kettlechips3

[kettlechips3]

Now I’m just supposed go to bed after watching that!!!

#succession #logan roy #kendall roy #roman roy #shiv roy

[kettlechips3]

is there a special version of killing yourself because i don't think the normal one is enough right now

[kettlechips3]

Eavesdropper H.S

Summary: Where your neighbour Harry happens to hear you masturbating to his music and decides to do the neighbourly thing and lend a helping hand... or something else. Based on this request that I got absolutely ages ago!

Warning: smut!!, oral (f recieving), dirty talk, penetration, mention of masturbation

Word count: 7k

Author’s note: Enjoy this oneshot of moustachrry who loves giving oral. Happy Reading! x

- Find my General Masterlist here -

At first Harry thought he was imagining it, his music playing from your apartment. But when he went as far as pressing his ear against the wall and try that glass trick he always saw in the movies when they were trying to eavesdrop, he was certain it wasn’t something his brain made up.

The sound of his music was clearest through the thin walls. He visibly frowned at the thought that someone could hear his music playing if they too pressed their ear to the wall and tried to listen, but he put that on the list of renovations he was going to do on his new apartment and went back to listening.

Harry hadn’t been there very long, barely a few weeks at this point. He bought the apartment as a getaway and somewhere he could stay if he decided to do Jamaica part two and go on a writing retreat post tour. He wanted to get the renovations done before he stayed there but he never got the time, hence the paper-thin walls he had to deal with for now.

His mind focused back on listening in. It wasn’t his finest moment, but he was bored, and curiosity got the better of him and he wanted to know which songs you were listening to. He had been curious about you since he moved into the building, but he hadn’t had the proper chance to have a conversation with you.

You shared the ‘hellos’ and ‘good mornings’ and ‘hey how are you?’ neighbours normally would when you passed in the hall or left or arrived at the same time, but beyond that he knew nothing about you. To Harry you were just the gorgeous woman next door. You hadn’t even acknowledged that you knew who he was beyond him introducing himself as ‘Harry’, but now he knew you did and were just being polite and trying not to make him uncomfortable.

It stroked his ego a bit knowing that you listened to his music, hence his burning curiosity on what else you listened to. When the song changed and another one of his played, his ego really did get a boost. Here you were, playing his music only.

The song switched again, and ‘She’ started playing and that’s when he heard it. Underneath his song was something that made his heartbeat faster and his cock pulse in his shorts. A moan.

Once he heard it, he couldn’t unhear it. Moaning, whimpering, deep gasps of air. At one point he even convinced himself he heard his own name being called out, but he wasn’t sure if that was his imagination or his now hard cock influencing his hearing.

There weren’t any other noises coming through the wall, so he knew you were alone. You were touching yourself to his music and the thought had his mind racing. He couldn’t help but want to march over to your apartment and help you out, make you come on his fingers… his mouth… his cock.

But he didn’t know you, and as much as he wanted to stand there and hear you come and potentially hear his name come out of your name again, it felt wrong. Maybe if he knew you, if he had at least one conversation with you he’d be able to convince himself that knocking on your door and offering a helping hand was a good idea.

But he didn’t, so he pushed himself away from his bedroom wall that backed onto yours and threw himself onto his bed. Looking down at his hard cock he knew he had to sort himself out. So he did, with your quiet moans on his mind.

//

“Morning Harry” you greeted with a sweet smile, approaching the elevator where he was waiting for it, very focused on his phone. His head snapped up at your voice and he immediately clicked his phone off, slipping it into his pocket so you had his full attention.

“Morning y/n” he smiled back, tucking his fingers into the front pockets of his pants and digging his fingers into his thighs to try and stop himself from getting hard. All he could think about when he heard your sweet voice was how it sounded when you moaned, and he was doing everything in his power to think about anything else.

“Busy day ahead?” You asked, taking a sip from your reusable coffee mug you were planning to take into the office.

His eyes flickered down to the way your lips clasped the opening of the coffee mug before meeting yours. You didn’t miss the way he looked at your lips and it made your body heat up with fire. God was he an attractive man. You didn’t know how people existed around him on the daily without falling to their knees just looking at him.

Hell, he could ask you to open your coffee so he could spit in it and you’d let him do it. Although, the idea of him spitting anywhere near you was insanely sexy so maybe that isn’t the right analogy to use.

“Just a few meetings today then having friends ‘round to have dinner and do some writing” he replied, looking down at your lips for a second before his eyes darted the lift doors when they dinged and opened. He held his hand out to keep them open and motioned for you to go first.

He was testing the waters bringing up writing. Part of him just couldn’t help himself. Maybe you’d even reply and acknowledge that you’ve heard some of his songs, even though he already knew the answer.

“Thank you” you smiled, entering the lift, and pressing the button for the basement. He nodded in acknowledgement then entered after you, pressing the ground floor button. “You’re quite talented, you know. I’ve listened to your music, it’s really good”

There it was.

An adorable blush flushed across Harry’s cheeks as he looked down on the floor. Even after all these years he felt nervous receiving feedback on his writing, good or bad. Even when he was certain he liked it and was going to include a song on his album, he still needed validation from the people he loved the most. Or from pretty girls that lived next door to him.

“Thank you. I really appreciate that” he thanked you, looking right in your eyes with a bright smile.

His tone was honest and completely genuine, and you liked that there wasn’t a single bone in his body that seemed cocky. You had wanted to at least compliment him on his music for a while now, but you didn’t want to come across as a crazy fan or make him uncomfortable. You were glad he didn’t seem on edge after your comment.

“So, what about you?” He cleared his throat with a little cough, “busy day today?”

You shrugged, taking another sip of the coffee and watching as the elevator numbers went down the quicker you reached ground floor. “Not really. I’m hoping to leave work a bit early and get back to Arlo, but it depends how busy it is”

Harry’s heart sunk to his stomach and he couldn’t help but feel disappointed. Even though he hadn’t thought about a potential boyfriend last night when he was eavesdropping on you, now he knew you had one. Arlo. Even his name sounded interesting, much more than ‘harry’.

“Lovely… how long have you two been together?” He asked with a little cough, looking at you briefly before averting eye contact. He was trying not to appear too interested in your relationship, but he just couldn’t help himself.

“Who? Me and Arlo?” You asked with a giggle. He looked at you strangely, “Arlo is my cat. He’s a possessive little british shorthair”

“Oh-oh!” Harry’s eyed widened and an embarrassed blush grew on his cheeks. “I’m sorry, I just assumed he was your boyfriend”

“No, I don’t have a boyfriend… in case you were wondering” you couldn’t help but flash a flirty smile and take another sip of your coffee, looking at him over the rim of your cup.

Well now Harry really did have no excuse to offer a helping hand. He didn’t want to approach the topic, but with that look in your eye and that flirty smile playing on that beautiful mouth of yours, he knew he wouldn’t be able to wait long to say something. Especially if he heard you playing with yourself to his music again.

The elevator dinged again, alerting the two of you that you had reached Harry’s floor. “Right…” he cleared his throat and stepped out of the elevator. “Well, enjoy your day y/n” he turned back to face you as he spoke, giving you his entire attention while the doors were still open.

“You too, Harry” you managed to get the words out before the doors closed. When they did, you could still see Harry’s green eyes staring at you from behind them.

Harry didn’t hear anything coming from your apartment that night. Maybe it was because you simply didn’t do it or because Kid and Tyler left much later than Harry thought they would. By the time they did it was way past the time he heard you last night, not that he thought you scheduled it in, but he just assumed you had gone to sleep already.

It was another two days before he heard you again. It started out the same way as the first time he heard you, his own music drifting through his bedroom wall from your apartment. And again, Harry couldn’t help himself and got up from his bed to press his ear to the wall and hear you.

This time though, your moans were a lot louder and on par, if not louder than his music playing. He had to close his eyes and rest his head against the wall at how fucking sexy you sounded. His ego was being stroked and so was his cock. Between his chest inflating at you finding his music seductive enough to masturbate to and how pretty you sounded, he was hard again.

You were actively trying to get his attention. The first night you weren’t sure if he had heard you or not, so this time you were louder and purposefully trying to get him to come over. The idea sparked when you heard his music playing through the wall last week, and from then you kept thinking about what would happen if he heard you.

He was gorgeous and you had thought about fucking him since he first moved in. Hell, even before that you had seen photos and videos of him doing his popstar duties and wanted to fuck him. Most of the population could say the same thing.

You weren’t one to make first moves though, and the thought of someone like Harry rejecting you made you want to shrivel up and die. Plus, you were really trying not to come across as a stalker fangirl who wanted to re-enact a fanfiction with him. You had never lived near a famous person before, and Harry was so sweet you just wanted him to feel comfortable in his own home.

At the end of the day though, he was just a man. So, making it seem like his idea sounded like the best plan to get him in your bed. It seemed to work too, because not long after you let out a (bit too loud honestly) moan of his name when your g-spot vibrator hit your spot just right, your doorbell rang.

You quickly turned it off and chucked it beside you on the bed before getting up and slipping your robe over your naked body. You made sure to close your bedroom door behind you so Arlo wouldn’t sneak in before walking to the front door. Harry was standing behind it, you just knew it. Even though it was what you wanted, you still felt nerves swirl in your stomach.

You at least had to act like him showing up was a surprise.

You peeked through the peephole before opening the door just in case it wasn’t Harry. Like you thought, he was standing there and looked quite flustered.

“Hi Harry. It’s quite late, everything alright?” you asked, playing with the ends of your hair as you leaned against your open door. Your satin robe was short and tied up snuggly, so it was clear you were wearing nothing underneath. Due to the cool air blowing in from the hallway, your nipples were hard, and they were definitely showing through the thin material.

Harry swallowed the lump in his throat and looked you up and down, seeing how confident you were to be stood there in such little clothing. He could tell by the look on your face that you weren’t surprised to see him there, which told him all he needed to know.

Over the years he grew quite good in reading people and figuring out if they were genuine or not. You were genuine for sure, genuine in playing his music and moaning loudly on purpose. There was a chance he was wrong, but he had a feeling he wasn’t.

“I heard you touching yourself… the walls are pretty thin, y’know” he replied, taking a lazy drag over your body and running his hand through his hair.

“Oh god, I’m so sorry” you replied, crossing your arms over your chest to push them up a little while trying to act embarrassed. “I’ve never had any noise complaints before, I didn’t realise people could hear me. This is quite embarrassing really, especially what I was listening to” you looked at the floor, blushing not from embarrassment but from the heat of his gaze as he intently looked at you.

“Is it though, embarrassing?” he asked, raising a brow. You looked at him confused.

“What do you mean?”

There was a switch in Harry. While always gorgeous and sweet, even shy at times, this Harry wasn’t like that. His eyes darkened with heat, and you could feel your heart beat faster just from the look he was giving you. He looked so utterly seductive, and you couldn’t help but think that this was the Harry writing all those dirty lyrics of his.

“Don’t act coy y/n” he tutted, taking a step closer to you. He hadn’t crossed the threshold of your apartment yet, out of respect, but he was close enough that you could feel his body heat radiating to yours. “I don’t think you’re sorry at all, actually think you did it on purpose to get my attention” he smirked, reaching out to brush your hair away from your shoulder.

A shiver ran through your body at his light touch, his fingertips brushing ever so gently against your shoulder. Even through your robe, he was having an effect on you. Your nipples grew even harder, out of arousal this time instead of the cold, and the painful sting sent pulses right to your clit.

“And what if I did?” you breathed, arching your back ever so slightly into his touch.

God, you needed him. Your orgasm had been ruined by his knocking and you could feel yourself clench around nothing in need for him. A man as pretty as Harry had a pretty cock to match, you just knew it.

“Well, guess I’m answering your call then. Neighbours are meant to lend a helpful hand in times of need, aren’t they?” his hand fell from your shoulder down to the bow you tied at your waist, fiddling with the loose ends like he could just pull them, and they’d come undone.

“Mhmm, and you seem like a neighbourly guy” you replied, taking a step back so he could step into your apartment. Harry did just that and took a step forward, going to take another so you’d step back again.

“Very neighbourly” he smirked, grabbing onto the bow and pulling you towards him. "Can I kiss you?" his other hand came up to cup your face, running his thumb along your bottom lip.

You nodded and hummed out a yes, then before you knew it both of Harry's large hands were cupping your face and angling it upwards so he could press his lips to yours. You kissed back eagerly, grabbing onto his t-shirt and fisting it in your hands so he wouldn't pull away.

He was an expert kisser, and his facial hair just added so much more to the experience. Your mind immediately drifted to what it would feel like to have it between your thighs, but you were definitely getting too ahead of yourself.  

The sound of the front door closing made your kiss break, but it didn't last long before Harry was encouraging you to jump and wrap your legs around his waist. His hands grabbed onto your ass as your arms wrapped around his neck so you could kiss him again.

Feeling your body pressed against his was like heaven, and he could feel your wet centre pressed to the outside of his pants, right where his cock was hard and waiting for you.

"Tell me where to go" he gasped into your mouth, digging his fingers into your ass and squeezing.

"Down the hall" you whimpered into his mouth. With that instruction, Harry ventured down the hall and followed the sound of his music still playing until he reached a closed door. He opened it haphazardly, focusing on keeping you upright and kissing those gorgeous lips of yours.

Kissing you was like a dream. You knew exactly what you were doing, your teeth grazing his bottom lip and capturing it in a way that had him whimpering into your mouth and digging his fingers into your ass cheeks. The ache of his fingertips had you arching your chest into his, firmly tugging his hair to give some of the ache back.

He shut the door closed with his foot then walked you over to your bed and lowered you to your duvet, his hands pressing on either side of your head as he gave you a few passionate pecs before pulling away and standing upright at the end of the bed. “See you left in a hurry to answer the door” he chuckled, looking directly at your vibrator sitting right where you left it beside you on the bed.

He could see your wetness coat the length of the vibrator and images of you using it flashed in his mind like a wet dream. His mouth watered just at the sight of your arousal shining the outside of it and he wanted to lick it clean. He wanted to lick you clean.

You propped yourself up on your elbows to watch him as he grabbed onto your ankles and unwrapped them from his hips so they dropped and your feet rest on the edge of the bed. “Couldn’t keep my guest waiting, could I?” you breathed, biting your lip as you checked him out. You let your knees fall inward, your robe sliding down your thighs right to your hips.

He stepped away from your bed and looked around your room a little to find where your speaker was playing ‘Kiwi’. God, he was just gorgeous. Tall and muscly yet soft in all the right places. His hair was so soft, and he smelt so divine you wanted to get him made into a candle so your whole apartment could smell like him.

“No, especially ones as giving as I am” he smirked, turning your speaker off from where it sat on top of your chest of drawers before turning back around to face you. He kicked his shoes off and slid his socks off as well. “Not the biggest fan of pleasing a pretty girl with my own voice in the background”

He stalked towards the bed with his eyes intently on your body, scanning from your quickly rising and falling chest to your legs bent and covering where he wanted to see the most. He was starving for it, his mouth watering just at the thought of tasting you. Fuck, he wanted your arousal everywhere. His tongue, his nose, soaking his facial hair so thoroughly your scent lasted for days.

That was one thing he loved about having facial hair now, aside from the redness it left after he had his face buried between a set of pretty legs; how scent would linger. He could wash his face and still smell your earthy arousal days later and that was exactly what he wanted. You, all over his beard and moustache so he’d be reminded for days how delicious you were.

“No? Thought musicians got turned on hearing their own voice. Superiority complex or something like that” you knew Harry wasn’t like that, at least that wasn’t the vibe you got. But it was fun to tease, especially when the smirk on his face deepened and he finally stopped right in front of you, running his finger ever so gently up your calf from your ankle.

“Actually get sick of hearing m’voice, if you believe that” he mused, his eye following his finger running up your calf to your knee. Your thighs clenched at the touch, a movement that didn’t go unnoticed by him. “Although it was a bit of a turn on hearing you touch yourself to m’music. Was it the lyrics or melody that got yeh?”

“Don’t think I can answer that when you’re touching me like that” you breathed, your toes curling as his single finger turned into his entire palm sliding up your thigh, his eyes going further up to see the trimmed hairs on your mound peeking out from your robe. He subconsciously licked his lips just at the smallest look at your pussy, and he was praying that you’d let him eat you out.

“I haven’t even touched you yet” he chuckled, “must be proper starving for it, huh?”

Yes. The answer to the fucker’s question was yes.

“Maybe” you replied, head tipping back when his other hand came and slid down your other thigh. Your body shuddered when he squeezed, massaging your thighs that were still squeezed shut together.

“Scoot up f’me then” he challenged. You did as ordered and shuffled up the bed until your head was near your pillows, bending your legs and keeping them together before propping yourself up on your elbows again so you could watch him better. You didn’t want to forget a single second of this entire experience, so you wanted to see everything.

He grabbed the hem of his t shirt and pulled it off his head before dropping it to the floor, running his hand through his hair and shaking his head a little to readjust it. Your mouth parted just looking at his chest and how ripped he was. His body truly was a work of art and the way he kneeled onto the bed and shuffled towards you had your core clenching.

“I’d really like a taste, may I?” he asked, looking right into your eyes as he stopped right in front of your legs and rested his hands on your knees. Your mouth grew dry. Never has a man asked to eat you out and made it sound so fucking sexy.

May I? May I?

You were honestly glad he didn’t know the true extent of your attraction to him because he could quite literally ask you to do anything and you’d do it. He could do anything he wanted to you, and you’d happily agree and get yourself wet for him.

“Yes, fuck. Yes” you nodded, relaxing your thighs so he could part them. His hands wedged between your knees then pushed them apart. You kept your legs bent at the knee and spread them wider for them, your heart hammering in your chest at how he was looking down at you.

“Fucking gorgeous, jesus christ” he cursed, making eye contact with you as he settled between your legs on his stomach. He seemed happy as anything to be there, and that made you relax more into the situation.

The compliment made you blush, and you had to resist the urge to cover your hands with your eyes. His hands slid down to your ankles, rubbing circles on your skin as he began peppering kisses from your left knee downwards. He took his time in this, his lips soft and gentle as he moved down.

His moustache tickled your skin the closer to your pussy he got, and you couldn’t help but giggle softly when he switched sides and his stubble brushed against you as well. He looked up at you amused with a raised brow. “Sorry, ticklish”

“Tha’s alright, darling. Got a cute laugh” he grinned, keeping eye contact with you as he bit down on your thigh instead of kissing it, sucking it right after nipping at the skin. You let out a little groan at the sting, feeling your clit heat up at the feeling. “That tickle?”

You shook your head wordlessly, sliding your hand into his hair and pushing it away from his face. When he reached your inner thigh, you were barely breathing, your feet fidgety as the ache between your legs grew more and more uncomfortable. His soft kisses turned into small nibbles and licks, biting up and down your inner thighs, switching sides between your left and right thigh until you were squirming in his grip.

His hands on your ankles kept them pinned wide, but it didn’t stop you from attempting to close your knees around his head. God, if his oral skills were anything like this you didn’t think you were going to last very long. Your inner thighs were coated with arousal and he was specifically avoiding those places because as hard as it was, he wanted his first taste of you to be right from the source.

“Please, Harry” you whimpered, reaching down to run your hand through his soft hair. He looked up at you and smirked, leaning down so his hot breath fanned against your pussy.

“Don’t worry, pretty girl. I got you”

He pressed a kiss to your mound before grabbing onto your knees and encouraging you to let your legs lie flat on the bed. “Now relax, just enjoy it”

His mouth met your inner thigh again before he turned and finally made contact with your pussy, swiping his tongue through your folds in an experimental lick. Harry let out a deep groan at the taste, eyes closing like he was savouring it before he dipped in again and swiped his tongue through your folds to collect as much as your arousal as he possibly could.

It was easy with how wet you were, your arousal wet and sticky and practically dripping down his throat. The whimper you let out when his tongue finally met your clit was pornographic, and he knew he wanted to hear that sound come out of your mouth over and over again.

“Fuck. You taste so fucking good” he praised, flicking his tongue over your clit. You could tell he was familiar with this position by the way he immediately picked up a rhythm of flicking his tongue on your clit over and over again. It was fast and so perfectly pressured you could barely keep your eyes open anymore.

“Feels so good, Harry. So so good” you moaned appreciatively, grabbing onto his hair harder and bucking your hips up to meet his tongue. You didn’t mean to, but it just felt so fucking good having his mouth on you, you couldn’t help it.

He chuckled in amusement against you, pressing his thumb to your clitoral hood and pushing upwards so your hardened clit was properly exposed to him. Wrapping his lips around your clit now was easy, and he did just that, alternating between sucking right on your clit and flicking against it with the tip of his tongue.

You couldn’t open your eyes anymore, let alone hold yourself up. One hand stayed in his hair while the other grabbed onto your own breast, squeezing to release some of the pressure at how amazing it felt to have his mouth on your pussy.

Heat was filling your body quickly, your back arching off the bed and your skin staring to get sticky with sweat. The satin material of your robe was keeping all the heat in, so you quickly undid it and let it fall open, sighing out in relief at the cool air hitting your heated skin.

Harry was in fucking heaven. With every lick and suck you were just getting wetter and wetter, and Harry was slurping it up like he was starving. He was moaning against you, his eyes closed in pleasure as he used his mouth and nose to practically bury his face between your lips.

But he needed more. Your thighs kept clamping around his head and it was making it a little hard for him to get enough movement, so he collected both your ankles and pushed your legs up to your chest. He used both hands to keep them pinned there, your new position making it easy for him to use his entire mouth to please you.

He sucked at your entrance, fucking into you with his tongue while trying to get as much as your arousal into his mouth. At the same time, he used his nose to bump up against your clit, rubbing against it for a bit before his lips returned to your clit.

“Fucking love this, taste so fucking good. Gonna let me do this again, won’t you? For me?” he grunted, sucking on your clit between words.

“Yes… god yes. Whenever you want” you cried out, gripping his wrist while your other hand stayed in his hair.

Being so exposed like that had your back arching, whimpers and moans dropping from your mouth uncontrollably. Your grip in his hair was so tight and now you were unapologetically pulling his face closer to your cunt. You couldn’t really grind from the position you were in, but you could manoeuvrer his face exactly how you wanted to.

When Harry slipped two fingers into you with ease, you could already feel your orgasm bubbling to the surface. He now had both of your legs collected in one of his hands and with a few different movements, he was able to find that spongey spot inside of you with the other. He immediately started fucking into you with his two fingers, hooking them so they’d hit the spot inside you that made you see stars.

If his fingers felt like that, you could just imagine how good his cock would feel.

“’m gonna come, Harry. Please… fuck, don’t stop” you begged, subconsciously holding your own legs to your chest because of how tense your body was in the build-up of your orgasm.

“Come for me, wanna taste it so fucking bad” he urged, breaking from your clit in a wet sound to talk before going back in and reaching up next to your legs to grab onto your breast. He had a firm grip and it seemed to fit perfectly in his hand, his fingers playing with your nipple and pinching it in a way that triggered your orgasm almost immediately.

“Fuck… fuckfuckfuck” you cried out, throwing your head back and holding onto Harry’s head so tight as it rolled over you in waves of pleasure. He kept stimulating you in all three places; your nipple, clit and g-spot and it made your orgasm feel like it went on forever.

Harry finally looked up at you and when he did his cock pulsed at the sight, his hips pressing harder into the duvet to try and relieve the ache. You looked utterly gorgeous in your state of pure pleasure and it was infinitely better than he could ever imagine.

When he felt your body relax he pulled away and gently lowered your legs to the bed before propping his body up onto his knees so he could hover over you, his fists pressed on either side of your body. He pressed open-mouthed kisses up your body as he came up, first at your mound then up the centre of your stomach to your heaving chest then neck.

You propped yourself back up on your forearms to watch him, panting at coming down from your high and how sickening it was to watch him crawl up your body like a predator. His facial hair was slick with your arousal, beads of wetness trapped in his moustache yet he had no qualms or even tried to rub it away.

You didn't give two shits either, not when he gave you some of the best head you had ever received in your entire life.

Your hands cradled his jaw as he made it over you, your body falling back to the bed as you craned your neck up to kiss him. You could taste yourself on his lips and tongue, and your cheeks became wet with your own arousal but you still didn't care.

"Do you want to keep going?" he panted, making sure his hips stayed away from your body in case you wanted to stop there. He really hoped you didn't, but he also couldn't rule out the possibility that you just wanted him to finish you off before fucking off to his own apartment.

He would've been happy to leave it here and go home with the scent of your pussy right on his mouth, but fuck was he craving more. Harry was a starved man, always had been a horny man since he was a teenager.

You'd think those urges would at least lessen as you get older, but for Harry it was the opposite, he was just able to control his dick better now than when he was 18.

"Yes... can't be unhospitable to my guest" you breathed, hooking your leg around his hip and pushing down so his hard cock pressed right against your pussy.

"How'd you want it then, y/n? It's all up to you" he smirked, grinding his hips into you as he kissed you again.

"Wanna be on top" you spoke into his mouth, gripping his curly locks between your fingers and pulling until he whimpered into yours.

He accommodated your request quickly, pulling back to sit on his knees before getting himself completely naked and lying on the bed beside you. He unwrapped the condom he brought with him as he watched you straddle his thighs, your open robe sliding off your shoulders to hook around your elbows.

Harry's body was a masterpiece and his cock was no different. You were utterly mesmerised looking down at him as he wrapped his tattooed hand around himself and tugged a few times for good measure. He was well and truly hard enough for you, but it was habit.

"You good up there?" he chuckled, sliding the condom down his length. You bit your lip and nodded, letting your robe slip completely off your arms before you chucked it carelessly behind you on the floor.

"Mhmm, you just got such a pretty everything" you mused, running your hands up his chest before pressing them on either side of his head so you could lean down and kiss him. You slid your hips upwards so your centre could press against his cock, his length nestling between your folds.

Harry groaned into your mouth and gripped your hips, grinding you against him before you had the chance to do it yourself. Your clit was still sensitive so just that motion alone had you moaning against his lips, desperately needing his cock properly inside you.

"Need it inside Harry" you whimpered into his mouth, unable to lift your hips and do it yourself due to how hard his fingers were digging into you. You knew you'd have little bruises where his fingers were when you woke up in the morning and you were looking forward to the reminder they'd give you.

"I got you, pretty girl. Don't worry" he assured you, loosening his grip and guiding you up so you were hovering over him. He wrapped his hand around himself and guided his tip between your folds, nudging it right at your entrance.

You kept yourself hovering over him, pulling your hair over one shoulder so it dangled down and wasn't in the way of Harry's face. He kept his eyes on yours the entire time and it made shivers run down your spine. It felt like you weren’t breathing anymore looking down at him in this state, his cheeks flushed and lips pink and swollen.

You had imagined what he’d look like above you many many times and you felt somewhat prepared for that sight, but this? You weren’t prepared for how gorgeous he looked underneath you. He seemed like a dominant man in many ways, and you expected him to take the lead and prefer being on top, especially for your first hookup.

Men were like that, always wanting to prove how ‘manly’ they were and have some sort of power over you. And fuck, you’d let Harry slap you around and dominate you any day, but you loved how he looked completely comfortable being beneath you and letting you decide how this was going to go.

It only made you ten times more attracted to him.

With a little squeeze of your hips Harry pushed you down onto him, your mouth dropping in a whine and your head tilting back at the stretch you felt accommodating his size. Your hips moved on their own, searching more of the fullness and sting that Harry’s cock gave you. He had already prepped you with his fingers, and you had a vibrator inside you earlier, yet he was still bigger, and you loved it.

“Fuck, baby. You’re so fucking wet for me” Harry groaned, grabbing your hip tight in his hand while the other slid to the front of your throat, using it to guide your mouth back to his.

You didn’t waste time before you started grinding your hips back and forth, his cock perfectly hitting that spot inside you that had you seeing stars. You fucking loved internal stimulation, hence your use of the g-spot vibrator earlier. Internal orgasms were just something entirely different, a different type of pleasure-no, ecstasy.

“Feel so fucking good inside me Harry” you whimpered, breaking the kiss and sitting up. You dragged your hands down his chest, digging your nails into his skin as you picked up your speed, changing your grinds into up and down motions.

“Fuck” he cursed, the sting of your nails in his chest making his thighs tense beneath you. You felt so fucking good around him he couldn’t think about anything else but you. You were surrounding him, your scent on his facial hair, your pussy tightly squeezed around his cock, just the sight of you sitting on him with your breasts bouncing at every movement had his mind spiralling.

Harry’s hand dropped from your neck and slid down to your breast, squeezing it firmly before grabbing your nipple between his thumb and forefinger and pinching it roughly. “Yes… yes!” The spike of pain had your eyes shutting, the stimulation going right to your clit.

“Like that, baby? Like when it hurts a little?” Harry teased, seeing how flushed your body had become just from the little bit of pain he delivered. You hummed out a yes and scratched your nails against his abs, your thighs burning at how fast you were bouncing on him.

With how wet you were it was easy for you to go as fast or slow as you wanted, your cream dripping down onto his length and soaking his balls from the speed you managed to maintain. It was clear you knew how to ride cock, and the sight of it was slowly engraving into Harry’s mind like a tattoo.

He knew he’d never forget the sight of you like this.

Harry dug his fingers into your ass before bringing his hand back and spanking you hard, your eyes flying open and a high-pitched yelp leaving your mouth. “What about that, y/n? You like being spanked too?” he couldn’t help but test the waters, craving the knowledge of what turned you on and made you come faster.

“Yes…” you trailed back, taking a break from bouncing and switching to grinding back and forth to give your thighs a break. “More… please” you whimpered, looking down at him to see an absolutely feral look in his eyes.

He rubbed over the spot he just hit before doing it again, your pussy clenching around him and more wetness leaking down and soaking his balls. He didn’t think you could get any wetter yet here you were soaking his cock more than you already had been.

Harry let out a borderline growl and grabbed your neck again, pulling you back down to smash his lips against yours. He honestly couldn’t take it anymore, watching your eyes grow fluttery and dark as he pushed things a little further. Now he just wanted to fuck you properly and show you what else he could do… how good he could really make you feel.

“Let me take over” he groaned into your mouth, propping his legs up so his feet were wide and flat on the bed.

“Please” you panted, your lips messily meeting his. Just the feeling of his hand around your neck was sending your mind wild. You had thought about those rings and tattoos of his wrapped around your throat more times than you could count and now that it was actually happening you were barely holding on.

“Good girl, knew you’d be so good f’me” he smirked, kissing you again as he used his feet for balance and leverage to fuck up into you. Your mouth opened in a cry at how fast and hard he was able to thrust up into you, his cock pressing into your g-spot with every hit and making your entire body limp above him.

You had let your body completely relax onto his, barely kissing back as pleasure took over your mind and body. Your clit wasn’t even being stimulated properly yet you could already feel your body prepare for your orgasm. Thighs tensing and toes curling, your body growing hotter and sweat starting to collect on your skin.

Your hands fisted the duvet on either side of Harry’s head as he grabbed onto your ass with both hands, spanking you periodically while grinding your hips down to meet his upward thrusts. He was strong and steady which made sense considering how toned and fit his body was. And fuck did he use his fitness to his advantage.

“Feels good, doesn’t it y/n? Love being fucked like this, don’t you?”

You only whimpered in response, your head tipping down to dig into his neck. His pace never slowed or faltered, even as Harry’s own orgasm grew and he could barely keep his eyes open anymore. He was so focused on making you come and making sure you’d feel it for days afterwards. Harry was nothing, if not a passionate lover that left a lasting impression.

“Making me feel so good too, baby. You feel so fucking good wrapped around me… yeh take my cock so well”

His words of praise were hitting you right in your core and it was speeding up your orgasm like nothing else. He just knew exactly what to say to send goosebumps all over your body and make you want to cry out with need for him. His cock was hitting all the right places and his hands were grabbing your ass and spanking you and giving you all the stimulation you could possible ask for.

“’Mgonnacome” you cried out, your toes curling as the wave grew bigger and bigger inside you.

“Give it to me” he spanked your ass again, “fucking give it to me baby”

A loud cry left your mouth as you finally let go, your whole body tense as waves and waves of pleasure flooded over you. Harry let out a whimper of his own, his eyes screwing shut as he paused his thrusts and shook beneath you while ribbons of cum filled the condom. He kept grinding you against him to carry your orgasm through until his cock couldn’t bare it anymore.

“Fucking hell” he breathed, running his fingers through your hair, and pushing it away from your faces so it was trailing down your back.

“Couldn’t have said it better” you let out a breathy laugh and shakily pushed yourself up, so you were hovering over him while his cock was still buried deep inside you. You looked down at him for a moment before leaning in to give him a final kiss, wanting to feel his lips on yours again before getting off him.

“I should go pee, but I just need a second to lay here” you breathed, gently lifting off him with a wince before dropping beside him. You landed on something hard and wet, making you furrow your brows before digging underneath you and finding your vibrator that by now you had completely forgotten about. “Forgot about this”

Harry laughed and ran his hand through his hair, sitting up and turning so he was on the edge of the bed away from you. “Guess my mission is complete then. I’d say making a girl forget about her vibrator is a win” he chuckled and removed the condom, knotting the end. “You have a bin in here?” he turned his head to look at you.

“Don’t get too ahead of yourself Harry, I’ll be reaching for it again like this never happened” you laughed back, dropping it back on the bed beside you. “There’s a bin in the bathroom, its one room over”

Harry nodded and stood up, slipping his boxers back on before exiting the room to discard the condom. He felt a bit bad about just leaving it in your bin like that instead of replacing the bin bag for you, but it was late, and he assumed you’d change it in the morning. When he got back to your room you had slipped your robe on and were sitting on the edge of your bed texting someone on your phone.

“Y’know, if you ever reach for your vibrator and decide you need something else. I’m only next door” Harry mused, crossing his arms, and leaning against your doorway. Your head snapped up to him and you turned off your phone with little care so your focus was on him.

Your heart was hammering in your chest at his suggestion, because although it was something you had always fantasised about, you expected this to be a one-night stand that you two never brought up again. His suggestion just opened a whole can of worms that you were thoroughly excited to explore.

“That’s very neighbourly of you” you smiled, standing up and walking slowly towards him. “I guess as your neighbour it’s only fair I extend the same offer” you stopped in front of him, “you know, if your hand ever gets boring” you teased, running your finger up his arm.

He chuckled and grabbed onto your waist, pulling you flush against him. “I’m a grown man, y/n. My hand got boring 10 years ago”

━━━━━━ ♡ ━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━ ♡ ━━━━━━━

Tag List: @tiredinwinter @cthwildflwr @harrystylestaylorswift @justlemmeadoreyou @myfavfanficsever @gurugirl @a-strange-familiar @hislcstyles

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[kettlechips3]

if you’re like me and you only watch f1 for free, here are some free sites you can watch it live at:

sportshub.stream - this is my personal favorite

totalsportek.pro

sportsurge.club

thehomesport.net

weakstream.org

there are also free apps you can watch it in:

Live player

strym tv - you need a code to watch in this app so you just press the + sign on the upper left corner, choose “Import playlist from URL” and paste this url http: //movitv. pro just remove the spaces

all of these have ads and if you have access to VPN, you might want to use it but i’ve tried all these links and app last season and hadn’t gotten a virus.

[kettlechips3]

Did you even care? ooc T.M.R x Fem!reader P.1

-summary - it was him who broke up with you but he cant get enough?

-genre - angst

warning - angst with no end🤗 wanted to cry tonight so im writing this because i can and i want to suffer because i find no good angst so please PLEASE SOMEBODY OUT THERE RECOMMEND SOME GOOD ANGST | cursing | harsh language

A/n : I had fun writing this and finally finished it after months of writers block 😮‍💨

_________________________________

you were having a heated argument with tom again for the 3RD TIME THIS WEEK.

and it was because of petty stupid reasons.

one was because you forgot his prefect badge he had asked you to bring to him when it was breakfast.

you were half asleep that time , so of course you had forgotten .

second was because of a petty argument over some book .

and now this? becuase i had stayed in his room to wait for him?

Your Pov :

this i getting out of hand , why was he this mad i already told him i was gonna be up here but then he goes mad over me?

"get out y/n" tom frustratedly ran his hand through his hair

"what? i just dont understand , i already asked you if i could stay here so why are you so ma-"

"GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE Y/N , BEFORE I CALL SALAZAR HIMSELF TO ESCORT YOU OUT" tom shouted with a glare that sent shivers down your spine

"fine." you say rolling your eyes at how how childish he is grabbing your robe before you leave

"and to just inform you , whatever we have going on is done."

you stopped. and turned around

"what?"

"yes , you were simply just an experiment" he looked at you with no expression on his face

tears were dripping on your face now with vision blury

"why? wha-? how could you-? , did you even care?" you managed to say with a confused expression written all iver your face

"not one bit" he smugly smirked

"i was seeing how people would react to something people call 'affection' and seeing how easy you get manipulated and how you obeyed me so much has made me realise love makes people weak and i dont have the time to feel weak"

you were currently bawling your eyes out

" whatever riddle , go fuck yourself "

as you stormed out of his room and slamming the door.

you had now hated tom riddle , you hated how he was right and you hated how he was making you feel weak.

_____________________________

Tom riddle Pov:

i have now gotten rid of the pesky girl and now my life shall be at peace finally.

but there was something off and he didnt know what it was ,

whatever i have got some reading to do , now lets get started..

______________________________☕

he didnt even realize he fell asleep , and he got ready for the day

"hey y/n have you seen my tie?"

no response

"y/n?"

his head suddenly rings and reminded him that he broke up with you.

a small o escaped his lips before he brushed it off.

how stupid of him to not remember such simple things

____________________________☕

he sat at his usual spot with his so called friends but something felt off , he feels cold i mean he always feels cold but this different and he doesnt know why , he looked at the seat beside him to find it empty.

his eyebrows furrowed but brush it off again as usual

" hmm , tom?"

he looked at malfoy as a sign to continue

"wheres your girlfriend , is she sick? or unwell?"

what why was malfoy out of all people be worried about you? he has no right to be worried about you.

"for your information , Abraxas , we are not together anymore"

lestrange looked at me with a confused face and questioned

"what do you mean by 'not together anymore' tom?"

i groaned and rolled my eyes

"she was just an experiment and was just a distraction to me , so i ended it"

"she? you mean y/n chang , was a distraction...to you."

"yes , how many times do i have to tell you fools this."

they both shared a look and looked at me again

" are you sure tom? we've seen the way you look at her.."

i sent them a glare

" i have to go now , goodbye"

______________________________☕

he was walking in the field after class to get his mind clear.

when he saw a dandelion. your favourite flower , he subconsciously smiled and picked it to give it to you.

he found some more orchids and daisies to give to you.

as he went back to the common room , his friends were already there waiting for him

"whos those flowers for?" avery asked

"my girlfriend"

"you found a new one?!"

"what no y/-" he cut himself off slapping himself mentally

"uugh " he muttered a spell and burned the flowers

"what youd do that for?" abraxas asked

"couldve have given it to me"

"shove off malfoy" i storm up to my room

.....

isnt this what he wanted?

peace and quiet?

he jumped on his bed and searched for warmth but there wasnt any..

he was again empty and he didnt know why...he hasnt felt this way for months now and it appeared again..somehow

___________________________☕

it has been approximately 4 weeks and 2 days since i broke up with y/n

and now i see her with non other that diggory , out of all people diggory? a pathetic hufflepuff?

What does Andrew diggory have that he doesnt?

he was sure smarter than the boy , he was surely more good looking than the boy , he was very much more good looking than him since he was fought over by alot of girls and guys

so what does he have that he doesnt

why was he thinking about you anyways , he was the one who broke up with you so why?

"hello tom , we have to tell you something"

distracted from his friends he turned his gaze to them

"what do you guys want "

"we have been observing you from afar"

i furrow my eyebrows at this

"not in a creepy way but we have come to a conclusion..."

they stay silent for a minute

"conclusion of what"

" a conclusion that you are....stillinlovewithher" they say rather fast but he could still comprehend what they say

"what in Salazar's mind are you guys talking about , i am not in love with y/n"

they both looked at eachother and smirked

"we never said who" (this is them rn 🤭😏)

he was trying to respond but he cant

was he really in love with you? he cant be , he cant feel love ever.

_____________________________☕

he was now in his bed at three in the morning , it was now a habit for him..to think about the 'what ifs' about you two

he asked himself every day

was it worth it?

is it worth it?

what can he do to fix this?

what if he never broke up with you?what if he never broke that fragile heart of yours?

what if he never lashed out on you?

before drifting to sleep

____________________________☕

morning has come and he was trying , yes trying (he doesn't really try since hes good in everything but whateves) to find a good way to talk to you or just have a small interaction with you.

and he is now again with his friends in his room pacing

"what are you doing tom?" abraxas says

"shh..somethings in his mind..bet its Chang hes thinking about" avery playfully whispered to abraxas but was loud enough for tom to hear

he rolled his eyes and glared at them

"tom , if youre trying to figure out a way to talk to Chang , i have a way"

his head snaped to avery and raised a brow

avery chuckled "if you want me to tell you , say please"

no

"pardon?"

"say plea-"

"I swear if you tell me to plead to you ill evada kedavra you right here and right now"

"alright , alright , no need to do that" avery said a bit scared and stayed silent for a minute

"well go on then" tom nearly spat on him (💀)

abraxas is just there sitting on the couch awkwardly

"geez calm down riddle , ok first you have to...

_____________________________☕

your pov🤗:

oof

something hit your shoulder or someone and they dropped something

oh!

its a journal ,

"hey um you dropped this" not looking at the person who dropped it

and when you made eye contact

oh. it was him , as you tried telling yourself that you dont care and just to act as if nothing happened

"oh , hello riddle , fancy seeing you here" you looked at him with a small smile

"hey oh , thank you for this book , i- uh"

"well if thats all i better get going now" you say trying to avoid him

"wait y/- , Chang could we maybe talk?"

this is what youve been avoiding but of course the universe had to be like this.with no answer you just go with the brain without thinking and said

"i - umh sure?"

"great , uh can we go somewhere private?"

"oh of course" again not thinking

you followed him to to the come and go room lr the room of requirements as you like to call it

as soon as you get there a door appears and he holds the door for you

once you stepped inside the room, you were in awe , the room was beautiful but that was besides the point

"so.."

"y/n i wanted to tell you , that night i regrett-"

"tom plea-"

"no y/n please , listen to me just this once" he says with pleading eyes and lips of worries as if hes begging for you

you smiled at him too continue

the smile that you always gave him whenever he needs comfort and warmth

"my dearest , y/n i wanted to tell you how i never meant for this to happen , maybe you won't ever forgive me , because my reasons won't ever justify my actions towards you or the things i have said to you that night or week , but i just wanted to tell you I regretted everything, and this doesn't mean you have to forgive me"

" It's funny actually , how I realized I care about you more than I thought, more than I actually think I can , You know how my all my silly giddy or romantic memories only content of you. like the day when you asked me out to go to hogsmeade with you as a date and I was confused on why , mostly beacause you are the most beautiful girl i have ever laid eyes on. I was even more confused with myself , when I came , but that was the best decision I've ever made. Oh and do you remember last winter? you threw a snowball at me and yelled something abt how i wasnt a good enough thrower to hit you with a snowball"he chuckled at the memories flooding in

you let out a small laugh remembering too

"you remember when we had our first kiss together as boyfriend and girlfriend?" you looked at him wholeheartedly

he smiled and looked down " of course i do , my love' how could I ever forget? that night i completely melted and maybe it was just me but I felt something Ive never felt with anyone else. I missed you and still do , I missed us the most , the little notes , the karaoke nights with only you singing , you dragging me into the rain just to dance in it , the glances we sneak to each other, the peaceful warm nights , you have bewitched my heart and soul, you taught me how to love and care , and mostly how to be loved and cared for , all I am asking is that could we ever go back to what we had?" he finished with tears in his eyes

"tom riddle , I love you with my whole heart , but I cant go back there , those words you said to me that night hurt me , that night where you swore you never cared , I lost a little of myself and you know I cant do this to myself , not after that" you say with teary eyes

he smiled at you , tears falling on his cheeks

"Thank you dear , for your time just know you always and will have a place in my heart , can i have the last kiss before we part ways?"

you smiled and leaned in for the last time ever , the last kiss.

"you too tom"

The last words of the lovers that were meant for eachother. Maybe in another lifetime.

_

ITS FINISHED 🤭🤭🤭🤭🤭 Its currently 3am and i finished this with 5% left

[kettlechips3]

Bro 😭😭😭

Right Timing | Charles Leclerc

Notes: 11k words of Charles and y/n pinning for each other…your all (hopefully) going to love it xx

this is my first post in about 6 months and I'm so happy to be back! thank you all for the continuous love and support I fucking love this app. this fic hasn't been proof read but oh well, ignore some spelling mistakes, sorry. anyways... ENJOY!!!

Blurb: One where you have a huge crush on your best friend's brother, the one and only charles leclerc, since you were a teenager, with him continuously telling you he was too old for you and you had no chance. You eventually gave up hope and moved on. But did charles? (Best friends brother troop/ slight enemy’s to lovers troop/ Older boy and younger girl)

Warnings: lots of angst, crying, sad y/n and sad Charles. lots of arguments and slight nsfw? but not really. Small age gap.

11.1k words

Arthur leclerc, your best friend since nursery… Your favourite partner in crime, your favourite laugh on a bad day, your favourite person in the whole wide world. Best to be described as home, your comfort person. He was the voice within reason, all that was right in the world. 

He's your best friend.

Y/n y/l/n, she was truly and utterly his favourite thing about the world. He counts his lucky stars he has her to help him carry his weight. Y/n was the only person Arthur let visit him when his dad died, and in his books, that made her alright. Sure she would make him want to scream and cry and punch walls, especially with her choice in men. But Arthur was always there for her, when she needed to laugh or to cry he knew what it was she needed at any given moment, he could read her like she was his favourite book. 

She was his best friend. 

—

How it started:

A little girl with puffy red cheeks sat at the bottom of the nursery playground. Her legs crossed on the green summer time grass as she sniffled again, gently plucking a daisy for the ground before adding it to the daisy chain she was making. She liked to say she enjoyed her own presence, but truly she was distracting herself from the lack of company. With the other young girls teasing her for her wild curly hair, she willingly chose to be sat on the grass of the playground alone.

“Hey! Can you teach me how you did that? I wanna make one for my mum!”

And with no regard for her personal space he sat down next to her on the grass, squashing half of her daisy chain, but she didn't tell him that.

He didn't care that she was crying or that she had poofy hair or that she was even a girl, he was eager to learn her talents and carry on with his lunch break.

But when Arthur noticed the signs that the girl was rather shy and sad he thought he would stay with her for the rest of lunch, keep her company.

Little did she know this company wasn't going anywhere any time soon.

And at age five, the pair promised to be friends for life.

It didn't take long for them to get their mothers talking, and after that it was set in stone, playdate after playdate. Arthur's mum became your mum's hairdresser, so there were many nostalgic memories for the two in the salon, especially when y/n would accompany her mother to her appointments. The pair's best memory is y/n letting Arthur cut her hair in the storage cupboard of his mum's shop. The horror on both parents' faces when one of y/n's pig tails were held in the hand of the young boy.

Their friendship only bloomed from there…

After spending almost every weekend watching Arthur and his older brother race in karts in the rain, to spending most afternoons around the leclerc residence playing with Arthur on his xbox, the girl felt like family.

When she was young she always found herself drawn to the middle leclerc. He was away a lot of the time, karting. He was slightly older so no doubt he found the pair childish and would always moan when he was made to spend time with them.

Charles' mother was the first to figure out your little crush on the boy. She first noticed it when you joined the family on a winter skiing trip, you were around thirteen. It was your first time up in the mountains, so when your arms started to wave and you felt your body lean way too far back Charles did the only morally right thing, dropping the glove he was putting on and outstretching his body to catch you in time.

He didn't catch you in time. 

Instead his heroic act to save you turned into humiliation when he realised you had taken him down with you.

Pascal carefully watched as you turned around, her eyes glued to yours that were glued to her sons. She watched your tinted red cheeks as Charles scoffed and begged you to get off of him as his bare hands were now engulfed in the thick snow, causing him to suffer with a cold for the rest of the holiday.

Your eyes widened and sparked at the sight of him. You would gaze up at him like he hung the moon and the stars, an expression his mother would soon get used to as she watched you fall for her son over the next few years. 

Charles was older, and very uninterested. He didn't find your little crush as cute as everyone else did, the thought it made him look uncool. He would roll his eyes when you would grab his arm or duck when you would try to kiss his cheek. He hated when your families would go out for meals and you would sit next to him, or how you would call him after a race to congratulate him, no matter his result.

Charles always saw you as his little brother's best friend, nothing more and nothing less.

That was until your first boyfriend. A three year age gap wasn't that big of a deal as they all grew older. Charles found himself having mutual friends with his brother and would occasionally bump into Arthur and you at a party.

You were 16, you thought you had met the love of your life, an older boy, he was 18, around charles age who was now 19 and worming his way into f2. 

Arthur didn't approve of Joao. He knew you were trying to prove to charles that the age gap isn't that big of a deal after his brother had repetitively told you you were to young for him, but somewhere down the line you found yourself mesmerised by Joaos eyes and that was it for you, charles no longer rented the forefront of your mind.

Joao was great, at first. You knew he wasn't the love of your life, but for the moment he looked to play the role quite well, and you were happy. You just didn't expect it to end like it did, maybe age gaps do matter?

You were at some house party in the hills of monaco, some friend of Joaos. You were downstairs in the kitchen with Arthur as he watched you drink your body weight in alcohol. He could tell something was bothering you but he chose not to mention it. In all your years of friendship he knew you would come to him eventually. 

“Where is the lover boy anyway?” he spoke up.

Your lack of response is when Arthur clocked onto your boyfriend being the reason for your excessive drinking. Him ditching you, yet again.

You slammed down your empty red cup, wiping the dribble from your chin as you decided enough was enough and you looked for the presence of your boyfriend. 

Arthur bid you good luck on your travels as his attention was now turned to the girl he had been eyeing up across the room.

And with your liquid courage you stumbled around the party. The house was huge. Gigantic windows that draped around the whole house. Everywhere you looked was so picturesque, making you fall in love with Monaco more and more. From the kitchen window you could see the river of lights leading down to the beach front. From the other end you could see continuous hills leading up into the stary sky, tiny specs of light from homes probably just as big and fancy as the one you were currently standing in swarmed your vision, a far cry from the apartment you and your mother shared where your view was a brick wall to another apartment complex.

Your heels were rubbing the back of your ankles as your hands gripped the bottom of your dress pulling it down as it was miles too short as you made your way out to the garden.

And there he sat, on the steps leading to the lit up outdoor pool, your boyfriend. A skinny little blonde girl sat on his knee. She was older than you, clearly. She took the cigarette from his lips and placed it on her own as her other arm draped over his shoulder. It was like this week after week, it was like you were a ghost.

This isn't the young love you put out for, and you decided enough was enough.

You always forgave him, but tonight was different. This night changed everything.

Tears welled in your eyes as you turned back into the house, you were going home. Joao caught a glimpse of this as he jumped up and followed you back into the house, why he would always chase after you you still don't know.

“Y/n, baby stop.” you ignored the sound of his voice as you pushed through the crowds of people to get back to the kitchen in hopes that Arthur was still there. He wasn't.

You made it to the kitchen before he grabbed the back of your arm pushing you against the kitchen island. His hand came up to wipe away a fallen strand of hair as he tucked it behind your ear.

“Come on y/n i didn't even do anything-”

“She was on your lap.” your voice crooked, you so desperately didn't want to be the little girl everyone thought you was and cry, not in front of everyone anyway. 

“It's not that big of a deal-”

“It is that big of a deal! I'm humiliated!” you shouted back, creating a scene you so desperately wanted to avoid.

“I just- I just want to go home.” you said in between sniffles.

“Baby, don't cry, let's just go back to mine, okay? I'll call a taxi-”

“No, I want to go home, my home.” you begged, the tears were falling now.

His grip tightened around your arm as you tried to wriggle out of his grasp.

“I need to find Arthur, and I need to go home.” you said, pushing his arm as he still had you pinned against the counter.

“Oh come on y/n, drop the act you know you want to come back to mine.”

You threw your head back dodging his fingers that were trying to touch your hair again, avoiding his eyes.

“Joao let go, you're hurting me.”

That only made his grip tighten around your arms, pushing you against the counter even harder than before. As he leant down to your ear-

“She said let go mate.”

Your vision was too blurry to focus on what happened next, but you felt joao grip loosen as he stood back.

“Yeah and what are you gonna do about it, leclerc?”

That's when punches were thrown and Joao was hunched over holding his busted lip. Joao was grabbed by another person before he could lunge back at who you assumed was Arthur, but as you turned your head you saw a different leclerc shaking his hand. His knuckles were red, and his eyes were darker than the ones you were used to, charles.

“y/n get in the car.” he said, you stood up, sniffing and nodding your head. But then you remembered your missing friend.

“Arthur-”

“I'll get him. Get in the car.” his tone was strong, not what you were used to from the middle leclerc. 

You waited by his car in the cold for a few moments just before Charles came out the house, a stumbling tipsy Arthur under his arm. There was pink lip gloss smeared over his cheeks and lips, and at that moment you felt a small smile creep on your face. 

However, the car ride home was silent, you sat in the front with Charles, as Arthur passed out in the back seat. Faint french music played from the radio as charles eyes were firmly gripped on the road.

As you rounded the street to your home Charles finally spoke up, “You really know how to pick them.”

You sniffled again, unable to reply to him mainly because he was right and you were embarrassed. As the car came to a stop Charles undid his seat belt mumbling that he would walk you to your door.

He balanced on the back of his heels as he watched the moonlight highlight your tear stained cheeks. Charles thought you looked beautiful that night even though you had been crying for the last half an hour, your hair hadn't been brushed and you were rummaging through your purse like a mad woman, he still thought you were pretty. He would never tell you that though.

“Don't tell me you've lost-”

“Got them!” You giggled, shaking your keys in the air before whipping your nose for what felt like the fifth time that night. You stalled as you pushed the key in the door, turning to look Charles in his eye for the first time since the party.

“Thank you-” but he cut you off, not wanting to hear it. You were his brother's best friend, Arthur wouldn't forgive him if he ever watched you in a position like the one that night and didn't do anything.

“Dont.”

“No really, thank you, charles.” You smiled, Charles smiled too, mainly because it was probably the first time you had called him Charles and not charlie.

After a moment you dropped your bag on the floor and wrapped your arms around the boy's waist, your head rested on his chest as he hastily moved his hand and rubbed your back.

“Just make sure the next one isn't a total dick, okay?” he whispered, his chin placed on the top of your head.

He didn't know how much that sentence broke your little 16 year old heart.

You smiled and entered the house, Charles didn’t drive off that street before you waved at him out your window.

On the drive home we looked back at his younger brother, drooling on the back seat of his car. 

It was that night where he realised the both of you weren't all that different, but so far apart.

The first time Charles saw you after that night was a couple months later, a family day at the beach. You had turned seventeen in that time and joao was old news. But charles eyes were stuck on your body as he watched you sat in the sand on your own. Sipping from a bottle of beer that you most likely stole from his crate, your toes were dipped in the wet sand as you watched the sun set on your own.

Arthur had brought his new girlfriend with him and even though you were still as close as ever, Arthur's attention was stuck on the pretty blonde that was talking to his nan.

The rest of your families were distracted too, or so Charles thought. His mum watched him intently as he walked back to the car park, grabbing a spare jumper from his car before making way down the beach front to join you.

He spent so much of his life avoiding you, but after the night of the party he just wanted to make sure you were okay. 

He crouched down in the sand next to you, aware of how your eyes were on him. He placed the jumper on your legs,

“You're going to get a cold.”

You scoffed but complied. Putting the jumper over your head and pulling at the sleeves, it smelled like him.

“How are you?” you asked charles, he could feel your eyes staring into his side profile, but he stared at the sun setting over the monegasque sea.

“I'm okay.”

The boys lost their dad a little under a year ago now, you hadn't really seen Charles since. But he knew you hadn't left Arthur's side for them few months.

“How you holding up, really?” you nudged his shoulder with yours, he did his little signature smile before looking down at his lap. Avoiding the question.

“Thank you. For looking after Arthur I mean, he's lucky to have you.” 

“Charlie…”

He looked in your eyes this time, he looked so sad, so broken. So desperate for a hug. You didn't pressure him to answer your question, insted you gently placed your head on his shoulder looking along the coastline in silence.

Charles appreciated the silence and the way you didn't push him, moments like these he understood why Arthur loved you so much.

“It will be alright you know.” you hummed on his shoulder.

“I know.” Charles whispered back.

“Really, i can already see Charles leclerc, ferrari formula one driver. Your face will be all over Monaco, and we're all so proud. He'll be so proud.” 

Charles hated how much you believed him, because in that moment a nineteen year old boy with dreams bigger than the world itself everything felt impossible. 

“Don't forget about me when you're all big and famous, yeah?” you smiled up at him.

Charles looked down at you, his eyes were glossy but the smile on his lips was enough to melt your heart, he threw his head back in a laugh. 

“I dont think I'm ever getting rid of you.”

Now it was your turn to laugh, “at least your self aware charlie.”

After all the laughing he noticed how your eyes shifted from his own to his lips, and then he remembered why he was avoiding you in the first place.

“y/n..” he whispered, oh how he whispered your name in his little broken accent, your heart melted as he backed away.

“I know, I know.”

You smiled and placed your head back on his shoulders looking at the sun that was nearly gone.

“You know I'm too old for you, right?” Charles whispered as he leaned his head on yours that was resting on his arm.

“I'm in it for the long game leclerc.” Charles giggled as he let his cheek get comfy on your head, pushing his side into you as you fully watched the sun disappear over the sea.

On the night of your 18th birthday Arthur had taken you out to your first club, you drank, alot…

Charles happened to be at the same club, so when your drunk body collided with his you couldn't help but wrap your arm around his torso, clinging onto him.

He gently placed hand on the small of your back smiling as you leaned on him.

Charles was 20 now, soon to turn 21 and had just signed a contract with alfa romeo, he was officially in formula one. Even Though you were proud of him you missed having him around. 

You stood on your heels, leaning up to his ear as Charles met your movements and bent down to hear you better in the loud club and your heart fluttered at the small action of his ear hovering near your face.

“I'm eighteen now charlie.” he could hear the smile in your voice.

“I know, happy birthday mon amour.” kissing your forehead, this was the closest you had ever been to him before, and you craved more. He had never called you the nickname before, he was teasing you.

“I'm officially an adult nowwwww.” you longed out his ear before you hand palmed his cheek. You so desperately wanted to kiss him.

“Y/n.” His tone was serious as he caught onto your intentions.

“Y/nnn.” You teased him back, imitating his serious tone and rolling your eyes as you do so.

“I know you want to Charlie, come on…” you giggled at him, but you were drunk and a mess, so the arm around your waist was to stop you from falling flat on your arse not because he just wanted to touch you, you thought. You pushed his hand off you and stood up straight, Charles sighed as he placed his hand back on the small of your back, you looked up at him. The stupid little puppy dog eyes that he refused to listen to.

“I'm too old for you, love.” Charles' hand once again held you close as you started to lose your balance again, “and you're too drunk.”

“Drunk on love.” you exclaimed, Charles laughed, like really laughed and you couldn't help but admire the creases around his eyes. He moved your arm over his shoulder so he could hold you up.

“Let's find Arthur and get you home, okay?” but as Charles pulled away you pulled him back.

“I've waited eighteen years, Charlie, I'm sure I have the patience to wait a bit longer.”

Charles thought maybe you had forgotten that night, but you remembered the way his hand was filmy stuck to the small of your back most of the night, and how he lent down to hear you and how his stubble felt in the palm of your hand, and the butterflies only got worse. 

You were falling harder everyday and you hated yourself for it, he didn't like you back.

Charles carried on with his f1 career with alfa romeo that year and you took up a journalism degree, following around arthur as he navigated the world of f3. You would occasionally bump into Charles when the boys had races at the same circuit. 

But with his first Monaco race you obviously had to be there to support him.

Charles hated how his heart beat boomed in his ear when he saw you standing in his garage with your old ferrari cap on and an alfa romeo shirt with the number 16 on the back hugging your chest. 

You truly had blossomed into a beautiful young woman and Charles found it harder to stay away. Your hair isn't frizzy anymore and you had for sure gone through puberty, he didn't like to stare but he found it hard not to sometimes. Especially on family boat trips when you would wear a bikini in front of him.

The worst part is you hadn't even openly flirted with him in a while, and he couldn't seem to figure out why, and that bothered him so much more than he liked. 

The small little y/n that used to follow him everywhere, always latched to his arm, looking up at him with heart eyes. I mean, you weren't sixteen anymore that was sure, but Charles couldn't help but feel a sense of abandonment that you weren't head over heels for him anymore. 

Charles needed to snake off that weird feelling in his stomach.

You were now 19 about to turn 20, it was the off season and you couldn't wait to soak up some sun on the leclerc yacht. Your favourite summer getaway.

You drove up to the small paddock on a little beach and climbed onto the grey boat, it was charles’, of course. The whole family was there, you were talking to pascal as arthur pulled you around the side of the boat, nearly causing you to break an ankle.

“Erm hello? Watch it.” you scolded him for pulling you so ruffly.

“You're over the whole in love with my older brother thing, right?” he asked, his hand running through his hair.

“I- i why?” you said, clocking your head to the side at Arthurs panicked manor. He knew you had been doing great this year, and he also knew why you declined every single boy that had attempted to ask you out on a date this year. 

“Okay, erm,'' Arthur stood up straight and scratched the back of his head.

“Forget your stuff, let's just get off this boat. And er, don't turn around okay?” he tried to nonchalantly say, his hands gripping your shoulders were a dead give away something was wrong though.

You nodded your head and followed Arthur down the steps of the boat before stopping in your tracks.

“Since when have I ever listened to you? I going to read my book on the sun-”

Your mouth fell open as you turned around to be met with Charles, your Charles with a girl.

A pretty girl, beautiful actually, she was slim and perfect and her smile was enough to make you want to crumble in a ball. 

She was leaning on him, grabbing his bicep as her hand brushed through his hair, he was laughing like really and truly laughing at whatever it was she had to say and you had never felt emotions like the ones you felt in that moment.

You felt like he had personally ripped your heart out himself, no remorse, and had just served it back to you on a silver platter.

He really didn't want you. 

“y/n, i didn't even know he was bringing her i-”

“You knew?”

Arthur sighed before running his hands through his hair, “it's been around four months, mum really likes her, she's nice. I mean she's not you, but he's happy so i can't complain.'' Arthur shrugged his shoulders, not sure how to console you in that moment.

You turned away from the happy couple and sat on the small steps that lead down to the bottom of the yacht. Arthur sat down next to you, pulling your body into his as he wrapped his arm around you.

“What about me? When will I be happy?”

You hadn't realised you were crying until Arthur grabbed your arm and pulled you straight off the boat.

That was your wake up call, you had spent too much of your life waiting for someone that never wanted you. 19 years to be exact, a sad sad story to anyone that knew you. You were embarrassed and angry at yourself. 

You needed to actually move on. 

So that's what you did.

And that's when you met him, a young british boy, he was around your age and drove for a papaya team that shared the f1 grid with charles.

Lando norris.

He was 20, awkward, way too cocky for only his second year, and when you bumped into him in Bahrain of 2020 you chose him to be the one to make you move on.

He asked for your number a few races later and the two of you used to text all the time. He took you on cute picnic dates, asked if he could kiss you before he did, and overall was the kindest most respectful boyfriend a girl could ask for. You were actually happy, and it only took nineteen years.

It was imola when you bumped into Charles in the paddock, his brother wasn't here so he was confused as to why you were here, but then he saw the McLaren hat on your head and his eyebrows furred evenmore.

“y/n?”

“Hello, charles.” you gave him a tight lip smile before moving past him but he chased after you why you walked down the paddock strip. Past the ferrari garage.

“You're a McLaren fan now, huh?” 

“Yep.”

Charles' heart hurt at your bluntness, he grabbed your arm so you would stop walking and talk to him. 

“y/n.” serious charles. That stupid tone that usually made you freeze and obey whatever he had to say.

But this time you rolled your eyes and pulled your arm from his grip.

“Charles, I really have to be somewhere.” you lied, checking your watch.

“Like a journalism thing? Why didn't you tell me you were going to be here, you could have flown with me and Joris?” and Charlotte, but he didn't mention that.

You really tried to pull your eyes from the red drivers suit that was wrapped around his hips, he was a ferrari driver now and you had never been more happy for him. You just wanted to wrap your arms around him and tell him how proud you were of him. 

But right at this moment, you had never wanted to create more distance between you both.

“y/n?” 

Both of your heads snapped as Lando ran up to you, you coughed and took a step back from charles.

Landos arm wrapped around your shoulder as he put out a fist for Charles to spud. Charles' eyes were glued to landos arm resting on your shoulder and he could feel the blood pumping in his heart speeding up.

Lando kissed your temple and Charles' eyes were glued to yours. 

“Charles.” Lando smiled nodding his head.

“Lando.'' Charles' voice was laced with venom, not that Lando noticed. 

“So you guys are?” Charles' eyebrows furred pointing between you both.

“We havent you know, labelled it yet. It's still kind of new” you smiled, it had been months.

“But I'm happy, really happy.” Charles knew that was a message to him, you were happy and he needed to leave you be. But with Lando of all people, Charles couldn't seem to shake this one off.

Charles mumbled something about needing to be somewhere and walked away from you both. Lando again oblivious to the interaction as his arm stayed secured around you and he balabbed on about the race as you walked to the McLaren motorhome.

Charles hated him. 

Charles hated himself for his feelings.

He didn't know why he was so bothered, he had never been this bothered, nothing gotten to him like you and Lando just did. Joris told him maybe it was because he had a soft spot for you deep down, he joked that maybe Charles liked you back and Charles ignored him for the rest of the weekend at that accusation. But that didn't mean he didnt ignore his words. 

It was over, you grew up and he should feel relieved you've moved on, right?

He broke up with Charlotte a month later.

Charles scoffed when you first bought lando along to family night, he hated how your mum loved his accent and how arthur laughed at all his jokes. He hated that he hadn't caught your eye all night, instead your eyes were glued on the stupid little british boys. Charles hated it, he sat there like a toddler that hadn't gotten their own way all night. He knew it was wrong but he hated his feelings more than he hated lando being sat at his table.

Charles was in the kitchen, he was picking at the leftover pie on the table top as everyone else was outside fawning over one of landos stories, he had really charmed the family.

His mother walked into the kitchen as he was taking a bite of cherry pie looking like a caught child, she laughed at the cherry stains in the corner of his mouth and passed him a tissue.

The pair stood in silence for a moment before Pascal spoke up.

“That's definitely not allowed in your diet, my sweet.” she smirked knowing the driver's strict diet.

“But you won't tell on me maman.” Charles flashed his puppy dog eyes as his mum laughed at his actions. She sighed and moved closer to him as he stood up straight. 

“You have a lot on your mind my boy, and don't tell me you don't because I gave birth to you, I know you better than you know yourself.”

“Maman.” Charles sighed.

“This is about her isn't it?” Charles' eyes refused to look at his mother at her words.

“I don't even need to say her name, it's her, it will always be her.” she smiled as she walked over to her son and placed a hand on his cheek.

“She's happy, Charles.'' he heard the sternness in his mothers voice.

“So everyone keeps telling me.” Charles scoffed again.

“So then you know you're being an ass, right?”

Charles' eyes widened at his mothers language but she just laughed and waved him off.

“After all the years she spent pining after you, Charles, it would be cruel for you to not let her be happy.”

“But what if I'm not happy?” he asked his mum, she just sent him a sympathetic smile and grazed his cheek once more.

“Do you love her?”

“I dont know.” Charles shrugged.

“See, it would be cruel to break her heart over this kind of uncertainty. Either you love her or you're just jealous. You have a lot of thinking to do my boy, but don't do anything until you're really sure. She's fragile when it comes to you.”

Charles nodded his head.

His mum was right, he really did have a lot of thinking to do. 

And as if on queue there she was, walking into the kitchen, the widest smile on her face as she grabbed another beer from the fridge. She had started to let her curls rome free recently and it was sending charles’ heart into a spiral, with her stupid little shorts and crocs and no doubt she had conned lando into giving her his jumper. 

She used to do that to him, Charles thought, remembering all the times you had tricked him into stealing his hoodies. 

She smiled at Charles mum and told her again that the food was lovely, nodding at Charles, and she left just as quick as she came in.

“Maman, I'm so in love with her it physically hurts me.”

And there it was, the words you had so desperately wanted to hear your whole life, but you didn't hear a sound as Charles vowed to never say it again out loud. Your happiness came before his.

Charle suffered for a year, he knew he loved you, he had said it out loud once and the vulnerability he felt in that moment knowing you were stood just 15 feet away with the boy you were in love with was enough to make him swear to never voice his feelings again, he was embarrassed and wanted the world to swallow him whole. The worst part was the guilt, he could only feel like he had let one of the best things go, slip straight from his grasp all for a bit of pride. He didn't want to be seen with the young naive girl that had a crush on him, but now he just felt stupid. Stupid that he didn't recognise your love for him sooner, he had always thought you were one of the most amazing humans he had ever met, he found himself looking for you in other people when he didn't even know it. He was stupid, and he knew that for sure.

Charles dedicated the rest of the year to focusing on his f1 seat, with ferrari fucking him and sebastian over and over and after his wins at spa and monza he felt hungry for more and felt that the true love of his life should be formula one.

But his heart hurt when he didn't hear from you after his win in spa, and then it crushed him again when you didn't contact him after his result at monza.

No call.

Not even a text.

He had fully let you slip from his grasp.

It was a long year for Charles that year, and as summer break quickly approached he found girls and training were his favourite pastime. He stopped turning up to family events when he knew lando would be there and you were in love and happy. After a while it was a rarity he would even stay at an event for an hour.

He was 22 and as a new season started the only thing he was talking from lando was his teammate, not that charles was complaining. He liked Carlos, and he was ready to step up and take that 1st driver's seat. He was ready to make everyone proud just like you had promised him that night on the beach.

After a while charles mothers birthday rolled around, one he would definitely not miss as his mother requested a small family meal. Everyone was sitting, looking over the menu when Charles undoubtedly noticed the missing presence of you.

“Where's y/n?” Charles asked Lorenzo, who was sitting next to him.

Lorenzo just shrugged and turned his attention back to his menu, was it normal for you to not attend family outings? Charles hadn't been around for so long he didn't even think to consider that maybe she didn't turn up to these things anymore either.

“With Lando I suppose.” Charles murmured, he tried not to sound jealous but the older brother just laughed.

“Lando?” as he turned to his younger brother.

“Why would she- you really haven't spoken to her have you?” Lorenzo asked, his eyes widening at the thought of his brother being so dumb.

Charles just shrugged his shoulders as he urged his brother to continue.

“They broke up, a while ago actually.”

Charles didnt know why his shoulders felt lighter but he chose to ignore it and try to press some more information out of his brother.

“So? First break up, we've all been there, doesn't mean she can't be here for mamans birthday.'' Charles rolled his eyes as he tried to act like he didn't care.

“She's not even in the country charles.”

Charles' head snapped towards his brothers, “She's taking a gap year, last I heard she was staying in Australia for a while.”

Lorenzo could see the gears turning in charles’ head; he knew he wanted to ask more so he answered for him.

“Hey Arthur, where's y/n these days?” Lorenzo asked his other brother who was at the other end of the table with his girlfriend.

Arthur shrugged before answering, “Still in australia at the moment, she really likes it there, but i told her she cant like it to much because there's no way i'm sitting on a plane for twelve hours every time i want to actually see her face and not on a phone screen.” arthur joked, everyone else laughed along with him for a moment until charles countered up the courage to speak up.

“Why didn't she just travel with formula one? She wanted to be an F1 journalist anyway.”

Arthur's eyes narrowed at his brother. 

You definitely hadn't meant to cause it, but there was a small crack in between the brothers' relationship within the last year. Arthur definitely blamed Charles and his stupid effects on you for you running away.

“She wanted to be away from f1 for a while.'' Arthur told his brother like it wasn't the most obvious thing in the world, hoping to squash this table subject, not really wanting to talk about his run away best friend.

“I mean I don't blame her, especially when her Lando ended like it did. She's living her best life.” Carla, Arthurs girlfriend chimed in. Arthur slightly winced at his girlfriend's words not wanting this to be the dinner conversation tonight, especially when Charles clearly knew nothing about y/n's life within the last year.

“What?'' Charles asked the table, but no one answered him, instead everyone's heads were down dead planted down at the table, everyone except for Carla who had no idea what she had just started.

“Why did no one tell me what's been going on?” charles raised his voice slightly, catching the attention from everyone else on the table.

Charles mother intervened knowing where this was going, “charles, not right now-”

“No, she's been going through something and no one even thought to mention it? What the fuck.”

Arthur was visibly turning red, Charles noticed as Lorenzo's head was shaking telling his little brother now wasn't the time, pleading Arthur to just bite his tongue.

“Say it arthur.”

The flame was lit.

“And who do you think upset her in the first place, charles?” Arthur tutted, picking up his menu pretending to scan it so he didn't have to pay attention to the conversation anymore.

“Drop it, arthur.” Lorenzo sternly interrupted.

“Considering no ones told me anything how the fuck am i supposed to answer that question?” Charles spat back at his brother.

Arthurs cheeks were a visible red now, he was about to blow up. Something he had been holding in for a while. He slammed his menu down and turned to look at his older brother.

“You know what Charles, you have no right! No fucking right, sorry maman for the language-” charles mum just put her hands up in defence as she let her youngest son get it all off his chest. 

“She loved you, and you constantly broke her heart and told her no and then when she was finally happy in a relationship you had to go tell the world you love her so much that ‘it physically hurts you!” Arthur mugged his brother's words.

Charles was shocked, he had no idea what was happening. 

No one knew of his feelings towards you, no one except- charles head snapped towards his mother who pulled a tight lip smile and just shaked her head in a no. Charles was about to deny deny deny when-

“Yeah, she heard it. And it fucking broke her charles. It was mean and it was selfish, and I've never despised someone more than you for what you did to MY best friend.”

“Arthur-”

“I'm not finished. Then you have the decency to finally come to a family meal for the first time in nearly a year, nearly a year charles! And ask about her like you didn't completely cut her and us out of your life? You're selfish, completely and utterly selfish charles.”

Charles sat at the table pale, he felt the colour drain from his face as he scrambled to find the words to say but his mouth didn't open.

“You really do pick and choose your moments brother, I don't know why I even came tonight, I'm sorry maman but I told you I wouldn't be able to sit in a room with him.”

Arthur stood up, he grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair and took Carla's hand in the other.

“I'm really sorry maman, and everyone else, happy birthday, i guess.” Arthur gave his mother a hug and walked out of the restaurant with carla. Leaving everyone else at the table in pure shock.

Especially Charles, he had know idea what to say, he looked up at his mother opposite him who looked at him with sympathy.

“My sweet boy, I'm sorry to say it but there was some truth to your brother's words. I told you she was fragile.”

Charles felt awful.

Charles felt like he was going to cry at the table.

It had been a long year for Charles, he had groveld for the most of it, thinking you were happy somewhere while Lando flew you anywhere and everywhere around the world. Now he came to think of it, maybe there was a better reason for the young mclaren driver avoiding him.

He wasn't really friends with Lando, but his teammate, Carlos was close with the boy and whenever there was an offer for the three of them to hang out Lando magically had something come up and couldn't attend. 

It all made sense now. Even the fact he hadn't seen you in the paddock, he thought maybe you were caught up in your studies, oh how he was wrong.

He sat at the table for the rest of the meal, and with every passing comment he didn't think he could sink more into his chair.

He was an awful person, he thought.

When the family were leaving the restaurant Charles hugged his family members, swallowing the anxiety and embarrassment down.

He looked over at Lorenzo who sent him a sympathetic smile, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“Tonight wasn't supposed to go like that, i told arthur to just drop it i-”

“No, it's okay. I deserved it.”

“I dont know, you fucked up, but you didnt need to run, nether did she.'' Lorenzo, his older brother shrugged.

“What happened? With her and lando." Charles pushed.

“alot .” lorezono chucked.

“I don't know if it's my place to-” enzo sighed at that stupid little puppy dog face his younger brother was pulling.

“I'm pretty sure she cheated on him, Arthur said as she fell into a bit of a hole. So the only thing she really could do was just leave Monaco for a while. She seems good, Charles, healthy and happy." Lorenzo shrugged, watching as Charles' eyes widened and he latched onto every word. 

“If it's any closure she's not mad at you, Arthur, well I'm sure he would be he loves y/n like a twin sister, but she's not mad at you. She was just confused and hurt.”

“If i call her-'' Charles started but his voice flattened as he realised it would ne dumb to contact you.

“Call her Charles, I'm sure she would be happy to hear from you.”

You knew what today was, arthur's molthers birthday. You had called her in the morning sending her your love and wishes, she told you that Charles was attending the meal and Arthur would be on his best behaviour, little did you know.

You wondered if Charles knew what you were up to, if pascal or lorenzo had been keeping him in the loop.

You were at the beach, cocktail in hand and book in the other, your earphones were in as you hummed to the faint sound of the music and read, but you were disturbed when the rigging was a call from your phone echoing through your earphones, charles.

Pick it up.

Pick it up.

You couldn't do it.

Your body froze in place, you pulled your airpods out, throwing down your book, not caring that you lost the page you were on. You took in a deep breath and picked up your phone, and just as your thumb hovered over the answer button, the ringing stopped.

He had called you?

You needed a moment to think about what you were going to say to him, what he would say.

You so desperately wanted to hear his voice, it had been a year, and you wondered if that was enough time for feelings to vanish.

You looked out at the calm seas for a moment, did you really want to fall back into a loop of pining for him like a puppy. You loved him, loved, past tense. You were a grown woman now, so you opened your phone and called him back.

Ringing.

“Hello?” his voice echoed through the phone.

“Charles?”

You heard his sigh of relief over the phone, and your heart melted all over again, he hadn't even spoken yet, but the closeness of his presence made it all too real.

“I'm sorry.”

He's sorry?

“Charles-”

“I'm sorry, okay. Arthurs right, I was mean and I was selfish and you deserved so much more than what I did to you. From the bottom of my heart y/n/n, I'm so so incredibly sorry.”

“It's- it's okay.” 

You forgave him.

“It's not.”

There was a silence that lingered for a moment.

“What I said, what you heard, it wasn't supposed to happen like that. I really didn't want it to happen that way.” he pleaded over the phone, his breathy voice echoing through the speaker.

“I want to see you.”

More silence.

“Please, y/n.”

“Okay.”

More silence.

“Soon, okay.” There was promise to your words.

“Soon.” he repeated, as though it was something for him to hold onto. 

Soon.

“When I'm ready Charles I'll come home, I'm just not ready yet.” you winced at your own words because you so desperately wanted to see him too.

“Then don't come home- i'll come to you, i'll catch the next plane if i have too just tell me where you are-”

“Charles, I'm not ready yet.” you interrupted him. 

Silence.

Charles wanted to cry, hearing your voice and knowing you were just within reach he wanted to see you, hold you, apologise as much as you would allow him to. He wanted to kiss you and hug you and love you forever, but you weren't ready.

“I'll wait for you, okay? Soon or not.” his voice cracked, and god did it melt your heart.

“I'll see you soon charlie.”

This was feeling a little too much like a goodbye for charles.

“y/n?”

“Yeah?”

“Am I too late?’

“Time doesn't apply when it comes to you.” and Charles had hope. He hadn't fully let you slip, yet.

Charles would now spend every waking moment wondering how soon was soon?

But after a while he figured ‘soon’ was a little long, three more months to be precise.

You had left Australia, travelled around more like you wanted to, and you came back to Monaco just before the end of the f1 season.

Charles was already in Abu Dhabi by the time you landed back in monaco.You had asked everyone to not tell him of your arrival.

You were sitting with Arthur in his mothers living room, just like the old days. You told him about your travels while he updated you on his love life and gossip in the paddock.

You had missed this.

And it wasn't until pascal passed you a warm cup of tea and sat with the two of you, sharing her own gossip from the hair salon you realised how much you were ready to be home again.

Arthur had run to his room quickly to grab his trophies to show you and as he walked out of the room your eyes lingered on the suitcases by the door.

“You're going to Abu dhabi?” you asked pascal.

“Tomorrow.” she smiled at you.

Pascal could visibly see the gears turning in your head, she placed a hand on your knee and smiled up at you.

“I don't want to pressure you y/n, and i know you just got back but you should consider it.”

You knew what she meant and you nodded at her with a small smile, and Arthur came back.

You went home a few hours later and sat in your room, if you go you'll see him, but you're going to see him at some point regardless. 

You felt vulnerable.

So completely scared, but that didn't stop you from texting Arthur that night telling him you were going to join him and his family tomorrow.

You were going to see him.

Your time was up.

You were ready.

You meet up with the leclerc family at the airport in the early hours of the morning, your suitcase gripped in your hand as you were mentally preparing yourself to sit on the plane and go over any and every possible outcome this weekend could have.

Arthur sat with Carla at the front, and Pascal was fast asleep. But the chair next to you suddenly became occupied when you looked up and saw the eldest leclerc.

“You look well, y/n.” he smiled down at you.

“Thank you.” you smiled back at lorenzo.

“I think the time away did you good, no?”

“yeah, i really needed some space, but now i'm back and just feeling a little..” you stumbled on your words, struggling to describe your emotions.

“Overwhelmed?”

“Yeah, exactly that.”

“Does he know you're coming?” you knew the ‘he’ lorenzo was referring too.

“I dont think so.”

“He's going to be happy to see you.” lorenzo nudged your shoulder.

“I hope so.” you nervously chucked.

You took in a deep breath and looked back at the eldest leclerc brother, “I'm just anxious, I have no idea how this weekend will pan out. The next time I'll be back on this plane going home I could be happy, sad, crying or planning to run away again. I just feel so lost.”

“Lost isn't a bad thing.'' Lorenzo shrugged.

“He's just as lost as you y/n, trust me. I just hope you both figure it out, you both deserve the peace of mind. And if this all goes to shit, you still got on this plane today and tried.”

“I just don't want to get my hopes up.”

“Then don't, sometimes things aren't just meant to be.”

That's what was worrying, you had loved this man for years, and now was the deciding day if he loved you back or not and you don't know if you were ready to give up the fantasy of him

being the love of your life up yet.

You weren't mentally prepared for the shit outcome of this story, you didn't know if you could handle Charles breaking your heart another time.

When the plane landed and the warm air hit your skin you took in a deep breath. Time to face the music.

You went straight to your hotel, it was a Friday so Charles was about to participate in fp1 by the time you turned up to the track.

The smell of burnt rubber and the sound of happy fans filled your ears, you had missed being in the paddock more than you knew. This place was your home.

You were walking with Arthur and Carla when your name was called, judging by the accent you knew it wasn't the monegasque, it was the papaya coloured boy running up to you.

You told Arthur and Carla you would catch up with them as you stopped and smiled at lando who had now reached you. 

“Hey.” he smiled.

“Hey.” you smiled back awkwardly.

“Listen lando, you deserve an explanation-”

“It's okay y/n, we were young, it was a while ago you’re forgiven.” Lando chuckled as he poked your shoulder.

“But that doesn't mean what I did was okay, you deserve more than what I gave you.” 

Lando gave you a sympathetic smile.

“Consider it done with, okay? No hard feelings.”

You smiled up at the British boy, he looked good, he seemed well and that made your guilt feel a little less painful.

“I erm, I have a girlfriend actually, she's great, her names luisa.”

You watched as he lips upturned at the mention of his girlfriend, he was smitten.

“I'm happy for you landini.”

You both laughed for a moment, the free air was nice. Seeing lando meant there was a weight lifted off your shoulders.

“I just wanted to see how you were doing, I didn't want things to be awkward.” he said.

“I don't think I could ever be awkward around you.” Lando smiled at your words.

“Are you still thinking about becoming an F1 journalist?” he asked, remembering how it was your dream, he had also hoped your disappearance in the paddock for the last year wasn't his doing, stopping you from reaching your dream.

You smiled as he remembered, “I'm working on it.”

“Well i hope i see you around more often then, you deserve it y/n, really.”

Lando was getting called from the other end of the paddock as he had to be in his car within the next 10 minutes, you both shared a hug and it felt nice to feel comfortable with him.

His hands squeezed your back before saying a quick bye and skipping down the paddock. 

As he pulled away and walked past, your eyes connected with them all to familiar grey ones you were so nervous to see.

Charles.

He didn't seem too happy though.

He had just watched you smile and laugh with your ex in the middle of the paddock and then hug him bye, even though you thought nothing of it, Charles' mind was spinning.

There he was, a tight lipped smile right opposite you. He had grown out his stubble and he looked tired. You knew he hadn't had the best of seasons with Ferrari, you didn't keep up with it too much, it upset you that his childhood team had failed him massively. 

He nodded his head and followed his press officer in the opposite direction, but you weren't going to let him go just yet.

“Charles, wait!”

And before you could process it you were running, sprinting down the paddock after him, but he had already disappeared into ferrari hospitality.

“Shit.” you mumbled as you jogged down to the garages in hopes of catching up with him.

You scanned your pass and walked into the back of the garage Pascal had walked up to you and grabbed your hand.

“You need to put some headphones on dear, it gets loud in -”

“Pascal, where did he go?” you asked her frantically, like a mad woman out of breath.

“Charles?”

“yes!”

A slight smile just appeared on her face as she turned around, “Be quick dear, I think I can see him putting his balaclava on.” She pushed your shoulder and you walked around the red barrer that clearly said ‘no public entry’.

“You can't be back here, ma'am.” a security officer grabbed the back of your bicep.

“No, I need to get through, it's an emergency.” you whined, pulling your arm from his grip.

“I'm sorry ma’am, it's a safety hazard.” the man's grip tightened on your arm as he pulled you away from the back of the garage. You pushed off him but his grip only improved as he swept you off the floor, lifting you up at your attempt to run. You kicked your legs like a child learning to swim and kicked arms that trapped you.

“If you refuse to cooperate, I'll have no choice but to remove you from the garage.” he said, trying to dodge your feisty little kicks.

“And If you don't get your slimy huge hands off me right now i'm going to-”

“y/n?!”

Your head snapped at the sound of your name, Jorris, Charles' best friend.

“Jorris, oh thank god!”

“She's okay, she can come in.” Jorris grabbed your other hand and wiggled you away from the huge security man's grip as he dropped you back to the floor. You brushed off your dress and gave the security man a dirty look before turning to Charles' best mate.

“Jorris, where is he?” your breathing was rapid and your heart beat feeling like it was thumping out your chest.

“y/n you really shouldn't.” he sent you a sympathetic smile.

“Please.” you pleaded with him. After seeing you try to fight a six foot five security man Joris really didn't want to feel the wrath of you right now, so he complied.

“You have five minutes, follow me.” he led you through the back of the garage.

Whenever Charles got in the car he liked to be left alone to his own devices, it was his switch off time, but you knew on some occasions he didn't mind the company, you just needed to talk to him, tell him you were here for him. You didn't want him getting in the car overthinking that you were here for lando.

And before you knew it, there he was, standing in front of you, you were painting out of breath with your hands on your knees as you looked up at him.

Charles giggled as you held up a finger to let him know you were still getting your breath back. He pulled his ear pieces out of his ear and zipped up the rest of his race suit.

“I hate to rush you, but I have to be in the car in four minutes.” Charles frowned, “and four minutes aren't enough for what I have to say to you, y/n.”

“Let's keep it short and sweet then.” you stood up straight and smiled at the boy.

“Im sor-” he started but you cut him off.

“That's not what I meant by sweet.”

Charles squeezed his eyes and winced at his name being called behind him, he opened his eyes and saw you beaming up at him and he knew he was in love, he just wasn't going to tell you yet, especially not if he had just witnessed you make up with lando. Lando made you happy, Lando didn't break your heart on multiple occasions like he had. Charles wouldn't blame you if you went back to the British driver.

You tilted your head to the left and smiled at Chris, Charles' manager. He was pointing at his watch and tapping his foot.

You looked back at Charles and took in a deep breath, you stood on your tip toes and placed your arms on his shoulders, gently placing a kiss to his cheek.

Your soft lips connecting with his ruff stubble is something Charles cherished, he couldn't wipe the Cheshire cat grin off his face.

“I know it's only a practice session, but good luck out there charlie.”

“Thank you.” he smiled, trying to hide his blush. He couldn't believe he was blushing and how the roles had reversed between the two of you.

“What about lando?” he had to ask, it was on his mind.

“I'm not standing next to Lando wishing him good luck right now, am i?” you smirked at him.

Charles smiled before looking back at his manager, he bent down and kissed your forehead like he had done a thousand times, but this time it felt different, electric, it felt like love. It was love.

“I'll be waiting for you, okay?” you told him.

Charles smiled to himself, he wasn't too late.

If anything was on Charles' side that day it wasnt timing. Charles finished fp2 with a few flying laps and a heavy heart, his first plan was to find you but his press officer had forced him to do interviews, and then he had a meeting and then he had checked his watch and it was way past nine and he knew you were probably back at the hotel by now.

He huffeed as he left his meeting, grabbing his jumper and keys and saying goodbye to the engineers that were going to work on the car overnight.

He had it all planned in his head, he was going to get some flowers on the way home, knock on your hotel door and ask you on a date.

“Charles!” called out his manager, he really hoped he didn't have to stay in this hell hole any longer, he just wanted to leave the track and get his girl.

“What?” he huffed.

“She waited.”

“What?” Charles repeated, his manager now having his full attention. 

Charles caught the way his manager's lips turned into a devilish smirk, but he wasn't looking at Charles, yet something behind him. When he whipped his head around there you were, his heart thumped at the massively oversized ferrari jacket one of the staff must have given you to keep you warm while you waited.

You just smiled at him and waited for him to walk to you, but charles sprinted, he was a man on a mission and when he got to you his hands slipped around your waist, pulling you up in the air for a moment before he dropped you back down, his hands still remaining tightly wrapped around your torso.

He tucked a stray piece of hair behind your ear before placing his forehead on yours.

“Take what's yours charlie.” you smiled. 

Charles' thumb gently traced over your plump bottom lip before he placed his hand on your cheek, smiling like an idiot. 

He slowly grazed his lips on your before gently adding pressure and connecting your soft lips with his in a quick kiss. A kiss that was full of smiles as Charles pulled you as close to him as possible. Towering over you as he kissed you unlike he had kissed anyone ever. The way your lips moved in sync with his was magic to him, it had never felt like this before.

He pulled back letting you get some air, before using that as leverage to stick his tongue in your mouth, he put all his power and passion into the kiss and it was just as you imagined him to be with you. Sensual and passionate. 

Your hands ran along his shoulders and up to his head where you gently tucked on his hair. Charles groned on your lips and eventually pulled back, he giggled as he placed his forehead on yours again. 

“All mine, finally.” He said through a wide smile.

“I've always been yours…”

Thank you for reading!! Here’s a gif of baby Charles because this is how i imagined him when y/n had her teenage crush. Bare faced and spiky hair🥹

[kettlechips3]

that pedro pascal laughing then crying meme is the perfect way to summarize what watching the last of us is like

[kettlechips3]

My period is making me really emotional while watching that’s 70s show when Eric is leaving for Africa and Hyde is being a tuff guy and not talking to Jackie. I really really wanted them to be endgame.

#steven hyde #jackie burkhart #thats 70s show

[kettlechips3]

Read this like asap 🥹

said something stupid, instead of 'i love you.'- c.leclerc

can't we just act like we never broke each other's hearts? pairing: charles leclerc x female reader word count: 26.9k (my bad fr fr) warnings: 18+ minors dni, protected sex, oral sex, google translated french. tw: charles' 2022 season (including france) a/n: this is something, that's for certain. good or bad is yet to be decided.

You’d texted him two weeks before the season opener. It was short, simple, and a huge overstep, one you promised yourself years ago you’d never make. Do you have any extra paddock passes? He’d said yes, and you begrudgingly asked if you could have an extra, if you could bring a guest, a boyfriend, Michael. He’s a big fan, of Charles and of Formula One. I really want to impress him.

Michael’s been impatiently itching to meet Charles since he spotted a photo of the two of you in your living room. You thought you’d taken them all down before he came over, but, you missed one. He’s sort of a Ferrari fan-boy, an Italian whose transplanted himself to Monte Carlo. You’d been putting off the meeting as long as possible, forced to consider if Michael actually liked you, or if he just wanted to know Charles. It wasn’t easy, to keep them apart. It was winter break, and Charles was in Monaco too much to be easily avoided. There’s a lot of verbiage that is used to describe home, vast is not one of them. 

You feel strangely out of place with someone else to look after in the paddock. Ferrari hospitality had been your home away from home for years now, the way you followed him around the globe like a helicopter parent that first year he wore red. The paddock was always different, but maintained a comfortable familiarity, recognizable faces, names, buildings and colors. Michael was wide-eyed and curious and you smiled at the way the sun bounced off his hair, the excitement he couldn’t contain when amongst the chaos you’d become accustomed to. His presence, though, felt intrusive on something that had, for so long, been just yours. 

Arthur’s familiar voice calls your name, over the bustling hum of different important and wealthy figures. You grin when your eyes meet his, stand up from the leather sofa you’re seated on, give him, and Pascale, big hugs. Charles told me you brought someone? She asked, voice sweet and curious. 

Her tone was contrasted by Arthur’s quip asking where your arm-candy had run off to, wiggling his brows and searching the room for a man he’d never seen. He’s oblivious to the glare Pascale shoots into the side of his head. 

You explain that he’s in the bathroom, check your watch. “Have you seen Charles today?” It’s not like him to not stop by and say hello, to check in and make sure you’re still enjoying yourself–or that you’re still capable of pretending you are. You wonder if he’s avoiding you, annoyed by the presence of your guest, a guest he doesn’t know. It’s unheard of, you asking for passes. It’s literally never happened. You’d asked about the possibility of one for yourself, back when he was with Sauber, and he’s maintained that you have an open invite since. 

“We were just with him.” Arthur says.

“How is he?” You ask, because he might be mad at you, but also because you know him. His brain works like clockwork. Two hours before a race, right now, he’ll be doubting himself, doubting the car, doubting himself again. In his moments of downtime, before he’s swept up into the chaos of it all, his brain will pick itself apart with nervousness. You think it’s endearing, his nerves. They remind you that he’s still Charles at times where he feels so grand and invincible. 

“He’s good.” Arthur says, because between crucifying jokes and mockings of his big brother, Arthur idolizes him. He’s none the wiser to Charles’ anxieties and insecurities because he’s never looking for him, blind confidence in the man he’ll never admit is his biggest role model. You look to Pascale, who understands the depth of your question, and get a reaffirming nod. 

Arthur diggs two sticker tags from his pocket, full grid access. “For you.” He says, fastening one onto your lanyard. “And for the boy.” He holds out the other, presents it like a crown jewel. You sigh, snatch it from his hand and shove it into your pocket. You hate watching races in the garage, with all the hyper-wealthy motherfuckers who buy their way in. You always feel like you don’t belong. Like, no matter where you move, you’re always in someone more important’s way. Your limbs don’t feel like your own, unable to settle, so close to the comfort of your best friend yet miles away from his occupied mind. 

“What’s going on?” Michael asks, airy tone in direct conflict to his hand on the small of your back, tense with envy. He’s silently laying claim to you, reminding you who you belong to, and you almost laugh at the thought of someone being threatened by Arthur. Charles, you could see. Charles, you’ve had that argument about before. Arthur, though? Arthur, who slept with his ratty blanket until he was sixteen, who lost not one, but two pet goldfish in the span of a year. Arthur, who is very happily in love with the sweetest girl to ever grace this Earth. 

“C’est lui?” Arthur asks, tone bored. “Il est vieux.”

“This is him.” You say, through gritted teeth, introduce them all formally and sit by as an observer in their conversation. The lowlight was Arthur’s mention of grid access, and Michael’s giddiness at watching the race in the garage. You knew then that you’d be uncomfortable well into the night. 

You end up in the garage during the driver’s parade. “Don’t touch anything.” You told Michael, the same warning Charles had given you the first time he brought you through a garage. The warning you give was less for your boyfriend, and more for you, who is desperate to run a hand over the red chassis, to memorize every detail of it. If you do, you might feel more comfortable when he’s inside, might be able to pretend you understand the concepts he casually mentions over dinner. 

You squeal like a child when you see Isa, hugging her tight and spilling all the details of your lives since Abu Dhabi last year. You introduce her to Michael, who says he’s a big fan of Carlos. Joris tugs on your ponytail, appearing with Andrea, who kisses your cheek, tells you Charles is going to be so happy to see you in the garage. You roll your eyes. 

Charles is heard before he is seen, a loud laugh, a familiar voice calling out your name as soon as he turned the corner. He’s probably just as surprised to see you in here as you are uncomfortable about it. When you hug him, the knotted waist of his overalls digs into you awkwardly. “You’re warm.” You say, peeling your body from his sweaty form. 

“It’s hot.” He says, runs a hand through his salty hair.

“They shouldn’t make you wear all this during the parade.” You said, and he shrugged it off, asked where your guy was. You look around, search the garage for him. He can’t be far, and surely he’s gawking from one corner or another. If not at the sight of Charles Leclerc, Formula One driver, than at Charles, a man, whose hand hovers just behind the small of your back. 

Two hands, two separate distinctions. One, possessive and impossible to ignore. The other, protective, almost goes unnoticed. For a few breaths, your shoulders are relaxed, but then his hand is gone, shaking Michael’s. “Good to meet you, Mate.” Charles says, and the whole place feels like a straightjacket again.

– – 

You stand next to Isa, your hands wrapped nervously around each other’s the entire race, watching monitors and listening in on the headsets. “Carlos says the cars have it this year.” She says, while the guys are lining up in their starting spots. It feels like everyone at Ferrari has been chasing it, whatever it is, for a decade. Every year is the year, and every year, you’re begging Charles not to base his self-worth on a bad race or a bad season. You’ll believe in him until your last breath, but your glass of Ferrari is never going to be half-full.

Charles and Max, Max and Charles, Charles and Max. They flip flop positions lap after lap. When it seems like he’s settled in, you allow yourself to breathe. The universe has never allowed him comfort, though. Enter, safety car. The replay is on the screen, and your heart pangs for Pierre, watching his dash go black in system failure. Your heart aches for Charles, though, and the forty-six laps of hard work that was erased just like that. 

Max races like Max, inching closer and closer to Charles, practically lining up next to him. You’re rearing up for a dogfight, but Max fucks up. You don’t know what he did, why he did it, and it doesn’t seem like anyone else does either. It doesn’t matter, though, because Charles is gone. Something in you settles, sure and confident, even if it’s not over yet. You hear murmurs, celebrations, Max is retiring. Charles is going to win.

A Ferrari one-two to start the season. Your smile is so big your cheeks ache. Under the lights, watching him up on the top step, listening to your national anthem, you allow yourself to hope, to buy into the hype everyone else is swearing by. 

His skin shines brighter than his smile, sparkling with whatever lemon-lime soda they’d filled the champagne bottles with this year. You have a momentary lapse, consider what his skin would taste like, sweaty and sticky and sweet. Michael’s presence, his arms caging you in between him and the barricade, assures that the thought is nothing more than a passing one. 

He hugs you when he makes the rounds, being whisked away to whatever media responsibilities he had to fulfill before he heads to the debrief. Sweat and seven-up soaked, he’s running on pure adrenaline, squeezing you so tight you struggle to breathe. 

– –

You shower back at the hotel, wash his hug down the drain with the rest of the race anxiety. He takes everyone out to dinner late that night; Arthur, Lorenzo, Pascale, Andrea, Joris, Michael, and you. It’s a tradition. No matter how late or early in the day it happened. A podium, a celebratory dinner. Like always. 

The air is light, happy conversations flow from smiling faces, filling the room with laughter and excitement and hope. You’re sandwiched between your boyfriend and your best friend. Charles’ arm throws itself around your shoulder when Lorenzo retells a story meant to embarrass you. Michael reacts accordingly, hand on your thigh, fingers digging into your skin. They’re fighting over you and only one of them knows it. 

Charles is engaged in conversation, and you’re pretty sure you’re going to have bruises in your leg by the time you go to sleep tonight. You nudge Charles’ foot with yours, his head turns before his eyes, lingering on Andrea and the conversation you’re pulling him from before he's searching your eyes curiously. You shrug your shoulder, and as if noticing it’s there for the very first time, he drops his arm onto the table and returns to the conversation. 

He must’ve showered, changed, and hurried here. His hair is still damp, and you want to play with it. Curl the long pieces around your finger and play with the short pieces at the nape of his neck. You soak up his presence as much as you can, knowing it’s going to be several weeks and several races before you see each other again. Crazy lives and crazy schedules that won’t feel normal again until break. You both take care to cherish the times you do get to spend together these days. You’re not twenty-one following him around the world anymore.

“Merci.” You say, at the end of the night. “For everything.”

He shakes his head, shoos your words away like they’re unnecessary, like you shouldn’t be thanking him for pulling strings. “Ton jouet garçon parle-t'il français?” He asks quietly, just for the two of you to hear. You roll your eyes, shake your head. “Il aest assez fan de moi.” 

“Tu l’aime bien alors?”

“Non.” He chuckles. “Je ne l’aime pas. Pas pour toi.” He says it matter-of-factly, annoyingly so and without any elaboration. 

“Heureusement, que tu n’es pas ma mère.”

“Heureusement.”

It’s Miami when you see him next. Hot and humid and sunny, once more. Windy, too. Big gusts move the palms, gluing your hair haphazardly across your face before you tie it back, blowing his shirt tight across his chest. “How’s grandpa?” He asks at lunch. You’re sat across from him on the expansive patio of a waterfront restaurant, waves crashing against the cement beams below you, a seagull running around on the wooden planks in search of fresh crumbs. 

After Bahrain, Arthur wouldn’t drop the salt and pepper allegations, pushing until he found out Michael was seven years older than you. None of the boys have referred to him as anything but a grandfather since. 

“Oh, that?” You say, nonchalant, like you can’t be bothered when you very much were. “He liked me too much.” Translation, he wanted me on a leash. 

“He liked you too much.” He repeated, smile tugging on his lips. “Please,” He gestured to you, “Élaborer.”

“You never liked him, anyway.” You say into the rim of your water glass, taking a long, cold drink. The condensation from the glass drips down your wrist, forearm, off your bent elbow and onto your bare thighs, just past the hem of your sundress. The glass makes a heavy clunk when you set it back on the tabletop. 

“Oh, I loved him.” He laughed. “He was just wrong for you, chou.”

“You barely knew him.”

“After he left you alone in the garage?” He leans back in his seat, gestures harshly across his throat and clicks his tongue. “There was nothing to know.”

“You leave me alone in the garage.” You remind him and he’s quick to jump in. 

“I do not.” He leans forward, elbows on the table, animated. You smile, he smiles. “I leave you with Arthur.”

“You do not!” You laugh, protest without thinking, without needing to. The memory of each and every race you’ve spent in the garage is burnt into your memory. Every second feels like a second and a half. There are no distractions, it’s just you, in the way, and him, flying around in a death trap at a million kilometers an hour. 

He tries to argue, insist he would never leave you alone if he thought you were uncomfortable. You don’t want to hear it, though. If he does leave you under the watchful eye of someone, they have always done a pretty shitty job at looking out for you. “Whatever.” He finally concedes. “Who’s on the radar now?” Nobody, you tell him. Going to be single for a while. 

“What are your plans tonight?” He asked over the phone. It was the middle of the decade, the start of your first year at University. The longest you’ve been away from home and the only time he’d been there without you. 

Jules had died that summer, and the sun had felt dimmed since. You spoke to Charles almost every day, but you were in no rush to get back home. It was ironic, Monaco reminding you of Jules, you finding an escape from the memories in France. It should be the other way around, but, logic has never had much hold over grief. 

“I have a presentation, remember?” He listened to you revise for it, mindlessly picking apart your notes, adjusting even the most minute details, for hours last week. You cried when the ancient printer in the library wouldn’t fulfill it’s only earthly purpose, and he patiently calmed you down, stayed with you on the phone until you fell asleep that night. He never acknowledged it, and you were grateful for it. 

“That’s tonight?” He asked, sounded defeated.

“Yes. Why?”

“I miss you.” He said, and you nearly crumbled into a little ball on the street. “I was going to come see you.”

You hesitated for a moment, tried to remember just how messy your apartment was, sized up your outfit. You didn’t want him to go telling stories to your parents of a disheveled daughter drowning somewhere just below the surface in France. You wanted to be put together when you saw him again, be the rock you were before you left. 

Generously, you would say you fell somewhere in the grey. “Come, then.’ You told him. “You can pick me up.”

– –

Nearly three hours later, after the conclusion of your presentation and his mind-numbing drive, he’s parked a short walk from your university building, waiting for you. “Sulut.” He said. 

“Hey.” You replied, climbing into the passenger seat. “How was Portugal?” He’d just gotten home and you’d been too busy with school to check any race results. Plus, you always liked hearing his recounts of races more than Google results. 

“How was your presentation?” He asks, doesn’t answer your question. 

“Good.” You smiled, buckled your seatbelt. 

Last season, before last summer and before Jules, you couldn’t get him to shut up about racing. It was all he ever wanted to talk about. He could be winning races or embarrassing himself on track, it didn’t matter, he’d talk your ear off. Now, he’s a lockbox with a combination that changes every day. You talk and you talk but nothing is really said, not anymore. You use each other’s voices to drown out the ones in your heads, to dull the pain, if even briefly. 

Growing up, it had always been your three families. Your fathers were best friends, had known each other before they knew their wives. You vacationed together, spent holidays together, had monthly family dinners and walked to the bus stop together. All of you kids were the same ages. Not planned, completely coincidental, they’d always say. You didn’t buy it, Arthur was the only one without a match, poor kid, the permanent brunt of jokes and the forever baby brother. 

“I don’t know my way around here.” He says, hand on the back of your headrest, backing the car out onto the road. 

“I do.” He smiles. Oh, how you missed his smile. All perfect and pretty, just like the rest of him, only happier.

You arrive in Spain early, with him. There’s optimism after Miami, Charles is back on track, back to believing he deserves the title and then some. You all spend the entirety of Monday in La Barceloneta, soaking up as much tranquility and Spanish sun as you can.

Someone is knocking–pounding–on the door of your hotel room. The sun has barely risen, pouring through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting hard golden shadows on the entire room. “Fuck.” You groan, rubbing sleep from your eyes, dragging your feet the entire way to the door. When Charles had said, we’re going to spend all day at the beach, you thought he meant midday, at the earliest. “What?” You say, met with Arthur’s annoyed face. 

“You could sleep through a freight train.” He says, and you flip him off. 

“You could have called me.” You say, yawn, stretch your arms out above your head. He rolls his eyes, and it gets under your skin in a way only a little brother can manage. You wish you had a shoe to throw at his stupid face. 

“Charles did. Three times.” He holds up a matching amount of fingers and you nod, that sounds like something you’d sleep through. “Are you ready?” 

Deep breaths, deep breaths, don’t lunge at him. “Do I look ready?” He looks you up and down and you can actually see the gears turning in his head, all three of his brain cells working overtime trying to convince him to keep his mouth shut. “Don’t answer that.” You say, stop him before your eye starts to twitch. “Give me half an hour.”

You knock on the door to Charles’ suite forty-five minutes later. Messy ponytail that you barely brushed, swimsuit, shorts, cotton button-up, entirely too large tote bag slung over your shoulder. Lorenzo answers, “Good morning, sunshine.” He says, all sing-songy and stupid. “Sleep well?”

You walk straight past him into the suite. You think your entire room could fit in his living area. You walk through it, past Joris and Arthur, engaged in a heated conversation, and Carla, who looks about as sleepy as you do. Charles is leaning against the kitchen counter, eating a bowl of something colorful. “No coffee?” You say.

Mouth full, he answers around his spoon, “I don’t drink coffee.”

“But, I do.” You say, grab a sliced strawberry from his bowl, eat it in one bite. 

“Feel free to make some.” Lorenzo chimes in. You flip him off, too, pouring coffee grinds into a paper filter and starting a pot. Lorenzo grabs a strawberry from Charles’ bowl too, and the metal spoon promptly collides with his arm. “Ay!” He yelps, tries, and fails, to jump away from the cutlery. “You let her have one!”

“She scares me when she’s tired.” He says, and you take another one because you know you’ll get away with it. He points the spoon at you, warningly. You wink, pop it in your mouth and he smiles, chuckles into the breakfast. 

– –

You fall asleep on the cabana bed in your shorts and bikini top, cotton shirt unbuttoned and laid over your face like it’s going to block the light out. You wake up when you’re hit with a bottle of sunscreen. There’s a possibility whoever threw it didn’t realize you were asleep, but the seam lines on your legs lead you to believe you’ve been relatively stationary since laying down here. 

You pull the shirt off your face, sit up, disoriented from the nap. “You’re going to burn,” Charles says, rubbing the lotion into his face. “You have pink cheeks.”

“No, I don’t.” You say, but lather up anyway, ask Carla to reach the places you can’t. 

The first drinks of the day come with lunch, a round of beers. Corona with lime. You keep yourself paced for the first couple hours, a 1:1 ratio between liquor and water. You maintain the slightest of buzzes, one that you really only feel when you catch yourself giggling too hard at one of their stupid jokes. It’s not the beer that takes you out, you’ve spent your entire life trying to keep up with Charles and his professional-drinker friends. It’s not the Sangria, either, however fun that is to sip. It’s the shots. It’s always the cheap tequila shots that do you in. You feel them too late, don’t realize you’re tipsy until you’re shitfaced. You’ll learn one day. One day, but not today. 

You and Charles are sent to find tequila, and you walk down the beach until you find a bar that looks like it’s got decent shit. “I like you like this,” You say, toes sinking into the wet sand, cool water washing over your feet with each crashing wave. 

“Like what?” He asks, squinting through the sun to see you. You left your sunglasses at the cabana and he gave you his to wear. They were big on your face and you thought if you moved too quickly they’d fall off into the sand. His linen shirt whips in the wind, his hair is sticking up in all directions, greasy with sunscreen. He glistened with sweat and coconut lotion, beautifully sunkissed.

“Just.” You shrug. “Happy.”

“Awww,” He teases, throws an arm around you, makes you miss a step and trip into him. He smells like summer and sandalwood and fresh, warm towels. “So sweet.”

At the bar, you order and he pays. Licking the salt off the back of your hand, you down the shot, pucker your lips around the lime, and set off back toward the rest of the group with a handful of shot glasses. It’s harder to carry them than you thought it would be, both of you fighting laughter when a bit of alcohol spills out of the tiny glasses, moving quickly over the burning sand. Back with everyone, you take another shot, no salt this time. 

The next round is broken up by something sweet and fruity. Joris takes a picture of you and Charles drinking them, arms intertwined like newlyweds at their wedding reception. You hope it doesn’t end up on social media, uninterested in a weekend full of online death threats. 

Another round of shots follows soon after, and then another. Not a single water has been sipped in hours. “We should go swimming.” You declared, unbuttoning your shorts and wiggling out of them. “Before we’re too drunk.”

“We’re not getting drunk.” Lorenzo says. Carla laughs from Arthur’s lap. 

You shrug. “I am.”

“You already are.” Charles laughs into a beer bottle. “No deeper than your ankles.” Fuck you, you mouthed, walked backwards towards the sea. You wade out until the waves splash against your chest. On the beach, Charles is unbuttoning his shirt and tossing it on the cabana, taking off his sunglasses. You feel hot in the chilly water. 

“My babysitter!” You laugh when he’s within earshot, slowly cutting through the water to you. 

“I told you ankles.” 

You shrug, form first with your hands and push them against his palms. “I’m not drunk.” He pushes back, laughing, you are. You shake your head, move your hands from his and run them over your hair, gather it to one side, twist the water from the ends. “The water is sobering me.” You lower yourself, sinking down until the salt water tickles your chin. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” You look up at him, probably with blown, tipsy pupils. 

“I don’t believe you.” 

You hum, dipping your head back into the water. “You never do.”

“I always do.” He says, and you laugh at the immediate contradiction like it’s the funniest thing you’ve ever heard. You might be drunk. 

You cut yourself off after that, until you can eat something and drink a non-alchoholic beverage. You won’t let yourself get sober, because then you’ll be passed out on someone’s shoulder by sunset. You won’t get trashy, though. It’s a race week, anyone could see him, take a picture with him, a video with you in the background. When you’re together, whether you like it or not, you’re a reflection of him, a public display of the type of people he wants to associate himself with. Tipsy and fun is cute and carefree. Trashed and blacked is messy and irresponsible. 

You’re trying to hold your composure in the taxi, resting your head, and eyes, on the window. The guys picked a restaurant while you and Carla were using the bathroom, and now you’re making Charles read you the menu. He’s doing it in butchered Spanish, trying to pick out the words and meals he recognizes. 

“Is there tapas?” You ask, smacking his chest with the back of your hand. 

“There is tapas.” He confirms.

You almost cry, laugh instead. “My god, I could kiss you right now.”

“You are so drunk.” He chuckles, and you bite your fist, sink into your seat, wish you could fake it better. Have fun and let loose without embarrassing him. 

“Je suis désolé.” You whisper, drop your head the other way, onto his bicep. He adjusts, moves his arm so it’s around you, runs a hand over your hair. He doesn’t ask you what you’re apologizing for, knows that you’ll tell him anyway. “Pour être embarrassant.”

“Chérie,” He says into the crown of your head, a soft kiss before continuing. “You could never embarrass me.”

– –

The sobriety returns during dinner, bringing a pulsating headache with it. You drown your sorrows in delicious, cheap food, and drink an entire pitcher of water by yourself. When you leave, on the street outside, a band is playing in front of a fountain. You all stop, gather around and listen, sway to the lyrics you can barely understand. Joris is taking pictures of the band, Arthur is spinning a giggly Carla around. Charles grabs your hand, twirls you around and dances with you under the orange street lights. You rest your head on his chest. 

“You should sing along.” The vibrations from his laugh soother your aching head. 

It feels like a scene from a movie, like every other person in the city fades away into obscurity and it’s just you and he swaying on the cobblestone street. You’re so close to him, can’t be much closer, wish you could be. If you could, you’d crawl inside him, inspect his brain and the beautiful way it thinks, admire the way he sees the world. You know it’s special. Everything about him is magnificent, from the tallest hair on his head to the soles of his feet, every birthmark and fallen eyelash in between. 

Slowly, your sway has come to a stand still, and he’s staring at you with dopey, tired eyes. It should be illegal, the way he;s looking at you. His sightline jumps all over your face. Your right eye to your left, your nose to your lips. They linger there, on your lips, and then he’s staring into your soul, searching for something. Can I kiss you right now. Give me a reason not to. You don’t know what he wants you to silently speak. If you knew, you’d tell him. 

A cat-call whistle snaps both of your heads to Lorenzo. “Get a room!” Arthur yells, pretends to gag. Carla smacks his chest a little too hard to be playful. 

The gap between you and Charles is only a few inches larger, but he feels unreachable, eyes glossy and avoiding you. “Fuck off, mate.: He says, drop a bill into the band’s opened guitar case. 

– – 

Sunday is a nightmare. There’s no way to sugar coat it or make it sound prettier than it is. Andrea grabs you from hospitality, throws his pass around your neck because nobody is going to stop him from getting into the garage. He keeps you at an arms length for the entirety of the short walk. 

The car is already stopped in front of the garage, he’s climbing out. His posture is defeated, depressing. You wonder if you’ll be able to say the right words or if he’s just going to want to yell. A few people give him encouraging words, pats on the back, a hug. They’re already asking him to go to the media pen, to feed him to the sharks like a bucket of chum. He moves past them all, gets his weight taken and bee lines it to his drivers room. 

Andrea nudges you in his direction. You stay in play, your feet frozen. You don’t know what to say. Go on, he says. 

Fuck. 

You knock on the door softly, nothing. Opening the door just wide enough to squeeze through it, you find him sat on the floor. Knees bent, arms locked and resting on them, fingers intertwined. His back is against the edge of the couch and his head is hung low. He doesn’t look like himself. 

“What?” He says, rigid, doesn’t even bother to look in your direction. 

“Do you want me here?” You ask, and his eyes shoot over to you. He looks exhaustingly sad and sorrowfully tired. You wish you could make it better, rub Neosporin on his cutes and stick a race car bandaid over them. Promis the wound would get better and know you were telling the truth. 

“Stay.” He says, so you close the door behind you. 

You sit on the couch, awkwardly scooch yourself over and around him, a leg on either side of his body. His head rests on your knee and your fingers toy with his hair, soaked with sweat. You don’t know how long you sit like that, just that it’s long enough for someone to knock on the door twice. You stay seated. 

“You should change.” You finally say, after the third set of knocks noticeably lacks the patience of the previous two. 

“Yeah.” He says, and you both stand. “Don’t go home?” He asks when you’re already halfway out the door, when you’re already looking at Mia in the stairwell. You look over your shoulder, nod, smile, and leave the door open for her to slide in and get to work. 

You wait on the stairs, take a deep breath before re-emerging into the chaos. Carlos is still fighting for the podium and you don’t want to drag the mood to the Marianas Trench. It’s just so, so hard to see him hate himself. 

Energy is low, morale is lower, but you stay seated in the back of the garage. When the race is over, you head back to hospitality, linger in his room there. Your phone is dead, abandoned on the floor and you lay on his massage table, staring aimlessly at the ceiling. Everything replays on the blank canvas. The perfect lap the day before, his pole position. The sparkle in his eyes and the lightness to his voice. A great start and a commanding lead and a quick pit stop and then he’s slowing down, Andrea is grabbing you and hurrying you across the paddock strip. 

Your presence scares him, makes him jump when he opens the door. “Fuck.” He says. “I thought you went home.”

You don’t bother to look up at him, to sit up. “You asked me to stay.” You listen while he shuffles around the room. His presence means the presence of others, and it’s not long before Andrea is there, picking up your phone and placing it on your stomach. His brothers are gone, Carla too. Joris lingers, the silent, unrelenting support of a friend. 

“Are you hungry?” Charles askes, and you turn your head to face him. His expression is as tired as his voice. 

“Are you?” You aren’t, but you can be if he is.

“No.”

“Me neither.” His eyes narrow, trying to decipher if you’re telling him the truth or if you’re being agreeable. He hates it when you do that, when you tell people what they want to hear instead of what they need to, instead of the truth. “Serious.” You reaffirm, and he returns to packing up his things. 

You just watch him. There’s nothing else to do, but, you want to live in his head, know what he’s thinking and feeling and fighting. You relish in any hint towards those emotions, from the way his shoulders hand to the way he zips up his backpack. 

“Come,” He says, extending a hand, pulling you to your feet. He grabs his sunglasses from their comfortable position on the collar of his shirt. It’s dark out. He just wants to hide the disappointment. There are still people lingering on the track, after all these hours. On your way out, he stops and talks to Pierre and Esteban. About what, you don’t listen. You don’t ever want to talk about this race again, want to leave it in the past. Head down, focused on the things yet to come. When Charles is ready to move on, Pierre gives him a heavy pat on the shoulder and a hug, one of the largest displays of encouragement any of these guys are capable of giving to each other. 

It must be so strange, you think, hoping for someone’s success and failure simultaneously. 

Fans are still here, too. He holds his head high and takes pictures and signs everything, makes them all feel loved and appreciated. Nobody is any the wiser to his inner turmoil, to the way he wil pick apart every single aspect of the race and internalize it, use it as fucked up motivation. He’s silent when he’s not interacting with the stragglers. You, Andrea, and Joris all trail behind him, engaged in quiet conversation about Monaco; the race, sleeping at home, the always surprising strangeness of a race you could watch from your bedroom window. Ahead, he holds out a hand to you, and you take a hurried couple of steps to match his pace. 

“You okay?” You ask. He nods. “Anything but?”

Anything but, a term you’d coined after Jules’ accident, when all anyone ever wanted to talk to you guys about was how you were doing, what you were feeling. The constant retelling, reliving, reassuring everyone you were doing okay when you were far from, it was almost as painful as losing him. Anything but is invoked, and the other has to change the subject, ignore the elephant in the room, no matter how big it is. 

A soft, sad smile tugs on his lips, silent gratitude, and he squeezes your hand tighter, barely so. “Yeah.” He says, and you go on about the haircut you’re thinking about getting once you’re back home in Monaco, asking if he thinks bangs are an option on a face shaped like yours. 

– –

You’re flying to Monaco with Charles, and the rest of Ferrari, early tomorrow morning, so your small group deciding in the hotel lobby that the night will be made better by liquor, probably isn’t the wisest of decisions. You do it anyway.

You all behave, careful not to get tipsy. Andrea reminds Charles he still has to train tomorrow, and that keeps him from going too far. The rest of you are just following his lead. 

He insists on walking you back to your room at the end of the night, even though Andrea and Joris both swore they’d get you there safe. She’s a runner when she’s drunk, he’d said, and you scowled. “Not since I was sixteen!” You defended, insistent that you didn’t need anyone; Joris, Andrea, or Charles, to walk you to your room. It’s not like you’re lost and drunk somewhere in an unfamiliar city. It’s a five-star hotel and you had all of one floor to travel between. 

He doesn’t even say anything on the walk he’d insisted on being present for. Your footsteps echo off the carpeted floors, bouncing between the thin walls and reflecting off the sleek, minimalist artwork. He has a beer in his hand, something from the hotel bar, priced entirely too high for the quality, you’re sure. Each time he brings it to his lips, the glass clinks against the ring on his pinky finger. 

He’s flushed, beautiful as ever, and you wished you were an overpriced bottle of beer; your sweat on his skin, the cold ring contrasting his warm, calloused hands. Those soft, pink lips on you, the way they almost were this week. They almost were, you keep telling yourself, you weren’t imagining it. “Charles.” He raises his brows, silently tells you to continue. “It,” You hesitate. You falter, because it’s not too late to say nothing, to bask in the silence a little longer. You can still stop yourself, shove the thoughts deep down and abandon them somewhere in the back of your mind. Curiosity, desperation, something sparked by the green in his eyes and the red on his shirt and the condensation on the bottle, it all gets the best of you. “The other night, it felt like you were going to kiss me.”

“Hmm.” He hums against the lip of the bottle, finishing off the last of the drink. There’s a long pause. You, waiting for him to say something, memorizing the strange pattern on the carpet. Him, saying nothing. You reach your room, hold the key card up to the lock. The silence is amplified by the shifting electronic gears and you’re pushing the door open. “Are you going to ask me?” You blink. “If I was going to kiss you?”

You exhale. Long and slow, do you want to know? “I haven’t decided yet.” You finally say. I’m not ready for this to get flipped on its head, you could’ve said. I love you too much to like you, you could have said. You didn’t.  “Nuit, Charles.” You say instead, disappearing into the darkness of your room. 

“Bonne nuit.”

“I’ve decided against the bangs.” You tell him in the grocery store around the corner from his apartment, leant against one of the doors in the refrigerator aisle. He’s waiting for a text back from his nutritionist, trying to figure out what he’s going to cook on the boat tonight. It’s family dinner night, and he’d volunteered to host, which meant he volunteered you to host on his yacht

“Good.” He says.

“You told me they would look good.” You laugh, wonder if he even remembers the conversation or if your words were just the backing track to his overthinking. 

He shrugs. “You’re supposed to stop me from looking like a fool.” He laughs at his phone screen, turns it off and slides it into his pocket. 

“My favorite thing about you is that you’re a fool.” He says, pulling open the door you’re leaning against, moving you with it. That’s not very nice, you said as he piled two packages of chicken breasts onto the groceries already in your hands.

“Chicken. Brave.” You add, reminiscent of the last time he tried cooking chicken on the water. It’s a good thing there was a fire extinguisher on board, and saying anything else would break the oath of secrecy you were sworn to. 

“Ha, ha.” He mocks. “Not funny.”

“You know what isn’t funny?” You grab another pack of chicken, just in case. “Telling me bangs would be good.”

Good luck this weekend, the cashier tells him when you’re checking out. Break the curse, yes? Charles laughs, because he’s a good sport, and agrees. You hate all the curse talk, it pisses you off, more than it does him. The conversation around it gets worse every year, every time he doesn’t win at home. 

They love him so much here, he’s their poster-boy during their poster-week, they don’t mean any harm by it, but it still gets under your skin. Curse this, curse that. Fuck off, shut up about it already. Everyone knows his Monaco track record, can everyone please find anything else to talk about?

– –

He finishes fourth, and it feels somehow worse than last year’s DNF. SO close, only to be screwed by the same shit as last week. You drink your weight at the club that night because maybe a lack of sobriety will make it sting a little less. 

“You are not wearing that.” Lorenzo says when you walk out of your building. You groaned, looked down at your outfit. It was slinky, but slinky is what everyone wears to the club, especially during the grand prix.

You settle for a blazer, tell him to suck your dick, and fill the pockets so you can abandon your purse. You start off at a smaller club, one that transitions from a restaurant after dark and has intimate, smaller tables. You’re there for a couple hours, eat something and get buzzed. Predictably, you meet up with half of the grid at Formula One’s favorite club, where you have a bigger section and a bigger group and get a bigger buzz.

“I can’t wear these anymore,” You whined, stopping to lean against the wall of a building to take off your heels. Your feet were blistering, and the thought of having to continue the walk with them on was dreadful. Charles carries them because you keep dropping one without realizing it. It’s not your finest moment, but, you only threaten to jump into one bush on the nearly fifteen minute walk. Overall, a strong showing on your part. 

You lose Charles at Jimmy*z, dancing with friends and strangers and other drivers and their parties. You’re drinking Negroni’s, and you aren’t sipping, occasionally splitting it up with a shot whenever someone suggests it. That’s when you see him again, when he’s putting a double shot of something expensive in your hand. I shouldn’t, you say, because you're teetering close to the line of embarrassment. He rolls his eyes, fully inebriated. Shiftfaced, if you will. “Shut up and take a shot with me.”

You do, it goes down smoother than water. 

“That’s good!” You say, examininging the glass. 

“I know.” He deadpans, and you both laugh. Sober Charles is one of the funniest people you know. Drunk Charles is the funniest person you know. He’s so unserious in everything he does–the way he talks, dances, expresses emotions, there’s nothing not funny about it. 

The club comped the table and a few bottles of champagne for the publicity that comes with having half of Formula One partying under their roof. In exchange, a manager is trying to wrangle Charles’ section into a group photo. You were standing back, laughing at them all failing to maintain any semblance of sobriety, all logic and composure out the window three drinks ago. Charles and Arthur are yelling your name, yelling at each other, looking for you in the strobe lights. You move, hope he doesn’t see you. He does, locks eyes with you, dopey smile, summoning you with this come-hither motion, his middle and ring finger calling you to him. Even drunk, you notice the gesture, the subtle curl, twitch of his long fingers. 

Fucking, hell. Flushed cheeks burn bright and you’re grateful your hair is down, covering your undoubtedly matching ears. He almost kissed you. He did. You’re not crazy, he knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s too smart not to. 

You smile, lips pursed, and shake your head. It makes him pout, and then he’s yelling your name, gesturing you over with the rapid movement of his entire arm. His other hand is smacking Arthur’s face, trying to rile he and Carla up. It works, and now half the group is yelling your name, so, you give in. Celebratory cheers leave their mouths and the boys share a near-miss high five. Charles grabs the back of your head, pulls you under his arm in one fail swoop. You hone in on his cologne. Tom Ford Tuscan Leather, no doubt. His signature night-out fragrance, the one you and Lorenzo nearly peed your pants laughing at when Pascale bought it for him a few years ago. The hints of raspberry and amber wood, the ones nobody can smell unless they’re this close to him, make you dizzy.

“You smell nice.” You say, and he just looks at you, lowers his head to talk directly into your ear. You look beautiful, he says, and you might be sober. “Don’t say that to me.” You laugh, smooth down your hair.

There’s a  real possibility at least one of the twenty people in the photo were actually looking at the camera. 

At some point in the night, you end up in the bathroom with Carla for an evening debrief. You don’t realize how drunk you actually are until you’re staring into your hazy soul in the bathroom mirror. It’s an out of body experience, truly, you’re watching this conversation from the astral plane. 

“Fuck.” You say, looking to Carla, who appears to be having the same experience as you. You both burst into a fit of laughter, the hunched over, sore abs, red faces, threat to the integrity of your bladder-type laughter that doesn't require anything to actually be funny. “I have to work tomorrow.” You say, trying to catch your breath. You work from home, she reminds you, and you’re both laughing again. “Je t’aime.” You slur, overwhelmed by the alcohol and emotion. “Beaucoup.”

“Non,” She giggles. “Je t’aime le olus.” 

“You look.” You hiccup. “So pretty, I hate you for being so pretty.” Carla shakes her head at her own reflection, adjusts her top, checks herself out. You pat the sweat off your forehead and wipe under your arms with toilet paper from a stall. “Arthur is so, super lucky.” Another hiccup. “You are so pretty. So nice and pretty.”

“No, you are so pretty.” She laughs. “Charles is lucky, and he doesn’t know it.” Charles, Charles, Charles. You don’t want to talk about Charles and his stupid face and stupid smile and stupid fingers and stupid skin. “I should call Michael.” You say, digging your phone out of your jacket pocket. 

“You should not.” She laughs, but you’re already searching your contacts for his name. “Nope.” SHe says, snatches your phone from your hands and holds it out of your reach. 

“Carla.” You hiccup, pleading and pouting.

“Nope.” She says, putting the device in the bag that hands around her body. 

– – 

“This is my song!” You yell, quickly downing the shot in your hand, entire body vibrating with the bass pouring from the speakers. 

“We should start a band.” Someone says, and Charles laughs. 

“We should!”

“You’re my best friend.” You tell him, stumbling over your own feet without even taking a step. His arm reaches out as a stabilizer, just in case you need one. 

“No,” He laughs. “You’re my best friend. More-er.” That’s not a word. You shake your head. 

“I could play the drums.” 

“I know we’re drunk, but, like. I love you.” You slur, test the waters of shifting your weight from one foot to the other. Another stumble, another hiccup. “I’d do, like, anything for you.”

“I know.” He says, but you can’t hear his voice over the music. “I love you.” He adds, smacking Lorenzo on the arm to get his attention, to draw him out of band practice planning. “She’s my best friend!” He says. 

“I know!”

“I love her.”

Lorenzo laughs. “We all know.” 

“We should take a picture!” You suggest to Charles, and he agrees. “I don’t have my phone. Someone stole it.” He gives you a puzzled look, concerned, grabs your elbow like you’re going to float away in the crowd and asks you to clarify. You just shrug. I have it, dumbass. Carla laughs, takes a picture of the two of you, doesn’t give you your phone back. 

The next time you see him, you’re sat at the table having one of those drunken moments of emotional, existential crises. Your fingers twiddle with the fake eyelashes you peeled from your lids minutes earlier. “I’ve been looking for you.” He says, heavily drops into the space to your right, slings an arm around you. 

You’re always under his damn arm, you never realized before just how often you’re here. Not that you don’t like it, it’s just an observation, confusing and emotionally charged, but an observation nonetheless. He’s so relaxed, completely slouched into the rich leather, legs spread wider than they need to be, the arm that’s not around you resting on the back of the booth. He’s watching everyone else, observing the different people with sleepy eyes and heavy lids. When he talks to you, he turns his head all the way, cranes his neck so he’s speaking into your ear again. You don’t turn your head, you’d be too close. “I have a secret to tell you.” He doesn’t whisper.

“What?” You laugh, settle into his side, into the laxity of it all. 

He opens his mouth to speak, pauses, rests his forehead on your temple. “I forgot.” He chuckles. You hiccup. You both laugh. 

Your eyes are closed, tired and so, so comfortable. You might fall asleep here, despite the loud noises and loud music and loud heartbeat. “You were going to kiss me in Barcelona.” You say, liquid courage forcing the words from your mouth like vomit. It isn’t a question. It doesn’t need to be. 

“I kiss you often.” He says, a weak defense, and kisses the crown of your head. “See?”

You’re not crazy. He was going to kiss you. He was. “Charles.” Your voice is quiet, strained and scratchy and serious. You don’t open your eyes, can’t look at him when you demand an answer, a confirmation. 

“I was.” The admission is suffocatingly delicate, like he might go for it, right then. His hand might grab your face and guide you to him. You’re ready for it, you think, as ready as you’re ever going to be for everything to change.

You don’t have to worry about it, to think about it and dwell on if he’s going to do it. He doesn’t. He just rests his head on yours. Your thoughts race faster than your heartbeat, and you wonder if he can feel your temples pulsing.

2013, family dinner. You’re in your room, hiding out for as long as possible, uninterested in the family events. Very teenaged girl of you, in all regards. Charles burst through your door, no knock, no warning. You didn’t even know they were there yet. Luckily for you, nothing incriminating was happening. He was quite the snitch back then, a real tattletale, especially if you were the one getting in trouble. 

“I have something to tell you.”

“Unless it’s that you’re going to turn around and leave my room, I don’t care.” You’d said, annoyed by his presence. At sixteen, your relationship could best be described as friendly enemies. He was always around, especially when you didn’t want him to be, and he was always the golden child. Perfect in school, perfect on the track, perfect son, perfect friend. His existence was infuriating and because you were so close in age, everyone always wanted you to be the best of friends. 

As a teenage girl, it was evolutionarily impossible for you to go alone with what everyone else wanted. You had to rebel, to run against the grain. Charles and you were not friends, and you did not care about what was going on in his life. 

“Single-seaters.” He said with a dumb smile, leaning on his hand against your dresser. You take maybe one step between your bed and his arms, hugging him tighter than you had since you were children. Okay, maybe you did care about his life. There are some things even evolution can’t change. 

“With who?”

“I thought you didn’t care?”

“I don’t”

His smile grew. “Fortec.”

You half-screamed, half-laughed, hugging him again, somehow tighter. “I’m so happy for you, Cha.” You said, with a level of sincerity you hadn’t used in years, especially with him. You thought for a moment you might cry, that he would make fun of you for it, that you’d do it anyways because you were so happy for him. 

“Don’t tell anyone, I’m not supposed to say anything.”

“Who knows?”

“Like, nobody.” He’s giddy, it’s almost cute. Almost. 

“Jules?” You ask, even though you think you already know the answer. Jules is God to Charles, this untouchable, invincible figure that represents the culmination of all his own dreams. He was the first person, you expect him to say. 

“Not yet.” He told you before Jules. 

You’re traveling in the weeks after Monaco, jet-setting around the world for your own career. It’s not until France that you see him again. You beat him there, actually, opting to spend some time visiting friends from University nearby, taking a bit of time to enjoy yourself and relax. Despite what everyone in your Instagram comments thinks, race weekends are not a holiday. The nerves and anxiety and heightened emotions you feel during one is so stress-inducing that the work week feels like a week in the Maldives. 

Love you, always proud. You texted him moments after he won in Austria, along with a picture of you and the drink you were having in celebration in your hotel room. 

You were a little bummed you couldn’t be there, celebrating with him. He really needed that win, and you could only imagine the weight it lifted off his shoulders. It’s been a while since you saw him genuinely happy on a Sunday night.

Love you, too. You suck. He texted back seven hours later, reiterating the sentiment the entire time he was home in Monaco and you weren’t. When you jokingly suggested he come to France early, you were met with the threat of being blocked. 

– –

You spent the weekend with Pascale, spending every day at the track trying to out-anxious each other. You don’t know how she sleeps, Charles and Arthur both doing this shit. You’re a nervous wreck and she barely flinches. 

“You remind me of myself a lot.” She tells you. Your knee is bouncing anxiously under the table you’re eating at. “Your mother, of course, but. Selfishly, I see the good parts of me in you.”

You’d always wished Pascale was your Mom, growing up. You have a great mother, you love her to death, but she was your mom. She had to discipline you, she had to put her foot down. Pascale didn’t have to do those things, not with you. She could be cool and carefree and spoil you because she was a bonus parent, not an actual one. If you grew up to be all kinds of fucked-up, she could wash her hands of you. Your mom couldn’t do that. 

You’re so lucky to have her as your Mom, you would say to the boys. They’d say the same thing to you. 

“You’re going to make me cry.” You say, picking at your cuticles. 

“Chérie.” She says, grabs your hand, stills your anxious fingers. “Je suis nerveux rien qu'à te regarder.”

“I don’t like Monaco.” You say. “No room for error.”

“You don’t like any track.” She chuckles, releases your hands. You put them in your lap and go back to picking at the skin. “Not when the boys are out there.”

She’s right, you’re squeamish when you watch Arthur and Charles, don’t think you’ll ever get used to it. Charles loves to make fun of you for it, has videos saved on his phone of you, caught on the television cameras, captured by friends, that one time you were in the background of a Drive to Survive episode. He laughs and laughs at them, but when he watches Arthur, he’s just as bad as you are. 

It’s different, when you love the driver. When you love them more than the sport, more than the team, more than nearly any other person in the entire world, every corner feels tighter, every straight feels faster, the whole thing feels like a narrowly avoided death sentence. 

“I don’t know how you do it.” After Jules, how you do it after Jules. After Anthoine, after hugging a grieving mother and watching your son drive on the same track. 

“I love watching them race.” She says. “I hate it, but I love it. All a mother can hope for her children is that they are brave enough to achieve their dreams.” They’re brave because of her, because of Hervé and because of her. They raised all three of their boys to be strong and brave and kind, and when Hervé passed, she picked up the pieces of her boys and glued them together again, built them up stronger, braver, kinder than before. 

– –

You don’t see him for a while after the race, don’t know if you want to. He’s been eerily calm all when things have gone wrong all season, at least when you’ve been around. It’s only a matter of time until he loses his cool, until he snaps. That radio call? Snapped like a glowstick. He’s angry, at himself, at the car, at the team, at the world. There’s nothing anyone is going to be able to say or do that would make him happy, neutral even. It’s going to be all pity-party and hushed curses until he gets some rest and resets. 

Behind the garage, when you’re finally leaving, he hugs Pascale tight. Her hand runs comforting circles on his back, and then it’s your turn to be suffocated. He squeezes you like it’s the last time you’re ever going to see each other, hangs on like gravity is pulling him in the other direction. “Anything but.” He said. “All night.” 

You nod. “My mom sent me a video of Gi playing with the dog today.” You spoke of your niece, of Charles’ goddaughter. If anyone could hit his soft spot, it was her. “Do you want to see it?”

“Yeah.” He said, and when he watched her stumbling around the park, when her innocent belly laugh and giddy screams spilled out of the speakers, he actually smiled, might have even let a little laugh slip. It’s impossible not to, really, with that little girl. 

He walks in relative silence back to the driver's lot, just listened to you go on and on. You feel nauseous, watching him put on a smile and interact with fans, laugh and take pictures and make children’s days by just existing. It must be such a strange life, a miracle his head hasn’t gotten ridiculously big. 

– –

At the hotel, you can tell he’s still pissed. Rest, reset. He’ll be himself in the morning. You exchange goodbyes in the elevator, you’re on a different floor than him. You expect it’s the last you’ll see of him until summer break. He leaves for Hungary early in the morning and you’re driving back to Monte Carlo with Pascale tomorrow afternoon. You expect, because he’s knocking on your door an hour later while you watch L’Atalante on your laptop. 

The light from the hallway is almost blinding in contrast to your dark room. “Hi.” He says, in running shorts and a t-shirt, bare feet. “L’Atalante?”

“How do you-”

He smiles. “You’re predictable.”

“What do you want?” You say through a  yawn, shocked he makes out the words at all. 

“Can I watch it with you?”

You sigh. “Charles.” You were minutes away from falling asleep, from putting this day behind you. Now, your feet are so cold on the floor it hurts and you’re becoming increasingly conscious and awake with each passing moment. 

“Please?” He asks, voice small and broken. Fuck. You hold open the door, because you’re weak when it comes to him. You’d let him treat you badly if it meant he’d treat you. “You know there’s a giant TV right here, no?”

“I like my computer.” You say, crawl back into the bed, sit up against the million pillows. He flops down next to you, on top of the comforter because he runs hotter than a fireplace. When he’s finally done moving around, shifting until he’s nice and comfortable–sorry, he said–you press play on the movie. 

“I love this part.” He says. 

“You hate this movie.”

“I do not.” He does. He complains every time you watch it, says you need to find a favorite movie that’s in color, that doesn’t have random cat montages, that the main love interest has too many glaring red flags. Watch it with rose-tinted glasses, you told him once, threw a piece of popcorn at his head. “This is my favorite part.”

“No, it’s not.” You laugh. “You hate this part.”

He laughs, too, sweetly and softly, into his own shoulder. “I love it.” You shush him, shove his shoulder because he can’t even say it with a straight face. He doesn’t stay quiet for long, and it’s clear he came here to talk, not to watch the movie, but he tries to pretend. “You need to come to more races.” He says, his head resting on your arm. “I don’t like it when you’re not here.”

“Okay.” You say, only half-listening. It’s your favorite movie.

“Today sucked.”  You paused the movie. Blinked twice, hard, frustrated because it;s your favorite movie, but he’s your favorite person. 

You look at him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” He reaches over and unpauses it, adjusts so he’s sitting up, too.

You pause it again. “I think you do.”

“I don’t.”

You close the laptop, set it on the bedside table and flip on the lamp. “I don’t know how to make you feel better right now.” You say, stand up, pace the room. It sounds like you’re admitting your defeat, expressing disappointment in yourself with a half-hearted apology. 

He stands up, too, follows you for a step but then you're still. There’s something unfamiliar painted across his face. Exhaustion, anger, desperation–you can’t pinpoint it. Urgency. You realize its urgency when his hands are on your face, thumbs dancing on your jaw, eyes darting between yours. Urgency. 

He was going to kiss you. He is going to kiss you, you think, and you’re going to let him. He can use you as a distraction, if he needs to. You can kiss it better, you’re sure you can. His forehead rests on yours, the tips of your noses bumping against each other, shuddered, broken breaths. Your lips are so close, jaws slack, sharing the air. You’re dizzy. Dizzy and hot and then he’s kissing you. The taste of his tongue, the scrape of his teeth, the softness of his lips, it’s all so new, so butterfly-inducing. He smells like himself, whatever soap he always uses when he’s traveling. It’s crisp and clean and you want to lick it off his skin. 

He’s the one to pull away, but you open your eyes first. “Sorry.” He says. You smile, kiss him again because you’re not sorry, wishing you could crawl inside his mouth and build a home there behind his beautiful, sharp, white teeth.  

Your name sounds like a symphony when he says it, all dopey and sing-songy, hands firmly on your waist. “Don’t look at me like that.” He says, laughs into your mouth. 

“Like what?” You ask, innocently. 

“Just. Fuck.” He shakes his head, one of his hands slipping under the hem of your shirt, open and flat, exploring the vast bareness of your back. “You.” 

“Me?” You giggle at his words, the stumble of them, cheeks hot and flustered. You shouldn’t be nervous. It’s Charles. You know him like you know your own hand, but, he’s never been yours, not like this. Your hands have never searched him like this, fingers never tugged on his hair with lust and longing, never felt the scratch of his stubble on your skin.

“Yeah,” He says into the crook of your neck, leaving a flurry of open mouth kisses in the space between your jaw and your collarbone. “You.”

“We shouldn’t.” You say, even though you’re helping him out of his shirt. “We should stop.”

“Do you want to stop?” He asks, his fingers stalling on the buttons of your pajama top. 

“We can do this, right?” You ask, because you need his reassurance. You don’t need honesty. You know the truth. You need to hear what you want to hear, for him to tell you if it’s safe to jump, to fall aimlessly into the unknown. You need him to lie to you. “Can we go back to normal after this?”

“Ouais.” He says, and even though you don’t believe him, you think he believes himself. “Retour à la normale.”

“Okay.” You say, and he’s unbuttoning your shirt again. If his mouth didn’t feel so good on you, if his big hands didn’t send shivers up your spine when he ran them up the sides of your body, you might have thought a bit harder about what normal is for the two of you.

His hands do make you shiver, though, and he’s looking at your body with these sweet, drunk eyes, sliding the shirt off your arms and letting it pool on the ground with his. 

You’re dropping to your knees on the cold floor next to the bed, pulling his shorts, his underwear, down with you. While he steps out of them, kicks them to the side, you admire him, toned and tanned and so, so pretty. You want to memorize it in case it’s the last time you see him like this, take notes on every freckle and muscle and defining feature under the harsh light. You need to feel him everywhere, to taste him, to make him feel as good as he looks. 

He’s already hard, cock twitching with lust and adrenaline and arousal, all for you. Your work is cut out for you. You tease him, whisper profanities and place soft kisses against the skin of his upper thighs. “You make me crazy.” He says, you take him in your mouth, and he goes momentarily stiff before he relaxes, lets your fingers and your lips work in tandem to pull your name from him. 

“Fuck.” He says, tastes like sex, sweet and salty and manly. His hands knot into your hair, pull it back into a haphazard ponytail that only loses shape as you continue. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He repeats, rutting into your mouth, fucking into your throat. You swallow around him, hollow your cheeks and he lets out this whimpered, wounded sound, forces your mouth off him. “Don’t do that.”

“You don’t like it?” You ask, take him in your hand, stroke over the slick of your spit, kissing the base of his cock and looking up at him with these big, saucer eyes. 

“No,” He shakes his head, drags a hand over his stubble. “You’ll make me come.”

You swipe your tongue in one long stripe, swirl it around the head of him, smile. “That’s the point.” You say, filling your mouth with him again, sinking until he’s hitting the back of your throat, gagging you, tears prickling at the corners of your eyes. 

He says your name like he’s battling to reason with himself, his grip on your hair tightening, pulling you off him again. You pout, and he rolls his eyes, shakes his head. “Tu es mauvais.”

“Ç’est vrai.” You roll your thumb over the tip, mindlessly, really, looking at him and waiting for him to speak. You’re an addict, already. It’s just so pretty. 

“Want to last for you.” You’re not even standing and your knees are unsteady underneath you. You look at the floor, your forehead on his thigh, and laugh. You laugh harder than you should, just out of shock and disbelief. “What?” He laughs, too.

You’re standing, he’s helping you stand. “Who would’a thought?” You can’t stop giggling, cock your head to the side and try not to smile. “You and me?”

His tongue is in his cheek, eyes rolling in such a bratty way. You wonder if he can see how swollen your lips are, all because of him. Your mouth feels empty without him there. “I hate you,” He says with a smile, and kisses you.

Your knees buckle at the edge of the bed, and it’s too easy, the way you’re both on it without ever parting lips for more than a hasty breath. He moves you around like a doll, gentle and effortless in his removing of your shorts, of your underwear, in the manipulation of your positioning on the soft mattress. 

He’s kissing you, sucking bruises into your collar, marking you like there’s any possibility you’re not already his. It’s hazy and intoxicating, him exploring your body, taking his time as he trails down your collar bone, through the valley of your breasts, hot, sloppy breath on your stomach, on your legs. You’re almost disoriented by it all, the natural comfort, the familiarity of him in a place so unfamiliar to his touch. He kisses your clit, you watch him, feel his hot breath on you, jaw slack and eyes glazed over. It makes you hot, makes your whole body flush and shiver. 

“Putain, t'es chaud.” He curses, smiles at you from between your legs. His fingers splay over your hip, his thumb dragging itself over you, parting your lips with the slick of you, amused smile tugging on his face. “You’re so wet.” He says, moves up to kiss you.

“Sorry.” You whisper into his open mouth. 

He shakes his head, mumbles something incoherent, kisses you again. “It’s hot, chérie. That you want it.”

“Want you.” You say, and he slides a long finger inside you, surprised whimper escaping from your lips into his open mouth. He curls it into you, crooks it at just the right angle and you writhe against the sheets. You can’t believe he’s got you like this, that you’re a mess for him over a single finger. 

He moves back down your body, another trail of nibbles and kisses before he laps at you, swirling his tongue around your clit in a way that’s almost painfully good, curling his finger into that same spot. When he slides in another, you’re a goner, moaning out his name like it’s the only word you know. 

“Let go.” He says. Your eyes are pinched shut in an attempt to keep yourself at bay for just a while longer. His eyes are glued to yours when you can finally open them. 

You shake your head. “I’m not.” You start, stopping short to compose yourself when your leg twitches, shakes in applause of his work. “No ego boosts.” You sputter. He laughs against you, the vibrations of it blinding, a whole new sensation that spreads fire over your skin, sends you over the edge with little warning. 

He doesn’t stop, not for a second, when you come. His fingers maintain their rapid pace even as you tense around him, his tongue, his lips, suctioned to you as your body tries to wiggle away. “Charles.” His name leaves your lips in a shudder, your thighs trying to close in on his head, the hand that isn’t inside you holding you open for him. 

He works you over, skilled fingers and skilled mouth, coaxing you through another, louder this time. He leaves you catching your breath, restless, incoherent, shaky on the crisp white sheets and two orgasms ahead. 

He’s so satisfied with himself, licks his fingers clean and grins and kisses you some more, just because he can. Because, it’s all gone to shit and the unspoken, unwritten rules of your friendship have gone so far out the window, they’re in another country. Maybe they’re in Hungary already, or waiting for the two of you on summer break, in Monza, hell, they might even be Abu Dhabi, there’s no telling. 

“Do you have a condom?” You ask.

He freezes, strong arm holding him over you, caging you in. His eyes shut hard. “No.”

“You didn’t bring one?”

“When I came to your room, I didn’t.” He sighs. 

“How gentlemanly.” You quip, wiggle out from underneath him. He flops back onto the bed, apologizing. You grab his t-shirt from the floor and hold it up to cover your body, he chuckles at that. “Apologize if I don’t have one.” You say, rifle through your backpack. Your leg shakes under you while you try to balance, squatting in front of the bag. You hope he notices, sees what he’s done to you without even filling you up all the way.

“Why would you have one?” He asks, just as you find the little package at the bottom of your bag. You turn on your heels, still bent over, condom wrapper in your teeth and look at him with narrowed eyes. 

“Do you really want me to tell you?” You ask around the wrapper. 

He thinks about it for way longer than should be required. “No.”

“Yeah.” You nod, dumbfounded, and stand back up. 

“Really, with the shirt?” He asks, laughing about it again.  

“Salope!” You say, drop the shirt, throw the condom at him. “Put this on yourself.”

“I don’t even like you.” He says, rips open the wrapper with his teeth and slides it over his cock. It hurts, almost, how badly you want him inside you, how empty you’ve felt since he took his fingers out. 

“Don’t do that, you’re going to make me come.” You mock his earlier words, puff out your lips, raise your brows, a knowing glance. 

“I was.” He defends, and you straddle him, wrap your arms around his neck. 

“No, you weren’t,” You kiss him, his hands explore the curve of your ass, fingers dig into your hips, push you down so you grind against him, spread your wetness over him. 

“Okay.” He says with a smirk, lust riddled and completely enthralled by you, one hand moving to thumb at your clit, start chasing another release for you. 

“Okay.” You repeat, barely a whisper, lift yourself up enough for him to line himself up with you. You sink down slow, savor the burn of the stretch, wish it was the first time anyone had ever done this to you, that you could belong to him and only him. 

“Fuck.” He says into your shoulder, kissing and sucking a purple spot into the flesh there, his hands splayed across your back, warm and strong and dragging across the hot skin. “Si bon.” Every inch of your body can feel him, hungry for more, the insatiable urge to hear his moans, to make him whimper, make him feel how you feel.

You grind your hips against his, chasing an unachievable leverage, a static inducing friction. Your foreheads rest on each other and your noses collide roughly in the sweaty, steamed, hitched breaths. 

You’re obsessed with the way he watches your bodies, eyes glued where he disappears into you. You never want to hear anyone else say your name, not after hearing the way he says it while he’s inside you. “That.” He says. “Love that.” You do as you’re told, eager to please, hungry for him to finish. “Es-tu proche?” You shake your head, because you are, but he’s closer. 

In a swift movement, he flips you over, switches your positions, slides back inside you. Even when he’s manhandling you, using you as a device for his pleasure, strong and without thought, there’s something gentle about it, something that anchors you to him. 

He fucks into you with deep, measured thrusts. The new position, the new angle, it drives you fucking crazy, your back arching off the bed, grinding onto his fingers in the selfish chase of your own high. “Charles. Fuck.” I know, he tells you, shaky, pace reduced to an erratic grind. I know, baby, and you’re coming again, biting into the muscles of his strong shoulders, wet and warm and so fucking full of him.

“I’m.” He whispers into your neck, nibbles on your ear. He pulls out and you whimper at the loss. “Where?” He asks, pulls the condom off, jerks himself with those long, veiny fingers. You smiled, devilish. You wanted, needed, his cum in your mouth. 

He’s too close to be gentle, now, to take care and take time. He’s desperate, it’s so fucking hot. His hands are on your head, knotted into your hair, holding you steady so he can fuck your throat. You gag around him, dizzy, hazy, eyes forced shut because everything is white and on fire. “Look at me.” He says. You do, and he has a fucking smile on his face, lewd and practically pornographic.

You hum, pleased with the state you’ve got him in and then he’s bottomed out, still and stiff, coming down the back of your throat, chanting your name like a prayer. 

– –

“What am I supposed to do with these?” You laugh into the bathroom mirror, after a shared shower, delicate fingers examining the fresh bruises he burned into your skin. “I’m spending the day with your Mother.”

He’s drying his hair with a towel, laughs. “Nobody thinks you’re La Sainte Vierge.”

You move through the bathroom, back into the bedroom to retrieve your pajamas from the floor. “And what is that supposed to mean?” You tease, returning, tossing his clothes on the counter. 

“It means,” He hums, wraps his arms around you, hugs you from behind. Your knees are weak and wobbly, his chin resting on your shoulder, looking at each other in the mirror. “Tu es belle, jeune et amusante.”

“Je suis amusante?” You ask, try to bite back a smile, fail.

“Très.” He says, nuzzles into your neck.

He sleeps in your room that night, wakes up early, shuffles around the bathroom, the light pouring out. His movement stirs you, his heavy feet roaming around the silent room. “Go back to sleep,” He says, kisses your hair, and the heavy door locks behind him.

Tired, from the weekend, from him, you let yourself go back to sleep. You should’ve got up and kissed him, you think. Really, truly kissed him, while the rules still didn’t apply and things weren’t back to normal. Whatever normal is for the two of you. 

“What?” You said, spit, when Charles called you for the third time within five minutes. The first Monday of summer break, he’s in Monaco and you’re in France, a thousand kilometers, an hour and a half flight, away. More specifically, you’re standing in the corridor of your office building, meters away from the door you’d just stepped out of, the meeting you had to excuse yourself from leading because your phone won’t stop ringing and surely, something must be wrong. 

“Hello to you, too.” He says, and you can hear the smile on the other end of the line. “Where are you?”

“Work.” You say, inspiringly calm. Fuck, she’s at work, you hear him say to someone. “Can I call you back in a bit?”

“Oui, désolée.”

“Ne sois pas.” You force a smile, like he can see it, and hang up, shut your phone off completely before returning to the meeting with an apologetic grimace claiming family emergency. 

You call him back an hour later, after the conclusion of your meeting and then some, pushing past the heavy glass doors to your office building and out onto the street, the breeze blowing your hair into your mouth as you step between two buildings. He answers, but it’s just shuffling on the other end, hushed, muffled voices. “Are you there?” 

“Oui, oui. Une seconde.” He says, far from the speaker. More shuffling before a proper greeting. “You’re on speaker.”

“What are you doing?” Shopping, he says, moves the phone, how’s work? You have to put a finger in your other ear to hear him, between the sounds of the city and the chatter on his side. “It’s fine.” You say, drag out the vowels because you’re bored, because you wish you were with him. He’s always so relaxed on summer break, so content and breezy and fascinating. You haven’t seen him since he was kissing your hair goodbye in France. You need to know if you can actually return to something normal.

“It’s fiiineee.” He mocks, laughs with whoever else is with him. You smile, all toothy and stupid. “Coming home today?” You can hear the hope in his voice. You’ve been here for less than twenty-four hours, it’s an unusually short trip. Most times, you’re here for a minimum of a weekend, almost always more. He shouldn’t be expecting you. 

“Yeah.” You check the time on your watch. “In a few hours.”

“You want to come on the water tonight?” He asks. 

“La Mala?” Of course, he says, like it shouldn’t even be a question. “With?” He speaks to someone else in Italian, you think you hear Andrea say something, and then Charles’ voice is louder, off speaker, you assume. 

“Lorenzo and some camera guys. We’re doing some… comment dire, day with my life?”

“I don’t know.” You hesitate, because the last thing you want to do is be one of three people, to be on display somewhere on Instagram or Youtube or wherever the video they’re making is going. You love him, but the attention is overwhelming and you like to stay as far from it as possible, especially when you’re nervously sorting out the normalcy of your relationship. 

You took a photo of him once, with a fan, just walking around the city. You weren’t even in the photo, didn’t say more than two sentences to the guy he was posing with. And yet, when he posted it on Twitter, said Charles was with some girl, posted a screenshot from your Instagram and said her, he was with her, you had a full inbox begging to know if you were dating Charles, calling you obscene vulgarities, threatening you. You weren’t even in the fucking picture. 

“It will be fun.” He says. “I haven’t seen you since france.” Exactly, you haven’t seen each other since France. Just over a week. It’s chump change for the two of you, at least it was, before his spit dripped down your thigh and he came in the back of your throat. Now, a week is the opportunity for an awkward plant to take root, grab onto you and make everything weird and uncomfortable and wrong/ “We’re having pasta.” He says, can sense your uncertainty, knows it sweetens the deal. 

“No chicken?”

“Never again.” He laughs. “You’re coming?”

“I guess.”

“You guess.” God, he is a child, truly. “Call me when you land, yes?”

“Yeah.”

– –

You can’t remember the last time you felt so nervous to see him. Sitting on the edge of the concrete landing, watching him cruise in on a little boat full of strangers, it’s almost worse than watching him race. Do you have to say something? Is he going to say something? Do you ignore it? That’s the agreement, right? Everything goes back to normal. Normal, normal, normal.

He looks like he’s been in the sun all day, cheeks pink and rosy, the blue of his shirt mellowing him out, making him glow. A God, Heaven shining down on him, presenting him to you like a gift. You hate that you have to share him with anyone when he’s like this, especially with strangers, with people who don’t know how lucky they are to see him like this. 

“Did you miss me?” He calls out when he’s within earshot. You stand up, take your shoes off because there is no way that boat is making it all the way to you. 

“Who called who?” You say, and he laughs. 

You hopped off the landing into the shallow water, walked out to the boat on your tip-toes, trying to keep the bottom of your pants as dry as possible. You had a change of clothes in your bag, but, even a minute in wet pants is too long. He helps you into the boat and you introduce yourself to the strangers pointing cameras at you. 

This was a mistake. It doesn’t even take the distance from the landing to the yacht for you to realize that. So fucking uncomfortable, cameras in your face, recording your conversations, watching the way you look at him. You can already see the comments calling you pathetic, calling you a whore, calling you a bitch.  

It is pathetic, you remind yourself when your hand is on his, stepping around him, moving from one boat to another. They will think it’s pathetic and they’ll be right. 

There’s more production people waiting for your arrival, waiting to take your place next to Charles and capitalize on the fleeting light and beautiful scenery. It’s unusual, there’s nobody here. You introduce yourself to them, too, because it feels strange not to. 

Once you’re onboard, you change in the guest suite. Sweats and a hoodie because the sun is setting, dusk settling on the horizon, bringing in wind with the tide. Bowl of pasta in your lap, mindless television playing, you lounge on the couch, watch Charles do an interview on that stupid little boat, rocking back and forth like a buoy on the open water. 

You want to reach out and grab his hand, hold it still, stop him from pulling his fingers and twisting his rings because then nobody will know he’s nervous, that he’s off balance. “What do you think they’re talking about?” You ask, pulling Lorenzo’s attention from the television. “He looks nervous.”

Lorenzo laughs, quiet, under his breath. “You.” 

You don’t turn back, know your face is going to give it away, can feel the blood rushing, the skin of your cheeks boiling. There’s no way he knows, right? Charles didn’t tell him. He wouldn’t. Lorenzo has no idea how close his joke hits, how deep the knife cuts. He’s just an older brother, living with the sole purpose of embarrassing you. “What?” You say, force out a laugh and almost choke on it.

“Kidding.” He says, and goes back to whatever is on TV. Your eyes stay on Charles, though, infatuated with the way the wind runs its fingers through his hair, the way it tugs on his shirt and inches the boat closer and closer to the yacht, to you. You stare so hard he can feel it, catches your eyes mid-sentence, smile pulling on his words. You’re convinced the upturned corners of his lips can lift even the lowest of spirits. He winks, and then he’s back in the conversation like he never missed a beat. 

Charles has made fast friends with the crew long before you got there. You wonder if they know each other, if they’ve met before. Light words flow with the waves, your body relaxing at the loss of the cameras, put aside to enjoy the experience, to breathe in the moment. His pull is gravitational, even through the strange tension and the awkwardness of the unknown. In your uncertainty, you linger just out of his reach, now comfortable enough to participate in their conversations. He catches you staring off into space, into the vast, starry sky, silently identifying the constellations above you. He pulls your mind back to your body with the tap of his foot on your outstretched leg. With what has to be the softest smile to ever grace this beautiful Earth, he calls you to his side with careful eyes and a subtle nod. 

You scooch closer to him, half-expect his arm to lazily drape itself around you because that’s what always happens. It doesn’t, and a pit of something grief-like settles in your chest. Instead, your arms hang at your sides, upper arms gracing each other every time one of you even thinks about breathing. Your hands are knotted in your lap, thumb examining the texture of your palm, fingers tugging on each other with agonizing anxiousness.

You were so naive to think, even for a split second, that you would go back to normal. THe tension you thought would settle has only become increasingly taught. 

“You okay?” He asks. You nod with a weary smile. A lie, and he knows it. “You worked all weekend?” He continues to prod, ignores the conversation happening around you like it’s just the two of you in a bubble. 

“No, just today.” You said. “Meetings all day.” You don’t look at him, eyes focused on your hands, popping knuckles and digging nails into your palm. You can’t remember the last time you were so unsettled in his presence. “I got a huge logo redesign deal.” 

“Of course you did.” He bumps your shoulder, jolts you. “You’re the best they’ve got and they know it.”

“I’m not the best one there.”

"Maybe not the most confident.” He laughs, reaches into your lap and grabs your hands, stilling them like a patient partner would do. “But definitely the most talented.” He squeezes your hand tighter, and you slide your fingers between his, envelope his hand in both of yours like you’re the one doing the comforting, squeeze back, thank you. 

Your head falls to his shoulder, sigh like you’re carrying the weight of the world, like you’re moments away from breaking down into a pile of ash, blown away with the breeze. A new normal. Maybe that’s what you’ll have to do, create a new normal that’s just as sweet as the old one. When the only options are a life of awkward anxieties or one without him in it entirely, a new normal doesn’t seem so sad. 

– –

He gets stopped seven times on the walk from the berth to the parking garage, takes careful time to be kind, especially to the kids. He’ll never not stop for a child, making their grabby hands, freckle faced days time and time again. You’re a good guy, you say after the fifth, know it’s the last thing he wants to do after his long day. I don’t know how you do it.

He shakes his head, sighs. “Le strict minimum ne fait pas de moi un bon gars.”

“You go beyond the bare minimum.”

He shrugs. “The bar is in Hell, I suppose.”

You take the train to Monza, hunkered over your laptop for the entirety of the ride, working. You weren’t planning on coming in until late Friday night,but Charles asked you if you’d get on the next train, if you’d come with him to sponsorship dinners and obligatory events in the leadup to the weekend. Please, he’d texted. Sayingno, doing anything but getting on the 6 am departure this morning, didn’t feel like an option. 

You texted Isa for three hours trying to figure out what the dress code was for these events, planning out your outfit. All you could get from Charles was, I don’t know, I’m wearing a blazer, probably. The last thing you wanted to do was stick out like a sore thumb, draw anymore attention to yourself or embarrass him. Underdressed, overdressed, you don’t know which is worse. 

You check your phone, scroll through social media and pick at a meal from the dining cart. You’re met with the same stuff you’ve been seeing since that stupid Monaco Vlog on Charles’ YouTube channel. The general consensus amongst all the strangers who know you so well, is that you and Charles are dating. I want this. They way they look at each other. Couples who are best friends make me melt. A friend told you those should make you smile, they don’t, because you aren’t dating. You aren’t dating and he’s going to see them and everyone wants to know everything about you and someone asked on a bikini picture how good Charles was in bed. None of them made you smile. 

Does she know she’s the third choice? Not smiling. Charles, serial monogamist or serial cheater? Not smiling. You’re a whore. You’re a slut. I hope you die, bitch. No smiles. 

They stung, they made you cry at your reflection in the mirror, private your accounts, limit your comments. They were everywhere, in your Instagram DMs, your Twitter mentions, your TikTok ForYou page. It was suffocating. 

Charles was trying his best to check up on you, which only made it all worse. You wanted to believe he wasn’t seeing them. He was just making sure your head was above water, and it was those best intentions that got you invited here, you assumed. It’s easier to keep an eye on you when you’re with him. 

It was a good idea, a good effort, for sure. It was a miscalculation, though, Charles seemingly forgetting just how much attention he has to give to strangers at these events. In a room full of people, dressed in your best cocktail attire, sipping a martini and watching people fight for his attention, you can’t remember feeling so alone, so on display. 

Everyone knows, or thinks they know, you’re Charles’ girlfriend. You’re a bigger extension of him than ever. Side-stepping cameras won’t cut it anymore, they’re hungry to judge you. Look who Charles brought, what do we think of her? Look what she’s wearing, how she speaks, how she stands. They hate you, you’re sure of it. You aren’t classy enough for this scene, not sweet enough, not pretty enough. You aren’t important enough. 

“How are you doing?” Isa finds you leaning on a tall table, poking your olives around your drink with the toothpick they were originally skewered on. 

“Are these things always this weird?” You ask, voice laced with hope that there is a learning curve, that there is some top-secret strategy she can give you so you don’t feel so shitty and deflated again tomorrow night. 

She laughs. “You’ll get used to it. But, yeah.”

“Any advice?”

“Threaten a sex strike if he leaves you alone for too long.” Your eyes go wide, shocked by her words. She just shrugs, downs the remainder of her drink. “Works every time.”

“Charles and I. We’re not. We–” You stumble over your words, and she looks at you with raised brows and a grin that makes you think Charles might be blabbing to the whole grid. “We’re not sleeping together.”

“Aren’t you, though?”

“Did Charles say something?”

She smacks her hand over her mouth, muffling her laugh. “No, but you just did!”

You nod, jaw clenched, tongue running over the front of your teeth. You’ve been so paranoid that Charles was going to tell someone and you’re the one who can’t keep their mouth shut. “It was once, and you can’t tell anybody.” You whisper, sharp. “Not even Carlos.”

“I’m going to tell Carlos.”

“You can’t.” It comes out as more of a plea than an argument. “He’ll say something to Charles, and then Charles will know I told someone.”

She says your name so sweet and patient, like you’re a preschooler about to get a passive-aggressive scolding. “I’ve never seen two people look like they want to fuck more than the two of you. If Carlos says something, it won’t be the first time someone has vocalized it to him.” It’s a horrifying thought that burrows all the way to your bone marrow. You’ve always thought you were so good at hiding it. 

You’re drowning at this party, under the waves of lingering and prying eyes. It’s been an hour since you’ve spoken to Charles, forty-five minutes since you’ve seen him. You pull out your phone and delete all your social media. This is so much worse than wallowing about death threats in the comfort of your own bedroom with the familiarity of your favorite ice cream. 

– –

You’re doing your hair when he knocks on the door. Impatient, impatient, impatient. You don’t answer, he keeps knocking, over and over again. “What?” You say, sharper than warranted, opening the heavy door with as much force as it will allow. 

“This is what you’re wearing?” He says, walks right past you and into your room. You’re not in the mood for his humor today.

“That’s really funny, coming from you.” You say, go back to the bathroom, hairspray your hair, pull a few face framing pieces out from the low ponytail. 

“I look great.” Says the man who hate-crimed an entire country with his jeans in Monaco, who is cosplaying as a banana this weekend. 

“Did you dress yourself?”

He appears in the doorway of the bathroom, leaning on it, looking annoyingly handsome in his suit jacket and white button up. “I did.”

“Oh,” You lock eyes with him in the mirror, put on a phony smile, fingers digging through your makeup bag on the counter searching for eyelash glue. “How nice for you.”

You watch him check his wrist in your peripheral, opening the cardboard lash box and pulling them out, carefully applying glue to one. “What aren’t you ready?” He asks.

“I’ll be ready at five.” You said, setting the falsies on your lash line, trying not to make your concentration face because you know he’s watching. 

You put glue on the other lash. “We’re leaving at four-thirty.” Your head snaps up from the task at hand. 

“You told me five.”

“I did not.”

“You did.” You say, continue putting the lash on before the glue dries because you don’t have another set with you. Quicker, this time, because apparently you’re running a half hour behind. 

“I told you it starts at five.” He says.

Oh. He did tell you that. “We have to be there when it starts.” You say in unison, your foggy recollection becoming clear. 

“Wonderful.” You laugh, to nobody at all. 

“Are you okay?” He asks, and it feels earnest, makes you laugh harder while you hove all your makeup back into the tiny cosmetics bag. There’s no way he’s that clueless, you think, blink hard in the mirror a few times, size up your hair and makeup. 

“No, I’m not okay!” You say, toss the bag onto the counter with a heavy noise. “I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to do this.” You push past him in the doorway, stop in the little hall between the bathroom and the bedroom, next to the mini fridge and Keuring-clad kitchenette, sigh at the ceiling so you don’t cry, don’t ruin your makeup. You’re already running late, no time for tear streaks. “I feel like a fucking idiot.” 

“You’re not an idiot.” 

You scoff, don’t even know why you’re angry, so emotional, why every nerve in your body feels supercharged. “You do a great job of letting me feel like one.” You don’t mean it, not really. You say it anyway. You know it will hurt him, and you’re tired of hurting alone. 

“What did I do?”

“Nothing.” You say, hoist the ironing board out of the wardrobe. “You did nothing.” You don’t bother setting the legs up, just lay it across the bed. 

“What was I supposed to do?” He asks, grabs the iron from your hands and fills it with water in the kitchenette sink, sets it on the iron board, plugs it in and turns it on. You did through your suitcase for your dress and blazer, shaking them out like they’re dusty old relics rather than something you’d bought just for this. 

You don’t know what to tell him. You can’t summarize all of your emotions into something succinct and comprehensible, especially not while you’re in the middle of feeling them. Everyone wants me dead, everyone is staring at me, I know I’m  not good enough for this. I want to be good enough for this, to make you proud, but it’s so hard. “You left me alone last night.”  You say, roll your eyes and take the tears with it. Elaboration feels like a giant, insurmountable, unachievable challenge. “You left me alone last night.” All you can do is repeat yourself, stare at the dress in your hands, examine the stitching like your life depends on viewing the heather grey fabric at a microscopic level. 

You can’t look at him, know he’s going to be staring at you with soft, sad eyes. You see him look at you like that and it’s game over. You’re not leaving the hotel tonight, not making it to that event. You’re going to cry yourself a bath, melt into a puddle of your own tears. 

“I’m sorry.” He says. 

“Don’t be.” You flatter out the dress on the ironing board. “You’re doing your job.” You move the iron in hard, quick lines over the fabric. 

“I’m still sorry.” He’s behind you, wrapping his arm over the front of your chest, pulling you back against his chest in some kind of strangely affectionate reverse-hug. It feels to right, so you squirm from his grip, keep at the hasty ironing. 

“Don’t feel bad for me.” Flip the dress, iron the other side. “I can hold my own in a room full of strangers.”

“I know you can.” You hate the tone in his voice; proud, almost. You’re not his to be proud of, even if everyone else seems to think you are. 

“Can we just?” You look at him for the first time since he dropped the time bomb on you. “Anything but?” He nods. You nod, switch the dress out for the blazer.

 “I like this jacket.” He says. You look at the outfit, grey dress, green blazer, white accessories. You thought it was too Christmas-y, the red accents on the bottoms of your heels and the red of your lip. It’s Ferrari red, Isa convinced you, very subtle. “You look good in green.”

“Green is my favorite color.” 

“I know.” He laughs.

“You know.” You yank the iron cord from the wall and pull your top over your head without thinking. You meet his eyes, and they don’t dare to waiver from yours. You nod, an I really just flashed you nod, sigh, pick up the dress and walk past him into the bathroom. “You can stare, Charles. I have good boobs.” A laugh from the other room while you step into the dress, pull the straps over your shoulder and leave the back unzipped. “And, you’ve literally been inside me.” You add for good measure. He coughs, chokes on his own laughter. 

Leave it to anything but to abandon one elephant and pick up a new one. “We’re talking about that now?”

You smile at your reflection in the bathroom mirror, wonder if he can hear it in your voice, if he knows you that well, listened to you speak so intently for so long that he can pick out minor fluctuations like that. “Talking about what?”

“You are.” He pauses, you tug on the hem of your dress and it doesn’t give any. You thought there was more fabric than there is. “Are you on something?” You can hear the smile.

“I haven’t been not talking.” You say, coming out of the bathroom, ball of pajamas wadded up tight in your hand. He tracks you across the room, back exposed, while you put the clothes in your bag. You walk back to him, pull your ponytail to one side, gesture for him to zip up the back of your dress. You suck in before he does it, even though the dress fits. 

“You’ve been telling people?” He says, his warm fingers gracing your skin, sending goosebumps up your spine. This never would have happened before, you lie to yourself. You’ve been blushing everytime he looked at you since you were in high school. 

“Maybe.” You say quietly, bit the smile off your bottom lip when his fingers linger at the top of the zipper. “Have you?”

“No.” He says, and when you turn around his eyes trail up your body slowly, taking your permission to stare as gospel, soaking up every inch of you with unabashed eyes. 

“I told Isa.” You say, shove an earring through your lobe.

“You.” Your words pull him back from the glossy eyed size-up with a chuckle. “You told Isa.” The other earring, and then you clasp a necklace, wish you had the nerve to make him do that, too.

“Accidentally.” You add, pull the blazer on, tug on the dress again. Still not budging. 

“Does that mean I can tell someone?” He pretends to mess with the settings on his watch. Pretends, you know, because his watch is never wrong. He changes it as soon as he’s in a new location. That watch has been right since his plane landed.

You sit on the edge of the bed, put your heels on and wonder if the red bottoms are really with the pain and suffering. “No.”

“Are we going to talk about it?” He asks, follows you to the bathroom where you’re already twisting your tube of lipstick, painting them a dark, lustful red. Ferrari red, a dark, ferrari red. 

“We’re running late.” You close the lipstick, put it into your handbag and clasp that shut.

“We are.” He says, and you’re already tugging the door open and gesturing him out. “I’m sorry for not looking out for you last night.” He says in the middle of the elevator ride. “Really.”

“Don’t.” You say. “We agreed, anything but.”

– –

Anything but, you agreed, but he’s silently apologizing all night. You’re not out of arm’s reach for more than a few minutes the entire night, and when you are, he’s got eyes on you, eyes on the bathroom door, eyes on the back of the head of whoever blocks his sightline. He finds you in the crowd every time. The green, he says, I just look for the pretty girl in green. “Don’t say things like that to me.” You told him, even though it makes you warm and fuzzy and grateful when he says it, when he’s there every time you look for him.

“Questa è la tua ragazza, no?” Mattia says to Charles when he introduces you. You’ve met him before, always in passing, though, so it’s a safe assumption to think he won’t know you. 

“Qualcosa del genere.” Charles says, thinks you don’t catch it, pulls you closer to his side. 

“Che cazzo significa?” Mattia asks, and all three of you laugh with varying levels of awkwardness, too much to say for anything to be whispered in the unsaid. 

By the end of the night, you've spoken to more people than you can count and done so in three languages, four, if you count the butchered Spanish class Carlos held with you. You’ve been confused for his girlfriend a dozen times, and somewhere along the line his corrections progressed from just a friend, through no correction at all, to yes. 

“Why did you say that?” You asked the first time he did it. 

“They’re going to think what they want to think.” He said. It felt like a cop-out answer. 

You don’t know if you’re more affected by his presence or if the hoards of strangers are, but it seems like everyone is more interested in what you have to say instead of just staring you down. Calling yourself comfortable would be quite a stretch, but, the room tonight feels a little less like a fishbowl and a little more like a cocktail party. 

You love watching him on stage, really love it, him addressing the audience. You almost burst into laughter, the customer service voice that transcends industries and languages and is something you never get to hear from him. He oozes confidence, talking and laughing with the MC and Carlos and Mattia. He’s so pretty under the hard lighting, it makes all his features look sharper, more defined, somehow. Heaven-sent.

When he comes back he says he’s hot, takes off his blazer and hangs it from the back of his chair, rolls up his shirt sleeves. It’s very grassroots political, very, mind-numbingly attractive. “How are you doing?” He asks, takes a sip of your drink because his is empty, maintains insightful, careful eyes and contrasts them by wriggling his brows over the lip of your glass. 

“I’m good.” You say, nod and smile so he knows you mean it. 

“Really? He sets the glass back down on the tablecloth. 

“Really.” 

– –

You’re at the track early Friday morning, watching Arthur’s practice session with Carla. You haven’t seen him race nearly as much as you’d like to this year. In Bahrain, you didn’t come to anything except Charles’ race, so scared about bringing Michael along. No Imola. You wish you could have been in Silverstone, watched it on your phone at work with the volume on level one. The only time you’ve actually seen him race in person was in Barcelona, and you were basically hungover that entire weekend. Hungover, and trying to convince yourself Charles was going to kiss you. 

You were going to watch him as much as you could this time around, make up for all the ones you missed. That was one excuse for staying away from Charles. The other, everything the two of you did felt emotionally charged. You’re either wishing you could wring his neck, or wishing you could nuzzle into it. Sometimes both. A lot of times, both. 

You grab lunch with Carla in general hospitality and then sneak your way  into the Paddock Club’s pit lane walk to blow some time. Charles is doing his warm up, probably playing football or doing neck exercises that could be in the director’s cut of a Fifty Shades of Grey film. Carlos, though, Carlos is talking to some engineer about something or another, and you catch each other’s eye. He smiles, looks away, and does a double take, furrowing his brows. You just shrug, make him laugh and shake his head. 

“Heard you were being sneaky today?” Charles asks when you’re leaving the track. Someone ahead is taking pictures of him, one of the regulars, one you recognize but don’t know. He’s the one that always asks Charles for a smile and is responsible for half the pictures in his living room. 

You step several feet to the side, remove yourself from the frame, out of the shot. Arthur laughs. No free food for anyone, not even the ones he likes. It’s going to be a long time before you volunteer yourself to be tormented online. 

He says your name, the photographer, and it startles you because you don’t know him. He shouldn’t know your name, you’ve never introduced yourself to him. Charles looks in your direction, holds out his hand and even though you don’t want to take it, don’t want any pictures of you two walking hand-in-hand, you also don’t want to leave him hanging like that in front of a camera. So, you take his hand and let yourself get pulled back into the shot. Maybe they’ll never see the light of day, you can only hope. Surely, a million other things will be more interesting than this. 

Mr. Photographer, Kym, Charles calls him. Kym asks your opinion on the yellow, and Charles laughs because you haven’t been shy with him about your distaste for them. You know Ferrari is really pushing it, though. “I think they’re great. Very avant garde.” You lie.

Yellow not a favorite color? He asks, says your name again. 

“She thinks yellow is a coward’s color.” Charles says, laughs with Kym the photographer. You cringe, even though he’s right. “She likes green.”

– –

You wake up miserable on Saturday, spend the day in your hotel room with the shades drawn and the do not disturb sign hanging from the door handle. Flu symptoms, someone from Ferrari, someone worried about Charles’ possible exposure, delivers a rapid test to your door. Negative. 

You have your phone playing on the lowest possible volume, still too loud, if you’re being honest, and listen to Arthur’s Sprint Race, to FP3, to Quali. 

I thought you didn’t have it in the straights, you mustered up the nerve to text him. Pole, right? You weren’t positive where anyone was starting tomorrow, too many penalties. If you had to bet on being right about one, though, it’s that Charles is on pole. You’d bet on that blind, though. 

We don’t, he replies an hour later. Extremely timely for him, especially on a race weekend. How are you feeling?

Like shit. Even with the brightness all the way down, your eyes still yearn to be clawed out when met with the LCD screen. 

Sorry.

You wallow, pick at the entirely too expensive meal from room service, take a few too many Advils because you’re pretty sure this bug will kill you before the liver damage gets a chance. You nap, you shower, shiver and shake, and nap some more. COnsider scoping your brain out and squeezing it until it pops, your pulse making your temples bulge. 

Your phone lights up the dark room. You don’t know how long you’ve been staring at the ceiling, forcing your eyes closed until galaxies and oil spills of color paint themselves across your eyelids. It could be eleven in the morning. It could be eight at night. Will you answer if I knock?

You say yes, figure he’s still at the track. He’s not. 

A single, quiet knock on the door, he couldn’t have used the force of more than a single knuckle. Your eyes are squinted shut when you open it, hand shielding your eyes. He laughs, just as quiet as his knock, slides into the room and pulls the door closed as fast as the slow-closing hinges allow. 

He puts the back of his hand on your forehead. You search to make out his features in the pitch-black darkness. “I’m dying.” You say, pitiful.

“You’re not dying.” You think he’s smiling, can hear it, even with congested sinuses and clogged ears. 

“I promise I am.” Your voice is so nasally and muffled and sick. 

“Poor thing.” His voice is half an octave higher when he mocks you. 

“Did you just come here to be mean?”

“No. I came to check on you.”

“Consider me checked.” You said, crawling back into bed. Even with your hands moving wildly in front of you in the dark room, you still run into the side of the bed with a thud. “Don’t laugh.” You warn, and he tried his hardest not to. You read once that orgasms can cure headaches. Briefly, you consider the logistics of it. 

Not worth it, you decide. You’d rather have your brain explode all over the walls of this dark room than make things any weirder, leave more feelings and emotions to linger in the shadows of the unknown. “Sommes-nous bons?” He asks, and your face controls into a twisted mess. No way is he doing this now. No way. 

“Pourquoi ne serions-nous pas bons?” You mutter, after much hesitation. 

“Je ne sais pas.” He says. “Vous vous sentez loin.”

“Je suis là.” You lie, and reach your hand out. He finds you in the darkness, or you find him. You find each other, that’s all that matters, really. You move in the bed messily, tangling the sheets and comforter with your legs, pulling him with little force onto the bed. “I’m here.” You repeat with your head on his chest, rising and falling with each breath. You don’t say it because you mean it, you say it because you know when his thoughts are on the verge of becoming all consuming. You say it because the last thing he needs to be thinking about this weekend is if you’re distancing yourself from him. You might know him better than he knows himself, you think sometimes. 

When you wake up in the middle of the night, you’re feeling alive, less corpse-like. He’s not in the room anymore. 

You wonder if it’s possible to distance yourself from Charles, or if your lives are so completely and utterly intertwined that it’s too late for that. A life lived together too long to make distinctions, you think. Nothing is yours, not really. 

Fight or flight, you will freeze every time. You can’t take the leap, have the hard conversations. If you do it, and it goes terribly wrong, crashes and burns brighter than the sun, there’s no walking away, no picking up the pieces and putting yourself back together again. 

When you were young, your Mother once told you she thought you and Charles were each one half of a puzzle–incomplete without the other. You’re lucky to have him, she told you, people spend their whole lives looking for the other half of their puzzle. 

You always found comfort in it. Now, you think maybe you and Charles are two separate puzzles that have been combined into the same box. Sure, they could be sorted, but pieces are probably missing, stolen by time or never there to begin with. The only way to sort each other apart would be to dump it all out on the table, slowly rebuild from the corners in, constantly checking the box to make sure that piece is a piece of you, not him. Nobody has time for that task, not even the people who love the puzzles, not even the puzzles themselves, so you sit on a shelf all mixed up until the end of time. 

He came to see you on your nineteenth birthday. Drove in from Monaco to the apartment you were renting with University friends. Four bedrooms, six people, two emotional support cats, low ceilings, broken fire escape, one bathroom, and a pantry full of cheap alcohol. 

When he arrived, there were significantly more than six people, the pantry full of liquor was a kitchen full of liquor, and you were dancing on a table, drunk in a way only a nineteen year old is on her birthday. Even sloppy and shitfaced, you could make out the distinctive tone of his holler over the hoots of the rest of your cheer squad. 

You’d laughed, giddy and loud, jumped off the table and threw yourself into his arms. “Vous êtes ici?!” You yelled into his ear, adjusting the strap of your top. 

“Je suis là.” He said, at a sober volume. “Bon anniversaire.”

“Merci!” You laughed, hiccuped. “Buvons!”

He should have been playing catch-up, but you’d never let a friend take a shot alone. A gruesome mistake you learned when you were curled over the porcelain toilet bowl two hours later. 

He had your hair knotted into a shitty ponytail, too loose, the part of your haircut meant to frame your face falling victim to the contents of your stomach. He rubbed his hand on your back, like a parent would, and told you it was going to be okay. You spit, laughed into the toilet because he was always so annoyingly sweet to you. You looked over your shoulder and told him so. You’re too sweet to me, you said, he looked at you all sober and earnest and chillingly, and then you threw up again. 

You rallied, though. The birthday girl always rallies. You smoked a cigarette from the perch of your bedroom window and listened to Charles talk about some girl and lecture you, going on and on about how you really shouldn’t be smoking. It’s quite bad for you. You wondered what would happen if you threw yourself out the window, if it would hurt more than his bashful words about her. It’s only the third floor. It won’t kill you. Hearing him say her name and blush one more time might, though.

Jealousy is ugly on you. You realize that in the weeks that follow, and decide that until you have the balls to say something to him, to take charge, you don’t get to be jealous of who he spends his time crushing on. Jealousy is for women who lose, and you’re not even playing, not even on the team. 

It’s a good thing you do, put it behind you, because he brings her to the family cabin you spend Christmas at every year. He warms her hands in his and kisses her under the mistletoe hung in the entryway. At the end of the week, he thanks you for being so kind and warm and welcoming to her. You smile, hug him. Anytime, you told him, cry yourself to sleep for three days thinking about how happy he is.

She’s too good for you was the nicest thing you ever said about her. It was a lie. Nobody is too good for someone as sweet as him. 

You see him next in Austin, a late birthday celebration in the land of unfamiliar accents and oversized portions. The losing battle for the championship is over, Max won in Japan and sat in some stupidly oversized armchair in the cool-down room. It’s ridiculous, honestly, I’m glad I didn’t win, he told you. You went along with it even though you know he’d give an arm and a leg to look like a fool in an oversized armchair in a cool-down room in Japan. 

Despite that, because of that, whatever, the pressure is off his shoulders a bit, the need to perform at superhuman level lowered. He seems lighter when you hug him. 

“I did a hot lap with Brad PItt.” He tells you.

You laugh at the absurdity of his life, follow him on his walk up the paddock. “And?”

He shrugs. “Tires were shit.” His typical day at the office might be batshit insane, but he’s always going to be Charles–little boy who loves cars-Leclerc. 

“Tires were shit.” You repeat. “That's all you got for me?”

“He didn’t speak much.” Make him speak, Charles. It’s Brad fucking Pitt, you would’ve said if it was a few months earlier and things were normal and deadpan and sarcastic between the two of you. You roll your eyes instead. 

– –

“You guys should not let them do this.” You tell the girl working the counter at Austin’s–an amusement park in, you guessed it, Austin, Texas. Americans are incredibly creative, you’ve come to learn. “They’re going to kill each other.” 

She can’t be making more than minimum wage–seven U.S dollars and twenty-five cents an hour–but there isn’t any amount that is enough to deal with this crowd in karts. Two of the most competitive men on the planet, egged on by each other and by the group of guys in line behind you trying to pay for your group’s tickets. 

Do not let them pay for you, you told Charles and he nodded, told you he knew, paid for everyone’s tickets. At any moment it feels like a little red dot is going to appear on your head and Ferrari is going to take you out. They won’t be thrilled to discover both their poster-boy and Disney prince were out late the night before a race, even less thrilled when they find out Charles and Carlos were risking injury in search of cheap thrills with strangers. 

You and Isa share a laugh, feel like mothers chasing toddlers around at Disneyland. We should do that, we should do this. Oh! Look at that, we can’t leave without doing that. 

You watch them ignore the teenager telling them the rules about the karts, telling everyone not to run into one another. It’s just the four of you; Charles, Carlos, Isa, and you. You know they’ll be crashing into each other before you get through the first turn. 

They argue about if they’re fighting for first or fastest lap, flip a coin and throw a fit about the results, play rock-paper-scissors to come to a decision. They lap you and Isa–the rule followers who don’t exceed the speed limit–fly around the track at a speed you didn’t expect anyone to be able to pull from the cheap karts. 

Carlos wins, Charles contests, says he’s going to formally protest it. Then, they want to switch to two-seater carts, so you and Isa are passengers to their reckless driving. Charles wins that round. Carlos and Isa leave after that, claim they’re tired. You and Charles stay for a meal. 

“It’s a pre-podium celebratory meal.” You said. 

“You’re going to curse me.” He groaned. 

For the first time in what feels like a lifetime, a meal shared with Charles is awkward, stiff. Before today, you’d barely spoken since Monza. Your social media was still full of death threats, or so you’d been told. The apps have yet to be redownloaded, it’s not healthy for anyone to see that kind of stuff. 

This is how it happens, you think. How lifelong friendships fall apart. There isn’t a separation spot that you can pinpoint and say yes, this is where it all went to shit. It’s a gradual separation, a day without a call, a week without a text, a month without speaking. Slow, steady, and sure, until eventually, you live separate, untangled lives. 

“So,” He says, eats a fry. “That big work deal?”

“Yeah.” You nod, cross one leg over the other on the cold metal chair. “It’s good. Almost done, I think.”

“I’m sure you killed it.”

“Yeah.” Uncross the legs. “Thanks.” Cross them again. The positioning of your legs isn’t the problem, the cold metal chair that doesn’t sit evenly on the floor and rocks when you shift your weight isn’t what’s making you uncomfortable. The food is good and the drinks are cold and your waitress is a sweetheart with a southern accent and long blonde hair. 

Y’all came from the race? She asked. We were busier than ants at a picnic all weekend. You told her yes. I like y’all’s accents, and that was the end of it. He couldn’t get away with that interaction anywhere else in the world. 

Everything is perfect, but you’re still uncomfortable. The problem is him. The problem is you. Everything breaks under enough pressure, even unbreakable things. 

“I miss you.” He said, because the closer your bodies are, the further away your minds wander. 

“I’m here.” You lie. 

He sees right through it. “No, you’re not.” Any possible defense would be weaker than the lie, so you don’t bother, sit in suffocating silence and pick at your fries. “Things have been weird since we slept together.” It was a mistake, you brace for the impact of it. Sleeping with him wasn’t a mistake, not for you. It was everything that has followed that was the issue. It should have been the end of a chapter, a closing book, one way or another. Instead, you’re writing an epilogue and flying by the seat of your pants, stumbling over your words and forgetting characterizations and just trying to make it to the next page. You should be in a new book entirely–a book without him or a book with him on every page. 

It was a mistake, you brace and brace but it never comes. He doesn’t say it. The other shoe doesn’t drop. He just looks at his hands, twists his rings on his fingers, pops his knuckles. “I don’t know how to fix this.” He speaks, finally, and it reminds you of when he kissed you, when you didn’t know how to make everything better. 

More silence, until you’ve both cleaned your plates, until Mary-Grace, the sweet talking southern-belle, sets the check down on Charles’ side of the table, until you watch him google how much gratuity he’s supposed to leave because he’s always scared he’s going to mess up tipping when you’re in the U.S. 

Distance is good, you think. Distance. People need distance. “Abu Dhabi is going to be my last race.”  You whisper. 

He laughs almost, sliding his card into the leather folder and setting it back on the edge of the table. “It’s going to be everyone’s last race.”

“My last race for a while, Charles.” My last race, ever, you think, if distance goes the way you think it will. “I’m going to–I think we.” You sigh. “We need some space, I think.”

“No. Don’t be stupid.” He shoos your words, brushes them under the rug. 

“We can’t fix it. We both know we can’t–”

“--I don’t know.” You speak over each other, building a Jenga tower of lies and one-ups until you finally snap into a different language. 

““--Doit-on vraiment continuer à prétendre que tout va bien?”

“I love you.” He blurts, cuts you off like it’s some grand admission, like you haven’t been saying it to each other since before the word love had any sort of connotation to it, back when it was just something people said to each other. The distance, it doesn’t mean you don’t love him. You’ll always love him, he’s Charles. You just. You need to breathe, and you can’t catch your breath when he’s around. 

“I love you, too.” You say, like you have a million times before, like you’re almost offended he thought any of this meant you didn’t love him. 

“No, no.” His voice is desperate, pleading with you to understand something you’re clearly missing. Surely, he doesn’t mean. “How do you… je suis amoureux de toi.” You clench your jaw and blink, and you’re pretty sure one eye closes before the other.

“Don’t say that to me.” You say. Not, I’m in love with you, too, even though you are. You’re trying to put yourself first here, trying to objectively look at your life, at the things in it that are hurting you. Mixed signals, hurting you. Death threats, hurting you. Unwanted attention, hurting you. The common thread is him, you need to separate yourself from him and he’s saying the only thing that could make you waiver. 

“Pourquoi pas?”

“Because.” You dig your shaky fingers into your leg, burrow them into the denim. It’s going to bruise, you don’t care, so will this conversation, so will walking away. “You don’t mean it.” Shake your head, lip quivering like a little girl who got hurt on the playground. He does mean it.You know him well enough to know he does, which only makes it that much fucking harder. “And I’m not going to say it back.” 

You love him so much, more than oxygen, maybe. You’d throw it all away for him, your heart would let you lose yourself if it meant making him happy, if it meant being with him. You’d stay off social media and pretend nobody was wishing for your death. You’d sit at awkward dinner parties and watch races with limbs that didn’t feel like your own. You’d do it all, if your heart was in charge, because you love him, and can’t fathom losing him. 

Space. Space will make it better, ease the sting of unspoken feelings and heavy words and stupid little games. Space will wash the salt from the wound. 

He says your name like a plea, a desperate prayer, bloody knees and lit candles. You say nothing, too much internal conflict to sort out to verbalize anything. 

The drive to the hotel is deafeningly silent. You can hear the tires of the rental car on the road below, can hear his feet on the pedals, the grind of his teeth because he’s angry at you. He’s angry and he doesn’t want to be. In love with you and he doesn’t want to be. You understand it well, recognize your own emotions being reflected back at you. If you listen hard enough, you convince yourself you can hear the traffic lights changing colors. 

You fly home commercial the next morning, skip the race, hear about his podium three days later from a friend. 

You don’t go to Abu Dhabi.

--

You don’t go to November, or December’s family dinner. He doesn’t text you, doesn’t call, makes no attempt at playing phone tag. 

--

You skip Christmas at the cabin, find out after the fact that he’d done the same thing. 

“Ça devient ridicule, chérie.” Your mother tells you over the phone. “Vous agissez comme un enfant. Vous l’êtes tous les deux.” You’d just told her you were skipping your dad’s birthday party. I have to work, you lied. I’ll bring his gift by the house next week. It was the straw that snapped her back, it would seem. “Vous serez ici demain. Pour papa. Il ne t'a rien fait.” She said it sternly, and if you were sixteen you might have been intimidated by it, might have listened. 

You told your sister after you got off the phone with Mom that you wouldn’t be there, told her as a heads up, so she knew the shit-show of slamming cupboards and passive aggressive comments she was walking into tomorrow. 

Go to your dad’s birthday. He texted you for the first time in months. I won’t go.

I’m an adult. There’s no way to send a message like that without sounding like a child. 

I wish I could see my dad on his birthday. Nobody does the guilt-trip like he does. Go. I promise I won’t be there.

Charles is scarily close to your Dad. Growing up, Charles–hell, all of the boys–they were the sons your dad never had, the ones he didn’t realize he wanted. It was infuriating, sharing him. And then Hervé got sick, and then he was gone, and your dad became a father figure for the boys. It was slow, and subtle, but it happened nonetheless.

You were the one who blew things up, who demanded space and time and distance. If anyone should suffer because of it, it’s you, not him. You should be there.

Not more than you. You disagree, but he’s impossible to argue with without being face-to-face. 

I can be an adult. You say, even though you aren’t so sure you can be. We can both go.

– –

You lingered in your apartment, wondered if he was really going to show up, if you were actually going to get in the car and drive over there, if it was too late to say you’d caught Covid or something. 

You change clothes seven times. Seven, because you want to look good, but not like you tried to look good. Effortlessly glamorous and classy and sophisticated. You don’t know why, it’s not like he’s the one who wronged you. If anyone should be spending extra time in the bathroom today it should be him, he should be trying to prove you wrong, to show you your mistake in walking away. 

It wasn’t a mistake. It was the biggest mistake. There were two very distinct sides to the coin. You’re back on social media, back to living your life without death threats and constant judgment. You haven’t spoken to your best friend in months, have no idea what he’s up to, don’t know anything more than his millions of followers. You miss him, but you don’t miss being Charles Leclerc’s friend, Charles Leclerc’s girlfriend. You like having your own name, being a person with traits that go beyond knowing him. You hate not seeing him, not being with him, worrying that you’re going to run into him around any corner. It’s a small, congested city. He could be any of the faces in the crowd. 

You get to your parents house after your sister and your brother-in-law and your niece. The house smells like pasta sauce and your mom’s flowery candle–the one that is teetering awfully close to potpourri and death and elderly woman. The Bianchi’s aren’t coming–they thought the party was next weekend, called and apologized three different times in the past forty-eight hours, according to your dad. The Lecelerc’s are yet to arrive. 

You slip into comfortable conversation with your family, Mom is right, you aren’t avoiding any of them. You help her out in the kitchen, get yelled at for tasting the sauce, chase your niece around the house, fulfill your duties as the fun aunt, sneak her candy from the jar in Dad’s office and swear just enough that she might call the dog a bitch. 

Arthur and Pascale get there first, before Lorenzo and Charles. They’ll be here late, Pascale says to someone, not you. “My brother is an idiot.” Arthur says when you greet him with a tight hug. You haven’t seen him since Monza, either. 

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” You say. You haven’t seen him, but you’ve spoken to him, congratulated him on moving to F2, offered to take him out to dinner the next time your schedules lined up. Drama with Charles wasn’t going to stop you from celebrating the closest thing you’ll have to a baby brother. 

You almost forget he’s coming. Almost, and then he’s knocking and walking through the door with a small, gift-wrapped box and an expensive bottle of wine, charming smiles onto everyone’s face with just his easy presence. He looks good. He always looks good, but damn, he looks good in that sweater and those jeans and his glasses–he should wear his glasses more, you’ve always thought. He doesn’t hug anyone, and you wonder if it’s so he doesn’t have to hug you. Instead, he hoists Gigi up into the air and steals her seat on the sofa. It’s his seat, unassigned, but assigned by years of occupying it at every family function. Gi wants to lay claim to it, but she’s just as happy on Charles’ lap as she is curled up in the corner seat of the sectional. 

You keep meeting his eyes, snapping them back to the ground every time. It’s sad, if you think about it too long. You were right,the two of you are too entangled. There’s no separating you, not with ties that run so deep, not when you and Charles are just pieces of a giant web of people. There are a million invisible strings and unseen connections that intertwine every member of your family and every last one of your friends. 

You’re painfully cordial. He helps your mom serve dessert, hands you a plate with a corner piece of cake and your favorite ice cream, doesn’t have to ask you like he does everyone else. You don’t even know how he knows your favorite flavor of ice cream, why he remembers that you love the corner piece of cake. 

You thank him, tell him the wine he brought is good and overpriced. I’ve missed being judged for every purchase I made He said, and you told him he couldn’t get rid of you that easily. It’s weird, the weirdest, because he did get rid of you pretty easily. 

“I’m going to F1. Sauber.” He told you in his kitchen while the two of you were washing dishes. You dropped the forks into the dishwasher with a spattering of clangs.

“Really?” You asked, a glaring absence of excitement in your voice. You knew it was coming, everyone knew it was only a matter of time, a talent like his is destined to get to the top. You knew it was coming, but, still, you selfishly and silently hoped it wouldn’t work out. He was yours, and you wanted to keep him to yourself, hated how much you already had to share him with the rest of the world. Gone for nine months of the year, away from home and away from you, it will be so lonely. 

He’s happy to leave you behind, overjoyed, even, and you struggle to come to grips with it, struggle to separate the emotions he’s feeling about achieving the dream versus the ones he feels about leaving you. It feels like the end of the world to your young and naive heart, like nothing is ever going to be the same, like you’re losing another person you love more than life. 

– –

It was the beginning of the season, he hadn’t been home in almost two months, was in the middle of a double header, China and Azerbaijan, you think. You were just trying to survive to Monaco. He’d never been so busy, you’ve never missed him so much. 

Your roommates were having a party, and you were working late. When you got home, his favorite song was playing through the apartment. You don’t know the name, aren’t even sure about the artist, but you know every word, learned them all against your will. Listened to him sing it under his breath while he cooked and scream it during long car rides and blast from his headphones so loud you were worried he’d have hearing damage. He was always, always, singing this song, and you were always, always, asking him to turn it off. 

You wished he was here right now, singing it out of tune and thinking he’s a popstar. You wish you could begrudgingly sing it with him. Instead, you grab a snack from the pantry and lock your bedroom door and put in your headphones, play your music so loud you can’t hear the party on the other side of the door. Tune it out, turn off your longing for him with it. 

You can’t wait until you graduate, until you can pack everything up into a little suitcase and spend all of your money and follow him around the world, can’t wait until you never have to miss him again. 

Come see me. He texted, a month after your Dad’s birthday, right before pre-season testing in Bahrain. He’s already there, or so you can piece together from the text, from the attachment in the subjectless email he’d sent you. Plane ticket, two, actually. Nice to Dubai, Dubai to Muharraq. Both first class. 

No. You replied. Get a refund.

See you tomorrow night. You hated the cockiness of the reply, hated more that you were already packing a suitcase. He didn’t even ask if you were working, didn’t check to see if your schedule was clear or if it was even something you wanted to do. 

I’m not your booty call.

Trust me, I know. He said. Ma vie serait tellement plus simple si tu l'étais. Well, he’s not wrong about that one. 

Your sister drives you to the airport. “I think I’m in too deep.” You told her. You two have never done shallow, she said. You promised to protect yourself, to prioritize yourself, and to text her updates whenever you had them. 

You wished your life was as simple as hers, a good job and a husband and a perfect baby girl. Big family parties and plenty of babysitters for date night and a village that loved and supported everything they did. She had the perfect family, had all her ducks in a row and her shit situated. “I love living vicariously through your insane life.” She said, and you kissed her cheek goodbye. 

– –

You follow his instructions, feel like you’re on a delusional scavenger hunt. Board the plane, land in Dubai, board another plane, land in Muharraq, get on the bus, talk to Azim at the front desk of the hotel, he knows you’re coming. Azim isn’t there. He works the night shift, apparently. 

Azim is not here. You texted your sister. 

Who is Azim?

They call Azim, he answers, and it’s all sorted out when the day-shift manager hands you a key. You wonder what Charles had told Azim. There’s a girl coming, be discreet. It doesn’t seem like him, none of it seems like him. Azim, I’m drunk and tired and invited my best friend, who claims to need space from me, to my room. Please let her in. That felt like more of a possibility, felt like it would confirm your suspicions, that he doesn’t want you here. He wants you, of last year, here. You, of France, likely. 

You’re not having sex with him. Not happening, you won’t fold, not even if he asks nicely. It would solve nothing, and has already fucked up enough of your relationship. If you suck his dick again, you won’t be able to be cordial at birthday parties, he’ll forget what kind of ice cream you like, and neither of you will ever be seen at the christmas cabin again. 

When you get to the room, the suite, you find there’s two bedrooms. Maybe he wasn’t looking for France, maybe he got into the room and saw there was another room and had a momentary lapse where he thought, you know who would enjoy being here? He bought the tickets, sent the text, and by the time he realized what he’d done, it was too late to back out. 

You’re replying to emails on the couch when he walks through the door. That redesign deal, after months and months of back and forth about something as small as the shade of one pixel versus another, is finally launching this weekend. You’re trying to make sure everything is in order, putting the final bows on the project and making sure no ends are left loose. 

“Hi.” You call out, in case he forgot he invited you. 

“Hi.” He says, appears in the lamp-lit room all comfy in that one sweatshirt you’ve always loved on him. “Are you watching L’Atalante?” He asks, moving past you and into the kitchen. It’s too normal. Eerily so, the plane might have passed through the z-axis or something and now you’re in an alternate timeline where none of it ever went sour. 

“No.” Everytime you watch it you think of him. Not in the cheesy, God, I love him and he is such the main character in this love story, way. In the God, I love him and wish he was here to make fun of me for loving this movie, way. “Haven’t watched it in a while.”

“Shame.” He says. “I liked that movie.”

You don’t feel like humoring him about this again, vividly remembering exactly where it got you the last time. Really, you could blame all of this on that fucking movie. If you never watch it, he never asks to come in, you never have sex, and everything is happy-go-lucky between the two of you. “How’s the car this year?”

“Don’t know yet.” He says, pulls a bottle of water from the fridge, the seal snapping when he turns the cap. “Why aren’t you watching L’Atalante?” He takes a drink.

“I told you.” You say quietly, unfocused on your words, fingers rapidly moving across your keyboard. 

“No, you told me you haven’t watched it.” He says, flops down onto the couch. “I want to know why.”

“I don’t know, because I haven’t felt like it.” You tell him, a little more annoyed this time. You haven’t watched the movie. A lot of people don’t watch their favorite movie all of the time. “Why do you care so much? Did you call me out here to play anything but?”

“I called you out here because I miss my best friend.”

“You don’t know me, anymore.”

“It’s been a few months, not a few lifetimes.” Even then, he’d probably still remember the corner piece of cake and his hand would probably still hover behind you protectively and find you in the dark rooms and the crowded rooms. You know no amount of time could make you forget his favorite song, or at what point in his day he gets nervous, what he needs when everything is going wrong, and the way he can sober you up with one look. “I still know you. I still love you.” You sympathize with it, relate to it, because nothing is as hard as trying to unlove another person, you’ve come to learn. “I miss my best friend.”

Don’t break. I still love you, Charles. Don’t break. I miss my best friend, too. Don’t break. Don’t break. “We can pretend for a weekend.” He says. “Just, be normal again. Be us again.” Us. There is no us. Don’t break. 

It’s not like it’s an argument you can just apologize and move on from. He can’t apologize for loving you, for needing to vocalize it. You can’t apologize for loving him, for not being able to take the leap. Normal, normal sounds so good. 

Can we go back to normal after this? 

Yeah. Back to normal. 

You never should have let yourself believe him. You wonder if he loved you, then. If he knew when he said it that it was a lie. You can’t remember when you knew you loved him, like really, really loved him. It was gradual, you suppose, a combination of time and sweetness and jealousy, of grief and joy and innocence. At some point, you were forced to face the sobering reality, but, you don’t know how long you’ve loved him like this. Does he remember a moment, or was it gradual for him, too? 

“Back to normal.” You said. The ultimate game of anything but, the final boss of your friendship. “Just for the weekend?”

“Whatever you want.” He says. “We can do whatever you want.” 

Don’t break. Do not break. “Okay,” you crack, and then, with the force of your entire heart, “yeah.” You break. 

A long time ago, before the gradual realization, you thought Charles and you were platonic soulmates. Today, can you go back to that? To the platonic love. Was there ever a fork in the road, a wrong turn, a path where you end up somewhere else, or have you always been destined to end up like this, in a hotel room, in a foreign country hiding from the rest of the world and pretending everything is light and breezy and comfortable when it’s far from. 

– –

It’s Monday morning, and your weekend together is over. It was a shorter adjustment period than you could have predicted, like relatives who don’t see eachother but once a year. It’s awkward hellos and bombed small talk until suddenly one of you makes a joke and it’s like you were apart for minutes instead of months. 

You go to this tourist attraction together, the Tree of Life. It’s a four-hundred-year-old tree that’s like, ten meters tall or something. It sits alone in the middle of the desert and nobody knows how it’s still alive. It’s a spectacle, according to Google, and was nominated to be another wonder of the world. Someone says its roots run fifty meters deep, and it sticks with you, the idea that there’s so much beneath the surface. You wonder if the tree had a companion four hundred and some odd years ago, if it always imagined spending every day with the companion tree, if their roots were tangled fifty meters below the surface. The tree is gone, now, but maybe its roots are still there, fifty meters down, all tangled up in the roots of this tree. 

It’s probably not from the Garden of Eden like they claim, and there’s surely a scientifically sound explanation for where the tree is getting its water from in the middle of the desert in a rain-less country. It’s just a big tree, destined to dry up and fall over and burn with the rest of the planet. It’s just a big tree, unless it isn’t. 

Does the tree know if it’s special or if it’s just that? You don’t know if what you and Charles have is something special or if you’re just something, but, then again, you aren’t a tree. Maybe the tree knows. Maybe you know. How does a person know that they know?

Charles seems to know, to think you’re worth his unrelenting patience, deserving of the corner slice and the color green, of the stars and the sand and everything in between. He understands you, and he still seems to know, to declare with confidence in the rush of a sports bar in the middle of Texas that he loves you. He’s sure enough that he skips Christmas because you thought space would make everything better, doesn’t tell you that you’re wrong even when you so obviously are, doesn’t stop loving you when you push him in the opposite direction. 

You’ve never been that sure about anything, you think. 

“Looks a bit lonely, doesn’t it?” He offers into the dry air, taking a picture with his phone. You hadn’t thought of it as lonely until he said something, viewed it as possessing an other-worldly strength and unmatched level of determination. The tree never told its companion it loved it, the tree kept to itself and eventually, learned to live alone in the sand. 

You shook your head. “It’s strong.”

“You can be both.” The tree can be both, he’d meant to say, because the Tree of Life is not a metaphor. It’s just a tree. 

– –

The weekend, the game of anything but, the avoidance of the World’s biggest elephant, is over. It’s Tuesday, now, breakfast from room service in the suite, awkward tension filling all the available space, compromising each molecule at an atomic level. He’s wearing a red t-shirt, because he always is, and it sits on him so nicely, looks so comfortable on his skin. You’re wearing a yellow pajama top and the silky material is charged with static and clings to you in all the spots you wish it wouldn’t. 

How do you know when it’s real? You had texted your sister in the middle of the night prior, two-twenty-three if you remember correctly. You couldn’t sleep, had a bad dream–couldn’t decide what was worse, the nightmare while you sleep or the nightmare when you wake.  

You don’t. She replied at a normal hour, when normal people wake up after going to sleep at a normal time. You never know for sure.

That’s fucked.

“I booked a flight home last night.” You told him, picking at the plate of eggs in front of you, the fork scraping on the ceramic plate like nails on a chalkboard, your teeth clinking against the metal everytime it was in your mouth. Just, wrong. In every possible way. 

“Why?” He asks, takes a drink of orange juice, a new quirk, you think. He always used to complain about the pulp getting stuck in his teeth. Don’t be such a princess, you’d tell him and he would roll his eyes, drink the remainder of the glass just to prove he could do it without complaining. 

“The deal was a weekend.” You say, pretend you’re not conflicted, regretting buying the ticket, admit you’re running away again. “The weekend is over.”

“You’re just going to leave again?” He nods, reassures himself through the sentence, wipes his mouth with a cloth napkin. “Not even going to talk about it?” You stay quiet, teeth clicking against the fork. “I–you are. God, you are so–”

“–Anything but.” You invoke it like a constitutional amendment, like a prophecy, like an unbreakable law. 

“​​Oh, va te faire foutre.” Your head rears back, but you don’t let it sting, know you deserve it. “We’re not doing Anything-fucking-but.” It’s been a long time since he was angry with you, openly like this, cussing you out. He’s scary when he’s angry at you, because he’s always calm about it. Raises his voice, maybe, but never yells at you. You wished he’d scream sometimes, it would be easier to read. 

“This weekend was really great, Charles. I don’t want to ruin it.” 

“I just. I don’t understand.” He runs his hand over his stubble, deep in contemplation, trying to analyze you, make sense of you. Good luck, you want to tell him. “I love you. I really, really fucking love you. Je sais que je ne suis pas fou. Vous le sentez aussi.”

A single, heavy tear falls from the corner of your eye. You wipe it with the rough cuff of your jacket before it can trail down your face. The inside of your cheek is bleeding, you think, because you can’t feel the pressure from your teeth but you can taste copper. “I’m scared.” There, you said it. You admitted it, exhaled it with the weight of the world, vomited it into his lap. 

His lips are tight in their frown, eyes red and glossy like he’s going to cry, too. He laughs, though, a sad and defeated chuckle. “You think I’m not scared?” He asks, voice fighting against itself not to crack. “I’m scared as hell to want you.”

He’s scared? But, nothing scares him. He’s fearless, you’re frightened. Unflinching and hesitant. Gutsy and cowardly. Nothing scares him, not even his own mortality. You’re supposed to believe that you, of all people, you, scare him? Impossible, you think.

“I didn’t tell you for fun.” He continues. “I told you, because it was eating me alive. I was so scared to tell you, thought I would ruin us. Mais tu partais, et je ne pouvais pas te perdre. Je ne pouvais pas.” 

Why, why, why is this so fucking hard for you. Sixteen-year-old you, twenty-year-old you, twenty-five-year-old you. Every version of you is screaming at you, we’ve loved him forever, this is all you’ve ever wanted from him. They kick your shins and gut-punch the breath from your lungs and scrape their nails behind your eyes. They are furious, because for longer than you can remember every wish–shooting stars, birthday candles, fountain pennies, fallen eyelashes, dandelions, and ladybugs–they’ve all been for the same thing. The very thing being served to you on a desert platter, all you have to do is pick up the fork. 

“Tu as peur?” 

“Pétrifié.”

Pick up the fork. Eat the corner piece of cake and savor every bite. Be scared. Be terrified that the world is going to take something pure and wreck it. Be scared, but do it together. Pick up the fork.

“I love you, too.”

You feel strangely out of place with someone else to look after in the paddock. Ferrari hospitality had been your home away from home for years now. The paddock was always different, but maintained a comfortable familiarity, recognizable faces, names, buildings and colors. He was wide-eyed and curious and you smiled at the way the sun bounced off his hair, the excitement he couldn’t contain when amongst the chaos you’d become accustomed to. 

“Ask before you touch, please.” You told him, his hand in yours, the same warning Charles had given you the first time he brought you through a garage. 

He is heard before he is seen, a loud laugh, a familiar voice calling out your name as soon as he turned the corner. “Hi.” You beam.

“Hi” He says, kisses you, runs his hand through the boy’s hair. “Quoi de neuf, Crevette?”

“Il fait chaud, papa.” He says, with poor enunciation and the dramatic waving of a little hand, fanning himself. Charles nods, hoists the little man onto his hip, whispers something in his ear. A private conversation between the two of them, you don’t dare intrude. “Dis-sa.” Charles says, repeats it when he’s met with a giggly belly laugh. 

“We go.” He says, in little, butchered english with a thick french accent. It’s easier to decipher a babble. 

Charles laughs, quirks his brows at you, shrugs. “We go.” He backs away from you slowly. 

“We go, where?” You say, laughing, too, because you can’t not laugh at your little boy’s giggle. It’s too pure, cracks even the toughest exteriors. Charles looks to his mini-me. “Où allons-nous mon amour?”

“La crème glacée.” He says, beams at his father. 

“You coming for ice cream, Maman?” Charles asks, holds out his free hand because it’s a rhetorical question. He’s looking at you with the eyes that make you sober and find you in any crowd, but he doesn’t have to have eyes on you to know you’re coming. “Do you think they have Maman’s favorite flavor?” He asked. 

“Ouais. Ils l'ont eu."

[kettlechips3]

Charles leclerc being active daily on instagram is leaving me speechless the pic 🫠😊😍

#charles lecrelc

[kettlechips3]

No cause this is so trueee

sluttiest thing man can do is wear his race suit on his waist.

[kettlechips3]

I need more footballer x reader stories ahhhh pleases

#diego lainez x reader #julian alvarez x reader #joao felix x reader

[kettlechips3]

𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓

fan favorites: ✩ = over 500 notes ✪ = over 1000 notes

─ ( DUDE, CALM DOWN! ) ✪

in which charles' wife gets drunk and he's less than amused about it.

genre: fluff

─ ( TEN SECONDS! ) ✪

your secret relationship with charles comes to light all because of a shirt. (verstappen!reader)

genre: fluff, suggestive content

─ ( FIERY! ) ✩

where you and charles finally come clean about your feelings.

genre: angst to fluff

─ ( I'VE SEEN THIS FILM BEFORE! ) ✪

you find yourself reliving your worst nightmare as charles crashes in spa. (hubert!reader)

genre: angst, fluff

─ ( MINE! ) ✪

a careful girl with a fear of falling finds herself with a certain monegasque determined to prove he's here to stay. (single mom!reader)

genre: fluff

─ ( BAD OMENS! )

an affair between you and charles runs deep as it breaks all of your hearts

genre: angst, suggestive content

─ ( CALL OUT MY NAME! ) ft. carlos sainz ✩

you don’t realize what you have till you lose it, a lesson charles had to learn the hard way.

genre: smut, angst, fluff

─ ( EARLY MORNINGS! ) ✩

early morning cuddles with charles.

genre: fluff

─ ( COCKBLOCK! ) ✪

where charles regrets introducing his sister to his teammate OR the leclerc brothers are cockblocks. (leclerc!reader)

genre: fluff, smut

─ ( MOTH TO A FLAME! ) ✪

if charles can't value what's in front of him then carlos is more than wiling to take on the role.

genre: angst, smut, fluff

─ ( CALL OUT MY NAME! ) ft. charles leclerc ✩

you don’t realize what you have till you lose it, a lesson charles had to learn the hard way.

genre: smut, angst, fluff

─ ( THE 1! ) ✪

daniel will never allow himself to love you but you’ll never let yourself not love him.

genre: angst, suggestive content

─ ( PEACE! ) ✩

in which daniel is terrified the whirlwind of his world would make you leave him.

genre: fluff, minor angst

─ ( CRAWL TO YOU! ) ✪

in which you and max always find your way crawling back to each other.

genre: angst, smut

─ ( OVER ANYTHING! ) ✪

max chooses between you and racing.

genre: angst to fluff

─ ( LITTLE VERSTAPPEN! ) ✪

you think max dislikes you but as it turns out, it's the complete opposite. (single mom!reader)

genre: fluff

─ ( TRAITOR! ) ✩

you never thought drama could come from supporting your boyfriend rather than your brother for one race. (sainz!reader)

genre: fluff

─ ( SHIT! ) ✩

trying to teach your daughter a new word is much harder than max thought. (dad!max)

genre: fluff

coming soon!

coming soon!

coming soon!

─ ( STAYING AWAY! ) ✩

you and mick can never stay away.

genre: angst, fluff

─ ( PIERRE! )

in which you do everything to try and forget pierre.

genre: angst

─ ( THAT'S THE WAY I LOVED YOU! )

where loving pierre had always been painful but missing him is worse.

genre: angst

─ ( INFATUATED! )

charles has had enough of you and arthur pining for each other and so he takes matters into his own hands.

genre: fluff

─ ( SPARKS FLY! )

when a man in the bar gets too handsy, arthur is more than ready to step in.

genre: fluff

─ ( YOU ARE IN LOVE! )

a night out reminds oscar how much he loves you.

genre: fluff

[kettlechips3]

☺️

over the influence — remus lupin x reader

summary: remus lupin is not your boyfriend, but he sure knows how to act like he is.

contains: friends to lovers, friends trying really hard to be lovers, fluff, mutual pining, lovesick oblivious remus, drunk!reader, modern!au, rugby!james cw implied fem!reader, reader wears a skirt, alcohol consumption.

note: um welcome to my first ever remus fic!? if I’m being honest I have no idea if it’s good but I’m posting it anyway yolo

fem!reader 2.9k words

You’re plastered when Remus finds you. Absolutely hammered.

He can tell because you’re giggling madly at one of Sirius’s jokes, which you never do, because Sirius’s jokes are awful and you thankfully have a good sense of humour. But, you’re a giggly drunk, who finds just about anything anyone says absolutely hilarious. It’s adorable, usually. But right now, it’s blowing Sirius’s ego out of the water.

Remus dives in to save you as Sirius roars with laughter at his own joke.

“Dove,” he says, clasping your shoulder. You’re slumped into the sofa, your head lolling against the cushions. “There you are.”

You twist to look who it is, your face all scrunched up as you take him in. You blink very slowly. Then, just as slow, your face lights up.

“Remus!” You gasp happily. “Hi, baby. I was wondering where you went!”

Baby. Remus’s face burns and his heart does a triple backflip. You’re drunk, he reasons. Super drunk.

“Are you okay?” He asks you, bending at the waist so you can hear him better. It’s loud, the music and the people and Sirius, especially.

“I’m perfect,” you say, words all slurry and sticky and ending in a sort of ditzy hiccup.

Well, you’re not wrong about that. Remus takes the seat next to you and your droopy eyes follow him down.

“How much have you had to drink?” Remus asks, trying for curious but coming out a bit concerned. “What did you even drink?”

You shrug and hiccup again. “I don’t know.” Your shoulders drop and so do your lips, a sort of confused frown washing over your features. “Sirius made me some weird concoction … it was kinda gross, Rem.” You look at Remus very seriously, your eyelids low. “Don’t tell him I said that.”

Remus laughs and pretends to zip his lips. “Your secret’s safe with me, babe.”

Chances are it’s not, and Remus will mock Sirius about it endlessly. Not tonight, though. Tonight he’s mainly focused on making sure you don’t touch another cup of anything other than water.

You’re giggling again, though Remus isn’t sure what at. You’re just gazing at him and giggling your head off like a maniac.

“What’s so funny, pretty?” He asks fondly, a grin tugging at his lips. He knows you don’t have a chance of remembering any of this by tomorrow morning. Hence the pet names.

You stop laughing abruptly. It’s alarming and then not, because your big grin stays put. You lean in close, your chest pressing into his side. Remus smells all your smells, your perfume and your hairspray and the mystery drink you’ve definitely had too much of.

“You’re pretty,” you say, completely ignoring his question.

Remus flushes. You’re never this forward. It’s driving him nuts, the way you’re looking at him. How close you are. The way your scents wash over him and make him feel almost as drunk as you are.

“Whatever you say,” he says, brushing off your compliment because what the hell is he supposed to say to that? “I think you need some water.”

Remus gets up but you catch his wrist before he’s fully standing, your soft fingers pressing into his skin.

“Wait, don’t leave!” You sound desperate and you look the part, too. Your pretty eyes are blown wide as saucers.

Remus falters. “I’ll be five seconds, dove. M’just getting you a glass of water.”

You pout in such a way that makes Remus want to kiss you silly. “Take me with you, then?”

Remus finds he physically cannot say no to that look. He hauls you up by the forearm and you cling happily to his arm. Remus makes his way to the kitchen with you attached to his arm like a barnacle, your fingers pressing into the crook of his elbow, your thigh brushing his as you walk far too close to him. It’s dizzying, and Remus is surprised he’s managing to walk in a straight line.

In the kitchen, it’s much quieter but you’re not any less drunk. You detach yourself from Remus and skip over to the kitchen island. Before Remus can stop you you’re hauling yourself up onto the bench, so unsteady on your feet that you almost topple right off. Remus catches you by the elbow just before disaster strikes.

“Oops,” you giggle, breathless and totally out of your mind. “Sorry.”

Remus’s heart stops racing with worry and instead races with infatuation with you. Even in your drunken state.

“S’fine,” he says kindly, patiently, because you’re too sweet for your own good. You almost went toppling to your demise and you’re apologizing. “Just be careful. Please.”

You nod and sit pretty while Remus retrieves a glass and fills it with cold water from the fridge. When he turns back you’re making grabby hands for the glass. Remus looks at you, your wobbly state and your clumsy hands, and holds the condensation-ridden glass closer to his chest.

You pout and drop your arms. “Remus.”

“You’ll drop it, honey,” he says, as kindly as he can without sounding like he’s babying you. He is babying you, actually. Not that he’s gonna tell you that. “Let me.”

You let him. He brings one hand to rest at the small of your back, his fingers brushing the strip of skin just shy of your skirt’s waistband. He tries not to think about it as he brings the glass to your lips.

You drink like you’ve been stuck in a desert for six days, gulping like your life depends on it. Remus is grinning fondly until you finish and dip your head backwards. Your neck is bared to the kitchen lights and your chest is heaving dramatically, and Remus feels so lightheaded he actually has to grab the counter.

You notice, because of course you do, even in your tipsy state. You frown and put your hand on Remus’s where it’s gripping the counter for dear life.

“Remus? Are you okay?”

Remus blinks rapidly, hitches a grin onto his face. “I’m fine,” he says, fake grin at work. “Do you want more water?”

You think about it for a second. Then you look at Remus like you’re about to deliver the worst news of his life. “I need to pee,” you say solemnly.

Remus almost laughs. Almost. “Well, c’mon then.” He sets your empty glass down and grabs your forearm. “I’ll get one of the girls to take you.”

“No!” You say desperately. You throw your arms around Remus’s neck and tug him into you, and Remus is so startled he doesn’t have time to think about how close you are. You push your face into his neck. “No,” you say again, quieter this time. “I don’t want them to look after me. I want you.”

Your closeness catches up with Remus in a rush of heat all over his body. Your thighs press into his sides and your arms are like a vice around his neck. His heart thrums and his chest burns and it takes him a while to figure out what he’s saying.

“Dove,” he says gently. He pries himself off of you, albeit reluctantly, and puts his hands over your biceps, squeezing lightly. “I can’t take you to the bathroom.”

You frown. “Why not?”

Remus stutters. “Well, because. I’m- I’m not—”

“Please?” You beg, looking awfully cute when you clasp your hands together between yours and Remus’s chests. “You can just stand outside the door and wait. I’ll be fine.”

Half of Remus thinks it’s a bad idea, you might trip on your own feet and whack your head on the bathtub. The other half of him can’t ever say no to you, not even when what you’re proposing is totally dangerous and an awful idea. He’s not exactly proud of himself when he nods.

“Yeah, alright then,” he says, and you beam. “Come on.”

Remus ends up looking after you for the remainder of the night, you’re so drunk. He drives you home not long after your bathroom break. Sobers you up with some tea which you barely touch, and more cold water which you skull like you’ve been deprived of it for days.

He deposits you in your bed and you’re already half asleep by the time he does it, but you manage a sleepy, “Thank you,” that’s so sweet Remus feels his chest ache. He leaves you fast asleep in the comfort of your bed, ignores the urge to crash on your couch, and double checks he’s locked your doors on the way out.

Not that anyone’s asking, but he’s maybe just had the best night of his life.

-

Remus gets a call from you the next day and his heart skips. He thinks, stupidly, that maybe you’ve decided you hate him after last night. He picks it up anyway, because he misses you.

“Remus,” you say, as soon as the phone’s on his ear. You sound somewhat anguished. “Was I awful last night?”

He laughs, surprised. “What?”

“Was I awful to look after?” You ask like it’s obvious. “I barely remember anything. James said I was clinging to you for half the night.” You’re moaning like it’s a bad thing. For Remus it wasn’t. “And I’m sure I said some weird shit, I was so loopy off that stupid drink Siri gave me. I—”

Remus saves you before you fall into a self-deprecating waffle.

“Y/N,” he interrupts your rambling. “What’s gotten into you, dove? You were fine. It was fine.” I like looking after you, he doesn’t say.

“But—”

“You’re being ridiculous.” Remus tries not to laugh because you are being ridiculous, but you also really do sound quite worked up about it. “It’s fine. I wasn’t about to leave you to the crows.”

You giggle, thankfully. When you speak again you sound much happier. “‘The crows’ as in Sirius?”

Remus snorts. “Yeah. The crows as in Sirius. I think I’ll have a word with him about the drinks he passes around.”

You huff, and Remus can picture your pout. “Please do. I’m never drinking with him again.”

Remus laughs, a mixture of amusement and fondness and agreement. You’re much more yourself this morning, perky and a little dramatic and a bit of an over-thinker. Though admittedly, Remus didn’t mind loopy you last night.

“Are you going to James’s game tonight?” You ask, a smile evident in your voice.

Remus snaps out of his lovelorness long enough to reply, “Are you?”

“Yeah, why?”

“‘Cos I’m only going if you’re going.”

You laugh loud and the heat in Remus’s cheeks only grows. He loves making you laugh more than he’d like to admit.

“That’s mean, Remus,” you scold, with less heat than a block of ice. “Don’t you want to support your friend?”

“Friend isn’t really the right word,” Remus jokes. He’s happy to make you laugh at James’s expense. He’s sure James can take it.

You laugh again, and Remus knows you know he means it jokingly.

You’re still giggling when you talk again, breathless and adorable. “Alright, well. Would you mind picking me up?”

Remus agrees far too quickly to be normal, with far too much eagerness. He gets off the phone after agreeing on a time to pick you up, and knows he’s a total goner.

-

Remus is not your boyfriend. And yet here you are, sitting very close to him in the stadium stands while you watch James’s rugby game. Only last night, he’d looked after you and driven you home when you got too tipsy. He’d also, at your request, given you a ride here, telling you all the while that you were the only reason he’s coming to the game at all. So maybe he’s closer to being your boyfriend than you think.

You watch James score a try and your row of seats erupts into cheers, Lily’s the loudest. The big screen above the field shows the camera panning to a close up of James. He whoops and pounds his fists in the air and blows a big smacking kiss in the general direction of your group of friends.

“He’s such a show off,” Remus drawls into your ear. You can hear him smiling.

You giggle and twist in your seat so you can look at him. He looks extraordinarily pretty tonight, in dark brown pants and a forest green t-shirt, his dark hair (in need of a cut) windswept and going in every direction possible. You want to kiss him so bad your chest burns. On the way here, he’d had his hand on your thigh for half the drive and you didn’t say a word for that entire time. You think maybe you’re unhealthily obsessed with him.

“What?” Remus asks curiously, lips parted, and you realise you’ve been staring too long.

Heat washes over your cheeks. “Nothing,” you say as nonchalantly as you can.

“Have I got something on my face? You’re staring at me like I’ve grown two heads.”

The way he says it is like he knows exactly why you were staring at him. Desperate for an escape, you stand before you even know what you’re doing.

“I’m going to get more popcorn,” you declare to your friends in general. You purposefully avoid looking at Remus, afraid you’ll keel over and die. “Anyone want more?”

You get a few yes’s and one “I’m coming,” from Remus, which completely ruins the point. You’d tell him so but that would mean admitting you’re sickeningly obsessed with him. You allow him to tag along.

Sirius gives you a look as you leave with Remus, eyebrows raised like he knows exactly how much you like his friend. You’re sure he does. He doesn’t miss much, that boy. And he’s been giving you looks ever since you arrived. You flip him off behind Remus’s back.

Once at the popcorn stand, Remus insists on paying. It’s irritating, really, how sweet he is.

“Remus,” you groan, swatting his wallet away. “I can pay for myself.”

“I know you can, dove,” he says. “I’m just trying to be nice.”

And he gives you a smile so staggering that you let him pay for the popcorn. You’re still grumbling about it on the way back to your seats.

“You’re too nice,” you tell him, plonking down in your seat with a frown. “Stop being so nice, I’m sick of it.”

Remus laughs, really laughs, the kind that has you fighting a smile even though you’re annoyed at him. He’s got a lovely laugh.

“Sorry,” he says, sounding the opposite. He’s got a smarmy grin on his mouth, all teeth. You’d pummel him if he wasn’t so pretty. “Do you want me to be mean instead?”

You glare. “You’re mean to everyone else,” you say, which is entirely true and you both know it. He wouldn’t look after a drunk Sirius like he did you if his life depended on it.

To your surprise, Remus flushes. “Well, I—“

He’s interrupted by a yell of his name from Sirius, and then you realise they’re all calling your name, too. Shouts of “Remus!” and “Y/N!” and “Look!”

You twist in your seat, confused.

“What—?”

And then you see it. The kiss cam is on the big screen, colours and words blazing. And just your luck, it’s your face blown up ten times as big on the screen, your eyes wide and your lips parted as you stare back at yourself, caught mid-sentence. You think maybe you’re dreaming, because right next to your face is Remus’s. He’s just as shocked as you.

You turn to look at the real Remus, just as he turns to look at you. Your friends are having a field day, shouting, “Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!”

You ignore them.

“I …” You’re not sure what to say, your mouth filling with nothing but silence. You want badly to kiss him. You’ve always wanted to kiss him, and you think everyone but Remus knows it.

“We don’t have to,” he says quickly, mistaking your silence for unwillingness. “It’s just a stupid kiss cam.”

But you do have to, because he’s Remus, and maybe this stupid kiss cam is the only chance you’re ever gonna get. You swallow the nerves that are building up in your throat and ignore the fact that Sirius is practically screaming at the two of you from three seats down.

“I want to,” you say quietly, too quietly, and Remus doesn’t hear you over the hubbub. So you try again. “I want to.”

Remus goes very still, his lips parted and his chest heaving. Suddenly it feels like it’s just the two of you. He stares at you like you’re made of gold and your heart does somersaults.

Then he smiles. “Me too.”

He brings his hand to your jaw and you barely have time to bask in his touch before he’s kissing you. Really kissing you. He tastes like butter and sugar and he smells exactly like he always does. His hands are soft but sure where they cup your face and your chest is on fire, your heart is punching and kicking and you worry you might pass out in his arms you’re so giddy.

Your friends are screaming bloody murder, Sirius the worst of them all, and you’re sure the kiss cam has probably panned away from you by now but you can’t stop kissing him. You kiss him and kiss him and kiss him until you can’t breathe anymore. You’d go on forever but you’re losing breath and you really do think you’re lightheaded now.

You pull away before you pass out from lack of oxygen. Remus looks as frazzled as you feel, pink in the cheeks and his lips all swollen and his eyes are bright and burning and holy shit, you just want to kiss him again.

You almost do, but then Sirius and Frank and Lily appear and clap your backs, shout words you can barely hear and Sirius is so happy he looks like he might burst into tears. You laugh, half-delirious and sick as a dog in love with Remus, and somehow your hands end up tangled with his in his lap and your thigh is crushing his and he’s looking at you like he wants to kiss you again.

Lucky you, he does kiss you again. And many more times after that, no kiss cam needed.

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[kettlechips3]

Like a kid in the Roaring Twenties (Saving Up To Buy Her Flowers)

Character A’s tattoo parlor and Character B’s flower shop have lived side-by-side for years, and the owners have a pretty good relationship going on. Character B is always bringing leftover, slightly droopy flowers to Character A, and Character A has been offering a free tattoo for ages. Character B finally decides to take them up on the offer after closing.

TW: cursing, one usage of 'my girl'

a million and two thanks to @exilelines who read this when i was too scared to post it, blindly supported it and offered feedback. i love you.

word count: 2,500

music blares from the shop next door.

you’ve learned to at least tolerate it, has gone from full screaming to just songs about how much the singer hates their town, and frankly-you have to take the wins where you get them.

you walk to the door, shutting it gently and ignoring the bell that rings overhead, as you flip the sign to closed on the door, flick the lights off

this is your favorite time of the day, closing. when the music turns off and you can walk around, one last trip around the store to water the flowers, make sure everything is at least semi neat.

Thursdays are your favorite day.

not because you close early (although that does help) but picking up the flowers used for decor for the week; the small tulip in water by the cash register, the small bouquet of sunflowers and roses when you walk in, the daises in the break room-collecting them all, wilted petal edges and all, crisp and browning, folding into themselves-wrapping s small string around them and bringing them next door.

originally, it started as a peace offering

the music blaring from next door gave you a headache, made you reevaluate your life, especially when customers made the dull ache behind your eye throb-

you went over, ready to all but plead for the owners to at the very least turn the music down, when you instead met him

he was tall, and lanky, hovering in a corner as he chewed on his fingernails, a beanie pulled over his head low, his hair in his eyes-

you couldn’t see him, but you saw his arms. even crossed over one another and leaning in close to see a co workers work, you could see the tattoos that littered his arms.

the sleeve was all black, all simple line work, starting with a grasshopper on his shoulder, a large bullfrog above his elbow, a mosquito hovers over it, a small section of bees in the corner, the empty spots without insects covered by various small branches, leaves stretching out of them, wrapped around his arm and to his wrist

“Hey.”

no one looks up.

you’ve never felt more uncomfortable in your life, the shop is blaring this music and isn’t that well lit, and the walls are covered with various band album photos blown up, awards line the walls.

you step closer, to the man with the sleeve of insects, and pull on his shirt sleeve: “i said hey”

you beg your voice to not come out as a whine, but fail, as he whips around.

immediately a smile is on his lips, a dimple shows on one corner of his cheek, uses his hand to move hair out of his way: “Well, hello.”

there’s humor behind his voice, a gentle teasing like there’s some inside joke here that you’re missing. his voice is surprisingly deep and low, all gravel, not a voice you’d think would belong to him

“Listen, you’re scaring the old ladies away-“

“what?”

his eyebrows are scrunched together in confusion but you swear you can see a smirk pull on the edges of his lips as he leans in closer, a shoulder down as he tries to make himself not tower over you.

“i said,” you hold in the sigh, wanting to get out of here, “you’re-“

“here,” he says gently, “follow me.”

and you can barely hear him over the music thumping as he leads, his hand stays on your shoulder as he gently guides you to the back of the shop, behind a few doors, to a more lit up room, where the music is at least a little gentler, not as abrasive. a couch is pushed into the corner, a small refrigerator hums in the other corner, a fold out plastic table in the center.

it hits you this is probably their make shift break room.

“okay,” he smiles, his arm up high on the doorframe, “you were saying?”

he’s cocky.

the smile doesn’t leave the corner of his lips as he talks, looks at your lips the entire time, waiting-daring-for you to say something

“i said-“ you pray your voice doesn’t shake, finds level ground, “can you turn your music down? you’re scaring away all the old people and that’s 90% of our clientele”

he smirks, “Yeah? and why would i do that, darling?”

“Because the old people!” you huff out, “listen, i have a peace offering.”

he snorts, “i gotta see this. go on, sweetheart.”

You roll your eyes, hoping he doesn’t see the pink creep onto your face. there’s a single tulip, tucked into your back pocket. usually, it’s reserved for crying children that come into a shop, you insist no one can be upset when they have a tulip-

and you grab it and hand it to him, “here, our nicest tulip if you turn the music down.”

he laughs, the kind where he throws his head back and squints his eyes, but when his head snaps up, his fingers reach for the stem delicately-

“this is your best tulip?” he laughs, “the edges of the petals are brown.”

okay, so it’s a lie, a flower you knee by the register, exchange them out every few days, but you didn’t have time to make him a fucking bouquet

“yknow,” you huff, “most people would just say thank you.”

you go to move hair out of your eyes and your well aware of how red and burning your face is

he’s laughing, but a part of him seems to melt away, this hard exterior he puts out, “Thank you.” and it sounds sincere, “but no promises with the music.”

“no promises,” you shake your head, “just less screaming. i can’t have another boomer yell at me.”

his expression hardens, “they yell at you?” he seems shocked, like he doesn’t work with the general public.

“I mean,” suddenly you’re tripping over your words that come back small and hushed, “Sometimes?”

It’s a question, not an answer, and he shakes his head like he can’t believe it.

“I’ll make you a deal,” he smiles, his eyes on the flower in his hand as he rubs the stem between his fingers, “You keep the flowers coming, and I’ll see what I can do about the music.”

Your eyes narrow. 

“Here's the deal: flowers once a week, and you stop playing music that could give 90 year olds heart attacks”

He laughs, pauses for a second, his voice comes back gentle, almost shy: “Once a week, yeah?”

Obviously referencing the flower delivery by you.

You roll your eyes, “Sure, fine.”

He smiles, “My name's Wilbur,” he tucks the flower behind his ear, “It’s a pleasure doing business with you.”

And so it begins.

Every Thursday you close the shop up, collect the wilting flowers from various corners of the shop and walk next door.

Wilbur is usually behind the desk, a pad of paper in front of him and a smudged pencil on his fist, always making a move to quickly slide the pad of paper out of view when you appear. It starts getting more elaborate. The first few times, he used a half empty water bottle to put the wilting flower in, a small wax dixie cup until he eventually upgraded to a small plastic cup with the shops logo on it with lots of water

And he always has last weeks flower tucked behind his ear, as if he’s been waiting for your arrival, has been watching the clock for the time to happen, for the smirk to gather on his face and to take the flower out from the pages between his sketchbook, when they get too old and brown, and tuck it behind his ear

It becomes a joke, when you drop the flower off, for him to offer you a free tattoo in exchange for the wilting flower.

Or at least, you always took it as one

But as you show up tonight, wilbur behind his usual spot, the store empty beside him and the music a lot quieter than usual, he smiles when you walk in the doorframe.

“Well,” he leans back in his seat as he throws his pencil down, his hands behind his head, “Look who’s here.”

“Who would’ve thought?” You ask as you approach the desk, “It’s almost like we do this every fucking Thursday.”

He laughs as he takes the flower from you, this time an actual bouquet, smaller than usual, of assorted flowers, a mess of roses and tulips, a dash of daisy and a mix of peonies.

Even though they’re wilted around the edges, and the age is showing, he takes the small bouquet and presses his nose into it gently, closing his eyes, a small smile on his face. 

“Say your line.”

His eyes snap open, “Come again, sweetheart?”

“Say your line,” you sigh, “You say it every Thursday?”

He hums, his eyes travel to the ceiling, “Hmm, let’s see?” 

You huff, cross your arms over your chest and tap your foot on the ground, acting like you’re irritated.

“Thank you?” He finally says. The smirk says he’s enjoying this.

“Wilbur-”

“Oh!” he shakes his head, “I got it: this flower is brown.”

“You’re literally insufferable,” You huff, “How you have any friends is beyond me.”

He laughs, “Alright, damn. Let’s see. Tattoo for your time?”

“That's the line,” You rock back and forth on your heels, “And yes. I’m ready.”

He all but perks up, “Oh? I thought you were terrified of needles.”

And you hesitate, don’t want to say that everything seems less scary with him by your side, because you two aren’t that close yet for you to be saying that, or that you trust him, because that’s a big word all by itself-

“Thought I could piss my family off in time for the holidays.”

He laughs, “There’s my girl,” and then, his voice a little lower, “You sure?”

You nod, fumbling for your phone as you grab it, unlock it as you show him a picture of what you have in mind, ignoring how your hands shake, “This.”

He leans in close, hums as he touches the screen and moves it along, really taking a good look at it: “Give me ten minutes.” he settles on, wheels his chair back and grabs his drawing pad and disappears with it.

As promised, wilbur appears back no more then ten minutes later, a water bottle in his hand as he throws it to you, flops into the chair and wheels to your side, his voice low: “So, I was thinking this-”

And your finger traces the outline he made, a simple sketch, simple line art, but you can see where he erased, tried again, erased and finally got it right

“Perfect, Wilbur.”

He smiles, “Go sit in the chair. I’ll be a second.”

Wilbur’s side of the shop is small, his booth a lot smaller than the seasoned artists that work there, pushed in the corner, the only thing that makes it his and sticks out are the glow in the dark stars that line the brick walls, the fairy lights hanging from the small mirror pushed in the corner, the small framed pictures that line the wall of various insects

“Get comfortable.” He throws his chin at the small chair he has, and you obey, flopping down, playing with your hands out of nerves.

“You’re okay,” He says gently as he wheels over, heard him going through his cabinet as he appears in front of you in large glasses, crooked, pressed onto the crook of his nose, “I got you, you’re good.”

And there’s weight behind it, wonder if he knows that, as you lay in the chair, fixing your arm on the arm rest where he’ll be working.

“I’ll take it slow,” he says gently as he gathers supplies and instruments, “And i’ll be gentle, I promise. And if you need a second at any point just tell me and-”

It’s weird, seeing him this genuine. Usually, it’s passing insults to one another, the only way you know how to make friends, little comments to one another so it doesn’t feel like you’re both doing anything-

“I’m ready, Wil.” You say gently, nodding, “Let’s go.”

he heistates for half a second, his voice gentle: "You ate today, yeah? Drank something? I have snacks-"

He wheels back in his chair, to a little cabinet where his hand hovers over it, offering the snacks.

"I did," You say back, just as gentle as he did, "I'm ready."

Wilbur goes slow, as promised. The buzzing of the needle is the only sound you hear, well aware now that wilbur has turned off the shitty pop punk music and has instead traded it for some acoustic album that plays gently through the speakers, only interrupted by his voice occasionally, low and soft, “You’re doing good, almost done.”

And when you look up, you realize the music you heard, that calmed you down so much, was also accompanied by wilbur’s own humming, gently, as if it’s just to himself, as he does the line work.

He sees you staring.

“You good, darling? Need a break?”

“I’m okay.” You say gently.

He nods, “One more minute, I promise. You’re doing good.”

And you nod, feeling comfortable with him, the little atmosphere he made.

A minute later, the buzzing stops and you feel the scrape of a rag over your skin, “All done, sweetheart. You did amazing, go take a look.”

You get up slowly, and while the mirror isn’t necessary considering it’s on your wrist, wilbur insists its part of the experience, as you turn your hand around in the mirror, the fairy lights hitting it just right, the little outline of a tulip under your pinky.

Wilbur appears behind you in the mirror, pushes his glasses up over his face into his hair, “What’d you think? And be brutally honest, I can take it.”

“It’s perfect.” you insist, and he laughs

“Well, you’re easy to please-”

“I owe you, let me pay.” 

And you’re up, pulling at your purse on the floor, ready to give him the few bucks to your name, when his hand is over yours, looking up and he’s looking into your eyes, “It’s part of the agreement, remember?” And then, gentlier, “I’m not taking your money.”

You shake your head, “The deal was flowers for-”

And he cuts you off, throws his chin at your wrist, “Exactly. Flowers for the different music. I’m just holding up my end of the bargain.”

You nibble your lip.

“Let me buy you a drink, at least.”

He laughs, as he wipes down the bed, “Darling-”

“One drink,” you say, your voice almost begging, “Please.”

He stops for a second, like he’s thinking, before nodding, “Let me clean up, i’ll be a minute. You can sit at my desk.”

You obey, sitting at the desk, ignoring his drawing pad and how it’s looking back at you, pleading for you to take a look, when he appears, his jacket over his shoulder, “Ready, darling?”

You stand, nodding immediately, as you go from behind the desk to his side, his hand in the air, fingers outstretched as if asking for you to hold it, to tangle your fingers into his-and without second thought you do, and follow him out.

[kettlechips3]

Your name is Helly R. and you’re new here

[kettlechips3]

*[elevator bell dings]*