Chapter Text
"Look at you, Oscar Piastri!"
Oscar looked up at the sound of his name, only to return his attention to his laptop barely a second later, seemingly far more interested in whatever was on his screen than the man currently glaring at him.
"What?"
“What do you mean what? Why is it so messy in here? Cables, papers, and—oh. Food wrappers? Seriously?” Lando pointed at every single thing as he said it, his expression growing progressively more offended with each one. The cables he could probably forgive. The papers too, maybe. But several fast-food wrappers were currently lying on the carpet. The white carpet.
Oscar, however, didn’t seem to care about a single word coming out of Lando’s mouth. His fingers continued moving across the keyboard with lights reflected faintly against his glasses, brows pulled together in concentration as though Lando wasn't standing two feet away complaining about the state of their living room. His eyes flicked toward the watch around his left wrist.
“Are you even listening to me?”
“Mm.”
Several seconds passed before he finally closed the laptop and let out a long sigh. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll clean it up later.”
Lando clicked his tongue, clearly dissatisfied with the answer. “Why are you even working out here?”
“My AC broke.”
Oscar pushed himself to his feet, stretching his arms high above his head. A small groan escaped him when the movement was rewarded with an ache spreading through his muscles. Fair enough. He couldn’t even remember what time he had first planted himself on that sofa. The sky had still been pitch-black then, and now sunlight was already spilling generously through the windows, the morning sky outside stretched bright and blue.
“Then clean this up before you leave. My friends are coming over.”
Oscar glanced at his watch again.
07.40
His face twisted into a grimace.
“Ah, shit. Lan, I’m gonna be late. We’ve been chasing a deadline since last night.” Oscar clasped his hands together in front of his chest, and there it was—that stupid, pathetic, apologetic look Lando had fallen victim to more times than he dared to admit.
“I’ll clean everything up when I get back. Promise.”
If there was one thing Lando Norris hated more than mess—and God knew he hated mess— it was the embarrassing ease with which he softened under the pleading gaze of his roommate.
Fuck you Oscar Piastri.
This was so unlike him. Lando did not tolerate trash in the living room. Hell, he barely tolerated a glass being left beside the sink instead of inside it, let alone greasy takeaway wrappers sprawled across a white carpet.
You’ve been bewitched by him, George had once told him.
Lando remembered calling him insane at the time, though looking back now, perhaps his bestfriend hadn’t been entirely wrong.
“Fine,” Lando finally dismissed him, trying his best to sound annoyed, though he would be lying if he said Oscar’s gaze hadn’t sent that familiar little something through him.
His reactions around Oscar had always been embarrassingly immediate. A smile. A touch. Sometimes just hearing mention of his name was enough. As if his body had made the decision long before his brain got any say in it. Like a compass needle always finding its way back north.
The sofa felt soft beneath his body, swallowing him whole until every muscle in his body relaxed as Lando continued scrolling through his phone. He had barely made it through a couple of videos when movement from the hallway caught his attention.
Oscar was already standing by his bedroom door, dressed neatly in a brown button-up shirt with his bag hanging from one shoulder. His hair was still wet from the shower, droplets of water darkening the fabric around his collar.
One of Lando’s eyebrows rose as his eyes flicked toward the clock in the left corner of his phone. He could have sworn not even seven minutes had passed.
“You’re all set?”
“Yeah.” Oscar adjusted the watch around his wrist. “It’s been really busy at work lately.”
Oscar moved toward the kitchen, opening one cupboard after another before eventually finding a slice of bread. Seemed like breakfast was going to be nothing more than that, because he immediately trapped it between his teeth while continuing to gather his things.
“Which friends are coming?” he asked, words slightly muffled by the bread.
“Just George and Alex.” Lando yawned, sinking even further into the cushions.
“Oh.” Oscar paused. “Them.”
Lando’s eyes immediately snapped up from his phone.
“What was that?”
“Hm?”
“That face.”
“What face?”
“The one you just made.” Lando narrowed his eyes. “What’s wrong with my friends?”
Oscar let out a short laugh, already shaking his head. “I have nothing against your friends, Lan.”
“It’s just…” Oscar trailed off, his eyes drifting toward Lando, who remained fixed on him with an accusatory expression. He sighed. “Do you really want me to say it?”
“Yes.”
“Fine.” Oscar removed the bread from his mouth. “George is kind of… I don’t know… weird?”
Lando still stared at him.
“Like, last time he was here, he told me my energy was confusing and that I needed to cleanse my space.” Oscar paused, lifting both hands to make air quotes. “And he 'wasn’t talking about my room'.”
The corners of Lando’s lips twitched. Approximately two seconds later, laughter burst out of him. “Okay—” He tried to speak through it, one hand coming up to cover his mouth. “Okay, yeah. I guess he is kinda weird.”
“Thank you.”
“But— I mean, there’s nothing wrong with believing in magic, I guess?”
Oscar scoffed quietly. “Well, I think it’s childish. There’s no such thing as magic.”
Lando waved one hand dismissively before returning to his phone. “Yeah, yeah. Whatever you say, Osc.”
“You’re not working today?”
The question earned nothing more than a quiet hum. “Client asked to reschedule.”
Oscar hummed in response as he started shoving everything into his bag. Laptop, charger, headphones, notebooks, work ID. Lando wasn’t sure how Oscar managed to carry all of that every day without destroying his shoulder.
Silence settled briefly into the space between them. The only sound came from whatever video Lando had started watching and the occasional car horn somewhere down the road.
Then Oscar’s phone started ringing, earning a groan from him. "Shit."
“I’ve got to go.” Oscar was already halfway to the door, quickly shoving his feet into his shoes. “Sorry about the mess. I’ll clean everything when I get back.”
And with that, the broad shoulders of Oscar Piastri disappeared behind the front door.
Lando finally locked his phone, allowing silence to reclaim both the room and his thoughts. His hazel eyes wandered toward the white ceiling above him.
Well. There went his morning entertainment.
Lando let out a long breath and sank deeper into the sofa. It had been more than a year since he and Oscar had become roommates. The whole thing had started because Lando needed someone to split the rent with and his cousin happened to know an old friend who was looking for a place in the area.
That was it. Nothing special.
Lando rolled onto his side, his thoughts inevitably drifting back toward Oscar. At first, Lando hadn’t thought much of it. Oscar seemed quiet enough, polite enough, and above all else, capable of paying rent on time. The fact that he was attractive had been noticed, obviously, but Lando wasn’t going to make a big deal out of it.
People were attractive—whatever. He had eyes. Unfortunately, then Lando started getting used to having him around.
Almost two years had passed since then. Two years of sharing the same roof, the same kitchen, the same living room, the same bathroom. Most importantly, it meant he had seen a lot of versions of Oscar Jack Piastri. Happy Oscar. Angry Oscar. Exhausted Oscar. Drunk Oscar. Lando had seen him half-asleep in the kitchen at three in the morning. He had listened to him complain about work. Heard him play guitar from the other side of the apartment. There was also that one time Oscar had a fever and woke up from some nightmare completely disoriented, which ended with Lando sitting beside his bed until he fell asleep again.
Lando had seen it all. And through every version, his conclusion had somehow remained exactly the same. Oscar was a black hole, pulling Lando in and swallowing him whole with every turn around his orbit.
If Lando had even slightly more courage, maybe he would’ve said something by now. He would have admitted how his heartbeat picked up whenever their hands accidentally brushed against each other, or how butterflies seemed to claw violently at the walls of his stomach whenever he caught the faint scent of Oscar’s shampoo. Or how every stupid song he had heard suddenly started making sense. All the joy, the vulnerability that came with Oscar—every bit of it. But alas, courage was a skill Lando sorely lacked.
And then, of course… there was Addie.
Lando threw one arm over his face at the mere appearance of her name inside his head.
Of course.
Addie.
Addie.
Adelaide.
Long curls. Glasses. Round brown eyes. A smile bright enough to light the entire block.
How unfair.
Addie had been Oscar’s girlfriend for five years. They met in high school—or something like that. Oscar had told him the story once when they got drunk together sometime during those awkward early months of living together, but Lando admittedly remembered very little of the actual story. Far too distracted by the flush spreading across Oscar’s cheeks from the alcohol.
He did, however, remember meeting Addie for the first time. And for everything good and holy in this world, Lando could've sworn the woman somehow even prettier in person than she did on Oscar’s instagram.
They looked good together. A perfect couple, stupidly in love.
How unfair.
Lando groaned quietly into his arm, frustrated by his own ridiculous feelings. Maybe this whole situation would’ve been easier if Addie was horrible. Maybe if she had walked into the apartment and slapped Lando across the face, cursed his bloodline, spat at him, or stolen money from his wallet. Anything that would give him a reasonable excuse to hate her.
Instead, Addie was nice. Painfully nice, to the point that Lando wondered whether she was even capable of getting angry.
Once, she brought him a bottle of wine because Lando had casually mentioned liking it. She always asked if he wanted anything whenever they ordered food. She remembered his birthday. Asked about his work. Listened when he answered. One time when Oscar had been running late, they sat in the kitchen for almost an hour, and much to Lando’s disappointment, the conversation had been enjoyable.
Even worse, Lando liked her. Not in the same way he liked Oscar, obviously. God forbid. One problem was enough.
But Addie was genuinely nice to be around. Lando could see exactly what Oscar saw in her, which made the guilt sitting at the bottom of his stomach harder to ignore. Because what kind of asshole secretly wished his roommate would break up with a perfectly lovely girlfriend just because he happened to be in love with him?
Everything about the pair just seemed to fit. Five years together, families knew each other, practically grew up side by side. Sometimes Lando watched the way Oscar looked at her and wondered why he was even bothered torturing himself with the possibility of anything else.
God really did pick favourites.
A notification cut through the spiral of his thoughts. Lando reached for his phone and found a message from George in their group chat.
still at the hospital
Another appeared seconds later.
probably gonna be here for another 2 hours
The messages were enough to bring Lando immediately to his feet. Right. Oscar and Addie could continue terrorising his thoughts later. For now, he had a living room to clean.
⋆⭒˚.⋆
“He's fucking insane!”
Both Lando and George flinched at the sudden outburst. Lando wasn’t sure which was more concerning: Alex yelling out of nowhere, or the fact that his phone had gone flying out of his hand and landed a few centimetres away from where they were sitting on the carpet.
Lando quickly snatched it up, checking the screen for cracks before handing it back to its owner.
“What now?”
“I don’t know, man. He’s fucking lost it. Thinks he can just make us do whatever he wants and—” Alex barely made it through the sentence before George shoved a slice of pizza into his mouth.
“Here.” The words came out slightly muffled around George’s own mouthful of food.
He glared at him, but deciding pizza was a better target for his anger, Alex took an aggressive bite. Lando watched, mildly fascinated. He had never seen someone eat with so much hatred before.
“You two should be grateful you don’t have a boss like mine,” Alex continued once his mouth was empty. “I swear, I’m this close to resigning.”
George clicked his tongue. “Please. At least you don’t have to deal with five-year-olds every day. Do you know how exhausting they are?”
He straightened his back, voice immediately rising several pitches higher. “Mr. Russell, hers said I can't slide down the slide.', 'Mr. Russell, them don't wanna me to play.'"
Lando snorted into his drink.
“I’m never having kids,” George continued, wiping grease from his fingers with a tissue. “If Max wants one, fine. He can carry it. I don’t care how impossible it is. But I'll be dead before I get pregnant.”
Lando sighed in relief. “Thank fuck I chose my job."
Their conversation continued for a while, jumping from one subject to another without any real direction. Work turned into some restaurant Alex and his girlfriend had tried last week, which somehow turned into politics, then ghosts, and eventually greek mythology.
That was just how these things went. It was hard for them to run out of things to talk about after knowing one another for so long. The three of them had been doing this since college: meeting whenever they could, ordering too much food, talking about everything and absolutely nothing until they realised several hours had passed. Even the location rarely changed. Lando’s place. For one very simple reason—his place was clean.
Recently, though, finding a day where all three of them were free had become harder. Work was partly to blame. Alex had his boss, Lando had his clients, and George had a classroom full of children. He also had his mom. He’d been spending more time at the hospital lately, stayed with her through appointments, scans, treatment, whatever else she needed. Which reminded him—
“How’s your mom?”
George stopped halfway through reaching for another slice. For a second, Lando regretted asking so casually. But then George smiled.
“Good, actually.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Really good.” He nodded, and the smile grew a little wider. “Her last scan was clear. They said she’s responding really well. Better than expected.”
Relief loosened something in Lando’s chest. “Shit. Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh my God.” Alex immediately reached over and squeezed George’s shoulder. “That’s amazing.”
There was something different about George when he said it. Lighter, maybe. The past few months had been rough on him, even if he rarely let it show for longer than a few minutes. Taking care of his mom, taking care of his brother. He was good at that—finding something positive to hold onto even when everything around him was objectively shit. They had never understood how he did it. Still, seeing that smile back on his face was enough.
“If there's anything we could help, though,” Alex continued, “you know. Just tell us, yeah?”
“Thanks guys.”
The topic passed as easily as it had arrived. They stayed there for hours, with no one making any real attempt to leave. At some point the pizza boxes had been pushed aside, drinks had been replaced twice, and the sun outside had climbed much higher than when they first arrived.
Lando eventually moved onto the sofa, stretching his legs out comfortably while George and Alex sat on the floor in front of the coffee table. They were playing chess. Well, playing might have been generous.
“Hey, you can’t move that.”
“Why not?”
“Because that’s not how you play it!”
“Well that's how we always play it in my country.”
“We're from the same country, you idiot.”
And various other arguments. Honestly, Lando had stopped listening somewhere along the way. Their voices faded into background noise as his attention drifted somewhere else, letting the sound filled spaces around him.
He remembered his dad once told him that every chapter of life came with its own people. But despite everything Lando had lost over the years, he considered himself lucky that these two idiots were still the same people he called friends. Perhaps it had begun with nothing more profound than the bond of being three British students in a foreign place, but they had been stuck with each other ever since.
“Um, Earth to Lando Norris?”
Alex snapped his fingers several centimetres from his face. Lando blinked a few times, dragged back into the room.
“What?”
“I asked when your roommate gets back.”
“Oh.” Lando shrugged. “Probably late. Osc said they’re really busy at the office.”
“Osc?”
George’s voice came from somewhere near the kitchen.
"What?"
“Osc?" he echoed. "Enough with the pet name.”
“It’s not a pet name. That’s just what I call him.” Lando’s voice immediately took on a defensive edge. “Besides, he also—hey! Can goes in the blue bin.”
“Yeah, yeah.” George picked up the can again. “Clean freak.”
Alex, meanwhile, seemed more interested in their previous subject. “Wait, no. Go back. You still like Oscar?"
Lando’s head snapped toward him. And before he could launch into whatever defences already forming in his head, George beat him to it. “Of course he does."
"I'm not?!"
"See? He gets defensive.”
“What the fuck are you two on about?” Lando protested as he attempted to stand. Where he intended to go, he had no idea, as long as it was somewhere outside the range of those pairs of eyes currently stripping him bare—but Alex grabbed his wrist and pulled him back down.
“Fine!” He threw his hands up. “So what if I still like him? It’s not like I’m gonna do anything anyway.”
George and Alex exchanged a look. Almost as if there was some sort of telepathic message passed between them. He merely huffed and reached for his soda again, taking a sip of what had now become depressingly flat liquid.
George tilted his head. “Want me to read your tarot?”
“What?”
Too late, George was already getting up from the floor and walked toward the bag he had left beside the dining table, ignoring Lando’s increasingly loud protests as he started digging through it. Then returned with a small yellow box.
“Oh, what the hell.” Lando dropped his head against the back of the sofa. “No.”
“Why?”
“I’m not letting a bunch of cards tell me what to do with my love life.”
“That’s not how tarot works.”
“I don’t care how they work.”
“Clearly.”
George huffed, entirely unoffended. If there was one thing years of friendship had taught them, it was that making George Russell feel embarrassed about his interest in anything metaphysical was practically impossible.
Tarot. Astrology. Crystals. Manifestation. Witchcraft. Name it, and there was a good chance George had read about it at least once.
Meanwhile Alex, traitor that he was, had already shifted closer to the table, suddenly looked interested. “Do it. I wanna see.”
“Fuck off.”
The box was already open. George removed the deck and began shuffling it slowly between his hands.
“You seriously carry those around everywhere?”
“Mostly.”
“Why?”
George shrugged. “For emergencies.”
Lando wasn’t entirely sure what he expected to find among them. Hearts, maybe. A ring. Money, if there was a card for that. Perhaps a skull to matched his gloomy mood.
When George eventually laid the cards across the table, Lando frowned. “Why is everyone naked?”
“What?”
“The cards.” Lando pointed at one of them. “Why are they all naked?”
“Seriously?”
“Well, there’s a concerning amount of nudity going on.”
“It’s symbolism.”
Lando pointed at one of the cards, where two very naked people stood beneath some kind of winged figure. “Dude, you teach kindergarten. You shouldn't be carrying naked people around children.”
Alex immediately started laughing. “They’re tarot cards!”
“Now, shut up,” George warned, though the corner of his mouth lifted along with it. He finally turned his attention to the five cards now lying face-up on the table. “Anyway. Five cards. Hm… would you look at that.”
“What?”
George pointed at the first card on the far left. “Okay. Your past.”
Lando tilted his head, studying the illustration closely as if staring at it long enough would somehow make him understand what any of it meant. Compared to the others, this one wasn’t nearly as vulgar. A man sat beneath a tree with three cups in front of him, while another was being held out by what looked like… a floating hand?
“Four of Cups.”
Lando waited.
“It usually means feeling stuck. Could be something comfortable and secure for some people, or boredom for others,” George explained, gently tapping his index finger against its edge. “More like... there’s something you feel is missing, but instead of actually doing anything about it, you’ve just been sitting with that feeling for too long. Maybe because you’re scared, or because you’re too focused on something you can’t have that you stop paying attention to the other choices.”
George pointed at the figure of the man on the card again. “You see how there are three cups in front of him, and one is literally being handed to him, but he just ignores them? Exactly.”
Unlike Lando, Alex seemed to understand every word coming out of George’s mouth. He nodded along, his body leaning forward as he gave the cards his full attention.
George ignored them both and moved on to the second card, and for the first time since this little game started, his eyebrows rose slightly.
The Lovers
“Oh,” he said.
Lando immediately narrowed his eyes. “What?”
“The lovers?” Alex cut in, pointing at the card on the table. “Even I can read that one.”
There was something deeply embarrassing about how quickly Lando’s mind jumped to one particular name. A certain Australian. He shoved the thought away just as quickly.
George seemed to catch whatever small change had passed across his face because an annoying smile started pulling at his lips. “Interesting.”
“Don’t start.”
George only laughed before looking back at the card. “This one can be about relationships and romance, yes, but that’s not the only meaning," George explained, though the amusement in his voice suggested he knew exactly what Lando was thinking. “It's about connection, alignment, and choice. Making a decision based on what you actually want. Sometimes, though, we only see what we want to see.”
Lando scrunched his nose. “Then why is it called The Lovers? Sounds like false advertising to me.”
George shook his head as he moved on to the third card. The amusement that had been sitting on his face faded slightly at the sight of it, replaced by something Lando couldn’t quite read. The card itself was dominated by dark colors.
Alex leaned closer to the table. “What’s that one?”
George didn’t answer right away. His eyes stayed on the illustration in front of him—a building struck by lightning, flames bursting through its windows as two figures fell helplessly from above. Even Lando could admit it didn’t exactly radiate positivity.
“This represents change,” he finally said. “Not a small one. Something sudden that shakes whatever you thought was stable. Like lightning striking out of nowhere. A truth coming out. A situation collapsing.” His eyes remained on the card. “But things don’t usually go back exactly the way they were.”
Lando was quiet for a moment. “That’s pretty scary, I’m not gonna lie.”
“Yeah,” George admitted. “But tarot isn’t meant to scare you.”
The words, however, didn’t seem to match his body language, because the moment his attention moved to the fourth card, George went completely silent.
Lando waited one second.
Two.
Three.
“Okay, now you’re freaking me out.”
His eyes dropped to the words printed at the bottom of the card.
The Devil
What the hell does that mean? The devil? Like the one from the bible?
The illustration didn’t exactly require any knowledge to look unpleasant. A horned figure dominated the upper half of the card, while two people stood chained beneath it.
Alex let out a low whistle. “Well, you’re fucked, Lan.”
“Shut up,” Lando muttered. “Thought you said the names weren’t literal?”
“And I still mean that.” George finally looked away from the card. “The Devil here is different from the christian concept. It represents attachment. Temptation. Something having too much power over you. Could also be about destructive behavior.”
“Like addiction?”
“Could be.” George nodded. “Or a relationship. Obsession. Desire. Even your own thoughts. Basically, anything you think you’re in control of when maybe, actually, it’s the one controlling you.”
For some reason Lando couldn’t explain, the room felt a little quieter after that. The sound of traffic still came faintly through the windows. The soda can was still cold against his palm. Alex was still sitting on the floor only a few inches from his feet. Nothing had changed. Still, Lando found himself looking at the two figures chained beneath the devil again.
“Sounds fun,” he muttered.
Finally, George moved on to the last card, but something immediately caught Lando’s attention. The card was upside down. He had no idea what that meant, but judging by the way George was staring at it, he was beginning to think maybe he should’ve been more persistent when he said no to this whole thing.
“Huh.”
“Don’t huh me. What does that mean?” Lando pointed at him accusingly.
George slowly leaned back against the sofa. For a few seconds, he only stared at the five cards now lined up across the table.
Four of Cups. The Lovers. The Tower. The Devil. The Star.
“The star is usually a good card,” he finally said. “Hope. Healing. Faith. After everything falls apart, there’s still something you can believe will get you through it.” His fingertip touched the final card, turning it slightly without actually putting it upright. “But yours is reversed.”
“Which means?”
“The opposites. Disappointment, mostly. Losing faith. Or putting too much hope into something.”
George went quiet for a moment. “Sometimes wanting something badly enough makes you convince yourself getting it will make you happy.”
The smile that had been lingering on Lando’s face slowly disappeared. He looked at the entire spread again. Now even he had to admit that, together, the cards did look a little depressing.
A lonely man. Two naked people. A burning tower. A literal devil. Then another naked woman.
Good God.
“So basically, I really am fucked?”
Alex immediately burst out laughing at the desperation practically dripping from his voice. George joined him, and with that, whatever tension had settled over the room broke apart.
“That’s not what I said.”
“Looks pretty fucked to me.”
“Cards aren’t fate, Lan.” George’s voice was softer this time. “Tarot isn’t some guaranteed prediction of your future. Think of it more like... uhm… a way of looking at something from an angle you might not have considered before. If a warning came up, doesn’t mean there’s nothing you can do about it.”
Lando raised an eyebrow. “Warning?”
George looked back at the cards.
“If I read all of them as one story?” He pointed at the first one. “You’ve been sitting in a situation that makes you feel stuck for too long. Now you’re at a point where there’s going to be a choice that matters to you, and that choice might change things in a pretty big way.”
His finger moved toward The Devil. “But you need to be careful about what you let yourself get attached to. About what you want, or about what you’re in control of.”
George paused for a second before adding, “And don’t assume getting the thing you want most automatically means everything will get better.”
“Right.” Lando let out a quiet scoff. “That’s reassuring.”
His hand reached for the soda can, which had almost completely lost its coldness by now. “Good thing I don’t believe in this shit.”
Almost half an hour had passed since the tarot reading when Alex finally decided to leave, using the same excuse he always seemed to have whenever Lily was involved.
Promised her I’d go out with her
Lando had spent a good few minutes making fun of him for being whipped, only for Alex to remind him that at least he actually had a girlfriend before walking out the door.
Asshole.
Now it was George’s turn to leave. He stood by the front door, putting his shoes back on while Lando waited nearby.
“Well, I hope you got everything figured out,” George teased as he straightened.
Lando scoffed, his eyes rolling. “Stop. I don’t want to hear about it anymore.”
George was already reaching for the door when he suddenly stopped. “Oh!”
Lando, who had just started walking away, turned back around. “What?”
“I got something for you, Lan.”
“What?”
George quickly reached into the bag hanging from his shoulder, going through one pocket after another until he finally pulled out a long, narrow box. It was triangular in shape, mostly white with red details along the packaging.
Lando took it from him with a confused frown. “One wish willow?” he read from the front. “What is this?”
“It’s a magic stick!” George’s entire face practically lit up, as though he had just discovered the secret of the universe. “You make a wish, break it in half, and boom. It comes true.”
All of George’s excitement was met with perhaps the flattest expression Lando could give him. “Seriously? A magic stick?” He turned the box over in his hands. “What is this, a toy?”
Lando scanned the back of the packaging, half-expecting to find "for children under ten" or something along those lines printed somewhere.
“Where did you even get this?”
George scratched awkwardly at his upper arm. “I don’t know. This weird guy on the subway sold it to me.”
Lando stared at him. If looks could kill, George Russell would’ve dropped dead right then and there. It was almost impossible to accept that someone as objectively intelligent as George could genuinely believe in a magic stick sold to him by some random stranger on the subway.
But then again, this was George Russell he was talking about.
“Great. So some crackhead sold you bullshit on the subway and you bought it. Who knows if there are traces of drugs in this thing, or even worse.”
“Oh my God, Lando Norris!” George groaned in frustration, both hands coming up to cup his cheeks. “Listen, you don’t have to believe me, but it’s real. It is real. I don’t know what else to tell you.”
That still wasn’t enough to convince him. If anything, Lando’s eyebrow only climbed higher.
“Okay, so why are you giving this to me?” He held up the box between them. “I mean, if it actually works, you could have anything.”
George went quiet. The change was small, but enough to make the amusement slowly disappear from Lando’s face. George’s hands came down to rest on his shoulder.
“I made my wish, Lan.” His voice was quieter now. “You only get one.”
Lando looked at him.
“And mine came true.”
“You mean your—”
“Just...” George cut him off before he could finish, his hand already reaching for the door handle. “Make sure you ask for the right thing, okay? Be careful what you wish for.”
He pulled the door open, then glanced back at Lando. “Even magic has consequences, you know.”
Before Lando could ask what the hell that was supposed to mean, George stepped out into the hallway. The door was almost closed when it suddenly swung open again. George stuck his head through the gap. “And don’t throw it away. That cost me ten bucks.”
Lando groaned. “Ugh. Fine.”
Satisfied, George disappeared again, and this time the door finally clicked shut behind him, while Lando stood there for a moment, staring at the little box still sitting in his hand.
ONE WISH WILLOW
He turned it over, then back again. A magic stick? Right.
After everything that had happened today, Lando didn’t even have the energy to question it anymore. He only shook his head before making his way back toward his bedroom, tossing the box onto the table as he passed. Maybe he should give it to Lou. At least the kid might get some use out of it.
One Wish Willow.
Yeah.
What a load of bullshit.
⋆⭒˚.⋆
For four confusing seconds after opening his eyes, Lando was convinced he had ended up in another dimension. Total darkness surrounded his entire field of vision, his head spinning as though there was a constant drum pounding inside his skull, throat so dry it felt almost impossible to produce a sound. To make matters worse, sweat had somehow soaked through the back of his shirt at some point during the night.
Except, a second later, Lando realized the pounding wasn't actually coming from inside his head. It sounded more like something repeatedly hitting wood. And the most reassuring part was the familiar voice that followed shortly after.
“Lan?" Another knock. "Lando?”
Relief arrived so quickly it was embarrassing. Lando climbed out of bed and moved towards the sound, one hand stretched in front of him until his fingertips finally found the door. The second he pulled it open, bright hallway light assaulted his eyes.
“Fuck.”
And there, standing directly in front of him with a stupid smile on his face, was none other than his beloved roommate.
“What?” His voice came out hoarse.
“Oh, sorry. Did I wake you?”
Both of Lando's eyebrows pulled together as he made his way toward the window, immediately reaching for the curtains. He pulled them apart and found himself staring at the dark sky above the city, a sharp contrast to the colours and lights stretching beneath it.
Wow. What time is it? He must've fallen asleep sometime after George left.
“It’s ten,” Oscar said, as though he had managed to read his mind.
Lando only responded with a rough grunt. Great. He had woken up at ten in the evening, which probably meant there was no chance of him falling asleep again until morning. He seriously needed to fix his sleep schedule.
“I brought you something.” Oscar lifted a paper bag in his left hand.
Now that his brain had started functioning properly, Lando finally took a moment to actually look at the man standing in front of him and realised that Oscar looked almost exactly the same as he had when he left the apartment that morning. Well, except now he looked significantly more exhausted. The top button of his shirt had been undone, his hair slightly messy, several strands falling carelessly over his forehead.
Oh, fuck Oscar Piastri and his ability to somehow remain attractive in every possible situation.
“You just got home?”
“Yeah.” Oscar placed the paper bag down on the table beside him. “Have you eaten yet?”
His smile immediately widened when Lando shook his head weakly. “Perfect. We can eat this.”
Lando eventually walked closer. “What is this for?”
“…An apology?” He laughed awkwardly, one hand coming up to scratch the back of his neck. “For the mess I caused.”
Of course, Oscar knew how strict Lando was about keeping their apartment clean. And no matter how used to living in chaos he might have been before, the past year had at least taught him to try following the rules Lando had established. Which trash belonged in which bin. Which towels were for hands and which ones Lando would genuinely threaten murder over if Oscar used them to wipe down the counter. At this point, Oscar was certain he could run his own cleaning company.
“A simple sorry would've been enough, Osc.”
“Yeah, but still.” Oscar remained stubborn. “Come on. Logan said it's good.”
Giving in, Lando finally peeked inside the paper bag, only to fall silent when he actually saw what was inside. A box of sushi. Not just one kind, either. Several different pieces were arranged neatly inside the container, complete with two small cups of sauce and two pairs of chopsticks.
One of Lando's eyebrows slowly rose before he turned to look at Oscar. “You do know I don't eat fish, right?”
Oscar went completely still. He blinked once. Then twice.
“…Shit.” One hand immediately came up to slap against his forehead. “I totally forgot. Oh my God, I'm so stupid. Sorry.”
Lando had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself from sulking. It wasn’t even Oscar forgetting that bothered him that much. People forgot things all the time. Lando himself had probably forgotten at least half the things Oscar had ever told him.
Still, there was a small, irritating sting somewhere underneath it. Which was ridiculous. Sulking because your roommate forgot you hated fish sounded painfully childish.
“Nah, you’re good.” Lando shrugged, hoping it came across more convincingly than it felt. “Don’t worry about it.”
“No, no.” Oscar shook his head. “I wanted to get you something.”
“You really don't have to.”
“But I want to. Please, Lan.”
Oscar took a step closer, until there were barely a few centimetres left between them. Lando, suddenly hyperaware of the situation they were in, instinctively stepped back. As though standing too close might allow Oscar to somehow pick up on the frantic beating of his heart, or the uncomfortable tightness beginning to form somewhere inside his stomach.
“Alright, alright.” He lifted both hands. “Now what?”
Oscar seemed to think about it for a second, his eyes briefly dropping to the abandoned box of sushi before returning to Lando.
“We could get something else?”
“Like what?”
“I don't know.” He shrugged. “There are some food trucks by the waterfront.”
Lando hesitated. It was stupid. Objectively speaking, there was absolutely no reason to hesitate. They were just getting food. Oscar had accidentally bought him something he couldn't eat and now wanted to make up for it.
That was it.
There was no hidden meaning behind it. No reason for Lando's heart to suddenly start behaving as though Oscar had just asked him to run away together and start a new life somewhere far away.
Get a fucking grip.
“Yeah, alright,” he eventually said, hoping the casualness in his voice was convincing enough. “Give me, like, ten minutes.”
Ten minutes somehow turned into twenty-eight, but that Oscar didn't complain. He simply waited by the door while Lando changed his clothes, fixed his hair, changed his clothes again, then spent another five minutes trying to decide which cologne to wear.
Nearly half an hour later, they were finally outside. The streets were quieter than they had been earlier that evening, though quiet in a city this busy was a relative concept. There were still cars passing every few seconds, headlights briefly cutting through the darkness before disappearing again, people walking past them in small groups, and somewhere nearby, a couple was arguing loudly enough that everyone within a ten-meters radius could hear every second word.
The temperature had dropped considerably, too. Lando shoved both hands into the front pocket as they made their way down the sidewalk, his shoulders curling slightly inward. Even the oversized hoodie did little to protect him from the bone-chilling wind.
Beside him, Oscar looked completely unbothered. He looked like he’d thrown on whatever was most comfortable—blue t-shirt that hung loosely over his frame, paired with loose cream-colored shorts that reached just above his knees. He hadn't even bothered with a jacket.
They must have looked ridiculous walking next to each other. Like they belonged in two completely different worlds.
To be completely honest, Lando couldn't remember when he'd first developed such a strong hate for fish. Maybe it was because of Finding Nemo he'd watched when he was four. Maybe it was the ridiculously dramatic vegan poster that had been plastered beside his school back home.
Whatever the reason was, if being anti-fish had somehow led him here—sitting on an almost empty bench near a river, a taco in his right hand and Oscar Piastri sitting close enough on his left that their shoulders occasionally brushed—he surely wasn't going to complain.
For a while, they simply ate. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence. Lando had learned that there was a difference. Silence around other people sometimes felt like something he needed to fix, an empty space waiting to be filled before it became awkward. With Oscar, it rarely did. They could spend an entire evening in the same room doing completely different things and still somehow feel like they were spending time together.
“I've been thinking,” Lando eventually said. “We've lived together for quite some time now. I feel like we need to get to know each other more.”
Oscar let out a small laugh, his right arm stretching casually across the back of the bench. “Alright. What do you want to know?”
“Uhm…” Lando paused, his gaze settled on the dark body of water in front of them, following the little ripples where the wind disturbed the surface. "I don't know... what's your favourite colour?”
“Green. Yours?”
“Ultramarine.”
Oscar's eyebrows furrowed immediately. “What the hell is that?”
“It's a specific shade of blue.”
Oscar turned his head to look at him, his expression settled between genuine confusion and mild amusement. “Does being a graphic designer come with knowing every shade of colour?”
“No, but that's an advantage."
Oscar huffed a quiet laugh, shaking his head before turning his attention back ahead. The view stretched out before them. Across the river, the city was still wide awake.
For another moment, neither of them spoke. Yet sitting there beside Oscar, Lando found himself strangely content with the quiet. There was something in the air that night that made everything feel slower, softer even. Maybe it was the cold. Maybe it was how far away the traffic suddenly sounded. Lando couldn't be bothered to figure it out.
He leaned his head back and looked toward the sky. There weren't many stars. This whole place was too bright for that, its lights drowning out almost everything beyond them. Only a handful of faint glowing dots managed to peek through the darkness.
“I wish we could see the stars from here,” he murmured.
Oscar followed his gaze, tilting his head upward as well. “What's your favourite constellation?”
“Orion.”
“Why?”
Lando shrugged. “It was the only one I could spot when I was a kid.”
“That's it?”
" Does there need to be a deeper reason?”
Oscar considered that for a second. “Well, I guess not."
Lando glanced sideways at him. “What's yours?”
“Aries.” His answer came so easily that Lando blinked.
“Let me guess, your zodiac sign?”
“Yeah.”
Lando laughed. “Don’t tell George that. He’ll start asking for your birth chart.”
“Absolutely not.”
Their eyes met for a second, and for that brief moment, Lando was almost certain Oscar’s smile had stopped his heart altogether, only for it to start again twice as hard, his pulse suddenly rushing through his veins. It was enough to make him look away first, taking another bite of his taco mostly so he would have something to do with his mouth besides say something stupid.
Their conversation continued without any real direction or sense of time after that, divided into little questions so ordinary most people probably wouldn’t care enough to remember the answers. Favourite films. Worst birthday presents. Places they wanted to visit. Foods they couldn’t stand. Oscar once confessed he thought pineapple belonged on pizza. Lando learned that Oscar preferred tea to coffee and had broken his arm falling off a bicycle when he was nine.
Nothing important.
Except Lando was trying to remember every answer anyway.
Maybe that was why, after another few moments, Oscar suddenly asked, “What's your biggest fear?”
Lando looked at him. “My biggest fear?”
“Yeah.”
He frowned and genuinely considered the question for the first time. He wasn’t sure anyone had ever actually asked him that before. People asked about favourite films, favourite food, favourite places, what he wanted to do in five years. Nobody really sat down and asked what frightened you enough to keep you awake at night.
“I don't think I have one.”
Oscar gave him a doubtful look. “None?”
“Not really.”
“Everyone's scared of something.”
“Guess I'm not everyone, then."
Oscar smiled faintly, but he didn't let the subject go. “What about… ehm, shit, I don't know, disappointing your family?”
Lando snorted. “Mate, I don't care if my family is disappointed in me. I'm not exactly impressed by them either.”
Oscar's laughed as Lando just shrugged, taking another bite of his taco as though he'd just said something completely ordinary. “I mean, if they don't like something I do, that's their problem. I don't live my life for them.”
“Fair enough.”
“What about you?”
Oscar's gaze returned to the water. “I don't know, I guess sharks are pretty scary.”
“But you're Australian. Don’t you guys, like, swim with them every day?”
“Wow, that's incredibly offensive to us and the sharks as well.”
Lando laughed quietly, shaking his head before another question suddenly crossed his mind. “Why don't you have a pet?”
Oscar laughed under his breath. “I don't think you could handle the mess a pet causes, Lan.”
Lando's head snapped toward him.
“I could absolutely handle a pet.”
Oscar laughed, his shoulders shaking slightly. “Besides, I have Milo.”
“Who's Milo?”
“The cat.”
“What cat?”
“Milo.”
“Yeah, I got the name. Who the hell is Milo?”
Oscar turned toward him, clearly amused now. “The stray that hangs around the apartment.”
“Oh.”
“He started showing up a while ago. People around the building feed him, so he just... kind of lives there now… I think.”
Lando laughed quietly, looking back toward the water. “I had a cat growing up,” he said after a moment. "His name was Bruce.”
Oscar's mouth curved into a small smile. “That's cute.”
Lando nodded, suddenly very serious. “I think I'm gonna name my kid Bruce.”
The words slipped out without much thought. He was still staring at the water when he said it, watching the reflection of a passing boat tremble across the surface.
Oscar didn't seem to think much of it either.
“Yeah,” he said casually. “We could do that.”
For a second, he genuinely wondered whether he had misheard him, because there was absolutely no reason Oscar should have said we. Not when they were talking about some hypothetical child Lando might have years from now with some hypothetical person who very definitely wasn’t supposed to be Oscar Piastri.
He slowly turned his head. “What?”
Oscar looked back at him, equally confused. “What?”
“You just said—”
Lando stopped himself. There was no universe in which he was repeating those words now, especially when Oscar looked completely unaware that he had said anything strange in the first place.
“Said what?”
“Nevermind."
Oscar stared at him for another moment before eventually looking away, deciding that Lando was simply being weird again.
Meanwhile, Lando could still hear those two words replaying inside his head with humiliating clarity.
We could.
It meant nothing.
Or everything.
Oscar had probably said it without thinking, the same way people said we should go there someday or we should get one of those without secretly proposing an entire shared future. It was an accident. A meaningless choice of pronoun.
Still, for one stupid, dangerous second, Lando let himself imagine it. Them, together, with a kid who looked like an equal mix of both—the thought forming so naturally that it almost scared him. It came together far too easily. Lando immediately took another bite of his taco.
Absolutely fucking not.
Beside him, Oscar remained completely oblivious, which Lando decided was probably for the best. He leaned back against the bench and looked towards the sky again, searching for Orion among the faint stars the city hadn’t managed to swallow.
He couldn’t find it.
But he stayed there anyway.