I Just Know I’m Going To Love This Series - Blog Posts
Radio Silence | Chapter One
Lando Norris x Amelia Brown (OFC)
Series Masterlist
Summary — Order is everything. Her habits aren't quirks, they're survival techniques. And only three people in the world have permission to touch her: Mom, Dad, Fernando.
Then Lando Norris happens.
One moment. One line crossed. No going back.
Warnings — Autistic!OFC, strong language.
Notes — Welcome to the Radio Silence universe! This chapter is mainly devoted to introducing Amelia as a character, but does have a bit of Lando in it too! Hope you love it.
Want to be added to the taglist? Let me know! - Peach x
2018
Amelia Brown stared at the new plaque on her dad’s office door.
Zak Brown, CEO of McLaren Racing.
She hated it.
Not because she wasn’t proud of him. Of course she was — her dad was brilliant, and he’d worked for years to get that title. It made sense. It was logical.
But the words looked wrong. Off-balance. Too sharp.
The old plaque had been there for years. Zak Brown, Executive Director of McLaren Technology Group. She knew the exact spacing of the letters, the way the light hit the brushed metal in the afternoon. She’d memorised it without meaning to. It had become part of the hallway, part of the routine. Safe.
She shifted her weight from foot to foot, fingers twitching at her sides.
It wasn’t just a new title. It was everything.
The MTC felt different now. The air had a new kind of buzz to it — louder, sharper. People looked at her differently, talked to her like she was someone else entirely. Like being the CEO’s daughter had changed her, too.
The rules had changed, and no one had told her what the new ones were.
—
Her father had been a Formula One fan for as long as she could remember.
V10 engines were her lullaby as a baby; the high-pitched scream of them a strange kind of comfort. Over time, the sound had settled into her nervous system, familiar and grounding.
By the time she was eight, she couldn’t fall asleep without it. Old races playing softly on the TV, the steady rhythm of the commentators’ voices, the roar of the engines, the tension winding through each lap.
One night, when she was ten, the power had gone out during a storm. No TV. No white noise. Just silence and the wind scraping at the windows.
She’d curled up in her bed, fists pressed tight against her ears, trying not to cry.
Then came footsteps in the hallway. Steady. Familiar.
Her dad’s voice followed, soft but certain. “Hey, kiddo. Got something for you.”
He stepped into her room with a dusty old laptop under one arm and a tangle of wires in the other.
Ten minutes later, her princess-themed bedroom was filled with the warm flicker of a grainy screen. The 2005 Japanese Grand Prix. One of her favourites.
She knew the race by heart. Raikkonen’s last-lap pass on Fisichella, the way Alonso danced through the field like he could see gaps before they even opened. She mouthed the commentators’ lines without realising, her breathing slowly syncing with the rhythm of the engine notes.
Her dad didn’t say anything. He just sat on the floor beside her bed, legs stretched out, back against the wall, holding the laptop steady for her to see.
Eight years later, Amelia thought about that night a lot.
She wasn’t stupid. She knew what Formula One had meant to her dad before she was even born. But somewhere along the line, it had become more than just his dream. It had become theirs.
For Amelia, it wasn’t just a sport. It was everything.
Formula One was her special interest; the thing that clicked in her brain in a way nothing else ever had. The stats, the strategy, the evolution of car design, the sound of a perfectly timed downshift… it all made sense when so much of the world didn’t.
It gave her a framework, a rhythm, a language that felt natural.
While other kids played games she didn’t understand, she memorised engine configurations. While teachers scolded her for “zoning out,” she was mentally replaying the 2002 Brazilian Grand Prix, lap by lap.
She could list every World Champion from 1950 onward before she could properly tie her shoes. At recess, when the others were pretending to be superheroes or princesses, she was mapping out imaginary circuits in the dirt with a stick, narrating races in her head with full commentary — down to the tire strategies and pit stop windows.
She tried sharing her passion with her peers, once.
In third grade, she’d brought a die-cast model of a 1998 McLaren MP4/13 to class for sharing time. She’d practised what she was going to say all night, rehearsed the facts in front of the mirror until the words felt smooth. Recited the specs; V10 engine, Adrian Newey’s aerodynamic innovations, Mika Häkkinen’s championship run, over and over.
But when she stood in front of the class, the words tumbled out too fast, too detailed, too much. She was halfway through explaining the brake-steer controversy when a boy in the front row yawned so loudly it echoed, and someone in the back let out a snort-laugh that made her ears burn.
After that, she stopped trying.
Except with her dad.
With him, she never had to translate. She could go on about tire compounds or telemetry data or how ridiculous it was that certain drivers still didn’t know how to defend a corner, and he never told her to slow down or “talk normal.” He just nodded, asked questions, matched her pace.
They didn’t need eye contact or hugs or long emotional talks. They had race weekends. They had side-by-side silence on the couch, watching onboards and live timing feeds. They had post-race debriefs at the kitchen table over scrambled eggs, like it was the most natural thing in the world for an eight-year-old to have such strong opinions about power unit reliability.
It was how they communicated. Racing was their shared language.
Her mom didn’t get it; not really. The noise overwhelmed her. The rules confused her. She once referred to Sebastian Vettel as “the one with the baby face and the weird flag thing,” and Amelia had almost burst into flames on the spot.
But she tried.
She printed out colouring sheets of cars when Amelia was little, even though she could already draw them from memory. She learned to set the TV volume just right; high enough for Amelia to hear the engines clearly, low enough not to overwhelm her. She made snacks on race days and never once complained when qualifying ran late into the night.
Her mom didn’t understand the obsession. But she understood Amelia.
—
Amelia walked into her dad’s office and froze, staring at the shelf lined with trophies, framed photos, and mementos from his years in motorsport. It had been that way for months now, ever since he’d taken the CEO position at McLaren, and every time she had to look at it, her ears burned.
Because the items on the shelf were never in the right order.
The memorabilia was all haphazardly placed; drivers she didn’t like sitting too close to ones she admired. There were racing helmets, but the scale didn’t make sense; one was huge, another tiny, a third just slightly off-centre.
There were photos, too, of her dad with the team, with Fernando Alonso, with the McLaren execs, but none of them were lined up properly.
The shelf, she thought, should be perfect. But it wasn’t.
Reaching up, she slid the first photo frame to the right, just enough to make it parallel with the others. Then the helmet, she shifted it slightly, aligning it with the edge of the shelf.
One by one, she adjusted the frames, the objects, the odd little pieces of her dad’s world that had once felt like a steady part of her life.
She wasn’t sure why it was bothering her so much today. Maybe it was the way everything felt out of sync.
When she reached the second shelf, she noticed a small figure of a car. A McLaren MP4/4. Her dad had given it to her when she was younger, one of the few gifts he’d ever picked out himself. She ran her fingers over the smooth surface of the model before she set it down exactly in the middle of the shelf, just below the first row of photos.
For a very brief moment, it was perfect.
Just a small fix. A temporary escape from the feeling that everything else was slipping out of her grasp.
“Wow. Looks much better.”
Amelia tensed at the sound of her dad’s voice from the doorway.
She hadn’t heard him come in. For a moment, she considered turning on her heel and leaving the room, pretending she hadn’t touched anything. But her dad was already smiling, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He didn’t look upset. He never did; that was the problem. She could never tell how he was really feeling because his face always stayed the same. It was like his expressions were stuck, and no matter how hard she tried to figure it out, she couldn’t read him. It made it hard to know if he was happy, worried, or anything at all. Everything just felt... flat.
“You know,” he continued, stepping further into the room, his hands in his pockets, “I’ve never been great at this stuff. Never really noticed how... messy things can get in here. But I guess you’ve got a better eye for it than I do.”
Amelia couldn’t help but feel a small rush of pride.
She nodded quietly, her gaze flicking back to the shelf. There was a strange sense of uncertainty creeping in, though. “Is it still okay, though?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “I mean... Does it still... feel like yours?”
Her dad glanced at her, then back at the shelf, his smile fading just a little. “Yeah,” he said after a long beat. “It still feels like me. And it’s you, too, right? Made you feel better to change things up a bit?”
She just stared at him, unsure how to answer that.
He stepped closer, running a hand through his hair. "I know things feel... different now. I guess I'm still getting used to it, too," he admitted quietly. "But it’s still... McLaren. It's still our world, kiddo."
Amelia’s stomach clenched. She wanted to say more, but the words wouldn’t come. She only nodded, her gaze travelling back to the perfectly aligned shelf.
Her dad placed a hand on her shoulder, his thumb brushing over her skin like a quiet reassurance. She made a small noise of discomfort. He paused, and then tightened his grip. So tight it might make a normal person wince. It just made Amelia let out a relieved breath of air, the pressure good, good, good.
It wasn’t that she hated touch, it was just that it had to be right, had to be just the right amount of force, of contact. Too light, and it felt like nothing at all. Too much, and she’d start to feel overwhelmed, like the weight of the world was pressing in. But this... this was perfect. His hand, firm on her shoulder, grounded her in a way nothing else could.
“Thanks for tidying up,” he said, his voice low but sincere. “I think I might leave it just like this for a while. Feels... good.”
She nodded, the pressure of his hand still there, steady, and it was like she could finally breathe again.
—
The McLaren pit garages smelled of oil and rubber. The fluorescent lights above hummed faintly, and she could still hear them even through the noise-cancelling headphones on her ears. Amelia moved through the space quietly, sharp eyes scanning the flurry of engineers, tire changers, and data specialists working with practiced urgency. Her hands were clasped behind her back, fingers pressed tight against her palms, and her gaze flicked between the monitors, the car, and the teams as they hustled to prepare the MCL33 for its next session.
Her favourite part was always the data. The telemetry displayed on the screens had a rhythm, a language that felt like it belonged to her more than anyone else. The raw numbers, the graphs, the fine-tuned fluctuations of the car’s performance; it all made perfect sense. She knew what to look for.
Her feet carried her forward. She found herself standing near Fernando Alonso’s MCL33, just a few feet away. The car was a beautiful mess of carbon fiber, heat shields, and wires, and it was just sat there, like a puzzle waiting to be solved.
Before the season had even started, Amelia had memorised every part of it, from the aerodynamic tweaks to the engine specs.
One of the engineers noticed her as she lingered, her posture attentive, her expression unreadable beneath the headphones. Everyone knew who she was. Zac’s daughter. A genius, in a multitude of ways.
He approached cautiously, not wanting to startle her. He’d noticed how her eyes narrowed when too many voices clashed together at once, or how she shrunk when people got just that little bit too close.
"Hey, Amelia," he said, his voice calm, not wanting to intrude. She turned toward him, her face still slightly blank, but he could tell by the way her eyes focused on his that she had heard him. “You good?” he asked, motioning toward the telemetry screens just behind her.
Amelia nodded, then hesitated. Her hand hovered for a second before she slowly, cautiously pointed at the screen. Her voice, when it came, was quiet, careful. “I... I think the tire pressures on the front left might be a little too high for this circuit. The temperatures are different compared to last year.”
She didn’t look at the engineer as she spoke. Her eyes stayed fixed on the data, like if she focused hard enough, she could disappear into it. She knew she was right, she was almost always right when it came to this, but the memory of past times, of laughter or dismissal, tugged at the edge of her confidence. She didn’t want to make it sound like she thought she knew more than the team. She didn’t even have a degree.
The engineer just blinked. “I’ll pass it along,” he said, eventually.
Amelia gave a small nod, then quickly turned her focus back to the car, to the numbers flicking past on the monitors. She adjusted her posture slightly, shoulders curling inward, trying to take up less space.
As she focused on the intricate lines of the MCL33, another engineer approached her. He was holding a tablet with a telemetry feed of his own, and without speaking, he offered it to her. Amelia looked at the data for a long moment, her eyes narrowing as she absorbed the figures and readouts. Then, her finger gently traced over the tablet’s screen, pointing to a particularly complex graph of the car’s acceleration over the course of a lap.
“Right there,” she said, her voice soft but clear, though it was a bit muffled by the headphones. "You need to adjust the mapping."
The engineer hummed, impressed but not surprised. “I’ll have the team look into it,” he said, before turning to relay her suggestion to the others.
Her dad was always there, of course, close, watching from a distance, his presence a quiet comfort. But Amelia didn’t need him right now. She just needed the machines, the numbers, and the freedom to study it all.
The engineers moved around her, respecting her space. Always careful not to brush against her, even though she was technically in their way.
When she finally did look up from the data screens, Fernando had stepped into the garage, just a few feet away, in his racing suit, helmet tucked under one arm. He glanced at her, then at the engineers who were quietly working around her.
He approached with a calm, easy presence that didn’t press too hard, didn’t demand anything. “Ah. How is the car feeling, pollita?” he asked, voice light but kind.
Amelia gave a small nod, gaze trained on the Spanish flag on the neck of his fireproofs.
Fernando smiled. Then he turned to the engineers, who were already passing along her observations.
“If she said it,” he said, tone warm and without a trace of doubt, “then yes—keep an eye on the turbo mapping. She is the smart one.”
—
She walked around the paddock often. The garages were fun —fascinating, even— but it could all very quickly become too much. The noise, the flashing lights, the overlapping voices, the sudden bursts of motion.
So she’d slip away. Not far. Just enough.
There was always a McLaren staff member trailing after her. Not hovering, not bothering, just keeping a quiet distance. Just far enough to give her the illusion of independence, a false sense of freedom she chose to believe in. She didn’t mind. As long as they didn’t try to talk, or worse, touch, she could almost ignore them entirely.
She wandered with a purpose that only made sense to her, eyes fixed ahead, headphones still on, the rest of the world muted and manageable. She liked it that way. The paddock, in the quiet bubble of her own world, was peaceful.
That’s when she spotted him.
Lewis Hamilton stood just outside the Mercedes hospitality suite, sunglasses perched on his nose. Roscoe was with him, tail wagging lazily, nose in something that probably smelled like food. Amelia stopped walking, blinked a few times, then changed direction.
Lewis noticed her before she got too close. He smiled, lowering his sunglasses slightly. “Hey, Amelia,” he said, crouching a little as Roscoe trotted forward to sniff her shoes. “Been a while. You good?”
She didn’t answer right away. Instead, she crouched carefully, reaching a hand out to Roscoe but not touching him until the dog pressed his nose into her palm. Only then did she give a tiny nod.
Lewis waited, patient. He was always nice like that.
“How’s Roscoe?” she asked finally, her voice soft and low. One time, somebody told her that she spoke like she wasn’t sure she had permission to do so. Always quiet. Mumbling, if she could get away with it.
Lewis just smiled, warmth radiating in that easy way of his. She liked Lewis a lot. “He’s good. Living his best life. Had a spa day last week. He’s spoiled.”
Amelia looked at the bulldog again, and her tight jaw felt softer. “Good.”
There was a pause. She didn’t move, didn’t say much, but she didn’t walk away either.
“You ever want to walk him sometime, just ask,” Lewis offered, still crouched.
Amelia looked up, eyes wide, the corners of her mouth twitching in what might have been the start of a smile. She gave a small nod.
Then she stood, gave Roscoe one last pat, and turned to leave.
The McLaren staffer fell into step a few paces behind her, still pretending not to be watching too closely.
Amelia looked down at her hand. Grimaced.
Her chest tightened. The feeling started crawling up her skin.
“I need sanitiser,” she said, voice rushed and clipped, a little too loud, a little too sharp. Her hands hovered awkwardly in front of her like she didn’t want to touch anything, even herself.
The staffer blinked once, then immediately fished a small bottle from his pocket and offered it to her without a word.
Amelia snatched it quickly, not too fast, not rude, she told herself, and squeezed a dollop into her palm. She rubbed it in with fast, focused movements. Between every finger. Around every nail. Up her wrists. Twice.
Only when the last of it had dried, leaving that slightly tacky residue behind, did her shoulders drop. The tension in her jaw loosened. The hum in her head began to fade.
“Thank you,” she mumbled, not quite meeting his eyes. She turned back toward the paddock walkway, pressing her clean hands flat against the sides of her jeans, grounding herself in the texture.
—
The MTC’s glass corridors were quiet, filled with the soft echo of Amelia’s footsteps. She liked walking here early in the mornings, before the building filled with noise and movement. The lines were clean, the light was even, and everything had its place.
She turned a corner and nearly collided with someone moving fast; backwards, clumsily trying to zip up his hoodie while juggling an apple and his phone.
Lando Norris. FIA Formula 2 championship runner-up, member of the McLaren Young Driver Programme, widely considered one of the brightest rising stars in motorsport. She knew all of this about him.
He skidded to a stop when he saw her, eyes widening slightly. “Oh, hey. Sorry. Didn’t see you.”
Amelia stared at him for a beat, saying nothing.
“You’re late,” she said plainly.
Lando blinked, then gave a sheepish grin. “Yeah. Kinda running behind this morning. Slept through my alarm. Happens sometimes.”
She tilted her head, studying him like he was part of a data set, eyes narrowed into thin slits. “You’ll never get promoted if you’re always late.”
The words came out blunt, matter-of-fact. She wasn’t trying to be rude, just honest. Patterns mattered. Timings mattered. Discipline mattered. Racing was full of rules, and being late was not acceptable.
Lando laughed nervously, scratching the back of his neck. “Oh. Uh—do you really think I won’t get promoted?”
Amelia didn’t answer right away. She studied him, eyes narrowing slightly, not in judgment but in analysis. She was already calculating, recalling his lap times, consistency, tyre management, race-craft under pressure. She’d watched his F2 season. Not just watched; studied it. He was aggressive under braking, a little rough on tyres mid-stint, but his spatial awareness was excellent, and his adaptability in changing conditions put him in the top percentile.
He was a good fit for McLaren, in her opinion.
“Are you fast?” She asked him, despite already knowing the answer.
Lando blinked. Let out a short, awkward laugh. “Yeah. I mean, I think so.”
She nodded once, satisfied. “Then you’ll be fine.”
With that, she turned and walked away, her stride quick and purposeful, the conversation already filed away in her mind, concluded.
Lando stood there for a second, caught off guard. Smart. Intense. Kind of pretty, too. But brutal. “Right,” he muttered to himself, watching her go. “Cool. Fast. Got it.”
—
Amelia sat cross-legged on her bed in her family home in England, the room quiet except for the electrical hum of her phone charger. Her mom was downstairs, making chilli for dinner, and her dad was still at the office.
She was scrolling through Twitter, quietly, methodically, as she did most evenings. She didn’t get involved much. A few retweets here and there. Articles, stats, insights. She had a good number of followers, mostly people who’d seen her on race broadcasts or encountered her race-day tweets.
But then, her thumb hovered. Lando Norris had tweeted earlier that day. She followed him, of course. She followed every McLaren adjacent account.
She clicked on his profile.
She knew him. Had obviously studied his race-craft.
She scrolled through his timeline, her eyes tracking his tweets one by one.
"Is it just me or does everyone have a friend who thinks they know how to cook but really just know how to burn toast? 😂"
Amelia blinked. She didn’t get it. Was that supposed to be funny? She wasn’t sure that incompetence was amusing.
She continued scrolling, her eyes scanning through the odd mix of jokes, memes, and race-day updates. None of it made any sense. She was used to tweets that were precise, purposeful — like her own. Her posts were methodical, always carefully planned, always factual. Data, analysis, insights. It was how she communicated with the world.
Another tweet.
“Just watched a documentary on the moon landing. Now I’m convinced I could be an astronaut. 😂”
Amelia frowned. There was no mention of racing, no insights into strategy, no talk of lap times or tire degradation. Just... this. She scrolled past it quickly, her thumb moving with a steady rhythm as she returned to her own timeline, where everything was neatly laid out, logical, and to the point.
Maybe she should talk to Lando about using his social media more usefully. After all, he already had such a large following. He could share insights, data, something valuable for his fans. He was a professional driver, for goodness' sake. It could be a way to connect with people, educate them, make them appreciate the intricacies of racing in the same way that she did.
She bit her lip, feeling a small knot form in her stomach. She wasn’t sure if she could just tell him to change. That would be... strange. Maybe even rude.
Two hours later, Amelia sat at the dinner table, poking at her food absentmindedly. Her mom was talking about her day at work, but Amelia wasn’t really listening.
Her dad, always quick to pick up on when something wasn’t right, glanced at her and raised an eyebrow. “What’s going on in that head of yours, kiddo?”
Amelia hesitated for a moment, rolling the words around in her mouth. She wasn’t sure why it was bothering her so much, but the thought of Lando’s Twitter kept circling in her mind, unresolved. “Lando Norris is a terrible tweeter. He needs a social media manager.”
Her dad stared at her for a beat, then burst out laughing. “Ah, that’s just Lando! Fans love him for it. He’s... unpredictable, keeps everyone guessing. People follow him because they like seeing the real him. Jokes and all.”
Amelia didn’t find anything about this situation funny.
She fiddled with her food, the tension in her chest tightening. Why did nobody seem as concerned about this as she was?
Lando was good. A good racer. A worthy driver.
Late. He was always late. He could fix that, though.
Fix, fix, fix.
She clenched her hands in her lap, staring at her plate, her thoughts spinning.
Her mom set her fork down, leaning forward slightly. “Amelia, is it really bothering you, honey?”
Amelia’s gaze snapped up, her eyes wide. “Yes! I don’t understand it. He could be doing so much more—he’s just... joking around all the time. He never posts about his telemetry or his tests. It’s such a waste!”
Her mom nodded patiently. “That’s what you would post about?” she asked, her tone gentle.
Amelia nodded, feeling her thoughts settle into place. “Yes. It’s all there, the numbers, the data. It shows his skills. It’s... more useful.”
Her dad hummed thoughtfully. “I could have a chat with him. Tell him to post more of his racing stats. They are impressive. But I won’t tell him to stop being himself. That’s working well for his image.”
Amelia wrung her hands together under the table, taking small, even breaths. It helped calm her, but the unease was still there.
“I think…” she started, her voice softer now, the edges of her frustration ebbing away. “He is a good racer.”
Her dad smiled at her, a little amused. “You care about his success, huh? Well, that’s sweet.”
Amelia nodded. Then she frowned. Sweet? Why was that sweet? She cared about the success of all the drivers in her dad’s team… not just Lando.
Her mom reached across the table and gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “You’re not the only one who wants him to do well, honey. But maybe let him be him. It’s working for him in his own way, even if it’s not how you’d do it.”
Amelia hummed thoughtfully, picking up her fork. She liked chilli. It was comforting. Simple. Consistent.
She missed the look her parents shared — half concerned, half understanding.
—
Fernando would leave Formula One at the end of the 2018 season.
Amelia didn’t know how to feel about it, or if she should feel anything at all. The news came as a whisper first; just a passing comment she overheard in the MTC, a conversation between her dad and one of the engineers. At first, it didn’t seem real. Fernando had been a fixture of the sport for as long as she could remember. The idea of Formula One without him felt... wrong. He wasn’t just another driver; he was Fernando.
And then, one afternoon, her dad sat her down in his office and confirmed what she had been dreading.
Fernando was leaving.
She found herself pacing around the house, her mind spiralling as she thought about the future of F1 without him in it.
He’d always been so nice to her, letting her into his garage whenever she wanted, no questions asked. There was never any judgment in his eyes when she stared at data screens for hours or rambled on about telemetry. He just... let her be.
He had understood her in a way few people ever did.
She would miss him.
—
Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz. 2019 McLaren Driver Line-up.
She’d expected it. She knew it was coming. Fernando was leaving. So was Stoffel. She’d already processed that. But somehow, seeing it laid out in front of her, seeing it confirmed in black and white, made it feel much more real.
Her dad had sat her down earlier on in the month, his voice soft but steady. He’d said it was a new chapter for McLaren, a step in the right direction.
She put the phone down, the buzzing of it faint in her ears, and stared ahead. The news sat like a heavy weight in her chest. Lando and Carlos. McLaren’s new driver pairing.
—
iMessage — Lewis Hamilton & Amelia Brown
Amelia Brown
I would like to see a photo of Roscoe.
Lewis Hamilton
*insert photograph of Roscoe*
You doing okay, kiddo? Lots of changes happening over there at McLaren.
Amelia Brown
I am fine.
Lewis Hamilton
You're always welcome at Mercedes if you need a breather, yeah?
Toto thinks very highly of you.
Amelia Brown
Because I am so smart?
Lewis Hamilton
Exactly.
—
Amelia sat in the kitchen, scrolling through Twitter as she sipped her coffee. Her nineteenth birthday had come and gone, quietly, without much fanfare.
Her gaze drifted across the screen.
Lando had posted something that caught her attention.
"Why do I feel like I need a vacation, but I also can't leave my bed?"
Amelia blinked at the tweet, trying to make sense of it. She tilted her head, her fingers hesitating over the keyboard. She didn’t understand. Was he… hurt? Why couldn’t he leave his bed? He was supposed to be racing a Formula One car in a matter of months.
With a worried sigh, she typed out a simple response to his tweet.
What does this mean?
She hit send and waited.
A few minutes later, Lando replied.
It’s just one of those random thoughts. You know, like when you’re too comfortable but you also want to escape, but you don’t really? Classic conundrum lol
Amelia stared at the reply, processing it slowly.
She... still didn’t get it. Why would anyone want to leave a comfortable bed just to go somewhere else?
She frowned at the screen for a moment, her eyes scanning the thread, and then she noticed the replies.
“Lando is so sweet to explain it! 💕”
“Aw, he’s always so patient with everyone ❤️”
Amelia’s brows furrowed. Sweet? Patient? She didn’t understand. He was just explaining himself and his terrible analogy. Had nobody else been confused?
She stared at the replies for a moment longer, the confusion deepening. It felt like there was something she was missing.
She felt a small twist of discomfort, the kind she always got when emotions felt too complicated, too layered.
Amelia clicked away from the thread, unsure what to do with the strange tugging sensation that lingered in her chest.
—
That night, Amelia sat on the edge of her bed, her knees pulled up to her chest. She glanced over at her mom, who was measuring her bedroom window. Amelia had asked for black-out blinds, now that the days were getting brighter again.
“When my chest gets tight— and I’m thinking about somebody, and then I see other people saying nice things about them... and it gets, um, uncomfortable— what does that mean?”
Her mom paused, turning to face her. “Well. It can be a lot of things, honey. Depends on the person. Maybe you’re feeling protective, or it could be jealousy. Sometimes, we can feel a lot of emotions physically, and they don’t always have to make sense.”
Amelia blinked, feeling something stir inside her that she couldn’t quite name. The word felt almost too big to say. “Jealousy?” she repeated, her voice barely above a whisper.
Her mom nodded, sitting down next to her. “Jealousy isn’t always bad. It’s just a feeling. Doesn’t have to mean anything.”
Amelia’s mind spun. The word echoed in her head, uncomfortable and unfamiliar.
Jealousy.
Something about it seemed to fit.