Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Keith pulled off his work gloves and wiped his forehead on the elbow of his shirt. Long sleeves were a pain in the ass when it was so hot, but it was better than coming home all sliced up from brushing up too close against the saw palmettos. Also made the mosquitoes leave him alone - some of the time at least. This was South Florida, they were goddamn insufferable the same as they’d been his whole life. It was a constant battle of whether to tie up his hair and risk bites to the back of his neck but stay cooler, or stay protected and sweat to death on a few more inches of his skin.

The grimy, warm feeling of the forehead sweat from his baseball cap was creeping up on him again. He snatched it off his head and used it to fan himself as he crammed his gloves into his right pocket with his other hand. At this point, there wasn’t much use in being out any longer. Not with the sun hanging so low in the sky.  He’d have to head back now if he wanted to beat Krome Avenue traffic (he never did, but a man could dream). The crickets were loud and thrumming in his ears, and the electric hum of the geriatric golf cart didn’t drown them out as he rolled over dirt and gravel past the rows and rows of palms and plant clusters. He pulled up to the “front office,” a term Keith still used loosely, and left the golf cart plugged in next to the little house. Nearby, a clay shingle slid off the roof and impacted the ground somewhere around the corner. At this rate Coran might have him up on the roof doing a patch job tomorrow.

Keith didn’t mind being told what to do at work. In fact, that was just fine with him until someone called his actual work into question. Just short of criticism he was happy to be bossed around all day long, since it freed up his mind for attending to the very busy schedule of his own thoughts. Being given a long to-do list meant he didn’t have to waste time constantly running back and forth asking “what next?” like a child. He was fine with not being the decision maker; he had enough shit to worry about in his life as it is.

“Did you find that leak, Keith?” Coran asked him from halfway inside a riding lawnmower somewhere off to his left, bubbling over with enthusiasm as usual.

“Not yet. I think I’m getting close, it’s just been harder to isolate with all the rain making up for the lack of irrigation.” He explained. “I think if I head back out that way first thing tomorrow I should be able to figure it out.”

“That’s excellent! Oh that reminds me, I’m glad you’re here. I- urk! Hold on,” he paused to extract himself from inside the mower and turned to face him. “Payroll may be delayed a bit this week, there was an issue with the timeclock and Allura has to manually confirm who actually earned overtime. We know you did, but you know how it is. Have to make sure these things get done right, you know!” Huffing proudly, Coran squatted next to some engine components laid out on a tarp to look over what he had left to work on.

Doing the math in his head, Keith figured that it wouldn’t be a super huge deal if he didn’t get paid for a few extra days. That was another thing about this job he liked, payroll came through every week instead of bi-weekly. He might have to do some stuff outside of work to make up for it if anything came up, but he’d end up doing that anyway. “Thanks for the heads-up,” he nodded briefly. He grabbed his mug and his hat from the golf cart and headed inside. Allura wasn’t there, which wasn’t a surprise; if she wasn’t still dealing with prissy property managers in Coral Gables she would definitely be stuck in traffic right now. If he sat around too long though he’d end up that way himself. Keith nudged the backdoor open and went inside to clock out, then scribbled a note of the time on the notepad on the counter (which made a lot more sense now that Coran had mentioned things to him). A quick pit stop to grab his backpack from his locker later and he was off.

It wasn’t too long after that Keith was on his bike down residential side streets to avoid that evening traffic. He and about fifteen thousand other people, it felt like, had the same idea, but it was better than being another glorified lawn ornament sitting out on Krome with the rest of them. Plus, the downtime was nice. He wouldn’t have to head out again until much later, so he wasn’t in any big hurry. A few years ago he’d be losing his shit to be stuck in commuter traffic, but his priorities had changed as he’d gotten older.  As he looked down at the glossy, almost caramelized purple of his bike waiting for the light to change, he couldn’t help but think to himself how much he’d mellowed out since high school.

Keith loved his purple Kawasaki. It didn’t look like it came out of a Monster commercial, for one thing, and since he repainted it he’d never lost it in a sea of annoyingly boring lime green, black, and red crotch rockets. Eventually he pulled up to the house and walked out to the mailbox to check the mail. Junk, coupons, as usual a bunch of shit for Pidge: bubblewrap mailers with odd protrusions and teeny boxes with international postage covering all the cardboard. Something for Matt from the county… probably jury duty again. They’d have to explain, again, the whole permanent mailing address for absentee voting but out of state for his graduate internship in Maryland thing. Keith was always grateful for not being the one to have to make those phone calls; they tested the outer limits of his patience. As it turned out shouting at county courthouse employees to “leave the guy alone for fuck’s sake, he’s contracting for NASA!” was a pretty compelling argument for letting their parents handle it. He dumped most of the mail into his helmet to carry everything, piling what wouldn’t fit on top precariously as he walked back up the driveway.

Pidge always complained having his bike parked in front with the cars was tacky (“this isn’t Hialeah, Keith”). Hell, they thought the bike itself was tacky. Keith couldn’t bring himself to care. Besides, Allura thought the glittery candy finish was pretty and Allura had an incredible eye for color. It’s why she was so good at practically everything when it came to landscape architecture. At any rate Keith liked his damn bike just fine, and he was not going to keep it in the backyard where it would get peed on. He could hear Kepler’s happy barking already from the living room window. Right on schedule, the curtains parted as a blunt nose wedged in between them. Keith couldn’t help but snicker; no matter how many times he saw it, a dopey-looking bull terrier face in the window wiggling from a full-body tail wag never got old.

Before he was even fully in the door Kepler was all over him, baying happily and prancing around like Keith had been gone for days instead of hours. Inside, even this late in the day it smelled like the coffee had been on all day – meaning that Pidge, unsurprisingly, hadn’t left the house and had likely been subsisting on cafecitos and cheap 89 cent rolls of galletas all day. He guaranteed they hadn’t even had the decency to take either with milk.

“Pidge! I got the mail, come get your shit and eat a vegetable.” Demanding without venom was something Keith had gotten good at. It was a skill he’d developed in middle school as he’d started spending more time over at Pidge’s house, and he’d had plenty of time to hone it once the adoption was finalized and he’d actually moved in. From somewhere deep within Pidge’s hoard of computer junk that passed for a room a noncommittal noise that definitely wasn’t real words drifted out to him. “’Kay, guess I’m opening this then. Where’s Guangzhou, is that where that one cleanroom lab is?”

As if they hadn’t played this game a thousand times before, Pidge emerged almost instantaneously from down the hall. “Keep your grubby chlorophyll-loving hands out of my mail,” they grumbled, not malicious. Keith had already dropped most of the mail next to his helmet on the side table by the front door.

“Have you actually eaten real food today or am I going to find ten pounds of La Llave grounds in the trash?”

“They’re not mutually exclusive, Keith,” was Pidge’s rather telling answer, meaning of course they hadn’t.

“Allura’s lychee tree exploded again this year.  She’s gonna be bringing a few pounds for me to take home to shave off some of the stock before they can go bad. I need to borrow the big tupperware.”

“I’m using it! Just get some plastic bags!”

“As a lap desk. I’m not getting twigs and crap all inside my backpack. Do you want free food or not?” Keith shucked his backpack in favor of carrying it by the handle as he walked back toward his room. “Emotionally prepare yourself to part with it for a few hours.”

Some days Keith felt completely indifferent to his life. He’d gotten fairly accustomed to it, finally; having some actual lasting stability and a secure routine had helped that along. Days like today though it felt like he was being crushed under the weight of his own emotions, like he was a grape and deep, private gratitude was a first-grader thundering across a cafeteria in huge light-up sneakers . It caught him at weird times. Back-and-forth with Pidge; siding with Dad over which songs by the Eagles actually were overplayed and which ones were worth playing over and over; getting a text from Matt with a story that couldn’t wait for the weekly family Skype call. The fact that Mom gave him dumb chores he hated like laundry, instead of dumb chores he still involuntarily associated with punishment and stress like dishes and cleaning the bathroom.

Once in his room he tossed his backpack onto the bed. He stripped out of his work clothes and slung them over the top of his laundry basket so they could air out a little bit instead of marinating in the sweat and dirt funk they always got if he let them crumple up at the bottom. Towels in hand he popped over to the bathroom. In the hall, he could hear Pidge fumbling around in the kitchen from across the damn house. “Pidge use the goddamn stool would you? You’re gonna break half the dishes up there. You are why we have a kitchen stool.”

“Come get the cheez-its for me!”

“I’m naked.”

“Shut the fuck up Keith I know you’ve got your boxers on, you never walk around in the nude.”

Keith mock-scoffed, sounding aloof. “Such scorn for your brother, Gunderson.”

“Don’t call me that at home, Keith! If you’re not gonna be helpful just go take a shower already.”

“Sounds great! Thanks.” He closed himself in the bathroom to the sound of grumbling from the kitchen and flipped on the fan to keep from choking on hot steam.

Keith felt much better after the relaxation of a warm shower. He really enjoyed the feeling of scrubbing off a day’s worth of sweat and dirt and the satisfying clean, fresh feeling that came after. With a towel around his waist and a second scrunched up around his sopping-wet hair, he set about the task of picking out an outfit.

He didn’t feel like bringing an extra pair of shoes, so he’d have to wear something that would look good with boots. It wasn’t supposed to be too disgustingly humid out tonight, miraculously, so he could always wear the tight black jeans and whatever top he felt like… That wasn’t a bad idea actually. He rummaged through his closet, ruling out anything he’d meant to iron but never gotten around to; he could keep putting that off until later. With this plan in mind he settled on an olive drab zip-up tank with military-style pockets and collar and metal shoulder studs. He grabbed a black ribbed tank from his clean laundry to wear underneath it in case he felt like wearing it open as a vest instead. Once dressed, he gave himself a once-over in the closet door mirror. He looked… pretty cute, honestly. With the zipper done all the way up, the gentle folds of the flared hem fell right on his hips very flatteringly.

Dressing up for races was something Keith had really come to enjoy. At first, it had just been a necessity. A messy fight with some comepinga-looking regular at his first race meant that he was pretty much effectively banned from actually racing – though on the other hand, douchebag’s face had definitely been banned from the light of day for a while. What started as Pidge joking at home about how he’d “make a good track bunny with those legs” had turned into a surprisingly viable social life. In the beginning he’d been completely unmoved by the idea of dressing like he was going clubbing on South Beach, but the girls had been unexpectedly warm with him and it quickly turned into something he looked forward to. Both because yeah, actually, he did look good in heels and that was okay, and because it was a social group he would otherwise have never experienced. The friendgroup dynamic was easy and comfortable. Even better, nobody made any jokes about Keith being “just one of the girls.” He felt respected as a person and given a comfortable place to express himself in ways he might have avoided otherwise.

A general indifference to people’s opinions of him had gotten him through a lot in life, and Keith felt like it was hard-won. As a child he’d balked under people’s expectations, the scruffy-looking Asian kid drowning in handmedown shirts a prime target for wandering-eye savior complexes. They saw the idea of Keith Kogane as they interpreted him, and not the actual Keith. The Keith who, sure, bounced around between foster homes, but not because of some tragic story of neglect. Improperly-completed paperwork discovered six months in, some other kid he tended to forget even lived with him getting caught with drugs and getting their parents thrown out of the system. Circumstance. Mundane shit. Ever since he was a toddler people had filled in the blanks, but they never bothered to ask him about his life in the first place. They always volunteered him some devastating tearjerker of a history. Keith wanted to be treated with dignity, he wanted to earn respect instead of kiddie-glove treatment.  But he was also keenly aware of how perceptions affected him, and learning to brush them off instead of getting consumed by them was a trial; it was an ongoing process.

Keith realized he was letting his mind wander again. He had shit to do, he could be introspective on the way there instead of staring at himself in the mirror like a dumbass.

Doing his makeup at home was the one thing Keith hated. He could handle tights riding up under his track pants sometimes, he could tolerate having to basically strip down out of his riding layer in public depending on where they were. But he haaated getting makeup-sweaty in his helmet. It was sort of necessary though when he took his bike, since he didn’t have any sort of large-enough mirror he wouldn’t also have to hold in a third hand he didn’t have while doing his eyeliner. He wasn’t feeling super dramatic today, so as he blow-dried his hair Keith decided what look to go for. Just a bit of concealer to cover up that work scrape on his jawline, then foundation (powder of course, Keith couldn’t stand the feeling of even liquid primer), and his lip balm just to even out his lips, make them pop. The tasteful little wings of his liner and the brownish-purple eyeshadow were all he’d need to top it off.

Of course, Caro would probably hold a mirror for him when he got there. Hell, she’d probably even demand to if he showed up and dabbed half his face off with a handkerchief one more time. Keith allowed himself to grudgingly accept the reality of his friend’s inevitable backseat makeup styling and grabbed his makeup bag. Whatever, at least she didn’t wait until he was finished to tell him if his eyeliner was wonky. Having to go back and fix it was a pain in the ass. He deliberated for a second before swiping the hand mirror off the counter to bring too; no sense in squinting into a tiny compact.

Keith made himself a sandwich, heckling Pidge some more about eating something too before they left (making a second sandwich was a lost cause, Pidge would inevitably forget about it and leave it for the ants).  He took it back to his room with a glass of water and scrolled idly through his social media as he ate. Keeping an eye on the time, he finished up and did his last round of preparations before leaving.

He always wore some sort of outer layer to races, both to keep strangers from heckling the ‘biker in the club gear’ at stoplights and to actually make sure his nice clothes stayed that way. Most of the time it was some kind of track pants and a windbreaker, since anything heavier made being outside in the Miami heat absolutely insufferable.  Once he arrived he would peel out of it, shove it in his backpack, and cram it into the trunk of Caro’s car (or Karina’s, or Megan’s, or whoever else was there when he pulled up). Twice-dressed, Keith grabbed his now fully charged phone and slung his backpack over his shoulders. But he wasn’t a barbarian, like some people in this family, so he also collected his dishes to bring back with him before he headed back down the hall. “Don’t forget to take the coffeemaker off the stove before you leave again, Mom’s gonna strangle you if you burn through a third one this year!”

A vaguely Pidge-like noise came from the kitchen, which Keith supposed might pass for an acknowledgement in an alternate universe. Sighing, he set his cup and plate in the sink. Pidge was hunched over the kitchen table, paused halfway through making a four shot colada to-go mug in favor of staring at their phone. “How do you not constantly have the shits from all that caffeine?” Keith asked, mostly rhetorical, as marveled as he was irritated by Pidge’s foibles. He turned off the burner, emptied the tightly-packed coffee grounds into the trash, and rinsed it out in the sink before leaving it there with the dishes.

“You betting tonight?” Pidge asked, not looking up from their touchscreen.

“No, there’s payroll shit happening so I don’t get paid until next week. The girls want to do IHOP after the race, so I’m budgeting.” That sandwich would only last him so long, and by the time 2am rolled around he’d be feeling empty.

“Cool. See you in a bit.”

He and Pidge always traveled separately when they went to races. It was safer in the event of a police raid, and Keith liked to stay out later than Pidge did anyway. Plus, they discovered very quickly that Pidge loved to complain about his backpack poking them in the face. Keith had explained many times that it wouldn’t happen if they wore their visor down, but in classic sibling fashion Pidge always countered that it didn’t fit over their glasses anyway. More importantly, Keith had learned early on that it was a real production to get Pidge to put a helmet on in the first place, so eventually he stopped arguing and let the bug splatters on their lenses after long rides speak for themselves.

As usual, Keith let his mind wander while driving. He knew the route. It didn’t really stop him from being alert on the road; it was more like background chatter. Come to think of it, it wasn’t really intentional, but a side-effect of going separately was that nobody at races really knew that Keith and Pidge lived in the same house; let alone were related. The complete and total lack of any sort of ‘family resemblance’ helped, of course. It wasn’t ever intended to be a secret, really. They did figure it might mean Pidge would catch shit about conflicts of interest in managing the bets, so they’d just agreed not to bring it up.  That particular problem had resolved itself after Keith’s first night. The fact that it wouldn’t ever naturally occur to anybody that the East Asian track bunny and the Cuban Jewish bookie were siblings was just a convenient bonus at this point.

There were some exceptions, of course. They knew Hunk and Lance from even before street racing – they were pretty much the only people they still talked to from high school. Two years in the same dual-enrollment program with one foot in college and one foot in the grave, as Lance always said (complained) had turned them into quite a unit. Of course, they’d bonded over some rather interesting moments along the way. They had the unique misfortune of taking the same class to fill the horrendous high school sex-ed distribution requirement.  So when their Human Sexuality “professor” (Keith refused to think of him with anything other than mocking air quotes) let slip that in his opinion as a psychologist, homosexuality was ‘caused by a child not having a good relationship with their same-sex parent,’ Hunk and Lance got to see Keith and Pidge’s reactions firsthand.

“When they don’t have a nurturing bond with their parent at a young age, or sometimes an older brother or sister, they seek that kind of same-sex attention elsewhere as they get older.”

“So you’re saying my dad didn’t love me enough as a child?”

“It can vary from person to person, but that’s usually part of it.”

“I’m adopted. I have a great relationship with my dad.”

“And you don’t think your biological father plays into that at all?”

“Please tell me you’re not suggesting he has an Electra complex with our dad.”

Years later and Keith was still smirking to himself thinking about it. The look on his face. Keith gave a singular breathy chuckle in his helmet as the light changed and he sped off.

Honestly though, Keith didn’t particularly care that nobody really knew they were related. It made shit easier. People not knowing his whole life story usually does.

The starting point for tonight’s race was standard in the deliberately erratic rotation. Originally it’d been the start of a housing development, abandoned and left mostly unfinished after the housing market crashed in 2008. They were a dime a dozen in Dade County. Some of them had been bought up on the cheap and met their intended fate as rows and rows of McMansions years later. But there were plenty, especially out here far from the Turnpike and the city centers, that were still little wastelands of concrete and gravel piles. Keith’s eyes searched for Caro’s Ford Fiesta, away from the cluster of cars and the street racers and wannabe-chulos that owned them. A familiar engine revved behind him, getting his attention faster than any horn-honking would.

She was just pulling up, her arm waving him over from the driver’s side window. He eased his bike off to the side to get out of her way and slid the Kawasaki in alongside her silver mini.

“Keith, I haven’t seen you in like, weeks! Where the hell did you go?” she demanded, flapping her hand reproachfully as she stepped out. A symphony of gold bracelets jangled lightly as she moved her arm. Her hair was straightened and silky smooth, pulled back into a high ponytail that fell past her shoulder blades.

Keith was hardly perturbed. “2002. They told me to tell you, they want their bangles back.” He smiled though, getting off his bike to meet her in a hug.

“Leave me alone! Some of us like to wear actual outfits instead of just clothes, I can’t just wear a dress with a metal halter and nothing to balance it out! And it wouldn’t kill you to think about an accessory. You look so unfinished half the time.”

“Oh my god don’t even start. I have a hair thing.” He held his left arm up to show off the black elastic band on his wrist. “That’s way more useful than a bracelet. And a lot less noisy,” he made sure to add pointedly. “Seriously though it’s been hot as hell, I come home from work fucking exhausted. And you know how it is, it’s the end of October. Everybody wants their landscaping done before the holidays, half-dead petticoat palms don’t make the greatest Christmas trees. So eeeverybody who’s thinking ahead is getting it done now before the rush, that way all they need to have done is a few lawn jobs to tide them over until after New Year’s.”

Caro studied his face, suspicious, before she accepted his explanation. “Well thank you for having the decency to take a shower before coming and not just spraying yourself down with an extra five layers of Axe.”

“As if I would use that shit. If I ever show up blasting trashy reggaeton and smelling like cheap aftershave please run me over.” The thought alone was repulsive. Posturing and machismo wasn’t exactly his style or his type.

Just as Keith suspected, Caro was happy to hold the mirror for him while they leaned across the hood of her car, catching up and talking about what Keith had missed. He felt badly having her take him through everything; with Pidge at home he wasn’t exactly out of the loop. But the friend group news at least was highly exclusive information and he was getting a, heh, crash course, in what happened while he was gone.

“…You’re thinking of some dumb joke again. Stop smiling like that before you fuck up your eyeliner,” admonished Caro from behind the hand mirror.

“Smoky eye,” he purred back, teasing, but he still settled down to wrap it up. Keith finished not a moment too soon, because just as he was putting the finishing touches on his eyeshadow he saw a familiar figure in the reflection behind him.

“Code white, yeah?” surmised Caro, seeing the quiet expression on his face.

“I still think it’s really stupid that you call him that. He’s a guy, not a security issue.” Keith retorted, hoping to sound indifferent.

It was impossible to not know who Shiro was; he drove a black Nismo GT-R and he consistently won more races than all the other regulars. Keith had seen his driving countless times. Unlike Keith, who had first learned the instincts of drifting from Mario Kart and became comfortable behind the wheel at arcade games long before actual racers, Shiro was an extremely technical driver. He seemed almost attuned to his racer most of the time. He had this vibe to him, like he never felt the stress of the races. It was almost a laxness, or a lack of competitiveness, that really didn’t make sense for a guy who pulled so many clutch wins and complicated maneuvers. Then again, Keith reasoned, not everybody could be an asshole.

“A security issue for your ass, maybe,” was Caro’s knowing reply, her smug sidelong glance not lost on him. Keith didn’t feel like giving her the satisfaction of a response.

True, Shiro was ridiculously hot. But he’d also been through a lot of shit, if the white streak and the scar were anything to go by. Girls were always throwing themselves at him, only to never be seen again after he turned them down. For a while a vicious rumor had circulated about what might have happened to them, but Keith had seen the Instagram photos from friends-of-friends’ parties that proved otherwise. A lot of the guys here were taken, so you were probably better off in the club scene anyway. At least the clubs had indoor plumbing at their events.

Keith figured Shiro had better things to do with his time. With a car like that, he definitely had the paycheck to back that theory up.

Chapter Text

Pidge wasn’t sure where Keith disappeared to to keep himself amused, but who knows. It was probably better they didn’t. Keep up this whole plausible deniability thing they had going. The two of them had an agreed-upon schedule: Keith leaves first but takes the long way, Pidge leaves later and arrives first. A bespectacled nerd driving a smartcar out in the middle of a field playing with drones aroused way less suspicion just after dinnertime than a swarm of revving engines. And it wasn’t even that much of a lie, either, because Pidge always got there first in order to scope out the starting point.

They didn’t need one of those ridiculous, expensive drone setups that cost thousands of dollars just for level flying and a good framerate. Pidge was a goddamn genius, and everybody knew that was just truth rather than vanity. Anything they couldn’t throw together on their own became a group project with Hunk (which, in itself, was cause for alarm among the wider ranks of their circle of friends). All they really needed was a pocket wifi network hooked up to Rover - Pidge’s silver and green Fortwo, a sturdy toy store RC flier, and a wireless webcam. Projects like that were fun for Pidge, someone for whom MacGyver was less a role model and more a religious icon. After a quick aerial survey, Pidge was satisfied that there was no police or civilian presence. They settled the drone stuff away into the custom padded carrying case Hunk had thrown together and whipped out their phone.

Most of the regulars had already signed in and placed their bets. It had been almost child’s play, reskinning a fantasy sports website to give a street racing ring a mask of legitimacy. It looked, acted, and sounded just like the NASCAR counterpart of a fantasy football league. It also made profiting off of races easy and painless. The pot was managed and monitored by Pidge’s custom software, and every betting account (and their corresponding paypal) was linked up to the brightly colored mobile site. When Pidge first got into racing it had been a messy business, cash changing hands twelve times a night – when it was even allowed to. With no solid way to regulate it, keep it fair, as a rule it had been discouraged. Back then betting couldn’t even happen under the table, it had to take it downstairs to the basement: hushed mutters in cars with tinted windows and shifty-eyed “handshakes” like it was drugs and not gambling.

The advent of Gunderson, as Pidge was known to the general racing population, had been literally revolutionary for the scene. It had taken a long time, but it was hard to say no to consistent, easy money that added up. Fewer people showed up in gutted old Civics with barely-held-together NOS setups in the trunk, choosing to invest instead in new (or at least, newer) cars with more raw power, better engines. As Gunderson, Pidge was very clear about making sure everyone’s cars at least looked street-legal, and the overabundance of car dealerships everywhere from Florida City to Palm Beach County made acquisition relatively easy. Not that Pidge wasn’t a complete fan of the risky engineering project idea, but it was much harder to spin a street race as an informal hobbyist and collectors meetup when the cops showed up to find everybody huddled around a bunch of busted-up franken-cars.

Pidge started the countdown to last call for race entries and announced tonight’s “map,” which corresponded to a real world location to those in the know. Putting the map out basically rang the dinnerbell, since it told all the locals where to go. For everybody else it was just a bunch of fun racing pixels and a probability game with a glossy, worthless in-game currency.

Shiro was the type to get there early, for a number of reasons. Tonight though he had something specific he wanted to get done before the race. He was nearly finished with some upgrades to his Nismo, and he needed to go over the changes with Pidge so they could update Shiro’s betting profile on the fantasy site. The second he got the cheery little squealing-wheels notification sound he’d pulled out his phone and headed to the starting point. If Pidge wasn’t available now, he’d at least need to discuss a time to go over the changes before next week’s race.

When he pulled up there weren’t many other people there yet, and Pidge was half sitting, half lying back on the hood of their Fortwo tapping furiously at their phone. “Got a minute, Gunderson?” he called out as he walked over. Shiro had accidentally overheard ‘Gunderson’s’ real name in passing, walking by while Pidge was having a conversation with Lance (who didn’t have enough guile to use a street name in the first place). But he was a respectable dude, so he only used ‘Pidge’ in private. Pidge looked up and nodded him over, slipping off the hood to let their feet touch the ground.

“My minutes are in high demand these days, but I think I can make time for my most consistent winner.” Pidge grinned.

“I’ve been working on some stuff, do you have a second to take a look at it now?”

“Yeah, run me through it. You know betting’s already closed for tonight, right?” they reminded, giving him a meaningful look.

Shiro shot a flat one back at them. “I think we both know I know how this works. I’m not done yet, but I should be by next week. I want Black’s listing to stay up-to-date. Between you and Hunk, nothing gets past you anyway.” He smirked, and the two of them walked over to his car. “Mostly it’s intake manifold stuff, but I’m gonna be tweaking the throttle to keep up.”

The two of them chatted easily, getting under the hood so Shiro could point out the changes he’d be making once the actual installation was complete. He showed Pidge the progress shots on his phone for comparison, and Pidge made note of the changes to put into the next site update. It didn’t take long, Shiro liked to alert Pidge to even the most absolutely minute changes in his setup. It was kind of precious, in a way, seeing such a strapping guy being such a nerd about engines. Mostly because Shiro seemed like the kind of car hobbyist to restore old classic muscle cars and parade them around for the social prestige – until you actually talked to him, of course. He was talking about the best way to atomize fuel when he trailed off mid-sentence. They didn’t need to follow his line of sight to know why he’d clammed up so suddenly. Smug, Pidge couldn’t resist bringing it up:

“The welcome wagon’s here, huh.” They commented knowingly.

“Pidge, Pidge please introduce me. You know I’m shit at taking to guys.” His eyes never moved from the man who had his attention. The urgency in Shiro’s quiet voice was palpable.

Not having any of it, Pidge flashed him a devilish grin. “Look around Shiro, you’re surrounded by guys. Don’t wilt on me now.”

Shiro was not prepared for banter, and groaned desperately in exasperation. “Screw you, you know what I mean you little demon. I mean The Nutbuster. That kind of talking to guys.”

“It’s not that hard, you obviously have some similar interests! Just strike up a conversation.”

Shiro shifted on his feet, pouting resentfully, and shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “What, so because he dresses cute he has to like guys?”

Pidge levied a skeptical look his way. “…No, mongo, am I stupid?” They ran a hand down their cheek in frustration; Shiro was so painfully linear. “You like makeup. He likes makeup. Ask him what Sephora he goes to or something, Jesus, ask him if he has a Youtube channel. He looks like the type.” Internally, Pidge was cackling, because they knew full well Keith had no such thing. Wheedling Shiro from the sidelines about his massive crush on Keith was the highlight of races – if you didn’t count making money, obviously.

“Have you forgotten why we call him The Nutbuster???” Shiro questioned, voice shrill with concern.

It had been an incredible sight.

The guy always looked… well, Shiro hesitated to think of him as ‘pretty’ because he wasn’t sure if that would be impolite, but he was definitely attractive all around. The first time Shiro saw him, dressed all cute with a little eyeshadow on, some sore loser had slithered up to the bunnies looking for what Shiro had assumed by his body language was sympathy sex. None of the girls were particularly excited about the idea, but he’d continued to hang around despite their obvious indifference. The guy told him to kick rocks, of course. Asshole had angrily, and loudly, responded “What the fuck! Nobody told me this was a drag race!” and jabbed his arm out like he was about to shove him.

The next few seconds, it’d seemed to Shiro, had passed quickly and yet gone on forever at the same time. Unintimidated, the brunet had grabbed the racer by the wrist and braced his other hand against his shoulder, using the asshole’s forward momentum to redirect him in a wide arc to the side that ended in pushing him back until he was flat on his back on the ground. The track bunny had loomed over him, one heeled shoe pressed against the man’s inner thigh. “Just so you know, I could bust your nuts with these heels. Leave me the fuck alone.”

It might not be fair to say that Shiro fell in love instantly, because for a solid few minutes he himself had felt that second-hand intimidation and tense atmosphere. But it was a stunning first impression, and The Nutbuster had not only coined himself a reverent nickname for Shiro to think of him with, but also a pretty irreversible opinion that he was goddamn incredible.

Pidge snorted, stirring Shiro out of recalling the scene. “Yeah, and the seventeen other nicknames you have for him, despite never actually going over to find out his fucking name.” Arms crossed, Pidge looked up at Shiro derisively. His skittish approach to the whole Keith situation was frankly ridiculous, as far as they were concerned. Shiro was ruining it for himself by not even allowing anything to get started.

“Oh my god I don’t even need to know his name, I just want him to look at me.”

There was no way Pidge was going to let that one go. “Oh bullshit, man, we both know you want a lot more than that. And yet you don’t even know what to call him!”

“There’s a lot of things I could call him,” Shiro fired back, somewhat absently – he was more concerned with watching The Nutbuster do his makeup against the hood of his friend’s car. “Fuck. Hot. Destroy Me. Step On Me. Heels.”

Pidge was mildly weirded out by the candid honesty – after all Keith was their brother – but overall they were undeterred. “So here’s what you do. You get an eyebrow wand, or whatever,” they began, enjoying Shiro’s horror at the phrase ‘eyebrow wand.’ “And you lure him over with it and ask him for besitos.”

“HE’S NOT MY DOG, PIDGE. I WILL NOT ASK HIM FOR KISSES.”

It was difficult for Pidge to shush him while they were laughing so hard. “Shut up with the P-name shit, man, there’s people around.”

Shiro lowered his voice, feeling much more embarrassed at the thought of asking for a kiss than the thought of making Pidge’s street name useless. “I’m serious though, what do I do? I don’t want to come off like every other asshole who goes over just to give him shit or mess with his friends, I don’t even know how to get his attention…” He trailed off glumly, jamming his hands in his pockets again.

Patience wasn’t a virtue Pidge possessed in spades. It had been like this for weeks. Shiro would show up, look around for Keith, and admire him from afar like some sort of lovestruck puppy or look depressed as shit when he realized Keith wasn’t there. “Listen.” Pidge started, wanting to be upfront about it. “At the rate you’re going you’re gonna get more attached to the thought of him than the actual person. You’re building him up to be this, like, I don’t know, some kind of untouchable celebrity. He’s a person, remember? He probably picks his nose in private just like everybody else.”

Looking affronted at the notion, Shiro was at least distracted from circling the drain of self-pity. When you put it like that, it did seem like he was making a big deal out of it. He looked over at The Nutbuster thoughtfully as Pidge took his silence as permission to continue.

“I’m not your motivational speaker, but honestly Shiro take a look at yourself. You’re not exactly someone people only want to see with the lights off. You’re attractive, and you do well in races, and to the casual observer at least, it looks like you’ve got your shit together. You need to talk to him before something happens and you regret not saying anything.” They urged, completely serious for the moment about the possibility of their brother becoming unavailable. Like Keith getting a promotion and spending less time at races, or, god forbid, actually getting a boyfriend. It didn’t seem too likely to Pidge – Keith didn’t really spend a lot of time socializing outside of work and races – but Shiro didn’t need to know that. He needed to be reminded that he couldn’t screw around pining forever.

The ominous weight of the implications in Pidge’s words wasn’t lost on him, and suddenly Shiro felt pressed for time. Like the window of opportunity for this to work out was closing before he could do anything about it. He didn’t feel confident at all, and the cold tightness in his stomach insisted that this was a really stupid idea. But when Pidge made him think about it that way, Shiro couldn’t help but realize just how long he’d been doing this. Weeks, for sure, but maybe months even? The passage of time hit him right in the gut almost like he was being dragged ahead by it, caught in a wind tunnel. If he kept waiting around forever he wasn’t sure he could live with himself. He wanted to talk to him, to hear his voice up close and maybe even see if he could get him to smile like his friends could so easily. All of it made him sense a kind of urgency he hadn’t felt before. Fuck, he was running out of time. But time for what?

“I need to talk to him before the race.” Shiro decided suddenly, his jaw set with determination as he looked over at the man across the gravelly field. “If I wait ‘til after he’ll just think I’m trying to impress him.”

“Well you better get on it then, we’re starting soon.”

Keith was settling his backpack into Caro’s trunk when he heard her bangle-laden arm reach out for him. “What’s up?” he asked as her palm came to rest on his studded shoulder. When he turned to look at her, her expression was something like an unspoken ‘I told you so.’

“So you’re always telling me how much you don’t bother because he’s not interested and you’re both busy. Well you better clear up some time in your schedule, because you’ve got a code white on your six and he’s looking your way.” She couldn’t hide the satisfaction in her hushed voice. Clearly she felt she knew she was right, and she was enjoying herself immensely.

It’s true that Keith didn’t really give the Shiro idea much thought. He obviously had things going on, he had a lot going for him, and nothing he’d ever seen him do gave even the slightest indication that he was interested in dating – let alone available. So to Keith, Shiro was just a highly attractive talented man who occupied the same social hemisphere. They hadn’t ever talked, they didn’t really see much of each other at races. Nice to look at, sure, but not really worth getting worked up about if only as a matter of courtesy. But that was why it took him by surprise to turn around and see Shiro a lot closer than he expected him to be, merely feet from him at this point, and staring at him intently. It was intimidating to say the least.

“Uh… hey?” Keith offered, more than a little bewildered.

At his greeting it seemed like Shiro almost faltered for a moment. The determined look on his face dropped away, replaced briefly by a hesitant one before being reconstructed into an endearing, almost sheepish smile.

“Hey. Sorry to, ah, bother you but, I was hoping I could ask you something?” He winced at his own words. Internally, Shiro was cursing himself for what felt like coming off as just another asshole coming to bug his crush about his life choices.

Shiro was too hard on himself.

Unalarmed but still unsure of what was going on here, Keith didn’t bother to keep his eyebrow from quirking up on his otherwise bland face. “…Go ahead?” he replied slowly.

A light blush crept over Shiro’s face as he opened his mouth to speak again. It was kind of adorable. “Well I was just, I was wondering how… how you get your eyeliner so perfect.” Well there it was, Shiro thought to himself, his foolproof solid opener sounding a lot more fucking stupid the way he delivered it. “…I was wondering if you had any specific techniques you use.” Good god, just kill him. He’s such an idiot. What is he, a twelve-year-old? His face betrayed his mortified feeling. Shiro felt very exposed.

A bit charmed, Keith’s mouth twitched upward into a smile. He was very surprised by the question, but he also wasn’t the kind to turn down what seemed like genuinely terrible flirting – or at the very least, a floundering attempt to strike up conversation. He moved forward to stand in front of Shiro and look at him, just barely below eye-level in his boots.

“Trade secret,” Keith said coyly, lips curled up into a confident half-smile. “I think your race is starting.” He inclined his head briefly to acknowledge him. As he walked past him, and away from him, it became clear it was also a parting gesture.

After Shiro discovered that it was in fact possible to actually feel weak in the knees, he’d looked around blankly for a moment to get his bearings. The friend with the high ponytail laughed quietly to herself. “See you around then,” she’d said with a metallic clinking of her jewelry as she’d waved at him and walked off.

He wasn’t an idiot, he knew that The Nutbuster was being playful with him rather than brushing him off. And holy shit that cocky smile, Shiro would be seeing that in his dreams for the next week if not longer. But he didn’t have much time to collect himself; the dopey smile on his own face pretty much remained there throughout the entire pre-race. Pidge went around passing out the usual little GPS trackers and synched them all up to their tablet. The two of them didn’t exchange words about what’d transpired as Shiro sat inside his Nismo, engine thrumming around him, but they didn’t really need to. The way Pidge raised an eyebrow at him as they passed him his tracker pretty much said it all. How it had affected Shiro was another story.

“Don’t get any crazy ideas, Casanova. You said yourself he’ll just think you’re trying to impress him, which is probably right. I got your built-in conscience right here.”

Seeing him reaching out for the tracker, Pidge slipped to the left to slap the little suction cups straight onto his windshield with a fiendish snicker. “You’re always falling for that, relax!”

Shiro rewarded them with a withering look. “You’re always being a shithead, calm down,” he mocked.  The frown melted into a soft chuckle though, and he tapped the tracker to make sure it was fully adhered to the glass. “Don’t worry about me, I know I don’t have anything to gain by not being honest.”

“Oh, are we still talking about racing or are we talking about something else?” Pidge threw back airily, and they scampered off to pass out the rest.

The race itself was fun for Shiro, as usual. Unlike most of his competitors he wasn’t really interested in the social benefits that came with winning. For him, this was just an entertaining hobby. Less than legal, maybe, but at eleven PM nobody really cared who was speeding unless the FHP hadn’t made their quotas for the month yet. As if people didn’t pull dumb stunts all over the county anyway. If you didn’t get caught and you weren’t stupid about your driving it felt pretty harmless compared to what people might do instead. The driving culture was pretty different here, and he liked it. It wasn’t the long promising stretches of desert highways or endless flats he’d grown up driving, but there was a lot of life here. He’d work on his engine, test things out on the road. See how his tweaks fared in the heat of the moment under real pressure. Already he was looking forward to his next day off, which meant time to install the upgrades and see how dialed-in the fuel injection could get.

The route was simple, and Shiro spent more brainpower watching for state troopers and Homestead Police cruisers along most of the first stretch all the way down South Dixie Highway through Naranja. On any given night the most action this part of town saw was a logjam in the drive-thru lines at the fast food joints, so the road wasn’t especially difficult to navigate. But the first stretch was also the easier one; the geometric zigzags back north and then west were usually the killer. Often people got lost and messed up the route. With Pidge watching for deviations like a hawk from in front of their tablet screen, at that point you could pretty much kiss your bets goodbye.

For Shiro, these things weren’t an issue. There was a time when he’d cruised all the side streets just to pass the time, to give his mind something to think about other than the pain in his arm or the insurance claims paperwork waiting for him back at his apartment. Even with a coy smile to think about distracting him, Shiro could navigate this part of Dade County blindfolded and chloroformed. By the time he got back to the housing development it was clear he’d outstripped the others. He recognized the cars of the hobbyists and the spectators, and the purple streetbike that drew his eye every time. The single beep from his tracker confirmed his first place finish, and he cruised to a stop right near Pidge’s car.

“Think fast, growth spurt!” he drawled cheerfully, tossing the tracker out his window to them. Pidge yelped and scrambled for it, glaring when all the movement sloshed coffee out of their to-go cup.

“Don’t think I like you just ‘cause you make me good money!” Pidge barked in warning, switching the cup over to their other hand to wipe the coffee on their shirt. Shiro laughed at that, and they peered at him scathingly. “I know your weaknesses, Rogue, and I didn’t have to be Professor X to figure them out.”

His laughing turned nervous. “Rogue, huh?” He lifted his eyes to the white tuft gently falling over his own forehead. “That sounds like a good street name. Maybe if I have to go into hiding I’ll- wait, Pi- Gunderson WAIT!” Shiro all but fell out of his car to give chase as he saw Pidge turn on their heels and start walking toward a familiar cluster of track bunnies.

Disaster was narrowly avoided: as he gained on Pidge Shiro realized that The Nutbuster wasn’t actually with his friends. He scanned the crowds, catching sight of him just in time to see a familiar black helmet descend over his head. As if sensing he was being watched, The Nutbuster turned around.

Shiro couldn’t make out his features from behind his visor, but he got the sense it was his turn to feel noticed. He felt his lips curl upward without his permission, though he did manage to get out a feeble wave to him. The rider fired back a casual two-fingered jerk of his forearm that seemed caught halfway between a wave and a salute, before giving a quick ‘kfmm-fmm’ rev of his bike and taking off.

Shiro hung around for a bit, chatting with people and talking about his car. He was always happy to have people ask him about parts and improvements, he loved seeing them take a more active role in maintaining their cars. It was one thing to buy a nice car and parade it around, it was another thing entirely to really work on one and make it yours. Shiro would always support people looking for that feeling, even among people he knew in the back of his mind he should really think of as his competitors. It wasn’t that they were incompetent – far from it, they were becoming a community of highly skilled drivers overall. But Shiro was somewhat detached from it all. What to some of them was the high point of the week, the social event, was just a way to let off steam for a guy like Shiro. His mind was always weighed down with thinking, visualizing, planning. He needed something to do, something to keep him busy and if not in motion, then at least occupied. Not quite restlessness, but a desire to have something besides his own thoughts to keep him company.

Eventually, he said his goodbyes and made his way back east, away from the vacant concrete lots and back toward civilization. His empty stomach was giving him an angry lecture from his midsection. This was Miami, every drive-thru was open until at least two, but he was feeling like sit-down tonight. He wanted to have a meal, not just food. Fortunately Shiro was also easy to please. There was no point in going all the way back down to Homestead; as much as he loved his favorite IHOP with the adorable sixty-year-old chainsmoking nightshift hostess and the aging carpeting, it was closed for renovations. His treasonous feeling was moderated by his hunger, so he did the next best thing: the one he’d actually driven past during the race back on South Dixie.

Despite the number of cars outside it didn’t seem too overcrowded, and the host was able to get him a booth to himself. Shiro put in his drink order and started thumbing through the menu idly. He was really feeling pancakes right now, but that wouldn’t be nearly enough. Halfway through the burger section a bright laugh caught his ear.

Shiro looked up immediately. At a cluster of tables in the center of the restaurant, head thrown back and eyes screwed shut with delight, sat The Nutbuster himself. Surrounded by his friends, pointing his fork mock-accusingly at one of them, completely comfortable. Shiro felt like he was witnessing a private moment, something meant to be shared between friends, but instead of feeling like an intruder he felt like there was nowhere else he would rather be. He smiled to himself, and tried not to stare at them. When his waitress came over he ordered the basic pancakes with sides combo, extra bacon and cheese on his hash browns, plus a mac and cheese off the kids menu.

While he waited for his food to arrive he split his time between his phone and watching the bunnies talk from across the room. He couldn’t make out their conversation, but that was fine. He wasn’t interested in eavesdropping anyway. Shiro was just happy for the opportunity to get to see him. It looked like they were partway through eating, the, what, eight-way conversation drawing out their meal. After what felt like no time at all his own food arrived, and he tore into the cheerfully piled little stack of pancakes like a man half-starved.

Shiro was a one-thing-at-a-time eater, making his way through each individual portion before starting another. Pancakes first, then eggs, bacon, hash browns, and finally macaroni. Without really meaning to, as he ate his eyes slowly drifted back over to the lively table nearby. He wished they would meet eyes, just once. A sharp pain under his lip distracted him – he’d missed his mouth, and jabbed himself in the face with his own fork like a goddamn idiot. “FU-“

Keith looked over just in time to see Shiro stab himself in the chin and dribble macaroni all over himself.

Chapter Text

Shiro felt himself go red in the face as he realized The Nutbuster was looking at him. Not only that, but he’d definitely just seen him fuck up something as basic as feeding himself. To his horror, the other track bunnies followed the brunet’s gaze, the ones with their backs to Shiro actually turning around to see. Well, he had a nice life while it lasted overall, he supposed. Death could come for him right now and it wouldn’t even be an indignity. The sinking feeling creeping over him while The Nutbuster very visibly struggled not to laugh would probably be more than enough to put him out of his misery.

The pinpricks of pain in his chin reminded him that he should actually clean up. He broke eye contact to grab a fistful of napkins off the table and start picking off the fallen pasta. His jacket was spared, and his jeans would be fine, but there would be no escaping the walk of shame back to his car with macaroni orange stains marring his navy-blue t-shirt. Maybe he could get away with it if he zipped up his jacket.

After checking himself over again, making sure he didn’t have any hidden land mines waiting to get squished in the folds of his clothes, he had a somewhat impressive pile of wadded up napkins next to his empty plates. He hardly wanted to finish the macaroni. He wouldn’t have dared to look back over at the group, but the sound of chairs scraping on tile drew his attention. In the time it had taken him to do damage control the bunnies had paid for their meal. As they hugged and said their goodbyes amongst themselves, Shiro self-consciously zipped his jacket all the way up.

“...Hey,” a familiar voice called. Shiro turned and found he was being looked at again (god why, just let his suffering be over already). Before he could worry about how to reply, his crush continued. “Have a good one.” He fired off that classic Nubtuster two-fingered wave and an amused smile before heading out with his friends, leaving Shiro and his macaroni carnage behind.

Shiro slumped into his booth with a quiet sigh. All he wanted to do was get out of here. He flagged his waitress down for the check and morosely sipped at his diet Pepsi while she rang him up. Once he signed the receipt he left a nice tip, shoved his hands in his pockets, and trudged out to his car. He noticed with surprise that the parking lot was very empty now; although knowing that the bunnies had all just left, he supposed they must have driven separately. So, realistically, it wasn’t really empty as much as it was returning to normal for this time of night… Shiro thought bitterly to himself that it would have been nice to have seen The Nutbuster’s purple bike beforehand, a warning it would’ve been helpful to have going in. He might have been able to spare himself some embarrassment.

The rest of the weekend passed uneventfully for Keith, and Monday he returned to work. He found the irrigation leak, patched it, and to his relief Coran replaced the roof tiles without him. Tuesday was intended to be pressure cleaning day, for both the office exterior and as many lawn statues he could get to, but it rained heavily all afternoon and well into the early evening. Allura had called around lunchtime to have him check the website instead and log all the new orders and appointments. It was mostly smaller jobs, though there was a tree-clearing job in his neighborhood he’d have to ride by and scope out sometime when it wasn’t raining. Nothing super complicated. After finishing that up he made the rounds through the greenhouses, taking extra care to examine Allura’s orchids. The hybrid she was working toward was coming along well. The first generation of seedlings was starting to peek out from their little moss baskets; when Allura was feeling particularly sentimental, she called them cradles. She kept encouraging Keith to try his hand at making hybrids too, roping him into their care and upkeep from time to time hoping it would get him interested. It sounded fun, but he felt like it was more of a commitment than he really wanted to put in. He already had one time-consuming hobby, two if you counted bikes separately.

All afternoon as it rained he dreaded going home; he rode his bike to work again that morning. He ended up putting his wallet and phone in the lychee tupperware to protect them from the rain. He loathed rain riding for good reason, but he did keep his high visibility jacket as padding in his backpack for emergencies. By the time he was ready to go it was starting to let up. Just in case, he checked the weather radar on his phone to make sure wouldn’t be heading straight into a total washout. Keith knew better than to trust drivers in the rain. He’d have to wait it out – or worse, leave his bike and ask for a ride home – if this was just a lull in the storm.

Satisfied that the bad weather was moving on, Keith slid into the reflective jacket anyway for good measure. He clocked out, crammed his hat and mug in his backpack, and headed home.

He regretted his choice the closer to home he got. While he was en route, the wind changed direction sharply. Keith had hoped to outrun it, but he knew better than to book it on slick roads with the sun hidden behind the clouds. Fortunately, it didn’t turn back into a total downpour until he was a few minutes away from home. If he took the main roads he wouldn’t get soaked, but he’d rather be wet than dead on the side of the road. So he took the cautious path through the neighborhoods where he could, only leaving where the canals between them blocked his path.

By the time he pulled up to the house he was totally drenched, but he saw his mom in the driveway hunched over the open trunk of her car. She was struggling to juggle groceries with her purse and the umbrella, all while trying to keep too much rain from falling into the trunk. Keith trotted over to help her, loading his arms up with as many plastic bags as he could loop them through.

“Thanks, Pumpkin!” she called frantically as she waddled, laden, to unlock the front door.

Keith slammed the trunk shut and hobbled after her, rain cascading over his visor distorting his vision as it started coming down even harder. He ducked inside carefully, dropped the groceries by the front door, and dashed out the front again to throw a tarp over his bike. Once he was back inside, most of the groceries were gone already. He bent down to take the rest into the kitchen when he heard his mom calling out to him.

“Take your wet shoes off! Put them on the back porch to dry for now, okay, don’t mud up the house!”

“’Kay!”

Well. His boots weren’t really the issue, all of him was a problem at this point. But Keith dutifully removed them, careful not to drip too much as he peeled out of his squelching socks. He moved quickly, trying to minimize his time spent making puddles, and popped out the back door to lean his boots up against the back of the house under the roof of the patio.

Eh, what the hell. While he was out there he pulled his wet clothes off, throwing off everything but his boxers and dunking them into the washing machine on his way back across the house. As he passed by his room though he noticed his door was cracked open. He pushed it open fully and chuckled with sympathy at the pitiful scene he stepped into: Kepler had nosed his way into Keith’s room to lie on his bed and burrow under the covers.

“Aw, bud… Hiding from the thunder?” He fondly patted the lump under his blanket. Kepler didn’t budge, only letting out a forlorn sigh. Keith laughed.

He changed into a loose tank and his swim shorts (there was no way he’d survive stepping into the kitchen with his wet underwear hanging out), then padded barefoot back to the foyer to help his mom with the groceries. But that was odd in itself, she only shopped on Sundays. Colleen Holt was the college placement counselor at the high school he and Pidge had gone to, it was unusual for her to get a carload of groceries on her busy weekdays.

“Is something up, mom? It’s Tuesday.”

“Oh, your dad got a wild hair again and invited a coworker over for dinner. You know how he is, always trying to parent everybody to death.” She chuckled through her nose and rolled her eyes as she closed the refrigerator door and began shelving pasta packages. “He said he’s been meaning to for a while, but he did kinda spring it on me. He’ll be bringing him by on Friday, so that means both of you need to be here that night. Don’t make plans.”

Pidge was thinking of a Saturday race anyway.

“What are you making?”

“Well your dad said his friend likes red meat, so I thought I’d do ropa vieja in the slow-cooker.”

Oh fuck yes, Keith thought. He liked it however it got made, but when Colleen put the shredded flank steak in the slow cooker instead of the skillet it was the best thing to ever happen to him. She didn’t do it nearly often enough.

“Which means,” Colleen continued, “That I need you to keep your fingers out of the slow-cooker. No samples.” Smirking, she wagged a finger at him to scold him playfully.

“Mom. I did that one time. When I was thirteen. I promise I can handle the pressure.” Keith felt totally embarrassed, because she’d never let him live that down and he knew it, but his mouth twitched upward into a smile in spite of himself.

Thursday Hunk texted him. Pidge was off building custom rigs for clients at top dollar or something, but Hunk didn’t want to come over to hang out.

Hey man, can I come over?

                                                yeah? pidge isn’t home though

That’s actually better, I wanted to talk to just you.

                                                …is everything ok?

Yeah dude

Well kinda. Are you busy tonight?

                                                not once i get off work. come by for pizza rolls?

This is why I love our friendship <3

Hunk seemed ready to have a mellow chill night as usual when he got there, but as time went on Keith noticed him growing more and more tense. Hunk didn’t bring it up, and as Netflix’s home screen scrolled through different promotions on the living room TV they sat in a terse kind of almost-silence. Keith really didn’t want to drag this out, but at the same time Hunk was clearly torn up about it enough to not want to initiate. He tried to broach the topic tactfully.

“So… you said you had something to talk to me about?”

Hunk’s face fell, and he glanced over at the unfinished plate of pizza rolls in front of them. Suddenly he didn’t feel very hungry.

“Yeah…” he sighed, hunched forward and shoulders slumped as he rested his elbows on his knees. “Sorry about all the drama, this is just a hard thing for me to, y’know, talk about.”

They’d known each other for years, but Hunk rarely came to him for advice. Keith was fairly certain he wasn’t exactly at the top of the list when it came to ‘wisdom.’ So it concerned him not that Hunk was having trouble talking about it, but that he was here in the first place.

“You’re good, you know I’m here for you. I don’t know if I can help, but I’ll try...”

If there was one thing Hunk appreciated about Keith, it was that he was loyal. Dedicated. He wasn’t the type to scheme behind the scenes and make plans without telling him, that just wasn’t his style. It made it easier to try to open up.

“I’m just, It’s my whole thing about Lance.”

Oh. Yeah, that’s definitely something Hunk would want privacy about. Keith nodded, prompting Hunk to continue.

“I guess I thought doing the racing stuff would make it easier. I mean he’s kind of unbearable sometimes, I thought for sure I might start to ease off a little. As frustrating as he can be, I figured I’d end up getting a little sick of him. I didn’t think I’d get into deeper shit!”

Keith tried not to look confused. “I thought you did it because you wanted to work on cars.”

The pained look on Hunk’s face really didn’t suit him. “Yeah, and the thing is I did. And our tastes are so different I thought that I would get frustrated, and my feelings and this whole, thing, about Lance would just run its course.”

As far as Keith could tell, Hunk had loved Lance as long as he’d known them. It didn’t sound like something that would just ‘run its course.’ But Keith wasn’t an idiot, and he knew Lance looked at Hunk like he was his whole world. It sucked that with how things were going their strong friendship was almost keeping them from getting together. It seemed like they were so caught up in valuing the friendship itself they were afraid to move forward, oblivious to the reality that they were basically made for each other. But spelling it out for him felt like it was going too far; Keith would never want to rob them of their opportunity to be honest with each other and finally make some progress on their own. Relationships were supposed to be built on communication, right? Not that Keith would know, all his ‘experience’ came from talking to random boys his age on avatar-builder websites in grade school and one-off dates with classmates. He wasn’t sure if he counted his online crushes on boys he never saw as relationships.

So he could tell that both of them were absolutely stupid over each other, but clearly someone needed a nudge to make the first move. He decided to try and encourage Hunk to confess his feelings.

“Dude, his ringtone for you is Suavemente, what better hint could you ask for? He’s practically broadcasting to the whole universe that he wants to feel your lips and have you kiss him softly, for god’s sake.” Of course Hunk knew this, but Keith was taking it slow. He had a feeling that making this argument was going to take some serious coaxing.

Hunk wasn’t biting. “Aw, that’s nice of you to say Keith but we’ve been friends for almost fifteen years, that’s just his sense of humor.”

“Hunk. He calls his car your daughter.” Hint number two.

“What, Vara?” Hunk laughed nervously, because he’d noticed that. “You’re reading too much into it, you know how important family is to him.”

“Exactly, he wouldn’t joke about something like that.” Come on, Hunk. Live a little, Keith thought.

“I really appreciate what you’re trying to do here, Keith, but I just don’t think he’s down for this. It’s not really worth bringing up.”

“Horseshit. You’re always putting other people’s feelings ahead of your own, dude, you need to cut that shit out. You’re miserable, you’re practically torturing yourself over something he doesn’t even realize is upsetting you. Haven’t you guys been joined at the hip since like kindergarten? Even if he did think it was weird, he’d never stop being your friend.” Keith reached out to clap his hand lightly on Hunk’s shoulder before he could think better of it.

Apparently, it was the tone change Hunk needed. “Oh my god dude, you totally just turned this into a pep talk. You did the shoulder grab and everything. Are you gonna come in for the one-armed bro hug next?”

Keith snorted, his grin lopsided. “Shut the fuck up, Hunk, I’m serious.” But his tone was still light. Gentle. “Do you really want to wait for him to figure it out on his own? He’d be so hurt that you didn’t think you could just come right out and tell him, you know that. I’m not saying roll up to his family’s house with flowers, I just want you to think about it. You guys have a lot of trust for each other, and you should give him some credit.”

Hunk smiled, an uncomfortable cross between appreciation and poorly-masked inner turmoil. “Okay, yeah, I’ll think about it.”

On Friday morning, the savory aroma of steak mingling with hints of onion and garlic was already starting to fill the house. Keith woke up eagerly anticipating coming home from work that night. He could handle making nice with some random middle aged airplane engineer if it got him good food.

That evening he left work with time enough to get showered and settled for dinner. He’d have to move his car around to the side yard so there’d be enough room in the driveway for the guest’s car, and it wouldn’t hurt to put his bike safely out of the way for good measure. Once that was done, he was back inside to freshen up.

Colleen wheedled and bothered until Keith gave in and agreed to wear a nice shirt, on the condition he could keep the jeans as long as they were ‘the good ones without the holes.’ He yanked the first polo shirt he put his hand on out of his closet and threw it on, giving a cursory tug to undo the top button. That would be fine, probably more than enough. It’s not like this was Hanukkah or anything special, it was just a sit-down dinner with company.

Out in the living room, Kepler’s barking signaled the arrival of both Sam and the dinner guest, and as Keith walked out from his bedroom he heard two engines cut off in the driveway. Pidge surfaced from their cave just in time for Colleen to issue commands from the kitchen. “Get the door, Sweetie! Pumpkin, come help me set the table would you?”

Dutifully, he and Pidge went their separate ways to do their respective tasks. Keith grabbed a fistful of knives and forks to put out on the dining room table while Colleen folded napkins into cheerful triangles and went back for the spoons. Keith could hear Kepler heckling his father from the doorway, jumping on him and yipping and looking just as ill-behaved in front of company as he always did. Keith whistled for him to put him outside for a bit, but he was totally ignored. With a sigh, he set the last fork down on top of the napkin his mom had just placed and sauntered off to the foyer to go collect their ridiculous pet decibel tester.

Sam’s face lit up when he saw Keith approaching. “Keith! Come here, let me introduce you!”

Keith was focused on Kelper, who looked about two seconds away from sampling the leather of the new set of work boots attached to an unfamiliar pair of feet.

“Ack- Kepler! Jesus!” Keith whipped an arm out to hold him steady by the collar. He hoisted him away, guiding the terrier by the hold on his collar far enough away that Keith could stand over him with a leg on either side, holding him gently in place. “Sorry about that,” he said with a small smile as he looked up to apologize to their guest.

Keith wished he’d put more thought into looking presentable. Standing in front of him in a fitted button down, sleeves rolled up in cuffs to the elbows, and black slacks was Mr. Code White himself.

 How the fuck did Shiro know Samuel Holt of all people? But Keith extended a hand, trying not to look shaken. “Nice to meet you.”

Sam looked delighted as he placed a hand on Shiro’s shoulder amicably. “Shiro, this is one of my sons, Keith. Keith, this is Takashi Shirogane, one of my engineers!”

Okay, well that explained what a huge gearhead he was. The guy did it for a living. Shiro reached out and shook Keith’s hand heartily, but the gentleness in his firm grip was somewhat of a surprise. “It’s great to meet you! Thanks for having me over on such short notice.” The pleasantly surprised look on his face didn’t escape Keith’s notice. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Pidge’s smug expression almost as well as he could feel it coming off of them in waves.

Sam turned to Pidge. “Is your mom in the kitchen, Starlight?”

“Yeah, she’ll probably meet us in the dining room.”

“I sure won’t be meeting any guest of mine anywhere but my front door!” Colleen corrected as she joined them in the foyer.

Keith wasn’t sure how he felt about having the hot guy he tried not to think about as anything but very casual eye candy as a dinner guest. Sam wrapped up introductions and Colleen ushered everybody to the dining room to sit down and eat. They chatted lightly as she began portioning out ropa vieja from the nice ceramic dish she’d plated it on. Shiro first, then Sam, herself and then Keith and Pidge. Plates got passed around for everyone to finish serving themselves, and conversation continued predictably. What Shiro liked about the job: “getting complex machines to work together,” how he met Sam: “I transferred in from flight school to use my engineering degree, this turned out to be more my speed anyway.” Keith noted he seemed less enthusiastic about that answer than the others, his smile almost turning wistful for the briefest of moments, but nobody pressed him for details.

Having Shiro be the center of conversation was totally fine by Keith. He was curious himself, for different reasons, but the less Keith talked about himself the better. Shiro seemed like a decent guy, but he was also known for his sense of fairness when it came to racing. It was no secret that Keith bet on races sometimes, and he was genuinely unsure of how Shiro might react now that he knew they lived together. Would he accuse them of colluding, getting Keith inside information to make money? He was getting jittery just thinking about it, so as the conversation lulled Keith decided to take their discussion in a different direction.

“Mom, did you do anything different this time? It’s even better than usual.” And that was saying something.

Colleen smiled in that self-satisfied, knowing mom way she sometimes did, and gave Sam a look across the table. “That’s because your father only buys the cheap flank steak when it’s on promotion. Tonight we have company, so we get to eat.”

Sam laughed sheepishly, shoulders rounded, but he didn’t deny it.

Her smile sweetened and she turned to Shiro. “How are you liking it, Takashi?”

“Oh, it’s great! I love the flavor, it’s really tender too! And just ‘Shiro’ is fine, ma’am.” His broad smile was earnest. Keith wondered if he was such a nice guy at work too.

Colleen was still eager to talk about him. "So, what do you do in your spare time, Shiro?”

“Oh, I like to work on cars.”

“Really? Keith likes cars too.”

Shit, time to cover his ass. “Yeah cars are fine. I’ve been more into bikes lately, though.” He hadn’t intended to sound so aloof, but Shiro really didn’t need to know Keith’s brief history of clashing with the other racers. That would be a real embarrassment.

Shiro smiled, looking at Keith with interest. "Really? What kind of bike do you have?"

Was this what an out-of-body experience felt like?

"I'm a Kawasaki guy, I've got a Ninja. It's one of the older ZX-10Rs, it's a 2007 so it doesn't have the digital traction control system but honestly I prefer it that way. Maybe this is obnoxious of me, but I feel like if you need to have your bike help you ride safely you probably shouldn't be on one."

He hadn't expected Shiro to laugh like it was funny, he hadn't really meant it as a joke. He was just being honest. But he smiled almost in spite of himself, because that loud laugh like thunder hitting you in the chest was hard to brush off.

Sam nodded with approval. "Yes, Keith's a very safe driver. Er, rider. Sorry Keith."

After dinner, Keith did the dishes with Pidge in the kitchen while Shiro talked with their parents in the living room. He could hear them talking, but he couldn't make out their words over the clinking plates and silverware.

“Matt’s gonna looove this,” Pidge chuckled, entirely too pleased.

"Are you sure it's safe to leave him in there alone?" he muttered.

"Keith, seriously? He's practically a boy scout. And one who tried to flirt with you last week too, if my eyes didn't deceive me."

He shot them a dark look of warning. "Shut up before I shove this spatula up your ass."

"Isn't taking things up the ass his job?"

"PIDGE."

Keith knew better than to let things devolve into a water war with Shiro sitting in the next room, so he took the strategic defeat at the expense of his urge to retaliate.

For a while, the two of them played video games with Shiro "because this household is a Mario Party household," as Pidge proclaimed. After that, Keith let Kepler out to run around in the backyard – which also gave him a quiet moment to think. He’d been sitting on the patio for a few minutes watching the dog sniff the grass and roam idly, when he heard the back door open behind him.

“Mind if I join you?”

Well, Keith supposed he didn’t mind. He’d had a while to adjust to the idea of Shiro being in his house, and all of Colleen’s questions meant that he knew a whole lot more about him now.

“Sure, sit wherever you want.” Keith gestured to the other chairs around the patio table.

Shiro sat down across from him and a little to the side, not staring him down directly but also giving him a comfortable distance between them. He was quiet for a bit before he spoke.

“So. I can’t really say I ever expected to find out you two were related,” he remarked with a chuckle.

“What, you didn’t see the family resemblance?” The corner of Keith’s mouth tugged upwards in a little smirk.

“Well you don’t exactly hang out together.” It had taken Shiro a moment to reconcile this new Keith with The Nutbuster in his head. They were clearly the same person, but it made him desperately curious. What other surprises did Keith have tucked away where most people didn’t get to see them?

“Yeah, we tend to get in our sibling time at home.” And plenty of it, because Pidge was a homebody.

After playing games with them, Shiro didn’t find that surprising.

“Is it like, a secret that you’re related or has it just not come up?”

Keith shrugged, frowning thoughtfully. “Kinda half and half, honestly, it does make things easier most of the time.”

“For sure.” Shiro nodded, understanding. “I didn’t exactly expect to see you at Sam Holt’s dinner table either, but I guess there was a benefit to that.”

Not following, Keith raised an eyebrow. “And that was?”

He grinned. “I got to prove to you I can eat a full meal without spilling food all over myself. Redemption.”

That coaxed a laugh out of Keith, sharp and quick. Shiro loved the sound. This was the closest he’d ever gotten to hear it, and it was just for him.

“Yeah, I guess you could count that as a benefit.”

They were both quiet for a while, and Keith was very aware that Shiro always looked as if he were about to say something but thought better of it each time. This was Keith’s house, if he couldn’t be comfortable talking to Shiro here then there was no hope. He might as well give it a shot, see if he was reading the signals as well as he imagined himself to be. Go big or go home, after all.

“Well, you got my name today. You forgot to ask last time. Wanna go for two for two and get my number too?”

Shiro’s mouth fell open at the offer, caught completely by surprise. “I- what? Oh shit, yeah! Yeah, that’d be great!” He fumbled for his phone, finally freeing it from his pocket. “Um… do you want mine?”

“Sure, Nismo, hand it over.” Keith whipped his phone out and swapped with Shiro.

He put himself in as ‘Keith K’ and waited for Shiro to finish. He got ‘Takashi Shirogane’ back, and Keith called him immediately. It took a moment to connect, and Shiro jumped when his phone started vibrating in his hands. He looked up at Keith to find him giving him a lopsided smile.

“Were you planning on coming tomorrow?” He got the distinct impression that racing was not a topic of open discussion in the Holt household. Their parents didn’t really seem like the daredevil types.

“Yeah, I’ll be there. You?”

“Definitely.” Shiro said, lying through his teeth. Up until he asked he’d been thinking about skipping it, wanting to give his embarrassment from last weekend more time to be forgotten. But after tonight he wouldn’t miss it for anything; maybe Pidge was right to warn him about impressing Keith after all.