Chapter Text
It had been a little while since Oscar had gotten a new neighbour. The apartment sky rise that he lived in had the funny quirk of being too expensive for most peoples’ tastes but those who could afford it could also afford the slightly nicer building on the other side of the Thames. It didn’t bother him though. Oscar rarely had time for interaction with other people. It was almost a blessing that the only other people on his floor was a family that were far too self absorbed to care for neighbourly friendliness.
Oscar had fought long and hard to make his way up the legal ladder. Being a partner at a prestigious law firm had not always been his dream but it was one that he, at times, struggled to make a reality. His age and lack of experience had been one of the most major hurdles but he had overcome it by spending long hours in the office and being the most efficient lawyer his seniors had ever had the joy of working with.
Aside from that, most of his struggles originated from him being oceans away from his family, living by himself in a dreary city full of dreary people and his significant lack of social life. He had only really made one actual friend since moving to London as a teen: a charming and incredibly blond American.
Logan was great and Oscar loved him to death. They had met on accident while studying at King’s College. Oscar, who was buried up to his eyes in case briefs and reading materials, had accidentally half ruined a scene for a short film Logan had been working on as part of his Bachelor of Media. Oscar had apologised profusely, promising to do whatever Logan needed of him to fix the scene despite how much work he had to do for his own degree. Logan, however, had laughed and waved him off, instead making Oscar pay for his coffee at one of the cafes around campus as compensation.
They had become rather close after that. Logan would keep Oscar company during his long study sessions in one of the College’s many libraries. In turn, Oscar would assist Logan in staging photoshoots or filming. Even now, Logan made sure to check on Oscar regularly, if only to make sure that he hadn’t killed himself with one of the fancy pens his firm provided him with.
So ultimately, it had come as a surprise to him when he had come back from a rather long day at work to find a small basket of mostly Kinder chocolate waiting outside his door, a little note attached. Oscar had brought the basket into his apartment. On the note written in a slightly wonky handwriting was: Hi I’m Lando I just moved in next door. Oscar couldn’t help but smile at the note. It was kind of cute, wonky handwriting and all.
He had allowed himself to indulge in the chocolate, never one to turn down a sweet treat. The chocolate had also served as a great way for Oscar to distract himself from agonising over what to write back to his new neighbour. His mother had raised him to be a polite boy and it would be rude of him not to acknowledge Lando’s existence, especially with the welcome gift of chocolate. But at the same time, he had no idea what to say. He hadn’t been there to receive Lando’s gift in person and Oscar was far too socially awkward in most situations to just go and knock on his door and welcome him in person. Plus, Oscar’s schedule was completely out of whack with the average person and the only hours he would be available were probably inconvenient for his neighbour.
Eventually he had settled on a simple message, only a couple of words. Oscar chose the fanciest paper he had in his apartment. While someone who (rightfully) thought that kids' chocolate made for a good gift was probably not the same sort of snobby men that Oscar spent all day dealing with, it would still do him well to make a good first impression. It was a bad message, all things considered, including the time he spent scouring internet sites for the proper ways to welcome a new neighbour. All of them suggested cooking them a meal or baking them something sweet but Oscar was neither a good cook nor a good baker and he really didn’t want to embarrass himself by getting this Lando something that he would like. So short and not so sweet it is.
Welcome to the building Lando.
From Oscar
P.S Thank you for the chocolate.
It wasn’t the best thing he had ever written, in fact it was probably one of the worst, but it served its purpose. Friendly enough to not be rude while also not insinuating anything untwords. Should he have gotten Lando a gift in return? Yes, absolutely his mother would say, but Oscar simply did not have the time to torment himself with picking the perfect gift, especially when he wanted to deliver his note to Lando in a timely manner.
He had slipped the note under Lando’s door the next morning before he left for work. Oscar had thought about knocking for a moment before remembering that it was 5:10 in the morning and that his neighbour was probably sound asleep like any normal person.
Oscar did want to meet his neighbour officially at some point. Preferably when Oscar has enough down time to invite Lando over for some tea and biscuits. Secretly, he hoped that his new neighbour was someone around his age. Logan had been nagging him constantly about expanding his friend list, offering to take him out to all the parties the American was invited to. Unfortunately, Oscar lacked his friend’s natural charm and social abilities. Simply put, Logan was built for London’s night life and Oscar was not.
His lack of friends did not bother Oscar all that much. Realistically, he knew that Logan was right, but at the same time Oscar struggled a lot with socialising and was of the opinion that a good night should be spent in the company of a cup of hot chocolate and a good book rather than out partying.
The few times Logan had managed to drag Oscar out to a club, the Australian had stayed plastered to the other man’s side and when Logan had abandoned him in favour of his own pursuits, Oscar had migrated to the quietest corner to nurse a gin and tonic before calling it early under the excuse that he needed to be up early for work the next morning.
This morning, Oscar was running late. It was a rare occurrence, and he was only behind by about five minutes off his usual schedule, but it was enough. He had shrugged on his suit and quickly patted down his hair so that it was presentable and all but ran out the door, only just remembering to lock up behind him.
The lifts were at the very end of the corridor. Oscar’s door was the furthest away from them, a little inconvenient but really no big deal. As he strode down the corridor, to his surprise, he spotted another man step into the lift he was after, engrossed with his phone.
‘Hold the door for me, mate!’ Oscar called out. The other man looked up, startled, and hurried to shove his foot in the door to hold it for Oscar. The first thing that Oscar noticed as he drew near was that he didn’t recognise this man. The second thing was the way his incredibly short running shorts clung to his ass. The third was how delicious the man’s biceps looked in his athletic shirt.
‘Thanks mate.’ Oscar said, slightly out of breath, not only from hurrying to the lift. The man in the elevator watched him with wide eyes. ‘You’re Lando, yes?’
It came out as a question but Oscar was not really asking. Unless the uptight family across from him suddenly decided to have guests over and those said guests were getting up at fuck o’clock in the morning to go running, then this man was very clearly Oscar’s neighbour.
‘Uhhh, yes.’
Oscar’s eyes crinkled into a small smile. Lando was ever so slightly shorter than him and Oscar was instantly endeared by his particular brand of British accent. It felt sort of like a betrayal against his Australian roots, to find the Brit cute, but Oscar couldn’t help it. ‘Nice to finally meet you.’
‘Yeah, you too.’ Oscar was no stranger to the awkwardness he detected in Lando’s tone so he dropped the conversation, perfectly content to wait in silence. The lift descended painfully slowly. It made Oscar pause. He wasn’t sure if it was simply his company that was making the trip down feel longer than usual or if there was something genuinely wrong. Oscar sincerely hoped that it was the former.
Famous last words, it turned out. With a large thunk, Oscar felt the lift stop. He waited a moment to see if it picked up again. It didn’t. He looked up, wondering what was wrong.
‘Uhhhhh.’ Beside him, Lando shifted from foot to foot. ‘D’you think it’s broken?’
‘I hope not.’ Oscar muttered under his breath. He had work to get to and did not want to be stuck in an elevator, despite how lovely his company was. He pressed the ground floor button and when nothing happened, pressed it again. Still nothing. ‘Fuck.’
Oscar felt, rather than saw, Lando back away slightly and heard the sound of fabric rustling as the shorter man slid to sit on the floor, back resting against the metal wall. He couldn’t blame the man, if you’re stuck in a lift with no foreseeable way out, you might as well get comfortable. Oscar, however, could not get comfortable and began to search for a solution.
‘Where’s the emergency call button.’ He groused. These blasted fancy elevators with their minimalistic design that Oscar had been taught to hate with a passion by Logan never made things easy. Instead of being clearly labeled, the buttons had abstract pictures beside them that seemed more suited for an Ancient Egyptian pyramid than a lift in London. Eventually, with enough silent cursing of the building architects to make a sailor blush, he found it.
‘Hello?’ The woman on the other side sounded bored and a little annoyed that her morning had been disturbed.
‘Yeah, hi, our lift has stopped moving.’ Oscar knew that his tone was far from polite, but he was not in the mood for making pleasant conversation. He wanted this issue fixed and fixed now. On the floor, Lando twitched.
‘Do you have the lift number.’ Oscar paused for a moment, searching.
‘Yes, it’s 04981.’ Oscar cast a look towards Lando, who was fiddling with his fingers, looking completely unbothered. He raised a single eyebrow at him. Lando only shrugged in response.
‘Right. We’ll send someone to help you. They will be there soon.’ The lady hung up without even so much as a goodbye. Oscar sighed. He knew it was wrong to get angry with people only doing their jobs and he refused to be like his older colleagues who started yelling and blaming the underpaid workers for issues out of their control but the entire exchange frustrated him. There was clearly a lack of urgency in the woman’s tone.
‘They don’t sound all that urgent, do they?’ He voiced those thoughts to Lando on the floor. To his delight, the other man snorted.
‘You could join me on the floor.’ Lando patted the space beside him. Oscar pulled a face.
‘No thank you. Who knows when they last cleaned this thing.’ Lando only grinned at him.
‘You loss, mate.’
‘No, I don’t think it is.’ The suit he was wearing certainly cost far too much money for him to dirty on the lift floor.
Lando hummed in lieu of a reply. They sat, well Lando sat, in comfortable silence. Oscar decided to distract himself by going over his schedule for the day. He would have to skip over his usual trip to the cafe near his firm that made favourite chocolate muffins in order to make it to his first meeting in time. A major medical provider had violated several of their contracts with their clients and Oscar was in the middle of determining which of those clients had enough of a claim to make it worth pursuing in court.
He was also supposed to have lunch with Logan today, which he would hate to bail on. Logan was always incredibly understanding of Oscar’s tight schedule and it wouldn’t be their first time he had missed one of their meet ups but he always hated doing it. Maybe if he worked even later than usual he would have the time to finish reviewing all his documents and still be able to have lunch with Logan.
‘Hey, you’re a lawyer right?’ Oscar was startled out of his thoughts by Lando’s question. It was a little strange and very out of the blue.
‘Yes.’ He answered slowly, raising both of his eyebrows this time.
‘Do you think I could sue for like, a million pounds?’ Lando’s eyes widened into a very accurate impression of a puppy begging for attention from its owner. It was far from where Oscar thought he was going with this, but also fully in line with the sort of person who has given out gift baskets full of Kinder chocolate as.
‘Is that really what you’re thinking about right now?’ Oscar asked, amused. It was cute, as all things seemed to be with the Brit.
‘Yes?’ Lando said, clearly attempting to lead Oscar into agreeing with his admittedly, silly proposal.
‘I don’t know. Are you predisposed to severe claustrophobia that triggers life threatening panic attacks? Do you have trauma related to being trapped in tight spaces?’ Oscar listed off a few examples that he could totally hear being used in court as part of a negligence case. He would definitely need to prove that being stuck in the lift had caused Lando at least some form of harm, other than being slightly inconvenienced, in order to have a legitimate case.
‘Well no but-’ Oscar shot Lando a look. The man on the floor wisely shut up. Oscar watched as an idea formed in Lando’s head. ‘Yes, I absolutely am terrified of lifts. Don’t you know, when I was 10 a lift killed my mum.’
A lie, most certainly, but an amusing one no less. Oscar couldn’t help but smile.
‘You’re gonna have to lie better than that if you want to be successful in court, mate.’ It wouldn’t be the worst lie that Oscar has ever heard be used by a plaintiff in court, but even a blind judge would be able to see through it.
‘I can lie very well, thank you very much.’ Oscar laughed at Lando’s very evident lie.
‘Sure you can, mate.’ Lando had the gall to look offended. Oscar quickly moved on from the topic of Lando’s perceived skill at deceit. ‘By the way, you never told me what you did for work.’
Oscar didn’t like the way Lando’s face fell slightly at the question. He thought it was innocent enough, but apparently not.
‘Uh, well, you know.’ Lando was clearly hesitant and Oscar had half the mind to retract his question and drop the subject entirely. ‘I’m a streamer.’
Huh. It wasn’t nearly as bad as Oscar thought it was going to be. He didn’t understand why Lando was so hesitant to answer. Unless he was, like, an adult streamer. Though as pretty as Lando was, Oscar doubted it.
‘Huh. What, like video games?’ He asked, partly to make sure but mostly out of actual interest. Lando looked up, surprised.
‘Yeah. Amongst other things, but yeah, mostly video games.’ Lando still looked like he didn’t quite believe that Oscar was asking questions about his job.
‘That’s cool. I was never really any good at video games.’ Oscar admitted, if only to make Lando smile. ‘My sisters would tease me endlessly about how bad I was. Moved to London to escape them.’
It was partly true. His sisters were merciless when it came to video games. Sessions of Wii Sports, Just Dance, hell even the Lego video games often ended in a bloodbath when their competitive streaks took over and Oscar most often the target of their violent tendencies. Most of the time he had to be saved by his mum before the girls could tear him to pieces.
‘I could teach you, if you had time.’ Lando offered, and then promptly looked embarrassed with himself. And the thing is, Oscar didn’t have the time. He never had time for anything. But the way Lando was looking at him, the way Lando looked in general, was pushing him to say yes.
‘I would like that.’ He settled on. Not an all out yes, but not an all out refusal either. He could already imagine himself carving out time in his schedule to make room for Lando.
‘Maybe after we’re done suing the building owners for “a million pounds”, as you put it.’ Oscar tacked on to distract himself from implications of how willing he was to upend his entire routine for a man that was basically a stranger just because Oscar found him cute.
‘Yep. Actually make that two million, so that I still get a lot after you take your cut.’ Two million might be a bit more of a struggle to get in court, but Oscar found himself determined to do it, if it was what Lando wanted. Negligence wasn’t even his area of speciality yet he was prepared to draft up an entire claim just because Lando looked at him the right way.
‘For you Lando, I’ll do it for free.’ Oscar winked and then mentally hit himself. Was he flirting? This felt like flirting. Oscar hadn’t flirted with anyone since he was in high school and his last attempt certainly hadn’t gone anywhere. Where was he getting this confidence from? Logan would be proud.
‘Really? You, uh, you don’t have to. I can afford you.’ A blush dusted Lando’s tan cheeks and Oscar thought it was the prettiest colour he had ever seen. He tried to cover up his own state of imminent combustion by laughing at the way Lando stuttered, covering his mouth as to not seem rude. ‘Surely your boss wouldn't let that slide.’
Oh it was so cute that Lando was worried about that.
‘Lando, I am my own boss.’ Now Lando seemed more embarrassed than anything.
‘Oh.’ Oscar didn’t bother to cover his mouth as he was consumed with giggles.
‘You can “afford me”, huh?’ Oh Oscar was really feeling bold today. It felt good, though, watching Lando blush at his blatant flirting.
‘I can afford your price, I mean.’ Lando scrambled to correct himself. Oscar knew what he meant, of course, but the teasing was too much fun. ‘Lawyers are expensive, right. Everyone says lawyers are expensive. I can afford to pay your price.’
‘I don’t know Lando, can you?’ He was definitely pushing it now, as he stood over Lando. He let the confident persona he adopted in court take over, smirking down at Lando. He wasn’t blind, he could see the way Lando’s eyes drifted to his lips. He could kiss Lando now, Oscar realised. He was far from opposed to the idea and he could tell Lando wasn’t either.
Then, in what Oscar could only describe as a cruel act of fate, the lift jolted for a second time that day and Lando jumped. Oscar looked up as the lift began to descend.
‘They have excellent timing.’ He muttered, annoyed. Of course they would get it working as he was about to actually act on his flirting for the first time in his life. And when Lando was so clearly into it too. He picked up the brief case he had abandoned on the floor earlier in favour of flirting with Lando.
Lando stood up silently, seemingly collecting himself. They waited out the rest of the journey in complete silence. All the confidence Oscar had felt now left his body as he tried to keep from glancing at Lando. When the lift finally reached the ground floor, Lando tried to escape immediately, practically running out of the lift.
Oscar almost let him go, but a voice that sounded distinctly like a mix between his mum and Logan had him reaching out.
‘Lando, wait.’ Oscar’s hand closed around Lando’s wrist. Without a look at Lando’s expression, he tugged the British man through the busy foyer to a quiet spot beside the elevator.
‘Give me your phone.’ He said, more confidently than he felt. Lando looked at him like he had grown a second head, his beautiful eyes blown wide.
‘What?’
‘Your phone, Lando. Give it.’ Lando didn’t even protest, he just handed Oscar his unlocked phone without a word. Oscar flipped through the apps until he found the one he was looking for. He tapped away, carefully choosing which emojis to use, smiling as he did so.
Once he was satisfied, he handed the phone back to Lando, still unlocked.
‘I’ve got to go to work to meet with a client, but Lando.’ Oscar reached out and in an act he could only describe as bold, squeezed Lando’s bicep. ‘I look forward to gaming with you.’
He left before Lando could get a word out, face burning. Despite everything, though, Oscar couldn’t wait to receive that text from Lando.
(Only after he was partially deafened by Logan after he recounted his morning over lunch).