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“Hey, Lance.” The voice cut through his bones like ice. A chill ran down his spine and he hated how he seemed to lean towards the melodic voice he used to find so appealing. Now it only brought up bitter and twisted feelings and he kept his eyes focused on the stage in front of him. It wasn’t until a hand came to rest on his shoulder that he forced himself to look at Nyma. She was still beautiful. Summer and a couple months wouldn’t change that. Nyma was like fine wine probably; she only got prettier as time went on. Her long blonde hair was pulled up in a messy bun and Lance could tell that the loose strands falling around her face had been carefully pulled out of the bun. Everything she did looked so effortless but there was a calculated precision behind all of her actions. There must have been a reason she did what she did, Lance just couldn’t figure it out.
“Hey,” he choked out. His voice caught on the single word and he cleared his throat to hopefully mask it. Wrenching his eyes away from the girl, he climbed up onto the stage. Plaxum had enlisted him to help choreograph for the school’s musical. He had been more than happy to help because the theater department collectively sucked at dancing. Had he not been so involved with the Castle of Lions, Lance would have auditioned for the musicals and plays during high school. It was no secret that he was born to be on stage.
“Are you okay? We haven’t talked much lately,” Nyma said, adjusting the backpack on her shoulder. A laugh escaped past his lips, something guttural and fake. Lance watched confusion shroud her beautiful features and his eyes shot back to the notebook in his hands, the pages littered with scraps of choreography and formations. The blue ink blurred slightly and he squeezed his eyes shut, forcing down the threat of tears. He refused to cry. He didn’t care anymore.
“Yeah, I guess we haven’t,” Lance replied, voice as monotone as possible. Under his breath, he hummed the tune to the first number, marking through the choreography. The transition to formations was awkward and he jotted the note next to the big pyramid he had sketched out. Oh, he would need to switch Plaxum and Florona so that they could frame the male lead.
“Are you mad at me or something?”
“Me? No, never.” Nyma’s lips quirked in irritation at his sarcasm and Lance couldn’t help but feel some small satisfaction at her discomfort. It couldn’t have been anything close to what Lance has been feeling these past few months. She couldn’t even know.
Nyma pulled herself up onto the stage and came to stand directly in Lance’s way. He huffed in annoyance and worked through the steps around her. Lance’s evasion only seemed to annoy her more. “What the hell did I do? I don’t understand.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t understand either but you don’t see me confronting you about it do you?”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Lance found himself at the opposite end of the stage as Nyma. Over here a conversation between the two leads would be happening as the main dance continued behind them. He could practically feel the warmth of a spotlight bathing over him as he held the hand of his love interest tight between his own. Theater gave someone the ability to be someone completely different in a way dance didn’t. With dance, you could only tell a story with your body in a choreographed way. The story was laid out for you by someone else and there was no great room to make it yours. Theater though, allowed you to take a situation and make it yours to such a greater extent. Sure, you had to stay on script but from what he understood, the blocking and the inflection and the other person’s reactions were all up to the people on stage to figure out. There was such freedom within the theater that he only found through dance with his improv.
“It means that I don’t have anything to say to you Nyma so you should probably head to the cafeteria. I wouldn’t want you to miss lunch or anything.” He heard the distinct sound of heels clicking on the wooden stage and in an instant, his notebook was being ripped out of his hands. An unintelligible cry ripped from his throat and he watched as the notebook landed in a rumpled mess of pages on the floor just in front of the stage. Internally, Lance cringed at the thought of all those bent corners and wrinkled pages.
“Well, you’re clearly mad at me so I suggest you start talking.”
“Or what?”
“I’ll go to Hunk.” Fuck, that guy couldn’t keep a secret to save his life. He loved Hunk to death but some things were better to entrust to Pidge. They would keep anyone’s secret to their grave as long as they deserved it. Get on Pidge’s shit list, however, and all of your shit would be plastered over social media’s and your mom’s wine group’s Facebook page. Lance wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t watched in fascinated horror as Pidge uploaded a picture of a kid, Andrew, with a Juul hanging out of his mouth and his friend lighting up in the back to Andrew’s mom’s book club Facebook messenger group chat. Andrew had made fun of Hunk for having two moms and Pidge wasn’t just going to sit by and let that shit slide.
“You want to know why I’m upset?” Nyma rolled her eyes. “I’m upset because apparently, I misread this situation that I thought was super fucking clear.” Now she looked confused and the words seemed to tumble out of Lance’s mouth. He had thought them for so long, had kept them trapped inside every time he saw her and now Nyma had broken that floodgate. “In April, you tell me that we can’t date, we can’t be together, because you were taking time to figure yourself out and I respected that. But I thought the feelings were still mutual. I thought we stood a chance.”
Recognition slowly began to dawn on Nyma’s face. “Lance, I-”
“No. Stop talking. It’s my turn to talk.” His words seemed to strike her, her mouth a perfect ‘O’ and Lance couldn’t care less. All Nyma ever did was talk and for once she was going to listen. “Maybe I was reading too much into things, I’m not too out of touch to realize that I do that. However, I thought that us not being together meant that you weren’t going to get together with anyone. Then, the third- the fucking third- time we talked this summer, you oh so casually mention you have a boyfriend.” Tension ran up his arms and he could feel his fingernails digging crescent moons into his palms. Anger and sadness coursed through his body and there was nothing he could do to stop it.
“When you went away for camp, I thought you would come home and there would be a chance for us. But, clearly, I was wrong. I guess you barely talking to me should have been my first hint, huh?” He forced out a chuckle but even to his ears, it sounded weak and unbelievable.
“Lance, can I explain?”
“I don’t really see what’s left to explain. Clearly, you didn’t really care about me in the first place.” He was being unfair, he knew that, but fuck he hurt. Pain etched itself into the folds of his skin and into the lines in his face. The angry and vindictive side of him wanted to hurt her as much as she hurt him but that was only a small part of him. The larger part of Lance was just tired. Tired of being pushed around by people he thought cared about him. He was tired of putting himself out on the line only to be pushed away and for his feelings to get stomped on. It just didn’t seem worth it anymore.
Standing there, framed by the heavy red curtains, Nyma looked like a star. From far away, her skin was glowing and her hair was shiny. The tight, blue crop top and ripped jeans she wore would have looked plain on anyone else but she made them look like something straight out of Vogue. Perfect posture and perfect teeth gave the illusion of just that: perfection. Lance had been blinded by that illusion. He had fallen under a spell of giggles and sidelong glances thrown at him as they passed each other in the hallway. Conversations late at night had gotten him to trust her and to be willing to continue to trust her. Nyma had been something special to him. She had been this picture of life and good energy and everything he wanted to have in his life.
Now though, Lance could see the truth. He saw the lifelessness behind her eyes. He saw the closed-off body language: arms pulled tight across her chest and a hip stuck out in defiance. The image he had created around her was falling apart and he didn’t want to pick up the pieces. Lance had put this girl up on a pedestal and now he was taking it down.
“Look, we can still be friends. We weren’t dating so we don’t have to do the awkward exes things. Just, please… Don’t look for me okay? Leave me alone and I think we’ll be okay.” With that, Lance hopped off the stage and picked up his notebook. He snapped it shut, ignoring the way those crease lines were now permanently embedded into the pages. Lance swung his backpack over his shoulder and made his way out of the auditorium.
He was being irrational, he knew that. Nyma was a good person and probably didn’t deserve to be treated like that. But honestly, neither did Lance. If Nyma didn’t have feelings for Lance, she needed to be upfront about it. At this point, Lance was just protecting himself. He caught feelings for people like he did everything else in his life: quickly. If he fell, he fell hard and fast and so far, there hadn’t ever been anything to break his fall. For some strange reason, his mind flashed back to how Keith had caught him during his audition. Lance had been so worried he was going to fall but Keith’s strong hands and arms and prevented that from happening.
Shaking his head, he pushed the thoughts aside. Now was not the time to deal with whatever that was.
Pulling out his phone, he sent Allura a quick text. When she texted back a couple minutes later, giving him permission, Lance felt a weight leave his shoulders. He plugged in his headphones as he pushed open the cafeteria doors. When he found the closest empty table, he sat down and flung his backpack onto its surface. As Lance scrolled through his music, listening to a few seconds of a handful of songs, a strange sense of peace overcame him. If he knew nothing else in his life, he knew this. He understood finding the perfect song and finding the perfect moves. Dance was always going to be something Lance understood.
--------------------------
“Olia! Watch your back leg, it’s bent!” Allura called out over the music. Lance watched as Olia flashed her a thumbs up and made her way to the back of the line. They had been going across the floor and as always, Lance was at the front of the line. He didn’t use to go first across the floor then a couple years back he did and he did the week after and the week after that and it just kind of stuck. It was an unspoken rule around the Castle that Lance went first. His partners changed though as sometimes he went with Hunk or Pidge or if Allura made the senior dancers mingle among the newer ones, Griffin or Kinkade.
Today though, Lance could turn his head and see Keith standing at the head of the opposite line. He had been shocked when Keith had put himself in front; Lance would have thought that Keith would go in the middle, maybe even be the last pair to go across. The guy hasn't exactly opened up to anybody in the few weeks he had been here and Lance was fairly convinced that he hated everyone at the Castle. They talked at school sure, but it was like pulling teeth with the guy. Keith hardly ever initiated a conversation with Hunk or Lance in class but when he did it was only because he needed to. In the hallways, Lance would try and wave or smile at him and if it was a good day, Keith would do one of those bro nod things at him.
The music cut off and Lance perked up through the day was still weighing heavily on his shoulders. He hoped it wasn’t affecting his dancing but from the confused and critical glances Allura sent his way as he went across the floor, Lance could tell it was. He hoped this would help. When they made eye contact, Lance walked across the floor to where Allura was standing. “I’m assuming you have the song,” he told Allura and she scoffed. It was a running joke amongst Voltron that Allura’s Spotify and iPod collectively had every song known to man. Lance quickly pulled up the song on Allura’s computer and turned to face his classmates.
“Come on out guys! I’m in charge today!”
“Just for this combination, Lance. Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Allura warned, eyebrows raised. Lance rolled his eyes but there was no heat in it. He smiled and took his spot front and center. This had happened a few times before so most of his friends followed his instructions with no confusion and some excitement. Keith though looked a little confused.
“You guys can choreograph for your own classes?” Lance heard him mutter. It was quiet enough that no one was supposed to hear but he was close enough to Lance that he picked it up. Spinning around to face him, Lance threw him a pair of finger guns.
“Yep! Not a lot of studios do but Allura and the rest of the teachers think it’s important that students get used to choreography because that’s what a lot of us are going to do after graduation. They also think creative expression is the ‘foundation for technical perfection.’” It was something they had all heard growing up. Alfor, Allura’s father, had founded the Castle of Lions because he thought that all the other studios in the area were too obsessed with technique and crushed any creativity or personalization out of their students. Alfor didn’t want ballet-bots; he wanted dancers. “Now, let’s learn the combo.”
During the day, Lance had found the song he wanted to dance too almost instantly. It wasn’t too sad, it wasn’t too happy. It managed to convey what he was feeling almost perfectly so it was no surprise that the choreography had flowed out of him smoothly. When he was supposed to be taking notes during math, he had been writing down choreography and tapping out the beat of the music with his pencil on his desk.
Khalid had a way of speaking to Lance. His mom didn’t like the artist because she thought his music was boring and all sounded the same. Lance was thoroughly scandalized to be related to this woman because Khalid is a god. They chose to agree to disagree before an all-out war started in the McClain household. Out of respect though, Lance had stopped blaring Khalid at all hours of the night and chose to listen to his album and various singles through headphones. Now though, the singer was blaring through the studio’s speakers and Lance felt so in his element.
The opening beats filled the remaining space in the studio, falling over the dancers like a blanket. Lance stepped off to the side, prepared to call out the steps as the first group of dancers performed. Some of the coldness he had adopted in regards to Nyma started to melt as he watched his friends tell his story. They had perfect moments of suspension, the steps melting into one another. Most of them got the head snap and arm throw on the right beat and it sent chills down his spine.
Watching this dance, the pirouette to the floor and the overextended back roll, Lance knew he was overreacting but damn if Lance wasn’t dramatic. He should have done this sooner- choreograph to his feelings. Having everything out on display like this made everything much more tangible and real. If it was in his head, everything could spiral and that’s how he got hurt. Here in this studio though, there was nothing more than the brief pauses in the choreography and smooth tones of Khalid’s voice. For these brief hours, he existed solely in this room and all of his problems and all of his drama faded to the very edges of his mind.
In the blink of an eye, the first group was finished and Lance found himself clapping without even realizing it. Then Keith was stepping onto the floor with his group and Lance couldn’t stop his eyes from snapping to him. There was just something about the guy that made Lance gravitate towards him like a magnet. He was annoying as hell and irked Lance to no end and had a shitty haircut but it was the small smiles that got him. It was the way he seemed to burn with such a fierce intensity no matter what style they were doing. He had this passion, this fire, within him and normally, Keith was shut off from the rest of the population but when he danced, Lance could see the scars and fire that was fueling and pushing Keith through life. It was mesmerizing.
Once again, Lance was clapping at the end of the routine. As expected, it had looked phenomenal on Keith. Everyone else was probably really good too. Then in what felt like no time at all, the class was ending and Lance was leaving the studio with a wave to Allura. She had another class after them but luckily, the students could all go home. He loved getting home before 9:30 or 10.
“Hey, nice combo Lance!”
“Yea, it was really good tonight!”
Lance smiled at his friends, laughing it off and thanking them. It didn’t feel like a nice combo or that it was really good- that was a piece of him he had just laid out in a dimly lit dance studio and nobody seemed to know except for him. There was no reason for anyone else to know as he hadn’t told anyone else but part of him longed for a comment of substance. He wanted some sort of recognition that what he did was meaningful.
“Hey.” Lance had only known that voice for a few weeks but man he would know it anywhere. Turning around, Keith was leaning against the lockers with his hands shoved deep into his pockets.
“Oh, hey.”
“I just uh…” Keith trailed off, looking everywhere but Lance.
“Yeah?”
Keith shot him an irritated look but Lance could tell there wasn’t anything behind it. Keith took a deep breath then continued. “I just wanted to ask if you were okay.”
A shock ran through Lance’s spine. Could Keith read minds? Probably not… But to have Keith of all people ask him that, it was really surprising and completely unexpected. Lance had thought he was going to get a concerned text from Hunk later- hell, he probably still was- but he hadn’t thought anyone, Keith especially, was going to come up to him and call him out like this. Because of this shock, his brain stopped working for a second and his tongue fell flat in his mouth with any words that may have been there drying up in an instant.
After an embarrassingly silent few seconds, Lance began to function again. He began to function so well that he took a deep breath, put on his best fake smile and said, “Yeah. I’m great man. Why?”
He knew exactly why. He knew Keith knew he was definitely not fine but Lance refused to bring his shit into the studio beyond combinations. Growing up, he had always heard to leave your baggage at the studio door. He just so happened to have started applying that to the rest of his life as well.
“Are you sure?” Keith pushed. His arms had come to cross against his chest and Lance could see a familiar stubborn look start to form on his face. He took that as his cue to get the hell out of there because if Keith was anything like Lance, he’d never let this subject go.
“Yep! Alright well, see you at school.” And with that Lance hightailed it the hell out of there. However, he didn’t leave quite so fast to miss the concerned expression that marked up Keith’s flawless features. His heart didn’t miss it either as it skipped a beat and made his skin flush bright red. He refused to have feelings though. They haven’t worked out well in the past and this time wouldn't be any different. If there was anything Lance was sure of it was that Keith Kogane would never be into stupid, obnoxious Lance McClain. No one else had been in the past so why would this be any different?
The annoying romantic in him though wanted to keep hoping. He wanted Keith to be different. Keith was so different from everyone Lance had ever liked before that maybe… just maybe… the ending wouldn’t be the same as all the other stories.
Lance shook his head of the dangerous thoughts. Maybes were how you got hurt and Lance refused to get hurt again. It was time to start protecting himself and if he got involved with Keith Kogane, he was just asking for trouble.