Work Text:
Confide, verb
1. To trust (someone) enough to tell them of a secret or private matter.
2. Dated - to entrust something to (someone) for safekeeping.
She finds him, as she often does, on the training deck.
Most nights that he can’t sleep, and those are most nights, he fights gladiator drone after gladiator drone until he’s almost too exhausted to stand. There’s a bit of a joke shared just between the two of them: who will find the other passed out in some unusual, non-bed place first, and who will drag the other back to their room to get a few scant hours of sleep.
It used to be her, mostly, sleep-delirious from working endless vargas in the lab, looking for any trace of Matt and her dad. But more and more often, it’s been him.
“Shiro.”
Shiro turns to look at her with the same dreamy slowness as a man half-drowned being pulled from a stream. He blinks. It’s not until he says her name that she’s sure he’s fully awake.
“Katie. What are you still doing up?”
Pidge leans against the entrance to the training deck and takes another moment to process the situation. For once, she’s not sure how to respond. Typically, it would be with some snarky joke - ‘Oh, you know, just trying to track down some space sheep,’ or ‘I decided I’d start my morning routine really early,’ - but she hesitates at the gaunt cast of Shiro’s expression.
“Is there something wrong?” she asks. Shiro was never coy with her when it mattered, and she was never one for tact anyway. Better to just be out with it.
“No, everything’s fine,” he says, too quickly, like the faster he can spit out the lie, the less she’ll notice it. She doesn’t try to hide the disbelief in her expression, and he catches on in an instant. He glances to the ground, face drawn.
“You were just standing here, not doing anything. Not activating the Gladiator, or fighting it, nothing. Just staring into space. Well, not space-space, but you get my drift.”
Shiro goes pale, or, well, paler than he’d already been. It brings out in stark contrast the dark circles under his eyes, all the bruises of sleeplessness. His “Was I?” is shaky, breathless.
She hastily deactivates the waiting training simulation and crosses over to Shiro. He watches her with wary eyes, as if unsure if she were about to strike. He may have been awake, but it’s clear to her that whatever fugue-like state he was in is yet to have faded.
“Let’s get you to bed,” she says, voice gentle. “You can tell me about it on the way back, if you want.”
With a nod, Shiro follows her off of the training deck. The lights flicker off behind them. She glances back, and for a split tick he’s nothing but shadow against darkness. Her stomach twists a bit, caught somewhere between worried and unnerved. It feels like she’s seen a glimpse of something forbidden, something no one else is allowed to see. But he’s showing her.
Before she can reconsider, she stretches her hand back towards him, seeking reassurance that he’s still real, still there. Shiro wraps her hand in his like it’s habit, and picks up the pace so that they walk side-by-side. They walk in silence all the way back to the paladin quarters. Shiro’s grip on her hand tightens the whole way there.
They stop in front of his door.
Pidge is mourning the nearing loss of Shiro’s hand in hers when he pulls her forward. She collides with his chest and feels his arms wrap around her back.
She has a tick to celebrate her closeness and worry at its cause before he starts speaking, voice low and strained.
“I haven’t been sleeping,” he starts, “because when I do, I can’t stop dreaming about all of the terrible things that could happen to you. All of the awful ways I could accidentally hurt you, or, or end up losing track of who I am, and where I am, and-”
Hesitantly, she places her hands on his back and runs them up and down, aiming for soothing. He trembles under her touch, shoulder blades and ribs rocking like fault lines.
“Shiro, you’re right here,” she says and then, realizing perhaps that isn’t the most helpful, follows with a, “You’d never hurt us, any of us. Allura would kick your ass if you tried.”
“But what if I hurt you?” His voice is sharp, and his fingers dig into her back. “Katie, I couldn’t live with myself if I messed up, if something happened to you because of it.”
She glances up and meets his stare. There’s a sort of desperation to his gaze that goes straight to her pulse. It’s like he’s stripping them both bare with the intensity of it.
“Come on, I’ll be fine,” she says, aiming for levity but falling flat. “Technically I’ve already beaten you in battle before, and I know you’d never let me get hurt.”
Shiro shakes his head. The white fringe of his hair plasters to his sweat-drenched forehead. She wants to run her fingers through it, set things right.
“Some nights, it still feels like they’re there, in my head. The Galra, the Druids. And if they can somehow still get to me, then it means that you’re not safe. If Haggar, or Lotor, or any of them knew…”
He lets loose a growl of frustration and pulls her even closer. His heart rattles out a loud, uneven tune against her ear. And so she holds him tighter, as if she could keep him grounded, keep him from drifting back into his nightmares.
“Knew what?”
She hopes she knows the answer before he gives it. Shiro tenses, features sharpening as he stares down.
“How much I want to be yours.”
There’s no keeping in the soft exhale, the “Oh,”; no keeping down the heat that spills into her cheeks. “I want that too.”
For the first time since she stumbled across him, Shiro looks wide awake. “Really?”
He’s given her something priceless, a gift she’d never refuse. There’s nothing more she wants to do than offer her own, and so she does, tipping up onto the balls of her feet and pulling him down until their lips meet. Their kiss is brief, more faithful exchange than uncontrolled flame, but she still feels dizzy for it. They break away long enough for Pidge to put Shiro’s hand up to the door scanner. The door to his room slides open.
“Really.”