The Art Of Loving pt. 4
pairing: oscar piastri x writer!reader theme: angst wc: 8.4K a/n: sorry :(
warnings: foul language, physical abuse, emotional & verbal abuse
How do you face the end of a story that was just beginning?
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They say it takes an average of sixty-six days to get used to anything.
The first time they moved in together, it had taken them exactly 10 days to adjust to the friction of sharing a space; of learning each other’s morning routines, navigating around their home, and building a friendship from the sterile foundation of a legal contract, but now that they had officially checked off the actually falling in love with each other box of their marriage, she realized that building a new habit was going to take a lot longer than the 10 days they had.
Day 1 of their new reality was proving to be a beautifully disorienting lesson in letting her guard down. It started the second she woke up. Usually, if they ended up tangled together during the night, there would be a brief, polite scramble to let go the moment their eyes opened, a flurry of mumbled apologies and sheepish pulling away. Today, Oscar’s arms were wrapped around her in a way that was undeniably meaningful. When she stirred, he didn't pull away. Instead, his grip tightened, burying his face into the crook of her neck and pulling her impossibly closer, anchoring her against his chest as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
She laid perfectly still for a moment, her heart doing a frantic little dance against her ribs as she stared at the soft morning light filtering through the blinds. Slowly, carefully, she tried to shift her weight to look up at him, but the movement only caused his arm to lock more securely around her waist. "Morning," he mumbled, his voice thick and raspy with sleep, the sound vibrating directly against her collarbone.
"Morning," she breathed, a small, tentative smile catching on her lips. She cleared her throat slightly, her old instincts screaming at her to give him space. "Osc? You’re kind of cutting off my circulation a little bit." She joked, trying to pry his arms open, but instead of the usual sudden panic or the sheepish, rushed apology she expected, Oscar just let out a low, deeply contented hum. He didn't move an inch. If anything, he tucked his chin tighter over her head.
"Good," he murmured, his eyes still closed as a lazy, boyish grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. "That means you can't escape."
"I'm not trying to escape," she giggled, her fingers tentatively reaching up to rest against his forearm. "I just thought... usually we, you know, do a polite three-second rule and scramble to opposite sides of the mattress." Oscar slowly opened his eyes, a glint of pure, unbothered mischief in his gaze as he looked down at her.
"Yeah, well, that was before," he said, shifting his weight just enough to prop his chin on her shoulder, staring at her with deadpan absolute certainty. "Now that I know you love me back, there’s no more letting go."
The unusual behavior is only amplified by breakfast. For months, their morning routine had been a dance of quiet co-existence; she would make his hot cocoa while he listened to his podcasts with his headphones half-on. Today, there were no headphones. As she stood at the stove, a pair of warm, solid arms slid around her waist from behind. Oscar rested his chin on her shoulder, his chest pressed flush against her back, effortlessly moving with her as she stirred the milk. They were like two peas in a pod, swaying in a gentle, rhythmic domesticity. She certainly wasn't complaining, but it was... weird. (In a good way.)
The real tipping point, however, came in the afternoon. Oscar was logged onto his sim rig, waiting for a track to load on the screen. She had dragged a giant bean bag from the living room into the corner of his tech room just so they could be close, content to lounge with her back pressed against the wall as she read a book. Without turning his head from the steering wheel, Oscar spoke up. “Baby, do you want iced coffee? I can EatIn from your favorite place. I’m kind of craving their pain au chocolat.”
Ba—what?
The incident from this morning was one thing, but this was a structural threat to her nervous system. Her face instantly flamed. She sat frozen on the bean bag, her eyes staring blankly at the page of her book, utterly incapacitated by the fact that he had just casually dropped the b-word into a conversation. “Hello? Are you still there?” Oscar’s voice broke the silence. He spun around, looking back at her with a curious tilt of his head. “I—uh, sure,” was all she could manage to choke out, her voice a full octave higher than normal. Oscar raised an eyebrow, a slow, knowing smile tugging at the corners of his lips. He unbuckled his headset, slid out of the rig, and walked over, crouching down right in front of her bean bag. “You good?”
It was entirely unfair. His face was inches away from hers, and it didn't help his case that he looked ungodly beautiful even in two-day-old pajama pants, a soft gray t-shirt, and completely unbrushed, wild hair. The sheer proximity made the heat rush straight to her ears, turning her a violent shade of pink. She held the book up slightly, trying to shield her face. “You called me… the b-word.” That was the exact moment Oscar’s heart seemingly exploded into a million tiny fireworks. The absolute contrast of this fierce, hyper-capable, independent woman who always had her chin up, ready to face whatever the day threw at her was turning into a flustered, blushing mess over a standard term of endearment was the most winsome thing he had ever witnessed.
“What? Baby?” he repeated, his voice dropping into a lower, raspy register that sent a literal shiver down her spine. She gave a helpless, microscopic nod, refusing to look him in the eye. “Do you like it when I call you baby?” he asked, the teasing smirk in his voice completely betraying the innocent look on his face.
“Oscar!” she whined, her hands flying up to cover her face entirely. Oscar let out a rich, genuine laugh, the sound echoing off the walls of the small room. He reached out, gently pulling her hands away from her bright red cheeks. “Come on, look at me, baby.” He was teasing now. “No, stop it, I’m leaving,” she gasped, scrambling to find leverage on the squishy fabric of the bean bag to stand up and escape the room, but Oscar unfortunately had lightning-fast reflexes. Before she could even get her knees under her, his hands locked around her waist, effortlessly catching her momentum and pulling her right back down. With a soft humph, they both collapsed backward into the oversized bag, completely tangled together in a heap of soft fabric and limbs.
She landed squarely against his chest, her heart hammering wildly, but as she looked up and saw him looking down at her, his eyes crinkling at the corners, completely breathless from laughing, the embarrassment melted into something fiercely sweet. “Uh-oh, but you’re stuck,” Oscar murmured, his arms wrapping securely around her shoulders to keep her from bolting, a triumphant grin lighting up his face. “You have no choice but to stay right here with me…baby.”
“You’re insufferable.” She buried her burning face directly into his chest, her own laughter finally bubbling up to join his.
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Day 7 was a different beast entirely. They’d been unexpectedly invited to Charles’ yacht for a summer getaway, and the weight of it felt heavier than any race weekend. This would be the first time they stepped into the world as people actually in a relationship. Now, she was a chronic over-packer, a woman who needed a week’s lead time to ensure every just-in-case scenario was accounted for. It was a coping mechanism she’d developed over years of managing everyone else's lives.
“Osco? Where’d you put my luggage? The yellow one I used before?”
The nickname had started as a sleepy mumble a few nights prior when she’d tried to say Oscar and Cocoa at the same time, and it had stuck because the way he’d giggled at the silly name was too adorable to stop. She walked into her—their—room, clutching the coffee he’d dropped off after his gym session. “It’s here, baby,” he said, his voice muffled. He was sprawled across the duvet, tongue poking out slightly in concentration as he fumbled with her Nintendo Switch, trying to figure out the controls of the new cozy game she’d just bought.
“Where exactly?”
Oscar sat up, pulling the yellow suitcase from behind the door. “Here.” She went to grab the handle, but as she pulled, she nearly stumbled. The bag was heavy. Like, fully loaded heavy. “Hey, what’d you put inside?” Oscar, already back to navigating her virtual world, didn't even look up. “Uh, our things? I’ve already packed for us,” he said, his tone as calm and matter-of-fact as if he were discussing the weather.
She froze. “You… packed?”
A part of her wanted to scream; another part wanted to tackle him into the pillows and never let him leave the room. She felt that familiar, traitorous heat creeping up her neck. She set her coffee down with trembling hands and unzipped the bag, bracing herself for a jumbled mess of racing tees and mismatched socks.
Instead, she found the literal key to her own heart.
Everything was tucked into her absolutely-anally labelled packing cubes. Their clothes weren't just folded; they were nested together, color-coordinated and steamed with a precision that bordered on obsessiveness. It was a visual representation of their lives merging, his heavy hoodies protecting her silk dresses, his structured linens alongside her summer romps. Who in the world packed like a professional organizer just for a weekend away? Also, when the hell did he make time to do this?
It felt ridiculous to feel a blush creeping up her neck over a neatly packed suitcase, done precisely the way she always did it, without a single word prompted, but truthfully it wasn't about any of that; it was the fact that he had looked at her life, seen a task she was so used to tackling alone, and quietly decided to handle it for her.
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Day 14 was the day of the getaway. They walked up the ramp of the yacht hand-in-hand, Oscar carrying the luggage in his free hand. As soon as they stepped onto the deck, Lando was already there, a devilish glint in his eye. "I hear congratulations are in order?" Lando whispered as he approached, a smirk playing on his lips.
She rolled her eyes immediately. "Aubrey or Posie?"
They had decided to keep the real status of their relationship a secret for a while longer, terrified of jinxing the peace they’d found, but a few nights ago, in an uncontrolled, accidental split second, Oscar had leaned down to kiss her while her sisters were on a video call. The screen had basically caught fire. “Oh my god! You guys confessed!” Aubrey had screamed, and in sheer panic, she had ended the call, which only prompted a hundred messages in their group chat.
Lando just laughed, miming zipping his mouth shut before handing them each a glass of welcome champagne.
Naturally, she knew it was her sisters who had leaked the news. After their last visit, Lando had kept in touch with both of them. On one hand, Lando had become a surrogate older brother to them alongside Oscar; on the other hand, it meant her secret romantic life had a direct pipeline to the talkative Brit. Oscar unbothered, just squeezed her hand, pulling her closer against his side as they looked out at the water.
The entire time they were on that yacht, Oscar’s hands had a higher attachment rate to her body than gravity itself. It was almost embarrassing. The calm, collected, and morally-gray-when-it-comes-to-dealing-with-emotions Oscar was replaced by a man who looked like he was constantly terrified she might evaporate if he didn't maintain at least a hover of contact at all times. It was fine and sweet until it turned absolutely hilarious.
She had wandered off toward the stern to chat with Carlos. Everything was casual, truly, but of course, Carlos, being the aggressively charming and physically affectionate Spaniard that he is, casually slid a friendly, older-brother arm around her waist as they both laughed at a joke about Lando's golf swing and obnoxiously tight pants. Across the deck, Oscar’s internal radar went deep into the red, and his skin practically caught fire. In a move that lacked any of his usual calm grace, he downed an entire glass of champagne in one aggressive gulp, set the flute down with a sharp clink, and marched across the deck like a man on a mission.
Before she could even finish her sentence, Oscar swooped in, his arm locking around her and pulling her so hard and fast flush against his chest that she literally jumped.
Carlos didn’t even blink. He just continued talking about the best restaurants in Madrid, entirely unfazed by the sudden arrival of a human shield. She tried to keep up her end of the conversation, too, but it was hard to focus when Oscar’s fingers were tightening against her skin. Even so, because Oscar was still a fundamentally polite and well-raised man, he didn't interrupt. He just stood there. Silent. Stoic. Breathing slightly heavier than normal, but still allowing them to finish their conversation. He didn't say a single word to stop them from talking; he thought that as long as he was serving as a literal physical barrier between her and the rest of the world, it’d be okay. Throughout it all, she bit the inside of her cheek to hide her smirk, leaning back just a fraction into his rigid chest.
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One of her absolute favorites would have to be Day 29.
It was the final day of their summer vacation, and she was being extra pouty. She knew that once the holiday ended, Oscar would be swept back into a world of endless meetings, media obligations, and intense training. Something inside her was deeply annoyed at how clingy she was; she had spent her entire life being a stoic anchor, but when it comes to Oscar, she just couldn’t help it.
Oscar, on the other hand, didn't find her annoying in the slightest. He only laughed when he saw her wandering around the apartment with a tragic, slumped posture; and by the fifth time she sighed heavily while walking past him, Oscar decidedly pulled her down to sit on his lap, in the warmth of his embrace, and that was where she stayed for the entire day. Somewhere in between, the warmth of the sun and the steady, comforting rise and fall of Oscar’s chest lulled her into a deep sleep. Luckily for Oscar, she slept for two solid hours. He then used every single minute of that time to execute a secret mission of his own on the mini verandah attached to their bedroom, which overlooked the ocean. When she finally stirred and rubbed the sleep away from her eyes, she was startled to find Oscar standing near the bed, looking entirely too put-together. He was all dressed up in a crisp white button-down shirt and tailored trousers.
"Osco?" she asked, her voice thick with sleep. "Why are you dressed like that?"
"You're awake," he said, walking over to the bed and leaning down to plant a soft, lingering kiss on her forehead. "I've prepared something for you." Before she could ask a follow-up question, he handed her a sleek paper bag with a beautifully folded dress nestled inside. "What's all this?" Oscar just shrugged, that endearing, boyish smirk playing on his lips. "Just change into that, then come back and get me, ‘kay?"
Curiosity completely overriding her lingering grogginess, she took the bag and hurried into the powder room. She changed into the dress, which fit perfectly, of course, because he had apparently memorized her sizes, rapidly brushed out her sleep-tousled hair, and swiped on some lip balm she’d thankfully left on the counter.
What on earth was he up to?
When she stepped back out, Oscar was waiting and had mysteriously and magically procured a gorgeous bouquet of her favorite flowers. Her eyes widened in genuine shock. "Surprise," he murmured softly. He stepped into her space, handing her the bouquet before wrapping an arm around her waist to pull her into a sweet, agonizingly slow kiss that tasted of pure devotion. When they parted, he took her hand and led her toward the heavy curtains of their room. With a dramatic flair that was entirely uncharacteristic of his usual quiet nature, he pulled the fabric open to reveal the mini verandah.
"Oscar," she breathed, her voice cracking with surprise.
He had transformed the small outdoor space into a private oasis. Knowing how much she loved ambiance, he had gathered every single one of her scented candles from around the apartment, improvising a makeshift, glowing pathway, casting a warm, magical amber glow over a small table set for two. On the table sat containers of takeout from the upscale Italian restaurant she always talked about.
"I know you've been sad that I have to go back to work and that things are about to get really busy," Oscar said, his voice dropping into that quiet, grounding register that always made the rest of the world vanish. "So I wanted to do this. For you. A real date, just for the two of us.."
"Oh, Oscar," she whispered, her eyes stinging with happy tears. She set the flowers down, her heart swelling to the point of aching. As someone who has practically mastered planning everyone else's surprise parties, birthdays, graduations, and dinners, having someone meticulously plan something entirely for her was overwhelming. They sat down, the sound of the ocean waves crashing softly below them, the scent of lavender and vanilla candles mixing with the salty night air. Then, in a moment of quiet stillness between them, Oscar looked across the table, the fairy lights reflecting in his eyes.
"I love you."
It wasn't the first time they had said the words, but the way he said it tonight, with a fierce, quiet certainty that carried no doubts, made her heart beat in ways she didn't know were physically possible. She hadn't even realized a person's heart could be so insistent, so utterly consumed by the desire to always be near just one soul.
She reached across the small table, tangling her fingers with his.
"I love you too, Oscar."
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Day 45 was a crisp afternoon, and Oscar was carefully leading her through what felt like an endless, windy hangar, his hands steady on her waist as she stumbled blindly under a silk blindfold. All she could hear was the deafening, increasing roar of what sounded like a giant, industrial fan slicing through the air.
“Can you at least give me a hint?” she complained, her laughter muffled by the wind whipping her hair around her face. “No,” Oscar replied, his voice laced with a rare, buoyant excitement that made him sound entirely unlike the stoic athlete the public knew. “We’re almost there. Two more steps. Lean on to me and be careful with your footing.” When they finally came to a stop, she could practically feel the nervous, giddy energy vibrating off him. Oscar felt like he was about to jump out of his skin. He reached behind her head, untying the knot, and as the silk fabric slipped away, her eyes adjusted to the bright afternoon sun. Standing on the tarmac in front of them was a sleek, gleaming helicopter, boldly emblazoned with the McLaren logo.
“No way!” she gasped, her eyes twinkling as she looked from the aircraft to the boy beside her. Oscar beamed. He stepped in close, wrapping an arm around her shoulder and pulling her tight against his side just to plant a firm, lingering kiss on the top of her head.
“Who did you blackmail to pull this off?” she joked, playfully poking his ribs. Oscar let out a rich laugh, ducking away from her finger. “I may or may not have charmed Mark into letting me borrow the team transport for the day. In exchange, I had to promise him extra sim hours next week and five more mandatory media guestings.”
She turned in his embrace, her jaw dropping. “But you hate interviews! You’d rather do literally anything else.” Oscar’s smile softened, the playful teasing melting into that quiet, grounding sincerity that always made her breath hitch. He reached down, tucking a stray piece of hair behind her ear. “But I love you. So it’s completely fine.”
They hopped onto the helicopter, but the moment the cabin doors shut and the engine began to rev into a high-pitched whine, her chest tightened. The reality of leaving the ground kicked her anxiety into overdrive, her fingers instinctively clenching into the fabric of her seat. Oscar noticed instantly. Without a word, he slid closer on the leather bench, his fingers interlocking with hers so tightly there was no room for fear to slip through. As the helicopter lifted off, tilting into the sky, she squeezed his hand hard enough to turn her knuckles white, her eyes shut tight.
"Look at me," Oscar murmured into her headset, his voice a calm, steady anchor over the static. "Just look at me, baby. You're okay."
She forced her eyes open, locking onto his steady gaze. Slowly, as the aircraft leveled out, he guided her eyes toward the window. The sheer, breathtaking beauty of the French Riviera unrolled beneath them like a canvas of deep sapphire and sparkling gold. With Oscar's arm wrapped securely around her shoulders, holding her so close she could feel the steady beat of his heart, the terror dissolved into pure awe. They spent the flight pointing out the tiny yachts below, laughing as Oscar tried to narrate the scenery in a ridiculous, over-the-top tour guide voice just to keep her smiling.
When the helicopter finally touched down on a private pad, the blades slowly spinning to a halt, Oscar waited for the ground assistant to jog over and pop the door open. The moment the fresh, salty sea air rushed into the cabin, Oscar stepped out first, turning back to offer her his hand with a theatrical bow. "Welcome to Saint-Tropez," he announced, a triumphant grin lighting up his face. She stepped onto the grass, completely awestruck by the sun-drenched coast and the beautiful, colorful villas in the distance. She turned to him, her heart overflowing. "What are we doing here?"
Oscar pulled her into his chest, his arms locking around her waist as he looked down at her, his eyes warm with a devotion that felt entirely permanent. "I figured it's been a while since you were able to sit down and just focus on writing without worrying about me, your sisters, and everything else," he whispered, his chin resting on her head. "So, I'm giving you something beautiful to write about."
A lump suddenly caught in her throat, the sheer weight of his care catching her completely off guard. As she leaned her head against his shoulder, looking out over the sparkling Mediterranean, a quiet, melancholic pondering began to untangle in her mind. It was just so easy for him to love her. There was no hesitation in him, no ledger where he kept score of what he gave versus what he received. He just poured all of his love out, entirely unprompted.
She wondered, not for the first time, if Aubrey and Posie had been right all along. Her sisters always used to lecture her, telling her that she had been shut off from the world for too long, that she’d worn her armor so tightly that she didn't even know how to accept affection anymore. Was that why even the simplest things, the way he memorized her coffee and sleep patterns, the way he held her hand when she was scared, felt so profoundly, devastatingly magical to her? Because she was a starving person finally being handed a feast?
But beneath the awe, a familiar, toxic thread of guilt pulled at her chest. She felt, deeply and truly, like she didn't deserve any of this. She felt like she was doing absolutely nothing for him in return. She wasn't the one sacrificing hours of her life to do the grandest gestures, she wasn't renting helicopters, she wasn't rearranging her entire universe just to make him smile. She was just there, receiving it all. How was it possible for a man like Oscar Piastri to look at her and find so much love to give, when she felt like she had so little left to offer?
"Hey," Oscar murmured, sensing the shift in her energy. He pulled back just enough to look into her eyes, his thumb gently wiping a stray, unbidden tear from her cheek. "You're overthinking again. Stop it."
She let out a watery laugh, burying her face back into his crisp shirt, deciding to silence the doubts, if only for today. She didn't have the answers to how he loved her so deeply, but as his arms tightened securely around her waist, she knew she never wanted to let it go.
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On Day 60, they spent the entire day wrapped in a hazy bubble of cinematic comfort, watching as many Adam Sandler movies as they could physically manage until their eyes burned and they couldn't laugh anymore.
By the time the afternoon began to bleed into a quiet evening, they reached the final movie on their list: The Wedding Singer, which had always been one of her absolute favorites. Somewhere along the way of running through the comedies, they had found themselves utterly tangled in each other under a soft, plush knit blanket, her back pressed against his chest and his long arms locked securely around her. As the screen flickered, her eyes wandered off to the final wedding scene. Watching the chaotic, sweet culmination of a love story on screen made something ache deep within her chest. She breathed a little deeper, a soft, involuntary sigh escaping her lips before she could even think to stop it. Oscar, being hyper-aware of every micro-movement and shift in her posture, noticed instantly. He pressed a soft kiss to the side of her neck, his breath warm against her skin. "You okay, baby?"
She smiled, tilting her head back to kiss the solid forearm wrapped around her. "Yes. I'm okay."
"But you're thinking?" he countered gently. To have someone be so entirely in the know of who you are, how you react, and exactly what you feel was both a profound blessing and a terrifying curse. She knew she couldn’t hide a single thing from him. Sighing once more, she let her guard down, her eyes tracking the rolling credits of the film. "Nothing serious, really," she murmured softly. "It’s just... I’ve always thought that if I were to ever get married, I’d have an actual ceremony. Even if it was tiny. Just a little celebration of a dream come true." She paused, her fingers twisting a loose thread on the blanket. "I mean, I know how this all started. And I just... I don’t know. It’s just crazy that my first marriage was a contract signing in a lawyer's office, more than anything else."
Oscar didn’t speak immediately. The silence stretched for a moment, and she almost regretted being so vulnerable, but then he suddenly reached for the remote and paused the television. The sudden quiet of the room alerted her as Oscar threw off the blanket and stood up, pulling her up right along with him. "Okay," Oscar said, his expression intensely focused. "Let’s go."
"Go where?" she asked, blinking in confusion. "Oscar, it's dark outside."
She tried to stop him, but he was already moving around the apartment with a bizarre, mission-driven speed. She watched in utter bewilderment as he snatched a small bundle of silk decorative flowers from a vase on the console table, marched into the bathroom to grab a clean, white linen hand towel, and then walked back over to her.
"Give me your ring," he said, holding out his palm. Completely dumbstruck and unable to speak out of sheer confusion, she slowly slid the band off her finger and dropped it into his hand. He took it, grabbed her wrist gently, and dragged her into the kitchen. He flicked off the overhead lights, leaving only the warm, ambient lighting to illuminate the space, casting long, intimate shadows across the room. He carefully placed their rings side-by-side on the marble kitchen island.
Then, with a completely straight face, he took the white linen hand towel and delicately draped it over the top of her head like a makeshift bridal veil.
She burst into a sudden laughter, her shoulders shaking. "Oscar! What on earth are you doing?" Ignoring it, he stepped directly into her space, taking both of her hands in his. His grip was warm, solid, and completely grounding.
"Now, I know this isn’t a fancy wedding at the plaza, or a tiny, picturesque chapel overlooking the sea," he started, looking down at her. He was dead serious, yet that beautiful, rare smile, the one that only ever comes out when the rest of the world disappears and it was just the two of them, lighted up his eyes. "But you’re right. You deserve an actual wedding to go along with this marriage. And I'm not letting you wait for it."
Her laughter died down, replaced by a sudden, fierce lump in her throat. She looked up at him, her heart beginning to hammer against her ribs.
"I don't have a script for this, and I usually look for logic in everything," Oscar whispered, his fingers tightening around hers. "But there is no logic in how completely you’ve rewritten my world. When we signed that contract, I thought it was just me agreeing to a neat, transactional arrangement to steady the waters; but what I didn't know was that I was signing up to find my anchor. I used to think that a life well-lived was one that was filled with calculated decisions, and always based on facts, but loving you has taught me that the most beautiful things are the ones you never saw coming."
He swallowed hard, his thumb tracing slow, soothing circles over the back of her hands. "I have spent my whole life looking forward, focused on the next turn, the next goal, but with you, I finally want to stand completely still. I love the fierce, protective way you carry the weight of everyone else, but it breaks my heart that you ever thought you had to earn your right to be cherished. So, I promise you this: I am going to spend the rest of our days ensuring you never have to navigate the quiet alone. I choose you. Not because a piece of paper told me to. Not because you helped save my ass; but because my soul doesn't recognize a home that doesn't have you in it. You are my wife. In every way that matters."
By the time he finished, the tears were streaming down her face, hot and fast, catching in the fabric of her pyjama shirt. She could barely see him through the blur of her vision, her chest heaving with a deep, emotional sob. "Your turn," he murmured softly, his own eyes suspiciously bright as he smiled down at her wreckage, wiping down the stray tears with a soft flick of his thumb.
She took a shaky, trembling breath, squeezing his hands back as hard as she could. "Oscar... I’ve lived my entire life always prioritizing everyone else. It was just human nature to me to be the one who absorbs the blows, who carries the worries, who stands in the background making sure everyone else survives. I built a life out of being the giver of love, and I honestly believed that was all I was meant for. Never did it cross my mind that there was room for someone to take care of me, but then you came along."
She let out a wet, breathless laugh, looking at their hands joined between them. "You love me so effortlessly, so greatly, that sometimes I feel bad but you never give me reasons to doubt. You look past the armor just see me. Oscar, when I am in your arms, the noise stops. My brain is completely quiet. I don't have to plan for the worst or protect against the dark. I just get to be loved. I never knew a love like that existed, and I love you so much it terrifies me."
With reverent, steady hands, Oscar reached over to the counter, picked up her ring, and slowly slid it back onto her finger. She did the same for him, her hands shaking as the band settled into its rightful place. "By the power vested in me by our kitchen," Oscar whispered, a playful glint returning to his eyes, "I think you're supposed to kiss me now."
She didn't wait. She reached up, her hands finding the sides of his face as she pulled him down into a deep, desperate, beautifully real kiss. It tasted like salt from her tears and the absolute certainty of their future. When they finally parted, Oscar wrapped his arms entirely around her, burying his face into the crook of her neck and holding her so tightly against his chest it felt as though he were trying to fuse their souls together. She held him back just as fiercely, burying her face into his shirt, inhaling the familiar, comforting scent of him. In that quiet, beautiful moment, as she rested in the safety of his embrace, she felt a fleeting thought cross her mind.
She had been so terrified to admit to herself that she actually deserved the profound, overwhelming love Oscar gave her, but holding him here, under the soft kitchen lights... she thought that maybe, just maybe, she did.
If she had only known what was going to happen in the few days, she would have stayed a minute more. She would have memorized the exact temperature of his skin, the precise pressure of his arms, and she would have held onto the warmth of his hug until the clock ran out.
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On Day 61 Oscar had left for the upcoming race weekend, and she had made the rare decision to stay behind at their apartment for the first half of the week. The plan had been simple, practical, and laced with their new brand of domestic sweetness: she would lock herself away to write for four days, and then fly out on a late-night flight just before the Grand Prix weekend officially kicked off. Oscar had kissed her goodbye at the door, complaining about how the hotel would be empty without her, and she had promised him she’d be sitting in the back of his garage by Friday morning like she always did.
But on Day 62, the illusion of their perfect, quiet world shattered under the weight of a truth she never saw coming. It wasn't the ruthless pressure of the international racing circuit or the prying eyes of the media that came for them, but the ghosts of her own house.
The apartment was entirely silent, the television humming low in the background as she began packing her luggage, when her phone lit up on the kitchen island. It was Aubrey. The moment she pressed the phone to her ear, her blood ran cold. Her sister wasn't just crying; she was hyperventilating, her voice a frantic, breathless whisper muffled by the heavy winter coats of the closet she was hiding inside. Between jagged, terrified gasps, Aubrey spilled the horrors she had just uncovered on their father’s home computer.
He hadn't just been drowning in bad investments or gambling debts, which they had always suspected. He had been systematically embezzling millions from his corporate clients for years. And then came the blow that made the room tilt beneath her feet: the accidental leaked paparazzi photos that had forced her and Oscar into the public marriage contract in the first place had never been a mistake. There was no rogue photographer who happened to catch him in a private moment. Her father had explicitly hired the photographer, leaked the coordinates, and orchestrated the entire fake scandal. He had engineered the legal trap because he knew Oscar’s family was prominent, he knew McLaren was a multi-billion-dollar entity, and he fully intended to blackmail and bleed them dry through the legal and financial attachment of a marriage. Aubrey had found the offshore accounts, the email threads, and the digital paper trail. But worse, she had confronted him after overhearing a suspicious, angry phone call in his study, and their father had snapped.
She didn't even remember grabbing her car keys. A blind, protective fury took over her body, and she practically tore the tires off her car, speeding through the rainy streets toward her childhood home. The drive took only fifty minutes, but it felt like fifty seconds of pure, unadulterated panic.
When she burst through the front door, the heavy oak swinging open with a loud crash, the house smelled exactly as it always had, stale whiskey and expensive furniture. Her father was standing at the base of the grand staircase, his clothing disheveled and his face contorted into a desperate, ugly rage that she recognized from the darkest corners of her childhood. Aubrey and Posie were huddled at the top of the landing, pale and trembling.
"I'm taking them," she demanded, her voice shaking violently but remaining utterly unyielding as she stepped between him and the stairs. "We are leaving. Right now."
Her father looked down at her, letting out a cruel, mocking laugh that echoed sharply off the high ceilings. He took a slow step toward her, his eyes wild. "Taking them? With what money? What are you going to do, write your little stories? You're going to support them with that? You’re just as pathetic and useless as your mother was."
Something inside her snapped. Years of swallowed anger, of being the shield, of playing the perfect, quiet, obedient daughter while absorbing his toxicity came rushing to the surface. She didn't shrink back. She stepped directly into his space, her eyes blazing with hatred so pure it stopped him in his tracks. "Don't you dare bring up my mother," she spat, her voice dropping into a lethal, shaking register. "For years, we have put up with you. We bowed our heads, we took your screaming, we played your perfect little family because we were terrified of what you’d do if we didn't. But looking at you right now? Seeing what a desperate, pathetic fraud you actually are? No wonder Mom was unhappy. No wonder she was so checked out. Living in the same house as a parasitic, hollow shell of a man was suffocating her. You didn't love her, you don't love us, and you certainly don't care about anything other than your own greed."
Her father’s face went from pale rage to a dangerous, mottled purple, his fists clenching at his sides.
"You think you engineered this brilliant master plan?" She pinned him with a glare, stepping even closer, completely disregarding the danger. "You used me as bait to bleed a good family, good people, dry because you were too incompetent to manage your own life. You are a thief. A blackmailer. A coward who hides behind expensive suits and whiskey."
"Shut the fuck up you ungrateful bitch!" he roared, raising his hand.
She screamed back, matching his volume, her voice echoing like a thunderclap through the cavernous foyer. "Look at yourself! You have absolutely nothing left. The police are coming, your accounts are exposed, and your daughters loathe the very sight of you. I will do everything in my power, I will spend every single cent I ever make, to take Aubrey and Posie as far away from you as humanly possible, you fucking monster!"
The insult pushed him entirely off the edge. With a guttural, animalistic snarl, his hand came down. The blow was blinding. The heavy, solid crack of his open palm against her jaw sent her stumbling backward, her vision instantly blurring as her shoulder slammed into the hallway table, shattering a crystal vase. A sharp, copper taste flooded her mouth. Before she could recover, he lunged again, grabbing her by the collar of her shirt and throwing her against the hardwood floor.
She didn't scream. She didn't cry. Her only instinct was to scramble back toward the base of the stairs, using her own battered body as a barricade. Just look at me, she thought desperately through the white-hot pain in her face. Above them, the terror broke into action. Seeing their sister bleeding on the floor unleashed a frantic, protective surge of adrenaline. Aubrey bolted down the stairs, grasping a massive, thick hardcover coffee table book they had owned for a decade.
With a desperate, choked cry, Aubrey swung the heavy book with all her might, striking their father squarely across the side of his head. The impact was a sickening thud. He stumbled sideways, his hands flying to his temple as he went down to his knees, completely stunned and disoriented, the breath knocked clear out of him. He wasn't permanently injured, but the daze was enough.
"Go!" she choked out, pushing herself off the floor and grabbing Posie's trembling hand, shoving both of her sisters toward the heavy front doors.
They scrambled out into the damp night air, their bare feet hitting the sharp gravel driveway just as a high-pitched, deafening wail of sirens broke through the quiet neighborhood. Through the blinding sheets of rain, the flashing blue and red lights of three police cruisers came tearing around the corner, illuminating the dark estate. The silent emergency alarm Aubrey had managed to trip from the closet had finally answered their prayers. As the officers charged past them into the house, she collapsed onto the wet grass, pulling her sobbing sisters tightly into her chest. Her jaw was throbbing, her ribs ached, and her soul was entirely hollowed out.
But the horror didn't end with her father in handcuffs.
She knew what she had to do. She couldn't let Mark or Oscar find out from a cold, detached police report or a leaking press outlet. So, on the morning of Day 63, while sitting on the floor of a generic hotel room with Aubrey and Posie fast asleep across the beds, she took her phone with trembling, bruised fingers. She didn't call. She couldn't bear to let anyone hear her voice break. Instead, she typed it all out in a long, devastating text message to Mark Webber. She detailed everything, the sickening truth that their entire marriage had been engineered by her own father as a trap to bleed Oscar and McLaren dry. She laid her family’s ugly, hidden sins completely bare.
The response from Mark was almost instant, his phone call coming through with a heavy, somber ring. When she answered, Mark was deeply hesitant, the seasoned manager in him struggling with the weight of what he had to say. He carefully tried to explain the brutal reality, that a scandal of this magnitude, tying Oscar's name and McLaren’s assets to a multi-million dollar corporate fraud ring run by his own father-in-law, would completely decimate his career more than the stupid paparazzi photos that started this ridiculous circus. The sponsors, the team, the reputation he had sacrificed his whole life to build, it would all be pulled apart, but she didn't even let him finish. Even as the hot, silent tears spilled over her bruised cheekbones, her conviction didn't waver.
"I know," she choked out, her voice paper-thin but absolute. "That’s why I told you. I wanted it to come from me," Her only priority in the entire world was making sure Oscar and her sisters were safe. Oscar is a good, kind man who had thrown his whole heart to protect her, and he didn't deserve to be dragged under by her family's fucked-up life. If keeping him safe meant amputating herself from his existence, she would do it without a single second thought. "Please," she begged, gripping the phone like a lifeline. "Do not tell Oscar yet. He will be devastated. He’ll try to fight the team, he'll try to find a way to save me, and he can’t. Just give me enough time to leave first, because if I have to look at him... if I see his face, I know I won’t be strong enough to walk away."
There was a long, agonizing silence on the other end of the line as Mark weighed the gravity of her sacrifice. Finally, his voice came through, thick with a profound, heavy pity. "Okay."
On Day 64, they rushed back to the apartment under the cover of dawn to pack. As she, Aubrey, and Posie threw things frantically into suitcases, she found herself paralyzed, staring at the walls of the place they had called home. Everywhere she looked, the memories mocked her. She saw the sofa where they had just laughed over a movie, the kitchen island where he had wrapped his arms around her waist while she made his cocoa, the hallway where he had bravely confessed his love in the quiet of the night. Every single corner of the apartment was overflowing with the ghost of them being in love. The tears ran down her cheeks so fast she couldn't even hide them. She hated crying in front of her sisters; she believed that they never needed to see her weak, but Oscar was not just anyone. He was, as cliché and agonizing as it was to admit, the absolute love of her life.
As she folded a stray t-shirt of his, pressing it to her chest, a desperate, hollow wish echoed in her mind. Just five more minutes. If she could just have five more minutes to hold him again, five more minutes to kiss his face, five more minutes just to pretend that everything was going to be okay, but the seconds were bleeding away, and she knew it was over.
Her father had ruined it all, and as she zipped her bag closed, a crushing weight of guilt settled deep into her bones. She blamed herself. She blamed herself for dragging Oscar into her dark world; for not knowing better, for being so incredibly selfish. If she hadn't let her guard down, if she hadn't said she loved him back that night, he would be safe, she wouldn't be breaking his heart.
And here she was now on Day 65.
Exactly sixty-five days since the night in the hallway when they had first promised to stop pretending. One day short of the average number of days it took to permanently cement a habit into a human life. So close, huh?
She stood in a windowless office of a family law firm, the air heavy with the suffocating smell of old paper, cardboard boxes, and sterile printer toner. Her hands were shaking so violently she could barely keep her grip on the cheap plastic pen the receptionist had handed her. The bruises on her jaw and cheek from her father's hands had faded to an ugly, sickly shade of yellow, but the ache in her chest felt like a fresh, open wound that would never stop bleeding. She looked down at the document resting on the cold metal desk.
Decree of Dissolution.
It was just three pages. Three pieces of paper to erase a life. Three pieces of paper to unmake the only home she had ever truly found.
Oscar didn't know. Right now, he was halfway across the world, probably sitting in a dark engineering room, staring at telemetry data screens, or walking the track. He was completely oblivious, entirely innocent, believing with his whole, beautiful heart that he was coming back to a quiet apartment where he and his wife would spend most of their days filled in each other’s love. He didn't know that the girl he loved was currently standing in a windowless room, signing her happiness away for his freedom, just to save him.
A tear slipped from her chin, splashing directly onto the white paper, instantly smudging the ink of her own printed name. She tried to wipe it away with her thumb, but it only smeared the black ink further, leaving a dark, messy stain on the page. It felt fitting. Her family touched beautiful things only to ruin them. She pressed the tip of the pen to the baseline. With a jagged, trembling stroke, she wrote her signature, officially severing the legal tie that bound them. She heard the lawyer quietly slide the papers into a folder, the sharp snap of the metal clip sounding like a gunshot in the quiet office.
This was it. The thing she had spent a lifetime running from, the terrifying, beautiful luxury of being taken care of, of being fiercely, unconditionally loved by Oscar Piastri, was broken. This was her reluctantly ending the Once Upon a Time she never thought she’d get to write.
She was forcing herself to unlearn the magic of being loved by him, breaking the habit before it could even fully form.
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