Work Text:
That Song From Tetris, Right?
Lance comes from a very…active family. With five sisters (two older, three younger) and Lance, their house was almost never quiet and definitely never still. And things were never busier than during Nutcracker season. Between Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, the McClain-Sanchez kids were basically chasing the sugar-high dragon for a sold three-month period. The eternal sugar buzz plus being cooped up indoors (seriously, screw Michigan, from September to March every year little Lance would have given every Pokemon card he owned to go back to his grandparents’ place on Varadero Beach), led to an explosion of energy that could only be vented one way: through organized athletic activities. And since every single one of Lance’s sisters managed to go through a ballerina phase, that meant tights and wooden soldiers and mouse kings Every. Single. Year.
Lance had nightmares about the sugar plum princess every December for twelve years.
And because Lance still had two younger sisters at home, one in middle school and one in high school and somehow still not disillusioned with the Nutcracker, plus two five-year-old nieces (twins, and seriously, could his sister not manage to produce one male offspring? Lance was sick of being the only boy – brother-in-laws don’t count) that meant that the Nutcracker would never die in the McClain-Sanchez household. Lance was going to be helping his mom run the stupid ballet until he died.
When eighteen-year-old Lance decided to go to New York for college he had not factored in the possibility of his Mama getting a job upstate, uprooting the whole family and effectively following him to the east coast.
“Es una coincidencia” Mama had said, “no te preocupes” Mama had said.
Now his family is less than an hour away, he's upstate too because fuck city housing prices and he's doomed to a lifetime of the recurring Nutcracker nightmare.
…
Late October
"I'm not doing it this year! There's no way no how that Mom is conning me into helping with the goddamn Nutcracker again."
"Lance, you've been saying that since you were five years old,” Mama sighs on the phone and he can hear the smile lurking at the edges of her words, “and you're always wrong"
"Well I'm right this year,” he insists, despite the fact that he can definitely hear Mama repeating everything he says to Mom and Mom’s answering laughter, “Not gonna do it, no way,” he insists in the face of his mothers’ amusement, “Definitely not.”
…
Early November
"Dammit!" Lance groans, pouring himself onto the couch and draping himself across Keith’s lap. His human pillow flicks him between the eyes but resettles his book on top of Lance’s shoulder without further complaint, allowing Lance to bury his face in Keith’s chest and make dramatic sounds of suffering.
"What?" Keith asks, nonchalantly turning a page.
"I think I just agreed to something I didn't want to do,” Lance sighs when he’s ready to form coherent words.
"No surprise there. You're very easy to trick,” Keith says mildly, shifting one of his hands and petting Lance’s hair in a move that’s either patronizing or sweet.
"You're not being very supportive,” Lance grumbles.
"You're being ridiculous," Keith says, continuing to pet him like a cat.
"UGH," Lance gives up and just lets his boyfriend treat him like a house pet.
…
Mid-November
"Lance. What happened to the living room?"
"Hi babe, pass me the glitter glue."
Keith gives him what Lance calls the Keith-is-Actually-a-Feral-Cat look; the wary, slightly panicky yet still superior look that says his boyfriend can’t decide if he should fight, flee, or just awkwardly poke a situation until it resolves itself. It’s a very evocative look. "Not until you explain why it looks like Craft Warehouse projectile vomited in here."
"Mom conned me into helping with costumes for the Nutcracker. Again,” Lance drizzles a trail of glitter glue along the outline marked out in fabric pen.
Keith, still in Feral Cat Mode, slinks around the periphery of the living room, "That mouse king mask is fucking creepy,” he says, crouching down and prodding the rubber monstrosity with one finger. He abruptly stands. “I'm going somewhere."
"Gonna be more specific?"
"I'm going somewhere that doesn't have a creepy plastic mouse-demon mask and two tons of tulle. Do you want some coffee?" Lance is pretty sure that if you cut Keith there’s a fifty-fifty chance he’ll bleed coffee instead of blood.
“Please, please, pleaseeeee.”
“I’m not going to Starbucks.”
“But Gingerbread mochas! And fancy Christmas cups!”
“Ugh. Stop looking at me like that.”
“Gingerbread mocha? With a shot of peppermint? And sprinkles?”
“Cavities.”
“And whipped cream.”
“Death and diabetes.”
“Remember the whipped cream.”
“Fine!”
“I love you!”
Keith grumbles incoherently at him but he comes back an hour later with exactly what Lance asked for.
…
The Next Day
"Keeeeeith. Help meeee."
"No, you brought this on yourself."
…
Later that day
"Fucking fuck!" Keith yelps and nearly drops the hot glue gun.
"Burn yourself again?"
"...no..."
"What happened to 'you're on your own, Lance' 'you brought this on yourself, Lance'?"
Keith makes a face, "You looked really pathetic."
"Wow, and who said the romance was dead," Lance is not giggling because Lance is mature and a grown-up…who is totally giggling at Keith’s grumpy-cat face.
"For the record, I’m regretting my magnanimity."
"That does not surprise me. Your heart is a strange, cold place with lots of punk rock and very little holiday cheer. Like Hot Topic without the slutty Santa's Little Helper costumes."
"Shut up or I'm gluing these sequins to your face.”
…
Even Later That Day
“Get off!”
Keith has him in a headlock with one arm and is drawing pictures on his face with glitter glue, "Stop whining, it's just glue."
"Pidge! Keith is gluing sparkles on me!" Lance whines as the door to the dumbwaiter between their houses slides open to reveal Pidge…and a bunch of mad-scientist-y junk from her basement lab (reinstated once Lance gave in and just moved into Keith’s side of the duplex).
She makes a face, "I don't want to know about your weird shit."
"Hey! I am being bullied in my own home by a pair of reprobates!"
…
Significantly Later That Day
"You have all the tender sweetness of a seasick crocodile!" Lance yells into the living room as he scrubs at the glitter glue on his face.
"Are you insulting me via the Grinch song?"
"...Maybe?"
"Then just call me a Grinch!" Keith sounds torn between exasperated and amused.
"But that's not creative!" Lance gestures dramatically, realizes Keith can’t actually see him as they’re in two different rooms, and gestures again just to prove to himself that he will not feel awkward in any way about the dramatic gesturing.
"And plagiarism is?"
"It's not plagiarism, it's a pop culture reference."
Silence in the other room as Keith digests this and then… "Seasick crocodiles make no sense."
"That's how you're exiting this conversation?"
"Why is the crocodile near/on the ocean? It makes no sense!”
…
After Midnight
"Tulle is actually really comfy. Like a scratchy pillow." Keith is curled on his side, facing Lance, his spine arched like the curve of a parenthesis.
"Go to bed, Keith, you're drunk," Lance is lying facing him, the other half of a parenthetical citation.
"Wouldn't be if you hadn't spiked the eggnog." Keith’s face is softer like this, the curve of his mouth easier, every muscle, even the little ones around his strange violet-blue eyes, looser.
"That was mutual 'nog-spiking, babe." Lance tips his head forward and closes the gap until their foreheads are touching, a soft point of warmth. No more parenthesis, they’re just one continuous bell-curve right now.
"Mmm." Keith closes his eyes and smiles, his fingers sneaking across the gap to curl around Lance’s
"Thanks," Lance blurts because he feels like it needs to be said and this soft space between them is the space for saying silly things like unnecessary thank-yous.
"For what?" Keith’s fingers are shifting, lacing themselves in with Lance’s.
"Helping with the stupid Nutcracker."
"No problem." Fingers squeezing each other tight. In a few minutes they’ll scrape themselves off the floor and go to bed and in the morning Lance will wake up sprawled half on top of Keith and they’ll put bandaids on their hot-glue-induced blisters and Keith will dart around their kitchen putting together coffee and breakfast and lunch like a hyper-efficient robot until his coffee kicks in and turns him into a human again and there will still be a pile of mostly-finished Nutcracker costumes in the living room.
And it will be a good day.
Lance might even tell Keith that he has more glitter than Tinker Bell in his hair before he leaves for work that night.