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autisticlancemcclain · 8 months

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Keith is acting suspicious.

Lance is sure of it. Beyond his usual shiftiness, his awkwardness, his tendency towards privacy. Lance knows his boyfriend, and he knows him well, and as such he knows enough to realise that his boyfriend is acting fuckin’ dubious.

Lance is going to snoop. (Yeah, yeah, ethical schmethical. Snooping fosters distrust in relationships and makes things tense blah blah blah. Lance recognises that. He also grew up with fucking Hunk Garrett and His Entire Family, so he also recognises that snooping is simply the best way to gather information. Fair’s fair.)

He waits until his boyfriend’s snores start to kick up, making the bedroom sound like an illegal motorized lawnmower race, and then carefully starts scooching out of his arms.

It takes a while — Keith likes to hold him. (Lance has to take a moment to calm himself down after the thought, lest he start to giggle giddily to himself, reminded that Keith loves him so much that at his most unguarded, his first instinct is to crush Lance in his arms. It’s exhilarating.) But slowly and steadily he manages to slide out of the arms around his waist, filling the newly hollow space with a pillow, and tumbles to the floor. He takes a moment, crossing his legs and sitting next to the bed, to look up at Keith, at the ratty mess of his bedhead and wide open snoring mouth and the tank top skewed across his torso, the hickeys Lance left all across his chest and collarbones peeking out.

“You are such a shit,” he whispers fondly. “I love you so bad it makes me want to, like, bite you or something. You make me weird.”

He watches Keith’s chest rise and fall until his legs fall asleep, wherein he flops onto the hardwood, wiggling his legs through the pins and needles and screeching silently into his arm (worst feeling in the WORLD) until his legs no longer feel like they’re on fire, and then he inches himself towards the right corner of the room like an inchworm.

(It’s three in the morning. No one is awake to judge him to give him shit or laugh at him or anything. He can do what he likes.)

He pulls himself up to his knees when he finally makes it to the corner, loosening his shoulders in preparation. The room is dark, so it’ll be a challenge, but this is not the first time he’s done this. Hell, it isn’t even the fiftieth. He’s a nosy person. He could do this in his sleep, probably, so in the dark is no problem.

As slowly as he can manage, to make sure it’s silent, he pries off the metal grate covering of the air vent, setting it down gently beside him. Laying down on his stomach again to get a better angle, he reaches down into the wide tube, following the curve of the cool metal, arm buried up to his shoulder, until he’s reached as far as he physically can. He carefully starts brushing his hands along the air vent, searching, feeling. It shouldn’t be too far down since his arms are way longer than Keith’s (Lance enjoys calling him T-Rex, which Keith hates and literally everyone else who knows them loves. It’s great).

Finally, his fingers brush on something small, compact, sturdy, and soft. He wraps his fist around it and slowly drags it out of the vent, keeping it in his fist as he crawls out of the bedroom and down the hall, somersaulting into the kitchen. He heads over to the fridge, figuring that if he uses the fridge light and Keith walks in, he can just pretend he’s getting a snack or something, shoving the thing he found into his pants. Keith’ll be too out of it to question it, anyway.

Laughing quietly and evilly to himself as he pulls open the fridge door, he brings his closed fist up to the light, examining the treasure he found. It takes a moment for his eyes to adjust to the light, to take in what’s in front of him.

He gasps sharply when he processes, and the treasure slips out of his hands, clattering loudly to the floor.

He freezes immediately, listening for the telltale signs of his boyfriend snorting awake, noticing Lance’s side of the bed is empty, then the sound of his footsteps as he comes to look for him.

But, fortunately, there’s nothing. The only thing Lance hears are Keith’s continued snores.

Rapidly, Lance scoops up the box and brings it back to the light. It’s unmistakable — there’s only one thing that houses in a small hinged velvet box. It explains the shiftiness over the last few weeks, too, the nervousness that Keith has been disgusting as mysterious intrigue.

Keith is going to propose. Keith is going to propose!

Smiling so widely his face hurts, Lance flicks open the box, bringing his face closer to carefully inspect the ring inside.

It’s difficult to see in the dull blue light of the fridge, but Lance starts to cry when he sees it, because he recognises this ring. This is Keith’s dad’s ring; old, heavy gold, classic princess cut diamond, simple and polished and elegant. This is the ring Keith often wears around his neck, although he rarely has as of late, for now obvious reasons. This is the ring Keith has carried with him for almost two decades. This is, without a doubt, Keith’s most prized Earthly possession, and his intent is to gift it to Lance, as a promise of his love and trust and faithfulness.

Lance has to sit down so he doesn’t pass out. He grabs a dishtowel on the way to the floor, pressing it to his face to muffle his absolutely wailing sobs, the most ugly crying he’s literally ever done in his life.

He’s so glad he snooped. If he had this reaction when Keith finally summoned the balls to ask him, his engagement photos would be so embarrassing.

He paused mid-sniffle.

Actually.

A little embarrassed of himself, he slides up his phone, holding the ring box up to his tear-swollen and smiling face to snap a picture. He looks like a mess, but it’s important to him to have a physical memory of the moment he first learned Keith planned to marry him. He’s sure he’ll cry more over it the next time he’s feeling sappy and emotional.

He doesn’t realise how long he sits, fridge wide open, back to the cabinet doors of the kitchen island, staring in awe at the ring, until his watch starts to beep.

“Fuck,” he curses, scrambling to his feet. It’s six o’clock. Keith’ll be up in fifteen minutes to go on his morning run, Lance has literally been mooning over his ring for two and a half hours.

He runs back to the bedroom, barely remembering at the last second time muffle his footsteps, shoving the ring back into the vent and pressing the grate back onto the hole. Keith stirs slightly at the noise, so Lance abandons any thought of whether or not the ring box is positioned back exactly where he found it and fuckin’ dives for the bed, reburying himself in his boyfriend’s arms and hoping he can pass it off as just having shifted around in his sleep or something. Apparently he squirms and kicks a lot (which is a lie that Keith perpetuates to take attention away from the severity of his snores), so it should be fine. Probably.

“Wh—L’nce?” Keith mumbles, stirring from behind him. He inhales deeply, arms pulling away from Lance’s and stretching out above him. Lance’s heart pounds. He forces himself to stay relaxed, to avoid squeezing his eyes shut. He prays that Keith doesn’t notice how sweaty he is.

Keith leans over to press a lingering kiss to his neck, then chuckles. Lance can feel the imprint of his smile on his skin, and tamping down his own reflexive smile is literally the hardest thing he has ever had to do in his entire life.

“You’re warm as hell,” Keith murmurs, dragging his lips down his neck, across his shoulders. His hand comes to rest in his hip, curling into the hollow there. “Betcha you were squrimin’ around in y’re sleep last night, ya worm. Betcha I’ve got bruises on my shins.” His shoulders, pressed against Lance’s back, shake with his laughter, because he is a shithead who is so lucky that Lance loves him. He presses one final kiss to Lance’s skin and then rolls out of bed. Lance listens carefully as he gets dressed in his jogging clothes and runs a brush through his hair. He falls half asleep listening to the familiar sounds, rousing slightly again when Keith ducks back in to kiss Lance’s head one last time before heading out.

Lance smiles as he falls asleep for real, after the sound of the front door opening and closing.

He’s gonna clown that dumbass so goddamn badly.

———

Lance has a love-hate relationship with pranks. On one hand, the one and only time he was sent into an asthma attack so bad he had to go to the hospital was after he and Hunk wrapped every single thing in Veronica’s room with aluminum foil while she was away on a trip, and upon seeing her reaction laughed so hard his lungs basically collapsed. He still can’t think of that without laughing. On the other hand, he’s had more than enough cruel pranks shoved his way, and never in his life wants anyone to feel humiliated because of something he did.

He can’t not prank Keith, though. He’s literally beat Keith to his own proposal. A prank is in order.

Usually, he’d call Hunk for something like that. They’ve been partners in crimes for most of their lives, after all. Pidge too, honestly. He knows they’d both get a kick out of this whole situation as well.

But…even if those dunderheads were capable of keeping their mouths shut, which they’re not, Lance kind of wants to…well, he wants to keep his proposal to himself. He likes being in on it. He likes being to only one in on it, actually. Honestly, the only thing he wants to do is brag to Keith that he knows, which defeats the whole purpose.

He straightens abruptly. A smirk spreads across his face.

He has an idea.

———

The first step is recon. He needs access to the ring, regularly and long-term, but all will be for naught if Keith realises it’s missing. He needs to know if Keith stashed the ring when he decided to propose and avoided thinking about it, or if he checks on it frequently and stresses himself out about when he’s finally going to go through with it. Both are very Keith options. In fact Lance wouldn’t be surprised if he somehow managed both at the same time, as impossible as that seems.

To get around the issue, Lance goes Spy Barbie. He waits until Keith goes out for his weekly coffee date with Shiro and Adam and then digs through his makeup kit, setting aside what he needs and sitting next to the air vent grate. He spends a good amount of time polishing the metal, making sure it’s as fresh and untouched as it was when it was first put in its package, and then he uses a wide end brush to apply a thin layer of highlighter to the white metal. He takes great care to ensure that no colour is visible, only a slight sheen if one were to look closely. And Keith doesn’t have any reason to look closely, and since Lance knows the universe loves him, he won’t.

The next step is waiting. Lance acts completely normally when Keith gets home, if a little giddy. Keith most certainly notices Lance’s giggles and affection and the way he can’t seem to keep his hands to himself, but he doesn’t seem to mind or question it. Lance does sometimes get like this, after all.

He scored a hot as hell boyfriend. He’s allowed to be a little awed sometimes. He doesn’t feel weird about it.

He does, however, mellow out in the next few days. Keith takes him to a car show, which is fucking wicked, and somehow manages to get himself and Lance behind the wheels of two 200 horsepower Mustangs for them to race, which is so exhilarating that Lance doesn’t have words for it. He just yells and jumps around about it a lot. He doesn’t actually manage to find words for a couple hours after he totally smokes Keith’s ass, but whatever. It’s cool. Keith tried his best and everything, Lance is sure.

A week later, when Keith is out on his coffee date again, Lance gets to work. He cuts a large square of parchment paper and covers it with clear packing tape, careful not to touch the sticky side, overlapping strips so they make one giant tape sheet.

Once the parchment sheet is covered, he peels off the tape, and as planned it comes off in one large sheet, slightly bigger than the air vent grate. Again careful to steer clear of the sticky part, he places the tape sheet sticky side down onto the grate, pressing down hard and rubbing to smooth it out completely flat. Once he’s sure it’s totally stuck down, he picks at one corner until it’s loose, then slowly and meticulously peels the whole sheet back. He holds the tape, now showcasing the concealer-print of the grate, up to the light, examining it with the utmost scrutiny.

Not one single fingerprint in sight. Keith has not touched the grate at all, hasn’t dug into his secret hiding spot. He is taking the refusing to think about it route, then.

Lance smirks. He reaches down and scoops up the ring, placing the grate back where it belongs and skipping out to the living room, humming jovially to himself.

Excellent.

———

The first picture Lance snaps, while biting his lip so hard to keep back his laughter it bleeds, is once again in the dead of night, two weeks after Lance first discovered the ring. Keith is sprawled out on his back this time, arms and legs askew, sheets tangled somewhere around his legs. Lance shifts so they’re both facing the same direction, then holds up his phone camera, trying to figure out how to artfully position himself for utmost devastation upon discovery. He decides eventually on a classic.

He heads over to the dresser to pick out his cutest pajamas, settling on the red spaghetti strap top with lace and short-shorts, debating on accessorizing and deciding at the last minute not to bother except for lip gloss, which is always appropriate. He climbs into bed next to Keith, gently laying his head on his chest and maneuvering one arm to wrap around Lance’s hips. The other he leaves flopped on top of the pillows. He leaves Keith’s mouth wide open because it’s funny, and goes the extra mile to mess up Keith’s hair worse than it already is, because that’s funnier. Finally he flicks open the ring case with his left hand and holds it to his face, grinning widely, and uses his right to snap a picture of the two of them. Once he’s satisfied with it, he untangles himself from the bed again, puts the ring away, presses a sticky lip gloss kiss to Keith’s cheek for funsies, and crawls back into bed for real. His sleep is sound as a baby’s.

———

The next photo doesn’t actually happen for another month. Lance fears overdoing it, and also kind of fears getting caught with the ring, so he leaves it in its hiding spot until the opportunity for another cheeky photo presents itself.

The opportunity in question arrives when Keith announces that he has arranged to drive down to the secluded beach that Lance took him too early in their relationship to spend the day. At first Lance thinks he’s proposing for real, and to check he waits until Keith has the car all packed up and ready to go and then pretends to run inside to go to the washroom. Instead he ducks into their room and tears into the air vent, grasping around until his fingers close around the box.

He scoffs to himself. Wimp.

He quickly shoves the box into his fanny pack (fanny packs are COOL and CONVENIENT and Lance will not hear a word of controversy on the subject, they are absolutely nothing like Keith’s dweeb utility belt) and sprints back to the car. When Keith asks him why he’s smirking, Lance manages to convince him that he’s just excited for the beach.

Lance should have been an actor, honestly.

He mostly forgets about the ring while they’re there. He has enough sense to keep it in the car instead of on the beach so it doesn’t get stolen, unlikely as it is, and just enjoys the day with his boyfriend. He convinces Keith to go jet skiing with him and cackles to himself as he purposely sends Keith flying off the back of it. He screeches at the top of his lungs later when Keith scoops him up from his nap and literally chucks him into the ice cold water. The two of them make really garbage sculptures of their friends in the sand to amuse themselves. They gather ugly seashells and send pictures to their friends asking them if they’ve been turned into mollusks, since there is a resemblance. The whole day was a blast. Lance firmly slots it in his top ten days of all time.

When they go for a long walk to watch the sunset, Lance snaps a picture with the ring and a very teasing grin the second Keith has his back turned. He will bring up how this was a perfect moment to propose, and he will pat Keith’s head condescendingly about it. He can’t wait.

———

The third photo is another dead-of-night-situation. Lance knows it’s repetitive, but it’s easy and it’s funny and Lance can’t resist.

To change things up a bit, he decides not to be in the photo, and also to see just how much he can get away with.

Keith is on his side, this time, one hand tucked under the pillow, one hand held loose and open on top of it. He’s been tired, lately, and when Lance says he fell asleep the second his head hit the pillow, he is not exaggerating. In fact Lance is reasonably certain he passed out in the way down. He is KOed. He’s unconscious. He is absolutely dogged out.

The timing is perfect.

Carefully, aware of the consequences should Lance make a mistake, he removes the ring from its box. He realizes abruptly that it’s the first time he’s ever done that, despite his ridiculous quest, and he finds that he can’t quite let go of the ring just yet. The metal feels cool and smooth on his finger tips; worn, even. It’s shinier than it used to be, which means Keith has probably had it professionally retouched. Resized too, probably, although Lance can’t quite bring himself to check. The diamond catches the minimal light in the room and refracts into rainbows that fall softly on Keith’s lax face, highlighting his sharp jawline, his softly squished cheek, his relaxed brow. He looks so dorky when he sleeps, completely free of the furrow of concentration that usually resides in between his eyebrows, his resting frown. His mouth is always wide open when he’s out, and the echoing of his snores is so comically loud and ridiculous but absolutely something that Lance can’t live without. He has them recorded, actually, for the rare nights they’re not home together, on the rare night Lance has to sleep alone.

Smiling softly to himself, Lance places the ring in Keith’s open palm. He rests his hand on top of Keith’s for a moment, just because he can, just to relish in the scratch of Keith’s callouses on his skin, before pulling back and steadying his phone to snap a picture. He catches it right as Keith inhales heavily, right as his nose scrunches up.

It’s goofy as hell. It’s perfect.

———

The fourth picture is the riskiest, Lance thinks. He’s taken to carrying the ring around with him everywhere, almost as if he is the one planning to propose, just in case he has a moment when Keith’s back is turned. (There really aren’t that many. Keith faces him a lot. He likes to hold Lance hand and kiss his face, neither of which you can do from behind. Lance fucking loves his boyfriend so much.)

They’re at a Thing. Lance’s parents are celebrating their fortieth anniversary, and obviously Lance is bringing Keith, and since Keith is his mother’s favourite he is encouraged to bring his family as well, which means Shiro and Adam are coming, and if Hunk and Pidge weren’t invited then someone would cry and nothing would be right in the world, and of course Veronica is bringing Allura, and Coran comes because Lance’s dad thinks he’s the funniest man to walk the Earth. And of course all Lance’s relatives are there.

The point is that it’s a full house. A couple full houses, actually, since their neighbours are also involved. It’s a lot of people in one place.

As is protocol in crowded places, Keith is essentially glued to Lance’s side. Lance is quite happy with this arrangement, because he gets to show his boyfriend off like the hot piece of ass he is, especially to his rude ass great aunties and uncles who always had something to say about Lance and his single-ness when he was still rocking braces. So.

One thing about Keith, though, is that everyone who meets him is doomed to fall in love with him forever and ever, or so Lance has noticed. His niece and nephew are no exception, and immediately upon catching sight of their uncle — Keith, that is, Lance may as well be dead meat when Tio Keith is available, which, rude — they descend upon him not unlike a vulture may descend upon a recently deceased armadillo. Or whatever. Lance didn’t grow up in the desert, he doesn’t know what happens there.

Occupied as he is, one child hanging off each arm, Keith cannot keep his vice grip on Lance’s hand. Occupied as he is, two children talking at him in a mix of Spanish and English so rapid that Lance himself cannot keep up, which is saying something because his nickname for many years was and aptly so Motormouth, Keith cannot have his full attention on Lance. In fact, even, his back is delightfully turned.

Lance doesn’t hesitate. He flicks open the ring box and snaps a picture. His grin is nothing short of gleeful and he is entirely unapologetic.

When he turns back around, ring box stuffed back into his pocket, he realizes Nadia is staring at him with wide eyes.

“You, shush,” Lance says, and then switches to Spanish so Keith, who is still learning, will miss it, “or I’ll choose a random child to be my flower girl. I swear.”

She glares at him. “This is why Tio Keith is my favourite,” she mutters, because she is a snot who acts as if Lance does not and has not for her whole life taken her on all sorts of cool awesome amazing trips and bought her cool awesome amazing presents. Who was it who bought them recorders when they were seven to terrorize Luis with? Lance. Who was it to take them to a live rocket taking off the summer they turned nine? Lance.

“You’re a brat,” he informs her.

She sticks her tongue out at him, snickering. “Side genes.”

Lance unfortunately has nothing to say to that and also refuses to be roasted by an eleven year old, so he yanks Keith away as penance and takes him to a corner somewhere to make out. He feels very smug about it.

———

The fifth time doesn’t happen.

The fifth time is a clusterfuck.

The fifth time, it’s night again, and Lance honestly doesn’t even plan on taking another picture. He’s just next to the vent, lying on his belly, legs kicking in the air as he inspects the ring for the billionth time. He’s so excited. He can’t wait to wear this on his finger. He can’t wait for Keith to put it there. He’s can’t wait to be Keith’s husband, is the crux of it all. It’s like groundhog day except with literal euphoria. Lance is the luckiest man literally alive, and Keith hasn’t even hinted towards a plan to pop the question yet.

“You are the nosiest motherfucker in the planet, you shithead.”

Lance yelps, startling so bad he almost brains himself on the floor and nearly drops the ring. He manages to catch himself with the grace of God and also probably luck, or neither of those things, but either way Lance heart nearly pounds out of his chest.

“You scared me, you butthead!”

Keith chuckles. His voice is low and raspy from sleep, vowels still rounded from the accent that only comes out when he’s mad or drunk or tired. Lance’s belly swoops. Keith grabs Lance’s ankle and tugs, dragging him over to him, pulling him upright when he’s close enough. Lance goes into him fully, curling up into him, head tucked under his chin. Keith’s hands come to rest on top of his, sliding the ring box from him.

“How long have you known, you snoop?”

“Six months,” Lance answers. “In my defense, you were acting suspicious as all hell.”

Keith kisses his head. “Fair.”

“I need to know everything about everything or I’ll die. You know this.”

Keith snorts. He takes Lance’s left hand and smooths it flat, spreading out his fingers. “Yeah. Ruined my plans, though.”

“Oh, please. You and I both know there were no plans involved. You walked by a shop advertising ring retouching and walked in before you even thought about it.”

Keith says nothing. Lance grins and presses on.

“I bet you cried the whole time, too.”

“Shut up. I’m gonna keep the ring.”

Lance kisses him on the chest, the closest place he can reach, through his sleep shirt. “No, you’re not.”

“Mhm.” Keith plucks the ring out of the box with one hand, setting it on the ground beside them and grabbing Lance’s hand with his other. “You’re right. I’m not.”

He doesn’t move for a while, except to stroke his thumb over the palm of Lance’s hand, over and over again. Lance likes the feeling. He’s always likes the feeling of Keith’s hands in him.

“I know this isn’t a fancy dinner or sunset on the beach or with your whole family present,” he murmurs. “But I’m tired of waiting, if you don’t mind me jumping the gun.”

Lance smiles widely. A tear leaks out of his eye, dripping down his face and onto Keith’s hand.

“I don’t.”

“Good.” Keith holds the ring just above Lance’s finger, poised, ready to slide it on but waiting for permission. “Lance Sanchez, will you marry me?”

“Keith Gyeong, I would want nothing more.”

Unhesitant at last, Keith slides his father’s ring onto Lance’s finger, centring it so the diamond shines brightly in the middle. It fits perfectly.

The tears stream down Lance’s face, and he can’t for the life of him pretend that they’re not, not that he’d bother. He buries his face in his fiancé’s neck and feels Keith’s own tears soaking his hair.

“I took a bunch of sneaky pictures of me holding the ring in front of you,” Lance admits.

Keith laughs. “Of course you did.”

“I carried the ring around for months.”

“Checks out.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too, Lance.”

“I can’t wait to marry you.”

Keith hums, tilting his head up and kissing him properly, entwining their hands so they can both feel the ring press against skin. “No more waiting for you, sweetheart.”

———

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