Chapter Text
knock, knock, knock
“Lance … can I talk to you for a minute?” Keith asked carefully, sounding almost … scared?
“Sure, come on in” Lance answerd Keith, surprise clear in his voice.
Lance was surprised Keith came to talk to him, because sure, he and Keith had gotten closer, especially after Shiro disappeared, but Lance still didn't feel like he was close enough with Keith to have such private talks. And considering this seemed like a pretty sensitive topic, Lance didn’t feel right sitting here with Keith. Shiro should be here in his place, but he wasn’t about to push Keith away, when he finally seemed to open up a little.
Admittedly, Lance still felt a little hurt and angry towards Keith for pretending to not remember Lance from the Garrison.
Sometimes Lance wondered if Keith really had forgotten him, if all these little moments Lance had spent curled up with him and James in one of their beds watching movies or just learning together for a test. Wondered if all these moments really were for nothing and Keith really didn’t remember him and James.
However, now was not the time to jump into that rabbit hole.
“Sooo,” Lance asked when Keith had sat down next to Lance “what did you want to talk to me about?”. “I…” Keith hesitated.
He didn’t know. I mean sure, Keith knew what he wanted to talk to Lance about, he just didn’t know how to properly put it into words.
“I guess I wanted to apologise to you”. Keith finally got out, still a little unsure about this conversation.
“Apologise?” Lance questioned. “Why would you want to apologise to me?”.
Keith hesitated for a moment before answering. “Because I acted like a total dick by pretending I didn't remember you … and James I guess?”.
Lance raised an eyebrow at Keith “You guess?”.
“No, I know, I’m just bad at all this feeling thing”, Keith grumbled out between his hands, which were currently hiding his bright red face.
Lance was silent for a moment, processing the words Keith said. ”Apology accepted” Lance sighed, “Though I’m not quite ready to forgive you just yet. What you did really hurt me, okay?”.
“Yeah that’s alright” Keith admitted, as he could imagine how much it would have hurt him, were he in Lance’s position.
“And while we’re all coming clean now, I’ve got to admit that I remember our bonding moment” Lance mumbled into the quiet atmosphere of the room.
Silence, before Keith exclaimed in shock “ You remember!?” voice raising at the end “ but why didn’t you say anything?”.
“I was still hurt from your little stunt of forgetting,” Lance made air quotes with his fingers for emphasis on forgetting “who I am” voice defensive and a bit angry. A sad and slightly hurt expression took over Lance’s face, eyes shining with unshed tears, lips wobbling ever so lightly, “After our little bonding moment I wasn’t sure where we’re standing and I didn’t want to end up heartbroken again, seeing as at that moment I still thought you had forgotten everything. So I denied remembering it, trying to protect myself from any more pain”.
Keith visibly winced at that because until now he was never aware of how much he actually hurt Lance without meaning to. “I’m sorry. I just” Keith trailed off letting out a frustrated grunt. “I know what I did is unforgivable and really hurt you and I don’t even want to think about James and how he must be feeling now. I mean we’ve been missing for months! Me even longer than you, he probably thinks we’re dead!“
Lance petted Keith sympathetically on the shoulder at that. If Lance was honest with himself he didn’t really think of that. Didn’t want to think of James and his family, all think he’s dead and knowing didn’t even get to say goodbye. Yea no thinking of that right now.
“But… after Shiro went missing and the Garrison just declared him and the crew dead, … there was just no way in my mind, that the mission failed because of some crew mistake or piloting error. I felt so lost, it was like someone pulled away the ground under my feet. I felt like freefalling, not knowing if it would ever end. It was all too much for me to handle, so I ran away like I always did when I felt like I was suffocating. And with that I hurt you both, for that I’m really, really sorry”.
Keith took a deep breath having said all that in a rush. Lance wrapped him in a tentative hug in a try to comfort Keith, who realised only now that he was crying.
“Hey, ssh, it’s okay, we all do stupid things once in a while” Lance gently hushed Keith who only begann to cry even harder, letting out all the tears he bottled up ever since Shiros dissapearence roughly a year ago. “The important thing is that you realised that you did something wrong and learned from it so you won’t make the same mistake twice”.
Lance just let Keith cry himself out on his shoulder while drawing comforting circles in Keiths back waiting for him to calm down enough to speak again. “So… ,” begann Keith cautiously, unsure of how to approach the topic. “where do we go from here?”. “I’m not quite sure what you mean Keith” said Lance with a raised eyebrow. Keith grunted in frustration at having to explain his thoughts. “What I meant was, what is our relationship status, how do we stand to each other?” Keith explained.”Well… if you’re okay with it I would be willing to try again. Give it another go” Lance shrugged, trying and failing to hide how much Keith’s answer meant to him. “That’d be nice,... but what about James?” Keith questioned.
“What about James”
“I mean in case we ever return to earth and James hasn’t moved on. What are we gonna do then? Where would we stand with him?”
“Easy, we could always just leave room for him should he still want to.” Lance replied casually. “Sounds good.” Keith yawned the exhaustion from crying so hard making him tired.
Lance laid down on his bed opening his arms invitingly for Keith to snuggle himself into. Keith accepted his invitation happily and promptly fell asleep in Lance’s arms. Just like that, the both of them slept soundly in each other's arms, for the first time in almost two years.