I keep seeing these tiktoks of this interior designer and a general contractor doing the trend where it goes: "I'm the [blank] and I wanted [insert thing here]" followed by, "I'm the [blank] and –" and then they get cut off because it doesn't matter, the first person gets what they want regardless of anything else. It reminded me of the fic looks could kill (I've got high beams) (which is really good, everyone go read it) but it also made me think up my own au. So, walk with me for a second.
Imagine interior designer Lando in the early stages of his career. He's with a firm that's doing well enough, he's done a few big projects where he's the secondary designer or has some sort of immediate supervisor but nothing on his own.
Eventually, he gets assigned a bigger project. A complete home renovation on a plot of land out in the countryside. The previous house gets completely demolished, the new owners wanting to built their own forever home that meets their exact desires.
Lando loves it. It's the first project he's had where he truly feels like he can be creative.
The only problem is how eccentric it is. All the usual contractors he reaches out to keep declining, claiming it's unrealistic to achieve everything the client wants within the given budget and timeframe.
This goes on and on until eventually he finds Mark's company and reaches out to the team headed by Oscar.
Oscar agrees to do a consult, because this is during the slow period of the year so he doesn't exactly have much to loose.
When they meet at the site, still bare boned and half demolished, Oscar realises just how fucked he is. Because this crazy designer with some stupidly eccentric project is hot. Stupid hot. And he's charming, and funny, and he's got this bright eyed wonder to his face every time he smiles.
And fuck — how's Oscar supposed to say no to that?
So, he agrees to it. Agrees to the weird banisters. To the counter tops he knows will take at least a week to install. To the lighting details that his electricians will hate him for when he briefs them about it.
For a second, ancipatory regret flickers through his mind. He thinks about how the hell he's going to make this all work given the parameters.
But when he first says yes to Lando's project, the smiles he gives Oscar washes away that moment's regret instantly.
What follows is eight months of absolute hell for Oscar and his team, but he can't even regret it given the way Lando smiles at him every time he's on site.
And maybe they flirt a lot around site and everyone else has a betting pool for various things. Namely how long before they kiss and how many more ridiculous details Oscar will agree to because Lando smiled at him when he asked.
About three months into the project, work starts to pick up again. Lando takes on a bunch of smaller projects. Mindless, repetitive stuff where he's able to use the usual contractors again. But even though it's all small stuff he's still busy. Far too busy to be driving from London into the countryside constantly for no real reason. So, his visits to The Project become few and far between, only stopping by at key points in the project for inspections and such. He's there for barely an hour at a time, he only has time to speak to Oscar about the project, all the usual banter turning into stress. Half the time he feels like his mind is already floating to whichever site he has to go to after this.
And it sucks. He's spent almost every day for the last three months at site, hanging around more than anything. He hardly sees Oscar casually anymore and he hates it.
But life moves on, they both have things to do —projects to be complete.
Eventually, it's over though. The house is basically complete and Oscar's just waiting on Lando for the final inspections before he hands it over to the clients.
And when Lando sees it in all it's glory he's ecstatic, truly delighted with how well it's all turned out. He can't stop smiling during the final walk through.
And Oscar's happy too. Because even if this was the worst project in terms of how difficult it was, Lando's happy. Right now that's all that matters to him.
When Lando hands the house over to the clients, Oscar sticks around, says he wants to make sure they're happy with everything. It's a lie, he's only there to look at Lando smile everytime the clients praise his work. Lando's bashful about it every time they do, letting out a nervous laugh and constantly pivoting to praise Oscar and his team for making it all possible.
Right as they're all about to leave, the wife make some comment about Lando and Oscar – something that implies that they're togther in some way – in this completely innocent casual tone. Obviously, they get bashful about it, trying to deny it because, well, they aren't together. But the wife just waves them off, and the couple leave the property.
Lando and Oscar just stand there in the driveway staring at each other. And then something something confession and they kiss right there.
One of the guys on Oscar's team pulls into the property right as they do, he's supposed to be there to pick up some tools that accidentally got left behind. But he sees Lando and Oscar, so it ends with him spamming the work group chat with blury photos and trying to claim the betting pool.
Maybe there's an epilogue of Lando and Oscar designing their own home and being all domestic and reminiscent about how they got togther. Then they grow old togther in a home that's theirs right from the foundation to the matching mugs they use every morning before heading off to work. Which they now do a lot of togther.
