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Keith had never thought he’d get to do this. Not with Shiro, anyway. It was beyond his wildest dreams. Well, maybe not quite beyond, but-
The large hands - one artificial and cool, one warm and callused - slowly unbuttoning his pants yanked his thoughts to a much more immediate concern. Something he’d obsessed over anxiously throughout puberty, but honestly hadn’t thought about a whole lot since. Until right at the present moment when he realized that someone else - not just someone else, SHIRO - was about to find out…
“Shiro, wait. Are you sure? I… I don’t look… normal.” Keith really truly didn’t want to stop. But he put his smaller hands over the ones on the front of his pants anyway, halting their movement. He didn’t want to tell Shiro ‘No’.
(Especially not now, with the both of them in his room, more than a little worked up, half undressed, and very close to falling onto his bunk with the potential for one or more very long held fantasies to actually become real.)
But one of the ways he was DIFFERENT was about to make itself extremely apparent and for once he couldn’t just recklessly-
The hand that touched his cheek was gentle, but the words that followed were even more so. “Normal for a human, or normal for a Galra?”
When Keith jerked his gaze up in shock to meet Shiro’s, all he saw there was patience and understanding. A simple question, kind eyes, and between them, it said everything.
Shiro understood him, when nobody else would even try.
Shiro ACCEPTED him.
Even with all his faults and all his difficulties and his… differences.
His indigo eyes stung. For the first time in a long time, he felt like crying. “Shiro, I-“
“It’s okay, baby…” The charcoal gaze grew even gentler, one thumb brushing over his cheek, the other fisting in slow motion at the fastening of his pants. “Whatever you look like down here, I promise, it won’t change how I feel about you.”
Keith squeezed his eyes shut so tight it hurt, fighting back the urge to cry, holding in the emotions making the ends of his fingers tremble. He swallowed thickly, voice coming out rough and wavering, but still full of certainty when he opened his eyes again. “I love you. I love you so fucking much, Shiro.”
“I love you too, baby.” Shiro smiled as he leaned in to kiss him.
Every worry and anxiety that had been building prior to that moment melted away, burnt off by the heat building between them.
Keith wasn’t worried any more as they fell to the bed together in a tangle of limbs. It didn’t matter what happened, or even what didn’t happen.
Shiro accepted him.
All of him.
The strong parts, the broken parts, the rough edges and the things that needed mending, and even the parts of him he’d never shown to anyone else because he was so sure they didn’t fit anywhere. Shiro accepted every last part of him. And he’d proved it over and over.
From that night on, Keith never lost faith in him. (Not that he’d wavered much before.) He knew whatever they came up against, it wouldn’t change what was between them.
They’d take on any challenges together.
And Keith wasn’t afraid any more.