#chapter  33

It wasn’t just a line item on a checklist. It was a sentence.

A verdict.

And Lando couldn’t read it without his throat closing.

Daniel was dead, and Lando had been too late. 

The papers in front of him blurred at the edges, paragraphs bleeding into one another, unread. Funeral arrangements. Security procedures. Transfer of assets. Unsent messages, unspoken apologies.

The pen hung uselessly in his hand.

He was just trying to work. Work was supposed to be safe, detached, obedient. Work wasn’t supposed to look at him the way he could feel his men look at him now — with eyes full of questions they weren’t brave enough to voice. 

How did this happen? How did you let it?

He should have seen it. He should have done something, for fuck’s sake. 

Daniel’s name had been printed five times in this document alone. It still didn’t feel real. It felt wrong, as if a name so vibrant, so alive, had no business existing inside an administrative file.

The rest of the house was quiet. Not still—there were voices somewhere deep in the walls, movement in the shadows, but it all felt hushed. Muted, like even the house was grieving. He could hardly blame it.

The Reaper wasn’t a sentimental man. He’d made it this far by pushing feelings down, by compartmentalizing everything, keeping the emotional weight locked away, safe from ever pulling him under. But Lando Norris could feel the light that had dimmed around the mansion, the hollow space where the warmth used to live. It wasn’t just the loss of Daniel. It was everything. Everything was colder now.

Lando had always thought of himself as someone who could carry weight. Who could look death in the face and not flinch. Who could be ruthless enough. But when Daniel’s body dropped, when the blood pooled, and when Max collapsed to his knees screaming like something had torn from his chest—Lando hadn't felt ruthless. He'd felt helpless

He couldn’t bring himself to face Max since.

Like a fucking coward.

Verstappen hadn’t said a word since that night—not one word beyond accepting orders or routine updates. Lando hadn’t looked Max Verstappen in the eye since because if he did, he knew what he’d see: Daniel’s ghost.

The house was quiet too. A stillness had settled across the estate, not just of sound but of spirit — a dimming of something once bright. There was no laughter in the halls, no music or footsteps. Only muted conversations and doors that weren’t closed all the way.

The warmth that had once flickered through the mansion in small, unexpected ways – an unguarded laugh from Logan, the smell of Carlos’s shitty microwave popcorn, the sound of Daniel’s boots scuffing the floorboards as he came in too loud, too late, always grinning – was gone, the very air seemingly hollowed out and echoing.

He buried his face in his hands and sat there for a long while. It wasn’t the kind of grief that bled out in sobs. It was quieter, meaner – like a slow rot behind the ribs.

When Max Fewtrell stepped into his boss’s office, he didn’t knock. He was entering as a friend. Even if Lando may never refer to him by that title, today he entered this office as he had done many times before – as someone who noticed the dark circles under Lando's eyes, the rapid emptying of his decanter.

“You’re not eating,” Max said softly.

Lando didn’t lift his head. “Not hungry.”

“You need to eat. You’re no good to anyone like this.”

He still didn’t respond.

There was a pause. Then a chair creaked as Max sat across from him. “You did the best you could.”

But what was the best when your man still bled out on a warehouse floor? When you heard him choke on his own blood over comms and couldn’t get there fast enough?

Lando’s voice was low when it came. “Did I?”

Max didn’t answer that. Just looked at him, tired in the eyes, like he hadn’t slept either. They’d all taken the hit—some closer to the blast than others — but Lando had been at the center. He always was. That was the weight of command, of consequence.

Heavy lies the head that wears the crown.

The service was short.

Just the Reapers’ Circle, and a few of the old boys from the Renault garage who still wore grease under their fingernails – the ones who had known Daniel from the very beginning, back when everything had felt like a dream on the tarmac. 

There were no pretend speeches, no too-holy choir, no annoyingly large floral displays.

Daniel would've hated all that.

The lot of them gathered under gray skies, cold wind skimming off the water. No one said much. A few passed a flask around, a few muttered goodbyes. 

Max had stayed silent, the usual fire in his eyes dulled by something deeper, more painful. He stood still the whole time, hand resting absently on the back of Penelope’s tiny head where she sat bundled on Kelly’s hip, too young to know what was being buried.

Too young to know what she’d lost.

How the hell was he going to explain to her that Uncle Danny wasn’t coming over to play anymore?

Lando had stayed in the background, giving everyone space, but the ache of it all was still there, the weight of it pressing on his chest like a stone that wouldn’t budge. 

He couldn’t be the leader they wanted him to be today. 

He didn’t deserve to.

Not after losing one of their own.

It was hours later, back in his room, when Max Verstappen finally got a moment to himself to breathe, nothing more than a hollow exhale. He’d changed out of his dark coat and was sitting in just a t-shirt now, elbows on his knees, the day’s weight still knotted in his shoulders. Kelly had taken Penelope home early—“She doesn’t need to see you this sad,” she’d said gently.

And maybe she was right.

Max didn’t know how to tell a toddler that Uncle Danny wasn’t coming back. That there wouldn’t be another Sunday where he rolled in with doughnuts and those god-awful glitter stickers she loved so much. That the belly-laughs were over now.

He was still staring at the floor when he heard the soft knock.

It isn’t Logan – his steps are quieter. Carlos’ gait is slower, steadier, more heavy-footed. This is someone different, more uncertain, a little–

Before he could place the sound of the footsteps, the door opened and Lando’s voice came through, tentative and low. “Max?”

The Dutchman blinked, surprised.

What was Lando doing here?

Lando never came to their rooms. He summoned people, made them come to him. It wasn't a rule so much as it was a fact, a simple truth of the way this familiar ecosystem of theirs had always functioned.

Max didn’t say anything at first, just blinked at the door like he wasn’t sure if he wanted company or not. He could hear Lando nudge the door open a little wider, just enough for Lando to step in.

“Shouldn’t you be with the others?” Max muttered, his voice hoarse from the tension he was holding in.

“I came to find you,” Lando replied, his voice quieter than usual, like he wasn’t sure if Max even wanted to see him. But it was too late now; he was here.

“What are you—” Max began, but Lando was already moving.

He didn’t say anything at first. Just stood there in that solemn, self-contained way of his, like he wasn’t sure if this was a mistake. He hesitated for a moment, and then, almost awkwardly, he handed Max a small box. It was simple, unassuming. Just a plain cardboard box, the kind anyone would put their stuff in when it needed to be kept together.

Max frowned, staring at it for a moment. “What’s this?” he asked, but his voice lacked the usual sharpness it had. Instead, there was a soft kind of confusion there, as if he already knew.

Lando shifted uncomfortably on his feet. “I thought you'd want this... Daniel’s things. Some of ‘em. S’not much. Just, like, things from his locker n’ his drawer in my office. He, uh… left things everywhere, really.”

He held out the small box.

Max stared down at the box, at the way Lando was holding it out like it was fragile, like it could break if Max didn’t take it carefully. And for a moment, there was silence. The kind of heavy silence that had followed Daniel’s death, as if the world had paused, unsure of what to do next.

“He would’a wanted you t’have it.”

Max reached for it slowly, like it might shatter in his hands. He opened it on his lap, careful.

Inside were a few photos. There was a cassette tape labeled Take Names, Kick Ass.Max spotted Daniel’s old aviators too, and his lighter with Fuck ‘Em All engraved into the side. And tucked beneath them was a folded note in Daniel’s handwriting, slanted and looping.

Max’s chest tightened.

Lando watched him wince, like the mere act of opening the small slip of paper that once belonged to the friend he’d once sat beside was enough to wind this grown man, like it would physically punch him in the gut.

The paper was soft and flimsy, preserved with each crease still perfectly folded like Daniel had probably kept it in his wallet.

Max dared to open it with shaking hands.

Enjoy the butterflies. Enjoy being naïve. Enjoy the nerves, the pressure, people not knowing your name. Enjoy the process of making a name for yourself, getting faster and faster with each run and meeting some great people along the way. Bring friends along. Bring family along. Don't assume they'll be a distraction. Don't be afraid to surround yourself with people you care about and love.

Max let out a wet laugh, but none of them commented on the fact that it came out more like a choked sob. But his smile was wide even if his eyes were a bit shiny, his heart warm with fondness for his oldest friend.

He smiled, a bittersweet smile, even though he could feel the burn of tears stinging his eyes. He wouldn’t let them fall. Not in front of Lando. Not like this. He wasn’t going to break.

Then, at the very bottom of the box, Max found something else. Something that made his heart clench.

It was Daniel’s watch. The one he’d always worn, the one that had been a staple of Daniel’s character. The one Daniel wore on every trip, every stupid mission, every late-night planning session where he’d point at the glowing numbers and say, “We’ve got exactly this much time to change the world, boys.”

The one Max had joked about stealing, but Daniel had always laughed off, claiming it was ‘priceless.’ But now, holding it in his hands, it felt... different.

Max closed his fingers around it, staring at it for a long moment before, without a word, he slipped it onto his wrist with shaking hands. 

The leather was cracked but familiar, like muscle memory, like time never passed. The fit was perfect, as if it had been made for him all along.

He glanced up at Lando then, wordless, a quiet question in his eyes. Is this okay? Is this... how we carry him now? Am I allowed to carry this much of him?

Lando didn’t speak. Instead, he stepped forward, lifted a hand, rested it on Max’s shoulder with a quiet kind of gravity, offering a reassuring squeeze.

There was a beat, and then, softly, a nod.

Max exhaled.

“Yeah,” Lando muttered, his voice soft. He gave him a sad, almost apologetic smile. “We’ll make sure he’s remembered, Max. Don’t worry.”

Max’s lips quivered, a single tear slipping down his cheek despite his best efforts to hold it back. But it was there —fleeting, soft— and he let it fall, not trying to wipe it away.

“Thank you,” he murmured, voice tight.

Lando gave him the best smile he could muster as he turned to leave. He’d only taken a single step in the direction of door, when–

“You kept them,” Lando breathed.

They were photos, taped haphazardly to the wall, overlapping, some curling at the edges from age or wear. They were moments of Max’s life, captured in still moments, frozen on the faded paper.

Before he could even stop and think, Lando’s steps led him closer, his gaze lingering on the photographs, and his chest tightened.

The room was mostly dark, the curtains drawn. But one corner glowed—lit by the soft flicker of a desk lamp and the dull shimmer of taped-up memories.

The photographs covered the wall like old postcards half-forgotten. Some were crooked others curling at the corners from the heat, taped up without symmetry without much care for looks or aesthetic — just need. 

A need to remember. A need to not forget.

The first was of a mountaintop in Hungary, all of them windswept and sun-flushed. Next was a polaroid of Daniel in Austin, smiling beneath a dumb brown cowboy hat that made him look like a drunk tourist, grin wide as ever. There was another too, this one of Kelly and Penelope at a carnival, her daughter mid-laugh, cotton candy stuck to her fingers and Penelope’s tiny hands squishing her mother’s cheeks.

Another one caught his eye. This one was of a beach in Miami, Logan half-buried in the sand. They’d only gone because Logan had been homesick and they were young and high off the thrill of new money and so they had decided there was nothing else to do. 

Going to the beach had never even been part of the original plan – their private jet had flaked after taking the money, and they’d been stranded without a plan or a care. Then, for those two days, there was just laughter. Just bad margaritas and a half-functioning grill and the sound of the tide rolling in like a promise.

Lando stared at the photo.

He could almost smell the salt in the air. Feel the heat beneath his bare feet. He remembered laughter— 

Daniel’s, maybe. Or was it Penelope’s? 

He remembered Logan teasing Oscar until he finally cracked a smile.

He remembered the warmth of the sand. Even standing here, he could still smell the sunscreen Carlos had obnoxiously insisted they all wear.

But just barely.

Now, it felt like a story someone else had told him. Something that belonged to another man, another lifetime. One where he still remembered what it meant to feel full.

He stared at the photographs, something burning behind his ribs. Because even now—even now—his men had warmth in them. Even Verstappen, who wore sharpness like armor. Even Oscar, who barely trusted anyone. Even Daniel, who was gone now.

It was all so human—so alive—in a way that Lando couldn’t remember ever feeling. And then there was the plane ride home, their flight being delayed, stranded at the airport after the money was taken. The photos all held stories, all of them steeped in memories, and they didn’t feel distant. They didn’t feel like past lives. They felt like a life that was still going, that could’ve still been going, if only it hadn’t been stolen.

Lando looked at the picture. He remembered that sand.

Or at least… he tried to.

Back when the water had been warm and Max had been happier and Daniel had still been alive.

He stood there, staring, until the ache in his chest pressed sharp against his ribs. He didn’t think Max noticed him until he shifted.

“You put them up,” Lando said, voice rough.

Max didn’t look at him. “I couldn’t throw them away.”

Lando nodded. Something in his throat pulsed.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen that one,” he said quietly, pointing to a photo where Daniel had Penelope on his shoulders, both of them laughing so hard they were blurry.

Max looked at it. “He was the one who taught her to eat ice cream backwards. Cone first, like shotgunning a beer,” the Dutch smiled fondly.

That pulled a breath from Lando — a laugh that felt broken on its way out. “F’course he did.”

They both let themselves breath in the memory of the ocean air again, before silence fell again.

He had to look away before the ache could settle too deep.

He wondered, as he walked the halls of his own empire, if he was the only one incapable of holding warmth. If it had been beaten out of him, starved out of him, cauterized into nothing.

Even his men—Max, Logan, Daniel—had managed to keep some of it. The good bits. The light.

His fingers twitched at his sides. There were no photos like that in his own room. None he could conjure of himself laughing like that, relaxed like that. At best, he remembered watching. Always from the outside.

He stared at Daniel’s face in one of the prints, smile wide and eyes crinkled at the corners. It didn’t seem right. That someone who could make a place feel warmer just by walking into it was gone. That someone who could make even Max love out loud wasn’t coming back.

Lando felt cold.

And for a moment—just a moment—he wondered what might’ve changed if someone like Daniel had been in his life sooner. If someone like that had taught him that gentleness didn’t mean weakness. That he could be safe and soft and still survive.

His mind betrayed him then.

Brought back the image of her—Y/N—with her steady hands and gentle voice. The girl who had patched him up and made him toast. The girl who had given him sanctuary not because she had to, but because she wanted to. The girl who had touched him like he wasn’t just a blade in human form.

He didn’t deserve it. Not any of it.

But god help him—he wanted her smile again.

Wanted to go back to that morning with her, burnt coffee and all, and press his forehead to hers just to feel something other than the static in his veins.

Unwillingly, he thought of her.

Of the girl who’d bandaged his knuckles without flinching. Of the way her hands had been steady even when her voice trembled. 

He thought of her hair still damp from a shower, curling against her jaw as she’d made him toast. Of her fingers brushing over his cheek like he was something delicate. Of the way she’d touched him—not out of pity, not out of fear, but with something gentler. Something he didn’t have a name for.

But for the first time, he wondered.

Would Daniel still be alive if he’d been the kind of man who knew how to feel things before they were ripped away?

Would he have believed in warmth?

He wasn’t sure.

He stared at the photographs, something burning behind his ribs. Because even now—even now—his men had warmth in them. Even Max, who wore sharpness like armor. Even Logan, who barely trusted anyone. Even Daniel, who was gone now.

They still had something to lose, something they let themselves hold close.

And Lando?

He wasn’t sure what he had anymore.

Except a girl with edified hands and a tired smile who looked at him like he could be something more. Someone whose touch hadn’t recoiled when she saw the blood. Someone who stitched him back together with trembling fingers and whispered reassurances he didn’t know how to believe.

He wondered, not for the first time, if maybe —maybe— if he’d had someone like her when he was younger, someone steady and kind and unrelenting in their softness, if he might’ve turned out different. If he would’ve known how to love people before learning how to protect them. Or how to protect people without ruining them in the process.

He looked at Daniel’s smile in the photograph again, and then turned away.

“I should’ve been better –quicker, or smarter – somethin’. I should’ve done more.” he whispered, his voice low. It was all he could do to keep it from cracking. “He trusted me.”

Max exhaled sharply, his face softening. “We all trusted you, Lando.”

Lando could feel the air sucked out of him.

Fuck. I let all of them down, didn’t I?

“And we still trust you. Do not be stupid, Lando.”

Lando looked at him with some mixture of confusion and shock. It reminded Max how young he was, how human behind the infallible mask. 

“It’s always ‘if, if, if’,” Max sighed, sounding almost defensive. “But Daniel knew.” 

“Knew what?”

“He knew why he trusted you, of course. You are family.”

Family.

Lando didn’t know what to do with that word, how to make it mean something that wasn’t fleeting. He couldn’t even bring himself to feel grief properly, to mourn Daniel as he should. But the more he stood there, staring at the photographs, the more he realized he was mourning. Not just Daniel, but the life he could’ve had. The connection he could’ve allowed himself.

He pulled his eyes away from Max’s desk, his gaze lingering on the photos one last time before he turned to leave, voice barely a whisper. “I won’t forget him.”

Max didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to.

He only smiled.

There’d been a shift in him, small, almost imperceptible. 

Like the way summer ends—not in one clear moment, but slowly. A little less light each day. A little more chill in the breeze.

Even she could tell he’d gone quieter.

Not just the exhausted kind of quiet, the I-haven’t-slept-in-a-week kind. No—this was deeper. A marrow-deep silence that clung to him in the pauses between sentences, in the way he’d drift off mid-thought and forget to finish what he was saying. Instead, it was a sort of hollowness beneath the surface, like he was keeping something down just to make it through the day.

He’d told her, one evening when he was sat on her couch, elbows on his knees, looking more like a boy than he ever had. He’d told her, eventually, about Daniel – about how one of his roommates —one of his brothers, really— died in a sudden car crash.

He’d shown her the photos without her asking, scrolling through his phone with a flat kind of reverence. The boys he’d once called his brothers. Smiling in the sunlight, arms slung around each other like the world hadn’t burned yet.

“This one’s Danny,” he said, swiping through his phone until he found the photo. She looked over to see a photo of a group of boys — grinning, chaotic, arms slung around each other like they believed in forever. He pointed them out by name.

“That’s Oscar. This one’s Max,” he’d murmured. “And this idiot—this was Daniel.”

She hadn’t known what to say. She only looked at the grinning man Liam was pointing to on the screen — eyes warm, arms slung around the shoulders of people he clearly loved — and nodded softly.

“Smiled like an idiot, never shut up. Drove everyone mad.”

She leaned closer. Took in the crinkle of laughter lines around Daniel’s eyes, the way his arm was slung over Max’s shoulder and how Liam himself—surprisingly—was actually laughing in the picture.

Not smirking, not just smiling, but actually laughing.

She’d looked at the face, with a grin so wide it reached his eyes, and felt something in her chest twist. A ghost of a man she never met but already mourned because of what he’d left behind in the man she loved.

The glare of the photo still open on his phone screen reflected back in his irises, but she had a feeling that wasn’t what was causing his eyes to glisten.y

The next thing he knew, Lando felt a small weight come to rest on his shoulder. He turned to find her head resting gently against him, her body curling closer as if to help warm his. “I’m so sorry, Li.”

“Yeah.” His voice barely stirred the air. “Me too.”

And since then, he’d been around more. Not that he explained it. He never asked if he could stay longer, or why her floor was comfier than his own bed, or why his jacket kept finding its way over the back of her chair. He just… stayed.

She let him.

She let him talk when he wanted to and go quiet when he didn’t. Let him sit close in silence, or disappear into his phone, or steal the last of her coffee without asking. Let him fill the space however he needed.

She let him sit on her rug and help her fold laundry without saying much. Let him watch whatever nonsense she had playing on the TV. Let him brush past her in the kitchen, casually stealing the snacks she swore she was saving.

She let him be quiet.

Of course, she worried anyway.

But one day, out of nowhere, he looked up from his phone while she was slicing fruit at the counter and asked her, uncharacteristically. “I was thinkin’ of going out. Can you… Will you let me take you somewhere?”

“What?” she asked carefully, not sure if she stood but also too afraid of having him close himself again. He’d already been so quiet today, but even on his worst day, she’d happily 

“Just… Come with me?”

She glanced over her shoulder. “Now?”

“Now.”

And why would she ever tell him no?

She didn’t ask questions. Y/N just smiled and wiped down her damp hands with a kitchen cloth before she grabbed her coat and followed him out.

They didn’t speak much on the drive.

The streets were quiet, the city slowly exhaling under the weight of dusk. His hand rested on the gear shift. Her hand didn’t reach for it like it sometimes did.

They pulled into a cemetery just outside the city, where the trees grew tall and weeping and the air smelled like rain, even though it hadn’t rained in days.

He didn’t say anything as he led her down a narrow path, past headstones with gold lettering, some freshly cut flowers, others forgotten. When he stopped walking, it was near a pair of small, unremarkable markers.

She glanced at him, unsure. “Whose—”

“My parents,” he said simply.

Her breath hitched. “I… I’m so sorry to hear that.”

His mouth curled slightly. Not into a smile. Not really. “S’alright. They were a bunch of bastards anyway.”

“Oh,” she whispered. “Li, I didn’t know—”

“Don’t,” he cut in gently. Not sharp. Just firm.

“I’m sorry,” she said instead, softer.

He nodded once. Then crouched, like it was instinct, and picked a stray weed off the base of one of the stones. His fingers brushed the stone, just barely. No reverence, no tears.

“It’s been a while since I last came here,” he said after a moment.

Her eyes flicked to his face. His jaw was tight.

“You don’t have to—”

“No,” he muttered. “It’s fine. It’s just…”

He stood again, looked down at the markers like they might talk back if he stared long enough.

“They weren’t, like, bad in the way people think. Just, like… selfish. Greedy. Left me behind when they had the chance to help. Guess they figured I’d die off and save them the trouble.”

She blinked, the ache in her chest blooming.

“But you were just a kid. What happened?”

He shrugged like it didn’t matter anymore.

“Nothing. They just didn’t want me anymore.”

She looked over at him, brows drawn, something tender pooling in her chest.

“I didn’t mean to—”

“Nah, s’fine. You should know.” He shoved his hands in his coat pockets, gaze fixed on the stone like it owed him something. “They were the kind of people who liked the idea of children more than actual ones. As soon as it got hard, they bailed. Left me to rot in Monte Carlo with nothing but my name.”

Her heart twisted, but she didn’t interrupt.

“Yeah, not your typical orphan sob story, huh?” he muttered, hands in his coat pockets, eyes on the names. “They weren’t good people. They weren’t even bad people trying. Just… the kind that think kids are accessories. Until they get too loud. Or hungry. Or start asking why the electricity’s off.”

She stayed quiet.

“Left me to figure it out myself. an off one night, locked the door behind them. I had to learn how to pick it just to get water.”

His voice was calm. Clinical, but there was a hollowness behind it, like he was reciting a file, not a memory.

“I lived on scraps for years. Slept under a train bridge with a knife in my sock and a backpack I’d kill for. Stole from people who didn’t miss it, and then from people who did.” A pause. “Guess that makes me a bastard, too.”

“You were a kid,” she said quietly.

“Yeah,” he said, with a humorless smile. “But even then, I was learnin’ not to need people.”

He glanced at her then. Something sharp in his eyes, something searching. “It’s easier that way, isn’t it? No one to disappoint. No one to lose.”

They stood in silence for a beat.

“They truth s’just that they didn’t want me,” he said, matter-of-fact. “Never did. Simple ‘s that. Gave up the second it got hard. Threw me to the streets when I was still small enough to sleep inside cardboard boxes. So I did. And then I got good at it. Got good at making people fear me. Good at surviving.”

She stepped a little closer.

“I don’t really talk about it,” he added. “Not ‘cause it hurts or anythin’. I just… figured there wasn’t anything to say.”

She watched him, the way he stood so still in the silence, the wind tugging at his jacket.

“You were so brave, Li. But I’m sorry that you even had to be.”

“I thought I was gonna die, that first winter. Some nights, I was ready for it. But then I met some people. Not good ones, but better than what I had.”

He looked at her then, not all the way – just a glance.

“They don’t make it worth it. Losing him. Losing parts of myself. But I wouldn’t change it either.”

She blinked back the sting in her eyes. “You don’t have to explain that to me.”

“I know.” He nudged a toe against the grass. “That’s probably why I brought you.”

There was silence.

“I’ve been thinking about the people I do have,” he continued, quieter now. “The ones who stuck. Max. Oscar. Danny… you.”

Her breath caught.

“And I’ve been wondering,” he said, “if it’s enough. If that’s all life really is—just making sure you have a few people who’d come looking if you went missing.”

She looked at him carefully. “And?”

“And how maybe they don’t make it worth it,” he said, voice flat. “But they make it… less shit.”

“I still think the world’s a shit place,” he said plainly. “And I still think you have to claw for every bit of light you get. But if you asked me if I’d change it… if I’d trade the people I’ve got now for a cleaner start…”

He scoffed once, under his breath, beginning to smile.

“Nah.”

She tilted her head. “Because it made you who you are?”

“No.” He cracked a faint grin. “Because if things had gone different, I might not have ended up at your café that night.”

That startled a smile out of her. “Liam—”

He shrugged, still too cool for his own good. “Don’t make it a thing.”

It was definitely a thing.

“I’m not good at this,” he said, low and clipped. “Feelings. Grave visits. Any of it.”

“I noticed,” she said, with a gentle kind of tease that earned her a rare smirk.

“But…” He hesitated. “You’re the only person I wanted to bring here.”

Her chest ached.

He reached into his coat then, pulled out a small folded piece of paper. No name. No writing. Just something he laid on the base of the grave like it was meant to rot.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Just a list of things they don’t get to take credit for,” he said simply. “Me. The boys. You.”

She looked at him— really looked. Not the man hollowed by loss. Not the kid who had to claw his way to the top. But the man between those things – scarred, hard-edged. But trying – trying to live, to feel.

He noticed her watching and, true to form, scoffed lightly, dragging a hand through his hair.

“Don’t start crying on me or some shit,” he muttered. “You know I’ll trip you if you do.”

She huffed a laugh, soft. “I’m not.”

“Good,” he said, but his voice was gentler now. Like he didn’t quite mean it.

They stood there a while longer after that.

She didn’t say anything, just stood there with him, in the wind and quiet. But then she stepped closer and let her hand gently graze Liam’s, her curled fingers carefully tangling themselves with his.

He didn’t pull away.

When an indeterminate amount of time had passed and the late autumn wind had sufficiently chilled their faces till their noses were tinged matching shades of pink, Lando finally turned back to his girl with fondness hidden in his smile.

“Come on,” he said after a long moment. “There’s a bakery nearby. You can judge their hot chocolate and ruin someone’s day with your opinions. Probably mine.”

She huffed a soft laugh, swatting his jacket before following as he turned away from the graves. “You love my reviews! In fact, I was thinking we should start a vlog. We’ve been to so many cool places, it’d be so fun! A cute little thing, y’know.”

“Yeah,” he hummed. “Just for us.”

a/n: sorry if the scenes are too long. and if there's any errors, please let me know! i juat wanted to get a chapter out atp lol

I think JJ is still the one to tell him, but it happens earlier, in the change room because more people know it’s important for Shane to get the news so they’re trying to get in touch with Hayden and JJ too. So Rivera’s text that Shane is staying with them comes before he gets on the team bus. Melnyk and JJ are friends, right? and they had plans to go out like old times, but this is obviously putting a cramp in that, so they’re all just going to stay in together instead (plus Hayden and Wagner). Shane gets Ilya’s text about the instagram messages when he’s already safe in the car or already at #1314’s house, so he learns that Ilya is blaming Crowell in a safe environment. He’s drinking vodka because a) fuck the performance diet, it’s an emergency and b) vodka makes him feel close to Ilya. But he also hates vodka so he only actually has two sips.

I said this in a comment but I still think it’s funny: There are probably big sleepover-party vibes but Shane is just the one wet cat who is fucking livid and shaking the entire time, even though they’re trying to cheer him up. But during all the games he’s still like: “Never Have I Ever.... wanted to kill someone as much as I do right now.” Or during Truth Or Dare, “Dare me to call Crowell and threaten his life.” And Marry-Fuck-Kill needs to have Crowell in every round, just so Shane can kill him over and over. Or else he adds Crowell in: “Marry Fuck Kill: Scott Hunter, Kip Grady, Ryan Price.” “Well, I would kill Crowell...”

And they finally calm him down but then Hayden gets the text about the audio and it starts back up again. No one recognizes it’s Ilya saying “it is” except Shane, who panics because he's positive it 100% identifies Ilya without a doubt (it doesn’t, he just knows his boy’s voice anywhere).