Chapter Text
There’s a boy at his door.
Not just any boy; a college age boy, maybe a little bit younger than him, with oceanic eyes, a T-shirt that reads Big Brother, and a name tag-- Hi, my name is Lance . He’s got a backpack slung loosely over his shoulder, he’s carrying a blue folder with a few papers sticking out messily, and his other hand is extended towards Keith.
“Can I help you?” Keith asks, accepting the handshake. Lance’s hands are warm and soft, unlike Keith’s, which are scarred and calloused from years of recklessness.
“I’m Lance,” the boy says, gesturing to the nametag Keith’s already read. “I’m Katie Holt’s new Big Brother.”
Ouch. That probably could have been worded more delicately, considering his neighbor Pidge’s real big brother died in a car crash two short months ago. Not that Keith is an expert on delicate wording or anything, but still. The words new big brother just sound bad to him.
Maybe Lance doesn’t know all the details of the situation. Maybe Colleen Holt didn’t want to explain everything to some stranger over the phone with Matt’s death so fresh on her mind. It would be more than understandable, considering all she’s had to go through lately.
Now that he thinks about it, Keith remembers her mentioning something about a Big Brother project the last time he’d gone over to visit Pidge, but none of that explains why Lance is here .
“Sorry I’m a little late,” Lance says sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m terrible with directions and my phone died on me mid-way here, so I had to stop and ask for help. Is now a bad time?”
“Uh…” Keith glances through the window to his left, where the Holts’ actual house is. Apparently Lance is really, really bad with directions, because he’d somehow managed to get the address wrong by one house.
Lance must take his silence for something else, because he continues even more sheepishly. “I thought you said noon would be fine, but I might be misremembering, since I also remember your name to be Colleen.”
“I’m…” Keith glances back at the door, trying to work out what to do. On the one hand, Lance clearly has the wrong address and should probably be informed of that, but on the other hand, Pidge would resent him forever if she ever found out he sent a Big Brother her way. She and Matt had been really close, and his death had impacted her a lot over the last few weeks. He doubts that a Big Brother would change any of that.
“I’m Keith,” he says unsurely, mind racing. “Pidge- uh, Katie’s friend. Colleen’s her mom.”
“I figured,” Lance says lightly, smiling. “I mean, you sounded way different over the phone. It makes sense that it wasn’t you.”
He glances inside like he’s expecting Pidge to materialize out of nowhere, and Keith realizes that he needs to make up his mind like, two minutes ago. Should he send Lance away or cover for Pidge? As much as he hates to think about the consequences, the answer is obvious.
“Katie should be down in a little bit,” he says, opening the door wider. Sure, Lance will realize that he’s bluffing eventually, but it’s not like Keith ever needs to see him again, and it will be worth it to save Pidge from having to open up about Matt. Shiro won’t be home for a while, either, so no one besides Colleen will ever have to know.
“Thanks,” Lance says, stepping inside. Keith leads him over to the couch, gesturing for Lance to sit.
“Do you want anything to drink?” he asks awkwardly, shifting from foot to foot. “There’s water, and… Orange juice?”
“Water would be great, thanks.”
Keith nods, turning towards the kitchen and thanking whoever might be listening that Lance didn’t choose orange juice. (He’s pretty sure the carton in the fridge expired a month ago.)
At least now he has time to make a plan. He can’t stall Lance forever, but he can hold him off for as long as possible, then politely tell him that he has the wrong address and he should leave Pidge alone. And then he should probably go over and re-pay Colleen for the session she’d bought. Big Brother programs can’t cost that much, he figures, and if Lance works for some sort of five-star sibling service, he can always pick up an extra shift at the Starbucks he works at. He just needs to keep Lance busy for as long as he can.
“Nice place you have,” Lance says as he walks back to the living room, looking around appreciatively. Keith shrugs, setting a cup of water down on the table. The cup he’d used is chipped and there’s a stain near the bottom, but it’s better than the My Little Pony mugs he buys Shiro every year for his birthday. (Those almost never get used, but Shiro’s too sentimental to give them away.)
“It’s my friend’s,” he says dismissively. “I’m just here for college.”
“Oh, really? What college do you go to?” Lance leans forward, resting his hand on his chin and smiling. He’s got a nice smile, all genuine and likeable. Keith almost feels bad for lying to him, before he remembers he’s doing this for Pidge.
“Iverson,” Keith responds automatically. Lance’s eyes light up.
“Really? So do I!” he exclaims, pulling out a student ID. Keith raises an eyebrow at his enthusiasm. He’s never met a college student so excited to actually be in college.
“What’s your major?” he asks nervously, wondering how long he can keep this up. He’s an awful liar, after all.
“Undecided. I wanted to go into astronomy and astrology, but I don’t know if I’d be smart enough for that.” Lance laughs quietly. “So I’m just hoping something catches my attention before too long. What about you?”
“Engineering,” Keith replies.
“Oh, really? My friend Hunk is majoring in engineering, too,” Lance says excitedly. “He’s a total genius. Maybe you guys share a few classes.”
“Maybe,” Keith echoes, doubtful. He doesn’t know of anyone in his class named Hunk, and even though Iverson’s engineering program isn’t that big, there are still more than enough classes for it to be believable that they’ve never encountered each other.
“Man, I can’t believe I haven’t seen you around campus yet,” Lance says, taking a sip of his water and leaning back. “What year are you?”
“Freshman,” Keith replies, glancing at Shiro’s My Little Pony clock carefully hidden out of sight of visitors. It’s only been a few minutes, and he’s already starting to regret his decision to distract Lance. For Pidge, he reminds himself, focusing back on the conversation. “And you are…”
“Freshman.” Lance grins. “I must not have been paying very close attention in the halls. After all, it’d be hard to forget a face like yours.”
Keith blinks in surprise. Is that a compliment? Is Lance joking? He honestly can’t tell, so he shoves it aside and replies, “It’s kind of a big school,” instead.
Lance stares at him for a second with a serious expression, then smiles again. “Nah. I’d remember you.”
“Well.” Keith looks around the room, hoping for a topic of conversation to jump out at him. “You said you were into astronomy?” he prompts, gaze landing on a star-covered bandana slung haphazardly across a pile of textbooks.
“Oh, big time. I had such a huge space phase when I was in high school. Basically everything I owned was space-patterned. I even asked my mom to paint my room like the milky way, with all the planets and constellations and stuff. My brother was so not into that.” Lance chuckles to himself, shaking his head ruefully. “I got over it eventually, but I guess a part of it kind of stuck. I still check my horoscope every morning.”
“Really?” Keith raises an eyebrow. “What’s your horoscope today?”
“That it’s going to be very busy,” Lance says. “And full of interesting, unusual developments.”
“Are they always accurate?”
Lance shrugs. “I’m not a firm believer, but sometimes it helps me get through the day. It’s always nice to have a little guidance.”
“Oh yeah?” Keith grins, despite himself.
“Totally. Here, I’ll prove it to you.” Lance pulls out his phone and starts typing. “When’s your birthday?”
“October twenty-third,” Keith replies automatically. “I’m a Scorpio.”
“Scorpio… Hm…” Lance clicks on an article and scans it for a few seconds. “Interesting…”
“What?” Keith asks, curious. “What is it?”
“It says here… ‘A handsome, charming stranger will mysteriously appear on your doorstep’,” Lance reads, face completely straight. “Huh. Seems accurate.”
“It definitely does not say that,” Keith says disbelievingly, stifling a laugh. Lance breaks out into a grin.
“Okay, so I may have altered it a tiny bit,” he admits, looking down sheepishly. “It actually says, ‘You might find what you seek in an unusual place and in an unconventional way’.”
“Yeah, that sounds more than a tiny bit altered,” Keith teases, rolling his eyes. “And anyway, those things are always so vague. You could totally interpret them any way you wanted to.”
“That’s the fun of it!” Lance exclaims, switching off his phone and setting it on the couch. “See, some days I think I know exactly what it means, and it manifests itself completely differently than I’m expecting it to. And other days, I have no idea what to expect, but once I look back at the day, it all starts to make sense.”
“So? It’s all still a bunch of nonsense.”
“That may be true,” Lance says, “but still. It helps sometimes, to think that every day has a moral, or a meaning. A point.”
“I guess.”
“So negative.” Lance shakes his head in mock disappointment, sighing. “Come on, though, you’ve gotta admit that mine was pretty spot-on. I was pretty busy running around and looking for your place.”
All of a sudden, he remembers why he’s doing this. He’s not here to make friends with Lance, he’s here to distract him from Pidge. He’d gotten sidetracked with Lance’s playful horoscope talk, but he needs to stay focused on his true objective. He can’t get careless and give something away, at least not until he’s taken up as much as Lance’s time as possible.
How long does one of these sessions last, anyway? An hour? Two? Is it prepaid or by the hour? He doesn’t dare risk another glance at the My Little Pony clock, trying to steer the conversation back to a safe topic.
“Do you live close to here?” he asks, leaning forward and resting his hand on his chin. Lance shrugs, making a “kind of” gesture with his hand.
“I mean, Iverson is pretty close,” he says. “I live at the dorms there, but I try to spend at least one day a week at my mom’s house, which is a little further. She gets lonely sometimes, you know? That’s why it took me so long to get here.”
“Aren’t the dorms kind of expensive?”
Lance nods with a wince. “It’s a little ridiculous to spend all that money when I could just live at home, but I had to get out of there for a little while. I picked up a few jobs and saved up a lot, and now I’ve got my own dorm, and a roommate, and I can visit Mami whenever I want.”
“It’s nice that your mom lives close,” Keith says with a small smile. “Is your roommate nice?”
“Oh, he’s alright.” Lance shrugs, taking another sip of his water. “I’m better friends with his girlfriend, but we’re friendly enough. To be honest, he’s hardly ever at the dorm at the same time as me.”
“Do you have a lot of friends at school?” Keith asks, finding himself getting curious again. Lance had already mentioned Hunk, who Keith doesn’t know, and his roommate’s girlfriend as well, but maybe he and Keith have some common acquaintances or something.
“Not a lot who I’m close to,” Lance says, “but I’ve got friends. It’s good to put your best foot forward with everyone, right?”
“I guess so,” Keith replies, not sure if he actually agrees. “What, did that come from your horoscope, too?”
“Nah, my brother used to say that,” Lance explains, swirling the water around in his cup. He watches it drip down the inside of the glass for a few seconds, seemingly lost in thought before he shakes himself back to the present.
“What were we talking about again?” he asks, scratching his head. “Oh yeah, dorms. I mean, living on campus isn’t cheap, but I got a few scholarships, so it’s not like I’ll be in debt forever.”
“Thank god for scholarships,” Keith agrees, huffing a laugh. “I’m glad Shiro let me stay with him, or else I’d never have been able to go to Iverson, even with my campus job.”
Lance pauses, confused. “Wait, who’s Shiro? I thought this was Sam and Colleen’s house.”
“Uh…” Keith scratches his cheek, trying to think of an excuse. “I mean, this is… Technically it’s not…”
Lance’s eyes narrow in suspicion. “This is where Katie Holt lives, right? You said you were her friend.”
“I am her friend,” Keith confirms, “but she doesn’t… Pidge doesn’t…”
They’re interrupted by a knock on the door, followed by the last person Keith wants to see right now yelling, “Hey! It’s me!”
“That.” Lance looks between the door and Keith. “That isn’t Shiro , is it?”
“No,” Keith says with a sigh, shaking his head and standing. He’s totally caught. “That would be my neighbor, Pidge Holt.”
“Your neighbor ?” Lance asks incredulously, standing as well. “I’m confused. What’s going on?”
Keith doesn’t reply. Instead, he opens the door and lets it swing open wide, revealing Pidge standing on the porch with a foil-wrapped dish in her hands. “Mom sent leftovers again,” she says, shoving the dish at Keith unceremoniously. “She says you could use a home-cooked meal.”
“Pidge, this really isn’t a good time,” Keith says, trying to sound quiet. There’s no way he can keep her from knowing about Colleen’s Big Brother plan if Lance is still here, and he really doesn’t want anyone else to know what he’s up to. “Thank your mom for the… whatever it is, but do you think you can deliver it later?”
“Wait, hold on a second,” Lance interrupts, pushing past Keith so that he’s standing between them. He looks back and forth between Pidge and Keith, his confused frown growing bigger the longer they stand there. “What’s going on?”
“Uh, Keith? Who’s your friend?” Pidge asks, frowning right back. “And why’s he wearing a nametag?”
“I’m Katie Holt’s Big Brother,” Lance explains automatically. Keith winces, and Pidge visibly recoils, almost dropping the dish.
“Excuse me?!” she exclaims, glaring. “Is this supposed to be some kind of sick joke?”
“What? No, your mom-” Lance cuts himself off when Pidge lets out a suspiciously growl-like sound. Keith steps in quickly.
“Pidge, he doesn’t know,” he says gently, setting a hand on her shoulder in what he hopes to be a calming gesture. “He didn’t mean it the way it sounds.”
“Well, it sounds terrible any way you put it!” Pidge snaps, turning her icy glare on him. “What is he doing here, anyway?”
“Yeah, that’s what I’d like to know,” Lance adds. “You know, considering Katie Holt doesn’t actually live here.”
Keith sighs, dropping his head into his hands. “Okay, listen… I didn’t mean to interfere with your plans and waste your time, but I had to look out for Pidge.”
“Look out for me? What are you talking about?” Pidge asks, her anger melting into confusion.
“Yeah, I’m still lost,” Lance agrees, still frowning. Keith shakes his head and sighs again.
“We should talk with Colleen,” he says, defeated. “I don’t want to explain this more than once.”
Half an hour later, Keith is still trying to convince himself that he did the right thing. He’s sitting in the Holt family’s living room, head in hands, listening to Pidge and Colleen arguing in the kitchen. He seems to have caused his neighbors a lot of trouble by keeping Lance away from his friend for as long as he could, but at least he’d been right about Pidge not wanting to deal with all this Big Brother stuff, especially not on her own.
A second body settles down next to his, followed by a long-winded sigh. Keith peeks through a gap in his fingers to see Lance laying back with his head against the back of the couch.
“Everything okay?” he asks, despite himself. Lance cracks open an eye.
“I feel terrible about all that stuff I said,” he admits. “I had no idea about Matt. Colleen was really vague on the phone, and I didn’t have any other information on Ka- Pidge.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Keith assures him, sitting up so he can face Lance. “You had no way of knowing.”
“Yeah, but still…” Lance trails off with another long sigh. Keith fidgets uncomfortably for a second before speaking up again.
“I’m sorry for lying to you,” he says guiltily. “I was just doing my best to look out for Pidge. Matt’s death has been really hard on her, and it just didn’t seem like a good time to bring in another Big Brother.”
Lance shakes his head, a faint smile appearing on his face. “Don’t even worry about it. Pidge is lucky to have a friend like you.”
“Still. I should have just told you in the first place, and we could have avoided all of this.”
They both glance towards the kitchen, where Colleen is still trying to reason with Pidge. Keith’s shoulders droop unhappily.
“Hey, don’t blame yourself,” Lance says, turning back to him. “Like I said, Pidge is lucky to have someone like you looking out for her. You’re actually a really nice guy, you know?”
Keith scoffs, but he can’t help but smile. “Yeah, right.”
“I mean, sure, you lied to me for like twenty minutes straight, but it came from a place of good intentions.”
Lance’s smile is gentle, but there’s a spark to it as well. Keith takes it as a sign that he’s just teasing. “I was going to tell you,” he says, “but I wanted to wait for as long as I could. You know, so you wouldn’t just go right over to Pidge and- well, I guess it already kind of happened.”
“I’m impressed that you kept it up for so long, though. I was totally distracted.” Lance winks, his expression playful.
They’re interrupted once again when Pidge comes shuffling into the living room, hands shoved deep inside her pockets. Keith tries to catch her eye, but her attention is focused solely on Lance.
“I’m sorry that I yelled at you earlier,” she mumbles halfheartedly, kicking at the floor. “I didn’t mean to offend you or anything.”
“It’s not your fault,” Lance assures her with a sympathetic smile. “I get it.”
“Yeah, but you were just trying to do your job.” Pidge takes a deep breath before soldiering on. “Okay, so, I don’t want to do this at all, but my mom thinks it will be good for me. So, if you’re willing to come back next weekend, I’ll play video games with you or something for an hour.”
Lance breaks out into a genuine grin. “I’d like that, Pidge,” he says.
“There are conditions,” Pidge continues, ignoring him. “One: we don’t talk about my brother. Two: you don’t call yourself my Big Brother, ‘cause that’s just messed up and I hate it.”
“Deal,” Lance agrees easily.
“And,” Pidge adds, holding up a finger before turning and pointing it at Keith. “You’ve gotta be there with me.”
“What? Why me?” Keith protests, balking. Pidge shrugs, dropping her finger.
“I want you there,” she explains. “At least for the first time. Plus, my mom says she’ll pay for the time you wasted if you agree to hang out with us next weekend.”
Keith frowns, crossing his arms. On the one hand, he doesn’t really want to spend his weekend with the guy whose time he’d just wasted, but on the other hand, he does kind of owe Pidge and Colleen. If this is how they want him to pay them back, he can’t exactly say no.
“Come on, man,” Lance says, nudging him playfully. “It’ll be fun, I promise.”
“Fine,” Keith agrees reluctantly. “If I’m free, I’ll come over and hang out.”
“You’d better.” Pidge still seems bristly, even after making a deal with him and Lance. “Ugh, I’m stressed out now. I’m gonna go take Beybey on a walk.”
As if on cue, the Holt’s family dog wanders around the corner and looks longingly at the door. Keith can’t help but sympathize with her--he’d make a run for it, too, if he could.
“Keith, want to come?” Pidge offers, already bending down to clip Beybey’s leash on. Figuring it’s as much of an olive branch as he’s gonna get, Keith nods and stands, then turns to Lance.
“I should probably get back,” Lance says sheepishly, glancing at his phone. “I’ll be a little early, but that’s fine.”
“I’m really sorry, again,” Keith starts, but Lance is already waving him off.
“Stop apologizing, dude. I really don’t mind, okay?” Grabbing his bag from the ground and turning to the door, he addresses both of them. “I’ll see you guys next weekend.”
Pidge rolls her eyes, opening the door to let him out. Once it swings closed, she turns to the place under the coat hooks where she normally keeps her shoes, finding the floor there suspiciously bare.
“Mom,” she groans, “stop moving my shoes!”
“Sorry, honey,” Colleen apologizes, appearing in the doorway. She looks tired and worn down, Keith realizes, now that he’s looking. Colleen is normally as put together as they come, as opposed to Sam Holt’s chaotic organization and scattered thought process. Matt’s death must be taking a huge toll on all of them. “I put them in your room, I think.”
Pidge sighs dramatically, turning to the hallway. “I’ll be back,” she calls over her shoulder, before disappearing further into the house. Colleen watches her go almost sadly before turning her attention on Keith.
“I’m sorry,” Keith says, ashamed. “About all of this. I just wanted to help Pidge-”
“I know you did, Keith,” Colleen replies, smile tinged with melancholy. “You’ve been an excellent friend to her over the past two months. But I really think being around Lance will be a good thing for her, even if it takes some time.”
“You really think so?” Keith asks doubtfully, glancing back at the door where Lance had disappeared. “No offense, but I don’t know how a Big Brother as cheery as him’s gonna help her through… this.”
“You’d be surprised,” Colleen says, a glimmer of her old self in her eyes. “Sometimes people find what they’re looking for in the most unexpected places.”
Her words mirror his horoscope reading to the point that Keith wonders if she’d somehow overheard them, although that’s obviously impossible.
“I just think it will be good for her to open up,” Colleen continues, glancing back down the hall. “I know she seems to be doing better, but I’m afraid that she’s bottling her emotions up. Nothing good can come of that.”
“But if she’s not ready to talk-” Keith protests.
“If she’s not ready, then Lance will help her through that, too,” Colleen interrupts confidently. “I know he’ll be good for her. All of this will be good for her. It will just take some time.”
“If you say so,” Keith replies, but he still feels doubtful. Why would Pidge open up to a total stranger like Lance if she won’t talk to him, or her parents, or her friends at school? And how can Lance, bright and smiley and happy as a puppy with a bone, possibly know how to help her through this? It just doesn’t make sense.
Pidge runs back through the hallway a second later, glasses askew, feet shoved into a pair of old green sneakers. “I’m ready if you are,” she says, picking up Beybey’s leash.
“Ready,” Keith echoes, shooting one last look at Colleen before his friend drags him out the door. She looks back at him surely, that confidence from before still set into her expression. She really does believe that Lance can help Pidge open up again.
The door closes behind him, and Pidge lets out a sigh of relief. “Come on,” she says, turning towards their neighborhood park with Beybey in tow. “Let’s get going.”