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Dealing with loss was never Pidge’s strong suit. Losing something made her angry. Losing Rover had made her determined to defeat the Galra that dared try to take the ship, with her, Shiro, and Lance still aboard, likely to become prisoner or murdered for the Galra to take control of the Lions. Losing her father and brother had pushed her to sneak into the Garrison not once, not twice, but countless times before she was found out and had to pretend to be a boy to sneak back into the building to search for proof that they weren’t dead.
However, some of the losses, Pidge - and the other paladins for that matter - never could recover from. And that just about pissed her off.
As the anniversary of Allura’s sacrifice came closer and closer, Pidge knew it was a bad idea to be alone, and doubly knew it was horrible to leave the only other Earth-bound paladin alone for the anniversary, and she made her way to the rendez-vous point.
Pidge found Allura’s sacrifice to be vile. The one who lost everyone, everything she had ever loved, the woman who gave and gave and gave every part of her to save others, and her reward for saving the universe? Death. It was unfair. It was cruel. The one who sacrificed her father’s memory, who sacrificed the Castle of Lions, who sacrificed everything over and over again, and she had to sacrifice even more to allow the universe to finally know peace once again.
It pissed her off more that Pidge could not defy fate, or whatever will it had been to take the Princess of Altea from the universe. She tried, really, she did. Allura had been a friend, the only other woman she spoke to for about two years on a daily basis as they were surrounded by men. She put away any ill feelings she had towards Allura and Lance’s relationship in favour of encouraging Allura to finally find something - or someone, she had hoped - that made her happy, that would give her happiness after the war. She pushed her crush on Lance far, far down, in favour of Allura’s happiness, something she only partially regretted when the outcome was that Allura was never going to find happiness alive.
As she paced at the entrance of the cafe, the rendez-vous point where she was to meet Lance, her thoughts shifted from her dead friend to him. It had taken ages, and a combined effort of Pidge and Hunk to coax him out of his little farm, where he kept planting juniberry flowers along with other crops that were actually edible, wallowing in his grief over the loss of Allura. She understood why it hurt him so much to lose the one he had been with, even if it stung her own heart to see him so desolate. She and Hunk agreed they’d give Lance a little bit of time to grieve by himself, but any longer and they’d be abandoning him to never get better. They refused to leave him by himself when it was clear his method of ‘healing’ was to wallow around in a farm far from his friends and family - Lance would argue his family lived with him on the farm, but every time Pidge had visited, he was alone in a large farmhouse, solitary with a couple acres of land for his crops and juniberry flowers - forever until he was forced to leave.
That wasn’t the Lance Pidge fell in love with. And she’d do anything to find the man she fell for once again.
It was coming up to the 6th year without Allura, the third since Hunk and Pidge coaxed Lance out of hiding from the world, and as Pidge brushed her bangs out of her face, she saw the familiar gait of the gangly Lance - no longer gangly, he really had settled into his long frame with wide shoulders and a strong build compared to his lean and teenaged fitness when they had been paladins - making his way to her, the light-blue marks on his cheeks standing out against his dark skin.
The marks never looked right to Pidge, but she ignored the thought like always, smiling warmly at her friend.
“Hey,” she greeted, lifting her sunglasses to nestle in her hair. “Took you long enough, I thought you were going to bail on me.”
“How dare you, Pidge. I would never," Lance gasped dramatically, but the dramatics couldn’t reach his entire face, and Pidge’s smile wavered for a moment. “How are you?”
“Oh, I’ve been… well. Working on some upgrades for Chip, better memory storage and all that junk,” she waved a hand dismissively. “What about you, farmboy? Anything interesting?”
She made a move to enter the cafe, wanting something cool to drink in the heat of the day. She knew she should have grabbed a hat, but of course she hadn’t thought to do so until she had been half an hour from her apartment.
“The strawberries are starting to come in, actually,” Lance said with an easy smile, but his gaze was faraway. “Juniberries are also blooming, so the fruits will be coming in the next month or so. Silvio always loves when they bloom.”
“That’s… nice,” Pidge struggled to keep her tone even. They were treading the line now, and she had been hoping they’d have found a seat before the moment would come. She could only toe the line so long before it got too much. “Come on, I want some lemonade before I die of sun stroke here. It’s hot out.”
Lance laughed, almost surprised by the comment, and headed inside with her. “Sorry, sorry, I forgot you’re unused to the heat again. Your cushy science lab must be blasting AC constantly now, huh?”
“Well, sorry that I don’t tan as beautifully as you do. I just burn in direct sunlight because I’m white as snow,” Pidge rolled her eyes before she tensed, realizing what she had said, and she knew the moment Lance realized what she had said.
For a moment, the two were quiet, the noise of the cafe wrapping around them, before Lance stepped into line, his lips thin and his cheeks darker than before, while Pidge’s cheeks were aflame for all the world to see.
Why did she have to open her big mouth? Why today, of all days, too?
The two were silent to one another as they ordered, yet Lance still paid for Pidge’s lemonade before she could grab her card, despite her protests after.
“You really didn’t have to, Lance,” she argued as she held her drink in one hand, heading for a table for the two of them to sit and relax - and hopefully forget her comment about him being beautiful, even if it was absolutely true - putting her sunglasses on the table as she sat down.
“Yeah, I know. I wanted to. It’s the least I can do,” Lance shrugged, sipping his own strawberry lemonade. “Have you been up to anything else, besides building and science stuff? Heard from the others recently?”
“Hunk reminded me about the rendez-vous, though it wasn’t needed. I like these days, they make my life a bit more interesting,” Pidge answered, glancing anywhere but at Lance’s face, noting the tan line on his collarbone where he likely got it from farming. His neck and chest that peeked out of his shirt was more golden than the bit of chest she could see that looked to be hidden by his shirt. It was an attractive look. “Shiro came by for repairs on his arm. Wasn’t much repairs, I think he was just looking to get out of work for a bit before Atlas set off again so he chose to bother me for a couple hours. Keith sent his usual memo that he wasn’t dead yet, the one he usually sends when he’s just returned from a difficult mission.” Both shook their heads at that regretfully.
“Other than that,” Pidge sighed and leant forward against the small table, “nothing really else since our last correspondence.”
“Good, that’s good. I’m glad,” Lance nodded idly, and at this point Pidge chanced to look at his face, quickly noting a couple freckles along his cheeks near the markings.
They were quiet, content to sip at their drinks and people-watch around them. By now, their heroics weren’t as fanfare-y as they had been when Pidge was still a teenager, so they blended in with the wallflowers well enough. Barely anyone took a second look at the two, too busy in their own lives to notice the space-war veterans in their midst, which was just what Pidge had been hoping for.
“Pidge.” Lance started, his drink finished and sitting on the table, empty and the condensation still pooling around it. “Can I ask you something, and you’ll be completely honest with me?”
Her eyes flit from his face to the table, tapping on her half-finished cup before she nodded. “Sure. What’s up?”
“Why are we doing this? Really?” He asked, as blunt as could be.
“This?” She asked for clarification, her brows furrowed.
“Meeting with me, talking about nothing, leaving your home, the city, to meet halfway with me every year around the same time as… As Allura’s death?” Both grimaced at their friend’s name.
“Lance… You can’t hide from the world over someone’s death,” Pidge began, nursing her cup to busy her hands. “I… Hunk and I…” No, he asked for her honesty, and she would give it to him. “I saw how you retreated into yourself when we got home, after everything. Left the Garrison without a word to any of us, and next thing we hear, you found a plot of land and began farming? Lance, the Lance I knew, would never hide away and become grounded like this. You wanted to be a fighter pilot, for quiznak’s sake!”
She sighed, and continued when she saw Lance had made no attempt to speak. “I thought, well, Hunk thought and I believed him because he’s like, your best friend, so he should know you better than anyone, right? Hunk thought you just needed time to yourself, to grieve. Allura’s death hurt us all, but you… You loved her.” She could taste the residual bitterness in her words. “Of course you’d take it worse. So… we left you alone. I tried to focus on building Chip, building ships for the next generations, to keep improving Earth’s innovations, but I kept worrying about you. After the first year, you had changed so much, and I do not mean it in a good way. I told Hunk, and he finally agreed we had to intervene, but by then, he had just gotten his kitchen off the ground, literally, and couldn’t just leave, so I was more than happy to drag you out of your little hidey-hole and force you to socialize once in a while, especially this close to the anniversary.”
Lance was still quiet, looking at Pidge briefly before looking down.
“I hated seeing you like that, Lance. And,” she shifted in place, sitting up straight, “I want you to be honest with me. Do you really think surrounding yourself with things that she used to love would actually help you get over your heartbreak? Do you really want to wallow in misery for the rest of your life, never getting over Allura?”
“Why would I want to forget about her?” Lance snapped harshly, and Pidge blinked at him, eyes wide. “You, you want me to forget everything I loved about her? You think that’s better for me?”
“What?” Pidge asked, hurt clear in her voice. “What the hell are you saying? I never said forget Allura! I said get over your heartbreak!”
“That’s the same thing!” Lance stood up quickly, and Pidge had to hurriedly get up after him as he made his way to the door.
“Wh- Lance!” She called after him, grabbing his wrist just as he exited the cafe.
“What.” Lance refused to turn around as they stepped to the side of the door.
“What is wrong with you? How… How dare you imply I want you to forget about Allura.” Anger welled up inside her, and it definitely didn’t help how close it was to her anniversary. “You weren’t the only one to lose her, you know. She was my friend too,” she scoffed. “Do you have any idea how difficult it was to deal with all you guys? Allura was the only other girl with us that entire time, before Romelle came by. I cared about her just as much as you did, as we all did. Do you think Coran is wallowing in his grief? He had lost just as much as Allura had, and then he lost her as well.” She pulled at his wrist, yanking it hard enough to force him to look at her. “How dare you think I think so lowly of someone I grieved for.”
Lance’s face was dark and he spluttered, yanking his wrist out of her grip to rub, his expression difficult to pin-point. “You don’t know how I feel.”
“I don’t, don’t I?” She raised an eyebrow, incredulous. “You really want me to read you like the open book you are, right here, right in the middle of town? Because you are so easy to understand.”
“No.” Lance snapped, before his expression morphed into a wince. “I’m sorry. That was rude. I’m sorry for thinking you’d say something like that. I just…” He rubbed his wrist again. “I don’t want to forget anything about her. It feels like if I move on, I’ll forget what her laugh sounded like, her exasperatedly fond expression when we’d talk for hours, just getting to know one another.”
“Lance, you can move on without forgetting her,” Pidge said, her voice softer than before.
“How?”
Pidge took his hands in hers, looking up at him directly. “Well, what do you think Allura would want for you?”
“I…” He trailed off, quiet and looking anywhere but at Pidge.
“She’d want you to be happy. Live with her memory,” Pidge squeezed his hands gently. “And living on that farm won’t make you happy. It’s been five years, almost six, and you still act like she died yesterday. Let the wound scab over and heal, Lance. It’s been long enough.”
Lance’s eyes misted over in an instant, and his words warbled. “But what if I forget?” He sounded so much like the teen Pidge had cared for in that moment, so vulnerable and pained, weighed by the choices they had made to protect the universe.
“You won’t. When you… When you love someone, you can never forget them,” her heart clenched painfully and she stepped closer to him. “You never forget them.”
She wiped a tear that escaped down Lance’s cheek, rubbing against the Altean marking Allura had given Lance, conflicted over them for a moment.
“I miss her,” Lance whispered.
“I do too, Lance,” Pidge whispered back, almost standing on her tiptoes to stay close to his face. “But it’s time to move on.”
Lance took a shaky breath and nodded, and he pulled back, wiping his own eyes. “Thanks, Pidgey, for knocking sense into me again.”
“Someone has to,” she smiled lightly, careful to not break the fragile moment they created there, right by the door of the cafe. “What should we do now? I have Killbot Phantasm 4, you know. It has a co-op story mode, which would have been awesome for 1 when we had it, huh?”
Lance’s eyes brightened significantly, and he nodded with more enthusiasm than Pidge had seen from him in ages. “Oh man, Killbot? It’s been years since I’ve thought about that series. I’d love to play some with you, Pidge.”
“Alright, come on, let’s get to my place, we’re a bit away,” she laughed, taking Lance’s hand in her own to pull him along, remembering the last time they had held hands while on the topic of Killbot Phantasm, all those years ago.
Lance never pulled away, just like that day.
“Stay alive long enough for me to respawn!” Lance cried, mashing the revive button like it would bring his character back any faster as Pidge shot at the skeletons that had surrounded them and took Lance’s character out so fast.
“I’m trying, hurry up!” She cried back, keeping an eye on her character’s health as she backed up to the corner of the room to give herself some distance. “This is why we use our health potions.”
“No, those are for emergencies only,” Lance argued as his character flickered back into existence, immediately shooting the skeletons that were cornering Pidge.
“And this wasn’t an emergency?” Pidge asked incredulously.
“Of course not, this isn’t the final boss battle!”
“You are ridiculous!” She huffed, rolling her eyes affectionately at Lance’s antics. “Come here, dummy, let me heal you up.”
“Thank you, Pidge,” Lance laughed, before he pressed pause on the game with a large sigh. “We should save for the evening.”
“Wait it’s evening?!” Pidge cried, turning to the clock with wide eyes. “Oh!”
“Time flies when you’re having fun,” Lance said with a chuckle. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to get back to my place before nightfall, and I’d rather not drive in the dark in the countryside. Do you know any good hotels nearby?”
“Oh, are you sure? You can stay the night here, you know,” she offered, even as she felt her face warm at the suggestion.
“You sure you want to deal with me for the night? Are you busy tomorrow morning?”
She shook her head. “I have tomorrow off, I tend to take a few days off for visiting you and… you know, Allura’s anniversary,” she looked away with a small frown. “Easier to deal with everything back in the lab when you’re not emotionally constipated and all that.”
“Right, right. Well, if you’re sure I can stay-”
“You’re always welcome to stay with me, Lance,” Pidge interrupted him, her tone serious.
“-I’d love to spend the night with you.”
There was a silence for several seconds, before Pidge remembered something - or rather, the sound of her stomach growling forced her to remember - that they hadn’t eaten anything since before going to the cafe hours and hours ago.
“Supper! Uh, I have a frozen pizza! Want some?” She asked, scrambling to her feet to hurry to the kitchen part of her apartment.
“What kind of pizza?”
“Standard pepperoni. I’m not very picky but I went shopping in a hurry and grabbed the first generic box I could find,” she pulled the pizza from the freezer and scurried around the kitchen to preheat the oven and get things ready to eat.
“Then sure, I love pepperoni pizza. Got anything else for sides?” Lance asked, walking to the entrance of the kitchen.
“Uhhh…” She shrugged, and gestured to the kitchen. “You can check. I don’t normally have sides with pizza, I just eat the entire thing.”
“Wow. Impressive,” Lance entered and checked the fridge, before pulling stuff out. “Hunk would be so disappointed in your food options.”
“Oh, don’t even get me started, there is a reason Hunk has never been to my apartment. He’d die by the lack of homemade meals I have in a year.”
Lance laughed. “I guess one of the benefits of living on a farm is I have so much to make myself even after selling the surplus.”
“Lucky you,” Pidge deadpanned, putting the pizza in the oven and setting the timer. “I’m not really a cook. I’d probably give myself food poisoning before I could even make something like mac and cheese.”
“Oh, don’t say that. I’m sure you could make something simple, like a sandwich.”
Pidge laughed highly, smiling at Lance as he laughed with her.
“We don’t tell Hunk about your eating habits,” he said, extending a hand with the pinky finger raised. “Pinky promise.”
“Oh my gods… Yeah, pinky promise,” she hooked her own pinky around his and they shook on it. “So, what sides are you making?”
“Well, you really do not have much. Found a fresh bag of premade salad, which should be good with some classic pizza,” he held up the bag and dressing in both hands. “Better than nothing, really.”
“Rude,” Pidge rolled her eyes with a smile.
They set up the small table in the kitchen for dinner, grabbing a couple small plates, a bowl for the salad, and a couple glasses, Pidge opting for her rarely drunk alcoholic apple cider she had gotten a couple weeks ago. They were adults, they weren’t going to do anything stupid, nor get drunk enough on the stuff.
Soon, dinner was ready and the two sat down to eat, a pleasant silence encircling them.
“This was… this was really nice, Pidge. Thanks for inviting me over,” Lance said after he had his second slice of pizza.
“Of course, Lance. I’m glad you enjoyed yourself,” Pidge smiled over her glass of cider, her cheeks warm. “You are always welcome to come over, anytime you want.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. I’ve missed you,” she spoke without thinking, and bit her lip lightly when she realized what she had said.
Lance chuckled quietly, and nodded. “Yeah… I’ve missed you too, Pidgey.”
Pidge reached over with her free hand and gently took Lance’s free hand, internally punching the air when he didn’t pull away. Instead, he twisted his hand to hold hers, gently squeezing it.
They made no other move, but the energy was there, and Pidge was hopeful that things would finally change for the better. Lance deserved to be truly happy again, and if she could have any part of it, she would take it enthusiastically.