I have a theory re Oscar’s leap in being able to dress himself. I think Pascale LeClerc has intervened, in a gentle “a nice young man like you with a public profile needs to learn to dress appropriately” manner. Not trying to push him too far, more “Oscar, mon cher, when you go to a formal event you must have a shirt with buttons you can close. It is to show respect for your hosts, n'est-ce pas?” And packed him off to a very trad Monegasque tailor to get properly fitted for things like shirts and blazers so he knows his proper sizing, and picked him out a few basics. She would have seen the photos of him at that athletics event in Monaco this year wearing a too-small dress shirt with jeans and gone “Charles, we must help him!”
(yes it was oscar’s mum who dressed him but let’s pretend it was charles’s mum 😅)
Charles had been watching it happen for weeks before he finally put the pieces together.
The shirts first. Buttons done up properly. Fabric that actually fit across Oscar’s shoulders instead of pulling like it was fighting for its life. Then the blazers—real ones, structured, sitting neatly instead of slouching off him like an afterthought. Shoes that looked chosen on purpose.
This was not a natural evolution.
Oscar Piastri did not wake up one day and decide to become a man who understood tailoring.
Charles clocked it properly in his mother’s salon, Oscar sitting obediently in the chair while Pascale trimmed his hair with the calm authority of someone who had seen far worse men than this.
“Charles,” she said in French, not even glancing up, “you did not tell me he owns only shirts with decorative buttons.”
Oscar smiled at her in the mirror, understanding approximately none of the sentence but recognising the tone immediately. Concerned. Maternal. Dangerous.
Pascale turned to him gently. “Oscar, mon cher,” she said, switching to careful, simple French. “When you go to a formal event, you must have a shirt with buttons you can close.”
Oscar blinked. “Ah. Yes.”
“It is to show respect for your hosts,” she added, nodding as if this were obvious. “N’est-ce pas?”
“Yes—uh… oui,” Oscar said instantly. “Respect.”
Charles bit his lip and looked away.
It had started, Charles realised, after that athletics event in Monaco. The photos had circulated. The too-small dress shirt. The jeans. The way Oscar had looked like a very polite student who’d accidentally wandered into the wrong building.
Pascale had seen the pictures once and gone quiet.
“Charles,” she’d said, deeply offended on his behalf, “we must help him.”
And help him she did—no drama, no makeover montage. Just a very traditional Monegasque tailor, proper measurements, shirts that fit, blazers that behaved. A few basics. Nothing flashy. Enough that Oscar now knew his size, at least.
Now, as Pascale brushed hair from Oscar’s collar and adjusted the fall of his neckline with practiced fingers, he watched her attentively, nodding along like a man being inducted into a secret order.
“Merci,” he said carefully, after she finished.
She smiled at him like she’d won.
Later, outside, Oscar tugged once at his sleeve, thoughtful. “Your mum is… very persuasive.”
“She’s gentle,” Charles said. “But she does not miss things.”
Oscar glanced down at himself again, then back up at Charles, something almost shy flickering across his face. “I think she saved me from looking like an idiot.”
Charles smiled, soft and private. “She has that effect.”
And if Charles noticed that Oscar stood a little straighter now, dressed like someone who belonged in these rooms—well. He didn’t say anything.
