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The first time they’d crossed the line, it had been raining.
They’d stumbled into Keith’s quarters soaked through from training, laughter shaking off the cold until it wasn’t laughter anymore. Keith remembered the way Lance’s voice faltered when their eyes met, how something fragile shifted in the air between them.
That night, they didn’t talk much.
Just touches.
Tentative at first. Then desperate.
And when it was over, when their skin was cooling and Keith was still trembling from the sound of Lance whispering you’re beautiful against his neck. He thought, stupidly, that maybe they’d finally stopped pretending.
He’d memorized every piece of that night.
The blanket draped half over them.
The way Lance’s laugh broke the silence when Keith got shy.
The way his hand lingered even after Keith had fallen asleep.
Now, months later, Lance sits across from him in the Castle’s kitchen, bright smile, shoulders relaxed, Allura’s hand brushing his. Like nothing ever happened.
“Hey,” Lance says, that same smile he uses when he’s trying too hard. “You doing okay? Thought we could hang out y’know, back to being friends.”
Friends.
The word hits harder than any Galra strike ever did.
Keith manages a nod, pretending his throat doesn’t feel too tight to speak. He stirs his coffee just to have something to look at.
Friends.
After nights of tangled sheets and whispered names.
After laughter pressed into skin and sleepy confessions in the dark.
After Lance told him he’d never felt more real than when Keith touched him.
“I’m happy for you,” Keith lies, quiet.
Lance’s smile flickers, just for a second, before he covers it with a nervous laugh. “Yeah… me too. I mean, it’s good, right? We’re all good.”
Keith wants to ask if Lance remembers.
The rain. The warmth. The way his fingers trembled against Keith’s jaw.
He wants to ask if any of it meant something, or if it was just a phase, a secret tucked into the space between missions and exhaustion.
But instead, he says, “Yeah. We’re good.”
And that’s how it ends.
Lance’s laughter fading down the hall,
Keith’s coffee going cold in his hands,
and the ghost of you’re beautiful echoing in his mind until it hurts.
---
Later, when he’s alone in his room, Keith lies in the dark and lets the silence press against him. He wonders if this is what moving on feels like, if it’s supposed to feel like missing someone who’s still right there.
He closes his eyes and remembers the night they stopped being just teammates.
How soft Lance’s voice was, how his breath shook when he said stay.
And how, in the morning, sunlight spilling over them, Keith thought he finally had something worth holding onto.
But now Lance wants to be friends again.
And Keith doesn’t know how to unlearn loving him.