Work Text:
“And that’s everything for class today, so if you have any questions, please email me. As always, the lecture video will be available on my page for rewatching, and of course there's the public class notes for everyone to add to or reference. Thank you, and have a pleasant weekend.”
Logan perks up as the prof finishes their closing speech, stretching and grunting as his back pops, one vertebrae at a time.
He’d been sitting in class, dutifully taking notes for the last hour and a half, and wasn’t aware his posture had been slipping until the professor dismissed them and he found himself hunched over his notes like a particularly cute gargoyle.
Later, he’s sure his back will pay for it, but right now it just feels good to wring out stiff muscles.
Once he finished stretching he can clean his desk up, carefully shuffling things into his bag to make sure everything is neat and organized.
Then his phone buzzes.
He stops, Wednesdays are his lazy days so he’s in no rush, and pulls his phone out of his pocket to see who's bugging him.
Logan expects maybe Hesh, whining about his physics class that gets out around the same time, but no. It’s Keegan.
<3 Keegan <3: Here to pick you up. Might have a surprise for you… (>3o)
Logan: What kind of surprise?
<3 Keegan <3: Get out here and find out :p
Logan giggles giddily, setting his phone aside and shoving the last few things in his bag before springing out of his seat. He jogs down the lecture hall steps and yanks on his jacket while he’s in the hall, springing across the small greenspace between him and the parking lot.
Keegan’s waiting for him where he usually does, straddling his bike under the shade of a big oak in the corner of the lot.
He’s busy with his phone, but looks up in time to watch Logan cross the blacktop, smiling the whole while.
“Good day?” He asks, and Logan groans dramatically before falling into his arms. “Not a good day?”
“I’m exhausted.” Logan whines, somehow wriggling into his lap while Keegan remains seated on the bike.
“From what? Sitting down for an hour?”
Logan glares at Keegan, who laughs.
“No, I’m tired because my brain was running at 100% for an hour, and a half.” He grumbles. “You try thinking that hard… if you even can.”
Keegan fakes pain, gasping and leaning back as much as he can without actually letting Logan go or falling off his bike. “I promise you a surprise and this is how you treat me? Calling me dumb?”
“I’d rather not lie…” Logan teases, and giggles as Keegan groans again.
“Okay okay,” Keegan grumbles, smooching him on the forehead before pushing Logan off his lap and handing him one of the helmets hanging off the handles of the bike. “Put that on and hop on before one of my students finds me.”
“You’re a student TA, not a professor just yet.” Logan teases, kicking his ankle.
Keegan throws his head back with a dramatic grimace and yanks his own helmet on, making sure Logan’s is secure and knocking on the top of his head before allowing him on the bike.
“I still help teach.” Keegan grumbles, his voice coming through the helmet's comm systems perfectly.
“Yeah and you almost had to stop because your history minor…” Logan scoots forward and wraps his arms around Keegan's waist as he starts the bike. “I’m your knight in shining armor.”
“Am I a damsel in distress?” Keegan wonders aloud as he coasts the bike across the lot, aiming to get on the main road and go… wherever the surprise is. His apartment?
“Yes, you’re my damsel in distress.” Logan replies, squeezing his middle gently and laughing when Keegan sighs in a faux annoyed way.
They stop talking so Keegan can focus on driving the bike.
Keegan’s a student at the university, but he’s also a teachers assistant. His job as a TA is to help set up things like quizzes, lectures, and he’s even subbed in to teach a class if the professor is absent for some reason. And as a student he’s working his way towards a doctorate with the goal of becoming a physics professor.
Logan and him started dating around a year ago. Little under or little more, depending on which anniversary you use…
They don’t have ups and downs in their relationship: They have hijinks.
Several.
One: Keegan was technically Logan’s student.
Keegan’s very smart. He nails physics and can talk a man to insanity with all the random fun facts he’s accumulated over the years, but his one place of failure is history. He sucks at history.
So badly in fact that he was in danger of failing. History is his minor, and if he were to flunk it, that would jeopardize his whole life plan. He’d need to do a lot of work to get everything fixed.
Lucky for him, history is Logan’s strong suit. He loves it so much he tutors.
So that’s how they met. Logan was Keegan’s tutor, then they became simple study buddies, and eventually, they started dating.
Two: Keegan didn’t realize they were dating until a good month after Logan.
Logan stopped tutoring Keegan for two reasons. He was actually doing well enough on his own to not need the tutoring any more, and because well… Logan realized he liked him and he figured a tutor messing with their tutee was inappropriate.
Logan also thought the liking thing was going both ways. Keegan was being sweet with him all the time and inviting him places and overall being a perfect gentleman, so Logan assumed he just didn’t like labels and was taking the more physical part of the relationship slowly.
Meanwhile Keegan was thinking that they were just amazingly close BFF’s… He’s stunningly smart but not very socially intelligent.
It wasn’t until Logan’s bastard of an older brother aka David got bored watching the two of them did he interfere and tell Keegan “Hey, my brother thinks you’re his boyfriend.”
At which point the whole mixup was unveiled and Keegan decided he was perfectly content with it anyways.
So now they have two monthly anniversaries. One for when Logan thought they started dating, and another when Keegan figured it out.
Three: Keegan knew Logan’s parents before Logan knew he knew them.
Logan knew pretty early into knowing Keegan that he had served in the military and left to do school full-time so he could pursue his dreams.
What Logan didn’t know was that Keegan had served on the same unit as Dad and Pops.
At least not until he brought the poor guy home for spring break so he could meet the parents. It wasn’t until they were sitting down for dinner that everything came to light.
It’s hilarious looking back on it, but it was a clusterfuck then. Pops and Dad were confused why one of their old sergeants was in the house and Keegan was struck dumb by the sight of Pops wearing a “Kiss the Cook” apron.
Hesh realized first of course and broke the rather tense atmosphere by having such an intense laughing fit Riley alerted like he was having a panic attack.
After everything was cleared up it was a pretty good night. Pops was having fits about both Keegan and Logan talking his ear off about their boyfriends with the realization that they were talking about each other. Keegan realized his old captain and lieutenants were a lot closer than friends… and also that they might become his in-laws.
As a bonus Logan now knew Keegan’s callsign, which he’d been doing everything to make sure Logan wouldn’t learn it.
Scout.
It’s so cute.
Logan recognizes the landmarks that mean they’re close to Keegan’s apartment, and he starts wondering about the surprise again.
“So what’d you get me?” Logan asks as they slow in the parking lot, the rumble of the engine dulling enough to let Keegan navigate and conversate at the same time.
“If I told you that would ruin the point of it being a surprise.” Keegan replies.
Logan whines. “But I wanna know!”
“You can’t last thirty seconds?” Keegan teases, elbowing him gently when he turns the bike into his parking space. “That’s not long at all.”
Keegan yelps when Logan smacks him on the hip. “Don’t be dirty!”
“I’m not!” He protests, turning the engine off.
Logan hops off first, letting Keegan unbuckle his helmet and waiting patiently while his boyfriend covers his bike.
Loves the damn thing as much as he loves Logan.
“Okay, now let’s go!” Logan insists, grabbing Keegan’s hand and tugging on his arm.
Keegan just smiles all amused and let’s Logan drag him along, even up the stairs. Though Logan has to stop when they get to the door so Keegan can unlock it.
“Now what is it?!” Logan demands, brushing past Keegan into the “mudroom” to put his helmet on its spot. A shelf in the closet. Then he whiles around to face him. “Tell me Mr!”
“Or what?” Keegan asks, hefting Logan up over his shoulder before the blonde can properly threaten him.
“I’m gonna kick your ass!” Logan threatens, reaching a hand down as far as he can to smack him on the butt.
Not too hard. Obviously he doesn’t want to actually hurt him.
Keegan just jumps and then laughs, dropping Logan on the couch like a particularly cute sack of potatoes and pushing him down again when Logan tries to stand.
“Stay here, I’m gonna go get it.” He explains when Logan gives him a confused look, kissing him on the forehead before he walks off.
He moves so fast he’s almost jogging, vanishing down the hallway and into his bedroom after only a few seconds.
It’s cute, he seems as excited to give Logan the surprise as Logan is to receive it. And now Logan is wondering what it is, because Keegan’s not an easily-excitable person.
Well, at least not until Logan takes his pants off, but emotionally Keegan is pretty stoic.
From his understanding his father was kinda a dick, and then the military traumatized him a good bit, so he has a hard time showing emotions. He can talk about them, which is a recent accomplishment of his and one that Logan is proud of him for, but he’s… got a permanent poker face.
Or sometimes, when he’s focusing on something hard enough, a murder face.
He smiles for Logan though.
God he’s pretty…
“Okay, can you close your eyes?” Keegan calls.
“If it’s just you naked I’m gonna be pretty disappointed.” Logan warns, covering his eyes with both hands. “Unless you’re wearing a sexy maid costume.”
“It’s not a sexy maid costume.”
“Damn.” Logan replies, pretending to be severely disappointed.
Keegan laughs at him, and he can hear his boyfriend getting closer to the couch.
“Okay, keep your eyes closed but hold your arms out.” He asks. “Like a cradle. I’m gonna hand you something.”
Said something jingles, and though Logan complies with what Keegan asks, he’s very curious and a little confused.
He feels Keegan place something in his arms that is soft and warm, and he jumps in surprise when it wriggles, making some squeaky protests.
“Careful!” Keegan warns, and Logan can feel him gently press on his arms so he won’t drop whatever it is.
Logan would like to ask what if it is what he thinks it is, but he’s so excited that his jaw has locked up. He feels it with one hand instead, freezing when he feels it sniff his fingers.
“You can open your eyes now.” Keegan tells him, and it takes Logan a good moment to listen, he’s so excited.
There’s an adorable black-and tan puppy in his arms with massive ears, sniffing anything it can reach with its cute little noise.
Logan whines in excitement, his jaw still locked up, and looks at Keegan, who seems entirely too amused.
“It’s a puppy!” He tells Logan, like the answer isn’t obvious, diving into an explanation right after. “Ajax has this friend who fosters pets and they got a litter of shepherds a few weeks ago, and when he told me I remembered you said you always wanted a dog, and Riley is there but he’s Hesh’s dog, even if you “share”, so I got one for you.” He pauses and Logan sees him swallow, a lot of hope and trepidation in his eyes. “Do you like it?”
Logan nods furiously, gasping when his mouth finally unlocks and he can edge a few words out. “But my dorm doesn’t allow pets!?”
Keegan nods, and Logan can see him reach into his pocket, holding up a key. “I was wondering if you wanted to move in with me?”
He shouts in surprise when Logan launches himself forward and sends them toppling to the floor, the puppy yipping in protest but held in such a way that it’s not squished between them.
Logan buries his face in the side of Keegans neck, and squeals in happiness, hugging Keegan as tightly as he can with the one free arm he has.
Keegan laughs the whole while, letting Logan smoosh him for as long as the blonde wants before he sits back up, straddling the ex-snipers hips.
“I take it that’s a yes?” Keegan asks, and Logan nods again.
“Obviously! Oh my god, how long have you had this planned?!”
“Well, we talked about you moving in before, and also about you wanting a puppy but not being able to keep it in the dorms, so I figured when I got news about the puppies that now was as good a time as any. So a couple weeks?” Keegan shrugs, laughing again when Logan leans down to repeatedly kiss his face. “Obviously you don’t need to completely vacate your dorm and abandon Hesh, but since you have a key, you can just come over whenever you please.”
“You are amazing!” Logan gushes, scooting the puppy off to the side so he can grab Keegan’s face in both hands and give him a big kiss right on his mouth.
It doesn’t last long, they’re smiling too hard for a proper smooch, but they get a few pecks in between giggles.
Logan props himself up on his arms to just stare at Keegan for a few seconds, smiling while the sniper grins back at him.
“Well, Hesh will be disappointed.” Logan muses, and Keegan squeezes his waist.
“Hesh can get over it.”
“Yeah, if he’s feeling too lonely I can just leave one of my hoodies for him to cuddle with.” Logan agrees and kisses Keegan on his face again, dizzy with giddiness.
Keegan grabs the pup before it can run off and plunks it on his chest, wriggling his finger at it which makes the pup tilt its head in confusion.
Logan takes the opportunity to pet the thing, admiring the sable coat pattern. All black and gray except for a few tan sections like the fur on its paws and the underside of its little tail.
“Awww, he’s gorgeous…” Logan mutters, kissing the little thing on the top of its head, letting it sniff his face when it looks his way.
“She.” Keegan corrects. “She’ll be old enough to be fixed in a few weeks, so no backyard breeding.”
“What am I gonna name you…” Logan mutters, pausing when he sees Keegan smile shift to a guilty stare. “What did you do?”
“Oh, uh.” Keegan humms awkwardly, avoiding eye contact. “I named her already. Ripley, like the protagonist from the Alien movies.”
Logan pouts and squints at him. “You named my dog?”
Keegan whines in the back of his throat. “Well she’s only been here for a few days getting used to the space… I don’t think she knows it’s her name yet so if you wanted to name her something else it’ll be fine…”
And that’s what he says, but he looks so heartbroken at the mere admittance of the idea that Logan can feel his heart seize in sympathy.
“No, it’s okay.” He decides. “I like Ripley.”
Keegan relaxes and looks up at him. “Really?”
“Yeah, I watched the movies with Hesh before. I know who she is, and she's pretty badass.”
That makes Keegan smile, that little close mouth thing he does that goes up on one side, makes his face look funny. “She is.”
What Logan doesn't tell him is his time spent watching the movies he was busy cowering behind Hesh… he was like seven at the time. Sue him.
Logan snorts. “Okay, but speaking of Hesh, how am I gonna tell him I’m not his roommate anymore…”
Keegan gets a contemplative look on his face. “Might be time to break out the whiteboard and draft up a battle plan…”
In the end it turns out it really is just as easy as telling him.
All Hesh does is get a grim look on his face and warn Logan to use protection… Jackass.