Thursdays are the worst because they're like what Miracle Whip is to Mayo. If he really wanted a sad sandwich, he would've just used a regular sandwich to mop up the tears he cried while looking at his bank account. Fuck Thursdays; get that fake-ass Friday bullshit out his face — 'kay, thanks.

Oh, sorry. Does it seem like he's in a bad mood? Because he's in a bad mood.

Lance doesn't understand how, despite all the energy and effort he pours into getting himself ready to face the day, nothing ever seems to get him prepared enough for a shitty commute. His train, the big beautiful 2 train that scales up and down the upper west side of New York City, decided to flip its shit as soon as he got on it and cancel itself and every other train behind it with it's fucking "hurr hurr, i gots a signal problem" line it pulls out of its ass every other day. (1)

Thankfully, there's another train that he can use to get to his job.

EXCEPT IT NEVER COMES ON TIME. (2)

So this leaves him standing in a hot and crowded underground train station, breathing in huge lungfuls of what's probably 80% toxic gas and 20% sweaty body odor (yeah, those are different) for thirty-five minutes, just waiting for the train to come. And when it finally gets there… It's crowded. Too crowded.

Lance takes one look at the stuffed train car and shoves himself the fuck in.

"Excuse me; sorry; oops, my bad; sorry — I need to pay rent; whoops; poor college student coming in!"

Thank GOD for that guy, 'cause thanks to that one guy, everyone else pushing and shoving their way into the train is promptly forgotten and ignored. Lance is in the safe.

Just kidding. He is that one guy. 'Cause desperate times calls for desperate measures.

Apparently, though, the universe wants him to drown in his misery and decides to dump a shit ton of rain on him. Right as he's getting out of the station and breathing acrid city air.

He stands in the middle of the sidewalk, ignoring the curses and death glares of other morning commuters, and stares at The Shop right outside the train station. The Shop, with its fancy tinted glass front. The Shop, with an 'artisan wood' bar table attached to the glass front on the inside, with matching, 'rustic-inspired' wooden chairs. The Shop, where a pretty blond with purple contacts and cherry-red lips sits at the glass front and stares right at him with a look of one part pity and one part humor.

He (kind of, sort of) feels like crying, because that's his workplace — this fucking shop that's literally, like, five steps from where he's standing. He's right in front of his workplace, and the skies wanted to rip open its ass for some fucking rain. (3)

It's six-forty in the morning and already he wants to die.

Looks like this day's gonna be a great day for work!

:)

By the time he's finally able to crawl into the coffee shop, there's a handful of customers sitting inside with drinks. Rax was behind the counter, but he only grunts as a way to say hello instead of shooting him a dirty look for coming so late. That means Lotor's already here, which means the guy actually came to work on time, which means Lotor actually gave a shit and woke up early, WHICH MEANS Lotor's gonna have three whole sticks up his ass.

Lance can't wait to start work today.

"You're late," Lotor has the audacity to say. "And I just mopped. Don't drip all over the floor like a wet dog."

Lance shoots the man a withering look that turns more into a look of envy because Lotor has the nicest hair he's ever seen. What's his secret? Does he use argan oil? Coconut oil? The life-force of a thousand aliens harvested using brutal and inhumane methods of extraction?

Mmm, nah. It's probably just good genes.

"You're early," says Lance, "And your hair doesn't look like shit, for once. Did you finally get a hot date or something?"

A green apron smacks him right in the face. He was about to stick his hand into the garbage by the sink and throw one of their empty milk cartons at him, but (A) Lotor's a snitch, (B) Hunk would be Disappointed, and (C) Lotor says something that shuts him the fuck up.

"Hunk told me if I'm late again, he's gonna have to lay me off."

Lance takes the apron off his face. He looks to Rax, who's thick eyebrows shoot up as his eyes flick on Lance's face in question. The two of them had always joked for months that this would happen, but they never really thought it would.

"I'm sorry," is all he ends up saying, unfolding the apron and pulling it over his head. Rax, on the other hand, says nothing and passes empty cups scribbled with orders down to Lotor.

As Lance ties the strings of the apron around his waist, he watches Lotor's impassive face carefully. Lotor's skin is soft, pale, and free of blemishes, but Lance has known for years that Lotor uses concealer to erase the heavy dark circles under his eyes. Today, though, he thinks he sees a bluish tinge under Lotor's eyes. That's not like him.

Lotor suddenly turns to him with a scowl. "What?"

Lance frowns. "You okay?"

Lotor tosses his hair over his shoulder. "If you have time to throw a pity party, go mop up whatever you dripped all over the floor."

Lance balks.

See what he means? Three whole sticks, all shoved up his pissy, lily-white ass. Whatever.

"Now," Lotor hisses, "Before someone tries to sue our ass for breaking their ass."

Lance, being the Extra person that he is, makes a low, sweeping bow and says in a deep, gravely voice, "Yessss, masssstaaaah."

He gets a milk carton thrown at him and several stares from customers by the counter. Rax ignores his existence, taking people's orders with a straight face and looking like he gives negative fucks.

But that's okay, it's all good. 'Cause Lance ain't no snitch. Fuck you lookin' at, bitch? Back up. Whatchu lookin' at his phone for, he ain't textin' nobody.

[ rax let lotor throw a milk carton at me ]

He gets an immediate response.

Pidge
Then stop bothering Lotor

[wtf ]
[ why you taking his side ]

Lance scowls and slips his phone into his back pocket, ignoring it when it vibrates again because wow, Pidge is a fucking sellout? Just because Lotor bought her a new phone case that one time after accidentally splashing espresso all over it, doesn't mean the guy's suddenly best friend status. You gotta earn that shit, damn.

Still stewing in his own salt, Lance gets the mop and bucket from the back room and considers not using any cleaner because, hello, it's just rainwater. It's not like it'll cause death and destruction if he doesn't bleach the shit out of it, right? Just mop up that rainwater and be done with it. Yeah. Yeah, that's good. That's a great idea. It's both economical and environmentally friendly!

And it'll also piss Lotor off, so. There's that.

Lance fills the bucket less than halfway with clean water before realizing— He's supposed to be mopping up water, not put more on the fucking floor.

Fuck.

He—

Lance slaps a hand to his face and groans loudly. Obviously, he was not awake. Or thinking.

He blames the shitstorm that was his morning commute.

He's got the mop in his hand and leaving the back room when he sees none other than Allura Lyon crouching on the goddamn floor layering paper towels over the puddles. She's wearing killer heels and a tight ivory lace top tucked into a black pencil skirt that makes him go both "ffffffuuuuuck me, please" and "hOW are you crouching on the floor in heels and a pencil skirt without breaking your ankles, what the fuck?"

Lance tosses the mop into the backroom and ignores the sharp hiss of "Don't break it!" from Lotor. "Allura," he starts, mildly mortified at the fact that a customer was cleaning up the mess he was supposed to take care of, "Allura, you don't have to—"

"Oh, please," Allura says with a laugh, "It's just a little splash from the rain. I don't mind." She smiles and stands up, then, and that's when he notices that she's got an entire roll of brown paper towels tucked under her arm.

"Did you just jack that from our bathroom?"

"Well, I was leaving the bathroom when Lotor made that stink over the world's tiniest puddle. I do apologize for that, by the way. Sometimes my brother can be quite a pain."

"Grande caramel macchiato for the control freak in last year's Versace heels," they hear Lotor announce in a scathing tone. A pause, and then a calm call of, "And a venti Americano for Amalie."

Allura shrugs, tossing her hair over her left shoulder with a flick of her diamond-studded wrist. "See what I mean?"

"Uh-huh," he says, but he's not really listening to her. He's too busy watching the way her luxurious, silver curls seem to float down her back like a large, soft cloud passing overhead in a bright blue sky. Yeah, he thinks, it's gotta be genes. There's no way regular man-made hair products could make anything look like that. Allura Lyon and Lotor Galvagno have genes from the gods.

But you know who doesn't have genes from the gods? That kid sitting over there, the one in the red and black plaid flannel and beat up, dirty black converse sneakers. Who the fuck wears that shitty outfit and isn't an edgelord in disguise? And his hair, god — if you're gonna have a mullet, at least make it look like it's your actual hair and properly condition the ends so it doesn't look like you picked up some fucking roadkill off the side of a hot country road and glued it to the back of your head. Lance hoped he never had to see this guy while he worked here ever again, because that guy was a walking fashion disaster just ready to be thrown into a dumpster fire.

And, yeah, all of this makes him sound so petty and shallow, but seriously — he wouldn't've gone on this bad a mental tangent if the guy had just stopped at being an ex-emokid who still dressed like they were in middle school even in their— what, how old was this guy? Couldn't be more than Lance's age, so, like… late teens, early twenties? Yeah, this guy was definitely stuck in 2008, maybe even worse, because of his fucking hair. That chopped up, severely dehydrated nest of fur was atrocious.

Like he'd said earlier — if you're gonna have a mullet, at least make it look nice. There were ways to do it; it sure as heck wasn't impossible. That guy, see — that one waaaay over there in the corner of the coffeeshop by the shop's front, the one on his phone, for example, has a mullet that actually looks nice, and—

The guy in the corner suddenly jumps, and Lance watches as the guy proceeds to flip his shit in an attempt to catch his phone before it can fall out of reach and shatter right before his very eyes.

It's a good thing Lance used to run track in high school, because he's there to save the guy's bank account from the inevitable doom of emptying out its entire contents in exchange for—

Lance freezes, because on the screen of the phone is a photo of himself. In it, he's slightly sunburnt and wearing blue swim trunks. He can't remember what he was pointing at, but he does remember that the drink he's holding in his photo — which he stole from Pidge — tasted too much like wheatgrass for him to actually like it. Hunk, who's leaning on his back, looks right at the camera and grins. Lotor's the one who took this picture; Lance knows somewhere on Hunk's facebook that there's one that goes along with this, the one where he spits out the wheatgrass and Pidge dumps whatever's left on his head. These are old photos, very old photos — from two whole years back.

And they're on this guy's phone.

Lance's skeevy creeper senses plunge into overdrive, and he's feels a powerful surge of emotion threatening to turn into a hot, shaking mess.

Which means, he's probably either gonna start crying and freaking out, orrrrr punch this guy in the face and then start crying and freaking out.

Haha, perfect. Nice plan, Lance.

"I can explain," says a voice that makes his heart skip a beat because oh, my god; ohhhhh, my god; ohhhhhhh myyyyyyy goooooood—

It's Keith.

Looks like today really is a great day for work!

:)

It's also a great day to go and throw himself into a blender, because KEITH IS HERE and of course the one cute guy who laughs at his shitty jokes and buys him his favorite treat disappears for a week and comes back to reveal that he's some kind of stalker or serial killer or vampire or even a fucking alien from outer space—

"Don't freak out," Keith says in a rush of words, "Uhhh, I know what this looks like, but I swear it's not— I'm not— Hunk started this, I swear. He friended me on Facebook and we started talking—"

"Hunk did what."

"—and then we somehow got around to talking about throwback Thursday? And then last night, he asked me to help him pick a photo—"

Lance puts on a dazzling smile, the first one of the day. "Oh," he says, and didn't really have much else to say because Lance was still digesting the fact that today apparently was National Sellout Day— which, of course, he never got the memo but the rest of his friends apparently did? Because one of his best friends just sided with Lotor today while the other happened to be making moves oN HIS MAN— WHAT THE HECK, HUNK?

"—Yeah, so," Keith takes the phone back and frantically taps his thumb on the screen to return back to his Facebook DM log, "He starts sending me pictures last night and asking me what I think. But since you guys are best friends, they just all, you know, happened to have you in them, and…. Yeah. That's it, I swear." Keith sears him with an intense look on his face that Lance momentarily gets lost in, not because he's cute as fuck, but because he's still stuck on one part of something Keith's said.

"They, uh… They all have me in them?"

"Yes, but I swear to god I wasn't—"

"It's— It's cool, man. I'm—" Lance feels his voice about to crack and stops talking just at the right moment. He clears his throat, very aware of the way Keith was still staring intensely at his face. Lance doesn't even think the guy's breathing. "Uh. I believe you."

The intense look disappears from Keith's face, and his shoulders sag as if some great weight had finally gone to dust.

Until Lance's opens his mouth again. "Can I see them?" he asks. And it's not that Lance doesn't trust Keith — cause let's be real here, no matter how cute this guy is, a stranger's still a stranger, ya know? It's not that Lance has suddenly got trust issues or anything, it's just that he needed to know what exactly Hunk was dishing out. It wasn't like Hunk to be this forward. He was a smooth guy, yeah, and he had game, sure.

BUT THIS WAS HIS MAN AND HUNK NEEDED TO HOP THE FUCK OFF.

"Yeah? I guess, sure."

He swipes through the photos, and it's like traveling back through time. He sees an old photo from way back, when Hunk got a little crazy at the after-party the night of their high school prom and tried to climb on top of the bar. He sees himself pulling at Hunk's leg with one hand as he frantically reaches out to block the camera with the other.

He laughs, strange as it is to see such a nostalgic photo on a stranger's phone. When he swipes next, sees himself again, concentrating at the latte machines with Shay right beside him as she points to the temperature gauge on the espresso machine. Her mouth is open, as if she were right in the middle of explaining something as the picture was taken. Hunk appears only at the bottom of the photo, the upper half of his face taking up the entire foreground. There are a few more photos that follow: Lance and Hunk majorly freaking out at the bungee jump platform of Xcelerated Adventures, a shot of them with Pidge's great dane stretched out on top of them—(4)

The next photo makes him stop. Hunk is nowhere in this one; it's just him. He doesn't remember ever seeing the photo before, which makes sense since he's looking up at his giggling niece on his shoulders, the two of them soaking wet from falling off his surfboard together. He vaguely remembers this to take place on the same day Pidge dumped her nasty smoothie on his head.

When he exits from the photos, the chatlog stares cheekily up at him.

Hunk
whoops, wrong one
ngl, that one's a good pic
cause i took it ;)

He stares at it for a while, a strange, new feeling rising to gnaw away his burning jealousy as he slowly came to the realization that Hunk wasn't just making moves on his man.

Hunk was making moves on his man for him.

Scratch National Sellout Day off the calendar and put in a new holiday— National Best Bro Day. No, National Best Man Day. NO— NATIONAL HUNK GARRET DAY. With a parade and balloons and floats, maybe. He'll make a speech. There'll be a dance-off and Hunk's world famous, uh— Would Hunk want to bake or cook? Both? Is that— Is that okay? Is that a thing you do at parades? Should the speech be at the parade, or should it come before? After? God, he had no idea how any of this stuff even worked—

"…Can I have my phone back?"

He pauses in the middle of figuring out which float should go ahead of what and where the podium should go and realizes that, hahahahaha, 'this isn't an actual holiday you idiot' and 'you were staring at a stranger's phone for so long, the screen's gone pitch black, you socially inept, awkward fucking piece of shit.' Fuck.

"So… Do you make all of your customers wipe down the floor, or is that, uh. Just for the special ones?"

A tittering laugh slips past his lips. "Hahaha, yeah… I mean, no. No, we don't— At least, I don't make people wipe the floor. With napkins. From the bathroom. She stole those from the bathroom, those weren't, like. The ones that go into the napkin dispensers. I mean, they aren't even napkins, those are paper towels; and it'd be weird if we tried to stuff paper towels into napkin dispensers."

"Yeah, that… That would be weird. And annoying. People would keep breaking them."

"Really? I just think people wouldn't use napkins and complain to us like they always do."

"Yeah, but if you really need a napkin you'd… You'd find a way to get it out. I guess."

"Y'think? I mean, they're not really good anyway. The paper towels in the bathroom kinda just… Turn into mush when they get wet."

"…Okay."

The conversation stalls painfully, leaving the two of them staring at each other with slightly constipated looks of civil politeness, each garnished with a classic Forced Smile.

On the inside, Lance has already dug himself into a ditch. From the way Keith's eyes kept dodging over Lance's shoulder to where the door was, the guy was probably desperate for an escape route.

Oh, boy! Lance thinks as pain begins to settle into his cheeks from holding his strained smile, Look at all of Hunk's hard work, just about ready to fly away!

Fix it, you idiot, growls his brain, grabbing desperately to keep whatever was left of his pool of courage from slipping through its fingers. Fix it! FIX! IT!

"So," the word pops out of his mouth suddenly, making them both jump. Lance pretends he wasn't startled by grinning widely and leaning forward, sliding an elbow on the counter where Keith's belongings (a cup, a book, a backpack) rest, and dumps his cheek on his hand. "You come here often?"

Keith stares at him and says nothing for a long, long time.

Lance stares back with a grin and thinks about sawing his own head off with a popsicle stick. Because obviously that's the better option.

"I don't," comes his halting response. Keith glances over Lance's shoulder again, then outside through the windows. "I sort of… I don't go out much. Except in the mornings. I used to go to another place, but it shut down. Something about selling liquor without a license, I think."

Lance slowly nods his head. "Okay," he says, because he wasn't prepared for Keith to still be standing in front of him. Or give an actual answer.

"So, uh," Keith scratches the back of his neck, pocketing his phone away and still awkwardly staring out the window, "When exactly does Hunk's shift start? Does he work today?"

Something ugly coils tight around his throat. He bites his tongue and lets the sudden pain chase it away. "He doesn't have a shift on Thursdays. He'll be here on Friday, though. Around six?"

Keith frowns, glancing past Lance's shoulder for a hot second. "Oh. Guess I won't be seeing him around anytime soon, then."

The ugly feeling that coiled in his throat now sits like a stone on his chest and drips bitterly into his stomach, the taste so strong he can taste it on his tongue. Lance leans back, putting a bit of space between them. The sudden movement makes Keith look at him, and Lance freezes. Keith stares openly at his face, an inquisitive look burning in his eyes. Lance isn't sure what that means.

"Do you work tomorrow?" Keith asks him, eyes never leaving his face.

Lance feels his mouth go dry. "Uh," he says, because Keith's eyes are somehow smoldering his cheeks a bright red. "Yes," he hears himself squeak out, and clears his throat, looking away to stare at how much water has collected by the street corner. There's absolutely nothing pooling there now; everything is trickling nicely down into the gutter. Part of Lance wants it to flush him away, because maybe then his face won't be on fire.

"In the morning? Same time? I can come by again."

Lance sputters, choking on his own words. "You— You don't have to do that. I mean, uh. Hunk's in on Saturday. Early. Like, six. N-No, wait. That's Shay. Uhhhh… Maybe, like. Seven, then. Or eight. He's definitely in before ten. I'm not in on Saturday, though. It's all Hunk. So you can, uh. You can come in and talk to Hunk however long you want, he's cool. Or Shay. O-Or both, whatever you're cool with. I'm cool. And so are you. Yeah. Cool."

He flashes another dazzling smile and feels sweat trickling down the back of his neck as his brain screams, YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO FIX IT, THIS ISN'T FIXING IT YOU STUPID DUMB FUCK.

He watches Keith's brow furrow deeply as he stares some more. Suddenly, his face turns lax as some kind of acknowledgement takes residence in his gaze and Keith says, with a light dusting of pink on his face, "I'm not here to see Hunk, I'm see to see—"

Lance swears his heart almost gets yanked out of his chest when a commotion at the front of the shop interrupts them when they're right there. The door to the coffeeshop swings wildly open, making someone yelp and another person mutter something that's probably not kid-friendly. Lance turns around on reflex, the words, "Watch your language!" on his hypocritical tongue when— hot damn, that is a beautiful man, fuck.

Said beautiful man comes in completely drenched, his black shirt skin-tight on a well defined chest and his jeans now an even tighter fit around perfect glutes and toned legs. This man did not skip leg day, hallelujah.

And he's using those powerful legs to come here, holy shit—

Keith immediately gets up. "Shiro!" he exclaims, grabbing his backpack, "I didn't know you were—"

The handsome man shoots Keith a look. "I saw you looking over at me while I waited outside in the rain."

Keith hesitates. "I… wasn't sure it was you?"

The handsome man closes his eyes and takes in a deep breath. It reminds Lance of how calm Pidge was that one day at the beach right before she dumped a smoothie over his head. He glances at the man's hands for a second, which are empty, and then looks at the counter behind Keith. He nudges Keith's cup (is that coffee?) further down the counter, away from either of them.

Operation: Save Hot New Not-Boyfriend-Yet Friend, success. Yes.

The handsome man sighs long and deep. "It's fine. Then, he turns to look curiously at Lance and smiles. "You're Lance, right? Keith's told me a bit about you."

MAYDAYMAYDAY—CRASH IS IMMINENT; I REPEAT— CRASH IS IMMIENENT

While Lance tries to reboot his brain, Keith punches the handsome man in the stomach. Astoundingly, all the man does is laugh as if the punch never happened.

"Come on," Keith growls, pulling on the handsome man's arm, "I'm late to class."

The handsome man's smile turns to a cheeky grin. "You don't have class on Thursdays."

Keith drags them both out of the coffeeshop with a hasty, "I'll see you," thrown in Lance's way.

"O-Okay," Lance returns haltingly, holding up a hand as the two of them growl and snicker all the way out of the coffeeshop.

Soft jazz quickly fills up the gaping lull of sound in the coffeeshop. It filters from the speakers into his ears, leaving a tingly buzzing sensation in his head. The patrons of the shop continue to drink to their own leisure, eyes roving over words on books and newspapers and bright screens, fingers curling over warm cups of lattes and cappuccinos and—

Coffee, Lance thinks, whirling around like a madman, Keith was drinking coffee.

Lance picks up the cup of whatever was left, a shallow pool of milky coffee now cold. He didn't know Keith drank coffee. Didn't he get tea the last time he was here? No, he asked for tea because they didn't carry almond milk like every other hipster coffeeshop on the street. Did they carry it now? What does almond milk taste like? Did it taste like soy? It better not.

His train of thought is interrupted by the sound of low, hushed whispers, voices of people he recognizes. He looks up, surprised to see that he's wandered back to the register while swimming idly in his thoughts.

Rax is handling the light stream of customers with a scowl on his face, brows so close together it almost looks like a unibrow. Down the counter, where the machines are, stand Allura and Lotor, shoulder to shoulder, each whispering to each other behind cups of coffee and staring appraisingly right at Lance.

"Nice hair, yes, but his eyebrows are…"

"His face is proportional, at least."

"Yes. Yes, it is. But he's quite short."

"Do you think that was his brother? He was tall."

"You mean to think he'll grow?"

"Perhaps, perhaps not."

"They look athletic. What do you think they might be into?"

"If it's soccer, that would be a nice match, don't you think?"

"Swimming— Do you think he swims?"

Lance stares at them as they continue to whisper, glancing at each other every so often with an elegant arch of a brow before returning their piercing gazes on him.

He scowls. "You know I can hear you, right?"

Allura laughs, a charming sound. "Oh, don't mind us. We're just about done."

"Besides," Lotor tosses his silky hair over his shoulder and turns away sharply, "We weren't talking about you."

"Oh, certainly not."

"Your face isn't proportional."

"Nor do you have an athletic build."

"And your hair is lackluster at best."

At this, Allura turns with raised brows. "Really? I think his hair is quite nice."

"Really?" Lotor mockingly sneers, "And next you'll think his jeans aren't a poor fit."

At this, Lance frowns. "What's wrong with my jeans?" he asks, digging his hands into his pockets.

Lotor and Allura pin him with a look. Then, Allura sips her coffee in silence while Lotor goes back to doing his job.

Lance growls. "What's wrong with my jeans?"

He's too loud. He feels the patrons side-eyeing him from all corners of the coffeeshop. It makes him wish he could sink through the floor.

Allura smiles. "Nothing," she says, reaching out with a hand. When he doesn't take it, she comes over and pats his back. "They're just, um. Large around the hips. It looks like your derrière is sagging."

"Give me a break," Lance mutters, rolling his eyes.

"No breaks," Rax hisses, startling a customer from inserting her card into the chip reader. "I've been picking up your slack for an hour. Get to work, or I'll get you fired."

Lance scoffs. "Hunk would never fire me."

Lotor says nothing.

Lance feels like an ass. A saggy ass.

:)

There's a light pull on the cup in his hands. Alarmed, Lance clenches it tight.

Allura retracts her hand immediately. "I'm sorry," she says, "I thought you were done. I was going to throw it away."

At this, Lotor stops and looks up. "I don't remember you making yourself a cup of coffee." Lotor's eyes narrow as a knowing look alights in them. "...Are you drinking Keith's leftovers?"

Heat rushes to his face like a geyser. "No," Lance hisses, lying. "This is my coffee." As if to prove a point, he downs the rest of the cup.

And immediately chokes, spitting it back into the cup and coughing.

"Who the fuck puts soy in their coffee?!" Lance demands, throwing the cup into the trash bin behind the counter. (5)

"Your hot friend, apparently," Lotor says, a delicate smile gracing his features. "Does that mean you don't like him? Is he up for grabs?"

Lance digs the cup out of trash and throws it in Lotor's face. "Back the fuck off," he growls, not caring that it misses and clatters on the floor. Lotor looks like he doesn't care either, which definitely means there's a full moon out, because Lotor, for once, looks like he's enjoying himself.

Rax, on the other hand, does not

He was also on his phone.

"Hey, Hunk. It's me. Just wanted to say—"

"GET HIM!" Lance shouts, lunging bodily after Rax.

Lotor actually joins him, wrestling the phone away from Rax's hand. Lance slaps a hand over Rax's mouth, muffling the stream of curses and threats to quit while Lotor says goodbye to Hunk and ends the call. As Allura takes over behind the register as she's done for them many times before, Lance trips on his own two feet and sends all three of them on the floor. They end up laughing, aprons ripped and hats askew; even Lotor, with his hair flying all over his face and a bruise coloring his chin, laughs out loud. Lance thinks the laugh is one of the nicest he's ever head.

END NOTES:

(1) The 1, 2, and 3 trains are always fucking up, but never as badly as the A, C, E, B, or D trains. You can look at the train schedule for the 2 Train at the MTA's website ( ). The MTA also keeps live updates on their transport system right on their website!
(2) The train he's taking is the B train.
(3) Based on the corner of West 60th Street and Broadway. See it on google maps here.
(4) Xcelerated Adventures is a well-known spot to do a variety of extreme sports/activities close to NYC. I've never been there because I like living :)
(5) The line about putting soy in coffee comes from a comedy sketch by Brandon Rogers. Feel free to PM me if you want to know what I'm talking about!