historically inaccurate but well-meaning t-rex (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
scriveyner) wrote2018-08-03 09:31 pm
scriveyner) wrote2018-08-03 09:31 pm
Voltron Legendary Defender (Nightbreed) - Sure Thing Falling [1] [Shance]
Title: sure thing falling - 1 - meetings
Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender
AU: Nightbreed
Characters/Pairing: Shiro/Lance
Rating: NSFW/E
Length: 3320
Summary: Oh, he was going to get Matt for this. This was a set-up.
"Buy me a drink?"
Shiro tilted his head, frowned, and then looked to his left. He wasn't certain that he was being addressed, at first ... but the dive bar wasn't exactly hopping at seven o'clock on a Thursday, and as far as he could tell he was the only person actually seated at the bar. He dragged his bottle on the polished wood bar top and slowly looked the speaker up and down.
Lithe and a bit lanky, warm brown skin and soft eyes, with short hair that curled a little at its tips, and looking far too young to be haunting Sam's. Shiro snorted and took a pull off his lager. "Nice try, kid," he said, the gruff edge to his tone intentional. "You should beat it before someone starts carding." That someone being him, probably, if the kid didn't take a hint and leave - he was off shift tonight but when his choices were 'sit in a mostly-empty cabin and drink shitty beer' or 'sit at work and drink shitty but free beer' the cards would always come down on the side of 'free.'
"I'll buy you a drink, then," the kid said, and leaned forward, waving at Matt. Matt raised his eyebrow at Shiro but didn't anything to him as the kid ordered two drinks; actual drinks and not the shitty beer that Shiro was nursing. Shiro watched Matt work with half an eye; Matt wouldn't go straight for the watered-down liquor if he knew the patrons were watching but the kid had eyes only for Shiro, so watered-down it was. Shiro honestly didn't get paid enough to care how the owner was ripping off the town's drunks - he was probably keeping his regulars alive longer by watering down their nightly booze if he was being honest.
Either way, he gave Matt a look through the streak of white in his hair, and Matt shrugged his shoulders without moving his arms, setting the drinks in front of Shiro's suitor. Transaction concluded, Matt moved down the bar to attend to two regulars who had stumbled into some of the stools in search of more liquor.
"Kid," Shiro said, adding an exaggerated sigh onto the end of his tone, "look, I'm not..." he turned his gaze back in time to see him downing the second drink, the first glass already completely empty. Shiro stared at him for a long moment, taken by surprise, as he placed the second glass back on the bar top and wiped the back of his hand over his mouth, exhaling loudly.
"What?" he said, innocently. "I said I'd buy you a drink, never said I'd let you drink it." He smacked his lips. "Besides, they were about as strong as one drink together, weak as hell."
Another pause, and then Shiro laughed out of sheer disbelief. He propped his prosthetic right elbow on the bar and cradled his chin in his hand, still looking at him. "You got some balls, kid," he said, more amused than not.
The kid leaned into the bar, both elbows on the bar top. "I'm not a kid," he said, his grin somehow dangerous. He tilted his head in toward Shiro, and there was a glimmer in his blue eyes that didn't seem quite natural. "My name is Lance."
Shiro held out his right hand, and Lance didn't hesitate in taking it. "Shiro," Shiro said, and expected a shake. Instead, Lance tugged his right hand toward him, drawing it toward his mouth and kissing the prosthetic's knuckles. Shiro yanked his hand away and looked around sharply but the usual clientele of the dive weren't paying attention to what happened at the bar. They probably wouldn't notice if a truck drove straight through the front of the building again, if Shiro was being honest.
"Shiro," Lance said thoughtfully, considering the name. "Sounds mysterious." He smiled, not at all rattled by Shiro's reaction. "Not from around here then, I take it, Shiro?"
"...no." Shiro clasped his beer tight with his left hand and tucked his right arm against him, still leaning against the bar. "I'm not." He glanced back down the bar but Matt was very much Minding His Own Business and making a show of drying off glassware and not looking at Shiro and his new buddy.
Oh, he was going to get Matt for this. This was a set-up.
But.
Lance was willowy, lean but strong, and now that he was actually eyeing him, he looked like a fair bit of a meal. He was exactly Shiro's type and he knew that Matt knew that, and now he wasn't going to let his knowledge of Matt meddling in his life stop him from having a good time. "So," Shiro said, finishing off the dregs in his bottle of shitty beer and putting it down on the bar top hard. "You gonna buy me an actual drink, or what?"
Lance smirked.
#
Takashi Shirogane had honestly had way worse ideas than taking a one-night stand home to his dingy cabin nestled off a long foot-path not far from the main road. He couldn't afford a room in the single motel in this run-down town, heck, he could barely afford the upkeep on the cabin he'd found abandoned and taken it upon himself to renovate. Lance didn't seem to care about the walk back to his place, though, arm tucked through Shiro's as they leaned against each other, stumbling the half-mile out of town and into the woods. It was dark but the moonlight showed them the way, the waxing moon illuminating the road where no streetlights marked the path.
"It's so quiet," Lance said, head leaned into Shiro's shoulder as they walked. It was quiet, it often was when Shiro passed through but after they both noticed the silence the insects began chattering again and filling the after-midnight air.
"I like the quiet," Shiro said.
Lance tasted salty, like the ocean air. Shiro kissed him just outside the door and again just inside it, tasted his warm brown skin as he trailed his mouth down his chest, Lance's hand tight in his hair. They dropped clothing as they went, Shiro sliding Lance's jacket down his shoulders and Lance pulling Shiro's shirt up over his head, spreading his hands over the broad, flat planes of his chest. His eyes flickered to where the prosthetic joined his skin near his shoulder, but Shiro didn't say anything about it so Lance didn't either, hands already on the buckle of Shiro's belt.
Shiro's bed was a mess before they fell on it together, mattress and box spring piled on the floor and no headboard to bang against the wall. Shiro hadn't brought anyone back here before, hadn't even dreamed of coming home with company, but Lance didn't say a word about it if he even noticed; straddling Shiro and watching him with a smug expression as he rode Shiro slow. Shiro swallowed hard, hands gripping Lance's thighs as he watched Lance move over him, the light still on in the main room throwing a stripe of brightness across the bed.
Lance was good, sensuous; he moved like the ocean, rising and falling in sinuous waves. He tossed his head, brown hair stuck to his forehead with perspiration, and watched Shiro closely thought half-lidded eyes. This clearly wasn't his first rodeo and Shiro was not complaining, the complete opposite of it and if he didn't get Lance off his cock soon he'd do something he regretted; so Shiro shifted and rolled them on the bed, pushing Lance into the mattress beneath him without slipping entirely out.
Lance let out a little cry, a short, shocked sob and then rocked again against Shiro's hips as Shiro eyeballed their connection in the dim light. He wasn't in deep enough for any issues to arise so he continued to fuck Lance shallowly, counting each sobbing breath that Lance let escape a victory.
" More ," Lance gasped, clawing at Shiro's thigh. Shiro couldn't give him more, he wouldn't; he wouldn't reveal that side of himself to anyone, especially not a silly one-night stand. He gripped Lance's legs tight, slipping his hands back over the curve of his ass and tried to hold him off, cock sliding shallow and fast over the sensitive nerve endings. Lance whined and squirmed, trying to entice Shiro deeper but at this point it couldn't happen even if he wanted to give into it, so he distracted Lance by gripping his cock in one hand and stroking him through to his orgasm.
Shiro didn't come inside. He left Lance half-delirious and somewhat passed-out in the bed and took himself to the bathroom, stroking himself to completion under the bright, unfeeling lights of the bathroom, door mostly closed behind him. The knot had fully formed under his skin and he palmed it, squeezed it and groaned as he came finally, trying in vain to keep his seed contained for an easier clean-up. He couldn't let Lance see his abnormality ... not that many people even knew what it was or what it meant, but the less he had to explain, the better. He was sick of moving on, town to town, and while this was a shitty little coastal village in the middle of nowhere he had found some measure of peace here and was intending on keeping it.
He cleaned up quietly, and when he cracked the door to the bathroom, lights out behind him, Lance was sleeping peacefully in his bed. Shiro smiled, the man (not a kid , Lance's eyes teased experience though his body belied his youth) had curled up on his side, a contented expression firmly in place. He was torn a moment, felt the buzzing need to crawl into bed beside Lance, slinging his arm up over his side and nuzzling into the back of his head ... but, that would be bad. He couldn't afford to get attached to anyone else. One-night stands only, Shiro reminded himself firmly; and left Lance to sleep alone, in his bed.
#
Shiro honestly didn't expect Lance to still be in his cabin when he returned, dawn a rosy blush on the horizon. The sky was a blossoming pink; there were storms coming, he could smell them in the ocean air ... but for now, the wind was calm.
Shiro hauled the deer he'd hunted to exhaustion around back to clean the carcass. It was fully daylight by the time he stepped inside, naked and covered in viscera from his kill, and he froze in place when he realized that Lance was sitting on his couch, wrapped in a worn blanket and drinking a cup of coffee from Shiro's only clean mug. "Huh," Lance said, looking him up and down. "Most people wear clothes when they clean a kill."
"I'm not most people," Shiro said, and made for the bathroom.
He showered and changed, pulling his hair into a loose ponytail before emerging in clean clothes and barefoot. Lance was still nestled on his couch but his mug was now sitting empty, balanced on the armrest, and he was leafing through the book of folklore that Shiro had left overturned on the table. "No television?" Lance said without looking up, sounding deeply disappointed.
"No," Shiro said shortly, stopping in the doorway. He watched Lance browse for a minute, slightly bemused. "What are you still doing here?" he asked, finally. "Most people would have left by now, it's not like the road's difficult to find in daylight."
"Mm," Lance said, pausing on one of the pages and scanning it curiously. Then he looked up, catching Shiro's eye directly, as he threw Shiro's own words back at him mischievously. "I'm not most people." Shiro was unimpressed, so Lance closed his book and set it on his lap. "What's for breakfast?" he asked instead.
"I already ate," Shiro said.
"Did you?" Lance didn't seem surprised at that. He also hadn't been surprised - or scared - of Shiro walking through the front door covered in blood. That made Shiro slightly uneasy, because people who didn't startle easy always meant trouble. "I was hoping we could hit up the diner on Main for breakfast before I left, my friend's probably worried about me."
We? "I'm not keeping you," Shiro said. "Feel free." He stepped past the couch and moved to the kitchen, but Lance didn't stir from his position on the couch. He stayed put, except shifting so that he could watch over the back of the couch as Shiro bustled around the kitchen, rinsing out the least-grody looking mug and filling it with the last of the coffee. Finally, Shiro leaned against the door frame that separated the main room from the kitchen, mug held between both hands. "How long, exactly, were you planning on staying?" he asked finally, the edge of frustration evident in his tone.
Lance tilted his head and frowned at Shiro. "What sort of question is that?" he asked.
"I have shit to do." Shiro said pointedly.
"Like, what, get drunk and illegally hunt more deer?" Lance toyed with the mug in his hands. "Interesting that I didn't hear any gunshots, though I suppose that might just draw the attention of the sheriff and I get the feeling you want to avoid that, living on the edge of town like you are."
"Look, I don't know how much plainer I can be about this," Shiro said. "Leave." He jerked his head toward the door. "This was a one-off sort of deal, I'm not looking for a relationship, kid."
"That's a pity." Lance was still making no effort at rising from the couch or emerging from his nest of blankets. "See, here's the thing." He blinked innocently at Shiro. "You removed my coat."
"Yeah?"
Lance smiled at him, the expression one almost of pity. "And then we fucked."
"No shit, I was there."
"Which means," Lance drew his legs up onto the couch, hidden mostly under the patchwork blanket he had wrapped himself in. "That we're married."
The silence stretched a full two minutes as Shiro rewound the entire night in his head and tried to isolate any tell that he'd picked up a clinically insane person instead of a quick fuck at the bar. Well , the mean little voice in the back of his head said, he did go home with you and you look like an ax murderer, didn't he?
Pointedly ignoring that voice, Shiro exhaled once. "Yeah, okay," he said, and then pointed to the door. "Get out of my house."
#
Lance left after that, without much fuss, thankfully, although he did give Shiro a very dirty look in all of it. Shiro tried to put the event out of his mind ... it was too good to be true, finding someone who was definitely His Type and even getting laid out of the bargain, and if he found out that Matt set him up with the town crazy person he was going to have to whoop Matt's ass personally for the indignation. When Keith heard about it, Shiro knew he wouldn't hear the end of it.
If he was lucky, he wouldn't see Lance again in town. He didn't recall seeing him prior to yesterday, so maybe he was just passing through, or had family and was just in town for a short visit.
That he should be so lucky.
The rain came in later in the day; fierce sheets of water that swept through coastal town. Shiro packed his freezer full of venison, and scrubbed out the kitchen before considering the mess that he lived in. He wasn't necessarily ashamed of it, and Lance hadn't said a word about it but the look on his face had been enough. Shiro began to pick things up, straightening, tidying the mishmash of items he had scrounged to fill his home with. He hesitated in the main room, the clothes he had been wearing the previous evening were scattered along the path to the bedroom ... as was an unfamiliar jacket, kicked half behind the couch.
Lance's coat.
Shiro groaned, picking up the coat and tossing it on the couch. He dumped his laundry in a pile inside the door to his bedroom and then stood in the doorway, staring at the jacket on his couch. He was going to have to return that to Lance, and that meant actually seeing Mr Crazy again.
Or, Shiro thought idly, he could just toss it.
No, he wasn't that sort of person. It was still raining out and his cabin already smelled enough like wet dog, so he'd wait until the evening to go into town. Maybe he'd find Lance at the dive bar again, and if not ... well, if Matt really had orchestrated this entire thing, he'd know where Lance was staying. That decided, Shiro picked up Lance's jacket and shook it out once, before hanging it from the knob on his front door. He smiled at it, without thinking, and turned back to tidying up. He had plenty to keep him occupied, until the storm passed.
#
"I'd never seen him before," Matt said, and scratched at the faded scar on his cheek idly. He was lying, and Shiro knew he was lying, and Matt knew that Shiro knew that he was lying, and he had no idea why he was doing this, at all. "His kind don't come into the bar very often." Matt gave the bar top an idle swipe with his rag, and cast a glance around the dim, mostly-empty bar. Early afternoon on a rainy weekday meant slow business, and aside from a few weather-worn locals in a corner booth playing faro the bar was completely empty.
"His kind? " Shiro repeated, because, honestly, Matt didn't strike him as someone who even say something like that.
Matt didn't seem perturbed by Shiro's disgust. He leaned forward a little, voice lower, and more insistent. "The sea folk ," he said, and Shiro stared at him, and then looked pointedly to the men playing faro, each one of them a fisherman. Matt shook his head at Shiro and dragged the rag over the bar again. "Outsiders," he said with an exaggerated sigh, and half-turned when the door opened, triggering the small bell that hung above it to announce entrance.
Shiro picked up Lance's jacket from where he'd slung it over a bar stool, and let himself out.
The rain had brought with it cooler air, and grey skies. It felt more like fall than summer, and Lance would need his coat. Shiro looked up and down the main street and saw the neon from the diner reflecting around the corner, and remembered Lance's request from the morning, so he slung Lance's jacket over his shoulder and headed in that direction.
Unlike the bar, the diner was actually busy. And, Lance was sitting at the diner's long counter, slumped over and head lying on his arms, the cook talking to him in low tones. Shiro hesitated a moment when the cook looked at him, but Lance didn't lift his head - at least, not until Shiro draped his coat over his shoulders. Lance shot upright, but the coat didn't slide off and he shot a look at Shiro that was absolutely agog.
"You forgot this," Shiro said, voice gentle despite the ruckus of the diner. "Thought you'd need it."
"You brought me back my coat ," Lance said, eyes wide. Shiro was a little unsettled by his shock. "Why?"
"Because it's your coat?" Shiro said. He patted Lance's shoulder. "Take care, Lance."
He glanced back before he left the diner, and Lance was still watching him, almost distressed. Shiro shook off the weird feeling Lance's expression gave him, and pushed out the door into the fading grey evening.
Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender
AU: Nightbreed
Characters/Pairing: Shiro/Lance
Rating: NSFW/E
Length: 3320
Summary: Oh, he was going to get Matt for this. This was a set-up.
"Buy me a drink?"
Shiro tilted his head, frowned, and then looked to his left. He wasn't certain that he was being addressed, at first ... but the dive bar wasn't exactly hopping at seven o'clock on a Thursday, and as far as he could tell he was the only person actually seated at the bar. He dragged his bottle on the polished wood bar top and slowly looked the speaker up and down.
Lithe and a bit lanky, warm brown skin and soft eyes, with short hair that curled a little at its tips, and looking far too young to be haunting Sam's. Shiro snorted and took a pull off his lager. "Nice try, kid," he said, the gruff edge to his tone intentional. "You should beat it before someone starts carding." That someone being him, probably, if the kid didn't take a hint and leave - he was off shift tonight but when his choices were 'sit in a mostly-empty cabin and drink shitty beer' or 'sit at work and drink shitty but free beer' the cards would always come down on the side of 'free.'
"I'll buy you a drink, then," the kid said, and leaned forward, waving at Matt. Matt raised his eyebrow at Shiro but didn't anything to him as the kid ordered two drinks; actual drinks and not the shitty beer that Shiro was nursing. Shiro watched Matt work with half an eye; Matt wouldn't go straight for the watered-down liquor if he knew the patrons were watching but the kid had eyes only for Shiro, so watered-down it was. Shiro honestly didn't get paid enough to care how the owner was ripping off the town's drunks - he was probably keeping his regulars alive longer by watering down their nightly booze if he was being honest.
Either way, he gave Matt a look through the streak of white in his hair, and Matt shrugged his shoulders without moving his arms, setting the drinks in front of Shiro's suitor. Transaction concluded, Matt moved down the bar to attend to two regulars who had stumbled into some of the stools in search of more liquor.
"Kid," Shiro said, adding an exaggerated sigh onto the end of his tone, "look, I'm not..." he turned his gaze back in time to see him downing the second drink, the first glass already completely empty. Shiro stared at him for a long moment, taken by surprise, as he placed the second glass back on the bar top and wiped the back of his hand over his mouth, exhaling loudly.
"What?" he said, innocently. "I said I'd buy you a drink, never said I'd let you drink it." He smacked his lips. "Besides, they were about as strong as one drink together, weak as hell."
Another pause, and then Shiro laughed out of sheer disbelief. He propped his prosthetic right elbow on the bar and cradled his chin in his hand, still looking at him. "You got some balls, kid," he said, more amused than not.
The kid leaned into the bar, both elbows on the bar top. "I'm not a kid," he said, his grin somehow dangerous. He tilted his head in toward Shiro, and there was a glimmer in his blue eyes that didn't seem quite natural. "My name is Lance."
Shiro held out his right hand, and Lance didn't hesitate in taking it. "Shiro," Shiro said, and expected a shake. Instead, Lance tugged his right hand toward him, drawing it toward his mouth and kissing the prosthetic's knuckles. Shiro yanked his hand away and looked around sharply but the usual clientele of the dive weren't paying attention to what happened at the bar. They probably wouldn't notice if a truck drove straight through the front of the building again, if Shiro was being honest.
"Shiro," Lance said thoughtfully, considering the name. "Sounds mysterious." He smiled, not at all rattled by Shiro's reaction. "Not from around here then, I take it, Shiro?"
"...no." Shiro clasped his beer tight with his left hand and tucked his right arm against him, still leaning against the bar. "I'm not." He glanced back down the bar but Matt was very much Minding His Own Business and making a show of drying off glassware and not looking at Shiro and his new buddy.
Oh, he was going to get Matt for this. This was a set-up.
But.
Lance was willowy, lean but strong, and now that he was actually eyeing him, he looked like a fair bit of a meal. He was exactly Shiro's type and he knew that Matt knew that, and now he wasn't going to let his knowledge of Matt meddling in his life stop him from having a good time. "So," Shiro said, finishing off the dregs in his bottle of shitty beer and putting it down on the bar top hard. "You gonna buy me an actual drink, or what?"
Lance smirked.
Takashi Shirogane had honestly had way worse ideas than taking a one-night stand home to his dingy cabin nestled off a long foot-path not far from the main road. He couldn't afford a room in the single motel in this run-down town, heck, he could barely afford the upkeep on the cabin he'd found abandoned and taken it upon himself to renovate. Lance didn't seem to care about the walk back to his place, though, arm tucked through Shiro's as they leaned against each other, stumbling the half-mile out of town and into the woods. It was dark but the moonlight showed them the way, the waxing moon illuminating the road where no streetlights marked the path.
"It's so quiet," Lance said, head leaned into Shiro's shoulder as they walked. It was quiet, it often was when Shiro passed through but after they both noticed the silence the insects began chattering again and filling the after-midnight air.
"I like the quiet," Shiro said.
Lance tasted salty, like the ocean air. Shiro kissed him just outside the door and again just inside it, tasted his warm brown skin as he trailed his mouth down his chest, Lance's hand tight in his hair. They dropped clothing as they went, Shiro sliding Lance's jacket down his shoulders and Lance pulling Shiro's shirt up over his head, spreading his hands over the broad, flat planes of his chest. His eyes flickered to where the prosthetic joined his skin near his shoulder, but Shiro didn't say anything about it so Lance didn't either, hands already on the buckle of Shiro's belt.
Shiro's bed was a mess before they fell on it together, mattress and box spring piled on the floor and no headboard to bang against the wall. Shiro hadn't brought anyone back here before, hadn't even dreamed of coming home with company, but Lance didn't say a word about it if he even noticed; straddling Shiro and watching him with a smug expression as he rode Shiro slow. Shiro swallowed hard, hands gripping Lance's thighs as he watched Lance move over him, the light still on in the main room throwing a stripe of brightness across the bed.
Lance was good, sensuous; he moved like the ocean, rising and falling in sinuous waves. He tossed his head, brown hair stuck to his forehead with perspiration, and watched Shiro closely thought half-lidded eyes. This clearly wasn't his first rodeo and Shiro was not complaining, the complete opposite of it and if he didn't get Lance off his cock soon he'd do something he regretted; so Shiro shifted and rolled them on the bed, pushing Lance into the mattress beneath him without slipping entirely out.
Lance let out a little cry, a short, shocked sob and then rocked again against Shiro's hips as Shiro eyeballed their connection in the dim light. He wasn't in deep enough for any issues to arise so he continued to fuck Lance shallowly, counting each sobbing breath that Lance let escape a victory.
" More ," Lance gasped, clawing at Shiro's thigh. Shiro couldn't give him more, he wouldn't; he wouldn't reveal that side of himself to anyone, especially not a silly one-night stand. He gripped Lance's legs tight, slipping his hands back over the curve of his ass and tried to hold him off, cock sliding shallow and fast over the sensitive nerve endings. Lance whined and squirmed, trying to entice Shiro deeper but at this point it couldn't happen even if he wanted to give into it, so he distracted Lance by gripping his cock in one hand and stroking him through to his orgasm.
Shiro didn't come inside. He left Lance half-delirious and somewhat passed-out in the bed and took himself to the bathroom, stroking himself to completion under the bright, unfeeling lights of the bathroom, door mostly closed behind him. The knot had fully formed under his skin and he palmed it, squeezed it and groaned as he came finally, trying in vain to keep his seed contained for an easier clean-up. He couldn't let Lance see his abnormality ... not that many people even knew what it was or what it meant, but the less he had to explain, the better. He was sick of moving on, town to town, and while this was a shitty little coastal village in the middle of nowhere he had found some measure of peace here and was intending on keeping it.
He cleaned up quietly, and when he cracked the door to the bathroom, lights out behind him, Lance was sleeping peacefully in his bed. Shiro smiled, the man (not a kid , Lance's eyes teased experience though his body belied his youth) had curled up on his side, a contented expression firmly in place. He was torn a moment, felt the buzzing need to crawl into bed beside Lance, slinging his arm up over his side and nuzzling into the back of his head ... but, that would be bad. He couldn't afford to get attached to anyone else. One-night stands only, Shiro reminded himself firmly; and left Lance to sleep alone, in his bed.
Shiro honestly didn't expect Lance to still be in his cabin when he returned, dawn a rosy blush on the horizon. The sky was a blossoming pink; there were storms coming, he could smell them in the ocean air ... but for now, the wind was calm.
Shiro hauled the deer he'd hunted to exhaustion around back to clean the carcass. It was fully daylight by the time he stepped inside, naked and covered in viscera from his kill, and he froze in place when he realized that Lance was sitting on his couch, wrapped in a worn blanket and drinking a cup of coffee from Shiro's only clean mug. "Huh," Lance said, looking him up and down. "Most people wear clothes when they clean a kill."
"I'm not most people," Shiro said, and made for the bathroom.
He showered and changed, pulling his hair into a loose ponytail before emerging in clean clothes and barefoot. Lance was still nestled on his couch but his mug was now sitting empty, balanced on the armrest, and he was leafing through the book of folklore that Shiro had left overturned on the table. "No television?" Lance said without looking up, sounding deeply disappointed.
"No," Shiro said shortly, stopping in the doorway. He watched Lance browse for a minute, slightly bemused. "What are you still doing here?" he asked, finally. "Most people would have left by now, it's not like the road's difficult to find in daylight."
"Mm," Lance said, pausing on one of the pages and scanning it curiously. Then he looked up, catching Shiro's eye directly, as he threw Shiro's own words back at him mischievously. "I'm not most people." Shiro was unimpressed, so Lance closed his book and set it on his lap. "What's for breakfast?" he asked instead.
"I already ate," Shiro said.
"Did you?" Lance didn't seem surprised at that. He also hadn't been surprised - or scared - of Shiro walking through the front door covered in blood. That made Shiro slightly uneasy, because people who didn't startle easy always meant trouble. "I was hoping we could hit up the diner on Main for breakfast before I left, my friend's probably worried about me."
We? "I'm not keeping you," Shiro said. "Feel free." He stepped past the couch and moved to the kitchen, but Lance didn't stir from his position on the couch. He stayed put, except shifting so that he could watch over the back of the couch as Shiro bustled around the kitchen, rinsing out the least-grody looking mug and filling it with the last of the coffee. Finally, Shiro leaned against the door frame that separated the main room from the kitchen, mug held between both hands. "How long, exactly, were you planning on staying?" he asked finally, the edge of frustration evident in his tone.
Lance tilted his head and frowned at Shiro. "What sort of question is that?" he asked.
"I have shit to do." Shiro said pointedly.
"Like, what, get drunk and illegally hunt more deer?" Lance toyed with the mug in his hands. "Interesting that I didn't hear any gunshots, though I suppose that might just draw the attention of the sheriff and I get the feeling you want to avoid that, living on the edge of town like you are."
"Look, I don't know how much plainer I can be about this," Shiro said. "Leave." He jerked his head toward the door. "This was a one-off sort of deal, I'm not looking for a relationship, kid."
"That's a pity." Lance was still making no effort at rising from the couch or emerging from his nest of blankets. "See, here's the thing." He blinked innocently at Shiro. "You removed my coat."
"Yeah?"
Lance smiled at him, the expression one almost of pity. "And then we fucked."
"No shit, I was there."
"Which means," Lance drew his legs up onto the couch, hidden mostly under the patchwork blanket he had wrapped himself in. "That we're married."
The silence stretched a full two minutes as Shiro rewound the entire night in his head and tried to isolate any tell that he'd picked up a clinically insane person instead of a quick fuck at the bar. Well , the mean little voice in the back of his head said, he did go home with you and you look like an ax murderer, didn't he?
Pointedly ignoring that voice, Shiro exhaled once. "Yeah, okay," he said, and then pointed to the door. "Get out of my house."
Lance left after that, without much fuss, thankfully, although he did give Shiro a very dirty look in all of it. Shiro tried to put the event out of his mind ... it was too good to be true, finding someone who was definitely His Type and even getting laid out of the bargain, and if he found out that Matt set him up with the town crazy person he was going to have to whoop Matt's ass personally for the indignation. When Keith heard about it, Shiro knew he wouldn't hear the end of it.
If he was lucky, he wouldn't see Lance again in town. He didn't recall seeing him prior to yesterday, so maybe he was just passing through, or had family and was just in town for a short visit.
That he should be so lucky.
The rain came in later in the day; fierce sheets of water that swept through coastal town. Shiro packed his freezer full of venison, and scrubbed out the kitchen before considering the mess that he lived in. He wasn't necessarily ashamed of it, and Lance hadn't said a word about it but the look on his face had been enough. Shiro began to pick things up, straightening, tidying the mishmash of items he had scrounged to fill his home with. He hesitated in the main room, the clothes he had been wearing the previous evening were scattered along the path to the bedroom ... as was an unfamiliar jacket, kicked half behind the couch.
Lance's coat.
Shiro groaned, picking up the coat and tossing it on the couch. He dumped his laundry in a pile inside the door to his bedroom and then stood in the doorway, staring at the jacket on his couch. He was going to have to return that to Lance, and that meant actually seeing Mr Crazy again.
Or, Shiro thought idly, he could just toss it.
No, he wasn't that sort of person. It was still raining out and his cabin already smelled enough like wet dog, so he'd wait until the evening to go into town. Maybe he'd find Lance at the dive bar again, and if not ... well, if Matt really had orchestrated this entire thing, he'd know where Lance was staying. That decided, Shiro picked up Lance's jacket and shook it out once, before hanging it from the knob on his front door. He smiled at it, without thinking, and turned back to tidying up. He had plenty to keep him occupied, until the storm passed.
"I'd never seen him before," Matt said, and scratched at the faded scar on his cheek idly. He was lying, and Shiro knew he was lying, and Matt knew that Shiro knew that he was lying, and he had no idea why he was doing this, at all. "His kind don't come into the bar very often." Matt gave the bar top an idle swipe with his rag, and cast a glance around the dim, mostly-empty bar. Early afternoon on a rainy weekday meant slow business, and aside from a few weather-worn locals in a corner booth playing faro the bar was completely empty.
"His kind? " Shiro repeated, because, honestly, Matt didn't strike him as someone who even say something like that.
Matt didn't seem perturbed by Shiro's disgust. He leaned forward a little, voice lower, and more insistent. "The sea folk ," he said, and Shiro stared at him, and then looked pointedly to the men playing faro, each one of them a fisherman. Matt shook his head at Shiro and dragged the rag over the bar again. "Outsiders," he said with an exaggerated sigh, and half-turned when the door opened, triggering the small bell that hung above it to announce entrance.
Shiro picked up Lance's jacket from where he'd slung it over a bar stool, and let himself out.
The rain had brought with it cooler air, and grey skies. It felt more like fall than summer, and Lance would need his coat. Shiro looked up and down the main street and saw the neon from the diner reflecting around the corner, and remembered Lance's request from the morning, so he slung Lance's jacket over his shoulder and headed in that direction.
Unlike the bar, the diner was actually busy. And, Lance was sitting at the diner's long counter, slumped over and head lying on his arms, the cook talking to him in low tones. Shiro hesitated a moment when the cook looked at him, but Lance didn't lift his head - at least, not until Shiro draped his coat over his shoulders. Lance shot upright, but the coat didn't slide off and he shot a look at Shiro that was absolutely agog.
"You forgot this," Shiro said, voice gentle despite the ruckus of the diner. "Thought you'd need it."
"You brought me back my coat ," Lance said, eyes wide. Shiro was a little unsettled by his shock. "Why?"
"Because it's your coat?" Shiro said. He patted Lance's shoulder. "Take care, Lance."
He glanced back before he left the diner, and Lance was still watching him, almost distressed. Shiro shook off the weird feeling Lance's expression gave him, and pushed out the door into the fading grey evening.