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Everything falls apart on a Wednesday.
Tons, millions, of pictures are released all over the Internet, sparking controversies and rumours. Pictures of Yuki, pictures of Pierre, pictures of Yuki and Pierre. Their names are trending on every major social media platform in existence, hashtags of Yukierre are everywhere, coupled with compilations of their moments together and their fans' shocked – delighted, perhaps? – expressions as they chant I knew it over and over again.
Their PR managers call them, demanding for an explanation and organising an emergency meeting with the rest of their PR teams to do damage control before more sponsors come knocking with questions of their own. It's mayhem; a shitshow.
Yuki is the first of the two of them to see the picture that started everything, his phone trembling along with his hand as Pierre rushes to get ready in the toilet.
It's a simple picture, a little blurry but clear enough to recognise both drivers in question, no doubt taken from an experienced paparazzi with too much time on his hands. If Yuki wasn't so busy trying not to throw up all over their hotel bed, he would've even acknowledged that it was a sweet picture; a cute one he would've secretly set as the wallpaper on his home screen.
His brain immediately knows when the picture was taken, even as his heart sinks to the pits of his stomach and wishes that he had it in him to deny it. Monday night, the night after their rather successful race – Pierre had taken Yuki out to a fancy restaurant; one of their traditional date nights together. It wasn't odd to find pictures of Pierre and Yuki eating together – they've publicly talked about their experiences dining together, after all – but nothing about their picture suggested anything platonic at all.
Picture-Yuki has his mouth opened wide, eyes zeroing in on the pasta delicately twirled around Picture-Pierre's fork. It's nothing quite out of the ordinary – Pierre had been filmed feeding Yuki before in a video together – but the fact that they're doing this without a camera crew around, in a private room of one of the fanciest restaurants in town, will no doubt leave a pile of questions in everyone's heads. That, alongside the pure endearment and naked fondness put on display on both Picture-Yuki and Picture-Pierre's faces for everyone to see, changes everything.
They weren't photographed kissing or anything (thank goodness for that), but there's an aura of calm and love surrounding the pair, so visceral and so plain to see that Yuki knows for a fact that they've been caught.
Realisation sends a hurricane of pure, undiluted, fear coursing through his veins. He's off the bed and crowding into the toilet before he can think twice about it, his knees throbbing from when he'd thrown himself onto the ground, seconds before he hurls into the toilet bowl. His phone clatters noisily onto the floor, forgotten.
There's a warm hand on his back, soothing. Grounding.
Pierre murmurs things he can't quite hear over the ringing in his own ears, but his voice does wonders to calm him down, to bring down the roar of panic in his mind to a slightly better, slightly more manageable, wail of trepidation. The Frenchman keeps one hand on Yuki's back, the other one coming over to brush fringe off his sweaty forehead, before moving to switch his phone off so that the picture gets swallowed by a screen of nothing.
He continues to whisper gentle nothings throughout it all.
Later, when Yuki finally regains some feelings in his legs and stumbles over the sink to brush his teeth, Pierre picks up his phone from the floor to get a closer look of the picture. He remains close to his side as the Japanese spits and washes his mouth, thumbing at the photograph and pursing his lips. Finally, when they're both dressed and are leaving the comfort of their hotel room, Pierre voices out, "At least it's a cute picture."
He's trying to find light in their situation, to make it seem like it isn't the end of the world to Yuki.
Yuki tries to smile.
He can still taste the bitterness of bile in the back of his throat.
~
Their PR managers know about them, of course. They needed to know, and Yuki was fine with telling them. In fact, he's fairly sure at least half their team knows, even though they've only personally told their PR managers and trainers. Yuki's fine with it – he wasn't worried about how they would've reacted anyway. He knows they are good people; supportive.
He doesn't know how supportive the rest of the world will be.
He knows, with a certainty like how he knows the sun will always rise from the east, how unsupportive his family will be.
Which is why he vehemently objects when their PR managers suggest for them to come out, to become official.
His hands are shaking, more than they were back in the bathroom, and the room echoes with the intensity that comes with his, "No!" Three sets of eyes turn to look at him, two sets clearly confused and one set – Pierre's – more understanding, sad. "No," Yuki repeats himself again, hangs his head down so he's staring at the table, so no one can see the tears uselessly welling up in his eyes. "No."
His voice shakes nearly as much as his hands.
They sit in silence for a bit until Pierre redirects the group, asks for other alternatives. There isn't much else they can do – they've been photographed in a somewhat compromising state and denying it will only bring more unwanted questions, scrutiny and scandals.
"Well, there's a short break coming up so at least we have a bit of time to organise everything before the two of you are required for media duties. We won't release anything right now, and both of you should probably stay off social media for a while but do give it a thought. We'll contact you guys as soon as we think of a better alternative."
Yuki isn't sure which one of their PR managers had said that, his eyes are still glued to the table, and the voice sounds muffled, drowned out to him, but he nods either way. Pretends that he understands, just so he can leave and bury himself in a pile of blankets and pretend this is all just another bad dream.
His legs feel like jelly by the time he regains enough feeling in them to lift himself off his seat and walk to the door, mindlessly shouldering out of the hotel room of their PR managers and following Pierre's frame to their own room.
"Yukino."
He looks up, clocks in Pierre's tired eyes and exhausted smile.
"It'll be okay, I prom-"
Pierre's words get cut off by Yuki's phone, the personalised ringtone hauntingly familiar. He freezes, catches sight of Pierre's clenched jaw, and knows that the latter is aware of who's calling him.
"I'll..." Yuki trails off, fumbling around with the device as he stumbles off to a corner of the room, away from Pierre. His ring time nearly ends by the time he presses the accept call button and brings the phone up to his ear.
"Yuki!"
He flinches away. Pierre takes half a step towards him, watching him closely. "Dad."
"What's the meaning of all this? Don't tell me you're actually together with him!"
"No!" He's glad Pierre can't understand Japanese very well. "We're friends. Only friends."
It sounds like a plea for his father to believe him. Distraught. Childish. Yuki feels like he's ten again, desperate for familial approval.
His father takes a deep breath, lets it out in a heavy exhale. It sounds a bit like relief. "And you're sure about it? He isn't making advancements on you?"
Yuki's heart clenches angrily at the implication. "He would never do such a thing." His voice comes out hoarse, a whisper.
"He's French, is he not? European."
The words are familiar, but not comforting. It doesn't matter if he's European or not, Yuki wants to say. There are people like us all around the world. And there are people like you, too. Instead, he murmurs a defeated, "Yes."
He knows there's no point arguing, no point trying to make him see reason in his flawed arguments. The last few times he's tried didn't end too well – Yuki has learnt from his actions.
"I knew it." His father sounds triumphant, as if Pierre being European actually proved something. "This is why your mother and I were worried when you had to move for racing. All these bad influences. Do you know how much explaining I have to do? All our relatives and friends have been hounding me about the news."
Yuki has nothing to say but sorry in response, so he apologises quickly and keeps silent; lets his father continue monologuing.
Then, finally, the words he's been hearing almost his whole life: "You will really break your mother's heart if you turn out to be a homosexual, Yuki – you know we can't love you if you are, right?"
His throat is closing up. "Yeah, I know." It sounds like someone's strangling him.
Pierre takes another step forward in his direction.
In drastic contrast, his father carries on as per usual. "You know you can't break your mother's heart."
It's not a question this time. "I know."
"Clean this mess up at once."
The call ends before Yuki can respond. His phone falls to the carpeted floor with a muted thump as he loses all feeling in his limbs. Yuki's legs give way, and he slides down against the wall until Pierre's there to catch him, strong hands under his arms lifting him up and tugging him close to a warm body. His face is pressed into Pierre's sternum, his arms useless by his side even as Pierre's start to encircle him, rocking them side to side in a comforting manner.
"I'm sorry," is what he manages to choke out after a while. Yuki repeats the two words again, over and over, until all he can hear is his own awful, raspy voice, apologising without end. The words tumble out of his mouth, unrestrained, and it brings a sick sense of comfort to him – apologising was all he ever did as a kid. Whenever something went wrong at home, apologising was the first thing he would do, the only thing he could do to lessen any punishments, to make his parents less disappointed in him.
Pierre presses a kiss to the top of Yuki's head, reassuring. He's used to Yuki's frequent bouts of apologies, understands where it came from and does his best to help him through it. Still, the Frenchman reminds him with a gentle, "You have nothing to apologise for, Yuki."
And perhaps, maybe another twenty years in the future, Yuki will finally believe it.
For now, he settles for I'm sorry.
~
It's not fair to Pierre, not in the slightest, when Yuki will do everything with him in private but suddenly acts so stoically cold to him the moment they leave the safety of their shared apartment in Milan. He understands that he's not being fair to the Frenchman, his partner, but at the same time, Yuki doesn't know what else to do.
So he kisses him harder at home. He hugs him tighter, cuddles with him more, latches onto him and lets Pierre do anything when they're alone.
It's not enough, Yuki knows.
He hears it in the way Pierre says I love you and Yuki doesn't verbally respond, just presses closer to the former and forcefully kisses him. He sees it in the way Pierre looks at other same-sex couples whenever they're in public, with that heartbreaking look of plain longing in cool grey eyes. He understands it in the way Pierre reads to him "Caged Bird", late one night in the comfort of their bed. And while the poem is more tailored to African Americans in America, Yuki hears the way Pierre speaks about freedom and how it applies to them, too.
Yuki knows why the caged bird sings.
The shoe drops a week later when Pierre brings up the topic of coming out, finally acknowledging the elephant in the room, and is met with a hurricane of anger, fear, and most disappointingly, shame.
"No," is Yuki's go-to response nowadays.
Pierre is patient, gentle, understanding. But even the nicest people have their limits. "I know you're scared, but I'm tired of hiding, Yuki. It's not your fault, I know, but I can't go on playing pretend anymore. I want to be proud of who I am, I want to be openly proud of you, and I want you to be proud of who you are."
"No." Yuki is stubborn, deeply rooted from fear.
"Yuki. Your family will never change, you know that, don't you? Why are you hurting yourself to please them when they haven't given a flying fuck about how much they've hurt you?"
He doesn't understand. Family is everything.
"Answer me, Yuki. Are you seriously ready to give up all this, to give up on us, just to hold on to people who never once cared about how you feel?"
Anger and indignation bubbles up in Yuki. "They're my family, they care about me."
"Clearly not, given how you always look one second way from a panic attack whenever they call yo-"
"You don't know anything about my family! They just want what's best for me."
"Yuki-"
"Shut up! You don't know how much they've given up for me to be here." His words have taken on a defensive tone, sharp and clipped and edgy. "You think it's easy to be an F1 driver coming from an Asian country?"
His accent thickens with his anger, another reminder of who he is, of where he belongs. Yuki doesn't fit in here, with the English-speaking people and their unfamiliar mannerisms. He belongs back home, where everyone is soft-spoken and polite in public, where everyone conforms to what society deems is good and respectable, where it's frowned upon to be anything other than a straight, hard-working member of society.
"Yuki, I didn't-"
"You don't understand what it's like – family is everything to me."
Pierre looks like he's at a loss. "Family's important to me, too, Yuki. I'm glad my family supported us when we told them, and I wouldn't know what I would do if things didn't go that way. I know how scared you must be right now, and I understand where you're coming from, but you're throwing your own identity away to be what your family wants you to be."
He shakes his head.
"It's different." Yuki's tired, exhausted. He's trembling too much. "Family is everything."
~
They haven't talked much since their fight. Yuki even sleeps in a separate bedroom now.
It's not Pierre's fault that he doesn't understand what Yuki's going through. They're from different cultural backgrounds, with different influences growing up. It's not his fault he doesn't comprehend the extent of what family means to Yuki.
But it's frustrating, nonetheless.
He's at the kitchen counter, warming his hands with a mug of freshly brewed coffee, when the front door opens and a familiar face walks in. Yuki nearly flinches off the barstool but keeps his cool and tries his best to smile once he's made eye contact with their guest.
"Yuki!" Pierre's mother is nothing short of loving. "It feels like forever since I last saw you!"
Yuki gets up and returns Pascale's hug, forcing out a laugh. It's been forever since he last dared to show his face in public. His eyes flick up to see Pierre dragging in his mother's suitcase through the entryway, making brief eye contact with the Frenchman before looking away.
They pull away from their (uncomfortably long) hug and Yuki takes a step back. "Can I get you anything to drink? Food?" He's still having a cold war with Pierre and he's a tad annoyed that the former hadn't informed him of his mom's arrival beforehand, but Yuki has been taught to be a good host since young.
Pascale takes him up on his offer and requests for water before sitting on the barstool beside the one Yuki had just been occupying. Pierre disappears into a spare room with her suitcase in hand, and Yuki fills up a glass with water.
Everything feels stifled, forced. Awkward.
She takes a sip before nudging Yuki. "Trouble in paradise?"
He doesn't know what, but something about Pascale invites Yuki to open up. It might be her comforting silence, or motherly love. Either way, he sighs and stares unblinkingly at his coffee. "My family."
"Ah."
Of course, Pascale knows about his... family troubles.
"Pierre doesn't..." Yuki struggles to put his thoughts into words. "He doesn't... understand. It's different, in Japan. Family is everything."
She hums. "Pierre told me about your fight."
"Oh."
"He wasn't complaining to me or anything. To be honest, I don't think he'd expected me to just show up in Milan, either." She laughs a little. "Just needed an outlet."
"I know." Yuki understands, really, he does. If anything, he's envious that Pierre can talk to his mom about things like this. He has a feeling that if he'd tried to confide in his mom about his relationship issues with Pierre, she would have a seizure – even the thought of outing himself to his parents sends another cold wave of dread through him.
"Yuki, you know you can always come to me, right?" When Yuki doesn't respond, Pascale tacks on, "You're part of our family, you know."
This gets his attention. He swivels, nearly falling off the barstool, to face Pascale properly, eyes wide. "...You're serious?"
"Of course, Yuki. You're like a son to me. Just not official yet."
His brain's moving too fast to even consider Pascale's implication of marriage. Yuki's trying – really, he is – to connect the dots, but the concept of a parental figure to him specifically, approving of his sexuality is hard to reconcile. "You're... not disgusted at the fact that I'm..."
The word evades him, gets stuck in his throat and chokes him up. He can't seem to say that simple word. You're not disgusted at the fact that I'm gay?
"No, I could never be, Yuki." There's a sadness to Pascale's voice. "As a parent, my greatest joy is being able to see my kids happy."
"Being with Pierre makes me happy."
Pascale smiles, "I'm glad."
They leave the conversation at that.
Later, deep into the night, Yuki finds himself tiptoeing into the master bedroom. He'd intended to sneak in quietly, unnoticed, but realises he's failed when Pierre turns his head towards the door almost immediately after he'd entered, fully awake. The warm glow from his phone is the only light source in the room before Pierre offs the device, chucking it to the bedside table.
Yuki crawls into bed, keeps on his side even as Pierre shuffles around to make more room for him.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have exploded on you – this whole thing hasn't been fair to you at all. I'm just... being a coward."
"Oh, mon beau." Pierre scoots over to him, cups his face with one hand. "I understand."
His thumb glides over Yuki's cheek, tender. It's amazing, Yuki thinks, how Pierre's hands have driven the fastest cars in the planet, are rough with callouses that come with his job, but are so soft, gentle, when handling him.
"My parents love me." Yuki states, because yes, it's a fact that his parents love him. "I just think... they think they're doing what they think is best for me."
And isn't this what everyone goes through? Parents thinking something is better for their child when in reality it just hurts their child even more?
Isn't this what makes it harder, too? Knowing that his parents so clearly love him, are so ready to give up everything for him to fulfil his dream of being an F1 driver, but are also the ones hurting him the most?
"My parents just want me to be happy."
Pierre hums, continues to caress Yuki's cheek. There isn't a need for him to say anything, so he keeps quiet, lets Yuki speak and sort his thoughts out. It's nearly early morning by the time Yuki's exhausted himself enough to fall asleep, his thoughts out in the open and so painfully filled with anguish that Pierre wishes he has the ability to make it so that Yuki Tsunoda knows nothing but joy in life.
But he can't. So, instead, Pierre hugs him throughout it all and prays that it's enough to keep Yuki whole.
~
The first time Yuki makes a move to hold Pierre's hand in public, his stomach turns and flips, and not in the good way. He feels antsy, like anyone might point a camera at them at any minute and post the pictures online, exposing them for all to see. He fears that his parents will suddenly appear in the middle of Milan, that he will have to come face-to-face with their disappointment and anger and disapproval.
He chances a look up at Pierre and his heart swells at the sight of his failed attempt at nonchalance. The Frenchman has his jaws clenched and lips pursed in a valiant attempt to hide his smile, obviously trying not to make this a big deal for Yuki's sake.
Yuki's heart settles, just slightly.
By the time they reach their flat, Yuki's hand feels comfortable nestled in Pierre's, their fingers slotted together fittingly. Pierre nearly picks him up off the floor in his haste to pepper his face with kisses, excited and enthusiastic and so, so happy.
And despite the lingering feeling of dread from their walk, Yuki finds himself laughing into Pierre's mouth and returning his eager kisses back.
Of course, with all things, it takes time for Yuki to get over his baseline level of fear and shame whenever it comes to facing his sexuality. Even then, he still thinks he isn't a hundred percent, isn't quite fully, over it. There are moments where he looks in the mirror and can't help feeling disgusted at himself, for letting his family down, for being like this. Sometimes, it hurts so much that he can't bring himself to admit that he's gay, much less in a committed relationship with another guy.
But he takes one look at Pierre, his Pierre, and all those feelings go away. Because being ashamed would mean being ashamed of his Pierre, and being disgusted would mean being disgusted at his Pierre, and wanting to hide away would mean hiding his Pierre, and Yuki would rather die than do any of those. Because Pierre Gasly is the sweetest, most patient, human being Yuki knows, and to say anything otherwise would be a crime against humanity.
The first time Yuki tells others I'm gay and doesn't throw up, is two days before the Azerbaijan Grand Prix. He's standing next to Pierre and facing a group of drivers he's closer to when he says it, shaky and hesitant, but he says it anyway. There's a fleeting period of silence where the drivers stare at him, then Pierre, then their joined hands, before bursting out in congratulations and rushing over to tackle them in hugs.
Yuki gets swept into an individual hug from Alex, who's busy crying in his ear about being so happy for him and so proud of him, and he laughs because he feels so much better. He opens his eyes and blinks tears away only to spot Pierre doing the same thing a few feet in front of him, tackled into a hug by Charles and Daniel. The sight of Pierre's wet, slightly red, eyes sends a flood of concern through Yuki, before he connects the dots and realises, oh, they're tears of joy.
It makes him cry harder.
Both Pierre and Yuki finish the race in the points.
~
On Monday, Yuki rides the high of his successful race and sends a letter addressed to his parents, telling them everything, from when he first met Pierre to their life together as a couple. It wasn't easy, sitting down to write that letter, and there were a couple of times where he'd almost scrapped the idea entirely. His stomach had rolled around with a vengeance, and he'd felt ten seconds closer to throwing up everything in his system with each line he wrote.
Alex shoots him a text, encouraging him, like the mentor he is.
Pierre remains by his side throughout, occasionally giving some input and leaving Yuki alone whenever he sensed that the Japanese needed it.
He had insisted that Yuki add in the times where they have hurt Yuki beyond belief, but the latter thinks it'll be too harsh of him to do so, so he merely sums it up with a few lines wishing that they had done things differently, especially pertaining to sexuality. Yuki ends it off on a note saying that he will always be their son, no matter who he loves, and that they're free to contact him whenever they want.
After all, family is still everything to Yuki.
The Japanese doesn't quite feel like it's enough, that it doesn't fully encapsulate everything he wants to say, but he doesn't think that saying it face-to-face will help much either. In fact, Yuki might be a little fearful that coming out in person would only result in a black eye for him and an eternity of emotional damage.
It takes him nearly an hour to send the letter, pacing back and forth in an unfamiliar post office. When he finally does, Pierre wraps his arms around him and blows a raspberry into the side of his neck, just to make him laugh, to get rid of the stiffness surrounding him.
It works.
And when Yuki's parents block his number with nothing but a clipped you're not our son, Pierre's there to collect the broken pieces in his arms and piece him back together again. More than that, Pierre's family and the drivers are there too, standing with the Japanese in solidarity and surrounding him with constant support that stems purely from genuine love. They hug him wherever he goes, one of them – mostly Pierre – always with him at all times, and they shield him from nosy reporters and paparazzi.
Family is everything, he supposes. But found family is a thing too.
He's grown up hearing the phrase blood is thicker than water, but really, the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb, isn't it?
Yuki thinks he's found his family.
The swelling in his eyes from excessive crying eventually goes down. Like most things, time heals it, and along with it, brings about a dull sense of emptiness – instead of its original sting – without his parents' support anymore.
Pierre is there through it all.
The next week, Yuki and Pierre film a video announcing their relationship to the world. It breaks the Internet in the best way possible.
~
Of course, there are still people who disapprove of who he is, of his relationship with Pierre, but Yuki tunes them out – people like that exist everywhere. There are also moments where Yuki's hit with a sudden wave of regret, wondering what life would've been like for him if he never came out. Would he still be in contact with his family? Or would he still be in misery?
He can never seem to find an answer to these questions, although Pierre vehemently argues that he's way happier now. (Yuki agrees with him.)
For now, Yuki does what he can: he goes to pride celebrations with Pierre, he advocates for people who were once like him, and speaks up for those who can't find their voice. It's tough and it's lonely, sometimes, when no one really seems to understand his internal conflict and the importance of what he'd lost. But he thinks he'll make it; he believes they'll make it.
He's no longer a caged bird.
The sky has never looked so blue.