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Shiro first met Keith when he was twelve years old. His parents always adopted kids (particularly the sort of young people others didn’t want to adopt: older children and teens; non-white kids, queer kids, disabled kids; basically anyone who wasn’t a healthy white newborn baby), and Shiro himself was no exception to that, having been adopted at the age of two by his maternal grandparents, Mr and Mrs Shirogane, after his mom and dad died. And it was just after his twelfth birthday when they brought Keith alone.
Keith was five years old, autistic and the illegitimate son of a young Korean-American woman (apparently Miss Kogane was desperate to keep her son as a baby, but she ended up giving him up for adoption), so it was no wonder it took five years in the system to get adopted. And when Gran and Grandpa brought him home, he was so excited. His hands flapped and he had the biggest grin on his face, rushing around their big house as tears ran down his face.
“One thousand, eight hundred days in foster care,” he kept saying, and Shiro had never seen a kid so happy to be adopted by his family before. “Now I’m adopted! Now I’m adopted!”
Gran and Grandpa were crying, so glad Keith was happy. And they gradually introduced Keith to his nine adoptive siblings, letting him adjust slowly to all the change.
Shiro was fifth. When it was his go, Shiro crouched down in front of Keith, and held out his hand. “Hello.”
Keith didn’t take his hand, but he was smiling. “Hello.”
“I’m Takashi Shirogane, but everyone calls me Shiro,” he said.
“I’m Keith. Hello, Shiro,” Keith said. “Are you Korean? I’ve never met anyone else Korean before.”
“No, but I’m Japanese,” Shiro said. “And there are lots of Asian people here. Gran!” he yelled, and Keith clamped his hands over his ears. “Sorry.”
“Yes?” his gran yelled back.
“Is Sam half Korean?”
“Yes, she is,” Mrs Shirogane shouted back.
Shiro smiled at Keith, who took his hands from his ears. “Your new sister Sam is half Korean. You can talk to here if you want.”
Keith smiled and hugged Shiro, taking him by surprise. “I like you, Shiro.”
Shiro smiled and patted his brother’s back. “I like you too, buddy.”
And from that moment on, Shiro and Keith had the closet bond of all the siblings in the Shirogane house. And Shiro cared about his little brother so much, and he never forgot their first meeting.