Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The whole fiasco began on an ordinary day much like any other - as ordinary as a day at a magic school could ever be. So really, it wasn’t like Lance could be blamed for not seeing it coming.

Just like any previous day of his first year at Eastern Magic Academy, he got up extra early, plumped up his custom-made Anna-design pillow and made his matching bed sheets with great care. Next on the agenda was sitting down to yet again review his coursework for the day’s classes. Those gold coins didn’t earn themselves, after all.

All the while, he skillfully ignored Dot’s grumbling about the sudden light in the room. His slacker of a roommate might be complaining now but he was sure to come crying to Lance last minute, begging to copy his transformation class homework. Which then would lead to Finn realizing that he hadn’t finished his either and to reminding Mash that he, too, shared their predicament. Lance’s friends were such lost causes.

The first half of the day flowed by without anything spectacular or noticeable, other than Lance earning a bronze coin for answering a particularly difficult question during magic history class and Mash getting in trouble with their basic spells teacher. Again.
Their assignment had been to open a simple wooden door with a spell, as opposed to just a regular lock. Mash, of course, had broken the door down instead (“Is it push? Or pull? ...Oh, pull wasn’t it, then.”), much to the teacher’s horror. Which had earned Mash a harsh scolding despite his instant apology because the teacher didn’t believe that he was truly sorry. (Lance thought it had been blatantly obvious from the way Mash was trembling with regret.)

Like most other supposedly ordinary days, their group of five gathered in Mash’s and Finn’s dorm room after classes, each occupied with their own activities. Lance was reading, Dot had spent the last half hour despairing over his potions homework, Finn had completed said homework after consulting Lemon and had gone on to studying with her. Mash had refused her enthusiastic offer of joining them in favor of devouring a giant mountain of creampuffs that he had seemingly materialized out of nowhere. Every once in a while, Lance reached for one as well, in order to keep up his sugar levels while reading.
Again, nothing out of the ordinary.

That rapidly changed, however, when Lance briefly left to get a new book.

Upon reopening the room door a few minutes later, he was faced with a rather alarming scene.
Dot’s frustration about his assignment seemed to have finally exploded out of him - a regular occurrence that in itself wouldn’t have been worth mentioning, had it not led to a very unfortunate chain of events. Dot’s fist angrily hitting the table caused Mash’s creampuff tower to tumble, creampuffs rolling all over the table and one particular specimen bouncing off all the way to the opposite side of the room.

Mash, of course, didn’t hesitate for even a millisecond when jumping after the stray creampuff before it could hit the floor, which inevitably meant that he was lunging himself at the very spot where Lance had just entered the room. Leaving no time to cast a spell or even dodge him, Mash’s more muscular body collided with Lance’s. The force of his movement was strong enough to send them both tumbling to the floor, Mash on top.
All of that would have been painful but not too big of an issue if the collision hadn’t ended with Mash’s lips on Lance’s. To make matters worse, Mash’s tongue was still poking out in concentration from his jump and Lance’s own mouth had been hanging open in surprise ever since his arrival.

Not that it mattered much to Mash. Probably. After all, that same movement had also allowed his outstretched hand to catch his creampuff just in time.

Within seconds of their lips connecting into what Lance could only describe as a French kiss - as much as it pained him to do so - Mash’s eyes widened in recognition. It seemed his bloodhound nose had easily caught onto the faintest scent of creampuffs still hanging onto Lance from earlier. And, to Lance’s great shock, Mash proceeded to lick at Lance’s lips with an apprentice hum.

Lance, like any normal person would have in this situation, blushed. Albeit very lightly.

Yet, apparently, the blush was visible enough for Mash’s eagle eyes to pick up. He retreated from Lance’s face and sat on him instead to point out, “Your face is red.”
Lance pointedly ignored the statement and did what was undeniably the appropriate reaction in this situation: He pushed Mash off of him as though he had been burned and jumped to his feet, quick to bring as much distance between himself and his completely unfazed assailant as was possible within the confines of the room.

The three witnesses of Lance’s predicament reacted as expected. Lemon, being the first to recover due to her obvious outrage, threw a fit.
“How dare you kiss my husband before I got to!”
In the background, Mash mumbled something like “Don’t remember ever consenting to the husband part.”

“Oh c’mon, Lemon, darling, don’t be upset!” That was Dot, whose expression had morphed from one of horror into one of utter disgust. “I bet Mash hated it,” he insisted, in perfect ‘how could a guy not hate kissing another dude’ manner.

That was, unfortunately, when Mash decided to rejoin the conversation. “Nah, it was good. Tasted like creampuffs.”
The moron was licking his lips again, undoubtedly to gather even the last bits of creampuff that might be sticking to his mouth. (There were none.)

Lance wanted the floor to swallow him right then and there. Too bad that they hadn’t been taught a fitting spell yet.

Lemon, meanwhile, was still puffing with anger. Finn looked increasingly awkward and Dot had turned to making disgusted noises at them. Knowing him, he had probably never even considered that kissing a dude was a possibility at all.
At the very least, they viewed the topic as concluded and eventually turned back to their previous activities like nothing had happened. Never before had Lance been as grateful for the very limited bit of tact his friends possessed.

Mash already seemed to have forgotten about the matter entirely - he was back to gathering his creampuffs from the table and contently stuffing his face.

Chapter Text

No one mentioned the incident, as Lance had come to call it in his mind, in the weeks after. In fact, he had thought his friends had completely forgotten about it - much unlike Lance himself. Well, he certainly wasn’t complaining about that.

So he had assumed, being lulled into a convenient but ultimately false sense of security. Until it happened again.

-

One particularly tiring double lesson of potions class ended with only Mash and Lance remaining in the classroom after even the teacher had left. This wasn’t an unusual occurrence by any means so Lance didn’t think much of it at first: Mash’s potions kept turning into creampuffs no matter what he did so he was made to work extra. Lance, in turn, liked to practice for future lessons in advance.
In hindsight, Lance should have learned to at least be suspicious of allegedly normal situations around Mash by that point. If only that had been the case.

Roughly an hour into their silent practice session, Mash ran out of potion ingredients and therefore out of accidentally made creampuffs to sate his addiction with. Lance, focused as he was on his ‘liquid happiness’ potion, didn’t notice - which was his second mistake of the day.

“Excuse me,” Mash addressed him a few minutes later, making Lance flinch in surprise and almost drop his entire swamp snake skin into his bubbling potion. He hastily put it down on the table to avoid any accidents and turned to Mash.

“Do you need my help with your potion?” he questioned, frowning. They had established months ago that Lance couldn’t do anything about Mash’s mysterious potion-creampuff problem, no matter how hard he tried. Maybe Mash had forgotten?

“Nah.”

Lance waited, hoping that Mash would elaborate. There were times when he had no trouble reading Mash despite the usual lack of emotion on his face. (A truly miraculous feat if he did say so himself.) But this was not one of them.

Therefore, Lance was entirely unprepared when Mash grabbed him by the collar without any pretext, hauling him close enough for their noses to touch.
“Kiss me again,” Mash demanded. His face remained completely blank.

Lance was, very justly, confused. As well as decidedly unimpressed. “And why, exactly, would I do that?”

Mash’s expressionless stare didn’t even waver when he answered, “I’m out of creampuffs.” As though that would explain anything at all.

Lance shouldn’t be surprised. This was, after all, Mash - the singular most unpredictable and one-track-minded person Lance knew.

“So?”

“The stores are closed already. And I used up my last ingredients,” Mash stated, like it should have been obvious.

Lance resisted the very powerful urge to roll his eyes. This was getting tiring. “So?”

“So I need you to kiss me again.”

Lance was speechless. This situation had gotten out of hand far too quickly for him to accept. He wasn’t used to not understanding his surroundings, even when Mash was concerned. Sometimes, he even prided himself on being better at reading Mash than Finn, Mash’s roommate, or Lemon, Mash’s self-proclaimed wife.
But what good were his skills when they failed him in a crucial moment like this one?

Either way, Lance decided against the obvious reaction of retreating. Mash was his friend and if wriggling out of Mash’s grip might have required force - sue him and his sometimes uncontrollable strength - Lance would rather not.
Which was his third mistake of the day because Mash took the hesitation as his cue to smash their lips together for the second time.

Lance hadn’t had time to think about the specifics of their kiss the first time around, due to his surprise and the short time their accidental kiss had lasted. This time, however, was a completely different story.
Mash kissed like he ate: eagerly and hungrily, still starving even after having devoured at least a dozen creampuffs - like his bottomless pit of a stomach couldn’t ever be sated. Maybe it couldn’t. Or maybe his muscles needed all that sugar to function.

The answer was hard to determine when Lance was suffering from a very unprecedented case of sudden dizziness that may or may not be to blame on the aggressiveness of Mash’s tongue pushing into his mouth. Mash’s tongue that, as Lance belatedly realized, was currently brushing against Lance’s own tongue with undeniable enthusiasm. What was happening to him?!

Lance was going to faint. This was too much, even for the renowned eldest son of the Crown family.

He couldn’t even tell if it was a good thing that Mash had let go of him and taken a few steps backwards, now regarding Lance with… muted sadness?

“You don’t taste like creampuffs anymore.”

Those words, at long last, snapped Lance out of his trance. “That should have been obvious!” he shrieked, not even finding it in himself to feel embarrassed at his unusually high voice.

Chapter Text

Just like the first time, Mash continued to act like nothing had happened between him and Lance at all. Like the two kisses they had shared had been insignificant on every level and weren’t worth being mentioned again. Ever. To be fair, they most likely weren’t - not to Mash, whose unbroken focus on creampuffs and nothing but creampuffs (and becoming a Divine Visionary) had gotten Lance into this predicament in the first place.

Lance was as relieved about his lack of a reaction as he was frustrated to his core. Because after much, much more overthinking than would have been acceptable, he still had no idea how he would have handled it if the topic had been brought up again.

He should be ignoring it altogether. Everyone else clearly had no trouble doing just that - not even Lemon, who had clearly been the most upset about Mash kissing someone, someone other than her. (Hell, just thinking about it made Lance blush. He wasn’t even the blushy type, dammit! Not at all!)

Lance didn’t have time for this mess. He should be focusing all of his mental capacity on his goal, on earning coins and becoming a Divine Visionary to save his sister! All of this was for Anna, his sweet little kind-hearted Anna, whose time was running out with every passing minute!
And yet here Lance was, getting distracted over something as trivial and unpleasant as one accidental kiss and another one caused purely by a horrible misunderstanding.

But sadly, that was the root of Lance’s problem: Kissing Mash hadn’t been unpleasant at all. The first time around, Lance had been much too distracted to notice anything but the strange tingle of a previously unfamiliar touch. It hadn’t been bad, exactly, just… weird.
The issue was with the second time. Whenever he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about it - at the late hours of the night when he was about to fall asleep or in the early mornings before he had to get up - Lance remembered the sensation vividly. He remembered exactly how it had felt when Mash’s lips had moved against his, when Mash’s tongue had invaded his mouth in search of his favorite taste. Oh, how ironic it was, that Lance now knew for certain that Mash was the one who always tasted like creampuffs, sweet enough to make Lance salivate just imagining it…

Just what was wrong with him, thinking about his purely platonic friend, his most important rival like that?!

Finn jumped halfway off his chair with a startled shriek when Lance’s fist collided with the surface of the table without warning. There, he had been randomly zoning out again! Lance never zoned out.
Besides, he was supposed to be helping Finn with his homework! When had he drifted off like this?!

Lance quickly took his leave, making up some half-assed excuse about having forgotten about an urgent question he needed to ask the transformation teacher. He did feel bad for Finn but his friend should be able to handle himself for an hour or two without Lance. They were all way too dependent on him, anyway.

But most importantly, he really, really needed to get this under control.

-

Lance’s solution to try and ‘get this under control’ ended up being far less conventional than he would have hoped. Then again, there weren’t exactly many ways to approach this extremely delicate situation, were there?

After long hours of internal debate, Lance had come to the conclusion that the best he could do right now was to try and get these strange thoughts and feelings out of his system. How would he go about that, you ask? Simple, by kissing Mash one last time to hopefully clear up all his remaining questions. To get closure, so to speak.

There was, however, an issue. Just because Lance was open to sharing one more kiss didn’t mean that Mash felt the same way. In fact, having found out that his theory about the creampuff taste had been incorrect, he was highly unlikely to want to kiss Lance again, right? Unless…

With an idea clear in his mind, all there was left to do was to wait for the right opportunity. It presented itself far sooner than expected - although it shouldn’t be all that surprising, considering that Lance spent pretty much every waking minute with Mash these days. And, by extension, with their other friends. (Sadly, there was no getting away from Dot even when Lance was asleep or was trying to be. The guy wasn’t only Lance’s roommate, to his utter displeasure - he also snored like a champ.)

Yet another weekday rolled around with the group gathered in Mash’s and Finn’s dorm room - this time, however, only Lance and Mash were left. Lemon had departed on a shopping trip to town a while ago, dragging Dot and his very telling nosebleed with her. Although, of course, it wasn’t a date as he assumed - she only brought him to carry the mountain of bags she planned to acquire. He hadn’t even been her first choice: Mash had denied her request in favor of continuing his workout.
Finn had left for the library a short while after, complaining that the rapid creaking of Mash’s huge weights distracted him from his overdue assignment, especially at the inhumane pace at which Mash was lifting them, only interrupted when he had yet another creampuff in between. (Lance had a hard time even just following the movement with his eyes.)

Hence, the two of them were left alone with Mash’s weights and the huge assembly of creampuffs on the table - with absolutely no one but Lance’s nerves to stop him from executing his ‘solution plan’.
The first part was simple enough: Just like so many times before, Lance reached for a creampuff after the other while trying to seem inconspicuous, even though it had been at least five minutes since he had read a sentence in his book and actually understood the contents of it. His heart had absolutely no business pounding this hard. Also, how could Mash even devour so many creampuffs at once, day after day? Lance had only had five and already, he was feeling giddy with too much sugar. Unless the sugar wasn’t to blame at all?

Before long, the plate was all but empty and when Mash tried to grab one more creampuff, his hand grasped at nothing. He sat his weights down, frowning deeply.
This was the chance Lance had been waiting for to initiate phase two. Now, all that was left was not to chicken out. (How was that even a possibility? Lance usually never shied away from a challenge, let alone felt nervous about it.)

“Hey, Mash.” The boy in question stopped mourning his lack of creampuffs, his disappointed aura dissipating immediately when he lifted his head to look at Lance expectantly. Lance, in turn, couldn’t help a nervous gulp. It was now or never.
“I think I taste like creampuffs again now but I’m not sure. Do you want to check?” Hell, he sounded so stupid right now.

Lance couldn’t be quite sure in his current state of mind but he thought he saw Mash’s aura light up considerably at the suggestion. Well, at least Mash wasn’t sad anymore.
“Sure,” he responded with his usual nonchalance - which was about the farthest thing from what Lance felt right now, his heart going into overdrive.

Mash didn’t waste any time approaching Lance and crawling onto the bed next to him, neither did he hesitate to climb on top of Lance and to pull him in by the collar like the last time they had kissed. Their lips met long before Lance had had the time to remotely prepare himself for what was sure to come.

From there on out, however, it was surprisingly easy to go with the flow - to lose himself in the feeling altogether. Mash’s lips were as warm and soft as he remembered - no surprise there, considering how vivid Lance’s memory of their previous kisses had been all along. Mash’s tongue licked into his mouth pretty early on and Lance let him, even reciprocated the gesture. He was feeling strangely more boneless the longer they were connected, his eyes fluttering closed automatically as he was overtaken by a warmth that he hadn’t quite come around to the last time.

This time, Mash made no move to retreat even a minute into the kiss - not that Lance had any concept of time left to speak of. His brain was getting more mushy by the second. He must really taste like creampuffs if Mash bothered with him for this long, huh?

Focused as he was on the sensation of his and Mash’s sweet tongues sliding together, he only realized at the back of his mind that Mash’s hands had somehow found their way into Lance’s hair and were now moving across his scalp in a haphazard pattern and… Oh. It hadn’t really occurred to Lance before but all of this actually felt more than just ‘not unpleasant’. It felt good. Like, really good.
So good, in fact, that Lance soon found himself giving in to the pleasure of the moment entirely. His hands reached for Mash without having received a conscious order to do so, trying to pull him closer, in order to chase more of this sweet, sweet sensation - whatever it was. Probably the fact that Mash still tasted like creampuffs too. Yes, that had to be it.

In the midst of it all, however, Lance had completely forgotten that human beings were in need of breathing air to survive. Not that he could be blamed when he had been this… preoccupied. He separated from Mash after an indefinite amount of time for that exact reason, ending in him both panting heavily and making an awkward spluttering sound that caused him to blush even more than he already must be. His face, at least, felt like it was on fire.

Lance had neither the presence of mind nor the opportunity to notice the faint flush on Mash’s cheeks - a stark contrast to his otherwise unmoved expression - before he was being pulled in again, this time with notably more force.
From there on out, the kiss started all over again. With the exception that Mash seemed even more hungry now, pushed forward with more urgency, as though he planned to devour Lance like he did his creampuffs.

It wasn’t long before his tongue pressed against the roof of Lance’s mouth, finding a spot that it hadn’t discovered before, when something weird happened. Lance felt himself shudder from the sudden bolt of electricity that flashed through him, a completely foreign noise escaping his mouth. If he had to describe it - which he would rather not, thank you very much - he would compare it to an embarrassing mix of a sigh and a moan. Lance hadn’t even known he was capable of making such sounds - but nevertheless, he was completely powerless to stop it.

Mash must be about as surprised at the noise as Lance felt because it was the reason why he pulled back a moment later, their eyes meeting for the first time in… minutes? Hours? He couldn’t possibly tell.
Lance didn’t have time to mourn his loss - not when he was frozen solid as the sight of Mash’s face finally registered in his mind. He had long become used to the fact that Mash’s blank expression hardly ever showed even a trace of emotion, save for maybe a flicker of anger when he was truly furious. Never had he seen Mash blush like he was now - although it was hardly worth mentioning compared to the furnace that Lance’s own face had become.
Mash stared back at Lance with something akin to wonder in his otherwise unreadable gaze and that… wow. It made Lance shiver all over and his knees feel wobbly. Good thing he was sitting down.

Lance couldn’t possibly have determined how long their entranced staredown continued but after a while, it seemed like Mash was leaning back in to kiss him again (Hell yes!). He probably would have, if it wasn’t for the faint sound of voices on the other side of the door that instantly made the two of them snap out of… whatever that had been.

It truly was a thing of magic how quickly all of Lance’s strength - and more - returned to him at the thought of being discovered in this position with Mash. In the few more seconds it took for Lemon to open the door and enter the room with Finn, an exhausted Dot and a dozen shopping bags in tow, Lance had shoved Mash off of him in a motion worthy of an MMA (mixed magical arts) fighter.
Finn was rightfully shocked at the sight of Mash lying on the floor, groaning and holding his arm from where it had unceremoniously bumped into the table. Lance, still on the bed and still blushing madly, was too embarrassed to feel guilty.

“Oh no, what happened here? Mash, my love, are you alright?!” Lemon squealed as she hurried to Mash’s side, leaving a distraught Dot to balance all of her shopping bags by himself.
But Mash, being Mash, had long recovered from both his fall and whatever anomalies his previous situation with Lance may or may not have caused. By now, he was casually sitting on the floor like nothing had happened at all, giving Lemon his usual blank stare. “Lance pushed me,” he declared in his usual monotone, as though that statement wouldn’t kick loose a full-blown riot.

Lemon was, unsurprisingly, livid. “He did what?!” she cried, outraged, throwing Lance the kind of nasty glare that would have made most other people fear for their life.
Finn, albeit clearly confused as well as affected by Lemon’s obvious bloodlust, was quick to try and defuse the situation. “No need to get angry, now, I’m sure there’s a good explanation for this.” He turned to the original instigator of the commotion for help, clearly uncomfortable with the direction it had taken. “Right, Lance?”

For once, however, Lance was the wrong choice to be of help. In fact, he had barely even grasped most of what had happened ever since his friends’ arrival.
“I should go back to my room,” he informed them in a tone of voice that sounded off even to himself, not daring to look at any of them or to react to Finn’s puzzled questions as he more stumbled than walked out of the room, lest they discover the remaining blush on his face. It was far more obvious that he was running away than he would have liked - to both himself and the others.

But it wasn’t like Lance had much of a choice on the matter right now. There was a bomb he needed to disarm and hell forbid he do it in the presence of any of them.

That had been the plan, anyway - but then again, when did his plans involving Mash ever work out as he had imagined?

He had hardly made it a few steps in the direction of his room when he was stopped dead in his tracks. “Lance?” an unmistakable voice called from just behind him, sounding calm as ever - so much unlike the tumult currently taking place inside of Lance. (It seemed he had graduated from ‘Lolicon’ at some point during the last weeks and now his actual name deserved to be mentioned.)

So Mash had followed him, whatever the reason. No matter what it was, it was likely to upset Lance even further.
However, Mash didn’t continue to speak, a fact that in itself had Lance rooted on the spot, waiting in giddy anticipation. How very self-destructive of him.

But even if he had wanted to, Lance couldn’t have reacted in time when Mash appeared next to him, leaned in, pressed a quick kiss to his lips and moved away, all within the span of a second.
Needless to say, Lance was completely dumbfounded - and the flicker of the tiniest, barely-there upwards quirk of Mash’s lips only served to further do him in.

“See you,” was all Mash said, his voice giving away nothing at all. Just like that, he turned to walk back to his room, leaving Lance to stare after him in a wide-ranged mixture of emotions - predominantly disbelief. He had imagined that, right?

Well, amidst all of the unanswered questions that had added to his growing mountain of uncertainties in the last hour, one thing was absolutely certain: Lance’s oh so great solution plan was in shambles.

Chapter Text

Before Lance knew it, it had become a pattern.
In other words, yes, he had kissed Mash far too often to still count it as an accident, a coincidence, or anything of the sort. Calling it a habit would be more fitting at this point. And Lance was one of the two people who had been repeatedly making the conscious decision to indulge in that very habit. Although it was clearly a much bigger deal to him than it was to Mash. The guy had probably never felt ashamed or excessively conflicted before in his undoubtedly sheltered life.

Nevertheless, after a few times, it had been surprisingly easy for Lance to shove aside any remaining inner protests of his overthinking self. It wasn’t like kissing Mash interfered with his studies - other than taking a few insignificant minutes off his study time - and there was no denying that Lance had earned it. He had been working with all he had for years now and although exhaustion was no excuse to slack off when his goal was the most important there could possibly be - saving his beloved Anna from the injustice of the Magic Realm… what was a little reward to keep himself motivated? Right?
‘Live a little once in a while, you damn nerd’, as Dot would say. (Not that Lance had ever considered taking advice from Dot and he was highly unlikely to do so ever again.) More importantly: his sweet Anna would probably tell him the same thing. She had always hated seeing Lance exert himself too much.

At first, it was only about once a week that Lance allowed himself to give in - soon, it became a few times a week and eventually, every day, then every few hours. Behind the school building, in an empty classroom or a broom closet, in the owl hut, in the dorm kitchen, in Mash’s and Finn’s room whenever it was just the two of them… they never seemed to have trouble finding good opportunities.

Well, there would have been no need to search for such secluded spots at all, had the kisses they shared these days been anything like the first two. However, ever since their third kiss, the time they spent losing themselves in each other’s warmth - and in the sweet taste of creampuffs - only kept increasing, to the point at which the length of such moments extended to that of entire sessions.
Lance vehemently refused to go the extra mile and call them make-out-sessions, his pride simply wouldn’t take it. Besides, there was no reason for him and Mash to be making out. It was all about the creampuffs. The creampuffs, got it?? He was doing Mash a favor here.

Naturally, their ‘special encounters’ only came to pass when the other condition, as well as the de-facto reason for their kisses, was fulfilled: whenever Mash ran out of creampuffs. Because according to Mash, kissing Lance helped with the craving, whether he tasted of Mash’s favorite treat or not.
Which made absolutely no sense. At all. But Lance wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. Well, actually, he was, but he didn’t really feel like he could afford it this time - not if he wanted to keep up this new pattern.

And hell yes did he want that. For more reasons than how kissing Mash strangely helped him focus. However, the other reasons, such as him liking how Mash tasted and absolutely adoring how their tongues moved together in their mouths or the smacking sound their lips made in a quiet room when they moved apart only to reconnect immediately were so embarrassing that Lance would much like to leave them unmentioned altogether.

All of those things considered, it wasn’t an issue that, no, they hadn’t actually talked about it. Not that that had ever stopped the kisses from happening. Mash wasn’t a guy of many words to begin with and, well, Lance had decided that for once in his life, he would let loose without questioning his decision any more than he already had. That annoyance Dot had called him a ‘stick up the ass’ too often in this lifetime as it was.
Besides, his brain cells had far better things to do than worry about a done deal, anyway.

-

Thinking back on it, all of these aspects were obvious signs of Lance getting carried away, not that Lance would know - it was a first for him, after all. (Except maybe that time when he had challenged Mash to a duel out of contempt after only judging his very misleading shell.)

It happened about a week (nine days, to be exact, and counting) after Lance and Mash had started meeting in Mash’s and Finn’s room right after class, making use of the small window before their friends gathered there as well to kiss some more. Which was, by the way, another spur of the moment decision that had developed into a pattern - without either of them ever addressing it verbally.

As for today (the tenth day in a row if Lance had any say in the matter), they hadn’t come around to it yet because Lance had been called back by the teacher to discuss an advanced spell he had asked about. He couldn’t deny that there was a slight skip to his step when he finally made his way through the corridors and towards Mash’s and Finn’s room.
How peculiar. How completely unlike him. Was he really looking forward to kissing Mash that much? Or even just seeing him? What a ridiculous thought. Lance consciously forced his pace to slow and his movements to calm, to fall back into his unusual sharp and precise walk.

However, by the time he opened the door to the dorm room, there was little he could do about the ghost of a smile his lips had curled into. (This was stupid.)
His eyes immediately found Mash at the table, who looked up at the sound of the door opening, rose to his feet at the sight of Lance and had crossed the room in one big stride by the time the door had closed behind the newcomer.

Lance wasn’t even surprised anymore when Mash’s hands reached for him to simultaneously pull him down and slam him into the door the very same way he had nine times before. (Lance had become so used to this very action, in fact, that he avoided getting a giant dump at the back of his head this time.)
In the blink of an eye - for far more than only the tenth time - Mash’s lips collided with Lance’s eagerly waiting ones in a shamelessly hungry kiss.

Lance didn’t bother suppressing his inevitable moan as he reciprocated with equal fervor, his eyes automatically fluttering closed. Mash didn’t hesitate to deepen the kiss or to immediately shove his tongue into Lance’s mouth. Lance, of course, had no complaints. He gladly wrapped his arms around Mash’s neck in return, pulling him even closer.
It had become a deeply familiar exchange quickly enough, one that never got boring but nonetheless was easy to sink into wholeheartedly every time.

Lance wouldn’t have had trouble losing himself in the feeling this time, either - in fact, he was about to do just that when an ear-splitting scream tore through the silence of the room. A scream that he, after rapidly moving away from Mash (which caused him to hit his head after all) identified as Lemon’s reaction to the shocking display she had just witnessed. Lemon, who had been sitting at the table with Finn and Dot, all of whom were now staring at Lance and Mash in utter disbelief.

Lance, meanwhile, was frozen, overcome by an admittedly frightening realization: their friends. They had been here all along. Of course they would be in the room. It was a weekday, long past the end of class. They were always here at this time, so much so that Finn complained about it on the regular.
Late as he was to arrive today, it shouldn’t be surprising at all that Lance had entered last. And frankly, it wasn’t - he simply hadn’t considered it. Hadn’t stopped to question his actions for even a second, to think before falling back into his newest favorite habit. (Even though thinking was more his thing than for anyone else in their group. He was on top of the class for a reason, dammit - was supposed to be, anyway.)

Lance had gotten carried away, more so than he had ever thought possible. He had messed up. Royally.

This time, Dot was the first of their friends who spoke up - shouted, more like. “Okay, what. The. Everloving. Fuck?!!!!” It was a fair enough reaction, Lance supposed.
Finn, meanwhile, was trembling slightly from stress but still managed to awkwardly clear his throat and press out, “Now, that didn’t look like an accident at all.”

Mash, nonplussed, turned to face him tilting his head in mild confusion. “That’s because it wasn’t?”
Oh how very like him to be absolutely unperturbed at the situation at hand while Lance was about to have the first panic attack of his life. And he didn’t even know why he cared so much. Which, unfortunately, made everything worse.

Lemon was in tears by now, having long moved to Mash’s side to cling to the sleeve of his robe and looking up at him with her infamous puppy eyes, pitifully-wet edition. (Although their success rate was zero percent, seeing as she had only ever tried them on Mash and Lance, who both happened to be completely immune to her charms.) “Mash, babe, you’re not cheating on me, are you?” Oh lord.

Mash’s expression didn’t even waver as he looked down at her.
“I still don’t remember agreeing to anything that’d make cheating possible-”

He trailed off when Lance, finally in control of his limbs again, pushed past him on his way to open the door and slip away as quickly as possible. By now, his thoughts had become loud enough to block out his surroundings altogether. There was no brain capacity left for him to notice the hardly visible hint of confusion that had made its way into Mash’s expression for the first time that day, nor the way Mash weakly reached out to him. The quiet “Lance, wait…” was completely lost on its supposed recipient.

The rising panic only fully took control once Lance had made it out into the corridors and brought at least 20 feet between himself and that wretched door. He had long given in to the sudden overwhelming urge to run. His mind was in desperate chaos.
How could he have been this stupid?!

Chapter Text

It took exactly two hours and 34 minutes until Dot could no longer keep himself from addressing the elephant in the room. No surprise there, he had looked like he was about to burst for the past hour, undeterred by Lance’s unsuccessful attempts at bewitching the room wall into swallowing him. One miserable top student he was.

“Soooooo…” Dot was stretching his words. This could only end in a complete disaster. “You gay or somethin’?”

Lance cringed. There they went.
Oh well. Now that he was at this point, might as well tell Dot the truth. After all that had happened, it might well be the least incriminating option.
“No? At least I don’t think so?” There was nothing he could do about the tense silence as his tongue curled awkwardly around the next words. “I just… really liked kissing Mash.”

Well, that was true for Lance. As for Mash… “I don’t think Mash likes guys, either… Actually, he only ever kissed me when he couldn’t eat creampuffs instead. So it was never actually about kissing me.” The thought had never stung before - why should it? - but somehow, admitting it out loud was a different matter entirely.
“You know,” Lance added for clarification. “Because of that first time. Because he’s been thinking I taste of creampuffs ever since.” Would hiding his massive blush by burying his face in his hands make him look any less pathetic? Unlikely.

Dot was quiet for a while - whether it was out of surprise or disgust, Lance didn’t bother to find out. So what if Dot was disgusted at the thought of Lance and Mash kissing? Lance wasn’t. Clearly, that rang true for Mash as well - and at the end of the day, wasn’t that all that mattered to Lance? Wasn’t it? But what about how it would make Mash feel? Would he even care? Then again, Mash’s friends had always mattered to him.

Before Lance could come to a conclusion whether or not he would mind if Dot, Finn and Lemon found him and Mash disgusting as a result of this entire mess, Dot spoke up again.
“And he’s only kissed you when he didn’t have any creampuffs to eat?” Still, Dot shivered a little at the thought but apparently he cared enough to endure it - for Lance’s sake?! So he was alright with it? Somehow? Weird.

As for his inquiry… Lance had never even questioned it - he had always taken for granted that creampuffs were the only reason why Mash had started kissing him and why he had continued to do so. Well, that had clearly always been correct, hadn’t it?
“Of course!” Lance was quick to respond. “That was the entire point of it! Of course he only kissed me when… when…”

Actually, now that he thought about it like that…

Lance had never noticed, preoccupied as he had been, but… but now that he tried to remember, he realized that his assumptions hadn’t been exactly right.
Mash hadn’t only ever kissed Lance when he was out of creampuffs. In fact, just yesterday, when they had met in Mash’s room after class, there had been a giant plate overflowing with creampuffs on the table right behind Mash. The same had been the case the day before yesterday. And the day before that. As well as many more times before that.

Actually, it was very much possible that Mash’s pockets had been full of creampuffs even when they had spontaneously kissed for the forth time, in the restroom between classes. (Because despite his original agreement, Mash had never once listened to Lance’s advise not to keep unwrapped food in his pockets. Of course not.) Lance had seen Mash munch on a creampuff a few periods later but had simply assumed he had gotten some from his room in between. Although, now that he considered it more thoroughly, there hadn’t actually been any time to do so unnoticed - not when Lance had been by Mash’s side the entire time.

So did that mean that ever since that time, their kisses hadn’t been about creampuffs at all? But then what? If not because of the creampuffs, why would Mash want to kiss Lance? Maybe for the very same reason that had made Lance play along this entire time? Because it felt good?
But no, that didn’t seem quite right. That couldn’t be all there was to it, could it? If that had been all there was to their kisses, Lance wouldn’t be feeling even nearly as inexplicably light with relief now. It made no sense.

In that moment, it mattered little that Lance usually took pride in his nearly impeccable pokerface - Dot somehow managed to see through his brooding silence anyway. By the time Lance next looked up, the damn fiend was smirking triumphantly.

“What’s up?” Dot questioned, trying and failing to feign innocence. As though he didn’t know the answer already.

He should count himself fortunate that Lance was too focused on his current problem to get angry. “No,” he finally answered Dot’s earlier question. “I guess Mash didn’t only kiss me after he ran out of creampuffs.”

“Yeah, had a feeling that’d be it,” Dot muttered in response, frowning in deep thought - it was not a good expression on him.
The silence returned as Dot was clearly trying to make sense of whatever was going on in his head - a war between homophobia and loyalty, if Lance had to guess.

Lance, meanwhile, had his own thoughts to attend to.
Why had he liked kissing Mash so much, anyway? It couldn’t have been for the obvious reasons that he had thought - Lance wasn’t that superficial. And while he could picture Mash kissing someone for the simple reason that it felt good - there was no harm in it, really - that couldn’t possibly be the same for himself, could it? If it was, Lance wouldn’t feel so put off just by considering kissing someone other than Mash, would he?

Before he could come to a satisfactory conclusion, he was snapped out of his thoughts by Dot opening his mouth. It seemed that the urge to be supportive of his friends (for Mash’s sake rather than Lance’s, most definitely) had won out in the end. Or maybe Dot was just that desperate to find a reason to postpone the homework in front of him.

“So, you wanna, like, date Mash?”

Lance stared at him, frozen in surprise. He’d never even considered that option. Hold on, was it even an option?

Dating someone… Honestly, Lance hadn’t thought about it in years. Not since his sister had become sick. Ever since the day he had left his home with a clear goal in mind, nothing else had mattered - certainly not a possible distraction such as this one.
So of course, he hadn’t considered it with Mash, either. Not to mention, Mash was a guy and totally not the type to make one think about that. Unless the person in question was an obsessive girl named Lemon.

But then again… Hadn’t Lance already let himself be distracted from his goal by Mash? From the moment he had purposely started kissing Mash, hadn’t there already been something other than his goal present in his mind? Something that had only grown from there on out, along with the time Lance was ready to dedicate to kissing Mash instead of focusing on what truly mattered? Well, the only thing that had truly mattered before. Because clearly, it wasn’t that simple anymore.

And now that Lance considered it for the first time, it wasn’t like one more step in this new direction would be a big deal.
Dating Mash? When he actually gave serious thought to Dot’s suggestion, the idea didn’t seem half bad. Knowing Mash, not much would change even if the two of them were to go out, except that there would be more kissing and touching and more time together in general. There would be no need to hide anymore, either, not that that had worked out for them to begin with.

With that in mind, he focused his attention on Dot once more, his expression a thoughtful frown.
“So you’re saying I should ask him out?”

Dot looked at him like he had grown a second head. “Are you stupid, nerd?” How incredibly flattering. “If you want to date him, why not ask him out?”

Well, that was one easy question to counter. “Why haven’t you asked Lemon out even though you’re crazy about her?”

It had definitely been worth asking, seeing as the suggestion caught Dot completely off guard, making him splutter incorrect protests, clearly flustered. The blush that overtook his face could easily compete with the color of his hair.
“Th-th-that’s different!” he insisted as soon as he was capable of forming a complete sentence once more.

Lance, thoroughly unimpressed, arched a skeptical eyebrow. “Oh, really.”

“Besides, that’s not the point!” Dot continued, obviously eager to direct Lance’s attention back to their previous topic. “Just go ask Mash out already! Get out of my hair, stinking nerd!”

In Dot’s defense, it was probably a good idea not to push the inevitable for much longer. Lance would get back at Dot for this soon enough.
But not now. Now, he had a mission to complete.

To think that Dot could actually be helpful sometimes. Although in a very... Dot kind of way.

-

Upon leaving his room, he almost walked right into Mash.

“Uh,” Lance greeted him unintelligently. The next moment, he wanted to slap himself for it.
Just what was wrong with him?! Why did he keep making a fool of himself around Mash these days? He had been on the way to meet Mash anyway. He had mentally prepared himself for this - not that it should have been necessary for such a simple interaction.

Mash looked no different from usual, his face no less blank than a few hours ago. If anything, Lance thought that he seemed a little lost. Hesitant. Then again, that was likely just Lance projecting his own feelings onto Mash’s expressionless appearance.

In the end, Mash was the one to speak up first while Lance was still trying to find the appropriate words.
“I wanted to talk to you. Finn said it was time to bake the creampuff with my own hands. I do that all the time, though…”

To his surprise, Lance found himself suppressing a laugh at Mash’s so uniquely aloof attitude. So Finn had put him up to this, huh?
Somehow, just seeing Mash act with such casual normalcy did wonders to calm Lance’s nerves. Why was he panicking? This was just Mash. His friend, one of the people Lance knew best - someone he knew better than almost anyone else did.

Lance forced himself to take a deep breath and push down his raging thoughts. There, control. Lance was a master of being in control.

“Perfect timing. I need to talk to you too. But not here.” Lance pointedly nodded back to the open door of his room. Through it, he could clearly see Dot pretending very badly that he was focusing on his assignment rather than curiously listening to every single one of their words. “Let’s talk in private.”

The last thing he needed was to have their friends eavesdrop on their conversation or for some random student to walk in on them. Or worse, a teacher.

“Okay,” Mash agreed, clearly indifferent to the matter.
Feeling impatient, Lance reached for his wrist to pull him along to his new destination. (They had shared many much more intimate touches than this one, after all.) “I have a place in mind. Follow me.”

How would Mash react if Lance were to take his hand instead? Would he resist? Unlikely. Then again, seeing as this encounter might well end with a brutal rejection that ended up straining their friendship…
Oh God, rejection. Somehow, Lance hadn’t even considered it so far - and he sure wished it had stayed that way. He did not need the additional uncertainty right now. Or the reminder that Mash wasn’t exactly familiar with such a thing as tact.

-

They made it to their destination both sooner and later than Lance had hoped: the door to the castle tower on which their astronomy lessons took place. The open space could also serve as a training ground for certain spells, which was why Lance had been given the key a few weeks ago.

Mash gave the door a considering look. “I remember: it’s a push-door,” he declared matter-of-factly as he approached it, clearly about to try to open it.
Which in itself was already enough to activate the inner alarm bells of any person who had known Mash and his quirks for a while.

“Wait,” Lance hurried to protest, reaching forward to stop him. “It’s probably locked-”

Crack.

Such was the sound of the door breaking clean off its hinges.

Mash, holding the door in one hand as though it was made of paper, looked dejected at his failed attempt. As much as Mash could look dejected despite his unchanging expression, anyway. There was also a slight tremble to his features that never failed to alert Lance: Mash was about to panic. “B-but it was definitely a push-door….”

Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Lance stepped forward to pry Mash’s hand off the door - which he certainly wouldn’t have managed if Mash hadn’t let him. He pulled Mash outside into the cool afternoon breeze before casually fixing the door with a flick of his wand. (That skill was the reason why Finn liked to joke that Lance was Mash’s ultimate partner in his fights against his worst nemesis - doors. Upon hearing that, Lemon had of course vowed to learn the spell too. But for now, Lance remained the only one in their group who could counteract Mash’s predicament like this.)

“Forget it,” he told Mash who still looked a little guilty. It wasn’t important, not in the face of what Lance wanted to get off his check before he could change his mind. What he needed to ask Mash right now.
Mash, however, blinked in confusion at his words, clearly not understanding. “But I’ll need to know if I should push it or pull it next time I-”

“Mash.”

Lance’s unusually sharp tone immediately silenced Mash who knew him well enough to sense the urgent tension in the air.

“Uhm, yes?”

Great. Now, with Mash’s full attention and his piercing yellow eyes on Lance, hardly two steps away, all of his nerves were gone again in an instant. How had Lance never noticed just how much he liked the shade of Mash’s eyes? Even his stupid mushroom haircut was actually pretty cute. Especially now that Lance knew just how soft that black hair actually was…

But treacherous stray thoughts and nervousness aside, was there even a non-mortifying way to ask this? One that wasn’t at least 90 percent certain to humiliate the hell out of him? If so, Lance sure didn’t see it.

If only it wasn’t for that damn lump in his throat. Lance swallowed heavily. “Wanna… go out?”

The silence that followed was interrupted only by the rapid beating of Lance’s heart. Mash, meanwhile, was staring back at him, completely unmoved. There was no surprise visible anywhere in his demeanor. Or any emotion to speak of.
(Lance would probably be wondering if Mash actually knew what relationships were if he hadn’t heard him reject Lemon so determinedly countless times before. Not that she ever seemed to notice.)

In other words, Lance was left guessing for what felt like the longest and most anxious minute of his life.

Until, finally, “Okay, sure.”

Amidst a pathetically overwhelming wave of relief, Lance’s first thought was, ah, what a Mash-like answer. He highly doubted there could even be a more casual answer to his question, much less one that sounded so much like Mash had given it no thought at all. Which Lance knew was not the case - Mash could actually be really thoughtful when it mattered, he simply wasn’t good at showing it.

But still… “You weren’t conflicted about any of this at all, were you?”

“I told you the day we met, I think you’re an okay guy.”

Lance tried not to feel too disappointed and failed miserably. That was all? Wouldn’t any of their friends fill that criteria? Then why agree to Lance’s proposal at all?
His heart felt like it had dropped to his stomach.

But for once, Mash didn’t need to be prompted to continue. “Now I think you’re a great guy. And you taste great too, even if it’s not creampuffs. I wouldn’t mind dating you.” From the guy who coldly shot down Lemon’s affections on a daily basis, this was practically a love confession.

Combined with the hardly noticeable smile that had once again snuck onto Mash’s face, the words were more than enough to immediately cleanse Lance’s mind of any negative thoughts he had had a minute ago. Instead, his heart was once more jumping rapidly in his chest, this time with undeniable joy. When had he become this easily moved by Mash?

Some of his relief definitely slipped into his voice when he, after releasing a relieved sigh, responded, “So that settles that. It seems we’re officially a couple now.”

Except, it didn’t feel like anything had changed at all. His new relationship status sure didn’t stop Lance from remaining in his place, awkward, unmoved and mute. What now? What did one do again in a relationship? The answer had come to him easily enough before, why did it feel like his head had been wiped blank now?

At first, Mash didn’t look like he would be of much help, either. At least he didn’t seem to be in a hurry. Or he just regarded standing around doing nothing as a good enough pastime. Which Lance highly doubted - after all, he could be using that time to hone his muscles or to bake or devour creampuffs.

Speaking of, “I’m out of creampuffs.”

It took a second longer than usual for the words to register in Lance’s mind, due to his desperate attempt to find any deeper meaning in them. But then again, this was Mash.

Which was why Lance, pushing down his confusion, opted to answer with a hesitant, “Uh, condolences?”

Mash didn’t look impressed. But when did he ever? However, there was something else in his gaze this time, a rare sharpness that Lance took a moment to notice. Huh?

“Lance.” His tone, too, was more pointed than usual.

So there had been more to his statement, after all? That certainly was a first.
But… Mash being out of creampuffs? What more could there possibly be to…
Oh. Oh. God, Lance was so slow today.

After that, at least, he didn’t hesitate to cross the remaining distance between him and Mash to wrap his arms around his new boyfriend’s smaller but much more muscular body. It filled him with warmth even just knowing how familiar the shape of Mash had become in Lance’s embrace. Not long now and he would know all of Mash’s hard edges and strong curves in his sleep. He was entitled to it now, to all of it.

Oh, how Lance would make use of that incredible privilege. He hadn’t thought he would ever get to, yet here he was.
But before that, he had a kiss to give. And after that, so, so many more.

“Has anyone ever told you you’re a total dork, Mash?” he muttered as he leaned in, his gut already prickling in anticipation just from feeling Mash’s warm, sweet breath on his lips.
“Couple times,” Mash replied easily.

His voice gave away nothing but his usual aloofness and yet, when Lance kissed him, he could clearly feel the smile on Mash’s lips press against his own.

-

When Lance returned to his room much later, Dot hadn’t moved much from his spot in front of his assignment. Well, he had always been a master at distracting himself from his coursework.

Now, for instance, the idiot was cackling about something that Lance had a sneaking suspicion concerned him.
Suddenly annoyed despite his otherwise awesome mood, he asked sharply, “What?”

Dot cackled some more, which, in turn, irritated Lance some more.
“You know, Finn told me. I just think it’s hysterical, that you can admit with a completely straight face that you’re a sis-con but this thing with Mash made you blush and stutter like a little girl. Unlike you, though, a little girl would be adorable instead of disturbing, acting like that.”

Of course it would have been something like that.

Lance wasn’t in the mood to spend much more time on this conversation instead of returning to his rather embarrassing but very wholesome stay on cloud nine so he skipped straight to his death glare.
“I’m going to kill you.”

Dot actually shivered in response, which was a very satisfying experience indeed - although far from the most satisfying one that had happened to Lance today.