when you were five, your world still felt like something you could carry in your hands.

you had a favourite mug that was slightly chipped at the rim, a pair of shoes that lit up when you ran too fast, and a stuffed toy you refused to sleep without no matter how many times your father suggested it was time to “grow out of it.”

so when your dad told you you were moving to melbourne, you didn’t really understand what it meant—only that everything you knew was about to be packed into boxes and sealed shut with tape.

what you did understand, however, was that your dad had fallen in love again, with a kind woman who lived in melbourne.

and that her best friend from years ago had a son your age.

“you’ll get along,” your dad had said, like it was the simplest thing in the world. “he’s your age. his name is oscar.”

you had nodded, swinging your legs off the kitchen chair, not fully grasping that this one sentence would quietly change the shape of your entire life.

the piastris came into your life the way some constants do.

quietly.

without announcement.

his mother—nicole—was already waiting at the door when you arrived, as if she had been expecting your footsteps for longer than you had been aware of them.

she had that kind of presence that made a room feel steadier just by existing in it.

and beside her, slightly behind, stood a boy with soft curls and serious eyes.

oscar.

he didn’t smile.

not at first.

just watched you the way someone watches something they are trying to understand properly before they decide what it means to them.

you tightened your grip on your stuffed toy.

he glanced at it.

then back at you.

and something small passed between you—too quiet to name, too early to understand, but already real in a way neither of you would ever fully unlearn.

“this is my son,” nicole said gently. “oscar.”

you nodded politely, like you had been taught.

your mother squeezed your shoulder in reassurance, and then—because mothers had a strange way of already knowing what their children would become to each other—she added lightly,

“you’ll be seeing a lot of each other.”

oscar’s mother smiled at that.

so did yours.

oscar just tilted his head slightly, like he was still deciding.

you learned quickly that nicole piastri was not just your mother’s friend.

she was a force in oscar’s world.

organised, warm, endlessly supportive in a way that made everything around her feel structured—even the chaos of racing life.

because racing was already there.

it wasn’t something oscar discovered later.

it was something he grew inside of.

his father, chris, was already part of that world too—familiar circuits, early mornings, the smell of fuel and rubber already stitched into their family routine like it belonged there.

you didn’t fully understand it at first.

only that sometimes oscar wasn’t at school because he was at “testing.”

and that when he came back, he always looked slightly older somehow.

like speed added something to him you couldn’t quite see yet.

your mothers made everything feel inevitable.

coffee mornings that turned into karting weekends.

“oh, they’re the same age,” one of them would say, like it was a coincidence worth repeating.

playdates that started as structured plans and ended with you both disappearing into whatever space had engines in it.

because it didn’t take long for the kart track to become the centre of his world.

and somehow, yours too.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

you still remember the first time properly.

standing beside nicole near the fence, sunlight too sharp against your eyes, the roar of small engines making your chest vibrate in a way you didn’t have words for yet.

oscar was already in a kart.

too small for how focused he looked.

hands tight on the wheel.

completely still in a way that made everything around him feel louder.

“he’s been doing this since he could practically walk,” nicole said softly, almost amused.

you looked at her.

“he likes it?”

she smiled.

“he loves it.”

and then the lights changed.

and he was gone.

afterwards, he didn’t talk much.

he never did, not at first.

just took off his helmet like it weighed nothing and walked over to where you were sitting on the pit wall, legs swinging too short to touch the ground.

he stopped in front of you.

looked at you for a second.

then, simply:

“you came.”

it wasn’t a question.

you nodded anyway.

“your mum said i had to,” you replied.

that made him pause.

“…mine said you’d be here.”

you blinked.

“oh.”

a beat.

then, quieter:

“did you win?”

he hesitated like he was still learning how to feel about results.

“…not today.”

you nodded like that made sense.

then shrugged.

“you will next time.”

something in his expression shifted—small, almost invisible.

like that answer mattered more than it should have.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

you and oscar became something people stopped questioning very quickly.

not because it was obvious.

but because it was constant.

if one of you was missing, the other was assumed to be nearby.

if there was silence, it usually meant you were together somewhere that involved either engines, sugar, or an unreasonable amount of imagination.

you were chaos in motion.

he was calm in control.

and somehow, it worked like it had been designed that way from the start.

you talked too much.

not in a way that ever bothered him.

just in a way that filled space he didn’t always think needed filling.

you narrated everything.

the sky looked “too dramatic today,” the clouds looked “like they were plotting something,” and the kitchen smelled like “someone was about to have a very important emotional moment involving cinnamon.”

oscar would listen.

always.

and then, when you finished, he’d usually say something dry like,

“you think too much.”

and you’d gasp like it was offensive.

“that’s literally my personality.”

“i know,” he’d reply, completely unbothered. “it’s loud.”

he, on the other hand, was quiet in a way that never felt empty.

just… intentional.

he noticed things you missed.

the way your mood shifted before you said anything.

the exact moment your confidence wobbled.

the way your hands always moved when you were thinking.

he didn’t always comment on it.

he just adjusted.

stayed closer when you needed grounding.

stepped back when you needed space.

like he was learning you in real time without ever making it obvious.

you baked when you were happy.

and when you were stressed.

and sometimes just because you felt like the universe needed cookies.

your kitchen became a permanent feature in both houses.

flour on your sleeves, sugar on the counter, music too loud for anyone else to understand why it was necessary.

oscar would lean against the doorway sometimes, watching you move around like you belonged in a different kind of world entirely.

“you’re going to burn that,” he’d say once, as you dramatically declared you were “trusting your instincts” with a tray of brownies.

“my instincts are never wrong,” you insisted.

they were, in fact, wrong.

he still ate them anyway.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

he raced.

always.

karting tracks became as familiar to you as your own street.

you learned the sound of his engine like other people learned songs.

you learned how he changed when he was in the kart—how something in him sharpened, focused, became almost unreachable until he crossed the finish line.

you would stand with nicole sometimes, both of you watching in that quiet, shared understanding that didn’t need explanation.

afterwards, he would always find you first.

helmet off.

hair flattened.

eyes still slightly distant like he hadn’t fully returned yet.

“did you see it?” he’d ask.

and you always nodded.

“always.”

christmases blurred together in the best way.

two houses that were basically one shared rhythm. siblings, dogs, cats, and every other thing in between. big dinners made by all the parents, wrapping paper strewn all over both houses, a barbecue going usually in one of the backyards.

his family, yours, all mixed in a way that made it hard to remember where one began and the other ended.

you would always insist on baking something slightly ridiculous.

once it was star-shaped cookies in a rainbow dough that all burned unevenly.

another year it was a chocolate cake that collapsed but was “emotionally rich,” according to you.

oscar would sit at the counter, peeling fruit or reading out instructions in the most unimpressed tone possible.

“you’re not following the recipe.”

“recipes are suggestions,” you would argue.

he’d raise an eyebrow.

“that’s not how cooking works.”

“it is in my kitchen.”

and somehow, it always ended with laughter.

birthdays were louder.

you always made them too big.

he always pretended not to care.

but he never stopped showing up when you needed help setting things up, or blowing up a hundred balloons because you loved them so much.

and you never stopped making him blow out candles even when he insisted it was unnecessary.

“make a wish,” you’d say every time, grinning so wide it made your cheeks hurt.

and he would always hesitate slightly before doing it.

like he already knew what he wanted, but wouldn’t say it out loud.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

as you grew, so did everything around you.

your voice got stronger.

you started singing properly— at first just in your room, then in kitchens, then anywhere someone happened to listen long enough to notice.

oscar never said much when you sang.

he just… stayed. sometimes leaning against a wall.

sometimes fixing something nearby. always there.

like it was the most natural thing in the world, to hear you humming and singing into your hairbrush, flipping your hair back and forth, jumping around all giggly. it was his favourite sight in the whole world.

and through all of it, racing kept pulling him forward.

first local, then national.

karting weekends that started taking him further away more often than before.

you got used to watching him leave. hugging him tight, and pressing a little good luck card into his hands every time.

then come back, oftentimes victorious, always with a little keepsake for you. sometimes as simple as a four leaf clover he found growing on the karting ground. sometimes a bar of chocolate. one time, it was a pink seashell he knew you'd love. or a notebook for you to write more poetry in.

then he'd leave again. with a crooked smile and a promise to be back soon.

the routine became as natural as breathing. his mom noticed how he always looked a little happier when you'd run in to hug him when he was back home. your mom noticed how quiet you'd get when he wasn't around, curled up in the house or on the swing, with whatever new novel you were reading.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

the treehouse had been your idea.

of course it had.

you had decided, very seriously at the age of seven, that your backyard was “wasting its emotional potential” and needed somewhere elevated for “important thinking and dramatic conversations.”

oscar had looked at you for a long moment after that declaration.

then said, completely flat,

“that’s not a real thing.”

but he still helped build it.

by the time you were older—older in the way children become without noticing—you both treated it like it had always existed, like a safehouse where the world could just....not exist for a while.

the wood was slightly weathered now, paint faded in places where summer sun had been too persistent. there was a crooked ladder that oscar had once insisted on re-measuring “properly” even though it never needed fixing. a small flag you had insisted on hanging that no one ever admitted to putting up.

it belonged to both of you in the way some places only ever belong to certain people.

that afternoon, the air was warm in a slow, melting way.

the kind of australian heat that didn’t rush you—it just settled over everything, soft and heavy, like the world itself had decided to take a breath and forget about time for a while.

your parents had let you drag ice cream up the ladder.

there were strict rules about this.

none of which you were following properly.

your spoon was already sticky.

oscar’s too.

he was sitting cross-legged beside you, back against the wooden wall, one arm resting loosely on his knee like he belonged there in a way that had nothing to do with effort.

a prince record was playing softly from your phone—something you had insisted on because you had gone through a phase where you believed every emotional experience required a soundtrack.

you were still in that phase, honestly.

“this song is important,” you had told him very seriously earlier.

he had nodded like he believed you.

he didn’t, really notice it much, or like it the most but he respected the commitment you had to your curated music personality.

you leaned your head back against the wood, licking melted ice cream off your spoon.

“this is perfect,” you announced.

oscar hummed.

“it’s hot,” he said.

“that’s part of it.”

“no it isn’t.”

you ignored him.

a comfortable silence settled between you—one of those silences that didn’t feel empty because it was already filled with years of not needing to explain anything out loud.

below you, the backyard looked smaller.

your parents were somewhere inside the house, voices faint through open doors.

everything felt suspended.

soft.

safe.

unchanging.

or at least, it was supposed to.

oscar shifted slightly.

you noticed immediately.

you always did.

“what?” you asked without looking at him.

he didn’t answer straight away.

that alone made your head turn.

because oscar didn’t usually hesitate with you.

not like that.

he was watching the ice cream in his hands like it had suddenly become difficult to focus on.

then he exhaled.

slow.

careful.

“…i need to tell you something.”

your stomach did something small and unpleasant.

you frowned.

“okay.”

another pause.

he rubbed his thumb once along the side of the spoon.

“i’m going to england.”

the words didn’t land immediately.

your brain almost didn’t let them in at first, like they didn’t fit the shape of the moment.

you blinked.

“like… for a race?”

he shook his head slightly.

“no. for racing. for school. for everything.”

you stared at him.

the prince song kept playing softly behind you both, suddenly too cheerful for what was happening.

“when?” you asked.

his jaw tightened just a fraction.

“…soon.”

that word did something worse than the first one.

because “soon” wasn’t a date.

it was a disappearance waiting to happen.

you put your spoon down slowly.

carefully.

like if you moved too fast the moment would break completely.

“how soon is soon?” you asked again.

he looked at you now.

really looked at you.

and whatever he saw in your face made something in his expression shift—something like guilt, or hesitation, or the kind of sadness that didn’t know where to sit yet.

“a few weeks,” he said.

and then, quieter:

“i didn’t want you to find out last minute.”

there was a silence after that.

a real one.

not the comfortable kind.

this one had edges.

you let out a small breath that didn’t feel like it belonged to you.

“oh,” you said.

just that.

oh.

you nodded once, like your body was trying to catch up with something your mind refused to process properly.

then you looked away.

down at the backyard.

at the swing.

at the fence.

at everything that had always been there and suddenly felt like it might not be anymore.

your throat tightened before you even realised what was happening.

“right,” you said.

your voice came out thinner than you wanted it to.

“okay.”

oscar shifted again.

“hey—”

you shook your head quickly, still not looking at him.

“no, it’s fine.”

but it wasn’t.

and both of you knew it.

he said your name softly.

like a warning.

like a question.

like something he was afraid of saying too loudly.

that was what broke you.

not the leaving.

not even the idea of distance.

but the way he said your name like he already knew it was going to hurt.

your breath caught.

once.

then again.

and suddenly it was like something inside your chest had given up pretending to hold itself together.

“no,” you said immediately, too fast, voice cracking without permission.

you turned to him then, eyes already wet, confusion and disbelief mixing into something sharp and overwhelming.

“no, you can’t just— you can’t just leave. you can't just leave me”

oscar’s face changed instantly.

“i didn’t choose it like that,” he said, voice low, urgent now.

but you were already shaking your head.

“but you are,” you said, tears spilling before you could stop them. “you are leaving.”

the word came out like it physically hurt.

leaving.

leaving.

leaving.

you wiped your face quickly with the back of your hand, furious at yourself for crying and even more furious that it wasn’t stopping.

“you’re just—” you swallowed, breath uneven. “you’re just going to go and everything is going to be different and you’re just saying it like it’s nothing—”

“it’s not nothing,” he interrupted immediately.

his voice was sharper now.

not angry.

just desperate.

“it’s not nothing,” he repeated, softer. “i just… i didn’t know how to tell you.”

that made you laugh once.

small.

broken.

“yeah,” you said, wiping your cheeks again. “you did a great job.”

he flinched slightly at that.

the prince record kept playing.

too loud now.

too bright.

like it didn’t understand what kind of moment it was supposed to be soundtracking anymore.

you pulled your knees up to your chest, hugging them tightly, ice cream forgotten beside you melting into the wood.

your voice dropped.

“so what, that’s it?” you asked.

he shook his head immediately.

“no.”

you looked at him properly then.

through tears.

through the blur.

and he looked… wrong.

like he was still trying to sit in a version of the world where this didn’t hurt anyone.

but failing.

“i’m still here,” he said quietly.

you let out a shaky breath.

“not really.”

that silence after was heavier than the rest of it combined.

because neither of you knew how to fix that kind of truth yet.

oscar shifted closer, careful now, like he was afraid of making it worse just by moving.

“you’re my best friend,” he said.

your laugh this time was softer, but it still broke at the edges.

“yeah,” you whispered. “i know.”

a pause.

then, smaller:

“that’s why it hurts.”

and somewhere in the background, the world kept going.

the sun stayed warm.

the treehouse stayed still.

the song kept playing like nothing had changed.

but something had.

quietly.

irreversibly.

and neither of you had the words yet for what it meant to love someone who was about to become a place you could no longer reach the same way.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

the days before he left didn’t feel like days at all.

they felt like something stretched too thin, like time had started to hesitate every time it passed through your hands.

his room was quieter than usual.

not because anything was missing yet.

but because you both knew what was about to be.

there were boxes open on the floor—half-packed, half-forgotten—like even he couldn’t decide what deserved to leave first.

you sat cross-legged on his bed, back pressed against the wall, arms wrapped loosely around your knees.

you weren’t helping. not really. you were just there.

watching. lips turned down in a little frown you couldn't quite get rid of.

quiet in a way that wasn't you at all.

oscar moved around the room slowly.

carefully.

folding things that didn’t need to be folded twice.

placing books into a box like they might feel the difference between being carried and being left behind.

he didn’t talk much at first.

you didn’t either.

it felt like speaking might make it real too quickly.

“you’re doing that thing,” he said eventually, not looking at you.

you blinked slightly.

"what thing?”

“the silent judging thing.”

you scoffed immediately, though it came out weaker than intended.

“i’m not judging you.”

he finally looked up at that.

one eyebrow raised.

“you’ve been staring at me for ten minutes.”

you shifted on the bed.

“i’m observing.”

“that’s worse.”

a pause.

then your voice dropped slightly.

“…you don’t have to pack everything,” you said.

he stopped for a second.

looked at the shirt in his hands.

then at you.

“i do.”

you frowned.

“why?”

his jaw tightened just a fraction, like the answer wasn’t something he liked saying out loud.

“…because i’m leaving,” he said simply.

and that was the problem, wasn’t it.

how easy he made it sound when it wasn’t easy at all.

you looked away before your face could do anything stupid again.

your fingers picked at the edge of the blanket under you.

“yeah,” you said quietly. “i know.”

that silence after was heavier than the last one.

because now it wasn’t news.

it was reality sitting between you both, refusing to move.

down the hall, voices echoed faintly.

your mothers talking.

planning.

organising.

trying very hard to make something feel celebratory that wasn’t.

because tonight was the goodbye dinner.

and adults always tried to turn endings into events.

as if food and candles could soften distance. as if cheers and good wishes could unbreak your heart.

oscar sat down on the floor near the boxes after a moment.

finally still.

for the first time that day.

he leaned back against his bed, exhaling slowly.

and only then did you see it properly.

not just the focus.

not just the quiet.

but the guilt.

it sat on him like something he didn’t know how to put down.

“stop looking at me like that,” he muttered.

you frowned slightly.

“like what?”

he glanced at you.

then away.

“like i’m doing something wrong.”

you didn’t answer immediately.

because you didn’t know how to explain that you weren’t angry.

you were just… trying to keep up with something you couldn’t slow down. hold onto somebody you desperately didn't want to lose.

“are you doing something wrong?” you asked softly instead.

his head lifted slightly at that.

and for a second, he looked younger again.

fifteen, yes.

but still just oscar.

still the boy who always knew where you were without needing to ask.

still the boy who had always been there.

he shook his head immediately.

“no,” he said.

then, quieter:

“but it feels like it.”

that landed differently.

because it wasn’t about logic.

it was about you. about leaving you.

about how nothing about that felt clean.

you swallowed.

your voice came out smaller than you wanted.

“i don’t want you to go.” your voice broke at the end.

he didn’t respond straight away.

just looked at you.

properly.

like if he looked long enough he might find a version of this where nobody had to lose anything.

“i know,” he said finally. he got up from the floor to sit on the bed next to you. reaching out until your pinkies hooked together, pretending not to see the tears brimming in your eyes. he shuffled closer until you were shoulder to shoulder, letting you rest your head on his shoulder. and then he let his own head drop to yours, pinkies still hooked, letting you sob quiet tears into his shirt.

and that was all.

because there wasn’t anything else that could fix it.

later, when you finally went downstairs, the house had changed.

not physically.

but in atmosphere.

warm lights on.

voices overlapping.

food already laid out like the evening was something meant to be enjoyed instead of survived.

your parents had gone all out. your mother’s laugh a little too bright. his mother’s smile a little too steady.

everyone pretending this wasn’t what it was.

oscar’s sisters were their usual selves, hattie, edie, and mae—louder in the way younger siblings are when they don’t fully understand the weight of what’s happening.

they tugged at his sleeves, argued over seats.

talked over each other constantly.

and for a while, the house almost felt normal again.

almost.

you sat near them, quieter than usual.

oscar kept glancing at you from across the table

not often.

just enough that you noticed every time.

like he was trying to memorise something he wasn’t allowed to keep.

at one point, mae climbed into his lap without asking.

he adjusted her automatically.

like he always did.

like it was instinct.

and you watched it happen with something tight in your chest.

because it was so him.

so gentle.

so present.

and still leaving.

hattie was talking about something completely unrelated—school, something funny that happened—but you could feel the undercurrent of it anyway.

the fact that none of them fully understood what was shifting yet.

only you and him did.

and the mothers too, in the quietest way. the way only mother's can.

oscar didn’t eat much. you noticed, of course you did.

he noticed you not eating too. picking at your favourite food as if it had suddenly gone rancid.

neither of you commented on it.

because saying it out loud would make it worse.

when the dinner finally softened into dessert and conversation blurred into background noise, he stood up first.

you followed him without thinking.

out the back door.

into the night air.

the garden was quieter now.

different from the treehouse kind of quiet.

this was heavier.

final in a way neither of you had ever felt before.

he leaned against the fence.

you stood beside him.

not too close.

not far.

just where you always were.

“i don’t know how to do this,” he admitted suddenly. your head turned slightly. “do what?”

he let out a small breath. “…leave and still feel like everything’s normal.”

your throat tightened again.

because it wasn’t supposed to be normal. but it also wasn’t supposed to hurt like this. you looked down at your hands.

then softly:

“it won’t be normal.”

a pause.

then, quieter:

“but you’ll still be you.”

he looked at you at that.

properly again.

like he was holding onto the sound of it.

and for a moment, neither of you said anything.

because there were no words that didn’t break something.

only the understanding that whatever came next… neither of you were going into it alone.

just differently.

and that difference was already beginning to ache.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

The morning Oscar left arrived far too quickly.

that was the cruel thing about time. for weeks, everyone had spoken about england as though it were still somewhere distant. there had been conversations around dinner tables, discussions in kitchens while coffee brewed, quiet mentions of flights and schools and racing opportunities. it had felt far away then, something sitting safely on the horizon where you didn't have to look directly at it. but now the future was parked in the Piastris' driveway in the form of suitcases and passports and a car waiting to take him to the airport.

and suddenly there was nowhere left to hide from it.

you hadn't really slept. most of the night had been spent staring at the glow-in-the-dark stars still stuck to your ceiling from years ago, prince playing softly through your headphones while you twisted the shell bracelet oscar had made you around your wrist.

the string had worn thin over the years and some of the shells had faded from their original colour, but you'd never taken it off. just as oscar still carried the lopsided clay kangaroo keychain you'd made him when you were eight, despite the fact it looked absolutely nothing like a kangaroo.

your mother found you awake before sunrise. she didn't say much when she entered your room. instead, she simply sat beside you on the edge of the bed and smoothed a hand through your hair, the same way she had when you were little and nightmares sent you crawling into her room. you could tell she'd been crying. Her eyes were swollen, and her smile looked fragile around the edges.

"come on, sweetheart," she said softly. "they'll be leaving soon."

for a moment, you considered staying exactly where you were. not because you didn't want to see oscar. quite the opposite. you wanted to see him too much. some childish part of your heart thought that if you stayed under the blankets long enough, maybe the morning wouldn't happen at all. maybe england would stay a conversation instead of becoming reality.

but oscar would be looking for you.

you knew he would.

and that thought alone was enough to get you moving.

the morning air was cool when you stepped outside, carrying that rare kind of quiet that only exists before a city fully wakes. the sky was painted in soft shades of pink and gold, the first sunlight catching on rooftops and tree branches. it should have been beautiful. instead, it felt unfair that the world could look so lovely on a day like this.

the piastris' driveway was already busy. suitcases sat in neat rows near the car. chris was loading the final bags into the boot while nicole moved back and forth between the house and driveway, checking things that had already been checked three times. hattie, edie and mae lingered nearby, excited in the way younger siblings often were when something important was happening but they didn't fully understand why all the adults seemed one misplaced sentence away from tears.

and then you saw him.

oscar was standing beside the car, helping his dad with one of the larger suitcases. his hair was messier than usual, and there were dark shadows beneath his eyes that suggested he hadn't slept much either. he looked older somehow. not because of the move itself, but because for the first time in your life he wasn't simply oscar from down the street.

he was leaving.

leaving

leaving

leaving.

as though he felt your presence before he saw you, his head lifted. his eyes found yours immediately.

like they always did.

the driveway seemed to blur around the edges. the voices, the suitcases, the adults moving about. everything faded until there was only him standing there in the early morning light.

for a second neither of you moved.

then oscar started walking toward you.

you didn't even make it halfway.

the moment he got close enough, something inside you cracked. all the tears you'd spent days swallowing surged to the surface at once. your vision blurred and your throat closed so tightly it hurt.

"no—"

the word broke apart before it was even fully formed.

you shook your head, trying desperately to hold yourself together, but it was hopeless. the first sob escaped before you could stop it, followed immediately by another.

oscar reached you just as you completely fell apart.

you collided with him hard enough that he stumbled backwards slightly, but neither of you cared. your arms wrapped around his neck while his locked around your waist, pulling you so close there wasn't a fraction of space left between you. you buried your face against his shoulder immediately, the familiar scent of his laundry detergent and perfume making everything hurt ten times worse.

your tears soaked straight through his shirt within seconds.

"don't want you to go," you sobbed against his shoulder.

the words came out muffled and broken, but he heard them anyway.

oscar's grip tightened.

god, that somehow made it worse. because he was holding you exactly the way he always did whenever you cried. like he could fix it. like he could shield you from whatever was hurting you.

except this time he couldn't.

his chin rested against the top of your head, one hand sliding into your hair. you could feel the slight tremor in his breathing before you heard it. then his chest rose unevenly beneath your cheek.

oscar was crying too.

not loudly. not dramatically. just quietly, the way he did everything.

a tear slipped into your hair.

then another.

you felt him lower his face briefly against the top of your head, as though he needed somewhere to hide too.

because for all his calmness, for all his determination and maturity, he was still fifteen years old.

and he was saying goodbye to the person who had been beside him for almost his entire life.

"i'll call you," he managed, his voice cracking unexpectedly.

the sound shattered whatever composure you had left.

"you better."

a watery laugh escaped him, halfway between a laugh and a sob.

"i will."

"you promise?"

"i promise."

across the driveway, nicole had started crying openly. one hand covered her mouth while the other gripped your mother's arm tightly. your mum wasn't doing much better. tears streamed freely down her cheeks as she watched the two children she'd helped raise side-by-side cling to one another like letting go might physically break them.

neither woman interrupted.

Because they understood.

they had watched this happen from the very beginning.

the playdates that became sleepovers. the school runs. the birthday parties. the karting weekends. the christmas mornings. the afternoons spent in the treehouse. the thousands upon thousands of ordinary moments that had slowly woven your lives together until separating them now felt unnatural.

almost cruel.

Eventually chris glanced toward the dashboard clock in the car, and everyone knew.

time.

always moving.

always taking things with it.

neither of you let go immediately. the goodbye stretched on for several more minutes, neither willing to be the first to pull away. when you finally did, your eyes were red and swollen. oscar's weren't much better.

you simply stared at one another.

trying desperately to memorise everything.

the exact shade of his eyes. the freckles scattered across his cheeks. the way his hair never sat properly no matter how hard he tried. the shape of his smile.

as though memory alone could somehow make distance easier.

then, quietly, oscar reached forward and tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear.

the same way he had done hundreds of times before.

his expression softened.

heartbreakingly so.

"hey."

you swallowed hard.

"yeah?"

s small smile appeared.

sad.

fragile.

"you know you're still my favourite person, right?"

fresh tears immediately filled your eyes.

a weak laugh escaped him.

"that wasn't supposed to make you cry again."

"it wasn't supposed to be today."

for a second neither of you could speak.

then Oscar stepped closer and rested his forehead gently against yours.

just briefly.

and in that tiny moment, standing in a melbourne driveway with your mothers crying behind you and the sunrise painting everything gold, it felt like the entire world narrowed down to one impossible truth.

you loved him.

maybe not in the way people wrote songs about yet.

maybe not in a way either of you fully understood.

but enough that watching him walk away felt like losing a piece of yourself.

and when the car finally disappeared around the corner, you stood there long after it was gone. the friendship bracelet sat snug around your wrist. tears dried slowly on your cheeks. your mother held one of your hands. nicole held the other.

and for the first time since you were five years old, oscar piastri wasn't just down the street.

he was somewhere far away.

and your heart didn't quite know what to do with the empty space he'd left behind.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

the first few weeks in england felt strange in a way oscar had never experienced before.

not bad.

just... wrong.

like someone had taken his life apart and put it back together again, only a few pieces hadn't landed where they were supposed to.

the boarding school itself was fine. better than fine, really. the buildings looked like something out of the books you'd always tried to make him read, all old stone walls and ivy creeping up windows, with sprawling green fields stretching beyond the grounds. the teachers were kind enough, the classes manageable, and the other boys in his dormitory had accepted him quickly.

oscar had never struggled to make friends.

not because he was loud or outgoing.

but because people tended to like him.

his dry sense of humour, his easygoing nature, the way he could make someone laugh without seeming like he was trying.

within a few weeks, he had people to sit with at meals, boys to talk racing with, teammates to train alongside.

from the outside, he was settling in perfectly.

from the inside, however, everything felt slightly off balance.

because every good thing that happened, every funny story, every stupid joke, every small victory, his first instinct was still to turn and tell you about it.

snd you weren't there.

the absence of you sat quietly in the corners of his days.

not loud enough to stop him functioning. just constant enough that he never forgot it.

the racing helped.

of course it did.

it was why he'd come.

why he'd left melbourne in the first place.

karting had stopped being a hobby years ago. somewhere along the way, it had become the thing everything else revolved around. the early mornings. the endless travel. the training. the sacrifices.

england put him closer to the centre of it all.

closer to opportunities.

closer to teams.

closer to the future he'd been chasing since he was small enough that his feet barely reached the pedals.

the weekends disappeared into races and testing sessions.

the weekdays became a blur of classes, homework, gym sessions, and phone calls home squeezed into whatever free moments he could find.

he was busy.

exhaustingly busy.

which was probably why the homesickness always hit him at the strangest times.

not during races. not during classes.

but while brushing his teeth before bed.

or walking back to his dormitory after dinner.

or hearing a song that reminded him of sitting in your kitchen while you attempted to bake something that almost certainly violated multiple health and safety regulations.

one particularly rainy evening, a little over a month after arriving, oscar found himself unpacking properly for the first time.

there was still something wedged beneath a stack of folded shirts.

a small cream-coloured envelope.

his name was written across the front.

in your handwriting.

slowly, he pulled it free.

inside was a polaroid.

and naturally it was that photo.

you were both thirteen, covered head to toe in flour after a catastrophic attempt at baking your mother's birthday cake. the cake itself sat crookedly in the background, leaning so aggressively to one side it looked seconds away from collapse.

your grin was enormous.

oscar looked deeply unimpressed.

which only made the picture funnier.

tucked behind the photograph was a folded piece of paper.

and immediately he knew.

a poem.

for oscar,

who says poetry is dramatic

and then secretly keeps every poem i give him.

a laugh escaped him despite himself.

"i think distance is a funny thing.

it stretches roads

and oceans

and time zones.

but somehow

it never quite stretches friendship.

you are still in my kitchen

every time i burn cookies.

still in the passenger seat

every time a good song comes on.

still sitting in the treehouse

even when i'm the only one there.

and maybe england is far away.

but the moon still sees us both.

and the stars don't care about maps.

so whenever you miss home,

look up.

i'll be looking too.

love,

your favourite person"

by the time oscar reached the end, he found himself staring at the paper for several seconds.

not reading.

just looking.

outside, the rain continued falling against the windows. the dormitory remained quiet.

somewhere downstairs, distant laughter echoed through the building.

but for a moment, it all felt very far away.

because suddenly he wasn't in england anymore. not really.

he was back in melbourne.

back in your kitchen.

back in the treehouse.

back on summer evenings spent sitting side by side while prince played in the background and you explained some wildly elaborate theory about life that somehow made perfect sense despite being completely ridiculous.

his throat tightened unexpectedly.

not because the poem was sad.

it wasn't.

you never wrote sad poems for him.

but because it felt like home.

and home was currently six thousand miles away.

a small smile spread across his face.

the kind nobody else saw.

the kind reserved only for you.

carefully, he folded the poem again.

slipped it back into the envelope.

then placed both the letter and the polaroid on the drawer beside his bed.

not hidden.

not tucked away.

somewhere he would see them every day.

later that night, long after lights out, oscar lay awake staring at the ceiling.

the rain had finally stopped.

moonlight spilled through the window.

and despite everything—the distance, the homesickness, the ache of missing people he loved—he found himself smiling.

because somewhere on the other side of the world, there was a girl sitting in melbourne who had hidden a poem in his suitcase.

a girl who still wore the bracelet he'd made her.

a girl who somehow made England feel a little less far away.

and for the first time since leaving, oscar fell asleep feeling a little more like himself.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

the first Christmas without oscar felt wrong.

not sad, exactly. just incomplete.

like someone had removed a colour from a painting and expected nobody to notice.

for ten years, christmas had always looked the same.

the piastris and your family together. too much food. too many presents. hattie and edie arguing over board games. mae falling asleep somewhere before dessert. nicole and your mother drinking tea long after everyone else had gone to bed.

and oscar.

always oscar.

sitting beside you while you both wrapped presents badly.

rolling his eyes when you insisted christmas songs needed to be played before december.

helping you hang ornaments because you were too short to reach the top of the tree.

just... there.

a permanent fixture in every christmas memory you had.

until suddenly he wasn't.

his family flew to England that year instead. you understood why.

you really did.

he'd only been gone a few months.

the adjustment was hard enough already.

and boarding schools didn't exactly shut down life because people were homesick.

still, understanding something didn't stop it from hurting.

you spent weeks preparing his present. not because it was expensive.

it wasn't.

oscar had never cared much about expensive gifts.

he cared about thoughtful ones.

about things that meant something.

so you spent evenings putting together a small scrapbook.

photographs. ticket stubs. little memories.

the kind of things nobody else would understand.

a picture of the two of you sitting on the roof of the treehouse at twelve. a photo of oscar covered in flour after losing a baking-related argument.

a dried flower from a school dance you'd both complained about attending.

tiny fragments of a childhood neither of you had realised was ending while it was happening.

you included another poem too.

of course you did.

oscar expected nothing less.

the package arrived in england a week before christmas.

and when oscar opened it in his dorm room after returning from training, he found himself sitting on the edge of his bed for nearly an hour.

not because of the scrapbook, although he loved that.

but because every page smelled faintly like home.

like your perfume.

like melbourne.

like summers.

like everything he'd spent the last few months missing.

"for oscar,

it’s strange here without you.

christmas still happens the same way

even when you’re not in it.

the tree still gets too tall for me to reach.

and i still pretend i don’t need help

even though i always do.

your side of the kitchen feels quieter.

like it’s waiting for you to come back

and make fun of me for doing everything wrong.

i think you’d hate the weather here right now.

it’s too warm for december.

you’d complain about it for at least an hour.

we opened the presents today without you.

it was kind of the same.

just less like home.

but i don’t think things disappear just because you leave them.

i think they just wait.

so i’ll wait too.

and if you’re somewhere with lights this christmas,

look at them properly.

they’re the same ones i can see.

we’re just under different skies.

love,

your y/n"

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

the second christmas passed much the same.

another year.

another set of phone calls.

another collection of racing commitments and school obligations and schedules that never seemed to align properly.

the distance became easier to live with.

harder to ignore.

both at once.

people often assumed long-distance friendships faded naturally.

that time slowly replaced affection.

that absence softened attachments.

what nobody told you was that sometimes the opposite happened.

sometimes missing someone became its own form of companionship. a constant presence. a shadow following you through every important moment.

at seventeen, oscar was everywhere.

and nowhere.

you spoke constantly.

texts.

calls.

voice notes.

pictures sent at ridiculous hours.

you knew which races he'd won before most people did.

he knew when you got accepted into performances before your extended family.

you were still woven through each other's lives.

just differently now.

and perhaps that was the problem.

because neither of you had noticed when friendship had started becoming something harder to define.

something larger.

something neither of you were quite brave enough to name.

then, two years after he'd left melbourne, everything finally aligned.

christmas.

seventeen years old.

oscar was coming home for christmas.

coming back

coming back

coming back

the news spread through both families like wildfire.

your mother cried.

nicole cried.

mae apparently cried because everyone else was crying.

you spent weeks pretending you weren't counting down.

pretending your heart didn't race every time somebody mentioned his name.

pretending the thought of seeing him again wasn't occupying an embarrassing amount of your brain.

it was ridiculous.

you spoke to him all the time. you knew exactly what he looked like.

there were photos everywhere. video calls. messages.

you weren't seeing a stranger.

and yet.

the morning they arrived, you found yourself standing in front of the mirror three separate times.

changing outfits. then changing back. then changing again.

your mother noticed immediately.

naturally.

mothers noticed everything.

"you look lovely."

you narrowed your eyes.

"i haven't even asked."

"you don't have to."

you groaned.

she laughed.

the airport arrival hall buzzed with noise and movement. people reuniting. suitcases rolling. voices overlapping. christmas travellers flooding through every available space.

and then you saw him.

for a moment, everything else disappeared.

because somehow the boy you'd said goodbye to in a melbourne driveway had become someone else entirely.

not different.

still oscar.

always oscar.

but older.

taller.

broader.

more confident somehow.

the soft edges of childhood had begun giving way to adulthood.

and suddenly it hit you.

two years.

two entire years.

you didn't even realise you were moving until you were already running.

oscar spotted you immediately.

his face lit up.

and then you were colliding into him with enough force to nearly knock both of you sideways.

his laugh was familiar. exactly the same. but his voice was deeper. a little more gravelly.

"hi." the word came out against his shoulder.

muffled.

pathetic.

entirely inadequate.

"hi."

his voice sounded softer than you remembered.

neither of you let go immediately.

and for one perfect moment, everything felt normal again.

like no time had passed.

like england had never happened.

like you were still twelve years old in the treehouse planning impossible futures. then reality caught up.

slowly, over the following days, you started noticing things.

little things.

small things.

oscar checking his phone more often. smiling at messages. stepping away to answer calls.

you didn't think much of it initially.

why would you?

until one afternoon.

the two of you were sitting together on the beach.

a place that had once belonged almost exclusively to your shared childhood. the summer air was warm.

the ocean stretched endlessly before you.

and for the first time since he'd arrived, you found yourselves properly alone.

the conversation drifted easily.

school.

racing.

friends.

life.

then oscar went strangely quiet.

you noticed immediately.

of course you did.

"what?"

he rubbed the back of his neck.

looked away briefly. then back again.

"there was something I meant to tell you."

tour stomach tightened.

not dramatically. just enough to notice.

"oh?"

a pause.

then—

"i've got a girlfriend."

the world didn't stop. that would've been easier. the waves kept crashing. the seagulls kept screaming overhead. the sun remained warm against your skin.

everything continued exactly as before.

except suddenly nothing felt the same.

you smiled.

because you had years of practice pretending things didn't hurt.

"really?"

"yeah."

his voice sounded uncertain.

almost guilty.

"that's... that's great, osc!"

you hated how convincing you sounded.

oscar looked at you for a second longer than normal.

like he was searching for something. then nodded.

"yeah."

neither of you said much after that.

what you didn't know was that the relationship had started almost by accident.

that somewhere during those two years, missing you had become unbearable.

that every girl he'd met was measured unconsciously against someone six thousand miles away.

that loneliness had eventually convinced him to try moving forward.

to try wanting somebody else.

to try building something in the space your absence had left behind.

she was nice.

kind.

funny.

easy to be around.

but she wasn't you.

and oscar had spent two years trying very hard not to think about what that meant.

now, sitting beside you with the australian sun painting gold across the ocean, he found himself wondering if he'd made a terrible mistake.

because seeing you again felt like coming home.

and home had always been the one thing he could never quite leave behind.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

a/n : feels good to be writing again!! part 2 out very very very soon trust. as always, comments, feedback and any general interaction is always very much appreciated!! haven't written in so long, i really missed this!! lots of love

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