Chapter Text
The McLaren hospitality unit carried a kind of controlled chaos that Lando had long stopped noticing unless he forced himself to. Cameras flashed in irregular bursts, journalists hovered with polite persistence, and the low hum of conversations layered over the constant movement of people in papaya uniforms. Media day always followed the same script, and after years in Formula One, he could perform his part almost automatically.
He leaned casually against the wall as a photographer adjusted his lens, shifting just enough for the sponsor logos on his shirt to sit perfectly in frame. The smile came easily, practiced but not entirely fake. It was the version of him people expected. Relaxed, slightly amused, like nothing in the world could really get to him.
The camera clicked a few times before someone from behind asked the inevitable question about the championship. It had been coming all weekend. It would keep coming.
“How does it feel knowing you and Oscar are the closest in the standings right now?”
Lando let out a small laugh, tilting his head in a way that looked spontaneous but wasn’t. “It’s great for the team,” he said smoothly. “Two McLarens up there is exactly where we want to be.”
It was a good answer. Safe, clean, completely useless.
The truth sat somewhere much less convenient. It had edges, and weight, and a name he was trying very hard not to say out loud.
When the interview wrapped, he stepped away from the cameras with a bottle of water and let his shoulders drop just slightly, enough that only someone watching closely would notice. Across the room, near one of the engineering stations, Oscar stood with a tablet in his hands, listening as someone walked him through data from the last session.
Even in a room full of noise, Oscar had a way of making things feel quieter. He wasn’t animated when he listened. He didn’t interrupt. He just watched, absorbing everything with a focus that felt almost intimidating. Lando had noticed that about him from the beginning. While everyone else filled silence with words, Oscar seemed comfortable letting it stretch.
It had been interesting at first. Then impressive. Then, at some point he had never quite pinpointed, it had become something else entirely.
Oscar looked up briefly, as if sensing the weight of being watched. Their eyes met for a fraction of a second, just long enough for Lando to register the familiar calm in his expression, and then Oscar’s attention dropped back to the tablet like nothing had happened.
That was all.
No acknowledgment, no small grin, none of the easy familiarity they used to have.
Lando took a sip of water, though he wasn’t really thirsty, and tried to ignore the quiet tightening in his chest. It hadn’t always been like this. Their first season together had been almost effortless. Lando had dragged him into late-night gaming sessions, into karting, into the kind of chaos that defined his off-track life, and Oscar had followed with that same understated patience, occasionally rolling his eyes but never actually saying no.
They had been easy back then.
That changed when the car got fast.
When podiums turned into wins, and wins turned into points that actually mattered, something subtle shifted between them. It wasn’t dramatic. No arguments, no obvious fallout. Just a slow, almost invisible cooling. Conversations became shorter. Time spent together outside the car disappeared. Every interaction narrowed down to what was necessary.
Teammates. Competitors. Nothing more.
A hand brushed his arm, pulling him back to the present.
“Babe.”
He turned to find Magui beside him, smiling in a way that was perfectly calibrated for the cameras already beginning to swing in their direction. He slipped an arm around her shoulders without thinking, leaning slightly into the gesture as flashes went off again.
“You survived media day,” she said, her tone light.
“Just about.”
From the outside, it looked easy. Natural. The kind of relationship that fit neatly into headlines and Instagram posts. She rested her hand against his chest, and he leaned down to press a brief kiss to her temple, the timing instinctive, practiced.
It worked. It always worked.
But there was a quiet understanding between them that never needed to be spoken out loud. Their relationship wasn’t built on the same thing people assumed it was. It was comfortable, familiar, even affectionate in its own way, but it existed within boundaries both of them had agreed to without ever formally defining them.
Magui knew things about him the public didn’t. About the way his life had never quite followed the expectations people projected onto it. About the relationships that had come and gone quietly, never confirmed, never discussed. About the parts of himself he kept carefully out of interviews and press conferences because the sport, for all its progress, still wasn’t a place where he felt safe putting everything on the table.
She followed his gaze across the room, and her smile shifted just slightly.
“You’re staring again.”
“I’m not,” he said, a little too quickly.
“Lando.”
He exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck as if that might help deflect the point. “I’m just thinking about the race.”
“Sure,” she said, though the way she said it made it clear she didn’t believe him. “Because you definitely look at tire strategy like that.”
He let out a quiet, reluctant laugh, but didn’t argue further. There wasn’t much point.
“You should get over that crush before it becomes a problem,” she added, her voice low enough that it didn’t carry.
“Crush?” he echoed, almost scoffing, though it felt weaker than he intended.
“Yes. That thing where you forget how to act normal when he’s around.”
He didn’t respond immediately. Instead, he looked back toward where Oscar had been, only to find the space empty now.
“Does he know?” Lando asked after a moment.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “But I wouldn’t bet on him not suspecting something.”
That made his stomach twist in a way he didn’t like.
Oscar wasn’t oblivious. If anything, he was too perceptive for his own good. The idea that he might have noticed, even partially, made everything feel more precarious than it already was.
Magui nudged him lightly, breaking the tension before it could settle too deeply. “You’ve got a debrief soon.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“Try focusing on that instead.”
“I am focusing.”
She gave him a look that said otherwise but didn’t push it further. “You’re hopeless,” she said, though there wasn’t any real judgment in it.
Maybe he was.
Because no matter how much he told himself to stop, to draw a line between what mattered and what didn’t, his attention kept circling back to the same place.
To Oscar.
The paddock outside was brighter, louder, filled with the usual movement of mechanics and engineers preparing for the next session. Lando stepped into it with the same practiced ease he brought to everything else, slipping back into the rhythm of the weekend as if nothing inside him had shifted at all.
Inside the garage, the atmosphere changed. The noise softened into something more focused, more purposeful. Screens flickered with data, engineers leaned over laptops, and the smell of warm rubber and fuel hung faintly in the air.
Oscar was already seated at the far end of the table when Lando walked in, deep in conversation with his race engineer. He looked exactly as he always did in these moments. Composed. Intent. Completely absorbed.
Lando took his seat opposite him, setting his notebook down in front of him as the debrief began.
For the next half hour, everything was normal. They discussed tire degradation, balance issues, wind conditions. Lando contributed when needed, Oscar asked sharp, precise questions, and the engineers adjusted their notes accordingly.
It was the version of them that worked perfectly on paper. Efficient, professional, focused entirely on performance.
At one point, Oscar glanced up. “The medium tire looks strong over long runs,” he said, his tone measured. “If degradation stays like this, we’ll have more flexibility with strategy.”
Lando nodded. “Balance felt decent too.”
Oscar’s gaze flicked toward him briefly. “Rear was sliding a bit in sector three.”
“Only on the first lap.”
“Still worth adjusting.”
The exchange was short, technical, completely devoid of anything personal.
And yet Lando found himself holding onto it anyway.
When the meeting ended, chairs shifted and laptops closed as people began to move again. Oscar stood, gathering his tablet, and for a moment it looked like he would leave without another word.
Instead, he paused beside Lando.
“You looked quick in FP1,” he said.
Lando blinked, caught slightly off guard. “Thanks.”
Oscar nodded once, as if that was enough. “The car suits you here.”
Then he walked away.
Lando stayed where he was for a second longer than necessary, staring at the empty space Oscar had left behind. It was such a small thing, barely even a conversation, but it lingered in a way it shouldn’t have.
That was the problem.
Everything about Oscar lingered.
Outside, the paddock carried on exactly as it always did, loud and relentless and indifferent to anything happening beneath the surface. The championship fight loomed over everything, growing heavier with each race, each point, each tiny shift in momentum.
Lando knew what he was supposed to focus on. The title. The car. The opportunity in front of him.
Instead, his thoughts kept circling back to something far less manageable.
Because somewhere along the way, this had stopped being just about racing.
And the more he tried to ignore that, the more obvious it became that he couldn’t.
Not anymore.