Chapter Text
Keith knows that he doesn’t stand a chance.
He is a proper nerd after all, thick glasses and messy hair, weird clothes thanks to his parents being too cheap to get him so nice looking shirts (he swears, they just adopted him so they can give him Shiro’s old stuff), hobbies and interests even weirder than his clothes and don’t even get him started on his friends.
He loves them, but still. They are weird. He is weird.
That’s why he knows he doesn’t stand a chance against all those hot and beautiful and cute and interesting and just not-weird people that flirt with the High School swim team captain Lance McClain.
He is just too pretty, too charming, too popular, too perfect to ever be interested into someone like Keith, even less Keith himself.
Keith’s stupid heart still won’t give up his crush on him though.
And that’s how he finds himself sitting at lunch, Pidge and Hunk talking animatedly about some tech-stuff they’ve been working on for the robotics club and Matt joining in with a few tips or comments every now and then. Shiro, Adam and Curtis are awkwardly flirting with each other at the end of the table, still trying to find balance in their newly founded relationship.
Even Allura and Romelle are busy talking about whatever those two are talking. Keith stopped listening the moment McClain walked into the room. They talked about school before, but by now it could also be something about the upcoming play of the drama club, or the prom in a few weeks, or just some date-ideas for their afternoon.
The most important thing is, that everyone is oblivious to his obvious pining, which Keith is thankful for. He doesn’t need anyone commenting on his heart-eyes or red cheeks he tries to hide with his long bangs whenever McClain laughs, or smiles, or does anything remotely beautiful like existing.
He knows best how far gone he is, and he knows best that he doesn’t stand a chance, so getting his friends’ interest involved would be like setting traps for an already caught Bigfoot: useless.
A sigh escapes his lips, a little bit too loud for his liking, and Keith quickly glances to the side to see if his friends noticed.
They didn’t.
But he’s glad. Keith forces his attention away from the group at the popular end of the cafeteria and back onto the group at the nerd-table. The name isn’t really accurate with Allura, Romelle and Curtis around, but it’s hard to find a better description for this weird bunch of teenager than that.
The topic hasn’t really changed in his mental absence, so it’s easy to get back into the girls’ conversation about their current history class. There is an exam in the afternoon which they are anxious about, since their history teacher Mr. Smythe loves to ask the most random questions, testing everybody not only on their ability to stay concentrated during his monologues about the world, but also their capability to achieve so much useless knowledge.
Not even Allura, his own niece, is able to guess most questions right.
“It’s impossible to get a straight A in his class,” Romelle complains, though with her grades she should stop worrying about not getting ‚A’s and start worrying about not getting any more ‚D’s.
Keith keeps that comment to himself though. He doesn’t need to bring his friend down when his current grades for his Spanish class don’t look any better.
“Nothing about us is straight,” Keith says instead. It earns him a chuckle and a push against his shoulder, as well as the attention of the rest of the table.
“What are you complaining about?” Adam asks, raised eyebrow and stern voice giving him the ultimate dad-look. Keith can already see him keeping Shiro’s and Curtis’ butt in check as soon as they leave for college.
“History,” the three of them answer simultaneously, and a collected groan comes from the group.
Pidge sighs the loudest. Even with their genius-brain it’s impossible to get all points on Smythe’s test. “Don’t get me started on that. I’d much rather talk about prom.” And that means a lot, coming from their mouth, since they hate prom.
Romelle doesn’t though. “Uh, I can’t wait! Only four more weeks, and we will dance the night away!” She grabs Allura’s hand and intertwines their fingers, giggling excitedly. Allura matches her smile, and in the far distance you can hear Pidge gagging at them.
An idea plops into Keith’s head. What kind of little brother would he be, if he didn’t use every chance to tease his big brother. “Hey Shiro,” he starts, the grin on his lips already giving him away. Shiro silently shakes his head at him, using his ‚don’t you dare’ stare, but Keith is having way too much fun to think about the consequences.
“Did you ask Adam and Curtis out for prom yet?”
Seven heads whip around, everyone excited for the answer. With the triad still being so fresh, and the three boys seriously lacking the basic skill of talking to each other, prom was probably a too heavy topic for the three of them.
As if Keith would care. He’d never ask if he had to worry ruining something for his brother, but making him uncomfortable is a whole different matter.
“So?”
“I was planning to,” Shiro says smoothly, way too smoothly for Keith’s liking, suspicion picking up. Turning towards his boyfriends he adds: “But I wanted to ask you out on a date first, if that’s okay?”
Of course his boyfriends are okay with it, they are his boyfriends after all. Keith rolls his eyes, catches Pidge do the same and they grin at each other. Pidge loves teasing her brother just as much as him, after all.
“Hey Keith?”
He looks back to Shiro, the smile quickly fading from his face as he sees his brother’s grin. That combined with the knowledge that Shiro is an actual asshole who loves teasing his brother even more than Keith and Pidge together, he can only imagine the worst.
“Didn’t you want to ask Lance McClain to prom?”
And the worst is what Shiro serves.
Seven heads whip around again, this time watching him instead. Keith can feel the heat rise to his cheeks, and gives his brother a deadly stare, only to get ignored.
“I didn’t think you would actually go for it!” Romelle says excitedly, and with a big smile on her face.
Allura nods along. “I am glad you are finally willing to make a move, Keith. Your obvious pinning was making us worry about you.”
So he was that obvious, huh.
Pidge is uncharacteristically quiet about the whole matter, which basically tells Keith all he needs to know. They knew about his feelings, probably even before Keith realized them, but kept silent for whatever reason. He needs to ask them later about it.
But first, he needs to find a way to get out of this situation. With the whole group looking all expectant and excited at him, not even bothering to ask for his point of view, it’s hard to find the right words though.
And before he can explain why the hottest guy of the school will not go on a date with him, Hunk speaks up.
“Dude, you should totally go for it,” he says, nodding approvingly. Keith has a hard time not to hate him right now. Hunk is one of those people who see the world through pink sunglasses, unable to realize that Keith’s chances with the captain of the swim team are close to minus one hundred.
The rest of the group seems to either be on the same page as Shiro to tease him, or to be just as oblivious as Hunk, because they simply agree with him. From the corner of his eye Keith can see Shiro grin at him, proud of his work of screwing Keith over.
And this is how Keith’s high school life goes downwards.