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I feel like I need to offer a brief explanation about Keith’s verbal grammar here before you all start reading.
Firstly, to my mind, Keith did not really start learning what I’m referring to in this fic as Common (whatever language is spoken in the VLD verse that the majority of alien races understand) or English until after he first met the Paladins of Voltron. My head canon for this fic is that Krolia took Keith with her when she left Earth due to his being Galra presenting instead of human presenting, while Tex stayed on Earth because there physically was not enough room on Krolia’s spacecraft for him to go with.
This is why you’ll notice that I’ve written Keith speaking with a lot of pauses (denoted by ellipses) and more often without conjunctions than with them. Because while he understands English and Common, and can read and write both fluently, his speaking and listening skills aren’t the best.
I may also have based that particular knowledge of language on my own high school experience with learning Japanese. I could read and write hiragana, katakana and some kanji by the time I graduated, but my listening and speaking comprehension was something I struggled with.
Anyway, that’s why I wrote Keith the way I did in this fic speaking-wise. I hope that makes sense to everyone, and that you all still enjoy this fic!
--
Keith watched what was happening in the officer’s lounge of the Atlas with confusion furrowing his brow, his ears flicking back and forward.
“What…are you all doing?”
He ignored the warmth he could feel heating his cheeks. Honestly, he was lucky that he was half-Galra and had inherited his mother’s purple skin. He wouldn’t be able to hide his embarrassment half so well if he had been born pink and all but hairless like the humans in front of him.
Lance, one of the Paladins of Voltron, turned to look at him, managing somehow to look offended, scandalised, and delighted at the same time.
Keith nearly hissed with how fast the lanky human got up in his personal space, slinging an arm around his shoulders. He was completely ignorant of Keith’s body language; the pinned back ears, the lashing tail, the way the tufts of fur ruffing his neck and the backs of his hands stood at attention.
Even after joining forces with the Paladins, he was still entirely unused to how ignorant of non-verbal communication they all were.
“Well, Keithy-Kat,” the brown-skinned human crowed, gesticulating at the room with the arm not around Keith. Keith flinched at the loud, grating sound of Lance’s voice practically in his ear. Another thing he still was not used to. Human’s senses weren’t as sharp as a Galra’s, so they tended to forget to lower their voices when talking to the Blades. Lance in particular was especially ignorant of this. Keith shrugged off the arm around his shoulders, moving further into the room as the other paladins, not including Commander Shirogane, turned to meet him halfway.
Pidge and Hunk dropped comfortably onto the sunken lounge in the middle of the room. Allura sat herself primly beside them, and Lance vaulted the back of the lounge to land beside her, wrapping his arm around Allura’s shoulders instead. Unlike Keith, the Altean princess tucked herself under his arm, a delicate hand rising to rest on the young human’s chest. Pidge’s older brother, the rebel Matt, moved to the kitchen space of the lounge and started making himself some kind of Earth-snack.
Keith crouched nearby, tail switching rhythmically behind him as he watched the humans and the princess with open curiosity on his face.
“Here on Earth,” Pidge started, taking up where Lance left off since he and the princess seemed to have drifted into their own, private world. “We have these things called ‘holidays’. Some are specific to only one or two countries, some are specific to different religions, and some happen on the same day for nearly every country on the planet.”
Keith cocked his head to one side, his ear flicking forward, riveted on Pidge as the young Green Paladin explained this concept to him.
“One of the international holidays, a world holiday, for lack of a better way to explain the term, is called Christmas.”
Keith’s head cocked to the other side.
“What is…Christmas?”
Footsteps entering the lounge had his ear flicking back towards the noise, the tip of his tail quivering. A moment later, a large, metallic hand touched down gently on his shoulder as Takashi Shirogane, Commander of the Atlas and Black Paladin of Voltron, crouched beside Keith so that he could sit comfortably beside the half-Galra, his socked feet resting on the cushions of the lounge. Keith looked up into the Commander’s silver eyes, feeling his whole body flush at the warmth he saw on the human’s face.
He had to swallow a few times to choke down the low, rumbling purr that threatened to erupt from him in public.
“It’s a holiday important to a lot of people on Earth, Keith,” Shiro murmured, looking around the room at the garlands on the walls, and the tree tucked into one corner of the room. “For some, it’s about giving and receiving gifts. For others, it’s about the religious background of the holiday; spending time in church and praying to God, for example. For everyone though, it’s the time of year we spend with our families and loved ones, enjoying each other’s company and warmth, and just basking in the love we have for each other.”
Keith gave a questioning ‘mrr’, looking at the other humans in the room as they all nodded in turn.
“Mum and Dad normally book us into a hotel somewhere in the mountains or on the beach. For us it’s about getting away from home and trying something different, enjoying different scenery, getting away from work,” Pidge trailed off with a shrug. “Dad and Matt were gone so long though that I think Mum just wants to stay at home with us this year.”
“We normally invite all the relatives over; all of Mum and Dad’s brothers and sisters and their families, plus all my grandparents. We grab a spot on the beach early in the morning and have our own private party all day, including a massive pit roast.” Hunk added, a small, reminiscent smile on the big human’s face. “Before the whole saving-the-universe thing happened, I got to take charge of the roast pig for the first time ever. I’m really looking forward to it this year.”
“We do something similar, just without the pit roast. All the girls put on these bright dresses, we men put on out best shirts and slacks, and we dance the night away in the backyard, with a family barbeque,” Lance added, looking up briefly before turning his eyes back to Allura’s, who smiled at him softly. “That sounds lovely, Lance,” she murmured, dropping her head onto his shoulder as his fingers traced patterns over the fabric covering her shoulder.
Keith looked back at Shiro, who smiled wistfully, looking at the room without really seeing it.
“Jiji and Baba used to let me open one of my gifts at midnight every Christmas Eve. They even woke me up just for that special, quiet moment with them in front of the fire late at night. Then they’d make us hot chocolate, and we’d all snuggle up together on the couch under this beautiful hand made blanket of Baba's.” Shiro’s throat clicked as he swallowed, a telling sheen in his eyes. “That blanket was the last gift they gave me, before Kerberos. Before they passed away.”
Shiro dropped his chin towards his chest, breathing hard as he reached up to thread metal and flesh fingers into the longer hair on top of his head.
Keith couldn’t help himself; he tipped into Shiro’s orbit, until he’s resting against Shiro’s side. Shiro looked up at him, and Keith flicked his ears forward, offering silent support. His tail curled around Shiro on the floor, the black furred tuft at the tip resting by Shiro’s thigh. When Shiro smiled at him, Keith felt his heart skip a beat before it started pounding in his chest.
“We do not have such days,” Keith murmured, looking at the lounge cushions in front of him. “At least, Mother and Kolivan have not said as such. I do not know if that is because of the recent history of the Galra Empire, or because of our battle to save the universe from the Empire, but I have no memory of such days spent with family.”
When he looked up, all of the humans were looking at him with variations of the same expression of shock.
“Damn,” Hunk murmured.
“Yeah,” Matt agreed.
“We gotta do it, huh?” Pidge asked, looking around the room.
“Oh-ho-ho we definitely gotta,” Lance crowed.
Keith’s tail switched across the floor behind him, ears flicking back and forward.
“Do…what,” he asked, trepidation in his tone. Shiro sighed, shaking his head with a fond smile on his face as he took in everyone’s expressions.
“Give Keith the Christmas Experience,” the Paladins cheered. Keith looked at Shiro, who was smiling softly down at him.
“Should I…be worried?”
Shiro bumped Keith’s shoulder with his own.
“Not yet,” Shiro answered quietly, leaning back on his hands as the others started talking in an excited manner, planning things that they could drag Keith along to. Keith’s English still wasn’t great, his Mum had had to leave his Dad behind when they left Earth after all, and Krolia had never really had the proper opportunities to teach him with how often she was sent on missions while he was growing up. He knew enough to get by, but not enough to understand the Paladins rapid-fire chatter happening across from him.
“Will I…,” here he trailed off, feeling heat suffuse his body, and completely unable to stop the quiet, stuttering rumble of a purr from rattling his chest now that it would be harder to hear with all the other noise in the room. “Will you…be doing a Christmas thing with me too?”
Shiro blinked, his features going slack for a moment, lips parting in his surprise. Then, those silver eyes smiled at him, and Keith’s purring kicked up a notch.
“I’d like that, if you want to, Keith,” he agreed. Keith hummed, his puur stuttering to a stop as they both turned their attention back to the room. Keith couldn’t help the small upward curl of his lips or the way his the tip of his tail twitched where it had curled around Shiro on the floor again, as human and half-human sat, watching their friends and enjoying their excitement, warm shoulder to warm shoulder.
For the first time in his short, terrifying life, Keith felt like he’d come home, and he didn’t know how or why he felt that way.
He was hoping his strange human friends would be able to show him, though.
*
Keith was beginning to think that this Christmas thing involved way too much planning.
At least, that was how he was feeling as Lance ranted about previous family Christmases to Keith and Allura as they made their way to the McClain household for ‘Day One of Keith’s Christmas Experience’. So farm he had listened to stories of ‘epic’ snowball fights, family holidays to California or Hawaii where the temperature stayed largely the same, and all the times Lance had had to console a bawling niece or nephew because some creepy sounding old, bearded man named ‘Santa’ did not give the children what they wanted for Christmas that year.
By the end of the drive to Lance’s family home, Keith was halfway convinced that the children in Lance’s family were entirely selfish, focussing only on what they did not have instead of what they did have. When Lance opened the front door to the high pitched screams of a human infant, Keith decided he was ready to turn around and go back to the blissfully quiet halls of the Atlas, where his eardrums were much less likely to start bleeding from exposure to high pitched decibels.
This was going to be a long night...
*
Keith was right. It was a long night.
He was fairly certain he had been poked, prodded, and had his tail grabbed and yanked by every human child under the age of ten Earth years. He had resorted to hissing at the children at least three times to get them to leave him alone, and yet they had still persisted, all while the adults in the house had laughed and called the behaviour ‘cute’.
At this point, Keith was beyond ready to return to his quarters in the Atlas. Possibly after a trip to the med bay to make sure that the tiny humans hadn’t broken his tail first. It hurt terribly where the tiny hands had all grabbed it in the exact same spot.
Keith was also determined to not participate in any further Christmas madness his friends might have planned for him. He was beyond done with the tail pulling and the ear-splitting infant screeches.
He levelled a glare at Lance all the way home in the silence of the vehicle. The bastard human ignored him entirely, holding hands with Allura across the console as he asked her what she had thought of the evening.
Keith was considering the finer points of murder when they returned to the Atlas. He was grumbling some choice Galran curses as he slid out of the vehicle and made a beeline for the training rooms. He needed to work off some steam or he would never sleep tonight.
Before he could get very far though, Hunk, Pidge, Matt and Shiro were waiting for him, ready to hear about his first Christmas experience.
“I hated it. Tiny humans yanked on my tail for amusement and screeched loud enough to deafen me.”
The rest of the group exchanged looks, Shiro’s being the most concerned, as Keith stomped his way passed them. When Lance and Allura wandered over to the group, the others levelled pointed looks at Lance.
“What,” he demanded. “You guys said to give him the ‘full Christmas experience’. How was I supposed to know he’d hate it?”
Lance looked on in confusion as his friends groaned and shook their heads, making their way back to the officer’s lounge to plan out the next event for Keith to attend. One that wouldn’t end up with the poor half-Galra being terrorised by children.
*
Keith was apprehensive about attending hunk’s family Christmas gathering, especially when he noticed more tiny humans on arrival.
Well, he was apprehensive until the tiny humans cheered ‘Uncle Hunk, Uncle Hunk’ as they raced over to the vehicle to attach themselves to whatever part of his large human friend they could reach, namely his legs. Hunk laughed and scooped two of the children up, turning to face Keith as he exited the vehicle.
“These are my nieces and nephews,” Hunk explained. “My brothers’ and sisters’ kids,” here he looked down at the little ones with mock sternness. “They’re going to be on their best behaviour today, right guys?”
The tiny humans nodded mutely.
“That includes no screaming, and no pulling Mr. Keith’s tail, right?”
The cluster of little humans nodded again, gave a polite, unified, garbled mess of ‘hello, Mr. Keith,’ then they were off again, running along the sandy shore of the beach where Hunk’s family had decided to gather this year. One of the children picked up a ball of some kind, and then they were all occupied with whatever game they had been playing before Hunk and Keith had arrived.
Keith was mystified. It was such a contrast to the way that Lance’s family had behaved that he wasn’t sure what to make of it all.
“C’mon,” Hunk said with a grin. “I’ll introduce you to everyone before I get to helping with the roast.”
*
Hunk’s family were as varied in age and location as Lance’s family had been. The biggest difference between the two families, however, was that Keith was treated with polite kindness, rather than the borderline insulting fascination with his alien features that the McClain family had displayed. He was ushered to a seat, offered some appetizers and Earth alcohol, the latter of which he politely refused (because he was a light weight and did not want to make a fool of himself in a public setting). He couldn’t help the anxious switching of his tail, or turning his ear towards every little sound around him. This ‘Christmas party’ was still loud, but it was a different kind of loud to his first Christmas experience.
There were no children grabbing his tail, for starters.
Instead, he faced a gauntlet of polite questions about his culture, how he lived growing up, and what made him decide to join the Blades and fight for the Coalition against the Galran empire regime. He was also never left out of a conversation, or, as Hunk had called him once, become a ‘wall flower’ (seriously, what were wall flowers? Why had he not come across one yet during his time on Earth? Why would no one explain this to him?).
He was also introduced to a lot of people. Lance’s family was big, but Hunk’s was bigger. Hunk’s parents and their siblings were present, as well as all of the mates and children of that generation. So were Hunk’s grandparents, as well as his grandparents siblings, children, and grandchildren. Hunk had also explained that he had older brothers and sisters who had mates and children, which were the clutch of children who had run to greet them when they arrived.
Hunk also advised that there were even more family members who were unaccounted for, due to attending their mates’ family events instead for that year. Despite this, Hunk advised that all of his family were pretty close with each other (well, except for cousin Sally, who was apparently a very mean, very stuck up person, and never attended family events unless they were held in posh restaurants).
Keith learned more about Hunk’s family in one sitting than he had neither planned nor wanted to learn.
Despite that, it was still...nice. The little humans played games of ball, or tag, or went swimming (at least until the sun went down). Hunk and a couple of his brothers and uncles dug a huge pit in the ground, which they then lit a fire in. Once the fire was hot enough, they lifted an entire spitted pig into the pit, and covered the pit over with fireproof tarps.
When the pig came out of the ground after sunset, the skin had formed a layer of bubbles in some places, while it had gone sticky and chewy in others, ‘because everyone likes their crackling different ways,’ Hunk intoned in the most serious tone Keith had heard from him all day.
An above-ground fire was started then, to keep people warm if they needed it. Then there was food, and dancing, and laughter, and Keith found himself smiling a small, tucked away smile by the end of the night.
Maybe, just maybe, this Christmas thing wasn’t entirely bad, after all.
*
Keith’s Christmas event with the Holt family was mainly spent updating his Earth vocabulary. The English language was similar enough to Common, which was used by most alien races, but there were a lot of colloquial terms that Keith did not know, and neither did the translator chip in his PADD.
His friends had taught him a lot over the years, since it had been a steep learning curve for the human paladins of Voltron to learn the variations between English and Common, but Keith was always eager to learn more.
Though, Pidge and Matt only grinned that particularly mischievous grin when he asked about the wall flower thing. They also refused to tell him about wall flowers, which had him grumbling and growling in protest when they started laughing about the fact.
“Some things you gotta learn on your own, Keithy-Kat,” Matt cooed teasingly.
“Do not call me that,” Keith protested, crossing his arms over his chest as his tail switched agitatedly behind him.
“Why not? I think it’s adorable,” Matt grinned at his half-Galra friend, leaning back in his chair and watching smugly as Keith’s patchy fur stood on end in his displeasure.
“I do not like it,” he growled sullenly, openly pouting now. Matt and Pidge cackled with laughter.
Keith was back to thinking that Christmas was a horrible time of year if he had to spend the entire night being teased by his human friends, and called by stupid nicknames.
The dinner Sam and Colleen served more than made up for it, though. It was hearty, and filling, and Keith found himself smiling that small smile again as he watched his friends talk and laugh with their parents, and enjoy their time together. The first time they’d had to relax together as a family in years.
Keith thought that maybe Christmas wasn’t a terrible holiday after all. Especially not if it made his friends smile like this all the time.
Keith immediately became sceptical again when the Holt siblings turned that look on him. The one that looked like they were plotting something. He did not like that look – it always lead to trouble.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“No particular reason,” Pidge began with a shrug, still with that grin on their face and that look in their eyes.
“Hey,” Matt began, raising an eyebrow as he continued to look at Keith in the same exact manner. “Who’s hosting the last Christmas event for you? Shiro, right?”
Now Keith was definitely suspicious.
“You both already know the answer to that question, so why are you asking me this?”
“Oh,” Matt hummed, drawing out the sound. He leaned back in his seat, splaying his arms over the back of the Holt’s living room couch. “No reason in particular. It’s just, y’see, I was talking to Shiro just yesterday while you were having Christmas with the Garrett clan.”
Keith’s heart skipped a beat in his chest, and he could feel heat rising to his cheeks. Unfortunately for him, his friends could read his micro-expressions like an open book by now, being the most adept of the Paladins at Galra culture and biology.
“Aw, Keith’s blulshing,” Pidge cooed, grin curling up at the corners. It vaguely reminded him of Kosmo’s smug expression whenever Keith gave in and gave him more treats. Keith glared at Pidge in response.
“Keith would’ve liked to see the way Shiro blushed when I asked what Shiro was planning for their Christmas together.”
Keith froze in place, the sudden flush of heat he felt warming him all the way to his toes, deepening the violet tones of his skin where it was bare of fur. Once his brain came back online, he stiffened in a mild sense of offence and frustration. Keith did not know if his friends were lying (it was so damn hard to tell with species who didn’t have the same micro-expressions the Galra did), but Keith really didn’t want them leading him on in any case.
He looked down at his hands, twining his fingers together and squeezing, releasing, and squeezing again.
“Shiro,” he murmured, staring at his hands clenched in his lap. Pidge and matt hummed questioningly, the smiles leaving their faces. “He...does not see me. Not in the way you are thinking of.”
The Holt siblings huffed and crossed their arms over their chests in perfect unison. Keith found that a little unnerving.
“Keithy-Kat, you are entirely too oblivious for your own good.”
“I am not. And do not call me by that name.”
Matt ignored the way his ears pinned back against his skull, and the way his tail thrashed behind him in his irritation. Pidge sighed, shaking their head and reaching out to shove their brother so they sprawled across the couch cushions with an indignant squawk.
“What was that for?!”
“For antagonising Keith. He doesn’t think Shiro likes him like that, so leave off.”
Matt crossed his arms over his chest, pouting. Keith couldn’t help the small quirk of his lips at the expression.
And just like that, the argument about Keith and Shiro’s feelings for each other was dropped, and the Holt siblings got back to their current round of Scrabble with him.
Keith couldn’t help getting lost in thought though. And if those thoughts contained silver hair in the sunlight, or grey eyes that melt to liquid mercury whenever that beautiful smile was directed his way...
Well, that was nobody’s business but Keith’s.
*
Keith was nervous, if the twitching of his tail was anything to go by. Kosmo, lying across Keith’s bed in his quarters aboard the Altas, whined at the sight and scent of his distress.
Tonight was his Christmas event with Shiro.
Shiro, who he has been trying very hard not to imprint on, since that was not how humans typically found mates. Yet imprint he had, and now he got to suffer with pining for the human who would never want him for the rest of his natural life span. Which was fine – Keith could deal with his traitorous body’s reactions whenever he was around Shiro for any length of time.
It just…it hurt. Having an unrequited imprint was always physically painful for a Galra to experience, which was just one of the many reasons the Galra typically did not mate outside of their own race. Because other Galrans could pick up on the micro-expressions and body language. Humans, on the other hand…
Keith didn’t know what hurt more – the fact that he loved Shiro, or that Shiro did not know about Keith’s love, and probably never would. His chest ached, and his skin felt like it was stretched too tight over his bones, and he was exhausted because he could not sleep no matter what he did to unwind at the end of a long day, but it was fine. It had to be fine. Because Shiro did not like to see Keith suffering. So, he continued to smile for his best human friend, and made efforts to conceal every wince or quiet, gasping breath he would take when things became too much and not enough all at once.
And if he had also been having near constant wet dreams about the burly, muscle-bound, kind man...well, that was his business. Still, Keith was concerned he would not be able to endure being in close proximity to Shiro, alone, for so long. With a sigh, Keith sat down on his bed next to Kosmo, who whined again, thumped his tail encouragingly, and leaned over to lick Keith’s cheek affectionately.
“Thanks, buddy,” he whispered, burying his fingers into the space wolf’s ruff for a moment, scratching affectionately. The large animal leaned heavily into the touch, almost blanketing Keith in his body-weight. He had been doing this for Keith since the day they had met each other on the space whale – providing a source of calm whenever Keith’s mind was nothing but anxious, distressed static. Kosmo soothed his ragged soul in so many ways – Keith was very grateful to the creature that he had stayed by his side through everything since that day.
Keith closed his eyes for a moment and breathed in deep through his nose, taking in every comforting, familiar scent his quarters offered. Then he stood from the bed, checked his appearance in the mirror one last time, and tossed his braided hair over his shoulder to lay down the length of his spine. Once he was certain that he was presentable for an evening spent in the company of the one person in all the universe who mattered, he dug his fingers into Kosmo’s ruff one more time.
“Alright, would you take me to Shiro’s quarters, please?”
An instant later, he was outside Shiro’s front door, and Kosmo disappeared with a quiet pop, likely retuning to Keith’s bed for the night.
Keith rung his hands together, shook them out, breathed in deep one more time, and exhaled shakily. Then, he straightened his posture, and knocked.
*
Shiro answered the door with a beaming smile, wearing one of those ridiculous knitted jumpers humans preferred to wear at this time of the year, a pair of glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, and a bright red apron which read “Kiss Me, It’s Christmas!” in curling white font.
Keith blushed.
“Keith, hi,” Shiro said, eye crinkling at the corners as he stepped back to allow Keith to enter his quarters. Keith side-stepped around the broad shouldered man and into the space, choking down a gasp and trying his best to supress the full-body shiver that coursed through him at the briefest moment of contact when Keith’s chest brushed Shiro’s arm. “I’m so glad you could make it tonight.”
“Thank you…for inviting me. For…showing me what Christmas means to you. I appreciate the gesture very much,” he murmured, watching after Shiro as they moved into the living space of Shiro’s quarters. Shiro turned that smile on him again, and Keith’s heart skipped a beat before it started pounding in his chest. Keith was in Shiro’s den now, and the space smelled entirely of Shiro.
Keith was having a very hard time keeping himself from breathing in too deeply, for fear of growing an erection he would not be able to explain away as his human friend turned toward the kitchen, telling Keith that he could make himself comfortable. “I’m just finishing up dinner now, so we’ll be eating soon.” Keith nodded and perched himself on one of the bar stools on the far side of the kitchen island to watch Shiro cook while they chatted. Shiro asked Keith about the other Christmas events he had been to – if he had enjoyed himself, whether everyone had looked after him, what all the Paladins did to celebrate the holiday this year.
It was…comfortable. So achingly warm and soothing for Keith’s entire being just to be near Shiro. It still hurt, but right now, like this…it felt like someone had rubbed a healing salve into his wounds to help ease the pain. Keith had to stop himself from purring with how good it felt just to be near this man that he cherished with his entire being. It was even harder to stop himself from getting up off of his stool and rounding the island to plaster himself to the human’s side and never let go again.
Yes…this might be a problem if things continued in this vein tonight.
*
The dinner was fantastic. Keith cleaned his plate, piled it with a second helping, then cleaned it again. All while Shiro had watched him with this smile on his face that made Keith blush, and left his mind feeling muzzy, almost like he was drunk, even though they had only drunk a single glass of Earth-wine each with their dinner.
After dinner, Shiro offered that Keith could make himself comfortable on the couch, he was just going to grab them something else to drink from the kitchen. So, there Keith sat, trying very hard to not turn his head to bury his nose into the couch cushions for how much they smelled like Shiro. When the man himself returned from the kitchen, it was with two ceramic mugs and an old, well-used knitted blanket in his hands.
Keith blinked in surprised as Shiro set the mugs on the coffee table in front of him, then flopped down onto the couch right next to him. Maker help him but Shiro smelled good.
“I thought we could get comfortable and watch a cheesy Christmas movie with our hot chocolate, if that’s okay?”
Keith could not answer verbally, his mouth had dried up the moment Shiro’s arms wrapped the blanket around them both, with plenty of blanket still to spare as the big human snuggled up close to Keith. Keith’s chest throbbed with wanting at the same time that his entire body released all tension. He went completely boneless in Shiro’s arms, snuggling in even closer before he realised what it was he was doing.
But Shiro merely gave a quiet huff of laughter and reached to grab their hot beverages and the remote for the TV from the coffee table. Keith was considering the merits of hiding himself under the blanket and not resurfacing until it was time to go home as Shiro resettled himself, still with one arm wrapped around Keith’s waist, while he offered one of the mugs to Keith with the other hand.
He took the offered beverage wordlessly and took a tentative sip, then sighed in contentment as Shiro chose a movie for them to watch on one of the Earth web-streaming sites and hit play.
Keith couldn’t help being hyper-aware of how close Shiro was to him right now. They had never really spent much time together in a private setting, and it was also never for very long, with all that was happening with the fight to save the universe, that there wasn’t any personal time towards the end of the war, when everything came to a head. This felt so private and intimate, and Keith felt like his brain was overloading just trying to process how this felt for him.
Put in simple terms – Keith did not know what to do. Did not know what to say. Should he say anything? He did not know, and that scared him a little bit, made his tail thump against the couch a couple of times until he concentrated on making it stop because fucking hell he did not need his body parts giving him away right now!
Keith’s breath stuttered in his chest as Shiro’s hand squeezed his shoulder gently, then dropped casually to his waist to give a gentle squeeze there as well. Did Shiro realise what he was doing? What was he doing? Keith was so godsdamned confused.
He managed to drink all of his hot chocolate, despite his internal crisis, and he also managed to keep his eyes on the TV screen for about half of the movie. The other half of the movie he spent sneaking glances at Shiro when the human was not looking.
Shiro was the more interesting of the two options, anyway.
*
When the movie finished, Shiro lifted his arm from around Keith and reached towards the ceiling, arching his back with a groan as he stretched stiff muscles. Then he smiled at Keith again. Keith blinked, then he blinked again as his face heated and surely filled with colour that the pale violet of his cheeks could not hide.
“Ah, I almost forgot,” Shiro gasped, getting up off the couch. When Keith made to follow, Shiro motioned for him to stay where he was. He returned to the couch shortly, wrapping himself back up in the blanket and around Keith, handing the petite half-Galra a brightly wrapped…something.
“Open it,” Shiro urged with a smile. “You can, you know, Jiji and Baba always let me open one present every Christmas Eve.”
Keith tucked a shaking finger under one corner of the wrapping and lifted, trying not to tear the bright, beautiful paper too much. He wanted to save as much as he could from this night.
Hidden beneath the paper was a simple wooden photo frame. Inside the frame was the first photograph taken of Keith on Earth.
It was a close-up of his face and Shiro’s, pressed cheek-to-cheek. Shiro was grinning into the camera, while Keith smiled more sedately. Shiro had insisted this method of photography was known as a ‘selfie’ and was a common Earth custom of commemorating good memories. They had taken the hoverbikes deep into the desert canyons that day, Keith remembered. The sunset that day had been beautiful, but Shiro’s smile when he asked if Keith would pose for a photo with him had been somehow brighter.
Keith was speechless. He looked up at Shiro, who was smiling that same bright smile at him, his throat working as he tried to find the words. He needed to find the words.
“Shiro, I…”
Shiro shook his head, and leaned in close to nudge his forehead against Keith’s. Keith held impossibly still as warm breath fanned over his lips.
“I wanted to give you something that meant something to both of us. This was the first thing I thought of,” Shiro grinned toothily at him, and Keith could not help but laugh at the sight of it. He soon stilled when Shiro’s expression became a more serious one.
“Listen Keith, there’s something I wanna tell you. Something important.”
Shiro had not moved out of Keith’s orbit yet. Keith was finding it hard to think clearly with the man so close to him.
“Shiro,” he murmured, blinking once, slowly, ears pricked forward. His tail curled around Shiro’s waist where they sat, still side-by-side on the couch. Shiro’s hands came up to frame Keith’s face, and his heart stuttered in his chest before starting up again at double the speed.
“Keith, for a while now, I haven’t known how to say what I want to tell you. I didn’t know how you’d react, and I was worried, because I didn’t want my feelings to get in the way of our friendship.”
“Your feelings,” Keith hummed questioningly, leaning into one of Shiro’s hands for a moment, looking up at those silver orbs from beneath his lashes.
“Yeah, and maybe your feelings are different to mine, but I need you to know that I don’t want to keep on just being your friend, Keith,” here Shiro paused, and took a deep breath, which gusted out of him in a warm huff that had Keith reflexively wetting his lips with his tongue. He couldn’t help but be absorbed by the way Shiro tracked the movement of his tongue, then cleared his throat.
“What I’m trying to say is,” when Shiro breathed deep again, Keith offered him a small, hopeful smile. “I want to do more than just hang out with you, Keith. I…I want to take you on dates, I want to go on adventures with you by my side, and I want to come home to you, your eyes, your smile, your moods, all of it. I really like you, Keith, and I’m hoping that the magic of Christmas is on my side tonight, because I’m really hoping you’ll say that you like me too.”
Keith’s brain went into full shutdown mode for about three ticks, and then he was tipping forward, falling into Shiro, letting himself have what he thought he never would have as they share their first kiss. It’s soft, and sweet, and everything Keith had thought it might be, and yet it’s so much more than that. All because it’s Shiro, with his bright eyes and brighter smile, his ready laugh and his cool head. His competitive streak and his temper. His past, his present, and the possibility of his future.
He breathes Shiro’s name on a sigh. Whispered ‘yes’ like a mantra into his mouth as he buried his fingers into those starlight bright locks of hair on the top of Shiro’s head, and leaned into his orbit.
Keith’s not sure how they end up in Shiro’s bed, he’s been too busy trying to pull Shiro’s ridiculous Christmas jumper over his head while Shiro was latched onto his neck and grasping at the tie that bound his hair. As hip length black locks unfurled from their neat, careful braid, Keith finally tossed the atrocious jumper into some unknown corner of Shiro’s bedroom. Shiro helped him remove his own shirt next, then Keith was lying back, sighing and whimpering into more kisses as they took a turn from sweet to passionate.
And if Keith woke the next morning tucked up against Shiro’s chest with a pleasant ache in the lower half of his body?
Well, that was nobody’s business but theirs. Theirs, plus a little Christmas ‘magic’.