She didn't come back to be seen.
And yet... they both noticed.
Twelve years after a crash shattered everything, Y/n Auclair returns to the paddock...quieter, guarded, no longer anyone's secret. But some things don't fade. Not the way Pierre watches...
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Summary: Y/n returns to the paddock, and with one coffee, Charles and Pierre feel everything they thought they'd outgrown come rushing back. Content Warnings: Mild language Word Count: 1.8k
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Charles Leclerc and Pierre Gasly had always been best friends. They had that kind of bond built by most on karting tracks. The kind which was built by competition, where every race, every run, even something as dumb as "who can sprint to that stack of tires faster" turned into a battle. Their friendship had been made from rivalry, shaped by it. And somehow, it had always worked, until it didn't.
When they were fifteen and sixteen, the competition shifted. This time, it wasn't about lap times or footraces. It was about Y/n Auclair.
Y/n was Jacques Auclair's little sister, and she'd grown up around them, quietly in the background at first, tagging along with her older brother to races here and there. But something changed the year before Jacques aged out of their category he started bringing her around more. She wasn't a kid anymore. Both Charles and Pierre noticed it at the same time. There was just something about her. The way she smiled too wide when she laughed. The way she bounced her leg whenever Jacques was on track, unable to sit still. She'd never noticed the effect she had. Not on them, at least. But the moment she started hanging around regularly, they both fell. Hard.
And, for the first time, they hated each other a little.
Y/n didn't have a clue. She thought they were all friends. She'd chat with Charles, then with Pierre, laughing and talking like it meant nothing, completely unaware that the two boys had started glaring at each other behind her back. Snapping. Getting snide. Everyone around them noticed. Their whole karting circle knew....
Y/n was accidentally in the middle of a love triangle which neither Charles or Pierre had signed up for but one that both refused to walk away from.
"Shut up. Seriously. You need to stop, it's creepy. Pierre's your best friend," Lorenzo had told Charles one day after hearing yet another rant about how Pierre got her number first.
"You're like a stalker, Mate. That's gross," Anthoine had told Pierre, after catching him crouched behind a stack of tires, trying to eavesdrop on Y/n and Charles having a conversation.
Eventually, it all got to be too much. Charles and Pierre had a major fight . One of those shouting matches where no one even remembers what was said, only that it hurt. And after that, they swore off competing for girls forever. They were supposed to be best friends, brothers, a duo. No one and nothing was worth throwing that away.
