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“You can be a hard guy to find when you want, did you know that?”
Lance recognizes the voice instantly and yet he still throws his head back, if only to get an excuse to stare at Keith as he makes his way down to join him for a little longer than he's allowed to.
“Well, if it isn’t my favorite mullet!” Lance coos from his spot by the edge of the pier, cackling when Keith kicks him on his right thigh once he reaches his side. “Ah, jeez, alright! I yield!”
“Heck yeah,” Keith celebrates briefly under his breath with a proud grin, making Lance snort with a roll of his eyes. He pats the empty spot next to him, a silent invitation.
“Watching the sunset?” Keith asks once he sits, nodding towards the sun that slowly sinks into the ocean.
Lance nods. “When you miss it once, suddenly you can’t get enough of it,” he confesses quietly, a fond look on his eyes before he turns to meet Keith with a crooked grin. “Feels oddly familiar, right? You, me, and the sunset?”
“We’re just missing a big mechanical lion,” Keith mumbles, a small laugh leaving his lips as he pulls one knee close to his chest.
Lance hums, kicking his leg in the air from where they dangle on the edge.
“That and the love problems,” he chuckles, rolling his eyes at the memory. “God, I still can’t believe I wore a bucket.”
“You looked really handsome,” Keith comforts as a mock, patting Lance on the back and laughing when the brunet shoves him by the shoulder.
“Shut up!” Lance yelps, a dark flush growing on his cheeks, which only makes Keith laugh harder. “This might as well be a deja-vu, ya know? But maybe now it’s your turn to have embarrassing love problems.”
Keith snorts, rolling his eyes at the suggestion. “I don’t have love problems, Lance.”
“ I don’t have love problems, Lance. ” Lance mocks, making a face as he echoes Keith’s words and uses his hand as a puppet. He yelps when Keith flicks him on the cheek. “Ow, rude , and everyone has love problems, man.”
“I don’t,” Keith says confidently, shrugging with one shoulder when Lance purses his lips at him. “I mean, I don’t see it as a problem , it’s just – it is what it is.”
Lance blinks, all the teasing being thrown to the ocean as soon as he carefully takes in his friend’s expression.
Keith doesn’t look troubled. Or sad. He looks resigned and tired, as if he had given his all and yet the battle had been lost since the start.
“Hey man,” Lance calls softly, offering a small smile and a nudge on the shoulder meant to encourage. “Whatever it is, problem or not, I’m here for you. You know that, right?”
Keith blinks. Slowly until his eyes stay wide open, as if waiting for Lance to take it back. As if the option of venting to someone had never crossed his mind.
Classic Keith.
“I mean , it’s honestly nothing,” Keith tries to brush it off, clearing his throat as he looks away. “It’s dumb.”
See, Lance’s heart breaks at the words, because: one, Keith has no business to ever feel like he doesn’t deserve the world and two, one of his deepest fears came true.
And maybe, now that Lance thinks about it, they came true a while ago and he just didn’t want to admit it. Maybe it’s been months, years, since then and Lance chose to ignore it, if just to save his heart from the inevitable heartbreak.
Maybe Lance once had a chance to prevent them from even happening.
“Ah, you’re in love.”
But it doesn’t really matter now.
Keith grunts, dropping his forehead on top of his pulled up knee in a weak attempt to hide himself and honestly, he doesn’t deny or agree with Lance’s conclusion.
But, damn it, Lance doesn’t have an imaginary degree on Keith Akira Kogane Brooding Language for nothing.
“Alright, mullet,” Lance says, clapping his hands to catch his friend’s attention. “Out with it! Sunset Bonding Moment 2.0 is on session. Spill, child, spill!”
“Oh, God,” Keith groans, hiding further down on his knee as Lance continues to lower his voice until he sounds like a old man, demanding for a confession.
But Keith’s smiling, peeking through his bangs to watch his theatrics with a small smile until he can’t take it anymore and finally he gives in.
“Okay, fine, so maybe I’m in love…”
Once, when he was around seven years old, Lance crashed against the group of cactuses his abuela used to have in her backyard with his bicycle.
The sting of all the needle-like stabs he had endured is nothing compared to the one he goes through as he listen to Keith talk about the person he loves.
And there’s no name, Keith cuts himself off whenever it seems it’s about to leave his lips, cheeks growing redder before saying something else to cover himself up.
But Lance has clues, small little things; it’s human male, Keith has known him for years now, fought in the Empire war with them, and Lance has the faint suspicion that he currently works at the Garrison.
“It just came out of nowhere, you know?” Keith continues, looking genuinely bewildered as talks and recalls everything . It’s like he can’t stop talking now that the dam has broken and Lance would laugh if it wasn’t for the lump in his throat.
“I mean, it wasn’t something that happened from one day to another, of course. I think it was the realization that it even happened in the first place what hit me hard.”
Lance hums, nodding along. “Like when you start eating your least favorite snack because there’s nothing else to eat but you slowly start liking it and one day you’re buying it deliberately?”
Keith blinks, opens his mouth to reply and then thinks it over. “Huh, actually yeah, like that.”
Lance snorts. “Sounds like you two have been through a journey together without knowing.”
“You could say that,” Keith whispers with a small sheepish smile, rubbing the back of his neck embarrassed.
Lance gaze softens as he watches. Despite the heavy knot on his stomach, Lance can't be anything but grateful that there’s someone out there who’s lucky enough to be loved by Keith Akira Kogane.
Lance prays that they are worth it. He hopes they are worth Keith’s love.
“Sounds like you’ve got it good , man,” Lance whispers, offering a bright smile despite himself when Keith’s shy eyes meet his own. “That doesn’t come by easily, believe me.”
Keith’s eyes turn sad on their edge, smile turning bittersweet and Lance knows he must be thinking that he was talking about Allura.
Lance isn’t. Allura carries, and always will, a piece of his heart with her wherever she may be in the universe just like Lance will always carry her hope for life in his marks.
But his mama have always told him his heart is bigger than he thought, and Lance never knew how true that was until the war ended and his heart kept on beating for two people when he had been so sure he would have no beat at all.
It didn’t take Lance long to realize the second heartbeat was for Keith and him only.
“You said he doesn’t know, right?” Lance asks, humming when Keith nods his head. “Why not?”
Keith sighs, a small resigned smile on his lips as he pulls his knee up and hugs it close.
“At this point, I don’t know,” Keith confesses quietly, eyebrows knitted together. “I guess I’m just scared I will drive him away and I can’t…”
Keith bites down his lower lip in hesitation before he sighs and lets it go. “I can’t lose him. I have lost so many people, Lance, I can’t lose him – not him.”
‘Oh, Keith,’ Lance thinks, heart breaking for his friend before he reaches out to clasp his shoulder, squeezing it until Keith’s eyes are on him once more.
“I think,” Lance starts slowly, swallowing down his own feelings for his friend’s sake. “I think love is always worth to take a shot in the dark.”
“And if I miss?” Keith questions softly right after, eyes wide and vulnerable. Lance’s heart clenches as his hold on Keith’s shoulder tightens.
“Then I will light your way back home,” he whispers, words full of conviction as he smiles. “I’ve got your back, Keith.”
“I know,” Keith mumbles, eyes never looking away from Lance. “I know you do.”
And Lance? Well, he’s just glad he’s not standing because he would be on the floor by now because of the soft smile Keith sends his way.
“Thank you, Lance.”
“Anytime.” Lance nods and because he feels it’s not enough, he adds, “Just let me know if he turns into an asshole; I might not know who he is but I will kick his butt into the next galaxy if he does you wrong, buddy.”
“Oh? Defending my honor, I see?” Keith teases, laughing when Lance puffs his chest with a proud grin.
“Are you kidding? Of course! Nobody disses my best friend on my watch!” Lance says, clicking his tongue in disapproval. “Doesn’t matter he might be your next boo .”
Keith snorts as he shakes his head. “Wow, and to think he used to called me his rival .”
Lance laughs with him, mouth ready to add his own two cents, when the words sink in properly inside his head and Earth stops moving.
It stops moving at the same time Keith’s breathe hitches, eyes widening in realization as the silence drags on until they eventually meet Lance’s.
And Keith looks so scared. Like Lance has figured him out. Like Lance will shame him for the person he choose to love.
Lance feels a little sick at the thought.
“Keith,” Lance says slowly, staying still because his friend looks like he’s a breath away from bolting and Lance needs to keep him near. Please. “Hey, it’s alright – ”
“I didn’t mean to say that,” Keith breathes out in shock, swallowing dryly. “Sorry, I – Listen, Lance, it’s fine, you don’t have to – ”
“ Ay Dios ,” Lance huffs, rolling his eyes before he reaches out and drops both hands on Keith’s shoulders, keeping him in place. “Keith, I don’t care.”
Keith blinks, frowns, and then, “Oh? Um, okay?” he mumbles, looking oddly hurt and offended. “I mean, you don’t have to be so blunt about it –”
“Okay, that’s fair,” Lance cuts in, raising both hands in surrender. “I just – look, this is not a jab at your taste in men, buddy, but seriously, James Griffin? He has the same haircut he used to have when we were, like, twelve!”
There’s a brief stunned silence before, “What?”
Was that a bad ‘what’? Lance finds it a little hard to know since it sounds bewildered and stunned but Keith’s scowling like he used to do whenever Lance would make a pop culture reference in their early Voltron days.
Lance hurries to mend himself. The last thing he wants is for Keith to lose his trust in him just because he doesn’t agree with his taste in men.
“No, but seriously, man, I don’t care if it is Griffin,” Lance says, shrugging once to both deliver his message and also brush away the pain inside his chest. At least until Keith leaves. “All I care about is that he treats you right like the damn paladin you are, okay? No, no, like the damn paladin and prince you are, even though you keep rejecting the title back in New Daibazaal – "
“ Lance ,” Keith snaps, sounding even more exasperated and annoyed than before. Woah, okay, this is not what Lance was meaning to achieve.
Lance proceeds to panic.
“What!” he snaps back, throwing his arms up in the air, words sharp but he knows he most look distressed enough for Keith to soften his glare. “Listen, all I’m saying is that Griffin is a lucky guy, okay? And if he doesn’t –”
“No.”
Lance shuts his mouth, lowers his finger as he had been just about to enlist all the things that would fall upon Griffin if he dared to treat Keith wrong.
And he shrieks, “What do you mean by ‘ no’ ¡?”
“What do you mean by ‘Griffin’ ¡?” Keith shots back, nose scrunched as he spits the name like it was prisión itself. Well, then. “When – Why is he even in this conversation¡?”
Lance makes an 'I don't know' sound, clearly distressed.
“Because you’re in love with him¡?”
“Since when¡?”
“You literally – just now!”
“Wha – Wait, you think the man I love is James Fucking Griffin?” Keith hisses.
Lance swallows, throat suddenly dry. “Is he...is he not, then?”
“ No .”
“Oh.” Lance smacks his lips together, humming to himself as he darts his eyes away from Keith before he says, “So, uh, who is it?”
"Lance, dude ," Keith whines, as if he was in physical pain. "You cannot be this dense."
“Hey – !"
"He called me his rival," Keith says slowly, eyes wide as he was explaining something to a toddler. Which, rude. “There’s only one person who called me his rival.”
Rival, friend, crush, best friend, everything – Lance doesn’t dare to hope.
“Ah, so Regris, eh –?”
“Oh my God.”
“Then just tell me , you dumb mull –”
But Keith doesn’t tell him. He never does because Keith’s not one to explain what he means.
Keith shows him. Whatever he means to say or express, he does it though his actions – big or small, they all mean something more than words can express.
And Keith’s lips pressed on his own it’s a confession itself that yet something more. It’s a promise that says so much more than neither of them can put into words but Lance knows they don’t have to find the right ones.
Because this small bump of a kiss is the right one. Keith’s the right one .
Lance gasps as Keith grows bolder and pulls him closer, both of his hands cupping Lance’s cheeks and his touch burns him in the best ways.
It’s a burn Lance never wants it to fade from his skin. Never, ever , and he needs to keep Keith’s lips on him because this right here it's theirs. This is theirs – Keith’s his to love and cherish.
Oh, God, it’s him, him, him.
“You love me,” Lance breathes out the moment they pull back, eyes slowly blinking open. “You love me.”
Keith shudders a warm breath against his wet lips and Lance’s unable to suppress the shiver that runs down his back when Keith nods.
“Then – then that was…”
“That was my shot,” Keith whispers, wetting his lips anxiously as he shyly holds Lance’s stare. “My shot in the dark to tell you – show you .”
“Dude,” Lance says, a smile growing on his lips as he presses himself closer. “Keith, it’s not even dark.”
Keith’s lips twitch in the most endearing way, smile slowly growing.
“But I totally hit it, right?” he asks, one of his hands sliding down Lance’s cheek to rest on his collarbone. “Right on the bull’s eye?”
“More like, right on my poor cuban heart,” Lance jokes, smile turning fond when Keith laughs and relaxes even further, “but yes, you hit it.”
“And you used to say I was a terrible shooter,” Keith teases weakly.
Lance would snort at the jab but instead he sighs contently the moment Keith, with his remaining hand on his cheek, starts stroking his skin.
Lovingly. It’s a loving touch.
Lance leans towards it, soaking on its warmth. “Hm, think do can do it again with your eyes closed, Sharpshooter? "
Keith hums, a small breathy laugh leaving his lips as Lance brushes their noses together as encouragement.
“Let’s find out.”