Work Text:
~
the end of summer breaks means charles has been learning lewis inside out for six months. his tactics and restless feedback to adami, lewis' behaviour toward his car, his hobbies, fashion obsession, and his dog, roscoe, as well as the numerous temptations he presented to charles to sing. and lewis’s unspoken past was revealed through the subtle hints shared every time nico rosberg was in the paddock.
charles caught them during their visit to japan, walking away without stopping for small talk. seventeen years of friendship, and something else, make it nothing. he wonders if it was he and pierre. in another life, where red bull never sacked him. in another life, where max verstappen decides to be a footballer, charles will lead the championship. then the great war for the championship did such a damage, will charles still see pierre as his best friend? he thinks about jules and his long-waiting seat in ferrari. if they were teammates, would it be like lewis and nico?
he felt a soft pinch on his waist then the crowd's cheers faded in. the bus tyres screeched as they made a turn onto curb 12. charles refocuses his thoughts, awakens from his daydream, to where he stands on the driver’s parade. he blinks, and the picture comes into focus again. carlos raises his eyebrows at him. annoyingly, his expression caught charles's mind in another place. there's an itch on his mind: the fact that they're no longer teammates, and the mind-reading should be stopped. but here carlos stands, patiently, not a single word came from his mouth. just watch him; more like read his inner thoughts, knowing there's something charles wants to share with him but is waiting for the right moment. (as if he wants to share, they are not teammates anymore).
but he does, “you’re looking at me”. he means carlos, stop looking at me, people are watching, in a hushed tone. charles' lips became too dry under carlos’ scrutiny, so he had to moisten them with a single lick, masking his annoyance as carlos’ eyes lit up with interest the moment he spoke up. his wide smile can be mistaken for the fans, but to charles, it is a source of mockery. because carlos now knows him too well. more than jules and pierre should have.
“and finally, you are listening to me,” he grins. charles rolled his eyes back at this very important story carlos told him over ten minutes during the parade.
“i did listen to you, carlos”
“no, you didn’t”
“i did”
“you’re clearly thinking about someone else.” his smile is so wide, like a child who has just won candy, with his fingers pointing to his face.
he groaned low, trying not to make it obvious how annoying carlos is and how much he wants him to leave his sight. the very important story is teto stealing his bike, gigi forgetting his way back to the shore and getting stuck in the middle of the mediterranean sea, carlos’ burned skin from the sardinia sun, despite charles' repeated warnings to reapply his sunscreen. it's all an act, so why did he have to listen to this story again when he was also there?
“and you are too optimistic to judge i’m thinking about someone and not something else.”
carlos shrugged and raised his left eyebrow slightly. great, that is where lewis is standing. how detailed does carlos scan him? carlos' eyes are back again at him, waiting for the final confirmation.
charles sighed in defeat, “fine,” and he had to shut his eyes in agony because he didn't want to see carlos clap his hands in triumph, celebrating their guessing game right.
“so what is it about?” he feels carlos’ broad shoulder radiating more heat under the hot spa sunbeams as he is softly feathering against charles’ polo. for instance, the crowds are cheering louder, maybe pointing at their closeness, but charles can’t quite see clearly as it's their back.
“you barely even talked about him when we were in mallorca.”
“hum.” he agrees. two weeks between the villa and the yacht only have his mind and arse full of carlos’s cum. why would he talk about lewis?
“it's just– we are here, racing in spa”. he glances around. the start line is coming at him, proudly, with media and celebrities buzzing there as if it doesn’t hold the most insane bloody battle. as if the concrete and grass do not burn into ashes, the collision of two silver arrows is mirrored in their hearts.
“you worry we’re going to crash like them, their incident nine years ago?”
carlos must be proud of his new achievement. a fucking psychic. by the grim looks on his face, charles wonders if carlos is always one step ahead in understanding his brain pathways.
he clears his throat in discomfort. “maybe…”
that wasn’t the direct answer charles wants him to know about, but it implies. so carlos is partly right, partly wrong, just too fast to conclude something he doesn’t know yet. it's not just the crash, for charles. it’s the spiral of guilt and mental war after it. every contact, aggressively and out of his control, he panicked momentarily. begging an apology to carlos, just like in silverstone. he never did that when he was still his teammate. why does it matter now? maybe because carlos' absent presence is getting heavier, and both of them are drowning in a sea of bad luck. maybe because every habit of stealing glances at another garage, he still sees 55 red numbers in the back of his mind.
with or without charles openly being truthful about that, he sometimes finds online evidence that carlos did the same thing, stealing a glance at the 16’ garage whenever he passed it. maybe carlos can sense it, but they never talk about it honestly.
“we are not them. and you are not in favour of doing bottas bowling, ” carlos replies nonchalantly.
“but i crashed into you before,” charles whines in disagreement. at least he is not nikita mazepin. “bottas' jokes are too much.” he gives carlos a side elbow attack.
“and you apologise and i forgive you, that’s it.” carlos gave him a side glance, his jaw clenched involuntarily, clearly confused about where this conversation was headed.
“what is it about? you are never concerned about this.”
charles wishes carlos could use a more indirect approach because he feels judged for something he is not guilty of. yet, he had no answer for carlos.
where did this thought come from? charles keeps asking this question several times. the answer didn’t come straightforward, but it lingered behind his mind, in the mist between fogs. it settles in between lewis’s small talks and longing gazes. his question during their shared flight was the moment lewis told charles his feelings.
he hears carlos exhale a long sigh, “even if it happens. you know how the end will go for both of us.”
what? cigarettes and wine after sex? charles wants to push him further, but the god (again) plays with his luck. it’s time to race.
~
charles saw nico, blond and pretty, from his nest inside the car. in his rear mirror, lewis is still pulling down his balaclava. his red suit is hotter than track temperature, and than nico stares. they don’t acknowledge each other. charles closed his visor and imagined the hue of baby blue.
~
charles wants to cry. right now, at 0 km/h, stuck in grass with debris fragments from williams' front wings and sidepod. on lap 50, he essentially handed lewis the podium spots. he wants to cry either because lewis is finally getting the podium or because carlos walks up to him and the first question he says is,
“are you okay?”
he fucking digging his own grave. what the fuck is god planning for both of them? this streak of bad luck never ends. charles gets out of his car, pats carlos briefly, and then walks away from carlos in silence, his head down. carlos's step behind him is sturdy, without a word. the internet will have a really great time on twitter after this.
~
they manage to do damage control to the media. unlike carlos, charles' mind was all over the place. he is walking straight, but in his head, he pictures the race again. where the curb is too close, where his braking fails, and he can’t see carlos from behind, he shunts hard against his front wing. how his legs became wobbly as the crash replayed again, and carlos’ brown puppy eyes staring at him ‘ are you okay?’.
charles chatters his teeth and walks faster than silvia, who follows behind him. because the “are you okay” is now playing like a broken record, and charles' depleted energy can’t hold his tears from spilling. he hadn’t seen carlos yet; maybe he wouldn’t, given carlos's recent painful disappointment about his race being ruined because of charles . also, this is the first time they had crashed. totally messed up. charles swears it would be the first and last time.
after another left turn, he will arrive at his motorhome. charles braces himself to take another step, still looking down to prevent the spillage of tears. he sees red walls, blurry as he squints his eyes to refocus. fuck, his eyesight has now failed him even worse. ferrari yellow's logo shines bright, helping him relocate his track. just another long step, he will come inside his room and cry and call carlos, telling him sorry, giving him a blowjob or whatever to make carlos feel better. then they will–
“woah, charles! moving away so fast?”
– fucking . no, not fucking nico rosberg. charles screams internally. he cranes his neck to find the blonde giving him a smile, hands holding a sky microphone, with sky’s cameramen shooting all charles' antics’. hypocrite. he had no choice; he got trapped.
he gave a small nod, “all good, nico,” hoping his smile was reassuring enough.
“why don’t you give us a small thought about what happened between you and carlos? isn't this the first time you've had a crash?” his smile is sly.
charles chews his teeth, gives him a quick race technical issue, then ends his statement with “we're both fine. no injuries.”
nico raised his eyebrow. “really? but i haven’t seen you two talking.” he kept pushing, and charles was a tenth of a second away from pushing nico against the wall.
“we–”
“lucky he is not your teammate anymore, huh? i had a feeling you always wanted to do that before.”
the red string snaps, “we are always good, nico.” charles turned away his heels fast. uncaring, how very childish he is on camera. the heavy gaze from silvia also didn’t help to ease the thrumming inside his ribcage.
~
“you see. something is brewing between these two former teammates. spa is just thrilling.” nico laughed as jenson shook his head. “you surely know what it felt like back then.”
then the video switches to their crash, carlos’ interview to dazn, to the fan war on twitter, calling charles stupid, or carlos' too brave action , both fractions are on fire, then goes back again to nico and jenson sitting in fancy stool and distracting color for charles and now, he hates everything. he hates the way nico is commenting aimlessly about his and carlos' racing style. he hates the way his hair always sweeps left perfectly, and the colour of blond is just too blond, just like lewis, who is too black for someone as white as nico. kinda unmatched, mismatched, or too yin-yang to be together.
“ it does turn back time. if we had this when they were teammates, it would be phenomenal” then the video replays. why does nico always bring it up too much, while lewis certainly doesn’t give a fuck? lewis is the most chill man charles has ever come across. he doesn't give a shit for someone who railed him, he shows what his worth and stays in his lane. why the fuck can’t nico just leave him alone?
charles' eyes’ are both red and his grip around his phone is tight. this is not the first time nico made a comment that made the situation worse. in china, when their tyre is just touching in a sprint. the articles nico wrote about their tense strategy result in vegas, call it the carlos and charles breakdown. monza when he criticized both of their aggressive and fighting for ‘unworthy p3’ racing, the way it tainted both charles and carlos reputation where both of them are satisfied. carlos always told him it was all fine and expected. his advocacy to charles’ aggressive racing is always; “ we didn’t crash, not a single scratch. it’s fine charles.”, “it’s not your fault, charles”, “i’m not mad at you”.
but charles just can’t; he can’t agree with carlos because it’s happening now, that they crashed and it's charles' fault, and there's nowhere carlos will accept his apology. yet, he knows, fucking he knows it to the core, that carlos be okay with it because he is a kind man, and he loves charles more than he hates him. because there is a knock on charles’ hotel room.
“you didn't answer my calls, you forgot your bag inside the motorhome and i had to fetch it because you purposely left the team meeting.” charles opens the door, still clutching into his phone, the video keeps replaying, to hear carlos’ scolding at him like a kid.
“charles, i thought you were kidnapped or something.”
see? although carlos struggled in williams, he admitted to losing confidence in racing due to bad luck. he also believed charles was gone, thinking someone had kidnapped him.
“or are you mad at me?” the spaniard crosses his arms at him. charles was just stunned in silence there. carlos should be angry, not worried. carlos should either shut him up, never talk to him again, or break up with him. just like what nico always wants them to be. stinging words, broken glasses, ugly cries.
and yet, here they are. just standing in the hotel room hallway like a normal person who drops his friend's belongings. because carlos is not nico and he is a better person than charles. he is not a man who was raised in shouting voices and became avoidant as a result. he is a man who was raised by intelligent communication from his father and gentleness from his mother. a man whose actions are never blinded by his emotions.
it angers charles because he is just a man. “i crashed into you and you’re still–” still kind, still wants to hug me like you are not also broken.
“you see. something is boiling between these two ex-teammates” shut up nico. shut up shut up shut up . a tenth of a second later, he startled at his phone and quickly locked the screen, but carlos was faster.
“what is wrong with you?” he grips charles' phone but charles is not giving it away easily. they wrestled in the hallway, trying to muffle their grunts and whines to avoid attracting other drivers. carlos grips charles’ waist, tickling him. fucker– he cursed with both of his hands are clutching to carlos’ left hand, where his phone is already on carlos palms.
“no, carlos don’t!” he said between breaths. but when carlos is deadly serious, he can use his authority to make charles smaller and pliant. so he pushed charles to the wall behind them, slotting their hips together. one hand pinned him down and his other arm caged charles’ chest.
“you are distracted and not being yourself.” carlos quickly entered charles’ phone passcode. eyes darting up and down as he sees what charles has seen.
he gulped at carlos's visceral reaction. this is bad, charles takes a deep breath. carlos is supposed to be angry at him, not at–
“the fuck when did they said this?”
carlos widens in shock,larger than any doe.
“don’t tell me you're fed up with what they say” he doesn’t bother to pause the video so nico and jenson's voices become their background sound. great.
charles inhaled slowly, “it's true. they said we should…,” angry, fight, “ there is something…–” boiling, breaks down– his voice came out weaker than he thought. the confidence slips away and he hates it. hates how carlos now look at him in disbelief
“charles, what?” carlos walks back as if he is listening to an unspoken word. he gave charles (or himself?) a space to breathe. charles whines at the loss. “i thought we’re already past this?” carlos asked in a breathy voice.
“i… not really but yes– i just” charles doesn't know, his eyes are already stinging by holding too many tears.
as a blurred image forms due to his tears or his minus increasing, carlos moves further away, unable to let it become another mistake. and at the same time, a british voice, taller than the blond man beside him, starts filling his peripheral vision. suddenly those figures stopped talking as they recognised two of them.
he acts and reacts quickly. charles grips carlos’ shirt, kissing carlos feverishly. carlos (not a man blinded by his emotion) shuts down his mouth from charles (a man who is blinded by his emotion). the rejection thrummed to his chest ragefully. despair, fear, and hopelessness finally break the dam down. when he tastes tears between carlos’ lips, he finally gets carlos to respond to his kiss.
“they are watching,” charles’ fingers cling to carlos’ hair, demanding. “so kiss me please. show them.” he watched as carlos’ brown eyes scanned him. there are trails of his tears smudging on carlos' nose slope and reddened cheek. show them what we are. i thought we passed this.
“carlos…” begging, another apology, another tear spilt out, and he finally sighed as carlos deepened their kiss. strong arms circling his waist, holds him steady. carlos brings his hand to caress charles’ wet cheek. reposition it to his liking. he blinks down slowly, then chuckles before claiming charles’ mouth.
“you are so–” he whispered as his tongue swept inside. “complicated.” carlos reclaims charles' mouth again, and again, and again. purposely, giving him teasing kisses, but not in a full deep tongue.
charles' hands still tremble and tangled carlos’s hair. it made carlos have to move his palm from charles’ cheek, to hold one of his trembling hands. “so complicated, more than how my race went.”
their fingers slotted together perfectly. palms against palms; like an ice cream and the scoop, burnt patty to its melted cheese burger, white king and black queen, white tiles and black notes.
carlos’ thumbs stroking calmly to charles’ knuckles.
“i’m sorry” charles says between kisses. but this time it feels lighthearted. “i’m sorry, i’m sorry”, he repeats in spanish, italian, any language his brain can comprehend.
carlos laughed on his lips. he rubs their nose together and brings their tangled hand to kiss charles’ back hand. charles finally opens his lids, carlos gently tugs their intertwined hand toward his chest and places their forehead together. his brown eyes (again) scanning him from the top. their eyes met briefly before he slowly darted left and stopped for a moment, analysing something in charles' face. maybe his freckles? or his acne? charles tends to forget his skincare routine. then carlos shifts his gaze down, somewhere on his cheek. he is frowning for a bit. charles raised his eyebrow at his sudden reaction. not long after that, carlos brings his free hand to touch the place he’s been glancing down.
“well, the only apology i accept is…” carlos' thumbs stayed on part of charles' cheek,
“is?” charles whispered low.
carlos’ thumb tapping against charles’ subtle skin, “is when you let me to fuck you in the bed”
the answer is so out of the box, and charles just barks in a laugh. at the same time, carlos' thumb slid down to charles’ dimples, like a child waiting for his parents to open their home door. the spaniard grins and then kisses him in laughter, already expecting that dimples will come and stay.
“okay, okay.” charles tries to speak between carlos’ frenzied kisses.
he is not caring for the two figures still standing there; his eyes are now focused on carlos. charles can’t look too far without prescription glasses anyway.
~~~
one shot espresso, two cubes of sugar, half of a creamer. charles is humming randomly as he sips the coffee he just made, well, carlos’s recipes. he brings the coffee to the sofa, where lewis is tapping his phone aggressively to someone.
charles calmly drinks the cup, not minding to break the silence. after his espresso finishes, he stands up to search the trash bin.
“charles,” lewis called him steady. but behind his natural tone, there is a layer of doubt. there he goes. charles came back to sit beside him with an empty cup.
“i’m sorry for…” lewis bites his lips, and for the first time, he is not looking directly into charles' eyes. “...the inconvenience.” his voice choked as if it was something painful and a bitter pill to swallow.
charles knew it. it must be about spa and lewis' lingering past. sometimes he wonders, why does it have to be lewis? so, charles didn’t ask, didn’t pry, if lewis wants to talk about him; he will answer, but if it's not, it's better not to open the can of worms.
the problem is, after seven months, the more he knows lewis, the easier it is to guess his next move. because when it comes to them, he always asks. as if he wants to change something. making amends.
“you handle things with carlos is so…” the words linger in the air, waiting for the right words to fill in.
charles hummed, “smooth?” he tries to shoot a blind answer. but lewis nods and charles thinks maybe that is the right answer. even though it was not right, practically. well, something became right when we expected that particular answer to be what we wanted.
“yeah, man. i mean, me and him, it’s always…”
“complicated?”
lewis swallowed and put his hand covering his mouth, “yeah… yeah that’s the word. complicated.”
“ahhh…” charles gasped for air he didn’t know he needed. complicated in different fonts. one is times new romans and the other is comic sans. charles nods in understanding.
he thought about spa, his crash with carlos, then lewis’ crash nine years ago.
“i always think you didn’t care much” it slipped off so quickly that he had to clap his mouth, comically.
lewis gave him bombastic side eyes before letting out his grandpa's laugh. the belly laugh is a sign of satisfaction or amusement at something really funny. charles put down his palm, slowly fidgeting with his ring, hoping he wouldn’t get into any trouble after this.
“then my acting is so good man!”
charles let out a nervous chuckle. should he join the laugh at the current fact or it’s lewis’ trauma coping mechanism? charles feels like he’s standing on broken glasses.
for eternity, lewis' laughter dies and he wipes his building tears. he clears his throat.
“so… you are acting?” charles nudges his knee.
lewis gave him his white tooth smile, “aw man, you’re teasing me”
“i’m just asking! i wasn’t in f1 yet when your spa incident happened…” charles shrugged. he lied a bit, sebastian told him one and two things about it. “so i only saw the aftermath.”
lewis nods at him with one eyebrow raise, clearly amused. “make sense. i did make some impression.”
charles locked their eyes together. he scanned lewis' brown eyes. it lacks warmth unlike carlos’ heated comforting gaze. lewis one’ seems to be used to or spent all in until it left for nothing.
“why?”
lewis let out a faint smile, “because i’m stupid ” he chuckled.
“hey! that’s my line” charles groaned, arms crossing his chest. it ignited another laugh from lewis, almost making silvia proud of him. see, charles is a good teammate too.
“but you are not stupid.” he toned down a bit of his acting.
lewis shook his head, “nah i’m. i was simply too caring, then hurt too deeply.”
charles' breath hitched. nine years, almost ten years, maybe more, if six and seven years old lewis and nico counted. “then why can't you just stop?” you are hurting , charles wants to say.
“that’s my problem.” lewis put his weight before he stood up, “i told you. i care too much.”
he saw lewis aimlessly wandering in front of his driver room. “we are working on it.”
“you are not giving up on him.” charles replies in exact timing.
the brit slides into his driver room, then smiles back at charles, “used to.” the door closes with a soft click.
charles exhales, as the memories of spa are rewashed over him. maybe he will never understand lewis' pain and attachment. he just wanted lewis to be free and find love again.
f1 is rugged and rocky but when you find someone who can welcome you home after a reckless day, someone who eases your day with laughter, someone who can be your partner to discuss, knows you inside out and be yourself– isn’t it the most fantastic feeling?
charles can’t quite pinpoint it. maybe he needs to be a world champion first to taste his own medicine.