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“Why are our rooms so far away, it’s kind of fucked up," Lando remarks, making his way into his boyfriends room. Oscar had walked the length with Lando from his room, and it was quite a distance. Their rooms were located in different buildings in the Olympic Village, and to an extent it felt like they were teenagers, sneaking around their residence halls in the middle of the night. It reminded Oscar of how it was for them in Tokyo as well, although they were definitely less secretive this time around.
It was their first night in the Village and after a very long opening ceremony including being on a boat much longer than either of them wanted to be, Lando and Oscar were both ready to sleep as well as you can on a twin-sized cardboard bed. They had hardly seen each other in the past few months; with both preparing for the games, Oscar had been off in Australia and Lando was looking forward to being as clingy as possible while they were in Paris.
It’s not like there’s any good reason the Olympic organizers would place the British golf team anywhere near the Australian gymnastics team, but Lando was never one to not complain when he had the chance to. “Maybe next time we’ll have to send them a letter asking to be in the same building. Or get a hotel room,” Oscar comments, taking Lando’s bag from him to place it in the corner of the small room.
“Why didn’t we do that this year? Is it too late to do that this year?” Lando flops onto the bed in the opposite corner, grunting as he hits the relatively stiff mattress sitting on top of the very hard cardboard bed frame. The couple had spent their fair share of time testing the limits of those cardboard frames in the past, so they weren’t particularly worried about the weight of two bodies on them night after night. “I would say it’s probably too late to do that this year,” Oscar made his way over to the bed, which only took about three steps from where he placed Lando’s bag, and shooed him over to sit on the bed with him.
Laying on the twin-sized mattress alone, the bed just felt small, but with someone else it was always a welcome excuse to lay as close as possible. Laying on the bed with Oscar sitting up, Lando brought his arm around Oscar’s waist, nuzzling his face into the younger boy’s side. “Do you wanna change into something more comfortable to sleep in?” Oscar asks, brushing his fingers through Lando’s hair. “Uh-uh,” Lando disagrees, “just gonna catch up on sleep. Before my rounds start. Goodnight.” He closes his eyes and snuggles even closer to Oscar.
The Australian smiles at his boyfriend's action, scooting himself farther down the bed to lay down, and giving Lando a kiss on the forehead before they both fall asleep a few minutes later.
The next day, Lando makes his way down to the gym floor after Oscar’s qualification. He had sat in the grandstands during Oscar’s entire subdivision and even longer, arriving at the gym with his boyfriend for their team’s call time for warmups a few hours before. Lando now wants nothing more than to run on the floor and hug Oscar and congratulate him, which is exactly what he is on the move to do. The security relaxed ever so slightly after the final set finished, and Lando uses his own status as an Olympian to convince security to allow him on the floor.
Lando wastes no time navigating his way through the crowd until he locates the small Australian team, just Oscar and one other gymnast, someone he had never met personally but had heard about both from Oscar and from watching the team.
Oscar notices Lando approaching and smiles widely, stepping forward into Lando’s arms to receive a well-welcomed hug. “I’m so proud of you,” Lando says into his ear, not quite a whisper given the volume of the room. Oscar had qualified for 5 disciplines, including the all-around, which he missed out on in 2020. He places a kiss just below his ear, then pulls out of his arms to see the unwavering smile on Oscar’s face.
“Yea, um… yea I’m really happy about that,” Oscar says. People often noticed the deadpan, emotionless face that Oscar often had when competing, but Lando knew that he was just a calm person, and he had a lot of emotions hiding under that typical deadpan look.
Oscar points to something behind Lando then, and he turns around to see a camera in the distance, pointing directly at the couple. They both wave at the camera, not having to fake their smiles as the joy still hasn’t faded from either of them.
For a moment, Lando’s mind gets the better of him and a hundred thoughts flood his mind about what the commentators behind that camera shot could be saying about them. There were hundreds of nations here with hundreds of different opinions, and he knew that he and Oscar weren’t the first Olympic couple to exist, or even the first same-sex Olympic couple to exist, but they were still in that spotlight right now and who knew everything that was being said about them.
Oscar could tell what was going on in Lando’s brain, seeing his focus blur and his expression drop ever so slightly. He grabbed Lando’s hand, drawing circles on the back of his hand with his thumb and drawing his attention back on him. Oscar gave him a look that Lando knew meant stop overthinking , and instead walked him over to officially introduce him to his teammate and coaches.
Lando, of course, couldn’t completely stop overthinking. It was weird, Lando thought, the position they were in now. A few years ago, he doesn’t think he could have ever imagined being out publicly, and he knows Oscar would think the same. But it was practically love at first sight for Lando when they first crossed paths in Tokyo, and he’s so happy that that’s not something they have to hide this time around in Paris.
They had kept in close contact even after going their separate ways after the 2020 games, and ended up getting together officially a few months after. It really helped that Oscar actually lived in England most of the time, only occasionally spending his time in Australia to train as a team, which of course wasn’t a very large team. They announced their relationship in 2022, after a lot of people got very speculative of why Lando had spent his time at the gymnastics world championships that year.
People are always very curious about how the two met, being in completely different sports in completely different countries. They never shared the details of the story publicly, but honestly? It started as a simple Hinge hookup, and they ended up spending every night afterwards together. Even after Oscar’s final Finals, when he was tired and sore and sex was the last thing on his mind, Lando spent the night with them and they just hung out. It was that night when Lando realized that he really wanted to keep what he had with Oscar, and he was glad to learn that Oscar felt the same.
Oscar spends a few minutes talking to his team while Lando stands alongside him, occasionally joining the conversation with a “yea” or “really?” Eventually Oscar turns to him and asks, “Is that alright?”
“Sorry. Sorry, is what alright?” Lando asks, realizing now that he was hardly listening. “We still need to do cool-downs and then the press stuff, so it might be another hour or two until we’re done. I was suggesting you just head back, I don’t want you waiting around for me all day when you have your own things you could be doing,” Oscar reiterates. “Oh, yea, sure,” Lando honestly doesn’t want to leave, but he knows that Oscar is right and he would be just as bored waiting for him at the gym. There’s another set of qualifications later in the day, Lando knows, but he finds himself struggling to enjoy gymnastics unless he knows he gets to look forward to seeing his boyfriend.
“Love you,” Oscar gives Lando a quick kiss, and he takes that as his cue that he should be leaving the floor.
Lando decides to wander the shops in the village while he waits for Oscar to return from the gym. There’s a few local restaurants and small business shops scattered along the masses of sporting goods stores and chain restaurants that sponsor the games.
Lando makes his way into one of the sporting goods stores to pick up a backup pair of golf gloves, remembering that he only brought one pair and not confident enough that he won’t lose that one pair.
The store is covered top to bottom in merchandise for different countries’ teams. Lando owns his fair share of Team GB jackets and hoodies, but he had been tempted for a while to buy a Team Australia jacket to support Oscar. It seems like something that would annoy Oscar, which pushed him to want to buy it, but at the same time it feels like a betrayal to all British people.
He decides against it, for now, and makes his way to the register to buy the gloves, grabbing a Monster at the register as well. The cashier says something to Lando in a French accent thick enough that he does not understand, so he mumbles something that could be easily taken as yes or no, depending on which answer was better. The cashier seems to understand this reply, as someone who was surely communicating with very few people who actually spoke his language, and hands the gloves back in a small bag after Lando pays. “Merci,” Lando replies, cringing to himself at his terrible French as he walks out.
He makes his way then to a small strip of local stores, all with very bland storefronts and very French names. He wanders into a store selling what looks like a variety of handmade items: soaps, keychains, stickers. He does a lap around the small shop building to take in the inventory of the store, seeing if anything jumps out at him, and one thing does.
He walks towards the table to the side of the room with a variety of jewelry sitting on top. There’s a couple friendship-style bracelets with different countries’ colors and names, and Lando sorts through until he finds one both for Britain and Australia. He takes both - a bracelet is a bit less subtle than a jacket, he thinks - and then shifts his attention to the more delicate jewelry on the table. There’s a display stand of simple gold and silver bracelets, and one catches his eye. It has basic gems (diamonds? Probably not, but Lando really has no idea) that go all around the otherwise plain silver band. Lando felt like the bracelet matches perfectly with the ring he has in his bag, waiting to give to Oscar at the end of the games.
Obviously, in Paris, they were going to try to find time to go on a nice Paris date. They end up going two nights later, right in between Oscar’s qualification and the all-around finals, right before Lando’s first round. They managed to get reservations for a nice restaurant in the middle of the city, and not too far of a walk from the Village.
The restaurant is pretty packed, but not busy per se as it’s quite small and reserved, as most fancy places are. While they’re waiting for their entrees to arrive, Lando pulls both of the friendship bracelets out of his pocket. “I almost forgot,” he starts, “I got you a gift the other night. Both of us, I guess. It’s nothing much really,” he hands Oscar the British bracelet and shows him the Australian bracelet, keeping it for himself. “I thought we could wear them to support each other without, y’know, being traitors to our own team,” he laughs a little bit, putting the bracelet on.
Oscar smiles, taking the bracelet and putting it on himself. “Thank you,” the smile shines through in his voice, “I really do love it. The blue looks good on me.”
“Everything looks good on you,” Lando remarks, winking at Oscar from across the table, “looks even better off though.”
Oscar’s face gets red immediately. “Oh my god, ” he responds to Lando’s comment, fidgeting with his new bracelet, “I hate you.”
"You love me,” Lando answers, and Oscar doesn’t argue back because it’s true.
Lando swirls his glass of wine in his hand. He got it just to feel fancy, not considering the fact that he doesn’t really like wine, and Oscar wouldn’t be able to help him finish it (not that he would have usually: Oscar doesn’t really like wine either).
“Are you feeling ready for Wednesday?” Lando asks Oscar about his final, breaking the small comfortable silence.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever feel ready, but I think I’m about as close as it can get,” Oscar says, taking another bite of his food.
“I know you’ve got this, I have no doubt about it,” Lando has a confidence in his voice that translates to Oscar, making him feel better about it just by hearing Lando say it. Once again, a small smile shines across Oscar’s face at Lando’s comment. “I know you’re going to do great too,” Oscar replies.
“You are going to be able to make it at some point, right?” Lando asks then, and Oscar knows he’s referring to his own rounds of golf, which happen right in the middle of the much longer gymnastics calendar.
“Course I am. I think I can make it to the first round on Thursday.”
Lando knows that Oscar has zero interest in golf, and it makes him happy to know that he’s willing to wake up early and do something he doesn’t particularly want to to show up and support him.
“I think I would just look like a bad boyfriend if you came to almost all of my events and I didn’t go to any,” Oscar jokes, and a smile appears on Lando’s face that matches his partners.
“You seem a bit out of it, is everything alright?” Oscar asks after another moment of silence.
“Yea, sorry. Bit tired, I guess.” In reality, Lando has spent the last few days overthinking everything. The proposal has gotten into his head, and he’s been filled with anxiety over it, even more so than the fact that he is currently in Paris for the olympics. The hope is that he just gets all of the thoughts out of his head before he has to go actually compete, but based on how it’s been for him so far it seems like it’s just going to get worse until he actually does it. Or until he chickens out.
“Do you wanna go back? We can leave if you’re done, no reason to stick around.” Lando nods, and a minute later Oscar is waiving over the waiter for the check.
On the walk back to the Village, Oscar takes Lando’s hand and turns to look at him. “Thank you for dinner. I’m glad we were able to fit it in before it gets too busy,” he leans in to kiss Lando, who leans back to avoid the kiss. “Don’t kiss me, you just ate salmon,” he says, a light-hearted tone clear in his voice. “Oh shut up,” Oscar tries again, and Lando allows the kiss this time.
“Gross. I hate you.”
“You love me.”
Lando finds himself in the grandstands of the gym once again a few days later. This time around, he has the TV broadcast open on his phone to listen to the commentary. It’s slightly delayed from what’s happening in front of him, but the commentators know much more about what he’s watching than he does, and the Omniscient French Voice announcing gymnasts in the arena is not giving him much to work with.
It’s just past halfway through the final, the 4th rotation just starting. Oscar’s done quite well so far, sitting in the top ten and projected to finish there as well, which is great results for Australia. In the transition between the gymnast before him, Lando notices a camera pointing in his area once again, so he’s unsurprised when he looks down to his phone a moment later and sees himself on the broadcast, and the commentators mentioning his name: “That’s Lando Norris in the audience there. Piastri’s partner, and an olympian himself- we’ll be seeing him competing in the golf finals later this week so good luck to him and of course his boyfriend, who we’re just about to see jump on the rings.”
Lando still hates being perceived at the moment, but he’s slowly starting to realize it is not avoidable. He’s at least happy to hear what the broadcast is saying about him, the fact that it’s positive. He doesn’t imagine that he’ll get any happier being on camera for the next two weeks, but at the very least during his golf sets he’ll know that everyone is being filmed and no one is targeting him.
He takes a deep breath right as the pundit finishes his comment, and simultaneously as Oscar salutes to begin his routine. He pushes the thoughts out of his mind to focus on his boyfriend, starting his routine on his best apparatus. Lando switches between watching the broadcast on his phone and what’s happening in front of him in real life. From watching the floor he can tell if the set is going well or bad, generally, but the broadcast has cameras much closer; he can see the toned muscles of Oscar’s arms as he holds himself up on the rings. After what seems like not nearly enough time, he finishes the routine by flipping about 4 more times than Lando could without dying. No matter how many times he’s seen Oscar, or any gymnast for that matter, do flips like that it amazes him every single time
Realistically, Oscar could play golf, albeit not well, but if Lando tried much more than a cartwheel he would almost certainly end up with something broken. His boyfriend is kind of better than him in every way, he thinks to himself, and it’s definitely not the first time he’s thought it.
After the treacherous moment of waiting, the score shows up on the screens and the audience bursts into cheers. A 14.133 - Lando doesn’t know the scoring system very well but he doesn’t need anyone to tell him it’s a pretty good score. He joins in with the cheering of the crowd. Unlike a lot of gymnasts Lando has observed, Oscar doesn’t show a lot of excitement on his face after a routine, he simply salutes and makes his way back to his coach, maybe giving them a hug if the routine felt really good, and maybe giving them a hug if he made a mistake. He does smile though, wide and bright, when his score is posted onto the screens. Lando can tell he’s happy about it without needing to watch the broadcast, but of course he does anyway to see the gorgeous smile on his boyfriend's face.
He thinks for maybe the millionth time in his life how lucky he is to have someone as smart, hot, and talented as Oscar, and watching him compete again is just reminding Lando how much he wants to marry this boy.
Lando looks away from his phone and back to the Oscar in front of him, and a moment later Oscar spots him in the crowd. If it’s even possible, his smile gets wider when they make eye contact and Lando waves from where he is in the grandstands. Oscar waves back, laughs just a bit to himself, then moves to prepare for his next set.
The final rotations go well for Oscar, and despite not knowing much about the sport (or perhaps because of it), Lando has learned to love gymnastics because of how insanely impressive it all is, and how all of the gymnasts he’s watched seem to have defied the laws of gravity.
Lando decides not to push his luck trying to get on the floor once the final rotation finishes. It’s a lot busier than it was during the qualifications, and with actual medals being given out the action on the floor is also much busier. Instead, he makes his way as far down as he can in the stands and waves Oscar over to talk to him over the barrier.
Lando struggles to contain his excitement once Oscar makes his way over to him. “Holy shit! Seventh, that’s amazing!” Lando pulls him into a tight hug, at a slightly awkward angle with the wall in between them. When they separate, Lando puts his hands on either side of Oscar’s face to kiss him, short and sweet, but he can still feel the smile on his lips on his own. “I’m proud of you,” Lando tells him once again. Oscar doesn’t reply, he doesn’t need to. His adrenaline is pumping and Lando could feel his heart racing, and there’s nothing for him to say in the moment.
Lando pulls him in for another hug: “I love you, see you later.”
Oscar replies, quietly, “I love you too,” before making his way back to his team.
Later that night, the two lie down together in the small bed, this time in Lando’s room. With golf starting at 9 am, they would have to wake up quite early, so they decide to stay in Lando’s room near the other golfers waking up early in the morning instead of risk waking the gymnasts trying to sleep in on their day off.
“Are you sure you want to come tomorrow?” Lando asks suddenly, clearly failing at getting an early night’s rest.
Oscar sits up slightly, trying not to disturb Lando’s comfortable position practically on top of Oscar. “What do you mean?” Oscar asks, “of course I want to come.”
“Cause I know we have to wake up so much earlier than you like to and on your day off and just for me to drag you to watch golf which you don’t even like—” Oscar cuts him off.
“Lando. I would come watch all four rounds if I could. I would wake up at 3 in the morning and come watch you play 100 different holes if that’s what it came to. I’ll be there to support you, ok? Of course I want to come.”
“Sorry. I think I’m just starting to get nervous about everything now. I don’t even know why, there’s nothing I should be nervous about, I do this all the time.”
Oscar rubbed his hand up and down Lando’s back, “You don’t need to apologize for being nervous, it happens. And just so you know, I would watch so much golf if it meant I got to see you and support you.”
Lando laughs, lightly, and buries his face farther into Oscar’s chest. “Thank you,” he says softly. “Let’s go to sleep now,” Oscar presses a kiss to the top of Lando’s head, and shifts back down the bed to lay down.
“Oh my god, turn it off,” Oscar moans as Lando’s 6:00 alarm starts going off, just loudly enough to wake up Oscar and keep him awake. Lando’s first alarm had actually been set for 5:30, but Oscar slept through it and Lando felt bad waking him up.
“Rise and shine, grumpy,” Lando is sitting next to him, scrolling on his phone and still waking himself up enough to get out of bed.
“I would literally rather die than get up right now. What time is it?”
“Six. I let you sleep through the first alarm.”
Oscar opens his eyes, the room still dark, and Lando moves down the bed to face him. “Hi,” Lando smiles, and Oscar gives him a dirty look in response.
“Ok, fine, I’ll go fuck myself I guess,” Lando jokes, and Oscar puts his arm around him, pulling him closer into a tight hug.
“Let’s just stay like this,” Oscar mumbles into the crook of Lando’s neck.
“Can’t complain about that,” Lando puts his arms around Oscar to hold him even closer.
A few hours later, Oscar is sat in the grass of the Golf National, baking in the heat of the sun and watching golf balls fly past him. He’s sitting with Lando’s parents, his siblings, and his nieces.
Oscar is glad that Lando’s family was able to make it. Not only does it keep him occupied during the downtime, but he’s happy for Lando’s sake as well. His family had tried so hard, but it was too difficult for them to make it from Australia to be there for the games. He knew that they were supporting him as much as they could and more from back home, but he was happy that Lando got that support in person.
His tee time hasn’t passed yet, so the group is sitting around waiting for Lando to get his round started. Oscar chats with Lando’s sisters while the time creeps closer, until Oscar suddenly feels a light tug at his sleeve.
“Uncle Osc, watch me,” It’s Lando’s oldest niece, about three years old, and she takes a step back before doing a cartwheel in the grass.
“Wow, good job,” Oscar reacts, and Flo and Cisca give her small praises as well.
“I’m gonna be a gymnast,” she tells him, struggling just a bit with the bigger word, “like you.”
“Oh, wow, are you? That’s very cool.”
She nods, and her dad cuts into the conversation: “We enrolled her in tumbling just a few weeks ago, she already wants to start doing flips and the lot of it.”
“Oh, well maybe in about 16 years we’ll be here again to watch you,” Oscar smiles, and at that moment the field announcer announces Lando’s name, next up to the tee. “Come here, let’s watch Uncle Lando,” she comes to sit on the grass, right in between Oscar and Lando’s sisters.
The next few days got busy for the two, with their events overlapping each other. Lando’s days were up to 7 or 8 hours long, making it pretty impossible to join Oscar until after his day was over as well. Oscar was able to join Lando’s family again for the second day for a few hours in the morning. Neither the men’s nor women’s gymnastics had any events that day, so most teams were taking that opportunity to meet and do any training they could, including Australia. After that, neither had the time in their days to watch the other compete.
They saw each other when they woke up in the morning, Lando’s alarm going off much earlier than Oscar’s, and his boyfriend groggily saying good morning to him and giving him a light kiss before falling back asleep for a few hours. They saw each other at night, Oscar laying down on the small bed and Lando giving him a very average, but welcomed and still enjoyable massage, before Lando laid his head down on Oscar’s chest and they fell asleep in the same position they always have, forgetting for the next few hours any problems they might face in the day, and just spending the time they have with each other.
While Lando has longer days, Oscar’s days are shorter, but spread out over a much longer period. Oscar still has one event by the time Lando’s fourth and final day is over. He does well; finishes in the top 15, ahead of both of his country mates. Oscar isn’t there to congratulate him, instead competing in the high bar final right around the time Lando’s day is ending, but they call each other as soon as they can and make sure to have a slightly nicer dinner than the dining hall food they’ve settled for the past few days.
When they go to bed that night, a bit later not having to wake up at 5:30, they’re both completely focused on the afternoon to come. Oscar plays his routine on a loop in his mind; with the rings being his best apparatus and the only event he has a real chance of medaling in, he’s completely focused on perfecting the routine as much as he can. He drifts off to sleep just a few minutes later, the fatigue of the past days and constant thought replaying in his head putting him to sleep. Lando, on the other hand, struggles to fall asleep. He listens to the calm, steadying heartbeat of his sleeping boyfriend compared to his racing, and wonders if he’s even more anxious about proposing than Oscar is to compete for a medal.
He almost definitely is. Oscar doesn’t get nervous about anything, he’s just a walking ball of calm compared to the energy Lando always has built up inside him. Lando knows that Oscar doesn’t need to overthink anything, he just thinks about it the perfectly right amount to prepare for what he needs to and then, just, does it. Lando wishes he could work the same way, but there’s no amount of ‘stop thinking about it and just do it’ he can tell himself to actually stop thinking about it.
He’s sure that at this point he’s thought of every possible way tomorrow can go. What if he says no? What if he doesn’t even get the chance to talk to him after, and the moment is ruined? What if there’s a family emergency and he has to leave before even watching Oscar compete? But as he lies down, sharing the small and uncomfortable cardboard bed that has, miraculously, still not given out under the two of them, his mind fills with one very important question: what if he says yes?
Lando is sat with his entire family in the grandstands of the Bercy Arena for the final day of olympic gymnastics. Lando convinced them all to stay in Paris for an extra day to be able to watch Oscar, and because he wanted them around for the proposal. He didn’t actually tell any of his family that he’s going to propose, he pretty much hasn’t told anyone honestly. He’s kept the plans to himself, mostly because he’s been too scared that something will go wrong or that he’ll back out last minute, but now that he’s here, ring in his pocket and the simple silver bracelet he bought their first full day in Paris on his wrist, he knows it’s what he wants to do.
The only person he has told is his sister, Flo, late the night before. He wants to be able to call Oscar’s family so they can be there as well, rather than find out by watching on TV, and he’s asked Flo to hold the phone for him. Knowing his sister, he’s fairly confident that by this point his other siblings have also heard his plan, this theory supported by the fact that Cisca keeps smiling and giving him a thumbs up every time they look at each other.
His niece is very excited to watch the women’s gymnastics, and is making sure that everyone around her knows so. Apparently she already knows who Simone Biles is and just can’t wait to watch her compete. Lando isn’t sure he knew anything at her age, it’s very endearing and a little bit impressive.
There’s four events for the final day, and Oscar’s is the first. He kind of wishes it were the last instead, and that it would be the final thing to worry about and they could go back to the Village right after. He knows that, staying for a few hours after the proposal, he’s going to get a lot of congratulations and he’s not even sure if he wants the attention. Lando would have no problem doing all of this completely alone, just the two of them, but he knows his family would be happy to be there and once he found out they both qualified for Paris, the idea came into his head and he committed to it.
Oscar goes right at the end, the 7th of the 8 gymnasts in the event. After watching everyone else go, Lando feels good about Oscar’s chances when he steps up to the rings. A few of them have made small mistakes in their routines, and watching the scoreboard, Lando is getting a good idea of what a good score does or doesn’t look like for this event. He watches Oscar approach the apparatus, notices the small tells of anxiety he shows and Lando is pretty sure he’s the only person in the room, and maybe even in the world, that really notices them.
Lando had facetimed Nicole Piastri a few minutes prior to quickly catch up before Oscar’s father and three sisters joined the frame, and now the Piastri family is sitting cuddled around a phone at nearly midnight their time, watching the scene that Flo showed in front of her.
Lando’s heart races as he watches Oscar’s routine, and his mind is a bit distracted by all of the movement on the rings and suddenly Oscar is dismounting and the arena is cheering loudly. Very loudly, Lando thinks, and it’s not even a minute later when the scoreboard flashes at the top of the Arena and Oscar has moved into silver medal position.
Holy shit.
Lando screams. It’s maybe a bit louder than what he was expecting, but it’s hidden by the volume of the room around him, and by Oscar’s mother who Lando thinks he could hear scream from Australia even if she wasn’t on call with them.
There’s only one gymnast left to go, meaning Oscar’s secured a medal. Australia’s first artistic gymnastics medal.
Lando starts to make his way down to the wall at the bottom of the stands, Flo following him and Cisca stopping the rest of the family from following. Oscar has stepped off to the side with his coach, but he hasn’t sat down. He’s not far from Lando, but he hasn’t noticed him yet.
The last gymnast to go is pretty good. Lando doesn’t know much about him but he recognizes his name. The tension in the room is tight as the final gymnast steps up to the rings, gets lifted up, and begins his routine.
Lando isn’t even watching. He’s leaning over the wall, staring at his boyfriend, willing him to look over and notice him. He doesn’t take his eyes off of Oscar until the arena gasps. Lando looks up-
The gymnast fell.
He stands up, getting lifted right back onto the rings. But he fell, he’s not going to be able to touch the podium contenders.
Oscar’s won silver.
He notices Lando then, glancing at the stands from where he’s standing against the wall and smiling wide when he sees his boyfriend already looking at him. Oscar knows he needs to wait for the final score to properly celebrate, both on technicality and out of respect, but he knows just as well that after the gymnast’s fall he would have to do something absolutely insane to get ahead of him.
He finishes his routine, and a minute later the score pops up on the overhead screens, securing Oscar in his place on the podium. It takes no more than a second for his coach to pull him into a massive hug, giving him a pat on the back so intense it stings for a few moments afterwards. After he releases the hug, both Oscar and his coach turn to the incessant “Osc!” coming from Lando at the barrier.
Oscar runs up to Lando, practically jumping into his arms. They hold each other there for a full minute at least, and pressed against his body Oscar can feel Lando’s heart beating a million miles a minute. They separate, and Flo quickly turns the phone so Oscar can say hi to his family. The conversation doesn’t last long, he doesn’t have the time for it to.
“Where’d you get this bracelet?” Oscar asks, noticing the new jewelry as he’s holding Lando’s hand.
Perfect. Lando was hoping he would notice it since he didn’t have it this morning, because it helps him lead into what he wants to say next.
He takes a breath, quick but deep. “Just in the village. I got something for you to go with,” he takes out the ring and begins to kneel, but quickly realizes it won’t work with the wall in the way of the two. “Fuck, whatever. Oscar Piastri, will you marry me?”
Multiple things happen at once. The cameras are focused on them now, so the audience erupts into cheers once again, no one louder than his mother from slightly higher in the grandstands, and Oscar’s from the phone. Oscar reacts first by covering his mouth with his hand in surprise, and Lando nearly drops the ring box from shaking so much, reacting quickly and catching it midair.
Oscar pulls him into an impossibly tight hug, and Lando is surprised to feel the shoulder of his shirt get slightly wet where Oscar’s face is nuzzled into Lando.
“Is that a yes?” Lando asks, with a slight laugh in his voice.
“Come here,” Oscar simply replies.
“I don’t think we can get any closer-” Lando starts, before suddenly Oscar is dragging Lando over the wall.
He giggles as Oscar picks him up, helping himself over the barrier.
“Say it again,” Oscar says when Lando reaches the floor of the gym. He can’t wipe the smile off his face.
Neither can Lando.
He takes the chance to do it properly this time, getting down on one knee, noticing Flo leaning over the wall out of the corner of his eye and a cameraman that definitely wants to get right into their faces.
“Oscar Jack Piastri, will you marry me?”
Oscar reacts the same way he did the first time, despite the fact he was not surprised by the question this time around. He covers his mouth with his hand, eyes watering very lightly, before he starts nodding his head. “Yes,” he finally replies, “yes.”
Lando starts to get up, very nearly getting knocked over by Oscar pulling him into a hug once again.
“I love you so much,” Oscar says into Lando’s ear.
“I love you too,” Lando pulls away to place a kiss on Oscar’s lips. He grabs his right hand to slide the ring onto his finger, “now go get that fucking olympic medal!” He kisses him one more time before Oscar’s coach approaches him to walk him where he needs to be. The podium ceremony isn’t until the end of all 4 events, but Lando just wanted to say it out loud and make it feel even more real.
A security officer walks up to him to help him back over the wall. Obviously he’s not supposed to be on the floor, but given that he was dragged over the barrier by Oscar they can’t really get mad at him.
Flo hands Lando his phone back when he makes his way to her, and he has a quick chat with a still very excited Nicole Piastri, and Oscar’s sisters who he can tell are excited despite the fact they don’t want to show it, being younger sisters and all.
When he hangs up, his sister jumps to pull him into a hug, “I’m so happy for you, Lan.”
“Y’know, I’m pretty happy too,” Lando fidgets with his silver bracelet.
They make their way back up to their family in the grandstands, where Lando is assaulted by even more hugs and congratulations, and a poor attempt at anger from his mom when she slaps him on the shoulder and says “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me beforehand” in between minute long hugs and kisses on the cheek.
With nothing else to compete in, Oscar joins the Norris clan for the remaining 3 events to watch.
Oscar sits on Lando’s lap. No one says anything about it. Lando steals Oscar’s Australia cap, but Oscar still has the country’s flag draped around his shoulders, which he got from his teammate in the stands. Oscar has a surprisingly long conversation with their niece about Simone Biles before they watch her beam routine. The energy in the arena stays high and everyone enjoys being in the gym for the final day of the competition. When the end of the final event approaches, Oscar reluctantly leaves Lando to go back to the floor, but is less hesitant about it when Lando tells him to go, reminding him that he’s going to get an olympic medal.
Being the first event, the podium is also the first of the four. It takes about 10 minutes once the final event ends for them to set up the podium and prepare everything, and Lando spends the entire time jokingly flirting over the wall with his boyfriend — his fiance.
Lando walks around the arena to be as close to the podium as he can so he can take pictures like a proud mother on her son’s first day of primary school.
When Oscar is on the podium, and he’s handed his medal, the camera focuses right on him for a moment. He shows off his new silverware - the ring and the medal - and Lando has never seen Oscar smile so wide.
They go out to a nice dinner that night, one that Lando had already planned under the ruse of it being their last night in Paris. It’s a small building with very exquisite, expensive-looking details on the interior of the restaurant. Both boys end up getting pasta for dinner, and they don’t stay long, eager to get back to their room instead.
Lando has taken the chance to introduce Oscar as his fiance to essentially every single person they have talked to since, including people they already know. In the gym, at the restaurant, to people they’ve passed in the village. Oscar has, almost, gone back to his usual calm demeanor, but Lando isn’t sure he’ll ever be calm again.
It’s too late for Oscar to call his parents to have a proper conversation with them, but he makes a plan to do so in the morning. When they get back to their room (Lando’s still, they found it easier to stay than going back and forth), which was mostly packed up for their late morning flight back to London, they lay down on the bed together to call friends and family, almost all of who had contacted them first to say congratulations after seeing it on TV.
The long phone calls and repetitive praise is tiring, but they drag themselves off of the bed to get ready for the night once they talk to everyone important to them. Once teeth are brushed and pajamas are put on, Lando gives Oscar a suggestive look.
“Hey Osc?” he asks, leaning against the wall. He puts his hand out, which Oscar takes, and he pulls him in for a kiss.
“Yea?” Oscar responds, pressed against Lando’s lips.
“Do you wanna test how much these cardboard beds can take?”