Chapter Text
( Now )
Lando is ready to crash for at least ten hours straight when his phone rings, interrupting his plans. When he looks at the caller ID, his heart nearly stops.
Arthur Leclerc.
Why the fuck is Arthur Leclerc calling him? Lando hasn’t spoken to him in over a year. He’s so surprised that he doesn’t even answer. Arthur leaves him a voicemail. Lando should absolutely not listen to it, but for some reason, he has this strange feeling that he should.
So he does.
“Lando, I don’t know if you’ve seen the news or not, but I really need you to call me back.” Arthur’s voice sounds wrong. He sounds like he’s been crying.
Lando’s heart drops. He doesn’t know whether it’s because he knows Arthur has been crying or because Arthur mentioned the news.
“I know you and Charles are broken up, and you probably don’t want to see him, but he won’t stop asking for you,” Arthur continues, and Lando’s so confused. Why is Charles asking for him? “Um, he’s okay, by the way. Just a little banged up. Just call me back when you can.”
Banged up? Lando’s seriously a bit worried now. Something obviously happened to Charles. He feels a little sick at the thought. Despite being broken up, Lando doesn’t want to ever see Charles hurt.
With trembling fingers, he goes to Google and searches Charles’ name. What he sees almost makes him throw up.
BREAKING: CHARLES LECLERC RUSHED TO HOSPITAL AFTER BEING INVOLVED IN MULTI-VEHICLE CAR CRASH
Lando feels his entire world crumble as he reads the headline. He feels like he’s been stabbed in the stomach or something. He feels like all the air has left his lungs.
Below the first article are a dozen more, all with the same headlines—that Charles has been rushed to the hospital, that his condition is unknown, that almost everyone involved is injured.
Lando doesn’t click on any of the articles. Instead, he calls Arthur. As he waits for Arthur to pick up, he rises to his feet, beginning to pace around his room.
“Lando?” Arthur’s voice is hoarse.
“Is he okay?” Lando demands.
“He’s banged up good,” Arthur says, repeating what he said in the voicemail. “A couple of cracked ribs. Fractured wrist. Lots of bruises.”
And that—that all sounds very painful, but Charles is alive, so Lando thinks that’s what really matters. Still, the thought of Charles being in pain is something that Lando hates, even after a year and a half of being broken up. He’s got this ridiculous urge to just protect. He supposes that instinct is hard to turn off when you dated someone for a little over three years.
There’s a pause. Arthur doesn’t say anything, like he’s waiting for Lando to say something, but Lando is waiting for Arthur to continue. Lando hasn’t forgotten what Arthur said in the voicemail. For some reason, Charles was asking for him. For Lando.
It doesn’t make any sense.
“Arthur, I’m really glad he’s okay, but why did you want me to call you?” Lando asks carefully as he stops pacing.
Arthur is silent, which doesn’t help that dreadful feeling in Lando’s stomach. Whatever Arthur says next, Lando has a strong feeling he’s not going to like it.
“He hit his head in the accident,” Arthur finally says, and Lando’s heart drops. “Lando, he thinks it’s 2022. He thinks you’re still together.”
For the second time that day, Lando feels the entire world crumble.
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The flight to Los Angeles is excruciating. It doesn’t feel like the plane is going fast enough. It’s already the longest flight of his life. He’s been on much longer flights, but this one feels like it’s dragging on endlessly. Flying from Austin to Los Angeles doesn’t even take that long, but it feels like it's taking forever.
In a way, it’s both a blessing and a curse. He wants to see Charles so badly, but at the same time, he’s not ready to see Charles. He has no idea what he’s going to say. He’s not prepared at all. The last time he saw Charles was when they were breaking each other’s hearts.
But Charles won’t remember that. When Charles sees Lando, all he'll remember is them being madly in love. Lando wants to throw himself out the damn plane window at the thought.
He’s so not ready for this.
And he could have said no. He could have let Charles’ family handle this. He could have let them tell Charles that he and Lando weren’t together anymore. He could have avoided this. He could have avoided breaking his heart all over again.
But he couldn’t.
He had to go.
Lando would have felt even worse if he had stayed away. According to Arthur, the first thing Charles did when he woke up was ask about Lando. Apparently, Charles thought they were together during the accident. When nobody said anything about Lando, Charles panicked. It took a sedative to make him calm down.
So, yeah, Lando felt like he had to go when he heard that.
The whole situation is so fucked up. Lando doesn’t think he’s ever felt worse than he does currently, which is saying a lot since he thought nothing could top how he felt when he and Charles broke up.
He’s definitely going to be crying over this later. He’s a little surprised he hasn’t broken down yet, actually. Maybe he’s still in shock.
By now, Charles’ accident is worldwide news. His mum had called him right before Lando got on the plane, wanting to know if Lando heard. All he told her before hanging up was that he was going to see Charles. He didn’t tell her details. He’ll go over that later when he inevitably breaks down over the phone to her.
Max kept blowing up his phone, so Lando had to put it on silent. He didn’t want to deal with all of his friends asking him about it. Lando could only handle so much at a time. He didn’t have the energy to respond to anything because he wasn’t sure about anything.
And he definitely isn’t okay. He’s not going to be okay for a while.
This is the worst fucking day of his life.
He doesn’t know what he’s going to do when he sees Charles. He knows he’s not going to be able to handle Charles looking at him with all the love in the world. He knows he’s not going to be able to smile and mean it. He knows everything about him is going to be off, and Charles will probably notice, which will only make things worse.
God, it’s such a mess.
And it’s about to get even messier because Lando spots the towering skyscrapers of Los Angeles coming into view.
Brace for impact, Lando thinks grimly.
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The security around the hospital is pretty insane. Getting inside is a nightmare in itself. The press surrounds the buildings like vultures, cameras flashing and voices shouting. It pisses Lando off to no end, but he keeps his head down as he’s escorted into the building.
When he reaches the wing where Charles is being held, he’s greeted by Pascale first. Lando’s heart aches at the sight of the woman. Her eyes are red-rimmed, and she looks nothing short of exhausted.
Lando doesn’t know if it was lucky or not that Charles’ entire family was already in Los Angeles. Apparently, they were having a vacation of some sort. Arthur told Lando over the phone that Charles had flown everyone out a few days before the accident.
“Lando,” Pascale’s voice trembles as she walks over to him.
“Hi,” Lando greets weakly. He’s not sure what else he can say.
Lando wasn’t really sure what he was expecting when he saw Pascale, but he definitely wasn't prepared for the woman to pull him into a hug. Lando’s frozen for a solid ten seconds before he manages to return the embrace.
He'd expected it to be awkward, but it's not. If anything, the embrace is comforting. It's a hug that Lando desperately needed.
“I’m sorry,” Lando says, voice muffled. He’s not even sure what he’s apologizing for.
Pascale pulls back, wiping the tears off her cheeks. “Thank you for coming. I know this must be difficult.”
Lando swallows. Difficult doesn’t even begin to cover it. It’s excruciating, but he can’t exactly say that to her. Pascale probably feels miserable enough, so he doesn’t want to add to that.
“How is he?” Lando asks, eyes flicking past Pascale when he catches movement down the hall.
Arthur and Lorenzo.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, Lando’s mind chants.
He hasn’t seen them in a long time. The last time—God, Lando doesn’t even remember the last time he saw them. He just knows it’s been a while.
They don’t look angry, which is… good. They just look tired. Their clothes are all rumpled, and their hair is messy, like they’ve been running their fingers through it. Charles ran his fingers through his hair whenever he was stressed. Lando wonders if it’s a Leclerc trait.
“Lando?”
Lando glances back at Pascale, giving her an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry. What were you saying?”
“He is asking for you,” Arthur says as he comes to a stop beside his mother, cutting off whatever his mother was about to say. He looks straight at Lando.
Lando sort of wants to die.
Again, he’s so not ready for this.
“Where is he?” Lando’s voice cracks as he asks the question. He doesn’t even feel embarrassed about it. He doubts Lorenzo and Arthur even care, so there’s no reason for him to care either.
Lorenzo gestures toward a door. “In there.”
Lando’s eyes flicker toward the door. This is the first time he’s seeing Charles since they broke up, and it’s going to be in a hospital room.
“Okay,” Lando says, taking a deep breath, trying to collect himself.
“Look, this is going to be really hard on you,” Lorenzo starts, and he looks sympathetic. Lando doesn’t really need his sympathy. “Charles thinks it’s 2022. He thinks he’s still madly in love with you.”
He thinks he’s still madly in love with you.
A knife to the stomach would fucking hurt less.
“You—you haven’t told him the truth yet, right?” Lando asks, but he thinks that if they did, Arthur would have stopped him from getting on the plane.
“No,” Pascale shakes her head. “He was already panicked enough when he woke up. We didn’t want to stress him out more.”
“We figured we would do that later,” Arthur says, looking a bit nervous about the idea of telling his brother that he and Lando are actually broken up.
“I’m sure that’s going to go great,” Lando mutters sarcastically, unable to help himself.
“Yeah. We are already dreading it,” Lorenzo deadpans.
“But thank you for coming,” Pascale quickly interjects, shooting Lorenzo a look. “Even if it’s just for now, it will really help Charles calm down.”
Lando forces a smile. “Of course.
He then turns back toward the door. Who knew a door could be so scary? Well, the door isn’t actually the scary part. It’s the person who’s behind the door who’s scaring him. He takes another deep breath before walking forward. It takes everything in him not to turn tail and run.
His hand trembles as he takes hold of the doorknob, and before he loses his nerve, he twists the handle and walks inside.
Charles is sitting up, a big white bandage wrapped around his head. There are a few cuts on his cheeks and a brace on his left wrist. Lando has never seen him look so fragile, and he doesn’t like it.
But the second Charles sees Lando, his entire face lights up.
“Lando!” Charles exclaims, his eyes bright, and there’s so much love in them that Lando wants to cry.
“Hey, Charles,” Lando tries to greet him as normally as he can, but his voice comes out all wrong. He winces and hopes Charles doesn’t notice how strained his voice is. “How are you feeling?”
“Terrible,” Charles responds, pouting. “But I feel a lot better now that you are here.”
There’s a pang in Lando’s heart. Just a tiny comment like that has Lando’s heart breaking all over again, and Charles isn’t even aware of it.
“Scared me,” Lando somehow manages to find his voice as he comes to stand by Charles’ side, looking down into bright but tired green eyes.
He’s not lying. He felt real, genuine fear when he saw the headlines.
“I am sorry,” Charles apologizes, and he looks genuinely upset about it, like he’s more upset about causing Lando pain than the fact that he’s lying in a hospital bed.
Charles reaches for Lando’s hand, sliding his hand into Lando’s, and a tiny gasp falls from Lando’s lips at the feeling of Charles’ hand in his. It still feels so fucking right.
“Don’t apologize,” Lando tells him, his voice shaking as he feels Charles’ thumb moving in circles over his skin. “Don’t apologize for that.”
If Lando ever imagined Charles apologizing to him again, he always thought it would be about their breakup. Not for getting in a car accident that wasn’t even his fault.
Before Lando even realizes what he’s doing, he’s leaning down, pressing a gentle kiss to Charles’ cheek, careful of the bandage wrapped around the singer’s head. The bandage is what stopped him from kissing Charles’ head.
“Get some rest, okay?” Lando tells him softly. “You can sleep now. I’m here, yeah? I’m not going anywhere.”
Charles looks up at him with so much vulnerability. “Promise?”
“Yeah,” Lando murmurs. “I promise.”
“Okay,” Charles says sleepily, closing his eyes. “I love you.”
Lando thinks he’s been shot. He feels like someone just ripped his heart out mercilessly. For a second, he thinks a small wounded noise escapes him, but Charles doesn’t move or open his eyes, so maybe he didn’t.
Lando can’t say it back.
Luckily for him, Charles doesn’t comment on it. His breathing is light. He’d already fallen back asleep, which isn’t that surprising since he just went through something traumatic. Lando can’t stop himself from wondering if his presence helped.
A tear trails down his cheek.
He doesn’t know how he’s going to do this.