cursed with the fangirl gene

Except she's Max's, so isn't that kind of his job?

It's the heat of summer and none of them can really be that bothered to do much of anything at all. Sweat sticks the inside of Lando's shirt to his back uncomfortably, and Max's curls are limp under the heat of the sun. Pietra - well, Pietra is fine, obviously. More used to the sun than either of them are, her skin golden and glistening, hair bleached a little lighter from long days spent outside over the past few weeks.

The ice has melted into Lando's drink, watering down the taste of it into something he hates. He should get another one, but the thought of moving grows less attractive as each moment passes. Max has his head resting on his folded arms, the hairs brushed in the opposite direction of their natural grain, and Lando itches to smooth them back over.

He doesn't. Max is too far away, on the other side of the table, and besides, Lando doesn't want to move.

It's a Monday and it's hot as balls and it's a Monday and that feels important, for some reason, after the fact. Like that explains why he isn't expecting it when Pietra says, apropos of nothing:

"So have you two really never kissed before?"

Max's head shoots up at an alarming speed, so fast that Lando is sure he hears the click of a bone settling into place. He meets Lando's gaze only fleetingly, an expression that looks panicked painted across his features, before he's staring at P.

"P," he says, jaw tight.

"What?" She shrugs, tossing a grape into her mouth. "It is just a question."

"A fucking weird one," Max mutters.

Lando's inclined to agree. He laughs, but it sounds uncomfortable even to his own ears, a little too disjointed. Like it doesn't belong to him somehow, despite the sound passing through his lips.

"Yeah, that's - why would you ask that?"

P just shrugs again, her sharp eyes resting on Lando. "It just surprises me. That you haven't. Unless...?" She leaves it open, flicking her gaze between the two like she's waiting for one of them to break.

Baffled, Lando looks wordlessly at Max, mouth half open as he tries to find the right words. He isn't sure there are any right words for this. Maybe 'no' or 'never' or 'gross'.

Except none of those feel right, even if at least one of them is true.

He's never kissed Max. Lando's - Lando's had a lot of girlfriends. He loves women. Sure, sometimes a man will grab his attention, new and shiny and fleeting, but it - Max is Max. Lando knows everything there is to know about Max, and Max knows everything there is to know about Lando, and they've both stayed. Because they're friends; best friends.

But the idea of kissing Max isn't new to him. Not at all. There've been - moments. Seconds, really. Situations where Lando had thought maybe, maybe, there was something else there.

And then Max had gotten with P and Lando had been more confused than ever, because P was - confident and gorgeous and funny and kind, and Max deserved all of that and more.

It didn't stop Lando from wanting it too.

He realises he's been staring at Max for too long; the blades of Max's cheekbones are pretty and pink beneath his tan, and he looks like he's caught between looking at Lando and looking at P, and Lando coughs, awkwardly, clears his throat and averts his gaze.

"No," he tries for another laugh. It still sounds odd. "Of course we haven't."

"No," Max agrees, his voice a mumble.

There's a curiosity to P's face as she leans forward, arms curving onto the table before her. Her shirt falls lower, clavicles exposed and catching Lando's attention, guilt a sharp stab to his stomach when he looks at Max; a furtive thing, filled with shame. But Max doesn't seem to notice because Max is looking at the wood of the table, rather than at either of them.

"Why not?" P asks.

It feels like the air has been sucked out of the room, which - they're on the fucking balcony so that makes even less sense than it usually would. Lando has to take a searing breath, expanding the width of his lungs as his finger slip across the table. He picks up one UNO card, rolling it between two fingers.

"What do you mean?" He smiles, like it's funny. Like they're all in on the joke. "We're - best mates, P," Men, he almost says, but he knows somehow that P would simply scoff and roll her eyes at that, embarrassing the both of them with the weight of everything she knows without them having to tell her. "Obviously we haven't kissed."

P leans back again, arms stretched behind her. Then she looks to Max, who still has that look on his face - like he's an animal caught in a trap, eyes circular and blown.

"I think you should kiss," she says softly. And then: "Max wants to kiss you, Lando."

Lando chokes on nothing but air, tears springing to his eyes as he tries to hide it with a cough. He's vaguely aware of Max whimpering, a noise he's definitely never heard Max made before.

"What?" he gasps, half out of shock, half out of pain as he rubs at his sternum, sucking down oxygen as he does. "You're mad."

Except P doesn't look mad. There's a vaguely excited energy to her, sure, but mostly she seems calm, a hint of a smile playing at her lips. Max still hasn't said anything and Lando chances a glance at him, concerned to see the lurid pink of his face, the way he's staring at P like he might cry.

"Max?" Lando licks his lips. "What's she on about?"

He sees the weird little half shrug Max does that looks more like a convulsion, his body shuddering with it; hears the satisfied sound P makes, like she's taking Max's non verbal response for admittance.

"I will go first," she says and Lando has no idea what she means. Not until she's shifting closer to Max, tilting his head up to face her with two fingers beneath her chin, leaning down to connect their lips.

And Lando's seen them kiss before, loads. But it's usually chaste, at least around him. This is heated and purposeful, and P leads the entire thing, her hand never dropping from Max's face, Max's body leaning into P like there's a magnet between them.

Lando forgets how to breath for a moment, blood caught between rushing south and rising to his cheeks.

They pull apart with an obscene, slick sound, and then P is getting up, moving around the table until she's standing next to Lando, her face expectant.

"It's okay," she promises.

Sparing Max a glance, Lando thinks his heart stops for a moment. There's unbridled desire in Max's eyes, a heat to them that makes Lando's skin prickle as he looks at P and Lando - and then he nods, this tiny, almost insignificant thing that tells Lando all he needs to know before P is sliding into his lap, and oh. When did he get hard?

He doesn't have time to worry about it before P's kissing him their tongues meeting almost instantly. He can taste the grapes she's been eating, sweetness blooming on his tongue, and beneath that, something darker - bitter. The coffee that Max drank half hour ago. The realisation he's tasting the both of them makes him feel hot all over, a moan slipping out into P's mouth.

It's over too soon, P slipping back to her feet, looking between them meaningfully. Lando's chest heaves. Max's face is almost red now, reverent under the colour.

"Now you," P commands, matter-of-fact, like she's asked them to get the dishes or something equally as banane.

Lando knows he should put a stop to this. That this isn't going to work, that this is something that can only end in heartache, and if anyone's going to be on the receiving end of that pain, it's only hoping to be him, isn't it?

But Max is up and moving and suddenly he's there - standing between Lando's spread legs, bending down as Lando's face turns up towards him, Max's face cast golden in the glow of the setting sun behind him.

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