah didn’t let up. “So? What’s going on? You ghosted me after Spa. I assumed it was love or death.”

“It’s not either,” Scout muttered. “I’m just adjusting.”

“To what? Having someone who texts back within the same week?”

“No. Well. Yes, but also,” She sighed. “He’s just good. Too good. Like what if I break it? Or ruin it? Or start getting used to this and then he pulls a disappearing act and I’m the idiot who thought I could be happy.”

There was a long pause. Then, Sarah’s voice, gentler than expected “You ever think maybe you’re allowed to be happy?”

Scout stared at the ceiling. “Not really,” she said. “It’s not exactly my default.”

“Well,” Sarah said, “maybe it should be.”

Scout let the silence stretch. Outside, a dog barked. Somewhere, a bin truck screamed down the road.

Then her phone buzzed. A message from Oscar. Thinking of you. Also thinking about that weird chocolate biscuit, you made me try. Miss you anyway.

Scout smiled. Small. Real. Sarah heard it in her silence.

“Yeah,” she said. “You’re toast.”

Scout didn’t deny it.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Next, they were in Monza. Together. She hadn’t made it to Zandvoort, a shift she couldn’t swap, a scheduling mess she hadn’t wanted to admit upset her. But she was here now. And that mattered more.

They flew in on Tuesday. Spent Wednesday wandering Monza’s cobbled streets, half-lost, half-in-a-daydream. Oscar wore sunglasses and a cap pulled low; she wore a linen dress she’d forgotten she loved. They bought gelato. Argued over flavours. Took photos on a bridge where he lifted her up until she laughed so loudly a tourist took a photo of them.

Dinner was candlelit. Not pretentious, just warm. Homemade pasta, wine they couldn’t pronounce. He didn’t check his phone once. She reached across the table just to hold his fingers.

And when they got back to the hotel, to the room they’d booked together, neither of them rushed. She kicked off her shoes, sighing like she’d finished a marathon. He poured water into a glass and handed it to her like it was precious. There was no urgency. Just wanting, slow and certain.

They curled into bed, limbs tangled. She wore an old shirt of his and nothing else. He was shirtless, warm against her, tracing lazy patterns along her thigh. They talked in low voices. About nothing. About everything.

At some point, he kissed her shoulder. Then her collarbone. Then her cheek. She turned and kissed him softly, slowly, as if they had hours, and they did.

No rushing. No pressure. Just hands. Just breath. Just stillness in motion.

Oscar pulled her into his chest and whispered, “I’m really glad you’re here.”

She closed her eyes, hand sliding up the curve of his back. “Me too.”

And that was it. Not fireworks. Just skin on skin and heartbeat to heartbeat, until they both fell asleep like that, connected, content, whole.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

Race day came with the buzz of electric air and pitlane chaos. Scout didn’t think she’d ever get used to it, the sound of engines and the pace of engineers, the static of radios and the glint of sun off carbon fibre. It was dizzying and addictive.

She walked the paddock alongside Oscar that morning, tucked just behind him. Lando greeted her with a dramatic bow, which earned him an eyeroll and a hug. A few other drivers passed with nods and raised brows. She caught Franco giving her a double-take. Carlos smiled. Charles said “bonjour” like he was half-joking.

Then came the girlfriends. Some waved. Some smiled politely. One, Alex’s girlfriend, gave her a warm “Finally!” and looped their arms together briefly as they exchanged pleasantries.

Scout had never felt more like a fish out of water in her life. But Oscar kept checking for her, gently brushing his fingers against hers whenever they weren’t being watched. When they reached the McLaren garage, he leaned in.

“You good?”

She nodded. “This is just a lot of expensive Lycra and weirdly tall people.”

He grinned. “And now you’re one of them.”

She snorted. “Absolutely not.”

Oscar squeezed her hand. “You’re still mine, though.”

From the paddock viewing terrace, she watched the race. It was a good one, intense, messy, tight. McLaren ran strong all weekend, and Oscar kept position like his life depended on it. He crossed the line in P2, the margin between him and Lando closer than anyone expected.

She clapped, cheered, pretended not to feel the butterflies that kicked into gear the second he stepped out of the car and lifted his helmet.

Her phone buzzed, it was the group chat Janet made, for the speed awareness course. A text from Tina, “Saw you on the Telly. Knew he liked you. Gary, you owe me a tenner.”

She laughed, and her phone buzzed twice again, Gary, “Piss off Tina.”,

And Ty, “Who is this?”

She laughed harder at that, the miserable group from hell, bringing her joy she’d never have imagined. Then came media. She watched from behind a screen in the hospitality suite, headphones half-on, a drink in hand, heart still racing.

A Sky Sports reporter asked him, “You’ve been consistently strong these last few races. Something’s clearly changed, is it confidence? Is it something in the car?”

Oscar smiled, subtle, not cocky. “I think when things outside the car are good, everything else starts to make sense.”

The interviewer nodded, not pressing. Moved on. But Scout knew. That line, that calm, measured nothing, was hers.

Her phone had since flooded with messages, but she only read one, Sarah, “Saw the podium. Tell your world champ to stop making the rest of us look bad. Also, I covered your Thursday shift. You owe me a pint and your firstborn.”

She smiled and sent an emoji rolling its eyes, as she scrolled her phone waiting for Oscar.

When she saw him again, hours later, she didn’t say anything. Just bumped her shoulder into his and handed him a bottle of water like it was some kind of inside joke.

He smiled. “You heard?”

She didn’t even look at him. “Could’ve been about your chiropractor.”

“But it wasn’t.”

“No,” she admitted. “It wasn’t.”

They ended the day surrounded by people but still orbiting each other. They celebrated with a few of the drivers, a casual dinner, nothing wild. Lando, of course, was the loudest. Charles bought the wine. Carlos stole the aux cord.

But it was Scout and Oscar who sat closest. Who kept leaning toward each other mid-laugh. Who shared food off each other’s plates. Who didn’t need to kiss to make it obvious.

When the group started dispersing, Oscar took her hand under the table.

“Come on,” he murmured. “Let’s go home.”

She didn’t ask if he meant the hotel. She didn’t care. She just followed.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

The pub was nearly empty. Tuesday night, post-dinner rush, the kind of shift that dragged its heels and ended in half-empty pint glasses and a jukebox no one had touched since 2011.

Scout wiped down the bar with the kind of focus only exhaustion could produce. Oscar was stacking chairs behind her, sleeves rolled up, hair falling slightly into his eyes. He’d shown up an hour before closing, kissed her behind the storeroom door, and said, “Put me to work.”

She did.

“Don’t forget the ones by the darts board,” she called.

“On it,” he replied, slightly muffled, like he was talking through a broom.

He’d done this a few times now, just showed up, swept the floors, carried bins, dried glasses. He never made it a thing. Never treated it like a favour. He was just there. Present. Useful. Quietly hers.

She glanced over her shoulder, watching him try, and fail, to fit a chair under a table that was clearly not chair-friendly.

“You know,” she said, smiling faintly, “you’re terrible at this.”

“I’m not trained,” he said seriously. “You’ve never given me proper induction.”

“You’re stacking furniture, not operating heavy machinery.”

Oscar turned, gesturing dramatically to the mop. “Speak for yourself.”

She laughed. It came out tired, warm, real.

Later, they walked home in the cool night air, their steps in sync, his hand occasionally brushing hers. When they reached her door, he followed her in without asking. It was understood now.

They made tea in the dark kitchen. Shared a biscuit. She changed into an oversized hoodie; he borrowed her spare toothbrush. They fell asleep on the sofa, curled up together like gravity wouldn’t let them drift apart.

A week later, he was in Brazil. And she was not.

She sat in bed, knees tucked up, hair damp from the shower, her phone perched against a mug on the bedside table. Oscar’s face lit the screen, fresh from media, still in team gear, a little sun-flushed.

“You look tired,” she said.

“I’m not,” he lied.

“Liar.”

He smiled. “How was your day?”

She told him, work stories, pub nonsense, a cat she’d tried to rescue and failed. He listened. Nodded. Added sarcastic commentary. They drifted between silly and soft, like usual. But something buzzed underneath her skin. A pressure she couldn’t name.

Oscar noticed before she could bury it.

“Alright,” he said eventually, voice gentling. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said, way too fast.

“Scout.”

She chewed the inside of her cheek. “It’s stupid.”

“It’s you,” he said. “So, it’s not.”

She let out a short laugh. “You’re too good at that.”

“At what?”

“Getting me to talk.”

Oscar tilted his head. “So, talk.”

She hesitated. Looked down. Picked at a loose thread on her duvet.

“It’s just,” she started. “Sometimes I get stuck in my own head. About this. You. Me. All of it.”

He didn’t interrupt.

“I feel like I’m always waiting for the part where it stops being good,” she said, voice barely above a whisper. “Like there’s an invisible timer somewhere. And I don’t want to ruin it by being too much. Or asking for too much. Or feeling too much.”

Oscar was quiet for a long moment. Then softly: “It’s not too much.”

She looked back at the screen. He looked tired, but not distant. Focused entirely on her.

“I know it’s race week,” she added quickly, self-conscious. “You’ve got other things to think about. I shouldn’t dump all this now,”

“Hey.” His voice cut gently through. “There’s never a bad time for honesty. Especially not from you.”

She smiled. A little wobbly. “I didn’t mean to spiral.”

“You’re allowed to spiral. I’ll be here when you stop.”

“Okay, now you spiral. Tell me your anxieties.”

He laughs, “I don’t think it works like that.”

“Come on, I told you mine, its only fair.” She said in between yawns.

He smiles, though it fades quickly. “I have to win the drivers championship this year. I’m capable, everyone knows I’m capable, so if I don’t, I’ll have failed. I’ll lose sponsors and supporters and eventually my place here.”

“That’s brutal,” she says. “Surely, they’d be more understanding, I mean it’s only your third year. Lando’s been here much longer than you, if you lost to him, would they understand.”

“Maybe, I guess.” He says, smiling at her. Her words won’t evaporate the pressure, but her attempt to eases his mind for a while at least.

They sat like that, the two of them, her in bed, him somewhere high above Sao Paulo, time zones apart but still orbiting.

Eventually, their words slowed. He lay back, phone propped up on his chest. She curled under her covers.

“You should sleep,” she whispered.

“So should you.”

Neither hung up. Minutes passed. Then breathing slowed. Then silence. They fell asleep like that. Together, apart. Still holding on.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

The final race of the season. Everything, points, pressure, pride, had led here. McLaren had already clinched the Constructors' Championship, a runaway triumph that no one had predicted back in March. But the Drivers’ Title. That was still wide open. Three points. One race. Two teammates. One impossible decision away from glory. Scout stood at the edge of the McLaren garage, heartbeat louder than the engine tests behind her.

She’d gotten the weekend off, not because Oscar begged her boss, though he had, in a highly formal email that ended with, “Please let your excellent employee have some time off so she can watch her slightly above-average boyfriend not crash his car.” but because she’d asked three weeks ago and Pete had said, “Go win me a drivers’ championship.”

Now here she was. Abu Dhabi. Sun blinding off chrome. Heat curling off the tarmac. Cameras everywhere. The McLaren garage was buzzing, not frantic, but electric. Two drivers. One trophy.

Scout kept near the back, sipping cold water and trying not to chew her nails. Lando had stationed himself beside her, full of nervous energy and fake bravado while Oscar was in briefing.

“You ready to be the girlfriend of a constructors champion?” Lando asked with a grin.

“Which one?” she replied dryly.

He laughed, clearly keyed up. “I’ll be gracious. He can have you.”

“You’re too kind.”

They might have kept bantering, but then Lando’s parents arrived, and he peeled away, hugging them both.

Scout turned her head, and Oscar was there. No words. Just a quiet look and a soft kiss pressed to her temple. It said more than anything could have.

The race was chaos. Nerve-wracking. Incredibly fast. Visibly tense. Max led briefly. Lando gained time in the first sector. Oscar clawed it back in the third. She barely breathed. Barely moved. Her nails were gone by lap 41.

Lap 58, the final one. Oscar crossed first. By just under half a second. World Champion.

The garage exploded. Mechanics yelled. Papaya confetti somewhere. Scout didn’t know who grabbed her hand, but suddenly she was pulled toward the pit wall, to where the cars would return.

Oscar’s car rolled to a stop. He stood on it, stood on it, like a myth, fist in the air. She had maybe half a second to react before he hopped off, sprinted toward her, helmet still on, and she didn’t even think. She just kissed him over the visor, laughing, crying, pulling his head to her chest like she didn’t care that the cameras were catching it all.

“I’m so proud of you,” she whispered, voice cracked with joy.

He squeezed her hand, hard, before running back to get weighed in. On the way, he and Lando dapped each other up, something unspoken and solid in the way they clapped shoulders and grinned, still breathless.

Scout stood back, dizzy from it all, watching the podium prep. Her hands shook as she took a picture of him from the crowd, him standing there, hair damp, champagne bottle already in one hand, and that smile on his face like he finally, finally let himself believe it.

She texted him. You always look good. But sweet Jesus.

He wouldn’t see it now. Maybe not for hours. She sent it anyway, because when he took the trophy, held it up to the sky, and winked down into the crowd, she knew exactly who that wink was for.

~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~🏎️~

They were still half-high off the podium when they went out. All of them. McLaren booked out a rooftop club somewhere with too many velvet ropes and not enough ventilation. It didn’t matter. The whole team was there. Drivers from other teams came too, Charles with a mischievous grin, Alex in a shirt that should’ve been illegal. Lando was already half-sloshed and clinging to a bottle of something fizzy by the time they arrived.

Oscar didn’t let go of Scout’s hand once. They danced. They laughed. They never stopped touching, hands on waists, hips, shoulders, back of the neck. Every few songs, someone would shout “Champ!” and Oscar would blush, and nod and Scout would roll her eyes and squeeze his hand tighter.

At the bar, Scout offered, “I’ll stay sober. You should have a drink, you’ve earned it.”

Oscar smiled, not even tempted. “Nah. I want to remember every second.”

She looked at him, soft and a little in awe. “Then I’ll stay sober too.”

He touched her cheek. “You're unreal.”

“Flattery won’t get you that kiss right now,” she smirked.

They left around 2:00 a.m., tired and floaty, Scout curled in the passenger seat of a rented McLaren courtesy car that Oscar was absolutely qualified to drive but definitely shouldn’t have taken out of valet himself.

The windows were down. Her feet were bare. Her heels were somewhere in the backseat next to a McLaren bucket hat, a confetti cannon, and what she suspected might be a half-eaten protein bar.

Oscar drove, slow and steady, humming off-key to a song that had ended five minutes ago. His hand tapped the wheel in rhythm with something only he could hear. She was half-asleep in the passenger seat, wind tangling her hair, eyes on the stars.

Then he said, totally unprompted, “I’m never going to top this week, am I?”

She looked over. He was smiling, but quietly. Thoughtful.

“Like, I could win five more championships, but this one’s always gonna be the one. First one. Best one. You. Here. Everything.”

She blinked, caught off guard by the way he said you like it was part of the trophy. Then, instinctively, “If you weren’t driving right now, I’d kiss you.”

Oscar didn’t hesitate. Flicked the indicator, swerved to the side of the road, and threw it into park. “Not driving anymore,” he said, turning to her with that infuriating grin.

She stared. “You are ridiculous.”

“And you’re stalling.”

She laughed. Then leaned across the seat and kissed him. Slow. Warm. Real. They broke apart once. Briefly. Somewhere between laughter and breath-

“I’m in love with you, Oscar Piastri,” she said, plain and clear and stunned at herself.

He froze. “Say that again?”

“I’m in love with you,” she repeated, surer this time.

His smile unfurled like sunrise. “I’ve been waiting my whole life to hear that.”

He kissed her again, hand in her hair.

“I love you,” he whispered back. “Now tell me again.”

She did. He kissed her.

“Again.”

She was laughing now, breathless. “I love you.”

“Louder.”

“I love you, you absolute menace.”

“Better.”

They stayed like that, ridiculous and overflowing, kissing like they couldn’t stop even if they wanted to. Neither of them wanted to.

Between kisses and laughter and wild, breathless declarations of love, Scout pulled back just enough to look at him. “We really did meet in hell, didn’t we?”

Oscar grinned. “Not intentionally.”

She laughed, forehead resting against his. “Some kind of fate, then.”

He kissed the corner of her mouth. “Maybe. Speeding into it.”

“Unavoidable crash.”

“Accurate.”

Then, quieter, warmer, he said, “It was chance we met, but not our love. That was intentional,” His fingers found hers, laced them tight. “I choose you.”

“Every day,” she said. “Even the ones with Comic Sans and Janet.”

He laughed into her mouth. “Best thing I’ve ever been sentenced to,” he whispered.

[papayareads]

past lives ⛐ 𝐂𝐒𝟓𝟓 & 𝐂𝐋𝟏𝟔

the past and present sit together under amber light, waiting to see which of them will speak first.

ꔮ starring: carlos sainz x reader x charles leclerc. ꔮ word count: 14.6k. ꔮ includes: romance, friendship, hurt/comfort, angst. mentions of food, alcohol; profanity; mildly suggestive content. childhood friends!charles, husband!carlos, ferrari teammates carlos & charles circa 2024. google translated french & spanish, yearning..., not a love triangle, inspired by & references past lives (2024) ꔮ commentary box: this was an insane idea that i wasn’t sure if i could pull off, but i like how this turned out! here’s to things that ache (and heal) over time 🩹 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

The classroom smells faintly of glue and crayons, with sun-warmed linoleum beneath your knees and the whir of the ceiling fan stirring the heavy Monte Carlo air.

Outside the window, the harbor glitters like a postcard.

Inside, you and Charles Leclerc learn to count to ten. 

You’re both five years old, sitting cross-legged on a faded rug patterned with cartoon fish. Madame Noelle holds up felt numbers and makes the class repeat after her. Un, deux, trois, she says. The class echoes. You don’t. You’re busy elbowing Charles.

“You skipped seven,” you whisper conspiratorially.

He hisses back, “I did not.”

You raise your hand dramatically. “Madame, Charles skipped seven!”

Charles scowls. Madame Noelle sighs. Monaco is too small for tattling. 

She knows both your mothers, has been to at least one of your birthday parties. Everyone in this principality has bumped shoulders at the boulangerie or shared a table at a family friend’s yacht party. There are no strangers here, only people you haven't seen this week.

Charles kicks your ankle under the rug. You kick him back. It means nothing. It means everything.

At pick-up, your mother is waiting outside the gate, sunglasses perched on her head. You find her chatting animatedly with Pascale, Charles’ mother. They laugh together like they’ve known each other since the womb. Maybe they have.

You tug on your mother’s hand and declare, with all the confidence of a child who has never been told no, “I am going to marry Charles.”

Your mother glances down at you, amused. “Really? Does he want to marry you, too?”

You shrug. “He likes me, so he will if I tell him to.”

Pascale overhears and grins. Your mother shares a look with her that says, Can you believe them? 

But they can. In Monaco, lives are lived out close together—childhoods overlapping like waves on the shore. With the world’s shortest national coastline, you and Charles are just one ripple of many in the glittering state.

Later, when you’re older, you’ll wonder how much of your life was shaped right then. In that kindergarten classroom. In the shadow of that city where everybody knew everybody, where declarations like marriage seemed both innocent and inevitable.

You grow up with Charles like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

Playdates become the rhythm of your weekends: afternoons on the beach building sandcastles until the tide claims them, climbing the rocks along the port with scraped knees and competitive shouts echoing off the sea. Your mothers exchange weekly texts like clockwork.

I'll bring them over after lunch.

Can Charles sleep over tonight?

They’re being impossible, but at least they’re impossible together.

One particular Sunday, they coordinate a park playdate. You’re not sure why it’s just you and Charles this time, no siblings in tow. Nonetheless, you go along happily, swinging your legs in the backseat while your mother hums along to the radio.

The park is quiet in that late-afternoon lull—shadows long, sun beginning its descent. Your mothers talk a few paces away from the benches, Pascale’s voice blending with your mother’s. You only catch pieces.

“Next year. Maybe sooner,” someone says. 

“It’s a good opportunity…”

“...How she’ll adjust…” 

You squint in their direction, but before you can piece together the puzzle, Charles nudges your shoulder.

“Race you to the fountain,” he sing-songs, already halfway across the grass.

You bolt after him, the words and worry dissolving like mist. Charles is all laughter and wild limbs, calling out taunts over his shoulder. You chase him through the warm dusk, the weight of whatever your parents are saying left behind in the dust kicked up by your sneakers.

Not too long after—it’s your last week in Monaco, and everyone knows it.

The class of twenty-something ragtag children all stare at you, expectant and wide-eyed. You keep your chin up. You pretend not to notice. 

“Is it true?” asks Delphine, whose pigtails are always uneven. “You’re leaving? For real?”

You nod, folding a worksheet in half just to have something to do with your hands. “Yes.”

“But you’re coming back, right?” Louis chimes in from the next row. “For summer or something?”

“No,” you say, just as firmly. “We are moving. For good.”

There’s a murmur, the kind that ripples through a classroom when someone says something adult-like and absolute. Someone asks, very quietly, “Why?”

You straighten in your seat, full of something that feels like pride but might just be anticipation. “Because I want to,” you declare.

That doesn’t go over well. Delphine frowns, and Louis looks like you’ve just admitted to liking math. So you try again, voice louder this time: “Because nobody from Monaco wins the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature.”

They blink at you.

You blink back.

And then, realizing that your audience is a sea of confused eight-year-olds who still think cooties are a legitimate illness, you amend with a sigh: “Because nobody from Monaco can become a star.”

That, they understand. Or at least they pretend to. They nod in solemn agreement, the kind only children can muster when they don’t really get it but don’t want to look stupid.

Outside, through the open windows, you hear the faint rush of traffic and the Mediterranean breeze tousling the palm trees. Monaco is small, after all. You’ve always known this. It’s beautiful and glittering and good for birthdays at the yacht club, but your parents have always wanted more for you. You’ve inherited their greed, their ambition. 

You wonder if Charles will understand. You wonder if you’ll have to explain it to him at all.

He says nothing of your big move, even as you neatly pack your life—an admittedly short one so far—into boxes and suitcases. He doesn’t say anything even on your last day, where you cry and cry and cry over your classmates’ handmade letters, your teachers’ kisses to your forehead, your friends’ tight hugs intending to tether you to this hometown. 

The afternoon sun stretches long shadows down the narrow, cobbled street. Monaco always glows this time of day, like the buildings are pretending to be golden just for you. The breeze carries salt and something blooming. It’s probably the last time you’ll walk this way with Charles.

He trails you on his bicycle, feet dragging occasionally on the asphalt like he can’t decide whether to coast or stop. You’ve both been quiet since school. Not solemn, just—holding something heavy between you.

He always gets quiet when you cry. He’ll tease you relentlessly until you burst into tears, and then he’ll lapse into silence as if he doesn’t quite know what to do with your sniffles and your bloodshot eyes. 

When you reach your gate, you stop and turn. Charles does too, resting a sneaker against the pavement to balance. He doesn’t get off the bike. He just stares.

You stare back, waiting. He squints up at you under his mess of curls, face red from sun and something else. When you deem him mute and incapable of human emotion, you turn to head into the house you will have to say goodbye to. 

“Hey!” he hollers.

You stop in your tracks, turn around. In all your childlike incredulity, you shout back, “What!”

He opens his mouth, closes it. His hands twist the handlebars.

Then: “... Au revoir.”

You blink. The word hangs there, too formal, too final. It should be bye or see you or even just a shrug. But it’s au revoir, and Charles’s voice cracks just slightly when he says it.

Before you can answer, he pushes off the pavement, pedaling hard. His bike wobbles once, then evens out, then flies. He doesn’t look back. 

He rides like he’s trying to beat you to your next destination, like if he gets there first maybe he can make you stay.

You watch him go, the sun catching in his spokes, the street swallowing the sound of his wheels. And then you start to bawl, enough that when your mother finds you minutes later, she worries if she is making the wrong choice. 

The next day, the ferry leaves early; you are made to wake even earlier.

You watch the orange haze of sunrise ripple over the sea as your parents haul your suitcase over the ramp. The harbor is already busy—tourists heading out, commuters looking bleary-eyed and determined, early-morning joggers looping around the marina in practiced silence. There’s no real ceremony to your departure. Just you, your family, and a handful of belongings you insist on bringing. Your mother lets you carry your books in your own little backpack, though she says it’ll slow you down.

Everything’s happening too fast and not fast enough. The boat rocks slightly as you step on board. You don’t look back.

It’s a long journey. You sleep through most of it, your body curled up in the stiff seat next to your mother’s. You wake to the sound of her voice murmuring into the phone and to the sight of unfamiliar architecture flickering by in a blur through the window.

By the time the ferry and the train and the car ride are done with you, it’s already night. The lights outside your window stretch on and on, and you can’t tell where the city ends. The apartment is bare but warm. Your room has a real desk. Your father says he’ll hang up curtains soon. You nod, exhausted.

Your mother makes you brush your teeth before bed. You’re not too tired to dream, though.

And when you wake up the next morning, it hits you all at once.

You are in Madrid. 

You will be in Madrid for the rest of your life. 

It’s exam season when you finally cave and make a Facebook account.

It’s not something you’d really planned. You’d held out through the first year, ignored the growing notifications from the university group chats, smiled politely every time someone asked if they could tag you in something and you had to say, again, you didn’t have one. But now, holed up in the library with a half-drunk espresso and three books splayed out in front of you like some kind of ritual offering, you finally give in.

Peer pressure wins. You make the account for the lack of better thing to do. If you’re going to procrastinate, you might as well be productive about it. 

You’re careful with the information you put in—just your name, your birthday, your university. No profile picture yet. You don’t even add anyone at first. You just lurk. 

It’s surprisingly entertaining: scrolling through photo albums, stalking classmates’ friends of friends. The world feels smaller somehow, everyone connected by a handful of mutuals and grainy phone camera photos from nights out. It reminds you of the country you left behind a decade ago. 

Maybe that’s why, on a whim, you search his name.

Charles Leclerc.

You don’t expect to find anything. Maybe a tagged picture from a karting event or a blurry group shot at some childhood birthday. But he has a profile, public enough for you to see everything: his cover photo is a racetrack, the Monaco circuit gleaming under dusk. His profile picture is newer—him in a race suit, holding a trophy with an almost bashful grin.

It hits you in the chest, how familiar he still looks.

You scroll down.

He’s posted a handful of times over the years. A race result here, a thank you to sponsors there. But it’s one particular post from three months ago that stops your heart cold. 

A sepia snapshot of the two of you, all missing front teeth and dirt-streaked cheeks. The post has a fair amount of engagement. A dozen likes, a couple of amused comments from elementary classmates. It’s the caption that’s the real clincher. 

Quelqu'un a vu cette fille?

Has anyone seen this girl, Charles is asking. A shout into the void. A prayer to a nameless god. A shot in the dark, except it hits its target. 

You read it once. Then again. Then a third time.

You don’t overthink it. You copy the link to the post, click Message. 

YOU [2:51 PM]: i think i know that girl. 

It’s foolish to think Charles will respond immediately, but you can’t help it. You refresh, and refresh, and refresh, until you feel pathetic and you’re fairly sure you’ve memorized every word on the Facebook masthead. You’re about to log out when you hear two pings. 

A friend request. And a response—

CHARLES LECLERC [3:32 PM]: Might need some proof.

It’s the worst week of your life as a uni student, yet you can’t help it. You smile, your fingers already flying across your screen to figure out a way to prove. 

Skype IDs are exchanged. A schedule is set; 9 p.m. your time. You don’t immediately realize Charles is racing, that he’s in a time zone completely different from yours. That he cuts some corners and loses some sleep to make it possible. 

Later that evening, the video call connects with a faint chime, and there he is. Older and clearer than memory. 

Charles, on your laptop screen. His hair is longer now, flopping a little over his forehead. There’s a sharpness to his jaw that wasn’t there before and a slight dusting of stubble he’s probably proud of. But his eyes? Still the same. Green like the clovers that once grew on your front lawn; flecks of brown and gold that soften when they find you.

“Woah,” he starts, and you privately note his voice is deeper, a little rougher. “It’s really you.” 

“Hey,” you say, grinning. Your voice comes out steadier than you expected. “It’s really me.” 

He leans toward the screen like it might somehow give him more of you. It makes you feel shy, the thought of being reached, being seen, being found. 

“So, uh,” you scramble for something to say, “Como estas?”

He raises an eyebrow. “Was that Spanish?”

You wince. “I meant… how are you. I meant to say it in French.”

“Ah,” he says, laughter dancing at the corners of his mouth. “Trying to impress me?”

“I live in Madrid now, Leclerc. It’s survival.”

“Then survive in French. I missed that voice.”

The words catch you off guard, make your stomach twist in a way that feels both ancient and brand new.

The conversation slips into French, as natural as breathing. You talk about university, about how big the world suddenly feels. He tells you about racing, how fast things are moving—literally and otherwise. You nod along, even when you don’t fully understand the intricacies. What you do understand is the light in his eyes when he talks about it. You remember that look.

It was the expression on Charles’ face when he was hoisted up on his father’s shoulders, watching the racecars zip past Monaco’s famed chicanes. You had sat with the Leclercs in the grandstands, had hung out your window with Charles in hopes of catching glimpses of the famous drivers.

As a child, his hands would curl into fists in the air, as if imagining a steering wheel. As if he was in the car himself, bringing home honor and glory to his own. 

Suddenly, the screen freezes. Charles’ face is mid-laugh, frozen pixelated. The audio drops.

“Charles?” you ask. “Hello?”

For a beat, nothing. Just the whir of your laptop fan.

Then, his voice crackles through. “I’m still here.”

The call steadies. He smiles. “Still here,” he says again, softer now, like a promise. Like a heartbeat.

You don’t say anything. Just nod. Because you are, too.

You lean back in your chair, trying to play it cool. “Well, good. Would be tragic to lose you to dial-up in 2014.”

He laughs. The same laugh. That’s how you know you’ve really found him again.

Something in you settles at that. Some small knot that had been twisted tight since you last saw him on your doorstep.

The conversation finds its rhythm. The first few minutes are spent marveling at how strange it is to hear each other after so long, followed by awkward attempts to remember who last spoke more fluently in which language.

The banter smooths out the awkwardness. Charles tells you about life in Monaco. He mentions his brothers, the narrow streets, the usual local gossip. And then, a little sheepishly, he talks about his time in Formula 2.

“I am hoping to make it to Formula 1 soon,” he divulges sheepishly, like it’s not something he’s allowing himself to hope for just yet. 

Your eyes widen. “Seriously?”

He nods. “I know, I know. It doesn’t even make a lot of sense but…” A beat. A full pause. “Can I say something like this?”

“What do you want to say?”

He lifts his eyes to yours through the grainy screen.

“I missed you,” he says, awkwardly. A little rushed, like he had to leap over a ledge to get the words out.

A short silence swells between you, thick and unexpected.

“Me, too,” you finally say, just as softly. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

And somehow, that makes it feel more real.

The next few months are full of effort. Real effort. Not just the half-hearted, “Let’s keep in touch” people promise and never follow through on. You and Charles really try.

There are Skype calls that happen at three in the morning for one of you and just after dinner for the other. Sometimes he’s bleary-eyed in a hotel room in Malaysia, apologizing for the bad connection as his face turns into a mess of pixels. Sometimes you’re half-asleep on your dorm bed, earbuds in, whispering so you don’t wake your roommate. The conversations are short sometimes, just a check-in—

“You okay?” “Yes. You?” “Tired. But okay.”

—and other times they stretch past midnight, both of you forgetting time zones and alarm clocks. Those are the best ones. The ones that feel like old times, like you’re just two kids again, killing time before dinner, no eight-hour difference between you.

But the connection doesn’t always cooperate. There are lags that make you talk over each other, then both stop, then laugh. There are missed calls. His, because he fell asleep after a race; yours, because you didn’t hear your phone buzz in your bag between classes. There are moments where you’re mad at yourself for missing him, mad at him for not trying harder, even though you know he is. You both are.

He sends you photos sometimes. From tracks you’ve only seen on the television. Podiums. Pit lanes. Hotel rooms with terrible wallpaper. One morning you wake up to a video: him walking through a paddock, the sky overcast, his voice saying, “Thought you’d like this. It’s raining here, just like home.”

You try to send stuff back, too. Little pieces of your life. A snap of the cafe where you study. A blurry photo of your friend’s cat wearing your scarf. Once, a voice memo of you reading a poem you found in a used bookshop that made you think of him.

You both say “Miss you” sometimes. Not often. But enough. Just enough to remind each other that you’re still there, still trying, still looking for the right time to align.

Still wondering what it means to hold on to someone who isn’t really gone, but isn’t really there either.

There is only so much that effort can mean, though. There is only so much that it can do. 

When there are more missed calls than actual ones, when there are less messages of substance and yawning gaps between responses, you can’t blame the frustration from bubbling. The expectations from crumbling much like the sandcastles the two of you used to build. 

You and Charles deny the deposition for a good six months. 

The Last Call connects after three missed tries. His face appears on your screen, half-shadowed by the dim hotel lamp behind him. He looks tired. You probably do, too.

You sigh. Not dramatically. Just... worn out. “Charles, maybe we should stop.”

He blinks, straightens a little. He stutters first in English, but then falls back in French. Your language of choice whenever the two of you were talking about something you wanted to keep secret, something that felt close to both your hearts. “Stop what?”

“Trying so hard to keep up. It’s... it’s not working, is it? Maybe we should just let things happen naturally. If we talk, we talk. If we don’t…”

His mouth opens, then closes again. You see the flicker of something in his eyes before he leans back, smile forced. “Right. Yeah. I mean—it’s not like we’re dating or anything.”

You laugh, but it sounds like a question. “Exactly. We’re not.”

He nods a little too quickly. “It’s probably better, anyway. Less pressure.”

Somewhere on his phone, a flower order confirmation remains open in another tab. A delivery to your dorm; blooms the color of your eyes, with the question he’s been meaning to ask since you first reconnected. He quietly files for a refund while you’re not looking.

You shift in your seat, arms crossed. “So... I guess we’ll just talk whenever. No more trying to schedule around time zones and bad Wi-Fi.”

“Yeah. No big deal.”

“No big deal,” you echo.

You both nod, your heads bobbing up and down in unison. You are both trying to convince each other. Yourselves. 

“I should go,” you lie.

He nods again. “Of course. Good luck with finals.”

“Good luck with Monaco.”

His smile falters, just a little. “Thank you.” 

You end the call. The screen goes dark.

Charles does not win in Monaco that weekend. 

You nurse the heartache the only way you know how: you wander. Feet on autopilot, you find yourself at the little bookstore a few blocks from campus, the one with the crooked shelves and the windows that fog up in the rain.

You trail your fingers along the spines of used novels and yellowing travel guides. The ache dulls in the quiet of it—the soft rustle of pages, the low hum of the radio playing something old and slow. You’ve always liked it here.

The owner, an older woman with thick glasses and a perpetual cardigan, catches you lingering and offers you a job before you even think to ask. Just weekends, she says in lilting English. Just enough.

You take it. Happily. The bookstore becomes a sort of sanctuary. You shelve poetry collections and ring up cookbooks and memorize the names of regulars. You surround yourself with other people’s words, and for the first time in a while, you remember why you left Monaco in the first place.

You wanted to live inside something bigger than the state. Bigger than legacy or expectations. You wanted to become someone you hadn’t already been written into.

One overcast afternoon, the bell above the door jingles. You look up from the counter.

The man who steps inside is tall, dark-haired, sun-kissed in a way that suggests he’s just gotten off a plane. He squints around the shop like it might bite him.

“Hello,” he says in Spanish, smiling a little too politely. “I’m looking for a cookbook. For my mother. She is very picky.”

“Do you know what kind?” you probe. 

“Something European, maybe. But modern? She does not trust anyone under sixty, but also hates anything too traditional.” He shrugs helplessly. “It’s a minefield.”

You laugh, already scanning the shelves behind you. “We might have something. Give me a second.”

He waits, hands in his pockets, looking around with polite interest. When you hand him a hardcover with a bright cover and minimalist title, he grins. It’s a nice smile, you think to yourself, as he turns the book over in his hands as if inspecting the weight of it. 

“This might actually work. Thank you.”

You smile and take the book back so you can ring it up. “No problem,” you say, your eyes lingering a little too long on his five o’clock shadow. 

He’s too distracted giving you equal attention to notice your staring. He pays with crisp bills and shining coins, his fingers brushing lightly against yours when he takes the book he just purchased. You’re convinced the transaction will end there, but then he offers his hand. 

“Carlos, by the way. Carlos Sainz. Not the rally driver,” he adds quickly. “His son.”

A corner of your lip quirks upward. It’s a familiar name and title, but not one you have any particular attachments to. “Should I be impressed?” you ask, taking the hand of the legend’s son. 

He laughs. “Only if you want to be.”

You shake his hand. Warm. Steady.

Something shifts. You don’t know what it is yet. Just that it feels like a beginning.

Carlos keeps coming back.

At first it’s little things: a recipe book for lentils, a thin novella in Spanish, a battered biography of someone you’ve never heard of but pretend to. Then he starts asking for weirder things. A Basque cookbook from the ‘70s. A philosophical treatise on sports. A slim poetry collection by a woman who disappeared in the Pyrenees.

You find most of them. He always smiles like he’s genuinely surprised.

“You’re magic,” he tells you once.

You snort. “No, I’m just stubborn.”

You learn things about him in the quiet way people share when they’re not trying to impress you. He races too, he says one afternoon, fingers brushing the cover of a travel memoir. Karting at first. Then cars.

You try not to ask who he races for, try not to let your thoughts spiral to Charles. You’re not trying to build a replica.

Carlos never pushes. Never oversteps. He just shows up. Makes you laugh. Leaves the space open for something soft to grow.

One day, he buys a copy of Letters to Milena. Doesn’t say why. Just nods when you hand it over.

Then he disappears.

Days pass. Then weeks. Then months. You think he’s ghosted you and hate yourself for how much it hurts.

Then one Saturday, the bell rings. You look up. And there he is.

He looks sheepish, holding a paper bag like it’s breakable. “I was traveling,” he says, by way of apology, “and racing.” 

You open your mouth to say it’s fine, but he’s already placing the bag on the counter.

Inside: dozens of letters. Handwritten. Folded. Numbered. On hotel stationery, napkins, scrap paper. Your name on every single one.

“I didn’t know your address,” he says quietly, nervously. “But I still wanted to talk to you.” 

You stare at the pile. Something rises in your chest, fast and helpless.

You lean across the counter to kiss him, and he sighs against your lips like this is all he thought about while jet-setting across the world.

The kiss tastes like courage and paper and something new.

It feels like the first page of a different story.

You and Carlos have been together for a little over a year now.

It’s quiet, mostly. Private. Not secret, but not something for cameras or press releases either. He doesn’t post you on social media. You don’t go to the races. Not because he doesn’t want you there—he asks, more than once—but because you can’t watch.

You try, once. Sit down with the race queued up, fingers curled into your sleeves. You make it five laps before your stomach starts turning. Before the sight of him—helmeted and flying—makes your breath catch in your throat. Too many angles, too many ways it can go wrong.

You text him afterward.

Good race. I think. I had to turn it off. Sorry.

He replies almost instantly.

That’s okay. I race faster when I know you are waiting for me at home.

And that’s the rhythm of it. He drives. You read. He flies. You shelve books and write.

On one of his rare weekends back home, the two of you are curled up on the couch in your flat, empty takeout containers on the coffee table, his head in your lap. He’s scrolling through something on his phone—team photos, maybe, or grid updates—when he says, absently: “There’s this new guy.” 

“Well—not new. Just new to the grid. Really talented. Weirdly poised,” Carlos says, “Name’s Charles. Charles Leclerc. Ever know him? He is from Monaco too.”

Your heart stutters.

You run your fingers through Carlos’ hair like nothing’s changed. Like the air hasn’t gone tight in your lungs.

“Yeah,” you eventually manage. “I knew of him.”

Carlos doesn’t catch the pause. Or if he does, he lets you keep it. He just hums, eyes still on his screen.

You lean back into the cushions, forcing yourself to breathe steady.

You knew Charles Leclerc once. And you still do, somewhere. Somewhere in the part of your chest that hadn’t quite let go. But Carlos is here. Carlos comes back. And right now, that’s what matters.

You tighten your fingers in his hair. He looks up and smiles.

For a little while, you let yourself forget the name still echoing in your head.

The future doesn’t arrive all at once. 

It comes in quiet mornings and shared coffees, in lazy Sunday afternoons rearranging the furniture, in long drives where nothing matters but the road and the sound of Carlos singing off-key beside you.

You keep dating. Keep building. A life. A rhythm. A future.

By 2021, you’ve settled in Madrid, your days divided between the bookstore and the pages of a manuscript you’ve been quietly shaping for years. Carlos is more than just your partner now. He’s your home. The person you find yourself planning for. Planning around.

That same year, two very good things happen.

Your book gets published. The small, strange novel you thought would never leave your laptop finds a home with a local press. The cover is understated, the first print modest, but it exists. It is yours. You hold it in your hands while Carlos opens a bottle of wine and insists on a toast.

He reads it in one sitting. You catch him wiping at his eyes before he grins and says, “You wrote me into this, didn’t you?”

You shrug, but you’re smiling so wide that there is only really one answer to his question. 

And then Carlos signs with Ferrari.

It’s the dream, the thing he’s been working toward for years. When the offer becomes official, he tells you before anyone else. You scream. He picks you up and spins you around the flat like something out of a movie.

You celebrate both victories in a tiny tapas bar with your closest friends. You drink too much. He kisses you too long. Everything is golden. Not golden like Monaco used to be, but golden in a Madrid way—golden like the stars hanging low from the sky, like the city that often threatens to swallow you whole, like the boyfriend that always keeps his promises. 

It isn’t until a week or so later that you see it. The promotional posters, the news articles putting them side by side. 

Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc. Ferrari’s newest duo.

You stare at the name for a while. It doesn’t hit like it used to. No twisting in your stomach. No sharp intake of breath.

Because your life is not a detour anymore.

You live in Madrid. You have a book with your name on the spine. You have a home filled with secondhand furniture and shelves bursting with stories. You have Carlos—his warm hand in yours, his letters tucked in a shoebox under the bed, his jacket draped on the chair you always forget to put away.

Charles is no longer a tether.

Your heart is here, and it is full.

So you keep writing.

The stories come faster now, shaped by time and the steadiness of the life you’ve built. Your second novel wins a regional award. The third becomes a quiet bestseller. Your name is suddenly spoken in book circles, whispered in lit fests, shortlisted for prizes you never dared dream of.

Carlos races in Ferrari red. You watch from home sometimes, peeking between your fingers, your stomach still tight with nerves. But you’re learning. You can watch without unraveling. You can hope without fear.

You remain private. Still keep your names from headlines, still skip the red carpets. It’s not secrecy; it’s sanctuary. Carlos says it best, one late night on your balcony with a glass of wine in hand: “Let them talk about podiums and scandals. I just want to come home to you.”

When the two of you decide to marry, it’s the same.

No press. No spectacle. Just family and friends in the garden of your shared home, chairs borrowed from neighbors, fairy lights strung by your best friend the night before.

Carlos wears a suit that doesn’t quite match and his grandfather’s cufflinks. You wear a dress you found in a vintage shop, altered at the last minute when the zipper gave out.

You exchange vows barefoot, toes curling in the grass.

Carlos’s voice is low, earnest. He stumbles once, laughs nervously, then says, “I don’t know where I’m going to finish every race. I don’t know what the next season will bring. But I know you. And I know I want this for the rest of my life, more than any podium that I could ever have.”

You say, “You once handed me a bag of letters. I have never stopped reading them. I promise to keep reading, and to keep writing—us, together—for as long as you will have me.” 

People cry. Someone drops a champagne flute. Carlos kisses you before they even pronounce you married.

The reception is homemade. Empanadillas on mismatched plates, a playlist you threw together last-minute, your uncle insisting on a toast that turns into a twenty-minute story about how he once met Fernando Alonso in a petrol station.

Carlos spins you around the living room for your first dance. Your cheeks hurt from smiling.

Later that night, the house is quiet again. Everyone’s gone. It’s just the two of you, tucked on the couch in your wedding clothes, eating leftover cake with forks straight from the box.

Carlos rests his head on your shoulder. “Married,” he says, tasting the word.

“Yeah,” you hum. “Mi marido.” My husband. 

“Mi esposa,” he responds in the same dazed, reverent tone. My wife. 

And for once, there is nothing left unsaid. No past to outrun. Just the thrilling certainty of a life still being written together.

The news breaks while you’re at the bookstore, helping a teenager find something that will make her cry. Your phone buzzes once, then again, and then it won't stop. You glance down and see the headlines before you can stop yourself; they fly over your lockscreen, obscuring the photo of you and Carlos from your first real date. 

Lewis Hamilton signs with Ferrari for 2025 F1 season. 

The air drains out of the room.

You close the shop early. Carlos is already home when you arrive, slouched on the edge of the couch, remote forgotten in one hand, still in the hoodie he wore to training that morning. He doesn’t look up when you enter.

You drop your keys and cross to him silently, kneeling in front of him. His eyes are red but dry.

“They told me this morning,” he says, voice hoarse, “before the news went out.”

You don’t ask who told him. You don’t ask why they couldn’t wait, or why they chose someone else. You already know the answers wouldn’t help. And you’re not about to lie to your husband, to try to coddle him into believing the team will give up its anointed heir for him.

You want someone to blame. 

Ferrari, for discarding Carlos after he gave them the best of his years. Charles, for staying. God, for the cruelty of it all.

But there’s no fight that matters more than the person in front of you.

So you climb up beside him, pull him in, let his weight fall against your chest.

“They’re going to regret this,” you whisper fiercely into his hair. “You’ll be back. You’re not done.”

His arms tighten around you. He doesn’t say anything for a long time.

Eventually, he murmurs, “I’m scared.”

“Me too. But I believe in you more than I believe in anything.” 

There’s a long silence, heavy but shared.

Outside, the world turns without mercy. But inside, you hold the man you married and swear, silently, to weather this with him. Just like you always have. 

That season, Carlos races like he has something to prove.

Because he does.

Every lap, every press conference, every qualifying session. He drives like he’s being chased, like every corner holds the future hostage. You see it in his posture, in the tension in his hands when he laces his boots, in the clipped answers he gives to questions that dance around what everyone already knows: he doesn’t have a seat next year. Not yet. 

You watch now. You watch everything.

Your anxiety still curls under your ribs like it always has, but you’ve learned to carry it. You sit through practice, through qualifying, through the races themselves, heart thudding in time with the engines. You count his pit stops under your breath. You only breathe when the checkered flag waves.

Watching Carlos means watching Charles, too.

It’s strange, after all this time, to see him again so often. On screen. In red. Next to Carlos. Older. Sharper. Still familiar.

He does well. Consistent. Composed. He and Carlos don’t speak much on camera, but you see it in the glances they exchange—in parc fermé, in briefings, in the margins of the paddock. There’s respect there. Maybe even something more complicated. Something rooted in memory.

You feel a pull sometimes. Not quite longing. Not quite regret. Just that soft ache of having known someone deeply, once.

But the man you wait for at the finish line is not Charles.

You watch your Carlos fight for every point. For every scrap of validation. He is relentless. Brilliant. You see the fans rallying around him. The journalists softening their tones. The world beginning to understand what you’ve always known.

Carlos Sainz is not done.

And more than anything, more than your own nerves or history or unspoken what-ifs, you want this for him.

You want him to keep driving. To keep writing his own story. Not just to prove them wrong, but to prove himself right.

Because he is meant to be on that track.

And you are meant to be right here, watching him fly.

Madrid holds its breath on the Saturday he brings it up.

You're folding laundry in the living room, half-watching the news, when Carlos walks in from the balcony, the sun painting warm lines across his face. There’s a careful energy in his step, a wordless deliberation that tips you off even before he says anything.

He stands behind you for a moment, then wraps his arms around your shoulders. “The Monaco Grand Prix,” he says, like it’s just another city, just another circuit.

You pause, folding slowed. “You want me to come,” you say plainly. 

He nods. “It’s... it might be my last one there. Maybe ever, depending how the year ends. And it’s the place you were born, you know? I want to do it with you there.” 

You look up at him. His eyes are hopeful but cautious, like he’s ready for the refusal. Like he’s already preparing to let it go if you so much as flinch.

And you do flinch, but not for the reasons he thinks.

Later that evening, after dinner, you set two cups of tea down at the dining table. Carlos joins you, still in his soft clothes, hair damp from a shower. You don’t know where to begin, but the weight of the past demands light.

You sit down across from him and say, “There’s something I haven’t told you.”

He watches you, quiet.

You tell Carlos. Not the same fantastical way you weave your stories; not the careful tales you chart on Microsoft Word. No, you just give him the truth. The one school in Monte Carlo. The green-eyed boy next door. The Skype calls, and the quiet ending of it all. 

A long pause settles between you.

Carlos is still, absorbing. Then: “And you did not tell me because...?”

You meet his eyes. “Because I didn’t want to make you doubt anything. Because he doesn’t matter now. Not like you do,” you manage. “But seeing him again—through the screen, in the paddock—it made me realize I needed to tell you before Monaco. You think I’m afraid of cameras or press or whatever. I’m not. I’m afraid of ghosts.”

Carlos leans forward, both hands on his mug. “I’m not afraid of him.”

You smile, small and sad. “I know. But I needed you to know why I’ve stayed away. Why it might hurt to watch you drive on a track he’s on, in the city that once knew us.” 

He reaches across the table, takes your hand in his. “Then come,” Carlos earnestly. “Not for the cameras. Not even for me. Come for you. For the part of you that’s grown since then. For the life you chose.” 

You let the silence hold you both for a moment before nodding. “Okay,” you say. “I’ll be there.”

Carlos kisses the back of your hand, gently. Gently. 

“It will be the race I remember most,” he promises. You don’t doubt it. 

Your arrival at Monaco rips through the news like a raging tsunami.

You don a paddock past that declares Guest of Carlos Sainz, and a sort of confidence that indicates this is not the first time you’ve walked down these roads. At first, the media labels you as Carlos’ girlfriend. And then they see the glint of your ring under Monaco’s perpetual sun, and the title changes. Wife, the press whisper amongst each other, their cameras flashing, flashing, flashing. 

Journalists dig for details. They find your writing. They put your accolades in the headlines. Someone interviews an old and withered Madame Noelle, who fondly recounts your aspirations for a Nobel Peace Prize for Literature. You make a mental note to tell her of your nomination.

Mere hours after you show up on the paddock, you get a frantic call from your publicist. “What have you done?” she demands. “Your books are flying off the shelves!”

“I went to a race,” you respond dazedly. 

Carlos stays with you through it all. He guides you past the cameras, past the fans, past the Monégasque who begin to recognize you. Carlos keeps a hand on the small of your back, his presence cool and steady.

Especially when the inevitable happens. 

When you step into the Ferrari motorhome and face your ghost. The one dressed in the same red apparel as your husband. The one with eyes you could make wishes on. 

Charles looks up at the sound of the door opening and his gaze lands squarely on you. 

Carlos doesn’t interrupt.

He sees Charles looking at you and simply steps aside, giving the moment air. Not leaving, not disappearing. Just pausing, the way someone does when they know something sacred is unfolding and their presence might shift its shape.

You step forward. So does Charles.

He’s older than you remember, but not by much. It’s more in the way he carries himself, in the lines near his eyes, in the heaviness that clings to his smile. He looks at you like he’s trying to understand something that changed when he wasn’t looking.

“Hey,” he greets. It’s small. Careful. Am I dreaming is the unspoken question. 

“Hi,” you reply. No, you’re not becomes your wordless reply.

There’s a beat. Then another.

He almost smiles. “You’re here.” 

You nod. “I’m here.” 

At first, something flickers across his face. Something warm, hopeful, almost boyish. For a second, he thinks it’s about him. 

That it was always about him. That the years and oceans and silences had all been waiting for this moment to make sense. That you're here now in Monaco to watch him break the supposed curse, to watch him fight for the title that has eluded him for years.

Then Charles sees the ring.

Then he sees Carlos, not far behind you, giving you space but not really gone.

The realization is slow. Painful. You watch it click into place.

“Oh,” Charles says, voice thinner now. He clears his throat, eyes flicking away for just a second before he finds his composure. “You’re—oh.” 

You try to smile. It flickers and dies. 

Carlos returns then, subtle but certain, his hand sliding around your waist like muscle memory. The touch grounds you. All at once, the nerves unravel. The noise, the flashing cameras, the ghosts all fade. 

You lean into Carlos without thinking. Your body remembers where home is.

Charles watches the way you soften in his arms. The way your shoulders drop, how your breathing evens out. He sees it.

His expression is unreadable.

Not angry. Not sad. Just—fractured.

Like someone watching the ending of a story they didn’t know was being written without them.

Pleasantries are exchanged. You find a corner in the motorhome as Carlos goes off to do his thing. There is something in your chest that you can’t quite name, three languages and decades of writing later. 

Later that evening, the hotel room is quiet, soft light spilling in from the lamps as Monaco murmurs beyond the balcony doors. You move through the familiar rhythm of the evening. Washing your face, brushing your teeth, folding your clothes over the armchair. Carlos is already in bed, shirtless and scrolling through his phone, but you can feel the tension under the surface.

He’s been reliable all day. Every time the press got too close, his hand found yours. Every time you faltered, he anchored you. But now, here, in the private dark of your shared life, the questions rise.

You slide into bed beside him, tucking your knees close.

Carlos puts his phone down, turning to face you. “Do you think he missed you?”

You pause, contemplating. “I think he missed the crybaby he knew a long time ago.”

“You were a crybaby?”

“Most of the time, Charles would just have to stand around and watch me.”

Carlos’s face shifts—just slightly. A flicker of something unspoken. His eyes go distant for half a second before he schools his features into something more neutral.

You catch it.

“Are you upset?” you ask gently.

He hesitates, and then shrugs. “No.”

It’s a lie. A visible one. You’ve known him too long not to notice when his mouth tightens just so, when his shoulders tense even as he pretends they haven’t.

You reach out, brushing your fingers against his arm. “Carlos.”

He looks at you, that flicker of hurt still in his gaze. Not because he doubts your words, but because he wishes he had been there first.

“I don’t have the right to be mad,” he says quietly.

“Of course you do,” you tell him instantly. “You’re my husband. You can be mad, or confused, or jealous, or whatever it is you’re trying to pretend not to feel.”

Carlos sighs, eyes flicking toward the ceiling. “He’s your childhood sweetheart. And it’s not like you’re going to run away with him.”

You laugh without meaning to.

Carlos looks at you again, semi-serious. “Are you?”

“Definitely,” you deadpan. “I’m going to throw away my life with you and run away with Charles to Monaco.”

Carlos doesn’t think that’s very funny.

You soften. “Do you even know me? I’m not going to leave Madrid for some... for Charles.”

Your husband’s eyes hold yours. “I know.”

A pause. Then, more quietly, he adds, “I know you.”

You curl closer to him, your fingers finding his under the covers. The silence that follows isn’t heavy this time. It’s whole.

Between free practices, with the sounds of tires screeching and engines humming just outside the hospitality suite, you scroll through your phone aimlessly. News alerts. Emails. A weather update. And then—

A Facebook notification.

You tap it open.

A message from Charles. The first in years. The app displays the last time you spoke: 2018. It’s a strange timestamp, haunting in its simplicity. A frozen past.

His message is short, straight to the point. 

I know it’s been a while. If you have time while you’re in Monaco, maybe we could catch up? Would be nice.

You stare at the screen for a long time. You tell Carlos about it when the two of you are back in your hotel room, because everywhere else feels too public for a fact so intimate. 

“He messaged me,” you say simply, showing him your phone.

Carlos reads it. Looks up, searching your face. “Do you want to go?”

“I wanted to ask you first.”

He smiles at that, gentle and firm all at once. “You’ve never had to ask for my permission.”

You nod, grateful. As you move toward the closet to pick an outfit, Carlos watches you with a kind of amused affection.

“What?” you ask, glancing over your shoulder.

Carlos grins ruefully. “Just thinking about how good of a story this is.”

“The story of Charles and me?”

“Yes. I can’t compete.”

You frown, turning to face Carlos. “What do you mean?”

“Childhood sweethearts who reconnect and realize they were meant for each other,” he says, half-joking, half-not. Enough to give you in second thoughts on whether you should go at all.  

You walk over, hands on your hips. “We’re not meant for each other,” you say exasperatedly. 

Carlos chuckles, his arms instinctively going to wrap around your waist. “I know, but in this story, I’m the evil Spaniard standing in the way of il predestinato’s destiny.”

You grab the nearest pillow and attempt to smack him with it, a laugh bubbling through your unease. “Shut up,” you huff. 

He catches the pillow midair, chuckling, and you lean over to kiss him quickly before turning back to the closet.

The Oceanographic Museum of Monaco perches over the sea like it’s always been there. Unchanging, while everything else around it has moved and morphed and grown. It’s one of the few places in the Principality that still feels untouched by the glamour and spectacle. It’s where you and Charles used to sneak away on slow afternoons, pretending you were explorers, eyes wide at the glowing tanks and coiled sea creatures.

There aren’t many places Charles can go without being recognized anymore. But there are places that will keep his secrets. Places he grew up in, just like you. Places that remember who he was before the rest of the world knew his name.

You walk past the same entrance where you once lined up on school field trips. There’s a hum of nostalgia in your chest as you step inside, taking in the cool dimness, the sound of water lapping gently against glass, the muffled echo of voices.

You spot him by the jellyfish tank. His posture is looser than you remember, but still unmistakably him—tall, arms crossed, brow furrowed in thought. He’s dressed lowkey: baseball cap, neutral jacket. Still, you’d know him anywhere.

You walk up slowly. “Leclerc.”

He turns, startled. His face softens the moment he sees you. But there’s a beat—a pause like he’s searching for the right thing to say.

So you save him the trouble. You step forward and wrap your arms around him.

He hesitates for a breath. Then his arms come up around you, awkward and homely and unused to closeness like this from you, of all people.

When you pull back, your hands still on his arms, you both take each other in.

You laugh.

It bursts out, sudden and genuine. The absurdity of it. The familiarity. The age on both your faces and the way the years folded in on themselves like they never passed at all.

Charles grins. “Woah.”

“Woah,” you reply, breathless.

For a second, it feels like nothing ever changed. Even though everything has. You hug him again, more out of instinct than anything. It’s clumsy, short, but filled with everything you can’t quite say yet.

Charles sighs as you part. “I didn’t know what I’d say,” he confesses in fluent French. “I still don’t.”

“We don’t have to say anything clever,” you assure him, your French just a touch rusty but not any less sincere. “We’re here. That’s enough.”

You begin to walk the halls of the museum together. You are not strangers to the exhibits. Coral reefs, deep sea creatures, the huge skeletal models you used to dare each other to touch. But neither of you is paying much attention. Your conversation is light, filled with small talk: racing, writing, Madrid, the sea.

At one point, Charles stops by the virtual Great Barrier Reef exhibit.

“I should take a photo of you,” he says suddenly. “You, back in Monaco. It feels right.”

You laugh. “I don’t know if this is my most photogenic light.”

“It’s perfect,” he says, already raising his phone.

You pose at his incessant prodding, your entire form stiff in the blue glow of the exhibit. It casts oceanic shadows over your face, and you can’t help but feel a bit self-conscious.

Then Charles giggles—the sound so much like the laughter you remember from your yesteryears—and it breaks the tension. He snaps a few pictures, and you ease into it, eventually throwing up a peace sign.

When he’s done, he lowers the phone and smiles at you. “I’ll send them to you.”

You nod, heart warm, throat tight. (The photos never find their way to your inbox.) 

It’s strange, being back. But it isn’t bad.

Not yet.

You sit at the far end of the museum, near the panoramic window that looks out over the endless stretch of the Mediterranean. The sun has dipped lower in the sky, and the light filters through the waves of the aquarium glass, painting you both in watery hues. There’s a hush here, the quiet that comes after the reunion adrenaline dies down, replaced by something slower. The final lap after a race. 

You glance over at Charles, who’s scrolling through some of the photos he took of you. His mouth curls slightly at one, and you can see him pause like he’s committing the moment to memory.

“So,” you ask, voice casual. “Are you seeing anyone right now?”

Charles looks up, surprised—not by the question, but maybe by how directly it’s asked. He pockets his phone and responds, “Yeah. I am.”

You tilt your head, smiling a little. “Serious?”

He runs a hand over his face, sheepish. “We just started talking about getting married,” he admits with a hesitance that has you blinking in confusion. 

“Do you not want to get married?”

“I don't know.”

Your brows furrow. “If you love her, why don’t you know?”

He shifts in his seat, his leg bouncing slightly. “It's a little complicated.”

You don’t push, but you do watch him. After a beat, he relents. “I think I want her to marry someone more impressive than me.”

The quiet deepens. Not with discomfort, but with a kind of understanding that doesn’t need words. The two of you feel very old in that moment.

Not just in years, but in the way time has moved through you both. In the way the years have taught you to doubt what you give, to second-guess what you’re worth. The sea outside rolls on, unaffected. Timeless.

You rest your chin on your hand, looking out the window alongside him. “You’re still Charles,” you say quietly.

He doesn’t look at you. Just offers a tired smile. “Maybe that's the problem.”

You don’t respond. What is there to say?

Some people grow into the people they were meant to be.

Others spend their lives trying to prove they were always worth becoming.

And some—some just carry the weight of both.

Charles breaks the silence first. “What about you and Carlos?”

You smile, unable to help the way you grin whenever your husband’s name comes up in conversation. You tell Charles as much as you can without boring him. The bookstore kiss over the counter. The backyard wedding with cheap champagne. The hyphenated surname, the apartment you share. 

You don’t mention the late-night talks, the bruises of uncertainty, the ache of Carlos carving out space for himself beyond the shadow of Ferrari. That part is too tender. Too recent.

Charles waits until you slow down. “I always figured he had someone,” he muses, “but he never said anything.”

“He wouldn’t,” you confirm. “He likes having some things that are only his.”

Charles’ gaze shifts, flickering somewhere to your hand. “I never thought it would be you.”

You can’t answer that. You don’t know how.

Silence slips between you again. This one is sharper, harder to bear. Your wedding ring feels impossibly heavy on your finger, like it’s pulling your entire arm down. You shift in your seat, suddenly aware of the weight of everything—not just the band of gold, but what it means. What it promises.

And what it leaves behind.

You return to the hotel late, just past the hour where the city outside softens and falls silent. The streets are darker now, shadows pressed up against the cobblestones, and inside, the room is gently lit. Carlos has left the bedside lamp on, waiting for you.

He’s in bed already, phone forgotten on his chest, eyes intense when they land on you. He doesn’t ask about your afternoon with Charles. You don’t offer anything. Instead, you slide in beside him, into the familiar ease of his warmth.

There’s no ceremony to it. No need. Just a glance, the softest touch of your fingertips along his jaw. He turns into it, eyes falling shut, and then his lips find yours.

You kiss like people who know each other’s shapes. Who’ve made a home in each other’s arms. The kiss deepens, slow and deliberate, his hands tracing the line of your spine as if to remind himself: here, here, here.

You let him. Letting your hands cup the back of his neck, letting yourself be unraveled with quiet sighs and whispered nothings. The world narrows to this. To the hush of skin against skin, to the reverent way he holds you, to the way your name sounds like a promise on his lips.

In the afterglow, you lie curled against him, chest rising and falling in rhythm with his. The silence is gentle, not heavy.

Then, Carlos speaks, his voice barely above a whisper. “Do you know that you speak in French when you talk in your sleep?”

“I do?”

“You never sleep talk in English, or Spanish. Just French.”

You tilt your head up. “I didn’t know that. You never told me.”

Carlos is quiet for a moment, fingers idly tracing patterns on your bare shoulder. You realize it’s his—your; a shared thing, now—surname. S-A-I-N-Z. 

“Most of the time, I think it is cute,” he mumbles. “But sometimes... I don’t know. I get scared.”

You shift slightly. “Why do you get scared?”

He exhales slowly. The deep and dying breath of a weight he has carried for God-knows-how-long. “You dream in a language that I can’t understand,” he says in a voice so small that you don’t immediately believe it’s your husband you’re speaking to. “There’s this whole place inside of you where I can’t go.”

Your heart tightens at that. You reach up, brushing his hair back, and press your lips against his. The kiss is soft, lingering. A gesture that tries to say: come in. Come close. I’ll show you.

The Monaco sun is high and soft at once, glittering off the Mediterranean like sequins scattered by the gods. In the Ferrari garage, the air hums with nerves and reverence. You are here as Carlos’ guest. As his wife. But the Monégasque crowd, ever discerning, ever nostalgic, knows your face too well. They know you are here for Charles, too.

Charles’ mother finds you first, arms warm and familiar as she pulls you into a hug. Her voice is full of joy, like no time has passed. “Tu as grandi,” she says. You’ve grown up. You smile, because you know she means more than just your height.

Charles’ girlfriend, standing nearby, offers a polite smile. Tight. Controlled. She’s beautiful in a sharp, curated way. You return the smile, equally curated. This is not your moment. Not anyone’s, really. Not yet.

Carlos starts at P3, the sun catching in his visor as he climbs into the car. You squeeze his hand before he goes, press your forehead to his briefly, whisper something soft and private. A murmur amid the noise. A prayer to all higher powers. A ritual, as sacred as the vows you exchanged on your makeshift altar. 

Charles is at P1.

The race runs steady. Smooth. Monaco is a street circuit notorious for its tight corners, but today it moves like silk beneath the tires. You stand with the engineers and crew, your eyes locked on the screens, barely blinking.

Lap after lap, Charles holds the lead.

Something blooms slow and aching inside of you. Not betrayal. Not regret. Just a deep-seated knowing. Of inevitability. Of time folding in on itself.

You remember it all: how you and Charles would sneak down to the port as children, watching the grandstands rise piece by piece, pretending the world was being built just for you. How he once said he’d win here someday, and you told him you’d be watching.

Is that a promise? he had asked, and you sobbed at the thought of him thinking otherwise. 

Years and years and years past that afternoon, Charles Leclerc crosses Monaco’s finish line first.

You don’t hear the cheering right away. Not over the rush in your ears. Your heart feels stretched, as if it’s holding two lives at once.

A hand presses a tissue into yours.

You startle, realizing your cheeks are wet. You hadn’t noticed the tears. Not until someone—perhaps one of the crew, perhaps someone else entirely—offers comfort in the silence that follows greatness.

You take the tissue. You press it to your face.

Charles has won Monaco.

And for reasons too vast to name, you are crying.

Carlos finishes P3. The moment he finds you after the awarding ceremony, he is champagne-soaked and bright-eyed. His face is alight with something close to joy, but not quite. The smile he wears is wide, yes, but not as full as you hoped it would be.

Still, he doesn’t hesitate. He pushes through everyone—engineers, media, crew, well-wishers—to get to you, to honor the first race you have watched in person. 

He wraps his arms around you and kisses you with the kind of devotion that carves out a space in time. When he pulls away, he whispers against your lips, “That one was for you, mi amor. For the little girl from Monaco.”

You close your eyes, and your heart stirs with something profound. You don’t know if Carlos knows the full weight of what he’s said, but you appreciate it. So much.

You try to tell him, try to choke it out, and it’s a mess of gracias and merci and thank you, like you can’t settle on which language you want to be grateful in. All of them, perhaps. It’s what he certainly deserves. He wills your indecision away with another kiss that feels like a promise in its own right. 

After the moment quiets, after he’s pulled away to do media and you’re left watching from the side, your eyes drift. 

And there’s Charles. He’s fresh off the podium, hair tousled from the cap, face flushed with the unmistakable color of victory.

There is too much that cannot be said. 

You reach out your hand, and he sees it, understands it. He takes it. You squeeze his hand, and he squeezes back. Just once.

And in that moment, you think back to a classroom high on a hill, where you once told Charles, told yourself, that nobody from Monaco becomes a star.

You want to laugh. Or cry. Or both. You want to go back in time and shake your younger self by the shoulders, to tell her Vous avez tort. You are wrong. 

You are holding Monaco’s star in your hands right now.

The bedsheets rustle as you and Carlos get ready for bed. He’s uncharacteristically contemplative, sitting at the edge of the mattress with his towel still slung over his shoulders from the shower. His hair, damp and curling slightly. His gaze, a thousand miles away. 

He doesn’t speak right away. Just stares at the floor with an intensity that makes your chest ache. You reach for the lamp switch but hesitate, sensing something lingering in the air.

Finally, he says, “I’m trying not to think of it as a metaphor.”

You shift until you’ve settled beside him. “What do you mean?”

He glances at you, a weak smile barely tugging at his lips. “Charles finishing P1. Me finishing P3.”

You let the words sit between you before replying, gently, “You’re forgetting the part where I love you.”

Carlos exhales and turns his face toward you fully. “I don’t forget it,” he admits. “I just have trouble believing it sometimes.”

Your heart fractures at the edges.

“It’s not you,” he says quickly, earnestly. “It’s not anything you’re doing wrong. It’s just…”

“The noise,” you finish for him, knowing of the voices in his head that he wars with everyday. They are commentators; they are his parents. They are you, too, sometimes, but they are also his own voice.

He nods, ashamed. 

You reach up, thumb tracing the curve of his cheek. “Then let me be louder.” 

He blinks, eyes dark and wide, as you lean in. The kiss you press to his lips isn’t urgent or rushed. It’s deliberate. Patient. A whisper of devotion, spoken without words.

He melts into you slowly, and you keep kissing him like a promise—like if you keep your mouth on his long enough, he’ll never again question the truth of your love. Like your lips could spell out every assurance in a language only the two of you understand.

Carlos pulls you closer, and when you break apart to breathe, his forehead rests against yours.

He doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to.

You are his proof.

And you hope, as he closes his eyes and holds you tighter, that tonight he believes it in every bone of his body.

Carlos is already awake when you stir the next morning, his arm heavy around your waist, his breath warm and steady against your shoulder. You turn slightly to face him, eyes still adjusting. His gaze is soft, but a storm brews beneath it.

“Charles invited us out for a drink,” he says, voice low, like he’s not sure if he should be saying it at all.

You try to blink the sleep out of your eyes. “When?”

“Tonight. After press.” He hesitates. “I thought about not telling you.”

The confession lands gently, but not without weight.

“But you did,” you murmur, which loosely translates to Apology accepted.

Carlos’ hand tightens slightly around your side, grounding himself. “I could not keep it from you. Even if I wanted to. My conscience would not shut up,” he grumbles. 

You breathe in slowly, watching the way his eyes won’t quite meet yours. You understand. How could you not? The history. The years. The tangle of past and present between the three of you, unspoken but undeniable.

Your fingers go to brush through his hair, still a little mussed from sleep. “We don’t have to go. Not if you don’t want to,” you reassure him. 

His brow furrows. “I want you to go. That’s the problem.”

You let that settle. The truth of it.

Carlos shifts, pulling you closer. So close you can hear his heartbeat against your ribs. He holds you like he’s scared he already lost you. Like saying the words out loud made the fear real.

You wrap your arms around him in return.

And you think: maybe this is how you survive the past. By meeting it, side by side, in the present.

By bringing it to a dimly-lit speakeasy tucked away beneath the facade of an unassuming storefront. Velvet drapes and low jazz hum in the background. The amber lighting casts soft shadows across the walls. It smells of aged wood and whiskey, and even before you descend the narrow staircase, you can feel Carlos’s fingers brush yours for reassurance.

He doesn’t hold your hand. He rarely does in public. But this, tonight, is a little different.

Charles is already there, seated with a drink in hand at a table tucked into the farthest corner. He looks up as the two of you approach, eyes flicking first to Carlos, then to you. The smile that spreads across his face is genuine, if a little tentative.

Carlos is the first to speak. “Charles.”

They hug—tight, familiar, and briefly forgetting whatever weight still hangs between them.

You and Charles meet eyes next. The sight of him feels like catching your breath halfway. You step in, arms wrapping around him in a hesitant embrace. He holds you a second longer than expected, like memory pulled him in. When you pull apart, his smile is softer.

“Alexandra couldn’t make it,” he says, voice low and smooth. “But she sends her regards.”

You nod, offering a polite smile. “Tell her thank you.”

The three of you settle in, the velvet booth hugging you in close. Carlos sits next to you; Charles, across the two of you. Carlos’ thigh rests against yours beneath the table, grounding you. You can feel the tension in his leg.

Charles orders a round for the table. The server doesn’t ask for names. Of course they don’t. Everyone in Monaco knows who Charles is, who Carlos could be, who you once were. Even here, in the quiet corners of this exclusive speakeasy, the walls feel like they’re watching.

Drinks arrive. The ice clinks.

No one speaks for a moment. Then Charles clears his throat. “So... this is nice. I wasn’t sure you’d say yes.”

Carlos shifts slightly beside you, and you glance at him before replying. “We figured it was a good idea.”

Charles meets your gaze again. “Yeah,” he croaks. “Good idea.” 

He takes a sip of his drink. Carlos rests a hand on your knee beneath the table.

And for a moment, the past and present sit together under amber light, waiting to see which of them will speak first.

You’re halfway through your drink, something citrusy and burning slow, when the conversation finds its rhythm. Easy, like skipping stones across a still lake. Carlos and Charles laugh about something from the garage, a story involving Lando’s half-zipped fireproofs and a mistakenly swapped helmet.

You lean back, watching them with a kind of quiet wonder. They’re good together, you realize. Not just on the track, but here too, outside the cars, outside the race. Carlos glances at you when he says something particularly ridiculous, like he’s checking if he’s still funny to you. He is.

The three of you have settled comfortably into English, but it meanders. You break into Spanish when Carlos exaggerates a story. 

“Mentiroso,” you chide, nudging your husband beneath the table.

Charles grins. “What did you say?”

You look at him slyly. “I said he’s full of it.”

“Which is probably true,” Charles says, lifting his glass.

Later, you tease Charles with Frenchisms, dropping a mon pauvre when he recounts a rough stint in the simulator. He shoots you a pointed look, mock-offended.

“She says that when she’s trying to make me feel small,” Carlos stage-whispers.

Charles chuckles, then, almost offhandedly, says, “Well, he did ask me for French lessons once.”

Your eyes dart to Carlos, eyebrows raised. “Did you?”

Carlos hesitates for a beat, a sheepish smile tugging at his mouth. “Yeah. It was to understand you better.��

The warmth from your drink rises to your cheeks. You search his face. “Because of the dreams?”

He nods. Something in your chest pulls tight. Tender and aching. The idea of Carlos, awake in the middle of the night, trying to catch scraps of your unconscious language and learning a new one just to keep pace—it overwhelms you.

The irony is not lost on you, of course. The happenstance of him having asked Charles, of all people. But that is only second to the sheer affection you feel for your husband in that moment.

You reach for Carlos’ hand beneath the table, and he squeezes it twice in a wordless Te amo. 

Charles, for once, gives you both a moment. He looks away, sipping his drink. But there’s a softness in the silence that settles. A quiet knowing.

You think, perhaps, he understands what it means to still be learning the language of someone you love.

With a little more alcohol in your systems, you and Charles slip into your native tongue. 

Carlos scrolls on his phone, thumb lazily flicking past a feed he’s not really reading. He’s two drinks in, one leg bounced lazily beneath the table, but he hasn’t said much since you and Charles code switched.

You and Charles speak quietly, close enough to be overheard, yet cocooned in a language Carlos doesn't quite live in. You laugh softly at something Charles says about your shared childhood, but the ease falters when he leans in, eyes fixed on yours like he’s carrying something too big to keep anymore.

Charles says, “It is good that you immigrated.”

“I agree,” you say, words already beginning to slur just a bit. As if you’re unable to keep up with all the words within you.

“Monaco is too small of a country for you,” he muses. “It’s not enough to satisfy your greed.”

You both laugh, the kind that makes your shoulders shake and your cheeks ache. Carlos looks up briefly, sips from his drink, goes back to watching a video on mute. 

And then Charles drops a quiet bomb, almost offhand. Spoken in the French that Carlos tried and failed to learn. 

“I didn’t know that liking your husband would hurt this much,” Charles confesses lowly. 

Stunned silence. 

The air crackles around the three of you. 

It’s as if something invisible but potent unfurls between you and Charles—a door that had always been there, just never opened. Now it’s swinging, slowly, soundlessly, wide.

Charles is not done. “When we stopped talking,” he says, “I really missed you. Did you…” 

He trails off. You know what he means to ask. “Of course,” you respond. Bien sûr. 

Charles’s tone sharpens, almost accusing. “But you met Carlos then,” he says. 

You stiffen. “You met your girlfriend then, too,” you reply, the defensive edge in your voice unmistakable. You feel the shift in energy between you. Even through the buzz of alcohol and the nostalgic glow of memory, there’s a thin, tense wire stretched tight across the table, taut like a rubber band.

Are the two of you really being jealous of each other—here, now, with your husband sitting right next to you?

Charles catches himself, remembers his place. His expression softens. “I’m sorry,” he says. Je suis désolé.

You breathe out. “It’s okay.” C’est pas grave. 

“I guess seeing you here again has made me have a lot of weird thoughts.” 

“What kind of thoughts?” 

“You know.” Charles hesitates, then seems to decide he’s gotten this far. “Seeing my first love after all these years. I shouldn’t have let her go. Thoughts like that.” 

Carlos doesn’t look up from his phone, but somehow, the room feels smaller now. Like it knows too much. Like all three of you do, even as you try to protect your husband from it through the smokescreen of language. 

Charles’ voice comes low, like he already knows this is the last time he'll speak this truth aloud. He goes on, the hypotheticals spilling out of him in one fell swoop.  “What if I'd gone and found you in Madrid? What if you could have come back to Monaco? What if you had never left?”

Your breath catches.

“If you hadn’t left like that, and we just grew up together, would I still have looked for you?” Charles goes on. “Would we have dated? Broken up? Gotten married? Would we have had kids together?”

The room fades. The soft jazz, the warm laughter from another booth, the low murmur of Carlos's scrolling. All of it falls into a hush.

Charles pauses. His eyes are steady now, holding yours with a painful clarity. “Thoughts like that,” he finishes lamely. 

You don’t speak. You can’t. Because there’s a weight to the moment—one that sits heavy in your ribs, tearing you up from the inside.

And then, he adds, gently: “But the truth I learned here is, you had to leave because you’re you. And the reason I liked you is because you’re you. And who you are is someone who leaves.”

There it is.

The ache spills into your chest before you even realize it’s taken root. Because it’s not unkind, what he says. It’s not bitter. It’s worse—it’s honest.

In that honesty, something beautiful and impossible hangs between you. A version of your life that will never be lived.

Charles sits back then. Just slightly. As if he’s letting go of a memory before it can burn him.

You sit across from him and let the ache settle in quietly, like a language you’ve always known how to speak.

Quelqu'un m'a dit drifts from the bar’s speakers like a whispered secret, Carla Bruni’s voice smoky and lilting in the familiar French. You recognize it immediately. The lyrics stir something in you. You let them settle into the silence between you and Charles, where his confession still hovers like dust in a beam of light.

I am told that our lives don’t have great value, Carla sings. I am told that the time that slips away is a bastard and that it’s making coats from our grief.

You finally speak, your voice half-swallowed by the velvet dark around your booth. “The girl you remember doesn’t exist here.”

Charles looks up. His eyes are soft. “I know.”

You nod once, slowly. “But that little girl did exist. She’s not here in front of you, but it doesn’t mean she’s not real.” A beat. You breathe in, steady. “Seventeen years ago, I left her with you.”

Charles exhales. He looks like something fragile just cracked inside him.

“I know,” he says again. “And even though I was a kid, I loved her.”

There is no shame in his voice. No hesitance. Just the truth. 

You both laugh; the sound, an exhale of something too old to cry about.

The song goes on. Someone told me that you still love me, Carla croons.

Charles adds—softly, earnestly, even as his heart breaks in real time—

“To Carlos, you’re someone who stays.”

You don’t say anything back. Because that, too, is the truth.

Carlos looks up at the mention of his name, brows lifting as if surfacing from deep thought. His eyes shift between you and Charles, searching for context. Charles smirks, the crooked kind of smile that’s equal parts tease and defense mechanism.

“We’re talking shit about you,” Charles teases, the way only an old friend can joke, as though time hadn’t passed and no lines had been drawn.

Carlos’ expression flickers through something complicated—surprise, amusement, a flash of wariness. But it softens when you lean into his side, your head resting against his shoulder for a fleeting second. The kind of gesture that makes things make sense.

A minute later, you excuse yourself to the bathroom.

The table goes still. The music, ambient and moody, flows like a whisper through the speakeasy. Carla’s voice is now a distant echo.

Charles watches your retreating figure. He doesn’t speak for a moment. Then, out of nowhere, he says to Carlos, “Thank you.”

Carlos turns to him. “For what?”

Charles doesn’t answer. He just shrugs, looks away like the answer should be obvious, or like saying it out loud might ruin it. The words aren’t necessary. Not here.

Carlos studies him for a moment, quiet. “You are welcome,” he says simply. Accepting grace for the time spent as teammates, for the woman he loved well enough that Charles became nothing but a footnote. 

The moment stretches out. Heavy, but not uncomfortable.

And then, Charles—perhaps for the first time in years—lets the emotion rise unchecked. His lips press together, nostrils flaring just slightly. His jaw tightens. The tears don’t fall dramatically. They come silently, one blinking past his lashes and trailing down his cheek like a secret.

Carlos sees. He does. But he says nothing.

He turns his gaze away, choosing not to acknowledge what should never be spoken between them. It’s the kindest thing he can do.

When you return, the two men are sitting just as you left them. The moment is already buried, tucked between the folds of music and memory, where it will stay.

You tell Carlos you’ll walk Charles to his car. He nods once and stays seated, watching as the two of you slip past the velvet curtains and back into the night.

The speakeasy door closes behind you just as the last notes of Carla’s song follow you out, fading like breath in winter. 

I am told that destiny is making fun of us. It doesn’t give us anything and it promises us everything.

Charles walks beside you, his hands in his coat pockets. The streetlights cast soft halos on the pavement. There are no paparazzi here, no fans, no noise. Just you and him and the silence of streets that seem older than memory.

“We should do this again sometime,” Charles says. His voice is light, but the words are heavy.

“Definitely.” 

You both know it’s a lie.

Monaco will likely never be in your orbit again. Not like this. Not with this kind of ache. Not with this kind of clarity.

The walk to the parking lot is slow, like your feet understand what your heart refuses to say out loud. You think about destiny—how strange and cruel and circular it can be. Charles, golden child of Monte Carlo, boy who was born to drive. He fulfilled his. You know it just by looking at him.

You have yours too. One that took you far from the Riviera, far from childhood ghosts, and into a life that is yours.

Somewhere between the beginning and the end, you and Charles became people who no longer quite fit into each other’s stories. Maybe you were never meant to. Maybe that’s the point.

He stops at his car, turns to you with that soft, sad smile. You hug him one last time. He lets go slower than he should.

“Take care of him,” he says.

“I will,” you promise. You would do it even if Charles didn’t ask you to. 

He nods. Then, quietly: “Take care of you, too.”

Charles gets into his car. You stand there a moment longer, watching him ready to drive off into the city that raised him.

You don’t cry then.

Destiny doesn’t owe you that.

You turn around, the weight of Charles’ goodbye already settling in your chest, when you hear him call out—

“Hey!”

It’s just a word. Just a sound. But the way he says it, like it comes from somewhere deep, somewhere old, turns the air electric. For a moment, it doesn’t feel like you’re in the present. That single word—“Hey!”—rewinds everything.

It’s summer again. You’re a child. You’re in Monaco. You’re at your front door, and Charles is on his bicycle. He says au revoir instead of je t’aime because he is too young to understand the latter. He bikes the entire length of Monaco and back, passing by your house a dozen times even though you’ve already been taken away by a ferry that Charles will curse for months to come.

The memory flickers on like a fluorescent light about to burn out.

You turn to look at Charles now, in the dim glow of the parking lot. For a moment, you’re fooled. You could believe he’s still that boy, standing at your front porch and watching his whole life as it’s about to split in two.

Charles has stepped out of his car. His face is flushed with everything he doesn’t say. There’s conflict written all over him.

The desire to speak versus the need to stay silent. The affection versus the reverence. The sting versus the respect. His hands twitch slightly where they hang by his sides.

Finally, he says, voice softer than it's been all night, “In a past life. Do you think...?”

A supposition. It is the closest you will get to each other without betraying what you both currently have.

Smiling sadly, you manage, “Maybe.” 

He tongues the inside of his cheek. An old habit, one that kept him from crying. “Okay,” he croaks. “Alright.”

“Charles…”

“No, no,” he says quickly, holding up a hand, the tiniest of smiles breaking through the storm in his eyes. “I’ll take 'maybe'.”

You swallow, and it feels like you’re swallowing every version of the past that could’ve been. “Okay.”

His gaze lingers. The moment stretches, enough that you feel every second like you’re learning how to count for the first time again.

Un. Deux. Trois. Quatre. Cinq. Six—

“Maybe in a next life, too,” he says. 

You blink. “Charles—”

“See you then?”

Your mouth stays parted, but the words don’t come. This one is an invitation you do not know how to RSVP.

Charles gets back in the car. The door shuts with a soft finality.

He drives off.

And just like that, the spell breaks. The memory fades. Monaco is now. Monaco is then. And you’re walking back to Carlos.

You head back into the speakeasy.

You begin crying.

With each step, you cry harder.

You are crying like the little girl you once were, except Charles is not there to watch you cry. He is not the one with a hand hovering awkwardly over your shoulder, not the one with a conflicted expression at the sheer enormity of your emotions. You cry alone.

Your heels click across the floor as you re-enter the bar, the sound too loud against the low music and warm hush of patrons. No one looks your way, but you feel like a spectacle anyway. A walking memory unraveling at the seams.

Carlos is waiting for you.

He’s not on his phone. His drink is untouched. It’s like he’s been watching the door the entire time, as though he truly wondered if you might not come back. If you might run away with the boy you once loved and never stopped missing.

When Carlos sees you in tears, his expression crumples. His mouth parts slightly, his brows pull in. There is no jealousy in his face. No accusation. Just sorrow. Just heartbreak, raw and unhidden, like he’s feeling your pain along with his own.

You stand in front of him, unable to say a word.

Carlos doesn’t speak either.

He watches you for a brief moment. Then he reaches for you.

You fall into his arms. He wraps them around you, strong and warm and sure, and holds you while you cry. And cry. And cry.

You bury your face into his shoulder, hands clutching the fabric of his shirt like it might anchor you to the earth. He strokes your back slowly, murmuring something you can’t hear but feel in the weight of his hold. It could be English, or Spanish, or French. You’re not sure. 

You are crying like the little girl you once were, except this time—this time—someone does something about it. Someone stays. ⛐

[papayareads]

Chapter 1: Fight

࣪ ִֶָ☾. summary ━━━━━━━ A brutal fight erupts between Y/N and Lando at a friends' gathering, where he unknowingly destroys his soulmate in a way no one thought possible. His attack confirms every fear she’s carried alone for years, shattering the last piece of hope she had. That night, overwhelmed by heartbreak and years of buried trauma, Y/N suffers a panic attack more severe than anything she’s ever experienced.

࣪ ִֶָ☾. pairing ━━━━━━━ Lando Norris x she!reader

࣪ ִֶָ☾. word count ━━━━━━━ 10.9k

࣪ ִֶָ☾. warnings ━━━━━━━ slight mention of abusive childhood, vey mean Lando, swearing, medical emergency (panic attack), loads of crying, loads of angst

Series Masterlist

The rain had stopped just as Y/N arrived at Max and Pietra's apartment building in Central London, though the gray clouds still hung heavy and threatening above the city's skyline. She stood for a moment outside the familiar entrance, adjusting the strap of her designer handbag and smoothing down her black cashmere coat. Fourteen months. It had been 14 months since she'd first met Lando Norris through their mutual friends, and 12 months since that fateful afternoon when she'd discovered the devastating truth that had turned her world completely upside down.

Twelve months since she’d seen him shirtless by Max and Pietra’s pool. Twelve months since she’d spotted the intricate, fine-line tattoo—a crescent moon birthmark—on his left hip, the exact same mark that adorned her own skin in the exact same spot. Twelve months of carrying the weight of knowing the universe had played its cruelest joke on her: marking her for a man who looked at her like she was less than nothing, who spoke with barely concealed contempt, and who seemed to take genuine pleasure in making her feel small.

The irony was so perfect it was almost beautiful in its completeness. Almost.

Y/N pressed the buzzer for their apartment, her fingers trembling slightly despite the mild evening temperature. The familiar sound of Pietra's voice crackled through the intercom, warm and welcoming as always, a stark contrast to the ice-cold dread that had settled in Y/N's stomach the moment she'd received the text about tonight's gathering.

"Y/N! Come up, love. We're all here already."

All here already. Which meant he was already there. Which meant she would have to spend the next several hours pretending that her heart didn't shatter a little more each time he looked through her like she was invisible, each time he spoke to everyone else with warmth and charm while reserving nothing but cold politeness for her.

The elevator ride to the 16th floor felt like an eternity, giving Y/N too much time to study her reflection in the polished steel doors. She looked composed, professional, put-together—the image she'd carefully cultivated over years of learning to hide every vulnerable emotion behind a mask of competent indifference. Her long hair fell in soft waves past her shoulders, and her eyes held that particular intensity that came from years of analyzing every interaction, every micro-expression, every subtle shift in tone that might indicate incoming rejection or abandonment.

She'd chosen her outfit carefully tonight—high-waisted black trousers that accentuated the curve of her hips while maintaining an air of sophisticated professionalism, paired with a burgundy silk blouse that brought out the warmth in her skin tone. The outfit was expensive, impeccably tailored, designed to project success and confidence. It was armor, just like everything else in her carefully constructed life.

The elevator doors opened with a soft chime, and Y/N stepped into the familiar hallway. She could already hear voices and laughter from behind Max and Pietra's door—Tom's booming laugh, Ed's animated storytelling voice, Max's quick wit cutting through the conversation. And underneath it all, like a bass note that made her chest tight with unwanted longing, she could hear Lando's voice.

That voice that could go from playful teasing to cutting cruelty in the span of a heartbeat. That voice that spoke to everyone else with such natural charm and warmth, but turned cold and dismissive the moment it was directed at her. The voice that belonged to her soulmate, who would probably laugh if he ever discovered the cosmic joke the universe had played on both of them.

Y/N knocked on the door, forcing her shoulders back and lifting her chin with the practiced confidence that had gotten her through boardroom negotiations and university presentations and every other situation where she'd needed to project strength while feeling fundamentally broken inside.

Pietra opened the door with a bright smile, her warmth immediately filling the space between them. "Y/N! You look stunning as always. Come in, come in. We were just talking about Max's latest disaster in the kitchen."

Y/N stepped into the warm, inviting space of the apartment she'd visited so many times over the past year. The living room was exactly as she remembered—comfortable sofas arranged around a glass coffee table, warm lighting that made everything feel cozy and intimate, floor-to-ceiling windows that offered a stunning view of London's glittering skyline. 

"Y/N!" Max called out from his position on the main sofa, raising his wine glass in greeting. "Perfect timing. We were just about to start placing bets on whether Tom can get through the evening without spilling something on himself."

"Hey now," Tom protested from his spot. "That was one time, and it was entirely Lando's fault for making me laugh while I was drinking."

And there it was. The mention of his name that made Y/N's entire body tense despite her best efforts to remain composed. She forced a smile and accepted the glass of wine that Pietra pressed into her hands, using the moment of taking a sip to scan the room and locate him.

He was sitting in the armchair near the window, and the sight of him hit her like it always did—like a physical blow that left her breathless and aching. Lando Norris at twenty-five was devastating in a way that seemed almost unfair, as if the universe had decided to concentrate all its efforts on creating the most beautiful human being possible and then, just for the sake of cosmic humor, had made him her soulmate while ensuring he could barely stand to be in the same room as her.

His curly hair was slightly messy, as if he'd been running his hands through it—a nervous habit she'd noticed over the months of reluctant observation. His green eyes were bright with laughter from whatever conversation had been happening before her arrival, and she felt that familiar twist of pain in her chest as she watched him be charming and animated with everyone except her.

When his gaze finally found hers across the room, the transformation was immediate and devastating. The warmth and humor in his eyes vanished, replaced by that familiar cool indifference that had become as much a part of their interactions as breathing. He gave her the barest nod of acknowledgment—polite, distant, the kind of greeting you'd give to a stranger you had no interest in knowing better.

"Y/N," he said, and even her name sounded different in his mouth than it did when anyone else said it. Clipped. Formal. Devoid of any warmth or interest.

"Lando," she replied, matching his tone exactly, though it cost her everything to keep her voice steady and unaffected.

The others seemed oblivious to the sudden shift in atmosphere, continuing their conversation about Tom's coordination issues and Max's latest cooking disasters. Y/N settled onto the sofa next to Ed, positioning herself so she could participate in the group conversation while keeping Lando in her peripheral vision—a skill she'd developed over months of trying to understand why he treated her so differently from everyone else.

The evening progressed much like every other gathering over the past fourteen months. Lando was his usual charming self with everyone—teasing Max about his latest streaming failures, asking Tom about his new job, complimenting Pietra on the dinner she'd prepared. He laughed at Ed's terrible jokes, offered thoughtful responses to serious topics, and generally embodied the kind of warm, engaging personality that had made him beloved by millions of fans around the world.

With Y/N, he was unpredictable—but mostly unkind. Most days, he was rude in the way only someone who knew exactly how to hurt could be—sharp, dismissive, and laced with quiet contempt. Other times, depending on his mood, the location, or even the time of day, he’d shift without warning—offering a polite nod, a short answer, or, worst of all, nothing at all. He'd ignore her completely, as though she were invisible. On the rare occasions he was civil, it wasn’t kindness—it was cold, calculated detachment. He answered direct questions with minimal effort, never initiated conversation, and kept a distance so deliberate it stung more than open cruelty. Hostility, at least, would have meant she mattered. This—this inconsistency, this indifference—felt like the slowest form of erasure.

Y/N participated in the group conversations with her usual intelligence and dry wit, making observations that made the others laugh, sharing stories from her work that showcased her sharp analytical mind. She was good at this—had always been good at performing normalcy even when everything inside her was screaming. It was a skill learned in childhood, perfected through years of practice in situations where showing weakness meant inviting more pain.

But tonight felt different somehow. Maybe it was the wine, or maybe it was the accumulation of twelve months of carrying the weight of their cosmic connection while being treated like a barely tolerated acquaintance. Maybe it was the way she'd caught him looking at her when he thought she wasn't paying attention—not with indifference, but with something that looked almost like hunger before he quickly looked away.

Whatever it was, when the conversation inevitably turned to relationships, Y/N felt that familiar coil of tension in her stomach begin to tighten.

"I just don't understand it," Lando was saying, running those long fingers through his curls in a gesture that made Y/N's stomach clench with unwanted longing. She watched the way his forearms flexed as he moved, the subtle play of muscle beneath golden skin, the way his hands—those beautiful, capable hands she'd seen grip steering wheels and sign autographs and gesture animatedly during conversations—moved with unconscious grace.

"Where are all the good girls these days? The ones who actually have their shit together. Someone mature, intelligent, who knows what they want in life."

The words hit Y/N like physical blows, each one more devastating than the last. Something hot and bitter rose in her throat—a mixture of fury and heartbreak that threatened to choke her. Here he was, describing exactly what she was.

Mature. Intelligent. Someone who knows what they want.

She was all of those things—had two degrees, spoke four languages fluently, could analyze market trends and debate European history with the best of them. But sitting here, listening to him describe his perfect woman while looking right through her like she didn’t exist, felt like being slowly skinned alive.

The soulmate mark on her hip burned like acid under her skin, a constant reminder of the cosmic joke that was her existence. Somewhere in the universe's grand design, she was supposed to be his everything. His perfect match, his other half, his completion. Instead, she was his invisible annoyance, his least favorite person in any room.

"I mean, I want something real," Lando continued, his voice gaining that passionate intensity that appeared whenever he talked about something that mattered to him. "Someone who challenges me, who doesn't just want me for fame or the money. A proper relationship, marriage material. Someone I could actually see myself building a life with."

Y/N's fingers tightened on her wine glass until her knuckles went white. Marriage material. Someone who challenges him. The universe had literally designed her to be those things for him, had marked them both before birth as perfect matches, and he was sitting there describing her while simultaneously treating her like she was invisible.

Max snorted from his position next to Pietra, his arm draped casually around his girlfriend's shoulders. "Mate, maybe you're looking in the wrong places."

"That's just it, though," Lando said, leaning forward in his chair, those green eyes filled with frustration. "I don't even know where to look anymore. Everyone seems so superficial, so focused on the lifestyle rather than actually building something meaningful."

Marriage material. Someone who challenges him. Someone mature and intelligent.

The irony was so perfectly cruel, she could barely breathe. The hypocrisy was so staggering it made something snap inside Y/N’s chest. A laugh escaped before she could stop it—bitter, sharp, slicing through the room like broken glass.

The sound made everyone turn to look at her, but she only had eyes for Lando—whose gaze had sharpened with something dangerously close to irritation.

"Something funny?" His tone was already defensive, already hostile. The way it always was when he spoke to her, like her very existence offended him on some fundamental level.

Y/N set her wine glass down on the coffee table with careful precision, her movements controlled despite the storm raging inside her chest. "It's just..." she began. "The hypocrisy is rather amusing, don't you think?"

"Hypocrisy?" Lando's voice was getting colder, more defensive. The atmosphere in the room shifted palpably, the easy warmth of moments before replaced by a tension that made everyone else fall silent.

"You sitting there, complaining about not being able to find a good woman, a mature woman, while you're still..."

"While I'm still what?" Lando interrupted, leaning forward in his chair. His eyes were full of anger now, all pretense of polite indifference abandoned.

"You're sitting here complaining about not being able to find a good girl, a mature woman who knows what she wants," she said, her voice steady as stone. "But how exactly do you expect to attract someone like that when you're still hung up on your ex-girlfriend?"

The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. Pietra shifted uncomfortably, her usually warm demeanor cooling as she sensed the brewing storm. Tom cleared his throat awkwardly while Ed suddenly found his glass fascinating.

Lando's entire body went rigid, every muscle tensing like a predator preparing to strike. "I'm not hung up on anyone," he said, but there was something too sharp in his voice, too quick in his denial.

"Really?" Y/N's voice was silk over steel, deceptively soft but deadly. "Because your Instagram says otherwise. Your family's Instagram says otherwise. Hell, every tabloid article about you and your little PR puppet says otherwise."

The words hung in the air like a challenge, and Y/N watched Lando's face cycle through several emotions—surprise, anger, and something that might have been shame before it was quickly masked by fury.

"You've been stalking my Instagram?" The accusation came out sharp and ugly, designed to put her on the defensive, to shift the blame, to cast her as the villain in this scenario. It was a tactic she recognized from childhood, from parents who turned every legitimate grievance into proof of her own moral failings.

But Y/N had been fighting battles since she was five years old, and had learned to weaponize words before most children could even tie their shoes. She didn’t flinch, didn’t back down, didn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her rattled.

"It's called having functional eyesight, Lando. Every time you and Matilde take your pathetic little PR strolls around Monaco—which, by the way, everyone can see right through—the articles always include screenshots. Screenshots of you still following your ex girlfriend, Olivia. Of your mother still commenting heart emojis on her posts. Of your father still liking her pictures from vacations she takes with her new boyfriend."

Each word was delivered with surgical precision, designed to cut deep. Y/N watched Lando’s face flush red, his hands clenching into fists on the armrests of his chair. Those beautiful forearms were tense with barely contained rage, veins standing out against his tanned skin, knuckles turning white from the force of his grip.

Even in anger—even as she systematically destroyed him with words—she couldn’t help but notice how beautiful he was. How the fury made his green eyes even more intense, how the muscle in his jaw jumped as he fought for control.

"How I handle my social media is none of your fucking business," he said, his voice low and dangerous.

"You're absolutely right," Y/N replied, her voice getting quieter, more dangerous. Years of boardroom negotiations had taught her that the softer you spoke, the more powerful your words became. "It's not. But you asked where all the good girls are, and I'm telling you. No self-respecting woman with actual standards is going to want to compete with the ghost of your ex-girlfriend. No one wants to be someone's consolation prize."

The truth of her words hit the room like a bomb. Y/N could see it in the way Tom and Ed exchanged glances, in the way Max shifted uncomfortably, in the way Pietra's face showed a mixture of concern and fascination. But mostly, she could see it in the way Lando's face went completely white before flushing with fury.

"That's complete bullshit," he said, standing now, using his height like a weapon. He loomed over her seated form, and for a moment, that old, instinctive fear flickered in Y/N’s chest—the kind she'd carried since childhood, from people who used their physical presence to silence her. But she’d learned long ago not to flinch, not to hand anyone that kind of power.

"Is it?" she asked, rising to her feet. She only came up to his nose, but her presence was unshakable. She held his gaze, calm and unyielding. "When was the last time you posted about being single? When was the last time you removed the pictures of you and Olivia from your Instagram? When was the last time you asked your family to stop engaging with her posts?"

"I don't—"

"When was the last time you took off that fucking bracelet she gave you?"

The words exploded out of her with more venom than she'd intended, and she saw Lando's hand instinctively move to his wrist, to the metal bangle that had become as much a part of his daily uniform as his watch or his racing gloves. Y/N had watched him wear that bracelet for fourteen months, had felt physically sick every time she saw it catching the light, every time she was forced to confront the visual reminder that he was still carrying pieces of another woman with him everywhere he went.

"You don't know what you're talking about," Lando said, but his voice lacked conviction now. His hand was still touching the bracelet, as if he was suddenly aware of its weight on his wrist.

"Don't I?" Y/N laughed, but there was no humor in the sound. "I know that you wear her jewelry every single day. I know that your family treats her like she's still part of the family even though you broke up three years ago. I know that you claim to want something real while maintaining connections to someone who's moved on with someone else."

"You can deny it all you want," Y/N continued, her small frame vibrating with barely contained fury, every muscle tense with the effort of not screaming. "But actions speak louder than words, don't they? And your actions are screaming that you're still completely hung up on a woman who moved on from you three fucking years ago."

The profanity felt good on her tongue, felt like the only way to adequately express the rage and hurt that had been building inside her for over a year. She saw Lando flinch slightly at her tone, saw something flicker across his face that might have been hurt if she hadn't known better.

"I'm not asking anyone to compete with anything," Lando snapped, taking a step closer to her. "Olivia and I ended on good terms. We're friends. There's nothing wrong with that."

The word 'friends' hit Y/N like a physical blow. She felt that familiar burning in her chest, the rage that had carried her through every dark moment of her life. The rage that had kept her warm through childhood and teenage humiliations and every moment in her adult life when she'd felt small and unwanted and completely disposable.

"Friends," she repeated, tasting the word like poison on her tongue. "Is that what you call still wearing her bracelet?"

"We ended things amicably. There's nothing wrong with staying civil with an ex."

"Civil?" Y/N said, her voice rising. "Civil is not blocking them, fine. Civil is being polite if you run into them. Civil is not maintaining constant social media connections, wearing jewelry they gave you—" her eyes flicked pointedly to his wrist "—and having your mother comment heart emojis on their beach photos!"

The silence that followed was deafening. Max cleared his throat awkwardly, but neither Y/N nor Lando acknowledged him.

"That bracelet—" Lando's voice was low, dangerous, "—is none of your business."

"It is when you're sitting here whining about not finding someone!" Y/N's hands clenched into fists at her sides. "No ‘good woman’ is going to want to wonder if she's just a placeholder until Olivia decides she wants you back."

"You don't know what you're talking about." Each word was precisely enunciated, his accent thickening with anger. "Olivia has a boyfriend. She's moved on."

"Has she? Have you?" Y/N challenged. "Because from where I'm standing, it looks like you're keeping your options open. Still maintaining those connections, just in case. Tell me, Lando, do you deny it?"

The muscle in his jaw jumped. His eyes—those beautiful eyes that haunted her dreams—narrowed into slits. The silence stretched between them, taut as a wire.

"That's what I thought," Y/N said quietly, but the words carried the weight of a shout.

You don't know anything about my relationships," Lando spat. "What makes you such an expert? When's the last time you even had a boyfriend? Hell, have you ever even had a real one? I’ve actually been in relationships—what do you even know about any of this? I bet you’ve never had a real boyfriend in your entire life."

The words hit their mark with devastating precision. Y/N felt her breath catch, felt the familiar shame crawl up her throat like bile. He was right, of course. She'd never been kissed, never been held, never been chosen by anyone. Not even by him, her supposed soulmate, who looked at her like she was absolutely nothing.

The cruelty of it was breathtaking. Here was the man the universe had supposedly designed for her, the person who was meant to love and understand her better than anyone else in the world, and he was using her deepest insecurities as weapons against her.

But she'd learned long ago how to weaponize her pain, how to turn her wounds into ammunition.

"That's completely irrelevant," she said, each word precisely enunciated.  "We're not talking about my romantic history or lack thereof. We're talking about your complete inability to understand why decent women run in the opposite direction when they see you coming."

"My inability?" Lando laughed, but there was no humor in it. The sound was harsh, ugly, designed to cut. "You want to psychoanalyze my relationship with my ex? Fine. Let's talk about how you push everyone away before they can get close. Let's talk about how you've built walls so high that no one can climb them."

Y/N felt her carefully constructed composure beginning to crack. He was getting too close to truths she'd never voiced aloud, cutting too near to wounds that had never properly healed. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't I?" Lando's laugh was harsh, nothing like his usual warm chuckle. "It's obvious to anyone who bothers to look. You're terrified of being vulnerable, so you criticize everyone else who tries. At least I put myself out there. At least I try."

"Try?" Y/N's voice cracked on the word. "You call what you do trying? Messaging models on Instagram isn't trying, Lando. Leaving clubs with a different girl every weekend isn't trying. It's collecting conquests."

The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. Even their friends, who had been watching the exchange like a tennis match, collectively held their breath.

"Conquests?" Lando's voice was deadly quiet. "Is that what you think of me?"

"Everyone thinks that of you," Y/N said, even as part of her screamed to take it back. "Your reputation precedes you. All those girls who've sold stories about you, all those photos of you leaving parties with different women—"

"You believe tabloid gossip now?"

"Are you denying it? Are you saying you haven't slept with dozens of women? That you didn't spend the first 6 years of your career treating the paddock like your personal dating pool?"

Lando's face had gone pale. His hands were clenched so tightly at his sides that the veins in his forearms stood out in sharp relief. "My past is my past."

"But it's not the past, is it?" Y/N pressed on, unable to stop now that the floodgates had opened. "It's your present too. The parties, the girls, the constant need for attention—"

"Attention?" He stepped even closer, and Y/N had to fight the urge to step back. "You think I do this for attention?"

"Don't you? The PR games with—" Lando cut her off.

"That's rich, coming from someone who's built their entire personality around being bitter and alone."

The words hit like physical blows, each one finding its mark with surgical precision. Y/N felt something inside her chest begin to crumble, felt the careful walls she'd built around her heart start to crack under the assault.

"I'm not bitter," Y/N said, and she could hear her voice beginning to shake despite her best efforts. "I just have standards. And those standards don't include men who are too emotionally weak to let go of the past."

"Weak?" The word came out like a roar. Lando took another step closer, close enough that she could see the flecks of gold in his green eyes, could smell the subtle scent of his cologne mixed with something that was purely him. "You think I'm weak?"

"I think you're a coward," Y/N said without hesitation, the words coming from some deep, dark place inside her that had been fed on years of disappointment and rejection. "You want this perfect woman, this mature, intelligent partner, but you're too fucking scared to actually make yourself available for her. You keep one foot in your past because it's safe. Because if you never fully commit to moving forward, you never risk being hurt again."

The accusation hung between them like a live wire, sparking with dangerous electricity. Y/N could see that her words had found their target, could see the way Lando's face went through a series of expressions—shock, recognition, fury.

"You don't know anything about me," he said, his voice low and dangerous. "You sit there in your fancy apartment in a very prestigious area of London, with your fancy job and your fancy education, and you think you have everyone figured out. But you don't know shit about what I've been through or why I make the choices I make."

"I'm not the one pretending to be something I'm not!" Y/N said. 

"Aren't you?" The words cracked like a whip between them. "At least I'm honest about who I am. I don't pretend to be perfect while judging everyone else."

"I don't—"

"You do!" His voice rose to nearly a shout. "You sit there every fucking time we're together, watching everyone, analyzing everyone, finding everyone wanting. Like you're so much better than the rest of us who actually dare to feel things, to make mistakes, to be human!"

"Being human doesn't mean being reckless with other people's feelings!"

"Whose feelings?" He threw his arms wide. "Whose feelings have I been reckless with? The girls who knew exactly what they were getting into? The ones who wanted the same thing I did—a good time, no strings attached? Or is this about your feelings?"

The question hung between them like a loaded gun. Y/N felt the blood drain from her face.

"My feelings have nothing to do with this," she said, but her voice came out whisper-thin.

"Don't they?" Lando moved even closer, close enough that she could see the way his chest rose and fell with each angry breath. "Because from where I'm standing, it sounds like you're taking this all very personally for someone who claims not to care."

"I don't—"

"You don't what? Don't care? Then why are you so invested in my love life? Why does it matter to you if I still wear a bracelet my ex gave me? Why do you care if I sleep with models or party too much or—"

"I said I don't care! You're the one playing innocent, asking yourself why you can't find someone serious—and I'm answering your stupid question," Y/N replied, her voice steady despite the chaos raging inside her. "From your actions, it looks like you're terrified of real intimacy. It's clear you'd rather play games with PR relationships and keep wearing jewelry from dead relationships than risk actually putting yourself out there for something real."

"And what about you?" Lando's voice was getting uglier now, more vicious. "What's your excuse for being completely fucking miserable all the time? What's your excuse for treating everyone around you like they're beneath you?"

"I don't—"

"You do," Lando interrupted, and Y/N could see that he was hitting his stride now, could see that he'd found his target and was preparing to destroy it. "You walk into every room like you're doing everyone a favor by gracing them with your presence. You act like you're so much smarter, so much more sophisticated than everyone else. But really, you're just terrified that if you let anyone get close enough to see who you really are, they'll realize there's nothing there worth knowing."

Each word was a knife, expertly wielded to cause maximum damage. Y/N felt them slice through her defenses, finding every vulnerable spot she’d tried so hard to protect.

The worst part was that some of it was true—she did keep people at a distance, did shield herself behind walls of competence and sophistication. And now, those walls were starting to crack. She could feel the little girl bleeding through—the one who’d been thrown into hallways, called names, told she was worthless.

But he didn't know why. He didn't know about the childhood that had taught her that love was conditional and dangerous, that vulnerability was punished, that the only safe way to exist was to make yourself indispensable through achievement and control.

"At least I don't parade fake relationships around for publicity," she managed, her voice shaking despite her best efforts to keep it steady.

"Fake relationships?" Lando's laugh was harsh and meant to humiliate. "You mean Matilde? That's work, Y/N. That's business. Something you might understand if you lived in the real world instead of your ivory tower."

"The real world?" Y/N's voice rose, her famous composure finally beginning to crack like ice in a spring thaw. "You think you live in the real world? You live in a fucking bubble where everything is handed to you on a silver platter, where people pay you millions to drive in circles, where you've never had to work for anything meaningful in your entire privileged life."

"I've worked for everything I have," Lando shot back, his face flushed with anger and indignation. "I've been racing since I was a kid. I've sacrificed everything for this career."

"Have you?" Y/N's voice was gaining strength now, feeding off her anger like a fire feeding off oxygen. "Because from where I'm sitting, it looks like you've just had an extended adolescence. You get to play with expensive toys for a living while the rest of us have real jobs, real responsibilities, real fucking problems."

"Real problems?" Lando's voice dripped with disdain, with the casual dismissal that only came from genuine privilege. "Like what? Like sitting in your fancy apartment judging people on the internet? Like working your cute little nine-to-five job that probably pays you less than I make in a single day?"

The classism in his voice, the casual dismissal of her work, of her struggles, of everything she'd built for herself—it was like being slapped across the face with a glove made of contempt. Y/N felt something hot and dangerous surge through her veins, felt every careful lesson in emotional control her childhood had taught her begin to crumble.

"You privileged piece of shit," Y/N whispered, her voice deadly quiet. "You have absolutely no idea what I've been through. No idea what I've had to overcome to get where I am."

"Oh, here we go," Lando said, rolling his eyes with theatrical exaggeration. "The sob story. Poor little Y/N, had to move to London all by herself. Had to get a job like every other adult in the world. Had to actually work for things instead of having them handed to her. How absolutely tragic."

"You don't know anything about my life," Y/N said, and there was something in her voice that should have warned him to stop. Something dark and dangerous and barely contained, like a dam about to burst.

But Lando was too angry to listen, too hurt by her words to care about the warning signs. Too focused on inflicting damage to notice that he was about to cross a line that could never be uncrossed.

"I know enough," he said, his voice getting crueler with every word. "I know you're a miserable person who gets off on making everyone else miserable too. You sit there acting superior to everyone when you're just angry that no one wants you."

The words hung in the air like a toxic cloud. Y/N felt them settle into her bones, into all the spaces where her childhood fears lived. All the spaces that whispered that she was unlovable, unwanted, destined to spend her life alone.

But Lando wasn't done. He was just getting started.

"You act like you're too good for everyone," Lando pressed on. "But really, you're just scared. Scared that if you let someone close enough to see who you really are, they'll realize there's nothing special about you at all."

He kept going, his voice turning uglier, more vicious, like he could sense how much damage he was doing and wanted to twist the knife. "You're cold. You're bitter. You're judgmental. You suck the fucking joy out of every room you walk into."

Each word was a precision strike, aimed at her deepest insecurities with the accuracy of someone who'd been watching her, studying her, learning her weaknesses even as he pretended to despise her.

"You want to know why you've never had a real relationship? It's not because you have standards. It's because you're completely incapable of human connection. You're broken, Y/N. And not in some romantic, fixable way that makes for a good movie. You're just fundamentally, irreparably broken."

The silence that followed was deafening. Y/N stood there, swaying slightly on her feet, feeling like she'd been hit by a freight train. Or maybe like she'd been thrown out into a hallway again, abandoned and alone while neighbours walked past and pretended not to see her.

Her soulmate—the person the universe had chosen to love her unconditionally—had just told her she was fundamentally broken. Had just confirmed every terrible thing she'd ever believed about herself, every fear that haunted her in the darkest hours of the night.

The irony was so cruel it was almost funny. Almost.

"Y/N," Pietra said softly, starting to rise from the sofa, her voice thick with horror at what she'd just witnessed.

But Lando still wasn't done. He was too caught up in his own fury, too intoxicated by the power of words to wound, to stop now.

"You know what the worst part is?" he continued, his voice dripping with contempt. "You actually think you're better than everyone else. You sit there with your fancy education and your perfect grammar and your sophisticated opinions, and you judge all of us like we're beneath you. But at least we're capable of happiness. At least we can connect with other human beings. You're just..." he paused, searching for the most devastating word possible. "You're just pathetic."

Y/N felt something inside her chest shatter completely. Some last, fragile piece of hope that she'd been protecting without even realizing it. The piece that had whispered, maybe someday, maybe if he knew, maybe if he understood...

That piece was dead now, murdered by his words and buried under the weight of his disgust.

The mark on her hip felt like it was burning straight through her skin, a constant reminder of the cosmic joke that was her life. Somewhere in the universe, there was supposed to be someone who loved her perfectly, who understood her completely, who chose her above all others.

Instead, she got Lando Norris. Beautiful, talented, charismatic Lando Norris, who looked at her like she was less than human and spoke to her like she was something that needed to be exterminated.

Y/N looked around the room at her friends—Max and Pietra looking shocked and uncomfortable, Tom and Ed staring with wide eyes, everyone frozen in the aftermath of the emotional explosion that had just torn through their peaceful evening.

"You're right," she said quietly, her voice steady despite the storm raging inside her chest. "I am pathetic. I'm broken and pathetic and completely unlovable. But at least I know it. At least I'm not walking around pretending to be something I'm not, desperate for a love I'm too much of a coward to actually pursue."

She turned to the room, to their friends who had sat in horrified silence through the entire exchange. "I'm sorry," she said simply. "I'll go."

She moved toward the door, her legs somehow still carrying her despite feeling like they were made of lead. Every step was agony, every breath felt like swallowing glass—but she forced herself to keep going.

Y/N was already gathering her purse with hands that shook only slightly. She couldn’t look at any of them again. Couldn’t bring herself to meet Lando’s gaze to see if there was any regret there—any recognition of how far he’d gone. Any humanity left in those green eyes that had once made her dream of impossible things.

She couldn’t stay in this room another second, not while breathing the same air as the man who was supposed to love her unconditionally—who had just eviscerated her with surgical precision.

At the door, she paused one last time, not turning around.

"And Lando?" she said, her hand on the door handle, her voice carrying clearly across the silent room. "When you're lying in bed tonight, still wearing her bracelet, still wondering why you can't find your perfect woman—remember this conversation. Remember that maybe the problem isn't that there aren't any good women out there. Maybe the problem is that you're not good enough for them."

She pulled the door open, then paused again, some masochistic part of her needing to twist the knife one more time.

"You want to know what your real problem is? It's not that you're still hung up on Olivia. It's that you're exactly the kind of man who would rather destroy someone else than admit you might be wrong. You're cruel, Lando. Genuinely cruel. And no amount of money or fame or pretty eyes is going to change that."

Y/N stepped out into the hallway and pulled the door closed behind her, cutting off whatever response Lando might have had. The silence in the corridor was deafening after the emotional intensity of the fight, and she stood there for a moment, trying to process what had just happened.

She'd fought with her soulmate. Had screamed at him, had been cruel to him, had exposed her deepest wounds only to have them used against her. The man the universe had supposedly designed for her had just told her she was fundamentally broken and unlovable, and the worst part was that she was starting to believe he might be right.

The elevator ride down felt like descending into hell. Y/N stared at her reflection in the polished steel doors and saw exactly what Lando had described—a cold, bitter woman who pushed everyone away before they could hurt her. A woman so damaged by her childhood that she couldn't connect with other human beings even when they were literally designed by the universe to be hers.

She thought about the way he'd looked at her during their fight—not with the careful blankness he usually employed, but with genuine disgust. Like she was something repulsive that had crawled out from under a rock. Like her very existence offended him on some fundamental level.

And maybe it did. Maybe that was why he'd been so cruel to her from the moment they met. Maybe on some subconscious level, he could sense the connection between them and rejected it utterly. Rejected her utterly.

The thought made her laugh, but it came out broken and bitter. Of course her soulmate would be the one person in the world who couldn't stand her. Of course the universe would give her someone who confirmed every terrible thing she'd ever believed about herself.

Her parents had told her she was worthless, disposable, a burden they never wanted. The boy in school had told her she was pathetic, laughable, deserving of public humiliation. And now her soulmate had told her she was fundamentally broken, irreparably damaged, incapable of human connection.

Maybe they were all right. Maybe there really was something wrong with her, something that made her unlovable no matter how hard she tried to fix herself, no matter how much she achieved or how much she grew.

When she finally made it to her apartment, she went straight to her bathroom and stared at herself in the mirror. Her face was blotchy and swollen from crying tears she didn't remember shedding, her hair was a mess, her clothes were wrinkled. She looked exactly like what she was: a broken woman who had just been destroyed by the person who was supposed to love her most.

She pulled up her shirt and looked at the mark on her hip—that soulmate mark that was supposed to represent destiny, cosmic connection, perfect love. In the harsh bathroom lighting, it looked like nothing more than a birthmark. A random pattern of pigmentation that meant absolutely nothing.

What a joke. What a cosmic, cruel, devastating joke.

She thought about telling him. About marching up to his hotel or cornering him the next day and showing him the mark. About watching his face as he realized that the universe had played the cruelest possible trick on both of them.

But what would be the point? He'd made his feelings about her perfectly clear. Learning that they were soulmates wouldn't change anything except to add a layer of cosmic irony to their mutual hatred. If anything, it would probably make him treat her even worse, knowing that he was stuck with her for eternity.

No, she decided. She would keep her secret. Would carry it like all her other secrets—quietly, privately, without burdening anyone else with the weight of it.

The tears came again then, great heaving sobs that shook her entire body. She slid down the bathroom wall until she was sitting on the cold tile floor, crying for the fight, for the cruel words, for the look in Lando's eyes when he'd told her she was broken.

But mostly, she cried for the death of a dream she'd barely let herself acknowledge. The tiny, secret hope that maybe, someday, when he learned they were soulmates, everything would change. That he would see her differently, understand her differently, maybe even love her.

That hope was dead now, murdered by his words and buried under the weight of his disgust.

Because even if he ever found out the truth—even if he ever learned that the universe had marked them for each other—nothing would change. He would still see her as broken, as unworthy, as fundamentally unlovable.

And maybe, Y/N thought as she finally cried herself into exhaustion on her bathroom floor, maybe he would be right.

Maybe she really was fundamentally broken. Maybe she really was incapable of human connection. Maybe the universe had made a mistake when it paired them together, had somehow failed to account for the fact that she was too damaged to be anyone's soulmate.

Maybe she was destined to spend the rest of her life loving someone who looked at her like she was absolutely nothing at all.

The mark on her hip burned like a brand, a constant reminder of the cosmic joke that was her existence. Somewhere out there, other people were finding their soulmates, were experiencing the joy and completeness that came with cosmic connection.

But not her. Never her.

She was Y/N, the girl nobody wanted. Not her parents, not her classmates, not the universe itself, it seemed.

And certainly not Lando Norris, no matter what some meaningless mark on her skin might suggest.

Y/N stood in her bathroom for what felt like hours, staring at her reflection in the unforgiving fluorescent light. Her face was a roadmap of devastation—red-rimmed eyes that looked like she'd been crying for days instead of hours, blotchy skin that bore the evidence of every tear she'd shed, hair that hung limp and disheveled around her shoulders. She looked like a woman who had been systematically destroyed, and maybe that's exactly what she was.

The shower called to her like a sanctuary, promising the illusion of washing away the evening's horrors. She turned the water as hot as she could stand it, watching the steam begin to fog the mirror until her reflection mercifully disappeared. The pragmatism that had carried her through childhood trauma whispered that she should eat something, should drink water, should take care of the basic needs that would help her body process the alcohol and stress. But she couldn't bring herself to care about any of that.

Food felt impossible when her stomach was twisted into knots of anguish. Water felt pointless when she was drowning in an ocean of her own tears. Self-care felt like a mockery when the person she was supposed to care for had just been declared fundamentally unworthy of love by the one person whose opinion mattered most.

She stripped off her clothes mechanically, each piece of fabric feeling heavy with the weight of the evening's memories. 

When she finally stepped under the scalding spray, the tears came again with renewed force. The hot water mixed with her sobs, washing away the salt tracks on her cheeks only for them to be immediately replaced by fresh ones. She braced her hands against the shower wall and let herself break completely, let herself feel the full weight of what Lando had done to her.

The worst part wasn't even the specific words he'd used, though each one had been chosen with surgical precision to cause maximum damage. The worst part was the look in his eyes when he'd said them—the complete and utter conviction that every cruel assessment was justified, that she deserved every verbal blow he'd delivered.

You're fundamentally, irreparably broken.

The words echoed in her mind like a death sentence, made worse by the fact that they'd come from someone whose DNA was literally designed to complement hers. If her soulmate could look at her and see nothing but damage, nothing but a pathetic woman who sucked the joy out of every room she entered, then what hope did she have with anyone else?

Y/N slid down the shower wall until she was sitting on the tile floor, hot water cascading over her hunched form as she wrapped her arms around her knees and sobbed. This was worse than anything her parents had ever done to her. Their cruelty had been born of their own trauma, their own inability to process emotions in healthy ways. They'd hurt her because they didn't know better, because they were products of their own damaged childhoods.

But Lando—Lando had hurt her with full awareness of what he was doing. She'd seen the moment when he'd realized how much damage his words were causing, had watched his eyes sharpen with something that looked almost like satisfaction as he'd found each new vulnerability to exploit. He'd taken her deepest insecurities, the fears she'd spent years trying to overcome, and had weaponized them against her with the skill of someone who understood exactly how to destroy another person.

Her parents had broken her accidentally. Lando had broken her on purpose.

The water began to run cold, but Y/N couldn't summon the energy to move. She sat there on the shower floor, shivering as the temperature dropped, feeling like the cold was appropriate somehow. Like her body was finally matching the frozen wasteland that her heart had become.

When she finally forced herself to stand and turn off the water, her legs felt like they belonged to someone else. Everything felt disconnected, like she was watching herself go through the motions of drying off and putting on pajamas from somewhere outside her own body. The dissociation was familiar—a defense mechanism that had carried her through the worst moments of her childhood, when the only way to survive was to mentally remove herself from the situation until it was over.

But this situation would never be over. She would have to carry the knowledge of what Lando really thought of her for the rest of her life, would have to see him at future gatherings and pretend that his words hadn't carved out pieces of her soul and left them bleeding on Max and Pietra's living room floor.

Y/N crawled into her bed without bothering to turn on any lights, pulling the covers up to her chin like a child seeking comfort from monsters that couldn't be defeated by hiding. The Egyptian cotton sheets that usually felt luxurious against her skin now felt rough and foreign, as if even her own bed was rejecting her presence.

The tears started again almost immediately, and this time they came with a violence that scared her. These weren't the controlled tears she'd shed in the shower, or even the angry tears that had punctuated their fight. These were the kind of tears that came from the deepest part of her psyche, from the wounded child who had never been properly comforted, who had learned to cry silently so as not to invite more punishment.

She pressed her face into her pillow to muffle the sounds that were escaping from her throat—sounds that didn't seem human, that sounded like an animal caught in a trap. The pillow quickly became soaked with tears and snot, but she didn't care. Nothing mattered anymore except the overwhelming need to release the pain that was threatening to consume her from the inside out.

You're just pathetic.

The words played on repeat in her mind, accompanied by the image of Lando's face as he'd delivered them. She'd seen disgust there, contempt, a kind of clinical detachment as he'd dissected her personality and found it wanting. No anger, which might have suggested passion of some kind. Just cold, calculated destruction delivered with the precision of a surgeon removing a tumor.

Y/N clutched her phone, considering calling Sophie, a good friend from work, or maybe her parents, or anyone who might be able to offer some comfort in this moment of complete devastation. But every time she started to dial, she stopped herself. What could she possibly say? That she'd had a fight with Lando and he'd said mean things to her? It sounded so trivial when reduced to simple terms, so childish and overdramatic.

She couldn't explain that he was her soulmate without revealing a secret she'd guarded for twelve months. Couldn't explain why his words carried more weight than anyone else's without admitting to the cosmic connection that made his rejection so much more devastating than ordinary cruelty.

And even if she could explain, what would be the point? Sophie would probably try to smooth things over, would suggest that Lando hadn't meant what he'd said, that he'd been drunk or angry or simply lashing out without thinking. But Y/N had seen his face. Had heard the conviction in his voice. He'd meant every word, had probably been thinking those things about her for fourteen months and had finally found an excuse to voice them.

The hunger clawed at her stomach, a sharp reminder that she'd only had wine at dinner, that her body was running on nothing but alcohol and adrenaline and heartbreak. But the thought of food made her feel sick. How could she nourish a body that housed a soul so fundamentally flawed that even the universe's perfect design couldn't make it lovable?

She rolled onto her side and stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows that offered a spectacular view of London's skyline. The city glittered below her like a constellation of possibilities, millions of people living their lives, falling in love, being chosen, being wanted. And here she was, 54 floors above it all, completely alone with the knowledge that she was the exception to every rule about love and connection and human worth.

Somewhere out there, Lando was probably going to sleep without a care in the world, completely unaware that he'd just destroyed the person who was literally made for him.

Maybe he was right to be disgusted by her. Maybe the universe had made a mistake, had somehow paired her with someone so far out of her league that his natural instinct was to reject her entirely. Maybe she was supposed to be grateful that he'd never shown any romantic interest, that he'd saved them both from the cosmic embarrassment of a fundamentally mismatched pairing.

You suck the fucking joy out of every room you walk into.

The accusation felt particularly cruel because it contained just enough truth to burrow deep into her psyche and take root. She did guard herself carefully in social situations, did hold herself apart from the easy camaraderie that seemed to come so naturally to everyone else. But that was survival, not malice. That was the result of a childhood that had taught her that letting people see your real emotions was a guarantee that those emotions would be used against you.

Y/N pulled her knees to her chest and rocked slightly, a self-soothing motion she'd developed as a child when the fights between her parents got too loud, when the threats became too real, when the only comfort available was the comfort she could provide herself. The motion was automatic now, muscle memory that activated during times of extreme distress.

She thought about her therapist's words, about being the product of emotional unpredictability and conditional love, about how her nervous system had adapted to survive chaos by becoming hyper-independent and emotionally constipated. Her therapist would probably say that Lando's attack had triggered every abandonment wound she'd ever carried, and had activated the deepest core belief that she was fundamentally unworthy of love.

But knowing the psychological mechanisms didn't make the pain any less real. Understanding why she was broken didn't make her any less broken. And it certainly didn't change the fact that the person who was supposed to see past all her defenses, who was supposed to love her despite her flaws, had instead chosen to use those flaws as weapons against her.

The hours crawled by with agonizing slowness. Y/N watched the digital clock on her nightstand tick from 11:47 PM to midnight to 1:00 AM, each minute feeling like an eternity of pain that had to be endured. She tried closing her eyes, tried willing herself into unconsciousness, but every time she started to drift off, Lando's voice would echo in her mind with fresh cruelty.

You're completely incapable of human connection.

The words felt like a prophecy, a future written in stone. If she couldn't connect with her soulmate, if the person literally designed by the universe to complement her found her so repulsive that he felt compelled to destroy her, then what hope did she have of ever finding love or acceptance or even basic human warmth?

Around 2:00 AM, she gave up pretending to try to sleep and turned on her phone, scrolling mindlessly through social media feeds full of people living their apparently perfect lives. Happy couples posting anniversary photos, friends celebrating promotions, families gathered around dinner tables with genuine smiles. The images felt like they were from another planet, a world where people were capable of the kind of joy and connection that seemed permanently out of her reach.

She almost opened Instagram to look at Lando's profile, some masochistic part of her wanting to torture herself with images of him looking happy and carefree, probably already having forgotten about their fight entirely. But she stopped herself just in time, knowing that seeing his face would only make everything worse.

Instead, she found herself googling articles about soulmate connections, searching for some explanation of how the universe could have gotten things so wrong. The articles were full of romantic nonsense about instant recognition and unbreakable bonds, about soulmates who found each other across crowded rooms and knew immediately that they were meant to be together.

None of them mentioned what happened when your soulmate looked at you with disgust. None of them offered guidance for what to do when the person who was supposed to complete you spent over a year treating you like an unwelcome stranger. None of them acknowledged that sometimes the universe's grand design was nothing more than a cosmic practical joke played on people who were already damaged beyond repair.

Y/N threw her phone across the room, not caring when it hit the wall with a sharp crack that probably indicated a broken screen. The sound was satisfying somehow, a physical manifestation of the internal destruction she was experiencing. At least now her phone matched the rest of her life—broken and probably beyond repair.

The tears came in waves throughout the night, sometimes subsiding to a trickle that allowed her to catch her breath, sometimes returning with such force that she had to bury her face in her pillow to avoid disturbing her neighbors. Her throat became raw from crying, her eyes swollen to the point where she could barely see, her chest tight with the effort of breathing around the constant sobs.

She'd cried before—had cried when her parents threw her out of the house, had cried when that boy in school humiliated her, had cried during those first terrifying weeks in London when everything felt foreign and hostile. But this was different. This was the kind of crying that came from complete hopelessness, from the realization that the one person who was supposed to love her unconditionally had instead chosen to confirm every terrible thing she'd ever believed about herself.

Around 3:00 AM, she found herself thinking about her grandmother from her father's side, the woman who had tried so hard to break up her parents' marriage. Maybe the old woman had been right all along. Maybe Y/N's mother wasn't worthy of the family name, and maybe Y/N had inherited that unworthiness, had carried it in her DNA like a genetic curse that made her fundamentally unlovable.

The thought sent her into a fresh spiral of anguish, because even her parents—damaged and cruel as they had been—had at least loved each other enough to fight for their relationship. Her father had been willing to threaten his own mother to protect his marriage, had chosen his wife over his family of origin when forced to make that decision.

But Y/N had never inspired that kind of devotion in anyone. Had never been worth fighting for, never been worth choosing, never been worth protecting. Even her soulmate, who should have been programmed by the universe to cherish and defend her, had instead chosen to tear her apart at the first opportunity.

Y/N made a decision in that moment, lying in her bed at 3:17 AM with tears streaming down her face and her heart breaking in ways she didn't know were possible. She would never tell him. Would never give him the opportunity to reject her knowing what she really was to him. Would never put herself through the devastation of watching him realize that even the universe's perfect design couldn't make her lovable.

She would carry this secret to her grave, would love him from afar with the knowledge that it would never be returned, would never be acknowledged, would never be anything more than a source of endless pain.

Because that's what broken people did. They protected others from their damage, even when it destroyed them in the process.

Even when it meant spending eternity loving someone who thought they were fundamentally unworthy of love.

Even when it meant accepting that maybe, just maybe, everyone who had ever told her she was worthless had been right all along.

The decision brought no peace, only a cold kind of resignation that settled into her bones like winter frost. She would continue to attend gatherings where he was present, would continue to pretend that his presence didn't affect her, and would continue to guard the secret that was slowly killing her from the inside out.

By 4:00 AM, her body had begun to rebel against the sustained emotional assault. Her hands were shaking uncontrollably, her breathing had become shallow and rapid, and her heart was racing like she'd just run a marathon. The physical symptoms only added to her distress, creating a feedback loop where her body's stress response made her more anxious, which in turn made her body react more severely.

She tried the breathing exercises her therapist had taught her, tried to ground herself by focusing on physical sensations like the texture of her sheets and the temperature of the air against her skin. But nothing worked. The panic was too strong, the emotional pain too overwhelming for any coping mechanism to penetrate.

As the sky began to lighten with the first hints of dawn, Y/N realized that she hadn't stopped crying for a single moment in the past seven hours. Her body was dehydrated, her head was pounding, and her chest felt like someone was sitting on it. But still the tears came, as if her body was trying to expel the poison of Lando's words through her eyes.

The hunger had evolved from a dull ache to sharp, stabbing pains that made her curl into an even tighter ball. But the thought of food still made her nauseous. Her body was running on pure emotional adrenaline, sustained by nothing but grief and the wine that was probably still circulating through her system.

Around 5:30 AM, she heard her neighbors beginning to stir—the sound of footsteps in the hallway, the distant hum of morning news programs, the everyday sounds of people starting their normal days. The normalcy of it all felt surreal, like she was watching life happen from behind glass, separate and excluded from the simple pleasure of routine human existence.

Y/N tried one more time to force herself to sleep, pulling her duvet over her head and squeezing her eyes shut. But behind her closed lids, all she could see was Lando's face as he'd delivered his final judgment, the clinical detachment with which he'd dissected her personality and found it lacking.

You're just fundamentally, irreparably broken.

The words had taken on a life of their own, echoing through her mind with the persistence of a song stuck on repeat. They felt true in a way that made her stomach clench with despair, true in a way that made every breath feel like an act of defiance against the obvious fact that she shouldn't exist, shouldn't take up space in a world where she clearly didn't belong.

By 6:00 AM, something in her body had reached its breaking point. The sustained emotional trauma, combined with the lack of sleep, lack of food, and lingering alcohol in her system, had created a perfect storm of physical distress. Her heart was racing so fast she could hear it pounding in her ears, drowning out all other sounds. Her breathing had become so shallow and rapid that she was starting to feel lightheaded.

And then, suddenly, she couldn't breathe at all.

The panic attack hit her like a freight train, sudden and overwhelming in its intensity. Her chest seized up completely, as if someone had wrapped steel bands around her ribs and was tightening them with each passing second. Her heart rate spiked even higher, so fast that she was convinced it would burst from the strain. Her hands went numb, her vision started to blur, and her entire body was consumed with the absolute certainty that she was dying.

This was it. This was how it would end. Alone in her expensive apartment, destroyed by the cruelest words her soulmate could devise, dying of a heart attack at twenty-seven because her body had finally given up under the weight of a lifetime of emotional trauma.

With the last rational thought she could manage, Y/N grabbed her cracked phone from where she'd thrown it against the wall and dialed 999 with trembling fingers that barely obeyed her commands.

"Emergency services, what's your emergency?"

"I think... I think I'm having a heart attack," she gasped into the phone, her voice barely recognizable even to herself. "I can't breathe... my heart is racing... I think I'm dying."

Tag list: @myescapefromthislife @gvcnnnnnnnbvszxv @lilorose25 @formulawhore @hangingwiththestars @ayap4paya @ispywlittleeye-blog @azuramicah @myheartgoesvroom @strawberrylov-er @landossnorriss @linnygirl09 @milkiane @liloessnitch

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[papayareads]

Marked

Summary: Lando never expected his innocent girlfriend to have tattoos, let alone there. One slow, heated night, when she finally says she’s ready, everything changes. And when his hands begin to explore, he finds more than just bare skin.

Pairing: Lando Norris x Reader

Warnings: Smut MDNI, oral (f receiving), praise kink, surprise tattoos, body worship, possessiveness

Author note : It's different from what I'm used to write but I saw this tatoo pic and tough of this with Lando. Let me know if you like it and if you want another version with other drivers ;)

You were lying on Lando's bed again, like so many nights before. His room was softly lit with the warm glow of a lamp, casting golden shadows across the walls, soft music thrumming in the background. But tonight felt different. You could feel it in the air between you, thick and electric.

Lando lay beside you, eyes on you like you were his whole world. His hand found yours, fingers interlacing naturally, grounding you. And then he leaned in, brushing his lips against your, gentle at first, testing. You melted into him, responding with a quiet whimper that made him hum with satisfaction.

The kiss deepened.

His hand moved to cradle your jaw, thumb stroking your cheek as his tongue slid into your mouth. You kissed him back with all the heat and longing you’d been storing for weeks. You felt him groan into your mouth when your teeth grazed his lower lip. You tugged at his shirt, desperate to feel more of him. He laughed softly against your lips, but gave you what you wanted, letting you tug it up until he pulled back and yanked it over his head.

You laid back as he moved over you, supporting his weight on one arm, using the other to cup your face and kiss you again, slower this time, almost teasing, letting his mouth linger on yours like he had all night.

His lips trailed to your jaw, your ear, whispering your name. You shivered.

He nipped your earlobe. "Still with me, sweetheart?"

You nodded.

Then his mouth was on your neck, hot, open kisses that made your breath hitch. He lingered at the sensitive spot just beneath your ear, then lower, biting gently at your pulse point. You gasped, and he kissed there again, then again, until your fingers dug into his bare shoulders.

He left red marks. On purpose. Marking you.

His hands slid beneath your hoodie, palms warm against your waist.

"Can I touch you here?" he murmured.

You nodded, but before he continued, he paused.

"You sure?"

You smiled softly, cheeks pink. "Lando... I think I’m ready."

He blinked, lips parted slightly. He stared at you as though you’d just said the most sacred thing.

"You’re sure? Really sure?"

"We’ve waited to do it together but now I want this... I want you."

His breath shook as he exhaled. "God, you don’t know what that does to me."

He helped you out of the hoodie, then paused again as he saw you in just your tight tee-shirt. His hands smoothed along your waist before he leaned down, kissing a path from your shoulder, slowly down your chest. His lips ghosted over the fabric covering your breast, but he kept going, mouthing at the space just below your ribs.

Then his hands gripped the hem of your shirt. "Can I?"

You nodded again, and he slowly peeled it upward, inch by inch, revealing your skin to him like unwrapping a gift. His lips followed every inch he revealed, across your stomach, along your sides, kissing your ribs.

Until he stopped.

His gaze locked on the delicate ink just beneath the swell of your left breast.

He blinked. "What’s this?"

You looked away, suddenly shy. "A tattoo."

"You have a tattoo?"

You smiled softly. "Tattoos."

His eyes darkened. "Plural?"

You nodded, cheeks burning.

"You’ve been hiding these from me?"

You bit your lip. "They’re in places people don’t usually see."

He leaned down, breath hot over your skin. "This changes everything."

His fingers traced the soft pink rose inked into your ribs, and then his lips followed. He kissed the petals reverently, then the stem, then the space just beside it. He licked a stripe slowly, watching the way your back arched under him.

"So sweet... so soft... and this under your shirt? You’re a menace."

You let out a trembling breath, your hand tangling in his curls as he worshipped the rose with mouth and tongue. His fingers slid up your side, brushing under the band of your bra.

"Can I see more?"

You nodded.

He unclasped your bra with care, his hands reverent, his mouth returning to your chest. He kissed every inch of your breasts, his tongue swirling around one nipple before moving to the other, never rushing, never breaking eye contact too long.

You moaned softly, body burning as his hands traced lower.

"Can I take these off?" he asked, nodding toward your shorts.

"Only if you do too," you whispered.

He grinned. "Deal."

He stood briefly, stripped out of the rest of his clothes, and you couldn't help but stare. He caught your gaze and smirked. "Your turn."

He returned to you and slowly pulled your shorts down, dragging them over your thighs, kissing the inside of your knees as he went. His eyes widened again.

"Butterflies?"

Two small ones sat on your hipbone, delicate and intricate.

"These are sneaky," he murmured, kissing each one gently. "You really are full of surprises."

He shifted you slightly, his hand smoothing over your side.

Then he paused.

"Oh my God. Is that a little red heart? On your ass?"

You covered your face, groaning.

Lando chuckled. "No no no, don’t hide now. This is perfect."

He kissed it. Once. Twice. Then again, biting gently before licking it better.

"You’re driving me crazy, sweetheart."

He came back up to face you, eyes hungry.

"Is that all of them?"

You shook your head slowly, eyes gleaming.

"No? There’s more? Where, baby?"

You reached for his hand and guided it down, over your stomach, over the waistband of your panties. You nudged the fabric aside.

He stilled.

A small, bold tattoo, inked just beside your most intimate place. Kiss here.

Lando stared, then looked up at you, breathless.

"You’ve got to be joking."

"I’m not."

"You wanted me to lose my mind, didn’t you?"

You smiled shyly.

His fingers traced the words slowly, reverently, over and over again. Then his voice, lower now, almost possessive:

"God, baby... You let someone put this here?"

You swallowed. "Well... there was this guy I used to date. He was a tattoo artist."

Lando’s expression shifted instantly. He froze. "Wait, he did this one? Here?"

You nodded slowly. "Yeah. He did."

Lando pulled back slightly, jaw tightening. You saw the flicker of something darker in his eyes, something that made your breath catch.

He knew you had a past. Of course, he did. But the idea of another man marking your skin there, so close to where Lando now worshipped, lit something deep and possessive in him.

His voice was rough. "Well... that’s too bad for him."

Before you could ask, he leaned in.

"Because I’m the one who’s going to kiss you here from now on. No one else."

And then he sank down, lips sealing over the tattoo, sucking hard until your hips jerked.

He sucked, and sucked, until he left a dark red mark blooming over the ink, his tongue soothing the now over-sensitive skin. You moaned, trembling, the mix of pain and pleasure making your legs shake.

He looked up, flushed, eyes full of fire. "Mine now."

His gaze roamed over your body again, taking in every curve, every mark he’d yet to kiss. His fingers returned to the rose beneath your breast, tracing the outline with possessive reverence. "This one... it needs to be mine too."

He leaned in again, kissing the petals softly. Then lower, to the stem, before opening his mouth against your skin and sucking, harder this time. You gasped as he bit gently, then kissed again. Another hickey. And another.

"Here," he murmured against your skin, breath hot, "so pretty like this. Marked for me."

You whimpered, arching into his mouth. He moved lower again, hands gliding along your waist as he pressed soft, reverent kisses over your hips.

"These little butterflies... they deserve attention too."

You could feel his breath tickling your skin just before his lips closed over one wing, kissing delicately. Then the other. He trailed his tongue along the curve of your hip, making you squirm.

"Good girl," he whispered, voice rough with need. "So perfect."

And then he shifted you slightly, hands strong but gentle as he rolled you just enough to expose the curve of your ass. His eyes zeroed in on the tiny red heart inked there.

"This one," he said, almost to himself, as if it were sacred. "You didn’t think I’d forget about this one, did you?"

You shook your head, breath caught in your throat.

He leaned down and kissed it softly, so soft it made you shiver.

Then his hand came down in a sharp slap to your ass, right over the little heart. You gasped, your body jolting at the sting.

The sound echoed in the room, followed by your breathy moan. He bent down instantly, kissing the now-pink skin, his tongue soothing over the heat he’d left. His voice came low, dangerous.

"That’s for hiding how not-so-innocent you really are, baby."

You moaned, the sound high and breathy as your hips jolted.

He soothed the spot with kisses, then licked over the fresh mark, voice rough and low as he spoke against your skin.

"Here. All mine now."

And god, you wanted more.

His hand soothed over the fresh sting he'd left on your skin, and his mouth followed, soft, apologetic kisses trailing behind the sharpness. You felt the shift in his energy immediately.

"God, baby..." he murmured, his voice suddenly tender again. "I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be that intense. I just, fuck, the tattoos on you... they do something to me."

He kissed the curve of your lower back, his fingers brushing along your side.

"I can slow down," he whispered. "If you want me to. I don’t want to rush you."

You shook your head, turning to glance at him over your shoulder, eyes soft. "It’s okay. I... I liked it."

A crooked, relieved smile spread across his face. He leaned forward, pressing a kiss to your shoulder, then to the reddened spot he’d just marked.

"Did it hurt?" he asked, brushing his lips over the skin again.

You bit your lip, smiling. "Not in a bad way."

He hummed against you, his grin warm. "So can I make it up to you?"

Your breath hitched. "How?"

He didn’t answer with words. Instead, he kissed his way down the curve of your spine, then lower. You felt his fingers gently push your legs apart, his mouth now hovering over the heat between your thighs, still covered by your panties.

He kissed the fabric once. Then again.

Then looked up at you, eyes dark and full of fire. "Can I taste you?"

Your breath caught in your throat, but you nodded. "Yes."

His hands moved with careful intention, sliding up your thighs, his palms warm and steady. "Can I take these off?" he asked, his fingers ghosting along the waistband of your panties.

"Yes," you whispered again, your voice shaky with anticipation.

He peeled them down slowly, eyes locked on yours, watching your face as if it were the most important thing in the world. When you were fully bare to him, he paused, exhaled slowly, reverently.

"Can I touch you here?" he asked, fingers barely brushing against your folds.

You let out a soft gasp. "Please."

His fingers teased you gently, testing your sensitivity. You arched slightly into his touch, a quiet moan slipping from your lips.

He smiled against your thigh. "Can I kiss you like this?"

"Lando... yes," you breathed.

And he did.

His mouth met you softly at first, lips exploring you with slow reverence. He groaned at the taste, and you felt the vibrations travel through you like a current.

"Do you like that, baby?"

You nodded rapidly, already breathless. "Yes. So much."

He looked up again, eyes wild but tender. "Do you want to hold my hand?"

You reached down without hesitation, threading your fingers through his. His other hand wrapped around your thigh, holding you open as he dipped his tongue deeper.

Then he pulled back slightly, voice low and coaxing.

"You can pull my hair if you want. You know that, right?"

You whimpered at the thought, tangling your fingers into his curls.

He moaned against you in response, then murmured, "You can be louder too. Be louder for me, baby. Let me hear how good I’m making you feel."

And when his tongue found that perfect spot, when he moaned into you like he couldn’t get enough, you did.

Your back arched off the bed, hips rolling against his mouth with abandon. Your hand clutched tighter in his curls, breath coming in desperate little gasps as your moans filled the room.

His fingers never left the 'Kiss here' tattoo, still red and tender from earlier. He traced the words with maddening slowness, as if branding them into his memory and into your skin.

"Can I go deeper, baby?"

"Yes," you cried, already undone. "God, yes."

He pressed closer, licking into you with more purpose, letting you grind against him, letting you take what you needed.

"Do you want me to keep going like this?"

"Yes, Lando, yes..."

"Can I touch your breasts too, baby please?"

"Yes," you whispered, voice shaky, body humming.

His mouth didn’t leave you for long. Between kisses and flicks of his tongue, he asked again, lower now, voice like a prayer, "Can I touch your clit, sweetheart? Make it feel so good you forget your own name?"

You whimpered, overwhelmed by how gentle and filthy he could be at once.

"God, Lando, stop asking, just make me come!"

He stilled for only a moment, lips glistening, looking up with a crooked grin.

"Eager, huh?"

Then you grabbed his shoulders and pushed him back where he belonged: between your legs, moaning, panting, needing.

"Continue. Don’t stop."

He laughed breathlessly. "Bossy."

And then he did exactly what you asked.

Lando lowered himself again between your thighs, his mouth returning to you with devotion. He licked you slowly, deeply, savoring the way your hips bucked beneath his hold, the way you whimpered every time his tongue flicked just right.

"You’re so perfect," he murmured between strokes. "So sweet, baby. You taste like heaven."

His tongue circled your clit with practiced precision, never rushing, always watching your reactions. His fingers stayed laced with yours until you were squeezing them, knuckles white. When he dipped a single finger inside you, he asked again, whispering against your folds.

He slid it in slowly, letting your body adjust, his mouth never stopping its rhythm. The stretch made your toes curl. Your thighs trembled. You moaned his name, louder this time, no longer shy.

He added another.

"Still good, baby?"

"Stop asking," you gasped out, voice trembling and breathless. "Lando, stop asking. Just, keep going. I’m gonna come."

Your hand tangled deeper into his curls, yanking him closer, your thighs tightening around his head as you rocked against his mouth, chasing the edge shamelessly now.

He groaned into you, the sound vibrating against your clit.

"God, baby," he panted between licks, "Getting desperate aren’t you?"

"Lando just...shut up, keep going!"

He smile between your legs and continue. You rode his mouth with abandon, grinding down, desperate and aching, as he let you take control, let you fall apart exactly how you needed.

His fingers curled just right, stroking your walls while his mouth worshipped you. Over and over. Building you up, letting your hips chase his tongue.

Your body writhed beneath him, slick with sweat, fingers in his curls, mouth open in bliss. He knew you were close. He could feel it in the way you started chanting his name, in the way your thighs locked around his head.

"Make me come." you murmured, breath warm, voice dark. "God Lando make me come now."

Your climax hit like a wave, full, blinding, consuming. You cried out, hips jerking, legs shaking as he held you down and worked you through it, licking every tremor, every pulse until you were gasping and twitching beneath him.

He didn’t stop until you were whimpering from the overstimulation, finally pulling back and kissing the inside of your thigh with deep reverence.

He looked up at you with swollen lips and awe in his eyes.

"That’s it." he whispered.

And you lay there, undone, ruined, and more loved than you’d ever felt in your life.

Lando crawled up your body slowly, tenderly, his lips brushing your skin in soft kisses as he moved. When he reached your face, he hovered, waiting, giving you time to breathe.

Then he kissed you.

You could taste yourself on his lips, but more than that, you could feel the emotion behind it: deep, raw, real.

"God, Lando," you whispered against his mouth, still breathless. "You’re so, so good at this."

He grinned, pressing his head against your neck. "And you, my love... are so bossy. Didn’t expect that."

You giggled weakly, still dazed. "Sorry. Was that too much?"

He grinned wider, brushing your cheek with his knuckles. "Not at all, just didn't expecting you hiding spicy tattoos and having a dom side?"

Your face flushed and you slap his shoulder "I don’t have a dom side, Lando!"

He smirked, lips twitching. "Oh really? You barely let me up for air, scratched my scalp, ordered me to make you come... that could definitely come across as a little bossy, my love."

You let out a flustered laugh and immediately pulled the sheet up over your head, groaning softly. "Stop. I was just... lost in the moment, okay? Now I’m having flashbacks and I’m mortified."

He laughed, genuinely and lovingly, and gently pulled the sheet down just enough to see your eyes. "Oh no, don't hide. I like this side of you way too much."

Still hiding under the cover, you mumbled, "I was just... really gone, Lando. It felt too good. Now I don’t know how to look at you."

He leaned in, lower the cover and kissed your nose, soft and sweet. "No need to be ashamed, baby. Really."

You let out a whimper and ducked back under the covers. "Stop looking at me, Lando. Let me be."

He chuckled, shifting closer. "See? There she is again, giving orders."

You groaned under the sheet. "Lando!"

He tugged gently at the covers, his voice soft but teasing. "Come on, baby. Don’t hide from me. I love every version of you. The shy one, the bossy one. All of it."

Still buried, you mumbled, "I was just... I don’t know. It felt good. Too good. And now I’m embarrassed."

He kissed the top of your head through the blanket. "There’s nothing to be embarrassed about. You were amazing. Everything about you tonight, so goddamn sexy, and beautiful."

He slowly peeled the blanket down again, inch by inch, until your face peeked out. "You have no idea how crazy you make me."

He kissed your cheek gently. "That side of you? That was a huge turn-on, baby. Don’t ever feel shy about it."

You blinked up at him, cheeks warm, smile blooming slowly. "Yeah?"

He nodded, grinning. "Yeah. Ride my face anytime. Seriously."

You groaned again, your cheeks flaming as you buried your face into the pillow. "God, Lando, don’t say that. Now I’ve got the image in my mind."

Lando leaned in with a teasing grin, brushing his fingers along your arm. "Yeah? Me too, actually." He wiggled his brows, lowering his voice. "Round two?"

You squeaked, hiding your face even deeper, but a laugh slipped out despite yourself. "You’re unbelievable."

"Mmm, maybe," he said, nuzzling into your cheek, voice low and sweet. "But admit it, you’re tempted."

You peeked at him with a flustered smile. "...Maybe."

He kissed you again, slow, warm, and full of everything that made you melt.

[papayareads]

girl, so confusing ⛐ 𝐈𝐇𝟔

r/aita · anon asked, “aita (m20) for realizing my best friend is attractive and starting to panic over it?”

ꔮ starring: pepe marti isack hadjar x best friend!reader. ꔮ word count: 10.8k. ꔮ includes: romance, friendship. pre-f1 isack (ft. yuki who is still in vcarb), so much jealousy!!!, emotionally constipated isack, i <3 pepe marti, idiots in love. title from charli xcx’s girl, so confusing. ꔮ commentary box: this got way too out of hand for something that was meant to be short 🤕 unfortunately, this has some of my favorite tropes, and getting to use pepe as a plot device was a major bonus! 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

The first thing Isack hears when he lands in Bologna is your voice, muffled through his noise-cancelling headphones and still somehow unmistakably you.

“You packed five hoodies and no toothpaste.”

He blinks at you, one hand gripping the strap of his backpack, the other still clutching his phone like it might protect him from your judgment. You look back at him over your shoulder, expression flat, eyebrows raised, the living embodiment of exasperated affection.

“I brushed my teeth before we left,” he says, which is not a defense so much as a cry for help.

You make a noise—something between a laugh and a groan—and keep walking. He jogs to catch up, the terminal humming around you both as you weave toward baggage claim like a pair of over-caffeinated ducks.

It’s been two weeks since you last saw each other in Paris. Long enough for Isack to feel it. Long enough for him to pretend he didn’t. “You know,” he says, nudging you with his elbow, “it would’ve been nice if you said you missed me.”

“I missed you like I miss stubbing my toe.”

“So passionately. Got it.”

The banter is easy, old, familiar. A thread pulled through years of half-eaten birthday cakes and failed group projects and one disastrous ski trip where Isack sprained his ankle trying to impress you with a backflip. (He still blames you. You still have the video.)

Now you’re here in Faenza, Italy, where the houses are too pastel and the espresso is too strong, and Isack is very suddenly, very alarmingly, a Formula One driver.

The Airbnb is two floors and aggressively rustic. There’s a bowl of artificial lemons on the kitchen table and a wrought-iron bed frame in his room that looks like it belongs in an indie horror film.

“I call the bed that doesn’t squeak when you breathe,” you say, tossing your duffel onto the couch with the confidence of someone who knows how to win.

Isack drops his bags and flops down beside you, limbs long and graceless. The couch groans. “This is surreal,” he says, staring up at the ceiling, which features an oil painting of what might be two angels fist-bumping.

You hum in agreement, already digging into your bag for a charger or snacks or possibly toothpaste to share with your idiot friend.

“You’re about to drive for Racing Bulls,” you say, not looking at him. “Like, real F1. Lights out and away we go. That kind of thing.”

He groans, dragging a hand over his face. “Don’t say it like that. It makes me want to throw up.”

“You’re just scared because now you can’t blame the car.”

He lifts his head to glare at you. You grin. It’s wildly unfair, the way you can disarm him with nothing but a look. “You’re the worst,” he mutters.

“And yet, you invited me here.”

He did. He really, really did.

He invited you before the holidays were even over, texted you in the middle of a New Year’s Eve party he barely remembered attending. Come with me. Pre-season. Italy. Be my emotional support baguette.

You’d replied with a thumbs up and a heart. Then, you showed up at Gare de Lyon with a suitcase and a grin and a croissant. You made him hold while you re-tied your sneakers.

He still thinks about it. The casual ease of your closeness. The way your shoulder presses against his now, warm and solid, grounding. “You excited?” you ask, gentler now.

He doesn’t answer right away. He merely watches the ceiling angels continue their enigmatic bro handshake. “Yeah,” he says after a moment too long. “And nervous. And... I don't know. It feels big. Bigger than I thought.”

You glance over. Your eyes are the same eyes that bore into him in first grade, when he was a curly-haired transfer student who still got his tenses messed up. 

“Good,” you say simply. “It should. You’re doing something big.”

He swallows. Looks at you for a second longer than he probably should. Then, he bumps his shoulder against yours again. “So, no toothpaste, huh?” 

You shove him off the couch.

Come evening, Isack announces dinner plans with a flourish. “Pepe’s in town. We’re meeting him tonight. Restobar. Casual.”

You look up from your laptop, face pinched in a suspicious squint, like you’re trying to detect the catch buried between the lines. “Pepe Martí?”

“The one and only.”

“Didn’t he spray champagne in your eye at Monza?”

“It was celebratory assault. Ancient history.”

You close your laptop with a soft click, settling back on the couch with the air of someone who’s already decided they’re going, but wants to be convinced anyway. “Weird. I thought he hated you.”

“He doesn’t hate me,” Isack says exasperatedly. “He just has a very aggressive love language.”

You snort. “That explains the champagne.”

In truth, Isack isn’t sure why the idea of you meeting Pepe now makes his stomach feel like it’s full of bees. Not the nice, metaphorical kind either. The buzzing, mildly panicked kind. You’d hovered at the periphery of enough F2 paddocks that your faces had probably passed like ships in the hospitality night.

But for whatever reason—timing, chaos, a tendency for you to disappear right before post-qualifying debriefs—you’d never officially met. It feels strange, almost unnatural, that two of the people who occupy the most space in his life have somehow never shared more than a passing nod.

Tonight, that changes.

The restobar in Faenza is dimly lit and full of old wood and louder locals. It smells like grilled meat, overconfident cologne, and faint desperation from the waiter who’s been dodging a birthday serenade at the next table for fifteen minutes.

Pepe is already there when you arrive, perched at a high table, hair a little too neat to be unintentional, like he tried and wants you to know he did.

“Amore mio!” he shouts when he sees Isack, arms thrown wide like they haven’t spoken in decades. Then, catching sight of you, he shifts gears so fast he might get whiplash. “And you must be the best friend.”

He says the best friend like it should be capitalized and possibly italicized. Probably followed by an exclamation point and a bouquet of flowers.

You smile, warm and polite, slipping easily into the kind of charm that sneaks up on people. Isack can practically hear the cartoon birds chirping around Pepe’s head. It’s ridiculous. And predictable. And he kind of wants to kick a chair.

Dinner is loud. The food comes in mismatched plates, the wine flows faster than it should, and the three of you start stacking shared appetizers in the middle of the table like a Jenga tower made of breadsticks and calamari.

You fall into conversation with Pepe like you’ve known him for years. He pulls out every story from their F2 days with the performative glee of a man auditioning for a biopic. You laugh at his impersonation of their former engineer. You laugh harder when he describes Isack’s sprint race tantrum in Austria, which, for the record, was justified. The gravel trap was a menace.

“I swear, he kicked a trash can so hard it broke the sound barrier,” Pepe says.

“I was emotionally processing,” Isack grumbles into his water.

“He nearly got fined for conduct unbecoming of a teammate.”

“That trash can had it coming.”

It goes like that for most of the night. Pepe playing the charming fool. You, being effortlessly yourself. And Isack, somewhere in the middle, pretending he isn’t watching the way Pepe watches you. Pretending he doesn’t notice the way Pepe leans a little closer every time you speak, or how he suddenly finds reasons to touch your arm, or laugh at even your worst puns like they’re comedic gold. 

You excuse yourself after the second round of drinks, disappearing toward the comfort room with a casual squeeze of Isack’s shoulder. It lingers longer than it should. The moment you’re out of sight, Pepe leans in with the subtlety of a man who’s never been subtle a day in his life.

“So,” he says, dropping the grin just enough to seem earnest. “Your best friend.”

Isack sips his drink, slow. “What about her?” 

“Is she single?” 

He shrugs, leaning back in his chair. “Why, you wanna ask her to prom?”

Pepe whines in protest. “Come on, man. I’m being serious. She seems chill as hell.” 

Isack lets that sink in. It sits weird. Like a pebble in his shoe. Not painful. Just—there. Just annoying enough to notice.

He looks toward the hallway, where you’re still gone, then back at Pepe, who’s watching him with the infuriating patience of someone who knows what he wants and has decided the universe should give it to him.

“Yeah,” Isack says finally. “She’s great.” 

“So you’ll help me out?”

Isack drums his fingers against the glass. It clinks like a ticking clock.

The answer should be easy. It is easy. You’re not his. He’s not yours. There’s no unspoken tension except for all the ones he doesn’t want to name. And still, there’s a part of him that wants to lie, to say you’re secretly married or halfway to a vow of celibacy.

Instead, he shrugs. “Sure,” he says with forced casualness. “I’ll help you.” 

Pepe beams. “I owe you one.” 

Isack smiles back, thin and crooked, and tells himself that the weird twist in his chest is just the lemonade. Just citrus. Just a passing sting.

You return, eyes bright, smile easy, sliding back into the conversation like you never left. Isack watches the way you light up when Pepe tosses out another joke, the way you nudge his knee under the table without thinking.

He tells himself he’s fine, and he really, really tries to believe it.

Isack finds you in the kitchen wearing his hoodie and making your third cup of espresso.

You’re squinting at your phone, barefoot, hair a mess, mumbling something about the Italian grocery app being designed by masochists. You look so at home in his borrowed clothes, in this little sunlit chaos of a kitchen, that for a second Isack forgets what he came in to say.

You glance up, breaking the spell. “You’re staring. Either say good morning or tell me if I bought the wrong kind of oats.”

He leans against the doorframe, arms crossed. “Good morning. Also, those oats are for horses.”

You scowl at the bag. “I knew it.”

He almost lets the moment hang there—warm, ordinary, the kind of domestic that sneaks up on you—but then he clears his throat. “I have to go to the garage today. Pre-season prep, fitting, simulator stuff.”

You nod, but there’s something in the curve of your mouth, the way your fingers still on the mug. Like you’re waiting. “Cool,” you say eventually, too casual. “Should I come?”

He pauses. Feels the answer bump against his teeth before he chooses a different one. “Actually… you’re going on a tour of the city.”

Your eyes widen with a hint of shock. “I am?” 

“Yeah,” he says, walking over to grab a banana he has no intention of eating. “Pepe’s taking you.”

There’s a beat. A flicker of surprise. Then something else. “I thought he was flying back to Sabadell this morning.”

Isack shrugs, peels the banana in one aggressive move. “His flight got delayed.”

He doesn’t say he knows it didn’t. Doesn’t say Pepe canceled it after dinner, sent him a text with a fire emoji and hope she likes biscotti. He probably should’ve told Pepe you don’t care too much for biscotti, but that’s his problem. 

You watch Isack for a second too long, like you might be doing mental math and realizing none of it quite adds up. Then, you sigh. “Fine. But if I end up on a scooter without a helmet, you’re going to pay for my hospital bills.” 

“Deal.”

You disappear to change. Isack eats half the banana before tossing the rest into the trash bin. It tastes like guilt and the aftertaste of something he hasn’t felt in years.

Half an hour later, you’re by the front door, tying your shoes. There’s a knock—sharp, eager. Pepe, standing outside in sunglasses and a jacket he clearly thinks makes him look like a local. He has the energy of a man about to star in a romcom montage.

“Ciao, mi vida,” he greets you.

Two languages in one go. Both you and Isack roll your eyes, but at least you’re smiling. “You ready to show me Faenza, or are we just going to loiter dramatically in piazzas?” you tease Pepe. 

“Both,” Pepe grins.

Isack lingers in the doorway, hand on the frame, watching as Pepe offers you his arm. You actually take it, laughing at something he says before you’re even out of earshot.

The door swings shut. The silence that follows is full of espresso steam and a terrible, gnawing question.

Isack wonders when exactly it started feeling like losing something he never had.

He pushes the thought to the back of his mind and focuses on what he does have: The Racing Bulls headquarters, which smells like rubber and ambition.

Isack walks in with his hands in his pockets, pretending he isn’t mildly intimidated by how many people already seem to know his name. Someone hands him a clipboard. Someone else gestures him into a fitting. There’s a brief but enthusiastic welcome meeting that involves espresso, four different PowerPoints, and Yuki Tsunoda casually hurling a stress ball at the wall.

“You’re the kid,” Yuki says, grinning.

“You’re not exactly ancient,” Isack shoots back.

“Yeah, but I have trauma. That ages you.”

They shake hands like boxers before a friendly match—no real heat, but both clocking each other’s moves. Yuki seems cool. Equal parts chaotic and competent. The engineers already seem in sync. Isack even gets a laugh out of one of the mechanics during seat fitting, which feels like winning something small but important.

The simulator is less forgiving. By hour three, his neck feels like it wants to secede from the rest of his body.

He gets through it. He takes notes. He lets the weird pressure sink in and settle somewhere behind his ribs. It’s real now, all of it. The team, the season, the expectation.

By the time he makes it back to the Airbnb, the sun is half-asleep and his shoulders are carrying the day like wet concrete. He kicks off his shoes, steps inside, and stops short.

You and Pepe are on the couch.

There’s a movie playing. Something old, black and white, probably subtitled. You’re tucked under a blanket, legs curled, face lit soft by the screen. Pepe’s sprawled beside you with a bowl of popcorn on his lap.

“Welcome back, rookie,” you call out to Isack without looking.

He mumbles something that might be a greeting, still caught off-guard.

“You hungry?” you ask, already standing. “We saved you some of the pasta. It’s in the fridge. I’ll heat it up.”

You disappear into the kitchen before he can answer. Pepe pats the cushion next to him, but Isack ignores it, lowering himself into the armchair instead. He sinks into the upholstery like it might help him process the entire day.

Pepe turns to him with the expression of a man who’s just been handed a glass of very good wine. “We had a good day,” he announces in a stage-whisper. 

“Did you.”

“Took her to the clock tower. And the bookshop with the cat that hates men,” Pepe rambles. “Then the two of us split a tiramisu. It was intimate.”

Isack snorts. “Sounds romantic.”

“It was. I could cry about it.” 

There’s a beat. Then: “Hey,” Pepe says, shifting slightly. “Can I ask you something kind of weird?”

Isack lifts a brow. “Is it about the man-hating cat?”

“No, it’s about your best friend.”

That lands heavier than it should. “What about her?” Isack asks, even though he already half-knows where this is going. 

Pepe eyes him, grin crooked. “How did you never fall for her? I mean, come on. She’s funny, and hot, and she clearly loves you in that ride-or-die, might-bury-a-body-for-you way.”

Isack opens his mouth. Closes it.

Because he has.

Not fallen, exactly. More like slipped, once or twice, when you were laughing too hard at one of his jokes or looking at him like he mattered more than his lap times ever could. It always passed. Or he shoved it down until it did.

Best friends. That’s the thing. That’s what you are. What you’ve always been.

He exhales, forces a laugh. “She’s my best friend,” he doubles down. “That’s it.” 

Pepe hums, unconvinced, but he doesn’t press. Maybe because you reappear, holding a plate of reheated pasta, steam curling upward. You hand it to Isack with a smile, then drop onto the couch again—but this time, you sit beside him. Not Pepe. 

Your knee brushes his. You don’t move away. Isack twirls the fork through the pasta and pretends it doesn’t mean anything.

Pepe watches the whole thing and doesn’t say a word.

The movie plays on, black and white shadows flickering across the walls like ghosts with good timing.

“Get dressed,” Isack proclaims. “We’re going to the beach.”

Your eyes light up instantly. “Like… for real? Not a metaphor? Not a training exercise disguised as leisure?”

“Sand. Water. Minimal cardio. I promise.”

You scramble to your feet with the glee of someone who’s just been told school’s canceled. “I’m wearing the obnoxious sunglasses.”

“I’d be offended if you didn’t,” he sighs, already reaching for the Gentle Monster knockoff that you purchased in a thrift shop. 

Isack manages to rent a car that smells like someone once smoked a cigarette out of spite in the glove compartment. You don’t seem to mind. You fiddle with the aux cord and commandeer the playlist before they hit the autostrada.

The drive to Ravenna is bright and warm, full of sun streaked windows and half-sung lyrics. You both argue over the best road trip snacks (he insists on plain chips, you bring chocolate despite the sun), and by the time you see the sea peeking through the trees, Isack is convinced the day might actually be perfect.

Which is, of course, the first mistake. He pulls into the beach car park and glances at you, ready to soak in your reaction.

“It looks beautiful,” you say, squinting toward the water. “Kind of makes me want to move to Italy.”

“You can crash in my closet,” he offers. “Great rent. Terrible Wi-Fi.”

You laugh, unbuckling your seatbelt. And then your gaze shifts. “Is that—?” 

It is. 

Pepe, with his shirt open, sandals tragically worn, holding a bouquet of flowers with the confidence of a man who has never once doubted a single choice he’s made. He spots you and waves like this is all very spontaneous.

You blink. “Huh. Small country.”

Isack’s already wincing. “Weird, right?” he fibs, as if he and Pepe hadn’t texted about this the night before. “Total coincidence.”

You glance sideways. “Really.”

“Italy is famously compact.”

You narrow your eyes, but Pepe is already closing the distance, holding out the bouquet like a contestant on a reality show. “For you,” he says, eyes soft. “I didn’t know what you liked, so I went with roses.”

You take them because you’re gracious, and good at hiding disappointment, and because you probably don’t want to look unkind in front of two men watching your every breath.

Isack watches your smile tighten. Not quite forced. Not quite thrilled.

You think roses are cliché. 

You once said it on a rainy walk in Montmartre, called them emotionally lazy flowers. You said peonies were better. Or wildflowers. Or anything that didn’t feel like it came from a Valentine’s Day display rack.

You still thank Pepe. Still hold the bouquet carefully. Isack looks away, throat tight.

The beach stretches out, endless and perfect. Sand like sifted sugar, water clear enough to tempt confession, and sunlight bouncing off the Adriatic with persistence that could qualify as flirtation.

You spread out the towels while Pepe enthusiastically stakes claim to a patch of shade with the same enthusiasm he brings to everything. Isack tosses the beach bag down with a grunt and sits, squinting out at the water like it might solve something.

Then, you start undressing.

It isn’t a performance. You’re only peeling off your cover-up and shaking out your hair with the casual grace of someone who has no idea they’re about to cause an emotional incident.

Isack forgets how to blink.

Pepe chokes slightly on his own tongue. “You look—” He stammers. “Wow. Like, illegal levels of beautiful.”

You laugh, polite and a little embarrassed, and Isack instinctively reaches for the armor he wears best. “Don’t let that bikini fool you,” he tells Pepe wryly. “She still owes me ten euros for losing rock-paper-scissors.”

The joke lands, sort of. Your expression flickers. A crack in the sunshine. You chuckle along with Pepe, but it doesn’t light your face the same way. Isack feels the moment curdle in his mouth.

“Pepe,” you say, turning smoothly. “Would you mind helping me with sunscreen? I can’t reach my back.”

Pepe perks up like a spaniel. “I live for this exact request.”

Isack stands before he can think better of it. “I’m going for a swim.”

You glance up at him, brows raised. “You haven’t put on sunscreen yet.” 

“Yeah, well, I’m allergic to public displays of lotion.”

You snort. Pepe laughs louder. Isack walks away.

The water is cold in the best way. A slap that feels like a reset. He dives under, lets the salt sting his eyes. It doesn’t help. All it does is remind him that you’re back on the shore, letting someone else touch the space between your shoulder blades.

He floats, arms out, staring at the sun through lowered lashes, and wonders why he thought today would end any other way.

The rest of the beach day unfolds like a montage directed by someone who hates subtlety.

Pepe is predictably unbearable. Doing handstands in the surf, trying to charm a waiter into giving you free granita, offering you his towel even though you’ve brought your own. You play along. You always play along.

There’s a moment where he convinces you to dance in the shallow tide and Isack watches from under his towel, sunglasses on, stomach doing the kind of slow roll he usually associates with track day nerves.

He joins in when he has to. Laughs when it’s expected. Still, there’s something dislodged in his chest the whole time. Like someone opened a cupboard in his ribcage and everything fell out at once.

The drive home is golden-hour quiet.

You’re in the passenger seat, legs curled under you, hair still a little damp from the sea. You hum occasionally to the radio, but it’s gentler now. Like the day has taken some of your noise with it.

Isack doesn’t mind the silence. He just minds what it might mean.

You’re halfway back to Faenza when you speak. “Any plans tomorrow?”

He shrugs. “Garage in the morning. Maybe grocery shopping. Why?”

You look out the window. Then back at him. “Pepe asked me out.”

There it is. The sentence drops like a wrench.

“Oh,” Isack says. “Cool.”

You nod a little too quickly. “Yeah. Just, like, a coffee. Not a big deal.”

He tightens his grip on the wheel. Loosens it. “Sounds good.”

Silence again. The kind that wants to ask something or be asked something. You lean your head back against the seat and say nothing else. Neither does Isack. 

When you pull into the Airbnb’s drive, the sky has gone syrupy with sunset. You reach for the door handle. “Thanks for today,” you say.

He nods. “Go on ahead. I’ll return the car.”

You hesitate. Like you might offer to stay. But then you leave. Isack watches until the door clicks shut behind you.

Then, he drops his forehead to the steering wheel and groans into the plastic. A long, aching sound.

The car beeps in protest.

He stays like that until there’s a rap on the window. He looks up to find a scowling policeman staring back at him. 

Isack apologizes in broken Italian, mutters something about returning the car. He straightens, pulls himself together. Drives off without another word.

The sound of the horn still rings in his ears, and so does your voice, soft and hopeful: Pepe asked me out.

Your date looms like a plot twist that everyone else saw coming. Isack is pretending to care about the race on his phone when you emerge from the bedroom holding two outfits in either hand.

“Pick,” you say, extending two hangers. 

Isack’s eyes narrow. 

On the left: the green sundress. The one you wore to Monaco last year. He remembers how it moved in the breeze, how it made your laugh sound louder, brighter. How he’d gotten annoyed at a passing fan who stared too long, and you’d called him dramatic.

On the right: the rust-red top and denim mom jeans. More casual, more subtle. The outfit you wore to that random film festival in Paris where you both sat through two and a half hours of subtitled existential horror and got crêpe after like nothing had happened. He remembers you licking powdered sugar off your thumb, asking him if yearning looked better in black and white. 

He still doesn’t know the answer. He does know what longing looks like in technicolor, though. It feels awfully a lot like this moment. 

He points to the red. “That one.”

You nod, satisfied. “Good. I was leaning that way.”

Of course you were. You disappear again. He stares at the spot you left like it owes him closure.

Minutes later, you step out, radiant in a way that feels both cinematic and inevitable. The shirt clings in the right places. The jeans sit perfectly. Your earrings glint. Isack pretends to be engrossed in folding a grocery bag.

He’s always known you were attractive. It was just a fact, like your love of overpriced coffee or your inexplicable ability to quote bad horror movies verbatim. But lately—and he doesn’t know when or how or why—it started feeling like a fact that might ruin his life.

You step up to him, easy and warm. “Wish me luck?”

He tries for nonchalance. “Try not to fall for his shirtless anecdotes.”

You laugh, and then, like it costs you nothing, press a kiss to his cheek. It lingers. Not on his skin, but somewhere behind his eyes.

And then you’re gone, out the door and into the arms of someone who thinks Thai food is a date night flex.

Because of course Pepe would pick the one cuisine you’ve always said tastes like betrayal. Because of course you’d go anyway.

And because, apparently, Isack has officially lost his goddamn mind.

Hours later, Isack hears the door open before he sees you. Keys fumbling, shoes lightly kicking the wall. You step inside with a sigh that belongs in a different movie. Something French and tragic with a cigarette dangling off the edge.

He doesn’t look up from his spot on the couch. “You’re back early.”

You toss your bag down with less grace than usual. “It’s midnight.”

“Early for Italians.”

You plop down beside him, exhaling like the night wrung you out. He doesn’t ask how it went, but you tell him anyway. “It was nice,” you say. “He took me to that place on Via Cavour. The one with the bamboo walls and the overly enthusiastic waiters.”

“You hate eager waiters,” Isack points out. 

You ignore him. “We had those noodle wraps that fall apart the second you look at them. And he talked about Barcelona for, like, an hour. Did you know he once almost bought a goat from a street vendor on a dare?”

“Unfortunately, yes. He brought it up in Hungary.”

You pull your knees up, arms wrapped around them, voice too cheerful.

“He was sweet, though. Paid for everything. Even hailed me a cab—after we walked the length of the harbor. God, my heels were not made for cobblestones.”

Isack glances down, frowns. “Your feet are blistered.”

“They’re battle scars.”

“They’re dumb.” Isack pushes the couch pillow off his lap. “Give me your feet.”

Your brows raise. “Kinky.” 

“Be normal for once, please. I have healing hands. Or at least Band-Aids.”

You hesitate, then you slowly stretch your legs across his lap. Your ankles are marked red, the pads of your toes faintly swollen. He reaches for the First-Aid kit on the living room coffee table, muttering French obscenities under his breath.

For a while, the room is quiet. Just music playing off his phone and the crinkle of wrappers. Then, you speak. Low. Like you almost didn’t mean to. “I thought this trip would be about us.”

He looks up. Your eyes are on the ceiling.

“I mean,” you continue, “I’ve seen Pepe more than I’ve seen you. And I came here for you. Not the Spanish court jester.”

The guilt is immediate and heavy. Isack presses a bandage onto your heel. Carefully. Like it’s the only thing he can still fix.

“I’m sorry,” he says, voice barely above a whisper. “Tomorrow’s yours. Just us. I swear.”

You finally look at him. Smile soft, tired. “Better be.”

He meets your gaze and thinks about how many things he hasn’t said. How many things he shouldn't. How tomorrow might break him anyway.

“I’ll make it perfect,” he promises, and he means it.

Isack wakes up the next day with mission energy. The kind he usually reserves for race day and the rare, sudden impulse to deep-clean his apartment at two in the morning. There’s a certainty in his chest, warm and weighted, like if he doesn’t get this right, something might shift out of place permanently.

Today is yours. No distractions. No Pepe. Just Isack and a plan that comes together like a jigsaw puzzle built from memory—each piece shaped by years of observation, of inside jokes and passing comments and the unspoken reverence of knowing someone better than you know yourself.

First: coffee. 

Not just any coffee. The tiny Faenza café you declared life-changing three summers ago, where the barista still calls you campionessa and overfilled your cup with a wink. You light up the second you step inside, greeting the staff like old friends. Isack watches you from behind his espresso, grinning quietly into the rim of his cup as you sip with dramatic flair and announce, “Still the best in Italy.”

Second: the museum. 

The one you dragged him to under the guise of ‘cultural enrichment’ but really because you wanted to see the weird medieval instruments that looked like cursed objects from a fantasy novel. You lead him straight to your favorites, offering commentary that is probably inaccurate. When you stop to take a selfie with a 14th-century lute, Isack photobombs. He tries not to preen when it goes live on your Instagram story. 

Lunch is picnic-style in a hidden courtyard garden you both stumbled into once when you were hopelessly lost and slightly hangry. He pulls out your favorite pastries from a paper bag like a magician revealing doves. You gasp at each one, acting as if he conjured them from thin air.

“How do you remember all this?” you ask, mouth full of cream cheese and suspicion.

He shrugs, feigning coolness. “I’m secretly sentimental. Don’t let Yuki in on it.”

“I knew it,” you whisper like it’s a state secret. “You’re all mush underneath, Hadjar.” 

The afternoon turns into a slow wander. You window-shop. He teases you for nearly buying a ceramic duck. You pause at a street artist sketching tourists and dare him to pose. He declines. You try again. He relents. The result is a caricature with an enormous forehead and dramatic brows that you both agree is a masterpiece.

By the third cobbled street, you’re limping. Maybe faking it, but Isack’s not about to deny you.

“Blisters,” you declare, stopping in your tracks and holding out your hands like you’re ready to pass away on the spot.

Isack knows where this is going. “You want me to carry you?” he sighs. 

“Yes,” you say without hesitation, eyes gleaming with mischief.

He groans, but turns around, crouching. “Get on.”

You leap onto his back with a delighted squeal, arms looping around his neck, cheek pressed against his shoulder blades.

“God,” he grunts, “you’re heavier than I remember.”

“You wound me. This is all emotional baggage.”

He snorts, trudging forward. People stare. He doesn’t care. If anything, he’s a little smug about it. You hum a tune near his ear, and he wishes, briefly, that the street would never end.

There’s gelato at sunset. You eat yours too fast and get a brain freeze. He steals a bite anyway. You chase him down the beach path with a sandal raised like a weapon. Somewhere in the chaos, the day becomes yours again—entirely and irrevocably.

The evening winds down in cinematic slow motion.

You’re curled up on the couch, sun-warm and half-wrapped in one of his old hoodies that hangs oversized on your frame. He flips through channels, but you're already half-asleep, eyes fluttering as your head finds his chest like it was always meant to rest there. One of your hands curls loosely near his ribcage. He doesn’t move.

“Best day ever,” you mumble, slurring slightly, barely audible.

Isack exhales. Lets the day settle into his bones like gravity. His heart stumbles in his chest.

He doesn’t answer.

He just closes his eyes and lets you rest against him, hoping, foolishly, that if he stays still enough, time might freeze right here. On the couch, with your hair brushing his collarbone, your breath slow against his shirt, and the knowledge that maybe, for once, he’s done something completely, unmistakably right.

Isack should’ve known the universe wouldn’t let him have one clean, uncomplicated day.

It starts well enough. The air between you is light, still golden from yesterday. You’re wearing the hoodie you stole from him again, and he’s not saying anything about it because he likes the way it looks on you.

You’re unusually chipper about going to Racing Bulls headquarters. You ask things like, “Will they make me wear a fireproof suit?” and “If I get in the simulator, will it unlock my F1 potential?”

“Only if you crash less than Yuki,” Isack says.

You grin like you have something to prove.

He parks and you walk in beside him, credentials already arranged. It feels weirdly normal—bringing you here. Like you belong in his world. Like you already do.

Then Pepe appears. Not just appears. Materializes. A recurring plotline in a show Isack didn’t subscribe to.

“Hey! What are the odds?” Pepe says, smiling too broadly.

“Suspiciously high,” Isack mutters.

“Campos stuff,” Pepe adds. “Quick meeting with the junior team. Thought I’d drop in on my favorite almost-teammate.”

Isack forces a tight smile. You’re smiling, too. “Small world,” you say.

“Tiny,” Isack deadpans.

The three of you trail through the main floor like some weird reality show cast. Isack leading, you flitting between curiosity and commentary, Pepe walking a little too close.

Yuki finds the three of you by the hospitality area, snacking like he owns the place. He greets Isack with a fist bump, eyes flicking toward Pepe, and then you. The older driver does a quick assessment.

“Ah,” Yuki says, nodding sagely. “You must be Isack’s girlfriend.” 

Isack freezes for half a second. He looks at you. Your expression is unreadable, but you don’t say anything. Neither does he. Pepe, however, laughs. Too loudly.

“No, no,” he says quickly, on your behalf. “They’re just friends. Best friends. Very platonic.”

The silence that follows is the kind that hums.

“Riiight,” Yuki drawls, eyes narrowing like he’s clocking something he won't bring up.

Before Isack can invent a distraction, one of the staff calls him and Yuki in for a strategy session. Yuki claps him on the back and whispers, just for Isack to hear, “Don’t worry. I won’t tell the team you have feelings.”

“I don’t,” Isack says a little too fast.

Yuki just smirks.

You wave as they head off. Isack glances back once, and you’re already laughing at something Pepe said. His stomach twists.

“Don’t worry, Hadjar,” Pepe calls out to Isack, voice trailing behind as you part. “I’ll keep her entertained.”

Isack doesn’t answer. He only walks into the meeting room and tells himself it’s fine. That he trusts you. That it doesn’t matter. That none of this means anything.

He’s starting to realize how often he lies to himself.

By the time Isack gets out of the strategy meeting, the sky’s shifted colors and so has his mood. He checks his phone the second he’s free. Nothing.

No messages. No missed calls. No chaotic selfies in your text thread. Radio silence.

He frowns. Shoots you a quick text: All good? 

Then one to Pepe, which he regrets immediately: Where are you guys? 

No response. Not for ten minutes. Then twenty. Then thirty.

By the time your name lights up his screen with a cheery, Hey! Sorry, my phone was on Do Not Disturb. We went downtown! Dinner later?, he’s already halfway to deciding he’s not in the mood.

He types, Nah, I’m heading back. Tired, and doesn’t wait for a reply.

The Airbnb feels too quiet when he returns. Like it knows something he doesn't. Like it wants him to sit in it.

He tosses his keys into the bowl by the door harder than necessary. Pulls a cold bottle of water from the fridge and doesn't drink it. Paces the kitchen once. Twice.

By the time you walk in, soft laughter still clinging to your clothes like perfume, he’s not ready.

“Hey,” you greet, toeing your shoes off. “Dinner was nice. Pepe told the worst joke I've ever heard. You would've hated it.”

He shrugs. “Didn’t feel like going.”

You pause.

“Okay. You could’ve said that without the tone.”

“What tone?” he snaps. 

You narrow your eyes. “That tone. The one where you act like I’ve done something wrong without saying what it is.”

Isack exhales through his nose, but it sounds more like a sigh sharpened at the edges. “Forget it. Doesn’t matter.”

“Clearly it does. You’re acting like I left you stranded in a ditch.”

“You kind of did.”

You glower. “We were at the same building.”

“And then you disappeared.”

You cross your arms. “Isack. I texted you back the second I saw my phone.”

“Whatever,” he huffs. 

That does it. You pull back like he slapped you. “I don’t know what’s going on with you,” you say, voice low and tight, “but figure it out. I don’t deserve to be your punching bag.” 

And just like that, you’re gone. Bedroom door clicking shut behind you with finality.

Isack stands in the living room, alone with his unspoken feelings and half-finished arguments. He sinks onto the couch and lets the silence stretch, taut and ugly. He presses the heels of his hands to his eyes and wonders how the hell he managed to mess up a day that hadn’t even started badly.

The apology never gets its moment.

Isack wakes up earlier than usual, heart already heavy with the weight of last night. He plays the conversation on loop in his head while brushing his teeth, scrubbing harder than necessary, like he can rinse the bitterness out of his mouth.

But when he steps into the living room, you’re gone.

Your shoes are missing from the doorway. Your favorite mug isn’t on the counter. The blanket you always drag onto the couch is neatly folded. The absence is clinical, as if you were never there to begin with.

He texts you. Hey. Can we talk?

Ten minutes later. I was a dick. I’m sorry.

An hour later, still nothing. Against his better judgement, Isack texts Pepe to ask whether he’s seen you. 

Pepe responds in under twenty seconds with a selfie of the two of you. You’re grinning, but it’s the kind of smile Isack recognizes too well—the polite, careful kind. The one you wear when you’re trying too hard not to feel too much. Behind you is a gaudy tourist spot Isack knows you once called ‘aggressively not my vibe.’

Isack doesn’t reply. He just closes the chat and holes up in his room like it’s a bunker. Laptop open, phone on silent. No appetite. No music. He scrolls through old photos with you and hates every one of them for being so easy.

Evening slips in like a whisper.

He hears the front door open, the rustle of your jacket being hung, the soft clink of your keys in the bowl. Pepe’s voice is low, by the door. “You alright?”

You pause for a beat too long. “Yeah.”

You don’t sound alright. Not to Isack. Not to anyone who knows what your voice sounds like when you mean it.

Pepe doesn’t know that, though. Just says, voice light and happy, “Good night, then. Text me if you need anything.”

The door closes with a click.

Isack hears your footsteps pad across the floor, soft and careful, like you’re trying not to wake something sleeping. Maybe it’s him. Maybe it’s whatever fragile thread is still left between you.

Your door shuts. Just like that, the apartment is divided. One wall. Two rooms. A silence loud enough to drown in.

Isack steps out of his bedroom for the first time that day. In the hallway, he stares at your door like it might blink first. It doesn’t, obviously. It remains closed, unmoving. A slab of wood and tension.

He hesitates for a second—just long enough to think, Maybe this is a bad idea—then knocks.

Once.

Twice.

Silence.

Still, he knows you’re awake. He can feel it. The kind of quiet that only exists when someone is deliberately holding their breath on the other side.

He leans forward, rests his forehead against the door. “I know you’re in there.”

Nothing.

Then, finally, your voice. Muffled but close. “Isack, if you’re here to pick another fight, go away.”

“Not here to fight. Just to sit with you.” 

He sinks down, back against the wood, knees drawn up. He imagines you doing the same, mirrored on the other side. Like two halves of the same coin, split down the grain.

“Did you have fun today?” he asks, tentative.

You exhale. The sound is barely audible through the barrier.

“Pepe tried,” you say. “Took me to a place he thought I’d like. I didn’t.” A pause. “I pretended to.”

Isack swallows. “Why?”

“Because he was trying,” you say. “And because I didn’t want to admit the only thing I really wanted to do today was talk to you.”

His chest tightens.

You continue, softer now. “But if you want me to be with him, say it. If there’s something you’re not saying, say that too. Just... don’t lie, Isack. Not to me.”

He closes his eyes. His head thuds gently back against the door. “I don’t know what to say,” he mumbles.

“Start with the truth.”

“The truth is—” He sighs, voice low. “I want you to be happy.”

Another silence. This one is thicker.

“You make me happy,” you say after a moment.

He freezes, fingers curling into his jeans. The quiet that follows isn’t awkward. It’s weighty. Something shared. Something hovering between.

He leans his head back again and stays there. Neither of you moves. Neither of you opens the door.

The next morning, Isack is on a mission. Again. But this one doesn’t involve strategic plans or grand gestures. 

He clatters around the Airbnb kitchen like someone who’s watched a cooking video once and promptly blacked out halfway through. The eggs burn before they scramble. The toast is more smoke than bread. The coffee tastes vaguely like dish soap. But he’s trying, just like Pepe has been trying these past few days. 

You walk in, hair still sleep-mussed, wearing one of his old jerseys like it belongs to you. Which, at this point, it kind of does. He glances up from the pan, sheepish.

“I made breakfast,” he says.

You stare at the charred offerings, then back at him. “Did you anger a god recently?”

He snorts. “I thought effort counted for something.”

You laugh, stepping in. You hug him from behind, arms around his waist, cheek pressed to his back. “It does,” you say. “You’re still a culinary disaster, but it does.”

He leans into it. Just for a second. Just until his heart starts doing that thing again—skipping like it knows something his brain doesn’t.

You pull back and poke him in the ribs. “Now get out of my kitchen.”

He does as told, retreating to the side while you take over. Watching you move—barefoot, still half-dreaming, humming something under your breath—does something to him.

Not the usual something. Not the friend-something. Not even the maybe-they-look-nice-today something.

It’s a quiet click in his chest. A door swinging open he didn’t know existed.

Oh.

It doesn’t hit like a thunderclap. It settles like a truth that’s always been there.

He loves you. He’s pretty sure he always has.

He just didn’t recognize it under all the noise. There’s no noise here—in this rented apartment, with you in his shirt and his heart at your feet. 

You turn and catch him staring.

He panics and ends up flicking you on the forehead.

“Ow,” you whine, offended. “Rude.”

He shrugs, trying for casual. “You were looking smug.” 

“I was fixing your eggs.” 

“Judgmentally.” 

You roll your eyes, smiling anyway. He flees toward his room like the coward he is.

Because if he stays, he might tell you what just occurred to him—and if he says it out loud, nothing will be the same again.

This time, you’re the one who invites Pepe. 

That alone should be enough for Isack to play it cool, to shove whatever very-not-best-friend feelings he’s developing back into the emotional locker he never quite learned how to use. But it isn’t.

Because now he’s watching you lean slightly toward Pepe while explaining something about the local architecture, and Pepe’s leaning in too, like a man who’s never heard of personal space, and Isack feels like his blood is simmering just under his skin.

“That’s a Corinthian column,” you say, gesturing upward. “You can tell from the acanthus leaves.”

“That sounds made up,” Pepe teases good-nautredly.

You scoff, delighted. “Argue with my art history minor. Go ahead. I dare you.”

Isack mutters under his breath. “She’s terrifying when she’s right. Which is always.”

You flash him a smile. “Exactly.”

The day unfolds like a postcard. Sunlight, earthware, overpriced gelato. You’re radiant and bright and completely unaware that Isack is hanging on to your every glance like a lifeline.

He stays close. Closer than usual.

At first, it’s subtle. His hand brushing yours when you cross the street. Standing just a beat too close while you admire something in a shop window. But then Pepe tries to buy you a bracelet from a market stall, and Isack somehow ends up between you two before it even gets clasped around your wrist.

“You don’t have to,” Isack says quickly, tone light but body angled in.

Pepe’s eyebrows draw together. “It’s just a gift. Relax.”

“She’s not a claw machine prize, mate,” Isack replies, sharper than he intends.

Your lips quirk into an amused grin. “Okay, weird metaphor. But noted.”

You never pull away from Isack.

You let his arm linger against yours when he steers you toward a quieter street. You don’t say anything when he finishes your gelato after yours melts. You don’t flinch when he gives you his jacket without asking.

“I was fine,” you say, adjusting the sleeves.

“You’re always cold,” he counters.

“Still bossy.”

"Still right."

Pepe, oblivious as ever, chatters on about something F2-related. Isack barely hears him. His focus is entirely on you—how you laugh at the wrong parts of Pepe’s story, how you glance at Isack like you’re checking in, like you’re waiting to see what he thinks of it all.

And maybe that’s what drives him most insane.

Isack knows he’s being possessive. Knows he’s being an awful friend to both you and Pepe.

He just can’t stop.

Not when it feels this easy. This natural. Like maybe the whole world tilted slightly and now the space beside you belongs to him, even if he has no idea what to do with it.

By the time night falls, the town square is glowing with string lights and low chatter, the kind of accidental magic that feels too well-timed to be anything but fate. Somewhere between dinner and dessert, the three of you wander into a festival unfolding in the plaza. Live music, paper lanterns, families milling about with gelato cups and plastic cups of wine. The air smells like fried dough and sea salt.

You gasp, delighted, before Isack can even react. “Oh my God. Look at that.” 

And then you’re gone, swept up by a pack of pre-teen girls who descend like fairies on a mission, dragging you toward a booth with wooden chairs and hair-braiding kits. 

“She’s not going to make it out alive,” Isack huffs, watching you laugh as tiny hands start weaving through your hair.

Pepe grins beside him. “They’ll probably give her glitter too. You know, war paint.”

The two boys stand there a moment, watching. Isack has his hands shoved in his pockets, body tilted just slightly in your direction like a compass that can’t help itself.

“So,” Pepe says, too casually. “Do you want her?”

Isack jerks like he’s been hit. “What?”

“You heard me.” Pepe doesn't look at him, just eyes you across the plaza. “Because I do. But I also don’t make a habit of stepping on my friends’ toes.”

Isack swallows. “She’s my best friend.”

"That’s not an answer."

Isack hates how quiet the world gets for a moment, even with the music playing. Like something in him is suddenly under review.

Pepe finally turns. His voice is gentler this time. “I like her. A lot,” he doubles down. “But I think you love her, and I think she knows.”

Isack shakes his head. “She—she’s just being nice.”

“She wears your clothes, dude. And she glows around you.”

Isack doesn't say anything. He can’t. He’s not sure what any of it means, only that he’s been dragging his feelings behind him like a broken wing and pretending he can still fly straight.

Pepe claps him on the shoulder. “Look, I’m not trying to start shit. But I figured it was time someone said it out loud.”

Before Isack can reply, you come bounding back across the plaza, hair intricately braided and laced with tiny ribbons, beaming like you’ve just been knighted. “Don’t laugh,” you warn. “They were very committed.”

“You look like a Disney heroine,” Pepe says brightly, already redirecting his shine back to you. “Come on, dance with me.”

“Right now?” 

He grabs your hand with a flourish and spins you toward the music before you can say no. As you disappear into the crowd, he throws a wink over his shoulder, aimed squarely at Isack.

Isack exhales, every breath sharp with something he doesn’t have the vocabulary for.

He stays at the edge of the square, watching you dance under fairy lights with his not-quite-rival of a friend. Trying not to wonder how it would feel to be the one holding your hand. Trying—and failing—not to want more.

Isack watches you and Pepe dance under the fairy lights, arms loose, laughter unforced, your smile all sharp edges softened by the glow.

It doesn’t ache as much as he thought it would. Not now. Not after the conversation. Not knowing that Pepe will step aside if he has to. That this isn’t a contest. That maybe, it never really was.

It’s still there. The sting of want, the slow burn of it. Thankfully, it’s no longer a weight pressing on his chest. More like a steady thrum. A sort of certainty.

You look happy, dancing with your hair braided. And that means something. It means everything.

Eventually, the music winds down into a slower tempo, the kind that makes the crowd melt into scattered couples and soft footsteps on cobblestones. You and Pepe stop spinning, your arms still linked. You’re flushed from the dancing, braid a little frayed now, ribbons slipping loose.

“Okay,” you say, breathless, leaning on Isack for support. “I’m not saying he’s a bad dancer—but I’ve seen storks with more rhythm.”

“Hey,” Pepe protests, mock-affronted. “I was giving old-school charm.”

“You were giving liability,” you quip.

Isack smirks, but he doesn’t jump in yet. Not until the next song starts.

It’s not loud or flashy. It’s not one that fills the whole plaza with noise. It’s a soft, nostalgic tune, almost drowned by conversation and clinking glasses. But he recognizes it. He knows this one. Because it’s one of your favorites, even if it’s instrumental and unrecognizable to half of the festival attendees. 

You told him once, ages ago, back in a crappy hotel in Baku or maybe a quiet kitchen in Paris. You said it reminded you of summers and home and moments that felt a little like forever.

He doesn’t say anything. Just offers his hand.

You’re smiling, the corners of your eyes crinkling. Like you’re surprised Isack remembers. You slide your hand into his with a joke of, “Only if you don’t step on my feet.”

“Zero promises.”

He leads you into the plaza, away from Pepe, away from anyone who might have a say in this moment. The music hums around you, low and easy. You slot into place like you were made to fit there, arms winding around his neck, fingers brushing the back of his hair. You smell like lemons and cheap festival sweets.

The world shrinks. The rest of the plaza folds into something irrelevant. Isack just holds you, swaying slightly, like he might have done this before in a dream he barely remembers.

Isack sways with you in the center of the plaza, half-forgetting where they are, half-hoping the music never ends. There’s something impossibly golden about the whole moment—the way the plaza lights glow against the soft dusk, the scent of fried dough and melted sugar hanging in the air, the distant sounds of laughter folding into the slow pulse of the music.

Out of the corner of his eye, he catches a flash of movement. Pepe, now dancing with someone else. A girl in a red sundress, twirling him around with the kind of giddy recklessness that suggests she might not know who he is, and wouldn’t care even if she did. She’s laughing openly and stepping on his feet, but Pepe is beaming like he just got handed a trophy.

Pepe grins over her shoulder and throws Isack a thumbs-up. It’s a little ridiculous. A little theatrical. Completely sincere. The kind of gesture only a friend with nothing to lose would make.

Isack lets out a soft breath. Something unknots in his chest. The guilt doesn’t disappear, not entirely, but it quiets, settles into something gentler. He presses his hand gently against your back, just above the dip of your waist. You fit too easily against him. Like the world makes more sense this way. Like maybe this is how it always should have been.

The music drapes over you, hushed and familiar. A soft, lilting tune with a melody that could belong to a lullaby or a heartbreak, depending on how you hold it.

He leans in, close enough that his breath brushes your cheek. “So,” he breathes, “about Pepe.” 

You make a face, subtle but unmistakable. Your brows pinch together. “Isack.”

“What?”

“Not now.”

Your voice is firm. It hums through the fabric of his shirt where your forehead rests against his chest. “This moment is just for us. Don’t bring him into it.”

His heart does something inconvenient and thunderous. A traitor in his ribcage. “Okay,” he says plainly, agreeing because you asked him to. Because you’re here, and he’s here, and that’s enough to level him.

For a beat, neither of you move, suspended in something that doesn’t quite feel like real time. It’s weightless and quiet, like the moment before a race starts. No countdown. Just breath.

And then—

He leans in.

It’s not dramatic. Not practiced. Just the slow tilt of his head, the closing of space, the way his mouth finds yours like he’s been thinking about it longer than he wants to admit. He kisses you like a secret. Like he’s handing over something fragile and true.

You kiss him back.

Soft. Unrushed. Sure. The kind of kiss that doesn’t ask a question because it already knows the answer.

Somewhere behind you, the lights blur and the music carries on, but Isack can’t hear a single note over the sound of his own heart breaking open. Not in pain. In relief. In disbelief. In something so sharp and sweet it almost feels like falling.

You stay close when you pull apart. Eyes still shut. Like the world might tilt if you look at it too directly.

Isack doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to.

Not yet.

Your hand lingers in his. Your thumb brushes over his knuckles like a promise you haven’t spoken out loud. His free arm stays curled around your waist, protective and still. He wishes he could stop time. Or at least pause it. Hold it right here, right now, when everything feels terrifyingly possible.

He exhales through his nose and rests his forehead lightly against yours.

The music keeps playing. And for once, Isack doesn’t feel like he’s racing against it.

You ditch the festival not long after. 

No real excuse, no polite goodbyes. Just a shared look, your fingers lacing through Isack’s like a decision, and then you’re gone. Ducking through the edge of the crowd and into a side street glowing amber with old lanterns. 

The only sound is the echo of your footsteps and the occasional bubble of laughter when you bump into each other, like your bodies are already pulling toward each other on instinct.

You don’t make it to the door before he kisses you.

Back against the wall of the Airbnb, a hand braced near your head. He kisses you like he hasn’t had oxygen all night, like the festival music still hasn’t left his ears, like you’re the only thing that’s ever quieted the noise in his head.

You break away long enough to say, breathless, “We ditched Pepe.”

“He’ll live,” Isack mutters, pressing his mouth to your jaw.

“You know he’s going to sulk.”

“He can file a complaint to Helmut for all I care.” 

You laugh against his mouth, then yank him inside by the collar.

It’s all limbs and laughter, hips bumping into furniture, mouths dragging over flushed skin, half-on half-off clothing, until you both land on the couch with the kind of graceless thud that only two idiots in love can make. You’re straddling him, his hair a mess from your fingers, his lips swollen and bitten.

“I always wanted you,” you say, hands on either side of his face. “Even when you were annoying. Especially when you were annoying.”

He huffs. “That doesn’t narrow it down.”

You smile. Kiss him again. It slows for a moment. Softens.

His confession comes out in between kisses. “I hated how he didn’t know things,” he says against your mouth. “Like your favorite flowers, or that you hate jazz fusion, or that you get blisters from walking too long in heeled boots and pretend you're fine anyway.”

“Isack,” you groan mid-kiss. 

“What?”

“You sound like a possessive freak.”

“I’m not.” Beat. “Okay, maybe a little. But only because I actually know you.”

Your mouth twitches as you pull away briefly, just enough to look down at him. “And you think you know everything?”

“I do,” he exhales. 

Your eyes sparkle with something wicked. “Confident.” 

And then you bite him.

Just below the jaw, sharp enough to make him gasp, his hands tightening on your hips. You push him down until his back hits the cushions, climb over him like you own him. In a way, you always have.

“There are still things you can learn,” you say into the skin of his collarbone.

And Isack—future Formula One driver, alleged adult, hopeless romantic idiot—is absolutely wrecked by it. By you.

He nods dazedly. “Okay. Lesson one. Let’s go.”

Your laughter is low, warm, the kind of sound he wants to bottle and keep in his back pocket for race days.

For once, nothing else matters.

The bags are packed. The Airbnb is a mess again. Somehow, more of a mess than when you arrived—clothes draped over chairs, an empty wine bottle teetering dangerously on the edge of the table, two mismatched socks living completely separate lives across the floor. It’s chaotic in a strangely comforting way.

Isack doesn’t really care.

You’re fussing over your suitcase. Half-sitting on it, you’re trying to zip it up with a grimace and a very creative string of French-English hybrid curse words that include at least one new invention Isack’s never heard before. 

He’s leaned against the kitchen counter, chewing absently on a protein bar and watching you like you’re some kind of performance art installation. One with a questionable soundtrack and even worse spatial awareness.

“You know,” he says dryly, around a bite of chocolate peanut doom, “if you packed like a normal person, this wouldn’t be a three-act tragedy.”

You throw a sock at his head. Miss. By a wide margin. “Sorry I’m not genetically engineered for spatial logic like some people,” you snap. “Besides, half of this is yours.”

“Then why is it in your suitcase?”

“Because your suitcase is full of, and I quote, ‘emergency snacks, three pairs of the same shorts, and my emotional support hoodie.’”

“That hoodie is mine, for emphasis.”

“Not anymore.”

Isack scowls, not for the first time this morning. He’s tired, mildly sore, and still a little emotionally short-circuited from last night. Kissing you, touching you, and waking up with your foot somehow wedged under his thigh like it belonged there did something to his internal wiring. 

It made him softer. Braver. Also dumber.

He’s also absolutely not in the mood to fight over hoodie custody. Not when you keep doing shit like brushing your hand over his waist in passing or slipping your fingers through his when you think he won’t notice. He has noticed, and it’s been driving him a little bit mad.

There’s a new rhythm to your bickering now. Same tempo, new instruments. The kind of intimacy that wasn’t there before, or maybe always was but just never labeled.

You steal sips from his coffee without asking. He keeps brushing your hair behind your ear without thinking about it. Now, you kiss his cheek absentmindedly when passing by, like it’s just something that belongs in the air between you

He scratches the side of his neck absently. Winces.

You look up. “Problem?”

“You gave me a hickey. Two, actually,” he grumbles. “On the same side.”

Your grin is unapologetic. “I was proving a point.” 

“What point requires me to look like I lost a fight with a vacuum cleaner?”

“The point that you’re mine,” you say, almost flippantly. But there’s something in the way you say it. A softness. A gravity. Like you’re saying it with your whole chest, even if you pretend not to.

His brain does a weird little reboot thing. He glares, which you ignore with all the grace of someone who has known him too long to be fazed.

“You’re cocky,” he accuses.

“I’ve always been cocky. You’re just soft now.”

He opens his mouth to argue but stops when you walk up to him, zip finally conquered, your eyes annoyingly fond. You press a hand flat to his chest and lean in until you’re close enough for your breath to warm his skin. His hands twitch at his sides like they want to touch. Hold. Keep.

“You going to miss me?”

“No,” he lies.

“Coward.”

“Menace.”

You smile. He kisses you. It’s too soft for the amount of fire it lights up in his chest.

Somewhere in the middle of a chaotic Airbnb and looming departures and matching hickeys, Isack thinks: he knows you’re here. You’re his. And whatever comes next, he wants to meet it with your fingers tangled in his.

He doesn’t want it to end. Not even a little bit. ⛐

[papayareads]

might not be for everyone, but i have to talk about this one because it’s genuinely one of my absolute fav reads right now 🖤 it’s this perfect mix of slow burn tension and really unapologetic, delicious spice (i just know it´s coming)🌶️✨ the writing is so sharp and raw in the best possible way, and it isn’t afraid to go dark sometimes, which just makes the emotional parts hit even harder. the dynamic between them??? insane. like painfully good.

please do mind the content warnings (they’re there for a reason!!) but if you’re into flawed characters, secrets with teeth, and the kind of connection that sneaks up on them (and you) this one is so worth it. genuinely can’t stop thinking about it 🩶🫶

White Mercedes | Series Masterlist

Oscar Piastri x Anneliese Wolff (OFC)

Summary — It was just supposed to be a game. Once a month. No names. No questions. A few hours where she could surrender fully—because everywhere else in her life, she was drowning.

But Oscar Piastri was all quiet power and brutal precision. He didn’t ask who she was, and she didn’t offer. Not her name. Not the harsh reality of her past. Definitely not the part about being Toto Wolff’s daughter.

But it’s not a game anymore. It’s a secret with teeth. And when it all comes crashing down, she doesn’t know if it’s her heart or his career that’ll break first.

Warnings — 18+ Content, BDSM themes, realistic and flawed characters, Dom!Oscar, Sub!OFC, slow burn, lots of smut (obviously), strong language, detailed drug-addiction/past-usage, suicidal thoughts/ideation, past-suicide attempts, vaguely mentioned past sexual assault.

Notes — Please heed the warnings and take care of yourselves xxx This one is a bit intense (a lot) at times, but it's going to make their happy ending so much sweeter.

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

[papayareads]

something blue - ln4

pairing: lando norris x fem!reader summary: in which you and your ex boyfriend see each other at a wedding months later OR lando misses the fuck out of you. warnings: angst angst angst, language, smut, duh smut, p in v, f!receiving oral, dirty talk, kinda sad, yearning??, NOT PROOFREAD (will fix any typos over time) word count: 5k+ author's note: hi angels!!! I hope y'all enjoy. xoxo. bad grip - op81 will be out next (on August 1)!!

◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤

“You’re in my seat.”

You don’t bother to look up right away. Instead, you take another sip from your glass, unbothered. You already know who it is…because you’d recognize that voice anywhere. Cool, low, and effortless. 

When you finally lift your head up, he’s standing across the table. A single hand shoved into his pocket, the other holding a half-empty glass. His jacket’s long gone. Probably draped over some chair a few hours ago, and the sleeves of his shirt are rolled just enough to show the veins in his forearms.

His tie is half undone and crooked. Which tells you that he stopped pretending to be formal about five drinks ago. He walks around the table, standing at the empty chair beside you.

Lando.

You blink. “Didn’t realize seating was assigned by ego.”

He lets out an amused sound. Not fully a laugh. And his eyes drag over you a second too long. Slow and obvious. But there’s some calculation behind it. Like he’s daring you to flinch.

“If we were, you’d have to be outside,” he says, stepping forward. His shoe now nudging the leg of your chair. 

You give him a tight smile. “And you’d be in the valet lot, bothering someone else’s date probably.”

He falls into the chair beside you. Resting his arm along the back of it like he’s claiming space. Not just the seat, but you. He smells like something expensive. Musky, citrus, and the memory of someone who’s never been told no.

You don’t bother to look at him. Instead, you glance around the table. Littered in polished silverware, large centerpieces, and down at the very end….a pair of mutual friends who definitely knew what they were doing when they made the seating chart.

You make a mental note to return the favor. Maybe at their wedding. Or baby shower.

“Didn’t think you’d show.” You say, fidgeting with the napkin.

Lando leans back in the chair, posture relaxed. Careless. Like nothing bothered him.

“Thought the same about you,” he says, voice low. “Figured you’d come up with some excuse. Avoid me even longer.”

You arch a brow.

You finally run to look at him.

“I was promised free champagne and music,” you mutter. “Didn’t realize you were part of the package deal.”

He watches your mouth when you speak. He always did. And it used to be flattering. Now it just feels like some bad habit neither of you can break.

He shrugs. “Sounds like a bonus to me.”

“You were always overconfident.”

“And you always had a way with making things difficult.”

You turn your full body toward him now, elbow resting on the back of your chair. Eyes narrowed. “Is that what this is? Difficult for you?”

He looks at you. Like really looks. His tongue presses agains the inside of his cheek, like he’s holding something back. Like he’s already said too much to you.

“Not particularly.”

You laugh. “Right. That’s why you sat next to me.”

He gestures to the table. “It’s my seat.”

“It’s the seat you decided you wanted as soon as I sat in it.” 

He grins. “Y’make everything sound like foreplay.”

“Only because you’re used to losing.”

And that earns a small laugh from him. And then he shifts closer, forearms on the table, close enough that you can feel the heat of his body. 

“Still got that mouth, yeah?” He says, quietly. “Never learned when to stop.”

Your eyes narrow.

He leans in closer. Just enough to make your breath hitch.

“I’d say it’s nice to see you,” he mutters, “but I’ve gotten really good at lying.”

You tilt your chin up. “That’s always been your strongest skill.”

The clatter of food being brought out snaps the tension just enough for you to tear your gaze away.

He stays close.

Watching.

Plates clatter around you. The smell of food floats through the air, and conversations pick up at the table. 

You pick up your fork. He doesn’t move.

“Seriously,” You look ahead at your plate. “Go sit somewhere else.”

“Didn’t know you were so territorial.”

“Didn’t know you were desperate for attention.”

It makes him smile. 

“M’not the one picking fights at a wedding.”

“M’not” you say, cutting into your food now. Not even hungry. “You’re just the one who showed up four months too late to a conversation.”

He hums. “Conversation, hm? Is that what we’re calling it now?”

You don’t answer. Mostly because you’re chewing. Mostly because of the way he’s looking at you. Like he’s still inside of whatever memory he just thought of. And it’s making it very…very hard to swallow.

You finally glance at him. “You’re not allowed to look at me like that.”

He leans in, smirking. “Like what?”

“Like you remember.”

And he holds your gaze. And for probably the first time, he doesn’t shoot back some one liner. He just looks.

So you do what you always do when he gets too close to the truth.

Weaponize your mouth.

“You’ve always had a shit memory,” Your voice is soft. “Selective.”

His jaw ticks.

You cut another bite off your plate.

And his knee brushes against yours. Stays there.

“I remember enough,” he speaks. “Like how your cheeks get more pink when you lie. Or how you always change the subject whenever you’re scared.”

You scoff. “M’not scared of you.”

“No,” He hums. “You’re just scared of what you’ll say if you aren’t careful with your words around me.”

You reach for your drink. And he watches your hand.

“Still an asshole,” you say.

He grins. “Still into it.”

You face forward again, refusing to leet him see the way your thighs press together. The way your pulse spikes.

But he knows.

-

He doesn’t ask. He never did when it came to you. Not really, at least.

He just appears. Hand out, gaze unreadable. Waiting.

And you consider ignoring him. Because you should.

But your pride is bigger than your bitterness, so you slip your hand into his without a word.

The palm of his hand is warm. Familiar.

And you hate that your hand still fits in his like it does.

The music shifts. Slow. 

His hand slips along your waist like its never forgotten. Possessive. Confident. Not polite in the slightest.

And you hate that your skin still burns beneath the pads of his fingers like it used to. Like it always did.

And you focus on the space over his shoulder. The warm lights. The movement of other couples. Anything that isn’t the way his thumb starts to slowly drag small circles across the skin of your back. Anything that isn’t his mouth.

“You’re quiet,” He mutters. Low and close.

You hum. “Trying to enjoy the song.”

“Funny. I don’t remember you ever being someone to pretend.”

You glance at him, “I don’t remember you always being this desperate for my attention.”

His mouth twitches. No teeth. “Always mistook interest for desperation.”

“No,” You shake your head. “I just learned the difference.”

He doesn’t answer right away. Just lets it sit for a moment. And then his grip is tightening around you. Not much. Almost like a reflex.

“Still cruel,” he mutters. “Sharp.”

“You always liked that about me.”

His eyes drag to your mouth. “Unfortunately.”

The music is the kind of slow that feels like a heat creeping under your skin. You move too well together. You hate that he still fits. That nothing in your body except for your brain seems to recognize that you’re supposed to be over this. Over him.

“I really thought you wouldn’t come,” He says. Voice casual.

You lift your chin toward him. “Didn’t think you’d notice.”

He looks at you. Like really looks at you. “I always notice you.”

And you hate the way it lands. Hate the way it makes your heart spike. Your stomach clench.

So you roll your eyes. “You’re exhausting.”

“And yet…” He leans in just enough that your noses are practically brushing. “You’re still here.”

You don’t respond.

Instead, you shift closer. Enough to make your chest graze his. Your thigh brush his.

Two can play at this game.

And his breath catches. You feel it. Hear it.

But he maintains the same cool and collected face you always used to fall for.

“M’not falling for it.” He says.

“For what?”

“This act of yours. The one where you pretend you don’t still want me.”

You smirk. “If I wanted you, you’d already know.”

And then he’s grinning. Slow. Dark.

“That’s the thing,” He mutters. “I think I do.”

And your stomach twists. Sharp. Hot.

You roll your eyes. Try to take a step back. But his grip on you doesn’t loosen.

“Let go.”

“I will,” he says. Voice low and dangerous. “When you stop pretending.”

If anything, his grip gets firmer. 

And you’re about to say something, but he cuts you off with movement.

Fast. Smooth.

Dips you without warning.

And the world tilts as you go with it, back arching in his hold, hands catching you with practiced ease.

The lights blur around you, but all you can really see is him. Framed above you. 

“Still a brat,” He mutters. 

And you smirk.

He drags you back up. Slow. Until your chest to chest. And then his lips are ghosting your jaw, your ear.

“I miss this,” he breathes. “Miss you. Mouthy. Mean.”

You try to laugh, but all that comes out is a breathy sigh. “You miss the idea of me.”

“I miss you,” his voice is firm. “Not the fucking idea.”

Your fists tighten around his neck. 

“Is that supposed to fix this?”

His fingers flex against your waist. Like it was hurting him to have you this close and not actually have you.

“No,” his voice is quiet. “But I never stopped thinking it.”

So you pull back enough to look at him. To look at the freckles on his nose, the lines under his eyes from lack of sleep. And he still looks at you like he wants you.

So you smile. Aching.

“Thinking about me was never your problem.”

And you don’t wait for a reply. Just step out of his arms.

Try not to look back as you walk away. Reaching the doors to the balcony and push them open. 

Cool air instantly greeting your skin.

You press your hands into the railing, pulse thrumming. 

And you’re barely there for a minute before you hear the door slam harder than it should’ve. Footsteps.

You don’t bother turning.

“You’ve got some fuckin’ nerve coming out here,” you say, arms braced on the railing, staring out into the dark like it might keep you from falling apart.

Lando’s voice snaps back instantly. “I have nerve?”

You spin to face him, anger bubbling in your chest. 

“Don’t act surprised. You always come chasing after me whenever it’s convenient for you."

His jaw tightens. “I came because you walked away in the middle of something.”

“No,” you bite. Eyes stinging. “You left in the middle of something. Months ago. When I was still holding everything together while you were in fucking Brazil or Australia or wherever the fuck you needed to be that week.”

He flinches, but you don’t stop. Can’t.

“You think this..this moment..means anything? That you can just show up, say you miss me, and everything you put me through will magically fade the fuck away?”

“And you think it was easy for me?” He grunts. “Y’think I didn’t feel it? Every timeI woke up in some hotel bed in another city with no one beside me? Every time I opened my phone and didn’t see your name because you stopped trying?”

“I stopped because I had to!” You shout. “I couldn’t keep waiting for scraps of you. I have a life too, Lan. A career.”

His hands fly into his hair. “I never asked you to give everything up!”

“You didn’t have to!” You yell back. “You just made me feel like I was the selfish one when I didn’t!”

Lando’s breathing hard now. Hands clenched into fists at his sides.

“Y’think I didn’t want to choose you?” He spits, eyes burning. “You think I didn’t want to fucking stop everything? The races. Media. All of it. Just to stay in one place with you?”

You flinch. But he isn’t done.

“I was trying to be enough for the sport and you.” His voice cracks. “But every time I blinked, it was like you were pulling further away. Like I wasn’t trying hard enough.”

“You were never there.”

The words land like a slap. Honest.

“I gave you everything I had to give.”

You laugh. Tired. Cold. “No, Lan. You gave me leftovers. Gave me what was left of you after everyone else took.”

“I was trying to make it work.”

“And I was trying to hold it together while you vanished into every fuckin country on the map.” 

He’s in front of you now.

But you keep going. Shaky. “I had to start pretending I didn’t miss you just to function. Had to smile and tell people that we were fine and so in love when the reality was I hadn’t even heard from you in five days some times.”

Lando flinches. “And you think I didn’t notice? That it didn’t kill me too?”

“You didn’t even act like it did.”

“I didn’t know how to fix it!” He explodes. “I couldn’t be everywhere at once. And I knew…I knew if I made you choose, I’d lose you!”

“Well, you lost me anyways.”

And that’s what finally breaks him.

Has him reaching out to grab you. 

And before you can so much as blink, his mouth is on yours.

Hot. Unforgiving. Fucking stupid.

But you don’t push him away. You kiss him back like its some punishment. 

And his hands slide to your hips. Your fingers twist against his collar, dragging him down harder  into your own mouth.

And when you break apart, your breath is ragged.

His forehead rests against his. You’re still angry.

“This doesn’t mean anything,” you whisper. Trying to convince yourself that you’re over it. That this is just a lapse in judgment.

“Don’t lie.”

And his eyes stay on you. Dazed. And you go to speak but nothing comes out.

So you turn. Fast. Like if you don’t turn away, you’ll let him do it again. Say the wrong thing.

But you barely make it a step past him before he says it.

“Wait,” he breathes. Hand around your wrist. Loose. “Please…just wait.”

You stiffen.

“I shouldn’t have kissed you,” he says. “Not like that…Not… uh, here.” He scratches the back of his neck.

You look over your shoulder. His tie’s half undone. Lips swollen and slightly wet. Hair a mess. And for once, he kinda looks wrecked. 

“I have a room upstairs,” He admits. “I’m not trying to pull you back into anything,” His voice soft. “I just…I need to talk to you. Somewhere quiet. Without this….noise.” He gestures to the crowd of guests, the music, the laughter. 

You hesitate.

You want to walk inside, finish your drink, and pretend. Pretend he’s someone you used to know. Pretend he’s someone you didn’t kiss. 

But he’s still looking at you like he means it. Like you mean everything.  Like he’ll drop down to his knees and beg you if thats what it will take.

“Five minutes,” he says. “That’s all I’m asking for…five minutes…please?”

You hold his gaze for a few moments. Let it stretch. Contemplate. And then you finally nod.

“Fine,” you whisper. “But you better mean it this time.”

He exhales with relief. Like he can finally breathe properly again.

“I do.”

And then you’re walking down the hallway. Past the ballroom. Past the noise. Until it’s just the two of you again. 

The elevator ride is short. Land steps out first. Not hurried or anything…just quiet. Like he’s scared if he’s too sudden you’ll run off.

The hallway is empty. And you follow him a step behind. Arms crossed over your chest. You feel flushed. Almost too aware, too alert, of everything. The kiss still at the forefront of your mind.

When he stops outside the door, his hands fumble with the keycard. Just slightly. Just enough to show how uneasy he is also feeling. 

He doesn’t say anything either.  He just pushes the hotel door open, steps inside and waits for you. Hoping you won’t change your mind and run off.

You walk in. The room is softly lit, just the bedside lamp and the light from the bathroom steaming out. Bottle of something on the dresser. And the bed’s made, but not really. Evidence of him lounging on it was clear.

He stands a few feet away. Looking at you like he doesn’t know what to do. Where to begin. How to start.

“So?” Your voice is a little too harsh. Out of protectiveness. “You’ve got five minutes.”

And he flinches. Breathes loudly.

“I didn’t come to the wedding to fuck with you.”

You blink. Caught a little off guard.

“I knew you’d bet there though,” He says. Honest. “Knew it would hurt. But I couldn’t stay away.”

You look at him now. His face is flushed. Lips slightly parted like he’s been holding this in all night. Like the cocky face he put on all night has completely vanished.

“All these past few months,” he continues, “I kept thinking it will get easier. The distance. The silence. I thought if I worked harder, did more training, more media, all of it….I thought…I thought if I buried myself in that I’d stop thinking about you every single time I opened my phone.”

Your stomach twists.

“But it never fuckin’ stopped.” He says, voice lower. “Didn’t matter where I was. Spain, Canada, China…you were always in my head. Always.”

Your throat tightens. And you feel the goosebumps form on your skin. 

He steps closer. Carefully. A single step. Slow.

“And I hated it.” His eyes flick to you. “Hated that I couldn’t even be mad at you…well I was mad. Fucking livid, all the fucking time. But not reasonably…because you had every right to leave.”

You exhale a deep breathe. Pressing your lips together. Trying to keep yourself composed.

“I wasn’t trying to punish you, Lan.” Your voice is soft. “I just couldn’t keep putting myself second.”

“I know,” he says almost immediately. “I know that now. But I didn’t back then. I thought I did everything I could. Giving you time that I didn’t even have to give.”

You shake your head. “Making time didn’t mean you were present.”

“And I get that now.”

He’s closer. Not touching, but close enough that you have to tip your head back just a bit to hold his gaze.

“Y’think I didn’t want to choose you?” His voice breaks a little. “That I didn’t spend nights wondering and pleading what it would be like if I could just stop everything? Just be with you.”

You don’t answer. 

“And the truth is…I thought if I even asked to you wait longer, you’d hate me for it.”

“I didn’t hate you.” Your voice is quiet. Soft. 

His gaze drops to your mouth. “I know.”

Silence.

Your skin is buzzing. Heart thrumming against your chest.

“I just…I missed you.” He mutters. “And I…I don’t know how to say it without sounding like a completely selfish prick.”

“You don’t sound selfish, Lan.”

Your eyes are stinging.

“You’re the only person who has ever made me want more than all of this.” He admits. “And I fucked everything up.”

You try to swallow the lump that’s sitting in your throat. “Yeah,” you mutter. 

And the words sting to say. Sting to hear.

But he nods. Doesn’t argue.

“I just thought…if I kept going…kept chasing everything, that I could fix it later,” he shrugs. “Like you’d just be there..when I finally figured it all out.”

You breathe. Exhausted. Sad. “You always said timing was everything.”

And his lips twitch. “Yeah, turns out I’m shit at that too.”

You don’t answer. Just look at the slope of his shoulders. The tiny wrinkle in his collar. And the way his hands keep opening and closing like he doesn’t know what to do with them. 

“I still think about you. Every night.”

You shut your eyes for a moment. Trying to stop the tears from forming in your eyes.

“Still reach for you in bed like a fuckin’ idiot.”

He leans in closer.

“And I know…I know that I don’t get to ask this, but…” his voice lowers. “Can I please kiss you again?”

Your breath hitches. Eyes sliding back and forth between his. And he looks wrecked. Devastated.

And this time…you kiss him first. Not because it fixes everything. Not because everything is magically better now.

But because it feels right.

It’s fast. Like you’re mad at yourself for even giving in. Like you don’t even want him to feel satisfaction of knowing just how much you need it too.

He groans into your mouth, hands cradling your jaw, holding you there.

And he’s no longer hesitating. No longer asking.

And you let him.

Let him press you against the wall of the room like he’s fucking starving, like he’s been imagining this for months (he has).

“Still know how to shut you up,” He mumbles against your lips, nipping your bottom lip.

Your hands fist into the collar of his shirt. “Y’still talk too much.”

And he’s already sliding one hand up beneath the hem of your dress. Greedy.

Gasping when his thumb brushes against you right where you need him. Teasingly.

“Still get like this, yeah?” He laughs. Darkly. “Worked up. Just from fighting.”

You glare, but it means nothing. Because you’re already moaning and gasping into his neck as he presses again.

“You’re not special,” you bite. 

But he laughs. Confident. “No?”

He drops to his knees in front of you like he’s done it thousands of times. He has. Like its muscle memory. It is.

“Yeah well tell that to your cunt,” he mutters, pushing your dress all the way up and licking a slow strip over the damp fabric.

Your body shakes. Your hand flies to his hair, weaving it in between your fingers as you grasp it tightly. And he’s fucking grinning when he feels you tremble.

“You used to beg,” He remembers. “Used to say my name over and over like it was the only word you knew.”

You squeeze your eyes shut. “And you used to listen.”

He pulls your panties down with his teeth. “Still do, baby.”

And then he’s tasting you like a staved man. Slow. Messy. But thorough. 

And you moan loud when he curls his tongue just right. Groaning into you like he’s the one who’s fucked.

“You feel the fuckin same.” He grunts, looking up at you. “Fuckin fuck. You feel exactly the same.”

You grab his collar. Desperate.  Pull him up towards you.

And his mouth is crashing into yours again. Then somehow you’re both stumbling toward the bed. Half-laughing, half-mad, half-clothed.

He’s fumbling with the zipper of your dress, cursing under his breath when the zipper gets caught. And you’re tugging at the buttons of of his shirt, only making it halfway through before your fingers give up. And you just shove the fabric open instead, buttons popping. 

“Christ,” Lando mutters, lips dragging along your throat, hands freeing the zipper. “Still so fuckin’ impatient.”

“Y’love it,” you breathe. “Always did.”

And his eyes darken.

“I did,” he agrees. Voice low. “Still do.”

You kiss him again. Hard, open mouthed. Because there’s just no point in pretending anymore. Not with the way he fits against you, not with the way your skin is buzzing from his touch. 

And he kisses you back like he’s missed this more than anything in the entire fucking world. Like the memory of your mouth could never be enough for him.

He pushes you back onto the mattress, his mouth dragging down your stomach like its a map he’s memorized.

“You’re shaking,” He grins against your skin. “Missed me this much?”

You nod, biting your lip. 

“Say it.”

Your voice breaks. “I missed…God I fuckin’ missed you.”

He groans, head falling against your thigh. “God, we never should’ve broken up.”

And then he’s burying his face between your legs like a starved man. Licking you like he needs to memorize every inch, sound, and twitch of yours. Moaning against you, mouth slick and open.

His tongue works over you slowly at first, deep. Dragging. And then he’s moving faster, meaner, teasing your clit and then backing off. Again and again.

Your hands fist into his curls, “Lan, please…”

He groans, rutting his hips into the mattress like he’s the one being teased. Then, pushing two fingers into you. Curling them just right. 

And your hips buck off the mattress with a loud moan.

“God…fuck..Lan, please don’t stop.”

He doesn’t.

He eats you through your orgasm like he needs you more than air. Popping off when you lay limply, before slipping up to hover over you. Lips shiny, eyes glazed.

And then he’s groaning hotly into your mouth when your legs wrap around his waist, grinding against him for some friction. 

“Fuck,” He groans, voice raw. Dragging his hips against you. “You always knew how to drive me fucking insane.” 

You arch up into him. “Then stop wasting my time.”

His hand wraps around your thigh, pulling it higher up his waist as he pushes into you. Slow. Like he’s savoring the feeling. 

Your lips part in a soft gasp and his forehead drops against yours.

“Fuck…” He groans. “I’ve thought about this almost every night.”

He pulls his hips back and thrusts again. Harder.

“Every time I shut my eyes…this. You.” 

You moan, loudly. Nails digging into his skin. 

He fucks you deep. Fucking filthy. One hand wrapped around your throat as he leans over you.

“This what you’ve been thinking about, hm?” He grunts. “Late at night, fingers buried deep in that perfect cunt…pretending it was me, yeah?”

Your face flushes as you nod. 

And he’s losing his rhythm, groaning.

“Been jerking off to the thought go you like this,” he confesses. “Fucking my fist and wishing it was you.”

He presses his fingers into your clit, and you jolt with a loud cry.

“Fuck…you’re gonna make me,”

“Then do it,” he snaps. 

And you do.

You come shaking as he fucks you through it, still muttering absolute filth against your ear. Still chasing his own.

And when he finally comes, it’s with a loud groan of your name. Cock buried deep as he spills into you.

He collapses on top of you for a moment, breathing hard.

You don’t know how long the two of you lay there like that.

But you feel Lando shift slowly. Like he’s scared if he moves too fast it will break whatever spell you’re both under. 

“You okay?” He whispers, voice hoarse. His lips grazing your shoulder.

You nod.

“I meant what I said,” he mutters. “About missing you.”

You let your eyes close. It would be so so easy to pretend that nothing mattered. To stay here and forget all the pain of the weeks you both spent apart.

But it did matter.

He rolls off of you, just to the side. Skin still touching. And when you finally face each other, his curls are damp, cheeks flushed, and eyes so so soft.

“You okay?” You ask.

His throat works itself before he nods. But he doesn’t take his eyes off of you.

“I don’t know what this means,” you confess. “I still don’t.”

And he looks at you like he’s reading your fucking soul. “Me neither.”

He drags his fingertips lazily along your skin. Trailing your shoulder, to your collarbones, before slipping them up to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear. “But I know it’s not nothing.”

You don’t speak. Your throat and chest tight with emotion.

Eventually, your fingers start tracing light shapes along his ribs. Thoughtless.

“You used to do that all the time,” He mutters.

You pause. “Do what?”

“That thing with your fingers. The little shapes. Lines. Especially when you couldn’t sleep.”

You feel your heart in your fucking throat. But you keep tracing.

“I never stopped thinking about you,” he says quietly. “Even when I tried to…it would..it would just have me thinking about you all over again.”

You swallow. “You didn’t have to try.”

“But didn’t I?” His voice is rough, hoarse. “You wouldn’t take to me. I didn’t even know what I was allowed to say to you anymore. If I was even allowed to say anything.”

“You could’ve,” you whisper. “I just….I didn’t want to be the one holding us together by myself anymore.”

“I know,” He says. “And I hate myself for making you feel that way.”

You blink hard, trying to stop the tears from falling.

Lando reaches for your hand, linking your fingers together. Bringing it to his lips, pressing soft kisses to each of your fingers, then your knuckles. One inside of your wrist. 

Slow. One by one.

“I think I was scared,” He admits. “That if I actually gave you all of me, and you still left…” He trails off. His jaw clenching and eyes shutting at the thought.

Your heart thrums. “I was never asking for all of you, Lan.”

“Maybe not with words,” he says. “But you deserved it anyways.”

He drops your hand, to bring it to your cheek. Thumb catching the single tear that manages to slip free at the corner of your eye. 

“I miss us,” he smiles sadly. “Not just the sex. Or this. Just I miss your stupid coffee orders that changed every week. And your laugh when you were too tired. Or the way you used to fall asleep on my chest.”

You bring your face closer to his, breathing him in.

“And I miss your terrible excuses for missing calls,” You joke. “And oddly enough, how you always left your fucking socks everywhere.”

He smiles. A real one.

And then he’s leaning in. Kisses you again. 

Soft.

Slow.

Sweet.

“Can we…try again?” He asks quietly. “Not tonight..not like this of course. But maybe…”

You squeeze his hand, a soft smile on your lips. His smile mirroring yours.

“One step at a time.”

And for now…it’s enough.

[papayareads]

formula fake-mance ⛐ 𝐀𝐀𝟐𝟑

r/aita · anon asked, “aita for pretending to date my best friend (m29) to make my ex jealous?” & anon asked, “aita for making out with one of my driver friends (m29) at a party and then pretending not to remember the next day out of fear of rejection?”

ꔮ starring: alex albon x best friend fake girlfriend!reader. ꔮ word count: 7.5k. ꔮ includes: romance, friendship. mentions of food, alcohol; profanity; suggestive jokes. fake dating, feelings realization/denial, childhood best friends. ꔮ commentary box: i’ve been having hella feelings about alex lately, and i’m about to make it everybody’s problem. serious creative liberties on the second request (soz) but i hope the word count makes up for it!!! jsyk: looped gracie abrams’ unreleased song in between while listening <3 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

Alex finds you in the kitchen, curled into the corner of the counter like you’re afraid the vodka might personally seek vengeance.

“You hiding?” he asks, leaning beside you and stealing a chip from the half-open bag you’ve been cradling.

You don’t look up. “I’m regrouping.”

“From what?”

“Social overwhelm.” 

You take a long swig of your drink. “Also, my heels hurt,” you say wryly. 

He huffs a laugh and tilts his head toward your feet. “You wore those just to make me look short.”

“You are short.”

Alex flicks your forehead. “I’m the tallest driver on the grid, thank you very much.”

You glance up at him, eyes a little too wide, pupils a little too dilated. You’re tipsy. Not wrecked, not sloppy, but looser than you usually are. Lopsided in the smile you give him, soft around the edges. Alex feels it thud in his ribs.

He’s used to this version of you. The one that comes out only with him. The one that drops sarcasm like armor and leans into him in crowded rooms without hesitation. He’s known you since you were kids, since your parents used to split school pick-ups and you cried the first time he beat you at Mario Kart. (“You cheated!” “I literally didn’t!” “I AM GOING TO TURN YOUR CATS AGAINST YOU!”)

You were the only one who never gave him a weird look when he said he wanted to race cars for a living. When he made Formula One, you mailed him a tiny plastic trophy with WORLD’S MOST AVERAGE MAN written in Sharpie on the base.

He still keeps it in his Monaco flat. Right beside the real ones.

Tonight, it’s his party. P5 in Austria. Not a podium, but it felt like one. The Williams crew had screamed in the garage, and you’d been there in the back, arms raised, mouth open in a wordless, feral cheer. He thinks about that moment now, how you practically tackled him afterward in parc fermé. Arms around his neck. Face in his shoulder. Like the rest of the world wasn’t worth looking at.

It doesn’t matter that you’re not dating. People assume. They always have. The glances, the smirks, the knowing comments. Alex doesn’t mind. He doesn’t care much how he’s perceived. Not when you keep choosing him over and over, in every small way that counts.

“Come on,” he says now, nudging your hip with his. “Everyone’s asking for you.”

“I’m protesting loud music and fake laughing.”

“Your fake laugh is top-tier, though.”

“It’s all the years I’ve spent laughing at your jokes.”

Alex fake-gasps. “You love my jokes.”

“Not the knock-knock ones.”

He leans a little closer, conspiratorial. “What if I told you I had a new one about Toto Wolff and a goat?”

Your face lights in a way that hits him like gravity. “Is the goat also Austrian?”

“Unconfirmed.”

“Proceed.”

Before he can get to the punchline, your hand shoots out and grips his forearm with sudden, startling urgency. “Shit,” you exhale.

Alex freezes. “What?”

You’re blinking over his shoulder, the color draining from your face in slow motion. “It’s my ex,” you mumble. “He’s here. Why is he here? This isn’t even his—oh my God, he’s walking this way.”

Your fingers tighten on his arm. Alex registers the heat of your skin, the press of your body turning instinctively into his side. He’s moving before he thinks, shifting slightly to block your view.

“Hey,” he says gently. “Hey. I’ve got you. What do you need?”

You stare up at him, startled. “I don’t know. I—I don’t want to look pathetic.”

Alex doesn’t hesitate. “Okay. Then let’s make him jealous instead.”

It comes out smooth, practiced. Like it’s something he’s thought about before. He doesn’t have time to examine all that. Not now, not with the way you’re holding onto his sleeve like a lifeline.

He’s always had a thing about your taste in men.

Never said much, never made a fuss. If pressed, though, he’d admit there’s not a single one of your exes he liked. They’ve all felt, to him, like half-chances. Men who didn’t see you properly. Who didn’t earn the right to touch your wrist, let alone your heart. Who took what you gave and didn’t know what to do with it.

And this one—this particular ex—he’s the worst of them.

It’s not just the breakup. It’s the way it happened. The slow, cowardly retreat. The way you’d checked your phone every few minutes for weeks, trying to laugh it off until you couldn’t anymore. The whispered explanations you’d given Alex after, eyes wet, voice small. “He said I was too intense,” you’d confessed, and Alex had felt something feral and sharp uncoil in his chest. 

Worse still, the ex is now part of the motorsports world. Some junior mechanic who floats around the Williams garage like static electricity. Useless and smug. Always managing to say the wrong thing with just enough charm to get away with it. Alex has had to sit through entire debriefs with the guy breathing two seats away, talking about tire temps like he invented them. And now he’s here. At Alex’s party. Circling like a vulture.

Alex spots him through the crowd, threading his way through the cluster of guests with that same half-smile. His eyes sweep the room—and yeah, he’s looking for you.

“Shit, okay, we need a plan,” Alex grumbles.

“What kind of plan?” You’re gripping his shirt now. Not hard, but enough to wrinkle it. He doesn’t care. Your panic is rising fast, cresting in your throat.

“I don’t know,” he says, scanning your face. “Do you want me to—should I pretend we’re together? Should I punch him? I’ll punch him. I’ve been meaning to try that.”

“Alex,” you hiss, barely breathing. “He’s getting closer.”

Alex curses under his breath. He’s thinking too fast and not fast enough. His fingers twitch like they’re trying to grab the idea before it’s fully formed. “Okay. Okay, we’ll fake date. Cool. How do people fake date? What’s the move? Should I put my arm around you or—”

You open your mouth like you’re about to say something helpful. Then you just—

—you kiss him.

No warning. No build. Just lips.

You grab the front of his shirt and yank him forward, right into you. Alex blinks, stunned, as your mouth finds his like it’s a question you’ve already answered a hundred times.

And suddenly he’s aware of a few things all at once:

Your mouth is soft. Warm. Slightly citrusy, he thinks, probably from the drink you had earlier. You always preferred something with lime.

You’re kissing him like you’ve done it before. Like it’s muscle memory. Like you’re coming home.

He is absolutely not thinking about your ex anymore.

His hands find your waist like they’ve been waiting. He doesn’t even think about it. His eyes flutter shut. The kiss isn’t long, isn’t showy. It’s not performative. It’s not even that dramatic. But it’s anchored, intentional, and it hits him like gravity.

Somewhere, distantly, someone laughs. The music shifts tracks. A cheer erupts from a corner of the flat where someone’s undoubtedly doing something ill-advised with beer. Alex registers none of it. Just the press of you against him, the brush of your nose, the almost involuntary sigh you make as your fingers slip into his hair and rest there.

The kiss deepens slightly, for one breathless second. Like maybe you forgot it was supposed to be for show, too.

By the time you pull away—slow and stunned and still close enough that he can count the freckles on your cheek—Alex realizes something terrifyingly obvious.

He quite liked that. 

Alex doesn’t even get the chance to speak.

Your ex materializes like a summoned ghost, all thin-lipped smile and cologne that’s trying too hard. Oliver, Alex vaguely remembers his name to be. He’s holding a red cup and some flimsy excuse for swagger, eyes flicking between you and Alex as if he’s connecting the most obvious dots in the world.

“Well,” Oliver says, tone derisive enough to curdle milk. “That explains the floor show.”

Alex tenses. You shift an inch closer to him, and it’s instinct when he hooks an arm around your waist. Protective, not possessive. 

You laugh. It’s too high, too brittle. “Oh, hey,” you fib. “Didn’t see you there.” 

Oliver raises an eyebrow, eyes glinting. “Didn’t mean to interrupt. You two looked busy.”

“We were. Are,” you say, then clear your throat. “Busy. We’re very... involved.”

Alex resists the urge to wince. You’re a good liar, but only when it doesn’t matter. Right now, you’re floundering. He can feel the way your hand clenches in the hem of his shirt.

“Right,” Oliver drawls, eyes narrowing. “So, what’s this? A little make out session to blow off some steam?”

You open your mouth. Then shut it. Then—

“We’re dating,” you blurt out.

A beat.

Alex nods like his heart didn’t just do a sideways flip. “Yep,” he says. “Totally. Very much dating.”

He leans in, presses a kiss to your shoulder like it’s nothing, like his lips aren’t tingling from the memory of your mouth. You lean into him, barely trembling.

Oliver doesn’t look convinced. He gives a little smirk. “Huh. Didn’t peg you as her type.”

“No one ever does,” Alex says lightly, “but here we are.”

You grab Alex’s hand like it’s a rope you’re about to swing from. “Anyway,” you announce, a little too brightly, “we’re gonna go have sex now. So. Bye.”

Alex nearly chokes. “What.”

You’re already dragging him away. Through the crowd, down the hall, past two confused Williams juniors and someone yelling about jello shots. You make a pit stop at the drinks table and knock back one, two, three shots like you’re hydrating for a marathon.

Alex stares. “What the hell was that?”

“Panic,” you say, breathless, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Performance. Chaos. I don’t know.”

He grabs a shot himself and throws it back. “You told him we were going to have sex.”

“I did.”

“That is not subtle.”

“Subtlety’s dead. I’m grieving.”

“You said it like we were late for a reservation.” He mimics your pitched voice as he shoots back a bit more vodka. “Gonna go have sex now. Are you for real?” 

You spin around to face him, flushed and wild-eyed. There’s a bathroom door to your left and you open it like it’s the only sanctuary left on earth. “Just get in here before I make it worse,” you snap. 

Alex steps inside after you, heart rattling in his chest, mind spinning like he’s still in the car at 300 kph. Underneath it all—rising like steam in a quiet room—is the echo of your kiss.

Still warm. Still there.

Alex wakes to pain.

Specifically, a full-body, top-down, soul-crushing headache that feels like his skull got rear-ended by a safety car.

He groans. The ceiling swims.

Somewhere nearby, a curtain flutters. The room smells of faint citrus and someone else’s shampoo. He blinks against the light, tries to sit up, immediately regrets it. It’s not just the headache; it’s the thudding ache of memory, half-formed flashes surfacing like debris.

Bathroom debrief. More shots afterwards. Laughter muffled against tile. Your hand in his hair, in his lap, on his jaw—

The kiss.

The first one, yes, but also—the second. The third? There’d been more, he’s sure. Stolen ones, maybe a little sloppier. Maybe even sweeter.

He remembers your back against the sink. Your laughter slipping into his throat. The way you whispered something like, “We’re so bad at this fake dating thing,” before kissing him again, just because you could.

He winces. His ears pick up movement. Rustling. A zipper.

He turns his head and sees you.

You’re halfway into your jeans, shoes dangling from one hand, trying to be quiet in the way only someone with a guilty conscience and a mild hangover can manage. Your hair’s a mess. His hoodie’s swallowing your frame.

“Are you—” His voice comes out gravel. He coughs. “Are you sneaking out of your own apartment?”

You freeze. Look caught. Like a cat with contraband. “No. I’m... relocating.”

Alex squints. “To where?”

You sigh and flop dramatically onto the edge of the bed, one shoe still dangling. “I was trying to spare myself the humiliation of the world’s clumsiest walk of shame.”

He rolls onto his side with a groan, dragging a pillow under his arm. “You can’t walk of shame if you didn’t even get to the sex part. That’s, like, an amble of emotional damage.”

You groan into your hands. “Alex,” you huff. “I told your teammate’s girlfriend we were soulmates. I told your head mechanic we were planning a trip to adopt a dog in the Alps. I have texts, Alex. So many texts.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Texts from Oliver?”

“No. Worse. Vowles.”

Alex snorts. “Oh, then, yeah. That’s legally binding.”

You shove your face into his pillow with a muffled scream.

He reaches out, tugs gently at your elbow. “Hey. Come here.”

“No.” 

“Get back in bed, honey.” 

“No.” 

“Please. I have a headache and abandonment issues.”

You hesitate. Then, grudgingly, you crawl back under the covers with all the reluctant grace of a cat forced into a bath. Alex immediately spoons you, arm slung around your waist, nose tucked against your shoulder.

“This is dangerous,” you mutter, already curling into him.

“You started it.”

“Don’t remind me.”

“You kissed me. Multiple times. You escalated.”

“I panicked!”

“You kissed me like it was your job.”

You groan again, burrowing deeper under the duvet. “It’s not my fault you’re so fake dating-coded.”

He exhales slowly, his breath warm at the back of your neck. “We could keep doing it.”

You go still in his arms. 

“The dating part,” he clarifies. “Just. For show. Until it dies down.”

Your voice is quiet. “And when it does?”

Alex doesn’t have an answer for that. But he squeezes your hand under the sheets and kisses the crown of your head, and when you don’t protest, he figures he’s got his green light. 

By the time Alex walks into the Williams hospitality unit, it’s already happening.

It started in the paddock like all stupid things do: with one overexcited media assistant whispering something to a trackside engineer, who tells a performance coach, who tells someone from catering, who tells James. And once James knows, the apocalypse is officially underway.

Alex is barely two steps through the door when someone claps him on the back.

“Congrats, mate,” chirps one of the tire techs. “Knew it was only a matter of time.”

Alex’s lips quirk in a confused half-smile. “You did?”

“Please. Everyone’s been placing bets since Baku.”

He’s still processing that when Carlos, freshly transferred and not yet fully acclimated to the chaos, strolls in with a smug grin. “So I hear you have finally stopped being a coward,” the Spaniard coos. 

Alex gapes. “What?”

Carlos just raises his eyebrows. “‘Just friends’ my ass.”

“I was just saying the same thing,” James calls from across the room, where he’s attempting to make cereal with a protein shaker. “They were basically married before this.”

It’s funny, and annoying, and deeply unsettling. Because nobody’s surprised. Not even Carlos, who’s only been here a few months and already talks like he’s seen through Alex from the start. It should be a relief—this casual acceptance—but instead it kicks up something warm and sharp in Alex’s chest.

Because if everyone saw it coming, why didn’t he?

He’s mid-thought when you walk in.

You’re wearing sunglasses indoors, which is never a good sign. And your expression—somewhere between dread and barely-contained scream—confirms everything.

The room erupts into cheers.

You flinch.

Alex laughs. Actually doubles over a bit. Because the horror on your face is so pure, so you, and it hits him in the heart like a dart. “Oh my God,” you groan as someone throws confetti from god knows where. “This is my nightmare.”

“You’re a micro niche celebrity,” Alex teases, pulling you in by the elbow. “Bask in it.”

“I have six texts from my mum. She says, and I quote, finally.”

He tries not to smile too widely. “She always did like me best.”

“She says she had a dream that we got married on a beach in Phuket. She sent me Pinterest boards. This is her Super Bowl.”

“You know,” he says, a little too lightly, “this should’ve happened ages ago.”

You look up at him, mistrustful. As if you’re trying to figure out whether he’s teasing. “What?”

He covers with a shrug. “The pretending thing. We’re naturals.”

Your responding smile is faint but real, like you want to believe him. Like you might. Alex watches you get tugged away by a group of mechanics who apparently want to quiz you on his worst habits. (You already know them. You’ve memorized the list.)

And still, the thought loops in his head like a faulty radio: this should’ve happened ages ago.

The thing is, he’d buried it. For years. Wrapped it in best-friendship and late-night texts and the safety of almost. Because the idea of losing you? Unthinkable.

But now, everyone sees it. Everyone thinks it’s real, and maybe he’s the only one still pretending it’s not what he’s wanted this entire time. Alex watches you laugh at something Carlos says, your cheeks still pink.

Alex wants to touch your hand and not overthink it. He wants to kiss you without needing a cover story. He wants it to be real. 

For the first time, he lets himself admit it.

Alex sees him before you do.

Oliver, back in the garage like nothing happened. Like he didn’t light a match and walk away from it, letting someone else deal with the burn. He’s got the same infuriating grin, the same sunglasses on top of his head like he’s too important for shade.

Alex feels it before he thinks it. The instinct to shift closer to you.

You’re leaning against a workbench, laughing with a junior engineer about something Alex didn’t catch. Your posture’s relaxed, but there’s tension under it. When Oliver’s voice cuts through the hum of the garage, you go still.

“Hey, stranger,” your godforsaken ex greets. 

Alex watches your spine straighten. You don’t turn yet. You take a beat. Then two.

Then you twist around with a smile that’s polite and painful. “Hey, Oliver.”

Alex doesn’t wait. He slides an arm around your waist like it’s second nature. Pulls you into his side and drops his chin to your shoulder, voice casual. “Everything alright, babe?”

You don’t flinch. You just lean in. Your hand finds his where it rests on your hip. “Yep,” you say, sweet and steady. “Just catching up.”

Oliver’s gaze dips to the contact. His jaw tightens a fraction.

Alex doesn’t let it rest. “We’ve been on such a high lately. Haven’t we? All these points. All this... chemistry.”

He presses a kiss to your temple. Your laugh is half-genuine, half-mortified.

“That so?” Oliver says, sounding like he’s chewing glass.

Alex just smiles. “Oh yeah. Chemistry’s off the bloody charts, mate. Don’t tell me you can’t see it.” 

Oliver barely holds eye contact before someone from the strategy team pulls him away. He leaves without saying goodbye.

As soon as he’s gone, you let out a breath like you’ve been holding it for a week. “Jesus.”

Alex drops his hand from your waist slowly. His palm tingles with the loss. You glance up at him, half a glower on your pretty face. “You didn’t have to go so hard,” you say. 

He raises a brow. “Didn’t I? Felt like he needed the full experience.”

“You inhaled me.”

“I’m a method actor.”

You nudge his side. “You’re disturbingly good at pretending to be into me.”

A laugh escapes him before he can stop it, and the words pass the floodgates not long after. “Who’s pretending?”

It lands like a joke. It’s delivered like one. But it hangs there between you, suspended in the charged space that always follows your name in his mouth.

You look away first.

Alex schools his face into a grin, the practiced one, the PR-safe version that’s all teeth and no truth. But inside, something twists.

Because it’s easy, too easy, to touch you like that. To play the part. To steal little pieces of something real under the guise of performance.

He wonders how long he can keep calling it acting before he forgets there was ever a difference.

You bump his shoulder gently. “Thanks. For that.”

“Any time,” he manages. “That’s what fake boyfriends are for.”

And it stings, just slightly, every time he has to say the word fake.

Because it keeps feeling less and less true.

The panic fades, or at least it mutates into something quieter. Less like a fire alarm and more like a ringtone you keep ignoring. It hums beneath everything, soft and persistent. An engine left running.

Everyone still thinks you and Alex are together. But the novelty has worn off. The jokes taper into shrugs. People stop asking when the wedding is and start acting like it already happened. The questions become lazy teasing instead of wide-eyed speculation. And the two of you—somehow, impossibly—slip back into your rhythm.

The bickering remains. So do the late-night phone calls, the shared snacks in the garage, the borderline hostile debates about music in the rental car. Now, there’s something new beneath it all. A softness that didn’t used to be there. An unspoken clause neither of you are brave enough to read aloud.

Alex tells himself it’s fine. This is fine. You’re both handling this like adults. Mature, well-adjusted adults who just happen to be cuddling more often, and whose inside jokes have started sounding dangerously like flirting.

It’s manageable until it isn’t.

He’s on his way past the media trailer, sipping lukewarm coffee, mind blissfully empty for once, when he hears it. Not because he’s eavesdropping. Just because someone inside is that loud.

“Honestly, I give it two more weeks. She’s obviously into him, but he’s way out of her league.”

Alex slows his steps. He’s never been able to resist a bit of tea. He gets more than what he bargained for, though. 

Another voice, lower, half-laughing: “Albon could do so much better. He’s just being nice. She’s like... convenient.”

His pulse spikes. His feet carry him before his brain catches up.

He steps inside the trailer and finds them. Three interns, hunched over a laptop, trying to act like they weren’t just dissecting someone else’s life. His life. Yours.

They don’t see him at first. Not until he says, too casually: “Sorry, what was that?”

Their heads snap up.

The one who probably said it—tall, wiry, self-assured in the way only someone new and clueless can be—starts to stammer. “I—uh—it wasn’t—”

“You talking about me?” Alex asks, voice calm and flat. Too calm.

They flinch.

“Listen,” he says, stepping closer, “I don’t care if you think it’s a joke. I don’t care if you think this is some group chat. If I ever hear you talk about her like that again—like she’s some backup plan, some convenience—I will make sure you don’t set foot in this paddock again. Got it?”

Silence. Wide eyes. A single, terrified nod.

Alex turns on his heel.

And, like you have some sixth sense of when Alex is fucking shit up, there you are. Standing in the doorway, arms crossed, one brow arched high enough to qualify as a warning.

“Alex,” you say, voice tight. “Walk.”

He obeys.

You don’t speak until you’re three trailers down, out of sight. Then you stop, whirl on him, and plant both hands on your hips. “You can’t just threaten interns,” you snipe. 

“I didn’t threaten them,” he says defensively. “I just clarified the hierarchy.”

Your brows draw together. “Alex. You don’t have to defend me. We’re not—this isn’t real.”

He wants to argue. He wants to ask why that should matter. But he just exhales, presses the heel of his hand to his eye. “I’m your best friend,” he says softly. “That’s all the reason I need.”

You look at him for a beat too long. You know his words are true. The only reason Alex needs to step up is you. Fake relationship or not, he would always have your back. 

The tension breaks eventually. “Okay,” you murmur. You step forward, reaching up to adjust the collar of his fireproof. “But next time, let me destroy my own reputation.”

He smiles weakly. “Only if I get to supervise.”

Your fingers brush the skin just beneath his collar—barely there, a whisper of touch. Maybe accidental. Maybe not.

He doesn’t pull away. Just breathes. Deeper, steadier. Like your presence recalibrates something in him.

He’d been burning, just moments ago. Fury lit in his chest like a fuse. But standing here, with you so close he can smell your shampoo, feel your breath?

It all goes quiet.

Defending you made him see red, but being near you pulls him back into color.

The team dinner is only meant to be mildly chaotic.

Instead, it veers off-road somewhere between the second bottle of wine and dessert, when someone—probably Carlos, definitely emboldened by sugar and no filter—decides to initiate a group interrogation.

“Alright,” he says, stabbing a spoon in your direction. “You two. Spill. The love story. I want origin details. I want eye contact. I want yearning."

The table erupts like a classroom with a substitute teacher. James leans forward, eyebrows waggling. One of the engineers claps like he’s been waiting for this all week. There is actual chanting. Someone starts drumming on the table with a fork.

There is no escape.

Alex exchanges a glance with you. You roll your eyes, but he catches the smile tugging at your mouth, sees the way your shoulders inch higher in amused defeat. You nudge his foot under the table like you’re daring him to do something stupid.

Challenge accepted.

He clears his throat like he’s about to make a wedding toast, carefully sets his wine glass down, and folds his hands in front of him with mock gravity. “You know,” he says, in a tone that already makes people laugh, “I think it started the first time she insulted my music taste.”

Immediate groans. Laughter. You let out an exaggerated sigh and cover your face with both hands.

“She said Oasis was ‘emotional beige’,” he continues, solemn. “And I thought—wow. That’s the meanest and most accurate thing I’ve ever heard.”

You peek out from behind your hands. “It wasn’t inaccurate.”

“It wasn’t merciful either,” Alex says, placing a hand on his chest. “But I knew, then, that this was the woman who would ruin me.”

James chuckles. Carlos mimes wiping a tear from the corner of his eye.

Alex leans into it. “She once helped me carry an entire IKEA wardrobe up three flights of stairs because I forgot to measure the doorway. Didn’t complain once. Just judged me silently the whole time. And that’s when I really knew.”

“You cried after,” you add, deadpan.

“I did not cry.”

“You absolutely did.”

“If I did, they were tears of appreciation.”

Someone clinks a glass for dramatic effect. There’s applause. There’s more chanting. Alex shrugs helplessly. “What can I say? She bullies me just the right amount.”

He doesn’t glance at Oliver, not directly. But he knows he’s there—three seats down, too quiet, stirring the remains of his dessert like it’s telling him secrets. Alex doesn't care. He tells himself that once. Then again. And again, until he can almost believe it. His hand stays where it is, resting gently on your knee under the table. His thumb traces a slow, thoughtless pattern.

Eventually, the noise ebbs again, and someone turns to you with a grin. “Alright, your turn. When did you fall for him?”

The table roars with anticipation. Alex expects a joke. A jab about his terrible taste in action movies or how he leaves wet towels on the floor. Something easy. Something safe.

But you smile, small and strange. A little embarrassed. A little vulnerable. “Honestly?” you start, and there’s a seriousness there that doesn’t belong. “I think I was already in love with him before I knew what it was.”

Everything stops.

The laughter doesn’t fade. It just disappears. Like someone cut the audio.

Alex’s world has tilted sideways.

You keep going, voice lighter now, deflecting a little with the shape of your words. “He was just… always there. Like some giant, awkward golden retriever. Every birthday. Every flat move. Every 2AM panic text. He’s part of everything. It crept up on me. By the time I realized, it was too late.”

Someone makes a heart shape with their hands. Carlos mutters something in Spanish that earns a round of teasing oohs.

Alex doesn’t laugh. He can’t.

He stares at you. At your hand, which finds his under the table and squeezes gently, like it means nothing. Like it doesn’t shatter him.

His brain catches up eventually, reminds him of the script. The part he’s supposed to play. He leans in. Brushes a kiss to your cheek. Then your mouth. It’s light. Practiced. Sweet. Exactly what people expect.

The table cheers again, louder than ever. But inside him, something tilts. Spins. Collapses and rebuilds itself all at once.

He pulls back and smiles for the group. He holds your hand tighter under the table, and he tries not to let the truth show on his face.

That he’s in love with you, and he has no idea how to come back from it.

The race weekend goes better than expected.

Clean, calculated. P4, but Alex is beaming when he gets out of the car. The points feel good. The champagne tastes better. And the adrenaline makes him bold in a way he hasn’t felt since karting days.

He’s going to tell you.

He has a whole plan. Flowers. Your favorite candies. A half-terrible, half-dramatic confession delivered with the sincerity of a man who’s spent far too long pretending not to be in love with his best friend. He’s already played it out in his head: how you’ll roll your eyes when he hands you the bouquet, how you’ll try not to smile when he fumbles the words.

How you’ll kiss him again—this time for real.

He’s halfway to hospitality, bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet, when he hears your voice.

And then Oliver’s.

Alex stops cold.

You’re around the corner, just behind one of the equipment bays. Alex stays frozen where he is. He knows it’s wrong, that he should announce himself, back away, do anything but listen.

He listens anyway. 

“You can’t tell me you don’t miss it,” Oliver says, voice low and coaxing. “I know you. I know how you get when you’re pretending not to care.”

There’s a pause. Alex hears the soft rustle of a jacket, maybe a step closer.

“We were good together. You can’t deny that. And this thing with Alex? Come on. He’s your friend. It’s clearly not real.”

Alex’s chest tightens.

“We were good,” Oliver presses. “I messed up. I know I did. But I still think about you. Every day. I miss you, baby.” 

Alex doesn’t hear your answer.

Because he turns away.

Walks. Fast. Doesn’t look back.

He doesn’t want to know what you said. Not really.

In his head, you’re already nodding. Already looking at Oliver with that softness you used to save for Alex. Already giving him another chance.

Isn’t this what you wanted all along?

Alex tells himself he should be happy for you. Instead, he crushes the flowers tighter in his hand, until the stems start to bend.

That’s why, later that night, Alex doesn’t expect the knock.

He’s in the middle of changing into his oldest hoodie—the truly hideous one that only travels because it reminds him of home and has a ketchup stain that predates his Williams contract—when the door rattles.

He thinks about ignoring it. He even halfway commits, dragging the hoodie over his head and tossing himself onto the bed as if he’s about to stage a one-man pity opera. The hotel room is dim, lit only by the bedside lamp, casting everything in warm, sleepy gold. It’s the perfect environment for wallowing, really.

Then he hears your voice.

“Seriously? You ghost me after race day curry? You’re lucky I haven’t blocked you yet.”

He stares at the ceiling. Sits up slowly, heart tripping in his chest like it doesn’t know what beat to follow. You knock again, then jiggle the handle. “I know you’re in there,” you complain, voice muffled by the wood of the door. “I have your location on, asshole.” 

He drags himself to the door, hesitating for just one second more—a flicker of cowardice he can't afford. Then he opens it.

You brush past him with the breezy confidence of someone who’s made herself at home in every hotel room he’s ever stayed in. It’s infuriating and comforting in equal measure.

“Wow,” you say, tossing your bag on the chair. “Moody lighting. Brooding face. Albon, are you cheating on me?”

You clock the flowers before he can hide them. They’re on the nightstand, slightly wilted, petals already starting to slump like they know they’ve missed their moment. Your eyebrows shoot up. “Huh. Flowers. Wait—is there really someone else?” 

He closes the door. Stands there with his arms crossed over his chest, hoodie sleeves swallowing his hands. Something inside him prickles. Something heavy and bitter and quiet. “Why are you here?” he asks, barely able to keep the waver out of his words. 

You glare at him. “Because you bailed on me. I brought snacks. We were going to watch terrible TV and yell at the screen like we always do."

“No,” he says, voice sharpening. “Why are you here? After what I heard. With Oliver."

Your expression flickers. The smallest hesitation, but it rings loud in the quiet of the room. Just enough for something in Alex to slip loose.

He laughs. It sounds wrong, wrong, wrong. “Unbelievable,” he breathes. “You came here to what? Let me down easy? Pretend everything’s normal while you go crawl back to the guy who made you cry in my car three months ago?”

“Alex—”

“No,” he cuts in. “You said you loved me before you even knew it. Was that just for show? Were you performing for the table? For him? Because it worked. He sure looked rattled. And you convinced me, too."

You step closer. “Alex—”

“If you want him back, just say it,” he says, gesturing wide now, breath picking up. “Don’t come in here and act like this is all some fucking joke we can keep playing because it makes you feel good, when I—”

You kiss him.

Mid-sentence. Mid-tirade. You grab the front of his hoodie, tug him down, and kiss him hard enough to knock every single word out of his mouth.

It takes him a full second to catch up to the moment. To the heat of your mouth, to the press of your body, to the hand curled at the base of his neck like it's always belonged there.

Then you pull back.

Eyes wide. Mouth parted. Panic dawning in your expression like a curtain ripping open.

“Shit,” you breathe. “Shit, I shouldn’t—I didn’t mean to—”

You take a step back. Another.

He catches your wrist, gentle but firm.

“Don’t,” he says, soft now. Breathless in a different way. “You don’t get to do that. Not this time.” 

It’s his turn to kiss you. 

Slower. Like he’s learning the shape of something he’s only dared to trace in dreams. Like the ache in his chest has finally been given a name and a mouth to match.

You breathe into him. Your hand curls into his hoodie again. The kiss deepens, sharpens, softens. A thousand versions of almost finally collapsing into one real thing.

You break apart just enough to rest your forehead against his.

“I wasn’t going to say yes,” you whisper. “To Oliver. I didn’t even want to hear it. I just—froze. I didn’t know what you’d heard. I didn’t know what you felt.”

Alex pulls you close again. Tight, like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he doesn’t anchor you there. “I felt like I was losing something I hadn’t even had the courage to ask for yet,” he says into your hair.

You stay like that. Wrapped in each other. The hum of the room falling away.

For once, Alex isn’t performing. Isn’t pretending. He’s just here. With you. In the honest, terrifying, electric truth of it all.

Maybe it’s messy. Maybe it’s complicated. But when he kisses you again, it feels like something simple.

You taste like the corner store mints you always carry, like adrenaline and something a little too sweet. Your fingers slide under his hoodie, tugging at the hem with practiced ease, like you've done it a hundred times before in dreams you never admitted to having.

He helps you, wordless. Arms over his head, the awful thing coming off in a tumble of cotton and static, hitting the floor with a soft thud. He barely notices it.

Because your lips are back once the hoodie has been cast aside. And every time your mouth finds his, something in his chest reshapes like it’s making room for something that’s already been there, waiting to be named. He’s dizzy with it, with you.

Your hands skate over his ribs. He catches the tremble in his own breath. It’s not nerves. Not exactly. It’s a pressure valve finally breaking open after years of holding still.

Somewhere in the haze of now, Alex sees then.

You, seven years old and already mouthy, yelling at a steward on the karting track while wearing his spare helmet. It was three sizes too big and you refused to admit it. You spun out twice and still walked off like you’d won the whole thing. He was in love with your attitude before he could even spell the word.

Seventeen. You, sitting beside him on a bench outside a test session, ankles crossed, eating crisps and talking about nothing and everything. His knees kept knocking into yours and he couldn’t tell if it was an accident or a dare.

You at twenty, crying in his passenger seat over someone who didn’t deserve to hear you laugh. First heartbreak. He remembers gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles ached, willing himself not to say something selfish. He hated that he didn’t get to be the one you trusted in that way—not yet. Maybe not ever.

More recent flashes. Your laugh in his kitchen as you made fun of his espresso skills. The way you always grabbed his arm at crossings, like he couldn’t be trusted to look both ways. How you wore his Williams team shirt around the paddock, oversized and confident, as if you belonged everywhere Alex existed. You always did.

Alex never stood a chance.

And now you’re here. In his hotel room. Kissing him like you mean it. Like you’ve always meant it. Pulling him in like he’s not a placeholder, not a maybe. Like he’s the whole damn point.

He pulls back, just slightly. Breath catching like it’s forgotten how to work. “Wait,” he says. It comes out rough.

You blink, the softest frown forming between your brows.

“I need to say—”

But you’re already shaking your head. Already smiling, like you know every word before it tumbles out.

“I know,” you say.

You know. Just like you know everything about Alex. Just like you know this was never going to be a one-act play for him, not going to be a funny story he might someday tell his kids. 

You kiss the corner of his mouth, then his jaw. The line of his cheekbone, his temple. A constellation only you know how to navigate.

“I know,” you whisper again, voice warm and sure.

Your hand finds his, and you tug him toward the bed.

Alex follows, pulled by instinct and gravity. 

The backs of your knees hit the mattress first. He leans in, one arm braced beside you, the other still holding your hand like it’s a lifeline. You fall into the pillows with a kind of ease that makes his heart ache.

He watches you for a second. Your flushed cheeks, your wide eyes, the curve of your smile that's almost shy. He thinks he might actually burst open with how much he wants this. Wants you.

He doesn’t doubt it.

Not for a second.

Not with the way you look at him, like he’s something rare. Not with the way you touch him, like he’s already yours.

He lets himself be pulled. Lets himself fall. Hoodie long forgotten, wallowing postponed indefinitely.

Drowning in you is the better choice.

It’s the only one he wants to make.

It’s another party.

Champagne buzz and neon spill, the kind of post-race affair that always ends with at least one person losing a shoe and another crying in a bathroom. There’s a half-hearted DJ, a rotating charcuterie table, and enough gossip in the room to power a small country.

But tonight, Alex doesn’t care about the chaos. Doesn’t care about the playlist, or the over-salted canapés, or even whether Oliver is somewhere across the room still trying to act like he matters.

Because you’re here.

Pressed against his side, half-tipsy and radiant, stealing the olives from his drink and slipping them into yours like he won’t notice. (He does. He lets you. He likes when you steal from him.)

You look up at him, all soft eyes and crooked smile, and Alex forgets how he ever pretended not to be in love with you. The music thuds around you, a blur of voices and clinking glasses and someone yelling about pit stop strategy. 

It’s all background noise. Static behind the real headline: you’re his now. For real. No pretending. No show.

When someone asks for a photo, he doesn’t flinch. Just pulls you tighter to his side, hand at your waist like it’s been there for years. When you nudge your cheek against his shoulder, he leans down and kisses your temple. Quick. Familiar. Easy.

It’s all so easy now.

Somewhere between the fake relationship and the real one, the nerves and lies had dissolved. What’s left is something better. Steadier. Quietly certain in the way only long love can be. He still gets breathless when you laugh too hard at your own jokes. Still loses focus when you wear his team gear like a second skin. Still finds excuses to sit too close on the couch or brush your fingers with his. He’s not afraid anymore. Not of ruining it. Not of being too much.

“You’re staring,” you slur, voice barely audible over the pulse of the bass.

“You’re pretty,” he says, shameless, a little drunk on the sight of you.

You roll your eyes, but your hand curls tighter in his. “God, you’re so soft now.”

“Just with you.”

You laugh. Nose scrunching. It kills him, the way it always has. He’s helpless.

It used to hurt, watching you with someone else. Watching your gaze tilt elsewhere, smile curving for the wrong person. He remembers every bitter moment. Every quiet ache. Every time he swallowed the jealousy and called it friendship.

Now, he gets to be the one on the receiving end. He silently vows to never take it for granted.

Oliver does pass by at some point. Alex barely registers him. Doesn’t tighten his grip, doesn’t look twice. You don’t either. You just thread your fingers through Alex’s, thumb tracing lazy circles against his knuckles, like it’s second nature.

Later, on a balcony with cold air on their skin and distant bass rattling the railing, you curl into his side. The night hums around you, a little blurry with drink, a little sharp with meaning. He tugs your jacket tighter around you, presses a kiss to your temple.

“You cold?” he asks worriedly. 

You shake your head, lips brushing his collarbone as you lean closer. “Happy,” you say. Simple. Honest.

He smiles, slow and certain, chest full in a way it hasn’t been since he was a kid dreaming about podiums and fairytale endings. “Me too,” he breathes. 

You rest your forehead against his. For a while, there’s no need for words.

There’s nothing complicated about it. Nothing performative. Just you and him, toes over a line you’ve both stepped past, hearts bruised and mended. You pull back just enough to meet his gaze.

“Still soft?” you tease as a preamble for what’s to come. 

“Always,” he says, no hesitation.

You kiss him like coming home. Like finally getting the timing right.

He lets himself burn. For once, it doesn’t hurt at all.

It’s everything he’s ever wanted, and finally, finally real. ⛐

[papayareads]

cottagecore!lando ?? this is only 5 sentences and i´m already in love?

also this would be very on brand for the seasonal fics right?

just started working on a little lando summer romance fic, here’s an excerpt from it :)

[papayareads]

MORNING

synop: soft sleepy morning sex

warnings: fem reader, pnv, unprotected sex, really romantic, softcore prn, husband/wife talk, pet names (baby, pretty girls, and more), light praise

👒: 2.5k words

the morning drifted in slow and syrupy, edges blurred like paint on wet paper. the bed cradled you, soft and heavy. lulling your body into stillness, your limbs slack, your eyelids unwilling to open.

the static light of the sun peeking into the room from between the blinds was dreamy. weight rested across your tummy as you rolled to lay on your back. eyes drifting lazily over the ceiling fan– still not really awake.

lando’s arm had found its home across your torso, hand tucked under your waist like it belonged there. he always held you like that, as if you might slip away if he let go– even in sleep. 

his face is tucked sweetly into the side of your neck. his nose brushing the delicate skin, it might have ticked if you weren't so comfortable. your skin tingled, but there was nothing left to feel except the soft hum of satisfaction.

you watched him with all consuming love. his tanned skin against yours, the windswept curls hanging sleepily against his forehead. his hand clenched around your waist– featherlight but claiming. 

his eyes blinked open, wonderfully slow. you watched as his consciousness started kicking in. watched as alertness eased into his facial expression. watched as his first decision of the day was to look over to you.

your eyes connected, filled with sleep and something much deeper. he smiled, seeing you were awake, leaning down to kiss you. lips connecting as you could still taste his smile. 

“good morning pretty girl” he said against your neck as he rolled to lay atop you. resting his waist between your legs, your hands found his hair. 

he hummed contently as your nails scratched light lines in his scalp. joints and limbs relaxing impossibly more, all but melting into you. 

“love you” he said, coated in that morning voice that made you just a bit dizzy. 

he turned his head up to rest his chin between your breasts. you looked down at him, adoration seeping from every one of his pores. in another life, you might have been worried about how you looked from this angle. but not now. not with him, not like this.

“love you more” your lips twitched, wanting to kiss him, but being too happy to move. “you look so hot like this” your hand moved to his face. lightly resting against the bow of his cheek. fingertips ghosting over the bridge of his nose, and the divot around his eyes. 

he couldn't take it anymore. he muscled himself up to be mouth to mouth with you. kissing you with dreams still lingering on his tongue. mouthing slow, and honestly. 

your hands dragged up his sides, really savoring every moment. the kiss held something quiet but burning. you felt it start in your heart and spread throughout you like the warmth of a fever. 

wet lips dancing with one another, as if the stars had made them a pair generations ago. his body was tired, still magnetized to the bed. but with your lips on his, he felt like he could do anything.

reality blurred in and out. time and space contorting into something less linear. like your mind and thoughts had been completely taken over. taken by his mouth, and how it moved against yours. 

he pulled away just long enough to look at you. faces only a foot apart, his eyes studied you. they flicked between different parts of your face, like in just that amount of time, he had forgotten how breathlessly beautiful you were.

every time he saw you felt like the first. especially in moments like these. moments of you that were entirely his own. moments that made him think about forever.

the way he looked at you, like you really mattered, like you were the only thing that had ever mattered at all. 

“wan you to be my husband, need to wake up to you like this every mornin,” you whispered, splittering with desperation that pooled in the deepest part of your stomach.

his mouth was on you nearly before you could finish. kissing you with just a fraction of more pace. more friction. 

“don't talk like that” he told you between kisses. never wanting to be separated by more than an inch. 

he had managed to climb himself up your body. the lower part of his stomach resting just against your crotch. you hadn't noticed it before. your bodies were just close together, and there was no intention behind it. 

now it was the only thing you could think about. your hips flinched before you could stop them. grinding, just a fraction, against him. embarrassment flooded over you like cold water. 

followed quickly by mind numbing heat. lando’s hands had moved to your hips, gripping you tight as he adjusted you both.

pressing his bulge against your sex with the perfect amount of force. friction bumping your clit.

his hips found a slow and agonizing roll. eyes never unlocking from yours. boaring into you with such intensity you felt your head spin. 

he dipped his head to kiss you again. slower, somehow softer. sleep still hung thick in the air as both of your bodies begged the other for support. lando held himself up by his arms, legs still flaccid against the mattress. 

rutting against you, using it to keep himself up right. his lips slurred whilst you kissed. he didn't care how he kissed you, neither of you did. the only thing that mattered was that he was kissing you. 

the length of his cock dragged against your clit, parting your folds as he pushed more into you. you were gasping into his mouth. hips stuttering and breath catching. opening your eyes to see him smirking down at you. pure joy plastered across his face as he had you like this.

exactly where he wanted you.

he dropped his head to your shoulder and continued teasing you through your shorts. you could feel his smile against you, but it all felt too good to care.

the fluidity of the light and colors of the room made you question if this was a dream or not. your blinks were still slow, tired. but every bit of brainpower you had was focused entirely on the outline of lando’s cock sliding between your sex. 

“you gonna let me fuck you?” his voice was ragged, and muffled against you. “gonna let me take you right here, first thing?” he teased.

your head was nodding before you had really even comprehended what he was saying. looking up at him with big wet eyes. you looked almost… pitiful. some dangerous mix of love and desire grew beneath the hardness of lando’s cock. 

he hooked a finger inside your shorts. the back of his knuckle gliding against your slick. wet and leaking through your underwear. your mouth shot open as you felt starved for his touch.

using his thumb to push your shorts and panties to the side, he slowly dipped his middle finger inside of you. teasing the edge with just the tip, and slowly letting you suck him in. your wet heat making it easy for him.

taking his finger so well, he was buried completely inside you and you were still insatiable for more. he pulled it out, as slow as the morning creeped along. diving back in and curling to hit a sweet spot.

a moan was pushed from you. his mouth hovered just against yours. letting you make noise, but being just close enough it was nearly kissing. he looked down at you through hooded eyes. 

your legs separated, opening yourself for him more. your cunt relaxed as he pumped torturously slow in and out of you. you leaked, more lubricant than you needed now. tempting him, daring him to fuck you. 

your brows crinkled and eyes fluttered languidly. the tip of his finger continuously curling into that one spot. 

he pulled from you completely, and you looked like you might cry. devastated at the loss of him. you just looked so sweet, lan couldn't help but reconnect your lips. needing to taste how beautiful you looked. 

he held you, weakly, but enough. you were mush and pliable to his hands now. willing and wanting to do anything he asked. 

his hand raised to your mouth. separating your lips and lightly setting them against your bottom one. you took his soaked fingers in your mouth before you even realized what was happening. 

expecting to find his lips, but finding the taste of your own pussy had you purring against him. you sucked his finger clean without hesitation. air escaped lando’s mouth like he had just seen something holy. 

you let your eyes shut again. content with his fingers in your mouth and the weight he applied on top of you and against your crotch.

he moved to free himself. pulling his plaid pj pants down just enough to have himself springing out. his thumb held your clothes to the side of your slit, the rest of his hand gripping your thigh with strength that would hurt if you didn't need this. 

he grunted as he laid his cock against you. glistening with arousal, he pushed it through your folds, the tip dipping in just barely. enough to give you a jolt of electricity. 

“say what you said earlier” he lined himself up with your hole. you knew what he meant. Instantly. 

“want you to be my husband” your eyes gleamed up at him. his hips moved faster than his head. sinking into you the second that word left your mouth.

every inch sunk inside of you with ease, aided by your begging wet walls. a moan left lando as his eyes rolled back so gently before he closed them. head falling back to your shoulder. letting you support him.

he stayed still, for you both to adjust. you adjusted to the stretch his cock gave you, pleasure tingling at the edges of the pain until it was all you could feel. he adjusted to the pressure and heat of your cunt. doing everything he could to not finish inside you right now. 

but the way your cunt was throbbing around him. maybe you wanted him to.

when he convinced himself he was ready, he could take it, he pulled his hips away just a bit. snapping them back against you the second he felt cold air around his drenched cock. the shift of cold air to your heat was brain numbing. 

his dick moved and twitched against the nerves deep inside you. sleep and pleasure mixing to have you nearly nonverbal. just moans and mewls escaping you as his tip pulled away again. 

he pushed back in, slower now, staring at your heat from his lazy positioning. 

“god, you feel so fucking good”

his mouth parted as you enveloped him again. a weak breath leaving him as your pussy opened even more for him. loosening to take him, to keep him in you as long as possible.

“that's it baby,” his hips found a steady rhythm. only pulling halfway out before he was diving back into you for more. the pattern was slow, stable. soft popping noises every time his hips collided back with yours.

your hands scratched at his neck where his hair ended. keeping him flush against you, relying on him as you supported half of his weight. he perked up enough to look at you. lips brushing against yours, as his pace never changed. 

“again,” the look in his eyes held every other word he might have used to explain. 

“my husband” your eyes lulled, focused only on him, a gentle gaze that held nothing but truth. “you're gonna be,” you leaned forward, kissing him. wet and still, speaking through shared saliva. “my husband.” 

he grunted into your shoulder. head collapsing back down, as the noise was strangled and unstoppable. gritted teeth and a locked jaw couldn’t keep him quiet when he had you spread open like this, begging for forever.

he moved his other hand to wrap under your thigh. spreading them both to be as wide as comfortably possible. your shorts snapped back against him, attempting to close you off, but his cock had other plans. 

he still fucked gently into you, your shorts and panties now dragging along the side of his shaft. a sharp hiss, too much friction. he swore against you. picking up pace to the one you liked. 

angling himself to hit that spot, the one that sent you tumbling over the edge faster than you wanted. he split you wide, faster now, more desperate. you fisted his hair at the back of his neck. 

he had to close his eyes, seeing you was too much. he didnt want to finish before you, but the way you looked right now was fucking exhilarating. 

you clenched around him with muscles too deep for you to be controlling. he knew what that meant. he knew you better than you knew yourself.

“gonna make you my pretty little wife,” his voice was honey dipped and laced with sleep, yet rough at the edges with desire stronger than you could imagine. 

pleasure exploded through you with force. starting from the outer lining of your cunt and pulsing through your body like a heartbeat. your arms and legs wrapped around him and squeezed. clenching every part of you, holding him like a vice. 

you clung to him like you might lose yourself if you didn't. like he was the only thing keeping you together. your ears rang, eyes shut so tight it hurt. every part of you was wound up to its tightest setting, pleasure running its course. 

until you felt warm spurts of lando’s love coat your insides. sending a part of himself so deep neither of you could reach it. touching nerves that had never been stimulated. he came on top of you with a fragile moan. broken yet entirely whole. 

the tightly bound coil loosened as waves of bliss crashed over you. gentle euphoria took hold of your entire body, rocking you in and out of consciousness. 

lando’s breath was the first thing that clawed you back to reality. his face was flushed, ears red and eyes blown like you were god herself. he dipped down to kiss you, his pace slowing to a still. 

his tongue cradled yours delicately. curling and flicking to feel every part of your mouth. 

he pulled away, smiling lazy, but drunk with love. the sleepy morning tugged on his eyelids, asking them to close. 

he laid his head to your chest, listening to your heartbeat. so real, so you. it pulled him deeper, closer, to the spot in your heart that was made for him. 

you smile down at him, his breath keeping you present in the moment. softly in and out, lungs filling and expanding. so alive, so him.