Rival Hearts by itsvlada

[Nico’s POV]

*Eleven years ago*

The letter in my locker was going to kill me. Not metaphorically. Literally.

My heart hammered against my ribs like it was trying to escape, and every breath felt stolen. Two years of swallowed words, sleepless nights, and careful silences had crystallized into three pages of handwritten confession hidden behind my spare gloves.

And today, I was finally going to hand my death sentence.

"Your sector two was fucking tragic," Soren said, shouldering me hard enough to send me stumbling. His laugh was infectious—always had been. That was the problem. "You took that chicane like my grandmother drives to church."

"At least I know where my braking points are. Yours were somewhere in the Mesozoic era."

He barked out another laugh, and the sound hit me like a physical blow. God, I was so fucked. "Bold talk from someone who nearly parked it in the gravel trap."

We'd been doing this dance for five years now—the easy banter, the casual touches, the way he'd fall asleep on my shoulder during film reviews like it meant nothing. Like it wasn't slowly killing me.

Because Soren Lindqvist was beautiful in the way that ruined people. Sharp cheekbones that could cut glass, eyes the color of winter storms, perfect full lips and a smile that made me forget how to think in straight lines.

Worse than beautiful—he was mine. My amigo, my best friend. My person. The only one who knew that I practiced my victory speeches in Portuguese when I couldn't sleep.

He had no fucking clue what he was doing to me.

We'd met at twelve at a junior karting academy in Italy where neither of us spoke the language well enough to belong.

Soren taught me Swedish curse words, claiming they were compliments. I caught on after the third time I called an instructor a "fucking idiot" thinking I was praising his technique.

He performs for everyone—louder, sharper, always angling for the crowd. With me he’s dropping the act. Just himself, irritating and honest and so carelessly real that something in my chest would tighten in a way I'd stopped trying to explain.

Two years. Two years since that night on the Formula 4 academy rooftop when he'd said, "You're the only person who really gets me, you know that?"

Two years of watching Soren laugh and feeling the ground shift. Two years of replaying accidental touches, analyzing conversations for meaning that probably wasn't there, telling myself amanhã—tomorrow I'd be brave enough.

Two years since I'd realized that what I felt wasn't just friendship. It was something volcanic, something that made my skin burn every time he touched me.

Tonight, it ended. One way or another.

We pushed through the locker room doors, and the familiar chaos hit us—fifteen junior drivers in various states of undress, the air thick with sweat, testosterone, and the particular cruelty of teenage boys sensing weakness.

My locker was three down from his. Close enough that I could smell his cologne—something expensive his father sent from Sweden. Close enough that when he stripped off his race suit, I had to stare at the floor to keep breathing.

"Qualifying's going to be brutal tomorrow," he was saying. "Did you see how Leclerc was taking turn seven? Kid's got ice in his veins."

I nodded, not trusting my voice. The letter felt like it was radiating heat through the metal door.

The plan was simple. Wait until we're alone. Hand him the envelope. Ask him to read it later. Walk away before my hands start shaking.

Simple.

I spun my combination lock—muscle memory, three numbers I could dial in my sleep. The door swung open, and I saw my spare gloves sat exactly where I'd left them, but the letter was gone.

Cold dread flooded my system, the kind that made your vision go white at the edges. I pawed through my gear with increasing desperation. Racing suit, spare helmet, energy bars my mother had sent from Brazil—

"Looking for something, Almeida?"

Marco Drexler's voice cut through the noise like a blade. He stood three lockers over, my letter dangling from his fingers like a dead thing. His smile was the stuff of nightmares, all teeth and malicious joy.

The room went cemetery quiet—that particular stillness that meant blood was about to hit the water while my world tilted sideways.

"Found this little love note tucked away," Marco announced, unfolding the letter with theatrical slowness. "Thought you boys might want to hear what our Brazilian prince has been writing in his spare time."

He cleared his throat and began reading in a mocking falsetto.

"'I don't know how to say this except to just say it. Every time you touch me—even accidentally—I feel like I'm burning. When we're working on the cars together and your hand brushes mine, I can't breathe properly for the next five minutes.'"

Laughter erupted, cruel and cutting, designed to flay skin from bone.

No. No, no, no. Those words were private. Sacred. Mine.

"'I wanted to tell you then that you're the only person who's ever made me feel like this. Like I'm losing my mind. Like I can't think straight when you're near me.'"

Someone made a gagging sound. Another boy whistled low and dirty.

My throat closed. This was how I was going to die—not in a race car at 200 kilometers per hour, but standing in a locker room while my secrets were turned into entertainment.

"'I've spent two years trying to convince myself this would go away,'" Marco continued, savoring each word like wine. "'But it hasn't. It's only gotten worse, and I don't know if you feel anything like this. Maybe you don't. Maybe this will ruin everything between us.'"

The room was breathing as one organism now, fifteen pairs of eyes locked on the unfolding carnage.

"'But I can't pretend anymore that I don't want to kiss you. That I don't lie awake thinking about what it would feel like if you wanted me back.'"

The silence that followed was deafening.

Then someone started laughing—high-pitched, hysterical—and the room erupted. A whistle, voices I couldn't separate through the roaring in my ears, as others joined in until the sound felt like razor wire against my skin.

Marco's eyes found Soren in the crowd as my best friend stood frozen, face pale as winter. "Who wants to guess who our little maricón has been dreaming about?"

"Bet it's one of the instructors!" someone called out.

"No way—it's Rossi," James called out. "He's always staring during briefings."

"That's fucking disgusting," Rossi laughed.

"Could be any of us," Marcus added. "Better check your beds tonight!"

I stood perfectly still, watching my life implode in slow motion. There's a particular discipline in remaining motionless while your world burns—I'd like to say I chose it.

But the truth was my body had simply stopped obeying commands.

Marco's grin turned predatory. "Catch, Lindqvist. Your love letter."

The pages sailed through the air in a perfect arc. Soren caught them reflexively, his eyes dropping to the handwriting he'd know anywhere—we'd passed notes through five years of lectures.

I watched him turn slightly away from the group to read and time crystallized, each second felt sharp enough to draw blood.

This was it. This has to be.

This was where Soren would prove he was who I'd always believed him to be.

He'd tell Marco to go fuck himself. He'd look at me with confusion or discomfort or even rejection—anything human. Anything that acknowledged that the person bleeding on this floor was his best friend.

Soren read for what felt like hours. I watched his shoulders shift, his face rearrange into something I'd never seen before. Cold and distant. A stranger wearing familiar lovely features.

Then he laughed—real laugh—and the sound drove through my chest like a spear.

"Jesus Christ…" Soren said, voice carrying to every corner of the suddenly silent room. "Can you actually imagine?" He looked me up and down like something he'd scraped off his shoe. "Him? As if I'd ever…" He shuddered theatrically. "That's fucking disgusting."

The room exploded. Louder now, vicious, given permission by his participation. Marco clapped Soren on the shoulder like they'd been friends all along.

"Should have known," someone shouted. "Always knew there was something off about him."

"Better watch your backs in the showers, boys!"

"Probably been jerking off thinking about all of us!"

Soren crumpled my letter—two years of desperate honesty—and tossed it toward the trash. It missed, landing on the wet tiles like roadkill.

I watched my best friend walk away with the pack that had just torn me apart, and felt something inside my chest go very, very quiet.

Not broken, because broken implied it could be fixed. This was something else, something final.

Então é assim. So this is how it is.

I'd handed him my heart, and he'd fed it to the wolves.

The laughter followed me out of the locker room, down the hallway, into the night where I could finally, finally stop pretending I was still breathing.

But I was still here. Still standing.

And I would never, ever make the mistake of trusting someone with the truth again.