Archive of Our Own

“I can’t believe we have to play after them,” Lance complains, again, as Shiro hands him an amp from the back of the van. “I told Hunk I wanted us to go last.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Shiro shrugs once the amp is in Lance’s hands, which might have been a mistake as Lance dramatically flails one arm into the air at Shiro’s comment, and the amp spends a few seconds precariously held only in Lance’s left hand. “Careful!” Shiro warns.

“It does matter, Shiro,” Lance replies and takes a proper hold of the amp again before setting it on the ground. “It does.”

Shiro sighs and continues to move gear out of the back of Lance’s mom’s van that she so kindly lets them borrow to use for shows. The band has always been something Shiro has done on the side for his own enjoyment rather than something he ever thought would go anywhere, but after Star Atlas received a write-up in the culture section of the city paper, well, Lance started to get big ideas. 

“What matters?” Matt asks as he walks up to the van, guitar case slung across his back. Pidge is trailing behind him doing something on her phone, drumsticks sticking out of her back pocket.

“Tonight’s show,” Lance sounds exasperated.

“We always play here because of Hunk, why is today so important?” Shiro asks, not understanding the fuss since Hunk is one of their best friends and will always let them play at his bar if the band wants. Shiro finally climbs out of the back of the van now that everything has been unloaded.

“Because,” Lance starts, “one, we were in the paper, people might have heard and have expectations now, and two, my rival is here.” He says the last point so matter-of-factly as if it was enough to justify his fervor over the show.

“Your rival?” Matt asks flatly.

“Yes, he plays bass in Blade of Night, who we’re playing before, remember, and I wanted us to have top billing tonight,” Lance huffs. 

“Hunk always randomly picks the lineups on showcase nights, you know this,” Matt says. “He’s never going to change that, even for us. He’s the master of fairness and friendship.”

Shiro makes a sound of agreement as he puts his own guitar case on his back and picks up some other equipment. Once all of them have accounted for everything they need, the band members make their way into Lion’s Bar. Hunk waves at them from behind the bar counter as they come in and immediately beeline through the small crowd to the backstage area, which is just a glorified storage space. Shiro recognizes a few people from the university they all attend in the crowd and gives them waves. From there, it’s the general motions of playing a set Lion’s to go through. The other bands playing before them are already there, but apparently not everyone on the bill tonight has arrived yet.

“He’s not here,” Lance hisses through his teeth after scanning the room. 

“Who?” Shiro asks, already having forgotten Lance’s apparent rival.

“Do you ever listen to me? Does anyone?” Lance returns to his natural state of frenzied flailing.

“Calm down,” Matt grabs one of Lance’s arms. “That means we can concentrate on getting ready, right?”

Lance grumbles before nodding and opening his guitar case. Seeing that his bandmate is calm for now, Shiro turns to his own guitar. The room is filled with the sounds of people talking in low voices and tuning instruments while the music playing out in the bar is slightly muffled. It’s a comforting mix of noises for Shiro. They’ve already decided on a setlist tonight—almost. Five songs, the standard short set for when the bar holds these types of shows with multiple local bands. They always pick their original songs fairly easily; the band is in agreement about which ones are their strongest. The cover of the night always gets an exhaustive argument until mere minutes before they go on stage. That seems how tonight will go as well with Matt and Shiro thinking they should play “Friday I’m In Love” while Pidge and Lance are adamant about debuting their newly perfected version of “That’s What I Like.”

“We should go with something fun, and what’s more fun than a slightly pop-punk cover of Bruno Mars?” Lance argues.

“Exactly,” Pidge agrees and pokes Matt and Shiro in the stomach with her drumsticks. 

Shiro sighs. “Okay, let’s go with Bruno.”

Pidge and Lance give a small cheer and high-five while Matt mutters a low “traitor” at Shiro. He shrugs at Matt, Shiro just wants to know what he’s singing now and not 60 seconds before going on stage. 

They give high fives and pats on the back to the group that went before them as they walk off the stage and Star Atlas makes their way on to set up. During the first two bands’ sets the crowd has filled up, Shiro notes, as he looks over the floor while adjusting the mic stand. A few stray yells of each of their names come from the crowd from people they may or may not know, which always makes Matt insufferable because he’s somehow developed his own following within the local scene.

“People love a scar and humor,” Matt once said lounging on the couch of his and Pidge’s shared apartment, and he gestured at the line running down one of his cheeks.

“I have a scar, too?” Shiro reminded, pointing at the line across the bridge of his nose.

“Yeah, but you only tell dad jokes,” Matt countered. Shiro had gasped, insulted, even though it was the truth.

Once everyone looks in place, Shiro walks around the small stage checking with each member to make sure they’re ready before going back to the mic at the front and giving a thumbs up to Hunk at the bar. Hunk returns the gesture and turns off the music playing over the speakers, and Acxa at the small soundboard in the corner of the room takes over. “West End Girls” was playing, but when it abruptly stops, cheers go up in the crowd because they know that means the band is ready to play.

Shiro smiles out at the audience and gives a small nod of thanks, and when the applause and yelling go down, he speaks into the mic. “Hey, we’re Star Atlas, and we’re going to play some songs for you.” Cheers start again, and Shiro gives one more quick look at Matt and Lance, nodding at Pidge so she can count them off for their first song.

He doesn’t need to look down at his fingers as he plays anymore, but Shiro still does when he starts a song out of habit. Shiro watches as he strums the smooth black plastic pick between his metal fingers, and then he looks briefly at his left hand working on the neck of the guitar. The moment where he’s supposed to start singing is creeping up, and he takes a deep breath before closing his eyes and turning to the mic.

Once they finish the first song, the band smoothly transitions right into the second one. Shiro can’t help but smirk out at the crowd in response to the cheering over the way the band eased into the next song seamlessly, but he doesn’t take too long to indulge before he starts singing. Between-song banter is something Shiro has gotten better at but still dreads. He picks up a water bottle from an amp and takes a drink, doing another check-in with his bandmates to make sure they’re all doing fine. Shiro goes back to the mic.

“How’s everyone doing?” he yells into the microphone. The crowd roars back with even more enthusiasm. “Awesome, awesome. Well, we’re thankful you guys came out to see us tonight.”

“You’re hot!” a voice yells from the audience, and it’s followed by cheers of agreement and laughter.

Shiro lets out a nervous chuckle into the mic and rubs the back of his neck with his left hand, not thinking about how the move emphasizes the muscles of his arms in the black t-shirt he’s wearing, which means the crowd yells more and whistles thinking he’s playing up to the compliment. He honestly didn’t mean to, it’s a nervous reaction. “It is...warm in here,” Shiro says a little sheepishly. That does get some laughs and claps from the audience, and Shiro can feel his face is heating, not just from the temperature of a hundred bodies in a confined space and less-than-top-tier stage lights. “Anyway, let's keep going, shall we?”

Star Atlas gets through the rest of their set, with Shiro stopping to talk to the audience twice more: once to introduce the debut of their Bruno Mars cover and once to thank them for coming out and that they had reached their last song. They walk off to loud applause and cheers, and Shiro feels his usual post-show high. There’s something so good about being able to stand in front of people and share something he created and instantly receive such a positive reaction while seeing the crowd having a great time, a small sea of bodies moving to the songs he wrote with his friends. The music itself is always developed as a collaboration of all the members together, but the lyrics, those have always been Shiro’s. It’s always been a wonder that the aerospace engineering grad student is the one who writes the poetic prose that is their lyrics. For Shiro, it’s always been a nice break from his work that has to be exact and precise. With writing lyrics and music, he can do anything.

Shiro is floating so high he barely notices the next band walk past and onto the stage while he heads off. They pack up their stuff backstage and take it out to the car now so they can come back and enjoy the rest of the night. Once again, Shiro is only vaguely aware of the next band starting, and it’s mostly because of Lance’s grumbles again about going before his supposed rival. Shiro does suppose they’re getting quite a lot of applause.

Once they lock up the van, Shiro leads Lance, Pidge, and Matt back into the bar, and they’re met with slaps on the back and overwhelmingly kind comments about the performance from those at the back of the crowd clustered near the bar.

“Impeccable as always,” Hunk yells over the band playing on stage, and he gives a thumbs up to Shiro as he wipes down the counter. Shiro gives a salute of thanks to Hunk with a grin, and Hunk turns back to the bar to make Shiro’s drink. He doesn’t need to ask, he knows. After they get their drinks, Matt, Pidge, and Shiro start to head into the crowd to properly watch the band that Lance is so bitter about, and Lance refuses to join them, taking a seat at the bar instead so he can speak—more like yell—with Hunk. 

“Whatever,” Shiro waves with a laugh at Lance as the three slowly navigate through bodies.

The stage is small, but Shiro does a slow sweep of looking at the members of the band on stage. His eyes shift from the guitarist to the singer, who’s also playing the guitar, and the drummer in the back—the latter two have hair brighter than Shiro’s silver. Finally, his gaze lands on Lance’s supposed rival bassist. And at that moment, Shiro is gone.

The bassist has long, shaggy black hair barely kept out of his face at all by the small ponytail at the back of his head. He’s swimming in an oversized sweater, and the rips and fading on his jeans look earned not bought. Even though his head is down, Shiro is enamored already. But then, he moves his gaze up, as if he knows Shiro is dying a little for a better look, and Shiro never really stood a chance. The bassist blows air up to get some of his hair out of his eyes, and then even this far back, Shiro can see how bright and stunning they look from just the stage lights.

Shiro feels a nudge at his shoulder that breaks him away from his admiring the bassist whose name he needs to learn as soon as possible. He looks to his side where Matt knocked their shoulders together, and he has one eyebrow raised as he looks between Shiro, then up at the stage at the bassist, and returns to look at Shiro, smiling knowingly. In an attempt to throw Matt off the scent, Shiro tries to casually turn away from the stage with an air of disinterest, but Matt knows. Matt always knows.

When the song ends, Matt leans into Shiro’s ear and yells over the crowd, “You’re so obvious!”

“I am not!” Shiro yells back, but that’s where their shouting conversation ends when as much of a hush as possible falls over the crowd because their singer starts talking. 

“Hello!” the singer yells into the microphone while smiling brightly. “I’m Allura, and up here we also have Romelle, Lotor, and Keith, and together we’re Blade of Night. We hope you have fun!” She gestured to each member on stage, and they nodded in acknowledgment, as Allura said their name. Now Shiro knows the bassist is named Keith, but Keith has returned to his watching his hands and the floor as he plays when the band launches right into their next song.

Mentally kicking himself, Shiro tries to pry his gaze away from Keith and take a moment to actually pay attention to the music. He nods and sways along, and he also takes some time to appreciate the lyrics as they’re sung from Allura’s truly beautiful voice. Every note out of her mouth sounds shiny and smooth, like little pearls of sounds falling off a necklace and bounding around. As their set progresses, Shiro gives up attempting to not watch Keith and lets himself indulge. Now Shiro notices that Keith’s mouth is moving just slightly, his lips barely parting to seemingly say the words to the songs along with Allura. It makes Shiro smile, he’s always liked when you can see other members of the band singing along to their own songs. 

When Allura announces their last song, Matt pulls on Shiro’s arm and jerks his head in the direction of the door as cheers and disappointed cries ring around them. Shiro doesn’t want to leave yet, but he gives one last glance back at the stage to watch Keith down half a water bottle in one long drink. It shouldn’t be attractive, but Shiro feels a very particular thirst watching Keith’s throat work. A single drop of water comes out of the corner of his mouth and runs down Keith’s chin. Matt yanks at the sleeve of Shiro’s sweatshirt again to make him look away as Keith uses the sleeve of his own sweater to wipe away the stray water. Again, it shouldn’t be hot, but it is.

They wave at Hunk on their way out, and he throws a final good job at them. Once they’re outside, Matt pulls Shiro toward him again. “Hey!” Shiro cries, tired of Matt just dragging him around like a doll.

“Don’t let Lance know you think his rival is hot,” Matt tells Shiro, face looking gravely serious, but the twitch at the corner of his mouth and his shining eyes give him away. Matt is trying to not laugh.

“Fuck off,” Shiro scoffs and gently shoves Matt away, who then does start laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Pidge asks as they reach the van, she and Lance are already there, leaning against the back. 

“Nothing—”

“Shiro’s crush.”

Shiro and Matt speak at the same time, and Shiro counts to three before Lance and Pidge process what just happened and launch a line of questioning at him.

“Who is he?” Lance asks, perking up and looking excited at the aspect of Shiro actually liking someone. Lance is one of those people who loves love and thrives off of watching people fall in love. 

“No one,” Shiro tries to move away from his bandmates, but Pidge magically appears at his side, stopping his path of escape.

“Who?” Pidge squints at him through her glasses. 

“I said no one, Matt is just joking around,” Shiro steps the other away around Pidge and starts to fish through his pockets for his car keys.

“Fine, keep your secrets, for now,” Lance squints. “See you at practice.” 

And with that everyone says their goodbyes and good jobs as they disperse to their cars, Pidge going with Lance in the van and Matt with Shiro. When they get into Shiro’s car, instead of buckling up or starting the car, Shiro puts his head down on the top of the steering wheel and takes a deep breath.

“I told you,” Matt said. “You’re so obvious.”

“Shut up,” Shiro weakly fights back, but he’s still thinking about Keith’s eyes after he flipped his hair out of his face.

♩♫♩♫

A few days later Shiro is sitting in the university library trying to finish a lab report, but he feels close to bursting with the numbers and equations that he’s been working on for the past two hours. He decides it’s perfectly reasonable to take a break right now, so he opens up Twitter on his laptop and starts to mindlessly scroll through his feed. A post catches his eye causing him to abruptly stop. Lion’s Bar’s account retweeted a post from Blade of Night’s account, and it’s a picture from the other night of the band on stage. Shiro then does the natural thing, which is to click on the band’s profile and look through it before following an Instagram link out to that account as well. Before he knows it, Shiro has about 12 tabs open in his browser of the band’s social media accounts, and YouTube videos featuring other Blade of Night’s performances. 

Shiro realizes what he’s doing when he reaches for his water bottle to take a drink while not looking away from the screen as he watches the band play what appears to be their most popular song at a small club venue he’s heard of in the next town over. Freezing with the bottle halfway to his mouth, Shiro sets it down and then closes all his tabs. He grabs his phone and types a quick text to Matt.

Oh no, I think I like him.

The response from Matt comes back after a few seconds.

You don’t even KNOW the man!!!

Shiro frowns at his phone and puts it down before leaning back in his chair and closing his eyes. To anyone else, it looks like he’s but another student having a moment of defeated exasperation due to school, but, in reality, he’s having a crisis over a bassist with long dark hair and impeccable guitar skills.

In the middle of his self-pity, Shiro hears the sound of his phone buzzing and sees another text from Matt. He’s asking Shiro to come over to Matt and Pidge’s apartment to hang out for the afternoon. If there’s one thing Shiro knows about the Holt siblings, it’s that anything he tells Matt, Pidge will inevitably find out as well. Shiro is left with the decision of either staying at the library or going to the Holts' where he’ll be mercilessly teased for at least 20 minutes until someone either puts on a movie or a video game. The latter doesn’t sound too bad, actually, so Shiro fires off a response that he’ll be right over and starts packing up his things.

When Shiro gets to Matt and Pidge’s place, he’s greeted by Matt opening the door and declaring, “Hey, loverboy.”

“Shut up,” Shiro groans as he pushes past Matt to get into the apartment. Pidge is sitting on the couch with an array of sci-fi and fantasy DVDs to choose from. “I assume he told you,” Shiro raises an eyebrow at her.

“He might have,” Pidge says it dismissively. “Come here and help me pick a movie,” Pidge adds with much more enthusiasm than she had about Shiro’s love life—well, he doesn’t have one, it’s more the vague idea of it. Either way, Shiro gladly takes the opportunity to not be the center of any teasing and leans over the back of the couch to see the spread of options. “By the way,” Pidge starts after a minute of them discussing the movies, “I have another friend coming over, too, if that’s cool.”

“Yeah, of course,” it’s now Shiro’s turn to be indifferent to questions, and he picks up one of the movies that he hasn’t seen before and reads the summary on the back.

“Cool,” Pidge replies. “I know him from class.”

Shiro makes a noise of acknowledgment of the fact and puts the DVD back down. Once they’ve narrowed it down to two final choices for a movie, Matt says maybe they should wait on Pidge’s friend to see what their opinion is for the final selection. Shiro nods in agreement and stuffs more popcorn into his mouth. Do the Holts always make a separate bag just for him whenever they watch movies together? Yes, and it’s one of the many reasons that he loves them.

There is a knock on the door from who Shiro assumes is Pidge’s friend. She jumps off the couch to go open the door and Shiro settles down with his bowl of popcorn. The door opens, and Shiro drops the popcorn. Entering the Holt’s apartment is none other than the man from Blade of Night that has been occupying most of Shiro’s thoughts for the week. 

“Hey,” Keith says to Pidge as he enters the apartment and waves at Matt. Shiro can’t move as Keith sweeps his hair out of his eyes and turns to look into the living room where Shiro is sitting covered in popcorn. “Um, hi,” Keith greets Shiro with uncertainty.

Shiro opens his mouth and closes it in shock, and then a kick to the back of the couch placed by Matt makes Shiro jump and say hi back in a voice that might be slightly laced with fear.

“Don’t mind Shiro, he’s a bit clumsy sometimes. Startles easily, like a small woodland creature,” Matt chuckles and gives Shiro a few hard thumps on the back.

“Really?” Keith’s voice is unamused but there’s a slight smirk on his lips, and Shiro thinks that is wonderful.

“You’re the bassist from Blade of Night,” Shiro says uselessly, stating a fact that everyone in the room is well aware of.

Pidge takes the moment to interject. “Yeah, we were in the same lab group last semester.”

“Cool,” Shiro replies, even though he’s still covered in popcorn and decidedly not looking or feeling cool at all. Right, the popcorn. Shiro tears his eyes away from Keith to stop and pick up the mess he made. It’s a great task to stop himself from staring at the other man.

“Need help?” Keith asks, strolling over to where Shiro is on the floor trying to reach kernels that made their way under the couch.

Shiro adjusts back from where he’s crouched down to the ground and looks up. Keith is standing above him, and Shiro is on his knees. The shock of the position sends Shiro rocketing up from the floor, and the sudden movement makes Keith flinch back. “No, it’s okay,” Shiro replies hastily. “It’s my mess,” and then Shiro laughs awkwardly.

Keith’s eyes narrow at Shiro. “Why are you acting weird?” Keith asks.

“What?” Shiro’s jaw drops in confusion.

“Like you’re uncomfortable that I’m here?”

Shiro looks at Pidge and Matt behind Keith in the kitchen, they’re both standing there with wide eyes. “I-I’m not,” Shiro replies.

“Yeah, you are,” Keith takes a step back and folds his arms. “Pidge and Matt said you were cool, it was just Lance who’s the one that invented the whole rival thing.”

“I don’t—”

“Fine dude, guess you’re the same,” Keith backs up more, and Shiro thinks he might sound a little disappointed.

“I’m not—” Shiro tries to backtrack, but Keith turns and walks away.

“Thanks for the invite, see you later,” he waves at Pidge and goes out the door.

And then it’s Shiro with the Holts all looking at each other in surprise.

“God, you really are meant for each other,” Pidge finally breaks the silence.

“What?” Shiro asks.

“He took your lack of ability to function because you like him as you don’t like him because he’s in Blade of Night,” Pidge pinches the bridge of her nose. “It’s like neither of you knows how to exist in society.”

“You really couldn’t string more words together?” Matt asks Shiro.

“You should have told me he was coming!” Shiro cries. “I wasn’t prepared.”

“Really, like you would have been any better if we told you he was coming,” Matt says skeptically. “You would have run away.”

“No,” Shiro sounds just slightly like an indignant child. And with that, Shiro collapses back onto the couch. “Dammit.” Shiro closes his eyes and sighs, feeling terrible.

♩♫♩♫

“Let’s start that one again, from the bridge,” Lance instructs.

Star Atlas is gathered in their practice space—Lance’s garage with the door just barely open—and they’re trying to perfect a new song. Right now it’s just instrumental, waiting for Shiro to write the lyrics that will go over it. He hasn’t come to any decisions about the words, just some hastily typed lines in a note on his phone.

It’s been a week since The Keith at the Holts’ Incident, and as the days pass, Shiro just steadily feels worse and worse. He thinks that he’s really messed up and doesn’t know if there’s any way to come back from it. How does he convince Keith that hey, I couldn’t talk to you because I think you’re beautiful and want to take you on a date and get to know you, not because I hate you. Shiro had expressed as much to Matt, and Matt had asked why he couldn’t just say that. 

Shiro plays along with the band as they rehearse the bridge of the song again, humming along to himself, but his thoughts drift to Keith.

“Someone seems distracted,” Pidge says when they finish the song.

“Something on your mind, Shiro?” Matt adds.

Lance looks at his three bandmates confused. “Is there something I’m missing?”

“No,” Shiro says a little forcefully. He turns to the Holts, “It’s nothing.”

“It’s something,” Pidge mutters to herself. “A dark-haired boy something.”

Lance perks up. “Oh, is this who you like, Shiro? Did something happen between you and him?” Lance asks the questions fast and walks closer to Shiro.

“Nope, no,” Shiro shakes his head. “We’re not doing this right now.”

“So you will talk about him with us?” Lance pushes eagerly.

“No, never, nothing to discuss,” Shiro shakes his head. “Let’s practice, uh, some other song, yeah?”

“Don’t change the subject, Shirogane,” Lance says, but he does back away from him. “You can’t escape me,” Lance then makes an I’m watching you hand gesture. “But we do need to practice.” Thankfully, Lance’s drive to improve as a band outweighs his thirst for gossip, so they do actually get back to practicing instead of putting the spotlight on Shiro’s life. He’s thankful for the change. 

Later, when Matt, Pidge, and Shiro are leaving Lance’s house, Lance yells a reminder for Shiro to work on lyrics for their new songs, and Shiro waves off Lance. Shiro knows he’s been dragging his feet on this, but he just doesn’t know what to write about. Once they get into Shiro’s car and are on the road, Shiro breaks through the unusual silence in the car. “How do I fix what happened?”

“Which part?” Matt asks.

“All of it,” Shiro groans, barely resisting putting his head down on the steering wheel as he comes to a stop at a red light. “I didn’t mean to upset Keith, I really do want to talk to him, even if it’s just to clear up the situation.”

“Will you ask him out?” Pidge asks.

Shiro makes a scandalized sound. “Even if he accepted my apology, I think that’s a little premature.”

“Don’t sell yourself short like that,” Matt says while patting Shiro on the shoulder, and Shiro turns to frown at his friend.

“I can’t deal with this, it’s like having a sad puppy,” Pidge sighs from the backseat. “Fine, I’ll try and get him to come over again, and you better be nice and talk to him properly.”

“What?” Shiro is surprised that Pidge gave in so fast. 

“You heard me, apologize,” Pidge says it as a command, not a suggestion.

But Shiro’s life is never that easy or convenient.

♩♫♩♫

The AUX cord in his car stops working, and rather than being reasonable and just deciding to listen to the radio, Shiro changes his drive home to stop at the Best Buy near the mall. He figures there has to be some sad cord sitting on a clearance shelf end-cap. Nodding at the loss prevention employees at the front, Shiro makes a beeline to the part of the store where he knows all the marked down sale items are hidden. On his path, he sees a familiar head of hair down one of the aisles. Keith is standing in front of the display of printers, and it’s not because he’s in the market for a new printer, no, Keith is wearing the standard blue polo shirt and khakis of an employee. Shiro manages not to trip over himself at the sight, and honestly, he’s a little charmed to see Keith out of stage attire.

Because he’s a little lost and in shock at seeing Keith, Shiro reacts on a delay when Keith starts to turn in order to lead the customer he’s helping down the aisle in the direction of Shiro. When he realizes they’ll be coming his way, Shiro tries to walk away as fast as possible so he can get out of Keith’s line of sight and also not look suspicious suddenly running through the store.

Shiro ducks himself behind the refrigerators in the home appliance area of the store in hopes that it will give him a place to hide and make sure he’s out of Keith’s line of vision while getting out of the store. By no means, absolutely none at all, can Shiro see Keith right now. Pidge was still trying to arrange another day to get Keith to come to hang out at her and Matt’s apartment. The opportunity to apologize hadn’t happened yet, and Shiro sure didn’t want to do it at Keith’s workplace.

Gingerly, Shiro moves around the fridges he’s hiding behind and pokes his head out to look around and see if he can find Keith’s current whereabouts. After a few sweeps of the floor, Shiro doesn’t see him and steps out from his momentary fort. Of course, that’s when Keith comes around the corner and sees Shiro immediately.

“I thought I saw you,” Keith narrows his eyes at Shiro and walks towards him. Shiro is frozen to the spot.

“Hey,” Shiro croaks out. “Didn’t know you worked here.”

“You didn’t?” Keith raises an eyebrow and crosses his arms in skepticism.

“Really, I just stopped by to check the clearance section for an AUX cord,” Shiro tries to explain.

“This isn’t where clearance is.”

“I know, it’s at the end of the aisle with the paper shredders.”

Shiro hopes he didn’t imagine the momentary rising of one side of Keith’s mouth, in dare he hopes, a small smile. “And you decided to check out fridges on the way? On the opposite side of the store?”

“I mean, I could be in need of a new fridge, I’ve just never thought about it, my apartment came with one,” Shiro feels his confidence grow an inch. “And this one seems nice.” He pats the appliance at his right side without looking at it.

“That’s a stacked washer and dryer.”

“What?” Shiro actually looks to his side. Indeed, it’s a stacked washer and dryer. “I’ve never thought about one of these either, and look, we match.” Shiro splays the fingers of his prosthetic on the shining stainless steel finish of the appliance. 

To Shiro’s surprise, Keith laughs. It’s a small sound, just barely more than an amused snort, but the noise is still a victory for Shiro. His heart is no longer racing in fear but rather in hope. “Sure, sure,” Keith says, amused. “Have any questions about it?”

“No,” Shiro starts slowly. “But, this wasn’t how I planned for this to happen, but I wanted to apologize.”

“For wanting a washer and dryer or possibly a fridge?”

Now it was Shiro’s turn to let out a small laugh. “No, I wanted to say I’m sorry for the other day at Pidge and Matt’s place. I wasn’t...upset to see you. Quite the opposite, really.”

“And what’s the opposite of horrified silence mixed with closed off?” Keith asks.

“Um, happy?” Shiro offers.

“Happy,” Keith’s eyebrows rise.

Shiro feels his cheeks burn as a blush starts to creep up just as he thinks about his response. “Yeah, I’d been hoping to get a chance to talk to you after seeing Blade of Night at Hunk’s. You’re really good.”

“Really?” Keith asks.

“Yeah, I wanted to get to know you, maybe?” Shiro asks hopefully.

“No, I was asking did you really think I was good?” Keith says it, but there’s a smile on his face to give away he’s joking.

“Oh, I can stroke your ego, too, if that’s what you need,” Shiro says it without thinking about his word choice.

Keith very obviously runs his gaze up and down Shiro’s body, clearly checking him out. “I’m sure you could, and then some.”

Shiro coughs. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“My shift is over at 7,” Keith cuts Shiro off.

“Oh, okay…” Shiro doesn’t want to hope he’s reading too much into the information.

“Okay, so at 7, be back here, and we can talk,” Keith tells Shiro.

Shiro perks up, he feels himself stand up straighter and beam at Keith. “Okay! I’ll be here.”

Keith looks at Shiro in the eyes before examining his face in slight scrutiny. “You’re cute happy.” And that’s the last thing he says before turning around and walking back out into the store. He leaves Shiro in shock, and Shiro can’t even go and flag Keith down again because he’s barely taken two steps away before a customer comes up to him needing assistance.

“Cute,” Shiro whispers to himself, and then he walks out of the store as if on a cloud, the AUX cord forgotten but now trying to think about how he’s going to spend two hours until Keith is free. And where is he going to take Keith?

♩♫♩♫

After driving home quickly to clean up and change, Shiro second-guesses himself and changes back into what he was wearing when he was in the store earlier, not wanting to come across as too much during their first time hanging out properly. He leaves his apartment just at the right time taking traffic into account to get to Best Buy at 6:55 and park his car. Shiro worries for a minute about how he’s supposed to let Keith know that he’s here. Should he go inside? Should he just wait until he sees Keith walk out of the store? A knock at his window makes him jump and breaks through his thoughts.

“Keith,” Shiro gasps. He’s standing leaned over Shiro’s car, smirking through the driver’s side window right at Shiro. He lowers the window quickly. “Hey, I was just going to come to and find you.”

“I could feel you worrying from the home theater section,” Keith laughs.

“Oh, I, oh, sorry,” Shiro mumbles, unsure of what to say.

“I’m just kidding,” Keith gives Shiro’s shoulder a slight nudge, it’s a joking gesture. “So, can I get in?”

“Oh!” Shiro flails momentarily and unlocks the car doors. “Yeah, come on in.”

Keith walks around the front of the car, and Shiro takes a moment to appreciate that Keith threw on a red leather jacket over his blue polo to hide it and also fight the lingering spring chill. “So, where are we going?” Keith asks.

“Do you like milkshakes?” Shiro asks back. 

“Not what I was expecting, but okay, yeah,” Keith nods.

“Have you ever been to the burger restaurant in the mall?” Shiro replies with yet another question.

“The one that’s where the previous burger place was that failed?” Keith raises an eyebrow.

“Yes,” Shiro chuckles. “That one. Well, the new place has really good milkshakes. And I know, sounds suspect, but I promise you I’ll change your mind.”

“Sure, drive on,” Keith smiles and buckles in.

In the quick drive over to the mall and finding a parking spot close to the entrance by the burger restaurant, Shiro and Keith make some small talk about Keith’s shift being as unexciting as usual, and Shiro tells Keith that he had an equally dull day with his TA office hours. That leads to both of them discussing what they’re doing at Garrison University. Shiro learns that Keith is in his last semester of the mechanical engineering program while Shiro is an aerospace engineering grad student.

“I wish you had been my Engineering Fundamentals TA,” Keith comments as they approach the host at the entrance of the restaurant. The conversation stops for a few minutes as they’re led to a booth and given menus. Shiro automatically turns the menu to the wide selection of milkshakes and tells Keith about all the ones he’s tried. 

They have a few moments of silence as they contemplate their orders, which end up being loaded fries to split and a banana milkshake for Shiro and a caramel one for Keith. Once that business is out of the way, Shiro circles back to what Keith had said before they entered the restaurant. “Why do you wish you had me as a TA?” He smirks and leans his on the table as he asks. 

“Because I had Allura as a TA, and she was hard on us,” Keith explains. 

“And you think I go easy on students?” Shiro asks.

“Yeah, I think you do,” Keith smiles, and Shiro will take that because yes he maybe does go easy on his students sometimes. 

“Fine, maybe,” Shiro admits with a laugh, “Is that when you met Allura?”

Keith nods. “She found out I played bass, and then spent months holding it in until the last day of the semester when she handed back our final grades. Allura put the lab report down and then asked me to come to play bass with her band, and I said sure.”

“That’s a great How Did the Band Meet answer,” Shiro says. “You were the last member they needed?”

“Yeah, I went over one Saturday to Lotor’s where they practice, met him and Romelle, we all got along, they said I played well, and that was it,” Keith shrugs.

“For just a few years together, you’re a great band,” Shiro comments. “And anyway, if I had been your TA, you’d never have met Allura and been in one of the hottest bands the city has to offer.”

Keith laughs at Shiro’s enthusiasm. “I guess that’s true, but how about you and Star Atlas?”

Shiro groans. “I feel like we’ve been together forever,” Shiro explains. “Which, isn’t a bad thing, I think we’ve really grown, but it’s been a long time.”

Shiro then tells Keith about how he’s been best friends with Matt since they were kids and both signed up for guitar lessons together in middle school, and then a few years later, much to Sam and Colleen Holt’s surprise, Pidge said she wanted to take instrument lessons as well and chose the drums. The three of them would play together for fun, nothing really serious, but they did get some songs cobbled together. Little two-minute things that needed fleshing out, but they were something to start with. When Pidge was in high school she became friends with Lance and Hunk, which led to Lance being added to their little group as a bassist and Hunk would provide support and snacks when they practiced.

“Then this happened,” Shiro raises his hand and wiggles the prosthetic fingers. “But everyone was supportive and got me back on my feet with my guitar and a microphone.”

“That’s awesome,” Keith says softly. It’s then that the waitress comes by with their orders. Shiro watches eagerly as Keith takes his first sip of the milkshake. Keith hums after drinking and moving away from the straw. “It’s good.”

“Just good?” Shiro presses.

“Okay, it’s very good, you were right,” Keith admits with a roll of his eyes.

“Told you!” Shiro replies happily and takes a large drink from his shake. The two of them spend a few hours sitting at the restaurant talking about everything from their favorite songs to family pets, and Shiro even managed to convince Keith that they should get one more milkshake to split. It’s a combination of sugar and time spent with Keith that keeps a little bounce to Shiro’s step as they make their way to Shiro’s car. It’s also the reason Shiro does a very enthusiastic singalong that includes drumming on his steering wheel to “In The Air Tonight” as he takes them back to Best Buy so Keith can get his car. 

“I think that was even better than your set the other night,” Keith laughs and gives a small clap at Shiro’s performance. 

“I’m both complimented and offended by that,” Shiro snorts as he pulls into the parking spot next to Keith’s car. “I’m glad we got to spend some time together.”

“Yeah, this was nice,” Keith smiles.

“I guess I’ll see you again...soon?” Shiro doesn’t want to sound too hopeful. “When’s your next show?”

Keith tilts his head. “You can see me before that, Shiro,” the corner of his mouth lifts slightly. Keith takes out his phone and flicks through things on the screen until he turns it around to present to Shiro. It’s open on a new contact, and Shiro’s name is already typed in with a microphone emoji. The extra touch makes Shiro’s heart soar. “Give me your number.”

Shiro doesn’t hesitate to quickly type his number into Keith’s phone and triple-check that it’s right because this would be the one time he’d managed to fuck up and get his own cell phone number wrong. When he hands it back to Keith, the bassist takes another few seconds to do something until Shiro sees his phone light up with a notification. Keith had sent him a message so they had each other's numbers.

“Then we’ll definitely see each other before our next shows,” Shiro grins.

“For sure,” Keith nods. “Thanks for hanging, Shiro,” Keith says with a pat to Shiro’s knee, and then he’s out the door and walking over to his own car. Shiro waits until Keith starts his car up to wave one last time over to Keith and drive out of the parking lot. He really hopes this doesn’t fizzle out.

♩♫♩♫

“One, two, three,” Pidge counts off and hits her sticks together to launch Star Atlas into one of the new songs they’re working on. They’re in Lance’s garage doing their usual Sunday afternoon practice. Shiro hasn’t written any lyrics for this one yet; the band only has the music together, so he just hums and sings some filler la-la-la’s to try and give a sense of what it will sound like once vocals are added. 

Lance doesn’t wait a second once they end the song to turn to Shiro. “Have you written anything for this yet?” he asks.

“I’m sorry, Lance,” Shiro shakes his head. “Haven’t had time.”

“I know, I know,” Lance nods. “You’ve got a lot going on, but I just wanted to check in on progress.”

“Thanks,” Shiro sighs. “Between classes, being a TA, and...other stuff, it’s just been rough trying to get some time squeezed out.”

“Other stuff?” Lance is immediately distracted by the vague excuse Shiro gave to what is actually texting Keith.

As soon as Shiro had gotten home from hanging out with Keith after the Best Buy Incident, the bassist had sent him a text with a YouTube link to one of the songs they’d talked about earlier. Shiro hadn’t heard of the band, and that had shocked Keith. Along with the video, there was a short message. 

Listened to this on the way home and thought of you. 

Keith kept sending Shiro songs after that, some that Shiro knew and some that he didn’t, all of them coming with messages about why Keith felt like sharing that particular one with Shiro. Sometimes he really liked the bass part at the bridge, sometimes it was because Keith hadn’t heard the song in a while and remembered how much he liked it and wanted to share, but Shiro’s favorite reason will always be when Keith says any variation about how the song somehow made him think of Shiro. Maybe Shiro has a small playlist going in Spotify right now compiled of all the songs that Keith has sent him. And Shiro isn’t one to shy away from work, so he sends back just as many songs to Keith across the day for as many varying reasons as Keith does. Shiro thinks that the two playlists actually go really well together.

“Anyway,” Shiro snaps out of his thoughts and looks back at Lance. “We still have at least, what, a month before our next show?”

“Yep,” Pidge throws a stick into the air and lets it twirl before catching it. “And we have midterms in the middle.”

Lance groans. “Please don’t remind me.”

“Maybe we should cut today short to go study?” Shiro offers with a raised eyebrow and a laugh.

“I’m sure you’re going to go study if we end early,” Matt snorts.

“Shiro doesn’t need to study, ever, he just has, like, natural talent,” Lance gestures at Shiro dismissively, and Shiro frowns.

“Yeah, I’m sure it’ll be a different type of studying Shiro will be doing,” Matt snickers. Shiro wonders if it would be too much to make the effort of taking steps over to where Matt is standing and punching him in the arm. When Matt shares a look with Pidge, Shiro decides he’s valid and does just that.

“Or not,” Matt takes a step back when he sees Shiro start to advance towards him.

“Is there something I don’t know?” Lance narrows his eyes at his bandmates.

“There’s so much, Lance,” Pidge sighs dramatically.

“Hey!” Lance gets distracted by Pidge’s laughing at his expense and forgets about questioning Shiro any further. 

They manage to make it through another few practice playthroughs of songs before deciding that’s definitely enough for the day because they all have other things to attend to. Shiro thinks he’s made it out free, but when he’s walking to his car, Lance shuffles along behind him.

“Yes, Lance?”

“So, Shiro, buddy, pal,” Lance starts.

“What is it?” Shiro rolls his eyes.

“You never told me who you’re crushing on,” Lance says with a smirk.

“It was lovely as always, Lance, have a good time studying, I’ll see you later,” Shiro pulls open his car’s backdoor to place his guitar across the seat. “I’ll work on the lyrics.”

“Don’t work too hard,” Lance winks. “Maybe spend some time with the lucky guy and inspiration will strike.”

“Are you telling me to go on a date,” Shiro deadpans.

“I’m not telling you to do anything, I’m just recommending.”

“Noted,” Shiro scoffs.

“This is for your own good,” Lance tries to argue.

“Yeah, yeah,” Shiro laughs and makes a dismissive gesture at Lance, thankful for his friend’s blind support. “See you, Lance.”

“Bye, loverboy!” Lance thumps the top of Shiro’s car and walks back to his house, and Shiro groans in annoyance that Lance and Matt are now sharing nicknames for him. But he sees a message from Keith flash across his screen, and the expression on his face shifts to something brighter.

♩♫♩♫

Later that week on Friday night Shiro finds himself standing outside his apartment building trying to casually scroll through his phone while looking up every two seconds at any car that passes by in hopes that it’s finally Keith. When Shiro left his last band practice, Keith had texted asking if Shiro wanted to go to a small show a town over. Shiro had jumped at the opportunity to both see some new local bands as well as spending time with Keith.

When Keith finally pulls up into a parking spot, Shiro slips his phone into the inside pocket of his jacket and hurries over to the car. The driver's side window rolls down and Keith’s head sticks out. He’s got his hair pulled back into one of his signature tiny ponytails and stray bangs flutter in the breeze. “Hey, you ready, Shiro?” he asks.

“Hell yeah!” Shiro tries to sound an appropriate amount of excited when he goes to open the passenger door, but he’s too enthusiastic in his actions and tries to pull open the door before Keith unlocks it. A few awkward seconds back and forth of Shiro trying to open the door and Keith trying to unlock it go by before Shiro finally finds himself seated next to Keith in the car.

“You really are excited,” Keith gives a small laugh as he watches Shiro buckle in. Shiro wonders why the tips of Keith’s ears are a light shade of red.

“Of course, I’m looking forward to seeing the bands,” Shiro pauses. “And you.”

“Oh,” Keith sounds surprised. “So am I.”

“Cool.”

“Yeah, cool,” Keith smirks. “Let’s go.” They spend the first few minutes driving in silence before Keith brings up if anyone will recognize them at the show.

The university that Shiro, Keith, and their bandmates attend sits in the middle of three towns: Garrison, Dabaizaal, and Altea. Shiro and the members of Star Atlas live in Garrison while Keith and his bandmates are all in Altea. Both of their bands are the most well-known in their respective towns, and they don’t go into Daibazaal too often to play. Keith told Shiro the first time they hung out that Keith grew up in Daibaizaal before his parents moved over to Altea, so he still likes visiting the town. He just prefers attending shows more than playing there. So, there’s a chance that people who go to shows in all three places might recognize Shiro and Keith.

“Ugh, I hope no one recognizes me,” Shiro groans, closing his eyes. “This is why I think I can’t really ever be a true frontman for a band. I don’t want the attention. I just wanna play.”

“I think that makes you a perfect frontman,” Keith responds, softly.

“Lance has the personality for it,” Shiro counters, opening his eyes and looking over to Keith.

Keith’s eyes are on the road. “Lance is that one bassist a generation that is somehow blessed and cursed with the personality for a band’s frontman but he isn’t one.”

Shiro makes a sound of agreeance. “You do fit the classic bassist image, though,” Shiro chuckles.

“I never said I didn’t,” Keith bristles.

“I didn’t mean anything against it,” Shiro hastily adds. “I think it’s cute.”

Keith snorts. “Yeah, grumpy bassist, very cute.”

“Well, you are,” Shiro replies without a pause and then instantly regrets how forthcoming he was with that comment.

“Well, thanks for that, Shiro,” Keith laughs. Shiro looks over at Keith at the same time that the other man spares a glance over to Shiro, taking his eyes off the road. The sun is setting and the desert is fading into shades of orange and red, but the pink on Keith’s cheeks aren’t the result of any light.

Shiro does his best to suppress a smile and look away from Keith while racking his brain for something to shift the conversation to instead of this shy back-and-forth flirting. Blessedly, Keith comes to the rescue and starts asking some technical questions about the equipment Shiro uses for his guitar during shows, and that helps them start a string of random topics until they reach the venue.

Vrepit Sal’s is the first registered historical landmark in the town of Daibazaal. It opened over fifty-years ago as a diner and had served patrons as a restaurant for most of those years until the eponymous Sal retired and handed the business to his children. It’s still a diner, but on weekends after 9pm it hosts local bands. Keith manages to find one of the last few available spots in Sal’s parking lot, and Shiro makes a comment about how busy it is.

“You’ve really never come to any shows out here?” Keith asks with a tiny, incredulous laugh.

“I know, I know, I needed to get out more,” Shiro shrugs with a guilty grin.

“Guess I’ll have to drag you out to make up for all your homebody-ness,” Keith places a hand on Shiro’s shoulder as the walk up to the diner’s entrance.

“I’d go willingly,” Shiro admits. Keith doesn’t say anything, he just gives a small hum.

They pay the cover fee at the door, and when Shiro steps into Vrepit Sal’s, it’s not what he expected at all. In his mind, Shiro imagined a classic diner that just had a small stage shoved into a corner with bands dragging up their equipment while half the occupants of the restaurant were there for the music and the other for the pancake special. Only some of that seems true.

Half the restaurant has classic diner vinyl seat booths and the other half appears to usually be regular tables and chairs, but right now those are all folded and stacked away to clear space for a stage and small soundboard. A gleaming countertop bar area is in the middle of the diner with a small view into the kitchen behind it. Shiro looks up at the ceiling and next to the usual lighting of the restaurant, which is turned off, there are track lights that give the whole restaurant the feeling of a typical music venue. 

“Wow,” Shiro whispers, stopping a few steps into Vrepit Sal’s and staring around. 

“It’s cool, right?” Keith sounds a little smug. “You’re wishing you came out here earlier. You should.”

“Yeah, honestly,” Shiro nods. “I want to play here someday.”

“You definitely will, big guy,” Keith smiles and then jerks his head in the direction of the bar. “You want anything? They only serve drinks and appetizers on show nights.” 

“They really have everything figured out here,” Shiro sighs, wondering if he’ll lose any cred for being at a show and ordering mozzarella sticks and a milkshake. 

“You want a milkshake, don’t you?” Keith already knows. He’s walked over to the counter and stands between two bar stools as he picks up a menu.

“Am I that obvious?” Shiro asks, walking over to Keith and stopping partially behind him. Shiro slides his right arm around Keith and watches the other man’s eyes go wide briefly before he realizes Shiro is just putting the arm on the counter for balance to lean down, not to put it around Keith.

“Yeah,” Keith breathes out.

Before Shiro has the chance to do or say anything else, a waiter comes over to them and Keith places an order for the mozzarella sticks that Shiro eagerly points down to on the menu and then a milkshake for them to share. “I guess it’s tradition now,” Keith laughs. They, unfortunately, don’t get the opportunity to spend too long indulging once their order arrives and they take seats on open bar stools. An announcement from the stage informs everyone that the first band will be going on in 15 minutes.

By the time they’re done rushing through eating and drinking, a decent crowd has gathered in Vrepit Sal’s. Keith and Shiro stand off to the back of the audience so they aren’t in the thick of it near the front of the stage. A few minutes after they find their spots, the lights go low and the cheers start. The first band takes the stage, and their singer with a bright purple mohawk introduces himself as Sendak and the band as Fire of Purification.

“Oh,” Keith says softly in a tone of realization. Shiro turns to ask what’s wrong, but he doesn’t really get the chance before the band starts playing. To say they were slammed into a wall of sound is an understatement. Shiro isn’t sure who to thank, or perhaps blame, for this. It should have been obvious, Shiro supposes, that this was a heavy metal band, but to think that those four people on the small stage of a diner could produce the level of sound that was blasting through Vrepit Sal’s right now was wild. Shiro never thought he would get the privilege to see a mosh pit in a diner, but alas, here he was.

When the first song ends, Shiro turns to Keith and says, “Wow.”

“I didn’t realize they were playing tonight,” Keith looks annoyed but also like he wants to laugh just a bit.

“You a Fire of Purification fan?” Shiro asks.

“No,” Keith shakes his head. “Sendak’s family lived next door to us when my family was still here. He was always into metal, and I heard that he managed to form a band. When I went to look them up I found Sendak’s own YouTube channel. It’s for, uh, hand-to-hand combat techniques? And he uses the band’s songs as background music and always plugs them, like, ‘hey, if you also like what you’re hearing, it’s my band, Fire of Purification, links to our Insta and Spotify in the description.’ Honestly, I forgot he really was in the band..” Keith trails off.

“I mean, they’re not bad,” Shiro starts to reply, but he’s immediately drowned out by the next song starting and Sendak’s voice. It’s a little comical, Shiro supposes, and he gives Keith the biggest smile he can. It looks like Keith is fighting to maintain his unamused frown, but he gives in and starts laughing, ducking his head to rest his forehead against Shiro’s shoulder to laugh. Shiro instinctively puts his arm around Keith and pulls him in a little closer, laughing as well and resting his chin on Keith’s head. It’s unfortunate when Keith has to move back eventually and Shiro needs to let go of him, but Shiro relishes the moment.

Fire of Purification plays a thankfully short set. Shiro does admit to Keith seriously later while they’re leaving the stage that as far as metal bands go, they were pretty good. Keith’s face doesn’t budge from displeased when Shiro says all of this. A few more bands cycle through the small stage, and they’re all great as well. Shiro eventually manages to get Keith to admit the entire bill for the evening is pretty decent, which even means that Fire of Purification was somewhat enjoyable.

The final band is on stage now, and they’re at their second-to-last song. “We’re going to bring things down a notch,” the singer says as she switches out an electric guitar for an acoustic. “This one is for holding someone you love. Or like. Either or.”

What she says sits heavily on Shiro’s mind as the song starts, and he becomes ever so aware of Keith next to him. He quickly glances over at Keith, who is staring ahead at the stage, slowly starting to sway a bit to the music. Shiro looks over at the crowd of people around them and sees that couples are showing some physical signs of affection with arms wrapped around each other and hand-holding, and then there’s a couple over at the bar simply making out right now. At this moment Shiro thinks that’s a bit much, but he knows deep down if that was Keith and him he wouldn’t give a shit.

So, Shiro chances it and puts his arm around Keith’s back, and then he holds his breath. Keith doesn’t move for a few seconds, but then he finally relaxes and leans into Shiro. Both of them then turn their heads to look at each other at the same time. Shiro gazes down at Keith’s face and gives him a small smile, which is mirrored on Keith’s face. Keith’s eyes move quickly back-and-forth from Shiro’s eyes to his lips before it seems like Keith makes a decision much like Shiro had just done and leans up on his toes to plant a light kiss on Shiro’s mouth. When Keith settles back down on his feet, he maintains his stare on Shiro’s face. 

Shiro turns his own body while tugging Keith forward so they’re angled more to face each other, and he takes a moment to search Keith’s face for the approval he knows is already there, unsaid. His free hand settles gently on Keith’s face, holding Keith’s chin gently between Shiro’s thumb and forefinger to draw Keith up for another kiss. This time, the kiss lasts longer, and Shiro lets his eyes flutter closed. The sound of the band playing and the gentle murmur of people talking still doesn’t manage to drown out the quiet moan Keith lets out when Shiro’s tongue swipes Keith’s bottom lip. The small noise lets Shiro prod a little further and slides his tongue into Keith’s mouth. The hand that had been so carefully holding Keith’s face moves back to grip his hair and then tilt Keith’s head in order to further deepen the kiss. Keith’s hands are both on Shiro’s shoulders, squeezing tightly onto the material of the sweatshirt Shiro is wearing. But then one of Keith’s hands eventually starts to creep down Shiro’s chest before settling on a pec and giving it a soft pat. The action makes Shiro smile into the kiss and pulls Keith in even closer. 

When the song ends, it takes a moment for the two of them to part, wanting to stay suspended in time just a little longer. The singer is speaking to the crowd, and Shiro vaguely pays attention to the words at first, still too fixated on Keith’s face. They’re both grinning. “Hope everyone liked that song, but particular shoutout to the couple making out at the counter and the couple near the back who looks like they only have eyes for each other.” Laughter and cheers from the crowd make Shiro suddenly turn to look away from Keith and at the stage. “Yeah, you there, silver hair, and your partner,” the singer laughs and nods at Shiro.

“Oh my god,” Keith whispers and hides his face in Shiro’s chest. 

Shiro feels his face turn red and gives a small wave and thumbs up at the singer, and the crowd and band laugh again before the singer moves on to introduce the last song. He leans down to speak into Keith’s ear, “wanna get out of here?”

Keith shakes his head and finally pulls back. “We should at least stay for their last song.” Shiro nods in agreement but keeps his arm around Keith as they watch the band close out their set. As soon as they’re done, though, Keith grabs Shiro’s hand and pulls him out of Vrepit Sal’s. “That was so embarrassing,” Keith mumbles as he pulls his keys out of a jacket pocket.

“I’m sorry,” Shiro apologizes, his stomach dropping thinking about how he made Keith uncomfortable.

“No,” Keith abruptly stops walking and turns to Shiro and pulls him down into a kiss that takes Shiro by surprise. When he parts from the kiss, Keith goes on, “Not this, not kissing you, just...being called out for it, okay. I don’t like being the center of attention.” He gives Shiro’s boot a playful kick. “Bassist, remember?”

“Oh, good,” Shiro feels infinitely better. “As long as you’re okay with it.” Shiro leans down to give Keith another kiss.

“More than,” Keith replies, beaming.

♩♫♩♫

Shiro and Keith see a lot more of each other after that. They text constantly and make time in their days on campus to find each other to study in the library together. Shiro goes over to Keith’s apartment that he shares with Lotor and gets the slow up-and-down appraisal from Blade of Night’s drummer, which makes Shiro feel more scrutinized than he ever has in his life.

“You’ll do,” Lotor finally says before disappearing into his room.

“I’ll do?” Shiro asks, turning to look at Keith, who spent the entire evaluation leaning on the kitchen island eating an apple.

“He just wants to look out for me,” Keith shrugs.

Shiro also particularly likes the handful of times that he brings his guitar over to Keith’s and they play together. Nothing serious, just their own little jam sessions together messing around and trying to figure out each other’s playing style. One particularly scandalous time Lotor arrives home to see Keith and Shiro very drunkenly singing along to the Tiny Dancer scene in Almost Famous. They yell at him to join in, but Lotor silently steps back out of the apartment, closes the door, and leaves. This causes the two of them to break into laughter instead of a song this time, and Shiro doesn’t know the last time he ever laughed so hard. They also finally have that movie night at the Holts’ place as well. 

But most importantly for Shiro is that he finally feels able to write again. Whatever block he had with the songs he needed to work on broke, and his thoughts began to flow freely. It just so happened that any time after he saw Keith Shiro would need to open the notes app on his phone and jot down little bits and pieces he thought of for lyrics. 

It’s with a finally completed song that Shiro arrives at Lance’s house for band practice, a little bounce to his step from the combined happiness of how well things are going with Keith and the fact that he finally finished the song that he’d been working on for so long.

“I heard something,” Lance declares when Shiro enters the garage practice area before anything else can even be said. Matt and Pidge are already there, sitting on the old couch in the corner while Lance is perched on a barstool.

“Oh?” Shiro acts confused.

“I heard from James in MFE that you and Keith from Blade of Night are dating,” Lance crosses his arms, eyebrows raised. 

“Well, yes, we are,” Shiro admits. 

“Finally!” Lance cries, throwing his hands up in the air. “You’re welcome.”

“What?” Shiro frowns in legitimate confusion this time and looks over at the Holts, who don’t look as thrown by Lance’s statement. “Why am I thanking you?”

Lance sighs. “Because it’s all thanks to me that you and Keith got together. Don’t you get it?” Lance explains it as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. It’s not. Shiro’s certain there are aspects of advanced particle physics that make more sense. Lance sighs again when he sees that Shiro is no more clear on whatever he’s going on about right now. “I know Lotor and Allura from a class at Garrison, and one time during a study group we got to talking and realized that maybe you and Keith would get along really well. I told them to leave it to me for the setup. And I thought, hey, what better way to make Shiro interested in Keith than to act like he’s my rival since we have history. The cherry on top was that Pidge is friends with him already.”

“Yeah, Lance...I don’t get it,” Shiro admits.

“Shiro, if I hadn’t put Blade of Night on your radar from talking about them and Keith all the time, you’d have barely noticed! You’re always so busy between the band, work, and school, would you really have stopped to watch them that day?” Lance asks.

Shiro thinks about it for a moment and supposes, yes, it’s true that to some degree he’s been less and less invested in the local band scene while he’s become so busy with the rest of life that he doesn’t pay as much attention to other bands as he used to, but Shiro thinks there’s no way he could have missed Keith and says as much.

“Shiro, my man,” Lance gets up from the stool and walks over to Shiro. He puts both hands on Shiro’s shoulders and looks Shiro square in the eyes. “That was the third time we played on the same bill as Blade of Night, and you only finally watched them after I complained.”

Shiro looks over at the Holts, and Matt nods, “It’s true.”

“Oh,” Shiro says the single syllable slowly. “I see.”

“Like I said, you’re welcome,” Lance pats both of Shiro’s shoulders and goes back to sitting on the stool.

“I don’t think you deserve all this credit, though,” Shiro replies.

“Yeah, we did our part in this, too!” Matt defends his sister and himself.

“Your plan ended in the two of them being too worried that they didn’t like each other!” Lance cries.

“We still got here, though, didn’t we?” Pidge argues.

“Fine, the Holts helped,” Lance concedes. “I’ll take best man at your wedding as enough thanks, though.”

“Lance!” Shiro cries, and Lance simply shrugs in response.

“He’s never going to let you forget,” Matt says solemnly.

Shiro sighs and decides that this is his life and he’s going to have to live with it, but he takes the moment to change the subject. “Well, more importantly, I’ve got the lyrics to one of the songs done.” His bandmates make excited exclamations in response to the news. He hands printouts from his backpack of the lyrics to the others and waits silently as they look them over. Shiro guesses that after the conversation they just had that they’ll know what the song is about, or rather, who.

Lance speaks first. “I see you have to thank me for this as well,” he waves the paper around, and Shiro snatches it back.

“Yeah, yeah, why don’t we just play it, okay,” Shiro tries to come off as annoyed, but he knows the smile on his face is betraying him.

“I can’t wait to watch Shiro be in love,” Lance says dreamily as he slips the strap of his bass on. 

“It’s insufferable,” Matt tells Lance.

“Thank you for the support,” Shiro rolls his eyes. “Anything from you before we start?” Shiro directs the inquiry at Pidge once she’s settled behind the drumset.

“I mean if you’re going to write lyrics like this, then go ahead, be all gushy in love, I like it,” Pidge shrugs.

Shiro narrows his eyes at her. “I can’t tell if that was really supportive or not, but I’ll take it. Count us off, please?”

Pidge nods, counts them off, and Shiro finally gets to sing real lyrics to this song.

♩♫♩♫

It kind of creeps up on them, well, it at least does for Shiro. When Lance tells the band he booked them for one of the next showcase nights at Hunk’s. Everyone agreed that because now they had a new song under their belt, Star Atlas would be able to build some hype for the debut at the show. Shiro had acknowledged but not processed the information. He had been too busy keeping up with his classes, work, the band, and, importantly, Keith, to really take much time to dwell on the fact he would need to be ready in a month. But they’re here, and this time Lance is stressing about playing the new song in front of an audience for the first time.

“Your family liked the song, and so did my parents,” Shiro gives Lance as much encouragement as possible while they unload the van.

“Shiro, your parents were on the phone, and my mom would say she loved it if you were reading from a textbook while we all played one note over and over,” Lance says flatly.

“Fair,” Shiro has to concede there, on both accounts.

He’s straightening up from setting down a bag of pedals when Shiro feels an arm snake around his waist. Shiro knows who it is instantly. 

“Hey,” Shiro greets Keith as he turns around in his arm. Keith smiles up at him and gives him a small peck on the cheek. “You’re in a good mood,” Shiro notes.

“Show days are good days, and we have a new song,” Keith says.

“Can’t believe you’re debuting a new song today, too,” Lance grunts as he closes the van’s trunk. 

“I’ve just had some inspiration,” Keith smiles at Shiro when he says this.

“Wow, same,” Shiro laughs and goes in for a proper kiss from Keith.

“Young love,” Lance does an exaggerated clutching of his heart. “But actually, I have a serious question, Keith.”

“What?”

“You write all the lyrics for Blade of Night, right?” Lance asks and Keith nods in response. “Well, then, how do you feel having Allura sing them? Since it’s your words, your feelings, ya know?”

Keith tilts his head slightly and scrunches his face in thought. “I don’t know, it’s like watching someone perform a play you wrote, or something, to me. Like I wrote my message, I got out what I want to say, but there’s someone else better suited to be the person who…” Keith trails off, thinking on his words. “I just want the song out there, I don’t need it to be through me,” he finally finishes.

Lance nods his head slowly. “I think I understand that,” he then gives Keith a friendly pat on the shoulder. “Still weird knowing that what Allura is gonna sing is about Shiro.” 

After that statement, Lance picks up some gear and walks away, leaving Shiro and Keith in silence. “So, you wrote about me…” Shiro smirks at Keith.

“Don’t act like you didn’t, too,” Keith turns his head away, blushing.

“Oh, baby,” Shiro croons, “I’m flattered, and of course I am about to go on stage in about an hour and forty-five minutes and perform a song that bares my feelings about you.”

Keith snorts in response but doesn’t comment any further on the matter. “Need help carrying the rest in?” Keith asks nodding to the bags at Shiro’s feet still.

Shiro shakes his head. “Nah, I got this, you’re on soon, so you should go get ready.” They kiss one more time before Keith hurries back into the bar.

It wasn’t until this moment now that Shiro starts to feel incredibly nervous and the butterflies settle in his stomach. It’s been so long since he’s been this anxious before a show because they’d been playing pretty standard sets for most of the year. But it’s not just a new song that Shiro will sing tonight, it’s a song about Keith, and Keith knows it. He’s in a daze with this thought through the walk into Lion’s and backstage to drop off the rest of their equipment, and then Shiro goes back out into the crowd since Star Atlas is second on tonight’s bill.

The rest of Shiro’s bandmates stay with him near the back of the venue so they can make a quick exit to get ready for their own set after. When Blade of Night enters the stage, the crowd cheers wildly, hands going into the air and some raised beer glasses as well. 

“Hello, hello, Lion’s!” Allura yells into the mic as she puts on her guitar. “We’re happy to see new faces, old faces, and all the faces in between tonight. We’re Blade of Night, and our first song is appropriately called ‘Song for the Evening’.” As soon as Allura finishes saying the title, she gives a small nod and the band is off playing. It’s an old song they’re starting with, so people in the audience as familiar with it and dance and sing along.

The rest of the set also consists of previous songs of theirs and a New Order cover thrown in for good measure, which is always a crowd-pleaser. At some point, a drink was put in Shiro’s hand by Lance, and Shiro downs is right before he knows Blade of Night is about to play their last song. They have four minutes left to their set, so this has to be it. 

Allura circles the small stage while drinking water before returning to the microphone. “So, this is our last song,” Allura announces, and there are sad sounds from the audience. “Shh, it’s okay, it’s okay, Star Atlas is on next.” That receives more cheers from the crowd, which boosts Shiro’s confidence in the night just a bit. “Our last song is a new song,” Allura has to stop for the applause and shouting once more. “Some of you might know that our main songwriter for Blade of Night is Keith over there,” she points at him. “So everything I’m singing, he’s the genius behind those words, and with this one, I think he’s done something really special.”

Pidge tries to give Shiro what he assumes is a friendly nudge, but it’s really just a hard jab of her elbow into his side. Shiro tears up a little from the pain, which is unfortunate because Matt chooses that moment to look over at Shiro. “Dude, are you already crying?” he asks, jaw dropped and eyebrows raised.

“No, I—” Shiro doesn’t get to finish what he’s going to say because Blade of Night starts to play. It’s a mid-tempo song, the right vibe going to end a set on. After a few seconds, Allura starts singing.

Hey, let’s get away from here…

Shiro feels his whole body go cold momentarily when he realizes what the song is about. Keith’s song is based on the conversation the two of them had on the drive back from the first show they went to together in Daibazaal. The road had been mostly empty, which was normal for that late on a weekend night, and they’d rolled the windows of Keith’s car down.

“You’ve always lived in this area, right?” Keith had asked, which Shiro confirmed. “Wanna get away from here sometime?” Keith had then asked.

“One day, yeah,” Shiro had sighed. “And it’s either going to be the band or the Ph.D. that does it for me, I think.”

“Or, we could just go. I’ll keep driving, never stop, just pick a direction,” Keith slowly started to accelerate the car as he’d said this.

“I don’t even get time to get my affairs in order and pack my favorite pj’s?” Shiro had laughed.

Keith had slowed down the car back to the steady speed of the highway. “I’ll let you get the pj’s,” Keith had laughed.

Straighten your textbooks, just give me that loving look...

The air kind of just leaves Shiro at that point, and he just barely processes the rest of the lyrics, his eyes are on Keith the whole time. Right now, Shiro wants to run up to the stage and say yes, yes, yes, let’s go to the bassist whose eyes are closed right now as he plays and mouths along to the words of the song. But Shiro knows he can’t do that and exercises all the restraint he can. Star Atlas doesn’t even get time to fully appreciate the end of Blade of Night’s set because they need to hurry backstage to changeover for their set. 

“Did you and Keith—” Matt starts to ask something that Shiro doesn’t know if he will be able to answer.

“Not now!” Shiro yells a bit louder than he meant to. “I’m sorry, not now,” he says after taking a calming breath. In the bustle, he doesn’t even manage to see Keith as he moves from offstage to backstage and then to the bar. But he can’t think about that at the moment, he’s got some songs to play with his band, and the very last one written on their post-it note setlist is one for Keith.

Once they’re ready, Shiro gives the thumbs up to Hunk, Acxa takes over at the soundboard and the crowd cheers. “Hello,” Shiro smiles and tries to look around the bar for where Keith is, and he spots him leaning on the wall at the back of the venue, half shrouded in darkness. “We’re Star Atlas, and we’re going to play some songs.” Shiro sticks to his short intro and lets the crowd give as much a roar as a 150 person capacity venue can.

Like Blade of Night, Star Atlas goes through their older songs first and throw in their always-appreciated Bruno Mars cover for tonight. Shiro gets lost playing and singing, and just the general joy he gets from performing in a band with his friends washes over him for the set. He feels on air by the time they get to the final song, and then it feels like he crashes back down to Earth. Shiro knows the calculation to find out that speed, and this felt much faster than that. He spots Keith still in the same partially-hidden place, but he is holding a drink now.

“This next song is a couple of things,” Shiro speaks into the mic. “It’s our last song,” he waits for the chorus of no’s to subside, “I know, I’m sorry, but it’s also a new song!” He punches his hand into the air in excitement over the song and it leads the crowd to do the same as they cheer. “And this song is an answer.” Shiro steps away from the mic and looks around at his bandmates. Just before they start the song, Shiro ducks to the mic again, “And it’s for someone special.” That last comment gets some ohh’s from the audience, and then Star Atlas starts to play the song that took Shiro so long to finish. But all it took was a 30-minute drive with Keith to get him there.

We can get away from here, I’ll go with you anywhere…

Shiro sings the opening lines to the songs with his eyes closed and stays that way through the intro. When he takes a breath before getting to the bridge, Shiro opens his eyes and lands them on the spot Keith had been standing. Except he’s not there. Shiro tries to keep it together as he keeps singing and sweeping the crowd for his boyfriend.

We’ll put away all the paper, when I’m with you I feel so much safer…

Shiro finds Keith finally and is surprised to see he’s crept his way up from the back of the bar to be near the middle of the audience. It’s a small venue, so Shiro can look directly at Keith from the stage. There’s a look in his eyes that Shiro can’t place, it’s a little bit wild. Keith knows, of course, he figured it out immediately, that Shiro wrote lyrics to this new song based on the same moment that Keith wrote his about. And Shiro managed to make his a perfect reply to Keith’s. They never once talked about what the lyrics were about when they discussed writing and new music, always keeping things general about the songwriting process, but somehow, they managed to do this.

Their eyes stay on each other through the whole song, and Shiro doesn’t care if anyone notices. Everything narrows down to Keith, and it feels like he’s singing the song just to him. He’s acutely aware that Keith is slowly creeping through the crowd, getting closer and closer to the small stage.

Let me be a passenger, let me be a traveler, with you…

Shiro finishes the song, and everything around him is white noise after that. All he knows is that Keith has much less restraint than him as he jumps up onto the stage. Shiro barely has the presence of mind to move his guitar to the side before Keith launches himself into Shiro’s arms. It just makes sense, then, for Shiro to cup Keith’s face and bring their mouths together for a kiss. It’s when their lips part that Shiro finally remembers that, oh, he just ended playing a set with his band in front of over a hundred people. And then they all just witnessed Shiro and Keith making out a little in front of everyone.

At some point, Lance moved over to the front of the stage and tips the mic towards himself. “As you can see, our grossly romantic singer is a bit busy right now, but thank you all for coming here to see us tonight. I can only apologize for them,” he waves at Keith and Shiro, who are still loosely wrapped in a hug, with a laugh.

The crowd in the bar sounds the loudest it has the entire night, maybe the loudest Shiro has ever heard it in Lion’s. When they get backstage, Keith grabs Shiro’s hand and drags him outside. 

“I can’t believe this,” Keith laughs and he leans against the side of the building, pulling Shiro close, and Shiro rests his hands on Keith’s waist, shuffling closer. 

“We’re so powerful, imagine if we wrote a song together,” Shiro laughs, bursting with so much joy right now, he kisses Keith again. 

“No,” Keith says when they pull away for a moment. “That’s when it would go to shit, we can never discuss our songwriting with each other,” Keith laughs.

Shiro hums in contemplation. “Maybe.” He gives a quick kiss. “But, I think I know one thing,” Shiro says.

“And what’s that?”

Shiro sings his response to Keith softly. “Hey, let’s get away from here...”