.

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Keith knows he was alive at some point. He had to have been.

But now? Dead as hell with a liquor-induced migraine the size of Wyoming. Keith swears he is never touching Everclear and, by god, he is never mixing it with something tasty like peach nectar juice again. Too, too tasty. He flinches, silently groaning in his halfhearted attempt to crack open his eyelids.

Slowly, so slowly, Keith is able to, both of his rapidly blinking and bloodshot eyes wide-open.

Okay… okay. Hands?

He wriggles his fingers at his sides. Toes? Yep, Keith feels them wriggling too. His hands slide back from outstretching from his sides and experimentally pinches over his nostrils and mouth, his knees, his thighs and his armpits, checking for all of his parts and if they're numbed out like his friggin' jaw when his teeth clench, testing the soreness. Unbruised and sluggish, workable… for the most part.

Keith fights off a yawn, pushing his face deeper into the plush, colorless pillow and now checking if he's fully clothed, stirring his limbs encased in the lightweight, thick and vanilla-scented comforter.

Wait… he doesn't own a comforter this nice. Or a bed.

Jarring himself upright, Keith's palms shoving muffled and rough to the butter-yellow sheets, makes the entire room spin sideways like a carousel gone wild. It feels like his very soul roils right under Keith's legs and is trying to escape… this room that's definitely not his.

Bright sunshine filters in through a two-pane window, revealing a brick wall on the left and a glorious view of the nearby, overflowing dumpster in the back of a parking lot for the apartment complex.

There's a closet of mostly shawls and sweaters and coats, from sheer to leathered quality, and then a high, top shelf of various college-affiliated sport jerseys from all across the country. Most of the room is a dusky rose-color in paint with lavender string lights switched on and overtaking on the walls and molded paneling. A laundry bag of sunglasses and big, pastel scrunches and notebooks cascading on the floor.

Asides from the soft yellow and white sheets, there's a collection of shaggy and grey pillows and a blanket. More tinier, stiff pillows that are white and black bordering the bed's wooden headboard. Paper-mache sunflowers tacked onto the wall in front of Keith. A white-and-black patterned quilt bunched to his waist.

He's dressed — oh thank god. That wouldn't have been a promising sign.

Where the HELL is he?

And what the everloving shit happened to him last night?

Keith squints his eyes, beginning to turn around and then freezes up at the loud snuffling noise. From beside him, a huge blackish-blue dog (dog?.?.?) with luminously golden eyes gazes at Keith with ridiculous amount of calmness and neutrality. "Nice… nice doggie," Keith mumbles, his head feeling worse than ever, slipping clumsily towards the mattress's edge and putting up his hands in surrender.

Another young man buries themselves into the dog's fur, waking up groggily, reluctantly. Most of him is lean, sinewy muscles, Keith realizes, absolutely doing his best not staring. On those fairly broad and relaxed shoulders exposed without the sheets, and his light brown skin, glimmers with a streak of bluish gel-glitter.

Oh god — is he naked?

"Fuck."

"Would you mind having a panic attack somewhere else?" A voice croaks out. Keith grinds the heels of his palms over his temples, closing his eyes and swallowing down a mouthful of warm bile. His head hurts so much. When he reopens them, the other man has rolled into his side, watching him semi-curiously.

Oh, wow — the sheer amount of blue in his eyes is dizzying. He's not bad-looking. Not at all.

Shut the fuck up, don't, Keith warns himself mentally.

"Is this your room?"

Keith's voice sounds no better, dried out and raspy. It's barely any syllables. He glances at the young man again. His previous bed-companion manages to hitch himself on his elbows, looking around dazedly.

"Actually… no, it's not…"

"Is that your dog?" Keith asks, nodding to the fluffy, canine-like animal who boofs and squirms closer. He holds out one of his fingers, hesitating initially, and then allows the dog to eagerly sniff him.

"Nope," the young man proclaims as if it's a matter of fact, but smiling boyishly. "I'm Lance, by the way."

Keith doesn't say anything, but tries to force himself to breathe through the waves of pain. After a moment of regaining his senses, he narrows his eyes and reexamines this Lance guy in silence. Optimistic attitude… sharp features and pouty, thin lips… a little bit too chill about ending up in a strange bed, in the strange room, with a strange stranger… probably an vlogging influencer who parties too much…

"You don't remember how you got here?"

"… Do you?" Lance counters, raising his eyebrows. When Keith doesn't reply, only scoffing, he tosses him an irritatingly knowing look. "It was three parties combined, I think—one from Allura's mansion, and one from Matt Holt's place for Shiro's birthday, and then the college grads from the bar. Now I don't remember all of what happened, but I can see why I stayed… you are… …" Lance blows air purposely through his lips, flapping them. He peers over Keith with obvious appreciation. "… one serious hottie."

At this, Keith's own lips twitch upwards. Oh no. This guy is cute and a dumbass.

"Sure," he murmurs, finally getting off the bed. The blackish-blue, furry canine whines out an acknowledging sound, then drops its head onto its paws. Keith discovers his jacket abandoned on a rug and picks them up, mindful of his balance and his throbbing and still complaining skull when the bright light reaches his eyes.

Lance observes him, shifting off the white sheets to his ankles. Thankfully he's got on a pair of boxers.

"Don't get dressed on my account."

He sounds pleasantly amused. Great. Keith faces away from him quickly, his chapped mouth twitching up further into a lopsided smirk. "I'm gonna find aspirin and get the hell out of here is what I'm gonna do."

"You always this cranky while hungover?" Lance points out. "Just for future reference I should know."

Keith flattens his mouth, schooling his expression to go blank from its own amusement. "There's no future anything for me that involves you." He adds, offering a one-armed shrug. "… No offense."

Lance whistles quietly, craning his neck and eyeing the bedstead with a semi-grimace.

"Ouch," he says, snatching up his iPhone. While he's browsing, Keith continues to stare at Lance thoughtfully. Optimistic, not bad-looking and a dumbass, but Lance seems genuine. To himself and to other people. That's rare. Everybody Keith has ever met tried to be something other than themselves. For money, or for recognition, or to fit in with their expanding, shitty cliques that ultimately mean nothing.

While he's checking his shoelaces, Keith overhears Lance snickering, flipping idly through his photos.

"Do I even wanna know… …?"

Lance mocks Keith's one-armed shrug, grinning sheepishly and embarrassed. "Mm… dunno, man…" he answers, presenting out his radiantly blue iPhone to Keith's direction. "You might wanna…"

Keith takes it, scrolling up and he nearly loses his grip on Lance's phone. There's a bunch of nighttime photos of Lance and a clearly shit-faced Keith, hanging on each other at a rave, laughing and dangling themselves into each other's space. Keith's insides goes swimmy and weak as he passes over one of the images of himself drowning in purple, metallic-gleaming confetti and kissing Lance open-mouthed.

It looks like he's trying to suck Lance's face off.

The rest of the photos on Lance's cellphone are just as amateur and messy, with both of them running around through a park illuminated by dots of low-powered streetlamps. Lance squats over the water fountain, like he's taking a piss. A couple of photos of him and Keith making vulgar gestures to the park's statues, hooked by their arms and kicking their legs, and then one of Keith pretending to jerk off in another statue's face. He's flushed a mottled, ugly red from the alcohol intake, Keith guesses, perspiring heavily and looks awful. That's the only word he can think of to describe it right now.

"Jesus," Keith mumbles, suddenly very glad that he lost his own phone a week back.

"C'mon, seriously… admit you had a good time," Lance says gleefully, and then he frowns as Keith mass-deletes all of last night's photos starting with the rave where they met. "Hey! Dude, seriously!"

Keith tosses Lance back his phone, frowning when the other man makes a frustrated moan.

"You could at least leave me something to remember you by… since you refuse to tell me your name…"

It's nearly a pout on Lance's lips. A very annoyingly cute and natural pout.

"Hold up your camera," Keith orders monotonously. At the confused glance, he repeats it. "You wanted a picture, right?" Lance smiles again, heartfelt if not tipsy, and shit — it's not even remotely fair. He adjusts his cellphone, and then Keith moves in, arching his middle finger to Lance's built-in camera.

"Oh my god, no! Not that!" Lance cries out, aggravated. He waves his iPhone haphazardly. "Something good! Like… show me your abs or whatever. You don't got any weird tattoos, right?"

Keith resists the urge to protest, but then does it, grabbing the hem of his black tee and pulling.

Instead of Lance sassing him some more, he looks pretty much amazed, mouth hanging open. "Holy shit… an ACTUAL six-pack?" Lance whispers, shaking his head. "That's… dude, who the hell are you?"

"Lance, will you just—"

The shutter-app goes off. Keith wrestles Lance's phone away briefly to check how it looks. All of Keith's face visibly is the point of his chin, down to his pecs and stomach, and then his belt-buckle. The other man chuckles when Keith tosses back his phone, glancing down wistfully at his masterpiece. "Ah, yes…" Lance murmurs, dramatically placing a hand to his collarbone. "The one that got away…"

"You happy?" Keith asks sarcastically, adjusting Shiro's borrowed, dark brown jacket. The dog gives a low, whining yap at both men and wags its tail, keeping its fluffy head down. "Can I go back to my life?"

He's not reassured by how Lance's blue eyes scrunch up in musing.

"I would be if there was a name to attach to this hot selfie I've been granted…"

"Keith…" Maybe it's only his imagination but the soreness in his head lessens. "It's Keith," he repeats quietly, his cheeks flaming when Lance stares over him admiringly and with a touch of goofiness.

"… Yeah. Thanks, Keith."

There's background noises like heavy, stomping footsteps and the AC cranking, and not-Lance's dog panting and whining, and Keith tunes them out. He steps around the bed, never looking away, heaving with his full weight to his palms pressing down to the mattress and butter-yellow sheets on top of it. Keith has no idea what Lance's mouth tasted like a few hours ago, but now he tastes like heated, aching flesh and spit.

He parts his lips, inhaling, when Lance gasps softly, delighted, against him, opening his own rosy-brown lips, brushing them over Keith's mouth. There's nothing wild or dangerous, or borderline risky, about this kiss between them — just the sense of comfort and warm, unfamiliar intimacy.

"Thanks," Keith murmurs back, ignoring the whimper of loss from the other blissful man, smugly waving.

Out in the hallway, he glimpses a few people milling in and out of another hallway with the EXIT sign scribbled with marker — SEXITUP. Down on the ground floor, Pidge and Hunk are over their latest engineering project, stopping when they both spot him at the same second.

"Hey, Keith!" Pidge calls out. "Found you something!" She throws him his lost cellphone which Keith scrambles to catch. He nods, blatantly intrigued on how Pidge found it, unlocking the item.

There's 25% battery life on it. A crystal-clear photo of Lance appears as Keith's home screen, straight right into Keith's eyes, floating in a watery bathtub with his pink dress-shirt ballooning around his raised arms, his neck and temples littered by colorful pansies and dandelions and their leaves.

Keith's tongue sweeps over his bottom, red-raw lip.

"Fuck," he declares, smiling hard.

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Voltron isn't mine. Welcome to November! It's getting so much colder and I love it! OKAY SO,,, I did a pitch hit for the Keith Birthday Exchange and for maddymaycreates on Tumblr. A few ships and ideas were given to me and I tried to roll with the essentials: no angst, nothing like that and keep it fluffy and funny. Oh, and doing a modern Au with them as college students. I really hope my giftee sees this and likes it! And I hope you guys do too! I'm getting slowly more into writing romantic Klance and getting myself comfortable with it because it IS a good ship. It just feels like fandom bursts into hellfire constantly sometimes. If you got the opportunity to read this and liked it, please leave me a word or two about your favorite part! It would mean a lot! Thank you so much!