finished flight crew au one shot <3

flight crew au came out on top of that poll from a while ago so I cleaned up, edited, and added onto this drabble to make it a complete scene that I feel happy posting. hope you enjoy it!!! there will be much more flight crew au to come!

::

It would be ambitious to call it the worst day ever, but Lance is an ambitious guy, and that is how it starts. After getting little to no sleep the night before, his report time early in the morning was around 0500 and while he’s not technically a morning person, he doesn’t let that stop him from being friendly or pleasant. Especially with the promise of espresso to look forward to. He chooses to be an optimist, you know--determined to make the most of his day.

But the Starbucks had been closed when he and his crew arrived at the airport, and it felt like a sign. Everything went downhill from there.

He’d been scheduled to work two flights, but two turned into three when they had to divert due to weather over Denver. On top of that, there had been a delays, many disgruntled passengers, and a mishap during one inflight service when he’d made a drink and then accidentally dumped it all over a woman who also had a baby in her lap. And, despite working the last two flights with Keith up in the cockpit, he hadn’t been able to see him or spare more than a fleeting hello in all of the chaos. Which sucked okay!

All in all, Lance had been on the verge of frustrated tears by the end of the last flight, locked up in one of the lavatories to try and get a grip. He needed to do something to turn the day around before going to bed or his whole day tomorrow would start out sour.

Which is why Lance invites the whole crew out for drinks. He’s delighted when they all accept, even lone wolf Keith, who looks just as exhausted by the events of the day as Lance feels.

He’d never admit it to anyone, but knowing Keith is going to meet them all down at the bar makes him glad he’d packed a set of clothes that compliment him so well. After arriving at the hotel he changes into a pair of dark, slim fit jeans with holes in the knees and a heather grey shirt his mama always says brings out the blue in his eyes. He even takes a little extra time to fix his hair.

He guzzles two house margaritas with Romelle before he even notices that Keith has arrived. The alcohol gives him the courage to corner Keith at the end of the bar where he’s nursing some dark beer in a sweaty glass and scrolling listlessly through his phone. Despite agreeing to come out with everyone, he clearly hasn’t made much of an effort to involve himself and Lance is feeling a little neglected because of it. He hasn’t asked, or poked, or prodded, since he hasn’t had a single moment alone with Keith all day, but he can tell there’s something on his mind, and it’s heavy enough to weigh at his shoulders. His well-defined, beautifully sculpted shoulders. And that just won’t do.

“Hey, man,” Lance says by way of greeting, plopping loudly into the bar stool beside Keith, keeping his tone light. The legs screech against the old wooden floors, nearly loud enough to carry over the pounding bass in the room, and at least ten different sets of eyes swing their way. Lance chooses to ignore it, grateful that he at least kept his balance, mostly because it claims Keith’s attention, too.

Keith has looked up from his phone, his dark hair tucked behind one ear. “Hey.”

“What gives?” Lance slides his hand around the cold glass of his third drink, thumbing at the condensation. “You’ve got your grumpy face on and you haven’t said two words to me since we got here. Somethin’ crawl up your butt and die while you were changing in the hotel room earlier?”

Keith merely rolls his eyes as Lance presses the straw to his bottom lip and takes a sip. “You wanted me to come so I came, Lance.”

Lance sucks harder at his straw, furrowing his eyebrows. “You’ve been ignoring me,” he says, accidentally petulant. Whoops.

Keith’s eyes narrow a bit, his eyebrows knitting together.

“We aren’t talking about me!” Lance drops an elbow to the table and leans his cheek into the cradle of his palm, immediately changing the subject. “I’m trying to ask if you’re okay. That’s all.”

“That’s a terrible way to ask.”

Lance pushes his drink away. “Keith, c’mon man.”

Keith sighs, tilts his head so that his gaze is cast out and away from Lance, towards where the rest of the crew is happily conversing at one of those tables that you stand at. Lance waits patiently for him to continue, sensing a give in Keith’s reluctance.

“Don’t….make it weird, okay?” Keith says, avoiding eye contact. “I’m fine. Really.”

“Okay,” Lance prompts, promises. There’s still more, he can tell. Lance has become proficient at reading all of Keith’s unreadable expressions, the impenetrable wall he’s constructed around all of his emotions.

Once Keith has made up his mind about something, he doesn’t hold back. Lance has noticed that, too. “I’ve just been thinking about my dad.” He still keeps his gaze safely away, hidden, like he knows that Lance can read him like a book. And Lance knows that Keith’s dad died a long, long time ago, when he was still just a kid—or that’s what he’s inferred from various other conversations—but the way Keith says it, soft and...it’s not vulnerable, but it could be. If they were somewhere else. If the music in the bar wasn’t so loud or if the guy behind him wasn’t laughing obnoxiously to a joke neither one of them heard.

Lance grabs his drink again, takes another sip, forcing nonchalance because he knows that’s what Keith would prefer. Even though the part of him that has never lost someone he loved dearly trembles at the thought of Keith’s heart, healed from time, but still feeling the echo, the shape, of that loss. He pretends like Keith is telling him the time or the weather, and keeps his gaze trained on his face.

“Today would have been his birthday,” Keith offers when Lance remains silent. He says it matter of factly. Lance aches, hurts, sympathy immediately swelling up on his tongue, but that’s as much as Keith says. It’s evident he doesn’t mean to open up anymore than that when he finally looks back at Lance, as though waiting for him to respond, his shoulders a little tense.

Lance takes a long sip, meeting Keith’s gaze head on, and then sets his drink back down. “You didn’t have to come out, Keith.”

Keith merely looks at him. “You asked me to.”

At that, Lance frowns. “You can say no to me.”

Keith continues to look at him with those dark midnight eyes, just like that. It feels like a simple statement at first, something obvious, but Keith’s obstinate silence slowly becomes louder than the music, louder than the laughter, louder than Lance’s blood rushing in his ears. A tension tightens in the air between them, Keith unwavering. This is a silence that means something—a weakness, maybe, that Keith isn’t ready to admit to. Or maybe, one that Lance isn’t ready to hear.

His skin flushes hot, his own words echoing in his ears. He cups his hands around his glass, looking away, the condensation cool and wet against his palms.

“Don’t feel like you have to stay,” Lance says after a moment of composure, aware that Keith is still looking at him, his stool half turned in his direction. “Today was just so shitty and I needed to get out of my head before I went to bed. But I’m kinda realizing now how selfish that was, haha, begging for you to come out with us. I’m sorry if I made you feel—“

“Lance, you’re making it weird.”

“I’m trying to be sensitive!” Lance looks back over at him, furrowing his eyebrows again.

“I said I’m okay.” Keith rolls his shoulders. “I—I want to be here.”

Lance sighs. “Can I at least do anything?”

Keith takes a long swig of his beer, finishing off the glass, and then sets it back down on the table, giving Lance a half-smile. “You can buy me another drink.”

Well, that’s easy enough. Keith really does seem okay, despite being a little more withdrawn than usual, and Lance figures he’s not forcing himself to put on a show when his smile is so genuine. Lance sucks down the rest of his margarita, and then waves the busy bartender over to order another round for both of them.

::

Lance really starts feeling it after finishing his fourth drink, some cherry-sweet concoction that sticks to all the crevices in his mouth. Keith switched to Jack and coke a while ago, drinking them like water, and it’s relaxed him so much that Lance was able to coax a few jokes out of him as the number of patrons in the bar slowly dwindled away.

Romelle and their captain had joined them for several minutes at one point, but it was getting late, and they called it a night after finishing off their drinks, leaving Lance and Keith to bask in each other’s tipsy company alone. They’d fallen into easy conversation, Keith more open and talkative than Lance has ever seen him, and it makes something in his belly warm, something untouched by the alcohol.

“‘Kay, so, why a pilot?” Lance asks, a bit of a slur in his voice, leaning against the bar heavily with his cheek propped up in one hand.

“Hmm?” Keith murmurs, as though he’s been distracted, even though he’s been looking right at Lance this whole time.

“Why’re you a pilot?” Lance asks again, a little louder this time.

“Always wanted to be a pilot,” Keith tells him after a slow moment between them. His accent slips through on the alcohol, a little bit of a country twang catching on the lilt of his words. “My father was a pilot in the Air Force, ‘n of course I wanted to be just like him growin’ up, especially after he passed. I enlisted at 18 but I didn’t even show up for basic training.”

“Why not?”

Keith shrugs and swirls the ice in his drink with his straw. “I realized I didn’t want to be in the military. I just wanted to fly. By the time I turned 19, I was studyin’ for exams and takin’ lessons to get my pilot’s license, and the rest is history. Flyin’ for a commercial airline isn’t my dream, but my mentor, Shiro, has a plane ‘n he lets me borrow it from time to time.”

Lance stares, transfixed, because it’s the most he’s ever heard Keith say at one time and also because he didn’t realize that Keith was so southern. He feels hot under the collar of his shirt but he plays it off, pretends it doesn’t exist. He kicks his legs a little as they dangle off the bar stool and brings his drink to his mouth again, purposefully nudging against Keith’s boot, thrilling when Keith nudges him back.

“What about you?” Keith prompts.

“Hmm?”

“Flight attendant?”

At that, Lance grins around the straw between his teeth. “I wanna travel.”

“Where?” Keith is so focused on him. And sure, he’s always got that laser intent gaze going for him but right now Lance is especially unequipped to deal with it. He’s never felt so seen before, is sure that he’s never claimed someone’s attention so thoroughly. If he hadn’t been drunk before, he certainly is now.

“Everywhere,” Lance says, setting his drink down. The ice clinks against the glass in a clear, satisfying sort of sound. He’s so exhausted, but he wants to have another if it means he can stay here with Keith a little bit longer. “There isn’t anywhere I don’t want to go.”

“Have ya gotten to travel outside of work, yet?” Keith asks, eyes heavy.

“No,” Lance admits, pushing the glass away, unable to help himself by stirring the melty ice around with his straw. “I’ve only used the benefits to see my family when I can manage to take time off work.” He pauses, for a moment. “I work a lot, Keith. We don’t all make $300 an hour to nap in the cockpit okay.”

Keith rolls his eyes at him, but grins. “So be a pilot.”

Lance stares at him. And then blinks. “I’m sorry, what.”

“Be a pilot.” Keith shrugs.

Lance almost admits that he’s thought about it. He’s looked into it. He’s….interested in it. But not for a commercial airline and definitely not with the paycheck he’s bringing home every month now. To deflect from Keith nettling further into his secret hopes and dreams, he points a finger at him--points it right into one of Keith’s obscene pectoral muscles--unsteady with alcohol, flushed and quite honestly, ready for bed. “You be a pilot.”

Keith shakes his head fondly. “Yer drunk.”

Lance reclaims his own finger and uses that hand to pinch his straw, sucking up the last of his current drink. “So’re you.”

“Mhmm,” Keith agrees, low and warm.

Lance flushes deeply at the sound--it goes straight to the pit of his belly. He kicks at Keith’s foot again as if in retribution, but Keith only smiles at him. Lance has never seen him so relaxed, and it’s making Lance’s head even fuzzier than it already is. “I think we should go to bed.”

Keith raises an eyebrow at him.

Lance’s mouth dries up when he realizes what he said, the haze of the alcohol almost vanishing entirely in his embarrassment. “No! I mean--not like that! I meant we could go to sleep separately! Separately! You know, in our own rooms!” Hot shame crashes over him; he’s tugging at the sleeve of his shirt with nervous fingers as he tries to keep from gesturing wildly. “You could go to bed in your room and I could go to bed in--”

“Mine,” Keith says, drunk, voice thick with his accent.

Lance freezes, practically feeling the way his blush travels from his neck to the tips of his ears. His eyes scrunch closed tightly against his humiliation. “Stooop! I’m already embarrassed, Keith!” He claps his hands to his face in an effort to hide himself.

Keith doesn’t say anything for a moment--Lance is too afraid to look up at him and see what he might find there. Amusement, or something like that.

“Yer cute.”

“Shut up.”

Keith chuckles and Lance only peeks up at him when he hears him slide off his stool and reach for his wallet. He pulls out a small wad of twenties and uses his empty glass as a paperweight to keep them in place. “C’mon. Think you need a little fresh air before you combust.”

Lance frowns at the money and reaches for it. “Hey, I was supposed to pay--”

But Keith takes his reaching hand and pulls him down off the stool, steadying him with his other hand at Lance’s waist when he wobbles a little on his feet. Although his blush never went away, the proximity of Keith’s hands to his body makes him feel lightheaded and weak kneed. He can only draw in a proper breath when Keith silently deems him stabilized enough to step away.

Keith leads him out of the bar but in the opposite direction of the elevators, and even though Lance thinks it’s a bad idea to prolong his exposure to this warm-eyed, easy-going version of Keith, he follows along like he’s under the spell of a pied piper. They end up on the pool deck, conveniently deserted despite it being only 9pm, each of them sprawled out side by side in those adjustable pool loungers.

Conversation flows easily here. In the morning, Lance doesn’t really remember what they talked about--he only remembers the sound of Keith’s rumbly laughter, the way it caught in the corners of his mouth, the way it happened again and again and again and again. After they get bored with the chairs they sit with their feet in the pool, pant legs rolled up, until a staff member comes outside to tell them the pool hours are over.

Keith walks Lance to his room. It’s not like tonight was a date or anything--far from it--but the way Keith looks at him when they reach #534 makes him wonder, in the last dredges of his alcohol-ridden brain, what a date with Keith would be like. “You go home tomorrow?” Keith asks, voice low, as though he doesn’t want to make too much noise in the hallway.

Lance nods, looking up at him. “Yeah. By 8pm or so. You?”

“No, I’ve got a layover in Dallas tomorrow.”

He can’t help but feel a little disappointed. “Well...it was nice to see you today,” Lance says softly. “Thanks for having a drink with me. It was fun.”

Keith looks at him for a little bit longer, his gaze so intent and heavy lidded that it feels like he’s about to do something completely reckless. The space between them sings with tension and Lance knows that they both feel it--it’d be impossible not to.

“I had fun, too,” Keith finally says, shoving his hands in his pockets, the corner of his mouth ticking up into a half-smile. Lance’s chest immediately fills up with little champagne bubbles, thousands of butterflies, and light as warm and wonderful as the sun. The tension disarms. He finds himself grinning, unable to curb his pleasure at such an honest and simple statement. He likes that Keith has fun with him.

Lance swipes his keycard over the magnetic strip on the door. “Good. You need a little fun every once in a while. Can’t have your gorgeous face etched up with frown lines before you even hit 30. That would be criminal.” He feels himself flush for saying something so flirty, but Keith’s smile widens and he’s glad he said it. The little locking indicator on the door turns green and he twists the knob, heaving it open and then spinning around to press his back up against it so he can look at Keith a little bit longer.

“Guess you’d know a thing or two about that,” Keith says, looking so goddamn perfect standing there in the hotel hallway. Before Lance can decipher whatever the hell that means, Keith is shifting to the side and tossing another smile his way. “Stay safe tomorrow, Lance.”

Lance swallows around his thrumming heart. “Yeah. You too.” He waves a little as he steps back into his room and closes the door. Heat explodes in his face as he glances through the peephole to find Keith still standing there for a moment longer, lingering, hands still deep in his pockets, before he turns and walks back down the hallway towards the elevators. Lance watches him go.