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Lance fiddles with his thumb against the wooden balcony. The cold burns into the edge of his pinkies and wafts out of his mouth, a ghost against the backdrop of night. He sighs and looks up, where Canis Major sticks out and twinkles down at him. He thinks, not for the first time, I’ll do it tonight. I’ll tell Keith how I feel tonight.
He had resolved to do it countless times, although for the sake of his integrity he wouldn’t say countless . Just… four times. Or so.
The first time he had looked up and told Orion he would do it, he stood outside till his feet held tight to the ground like a human icicle, then proceeded to wait until the last possible second. He sat waiting for Keith in the lobby of their residence hall, regretting keeping his shorts on when it was 30 degrees outside, the back of his head digging uncomfortably into the swivel chair. Keith had come in with his hair sprawled across his forehead, in what Lance has dubbed, Helmet Head. He hadn’t done much of anything really, except for walk up to him with his helmet tucked against his side, eyes wondering what Lance is doing up without even having to speak.
And Lance, knocked out nearly breathless where he sits, had almost choked on his own spittle.
It’s different this time. It’s gotta be. They leave for winter break in two days, and he doesn’t want to come back wondering what if.
“Hey, there you are.” Lance turns, shoulders hiking up in surprise.
“Jesus, Keith. You scared me.” He squeezes the banister, heart racing.
“Sorry,” Keith grins and walks over. “You weren’t bombarding me with photos of your suit so I wanted to make sure you weren’t dead.”
Lance rolls his eyes and nudges him with a shoulder. “I was just about to get ready. And speaking of which.” He spins on his toes and heads back into his room to grab the red and black mask off his desk. He wiggles it at Keith, who throws his head back with a sigh.
“You didn’t.”
“Oh, but I did.” He stretches his arm out. “Now you don’t have an excuse not to go!”
Keith takes it and holds it between his hands. “You didn’t have to get me one.”
“Of course I did.” Lance waves him off and takes out his blue tux. “You’re coming to this dance and we’re gonna have a great time before break!”
Keith leans back against the balcony, his smile looking far too at ease. “Okay.”
Lance squints at him and marches closer. “ Okay? You’re not going to come up with an elaborate reason to argue with me about not going, which you will inevitably lose, and cause you to come anyway?”
Keith stares down at him, still looking amused. “That’s more along the lines of something you would do.”
“Is not!”
“Is too.”
“Not!”
“Too!”
“That doesn’t even make sense, hmph. ” Lance raises his shoulders and turns his nose away, appearing victorious. Keith only laughs, but then Lance remembers something and gasps. “Your tux! Shit, we need to get you a tux. I knew I should’ve made you get something when we were at the mall, I mean why would I listen to you when you’re the most stubborn person about this sort of thing? Okay, listen, I’ll call Stacey from the boutique–”
“Whoa, hey, relax,” Keith cuts in, grabbing his hand and stopping it from its relentless waving. Lance tries not to stare at it. “I’ve already got something.”
Lance blinks. “You just happened to pack a tux when you moved into your dorm or something?”
“No, I bought one. For the masquerade.”
“So you were going to go the whole time?”
Keith pushes off the banister and taps the mask against his chest. “You made such a big deal out of it, of course I did.”
Lance grabs him by the jacket and begins pushing him toward the door. “Go. Get out of here and get changed, I can’t believe you. So you were just gonna show up without a mask? You’re – you’re lucky I got you one or else it would’ve been an embarrassing way to end off the semester!” He shoves him outside and only has time to see his teeth peek out in the middle of a laugh before he shuts the door.
God, his face is on fire. And his heart is a wreck. He leans against the door and hangs his head. How on earth is he going to do this?
Lance tries not to speed walk on the way to the student union for fear of ruffling and dirtying his clothes, but boy is it hard to keep his nerves at bay. He puffs out his cheeks, brain so single-minded he doesn’t really take in the rest of his surroundings; a girl in a suit sliding by on her skateboard, a mirage of people holding hands, various posters bashing the Daibazaal Jungle Cats plastered on lampposts and dormitories and windows.
It’s hard to ignore the ambiance when he enters the ballroom, though. It’s basked in soft yet darkened pink and blue light, casting a mysterious and alluring glow onto everyone dawning a mask. He’d been a part of the committee, but seeing it come to life like this is a whole other spectacle.
He spots Keith near the punch bowl, and god, god, he’s straight out of a rom-com or something because he swears everyone around him just disappears. His suit is miraculously red, matching the mask Lance got him almost perfectly. He’s wearing a white button-down under his suit jacket and seems to have forgone a tie entirely. And that untamable hair of his is tied in a low pony-tail, which alone gives Lance many things to contemplate. He looks almost casual, and yet as stunning as can be.
Lance sags under the weight of his sigh, feeling suddenly small under his own suit jacket. A cerulean blue, the calm to Keith’s scarlet red. Keith sees him at that second, his eyes framed beautifully by the mask, and raises a hand as if to catch his attention. As if he isn’t the first person in the room to capture Lance’s attention.
“Hey there, stranger,” he says, somehow, when he gets there. “Weird seeing you without your leather.”
Keith pockets his hands, and Lance swallows. “You know, you never did send me those pictures. You look good.”
“I bet you were lookin’ forward to them, huh?” he says, without even thinking about it, and bites his lips.
Keith stares at him, and Lance thinks his brows would be raised if his mask wasn’t covering them. This might be the first time he’s… flirted with him. But Keith huffs, shakes his head like he’s witnessed some kind of illusion, and taps Lance’s mask with the back of his finger. “It suits you. The blue.”
“Thanks,” Lance rushes out, his cheeks heating up again. “It suits you too. The red.”
“Thanks,” Keith grins, and Lance notices how his mask makes his jaw stand out distractingly.
“For tonight, though, I’ll just be… Blue.”
“Blue?”
“Yes, you’ve not earned yourself the place to see just who resides beneath this mask.”
Lance doesn’t think he’s seen Keith smile this much before, and it makes him ectatic beyond words to know he’s the reason for it.
Keith cocks his head to the side, humoring him and making Lance’s heart flutter. “And what do I have to do to find out?”
“Well…” and just as he’s about to lay it on him, someone calls out, “hey, Lance.” He composes himself just enough not to jump, and turns to find a girl standing next to him. He recognizes her from one of his core classes, usually sits a couple seats in front of him. Lexi… or was it Alexis?
“I really like your suit,” she says. “Would you maybe wanna dance?”
“Oh,” Lance says, still startled. “Um, sure.” He sends Keith a half-smile before being swept off onto the dance floor.
He feels a swell of worry at being interrupted, but tries to tell himself that it’s okay. The night is young. He still has time.
After the dance, Lance stands next to Pidge and chews his lips raw, watching as Keith talks to Hunk from across the room. He’s not doing much of anything really, he looks so nonchalant and at ease, even though he never makes it a priority to attend dances and parties. It’s completely out of his element, per say, and yet there he is, looking like he fits in nothing else but a suit and a crooked smile, making anyone bend at the knees by asking may I have this dance?
“Are you in the 8th century again?”
Lance takes a sharp breath. “What?”
“The way you're looking at him,” she says, logically. “It’s like he’s a knight or prince or something and you're waiting for him to proposition you.”
He pouts. “That’s – so off base you don’t even know what you’re talking about!”
She rolls her eyes. “Just go talk to him.”
“Well, I’ll have you know I had a good flow going earlier, but it got ruined.” He sighs. “I’m waiting for a chance.”
“He’s right there.”
“Yes, Pidge, I see that. But it needs to be perfect!”
She raises her hands. “Alright, alright, didn’t mean to get in the way of your flow. ”
“Shut up.”
She chortles. “Well heads up, your prince is heading this way.”
Lance peaks up to find Keith walking toward him, not in slow motion or anything. Nope. Not at all. Nothing of the sort. “He’s not my prince,” he whispers, faintly, just as Keith stops in front of him and the lights grow brighter.
“Hey,” Keith grins, and damn it, his lips look… so kissable when the top half of his face is hidden beneath the mask.
“Hey,” Lance smiles back, and feels the need to step out into the cold air immediately. “You enjoying yourself?”
“Yeah, it looks good, Lance. You did good.”
Lance kicks his foot against the ground, his hands tying behind his back. “It’s Blue, remember?” he says, with a crinkle-eyed smile that has Keith redirecting.
“Forgive me, I don’t know what came over me.”
Lance chuckles, his heart coming to life again. “But you mean it? I mean, you hate these kinds of things.”
“I was always gonna come, you know,” he says, stepping closer. “You spent a lot of time on this.”
Lance tries not to sigh, his heart scrunching, then reaches out and grabs Keith’s hand to pull him onto the dance floor. “Dance with me?”
Keith follows, looking a bit shocked, but follows nonetheless. Lance stops and wraps Keith’s arms around his waist so he can lock his own around his neck. “This okay?”
Keith looks at him for a second too long before he says, softly, “yeah, o’course.” And then… he brings Lance in closer, makes it easier for Lance to lean into him, makes it look like he wants him to lean into him. Lance knows it’s impossible to compose himself in a position like this, but he swims in it. He lathers himself with it, with this closeness, with the sight of Keith’s stubble, the sensational pressure against his waist, the hair at the back of his neck, which brushes against his hands and makes him want to give a gentle caress.
“This is one of the things, by the way,” he says, quietly, as they sway from side to side.
“One of what?” Keith asks, just as quiet.
“The things you have to do to see who’s actually under this mask, of course.”
Keith leans in, head tilting like he’s going to make a sarcastic comment. “ Things ?”
“That’s right, what’d you think, it’d be as easy as getting to move me side to side?”
“I don’t think I’m doing so hot,” he says, and pivots to twirl them around. Lance feels weightless against the breezing air. “I keep making a fool of myself with you.”
“Not possible,” he murmurs, like he can’t control it, feeling suddenly grateful for his alter ego.
“How come? You barely know me, Blue.”
Lance hums. “Let’s say you just don’t strike me as the type.”
“That’s a big assumption.”
“Alright, it’s the way you dance.”
Keith looks between his eyes. “The way I dance?”
“You’re leading,” Lance says, letting a finger stray to a strand of hair and lightly twirl. “And are managing not to make a fool of yourself.”
Keith laughs, his neck appearing to slightly redden, his thumbs moving up and down Lance’s waist. “I hadn’t noticed. Maybe I’ll do it now that I’m aware of it.”
“Doubt it.”
“And why’s that?”
“Because…” he lets himself look deep into Keith’s eyes, their movements turning slower, calmer. “I have a feeling you’d never let me fall. Simple as that.”
“Mmm, well you’re right about that,” Keith says, suddenly very close to him, nearly nose to nose. He brings a hand up and slightly, so slightly, tilts Lance’s chin up. “Maybe I do know you.”
Lance swallows, coming to a complete stop, tulips and lilies and woodpeckers growing in his stomach. He lets himself stay in this moment for as long as he can, before grasping Keith’s wrist and crawling up to hold onto his palm.
“No cheating,” he whispers as he pulls it down. He carefully lets his hand go once he’s got it back down, letting his fingers skim across his.
“You’re really gonna make this difficult for me, huh?” Keith wraps his arm back around him, and Lance well and truly, melts.
“It wouldn’t be all that fun if it was easy now would it?”
“That’s your opinion.”
Lance laughs, and then Keith laughs with him and their heads are bowing forward with the ridiculousness they must feel, and yet, he continues to entertain him. Lance slides a thumb across the jut of Keith’s jaw, an inadvertent display of affection he can’t hold in even if his arms were chained to the ground.
They dance until Lance starts feeling groggy and has to lean his head against Keith’s shoulder to keep himself afloat. He feels so emboldened, so daring and fearless. Keith’s cheek is pillowed by his hair, and Lance wants to be nowhere else but here, held so close like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
Sometimes they’ll dwindle over to the tables to grab a drink and eat finger foods, then head back to the dance floor. Keith will say something like, “so, Blue, what do you want to do when you get out of here?”
And Lance will say something like, “I kinda want to go out and lay in the snow.”
And Keith chuckles, oh how splendid it is to hear him chuckle. “I meant after college.”
“Oh,” his nose wrinkles. “Something to do with stars.”
“Stars, huh? Sounds about right.”
Lance tilts his head, his grin unstoppable. “Why?”
“You ever seen the movie Stardust?”
Lance softens. He’s the one who made Keith watch it, afterall. “Yes.”
“One of the characters is actually a fallen star. I feel like you’re… like that.”
Lance shakes his head, like he can’t believe him. “You calling me a star?”
“You just showed up out of nowhere tonight,” he explains, like it could make any sense and yet it makes Lance’s heart surge. “And you haven’t stopped glowing.”
“You’re…” Lance says, out of nervousness and a complete lack of knowing what to say. “Insane.” And then he stuffs his head into Keith’s neck and Keith laughs more and more and more.
Lance can’t believe how well Keith is playing along, and almost wishes he really was a stranger to him, just to make sure of the truthfulness behind his words. Could he really mean what he’s saying, or is it all part of this little game Lance has concocted?
“Come on,” Keith is saying, and Lance is removed from his safe space by Keith himself, who’s now tugging him to the doors.
“ Come on where?”
“Outside, Mr. Fallen Star.”
“Don’t – call me that!” he says, completely and utterly flustered.
The snow outside is falling in gentle sways, much like how they were dancing inside. They run down the field, kicking up snow and making Lance squeal when the wetness soaks into his feet. He pushes Keith into the pile and then falls down with him, then begins to pelt him with barely formed snowballs. Keith starts to do the same before they fall into the snow and evidence of their laughs fog up in front of them.
Lance sighs and finds himself coming face to face with the stars in the sky. They shine down on him in colors of comfort and belonging, and he takes it in like the cool air surrounding him. He turns and Keith is there, his mask laying somewhere in the snow. It takes him a long while to orient himself to this picture of Keith: wayward hair plastered to his cheek from the wetness of the snow, the reveal of those eyes he’s already so familiar with and yet seeing them again after hours of keeping them beneath a mask is so… beguiling.
Sagitta is peaking out right behind Keith, and Lance’s words are lost, found, lost, found.
“I have this friend who’s been going outside to look at the stars a lot,” Keith says, suddenly. “Makes me wonder what he’s been thinking about.”
He knows he’s talking about him.
Lance looks back up at the sky and begins poking at the skin next to his thumb. “The stars have always been there, makes them comforting to look at. To think out loud in front of them.”
Keith hums.
“Constellations aren’t anything new,” Lance says, works his way around his words. “Lots of people love them, but… there are some that aren’t really talked about as much as they should be.”
“Like which?”
“Well… there’s Lepus, and Pyxis, and Monoceros and… Sagitta. Sagitta is my favorite. It doesn’t compare to Pleiades or Orion, but I always thought it was pointing at my soulmate when I was younger,” he laughs, like he’s remembering when he would look out the window of his childhood bedroom and daydream about where the arrow was pointing, where it would lead him if he followed it… to who it would lead him to.
“That’s… really cute,” Keith says, and Lance turns his face away, chuckling softly. “You think you found them?”
Lance looks back at him, and doesn’t even think about it as he nods. “Yeah. I think I have.”
Keith watches him like he’s analyzing something, searching for the layers, the answers, before he says, “Can you… take off your mask?”
“There’s one more thing you have to do,” Lance says, sitting up with his heart pounding in his ears. Keith follows him up, leans closer. Lance swallows, looks from Keith’s eyes, to his nose, to his lips. “Kiss me. But – if you don’t want to then I’ll take it off right now and it’ll be like none of this ever happened. It’ll be okay.”
Keith doesn’t speak and only comes closer, until he grasps his mask. Lance gasps softly, but before he can remove it, screaming breaks out from inside the union. Some people come flooding outside, and Lance moves before he’s even aware of it.
He pushes past people to get inside and stumbles, feet slipping beneath him but managing to catch himself. He looks around in befuddlement, the floor sopping wet with something sticky and smelling of fake sugar.
“What happened? What’s–” he gestures to the chaos surrounding him.
“It’s those Diabazzal rats,” a guy Lance recognizes from his dormitory says. “They freaking dumped liters of Gatorade all over the floor and ran! A bunch of lowlives, I swear if we don’t beat them this Saturday I’m gonna storm over there myself–”
Lance slumps as he watches everyone dash for the doors, speechless. Actual Gatorade splashes all over the place in their hurry, looking nothing short of pissed. He looks down at his own soiled shoes and dripping pants, heat burning up his neck and into his eyes. His dance, all ruined.
“Lance!” Keith grabs his shoulder and stands in front of him, eyes brimming with concern when he looks at him. “Hey, it’s gonna be okay–”
“No it’s not! This was meant to be perfect, and – and it was going so well, at least that’s what I thought, but now everything is ruined! You were probably going to take this mask off to let me down easy, too, right? So just… leave while I deal with this mess!”
And then – Keith takes Lance’s mask off and comes in and… kisses him. Lance goes still against his lips, but melts against the hand on his shoulder and the side of his face.
Oh… oh wow.
“Nothing’s ruined,” Keith says, and he’s so, so, so close to him. “Nothing besides these floors at least.”
Lance doesn’t realize he’s crying frustrated tears until he has to sniffle a breath. He wipes his eye and bumps into Keith’s hand, which moves to thumb at a tear for him.
“Kiss me again?” Lance says, weakly.
Keith smiles softly, and brings his other hand up to hold his face in both hands, and kisses him again. Longer, so much longer. Lance reaches up to hold onto Keith’s arms, like he’s making sure he doesn’t let go, and leans his head into it, closes his eyes and gets lost. He feels like he’s levitating, and he knows it’s corny but he’s so floaty right now.
“I’ll help you clean this up, then we’re going to change out of these clothes and I’m taking you to get some food.”
“ Mmm .” Lance lets his fingers dig into his hair so he can pull him back in and steal his lips again. His whole body lights up, and Keith wraps his arms around him and holds him and smiles into it and – Lance is so lost.
He kisses and pecks him until Keith starts laughing and nodding like he understands his passion but they’re standing in a lake of Gatorade for crying out loud–
“Alright baby, let me just–”
“Not a chance, I fully believed this would never happen, and did you just call me baby? ” Lance groans, his eyes widening like he’s finally been shaken awake, only to poke his nose with his and say, “you – you can’t do that just yet–”
And he attacks him with another kiss.
They do manage to leave the hall eventually, but only after Lance has been thoroughly and absolutely kissed.