One Of The Best Yet

IVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS ONE

bejeweled | ln4

"and I miss you, but I miss sparkling"

summary: after a triple-header where they couldn't see each other, things got even stranger when her boyfriend seemed totally uninterested in spending time with her. so, she took matters into her own hands

warning: a little bit of angst, but fluff ending, mentions of a long-distance relationship, Lando being an uninterested boyfriend, reader feeling ignored and worthless, reader being petty, mentions of alcohol, swearing, reader trying to make Lando jealous, mentions of McLaren's bad 2022 season and Danny leaving the team (crying 😭), not proofread

pairing: lando norris x reader

word count: 2.7k

note: everything in bold are song references and in italic are thoughts, which includes memories from the past.

masterlist

Baby love, I think I've been a little too kind

Didn't notice you walkin' all over my peace of mind

In the shoes I gave you as a present

Puttin' someone first only works when you're in their top five

And by the way, I'm goin' out tonight

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.'

Y/N couldn't keep count of the number of times she had heard this phrase being said during the past two years. 

She prayed that people were right. That distance would make their relationship stronger, their time together more special, their appreciation for each other bigger.

She hoped her heart would mend every time he came back home but in all honesty, she just felt... lonely.

From: babe

only a few more days and the torture is over, can't wait to kiss you again gorgeous, miss you 🧡

Y/N read Lando's text over and over again, daydreaming about their reunion after so long apart, as the driver had three races in a row at Spa, Zandvoort and Monza.

It didn't matter how many times Lando called or texted. How many times he expressed how much he missed her. How many times he said how excited he was to see her again.

In the end, it was exhausting spending her days simply waiting for him to be there.

Best believe I'm still bejeweled

When I walk in the room

I can still make the whole place shimmer

And when I meet the band

They ask, "Do you have a man?"

I could still say, "I don't remember"

Suddenly, the jingling of keys on the other side of the door caught her attention. Y/N turned towards the entrance where she saw the image of her boyfriend appear through the darkness of the night that filled the apartment.

Quickly getting back on her feet, the girl rushed to him, hugging the boy desperate to return to her arms. His body relaxed as soon as it made contact with hers and Lando let him pull her as close to him as possible.

"Fuck," Lando whispered against his girlfriend's forehead, whose tears of relief now streamed freely down her cheeks. "I can't believe I'm finally back home."

"God, I swear it was the worst weeks ever." The girl confessed, although it was common to be apart for a long time since her work did not allow her to follow him most of the time. "I've missed you so much, Lan. So much."

Grabbing her gently by the sides of her neck, the driver looked straight into her bright, tired eyes. "Me too, baby. But now we have two weeks to ourselves."

For a moment everything fell into place. But it was only a matter of time before it all came crashing down again.

Familiarity breeds contempt

Don't put me in the basement

When I want the penthouse of your heart

Diamonds in my eyes

I polish up real, I polish up real nice

After spending the night lying next to the boy she loved, Y/N couldn't control all the excitement she felt inside her chest.

Very early in the morning, the young woman got out of bed, leaving the sleeping man behind, and headed to the kitchen where she went all out to celebrate his first morning back in Monaco.

With the utmost care and love, she cooked just about everything: scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, pancakes, you name it. And as soon as everything was ready, Y/N returned to the room and jumped on top of the British man, now awake on his phone.

"Good morning, sunshine!" The girl said, as she hugged his hips and laid her head on his stomach. "I made the best breakfast ever just for you, baby. So you better be hungry." 

Her laughter was quickly interrupted by the boy's surprising coolness towards her. "Good morning, but I think I'll pass. I still feel super tired from the flight, so I'm going to stay in bed a little longer." Lando set his phone back on the bedside table and, running a hand over the top of her head as an act of apology, continued. "I hope you don't mind, love. It's just for today."

It's just for today, he said.

The next day, still under the wave of happiness, Y/N tried her luck again and decided to approach her boyfriend again to make plans, now that he was already feeling more energetic and recharged.

Lando spent the morning jumping around the house, so when Y/N saw him walk back into the room, she dropped to her knees in her seat, turned around and leaned on the back of the couch.

"Lan, what if we went out to dinner at that Thai place we went to last month?" She asked, her head turning slightly as she remembered their meal. "I swear I'm still thinking about that Pad Thai."

Lando continued his way to the kitchen, opening the fridge to get some water. "Hmm, maybe another time. Don't feel like going out."

And with only a few words, he disappeared again into another room of the house.

On day 3, the girl was caught off guard when she saw her boyfriend with a backpack on his back and his hand on the doorknob.

"Hey, where are you going?" She questioned, curious.

"Just going to the gym with Carlos." He replied, eyes on the phone in his other hand.

"I thought you were tired." She blurted out. At that moment, the persistent girl decided to be direct and confront him. "Is there something wrong? You've been so distant lately."

She had barely seen him even though the two of them shared the same house. It was getting embarrassing how much she tried to engage in conversation with him, only to get rejected every single time.

The driver just spat out a string of words, including 'busy with business' and 'training', but nothing soothed the uneasiness she felt in the pit of her stomach.

Baby boy, I think I've been too good of a girl

Did all the extra credit, then got graded on a curve

I think it's time to teach some lessons

I made you my world, have you heard?

I can reclaim the land

And I miss you

But I miss sparklin'

It just didn't make any sense.

What happened to the 'week to ourselves? To all the 'I miss you' and 'I can't wait to see you' he said?

It got to the point where she was even starting to question every time he told her he loved her.

A week passed, and in a last attempt, Y/N walked up to her boyfriend and placed her hands on his shoulders, placing a small kiss on his cheek.

"How about we watch a movie, cuddled a bit on the couch…?" She suggested, whispering close to his ear.

Lando placed a hand over one of his girlfriend's hands, looking back to meet her gaze. "Sorry babe, but I'm going to stream with the guys now. Maybe later."

Maybe another time. Maybe later.

She had been a little too kind and she was done playing nice.

It was time to teach him some lessons.

Best believe I'm still bejeweled

When I walk in the room

I can still make the whole place shimmer

And when I meet the band

They ask, "Do you have a man?"

I could still say, "I don't remember"

Y/N entered her room and confidently walked to her closet. She knew exactly the garment she was looking for and as soon as she laid eyes on her shiny bejeweled dress, she picked it up.

Leaving the clothes she wore behind on the floor, she changed into the stunning dress and sat in front of her mirror, curling her hair and doing her makeup.

Her eyes ended up dark and smoky, perfectly adorning the determined and vengeful look on her face.

Grabbing her small Prada bag, Y/N walked to the room where Lando was already streaming, catching the driver's attention.

"Hey, I'm already live." He warned her, as he turned to see his girlfriend. Laying his eyes on his girlfriend all dressed up, a nervous shiver ran down his spine. "Where are you going looking all polished up?"

"Don't wait for me for dinner," She answered coldly, even though she knew the people in the comments were going to have a field day with this. "And by the way, I'm going out tonight."

Familiarity breeds contempt

Don't put me in the basement

When I want the penthouse of your heart

Diamonds in my eyes

I polish up real, I polish up real nice

As soon as she walked into the room, she made the whole place stop with the shimmer of her dress under the spotlight.

If Lando wasn't going to give her the love and attention she deserved, she sure as hell was going to give it to herself.

Y/N was finally done with letting her worth be determined by a man, even if he was supposed to be the love of her life.

Sapphire tears on my face

Sadness became my whole sky

But some guy said my aura's moonstone

Just 'cause he was high

Walking towards the bar, the young woman couldn't help noticing the eyes that fell on the fascinating and beautiful image that she was.

At that moment, although she missed him and the good times of their relationship, she was reminded of how much she missed sparkling.

Y/N ordered two tequila shots and drank them without missing a second. She now felt prepared to start the night, leaving her problems behind.

Dancing as she made her way to the middle of the floor, the girl began to sway her hips to the music, between the hot bodies glued together in the room.

Tonight was all about her.

And we're dancin' all night

And you can try to change my mind

But you might have to wait in line

What's a girl gonna do?

A diamond's gotta shine

Back home, Lando couldn't shake the feeling of apprehension and anxiety that gripped him.

As much as he tried to keep his good spirits and attention on his friends, his followers and the game, his mind was elsewhere: her.

His eyes roamed the chat as he interacted with some of his fans until one of them made his heart stop beating for a second.

teamlandofewtrell: have you guys seen Y/N photos clubbing? I smell trouble in paradise lol

The man cleared his throat, trying to maintain his posture. "Guys, I have to go now, but I'll see you very soon!"

Without further explanation, Lando grabbed his coat and the keys to his McLaren and headed towards her.

And as soon as he entered the club, he immediately found her.

The furious boy walked over to her, grabbed her arm and pulled her to a more sheltered corner, only to find her surprised and upset eyes.

"What the fuck were you thinking?!" He shouted over the music, unconcerned by prying ears. "First you make me look like an idiot on stream, then I find out you're alone in a club doing who knows what. Are you all right in the head, Y/N?!"

"You're worried now, are you?" The girl laughed sarcastically. "That's fucking rich."

"You have to be fucking kidding me. It has to be." Lando ran his restless hands through his hair nervously. "All because I didn't want to see a movie with you today? That's it?"

"Today, of course. The problem is from today." She continued her ironic tone. "You know what, Lando? It's about time you realized that just because I made you my world doesn't mean I can't claim the land."

Best believe I'm still bejeweled

When I walk in the room

I can still make the whole place shimmer

And when I meet the band

They ask, "Do you have a man?"

I could still say, "I don't remember"

Lando was shocked by her confrontational words, as it was a side she rarely showed.

"Stop this nonsense, Y/N." Lando snapped, gripping her arm with some force. "Let's go home now, and tomorrow we'll talk when you come to your senses."

Out of nowhere, a man approached the couple. "Hey, is everything okay here? Do you need some help, babe?" He asked her.

Y/N recognized him as the vocalist of the band that was performing when she first arrived at the scene.

"It's okay, thanks." She replied, freeing her arm from her boyfriend's hold and letting her burning eyes lay on Lando's face. "This man was about to leave."

"If you need to come with me, feel free to join, gorgeous." The singer said, looking her up and down. "Do you have a man? 'Cause if you don't, I sure could be yours for tonight."

Even though she was uninterested in the man's suggestive proposition, she couldn't pass up an opportunity to entice the driver. "I don't remember."

"She has a fucking man, now get the fuck off." Lando spoke out aggressively, having no patience left for her foolishness.

Familiarity breeds contempt

Don't put me in the basement

When I want the penthouse of your heart

Diamonds in my eyes

I polish up real, I polish up real nice

"You have the nerve to show up here playing the role of the victim when all you did this whole week was ignore me," Y/N yelled, losing her mind. "Day after day, I made a fool of myself and tried to approach you, to make plans with you, to do the things I know you like to see if you would change your shitty attitude but nothing."

"From the second you arrived, the only thing I got from you was a cold shoulder and indifference. And honestly, I'm fed up, fed up with your behaviour when all I did was wait for you, all alone and miserable, while you fulfilled your dreams."

Lando remained glued to the ground, unable to move as he tried to assimilate all the angry words she spat in his direction.

"So if you have anything else to say to try and ruin my night, you might have to wait in line because I don't have the time to do so right now."

And we're dancin' all night

And you can try to change my mind

But you might have to wait in line

What's a girl gonna do? What's a girl gonna do?

I polish up nice

Eyes to the floor in embarrassment, the driver gently grabbed her hand. "You're right, I'm so sorry, love."

"What?" She blurted out, not believing the sudden change in him.

"You're right, I've been an absolute prick to you lately," The boy looked into her eyes, his gaze filled with regret and sorrow. "Those last three weeks weren't just bad because I was away from you. It was bad news after bad news and I just ended up taking it out on you unfairly."

"Lan, you know you can talk to me about anything." She softened and stroked his hand. "What's wrong?"

"Everything, honestly." He sighed, saddened. "The car is shit most of the time, I can't seem to get out of 7th place ever, Danny is leaving the team next season and, as if it couldn't get any worse, I spent all weekend getting asked about it like I had some power over the matter."

Y/N knew her partner was feeling especially down over losing yet again another teammate he really cared about, so Lando's anguish came as no surprise.

"I'm sorry, Y/N, really." Lando apologized again. "You didn't deserve all of this."

"Baby, I'm here for you. Always. Through thick and thin." Y/N brought her lips to his, letting her hands grip his curly hair as she leaned into his kiss. "Let's have some fun, dance a little, and make up for lost time, what do you think?"

"Lead the way, gorgeous." Lando kissed her again before she led him to the centre of the floor.

Gathered in their bubble of love again, Y/N, who once shone like a jewel, now shone like a true diamond with the light of her life reflecting on her side.

Best believe I'm still bejeweled

When I walk in the room

I can still make the whole place shimmer

taglist: @dan3avocado @starxqt @roseinnej @spiidergirlsworld @ccloaned @hotpigeon22 @dr3lover @lovelytsunoda @primadonnasdream @luxebeautystyle @wallfloweriism @ilivefortheleague @gwynethhberdara @satellitelh @adavenus @audreyscodes @wifeoflucyboynton @th6ccnsp6cyy @classifiedsblog @flyingmushroomss @motylekrozi @claramllera @gabrielamaex @handsupforamiracle @pierre-gasssllyy @lorenaloveslewis

@idkiwantchocolatee @simpforsunwoo @kissatelier @xweirdxsceletton @micksmidnights @miniminescapist @inchidentwithmax @hopelesslyromantics-world @alwaysclassyeagle @indieclarke @capela-miranda @okokoksblog @pulpfixion @sins-only33 @sainzclerc @allisonxf1 @honethatty12

@amsofftrack @scuderiamh @junkiespromise @loudoperahumanoidpanda @honeyric3 @holy-macncheese-balls @ricciardosheart @pierreverstapkin @ravenqueen27 @majkaftorek @home-of-disaster @buendiabebeta @itgirlofnowhere @roses-of-eden @thewintersunset @rubychocolatechips

(taglist continues in the comments)

thank you to everyone that asked to be tagged! please let me know if you want to be added to the next stories! 💌

---

We love it though 🤷

williams admin calling galex ‘aleorge’ and teaml4ndo calling dando ‘landan’ is just further proof that ferrari admin needs to get the fuck off ao3. like why the fuck do u know they’re called sebchal

---

Chef’s kiss

dark paradise - lando norris

lando norris x female!reader [1.6k] summary: it was no secret that alcohol made you and lando frisky. warnings: 18+ explicit smut & language, public sex, pwp. a/n: HELLO it's me again. I have a lot of lando feels and just needed to write it out. this is short and smutty, but I hope you enjoy it all the same!!

Your body hums, heart thrumming in your chest as you grip meaty shoulders with your hands and bring the man closer to you. It’s hot, humid even, the whole club reeking of washed out perfume, alcohol and sweat. It feels deprived almost, but you can’t bring yourself to care even an ounce because bright and blue eyes are staring right into your eyes; pupils blown and dark.

It’s foggy and the strobe lights make it hard to see more than ten meters ahead of you, the music so loud in your ears that it drowns out the rushing sound of blood. It becomes a little overwhelming when big and calloused hands find the sides of your thighs, drawing a path up, up, up until they meet the hemline of your dress.

You pant heavily, drawing air that he breathes with his mouth so close but so far from you. The very same lips you’re staring at pull into a slow smirk, like he knows what he’s doing, like he knows the effect he has on you and he does. It’s so hard to concentrate, thinking of nothing but the feel of his mouth against yours. You crave to taste them, to delve into his mouth and have him draw every last ounce of sanity from you. A form of surrender you're all too willing to act out.

But Lando has other plans, content with making you squirm where you’re standing, two of his fingers finding their way up your dress and drawing slow and tantalising circles on the skin of your inner thigh. His eyes never leave yours, watching your every move and twitch as he nudges the edge of your panties. You can almost see what he's thinking, how he yearns to have you home in your bed with your back on the mattress and your legs caging his head.

He doesn’t slip inside, just touches the hem of the fabric, running the pads of his fingers so achingly close to where you need them most.

You huff out a breath of frustration, gaze straying from his face to somewhere behind him where the throng of people are dancing in their own world, like yours isn't spinning out of control. Lando’s fingers stop their teasing movement, making his dislike of your wandering eyes known by tutting and bringing his other unoccupied hand up to grab your chin.

The way he turns your head makes you whine, eyes watering a little and he grins because he loves how needy alcohol makes you. You’re not even drunk, having taken only two shots at the beginning of the night and nursing a strawberry mojito to keep that buzz going.

It hadn’t been hard to work you up into a frenzied mess, sharing a few dances with you and whispering some filthy words in your ears before you were dragging him into a remote and dark corner and licking into his mouth.

He looked into your eyes, watched how the frown marring your eyebrows deepened when he slipped a finger inside your underwear and he nudges your clit. It never got old, seeing the look of absolute pleasure blanket your face so easily, your pretty mouth so wet with saliva and inviting that he wanted nothing more than to bring you to your knees and slip his cock into your greedy mouth.

You let out a shuddered breath through your nose, eyelids fluttering shut for only a second before Lando’s hand tightened its hold on your chin. Just hard enough for you to take it as a warning, eyes opening right back up to look at him through hooded lids.

He rewarded you by sliding a second finger into the fabric of your panties, bringing the digits down to your hole to coat them in your slick and up, rubbing small and tight circles onto your clit just how he knew you liked it.

You whined, high and needy, feeling your knees buckle a little at the perfect pressure of his thumb. Lando licked his lips, taking a step forward and forcing you further up the wall; putting more pressure in his fingers and keeping you from teetering to the side.

It was like fire licking up your spine, toes tingling in a way that was definitely not from them going numb for being squeezed into your high heels for hours. Any other day and you would’ve probably been more sensible, more aware of your surroundings and that it only took one person to look your way to know what the two of you were up to.

But today wasn’t that day. It had been a successful race weekend in Monaco and the entire grid had gone out to celebrate. Lando had even found himself behind the DJ booth again, spirits so high that you couldn’t help but give in to everything he did and said.

It was no surprise that alcohol made you both a little frisky, it was a running joke between your friends at this point. A few drinks and you both would find yourselves wrapped up in each other, forgetting about the outside world.

You wrapped your arms around his shoulder, linking your hands into his hair to bring him closer to you so you could reach his lips. Lando went easily, hand sliding from your chin to your throat, resting it there as you opened up to him; allowing him to kiss you as he pleased.

It was filthy, how he slipped his fingers inside of you just to hear and feel you moan into his mouth, bringing a thumb to play with your clit until you were sucking on his tongue. He tasted of the aperol spritz he’d downed earlier, so intoxicating and sweet that you found yourself craving for more.

You made a sound of protest in your throat when he pulled back, kissing up your jawline before he rested his head against the side of yours. His breath was hot against your ear, sending shivers down your spine.

“You look so pretty with my fingers inside of you.” There was a husk to his voice that made you grip his hair tighter, rolling your body up and into his hand between your legs. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” You echoed his word, dazed and shaking.

His fingers were sinful, playing you like a fiddle with such a practiced ease that it should’ve been illegal.

“Dripping down my hand.” He let out a laugh and you keened.

His face moved against your ear and you could just picture the shit-eating grin on his face, how fucking cocky he looked because he had done that. He’d successfully rendered you into a mess.

“F-fuck.” Your voice hitched when the pressure in your belly started to build, clenching around the fingers inside you.

It didn’t deter him though, only made him work a little faster when you dug your fingers into his hair and pulled. A throaty moan sounded in your ear and it was so erotic that your knees almost buckled.

“Lando.” You didn’t need to say any more.

“I know baby, I know.” He turned his head so he could see your side profile, watching your mouth gap open and closed as you struggled to find words. “Louder, baby. Let me hear you.”

White light exploded behind your eyelids as you squeezed them shut, bucking your hips as the rubber band got pulled so taut that it finally snapped. You came with a wail of his name, drowned out by the pulsing music in the club but Lando heard it loud and clear.

He could feel you squeezing his fingers, hole fluttering when you started to come down from your high. You whimpered when his thumb on your sensitive clit became too much, reaching a hand out to slap at his arm in a poor attempt to make him stop.

Lando pressed a chaste kiss against the column of your sweaty throat, relishing in the breathy whine you let out when he pulled his fingers away. Your throat bobbed under his lips as you swallowed, letting him right your underwear and pat down your dress - like nothing had happened. Like he hadn't rocked your world three ways to Sunday.

“You look so beautiful, baby.” He complimented you sweetly, pushing himself upright to smile at you. “Came so prettily on my fingers.”

Heat spread onto your cheeks as you regarded his eyes, blown out pupils and the redness on the apples of his cheeks. Lando was clearly turned on and you knew that it was only a matter of time before he called it a night and took the both of you home.

You didn’t mind though, you were ready to leave this place.

Lando brought the hand that had been inside you up between you, slipping two wet fingers into his mouth to suck on them and you covered your face with your hands at the obscene show he was putting on. His laughter reached your ears and you shook your head, peeking at him from between your fingers.

“You’re unbelievable.” You couldn’t help but laugh at the grin on his face.

“Yeah, maybe.” He placed two hands on either side of your hips to draw you into him. The hard plane of his body against yours felt a lot like home, and you welcomed the feeling with open arms. “But you love me.”

Your teeth found your bottom lip, holding back a smile.

“I really do.” You nodded, reaching a hand up to thumb at his lower lip. “I’d love you even more if you took us home.”

---

Idk if this is a one shot or if we’re getting more out of it but idc cause it’s actually a masterpiece

Whipped

Pairing: Lando Norris x Assistant!Reader

Warnings: Smut mentioned, Lando is a secret simp, Fuckboi!Lando

Rating: PG-17

Requested: Yes/No

Being Lando's assistant, you've seen and heard many things. Girls coming and going at odd hours, girls leaving his driver's room in a mess, hell, you've even had to hide girls from the media after hookups. But you knew this when you took the job as it was the first sentence in the contract.

It has never bothered you because Lando was a playboy/fuckboi who wanted to have fun. Of course, you did more than just help him with his ways, interviews, photoshoots, media obligations for F1, and anything Lando needed you for. You did.

Lando flirted with you. Brains and beauty is what he said about you when people asked. He praised you to no end but never crossed a line with you, always keeping it professional; he cherished you too much.

"Lando! For the love of christ, put on clothes. You have the driver's interview!" You bang on his door, but that doesn't stop the porno noises in the room; you just roll your eyes.

Leaning against the wall, the door gets thrown open, almost hitting you, but you just stare at the blonde girl rushing out of the room with Lando following her.

"See you later." The blonde giggles winking at him as she rushes into the sea of people here for the race.

"Really? We just landed yesterday and couldn't wait, could you?" His head turns to your hard stare, and he has the decency to look ashamed.

"What? She's hot." Is his only argument which has you standing up straight again.

"Make yourself presentable. I don't need to get shit again from Zac about your.......look." Eyes roll over his messy hair, lipstick-stained skin, and love bites very visible.

"Damn, okay, don't lose your cool. I'll look nice." He smiles and goes back into the room and, not long after, comes out smelling clean, clearly taken a shower while you waited.

"Ready?" He asks and starts the walk to the media room having the media day with Carlos, Fernando, Pierre, and Max.

You don't say a word to him on the walk there, just stopping occasionally for him to take pictures and sign autographs for fans. Walking into the media pen, you wave at the others, but you have a slight blush when you wave at Max, who waves back, smiling too. Lando looks back and forth between you two, this little tightness in his chest with seeing the blush on your cheeks.

"Stay here. You've been trying to find me all day, so you don't have to stand the entire time." Lando mushes you to a chair in the back.

"Bu-" "Just stay here." He groans, walks up to the sofa, and sits between Max and Carlos, forgetting about that feeling in his chest.

You type away on your phone, answering emails and texts from the team and brands that want Lando to model or talk about their brand. You don't even look up when Carlo's, Lando's, and Max's voices are above your head.

"Lando's got you working hard, doesn't he?" Head snapping up, you meet Carlos's eyes with a slight blush forming, having always found him attractive.

"Not too hard. He needs a shock collar when he wonders after a girl." You joke, making Carlos laugh and causing the other two drivers to stare at the both of you

"Yes, he does. Honestly, it's impressive but also cruel to you." You nod in agreement with the Spaniard heading out into the sun and walking through the Paddock.

"It is; the girls sometimes come back expecting round 2 only to realize that he doesn't do that. One and Done." You gripe, which Carlos adds onto.

Lando tries to stay focused on his conversation with Max, but he's unable to when he hears you and Carlos laughing and quipping inside jokes back and forth. That earlier feeling returns to his chest, making him wonder why he felt this way.

"What's up with you? Why are you staring at Y/n like that?" Max asks, noticing how Lando is walking weirdly to keep an eye on the two people behind them.

"What? I'm staring at her. I'm just....I gave her a hard time earlier and ensuring she's okay." He rushes out, ripping his eyes off his assistant, trying his best to focus on Max.

"Translation; I was busy getting laid that I made Y/n run all around the Paddock trying to find me before the interview." Max snips.

The drivers hated seeing Lando give you such a hard time, especially regarding the girls. Carlos and Max hated it when you'd run to them out of breath or annoyed trying to find Lando when he runs off with some girl. Lando doesn't say anything as he stops walking, staring as Carlos and you walk past, not even paying to the fact you walked right past them.

"Honestly, if the money wasn't so damn good, I would've quite a while ago." You joke, but to Lando, it sucked the air out of his lungs hearing those words.

Max watches Lando's face, the color draining, and how his chest and throat tighten as he processes those words. He wants to tell Lando that it was a joke, you always joked about quitting, but the moment someone offered you a job or tried to tell you how horrible Lando was, you'd defend him.

Yes, he slept around. Yes, he sometimes made life unbearable, and you wanted to kill the prick, but you knew the real him. The gamer nerd, the doting uncle, the mentor for young karting kids, the guy who would drop anything to help anyone. You knew the real Lando but saw more of the Fuckboi than the man behind this persona.

Laughing and joking some more, you find yourself back in front of the Mclaren motorhome, and low and behold, a new girl was sitting in the spot Lando always told girls he met that he wanted to hook up with. Lando jogs up the steps and stops when the girl steps in front of him.

"Hi, Lando." The girl was practically shoving her chest in his face, and while you wanted to gag, you didn't blame her.

Lando was beautiful, and that boyish charm would make any girl drop. What would usually not bother you was. Why did you care if Lando paid more attention to them than you? Woah...where'd that thought come from. You didn't want that attention from him. Did you? No, you didn't because if Lando wanted you, he'd already have you. You fell for the man you knew personally, not the act he put on in front of the girls.

"Listen, umm Kelley, I'm sorry but.....I'm canceling plans. I have to do training with my assistant. Sorry." He rambles and yanks you inside, leaving your head spinning.

"Lando, you don't have plans; you can hook up with her. I'll cover for you." You smile, double-checking the calendar to make sure you got everything.

"The night before the first practice, we always watch movies." He states, looking at you hurt since you forgot.

"Lando.....we haven't done that in almost 2 years. You spend your nights hooking up with girls." You state cocking your head to the side, suspicious of his motives.

"Well, I want to do it tonight, okay. Just....I'm not always like that." You almost missed the last part since he turned his back to you and started to walk away.

"See you at 9." rushing past him and up the stairs to your mini office to get some work done. You swear you could hear Lando's smile.

When 9 hit, you knock on the door, standing outside his apartment door for the last 15 minutes trying to gather courage. You loved the Monaco race since you all could be home, but also you loved the view outside Lando's apartment that overlooked the marina and city. The door swings open after the 2nd knock. Lando wearing a black shirt and grey sweatpants, you almost blushed at the thoughts that whizzed past but quickly shook them away. It was cheating for him to wear this, but it wasn't for you; for all you knew, he could've just gotten home from a girl's place.

"Come on, I've got Fast and Furious on." Closing the door behind you, a soft giggle leaves your lips. Lando can't help his full smile come out, hearing your laughter, and follows you to his living room.

You slide your shoes off and lay comfortably on the couch, knowing Lando is probably fixing snacks as you hit play on the movie. He comes padding into the room and puts down fruits, pretzels, candy, and other things laid out, but you notice that all your favorite foods and the movie selection lined up as your favorite movies. Nothing of his was thrown into the mix.

Thinking nothing of it until Lando lifts your head and lays it in his lap, but he doesn't touch you, not even playing with your hair like he would typically do whenever you had your head in his lap.

"Okay, what the hell is going on with you?" You ask, pausing the movie as you sit up to look at him.

"What do you mean? We're just watching movies." His face scrunched up in confusion.

"No. We're watching my favorite movies only. Eating only my favorite snacks, and you aren't even trying to make a move on me! So what's going on with you?" You yell, hating this change in him all of a sudden.

"I don't want you to quit!" He yells back now you're the one making the confused face.

"What? Lando, I'm not going to quit."

"Yes, yes, you are. I heard you talking with Carlos. You said you'd quit if the money wasn't so good. I...I know I've been sleeping around a lot, but honestly, I can't...I'm just trying to forget that the person I want doesn't want me." He groans, running his hands over his face in frustration.

"Lando." You sigh, gathering your thoughts. "it's a joke. A gag between Carlos, Max, and me. I'm not going to quit. You'd have to fire me first." You laugh, touching his jittering leg, making it stop as he looks up at you.

"Also, no girl is ever worth that. You shouldn't even be dealing with your feelings like that. So, who is this girl?" You ask, wanting to know who is sending Lando into a tailspin.

"You." You both just stare at each other as you just blink at him before laughing out loud.

Lando groans and hangs his head. He knew he didn't deserve you; honestly, no one did; you were perfect. You try to gather yourself so you don't hurt Lando too much with your laughter.

"No, seriously, who is it really?" You ask, wiping away tears from laughing.

"You. It's always been you. You weren't supposed to have 3 weeks of vacation when you first started. It was supposed to be 1. I changed it. I changed the menu for your favorite foods on the road so you weren't homesick. Whenever you got sick, I left the little care baskets of your favorite things to make you feel better. You big ass raise you got last year? ME! I pay for it myself; Mclaren doesn't pay you like everyone thinks. I pay you because you're mine. I don't want you to leave because if you leave, no one, no one, could even replace you. You are what I want." He huffs out, breathing heavily.

Standing slowly, you nudge his legs open, move between them, and lean down, making Lando swallow thickly as he tries hard to control the urge to not kiss you silly.

"Want me, Lando? I'm yours?" You ask, smirking, moving your fingers through his curls.

"Then earn me. You wanted to be such a fuckboi, but you're really a simp, right? The moment we met, I wasn't yours. You were mine." Leaning down, you kiss the corner of his mouth before quietly leaving his place.

Let the Games Begin.

---

Beyond beautiful (:

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐂𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐊𝐢𝐝 // 𝐋𝐒𝟐

Summary: “I’m tired of acting like I’m not in love with you,” — Or, the one where two people are experiencing the worst year of their lives respectively. Falling in love shouldn't be that difficult on top of it all, right?

Pairing: Logan Sargeant x Fem! Reader (team photographer, skater girl™, has tattoos and is vaguely bilingual)

Word count: 23.3k

Warnings: 18+ Minors DNI ❀ Angst: panic attacks, anxiety, self-deprecation, mention of medication, anxiety disorders and ADHD. Reader has a shitty family as well. Smut: penetrative sex, they're needy as hell, otherwise very vanilla. Fluff: she fell first, he fell harder, a bunch of silent crushing on each other, a very sappy and happy ending. Other: inaccurate timeline and race results.

A/N: I'm back! I planned this before Zandvoort and before Logan got dropped and didn't feel like changing it to fit reality, so Logan gets to finish the season in this fictional universe. He also get's to go to Indycar because I'm sad and maybe delusional. Please tell me what you think ♡

Oxfordshire, UK

The rain drizzled down as you cruised around the almost empty parking lot on your board, the drops making little sounds as they hit the brim of your rain hat. February in England wasn’t that great—no snow, just rain and cold weather. Awful, but doable for someone who had a skateboard stuck to their feet ninety percent of the year. 

You were early, which was uncommon for you. But Angie had told you to come early, and you didn’t want to screw up on what was technically your first day on the job. Having someone you saw as an older sister as your boss had its pros and cons. 

“Should you really be skating in the rain?” Angie called out, standing underneath the awning above the main entrance, shielded from the rain. Her Williams-blue raincoat was pulled up to her chin, and you could see her visibly shiver from the cold. 

You had received a similar jacket, amongst a lot of other team gear, in advance for your first day. It wasn’t exactly your style, but you guessed that wasn’t the point of having team gear in the first place. Or any kind of work uniform, really. The coat kept you warm and dry, that was all that you could ask for. 

“Can’t you see how slow I’m going?” you protested, laughing at her cautiousness. 

You knew what you were doing. It wasn’t advised by anyone to skate when it was raining outside, but casually riding in a flat, empty parking lot at a slow speed, just to not get your shoes wet, wasn’t dangerous. Not for you, at least. You had been skating for close to two decades.

Angie had asked you to take some pictures of the building, and then take pictures of all the team members as they arrived at the factory. 

You had held a camera in your hands for almost as long as your feet had stood on a skateboard. The two interests kind of coexisted and fed off each other as you grew older. Only photography was able to make you money, though. 

You’d read in an article that the Williams factory was supposed to be modest in comparison to McLaren’s or Red bull’s spaceship-like buildings, but this was still huge to you. And you hadn’t even gotten inside the building yet. 

As cars filled the parking lot, you snapped photos of the people going inside. Mechanics, engineers, people on the communications team—it seemed like everyone was present for this pre-season meetup. Maybe it was because it was the last one before the team flew off to Bahrain. 

Some smiled at you as they spotted the big DSLR camera in your hands, others walked right past. Angie seemed to know almost everyone as she greeted them by the entrance. Sure, she was some kind of high-up marketing manager, but recognising so many people seemed excessive. Or maybe just impressive. 

She’d given you a crash course in Formula 1 as she had hired you. You had heard her talk about her job on many occasions, even catching a race or two when it was on television, but you quickly realised that you didn’t know half as much as you probably needed to. 

It was hard for you to even pinpoint who were the Williams’ drivers as they both came walking across the parking lot. Angie’s immediate perked attention and widened smile told you everything you needed to know. You would need to get good photos of them both. 

You tried your best to remember who was who, and when you recalled that one raced under the Thai flag and the other for the US, it was quite easy. 

Alex was tall, and happy. He walked with quick steps to get away from the light rain, greeting Angie with an effortless hug. He had no problem smiling when he saw you with the camera, raising his eyebrows at your stance on the skateboard. 

Logan wasn’t far behind. He looked younger, and less confident in the way he carried himself. His steps were slower as he too made his way under the awning. He reminded you of kids you’d gone to school with, with their boyish charm and cluelessness. He was young, and sweet—maybe even beautiful. 

You could see it all as you lifted your camera to spot him from the viewfinder. His smile didn’t form as easily as Alex’s had done, but when it did, and he flashed you his stupidly perfect and pearly white American teeth, you couldn’t help but feel how the corners of your lips turned upward. This was going to be a difficult year if you already were developing a minor crush on the first cute boy you’d seen. 

“Who’s Paddington?” Alex asked Angie after he had greeted her. 

You could overhear him perfectly fine as you pretended to take some photos of the main building. 

“What? Oh, because the red bucket hat?” she chuckled, shaking her head. “That’s our new team photographer.” 

Logan too gave Angie a quick hug. After all, she was one of the more tolerable people forcing them to do social media content. 

He laughed at the nickname Alex gave you. Logan would’ve gone with Tony Hawk over Paddington, but maybe that was because he found the fictional little bear with a red hat and a blue coat to be a very British reference. 

“She looks about twelve,” Alex remarked, watching as you adjusted something on the lens, your movements precise and confident despite your youthful appearance.

Angie laughed again, the sound warm and contagious. “She’s the same age as Logan.” 

Logan playfully pouted at his two colleagues joking. He guessed the both of you looked young. Maybe too young to be in such a professional setting. 

“She’s my best friend’s little sister. I’m mostly being kind by offering her a chance to work with us,” Angie continued to explain, raising her voice slightly to get your attention. 

She didn’t really need to, because you had heard every single word of their conversation. 

“That’s her way of secretly telling you that I’m severely underqualified for this job and I’m using it as an excuse to travel the world,” you said under your breath, your gaze still fixated on the viewfinder as you slowly skated towards them. 

Same, was what Logan immediately wanted to say, but instead he just laughed, unsure of how well his self-deprecating humour would translate.

You stepped off your board, before popping it up with your foot on the tail end to grab it with your hand. You hadn’t expected them to laugh, because it wasn’t exactly a joke. You guessed it kind of came across as one, though.

You told Alex and Logan your name, gently reaching out your hand to shake theirs, but Angie’s hand pulling down the brim of your hat over your eyes stopped you in your tracks. 

“I have a feeling you’re going to be stuck with Paddington around here,” she laughed.  

“The Williams hat you gave me can’t stand the rain,” you argued, fixing the hat back into place. 

It was true. The cotton of the team hat she had given you would’ve been drenched at this point. But you still appreciated her effort because she thought the hat was more your style than the classic baseball cap that most of the other employees sported.

“You’re such a child, you know that, right?” 

That was something you’d heard all your life, because you somehow always turned out to be the youngest one at every family function. You didn’t take it as an insult when Angie said it, though. She had valued what you brought to the table for as long as you could remember. Maybe that was the only child within her showing through. 

“That’s kind of on you, Angie,” you pointed out. “If you hadn’t been mostly kind, I wouldn’t be here to annoy you.” 

You saw how Angie wanted to argue back, but was interrupted by the sound of your ringtone. Teenagers by My Chemical Romance. You had intention behind it when you initially picked it (something about rebellion and fuck the system), but now it was mostly a running joke that you couldn’t let go of, no matter how many times you swapped phones.

You also loved the embarrassment that flashed over Angie’s face as it interrupted her. Alex and Logan couldn’t help but laugh as you excused yourself to answer. 

Logan watched as you slowly cruised over the parking lot, phone up to your ear as you talked to whoever it was over the phone. He heard you raise your voice, speaking in a language he didn’t recognise, or at least didn’t understand.

“Her family sort of… resents her? So, I did what I thought was right.”

Angie felt the need to explain as the three of them heard you start to argue. She knew it had to be your mother calling, because you had given up on arguing with your father already.

“Is she at least a good photographer?” Alex asked with a sigh.

“She’s the best.” 

. . .

Melbourne, Australia

. . .

The season started with a whirlwind. You definitely hadn’t mentally prepared for the challenge it would be to travel nonstop, and even if you had some downtime, the anxiety of always being on the move didn’t leave your body. Before you had the chance to experience a new city, you had to be thinking of when you were going to the next one. 

And you were rusty. You didn’t yet have the right mindset to be in the position you were in, constantly forgetting things and not getting the perfect photos. You’d done sports photography for a long time, but there was a difference in speed between x-games sports and fucking Formula 1. 

That was why you found yourself back at the hotel in Melbourne, riding the lift to your floor to retrieve some equipment you’d forgotten in your room, your body teeming with nerves and embarrassment over what had just transpired. While Formula 1 was a travelling circus with a lot of important and famous people, you hadn’t expected to actually run into anyone that would leave you speechless. You were usually too good at talking. 

As you exited the lift, you spotted Logan in the hallway, looking like he was about to enter his own hotel room. Your speedy steps interrupted his actions, and even if you two hadn’t really had a one-on-one conversation before, you had to tell someone about who you just ran into. 

“I just made a fool out of myself in front of Keegan Palmer,” you exhaled loudly as your steps came to a stop in front of him. 

“Who?” Logan questioned, holding the door to his room open, a little bit taken aback by your boldness. 

“Olympic skateboarder,” you clarified. “He’s kind of a big deal, and he’s friends with Lando somehow.” 

Logan remembered something about a famous skateboarder in the back of his mind as he let out a short laugh. “So, what did you do? Ask for a selfie?”

“I wish. No, I just ran into them in the lobby and couldn’t form a sentence because I was shocked. I literally froze,” you groaned, rubbing your temples as your emotions started to settle. 

As they did, you took in Logan’s expression. While you hadn’t necessarily talked much before, you had taken a lot of photos of him. He always portrayed a certain charm, even when he was focused on racing or unaware of the camera. He didn’t do that now. Something seemed off with him from his blank stare at you. He was there, able to laugh at your awkward interaction, but he wasn’t present. 

“Shouldn’t you be at the paddock?” Logan asked after a moment of silence. 

“I forgot an SD card in my hotel room,” you explained. “Shouldn’t you be at the paddock?”

His face twisted in disbelief. “You haven’t heard?” 

“Heard what?” 

“I’m not driving,” he answered plainly, but the words landed heavily. “Alex is taking my car because they don’t have a spare chassis to repair the damage from his crash yesterday.” 

You blinked out of confusion as you raised your eyebrows. “Is that even allowed? It’s your car.” 

“I don’t know, but it’s probably for the better,” Logan shrugged with a certain nonchalance. “I don’t want to make a big deal out of it.” 

“You’re paying for a mistake that he made. It is a big deal,” you argued. 

You’d practically ran up to him to talk about your embarrassing moment that you had failed to even acknowledge what kind of mood he was in. That was a bad habit of yours—badly reading people and basically running them over with your talking. 

And here he was, feeling like shit over a decision that no one thought was possible. He probably had no will to talk about some skateboarder with you.  

You noticed the way his hands trembled slightly, holding a tight grip on the door to the point where his knuckles whitened. The realisation hit you at the same time his expression shifted, his bravado cracking under the weight of something much deeper, his breath coming quicker than normal. 

“Mate, are you okay?” you asked him softly. 

“I’m fine,” he muttered, but his wavering voice betrayed him.

Logan wasn’t angry at the team, or at Alex. He knew that it was the right decision because Alex would have a better chance to score points. He probably would’ve made the same decision if he were team principal. 

He knew he wasn’t good enough to deserve a chance.

He knew he wasn’t good enough to argue his case. 

He knew he wasn’t good enough. 

It was killing him inside. Logan wanted to flee the scene. He wished he could rewind time five minutes and just walk into his hotel room instead of stopping when he heard your steps. He wouldn’t have had to explain this to you. He wouldn’t have had to feel this way in front of another person. It had been bad enough when he got the news in a conference room filled with team members. 

This was different, though—you two alone in a hotel corridor. 

He felt like he was choking, like the feelings inside of him wanted to come out but he had no idea how to let them out. He couldn’t get enough air in his lungs, no matter how heavily he breathed. He’d never felt like this before. 

“You’re having a panic attack, dipshit,” you stated. 

It sounded like you were joking, but in reality you were fighting concern with humour. You could see exactly what was happening to him, all too familiar yourself with the overwhelming feeling of when anxiety finally catches up with you.  

Logan looked at you, eyes wide. “N-no, I’m not. I’ve never—” he stammered, shaking his head.

“You haven’t had one before? Oh, fuck.”

It hadn’t even crossed your mind that people in their twenties could’ve gone their entire lives without experiencing an anxiety attack. You could handle them quite well after years of being a miserable child and teen, but Logan didn’t look like he knew what was even going on. The first one wouldn’t always be the worst one, but right now, this would be hard on him. 

You took a step closer, your heart suddenly racing. You didn’t know if he wanted you to touch him, so you acted hesitantly at first. But by his shocked expression and shaking hands, you knew that he needed help calming down. He looked lost, like the ground had suddenly shifted beneath his feet and he didn’t know how to steady himself.

“God, here—” you reached out, grabbing his hand, your fingers firm but gentle. “Just hold my hand.” 

You dragged him into his room, to get privacy if someone entered the floor. He collapsed against the door as soon as it shut, sliding down it to sit on the floor. You crouched in front of him, now holding both of his hands to stop their shaking and to centre his focus. 

“Mimic my breathing, look at my chest,” you instructed, guiding him as you took deep and steady breaths, making sure that he could see the tempo in which they rose and fell. 

Logan couldn’t get any words out, but he tried his best to calm down. He was slowly able to sync his breathing with yours, the tightness in his chest and the pounding in his head easing as he got enough oxygen in his system again. The feeling inside was still foreign to him, like it wasn’t palpable at all. 

He realised he was crying when he felt a cold tear slide down his cheek. He wasn’t sure when was the last time he had cried in front of someone, but he was past the point of embarrassment. 

You didn’t seem to care about it anyway. You had a kindness in your eyes that was unexplainable to him, and he wondered how you knew how to deal with this so well. 

“See?” you whispered after a moment. “You’re okay. Just keep breathing with me.”

Logan closed his eyes for a second, feeling his wet eyelashes hit his cheeks. Your voice grounded him and he couldn’t think of anything else in the moment. He couldn’t think of racing. He couldn’t think of Alex. 

He thought of your unwavering grip on both his hands, sending a calm feeling through his body. He thought of the sound of your steady breathing, making it easy for him to follow. 

He slowly opened his eyes to look down at your intertwined fingers, your thumb rubbing soothing circles on the back of his hand. Logan had seen that you had tattoos before, but now was the first time he was close enough to distinguish them.

Like patchwork, they lined both of your arms, getting cut off by the hem of your Williams t-shirt right before your shoulder. They looked like doodles. There was a disco ball, and flowers, and a stamp from your home country. As his eyes trailed further, he could see a few on your legs as well, revealed because you were wearing shorts. You had a tattooed band-aid on your knee and a ghost on skateboard on your lower thigh. He assumed they had a connection. 

“I like your tattoos,” Logan heard himself say, voice thick from the tears.

You glanced at him, a smile tugging at the corners of your lips. The tenseness of your body softened, relieved that he seemed to be coming back to himself. “You do? You don’t seem like the type.” 

Logan shook his head, wiping his face with the back of his hand. “Oh, I’m not—but I like them on you.”

He grabbed your hand again afterwards, unsure of why but relieved that you just continued rubbing absentminded circles. You flexed your arm slightly, turning it so that Logan could get a better look of the inked designs. 

“What are the paw prints for?” he asked, genuinely curious now that his mind had space for other thoughts. You had four little black paw prints on the inside of your arm. 

“My parents dog,” you said, warmth filling your voice. “A golden retriever named Tater Tot.”

He chuckled, a sound that felt foreign after the weight of his emotions. “They have tater tots outside of America?”

“Barely,” you replied. “Which is a shame because I love them. We went to Florida on vacation when I was a kid, and I think I ate about a thousand tater tots from the hotel buffet.”

“Florida?” Logan dared to look at your face fully now, intrigued. “I’m from Florida.

“I know, Logan.” 

You laughed gently. His Americanness didn’t go unnoticed by anyone in a place like this, where most of the team members were European. It was also one of the few things that had stuck with you from Angie’s rambling about her job—that she had to work with an actual Florida man, like they were mythological creatures. 

“We went to Orlando. Disney World and all that, y’know?”  

“Yeah, the classic American pilgrimage,” he smiled, then hesitated. “Have you been back? To America, I mean.”

You shrugged, your expression shifting to something more neutral, as if you were weighing the pros and cons in your mind. “No, it’s not really… something I want to do? With war criminals as presidents, and guns at grocery stores—oh, and no butter on your sandwiches?” You shook your head dramatically. “That’s my personal hell.”

Logan laughed again, feeling a slight stinging pain in his chest that he decided to disregard. If he kept on breathing deeper, he knew that it would go away on its own. 

You watched as he winced, even if he tried to hide it from you. You took a moment to breathe with him again before continuing. “I have a friend who moved to San Francisco, though. She lives with this skateboarding collective and uh, it seems really nice.”

That was maybe the only reason you would go to the US, for more than the American grands prix of course. It was an old university friend who skated competitively. Even if you weren’t on the same level, you still felt like a month or two on the west coast could do your head and mental health a favour. 

“That might be a bucket list thing for me,” you explained, at which Logan smiled. 

You observed his face, glossy blue eyes from tears and messy blond hair from the chaos he had just experienced. A certain hopelessness lingering in the air that you tried to not think about too much. It was still too early to tell how the season would end. 

“I feel a lot calmer now, uh… so thank you for all that,” he said, showing gratitude. He didn’t know how you’d known exactly what to say, but you had pulled him back from the edge, and that mattered more than anything.

“Yeah, distraction tends to work quite well,” you replied, giving him a knowing look. “You should maybe talk to someone if this becomes a reoccurring thing.” 

His smile faded, but he nodded. Logan didn’t know now what this could lead to, but maybe he needed to prepare himself for feeling like this. He kind of wanted to talk to you about it, making a mental reminder to ask if panic attacks were common for you. 

“We should probably get back to the paddock,” he murmured as realisation hit him. 

He would have to face a lot of questions, and he was destined to put on a brave face, showing that this wasn’t something that had bothered him. 

“Only if you feel like it. I don’t care if we get in trouble,” you said, reassuring him. 

He shook his head, dropping the hold he had of your hands as he stood up and smoothed out his shorts. 

“I’ll be alright, I think.” 

. . .

Miami, USA

. . .

It became a thing for you to calm Logan down. 

You'd said it yourself: It was too early to tell how the season would play out. But race after race, you grew more certain—this Williams car might just be the worst on the grid. And while you knew close to nothing about the engineering and mechanical side of things, you realised that neither did most of the audience. That was why people started to blame the drivers instead. 

It didn’t really get to you—until Miami. That was when you felt anger over racing for the first time in your life, but absolutely not the last. 

The Miami sun had been relentless, casting a hot haze over the track and the bustling energy of the crowd. The faint smell of burnt rubber lingered in the air as you clutched your camera, squinting through the lens, trying to spot the cars as they zoomed by in a blur of colour and speed. The piercing sound of engines roaring filled your ears, but it was a sudden crash that made your heart drop.

You hadn’t been too far away from the exact barrier when the crash happened. And when you realised that it was Logan, getting pushed off the track by Magnussen for a measly 18th position, you felt rage inside. He didn’t even get to finish his home race because of someone else’s carelessness. 

By the time you made your way to the garage, the race had ended. The sound of people cheering for Lando’s first win was still deafening. Logan was checked by the medics but had been released soon after. When you found him, he was sitting in his driver’s room, still in his racing suit with his helmet beside him, his face flushed red and tense. His eyes met yours through the open door and you hesitated going to talk to him at first, but with a slight nod, he showed that it was okay. 

“Sooo… Magnussen is a cunt,” you blurted out, leaning in the doorway, the words escaping before you had a chance to filter them.

Logan couldn’t help but huff out a laugh in frustration. It was an empty laugh, the kind that didn’t quite reach up to sparkle his eyes with any genuine effect of your humorous words. Instead, the only thing adding light to his eyes were the tears threatening to fall. You’d seen it before. 

You felt heat rise to your cheeks as you realised what you had said. “I’m sorry, I don’t actually know him, that was really harsh.” 

“Well, I’m glad you said it because I’m not allowed to,” he muttered in response, looking down at his hands, pulling at loose skin from his cuticles. 

He sighed loudly, leaning to rest his head on the wall behind him. You moved his helmet to sit beside him, knowing now that you weren’t pushing any boundaries. You wouldn’t exactly call yourselves friends—you didn’t really know anything about each other—but having travelled and worked so closely together for two months now, you were starting to learn how his post-race emotions functioned. 

“I think I might be the living embodiment of it could be worse,” Logan stated.  

“Yeah, you could be in that series where they race electric scooters,” you joked. 

The corners of his mouth turned upward for a split second, then he thought about how the people racing scooters probably were having more fun than him this season. 

A silence settled between you, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. You watched him for a moment, noticing the tension still visible in the tight set of his jaw. The weight of the season was bearing down on him—the constant pressure, the unfair expectations.

“You don’t have to stay,” he said softly, eyes downcast.

“I want to,” you replied without hesitation. 

He looked up at you, fully taking in your appearance. Miami made everyone hot and bothered, and not in the good way. A sheen of sweat coated your forehead, and your skin had gotten more golden from being under the sun. Just as he spotted a fresh scratch on your elbow that he assumed was from skating, he also acknowledged the shirt you were wearing. 

It wasn’t the William’s kit. It had his face on it, with the American flag and a bald eagle behind him. Perfectly oversized in your street-style-skater way. The text on it said wtf is a kilometer.

He snorted out loud, getting your attention. “I like your shirt.” 

“It’s cool, right?” you replied, tugging at the hem. “A little girl from the fan zone gave me this friendship bracelet too.” 

You reached out your wrist for him to see, baby blue beads rattling together. He carefully moved his fingers to twist it, showing him how white alphabet beads spelled out his surname, right there on your wrist. You were fully decked out to support him today… and he hadn’t even managed to finish the race. 

As his hands moved, you saw how they were practically shaking, something his nerves caused him to do. It was an uncontrollable response to the adrenaline and pent-up frustration. 

“You’re not alright, are you?” you asked gently.

He didn’t answer at first. Instead, he stared ahead, eyes glassy. Then, after a moment, he let out a shaky breath. “Can you say something to distract me? Tell me something about you that I don’t know.” 

You realised why he asked that. Like with the tattoos in Melbourne, distraction had worked on his anxiety before. You didn’t know if he had experienced more panic attacks or if he had tried to talk to someone about what had happened, but if you could help even a little bit by just yapping, you would do it whenever he asked. 

You thought for a second, thinking of something light-hearted to tell him. An idea popped into your head as you pulled out your phone from your pocket. “Oh, I started this instagram diary thing to get some use out of all the photos and videos I take. That should tell you everything about me.” 

The screen showed a grid of colourful photos, and Logan immediately scooted closer to get a better look. They were themed and edited to match together with long captions to actually mimic a diary. Your account was relatively small, mostly followed by old friends and members of the Williams team. 

You didn’t really have anything to hide, so you handed him the phone to let him scroll freely. There were weekly posts, one from every country you had visited thus far and also ones from when you were back in England. He’d learnt by now that you weren’t English, but lived with Angie and her fiancé Matthew during this season, only because employees needed to be based in the UK. 

“You really get out there and explore every time we’re in a new city?” he asked, slightly amazed after stopping at the post from Australia. It was a photo dump with everything from the beach, to a skatepark, to you enjoying the nightlife. 

“Yeah, but my schedule is not as busy as yours,” you replied, your lips curving into a small smile. “You should join sometime, maybe not to a skatepark, but for dinner or karaoke.” 

“You got to do karaoke in Japan?” Logan wondered, scrolling back up to see the post you had made from there. 

Cherry blossoms, sushi, a skate shop with custom decks. Logan had seen that you had gotten a new board with The Great Wave off Kanawaga on it to match your blue Williams clothes, but he didn’t know from where. The last picture of the post was from a bar lit in neon lights, something written with Japanese characters. He assumed that was where the karaoke had taken place. 

“Yeah,” you grinned, thinking back to the night. “Angie does a mean Michael Jackson impression.” 

Logan had a hard time envisioning Angie singing in front of people. She was in her early thirties, and while she was lovely, she was also kind of stiff. Maybe it helped being on the other side of the world. 

He shook his head, an amused scoff escaping him, but then his eyes drifted to an older post, further down your feed. It was multiple posts actually, all aligning together in an explosion of colours. It was collages of pictures, that, when zoomed out, depicted a picture in and of itself. They were all of a girl with bright pink hair. 

“What’s all that?” he asked, tilting the phone for you to see better. 

“It’s a project I did for university, like a mixed media thing where we had to turn photos into an art piece of a different kind,” you explained. 

You said it simply, but Logan was beyond impressed at how much time and precision it must’ve taken. First to take and develop what seemed like a million photographs of the same person, and then to make a collage out of them, basically using the pictures as building blocks to make a much larger version of said person. 

“Did you go to art school?” 

“Oh no,” you laughed softly. “I did political science with a minor in photography. My entire family is made up of lawyers, so that was always my plan A.”  

He looked at you curiously. “So why aren’t you in law school now?” 

“Because I got rejected by every single one I applied to,” you dead-panned, tinged with a kind of self-deprecating humor. “I’m not that smart, Logan. Angie practically saved my life by letting me join her.” 

There was a brief pause, a moment of vulnerability hanging in the air. 

It was ridiculous really, how it all had happened—how you had been shaped your entire life for one future and then achieving nothing of it. 

You were the youngest of three siblings. Your brother was fifteen and your sister was ten when you were born. It was obvious to everyone except your parents that you were an accidental pregnancy. 

Being that much younger, you always felt behind because you were never on the same intellectual level as the rest of your family. Then, when you finally caught up in age and was supposed to be seen as an adult, you still couldn’t succeed in the things your siblings had succeeded in. You never got into a nice university, and while you just narrowly managed to graduate, it would have never been enough to get into law school no matter how hard you tried. 

School was never your thing. You found joy in art and sports, but you never had the concentration to sit down with your nose in a book to learn things. It took your parents a long time to realise this, because your siblings had never had any problems. Your brother was the youngest chairman ever at your father’s law firm, and your sister worked for the World Court in The Hague. 

You never stood a chance, but no one saw that. 

Angie was your sister’s childhood friend, and when she found out about your failed attempt at law school, she was the one to arrange this job for you. She knew that it was never your dream to do as the rest of your family. Your parents still didn’t see that. 

Everyone said that all they wanted for their children was for them to be happy and healthy, but that wasn’t really what they wanted. They wanted them to be like themselves, or even better—they wanted them to be better than themselves. And when the first two children actually managed to be better, who wouldn’t be a little disappointed in the third one? 

Logan’s voice brought you out of your spiralling thoughts. You watched as his eyes softened, and he said with pure honesty, “I think what you’re doing now is way cooler.” 

“Yeah, but my parents, and grandparents, and siblings do not,” you shrugged, the compliment washing over you but not quite sinking in.

“What would you have been doing if their opinion didn’t matter to you?” he asked, his voice suddenly louder. 

You contemplated for a moment, startled by his question and change of mood. 

“I would have skated a lot more, maybe even competitively. Or started with sports photography earlier. Not done political science, that’s for sure,” you said. “What about you?” 

“I think I’m already supposed to be living my dream,” he answered, but his voice lacked conviction. “I shouldn’t feel this… sad, I should be enjoying what I have right now because Sainz is taking my seat next year.” 

“Carlos? Jesus, that’s the downgrade of the century,” you blurted out without thinking, and Logan’s head snapped towards you, surprise in his eyes.  

“What? Do we think the Williams car will magically compete with Ferrari next season?” you chuckled. “No, it will be hilarious to hear him complain over the radio.” 

You hadn’t given him the time to answer, but he would’ve said something similar to what you did. He was reluctant to laugh, but he knew it was true. 

As he let the laugh out, he was immediately stuck by how freely he did it. He’d felt the same kind of weight over his chest like he had in Melbourne earlier. With the medics, and with the engineers, and with James. He didn’t feel that now, he could laugh without thinking of it. Without thinking of how his future was still very much undecided. You’d done it again—distracted him out of total anxious paralysis. 

“Do you know what you’re gonna do?” you asked. 

“I’ve got absolutely nothing figured out,” he admitted.

“Then I think we should use Lando’s win as an excuse to get absolutely wasted.” 

. . .

Montréal, Canada

. . .

Canada was cold, like actually freezing. And it wouldn’t stop raining. You tried to do your job the best you could, but when your shoes were soaked through and raindrops had started to trickle down the inside of your coat, getting good photos was impossible. So, you had to give up with capturing the track and the crowd and opted on finding something content-worthy in the garage instead. 

Logan found you on the floor of the garage, sat on your skateboard, using it to slide across to capture the car in some sort of panoramic view he assumed. He didn’t say much, leaving you to work in peace as he went on to focus on his own things. He could spot you in his periphery every now and then. You still wore your red bucket hat because of the rain, and your worn-out Nikes squeaked against the slick flooring. 

He heard Alex enter his side of the garage with a ringing laughter, patting his shoulder as a way of greeting him. 

“Might I ask why Paddy is on the floor?” he asked, voice laced with amusement at the girl in front of them, basically folded in half to get the perfect photograph. 

You looked up at Alex from your position, the camera still held up like a shield between you. The flash went off as you sneakily took a picture of the two drivers. “Angles, baby. Angles,” you grinned. 

Alex tilted his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “What angle is that exactly? My double chin?” 

“Don’t worry, you look great,” you reassured, standing up again. 

Logan could see how your eyes searched for something, and when he spotted your lens cap laying on a nearby table, he reached out to give it to you. You nodded slightly as a silent thank you, surprised at how observant he’d been.

He would’ve never admitted it at the time, but how easy the word baby left your lips definitely lingered on his mind. It didn’t exactly help that it was Alex you’d said it too, even if it was in a jokingly manner. 

You continued working, changing cameras from digital to film, capturing the team as they prepared for the race to start. You only stopped to go outside to photograph when a hailstorm hit the paddock. 

Logan saw you enter the hospitality, drenched from head to toe, your blue coat having turned navy from the rain. Your eyes watched the hail in miraculous awe. He spotted you shivering from the weather, your hands having a hard time holding the camera as the cold gnawed at your fingers. 

You felt him before you saw him, his quiet energy sneaking up on you, standing behind you as hail and raindrops hit the glass panes of the Williams hospitality building. 

“Here,” he said, holding out a steaming mug.

You blinked, momentarily confused by the gesture. “I don’t drink coffee,” you reminded him. “Everyone says I’m hyper enough without caffeine.” 

Logan’s lips curled into a small, knowing smile. “I know that,” he replied. “It’s mine, but you can use the mug to warm your hands.” 

“Oh…” Your voice trailed off as you reached for the mug, the warmth radiating from the ceramic a stark contrast to the cold that had settled in your bones. Your fingers touched his as you grabbed it, almost feeling igniting a hotter fire than the boiling hot coffee warming you. “Thank you.”

Logan watched you in that silent way of his, the hailstorm outside temporarily forgotten as the world seemed to shrink down to just the two of you.

You glanced up at him, your heart doing a ridiculous fluttering thing it had started doing whenever he was close. His gaze was steady, searching yours with a familiar, unspoken understanding that had developed over months of working together. A soft chuckle escaped your lips, the sound surprising even you, thinking back on how he had handed you your lens cap earlier. And now this, too. 

“Why do you always seem to know what I need before I do?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” he said, voice low enough for you to just about hear him. 

It took you a while to understand what he meant. Then it hit you, that your comfort—your distraction—was what he needed. And you did it without him asking. Ever since tears had fallen from his blue eyes on that hotel room floor somewhere in Melbourne. 

. . .

Later, the race began and came to an end. 

The rain had stopped and the streets had dried up, leaving an eerily quiet race tack left under glimmering city lights. As you skated the paddock, weaving through the lingering crowd, the adrenaline of the race still pulsed through you, but it was dulled by the quiet aftermath.

You hadn’t really had any time to talk with anyone, being out by the track all race. While the race was disappointing, the cars had at least been a pleasure to photograph as they sprayed water around them. 

You spotted a group of team members ahead, their heads low, conversations muted. Among them, Logan’s familiar figure stood out. You pushed off your skateboard with a quiet flick, coasting toward him. His ears perked up at the sound of the wheels against the concrete. As you got closer, you set your foot down, slowing to match his pace.

“Soo… uhm,” you started, voice unsure.  

“Yeah, we don’t have to talk about it,” he said quickly, his gaze locked on the asphalt in front of him as he continued to walk slowly, you riding beside him. 

You both knew what it meant. A double DNF, a race weekend that spiralled out of control, and hours of work undone in seconds.

“We can, if you want to,” you offered. 

You glanced at him then, really looking at him for the first time since before the race. He looked tired, but more than that—defeated. And yet, he was trying to be strong. You offered him a chance to vent, even though you both knew it wouldn’t necessarily help. Not when you couldn’t pinpoint a defining factor as to why the weekend had gone to shit. It wasn’t his fault. It wasn’t Alex’s fault. It was just a mess to race in this much rain. 

Logan let out a deep breath, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m not sure anyone on the team would want to talk about today,” he admitted. 

You could only nod, completely understanding that it was probably best to be quiet about the race. You were better off distracting him, like you usually did. 

“You wanna have dinner? A little pick-me-up? Maybe Alex and Lily will want to join.” 

Logan huffed a dry laugh. “They’re having what Alex calls DNF therapy.” 

“Do I wanna know what that means?” you questioned, acting intrigued. 

You didn’t need to ask. You understood what it meant. But you asked anyway, to see if Logan would explain it to you. 

“No, you don’t,” he replied short, shaking his head. 

“How about room service and a shitty movie instead?” you suggested. 

“You’re starting to know me so well,” he said. He then paused, the realisation settling in as he glanced sideways at you. “I guess you’re my DNF therapy, huh.”

You tried to stop yourself from making the conversation take a turn. You really did. But the joke was there, right in front of your eyes, looking so damn tempting. 

“I’m not having sex with you, Sargeant,” you said sternly. 

Logan blinked, his eyes wide for a second before he burst out laughing. He raised his hands in mock surrender. “Noted. Loud and clear.”

For a brief moment, a tension so thick formed between you that you could almost feel it taking up space in the cold, still slightly rainy air. It was quickly replaced by the laughter—the easy banter you usually had with Logan. 

But the thought lingered in your mind longer than it should have. In reality, you probably would’ve done it. If he asked you, that is. Sex with Logan, huh. The heat that rose to your cheeks was almost painful. Your infatuation had been visible, right there on your face, if only Logan had been confident enough to see it. 

You had to push these thoughts away. You didn’t need things to be complicated between the two of you. Even if this stupid crush you had on him was starting to become harder to ignore.  

Instead, you nudged his arm playfully before pushing with your foot to skate in front of him, glancing back over your shoulder with a grin. “Come on. Let’s go order some overpriced food and find the worst movie possible.”

. . .

Baku, Azerbaijan

. . .

Azerbaijan was hot, like actually blazing. You could feel sweat running down your face and back every time you were out of the air-conditioned garage to photograph. By the time race day came around, you already had blisters on the inside of your thighs from chafing, and your skin was warm to the touch from being burnt.  

The moment you had now, on the Sunday morning, to sit inside and edit some photos was therefore sacred. It was the first calm and, more importantly, cool moment you’d had in days. The torment the heat had on your body had still left its mark. You couldn’t get comfortable. You couldn’t get your heart to stop racing. You wouldn’t have called it anxiety, but since this morning, you were now sure that heat exhaustion wasn’t the only thing you were feeling. 

Your mind was enough of a twisty place. Now, when it wouldn’t shut the fuck up, it was like a constant stream of emotions just overwhelming you. 

At least, the photos you had taken during practice and qualifying turned out sick. You’d tried out a new long exposure technique that really captured the speed even in static form. And you had definitely gotten better at candid portrait photography, which was a huge part of your job. Editing was usually the simplest part for you, but when the photos were so close that you could count the subject’s individual eyelashes, it was easy to get flustered. 

You finished the editing and decided on asking both Alex and Logan for their favourites before sending the content to the media team. It wasn’t something that was required from you, but you also knew that having your photo taken could be difficult. 

With your laptop in your hand, you walked to their driver rooms, rounding the corner to be met with a wide open door into Logan’s. 

“Logan, I—” you started, your breath catching in your throat at the sight in front of you. 

There he was, in workout shorts but no shirt, lounging in his room before changing into his race gear. He didn’t even have time to look up from his phone before you were rambling out an apology, ready to run out of the room—hell, maybe even the garage. 

“Oh fuck, shit, I’m sorry,” you hurried to say, feeling your pulse quicken. You hoped he didn’t notice how your mouth hung open or the way your eyes darted everywhere but his torso. 

“What’s up?” he said, straightening his back and running a hand through his hair.

His casual confidence made everything about your reaction feel even worse. He didn’t mind you seeing him shirtless, so why the fuck did you have to care so much? 

“I just…” you stammered, losing all sense of vocabulary as your eyes deceived you, glancing at his chest. “Forgot how to English.” 

Logan let out a gentle laugh, and you mentally told yourself to get your shit together. 

“I have some photos for you to look at,” you said, holding up your laptop that had been your reason to barge into his room in the first place.

“Right, right,” Logan nodded. “Let me put a shirt on first.”

Your mouth moved before your brain could stop it. The moment the words left your mouth, you wanted to crawl into a hole and disappear. 

“No, I get it. I’d be shirtless too if it was socially acceptable.” 

He froze mid-step, his head slowly turning back to you with a raised brow.

You’d said no. In milliseconds. Like you were opposed to him putting a shirt on. Like that was a totally normal thing. Then, you just had to mention yourself being shirtless. So, you were forced to wonder if he was thinking about you without a shirt on as much as you were thinking about him without one. 

Well… you didn’t necessarily have to think. He was already standing in front of you shirtless. That was a known fact.

The moment you thought he might actually flirt back with you, it was like you could see how the tension washed away from his face. 

“It’s hot, right?” he asked, moving some things out of the way so that you could place your laptop on the table in his room. A part of you thought he wasn’t actually talking about the temperature. 

“Way too fucking hot,” you mumbled as your fingers shakily hovered over the mousepad. Your heart was racing and your body was overheating. You didn’t dare look up from the screen, afraid of what you might see in his eyes—or worse, what he might see in yours.

He overviewed the photos, pointing out some of his favourites. You’d gathered quite quickly that Logan had an amateur interest in photography. He didn’t shy away from complimenting your work or from asking questions about certain shots he found special. That didn’t make the rushing heat flowing to your face any better. 

“You alright?” you heard him ask as you closed the laptop shut, your photo viewing session done for now. You couldn’t really focus, a ringing sound hitting your ears. 

You swallowed hard, nodding. “Yeah, just a lot to do. I’ll see you after the race.” 

With that, you dashed out of his room, on your way to find Alex instead. You couldn’t keep doing this to yourself, but that didn’t exactly matter. Either way, you were in too deep, and you knew it.

. . .

The Williams car was decent in Baku—fast on the straights, as expected. Alex got points and Logan wasn’t far from archiving it too. Still, it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t the most depressing result—he would manage this weekend without once collapsing like an anxious mess. That was a win in his book nowadays. 

Logan walked with Alex from the media pen, adrenaline in his steps, talking freely about whatever came to mind. 

“Did she show you the photos she took during practice yesterday? She used some kind of long exposure. I don’t know what it’s called or how she did it but it looked so cool—” 

“Logan,” Alex stopped him. 

“What?” 

“Take a breath, you’ve been talking about Paddy for like five whole minutes,” Alex teased, a grin tugging at the corners of his lips. “I get that you like her photography, but this is borderline obsessive.”

“I’m not obsessed,” Logan defended. “You were the one who brought her up in the first place anyway.” 

“Mate, all I did was ask if you’d seen her. She didn’t take any photos as we exited the cars,” Alex explained. 

Logan shrugged. “I haven’t seen her since before the race.” 

“Me neither, that’s why I asked.” 

Realisation dawned upon Logan that something wasn’t alright. You’d seemed sort of unbalanced earlier in the day, but he assumed that was the heat and a massive workload. It wasn’t something he hadn’t seen before, and you seemed to quietly get through every hurdle in your way anyway. He would be blind if he didn’t see your embarrassment to barging in on him shirtless, but he had explained that reaction away too in his head. He mostly found you cute, but that didn’t have to mean anything. 

He couldn’t find an explanation for this, though. Even after shit races, he looked forward to seeing you with your camera held high every time he exited the car, got weighed, or was walking to the media pen. But you hadn’t been there today… 

His emotional support photographer hadn’t been there. Sure, today’s race wasn’t that bad, and he didn’t necessarily need you as a distraction for his anxiety. But you didn’t know that. That had to mean that something had happened to you. 

“Angie, where’s Paddy?” Alex asked as they entered back into the Williams garage, practically running into the obviously stressed-out marketing manager. 

“Uhh…” Angie hesitated, not lifting her eyes from her phone. “Still with the medical team, I think. She passed out during the race. Heatstroke, most likely.” 

Logan froze. He didn’t understand why he cared so much, but for some reason he did. He cared about you, and he cared so much that he was about to act irrationally. 

“She passed out? How are you so calm?” he questioned. 

Angie shrugged, far too nonchalantly for his liking. “It’s a million degrees outside, heatstrokes are bound to happen—”

Logan didn’t wait for another word. He was already moving, cutting through the garage with purpose.

Alex shouted after him, “Logan, where are you going? We have debrief soon!” 

“Tell them I’m not coming!” was all that he yelled as a reply. 

. . .

The air in the small, sterile room seemed to hum with the tension that had followed you since you woke up.

“Miss, how are you feeling?” 

You blinked, still trying to find your bearings. It took you a second to even see the medic that was talking to you. The heat clouded your vision like a mirage. Your mouth was dry, your skin sticky from sweat, but at least you were conscious. They’d placed you in a secluded room in the makeshift medical area, lying on a stiff and temporary cot. 

“It’s a lot better now,” you replied hoarsely, managing a weak smile. “Still have a slight headache, but I guess that’s normal.” 

You didn’t know if it was the bright fluorescent lighting or the heat still affecting you, but your eyes burned and your head pounded. You felt the instinct to rub your temples, but was hindered when you felt an IV-needle inserted in your arm. 

You didn’t know how long you’d been out. You weren’t  even sure what had happened really. One second you were in the garage, trying to get a perfect shot of Alex making his pit stop. The next one, you have a vague memory of being moved into the medical area and multiple people’s voices buzzing above you. 

“Yes, it is. Do you know what happened?” the medic asked. His voice was kind as he stood by your bedside, an iPad in hand with information. 

“Uh, I… passed out? Did I hit my head?”

“No, no, you didn’t. You should be lucky that garage was filled with people to catch a falling lady,” he joked lightly. 

You smiled, albeit a bit forced. You looked at the medic’s name tag, trying to make out the letters with your clouded vision. Amir. That was a pretty name. At least your brain was working somewhat.

“We just want to observe you for a little longer to make sure you’re no longer dehydrated, otherwise you should be completely fine. Are you on any medication now?” Amir continued by saying. 

You thought for a second. “Yeah, wait… I can never remember the names.” 

Looking around you, you were thankful to see your camera bag with your phone inside placed neatly on a table next to the cot. You moved carefully to reach it, opening your notes app to show Amir the prescriptions you had written down. 

“I take those daily for ADHD, and uh… those for anxiety when I feel like I need it,” you explained, pointing at the screen even though it hurt your head to look at it. 

Amir nodded and tapped something down on his iPad. “Did you take one today?” 

“Yeah, one of each.” 

“Good to know. I’ll go get you something for that headache,” he reassured you before leaving, letting his hand gently squeeze your arm as an act of thoughtfulness. 

You closed your tired eyes for a moment, a feverish cold sweat catching up to you, making you realise just how uncomfortable your Williams kit was, practically glueing your warm body to the cot. 

The door clicked shut softly behind the medic as he left, but it wasn’t long before you heard it creak open again. You looked up, expecting Amir, but instead, it was… Logan.

You blinked, a little confused. His blond hair was slightly damp, still sporting what was obviously helmet-hair. He looked tired, maybe as exhausted as you felt, yet he stood there, hesitant for only a moment before stepping inside. 

He shouldn't be here. He should be debriefing with the team, or doing interviews, or—

“What the hell did you do?” Logan asked, only half-teasing as real concern bled through in his voice. 

“Apparently I passed out,” you answered, trying to downplay it with a weak smile.

Logan sighed, the tension visibly draining from his body as if seeing you alright, even in this condition, was enough to ease the worry that had been weighing on him. You were sure you looked like a complete mess—sweaty, shivering, barely able to keep your eyes open.

He moved inside the room, sitting down on a stool next to your cot. You turned to look at him, feeling his intense eyes on you already. You didn’t know what to do, or what to feel. Your system was already cooked, fried up completely from feeling bad all day to passing out in front of a crowded garage.  

“So, uhm… you’re just as anxious as I am?” he asked nervously, tilting his head. 

Your stomach twisted. It didn’t take you long to realise that he had overheard your conversation with Amir—about the medication, about your diagnoses. It wasn’t a secret in  any way, you just hadn’t planned to tell him about it unless he asked. Your magical cure to dealing with his anxiety was… two decades of dealing with your own. 

“Not that it’s a competition, but I’m way worse,” you joked. 

Not fitting in at school, not fitting in at home—it would make anyone anxious out of their skin. And younger you were surrounded by people who didn’t know how to deal with it—to deal with you. Your family labelled you as a sad child, or god forbid sensitive, and sort of just accepted your anxious responses to every minor thing. Doctors and therapists called you emotionally intelligent, but you never found that to be a compliment, like it was a positive thing to be so aware of your own problems. 

Logan stared at you plainly. “Do the meds help?” 

You scoffed. “Yeah, they do. Just not against heat exhaustion.” 

You saw how Logan’s expression stayed the same, slightly emotionless, slightly annoyed at how you just couldn’t help yourself from joking about the situation. You’d experienced it before—how people disliked you for it. 

“You don’t have to be here, Logan. I’m fine,” you added, shying away from looking at him. 

That broke his demeanor. He was quick to grab your hand, careful with the IV-port connected to your inner elbow. His grip was firm but tender, grounding you in a way you hadn’t expected.

“I want to be here,” he shortly replied. There was no room for debate. 

You wanted to protest, to tell him that he didn’t need to babysit you, that he had more important things to do. But the truth was… you weren’t fine. Not really.

You were used to keeping to yourself, even in busy places like the paddock. You were used to the chaos and noise of your family, where attention was either forced or withheld, never calmly showed. Silence was your refuge. You were talkative, sure, but you had learnt early on that asking for help meant admitting weakness—something that wasn’t welcome in the household you grew up in. As a kid, you would shut down when you felt this overwhelmed. Even now, sat in a medical room after collapsing for heat exhaustion, that old instinct was there, tugging at you to shut down. 

Logan, however, was still there, unfazed, waiting.  

Maybe he wanted to tell you how it was slightly reckless to feel this bad and not inform anyone, but he also understood more than anybody—that admitting a weakness while doing a job people questioned your talent for—wasn’t something easily done, or something that would even help your cause in the end. 

But he didn’t say anything. He just held your hand, breathing steadily. His fingertips traced upward to one of the floral tattoos you had on your forearm. His touch felt… gentle. Intimate, even, your clouded mind envisioned. It sent a shiver through you—not from the feverish cold sweat, but from something else entirely.

“How did the race go?” you asked, swallowing down emotions, more to change the subject than anything.

“Not important.” Logan shook his head. “What? I mean it. I’m focused on you now.” 

You tried to roll your eyes, but the effort was too much. You could feel yourself unravelling, the exhaustion too heavy to ignore anymore. He noticed it too.

“My father called me this morning,” you blurted out after a moment of silence, surprising even yourself. “I think that’s why I was feeling so off today.” 

Logan, again, didn’t say anything, just waited, his gaze steady, patient. He wasn’t rushing you, wasn’t pushing you to say more. He was just… there. He’d learnt from you, you slowly realised—to let anxious people talk when they wanted to talk and to distract them when talking would only make things worse. 

“We haven’t talked in months,” you admitted, biting your lip. “So, I thought… I thought he was finally going to be the bigger person and actually show some interest in my life and the job I’m doing.” 

Logan nodded slowly, sensing the conclusion before you even voiced it. “I’m guessing he didn’t?” 

“He called to offer me a job at his firm because one of their legal assistants is going on maternity leave.” You let out a bitter laugh, the sound hollow. “I’ve been working and travelling the world for half a year, making a name for myself, and he still doesn’t believe that I can do it.” 

It was funny, how the first man to ever break your heart was your own father. And he hadn’t done it with malicious intent, but because he was just too blind to get to know his own daughter.

Your breath hitched, and before you could stop them, the tears spilled over, silent but insistent. You wiped your face with the back of your hand, embarrassed by the vulnerability, the rawness. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m crying.” 

“Don’t apologise. You’ve seen me cry enough times to know that it’s okay.”

Logan’s grip on your hand tightened just a fraction, a quiet reassurance. You didn’t have to suck up the tears and build up a façade to prove that you were unbothered.

“He doesn’t need to believe in you for you to succeed,” Logan said quietly, his words like an anchor to your focus. “You can do it, actually, you are doing it.” 

And the first time in your life, you allowed yourself to believe that maybe, just maybe, he was right.

. . .

Austin, USA

. . .

Austin was… disappointing. 

That was the word of this season. Disappointing. Because no matter how hard it looked like Alex and Logan were pushing themselves and the cars—they got nothing out of it. Now, Logan knew for certain that he wasn’t coming back to Formula One next season. As much as Logan had wanted to go out on a high note, to leave with his head held high, reality didn’t allow it.

The only moments that really brought him any sort of joy nowadays were the ones off track. Especially the ones with you. He didn’t like to overthink it because it was complicated, and God knows he wasn’t in the right state of mind for anything complicated. But calling it platonic? That would be a lie. It wasn’t necessarily love either, just a deep understanding of each other. 

Like now, on the Sunday evening after the disappointing race, when you and him spent time in his hotel room, watching a movie that was so bad and eating room service food that was so tasteless. You were there, for him, as a distraction, as a constant. You laughed at the ridiculousness of the plot, made sarcastic comments about the actors, and occasionally hummed along to the cheesy soundtrack. You showed him attention and affection when he quite literally felt like the worst person in the world. 

“I should probably go to my own room,” you said, trying to hide a yawn as you spoke. The food finished a long time ago and the end credits rolling on the TV-screen at the end of the bed.  

Logan looked at you over his shoulder from his position on the bed, the one he’d been sinking into from exhaustion since you’d both entered his room. He was laid on his side, back turned to you. You were sat against the plush headboard, your hair looked a mess as you leant your head. He’d been quiet for a long time, barely even laughed during the movie’s funnier parts. But now, he slowly shook his head as he looked at you. 

He didn’t want you to leave. 

You silently agreed to stay for a little longer by just a look from your eyes. He turned his back to you again and you reached for the remote to turn off the TV. A static and quiet sound of air-conditioning the only thing audible in the hotel room. You shuffled behind him carefully, letting yourself lie down with your front facing his back. You didn’t dare to move under the covers like he had, only his blond hair and shirtless shoulders peeking out. 

“They should’ve just sacked me off before the summer break,” he finally muttered. You saw how a breath left his lungs, weighing him further down into the mattress. “Or after the crash at Zandvoort. Y’know? Just done something to get rid of me so that I didn’t have to feel this way.” 

He hadn’t talked like this in a while. You’d heard it a lot earlier during the season, when there were talks of him getting replaced after every race he didn’t score points. The talking never stopped, but Logan’s attitude definitely changed. He was indifferent to it, and that was scary to see—someone so young, kicked to the ground repeatedly, that his dreams lost their importance even to himself.

He’d been more careful with you since Baku. You thought maybe that had an influence on him too. He didn’t want to crowd you with emotions and anxiety when he now knew that you didn’t have it easy either. You didn’t think that was fair. You had never once felt like he added on to your anxiety. He only made it better. 

“You’re not saying much,” he added quietly, as your silence became too much for him. 

“For once in my life, I thought I’d try out what it’s like to be quiet,” you responded, but there was no bite in your voice. It was gentle, sympathetic—not joking like you used to do. “No, I’m sorry. I was letting you vent. It sounded like you needed it.” 

Logan's body slumped further as he exhaled, realising that you were right. 

“Logan, listen,” you said. “It would make no sense to sack you off. No possible replacement would be able to adjust in time for a better chance at points. Williams is doomed this season no matter what if they can’t give both cars equal machinery.” 

Your words hung in the air, not offering a solution, but trying to relieve him of some of the guilt he had piled on him. 

Without thinking, your fingers began tracing a pattern on his back, just by his exposed shoulder blade. Small, mindless circles—something to occupy the space between words. You weren’t even aware you were doing it until Logan spoke again.

“Are you doing one of those children’s rhymes?” Logan asked with a slight amusement as he recognised the pattern your finger was moving in.

“Who says they’re just for children?” you joked. 

“X marks the spot, a circle and a dot…” he started, trailing off with a soft laugh. His voice was muffled by the pillow he was lying on, but you could hear the faint hint of a smile in it. 

“Wait…I don’t know the right order in English,” you admitted, a little embarrassed as you lifted your finger from his skin. 

“Do it in your language,” he suggested in a heartbeat. 

“But you won’t understand it?”

“I just like listening to you speak,” Logan said softly, sincerely. 

“Really? I’ve been told that I sound like a muppet before by English speakers,” you questioned, feeling a flush rise in your cheeks despite yourself.

That wasn’t a lie. Muppet. Cartoon character. Or just any national stereotype people could think of. You’d heard it all. 

Logan chuckled, the sound vibrating through his chest. “Is that why you try to not have an accent?” 

“Yeah, I guess so,” you shrugged. “It was either a borderline offensive British accent or sounding like I’m one of the Kardashians.” 

He felt a short breath fall on his naked shoulder, something between a giggle and a huff. He could imagine the look on your face—smiling, trying to not be too loud for the room’s sombre atmosphere. 

You did as he asked, tracing the rhyme onto his back in the way you remembered your mother doing it to you as a child when you couldn’t sleep. His skin was tan and slightly freckled, feeling smooth under your fingertip. You whispered the words quietly in the language you knew best. 

“I love how you sound when you don’t care,” Logan said after a moment. “And in your native language.” 

You raised an eyebrow in confusion. Not that he would be able to see your expression anyway. You had no idea that he’d even heard you speak in your native tongue before.

“When you’re on the phone with your family and so on,” he continued. “Your tone changes, it’s more melodic.” 

You’d always been self-conscious about your accent, always trying to blend in, to sound like everyone else. Again, it was one of those things that had always made you feel just a little bit inadequate. A little bit less than the older people around you. But here he was, appreciating the very thing you tried to hide. Loving it, even. 

“Thank you,” you whispered, voice barely audible as you let your head fall forward, your forehead resting gently against his shoulder blade. 

You stayed like that for a moment, tracing his back, savouring the quiet, intimacy of the moment without needing to explain or define it. You could’ve told him that you liked him. Your lips were only centimetres away from kissing the bare skin of his shoulder. You sensed that it was not the best time to try messing with his head and digging up your emotions to the surface, so you squashed them down all over again. 

Logan fell asleep first, but you weren’t long after. Right there, behind him. That was never your plan, but a tired mind did whatever the tired mind wanted to, you supposed. Now that it had happened, you couldn’t bring yourself to regret it. It didn’t end up being an issue until morning came around. 

It was early—earlier than what it needed to be—when the sun broke through the curtains and filled the room with light, evidently waking you. The daily alarm you had set on your phone wouldn’t be ringing for another hour or two. 

You had slept fine. Nothing disrupting you. Nothing waking you. You didn’t even dream. When you woke up, however, you thought you might be dreaming. 

During the night, your positions had changed. Somehow, you weren’t behind Logan anymore, with a safe distance. No, he was spooning you. An arm lazily draped over your stomach and his warm breath tickled the skin of your neck every time he exhaled. 

Nope, you definitely weren’t dreaming.

You laid as still as you possibly could, tensing your entire body, gathering that he was fast asleep. But, you had to move at some point. Your body would go into rigor mortis if you didn’t. And you were scalding hot. Falling asleep in a sweatshirt, Logan’s arm hugging your waist. It was all too much for you. 

That was when you felt it. You accidentally shifted your legs, moving further back. You felt him, poking the back of your thigh. Hard, frustrated, large. A warmness spread through your body as you realised it, making the climate even more unbearable in that bed. You knew that it was involuntary. It was just how the male body worked sometimes. You knew that this wasn’t some indication that he reciprocated the feelings you harboured for him. 

Somehow, that wasn’t even the worst part about it. You could feel his heartbeat racing, as his chest was so close to your back. That was the worst part. Like this was exciting him, or making him nervous—even in his sleep, even involuntary. 

You were going to die. This was about to kill you. And you’d let it happen. You wanted it to kill you. 

You had to get out of here, and that was now. 

You sure looked comedic, trying to get out of that bed quickly while also not waking him. Like a newborn giraffe, attempting to stand up for the first time as a heavy comforter clung to its body. 

But you did it, shutting the heavy hotel room door behind you, eyes darting around the hallway of rooms, looking to see if you’d been caught by anyone. Just as you started to walk to your own room, a voice from down the hallway stopped you. 

“Why were you in Logan’s room at the ass crack of dawn?” 

You spun to meet Angie’s gaze, and she came up to you, just having left her own room, dressed and ready for the day. You were in yesterday’s clothes and makeup, looking positively frazzled. She read your expression in a second. 

“Oh my god,” Angie gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. “You slept with him!” 

“No, no, I promise I did not!” you defended quickly, voice laced with panic. “Or, I mean—” you fumbled over your words as you watched Angie try to not burst into laughter. “We fell asleep next to each other, but we did not have sex.” 

“I don’t really care what you did or did not do with him, because I trust you to still be good at your job. I just—” she paused, her face softening as she looked at you, the big sister mentality coming into place even though you shared no ties of blood. “I want you to know your worth, and that race car drivers are notorious for being—” 

You cut her off, voice steadier than before. “I know my worth,” you said, before adding with a dramatic sigh, “I just happen to be on sale for a certain sad and anxious American.” 

“I get it, it happens to the best of us,” Angie nodded, her lips curling into a smirk. “You think you know what rock bottom feels like and then all of a sudden you want to fuck the blond guy.”

You could only laugh at her unusually crude words. Maybe it hit too close to home for her. 

“You’re engaged to a blond guy, Angie,” you pointed out. 

Matthew’s hair was almost white, that’s how blond he was. He most certainly had some Scandinavian in him. Logan would be considered brunet in comparison. 

“Like I said, it just happens,” she shrugged, draping an arm around your shoulder. Back to comfortable camaraderie. “Let’s go get breakfast, lover girl.” 

. . .

On the other side of the door, Logan had woken up by the sound of it slamming shut. It took him a moment to piece together what had happened. His increased heart rate. His throbbing morning wood. You, running out of his hotel room before he could wake up. What the fuck did this mean? God, he felt like dying. Or maybe just taking a really long, cold shower.

. . .

Mexico City, Mexico

. . .

“This is a waste of your time,” you called out from across the park, feeling the warm wind sweep through your hair as you carved the side of the bowl. You pushed your weight into the deck, the skateboard responding to your every shift, gliding along the concrete.

While you’d gotten to skate in some impressive parks around the world this year—this one in Mexico might take the price for being the best. It was gorgeous, in an area that you could tell flourished with graffiti and street artists. The concrete was smooth, the bowl was deep and large enough. The local skaters were talented and ranged from kids with their fathers to groups of teenagers.

“It’s not wasted time if it’s with you,” Logan said from his seat by the edge of the bowl, his eyesight focused through the little viewfinder on a vintage polaroid camera.

You’d both been asked to go to dinner with some team members after the Mexican Grand Prix, but you had answered honestly with how you’d much rather go explore this skatepark that you had heard amazing things about. Logan had answered with less honesty that he was too tired. With one look, you could tell that he silently asked to join you instead.

He was happy to just sit in the evening sun, looking out over the people skating, and stealing a camera from you to take some photos. You’d given him a polaroid camera that was only for your personal use. The film was getting expensive and your case of developed pictures was getting full, but you knew the memories would be worth it.

Logan wasn’t sure that he was very good at photography at first. He was too impatient to wait at the film developing, thinking he’d ruined most of the shots before colour even started showing on the little squares of film.

But he hadn’t ruined them. He just had to wait. And after he had waited, he was pretty damn proud of the outcome. There were gorgeous murals, a lot of the setting sun, some of kids skating around—but most of them were of you. The sun kissed your skin, and the sweat from your ride clung to you, but still, there was something about the way Logan saw you through that camera lens. Young, sweet—maybe even beautiful.

You rolled your eyes at his cliché words, pushing the tail of your board to get a bit more speed as you curved around the deep end of the bowl. Your body had memorized the movements of skating so deeply that you no longer thought about them; you just moved, instinct guiding you. It was moments like this when everything else fell away, and you were simply alive.

Logan snapped another picture, the click of the shutter audible even over the distant chatter of the park. You could tell he was smiling, even though the camera obscured half his face.

“You’re such a shutterbug!” you teased, your board coming to a stop just below him in the bowl.

“And you’re very photogenic,” he shot back without missing a beat, the sound of the shutter following swiftly after.

He could only imagine what the picture would look like without it having fully developed yet. Your high pitched laugh materialising in a wide smile with crooked teeth. You looked like a little train conductor in your striped denim boiler suit, worn-out to the point of tearing, showing off banged-up knees and elbows from never enough wearing protective gear.

After what felt like hours of skating, you finally called it a night, and the two of you began to walk back to the hotel. The buildings around you, old and worn, were painted in soft pastel shades that had faded with age. Mexico City had that effect—beautifully chaotic, with stories hidden in every crack and corner.

You were still buzzing with the adrenaline from skating, unable to stop yourself from laughing every few minutes. It was a lightness that came from doing something you loved, and being with someone who, in his own way, seemed to love it just as much.

Out of nowhere, you pointed up, a giggle bubbling over. “Look!”

Logan followed your gaze, his eyes landing on a pair of old, beat-up Converse dangling from a power line overhead.

“I’ve always wanted to do that,” you said, half to yourself. “Isn’t that used to mark a spot for drug dealers?” Logan asked, brow raised in amusement.

“Maybe. But it’s also used to commemorate things. Graduation, marriages, all sorts of stuff.” You gave him a playful smirk. “You know, to mark a memory.”

“You should do it, to commemorate this year.”

“Actually…” You trailed off, biting your lip. “I’ve been thinking about getting a tattoo to commemorate this year.”

His eyebrows shot up, clearly interested. “Really? What of?”

“Not sure yet. Something small, meaningful. I’ll figure it out.”

Logan hummed in approval, then looked pointedly at your shoes. “You know, you could commemorate this moment by tossing those sneakers up there. God knows they’ve seen better days.”

You glanced down at your well-worn Nikes, the soles starting to peel, the laces frayed. The cobalt swooshes had practically turned a faded navy-brown shade instead. Thinking about it, your suitcase was filled with other sneakers too.

“I mean, you’re not wrong. But how am I supposed to walk back to the hotel?”

Without hesitation, Logan smiled. “I’ll carry you.”

You scoffed, shaking your head. “No, you won’t.”

His response was swift. He knelt in front of you, leaning down to untie your shoes with an easy, confident motion.

“Logan,” you protested softy, when you really had nothing against it.

“Come on, just do it,” he coaxed, glancing up at you.

Who were you to say no to a man on his knees? You decided on listening to him. Stepping out of your shoes, you felt the warm ground beneath you, hurting slightly from tiny rocks and dirt digging into the soles of your sock-clad feet.

You tied the shoes together by the laces and with a pathetic first attempt, you launched them high up into the air, no way near the power line. Logan let out a little laugh in utter disbelief because he found the action so endearing.

“It’s harder than it looks!” you defended.

“That’s what he said,” he joked under his breath as you tried again… and again.

Thankfully you were decent at other things, because throwing was not your forte. You were about to give up as you tossed one single last throw, groaning out of frustration as you tried your best. With eyes closed, you hoped for the best. A slow applause from Logan made you dare to look. And surely, there were your blue Nikes, dangling on the power line above you.

“Oh my God, I did it!” you exclaimed, throwing your arms up in triumph. “Logan, take a picture, please!”

He chuckled, snapping a quick shot with the polaroid as you stood under the shoes, grinning like an idiot.

Before you knew it, Logan had swept you off your feet, literally, hoisting you onto his back. You kicked your legs weakly in protest, though your laugher told him you weren’t actually mad. Graciously, he even picked your skateboard up, sticking it between his arm and ribs.

“No, no, put me down. This is not working,” you squealed, feeling like you were about to fall off, your arms instinctively wrapping around his neck for balance.

“I’m not putting you down,” Logan retorted as he started walking with ease down the sidewalk with you on his back. “You’ll hurt your feet.”

He shuffled you higher up on his back, his hands grasping tightly around your legs. You were scared he was going to drop you, or worse, fall over because of the weight.

“Put me down.” You tried your best to sound serious, but it did nothing, he just kept on walking. The hotel was only minutes away and he didn’t show any signs of slowing down.

“You’re enjoying this,” Logan accused. “I know you are.”

You leaned your chin on his shoulder, finally giving in. “You've carried me this far, you might as well take me home.”

As you approached the luxurious hotel the team stayed at, Logan didn’t set you down until you were in the lift, earning looks from both guests and workers. Neither of you cared. He set you down gently, your sock-covered feet making a soft thud against the lift’s marbled flooring.

He gave you your skateboard back, shifting uncomfortably in his spot as the lift started moving upward. “I had fun tonight,” he whispered to you.

You leant against the wall, a loud exhale escaping you. “So did I.”

As you watched Logan, the laughter that had filled the air moments ago now gave way to something quieter, something more charged.

He took a small step towards you before you could even think, his face soft but his eyes intense, searching yours as if waiting for permission. There were a million things you wanted to tell him, to interrupt him, just to make sure—but the weight of the unspoken pulled you both together, speechless.

Your heart pounded in your chest as his gaze flickered down to your lips, then back to your eyes. You could feel the heat radiating from his skin, your heart racing in sync with his as your lips hovered inches apart. He was just as nervous as you were.

You both closed your eyes, anticipation tingling through you, waiting for that inevitable spark—

“Hey!” Alex’s voice cut through the moment like a knife as the lift doors opened with a ding. He blinked at you both, stumbling away from each other, a curious smirk tugging at his lips. “Where are your shoes, Paddy?”

You stared at him, dumbfounded, and then down at your sock-clad feet. “Uhh… on a power line?”

Logan laughed, shaking his head. His cheeks were burning from what had almost happened, and from getting caught by Alex. It was so obvious. If only your rooms had been on a higher floor.

. . .

Las Vegas, USA

. . .

You changed after Mexico, and Logan took notice. You worked longer hours—a lot more than you needed to. You didn’t find the time to go exploring. Or if you did, you didn’t post it to your instagram diary. You also drifted apart from Logan. Your conversations were shorter, your movie nights extinct, and you being a distraction for him was exchanged with you saying that you had more work to do. You became a ghost in his world, present but not truly there.

It didn’t matter how many times Logan tried to talk to you about it. The message was clear. You’d shut him out. And he couldn’t for the life of him understand why. 

Your evening in Mexico City had been magical; at least that was what he felt. And even though Alex had interrupted at the worst possible moment, Logan still naively thought you’d be able to go back to that magic if you got a chance alone together. 

But you were busy in Brazil, and the promotional aspect of the Las Vegas Grad Prix was nothing short of crazy. Some might even have called it torturous. He just didn’t find the right time, and you didn’t even make the time for him to try. 

The stumbling, awkward times he had tried—Logan couldn’t even form a sentence. He’d interrupt you when you were working, or catch you just as you were about to go to bed. It was never good enough. His emotions had shifted insanely fast, or maybe they had moved at a slow pace for such a long time that they now felt like a tidal wave hitting him straight in the heart. 

He liked you. 

Your obsession with tater tots, your inability to sit still, your love for shitty movies, your ability to always match the colour of your sneakers to your work clothes. It was all the little things. Your way of treating him like he wasn’t wasted potential or fragile like fine china. That you knew how to deal with him, like this season wasn’t the end of the world. 

And the worst thing was that he was pretty damn sure that you liked him back. Yet, you were running. 

. . . 

You weren’t there to bother him when he finished the race in Las Vegas. You didn’t stand there with your camera, ready to get an unflattering picture of him dripping with sweat. And it wasn’t like in Baku, where he had sensed something was wrong immediately. This was calmer, and Angie just told him that you were back at the hotel when he asked. 

He got a point in Vegas, but you weren’t there to capture it. He got to look happy in pictures for other photographers and he got to finally express some happiness in the post-race interviews. And while a part of him was over the moon, he couldn’t stop thinking about how it seemed like you hadn’t even seen him accomplish it. 

That was why he now stood outside of your hotel room, freshly showered and changed but still buzzing with adrenaline, a shaking fist knocking lightly on the door. 

He shifted his weight, unsure if he was meant to be here, but he needed to see you. He needed to talk to you. He needed to actually kiss you, without interruptions. The both of you needed to celebrate, to feel a night of joy after this nightmare of a season. 

The girl who opened the door looked tired, clad in sweatpants and a hoodie draped over her head. Your makeup-less face showed dark circles under your eyes—something that had gotten worse in the last couple of weeks. You looked like you were on the move, already with your shoes on and your suitcase packed, standing right in the doorway. 

Logan saw it, but in his excited state—he didn’t immediately connect the dots. 

“I got points—,” Logan started, his voice brimming with pride before he corrected himself, the enthusiasm in his tone softening slightly. “Well, one point, but still.”

“I know, Logan,” you replied gently. “I’m proud of you.” 

Even if you hadn’t been at the paddock tonight, you hadn’t kept your eyes off the livestream for even a second. You may even have shed a tear as he crossed the finish line. 

Logan beamed for a second, the glow of the accomplishment still warming his chest. “You weren’t there after the race, so I thought I’d come see you now,” he continued, a hint of nervousness as he paced uncomfortably in place. “A bunch of us are going out to dinner—” 

But then his attention drifted. His brow furrowed, his attention drawn to the luggage again as realisation dawned.

“Why is your bag packed already?” 

You looked at the suitcase, the same realisation flashing across your face as if you'd forgotten it was there, or perhaps hoped he wouldn't notice, and then back up at Logan with a visible uncertainty. You shook your head as you knew you had to explain it to him. 

“They’ve agreed on an exemption from my contract,” you said quietly. “I’m not working the last two races.” 

“B-but why?” Logan stammered. 

“Because I asked for it,” you shrugged with an audible sigh. “I have a flight to catch tonight.” 

Logan felt his stomach drop as he took in your words. “Wait, you’re going home?” 

“No,” you scoffed. “I’m not sure I’m welcome there.” 

The weight of those words settled heavy between you both. Logan was unsure of what to say. He felt like he knew more about your family than you let on, but he hadn’t expected you to be this lost. He thought you were still figuring it out, like him.

He swallowed hard. His mind raced, piecing together the fragments of the conversation, but nothing added up. “Then where—?” 

“I’m starting out in San Francisco,” you said, cutting him off before he could finish. “And then I’ll see from there on.”

San Francisco. You’d mentioned it numerous times before. You had friends there. Professional skateboarders. It made sense that was where you were running to. It made sense that you had been distant these last weeks. Because this couldn’t have been an easy decision for you. 

“I know we’ve talked a lot about your future, but mine is just as uncertain, and I need to do something about it. I can’t go home to a place where I don’t belong. I need to find my own ground.” 

You were almost desperate as you spoke. 

Logan took a step closer, still having a hard time grasping what was even going on. “Wasn’t that what this year was all about?” 

“It was always a fixed-term contract, you know that. Angie just bought me some time to figure things out,” you explained. 

“So, running away is you figuring things out?” His words came out sharper than intended, and regret instantly washed over him.

“Logan,” you said, almost pleading now, as if asking him not to push any further.

Maybe you weren’t running away now. Maybe you had already ran, the start of this season being your first stop. 

“I’m sorry, I just—” Logan paused, his hands gesturing toward you as if he wanted to hold on to something, anything, to keep you from slipping away. “I have something to say to you.” 

“I know you do,” you replied instantly, not letting him speak any further. Your voice creaked as you felt a cry clogging up your throat. “Trust me, I do too. But it’s not the right time for either of us. It will only complicate things.” 

Logan opened his mouth to argue, but shut it just as quickly. The words he longed to say hung heavy in his throat, unsaid and unacknowledged. He knew you were right. He knew it. But the words felt hollow in the face of you leaving. The question hung in his throat, unspoken. Would you stay if I asked?

You both knew that the answer to that question would be yes, in a heartbeat. He couldn’t ask that from you. He would never be the one to hold you back. You had enough people against you. He needed to be with you, even if that meant oceans apart.

“Is this goodbye, then?” His voice cracked as he asked it. 

You shook your head slowly, reaching into your carry-on bag. “I have this for you.” From the depths of the small bag, you pulled out a simple, leather-bound photo album, perfectly pristine, and handed it to him. 

Logan looked down, fingers tracing the edges before opening it. Revealed was a collection of photos you had taken over the past year—candid shots, moments of him between races, behind the scenes. His chest tightened as he looked at the first one, an image of him laughing, helmet in hand, caught mid-conversation with his team. You had always seen him differently, and now, looking at these photos, he could see how much it meant to you.

There was a mixture of digital, film, and polaroid pictures, all signed with the corresponding city and date. You’d started this collection when you were simply work acquaintances. The best photos were the ones that had nothing to do with racing. Sightseeing, views from hotel room balconies, and restaurants with the local cuisine. 

His ultimate favourite that you had included was the one he had taken of you in Mexico, barefoot with your sneakers hanging over you on a power line. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” you said, the guilt clear in your voice. “I didn’t know until this morning—” 

“You don’t owe anyone an explanation,” he cut you off gently, his eyes still focused on the photos.

You bit your lip, still on the verge of tears. Seeing him so captivated by your year together in photos made it much harder. 

He looked up, gently closing the album, and with a quick motion, he had embraced your body, wrapping his arms around you with a loud sigh. His t-shirt was soft against your skin as you felt it grow wet from your tears that had finally fallen. You could feel his heartbeat, ticking impatiently. 

“Do you think I’m making a mistake by leaving?” 

Again, if he said yes… You would rethink everything. 

“No, I think you’re doing what you need to do.” 

Logan was determined.

“I really have to go now,” you said softly, but you didn’t make any effort to move away from his embrace. You leaned into him instead, your head resting against his chest. You felt his trembling breaths, almost like a stuttering, keeping him from crying out loud. 

“Just a couple more seconds,” Logan whispered into your hair, his arms tightening around you. “I hope you find what you’re looking for,” he added, a slight tone of hope noticeable. 

“I know we both will.” 

Finally, you pulled back, but you left the goodbye unsaid. You reached to squeeze his hand as a last gesture. You’d never been good at goodbyes, so you left it to the lights. The soft glow of the Las Vegas skyline was the only thing illuminating the hotel hallway as you flipped the switch and slipped out the door, making a beeline for the lift. 

It was the end of an era. Logan knew it before the year had even started. He just hadn’t imagined it to feel this important—to feel this uncertain. He hadn’t imagined you. And when he started to imagine you, it was already too late. It had always been too late.

He tried to tell himself that he hadn’t lost you. But it felt strangely like it. 

Logan stood still in that hotel corridor for way too long, staring at the spot where you had been. This was the way it had to be, but he wasn’t sure that made it any easier. 

. . .

Fort Lauderdale, USA

. . .

Logan went home after the season ended. He stayed for the prize giving ceremony. He stayed long enough to say goodbye to the people that it mattered to. Then he went home, and he wasn’t sure how he would look back at his past experiences. Now it mostly hurt, but still—he had made it there in the first place. 

Home meant Florida this time. England, or Europe in general, had been his home for most of his conscious life, yet he never felt homesick for it. That was until now, when it wasn’t his home anymore. Florida was nice, it was always just nice. The weather was warm and the beaches were pretty, but when he was sunburnt to the point of peeling and had sand in his shoes, he missed the bleak English mornings with rain pattering against the windows. 

He signed for Indycar in the end, and when the season started in March, Logan found it refreshing. He loved racing, and he loved that he got a chance to do it again. He didn’t love the pressure put on him, mostly by strangers on the internet. He didn’t love the rookie title because he wasn’t treated like a rookie. He’d raced in the pinnacle of motorsport, he should know better. He should be better. Logan tried to not let it get to him, because in the end—he was the one that had made it to the pinnacle. Not a lot of other drivers could say that, especially other Americans.  

You liked every single one of his Instagram posts. Commented when he did well in races. That was the closest thing you two had to communication. Logan understood you, though—that you needed to leave when you had the chance to. He couldn’t have changed that. He wouldn’t have changed that. 

He thought of messaging you, but he had a hard time figuring out what to say. Writing down something long in his notes app, only to cringe at himself seconds later. Nothing seemed right and nothing seemed fair, like he was guilt-tripping you into reminiscing the last year. He knew what he felt for you, but he could never force you to be closer to him, to give up your chance at exploring and finding yourself. It was better to just let you live, but he knew what you felt for him too, that was why it was so hard for him to stay away. 

Stuck between a rock and a hard place. 

Logan liked every single one of your Instagram posts as well. You kept up with the diary, even if the travelling wasn’t as rapid as under the racing season. 

He saw pictures of you all over the American west coast. You were on cable cars and steep streets in San Fransisco. You were skating in Venice Beach, surfing in Santa Cruz, and hiking in Yosemite. You went on road trips up north to go to concerts in Portland and Seattle for bands that Logan had never heard of. 

You hadn’t been kidding when you said you had friends there. The skateboarding collective you lived with in Cole Valley was a never ending stream of eclectic people coming and leaving. 

Your closest friend was the girl with bright pink hair that he had spotted on your Instagram before from your numerous university art projects. She skated on a competitive level and you would join to take photos of her. 

Another one of your friends was a boy who looked strangely like Timothée Chalamet. He was a tattoo artist who would go skating with you at night to spot pretty sunsets. He tried not to be jealous. He should have confessed his feelings for you to even have a reason to be jealous. 

Your posts became more scarce during the early summer. When you posted a slideshow of pictures of Tater Tot with a long caption about his passing, Logan understood why. He felt tears forming in his eyes as he watched the pictures of you and the golden retriever, the fur around his face having faded and his nose all pink from old age. 

He felt like reaching out to you even more after that, especially since you were back home with your family and he could only imagine how that felt for you. When you posted a picture of a new family dog not too long after, with a normal boring dog name that he could tell you hadn’t chosen, he felt a slight anger inside.

You went skating around Europe after that, the girl with pink hair by your side. You posted a video of Angie trying to skate while in Barcelona, and Logan connected the dots that you had gone to the Spanish Grand Prix. He liked that you were still welcomed by the team, but he was unsure if he would’ve gotten a similar treatment. 

On a weekend without racing, Logan was back home in Fort Lauderdale. He spent the evening with his brother and some friends in their backyard. He was there, but he didn’t feel present. Something you had taught him stemmed from anxiety. It wasn’t as bad as it was during his last F1 season, but he still liked to look at your pictures as a distraction when he felt anxious. The stories they told were still better than what was going on in his actual life. 

“Since when are you interested in skateboarding?” his brother's voice broke through his focus. Logan barely had time to register him hovering over his shoulder before he took a seat across from him, sinking into a deck chair with a teasing grin.

Logan didn’t realise that he had a video of yours on repeat. It was you in a skatepark in Copenhagen, landing a trick you’d never done before. 

“Oh, I’m not—” he started, his tongue suddenly feeling clumsy in his mouth as he fumbled for an excuse. “It’s the old Williams photographer, she’s travelling to all these places to skate. It’s quite cool to see.” 

His brother raised an eyebrow, clearly not buying it. Logan flushed under the scrutiny, knowing full well that his brother could read him like an open book. He didn’t just think it was quite cool. He was invested—and not just in the skateboarding.

“A girl, you say?” his brother pressed. 

“It’s not like that, she’s on the other side of the world,” Logan protested quickly, slipping his phone back in his pocket as if to hide any evidence of his admiration. 

His brother could only laugh at his poor attempt of conviction. “Would it be like that if she was closer?” 

Logan froze, unable to answer. His brother was able to read his expression all too well again, his smile softening as he watched Logan carefully. 

“I am taking that as a yes.” 

. . .

Oxfordshire, UK

. . .

Angela and Matthew Thompson, read the sign outside of the rented out manor house. Somewhere in the English countryside, as the evening sun cast a golden glow over the courtyard. You’d snapped photos of the garden and the exterior, but the sign stopped you for a moment. 

You found it odd, firstly seeing Angie be called by her actual first name and then secondly, not by her maiden surname. You guessed that was what it was like—getting married. The formal side of it all, at least. 

Click. 

You got a quick photo of the sign before you entered back into the manor. The big ballroom was filled with the soft murmur of guests and the rustling of chiffon dresses. 

The ceremony had been earlier during the day, a small gathering with only immediate family around. You’d only been there because of your duty to photograph the entire thing. Otherwise you probably wouldn’t have. Angie’s cousin was her only bridesmaid and Matthew had his closest childhood friend as his only groomsman. Both their parents were present as well, and Angie’s grandmother had been ring bearer. Adorable, that was the only way to describe it. Quaint and quite literally perfect, in the manor’s rose garden with birds chirping and a violin player. 

Click.

You stood in the doorway to the ballroom, adjusting your camera, scanning the scene for the perfect shot. You found it in two of the party’s younger guests, looking at the wedding cake with temptation in their eyes. The was just something about kid’s in formal clothes. A little crooked bowtie and sparkly silver ballerina shoes. 

The reception was bigger, with friends, distant relatives and work colleagues invited. Your family was included in that, but you had gotten good at keeping a distance and they had gotten better at ignoring you instead of arguing with you. That was some sort of improvement. Having the excuse that you were technically working was also in your favour, even if Angie probably wanted to drink you under the table and get you dancing one of Matthew’s rich colleagues. 

There hadn’t been a dress code beyond formal, but somehow a lot of the guests seemed to match, making the photography blend together in perfect hues. You couldn’t wait to edit and put them together. Sage green, baby pink and light yellow. The men and their suits in tones of beige and blue. You guessed that was the English summer in colours. 

You were never really one to dress up nicely. You preferred something practical, but even you felt a little whimsical tonight. A periwinkle dress and white heels—a complete juxtaposition of your usual streetwear and sneakers. 

Click.

You managed to get a picture of the happy couple from far way. Candid, when they thought no one was watching. Those were usually the ones that turned out the best. No posing, no fixed smiles. Angie showed a wide and almost painfully happy grin as Matthew whispered something in her ear, sneaking in a kiss on her cheek. Only they would know what had been said when they, years down the line, flipped through the photo album from their special day. 

That was the beauty of photos. The secret stories they held. 

You smiled to yourself, getting lost in the scene that showed through the viewfinder, shifting to find something new and equally magical in the movements of the ballroom. 

Suddenly, all you could see was one singular familiar face. 

You blinked, not believing your eyes before you zoomed in. Tall, blond, blue eyes catching the light—talking to a man you recognised as a Williams engineer. It couldn’t be… but it totally was. 

In a navy tailored suit, his tie slightly loosened, he raised a champagne coupe to his lips. He smiled at something the engineer said, flashing his teeth. You took a picture, and then one more—it was achingly familiar, yet so different.

It was like he knew he had a camera pointed towards him with how quick he reacted. He hadn’t even seen you when you took the first one, but by the time you were about to take a third one, his face was turned completely towards you—looking at your lens, looking at you. 

And of course, he waved. He smiled and he waved. 

Fuck, fuck, fuck. 

He quickly excused himself to the engineer and was then set on only you. He crossed the room with easy confidence, threading through the crowd. Since when was he so smooth?

You lowered your camera as your breath got caught in your throat, finally looking at him not through the viewfinder. 

“Logan,” you whispered, voice softer than expected. 

He said your name with an easy familiarity, one you’d almost forgotten. It pulled you back six months in time in mere seconds, as if nothing had changed. 

“Uhm, H-how did you get here?” you stammered, cursing yourself for sounding so surprised. You should’ve known he’d be here. Angie’s wedding had been a big talking point even back when he was driving for Williams. 

“There’s these things called airplanes,” he teased, the corners of his mouth quirking up. “Ever heard of them?”

You rolled your eyes, but your smile was impossible to suppress. Silence fell over the two of you as you struggled to find ways to continue the conversation. The tension was palpable, stretching thin as if either of you could snap it with the wrong word. Logan looked lost too, like the confidence he thought he had washed away when he finally got close to you. 

You’d thought about it—what it would be like to talk to him again if you ever got the chance. Being speechless was never in those thoughts. 

“You’re hair has gotten long,” you blurted out, desperate to fill the silence and because it was honestly the first thing you noticed to be different about him. His blond hair had grown longer, with a slight wave to it, almost curling at the ends.

“Is that a compliment?” Logan mused.

“Yes,” you were too quick to reply. “Or, I think so. It’s different.” 

Logan chuckled softly as you winced at how clumsy you sounded. 

“So… you work weddings too?” he asked, glancing at the camera still in your hands. 

Great. He was shit at small talk too. 

“Only when it’s Angie,” you answered, trying to sound at ease. “I promised to make her look gorgeous even before she met Matthew.” 

You did not remember the first time she asked you. It was a decade ago at this point. But every time you had taken a photo of her—professionally and privately—she liked to remind you of how she felt like no one else ever had captured her fairly, or flatteringly. She was always your biggest fan, even when you were just taking grainy pictures of your friends at the local skatepark. 

“Can I see?” Logan asked and you handed him the camera without a doubt. 

There was something so familiar in the gesture, like muscle memory kicking in. You used to share everything with him. You were happy to know that even through it all, he at least still cared about your photography.  

Before you could even react, he raised the camera and snapped a picture of you, completely unprepared. The flash was too bright, and you squealed in surprise.

“Dude, what the fuck?” you exclaimed, blinking away the aftershock of the flash.

Logan raised an eyebrow. “Dude? You’ve turned American!”  

You couldn’t help the laugh that escaped you. “I have not turned American.”

Logan joined your laughter, but only for a second—something on the camera catching his attention instead. He looked at it intensely, only for you to realise that it was the photo he’d taken of you. Overexposed and blurry. Not perfect in any way, but candidly capturing a moment. 

“My god, you look lovely.” 

He said it softly, like an afterthought, like he didn’t mean for you to hear it. 

Heat crept up to your cheeks as he handed you the camera back to you. You couldn’t look too long at the photo he’d taken of you, so you pressed the button to show the one taken prior. It was him, of course—smiling as he had clocked you from across the room. 

“So do you,” you said, showing him the picture of himself. “Happiness suits you.”

Logan’s smile faltered for a moment as you surprised even yourself with your honesty. You realised how he could overthink what you had just said—like happiness was something new for him to express. And maybe that was true. But it was a sad realisation, and a mortifying thing for someone else to have discovered about oneself. 

Before an uncomfortable silence fell between the two of you, a familiar voice broke through the moment.

“There you are!” Alex’s voice was bright, his cheeks tinted pink from champagne and dancing. “I’ve been looking for you!”

You turned, grateful for the distraction, as he came up and enveloped you in a hug. You smiled, hugging him back, telling him how you’d missed him. 

“Logan!” he exclaimed as he turned his attention to him. “It’s so good to see you.” 

They did one of those awkward side-hugs that men insisted on giving each other. Logan said something similar in response, his voice warm but his eyes still flicked to you. You gathered from just that little interaction that their departure must’ve been stretched and difficult. They were good friends, for christ sake, but Williams had made everything toxic. 

Alex beamed. “Well, come on! It’s my turn to pester Paddy with a camera. Scoot together.”

Before either of you could protest, Alex grabbed your camera, leaving you both standing there, shoulder to shoulder. A fire burning through the fabric where your bare shoulder touched his blazer. 

Click. 

. . .

After long speeches, and first dances, and consuming too much wedding cake, you found yourself on a balcony, taking a breather, looking out over the garden. You heard the door open behind you, and it was like you could feel that it was his presence. You let out a small laugh as you kept your eyes focused on the view. 

“What are we looking at?” Logan’s voice came soft and steady beside you, making you turn your head.

“My sister sharing a cigarette with a Williams mechanic,” you scoffed, nodding towards two figures below the balcony. 

Your sister, known as an overly ambitious goody two shoes, wasn’t only sharing the cigarette—she was shotgunning it. Your past self would’ve wanted to go tattle to your parents, but now you were kind of glad to see a human, imperfect side of your sister, acting promiscuous with a greasy mechanic.

There was a brief silence as the evening air wrapped around you. Logan slipped his hands into his pockets, shifting his weight slightly.

“How’s it been? With your family and all?” he slowly asked, trying to make it sound casual. 

“They still treat me like a toddler, if that’s what you’re wondering. But we don’t argue anymore—just pretend each other doesn’t exist,” you scoffed. 

He glanced at you, the hint of a frown on his face, but didn’t press further. Instead, he pulled out his phone from his suit pocket as it vibrated, the faint sound breaking the quiet between you.

You let your eyes linger on him for a moment. The small gesture shouldn’t have meant anything, but something about the way his fingers moved so delicately over the screen made you pause. Then you saw it—the photo behind his clear phone case.

“That’s from Mexico,” you said without thinking. 

Logan glanced at you, then back at his phone, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “Yeah. My favourite from the album you gave me.”

You blinked, remembering the moment instantly—tossing shoes over a power line, him carrying you home, Alex doing what he did best—interrupting.

“I know it’s slightly pathetic, but that was one of the best days of my life,” Logan admitted, shying away from looking at you. 

It had been one of the few peaceful moments amidst the storm of races, pressure, and long, chaotic nights. It was supposed to be just another moment, but it had become more. You both knew it meant so much more. 

“It’s not pathetic, Logan. At least, I don’t think so,” you reassured him. Your heart clenched at his honesty, but you felt it all the same as him. 

Logan let out a small breath of laughter, but the smile that accompanied it didn’t reach his eyes. He slid his phone back into his pocket, but the photo lingered in your mind. Logan glanced back at the ballroom, then back at you, his gaze lingering as if he was working up the courage to say something else.

But then his eyes dropped, right to where your arm touched against your ribs, a small glint of ink peeking out, darker than any of your other tattoos. Logan froze. 

“That’s my number…” he said, his voice soft with disbelief. 

You felt your breath hitch as he stared at it. You instinctively rubbed your fingers over the tattoo, tracing the outline of the small F1 car inked delicately with his racing number on the nose. You suddenly felt very exposed, but not in a bad way. You moved your arm to give him a better view. 

“What other number could I possibly have picked?” you wondered, tilting your head. “I did tell you that I was planning to get one.” 

His hand nervously reached for yours, his thumb brushing over the tattoo with tenderness, touching you in a way he hadn’t before. The new ink sat just centimetres above the tiny paw prints you had in memory of Tater Tot. Logan could’ve cried on the spot. 

“I really like it,” he whispered. 

He dared to meet your gaze. You stood there in silence for a moment, the weight of everything between you suddenly heavier than ever. His thumb continued to caress the tattoo. 

“Are we okay, Logan?”

He exhaled as you asked it, out of relief it seemed. 

“I thought everything would be different, seeing you again,” Logan explained. “But I strangely feel like nothing has changed since Vegas.” 

You nodded, a smile creeping up on your face, as you could only agree with him. The distance, the time apart, hadn’t dulled anything between you. If anything, it had only clarified what had always been there.

In the background, you could still hear the music play loudly from inside the ballroom. Your sister and her mechanic were long gone from the garden. You had nothing to worry about and everything to win. 

“So… how do you feel about dancing at weddings, Sargeant?” 

. . .

The manor had rooms for all the guests to stay overnight. You stumbled into yours in the small hours of the night—tipsy from champagne, tired from dancing. Logan was right behind you, laughing at you almost falling over from trying to unclasp your heels.

“Need some help there?” Logan teased.

“I’ve got it,” you mumbled, finally getting them off to feel the carpet against your bare feet.

Logan took a stance by the window, hands shoved into the pockets of his navy suit pants, looking out onto the moonlit garden. His jaw was tense, a sign that he was thinking—no, overthinking.

You watched him for a moment, how his fingers flexed slightly in his pockets, how his shoulders rose and fell with a breath, before you went into the en suite bathroom, desperate to get your makeup off after wearing it all day. It was an oddly familiar feeling, being alone with him in a hotel room.

The rest of the wedding had been so lovely. It hadn’t mattered much about what had been left unsaid, but instead what mattered was the way you acted towards each other now. You had been bracing yourself for the moment it all would break loose the entire night, ever since your eyes met his across the reception hall, but you had no idea how to start.

It turned out, you didn’t have to.

“You wanna know something?” Logan’s voice was slow, his back still turned against you, as he spoke. He waited for you to say something, but all you did was mumble a huh from the bathroom, clearly more focused on your makeup than on him.

He took a breath, slowly turning to you. He felt himself melt at the sight of you—in your pretty dress and a squeaky clean bare face. His gaze held yours, and in that quiet second, the world shifted.

“I’m tired of acting like I’m not in love with you.”

The words slipped from his lips easily, almost like they had always been there, waiting for this moment to escape.

You froze in your movement, putting your skincare back in your makeup bag, not sure that you had heard him correctly. “What?”

“I said,” Logan repeated, a touch firmer, “I’m tired of acting like I’m not in love with you.”

You stepped away from the sink, opting to stand in the doorway instead as you watched him—how emotions washed over his face like colours melting together in a sunset. You had a hard time hiding the smile that began to form on your face. “You’re in love with me?”

Logan shifted, looking almost sheepish as he rubbed the back of his neck. “Don’t look so smug,” he muttered, though a smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth. “You’re gonna make me regret saying anything.”

But you didn’t feel smug—not in the slightest. Your chest instead filled with warmth, something dangerously close to… well, love.

“Well, excuse me for being a little happy about the fact that you love me back,” you said, almost argumentatively, crossing your arms.

“Back? You love me too?” Logan walked closer, almost stumbling as he passed the corner of the bed.

“Yeah, dumbass.” You rolled your eyes at his oblivion. “I’ve had a crush on you since before you even knew I existed.”

“A crush?” Logan chuckled, a sound full of disbelief and a little wonder. “How long have you—”

“Since Baku,” you interrupted, your voice quieter now, more serious. “I think I’ve loved you since you stayed with me in Baku.”

That admission hung in the air, heavy with memories of long flights, foreign cities, whispered conversations in crowded spaces, and the closeness that had grown between you. Logan stared at you like he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.

Maybe the two of you hadn’t exactly known what the other wanted to say, that last night in Vegas. Or maybe, neither of you could’ve expected the intensity of emotions that would come to the surface when you finally did get to say what you had wanted to.

“Why are you still standing so far away?” Logan took a deep breath, his heart pounding against his ribs. “Come take what’s yours,” he then whispered, his voice a soft command that sent shivers down your spine.

You didn’t need to be told twice.

Without another thought, you exited the bathroom and crossed the room in a few quick strides. You felt your pulse thrumming in your ears as you reached him, and without hesitation, you slid your hands up his chest, feeling a steady heartbeat beneath your palms.

Logan’s arms closed around you, his warm hands brushing the skin of your back, exposed by the low hem of your dress. He pulled you closer, until there was no space left between you.

His lips found yours, soft and sure. You melted into the kiss, into him. This time, there was no one to interrupt you. Months of longing and unspoken feelings poured into one single moment.

As soon as Logan felt you smile against his lips, he was sure world peace was achievable. With more confidence, he kissed you with a feverish intent, slipping his tongue in your mouth, falling backwards onto the mattress with you on top of him.

Moving your legs, you straddled his lap, sinking down comfortably on top of him while you put your arms around him. He rested against the bed frame, hair getting messed up as your fingers played at the nape of his neck. You continued to kiss, his hands rushing to touch your body—one on your cheek and the other on your waist. Your dress bunched up around your thighs as you pressed closer to him, feeling the heat of his body through layers of fabric.

You pulled apart after a moment, but only far enough to inhale, your noses still touching. The room was dead quiet, save for the panting sound of your breathing.

“You have no idea the things I’ve wanted to say to you,” Logan murmured, resting his forehead against yours. “The things I’ve held back…” he added softly, his thumb now gently stroking the side of your face.

“You could tell them to me now,” you teased, sneaking in a small peck. A smirk tugged at the corner of Logan’s lips. “My brain can’t really focus when you’re sat on me like this,” he said, his fingers tracing slow circles along the exposed skin of your upper thigh.

You bit your bottom lip, brain filled with lust and sudden bravery. “Unzip me, please?”

“Should we— I just don’t want to rush anything,” Logan mumbled out of nervousness.

“You don’t think a year worth of tension is enough?” you whispered, smiling.

Logan swallowed, his hand daring to move behind you. The sound of your zipper easily sliding open filled the silence between you as his fingers delicately touched your exposed back. His eyes never left your body as the thin straps fell off your shoulders, the top half of your dress pooling around your waist. With a soft tug, you were all exposed. The white lace of your bra doing almost nothing to conceal your chest.

You were privy to his persistent stare at your body. You couldn’t pretend you weren’t, and your satisfaction was hard to withhold, a devious smile forming on your lips. His hands moved under your skirt, gently lifting it over your head, revealing delicate white lace panties that matched your bra.

“Did you plan this?” Logan had to fight himself to not let his jaw physically drop at the sight of you.

He held a certain emotion in the way he looked at you. You’d seen desire before in a lover’s eyes. This was softer. This was different. Devotion, maybe. Love, most definitely.

“Better safe than sorry,” you shrugged.

With a soft exhale, he chuckled in utter disbelief. Dipping his head, he couldn’t help but kiss the valley between your breasts, nipping and sucking at the soft skin. His hair tickled against your neck as his mouth explored, surely leaving a mark or two.

With a quick movement, he unclasped your bra, discarding it as he continued to kiss your skin. Your breasts, your collarbones, your neck and jaw. He even moved to kiss a spot on your arm, making sure you took notice at how his lips gently pressed against your tattoo of his racing number.

You both took a moment, letting your eyes linger on each other’s. It was hard to find things to say, but you guessed the silence, panting breaths and growing humidity were enough to express what you both wanted.

Your fingers diligently started to unbutton his shirt, leaving kisses on his neck and sternum as each inch of his skin was revealed for you. When you reached the last button, your hands dangerously close to his lower stomach, Logan moved swiftly to remove his shirt in one go, tossing it on the floor to land next to your dress.

Immediately, you sunk your fingers back into his blond waves, tugging lightly as you kissed his swollen lips. He matched your ferocity, sliding his hands from your waist down to your ass, squeezing over the soft lace. Both of you groaned at the feeling of your hips grinding down onto the fabric covering his growing hardness, almost a surprised feeling at how quickly it all had evolved.

“I’m starting to think you might like me or something,” you giggled, like an angel.

Logan wanted to argue. He wanted to say something witty. But he had no choice. With your wandering hands, all he could do was bite down on his lip to drown a pathetic moan trying to escape. With your wandering hands, you pulled his zipper open, helping him out of the rest of his clothes.

His cock sat hard in the space between your bodies, and as you tentatively touched him, feeling hot and heavy in your hand, he whined out a sting of curses. His stomach flexed as he ached for real friction, your hand only lazily stroking him. He groaned, head falling back to hit the headboard. The loveliest of pinks suffused his cheeks, a trail of rose-coloured blotches lingering all the way down his chest.

He tried to drag you closer to him with a firm grip on your hips, desperately searching for more. His hand found its way down between your legs, gently touching over a wet patch that had formed on your panties.

You hummed at the sensation, kissing his jawline, feeling him tense at your touch. “Can I ride you?”

“Mhm, yeah… you want that?” Logan panted, gentle little breaths pushing past his lips.

Nodding enthusiastically, you placed your bottom lip between your teeth as you looked at him, eyes darkened. “I have condoms in the bathroom,” you said getting off of his lap, walking over. At the loss of touch, Logan couldn’t help but audibly whine.

You made a point to shake your hips as you walked. You knew you had his eyes on you. After fetching the little foil packet from your makeup bag, you stopped in the doorway to pull your underwear off, dragging the flimsy lace agonisingly slowly down your legs as Logan could only watch.

“You look heavenly,” he whispered as you towered over him to kiss him, before straddling his lap again, your naked body finally touching his without anything in between.

Logan swallowed his moans as you carefully tore open the condom packet and rolled it over his sensitive length. He helped you lift you up on your knees, enough to align himself with your soaking entrance. A year of tension really was enough foreplay. Fluttering around him, you adjusted to all of him, carefully and slowly moving into a perfect rhythm.

You couldn’t be held responsible for the words and sounds leaving your mouth as you rocked against him. His hands gripped your waist and then your ass, kneading the soft flesh, spilling out between his fingers. You heard him suck in a breath as your fingers got entangled in his hair, gently pulling at the ends.

“Logan,” his name left your mouth with a delicate whine.

“Hm?”

You needed him to look at you. Logan’s hand found home on your cheeks, keeping his eyes tightly locked with yours as you connected in the most primal way. “Tell me I’m yours,” he whispered gently, feeling himself bottom out inside of you.

“You’re mine, all mine, baby,” you reassured, finding his lips for a messy kiss.

Slowly, you started bouncing faster, Logan’s hands guided you, helping you with every move, rise and fall. You were both stuttering out moans at the almost overwhelming feeling—the wetness, the squeezing, the friction.

It didn’t take long before you were both panting, flushed messes, the movement slowing down as the desperate feeling of release grew stronger.

“Are your legs getting tired?” Logan asked, voice hoarse. “F-fuck, let me help.”

He tilted you, shifting to a more horizontal position, as he wrapped his arms around your waist, letting you bury your face in the crook of his neck, sucking and kissing wherever you could reach. With forceful thrusts, he up fucked into you, digging his fingers into the fat of your hips to pull you even closer.

He took care of you. Your tits bounced against him as you moved together. The tension inside of you only growing and spiralling. Logan reached between your bodies, moving his limber fingers to circle your puffy clit.

You repeated his name through broken moans, all choked and caught in your throat, as he continued his mission. Through deep breaths, you got lost in the scent of him. Cologne, musky and warm. It was almost distracting, until he reached a soft spot, thrusting inside of you.

“I’ve got you,” he reassured. “I’m right here, let it all out.” Logan brought you over the edge. You bit down on his shoulder as the feeling washed over you, a white fire lighting from inside of you. His writhing against you told you he wasn’t long after, filling the condom as he rode out both of your highs. He rested still inside of you for a while as you both caught your breaths.

You needed help to get off him, your legs still shaking. With a tired moan, he slipped out and you collapsed on the bed next to him, feeling the sheets ruffle around you. Logan glimmered under the moonlight seeping in through the windows, as sweat stuck to his flushed skin. His outgrown hair falling over his forehead.

You faced each other on the bed, your voices barely above whispers, not necessarily thanking each other, but more just mumbles about how special this felt. Logan’s hand found your arm, delicately tracing the car tattooed on your bicep. It tickled, so you let out a breathy laugh as you placed your hand on top of his.

Logan’s lips curled into a lazy smile as he felt your reaction. “Did you get any other tattoos?”

“Nope,” you replied, shaking your head lightly. “I think you’ve seen them all now.”

There was a softness in his expression that made you feel safer than ever before. It was the kind of comfort that came with time, with knowing someone deeply and being known in return.

“When did you know that you liked me?” you asked suddenly, thinking back to your own admission about falling for the sight of him through your lens before you had even had a conversation together.

“In Australia,” he said after a beat, his voice gentle. “You were talking so fondly about tater tots.”

“Tater tots?” you echoed with a grin. “That’s when you knew?”

You had a feeling it wasn’t only about your love for fried potatoes, thinking about what had happened just moments before that conversation. He had started to like you because you cared about him in a moment where he felt his weakest.

“I was quietly observing you before that, but I think that was our first actual conversation,” Logan said, reminiscing. “And then,” he continued, his tone growing softer, “I just kept falling for you. Every city, every race, every little thing you did.”

Your heart warmed in your chest as his words washed over you. You felt the pull of the past, the shared experiences, the way your lives had intertwined across the globe.

“Seeing you throw your sneakers over the power line in Mexico made me realise that I love you,” Logan finally whispered.

“I love you too,” you mumbled against his lips, reaching to gently kiss him again… and again.

Afterward, you left the bed to take a moment for yourself in the bathroom. Discarding the condom, peeing to prevent a UTI, staring at yourself in the mirror for an undisclosed amount of time. You looked like a mess, but a beautiful mess—with splotchy love bites and scratches.

You turned the shower on, knowing that you wouldn’t be able to sleep if you didn’t get the clinging feeling of sweat off your body.

“Are you getting in with me?” you asked Logan, peeping out behind the bathroom door to hide your naked body, spotting him still sat on the bed, the sheets covering him.

Logan lifted his gaze from the floor, meeting yours with a slow smile. He didn’t move; he only tilted his head in thought. “Why does that feel more intimate than what we just did?”

“Because it is,” you hesitantly answered, fidgeting with your fingers as your nails tapped on the door.

It didn’t take long for you both to be drenched and humid in the warm water of the shower, not having any hurry of getting out, steam fogging up the bathroom. You were just enjoying the closeness for now. Body against body. Your hands massaged his scalp as you washed shampoo out of it.

“Soo…” Logan began, dragging out the word, droplets were falling from his hair over his face. “What happens now?”

“Round two?” you teased, buying yourself a moment to think about the actual implication of his question.

Logan chuckled, but waited for a true answer. Round two was inevitable. He was asking something deeper.

“I’ve got nothing to do and a newfound love for racing and the US,” you finally said, easy as pie. “You should take advantage of that.”

“I think I might,” he smiled. “Life is a lot better with you close.”

You reached up to cup his cheeks, the pads of your thumbs gently rubbing over his pink cheekbones. His eyes looked onto yours, pulling you closer as his hands found the curve of your waist, the water still falling on you like an outburst of rain from a stormy sky, electricity unloading.

“We’ll be alright, I think,” you mumbled, gracefully placing a kiss on his wet lips.

Logan’s voice echoed softly in the bathroom, words leaving with an unusual certainty.

“I’m starting to think so too.”

Thank you for reading! ♡ Please comment, reblog, like or send me a messenger pigeon.

I'm calling this beast my best attempt at a fix-it fic. This was a nightmare and tumblr's paragraph limit is my mortal enemy. I had to remove like three scenes to even fit all of this which messed up the timeline like crazy. The title is from Worst Case Kid by Tommy Lefroy!

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A must read on my list ^^

everything.

ln x fem!reader

in which you’re his best friend until you’re something more

hi! here you go lmao. probs the fluffiest thing i’ve ever written and i am obsessed with the concept! thank you for being here and baring with me - i loved writing this one and i’d love to hear what you think! huge shoutout to my girlies @mcmuppet and @lavenderlando ily both!

songs that set the mood: pink and white by frank ocean, daylight by harry styles, angel by finneas, enchanted by taylor swift, hate to be lame by lizzy mcalpine

warnings: 18+!! minors dni!! smut, language, friends to lovers brain rot, slight corruption kink, readers first time, qatar angst

6.4k words

“do you wanna talk about it?” you whispered softly, your hand resting on lando’s sagged shoulder.

your eyes were fixed on the third place plaque on his table in front of you, his very much fixed on the floor.

“no.” his reply was short and sweet, his tone conveying exactly how deflated he was.

you’d only flown in to qatar this morning, the october sun hitting you hard as you walked into the paddock, drastically different to the london climate you’d grown accustomed to. lando had all but begged you to come, your evening before spent on the phone, and you knew that he needed a friend, otherwise he never would have asked you to fly halfway around the world.

friends. that’s what you were.

you’d hugged him tight and told him that the weekend had to get better, and then his teammate put it on pole and got his first win. so, yeah, maybe it wasn’t going to get better and not even the podium could cheer him up.

his radio messages had hurt your heart, your chest aching as he self deprecated in the cockpit. he owned his mistakes, sure, but he’d taken it a step too far and you knew you had a job to do. you’d do anything, quite literally anything, to cheer him up.

you’d always found a way to be there for eachother, your friendship spanning five long years after you’d knocked a coffee over a guy you quickly recognised as the new mclaren driver. both nineteen and awkward as hell, you’d um-ed and er-ed and danced around one another in the busy pret in central london, chucking tissues at him, attempting to mop up the frothy mess all over his white sweatshirt.

eventually you’d just burst into laughter, lando immediately following suit. your cheeks were hurting from smiling at the curly haired stranger, intrigued by the very way his faced moved when he laughed, and he’d looked at you like you hung the stars in the sky, not like someone that had just destroyed a brand new hoodie.

and just like that, a connection was born.

you’d gotten used to having a friend for only half the year, but he never let you feel the distance. paddock passes often fell through your letter box and you could usually be located in the background of his streams when he was home long enough to do them, the amount of times you’d been wrongfully accused of being his girlfriend a list as long as your arm. even in those moments of awkwardness, friendship prevailed and you both managed to crack up together about the conspiracy that you were more than friends.

and what an intriguing conspiracy it was.

“we should get you back to the hotel, you need to get some rest.” you told him, standing from the sofa and offering him your hand.

lando grabbed it, squeezing, his own special way of telling you he was grateful for your presence, and let you pull him up. as he tried to walk towards the door, you stopped him, hands on his shoulders. you wanted to shake him, tell him how fucking great he was. you didn’t think he’d appreciate that after an intense session in the car.

“hey, look at me. you got this, okay?” you smiled reassuringly, managing to get the smallest crack back from him, his lips upturning ever so slightly. something in his eyes told you that you’d succeeded, a small glimmer of an emotion that you didn’t know how to unpack.

friends.

that’s what you were.

-

you tried to ignore how touchy lando was being. you figured he just needed some comfort, physical touch not out of bounds in your friendship, but a new level had been reached.

on the entire walk through the paddock to his car, his hand sat comfortably on the small of your back, despite the endless amount of cameras pointed at you. his hand skimmed your thigh in the car, accidentally, you told yourself, and you had to avert your eyes when his hand graced your headrest as he reversed out of the parking space. knowing that he needed you in qatar so desperately that he’d flown you out was one thing, the way he was treating you once you got there was something else.

he’d opened your door when you pulled up at the hotel valet, helping you out of the car, his hand tucked in yours for a second longer than necessary. once again, his hand seemed to be glued to your lower back the whole way to the elevator.

the ding of the lift had you both shuffling out onto your floor, trailing towards your rooms in a heavy silence, something more left unsaid in the air.

you reached your door first, coming to a stop and shuffling around in your bag for your keycard.

“um, i need to be at the track early tomorrow. breakfast?” lando asked.

you turned to look at him, nodding your head profusely.

“of course, just drop me a message and i’ll come down and meet you.” you affirmed, your fingers finally grasping the piece of plastic that had, of course, fallen to the very bottom of your tardis of a tote bag.

you expected him to leave, but he lingered, as if there was something else on his mind.

“you okay?” you raised an eyebrow, unlocking your door. lando seemed to snap out of it then, awkwardly running a hand through his curls that had taken a brutal hit from the humidity. you liked the look on him, nonetheless.

“yeah, i- yeah, i think i just need some sleep.”

“okay, well, goodnight. let me know if you need anything.” you disappeared through the door then, the tension getting the better of you. you slumped against the shut door, wondering what he so clearly wanted to say.

-

the clock read 1:32am on your bedside.

a faint tapping had woken you up, and you groggily scanned the room, trying to find the source of the noise. you deduced that it was coming from your door, letting out a groan as you threw the cosy comforter off and trudged towards the disturbance.

you cracked it open, peeking through the gap and coming face to face with your best friend.

“lando?” you croaked, opening the door further.

“i’m sorry, can’t sleep. can i come in? it’s okay if not, i just didn’t know what to do.” he sounded so shy, something you didn’t recognise in the man stood before you, and you quickly swung the door open, ushering him inside.

“come, sit.” you waved for him to follow you across the room to the foot of your bed. he sat down beside you, the mattress dipping.

you patted your lap and he instantly knew what to do, laying down with his head in your lap. it’s something he did quite frequently when you were sprawled on his sofa at home, watching a shitty movie that neither of you were really paying attention to. you’d often be looking at him, praying he didn’t notice, and he’d be playing with your fingers, tracing the palm of your hand.

you couldn’t help yourself, running your hand through his curls. you didn’t mean to, stomach instantly twisting with embarrassment, but it was quickly twisting with something else. his eyes fluttered shut, a low groan falling from the back of his throat. it made your thighs clench, and he must have noticed, the tiniest smirk on his face.

“you okay?” lando asked, his eyes still shut, a look of relaxation finally on his face.

you coughed awkwardly.

“yeah, sorry. are you comfy?” you said teasingly, trying to cut the growing tension in the room.

“i am now, could fall asleep here.”

“you can, you know.” you whispered. his eyes flew open. your heart was hammering in your chest. this was new territory and you were worried you’d fucked up. sleepovers were also a norm, but one of you usually retired to a guest room, not the other side of eachothers beds.

“you want me to stay?” his voice rose in surprise.

“well, i mean, you can if you want, like, there’s space and-“ you rambled.

“do you want me to stay?” he repeated.

“is it gonna help?” you questioned cautiously.

“yes.” the confidence in which he replied did something to you.

“then stay.”

you crawled up the mattress, falling back into the place you’d so comfortably occupied just minutes before. you laid so still, watching with quiet curiosity as he slipped his hoodie off. his shirt came with it ever so slightly, riding up over his back, and you had to pry your eyes away, the ache between your thighs still ever present.

what on earth were you doing, allowing your best friend to crawl into bed with you? emotions were running so high, but it felt like a switch had been flipped ever since you hit the tarmac in qatar. every look, every touch was fuelled by something different to what it had been before and you weren’t sure if it was a good thing or not.

lando turned towards you, making his way back over to the bed. he looked apprehensive, as if he was thinking the same thoughts as you, wondering if there was any logic in what was about to happen. he seemed to come to the conclusion that this was, in fact, happening, crawling into bed beside you.

“is this okay?” lando breathed into the darkness of the room, his hand brushing yours. you were both as still as planks, mere centimetres separating you, the only light coming from the lamp beside the bed.

“yeah,” you took a deep breath, preparing for the words that were about to come tumbling out. “i’ve just never done this before.” you spoke quickly, sucking in another breath as you finished.

“you’ve never…”

“i’ve never shared a bed… like this.”

“like what?”

“with a… a guy?” your anxiety riddled words came out more like a question than an answer.

“oh. oh.” it seemed to dawn on lando then. “so, you’ve never… oh. i mean i can go if you’re uncomfortable.”

“lando, no, i just wanted you to know. i’m always comfortable with you.” you said, quietly baring your soul to him.

you weren’t sure why you’d basically told him you were a virgin. it held no relevance, he was just here to sleep, for some friendly comfort. he was not here for any other reason. and yet here you were, spilling the beans, all over the bed you found yourself sharing.

“i didn’t come here to, you know. i just needed you.”

you tried to ignore the pang in your chest and the annoying, minuscule butterfly springing to life in your belly.

“god, yeah i know! i didn’t think that you wanted to, well i mean not with me because why would you want me like that anyway, i get why you’re here, lando.” you rambled into the empty air. you heard yourself, groaning in embarrassment and dragging the cover over your face. lando laughed, pulling it back so he could see you again.

he was leaning over you, perched on his side, resting on his elbow.

“trust me, i’m more than happy with any part of yourself that you wanna give me.”

“don’t tease me, lando.” you scoffed. he was joking, right? right?

“i’m not! i promise, this is the one place i want to be.”

“why? why with me? i mean you could’ve called max. all he does is stream when you’re not home, think he misses you.” you were half joking, half deadly serious.

“come on, it’s you. it’s just… its been so hard this year, being away from you so much more. and then you came all the way here…” lando trailed off, averting eye contact.

you turned on your side to face him, placing your hand over his affectionately.

“you needed me.”

“exactly. i needed you. you.”

he gave you a look, one that you didn’t recognise, but you understood what it meant. it said more than anything had done since this confusingly beautiful interaction began. you got it, then, why you were here.

“lando-“

“i know that i shouldn’t tell you this and i can’t just spring this on you in the middle of the night, but i-“

“lando!”

“what?”

“kiss me.”

and god, he kissed you. the air was sucked out of your lungs, dragged out of you by the way he put his hands on your body, so urgent.

you sunk back into the mattress, his body over yours, a hand cupping your cheek while the other rested on your waist, stroking the skin there, exposed from your ridden up top. your hands were in his curls, and you revelled in the way that you could shamelessly touch them now.

he paused for a second, nose brushing yours, breathless and grinning down at you, a knowing smile that was so beautiful that it rendered you speechless.

“you have no idea how long i’ve waited for this.” lando breathed, scanning your face as if he was trying to take it all in. you, panting beneath him, coy smile, cheeks flushed. you’d never looked so gorgeous to him.

you leaned in to kiss him again, slower this time, relishing in the moment. you were lost in him, thinking back to the very first time you’d locked eyes and how you never thought it would come to this. this, the way he was holding you, was the best surprise.

lando pulled away, peppering your flushed cheeks with kisses, a dazed giggle passing your swollen lips.

he flopped onto his side, grinning at the ceiling mindlessly. you hadn’t seen him smile that big all weekend.

“are you tired?” you whispered, lips brushing his cheek, his light stubble rough against you. you wondered how it would feel elsewhere, scratching over your bare skin.

“no.”

“then why did you stop?” you asked, the words falling off your tongue slowly, sinking all over him like honey. you felt the way he tensed up, the suggestion that laced the seemingly innocent question making you tingle.

“i didn’t come here for that.” he reiterated.

“and i didn’t let you in for that. but here we are.” you weren’t ashamed of what you were asking, the moment was right, the one, and you knew it.

“it’s too soon.” lando was apprehensive. he was always overly protective of you, previously as his friend, but this, god, this was an entirely different ball park and he was proceeding with caution, against every natural instinct in his body screaming at him.

“says who?”

“it’s your first. it needs to be special.”

“everything about this is better than i could have ever imagined.”

“are you sure you want it to be me?” there it was again, those unrecognisable nerves that made everything inside of you flutter.

“lando, there is no one else i could ever want to do this with more than i want to do it with you. i want it to be you.”

“but… now? are you sure? i don’t want you to regret this.”

“the only thing i regret is that this didn’t happen sooner.”

“one last time. i just need to hear it one last time.”

“i want you, lando.”

and with that, the air changed, charged with a different kind of tension. lando pulled you on top of him, hands firm on your body, the action itself gentle. you steadied yourself, hands on his shoulders, his resting on your waist.

“can i take this off?” he tugged at the hem of your shirt. you nodded profusely. “words, sweetheart. i need you to use your words.” lando cupped your jaw as he said it, squeezing ever so slightly, enough to turn you into putty in his hands.

“please. yes.” you said shakily.

he smiled softly, slowly peeling the material off of your body, up over your head and tossed carelessly onto the floor. he kept his eyes on yours, despite the fact you were now left bare, aside from the white cotton panties that separated you both. he pawed at your sides, kneading gently at your soft hips.

“we’re gonna start slow, okay? gonna take my time with you.” he muttered, eyes on yours before they trailed slowly down, across your face, neck, collarbone, further and further until he was taking all of you in. he began to stroke the underside of your breast with his thumb, watching the way your body tensed under his feather-like touch.

“okay.” you choked out, head tipping back as he placed a kiss to the base of your throat.

his kiss trailed further down your body, peppered in the valley of your breasts, and then you stopped breathing, the air caught in your throat because he was looking at you, really, truly looking at you, as his tongue found your nipple. you couldn’t take your eyes off of him, not when he was looking at you like that, not when he was making you feel this good already.

lando pulled away, just for a second, just so that he could shift you from his lap onto his thigh. he was still fully clothed beneath you, totally in control, and you craved him in a way you didn’t know was humanly possible, so much so that you didn’t need the encouragement he was giving you to start rolling your hips, pussy grinding down on his covered thighs, the friction of your underwear driving you insane.

“oh, baby. you want me so badly, don’t you? should’ve asked me sooner. m’gonna make you feel so good.” his hands were on your hips, guiding you backwards and forwards on him.

“it feels so- oh, god.” you whimpered, fingers tangling in his curls, back arching further into him as your thighs clenched around his. he licked over your collarbone oh so slowly, a shiver running down your taut spine.

and then he was kissing you again, tongue slow over yours, his fingertips surely leaving marks where he was controlling your pace. the kiss was filthy, untameable, and you found yourself dragging against him slower, harder.

“i need you.” you panted, forehead falling on his shoulder as you pulled away from his lips, goosebumps pricking your sweat slicked skin. you were so close to an orgasm, desperate to feel him everywhere.

“i want you to come for me like this first, okay? can you do that for me, baby?” he cooed, bouncing his leg ever so slightly. “look at me.” and you did, somehow mustering the strength to pull yourself back up and find his darkened eyes.

you were a mess of curses when you let go, your body convulsing, collapsing into him as you came. you were throbbing on his thigh, one glance down at where you were grinding against him displaying your slick. his arms went around your body, flipping you onto your back so that you were resting against the mattress.

“you did so well, baby.” lando crooned, resting over you on his forearms. you stared up at him in awe, blinking away the haze. “do you want more?”

“i want everything.” you breathed, pulling him against you. you smoothed your hands over his shirt until you reached the hem, dragging it up over his back. he helped you take it off, and then it was lost to the room. you grabbed at his shoulder blades, smooth, muscular planes of bronzed skin so warm under your touch. you felt insatiable, like nothing was enough, totally intoxicated by him and everything he was managing to make you feel.

lando’s hand slid down your body, searching for the band of your underwear. when he reached his destination, he toyed with the lacy edges, letting them snap against the pudge of your belly, teasing you. you bucked your hips, frustrated, and he used the opportunity to cup your pussy, feeling where you’d soaked through the cotton. the groan he let out was carnal, animalistic, almost needy. he could feel all of you, how you ached and dripped, how you needed the everything that you’d requested.

“you’re so fucking good for me, god.” lando almost slurred his words, voice lower than you’d ever heard it. you keened at the sound, pushing your hips further into him.

lando didn’t give you much time to dwell on it, mouth latching onto your underwear where it met the crease of your thigh. he was so close, so tantalising close to where you were aching for him and you were just about levitating off the bed when his teeth grazed your inner thigh. you couldn’t see him looking at you, losing it, inhibitions out the window. your eyes were already squeezed shut when he began mouthing over your cloth-covered pussy, spit further ruining the sodden material.

“take them off.” you cried out, tugging hard at his curls that you hadn’t even realised you were clutching for dear life. and lando was a good listener, because he complied immediately, tearing the lace down your legs like a starved man.

his tongue was on you then, everywhere all at once, running through your folds and over your clit. you didn’t know if you were dead or alive, a different kind of pleasure than anything you’d ever experienced coursing hot through your veins. lando switched between long, slow licks, his tongue flat against you, and rapid kitten licks, burying his face in your cunt.

everything was moving in slow motion, your hands grasping frantically at anything you could reach; his curls, the sheets, his shoulders. you could barely make out what he was saying, his words muffled, lost to the soft flesh between your legs. it seemed to echo, every lick, stroke, word. you snapped out of it, finally, when he pulled away.

“more? you want my fingers, baby? gonna get you nice and ready for me.” you just nodded, voice lost to the air of the room.

one arm locked around your thigh, pinning you still, and the other snaked up your leg until he reached the mess between your thighs. he took a moment to take it in, how wet you were, how fucked out you looked, knowing full well he must have looked the same, unhinged as he gave into your shared desire that he’d tried his best to keep hidden. he’d never felt more stupid in his life for holding back, as he took in the ethereal delight sprawled under his touch.

when lando slid the first finger in, your stomach twisted deliciously. he watched you carefully, searching for discomfort but all he could find was sheer bliss, written all over your face as clear as daylight. he worked the digit in and out, nice and slow, curling against your walls. he could feel how tight you were, clamping around just one finger and he thought his head was gonna explode. he added another finger, watching the way you took him in, twisting his fingers.

“are you gonna let go for me again, sweetheart?” lando punctuated his words by putting his mouth back on you, teeth grazing your clit as he sucked.

you were thrashing, a silent scream building from the fire in your belly. you could just about make out the way he was spurring you on, his mouth running as you spilled over the edge, covering his fingers. you saw white, maybe god, ears ringing, and when you finally mustered the energy to look at him, you could have come for a third time. lando looked feral, lips red and coated in everything you had to offer him. his eyes were glazed over, a hazy grey that sent a jolt through your body, the aftershocks of the orgasm setting in.

“christ.” was all you could sigh out. a lazy smile painted your face, your eyes blown out, everything a little blurry. everything except him.

you could feel him scaling up your body, crawling over you until he was level with your face. he placed a kiss to your throat, your jaw and finally your lips; when he pulled away all that was left was shared giddy smile, both of you suddenly shy. you couldn’t stop the roaming of your hands, exploring all the parts of him that you could reach. when you found the waist band of his joggers, your hand grazing his abs as you did, he sucked all of the air out of the room, a sharp inhalation making him tense up.

“you still want all of me?” he breathed, his shaky breath fanning your face. lando was obsessed with hearing you say it, obsessed with how you wanted him as much as he needed you.

“all of you. lando, this is… you’re perfect.” you admitted, lips brushing his. your hands pushed the material down his hips, nails raking over him as you did. he couldn’t seem to wait any longer, kicking them off the rest of the way, his boxers quickly following suit.

you couldn’t help but stare, all of him bare against all of you. your nipples brushed his chest, his hands holding you close, your hands threaded through his curls. it was like you were sussing each other out, eyes watching lips and hands getting lost. you stayed like that for a moment, pressed together, closer and closer, until he was slotted between your legs like he was coming home. lando searched your face one last time, hunting for a smidge of discomfort.

“are you ready for me?” he whispered.

“yes.”

the initial stretch burned, but he slid into you smoothly, his cock slipping through your folds with ease. he felt you clamp down on him, his head thrown back as far as it could go, thick neck exposed to you. you bit down on his shoulder, where it met the base of his throat, trying to mask the gasp of pleasure that sent your eyes rolling back in your head. he grunted at the sensation, enjoying the sting.

“oh, fuck.” he was shuddering, trying to keep himself in check.

“don’t, oh god,” you started, meeting the roll of his hips. “don’t hold back.”

“we gotta go easy.”

“i don’t want easy.” you tightened around him then, and he saw stars.

“you’re so fucking good.” lando groaned, an edge of excitement in his voice, and then he unleashed everything that he’d held back. how much he wanted you, and a bittersweet weekend of frustration versus success came crashing down and he couldn’t do anything except give himself to you exactly how you wanted.

lando was a delicious weight on top of you, the drag of his hips slow, meeting yours hard. the pressure made you lightheaded, his body moving against yours like the thick drip of honey, smooth and sweet. you couldn’t make sense of it, of how fucking good he felt, grinding deeper and deeper into you like he’d found buried treasure. the overstimulation had your third orgasm building nice and quick, waves of pleasure making you dizzy.

“you like it like this? like when i fuck you nice and hard?” yes you did. “don’t think i can go without this now, you know that? such a good fucking girl.” you couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, just let his words wash over you. “so beautiful, taking me so well.”

you couldn’t process that this was your best friend lando. this was a different person, it had to be. yet, somehow, it made sense that the man you knew, the one who spoke his mind, mischievous and troublesome, would be like this, a god above you as he fucked deeper into you with every thrust. he was filthy and gentle, brutal and sweet. it didn’t make sense, but it also just did.

“are you gonna come for me? one more time, baby. need to feel that perfect fucking pussy.” well, his wish was your command, because then you were gushing. the one thing you could feel was him, none of your other senses worked, you couldn’t see past the tears that fell, couldn’t get any words past your lips. maybe you screamed, you weren’t exactly sure.

lando was kissing you everywhere. each hip bone was met with his lips, your stomach, over your ribs, breasts, clavicle, neck. your face was covered in kisses next, your cheeks, forehead, a dainty peck to your nose.

“can you look at me?”

your eyes cracked open slowly, the exhaustion hitting as you came back to reality.

“was that okay?” there he was again, this shy version of lando that you couldn’t get used to.

“okay? lando that was…” you shook your head in awe. “that meant everything to me.”

he smiled then, that gorgeous, gorgeous smile, the one with the crinkles by his eyes and his teeth on full display. you melted.

“me too. you’re fucking beautiful. so, so fucking beautiful. should’ve told you sooner.” he murmured.

his words made you think, way too hard for your current state. what happened next? lando had said some things, some pretty big things that you didn’t know how to comprehend. it was crazy, how scared you were to bring it back up to him, considering he’d just been inside of you.

“sooner?” you whispered, hardly audible. lando was midway through tucking you both into bed, pulling your flushed, naked body into his own under the duvet.

“yes. a lot sooner.” he replied, not a trace of doubt in his voice.

‘how much sooner?’ you thought to yourself, unable to stay awake any longer to agonise over it, your dreams haunted by the way he touched you so well. it was magnificent to fall asleep in his arms, and you couldn’t help yourself from wondering when it would happen again.

-

you woke up tangled with him, fingers stroking your cheek, smoothing your hair out of your eyes.

lando was always so warm, but now his tanned skin radiated sunshine, a beacon of light in your bed. you smiled, eyes still shut, shielding yourself from the streaks of light casting over the room from the crack in the curtains.

“what time is it?” you croaked, bringing a hand to your eyes to rub away the sleep.

“gone eleven. i need to go, baby.”

baby.

you hadn’t gotten a chance to take my notice of the things he’d called you last night, too caught up in the way he played with your body. now that you heard it, in the calm after the storm, it made you swoon.

“already?” you tried to hide your disappointment, not quite ready to detangle yourself from him.

“need to get to the track. i think i’m already late. i just wanted to be here when you woke up.” lando sounded so soft, not as groggy as you, and you wondered how long he’d been awake, watching the soft rise and fall of your chest.

“thank you.” you knew that you’d have spiralled waking up alone, and you were immensely grateful that he’d stayed.

lando began to get up, wincing at your whine of protest.

“i’m sorry. i’ll have someone pick you up later, okay? i’ll see you soon, i promise.”

you knew he had to work hard today, knew how much analysis he needed to do before the race. he was starting further back than anyone would have liked, and he had something to prove as well, oscar starting too close to the front for lando’s liking. there were places to make up and hard work to be done to get back to the front.

“don’t apologise. i hope it goes smoothly today.” you smiled at him, watching him collect his long forgotten clothes. you were entranced by the way his body moved, the lines and shapes that tensed and rippled as he dressed himself.

“i’ll message you.” he promised, creeping back over to the bed. you weren’t sure what to expect, but the soft kiss to your lips, almost apprehensive on his part, could have killed you off, your heart pounding.

your grinned like a fool when the door shut behind him.

-

the shower was burning hot, loosening up your muscles. you cleaned yourself slowly, examining your body, the same one that you’d given to lando. he’d taken you apart, piece by piece, and put you back together, the traces of him that he’d left behind delectably apparent.

you followed the trail of marks he’d left, starting with the love bite below your right breast that you couldn’t even remember him leaving, making your way to the litter of fingerprints that were tattooed into your hips. your fingertips ghosted over your swollen lips, the kiss that he’d left at the junction between your neck and your shoulder, reminiscing the evening. you seemed to ache everywhere, the dull pain setting into your bones so nicely.

you prayed it would happen again. you felt like it would, everything between you had changed now, changed from any possible return to the norm. you wanted it to change, you couldn’t fathom the idea of staying friends when the lines had blurred like this, when he’d kissed you so deeply, touched you so intimately.

the shower was much needed, refreshing your body that was now tainted by him in the best way. you tried to keep a clear head while you got yourself ready, taking your time to make yourself presentable to the paddock. the time of your departure was looming, the pink and white sunset outside your window indicating that the race was only a few hours away. the air had cooled slightly, and you knew you needed to make your way to the lobby.

your phone dinged in your hand as you were packing your essentials into your bag. you glanced down at the device, unruly smile gracing your face.

see you soon, the text read, an orange love heart punctuating the short but sweet text. it was safe to say that the butterflies in your belly were well and truly alive.

-

the screen beeped as you scanned your paddock pass, and you slipped through the gate, making your way into the paddock. it was beautiful in qatar, they’d outdone themselves with this structure, the glass ceilings and jungle of greenery an expression of wealth and elegance.

you made a beeline for the mclaren garage, greeting lando’s pr officer who smiled warmly at you. you recognised oscar smirking as you appeared in the garage, and as you got closer you realised why.

“nice to see you. looking for lando?” his monotonous voice held an amused twang.

“hey oscar, great job last night!” you said, waiting for the other shoe to drop. “yeah, is he around here somewhere?”

“yeah he’s just doing press i think. extra spring in his step today.” oscar gave you a knowing look, one that made you blush.

“what do you know?” you deadpanned, fighting back laughter.

“i know that this was a long time coming.” he smiled, and then he was gone, lost to the bustle of the garage.

you stood there, probably in the way, lost in thought about what oscar had just said. he was right, this was a long time coming.

you jumped a bit when a hand landed on your waist, relaxing instantly into lando’s body when he pressed himself against you, head on your shoulder.

“i’m so glad you’re here.” he whispered, pressing a secret kiss under your ear, and then he, too, was gone, before you could even react.

your nerves were shot, ushered to the back of the garage where you found a headset. you chewed your nails, anxious about it all. the race, the changes that you were surely coming. you wanted it, wanted everything from him that he’d give you, willing to commit to all of it, to him. the distance, borrowed time, chaos of his world. last night had changed everything and you couldn’t have asked for more.

eventually the lights went out and the fight was underway. you found your hands clasped together, sweating in the dry heat and the anxiety. you clapped every time he made an overtake, storming through the field. when he made it into p3, picking the pace up on oscar, the nerves resurged and you prayed for a clean end to this race.

lando’s radio messages flooded your ears, and your leg bounced uncontrollably, your shoe slapping against the floor.

“be sensible, lando.” you muttered under your breath, resting your chin on your tightly clasped hands. he would be on the podium, but you knew it wasn’t enough for him, it never was. would you be enough for him?

eventually he agreed to hold position, thank fuck, and you could breathe again. he’d driven a beautiful recovery drive, bringing the car onto the podium, and you rushed out with the team to congratulate him. you lingered at the back of the pack behind the metal barriers, watching in quiet admiration as he jumped out of the car. he slapped oscar on the back, hugging his younger teammate before bounding towards the team. his head was darting around as if he was looking for something, but you couldn’t make it out with his helmet still on. and then the helmet came off and it became clear.

he was looking for you.

lando pulled away from a hug with a mechanic, leaning over the barrier right in front of you. you gravitated towards him, somehow moving through the swarm of team members until you were pressed against the metal too. he was beaming, eyes brighter than they had been all working weekend, and then his hands were on you. the hug he pulled you into was tight and you clung to one another for a moment, unbothered by his damp race suit, or the tickle of his sweat slicked curls.

the kiss he pressed to your cheek was far less secret than the one in the garage, so was the one he pressed to your forehead, but the one he pressed to your lips, as quick as it may have been, was the one that really took the cake. you were blushing when he pulled back, a mischievous grin on his face. you shook your head in disbelief at his boldness, unable to tame your bewildered smile.

“what are you doing for dinner, baby?” he called out to you as he walked away. the podium high had clearly set in.

nothing, you mouthed back, not quite confident enough to shout across parc ferme.

“good, we’re going on a date.” lando winked and then he was gone, pulled into the chaos of post race duties.

tears pricked your eyes when he stood on the podium, a much happier man than the one you found when you’d arrived. you couldn’t put it into words, how one night had changed everything, giving you everything you didn’t realise you wanted.

then again, lando was always good at beating expectations.

-

hehe the end

-

taglist

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HELLO?!?! Beautiful.

Clandestine

Lando Norris

A story in which two friends are caught doing something they probably shouldn't be.

Word Count: 1.9k

Warnings: This was going to just be mild smut and suggestive themes like kissing but I got a bit carried away, it includes some description of nudity and like...almost sex but not quite, lol. Also LMAO I changed the title after I published this so sorry if that was confusing <3

You and Lando had been hanging out for what felt like forever. Since the day that you met him when you were both just 19, introduced by none other than Max Fewtrell at one of his notorious house parties, it seemed that you were destined to be best friends.

You guys couldn't get enough of one another, spending every free second you had like there wasn't enough time in each day; like you were desperate to keep learning about every tiny quirk he had until he was inevitably pulled away to some race or training session halfway across the world.

You couldn't remember exactly when your relationship had evolved; sometime during his fourth season in Formula 1, when his times away got longer and his visits home became less frequent. Perhaps it was the time apart that made your hearts grow fonder or just the feelings that had been suppressed during four years of friendship finally breaking free. But it had been him that made the first move, kissing you against a wall in some nightclub while you and Max visited him.

It wasn't awkward at all, in fact, it was just perfect. The way he approached you was just right, his arm slipping around your waist like he had done so many times before, and it giving you butterflies just as it always did; except this time his voice was deeper, his demeanour more confident, and every pair of eyes in the room was on the two of you.

He grabbed your hand and laced his fingers with yours, again no different to the way he had done hundreds of times before, and led you out to the hallway of the club, and it was right there that he had finally kissed you. And god it was perfect, his lips as they brushed against yours, his tongue as it slipped into your mouth, his hands as one wrapped around your waist and the other fell to squeeze your ass, his cologne as it filled your nose, his hair as you pulled on it, his teeth as he bit your bottom lip.

He was perfect. And all he had to say was, "Want to go home?", and you followed him out of the club and into a taxi like a little lost puppy, ready to do any and everything he asked.

Ever since that night a few months ago, you and Lando had been acting as friends when you had an audience, but as much more when you were alone. You still spend hours in one another's company, hanging out with all of your other friends without them suspecting a thing, but the moment it was just the two of you, your relationship turned into so much more.

You began to think that it was weird how relaxed you were, surely you should feel sad that Lando only wants to show affection in private, with no one else around. But when you really thought about it, about how his last relationship had been, you were glad that you guys were hiding. This way, Lando was yours, and only yours; your relationship didn't belong to the peering eyes of strangers and only you got to see him in his most vulnerable moments, when he hugged you, when he kissed you, and when he made you feel good. That was yours and his, only.

"You okay?" Lando's hand squeezing your thigh made you snap your attention back to reality; it seemed that you had drifted off into thought, something you had been doing a lot recently.

In front of you was Max's phone, showing a photo of the three of you from 3 years ago today, during Lando's 20th birthday party. You guys had already been inseparable for a year at that point, the best of friends, and as you looked down at the screen your heartstrings tugged. So much and so little had changed, and you had no idea how to feel.

"Send that to me! We were so cute." You joked even though you felt sad looking at the photo, reminiscing on those years that really weren't long ago. In truth, you looked the same but the guys looked completely different, perhaps it was because you couldn't actually see yourself compared to the photo, or because the two of them had really done a lot of maturing since then.

"No, I look 12." Lando groaned pushing the phone away, and you realised his hand still rested on your thigh; something he often did when it was just the two of you, during drives or while you watched movies. But, right now you weren't alone and perhaps he needed reminding of that, so you brushed his fingers off your leg as subtly as you could, pulled your tight dress down and stood up from Max's garden sofa.

"Does anyone want a drink?" You asked the group huddled around the firepit, Max's outdoor furniture filled with the faces of your closest friends. A few yes' and no's came from the group as they looked up at you and you took a mental note of what everyone was drinking, then made your way across the garden.

As you entered the kitchen of the penthouse you and Max shared in London, thanks to Lando 'helping' with rent because he stayed there 2 weeks out of the year, you could see that the 23rd birthday party you were throwing him was going very well. Most people attending were your close friends but some people had managed to find the address because they 'knew so and so', but thankfully your security was turning most of them away.

As you squeezed past groups of people, you tried to make your way towards the bar you had rented, which was sitting in the hallway with six busy bartenders, but it was proving difficult due to the seemingly growing crowd. With a sigh, you gave up for the time being and took a seat at the kitchen island. You pulled your phone out and started to scroll when it buzzed and a text appeared at the top of your screen.

Lando: you okay? Y/n: yep, bar is rly busy rn, drinks might be a while Lando: you mean you cant get served at your own party Y/n: you know what, you can get your own drink Lando: kidding! Y/n: thought so Lando: you want some help? Y/n: actually could you go to the bar, im going upstairs to change my shoes Lando: you sure you don't want me to join you? Y/n: hushhh Lando: you know im subtle ;)

You clicked your phone shut and made your way upstairs to do exactly what you told Lando you were going to do. Your feet were killing you and the Versace platforms you were wearing were definitely the culprit, so you changed your shoes for some slippers, no longer caring about looking good as most people were drunk anyway. After sitting on your bed for a moment and relishing in the bliss that was your feet no longer burning, the door to your bedroom swung open and a smiley Lando appeared, a silly smirk on his face.

"Can I help you?" You asked with a smile creeping onto your face that you seemed unable to hold back in his presence.

"Maybe"

You knew exactly how he was thinking just by the tone of his voice, the lower pitch and the way his eyes seemed darker than usual. You had come to learn very quickly when Lando was in the mood, well you'd learned a lot of things about him and his body recently. His eyelids hung heavier over his eyes and the smirk on his lips only widened as he approached you.

"I thought you could use some company." He whispered as he wrapped his warm, inviting arms around you and pulled you close to his chest, peppering your cheek with tiny kisses that made your skin tingle.

"You read my mind." The tiny hairs on your neck stood up when Lando's hands dipped to your behind, squeezing it and connecting your lips in a passionate kiss. His tongue danced with your own and every movement he made had your stomach fluttering and mind spinning.

The sound of the distant DJ was just enough to cover the quiet sighs, gasps and smacks that were leaving the two of you. Luckily, the guests were pretty good at respecting the 'no upstairs' rule except for the few wandering ones looking for a toilet, so you were confident that you and Lando were alone for the time being, allowing yourself to get lost in his lips for a little while.

The more time passed and the more impatient he got, subtly increasing the pace and force at which he kissed you until he needed to prop you against your desk to make sure you stayed upright. Lando was such a good kisser, his lips seemed to make you drunk; it was like you felt him touching every inch of your body when in fact all he was doing was running his hands across your ass and lower back, sometimes your neck.

Your entire skin burned with pleasure and your mind began to wander, thinking of all the ways he could make you feel with his lips, and other parts. After a while, his fingers found the straps of your dress and pulled them down gently, which you gladly helped him with, freeing your chest for him to move his lips too.

He left tiny kisses, licks and nips that had you pretty much purring for more of his touch; you managed to unbutton his shirt and free his torso, with him helping you disregard the shirt behind him in the room. You ran your hands down his abs, a smile breaking out on your face in disbelief at how good his muscles felt under your fingertips and you leaned forward to kiss him deeply. Your bare chest connected with his and a deep groan left his mouth, making him run his huge hands down your bare legs and wrap them tightly around his waist, letting your weight be supported by your desk.

Just as he leant further into you, grinding his crotch into yours and using one of his hands to support both of you on the surface of the desk behind you, light filled the room and a loud gasp from the doorway made you move away from Lando.

"What the fuck!" A voice you instantly recognised echoed through the room.

Thankfully, Lando had better critical thinking skills than you and didn't pull away, he made sure to shield your naked chest from view by keeping you pressed against him. Instead of flashing your boobs to the stranger, he picked you up and turned towards them so he could see who they were, but you already knew and just shoved your face into Lando's chest in embarrassment.

"What are you guys doing!" Max almost squealed, clearly in disbelief.

"Uhh..." Lando began but was quickly cut off.

"Don't answer that!" Max scolded and Lando chuckled quietly against your shoulder, reminding you that your top half was still naked and prompting you to pull up your dress, but not before smacking Lando for his immaturity.

"Put me down." You whispered and managed to fix your dress completely before turning to face your other best friend, but he was already gone by the time your feet hit the floor, your bedroom door slamming and letting you know that the next conversation you had wasn't going to be easy.

"Fuck." Lando ran his hand over his mouth.

"Yeah, fuck..."

---

Carlos celebrates winning the 2024 Mexican Grand Prix 🇲🇽 | via alexberumen01

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Packing it Up

~Packing it Up by Gracie Abrams~

Author's Note: Requested! OKAY so here is this giant one shot that I have been working on for a while. it's been hyped up bc its SO long but there is no smut so if 20k words and no smut is not your cup of tea so sorry. There is bestie Jack and bestie Trevor in this as well Summary: Luke falls for Jack's best friend, Y/N. Warnings: swearing, a mini novela Word Count: 22,225 Luke Hughes x fm!reader

There was a time in her life that she thought she found the love of her life. He was her college sweetheart. It was the typical fall in love at college orientation and stick around for a while because you are in love. At least she thought she was in love with him.

Her family never liked him, thought that Henry was full of himself and never treated her right. Her childhood best friend Jack hated him. There was never a moment in his life that he was nice to Henry. Henry always said that it was because Jack was in love with her but that was not the case. 

Jack was never the type of guy to keep his feelings inside. If he had feelings for someone, he wouldn’t hesitate to tell them. Even if it was his childhood best friend, he would tell her no hesitation.

Jack never knew why he hated Henry, he just knew that something was not right with the guy. His suspicions ended up being correct when she came over to his apartment this past April.

Usually, she called. There was never a day where she would just show up at his door because who knows who would be inside of his apartment. But he was her best friend since they were six years old. But she couldn’t return to her apartment and she had nowhere to go. So, she ended up driving over an hour in late night traffic to his place. 

Raising her hand up, she knocked on the door a few times before she wiped her hands across her cheek. After several moments passed, the door was pulled open and Luke was standing at the door. 

“Y/N? What’s wrong?” he asked, scanning her features. Glancing up, she met his eye as her lips quivered. 

“Hey Luke,” she let out as her voice cracked as she spoke, “Is Jack here?” her voice got quiet. Luke nodded as he stepped aside, allowing her to walk inside the apartment. Luke took a sudden breath as shut the door behind her. “Congrats on the call up by the way,” she mumbled as she wiped a tear that fell onto her cheek. He forced a small smile on his lips.

“Thank you,” he paused for a moment as he looked over at her. “I’m gonna go grab Jack,” he mumbled as he walked down the hall towards Jack’s room. She stood awkwardly beside the dining table waiting to either get kicked out or hug her best friend. 

It only took a minute for Jack to emerge from the hallway. His eyes widened, his cheeks were flushed red and his hair was messy. His body was only covered with a pair of grey sweats as he walked towards her. Without hesitation, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against his chest. She wrapped her arms around the center of his back.

A sob left her throat as she buried her face in his neck. His hand glided up and down her back soothingly. 

A girl stormed past Luke, her hands were full of various clothing items as she practically flew out of the apartment. Luke stood awkwardly in the living room watching the pair. 

The door slammed shut and Y/N pulled away from him. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry,” she said through a sob. 

“Don’t ever apologize,” he mumbled as he pulled her against his chest again, “What happened?” he asked softly. 

“He’s been cheating on me with my roommate,” she mumbled against his chest. Jack shifted his gaze towards Luke, his entire body erupting in flames. “I can’t go home,” she let out. 

Y/N pulled away from Jack, glancing towards Luke; to see him fuming too. Looking into his eyes, he took a deep breath as he shook his head. “I’ll fucking kill him.”

After that, he helped her move out of her apartment. Luke and Jack both were there to help move all of her things to her new studio apartment. At every moment possible, Jack would slip in a snide comment of how awful of a person her roommate was for doing what she did. Luke was just at Y/N’s side the entire time, quietly comforting her while they packed.

Her new apartment was an even split between their apartment in New Jersey and her school at NYU. It was a lot easier for her to travel between the three places and she was grateful.

It worked out that her school year ended a month after her disastrous break up. She went back home in Michigan with plans to spend the summer with the Hughes and posse. Y/N needed the distraction and the Hughes’ lakehouse was always the perfect place to do that.

Constant sun, bikinis, and endless drinking. It was her favorite time of year, it was her form of therapy. Even when she was having an amazing year, all she wanted was time on that boat soaking up all of the sun she could.

But this year, she needed that time away more than anything. For obvious reasons and for the other things that were going wrong with her life. Her new apartment had a leak in it and half of her wardrobe was destroyed and her finals didn’t go to plan because she was too overwhelmed by the fact her boyfriend was cheating on her.

The information fell into her lap that her roommate and Henry had been hooking up behind her back for months. It was as if they took her heart and smashed it to the ground repeatedly.

Now, the wallowing was something she was putting on the back burner. There was only one plan on her mind and that was letting loose. On the drive to the lakehouse, she informed Jack that she was not going to behave one bit and he gave her full permission to do whatever the hell she wanted.

Well, his friends and siblings were off limits, she couldn’t do them but she could do whatever the hell she wants. It was the usual rules of the lakehouse trips, let loose and have fun. But it often led to Y/N babysitting the five boys that were with her. She never really minded it but this year she told the boys it was her turn.

Given the circumstances, no one was opposed to the idea. Jack, Luke, and Y/N were the first to arrive at the house. Jack was at the grocery store getting an overwhelming amount of groceries for the house. Five professional hockey players under one roof, they were going to need a lot of it. 

Y/N had already unpacked her suitcase in her room and had planted a spot on the giant couch in the center of the living room. She had a blanket covering her frame as she began to play the pilot episode of Grey’s Anatomy. A show none of the boys have attempted to watch, and she knew that at some point they would all get terribly invested.

Luke emerged from his bedroom on the second floor of the house, wearing a hoodie and sweatpants. “Hey,” he let out as he jogged the five steps towards the couch. Lifting her gaze, she smiled towards the youngest Hughes. 

Her family has been friends with his family since she could remember. She was the only kid that was actually close to the boys. All of her siblings were under the age of seven, so they usually looked up towards the Hughes boys as role models, more than anything.

“Hey Luke,” she said as she pulled her blanket up higher on her body. He sprailed out over majority of the couch. His head was laying on some of the leftover blanket beside her.

“What are you watching?” he asked while tilting his head back to meet her gaze. She looked down meeting his light eyes for a moment. 

“Grey’s,” she said as she tilted her gaze back towards the screen. He scrunched his features together as he looked towards the screen.

“I can’t believe you like this stuff,” he mumbled before he let out a long drawn out breath. She chuckled as she looked back towards Luke; his eyes were already on her.

“You can’t say anything until you actually sit down and watch an episode,” she mumbled. He smirked before he sat up slightly; pulling some of the blanket over his lap.

“Fine, catch me up,” he mumbled as he pointed towards the TV slightly. She giggled before she began to explain the fifteen minutes of the show. “Wait, so that guys her boss?” Luke mumbled as he pointed towards Derek on the screen. 

“Yep,” she said as she nodded dramatically. Luke shook his head as he blinked harshly.

After a few seconds, Jack busted through the front door carrying a lot of grocery bags. “Hey jackasses, a little help here,” Jack muttered as he walked past the giant couch towards the kitchen. Luke and Y/N met each other’s gaze for a second before they both jumped up from the couch to meet Jack in the kitchen.

While they were putting away groceries the other three boys arrived. They each dragged two giant suitcases inside, cheering loudly as they stepped inside. Y/N rested the boxes of pasta onto the counter as she excitedly walked out of the kitchen, the other Hughes boys followed quickly after her. 

Y/N smiled widely once she saw the eldest Hughes brother. “Hey Y/N, how are you feeling?” Quinn asked as he wrapped his arms around her. 

“Been better,” she said, a dry chuckle leaving her lips.

“Well that’s going to change because this is going to be the summer of your life, Y/N,” Trevor expressed as he held out his arms waiting for his hug. She smiled widely as she slipped away from Quinn towards Trevor. 

“Planning on it,” she mumbled as he wrapped his arms around her tightly. 

“That’s because we’re getting drunk off our asses every night,” Cole said with a teasing grin on his lips. She chuckled as she slipped away from Trevor towards Cole. He rocked her back and forth in a tight embrace. 

“Definitely planning on that,” she mumbled as she slipped away from Cole’s embrace. “Jack bought a lot of stuff, let’s get started,” she teased as she started stumbling backwards towards the kitchen again.

She was laying in bed in silence. She was staring at her ceiling, replaying every moment of her relationship with Henry. Her mind was trying to find the exact moment he decided she wasn’t worthy of him or love. The moment he decided that she wasn’t what he wanted anymore.

Y/N’s probably laid there for several hours at this point, the silence starting to drive her crazy but she couldn’t find anything to fill the silence. Or overtake the sound of her own thoughts. She wiped her hands across her cheeks as she took a deep breath.

Her phone vibrated beside her on the bed. Her lips fell into a pout as she reluctantly pulled her phone towards her face. She read a text from Jack telling her to unlock her door. 

A groan fell from her lips as she whipped the blanket off of her frame. She adjusted the loose shorts on her body as she brushed a few piece of nearly matted hair away from her face.

Pulling the door open, she was expecting to see Jack standing there but instead it was Luke. Her face scrunched together as she met his gaze.

“You are not the Hughes brother I was expecting,” she muttered as she stepped back.

Luke laughed as he forced himself inside. He held out a bag towards her, waiting for her to take it. She looked towards him suspiciously. He chuckled. “I was sent on a mission to retrieve you for the game tonight,” he let out.

Rolling her eyes, she took the bag and looked inside. From what she could tell it was a cute red long sleeve top. She closed the bag and placed it onto her counter. “I told Jack that I would watch the game from my apartment,” she mumbled as she suddenly felt very self conscious of how her appearance looks. 

“Well, I don’t think this is optional. I was told to drag you out of the apartment no matter what,” Luke explained as he scanned her frame, “And I think you want to change unless you want to show up like a homeless man,” he said teasingly.

Her eyes widened as she smacked her hand against Luke’s arm, “That is so rude, Lukey,” she said while shaking her head, a shocked chuckle fell from her lips. She turned her gaze towards the mirror against the wall and she took a deep breath, “And so true, oh my god,” she muttered while taking a deep breath.

“Are you doing okay?” he asked quietly. He scanned her body, noting that she probably was definitely not doing okay.

Tilting her head to the side she stared towards the floor. She pursed her lips forward, “I think I could use a reason to leave my apartment,” she mumbled. Lifting her gaze, she met his gaze. He smiled widely. “How much time do I have?” she said.

Luke glanced down towards his watch, “Game starts in like three hours and it’ll probably take like forty minutes to get to the arena with traffic,”

She nodded, “Okay, that’s barely enough time but I’ll figure it out,” she mumbled as she jogged towards her bathroom. He pulled his head back as he stared towards the bathroom door.

“Barely enough time?” he mumbled as he shook his head slightly. 

He heard the shower start and his gaze began to scan the studio apartment. It was a mess. Which was surprising because she was always the type of person to never have a spot of dirt in her apartment. He also had three hours to kill, so he walked towards the kitchen and began to clean her dishes.

She would either yell at him or be grateful, he didn’t know how she would react. But he was going to do it anyway. He connected his phone to her speaker and began to play his music. 

It took another forty minutes before she reemerged from the bathroom, her body was only covered by her towel. She stopped short, tilting her head to the side as she watched Luke from a far. Her kitchen was completely spotless and he was vacuuming her living area. Her studio apartment was small so he was practically vacuuming the whole place. 

He lifted his gaze, meeting her eye. He swallowed hard as he turned the vacuum off as he scanned her frame. “Is this okay? I’m sorry, I know how much you hate mess so I had time to kill and I thought that maybe–” 

“No, no, it’s okay. Thank you, Luke. This actually means a lot,” she explained as she continued to look into his eyes. His cheeks flushed red while he smiled softly. “This is really sweet actually,” she mumbled as tears started to form in her eyes. 

“Y/N?” he let out softly. 

She shook her head, “This is really nice and I can’t cry so I’m going to take some clothes and then–um– go back to getting ready,” she mumbled as she wiped her hand across her eyes. She walked towards the bed which had the bag of the new shirt; one of the brothers’ got her.

He chuckled, “Okay,” he mumbled before he turned on the vacuum again.

It took another hour and a half before she was officially ready. Luke was able to clean the entire apartment and have time to sit on her bed and talk with her while she was applying her makeup. 

“Hey Y/N,” he mumbled as he swung his legs back and forth in the air. She chuckled as she pulled the mascara wand away from her eye. She tilted her head to the side to meet Luke’s gaze. “Are you almost ready?” he sing-songed. She smiled softly towards him.

“Give me like five minutes,” she mumbled. He nodded as he pursed his lips forward. He glanced down towards his watch as he nodded. She shook her head slightly as she began to apply mascara to her eyelashes, “I’ll try and make it three,” she muttered. He smiled widely as he climbed off of the bed and began to pace back and forth. 

“Okay good. Yeah, okay,” he mumbled as he began to walk around.

She kept her promise and they walked out of her apartment side by side. “The top looks good on you,” he mumbled as he reached over and pressed the elevator button. She smiled to herself as she kept her gaze towards the floor.

“Thank you,” she mumbled.

“Come on,” he said with a wide grin, “I was thinking we could each get a popcorn and then we could–”

~~~

The other boys were drunk in the basement, laughing loudly as they continued a pool tournament. She never competed, usually she was the score keeper or Luke was the score keeper. But she was definitely too drunk to keep track of numbers. 

Jack hit the eight ball into the exact pocket he needed to. He lifted his drunken gaze and smirked towards the other boys. Scanning the room, he noticed that she was nowhere to be found.

“Where’s Y/N?” he asked, meeting each of the boys' gaze. They all shrugged.

“I’ll find her,” Luke offered as he got out of the tournament quite early. Jack nodded encouragingly before he wandered towards the chalkboard to add points to his tally. 

“Text me once you do,” Jack said as he drunkenly searched for Luke but he was already half up the steps.

Luke continued up the steps to see Y/N sprailed out on the large couch. Somehow taking most of it with all of the blankets and pillows surrounding her. He smiled to himself as he walked towards the couch. Pulling the blanket from her face, a drunken smile formed to her lips. 

“Little Hughesy,” she mumbled as she saw him walking towards her. His face scrunched up in disgust as he shook his head. He flopped down beside her forcing a gasp from her lips. “You ruined my masterpiece,” she whined as she watched him climb under a completely different blanket and rest his head on the bright pink pillow. He didn’t know when they even got a bright pink pillow but it was comfy so he didn’t care.

“You called me Little Hughesy,” he whined before he shifted his gaze towards the TV screen to see Grey’s Anatomy on the screen. He shook his head before he further adjusted the pillow beneath his head. “Haven’t been called that since I was nine,” he countered as he lifted his head to see her already looking towards him. 

“You will always be Little Hughesy,” she mumbled, looking into his eyes. “Even though you’re like huge.” He rolled his eyes while laughing as he continued to look over her features.

“Not huge,” he muttered before he looked towards the TV to see Meredith and Derek chatting in the stairway. “What’s happening?” he asked, referencing the show. Y/N’s lips fell into a pout as she looked back towards the screen.

“I will not explain everything you miss, you either sit and watch with me or don’t ask questions,” she explained while laughing. 

“Well tell me who’s that guy?” he pointed towards the screen again.

“You ask me another question and I’ll call you Little Hughesy forever,” she drunkenly explained, unsure if the words left her lips in a cohesive sentence. He rolled his eyes as he smirked. 

“I’m never going to get into this show,” Luke mumbled as he crossed his arms over his chest as he continued to stare towards the TV. Absolutely getting interested in the show. It was definitely interesting but he would never let it slip that he actually enjoyed it.

For the next hour the pair layed together, quite far apart, as they watched the show together. At certain parts, she would explain a few details he missed when he didn’t watch the few scenes. She knew that he wanted to know, so she gave him the information anyway.

The other boys remained in the basement, half drunk and half asleep on the beanbags. The first night at the lakehouse they usually all get drunk off their ass. But most of the nights afterwards, they tend to have at least one person sober adjacent. 

Which usually ended up being Y/N and she never really minded that before, but she wanted to be the one to let loose and not care. None of the boys objected and it was no problem for them.

She reached for the remote and she hit pause before she turned off the TV. Luke instantly sat up, “Hey, I was watching that,” he slurred out. Looking up towards him, she saw the blush across his cheeks. His hair was messily laid across his forehead.

“I’m going to bed,” she announced as she threw the three blankets away from her body. She stood up and began to pick up all of the blankets. A dramatic pout fell on his lips as he gripped the blanket that was covering his frame. 

There was already two blankets in her arms as she tried to reach for the one covering Luke. He pulled it back, nearly forcing her to fall on top of him. A loud giggle fell from her lips as she stumbled backwards. 

“Oh my god,” he let out while standing up. He kept the blanket in his hands as he fought the smirk forming to his lips. “Are you good?” he asked through laughter. 

A gasp fell from her lips as she wrapped her entire frame with the three blankets now in her grasp, Luke was still holding onto the one he was using. “You nearly killed me!” she said through a wide grin. 

“Well, let me at least help you as an apology,” he teased as he reached for one of the blankets she was carrying. Meeting his gaze, her smile softened as she continued to look into his eyes. He took the blanket from her. “Come on, I’ll tuck you in,” he teased. 

“Oh shut up, Little Hughesy,” she let out dramatically as she lead the way down the hallway. He gasped dramatically as they turned into her room. She placed all of the blankets in her arms onto the queen sized bed. Luke dropped the blankets onto the bed, looking towards her. He pursed his lips forward, teasingly. “You are not tucking me in, go away,” she said as she shoved him backwards.

He gasped as he raised his hand up and held it protectively over his chest. “Here I was trying to be nice and you shove me away. Rude, very rude actually,” he teased as he crossed his arms over his chest. Y/N squinted her eyes slightly as she fought off a grin.

“Goodbye Luke,” she said as she pointed towards the door. He smirked as he stepped out of the room, waving towards her. He shut the door behind him and she spun around and stared towards the door while taking a deep breath. Slowly, she sat down and continued to stare towards the door. 

~~~

The following morning, everyone was horribly hungover. Especially, the boys that remained in the basement were in a lot of pain. Their bodies were half on beanbags and half on the ground. Both Luke and Y/N were less damaged because they actually slept in their beds.

She was in the kitchen and making a full breakfast spread. She was already three homemade lattes deep and her hangover was practically gone. None of the boys have made an appearance beside stumbling up the stairs towards their rooms. 

Completely ignoring the fact that she was cooking. Mainly because she never cooked for them before. So they assumed it was only for her. Despite the fact that she was scrambling two full carton of eggs. She also used two packages of bacon and sausage, It was very obvious that it probably wouldn’t be enough. But she was trying to be kind.

She heard steps coming down the steps and a loud dramatic yawn. She spun around to see Luke walking down the steps with only a pair of black sweats covering his frame. She trailed his body with her sleepy gaze while he wasn’t looking. His hands were rubbing his eyes as he finished the steps.

Swallowing hard, she forced her gaze back down towards the giant pan in front of her. “Hey,” he let out as his voice was very hoarse. He walked towards the fridge pulling it open to grab something to drink.

“There’s coffee,” she mumbled as she pointed towards the coffee pot with her spatula. He shook his head as he pulled out the orange juice container. Her face scrunched up as she stirred the eggs for the last time before turning it off and moving it to another stove top. “I forgot, sorry,” she muttered as she leaned down and opened the oven to check on the bacon and sausage.

“It’s cool,” he mumbled as he yawned one more time, “That’s a lot of food, you sharing?” he asked as he walked beside her, glancing all around the kitchen. She rolled her eyes playfully as she shifted her gaze towards Luke. 

Meeting his eye for the first time since last night. Taking in a deep breath, she waved him back as she opened the stove again. A soft chuckle left his lips as he stepped back, drinking directly from the carton. He reopened the fridge and placed it back inside.

“Yes and what the hell are you doing?” she said and while chuckling. He shrugged as he stepped away from the oven as she placed the large cooking pan and placed it onto the stove top. “You cannot just drink from that and put it back,” she explained while shaking her head. 

“Oh Y/N, you have no idea how often we do that,” he said, a dry chuckle falling from his lips. She clenched her jaw while rolling her eyes as she took a step back staring at all of the food she’s prepared. Suprisingly proud of herself. He took a deep breath, “I’ll buy you a new orange juice.”

She chuckled while tilting her head to the side to meet his gaze. He looked genuine in his offer. “No, it’s okay,” she let out as she took a deep breath. “Okay, make your plate and make sure to leave some for the rest of us,” she teased.

Luke barked out a laugh as he took a hold of a plate and instantly started adding to his plate, “Better tell them to hurry,” he joked as she slipped out of the kitchen towards Cole’s room which was on the same level as hers. 

Softly, she knocked a handful of times. It took a few seconds for him to swing the door open. His head was sunken into his hoodie, “What?” he groaned out, his voice was practically gone. 

“Breakfast,” she simply said before she walked down the hall towards Trevor’s room and alerted him of the same thing. He took a little more convincing to leave his room. She climbed up the steps towards Quinn and Jack’s rooms, not even sure if they were in them.

Firstly, she knocked on Jack’s before she took fast steps towards Quinn’s room. They both stepped out of their rooms at the same time, their faces looking like they had been hit by trucks. “Go get some breakfast before Luke eats it all. There’s also coffee,” she offered as she climbed down the steps to hear laughter falling from Luke’s lips. He was sitting at the dining table, already devouring the food.

“Okay, what’s the plan for tonight?” Luke asked as he leaned back watching his older brothers walk down the stairs towards the kitchen. 

“Dude, I’m too fucking hungover to even think about tonight,” Cole interrupted before he shoved a piece of bacon into his mouth, his face still deep in the hoodie. 

“I’m down for anything,” Quinn mumbled as he added eggs to his plate. 

“I was thinking we could go dancing,” Y/N said quietly as she walked behind Jack, waiting to get some of the food she made. All the boys shifted their gaze towards her, collectively nodding. Furrowing her eyebrows, she met each of their eyes before they all shyly looked down towards their plates. 

“Why didn’t that take more arguing?” she questioned as Quinn walked towards the fridge. Watching him pull the orange juice out and drink it directly from the carton. Her mouth fell open as she shifted her gaze towards Luke who was fighting a grin forming to his lips.

“Because you got your heart broken so we’re going dancing if that’s what you want to do,” Jack expressed as he walked backwards towards the dining table. Taking in a deep breath, a small smile formed to her lips.

“Thanks guys,”

~~~

The pregame for their night out started an hour ago and she was the only one getting ready because the boys were waiting until last minute. Which never failed because they were used to planning everything perfectly for their pregame fits. A groan fell from her lips as she stared towards the two outfits in front of her. 

One was a skin tight black dress that had a deep cut down the center of her body; practically revealing everything. She’s worn it to dance clubs before and has always felt so hot wearing it. 

The other one was a corset top with a tight black mini skirt. An outfit she often wears to the parties in New York. She’s gotten in trouble a few times from Henry wearing it; too slutty in his eyes. 

But she couldn’t decide which one to wear. She peaked her head out of the bedroom, “I need a man’s opinion!” she shouted. All of the boys shot up to their feet, no hesistation. Each of them holding beers in their hands as they continued down towards her room. Somehow all five of them were able to lay on her bed and stare towards her closet that had the outfits hanging up.

“I can’t decide which one will make more men dance with me tonight. So which one is hotter,” she questioned, cringing at her own question but the boys were surprisingly helpful. They shared glances as she watched each of them scan the outfits, then scan her frame. 

Suddenly, a wave of nausea coursed through her body, regretting asking the question to begin with. 

“Can you try them on?” Cole asked. Jack smacked his hand hard against Cole’s arm. “Ow! Damn,” he groaned out.

“Off fucking limits, you know that,” Jack scolded pointing towards him with his beer.

“I meant-like-how am I supposed to figure out what’s the hottest, if I can’t see them o-on her,” his voice got quieter as he spoke. The boys began to laugh. 

A grin formed to her lips as she shook her head, “I’ve got Instagram posts in both of these outfits,” she let out and each of the boys pulled out their phones, searching her Instagram instantly. “Are you guys fucking serious?” she asked, laughing. 

“Mini skirt,” all of the boys said in unison as they shifted their gaze towards her. It was awkward at how quick they all replied. Her eyes widened as she laughed; the boys began to laugh too. 

“Okay, thank you. Now leave,” she said shoving each of them out of the door as they practically formed a single file line out of her room. 

It took another hour for her to be done getting ready as well as the boys. They were all practically wearing matching outfits. Their bodies were covered in either a black button down or a black t-shirt. They were all wearing dark wash jeans that could practically be the same brand. 

“Well if I have to be somewhat sober tonight at a night club then I’m gonna need some fucking-” Trevor stopped talking as Y/N walked out of the hallway. Her gaze was on her phone as she was walking towards the dining table to take another shot before they left. The tight black corset top showed off her chest perfectly and the mini skirt showed off her thighs in amazing fashion.

When Trevor stopped talking all of the boys lifted their gaze to see what he was looking at. They were all too stunned to speak. 

She poured out a shot of tequila for herself as she spun around to see them all staring towards her. Her face scrunched up in disgust. They all instantly shifted their gazes elsewhere; besides Luke. He was still staring. He was more subtle than the rest of the boys as he was sitting on the couch that was practically angled in her direction. 

It was impossible not to be attracted to her; literally so stunning everyone had to stop and admire her for a moment. Pressing his lips together, he took a deep breath as he watched her take the shot. She threw it back and didn’t even flinch at the taste. She placed the plastic shot glass back down onto the counter as she walked towards the group of guys. All of them now, slightly flustered. 

“Anyone call the Uber yet?” she asked as her gaze met Luke’s. He quickly shifted his gaze down towards his lap. His legs were bouncing intensely. She took in a deep breath as she forced her gaze towards the floor. 

“Should be here any second,” Jack said as he lifted his gaze and scanned her frame shamelessly. Watching Jack, she took a deep breath before she walked back towards the dining table. “Wha-what are you doing?” he questioned. 

She poured out another shot, “I’m too sober for all of your eyes to be staring at me like this,” she mumbled before she took the shot again; this time cringing at the taste.

The ride to the club took only ten minutes and in those ten minutes, it felt like every ounce of liquor in her body overtook all of her thoughts. She was sandwiched between Luke and Trevor in the furthest backseats. Her heart was pounding out of her chest as her vision was starting to blurr in front of her. 

Tilting her head up, she met Luke’s gaze. His eyes squinted slightly as he scanned her features. “You good?” Luke asked softly. Looking into his eye, she nodded too confidently. He chuckled as he scanned her features, his gaze lingering on her lips for a moment. “Are you drunk?” he asked barely above a whisper. 

Pursing her lips forward, she nodded. He rolled his eyes playfully as the car was pulled into park outside of the club. 

Cole and Jack slide the doors to the mini van open and climbed out of it. Y/N began to climb out of the car and it was quickly followed by Luke and Trevor. “You got your fake?” Trevor asked Luke barely above a whisper. He nodded. Luke stayed at the back of the line, avoiding being too close to his brothers. 

Without turning back, Jack and Quinn head straight into the nightclub. Cole and Trevor were next and Trevor was definitely not looking forward to being practically sober. Y/N walked towards the entrance with her ID in her hand. The bouncer didn’t hesitate as he let both Luke and Y/N in no problem. 

Luke smirked towards her as they continued into the club. She smiled towards him as she started walking deeper into the night club. She didn’t care if Luke was following her or not. All she wanted was to dance and drink more alcohol. Her hips instantly swayed back and forth to the beat of the loud chest vibrating music. 

She was at the center of the dance floor, nearly bumping into every body possible. She found a spot, just for her and she danced to the music alone. 

It’s been months since she’s felt this free. Sure, it was dancing at the center of a club, surrounded by hundreds of people feeling the same way. It was the first time that she's been single in her early twenties and she was okay with drawing all of the attention she could. God, she loved being the center of attention.

Except it didn’t last long for someone to take a hold of her waist and begin to dance with her. She didn’t mind, her whole intention for the night was to get close and sweaty with random strangers. His hands glided along her stomach as he grinded to the beat against her. She ran her hands across the top of his as she continued to grind with him to the beat.

She was with him for a while, several songs had past as he tried to move things along with her. Her body was running hot as her body was erupting in goosebumps with his slow slick movements along her frame.

His hands began to brush her hair off of her neck. Slowly, she spun around, allowing his hands to rest very low on her waist. Looking up, she saw a complete stranger. Her hands slipped from his shoulders as she began to walk away from him, sauntering away. 

Her eyes connected with Trevor’s, he was sipping from a glass with a clear liquid. She knew it was water because once someone is assigned the sober job; they take it seriously. Clenching his jaw, he brougth the tiny red straw towards his lips as he took a small sip. He watched her wander towards the bartop. 

She walked up towards the bar, smiling widely towards the bartender. His eyes widened as he leaned against the counter to hear better. “Tequila shot!” she shouted. He nodded as he leaned back and began to pour the liquid into a tiny glass. 

“Starting a tab?” he asked and she nodded, handing him her card. He went over to the computer and started typing a few things. But she didn’t care as she took the small glass and tossed it back. Burning her throat on the way down, but it felt so good. The added courage gave her full permission to really let everything lose. 

All she wanted was to feel close with someone. She wanted her heart to be jumping into her throat, her body vibrating from the music. She craved the feeling of a stranger’s lips against hers. Maybe even more.

There was an attempt to slide back into the center of the dance floor. Except her gaze landed on Cole and Jack dancing Jersey Shore style. Cocktails were in their hands as they were dancing back and forth. Jack’s eyes lit up as he saw her walking towards them. 

“Y/N!” he shouted but it was barely audible as the music was so loud. She smiled widely as she let out a long drawn out breath as she began to dance again. The boys were laughing loudly. 

It didn’t take long for another guy to slide behind her. Jack and Cole shared glances as they fought off a laugh rising in their throats. They began to dance away from them; knowing that Trevor was keeping an eye on her. The two boys continued to dance towards the bar, as their drinks were running low. 

After a few minutes, she got bored as the man had no sense of rhythm so she continued deeper into the crowd. 

Lifting her gaze, her eyes met Luke’s. He was watching her from afar. He slowly brought the cocktail to his lips, finishing the drink. He set it down on a random table as he tilted his head back. His eyes were still watching her. His tongue dragged across his bottom lip as he fought a smirk forming to his lips.

It could have been the seven shots of tequila in her body or the strobing blue and white lights in the club but her heart jumped into her throat. Pursing her lips forward, their eyes remained connected from across the night club for a moment. Shyly, she dipped her gaze towards the floor. The pounding music made her vision blurred.

Lifting her gaze, she looked towards his direction to find him gone. A frown formed to her lips. As the song changed she slipped deeper in the crowd in search of him. 

It didn’t take long to find him because he was searching for her too. They bumped into one another, giggles falling from their lips. His hands rested onto her hips to stablize her. She looked up towards him meeting his gaze. He smirked as he scanned her features as he bit his bottom lip.

His hands glided towards the small of her back. Her hands landed on his chest as she smirked up towards him. His eyes lingered on her lips for a second but it was so dark she couldn’t tell.

He leaned down towards her ear, “Wanna dance?” he asked before he pulled his head back. She smiled as she slowly spun around, allowing her body to be pressed against his. 

It was instant that their bodies moved in sync as he wrapped his arms losely around her stomach. His fingers delicately traced against the small section of exposed skin just above her hip. Her body erupted in heat as she pressed her head back against his chest as they were moving along to the beat of the song.

Her hands rested on top of his hands as she glided along his skin. Her breathing matched his as the beat of the music was pounding into her chest. He slowly took a hold of her hair and carefully pushed it off of her neck. Her hair fell off of her shoulder. The delicate touch against her neck sent shivers down her spin. His lips were hovering beneath her ear. 

“Hey,” he whispered into her ear. She smiled widely as her heart began to pound hard against her chest. 

Tilting her head back, her eyes shut as she allowed herself to melt into his arms fully. His fingertips graze along her exposed skin along her hips. 

Something about being in his arms felt so right, his lips grazing the skin along her neck, the way his hands dragged along her skin, the way his body moved with hers. It was right, had to of been. 

At least the seven shots of tequila told her so.

His lips brushed against her skin and she slowly spun around. His hands remained on her frame, they were loosely on her lowerback. She rested her hands onto his shoulders as she slowly glided her hands up his neck into his hair. 

Leaning towards him, their noses bumped into one another as they were breathing heavily. A smirk formed to his lips. He pulled her tightly towards him, their chests were pressed against one another as she was doing everything in her power not to kiss him. 

His hand slipped beneath her tight corset top; desperate to feel more of her skin. The small section between her mini skirt and her corset wasn’t enough for him.

Her fingers tugged his hair slightly as she tilted her head to side, nearly allowing him to kiss her. But he didn’t, his lips were hovering over hers. 

“Luke,” she whispered into his ear, he tilted his head back to meet her gaze. Her fingers slipped from his hair, down his neck. A smirk formed to her lips as she slowly stepped back away from him. His hands tried to keep a hold against her body but she stepped away from him. 

Maintaining eye contact, she took several steps back; winking towards him. He chuckled as he shook his head, while fighting a grin forming to his lips.

Her body instantly ran cold as she remerged into the crowd, her eyes met Trevor’s for a second before she continued towards the bar. Her breathing was still heavy while she missed his body pressed against hers.

She was sitting on her couch finishing up her flashcards for her hardest final exam. She was on the last page of her study guide and notes and only had eight flashcards to make left.

She began to hum along to the country song playing in the background as she continued to write the details onto her card. There was a loud knock against her door and she slowly climbed off of the couch. 

Y/N walked towards the door and pulled it open to see Luke waiting for her with Chinease food takeout in his hand. She smiled softly as she stepped aside letting him in. “Can you take a break?” he asked softly as he held up the comically large paper bag. 

“I think I can for a little bit,” she teased as she pointed towards the tiny dining table. He happily walked towards it and placed the bag onto the table.

“Okay, so I ordered practically everything, but it's like a buffet style so we can eat whatever we want,” he explained as he began to pull out each of the containers. She smiled softly as she sat down and looked towards him excitedly. “Hopefully this can make studying easier for you,”

“Thank you. Definitely in need of this,” she mumbled as she opened the first container, it smelled amazing. “Holy shit,” she mumbled as she held her hand towards Luke as he handed her the plastic set of silverware.

“Right?” he said excitedly as he placed the paper bag onto the floor before he opened the egg roll container and took one out. “How is studying going by the way?” he asked before he took a bite.

She tossed her head back as a groan fell from her lips. He chuckled with a mouthful. “I am this close to dropping out and becoming a stripper,” she let out, only slightly joking. His eyes widened as he stifled a laugh.

“I’d watch,” he muttered, causing her to kick him beneath the table as she laughed. “I mean you gotta support local–”

“Do not finish that sentence Luke Hughes,” she warned through a laugh.

“Fine, fine. How about I help you study instead?” he offered before he tossed the rest of the egg roll into his mouth. Y/N stared towards him suspiciously. “You realize I also went to college right? I’m not like Jack who barely attended high school,” he explained. 

“You say that like you didn’t just drop out,” she explained teasingly.

“I didn’t drop out, I finished off the semester early. You know because the whole life long dream of playing in the NHL happened. No big deal or anything,”

“Right, completely forgot,” she said sarcastically. “Okay, but if you distract me, then you have to leave,” 

“Got it,” he mumbled before he took a different container and opened it up.

For another hour, they both feasted on everything that Luke bought. It was definitely too much food but she was happy that she wouldn’t have to buy groceries for several days. 

He waited on her bed as she finished making the last of her notecards. He was scrolling on his Twitter feed, reading different posts regarding the league. She took the large stack of cards and walked towards him and handed them over towards him. He stared blankly.

“Okay, you and I definitely study differently,” he muttered as he took the stack and began to flip them back and forth. “Um, am I reading the definition or term?”

“Definition first and then once I have it down, we’ll do term,” she explained. He nodded slowly while he kept staring at the stack. “Unless you actually don’t want to help me,” she teased.

“Nope, I’m ready whenever you are,” he muttered. She hummed as she sat down on the couch, looking towards him expectantly. He began to read the lengthy definition waiting for her to answer.

She answered incorrectly, confidently, and they both realized it was going to be a long night. “I hope you didn’t have plans tonight,” she mumbled as she met his eye from across the room. He smiled towards her.

“My calendar is wide open,” he said with a grin.

It had been several hours later. Luke didn’t complain once the entire time they studied together. He didn’t hesitate when she got the same term wrong for the fifteenth time. Simply, told her the correct answer and went on. At this point, she was pacing back and forth in her tiny apartment. It was her attempt of trying to speed up the mesmerization process. 

He was watching her pace back and forth as he was laying on his stomach. He was kicking his feet back and forth slowly as she continued to pace. “Why don’t we take a break?” he asked as he placed the notecards in front of him. She shook her head as she stared towards her ceiling trying to think of the answer. 

“Okay, we’re taking a break,” he mumbled.

“Luke,” she whined as she stopped short.

“You will not remember any of this if your brain is short circuiting,” He said while standing up from the bed. He took steps towards her, meeting her eye. “Let’s go take a walk,” he mumbled as he examined her tired features. She nodded as she let him take the lead. 

“Maybe we’ll stop and get some hot chocolate or something,” he expressed as he took a hold of her jacket and held it out towards her. She mumbled a ‘thank you’ as she began to cover her frame with it.

“Okay,” she let out softly as she met his eye once more. He pulled the door open and they both began to walk out side by side. 

At first they didn’t say anything as they walked out of the apartment and down the stairs. They would share awkward glances as they would squeeze around the tiny staircases and the small door that led to the lobby.

They stepped outside and it was surprisingly cold as they began to walk down the busy sidewalk. Luke shoved his hands into his pockets as he glanced towards her. She was so beautiful, he’s always recognized that.

“Are you doing okay with everything?” he asked softly.

“I just want to pass this last exam,” she said simply, very clearly thinking about something else. He continued to look over her features, nearly bumping into someone in the process. 

“Anything else on your mind?” he asked barely above a whisper. She took a deep breath as she kept her gaze ahead. 

“I just wish I was good enough,” she explained. His eyes widened as he continued to look over her side profile. She contemplated on explaining further, lifting her head up, she met Luke’s light eyes. His desperation to make her feel better is evident in his gaze. “I want to be good enough,” she mumbled as her lips quivered. 

“You are more than enough, Y/N. He’s a fucking idiot for not thinking so, you have to know that,” he explained as he took a hold of her arm. He pulled her back, forcing her to face him. Her lips continued to quiver. “You are gorgeous and smart and kind and you make everyone laugh. I mean you should really do a comedy tour. You are beyond perfect,”

She scanned his features and took a shaky breath. Swallowing hard, she nodded. “You laugh at everything,” she said barely above a whisper. He chuckled softly while shaking his head. He pulled her towards him, wrapping his arms around her tightly. 

“I do not laugh at everything,” he let out softly as he ran his hand through her hair for a moment.

Taking in a deep breath, she shut her eyes. “Thank you, Lukey,” she mumbled as her entire body softened against his body.

~~~

It didn’t matter what time she got back or the amount of alcohol in her system; she was always the first one awake. Although, she was definitely violently hungover. She was sprailed out on the couch with three blankets covering her frame. She had a large Yeti cup of iced coffee that she was sipping dramatically to try and fix the headache she was dealing with. 

Trevor entered the hallway, his head deep inside of a hoodie. He smirked once he saw her. “Didn’t think I’d see you awake until this afternoon,” he teased. She rolled her eyes, shutting them harshly as her entire head felt like it was going to fall off. “Have you eaten anything yet?” he questioned as he walked towards the kitchen.

“No,” she forced out as she took in a deep breath.

He nodded as he was quickly putting a bagel into the toaster. He glanced towards her for a second as he walked towards the living room.

“Do you remember last night?” he questioned.

Did she remember last night? 

She hasn’t stopped thinking about last night. Her mind keeps replaying the moment she nearly kissed him. The feeling of her heart beating so hard she was scared it would explode in her chest. Her fingers in his hair, his hands touching her skin, the feeling felt so perfect and so right.

Yet it was so wrong. He was her best friend’s little brother. Jack’s little brother. Family has always been off limits and she was always off limits to him. Jack would lose every once of trust and love he had for her if she got with his little brother. So wrong but she can’t stop thinking about what it would be like to kiss him. Or to be that close to him every night. She needed him, that’s all she knew.

“Y/N, hello?” Trevor asked, nearly too loud for her liking. Her aspirin wasn’t working as fast as she would’ve hoped.

“Yeah, yeah, I remember it,” she mumbled, shyly.

“You remember drinking half a tequila bottle,” he asked as he continued walking towards the couch. He met her gaze, a teasing grin on his lips. 

She furrowed her eyebrows harshly as she covered a blanket over her face, “Do you really think I would look like this if I didn’t?” she mumbled. A loud laugh fell from his lips as he plopped down beside her.

“So you remember dancing with Lukey then,” his voice got softer. She kept her face hidden as she felt her entire face scrunch up nervously. “Y/N?” he asked softly. Slowly, she pulled the blanket from her face meeting Trevor’s gaze. She hummed. “Girl, come on, everyone knows your off limits but Luke? That’s-”

“I know!” she let out. 

“He’s Lukey!”

“I know!”

“Jack would be so mad,” Trevor let out barely above a whisper.

“ I know, Trev! I’m gonna talk to him,” she mumbled.

“Jack?” Trevor questioned as the toaster popped the bagels out. He shot up from the couch.

“N-no Luke, I’ll tell him that last night was a drunken mistake,” she mumbled as she took a deep breath. 

“I’m just-” Trevor mumbled as he began to smear peanut butter onto the bread. 

“I know,” she mumbled as she took another sip from her iced coffee. Trevor walked back towards her with a plate. He handed it towards her and she smiled widely. She sat up slightly as she took a hold of the plate and instantly began to bite into the bagel.

There were loud footsteps climbing down the steps, both Trevor and Y/N switched their gaze towards Luke who was climbing down the steps. His face was hidden by his hoodie as he walked directly towards the kitchen. He wasn’t even looking towards the couch, he was in desperate need of food. 

Her gaze lingered on him. Her heart jumping into her throat as she felt her breathing stagger slightly. Her eyes were stuck on him. He was intoxicating and she was in trouble as she watched him from a far. 

Trevor watched her watch him, a smirk forming to his lips before he stood up from the bed. “Try not to throw that up, I’m going to go shower,” Trevor said loudly as he wandered back down the hall towards his bedroom. 

A chuckle fell from her lips before she bit into the bagel again. Luke wandered towards the living room, biting into a uncooked bagel of his own. He smiled softly once he saw her. 

“Good morning,” he mumbled through a mouthful. Squinting her eyes slightly, she stared towards him suspiciously. “Are we going to talk about it?” he asked bluntly after swallowing his food. Her eyes widened as she shook her head. He nodded, “Okay,” he said simply before he walked back towards the stairs.

“Wait, that’s it?” she questioned as she sat up slightly, placing her food onto the coffee table. He spun on his heel to meet her gaze. “You’re not going to try harder to talk about it?”

He chuckled. “Uh no-you’re the one that wanted to dance with me so, if you don’t-”

“Um, if I remember correctly you’re the one that asked,” she said as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“You were the one that was making eyes at me-”

“Eyes at you!” she let out appalled. He chuckled as he took a step towards her. “Now that is ridiculous,” she teased. All he did was purse his lips forward and nod. “It was a drunken dance that’s all,” she explained. 

He smirked as he nodded, “Yeah,” he let out simply. He walked around the couch and slowly sat down beside her. He met her gaze, “Whatever you say,” he mumbled.

“What does that mean?” she questioned, feeling a grin form to her lips.

“I mean you did almost kiss me, but sure, just a drunken dance,” he let out, a smirk on his lips.

“I did not!” she let out.

“Oh sure, yeah. Definitely not,” he said tilting his head to the side, his eyes squinting slightly. She rolled her eyes playfully before she reached towards the remote. Her aspirin was finally starting to work. 

“I did not try to kiss you,” she said quietly. He shook his head before he stole one of her blankets and draped it over his lap over himself. 

“I didn’t,” she mumbled as she tilted her head to the side, meeting his eye once again. Her gaze lowered towards his lips for a second.

“Are you going to put on Grey’s or not?” he asked softly.

All she could muster up was a nod. He smirked before he was able to bite into his bagel. She rolled her eyes playfully as she reached towards her plate. 

~~~

Once all of their hangovers were done they decided to spend the rest of the afternoon on the boat. Quinn was already on the boat, preparing it. Jack and Luke were setting up the coolers of alcohol while they were waiting for the others to come outside. 

Y/N took a hold of her sunglasses and her Kindle as she started walking outside. She stopped short as she watched Jack shove Luke into the lake. She could hear Quinn and Jack’s laughter from the backdoor of the house. 

It didn’t take long for him to climb back into the boat, his body completely soaking wet. His hair dripping as it was laid across his forehead.

Her heart began to beat hard against her chest as her gaze lingered on his frame, watching the water roll off of his body. His swimtrunks were tight against him. He was tugging at the bottoms, the v-line on his body became more evident as he was adjusting it. He looked good and she was not being shy by the she was staring at him. 

Subconsciously thankful for the fact that her sunglasses hid her gaze.

“Are you sure it was a drunken mistake?” Trevor asked as he stood beside her. Suddenly, she shifted her gaze towards him. She swallowed hard as she subconsciously shifted her gaze towards Luke again. 

“It was,” she mumbled as she began to walk towards the dock. 

“Are you sure because you are staring at him like he’s a piece of meat and you’re starving,” Trevor whispered as he followed after her. She barked out a laugh as she glanced towards Trevor.

“I am not,” she muttered as she walked towards the dock, meeting Jack’s gaze. Her soft smile fading as guilt overwhelmed her features. Jack frowned slightly as he walked towards her, holding out his hand to help her into the boat. “Thank you,” she mumbled. He didn’t say anything as he walked towards Quinn at the head of the boat. 

She sat down in her usually spot and instantly tilting her head back. A sigh fell from her lips as she felt the heat radiate over her skin. 

Cole started jogging towards the dock, “Hurry up asshole!” Quinn shouted through a laugh. He was shirtless as he was carrying a beer and a towel. 

“You guys all left me!” Cole shouted as he reached the boat. He was able to climb into the boat no problem before he sat down beside Luke. Shimming as he tossed the towel beside him before he brought the beer towards his lips. 

“Okay, are we ready?” Quinn asked and everyone cheered slightly. He chuckled as he started driving out into the lake. Luke took a hold of the speaker and started playing music loudly from it. He was leaning towards Trevor and Cole, talking about something. 

Y/N was sitting with her Kindle in her hands, she was trying to find something to read. Jack sat down beside her, practically against her. She lifted her gaze, meeting his eye through her sunglasses. 

“Are you feeling okay?” he asked as he tapped his hand against her thigh before he crossed his arms over his chest. 

“Better,” she mumbled. 

He nodded, “Good, I’m glad,” he said as he wrapped his arm around her shoulder, “What are you reading?” he asked. She chuckled as she tilted her head against his shoulder. Her gaze shifted towards Luke who was looking towards her already. Once their eyes connected, or he assumed they did through her sunglasses, he shifted his gaze towards his lap.

“I don’t know yet,” she said softly. Her gaze still watching him as he leaned back onto his arms. His abs on fully display. Her mouth nearly fell open but she stopped herself as she looked back down towards her Kindle. 

“Want a beer?” Jack asked as he leaned forward towards the cooler. She shook her head as she selected a romance novel and began to load it up. 

It was a couple hours later and the sun was starting to go down, creating a beautiful sunset over the water. She was no longer reading, only got around fifty pages done. But now she was sprailed out on the back of the boat, laying on her stomach. She was staring towards the sunset. Luke climbed beside her, laying down on his stomach.

Tilting her head to the side, she met his eye. “Hey,” she mumbled. He smiled softly before he interlocked his fingers as he shifted his gaze towards the sunset. Her eyes kept admiring his side profile. His lips were curled upward slightly as he was looking over the pink and orange hues of the sky. 

“I always forget how pretty the sunset is out here,” she mumbled as she forced her gaze towards the sky.

He hummed as he shifted his gaze towards her, scanning her features. “It is isn’t it?” he muttered as he looked at her side profile for a moment before he shifted his gaze back towards the sunset. “I’m glad you came with us,” he let out quietly. 

“I know, I would’ve been so mad at myself if I stayed in Jersey,” she mumbled before she looked back towards him. Their eyes met and her body erupted in goosebumps. His blue eyes were soft and sleepy. “Couldn’t let Henry win again,”

Luke’s mouth fell open as he shook his head. “He hasn’t won a damn thing,” 

“I mean he did shatter my heart,” she looked down towards her hands, twisting the ring on her finger. 

“Shattering your heart is him losing. Why would anyone want to do that?” he said barely above a whisper. Lifting her gaze up, she met his eye; a soft smile formed onto her lips. 

“I don’t know,” she muttered, a pout forming to her lips.

“He lost you and you get to be hot on a lake all summer. I’d say you’re winning,” he mumbled as leaned towards her. She giggled as she leaned towards him slightly too. 

“Thanks Luke,” she let out barely above a whisper. He smirked as he nodded. He tilted his head to look behind him to see the rest of the guys hanging in a circle and laughing; completely ignoring them. “You really think I’m hot?” she asked shyly.

His mouth fell open as a scoff fell from his lips, his eyes trailed her frame. “Are you fucking joking?” he let out while laughing. “Have you looked at yourself recently? I mean you’re literally the definition of beautiful,” his gaze dipped towards her lips for a second before he forced his gaze towards the sunset. 

The music was so loud that their conversation was between them and only them. Except Trevor couldn’t help but notice them. He was smiling softly as he watched them meet each others gaze.

She pressed her lips together as she tried not to laugh. She tilted her head to the side as she fully met his gaze. A soft smile formed onto her lips, “I really needed to hear that,” she mumbled. 

“Of course,” he let out as his gaze dipped towards the grin on her lips.

Cole smacked his hand against Trevor’s arm, pointing towards the pair. A snicker fell from Trevor’s lips as he forced his gaze elsewhere. Jack and Quinn were clueless.

~~~

The next few days were filled with the same day drinking and relaxing on the boat. Their evenings were filled with laying in the living room watching Grey’s Anatomy. The boys were all reluctantly watching it except Luke. He was equally interested especially after Addison was introduced.

Tonight was no different, except they were all in the basement hosting another pool tournament. She was sitting on a table as she was adding up the scores as she stared towards the giant chalkboard beside her. 

“Quinn’s back in the lead,” she said as she smiled widely.

“Let’s fucking go!” he shouted as he raised his beer up in the air. Luke let out a loud groan as he walked towards Y/N and the chalkboard. 

“No way, add it up again!” he begged as he walked up beside her, looking towards the scores. Luke delicately rested his hand on the table directly next to her thigh. Her gaze dropped down towards his hand, a mere inch from her skin. Quickly, she forced her gaze back up towards the chalkboard. 

“I added it three times,” she whined out. He pouted his lips as he looked towards her, meeting her eye.

“Add it differently,” he mumbled, his gaze lowering to her lips.

“Luke,” she let out through a chuckle.

“Sorry Lukey, maybe next round,” Quinn said smuggly as he began to reset the pool table. Luke continued to scan her features for a few seconds before he stepped back.

“I don’t wanna play another round. Cole, wanna help me make a drink?” He looked towards Cole. Without hesitation Cole stood up and followed after Luke towards the stairs. 

“Me neither, I wanna relish in this victory for the night,” Quinn said as he took another sip of his beer. 

“‘Course you do, asshole,” Jack muttered as the both of the older Hughes boys plopped down on some beanbags. They all chuckled as Trevor started heading towards the stairs.

“Y/N, wanna a drink?” Trevor asked as he began to slowly climb up the stairs. She nodded as she hopped off of the table and headed for the stairs. 

“I’ll come with you,” she mumbled as she skipped towards the steps. 

Jack watched suspiciously as he shifted his gaze towards Quinn for a second. Quinn simply shrugged as he pulled his phone from his pocket.

Cole and Luke were still in the kitchen once both Y/N and Trevor reached the top of the stairs. 

“Do you really think that she–” Luke stopped talking instantly as he saw Y/N and Trevor side by side. A frown formed to his lips for a second before he quickly brought his cocktail to his lips. Luke shifted his gaze towards the floor. 

“Want a mixed drink or a beer?” Trevor asked as he walked deeper into the kitchen. 

“Any seltzers, Trev?” she asked softly. 

“White Claw?” he asked as pulled the fridge open. She hummed as he tossed her the drink.

“I’m gonna head to bed,” Luke mumbled before he chugged his drink and placed it into the sink. He met Y/N’s gaze before he climbed up the stairs towards his bedroom. Cole frowned slightly as he watched the youngest Hughes walk away. 

Cole quickly followed after him, “Wait–” he called out as he jogged up the stairs. 

She popped open the drink as Trevor pulled a beer out for himself. “Can I talk to you, Trev?” she asked softly. He nodded as he pointed towards the couch. They both sat down quite far apart but they both covered their laps in blankets. “I think you might be right,” she mumbled.

“About Lukey?” he asked quietly. 

She nodded, “But I can’t tell if my feelings are because I’m still trying to get over Henry or if it’s because I’m ready to move on,” she mumbled.

“Well, if you’re even questioning it, I’m sure you’re ready to start something new,” Trevor expressed, glancing behind him. 

“Jack would kill me,” she let out barely above a whisper, “I mean, it’s his little brother.”

“Yeah but it’s not like he’s a kid, you’re barely two years older than him,” Trevor explained. “I think Jack would be pissed at first but get over it if it means you two are happy,” Trevor brought his beer towards his lips.

She stared down towards the can in her hand, she began bending the tab back and forth. “But it’s Lukey,” she muttered as she met Trevor’s gaze. “Little Hughesy,”

“I don’t know when he became something other than Lukey, but I am worried this is gonna fuck everything up,” she mumbled before she pulled her knees towards her chest. 

“He stopped being Lukey the second he got taller than Quinn,” he let out jokingly. “And got abs, which you seem to enjoy,”

“Trevor,” she scolded while laughing.

He took a deep breath, “If your worried you’ll fuck everything up, just hang out with him more and see if your feelings are real. You know push boundaries a little,”

“Push the boundaries, okay,” she muttered as she nodded slightly.

Her phone vibrated in her pocket as she pulled it out instantly.

Luke: Wanna watch Grey’s in my room in ten?

Her heart began to beat heavily against her chest as she read the message. A small smile formed to her lips as she whipped her phone around to show Trevor. He smirked as he nodded.

“Nice,” he said while chuckling.

“What does this mean?” she asked, her eyes widening slightly. 

“I think it means he’s wondering if you want to go watch Grey’s Anatomy in his room in ten minutes,” Trevor said sarcastically. 

She leaned towards him, shoving him before she stood up from the couch. “You’re such a dick, Trev,” she said as she walked away from him while laughing. He tossed his head back and laughed. She walked towards the kitchen as she sent back a reply to Luke saying she’ll be there soon. 

He sent back a smiley face. Lifting her gaze, she saw a glimpse of Cole and Trevor both heading down towards the basement. She knew that Trevor would find an excuse as to why neither of them were back in the basement.

She finished her drink in a few minutes before she headed towards the stairs towards his room, her heart slamming against her chest hard. She awkwardly raised her hand up and knocked. After a few seconds, Luke pulled the door open a wide grin on his lips.

“Come on, I need to find out if Denny lives,” he said as he waved his hand towards her. She chuckled as she stepped inside of his surprisingly clean room. He shut the door behind her, twisting the lock in the process. 

Without hesistation, she laid down on his bed, climbing under the blanket. He took a fast step towards her, leaping over her to lay on the other side of her. He plopped down beside her climbing under the covers.

He shifted his gaze towards her, running his fingers through his hair. Tilting her head to the side, she met his eye. She fought the smile forming to her lips.

“Your face better not reveal anything, no smirk, no smile. No tears, okay?” he asked teasingly. Her lips curled upward in a grin. “I said no smile, it’s a nice smile, but I said no smile,” he let out.

Her mouth gaped open slightly before she forced her gaze towards the TV screen in front of them. “Just get ready,” she muttered. 

“No talking,” he let out while laughing, she shifted her head to the side to meet his eye again. 

“No talking?”

“No talking if you’re gonna say stuff like that,” he said as he reached his hand over to take a hold of the TV remote. “No spoilers,” he said pointing a finger towards her. Her mouth fell open as she pushed his finger away. A giggle falling from her lips. “No spoilers,” he let out softer as his gaze lingered onto her lips.

“Got it,” she mumbled as she felt her cheeks begin to blush as her skin ran hot. He inched towards her, staring at her lips. Suddenly, she felt herself leaning towards him. Wanting to kiss him, craving his lips. All she could hear was the sound of her own heartbeat in her ears. 

After a few seconds, she pulled back. “Luke,” she mumbled.

“Yeah?” he let out softly as he leaned away too.

“We can’t,” she mumbled. He clenched his jaw as his head was still tilted to the side, scanning her features. 

“Can’t what?” he asked softly.

“You’re looking at me,” she mumbled, “You can’t look at me.” 

“I can’t look at you?” he asked softly, his gaze lowered towards her lips again. His gaze flickered up towards her eyes again and she shook her head slightly.

“Stop looking at me like that,”

“Why?” he muttered as he inched towards her again. Instead of pulling away, she found herself staring at his lips again. “Because of Jack?” he mumbled. 

It took a few seconds to reply, “Yes,” she said as she shook her head again. Luke took a deep breath as he scanned her features one more time before he forced his gaze towards the TV. He began to pull up Netflix. “Luke,” she mumbled.

“Let’s just watch the show,” he mumbled as he tilted his head back against the headboard. Taking in a deep breath she forced her gaze towards the screen.

“Luke,” she let out barely above a whisper. He tilted his head to the side, meeting her eye again. “I’m sorry,”

He reached his hand over and delicately rested it against her cheek. Her breath caught in her throat as she looked deeply into his eyes. He ran his thumb across her cheek as she leaned into his hand. 

Y/N wanted nothing more than to lean into him and kiss him desperately. Feel his lips on hers and feel his hands roam her body. It was all that she has wanted over the last few weeks. Maybe months.

Still, she couldn’t tell if it was mere attraction or if she was falling for him. She made a promise to Jack and she needed to keep that promise. Off limits.

“I’m gonna cry a lot this episode aren’t I?” he mumbled before he reluctantly pulled his hand back to his side. 

A soft chuckle fell from her lips as she looked back towards the screen as he did the same. “I’m not allowed to talk, remember? That was your rule,” she teased.

“Right, right. My rule,” 

~~~

A week later, Luke and Y/N were getting closer and closer to reaching something. Her feelings for him were definitely more and more prominent. It finally was hitting her that her feelings weren’t mere attraction but she was falling for him. She was sure that Jack could tell. She knew that Trevor was doing his best to keep it a secret.

She was standing in the kitchen, making dinner for all of the boys. They were all hanging on the boat despite it being docked. She peeked out of the window as she stirred the stirfry in the giant pan. She saw Luke walking up towards the house. Her lips curled upward slightly as she waited for him. 

He stepped inside, “I was sent to see when dinner will be done,” he let out as he leaned against the wall, leaning his head against it. She smiled towards him as she took in a sharp breath.

“Few minutes,” she mumbled. He nodded as he pursed his lips forward, “Anything else?” she asked softly. He smirked as he shook his head slowly. “You sure?”

He took another step towards her, his gaze lingering on her frame. Her body was only covered by the lime green bikini and the white coverall.

“Are you drunk?” she asked as she admired the bright red blush on his cheeks. He raised his hand up and shook it side to side. Tilting her head to the side, she fought the grin forming to her lips. “Go before you do something you’ll regret,” she muttered as she pushed him back slightly. 

He chuckled as he took in a deep breath. He reluctantly stepped away, “That’s an amazing color on you,” he mumbled.

“Luke,” she sing-songed. 

“Yeah, yeah I know,” he mumbled before he stepped back outside and jogged down the steps towards the boat. Every so often, he would glance behind him towards the house. 

A small pout fell to her lips as she continued making the dinner. Taking in a deep breath, her heart slowly started to slow down with him gone. 

It took another few minutes before she turned the stove off. She walked towards the door, pushing it open as she stepped out. “Dinner’s done,” she called out before she instantly went back into the house to make her own plate. 

The boys instantly started jumping off of the boat and jogging towards the house. Luke was the last one to enter the house. All of the boys were distracted by getting their plates and finding a place to sit and eat. Luke entered the house, his gaze lingering on her frame. He pursed his lips forward as he took steps towards the stove to make his own plate.

“We haven’t been to the club in like a week, should we go tonight?” Trevor asked before he shoved some food into his mouth. Luke whipped his head around to look towards Y/N. She was already looking in his direction. Trevor glanced towards Y/N for a second before he shifted his gaze towards Cole.

“I mean, I’m down to be sober if you guys want to go,” Cole offered quickly. Luke shifted his gaze towards Cole and nodded slightly. 

“I’m gonna need a nap before we go to any–” Jack said before he began mimicking EDM music. Y/N laughed before she brought her seltzer towards her lips. “But yeah, I’m down,” he agreed.

It took several more hours before any of them were ready to head out. The guys were once again all waiting for her to be ready. She was tipsy as she was finishing getting ready. She was wearing the skin tight dress she didn’t wear last time they went out. She stood in front of the mirror, making sure that everything would stay in place. 

Once she was satisfied with how the outfit looked she left her room, chugging the remainder of her drink. Entering the living room, the boys fell silent as they were all admiring her frame.

“What did I say about staring?” she said simply as she walked towards the tequila bottle on the dining table. A few of the guys cleared their throats and began their conversation once again. 

On the other hand, Luke was still admiring her frame. The dress fit her tightly to the point that every single curve of her body was amplified. He leaned forward as he dragged his hand across from his nose as he continued to stare towards her.

Jack was laughing at something Cole said when he shifted his gaze towards his younger brother. His smile faded slightly as he saw the way Luke was admiring Y/N from a far. His eyebrows furrowed as he saw Luke smile softly as Y/N spun around. Jack clenched his jaw before he brought his beer towards his lips, finishing the drink in only a few sips.

He watched as Luke and Y/N eyes connected. The smile on her lips was small but it looked like it was reserved for Luke. 

“Uber’s almost here,” he muttered as he stood up from the couch and headed towards the dining table where Y/N was standing. Once he reached the table, he took a hold of the vodka bottle and brought it towards his lips. He drank directly from the bottle for a few seconds before he placed it back down. 

Everyone looked towards him in horror. “Was thirsty,” he forced out, sounding like fire was running up and down his throat. His phone vibrated in his pocket and he pulled it out to see the Uber was at the house. “Gotta go,” he muttered, still fighting from the alcohol. Everyone nodded awkwardly as they stood up and began to head towards the door towards the Uber.

“Are you okay?” she asked him as the rest of the guys left the house. 

“Are you fucking Luke?” he asked harshly, looking deeply into her eyes. 

“What?” the word fell out barely above a whisper.

“Are you fucking my little brother?” he asked as he got closer to her face. Her eyes widened as she shook her head.

“No,” she mumbled as she looked into his eyes.

“Don’t lie to me, I’m not blind. I see you guys disappear all of the time,” he said as he continued to scan her features, for the truth.

“We’re just hanging out, Jack, I swear,” she let out as she stepped away from him. He clenched his jaw as he tilted it to the side. 

“We used to do that, what happened to that?” he questioned. She dryly chuckled as she shook her head.

“Are you seriously jealous of Luke?” she asked somewhat harshly. His mouth fell open for a second before he clamped it shut.

“I’m not jealous of Luke,” he said simply. 

“Then why won’t you believe me that we’re just hanging out?” she threw her hands to the side. At first Jack didn’t reply. He stared towards her, frowning slightly. “Jack!?”

“Because have you seen the way he looks at you?!” he yelled out. “I mean even all the way back to April, this kid is in love with you and I don’t need you breaking his heart!” he explained loudly. 

Pulling her head back, she blinked slowly as she took in a shaky breath. Her gaze lowered towards the floor. Pressing her lips together, she nodded. “You’re my best friend Jack. I won’t let anything change that,” she muttered before she tilted her head back, blinking back the sudden wave of tears hitting her eyes. 

“Y/N,” he let out barely above a whisper. 

“They’re waiting on us,” she said as she pulled the door opened and stormed out. She stomped down the steps as she walked towards the Uber seeing Trevor sitting in the front passenger seat. 

She walked up towards the door, pulling it open.

“Woah, occupied,” he said while raising his hands up. 

“Get out, I’m not sitting next to Jack,” she said simply. Jack started walking down the steps slowly.

“Sit next to–”

“Trev,” she let out simply as she met his eye. It took him a second before he understood what was happening. He nodded as he unbuckled the seatbelt and climbed out of the seat. Delicately resting his hand on the center of her back for a moment before she climbed into the passenger seat. Trevor opened the back door, shrugging slightly as he climbed over Luke towards the backseat. 

Jack was quick to climb over Luke as well as sit beside Trevor and Quinn in the furthest backseat. Luke tilted his head back, meeting Jack’s gaze, mouthing, “Are you guys okay?” 

Jack shook his head as he tilted his head back against the headrest. The Uber took off towards the club, awkwardly turning the music up in the process. The drive didn’t take long and they were quick to all climb out. Y/N didn’t wait for anyone before she started heading directly towards the entrance. It looked as though flames were practically coming out of her body as she stormed away.

Jack stood outside of the car staring towards her walk into the club. “What did you do to piss her off?” Quinn asked as he smacked his hand against Jack’s upper back. Jack glanced towards Luke; who was walking towards the club entrance with Cole beside him. Trevor was awkwardly glancing between Luke and Jack.

“I accused her of leading Lukey on,” he said while meeting Quinn’s gaze. Jack watched Quinn’s eyes go wide.

“What, like, Luke has feelings for her or something?” Quinn questioned. Trevor’s eyes widened as he swallowed hard. Watching Luke and Cole enter the club no problem.

“More like I think she has feelings for him and I basically called her a slut, so that’s why she’s–” he stopped talking as he tossed his hands to the side. 

“You called her a slut?” Quinn asked flabbergasted.

“No! No, I told her that I don’t want to see Luke’s heart get broken,” he mumbled as the three of them all started walking towards the entrance to the club. 

“Like that’s the only option if they get together? They could be happy, you know,” Trevor expressed as he pulled out his ID from his wallet. Ever since the first night at the club, he’s been rooting for them like crazy. 

“They’re not getting together,” Jack said as he flashed his ID towards the bouncer. He nodded allowing the guys to enter the club.

“Why do you care so much?” Trevor asked as he began walking backwards to meet Jack’s gaze.

“Because I don’t want to lose my best friend. If they break up, I’m choosing my little brother,” he explained as they started walking deeper into the club. It was starting to get too loud to talk without shouting into each others ears. Jack shifted his gaze to see both Luke and Y/N standing at the bar waiting for their drinks.

“Are you okay?” Luke asked as he leaned towards her, his lips brushing against her ear. He pulled back, trying to meet her eye but her gaze remained ahead. His eyebrows furrowed as he leaned towards her to ask it again; instead their shots were placed in front of them. 

Without hesitation, she brought the shot of tequila to her lips and threw it back. She placed the glass upside down. Luke’s eyes widened slightly before he took the small glass and took the shot himself. He swallowed it with much difficulty, his entire body reacting as he placed the glass upside down.

She took a hold of his shirt and began dragging him into the club. Luke smirked as he followed along. But instead of stopping at the center of the dance floor she kept going. She kept dragging him, shoving through several groups of people in the process. Luke was shouting, asking where they were going but she was determined to take him somewhere private. 

They reached a secluded hallway, probably for the bathrooms. The music was still loud but was much quieter in that section. She pushed him against the wall before she crossed her arms over her chest.

“You have to stop!” she shouted, finally meeting his gaze. He pulled his head back, frowning. “We can’t do this anymore,” she let out as she continued to scan his features.

“We’re not doing anything!” he let out while shaking his head. His eyes softened.

“The flirting! The looking at me! It has to stop, okay we can’t do this!” she said as she dropped her gaze towards the floor.

“Why?” he let out, taking a hold of her arm delicately.

“Because Jack knows and we haven’t even done anything yet! So we have to stop!” 

He shook his head as he clenched his jaw repeatedly. “Why does Jack get more say than me?”

Her mouth opened and shut as her heart was pounding so hard against her chest, it was nearly louder than the music. She looked deeply into his blue eyes. The blue light from the club was over his skin, making his blue eyes look dark.

“He’s my best friend, okay? Jack, Quinn, Trev, Cole, you.” her voice faded slightly as she dropped her gaze towards his chest, “You guys are all I have okay?! So if us getting involved makes me lose all of that, then I can’t. I can’t do that,” she said while holding back her tears that were trying to form in her eyes.

He nodded as he admired her features. Her eyes were teary as she was staring towards his chest, the top two buttons were unbutton, revealing his collar bones and some of his chest muscles. She was the most beautiful girl he's ever seen. He’s thought that his whole life. No one ever compared to her and no one will ever compare because she was everything. 

He loved the way her lips would curl up slightly any time he said something dumb. Or the way she danced slightly while cooking; even if there was no music. Or the way her love language was touch, even as kids. She was always the first to initiate a hug or rest her head onto his shoulder. 

She was always the center of attention, loved having eyes on her. But right now, all he’s wanted was to be the only guy that gets to look at her the way he is now. Like she is all that matters. 

They were close but she wouldn’t meet his gaze, unsure if she could stop herself if she did.

“You can’t tell me you haven’t thought about what it’s like to kiss me,” he said softly. 

Lifting her gaze up, she met his eye. “Do you really think that I would be doing this if I could stop thinking about it? We can’t,” she said as she forced herself back. Their eyes were still connected before she began to walk away from him.

“Y/N,” he called out.

She spun around, meeting his eye again, “Luke, we can’t,” she said while shaking her head. 

He reached towards her, taking a hold of her waist as he pushed her against the wall. Her eyes widened slightly as she rested her hands onto his chest for stability. “Luke,” she mumbled.

“If you can’t stop thinking about it, then kiss me,” he whispered as he leaned down against her ear. He pulled back, taking a delicately hold of her chin. Scanning her features, his gaze admiring her lips.

“Luke,”

“If you can’t stop, then kiss me,” he whispered again as he lifted his gaze to meet her eye. Her breathing quickened as she swallowed hard. Her hands were still pressed against her chest.

He was so close that if she breathed differently, their lips would connect. She was desperate to feel his lips against hers. Her hands gripped his shirt for a moment as she continued to look into his eyes. 

“Kiss me,” he mumbled. Her gaze flickered back down towards his lips.

After another second, she reached up and took a hold of his cheeks. Pulling him towards her, their lips connected instantly and desperately. His hands glided along her hips and rested on her lower back. 

He pulled her tightly against his body. Her hands glided from his cheeks towards the base of his neck. Her entire body erupted in flames. It was as if every ounce of tension in her body faded as she continued to kiss him.

Her fingers began to glid through his hair as a breathy moan fell from her lips. Everything was perfect, everything was right in this moment; his body pressed against hers and their lips connected.

There was a passing second that she thought that this would be okay. Jack would get over it and her and Luke could be happy together. Nothing else mattered right now, nothing else other than Luke.

Slowly, she pulled away. Her fingers tugged at the ends of his hair. His nose bumped against hers, as he leaned towards her desperate for her lips again. Their lips connected again as a moan fell from her lips. 

His hands lowered on her frame gliding along the curve of her ass as he reached for her thighs. Her arms wrapped around his neck as she leaped up and wrapped her legs around his waist. His hands were gripping her thighs tightly.

Several minutes past as they were in their own little world, not caring who could be watching. All she needed was him, that’s all she knew. 

“Luke,” she mumbled against his lips. He hummed against her lips, sending a vibration to course through her body. Tilting her head back, he leaned towards her desperate for her lips again. “Wait-” she said through a giggle. He smirked as he reluctantly tilted his head back. He tilted his head to the side as his gaze was on her lips.

They were both breathing heavy, her hands glided from his hair towards his cheeks. “We can’t,” she mumbled as she dragged her thumb across his cheeks. He clenched his jaw as he met her gaze. 

He slowly put her back down, his hands glided up the same path they took before. Her hands glided from his cheek down his chest. Adjusting her dress on her frame, he soon rested his hands onto her lower back. He leaned towards her, kissing her softly. 

“I know,” he mumbled against her lips as she slowly slipped away from him.

He didn’t stop her as she began walking deeper into the night club. He stood in the secluded hallway, watching her slip away into the crowd. He clenched his jaw before he took a deep breath. He dragged his hand across his nose before he dropped his gaze towards his feet. 

He needed another drink. He needed many drinks.

~~~

Tensions were high for the next few days after that. She was considering on leaving because Jack wouldn’t talk to her and she was avoiding Luke the entire time. She stayed in her room for an entire day, claiming to be violently hungover. Which was not entirely wrong because she was in fact, violently hungover. 

She was laying in bed, staring towards the screen. She was debating on what to watch. She clicked on Grey’s Anatomy, since that’s what she’s been watching this summer. It felt wrong without Luke. 

Almost on cue, there was a loud knock on her door. She muttered a come in as she rolled over to see who was walking into her room. Luke stepped inside, quickly twisting the lock behind him.

“What are you doing?” she asked quietly. He took a deep breath as he sat down on the mattress. 

“I should be asking you the same question because what is that?” he let out as he pointed behind him towards the TV. She smirked as she shook her head slightly.

“What are you doing, Luke?” she asked as she scanned his features. He smiled softly as he rested his hand beside her thigh. 

“I’ve missed you,” he mumbled as he pursed his lips forward, “And the other guys all went out with some girls they met the other night. So here I am,” 

Her eyes widened, “You missed me?” she asked teasingly.

“Well, you’ve been hiding in your room for days so, yes I’ve missed you,” he explained as he leaned towards her. 

“I haven’t been hiding,” she mumbled as she scanned his features. 

“Oh really, what have you been doing?” he asked as he tilted his head to the side.

“Enjoying some peace and quiet,” she mumbled, “And some Grey’s,” she felt her chest get heavy as she continued to look into his eyes. “They left us alone? I can’t believe it,” she said sarcastically. 

He chuckled as he climbed over her, laying beside her. “I think Jack’s exact words were ‘try not to have sex while we’re gone’,” Luke said jokingly. 

“Well, he won’t have to worry about that,” she muttered as she pressed play on the TV. He chuckled as he crossed his arms over his chest.

“And how are you so confident about that?” he mumbled as he tilted his head to the side. He met her gaze, a smirk on his lips. 

“Because–” she trailed off as her gaze lowered towards his lips, “Stop looking at me,” she said while fighting off a grin. He chuckled as he inched towards her. “Luke,” she mumbled.

“I can’t stop,” he mumbled as he reached his hand over and took a hold of her cheek. He pulled her towards him as he kissed her desperately. A gasp left her lips before she began to deepen the kiss. The tension in her body faded as she tossed the blanket from her frame.

She thought about it for a second before she slowly climbed onto his lap. He took a hold of her thigh as he helped her. Her hands landed on the base of his neck as she began to twist the small curls. His hands were delicately running along the exposed skin of her thighs.

After several minutes she finally mumbled out, “We’re not having sex,” against his lips between kisses. Luke let out a soft chuckle.

“Okay,” he mumbled, a small smile forming to his lips. He tilted his head back against the headboard as he admired her features.

“This is why I was hiding,” she mumbled as she scanned his features. She ran her thumbs across his pinked cheeks.

Leaning towards her, he pecked her lips. “Thought you weren’t hiding,” he teased. Her lips fell into a pout as she continued to run her fingers through his hair. He raised his hand up and dragged his thumb across her bottom lip. 

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she mumbled as she looked into his eyes. 

“But you want to,”

“Luke,” she said as she tilted her head to the side. She wanted to say more but every thought she had disappeared as she leaned towards him, kissing him desperately again. His hand glided to the base of her neck. 

“Y/N,”

“Can we not talk?” she mumbled and he nodded before he pressed his lips against hers.

~~~

She was pacing back and forth in the hallway in front of Trevor’s room. She had to tell someone because she can’t spend the remainder of her time at the lakehouse stuck in her room. Someone had to know because she spent majority of her night last time making out with Luke and she was feeling guilty.

Guilty because she hated that she was doing it behind Jack’s back but it was perfect. Luke’s perfect and she was tired of pretending he wasn’t.

A gasp left her lips as Trevor stepped out of the room. “Oh my god!” he shouted as he stepped back placing his hand against his chest. She jumped back. “What are you doing?” he asked in a hushed tone. 

“Can I talk to you?” she asked quietly. He nodded suspiciously as he pointed behind him. “Great, thanks,” she muttered as she walked into his room. He laughed as he shut the door.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked somewhat teasingly as he sat down on his bed. She began to pace back and forth in front of his bed. His eyebrows furrowed as he continued to watch her back and forth. 

She took a deep breath as she stopped short and met Trevor’s gaze. “I need you to be a girl right now, this conversation won’t work if you react how you normally do,” she explained while looking into his eyes urgently. He nodded slowly. 

“I can be a girl,” he said confidently.

“Okay,” she said breathlessly, “The other night at the club, I made out Luke,” she explained. 

He chuckled and raised his hand up, “Nice!” he said. Her eyes widened while shaking her head. He cleared his throat and lowered his hand, “Right, be a girl, right,” he nodded before he began to talk again with a higher pitched voice, “Oh my god, that’s amazing. What was it like?” 

“Trevor, come on,” she whined out. 

“Seriously! What was that like!?” he asked, his voice back to normal.

“It was amazing but it can’t be amazing because Jack would never speak to me again if he found out,”

“That’s not true,” Trevor said.

“It is true because I did it again last night,” she said shyly. Trevor’s eyes widened as a grin formed to his lips. 

“Please high five me,” he said while holding his hand up again. Clenching her jaw, she reluctantly high fived him. 

She sat down beside Trevor, criss crossing her legs. Pressing her lips together, she took a deep breath. “I’ve never been kissed like that before,” she mumbled. Trevor smile softened as he met her gaze.

“I gotta ask,” his voice was quiet as he glanced towards his bedroom door, “This doesn’t seem like it just started this summer,” he shyly looked back towards her. 

“We hung out a lot while Jack was in the playoffs,” she said simply as she pursed her lips forward. 

“I was heartbroken and lonely. Luke didn’t know anyone else out here and was lonely too. I don’t know when it happened but he stopped being Jack’s little brother and Little Hughesy and he was just Luke,” she expressed.

“So you’ve had feelings for him for a while then?” Trevor questioned, squinting his eyes slightly.

“Maybe? I don’t know,” she forced out as she tapped her fingertips against her calves. He nodded while he tried to meet her eye. “I just like being around him,” she mumbled.

“You also like kissing him apparently,” Trevor teased. Her mouth fall open as she pushed him. He fell onto his elbows while chuckling.

“Yeah I do,” she let out softly, “He’s really good at it,” she continued.

Trevor fell onto his back while laughing. He covered his face with his hands, “That’s the line! I didn’t need to know that,” he muffled out through his hands. She tilted her head back laughing.

“Do you really think Jack can get over this, if Luke and I get together?” she asked, switching the tone to serious quickly. 

Trevor pulled his hands away from his face as he slowly sat up. He dragged his hand across from his chin as he swallowed hard. “I think he would be pissed longer if you two keep hiding it from him. You also should figure out what is going on with Luke before you tell Jack anything,” 

She nodded as she stared towards her lap, taking everything in. “Okay, yeah–figure out what’s going on first,” she repeated as she kept her gaze towards her lap. Trevor stared towards her, pursing his lips forward.

“You clearly have feelings for him, so just tell him that,” 

“I think he already knows,”

“You think?” 

“Yes, I mean I think it’s obvious,” she muttered. 

Trevor threw his head back laughing. “He’s a Hughes, they can’t pick up on clues if they were written in a giant billboard,” Trevor explained. Her mouth fell open as she rolled her eyes playfully.

“I mean I told him that I couldn’t stop thinking about him, I think that’s obvious enough,” she said while laughing. Trevor’s lips fell into a pout as he tilted his head to the side. “Stop,” she whined as she pushed him back again. 

“Go talk to him,” he said while delicately pushing her off of the bed. She stood up and took a deep breath as she walked towards the door. 

“Wish me luck,” she muttered before she snuck out of the room. 

Shutting the door behind her, her legs suddenly felt heavy as she started walking towards her room. Y/N pulled her phone from her pocket to text Luke to meet her in her room. Lifting her gaze, she saw Luke walking towards her. 

Her eyes widened as her heart began to pound hard against her chest. 

“The pizza place doesn’t deliver so Jack and Quinn went to go pick it up,” he explained as his eyes trailed her frame for a moment.

“Perfect because we need to talk,” she said simply as she turned towards her room, she opened the door and slipped inside. Quickly, Luke followed her inside; a soft grin on his lips in the process.

“Yeah?” he asked softly as he shut the door behind him, twisting the lock in the process. Slowly, she turned around to meet his eye as her lips fell into a pout. His eyes widened as he rested his hands onto her hips. She lifted her gaze as she looked into his eye. “What’s going on?” he asked while scanning her features.

“I hate this,” she mumbled as her voice broke. His eyebrows furrowed harshly as he panickly looked over her features. 

“What?” he asked barely above a whisper.

She swallowed hard before she practically leaped towards him. She wrapped her arms around his neck as she kissed him urgently. He wrapped his arms around her lower back as he kissed her back hesitantly. He slowly stumbled towards her bed. 

Her legs hit the mattress. He slowly loosened his grip around her body, she returned to her feet as their lips were still connected. 

Her fingers ran through his hair as she slowly moved her hands against his cheeks. She ran her thumbs across his cheeks, feeling the heat radiate from them. His hands were on her lower back, pulling her towards him hesitantly. 

“I’m getting mixed signals here,” he mumbled against her lips. Slowly, she pecked his lips one more time before she slowly pulled away from him. She met his blue eyes for a second as she sat down on the bed. Looking up towards him, her lips fell into a pout again. 

He sat down beside her, wrapping his hand around her waist. His fingertips were delicately tapping against her hip. Tilting her head to the side, she met his gaze. She took a deep breath.

“You’re right,” she mumbled. He scanned her features, waiting for her to continue. “I want this. I want you and I hate that I do because you are the one person I shouldn’t want. I hate that I am sad when you’re not around. I hate that I haven’t stopped thinking about you and I think–I think you haven’t stopped thinking about me too,”

“I haven’t,” he let out.

She looked deeply into his eyes, nodding slightly as her lips curled upward for a moment. “Is this just physical or is this something else? Because I can’t tell and I don’t know if it’s because of my trust issues or what el–”

He reached his hand over as he took a hold of her cheek. He dragged his thumb across her skin for a moment. Her breath caught in her throat as she looked into his eyes. “I want you, I want everything,” he expressed as he leaned towards her, pressing his lips against hers delicately. “I need you,” he mumbled against her lips.

Reluctantly, she pulled back to meet his gaze. “Really?” she asked barely above a whisper. He hummed and she smiled softly. “Okay,”

“Okay?” he questioned as he raised his eyebrows. She nodded as her smile widened. He giggled softly before he wrapped his arms around her tightly. A giggle fell from her lips as she wrapped her arms around his neck. She fell onto her back as he was still holding her tightly against his chest. 

He lifted his head up from the crook of her neck as he leaned down and kissed her urgently. She hummed against his lips as her fingers began to run through his curls. They slowly adjusted their position, she was laying completely on the bed as he was on top of her. Their lips not separating for a single second.

In that moment, everything was perfect. His lips on hers as her hands were roaming his body. They were together and everything was the way it should’ve been. 

He pulled his lips away from hers as he began to trail his lips along her jawline. He lowered them down her neck taking a moment to glide his hand up her shirt. Delicately running his fingertips along the side of her waist. 

A hushed moan fell from her lips as he trailed his lips back up towards her lips. He pressed them against hers sensually as his hand hiked up her shirt slightly on her frame. 

Arching her back into him, she allowed him to begin to pull the shirt from her frame. Instead, he smirked as he climbed down her frame, pressing wet kisses against her stomach. She took a hold of the ends of her shirt and pulled it over her head. Tossing it to the floor, she glanced down towards Luke.

She grinned as she tilted her head back. He hummed against her skin, sending electricity all over her body. A sudden gasp fell from her lips as she stared towards the ceiling. He pulled his lips away from her frame as he sat back, tugging his shirt from his body. He tossed it to the floor.

Her eyes lowered towards his abs and he smirked slightly as he climbed back on top of her. “What?” he asked innocently. She shook her head as she pursed her lips forward. She slowly ran her finger tips down his chest, tracing each line of his muscles. Her eyes widened slightly as she watched his body tense under her touch. 

“Very nice,” she mumbled as she lifted her gaze back up meeting his eye.

“Yeah?” he asked teasingly as he leaned down and kissed her delicately. “Yeah?” he asked again against her lips. She hummed as she raised her hands up and began to run her fingers through his hair.

There were loud knocks against her door and Luke quickly fell away from her. “Jack and Quinn just pulled into the driveway. You better get yourselves together!” Trevor shouted from outside the door. Luke stared towards the ceiling breathing heavily. 

“Fuck,” she mumbled as she jumped off of her bed as she leaned down to take a hold of her shirt. Luke slowly stood up from the bed, reaching for his shirt as well. “You can’t say anything until I talk to Jack,” she let out as her breathing started to quicken. “You promise?” 

He nodded as he walked around the bed quickly. He leaned towards her, kissing her urgently. He rested his hands onto her waist, “I promise,” he said as he pulled away. She walked away from him as she took a deep breath.

Unlocking the door, she pulled it open to see Trevor standing there. He had a grin on his lips as he had his hand up for another high five. 

Rolling her eyes she walked past him, “I am not high fiving you again,” she let out while laughing as she continued down the hall. Her hands were running through her hair and fanning her face; trying to pretend she wasn’t all flustered. She met Cole’s gaze as she walked towards the couch. He smiled softly towards her before he looked back down towards his phone.

“Don’t leave me hanging, Lukey, this is awesome!” he said excitedly in a hushed tone. Luke glanced down the hall towards Y/N but she was already in the living room. A smirk formed on his lips as he high fived Trevor. 

“Can’t talk about it until she speaks with Jack, alright?” Luke whispered. Trevor nodded quickly as he pointed towards the hallway. They began to walk side by side as they heard the door being pushed open. 

Quinn was carrying two boxes and so was Jack. “Where’s my tip?” Jack said happily as he strutted inside the house. Quinn shook his head while following Jack.

“I fucking drove, dude,” Quinn said while laughing. Jack didn’t respond as he rested the pizza boxes onto the counter. Quinn placed his boxes on top of Jack’s. Luke looked towards Y/N as she was staring towards her lap, she was tapping her fingertips against the top of her thigh. Luke took in a deep breath as he walked towards the kitchen with the other boys. 

They all began to take slices of pizza and placing them onto their plates. After a few seconds, they all walked away and headed towards the living room. Luke took a few slices and placed it onto a plate and he walked towards the living room. He walked directly up to Y/N and handed her the plate. Looking up towards him, a soft smile formed to her lips.

“Thanks,” she said softly. He nodded before he walked back towards the kitchen to make his own. Jack glanced towards the pair, his eyebrows furrowing slightly. He pursed his lips forward as he tilted his head back slightly. 

Y/N shifted her gaze towards Jack just when he was looking towards her too. He nodded slightly before he happily bit into his food again. She took a deep breath as she bit into her food. 

~~~

The following morning she was waiting for Jack to emerged onto the main level of the house. She was sitting in the living room a coffee mug in her hand as she was scrolling through her Tiktok.

This was the first time in months that she’s felt this happy, maybe in years. Her entire body was physically more relaxed. Every ounce of tension in her body was gone. Well maybe not every ounce. She was still so nervous to tell Jack. But something about last night told her that maybe it would be okay. 

She heard steps from the stairs and she lifted her gaze to see Luke walking downstairs. He was sleepily rubbing his eyes. Y/N smiled softly as she watched him climb down the steps. Luke pulled his hands away from his eyes. He grinned widely as he saw her on the couch. 

“Good morning gorgeous,” he said as his voice rasped. He walked towards her while looking into her eyes. 

“Morning,” she muttered before she took a sip of her coffee. He stood behind her looking down towards her. She tilted her head back as he leaned down towards her delicately pressing his lips against hers.

He pulled away, “Are you talking to Jack today?” he asked softly. She nodded slowly, “Good because I might have already told Quinn,” her eyes widened, “He’s on board, he’s cool,” he reassured before he pecked her lips. She chuckled as he leaned back. 

“I am going to talk to him this morning,” she said as she took a shaky breath. Luke hummed as he walked towards the kitchen to make some breakfast. 

After a few more minutes, it seemed like all of the boys woke up at the same time and walked down towards the main level. Quinn walked down the steps smirking towards Y/N as he stifled a chuckle. She pursed her lips forward as she looked back down towards her lap. 

Slowly, she stood up from the couch. “Uh–Jack?” she let out. He lifted his gaze from his phone, meeting her eye. “Can you come with me, we’re out of tequila an–and other alcohol,” she mumbled.

“Yeah, sure,” he said as he stood up. The other boys shared glances as she walked towards the door. She took a hold of her purse that was on the side table. She took a hold of the keys inside of the bowl. Jack met Luke’s gaze for a moment before he followed Y/N out of the lakehouse.

It took a few minutes before she pulled out of the driveway. Her entire body felt weak but she needed to tell him. She couldn’t move forward with Luke if she didn’t tell Jack.

Jack was in the passenger seat, trying to find a playlist to play. He decided on his country playlist, the playlist he would usually pick. He leaned over and turned up the music.

Jack furrowed his eyebrows as she took a left instead of a right. “The liquor store is that way,” he said pointing behind him.

“I’m going to talk and you are going to listen,” she said simply, “Which is why I am taking the long way,” she explained.

“Okay,” he said suspiciously. 

“I think,” she paused as she tapped her finger nervously against the steering wheel. “I think you think that I’m leading Luke on,” she started. Jack sat up straighter, staring towards her side profile. “Or that this is a summer fling but I–” she paused again as she pulled up to a red light.

Y/N looked towards Jack and he was listening intently. 

“I have feelings for Luke,” she let out slowly as she met his gaze. Her heart was pounding hard against her chest as his face didn’t change. 

“I think I’ve had them for a while but I am not sure because everything with Henry messed me up really badly. And he was there which is not your fault you were busy in the playoffs and–” she paused as he pointed ahead of him. She took a deep breath as she started driving ahead.

“I was lonely and he was lonely; and I loved spending time with him. But I didn’t think it was feelings until we danced together while we were extremely drunk.” she paused as she took a sudden breath. “I tried to stop my feelings, I shoved them down and I kept my distance but he is impossible to stay away from because he is charming. He is cute and a great kisser.” she explained rushly. 

Her mouth fell open as a wave of nausea coursed through her body. 

“I mean it was only a few times but now I think we’re serious like possibly he might be my boyfriend. We didn’t put a label on it. But I wanted to tell you so badly because you are my best friend and he’s your little brother; and I know how protective you are over him and I won’t hurt him. I’ll never hurt him or–or you,” she explained.

For the first time in possibly minutes, there was a silence. Jack’s lips curled upward as a chuckle fell from his lips. “Can I talk now?” he asked slowly. She nodded dramatically as she kept her gaze straight ahead, even though she was at a red light. 

“I’m not blind, you know,” he began, “I think I knew that you and him had feelings for each other when I was getting my ass handed to me in Raleigh. Any time I called Luke, you two were together hanging out. I just thought that he was cheering you up but I think you two were falling in love.”

Her eyes widened slightly as she kept her gaze ahead. He chuckled.

“These lakehouse trips are the only times I see all of my favorite people in one place. I was watching my little brother take my best friend and I was mad. So I yelled at you,” his voice got quiet, “I’m really sorry. But if Lukey makes you happy and you make him happy. I think I can be happy too,” he explained. Her lips curled upward as she pulled into the parking lot. “But I’ve got rules,” he began.

“Okay,” she said while laughing. 

“First rule,” he cleared his throat, “I don’t want to see it. Hands, mouth, keep them to yourself. Second rule, I share custody of both of you. I get time with Lukey and I get time with you. Third rule. When it’s all three of us, I’m not the third wheel; there better be no evidence that ya’ll are together. Fourth rule–”

“Four rules! Are you kidding!?” she said while laughing. He smirked while rolling his eyes.

“Fourth rule,” he let out slowly, “I don’t want details. That thing about my little brother being a good kisser, I didn’t need to know that information. We’re best friends but I don’t need to know,” he explained. 

She tilted her head back and laughed. After a few seconds, she unbuckled her seatbelt and shifted her body to face him. Leaning her head against the headrest she met Jack’s gaze. Her eyes softened.

“Are you sure you’re okay with this?” she asked barely above a whisper. 

He nodded, “I’ve never seen my little brother so happy and just so happens, I’ve never seen my best friend so happy. So yeah, I’m okay with this,” 

~

They both returned to the house, carrying several bags of alcohol. They were smiling and laughing as they stepped inside. “Our alcohol!” Cole cheered as he stood up and jogged towards the door. He took a hold of a few of the bags to lighten Y/N’s load. Luke lifted his gaze, a hopeful smile on his lips as he met Jack’s gaze. 

Jack didn’t change his face as he continued walking towards the kitchen with his bags. Luke’s face fell as he lowered his gaze towards his lap. 

“We nearly cleared all the shelves,” Y/N joked as she placed her bags onto the countertop while Cole and Jack placed theirs on the dining table. 

“Almost but we are drinking all day today, okay. Get some shots in your bodies now,” Jack teased as he walked towards the living room. Luke stared blankly ahead his heart slamming against his chest. Y/N stood by the dining table, looking towards Luke expectantly.

Luke watched as Jack walked towards him. Jack smiled softly as he patted his hand against Luke’s shoulder, “Your girl’s waiting on you, come on,” he said, a teasing grin on his lips. 

“My what?” Luke let out softly. 

“Your girlfriend over there,” Jack teased as he tilted his head to the side in the direction of Y/N. Luke smiled widely as he stood up from the chair, he faced Jack. Luke looked into his eyes.

“Are you cool with this?” he asked softly. Jack smiled as he reached up and wrapped his arm around Luke’s shoulder. On his tippy toes, he began to walk with Luke towards the dining area.

“I am cool with this but I have rules,” Jack announced loudly. Everyone else began to pay attention too. 

“Aw nice! You told him, this is great,” Cole cheered before he tossed back a shot of vodka. 

Y/N smiled towards Luke as she leaned against the dining table. 

“I have exactly four rules,” Jack said as he pulled away from Luke and stepped beside Cole and took a hold of one of the tiny shot glasses.

“Get ready,” she teased as Luke walked towards her. Delicately resting his hands onto her waist.

“First rule! No hands!” he waved his hands towards them. Awkwardly, Luke pulled his hands away from Y/N’s body, stifling a laugh. He furrowed his eyebrows as he looked into Y/N’s eyes. “No mouths, I don’t wanna see it,” Jack said before he tossed the shot back. He shook his head. 

“I second that rule,” Quinn encouraged before he tossed back his own shot.

Jack continued to list the remainder of the rules. Everyone else nodded along with each rule. They agreed to every last detail. Jack was animated with dramatic hand gestures in the process. All Luke could do was laugh. 

“So basically, you want us to act like nothing ever happened?” Luke asked with a grin on his lips. Jack nodded while crossing his arms over his chest proudly. Luke shifted his gaze towards Y/N, raising his eyebrows slightly. She nodded very discreetly. “Oh, so you don’t want to see this?” he asked teasingly as he delicately rested his hands on her lower back as he leaned towards her, kissing her urgently. 

“Stop it!” Jack shouted while laughing. “Already breaking the rules!” he yelled as he pushed Luke away from Y/N. All of the other boys started laughing and wolf whistling. 

Luke kept his hands onto her waist as he leaned his head against her shoulder. She reached up and rested her hand against his neck. 

“Too much, too soon. I need more alcohol,” Jack let out while shaking his head, still laughing. Quickly, Jack poured himself another shot. “Someone take a box or a bottle, let’s get on the boat. So I don’t have to be watching this,” he mumbled as he took a hold of the vodka bottle and began walking out of the lakehouse. 

All of the other guys laughed along as they followed him out of the house.  Each of them taking a box of seltzers and leaving Luke and Y/N alone. He smirked before he leaned towards her, kissing her desperately. She giggled as she leaned away.

“Hey,” she mumbled as she ran her thumb across the side of his neck. 

“Hey,” he muttered as his gaze lowered towards her lips. “His rules are stupid, right?” he asked as gaze remained on her lips. She nodded before she leaned towards him, kissing him desperately. 

“Come on, before we get into trouble,” she mumbled against his lips. He smiled softly as he reluctantly stepped back. He held out his hand towards her and she happily took a hold of as he guided her towards the exit. 

~Three days later~

He was laying shirtless on her bed, only a pair of black sweatpants covering his frame. She entered her room a towel covering her frame. Her eyes widened as her grip tightened around her towel. 

“Luke! What the hell!” she said as she looked over his frame. He smirked as he did the same. Pressing his lips together, he fought a grin forming to his lips. 

“Hey,” he said simply as he leaned back on his elbows as he continued to admire her. 

“No hey, you are in my room and I don’t have clothes on,” she said while walking towards the closet to find something to cover her frame. Luke stood up from the bed excitedly. He stepped towards her excitedly, a smirk toying to his lips.

“Um, you know,” he swallowed hard as he scanned her frame. His cheeks started to pink up. “Boyfriend’s tend to see girlfriend’s without clothes,” he let out shyly. Her eyes widened as her mouth fell open. She tried to stop herself from laughing. 

“Well, boyfriend, if you think that this is the first time you’ll see me naked then you are strongly mistaken,” she let out teasingly. His lips fell into a pout as he continued to scan her frame. “Turn around and close your eyes, please,” she let out smiling. He smirked as he slowly turned around and closed his eyes.

“Thank you,” she sing songed. She dramatically dropped the towel towards the floor.

“Now that’s just mean,” he said as he chuckled. She reached into her closet and took a hold of her matching pajama set. It was pink and silk and she quickly covered her frame. She ran her hand across her stomach. It was a thin tank top with a pair of loose shorts.

“You are so dramatic,” she said as she ran her hand across the center of his back. He tilted his head back as he swallowed hard. “So cute but very dramatic,” she mumbled. He chuckled dryly, his eyes still closed. 

Slowly, she took a few steps to face him. Delicately, she ran her hands across his chest. His body tensed under her touch as he bit his bottom lip. 

She glided her hands from his chest up to his shoulders before she landed on his neck. Her thumbs ran across the sides of his neck as she leaned up towards him and pecked his lips. 

“Can I open my eyes,” he asked softly. She hummed and he opened his eyes slowly to meet her gaze. He reached his hands towards her resting on her waist. “Fuck, you’re beautiful,” he mumbled before he leaned towards her kissing her urgently. 

He leaned down as he took a hold of her thighs. Instantly, she jumped up and wrapped her legs around his waist. 

Her hands ran through his curls as she deepened the kiss. Delicately, he lowered her down onto her bed as he climbed on top of her. A giggle fell from her lips as he pulled away, meeting her eye. “We’re not having sex in this house,” she said as she ran her hand across his jaw.

“I know,” he muttered as he leaned towards her as he pressed his lips against her jawline. Tilting her head back, he lowered his lips down her neck, trailing wet kisses.

Her breath caught in her throat, “I–I mean it, Luke,” she mumbled as she dragged her tongue across her bottom lip. He pulled the strap of her top off of her shoulder as he continued to lower his lips. 

He slowly began to suck against the skin beneath her collarbone. He dragged his tongue across the heated skin as he tugged at the ends of her top. “Luke–” she let out breathlessly. 

He hummed against her skin as he lifted his head up to meet her gaze. He glided his free hand along her side as he dipped his hand beneath the thin fabric of her tank top. “You can’t be doing this,” she muttered as she ran her fingers through his curls. 

He smirked as he pecked her lips. “You cannot be kissing me like that,” she let out as she looked deeply into his eyes.

“Why not?” he asked softly as he leaned down and kissed her softly. She whined against his lips, he chuckled as he smiled as he pulled away. 

“Because…” she trailed off as she scanned his features, “You just can’t kiss me like that,” she mumbled. He smirked as he leaned down and pressed his lips against hers. A muffled moan fell from her lips as he kept the pace slow. His hands were delicate as he glided along the skin of her stomach before he delicately tugged at it. 

“Do you want me to stop?” he asked as he pressed his lips against the corner of her lips. She took a deep breath as he kissed her jawline.

“No, don’t stop,” she mumbled breathlessly. He smirked against her skin as he continued to lower his lips along her skin. “Fuck,” she mumbled as she tilting her head back as she shut her eyes. 

There was a loud knock against her door and Luke lifted his head as he clenched his jaw. Her lips fell into a pout as she let out a groan. “There’s a fifth rule! No sex while we’re under the same roof!” Jack shouted from outside the door. 

Luke laughed as he rolled onto his back while shaking his head. He took a deep breath. He reached towards her, taking a hold of her waist and pulled her towards him. She smirked as she rolled onto her side as she rested her head into the crook of his neck.

“Oh my god, he’s going to be so annoying, isn’t he?” she mumbled as she pressed her lips against his neck.

“He’s going to be awful,” Luke let out while laughing.

---

when you’re in love with your best friend, and it feels like carrying a secret so heavy it could crack you open.

when she leans her head on your shoulder, and every cell in your body lights up, but you have to sit there and pretend you’re fine. pretend you don’t dream of holding her hand forever, of taking her face in your hands and kissing her just once, just to see if she’d kiss you back.

when she tells you about the guy she has a crush on, and you smile, you always smile, because that’s what best friends do, right? we cheer each other on. but inside, something in you aches, this quiet, secret thing that hopes maybe—maybe one day, she’ll see you the way you see her.

it’s the way you know every detail of her: how her laughter changes when she’s tired, the way she twirls her hair when she’s nervous, how she only drinks her tea with too much sugar. and sometimes you wonder… does she know you like that? does she think of you the way you think of her?

you’d give anything just to know. just to know if she ever looks at you and feels that same skip in her heartbeat, that same quiet ache. but you don’t ask. you never ask, because it’s safer to stay quiet than to risk the truth that might break you.

and so, you sit there, loving her in silence, holding all the words you’ll never say.