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Luca is in the middle of a press conference when he finds out about it. Perched on one of those too-tall chairs they always seem to provide, the ones where his own feet brush the ground well, but anyone shorter has to suffer the indignity of dangling like a child. Crowds of journalists staring at them, cameras trained, simple, boring questions rotating through the air.
A normal conference, for all intents and purposes. One week after his best results of the season, a solid fifth place, which is why he is there for the pre-race conference. Marc in the middle because of course he is, and Bezz on his other side. Really it should have been nothing special at all, until that journalist decided to make a joke.
“Marc, we saw you with the helmet when you took a picture with a fan, are you planning on wearing it during the race?”
Scattered laughter echoes around the room, Marc’s face splits into a grin and even Bezz leans forward with a snicker, like those words are part of some strange joke he knows immediately. In fact, everyone seems in on it, but all Luca can do is blink in confusion, let his eyes trace over the expressions everyone is making, attempting to gauge what exactly it is they are talking about.
“Ah, it would be funny, no?” Marc says, sounding delighted, “not very aerodynamic though, so perhaps not.”
“Noooo, everyone will be disappointed,” Bezz responds into his mic, which makes Marc cackle out loud, slapping the Aprilia rider on the shoulder, and also makes Luca even more confused.
“What is this?” He asks without thinking, and eyes swivel to him, filled with mirth. It is Marc who answers, leaning over, smile blinding in the sort of dizzy-making way it always is.
“You did not see?”
Luca shakes his head quietly. Marc grins harder, looking almost thrilled.
“It is like this,” He says, popping his hands up on top of his head, pointed upward, “a fan gave me one of those helmets, with the ears. They all seem to like it.”
Luca presses his lips together, caught a bit by the intensity of having Marc Marquez looking directly at him (an intensity everyone can attest to, even Vale, though he gets all huffy about it). Then his eyes widen slightly as he gets it.
“You mean cat ears?” He blurts despite himself, and the laughter bubbles over in the room once more, now amused at his dumbly baffled question. Marc nods, eyes crinkled up, wiggling his hands a bit, then laughs hard at himself. Luca blinks at him for a bit, brain going slower than it ever has before, and really can’t do much but stare.
Cat helmet. Marc Marquez wore a cat helmet. As in a helmet with ears like a cat on top. He wore one. He wore one and everyone seems to treat it like something funny while all Luca is feeling right now is that obsessive focus he has had for one thing or the other his entire life. Usually it is bikes, or stats, or races, or even once cooking.
But… Cat ears. Marc Marquez in a cat ear helmet.
Huh.
“Didn’t you say you wanted him to wear that once, Maro?” Bezz says into his mic, shit-eating grin on, and the laughter gets louder as a few people remember what he is talking about. Luca can only nod in a weak manner, honest because he has never been a very good liar and it would probably be worse for him to say ’no’ and have everyone well aware he is not telling the truth. Out of the corner of his eye, he swears Marc smirks at him.
“Yes, they asked us who was most likely to wear one of those helmets. I said Marc,” he responds placidly, even though he knows it is a thin defense, even though he knows that explaining it is probably more suspicious than simply laughing, even though he knows if anyone were to watch that video back, they would be able to understand that it really isn’t what he said at all. It had been him who said he wants to see Marc with that sort of helmet, after all. Wants.
At the time it had been something said and laughed off, a semi-Freudian slip of the tongue that wasn’t particularly dangerous at all. Mostly because it was simply for one of those silly videos Honda put out that not that many people watched, and so even though he felt a twinge of regret after saying it, he moved on quite cleanly. Because no one cared.
There was also no danger then because it was one of those far-out ideas that no one believed could possibly happen enough to question why it would be mentioned. Cat helmets were for street racers who like a good gimmick, or because someone wanted to look cute, sexy even. Not MotoGP champions like Marc, who is much more like a lion or panther or something else vicious than a common house cat.
But now Luca is sitting next to Marc in the middle of a press conference and the older rider has worn a damn cat helmet and Luca has not seen it yet and Bezz of all people is bringing up what he said years ago in a stupid challenge video for Honda as if he had been keeping it in the back of his mind and waiting to use some day. And Luca isn’t humiliated per se, that would probably be too intense of a word, but his personal, and rather physical, feelings toward someone are just that. Personal.
“That’s not what you said,” Bezz keeps going cheerfully, and Luca narrows his eyes at the other rider, sees a gleam of wickedness. Last race weekend he had contact with Bezz during the GP. They had both moved on, of course, but he can’t help thinking this might be a bit of revenge. The look his fellow academy rider shoots him confirms that, eyebrows waggling.
“You said you would like to see Marc in a cat helmet. Like.”
Now, Luca is not the violent type. But in the back of his mind, he wonders if Vale would be too upset with him for murdering the Aprilia rider. He thinks maybe a bit, but his brother would get over it.
“Well,” he starts, a bit stilted, “I thought it would be funny.”
“I guess I gave you what you wanted,” Marc says in a strange, low voice, reaching over to squeeze Luca on the thigh in the way he is prone to and has been for years every time they happen to speak. Luca only eyes him in return, a bit at a loss as he decidedly does not notice how the older man’s skin glows under the lights and wishes his thigh didn’t feel cold when the contact disappears.
The moderator clears his throat, trying to herd them back onto the rails, but the damage is already done. Someone in the back asks if it will be in this week’s Ducati Inside. Another voice calls out something about sponsorship opportunities. Marc, entirely unbothered, leans closer to his mic, and Luca of course watches him.
“There are many photos,” he says cheerfully, “too many. But maybe some people really like me with the ears.”
He doesn’t look at Luca when he says that, but nearly half the room does, and he feels that attention prickle on his skin, hot as a brand, in a way he isn’t used to at all. Luca just breathes, shifts on the chair, the plastic edge biting into the back of his thighs. He keeps his face neutral with the effort of someone who has had years of practice doing exactly that, but he can feel heat crawling up his neck anyway. Marc says things like that. Light, offhand, smiling, unseriously flirty, but somehow they always land sharper than they should, Luca has noticed. Like every syllable is entirely on purpose, like every look is double layered. It makes him feel paranoid at every breath the older man takes, in a foolish way that is a bit too much like his brother.
The moderator manages, eventually, to wrestle control back. A question about tire choice. One about the track limits. One about the previously mentioned contact with Bezz. Luca answers on autopilot, the practiced cadence of polite boredom slipping into place, even as his mind keeps circling back, unhelpfully vivid, to the imagined picture.
Cat ears. Marc Marquez on a sleek, unadvertised bike, glossy black helmet on his head, little plastic ears that match his leathers jutted out on top. Head tilted at the camera, the joke obvious even as the picture doesn’t feel like one. A dangerous idea paired with an even more dangerous imagination.
When the press conference finally ends, Luca exhales despite himself. Clips off the microphone, leaves it on the seat, plans exactly how to retreat out of here and settle back into the routine he knows and loves on a race weekend. Pre-practice analysis, rest, physio the next morning sometimes if he needs it, practice sessions, more analysis and debriefs, and on and on it goes. It’s easy to compartmentalize when you have a routine. Luca likes easy.
But a hand on his arm stops him from getting away. And when he shifts his eyes off the floor, it is to a blinding smile and unblinking stare.
“You like cats?” Marc asks, an innocent sort of non-sequitur question if not for the context. Luca stares down at him.
“I have a dog,” he responds blandly, “But, well, yes. I like cats. They are cute.”
That last part was unnecessary. He notes that to himself so he won’t make the same mistake again, notes also the way the older man seems almost surprised by his response eyebrows jumping briefly, eyes narrowing.
“Yes, very cute,” Marc says, humor in his voice like he wants to laugh but knows he should not. “I think you will like the pictures. Maybe I will send you some.”
Then he laughs and turns away like it is nothing.
Luca doesn’t say anything to Marc again after that mostly because he can’t. Marc doesn’t either, just slips away into the little cloud of red that follows him everywhere, head thrown back at some kind of unheard joke as Luca stares and tries to pretend that he isn’t.
It is Bezz who waits for him, smile wide, and Luca just shoots him a flat look and steps by, ready to march to the Honda garage and pretend like that whole conference never happened.
“You look irritated,” the other rider croons in his ear, speeding up to slide into step next to him, and Luca has to hold himself back from scoffing.
“I’m not,” is all he says blankly, and Bezz laughs.
“You are, you are. You do this thing with your jaw whenever you get mad, Vale told me about it after I complained about what happened in Silverstone.”
“Silverstone was your fault,” he points out mildly for the lack of a better argument, and Bezz scowls.
“No it wasn’t,” he says indignantly, “You were the one who ran into me, and beside it was me who lost five positions, not you, and- hey, stop trying to change the subject. Do you want to see the videos or not.”
Interest prickles in the back of Luca’s mind, but he just shakes his head, forcing his eyes to scan over the paddock like he always does. Because this is normal, because it is a normal day and Luca is decidedly not thinking about how Marc might look with that damn helmet on.
That’s a lie. He definitely is. But he shouldn’t, the middle of a paddock filled with cameras is not the time to pop a boner. A race weekend is not the time to pop a boner.
“Come on,” Bezz whines, “they showed up on my TikTok, and-”
“Doesn’t TikTok only show you things it thinks you will like?” Luca asks blankly, turning to look Bezz in the face and the other rider blanches, bravado dropping as the gun he was holding is now pointed at him.
“No, I mean-” he starts, flustered.
Luca doesn’t let him finish, just huffs out a quiet laugh and ducks into the Honda garage, grateful that the conversation is ending there.
For the rest of the day he tries to push it to the back of his mind and is mostly successful. The garage is a zen sort of place, where human emotions get thrown out the window and he can let his brain become a machine more than an organ, analyzing data and critically eyeing the setup they are deciding to test during the first practice tomorrow. It’s peaceful and he almost entirely forgets about that stupid conference and the damn cat helmet. No one in Honda mentions it, anyway, not even Santi Hernandez, who still talks about Marc like a little brother he is particularly proud of and sometimes stares at Luca with this knowing look every time he rewatches races and focuses a bit too hard on the rider in red.
But still, every time he lets his mind wander he sees it, and he has to keep snapping to attention to knock it out of his skull. By the time they all trudge back to their motorhomes, his back is knotted up like the ropes on a ship from the stress of attempting to keep his professional life and his personal thoughts separated. Distantly he types out a text on his phone to his team, planning out a massage session early the next morning. He’ll need it.
The peace and quiet of his motorhome is both a blessing and a curse, in truth. A blessing because the paranoid feeling finally drops away, a curse because the minute all other stimulus disappears, his mind wanders back to that conjured image all too easily. Black leather, upright head, back arched, head tilted curiously. Ears. Like a cat.
He wonders, as he pours a glass of water and brings the glass to his lips, if they tried to get Marc to wear a tail. He can picture that too, except in his imagination it isn’t one of those clip-on, cheap-looking ones from the store that hangs uselessly behind. No, it is real, lashing in the air when the older rider stares down at his data or lifting high and flicking excitedly as he stands on the podium, grin wide, or puffing up after a nasty crash, eyes behind his helmet burning with irritation.
Or wrapping around the thigh of someone who is bending him over the seat of his-
Luca chokes on his water at the surge of arousal, spraying everywhere, and he has to shakily drop it on the counter as he hunches over, hand on his chest, scarlet red now, whether from the lack of oxygen or that thought, he has no idea.
He straightens slowly, coughing once more for good measure, like that might shake the thought loose, or something just as stupid. It does not, of course. The thought clings, irritating and vivid, and he presses the heel of his hand into his sternum as if he can physically push it back down where it belongs, back in the little box he had labelled ‘Not Okay To Think About’ a long time ago. A box that is mostly made up of Marc, actually. Foolishly.
It’s not that he has a crush on the older rider. That would be… dumb. It’s just that Luca still remembers watching Marc on screen before him and Vale turned sour, and he still remembers the way his older brother used to talk about the Spanish rider with such admiration. And fondness. And intensity. And a lot of other things. So it’s not Luca’s fault that he took those words at face value and developed his own sense of admiration and fondness, just as it’s not his fault he couldn’t get rid of it after 2015. It’s all stupid, anyway. The issue is between Marc and Vale, not Marc and Luca.
But still, he knows he isn’t supposed to think about Marc as much as he has a habit of doing, especially because he can’t really separate how pretty the older rider is from all the more normal thoughts about racing. Knew that even back then, so thus the box was born and Luca made sure no one could ever pick up on a thing. It’s not a crush, it’s just… Marc. He gets in your head in all ways, professional and otherwise, and simply refuses to leave, stuck there like a golden idol to project all your fantasies and wishes and wants and everything. That’s what Vale had said once, though he had been very drunk at the time. Not that he is someone to use as a baseline for normal. Especially about Marc.
“Relax,” Luca mutters to the empty motorhome once he is able to breathe properly, voice rough like sandpaper.
He glares at the glass, before hastily pouring the rest of it into the sink and turning the tap on harder than necessary, the great roar of water loud in the quiet as he watches water swirl like it might hypnotize him into calming down. It works a little. Enough that his breathing evens out, enough that the sharp edge of uncomfortable heat dulls into something more manageable. He has had worse intrusive thoughts in worse places, like the middle of the racetrack. At least he is alone right now.
Still, the feeling lingers.
It sits with him as he showers, hot water beating against his shoulders while he keeps his forehead pressed to the tile, breathing measured. He focuses on the mundane. The crack in the shower floor he has never noticed before, the tension in his spine that melts slightly with the pounding water, the smell of his body wash thick in the air, the way the motorhome’s boiler always takes a second too long to heat properly and then too much, so it is scalding by the end. Anything but ears and tails and the particular way Marc’s smile had curved when he talked about the apparent multitude of videos, something smug and coy in his eyes, as if he is well aware that while some may find it funny, others may think about it a bit too much. Luca doesn’t know. He’s probably imagining that bit.
When he finally dries off and pulls on a loose T-shirt, it is almost a relief to have gotten through the shower without letting his mind wander too much. He rolls through the rest of his routine until he hits his bed, head swallowed by his thick cotton pillow, heart pounding in his chest despite himself as he stares up at the ceiling.
This, he supposes, is the difficult part. Usually he runs through the track before he sleeps, the lulling sound of an imagined engine in his ears pulling him into sleep. And he tries to. He closes his eyes and pictures the track he will be on for the rest of the weekend, pictures each corner and straight and the way it feels to jump off the starting line, surrounded by the other roaring engines and bodies and the screams of a crowd.
But this time it is not a track he sees or the bikes he hears. No, it is that helmet, and Marc, sitting astride a bike that has now morphed into Luca’s Honda, his number splashed across the front. And it is Marc’s voice that fills his ears, curling and coy in accented Italian.
‘You like it?’ Imaginary Marc asks, and Luca curses out loud as he rips his eyelids open sitting up and wondering how he will get through this weekend is he can’t even survive shutting his eyes for a single second.
It’s not even that he has never thought of the older rider in this manner. He was a teenager when Marc was early in MotoGP, when he was all plush skin and glowing youth and the brilliant flavor of someone new showing up and destroying everyone else with moves that shouldn’t really be possible. Eighteen-year-old Luca had certainly spent more than one night with his hands down his pants, imagining what Marc Marquez might look like on his knees.
But that was years ago. That was teenage hormones paired with the admiration for a champion paired with the fact that Marc is particularly pretty. That was something he filed away in that little box, and didn’t think about further, especially after 2015 and all his interactions with the older rider became that much more scrutinized.
Yet here they are. Here they are.
In that moment, the phone which he had carelessly tossed on top of his side table lights up, bright in the darkness, and Luca eyes it almost warily, before he decides that at least that can distract him. His stomach only tightens a little bit when he realizes that the texts are from Bezz. It’s a bad idea, he thinks numbly, because he is sure he knows what Bezz wants to talk about. Yet still he opens the app like Persephone descending into the underworld
‘Know you don’t have TikTok’ is the first text. The next is a winky face. The third, fourth, fifth, and sixth? Are all videos. And he is well aware what they are of.
Luca clicks on the first one without even a single thought. It can’t be that bad anyway, right? Luca’s own mind has probably conjured up something so opposite to what happened that he will watch it and just rolls his eyes with a laugh. It won’t be bad. He doesn’t think it will be bad.
The video loads.
And Luca is, instantly, catastrophically wrong.
Marc is outside the Ducati garage, perched on his GP26 and wearing the biking gear that Luca has seen him in before, all tight, almost sheer, lycra that hugs every curve and muscles and detail on his body like a second skin. The cat helmet is on his head, ears cutting clean lines against the sky, absurd and sleek and wrong in a way that makes Luca’s breath catch painfully in his throat.
The camera angle is low, tilted, clearly taken by a fan crouched near the barrier. Marc looks like he is probably laughing, one hand lifting off the bar in a lazy wave, and when he turns his head to something a Ducati team member says, he tilts it perfectly. Like a cat.
Something in Luca’s chest drops. Not flutters or squeezes or heats up slightly, or anything easy like that. No, it drops all the way to the very bottom of his entire being. Like missing a step on the stairs, like the feeling when you jump off a cliff into water, like the first sickening instant before a crash where your body realizes before your brain does and your entire being is weightless and afraid and alive.
Warmth surges painfully through his body and Luca is as hard as he has ever been in ten seconds flat.
“Oh,” he breathes, barely audible in the empty motorhome.
The video keeps going. Marc is explaining something, back arched slightly as he turns, bike rocking gently between his thighs. Someone off-camera shouts something Luca can’t hear, and Marc laughs the way only he does, all chattering, delighted humor. Then like it is some kind of karmic thing to ruin Luca’s life, he reaches up, taps one of the ears with his curled-up fist. It’s… it’s… it’s ridiculous, actually. It’s entirely ridiculous, and from the look in Marc’s eyes that are visible through the open visor, entirely on purpose.
The sound of the engine vibrates through the video, low and intimate, and Marc leans forward over the tank just slightly, weight shifting, spine curving in a way that is painfully familiar to anyone who has ever watched him ride, and Luca’s eyes fall helplessly to the rest of him. To the way his thighs hold tight around the bike, to how without leathers on the whole thing looks… pornographic. He knows it’s not meant to be, knows that the older rider was probably just doing a track walk, or rather bike, with his team, that he most likely came back to his garage to find the fan there with a request and the helmet. That he was probably told to get on the GP26 to make it even funnier. That the… the position he is in is what he always does when he rides, and it is only looks like that because his leathers are off.
But still. Luca’s erection can’t tell the difference between purposeful and accidental, and so as he watches the way Marc continues to pose and laugh and flex the muscles in his back and thighs for the camera, helmet jauntily on his head, the side of his brain that is entirely stolen away by arousal thinks that it must all be Marc’s doing. That maybe he knew what Luca had said all those years ago, that maybe he is teasing. That maybe he wants Luca to watch this and slide his hands down grip himself through his sweatpants and touch himself until he comes to the thought of helmets and tails and skintight lycra.
He lets out faint noise into the quiet, feeling hot and sweaty and exhausted, but his eyes remain glued to the video until it ends. It stops, frozen on a shot of Marc leaning over to shove one of his mechanics in the arm, waist twisted, on display, and disappointment fills Luca’s chest.
Until he remembers that there are five more videos to watch.
Shamelessly he clicks on the next one.
Marc is off the bike now, standing with the fan and posing for a picture. It’s a shot from inside the Ducati garage, and from the screen recording Bezz has taken it looks like it was posted by the team. And on his mind Luca scowls a bit at the idea of Ducati themselves posting Marc like this. Because this shot is also a bit… pornographic. It shows his ass a little too much, almost purposely so, and when Marc throws his head back to laugh, he looks like he is a cat stretching, all bending and arching and smooth. He really is… muscular. Especially back there. Luca knew that, but he tried not to dwell on it before.
The next videos are much the same. Different shots, different angles, forming a picture that is all tight clothes and cat ears and the way Marc might look underneath his hands. The way his body looks bent into different positions. The way he might smile, coy and amused and sure of himself, when he is on his knees or back, or on his stomach, turned around to glance over his shoulder like a vicious monster who knows exactly what he looks like.
He is… this is…
Luca slides a hand into his pants before he can convince himself not to, then restarts the first video with no sound.
Maybe he should feel guilty about this, he thinks distantly as he stares with intensity at his screen. Maybe he should also feel ashamed of himself for looking at Marc, a man who he technically is supposed to dislike, in this manner. But really he has never been the type to mull over these sorts of things too long, more the type to brood for thirty minutes max, shrug, and accept it. Human nature is so very… human after all. And in his personal opinion, you’d have to be dead in the ground to not be affected by Marc looking like that. So mostly he gets a tinkling of distant embarrassment as he wraps his fingers around his erection, which is quickly squashed by how good it feels.
He doesn’t groan or moan or curse or anything like that as he starts to jerk off. Luca has never been particularly loud in the throes of pleasure. His last girlfriend said it was like fucking a robot, because he would simply do what he needs to do, eyes wide open, face placid, focused more on what is in front of him rather than what is going on inside.
Somehow, he thinks Marc wouldn’t mind that. Somehow he thinks Marc would be entirely fine about being the center of attention. Somehow he thinks that Marc would be loud enough for the both of them, and wouldn’t mind the way Luca always gets intense and thoughtful when he has sex. Somehow he thinks the older man might even like it.
It’s almost a perfect image in his head. Marc would probably ride him, he thinks almost clinically. The older man is a control freak; he would want to be on top even as he took it. His thighs would clench strong just like they do in the video, and without even a single layer to cover it up, Luca has no doubt it would be quite the sight. Marc is like an anatomical model, after all, so perfectly made. Every muscle outlined, every tendon taut, every inch of skin smooth and glowing and flawless, aside of course from where those scars litter him. Which makes it even more flawless, in Luca’s opinion.
Marc naked, perfect skin on display with a cat helmet on. Arching beautifully, all compact muscle, a body built to ride paired with a mind born for it sinking down on Luca, noises loud and plentiful. Fingers clawing, nails scratching, teeth biting, wicked laughter pouring out of his mouth.
And Luca would just take it. Touch what he is allowed, avoid what he isn’t. Watch fascinated as Marc throws his head back and uses that body to get off so beautifully. Cat-like, just as in those videos, and twice as dangerous. A coiled-up panther sitting in his lap, grinning down at him, sharp teeth flashing with every jolt, entirely unashamed and entirely aware of the danger that lurks behind every sound.
Well. The precum pearls pretty on the tip of Luca’s erection, and he eyes it for a second, presses his thumb into the tip, stupidly thinking about Marc licking it away with his tongue. Like a cat skimming the top of a bowl of cream. The older rider would be good with his tongue, and Luca could probably just watch him go at it for hours. Watch the flush build, watch those plump lips get plumper, watch Marc’s dark eyes get glassy as he sucks Luca down. In this image, the helmet is gone, but the ears remain. And there is a tail lashing behind Marc, curling around Luca’s ankle.
He comes to that picture, sighing heavily as it rolls through him like a wave. Not the most intense orgasm of his life, but the longest lasting. Mostly because in his head, Marc is still there, lapping at the splatters of semen and drinking it down with a greedy laugh, mouth curled up wickedly when he pulls away, ears flicking in delight.
Luca can almost feel it. He slides his hand up to rub over his forehead, dragging the beading sweat into his hair and making him wonder if he needs to take another shower. Probably. But that is a tomorrow problem.
Another sigh forms in his lungs, filled with something that leans toward regret but is not thick enough to really mean anything. It’s just bodily urges, anyway. It’s just human nature. It’s just an interest that was inherited a long time ago from a man with much less restraint than him.
Vale would probably be mad at him, he thinks distantly as he cleans himself up. He would probably go on another long-winded rant about mind games and not falling for them, the hypocrite that he is. But also maybe he would understand. Maybe he would watch those videos and look at Luca and be angry but get it even if he refused to admit that out loud. Luca thinks that is probably the more accurate picture of what would happen.
Another ding on his phone rips him from his ruminations, and he lifts the screen to his face to see an Instagram notification. He clicks on it numbly and then has to sigh for the third time that night, rubbing his previously semen-soaked hand over his stomach.
Marc had tagged him in a post, a compilation of the cat helmet pictures. He stares down at them, rolls the words in the caption around in his mind.
‘If I had known you would be such a fan of the helmet @lucamarini10 I would have made sure we got a photo together. Hope you like these ones anyway’ followed by a string of emojis. One of them is a cat.
Well. Luca isn’t sure what the morality of liking someone’s Instagram post after you just jerked off to them is, but he does it anyways.
The moral qualms lessen the longer he swipes between each photo, which range from simple, easy pictures standing next to a fan, to a shot from one of those cursed videos, with all the tight-arch-hot of it all. And strangely it feels like… permission. Like maybe Marc really did know exactly where his mind went and is more than okay with that.
Logically, he knows that is not true. But Marc has never tagged him in a post before, and Luca isn’t even in a single video. The only reason you tag someone like that is if you want them to see it.
Or maybe he is over-rationalizing this. Maybe some social media intern saw things online about the press conference and decided to capitalize on that to make a post that would get buzz. It certainly did, up to over 200K likes in minutes, so if that was the goal they succeeded.
But if Marc made the post… well, Luca will think about that later. For now he just scans his eyes over each picture, valiantly avoids reaching down for another round even as the heat pools. He comments after a while of staring, because he kind of has to, something bland and impersonal the way he knows he should. If he waits, staring at the screen, until Marc likes his comment, it doesn’t matter. He was just curious if it would happen.
Eventually he drops his head back to his pillow and closes his eyes gently, mind still swimming around each photo and video and imagined scene. Like a damn curse.
He falls asleep like that, flat on his back, head louder than normal, fingers still wrapped almost possessively around his phone. And when he wakes up the next morning and remembers exactly what it was that sent him to sleep, he allows himself a moment to flush and squeeze his eyes shut before he pushes it all into that little box again.
***
Of all the times to make it on the podium, this has to be the funniest, Luca thinks sardonically as he slides into parc ferme, heart still hammering from the race rather than anything else for once this weekend. Sweat slicks his spine beneath his leathers, adrenaline buzzing sharp and bright, and the world feels too loud and too close in the way it always does after a good result. Cameras crowd in immediately, lenses flashing, the familiar choreography snapping into place.
Third place is good, especially on that bike. Third place is very good. He just sort of wishes maybe a certain rider in red had a bad weekend, because the thought of standing close, being close, of having Marc reach out and clasp his hand with a friendly ‘good race’? He isn’t sure what sort of reaction it will spark in him.
It didn’t help that he had been pretty close for so much of the race. It didn’t help that Marc had a bad start and when he slid past Luca to take second away, he had darted a look over his shoulder that almost looked playful even through the tinted visor. It didn’t help that for just a split-second Luca could have sworn he had seen ears on top of that scarlet-red helmet, before the older rider disappeared into the distance to chase Pecco for the lead.
None of it helped, but still it happened, and Luca has just enough time to attempt to recover his composure that is so often lost in adrenaline and speed before Marc rolls in, Ducati surrounding him with cheers and laughter immediately as they have been apt to do since the older rider was painted red for the first time.
He doesn’t look at Luca at first, busy talking, and then going up to his team, and then unclipping his helmet, dark hair plastered to his forehead with sweat, grin already forming as he glances toward the stands and runs his fingers through his hair. The crowd roars for him like they always do, a living thing that surges and swells at his presence in the manner only one other rider has been able to manage before. Luca keeps his eyes firmly forward, jaw tight, telling himself, not for the first time this weekend, that the Instagram post meant nothing. That Marc wasn’t teasing him. That he is not thinking about cat ears, or lycra or the way Marc’s voice sounded in his head when he came.
Then he feels the pressure of a thousand suns for the briefest second, and he knows that Marc is looking at him. Against his better judgment, Luca turns to catch his eye, finds what he swears is curiosity, interest, amusement, more, all wrapped up in the black velvet of Marc’s race-blown eyes.
The look is brief, as is the way Marc steps forward and claps him on the shoulder, bland banalities thrown out from both of them as Luca analyzes every move he makes. The fingers squeeze and he does his best not to flinch and Marc’s mouth curves up like he is holding back a joke, and that is it.
Luca moves away first, hiding like a child behind a hug to Pecco, who blessedly doesn’t notice a thing, simply starts complaining about something another rider did at the first corner.
On the podium the anthem plays, cheers pour out, and Luca lets himself be pulled into the moment, into his best result with Honda to date. He smiles for the cameras, accepts the trophy, lifts it when he’s supposed to, stares down at his team and feels pride a mile high just as he should. The ritual steadies him, the familiarity of satisfaction and the routine he has followed since he was a child. Racing he understands; racing has rules.
Marc, however, does not. Marc is a wild card if there has ever been one, both on and off track. The type of person to smile and laugh and lean in close, and then rip your throat out the second those lights go out. The type of person who holds himself above everything else who keeps a barrier up at all times unless he likes you very much, but has no issues posting himself half naked across the world. The type of person who people despise so much they want him dead, or revere so much they treat him like an idol sent down from the heavens. The type of person who is known for mind games and wars and rivalries that last decades, but who also smiled at Luca when he first came into MotoGP and didn’t seem to project Valentino Rossi onto him like so many others have done before.
When the champagne begins to spray in the air in grand, bubbly arches, Marc is the first to soak him, because everything of course seems intent of striking at Luca’s self-control. He barely has time to brace before cold liquid hits his chest and neck and face, soaking through his suit, carbonation fizzing on his skin. Marc laughs loudly, unrepentant, already winding up for another spray before Luca can even wipe his face off.
“Bastard,” he says, but there’s no heat in it, and Marc’s eyes flicker as he laughs, gaze sliding all over Luca.
“You are too slow,” the older rider shoots back, accent thick with adrenaline, grin wicked as he dodges Pecco’s spray. Luca doesn’t even try to get him, focuses on soaking the Honda crew down below and not thinking about what Marc’s lips look like wrapped around the head of the bottle.
The real issue of course comes when they pose for the pictures. Marc in the middle, Pecco on the left, Luca on the right, and as he shuffles in closer to the older man, Marc slips on champagne, almost going down.
Luca helps him. Foolishly. And it isn’t something dramatic or anything, he doesn’t catch the older man in one of those dips from the movies or anything, but his hand does curve around Marc’s waist, and big eyes do blink up at him, and that curling smile does quirk into something it more human, and Marc does laugh as they straighten up.
And Luca… Luca does something stupid.
He lets his hand linger. He lets it sit there firmly on Marc’s waist, fingers digging into the leathers. He lets it stay there throughout the picture taking, even as Pecco simply has a casual hand on Marc’s shoulder. He lets it dip, even, lets his hand wander slightly lower than he should. Lets himself do worse, because when Marc shifts away slightly Luca accidentally tugs him back, hand clamping down because the buzz of feeling the curve of Marc’s waist (and more) under his fingers is making him stupid and greedy and entirely illogical.
The older rider doesn’t say a thing about it, just as he didn’t say or do a thing when Luca’s hand went a bit too low. Just turns to him, eyes once again analyzing, and smiles. Then he is gone, and they’re ushered away, down from the podium and back into the controlled chaos of the paddock, to their garages where their teams will tell them everything they did wrong.
Luca is in a daze the entire way back, hand tingling. The minute he gets inside, he wrenches his mind back into professionalism, distantly waving at Joan, who had yet another unfortunate crash, and simply is glad that he won’t be on the end of another difficult conversation. The bike worked really well for the first time in a while, Luca knows his performance was solid, so blessedly there is nothing more to say. They simply go over a few technical things for the next race, asked him for some feedback, and then it’s done. Far easier than most debriefs.
Luca eventually peels himself out of his leathers in his riders room with the methodical focus of someone determined not to think too much. He towels off, pulls on team gear, grounds himself in the weight of fabric and routine, grounds himself before he has to go to yet another press conference to sit next to Marc Marquez and try not to think about any of it. Bezz won’t be there, at least, and he is sure the focus will be more on Pecco and Marc’s battle to the flag than anything having to do with that damn helmet, or the way Luca had… clung on the podium.
He’s halfway out the door, pulling on his Honda cap, when someone clears their throat. And maybe Luca’s body knows before his mind does, because he tenses up automatically, head snapping up to stare blankly in front of him even when he can feel a presence leaning against the wall to his side.
“You really had a good race.”
Marc’s voice is closer than it should be.
Luca blinks twice, then turns slowly, schooling his face into something neutral but not unfriendly as best as he can. Marc stands inside the long hallways of the Honda hospitality area, out of his leathers now, posture easy like he belongs there, like it is still his team. It kind of is, even if he has been gone for years. Luca bets he had no issue walking right in, probably was welcomed with grins and cheers. His hair is damp, his cheeks still flushed from exertion, eyes bright with that familiar, dangerous energy.
He looks good, that is to say. And Luca still remembers the shifting of muscle under his fingers as Marc laughed up there in front of everyone.
“Thanks,” Luca says, because that is the correct, normal, expected response. “You too.”
Marc hums, glancing around like he’s taking in the space, the lack of people as everyone prepares to get everything ready to leave, the very thin veneer of privacy. His gaze flicks back to Luca.
“You see the post?” He asks lightly.
Well. Shit.
Luca exhales through his nose, entirely helpless. “I did. I liked it. I commented.”
Marc shrugs, casual, something pleased settling in his face, lips curling up more than normal.
“Could have been someone from your social media team,” he offers, and Luca huffs a bit, because isn’t that funny. Almost the exact thing he thought when he saw that Marc had tagged him in a post.
“Well, it was me.”
“And?” Marc prompts, head tilting just a fraction.
Luca doesn’t know what is happening. His mind is whirring at a million miles an hour in an attempt to rationalize or explain or figure this out. But really there is no logical explanation for Marc being here, or even for Marc making that post last night. If it were anyone else Luca would label it interest. But it can’t be that.
“I liked the helmet,” he responds as unemotionally as possible, “it suits you very well.”
“Does it?”
“As I said.”
“How much does it suit me?”
Luca stares. Watches as the older man’s smile widen the longer he just blankly assesses, watches Marc assess him back. He feels something prickle, feels the box in his head slightly open.
“Are you flirting with me?” He asks before he can stop himself, and Marc’s eyebrows fly up as he begins to laugh.
“Were you flirting with me on the podium?” He counters and Luca blinks, still trying to analyze it all. He doesn’t know how to respond to that question, but Marc amusedly waits until he does.
He settles on his default, which is, unfortunately, honest,
“No,” he gets out, “or rather I didn’t mean to.”
Marc nods sagely.
“Ah yes,” he says in a lofty tone, smile still firmly in place, “we all accidentally feel up people all the time. A common issue.”
Luca’s face blooms with color, analysis is thrown out the window, and he knows he must be as red as the shirt Marc is wearing because the older man looks like a cat that got the cream.
“That is-” he begins to protest weakly, “I don’t mean it was an acci- I wasn’t feeling you- I-”
He is at a loss for words. He hates being at a loss for words. The feeling of being unable to control every single syllable on his tongue strikes him square in the chest and he… he… he…
A hand grabbing his makes him flinch out of what might have been panic, and when he rapidly blinks, Marc is now in front of him. And he looks very much like he is enjoying this.
“No?” He croons, “so that was Pecco’s hand I felt on my ass?”
Somehow, Luca feels himself go even redder. His mind is fuzzed out and the box has been destroyed, and all he can think about is that stupid cat helmet and the way Marc had felt under his fingers and the delighted look in his eyes and the way the older man has shifted closer than they have ever been before.
“Maybe,” he manages, and Marc laughs once more, so close now it vibrates through Luca’s chest as he stares down at the older man.
“You’re a terrible liar.”
Luca swallows.
“I know.” He says, and for the first time shame rises like monolith, and it must show on his face because Marc laughs again, other hand reaching up to curve around the nape of Luca’s neck. His fingers are thick and long and calloused and hot and Luca wonders if the older man is going to throttle him for daring.
But he doesn’t. Marc just shifts even closer grins even harder, presses even firmer.
“Oh calm down,” he murmurs, “I never said I didn’t like it.”
And if Luca thought his mind had stuttered to a halt before, it is nothing to this. nothing to the way every cell in his body freezes as he processes what Marc said. He blinks once. Process even harder. Blinks again. Ties a few things together. Blinks again.
“What?”
“What?” Marc echoes with a grin.
He blinks again. And distantly he notes that they are in a hallway that any Honda employee can walk through. That there are cameras everywhere here. That the history between their families, or rather between Marc and Vale, is so massive and intense that if anyone even saw them this close a little there would be thousands of articles written about it.
But he needs the answer to the puzzle in his brain. So he asks.
“You liked me touching you?”
Marc nods like it is easy. Like that answer isn’t entirely against all common sense. Like it isn’t something that should never have been said. Like he really means it. And Luca has a small realization.
Marc Marquez is definitely flirting with him and he thinks he has been since the damn press conference.
Well. Right. Okay.
“You liked touching me, I presume? Also looking at me. You liked that post I made then commented ten minutes later. Did you really stare at those pictures for ten minutes? You like cats that much?”
Now, if it were any other moment, any other person, any other second, Luca might deny that. Even with his inability to lie he would figured out a way to not answer with yes or no. He is good at finding ways to avoid when he really doesn’t want to respond, and he should very much not want to respond to this particular question.
But it is not any other person, or any other moment or any other second.
“Yeah,” he manages, “well, no. Not to the cat part. You just looked good. In them. In the helmet and the pictures.”
Marc’s grip tightens like he is rewarding him for that answer, and Luca can only stare, brain narrowed in on just the way Marc is looking at him right now, the way he is so close, the way he keeps suppressing an even wider smile as if he is attempting to be careful about this.
“Did I?” He asks delicately. “Did you jerk off to them?”
The question is crass and like a slap to the face. As is the way Marc moves his hand to his waist, and oh, Luca’s fingers are on him again. And this time there is no thick leather as a barrier, just warm skin through a t-shirt and the way he presses into the touch like he actually likes it.
Marc is smaller out of his gear, he observes. And more sensitive. When Luca flexes his fingers, the older man’s lashes flutter the slightest bit, and he looks even more pleased.
“No,” Luca eventually manages, and he sees disappointment flare, which he really can’t abide by right now.
“Bezz sent me videos, I… to those.”
The pleased look is back on Marc’s face, and Luca notes that it suits him well. He categorizes it, labels it, and files it away in the back of his head. No box to shove it into anymore, but there nonetheless, like every little fact and stat and piece of information he has ever learned. Like everything he wants to remember.
“Well that’s flattering,” Marc says mildly, and Luca decides that he can be a bit illogical right in this moment. So he slides his other hand up to Marc’s waist, and tugs him in until they are flush, and learns learns learns.
He learns that Marc likes it when he squeezes down firmly. He learns that Marc smells like adrenaline and bergamot. He learns that up close there are freckles dotted over his cheeks. He learns that Marc’s eyes aren’t actually pitch black like they look from far away, but a dark shade of burnt umber. He learns that it hurts his back a bit to lean down and nose against Marc’s cheek. He learns that the older man laughs when that happens.
“Down boy,” Marc coos, “what happened to Mr. Cool and Collected?”
Luca just hums, not a single word on his tongue. He is being a little bit overwhelmed with the influx of information right now, after all. In the back of his mind he is well aware that it has gone from zero to one hundred rather fast. Or maybe not zero. Closer to twenty-five, maybe fifty. Seventy-five? He isn’t sure. His brain is kind of going haywire. Maybe it has been for a while, all his synapse misfiring in a way they weren’t supposed the first time he looked at Marc and wanted.
God. Vale would kill him. But he would also understand.
In the distance a door slams, and Luca feels it tear him out of the buzzing sensation that had settled over him. His hands tighten, as if Marc may jerk away from him the second it becomes clear they are not alone, but the older man doesn’t. He just tilts his head at the sound (like a cat, Luca’s mind unhelpfully tacks on) and smiles, looks vaguely embarrassed.
“Ah, I probably should not have done this here,” he says as bashfully as Luca has ever seen him, “but not my fault. Very much your fault.”
That makes Luca furrow his brow.
“How is this my fault?” He wonders, words finally arriving on his tongue, and Marc lightly pats him on the cheek.
“No one could handle a pretty boy like you acting like that and not want to jump his bones. Actually I am behaving quite well.” Is all he says, and Luca flushes again. He keeps doing that. But honestly, whatever. It doesn’t matter. The ends justify the means he supposes, the means being acting like a teenager with a crush, the end being getting his hands on Marc Marquez’s waist and holding him close.
“But….” Marc says, pushing him back slightly in the chest.
“We have a press conference to get to. So we will have to stop,” he continues. Luca frowns, especially hard when the older man pulls out of his grasp. His hands hover uselessly in the air, cold as ice blocks and while the rational part of his brain, which is slowly fighting back to the forefront, is agreeing with what Marc says, the other part, that Luca isn’t even sure what to label, is deeply against not touching anymore.
He licks his lips.
“You’re right,” he decides, and Marc gives him another pleased look. Luca decides in that moment that he needs to keep a running list of whenever that happens, simply so he can make sure it happens a lot. New goal in mind, he nods, drops his hands to his side and finally allows himself to breathe properly for the first time since he stepped out of that room.
Marc laughs, steps away fully and now they are standing like normal coworkers, the space between them now semi-normal and semi-simple and everything that it has not been for what feels like hours. Luca stares at him for a moment, eyes sliding everywhere, and Marc turns his face away, ears going a shade of pink Luca swears he has never seen before. So he names it in his head, and files it away too.
“You have to stop staring at me like that,” the older man mumbles. Luca hums again.
“Why?”
Marc shoots him a look.
“Because I don’t think letting you fuck me in the middle of this hallway is a very good idea.”
At that Luca nods, because what else can he say to such a thing, and falls into step next to Marc as they finally move to leave the Honda hospitality. The sunlight beams out in the paddock, and he still hears the thunder of thousands of fans’ feet, and he wonders for just a moment if any of them would ever expect something like this. Probably not. Luca certainly didn’t. He had run the numbers in his head a thousand times over and not one ended with Marc Marquez pressing him up against a wall and talking to him like that.
Perhaps, he thinks vaguely, his calibration is off. Perhaps he will have to adjust that. Perhaps someone can help him.
“Oh,” Marc says offhandedly as they are just about to exit, “I kept the helmet by the way.”
Luca stops in his tracks, but Marc keeps going, not even glancing back at where Luca has malfunctioned at the thought, opening his mouth to speak, but coughing instead.
The older man finally looks back at that, face terribly amused.
“Ah, why did you stop? Hurry up,” he says, though he knows fully well why. Luca just smiles, drags a hand down his face, and shakes his head helplessly. This is crazy. This is completely insane and entirely illogical and he is not prepared on how to handle any of this. There are no rules to follow, no manual to read, nothing.
He kind of likes it.
“Here, kitty kitty,” Marc croons, crooking a finger to urge Luca closer before dissolving into cackles like it’s the funniest thing in the world.
Luca goes. And when Marc slides a hand over his arm lightly as what feels like another reward… well….
It just about makes him purr.
The End