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Lance and Keith have been dating for a while now and their relationship has grown steadily into something their friends describe as ‘overly-sweet and gross’ (Pidge’s words). Sure, they still banter like idiots over stupid things like their strange tastes in music (“Keith, stop listening to Kanye West at seven in the morning, now’s not the time!”) and what food to make for dinner (“No, Lance, we can’t have pot noodles for dinner every night!”) and they always challenge each other to do dumb things (“Bet you I can chug all this barbeque sauce in one minute!” “Lance, no… fine, but I get twenty bucks if you can’t do it.”) but now they do couple-y things too. Like kissing – Lance likes that – and cuddling and sharing a bed (even if both of their beds are single beds and it ends up getting too hot during the night). But that’s just how they are and if they’re happy and they love each other, then it shouldn’t be a problem, right?
One night, Lance wakes up at around two in the morning to get some water from the kitchen. Keith had said he’d be home late because he went to visit Shiro after class, so Lance didn’t wait for him because he was just too tired from studying all day. The couple share an apartment together to make rent cheaper while they’re still in college and sometimes, they wait for each other to come home before they go to sleep. Lance trudges languidly through their apartment towards the kitchen. A strange noise coming from the living room causes him to falter in his steps. It sounds like a voice.
Holy shit, there’s a murderer in the apartment, this is it, this is how I die, Lance immediately thinks of the worst as he tip toes to the living room, the socks he fell asleep in silencing his footsteps. Lance is prepared to use those two months of martial arts practise he got from Keith for this very moment (even though he was pretty bad at it).
“¡Vamonos!” A little girl’s voice suddenly exclaims in Spanish and Lance nearly dies. His socks slip on the smooth, wooden floor and he bangs his knee into the wall, letting out a very unmanly squeal as he falls. Holy shit, there’s a Spanish ninja child in my house, I don’t have the skills to take them down, Lance screams internally, preparing to be sliced with a shuriken and die on the floor and –
“Lance?” A very familiar voice pipes up over the chatter of the Spanish child. It’s Keith. Lance looks up to find no one but Keith in the living room, sitting on the couch. He jumps off the old couch and rushes over to Lance’s side, nothing but concern and confusion in his eyes. “Are you okay?”
Keith helps him stand, but Lance is desperately trying to look over his boyfriend’s shoulder to see who the hell is screaming in Spanish so late in the night. On the TV, he sees a familiar cartoon girl smiling down at a monkey. It takes a moment for Lance to comprehend what’s going on.
“Lance, hey, are you really okay?” Keith asks again, taking note of how the other is dazedly looking over his shoulder.
“Keith, why are you watching Dora the Explorer at two in the morning?”
Keith suddenly freezes when he remembers what’s on the TV behind him. His eyes widen and his cheeks burst into colour, visible even through the dim light of the TV in the background.
“I-I was just… I was doing…” Keith begins to stutter, voice growing quieter and quieter until he’s mumbling incoherently under his breath. Lance puts his hands on his boyfriend’s shoulders reassuringly, giving him a questioning look. Keith looks at him and sighs, defeated that he can’t make up a good excuse as to why he’s watching a children’s cartoon at two in the morning.
“Hey, it’s okay – you don’t need to get upset just for watching Dora the Explorer.” Lance says, rubbing up and down his arms. “Although, I do have questions, dude.”
Keith swallows audibly and nods. “Okay, I’ll tell you.”
“Alright, but let’s go to bed, I’m too tired to stand.”
Lance turns off the TV and tugs Keith to his bedroom. He pulls Keith into his tiny single bed and they squish together, arms wrapping around each other and legs tangling together almost automatically. Lance feels warm and he knows he’ll be waking up in the middle of the night again to throw the sheets off of them because it’ll be too hot and later, he’ll probably wake up at seven in the morning to see Keith toppling onto the floor again because ‘it’s too hot for this, Lance, why do we think it’s a good idea to do this in the summer’ but in the moment, it’s just him and Keith together, forgetting about the world around them and relishing in each other’s warmth.
“I want to learn Spanish.” Keith confesses, burying his head in the crook of Lance’s neck to hide his blush.
“So you decided to watch Dora the Explorer at two in the morning?” Lance can’t help himself from asking, earning a light smack on his back from Keith. He chuckles to himself, feeling the glare Keith is throwing at him rather than seeing it. “Okay, okay, sorry. But, why do you want to learn Spanish?”
“B-because…” Keith starts to get nervous again, but he continues his explanation. “I want to feel… closer to you, and your family. I want to know more about your culture because I feel like I’ll know you better too and learn all those customs and stuff you do that I have no clue about, and the food you love and how to make it. And I really want to be able to talk to your relatives, especially your grandmother, without you having to be there to translate everything for me… I just, uh… I just want to know every side of you, because… you’re important to me and… stuff.”
Lance’s poor heart hammers wildly in his chest. His eyes start to sting from joyful tears and a big, dumb grin appears on his face. He wraps his arms tightly around Keith, bringing him so close that his nose is pressed against Lance’s shoulder. There aren’t enough words in any language that are able to describe how happy Lance feels right now, at 2am on a rainy night in September. He seriously can’t describe how much he loves Keith, with his dumb mullet-hair and his smart-ass comments and his big smiles and those sneaky kisses he gives Lance as they leave classes.
“Oh my god, you have no idea how cute you are right now, Keith.” Lance mumbles excitedly into his hair, which smells like the rain and the mint shampoo that Lance bought impulsively last week which they have to finish because it’d be a waste to throw it away. “God, you’re so amazing.”
Keith buries his face deeper into Lance’s neck, embarrassed but happy from the praise, mumbling, “it’s not that amazing, honestly, I just want to learn something that’s important to you.”
“Keith, stop, seriously, my heart can’t handle this.” Lance says dramatically, pleased to hear a light chuckle and a ‘shut up, idiot’ from his boyfriend. “But, hey, if you really want to learn Spanish, I could help you, y’know?”
Keith raises his head to look up at Lance. They’re only inches apart and Lance is so tempted to lean down and kiss him.
He suddenly remembers the first time they kissed. The butterflies in his stomach just wouldn’t stop and his face was as red as that stupid jacket Keith always wears and his heart was beating so loudly he was certain that Keith could hear it. But Keith wasn’t any different. His cheeks and his nose were tinted pink, his violet eyes looking intensely at anything but Lance because he knew what they were about to do and he was too nervous to look him in the eye. Then, Lance had lost patience and leaned in much too quickly. Their noses bumped together and their teeth clashed unpleasantly, but then their lips softly pressed against one another and Lance’s whole world seemed to light up when Keith kissed him back. The butterflies were replaced with a warm, happy feeling that spread all over his body and Lance was just so happy, he felt like he could do anything.
“Are you sure you’d want to do that?” Keith asks uncertainly.
“Whenever we’re both free, of course.” Lance says, giving into his desire and giving Keith a chaste kiss on the corner of his mouth. “I’m pretty sure I’m at least a little better as a teacher than our good friend Dora.”
Keith laughs, punching Lance lightly on his shoulder. Lance pouts, acting hurt, and Keith kisses him lightly.
“Alright, now let’s sleep because I have an exam tomorrow and I seriously don’t want to fall asleep in class again.” Keith says, recalling the time he spent all night studying only to fall asleep in class during the test (Hunk had thrown rolled up pieces of paper at Keith’s face to wake him up – surprisingly, nobody noticed that).
Lance starts teaching Keith every evening after they finish any essays or assignments for class and eat dinner (“Lance, I told you, we can’t have pot noodles every night!”). They go to Keith’s room and sit at his desk and Lance starts with basic stuff like greetings, introductions and asking questions, slowly getting harder and harder as they continue their lessons. Lance’s heart fills with warmth when he sees how invested Keith is in this, how dedicated he is to learning Lance’s first language.
Keith would borrow various books from the library and even buy some online. He would get apps on his phone to help him with vocabulary and grammar and he isn’t afraid to ask Lance any questions. Surprisingly, Lance is a pretty good teacher and he finds that he enjoys teaching Keith. Even when Lance isn’t teaching him, Keith is still learning and studying. He’d sit in his room after Lance leaves for bed and continue to study for another hour or two.
Of course, learning a language isn’t easy. Sometimes, Keith’s pronunciation is a little off and it’s hard for him to understand the different dialects. Regardless, Keith presses on. He stays up late until he can understand all the dialects and pronounce all the words he’s learned. His accent is a little strange, but it’s understandable (and Lance finds it somewhat cute). Lance just couldn’t be more proud of his boyfriend.
Months pass, and it’s almost April. Lance and Keith go to visit Lance’s family during a long weekend. Lance’s sister had just returned from a home-stay in France after six months and they wanted to celebrate her return (they also used her returning as an excuse to have a huge family get-together).
Keith is jittery with excitement and nerves, eager to speak to someone other than Lance in Spanish but also nervous because he doesn’t want to mess up. Over these past few months, Keith has learned a great deal of the language very quickly and he’s able to have simple conversations with Lance easily. But, Lance can feel Keith’s nerves from a mile away and he squeezes his boyfriend’s hand to reassure him. It helps a little, Keith stops fidgeting in his seat and he looks out the car window at the passing scenery of fields growing wheat and corn.
Lance’s family live on the outskirts of a town in a large farmhouse that they bought when they moved from Cuba, almost a three hour drive from Lance and Keith’s college. It has a huge field in the back that’s filled with all sorts of fruit and vegetables in the summer and apple and cherry trees in the front garden. Sometimes, the fruits fall on the roof of the cars parked in the front and the kids would pick and wash them so they could eat them later. Lance smiles, a wave of nostalgia settles in his chest as they park their car in the driveway, remembering all the fond memories he shared with his family in the house that he grew up in.
Everyone immediately rushes out of the house to greet Lance and his boyfriend. The children, Lance’s youngest siblings and cousins are squealing with excitement, jumping onto his legs and blabbering in Spanish about how much they missed him. They rush over to Keith as well, hugging his legs and immediately asking him to play with them again. The last time he visited, the kids had taken quite a liking to Keith and they begged him to play with them, which he did very hesitantly, but after a while, he got really into it and they all played with him until they had to go to bed.
Then, Lance’s older siblings and cousins rush over, hugging him tightly and talking in Spanish again. They greet Keith politely, jokingly asking how he can live in the same house with Lance without wanting to commit murder. Keith only laughs at the question, replying that he’s thought about it numerous times over the years.
Lastly, Lance’s mother and father come out, hugging their son tightly, muttering about how much they’ve missed him these past few months. They look behind Lance at Keith. He feels very out of place in such a warm, loving place. He doesn’t think he belongs here at all.
But then, Lance’s mother comes over and hugs him so tightly he can’t breathe. Her tight embrace reminds him of Lance’s hugs, suffocating but full of love and warmth and it has Keith hugging her back immediately. He puts on a shy smile and shakes Lance’s father’s hand in greeting.
“Keith, it is very nice to have you with us again.” Lance’s mother says, her Spanish accent strong as she speaks. Behind her, Keith gets distracted by Lance’s face and wild hand gestures, indicating for him to show off his language skills and speak some Spanish. Keith blushes a little and looks down at his hands shyly, playing with the fraying hem of his old jacket.
“I-it’s good to see you…” Keith says quietly in Spanish, looking up at Lance’s mother again. Keith tries not to glare at Lance, who’s behind his mother giving him two thumbs up and a big, goofy smile. Lance’s mother looks at him in surprise. A wide smile appears on her lips and she takes a hold of Keith’s hands excitedly.
“Are you learning Spanish?” She asks in her native language, her bright blue eyes sparkling with excitement. Her eyes are the same colour as Lance’s and they remind Keith of all those times that Lance gets excited over miniscule things, like a new anime coming out, or when Keith gives in and buys Lance something he wants from the supermarket.
“Y-yes.” Keith replies in Spanish, jumping at her excited squeal.
“Oh, you are just too precious!” She exclaims, enveloping Keith in another bone-crushing hug. “Please, come inside, it’s quite cold today – goodness, it’s April and yet it’s still so cold! The weather these days is crazy!”
Lance joins Keith’s side again, smiling at him so lovingly that Keith has to look away, a blush blooming on his cheeks. He still takes a hold of Lance’s hand as they walk into the house behind his parents. It’s crowded and lively with chatter. Something is cooking in the kitchen, the delicious smell of different foods immediately making their mouths water.
They’re ushered into the living room where the majority of the family are settled. The pair exchange more hugs and kisses with different relatives and Lance introduces some of his cousins to Keith and there’s so many names and so many people that Keith feels a little overwhelmed. They strike up a conversation with Lance’s cousin, who’s also around their age and in college, and her girlfriend. The two of them also live together and they’ve been dating since their freshman year of high school, but they’ve only come out to their families recently.
Thankfully, everyone in Lance’s family is extremely accepting of same-sex couples (“I just don’t understand what’s so wrong about loving someone of the same gender.” Lance’s grandmother had said when Lance came out to her as bisexual all those years ago, “getting angry about seeing two people of the same gender together is ridiculous.”). Keith was surprised by how casual everyone was when Lance introduced Keith as his boyfriend, but at the same time, he was extremely touched by their nonchalance about same-sex couples.
Eventually, dinner is prepared and Lance and Keith go to sit at the table in the kitchen. However, there just isn’t enough space for everyone to sit around the table. People still crowd inside, children are sat on the counters and some people even sit on the floor until everyone is squeezed into the kitchen, talking to relatives beside them or shouting at others across the room.
Keith and Lance are lucky enough to get two seats beside each other and Lance secretly holds onto Keith’s hand under the table (Keith isn’t going to say that he isn’t so subtle about it when he sees how Lance’s cousins smile at them or how his parents share knowing glances with each other). They eat while talking to different family members – Lance with his younger sisters and Keith with Lance’s grandmother, who can’t speak a word of English.
The elderly woman has a gentle, loving smile on her face the whole time. She looks so proud of Keith as she listens to him stutter and speak in Spanish, looking at him like he’s her own grandson. Her expression makes his chest feel warm and after a while, he almost feels like he’s a part of the family – a part of Lance’s world that he was never understand before.
“You must love our Lance a lot.” Lance’s grandmother comments with a chuckle. “You’re even learning his first language.”
Keith blushes at the comment, even if it’s completely true. “Y-yes, I-I do – love him, that is…”
Lance’s grandmother smiles at him happily. “That’s good. Because I’m certain that he loves you just as much to do the same for you. He’s a lot like my husband, you know…”
Keith smiles as he listens to her story about her late-husband and how they fell in love, trying his best to understand every small detail in her story. She purposely speaks a little slower so Keith could understand and, at first, he felt embarrassed about it, now he slowly forgot about it as he got invested in the story of the time her late-husband fell out of his boat trying to woo her. Meanwhile, Lance has disappeared into the living room to play with the children and even if he’s not by Keith’s side, he doesn’t feel nervous or afraid anymore.
For the majority of the evening, he talks to Lance’s grandmother, telling her about how Lance is doing in college and some of the antics he gets up to with their friends. He stutters through some words and sometimes he doesn’t know something in Spanish but Lance’s grandmother is very patient and even tries to help him.
Later, Keith is dragged into the living room by Lance’s younger siblings and he plays with them until it’s late and they’re all starting to doze off on the couch. They beg Keith to take them to bed and Keith just can’t say no to their big, puppy eyes and little pouts. He takes them upstairs with Lance’s father while Lance and his mother say goodbye to their relatives as they prepare to go home.
The house is much calmer now. The TV in the living room is playing a cheesy, Spanish telenovela that Lance’s sister’s love and it provides background noise. Lance and his mother sit in the living room with a cup of lukewarm tea that Lance’s grandmother had made earlier, talking to each other while Keith and Lance’s father put the children to sleep.
“You know, it’s really admirable of Keith to learn Spanish.” Lance’s mother comments out of the blue. Lance blushes and chuckles nervously. “It makes me very happy to see that he is willing to learn something that’s so important to you.”
“You’re right, but he’s just that kind of person.” Lance says, trying to sound casual about it, even though his stomach is doing somersaults.
“He really loves you, you know.” His mother says, looking at her son over her teacup. “He’s learning a language just for you, so that he could feel closer to you.”
“I mean, I wouldn’t go that far…”
“Oh, don’t be silly, just one look at the boy is enough to see how much he loves you.” Lance’s mother swats at his arm. “You better not lose him, Lance. It’s rare to find someone who could love a person as much as Keith loves you. Hold onto him tightly, darling.”
Lance realises; his mother is right. Keith loves him (no matter how embarrassed he gets when he says it). Keith is willing to do so much for Lance and Lance, without a doubt, would do anything for Keith too. Lance realises he couldn’t be luckier than he is right now, together with Keith and his family. He really doesn’t want to let him go.
It’s almost 11pm when the couple are finally alone together. They’re sleeping in Lance’s old room which, thankfully, has a double bed they can share. Keith is sitting on the bed, texting Shiro goodnight after telling him how his day went with Lance’s family. Lance has just come out of the bathroom and he’s towel-drying his hair in front of the mirror.
“Y’know, my family are really happy to hear that you’re learning Spanish.” Lance says nonchalantly. Keith puts down his phone and looks up at his boyfriend. “Also, it makes it seem like you’re so smitten with me that you want to know how to speak my language.”
“Shut up.” Keith retorts, but it lacks any harsh bite to it. Under his breath, he mutters, “s-so what if I’m ‘smitten’ with you?”
Unfortunately for Keith, Lance hears it and makes high-pitched cooing sounds. “Aww, Keith’s in love with me, that’s so cute!”
“Lance, we’re dating, of course I’m in love with you.” Keith deadpans, but there’s a smile tugging at his lips.
Lance sets the towel onto the chair by his old desk and saunters over to Keith, wrapping his arms around his neck and bending down to kiss him. Their lips meet and Keith sighs into the kiss, finally getting a chance to be overly-affectionate with his boyfriend without anyone seeing it. Keith wraps his arms around his waist and pulls Lance onto the bed. They slip under the covers and cuddle, but they don’t really feel like going to sleep yet. Instead, they turn on Lance’s old, boxy TV and skim through some channels, finally settling on the news channel just to watch something instead of sitting in silence.
“But, seriously, you don’t know how happy it makes me.” Lance starts again. “You learning Spanish, I mean. I’m really, really grateful for it.”
“It’s no big deal, Lance.” Keith mutters, playing with the creases on Lance’s pyjamas. “It’s something that’s important to you, so of course it’s important to me too.”
“It is a big deal to me, Keith. And I love you so much for doing it.” Lance says. He takes a deep breath, tightening his hold on Keith’s shoulder to gain his full attention. Keith looks up and Lance’s face is only inches away from his own. His beautiful blue eyes look directly into his own and Keith’s breath hitches. “Jagiya saranghae.”
Keith’s eyes widen in surprise and for a moment, he forgets that breathing is a thing. “W-what?”
W-why is Lance speaking in Korean?
“A-ah, did I say it wrong, I probably said it wrong!” Lance presumes that Keith’s shock is from how badly he pronounced the words. “I was trying to say ‘darling, I love you’ but it probably came out wrong and-”
“No, no!” Keith puts a hand over Lance’s mouth to stop him from talking, knowing fully well that he’ll just babble on and won’t let Keith talk for at least five minutes. “No, it’s not that. Y-you said it right, I was just… shocked, is all. Why did you say it in Korean?”
Lance is blushing and averting his eyes, much like Keith does when he’s shy and nervous. Keith takes his hand away from Lance’s mouth so he could speak. “W-well, you see, I’ve been, uh, I’ve been learning Korean these past few months. I-I mean, I know that I don’t have anyone to impress and you don’t speak it a lot either…”
Lance knows about Keith’s past. He knows that he doesn’t have any family, no parents for Keith to introduce him to or siblings who’ll embarrass them for being all lovey-dovey together, no grandparents who’ll talk to about their marriage and life like Lance’s grandmother does. Keith has been alone for much too long. He’s never had anyone to speak Korean with except himself. The only way for him to connect with his language is by watching cheesy Korean dramas in his room or listening to Korean music, and he loves the dramas and music, but it just doesn’t compare to actually talking in Korean, performing little customs during special times of the year or wearing a hanbok during the winter to celebrate the New Year.
“But…” Lance cups Keith’s face so he’ll look into his eyes and see just how serious Lance is about all of this. “It’s your language, Keith. You grew up with it and it’s a part of you. It’s a part of you that I want to understand and cherish and love, just like you’ve done for me. So, these past few months, I’ve been trying to learn Korean to impress you. I know I’m pretty bad at it, all I had was the internet for help, but if you want, you could teach it to me properly? Then, you won’t have to speak it alone anymore, I’ll be there with you and I’ll stay by your side for as long as you need me.”
Keith is close to crying. His violet eyes shine with tears and his bottom lip trembles slightly. The look of pure, innocent surprise on his face is something that Lance has never seen before and it makes Lance’s breath hitch. Keith wraps his arms around Lance and pulls him close, burying his face in his chest.
“I love you so much, you idiot.” Keith mumbles into his shirt, sniffling slightly. “I love you, te amo, saranghae.”
He continues to mumble into Lance’s chest, saying ‘I love you’ in English and Spanish and Korean. Lance feels like he’s falling in love with Keith all over again. His heart is beating fast, his chest feels tight and butterflies flutter in his stomach. It feels like his world has lit up like the stars in the sky, shining around the two of them.
“I love you too, Keith.” Lance says, kissing the top of his head softly. “I love you so much.”
They lay in each other’s arms for what feels like forever. But time doesn’t seem to matter to them in that moment. They look out Lance’s window, which is still covered with little stickers that he stuck on years and years ago, some of them ripped and others peeling off. The stars shine in the dark blue, cloudless sky, the moon being the only source of light for them
Lance thinks about the universe, how infinite it is and how much there still needs to be discovered. He thinks about what it would be like to go into outer space, discover unimaginable things and come into contact with different aliens. But, no matter where he goes, in outer space or on earth, he always wants Keith to be by his side. Because he doesn’t want to let Keith go, and Keith doesn’t want to lose Lance either.