Work Text:
Keith wasn’t sure how and couldn’t quite remember why he ended up in the arms of a muscular man who was not his boyfriend. The only thought, however, that ran through his head throughout the duration of this lesson was that Lance better fucking love him for this.
They had been lying down side by side on Keith’s bed in their shared dorm while scrolling through their Instagram accounts on their phones and listening to Lance’s music.
Lance looked over to Keith’s cellphone. “Ooo! I like that post. Like it so that I can like it off of you.”
“No? Why don’t you just go on their account and like the post yourself? This doesn’t even fit my Instagram’s aesthetic.” Keith started using Instagram recently because Lance had forced him to. His feed mostly consisted of motorcycles and isolated areas—it wouldn’t do well to like such a stupid post.
“You’ll temporarily break your aesthetic because you love me. I taught you about aesthetics anyways, so it’s the least you can do. Plus, Keith, no one can see your liked posts anyways.”
At this, Keith rolled his eyes and sighed, fully knowing that Lance had on an endearing but annoying grin on and consequently submitting to it by hitting the like button. He was right anyways about both parts. He’d kill Lance if more weird posts started popping up. In return, Lance chuckled under his breath when he saw the post of the green aliens dancing to a remix ofThe X Files’ opening song* on the activities page.
The music in the background panned out and the piano, clapping, and lyrics at the beginning of the next song were clear indicators to Lance that his favorite song was playing.
Voy a reír, voy a bailar
Vivir mi vida la la la la
Upon hearing these lyrics, Lance immediately launched out of bed and started dancing. “Hold UP! That’s my JAM!”
Voy a reír, voy a gozar
Vivir mi vida la la la la
On cue with the singer, Lance shouted an, “Eeeeso!” and then proceeded to dance to one of his favorite contemporary salsa songs, “Vivir Mi Vida” by Marc Anthony.
Keith had never heard such an upbeat song before in another language, nor had he ever seen a dance like the one Lance was doing right before him in their living space, thus his bewilderment and sudden gaping at the way his boyfriend’s hips were swaying. Keith had been speechless while watching Lance dance along to music foreign to his own ears for a few seconds, until suddenly he was being pulled up from his mattress and onto his feet.
“Wha—”
“Dance with me.”
“What the hell. No?”
Lance had taken a hold of both of Keith’s hands and continued swaying his hips, feet moving quickly. He had been filled with an energy Keith had not known Lance could muster so quickly when they had been lazing around in his bed only a minute ago.
“Come on!”
“No. Lance, I can’t dance to this.”
Lance laughed and reassured him, “You can. Just follow my lead. Copy me.” Lance’s dance slowed in an attempt to demonstrate how to dance to salsa, but Keith was at a complete loss.
It was enough that Keith knew little to nothing about Lance’s overall culture—his Spanish was very poor, although Lance was trying to teach him simple words, phrases, swears, and the names of a few dishes—but now he couldn’t even learn a damn dance? Granted, dancing had always been one of his weakest points—it had never been his thing in the first place and he had two left feet, but this was downright embarrassing. In those four minutes while the song had been playing and he and Lance were dancing, he had stepped on Lance’s feet at least seven times and had nearly knocked him over at least three times. Not to mention how flustered Keith became when he caught a glimpse of himself dancing with Lance from his closet mirror across the room and thought he looked ridiculous compared to Lance’s skilled dancing.
Once the song had ended, Lance turned off the speakers and grabbed a bottle of water and tossed it over to Keith who had been sweating streams and wiping some from his forehead.
Keith caught the bottle successfully and took a large gulp of water. Out of breath, he turned to Lance. “Jesus . How the hell did you learn to dance like that?”
Lance hummed in thought. “Salsa is really popular in my culture and my parents taught me the dance when I was younger, and a few other dances.” He shrugged as though it weren’t a big deal; it was a big deal.
Keith knew exactly how much Lance adored his Cuban culture and at this time he felt rather awful and incompetent for not being able to understand or fully grasp aspects of the culture—two feelings he did not handle well. Now, not only was he terrible at speaking Spanish, but he can’t even dance to salsa. Great. He felt tense, frustrated. His jaw tightened and his fists clenched.
Lance’s right hand rested on Keith’s cheek, recognizing Keith’s look of frustration, and he cocked his head to the side with a low chuckle. “It’s okay, babe. Don’t feel bad.”
At this, Keith averted Lance’s gaze. He felt silly for letting the fact that he’s quite terrible at dancing salsa affect him as much as it had, but if salsa was something Lance enjoyed and was good at, then Keith figured he had to at least demonstrate competence in some aspect when it came to Lance’s culture. Something had to be done.
Keith looked up at the flyer on the student union bulletin board.
“Ballroom Dance Club—practices from 7:00 – 8:30PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays, Fitness Facility Room 201,” he muttered to himself. “Huh, might be just what I need.”
“Hey Keith!” Lance called, setting down his tray of food. “I found a table!”
Keith nodded and made a mental note of the flyer. He’d be there at 7PM sharp.
… And now here he was, awkwardly in the arms of this very fit, muscular man.
“1, 2, 3…5, 6, 7. 1, 2, 3… 5, 6, 7…”
Keith tried to concentrate on Shiro’s counts, following his lead and trying not to pay attention to how warm his hands were. This basic stuff wasn’t so bad. Step back 2, 3… Forward, 6, 7. Back, 2, 3… Forward, 6, 7.
“Now get ready…. To turn…” Shiro said.
Oh crap. Why did he volunteer to help Shiro demonstrate?
Keith stuck his left foot out in front of him and tried to put his right foot behind him with his right toe pointing almost directly backwards so he could pivot on it. But after Keith turned, he ended up to the left of where he started, lost contact with Shiro’s hand, and was so flustered that he almost missed the final three 5, 6, 7 steps.
“Let’s try that again,” Shiro said, demonstrating as he spoke. “Remember, when you put your right foot back on two, you can also pivot your left foot like this to help with the turn so you get back to neutral position—feet side by side, in a normal, relaxed stance—on three.”
Keith nodded.
“Ok.” Shiro said. “Everyone got that?”
The other students in the studio nodded.
“All right, let’s all do this together.” Shiro held Keith’s right hand again and put his left hand on Keith’s back. Keith gulped.
“1, 2, 3…5, 6, 7. 1, 2, 3… 5, 6, 7. And turn…”
This time, Keith followed Shiro’s tip and turned his left foot along with his right. It wasn’t perfect—he still ended up a little bit to the left, forcing Shiro to move to the side along with him—but he managed to turn without breaking hand contact. Success. No matter how small, every victory counted towards learning Lance’s favorite dance.
After a couple minutes of dancing, Shiro stopped the music.
“Great job everyone!” Shiro beamed proudly. “And thank you for helping me demonstrate,” Shiro smiled at Keith. Keith gave him a weak smile in return and returned to the group of students.
“Ok…” Shiro looked at his watch. “Allura should be getting here any minute now…”
As if on cue, the studio doors opened suddenly, and a tall woman in workout clothing with an overstuffed backpack walked quickly through them.
“Whew!” she wiped sweat off her forehead and set her bag down next to the others by the door. She grabbed a hair tie off of her wrist and tied up her platinum blonde hair, which glowed like starlight against her dark skin. “Sorry I’m late; got held up in lab.”
“It’s ok,” Shiro assured her. “Work comes first.”
“I know, but you know how I hate missing dance,” Allura said. Her eyes caught Keith’s. “Hey! My name’s Allura.”
Keith shook her outstretched hand. “Keith.”
“How did you hear about us?”
Keith introduced himself to Allura like he did earlier to the rest of the club and explained how he got interested in salsa from watching his friend dance.
“Cool!” Allura said excitedly. “Like Shiro’s probably told you, new people are always welcome, and we don’t mind teaching you salsa basics. Especially since we just started, and everyone can use a refresher anyway.”
Keith joined the rest of the students again while Shiro and Allura got ready to demonstrate the next part of the salsa lesson. Keith scanned the group for a potential partner and found a lone girl with blonde pigtails and purple lipstick. She shifted to the side a bit to make room for Keith next to her.
“Nyma,” she said. Keith gave a nod and shook her hand.
“Hey!” Keith felt a large clap on his back and looked up to see Hunk and Pidge.
“Hey!” Keith said back. “I didn’t know you guys were into ballroom dance?”
“Same,” Pidge raised an eyebrow and smirked. “Where’s Lance?”
“I’m trying to learn salsa ‘cuz it’s something he grew up with. I want to dance with him.”
“Awwwww,” Hunk enveloped Keith into a big bear hug. “That’s so sweet!”
Keith squired out of Hunk’s grip.
“Does Lance know?” Pidge asked.
“No,” Keith said. “I want it to be a secret so I can surprise him by dancing to his favorite song.”
“AWWWWWW” Hunk cried and hugged Keith again.
Pidge batted at Hunk to give Keith a chance to breathe. “We’ll keep it secret, don’t worry.”
After the night’s lesson was over, Keith stayed behind to talk with Shiro and Allura.
“Hey,” Keith asked. “So… I’m interested in joining your club in general, but I also want to learn how to dance to a song that my boyfriend likes.” Keith face flushed.
“That’s so sweet!” Allura gushed.
Shiro grinned. “Which song?”
“Um,” Keith shuffled a bit. “That song that goes—uh. ‘Voy ah viv-eer. Voy ah bye-larr.’ Or something.”
Shiro and Allura looked at each other, recognizing precisely which song Keith was referring to.
“That sounds like Vivir Mi Vida’ by Marc Anthony!” Allura said excitedly.
“That’s a great song,” Shiro agreed, “But it involves a lot of steps that you haven’t learned yet. If you want, Allura and I can maybe meet with you between club meetings?” Shiro looked at Allura for confirmation.
“Um, let’s see.” Allura opened her bag and dug through it. “Hold on… K.”
She brought out a student planner and flipped to a page. “Well… Hmm… I actually have a lot of close deadlines coming up for my Master’s thesis.” Allura looked at Keith apologetically and then turned to Shiro, who was looking at the calendar on his phone. “Shiro, are you available?”
Shiro raised an eyebrow at his phone. “Well… I’m also going to be a bit busy because there’s a research conference that I’m going to present my senior thesis at, but I have some time here and there on the evenings.” He looked at Keith. “I’m free tomorrow night from 8:00 – 9:00. Are you free then? I can show you some more basic choreography, and we can go from there.”
Keith nodded. “Yeah, sounds good.”
“Great!”said Shiro. Allura smiled. “Your boyfriend’s going to be so happy. I’m glad we can help!”
“Baaaabyy,” Lance sang as he entered the dorm and closed the door behind him. He had experienced a long, hard day of back to back classes—Thursdays were always his busiest day of the week and he barely had time to see Keith throughout the day, save for their thermodynamics class in the afternoon. Right now, all he wanted was to kick back, relax, and spend quality time with his boyfriend, but his thermodynamics homework awaited. As usual, he figured he would just do his homework with Keith. Besides, any time with Keith was well spent.
He searched around the room for his favorite mullet boy, but to no avail. That was when he remembered Keith telling him earlier that he had plans to meet up with Hunk and Pidge for a thermo study group. “Uuugh, mi cielooo**,” he whined as he plopped onto his mattress and hugged his blue robot lion plushie that Keith had helped him win at the state fair. He didn’t want to do his homework alone, but he also didn’t feel like getting up from bed, so he decided on calling Keith for help; he missed him anyway.
Lance pulled out his cellphone from his pocket and dialed Keith’s number. A few rings, and then the operator announced that his call had been forwarded to an automated voice messaging system. Keith wasn’t always fond of phone conversations, so texting him was probably the best option. Lance opened his chat with Keith and typed up a new text:
“I need youuuuu 
”
Minutes had passed and he received no response and was beginning to grow impatient. He groaned and took out his homework and placed it on his bed as he dialed Hunk who had picked up the phone after the third ring.
“Yee-ellow?”
“Hunk! Help! I’m getting mauled by a beast!” Lance shouted on his end.
His theatrics never ceased to surprise Hunk. Last time he spoke to Lance over the phone, Lance was getting kidnapped by an evil fairy and Hunk raced over to Lance and Keith’s dorm to rescue his friend only to discover that Lance had only run out of toilet paper while in the bathroom and needed someone to pass him a new roll. “Wait, dude, are you serious? I’m heading over right now !” There was the sound of papers rustling and being collected quickly on Hunk’s end.
Lance sighed while rolling his eyes, “No, Hunk. I’m so bored.” He looked down at his homework and bit his pen’s cap in thought. “I don’t get any of this thermo homework and Keith isn’t answering his phone. Can you put him on?”
“Huh? Keith isn’t here with me and Pidge though, he left to mee—OW! What was that for!?” Hunk shouted.
There was a slapping sound and Pidge’s voice could be heard in the background, but Lance could not make out exactly what she had been saying; though he could confirm that she said something about Hunk being an idiot.
Lance’s eyes narrowed. “Keith told me that he would be in a study group with you and Pidge. Did he leave?”
Hunk scrambled to come up with a quick excuse. “Uh, yeah. He was here but said he needed to go to the store.”
“The store,” Lance repeated, not fully believing him.
“Yeah, CVS. For, uh, more toothpaste?”
Lance deadpanned. “We have toothpaste.”
“Oh! Well, it must have been f-floss then. Floss, yeah.”
Lance was too skeptical to let this go. “But—”
He was interrupted by Hunk who had begun making static noises. “We’re—KUH—up—KUH—can’t hear you. KUH—gotta go. Bye!” The line ended.
Lance sighed and turned back to his homework, still puzzled. Google would be his friend for this homework assignment, he guessed.
“Lance, I really hate you for ever making me start watching this damn show, but I hate Dan sooo much more. God .” Keith reached over and dropped his pizza crust into the pizza box, wiping his mouth and fingers with a napkin. He and Lance had been marathoning Gossip Girl on Netflix for the past week whenever they both had the chance. “Why is Serena even with him? Fuck, I hate him.”
Lance reached over the box and picked up Keith’s unfinished crust and took a large bite, mouth full. “I know. He’s such an ass! Serena deserves so much better.”
“Wait,” Keith stood from the floor and dusted off the pizza crumbs, “don’t start the next episode yet. I gotta use the bathroom.” He walked over to the bathroom and closed the door behind him.
“K.” Lance responded. He grabbed his laptop, opened up Tumblr, and began writing a text post to update his followers about his Gossip Girl rewatch with his boyfriend when Keith’s phone vibrated, indicating that he received a notification. He and Keith usually text Hunk and Pidge throughout the day, so he figured it was probably a text from one of them. He set his laptop aside and picked up Keith’s phone from the floor and disconnected it from its charger in order to properly hold it. To his surprise, the text was not from Hunk, nor from Pidge. It had been from a person named Shiro who had texted: “Hey Keith. Are we still on for tomorrow at 8:30pm as usual?”
Odd. Lance knew no one named Shiro, and he and Keith shared the same circle of friends. Keith would never voluntarily hang out with anyone who wasn’t a close friend like Hunk, Pidge, or himself, so whoever this Shiro guy was must have been worth Keith’s time. But why had he never heard of anyone named Shiro until now? Also, what was up with the “as usual” part of the text? Around 8 o’clock on some nights and at odd times during other ones, Keith was usually out doing something. Could he have been hanging out with this Shiro guy all of those times? Given the timing, it would have made sense. But why didn’t Keith just tell him he was hanging out with someone? He suddenly thought back to the time when Keith had said he was going to a thermodynamics study group with Pidge and Hunk from 7pm to 9pm, and then supposedly went to CVS to get some toothpaste, or was it floss? He hadn’t come home with either oral cleanser, but Lance tried not to make a big deal out of it, no matter how skeptical he had been. If something bad was going on that Lance should know of, either Pidge, Hunk, or both would let him know. He was not usually distrusting of Keith and he didn’t want this to be his first time in doing so, but he had seen enough telenovelas to know what this meant. His breathing had become shallow and labored as he began to sweat at the thought that Keith could have been—no. No, he would never. Lance and Keith were not like that; they never hid anything of importance from one another and had a healthy relationship. Sure, prior to becoming boyfriends, they were competitive and were always at each other’s necks and argued over trivialities, but things had changed for the better between them. They were a good couple, good friends, and were good for each other. But still, what if…
“Lance? Are you okay?” Keith had returned from the bathroom and he rested his hand on Lance’s shoulder as he kneeled next to him. Lance looked sweaty and sickly which Keith found alarming considering that normally Lance often masked his feelings when something was wrong. He had learned to open up to Keith, though, so Keith waited patiently for Lance to tell him what was up—that is, if he was comfortable with telling him anything at all.
Lance opened his mouth to speak, but the words caught in his throat. His thoughts were clouded and Instead, he lifted Keith’s cell phone, notification open, and showed it to him, revealing that he had seen the message.
Keith’s eyes glanced at the glaring notification, then at Lance, then back at the notification, then once again at Lance. Playing dumb might be his best bet. “What is it?”
Lance exhaled shakily as he asked Keith, “Who?” Keith only blinked in silence. “Who is Shiro and...and why have you been meeting him?” Lance bit his lip and his eyebrows furrowed in frustration as he brought his knees to his chest. With a shaky inhale, he continued, “You’ve been going out a lot lately and have been vague about where you’re going. You lied to me a few weeks ago when you said you were meeting up with Pidge and Hunk to study. Why? I-I don’t want to accuse you of anything, but this has been bothering me for the longest time and I can’t take it anymore. Please, Keith. Tell me.” Telling Keith that he had been suspicious of him was hard for Lance. He felt horrible for even accusing Keith of doing anything awful, but he was scared. No matter how haughty he was, he was afraid of being hurt, especially from someone he loved so dearly.
Keith was silent and couldn’t bear looking into Lance’s pleading eyes and pained expression, but felt an intense desire to hold Lance, so he did. He cupped his hands around Lance’s face, thumbs stroking his cheeks. He had no idea that Lance had been feeling this way or that he had been catching onto him. Lance was smart and sharp-witted, often catching onto things quicker than others. Keith should have thought things through better. He absolutely dreaded having to tell the truth in the first place; the truth was embarrassing, but it had to be said in order to alleviate his boyfriend’s anxiety—which Keith himself had inflicted—and finally come clean. The jig was up. “He’s my…dance instructor.”
After a few seconds of silence, Lance’s expression fell into a neutral, unreadable one. “What?”
Keith sighed and shifted from his position kneeling in front of to a sitting position on the floor, still facing Lance. “I’ve been...seeing Shiro, the president of the Ballroom Dance Club, to improve my...salsa dancing.” Lance looked at Keith in puzzlement, so Keith clarified. “I just felt useless? I’m absolute shit at Spanish and don’t know much about your culture and was frustrated that I couldn’t dance well to your favorite song. I—I just,” he felt his cheeks flush as he spoke, “I wanted to learn for you so that I could surprise you and show you how my salsa dancing has changed.” The rest had come out lower than expected, embarrassment taking over.
“Shiro told me about how the song is about having a good time and enjoying life to its fullest, no matter the obstacle. So I wanted to learn how to dance to your—” he was terrible at pronouncing the song title, “your jam. But I had to learn basic moves first to songs I’d never heard. So I started taking extra lessons because I’m fucking awful. I didn’t know dancing would be so hard or that these lessons would take more than a week or two for me to actually learn even the most basic steps! It’s laughable how much I stink,” everything came out quickly and Keith hardly gave himself time to breathe.
“But anyways, Lance,” he removed his cell phone from Lance’s hand, set it aside, and took both of his hands in his own. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel like this. I could see why you would think something bad was happening. Which, believe me, I would never—” He couldn’t finish. The mere thought of disloyalty to Lance made Keith sick. He loved Lance far too much—even though at times Lance was annoying and egotistical—to even think of being with anyone else. His boyfriend was hurting because of him. He felt like such an ass.
Lance wasn’t sure if it was his own hands shaking or if it was Keith’s—probably both. The two of them were a mess and Lance was processing what Keith was confessing. “So, Pidge and Hunk?”
“They were covering for me. They knew about the lessons.”
Lance’s anxiety flushed away at the realization that his idiot, hot-tempered boyfriend was actually trying to do something sweet and surprise him. He felt like a fool for being paranoid. He would have to cut down on the amount of telenovelas he watches; they were plaguing his mind. Lance felt his face heat up at the thought of Keith dancing to salsa. God, his boyfriend was so damn cute. He leaned over and kissed Keith on his right cheek and rested his forehead against his ear.
“Mmkay.”
“Y-you’re okay? Are we cool?”
“Yeah.” He laughed and parted from Keith to side-eye him. “And hey, you’re not total shit at Spanish and I don’t mind that your dancing freakin’ sucks.” He teased, earning a grumble from Keith. “But I do appreciate the effort and feel happy that you care so much.”
Keith sighed in relief and shifted so that his back was against the wall while pulling Lance between his legs and bringing him into his arms. “Good. Rude, but good.”
Lance tilted his head back so that he could look up at Keith. “You’re stupid, you know that? And...I'm sorry for accusing you.”
Keith scoffed at Lance and then was silent for a few moments. He remembered a word Lance had said to him days ago and decided this was the perfect moment to put it to practice. “Bés…” He mulled the word over carefully in order not to mispronounce it.“Bésame***.”
Lance’s heart began to race. Dumbfounded, he was at a loss for words. The only thing he could think of was fulfilling Keith’s request to kiss him and yearned to show him as much affection as he possibly could. Lance tackled him onto their carpeted floor and hovered over him, hands on either side of Keith, and proceeded to kiss his forehead, his nose, his eyes, his cheeks, until every inch of his face was covered in proof of Lance’s love and forgiveness. He then kissed his lips as slowly and as tenderly as he could possibly muster before Keith tangled his fingers through Lance’s hair, deepening the kiss and kissing back with more ferocity while eliciting a sigh from Lance in the process.
“Te amo****,” Lance whispered as they parted.
“Me too,” Keith said, which only resulted in Lance sucking his teeth and a smack to Keith’s arm. He laughed, “I mean, I love you too.”
“You’re doing great, Keith!” Lance laughed, guiding Keith on the dance floor and putting his left hand around his waist to help lead him into the next move.
Keith squeezed Lance’s hand and happily grooved along with the bongos and trumpets. After their conversation, Lance joined the ballroom dance club along with Keith and had been going to practices with him for the last couple of weeks. Lance had said he just wanted to check out the scene, but Keith was sure his boyfriend just wanted to make fun of his dancing. It felt great to learn new dance moves with his Lance, and—best of all—Shiro and Allura were rewarding everyone for learning basic steps and choreography combos by hosting a freeform salsa session to Vivir Mi Vida!
“Eeeeso!” Shiro and Lance called out in unison with the singer and turned Allura and Keith around gracefully.
Pidge and Hunk were dancing near Lance and Keith and were having fun with the basic salsa step pattern. Keith saw Pidge tug on Hunk’s shoulder and lean in to tell him something.
“Another turn!” Lance said excitedly. Keith pressed his right hand against Lance’s and executed a very nice turn—back around facing forward on count 3, ready to go into the 5, 6, 7 pattern.
“Nice!” Lance smiled. “You look a lot more comfortable doing this than you did when I took you dancing last month.”
“Wheeeeeeeee!” Pidge yelled as Hunk and she starting doing sequential turns across the entire dance studio. Professor Coran, the club’s faculty advisor, joined in on the fun and started salsa stepping and grooving towards them from the other side.
Lance was glowing, so Keith knew he had made the right choice in taking these dance lessons. The weeks he had spent in sweat and frustration from practicing were definitely worth it. He twirled Lance again, and instead of Lance taking his hand and placing his other hand around Keith’s waist, he dabbed. He fucking dabbed.
Keith’s mouth gaped a bit in a short gasp. “Did you just dab ?” He was not an expert at salsa dancing, but he was sure that was not a part of the routine.
“Alright! We’re dabbing now?” Pidge shouted as she and Hunk neared Keith and Lance to join in on Lance’s dabbing.
Keith pressed his fingers to his temples and shook his head. “Un-fucking-believable.”
Lance laughed and dabbed continuously while Pidge, Hunk, and, surprisingly, Shiro, Allura, and Coran dabbed along with him—it’s what the kids did nowadays. There was only one thing left to do.
Keith dabbed.