2026 // 2020
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Discoholic 🪩

pixel skylines
Cosmic Funnies
cherry valley forever
Misplaced Lens Cap
hello vonnie

if i look back, i am lost

roma★
trying on a metaphor
i don't do bad sauce passes
Three Goblin Art

blake kathryn
taylor price
AnasAbdin
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
ojovivo
YOU ARE THE REASON
Game of Thrones Daily
Keni
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@papayabee04
2026 // 2020
Bet.
Summary: Your usual cosy F1 stream turns into absolute chaos when a certain McLaren driver joins your chat… and decides to stay.
Warnings: flirting, mild suggestiveness, chaotic twitch chat, second-hand embarrassment, sort of nsfw, I’d say maybe 16+?? nothing graphic, if I’ve forgotten anything please let me know
Word count: 1.4k ✨
A/N: I promise you, I got the idea for this fic bc I said the same thing. I’m doing a career mode on f1 25 with lando as my teammate (sorry osc) and I was leading for my first win, lando was p2 and george was p3 and lando was quite literally breathing down my neck, and I was concentrating so much that I just said “if you let me win, I’ll get on my knees mate”.. luckily I was on my own in my living room. Sadly, I wasn’t streaming and lando didn’t didn’t appear in my chat or my insta dms but a girl can dream. Enjoy babies 🩷
A/N2: WE ALSO HIT 400 FOLLOWERS GUYS!! I CANT explain how happy it makes me to have all you here and have you reading my fics. Thank you all so much 🌸🩷
Masterlist
Your room always felt like your own little world. Magnolia walls, soft and warm under the glow of fairy lights that framed your shelves and desk, with pink accents dotted everywhere, your bedding slightly crumpled behind you, your fluffy chair, even the fake plants you’d bought purely because they “matched the vibe.” Everything about it was calm. Comforting. Which was ironic… considering what your streams usually turned into.
“Alright chat,” you said, settling further into your chair and tugging the sleeves of your oversized McLaren hoodie over your hands. The bold Norris 4 on the back had faded slightly from how often you wore it. “We’re loading into quali, yeah? Be nice to me today, please.”
Chat immediately disagreed.
chat:
user1: no
user2: we’re never nice
user3: BIN IT FIRST LAP
user4: P4 MERCHANT INCOMING
user5: HI Y/NNNN
user6: YOU LOOK SO CUTE TODAY
You snorted softly, adjusting your headset. “Thank you to the one nice person in there,” you laughed. “The rest of you, mods ban them.” You flexed your fingers around the wheel as the session loaded, settling into position. This was your favourite part of the day, streaming, racing, chat yelling at you for missing apexes like they were all secretly F1 engineers.
“Okay,” you murmured, leaning forward slightly. “Focus mode. No distractions.”
Across Europe, in Monaco, Lando leaned back in his chair, headset slightly askew as he stared at his screen. “Where’s Max gone?” he muttered. They’d just finished a game of CS, and Max had disappeared with a quick “two minutes” that definitely meant longer.
Lando grabbed his phone, unlocking it lazily and opening Twitch. Scroll. Scroll—
Pause.
“…what’s this?”
Your stream thumbnail caught his eye immediately, McLaren hoodie, wheel setup, soft pink room. The title read: “CAREER MODE CHAOS – PLEASE LET ME WIN FOR ONCE 😭”. He clicked before he could think too hard about it.
Back in London, you were mid-lap, completely locked in. “Okay, that was a decent sector,” you said, nodding slightly. “We’re improving, we’re improving, don’t speak too soon.”
Chat was flying.
chat:
user7: purple sector incoming
user8: invalid lap in 3…2…1…
user9: don’t curse it!!!
user10: Y/N LOCK IN
user11: she’s cooking???
You bit your lip, turning into the final corners. “Please don’t invalidate,” you whispered, almost like the game could hear you. You crossed the line, improvement.
“YES, okay!” you grinned. “P1 for now, I’ll take that.” Leaning back slightly, you exhaled, glancing at the timing screen.
P1 — You
P2 — Lando Norris
P3 — George Russell
You narrowed your eyes. “Why is he always there?” you muttered. “Like, go away. Respectfully.”
In Monaco, Lando blinked, then leaned forward slightly. “…hang on.” His eyes flicked between your screen, the leaderboard, and chat, a slow grin forming as he realised what he’d stumbled into.
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
“You’re not overtaking me,” you said, pointing at the screen as if Lando could hear you. “I refuse. This is my win.”
Chat immediately started stirring.
chat:
user12: HE’S COMING FOR YOU
user13: LANDO P2 -> P1 INCOMING
user14: TEAM ORDERS??
user15: PLEASE LET HER WIN
user16: Y/N VS LANDO ARC
You laughed, shaking your head. “Honestly? If he doesn’t overtake me, if he actually lets me win—” you paused, a mischievous smile creeping in as chat began to anticipate the chaos.
chat:
user17: OH NO
mod1: DONT SAY IT
user18: SHE’S ABOUT TO—
mod2: Y/N STOP
You grinned anyway. “—I’ll literally get on my knees for him.”
In Monaco, Lando choked on absolutely nothing. “…what?” His eyes snapped to chat as it exploded, messages flying too fast to read. He stared at the screen for a second longer, then, without overthinking it, typed.
landonorris: bet.
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
“You’re not overtaking me, Norris.” you said, pointing at the screen as if Lando could hear you. “I refuse. This is my win.”
Chat was beyond saving.
chat:
mod1: READ CHAT
user19: Y/N LOOK AT CHAT RIGHT NOW
user20: MODS PIN IT PIN IT PIN IT
mod2: OH MY GOD THIS IS NOT REAL
user21: LANDO?????
Your mods scrambled, pinning the message as everything spiralled. But you were locked in.
“Stay in P2,” you said firmly, like you were giving real team orders. “That’s a great position for you. You look good there. Don’t let George through though, be useful.” You laughed at yourself. “Team player, yeah?”
In Monaco, Lando leaned back, watching. Still waiting for Max, he didn’t leave. Didn’t say anything else. Just stayed, reading chat, watching you argue with AI him like it was real. “…she’s actually funny,” he muttered.
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
Final lap. Your heart was racing.
“Okay, okay, chat.. this is it,” you said, leaning forward. “If I don’t mess this up, this is my first win.” Behind you, Lando was still P2, close. Too close.
“Don’t you dare,” you whispered. “Don’t you actually dare.”
Chat was unhinged.
chat:
user22: HE’S RIGHT THERE
user23: LANDO PLS BE A GENTLEMAN
user24: REMEMBER THE DEAL
user25: BET. BET. BET.
user26: IM SCREAMING
Final corner. He moved.
You gasped. “NO—NO—NO—” You held it. Barely. Across the line.
P1.
You threw your hands up instantly. “YESSSS! OH MY GOD, I DID IT!” You were glowing, spinning slightly in your chair, laughing.
On screen:
P2 — Lando Norris
P3 — George Russell
You shook your head in disbelief. “Well,” you said, breathless, “a deal’s a deal.” You reached for your phone dramatically. “Let me just DM him real quick—”
Chat absolutely lost its mind.
chat:
user27: STOP
mod1: DONT YOU DARE
user28: CHECK CHAT FIRST
mod2: Y/N PLEASE
user29: THIS IS INSANE
user30: HELLO?????
“…wait.” You frowned slightly, finally looking over properly. You scrolled. Paused. Read the pinned message. Read the username.
Everything stopped.
“…no way.”
Silence.
Then.. “Oh my—” Your hand flew to your mouth. “OH MY GOD.”
Your face went bright red instantly as you hid behind your sleeves. “You weren’t meant to see or hear that,” you mumbled. “I’m so sorry, oh my god, I’m actually so sorry.”
Chat was unreadable now, pure chaos.
Then—
landonorris: it’s fine 😭 that was funny
You groaned, dropping your head back. “I’m actually never speaking again,” you said weakly.
Another message popped up.
landonorris: check insta when you’re done streaming
You blinked. “…what?” Sitting up straighter, you shook your head quickly. “I.. no, I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean, like, I was just joking, I wasn’t actually—” You gestured helplessly, words failing.
He replied again.
landonorris: i’ve heard much worse, promise
You froze, then immediately got more flustered. “Oh my god, stop,” you laughed nervously. “That does not help.” You shook your head, trying to recover. “Nah I’m joking, I’m joking. Please don’t take me seriously chat, this is how I get into trouble.”
You kept streaming. Somehow. Barely.
Every time his username popped up, your brain short-circuited.
chat:
user31: she’s so flustered
user32: THIS IS EVERYTHING
mod1: LANDO IS STILL HERE BTW
user33: HI LANDO IF YOU SEE THIS
mod2: WE SHIP IT SORRY
mod3: Y/N BREATHE GIRL
At one point, you missed an entire braking zone. “Okay, that one wasn’t my fault,” you said immediately.
chat:
mod4: it literally was
user34: LANDO DISTRACTED HER
user35: HE CAUSED THIS
You covered your face briefly. “I hate all of you.”
Lando stayed the whole time. Quiet. Watching. Occasionally dropping something small, a “nice lap”, a “that corner was decent”, each one sending chat spiralling again, each one making you a little more flustered.
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
Three hours later, you slumped back slightly, stretching. “Alright chat,” you said, smiling tiredly. “I’m gonna head off, it’s literally half eleven for me right now and I need sleep.” You leaned closer to your mic. “Thank you for hanging out, thank you for—”
A message appeared at the top.
landonorris: don’t forget to check insta, goodnight 😉
You froze. “…yeah. I won’t forget.”
You ended stream almost immediately. The second your PC shut off, the room felt too quiet. Your heart was still racing.
“…there’s no way that just happened.”
You grabbed your phone. Notifications everywhere.
Then..
There it was.
lando started following you!
lando wants to send you a message!
Your stomach flipped. You tapped instantly.
The DM opened. You stared for a moment before reading.
lando:
so… about that deal
Your eyes widened.
Another message.
lando:
don’t worry, i’m not collecting on it
yet 😄
You let out a small, disbelieving laugh, heart racing all over again.
Another message.
lando:
but i will say… you drove well
even if you were threatening me the whole race
You smiled despite yourself.
Then..
lando:
guess i’ll just have to hold you to a rematch instead
Pause.
Typing…
Your breath caught slightly.
lando:
and maybe next time i won’t be so nice about staying in p2
You stared at your phone, cheeks warm.
Because somehow..
That felt like a challenge.
And maybe, you kind of wanted to accept.
this joke will always be funny
one thing i love about oscar is that he never gives up, even when on the back foot. all those races last year when he was starting from p5, he gave it his all despite knowing that the car wasn't set up how he liked or he couldn't match the pace. he still fought and fought. and in the race yesterday, he knew that beating the mercedes was probably going to be extremely difficult, if not unachievable and yet he still tried, he saw an opportunity and seized it. he never gives up even when things look impossible. and now i'm not saying some drivers on the grid have a defeatist mindset when they aren't sat inside a rocketship, but i'm also not, not saying that.
anyway. oscar's determination is so admirable, he comes back stronger every time and its so beautiful to watch.
Hi! Absolutely love your writing! I was wondering if you could write an unrequited love for Oscar. Real angsty in the beginning and if it could have a happy ending. I was just listening to Ariana Grande’s just a little bit of your heart and it got me in my feels and thought of this. If you wanted to listen to it for a bit of inspiration too it’s up to you. Thank you so much. 🫶🏼💕
The Architecture of a Safety Net - OP81
served with: oscar piastri x fem!reader chef's note: you stop settling for crumbs, and Oscar finally realizes that while he was out looking for fire, he was letting the hearth go cold. portion size: 5.6k
note: hello! sorry for the delay but here´s your request xx 😽🤍 and i don´t know what happened with the wc lol :)
Meeting Oscar wasn't a cinematic event. There were no slow-motion glances or sudden silences. It was just a Friday night at Sarah’s cramped apartment, a bowl of stale chips between you, and a debate about whether a hot dog is a sandwich.
He had this way of looking at you—not with intensity, but with a disarming curiosity. By the time the party started winding down, you realized you hadn’t spoken to anyone else for three hours. He was easy. He was like a song you’d known your whole life but were hearing for the first time.
OMG! BEAUTIFUL!
Mirrorball
Pairing: Lando Norris x Female reader Word count: 7.8k Summary: After a night that leaves you more hurt than Lando realizes, you begin to think the two of you cannot possibly work. Lando, meanwhile, is forced to face just how ignorant he’s been and whether he can become someone better for you. Tags: angst, fluff, autistic reader, offensive comments about autism, shitty friends... A/N: Hey there! Quick context: I'm a person with autism and something similar happened to me the other day with people who I thought were my 'friends'. Idk, I just needed to vent in some way. I'm still kinda sad about it, tbh. Anyways, I hope you enjoy this <3 (Also, autism is a spectrum, and every autistic person experiences it differently. So please remember this is just one perspective, not a universal representation.)
It had only been a few weeks. That was what made it so dangerous. If it had been longer, maybe you would have told him already. Maybe you would have known where the edges of him were, known which opinions were really his and which were just carelessness and noise and wanting to fit the room he was in.
But it had only been a few weeks, and everything still felt bright and new and a little unreal in the way new relationships did. Lando texting you as soon as he woke up. Lando pulling you into his side in public like it was already instinct. Lando looking at you across a room and smiling like he’d remembered something private.
It had made you hopeful. Hopeful enough, stupidly enough, that you had started thinking maybe when you did tell him, it would be okay. Maybe he’d be different.
So you’d waited. Not because you meant to hide it forever. Not because you were ashamed in some simple way, but because saying ‘autistic’ out loud always changed things. People heard the word and suddenly stopped seeing you and started sorting you into all the lazy little boxes they already had ready.
Too much. Too sensitive. Too difficult. Too “everyone’s got a bit of ‘tism.” Too not what they imagined. Too high-functioning to count. Too inconvenient to be easy.
You were tired just thinking about it. So you’d waited. Told yourself it was timing. That you wanted him to know you first, before the word got there and tried to reorganize your whole personhood around itself.
Tonight had started so well, too. Just drinks with friends. Low lights, loud laughter, too many glasses on the table already. The kind of night where everyone kept leaning over each other to tell stories and nobody minded being interrupted because the whole point was the noise of being together.
You were tucked beside Lando in the booth, your leg against his, his hand occasionally landing on your knee in those small, absent touches that always made your stomach flutter a little. He’d already leaned in twice to say things in your ear that could absolutely have waited, just because he liked being close.
You had been okay. A little tired from the noise. A little stretched around the edges. But okay.
Then the conversation drifted. Someone mentioned an old classmate. Someone else rolled their eyes and said, “Oh my God, she’s one of those people who blames literally every single thing on being autistic.”
A few people laughed. Your body went still. Not outwardly. You had years of practice for that. But inside, everything tightened.
One of the girls across from you took a sip of her drink and snorted. “No, seriously. I get it if someone’s autistic, but do they need to make such a massive deal out of everything?”
Someone else laughed harder. “That’s what I’m saying. Like babe, the lights aren’t attacking you.”
A guy at the end of the booth leaned in. “I knew one who’d be like, ‘I’m overstimulated,’ every time the music was too loud. Sorry, but that’s just called being annoying in a bar.”
That got a bigger laugh. You looked down at your glass. Under the table, your fingers had already started moving against your thigh, tapping tiny patterns into the fabric of your jeans.
One of the girls shook her head. “And the hyperfixation thing? That’s just having an unhealthy obsession.”
“Literally,” another said. “No one wants to hear a forty-minute explanation about one train line or one anime or one weird historical figure.”
Lando laughed softly at that. Not because he meant harm. That was almost the worst part. Just that easy social laugh. The kind people gave when the whole table was already going and it felt easier to slide along with it than think.
Then he said, “Yeah, but at least they really commit, to be fair.”
A few people laughed again. You felt the words hit your chest like a flicked pebble. Small. Still enough to hurt.
Someone else warmed to it. “No, because once they’re on a topic, you’re done for. It’s like getting cornered by a TED Talk you didn’t ask for.”
Lando grinned at that. “Like when someone traps you and you can physically see they lack the the ability to read the room.”
“Exactly!”
“Honestly,” one of the men added, “I think half the time they just use it as an excuse to be rude.”
That got immediate agreement.
“Or awkward.”
“Or controlling.”
“Or weird about everything.”
“Oh my God, the routines.”
That one made the whole table laugh.
One girl lifted her brows and said, “If someone tells me they can’t cope because we moved dinner thirty minutes later, I’m leaving them there.”
Someone else said, “No, literally. Imagine being held hostage by a schedule.”
“Or by food,” another chimed in. “I can’t with adults who act like they’re going to die because peas touched their potatoes.”
That one earned louder laughter.
Lando, already a little tipsy and very much in the flow of the table now, shook his head and said, “Yeah, that one’s a bit mad.”
There it was. Not cruel. Not sharp. Not meant to wound. Just careless. Thoughtless. A soft little agreement tossed out because everyone else was doing the same. And somehow that hurt more. Because if he had been openly awful, maybe you could have hated him cleanly. Maybe you could have gotten angry and known exactly where you stood.
But this was just ignorance. Just him following the room. Just him being one more person who had never had to think carefully about any of it, because none of it belonged to him.
You could feel your pulse in your throat now.
Someone across from you was still talking. “The stimming thing, too. Sorry, but if you’re a grown adult and you’re full-on flapping or rocking in public, what am I supposed to do with that?”
A guy near the end laughed. “Pretend it’s not happening, apparently.”
“Or everyone has to act like it’s cute and not deeply uncomfortable.”
One of the girls mimed a little rocking motion and did a babyish voice: “Sorry, I’m overwhelmed.”
The table broke into fresh laughter.
Lando let out another laugh and muttered, “That’s awful,” but he was still smiling when he said it, and there was no actual correction in it. No stop. No maybe don’t.
Someone else said, “And the scripting thing creeps me out. Like, what do you mean you practiced this conversation?”
“Right?” another said. “Just talk.”
Lando shook his head, amused. “That one is pretty wild.”
You stopped hearing the exact words after that. Not because they weren’t loud, but because your body had started to go strange and floaty in that familiar, horrible way. Everything too sharp and too far away at once. Glasses clinking too bright. Music pressing into your skin. The air too warm.
Under the table, your fingers were moving faster now, tapping, pressing, rubbing the side seam of your jeans so hard it almost hurt. You tucked one hand under your thigh to hide it.
The comments kept going.
“Some of them act like eye contact is oppression.”
“I knew one who’d tell people not to touch her unexpectedly. Like, babe, relax.”
“That would make me want to do it more.”
More laughter. You swallowed and stared at the condensation on your drink.
One of the girls was saying, “And they always want everyone else to rearrange the world around them. Like no, sorry, fluorescent lights are not a hate crime.”
Another voice cut in. “It’s the oversensitivity for me. Like every little thing is the end of the world.”
And then Lando, still in that same thoughtless, tipsy rhythm, said, “Yeah, I mean… at some point it does stop being a diagnosis and start being a personality trait.”
The table laughed. Someone clinked their glass against his.
Your stomach dropped so hard it made you feel briefly sick. Because there it was now. Not just laughter. Not just not stopping it. An actual opinion. Lightly said. Carelessly said. The kind of thing he might not even remember tomorrow.
You felt something in you go cold.
The room seemed to narrow. Not dramatically. Just enough that you knew you were getting close to the point where if you stayed, you would cry. And you could not, absolutely could not, cry here. Not in front of all of them. Not in front of him. Not while they were still half-laughing over traits you had spent your whole life trying to file down into something easier to live beside.
So you waited for the first pause that looked survivable, then touched Lando’s arm. He turned immediately, warm and easy and completely unaware of what he had just done to you.
“You okay?” he asked.
You nodded too fast. “Yeah. I just… I think I’m feeling a bit sick.”
Concern crossed his face at once. Real concern.
“What? Sick how?”
You forced yourself to sound level. “Bit dizzy. I don’t know.”
His hand moved to your knee. “Do you want me to take you home?”
And there it was again, the sweetness. The care. The reason this hurt so badly. Because he wasn’t a bad person. He wasn’t mean. He just had no idea. And right now, that ignorance was cutting you to pieces anyway.
“No,” you said quickly.
His brows drew together. “You sure?”
“Yeah.” You gave him a small smile that felt awful on your face. “I’ll just get a taxi.”
“I can drive you.”
“No, really.” You shook your head and reached for your bag. “It’s fine.”
He was looking at you more carefully now. You could tell. Not enough to understand, but enough to notice that something had gone strange.
“You’re being weird,” he said softly.
The words landed harder than they should have.
You made yourself laugh a little. “I’m sick. I’m allowed.”
But the laugh sounded wrong. You heard it. He heard it too.
Lando sat up straighter. “No, I mean—” He lowered his voice. “Did I do something?”
And because you were hurt, and overwhelmed, and trying very hard not to let your face crack open in front of a whole table of people who had just turned your life into a joke, the answer came out colder than you meant it to.
“No.”
Just that. Too flat. Too quick. Lando went still for a second.
You saw the shift in his face immediately, the small hurt of someone realizing they’d somehow ended up on the wrong side of your mood and not understanding how.
You stood too fast, adjusting your bag on your shoulder. “I’m just going to go.”
He looked up at you, frowning now. “I’ll come outside with you.”
“No.” You forced another smile. “No, it’s okay. Stay. You’ve had drinks.”
“I’m not that drunk.”
“You’ve had drinks,” you repeated, a little more sharply than you meant to.
He stared at you. Then, quieter: “Okay. But text me when you get home.”
You nodded.
“Promise?”
“Yes.”
“Seriously.”
“Lando.” Your voice softened for one second out of sheer habit. “I will.”
He looked like he wanted to say something else. Ask another question. Push harder. But he was still missing the shape of it, and maybe some part of him could tell now that if he pushed too hard in front of everyone, whatever was wrong would only get worse.
So he just nodded once. And when you turned to leave, you could feel his eyes on your back the whole way out. Cold. Sharp. Too aware now that something was off and he didn’t know what.
The air outside hit you like a slap. You made it halfway down the pavement before the tears started. Not dramatic sobbing. Just that awful hot burn spilling over because you had held on one minute too long in there and your body had stopped agreeing to the performance.
You kept walking anyway. Bag clutched to your side. Phone in your hand. The sound of the bar door behind you already swallowed by traffic and wind.
And the most painful part, somehow, was still this: that when he looked at you just now, confused and worried, he had no idea he was one of the reasons you were leaving.
The days after that night were awful in the quietest way.
Not dramatic. Not explosive. Worse. Because Lando texted you exactly the same.
Good morning. How’s your day going? Saw this and thought of you. Miss you. You free later? Did you eat? Night, pretty girl.
And you answered. Of course you did. You weren’t cruel enough not to. Maybe that was the problem.
Because on his side, it probably looked normal enough. A little off, maybe. A little slower. You took longer to reply, turned down seeing him twice, blamed work once, said you were tired the second time, and then when he suggested just coming over and bringing food, you said you had an early morning.
All technically plausible. All lies.
The truth was simpler and worse: you were trying to gather the nerve to end it before you got in any deeper. Because that was the thing, wasn’t it? You could not unknow what you’d heard. Could not unknow the way he had laughed, the way he had gone along with it, the things he’d said himself. And maybe he hadn’t meant anything by it. Maybe it had been ignorance, social momentum, too many drinks, all of that.
But what did that change? You were still you. Still autistic. Still all the things that became too much for people once they had to live beside them instead of make general statements about them in a bar. And if that was how he talked before he knew, what happened when he did?
You already knew the answer, didn’t you? Maybe not because of him specifically. Because of history. Because of the world. Because of the thousand little humiliations that had taught you what people found charming in theory and unbearable in practice.
So yes, you kept texting him. And yes, every time his name lit up your phone, your chest still did that stupid, traitorous little thing. And yes, every night after answering him, you would sit there with your phone in your hand and think: I need to end this now.
Then he invited you over on Sunday afternoon.
No bar. No friends. No excuses. Just: Come over? I miss you. I made your favourite.
And because some weak, aching part of you wanted one more normal afternoon before you destroyed this on purpose, you said yes.
You regretted it before you even reached his building. You regretted it in the lift. You regretted it standing outside his door. And then he opened it, and the regret got teeth.
Because Lando looked so happy to see you. Not politely pleased. Not relieved. Happy.
His whole face opened the second he saw you there, and before you could brace, he was already pulling you into a hug that was warm and familiar and automatic, like the last few days of distance had only existed to him as inconvenience, not warning.
“There yu are,” he murmured into your hair.
You almost broke right there. Instead you hugged him back because your body hated you and because you were weak and because it felt so terribly good to be held by him that for one humiliating second you wanted to pretend none of this had to happen at all.
When he pulled back, one hand was still on your waist.
“I made your favorite,” he said, stepping aside so you could come in. “The real one, not the fake healthy version.”
The apartment smelled like garlic and tomatoes and warm bread. There was music playing low somewhere. The table was set. Of course it was. Of course he had cooked. Of course he’d been excited to see you. Of course he’d made this harder without even trying.
You stepped inside and shrugged off your coat while he took it from you automatically, hanging it up like this was ordinary and safe and headed somewhere good.
“You okay?” he asked.
Too casually. Too gently.
You looked away. “Yeah.”
Lando shut the door, turned back toward you, and frowned.
“No, come on. That sounded fake.”
You laughed a little, because if you didn’t laugh you were going to start crying before you even got past the kitchen. “You sound very confident.”
“I am very confident.” He tilted his head, studying your face. “You look weird.”
“That’s flattering.”
“You know what I mean.”
Unfortunately, you did.
You moved farther into the apartment because standing in the doorway while he looked at you like that felt like a bad idea. Lando followed a second later, still talking.
“I wasn’t sure how hungry you were,” he said, lifting the lid off the pot on the stove like the food itself might help, “so I maybe made too much, but I feel like that’s better than not enough.”
You looked at the table. At the glasses. At the stupid bread basket. At the ordinary tenderness of it all. And something in your chest twisted so hard it actually hurt.
“Lando.”
He turned. You opened your mouth. Nothing came out.
He waited. Still warm. Still open. Still expecting the kind of conversation normal couples had in normal kitchens before dinner.
You couldn’t do dinner. You couldn’t sit across from him and let him feed you and let him smile at you and act like this was still a thing you were allowed to have. So the words came out too fast and too blunt, like ripping a bandage and skin together.
“I think we should break up.”
The room stopped. Completely.
Lando didn’t move for a second. Actually didn’t move. His face just… emptied. Not of feeling. Of comprehension. Like he had heard the sentence and his brain had refused to accept it as part of the language.
“What?”
Your throat was already closing. You forced yourself to keep going.
“I think we should stop this now.”
The silence after that was worse. Lando put the spoon down on the counter very carefully, like one wrong movement might change what he’d just heard.
“What are you talking about?”
His voice had changed. Not loud. Not angry. Just thin around the edges.
You wrapped your arms around yourself. “I don’t think this is going to work.”
Lando stared at you like you’d started speaking another language. Then he laughed once. Not because anything was funny. Because the alternative was something worse.
“No.” He shook his head. “No, what?”
You looked at the floor. “I’m serious.”
“About what?” he asked. “About… this?” His hand moved helplessly between the two of you, the room, the whole shape of the afternoon. “What are you saying?”
You swallowed. “That we should end it before it gets worse.”
That got him moving. Not much. One step closer. Enough that you could feel how thrown he was now.
“Before it gets worse,” he repeated. “What does that even mean?”
You said nothing.
Lando dragged a hand through his hair. “No, sorry. Hang on. Is this because I’ve been busy this week?”
You blinked. “What?”
“I know I’ve been crap at texting back during the day and then when we did see each other last week I was distracted and—” He cut himself off. “If that’s what this is, just say that.”
“It’s not that.”
“Okay.” He nodded too quickly. “Then is it because I did something? Is there something I’ve missed? Did I say something weird? Are you upset about something and I’m just not getting it?”
“It’s not—”
“Is it too much too soon?” he pressed. “Because if you want to slow down, that’s fine. We can slow down.”
“It’s not that either.”
Lando looked at you for a long second.
Then, quieter, “Is there someone else?”
Your head snapped up. “No.”
“Then what is this?”
His voice cracked slightly on the last word. That almost undid you. Because he looked confused, yes, but under that now was hurt, not dramatic, not loud, just real, sitting openly on his face while he tried to make sense of why his girlfriend had come over, let him kiss her hello, and then casually shattered the room.
You looked away first.
“I don’t think we’re compatible,” you said.
Lando went completely still.
Then he said, flatly, “That’s complete bullshit.”
You looked at him.
“No, seriously,” he said. “That’s actual nonsense, and you know it.”
“Lando—”
“No.” He shook his head once, sharper now, fear making him angry by accident. “Do not give me that. Don’t stand there and say some vague shit like ‘we’re not compatible’ like this is mutual and random and nobody’s fault.”
Your eyes burned instantly. He saw it. Kept going anyway, because he was panicking now, because this was not making sense and the more it didn’t make sense, the more he needed to force clarity out of it.
“What happened?” he asked. “Did somebody say something? Did I do something? Did I miss some huge thing and now I’m getting broken up with in my own kitchen and you won’t even tell me why?”
“I’m trying to.”
“Then try harder.”
The second it came out, you saw him regret the sharpness. But it was too late. And because you were barely holding yourself together already, the cruelty of that, even accidental, pushed you right up to the edge.
“You want the truth?” you said.
“Yes.”
You let out one broken breath. “I’m autistic.”
Silence. Not just surprise this time. Shock.
Lando stared at you. And then, because he was blindsided, because the sentence had dropped into the room from a height he hadn’t been prepared for, because he was still trying to catch up to what that meant in relation to everything else, the bar, your distance, the breakup, all of it, he said the worst possible thing.
“But you don’t look—”
“Don’t.”
The word cracked out of you so fast and so sharp it actually made him stop.
“Don’t even finish that fucking sentence,” you said, tears already falling now because of course, of course, of course that was what came out first. “God, don’t you dare.”
Lando looked like he’d slapped you by accident and only realized it after the sound.
“No, I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did.” Your laugh came out ugly and shaking. “You absolutely did. You were about to say I don’t look autistic. Right? That I don’t seem autistic. That I’m not like—what? Whatever stupid version of it people are willing to accept?”
His mouth opened. Closed. You could barely breathe now.
“That is exactly the kind of thing people always say,” you said, voice trembling harder with every word. “Every single time. ‘You don’t look autistic.’ ‘You don’t seem autistic.’ ‘Really? Are you sure?’ Like there’s some correct face for it. Some approved little image.” You wiped angrily at your cheeks. “And then when you do act autistic enough for them, suddenly you’re too much and difficult and embarrassing and—”
Lando had gone pale. You saw the moment it clicked. Not just the word, but the pattern. The shape of every comment at the bar suddenly reassembling itself around you.
“The bar,” he said quietly.
You laughed once, helplessly. “Yeah. The bar.”
His face changed. Really changed.
“Oh my God,” he said.
And that was the thing that hurt most: the sincerity in it. The realization. The horror.
Because you had sat there while everyone laughed about people like you, while they mocked stimming and sensitivities and routines and hyperfixations and social scripts and food textures and needing things explained differently and melting down in bad environments, and Lando, your Lando, had gone right along with it like it was just one more funny conversation in a crowded booth.
“You laughed,” you said.
He shut his eyes briefly.
“You agreed.”
“I know.”
“You said… ugly things.”
His eyes opened. “I know.”
“You said maybe at some point it stops being a diagnosis and starts being a personality trait.” Your voice broke. “You said that.”
The shame that crossed his face then was immediate and vicious. Like he wanted to physically drag the sentence back out of the air and couldn’t.
“I know,” he said again, but it sounded wrecked now.
“And you don’t get it,” you said, crying harder because now it was all there, all the fear and all the humiliation and all the old shame the bar had ripped open again. “You don’t get what that felt like. Sitting there while everyone around me laughed about traits I have. Things I do. Things I have spent my whole life trying to hide or apologize for or make look smaller so people won’t get annoyed.”
Lando stood completely still. You took a shaky breath that did nothing.
“I cannot fucking help it,” you said.
The room went quiet around your voice.
“I cannot help it when I get anxious in crowded rooms and everybody is talking too loud and my brain starts misfiring and I can feel every noise in my skin. I cannot help it when I’m wearing a wool sweater and suddenly the texture feels so wrong I feel like I want to die. I cannot help it when I start tapping or picking at my fingers or rubbing seams or rocking because if I don’t do something I feel like I’ll come out of my body.”
Lando looked shattered already. You kept going.
“I cannot help it when I get fixated on things. I cannot help it when I read some fucking Greek mythology novel and then my whole brain gets stuck on it for two weeks or maybe even months and I all I want to do is talk about it because it feels like my skin isn’t big enough to hold it quietly. I cannot help the routines or the scripts or the fact that eye contact can feel impossible or that sometimes I need things explained differently when I’m overwhelmed or I go quiet and shut down and look weird.”
Your breathing was breaking now. Your whole chest hurt.
“And after that night,” you whispered, “all I could think was that of course. Of course this is how it would go.”
Lando looked at you like the words were physically hurting him. You laughed through the tears. It sounded awful.
“Because why would I stay?” you said. “Why would I let you get attached enough to see all of that up close when I already know what people think? I already know what happens. At first they think it’s quirky or whatever, and then eventually it’s too much.”
“Stop,” Lando said, but his voice was breaking too.
“No.”
“Yes,” he said, but there was no force in it, only pain.
“No.” You shook your head hard. “You don’t get to tell me to stop when you’re not hearing the point. I really like you. That’s what makes this so fucking humiliating. I really like you. And then I sat there and listened to you all laugh and I just thought… there it is. There it fucking is. He should be with some neurotypical girl who doesn’t need so much. Someone who doesn’t get overwhelmed by bars or need to leave early or cry because a sweater feels wrong or get stuck on stupid things for weeks or need room and patience and—” Your voice broke completely. “Someone easier,” you finished, barely above a whisper. “You should be with someone easier.”
That was the point where Lando cried. Not big, dramatic sobbing. Just one sharp fracture in his face, one moment where he stopped trying to hold himself together and lost.
It was devastating for one simple reason: Lando did not cry easily.
You’d never seen him do it like that. Not from embarrassment. Not from frustration. Only when something had gone very deep. And the tears on his face now were not because he felt accused. Not because you had called him out. Because he had heard you. Fully. And understood, all at once, how badly he had hurt you without ever meaning to.
“Jesus Christ,” he said, voice shaking.
You looked away because the sight of him crying somehow made everything worse. Not better. Worse.
“I’m so sorry,” he said.
You let out a broken laugh. “Yeah.”
“No, don’t—” He dragged a hand over his face, tears still there, no composure left in him now. “Don’t do that. Don’t—fuck.” He looked down, then back at you, and his face had gone so open it was hard to look at. “I was such a fucking asshole.”
You wiped at your eyes. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter.”
The force of it made you look at him.
“It matters because I sat there and I joined in,” he said. “Maybe not as badly as the others, but I still did it. I laughed. I repeated shit. I wanted to keep the mood easy, wanted to be funny, wanted to go with everyone else instead of thinking like an actual human being, and you were right there.” His voice cracked again. “And you were hearing all of that from me.”
The tears kept coming down your face. Quiet now. Steady.
Lando shook his head hard like he hated himself for every second of it. “I can’t even tell you I’m not that person without sounding ridiculous, because I was that person. That night, I was. Ignorant and careless and cowardly enough to go with the room instead of being decent. And I’m probably still too ignorant.”
He took a breath that trembled on the way in.
“And those people?” He laughed once, bitterly. “If that’s genuinely what they think, if that’s who they are when nobody stops them, then I don’t want people like that around me. They’re not my friends.”
You stared at him. Lando looked wrecked and utterly sincere.
“I’m not doing that,” he said. “I’m not standing by that conversation. I’m not standing by those opinions. And I’m definitely not standing by the version of me who sat there and made you feel like being yourself would make you unlovable.”
That one hit. Your face crumpled all over again.
Lando took one small step toward you. Then stopped, careful now.
“I want to do better,” he said.
You closed your eyes for one second.
“Not just say it. Actually do it. I want to learn. Properly. I want you to tell me when I’ve said something stupid and I want to listen instead of getting defensive. I want to read, I want to ask questions, I want to understand what helps and what hurts and what being autistic is for you, not for whatever bullshit stereotype I clearly have in my head.”
You opened your eyes. Lando’s face was still wet. So was yours.
“I want you,” he said.
The sentence landed like something warm and clean in the middle of all that wreckage.
“Not some hypothetical easier girl. Not some quieter girl. Not some version of you cut down into something more comfortable for everyone else.” His voice lowered. “You.”
Your breath hitched.
“I want the girl who gets anxious in bars and obsessed with mythology and weird about sweaters. I want the girl who maybe needs things from me because I happen to really fucking like giving them if it means she feels safe.”
A laugh-sob escaped you before you could stop it.
Lando smiled through tears, tiny and devastated. “There you are.”
You shook your head. “You don’t know what you’re signing up for.”
“That’s my choice.”
“You say that now.”
“I’m saying it now,” he said, “and I’ll say it tomorrow too.”
The room had gone so quiet you could hear the stove ticking behind you. He took another step.
“Can I hug you?” he asked.
The question nearly broke you again. Not because it was big. Because it wasn’t. Because after all of this, after you had come here prepared to blow everything up, after you had just bled all over his kitchen floor in the shape of your worst fear, he was still asking. Still making room. Still letting your body belong to you first.
You nodded.
Lando moved like he was afraid of startling you, and then his arms were around you, warm and careful and tight enough to feel real. The second he held you, the rest of your composure gave up completely and you folded into him with a sound somewhere between a sob and a breath.
He buried his face in your hair and held on.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
You cried against his shirt and let him hold you.
For a while, that was all there was. His hand moving slowly over your back. Your breathing trying to settle. The warm smell of food and him and the soft music still playing stupidly in the next room like the world had not just split open and remade itself.
When you finally pulled back, he kept one hand on your face as if he needed to reassure himself you were still there.
You looked at him. He looked ruined. Open. So, so sorry.
And because at that point honesty was the only thing left in the room that hadn’t already been broken and rebuilt, you whispered, “I really thought you were going to hate me once you knew.”
Lando’s expression cracked all over again.
“No,” he said softly, fiercely. “No, baby. I hate myself a bit right now, sure. But never you.”
You let out a watery laugh.
“That’s not funny,” he said, still looking at you like he wanted to protect every part of you from the last week, from the bar, from himself.
“It sort of is.”
“It’s really not.”
You smiled anyway, weak and exhausted and still raw.
Lando’s thumb brushed under your eye. “We’re not breaking up.”
It wasn’t really a question. Just him staking out the future before your fear could try to steal it again.
You gave a tiny, helpless laugh. “That your main takeaway?”
“It’s a very important takeaway.”
You shook your head. Then, because his face was right there and your body still knew him before your fear did, you kissed him. Just once. Soft. Tentative. A little salt still on both your mouths from tears.
Lando froze for half a second in pure surprise. Then kissed you back like he’d been handed something precious and dangerous and wasn’t going to waste the chance to hold it right.
When he pulled back, his forehead rested against yours.
“I’m going to do better,” he whispered.
You believed him. Not because people didn’t say things like that all the time. Because he looked like a man who had already started changing.
“Okay,” you whispered back.
And in his kitchen, with dinner going cold on the stove and the two of you still a mess and the afternoon in ruins around your feet, it somehow still felt like the beginning of something better than before.
After that afternoon in his kitchen, Lando did not become perfect. That would have been impossible. Also, suspicious.
He still said the wrong thing sometimes. Still got confused. Still had moments where he realized halfway through a sentence that he was making some terrible assumption and stopped with a look of such immediate self-disgust that you usually ended up laughing before he could spiral.
But he got better. And maybe more importantly, he got better on purpose.
That was what undid you. Because there was no dramatic speech after that day. No one grand promise that fixed everything at once. Just Lando, looking at you with red-rimmed eyes and shame in his face, saying he wanted to do better. And then actually doing it.
At first, it showed up quietly. In links. Articles. Essays. Videos. Actual autistic creators talking about sensory issues and masking and shutdowns and routines and special interests and burnout and all the things people who weren’t autistic kept describing so badly.
He didn’t send them to you in some patronizing “look, I’m learning!” way either. He just… read them.
You knew because sometimes, while you were lying on his chest or making tea in his kitchen or sitting beside him half-watching something at night, he would ask questions. Real ones. Thoughtful ones. Not the sort designed to reassure himself that he was doing well. The sort that meant he had been thinking.
“Can I ask you something?”
You had looked up from his sofa one evening, halfway through untangling the string from a hoodie you’d accidentally knotted. “That depends. Are you about to say something awful?”
He’d laughed softly. “Hopefully not.”
“Encouraging.”
He had shifted on the sofa, angling more toward you. “What does it actually feel like when you get overstimulated?”
The question had caught you off guard. Not because it was rude. Because it wasn’t. Because he had asked it like the answer mattered. Like he wasn’t after a neat little definition he could tuck away and feel accomplished about. Like he genuinely wanted a map so he could recognize the terrain when you were in it.
You had taken a second. “It depends.”
He had nodded immediately. “Okay.”
“Sometimes it feels like everything’s too loud and too bright and too close to my skin.” You looked down at the drawstring in your hands. “And sometimes it’s less dramatic than that. Just… like my brain starts tripping over itself. Like I can feel myself getting meaner or quieter or more tired really fast, and I can’t always stop it.”
Lando had listened without interrupting. Really listened.
Then, after a second: “And if that’s happening, what helps?”
You’d blinked at him.
“Like what should I do?” he had asked, softer now. “Or not do?”
That was the thing. He never made your autism a spectacle after that. Never made it some tragic revelation he needed to tiptoe around or overcompensate for in huge, performative ways. He just started paying attention.
He learned the look your face got when a room was too much before you had the language for it. Learned that if your replies got shorter and your shoulders crept up toward your ears, it usually meant you were hitting your limit. Learned that “I’m fine” was sometimes true and sometimes absolutely not, and that the difference lived mostly in your eyes.
And when he got it wrong, he let himself be corrected. That mattered too.
One night at dinner with friends, he’d leaned over and asked, “You okay?” in that low, automatic way of his. You had nodded.
He’d looked at you for a second longer. “Do you want to go?”
You had blinked. “That obvious?”
“Only if you know your face.”
You’d smiled into your drink. “Give me ten minutes.”
He had nodded once. “Okay.”
No guilt. No but everyone’s just getting started. No making you explain yourself to the room.
Ten minutes later, he’d stood up, announced to the table that you both had an early morning, and gotten you out of there before the noise had a chance to turn poisonous in your bones.
Afterward, in the car, you’d been quiet. Lando had driven with one hand on the wheel and the other resting open on your thigh, just there if you wanted it.
“You didn’t have to leave too,” you’d murmured.
He had glanced at you like the idea was absurd. “Why would I stay if you were done?”
You looked out the window so he wouldn’t see what that did to your face.
He got attentive to textures in a way that was almost funny. Not expert. Just vigilant.
He started asking, “Is that one bad?” if you touched a jumper in a shop and immediately made a face.
You were in his room once, getting ready to go out, when he came in wearing some new sweater he clearly liked.
You looked up. Paused. Then visibly winced.
He stopped dead. “That bad?”
You tried not to laugh. “It looks fine.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
You reached out and rubbed the sleeve between your fingers, then shuddered dramatically. “I think if this touched my neck I would become a danger to society.”
Lando looked down at the fabric. “Right.”
Then he pulled it off over his head with zero hesitation and tossed it onto the chair.
You stared. “You didn’t have to do that.”
He shrugged into a T-shirt instead. “I know. But if you’re next to me all night and one accidental brush of my arm is going to make you want to peel your skin off, feels counterproductive.”
The look on your face made him grin.
“What?”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“And yet,” he said, stepping back into your space, “helpful.”
He listened to your hyperfixations like they were love letters. That might have been the most dangerous thing of all.
Because there was one particularly humiliating afternoon where you’d ended up on the floor of his living room, surrounded by open tabs and one half-read book and three badly organized notes on your phone, talking far too fast about a myth you had gotten stuck on that week.
One evening, weeks after the kitchen argument, you were curled into his side on the sofa, one of your books open but unread in your lap while he scrolled idly on his phone.
You had been talking for a while. Something about a new fixation. Ancient sea routes, maybe, or sacrificial rites, or the political symbolism of monster myths, at this point he had become alarmingly hard to surprise.
You stopped mid-sentence, suddenly aware of yourself.
Lando looked over. “Why’d you stop?”
You shrugged, already embarrassed. “Nothing.”
“That’s fake.”
“I’ve been talking for ages.”
“So?”
“So…” You looked down. “I don’t know. It’s a lot.”
Lando set his phone aside and turned toward you properly.
“Baby.”
You looked at him. He reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, expression soft and utterly serious.
“I am listening,” he said. “On purpose.”
Your chest tightened.
Then he smiled, just a little. “Also, if you stop now, I’ll never find out whether the bronze-age sailors were incompetent or cursed, and that feels unfair.”
You laughed. Actually laughed.
He smiled. “And you look hot when you’re ranting, actually. Unexpected bonus.”
You shoved at his shoulder. He laughed and kissed your forehead.
By the time your first race weekend together came around, he was already impossible about you. Not clingy in public, well, not excessively. But attentive in a way that made it clear he had been thinking far ahead of the actual moment.
The paddock was already intense on its own. Louder, brighter, more chaotic than it looked from TV. Crowds, cameras, radios, engines, clattering equipment, endless people wanting something from somebody.
You had been trying not to overthink it all week. Because you wanted to be there. Wanted to support him. Wanted to see his world properly. You just also knew your nervous system was about to have opinions.
You were at his flat the night before flying out, perched on the edge of his bed while he packed with his usual complete inability to fold anything like a civilized person, when he suddenly said, “Oh, hang on.”
You looked up. Lando crossed to the wardrobe, reached into the back of a drawer, and came back holding a box. He handed it to you.
You frowned. “What’s this?”
“Open it.”
Inside were a pair of noise-cancelling headphones. Really good ones. The expensive kind. The kind you had looked at online before and then immediately closed the tab on because spending that much money on your own comfort always still felt faintly self-indulgent.
You looked up at him. Lando had gone a little pink around the ears, which always meant he cared more than he was pretending to.
“I just thought…” He shrugged one shoulder. “It might help. For the paddock. If it gets too much.”
You stared at him. He looked suddenly defensive in the most Lando way possible, which is to say defensive because he was shy, not because he was angry.
“You don’t have to use them,” he said quickly. “I’m not saying it’s definitely going to be awful, I just thought it’d be better if you had them and didn’t need them than needed them and didn’t have them.”
Your eyes burned instantly.
Lando saw it and immediately looked alarmed. “Why are you crying? This was supposed to be a practical gift.”
You laughed through it, clutching the box to your chest.
“It is a practical gift.”
“You’re making it emotional.”
“That’s because you made it emotional.”
He stared at you for one second. “I bought headphones.”
“You bought me headphones.”
“That was implied by the purchase.”
You smiled, wiping quickly under your eyes. “Thank you.”
And because he couldn’t handle gratitude for too long without ruining the mood on purpose, he shrugged and said, “Well. I’m invested in your survival. Bit selfish, really.”
Then he kissed the top of your head and added, softer, “I want you comfortable.”
That was what he kept doing.Wanting you comfortable. Wanting you safe. Wanting you understood, even in the places where he was still learning how.
He started checking little things before you had to.
“How bad is the noise in here, scale of one to awful?” “Do you want to sit somewhere else?” “Do you need five minutes?” “Do you want me to answer for you?” “Too much?” “You sure?” “Okay. We can go.”
And maybe the most important part was that he never made it feel like a burden. Never sighed. Never made a joke at your expense. Never acted as though your needs were interrupting the real version of life.
He just folded them in. Made room. As if loving you had simply expanded the blueprint of what he considered normal.
He still said sorry sometimes. Not all the time. Not in a guilty, performative loop.
Just when the memory of that night came back across his face and he’d look at you a second too long and say, quietly, “I really was such a prick.”
And you would roll your eyes and tell him he’d made the point several times already.
But secretly, privately, part of you never stopped being moved by the fact that he had not decided his one apology was enough and moved on.
He remembered. He cared. He let it change him. And maybe that was the whole thing, really.
Not that he had never hurt you. Not that he had gotten it right instantly. That when he understood he’d hurt you, he loved you enough to learn better. And then he kept loving you in ways that proved it.
you can just tell this is franco colapinto’s first life
Squished Cat | Oscar Piastri
Miss Possessive - LN1
Lando Norris x girlfriend!reader
Summary: With their relationship secret, Lando’s girlfriend struggles to hide her insecurity when girls constantly flirt with him.
Wrote this short one at 3am when I couldn’t sleep. Not proofread so I fear it could be incoherent!
Written to Miss Possessive - Tate McRae
When we're ready- Arthur leclerc
Summary- Despite being together for 8 years, you and arthur are the only couple in the leclerc family who haven't tied the knot... when online comments and teasing from his family get to much, Arthur is quick to show what his priority is!
words-6.7k
lando asked to get a pic with oscar and oscar smiled when he noticed 🥹🥹
Drag Path
Pairing: Oscar Piastri x Female reader Word count: 7.4k Summary: After crashing out before the Australian Grand Prix even begins, Oscar somehow keeps it together through the paddock, the cameras, and the long ride home. But the second the apartment door shuts behind you, all that heartbreak finally catches up with him. Tags: so much angst, hurt/comfort, post-race heartbreak, vulnerable oscar piastri, soft intimacy, some smut, cockwarming, i'm not sure what else... A/N: how are you all doing after australia's 2026 race? cause i'm not okay at all. I ended up writing this at 7 a.m., so it might be full of mistakes and full nonsense. I was sleepy af, sorry
You knew something was wrong before anyone said it. Maybe it was the sound.
Not the crash itself, you didn’t hear that at first, not really, not in any clear or recognizable way. Albert Park before a race was too full of noise for one impact to make itself distinct. There were engines whining through their pre-race procedures, helicopters somewhere above the circuit, the constant hum of a crowd too excited to ever truly settle, the clipped, rushed voices of team personnel speaking into headsets as if the whole paddock operated on one continuous breath. Everything bled together into that familiar Formula 1 chaos.
But then the rhythm of it changed. It was slight. Brief. A shift in the current. The kind of thing nobody else would notice unless they were already looking for him in every passing second.
You were. Of course you were. You had been for the last fifteen minutes, standing just on the edge of where you were supposed to be, hands clasped so tightly in front of you that your knuckles ached, pretending to be calmer than you felt. The pre-race tension had been alive under your skin all morning, part nerves, part excitement, part the very specific ache that came from caring about someone who got into a Formula 1 car for a living and then calling that feeling love.
Oscar’s home race. You had repeated the words so many times over the weekend that they had almost stopped sounding real. His home race. His city. His people. The race that mattered in a different way than the others did, whether he admitted it or not.
And, because he was Oscar, he had not admitted it. Not properly. Not in any way the cameras could clip and replay.
He’d shrugged off every question with the same dry, even tone he always used when people pushed too hard. Yes, it was nice to be home. Yes, the support had been great. Yes, it was special. No, he wasn’t approaching it differently. No, he wasn’t feeling extra pressure. Just another race, really.
You had nearly laughed the first time he said it in front of a microphone. Just another race.
As if he had not spent Thursday night lying next to you in the dark, one arm tucked beneath his head, the other draped across your waist, staring up at the hotel ceiling while the city glowed faintly through the curtains.
“You’re thinking too loudly,” you’d murmured, half asleep.
He’d gone still beside you. Then, after a pause: “Didn’t know that was possible.”
“With you it is.”
He’d turned his head to look at you then, expression unreadable in the dim room, though you could feel the corner of his mouth threatening to lift.
“Interesting diagnosis.”
“You’re nervous.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m literally lying down.”
You had smiled into his shoulder. “That doesn’t stop you from being nervous.”
Another pause. Longer this time.
Then his fingers had tightened lightly against your side, almost absentmindedly, and he’d said, very quietly, “It’s a lot.”
That was the closest he had gotten to saying it.
For anyone else, it would have been nothing. Barely a confession at all. A throwaway comment. An understatement.
For Oscar, it may as well have been a full emotional monologue. It’s a lot.
That was how he told you things mattered. In small sentences. In restrained ones. In words so careful they almost hid the truth instead of revealing it. If someone didn’t know him, really know him, they would miss it entirely. They’d think he was detached, or unemotional, or simply too cool to care.
But you knew better. You knew the version of him no one else got. The version who let silence do most of his speaking, but always touched you when he needed grounding. The version who got sharper when he was stressed, not cruel, never cruel, just more clipped around the edges, as if he was trying to keep every feeling compressed into as little space as possible. The version who would never ask for comfort directly but would drift closer to you, shoulder to shoulder, knee brushing yours, hand resting at the back of your neck for one second longer than usual. The version who cared so much it leaked out only in the places he thought no one was looking.
So yes, you were watching for him now. Watching the timing screens when you could. Watching the monitors. Watching the movement in the garage. Watching for the car, the helmet, the impossible flash of papaya that your entire body had become trained to recognize before your brain did.
And then everything shifted. One of the McLaren engineers went very still. Another voice came sharply through a headset. Someone swore under their breath. Your stomach dropped before your mind could form a reason. You stepped forward instinctively, eyes darting to the nearest screen just as the replay appeared. The world narrowed.
There he was. Oscar’s car at the exit of Turn 4, angled wrong in a way your body understood as danger before your thoughts caught up. One ugly, sickening moment of lost control, the rear stepping out, the correction not enough, the car sliding with all the awful inevitability of something already decided. Then the wall.
The impact wasn’t the biggest you’d ever seen. It didn’t need to be. It was enough. Enough that you felt all the air leave your lungs at once. Enough that your fingers went numb. Enough that for one horrible second you forgot where you were standing, forgot the people around you, forgot that the race still existed and the paddock was still moving and you were supposed to remain composed because this was Formula 1 and drama never stopped the machinery of it. You stared at the screen as if staring could undo it.
He’s okay, was your first thought. It came not because you were calm, but because you had to think it immediately or else nothing in you would function. He got out. That mattered.
You saw the replay again. Saw the car still. Saw him climbing free. Saw the movement of his body that told you he wasn’t physically hurt, not in any obvious way, and the relief hit so hard it almost made you dizzy.
Then came the second wave. He’s out. The home race. The first race of the season. Before it even started.
Someone near you said, “Oh no.”
Another voice, too professional, too steady, was already talking through damage assessments. Front-right suspension. Significant impact. That’ll be game over. No coming back from that on the reconnaissance lap. Brutal.
Brutal. You hated how ordinary the word sounded in the middle of something that felt catastrophic.
The monitors kept moving. Camera angles switched. Commentators filled the silence. Somewhere out on the grid the rest of the field continued existing, because of course they did. Formula 1 never paused to mourn one person’s disaster. It simply absorbed it and moved on.
Your body did not know how to do that. All at once, the whole paddock felt too bright. Too loud. Too full of people who were not him.
You took a step back, then another, eyes still fixed on the screen as though he might somehow reappear and tell everyone it was fine, it was fixable, there’d been some mistake, the car could be repaired in time, the race could still happen.
But the image changed. Oscar, helmet still on, walking away. Not running. Not gesturing. Not putting on any kind of visible performance of frustration or devastation. Just walking.
Your throat tightened painfully. Because there it was, that terrible, controlled stillness you knew so well. Even from a distance. Even through a screen. Even after a crash that had ended his race before it began, he looked composed. His posture straight.
He was already pulling the walls up. And you knew, with dreadful certainty, that by the time he got back to the paddock, everyone else would see a driver handling disappointment professionally. You would see Oscar trying not to break open in public.
You started moving before you consciously decided to. Nobody stopped you. Maybe because they knew who you were. Maybe because everyone in that garage had their own version of panic to manage. Maybe because there was no universe in which anyone would have looked at your face in that moment and thought, yes, let’s delay her.
The walk back through the paddock felt impossibly long and unreal. You could hear pieces of conversation as you passed, fragments that snagged against your skin.
“...home race too...” “...such a shame...” “...just lost it...” “...what a nightmare...”
You wanted all of them to shut up. Not because they were wrong. Because they were saying it too easily. There was a strange cruelty in how quickly other people could summarize someone else’s heartbreak. Package it. Narrate it. Turn it into a line for television, a talking point, a tragedy with convenient wording.
You pushed past another cluster of personnel and finally reached the quieter stretch nearer the back of the McLaren area, where things became less performative, less visible, more real. That was where you stopped. Because there he was.
For one moment, all you could do was look at him. Oscar had changed out of his helmet and balaclava, though he was still in his race suit, unzipped to the chest. His hair was damp at the edges, flattened and out of place from the helmet, and there was a flush high on his cheekbones that might have been heat or adrenaline or anger or all three. One of the team members was speaking to him, something logistical, probably, something about the car, the debrief, the sequence of what happened, but Oscar only nodded once in response.
Calm. Neutral. Controlled. He looked devastatingly put together for someone whose day had just imploded. And maybe nobody else would have noticed it, but you did: the tension in his jaw, the way one hand flexed once at his side before going still again, the slight blankness behind his eyes that meant he was no longer really seeing the people in front of him. He was enduring them. Your chest hurt.
As if sensing you before he actually saw you, Oscar turned his head. Your eyes met. Something changed in his face. Not a lot. Not enough for anyone else to clock it. But enough.
The set of his mouth loosened by a fraction. His shoulders dropped, not visibly, not dramatically, just the smallest release, a silent acknowledgment that you had arrived and, with you, the need to keep every part of himself rigid had shifted.
The team member followed his line of sight, looked at you, and immediately said, “We can pick this up in a few minutes.”
Oscar gave a short nod. Then the person stepped away. And suddenly it was just the two of you. For half a second neither of you moved.
You had imagined all weekend what this race day might feel like, thrilling, stressful, emotional, maybe triumphant if luck and speed and strategy all aligned. You had imagined hugging him after qualifying, after the anthem, after the race. You had imagined the grin he might try to suppress if things went well. The dry comments. The almost-smiles. The way he always acted like praise slightly inconvenienced him even when you knew he secretly liked hearing it from you. You had not imagined this.
You crossed the space between you first. Not quickly. Not dramatically. Just directly, like the answer to a question neither of you needed to ask.
When you stopped in front of him, you saw the composure up close and hated it for him. Hated how practiced it was. Hated that he could wear it so well. Hated that he clearly thought he needed to.
“Oscar,” you said, and your voice came out smaller than you meant it to.
His gaze flicked over your face, taking you in with that same contained focus he used for everything important. “Hi.”
The word was so absurdly normal that you almost laughed. Or cried. Maybe both.
“Hi?” you repeated, your eyebrows lifting despite yourself.
One corner of his mouth moved, but it wasn’t a smile. “Not my best entrance.”
That did it. The ache in your chest sharpened into something unbearable. Because of course he would do that. Of course the first thing out of his mouth would be a joke so dry it barely counted, delivered in that maddeningly even tone that pretended this was manageable. Pretended he was manageable. Pretended if he said something understated enough, it might shrink what had happened into a thing you could both survive standing up.
You stared at him for a second, eyes stinging, and said softly, “That’s what you’ve got?”
He held your gaze. “Still workshopping it.”
Your expression must have cracked then, because his own shifted immediately. The joke vanished. Not entirely, there was always something wry about Oscar, some dry thread woven into everything, but what replaced it was quieter. Gentler.
“Hey,” he said.
You pressed your lips together so hard they hurt. He looked at you for one long second, then stepped forward and reached for you first. That was all it took.
The moment his arms came around you, your own went around him with far more force than you intended, clutching at the back of his race suit as if you needed to physically confirm he was whole, really here, not injured, not lost to the violence of that impact or the cruelty of how sudden everything had been.
He made a soft sound, almost a breath, almost surprise, but then his hands settled firmly against your back.
And there it was. Not the version of him the cameras got. The real one. Still composed, yes. Still holding himself together with that iron restraint that seemed built into his bones. But no longer entirely alone inside it.
You buried your face against his shoulder. The fabric of the suit smelled faintly of heat, fuel, and him.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered before you could stop yourself.
His grip tightened slightly. “You didn’t crash the car.”
“I know.”
“Good.”
You let out one wet, helpless laugh against him, which was probably his intention. He always did that, slid something dry and understated into the moment not to dismiss your feelings, but to keep them from drowning both of you. It was one of the strangest, most tender things about him. Oscar did not do emotional flooding. He did emotional triage. A perfectly timed comment, a brush of his thumb over your side, a quiet sentence that somehow gave you room to breathe again.
But this time, even with him holding you, you could feel how hard he was working. Every muscle in his body seemed controlled. Measured. Contained. You pulled back just enough to look at him. His face was infuriatingly calm. His eyes were not. Not because they were watery, they weren’t. Oscar would sooner evaporate than cry in the middle of the paddock with half the world watching. But there was something shuttered there, something carefully locked down, and you knew him well enough to understand how much force it took to keep it all behind that expression.
You reached up and touched his cheek. The contact made him go still in a different way. Not frozen. Just attentive. As if every one of your touches registered somewhere deeper than the rest of the world ever got access to.
“You don’t have to act like it’s fine with me,” you said quietly.
His eyes flicked away for one second, then back.
“I know.”
“You’re doing it anyway.”
“I’m trying not to throw a tantrum in public,” he said.
“I hate this for you,” you whispered.
That hit him. You saw it happen. A tiny shift. Barely anything. The muscles in his jaw tightening once. His gaze dropping to somewhere near your shoulder before coming back up.
“Yeah,” he said at last. “It’s... not ideal.”
The understatement was so aggressively Oscar that, under any other circumstances, you would have rolled your eyes. Instead tears finally spilled over. His entire expression changed.
“Oh, no,” he said, and there it was, that immediate, almost reflexive redirect toward you. The instinct to manage your feelings before his own. “Don’t do that.”
You gave a broken laugh, wiping furiously at your cheek. “Don’t do what?”
“That.”
“What, have emotions?”
“Preferably fewer, yes.”
Despite everything, a tiny huff of laughter escaped him.
You stared at him in disbelief. “You are impossible.”
“I’m aware.”
“You crashed on your way to the grid at your home race and somehow I’m the one being told off.”
“I’m not telling you off.”
“You absolutely are.”
“I’m being very gentle,” he said.
You looked at him for one beat longer, then shook your head and laughed again through the tears because he was infuriating and because he was trying, in the most Oscar way possible, to save you both from the full weight of the moment flattening you.
The laugh seemed to ease something in him. Just a little. His hand came up to brush his thumb under your eye, catching the edge of a tear with surprising softness for someone still wearing the emotional armor of a man trying not to implode.
“Better,” he said.
“Don’t be smug.”
“I’m not.”
“You are internally.”
“Possibly.”
You let out a breath that shook on the way out. Then the reality of it all settled back over you, heavier now for having briefly cracked.
“The race hasn’t even started,” you said, almost to yourself.
Oscar’s expression stilled. “No.”
Your throat tightened again. “You didn’t even get to—”
“I know.”
The words weren’t sharp, but they stopped you. Not because he was angry at you. Because he couldn’t bear hearing the rest of the sentence out loud.
You saw it instantly and wished you could take the unfinished words back. He noticed the regret on your face right away, of course. He always noticed everything with you, even when he acted like he didn’t.
His hand slid from your cheek to the back of your neck, fingers resting there, warm and grounding.
“It’s okay,” he said quietly.
It wasn’t. You both knew it wasn’t.
But what he meant was, I know what you were trying to say.What he meant was, don’t make this harder for yourself.What he meant was, I can’t hear the shape of the loss spoken too clearly yet, so please love me gently.
You understood him in all the languages he never used out loud. So instead of finishing the sentence, you stepped closer again, resting your forehead lightly against his.
For a moment you both fell quiet. In the distance, the atmosphere of the paddock shifted again as the race drew nearer to starting. You could feel time moving now, cruel and practical. Oscar would have to go soon. There would be obligations. Interviews. Team meetings. The sterile language of incident analysis. He would have to relive what happened in detail, likely more than once, for people who needed information, content, narrative, closure.
He would do it well. That was the worst part. He would be articulate and measured and maddeningly calm. He would probably downplay the emotional side of it all so expertly that half the paddock would walk away thinking he was taking it fine.
You touched his wrist gently. “When press is done with you...”
He looked at you.
“Don’t disappear into your own head, okay?”
One side of his mouth tipped faintly. “No promises.”
“Oscar.”
“I heard you.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“It usually is.”
You narrowed your eyes.
He looked almost amused, but there was affection underneath it. “I’ll come find you.”
Your expression softened immediately. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Even if you decide to be all stoic and emotionally unavailable?”
“That’s a bit harsh.”
“It’s accurate.”
“Debatable,” he said again.
You leaned in and kissed his cheek, quick and soft. “Come find me anyway.”
His hand squeezed your waist once. “I will.”
The second the apartment stopped echoing with the sound of the door closing, Oscar looked like he couldn’t hold himself up under the day anymore.
It was in the way he stood there for one suspended second too long, shoulders tight, eyes fixed on nothing. Like he’d gotten himself all the way home on pure discipline and now that there was no audience left, no reason to keep the seams of himself stitched shut, his body didn’t know what to do next.
You barely had time to say his name before his face changed. Not all at once. That was the heartbreaking part. It happened in pieces, like even his breakdown had to fight through layers of restraint first.
His lips pressed together too hard, then trembled. His throat worked around a swallow that clearly hurt. His eyes went glassy, then wetter, then bright enough that you could see him realizing he wasn’t going to stop it in time.
“Oscar,” you whispered, already moving toward him.
He shook his head once. It wasn’t a no. Not really. It was more helpless than that. More like please don’t look too closely, because if you do, I’m gone.
Then his mouth quivered. Actually quivered. And the sight of it hit you so hard your own breathing caught.
He turned his face away immediately, one hand coming up like he could hide the evidence after the fact, but you had already seen too much, the shine in his eyes, the tightness in his jaw, the awful effort in every muscle of his face.
“I’m okay,” he said, and the words came out thin and shredded, the last syllable cracking in a way he clearly hadn’t meant to let happen.
Your heart broke cleanly in two.
“No, baby,” you said softly, reaching for him. “No, you’re not.”
That did it. His expression folded in on itself with this small, terrible kind of collapse, brows pinching, lips shaking harder, breath stuttering in and not quite coming back out right. He looked furious at himself for it instantly. Ashamed. Like the fact that he was standing in his own apartment with wet eyes and a trembling mouth was somehow one humiliation too many on top of the rest.
“I’m sorry,” he said quickly, too quickly, voice breaking again. “I just—”
He stopped because he couldn’t finish. A tear slipped out. He made this tiny, wrecked sound in the back of his throat, half frustration, half pure hurt, and turned away from you fully then, dragging a hand over his face as if he could physically wipe the whole thing off himself.
You reached him just as his breathing started to go uneven.
“Oscar—hey, hey, come here.”
He bent toward you like he didn’t know where else to go. His forehead nearly hit your shoulder. His hands gripped at your arms, then your waist, then the back of your shirt, like he needed to anchor himself somewhere and you were the first solid thing his body recognized. The first shaky breath left him against your collarbone, then another, and then he was crying in earnest, still trying so hard to keep it quiet it made the whole thing worse.
There was something devastating about the way Oscar cried. Even now, even cracked open, even miserable, he was still trying to minimize it. Trying to make himself smaller inside it. Like if he kept the sounds tiny enough, kept the shaking under control, kept his face hidden well enough, maybe this wouldn’t count as really losing it.
But he was. He was losing it. And you held him through every second of it.
“It’s okay,” you whispered into his hair, your hand spread between his shoulder blades, the other cradling the back of his head. “It’s okay, sweetheart. I’ve got you.”
He clutched you harder.
“I’m sorry,” he said again, voice breaking around the words. “I know this is—”
“No.” You pulled back just enough to cup his face, forcing him to hear you. “Don’t. Do not apologize.”
His lashes were wet, cheeks flushed, lower lip trembling so badly now that he finally just bit down on it like that might stop it. It didn’t. If anything it made him look even more fragile, like someone trying desperately to hold a door shut against something too strong on the other side.
“It’s embarrassing,” he whispered.
The confession came out in pieces. Small. Barely audible. Mortifying to him, obviously.
You shook your head immediately. “No.”
“It is.”
“No, baby.”
His face twisted. “I’m standing here crying because I binned it before the race even started.”
The sentence came out ragged, anger at himself tangled up with hurt so badly there was no separating them.
You touched his cheek with both hands. “You’re standing here crying because you’re heartbroken.”
His eyes shut like even hearing the word was too much.
“I didn’t even get to start,” he said, and that was the rawest version of him yet, no polish, no detached analysis, no sarcasm left to hide behind. Just pain. “I didn’t even get one lap. One race. Just... gone.”
Your own eyes stung instantly. “I know.”
“It was home,” he said, voice cracking so badly on the last word that he stopped and pressed his mouth together again, hard, like he could physically keep the rest inside.
But it was already spilling over. He covered his face with one hand, shoulders hitching once, then again.
“Hey,” you murmured, reaching up to gently catch his wrist. “Come with me.”
He didn’t really respond. He just let you guide him. That alone told you how far gone he was.
Usually, even upset, Oscar would still have some instinct to straighten up, to say he was fine, to insist he could walk on his own, sit on his own, manage it. But now he just followed the pressure of your hands like he didn’t have enough left in him to pretend otherwise.
You led him down the short hallway toward the bedroom, one hand in his, the other on his arm. His breathing was still uneven, and every so often he’d drag in one shaky breath that sounded almost steady until the end of it broke apart.
By the time you reached the bed, he looked wrecked.
“Sit down for me,” you said softly.
He did. Almost instantly. He sat on the edge of the bed like his legs had finally given up on being useful. Then, before you could even move in front of him, he bent forward and covered his face with both hands. The sight of that nearly undid you.
Oscar, who hated being visibly emotional, who hated being watched when he was vulnerable, who would rather evaporate than be dramatic in front of anyone, was sitting on the edge of the bed with his face hidden in his hands because he couldn’t keep himself together anymore.
You climbed onto the bed behind him immediately. The mattress dipped under your weight, and then you were wrapping both arms around him from behind, one across his chest, the other around his waist, pulling him back against you as tightly and gently as you could.
The second you touched him like that, he broke harder. His whole body folded into the hold as if he’d been one second from coming apart completely and your arms were the only thing that kept him from it. His hands stayed over his face. His shoulders shook. The sound he made was still small, still so controlled, still so him, but it was unmistakably a sob this time, dragged out of him against his will.
“Oh, sweetheart,” you whispered, tightening your arms around him. “I know. I know.”
He shook his head under his hands.
You pressed your cheek to his shoulder blade, holding him tighter. “You don’t have to hide.”
He gave a broken little laugh-sob into his palms that sounded horribly ashamed.
“I look ridiculous,” he said, words muffled.
You closed your eyes for a second against the ache of it. “No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do.”
He sounded like he hated how young and wrecked his own voice had gone.
You slid one hand up from his chest to his wrist, thumb brushing there gently. “Oscar.”
He didn’t move his hands. So you kissed the back of his shoulder instead, then the line of his neck, then just stayed there with your mouth near his skin and your arms around him, making him feel every possible version of I’m here.
“You don’t look ridiculous,” you murmured. “You look devastated.”
His breathing hitched hard.
“It mattered to you,” you whispered. “It still does.”
That got another shudder through him. He dropped his elbows to his knees, still covering his face, and you went with him, arms tightening around his middle from behind, practically wrapped all the way around him now. You could feel each uneven breath under your forearm. Could feel how hard he was trying to calm down and failing every time he got close.
“I should be over it,” he said into his hands.
“No.”
“It’s stupid.”
“No.”
“It’s just one race.”
You pressed your cheek to his back again. “It was your home race.”
He went very still after that. Then his mouth trembled visibly behind his hands, enough that the heels of his palms shifted with it.
“It was supposed to be good,” he whispered.
And there it was. Not the crash. Not the replay. Not the debrief. Not the headlines. That.
It was supposed to be good.
The quiet hope underneath everything. The one he’d tried so hard not to name all week. The thing he’d denied in every careful media answer. The thing he’d only let you see in tiny moments and half-sentences and restless silences in the dark.
It was supposed to be good.
You tightened your hold on him until you were almost trembling with it. “I know, baby.”
His next breath shook all the way through him.
“I needed it to be good,” he said, and the voice that came out barely sounded like him anymore, so cracked, so small, so hurt you had to blink back tears immediately.
“Oh, Oscar.”
He finally dragged one hand down from his face, only to wipe harshly at his cheek and then cover his eyes again like he couldn’t bear the idea of being seen like this. “I’m sorry.”
You sat up slightly behind him and kissed the side of his head. “Stop apologizing to me.”
“I can’t help it.”
“I know.” Another kiss. “But you don’t owe anyone an apology, least of all me.”
A tiny, wet exhale that might have been a laugh left him, but it dissolved into another broken breath before it could become anything real.
You stayed like that for a while. Wrapped around him. Holding him together. Feeling the worst of it move through him in waves.
Each time he seemed to steady, something else hit him, the memory of it, the humiliation of it, the loss of it, and his shoulders would tense again, his face would disappear more stubbornly into his hands, and you’d just hold on tighter.
“It doesn’t make me think less of you,” you whispered at one point, because you knew him. Knew exactly where some part of his mind had gone. “Not even a little.”
He inhaled sharply, like the sentence had landed somewhere tender.
Then, very quietly, muffled by his palms, “You shouldn’t have to deal with this.”
Your chest ached. “Deal with what?”
“This.” A helpless gesture from behind his hands. “Me being like this.”
You kissed his shoulder again, lingering this time. “I want to.”
He shook his head faintly.
“I do,” you insisted, voice soft but firm. “I want you exactly like this if this is how you need to be. You don’t have to be easy all the time.”
At that, his hands finally slipped down. Not all the way. Just enough to reveal his face. His eyes were redder now, lashes wet, cheeks flushed with humiliation and crying. He looked absolutely wrecked by the fact that you were seeing him like this, and yet underneath that embarrassment there was something else too, something needy and raw and almost disbelieving. Like he couldn’t quite understand how you were still here, still touching him, still looking at him so gently when he felt so broken open.
You moved one hand from around him to his jaw and turned his face slightly toward you.
“There you are,” you whispered.
His lower lip quivered again instantly.
He looked away. “Don’t.”
Your thumb brushed under his eye. “Don’t what?”
“Be nice to me right now.”
The sentence was so painfully him you almost smiled through your tears.
“Why not?”
“Because I can’t...” He stopped, swallowed, tried again. “I can’t deal with that at the moment.”
Your whole face softened. “You can, though.”
“No, I really can’t.”
His voice cracked again on the last word, and the embarrassment that flashed over his face after it made you slide both arms around him once more, hugging him tighter from behind.
“Yes, you can,” you murmured into the side of his neck. “You can let me love you through it.”
He closed his eyes. You could feel the exact second he gave in to the sentence. Not giving up. Giving in. Letting himself be loved instead of trying to outrun it.
His head tipped back against your shoulder, just slightly, an exhausted, instinctive lean into you. You kissed the damp skin near his temple.
“That’s it,” you whispered. “Just stay with me.”
He nodded weakly. For a while you simply held him while his breathing settled by degrees. One of your hands stroked slowly over his chest. The other combed through his hair over and over, each pass softer than the last. Sometimes he’d catch your wrist for a second, not stopping you, just holding on. Sometimes he’d tilt his face a little more into your shoulder as if he wanted to disappear there.
He was still embarrassed. You could feel it in the way he kept ducking his head whenever you moved around far enough to look at him. In the way he wiped at his face too quickly, like he hated any visible proof. In the way he kept swallowing back the remains of his crying as if even now he wasn’t sure he was allowed this much. So you loved that part too.
You kissed the corner of his jaw. His hair. His temple. The side of his neck. Each kiss quiet and grounding and full of adoration.
Eventually he turned his head enough that your mouths were only inches apart. His eyes flicked to yours, uncertain, vulnerable, still damp.
“Hi,” you whispered.
A tiny, watery huff left him. “Bit rough.”
You smiled softly. “You’re very brave for surviving me saying hi.”
That got the faintest twitch at the corner of his mouth. There he was. Still wrecked. Still heartbroken. Still needing you. But there.
You touched his cheek. “Can I kiss you?”
He nodded immediately. Too quickly. Like he needed it. So you kissed him. Slow at first. Very gentle. Just enough pressure to let him sink into it.
He exhaled shakily into your mouth, and the sound of it nearly melted you. One of his hands came up and found your arm where it was wrapped around him, gripping there as if he needed an anchor while he kissed you back.
You kissed him again, deeper this time. And Oscar turned into it with heartbreaking need. No teasing. No measured restraint. No dry little comments. Just need.
He shifted, turning more toward you on the bed until he was half twisted in your arms, then fully, and suddenly you were both moving at once, the awkward, eager scramble of two people who only cared about getting closer. He pulled you with him, and you let him, until you were facing each other properly, knees knocking, hands everywhere soft and searching and desperate in that way heartbreak sometimes made tenderness feel urgent.
His hands found your waist and held on hard. You cupped his face and kissed him again, and his mouth parted under yours with the most fragile little breath. He still tasted like tears, like held-back words, like the raw ache of a day gone wrong. Every time you kissed him, he seemed to need more of it, not in a greedy way, just in this broken, clinging way that made your chest ache. Like he was trying to be reassured with touch because words alone weren’t enough.
When you pulled back for air, he followed you an inch, eyes still closed.
You brushed your thumb over his cheek. “Sweet boy.”
He actually shivered.
His forehead dropped to yours. “Don’t call me that when I’m already humiliated.”
You smiled softly. “You’re not humiliated.”
He opened his eyes just enough to give you a look that said clearly, I am absolutely humiliated.
You kissed the pout of his mouth before he could say it. That made him melt all over again.
His arms came around you then, really around you, tight and close, pulling you into his lap as if he could not physically stand another inch of distance. You went willingly, settling against him, and the second you did he buried his face against your neck.
There was something so undone about it. So needy. So unguarded. You wrapped yourself around him instantly.
“That’s it,” you whispered, one hand in his hair, the other rubbing slowly up and down his back. “You can have me. I’m right here.”
He let out a shaky breath against your skin.
“Still sorry,” he muttered, voice muffled into your neck.
You smiled sadly and kissed his temple. “I know you are.”
“For this.”
“I know.”
Another pause. Then, smaller: “Can’t seem to stop.”
Your heart twisted so hard it hurt.
You drew back just enough to look at him and tucked a piece of hair back from his forehead. “Then don’t stop yet. Just let me hold you while you do.”
His face softened with something almost like relief. You kissed him again before he could get embarrassed by that too.
This time the kiss went deeper almost instantly, because he needed it to. Because he was still aching, still shaky, still full of things he couldn’t name without breaking apart again. His hands slid into your hair, clumsy and warm, and for a few seconds it was nothing but mouths and breath and the soft rustle of the bedding beneath you.
Every now and then his mouth would falter, the emotion of the day catching up to him again, and he’d press his forehead to yours with a shaky exhale like he was trying not to cry all over again.
And every time, you’d kiss him softly once, then again, then drag your fingers through his hair and tell him in the quietest voice you had, “I’m here.”
Eventually he pulled back just far enough to look at you. His cheeks were still flushed. His lashes were still damp. He still looked embarrassed, still wrecked, still heartbreakingly soft from crying. And he still needed you so obviously it made your whole chest ache.
“You’re not going to think I’m pathetic for this?” he asked, voice low and rough and terribly sincere.
You took his face in both hands.
“Oscar,” you said softly, “I think you’re the bravest person I know. And right now I mostly think you need to be kissed and held until you stop apologizing for having a heart.”
His mouth trembled again, but this time it was closer to being overwhelmed than ashamed. He leaned into your hands. Then he kissed you first. It was a little desperate. A little messy. Very, very tender. And you kissed him back like you could make a home out of your mouth for him, something warm and safe and only his.
He made a small sound into the kiss, still wounded, still soft, and pulled you even closer, until there was no space left at all. And this time, when his eyes filled again, he didn’t hide. He just let you hold him and kiss him and love him through it.
Then, voice small, painfully honest: “Can I… be inside you? Just to—” he swallowed, eyes glossy, “—feel close. I don’t want to think. I just want you.”
You cupped his cheek, thumb brushing his jaw. “You can have me. Come here.”
You took off your sweatpants and climbed into his lap gently. After pulling his jeans and boxers down, he helped guide you down onto him as you moved your panties to the side, slow, careful, like you were something holy. You sank onto him fully and both of you gasped, soft and shaky.
He exhaled into your shoulder like he was finally home. No thrusting. Just warmth. His cock deep inside you, your bodies joined, his arms wrapped tightly around your waist. He let out a broken breath.
“Feels like I can breathe again,” he whispered.
You stroked his hair, cheek to his temple. “You’re safe here. I’ve got you.”
His fingers pressed into your hips, grounding himself in your presence. Every tiny shift made you both shiver, but neither of you chased friction. The connection was the point, the warmth, the fullness, the intimacy.
Time blurred, soft and slow. You kissed his forehead. He sighed, melting under you inch by inch.
Eventually his hands started roaming, lazy strokes up your spine, thumb circling your hipbone, a kiss to your throat. The kind of touches that weren’t asking, just needing.
“You make everything quiet in my head,” he breathed. “I didn’t know I could need someone like this.”
Your chest tightened. You kissed him, slow, lingering, lips brushing like a confession. He kissed back deeper. Gentle became hungry. Stillness became rocking hips. His hands gripped your ass softly, guiding the smallest motions.
You broke the kiss gasping. “Oscar…”
He rested his forehead to yours, pupils blown wide. “Move for me,” he murmured, quiet but wrecked. “Just a little. Please.”
You rolled your hips, slow and soft. He sucked in a breath through his teeth, fingers digging into your waist. “You are so good to me,” he whispered, praise melting into need. “So warm. So perfect around me.”
The soft rhythm grew, bodies sliding together. No rush. No frantic hunger. Just deep, lazy thrusts, like making love half-dreaming, like your heart was guiding your hips more than your body.
He kissed you again, slower this time, tongue brushing yours like he was tasting comfort. “You feel like home,” he breathed into your mouth.
Your fingers tangled in his hair, pulling lightly, and he moaned. Quiet, broken. He thrust up into you, gentle but deeper. Again. And again. Slow waves of pleasure building like warm honey spreading through your veins.
You gasped into his kiss. “Oscar, that feels—”
“I know,” he whispered, kissing down your throat. “Let go for me. I’ve got you.”
His thumb found your clit, barely any pressure, just enough. Combined with the languid slide of him inside you, it was overwhelming in the softest way.
Your orgasm came slowly, like a tide rising, thighs trembling around him, breath catching as you pressed your forehead to his shoulder. “Oscar — I’m—”
“Come for me,” he murmured, holding your hips tighter, helping you ride the wave. “Just let it happen.”
You melted, unraveling with a whimper, muscles fluttering around him. He groaned into your neck, hips stuttering but never rough, chasing his own release through your pleasure.
He came with a soft broken sound, burying his face in your shoulder like he couldn’t contain it. Warmth. Pressure. Fullness. Two bodies trembling as they fell apart together softly.
For a moment neither of you moved, just breathed, foreheads touching, hearts synced.
He kissed your jaw, your cheek, your lips, slow and reverent.
“Thank you,” he whispered, like you saved him. “I needed you.”
You brushed a curl back from his forehead, smiling softly. “I’m not going anywhere.”
He guided you down without pulling out, curling you against him, cock still warm inside you, hand on your back like he needed the connection to keep breathing.
“Can we stay like this for a bit?” he murmured.
“All the time you need,” you whispered.
You fell asleep still joined, bodies tangled, love warm and quiet around you.
Thank you for this! Made it a little bit better 🥲
fp1 & fp2 issues, GP Australia, 2026
"No, apparently that's because of the FIA. When you're too low in RPM, they turn something off."
okay so what i'm learning about the new cars is that they will commit suicide if you look at them the wrong way
🌪 Dirty Air Explained
Why Following Another Car Is So Hard
In Formula 1, cars don’t just race on engines and tyres. They race through air. When a car follows another closely, it drives through dirty air.
📏 Track Limits Explained
What They Are & Why Penalties Happen
Track limits define how much of the track a driver is allowed to use. Exceeding them can lead to warnings, lap deletions, and penalties.
📏 Track Limits Explained
What They Are & Why Penalties Happen
Track limits define how much of the track a driver is allowed to use. Exceeding them can lead to warnings, lap deletions, and penalties.