Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Life after death is strange, in that it’s still like walking barefoot on a wire, but with the cynical, somewhat finite, reassurance that there’s generally nowhere further left to fall.

It’s played out fairly ‘textbook’ so far: Nico fell, he was caught, and now it’s on him to chart the steps forwards, and to help those he loves do the same.

The kids, as is often the case, are a story in two parts. Margot is stoic, mostly silent— but the occasional question about her opa, and the fact she hasn’t truly shut any of them out, gives Nico hope that if she wants to talk, she will. Erik, by comparison, is a fountain of emotion, none of it well-concealed. He cries a lot, seeks reassurance from both parents - something Nico is selfishly grateful for, still outrunning the shadow of his mid-funeral breakdown, and behaviour at the wake.

As Nico thoroughly, thoroughly deserved, Vivian gave him fresh hell for that one, the morning after the funeral.

“For as long as I live, I swear I’ll never know what the fuck you were thinking.” Nico wished he didn’t know what it was like to take a dressing-down from Vivi still in her pyjamas— but more than that, he wished it had never been necessary. “I’m trying to be sympathetic, Nico, really I am— but the kids and your mother have been dealing with enough, without having to watch you self-destruct.”

“I know.” In a lifetime of lifetimes, Nico could never have articulated the guilt. It thundered through his already aching head like a damn train, another jump on the ‘tracks’ rearing whenever he remembered his children, presumably sleeping, just metres away in their beds. “I have no excuses, Vivi. I’m not trying to make any— just apologies. To you, to the kids, and to Mama.”

“She’ll hear you out,” Vivi said, after a beat— and then, in a well-known, well-practised act of ‘white flag,’ she picked up the cafetière, and handed Nico a cup of coffee. “We all will, Nic. But Jesus Christ— what happened?”

Nico knew what she was actually asking. It even made sense: the only part of ‘All This’ she never saw was when he and Lewis were outside. She saw him rush out; she saw him walk back in, mask-on, ready to continue, and none of what went on in-between.

He couldn’t explain that to her, nor the way he’d felt the Earth sweep like a rug from under him, when he had to walk back into that same fucking enclosed garden, and embrace the people smiling through their tears, when all he himself wanted to do was vacate and forget. The stopgap was in the same realm as why Vivi didn’t follow Nico out of the funeral service herself, why she knew it was no longer her place— and Lewis, of course, always Lewis.

It weighs heavily on him, in the days and weeks that follow. For all he’s committed anew to protecting and supporting his family, it hits him like a train whenever he remembers:

My dad’s dead.

It rises like a vice around his chest each time, squeezing the air like juice from a rotting orange— and for all he knows now better than ever that Lewis will have his back against the grief, for all his family loves him, and that Lewis’ support holds him as turbulently ‘steady’ as his arms had at the funeral, Nico’s never felt more alone in his life. His heart is screaming for something, a way through the trees, a means of telling Lewis what he needs, but it’s like he can’t venture close without the ‘aid’ of an emotional collapse. For everything that’s changed, they’re no further forwards, and maybe the worst part is that Nico has no real idea of where he wants ‘forwards’ to lead them. The signals are conflicting because it’s Nico who’s giving them, and to cap it all off, he just had to be a selfish bastard and give Lewis hope he’d work them out in the end.

It’s Vivi, of course, who calls him out on it, when Nico arrives to collect the kids in late September, looking (correctly) like he hasn’t slept in a week.

She doesn’t say anything, just bypasses the coffee machine entirely, and instead hands him a can of Red Bull from the fridge. Nico‘s got no idea why she has it. He cracks the can anyway and gulps, bracing against the awful taste.

“Have you eaten today?”

“Yes.” It’s two in the afternoon; despite appearances, Nico hasn’t completely lost his ability to self-sustain. The fact that what he ate was leftover cauli ‘rice’ shovelled onto a single slice of bread feels like none of Vivi’s business. He’s also not in any real mood to chat. “Are the kids ready?”

“Margot’s still at Mathilde’s.”

She walks around him to the table, and even before she’s nodded at one of the five empty seats, Nico knows full well what this is, or at least, the bones of it.

“If you wanted to talk, Vivi, you could have just said.”

“I know.” She takes her seat, and Nico takes his next to her. It’s a little too familiar somehow, memories of separation, his father’s diagnosis, of Erik being bullied at school. They always held their good conversations in bed, or out on the terrace with wine; the table meant business. “I’m sorry. I would’ve pre-warned you, but then you’d have asked me why.”

“Why?” Nico quips, but any attempt at humour dries up when Vivi produces a card from her pocket, sliding it across the table towards him. It’s white, embossed, but the name and many, many letters are what keeps Nico from going full ‘Bateman’ - letters that he might not be able to interpret, but knows the weight they carry.

“Vivi—“

“Just hear me out,” she says, palms towards him like she’s steadying a wild animal. She well might be - Nico hasn’t decided yet. “I know you’re not a sceptic— so why not try it?”

There are maybe a dozen reasons why not— though none of them would hold water in the Court of Vivian, and Nico’s frankly thinking that I don’t want to ought to top them all anyway.

“I appreciate what you’re trying to do.” He places two firm fingers on top of the card and slides it back. “Really. And I appreciate the concern, but it’s—“ Awful. Terrible. Painful and cruel, like I lost him as a child, and still wonder  if maybe, somehow, he’ll come back. “It’s just grief, Vivi. It’s— normal.”

“It is normal.” That pulls Nico up short. In a life of lifetimes, he never expected to hear her agree with him there. “And I’m not telling you how you should mourn, Nico, truly I’m not—“

“Of course you aren’t.” The irritation isn’t earned; Nico knows full well all Vivi’s doing is looking out for him, but when all he’d had the energy for today was collecting his children and feeding them a dinner he didn’t cook, an intervention is the last fucking thing he needs. “You can forget it, Vivi.”

“I thought you might say that.”

It’s Nico’s own error, really, forgetting that for all Vivi is an excellent partner, and a near-faultless mother, there’s still some of that girl in her, the one who snuck him a beer in 2002, then snuck him onto her father’s yacht shortly after. Her goals are her goals, provided no one gets hurt— but clearly Nico’s ego doesn’t count, because the next thing she shows him - an appointment, pre-booked, on her phone’s calendar - almost sends him through the roof.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Nico—“

“Are you fucking—“ Erik’s in the house; it throws a damper on Nico’s anger, if not a bucket. He pushes Vivi’s phone back at her, then hisses, though he knows he’ll regret it: “You are not my wife anymore, Vivian, what gives you the right?”

“Our children.” She pushes off the table with two full palms, the definition of ‘standing on business.’ “The children I am about to send off to your home when you are breaking apart— and that is only part of it Nic, because I’m worried for you.”

“Oh, are you?”

“Of course I am.” She has to lean up to make it work, but the second her hands come down on Nico’s shoulders is the second Nico feels himself come back to Earth. “You’re my very best friend—  but you’re not ‘you’ right now, Nico. Lewis’ efforts-aside, you’re losing weight— and you’re not talking to him, are you?” She gives him a squeeze, and if Nico had any doubts as to her sincerity, they slink away as she drives in the final nail. “You’re not talking to anyone.”

Nico thinks about denying it— but then what good would that do him? There’s also the fact that lying requires energy, and of that, Nico is fresh out.

“Because I don’t know what I would say,” he admits, torn between wishing he had more Red Bull, and wishing that the can was, instead, full up with gin. “I truly don’t know where to start - not with you, not with Lewis— and definitely not with a total stranger in grief counselling.”

“If you recall, I never said ‘grief’ counselling,” Vivi says— and before Nico can ponder what exactly she means by that, she’s scooped the empty can out of his hand, and given his cheek a sympathetic peck. “The appointment is booked, anyway. Go or don’t go, I can’t force you— I just think it could be of real benefit to you both.”

“Mm.”

It takes Nico a second.

“Sorry— ‘both?’”

**

October

“So,” Steve Walker, MSc, ICCEFT, says, folding his hands on top of a colossal desk. “I’ve got to say, this is a professional first.”

Nico doesn’t doubt that it is. Leaving aside the fact that photos of him and Lewis together, in one place, with a shared goal, would send the online motorsport space into a tailspin, this can’t possibly be ‘business as usual’ for a couples’ counsellor.

It stands to reason that most of his regular clientele would be actual couples, after all. 

“Thanks for seeing us.” If Lewis is as uncomfortable as Nico is here, he’s doing a very good job of hiding it. The only ‘tell’ is the way he’s clenched his hands in his lap to keep from fidgeting, which incidentally also removes any compulsion Nico might feel to try and grab one. “I’m guessing you don’t often take referrals without speaking to the actual clients first?”

“Well ordinarily I wouldn’t,” Steve says, flipping open his MacBook on the desk. It’s obvious he’s found what he’s looking for when a small, but definitely amused, crease appears between his eyebrows. “Your ex made a compelling case, though, Nico. Read like a tragic romance— though I’d obviously welcome hearing it in your own words.”

He looks at them both as if to say when you’re ready-? Nico doesn’t fancy his chances telling Steve that if those are the terms, he’ll be waiting a while.

“What is it you need to know?”

“Well, I can send you away with the paperwork for most of it,” Steve says, “but I suppose my burning question is: what are the two of you hoping to get out of this process?”

Straight in, then. Alright.

“That’s— fair,” Lewis says, as Nico’s still panic-gathering his thoughts, wondering nonsensically if they ought to have somehow studied for this— and indeed, they likely should’ve, because when Lewis follows up with, “Can’t say we’ve actually talked about it,” Steve folds the lid of his laptop closed, then folds his fingers together to match.

“Mm.” He’s incredibly hard to suss out, is Steve; whatever scent blockers he’s using are immaculate, and the rest is either aura, or deliberate practice at becoming as impenetrable as possible. “Now I’m just guessing here— but might that be exactly the root of the problem?”

He’s right, of course, and right to such a degree that all Nico wants to do is deny it.

When neither him, nor Lewis, say anything, Steve clearly fits the pieces together for himself.

“Well, look, guys, there’s a lot of exercises we can discuss. The Therapist’s Handbook is an almost bottomless bucket of tricks— but to put it in terms you might relate to, there’s no point in a workout unless you know what you’re focusing on.” Met with silence again, their therapist - theirs - just shrugs. “General fitness, or building muscle? Weight loss, or weight maintenance? Communication? Conflict resolution? Sex—“

“I’m guessing you’re no longer discussing the gym,” Nico quips dryly— and although he never intended to, it’s as if he somehow manages to shatter a spell. At his side, Lewis hides a smirk behind one of his hands, and across the desk, Steve raises both in a shrug.

“Hey, you caught me,” he says. “What can I say: I’m a shrink, not a wordsmith.”

“One of us has to be.”

It’s Lewis who says it, and when Nico looks across at him, it seems abandoned any attempt at feigning professional composure. He’s fixated on Steve behind the desk, eyes big and openly vulnerable, and suddenly it makes perfect sense, why he agreed with Vivi’s suggestion they come here. Hell, for all Nico knows, it could’ve been Lewis who put the idea in her head. “If we can’t do it on our own steam right now, can’t you— I dunno. Try and help us start?”

Something falls out the bottom of Nico’s chest. He’s not sure where the pieces end up.

“Alright,” Steve says at last, and this time, both Nico and Lewis lock in. “Then in the interest of ‘starting,’ can of worms be damned— Nico.”

It’s like being back in school, getting called upon by his English teacher, when Nico had yet to fully grasp that what he was there to learn would go on to benefit him one day.

There’s some irony to examine there. As per usual, this isn’t the time, so Nico just says,

“Yes?”

“How would you describe your relationship?” Across the desk, Steve crosses one leg over the other, as if it’s the simplest question in the world, and this is just another day. “As in, its current state?”

As both Steve’s gaze, and Lewis’, settle on him, Nico can feel the sweat gathering at the back of his neck. What, exactly, is Steve expecting him to say— and how long does he have? They could fill a thousand books - hours of talk-time not even he and Lewis could justify the cost of - just to cover the basics of what led them here.

“I—“

Karting, shared beds and destroyed rooms. Holidays, girls, sun, sea, and sand. Mercedes, rivalry, rage and, sex. Grief, caring, crying, risotto, the kids—

“Complicated.”

“Good.”

Interesting choice of word, is Nico’s first thought; the Herculean effort it took to get out notwithstanding, he doesn’t have a chance to call Steve out before the shrink’s attention has shifted. 

“And you, Lewis?”

Suddenly, there are more important things for Nico to focus on. In a way, it makes sense: they always treated everything as a contest, from the fucking pizza, to the— less media-friendly recollections. Of course he’s trying to compete with Lewis here, too, seeking the better, ‘winning’ answer… in therapy, Jesus Christ, what the fuck is wrong with him?

Fortunately or unfortunately, it seems Lewis’ vulnerable streak has its limits.

“What he said.”

“What he said was good.” Steve, Nico decides, is either the most patient man alive, or is frequently forced to deal with far bigger assholes for far less money. “In your own words, though?”

Lewis was clearly expecting the pushback. It occurs to Nico he was merely playing for time, when it takes him maybe half as long to provide his own answer.

“Confusing.”

“Good,” Steve says once more, then: “I notice you prefer adjectives over labels.”

“That tell you anything?” Lewis asks, a touch snarky, but Steve doesn’t rise to it.

“Just an observation,” he says. “Ask my kid, and they’d tell you ‘labels are for boxes;’ and I’m not here to judge— though if you’d permit a touch more scene-setting…?”

When Lewis doesn’t openly object, Nico shrugs.

“Sure.”

“I’ll make it quick,” Steve promises, then reopens his Mac. “Just so I have the full picture, then: have you ever been romantically involved?”

“No,” Lewis says, as Nico thinks, wryly, that at least they’re starting on Easy Mode.

“Alright.” Steve makes a few notes. “Are you sleeping together?”

… and there it is.

“Not— currently.”

“But you’ve been intimate in the past?” Steve asks, as if Nico hadn’t just laid down the perfect psychoanalytical breadcrumb trail at his feet. “Recently?”

“Yeah,” Lewis says. It’s clear the ‘in for a penny, in for €300 per session’ attitude has caught him slacking, because he quickly fesses up. “And— non-recently. When we were teammates.”

It seems insanely reckless to say it aloud; if even a whisper of this got out— But those are Nico’s own hang-ups talking, and though he’s more than due a conversation with himself about what all of this might mean, Lewis hasn’t actually told Steve anything that isn’t true.

This is a safe space, Nico reminds himself. All that’s missing is a fucking flag.

“It’s clearly not a comfortable topic,” Steve observes. “Forgive me for raising another: was there infidelity involved?”

“No,” Nico says, only spared the instinctive irritation by remembering that is, in fact, a very reasonable question to ask someone whose wedding made it to the Daily Mail in 2014. “The details aren’t all mine to share— but no. We had an open marriage. There were frequent discussions.”

“Not with me.” Before Nico can ‘round on him, Lewis saves his own life by qualifying the comment. “I don’t mean— it’s not that I thought I should’ve been involved.”

“Then what did you mean?” Nico asks, teeth gritted hard enough to make sand, as Lewis throws up his hands.

“Kinda proving my point, man. Look—“ It’s Steve he appeals to then - something Nico realises, with a sense of frustrated dread, is going to start happening a whole lot from now on. “It’s not a new thing. Naked or not, we’ve never been any good at talking.”

“That’s not unusual,” Steve says. He closes the laptop lid yet again. Nico’s starting to get that it’s a ‘move’ of his, no doubt meant to reassure them. There is no transcript in Ba Sing Se— or whatever the fuck. “I see it often enough with alpha pairs - as mammals, we’ve come to rely on scent clues as a conduit for communication. As humans—“ Steve shrugs. “Well, I probably don’t need to explain how often that doesn’t stack up long-term.”

He doesn’t, but to Nico’s mind, it’s reductive at best. If his, and Lewis’, secondary sex was the only thing underpinning their decades-long failure to understand each other, they could’ve just signed on for a dose of pills. As-is, they’ve got a bigger problem, one that starts with how grateful he is - has (almost) always been - to have Lewis in his life, and ends with how very fucking uncomfortable it feels, like the way antiseptic stings when applied to a cut.

It’s an intrusive thought to rival the best; Nico wants to slap himself in the face for even conceiving of it— and then not, because once-fucking-again, no lies have actually been told.

This whole thing is a farce if they can’t be honest. It can’t all be a show of Lewis’ effort, either, and apparently Nico’s limbic system agrees, because he downs the rest of the mineral water Steve handed out on entry, and takes the bull by the horns.

“Look, you want to know what we are? Like, right now, what we are?”

“Nico—“

“He has been keeping my family afloat.”

In the silence that follows, Lewis looks horrified. He’s also trying to look anywhere other than at Nico, and through a surge of spite completely enmeshed with sentiment, Nico isn’t about to let him off. Not now.

“Interesting,” Steve says. “How do you mean, exactly?”

“My father died back in August.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah.” Nico clears his throat. There’s suddenly more than just grief sitting in there. “He suffered a stroke two years ago; since the news broke, Lewis has—“

“I cook.”

The power changes hands again, and Nico feels the throttle surge; it’s lights out, and—

“You— cook?”

“Yeah,” Lewis says. It’s like he’s admitting to a murder; Nico wants to take it - the same martyred bullshit he’s guilty of himself - and beat Lewis over the head with it like a bat. “Yeah. For the family, I— cook.”

“You supported Nico’s family through a major tragedy,” Steve observes. “That’s quite a gesture.”

“It was. It is.” Nico swallows, and it’s almost audible in the quiet office space. It’s crunch time, he knows; his body and brain are fighting him each and every inch of the way, like he’s somehow begging himself not to lose control again, to not say yet another thing he knows he’ll live to regret.

Lewis is watching him, and for once, perhaps deliberately on his part, his face is completely unreadable. He’s waiting, Nico realises, waiting for the shoe to drop, or for Nico to use it to kick him— and he could, easily, however unintentionally, if his touch is anything but featherlight, his phrasing all but perfect.

“Please don’t misunderstand,” Nico says, surprising even himself with how quiet he sounds, how completely the sincerity comes through. It’s like everything else around them fades out as he turns in his chair; Steve’s not there anymore, much less involved, as Nico, for what might be the first time ever, actually talks to Lewis Hamilton. “I am— so very grateful, for everything you do.”

“But?” Lewis hedges, like he’s actually asking Nico what he needs— and as the shock of that wears off, Nico feels the pieces shift, falling back into a new shape. It’s not easy to say, far from it. But it’s not impossible, and Nico proves as much, as he takes the bit between his teeth.

“But I need to talk about it. My father, his illness, what it has felt like since he passed, I—“

It’s an imperfect art; even as Nico feels tears fill the back of his throat, he’s not ready, nor willing, to cross that line.

Instead he goes back to Lewis, back to his eyes, the warm weight of his gaze, the feeling of being held, even if it happens to be on the edge of a terrifying drop.

“I want to talk about it with you. And I don’t know what this is, really, or what it could be, but I know—“ Breath catching in his throat like vomit, Nico locks in: one final push, no audience. “I know I want you in my life. And I will do— anything I can, to not push you away this time.”

“Gentlemen?”

In a room where they could’ve heard a pin drop, when Nico hasn’t moved save to swallow, and Lewis is still looking at him like they’re something brand new, Steve’s voice cuts through like an assault. Nico jumps in his chair, Lewis hisses— Steve calls time on the season, and Nico can’t explain how he wants to both thank him, and throttle him, at the same time.

“That was good work,” Steve says. He’s got the laptop open again, but he’s looking at them both, serenely satisfied. “Go gently, yeah? I’ll email you the paperwork— then it’s just a case of rebooking, and payment.” Something amused catches one corner of his mouth, lifts it a bare millimetre. “Will we need a contract for that, do you think..?”

Nico knows what he’s trying to do; apparently so does Lewis, because he’s quicker off the line, quicker to give Steve the measured, appropriate laugh he’s seeking.

“Nah. Our boss made us throw down three-hundred grand each for a car repair in 2016. Pretty sure we can figure this one out.”

As Steve chuckles, and Nico absorbs, he lets his eyes slide shut, just briefly, when Lewis’ foot touches his own, beneath the cover of the desk.

“I meant it, guys,” Steve says, after, when Nico and Lewis are gathering themselves to leave. “That really was good, for a first session.”

“Are you going to grade us?”

“Oh you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Steve says, and Nico has to assume there’s something ‘British’ at work that he doesn’t understand, when Lewis smirks.

Nico’s not sure why. He was being entirely serious.

“I don’t give out marks for therapy,” Steve clarifies, then gives them both that Look again - the one that reminds Nico of school. “You guys can’t treat any part of this like a race, or a contest. You know that, don’t you?”

“Yeah, we do.” Lewis, looking like all he wants to do is grab Nico and steer him outside, settles for grabbing his coat off the chair for him. “Thanks, Steve. We’ll see you.”

“You will.”

And Nico truly believes that’s all there is, that they’ve made it through intact, with nothing to reflect on other than what had been openly laid down. That is, of course, until Steve clears his throat.

“If you don’t mind, gents, can I leave you with a thought?” 

Nico’s hand is on the doorknob. Dammit. They were so close.

“Yes?”

“When I asked how you’d define your relationship—“

“And we tacitly agreed with your child that labels belong on boxes?”

“Which is usually true.” At Nico’s side, Lewis has gone still— and this time, Nico feels it too, the proverbial shoe, the dropping, the kick.

“Neither of you said ‘friends,’ though. That’s not usually so difficult to admit.”

**

It was Susie who suggested it - a final resting place for Nico’s father that somehow satisfied three separate sets of requirements: those of the family, those of the Principauté de Monaco, and of the old man himself.

Trawling through the same records he left with orders for the funeral, Nico quickly discovered his dad had harboured no interest in being buried; ironically, this was exactly what the State wanted most, or failing that, a specific internment of ashes in a ‘consecrated columbarium’ at the National Cemetery.

“Of all the things that didn’t need added bureaucracy,” Nico stews to Susie one evening, waiting in her kitchen for Erik to collect his belongings, and say goodbye to Jack. “I mean, I get it. They can’t have ashes scattered all over the streets, but options beyond ‘here or here’ would be useful, at minimum.”

“I’ve been looking into this,” Susie says. She’s re-potting a plant with rubber gloves up to her elbows, the kind of dirty, meticulous work thats making Nico restless just watching her. “Technically you can scatter them at sea, over a certain distance from the shore—“

“He’d hate that.”

“I know,” Susie says patiently. “Just like I know your mother doesn’t want him going in the garden of a house he never saw.” She glances upwards at Nico, smiling benignly, even as she makes an emphatic snip with her shears. “I have been known to listen, occasionally.”

“Yeah, okay.” It’s a valid point, particularly as nothing, from the funeral planning to the delivery of his damn eulogy, would’ve happened without Susie involved. “I’m sorry. I suppose I’m just hoping that eventually we will run out of hurdles.”

“Like I said, I’ve been looking into it.” Having finished sweeping dirt off the table, her plant nicely rehoused, Susie heads to the sink. “How would you all feel about a spot on the costal path?”

“That’s allowed?”

“It is with landowner permission.” Hands dried, Susie passes over her phone, already open to the camera roll. “Especially when said owner is A) an 80s motorsport fan; B) not a heartless prick; and C) someone who owes Toto a favour.” She peers over Nico’s shoulder, watching as he scrolls through the images - a rocky sandstone pathway, lush shrubbery, a view right down into Monte Carlo, where Nico can easily pick out the twists and turns that form the race track. “It’s drivable, up to the peak itself, then a short walk on the flat your mum could easily mana—“

“It’s perfect.”

Though no one has ever had to work hard, to see the light that comes off Susie Wolff, Nico has to admit this moment is a masterstroke.

Over the following weeks, plans are set in motion. They inter Nico’s dad on a Sunday - Race Day - then gather around the TV, glasses raised, as Oscar Piastri banks another twenty-five points towards his coveted third Championship. They plant a tree on the site; Nico takes Michel, the landowner, for dinner, and then Toto in the same week, to express his thanks.

A new routine emerges: every Thursday, Nico visits his father, and every Friday, he and Lewis attend therapy to talk about his father. He’s silent at one, and not at the other; more often than not it’s a case of forcing himself, and he leaves exhausted, wrung-out to the point where he seriously questions if he should be fucking walking, much less driving.

Lewis always takes a cab, one he arrives and leaves in. He shows up a few hours later either way to make dinner, and for all Nico’s grown used to a steep curve of emotional whiplash, that— that might end up undoing him eventually, if he doesn’t find a way to voice it in front of Steve.

It’s also one thing that’s still easy to push down, when still in-mind of the alternative. If one thing between them can, thankfully, go unsaid, it’s that neither of them want a repeat of the month between his mother’s birthday and his father’s death.

By the time November hits, it’s become a lifestyle, more-so than a routine.

He still goes to bed alone. Nature isn’t healing; he still feels numb, anaesthetised, but fully awake, staring into a void as well as up at his ceiling.

Some nights, though, are better than others. Usually they’re when Nico’s exhausted, body and brain, too tired to overthink, but awake enough to enjoy the scent and sounds in their own little slice of peacetime.

Lewis, in his old age (let it never be said Nico won’t milk the five months separating them for all they’re worth), has become quite the host. From his seat at the kitchen counter, Nico sips sparkling water and watches Lewis fry mushrooms in masala spices, to be served with millet dosa, and plant-based cucumber raita.

He’s in his element, Nico notes, in a way he never thought to picture him outside of racing— and although the cynic in Nico wants to say that it hardly counts if he’s not competing, to truly let that thought dig in would be untrue, as well as unfair. Every move Lewis makes looks like a deliberate act of service; he can’t conceal the enjoyment, the satisfied hum when he checks on the dosa, or dips a little finger into the bowl of raita to check the flavour. It’s atmospherically delicious, and also infectious, though Nico only realises how much when he looks up from Lewis’ hands to find the other man watching him, in no small part amused.

“Something you want to ask?”

Many, actually, Nico thinks, from the mundane, to the kind of shit that would prompt Steve to fire them immediately.

“I don’t think so,” he says instead. “I was under the impression we’re not supposed to take opinions on cooking from the British.”

“Nah,” Lewis says, grinning. “Listen to some of us; just not lazy white folks.”

“The modifier there, because..?”

“Because my mum doesn’t count,” Lewis says, and then seeks to stopper Nico’s mouth by offering him a spoonful of mushrooms. “Taste this, would you?”

Nico leans forward on instinct; it will occur to him seconds later that Lewis probably meant for him to take the spoon, but by then it’s too late, and Lewis, crucially, doesn’t argue either. He feeds the mushrooms directly between Nico’s lips, and as a frankly gorgeous blend of heat and spice spreads over Nico’s tongue, there’s no avoiding how charged the moment feels, nor how completely he has to fight the urge to do something stupid, like sweep the whole dinner ensemble off the countertop and lay himself on it instead.

For all he and Lewis have fucked, Nico’s not used to that desire rearing its head in a space that isn’t pinned down by volatility, and seeking the quickest, most effective way of putting his frontal lobe on mute.

He’s equally unprepared for the guilt that follows, the gnawing, self-flagellating reminder that they’re in mourning, yet here he is, thinking with his dick?

It’s not quite a ‘bait and switch,’ but Lewis picks up the tension shift, regardless. He takes back the spoon and tosses it in the sink, busying his hands with the dosa, a safe distance from Nico, before asking: “Taste okay?”

Nico, who wouldn’t know if the mushrooms needed salt any more than a sprinkling of anthrax, is just grateful for the distraction.

“Very good,” he says, and then, because the temptation is too great to resist: “When you said you’d ‘learned’ to cook, I didn’t realise you’d really learned.”

“What’re you saying?” Lewis asks, not looking up from the bread, but unable to keep the playful half-smirk off his face. “You implying I couldn’t cook before?”

“That’s exactly what I’m ’implying,’ Lewis.” The same way every smile has been surprising him since the funeral, Nico’s laugh sneaks up on him. “I’ve seen you burn a pan of water.”

“That’s bullshit, man.” The whiplash is incredible, but so-too is Nico’s apparent ability to withstand it, so long as Lewis is smiling. “Critical difference: you’ve seen me burn a pan that once had water in it.”

“You’re right,” Nico says. “Where would we be, without your meticulous attention to detail?”

“Hungry,” Lewis says, pointed, but it’s clear he’s pleased too. A ruddy sort or flush spreads over his cheeks, and for all he catches himself mentally, he can’t will the evidence away.

It’s far from the only thing he’d be, Nico reflects, once they’ve put away as much food as they can stomach, and he’s doing his bit by cleaning up. The kind of isolation he’s felt since that first, awful day could never have been sopped up with food and company alone, but the fact that Lewis learned how to do this, for him— It’s unspeakably tender, caring in a way that no one has shown Nico, beside the people who love him most.

And isn’t that a fucking thought, when it comes down to it? Isn’t that a fucking thought.

It was probably inevitable; from the moment Lewis fucking spoon-fed him, this was always going to end a certain way— but their emotions have been at the surface for weeks, and it’s not as if they haven’t practiced the steps.

He leans over Lewis without thinking, reaching for a clean washcloth on the counter. When Lewis stiffens with tension, Nico feels it, turns, leans all the way in as Lewis cups his jaw, a perfect call-and-answer.

As kisses go, it’s a good one - deep and searching. The familiar tension’s still there; Nico’s learned to pinpoint the moment they hit the gas and the clothes start flying, feels it coming when his chest starts to tighten, an alpha’s growl building, cresting— 

Extinguished, when what slips out of Nico instead is unmistakably a moan.

It’s quiet, some might even say soft. It reverberates between them like a fucking canon, and Nico’s not sure who pulls back first, only that they do, and that whatever might’ve followed that moan ends with Lewis’ forehead against his collarbone as they both try and catch their breath.

“I’m sorry,” Nico says, at length. The trepidation is back, and the guilt, Jesus Christ, the guilt, multi-faceted now, as he tries willing himself to remove his hand from the back of Lewis’ head. “I’m sorry. I don’t—“

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not—“ Nico catches himself before he outright self-flagellates. The issue runs deeper than that; at the root of it, he’s still a man who just lost his father, a man who can’t tell his first best friend that he loves him. He crumbles his face against Lewis’ hair. “It’s not you. I’m just not—“

“Ready?”

Love is patient, Nico remembers hearing. Love is kind.

He’s still ruminating when Lewis kisses his forehead, pulls him into and against his body instead. Nico’s eyes slide shut, his arms come up as he nods, and doesn’t talk, because despite what Steve says, maybe there isn’t always a need to.

He does say thank you, though, minutes or maybe hours later, as the dust they’ve kicked still hangs in the air, but all around them water - the pool, the rare late-winter sunshine, Lewis pulling him up from the depths when things were simpler, yet still so much harder.

“I owe you— more than I could ever say,” he tells him, “for not letting me drown.”

“Never.”

Nico holds on tighter than he ever has, as the echo picks up like a chorus: Lewis’ words in the garden, I’ve got you, I’ve got you—

If sleep had evaded him before, this is the night it places Nico on ‘nil-by-mouth.’

**

There’s something Nico’s been putting off.

Steve, in his infinite wisdom, has moved on from simply accepting Nico and Lewis’ practiced apathy, and started insisting on action. They left therapy this last week with ‘homework’ - that is, if they still can’t put a finger on what they’d like to be, they’re to confide in someone close to them, as to what they are, currently.

“Let’s not panic,” he’d said, in a way that implied he knew the both of them far too comfortably well already. “Just be honest, the same way you are in here - it won’t kill you.”

Coffee cup in-hand, as if both Nico and Lewis weren’t staring at him like he’d recommended starting a war, the bastard actually had the nerve to shrug. 

“I’m not suggesting you discuss your actual past sex life with your mother.”

That is, in effect, exactly what he suggested— though thankfully they both possess enough self-restraint that neither Nico’s mum, nor Lewis’ brother, will end up so-scarred.

Nico’s thinking of Steve’s speech on labels, as he drives over to his mum’s. Frankly he’s fixated on it— and it’s both the reason he can chart his way into this conversation, and the reason he’s fighting with all he’s got not to drive off the fucking road en-route.

It shouldn’t matter. It might matter less, ironically, if there even was a label Nico felt comfortable with. As far as ‘men’ go, it’s only ever been Lewis. Hell, as far as sex goes it’s only ever been Lewis, Vivi, and a poor girl named Lena who let sixteen-year-old Nico flop around on top of her one time over Ibizan summer, and approximately four Diet Cokes.

There’s no way his mother needs to know any of that. If he’s honest, the whole concept has Nico fucked up, feeling like a child, when the other half of his brain is screaming to remind him he’s also a dad. As of today, neither of Nico’s children have ever ‘come out’ to him. He’d like to think they wouldn’t feel the need to, yet is also smart enough to know just how naive that position is.

He doesn’t envy a damn one of them, the kids who might ‘have it easier’ these days than it was in the 00s, yet still, occasionally, unfortunately, still have everything to fear from the people who are supposed to love them without question.

He’s forty-seven. He feels twelve. It stops mattering either way, when he does his homework, and his mother responds by looking at him like he’s just told her the Earth roams, as a rule, around the Sun.

Nico, of course, reacts rationally.

“Really, Mama? Thats all you have to say?”

“Nico, liebchen—“ Over fifty-ish years as a wife and mother, Sina Rosberg has perfected the art of physically portraying a headache. This, though, is truly a masterclass; she scarcely even looks up from the bread she’s kneading, flour up past her elbows, a very particular pinch between her brows. “I heard you, I see you: you and Lewis have something ‘complicated.’” She looks up at him, faintly but definitely amused, as that pinch between her brows becomes a full raise. “That would have come as much more of a surprise, if he had not been at every family occasion since 2030.”

“Thats—“ A a good point, when Nico thinks about it, and reflects on what he actually said to his mother. He’d put no name to it - why should he expect her to react as though he had?

“Look at you,” his mum says, as Nico’s still working through the recollection-logic loop. She doesn’t bother wiping her hand before patting him, leaving a floury handprint on his elbow. “You are the same to me now as you were at fifteen, telling us you crashed your father’s car— only this time you’ve done nothing wrong.”

Nico, still, is silent. It’s as if he expected a great weight to lift, something worth the mental effort it took to ‘confess.’ It hasn’t, but Nico doesn’t think his mother’s non-reaction has anything to do with it; this sits deeper down, or maybe somewhere else entirely, like he’s fired a perfect shot, only to discover the target has moved.

Back in the room, his mum has wiped her hands. He realises only when she cups both of them around his jaw.

“Nico, my darling, mein sohn— you know I will always lay a place for Lewis at our table. He is like Susie - he is family, whether ‘complicated,’ or less-so.” She scrubs a familiar thumb over his cheekbone, like she’s chasing imaginary tears, keen to comfort. “Do you need me to say more? If you do, I promise I will try.”

It’s the first hint Nico receives of what should probably have been obvious: this is no more comfortable a conversation for his mother than it is for him, and likely what Steve intended from the start - to challenge Nico, to see just how far he will go for Lewis, when prompted.

To coin an almost thirty-year-old meme, the limit does not exist; thats not what his mum is asking, though, and maybe it’s because some part of him had prepared for this, or maybe it’s that he’s so raw, emotionally, that his mother’s thumb on his cheek was almost painful, but the answer exposes itself like a nerve, demanding attention, if not healing.

“No,” he says, and gently eases his mum’s hands away from his face. “It’s not you. Maybe—“ The breath he snatches feels like he wrestled for it, tooth and nail, until blood ran down from his nose. “Maybe it wasn’t ever about what you had to say.”

“Ah.”

It’s one thing they don’t do, that they haven’t done, with any frequency or demand, since the day after Canada, at the nursing home. In some ways, it feels like grotesquely raising the dead; in others, in reality, it’s Nico’s mum raising her hands again, this time, simply, to cup her son’s elbows.

“Liebchen— I won’t do either of you the insult of claiming I know for sure—“

“No,” Nico says, before she can finish. It was a pipe dream at best, he knows— but it was his dream, still his. “No, Mama, it’s— I understand.”

“I am sorry, Nico.” She gathers his hand up in hers, and although he might not appreciate the honesty today, he can’t deny that’s what it is, what she’s always, unfailingly, given him. “I knew your father for fifty-one years— and yet I still do not know what he would have said, on his way to accepting it. But I know he would have— Nico.” His gaze pulling from hers is, apparently, unacceptable. “He would have. Your father could be old-fashioned, of course, but he was never bigoted. He was also never stupid— and I have never known anyone who understood ‘complicated’ better.”

Nico, brain-bruised, newly, illogically, heartbroken, and exhausted, as he feels, can still get his head around that.

What he’s not prepared for is what his mother says next— and casually, to boot, as she actually pats his cheek, before turning back to her fucking bread.

“‘Complicated,’ was his speciality. And even ‘back then,’ he was always fine with Niki.”

It’s a strange bombshell, that. For a good few seconds, Nico doesn’t even register, and it takes another few after to take it in, to actually comprehend what she’s just said, much less implied.

“Sorry— Niki?”

“Well, yes.” Hands filthy and floury again, Nico’s mum, unbelievably by his estimate, raises them both in a shrug. “Oh— you know.”

“Actually,” Nico says, “actually, Mama, I don’t.”

“Oh, well—“ It’s like her awareness kicks in, right around the same time Nico’s last grip on sanity, as he understands it, vacates the room. She wipes her hands again, this time covering the dough before she turns once again to face him. “I suppose maybe you wouldn’t. Hunt did die young, after all.”

Nico’s brain, already overtaxed, feels like it’s due to start seeping out of his ears.

“James Hunt? You’re seriously telling me—“

“Oh, listen to you,” his mum chuckles - chuckles - into the face of Nico’s expanding crisis. “Your generation didn’t invent this, Nico. Maybe you can be more ‘visible’ about it now, but it’s nothing new. It even sounds very similar: Marlene knew, she understood— admittedly I’m not sure about James’ wife, but—“ 

“Mama—“ Nico pinches the bridge of his nose, wondering why he ever believed this might be the simple trip Steve touted. It’s never simple with them; there’s always another issue, another twist, in this case a boss whose reason for turning the other cheek to his and Lewis’ increasingly indiscreet encounters at Mercedes is now showing itself in a whole different light. “Mama, why are you telling me this?”

“Because,” his mother says, “sometimes, Nico, we do better taking people by their actions, over what it is they say.” She sighs, and with her next words, Nico realises his big misconception: it’s not what Nico’s been doing that worries her. “Thats true of your father, and, I think, of whatever you’re discussing in ‘therapy.’”

“Don’t start—“

“I do not mean you shouldn’t go,” his mum cuts through. “If you and Lewis need to learn to speak to each other, of course I would never discourage it.” She takes a deep breath, one that feels like it’s shuddering through Nico’s chest as much as hers. “I know that he has been an amazing support, and I know how much kindness that requires. Do you also discuss the many times you were unkind?”

She’s a smart woman, Nico’s mother. There’s no missing her pronoun switch, where ‘he’ becomes the plural ‘you,’ and really, if she’d gone into this afternoon with the microscope at arm’s length, it’s pretty clear that’s gone out with the dishwater.

“I don’t see how that’s—“ any of your business, “relevant.” Nico swallows as he pushes his hair off his forehead, trying once again to ignore the suspicion it’s becoming thinner. “I— we have made a commitment—“

“A commitment to what, Nico?” his mum asks. “To forget the past? To forgive? Or to talk about your grief? Because, liebchen—“ She moves her hand again, then, gripping Nico’s fingers and holding his gaze. “One day, you will not grieve for your father the same way as you do now. I will not tell you how you should do it, or how long that will take - only that if grief is the reason Lewis is here, in your home every night, after fifteen years of barely speaking—“

“That’s enough, please.”

“Nico—“

Firmly, Nico pulls his hand away from hers. It’s a fear he never knew existed, or maybe one he’s been pushing back. He’s more than raw enough, so afraid of breaking again, so illogically ashamed of the impulse, that the dual implication - Lewis feeling obliged, Nico showing only Lewis the extent of his pain because he knows it - makes him want to bend over his mother’s sink and puke ’til there’s nothing left in him to hate.

“I can’t explain it,” he says. “I wish I could, Mama, but—“

That isn’t for you.

“That isn’t why I came.”

“I know.”

For all he ended up not saying, she seems to hear every word.

Prickly, oversensitive though he still is, Nico does allow his mum to hug him before he leaves. He’s almost instantly glad for it, for her familiar scent and still-strong arms - a reminder he didn’t realise he needed of how she’s still here, still present, still giving him a hard fucking time.

“Don’t be,” is her response, when, overwhelmed by that sad gratitude, Nico offers apologies for his mood. “I’m sorry to overstep.”

He doesn’t tell her she isn’t, they both know better. He also doesn’t fight her when she kisses his cheek, then again, and again, the way she always does when she feels some part of him - physical or otherwise - is leaving.

“I just want to see you happy again, liebchen. I want you to give, and receive, the love you deserve. That’s all we ever wanted for you.”

Once again, there’s no missing the switch in pronouns. A soft German lilt, and a harsh Finnish chuckle, trail Nico all the way back to the city.

**

“You’re quiet today, Nico.”

Nico likes Steve, he really does. As shrinks go, as taxing as this process is supposed to be, he never pushes too hard, and resistant as Nico was at first, he can admit that the progress they’re making is good.

Some days though. Some fucking days.

“My apologies,” Nico says, syrupy with sarcasm. “I wasn’t aware it was my turn.”

In some ways, in many, therapy is like being back at the press conferences - all those clips he can’t stand to see now, of him and Lewis taking cheap shots to cover the true extent of their hurt. For all the goal here is to share their feelings, not curate a certain image, there’s a limit to Nico’s tolerance. It’s like he’s striving to blame someone else - specifically Steve - for his own discomfort, and Lewis’ composure doesn’t help. He was even content, Nico realised, calmly relaying the conversation with his brother, the way Nicholas took it onboard, punched his arm, then carried on like nothing had happened, and never asked a single uncomfortable question.

Nico’s a big boy. He can recognise, and own, the fact he’s reacting out of envy, and old grievances - the why does Lewis Hamilton always have it so much easier than me? question is one he both debunked the first time he saw a psychiatrist, and only truly reflected on later, when a fourteen year-old Margot gave him a thorough dressing-down about privilege.

Still, though. A simple punch on the arm from his mother would’ve been nice— and Steve clearly knows that, or at least picks up what’s been laid down between Nico’s attitude, and Lewis’ raised eyebrows.

“Was there something about your mother’s response that upset you?”

Isn’t that a question. Nico’s not initially sure what he’s supposed to say: that following the conversation with his mum, he’s terrified all this is for nothing, that every step he makes towards healing is one closer to Lewis’ ‘project’ completing?

But— that’s a nonsense, isnt it? Lewis isn’t attending these sessions with him, isn’t investing money, time, and considerable effort into being a better friend-and-maybe-more, to jump ship as soon as the work is done. Even Nico can see how ridiculous it would sound out loud, so he picks a different lane, opting for something that actually deserves examination.

“She said that we’re not kind to one another.”

Lewis’ eyebrows don’t lower. No argument, though, Nico notes. That bodes well.

“That’s interesting,” Steve says. Nico, personally, has learned to loathe that word. “Just for avoidance of any doubt, here - did she react poorly? To ‘implications’ regarding your sexuality?”

“No,” Nico says, and doesn’t think he imagines Lewis relaxing, if only slightly, at his side. “No; I never expected her to.” The lock off his tongue,  he adds: “And apparently she and my father were both fine with our old boss ‘romancing’ his arch rival, so—“

“Wait, what?” At Nico’s side, Lewis’ jaw actually drops. “Fuck off— not Toto and Horner?”

“No,” Nico says, and only realises then just how much worse that revelation could have been. “God no. Niki.”

“Niki— and who? Ja—“

“And James Hunt,” Nico finishes, “yes.”

“Huh.” Lewis’ brows don’t lower, but it’s clear he’s mentally running numbers - everything from what in the fuck, to how did we miss it, miss him? “Jeez. That old dog.”

“Yeah, gents, if I could get us back on-track here—“

Steve doesn’t have the laptop open this time. Rather, he’s sat back in his chair, looking more legitimately curious than he’s managed these whole two months of sessions. It’s no ‘sensation’ now, all sincerity, when he asks:

“When your mother said that, Nico, how did you respond?”

“I—“ It’s the first time Nico’s framing it as something he could’ve actually responded to rather than shutting down the conversation. “I didn’t. I couldn’t.”

“Why not?” Lewis, not Steve, asks, and for once, Nico knows exactly how to respond.

“Why? Because it’s true, isn’t it? She saw it then, so she called m— us, out, now.” He tears his gaze from Lewis’, looks instead to Steve. “I mean, wouldn’t you agree?”

“As a neutral party here, I couldn’t possibly comment.” Nico’s not seen the drinking of a beverage so pointed since Mark Webber slammed that glass down in 2010. Steve actually shrugs as he sips, then says: “As a Formula 1 viewer, however— I suppose it’s fair to say I have ‘context.’”

Part of Nico wants to thank him for the vindication. Part of him wants to ask then why the fuck did you have us fill in all those forms?

“Would you agree with Sina and Nico on that, Lewis?”

For a long time, Lewis says nothing. It comes awfully close to driving Nico insane, for all he can understand the hesitation, the need to nail the phrasing, rather than risk a row.

“I guess,” Lewis says eventually, very carefully, “I thought we’d left all of that in the past.”

Nico knows it’s coming. He still flinches, when Steve asks for more clarity, and Lewis says:

“What h— what you said after the funeral. That hurt.” He twists his fingers together in his lap, chin set, like he’s trying with everything he’s got not to drop his gaze. It’s somehow only occurring to Nico now that recalling that incident is as painful for Lewis as it is for him, particularly when he says: “You made it out like I was a ‘thing’ to you. Like I was there to service you, not—“

It seems he doesn’t have a word for the end, for what he was there to do instead.

“Yeah, I know you were drunk. I know you really regret it, but you asked, so that’s my answer.” To Steve, he says: “We said, and did, some awful things, back then. What made it to the press was the tip of the freaking iceberg, and I didn’t always take it seriously as I should’ve. One of our colleagues, he really liked winding Nico up, too, and we were mates, so I kinda leaned in. I’m not proud of it. But I thought we were done with all that, so—“

We might never be, not really. It ranks amongst Nico’s greatest fears, even as Lewis turns to him, even as he ‘does the work,’ and tells Nico exactly how he feels.

“So, yeah, we can be unkind.” He unfolds himself, stance open, hands finally stilling where they’ve been tapping his thighs. “We can hurt each other. We have. Since we were kids, we’ve known exactly how to.” He pins Nico with his gaze, then, Nico who couldn’t move if he wanted to, if he ever had the strength. “I don’t want to go down that road again. Do you?”

There’s something to moderating your thoughts, to giving each word time to breathe, before actually speaking. Sometimes, though—

“No,” Nico says, and he definitely sees it this time, the way something in Lewis backs off, vindicated or relieved. He remembers it all - the fury, the hurt, the sense of injustice; the way Vettel encouraged it, laughed with Lewis, laughed at him with Lewis— and for a moment, for the moment, it matters, and it doesn’t. In this moment, Vettel is at home with his husband and son, and he and Lewis are here, and they’re older, allegedly wiser, and they’re doing the work. They’re doing it, so Nico can complete his part. “No, Lewis. I promise, that will never happen again.”

In the silence that follows, Nico’s grateful one of them, at least, knows how to handle it.

“This was great work, guys. Really great, some of your best.” From his seat on the other side, Steve reaches for the jug of water placed between them, tops off all three glasses. “You’re human. You’re going to make mistakes. If you’d like to use some of our future sessions to unpack the past hurt, I think that could be useful - I just want you to be very clear about the goal, particularly as I think there’s another lesson from that anecdote, Nico. The one about Hunt and Lauda.”

“Yeah, fine,” Nico sighs, but Steve has a point, and this session has already run him dry. “Conflict breeds lust, breeds resentment— we shouldn’t blame ourselves.”

“That’s not what he means.”

When Nico looks, there’s a funny look on Lewis’ face, not ‘shook,’ exactly, but definitely like he’s working through something. Fortunately, he shares with the ‘class.’ “You mean that Hunt died in the 90s, right? Almost thirty years before Niki.”

“That is more what I was aiming for, yeah,” Steve says, as another round of pane glass shatters itself inside Nico’s head. He steeples his fingers on the desktop, and it’s clear he’s been waiting to make the point for some time. “Life is short, guys. At the end of the day, what are you going to say mattered the most: what happened in the past, or what you’re walking towards?”

Outside, after Session End, Nico can’t get that last sentence - the sentiment - out of his head. He knows what they’re doing here, he thinks he knows where it’s going— but it’s like some part of neither of them knows when would be safe to lift off the brakes.

What would it be like, he wonders, to say fuck it? For all that road tends to lead one of two ways - into bed, or into a fight - there has to be something beyond the intangible signpost of ‘better,’ something they can hang their hats on, say once and for all that it’s what they want.

It’s clearly bothering Lewis, too. He’s usually straight into the nearest cab, but today he trails Nico to his car, not even batting an eyelid when Nico gives in to a lingering vice, and pulls out his packet of cigarettes.

“So that was—“

“How are you—“

In the aftermath, they share a wry smile, Lewis huffs a laugh. It’s typical of them: same page, somehow an entirely different chapter 

“Sorry,” Nico says, blowing smoke over his shoulder, away from Lewis. “You go.”

“Nah,” Lewis says, “just— that was something, right? That wasn’t what I expected to come out.”

“About Niki?”

“Yeah,” Lewis says. “And the rest, like—“ It’s as if he considers hitting full throttle but, in a very familiar motion, pulls back. “Yeah, mostly Niki. D’you feel like we should’ve guessed, or something?”

It’s trite as all hell, in many ways no better than gossip. Faced with the alternative, though, Nico couldn’t be more grateful if he tried.

“I don’t think so,” he says, carefully contemplative. “Does it seem all that weird? Vettel and Webber are married; Toto, Susie, Vivi and I are now almost Biblically linked—“

“Careful,” Lewis says, as a mischievous grin breaks over him, like sun peeping through cloud. “Think too long about that one, you’ll give yourself a complex.”

“Yeah,” Nico says, and most definitely doesn’t say that he and Vivi shared a few ‘insightful’ conversations about both Wolffs in the first half of 2013. “My point is, stranger things have happened. Maybe sometimes, they happen in their own way, and it’s not anyone else’s business.”

“Yeah,” Lewis says. “Yeah, maybe.”

They can only put it off for so long, or maybe Nico opened the door to it.

“Listen, what I said in there, I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad—“

“It’s fine,” Nico interrupts— and surprises himself with the realisation that it is, that he can, in fact, stomach the re-hashing of criticism without a breakdown. “Really, Lewis. I—“ He takes a deep breath, lets it settle, then exhales smoke. “I think Steve is right. If the way to put these things to bed is to discuss them, then maybe that’s exactly why we’re here.” It’s newfound hubris at the wheel, as he leans back against the car, and musters up a smirk. “You can push me a little, you know. I won’t break.”

“A little, huh?”

Lewis has a point. This is immensely fragile ground— but he’s grinning, cautious but sincere, as he sticks the landing.

“Alright, Britney. I can push you.”

“Fucker.” Nico does the pushing, then, heel of his hand against Lewis’ shoulder, which sends his cigarette flying. Lewis’ laughter has always been infectious, but it just feels so fucking good to do so, and to not think about how, or why, that it’s easy to get swept up— so much so that when another door presents itself, Nico doesn’t hesitate.

“Don’t get a cab; come back with me?”

“I— yeah,” Lewis says. He sounds surprised, but he looks pleased, and Nico’s so caught up on it that he misses the moment it turns playful, until Lewis is leaning against the car’s left-hand door. “You gonna pass me the keys, or—?”

“Don’t act cute,” Nico tells him, and can’t bring himself to regret it, even as they peel through traffic back towards home.

**

It’s not that happiness is a choice, more-so the Doing of the Work. 

As December arrives, Nico tunes in to the other ways, beyond therapy and dinner, that he and Lewis have begun shaping their lives around ensuring they stay present in each other’s. In the end, Niki and Hunt do end up paying something forwards; they’re deliberate with each other, if not delicate, and soon enough they’re sitting dangerously close to solid ground. It’s not just the camaraderie - natural competitiveness returns, because they’re no longer terrified of things re-souring. Lewis pushes him in the gym, they chase each other for the best times, the best endurance, over and over again in laps ‘round the pool.

After workouts, there are days out. The paparazzi press in Monaco are a mostly-muzzled entity, but fans will be fans, and just as when they’d been to dinner back in the Spring, photos start leaking out online. One in particular really blows up: the two of them en-route to one of Erik’s football matches, Nico’s hair in his face, Lewis mid-sneeze.

They look ridiculous. Vivian, of course, has it framed.

It’s such a long way from where they were, or ever truly have been, that it feels like they’re somewhere brand new. Lewis gives Nico a key to his own apartment; once or twice a week, Margot ‘borrows’ it to join in on walking Dolly. In mid-December, there’s a ‘double date’ - Nico and Lewis, Vivi and Susie, chilled wine, fresh pasta, stories, laughter, love, and Nico floats on it all, he smiles again, he laughs.

He still doesn’t sleep, not properly. What he does get comes in bursts, handed out in rations when his brain seems to realise it needs at least some down-time to continue functioning. The rest, Nico spends curled on the edge of his mattress, awaiting the moment he’ll surge back to consciousness, fighting the sudden urge to gag.

It’s worrying Lewis; that much becomes clear when Nico jerks awake from an entirely accidental nap on his couch, to find Lewis sat, cross-legged, on the floor right next to him.

“Wha—“

“It’s okay.”

It’s very far from okay; Lewis looks rigid, his dog whining on the floor next to him, his hand in Nico’s hair.

Still, he says it’s okay, it’s okay, sleep, until Nico succumbs— until four, maybe five ‘jerks’ later, when he awakes to find Lewis, and Dolly, fully passed out against the arm of the couch.

It’s as if he has no idea what to do in the moment: start sobbing? Pull Lewis up onto the couch with him? Both?

In the end Nico drapes a blanket over his shoulders, then removes himself from the equation, because it honestly seems like the kindest option, and Lewis clearly agrees. He’s not there when Nico staggers from his room again at 6AM, but he is by nine, with arms full of a greasy takeout breakfast that would’ve made both their Mercedes nutritionists sob.

“You should see someone about that,” is Lewis’ only comment, as he sits on the same couch, feeding bits of veggie sausage to a vibrating Dolly. “You’re barely asleep five minutes at a time, man. It’s no good.”

It’s a pretence, Nico knows - an attempt at seeming casual, of ‘offering’ advice, like he isn’t now walking with a wince, forty-seven year-old bones recently heaved off the floor.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, there’s too much going on, for Nico to spend time digging into it.

Much as with any other festival, Christmas in Monaco is a spectacle. A huge tree goes up in the Place du Casino; what was already fairly gaudy becomes a dedicated altar of kitsch— though as a German, Nico really has no one to blame but his own people. As most of the Principality, and indeed most of the Western World, prepares to celebrate, it’s not lost on any of the Rosbergs that this is set to be one in a whole string of ‘firsts’ without Keke. The further-flung, more existential ones, Nico’s already considered: birthdays, graduations, his children’s weddings, should they have them. Christmas comes every year, and it’s coming now. Margot visits the markets with her friends, returns home in tears. Nico blunders with his shopping, adds the obligatory pair of lounge slippers to his cart before he remembers there’s no one to wear them.

Their spirits rise and fall with the temperature - still changeable this year, despite the ever-decreasing number of days left in it. When Oscar Piastri secures his third Championship, dedicating the win in beaming post-race interviews to his and Norris’ daughter, Nico already has one foot out the door.

He drives across Monte Carlo, and out into Larvotto to his mother’s, with a very specific request in-mind. To no one’s surprise, once he explains, she drops everything in order to fulfil it.

Nico’s certain, looking back, he drives the whole way to the coastal path on autopilot. It’s not just a familiar route to his dad’s ’grave,’ it’s an instinct his dad gave him - foot down, follow the road. His trips here so far have felt dutiful, a way to bring that person - that son who followed every footstep - into the light, out of the silence— and now it’s sunset, and for the first time, Nico isn’t silent at all.

“Hallo, Papa.”

Up at the tree they planted, sat on the bench they placed there beside it, a great shiver runs from Nico’s scalp to the tips of his toes.

“It’s nearly Christmas. Tomorrow, the kids want to come and put decorations on—“ When the wording evades him, he gestures. “I suppose, not ‘you.’ But this is your warning, and, I guess, a bribe.” The cookies are still warm, as Nico shakes the box. “They’re Mama’s lebukchen. Your favourite.”

Having brought the offering along, Nico finds he’s not sure what to do with it, in the moment. ‘Meant’ or ‘should’ are words, and concepts, he’s being told week-upon-week are best left at the door, but that wasn’t how his father operated. He tries picturing what the old man might’ve said, surprises himself with a snort, another of those involuntary full-body shivers, when he lands on: and what was your plan for those? Add some crumbs to my urn?

As the ‘voice’ fades, Nico braces himself for pain. It almost rocks him when it doesn’t come, like the first tentative step on a broken limb.

Nico’s hands tighten around the box of cookies. Another hand, one he can’t see or perceive, slackens its grip around his heart.

“I— don’t really know what I’m here to say.” With every word, the steps get easier. Nico’s muscles stretch, atrophy screaming, before giving way. “I’ve been—“ The snort catches him. “I’ve been in therapy. That requires a lot of ‘saying,’ particularly to Lewis.”

Lewis?

This time, Nico doesn’t even hesitate.

“Yes, Lewis. He comes with with me, he’s been there for everything, since your stroke. Which I did tell you, when you could—”

Steve says, over and over, there’s no schedule to these things, no expectation, no Great Timed ‘When,’ or ‘Why.’ You’ll know, he always insists, you will know— and Nico never believed him, never truly thought the moment might come, not until he’s setting the cookies down at his side, and saying:

“Okay, Papa, in truth? Lewis Hamilton and I have been fucking since 2014.”

Soon as the words are out of his mouth, Nico can’t believe his own recklessness. If anyone had overheard— but when no camera flashes go off, and his father doesn’t bring the Heavens down around his ears, something settles, fresh out in the universe, but still steady, still holding, as Nico takes a breath.

“Please know, I was never unfaithful to Vivi. We had an understanding— much like Niki and Marlene’s, apparently.” He shakes his head. “Hearing that from Mama was fun, by the way. Thank you.”

Nico’s not sure why, but all he can imagine from his father, hearing that, is a smirk.

“It’s funny,” Nico says, following the path he laid down, even as any lingering humour dries up. “Mama didn’t know what you would think. Honestly, Papa, I don’t truly know how I feel myself. It’s like—“ Up against the expectant silence in his own mind, something has to give. Nico drops his head into his hands even before the first tears can fall. “Jesus. Since you got sick, it’s like I haven’t ever known what I’m doing. I had the kids to consider, and Mama, and Vivi— everyone, and myself, to convince it wasn’t really happening, that you weren’t— but it was, and you were, and I couldn’t stop that— and Lewis was there, Papa, he— helped me forget. When I should have been at my most present, I asked him for that— and maybe the worst part is that I don’t regret it.”

Another shiver wracks his frame. Gaze blurred, cheeks streaked, Nico looks up at his father’s tree, like he might see absolution carved into the wood, woven between the branches like silver tinsel.

“I don’t regret it,” he repeats, and only pauses a second to consider who he’s really confessing to. “I wanted it. Some days I needed it, I needed— him. Lewis. I still do. I don’t really know why.”

Because you love him, boy. And you should know that by now, because I did not raise a fool.

Of the second part, Nico’s none too sure. What else but foolish selfishness could have— yet he staggers back from the brink of that spiral before it can truly begin. It’s like something’s hooked him by the waist, holding him back, out of danger, and Nico doesn’t know what to call it, because he’s not deranged, nor even especially spiritual. He can’t, in good faith, call it ‘Papa.’

He might, at long last, consider calling it ‘forgiveness.’

“I think— you and I both know what we had,” Nico says. “Our relationship, we— understood it. It was close to perfect. I still let you down.” A sob hitches in his throat; he catches it. “I still love you. I will until my body is right there beside yours.”

And I love you.

Where Nico’s spirit is lacking, there are some things he’s always known for sure. His Papa, his hero - the man who was so terrible a manager because he was just too damn good at being Nico’s dad.

“I’m sorry I never said it enough. I’m sorry that— that I didn’t know how to say it the way you needed me to, near the end. I’m sorry that it feels so much easier to do now you’re gone.”

A whisper through the trees, winter wind, the Christmas spirit; Nico sits tight, as a different set of arms, unseen, settle around his shoulders.

“I wish you weren’t gone. I wish I could hug you again, talk to you, hear your voice—“ Nico’s own cracks on that very word, but it doesn’t stop him. He’s reasonably sure nothing could now. “I wish I could watch you play again with the kids. That we could all eat together; I wish you could shake Lewis’ hand. I—“

I wish you could see how happy he could make me. I wish you could be the one to tell me to try.

“I wish you were still here.”

The final shiver, a tingle that wracks Nico’s body like a fever, is the most tangible yet— and Nico doesn’t ask, nor question it, because he knows, however improbable, however perceptively unreachable, what else he’s buried here tonight, beneath the branches.

He wipes at his eyes, remakes himself. Beyond the tree, down in Monte Carlo, the lights have come on as the sun dips. To everyone else, it’s been less than an hour; to Nico, it’s been two years and counting, and his father’s watch is on his wrist.

He settles his right hand over the face. There’s no stopping it, no turning it back. There’s only now, the hour, the day— and of course, at last, the words.

“Frohe Weihnachten, Papa.”

He leaves the cookies, because he’s taking something else away. When his head goes down on the pillow that night, he doesn’t wake up until evening.

**

On December 25th, Nico opens his eyes in the annexe of his mother’s house, sunlight streaming through the windows like some sort of Heavenly host has set up shop on the lawn.

What is this day like, Nico wonders, for folks who actually believe in Jesus?

It’s a thinned out crew expected for their second of the ‘Holi-Days,’ as Erik puts it: Susie is in Scotland with Jack; Lewis has been with his family in London, but texted Nico when he arrived home, and is set to arrive around lunchtime. There’s also no denying the obvious: the great, empty chair at the head of their table, a gruff voice humming Christmas songs, the smell of burnt sugar, sweet brandy, cigars. Christmas here is also a new one; privileged as he was and is, Nico never really had one ‘childhood home,’ but it’s his children he feels for, now ‘Oma and Opa’s House’ as they always knew it is a thing of the past.

It’s a strange thing to confront, how the happiest of occasions can become— not tainted, precisely, but altered, another loss, one more thing to mourn, and as he lets himself into the house, it’s not lost on Nico that even three months ago, the sight of his father’s armchair, perpetually empty, sat in a strange living room, would’ve ended in disaster. Instead, as he takes a moment to step close, to run his hand over the weathered fabric, he remembers the way it always looked in the firelight, remembers the old man snoring, one or other or both of his infant grandchildren similarly snoozing on his lap. From later down the line, as recently as 2029, he remembers the kids sneaking up to balance objects on Opa’s head without waking him, all three of them, plus Vivi, competing to throw peanuts into his open mouth mid-snore.

A sound from nearby - a stubbed toe, a hushed round of cursing - yanks Nico from his reminiscing. He crosses to the door, can’t help but smile when he finds his mother outside, sat on the stairs and furiously rubbing her foot.

“If you need me, there’s such a thing as calling out.”

“I didn’t even know you were awake.” As Nico helps his mum back to standing, she settles a knowing hand on his cheek. “I also didn’t want to interrupt.”

“Thank you.” The edge of the memory has yet to fade; it’s like there’s still salt on his fingertips, a laugh to be smothered against the crook of his elbow, as he confesses: “I was thinking about the peanuts.”

“Ah, yes.” For a brief moment, his mother looks sad. Then there’s the smile, the blended, guilty, admission of happiness, in spite of itself. “I always thought you would choke him.”

“You did,” Nico says. “Not that he would wake, shrug, then start chewing.”

“Your father.” Nico’s mum shakes her head. “A true connoisseur.”

Nico estimates they make it through approximately half a second of eye contact before they both start laughing. It has a short peak, but it happens; it wrings them out, but in a good way, like the burn after a workout, like the catharsis after a cry. In the aftermath, Nico kisses her cheek. In the aftermath of that, she puts him to work.

“Mama,” Nico says, still barefoot, arms full of sheets and towels as his mother prepares the fourth spare bedroom for an occupant. “For all it’s great to see you active, don’t you literally pay someone to do this kind of thing for you?”

“Don’t act spoiled,” his mum says, not even bothering to look up from the pillow she’s firmly shaking into its case. “It is also Christmas, so I do not, nor should I— and nor do I want to.”

She does look at Nico then, piercing, like she knows something he doesn’t.

“Should Lewis Hamilton wish to sleep in these sheets, I will lay them myself. Now—“ Before Nico has a chance to process what she’s just laid down with the Egyptian cotton, she practically snatches the remaining items from his arms. “Don’t you and Margot have breakfast to prepare?”

They do, as it happens, and Nico is shocked, then gratified almost to the point of embarrassing ‘dad’ tears, when the ‘you and Margot’ of that assignment turns out to be something oma and enkelin arranged specifically.

In truth, there’s very little for Nico to do at all. Instead he hangs back, overflowing with pride as Margot boils and peels eggs, plates sausage, cheeses, and butter in their own dishes— and then her Showstopper: freshly baked brötchen, which she lifts from the oven with a flourish that puts every one of her childhood ballet shows to shame.

“These look incredible,” Nico says, snatching a kiss to the hair as his daughter hurries past him, sole-focused. “Any change of tasting?”

“Sure.”

She plates him one, then watches, pleased to the point of glowing, as he samples it.

“Amazing,” he says, never more proud, nor more aware of his mother’s machinations, than now. “Marichen— you could be a chef.”

“I’m thinking about it.”

With that (welcome, delightful) bombshell, she instructs Nico to start pouring orangensaft for the table, then calls him out for a stray drop left on the rim of one glass.

That feels like a gift all on its own, one Nico’s sure her opa would’ve appreciated.

With regards physical gifts, or ‘presents,’ as Lewis insists on calling them, he arrives with an obscene amount around midday— and despite Nico’s instinctive concern this is the same bag of Barbies and Tonka Trucks he sent the kids anonymously ‘back in the day,’ these turn out to be painfully considerate.

For Erik, of course, it’s all about football; he unwraps an old-school sticker book, plus a handful of £2 sticker packs, to go with it. Later in the haul is a voucher for his favourite pizza place in town, and a Bayern München shirt signed by Harry Kane— whatever favour Lewis had to call in for that one, Nico doesn’t know.

Margot’s gifts are all the more interesting, and yet more-so because Lewis seems to have recognised her flare for cooking before Nico realised it himself. Amongst accessories for her Kitchen Aid, a cookbook, a personalised video message from Gordon Ramsay, Margot throws her arms around him in delight when she unwraps the thing she, apparently, wanted most: a set of cooking tongs that look like a white and yellow duck.

Nico sees it, loves it. He waits for the shoe to drop, for Lewis to admit he broke the rule they declared regarding ‘no gifts,’ and bought him something anyway.

He doesn’t, and as a result, Nico unlocks a whole other degree of gratitude. There is something to being known, after all.

“So, fill me in here—“

Nico, a glass of wine down by 2pm, and in no mood to fight, still recognises the opening for banter, when Lewis’ face is full of mirth.

“Hmm?”

“You didn’t get your own mum a Christmas present, or what?”

“I got her a bracelet, and tickets to the theatre,” Nico says, with a slow smirk. “She opened them yesterday - the 24th, which is when Germans exchange gifts.”

“Ah shit,” Lewis says, miming a punch to his own thigh. He grins, leaning back on the couch, his ankle brushing Nico’s as he goes. “See, if I’d known that—“

“What? You’d have flown back early?” Nico quips— then pauses midway to his wine glass when Lewis just looks at him, not speaking. “I— seriously? You would have done that?”

“If you needed me to,” Lewis says softly, “yeah.”

It’s the perfect thing for him to say. It’s also the worst, because all Nico’s thinking is forget ‘need;’ what about what I ‘want?’

“I’m just glad you’re here now,” he says instead, then tips his wine glass against Lewis’ sparkling water. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Lewis taps their drinks with a clink, and it settles in the air, another secret, but this one just for them. “So— since I’m apparently playing catch-up, how d’you say ‘Happy Holidays’ in German?”

Nico smiles. “‘Schöne fiertage.’”

“Sherneh—“ The look on his face is priceless, and Nico starts laughing, really loses control of it when Lewis kicks him. “I’m trying, aren’t I?”

Yes you are, Nico thinks, impossibly fond. In every, single sense of the word.

It occurs to Nico, when they’re sat down for dinner, Lewis has never asked him to translate something actually meaningful into his first language before. He wanted the obvious, of course, when they were kids: the swear words, the insults, how to order a beer— but today, Lewis could easily have Googled it. He didn’t. Instead he asked, like what he really wanted was to hear how Nico would say it. And that is different. That, for all intents, is a first.

The truth is, even if Lewis were fluent in German, Nico’s not sure they would ever use it. Whatever words there are to describe their relationship exist only in English, something that doesn’t translate, something that sticks on the tongue. It doesn’t stop Lewis from practicing, repeating fucked-up vowel after fucked-up vowel until the kids are feeding him twelve-syllable compound words, just to make his eyes bulge.

Vivi catches Nico’s gaze across the table, when Lewis’ face is all crinkled with laughter, and Margot’s just thrown out ‘rechtsschutzversicherungsgesellschaften,’ like he’d have a hope in hell. It’s an expression Nico recognises, even though he’s never seen it before; look how he is with our children, she’s saying, well done, and also, good luck.

Nico thinks he might need a decent serving of that— though it’s tricky to remember when a glass is poured for his dad at the table’s head, when Vivi raises her own, and shortly thereafter a bag of marshmallows, prior to them all departing the room, as Nico tucks a lingering, reflective Margot under one arm and against his ribs.

You’re a lucky man, mein sohn.

I am, Nico thinks. Truly, Papa, I am.

He stops drinking, wanting for whatever reason to be awake and aware for what might come next— but it’s the Christmas spirit that’s gripped him really, painful memories repurposed, his children laughing, Lewis slotting effortlessly into the middle of it all, sidling up to Nico’s side to ask:

“What’s with the marshmallows?”

“One of Papa’s traditions,” Nico says. He’s aware more than ever of the intimacy, of Lewis sat close, of Margot, Erik and his mum crouched at the fireside with a large fork, and a bag of sugar. “When I was a kid, we would toast marshmallows in the fire, every year.”

“On the 24th?”

“Usually, yes.” Nico knows what Lewis is asking. The ‘spirit’ has grabbed him too, he can tell by the way they’re drawn to each other, by the way something seems to bloom in his chest, and spark in Lewis’ gaze, whenever they’re on-course to catch gaze. It’s like Nico’s drunk, how easily the words come out: “It’s not about the date. This is always for family.”

Happenstance or deliberate, Nico’s close enough that he can’t miss the way Lewis exhales, the way his gaze comes up, and his right hand twitches like it’s missing something within its reach.

“Nico,” Lewis starts, so soft— and Nico doesn’t imagine the way he dips, the way Lewis’ gaze settles on his lips. They’re right here, he knows, on the edge, but also Right Here, in front of his—

Nico’s truly considering closing the gap, that is until Margot leaps off the rug, and they fly apart like they’ve been caught necking in the damn garage, and Nico seriously has to hold himself back from commenting, when he spies Vivi across the room, laughing full-bodied into her glass of Pinot Noir.

Lewis is quicker, all that glorious PR training paying out as he smiles, bumps Margot’s elbow with his own.

“Hey, Mar. Those for your dad?”

“For both of you.” To Nico’s considerable shame, he only then realises she’s brought two toasted marshmallows over, gooey, delicious, more tempting than Nico wants to acknowledge with such a great, sudden, (ineffable) temptation already at his side. “They’re vegan, so… enjoy?”

Tableside manner, Nico hopes, is something that comes with age and experience. It’s hard to care, though, his pulse still ringing, as they suck down Margot’s offering, and compliment the ‘chef.’

The gap’s still there; Nico’s prepared for the nudge of Lewis’ toes against his own beneath the table. What he gets instead is Lewis’ hand reaching for his own, and a spike of heat, of promise.

Their time will come, he thinks. What he doesn’t know is how, or when, or even what— but he figures it out hours later, when he’s preparing for bed in the annexe, and the inevitable knock sounds out.

He pulls open the door, and there Lewis is, sweatpants, bare feet, next to no jewellery, just there, just here, and here to say:

“Do you—“

Poor form be damned, Nico cuts him off with his lips.

They stagger with it; Nico catches himself in the same breath as Lewis, his foot slipping from under him, regains his composure in time to take Nico’s cheeks between his hands. The kiss that unfolds is a masterpiece, all Lewis’ focus, all his considerable skill— but it’s gentle, it aches like it has its own heartbeat, and it’s then that Nico realises what they’re about to do. It’s then he understands that this is going to break them, and remake them, and that thought is petrifying, Nico is petrified.

He’s also never wanted anything more in his life. The desire thunders through him, the same strange feeling building in his chest, a snarl repurposed into a desperate, longing groan.

It doesn’t trip them, this time. This time, Lewis reciprocates; this time, he holds Nico as he kisses his jaw, his throat, lips soft, stubble snagging as Nico’s eyes slide shut, his mouth falling open. From headrush to a sudden absence, all the blood in Nico’s upper body heads south. His heart pounds, his cock throbs like it’s proximity alone, and this great ability Lewis once had to make him feel secure and cared for, drawing him out, reminding him how good it can feel. Lewis never lost that ability, Nico realises; like so much between them, it’s simply been paused, like an old cassette tape, lying ready and waiting for a fresh recording.

The feeling flutters through Nico, for a moment— only a moment, before Lewis’ hands slide down to grip his ass, not squeezing, asking—

Any fear or trepidation shooting through Nico is absolutely run down by the thrill, when one of Lewis’ fingers catches the ‘edge.’ It feels almost like a handshake, an accord that cements with Nico nodding against Lewis’ neck, his whispered, but certain, yeah, yes—

On the bed, both of them stripped, it begins again, pushes forward, slow, but inevitable in a good way - in the best way, even as Nico sinks deeper, even as he can’t bring himself to lift his hands from Lewis’ body. They’ve never touched each other like this before, like it will matter longer than it takes for the anger and hormones to burn off. They roll over each other on the mattress, hands everywhere, lips specific; Nico’s not heard a noise from Lewis quite like the one that escapes when he kisses a nipple, then sucks the edge of it into his mouth, a thumb on the other, stroking down. He can count Lewis’ ribs beneath his fingers and the solid layer of muscle on top— a countdown, it turns out, before he’s rolled smoothly onto his back, and Lewis is there again, over him, around, kissing him, holding him, running his own hands across Nico’s body, kissing his hips, thumbing his nipples until the fire burns off, and what’s left is just heat.

It counts for a lot. When Nico relaxes enough for his legs to fall open, his breath catches in his throat, then escapes again when Lewis shifts, his palm cupped behind Nico’s knee, pushing up, wider, spreading him—

“Fuck, look at you,” Lewis murmurs. His eyes have gone huge, pupils blown as he seems to drink Nico in. “Shit, Nico— this okay?”

Prone on his back, knees around Lewis’ ears, Nico nods. “Yes,” he whispers. “Yes— yes, please.”

“Easy,” Lewis says. He turns his head, kisses the inside of Nico’s thigh, seems to smoulder when Nico whimpers. “I’ve got you. You don’t need to beg.”

Nico does beg— he begs a whole lot, with his words and his body, as Lewis strokes him open, works one lubed finger, then two, inside him, kissing his thighs, his hips, stroking down his ribs and over his stomach. He begs because he’s at a loss to explain how it feels, or what he wants beyond more, and now, and somehow, his cock aching as it rubs against his abs, leaking pre. I’m so wet, he thinks, and the thought almost undoes him, a sob building, before he catches it with knuckles between his teeth. Lewis hears it anyway, surges upwards, his forehead against Nico’s, his spare hand pushing into Nico’s hair.

“You need another?” Lewis whispers— and Nico does crack open then, but in a way Lewis can likely see, rather than just hear. His legs are shaking; each curl and push against his prostate leaves Nico feeling on the edge of something - orgasm, tears, pissing himself - something vulnerable and embarrassing, something no one should see, except for maybe this man who has always managed to see him, no matter his many attempts to hide.

“No,” he says, gasps, “no, I’m good.” Another wave hits him: Lewis’ fingers, his kindness— Nico sobs. He sobs for real. “It feels so fucking good—“

Nico’s trembling all over by the time Lewis withdraws; something incoherent falls from his lips at the sudden feeling of emptiness, but Lewis kisses that away, too. He’s not stopped kissing Nico the whole time, never fully lifted from Nico’s lips, or his neck. Now, his body bowing over Nico’s, his eyes are caught up by the moonlight, big and dark, naked, holding Nico’s own.

It’s Nico who pushes up this time, insisting on the kiss, then holding, controlling it, as Lewis suppresses a shudder. He loses that battle, and bites off a sound when Nico reaches down and wraps his fist around Lewis’ cock.

“Shit, Nic—“

“Lewis—“ Sweating, searching, it feels obscene, how Nico could ask for something he’s never had, with such certainty that it’s what he needs. But that’s humanity, sometimes, or hubris, and it’s still life— it’s a life Nico lived without knowing it, for so long that it’s setting him on fire, nerve to knuckle, and he just wants, he wants, he wants— “Lewis—“

Why does Lewis understand, Nico wants to ask. How does he know what Nico needs, what he wants, here, better than anywhere, or any time, else?

It stops mattering, or maybe it never did. Maybe it was always held in this, waiting to break, waiting for Nico to be sure enough, or brave enough, for him to hold Lewis’ gaze as he helps line him up, commits his last bit of control to sinking himself onto Lewis’ cock.

It stings, Nico can’t deny that— but hasn’t everything, since they met? Hasn’t time, and experience, taught him it will always come good, in the end?

It does. Lewis moans in two syllables, he snatches at Nico’s hair.

He kisses and bites, and clings to Nico’s lips, as he asks, at great length and effort of holding back, “Can I— fuck, can I move?”

And Nico says, “You’d better,” with his whole chest, so Lewis does. God, he does. He does until Nico is clinging, clenching, ‘til he’s sobbing, ‘til he wishes he could scream— and at the peak of it, the shattering end, when Lewis is saying “come for me, oh my God, Nico, come for me—“ for once in his life, Nico doesn’t argue.

He obeys, and he comes harder than he thought he could at his age, like he couldn’t, anymore, for anyone but Lewis— and he swallows the yell, and he can’t, and Lewis’ own hits his teeth before it can hit his brain. Nico’s is already swimming when Lewis collapses on him, still inside him, twitching, searching, even as he manages to lift his head, and kiss Nico as he comes down, until Nico’s thighs collapse, too, open, exposed.

He wonders if he’ll ever figure out how to close himself again. He wonders if he’ll ever want to.

He wonders— and even as they recover, as Lewis presses slow kisses against his neck, he knows all hope of hiding it is moot when Lewis says, softly:

“You’re thinking.”

“You say that like it’s a crime.”

“Right now it kind of is.” For reasons Nico truly can’t fathom, Lewis doesn’t roll off him, or even pull out. Instead he keeps stroking, keeps kissing— though only Nico’s neck, not ever his face, nothing with a chance of meeting his gaze. “Enjoy some afterglow with me, man, c’mon.”

And Nico would truly like to, because Lewis is right, isn’t he? They’ve just made love; Nico shouldn’t be thinking of anything other than the man in his arms, and maybe, eventually, the necessity of cleaning up.

The clock’s not long struck midnight, Nico realises. The ‘spirit’s’ vacated, what’s left is reality, their reality, everything they’ve made clearer, but now have to try and confront, the promises he’s made, all the many ways Nico still feels he can’t do it, that he’s not enough, right now, to fulfil them.

As their breathing calms, as Nico still holds tight to Lewis, and Lewis to him, he does what he’d told his Mama to do, and reaches out.

“Lewis?”

“Mm?”

So what if it damns me, Nico thinks. So what if I can’t do it without him, I have to try.

“I have to keep seeing Steve, don’t I.”

It’s out in the world now, if nothing else. If nothing else, Lewis should know that it’s not on him, that he’s not obliged—

“Yeah.”

For a moment, Nico wonders if it’ll finally prove too much, bracing for a crack he’s poorly prepared for, one that’ll hit him now, at his most vulnerable, at full-force.

He’s completely unprepared for Lewis to lean over him again, for Lewis to kiss him, for his fingers to sink into his soaked hair.

“Yeah, we do.”

Life after death is strange, Nico thinks. You’re just never prepared for how strange, until you’re forced to talk about it.