Chapter Text
Keith didn’t expect much from the new house.
He never did.
Moving had become a kind of ritual for him and Shiro -- pack, unpack, pretend the walls didn’t echo, pretend the neighbors didn’t stare, pretend this time would be different.
It never was. Keith had learned to stop hoping for anything more than a roof and a room where he could close the door.
The neighborhood was too bright for his taste.
Perfect lawns, trimmed hedges, houses painted in colors that tried too hard to be friendly. Keith stood on the curb with a duffel bag slung over his shoulder, the late‑afternoon sun pressing warm and heavy against the back of his neck.
Shiro was already halfway up the driveway, calling something about dinner plans, but Keith barely heard him.
Because across the street, a boy was laughing.
Not just laughing -- radiating. His whole body moved with it, shoulders shaking, head thrown back, sunlight catching in his hair like it had been waiting for him specifically. He was sitting on the driveway with a friend, legs sprawled out, hands waving as he told some story Keith couldn’t hear.
But he didn’t need to hear it. The boy’s voice carried, bright and warm and alive in a way Keith hadn’t felt in a long time.
Keith froze. The world didn’t. A car drove past. A dog barked. Shiro called his name again. But Keith stood rooted to the spot, staring like an idiot at the boy across the street.
Then the boy looked up.
Blue eyes. Ridiculously blue. The kind of blue that made Keith’s breath catch, made his heart stutter, made something deep inside him tilt like a compass needle snapping toward true north.
The boy blinked, surprised, then smiled -- small, uncertain, but real. Keith’s stomach dropped. He didn’t know this kid. He didn’t know this street, this town, this life he was supposed to build here. But in that moment, he knew one thing with absolute clarity:
This move was going to be different.
Not because of the house. Not because of the school. Because of him.
The boy across the street.
Keith didn’t know his name yet. He didn’t know that he talked too fast when he was nervous, or that he tried too hard to impress people, or that he’d spend years pretending not to notice Keith at all.
He didn’t know that this boy would become the center of his world, the source of his confusion, frustration, heartbreak, and hope.
All he knew was that the sun was too bright, his chest felt too tight, and for the first time in a long time, Keith wanted something.
He wanted to know the boy who laughed like that.
He wanted to know Lance McClain.
And he had no idea how much that want would change everything.