Headcanon: Keith's dad was a real classic rock kinda guy. He only had a couple of records on his old record player, never really got into tapes or CDs - picked up a few new ones here and there from artists he liked, but otherwise, rotated the same ones for Keith's entire

childhood. Keith has memories (hazy now) of working on bikes or grilling burgers on the tiny little charcoal grill as they watched the sherbet sunset in the desert, forever listening to those same records over and over. His dad never got tired of them and neither

did Keith. So when Lance catches him humming to himself one day while cleaning Red and starts laughing, he's embarrassed and defensive.
"You fucking WOULD," Lance cackles. "The music matches the mullet. Jesus, dude, we gotta update your repertoire."
Lance is sincerely

caught off guard when Keith throws down his rag with a heated, "FUCK you, Lance" and storms out of the hangar. He'd only been teasing! He can't even find Keith to apologize; dude's just up and disappeared. So he does what anyone looking for Keith would do: he goes to find Shiro.

He explains the situation with wild arm gestures and high pitched defenses. What the hell was Keith's problem? He'd been joking! Trying to bond!
Shiro shakes his head and sighs. "I know you didn't mean to, but you definitely hit a sensitive spot there, buddy."
"The Eagles?!"

"Okay, not the music specifically," Shiro concedes, and proceeds to tell Lance the sad, quiet history of Keith and music. How, when he'd lived alone in the shack, he'd found and fixed up his dad's old record player. How that record player was the only thing that kept him company

for an entire year in the middle of the desert when all he had to go on was a pulse of energy in the sand and the conviction that Shiro was alive somewhere in space.
Well, now Lance feels like a grade-A asshole, even when Shiro assures him Keith isn't actually mad and

knows Lance didn't mean it. Still. Lance loves to rib people, but he'd never intentionally *hurt* anyone - especially not Keith. Not these days. Not since he'd woken up one night a few months ago with sticky sheets and a very BIG realization to deal with. And thing was,

Keith had seemed to reciprocate?? Any time Lance joked with him, instead of the scowl he'd originally gotten, now he gets a quiet smile and, if he's lucky, sometimes an outright laugh. The first time he hears it, it startles him, then he vows to do anything he can to keep hearing

it. So this whole I-accidentally-hurt-Keith's-feelings business? Not gonna work for him.

That's how, with help from Pidge, he catches Keith the next time he's in Red's hangar. And by 'catches,' he means 'gets the lights turned down low and blasts music from Blue and shows off

his aerial skills by dropping down dramatically from the cable Blue so helpfully held in her jaws for him. Keith's head had snapped up the minute he heard the piano, and when he turned to see Lance, spread-eagled in mid-air and belting out "I WOULD DO AN-Y-THING FOR LOVE, KEITH -

"AND I MEAN ANYTHING, LOOK AT THIS, RIGHT HERE, I'M SORRY - oh shit it's actually starting - uh...I would do aannnyything for loooove, I'd run right into Hell and baack..."
Keith blinks. Blinks again. And then collapses into laughter so helpless that he can barely catch his

breath and he's got tears leaking down his cheeks. Lance grins at him, flipping himself around into a sort of swing so he can look at Keith from right-side up.
"Yeah?" he asks.
"Yeah," Keith agrees, still shaking his head and smiling.

So maybe Keith's taste in music still

low-key sucks. But catch Lance loading it all on his tablet so they can listen to it when they're snuggling on the couch in the rec room. Keith smiles and leans his head on Lance's shoulder and hums along, and Lance thinks, "Huh...guess I really would."
(And he WILL do that).

This has been a horrible, cheesy, self-indulgent thread from someone who really did grow up on the same, like, seven records. I shan't ask forgiveness.

#klance