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Lance sighed and flopped into his hard bed. He let out a loud whine and closed his tired eyes. The campus had opened at 10am that morning for move in day. He was lucky that he got everything to fit together from Cuba.
Lance had struggled getting all the paperwork in to choose what room he was in. If you had a full scholarship you had the accessibility to pick a dorm from any of the complexes on campus. This openness to the dorms included the senior aerospace complex. In Cuba, the internet was terrible at best. It was difficult to choose one of those senior dorms that Lance wanted so bad. You know that way he could hit up one of those senior ladies.
When Lance had gotten to the college one of the tour guides helping the freshmen directed Lance to his room. As they showed Lance around they mumbled under their breath about his roommate. Well at least that’s what Lance had thought he heard. There hadn’t been a roommate present yet. Which sucked. Yet, he knew that the roommate was on a full ride scholarship for aerospace and aeronautical engineering. The only reason he knew this? He had the tendency to eavesdrop on counselors and teachers all the time, it’s half the reason he even got the scholarship he did.
In all honesty Lance was here by chance. He had heard his principal talking to the top person in their class about AIT and the requirements to get in. He also heard how they could get the schools only abroad full ride scholarship. Being the second in his class and also being quite competitive, he stole the full ride scholarship and rose to be valedictorian.
After getting the scholarship Lance had been informed that the college set aside dorms in every complex for the full ride scholarship kids. Lance had been lucky enough to snag the last room in one of the senior complexes. Which had been difficult to try and get all the way from Cuba. However, the only reason they were there was because of the aerospace program. The program required its students to live on campus for its weird class and simulation times.
The room was amazing, it had sort of a common room area and a kitchen, then it split to the rooms. Lance’s room seemed even bigger than the one back in Cuba. Although in Cuba Lance had also shared his room with a bigger sister and brother.
“Hello? Is anyone here?” A voice said from the common room. Lance shoot off his bed. Was that his roommate? Was he finally gonna meet his roommate?
Lance took a deep breath before entering the common room, waving a little. The man that stood before him was a tall man. A very tall man, six or seven inches taller than him. The man had jet black hair on most of his head, except for a little white piece of fringe in the center of his head at the front. His hair looks funny, but cute , Lance thought to himself. He had a scar going across from the middle of his left cheek, across the bridge of his nose and to the middle of his right cheek. That’s kind of sexy , He thought to himself, putting a hand on his hip. He was wearing a tank top which put a prosthetic right arm starting at his bicep on full display. Now, that’s ho t. He smirked a little before shaking his head. This was a guy and Lance? Lance was straight, no doubt about that. He thought that this guy was decent looking and there was nothing wrong with that.
The man before him shuffled and moved to cover his right arm. “Are you just gonna keep staring at me or..?” he questioned, looking confused. Lance shook himself out of thinking and looked up towards the other man. He looked like a deer caught in the headlights.
“Can I help you?” Lance started, offering a hand to the man, “Sorry, I kinda zoned out there. Even though the time hasn’t changed from when I was at home the flight kinda messed with my mind.” he smiled.
Shiro nodded and placed his stuff on the ground, gesturing to follow him. “It’s okay, I understand, I came from Arizona and so I’m a little jet lagged.” he laughed a little and led Lance out to a dark cherry car with a Kia logo on it. That’s a car a stereotypical mom would have, Lance thought, laughing a little. He didn’t need to watch any American movie or tv show to figure that out. It was a nice car though. It was better than Lance’s car, but then again Lance didn’t have a car, he got an Uber from the airport to the college.
“What model is it?” Lance asked, throwing a duffle bag over his shoulder and picking up two boxes.
“2016 Kia Sorento.” his roommate stated, which caused Lance to chuckle a little. “What’s so funny?” the taller man asked, looking confused.
Lance giggled again and put the boxes down, grabbing a small bag to put on his other shoulder. “You said that so matter of factly, it was a little funny,” Lance said, smiling at the taller man.
“Well, what’s your car model? Plus you asked and I answered.” he said pursing his lips as he glanced back towards Lance, starting to move towards their dorm.
“I don’t have a car, we don’t use them a lot in Cuba, we take public transportation and walk or bike most of the time. Are you a senior?” Lance asked, going to the door and setting the boxes down.
“Nah, I’m a freshman, upsettingly enough. I should be at least a sophomore by now, but there were… complications.” he said glancing at his right arm. He looked down and shook his head before looking back up. “Well, if we are gonna be roommates I guess we should know each other's names. I’m Takashi Shirogane, but everyone calls me Shiro.” He stated, extending his hand for Lance to shake.
Lance extended his hand and shook Shiro’s hand. “I’m Lance Fuentes and I’m also a freshman. Although I’m here for biomedical engineering instead of astronautical engineering,” he said smiling, then catching his words. Shiro had never told Lance what he was studying. Which would make Lance seem like a creeper because he happened to know what the other man was studying.
“How did you know that?” Shiro asked, looking confused. He whipped his head around to look at Lance.
“I heard the person that showed me my room talking about my roommate. It was an accident and I swear I wasn’t creeping, it just kinda happened.” Lance said, a rose-colored blush covering his cheeks.
Shiro nodded. “Okay, I understand,” he said, sighing.
Lance helped Shiro move in and the rest of the night was spent unpacking and moving into their dorm. Lance had found out that he and Shiro had the same taste in movies. Which surprised him. Now their joint movie collection included random chick flicks, horror movies, and sci-fi. At the end of the night, they both awkwardly bid each other goodnight before heading off to bed.
Finals came around too soon. Lance and Shiro had been roommates for about four months now and they had been getting on well.
The two started to have weekly movie nights on Friday, most times they were joined by their friends, but sometimes they were by themselves. Neither of them cared much though because their relationship was pretty much set in stone. They were friends, right? He hoped so, there had been a lot of rough times in the dorm, especially when they played spin-the-bottle. That had been hell.
It started off jokingly on a movie night, all of their friends (all being Allura, Keith, Hunk, and Pidge) had come over for a movie night. They had watched Poltergeist and were all promptly spooked by it, so they decided to play party games for a while. At first, Lance refused to play the game because, well, he hadn’t had his first kiss yet and dammit he wasn’t going to get it here.
However, his friends had a different idea. Hunk had whined and groaned, asking Lance to play several times, to which Lance said no. Then there was Shiro. He put the softest pout on his lips and damn Lance couldn’t say no to that. How bad could it be?
The answer was it could be bad. Really bad. The first few rounds had been fine. They all sat in a circle and spun the bottle in the middle. Shiro had been first to spin and he got Keith, then Pidge and Allura (but Pidge was sneaky and kissed her hand). Then it was not so great. Hunk’s turn came around and when he spun the bottle it landed on Lance.
Now, this wasn’t exactly bad, Lance was pretty confident in himself and Hunk was attractive, so he guessed that it would be okay. But then Hunk kissed him. On the lips. And Lance liked it. Hell, he loved it. Hunk’s lips were so soft against his own and he was so warm, but it was just a game. This confused Lance though, he was straight? Wasn’t he? But it was then why did he like kissing Hunk? Maybe it was just because it was a good kiss? It probably didn’t mean anything. However, Lance had decided to quit the game for the rest of the night, he wasn’t exactly ready to question his sexuality yet. Lance retired to his room promptly and began to work on some of his physics homework.
After a couple hours the young man began to get hungry so he tried to exit his room. Tried being the keyword. As he opened the door he saw a skinny black mark wrap around his door frame. He questioned the mark and attempted to leave his room, but then he saw it. It was a big spider. A big spider on his wall. Lance is terrified of spiders.
“Shiro!” He yelled, backing up into his room, whimpering softly. The tall man came into the common room and looked around confused.
“What’s wrong?” Shiro spoke cautiously from the back of the common room, coming over to Lance and rubbing his eyes sleepily.
Lance pointed to the wall and whispered softly “Please help–there’s a spider on the wall outside my room and it won’t let me leave.” Lance was now physically shaking, which woke Shiro completely up. Shiro had never seen Lance this scared or upset.
The spider moved a little and Lance whimpered loudly, backing up into the opposite wall quickly. Shiro nodded and frowned at him. “Do you want me to kill it or…?” Shiro said, offering to try and help.
Lance shook his head quickly “No, it probably has a family.” he said softly, whimpering as it moved again, this time moving off the door frame. Shiro quickly went into the living room area of their common room and grabbed a glass left over from the movie night. He placed the glass on the wall over the spider, effectively trapping it.
“Can I have a paper that you don’t need anymore? Preferably some thicker paper.” Shiro said looking at Lance who had calmed down slightly since the spider moved off his door frame. Lance nodded and grabbed a paper that had the name of some sorority on it, probably inviting Lance to join.
Shiro slid the paper under the glass and slowly took the spider out of the dorm with the help of Lance opening the door. Shiro came back into the dorm a couple minutes later, holding the glass and paper, he set the paper and glass down lightly and walked over to Lance. “It’s gone now, Lance. Don’t worry it can’t hurt you,” he said softly, engulfing the shorter man in a hug.
“Thank you for protecting me, Shiro.” Lance giggled out, smiling widely and looking up slightly at the other man.
Shiro smiled back and stepped away. “I’ll always protect you, Lance.” Shiro said before his eyes widened and a light blush covered his cheeks “Uh, do you wanna watch a movie or something so you calm down?” Shiro said quickly, trying to cover up what he had previously said. Lance nodded, not really feeling all that hungry anymore.
Lance and Shiro sat on the couch for a while and talked about life before Altea Tech. which gave Lance more insight into Shiro’s life which was pretty much a mystery to him beforehand.
Shiro had revealed that he was 21, which Lance didn’t know before, but it wasn’t exactly a surprise. Shiro also revealed that he was in a large car crash, which halted him using his scholarship (luckily the school was run by a family friend, so they held onto the scholarship.) and caused him to lose his arm, which is why he had the prosthetic.
After they both exposed their backstories to each other they sat in silence for a moment, looking at each other with huge smiles from a cheesy joke that Lance had said, honestly Lance can’t remember because Shiro was just too gorgeous. Not that Lance was checking Shiro out, Nah. Not at all. Plus Shiro wouldn’t check Lance out either, nope.
Suddenly, Shiro started moving closer to Lance, looking at him contently and almost… lovingly it seemed. Then Shiro started leaning in and god Lance couldn’t move, he knew what was coming, but he just couldn’t move and didn’t know why. He was straight, right? So if he was, why wasn’t he moving out of the path or his beautiful roommate's lips from connecting to his. Shiro’s lips brushed against his and that’s when Lance lost his shit.
Lance sprung off the sofa and ran into his room, holding his breath. He couldn't believe that just happened. Shiro, his roommate, almost kissed him. Lance was straight though? Wasn’t he? He never really explored his sexuality, but he was sure that he was straight. Was he sure? He didn’t know anymore.
His breath hitched a little with a realization. He wasn’t straight. It made sense now. He had always been attracted to girls and boys. Hell, his first kiss was his best friend Hunk, even though it was during spin the bottle; he had even liked that kiss. It was all too confusing, why was this being revealed now? He was in college, he was supposed to have this figured out by now, wasn’t he?
“Lance…?” Shiro’s deep voice was muffled by the door that Lance was sitting up again. He heard a soft sigh, well it might have been loud, but it sounded soft through the door. “Lance, I’m sorry. I understand if you don’t swing that way and I’m sorry. I am so sorry for assuming what your sexuality was, that was not okay for me to do.” Shiro knocked lightly on the door, seeking some kind of response, but Lance stayed dormant against the other side of the door.
“I don’t know… like what way I swing. I just don’t know and I am so sorry for not knowing. I know I should know, but I just… I don’t.” Lance said softly, frowning at himself and the fact that he didn’t know. It was frustrating that he didn’t know.
“Let me in, please.” Shiro spoke in a whisper, he breathed in deeply, “I want to help you, as a friend. I know how this feels, not knowing, and I want to help you, please.” Shiro said.
Lance hung his head down and stepped away from the door, opening it a little before turning and sitting on his bed. Shiro walked into the room and looked around, smiling a little at the posters on the wall. The older man sat next to the younger one and gave a hopeful smile.
“Thank you for letting me in, Lance.” Shiro spoke in a hushed tone. He opened his arms and looked towards Lance, signaling that if Lance needed a hug he was there for him.
Lance practically fell into Shiro's embracing, breathing deeply into his shirt. Why was this so difficult? Why couldn't he just know what he wanted? It was okay to feel like this, right? I mean it must have been. It should have been.
“Is it… okay?” Lance asked, peering up at Shiro and looking for guidance.
“Liking someone?” Shiro questioned. Lance nodded his head and looked down, hanging his head in shame. "Of course it's okay to like someone, you're allowed to like anyone you wish. You shouldn't be punished for liking anyone. I certainly won't shame you for liking anyone. I'm gay and that's okay, I mean as long as you're okay with it of course. My point is, you should love whoever you want to love, regardless of gender, but make sure to take yours and their comfort into account." Shiro smiled a little and put his hand under Lance's chin, making Lance's head turn up to face Shiro.
Lance contemplated quietly. He could either run from this, as he does with some of his problems or face this head on and just dive in. Of course in this situation, he chose the latter. Lance breathed in deeply before connecting his lips to Shiro's. Shiro hesitantly kissed back and moved his hand to Lance's cheek, cupping it softly.
After a minute Lance pulled away and panted softly, not believing that he just did that and loved it.
But that had been a month ago at least now, they had had many other encounters like that, but since finals were right around the corner along with winter break they hadn't really spoken much.
Lance walked into the dorm room, head buried in one of his bio textbooks, reviewing for his final. Lance glanced up for a second to see Shiro in a crop top. He shrugged and went back to reading before processing what he had seen and his head shot up, mouth open.
"Is that my shirt?" Lance asked, placing his textbook on the couch and observing the crop top, convinced that it was his.
"Uh.. maybe? I found it on the floor out here." Shiro shrugged and walked over to Lance, kissing the top of his head.
"...you look better in it anyway." Lance said, places his hands on Shiro's chest, blocking out his surroundings and just living in the feeling of Shiro's very muscular and defined chest. "Jesus Christ," Lance mumbled under his breath.
"You okay there, babe?" Shiro questioned looking down at his.. friend? Both of them were honestly a little confused with their relationship.
Lance was shaken out of his trance by Shiro's voice, blushing deeply and chuckling awkwardly. "I'm amazing!" he said a little too enthusiastically, blushing even deeper in embarrassment.
Shiro blushed a little and chuckled, kissing Lance's cheek softly. "You're too cute," he spoke quietly. Lance shivered and pulled away from Shiro.
Shiro frowned and began to open his mouth to say something before Lance put a finger to his lips.
"Shiro," Lance started, frowning a little, trying to figure out how he should proceed, after a minute he continued "I hold romantic feelings for you and now I know for sure I'm not straight, but I don't know what exactly I am, so I was wondering if you wanted to join me for that adventure?" Lance finished.
Shiro's eyes widened before looking at Lance confused "Did you just ask me out?" he asked, a little smile spreading across his lips "Because if you did that was far too formal." Shiro moved closer to Lance and smiled wider. "It's supposed to go something like this," Shiro stood up straighter and took Lance's hand gently "I like you a lot, Lance, and it's completely okay to not know what you are, I wouldn't expect you to know. I will always be here to help you figure that out and I'll be here as long as you want me. That being said, I was wondering if you would allow me the honor of being your boyfriend?"
Lances mouth fell open, taken aback at the question. He hadn't known if he had actually asked Shiro out or not, but now was the opportunity to date one of the hottest men that he's ever known. It wasn't that Lance didn't already know his answer, he was just so shocked that Shiro actually liked him enough to ask and that made him speechless.
Shiro looked over Lance's features worriedly before Lance started nodding. "Yes.. of course!" he cheered hugging Shiro.
Shiro let out a breath that he had been unconsciously holding in and leaned down, brushing his lips against Lance's. "Can I kiss you?" he asked, connected eyes with Lance.
"Yes please." Lance spoke softly before Shiro kissed him passionately, Lance reciprocating the kiss with the same power and feel.
Shiro pulled away after a minute and kissed the top of Lance's head. "Go back to studying, babe, you have a lot of work to do." Lance smiled softly and nodded going to his room, burying his head back into his textbook.
Finals passed with ease for the couple, at least that's what was communicated between them. Lance took it upon himself to prepare a nice meal for Shiro that way when he got back from taking his last final there was good food for him to eat before they split paths for winter break.
Lance spent the afternoon making homemade fried rice, which admittedly didn't take that long, but he prepared all different kinds including some with vegetables and some with meat. Lance had begun to really love fried rice after Shiro bought takeout for them one night after Lance had a big test.
Lance set the small table that they bought together and placed all the food on it before going to his room for a minute to clean himself up and change. He walked back out right as the door opened, Shiro stumbling in tiredly.
"Hey, darling." Lance said flirtily, going over to his boyfriend and taking his stuff from him, "I made some food for you, so you could relax and eat before you leave." Lance smiled and went in his tiptoes to kiss Shiro's cheek.
"I thought I told you that I'm staying here for the holidays?" Shiro said confused, embracing his boyfriend in a thankful hug. "I have simulations to do over the break, plus I don't have enough money to go back home for the holiday." Shiro nuzzled the top of Lance's head and Lance frowned, nuzzling closer to Shiro.
"I'm sorry, baby..." Lance trailed off, looking up towards his boyfriend before pulling away and grabbing his hand, leading him to the table. "I made fried rice for you! It was more self-indulgent though, but I thought that you might like it because you introduced me to it." Lance smiled and Shiro nodded appreciatively.
"Thank you so much, baby boy." Shiro sweetly smiled and sat down, Lance joining him by sitting down across the table. "What are you doing for the holiday?" Shiro questioned, beginning to plate his food out.
"I'm going back to Cuba! I'm gonna spend Christmas there and come back here for the new year because Hunk invited me to a party." Lance cheerily said, filling his plate with food. Shiro smiled and nodded eating his food tiredly.
After they finished eating dinner Lance packed quickly and said goodbye to Shiro, making sure to tuck him in for a good nap before leaving the dorm and heading to the airport.
Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a thing was stirring, except for Lance who was skyping Hunk.
"He stole one of my crop tops and looked. So. Hot." Lance said making sure to annunciate 'so' and 'hot'.
Hunk rolled his eyes and laughed "Dude, I get it you're dating Shiro." Lance scoffed and frowned. "Stoppppp, just 'cause you're pout works on Shiro doesn't mean that it'll work on me, I thought we've been through this before, Lance." Lance rolled his eyes and his frown deepened.
"Stop exposing me like this, Hunk!" Lance pouted more and groaned, checking the time in the corner of his phone. "Look, dude, I gotta go, it's almost 12 and my parents will kill me if I'm up any longer," Lance explained smiling.
Hunk nodded in understanding and started waving "Goodnight, Lance, see you at New Years." Hunk said softly then hung up the call.
Lance typed a quick goodnight message to Shiro (who hadn’t answered any of his calls or texts in the past few hours) and set his phone down, falling asleep quickly.
Lance awoke to one of his sisters banging on the door and telling him to wake up. Lance turned in his bed and groaned, getting up slowly and making his way downstairs, half asleep.
"Hey, Lance!" Shiro said in a deep voice, smiling up from under the Christmas tree and Lance waved at him.
"Hey, Shiro.." he spoke softly rubbing his eyes a little before looking back at the tree, shocked at what he saw "Shiro?!" he yelled, rushing over to his boyfriend, smiling widely.
"Merry Christmas!" Shiro cheered, standing up from under the tree and moving over to where Lance was sitting, engulfing him in a hug.
"What are you doing here?" Lance questioned, a little horrified at the fact that his boyfriend was in Cuba and more importantly in his house, under his Christmas tree.
"I wanted to surprise you! Hunk helped organize everything!" Shiro said, kissing Lance's cheek and smiling. Lance smiled back and moved closer to his boyfriend.
"I might have told my family about you." Lance smiled awkwardly and looked down a little bit.
"He's terrible at keeping secrets, especially when it's about love." his mama said from across the room, watching the young couple reunite after the week that they've had away from each other. "Also, don't worry, we approve of you. Very highly now that I've seen you." she winked at Shiro and he reactively blushed.
"Mama!" Lance cried, scoffing at his mother’s actions. "She's just teasing you, I hope you know that." Lance rolled his eyes and chuckled.
The rest of the break was filled with the couple hanging out and Shiro learning more about Lance and his life in Cuba. Towards the end of the trip, they had a very steamy encounter on the beach that ended in some less than pleasant sand rashes. After the break had ended the couple returned back to their lives in the dorms of Altea Institute of Technology.
Years had passed since their first Christmas together and now they were ending their time at Altea Institute of Technology.
"Lance! Is your room cleaned out yet?" Shiro called into the common room. Strangely enough, they had both decided to stay in the same room for the past couple years. It was familiar and with Shiro, in the aerospace program it seemed inappropriate to move out when he'd have to stay.
"Of course it is, Shiro! All it had was boxes of stuff in it from the beginning of the year." Lance rolled his eyes and moved the last of the boxes out into the common room.
"Will you help me load up my car, sir?" Shiro asked flirtily. Lance laughed briefly remembering how they first met and nodded.
"Of course, darling!” Shiro blushed at the name and smiled, leaning down and pecking his lips.
"Remember that graduation is in an hour." Shiro spoke, picking up a box and beginning to take it out to the car.
Lance groaned loudly "We get it, you're valedictorian! You got it by how much?" he questioned, following Shiro out to his car and putting the box into it.
"About one-third of a point." Shiro teased. Lance huffed and rolled his eyes again, continuing to help Shiro with his stuff.
After the car had been packed up they got ready for the ceremony and headed to the location.
The ceremony in itself was long and quite boring if you asked Lance, but then it came time for Shiro to deliver his speech and Lance perked up at the sight of his boyfriend happily standing behind the stand, with a speech in hand.
"Hello, friends, peers, and family. It is my honor to be this year's valedictorian of Altea Institute of Technology. I have been here for four years and am graduating with a bachelors in aerospace engineering. Through these four years, I have made many friends and have so many amazing opportunities. It has been a hard four years in the aerospace program, but it definitely paid off. With this degree, I have gotten a very gracious offer from NASA who wants me to help engineer a droid to go to space." Shiro stopped for a minute and let everyone clap before continuing, "In these four years I have also met the love of my life, Lance. We started off as dorm partners and quickly became best friends along with Hunk, Keith, Allura, and Pidge. That year Lance's best friend, Hunk, helped me surprise him back in Cuba for Christmas. It was then that I knew Lance was the one. Sure, sometimes things had been hard, but that's okay, any relationship or college experience always is." Shiro paused and took a breath, "It is because of everything that has happened that I'm doing this. Lance, can you come up here please?" Shiro gestured towards Lance, beckoning him to come on stage.
Lance slowly rose to his feet and joined Shiro on stage. Shiro smiled appreciatively and got down on one knee, fiddling with something in his pocket. "Lance, I love you more than any words can explain, you light up my life in a way no one else could ever dream of doing. You have changed my life so much for the better and make me such a good person. It has been my humble honor to know you and to have the opportunity to love you. It is with these truths that I want to pose a question. Even though we've been through a lot and probably will continue to go through a lot, I want to continue to do this together. So, I was hoping that maybe perhaps you would like to marry me and become my husband?" Shiro pulled the box out of his pocket and opened it, revealing a beautiful black titanium ring.
Lance stood in shock as Shiro smiled lovingly up at him. "Of... of course!" Lance cheered, wiping away tears that he had not known he started shedding.
Shiro put the ring on Lance's hand and stood up kissing him passionately and Lance kissed back.
After the audience had died down from their cheers the ceremony continued as planned and Lance held Shiro's hand the whole time. Long after the ceremony had ended and all of the family had gone home the couple said goodbye to Altea Tech and headed to their new apartment just outside of Orlando.