Work Text:
If there’s one thing Keith has learned about love, it’s that you save each other. Sometimes it’s from death itself, evil clones, being torn apart by the universe.
Sometimes it’s from ugly bed-frames.
“It’ll ruin the vibe,” Keith repeats again. He’s firm in this decision. In actuality, he has no idea what he’s talking about; only that he heard it once on a home renovation show that Shiro once made him watch that he only partially hated every moment of. (“Kindergarten therapists and professional goat yoga instructor couples don’t get 2 million dollar budgets, Shiro.”)
“Mmm. So… no... headboard.” Shiro’s voice drifts out from behind Keith, and he says it in a voice that sounds distant, forcing out the last word as if he’d been denying Keith’s refusal towards it this entire time. And he has. Multiple times. He also seems to be staring somewhere off in the corner of the bed-section..
“Exactly.” Keith doesn’t look away from the bed frames. He tilts his head at them as they move throughout the rows. He scrutinizes each for a second, before dismissing them with a scrunch of his nose. “Allura and Lance both said that they think the room would look nice organic.”
Again, Keith has no idea what that means either, but can summon up the faint memory of a Shiro lecturing him about the importance of food that was locally-grown.
“That one’s nice… no nevermind. It’ll clash with the dresser. Also, the wood-grain looks sketchy, I think. What do you think, Shiro?”
Shiro doesn’t reply. Keith looks back at him, and only then notices the pink dusting on his face. “Shiro?”
He startles, coming out of his head with a sheepish smile. “Yeah?”
“Shiro.” The word, the way he says it: the concern laced with the faint underlying of hurt, the tiny lift at the end that might be a question now but was a pained voice crack years earlier brings with it sounds of battlefield, of unconsciousness, of head cradling and fierce, desperate pounding.
It’s sudden and overwhelming. He stays there, rooted for a second, unable to move save for his rapid breathing that’s only picking up.
Stop, he tells himself. Not now.
He knows Shiro feels it too- the shared thread connecting them that is the knowledge of loss and fighting. Is he hearing the sound of explosions and blades colliding too? And then suddenly he feels a prickling feeling in the corners of his eyes that seems to only have increased since the end of the war. Immediately, Shiro steps forward -one, two long rushed strides- and gathers Keith in his arms. ‘Hey, hey what’s wrong?”
He knows what’s wrong. He knows he does- Shiro knows better than anyone. And yet that phrase, as if he didn’t, didn’t help ease the weight that suddenly made himself comfortable on Keith’s chest.
Keith scrubs at his eyes and tries to ignore the looks they’re probably getting. He wants to tell- he wants to hold on and not. But they’ve talked about this, they’ve fixed this. Relationships need communication, and this is the one relationship he hasn’tfucked up yet. This is the one he holds above anything else. He’s not starting now.
“It’s nothing. I’m sorry.” A breath. “It’s just- it’s just that three years ago we were fighting in intergalactic war and now we’re here and it just- it means a lot to me. You. This. Picking out dumb Ikea furniture out together and stressing over how much natural light the bathroom will get and not whether or not we’re going to live another day. And this- this is something I can actually do, that I want to do. I know that’s dumb but I want it so bad, Shiro.” His voice is muffled by Shiro’s scratchy shirt he refuses to throw out and he swears he can hear Shiro’s heart squeeze with guilt.
He’s gotten better at this. The talking, the words, the admittance of hurt.
“I’m sorry, Keith. I’m so sorry. I was just spacing out. I swear I’ll pay better attention. I want this too. So much. I’m just… thinking.”
Keith pushes away from Shiro, wiping at his nose with his sleeve. He feels proud of himself. They’ll last another day. They’re fine. “So what were you thinking about?”
“I-” The guilt in his features is quickly getting replaced by a wild blush that takes over his face like a forest fire.
Keith manages a shaky smile as he exhales, trying to shake off the last of the tears.
“What? So when suddenly I can manage to talk about my feelings in a crowded Ikea you can’t?”
“It’s not that!” Shiro opens his mouth- again, and again. But as soon as his lips part they close again.
“Careful,Takashi. Someone might think you’re embarrassed.” He playfully pokes at the white scar that cuts across Shiro’s nose. It stands out especially when his face flares out like this.
“I’m not-” and there goes the blood rushing again.
Keith grins cheekily. “If all your blood goes to your face then how can you get hard enough for me to suck you off later?”
Shiro sputters, and Keith laughs. He wants this. He wants silly moments with Shiro, he wants laughter and soft moments and parents warning their children about the two married grown men chasing each other and playing hide-and-seek in a furniture store. He wants it with an ache that competes with the ache he once wanted Shiro with.
“Seriously, Shiro. Tell me. C’mon.”
He can’t tell the normal shade of his face anymore. It reminds him faintly of a little girl stealing her mom’s blush for the first time and having no semblance of “sometimes less is more”.
“The- the headboard. It- I want the headboard. Headboard.”
And there’s the assertive Atlas captain Keith remembers so clearly. The fearless, bold leader.
“You’re gonna ruin the organic vibe. I already said no headboard.”
“You don’t know why I want it.”
“Put the candy back where you found it, Johnny.”
“Hilarious.”
“It’s what you deserve for even having the thought to ruin my home with you because of a ugly bed frame. It’s what divorces come from.”
“Think about it for a moment, Keith. What do we use our bed for? Why might I want a headboard?” Shiro’s face is still red but the edge of his mouth quirks up.
“We sleep, we- oh.”
“Oh,” Shiro, the man Keith adores most, the man he hates most, mimics.
Now it’s Keith’s turn to flush. “You- you want to-”
“I do.”
--
(Sometimes you save each other from evil twin clones, sometimes you save each other from ugly bed frames. All the same, you always need something to hold onto. It’s why you love, it’s why you keep loving. You need that connection, you need that love you hold onto. You have hands to clasp, you have memories to grasp. Maybe, if you’re lucky, your relationship even contains a headboard when the situation arises.)