systemicoppression
You think you're the painter, but you're actually just the canvas
155 posts
Latest Posts by systemicoppression
misfortune 😭😭🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽
Formula One's royal couple, Prince Charles Leclerc and Prince Max Verstappen, greeting their fans minutes before the misfortune (Charles suffering again at the hands of Ferrari) and the fortune (Max winning the Imola GP).
he looks so sad I'm.
does this race give you hope for monaco? no.
I NEED THIS BIBLICALLY PLEASE
I DID SOMETHING ACCIDENTALLY 😭😭
slayed and yayed
behind the scene | oscar piastri
summary; when you’ve been quietly dating oscar for a few months but once you perform at a mclaren gala, things become not so quietly
featuring; oscar piastri x underground jazz singer!reader
fc; ning yizhuo
warnings; english isn't my first language + not proof read YET ! and this is pretty short sorry my finals season started
an; i'm taking requests pleaseeeeee give me scenarios i would gladly write them
navigation masterlist request
yourusername
liked by noguidnce, oscarpiastri and 43k others !
yourusername first time collaborating and it’s out !!! around me by no guidnce featuring myself ahhh im so excited for you guys to listen to it
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author pls go give noguidnce a listen they're such a talented rnb group way too underrated for their talents
username OH HELL YES
username yn on a rnb track is everything to me
username may this collab get her out of the trenches we need people to listen to her incredible music AHHHHHH
eshnmusic i see some fine fellas right there
▮ yourusername indeed
noguidnce LFGGGGG
▮ yourusername ❤️🔥❤️🔥
▮ username NEXT COLLAB FLO PLEASEEEE
username oscar piastri in the likes pls
username i’m so excited for this collab
username NEED TO HEAR IT LIVE PLEASE
▮ yourusername soon 😁😁
▮ username OMG
▮ username a tour ????
oscarpiastri
liked by yourusername, landonorris and 798k others !
oscarpiastri summer in australia !! see you in 7 weeks
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username cutest dog ever
username lmaoo he looks so awkward i love it
landonorris blessing my feed with those pics
username is that a girl in the reflection of the 1st pic
▮ username CRAZY
▮ username noticing this is so weird
username can't wait for the season to start
▮ oscarpiastri me too !
username so fine
yourusername
liked by oscarpiastri, laufey and 24k others !
yourusername sydney you were amazing thank you so much !!!
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oscarpiastri great show !
▮ yourusername thank you so much
▮ username hold on this is my multiverse
username this literally was the best night of my life
▮ username she had so much fun with crowd this was my favorite concert ever
▮ username i know right !!!
▮ yourusername oh wow thank you much guys !!! this means a lot to me 💞
username need her to collar with laufey they match each other's vibes so well
▮ laufey yes please ! (liked by yourusername)
oscarpiastri
liked by yourusername, aussiegrit and 664k others !
oscarpiastri practicing my japanese and enjoying the food in tokyo after a good race 🍥
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username oh we're getting boyfriend material oscar now ?
▮ username i took this picture btw
username he's so fine
mclaren improving your japanese i see
▮ oscarpiastri i gotta get ready for next year's gp
username that dessert looks exquisite
author run out of ideas of comments sorry
yourusername
liked by yourbestfriend, oscarpiastri and 54k others !
yourusername got my biggest crowd here in tokyo thank you so much for hosting me so well in your beautiful country love yall 💕
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username that ice cream looks so yummy
▮ username that man is grating that ice cream as if someone is trying to snatch it from him
▮ username probably yn
username cutest girl ever
yourbestfriend you were singing about how i found myself a new bf but i see you got one too 😛
▮ yourusername i might have yes 🙈
▮ yourbestfriend see people you only have to sing about falling behind to fall in love
username that girl knows how to perform !!! the show was incredible
honjowolf would love to collaborate with you 😄
▮ yourusername let me contact you 🤝
username she illuminates on stage this is crazy
oscarpiastri
liked by yourusername, mclaren and 876k others !
oscarpiastri traded the silverstone paddock for a suit at a charity gala here at mclaren headquarters and a bit of jazz 🎶big thanks to the ones who made this event possible and to raise funds for such an important cause
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username starboy
username he's raising awareness and my standards too
landonorris who knew you clean up so well
▮ oscarpiastri you clearly didn't get the note tho
username mental health, jazz, and oscar piastre in a suit ?? this post healed me
username oscar advocating for mental health looking this good ?? unfair !! i would hate to be zak brown posing next to oscar
username casually attending a gala with our girl yn performing ?? this is my crossover im not even playing
username running to edit this gala look damn
author lets pretend he's wearing a tuxedo
maxverstappen your tux game goes strong
▮ oscarpiastri thanks mate
yourusername
liked by oscarpiastri, mclaren and 90k others !
yourusername an evening of music and grateful feelings for allowing me to lend my voice for such an honoring cause at mclaren’s charity gala for mental health awareness and accessible therapy for young athletes and artists, thank you so much ❤️🩹
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landonorris you're booked for my birthday, you've been noticed 😁
▮ yourusername ahaha would love to
username i don't know what you sound like but i already know you sound like honey and heaven
username someone said “jazz goddess” and they were RIGHT
author now let's pretend oscar is in the 2nd pic looking at you with lovey dovey eyes
username okay but did anyone else clock oscar in the front row looking soft ???
▮ f1updates second pic is radiating “i'm in love” energy from oscar
mclaren thank you for lending your voice to such a powerful night. you helped bring the message home 💛
▮ yourusername thank you so much for having me :)
yourbestfriend you + that look = the reason my soul left my body
▮ yourusername i love youuu
username most elegant jazz singer gen z has ever put out there
oscarpiastri
liked by landonorris, yourusername and 1.1 M others !
oscarpiastri cat is accidentally out of the bag ?
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username not you dating our girl yn
username CAN YOU FIGHT OSCAR ????
username YN GETTING MAINSTREAM NOWWWWW
username y'all are so cute what
mclaren does this mean we get a jazz performance before every race for good luck (liked by creator)
username the pics he took of her are so pretty
username he's down bad in that first picture
username that dump is the cutest post on his account omg
username im so happy for them
landonorris aw parents
▮ oscarpiastri you're older than us ?
▮ yourusername and ?? let him be that's my son
▮ landonorris thank you yn you're my favorite parent 😸
username im dying at this dump
yourusername
liked by oscarpiastri, lilymhe and 87k others !
yourusername ik he did it on purpose
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username omg this is so cute
username AWWWW the lego parrots
username again oscar can you fight ????
username y’all are so cute i can’t
username i just realised but she's the jazz singer who sang at mclaren's charity gala omg
lilymhe double date when ?
▮ yourusername asap please
username mama y papa
username they’re now my favorite couple in the paddock
username he won
username our parents omg
username powerful couple
texts messages between oscar and yn
instagram stories updates from yourusername and oscarpiastri
yourusername
liked by oscarpiastri, lilymhe, aussiegrit and 127k others !
yourusername happy valentine my loves 💘 to celebrate today, dear soulmate is out on every platforms !!! it is a song who's very dear to me because i wrote it the very night i met my person, the one who makes me smile, laugh, love this life and my everyday inspiration ! i hope you'll cherish it 🫧❤️🩹
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oscarpiastri i love you and i'm proud of you, always.
landonorris ok but where’s my version called “dear best mate” ??
▮ lilymhe if anything she'll have a version up for her platonic soulmate aka me
▮ landonorris loooll you're delusional
▮ yourusername actually lando...
username SHE DROPPED THE LOVE SONG OF THE YEAR AND HARD LAUNCHED IN THE SAME MONTH ??????
username no bc this caption just made me cry in public. again. thanks.
username i’m not your person but i felt SO chosen listening to this 🩷
mclaren on repeat in the garage. happy Valentine’s day from the whole team 💌
f1gossips “the night i met my person” PLS IS THIS ABOUT THE DRIVER WHO LOOKS AT YOU LIKE YOU HUNG THE MOON???
username dear soulmate? no babe. dear GOD, this song is everything 😭💔
bellahadid you don’t release songs, you release spells.
▮ yourusername omg i love you best compliment ever
username i will never recover from this caption. you’re literally a love story.
username the vocals, the lyrics, the message??? ur pen is dipped in romance
username me @ my situationship: “this could’ve been us if you inspired me like THAT.”
Atleast you kissed the brick before you threw it at me
Mon Soleil
Charles Leclerc x high school sweetheart!Reader
Summary: you don’t belong in the shadows, but selfishly Charles loves that you’re only his there (in which Charles Leclerc has kept his girlfriend hidden from the world for years and years … until he didn’t)
The door shuts softly behind him.
That in itself is telling — Charles always shuts it gently when he’s trying not to bring the world inside with him. Shoes scuffed, travel-worn jacket slung over one shoulder, eyes a little too tired to be young, he exhales like the weight of the grid is still pressing against his spine.
Silence greets him, familiar and warm. It’s not the absence of noise, but the presence of peace.
He walks through the apartment slowly, like something might break if he moves too fast. The city hums outside, Monaco golden and quiet beneath the early evening sky. From the living room, the sliding balcony doors are cracked open just enough to let in the scent of sea salt and sun-warmed stone.
That’s where you are.
Curled up on the balcony chaise, legs tucked beneath you, a loose cardigan slipping off one shoulder. There’s a book in your lap, but it’s long since fallen shut. Your eyes are closed, head tipped toward the sky like you’re soaking in the last of the daylight. Hair soft, skin glowing in the low sun — it hits him all at once, how desperately he’s missed you.
Charles leans against the doorframe, watching for a moment, throat tight.
“Mon soleil,” he says softly, barely more than breath.
You blink your eyes open, slow and sleepy, like your mind’s still somewhere inside the pages or the sunlight or the quiet. Then you smile.
“Hey,” you say, voice rough with rest.
He crosses the distance in seconds. The moment his lips brush your temple, everything else dissolves — the cameras, the interviews, the brutal double-header, the fake smiles. All of it gone. You tilt your head so he can press a second kiss just under your ear, and his arms wrap around you from behind, grounding.
“You’re home early,” you murmur.
Charles huffs a quiet laugh against your skin. “It’s nine.”
Your fingers find his. “Early for you.”
He exhales, forehead pressed to your shoulder. “Didn’t want to go to the after-party. Couldn’t take another question about the championship.”
“Did you win?”
“Yeah.”
There’s a pause.
“I’m proud of you,” you say, simply, gently. Like you mean it and nothing else. No noise. No expectations.
He closes his eyes.
“You know they had me filming a social media bit with Lewis twenty minutes after I crossed the finish line?” He says, muffled against your collarbone. “I was still sweating. I hadn’t even called Maman yet.”
“Sounds like a dream job.”
Charles snorts. “Yeah. The dream.”
You twist a little to look at him. There’s a faint crease between his brows, like something he hasn’t said yet is still sitting there, waiting.
“What is it?”
He doesn’t answer immediately. Instead, he brushes your hair back, fingers gentle at your temple, then your jaw. The kind of touch that says you’re real. I need that right now. You lean into it.
“They want me to fake date someone,” he says finally, eyes fixed on yours. “For a brand thing. PR stunt. ‘Broaden my audience appeal.’ Some model who’s apparently very into vintage cars and barely has a pulse.”
You blink.
He watches you, gauging the flicker of emotion across your face. “I said no,” he adds, quickly. “Obviously. I didn’t even let them finish the pitch.”
Your voice is dry. “But you told me anyway.”
“I had to,” Charles says. “It’s your life too.”
You’re quiet for a moment. “Do you think they’d actually push it?”
He sighs. “They’re not stupid. They know I’d walk before I let them touch this.” His thumb presses to the space over your heart. “But they’re not used to me saying no to everything else.”
“You’ve said no to a lot.”
He smiles faintly. “Yeah, but only when it’s worth it.”
You reach for his hand, the one still resting on your shoulder. Your fingers link instinctively.
“Was it hard?” You ask. “To say no?”
“No,” he says immediately. “What’s hard is not being able to tell the world why.”
There’s something deeper in that — something that aches.
You look at him. “You’d want to?”
He hesitates.
“I would,” Charles says quietly. “But I know what it would do to you.”
That stings, a little. Not because it’s wrong, but because it’s true.
He sees it in your expression. “Hey,” he says, gently. “I didn’t mean that like — like you can’t handle it. I know you could. I just … I like this. Us. The quiet. The privacy.”
“I like it too,” you admit, leaning your cheek into his shoulder. “But sometimes I think … maybe I’m hiding.”
“You’re not,” he says immediately, and there’s something fierce about it, the way his arms tighten around you. “You’re not. You just like peace. And that doesn’t mean you’re hiding.”
You shrug.
He shifts to face you more directly, hands cupping your jaw now. “You don’t belong in the shadows,” Charles murmurs, brushing his thumbs across your cheeks. “But selfishly, I love that you’re only mine there.”
You exhale a shaky little laugh. “That’s kind of possessive.”
He smiles. “Yeah. It is.”
“You’re usually not.”
“Not with the world, no,” he says. “But with you? Yeah. I am. I want to be.”
You look at him for a long time.
There’s still sea breeze in the air, warm and thick with salt. The sun is low now, slipping behind the hills. The light on your skin is rose-gold, and he looks at you like you hung the sun there yourself.
“I wrote today,” you say finally.
His eyes brighten. “Yeah?”
You nod. “Couple thousand words. Not great ones. But better than the last few days.”
“I want to read them.”
You raise a brow. “You always say that.”
“And I always mean it.”
“I’m not ready.”
He doesn’t push. “Okay.”
You smile, just a little. “But I like that you ask.”
Charles leans forward, brushing his lips across your forehead. “Always will.”
The wind stirs a strand of hair across your cheek, and he tucks it behind your ear with a kind of reverence.
“How long are you home for?” You ask.
“Five days.”
“Before Spain?”
“Yeah. I was going to train tomorrow, but I think I’ll take the morning off.”
Your voice is quiet. “For rest?”
“For you,” he says, and the way he says it makes your heart stumble.
“Charles-”
“No,” he says, gently. “You don’t have to earn it. I want time with you. You’re the only place I feel human lately.”
You swallow.
He leans in and kisses your cheek, slow and warm. Then your jaw. Then your neck, just above your pulse. You shiver slightly, but it’s comfort more than anything else — being found, being known.
“You want to go to bed?” He asks quietly.
You nod.
So he takes your hand, and it’s not rushed — it’s not hungry or dramatic. It’s grounding. Soft. He guides you inside, flicking off lights as you go, easing you into your shared room like he’s placing you somewhere safe.
In the bedroom, he pulls off your cardigan for you, brushing your shoulders with his hands. He peels back the covers, helps you climb in, then joins you. Not an inch of space between your bodies. His arms come around your waist from behind, holding you steady.
He presses a kiss to the back of your neck. “You’re not hiding,” he whispers. “You’re home.”
You reach back for his hand under the sheets. “Even when I’m quiet?”
“Especially when you’re quiet.”
He’s tracing patterns across your ribs now, soothing. Breathing slow. The world doesn’t exist here.
“Mon soleil,” he murmurs again, a little sleepier this time. “Even when the lights go out.”
You hum. “I’m glad you’re home.”
“I always come back to you.”
And in the hush of the room, you believe him.
He holds you closer.
Outside, Monaco sleeps.
Inside, he dreams only of you.
***
The car pulls up to the curb in front of the Palais de Tokyo, slow and deliberate like it knows what’s waiting outside.
Flashes ignite immediately — paparazzi like moths drawn to the promise of fame. The bulbs flicker against the polished black of the car, against the glittering heels stepping out before them, against the tension sitting thick in Charles’ chest.
He glances over at you.
“You sure?” He murmurs.
You nod, hands smoothed over the deep navy fabric of your dress. His fingers brush over yours where they rest in your lap — one soft, grounding touch.
“Okay,” he breathes. Then he adds, a little lower, “Stay close to me.”
The door opens.
The noise hits first — camera shutters, yelling voices, someone shouting his name in five different accents. It’s not unusual. It’s just … amplified. Paris amplifies everything. This isn’t a race weekend. This is Fashion Week. Which means the crowd outside isn’t just motorsport fans — it’s models, influencers, press junkies, people who invent rumors for fun and watch them come to life in real time.
You step out first.
And it’s small, the moment. Barely three seconds between your heels touching pavement and Charles following behind you, hand briefly ghosting the small of your back.
But it’s enough.
The buzz changes pitch the second he emerges.
There’s a flicker — a sharp inhale among the crowd, someone saying “Wait, who is that?” and another whispering your name as a question. Not as a fact. Just an idea. But ideas are dangerous here. Ideas spark headlines.
“Keep walking,” Charles mutters under his breath, close enough for only you to hear. “Just smile. Straight through.”
You nod. You’ve done this before — stepped through this minefield together. But something feels different tonight. Sharper.
Inside, the noise doesn’t follow. The air changes. The show hasn’t started yet, and the room is full of champagne flutes, soft designer scents, the low hum of fashion people pretending not to care who else is watching. You don’t drink — your fingers toy with the stem of a glass while Charles excuses himself for a brief interview across the room.
You watch him go.
He’s good at this. Too good. Easy smile, charming accent, sharp tux — he blends in so well it’s almost hard to remember how badly he used to flinch under attention.
The memory hits like a whisper.
***
It was at school, back in Monaco. He’d shown up to class ten minutes late, hair still wet from training, a smudge of grease on his collar. You were already sitting near the back, half-hiding behind a copy of Little Women.
He slid into the seat next to you, awkward and quiet. Everyone knew who he was. Charles Leclerc — the golden boy. The kid with the karting trophies and the tragic backstory. But up close, he didn’t seem golden. He seemed … tired.
He hadn’t spoken until three days later, when you’d accidentally left your notebook behind after class. He ran it out to you — literally ran. You were already halfway down the hall when he called your name.
You turned.
He held it out. “You forgot this.”
You took it, quietly. “Thanks.”
He hesitated, then blurted, “You write poems in the margins.”
Your eyes narrowed. “You read it?”
“No, I mean, just that one page. The one on the train. It was … good.”
You tilted your head. “You read poetry?”
“No,” he said, too quickly. Then, “Sometimes. I don’t understand most of it.”
You smiled. “That’s okay. Most people don’t.”
He paused. “Can I sit next to you again tomorrow?”
You nodded.
That was it. That was the moment it began.
Not with a spark. But a softness.
***
Now, across the room, Charles finishes his interview and makes his way back to you, expression slightly tight.
“Are we okay?” You ask under your breath.
He kisses your cheek. “Fine. One of the photographers caught a weird angle of us getting out of the car. It’ll blow over.”
You nod slowly. “You sure?”
“No,” he admits, low. “But I’m pretending.”
The lights dim then, and conversation dissolves into applause as the show begins. Your friend’s collection floats down the runway — fluid and sharp, dramatic and quiet all at once. You squeeze Charles’ hand, and he leans in to whisper, “He’ll be huge after this.”
You smile. “I know.”
But it doesn’t last.
After the show, as the crowd floods the exit, there’s a moment — a flash of something too fast to be fully seen. A journalist stepping forward, recorder in hand.
“Charles, Charles, one question?”
He stops out of habit. You hesitate beside him.
The journalist glances at you, sharp and curious. “Is this your girlfriend?”
Silence.
For a second — just one — he doesn’t say anything. The beat stretches, too long, too brittle.
Then, “No comment.”
You flinch, barely. But he feels it. Of course he does.
He wraps a protective arm around your waist, not possessive but anchoring. “We’re here supporting a friend.”
The journalist tilts her head, eyes narrowing. “Right. So the matching entrance was just coincidence?”
Charles doesn’t answer.
You can feel the tension in his body, coiled and barely held.
He pulls you away before it escalates. No scene. Just a quick exit, one hand in yours as you disappear back into the private car waiting in the alley.
The moment the doors shut, the silence is deafening.
You stare out the window.
He speaks first. “I didn’t mean-”
“I know,” you say, too quickly.
“But it didn’t sound like-”
“I know, Charles.”
Another pause.
“I just …” he sighs. “It wasn’t the moment.”
You nod. “It never is.”
He closes his eyes. “That’s not fair.”
“Maybe not. But it’s true.”
There’s a sharp quiet between you now, the kind that doesn’t come from anger but from ache.
Charles leans forward, elbows on his knees, hands in his hair. “I’m trying to protect you.”
You stare at him. “And I love you for it. But I’m not breakable.”
“I know that.”
You exhale, soft. “Do you?”
He turns to face you fully. “I do. But you didn’t see the headlines they almost ran after Monaco. They twist everything. I don’t want you swallowed up in that circus. I want you safe.”
“And I want you honest.”
His jaw tightens.
You look away. “This is the first time in months we’ve fought.”
“I hate it.”
“Me too.”
The car pulls up to the hotel. You walk inside together, quiet, each step heavy with words unspoken. You ride the elevator without touching. Not out of distance, but because neither of you knows how to fix this yet.
The second the hotel door clicks shut, Charles exhales.
You kick off your shoes, walk toward the window. The Paris skyline is lit in gold and white. The Eiffel Tower gleams in the distance, unbothered.
You don’t hear him cross the room, but you feel it when his hands come to your waist.
“I didn’t say it,” he murmurs, voice rough. “But I thought it.”
You swallow.
His lips brush your shoulder. “I always think it.”
“I know.”
His hands move slowly, drawing you back into him, arms around your waist. His voice dips lower. “I’m yours. Always. Even when I can’t say it out loud.”
You turn in his arms, looking up at him. “You shouldn’t have to hide the things you love.”
“I’m not hiding,” Charles says, quiet but certain. “I’m guarding. There’s a difference.”
Your eyes search his.
He leans in, forehead resting against yours. “Don’t shrink from the light,” you whisper.
“I don’t,” he breathes. “I just want the light to stay mine.”
You kiss him first.
And then everything slows.
There’s no rush in the way he undresses you — just reverence. His fingers skim your spine, your ribs, the sides of your thighs. You feel his breath at your neck, his lips brushing over your skin like apology and promise all at once.
He lifts you gently, lays you back against the sheets with a kind of sacred care. Like the whole world could fall apart and he’d still hold you steady. Every movement is deliberate, grounding. He touches you like you’re sunlight made tangible — something fleeting he wants to memorize again and again.
His hands stay on your hips, firm and steady, even as his mouth whispers over your skin — your collarbone, your chest, your stomach.
“I don’t need the world to know,” he murmurs, voice thick. “But I need you to know.”
“I do,” you breathe. “I’ve always known.”
He kisses you like that’s the only answer he’ll ever need.
When it’s over, your limbs tangled, breath synced, he brushes a strand of hair off your forehead.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “For freezing.”
You shake your head. “You were scared.”
He holds you tighter. “I just want to keep you.”
“You have me.”
He nods.
Outside, Paris lives loud. Inside, Charles stays quiet — arms around you like gravity.
He says it again, barely audible.
“Mon soleil.”
And you fall asleep knowing he means it.
***
It’s early when Charles wakes, the sky outside a soft watercolor of dawn. The city’s barely breathing yet, Paris muted under pale blue and silver. The sheets are warm. You’re tucked against him, one arm slung across his ribs, your face buried somewhere near his collarbone.
He stays still for a moment.
Watches you.
You’re beautiful in the way only people at rest can be — unguarded, soft-edged, not thinking of the world or the weight of it. And Charles, for all his fame, for all his speed, has always worshipped slowness with you. He memorizes the shape of your mouth, the curve of your spine under the duvet. It makes him ache, how safe you look here, next to him. Like maybe, just maybe, he hasn’t ruined that yet.
He slips out of bed carefully, not waking you. Pads across the hotel room barefoot, dragging his fingers through sleep-mussed hair. There’s a note of stillness in him this morning, unusual but welcome. The weight of last night is still there, but it’s different now. Muted.
Your suitcase sits open in the corner, a paperback wedged between layers of clothing. The spine cracked, corners worn.
But it’s not the book that stops him.
It’s the manila folder on the desk.
The pages are stacked neatly, a thick rubber band holding them together. His name’s not on the front, and you haven’t told him much — only that it’s your second book, slower going than the first. But the edges are filled with your handwriting, your margin notes, your scratched-out titles.
He tells himself not to look.
Then he does.
Just one page, he promises.
Then two.
Then-
A line.
To the boy who lives at 320 km/h but holds me like I’m fragile porcelain.
Charles stops breathing for a second.
The words blur.
He sinks into the desk chair, pages cradled in his hands like they might shatter. He flips through more — just a few at first, then faster, scanning blocks of dialogue and prose, your voice echoing in every line. It’s fiction. Of course it is. But he knows himself in the spaces between. In the way the protagonist runs from everything except her. In the way he comes back. Always.
There’s a passage — midway through — that hits too close.
He doesn’t know how to rest. His body hums even in sleep. But when he touches her, something changes. It’s not desperation — it’s reverence. He holds her like she’s a map, and he’s finally found home.
Charles exhales, long and slow.
He reads on.
The world never asked him who he was. They only told him what to be. But with her, he can become something else. Someone honest. Someone flawed. Someone who doesn’t always win but is still worth loving.
He closes the manuscript after that, heart pounding. A different kind of pressure — intimate, unbearable, right under his ribs.
You see him.
You always have.
And suddenly, he wants to speak. To tell you everything he never quite knows how to say out loud.
So he finds a notepad in the hotel drawer. Quietly, without thinking too much, he writes.
***
Letter one.
Found tucked inside your book the next morning.
I am so tired of being the world’s Charles Leclerc. But I never tire of being yours.
***
Letter two.
Slipped between your sketchbook pages a few days later.
Sometimes I think you’re a quiet kind of genius. The world sees flashes, but I get the whole storm. You make me want to be more than fast. You make me want to be still.
***
Letter three.
Folded into the pocket of your jacket before he leaves for Spain.
I dreamt once that we lived in a house by the sea. No press. No racing. Just your words, my hands, and time. I don’t know if I’ll ever deserve that. But I want it.
***
He doesn’t sign them.
Doesn’t say they’re from him. Doesn’t need to.
You’d know his handwriting anywhere.
***
The morning after you return from Paris, you find the first one.
It’s there, plain as anything, pressed between two chapters of the book you’ve been reading for weeks. You weren’t even sure where you’d packed it. But it finds you.
You don’t say anything.
You just … sit with it.
Read it twice. Three times.
Then you place the paper back inside the pages and slide the book onto the nightstand like nothing happened.
When Charles stirs, you’re already watching him.
He groans a little, stretching. “What time is it?”
“Still early,” you murmur.
“Mm,” he rolls closer, eyes half-lidded. “You’re staring.”
“Maybe.”
He grins. “Lucky me.”
You lean in and kiss him.
It’s longer than usual. Slower. More certain. His hands come up to cradle your face, a little confused but not resisting.
When you pull back, he’s blinking at you. “What was that for?”
You shrug. “Felt like it.”
He hums, pulling you in again. “Do it again.”
So you do.
***
That day, he flies out for a press shoot in Spain. You stay in Monaco, returning to your writing, to your own quiet world.
But something’s shifted.
You start noticing the notes.
They don’t come every day. They’re not dramatic or poetic. They’re just him. Honest. Raw. Tucked where you least expect them — inside your journal, between the receipts in your wallet, once even in the fridge, stuck to the almond milk.
And still, you don’t mention them.
Because that’s the thing about Charles.
He’s loud on track. Loud when he’s winning. Loud when he’s fighting.
But when he loves — it’s quiet.
***
A few nights later, you’re on FaceTime. He’s sprawled across a hotel bed, hair wet from a shower, wearing a T-shirt that used to be yours.
“You find any new letters?” He asks, casual, but you see the corner of his mouth twitch.
You tilt your head. “Should I be looking?”
He smirks. “Maybe.”
You smile. “No new ones today.”
He feigns offense. “That you found.”
“Exactly.”
He laughs, soft and real. “You like them?”
“I do.”
There’s a pause.
“Even when I’m not good at saying it out loud,” Charles murmurs, “I’m thinking about you.”
“I know.”
He leans back, arms crossed under his head. “I think about how we met, sometimes. How I didn’t talk for like two weeks. You probably thought I was an idiot.”
“I thought you were shy.”
He blinks. “Really?”
“Yeah. You were always rushing somewhere, but you looked like you were trying not to bump into anyone.”
He laughs. “Because I was. Monaco’s small but brutal.”
You soften. “You’ve always been good at seeing everything.”
He nods. “But you were the first person who saw me. Before the racing. Before the trophies.”
“I still do.”
He swallows hard.
***
Later that week, another letter finds you inside your typewriter cover.
Letter four.
I don’t always know who I am to the world. Sometimes it changes by the hour. But with you, I never have to wonder. You anchor me. You make the noise stop. I hope I do the same for you. Even if I don’t say it, I’m trying.
You fold it gently, slide it under your pillow.
He’s not with you tonight, but the space beside you feels a little less empty.
***
A few days later, you call him out of the blue.
He answers on the second ring, breathless. “Everything okay?”
You smile. “Yeah. Just wanted to hear your voice.”
He sighs, soft and happy. “I miss you.”
“I miss you too.”
There’s a pause. Then:
“Do you want me to stop?” He asks.
You blink. “Stop what?”
“The notes. The letters. If it’s too much.”
Your heart twists. “Charles. No. I love them.”
He lets out a breath. “Okay.”
You add, quieter, “I keep them. All of them.”
“I know,” he says, and you can hear the smile in his voice. “I figured.”
***
That weekend, he comes home.
No cameras. No entourage. Just him, shoulders looser than they’ve been in months.
You open the door in sweatpants, hair still damp from a shower, and he smiles like it’s the only thing he’s been waiting for all week.
“Hi,” you say.
He drops his bag and kisses you before you can say anything else.
Later, curled up on the couch, his head in your lap, he murmurs, “You wrote about me.”
You pretend not to know what he means. “Everyone writes about you.”
“No,” he says, tilting his head to look up at you. “You wrote about me.”
You brush your fingers through his hair. “I write about what matters.”
He closes his eyes. “I hope you always do.”
You kiss his forehead. “And you’ll keep writing letters?”
He grins. “Until I run out of hiding spots.”
You smile. “Then you’ll just have to start saying them.”
He nods. “I will. One day.”
But until then-
The notes are enough.
***
He sounds like someone else on the phone.
The call comes after the sprint race in Miami, crackling with poor reception and exhaustion. He’s finished P2, and the media's already torn him apart for not converting pole into a win. Again. You can hear it in his voice — the frayed edges, the clipped tone he tries to soften for you.
“They said I’m not aggressive enough,” Charles mutters. “That I’m too emotional. That I’m-” he breaks off, breathing hard. “That I don’t have the killer instinct.”
You’re silent for a moment. “Do you believe them?”
“No,” he says, too fast. “But maybe … I don’t know. Maybe they’re right. Maybe I’m-” he trails off again, breath catching in his throat.
You sit up straighter, your grip on the phone tightening. “Charles.”
He doesn’t respond right away.
“Charles, look at me.”
“I can’t,” he whispers. “You’re not here.”
And that’s all it takes.
You’re already moving, throwing clothes into a carry-on bag with more purpose than coordination. You book a last-minute flight while brushing your teeth, your laptop balanced on the bathroom counter. The Miami heat feels a world away, but you can already see it — the chaos of the paddock, the swarm of cameras, the sound bites dissecting his every word.
And underneath it all: him.
Raw. Alone.
Not anymore.
***
By the time you arrive, the Sunday sun is already bruising the skyline, and you haven’t slept in seventeen hours. But the moment you step through the paddock gates, heart pounding behind your lanyard and sunglasses, you know exactly what you’re looking for.
He doesn’t see you at first.
He’s talking to an engineer, brow furrowed, body wound tight like wire. But then someone taps his shoulder, nods in your direction, and Charles turns.
His whole face shifts.
Like breathing after holding it too long.
He doesn’t say anything. Just strides across the paddock like the ground might collapse between you if he doesn’t close the distance fast enough. And then he’s there — eyes wild, chest rising and falling fast.
“You’re here,” he breathes, voice cracked.
You nod. “Of course I am.”
He grabs your wrist — not roughly, but with urgency. “Come with me.”
He pulls you through a back hallway you’ve never seen before, past mechanics and closed doors, until he finds an unlocked storage closet that smells like tires and adrenaline. He drags you in, shuts the door behind him, and exhales like he’s finally allowed to fall apart.
And then-
His arms are around you.
Just like that.
He buries his face in your neck, hands shaking at your waist. “I couldn’t do it anymore,” he whispers. “I tried. I really tried.”
“I know,” you say, threading your fingers into his hair. “I know you did.”
“They said so many things,” he murmurs against your skin. “Not just about driving. About who I am. About what I’m not. It was so loud, and I just — I needed you.”
You pull back just enough to cup his face, forcing him to look at you. “Charles. Listen to me. You are not what they say. You’re still my Charles. Not just Ferrari’s. Not theirs.”
His eyes close, a single tear slipping down. “You always say the right thing.”
“No,” you say, brushing it away. “I just say what’s true.”
He looks at you then, really looks at you — hair a mess from travel, skin tired from the flight, sunglasses still tangled in your hair. And he kisses you like he’s afraid you’ll vanish.
Like if he doesn’t hold you tight enough, the world will take you too.
Your back hits the supply shelf with a soft thud, and his hands are on your jaw, your shoulders, your waist — everywhere at once. You kiss him back just as fiercely, anchoring him with every breath.
“Say it again,” he murmurs, lips brushing yours.
“You’re still mine,” you whisper. “Always mine.”
***
That night, the hotel room is dark and quiet, lit only by the faint glow of Miami’s skyline outside the floor-to-ceiling windows. You’re on the bed, curled up in one of his shirts, freshly showered, still buzzing from the day.
He sits on the edge, towel around his neck, hands braced on his knees like he’s holding himself together.
You crawl over to him slowly, wrapping your arms around his torso from behind.
“Hey,” you murmur against his shoulder.
He exhales. “I keep thinking I have to be perfect. Not just on track. Everywhere.”
“You don’t.”
“I know,” he says. “But they make it feel like I do. Like if I’m not smiling enough, or fast enough, or hard enough, I’m … replaceable.”
You press a kiss between his shoulder blades. “You’re not.”
He turns to face you, eyes dark and heavy with everything he’s been carrying.
“You always know how to make it stop hurting,” he whispers.
You crawl into his lap, straddling him slowly, hands cupping his cheeks.
“Because I love you,” you say simply.
His lips find yours again, slower this time. Less desperation. More reverence. His hands slide under your thighs, then up your back, anchoring you to him like you’re the only solid thing he has left.
“You’re my girl,” he murmurs, voice hoarse. “My warmth. My sun.”
You kiss his temple. “Then let me be.”
And he does.
He lays you back on the sheets like you’re fragile and sacred all at once. His touch is soft but sure, worshipful, his hands tracing every inch of skin like it’s familiar scripture. He whispers in French sometimes, half-prayer, half-plea. His mouth brushes over your collarbone, your ribs, the inside of your wrist.
“Mon soleil,” he says again and again. “My girl. My warmth. My sun.”
You thread your fingers through his hair, breath catching as he kisses a slow trail along your sternum.
“You don’t have to prove anything here,” you whisper.
“I know,” he says. “But I still want to show you.”
His voice trembles — not from nerves, but from feeling. Too much of it, barely contained.
“If I crash out of everything,” he says, forehead resting against yours, “I want to crash into you.”
Your heart stutters.
“I’d catch you,” you breathe.
His lips find yours again, and this time it’s softer. Slower. Full of promises neither of you speak aloud. He moves like he’s memorizing you. Not rushing. Not conquering. Just … loving. Tracing you with quiet devotion.
When it’s over, he doesn’t let go. Just holds you to his chest, face buried in your hair.
Neither of you speaks for a while.
Eventually, you say into the silence, “I’m coming to the next race.”
He nods, arm tightening around you. “Good.”
“I’ll be at the track. No press. Just watching.”
He kisses the crown of your head. “Knowing you’re there changes everything.”
You press a hand to his heart. “It’s still yours, you know. Even when you think you’ve lost yourself.”
He closes his eyes. “You always bring me back.”
***
And in the morning, before you leave for the airport, you find another note.
Folded into the pocket of your hoodie.
His handwriting, scrawled but certain.
You saved me this weekend. You keep saving me. I love you more than the silence between races, more than the moments I win. You are the only finish line that matters.
You don’t cry.
But you hold it to your chest for a long time before tucking it into your wallet.
Where all the others live.
***
The mirror glints with a kind of reverence.
Your reflection blurs around the edges, not because of the makeup or the soft updo or the silk pooling at your ankles, but because tonight — the first time ever — you are not just his secret. You’re stepping into the light with him.
He’s behind you in the hotel room, shirtless and warm from the shower, towel still low on his hips. His eyes are on you like you’re something he dreamed up. Slowly, he crosses the floor, wrapping his arms around your waist from behind and resting his chin on your shoulder.
“You look like starlight,” Charles murmurs against your skin.
You smile softly. “That’s poetic.”
“It’s just true.”
Your fingers rest lightly over his. “You still sure about this? We can still back out. Stay here. Order room service. Watch old races until you fall asleep in your pasta again.”
He laughs quietly, that low, melted sound. “And miss the chance to show you off? No, mon solei.”
He kisses your shoulder, breath warm. “Besides,” he says, voice dropping to a whisper, “you’ve been mine in the shadows for too long.”
***
The carpet is a blur of white lights and velvet ropes, of camera flashes and murmured names, but his hand never leaves yours.
Not once.
You step out of the car together, and everything slows.
You feel the collective intake of breath from the press line, from the onlookers who’ve speculated, dissected, whispered. Your dress shimmers under the strobes, and his tux is impeccable — tailored like the life he lives — but it’s the way he looks at you that steals the attention.
Not just affection. Not even pride.
A kind of awe. Like he can’t believe you’re real, and that you chose him.
It’s the kind of look that writes headlines before they’re even typed.
Charles doesn't falter. He doesn’t glance around to see who’s watching. His eyes are only for you. Fingers laced, thumb rubbing the inside of your wrist in slow, grounding circles.
You hear one journalist gasp softly into her mic, like she’s realizing it in real time.
“That’s her,” someone murmurs. “The girl Charles Leclerc looks at like she hung the stars.”
And still, his eyes don’t leave yours.
“Too late to run?” You whisper as cameras flash like lightning.
He grins. “You run, I follow.”
A dozen questions are hurled in your direction as you move down the carpet together.
“Is this your girlfriend?”
“Are you official?”
“When did it start?”
Charles only smiles — polite but cool. Still untouchable. But his hand never wavers in yours. He lets the silence answer for him.
A look. A touch. A truth held in the space between bodies.
The world sees it.
And for once, you let them.
***
Later, when the speeches are done and the champagne has long gone warm, you both slip away.
Charles leads you up to the rooftop of the venue — one of those quiet, off-limits spots only someone like him could access without question. The wind brushes against your skin, and the lights of Monaco twinkle in the distance, reflected on the sea like fallen stars.
You kick off your heels the second the door closes behind you.
“God, I thought I was going to trip over a camera cable and faceplant into Toto Wolff,” you mutter.
Charles laughs, pulling off his bowtie and pocketing it. “I was watching your feet the entire time, just in case.”
You walk to the edge of the rooftop together, city stretched out below you like something painted. He stands behind you again, wrapping his arms around your waist, just like in the mirror hours ago.
“Everyone was staring,” you say, voice quieter now.
“Good,” he murmurs.
You turn your head, just enough to see him. “Not too much?”
He shakes his head. “I wanted them to see. Finally.”
There’s a silence — comfortable, but heavy with something unsaid. You rest your head against his shoulder and close your eyes, letting the night soak into your skin.
“I’m proud of you,” you whisper.
“For what?”
“For being brave. For letting them see the real thing.”
He exhales slowly. “It wasn’t hard. Not with you next to me.”
You feel him shift behind you, hands moving, and then he’s stepping around to face you. His expression is unreadable — tender but serious, eyes darker than usual under the moonlight.
Then he pulls something from his jacket pocket.
A ring.
Small. Delicate. Not flashy.
Two stones nestled together, pressed into a slim gold band.
One for his birth month. One for yours.
Not a proposal.
But something more sacred, somehow.
A promise.
“Charles-”
“I don’t want headlines,” he says quietly. “I don’t want statements. I don’t even want to trend on Twitter.”
He takes your hand.
“I want you to know, here and now, that even if no one ever saw us, if this had stayed ours forever — I would still love you like this. With everything.”
He slides the ring onto your finger. It fits perfectly.
“It’s not for the world,” he adds. “It’s for you. For us. For the days you stayed when I gave you nothing but exhaustion and travel and chaos. For the nights you held me when I came home empty. It’s a reminder. That no matter where I am, what I win, how loud it gets …”
He cups your cheek.
“You are still the only thing I want to come home to.”
You’re crying before you can stop it.
He pulls you into his chest, rocking you gently as you try to speak.
“You always make me feel like I’m not just … orbiting your world,” you manage. “Like I belong.”
He pulls back just enough to look at you, thumbs brushing the corners of your eyes.
“You are my world.”
You shake your head slowly, overwhelmed. “You’re always giving and giving. Aren’t you tired?”
His expression softens. “I am,” he admits. “But I’m less tired when I’m with you.”
You lean your forehead against his, the ring cool against his skin.
“I’ll wear this every day,” you whisper. “Even if it’s just for me.”
He smiles. “It’s always just for you.”
***
Much later, back in the hotel room, you sit on the balcony while he undresses inside. The city hums below, faint and electric. The air smells like salt and roses.
He comes out in soft cotton and bare feet, moving quietly.
And he sees you — bathed in the golden spill of the balcony lights, skin glowing, hair a little undone from the night, ring catching the faint glint of stars.
It mirrors the first night you sat like this, back at the beginning.
When he came home unraveling and found you, grounding him without even trying.
Now, he stops in the doorway, watching you like he’s memorizing it.
Like if he looks away, the light might disappear.
You glance up. “What?”
He smiles, slow and quiet. Walks over and leans down to kiss the top of your head.
“Mon soleil.”
You tilt your face toward him, teasing. “You’re really not gonna retire that nickname, huh?”
“Never,” he says simply, kissing your temple again. “Because it’s still true.”
You shift so he can sit behind you, and he wraps his arms around your waist, legs bracketing yours as you both look out at the water.
“The world saw you tonight,” he says after a long silence.
“And?” You murmur.
He presses his lips to the curve of your neck.
“And they finally know what I’ve always known,” he whispers.
You turn to look at him.
“That I revolve around you.”
The wind tugs gently at your hair, and his hands find yours again. His grip is warm. Steady.
You lean into him and close your eyes.
And for once, the world doesn’t feel too loud.
Because it’s not just you in the shadows anymore.
It’s you, glowing.
And him — right where he’s always been.
Yours.
for charles fan fiction, anything by @pucksandpower
YES YES YES I LOVE HER OMG And I have read all her fictions (EHEGRHEGHRGEHS) totally not normal about this
from friends to this
⋆ 𐙚 ̊. max verstappen x reader ⋆ 𐙚 ̊.
you've been friends with max for as long as you can remember, it takes a redbull engineer asking you out for both of you to realise you want more. (so much softness and longing)
alternative ending possessive version can be read here
You couldn’t remember the exact day you two had become friends. It was some day in middle school, you were sure of that. But the details had blurred over the years. It felt like you had always known each other.
Max had always been in your life.
You had always been in his.
Sitting in each other’s orbits just felt natural—though entirely platonic. That was the part others struggled to understand.
It was laughable the amount of times waiters had brought candles to your dinner table, 'for the mood', assuming the two of you were on a date. You'd stop correcting them after the third time it happened. Besides, it was fun to laugh about. To joke about how much you'd annoy each other if you really were a couple.
"You snore like a bear," you said, laughing over a glass of red wine, "I pity your future girlfriend."
"Doesn’t seem to bother you too much."
“For a free hotel room, I’ll put up with anything.”
He laughed.
After all these years of sporadically sharing hotel rooms, late night drives, unlimited paddock passesand crude jokes—you two had stayed simply good friends. He'd held you through bad break ups and you had held him through every DNF and every crash. You knew eachother like the back of your hand. Friends for life, that was what you always said.
Until things started to shift. Slowly. Subtly. So gently that neither of you really noticed.
It was Free Practice.
Rain had settled over the city days ago and showed no sign of stopping anytime soon. The paddock was chaos—engineers scrambling to keep tires warm, trainers trying to keep drivers from catching colds.
Max stood calm in the middle of it all. You watched him, helmet in hand, exchanging quiet words with GP. It was always a strange sort of magic, how he could look so at home in the storm—like it was made for him.
You smiled to yourself.
He’d be fine today. You knew it.
“So, how long have you been together?”
The voice broke you from your thoughts.
You blinked, turning to find Marcus—one of the newer engineers—looming beside your seat. Tall, a bit cocky, but charming in a way that probably worked for him.
“What?” you asked, unsure if you’d misheard.
“You and Max. Been together long?”
You snorted. “Oh. No. We aren’t together. Just friends, y’know?”
It wasn’t the first time someone has misunderstood your relationship with Max. Hell, it wasn’t even the first time someone from Red Bull had made the mistake. Marcus glanced back toward Max, then returned his gaze to you with a slow smirk.
“Damn. And here I thought I had no chance.” He grinned. “You free tonight? I’d love to take you for a drink.”
You opened your mouth, then closed it again. Your brain fumbled for an excuse, but none came fast enough.
“Sure,” you found yourself saying. “Why not.”
Barely a few minutes later, Max is by your side, throwing a tyre blanket over you to keep warm.
“It’d be unfortunate if you died of hypothermia before you saw me win on Sunday.”
“Yeah, what would you do without your only supporter cheering in the crowd?” You joked, burrowing into the blanket and sighing from the sudden warmth.
“I’d be lost without you,” he said, mock-solemnly. But there was a warmth in his voice that caught you slightly off-guard.
Max had told you to wear an extra jacket this morning. You had ignored him. He was pretty smug about it, but it didn’t stop him from trying to warm you up—even going as far as to offer his own jacket. As if he wasn't also standing out in the cold.
“Dinner tonight?” He asked, sipping on his water bottle and moving to sit beside you.
“Uh, I’ve got plans actually.”
Max raised an eyebrow. “Plans? With who?”
“Marcus,” you answered, feeling a strange knot form in your stomach. “He asked me out for a few drinks.”
“Oh.”
Max didn’t say anything for a moment, but his gaze flickered briefly to Marcus, cold and stiff, before returning to you. There was something unreadable in his expression.
“Well,” he said, his voice casual but slow, jaw tight and face still, “He seems… nice. I guess.”
You smiled slightly, though it didn’t feel true. You were unable to keep the small flicker of guilt from beating in your chest.
That night, as you found yourself in the dimly lit bar, nursing a glass of wine with Marcus, you couldn’t shake the feeling that something was... off. Not with Marcus, exactly. He was a decent guy—charming in that way that could probably win anyone over—but the whole time, you couldn’t stop thinking about Max.
Suddenly a text came through. You knew who it was before you even checked.
Going ok?
Marcus leaned over to see the message. He scoffed slightly, “I thought you weren’t together?”
“We aren’t.”
“Then why is he checking on you? Need his permission to go out?”
“Of course I don’t. He just…” you weren’t sure how to phrase it. “He just likes to know I’m ok.”
Another text came through, you angled your phone towards your chest so Marcus wouldn’t see:
I can pretend to be sick if you want to leave.
Then another:
I can see you reading these… is he that boring?
You laughed slightly and put your phone away.
It was ridiculous. You were here with someone else. Yet Max’s face kept slipping into your thoughts, his teasing smile, the way he always seemed to have your back without even trying. The way he cared so effortlessly. Always checking to make sure you were safe, you were happy.
When the evening ended and Marcus walked you back to your hotel, you could tell he wanted to kiss you. But a pit formed in your stomach at the thought of it. So you just smiled, thanked him for a nice night (not a great night, but a nice one) and quickly walked into your hotel room.
Being alone again was a breath of fresh air.
The next day, quali day, you found yourself wandering the paddock, watching the flurry of activity around you as everyone prepared. Max was in his element, once again, focusing completely on the task ahead. But when he saw you, that familiar, soft smile curved across his face.
“Survived last night?” he asked, walking over to you, his voice a mix of teasing and genuine concern.
You rolled your eyes, though you couldn’t stop the tiny smile that tugged at your lips.
You rolled your eyes, though the corners of your mouth tugged upward despite your best effort. “Barely. I think I hit my lifetime quota of polite smiles. I can only listen to guys explain their workout routine for so long.”
Max let out a low laugh. “Sounds fucking borning.”
You bumped his arm with your elbow, the familiar rhythm of your banter helping smooth the awkward edge that had hung in the air since last night. “Maybe I just have high standards.”
He tilted his head, eyes steady on yours. “Maybe you just went out with the wrong guy.”
The words hit you in the chest harder than you expected. You opened your mouth—half to laugh it off, half to challenge it—but nothing came out.
Max seemed to catch himself, blinking once, then glancing toward the garages like he hadn’t said anything at all. “Anyway,” he said, softer now, “Glad you survived.”
“I always do,” you replied, your voice not quite as light as you meant it to be.
Another pause. A quieter one.
Then he asked, “Did he try anything?”
You looked up at him, surprised by the question—not because he asked, but because of the way he asked. Not teasing. Not brotherly. Just… careful. Like he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
“No,” you said. “It wasn’t like that. I don’t think I wanted it to be.”
Max nodded once, but didn’t say anything. His jaw ticked slightly. You noticed.
Before you could decide what it meant, one of the Red Bull crew called his name from across the paddock, breaking the moment in two.
He started to walk off, then hesitated. “You’ll be watching?”
“You even have to ask?”
He smiled at that, something warmer than victory flickering in his expression.
And just like that, he disappeared into the crowd, leaving you standing there with a hundred unsaid things heavy on your tongue.
Max dragged the car to pole, of course.
By the time the final times were locked in, your voice was hoarse from cheering and your heart felt like it had been running laps alongside him. You waited until the press was done pulling him in every direction before slipping backstage near the motorhome.
He spotted you instantly, eyes lighting up under the brim of his cap. “There she is.”
You didn’t hesitate. You threw your arms around his neck and held tight, letting him feel the full weight of how proud you were. “You killed it out there.”
He laughed into your shoulder. “You think?”
“I know.”
When you pulled back, his hands lingered at your waist, grounding you. The smile on his face softened as his gaze dipped lower, hovering somewhere near your mouth.
You swallowed. He didn’t say anything else—just gave your hip the lightest squeeze. You thought he would step back, like he always did after a celebratory hug. But instead he stayed there. His eyes remained locked on yours.
“What?” You asked.
“Nothing.” His eyes flicked to someone behind you, then back to you.
“Nothing,” Max repeated, but there was a flicker of something in his voice. Something restrained. “Just… you’re here. That’s all.”
You huffed out a small laugh, though your heartbeat was climbing at a concerning rate. “Where else would I be?”
He didn’t answer that. Didn’t need to. You both knew where he was thinking of—across a bar table from a different guy, smiling politely, checking your phone too often.
Someone called Max’s name again—sharper this time. He blinked, like surfacing from deep water, then slowly stepped back. His hands dropped from your waist. You tried not to feel the loss of warmth too acutely.
“I’ll see you later,” he said, already backing away.
You nodded, watching him go. The moment, so suddenly, over. The warmth of his hands on your hips lingering after he had gone.
Later that night, you found yourself standing in the hallway outside Max’s hotel room, quietly debating whether or not to knock. He had texted earlier—Movie? My room? Just us?—like it was the most casual thing in the world.
But it didn’t feel casual.
Not anymore.
You knocked.
The door opened almost instantly. He must’ve been waiting.
He stood there in sweatpants and a hoodie, barefoot, hair still slightly damp from a shower. Your gaze dropped instinctively to the nape of his neck, the clean skin of his collarbone and familiar freckles.
He stepped aside without saying a word, and you moved past him into the room.
It was quiet inside, dim and warm. The curtains were drawn, a movie already paused on the screen—some familiar, ridiculous action flick with explosions every other minute. You smiled.
“Got snacks,” Max said, moving to the side table. “But no wine. Sorry.”
“Guess I’ll survive,” you said softly, taking off your jacket.
He sat on the bed, remote in one hand, and gave you a small smile that was all shyness and something a little deeper. “You coming?”
You joined him, sitting close enough that your shoulders touched.
The movie played.
You tried to focus, really, you did. But the warmth of his leg against yours, the way his fingers occasionally brushed the comforter close to your hand—it was pulling all your attention away from the screen.
And then it happened. Slowly. Like everything else with him.
Your head dropped to his shoulder.
He didn’t flinch. Didn’t move. Just let you stay there. Like he’d been waiting for it to happen. Hoping it would. You felt, more than heard, the breath he released. It ghosted across your hairline.
“I missed you last night,” he said, barely a whisper.
Your heart stuttered. “You knew where I was.”
“Doesn’t mean I liked it.”
You turned your head to look up at him. He was already looking down at you.
A beat of silence stretched between you. His hand twitched at his side, like he wanted to reach for you but wasn’t sure he was allowed to.
So you reached first.
Your fingers curled into the fabric of his hoodie, tugging him a little closer.
“I saw you walking back with him last night,” Max went on, his voice rougher now. “And all I could think about was how he got to be the one beside you. Even if it was nothing. Even if it didn’t mean anything. I hated it.”
The silence stretched out.
“I didn’t kiss Marcus,” you said, “because I couldn’t stop thinking about how it would feel if it were you.”
He swallowed hard, his gaze flickering down to your mouth. “Don’t say that unless you mean it.”
“I do.”
Another breath. Then, finally, his hand rose to your cheek—tentative at first, almost reverent. Like he couldn’t believe he was allowed to touch you this way. His thumb traced just below your cheekbone, and his eyes were full of something deep and aching.
When he kissed you, it wasn’t sudden. It was slow. Careful. Like he’d been dreaming about it for so long he didn’t want to get it wrong. His lips moved against yours with a kind of quiet desperation, like he was pouring years of longing into the space between you.
You melted into him instantly.
And when you finally pulled back, breathless and heart thundering, Max rested his forehead against yours, eyes still closed.
“I’ve wanted that for so long,” he whispered.
“I know,” you whispered back, smiling. “Me too.”
He opened his eyes, and they were softer now. Unshielded. “Please tell me this isn’t just for tonight”
“It’s not,” you said. You knew then, as you think you knew years ago, that this was it for you. Max was always where you were meant to end up.
hope you enjoyed <3 i've never written this trope before so apologise if it dragged a bit! as always requests are open!
sorry i never replied. everyday is blending together and im losing sense of time
tell your baby I'm your baby ahh mf
Charles congratulating Max on the baby
Max Verstappen has three kids; Penelope, Lily and Kimi Antonelli
gotta respect verstappism of kimi antonelli bc when he was told that max got 10s penalty for their collision, his response was "WHAT ABOUT PIASTRI?!"
I cried. So much. Curses and cheers
TRUE LOVE OF MINE
LINE BY LINE ᝰ.ᐟ "You with the dark curls, you with the watercolor eyes / You who bares all your teeth in every smile" - Lady Lamb, Dear Arkansas Daughter
ᝰ PAIRING: lando norris x reader | ᝰ WC: 5.5K ᝰ GENRE: best friends to lovers (we cheered!), reader = ex karting driver + med student, you have loved lando since the day you met etc etc etc ᝰ INCOMING RADIO: fun fact - the colors used in the title/headings on this post are actually the colors of lando's eyes from this post // this was a behemoth of a fic to write and i'm still nto entirely pleased, but the people yearn for lando norris ꨄ requested by anon!
send me an ask for my line by line event.ᐟ
The first time you see Lando Norris, he’s face-down in the mud, crying because someone called him a posh baby in the paddock, and you think he’s the most beautiful boy you’ve ever seen.
There’s mud crusted on his cheek like it belongs there, curls pressed damp to his forehead, and his whole face is crumpled like paper in a storm. He’s got one sock half off and a fresh scab on his shin, and still, somehow, he looks like he belongs in a painting. The messy kind. Watercolor, probably. Something soft and bleeding at the edges, impossible to frame.
He’s eight and you’re eight and a half, which means you get to say things like “it’s okay, babies cry,” even though you don’t really mean it. He wipes his face on his sleeve and looks up at you with blotchy cheeks and kaleidoscope eyes, like someone spilled a little too much green into blue, and says, “I’m not a baby.” You believe him.
You sit next to him on the curb, knees knocking together, watching his kart like it’s some sacred thing. The sky is gray, threatening rain, and he’s all flushed skin and scraped palms and frustration.
“They’re just jealous,” you mutter. He doesn’t look at you. “Of what? That I cry like a baby?” “No,” you say. “That your eyelashes are stupid long and you drive like the kart owes you money.”
That gets a huff out of him. Half-sob, half-laugh.
You offer him your juice box. He doesn’t smile, but he bares his teeth when he takes it, all crooked and endearing and real. That’s the thing about Lando. He’s always been real.
He holds out a sticky, dirt-streaked hand.
“I’m Lando.” “I know,” you say. “Everyone knows.”
You shake his hand anyway.
A month later, you beg your parents to sign you up for the junior karting class — not because you like cars (you don’t, really), but because you like him. Or maybe just the way he lights up when he talks about apexes and engine sounds like they’re things that breathe.
You come home smelling like oil. Your knuckles blister from gripping the wheel too hard. You cry once when you spin out and hit the barriers; but he’s there, pulling your helmet off like you’re made of glass, telling you, “You looked cool, though. Like, action movie cool.”
He makes you want to win. So you start trying.
When you’re eleven, he wins a race with his hair slicked back by sweat and wind, curls flattened into chaos. He leaps from the kart like he’s weightless, helmet swinging from one hand like a trophy of its own, and the grin he throws at you — all teeth, no restraint — nearly knocks you over.
“Did you see that?” he shouts, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Did you see?”
You did. Every lap. Every line. You saw the way his hands tightened before the last corner, the way his shoulders settled like he’d already decided to win.
You hand him his water bottle.
“You were okay.”
He gasps. “Just okay?”
“You’ll be cooler when you stop smiling like you’re showing your teeth to the dentist.”
He grins wider. Shoves you lightly with the back of his hand.
“Admit it. I looked sick.”
He did. He always does. Even like this, eyes stormy and pale all at once, flushed with the kind of joy that doesn’t need to be explained. He’s not handsome yet, not in the way the magazines will call him later. But there’s something about the way he holds a moment. The way you can’t look away when he’s in it.
Later that summer, you win.
It’s not a big race. Junior category, barely a crowd —but he’s there. Leans so far over the barrier during your final lap the marshal tells him to get down before he falls in.
You don’t hear the cheering. You don’t even feel the medal when they hang it around your neck. All you feel is Lando barreling toward you at the speed of light, helmet in one hand, arms wide, like you’re the one who gave him wings.
“You were flying,” he breathes, practically vibrating. “You were magic.”
You pretend to scoff. “Guess I’m not just here to hand you water bottles.”
He pulls you into a hug anyway. No hesitation. Just heat and sweat and the faint scent of petrol and whatever soap he uses. His heart’s pounding against your shoulder like he’s the one who just won.
Later, when you look at the photos, you don’t care about the trophy in your hands. You care about the boy behind you — curls wild, smiling so hard it looks like it hurts.
At fifteen, you start noticing the way other girls notice him.
It starts in Italy, or maybe Spain. Somewhere with sunburnt afternoons and the scent of burnt rubber curling off the asphalt like smoke. The girls linger after his heats now. They lean too close and laugh too loudly. Twisting their hair, asking if he’s going to the after-party, the lake, the whatever.
You stand beside him in the hoodie he gave you two summers ago: faded navy, sleeves chewed at the cuffs. It smells like sunscreen and old fabric and something unnameable that has always just been him. You pick at the hem while they talk, eyes on his profile.
The same boy you’ve known since he was sobbing on a curb with gravel in his socks has started to shimmer, like something just out of reach. Something made of light and speed.
His hair’s longer now, curling wild at the edges of his helmet. His smile’s the same, though. All teeth, all instinct. It still takes up half his face like he hasn’t learned how to hide anything yet.
But he doesn’t smile at them. He never does.
He looks at you. “You’re quiet,” he says, tugging at the drawstring of your hoodie. You shrug. “I’m always quiet.” “Not with me.”
He says it like a secret. Like he likes that about you — that there’s a version of yourself reserved just for him. You don’t say anything back, because you're not sure your voice would work even if you tried.
That night, you find yourselves walking the hotel parking lot, drinking vending machine soda that tastes faintly like metal and sugar. The sky's a navy bruise, and everything hums: the street lamps, the asphalt, your pulse.
“You’re kind of becoming a big deal,” you say, finally.
He laughs, low and a little shy, like you’ve caught him off-guard. “Don’t say that,” he says. “I’ll get cocky.”
“You already are.” You bump his arm with yours. It’s too dark to see his face clearly, but you know he’s smiling wide, teeth and all, like he’s baring it just for you.
And maybe he is.
Because even now, even with sponsors circling and flights booked across Europe, even with interviews and mechanics and the way his name sounds over loudspeakers, he still comes to your races.
He’ll show up between practice sessions with a baseball cap pulled low and sunglasses that don’t do much to hide him. You’ll spot him first, sitting on the pit wall like he’s always belonged there, one leg swinging like a kid with too much energy.
“Why do you still come?” you ask him once, after you’d placed second and felt like it wasn’t enough.
He shrugged. “Because I like watching you win.”
You think about that now, under the flicker of a buzzing lamp, watching the way his lashes cast soft shadows on his cheeks when he looks at you. His eyes are still that strange in-between — not quite blue, not quite grey, always shifting like skies about to storm.
Like watercolor left out in the rain.
You look away first.
You always do.
At sixteen, you run until your lungs burn. You don’t stop until your fists hit his front door, nails bitten down to nothing and eyes already stinging. He opens it in a hoodie three sizes too big, and the second he sees your face, he doesn’t ask.
He just pulls you in.
You’re crying too hard to speak at first, shoulders shaking, throat raw. He closes the door behind you and guides you to the stairs like it’s muscle memory, like this has happened before, and maybe it has, in smaller ways. Skinned knees. Lost heats. Bad days.
But this is different.
“They’re making me quit,” you finally get out. “They said— they said I have to focus on school. On real life.”
You say it like a curse. Like “real life” is something you never asked for.
Lando’s quiet for a moment. His hand curls around your wrist, thumb brushing a soothing rhythm over your pulse. His eyes — moss green in the dark — watch you without blinking. Always watching. Always knowing.
“Come on,” he says.
You frown. “Where?”
“Just— trust me.”
He doesn’t wait for you to agree. He just grabs his keys and your hand and pulls you out into the night. The wind has teeth. The sky hangs low, indigo and velvet. When you realize where you’re going, your heart breaks all over again.
The track sits behind the hill, silent and sleeping.
Lando hops the gate first, then turns and offers you his hand. You take it, fingers cold in his. He pulls you over like it’s nothing.
The lights are off, but the moon’s enough. It glints off the asphalt, pale and silver, the same way the sun used to gleam on your helmet when you’d throw it off at the end of a race, breathless and laughing. Back when your name had a number next to it and your dreams had engines.
Lando walks the edge of the track, then steps aside, gestures toward the start line like he’s offering you a crown.
“One more,” he says. “For old time’s sake.”
You laugh, watery and shaking. “There’s no kart, idiot.”
He shrugs. “Run it.”
So you do.
You take off, sneakers slapping the track, heart thudding like it’s trying to break through your ribs. Your hair whips behind you, tangled and wild, and you run like you used to race: reckless, full tilt, like the only thing that’s ever made sense is forward.
The wind hits your face and the tears dry on your cheeks and the world blurs around the edges. You run with everything you are; for every lap you’ll never finish, every podium you won’t stand on, every flame they’re trying to snuff out of you.
When you make it back to him, gasping and breathless, Lando is watching like he always does, with something quiet and fierce behind his eyes. Like he sees not just you, but the version of you the world won’t let exist anymore.
You collapse next to him, panting. He says nothing for a long time. Just sits beside you on the track, knees pulled to his chest, hoodie sleeves swallowed over his hands.
“You’ll come back to it,” he says eventually, soft like the curve of a turn. “I know you will.”
You don’t answer. You can’t.
He glances over, and for a moment, he looks like a boy again: the same boy with curls damp from rain, whose smile could split the sky. A boy who’s watched you win, lose, burn, rebuild. A boy who’s carried your dreams in the quiet way he carries everything.
“Besides,” he says, nudging your knee, “I’m still gonna win stuff. Someone’s gotta keep me humble.”
You laugh, finally — a real one. It cracks through the ache like sunlight through smoke.
“Always with the fast mouth,” you murmur. “And an ego the size of an engine.”
He grins. All teeth. Unashamed. Something ancient flutters in your chest, something that’s always been there but has never had the nerve to speak.
You don’t say you are the most beautiful boy I’ve ever seen, but you think it. You don’t say I’ve loved you since I was eight and a half, but maybe he knows.
Maybe he always has.
By eighteen, Lando’s face is in magazines. He’s a headline now, a profile shot under stadium lights, a name that doesn’t need explaining anymore. He smiles with his whole face — wide and unguarded — and sometimes you see a photo that feels so much like him you have to close the tab and sit with your hands in your lap, breathing slowly.
You still see the boy who once spilled chocolate milk all down his overalls at Silverstone and sobbed so hard he hiccupped for twenty minutes. The one who used to braid daisy chains into the laces of your boots between heats. But now there are articles that say things like rising star and British darling, and he fits in their glossy pages better than he should.
He FaceTimes you after qualifying P1 for the first time. It’s late, past midnight, and you’re still in the library, alone but for the hum of the vending machine and the ache behind your eyes. You almost don’t pick up.
But then you see his name flash on the screen — 🚦LAN-DON’T CRASH🚦 — and your stomach flips like it used to before lights out.
He’s still in his race suit, curls a mess of damp ringlets, cheeks flushed like he’s been running. There’s something in his eyes, too: watercolor green, vivid and blurred around the edges, like adrenaline and disbelief have soaked into his skin.
His smile breaks the second you answer. Wide and wild and so familiar it stings.
“Did you watch?” he says, already breathless.
“Obviously,” you say, tipping your phone back so he can see the chemistry notes scattered across the desk. “Had it up on mute during organic synthesis. You’re lucky I didn’t scream when you took the final sector.”
“You think I was okay?”
“You were sick.”
He pumps a fist and flops back onto some impossibly white hotel bed, still grinning like a kid who’s snuck past curfew. The camera wobbles, then steadies on his face again: flushed and freckled, sweat still clinging to his jaw. He looks happy.
You used to know that feeling. That kind of high. The kind that only came with rubber and gasoline and the blur of corners taken clean.
Your helmet lives in the back of your closet now, tucked behind winter coats and forgotten notebooks. You’ve traded it for lab goggles and timed exams, for ink-stained hands and the quiet sort of excellence no one applauds. Your medals sit in a shoebox beneath your bed, and you haven’t opened it in over a year. You tell people you’re pre-med now. That it’s what you’ve always wanted.
Two years have dulled the ache. Sandpapered it down from a blade to something you can live with. Sometimes you still dream of the track, of the smell of rubber and the scream of engines, but you wake up and make coffee and keep studying until the want quiets again.
Lando watches you for a second. He sees things other people don’t — always has.
“You good?” he asks, voice soft now, like it used to be when he’d sneak out to meet you by the tire stacks after dark.
You nod, a little too fast. “Yeah. Just tired.”
He raises an eyebrow, not buying it. “What are you working on?”
You sigh and flip your notebook toward the screen. “Chemical compounds. I’ve got a practical on Monday. Enantiomers, ketones, the whole gang.”
He makes a face. “Nerd.”
“National treasure,” you correct, dryly. “And future doctor, maybe.”
He lights up at that. “Sick. You can be my medic when I crash.”
You roll your eyes. “So I’ll see you, what, every weekend?”
“Exactly,” he says, smug. “We’re soulmates, remember?”
You want to say, you with the stupid grin, you with the disaster curls, you with the heartbeat I could always find in the noise.But instead, you shake your head and say, “God help your insurance.”
He laughs, throws his head back, bares every tooth like he always does. There’s a soft curve in the center of his front two that never straightened out, even after braces. You used to tell him he looked like a Labrador when he smiled like that. You still think it now, but it feels like something tender and sacred, like a memory you keep pressed between pages.
“I miss you,” he says, quieter now.
You don’t say I miss the version of me that only exists around you.You just whisper, “Yeah. I know.”
The call ends eventually. It always does. But you sit there for a while after, your notebook untouched, watching the ghost of his smile in your screen’s reflection.
You’re twenty-one and a half when Lando sneaks into your college graduation. You don’t see him at first. You’re too busy sweating in your robe, clutching your diploma like it might disappear, wondering if your cap looks stupid in photos. Your parents wave from the stands, your friends cheer, and you try to hold still long enough to soak it in — but it never lands quite right. Everything feels too big, too loud, too fast.
Until he finds you.
Until he hugs you from behind and says, low in your ear, “Told you you’d look cool in a cape.”
You twist around, and there he is, in a hoodie pulled low over those unmistakable curls, sunglasses at night like the world’s worst disguise. His smile is crooked, tired. Familiar.
“What the fuck,” you whisper. “Aren’t you supposed to be—”
He grins wider. “I skipped media day.”
Your jaw drops.
“Shhh,” he adds, holding a finger to your lips. “I’ll get yelled at later. Worth it.”
You don’t know whether to laugh or hit him. So you do both —thump his arm, then drag him into a hug, still warm from the sun and whatever it means to grow up.
He stays through the party, tucked into the background, stealing finger food and smiling like he’s always belonged. He doesn’t pull attention the way he does on track. Here, he just… exists beside you. Quietly. Constantly. Every time you turn around, he’s already looking.
Later, long after the music dies and your parents have gone to bed, the two of you end up on the grass in your front yard, barefoot, robes ditched, diplomas crumpled somewhere behind you. The stars are blurry, a little from distance, a little from everything else.
He lies flat on his back, arms spread like a kid making snow angels, and says, “I’ve got a flight in two hours.”
You hum. “FP1?”
He nods.
You both fall quiet. The silence between you has never been uncomfortable. It stretches like elastic, worn in with years of knowing — from tire stacks and afterschool karting, from night tracks and vending machines, from every version of growing up that had the other curled into its corner.
“I’m scared,” you admit, finally. “For med school.”
Lando turns his head to look at you. You’re lying close, your hair fanned out against the grass, fingers plucking gently at the blades. You don’t meet his eyes, but you feel them on you. The color of seafoam, soft in the dark. The kind that still knocks the breath out of you when you're not bracing for it.
“You’ll be great.”
You scoff. “You don’t know that.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Why?”
There’s a rustle of denim and hoodie fabric, and then he’s sitting up, pulling something from his pocket. A worn-out square of photo paper, crumpled and soft at the edges. He presses it into your hand.
You blink. It’s a picture of the two of you, age nine, arms thrown around each other in the pit lane. His curls are messy and stuck to his forehead, flushed cheeks stretched in a grin so big you can count every tooth. You’re buried in his side, beaming up at him like he hung the sky. Lando’s holding a trophy, but even then, he’s not looking at it. He’s looking at you.
“You gave me your gummy worms right after that,” he says. “Said I earned it.”
You run your thumb over the crease down the middle. The image is faded now, but you remember the moment like it’s stitched into you.
He says it like it’s obvious. Like gravity. “Because we’re soulmates. And I feel it in my bones.”
You don’t answer right away. You can’t.
The stars above you scatter like sugar across navy velvet. Your eyes sting.
“You know,” you say after a while, voice low, “If you crash, I’ll be the one stitching you back together.”
He grins. Not his media-trained one — not the sharp, rehearsed smile he wears under paddock lights — but the real one. The one that splits across his face without warning. That bares all his teeth like he’s never learned to hold anything back. That’s lived on every page of your memory since you were old enough to chase him across a track.
“That’s hot,” he teases.
You roll your eyes. “You’re a nightmare.”
“But I’m your nightmare.”
And that’s the thing, isn’t it?
It’s always been him. Him with eyes that shift with the light, that catch everything, that still find you first.
You with your goggles and your notebooks. Him with his fireproof gloves and nowhere to land.
You, who traded circuits for classrooms.
Him, who never stopped circling back to you.
He looks at you like he always has, like you’re the only thing that’s ever made sense. You think maybe you believe him.
That you’ll be okay.
Because he said so. Because he always shows up. Because he’s flying across the world in an hour, but somehow, you’ve never felt more grounded.
At twenty-three, he invites you to Monaco.
You’re dead on your feet when he calls. It’s nearly midnight and you’re cramming for your pathology exam, cross-eyed from the fluorescent lighting in your apartment. You don’t even remember what you said exactly; something like “med school is killing me and I swear to God I haven’t seen the sun in four days.” Laughed it off with the tired grin he knows too well.
You forgot it by morning.
He didn’t.
Now, a week later, you’re barefoot on his balcony, letting the gold-tinged air sink into your skin as the sun sets over the Riviera. The track lies sprawled beneath you like a secret. The sea beyond it glints like something ancient, something wild.
Your breath hitches without meaning to.
“I used to dream about racing this track,” you say, barely above a whisper. “When I was fifteen, I’d watch the onboard cams on my laptop and try to memorize every corner. I knew the lines like poetry.”
Beside you, Lando is quiet. But when you glance over, there’s a glint in his eye, the one that always spelled trouble. Or magic. Or both. His curls are pushed back haphazardly, like he ran a hand through them too many times on the flight, but there’s still that boyishness, untamed and familiar.
“What?” you ask warily.
He doesn’t answer. Just grabs your wrist. “C’mon.” “Lando—” “No time. Let’s go.”
You barely have time to yank on your sneakers before he’s dragging you out the door, past the sleepy concierge and down the quiet streets like he’s done it a thousand times. He takes sharp turns with muscle memory, his fingers tight around yours.
Only when the city’s noise has thinned and the streetlights spill onto the famous asphalt do you realize where you are.
“Lando,” you whisper. “We can’t—” “We’re not driving,” he grins. “Just running it. Like when we were kids, remember?" “FIA—” “Would fine me until my hair turns gray.” He pauses. “Still worth it.”
Your heart kicks against your ribs, but your legs are already moving.
You run.
Past Sainte Devote, hair flying behind you. Past the casino, your laughter ricocheting off elegant facades. You’re breathless by the tunnel, aching by the chicane, but he’s still pulling you like he did when you were kids and he insisted you could make it to the top of that hill if you just didn’t stop.
The air smells like salt and speed.
By the time you reach the harbor, your lungs are burning and your face is flushed and he’s glowing, cheeks pink, smile wide, teeth bared like he’s daring the night to find a brighter joy than this. He looks every bit like the boy you fell in love with fifteen years ago.
The one with grass stains on his overalls. The one whose curls never obeyed a comb. The one who grinned like mischief itself. The one whose eyes — not blue, not quite green — shimmered like someone had taken watercolors and washed them into something soft and stupidly beautiful.
You stop, breathless. He does too.
And for a second, it feels like everything’s still. Like the world just pressed pause.
Later, you sit at the edge of the marina, legs swinging over the water. Your shoes are abandoned on the dock. The air is heavy with the scent of engine oil and sea spray. The waves slap gently against the boats, like applause winding down after a show.
Beside you, Lando says nothing. But you feel him watching. And when you turn, he’s looking at you like he’s never seen you before.
But of course he has. He’s seen you in worse light: that post-rain haze in your old garage, your hair frizzed to hell and braces catching on your lower lip, oil on your jeans and mud on your ankles. He’s seen you bleary-eyed on FaceTime at 3AM. He’s seen you panicking over exams, crying in the paddock, snorting over bad pizza and better jokes.
Still, he looks at you now like he forgot the color of your laugh until this exact moment brought it back. His hair hangs loose over his forehead, still damp from the run, and the way his mouth twitches — almost a grin, almost not — makes your stomach turn over.
He bumps your knee with his.
“You okay?” he asks.
You nod. “Better than okay.” “You looked happy back there.” “I was happy back there.” “Good.” He’s quiet for a beat. Then: “I miss that.”
You glance at him, surprised.
“Miss what?”
“You. Like that.” He exhales, eyes trained on the moon's reflection on the water. “Laughing. Running. Being ridiculous with me.”
You don’t say anything.
He does.
“I miss you all the time,” he says, voice low. “Even when I’m with you.”
Your breath catches.
“You’re always somewhere else now. In your books. In your head. In hospitals I can’t pronounce.”
Your heart tugs at the edges. He doesn’t sound bitter. Just tired. Honest.
“I get it,” he adds. “It’s important. It matters. But sometimes I think about that summer when we were fifteen, and you stole my hoodie, and we made fake pit passes just to sneak into the garage.”
You laugh, quiet. “We were so stupid.”
“We were so happy.”
The silence after that isn’t awkward. It’s full. Like the city’s holding its breath.
You look over at him. Really look.
His lashes are darker now. His jaw’s sharper. A lock of hair curls against his temple, untamed. But he’s still him. Still the boy in the mud, the boy who taught you how to drift on your cousin’s farm, who shared his Capri-Sun at the track because you forgot yours, again. Still the one who taped your wrist when you wiped out in the rain and told you you’d make it to Monaco someday.
And here you are.
“Lando,” you murmur. “Yeah?” “I missed you too.”
He doesn’t wait this time.
He kisses you like he’s been waiting years to remember how.
And maybe he has. Maybe you both have.
The world blurs for a moment: the moon climbing higher, the boats bobbing gently below, the buzz of the city dissolving behind you, and all that’s left is him.
All sun-warmed skin and trembling fingers and eyes the color of every good memory — soft-washed, warm, like light bleeding through a window at golden hour.
He pulls back just enough to rest his forehead against yours, breath mingling with yours.
“I didn’t think you’d let me do that,” he whispers.
“I didn’t think you’d actually do it.”
You both laugh. Just a little. Just enough.
You’re twenty-five when you catch him watching you from across a hotel room in Japan. There’s a storm outside, low thunder rolling through the glass, and Lando’s shirt is damp from the run to the lobby. His curls are still wet, clinging to his forehead in loose, chaotic swirls. He should be tired — hell, you’re tired — but he’s watching you like you’re something new.
It’s not the first time he’s looked at you like this. Not by a long shot.
He’s never been subtle about it, not when he warms your hands in his pockets on cold walks back from the paddock, not when he lights up the second your name shows up on his phone. He’s the kind of boy who leaves his heart in plain sight, who grins with his whole body, who never learned how to want quietly.
You feel his gaze before you meet it. The kind that makes your chest go a little soft, like the edges of a photograph curling with time.
“You’re staring,” you say, without looking up from your textbook.
“I’m allowed to,” he replies. “I’m in love with you.”
You blink. Not because you didn’t know — he’s never been subtle — but because of how easily he says it. No drama. No orchestra. Just him. Lando, who once stuck gum in your hair during a twelve-hour drive to Wales. Lando, who whispered you’ve got me into your hair the night your grandmother died. Lando, who still trips over his own shoes in hotel corridors and grins like a child when room service arrives.
You toss a pillow at him. “Say it prettier.”
He catches it one-handed, kaleidoscope eyes glinting in the dim light. Smirks. “You make me want to write poetry, but all I know how to do is drive.”
That shuts you up.
His eyes crinkle at the corners, a blue-green haze in the lightning glow, and he grins wider, like he knows he’s just won something. Like he’d lose a thousand races and still call this the prize.
“Told you,” he murmurs.
There are races, years, chapters.
Seasons where you barely see each other, where you wake up to hotel ceilings and unfamiliar time zones and forget what city you’re in until he kisses your shoulder and mumbles something in a sleep-heavy voice like, It’s Thursday. We’re in Austin. His curls are flattened from sleep, his voice rough at the edges, and his arms still warm from whatever dream he was having.
Sometimes he wins. Sometimes he doesn’t. You never love him any more or less.
He still gets grumpy when he’s hungry, still laughs at memes from 2014, still buys you the weird flavored gum at petrol stations because you used to love this stuff, remember? Still leans into your space like gravity’s something personal. Still has a grin that cracks through your worst moods like sunlight.
There are cameras. Headlines. Speculations. But you’ve always known who he was.
You know the versions of him that never make it to the press: the quiet frustration of a red flag, the way he presses his tongue to the inside of his cheek when he’s nervous, the silence he sinks into after a loss. The way his curls flop over his forehead when he finally takes off his helmet. The way he says your name when he’s scared. The way he finds you in every crowd like it’s instinct. How his eyes — storm-colored, sometimes soft, sometimes sharp — flick to you the second anything starts to feel too loud.
And you’ve always let him. You always will.
He’s thirty-one when you find an old photo in a drawer: the two of you, muddy and grinning, barely ten years old. His curls are a mess, more fluff than form. You’re wearing his jacket, sleeves bunched up to your elbows. Neither of you have front teeth. You’re both sun-drenched and ridiculous.
“God,” you mutter, holding it up to the light. “We were a disaster.”
From the kitchen, he says, “Still are.”
You hear the clink of a spoon against ceramic. The rustle of his socks on the tile.
“You still love me?” you call, teasing, but not really.
He appears in the doorway, hoodie half-on, spoon in his mouth. He’s older now — jaw more carved, eyes a little softer around the edges — but the grin he gives you is the same one from every memory that matters. That lopsided, toothy thing like he’s always one second from bursting into laughter. A single curl falls against his temple, and for a moment, it’s hard to tell what year it is.
He swallows and says, “I’ll love you even when we’re bones.”
You believe him.
You always have.
HE'S NEVER LIVING IT DOWN AHASAAHSAHH
"new baby earlier this week, and when it comes to qualifying in miami, HE'S PROVED THAT HE'S THE DADDY ONCE AGAIN" 😭😭😭
and then Oscar grabs Carlos by the collar and smashes his lips onto the other
Lando: I bet you’re wondering why I gathered you here today. It’s because we need to have a discussion about how some people in this room aren’t getting along with other people in this room. Oscar: Why did you say that so vaguely? Carlos and I are literally the only people you called in here.
wait.
Fuck the constructors they are trying to beat Lestappan on ao3 top 100
Max directly drinking the champagne is pure comedy and I will never recover
Max looking at Charles
Max looking again and Charles looking back at Max/ the immediate synchronized head turn
Charles looking at Max before spraying his champagne and halting when he realizes Max doesn't celebrate.
dont talk to me. this is straight out of ff.
WHY DOES CHARLES LOOK SO DISTRESSED IM CRYING AHAHAHAHAHA
there's always that one thing in your head that you've ALWAYS and I mean always wanted to say but you're just a scared little girl bc what if NO ONE MATCHES YOUR FREAK but then like angels draped in white cloth, someone else says it. This post is that one thing. For me at least smh. 💔💔💔💔💔
carlos sainz in that suit keeps making me wanna be his clumsy secretary that cant get shit right so he has to fuck me dumb in order for me to get my job right for once 😭😭😭🙏🙏🙏 so down bad for him omg
screaming, crying, throwing up (IT SHOULD BE ME)
silver sparks and red flags - charles leclerc. ♡
--- The champagne had barely dried on his race suit when you found him.
He was still buzzing, electricity running through his skin like the roar of the engines hadn’t quite left him. Charles had taken P3 — not a win, but it meant something. The race had been chaos, and he’d fought for every corner like his life depended on it. When you saw him slip away from the crowd behind the garages, you followed without thinking.
“Charles,” you said, breathless, your smile aching in your cheeks. He turned to you, the fire in his eyes softening. “Mon amour.”
You barely had time to say anything else. He reached for you like gravity pulled him, cupping your face with hands still smelling like oil and speed, and kissed you — hard. Desperate. Like he needed the feel of your lips to make the podium real.
The kiss lasted seconds. Maybe less. But it was everything. A victory, a promise, a secret.
Or so you thought.
You didn’t see the photographer until the next day. The picture was already everywhere before you even got out of bed — Charles in his race suit, lips pressed to yours, hands tangled in your hair, your eyes closed and full of trust.
The internet exploded. And your stomach sank.
You were pacing his hotel room floor when he walked in, phone in hand. “So,” he said, calm like the eye of a storm. “We’re famous now.”
You looked up, heart in your throat. “Charles, this could ruin everything.”
He raised an eyebrow, tossing the phone onto the bed. “Ruin what? The relationship we’ve been pretending isn’t real?”
“Don’t,” you said, voice tight.
But he was already crossing the room, closing the space between you. “I’m not ashamed of you. I never was. If the world knows, let it. Let them know I love you.”
Your breath caught.
You didn’t say it often — neither of you did. The words were too heavy, too vulnerable, especially under the weight of the spotlight. But now, with the light burning brighter than ever, he offered them freely.
“I’m scared,” you whispered. “Not of being with you. Just… of the hate. The comments. What they’ll say.”
Charles nodded, forehead pressing to yours. “Then let them talk. I’ll be too busy kissing you to care.”
You smiled despite the storm in your chest, tears pricking your eyes. “You’re infuriating, you know that?”
“Oui,” he murmured, his smile crooked, his hands already sliding to your waist. “But I’m yours.”
---
screamed (no s) Charles' fanfiction is SO underrated I literally cannot dhdjdshjds
summary: your relationship with charles has hit a rough patch that's left you feeling unsure about your future together. this leaves him utterly resolved to patch things up with you--and perhaps make you a mother in the process. rating: nc-17 pairing: f!reader/charles content warnings: established relationship, smut, breeding kink/impregnation, brief allusions to lactation kink, creampies, charles leclerc consumed with lust for the rest of the (met gala) evening word count: 2.0k previous one-shot - lewis h. | beginning one-shot - george r.
In a matter of hours, the gentle golden emergence of the rising sun would break through the dark blue hue of the Manhattan skyline, signaling the birth of a new day.
While you would have loved to indulge in the chance to witness the city stir from slumber, you were much too preoccupied to consider the thought.
After all, there was simply no way that Charles was going to let you leave the bed anytime soon.
A stormy argument about the direction and future of your relationship followed by weeks of separation and declined calls and texts–needless to say, you both had endured quite the tumultuous patch together as of late.
You just didn’t expect reconciliation to transpire at the Met Gala of all places.
After all, with your blossoming career as one of Hollywood’s newest A-list starlet, an invite from Anna Wintour was to be expected this year–something that Charles was aware of, having been the one to hand deliver your formal letter of invitation to you with a curious look on his face when the envelope arrived in the mail back home in Monaco.
And while someone as prolific as him would have no issues being at the fashionable affair that was the Met Gala, by this point only the likes of Lewis and Daniel have ever had the chance to grace The Met's most lavish evening in the past.
Yet as you carried yourself graciously along the red carpet for both the press and the public while adorned in a dress that exuded Versace’s signature extravagant elegance, even you couldn’t fully hold back your surprise when you saw Charles standing beside Lewis as they were interviewed by Vogue.
Whereas his teammate–as to be expected–was fully dressed down in theme and did most of the talking, your boyfriend took on a more reserved approach while dressed simply in one of Dior’s in-season suits. By this alone, you just knew that he likely begged Lewis–what with close association to Anna–to help him gain access to the gala.
Charles did try calling you over the weekend to no avail, so he most definitely had been pushed beyond what he could withstand amidst your current separation.
As you were soon politely requested by event staff to continue further into The Met to clear the red carpet for newly arrived guests, there was no chance for you to stand back and wait for Charles’s interview to finish in hopes that he would move on ahead without him noticing your presence.
Such hopes were futile.
Amidst the bustling fanfare of the Met Gala’s red carpet, amidst being in an interview with one of the biggest fashion publications in the world, those familiar jade green eyes of his still found their way to yours.
In that very moment, there was no one else in sight save for you and him.
The gnawing pain from the harsh words flung at each other during that argument, the lingering anguish of bearing the love you still had for him–all came rushing forward as you reluctantly stepped ever closer towards where he was standing.
Thankfully for you, his interview did in fact conclude.
Mainly because the Vogue correspondent was set on speaking with you next.
Yet as both Lewis and Charles were set to proceed onwards, the former quickly giving you a sheepish smile and his hands clasping together as a gesture for your forgiveness, the latter maintained his ground.
After evading him for so long, you were finally within reach. Why else would he move?
Still, because he was here thanks to Lewis’s ties with Anna, he had no choice but to abide by his teammate slinging an arm around his shoulder and ushering him on ahead.
Charles did make sure to send a glance back your way, his stare lingering and burning.
A silent declaration that this wouldn’t be the last time you would see him tonight.
And knowing him, he would absolutely make sure of that.
While a shiver shot up along your back, you smiled ever so graciously towards the Vogue team as you approached them, your expression composed, dignified, and most of all–camera ready.
The interview was quick and lively, smiles and giggles all around between you and the correspondent as you expressed your excitement over having the chance to attend the renowned event.
But from then on however, you were on edge while fulfilling your obligations as a guest. Touring around The Met’s exhibition for this year, meeting with the likes of Anna herself and other top level figureheads across the fashion and entertainment industry, enjoying catering at the Versace table while you flaunted your dress for their social media team, joining the photos of previous castmates and other acting acquaintances–whether required or not, you dived head first into anything you could as to avoid Charles.
But you of all people knew that once he had his eyes set on anything, he would stop at nothing until he had it firmly clutched within his hand.
Hell, that was how the two of you even got together in the first place.
However, with you being dressed like heaven itself, this made mobility all the more difficult whereas he–far too used to making his way around a party for the elites–would be as efficient in his movements.
You thought you would find sanctuary by opting to head back to The Met’s exhibition hall while everyone else was busy either dancing the night away at a special performance by Lady Gaga or gearing up to hit the town for an afterparty but as you returned to the main showcase, you realized you assumed wrong.
The abrupt click and drag of your heel rang throughout the room as you halted your steps, your eyes immediately growing wide as you caught the familiar silhouette of Charles while he was inspecting some of the exhibit pieces.
Instinctively, you spun on your heel as you prepared to leave in a hurry.
But the heartache that could be heard with the call of your name stopped you from taking even another step.
Your chest felt tight as you slowly turned to face him, only to be met with his intense gaze as he stared you down, making you feel petrified in place.
Was it instinct? Fate? Of all places to be, your mind raced in wonder how he seemed to anticipate you coming to the exhibition hall.
It would be a realization to be had much later, but while you and your Versace designer were friendly acquaintances, the prince of Ferrari and one of Italy’s most acclaimed fashion houses were basically family.
If he was looking for his princess, of course they would help him track you down.
And now, with him standing before you, there was nowhere else for you to slip away to, no call or text you could just ignore.
All that was left were Charles’s awaiting arms as he approached you.
His hands cradled your waist, his lips fell by your ear.
Gently, he murmured that the two of you ought to take your much-needed conversation elsewhere.
And by elsewhere, he meant his hotel–a top-floor suite at the Ritz Carlton that he managed to attain despite The Met Gala weekend turning Manhattan into a fight for accommodations.
During the taxi ride over, you couldn’t help but think back to your fight–concern and frustration over your relationship, a questioning of his commitment to you as it felt more and more that you were taking a backseat in his life in his pursuit of furthering his career, a contrast to how you were able to support him while still minding over your growth as an actor.
It made you worry whether he even had any interest in starting and nurturing a family together, something you’ve expressed interest in wanting as your romance with him blossomed.
Yet as you were led into his room, his fingers intertwined tightly with yours as he guided you forward, all such doubts were finally eased and calmed as your Versace and his Dior made their way to the floor.
Back at The Met, the festivities continued on well into the night, the party having yet to relent amongst its high-profile guests.
Outside the Ritz-Carlton, the ceaseless buzz proceeded on, locals and tourists alike enjoying the warm spring evening while drivers stuck in their cars bemoaned the usual evening traffic.
But within Charles’s hotel room, the mood was much different.
So yearning, so apologetic, so desperate.
Not once did your lover dare to separate from you, nor permit you to stray away in the slightest.
Weeks of separation made every and any contact between your nude bodies a glorious reunion.
Maintaining his position on top of you with utmost gratitude, Charles reaffirmed where he stood in terms of your relationship by the press of his lips and the caress of his fingers.
Between kisses–some sweet and tender, others much more ferocious with need–he offered his heartfelt apologies, whether uttered with gentle sincerity or affirmed amidst shuddered groans.
You were left to writhe and shudder beneath his hands as they massaged and kneaded your breasts, the fine bristles of his stubble tickling your skin while his lips relentlessly suckled on your nipples.
Almost as though he was trying to drink milk out of them.
Though you had no drink to offer, he opted to feast from your cunt instead. His face happily buried between your thighs, the tip of his tongue switching between circling over your clit to dragging over the length of your drooling core, continuing on with this until you were practically crying out for him to fill you up with his cock already.
And who was he to deny you?
This was what led you to the present.
You and Charles, knelt together on the bed, his arms wrapped tightly around your waist for purchase as he persisted with slamming the full length of his cock into you from behind. Your hands rested on his forearms, your nails digging into his skin as your eyes rolled back in ecstatic bliss, your cunt sopping wet from your own arousal and the many times that your lover had since orgasmed inside.
His lips were in the midst of marking up your neck between kisses and bites. While you were pristinely picture perfect for the media at the gala earlier, after your time apart, he was adamant in ensuring that anyone who so much looked your way would be quick to realize that you belonged to him.
Though, he was also very much determined to go a step further in getting this particular point across.
Charles kissed right up to your ear, his voice rasp with desire as he declared, “I’ll risk it all for you, mon couer. Any day. Any time.”
His hands planted right over your stomach tenderly while he groaned out, “Anything for the woman who I want to bear my children.”
Your eyes flew wide open as you gasped out his name.
He hissed in delight upon feeling your cunt immediately clench around his cock, compelling him to piston into you even harder. “I haven’t touched myself while we’ve been apart, you know. All because I wanted to save everything up for you, for your womb.”
Hearing you whimper and moan in joy prompted him to bring his fingers up to your chin, cupping it tenderly as he turned your head to the side, having you face him while he looked directly into your eyes. His voice firm with resolve, he proclaimed, “I see my future with you, mon couer. With you and our children. So please–”
Proceeding to smother your lips for a kiss, his words were muffled as he pleaded with dire desperation, “–take every drop I have. I beg you to not let anything spill.”
“Yes Charles,” you moaned blissfully against his mouth. “I’ll take everything you give.”
And with that, the hot rush of his seed flooded deep into your cunt once again, with plenty more in store.
It would be a considerable amount of time until the two of you would have your fill of one another.
While the two of you would certainly find yourselves sleeping through the rise of the morning sun, as you and Charles remained happily nestled in each other’s arms, you both were at peace, knowing this would be the start of a new chapter for your relationship:
The birth of your family to be.
-----------------------
it may be 420 today but instead of weed, we're here to enjoy BREED 🤰🙆♀️
but with this!!! AAAAHHH it is done!!! 2 polls, 1300 votes, 7 drivers, 7 tropes, 7 one-shots--"poll positions" has officially reached its conclusion!!! 🥳🍾
thank you all so very much again for participating, whether you joined the polls, read any of the one-shots, liked/reblogged/commented--i am truly grateful for your support!!! 🥹❤️🙇♀️❤️
as i continue to delve further with writing for these vroom vroom mfs, please i'd love to hear any suggestions for future works/fic events!!! lmk who you'd like to see works written for, if you'd be down for another round of "poll positions" with a different theme, tropes/aus you'd want to read--i'm all ears and my inbox is open 👂💌
thanks again and i'll see you around!!! 🤝💕
hang it in the louvre ive seen enough
THE LAST PICTURE IM CRYING AKJSHAJKSJAS
what driving a redbull does to a mfs
look at my husband, THE WAY YOU MANAGE TO STAY GOATED IS SO TUFF TWIN
✨ max's 64 wins!! ✨
(updated this post)
sorry what
"Ao3 will be down for three hours for a scheduled maintainance."
You should've just killed me.
you read stuff on wattpad for shit and giggles where most of the fics there are reader-inserted ones written in 1st person pov where y/n is a barely legal white girl with blonde hair and blue “orbs” who’s so smol and fragile that she’s dependent entirely on this morally questionable guy who’s killing people for a living but for some reason happens to have a soft spot for her.
you read real actual literature on archive of our own where it’s two middle aged men, who are each other’s sworn enemies, with tragic past, trauma and strong homoerotic tension. and while they’ve made each other bleed, killed each other’s friends and loved ones out of jealousy / possessiveness, lied and betrayed and manipulated, the rawness, depth, complexity and slow burn will keep you up all night, haunt you during your day and possibly change your life forever. and also the sex isn’t just smut. the sex is poetry that puts Shakespeare to shame
Brian O’Conner is simply for the girlies idc what yall slimey males yap about
Lack of brian fics is sickening btw. PLEASE IF YOU HAVE GOOD ONES SEND THEM MY WAY
That man loves his country more than the Spanish economy loves its people
seeing people say "oh of course carlos brings ferrari here too with the red and yellow in his helmet" HE'S SPANISH ??? HAVE YOU SEEN THE FLAG ??? DO YOU KNOW HOW PATRIOTIC THAT MAN IS ??? LEAVE HIM TF ALONE
Hi, I hope you are doing well.🌹
Can you help by sharing my story, reblog, and donating if you can, to keep hope alive for me, I'm type 1 diabetes. I am calling on your humanity and kindness to help me donate to reach the goal of $340.
This amount will enable the approval of an insulin pump that will help me better control my diabetes. Although I am happy that I have been approved the hardest part is the money to pay for the pump and equipment, please your contribution is important. Thank you ❤️❤️❤️
I'm so sorry I can't donate but I will definitely reblog and share with everyone else. God is with you and you will most definitely recover. I believe in you <3
they matched each other's pettiness
oscar wanting to meet leo "if he can pop to mclaren" is so funny because of course oscar can't pop to ferrari - there's a man who wants him dead