Chapter Text
“Lance, this will be good for you. You need some time away from the city!”
His mother’s words rung in his ear as he stood in front of the rickety old farm house. Lance didn’t think this would be good for him. He knew it wouldn’t be. His mother had got him a summer job at a small farm, helping the man who ran the small bit of land. To be truthful, Lance could use the extra money, since he had just gotten out of high school. But why did his mother think this would be the best option? He groaned a bit as he slowly dragged his suitcase and duffle bag down the long dirt driveway. He had a bag slung over his shoulder for all of his beauty and face supplies, and he gripped it tighter as he got closer to the house. He may not be at home this summer, but he would be damned if he let his skin get crusty and gross.
As he got closer he could hear sounds of animals from the barn in the back of the lot, and everything started to feel real. For the next 3 months, Lance would be staying with some stranger he didn’t know. He gulped a bit and tried to remember some things his mother had told him. She had said his name was Keith, and he was a really quiet guy who didn’t get out much. But she wouldn’t stop going on about how nice he was.
“Great,” he grumbled under his breath. “I’m probably gonna be stuck with some old redneck, while Hunk and Pidge are living it up in Hawaii. How did I get so lucky…”
He looked around. This driveway was so long and he was still only halfway there. He figured he’d play on his phone to pass time, but when he switched it on he let out a gasp. There were no service bars.
His eyes widened. “I’m going to die here.”
He quickly put the device back into his bag and looked around once again. As he got closer, he could see that there were parts lying around in random places. He was no expert but they were probably either for some sort of car or motorcycle.
Finally-- finally -- after 3 minutes of walking down the long driveway he was able to see the house up close. The worry in his gut grew at a rapid pace.
The place looked way worse in person.
The roof and siding were warped. The place looked like it needed to be condemned and he was going to be living here, for three months. He tried swallowing his anxiety but was hit with another concern. ‘What if this place doesn’t have running water? What if I have to bathe outside in a bucket like an animal?’ His mind supplied him with the possibility of his skincare routine faltering, but he was pulled from his thoughts by an unfamiliar voice.
“Lance, right?”
Lance jumped a bit at the sudden presence. He didn’t realise he’d turned away from the house, so he whirled around to the source of the voice. He looked up and saw the man standing in front of him and nearly choked.
‘Oh no, he’s hot.’
“I, uh, I’m Keith.” Keith had extended his hand to him while he was staring. He quickly drew a hand to grab it. The handshake was firm and Lance couldn’t help but stare at Keith’s arms. He felt his face burn up and quickly withdrew his hand. He needed to control his thoughts. He was here to work.
Keith cleared his throat, breaking the awkward silence, and gestured to the bags and suitcase Lance had been lugging around. “I can take your things if you’d like?”
Lance nodded, still not able to think properly. He followed Keith -- he was lifting Lance’s belongings like they barely weighed a feather this is not fair -- into the house. If his face was red before, it was on fire now. Keith was easily one of the most attractive men he had even met. He could feel his heart racing. He needed to calm down, he was being irrational he didn’t even know this guy.
All thoughts disappeared when they entered the house.
Unlike Lance’s house, there were no family photos or little placeholders. This place didn’t even look like someone had lived in it. It was almost... sad. He furrowed his eyebrows at one of the one picture frames that was turned downwards.
Before he could even think about it, Keith was calling him from the top of the stairs.
“Did you wanna see your room or not?” Lance could hear a sort of snark in his voice. His eyes widened in surprise. “Because I don’t have all day.”
“What happened to the gentleman that was happily taking my bags?” Lance’s eyebrows rose when he ran up to meet the man.
“Yeah, well, you were slow.” Keith gestured to the room next to the corridor.
Lance rolled his eyes and staggered slowly into it, taking in the sight. The bed was kinda saggy, and the blues on the walls looked kinda dull as if it was painted a long time ago. Lance made a face at the room, though he thought that it could’ve been worse since it looked like it was well kept. It wasn’t much bigger than his bedroom back home, too, so maybe it wasn’t that bad.
Speaking of home, how was he gonna call his family?
Lance paused. Nope. Not gonna dwell on that. He shook his head and began to unpack his things, trying to keep busy.
When he dumped his bag of skin care products onto the bed, he heard a snort. Lance turned and saw Keith leaning against the door with a smirk plastered on to his face. Lance simply narrowed his eyes at him and went back to concentrating on his products. He liked to keep them organised, so what?
“Can I help you?” Lance finally demanded, words spoken more like a statement than a question. He looked up to Keith with a glare, who in turn just snorted. He turned to Keith fully, hands on hips. “Don’t hate because I have clear skin, sorry you like to be crusty.”
“I do have really smooth skin for your information” Keith teased. “Besides, don’t you think that’s a bit much?” He gestured to the bottles on the bed. “There’s like at least 20 bottles there? What do you even need all that for?”
“I like to have options,” Lance stated matter of factly, picking through the pile and picking up a few bottles with expert hands. “These are my exfoliators. I like to have a few different scents, because, you know, variety.” Lance put those down and picked for more. “These are my scrubs! I like to use sugar some days and salt on other days, and then,” Lance held up 7 different tubes in his hand's all different colours, “here are my face masks.” He started ranting, noticing the small smile on Keith, nodding, like he was actually waiting for him to continue.
Usually, when Lance explained this stuff to people, he was ridiculed or told he was less of man. But Keith just stayed quiet. It was kinda nice to not be told what he liked to do was wrong.
“I think one day I’ll have to give you a spa treatment,” Lance said finally, then gave a sly smile. “I can see how gross your pores are from here.”
“Hm, nice idea. But I think I’ll pass.” Lance watched the smile on Keith’s face grow wider. ‘I am doomed.’ “Anyway, I’ll be right back with your clothes. I should probably show you around the place and give you an idea of what you will be doing later.”
Lance nodded and gave a small wave when Keith left. He felt himself smile as he looked back down to all of his products, strewn all over the bed. He was already gaining some unwanted butterflies.
‘These 3 months are gonna be painful.’
Something smacked the side of his face. He let out a yelp and hastily swatted it off his head, sending the man responsible a death glare. Keith had a hand over his mouth, trying to suppress his laughter before tossing a pair of boots into the room and walked out of sight.
Lance brought a hand to his chest and furrowed his eyebrows. This wasn’t good. Oh god. His face was on fire and it had only been an hour.
Lance wasted no time on getting changed. Keith had given him a dark grey shirt and work jeans, along with a pair of large work boots. Lance assumed that his mother had given Keith all of his clothing and shoe sizes since they all seemed to fit extremely well. He studied himself in the mirror.
He slicked his hair back and shot finger guns at his reflection, giving himself his signature Finger Guns, smirking. “Lookin’ good.”
He heard another snort from the corridor. He turned to the doorway again, which was currently occupied with Keith and his dumb amused face.
“Ehm.”
Keith smirked. “You done?”
Lance squawked in frustration (and maybe a little embarrassment. Just a little.). “Get out!”
Keith walked back into the corridor. “You’re too slow. I need to give you the run downs since it’s your first day.” He heard heavier footsteps. Keith was heading downstairs. “Meet me in the barn!”
Lance paused. He had assumed Keith was gonna let him get comfortable with the house since it was his first day. When Keith said… what he said, he then assumed he would be working for a few hours before settling down for the night. It was his first day after all. Keith, the kind beautiful caring considerate man, was at least going to let him go easy. Right?
Wrong.
When Lance had gotten down to meet with Keith, Keith was already telling him what to do about everything. And maybe it would have been fine if Keith wasn’t so picky.
“You aren’t doing it right.” Lance groaned loudly. Keith staring at him with his arms crossed with an annoyed look on his face.
“All I’m doing is spreading hay onto the ground?” Lance sad in exasperation, arms going slack. “How would I do it wrong?”
“You're not spreading enough of it.” Lance stared at Keith retreating figure in disbelief. His face was now going red for a different reason. He couldn’t believe someone could be this frustrating.
Lance let out a grumble and got back to work. He’d been given a few simple tasks, but apparently, according to a certain someone, he was messing every single one of them up. He took everything back. Keith was a jerk -- a hot jerk, but a jerk nonetheless.
After a few hours, he was finally done with the tasks that Keith had given him. He groaned in frustration at the amount of sweat pooling around his forehead. All he could think about was getting into the shower for a nice refreshing bath to clean the dirt off of him. He could feel his face yelling at him to clean it.
“So much for a good first day,” he muttered. Rubbing the back of his neck, he walked out of the barn and ran into Keith. Literally. They headbutted each other and doubled back in pain.
“Watch it!” Keith growled, rubbing his head.
“You watch it, Mullet Head!” Lance cried back, scrunching his face up in pain. (In the back of his mind, he was thinking how weird and dumb that nickname was. Mullet Head? Really, Lance?)
“Wha - don’t call me that.” Lance pouted and turned his head away. Lance hadn’t expected his first day to go like this. He was hoping this job would be at least a tad bit more enjoyable, but instead, he was stuck with a boss who would make his life hell for the next three months.
“Whatever, I finished what you asked.” Lance extended his hands toward the farm dramatically. “Ya happy?”
Keith rolled his eyes and walked past him. He sighed, frustrated and followed the man back into the barn.
Keith looked around for a moment. With a sense of finality, he shook his head. “Nope.”
‘I will punch you.’
“You’re kidding right?” He had spent so much time doing whatever he was supposed to do and Keith still wasn’t happy. How would he survive 3 months of this? He could barely survive a few hours.
He was gonna die. This was the end. Say goodbye to his family for him.
“I’m not. You clearly rushed.” Keith deadpanned as he picked up a shovel and handed it back to Lance. “Go back through them all, and take. Your. Time. I can still see some hay in some of the stalls.”
Lance was about to protest, but Keith just groaned again, grabbing another shovel and shovelling out some of the stalls.
“What are you doing?” Lance shifted a little to take a peek at Keith. He flinched at the hard stare Keith gave him.
“Well, someone doesn’t know how to shovel hay, so I guess I need to show them how to do it properly.” He turned back, focusing on his task. “I want to eat and I can’t do that if this isn’t done.”
Lance sighed and walked closer, observing Keith and his familiar movements. He had to admit the technique was way better and faster, but, of course, he would never admit that out loud. When he figured everything out he tried copying Keith’s movements, albeit a little sloppily.
After another hour of working in silence, everything was eventually wrapped up. As they walked out Lance noticed that Keith was lagging a bit behind. He turned, about to make a sly remark, but then he could see Keith nuzzling one of the horses and he died on the spot.
“Okay, I’m gonna pretend like that wasn’t the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” Lance mumbled to himself, walking back to the house as Keith closed up the barn doors. His face was burning up now and he couldn’t stop the silly smile from appearing on his face.
‘Wow, Lance,’ he thought, mentally slapping himself, ‘I can’t believe you’re so deep in sappy feelings already. Stop.’
He got to the door and heard barking. Body tensing, he slowly turned around.
‘What the heck.’ The sight that he was met with shot him right through the heart.
Keith was a few leashes, all attached to the four dogs trailing beside him. They were wagging their tails and prancing around Keith like he was some sort of angel, and the sight was just so cute.
You couldn’t really blame him when Lance gasped out loud and whispered, “Puppies.”
Ears perking up, all four pairs of eyes turned to him. In a split second, they all ran to him, and he braced himself for impact when one of the larger breeds jumped onto him. He fell back nonetheless, surprised by the sheer weight of the dog, and landed on his back, laughing and cooing as all of the dogs started licking his face.
“Who’s a good boy?” he cooed, petting and scratching the scruffs of their ears as he nosed into their fur. “You are. You all are!”
One of the dogs put its paw on his chest and pushed him back, slobbering his face up. As weird as it was, Lance couldn’t help giggling as they continued fighting his attempts to get them to stop. “Beautiful--okay, stay down--oh my god you’re so cute--”
“Alright guys, that’s enough.” He felt the weight being pulled off of him and he sat up, using his arm to wipe the slobber off of his face, another hand for support because oh god, his stomach hurt from laughing too much. He looked up at Keith who was holding the dog by his side. He extended a hand to Lance, very clearly trying to suppress a laugh, but to no avail. Lance shook his head a little before taking it and standing up. Dusting himself off a bit.
“Were you hiding these little guys from me?” Lance laughed, looking up at Keith as he bent down to pet one of the tinier dogs. The one that had knocked him down was recognisable as a Mastiff, or some sort of mix while the other three had the looks of a labrador.
“They kinda just do their own thing during the day? Then they come back at night.” Keith admitted, patting the Mastiff at his side. “This big guy here has been here for the longest, his name is Fluffy.”
“Fluffy?” Lance couldn’t help but snort.
“Listen, I named him when I was really young.” Keith pouted, a small smile on his face. He pointed to the other dogs. “Anyway, the others are Daisy, Pumpkin, and Floofy.”
Floofy. Just. Wow. “You are not allowed to name any more dogs, Keith.” Lance chuckled lightly, opening the door. The dogs ran into the house and disappeared from his sight a second later.
“Energetic bunch, aren’t they?”
Keith hummed, following him into the house.
They settled themselves in the living room--small, occupied by a couch and a tiny old fashioned television. Lance stood at the side, since he didn’t have a place among the dogs that were currently rubbing themselves on Keith.
He looked out the window, breathing slowly. The sun was setting, light staining the clouds in pink and orange. He could almost see the stars blinking slowly in the darkening sky. The sight of it instantly took his breath away. He’d never seen anything so beautiful before.
‘Well,’ Lance thought again, turning to Keith. ‘Not really.’
Lance finally plopped himself on the couch. “So, what’s to eat? I’m hungry.” Man, he missed Hunk’s cooking. Hunk in general, actually. He wondered if he could call his best friend later.
“I could…” Lance saw Keith twiddling his thumb, “...make some spaghetti?”
Lance squinted at the hesitation in his voice but dismissed it when he felt the need to yawn. “Okay.” Lance stretched his lanky body, yawning. “I’m gonna go shower. Tell me when you’re done.” He sluggishly made his way up the stairs, body aching, so he was excited to be able to feel the hot water.
Lance entered his bedroom. Everything was exactly where he left it, so he went over to his suitcase and brought out hoodie and jeans. He picked up his towel and beauty products then made his way to the bathroom, bracing himself for possible dirtiness.
He opened the door. “Holy crow, this is cleaner than my bathroom back at home.”
He gingerly stepped into the bathroom, feeling the dry floor. He set everything down and checked the walls, pleased to find a water heater.
Soon enough, he was grinning ear to ear as the lukewarm water ran down his body. His body relaxed, and he sighed, content. He scrubbed away the dirt from his body and hummed lightly, spending a few minutes washing his hair. Washing away the foam, he stood in front of the mirror and narrowed his eyes at his own reflection.
He grinned. “Time to get beautiful.”
He poured some of the product into his palm, ready to start his much-needed skin care routine, but just when his hands raised to his face, a loud ear-piercing beeping invaded his ears.
“Shit--” He flinched, nearly falling due to the slippery ground, his face scrunching up at the sound. “What the heck is that?” He paused. Hold on. Isn’t that the fire alarm? Why was the fire alarm activated?
Unless… “God dammit Keith,” he muttered through gritted teeth, turning off the water and throwing his clothes on. He didn’t have enough time to dry himself off, so the fabric felt icky and stuck to his skin, but he would rather be soaked and alive, than dry and dead, thank you very much.
He ran, long leg skipping stairs. Heavy black smoke was pouring out from the kitchen, and his heart rate increased by a mile. Was Keith okay? What happened anyway? He barrelled into the kitchen, trying to see Keith through the thick smoke. “Keith--”
Keith had been cursing and waving a kitchen towel around, trying his hardest to disperse the smoke. He turned over, face in a scowl, but then he saw Lance and his face burnt up in embarrassment. Lance sighed, relieved, before noticing the stove was still on and ran over to turn it off.
“What,” Lance started. “Exactly happened, when I was gone?”
“Ehm,” Keith spoke, deciding to stop there. Helpful.
Lance shot an unimpressed gaze at him before turning his attention to the pot. He picked up a table cloth and lifted the lid, coughing when a burnt smell invaded his nose.
“Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” Lance muttered. The noodles were charred black. There wasn’t even any water in the pot. He looked up to say something to Keith but stopped, focusing instead on opening the windows and fanning the smoke out. From the corner of his eye, he could see that Keith was frozen in place, staring at him, and wondered why Keith would offer to cook, considering he clearly doesn’t know how.
“Are you just gonna, ya know,” Lance gestured at whatever Keith was doing, “Stand there and look pretty or something?”
Keith shrieked, which definitely caught Lance off guard. “What?”
Lance looked at him weirdly. “Dude, you almost burnt your kitchen down. Your fire alarm is still ringing. Fan out the smoke or something.”
Finally, the ringing ceased. They leant against the wall, trying to relax. Lance looked down and realised his clothes were soaking wet and sticking to his skin, which was definitely uncomfortable. ‘And it stinks like smoke, which is an added bonus. I hate my life.’
“Oh god,” Lance cringed, pulling at the fabric. He turned to Keith, but he was looking everywhere but him. “Jeez, at least thank me or something. I can’t believe you almost killed yourself because you can’t cook.”
Keith’s mouth twitched slightly, and he turned to Lance with an amused expression, face still red. “Well,” he started, voice slightly higher, “thanks for not leaving me to die, I guess.”
Lance let a smile reach his face. “Pleasure’s mine.” He walked to the stove and carried the pot to the sink, throwing out the charred insides and washing it. Filling it with some more water, he placed the pot onto the element and turned to Keith. “Grab me the noodles.”
Keith shook his head out of his trance. “Uh, yeah, sure.” He went back to the cupboard and took out the box, walking back and handing it to Lance, who, after a few minutes, put them into the boiling water and stirred.
Keith was peaking over his shoulder, eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
“You have to boil the noodles,” Lance explained. “With water,” he added helpfully.
Keith visibly deflated next to him. “I… may not know how to cook,” Keith admitted, his voice small.
Lance turned to him, and the embarrassment on his face was very easy to read. “I figured,” Lance teased, stirring the noodles until they were softer and fully submerged into the pot. He closed the lid to let the noodles simmer and placed the spatula on top, rubbing his hands. “But that’s okay! I can teach you.” He turned to Keith gave him a reassuring smile. “We do have three months. All the time we need to kill your bad cooking habits, really.”
Keith’s eyes widened, then softened. A small smile crept onto the other man's face. Nodding, he turned back to the pot and watched the noodles through the glass lid.
Lance quickly looked back down to the food he was cooking, blushing furiously. That smile, oh god, it was going to be the death of him.
Silence had eventually stretched between them. It felt comfortable to him, minus his clothes still clinging to his skin. He wasn’t sure about how Keith felt about it, though.
Lance pursed his lips. He wanted to believe he could have a chance with Keith, and with the way he had acted around Lance, maybe he did have a chance. He could let himself hope, right?
He shook his head, chuckling softly. Keith looked up to him with curious violet eyes, but Lance dismissed it. Who was he kidding? Keith was gorgeous -- too gorgeous, and way out of Lance’s league. Even if the feeling was mutual, Lance didn’t deserve a guy like him.
Besides, he didn’t even know if Keith was into guys anyway. He didn’t want to risk getting fired because he got mixed signals. It would be best to just shove down these feelings. Yea, he could do that.
He was the best at doing that.