Three Is A Crowd

by TimWrites

Summary:

Lance has realized something horrifying. He's in love with two of his team and he's messed up. He runs away from Keith and Shiro. He has to try again. Even if the duo he loves come chasing after him like some damned juggernaut.

Chapter 1: Runaway

Lance knew that he shouldn’t. Everything would end. His reputation, his presumed sexuality, his friendship with Keith and Shiro, Pidge and Hunk and his entire life. Shiro, especially, would have his body on a cross by morning. He would be covered by social media.

 

The party was raving, the house booming with graduation music and it was in full swing. Yet all Lance had done was drink a beer and stare longingly at two boys. Then he wandered into a room, trying to get a breather. But the latino mistakenly walked into the same room as a expecting lovebird. And heartbreaker. He had to get away from the scene.

 

But Keith, with that stupidly vintage mullet, turned around- He gave this beautiful, moonlit smile (how cheesy was that, probably just about how useless Lance was in love) and went to call out a name that wasn’t the brunet’s own. His cold fingers clenched to a fist and the alcohol in his system propelled him forward, both arms shooting out to grab Keith’s shoulders. The feeling in his stomach welled, coming to a mix with dread and adrenaline as he kissed the other’s lips. They paused, a inhale before Keith bit him, blood spilling onto their lips before he pulled back, slight tears in his eyes.

 

The look on mullet’s face burnt into his mind, sobering his entire body. The confusion, fear and another emotion he didn’t bother identify passed over, hitting him like weapon wounds. It hurt his aching heart.

 

Watching the other, carefully, Keith’s eyes went from him, to another, staring almost directly behind him. It had to be Shiro, the boyfriend . It didn’t even occur to him to stop and explain. Just to run like the devil and the entire contents of hell was following him. He knew the frat house well enough to leap off the balcony they were stood on, then onto the roof. It took his weight but creaked under the sudden pressure.

 

The muscles from being a receiver kicked in as he sprinted, dead out towards the end, at least taking in another loud thud and sudden groaning of the wood from the roof. Now it was a chase, dammit, but Lance knew he could run faster than the quarterback and with the sudden rush of fear, it was definite.

 

Leaping down from the low roof, he heard Hunk and Pidge call something after him. He couldn’t face them- Damn it, why had he done this- The thoughts rushed through his mind as Lance yanked out his van keys, the blue van with decorations he’d nicknamed originally “Blue”, before yanking the door open and starting the engine. It turned over once and fear icily flowed through him as Shiro neared, until it finally edged in and revved just as he got near enough to yell. Fuck- Lance didn’t want to hear, he didn’t want this-! The engine roared. He managed to drive away, just as everyone started calling to him, the thoughts and nightmares coming to life.

 

He didn’t go home, because even Lance could keep some things a secret from the group. Like how he got into a University, got a job, got a student dorm... That his life was going somewhere after this, that the heartbreak was going to heal and he was going to open up a bakery or cafe. Something. Anything.

 

He pulled in at the river, the one Coran showed him once, a precious memory he was corrupting. Lance clutched the steering wheel, fingernails digging deep into the fabric. Tears and wails leapt out of his throat, tired bags beneath his eyes showing how he had tired over the love he hated, how much he had pulled himself apart to keep his friends safe. It hurt every time he went for a group hug and every moment he watched between them, but he still held everything inside.

 

When Lance fell in love, at the start, it was pure and light, before he realized. Light touches, grins filled with adrenaline and excitement. Nothing like now. He slowly cursed it, pounding it into his mind, mouth and motto. You will ruin it. Distance himself, hold his tongue, watch but don’t touch like it’s a piece of art and he had black ink on his hands. It hurt him so much but at the same time, the love flowed about his heart. That stupid grin that Keith got when he scored a touchdown, the roar that Shiro let out at the last match of their high school football careers.

 

As the brunet broke down in his van, the stars above him shone brightly, a shooting star passing over, starting the stellar shower he'd been meaning to take the group to see. Lance looked up at them with teary eyes, blurred sight and shakes taking the beauty in. He quietly wished to himself that it had worked like in a fairy tale.

 

---

 

Months later, Lance had left for Virginia. His accepted college application in hand, his dorms sorted out and his heart cold but healing. Offers of comfort had coated him, but he rejected all of them. The new reputation for him was a nerd, which humored him beyond belief. The campus was big and the business degree was going amazingly. But right now, Lance was a wreck on the dorm kitchen floor. He was sobbing and clutching pictures desperately, cuddling them as his dorm mates popped their heads around the door.

 

“Lance, my dude, you ok? That’s proper tears’?” Jace, a bored music major, questioned unsympathetically. Somehow the entire dorm had learnt about his heartbreak and runaway status over a few too many drinks and an entire fresher week of wreckage Lance. Basically this wasn’t the first time he'd been found on the kitchen floor.

 

“Find another photo of them? This mysterious person you won’t tell us anything about?” Lance sobbed a yes, which was more snot than sound, toward the other room mate, a boy called Matthew.

 

Matthew looked like Pidge, as though they were related and Lance had a sneaky feeling they were. His hair was the same kind of rustled bird's nest brown and messy style, but he had harder eyes, serious and a dark shade of brownish gold, closing in on the prettier side of a attractive guy, even though the second year of college was taking it's toll. He acted like a hipster, keeping a pair of nasty rounded glasses on him at all times and getting pumpkin spiced everything. Meanwhile, his boyfriend Jace (even Lance, who hadn't noticed when he broke his nose, noticed the way they brushed past), was the total opposite. He was a wreck, a casual normal college student with bags under his eyes, a tired manner and cursive way of speaking. 

 

Jace had a black long braid of hair that looked dumb but cool as hell to Lance, and skin that was reminiscent of his own when Lance went on surfing weekends with his family, albeit the holidays were usually hectic and full of screaming and stress. Which oddly enough was a great description of Jace. The elder of their little house of misfits was also known as the tall one who was petty enough to make them climb for their cereal if pissed off with anyone.

 

Jace sighed and moved back into his room, with a slam of the door and mutter of something offensive, while Matthew yelled a, “Fucks sake!” It was near the finals, he could at least empathize with their frustration at his timing for another sobbing fit on the floor. At least it didn't include a bagel and milk like the last time.

 

Lance was left clutching the last photo he had of the group, and managed to shuffle out into the lawn (after cleaning himself up), laying in the sun to revise and suffer in the sunlight.

 

His hair had grown, to the point of him having a hair cut. He chose to do a trim and let it grow until he could just put it all back in a low bun at the back. His lax attitude had grown until he was totally at peace on the outside. Not like his heart was constantly having a revolution at everything he left. Lance hadn’t checked any of his media since and even left the email, despite his parents. 

 

But today was not the day and he was not having any of his dumb shit anymore, it was sunny and he was going to be a rational, or as close as a college student could get to it, human being. And take a nap. Or revise.

 

...Nap it was.

 

---

 

 

Despite Lance being a normal, rational college student, still managed to sleep for a solid two hours and burn the hell out of his stomach, leg and arms. Because he forgot to cover himself. Again. He had managed to put his sunglasses on though and Jace hadn't drawn anything on him with sun cream either so it was a good day. But he'd jumped when someone yelled his name from inside (it would only be Matt or Jc, no one else was ever home during the day) and started to act like he'd been looking over his textbook the entire time.

 

So, when someone paused outside his gate and his sunglasses raised from the book, he wasn’t really reading but more skimming, it didn’t really pause him because he wasn’t thinking or focused. Nor could he really see who it was. But the voices-

 

“Lance?” He froze and slowly lifted his shades, connecting his line of sight with the two that basically gave him a kitchen floor reset every time he thought of them.

Oh shit.

 

Chapter 2: Devastating Storm

Summary:

How bad can Lance react to them? This bad.

The bubble of fear and horror in his throat vomits up like something mutilated. His sunglasses don’t quite cover the look of pure terror. It feels like all of the storm of haunting nightmares have just come back (again). The ones he woke screaming or sobbing from at one in the morning, ones that left him in the shower trying to scrub his skin clean of what he did.

 

But it surges blood through his veins and, although icy, Lance is gone in seconds. His bare feet nearly slip on the soft grass that doesn’t feel as comforting anymore.

 

“Keith! Wait-!” The flush of near hysterics that goes through him has him through the door in three steps, feeling a hand grab the back of his shirt with experienced hands. A sudden memory comes to mind, causing a sharp inhale and tense of his shoulders.

 

---

 

 

Lance throws the ball to Keith, watching long strong hands gently cradle the ball in slow motion, before toned, fast legs push him faster than the latino could manage at that second.

 

His heart beats faster and a dorky grin spreads through his face as someone, probably a Galra linesman, smashes him down onto the dirty mud. It hurts and he knows it’ll bruise but the feeling of adoration as Lance watches the ball slam down on past the touchdown line is worth it.

 

---

 

 

Keith’s hands are strong, stronger than they used to be, gripping onto his shirt tight and Lance turns back, eyes wide, like a frightened animal jerks and spins. His shirt tears and another hand goes out to grab the long brown hair he’s grown. It’s too fast and successfully snags some.

 

Yet Lance is in the house and Keith isn’t. The latino doesn’t hold back, grabbing ahold of his door and yelling out a cry of pain as he hits both his own head and Keith's hand with said door. Blurry vision still shoves him into the corridor while a hand lets go, strands of hair softly falling down between the duo.

 

Lance is so close to closing the door. This doesn’t feel real, how can it be? It had to be another nightmare, he’d wake up any minute and they would be on the west coast, enjoying their lives together. Without Lance.

 

“Lance- You fucking asshole, don’t you dare close that door-!” Keith’s voice rings out from the other side and he is furious, snarling viciously.

 

It isn’t a dream.

 

He’s trying to pull the door closed when another set of hands get between the door and the frame. A face appears between them too. Another memory stirrer.

 

Sweat drips down Shiro’s face as well as the water he just poured over it to cool down, but Lance’s blue eyes are staring adoringly at the perfection of him.

 

From the shaved sides of his undercut to the long piece of bleached white which has been deemed uncool for far too long for Lance to be attracted to it (He still is), to the curve of his jaw and tiny pieces of stubble that Shiro missed as he shaved. Those dark eyes open and smooth towards Lance, a smile lighting the sides with wrinkles that have the latino’s heart in his mouth.

 

Lance sends a grin back so wide that his jaw pops. It was worth it for the laugh Shiro emits though.

 

“Lance- Please wait a minute- Where have you-” Panic violently controlling his system, Lance lets go of the door to shove Shiro away, trying to escape.

 

The door makes a crunching sound and both Shiro and Lance stop. Shiro turns to his side and the horror that spreads over his face is enough to have Lance’s eyes filling with tears. He hurt Keith.

 

Again.

 

Lance pushes him again, this time weaker, and quietly manages to force out a broken,

 

“Leave.”

 

Nothing stops him from closing the door this time. Lance locks it. Sits down behind it and listens to the conversation.

 

“Keith, we need to get you back home or to hospital, you’re bleeding a lot-” The worry in Shiro’s voice has Lance biting his hand, blocking the shaking tears and sobs. His eyes are wide.

 

Lance had assaulted Keith twice now.

 

“‘M fine, just get that fucker out here, I’m gonna’-!” Keith sounded a little slurred, (Lance’s mind supplied the, you hit his head, you tried to fuck up his life now you’ve hurt him seriously , it doesn’t help him get quieter) before the rustling happens and footsteps echo through the thin wood.

 

“We can come back later, he’s not important right now, that injury is.” Lance’s mind echoes and torments him with the, he’s not important , like it’s some kind of mantra.

 

The sounds of them moving away are followed by silence. Lance’s head is in his hands, shoved between his knees as if to protect him from himself.

 

The piece of Lance that hates himself is blooming, urged on by pieces, tearing apart the facade he’d built over months of layering on quiet comforts to himself. Assurances of, “Hunk wouldn’t ever hate me,” fell into the sludge as his mind flowed to an image of his best friend looking betrayed and kicking a broken Lance away with a, “I don’t know homewreckers.” Pidge’s little comments resurfaced, the light joking tone now vicious and toxic, “Why would anyone ask someone like you out? You’re so weird.” Keith’s face after Lance kissed him, disgust and anger spreading like something monstrous. Shiro’s words, “ he’s not important, ”

 

“ he’s not important- ”

 

A gentle touch on his shoulder jerked Lance away from the panic attack, tears and breathing coming out in varying paces. Matthew had a soft look, a person who just found something very fragile. Jace was behind him, a worried expression coating him. It didn’t suit them. Lance tried to fake an expression.

 

A crooked smile and quivering lip just made his tears run faster, hiccups shuddering out of struggling lungs. Matthew started to tear up, eyes widening.

 

“Lance. Don’t. Don’t force yourself. You can cry, so please, please don’t look like that, you’re allowed to hurt. Whatever just happened, we can fix it. Just cry Lance. Don’t hold back, please.” Matt wiped his eyes as his gentle hands held Lance’s head up, fixing his gaze onto the elder boy.

The shuddering breakdown that followed, the grief stricken wailing that clutched at both Matt and Jace, was scaring them. Lance had cried a lot and sobbed but this wasn’t the dramatic normal kind. It was Lance showing them how much he really was hurting. The latino clutched onto Matthew, even though he was taller, like a child. Matt was reminded of when Pidge was tiny, when she would cling onto him like he was her only lifeline.

 

It only ended when the brunet’s voice physically stopped coming out and his tears slowed to a lower pace. J moved him, helped him walk into the kitchen, gave him a drink and fed him. Lance barely reacted, like he was hollow from it all. Matt lead him to the shower, let him use all the hot water and then walked him to his room. Just sat there next to him while Lance laid in bed, brushing the boy’s long hair back like he used to do for Pidge.

 

As soon as Lance was asleep, Matt and J switched, a quiet conversation that only needed a few mummered sentences.

 

(“We need to keep an eye on him.”

 

“I’m going to tell my sibling I can’t talk tonight, watch him for me, then I’ll bring in the bedding.”)

 

Matthew made his way up the stairs, the trio had put Lance on the bottom due to his snoring, before entering his room and skyping Pidge. The response was quick and they popped up with a curious look immediately.

 

“Hey Matt, it’s unusual for you to call this early, what’s up?” Lance never knew about Matt, so when Matt saw him, the missing teen that Pidge had been searching everywhere for, at his door as one of the applicants, he immediately chose him. Pidge was told an hour later. Most skype calls were between them about Lance or engineering. Pidge was always worried. They had never explained everything but said that Lance ran away from them all without hearing them out.

 

“Listen, Pidge, Lance just had a breakdown. He saw someone outside and there was a scuffle or something but, it’s whoever he was heartbroken by and me and J have never seen anything like this. He was crying so hard that he lost his voice Pidge, his eyes are so puffy that it’s like he had a reaction. I want to know what happened, because this is ridiculous. Lance is years younger than me and he should not be this upset over just seeing them. It took so long for him to open up a little to me and J for the first time. We’re not doing it again.” Matt spoke clearly and for once, Pidge looked a little caught off guard.

 

Their expression softened and Matt watched quietly as they sunk into the seat.

 

“It’ll take ages, but you can’t tell him you know. It’s been hard enough for me and Hunk to stay away even if we don’t have enough money. The only reason I can tell that Shiro and Keith would be there is because they’ve been looking for him again.” Matt’s eyebrows raised. Two guys? Something told him that Pidge was going to have to take a while to explain.

Lance awoke with a pounding headache and a dull body. He felt like shit. Numb and shit. He looked to the right to see Jace and Matt sleeping on his floor, both snoring and looking tired.

 

The sense of pure affection towards the (gay as hell dude bros) duo, coated him. They stayed and it meant a lot to Lance.

 

He slipped out of bed, ran a hand over his face before moving out the room, into the kitchen. Shuffling about quietly, Lance started cooking up pancakes, separating them into three piles. He hummed a little, tired and emotionally drained but he still managed to suck a little comfort into him with the singing and mundane task. It was something he used to make with Hunk. Who knew after something that bad, Lance could still sing, at least in his own language. He opened the window a little to get rid of the steam, not caring in the slightest that everyone outside would hear.

He didn’t notice the two people beyond the lawn. Nor the way Keith’s eyes softened and Shiro quietly hummed along. They moved on, for a moment hesitating.