i'll be your romeo
jilliancares
found here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17230991
edit: you can find it translated into russian here!!! https://ficbook.net/readfic/7894965
Work Text:
In a world with many people and little time, God took mercy on his creations. He recognized their struggle for love and pitied those that never found their intended half. And so the Soul Mark was created, though it would only activate for each person once the other was in love with them.
Perhaps God's act wasn't one of mercy. Perhaps it was something cruel, something to entertain him as he watched his creations scramble around in desperation. After all, a much more merciful Soul Mark would be one that identified soulmates the moment they met, not after they'd already fallen in love.
--
Contrary to what some might think, Lance loved his school's library. There was just something about it. He was pretty sure it had something to do with how little fucks everyone actually gave in there. Countless people could be found sleeping, curled up in armchairs and slouched against beanbags, and it even wasn't rare to see someone casually crying over some paper they were writing.
Besides that, there was the Starbucks within the library that provided Lance with as much caffeine as he could ask for, which didn't really make studying any easier but definitely made him feel more productive. It was where he could be found right now, standing in the monstrously long line and scrolling through his phone as he waited, slowly inching forward as the minutes passed by.
Hunk and Pidge were already seated. They'd taken one look at the line and said I think the fuck not before grabbing a table for the three of them. But Lance's veins were feeling suspiciously free of caffeine, so obviously that needed to be remedied immediately. Besides, he kind of had a tradition here.
When he rounded the corner, finally making it into the actual roped off section intended for the line instead of just snaking down the edge of the room, he let out a sigh of relief. The cute barista was working. Keith.
No matter how busy the Starbucks was, Keith always spared a minute or two to chat with Lance. Lance liked to think that that was due to a certain level of chemistry between the two of them. After all, though Keith liked to scoff and roll his eyes at the various pick-up lines Lance threw his way, he never objected to his advances. Not many people did, when anyone could be anyone's soulmate. That was part of the reason why Lance was such a notorious flirt, though he liked to think he'd be the same even if soulmates weren't a thing.
Lance didn't know much about his soulmate. No one did, before they met them. But he still had impressions of them, warm feelings in his chest when his soulmate was happy, and sharp, burning ones when they were mad. Lance loved these impressions of his soulmate, and he often wondered which feelings he projected to them the most.
He grinned when he finally got up to the counter, feeling a warm flush in his cheeks when Keith realized who was before him, his entire demeanor seeming to light up.
"Good morning," he said, his voice sounding more personable than it was with his other customers. "What can I get for you?"
"My regular, thanks," Lance said, before leaning forward on the counter. "Hey, you've got a little something on your face."
Keith frowned, lifting a hand. "Where?"
"Everywhere. It's gorgeous."
Keith blushed, then shook his head in exasperation. "That one was horrible."
"Pfft, it was great," Lance said, leaning back again.
"Name?" Keith prompted, and Lance smirked.
"Elton."
"I know that's not it," Keith huffed.
"Write it, Keith," Lance demanded, pointing at the cup, and Keith reluctantly wrote the alias. Lance never told Keith his actual name. They'd had a class together last semester and had even talked a few times - prompted by their horrible professor who liked to force group discussions - so when Lance had come to Starbucks and seen him working there for the first time, he'd been excited.
But, "Name?" Keith had said to him, and Lance had gaped.
"You don't remember me?" he'd demanded, and Keith's cheeks had quickly grown pink. He'd known who Lance was but couldn't remember his name for the life of him. Now, it was a sort of running joke between them, though Lance supposed he really would have to tell him his name eventually. One day.
"Have a good day," Keith told him after swiping his card and handing him the receipt. Their fingers brushed as Lance took it.
"You too," he said with a wink.
By the time he got his coffee, the terrifying line had begun to die down. All of the employees looked relieved and relatively exhausted, and Lance accepted his drink with a smile. Finally, he went to sit down with his friends.
"What's your name today?" Pidge asked. She was sitting with her feet on the seat as well as her butt, her knees digging into the table. Hunk sat beside her, looking much more like a normal person.
"Elton," Lance said proudly, spinning the cup around to show them the name. Beside it, Keith had drawn a little slash face. "Elton John was on my mind," Lance admitted.
"Original," said Pidge.
"Can we start studying now?" Hunk interrupted. "I really think I might fail this bio test."
"Oh yeah, definitely," Lance said, taking a sip of his drink. "I'm only studying to try to fail less."
"Good strategy," Pidge said sarcastically, and then they all buried their noses in their books, Lance's coffee the only thing keeping him sane.
God, this might've been the most boring text book he'd ever had to read. Who even took the time to write these things? Still, Lance struggled through the text, letting the ambient noises of the coffee shop and the savored sips of his drink sustain him. It wasn't until a few minutes later when his attention was actually drawn away from his studies, and while normally he would be grateful for any sort of distraction, this time... not so much.
"Oh my God," Hunk said suddenly, fear evident in his voice.
"What?" Lance said.
"Don't panic," said Hunk.
"What?" said Lance, panicking.
"Okay don't panic, but there's a spider on your-"
"GET IT OFF GET IT OFF GET IT OFF," Lance screeched, eyes darting around frantically until they fell onto his hand, where a spider was indeed perched. "Hunk."
"Stop-!"
Lance shook his hand violently and the spider landed onto the table. Lance immediately climbed onto his chair. "Pidge! Get it!"
"Why should I get it?" Pidge protested, although she was already balling a napkin up in her hand.
"Aww, don't kill it," Hunk whined.
"Kill it! Kill it!"
"Everyone shut up!" Pidge snapped, reaching for the spider, which at that very moment leaped in Lance's direction. He flung his entire body away from it, knocking the chair over and landing in an ungainly pile on the floor.
"LANCE!" Pidge shouted.
He immediately shot back to his feet, face red with embarrassment, and brushed himself off. Pidge smacked the bundle of napkins onto the edge of the table, where the spider had evidently landed, and Hunk let out a sad little groan - it was dead.
And everyone was looking at Lance.
He laughed nervously, brushing a hand through his hair. "Um. There was a spider," he awkwardly announced, and a few ripples of laughter spread throughout the room. He moved to sit back down, to get out of the spotlight and away from his embarrassment, when he suddenly felt... warm.
Like, all over. And especially in his chest. The warmth was snaking throughout his body, growing hotter and hotter, burning like fire, except it didn't hurt him.
A moment later, he realized he was glowing. His veins were lit up - bright red - and he knew from the countless videos he'd seen online that his irises would be glowing the same color.
But what the fuck? Why would his Soul Mark be happening now? Who could possibly be in love with him? His head whipped around the room, but he was too overwhelmed and frantic to really take anything in.
Finally, the warmth faded away, the glow leaving with it, until one last wave of heat scorched across his wrist - the words his soulmate had thought when they'd realized they were in love with him.
Applause broke out around the Starbucks, people grinning at him and whistling. Lance promptly sat back down, face even hotter than before. "What the fuck," he said.
"Oh my God," said Pidge.
"Who...?" said Hunk. The three of them looked around - in Lance's case, desperately - but he couldn't see a single person who seemed like they were in love with him. Were they even present? Usually, that was the case, but on rare occasions...
"What's your wrist say?" Pidge asked, and Lance blinked, remembering that there should be words there now. He held out his wrist and they all leaned forward, staring down at it.
There, in an endearing scribble, read the word Lance.
"What the fuck?" Lance repeated.
-
Lance didn't think there were very many people who had their Soul Mark and no soulmate to show for it. It was rare for a Soul Mark to appear when the soulmates in question weren't already dating, and rarer still for either party to have absolutely no clue who the other was. So yeah, Lance was in a bit of a pickle.
His soulmate must've been in that Starbucks, right? Must've seen that mortifying spectacle and for some reason thought to themselves, yeah, I think I love that idiot. Except who?
Obviously, Lance first turned his suspicions on Pidge and Hunk. But then, Hunk already had Shay, obviously, which left Pidge. "I know what you're thinking," she'd said once they'd finally left the Starbucks, Lance having lingered for an obnoxiously long amount of time, wanting his soulmate to come forward and admit that it was them that was in love with him. "And I'm sorry, but there'd be something seriously wrong with the universe if we were intended for each other. No offense."
"How could I not take offense to that?" Lance had scoffed, though he agreed that he and Pidge weren't meant for each other. But still. Rude.
"I just wanna know why they thought your name," Hunk had piped up, and Lance couldn't help but agree. Was it supposed to be fond? Exasperated? He'd never heard of anyone having their own name as their Soul Mark before, and to be honest, he was a little embarrassed about it.
Actually, he was a lot embarrassed about it. Not necessarily because of what it said, but because he still didn't have his soulmate. If Lance had caused a horribly embarrassing spectacle in public like that by falling in love with his stranger soulmate, he'd at least have gone up and informed them that it was his fault. And that they'd be spending the rest of their lives together, ideally.
"What am I gonna do?" Lance demanded now, not for the first time. He was curled up in a ball on his bed, his hand flung out in front of him. His wrist faced upward, Soul Mark bared for the world to see. Lance. His soulmate's writing really was cute. A sort of sloppy scribble, but still perfectly legible. A lot of personality in those five letters. And even more personality in the fire Lance had felt within him during his Soul Marking, the warmth and the red glow. It was different for everybody, so he'd never known what to expect, but for some reason, red seemed fitting for his soulmate.
Red. Where are you?
"Loiter at Starbucks every day and hope your soulmate shows up again?" Pidge suggested half-heartedly. She was splayed on the carpet between Lance and Hunk's beds, while Hunk sat in his desk chair.
"I'm never going to find them," Lance muttered, defeated.
"I mean, you're halfway there," Pidge pointed out. Lance groaned.
"Honestly, your Soul Mark narrows it down a lot," Hunk pointed out. "It has to be someone that knows your name, right?"
"That could be anyone," Lance said, dejected. "Pidge shouted it when I fell off the chair. Thanks for worrying about me, by the way."
"I was reprimanding you, actually. But no problem."
"This is the worst," Lance huffed.
"Don't say that!" said Hunk. "Come on, this is a cause for celebration! You've almost found your soulmate!"
"I guess..."
"They probably just didn't say anything because they're embarrassed about it," Hunk continued. "I mean, you guys aren't even dating yet, so they must feel pretty awkward."
Lance brightened. "You're right. I'd feel embarrassed if it were me."
"See? They'll come around soon! For now, let's celebrate!"
And celebrate they did. It was a Friday, which was a testament to how desperate they were to study for their bio exam. Then again, the fact that they'd given up immediately after Lance's Soul Marking and were now going out for the night was yet another testament to how irresponsible they were. Still, they had the whole weekend. What could one night hurt? This was about celebration.
"Yeah, you tell 'em, Lannnse!" Pidge slurred, leaning against the wall beside him.
"You've definitely had enough," Lance said with a grin, eyeing Pidge's cup.
"Touch my cup and I'll kill you," Pidge said, sounding scarily sober again, so Lance waved his hand at her in surrender. When he turned back around, the girls they'd been talking to were gone. Whatever - they weren't soulmate material anyway. Lance already had a soulmate. Er... somewhere.
"Hey, I'm gonna get another drink," Lance informed Pidge, who nodded sagely. She hooked a thumb over her shoulder, back towards the living room where Hunk was sitting.
"I'll find Hunk," she promised, and they parted ways, Lance heading toward the kitchen.
This apartment was well-stocked with alcohol. Lance still could hardly understand why people threw parties, sometimes. You had to spend money on alcohol that strangers would drink and later clean up the mess that strangers had made. Still, Lance didn't question it. He just appreciated that it happened.
Next year, him, Hunk, and Pidge planned to get an apartment near campus together. As sophomores, they were still stuck in the college dorms, but Lance didn't mind all that much. He was just excited to be at college, experiencing the next phase of his life. Growing up, he'd always managed to convince himself that he would find his soulmate at the next phase. In middle school, it was all about high school. And then during high school, he was convinced it would happen during college.
And yet now... well, he was halfway there, sure, but what if his soulmate never showed themselves to him? What if they were too embarrassed?
No, no, no, push those thoughts away. Tonight was a celebration.
Lance stopped in front of the counter, swaying a bit, and examined his options. Reading was hard - God, was he that far gone already? - but he recognized the bottle cap on one of the bottles before him, so that was the one he reached for. He splashed a generous amount into a cup, followed by some sort of juice that was red - that would scare the shit out of him later, if he ended up throwing up - and he gave it a good swirl once he was done.
"Pretty sure that's gonna be gross," someone commented. The words registered after a moment and Lance spun around, ready to defend his honor. But then-
"Keith!" he exclaimed, recognizing the barista before him. He stumbled forward immediately, throwing his arms around his friend - were they friends? - and somehow managing to not spill his drink. Keith held him up with a grunt, though it quickly transformed into a laugh.
"Good to see you, Elton," he said, using the nickname from that day. Lance giggled into Keith's ear.
"S'not really my name!" he sang, and Keith patted his back a few times before pushing against him, helping him stand up on his own again.
"I know," he laughed. "You wanna tell me?"
"Nah. That'd ruin all the fun. Hey, did you see what happened to me today? My Soul Marking?"
Keith flushed. He looked pretty like that, all pink-cheeked. Lance reached up and poked one of those pink cheeks. "Yeah, I did," Keith said, reaching up to wrap a hand around Lance's finger. Keith's hands were soft; Lance didn't know why he was surprised by that.
"Can I tell you a secret?" Lance said, his voice lowering appropriately for the secret-telling. And Keith leaned in closer, prepared to hear it. "I don't know who my soulmate is," he whined.
"Really?" said Keith.
"Yep!" Lance said loudly. "But they were in your Starbucks, I'm sure."
"Well what's your Soul Mark say?" Keith asked, and Lance was halfway to showing him, even reaching to pull up his sleeve to do so, when he suddenly remembered. He couldn't show Keith his name. So he told him as much, and Keith looked kind of stricken - was that the right word? - before he nodded slowly.
"I want to go home," Lance announced.
"Yeah, I think you should," Keith agreed, and he plucked Lance's drink out of his hand and poured it down the sink. Lance didn't have the energy to protest.
Luckily, Keith had seen Lance in Starbucks enough times to know who his friends were, so he helped him find them. Pidge was conked out against Hunk's shoulder, and Hunk looked relieved to have found Lance.
"You good to take them home?" Keith said from somewhere in the distance.
"Yeah, thanks man," said Hunk.
"You should be a part of our investigation," Lance announced, turning on Keith, suddenly.
"I - what?"
"Yeah!" Lance said. "We're friends. I mean, I know you don't know my name, but we're friends, right?"
"Right..."
"So you can help me find my soulmate! You know, keep an eye out for people who seem weirdly interested in me when I'm there. That kind of stuff," Lance said importantly, holding onto Keith's shoulder now.
"Let's leave Keith alone, okay?" Hunk said gently. "We're gonna go home now."
Lance pouted. "You'll help me, won't you?" he asked, his hand sliding down from Keith's shoulder to his wrist to his fingers as Hunk started ushering him away, Pidge awake again and glaring at anything that moved as she was pushed along too.
"Sure thing," Keith said, briefly squeezing Lance's fingers. His chest filled up with warmth - strangely familiar, though he couldn't place it - and he grinned at Keith.
"See you there!" he promised, holding onto Keith's hand for just a moment longer, before he was finally pulled out of reach. He crashed right in bed that night, and though he usually slept like the dead after a night of drinking, he dreamt vividly. He dreamt of fire swallowing him whole, ticklish instead of painful, and he relaxed into it, feeling safe and warm.
Where are you, Red? he thought, and the flames diminished, snuffed out completely. Red didn't want to be found.
--
"We just have to think of this logically," Pidge said, not for the first time. She was all about doing things the logical way.
Lance didn't respond, just continued to sit there with his chin in his hand, the eraser of his pencil tapping rhythmically against the open notebook in front of him. On it was a list of names. Okay, correction. On it was three names.
Pidge, Hunk, and Keith. Except Hunk's had a line through it, because unless he was a miracle of nature with two soulmates, he couldn't be it. And Pidge was crossed out too, because, well... she was Pidge, okay? And Keith was also crossed out, because he didn't even know Lance's name. That much had been proven at the party last Friday.
"Hey guys," Keith greeted, sounding kind of shy as he appeared beside the table. He'd agreed to spend his break with them when Lance had asked, after ordering a coffee and informing him that his name was Romeo, and finally the time had come for his break.
"Keith! Sit down," Lance greeted excitedly, scooting down along the booth to make room for him. Keith joined them, sitting across from Hunk. He glanced around the table and spotted Lance's notebook before raising an eyebrow.
"My list of suspects," Lance explained.
"It's just us three," Keith pointed out. "And we're all crossed out."
"It's not extensive," Lance protested, before slouching low in his seat. "I'm never gonna find them."
"That's not true," Keith said, and for some reason, hearing the same words he'd heard a million times now in Hunk and Pidge's voices rang through him in a different way, coming from Keith. "They probably have a good reason for not coming forward. And there's a lot of regulars in here right now - it could be any one of them. So just keep coming here and... maybe they'll work up the courage to tell you that it's them."
"You think so?" Lance said, filled with new hope.
"I'm sure of it," Keith promised, and Lance sighed in relief. He flipped his notebook shut and grabbed his drink with renewed interest, now that he didn't have any concrete plans other than just being there.
Pidge had her laptop open in front of her, less invested in the investigation than the rest of them. Was that suspicious? Should Lance uncross her name?
"So... how long have you guys known-" Keith hesitated "-Romeo."
Pidge shut her laptop, instantly invested in the conversation.
"Are you really not going to tell him your name?" Hunk said desperately. He was convinced he was going to slip up and accidentally say Lance's name in front of Keith. Lance was convinced his threats would keep Hunk from doing so.
"Yep," Lance said brightly. "Besides, it's like, our thing."
"We have a thing?" Keith said, amused.
"Yeah," Lance said, elbowing him. He knew Keith knew what he was talking about, he was just being stubborn. "I give you stupid pick-up lines and fakes names, and in exchange you give me real smiles and not 'I-hate-my-job-and-you' smiles."
Keith laughed - a real laugh, a real smile - and shook his head. "You watch me too much."
"True," said Pidge.
"False," Lance said, a near screech. "Besides, I have a soulmate now. Somewhere. The flirting will have to come to an end."
Keith shifted beside Lance at that, drawing his attention. He looked surprised to find Lance looking at him. "Um. But not the fake names?" he prompted.
"Never," Lance said with a grin. Their knees were touching under the table. He pretended not to notice the warmth emanating from Keith.
--
"How's the search, Romeo?"
Lance had given Keith probably hundreds of names, by now, but that one had stuck. Maybe it was kind of ridiculous, but Lance's heart always swelled - just a little - when he heard Keith say it. And he heard it pretty often, considering he sat in Starbucks every day.
Except not today. For once, Lance wasn't in the library's Starbucks, but the actual library itself. He hadn't expected Keith to join him, mostly because he hadn't thought Keith had even known he was here at all, and yet here Keith was. In his hand was a drink - Romeo scrawled across it in his weirdly familiar handwriting, though Lance must've seen it countless times by now - and his face was lit up with a soft smile.
"What are you doing here?" Lance asked, surprised by the softness of his own voice. He pushed his notebook away from him. He was horrible at studying in the company of others, not that he entirely minded the distraction.
"My shift ended early today," Keith explained. "I was actually gonna take this to your dorm, but I saw you sitting over here, so..." he trailed off, his cheeks dusted pink, and Lance finally let him relinquish his hold of the drink.
Perhaps a bit selfishly, Lance thought Keith was cute. Adorable, really. What else could someone be when they thought to bring you your favorite drink - all the way across campus - simply to be nice?
Ever since Keith had started hanging out with Lance during his breaks, they'd become really good friends. He'd accompanied Lance to his dorm a few times, often with Hunk and Pidge included, and it was starting to feel like he'd always been a part of their friend group. Plus, Keith really helped Lance take his mind off the whole soulmate thing. It no longer seemed so pressing and drastic to figure out just who had managed to fall in love with him. He'd find out when he'd find out, and he was realizing that that was no longer such a horrifying idea.
"We can still go to my dorm, if you want," Lance said, reaching forward to shut his textbook entirely. He hated his oceanography class anyway. He'd thought it was going to be interesting - he loved the ocean, after all - but to his dismay he'd come to find out that oceanography involved a lot more than just the ocean. First, they'd learned about space, and the formation of the earth, and then the earth without any water in it, and then the earth when Pangea began to split... They hadn't even gotten to the actual water yet, much less the life in it, which was what Lance had been most excited for.
"Aren't you studying?" Keith asked with a frown.
"Just finished," Lance lied. It was more of a half-truth, really. He was done, if you considered the fact that he wasn't going to crack open his textbook again. "So? You wanna come? We can watch Brooklyn Nine-Nine together," he bribed. Keith didn't have a Hulu account, which meant he only ever watched it when he was with Lance. And right now, he looked sorely tempted.
"Fine," he said. "But don't blame me if you fail whatever exam's coming up."
Lance tucked his textbook and laptop into his bag and swung it over his shoulder before starting off towards the exit. Keith fell into step beside him, bangs falling in front of his face as his gaze ventured toward the ground. Lance noticed this happen a lot, which only made him wonder what Keith would look like with his hair pulled back. It certainly looked long enough to be put up, and though once upon a time he'd thought man-bun's looked pretty douche-y, he couldn't help thinking it'd look good on Keith.
They stepped out of the library and onto the quad. The sky was overcast and it was particularly windy out, leaves whipping through the air as they began the long trek towards the east side of campus. That was probably the worst thing about college, not that Lance minded all that much. It could just be a pain, when you were the kind of person who often slept through your alarm and found yourself sprinting across campus with your shoes untied and half a bagel in your mouth, already ten minutes late to your intro to lit class.
The campus was pretty, though. People had always been saying that to him, back when he'd been a senior in high school looking at colleges. Oh, you have to check out Blah Blah University, the campus is absolutely beautiful. He'd thought they all looked pretty much the same, but now that he was actually at a university, he couldn't disagree more. He looked around this whole place with affection - each sunset was dazzling, and the mountains were always visible in the distance, so different from what he was used to and so breathtaking because of it. Even the buildings looked beautiful, which wasn't something he'd ever really thought before.
About halfway back to The Shore - an ironic nickname for the dorms that bordered the rather pathetic and artificial pond on the east side of campus - a large raindrop splattered on Lance's forehead, making him pause with his drink halfway to his mouth.
"I just felt a raindrop," he announced.
"I didn't," said Keith, seconds before the sky opened up without warning, as if to say, feel it now, Keith?
They both shouted, drenched almost instantly, and took off running, Lance regretfully abandoning his drink in a trashcan along the way. They weren't even close to either of their dorms yet, and not wanting to run through the rain for another ten minutes, they sprinted into the nearest building, the on-campus post office and lounge (an odd mix, Lance knew).
They stood gasping in the entryway, looking around. No post office employees were there, seeing as it'd passed closing time a while ago now, and the only other students around were those dotted along the lounge with laptops and books open in front of them and the few taking shelter much like Keith and Lance.
"My laptop better not have gotten wet," Lance grumbled, glaring out at the rain.
"It's in your bag and a laptop case, it'll be fine," Keith said. "I'm the one who has to wear this same exact outfit at work tomorrow."
They ended up heading further into the building, not wanting to stand by the windows and not seeing any of the good seats remaining in the lounge area. They came to a stop towards the back entrance, where Lance spied a stairwell that he immediately sat himself on. His clothes were sticking uncomfortably to his skin, and he ran a hand through his hair in an attempt to make it look less horribly plastered to his head.
Keith sat down next to him with a sigh, his shoulder brushing Lance's, and Lance determinedly ignored the heat that radiated from that point of contact. The air conditioning was on high in the building, and goosebumps were littered all over his skin from the combination of that and his wet clothes, and yet he still felt suspiciously warm.
Get a grip, he told himself. You have a soulmate.
"Guess we won't be getting back anytime soon," Keith said, leaning back on his elbows and finally dislodging his arm from where it'd rested against Lance's.
"We can find a way to pass the time," Lance promised.
"Yeah, like what?" Keith said. Lance realized he was watching him say it. Like, watching. The way his lips moved to form the words, the way his mouth quirked up at the end as he waited for an answer. Lance yanked his eyes back up to Keith's at the last moment, hoping he hadn't noticed.
Lance still hadn't answered. How long had it been? Seconds? Minutes?
No, if it'd been minutes Keith wouldn't be looking at him like that, like he was a normal person.
Just respond, Lance, he told himself. Say something normal. You say normal things every day.
"Like this," Lance said dramatically, jumping to his feet, only moments before he smacked Keith on the shoulder and shouted, "You're it!" Yeah. That definitely wasn't a normal thing to say.
"Wha - Romeo!" Keith yelled, and what ensued was the most intense game of tag Lance had ever played. Not because Keith was that insane of a player, but because college was and always would be a very strange and wonderful place. After getting tagged for the third time, Lance noticed a group of bystanders watching them with amusement, and he ended up tagging one of them. Instead of rolling their eyes and telling Lance to fuck off, they gave chase.
Soon, the whole building was playing. Study sessions were upended and innocent people who claimed they weren't playing were getting roped into what would soon go down in history as The Great Mail-Room Tag Game.
At one point, Lance was hiding in a janitor closet - stylish, he knew - when he peered Keith sprinting down the hallway, clothing now only damp and sweat sticking his hair to his forehead instead of rain. He reached out and yanked Keith into the closet with a startled yelp just in time to get him out of the way of his pursuer, which was a girl hurtling around the corner wearing a military uniform, which meant Keith totally owed him.
"You owe me," Lance whispered to him, just to make sure he knew. The closet was already cramped for one person, but with two people, it was downright unbearable. He could feel Keith's chest heaving against his own, could feel Keith's breaths against his neck.
Right then, Lance's soulmate decided to give him some sort of warm, fuzzy feeling in his stomach, as if they'd just come across a kitten or something. Not helping! he thought at them.
"I could've totally beaten that girl," Keith whispered back, an obvious lie, as the girl hurtled past their hiding space and onto her next victim. They stayed in there for a little bit longer, just to be sure, and Lance spent every second wishing he could escape immediately and remain there forever in equal amounts.
God, Lance was so fucked.
The game was still going strong by the time the two of them left, the rain finally having died down. Ten minutes later, they were both squished in Lance's twin bed - and dressed in Lance's dry clothes - and watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine under the covers. When Hunk walked in, he said nothing, just shook his head in mild exasperation.
--
"My life is ruined," Lance announced, slamming the door closed behind him. Hunk was sitting at his desk, squinting at his laptop in concentration as he continued to type. Probably for the essay that he'd said was due in the morning. Sorry, buddy.
"Uh...huh," Hunk said, distracted, his tongue now poking out of his mouth. "How come?"
He was much too used to Lance's dramatics. This was a crisis, dammit!
"I don't want to find my soulmate anymore," Lance announced. He'd just come back from Starbucks. That was a normal part of his day, now, but he was starting to think that he might have to avoid the place he'd been making it a point to constantly be.
Thankfully, this actually got Hunk's attention. His fingers stilled over the keyboard and he twisted carefully in his seat, directing his incredulous expression at Lance instead of his laptop. "Sorry, I think I momentarily fell asleep and had a weird dream. I haven't slept in two days. What did you say?"
"Dude, you need to sleep."
"Not after this much Redbull, I don't," Hunk proclaimed. He was usually the most put-together of the three of them - Lance, Pidge, and himself, that is - but this wasn't entirely out of character. He tended to get all panicky and uber-concentrated right before a big assignment was due.
"And to think I thought Pidge was the unhealthy one..." Lance muttered.
"Why don't you want to find your soulmate, Lance?" Hunk prompted. "That was real, right?"
"Yeah," Lance said, and he sank down onto his own desk chair, pulling his feet up onto the seat so he could hug his knees to his chest. He planted his chin on his left one. "I just... don't think I'm ready."
"Bullshit," Hunk said, calling his bluff. "You've been ready to meet your soulmate since you were five. I don't think I've gone a day of my life without hearing you talk about meeting them."
Lance sighed, and it felt like his entire body deflated with the breath. "Yeah, but..." he said, trying to build himself up to it. He'd been trying not to admit to it, honestly. Acting as if he didn't acknowledge it, it wouldn't be real. Like he could shove the realization out of his mind and live on in ignorant bliss.
It wasn't working.
"I think... I like Keith," he admitted, his voice coming out small and quiet. It was the opposite of how he said most things, all loud and dramatic.
Whatever Lance was expecting - gasping, widened eyes, possible things thrown - didn't happen. Hunk just blinked at him. "And?"
"And this is happening at the worst possible time! I have a soulmate! They're out there, and they're in love with me, and I'm crushing on some other dude!"
"What if Keith is your soulmate?" Hunk proposed, as if Lance hadn't gone to bed the last several nights fucking dreaming that that was the case.
"He can't be. He still doesn't know my name."
At that, Hunk's expression did sink. Still, he was Lance's best friend, so he tried to power through it. "And?" he finally prompted. "There's nothing wrong with dating before your soulmate. Hell, most people do date before their soulmates. That's how you find them."
"Yeah, for most people, maybe!" Lance said. "But mine's already out there and waiting!"
"Except they still haven't come to you," Hunk pointed out. "So maybe they aren't ready yet. Maybe this is a good thing."
"I feel like I'm betraying them by feeling this way," Lance muttered, sinking into himself even more. His shoulders slumped forward, and he pressed his forehead to his knee. "And I can't tell Keith. It'd totally weird him out. He knows I'm looking for my soulmate."
"You never know until you ask," Hunk said patiently. "Maybe just... see what happens, you know? If something comes out of your friendship, then just... let it."
Lance shrugged, still not looking at Hunk.
"Well don't beat yourself up over a crush, at least," Hunk said. "If your soulmate wanted you all to themselves already, then they could've done that, like, what? A month ago?"
Lance frowned. Had it really been that long? Had he really been staring at his name on his wrist, looking so familiar yet somehow not familiar enough, for an entire month already?
"Maybe the reason they haven't told you yet is because they're dating someone else right now."
"Bastard," Lance muttered, but Hunk just laughed.
"If you like Keith, Lance, I think you should give it a shot. At the very least, it could be a learning experience."
"Yeah, maybe," Lance muttered. "Thanks for talking to me, Hunk."
"No problem," Hunk said. "Now can you do me a favor?"
Lance picked his head up, looking at his friend.
"Can you get me a Five Hour Energy?"
--
Lance wasn't planning on taking Hunk's advice. Sure, it sounded nice all packaged and gift wrapped like that, but reality wasn't that simple. He could start dating Keith and his soulmate could finally muster up the courage to talk to him the very next day. He could fall so in love with Keith that when his soulmate did talk to him, he couldn't break it off - stuff like that happened to soulmates all the time. Hell, he could ask Keith out and Keith could flat our refuse.
But then, a lot of things happened to Lance that he didn't plan for. He didn't plan to get a rejection letter from his top choice school and end up going to his second only to fall head over heels in love with it. He didn't plan to trek all the way across campus to the Chick Fil A they had housed in one of the dining halls only to get there and realize it was Sunday. He didn't plan to have his soulmate fall in love with him in the middle of a busy Starbucks where everyone could be privy to their embarrassing little revelation.
And he certainly hadn't planned to end up like this, with one hand gripping the back of Keith's hair as he kissed along his jaw while Keith made these tortured noises in his ear.
All right, maybe Lance should backtrack a little.
It'd been a normal day, just like any other. By that, of course, Lance meant that he'd jerked awake to find he'd slept through his first seven alarms and scrambled out of bed, cursing himself for scheduling his classes so much later than Hunk's. Never again would he make it so that Hunk left so long before him.
So he'd gotten to class, managing to brush his teeth but not shower, and managing to grab his bag but not put any of the right notebooks in it, and sat down for the remainder of the lecture, ignoring the pointed look from his professor. His subsequent classes were better, if only because he was on time (though still wildly underprepared), and by the time he'd gotten out of his third class, he was free.
He'd stopped at the dining hall on his way to the library, where he'd made a sandwich and grabbed no less than six cookies at the all-you-can-eat buffet, and made it to Starbucks just in time to stand in line with everyone else that went to Starbucks after their classes. Hooray.
Still, it wasn't all bad, because Keith had noticed him standing in line way before he usually did, which meant Lance had spent the wait periodically looking up from his phone to find Keith already staring at him. What had followed was a stupid game of them making faces at each other, which Lance had definitely won, if he had any say in the matter, and then he'd finally reached the counter.
"You're late, Romeo," Keith had pointed out, which - solely because Lance was stupid and had an embarrassing crush - had made him blush. Because Keith knew what time he usually came. And normally Lance didn't grab food on his way to the library, but seeing as he'd chosen brushing his teeth over grabbing breakfast that morning...
"If by 'you're late' you mean 'thank you for bringing me this cookie', then yes, I guess I am late," Lance had replied, before handing Keith a cookie wrapped in napkins from the dining hall. Keith had looked surprised, but Lance hadn't given him a chance to respond, had kept talking as he'd savored the way Keith's cheeks had gone pink. "I'll have my usual, please."
"Sure thing," Keith had said. "Name?"
"Darcy." He'd been keeping it up with the romantic names, ever since the whole Soul Mark incident. Google had definitely become his friend, and he usually made it a point to find a new famous lead in a love story to give to Keith when he got up to the counter. Sometimes Keith humored him and actually wrote the name, but most of the time he stuck with 'Romeo'.
And it'd been a normal day. Save for the surprise cookie he'd given Keith. He'd sat at his table, done his work (for once), and kept Keith company during his break (it no longer felt like Keith was the one keeping him company). He'd stuck around until Keith had gotten off, planning to invite him back to his dorm, when things had taken a huge deviation from the norm.
"I need a drink," Keith had announced. Lance hadn't blamed him. Service jobs sucked, and he couldn't think of any more stressful than something like Starbucks. And he'd known he'd seen Keith drinking before, technically, but he hardly remembered that night at the party, and he'd been excited to see Keith tipsy, especially since he really knew him now.
So they'd gotten in Keith's car (scholarship students got all kinds of privileges others didn't - like being able to have their car on campus) and gone to a nearby bar, fake IDs in hand. Unfortunately, Lance still didn't get to see Keith drunk.
Because after only one drink each, this mega creepy dude started trying to make the moves on Keith, and Keith was clearly uncomfortable, so Lance did what any good Samaritan would do and stepped in. Like... in between Keith's legs, where Keith had been sat on the barstool.
"Dude, stop hitting on my boyfriend," Lance had said, and the guy had looked a little affronted before rolling his eyes and muttering 'whatever' before walking away.
And then Lance had just... still been there. In between Keith's legs. Staring at him.
"You didn't have to do that," Keith had said, always a stupid amount of stubborn.
"Just doing my Romeo duty," Lance had proclaimed.
"That's doesn't even make sense."
"Sure it does," Lance had scoffed. And he'd told himself to move - really, he had - but his body hadn't listened to him. His legs had stayed glued stubbornly to the floor, determined to stay Right There where he could feel Keith's knees on either side of his waist, and so he had.
God, I want to kiss you, he'd thought.
"What?" Keith had squeaked, proving that Lance was bad at not speaking the things he thought, apparently.
And then it'd been a whole bunch of stuttering as Lance had attempted to explain. As he'd attempted to convince Keith that he wanted to find his soulmate - really, he did! - but he was just really attracted to Keith, and he couldn't help it, and he hadn't meant to shove his feelings all into Keith's face, and-
Yeah, it'd gone on like that. But Keith had kissed him quiet. And then Lance had kissed him loud.
And now, they'd somehow wound up in the back of the bar, pressed against some wall that was probably pretty disgusting, and yet Lance wasn't thinking about that. He was thinking about the sounds he was apparently capable of making Keith make, and the way they changed in pitch and tone when Lance kissed here, sucked there.
"F-fuck," Keith gasped, his fingers bunching the material of Lance's shirt around his waist. "Can we leave soon?"
"Hunk's in my dorm," Lance said, his voice coming out guttural.
"Oh," said Keith. "You want-you want to go back to a dorm?"
Lance pulled away, his face flushing. "Uh. Not necessarily... I mean, we don't have to-"
"No, it's fine," Keith interrupted. "We can go to mine. I have a single."
And Lance, who had gone back to mackin' on Keith's throat, abruptly pulled away again. "Seriously?"
"Yeah," Keith said. "It's part of the-"
"Scholarship program," Lance finished for him. "Man, what don't you guys get?"
"A stable home life?" Keith suggested, eyes twinkling, and Lance snorted, letting his forehead land on Keith's shoulder.
"Don't do that to me man," he groaned, laughing into Keith's shirt. Only recently, Keith had done something dumb which had prompted Lance to say, man, who raised you? To which Keith had responded, well, a lot of people, actually. I grew up in foster care. The following silence had been unbearable.
They ended up going back to Keith's dorm, though.
--
Having Keith as his boyfriend was... truly something else. For one thing, he had to warn any friends he was with that didn't know Keith already not to say his name. "It's a long story."
Furthermore, there was the constant teasing from Pidge and the endless, terribly smug looks from Hunk. And then there was the actual dating Keith part, which wasn't so bad.
"Name?" Keith said, eyebrows raised and smirk prominent.
"Edward," said Lance.
Keith blinked. "That's not from a famous love story," he said, obviously having caught on to Lance's tactic.
"Have you forgotten Twilight so soon?" Lance said dramatically, placing a hand to his heart.
"Jesus Christ."
"Also not my real name," Lance joked, making Keith roll his eyes.
Minutes later, another server was calling out, "Romeo!" because apparently Keith had refused to put Edward on the cup for him. He should be getting off any minute now, so Lance didn't sit down, he just stood near one of the tall tables and waited, watching Keith in action.
He liked looking at Keith when Keith didn't know he was looking at him. The way he frowned when he typed people's orders onto the screen, and the way he got that furrow in his brow when he counted money. How his expression absolutely deadened when someone was being an asshole to him. He liked seeing how different his expressions were when he interacted with strangers versus when he interacted with Lance. How they never got to see him smile all soft, never got to see the gooey look in his eyes or the way he blushed.
Finally, Keith's shift ended. One of his co-workers came up and tapped him on the shoulder and Keith shot them a grateful look before pulling his apron over his head and hanging it on a hook. He disappeared into a door behind the counter and was gone for another minute or two before he emerged from a different door, this one not behind the counter.
"Hey, Romeo," he greeted, before plucking Lance's drink out of his hand and taking a sip. His face wrinkled. "Urgh."
"Hey!" Lance protested - both the theft and the insult. "You wrote this order down, Keith. You knew what it was."
"And I was hoping it'd taste better," he said petulantly. "How the hell do you drink this much sugar? Every day?"
"It powers my body."
"I think that's the caffeine."
The two of them had emerged from the library. It was a nice day out, the sun high in the sky and the breeze not too chilly. Lance found himself linking hands with Keith thoughtlessly, though he much appreciated the way it made Keith's cheeks grow pink. The curse of light skin. Or blessing, in Lance's case - he got to see it all the time.
"Where are we headed?" Keith asked, his fingers tightening around Lance's a bit as the words left his mouth.
"Secret," Lance said, grinning. "Ooh! Look! Let's take that!" He was pointing at a motorized scooter. They were littered all around campus for anyone to use, as long as they had the app and a credit card.
"No," Keith said. "No way."
"What? You scared?"
"With you steering? Terrified."
Lance just scoffed, and he used their connected hands to drag him to the scooter, his phone already in his opposite hand. The scooter beeped as it connected to his phone, and then he climbed on, one foot keeping balance on the ground, as he looked over at Keith.
"Come on," he said, still grinning. He knew Keith was going to give in a moment before he actually did, his shoulders slumping forward in defeat.
"Fine," he said, and then he clambered onto the scooter - not really meant for two people - and wrapped his arms tight around Lance's waist. "You better not kill us."
"I would never," Lance gasped, scandalized, before putting his hands on the handles. The right handle accelerated, and the left one braked. "Hold on," he said, before twisting the right one and shooting off.
Keith yelped, his arms suddenly wrapping around Lance much more tightly. Lance laughed, exhilarated, the breeze suddenly much colder as he flew into it. Soon, Keith got his bearings, and he was giggling into the back of Lance's neck, arms gripping him tighter whenever Lance turned.
"Where are we going?" Keith demanded.
"Telling you would ruin the surprise, wouldn't it?" Lance shouted back. They were coming up on an intersection - only the campus buses and occasional student drivers drove here - and the pedestrian crossing sign was counting down, already at five. Lance twisted the acceleration as far as it would go.
"Oh my God!" Keith shouted. "Lance! Slow down!"
For a second, Lance just laughed. But then realization slammed into him, and the scooter jerked as it did, nearly flinging the both of them off into the middle of the road. At the last moment, he regained his balance and composure, straightening them out just in time to fly up onto the other side of the side walk, the crossing sign changing back to a red hand - stop.
"What did you say?" his voice was strained and quiet, but Keith obviously heard it. He wasn't hugging Lance so tight anymore, was trying to put space between them, it seemed like.
"I said to slow down," Keith said carefully, and Lance shook his head. He was... confused. And beneath that confusion, a little angry. Keith knew his name? For how long? Why hadn't he said anything? Why was Lance so annoyed about it?
"You said something else," Lance said. He didn't realize he was speeding up, the scooter going faster as his heartbeat did.
"You need to slow down," Keith said. Lance ignored him.
"Say it," he said, and Keith's head bonked against the back of his shoulder.
"Lance," he said, practically whispered, but Lance heard it loud and clear. He sped up. Zoomed across sidewalks, weaved between students, hurtled toward his surprise destination. Keith knew his name?
And then it hit him, all over again. His name on his wrist. As if the person had known him but hadn't known his name. As if they'd heard countless aliases, and his true name had wrung clear to them, hammered into them with some sort of distinct meaning.
But why would Keith be in love with him? And why wouldn't he just tell Lance?
"Keith," Lance said. He'd slowed down on the scooter, mindlessly. He didn't feel mad anymore. He felt... breathless. Suspended. Balanced between one place and another, hanging in the limbo that came right before a realization. "Do you love me?"
Keith's arms went tight around him again. Lance could feel him shaking. The scooter was moving at a crawl now, creeping along the sidewalk, going tha-thunk, tha-thunk, tha-thunk over every crack in the pavement.
"Yes," Keith admitted softly.
And Lance shook his head, grinning. What an idiot. When he'd talked to Lance about that supposed soulmate, had suggested that Lance just keeping coming to Starbucks, that they'd work up the courage eventually - he'd been talking about himself. The whole time.
"I'm sorry," Keith continued, clearly not having realized that, of all things, Lance felt glad. "I was just embarrassed, okay? Who falls in love with some boy that tells them shitty pick-up lines and goes by fake names? Who falls in love watching that boy shriek at the sight of a spider?"
"You'd better get used to that shriek, Keith," Lance said.
"What?"
"You're going to be the one killing spiders for me, now," Lance informed him, and Keith spluttered behind him.
"I-what? What do you-"
But Lance could barely hear him. He was grinning and shaking his head. Oh, Keith, he thought. He thought of all the stupid pick-up lines he'd told him. All the fake names he'd employed, simply to tease him with. He thought of the name that'd stuck, the one Keith had chosen, and probably for a reason, too. That romantic. I'll be your Romeo.
Keith made a weird noise behind him, moments between an eerie blue glow surrounded them. It surprised Lance so much he finally lost control of the scooter, the handle wobbling terribly in his hands before he rode off the sidewalk and into the grass, the two of them tumbling to the ground with an, "Oof!"
Lance flipped over immediately, sitting up to look down at Keith. He was laying there, eyes closed and rubbing his elbow with a frown. His entire body was glowing, his veins lit up with a bright blue light - Lance's light. When Keith's eyes opened, they were blue, blue, blue, glowing and winking out of existence with every blink.
Slowly, the glow started to fade out of Keith's skin - finally allowing the air to return to Lance's lungs, he'd been so breathless beholding the sight - and Keith gaped at him. And then he hissed, gripping his wrist as the burning pain of his Soul Mark assaulted it. When he pulled his hand away, he peered down at the skin there.
He looked back up at Lance, incredulous. "'I'll be your Romeo'?"
Lance flushed. "Shut up," he said. "At least it's not your name."
And then Keith was blushing too. "It was monumental!" he argued. "I'd been waiting to hear it for a long time!"
Lance couldn't help it - he laughed. He planted his head on Keith's shoulder and laughed and laughed. The stupid scooter was still draining his credit card, because he hadn't disconnected his phone, and Keith's shoulder was shaking under his forehead, because he was laughing too. And it was perfect. It was just perfect, being there with Keith. Being his soulmate.
"I can't believe you fell in love with me 'cause of a spider," Lance said.
"And I can't believe you fell in love with me because I said your name," Keith countered. "How conceited."
Lance shoved Keith backward with a laugh, and then he climbed on top of him, planting kisses all over his face. They never made it to Lance's surprise destination, which was this outlook he'd discovered with a great view of the mountains, but it didn't matter. He could take Keith another day.
--
"Name?" Keith said, smirking familiarly.
"Paris."
"Helen of Troy?" Keith said almost absently as he wrote on the cup.
"Ding ding!" said Lance. "How's work?"
"I spilled coffee on my pants," Keith said, sending Lance a grumpy look.
"Delicious," Lance said, ignoring Keith's glare. "Do you want to switch pants? I could wear yours back to my dorm."
"No," Keith said with a sigh. "Are you going to stay here until my break?"
"If you give me a cookie," Lance said angelically, but Keith was already reaching for the baked goods.
"Go get a good seat," Keith said as he handed him the cookie in a little bag. Lance knew that really meant go get a booth. That way they'd be able to cuddle up next to each other for Keith's entire break. Keith might even bring Lance a second drink, by that time.
He waited at the end of the counter for his drink, shaking his head in exasperation as the employee called out, "Lance!"
Keith never wrote his fake names anymore, though he still did call him Romeo.
Still, Lance didn't exactly mind. When he reached for the drink, his sleeve pulled back, revealing the word on his wrist. Lance. It perfectly matched Keith's scrawl across the cup.