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Chapter Text

Oscar’s mum likes to say bad things happen in threes. He’s not superstitious, but waking up to a text from Max Fewtrell the night of the same day that Lily broke up with him and he spun out in his home race might be enough to sway him.

hey mate, small emergency, are you awake???

The light from his phone is offensively bright, and the words swim around the screen under the weight of the migraine pulsing behind his eyes.

He groans, whacking his hand around the hotel’s bedside table until he’s able to turn the lamp on. There’s only one reason Max would be texting Oscar in the middle of the night—especially after a race like that—and he’s unfortunately too attached to said reason to ignore the text.

Now I am. Is Lando okay?

idk

i’m on the phone with him right now, but he’s drunk as shit and not making much sense

i think he’s calling me from a club bathroom?

Jesus

Is he hurt??

no i don’t think so, i think he’s just drunk

you're still in melbourne right

He is. Max doesn’t even need to ask before Oscar is thumbing back a response and pulling on a sweatshirt.

Despite Lando’s best efforts, his love for parties and clubs never rubbed off on Oscar. Maybe they’d be closer outside of race weekends if Oscar were a bit more willing to let loose, but it feels a bit dangerous, knowing he’s one misstep from getting photographed at the wrong moment and throwing his whole career away. Or apparently, one misstep away from ending up drunk and alone on the bathroom floor in a club 24 hours by plane away from home.

Send me the address. Leaving now.

Max responds with a screenshot of one of those apps that let you track your friends. Oscar doesn’t have an app like that. If it were him drunk out of his mind, no one would know where to scrape his body up at the end of the night.

Isn’t that a sour thought? No more Logan, no more Lily. Oscar’s closest friend at a grand prix weekend is genuinely Lando, and he knows Lando likes him, but he isn’t sure if he even makes it into Lando’s top five. He tries to shake the thought. Carlos Sainz isn’t the one Max is trusting to go rescue Lando after all. Nope, that responsibility is all Oscar’s. Steady, dependable Oscar. Awkward, boring Oscar.

By the time he makes it to the hotel entrance, Max has sent a few followup messages letting him know he managed to get Lando to lock himself in a stall until Oscar gets there. He doesn’t want to waste time waiting for a rideshare, so he just hurries down the street on foot. The rain stopped hours ago, but it left the asphalt covered in puddles, everything gray and dull to match Oscar’s mood. He feels like he should at the very least be irritated by being dragged out of bed, but he just feels wrung out and crumbled at the edges like an overused sponge.

Oscar vaguely recognizes the club as one Lando had brought him to two years ago, back when Oscar was still a rookie trying to look like he wasn’t a complete stick in the mud and Lando was still trying to be the cool, older teammate that Carlos and Danny had been for him. It’s not hard to get them to let him inside, not when his name is Oscar Piastri the weekend of the Australian Grand Prix.

He pulls his hood over his head and tries his best to slip through the crowd unrecognized until he’s able to find the corner that houses the bathrooms.

The moment he enters, Oscar crouches down to look under the stalls, uncaring for anyone else who might be there. To his relief, he immediately catches sight of Lando slumped against one of the toilets.

He knocks on the stall. “Lando, open up now. Time to go.” Lando lets out a moan, and Oscar knocks a little more impatiently. “Come on, mate. It smells like vomit and shit in here. Let’s go.”

“Can’t go, I’ll be late,” he slurs. “Max says I have to wait for Osc. Osco. Os-car. He gets annoyed with me when I’m late for things, but he’s always late too.”

“I—Late for what?”

Lando doesn’t respond, so with a silent apology to his clothes, Oscar lies on his back and pushes his way under the stall door. He finds Lando’s phone on the floor—still open to his call with Max—and lets Max know he’s with Lando before hanging up and shoving it in his pocket.

“Oscarrrrrrr,” Lando says with a grin, but his face is red and splotchy in a way that looks like it’s less from the alcohol and more from crying.

“What’s wrong?” He scans him over, trying to see if there are any bumps or bruises where there shouldn’t be. “Did something happen?”

“Nothing’s wrong, all better now.” Lando picks himself up off the toilet so he can bury his face in Oscar’s shoulder instead. “This is better.”

“Better than the toilet? I sure hope so.”

“Not when I meant.”

“What did you mean?”

“You don’t get to know what I meant.”

Oscar closes his eyes. “Lando, please.”

“Please what?”

“I don’t know. You just worry me sometimes.”

Lando pulls back to look at him. “Nothing to worry about, Osc. I’m fixing it.”

“Fixing what?”

Lando responds with some wild hand gesture that Oscar can’t even begin to follow.

“Okay, well we need to go back to the hotel now, Mr. Fix-It. Can you stand?”

He nods, but Oscar can tell he didn’t understand a word he said. He sighs, prying his arms under Lando’s arms to pull him to his feet. They manage alright, but Lando frowns as soon as he’s up. “I think there’s vomit on my shirt.”

“Gee, I wonder how that got there.”

“You’re mean when you’re drunk.”

Oscar sighs again. “Sure I am.” But Lando’s swaying against his side in a thin, vomit-covered T-shirt and looking a lot more miserable now that he’s standing, and Oscar’s always been weak for him anyways, so he yanks his hoodie off and wrestles it over Landos’s head.

“Thanks, Osc.”

“You’re welcome.”

Together, they stumble through the throng of clubgoers back to the front to wait on a bench because Oscar did call a rideshare this time. Stumbling through the streets of Melbourne while half-carrying a drunk Lando Norris was not his idea of a good time.

Lando leans into his side—more out of an inability to support himself upright than anything else—and even though Oscar has never been one for physical contact, he wraps an arm around his shoulders. He’s half-convinced Lando dozes off while they wait, and Oscar spares a thought for whoever Lando went out with tonight. Lando’s a grown man, but he finds himself (maybe unnecessarily) upset with whoever it was.

It doesn’t take long for their ride to come, so then Oscar’s bullying Lando into the car, and then he’s bullying him into the hotel, into the elevator, and all the way back into Oscar’s room because he can’t be arsed to figure out where Lando’s is.

He winces when Lando flops on top of his clean sheets, but takes the opportunity to yank his shoes off. “Gentle, Oscar,” Lando whines.

Oscar responds by threatening to pour water down his throat unless Lando does it himself.

He does so (thankfully), and Oscar takes a seat at the edge of the bed to watch him. Partially to make sure he doesn’t accidentally waterboard himself and partially just because Oscar likes watching Lando. His teenage crush on him has gentled into white noise—still a constant, but it no longer feels like sirens are blaring every time he looks at him. Comfortable.

Lando sets the bottle on the nightstand, and Oscar lays painkillers and Lando’s phone down next to it. Then Lando squirms under the covers, and Oscar climbs in on the other side. He should make them change their clothes or get Lando to brush his teeth or something, but he’s exhausted. Oscar’s shirt is mostly clean and he thinks Lando deserves to face the consequences of his own actions in the morning, so he calls it good.

“Hey, Osc?” he murmurs once Oscar finishes settling in.

“Yeah?”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to get like this. I’m sorry Max made you come get me.”

“It’s okay,” Oscar says. “All good now, right?” And Oscar means it when he says it, but the words “all good” still taste like ash on his tongue. A wave of grief (partially for his relationship with Lily, but mostly for the race which, wow, really tells you something) crashes over him. He holds his breath until it subsides and he’s able to kick his way back to the surface, neatly packing it away in perfectly compartmentalized boxes.

Lando doesn’t notice, is way too drunk to, but his eyes are wide and watery like he can feel it too. “It’s just all so much. I don’t know how we’re supposed to live with all of this.”

He doesn’t need to say anything else for Oscar to understand. They talk about it a lot in the quiet moments when it’s just them: the crowds, the screaming, the twenty-four hour long flights and never seeing your family. Bending yourself to be the right shape until you can’t even recognize the you in the camera lenses. The way you can win and still feel like you’re drowning.

Lando doesn’t keep up the act when it’s just the two of them, just lets his expression be open and exhausted. Without the flashing lights and cocky smiles, he always looks younger. It makes Oscar feel younger too.

He thinks about Lily breaking up with him because everything about Formula 1 is too demanding, and because Oscar wasn’t willing to compromise on any of it.

He imagines a world where he quits tomorrow and never sees a racecar again, settling down with someone, going to a nine-to-five, and coming home to the same place every day for the rest of his life. A quiet life. A slow life.

It makes him shiver.

“I don’t know how to live without it,” Oscar replies.

——

He wakes up because Lando’s shoving his feet between Oscar’s ankles. His bony, freezing feet.

“Shove off, mate,” Oscar says into his pillow, pushing him away. He knows Lando wasn’t all the way awake, because he can feel the way Lando buffers next to him the moment he becomes aware enough to realize where he is. Or more likely, who he’s with.

“Oh my god,” Lando whispers, voice hoarse. “Oh my god, did we fuck?”

“What?” Oscar shoots upright.

“Wait, no, pretend I didn’t say that. I’m a man. A straight man who likes women. Of course we didn’t fuck, that’d be insane.” His words are too rushed to be anywhere near believable.

Oscar blinks slowly. “Do you—Do you actually want me to pretend I didn’t hear it, or can I ask why you think we fucked?”

Lando squints. “Uh. The first one?”

“Alright then.” He checks the time. They’re scheduled to get to China sooner than they usually would to try to make up for the jetlag that goes hand-in-hand with visiting Australia. It’s a bit annoying, especially because it means he didn’t really have a chance to spend much time with his family, but Oscar will just have to find some other time to make the trip down. “Best get up then. Plane’s up in a few hours.” Then Oscar pads off to the bathroom to give Lando a chance to regroup himself.

He lets the warm water work its wonders on his sore muscles, and he brushes his teeth afterwards before packing his toiletries up, fully expecting Lando to be gone by the time he gets back. Instead, Lando’s right where he left him, only now furiously texting someone.

“You alright, mate?” Oscar asks.

“Um. Yes?”

Oscar shrugs and starts stuffing the rest of his belongings in his luggage, deciding to let Lando work through whatever’s going on in Lando World on his own until he’s ready to share.

“Aren’t you going to say anything?” Lando presses.

“About what?”

“About—You know what!”

“I thought you didn’t want me to.”

“I changed my mind, ignoring it is worse.”

“Okay.” Oscar leans against the wall. “So you like men.”

Lando flushes red. “Ohmygod, why are you like this?”

He frowns “Like what?”

“Like, why aren’t you freaking out?”

“I find most things in life really aren’t worth freaking out about.” Oscar hesitates before pushing off the wall to sit next to him on the bed. “If you’re worried I’m going to tell someone, I promise I won’t.”

“Oh. That actually didn’t even cross my mind.”

Oscar gives one of his patented close-lipped smiles. “Then what’s there to freak out about?”

Lando stares at the floor, long enough to be concerning. “I don’t like guys.”

“Lando…”

“I don’t! I'm not gay, okay?”

“Okay,” Oscar agrees hesitantly. “But like… You know it would be okay if you did, right?”

“I’m a Formula 1 driver, Oscar.”

The way Lando says it grates on him, like Oscar has no idea what he’s talking about. It’s almost enough to loosen his own tongue, but Oscar is planning on taking his own sexuality to the grave with him. Or well, at least to the end of his Formula 1 career. He’s well aware that this is one of the sacrifices he’ll just have to suck up, right next to leaving home at fourteen and always being a little hungry. All for the sake of racing.

“Okay,” he says.

“Sorry for snapping,” Lando mutters. “But like, you get it, right? You get why I can’t say it?”

Of course he does. And Lando's words are as good as an admission.

Tentatively, he wraps an arm around him. He’s never been good at physical touch, but Lando leans into him like he’s doing something right. “It’s okay. But you know I'm always here if you want to talk about anything, right?”

“I know, Osc.” He breathes out slowly. “You’re a good friend.”

“Don’t I know it.”

——

George and Alex pull Lando into their circle the moment they see him at the driver’s parade in China. Australia was extremely busy for McLaren (being Oscar’s home race and all), so he really hasn’t been able to catch up with them since their last padel match over break (ignoring the brief run-in they had last weekend after his win when they poured shots down Lando’s throat).

“I think proper congratulations are in order,” George says, shaking Lando’s shoulders roughly.

Lando laughs. “Mate, I think you congratulated me well enough already.”

“Nah, who cares about the win? We mean the girl.” Alex wiggles his eyebrows. “Way out of your league.”

Which, bullshit. He’s a good-looking, rich, Formula 1 driver. “What are you talking about?” he grouses.

George slings one of his giraffe arms around Lando’s neck. “You haven’t seen it? You got caught on camera getting handsy on the dancefloor.”

“‘Handsy’ is one word for it. ‘Tongue-sy’ is another,” Alex adds.

Lando groans. He can only really remember flashes of that night, but he does remember dancing with a woman and feeling nauseous for more reasons than just the alcohol. She was beautiful, he knows, and he wanted so badly to want her. He’s gotten through dozens of nights just like that one by taking pretty women to bed and ‘lying back and thinking of England,’ so to speak.

And instead that night ended up with Oscar taking him to bed instead.

Lando slams a lid on that particular thought and glances around for his teammate. He finds him standing on the outskirts of a group of rookies listening to Max monologue. Oscar’s usually on the outskirts when he’s not glued to Lando’s side, especially since Sargeant’s been gone.

“Oi, Osco!” Lando calls, jerking his head to indicate Oscar should come stand with them.

Oscar looks startled, but dutifully slots into position next to Lando. George and Alex exchange polite greetings with him—because even though they’re not close, it’s hard to dislike Oscar—before turning back to Lando.

“So did you end up having a fun night, Romeo?” Alex continues.

“Talking about Lando’s wild night out after last weekend,” George says to give Oscar context.

Oscar, who knows exactly how Lando’s wild night out ended, turns to Lando. “Oh yeah, tell us all about how it ended.”

“Shove off, all of you. You’re all a bunch of valoristic–voytastic—”

“Voyeuristic?” Oscar offers.

“Voyeuristic freaks!”

Alex looks at George. “He’s not oversharing. That means something embarrassing happened.”

Lando hates having friends. “No it doesn’t,” he whines.

“It does, but you don’t have to tell us,” George says. “It’ll all come out next time we get some tequila in you anyways.”

“Why is it always me you’re picking on?”

George snorts. “Us three are all in committed relationships. We have to live out our drama through you.”

Oscar freezes, his carefully blank expression washing over his face. It’s gone in an instant, replaced by his same easygoing smile. Easy to miss. Lando doesn’t miss it.

“Oscar?” he says, trying to ask ‘what’s wrong’ through telepathy alone.

“What?”

Lando stares him down but doesn’t say anything more just in case he really doesn’t want the peanut gallery to know.

“Fine,” he sighs, because Oscar rarely denies Lando anything. “Lily and I broke up.”

“What? When?”

“Last Sunday?” he says like a question.

“Oscar.”

“It’s fine!”

“It’s—” Lando becomes abruptly aware of George and Alex watching them like a tennis match. “We’re talking about this later,” he says instead. He can’t believe Oscar didn’t tell him, especially after Lando dumped his problems all over him.

“Okay,” Oscar agrees easily.

“Tough luck, mate,” George says. “We should go out tonight, get your mind off things.”

Oscar laughs. “I don’t know, that’s not really my scene.”

“Come on, Oscar. It’s looking like you and Lando are going to be bound together forever in holy McLaren-mony. It’s about time we get to know you, yeah? Third season’s the charm.”

Lando could kiss George if he actually manages to get Oscar to go out.

“Besides, you have to be getting sick of Lando by now,” Alex tags on.

“Please?” Lando says with a winning smile.

Oscar says, “Fine,” and all three of them cheer. “But you’re not allowed to leave me alone all night long.”

“‘Course not, Osc. It’ll be fun.”

——

As soon as the parade ends, Lando rushes back to his driver’s room, searching for the video as he walks. He doesn’t have much time before Jon barges in to make him start stretching.

He ignores Oscar’s confused noises behind him and slams the door shut. With a shaking thumb, he presses play on the video.

It’s hard to make out much, the room is dark and the video is grainy, but whoever’s behind the camera zooms in on a pair of figures. One is very recognizably Lando. Plastered against his front is a woman in a tight dress and makeup that’s defined enough for her face to actually register on camera. Beautiful.

Someone he doesn’t know hands video-Lando a shot, and he knocks it back without question.

The video loops, and Lando watches again. He remembers using the burn of the drink to try to distract himself from the burn of her hands on his shoulders, his chest, his neck. Chugging alcohol is usually enough to make his senses start to blur, until the touches stop feeling like hot brands. Sometimes, he’s able to get drunk enough that the touches actually start feeling nice. Those are the nights that he tries to convince himself it’s working, and that if he just keeps trying, he can train himself into liking women.

This was not one of those nights.

On his third watch, he’s able to make out the way she licks up the side of his neck. Her tongue was hot and slimy, and Lando clasps a hand on his neck as though that can stop the memory of the feeling.

In disgust, Lando throws his phone. He means for it to land on the big chair he sometimes sleeps on, but he overshoots and it thumps into the wall instead.

Fuck. Lando slumps into the chair instead, burying his head in his hands. He should have waited until after the race to watch it. Now he’s going to be distracted and bin it, and all people will be able to talk about is how Lando can’t pull out a decent result even in the fastest car on the grid.

With each season that goes by without a championship, Lando can feel himself getting more and more desperate. If he could just stay focused, this could be his year. He has to believe it is his year, as long as Oscar doesn’t take it from him. Oscar, who knows Lando’s biggest shame.

Championship fights between teammates aren’t pretty. He thinks Nico Rosberg would have used something like this against Lewis. He thinks Mark Webber would have used something like this against Seb. But for all of Mark’s attempts to turn Oscar into someone who’s going to win at all costs, Lando doesn’t think Oscar will pull the trigger. He searches himself for even a sign of anxiety that Oscar will use it against him and comes up dry. Lando and Oscar just aren’t like that.

There’s a knock at his door. Lando doesn’t trust himself to sound normal when he answers, so he doesn’t. The door slides open anyways.

It’s Oscar, with his stupid raised eyebrows and placid expression. “So who won? You or the phone?”

Lando is abruptly reminded that the wall he threw his phone at is the one he shares with Oscar. “Not too sure, but I think I’m feeling a bit beat up at the moment,” he answers honestly.

“The bastard.”

“Are you only here to mock my struggles?”

“Only partially. I come bearing a peace offering.” Oscar grins, revealing a pair of Capri Sun pouches from where he was hiding it behind the door frame.

Lando lets his gaze wander across Oscar’s face. It’s his Lando-smile, the one with the open eyes and full-toothed smile, the one he wears when he thinks he’s done something good and is waiting for Lando’s response. The rush of fondness Lando feels is incredibly sappy and gross. “Well in that case, what are you waiting for?”

Oscar closes the door behind him and takes a moment to stab the straw in before handing it to Lando, because he’s always doing nice things for Lando. “For you.”

“Thanks, Osc.” Lando waits for Oscar to stab his own pouch (the time feeling helplessly endeared by the way Oscar struggles to get the wrapper off the straw) before toasting him with a, “Cheers, mate.”

The first sip tells him Oscar got him the best flavor: Tropical Punch. He wonders if Oscar knows it’s his favorite or if it’s just a coincidence. It seems like the kind of thing Oscar would know. He’s thoughtful like that.

“So. Feeling alright?” Oscar asks, taking a long drink.

Lando tracks the line of his throat as he swallows. His skin is so pale, it makes it look softer than it probably actually is. He almost wants to touch it, but that would be weird. “What?”

Oscar stares at him with another pointed sip, and for some reason, Lando’s cheeks go hot.

“Oh. Yeah. Yeah, I’m alright. Just, uh, excited for the race. Shanghai. Very fun.”

The conversation tapers off, and Lando can tell the exact moment Oscar starts overthinking and regretting his decision to 'bother' Lando. Lando wracks his brain trying to come up with something to talk about, but the first thing that comes to mind is Lily, and that feels like more of a late night kind of talk than a 'right-before-we-go-out-and-drive-cars-at-300-kph' kind of talk.

“I’m glad you agreed to come out tonight. You always say no when I ask, but when it’s George Russell—” he says instead.

“What can I say, George is prettier than you. He bats those baby-blues and I’m helpless to his whims.”

“George is not prettier than me,” Lando hisses.

“Gee, I dunno—”

“You take it back right now.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Or what?”

Lando darts up, not entirely sure what his goal is, but Oscar is standing there with his smug, infuriating smile, so Lando launches himself at Oscar and tries to catch his arms.

Oscar attempts to swat him away. “What are you doing?”

“Winning.”

“Winning what?”

“I don’t know!” Lando says. He lunges again, failing to account for the fact that Oscar is not only taller than him, but wider and stronger.

He snatches Lando’s wrists. Lando keeps trying to pummel him, but Oscar holds him steady. “What are you—Would you quit that?"

“Not until you repent.”

Oscar snorts. “For what, saying George is prettier?”

“No! Maybe!”

“If I tell you you’re prettier, will you stop trying to hit me?”

“Yes!”

“Okay, Lando. You’re prettier than George.”

And Lando tastes sweet victory for all of about two seconds before realizing the new danger he’s in. He truly was only joking about being upset. It was just like, cuteness-aggression towards his teammate or something.

But now his hands are being held in place while Oscar (albeit jokingly) tells him he’s pretty.

“Yep! Cool! Thanks!” Lando rips his hands away, but it’s with the knowledge that he only manages it because Oscar lets him.

Nope. No. Nope-ity nope no.

Lando takes whatever bundle of feelings he’s felt in the last minute and shoves them away. He determinedly thinks of the beautiful woman with the wandering hands and does his best to convince himself that that’s what he wants.

He’s saved from having to come up with something to say by Jon knocking at the door and poking his head in. Jon makes a joke about Oscar hiding from Arturri, and Oscar makes a joke about being busted, and Lando pretends to be too busy getting something from his bag to make eye contact with Oscar as Jon kicks him out.

There is a whole can of worms here that Lando refuses to open up. He promises himself he’ll be back to acting normal by tonight.

Chapter Text

Oscar wins in China.

He knew it was coming—the car is fast this year—but it still settles something that his disaster in Australia raised. His third ever Formula 1 win. Fifth, if you count the Qatar sprints.

He lets Lando into his hotel room to rifle through his things for a suitable going-out shirt when they get back. Lando’s not going to actually find anything, but Oscar flops on the bed and listens to Lando’s mutterings without complaint.

“Oscar.”

“Yeah?”

“This is tragic. This is so tragic.”

“You sound surprised.”

“Honestly, the tragedy that is your wardrobe never stops surprising me.” He tosses a balled-up shirt at Oscar. “Why is everything wrinkled? Learn how to fold your clothes, you muppet.”

There’s nothing wrong with his clothing, he just has a very strict comfort zone when it comes to clothing. “What’s the point of folding things on the last day? The weekend’s over.”

Lando groans.

“Just find the least wrinkled shirt and call it a day,” Oscar says, a very reasonable suggestion in his opinion.

“You only brought three shirts that aren’t team kit, and one of them has toothpaste stains.”

“I could hit up the club in team kit,” he says, mostly because he knows it’ll annoy Lando.

“No you can’t.”

Oscar lets this go on for a few minutes before taking pity on Lando and unearthing a clean white hoodie, something logoless and far too expensive for what it actually is. Lando decides he’s not allowed to wear shorts, so Oscar ends up in his McLaren-mandated black jeans.

Lando looks like it pains him. Like, actually, physically pains him. “I can’t believe I’m letting you go out like this. I’ve failed you as a teammate.”

“Sorry that playing Barbie wasn’t as fun as you thought it was going to be.” Oscar’s not actually sorry at all.

“Oscar,” Lando groans. “How are you going to be seducing babes like this? Isn’t this, like, the first time you’ve been an eligible bachelor since boarding school?”

Oscar looks down. He’s been trying not to think about Lily and has mostly succeeded. It’s been a busy week, so he hasn’t been short on things to use to distract himself. A busy year, actually. He doesn’t want to make it to the end of the fight and lose and know it’s because he had anything left that he could have given. Every bit of spare attention or time he has goes straight to training. Lily hadn’t liked that.

Rather than trying to unpack that tangle of emotions, Oscar shoos Lando off to go get himself dressed.

When he’s gone, Oscar pulls out his phone and opens up his text thread with Lily. He scrolls up and up, watching the text bubbles fly by. Her messages, multi-sentenced and heartfelt. Checking in on him or sharing things about her day. Funny little jokes and pictures of her coffee. His messages, dry and short. Apologies for not responding sooner and using the react feature more often than not. He never went as far as to miss a date or one of their nightly calls, but he’s been so twisted up running himself ragged that the little things became sacrifices.

He thought she understood though. She said she understood. And maybe she did. He doesn’t blame her for not wanting to deal with it all, but it still hurts.

He briefly considers sending her a message. They said they’re going to keep in touch—they’ve been best friends for years—but he’s not sure how long it is post-breakup they have to wait until reaching out is appropriate. He turns his phone off and shuts his eyes for the five minutes until Lando comes to collect him for the night.

Lando ended up in a white top, with a black button-down over it, and Oscar enjoys the way they look like a matched set even without the papaya orange. Maybe that was intentional on Lando’s part.

They show up together, shoulder to shoulder until Lando spots Carlos dancing and rushes over to sling an arm around his neck. Their group for the night expanded to include not only Alex and George, but Carlos and Charles and Max too, because Lando is a fun person who has friends that like going places with him. He thinks Yuki and Pierre mentioned they might stop by at some point too, but he’s not entirely sure.

Oscar slots himself into the corner booth next to Charles and resigns himself to a long night of nodding along to conversations he can barely hear and doesn’t have enough context to understand.

To his relief, it’s only a minute before Lando is shoving Oscar further into the booth (and into Charles) so he can perch on the edge next to Oscar. He has to lay his arm across the back of the booth to stay balanced, and it brushes against the back of Oscar’s neck just lightly enough to make him shiver. It was easier to ignore his attraction towards Lando when he was in a relationship, but Oscar is nothing if not good at managing his feelings and emotions. It won’t be a problem.

Most of the others made it here before them, and he reckons they’re a few drinks in by their volume alone. Oscar feels a little out of his skin, but he’s mostly content to close his eyes and let the waves of conversation drift over him. He can’t make out most of everything they’re saying (it really is too loud in here), but he doesn’t think anyone’s really expecting him to respond anyways. He laughs along when the group does, and every so often, someone pushes a new drink into his hand, and he feels fine. Going out isn’t nearly as awful when Lando doesn’t abandon him the moment they walk in.

With each round, Lando gets louder and louder until he’s standing up to shout something across the table at George and immediately sitting back down. “Woah, dizzy.”

Oscar himself is just pleasantly buzzed because he’s waved his hand whenever shots were being passed out. “Have you drunk any water?”

Lando laughs. “No.”

“You think we should go get some?”

“I think you should go get it for me,” Lando says, wiggling his eyebrows.

Oscar’s not impressed. “Lando.”

“Oscar.” Lando just smirks at him. They both know he’s going to do it, but he feels he was obligated to put up some form of resistance on principle.

He rolls his eyes, pushing at Lando’s shoulder to get him to let him out of the booth, but Lando refuses to move because one of his favorite pastimes is being slightly inconvenient to Oscar. Oscar’s bulked up a lot in the last year though, so rather than going through the humiliating ritual of crawling across Lando’s lap, he wraps an arm around Lando and manhandles him up.

Lando squeaks, and the table bursts into teasing laughter as Oscar pushes him to sit back down. “This is an abuse of power!”

Oscar chooses not to reply, going to fetch Lando’s glass of water from the bar. One of them is abusing their power, and it is not Oscar. He actually gets the bartender to give him a tray full of waters though because he feels slightly responsible for the whole rowdy group.

The cheer they let out when Oscar returns is gratifying. He’s always enjoyed doing things for others, and despite being rather introverted by nature, he really does want to be liked by the other drivers.

They’ve started up a game of fuck-marry-kill while Oscar was gone, full of the names of models and actresses that he mostly doesn’t recognize, but he’s feeling confident enough to offer up his opinion on the few he does. Carlos argues with him every time he says something, but after the first few times, Oscar starts to think Carlos is messing with him not because he wants to annoy Oscar, but because he thinks it’s funny. Maybe it is a bit funny. Oscar can’t admit that though, he’s a principled man who will not be swayed into liking Carlos Sainz even a little bit.

Lando, on the other hand, is quiet for the first time all night. He’s tense and twitchy like he was when he used to spend too much time reading comments on social media and Oscar would have to steal his phone on orders from Fewtrell.

Oscar leans into him. “You alright?”

Lando startles. “Yeah. I’m aces.” He certainly does not sound aces.

“Are you feeling sick?”

“No, I’m good. Just hanging. Being chill.”

“You’re being weird.”

“I’m not being weird.”

Oscar scans him up and down, as if he can see what’s wrong just by looking. Lando has a healthy flush to his cheeks, but his hands are sure, and his dizziness isn’t so bad that he can’t steady himself by the back of the booth.

“Was it the race?”

“It’s not the race.”

“But you admit it’s something.”

Lando groans. “Leave me alone for once.”

“No, I’m going to figure it out.”

“Why are you like this?” Lando asks, and Oscar gets a sense of deja vu. Those are the same words Lando said to him last week when he was hungover in Oscar’s hotel room.

He gets a hunch.

“Fuck, marry, kill,” Oscar whispers. “Senna, Prost, Schumacher.”

“What?” Lando hisses.

“You heard me.”

Lando looks around furtively. “You can’t do that.”

“You didn’t want to play with women, right?” Oscar asks, and Lando’s silence is enough to confirm it for him. It confuses him a bit because he knows he’s seen Lando with women before, but it doesn’t really matter either way. “Lando,” he says, waiting for Lando to stop fidgeting and meet Oscar’s eyes. “It’s okay. It’s just a game, right?”

It takes a moment, but Oscar sees the exact moment the tension drains from Lando’s shoulders. He breaks eye contact, but he still opens his mouth to mutter, “Fuck Senna, marry Schumacher, kill Prost.”

Oscar grins, “There you go.”

There’s a glint in Lando’s eye now as he looks around the table, one that usually means trouble. “Your turn then. Charles, Max, Carlos.”

“Kill Carlos,” Oscar says without hesitation.

Lando bursts out laughing. “You can’t kill Carlos.”

“Yes I can. That’s the whole point of the game.”

“Okay, but I’d be sad if you killed him.”

“Then you shouldn’t have put him on the chopping block!”

“You should kill Max instead.”

“Why would I kill Max?”

“McLaren domination.”

“Why don’t I kill Charles? Take him out, Max loses interest in the sport and refuses to race again à la Prost, and then we’re pretty much set from there.”

“Why are you two talking about killing me?” Charles asks loudly from Lando’s other side, and everyone turns to look at them.

Oscar and Lando both freeze.

“To… win the championship?” Lando says.

And in the minds of their fellow drivers, this must be a perfectly valid reason because they all nod along.

“Why wouldn’t you just kill Max?” Alex asks.

Lando throws his hands up. “That’s what I said.”

“Was this just a fun thought experiment or were you playing the game? Who was the third option?”

“Carlos,” Oscar says, glaring at him so Carlos knows exactly where he stands in Oscar’s rankings.

George slams a fist on the table. “Fuck Charles, marry Carlos, kill Max.”

Alex turns to look at him. “You wouldn’t marry Charles?”

“Charles is hot, but Carlos would make me pancakes and whisper Spanish in my ear.”

“That’s fair.”

Lando looks about ready to combust. There’s really nothing like listening to straight dudes talk about how hot their friends are.

“Lando,” George calls. “Carlos, Danny, Oscar.”

Lando’s face turns bright red. “That is not fair.”

Carlos laughs. “Come on, cabrón. I want to hear this one. Carlando forever, yes? Best teammates?”

“I—Uh, I really don’t—”

Oscar feels compelled to defend himself. “You can’t pick Carlos. I’m the one who’s still going to be your teammate in ten years.”

“Guuuys,” Lando whines.

Carlos and him make eye contact, and he knows they have the same idea.

“Do not break my heart,” Carlos says.

“I keep Kinder chocolate in my luggage for you,” Oscar tags on.

“Oscar will not golf with you.”

“You’re halfway in my lap right now.” (Mostly an exaggeration.)

Lando groans. “You’re both bullies. Stop it, go back to hating each other.”

Carlos smiles. “Aw, you know we love you.”

“Speak for yourself,” Oscar snorts. “I’ll only love him if he picks me.”

Lando slams his forehead on the table, and Oscar feels bad enough to pat him on the back.

Alex must pity him too because he turns to Max to ask, “Danny, Checo, Charles?” and the whole group moves on.

Lando turns his head just enough to glare at him, but all Oscar can do is smile fondly.

——

“Hey, Oscar?”

“Yeah?”

“What happened with you and Lily?”

“Nothing dramatic. It just didn’t work out.”

“Oh. I always thought the two of you were solid.”

“Me too.”

“Then what was it? She found out you have a really embarrassing tattoo on your butt and that’s why you didn’t let her hit?”

“What? No.”

“Okay, you found out that she has an embarrassing butt tattoo?”

“Also no.”

“Is it a tattoo of my face? Is my face on your butt, Oscar? Is that why you’re being so cagey about the ass tatt?”

“Oh my god, shut up.”

“You know you love me.”

Oscar sighs. “I guess we just found out we weren’t as in sync as we thought. She says I’ve changed.”

“Have you?”

“What?”

“Have you changed?”

There’s a long pause before Oscar speaks again. “I’m trying to win a championship.”

Lando meets his eyes, head-on and steady. “That doesn’t answer the question.”

“Doesn’t it?”

——

The circus that is Formula 1 moves onto a triple header. Max manages to steal Japan, but Oscar snags Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. With each win, the champagne tastes sweeter and sweeter.

Somewhere in the middle of it all, Oscar starts chatting more casually with the other drivers. First because Lando is dragging him around to socialize, but then because he feels confident enough to initiate conversations himself. He gets an invite to play doubles padel with George, Alex, and Lando, and it feels less like he’s being invited as Lando’s tag-along and more because they actually want him there.

It’s nice. Oscar’s always been a bit of an oddball—one of only two drivers from his generation left standing. Mick and Guanyu and Logan were all gone, leaving Oscar and Yuki as the only rookies left from that six year gap spanning from when Lando, Alex, and George joined in 2019 to the utter influx of rookies in the 2025 season. He’s never quite fit in with either group.

Oddly, amidst what they both know is going to be a title fight between Oscar and Lando, they start getting closer than ever. Lando apparently feels comfortable enough to slap Oscar’s ass in the middle of an interview, and it’s almost enough to make Oscar regret everything, but he ultimately decides he’s happy to be “one of the guys.”

(He does find the clip later that night and rewatch it a few times because Lando Norris will probably always make Oscar feel some type of way. He knows nothing will ever come of it—even if sometimes Lando’s looks make him question—but he doesn’t actually want anything to come of it. He’s not willing to put his career at risk, not even for Lando.)

They get to Miami, and Oscar has actually started looking forward to the drivers’ parades. They’re really the only chance during the weekend other than the drivers’ meeting that he gets to talk to the other drivers unless they go out somewhere.

The drivers’ parade in Miami goes a bit differently though, and Lando can’t stop grinning, and neither can Oscar, partly because of the LEGO car, and partly because Lando smiling at him will never get old. He wants to drive it because it really is freaking cool, but Lando looks at him the same way he always does when he wants something, and Oscar caves without even having to be asked.

He’s a bit too aware of himself (knowing there are cameras all over the car), but he’s mostly happy to sit back and watch Lando scream and crash into George and Kimi and make gremlin noises. Oscar likes the gremlin noises a lot better when they’re directed at someone other than him. Their car takes a lot of damage, but at least they don’t completely crash out like Mercedes and Williams.

Then they go racing, and Lando may have won the sprint, but Oscar wins the race, and it feels like he’s finally done paying off his debt from Australia. He’s ten points ahead of Lando now.

Lando doesn’t tell him congratulations, but Oscar doesn’t mind because he doesn’t think he’d congratulate Lando for a win either, not at this point in the season when the points are so close and they’re next to each other on track more often than not. They do tell each other “good job” and “good race” and “mega driving” though, and it feels better than a “congratulations” because there’s an understanding between them that’s going to make sure they survive a championship fight as teammates, and they’ll do it again next year, and again the next and the next.

The reporters and the media and even the other drivers don’t understand it. They keep asking the same stupid questions about how they’re handling a rivalry. Lando says they both know they want to beat one another, and Oscar tells them they want to grow old together. It’s the same thing.

——

Lando invites himself into Oscar’s room after the race, Switch in hand. He’s sore that Oscar won—it stings a bit to think there’s a chance Oscar might beat him to the WDC trophy right when it’s within reach—but Oscar’s not upset that Lando is upset about Oscar’s win, and that’s the core of why they work. He just lets Lando in without fanfare.

Lando collapses lengthways on the hotel sofa (perks of being WCC winners and WDC contenders, their rooms are nice this year) and holds his Switch above his face, pulling up his savepoint.

“Sure, just come into my room and use my sofa. Not like you have your own or anything,” Oscar says in that flat, dry way of his that took Lando forever to realize is how Oscar makes jokes. Just observations presented like he’s about to look at an imaginary sitcom camera.

Lord help him, but it makes Lando crack a smile. Not because he’s been brainwashed into thinking Oscar’s funny, but because he’s been brainwashed into enjoying all of Oscar’s Oscar-ness. “Yours is better.”

“Right, because I’m sure they’re very different,” he deadpans in the same voice.

“This one comes with company.”

“And I’m sure you’re enjoying my company loads from where you’re ignoring me on the other side of the room.”

“Well, I would be ignoring you, except you keep talking to me.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Ouch, really hurting my feelings here, Osc.”

“If I wanted to hurt your feelings, I’d kick you out.”

“You’re not gonna kick me out.” 

“I could.”

“But you’re not.”

Oscar sighs like Lando doesn’t know that Oscar actually enjoys it when Lando parks himself in his space without asking. “But I’m not.”

Lando grins, turning back to his game, and Oscar reclines on the bed for lack of anywhere else to sit. He really does mean to ignore Oscar and just use his presence like a weighted blanket, or perhaps as a particularly calming house plant, but his eyes keep flicking to Oscar against his will.

Oscar is scrolling on his phone, the blue light cast across his features. Lando’s too far away to see all of his freckles and moles and acne scars, but he knows they’re there, the same way he knows the curve of Oscar’s jaw and the color of his cheeks without looking.

Oscar glances up, and Lando knows he’s been caught staring, but he doesn’t look away. That would be admitting that he’s being weird. And he’s not. He’s allowed to look at his teammate, Lando catches Oscar looking at him all the time and it’s never weird. (Okay, sometimes it’s weird. Oscar looks at him a lot.)

“Need something?”

“No. Just tired. Long weekend.” Not technically a lie.

“Okay, well you’re not allowed to fall asleep on my sofa.”

“It’s not your sofa. And I’ll fall asleep on it if I want.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was the people’s sofa.”

“I’m sensing sarcasm.”

“Sarcasm? From me? Never.”

“I don’t think I like your tone, Piastri.”

“You could always leave.”

“Nah, that’d be giving up.” Lando shoots him an easy grin.

Oscar sighs, but Lando sees the way his mouth twitches. “Why do I keep you around?”

“For my looks.”

His nose wrinkles. “Can I return you?”

“Check the policy.”

“Unfortunately, it says no.”

“You’re breaking my heart. I thought you wanted to be forever teammates.”

Oscar stops trying to hide his smile. “Where’d you get that idea?”

“Just a funny feeling I had.”

“You should get that checked out.”

“Yeah? And what’s my diagnosis, Doctor?”

“Annoying.”

“What’s the cure?”

“It’s terminal.”

“That sucks, you’ll have to find a new teammate.”

“Eh, what a hassle. Guess I’m stuck with you.”

Lando hums contentedly. “Yeah. Guess you’re stuck with me.”

Chapter Text

After Miami, they go to Imola. Oscar goes from P1 to P3, and Lando goes from P4 to P2, and this time it’s Oscar’s turn to be a bit grumpy, but Lando still shows up at his room afterwards, and Oscar still lets him in.

Then Lando wins Monaco—his first win since Australia—and it’s fucking awesome . As much as everyone likes to complain about it being a shitty, boring track, there is nothing as satisfying as winning in Monaco. Oscar’s on the podium with him, cheeks flushed and dripping in champagne. His parents are down below, smiling as wide as he’s ever seen them. Charles (because he’s secretly evil) sprays his champagne right into Lando’s eyes, and it stings, but everything is good and bright.

During the post-race press conference, Oscar invites Charles to watch the Indy 500 with him at Oscar’s own apartment. Lando hasn’t even been to Oscar’s apartment. He tamps down any bitterness that may be there and chooses instead to see it as a good thing that Oscar is feeling comfortable enough to try initiating social events.

He almost catches Oscar afterwards to say, "Pick me, invite me over instead,” but the words stay stuck to his tongue. His tolerance for Lando at his most unfiltered is higher than most, but he already puts up with enough by letting Lando invade his hotel rooms after races, and is too nice to tell Lando if he ever actually crosses a boundary. Lando’s gotta pump his brakes before that actually happens.

Debrief is quick today, then Oscar is off like a rocket so he doesn’t miss the start of the race.

Lando finds Carlos and lets him squeeze him tight. They’re planning on going out tonight together regardless of results; Carlos has an invite to Ferrari’s afterparty, and partying with Charles in Monaco is an experience like none other. It’ll be a good opportunity for Lando to get back to his old self, the one who wins races and can pick practically any girl he wants. Melbourne was just a fluke.

With that in mind, Lando downs three shots the moment he and Carlos waltz in. Being drunk always makes this part a little easier. He doesn’t go looking right away—he really hasn’t hung out with Carlos enough lately—but he forces his limbs to start loosening up. Besides, his shirt is unbuttoned practically to his belly button. Some lucky lady is bound to approach him sooner or later, and Lando likes that better than when he has to do it anyways.

Carlos raises his eyebrows. “Someone is ready to party tonight.”

“Oh, you know,” Lando responds, wiping a stray drop of liquor from his mouth. “What’s not to celebrate?”

“I’m proud of you, you know,” Carlos says.

It takes him by surprise. “What?”

“I’m proud of you, Landito,” he says louder, like he thinks Lando couldn’t hear him over the music. “You’re all grown up and winning races.”

Lando would like to argue that he’s been “grown up” for ages. “Don’t get sappy on me now, Carlos.”

“There is no helping it. You were a baby when we met.”

“I was nineteen.”

“A baby.”

“Carlos.”

“Do not ‘Carlos’ me! It is true! You were like Kimi or Ollie.”

“I’m going to tell them you called them babies.”

Carlos waves his hand. “They know. I would say the same to their faces.”

“I think it’s just that everyone seems young at your advanced age.”

“Do not insult me. I have wisdom.”

They grin at each other. Bantering with Carlos is easy and familiar.

“No, you have back problems.”

“I take it back, I am no longer proud. You have grown up with no respect for your elders.”

Lando opens his mouth to retort, but a pair of girls start dancing a little too closely to them, so Lando offers to grab another round from the bar for him and Carlos. Liquid courage.

He fully expects them to be gone by the time he returns, but even though Carlos has Rebecca and no reason to be talking to girls at parties, Carlos has always been a little too helpful. He waggles his eyebrows at Lando upon his return, and Lando gets the message.

“There he is, the race winner!”

Lando braces himself. He can’t be upset with Carlos, this is what he wanted. It’s sooner in the night (and he’s more sober) than expected, but it’ll be good to get it over with.

He hands the drinks off and puts his hands on the woman’s hips. And it’s fine. They move back and forth together, her hands looped around his neck, but their hips aren’t touching yet. He closes his eyes and tries to enjoy it. Without looking, it’s easy to fall into the rhythm of the booming bass music.

She says something into his ear, maybe her name, maybe a question, but he can’t quite make out what it is. He squeezes her hips harder in acknowledgment and hopes it’s good enough.

She drops back on her heels, and Lando realizes she had to stand on her tiptoes to reach his ear. He’s so much bigger than her, taller and broader, sharper lines. It makes him feel clunky. Out of place. Their edges aren’t fitting together the right way.

He pulls her closer as if to prove a point to himself. It’s the right move, the expected move, and he’s rewarded by her hand sliding into his shirt to rest against his chest. He catches himself wishing he hadn’t undone so many buttons, and leans into her hand to spite that thought.

If this could just work, if he could just get himself to work the right way, everything would be so much better. He tries harder, forcing himself to enjoy the press of her breasts and the sway of her hips.

She says something else that he can’t hear. He wasn’t having any trouble hearing Carlos, so her voice must just be softer than his. He doesn’t need to hear her to understand what her coyish smile says though. 

They stumble across the room together. He’s not entirely sure where they’re going, but they make it outside onto a balcony.

He’s going to do this. He’s going to make this work. Really, it’s a failure on his part that he hasn’t tried since Melbourne.

Lando runs his hands over her back, and her lips attach themselves to his neck. He chooses not to focus on the feeling and busies himself with groping her ass. If he does this with enough women, it has to start feeling good at some point, right?

She moans, leaning back. “Red is your color,” she teases, lipstick smeared and eyes trained on his neck. He can finally make out the French (Monegasque?) accent dripping off her words.

He doesn’t have it in him to come up with a response, so he surges forward to capture her lips with his. He imagines the lipstick is staining his mouth like blood. The thought burns, and he leans down to take his turn attacking her neck instead, but she pulls him back to her mouth by his hair.

She makes a high-pitched noise when their tongues slot together, and it’s wrong and it feels wrong, but he needs to do this. He can like this, he knows he can.

He pushes her back against the wall, and her hands scrabble at the remaining buttons on his shirt. She gropes along his chest, trails her fingers across his belly, traces the line where his trousers meet his skin. He shivers, and their lips break. A line of spit connects them.

She’s the one against the wall, but it feels like he’s the one pinned. She’s touching him all over, pulling his hair to put him where she wants, moving his hand to cup her breast. He blinks, and he’s no longer an active participant, just watching from the sidelines as she touches his body.

Lando struggles not to flinch at every move she makes. You like this, you like this, you like this, he chants in his mind.

He presses closer, giving her easier access to scrape her teeth across his chest. She squeezes at the muscle there with a wicked grin, like he’s something for her to eat. It’s easier like this than when girls expect him to be the one in control. Those nights are harder. He can’t always bring himself to touch the right ways, but he does know how to stay still and let things happen to him. Phrasing it like that makes it sound bad, but it’s not. It’s just what he has to do to fix this. Even if he could just convince himself to be attracted to guys and girls, that would be enough. He could handle that.

She takes his hand and directs it underneath her skirt to make him paw over her panties. She brings his other hand up to her mouth to lick and suck at his fingers. He’s always had large hands, so even two fingers between her lips looks obscene. He presses down on her tongue and shapes his fingers between her legs to give her something to grind on.

With her mouth occupied, Lando finally has a moment to breathe. He wishes he had a chance to drink more beforehand so his mind could slip away easier. Each moan she lets out vibrates around his fingers, just enough that he can’t let himself check out fully.

She must not be content to sit back for long though, because she releases his fingers to attack his mouth with hers again. He wants to spit her tongue out immediately, but he forces himself to open his mouth instead.

It’s awful. It’s bad and it’s slimy and it’s wrong, and his desire to stop is starting to overcome his desire to make himself want this.

He stops moving his lips and lets her do all the work as she licks and gropes and uses his body however she wants to. Her hands skate too close to where he doesn’t want them, and he whimpers. It sounds completely pathetic. She doesn’t seem to notice though, continuing on as it gets harder and harder for Lando to breathe.

She yanks his head back by his hair to nibble at his neck again, and his breaths come out in small, aching gasps.

“Your pulse is so fast,” she whispers, kissing over the spot where his blood pounds.

There’s no witty response from him. This isn’t doing what it’s supposed to do, it’s just making him feel sad and worthless.

Their lips meet again, and he shudders.

She finally notices and pulls back. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” he gasps. “Just keep going.”

“You’re crying.”

“What?” He reaches up to his face and is horrified to find it wet. “I’m not—I can do this.” He can, he knows he can make himself get through to the end, just like all the other times. “Please, I promise I can do it.”

To his shame, a sob tears itself from his chest the moment the words leave his mouth. Crying over some heavy petting, god, he’s such a pathetic—

“What do you need?”

Lando doesn’t answer, too busy falling to his knees so he can pull at his hair. Get a grip.

“Do you want me to grab your friend?” she asks, panicked.

“No!” The thought of Carlos seeing, of Carlos knowing is terrifying. “I’m fine, I promise.” His chest is tight and he can’t breathe. He reaches out to touch her again, but she backs away.

“No, cheri.”

Lando flinches.

“We will call someone else to take care of you then. You are not well.”

“Oscar,” he gasps. Lando curses himself for being so needy, but Oscar already knows, and Lando knows he’ll drop everything to come get him.

“Give me your phone, and I will call your Oscar, yes?”

He pulls it from his pocket with shaking hands, unlocking it with face ID and handing it over to a complete stranger.

She taps at the screen, and through the ringing of his ears he can hear the ringing of the phone. The call connects. “You are Lando’s Oscar?” she asks. He can make out Oscar’s muffled voice responding, but he has no idea what he says. 

Lando drops his head onto his knees and tries to breathe as she talks back and forth with Oscar. He’s such a screw up. What would the world say if they could see him now, unable to breathe just because a girl touched him? For fuck’s sake, they’re still clothed.

She shoves his phone into his hand, and he hesitantly brings it to his ear. “Oscar?”

“Lando, are you okay?”

Lando’s shoulders drop at the familiar lilt of Oscar’s voice. His accent gets stronger when he’s tired. “Yeah,” he says, and that’s all he says because his voice breaks halfway through the word.

“What’s wrong?”

Lando shrugs even though Oscar can’t see him. “You’re coming, right?”

“I’m coming, yeah.” He can hear how Oscar’s walking fast enough to affect his breath. Abruptly he remembers that the streets are still closed down for the race.

“Okay.” Lando wants to say more but can’t get the words out. He doesn’t deserve Oscar.

He burrows his head back into his knees and listens to the sounds of Oscar scrambling across the city by foot just because Lando needs him. Monaco is less than three and a half kilometers long, and Lando has never been so grateful for that. It’s not quite twenty minutes later when the balcony door opens again. The girl left at some point, he’s not sure when, so Oscar finds him curled up alone.

He has to look like an embarrassing wreck.

Oscar scans him over, and Lando can track each detail that Oscar catches. Disheveled hair, red eyes, red lips and neck, torso bared. “Jesus,” he says emphatically.

“Nope. Just Lando.”

It’s not a particularly funny wisecrack, but that level of humor would normally have Oscar bending over at the waist with the force of his laughter. Oscar is decidedly not laughing now.

“Come on.” Oscar crouches down and starts buttoning up Lando’s shirt for him. Lando wonders if Oscar thinks Lando’s a lot drunker than he actually is (he’s not completely sober, but he’s also not can’t-button-my-own-shirt drunk), but his hands are soothing when they brush against Lando’s skin, so he lets it happen. Actually, this would probably be less embarrassing if Lando were drunker because then Lando would have an excuse for letting it happen.

Lando stands up mostly by himself, and Oscar wraps an arm around his shoulder. His eyes are sharp and focused, too busy shouldering through the crowd to notice Lando staring again.

He tucks himself closer, relishing how much safer Oscar’s touch feels.

“You have got to stop doing this to yourself, mate,” Oscar mutters when they step out onto the pavement.

He doesn’t sound angry. Maybe it’d be better if he were though because Lando knows he takes advantage of Oscar’s kindness more than his fair share, but Oscar doesn’t seem to. And Lando is maybe a bit too selfish to tell him.

He closes his eyes and trusts Oscar to take him wherever he’s going to take him. The silence makes the walk drag, but if they start talking, then they’re going to talk about it, and Lando doesn’t want to do that.

It’s only when they’re walking into an apartment building’s lobby that Lando realizes his hopes of seeing Oscar’s apartment are coming true. He wishes it were for a different reason.

They go past the doorman and up the elevator and then Oscar is turning a key in the door and nudging him through.

Lando curiously looks around and—well he’s not exactly sure what he was expecting, but it isn’t this. There’s a couch, a coffee table, a TV, and not much else. It looks like the apartment of someone who just moved in, but Oscar has been living in Monaco for the better part of a year now.

He only really has a moment to look before Oscar is shoveling him to the bedroom and depositing him on the bed. He can tell Oscar has something to say, but he quietly kneels down to start untying Lando’s shoes instead. Lando fights the urge to touch his hair. The lamplight makes it look glossy and soft.

“Oscar?”

He glances up at Lando, and the eye contact feels—

Well. It feels something.

“Yeah?”

“You know I’m—I’m really not all that drunk.”

Oscar freezes from where he just pulled Lando’s foot in his lap to begin untying his other shoe. “Oh. Oh, I’m sorry.” He drops Lando’s foot like it burned him.

“It’s okay,” Lando murmurs.

“No, it’s weird. I should have asked—“

“Oscar. It’s fine. You were just trying to take care of me.” You always are.

There’s a long beat of silence, and Oscar is still on his knees, and his straight eyebrows make his eyes look more intense than they have any right to be.

“I mean, yeah. We’re a team, right?”

“Yeah, Osc,” he says. “We’re a team.”

Oscar swallows audibly. “So if you’re not wasted, what was all of that?”

His instinct is to start denying everything, to come up with an elaborate explanation for what happened. But Lando is too tired and Oscar is too smart. “You already know, don’t you?”

“I could take a guess.”

“Then do it.”

“I’m not going to put words in your mouth.”

He’s too patient with Lando. It’d be easier if Oscar could just go ahead and rip the bandaid off so Lando didn’t have to do it.

“She was touching me.”

“Yeah.”

“I didn’t want her to touch me.”

Oscar stills. “Was she—Did she—?”

“No! No, she was nice or whatever. It was just—I just wanted to—“ He swipes roughly at his eyes that are welling up again. “I didn’t want her to touch me,” he says again, but this time it feels more like he’s admitting it to himself.

“Lando,” Oscar breathes, but Lando can’t bring himself to look at whatever expression he’s wearing. He rests a hand on Lando’s knee.

“I didn’t want—I didn’t—I didn’t want her to—“

“Hey, it’s okay—“

Lando cuts him off with a heaving sob. And once it starts, he can’t make the crying stop, breaths coming out in huge, awful gasps.

Oscar surges upwards to wrap his arms around Lando and lets Lando bury his face in his stomach. He curls over top him until he’s all that Lando can see or hear or smell. Until he’s surrounded. Lando sobs harder, and Oscar holds him while he falls apart.

“Shh, it’s okay. We’ll figure it out, yeah?”

“Maybe I don’t,” he says, pausing to gasp for air, “don’t want to figure it out.”

Oscar strokes his hair. “I know you don’t.”

Lando pulls back enough to be able to meet his eyes, but not so far that he dislodges Oscar’s hand. His other hand comes to flutter around Lando’s cheek for a moment before resting on his shoulder instead. He doesn’t know how to feel about that. “I’m sorry I’m such a mess. I’m sorry for dragging you into it.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry for. And I’m glad you called, I—Lando, you didn’t look right.” His fingers grip the curls on the back of Lando’s neck. “It was—I mean, it was a bit scary, but Jesus, if that ever happens again, I want you to call me or—or someone.”

Guilt washes over him; Oscar looks absolutely wrecked. Oscar, who’s normally so unmovable, calm even when Lando knows he’s raging on the inside. It aches, knowing that he was the one to do this to him.

“I don’t want anyone else to know,” Lando whispers.

“Then call me. I’ll be there, you just have to—just have to call. Okay?”

He’s helpless to do anything but agree to whatever Oscar tells him. “Okay.”

“Can we just—“ Oscar takes his hand away to rub at his eyes. He looks fucking exhausted. “Let’s go to bed, yeah? We can talk more in the morning.”

“Okay,” he says, voice small.

It’s awful how quickly Lando has come to rely on him. Of all the people in his life, Oscar was the one Lando trusted to catch like this. His biggest competitor. Lando has to be going mental, he knows the horror stories of teammates falling out, but he’s not going to let that happen. He knows Oscar isn’t going to let that happen either.

They work together sluggishly to arrange themselves, like their limbs have suddenly grown heavier. They’re not quite touching anymore by the time they settle, but they’re also not as far apart as they should be in a bed this size.

Lando’s heart rate finally settles. He’s safe with Oscar. Physically, yes, but also in the sense that Oscar is steady enough to keep him from falling off the rails like he would if he were alone. It’s not fair to him that Lando keeps using him like this—eventually Lando is going to take more than Oscar has to give—but he’s never been known for his self control.

Oscar reaches out to hold onto Lando’s wrist, and Lando closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to deal with how the way he’s looking at him makes him feel. He tries not to dread the morning.

Chapter Text

Oscar keeps his finger pressed against the pulse point of Lando’s wrist as if that could ward off the thoughts keeping him awake. He’s absolutely exhausted, but every time he closes his eyes, he’s bombarded with images from last night and has to open them to check that Lando’s still alright.

His whole body was shaking when Oscar found him, with his shirt halfway off and his breaths coming out in loud pants. He was so pale and sweaty that Oscar genuinely thought he had taken something at first. Even now with his face slack from sleep, his eyebrows are sloped inwards, his mouth is pinched shut, and there’s something about the splay of his limbs that makes him look like he’d collapsed in a heap and couldn’t bring himself to move into a more comfortable position.

It’s awful. The whole thing is awful. He doesn’t want to make assumptions, but between this and Melbourne, the pieces have come together in an ugly way.

He thought Lando was like him.

Oscar knows he’s bisexual, and has never tried denying it to himself. He’ll never act on any of his urges towards men, but he acknowledges that that’s just the price he pays for racing. He lets himself think about men within the four walls of his bedroom and packs those feelings away the moment he steps outside. Maybe it’s not the most holistic approach to life, but Oscar doesn’t think he’d ever go as far as to have sex with people he’s not attracted to just to… Keep up appearances? Or whatever justification is running through Lando’s head.

He just doesn’t get why Lando would put himself through something like this. Oscar has personally seen Lando with what feels like dozens of different women over the years, and considering how rarely Oscar goes out with him, that’s really saying something.

Whatever it is, it’s self-destructive, and it’s terrifying to him in a way he can’t find the words to describe. He tries to wrap his head around it, but it feels like he’s spinning in circles while grasping at clouds of smoke. He can’t see the shape of whatever this is, can’t understand exactly what Lando is doing to himself or why.

And if Lando’s issues aren’t bad enough, he’s got his own roaring in his chest. Oscar doesn’t hide things from himself; he is fully aware that he has less-than-platonic feelings for Lando. Normally, it’s second nature to shove those kinds of thoughts away, but even he has to admit that seeing Lando in his bed is stirring something up. All of those repressed thoughts are bubbling up because Oscar is the one Lando called when he needed help, and he can’t help but latch onto that fact. He likes when Lando asks him to do things for him, like grabbing a drink from the fridge, and he likes the smile Lando gives him when he does. It makes him feel useful. Or maybe needed? This is like that, but so, so much more important, because it means Lando trusts him.

That trust is dangerous. Oscar is scared and worried and wants Lando to stop putting himself in positions like this, but underneath all of that, he’s secretly absurdly pleased to be the one Lando wanted. And that’s bad. Because if the world flipped upside down and Lando got on his knees tomorrow to tell Oscar that he’s in love with him, Oscar would say no and break his own heart in the process. That kind of thing isn’t an option, not for Oscar.

It’s fine though. Lando is just desperately in need of a friend right now, and that’s something Oscar knows he can do.

He lies there like that until the sun peeks through the curtains and Lando’s eyes crack open. They stare at each other, neither quite knowing what to say, but one of them has to be the one to break the silence, so Oscar asks, “Wanna brush your teeth?” The taste has to be something awful.

Lando’s mouth twitches, but when he speaks, his voice comes out like a croak. “Is that your way of telling me my breath stinks?”

“If your breath stank, I’d just tell you.”

“Yeah, I know.” His expression is far too fond considering the circumstances,

It makes his stomach flip.

“Right then.” He practically rolls out of bed and makes his way to the bathroom, Lando close behind. He rummages around for a spare toothbrush, watching Lando take in his own appearance in the mirror. Lando thumbs at his neck right where the brightest splotch of red lipstick is.

“Shower?” Oscar asks.

“Shower.”

Lando starts unbuttoning his shirt right there in front of him, so Oscar hurriedly leaves to get him a fresh towel and a change of clothes. When he comes back, Lando is already behind the curtain, so Oscar takes a quick moment to brush his own teeth.

While Lando works on putting himself back together, Oscar heads to the kitchen to toast a pair of bagels, cursing himself for not keeping a full enough fridge to make something better. Then he curses himself again for not having a coffee machine. Oscar’s mum always made a pot of coffee in the morning whenever they had a guest stay over.

Then he remembers it’s just Lando, who uses a mini fridge as a lamp stand. He doesn’t need to feel so anxious.

He’s proven right when Lando shuffles in and starts scarfing down his bagel without comment.

“You’re welcome,” Oscar says sarcastically.

Lando squints at him. “You’re more Australian in the morning.”

“What?”

“Your accent,” Lando says with a mouthful of bagel, “it’s stronger in the morning.”

“Oh.” Oscar hadn’t realized.

They chew in silence while Oscar waits for Lando to initiate the conversation they both know they’re going to have. Then Oscar realizes Lando isn’t going to initiate the conversation.

He sighs. “Lando.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“This doesn’t have to be, like, a thing.”

“I hate to tell you, mate, but it’s already a thing.”

“But it doesn’t have to be.”

“Lando—”

“What, Oscar?” he snaps. “What do you want me to say?”

Oscar looks down at his plate.

“Sorry,” Lando mutters. “I just—you understand, right?”

He has got to be kidding. “No. I don’t understand. I don’t understand any of it.”

“Don’t play dumb, Oscar. You know what this sport is like. They’d tear me apart.”

The words echo Oscar’s own thoughts on the matter painfully well—Oscar knows that better than anyone—but there’s a big difference between what Oscar’s doing and what Lando’s doing. “They won’t need to, Lando, you’re doing a perfectly fine job tearing yourself apart.”

“I’m not tearing myself apart.”

“Then what would you call it?”

“I’m fixing things. And it’s my choice to make,” Lando bites out, crossing his arms.

Oscar’s cheeks burn, the way they always do when he’s feeling emotional. “This isn’t good, Lando. How is doing this supposed to help?”

“It’s working, I promise. I’m getting better.”

“Better how, Lando? None of that looked fucking better.”

“It was an off night!”

“And what about Australia?”

“I was fine in Australia. I was just taking a break in the bathroom and Max had to go and tattle.”

“Lando.” Oscar covers eyes so Lando can’t see how they’re starting to get shiny. “You weren’t—you weren’t fine. And it’s not because there’s something wrong with you, or because there’s something you need to fix,” he spits out the word like it’s poison. “It’s because you were hurting yourself. This is—God, this has to be some form of self-harm.”

Lando deflates. “It’s not like that.”

“It is like that, and I don’t—I can’t—” Oscar chokes on the words. Fuck, what’s wrong with him? He was fine. He’s been fine all morning, why is now the moment he can’t hold it together?

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called. I shouldn’t have dragged you into this.” Lando stands. “I’ll go, I’m sorry.”

“Stop apologizing! I’m glad you called. I don’t want you to go.”

“I’m literally making you cry, Oscar! That’s awful. I never want to make you cry.”

“I’ll cry a lot more if you leave like this.”

“Then I don’t know what to do!” Lando sits back down heavily.

“Just—just stay, okay?”

The silence stretches long enough that Oscar is sure Lando is going to try to leave again, but then he whispers, “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah.” He takes a huge, shuddering breath. “Okay.”

The tension slumps from Oscar’s shoulders. There’s so much to say, but it all tangles together in a big ugly mess in his mind until he can’t start one thought without another interrupting it halfway through. “You scared me,” he says because everything else is too complicated to get out.

“I did?”

“Of course you did. You don’t know what you looked like.”

“I didn’t—I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I know.”

“I just don’t want to feel like this anymore.”

“Like what?”

“Wrong.”

It hits like a knife to his own chest, but Oscar forces himself to look up and say the hard part. “Listen to me, Lando. There’s nothing wrong with being gay.” Lando flinches at the word. “You’re right that—I mean, it might not be a great idea to like, let the whole world know or whatever, but that’s not because something’s wrong with you, it’s because there’s shitty, homophobic people in the world. And it sucks, and I’m sorry that’s something you even have to consider, but you have to know this won’t work out the way you want it to. You can’t ‘fix’ anything because there’s literally nothing to fix. It’s like, I don’t know, putting a car in water and expecting it to work. There’s nothing wrong with the car, it’s just not a boat.”

“I want to be a boat though.”

“No you don’t, you just wish people would stop expecting you to float. And that they wouldn’t get pissy if you don’t. Also, cars can’t become boats.” The metaphor feels fittingly disjointed enough to match his headspace.

“They can if you add enough pool floaties.”

“You don’t really believe that, do you?”

Lando sighs. “No. I guess I don’t.”

“Okay, good. Good.”

“But Oscar, I don’t know what else to do.”

“You don’t have to do anything. Just—just don’t do that.”

“That’s not helpful.”

Oscar closes his eyes. “I know.”

God, does he know. He’s not exactly the poster child for having a healthy relationship with his own sexuality after all, but Oscar’s never done anything like this. For a moment, the words are on the tip of his tongue—the big, scary words that would let Lando know they’re the same in this too. It would be nice to finally have someone to share that part of him with, and for it to be Lando, who understands  the position he’s in more than anyone else in the world could.

But telling even one person puts it at risk of being leaked, no matter how much he trusts them. If all of his thoughts and all of his feelings stay firmly inside his own head, there’s no chance of them hurting his career. He’s already sacrificed so much for it; this is nothing.

Lando huffs, but doesn’t say anything.

He wracks his brain for the magic words that would fix everything, but comes up empty handed. He’s talked Lando off the ledge for now, but what if he lets Lando leave and he immediately goes out and hurts himself again?

And he is hurting himself. Oscar knows it, and he’s pretty sure even Lando knows it. Maybe Lando thinks he’s doing it to “fix” things, but to Oscar, it reads more like Lando is punishing himself.

His chest is so abruptly heavy that he’s afraid his heart is going to sink straight down through his body and hit the floor. There’s a buzz making its way through him now that the immediate adrenaline is wearing off, leaving Oscar with shaking hands and a dizzy head. He presses his palms flat against his thighs to get them to still.

“Are you okay?” Lando asks, but the words sound like he’s underwater.

“Yeah. I’m fine.” Of course he is, he always is.

Lando’s brow scrunches. “You look pale. Like, paler than usual.”

He ducks his head as if he could hide his face from Lando. He is fine.

“What’s wrong?”

What isn’t wrong? he thinks, but he can’t exactly say that. “Could we—Do you mind if we just go back to bed?”

“Really, Osc?”

“I’m tired. I didn’t sleep well.” Understatement of the century.

“Sorry,” Lando says again. “Of course we can.”

“It’s okay,” Oscar promises, ignoring the fact that there’s no real reason for Lando to get back in the bed with him. He just really doesn’t want to let him out of his sight.

They both stand up, and it’s awkward for all of two seconds before Lando pushes into Oscar’s space to wrap his arms around him. Oscar buries his nose in Lando’s still-wet hair, and is met with the smell of his own shampoo. He squeezes Lando’s back, and his fingers dig into the fabric of his own hoodie too.

For once, Oscar refuses to be the first to let go. The hug lasts long enough that both of their breathing calms down and starts to sync up. It reminds him of how they instinctively meet up in Lando’s driver’s room when races leave them disjointed and irritated with each other. It usually takes a few minutes for their edges to line back up and click into place, but they always leave in lock-step.

“Bed, yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Lando backs away, but keeps his fingers clenched in the sleeve of Oscar’s T-shirt so he can pull him along.

Oscar’s not stupid, and with everything that’s happened, he’s hyper-vigilant about the signs. He knows this isn’t how platonic male friends typically act (this isn’t even how Oscar and Lando typically act), but he can’t bring himself to care. He’ll care when he wakes up again, when he has to force himself to separate from Lando like he’s amputating a limb. He has to be the one to do it, because Lando is so deep in denial that Oscar is sure he isn’t thinking anything of this.

For now though, he lets Lando push him into bed and climb into the other side, pathetically thankful that he isn’t leaving just yet.

——

Things are easier when they wake up the second time, as Lando seems determined to act like none of it happened and that he’s visiting Oscar’s flat for completely unrelated reasons. Oscar still vows to keep a closer eye on him from now on, the undercurrent of worry coursing through him making him feel like he’s about to develop separation anxiety. Lando is going to get sick of him within a week, but Oscar frankly doesn’t care. He’s not sure he could survive seeing him like that again.

Actually, he’s not sure he can survive seeing Lando as he is now, wrapped in his clothes and sprawling himself out in Oscar’s space like he always does. Oscar passes a blanket to him on the sofa without before he has the chance to ask—because Lando is always cold.

“Why haven’t you decorated?” Lando asks as he wraps it around his shoulders.

Oscar glances around, trying to imagine what someone else would think about his flat. Decorating has kind of… fallen to the wayside. Oscar needed more time to focus on racing when he first moved, and after that, it never felt like there was a point when he didn’t have people visiting. Half of his life is in Australia, half of it is in England, and Oscar is alone in Monaco. Most of his things are still in unpacked boxes, but he’s at least finally moved them into the guest room he uses for sim training.

“Never got around to it, I guess. More important things to focus on. Like beating you,” he tries to joke.

Lando ignores the jab. “I mean yeah, but it’s just a bit… I don’t know. Empty?”

“It doesn’t really need to be filled, we spend so much time in hotels anyways. And when I’m at home, I’d rather use the time to review on-boards or data. Or to go to the gym.” Which reminds him that he missed his morning workout. He inhales sharply but then forces himself to relax. Missing one workout won’t be what costs him the championship.

Lando raises an eyebrow. “Yeah, but… All the time?”

“Are you making fun of me?”

“‘Course not, Osc. I think you have way too much dirt on me now for me to ever make fun of you again.” Lando smiles self-deprecatingly.

“Lando, you know I’d never do anything to hurt you, right? Not like that.”

He doesn’t hesitate. “I know. But really, what do you even do for fun? There’s, like, nothing in here.”

“Oh. I don’t really know.”

“It’s not a hard question, Oscar.”

It shouldn’t be, but Oscar left all his friends behind when he moved to Monaco, and he frequently gets pangs of guilt if he goofs off during time that could be spent working. He and the people around him have sacrificed so much for Oscar to be in the position he is, he’s not going to waste it. “I guess I watch TV sometimes? Cricket or basketball if I can catch it. I go for a lot of runs and bike rides too.”

“Oscar, that’s literally just working out.”

“No, it counts as fun if I don’t do it on the treadmill,” he argues. “I run on the beach sometimes, which is nice.”

Lando looks at him like he’s crazy. “Oscar.”

And yeah, okay, Oscar knows, but he has goals and a hunger to win. “What?”

“I am begging you to tell me literally one thing you do for fun that isn’t related to racing.”

“Why does this even matter?”

“Oscar.”

“The championship is everything, Lando. You know that.”

“This is insane. You need a hobby. Go do pottery or something.”

“Racing is my hobby.”

Lando wrinkles his nose. “Y’know, I know everyone is always going on about how I don’t have the ‘championship mentality’ needed to win. But fuck me, mate, if this is what that looks like, then I’m glad I don’t have it.”

“They really need to stop saying that. They have no idea how hard you work.”

Lando sighs. “I appreciate that, Osc, but it’s really not the point I was making. Your walls are naked.”

“You mean my walls are bare?”

“Same thing. It’s tragic.”

“You said the same thing about my clothes.”

“It’s true. Everything about the situation is tragic. And I know you said we can’t ‘fix’ my thing or whatever, but we can definitely fix yours.”

“No, what I said was that there was nothing to fix. And there’s nothing to fix here either!” He’s winning, so Lando isn’t allowed to say his methods aren’t working.

He stares at him with disbelief. “We’re hitting the shops today. Go get dressed.”

“Lando.”

“Do we really have to argue about it? We both know you’re going to agree.”

“I could say no,” he argues, just to be petulant.

“Oh my god, do we actually need to have this discussion?” Lando looks him dead in the eyes. “Listen to what I’m saying. This is a crazy way to live. I’m holding an intervention now because I didn’t realize this was how you lived your life. If you don’t want to go to the shops, we can do something else, but we are doing something today.”

“There’s nothing to worry about,” Oscar says. He means it to be reassuring, but Lando looks at him like he said something stupid.

“Oscar, how would you feel if you found out one of your friends lived like a weird racing monk who commits total abstinence towards things like ‘fun’ and the ‘life’ part of a ‘work-life balance’?”

“You’re just saying words at me now.”

“Okay, let’s try this,” Lando sighs. “I had a really bad night and a really hard morning, and I want something to distract me today. This will help me. Will you go get dressed now?”

“You’re trying to manipulate me.”

“Yes, I am, and it’s working. Go.”

Oscar goes.

They end up walking to the garage of Lando’s building because Lando wants to take his McLaren 765LT and drive to Nice. It’s custom, with LN4 logos on the seats and fluoro accents. Oscar lets out a low whistle when he sees it.

They (Oscar says they, but he really means Lando) decide to take the scenic route that traces along the beachfront the whole way. Lando presses a button that slides the rooftop back, then slides on a pair of sunglasses and hands Oscar a second pair with a boyish smile. Oscar puts them on, and it’s only a minute later until they’re speeding down the coastal road with the wind tousling their hair.

He tilts his head back against the seat, feeling almost like a completely different person than the Oscar from a few hours ago. The dissonance is even worse with Lando, the image of him from last night overlapping with the one beside him now who looks like he doesn’t have a care in the world besides fast cars and easy smiles. This is the Lando he’s familiar with, the one who waltzes through life, pushing at Oscar’s edges and dragging him around like a purse dog.

It has to be an act, but the familiarity is still soothing. Lando’s still Lando.

Lando hands Oscar his phone and puts him in charge of playing the Spotify songs that Lando tells him to, but they don’t talk much in the forty-five minute drive to Nice. Small talk would be too forced, and anything actually on their minds would be too heavy.

It’s good like this though. They could both use the time to decompress and sort out their thoughts.

Lando parks them on a street in Nice full of shops Oscar doesn’t recognize. He has no clue what’s on Lando’s list of ‘things to make Oscar’s life less sad,’ but he’s content to let himself be caught in the storm that is Lando Norris with his mind set on something.

The first one they enter is some home decor place. Lando splays his arms out as soon as they enter. “Alright, what’s speaking to you?”

“Nothing’s speaking to me. I didn’t want to do this.” Admittedly, he’s not too grumpy about it though. It’s a bit surreal hanging out with Lando like this, but it’s good too.

“Okay sure, but we’re not going to make any progress like that.”

Oscar shrugs.

“Let’s just—okay.” Lando grabs his arm, dragging him along as he sticks his nose down each aisle. “Aha! Pictures. Which ones do you like?”

“I don’t—Lando, I really don’t need a picture of black and white giraffes. Or a mosaic butterfly. I don’t need any of this.”

“No, you’re supposed to want it.”

“I’m supposed to want the giraffes?”

“It’s about what the giraffes represent.”

“Sure. And what is that?”

“It’s—” Lando shakes his head. “Maybe this is too advanced. We should start simpler.”

“You have no idea what you’re doing.”

“No, you have no idea what you’re doing. I’m trying to help.”

“You’re a fraud.”

Lando huffs. “Come on.”

It takes them a few minutes, but once they reach the bedding, Lando is able to get him to pick something out (because apparently Oscar’s plain white sheets aren’t good enough for Lando Norris). The same thing happens with towels, and curtains, and a pair of bright orange throw pillows. Lando also starts piling things into the cart that he thinks Oscar has to have, like ugly socks and a fruit bowl.

The one thing Oscar puts into the cart is a decently priced coffee maker, but Lando looks at him like he’s gone crazy.

“Oscar, you don’t like coffee.”

“Yeah, but what if I have a guest over or something?”

“Have you ever had anyone else over?”

Oscar frowns. “Hey, I tried inviting Charles over literally yesterday. And Lily, of course.” She hadn’t wanted to move to Monaco with him, but she came to visit often enough. Maybe she could already see the signs appearing that Oscar couldn’t.

“Hm. Well if you’re keeping drinks just for guests now, we better make a stop so I can pick out what I want.”

Oscar pauses. Lando worded it carefully, as though testing the waters to see if it would be alright if Lando came around again. As if Oscar ever wanted to see less of him. “Sure, Lando. Whatever you want.”

Lando smiles. “Cool.”

He drags him around to a couple more shops, loading Oscar’s arms up with shopping bags as they go along. He tries getting Oscar into a clothes shop too, but Oscar draws a line there and refuses to cross it. By the time they make it back to Monaco, it’s late afternoon. They do end up making a stop at a food shop (Oscar really does need to grab a few things even if they’re leaving for Spain in only a couple of days), and Lando makes good on his wish to pick out drinks. Snacks too, and he claims Oscar isn’t allowed to eat them.

Lando helps him carry the bags up to his flat, and even helps put the food away. He side-eyes Oscar when he sees the near-empty fridge, but he doesn’t comment, so Oscar counts it as a win.

When they’re done and it’s time for Lando to leave, he lingers on the threshold. Oscar mirrors him.

“Thanks, by the way,” Lando says, a tad awkwardly. “I don’t think I said that. You’re a good friend, Oscar.”

He flushes. “You’re not so bad yourself.”

“You give me too much credit. Seriously though, just look after yourself, yeah?”

“Yeah, okay. You too though.”

“Yeah.” Lando swallows, looking at his feet.

Oscar hesitantly raises his arms in an open offer, and Lando steps forwards to slot himself into place. It’s only a few heartbeats long this time before they separate.

Lando opens his mouth like he’s planning on saying something else but stops himself. He lingers for maybe a beat too long before shooting Oscar one final grin. “See you soon, Osc,” he says before spinning on his heel.

Oscar watches him go, wondering if Lando will ever stop making him feel like a whirlwind has thrown him around.

He is, quite frankly, exhausted, so Oscar resigns himself to making a snack before going to bed despite the early hour. It’s quick work, so it’s right as he’s climbing into bed that his phone buzzes with a notification:

Lando Norris

@LandoNorris

Hey @MonsterEnergy. Heard Osco needs a mini fridge to keep drinks for guests. Any chance we can hook him up?

Oscar stares at it. Lando doesn’t keep Twitter on his phone anymore. He had to download it just for that. Just for some silly message to let Oscar know he’s not planning on letting Oscar rot in his ‘monk’ lifestyle by himself.

He taps the like button before setting his phone down so he can stare at the ceiling instead.

Chapter Text

Calling Oscar was such a shit decision. Of course he wouldn’t let it be once he figured out what was happening. Of course this was what made him finally put his foot down with Lando (not that Oscar has any control over Lando, but he looked at Lando with those big, teary eyes, and Lando felt helpless). He’s caught glimpses behind the curtain before—Oscar, red-eyed after licking his wounds alone—but he’s never actually cried in front of Lando. Never because of Lando.

It’s sickening to know Lando has this kind of power over him, like he’s holding something fragile in his hands and already knows he’s too clumsy not to crush it.

Oscar might already be halfway towards cracking though because wow. He needs a long heart-to-heart with a sports psychologist. He used to mention his plans for hanging out with Lily or their friends from boarding school all the time when he still lived in the UK, but Lando tries remembering the last time Oscar said anything about texting or calling or visiting any of them and comes up empty. That can’t be a good sign. He wonders when the last time Oscar talked to his family was. It’s been two and a half months since the Australian GP, but even then, Oscar didn’t make time to see any of them outside of the garage. Granted, there really wasn’t much time before they were being shuffled off to China, but…

It doesn’t make Lando feel great about the whole situation. It’s like Oscar is trying to cut out anything in his life that doesn’t have to do with Formula 1. He’s been doing so well this year—improving so fast—that Lando isn’t sure anyone else has noticed, not when fortune and fame are smiling on him and the results of Oscar running himself ragged are so good. Oscar himself doesn’t seem to notice there’s even a problem.

Then there’s the other thing that Lando refuses to acknowledge. The thing Oscar drew him to confess. The thing he put a word to. Lando should cut contact and get out before Oscar can unravel any more of him, but he’s afraid that Oscar will be the one unraveling if he does that. Oscar, whose only crime is trying to take care of him. For fuck’s sake, Lando is in bed wearing his clothes right now because all Oscar ever does is give. He can’t do that to him.

So no. Lando isn’t going anywhere.

He pulls out his phone and downloads Twitter again long enough to send a tweet that signals to both himself and Oscar that he’s planning on sticking around.

Then he gives himself a moment to deal with his third Oscar-induced crisis of the day, which is that the shirt and hoodie Oscar gave him smell the same as Oscar’s pillow, and Lando knows this because he’s spent a significant portion of his day wrapped up in Oscar’s clothes, Oscar’s sheets, Oscar’s arms.

Almost in a trance, Lando taps the search icon and searches ‘Oscar Piastri’ under the photos tab. Twitter doesn’t disappoint, immediately popping up with thousands of pictures. He scrolls quickly, not allowing himself to linger on any one picture. Oscar’s smiling bunny teeth, Oscar in a suit, Oscar post-race and sweaty, Oscar standing on top of his car, Oscar in the ice bath, Oscar staring at Lando with his Lando-smile over and over again.

He turns his phone off because what the fuck. Oscar is not pretty, Oscar is not hot.

Lando shouldn’t be having these thoughts, shouldn’t even be having thoughts adjacent to this. Ignoring the fact that Oscar isn’t a woman (and that’s—well it’s—Lando isn’t ready to admit anything to himself), he couldn’t pick a worse person to have these thoughts about than his teammate. That’s his job, his career. Shitting where he sleeps and all that.

It’s just that—it’s Oscar, kind and attentive and hard-working. He laughs at Lando’s shitty jokes, and brings him his favorite drinks and snacks when he’s upset.

Stop.

Lando has had a lot of low points in his life, but he draws the line at crushing on his straight, male teammate. That’s just asking for trouble.

He rolls, pulling the hood over his head. It’s stupidly soft and smells stupidly good, and worse, it makes him feel all stupidly gooey inside, all because Oscar was stupidly nice to him. He always is.

He’s going to go crazy if he can’t talk about this with someone, but he can’t talk about it with Max, because that would involve having to tell him things, and he can’t talk about it with Oscar, because Oscar is the whole problem in the first place.

There’s really no winning here.

——

Lando doesn’t have to see Oscar again until Thursday when the PR team is dragging them around, forcing them to film TikToks and putting them up for slaughter by the hands of reporters. Oscar rolls his eyes at Lando when no one else is looking, and he hides in Lando’s driver’s room around lunchtime, and Lando is relieved by how normal it all feels. It’s just Oscar.

They show up to the driver briefing together on Friday morning in their matching polos and caps, and Oscar hovers nearby while Lando clasps hands with the other drivers. He’s been watching Lando more intently than usual, but he figures he deserves it, and maybe he secretly enjoys the extra attention too.

They sit next to each other as the course clerk goes over track conditions and regulations. The clerks are rarely able to tell them things their teams haven’t already, but the briefings are taking longer than ever this year given how many rookies are on the grid. Lando doesn’t speak a lot in these meetings, usually content with the input that the more vocal drivers like George or Max offer.

It’s Spain, so when everything is done and they’re given the remaining time to socialize, Lando makes a beeline for Carlos. “Home race, how are we feeling?”

Carlos laughs, pulling him into his side. “It is good, of course. It is always good to be home.”

“It’s our week, I can feel it,” Alex says.

Lando smiles along good-naturedly, but he casts a wicked look at Oscar. They all know it’s going to be their week, just like it has been every race week this season. He wants to beat Oscar more than anything, but he also likes that they get to share this: the wins, the glory, the domination. It’s all theirs.

Oscar’s lips twitch back. He’s too well-trained to let anyone else see his thoughts on the silent conversation they’re having, but he cracks just enough to let Lando read him. He likes this too, that Oscar lets him see parts of him that no one else gets to.

“Okay, Thing One and Thing Two, I hope you know that it looks like you’re eye fucking when you do that. I need you to stop doing it in front of me,” Alex complains, just as George joins them.

“What?” Lando hisses. “That is not what’s happening.”

Alex puts his hands up. “Woah, chill. Obviously not, it’s a joke.”

Lando takes a deep breath, trying to calm his racing heart. ‘Obviously not.’

Everyone stares at them, and he feels himself shrinking from the weight of it.

Carlos clears his throat. “We are all aware that you are a lady’s man, Landito,” he says with an obnoxious wink, clearly trying to lighten the mood. “There will be a party for my home race, in case you want to celebrate my win with any of them. I will send you all the address.”

All his reassurance does is make him feel sour. He smiles anyways. “I think I’ll leave the partying to you this week.” He’d much rather prefer a return to his pre-Monaco routine of bothering Oscar after races instead.

His refusal causes Oscar to relax. Lando tries not to read into it too much because the guilt might pull him under.

“Well, I for one could definitely use a night out,” George says, glancing between Alex and Oscar. He sounds too happy. That usually means he’s up to something. “What do we say, boys?”

Alex snorts. “Uh, I don’t know, Georgie…”

“I’ll take that as a yes. Oscar?”

Lando blinks at him, dumbfounded. George can’t do that. He wants to spend Sunday evening invading Oscar’s room and stealing from his mini bar, and there’s no point in doing that if Oscar is out with George. He almost starts whining, but then he remembers the whole, uh, situation. Maybe he does need to work on being less attached.

He excuses himself from the conversation before Oscar can answer, citing something about wanting to go talk to Franco, and practically runs away to insert himself between him and Gabi. They’re talking about some movie that Lando has never heard about and never seen, but he nods along like he has and tries to convince himself that he doesn’t care what Oscar does.

Still, he watches from the corner of his eye as Oscar says something that causes the group to frown. Alex looks over at him, but George slaps his arm and he turns back around.

He’s not sure if that means Oscar is going or not, but he doesn’t care. Oscar can do what he wants. Lando will just… find something else to do. Actually, he should find something else to do regardless of whether Oscar is free or not. That would be the smart thing to do.

His eyes meet Oscar’s. Even from across the room, he’s able to pin Lando in place with a look. Oscar pulls out his phone to send a text. Lando’s own phone buzzes, but he can’t bring himself to tear his eyes away to check it until Oscar jerks his chin at him.

I’m not going, by the way, it reads. Not if you’re not.

Lando swallows, looking back up. Oscar’s gaze hasn’t left him.

“See? This is exactly the kind of look I’m talking about!” Alex exclaims, and George slaps him again. “Don’t hit me, I’m right!”

Lando turns back to Franco and Gabi so he doesn’t have to deal with all of that, but he can’t shake the feeling that they’re still talking about him. He feels jumpy, like at any moment someone is going to point a camera at him and go ‘gotcha!’ He hasn’t done anything wrong, and he hasn’t done anything anyone could catch, so there’s no reason for his heart to be climbing up his throat or for his hands to buzz.

The feeling doesn’t leave him for the rest of the day, chasing him through the paddock and around the track where every twitch he makes is filmed for the world to see. The anxiety isn’t new, but everything is a lot closer to the surface than usual. More visible. He’s almost surprised that no one stops to call him out on it.

It’s still there even when he makes it back to the hotel. He goes over to make sure the curtains are completely shut four different times and keeps checking the mirror to see if he can tell if it’s actually a one-way one. Then he paces around the room because he can’t bring himself to stay still. It’s not the first time he’s driven himself crazy with paranoia that someone is watching him, but it doesn’t make him feel any better to know he’ll find this all silly in the morning. It just makes him feel crazier.

Something creaks in the corner, and he freezes. There’s nothing there. He’s alone. No one is here.

He knows all that, he does, but he still can’t bring himself to move. His ears strain instead, like his brain has decided listening is more important than moving, and it’s a horrible decision because there are all sorts of weird noises to latch onto in a hotel, ones that sound like they could be coming from within the room.

He exhales slowly. He’s gotten in moods like this before, and they can take hours to resolve themselves. It’s better when he’s able to call Max, just so he can hear someone else’s voice and give his mind something else to latch onto.

Or better yet, if he’s able to be with someone.

That’s a better idea. He really doesn’t want to be alone right now.

Moving quickly, he shoves his keycard in his pocket and hurries out down the hallway. He’s never gone to Oscar’s room on a Friday before, but there’s a first time for everything, and Oscar can tell him to shove off if he really doesn’t want him there.

He taps his knuckles on the door, glancing around nervously.

He’s not kept waiting long before Oscar answers, wearing lounge clothes and a small frown. “Is something wrong?”

“What? No. Why would you assume something’s wrong?”

Oscar gives him a look.

“Okay, fair, but nothing’s wrong this time,” Lando lies. “I just wanted to hang out.”

Oscar’s cheeks flush. He opens his mouth to respond, but the sound of someone shuffling around in the room behind him cuts him off.

“Who is it?” comes a woman’s voice.

Oh. Oscar’s with someone. Oscar fucking Piastri brought a woman into his hotel room. Why would Lando assume he would be waiting for his beck and call? “Sorry,” he stutters. “I didn’t realize you were—I’ll just, uh—” He jerks a thumb in the direction he came from, stepping away.

“What?” Oscar grabs his arm. “Lando, it’s just Edie.”

“Edie?”

“Yeah?” His eyebrows raise. “My sister? I’m sure you two have met at some point.”

He pauses. Oscar definitely mentioned that his sister was going to be in Barcelona for the race. He doesn’t remember which one is Edie, but he has met all three of Oscar’s sisters at one point or another, if only briefly. “Oh. Yeah, Edie.”

“What are you saying about me?” She leans around Oscar like she’s been hiding there the whole time. Lando notes that she’s the one with the tan and the lip ring, hoping he can remember for next time. “And does Lando Norris usually do unannounced late night rendezvous at your door?”

Oscar elbows her. “He does what he wants.”

“And you let him? That’s adorable.”

Lando can’t help but smile. Oscar really does let him get away with a lot.

“Really though, are you sure nothing’s wrong?” Oscar asks, refocusing on Lando. “I can kick her out back to her own room if you want to talk.”

“Uh, no you can’t?” Edie says. “You haven’t made any time for me lately. Norris gets enough of you, it’s my turn.”

“Edie,” Oscar admonishes.

“Don’t say my name like that. And don’t think I won’t tell on you to Hattie, because I will.”

“Sorry.”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Lando promises. “I’m glad you have someone in your corner this weekend.”

“We’d be in his corner every weekend if he would just call us back,” Edie grumbles. “You don’t have to leave, but be warned that I will be smearing goo on your face if you stay.” Then she walks back into the room, leaving them alone.

“Get out while you still can,” Oscar jokes.

That really should be his cue to wave goodbye and leave them alone, but Lando is a bit selfish sometimes. “Do you want me to go?”

“What?”

“Like, would it be a bother if I stayed?”

“Oh. Never.”

He tries not to show his relief. “Well, don’t go making promises like that, Piastri. You might never get rid of me.”

Oscar smiles. “The horror.”

“C’mon then.” He jerks his chin. “After you.”

They walk in together to find that Edie has spread a wealth of little tubs and pots across the foot of the bed. She slingshots a headband at them, hitting Oscar right in the face much to his spluttering. “Gear up, boys. I’ve got my work cut out for me.”

It’s not a perfect fix, but his anxious thoughts are calming down. Oscar’s room seems brighter somehow, less likely for his brain to think things are hiding in the shadows.

“My skin isn’t that bad,” Oscar complains.

“It is. But don’t worry, I’m going to fix it for poor Lily.”

Lando glances at him. They broke up two and a half months ago, and Oscar didn’t tell his sister?

Oscar pretends to be too busy sliding on the headband to respond, but Lando knows better. His expression is smoothed out in that media-perfect placidity of his that earned him the stupid nickname “Ice Boy.” Lando stopped being fooled by it ages ago, but Edie can’t seem to tell the difference.

Lando accepts a headband to pull his own hair back on autopilot, content to stay silent and observe the two of them. They break into small talk about Edie’s schooling and personal drama with her friends. Oscar plays his part perfectly, humming in the right spots and asking the right questions, but every time Edie asks about his own life, Oscar manages to redirect the conversation back to her or someone else in their family, or to make it about racing instead. It’s almost fascinating how easily Oscar falls into that dance.

He looks at Oscar’s shut eyes and scrunched nose, hair pulled back to expose his forehead in a way that Lando knows the internet would make fun of as Edie applies a pale mask around his cheeks. It gives him a chance to stare when normally he would be worried about getting caught. Somehow, he still looks good. 

Then again, maybe he should have been worried because Edie’s eyes dart over to watch him watch Oscar, and there’s no helping the blush that heats his face.

When she finishes, it’s his turn. He tries to imagine what his younger self would say if he knew this is what it would really be like in the space between the paparazzi and fast cars. Somehow, he can’t imagine Senna and Prost in this same position, but maybe Lando figured something out that they didn’t, because the combination of gentle fingers on his face and soft chatter in the background does wonders to lull him back to peace.

They take turns using the sink in the attached bathroom when it’s time to wash it off. Oscar offers to let him go first, but Edie bullies him away, quoting that the one she put on Oscar will start to ‘burn and melt his face off’ if left on too long. They exchange a dubious glance, but neither of them are confident enough to argue with her.

“Well. Thanks for not putting the face-melty one on me,” Lando says once he’s gone.

“‘Course not.” She grins. Lando searches her face for traces of Oscar—maybe their noses or the cuts of their cheeks?—but they don’t look very much alike, nothing like Lando and his siblings. “Could you imagine what the papers would say? ‘Formula 1 Driver’s Face Sabotaged by Teammate’s Sister’?”

“You’d be crucified by dawn.”

She snorts. “Yeah, I won’t risk it, I think.”

“Smart.”

They fall silent for a moment, listening to the sounds of Oscar splashing water in the bathroom.

“Y’know, I didn’t realize the two of you were so close,” she says.

“We spend a lot of time together,” he responds, almost defensively. It feels like she’s fishing for something.

“It’s not a bad thing. Actually, it’s probably a good thing that someone’s keeping an eye on him.”

He mulls that over. “Does he really not call home?”

“Not often. Sometimes not for weeks at a time. He apologizes a lot for the time difference and him being busy, but… I don’t know. It’s always been difficult, but never like this before.”

He sighs. “Yeah, I’m starting to realize that. Give it some time, I’m working on it.”

“That makes me feel a little better at least.” Her eyes stay trained on her clasped hands, and Lando feels compelled to say something more, but he’s not sure what.

“He’ll be okay,” is what he settles on.

“Thanks.” She gives him a small smile, glancing in the direction of the bathroom. “Actually, can I ask something a little odd? Before he comes back?”

Lando shrugs. “Sure.”

“Could I have your number? Not for anything weird, I promise. Like, I know you’re probably really wary about giving it out to people because like, duh, but it would just make me feel better if I had some way to make sure he’s okay other than watching his interviews. Because he is not the best communicator, and—”

“Hey,” Lando says, cutting off her rushed whispering. “It’s okay.” He motions for her to hand him her phone, hurrying to type in his number. It feels illicit for some reason. He tosses it back just as Oscar reemerges with lobster-red cheeks from scrubbing too hard.

“I’m never letting you do that again,” he complains.

Edie smirks. “Like I’ll give you a choice in the matter.”

“You can’t get to me from Australia,” Oscar grumbles as Lando goes to take his turn in the bathroom. He exchanges a look with his co-conspirator as he passes, noting the way her smile dips.

He doesn’t let his own expression drop until he’s staring into the bathroom mirror. He’s not sure what to make of all of that, but he’s almost thankful for it for the distraction it gives him.

It’s a lot easier to focus on Oscar’s issues than his own.

——

He waits until after the race to confront Oscar about it. True to his prediction, it’s another 1-2 that leaves them sticky with champagne, and Oscar lets him into his room afterwards without complaint as always.

He debates easing into it with small talk, but the whole beating-around-the-bush thing has never worked for them. “You haven’t been talking to your family,” he points out bluntly.

Oscar’s eyes flick up. “Yes I have. You’ve literally seen my sister all weekend.”

“Yes, I have. And she says you haven’t been picking up anyone’s calls.”

“It’s not intentional, I’m just busy. And the time difference is crazy, one of us is always asleep.”

“You don’t talk to your friends from England either,” he guesses, already knowing he’s right.

“There’s no possible way for you to know that.”

“And yet I do.”

He crosses his arms. “It’d be a distraction. And there’s no time anyways.”

“As the one person in the world who has the exact same job as you, I can assure you there is.”

“Not with my training schedule there isn’t. There’s always something more I could be doing.” Describing Oscar Piastri as frantic feels wrong, but the way he says it doesn’t sit right with Lando.

“I really don’t think that’s healthy.”

“Well maybe that’s why I’m winning and you’re not,” Oscar snaps.

Lando stills, holding his mouth shut for fear of whatever nasty barb it’s going to spew in response to that.

Oscar deflates. “Sorry. I just—I know I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I lose and know that there was anything more I could have done. I’ll give whatever I have to.”

“You’re a person, not a machine.”

“I’m a driver.”

“And what? If you got a career-ending injury tomorrow, what would be left? What do you have that isn’t about racing?”

“Everything,” Oscar says, “is about racing. You know that just as well as I do.”

He seems to genuinely believe it, but… Look, all Formula 1 drivers are a bunch of racing obsessed freaks, but not even Max fucking Verstappen is this bad.

“Not everything, Oscar. You’ve got a whole family who would say otherwise. Don’t ignore that.”

“I left home when I was fourteen years old and haven’t been back longer than a few weeks at a time since. That was ten years ago. I missed my baby sisters growing up, Lando. I can’t get that back, and Christmases and phone calls don’t exactly make up for the missing years. If I lose, then what the hell was all that for?” Oscar has barely moved a muscle, but his chest rises and falls in quick pants. “I’m not going to lose, Lando.”

“Oscar…”

“Don’t. I’m not in the mood.” He exhales slowly. “I think you should go.”

It hits like a slap. Lando has never not been welcome in Oscar’s space before. He doesn’t know what to say, so he just stands there, unwilling to speak but also unwilling to leave. Oscar stares him down with flushed cheeks, but whereas it’s normally endearing, now the splotches read like a warning signal.

The silence stretches on far too long before he works up the courage to say, “No.”

“No, what?”

“No, I’m not leaving,” Lando says. “Well, okay, I guess I would if you really wanted me to, but I don’t think I should. I think I should stay, and I think we should talk it out.”

“Why?”

Because I’m worried about you, and I don’t want you to cut me out too, he doesn’t say.

“Because on Friday, you said I could stay if something was wrong. Well, something’s wrong, and I want to stay.”

“This isn’t exactly what I meant.”

Lando shrugs. “I want to be here. Do you want me to be here?”

“I always want you to be here,” he says, far too honestly. “But I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

“That’s okay,” he rushes to reassure. “We can do whatever you want as long as you don’t go to bed mad at me.”

“I’m not mad at you, Lando.” He sighs. “And I’m pretty sure that’s a rule for married couples.”

“Close enough. How do you want me then?”

“What?”

“Like, what do you want to do?”

“Oh. I don’t know.” Oscar collapses onto the foot of the bed.

Lando sits next to him and folds him into his arms on instinct. Oscar slumps into him without raising his own, trusting Lando to take him weight. Lando lightly runs his hand up and down his spine, afraid to move too much, like when a cat sits on you and you do everything you can not to scare it off. They’ve done this in reverse before, but Oscar has never let himself be held before without holding back.

It makes him feel a bit possessive. He tries not to, but it’s hard now when he knows he’s the only person allowed to do this.

“Thank you,” Oscar breathes.

“Yeah, of course. Anything you need, Osc.”

Hunched over as he is, Oscar’s shoulders look massive. Like, stretching-against-his-shirt massive. He catches his eyes wandering and drags them away to stare at the wall, but that doesn’t change the way Oscar’s forehead presses into his skin. The heat of it burns.

Lando stops moving his hand, suddenly afraid it’s too intimate of a gesture, but the stillness is worse. Without it, the only thing left for him to focus on is the sound of Oscar’s breathing, each exhale ghosting along the delicate skin right by Lando’s pulse.

He swallows heavily, the sound ringing out like a gunshot in the silence. Too loud. Oscar has to have heard it, what if Oscar knows what he’s thinking?

He’s going insane. He has actually, totally, one-hundred percent lost his mind. Why does a one-sided hug with Oscar feel like this? He’s spent so long trying to get this feeling with women, and this is what does it? It’s not fair. His hand curls into the back of Oscar’s shirt, and he hates himself for noticing the muscles that lay underneath. He has to stop it, but if he can’t convince himself to start feeling things, why would he think he’d be able to get himself to stop feeling them?

He pulls back from Oscar and hates himself for that too. Oscar looks bereft, like Lando has taken something important, but he can’t do this. His pulse flutters with anxiety. He has to go.

“Cool. Glad we sorted that out then, should be getting to bed. Flight to catch tomorrow and all,” he says, standing up.

“Lando,” Oscar says hoarsely.

“Yeah?” For a moment, Lando thinks he’s going to ask him to stay. He’s not sure if he wants him to or not.

“Nothing. Have a good night.”

“Yeah.” He clears his throat. “You too, Osc.”

He tries not to feel like he’s running when he shuts the door behind himself. He pulls out his phone to check for the address Carlos sent in the group chat earlier, then he calls a rideshare and leaves the hotel as quickly as possible.

When he arrives, he goes straight for the dance floor without a drop of alcohol in his system. He’s going to find the first woman who makes eyes at him and take her back to the hotel and have sex. None of this chickening out shit that he’s been doing lately.

He scans the crowd, searching for a good target. The party isn’t short on options, but of, course, nothing ever goes to plan for Lando, and he makes eye contact with George fucking Russell first. And instead of ignoring him and going back to what he was doing, George decides it’s a good idea to start pushing through the throng of people to get to Lando.

“I thought you said you weren’t coming out tonight,” George shouts over the music.

“Wasn’t planning on it, just needed a change of pace tonight. Thought I’d try my luck with a Spanish girl,” Lando shouts back. As he speaks, George pulls out his phone to tap something out before sliding it back into his pocket. “Where’s your better half?” Lando asks.

“Har, har. He didn’t feel like celebrating after a DNF. Where’s yours?”

“Where else? Sleeping,” he lies.

“Hm. You did invite him, didn’t you?”

“Oscar got the message in the group chat the same as everyone else.”

“Yeah, but everyone knows he’s not going to come if you don’t. Did you tell him you were coming?”

He frowns. “Why would I have to tell Oscar?”

George waits a beat too long to respond. “No reason.”

They stare at each other. It’s entirely too awkward for Lando. “Uh, I should—”

“Hang out with me for a bit,” George says.

“I’m gonna have to take a rain check, Georgie. I’ve got other plans tonight.”

“Twenty minutes max, then I’ll let you go. You’re right that it’s not as fun without Alex and Oscar.”

“I don’t think I actually said that,” Lando protests, but George is already grabbing his arm to manhandle him to a pair of seats at the bar. He casts a mournful glance at the crowd of dancers, eyeing the ones who could potentially solve his problem for the night. Twenty minutes won’t hurt, but god, George is fucking weird.

“No, but it’s true, isn’t it?” George says absently, pulling his phone back out to type something else.

“I’m sorry, have you met Oscar?” Oscar is—Well, he’s Oscar. No one’s ever accused him of being the life of the party.

“I’ve met you,” he counters. It’s just about the worst thing George could say to him. He does not want to think about Oscar anymore tonight, or hear his name, or have George continue to imply things that Lando isn’t sure George knows he’s implying.

“Well, he’s not exactly invited to participate in what I’ve got planned for tonight,” he settles on saying.

“Lando…” George has always been expressive. He rarely regards Lando with a look as careful as the one he gives him now.

“What?”

“I—Nothing.”

“Why are you being weird?” Lando asks.

“I’m not being weird.”

“Mate.”

George sighs. “I just… I mean, I guess I just want you to know that if there was anything you wanted to, uh, tell me… Then that would be okay..”

Lando is too tired for this. “George, I have no idea what you’re trying to say. Do you have something you need to talk about?” he asks, suddenly concerned.

“No! Just thought I’d, y’know,” he waves his hand around, “get that out in the air.”

“Okay… Anything else you want to ‘get out into the air’?”

George checks his phone again. “Nope. Don’t think so.”

“Alright then.” Lando motions for the bartender to bring them a pair of waters. George seems like he could use it. They sip quietly for a few minutes while Lando watches as George fidgets and flickers his eyes around the room.

“George, why are you acting like the mob’s out to get you?”

“I’m not!”

“You are.”

“Okay, I’ll tell you, but I want to say sorry first.”

“Sorry for what?”

“I texted your parole officer.”

“My what?”

“I told him I’d let him know if I saw you out tonight,” George confesses, and there’s no doubt in Lando’s mind who ‘he’ is.

“You texted Oscar?”

“Yes. I did.”

“Why?”

“Well, I don’t know exactly what’s going on with you two, but he sounded pretty concerned the other day. We were all a little concerned if I’m being honest.”

Lando stands, trying not to feel like he’s been caught doing something wrong. He hasn’t; he’s allowed to go out. “Is he here?”

“I reckon he’s just about made his way in, yeah.”

“George,” he stresses.

“Look, I’m not going to pry into your business, but I find it really hard to believe that he has bad intentions. The guy thinks you’re just about the greatest thing ever.”

Lando can’t even argue with that. He’ll be the first to admit he can be a bit abrasive and has a bad habit of sticking his foot in his mouth, but Oscar makes him feel likeable in a way he usually doesn’t. That’s the whole problem. Lando wouldn’t be feeling things he shouldn’t if Oscar liked him a little less.

He can tell the moment Oscar enters the room, their gazes snapping together like magnets.

“If I go missing, you know whose basement to check,” Lando says, holding his ground as Oscar stalks towards them through the crowd. Of course Oscar came to get him, even on a bad night.

“Hey, whatever’s wrong, let him help, yeah? Also, no thanks on the basement thing. I don’t want to have to see what kind of freaky shenanigans the two of you get up to down there.”

“What are you—George! That is not—”

“Don’t tell me! I don’t wanna know.”

“There’s nothing to—Hi, Oscar.”

Oscar looks him up and down, probably surprised at the sight of Lando not in the middle of a fucking meltdown for once. There’s almost no evidence of his own emotions from earlier, but Lando knows how exhausted he must be.

Lando doesn’t feel guilty. He doesn’t.

Oscar sighs. “Hi, Lando.” The spinning neon lights do devastating things to his face, emphasizing the planes above his cheekbones and the ridge of his brow. His hair is tousled and still slightly damp from his shower. Even his stupid sweatshirt—one that Lando recognizes as being the one Oscar let him borrow way back in Melbourne—is doing unfair things to Lando. There’s nothing about him that Lando should be finding attractive or hot, but his heart still beats its fists against the cage of his ribs.

“Are you going back to the hotel with me or are we staying here?”

Lando barely processes the words. “Huh?”

Oscar takes a moment to clasp hands with George, thanking him and sending him off before he slips into the seat George just vacated.

It gives Lando a chance to screw his head back on right. “You told our coworkers to keep a fucking eye on me?”

“Was I wrong to?”

“This has to be a form of stalking.”

“It’s a form of stopping you from hurting yourself, Lando.”

He wants to be furious at him for getting other people involved, but Edie’s number sits heavy in his contact list. “I’m perfectly fine, mate. I don’t need you tailing me like a mother hen.”

“You’re—God, you have no idea how—” Oscar takes a deep breath. “This whole thing terrifies me. You terrify me.”

Maybe it’s payback, because Oscar terrifies him too. “You can’t tell me what to do,” Lando says weakly, even though it’s starting to become alarmingly clear that Oscar can tell him what to do.

“You can do whatever you want. I just—I want to be here while you do it.”

“Why?”

“I—I just don’t want to get a call like that again. You have no idea what it felt like, sprinting through a city while you sounded like that, and then getting there and you—you were so…” He closes his eyes. “I don’t care if that means I have to sit here and watch you dance with women all night, or loiter around some—I don’t know, fucking motel parking lot or something. I just—I need to be there. I can’t do that again.”

“Oscar…”

He looks up with a twist to his lips that wouldn’t mean much on anyone else, but that means everything on Oscar. “So I’m going to ask again. Are we staying or leaving?”

He says it so simply, but leaving feels like admitting something, like his denial is hanging on by a thread and that’s the final choice that would cut it loose. He doesn’t want that to happen because then he’d have to actually start dealing with things, and that is so much worse and so much scarier. He doesn’t really want to stay either though—which doesn’t make any sense because he was the one who chose to come—but a part of him was relieved when George intercepted him, and an even bigger part of him was when Oscar showed up, positioning himself between Lando and the rest of the crowd.

Lando’s head is filled with white noise, but putting this look on Oscar’s face is somehow worse than the rest of the pain and confusion swirling around in him. He doesn’t want to have to make a choice, but he does want to get that look off Oscar. He wants Oscar to go back to having blushy cheeks and crinkled eyes.

Lando swallows. “You’d really do that?”

“Of course,” he says. Steady. Resolute.

He finds himself thinking for the millionth time that Oscar is too good for him. “Then yeah. Take me back.”

“Okay.” Oscar smiles at him, bunny teeth on full display. Lando can’t breathe.

He’s so fucked.

Chapter Text

Oscar unconsciously shepherds Lando back to his own room. By the time he realizes, they’re too far down the hall for him to change course without drawing attention to it.

“I can sleep in mine,” Lando says.

He stares at the door in front of him, forced to admit to himself that he doesn’t want Lando to leave. He’s afraid his thoughts will start spiraling if he lets him out of his sight.

“You could,” he replies neutrally.

“But you don’t want me to.”

He wishes he could be fine with him leaving, but Lando has such a chokehold on him that it’s hard to breathe sometimes. He leans his forehead against the door so he doesn’t have to look at him. “No. I don’t want you to.”

“Okay then. I won’t.”

“Thank you,” he whispers.

“I don’t know why you’re thanking me. It feels like all I’ve done lately is cause you trouble.”

“You’ve always been trouble,” Oscar says truthfully as Lando elbows him for the keycard so he can lead them inside.

“And yet here we are.”

“Yeah. Here we are.”

A single lamp is the only light turned on. It casts a hazy glow around the room and lines Lando’s hair with gold, like tinsel. His features seem softer than usual, but he’s watching Oscar with such intensity that it almost makes him shiver.

Oscar’s not sure where to start, isn’t sure he has the energy to. He knows Lando won’t though, so he opens his mouth and lets the words fall out without thinking. “I was serious when I said I wouldn’t stop you. Not if you don’t want me to. But tell me next time? Please.” His voice comes out raspier than expected.

“You shouldn’t have to keep doing this.”

“Neither should you.”

Lando sits down on the edge of the bed, but doesn’t respond.

He’s scared to press too hard, and scrambles to find words that won’t fuck everything up. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

“Saying it makes it real.”

“It’s already real, Lando. You wouldn’t be doing all this if it wasn’t.”

His head ducks low between hunched shoulders. “There are… things that I’m feeling. I can’t stop them. And I don’t know what to do with them.”

It’s the closest Lando has come to verbalizing it.

There’s irony in the fact that Lando is confessing this to Oscar of all people. Lando, who Oscar had a puppy crush on long before they ever properly met. Lando, who now haunts his sleepless nights. If Oscar knew what to do with unwanted feelings, half his problems would be solved.

“Don’t do anything then,” is all he has to offer.

“I want them to go away.”

“Ignoring them won’t make you stop feeling them.”

“Coming from you?”

Oscar bristles, afraid he already knows what Lando is going to say next. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I dunno. That’s what everyone always says, isn’t it? That I should be less emotional and more like you.”

He’s so goddamn tired of hearing the same thing over and over about calm, emotionless Oscar Piastri. Sometimes he thinks all he can do is feel. “You really think that about me? That I don’t feel things?”

“No,” he says immediately. “Sorry, Osc. I’m just—tired, I guess. And you can be so… I don’t know. The thing we were talking about. I don’t understand it. I know you tried explaining it, but… I still just don’t get it.”

“I’m fine, Lando.”

“Oscar…”

“Don’t,” he bites, not willing to revisit that conversation. “I have everything I want.”

“And what is it you want?”

“I want to win.”

“And what else? Friends? Family? You need people other than your charity case of a teammate that you’re forced to spend time with.”

He doesn’t—he’s doing fine—but it still hurts right in the heart of the lonely little boy that never leaves him, the one that grew up oceans away from home and had to learn how to rely on himself. He never quite fit back in with his family once he left, but it’s not like he never talks to them. He makes sure to send a text often enough that they don’t worry he’s dead, and he coordinated Edie’s trip to Spain when she asked. “Either they understand, or they don’t.”

“And you claim you don’t have problems.”

“You have no space to judge how I handle things.”

“No, I don’t. But you don’t really think a sport is worth all that?”

“Well, you do too apparently.”

“That’s different.”

“Is it? You can’t even bring yourself to say the word gay, Lando.”

He flinches.

“Yeah. That’s what I thought,” he says, but he doesn’t feel like he won anything. He just feels mean.

“So we both have issues. At least I can admit I do.”

He doesn’t like thinking about all of this, let alone talking about it. A dozen different responses come to mind, each crueller than the last just to get Lando to stop pressing him, but Lando doesn’t deserve that. He exhales slowly. “I don’t want to fight.”

“I don’t either.”

“Then what are we doing?”

“I don’t know,” Lando says quietly. “I like it better when we’re on the same side.”

“Yeah. Always,” Oscar agrees, even though they both know they’re against each other for the only fight that really matters.

“Trust me then? I’m trusting you with my thing.”

“You didn’t though. You left,” he accuses. Maybe he’s not as over Lando abandoning him as he thought.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t because I thought you were wrong, or because I didn’t trust you. I’m just fucked up enough that I wanted to try one last time.”

“Last time? You’re done with it then?”

Lando squeezes his eyes shut. “I should be, right?”

“Yeah,” Oscar says as quickly as possible.

“I’ll try then, if only because I think I’d be an awful person if I kept putting you through this.”

He wants to argue with that and tell him it’s okay, but frankly, if the guilt of what it’s done to Oscar is enough to make him stop, then he’s going to let it. “Okay.”

“You’ll trust me too then?”

He hesitates. “It’s working though. I’m winning.”

“Not calling your mum back isn’t the reason you’re winning, Oscar. You’re winning because you’re a fucking brilliant driver.”

It’s not that simple, but he’s not sure how to make him understand. “Thanks,” he says to placate him.

They know each other well enough that he sees through it, and Oscar sees him see through it, but Lando lets it go anyway. Otherwise, they’d go around and around in circles all night long. “Enjoy leading while it lasts. It won’t be long.”

He snorts, glad to be back in familiar territory. “Naturally.”

Lando flops backwards, the bottom of his shirt riding up slightly. “Can we go to bed now? I’m tired.”

“Of course,” he agrees, even though he knows he won’t be able to fall asleep.

“Great.” He kicks his shoes off, sending them sprawling across the floor. Then, he shimmies out of his jeans and messily shucks them in the same general direction. They look out of place; everything of Oscar’s is neatly packed away and out of sight. What doesn’t look out of place is Lando sliding under the covers like they’re his own. He does that a lot, carving out a spot in Oscar’s space without even asking permission anymore. Oscar knows he’d let Lando do just about anything he wants, he just wishes Lando didn’t know it too.

“Coming, Osc?”

Feeling like a dog brought to heel, he turns the lamp off and climbs into bed.

In the dark, it’s a lot harder to push back the thoughts that are always creeping at the edges of his mind. He likes this part—the late nights, and the hurricane mess, and having Lando in his bed. They’re too far apart for it to be anything but an illusion, but he swears he can feel heat radiating Lando’s side.

“Thanks for coming to get me,” Lando murmurs. “Again.”

“Anything you need,” he whispers, afraid that the words will hurt more if he speaks them too loudly. “You know that.”

“And how is it that you’re always what I need?”

He closes his eyes as if that can shield him. Lando doesn’t mean it that way. He couldn’t take it if he did.

“You’re just always so steady,” he continues. “I feel like I’m throwing myself from one crisis to the next while you chase after me to make sure I don’t fall apart.”

“Well yeah. I don’t want that to happen. Not if I can help it.”

“Why not? You keep saying the championship is the only thing that matters. Me having breakdowns every other week would only help you.”

“That’s not true,” he says. Mark’s voice in his head says the opposite.

“It is. You’re just too good of a person to take advantage of it.” Lando means it as a compliment, but it hits like an accusation. Like he’s calling Oscar soft. “That’s the problem,” he breathes, quietly enough that Oscar isn’t sure if he was meant to hear.

Oscar isn’t as good as Lando thinks he is—it’s not like the thought hasn’t crossed his mind—but what’s the point of winning this year if they take the team down with them? He’s planning on winning over and over again. It’s just a coincidence that making sure Lando’s okay fits in with that.

He tries to convince himself that he’d still be willing to throw Lando under the bus if it really came down to it. Even just a few months ago, he doesn’t think he would have hesitated. He hesitates now though, and that’s dangerous. It means he’s losing focus. He’s Oscar fucking Piastri, losing focus isn’t something he does.

“Let’s go to sleep now,” he says.

Lando takes the redirect for what it is. “Yeah, okay. Goodnight, Oscar.”

He lingers on the way Lando says his name, breathy and intimate, with his accent skipping over the “r” like always.

“Goodnight, Lando.”

It’s a long time before sleep finds him.

——

He wakes up the next morning to the sound of someone banging on the door. It’s disorientating because—well frankly, the person most likely to pound on his door like this is the one curled up an arm’s length away from him. Then he remembers. He was supposed to have breakfast with Edie.

He rolls out of bed, hurrying to open the door and shove his body in it so he’s blocking her view into the room.

“Hi,” he says casually.

She squints at him. “Hi.”

“Could we actually order the room service to your room instead?”

“Why?”

Oscar scrambles to come up with a good excuse. Really, there’s no reason for him to not tell her the truth, but it opens him up to questions that he really doesn’t want to have to answer.

He takes too long though, and Edie ducks under his arm to peer in. Her eyes immediately lock onto Lando’s unfortunately recognizable face, still asleep.

He waits for the shock, or the accusations, or for her to start taking pictures to send to the family group chat, but she doesn’t do any of that. She just looks at him carefully, gently. It makes him feel exposed.

“Yeah,” she says. “We can do breakfast in my room.”

He’s quick to grab his keycard and phone from the bedside table, not letting his gaze linger on Lando’s face while Edie’s still watching him.

They don’t speak as they walk through the halls. There’s not a chance that she just lets this go, so he frantically thinks up responses for anything she might say and for denying whatever ideas she’s concocting in her head. He shouldn’t need to do anything but tell the truth because nothing actually happened, but that doesn’t sound convincing even to him.

Oscar made sure Edie got a room near the McLaren room block, so the walk isn’t far. He sends a text to Lando letting him know where he went before they get there.

She waits until the door is firmly shut behind them.

“So. Lando’s nice.”

“Don’t do that. Nothing happened.”

“Don’t do what? I’m just making conversation.”

“You’re doing a lot more than that. Stop fishing.”

“Can you blame me? I wouldn’t have to fish if you would just tell us about your life.”

“I tell you about the important things.”

“Do you?” Her voice sharpens. “How’s Lily then?”

Guilt stabs at him. He didn’t mean to keep the breakup a secret, but it never felt like there was a good time to tell everyone. And maybe he also didn’t want to because if he told people, then he’d have to deal with his feelings and their feelings, and he really didn’t want to do that.

Edie sighs. “Yeah. That’s what I thought.”

“How’d you know?”

“I know you, Oscar. I don’t care if ‘nothing happened,’ you would not have Lando Norris in your bed if you were still in a committed relationship.”

“You sleep with your friends all the time, Edie.”

“You’re not me, Oscar.”

There’s nothing he can say to that. She’s not wrong, but he doesn’t want to talk about it either. “I’m sorry I didn’t say anything about Lily.”

“It’s fine, Oscar. I just don’t want you to become a stranger.”

Aren’t they already kind of strangers?

Oscar looks at her and sees her as she is now: grown, strong, and someone he sees twice a year if they’re lucky. He loves her, he thinks, but she’s not the person he pictures when he thinks of his sister. He still thinks of her as she was when he left home, the version of her that held his hand when he took her on trips to the park. He’s almost angry when he remembers there’s a grown woman in the spot where his little sister should be, like it’s her fault for not staying the same after all these years.

“I do miss you,” he says, not sure if he’s talking to the girl or the woman.

She grabs his hand. “I miss you too. We all do.”

“I’m sorry, I really am, but… It’s just not the same.”

From the look on her face, he thinks she understands what he means. “I know. But we’re still trying. We still love you.”

He swallows past the lump forming in his throat. Maybe this is part of why he keeps his distance too: it’s hard to talk to any of his sisters without it hurting. “Yeah. Love you too.”

“Enough that you’ll talk about Lando with me?” she teases, and he recognizes her own discomfort in the way she tries to make it into a joke. He does the same thing when asked about bad races.

“No.”

“He’s a nice boy!”

“Why are you talking like you’re my mother? We’re both years older than you.” Then he remembers. “Also, he’s a guy.”

“It’s okay if you like guys, Oscar. You know that.” And yes, Oscar knows he doesn’t have to be afraid of Edie’s reaction to that (between the haircut and the lip ring), but he does have to be afraid that she’ll go spilling to the whole family,

“It would be okay, but that’s not what’s happening.”

“Isn’t it? He cares about you. I think he likes you too.”

“We’re not talking about this.”

“But I want to talk about this. You’re finally interesting again.”

“I’m a world famous driver, I’m plenty interesting.”

She waves her hand. “Old news.”

“You’re so annoying,” he says, even though it’s kind of nice to be going back and forth like this. It feels a little like they’re trying too hard to play house, but he doesn’t hate it.

“Really though, Oscar, I think he’s good for you. Do you know how smiley you are around him?”

Oscar winces. “Yeah. I know. It’s awful, isn’t it?”

“It’s not awful when he’s the same way.”

“No, it’s worse. We’re too far in the public eye, Edie. That’s not something I want.” It’s exhausting enough maintaining that boundary with himself, but even thinking about trying to explain what it’s like to someone else drains him.

“That’s okay. But if you did want it—”

“I don’t.”

“I know, but if you did… You know I’m always there to talk, right?”

“I… Yeah. Thanks, Edie.”

They wrap their arms around each other, and like most of the hugs Oscar gives, it’s a bit awkward, but it was even when they were little.

“Wait until I tell Hattie and Mae that I got you to have a real conversation with me. Feelings and everything.”

“I’m sorry,” he says again, hoarsely, meaning it more every time he does.

“It’s okay, we know you’re busy. Just try not to forget about us, yeah?”

He feels so incredibly guilty because that’s exactly what he’s been doing, but all of his justifications for why seem weak right now.

“‘Course not.” He squeezes a bit tighter and thinks he understands what Lando meant when he said he’d be an awful person if he were to keep putting Oscar through the same thing again and again. In his same position, Oscar’s not sure if he cares or not.

——

He can’t stop thinking when he gets home to Monaco, but it doesn’t feel productive. Mostly he just stares blankly at walls in between training and looking over data. But for all the thinking he does, he doesn’t find any grand conclusions beyond being stressed in ways that have nothing to do with racing. He likes being stressed by racing. He doesn’t like this.

——

They have a weekend off between the end of the triple header and the Canadian Grand Prix, and George somehow convinces Max to host an outing on his new superyacht.

Lando pulls up outside Oscar’s building a few hours before sunset, and Oscar climbs into the back seat, glancing at Lando’s toothy grin and exchanging a nod with Max Fewtrell. Lando is taking advantage of the rare break to host him for the week. It was hard enough for them to see each other between constant travel and living in separate countries, but adding the title fight to Lando’s plate has only made it worse—something he has complained about to Oscar with no end.

They exchange pleasantries, and he can tell Max is at least slightly surprised Oscar is joining them for once. Oscar’s surprised too. Being seen goofing off instead of working on their breaks makes him nervous; he knows he should be doing more to show that he’s making the most out of the opportunity he’s been given. His muscles are sore, his stomach is empty, and his brain is tired and overworked, but none of that is something he can point to and say, ‘See? Look how much I want this. Look how hard I’m working.’ He’s afraid of the assumptions people will make if he’s caught wasting time.

(He’s also afraid of what Edie would think when he still hasn’t texted her since his flight took off.)

But a few minutes after he declined George’s offer, Lando rang him up to try convincing him otherwise. Oscar agreed then, not because Lando’s offer was any more enticing, but because Lando has a way of telling rather than asking. It’s so much easier to say yes when it feels like there isn’t a choice to begin with. He thinks Lando’s picked up on it, but as long as they don’t have to talk about it, Oscar’s okay with that.

They park in the marina, and Oscar slings his singular bag over his shoulder. Then, he and Max stand there watching Lando wrestle with the four different bags he brought.

“Mate, you realize we’re only out for the day?” Max asks.

“I know that! But what if I need a change of clothes? Or another towel?”

“Then put them in one bag. And I’m pretty sure they’ll have extra towels.”

“Okay, but what if they didn’t? And then I’d whip one out and be a fricking hero.”

“I’m swooning already.”

“Don’t mock me—!”

Oscar tunes out the rest of their bickering and wordlessly grabs the two heavier bags. He’s already used to freeing up an extra hand to help carry Lando’s stuff at the airport. Lando, also used to this, doesn’t pause his arguing as he slams the trunk shut, just motions for Oscar to hold one of the bags out for him to slip his keys into.

The three of them head down the boardwalk, Oscar half a step behind Lando and Max. He doesn’t mind, not really wanting to have to carry a conversation right now anyway. Instead, he watches how the Mediterranean sun warms the back of Lando’s neck, turning it a blushy sort of golden. Every few steps, Lando glances at him to make sure he’s following, and Oscar forces himself to keep smiling back because it makes his steps extra bouncy.

It’s not long until they’re boarding the boat, and Oscar bemusedly feels a bit like a valet as he lets Lando direct him on where to set the bags down.

Only the Monaco-based drivers and their entourages are here, with the notable exception of Lewis (who almost never hangs out with them) and the notable addition of Daniel (who apparently has a lifelong invitation to parties on Max Verstappen’s yacht). Oscar recognizes the faces of most of the people here, so he’s not too anxious about being left to his own devices, but Lando doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to get rid of him, pulling him along arm-in-arm as he (re-?)introduces Max to everyone. He’s quietly thankful because he has forgotten a lot of names, including those of George and Charles’s girlfriends.

He does notice a weird tension between Lando and George when they greet each other. He wonders if it’s his fault because of what happened in Spain, but George’s smile is suspiciously wide, so maybe not. Lando quickly lets go of Oscar so he can cross his arms and glare instead.

Oscar looks at Max, who shrugs in response. Combined, the two of them are a completed venn diagram of everything Lando Norris, so if neither of them knows about it, it can’t be too bad.

He ends up losing Lando for a bit after that, instead getting caught in conversation with Charles and Max V. about the regulations for next year. It still shocks him that people he spent his teenage years looking up to value his opinion on things like this, and it serves as a surreal reminder that he’s actually made it and doesn’t have to worry about finding a seat. That’s more than what most of the drivers in his cohort can say, so he must have made the right choices. It’s worth everything, it has to be.

He sighs, excusing himself to find a quiet spot on the upper deck. The thoughts follow him.

Lando finds him again when the boat is leaving the harbor, leaning against the railing next to him with a drink in hand. “Pretty view, huh?”

He watches mournfully as land gets farther away. “I guess.”

“Not a big fan of boats?”

“Not a big fan of being trapped. I don’t like not being able to leave places if I need to.”

“Oh. I like it.”

“Which part?”

“The part where we’ll be far enough away that no one will be able to photograph us for once. We can let loose.”

He hums. That’s a big part of why he doesn’t like going out: too many people filming everything. It’s annoying for someone like him who spends most of his free time at home. It must be even worse for someone like Lando. “So not only am I trapped, I’m trapped with a version of you who’s ‘letting loose’? Yikes.”

Lando elbows him. “Oh, shut up, you know what I mean. I don’t like being watched all the time. I miss my privacy.”

It’s especially bad this year now that all eyes are on them. He can barely remember how to breathe without worrying how it might look to someone watching through a screen. “I get what you mean.”

For once, he lets himself look at Lando the way he learned not to out of fear of it getting screenshotted and thrown around the internet. He was made for weather like this, with tan skin and long, pretty lashes and his linen shirt unbuttoned down to his navel. Lando would argue it’s because it’s ‘too hot’ or that it’s ‘practical since he’s going to take it off soon anyways,’ but Oscar knows Lando wears his shirts like this because he knows he looks good.

Mouth suddenly dry, he licks his lips. They taste like sea salt.

“Then maybe today’s the day I finally see you let loose,” Lando says, offering him his half-drunk cocktail.

“Yeah, right.” Oscar snorts, but he accepts it anyway. The drink is cool and sweet on his tongue.

“Good?”

“Yeah. Good.”

They stand there side-by-side for a while. At some point, someone hooks their phone up to the speakers and music begins blasting. A game of beer pong gets going on the lower deck, and, when they’re far enough away from the shore that the yacht slows to a stop, people start stripping down to their bathing suits. Oscar has no intention of diving into the sea, so he migrates to a sofa lounger to watch instead. Lando—shirtless and in tiny swim shorts—fusses over him before he joins the swimmers, making sure Oscar has a new drink in hand and a bottle of suncream for his ‘poor, pasty skin.’

Then Oscar is left to sip his sparkly blue frou-frou drink and let the sun heat him until he’s boneless in the cushions. Charles and his equally beautiful girlfriend are sunbathing not too far away. He gets pulled into their conversation a few times, but he’s mostly content to lie there and listen to the sounds of soft chatter and crashing waves.

The drinks start kicking in and do wonders to calm his racing thoughts. Lando may have had a point about relaxing without being afraid of someone filming for once, and Oscar’s been wound way too tight, so he just keeps sipping, wandering over to the bar for more brightly colored cocktails every time he finishes one.

Stretched out as he is, like a cat in a sunbeam, it doesn’t take long for the alcohol to make him sleepy.

He doesn’t actually remember falling under, but when he wakes up, it’s because something is tickling his stomach. He blinks his eyes open to see people huddled around him, with Charles dutifully handing playing cards to Alex who’s trying to balance them in a house on top of Oscar. Charles’s girlfriend has disappeared, but Lando and Max F. are on his other side, engaged in a badly whispered argument over which one of them fucked over their “team’s” turn. Lando lets out a particularly loud squawk, and Oscar can’t help but burst into giggles.

Max smacks Lando. “Great going, you woke him up.”

“Me? You were the one who—”

“No,” Alex groans. “We were doing so well!”

Charles points an accusing finger. “This was sabotage.”

“Oh, come off it—”

Oscar lets the argument fade into the background as he forces himself to sit up. The remaining cards tumble off of him, and he hadn’t realized they were still there to begin with, so he starts laughing again.

“Oh my god.” Lando grabs his face, and it takes Oscar far too long to process what’s happening. “Oh, yes,” he says with a wicked grin.

“What?” Alex asks.

“He’s sloshed.”

Their laughter roars.

“Noo,” Oscar denies, but he can’t control the too-wide stretch of his lips, and his cheeks are already sore from smiling too hard.

Lando’s face softens, and he’s still holding Oscar’s, and he’s so painfully beautiful. “You’re so red.”

“He looks like a lobster,” Max chortles.

“Don’t be mean to me.”

“We’re not being mean. We actually came to see if you and Charles wanted to come try the jacuzzi with us, but then, well…” Alex trails off.

“We wanted to draw on you, but we couldn’t find a marker,” Charles adds helpfully.

“Mean,” he repeats.

“So, what do you think? Wanna come, or do you want to go back to sleep?” Lando asks.

“What are you doing?”

“Jacuzzi.”

Oscar nods. “Jacuzzi then.” He moves to stand, and Lando immediately catches him when he almost falls over. His hands are so big on Oscar’s waist as he steadies him, like baseball gloves or something.

“Jesus, Osc.”

“Osc,” he mouths under his breath. He loves when Lando calls him that.

“Come on, mate.”

Lando drags him along. The world spins around him like a carnival, and Oscar is abruptly aware of how much he really drank. It didn’t feel like that much until he had to start moving. He doesn’t want to be a burden, so he concentrates on putting one foot in front of the other and trusts Lando to get him to their destination safely.

He peels his shirt off when they get there and tosses it—somewhere. Then, there are hands helping him get in without slipping and heaps of giggles. He doesn’t care if they’re laughing at him; he’s too bubbly and warm. His eyelids creak open just enough to make sure Lando is still next to him. He does trust most of the people here to some degree, but he feels better about letting his guard down with Lando nearby.

Lando’s looking at him too, but not at his face, which is annoying because he wants to see Lando’s eyes. Oscar splashes water in his direction to get him to look at him properly.

He does, and Oscar smiles again. Really, he’s not sure if the smile ever left.

“Hi.”

“Hi,” Oscar responds dopily.

“You can’t—C’mon, Oscar, you can’t look at me like that,” he whispers.

“Like what?”

“Like that.”

“This is how I always look at you.”

His lips part, and Oscar tracks the movement. “No, it’s not.”

“Okay.” His hair is bugging him, so he reaches up to push it back and—well, now his hair’s wet. He glares at his hand in betrayal.

Lando sighs. “You’re drunk. You’re just drunk.”

Oscar forgot what they were talking about. “Yeah.” He hasn’t been this drunk since the night they won the WCC. He smiles at the memory. “We won a world championship together.”

“You have a one track mind.”

“Two tracks,” Oscar argues. Racing, and Lando.

“Yeah? What’s the other one?”

“The other what?”

“The other track.”

Oscar snorts. “Gillies Willnuv. You should know this.”

“What?”

“The next track. Circuit Gillnev Villneneuve.”

“You mean Gilles Villeneuve?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Sure, Osc.”

He hums, leaning his head back against the lip of the tub. “I like winning things with you.” He’s not sure why he says it with the ticking clock that hangs over their heads. They both know it’s not going to feel like winning together this year.

“Yeah,” Lando murmurs. “Wish we had a chance to do it more.”

“This is fun too though.”

“For now.”

For now, when they’re only twenty-two points apart and both believe they’re going to win. He closes his eyes as if to shut out the thought of what comes next.

Lando pokes him. “I’m not letting you fall asleep in a hot tub.”

“I’m not going to fall asleep,” he whines.

“Yes you are.”

“Okay, yes, I am. You’ll catch me though.”

“Oscar, I really don’t want to add saving you from drowning to the list of activities tonight.”

“Lame.”

“I should offload you onto someone else.”

“No, you like me too much.”

Lando chuckles, putting his arm around Oscar to help hold him up. He likes how comfortable Lando is with touch. It’s nice sometimes. No one else ever holds him. “Where’d you get that idea?”

He doesn’t respond. Lando takes it as a cue to reinsert himself into whatever group discussion is happening, but Oscar doesn’t care enough to listen, too busy watching the water lap at Lando’s skin. He leans farther into Lando’s hold, noting the hitch in his breath. The chain on his neck glints, and Oscar almost reaches up to play with it before mentally slapping himself.

Even with a muddled mind, he knows he’s not supposed to be having thoughts like the ones coming to him now, but he comforts himself by reminding himself he’s just drunk, so none of this means anything. Besides, his thoughts about Lando are a lot more fun than his thoughts about everything else that’s been stressing him out, so he lets it slide.

He traces patterns in the water droplets on Lando’s arm, a little obsessed with the way it makes the muscles there twitch, until Lando is reaching out to stop him with red ears.

“You have to know what you’re doing,” Lando accuses.

“What?”

“Oscar, please.”

“Please what?”

“Just—Nevermind. Just put your head down again or something.”

“Okay.”

He doesn’t actually end up falling asleep, mostly because he doesn’t think he’s ever been drunk enough to do something that stupid, but it’s a close call when the boat starts moving at a steady rock as it heads back to shore. When they dock, he perks up long enough to argue with Lando about being able to carry the bags—because he likes doing things for Lando—and Lando relents because his hands are going to be full keeping Oscar upright anyways.

Lando parks in front of Oscar’s building and leaves Max (who also looks like he’s had a few, if not quite a few as Oscar) in the car so he can make sure Oscar gets all the way home. Oscar argues that he doesn’t need to, but Lando starts walking without him halfway through his attempt and forces him to scramble after.

He makes him drink a glass of water and put on clean clothes, and he somehow remembers where the pain meds are. He does practically everything but tuck Oscar into bed, snarking and teasing the whole time, and all Oscar can do is follow along.

People don’t do this for him; he’s the mature one. The independent one. The one who doesn’t need people fussing over him.

That’s how it’s always been.

The thought is too close to everything he wants to avoid thinking about. Without his consent, his eyes begin watering, and it’s awful, and he doesn’t really understand why, and Lando notices immediately and begins talking in a soothing voice like Oscar’s a wild animal, but that only makes him cry harder.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” He grabs Oscar, and Oscar clings back. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” he says wetly, voice muffled by Lando’s shoulder. Lando’s hand moves in circles on his back, and it’s gentle, and he can’t stop crying. “It’s just the—the stupid alcohol.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. No. You’re being nice to me, and it’s awful.”

Lando leans back. “It is?”

Their faces are so close together. He gets the urge to do something really, really stupid. “Horrible.”

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No! Maybe. I don’t know.”

“You’re going to have to explain this one to me, I think.”

He’d rather die. “I don’t want to.”

“Oscar.” Lando puts a hand on Oscar’s face. “Is something actually wrong, or are you just drunk?”

“Just drunk,” he says, hoping it’s true.

“Okay.” He pulls Oscar back in and lets him stay there for a long moment, not caring that Oscar’s probably getting snot all over his shirt. “Let’s get you to bed then, yeah?”

“Yeah. That sounds good.” Anything to get out of this conversation as quickly as possible.

Lando stands in the doorway of his bedroom while Oscar crawls into bed, and he asks if Oscar needs him to get anything else, and Oscar can’t think of anything appropriate to say, so he says no. Lando wouldn’t be able to stay anyways, not with Max in the car.

“Alright then. ‘Night, Osc.”

“‘Night, Lando.”

And then he’s left alone, tucked into the sheets that Lando bought for him, and he starts crying again, and he still doesn’t understand why. Everything’s just felt like so much lately, and his carefully constructed world that was centered on racing and cars is falling apart.

He sobs in a way he’d never let anyone else see—big, ugly, gasping things. It’s too much, and he’s too off kilter, and none of his cut-off thoughts are making sense, just that he kind of wishes Lando didn’t have to leave. But he can’t think that, because he still has to beat Lando, because that’s what everything’s been for. That trophy is supposed to be everything he’s ever wanted, and it still is, but he wishes he could get it without hurting him or… anyone else.

That’s not possible, and this right here is everything Mark warned him about. He needs a killer instinct, not some half-developed dream about friendship. Friendship doesn’t win championships.

And he wants to win so badly.

Chapter Text

Lando tucks himself into the corner of the couch as if to ward off prying eyes. Max is dead asleep in the guest room, and no one else can get into the flat, but he’s irrationally afraid that someone is going to pop up behind him and see what he’s doing. He almost tempts himself into grabbing a blanket to pull over his head, but that’s ridiculous. He’s twenty-five years old.

He used a burner email to create a new Twitter account in an incognito browser, and now the cursor blinks away in the search bar, tempting him to type something. He dithered around on the home page for a bit, but he’s not sure who he was pretending for. It’s different from the last time he did this. The last time was out of confusion. This time, the curtain has already been pulled back. He knows exactly what he’s doing as he turns his brightness all the way down and types ‘Oscar Piastri.’

The first picture isn’t incriminating enough to justify his thudding heart, just a standard race winner graphic from Barcelona. It’s Oscar posed in his race suit with a stiff smile—nothing groundbreaking, and certainly nothing losing his mind over.

He scrolls past a few more pictures of him looking the same as he always does, and Lando is almost able to convince himself that he can be normal about this whole thing when he comes across a video of the podium from last week. Oscar’s cheeks are still flushed bright from the race, sweaty hair plastered to his forehead. And he fucking—he licks his bottom lip. It’s a nervous habit Lando has seen him do a hundred times before, but it’s all zoomed in, and with the sweat, and his tongue just—rolls out of his mouth so slowly.

He replays it without thinking.

This—this is something. He doesn’t want it to be, but—Oscar’s neck looks so fucking huge, and his shoulders stretch out far wider than they have any right to. He pauses so he can stare, so he can try to figure out how sweet, dorky Oscar can look like this, but all it does it make him feel hot.

He looked like this tonight, hair wet and cheeks pink for entirely different reasons, but the result was the same. And he’d been shirtless and practically hanging off Lando the same way Lando is used to from women in tiny bikinis, but with them, the next step would have been wandering hands and him tugging them into his lap—which is entirely unhelpful because now he’s imagining Oscar sitting on his lap and looking at him with dark, pretty eyes. It’d be different, because Oscar is bigger than him, so maybe it’d feel more like Oscar were caging him in, and maybe he’d lick his lips just like in the video like he’s planning to eat Lando whole.

Lando sticks his fingers against his pulse, just to check that he’s not hallucinating how fast his heart is pounding.

This is insane behavior. It’s bad enough that he’s thinking these thoughts, but the fact that something so tame is getting him so riled up is embarrassing. The fact that this all started because Oscar is too nice to him is even more so. But it doesn’t matter that Oscar is always doing nice things for him because it doesn’t mean anything. That’s just how he is, and Lando shouldn’t be—violating him or whatever this is.

He imagines what Oscar would say if he knew what Lando was thinking about him, and the resulting shame immediately douses whatever heat had built up. Maybe he’d think Lando was gross or—or pathetic. His chest squeezes. He needs Oscar, has carved out a spot in his life just for him, and whatever thoughts he has about the way Oscar looks at him or touches him when he’s drunk will only ruin that.

He turns his phone off, hollowed. It’s unfair. He tried so hard to be normal, he really did, but it didn’t work. Everyone else gets to walk around without all these thoughts about being wrong, not afraid that one wrong gesture or glance would put their whole career in the bin.

It was easier before, but as much as he wants to blame Oscar for forcing him to start confronting things, he’s not the reason Lando hasn’t been able to bend himself into the right shape this year. He’s not sure what the change was, but something in him had gotten so fed up with it all that he started getting sick whenever he tried. He pictures any of the things he used to be able to make himself do and is overcome with a wave of nausea so powerful he collapses into the cushions to ride it out.

Still though, as awful as it made it feel, he mourns that he can’t hide like that anymore. No one would make accusations about the guy who’s with a different woman every other week, but they would about the guy openly mooning after his teammate. He doesn’t want to lose his friendship with Oscar—it’s sometimes the only thing keeping him sane—but getting caught would be…

He doesn’t want to get caught.

He only manages to catch a few hours of sleep that night, but Max doesn’t get up until noon the next day. He stumbles out of the guest room to go chug water directly from the sink and then slumps against the counter to nurse his head. Lando wonders how Oscar is, if he’s awake or feeling sick. His fingers itch to text him, but he resists.

They order breakfast to be delivered. Lando makes sure to make something Jon-approved and is distinctly envious of Max’s own choice.

Max is never great company when hungover, so Lando escapes for a couple hours afterwards to go work out. Max is in remarkedly better spirits when he gets back, sprawled out on the couch with a game controller in hand. He tosses the other at Lando once he’s showered, and it’s easy in the way things are usually easy when it’s just the two of them. Lando keeps expecting him to call him out on the way he acted last night, but the closest he comes is remarking on how he’s “surprised Piastri deigned to get on their level for a night.”

The comment rubs him the wrong way. It wouldn’t have a year ago—Max and Lando can be a bit dickish when they’re alone together, and Lando likes it that way, that he doesn’t have to watch what he says around Max—but it leaves a bad taste in his mouth now, and he gets an irrational urge to defend Oscar.

“Watch it. Oscar’s not so bad.”

“Didn’t say he was. I like the guy,” Max says, not looking away from the game. “It was a little odd though, don’t you think?”

“What was?”

“I dunno, all the touching. Like, I know you do that, but I didn’t peg him for the type.”

“He could barely sit upright. I was just making sure he didn’t drown himself,” Lando says, trying not to sound defensive even as his pulse starts to race at the memory of of how it felt to have the weight of Oscar’s head lolling on his shoulder, the edges of his hair brushing Lando’s bare skin.

“No, I know.”

“And he’s not used to drinking that much. He couldn’t think straight.”

“I get it. I just didn’t realize you guys had gotten that close.”

He forces his muscles to relax. “I guess we’ve spent a lot of time together this year. Lot of pressure, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, but that usually has the opposite effect.” Max finally hits pause on the game. “Is everything really sunshine and daisies with you two? I’m not gonna lie, I kind of thought it was an act.”

It’s almost funny how wrong he is. “Not an act. He’s a good guy.”

“I’m glad,” Max says, unexpectedly serious. “I know how badly things like that get to you. I’d kick his ass if he were being a dick, but it’s good to know I don’t have to.”

Lando softens. Max is the one person in his life who’s always on his side, even when he’s been objectively in the wrong. This whole thing with Oscar must have Lando feeling extra sappy because he suddenly wants to lean into Max’s side. He imagines telling Max, wonders if Max would say something similar if Lando were ever actually in a relationship with a guy.

Then Max opens his mouth again. “You should be careful though.”

“About what?”

“Getting all touchy like that with another bloke. People might get the wrong idea.”

He laughs nervously. “What are you on about? It’s just Oscar.”

“I know, I know, but you don’t want any weird rumors flying around.” He smirks. “Like that you take it up the bum or something.”

His shoulders curl. Max said it so casually, probably with no clue how derogatory it came across, how gross it makes Lando feel. He knows he isn’t really a bigot, that he’d never say something like that if he knew, but his thoughts of telling Max get squashed. He tucks the secret back in close to his chest and gives him a shove. “You must be on something, mate.”

He shoves him back. “I’m just looking out for you.”

“Look out for me a little less, why don’tcha?”

Max grins. “Never.”

He means it, too, which is both the best and worst part. Lando feels so incredibly guilty for not being able to tell him, but his nagging fear that everything would change once he gets the words out keeps him quiet.

——

In Canada, things start going to shit on Friday. Lando ends up in seventh during FP1, and Oscar is all the way down in fourteenth. Things go a bit better in FP2, but Oscar is still in P6.

With Oscar twenty-two points ahead of him in the championship, he doesn’t have the luxury to be upset for him. Oscar’s talking with his engineers now, feet placed perfectly shoulder-width apart. He never looks more confident than in moments like these—fireproofs on like armor and a cap pulled low over his helmet-mussed hair—but Lando sees his chinks like they’re his own. He knows Oscar likes to use the press of his crossed arms against each other to ground himself when he’s stressed.

Neither of them are strangers to being satisfied when the other stumbles this year. It doesn’t matter if they beat anyone else, they already have. They just need to beat each other.

He shifts, and Lando tracks it like he’s smelling blood. He takes in the lax planes of his face—too calm to be for anything but show, and completely lacking the easy smile he wears more often than not these days.

Lando frowns. He might want Oscar to do badly, but he doesn’t want him to be upset about it. Which doesn’t make any sense.

He wouldn’t have cared before, it’s just the game they place. One’s win is one’s loss, and they both know it, no hard feelings. Wanting each other to fail is normal, expected even, between competitors.

What’s not normal is Lando’s desire to go comfort him. They don’t do that, not about racing. Not since they switched from fighting to get in the points to fighting for podiums to fighting for wins. Whatever friendship they have doesn’t cross over to what happens on track, and Lando knows for sure that Oscar (with his psychologically-concerning obsession) doesn’t feel this way when it’s the other way around. Maybe this is just further proof that he doesn’t have the right mentality.

Oscar finally notices him watching and holds his gaze. He wonders if he has his own tells Oscar has picked up on without him noticing, if Oscar can read him just as well as he can read Oscar. He couldn’t do this kind of silent communication with Carlos or Daniel, but there was rarely a still moment with them around. Oscar knows how to be quiet, how to observe, how to calm Lando’s constantly racing thoughts with a glance.

He’s suddenly too aware of himself. Are his eyes always open this wide? Is his mouth always this slack?

Oscar looks away, and he’s left off-balance for absolutely no reason. This is ridiculous. He’s certifiably insane.

He forces himself to listen to what his own engineers are discussing, and does not spend any more time thinking about how Oscar’s mouth is pressed into a flat line, and how his fingers still curl harshly into his biceps. It shouldn’t matter to him what Oscar feels about his performance in free practices of all things.

When it’s time to pack it in and head back to the hotel, they file into the backseat together. The mean, reckless part of him wants to needle Oscar about his poor performance. The kinder, empathetic part of him wants to ask about it just as badly, but Oscar stares out the window the whole drive, barely acknowledging Lando’s attempts to talk. Somehow, that’s the biggest red flag of them all; Oscar never ignores him. He’s used to having his full attention.

Oscar climbs out of the car with barely a wave, and it’s so out of character that he has to wonder if this is a prank, like McLaren PR is about to jump out and reveal they were filming the whole time.

Lando moves robotically as he finds his way to his room and into the shower. The water that drums into his skin is hot enough to suffocate, but it helps him get his head on straight. Why is he so thrown off that Oscar was acting mildly distant at worst? Or is it just the fact that Oscar is upset? Or is it just that Lando’s having a hard time peeling his eyes and thoughts away from him?

Usually when he can’t convince himself to stop overthinking things, he goes and bothers Oscar, but that doesn’t seem helpful here. It almost feels like a betrayal, but Oscar hasn’t done anything wrong, it’s just Lando’s never-ending mess of emotions getting in his own way again.

He finishes up and throws on a set of lounge clothes, too wired to go to sleep, but too tired to do much of anything. He ends up flopped on the bed, mindlessly scrolling through all the missed messages he has no intention of answering. It’s not all that effective of a distraction, but there’s a livewire under his skin preventing him from focusing on anything else.

It’s a couple hours of mindlessly-opening-and-closing-apps-on-his-phone later that he stops batting away thoughts of him. Oscar was upset, so really it would be the correct thing for Lando to go check on him. Not because Lando wants to see him, but because Oscar could use the companionship. Oscar does the same thing for him all the time—well, in his driver’s room. He’s good at it too, somehow having managed to memorize all of Lando’s favorite things without being told. He even started keeping Kinder chocolate in his bag—something he’d done as a gag at first and never stopped because of how delighted Lando was.

He puts in a room service request for two hot chocolates. He doesn’t think too hard about it (and what their trainers don’t know can’t hurt them), just waits for it to arrive. Perks of being a driver: hotels always double-time his orders. He accepts the drink with thanks when they arrive and heads back inside just long enough to slip on a pair of shoes and grab his phone and wallet. Then he’s out the door and wandering down the hall to Oscar’s.

There’s no reason to be nervous. He’s shown up unannounced before, and Oscar’s never had a problem with it before. Still, he has the ridiculous urge to go back and check his hair in the mirror to make sure it looks okay. It’s so stupid; he’s never cared about Oscar’s opinion on things like that.

Determined not to linger on that, he kicks Oscar’s door so he doesn’t have to jostle the cups around.

It only takes a few moments before Oscar is opening the door and frowning at him. “Need something?”

Okay, not the greeting he’s used to. “Yeah, uh… Here.” He shoves a cup into Oscar’s hand. Over his shoulder, he can see a laptop open on the bed, paused in the middle of what looks like George’s onboards. “What are you doing?”

Oscar shrugs. “Studying.” His hair, stiff with dried sweat, sticks up at odd angles, and his fingers clench the cardboard cup harshly enough to dimple it. The tension lines carved into his face are even more damning.

“Mind if I come in?” Lando asks carefully.

He makes a noncommittal noise and turns to stalk back into the room. Lando takes that as permission to follow, shutting the door behind them. Oscar stands in the middle of the room, muscles coiled like a spring about to go off.

Lando takes a pointed sip, causing Oscar to frown at the drink in his own hand like he’s unsure how it got there. “Okay, what’s up with you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Come on, Osc.”

“Nothing’s wrong,” he assures, badly. “I’m just a little stressed.”

Lando moves closer. “I’ve seen you stressed before, Oscar.”

“Then—I don’t know, Lando.” He turns his head to the side. It puts Lando at eye level with one of the moles on his neck. “It’s an off day, the car doesn’t feel right, I’m distracted. Take your pick.”

“Don’t do that.”

“Don’t do what?” Oscar asks, sighing when all Lando does is raise his eyebrows. “Look, I’m fine. You can go.”

“Do you actually want me to?”

Oscar doesn’t respond, but his jaw clenches, and Lando can’t help but stare. It’s unfairly attractive.

He grabs Oscar’s arm before he can do something crazy like turn Oscar’s face to make him look at him. It accomplishes the same thing anyway as Oscar’s eyes snap to his when he makes contact. Oscar doesn’t move away though, just waits with a helpless look on his face. Lando thinks he’s always had a hard time letting people get close—maybe a consequence of being alone at boarding school, maybe just who he is as a person—but he never really fights Lando on it either. He lets Lando push.

He makes a decision. “Go shower. I’ll wait.”

Oscar’s shoulders slump like he’s relieved. Like he doesn’t want Lando to leave despite his prickliness. “I’m busy,” he says, but he moves easily when Lando shoves him into the bathroom.

“Wait here.” Lando goes to rifle through Oscar’s luggage for a set of sleep clothes, quickly returning to shove them into Oscar’s arms. “Go take care of that greasy mop on your head.”

Oscar stands there holding them.

“C’mon, mate, I’m not going to take your clothes off for you.”

Oscar’s face lights up bright red (as expected), and he immediately turns around, grabbing the collar of his shirt and yanking it over his head. It exposes the long line of his back.

Lando makes sure to keep his breathing even. This isn’t the first time he’s seen Oscar shirtless. He walks out of the bathroom at a completely reasonable pace.

The laptop still sits open on the bed. Curiosity wins over, and he grabs it to take a look. He was right that it’s showing George’s onboard from earlier, but there’s another tab open too. He clicks on it and sees his own FP2 feed, paused halfway through.

Of course Oscar studies his laps—he studies Oscar’s too—but that doesn’t stop him from preening. He likes that it’s the two of them fighting for it, that they’re so tied up with each other this year that it’s impossible to think of one without thinking of the other. That their names might still be said in the same breath ten years from now if they can survive this season.

He doesn’t like the idea that they might not, wishes they could spend forever caught in the middle of the season. Right now it’s Schrödinger's championship, and he doesn’t want to open the box.

He puts the laptop back how he found it, choosing to flop back on the bed and wait for Oscar to emerge.

When he does, he stands over Lando, giving him a devastating view of the water dripping down his neck.

“Feel better?”

Oscar nods.

“Cool. Wanna finish your homework together?”

“You’re not going to ask any more questions?”

“Do you want me to?”

“Not really.”

“Then no. We can just watch together instead.”

“Okay. That’s—that’d be fine.”

“Great.” Lando grins at him. (Too widely. He feels dopey.)

Oscar sits down, back against the pillows, and Lando thinks go big or go home and crawls to sit next to him, pressed shoulder to shoulder. He’s touchy with his friends, and he’s not nearly as worried about scaring Oscar away anymore.

Oscar tenses at first before relaxing, always willing to let Lando make room for himself—in his apartment, his bed, his space, his life. They balance the laptop between them, hot chocolates in hand.

——

Qualifying goes better for Oscar (P3) and worse for Lando (P7). Neither of them are happy with that, but P7 in the MCL39 is especially unforgivable.

Oscar finds him in his driver’s room afterwards and stands awkwardly in the doorway, never as comfortable inviting himself into Lando’s space as Lando is inviting himself into Oscar’s. It’s almost a surprise; Oscar was back to being distant the whole day, and he’s not quite sure why.

Lando groans. “Just come in already.”

He shuts the door and rests his hands on his hips. Lando has already been having a hard enough time around Oscar in his dorky team polos, the black fireproofs aren’t fair. “Pull it together, mate,” he says.

Lando stiffens, irrationally afraid Oscar heard what he was thinking, but then he realizes Oscar’s probably referring to the way Lando is sprawled out on the ground in defeat. “Well if you’re going to be mean about it—”

“I’m not being mean.”

“Yes, you are!” he argues even though he really doesn’t expect Oscar to have sympathy for his poor results. It’s smarter than whatever the hell Lando was doing Friday.

“Fine.” Oscar gently kicks his side with a grin. “Now I’m being mean.”

Lando curls around the spot like he’s been shot, sending Oscar a glare. “I’m going to report you for teammate abuse.”

“You do that.”

“I’m serious.”

“Well, you’d have to stop sulking on the floor to do that, so I think I’m in the clear.”

“How come you’re allowed to be upset by a bad result but I’m not?”

“To be fair, you didn’t really let me be upset either.” He tilts his head. “But we’re different people. Losing makes me hungry.”

Lando huffs. “Doesn’t it for everyone?”

“Maybe. But you’re faster when you’re not.” Oscar sits down next to him, dramatically flipping the top of his race suit behind him like he always does when it’s undone to his hips. “Seriously, mate. We both know you’re good enough to turn a P7 around,” he says like there’s not a doubt in his mind. “You just need to get out of your own head. Stop doubting yourself. You’re a good driver.”

Lando doesn’t know what to do with that. A hundred honest words sit on his tongue, all the way from ‘you’re good too’ to ‘why are you saying this to me?’ to ‘thank you,’ but everything that comes to mind is too vulnerable or too sweet, and they stick in his mouth like honey.

He clears his throat. “Better than you?”

Oscar smiles, sharp in a way he would never let other people see. Just Lando. “Guess we’ll see.”

——

Lando starts the Canadian GP on hard tires, prays there isn’t an early safety car, and prepares himself for a long, grueling climb to the front.

On the slower tires, it takes him eleven laps to overtake Fernando, but it pays off when he’s able to overcut Lewis on Lap 29 without having to fight. He comes out of the pits in fifth place, six and a half seconds behind Oscar, with fresher tires and 41 laps to go.

It’s good. He’s confident.

And then he spends 37 laps behind Oscar, who can’t seem to overtake to get back into third. That’s a lot of time to think. He gets within a second on Lap 58, and stays that way for eight laps straight. He’s faster, but the pit wall doesn’t mention switching the cars, and neither does he.

There’s something psychological about staring at the back of the same car for so long. Oscar was right to call it hunger because his thinking gets more frenzied the longer he chases his tail, like a dog salivating after a rabbit. He wants it, badly, and spends those eight laps entertaining a fantasy where he glides past Oscar, makes quick work of Kimi, and turns an awful race into a podium.

He dives for it on Lap 66, overtakes Oscar into the hairpin, and runs too wide on the way out to maintain it. They’re side by side down the straight, perfectly in sync. His blood pounds loud in his ears. He wonders if Oscar feels as crazed as he does. He wonders if you could even tell them apart from a distance.

Oscar breaks late on the next corner, and Lando finds himself staring at his rear wing again.

There’s no real thought behind his next move, just instinct and a desire to catch.

He goes for the gap between Oscar and the wall. It’s not big enough, and Oscar doesn’t make space for him for once, not when it’s about racing. He hits Oscar, slams into the wall, and skids off into the grass.

Sitting there, all he can think about is what Oscar said. They’re different people. Hunger makes Oscar fast. It makes Lando sloppy.

He’s motionless until Will is in his ear, asking if he’s alright. He can already imagine what people are going to say, how they’re going to pick him apart for this and every word he says from here on out.

“I’m sorry. It’s all my fault. Sorry,” he says, voice cracking. “That was stupid of me.” So stupid. There were only four laps to go. He’s grateful for his helmet because, for all that people will replay his radio message, they won’t get to see the expression on his face.

He climbs out and replaces the steering wheel with shaking hands. He’s grateful for the gloves too.

Everything is a blur as he makes his way back to the garage, slipping past everyone to his driver’s room. Four laps isn’t a lot of time, but it’s long enough that they’re letting him change out of his race suit before media duties. He practically throws it off, letting everything land crumpled in the corner before shoving himself into team kit. His movements are sharp and jerky,  but he refuses to slow down. If he allows himself time to think about it now, the cameras will see him red-eyed.

He won’t give them that. Not if he can help it.

Lando gets to the media pen before any of the other drivers. The reporters light up at the sight of him, and he lets someone from PR direct him to the first microphone. He keeps his back straight, making sure to say all the right things. I’m sorry, it shouldn’t have happened, it’s my fault, he repeats on loop. It’s all true, but he finds himself worrying that his apologies aren’t good enough, that someone on the internet is going to replay some benign clip and find fault with the way he says them.

It wouldn’t be the first time, he thinks. He shoves down the panic, squeezes his eyes shut for a long moment, then goes back to answering the same question over and over again.

He notices the exact moment Oscar enters the pen. Oscar doesn’t look upset, but he also doesn’t look like much of anything, that same blank look from Friday firmly back in place.

Lando moves to clasp his hand on autopilot. Everything is so mixed up in his head that he can’t tell if he’s doing it as a real apology or because he wants the cameras to see him apologizing. “I’m sorry,” he says, but it comes out distant, like someone else is speaking from his mouth.

“No, it’s fine.” Oscar smiles, but his eyes are distant too, and Lando can’t tell if Oscar is also just playing pretend for the cameras. “I mean, I ended up alright.”

He turns away, and Lando has to go back to his own reporter, shaking his head to try to clear the fog that’s taking over. His thoughts are coming out too slowly, and he can’t remember half of what he says, but the PR woman doesn’t give him any scathing looks, so he must do okay.

He got there first, so he finishes first, but he doesn’t head back to the team right away. He waits for Oscar, hoping to apologize again as they walk back together. Again, everything is so jumbled that he doesn’t know if it’s because he genuinely wants to apologize, or if he just wants to be able to tell the team that they’ve already made up before anyone has a chance to yell at him.

Oscar falls in step with him, but he’s still not looking at Lando, not really. Or maybe he’s being normal and it’s just Lando’s mind playing tricks on him.

“I mean it. I’m sorry.”

“Like I said, it’s fine. Really.”

Lando hates talking to Oscar when he’s like this, all of his real thoughts smoothed away beneath what he thinks he should be saying. He doesn’t like not knowing what Oscar is thinking. “It’d be fine if it wasn’t fine. I’d rather you tell me.”

“This is just how it goes sometimes, I know that,” he says, but the corners of his mouth are still slack, which is awful because normal Oscar is always smiley around Lando. “We can talk more later, yeah?”

“Yeah. Okay,” Lando agrees, still off-kilt.

“Good.” Oscar squeezes his shoulder, and Lando leans into it like it’s going to hold him up. That means more than anything Oscar said. Oscar doesn’t touch people he doesn’t like, so he must not hate him.

They return to the team side by side, just like they were on track. The only difference is that Lando doesn’t try fitting in Oscar’s space where he shouldn’t. Oscar speaks before Lando gets a chance to, reassuring Andrea and Zak that everything is okay, that they don’t hate each other, and other important things.

Lando barely hears any of it, nearly tipping with how dizzy he feels suddenly. He just stands there and nods along to whatever Oscar says.

Oscar looks at him, and he has the insane thought that he should make himself look a bit more pathetic so Oscar’s protectiveness kicks in and he hugs Lando. He doesn’t though, because he’s fine, and that’d be crazy, and he’s a grown man who can stand on his own feet.

They’ve got a gap before Austria, so the consensus is that they should give everything time to cool off and they’ll debrief back in Woking. All Lando takes from that is that he’s allowed to leave now.

They put Lando and Oscar in different cars, which is fine because they don’t always ride together, but it feels rather pointed on today of all days.

He showers, changes clothes, brushes his teeth, then gently lowers himself into bed. It reminds him of how his grandparents move with their brittle bones, too fragile to do something as rough as collapsing, no matter how much he might want to. He curls up on his side, trying to ignore the siren call of his phone and the godforsaken social media that he redownloaded. He made a mistake, but he owned up to it, and everything is fine now. He just needs to sleep it off and let everyone forget about it in a month or two.

The positive reframing doesn’t work. Everyone might have smiled to his face after the race, but he’s sure they’re all thinking shit about him right now.

His breath hitches, over and over again until he’s lying there gasping pathetically. He tangles his hand in the front of his shirt as if he can make his breathing come easier by pressing hard enough. His fingers dig into the flesh there until it’s all he can focus on, right above his heart.

He wishes, not for the first time, that he had more control over his emotions. He can’t imagine a lot of world champions shaking helplessly over an incident as minor as that. This is just a Lando Norris special.

Tears burn at his eyes, and he curls in tighter, shoving his face into a pillow to soak them up.

He wants—a hug. From his mom or Max or someone. He does the math in his head, and it’s late back home. Either of them would pick up, he knows, but he doesn’t think he could handle feeling like a burden to them right now.

Or maybe they’ve already called him and he’s being a bad son and friend by not turning his phone on to check. Either way, he lies there paralyzed, unable to bring himself to move and unable to fall asleep. The tears do eventually stop, simply because there’s a limit to how long he can cry before he goes numb.

When the knock comes, it’s so quiet that he’s not sure if he actually heard it or not. Then it comes again, and he forces his limbs to cooperate in standing. He doesn’t allow himself to  guess who it is.

He stumbles to the door, undoing the chain and pulling it open.

It’s Oscar. Of course it is.

That blank expression cracks the moment he gets a good look at Lando. He doesn’t try to figure out which sad aspect of his appearance did it, he’s too busy being thankful that Oscar finally looks right.

“I’m sorry,” he says again, partially because he’s not sure Oscar actually heard him before and partially because he wants to say it at least once with no ulterior motive.

“Lando, I told you it was okay,” Oscar says frantically, staring at him like he can’t figure out why Lando’s tearing up.

“Tell me again.”

“It’s—” He pauses to fully step into the room and shut the door. “It’s okay, Lando. Everything’s okay.”

This was what he was missing: Oscar’s big doe eyes and his soft, Lando-voice.

“Yeah. I believe you this time.”

“Okay. Cool.” Oscar’s arms are straight down by his sides like he has no idea what to do with them. “I was, um… I guess I was worried when you didn’t—I mean, I kind of expected you to, y’know…”

“I don’t know what you’re saying, Osc.”

“I thought you were going to come to my room. Like you always do,” he says awkwardly.

Lando stills, not sure what to make of the fact that Oscar expected him to come, and that he came to Lando’s for the first time ever when Lando didn’t show up.

He moves closer, just to test the waters. Oscar’s hands twitch, but he doesn’t flinch away, so Lando slots himself forward into a proper hug. It only takes Oscar a moment to get on board, and then he’s wrapping himself around Lando. He likes how Oscar hugs as if he’s trying to cover as much of Lando as he can.

He breathes in the smell of Oscar’s body wash and dumb chocolate-scented deodorant. “I didn’t think you wanted me to.”

“What? Of course I did. You always do after races.”

“Yeah, but this one was different.”

Oscar doesn’t try to deny it. “Maybe. But that was the race, and now it’s over.”

“It’s not over though.”

“What do you mean?”

“The things people say. It won’t stop.”

“Who cares? Will, Andrea, Zak, your engineers; no one else’s opinion matters.”

Lando pulls back, fisting his hands in his hair. “And they’re probably all thinking about how I bottled it right now. That was such a fuck up.”

“Did they tell you that?”

“No, but they wouldn’t. They know it’d only make me worse.”

“So you’re saying they won’t tell you the truth because it’d mess you up?”

A shrug is his only response.

“Okay. Do you think I’d lie to you?” Oscar asks with dark, intense eyes. “What would be the reason?”

He runs a hand over his face. “God, I don’t know, Osc. Because you’re a decent friend?”

“Not that decent.” Oscar crosses his arms. “Look, you’re right. This weekend sucked all around, and you had no business going for that move. But sometimes that’s how it goes, we all knew we were going to make contact eventually, and anyone who actually matters can see exactly how much you’ve given the team this year. One fuck up isn’t enough to make you stop being their golden boy.”

“Why did you think I was going to come to your room?” Lando asks so he doesn’t have to agree or disagree.

He frowns. “I told you. You always do after races.”

“And I told you that this one was different.”

“Lando—”

“Not because of me. Because of you. You’ve been so weird all weekend, and you could barely look at me today.”

“Like I said, the race is over now.”

“What does that mean, Oscar?”

He shifts uncomfortably. “I don’t know. It’s just distracting.”

“What is?” Lando presses. Oscar’s quiet for too long, and he realizes. “I’m distracting?”

“Not you specifically. I just… I don’t want to talk about this.”

Too often Lando finds himself wanting to pick at Oscar’s edges like a scab. He wishes Oscar could just come out and say when things are wrong. “Then just… Help me understand. I can’t read your head.”

“You don’t have to understand.” Oscar sighs at Lando’s pointed look. “Does any of this matter? I’ll go if you don’t want me here.” He moves to leave, and Lando’s hand shoots out to grab his wrist.

“Stop running.”

“I’m not running.”

“You are.”

Oscar groans. “You ask me about my feelings too much. No one’s asked about my feelings in my life as much as you do.”

Yeah, and Lando has some thoughts on that. “Maybe they should have.”

“I’m fine.” His forearms press into each other so hard the tension makes them shake almost imperceptibly.

He moves without thinking, reaching up to pull Oscar’s head down into his shoulder. Oscar stays there, hunched without reciprocating, but he lets Lando do what he wants, arms still crossed between them.

He’s not sure if anyone’s ever hugged Oscar as much as he does either. He sometimes reminds Lando of a stray cat he’s trying to lure in.

“I don’t need all of this. I’m fine without it.”

“Okay. You’re fine,” Lando agrees softly.

“I don’t need it.”

He’s never sure what to make of it when Oscar gets vague like this, as if Lando has any idea what’s going through his head. “Sure.”

“Don’t placate me.”

“Wow, there’s really no winning with you.”

“I brought you something.”

“Yeah?” he asks, amused.

Oscar leans back to reach into his pocket and pull out one of those Kinder chocolates he takes all over the world for Lando. “Thought you might need it. I know media gets you all… Y’know.”

“Yeah. It was a lot.”

Oscar fumbles with the wrapper, tearing it open for him. “You were kind of pale and shaky.”

“I guess so,” he says, fiddling with the chocolate handed to him. It’s slightly smushed, but he doesn’t mind.

“You look better now.”

Yeah, Oscar has that effect on him. “You’re really not upset with me?”

He snorts, and Lando knows he’s thinking about how a DNF for Lando only helps him, but he’s too polite to say it. “Not even a bit.”

“And you like when I show up at your room without asking?”

“Yeah, it’s… Nice. I can’t overthink it when you just decide things on your own.”

“Gee, Osc, that makes it sound like I order you around all the time.”

Oscar smiles. “Don’t you?”

Lando can’t even argue with that. Maybe he’s been using the fact that Oscar can’t say no to him to his advantage a bit. Then he remembers his recent revelations about Oscar, and pairs that with this, and feels hot under the collar. He shoves the thought aside. “Only benevolently.”

“Sure.”

The conversation peters out, and Lando can feel the next step coming before it happens. It’s late, and there’s an early flight, and Oscar is going to go back to his own room. He’s struck with memories of Spain, the last time he was overwhelmed by the amount of people watching and nitpicking his every breath. The way the shadows turned sinister and his brain tried convincing him someone was still watching even with the door shut and locked.

He really doesn’t want to be left alone again.

“Stay,” Lando says. He doesn’t ask.

“What?”

“Stay. Here.” He waves a pathetic hand towards the bed.

“Why?”

“It’d be nice to… I mean, sometimes on days like this, I just need… Y’know. Someone.”

“Someone to what?”

“I don’t fucking know, Osc, to check under the bed for monsters or something. Are you staying or not?”

“Well, how can I refuse a request like that?”

“You can’t.”

Oscar huffs a laugh, pushing past him. He already knows which side of the bed Lando likes. “Tyrant.”

Lando grins after him, completely enamored. He’s careful to slide in right on the edge of the bed, leaving as much room as possible between them. It’s not the first time they shared a bed, but it is the first time since he realized Oscar is, well… Attractive. They’ve got a good thing going this season, he refuses to let all of that messiness ruin things.

He suddenly feels cold. Oscar makes it too easy to forget about everything that’s going wrong. The lights turn out, and all he’s left with are his thoughts crashing back down—the weight of the DNF, and the expectations, and all the people he’s letting down. It’s suffocating.

He hears Oscar sigh. “Come here.”

Lando freezes. “What?”

“I can hear you thinking. Just come here.”

He’s embarrassed by how quickly he moves, scooting until they’re slotted parallely.

Oscar lays a stiff arm over him.

This isn’t something they do. He can picture what Oscar must look like, the way he bluescreens when touch is too much or unexpected. He tries anyway though, has always been like that: too willing to make himself uncomfortable if he thinks that’s what people want from him.

Lando doesn’t have the heart to fight it because, well, he does want it. He wants someone nearby to keep him from spiraling. He wants someone to ground him, and no one’s ever been able to do that as well as Oscar.

“Thank you,” he breathes, never able to say it enough. He doesn’t wiggle closer like he might with his other friends, too afraid of overwhelming him. And somehow, that one oddly-placed arm means more anyway.

“Better?”

“Yeah. For now.”

“I’ll take it.”