WARNINGS: Slight angst. Gay thoughts ('cmon. It's Klance. What did you expect?). Lance is a dear and I love him lots and lots.
AN: Klance for the soul! FFN and its 'no more spaces than you need' setting made me have to rethink how could I separate things as I wanted... I'm not too happy with the results, but oh well. (For better formatting, go to my AO3 or Tumblr!)
WRONG NUMBER
"… and… that is it. That's all I wanted to say. I… I love you."
Beep.
Lance stares at his phone in bafflement.
He's been doing so for at least half an hour, and he can't stop. He breathes out shakily, suddenly realizing that he has been holding his breath, and debates over the wisdom of pressing the 'repeat' button again.
He does.
"… Um. Hi. It's me. I know you told me we're over, but…" The voice in the recording is male and strangled, rough with suppressed feelings, and Lance feels his heart going to him, whoever this stranger is. "It's just. I was thinking about that date you were going to take me on today, and I guess I just. I don't really know. Dammit!"
Lance knows how to detect tears in a voice. He has three younger sisters that he has always liked to tease for everything, but whom he will defend tooth and nail from the whole world if necessary, and from all the assholes that make them cry.
This guy is heartbroken, and Lance doesn't know him, but he really wants to give him a hug and make the pain go away.
"I guess I just don't buy it yet. I can't… I simply can't. I'm gonna be at the cinema, like we'd planned. I'll be there for two hours before 'Arrival' starts. If you don't show then… then, I guess I'll just have to accept it."
He chokes a little on the last sentence, and Lance really wants to know who the fuck left him being such a mess. So he can punch them. Guy or girl, he doesn't care.
(He doesn't even think about the possibility of the recording guy being one of those annoying, clingy exes he has seen so many times in movies and dramas. He simply doesn't sound the type.)
"… and… that is it. That's all I wanted to say. I… I love you."
The record ends and Lance finally decides that he has heard it enough times. He leaves the phone over the coffee table and lets his head drop onto the back of the couch. He inspects the ceiling, mind working furiously.
"What should I do?" He doesn't expect an answer, and doesn't receive one. He's alone at the apartment, and will be for three more hours at least—Hunk has gone to visit Shay after class.
The guy obviously got the number wrong.
Lance doesn't know how that could have happened. Surely, if they were dating, he should have had the contact information right?
But then again, the call could have been done from a line phone. Or a public one. Lance can't know that. He can't return the call, and he doesn't even have a name to go on. The guy hadn't identified himself, or his partner—which admittedly makes sense, because they must have called each other with enough frequency to identify the other just by their voice. Heck, Lance does that with Hunk and Pidge all the time.
He should delete the message and forget all about it. It doesn't concern him, after all. The guy is a stranger and he simply cannot do anything to help him, so he shouldn't feel guilty if he simply ignores it.
It is the logical thing to do.
Right?
…
Too bad.
Lance has never been a logical person.
He jumps from the couch and goes right to his desk, powering on Hunk's laptop. His is on his room, and this is an emergency, dammit!
"C'mon, c'mon, c'mooooon," he mumbles, leg jumping spasmodically while he waits for it to load. Then he double clicks on the Chrome symbol and opens Google. "Fucking finally!"
He hurriedly types the name of the movie and looks for the times it plays. It has two shows in the local cinema after six, and Lance bets the guy was referring to the night one. It makes sense, taking into account the 'I'll wait two hours' and the time the recording was made.
He closes the tab and hurriedly runs towards his bedroom to change, but when he is about to open his door, he freezes.
Is he really doing this?
For a stranger who might not even be in that cinema, because he could have been referring to any other?
Lance bits his lip, thinking.
It doesn't make sense, he had already established that. It doesn't, and yet… He still feels like he should let the poor guy know the truth, so he can try and contact his lover again. What does he know? Maybe the other person has been waiting for this call and never got it, and for that reason the two will be separated forever and Lance… doesn't want the owner of that voice that was charged with so much emotion to believe he isn't loved back if that is not the case.
Broken hearts hurt like a bitch.
He doesn't want to be the asshole that let it happen when he could do something about it.
He rushes through the front doors and looks around expectantly, and then it suddenly hits him.
Lance doesn't have a fucking clue of who he is looking for.
Sure, he knows it's a guy, and he can hazard a guess and say that he probably looks out of sorts and jittery nervous, but that certainly isn't much description to go on, especially in a place as crowded as the cinema during Friday night.
What the fuck was he thinking.
He sighs loudly and makes his way towards the box office, not with the intention of buying a ticket, but to check which auditorium 'Arrival' is going to be played.
It can, maybe, help him narrow the search.
When he gets it—it's auditorium five—he wanders towards that direction, taking note of every unattached guy around and trying to figure out if any of them could be the one he's looking for.
There are too many, though Lance can appreciate their looks—there is that cute brunet in the plaid shirt, and the tall one with the ear piercing. Then there is the one with—ah, wait. He has a date. Wow, she's hot, too. They make a good couple.
Lance eyes the big number five over the auditorium's entrance and makes his way towards an unoccupied part of the wall to wait. There is a boy around his age next to him, wearing a black tee and a cropped red jacket. He's looking at his phone and his long bangs cover his face, so Lance can't really make out what he looks like, but if it's anything like the rest of his body, then… holy fuck.
He takes out his own phone and looks at the time. An hour and fifteen minutes left.
Now, to wait.
Lance keeps an eye on the guys until they join a group or pair off, and his list is rapidly narrowing, but not fast enough.
He looks at the time again and bites his lip, wondering what to do. It's five minutes to the beginning of the show, and there are three guys waiting alone, not counting himself.
Any of these could be the mysterious guy from the recording, but Lance can't simply go to them and ask: 'hey, did you by any chance just broke up with your significant other and then called their number and left them a message to meet here if they wanted to make up? Because I got it instead, sorry, try again.'
First, that is totally insensitive and unacceptable. Second, what if he gets the wrong guy? And third, what if neither of these guys is the one? He'd be making a huge fool of himself and—
"Stood up, too?"
Lance's head shots up and he looks at the boy who has been sharing a wall with him all this time. His brain short-circuits.
"Um, what?" he asks dumbly because not only is he at a loss, but also because he's just the tiniest bit starstruck by the other's pretty eyes. He was right—damn this guy is hot.
"Date stood you up?" he asks again, not at all mockingly. He sounds sympathetic and sad. "You've waiting here for two hours. Dude, they probably ain't coming. I know mine isn't."
If the occasion was different, Lance would probably be much more offended than he is feeling right now.
But he recognizes that voice, now that the guy has spoken a whole sentence, and doesn't really registers what the other is saying.
"Ah! It's you!" he says instead, jumping away from the wall, eyes round with surprise. The other guy looks taken aback.
"What?"
"You! You are the one that—wait a second—" Lance makes a 'hold it' gesture with his left hand out and the index finger pointing upwards. He fiddles with his phone, connecting his blue ear buds to it and opening the voice mail. He then offers the tiny ear buds to the guy, who looks at him as if he thinks Lance's insane. Lance frowns and dangles the ear buds in front of his face. "C'mon, put them on. I need you to hear this," he says, but the guy is already slowly inching away from him, looking ready to bolt. Lance swears mentally and huffs. "Please?" He decides to take out the Big Guns and subject the innocent fool to the full power of his Puppy Dog Eyes.
As expected, the other caves.
Once Lance is sure the guy has put on the ear buds, he presses 'repeat', and the recording starts again.
When the guy immediately loses all color and rips the tiny buds away from his ears, he is certain that he got the right one.
"What the fuck?! How—why—how do you have this?" he asks harshly, just a bit hysterical. Lance quickly raises both hands in the universal sign of surrender.
"Sorry, dude. I don't know what you did to mess up the numbers, but the message never reached them. I just thought I could be the cool guy here and let you know," he says sincerely, hoping the guy won't skewer him with a hidden knife or something. He looks angry enough to do so, and his glare is terrifying.
The other glares at him for some more seconds and then completely deflates, suddenly looking much smaller and younger than he is.
"Fuck, I'm such a fuck-up. I can't believe this," he mutters to himself, tone derisive. "I can't do anything right, not even calling his number. There is no wonder he left me, I—"
"Hey, stop. Stop right there. So you made a mistake. What of it? Now you know why he didn't show up. Call him again. See what happens. And don't you dare put yourself down like that. I don't know you like, at all, but you never should tell such horrible things about yourself. So cut it off."
The guy looks at him with eyes huge, surprise evident in the slackening of his mouth and the tightness of his shoulders. Lance crosses his arms and pointedly looks at the other's phone in his right hand, moving his whole head so that his chin helps get the point across.
"Call him."
The guy visibly struggles with himself for a second and then sighs, lifting the phone and unlocking it to make the call.
Lance relaxes back against the wall and studies the other's profile. The boy is anxious. He can tell because of the nervous energy radiating from his entire body, taut and looking as if he's ready to flee or fight.
There is a beat of silence, and then a phone rings not too far away from where they are standing. The both of them jump, startled, and look around just in time to see a tall guy with bleached white hair and a blonde, gorgeous girl leaving one of the other auditoriums with their arms linked.
There is a sharp inhale of breath at his side and Lance turns back to his companion, alarmed. The guy is clutching the phone in a death grip, knuckles white. His eyes are suspiciously shiny, and Lance just knows that the asshole who has just ignored the ring of his phone as he flirts with the bimbo is totally this guy's ex.
Lance forgets that he doesn't know anyone in this love triangle, he forgets that he hadn't wanted to get even more involved in this mess.
He is so angry that he simply starts marching over towards the oblivious couple, completely intending to give that guy a good punch in the face and maybe a lecture. Maybe.
But then he's stopped in his tracks when a hand clutches the back of his jacket and a firm voice says, "Stop."
He turns around to the victim of this soup opera and raises an eyebrow, scowling slightly.
"Why? He's an asshole, he deserves to be beaten into a pulp."
The guy half-smiles at that, and the expression is so vulnerable that Lance's anger disappears to be replaced by concern.
"Hey, are you…" he's going to say 'okay', but then he realizes that it's a stupid question. The guy is obviously not okay. He changes tracks. "Do you want to go for ice cream? Or maybe a pizza? Or, I don't know, gingerbread cookies?"
The guy snorts and looks at him with an eyebrow raised, but his smile is there and it doesn't look as broken as before, so Lance feels his chest lighten. "Gingerbread cookies?" His tone is shaky still but amused, so Lance can't help smiling a little more.
"My sister loves them, they are her comfort food," he explains, and the other boy laughs at that. It's soft, and tiny, and doesn't lasts as long as Lance would have liked, but it's genuine. Lance's smile broadens. "I'm Lance," he says, offering his hand.
He takes it. "Keith."
They let go, and then simply stand there in silence for a moment.
Then Keith coughs. "Pizza sounds great, but… Eh, I bought two tickets already and I kinda want to watch this movie so… Do you want to…?" He leaves the question hanging, but Lance gets what he means, anyway.
He knows this may be nothing more than a rebound. He doesn't really believe it is—he has had a couple of relationships that were rebounds, and this doesn't feel anything like those.
This feels… different. As if he's making a new friend, with the distant possibility of becoming more, but with no real pressure for it.
It feels right, in a way that no other relationship has felt for him, and Lance thinks that he'd be a fool if he doesn't try to see where it goes.
So he does.
"Sure, why not?" he accepts the wordless invitation with a shrug and a small smile, which Keith returns.
Man, will Hunk be surprised when Lance tells him what happened today!