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"Did you just blue shell me?!" Keith yelled as Dry Bones skidded off the track and Lance's King Boo advanced to first place. Lance flashed Keith a smirk and knocked his knee against the florist's thigh playfully.

"Eat it, mullet."

Brows furrowed, Keith weaved around the cows that were wandering across the track, slowly climbing back up the ranks from sixth place. The boys were on lap three of Moo Moo Meadows and Lance hadn't surprised Keith with the fact that he was a natural at MarioKart, despite his claims that he'd only played the game once or twice before. He'd winked at Keith's perplexed face after they'd finished the first lap, saying simply, "Cubans do it better, baby!" As their pizzas cooked in the oven, the smell of melting cheese and herbs filled the small apartment and Keith's stomach gurgled in delight. He hadn't had pizza in ages.

In one last burst of speed from a mushroom, Keith was able to snag second place just as Lance finished in first. "Ayyy!" Lance exclaimed happily, dropping his controller to give Keith a solid high-ten. "I didn't know if you were gonna recover from that blue shell, man, but you surprised me."

Keith rolled his eyes, "That was a lucky hit, I would have won otherwise."

Lance nodded like he totally believed him, suppressing giggles as he agreed, "Yes, of course, I'm a mere peasant in your MarioKart monarchy, King Keith. How dare I commit treason! What shall my sentence be, your majesty?"

Keith rolled his eyes. "You pick the track this time then, if you're so confident-"

"I am."

"-and I'm gonna check the pizzas."

Keith, by some stroke of luck, won the next round, but Lance pulled through in the end and, by the time the sun had set and the sky was a dark, inky indigo, their score was a pathetic 1:7.

"AAAND LANCE MCCLAIN TAKES THE WIN AGAIN, FOLKS! COULD IT BE THAT HE IS, IN FACT, THE MARIOKART KING? IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE? WE GO NOW TO KEITH KOGANE, THE CURRENT SUPREME MARIOKART KING. KING KEITH, WILL YOU HAND OVER YOUR CROWN?" Lance looked at Keith expectantly.

Resigned and reluctant, Keith slowly lowered his head in a bow to the new king. "HE'S DONE IT, FOLKS!" Lance crowed happily before tackling Keith down on the couch, his warm arms surrounding Keith in a triumphant hug.

[Keith.exe has stopped responding]

Lance pulled back, a thin gold chain escaping the hem of his shirt and dangling from his neck as he held himself above Keith (who's heart had gone into catatonic shock at the sudden contact). Still grinning, Lance noticed Keith's expression, one of flushed embarrassment, and his smile slowly slid into something a little more flirty. "Your cheeks are all pink, mullet," he whispered, leaning a little closer.

"I wonder why," Keith responded almost inaudibly, unable to move under Lance's sapphire gaze. Lance leaned down even closer to Keith's face, brushing their noses together.

"You're cute when you're like this, you should do it more." Lance lowered his eyes and dropped his chin, his lips skimming the pale skin of Keith's neck. A shiver bolted down Keith's spine and his back arched up slightly, towards the heat of Lance's body. Lance's breath was warm on his skin, his hands planted on either side of Keith's face. A slow, shaky exhale left Keith's lips and he shut his eyes tightly, the sensory overload making his head spin.

Keith usually avoided touching people at all costs, and usually got uncomfortable after anything past a handshake, but now he didn't know if he wanted to push Lance away or pull him closer. Here was this gorgeous, sly creature that, for some reason that Keith couldn't conceive, was interested in Keith, or at least interested in him enough to do whatever this was. He'd never known what it would be like, what it would feel like, and had never put a lot of thought into it to begin with.

But, now that it was finally happening, Keith felt completely and utterly unprepared.

However, before things could go any further, there was a loud knock on the door. Lance pulled back, flashed Keith a sheepish smile, and then climbed off him so Keith could get up to answer the door. Upon opening it, Keith and Lance were met by a tall, elvish girl with thick eyeliner and blonde pigtails tied high up on her head. She wore a bored expression, one of her eyebrows quirked quizzically at Keith, who vaguely recognized her but couldn't remember where from.

"Hey dude, sorry to bother you guys, I'm your new neighbor." She motioned over her shoulder at the door across the hall from Keith's apartment. The door was slightly ajar and the boys could hear quiet ambiance lofi floating into the hallway. "My sister's trying to have a spa session and she said that you guys were being loud as hell so her rodents couldn't relax properly."

Keith blinked. "What?" He has been too busy trying to place where he'd seen the girl before that he'd only heard the last few words she'd said.

All of the sudden, another girl emerged from the apartment across the hall. Immediately, it was obvious that the sisters were twins, although the new girl wore her pigtails down by the nape of her neck with a braided crown around her head. Her face was covered in a seafoam green face mask and she had a towel draped around her neck. Lance had to hide his surprise with a cough when several mice poked their faces out from inside the girl's sweatshirt hood.

"Nyma!" the girl complained worriedly, "I was just saying that I was wondering what they were doing." She turned towards Keith and Lance, distress apparent on her face, "You weren't bothering me, I promise."

Keith scratched the back of his neck embarrassedly, "No, it's ok, we were being kind of loud. Sorry about that."

The girl held out her hand invitingly. "I'm Romelle, and this is my sister Nyma." Keith shook her hand amicably, then did the same for Nyma, who still looked a little annoyed. "We moved in last week."

Keith suddenly remembered where he recognized Nyma from- he'd seen her and another guy skateboarding around town, namely on the night he'd gone to hugs 'n mugs to tell Hunk about Lance. A spark of jealousy pinched the back of his mind- he'd always wanted to be an edgy emo teenager and learn how to skateboard.

"And who are your..." Lance trailed off, looking pointedly at the mice in Romelle's hood.

The blonde giggled. "My mice? This is Platt, Chulatt, Plachu, and Chuchule," she pointed to each of the mice respectively. Keith kept his opinions on the rodents' names to himself.

"They're really cute," Keith admitted, and the one named Chulatt looked at him inquisitively.

"They're really quite smart, I mean, they have-"

"Alright, that's enough, Romelle, I'm sure they're not interested in hearing your lectures about mice," Nyma interrupted her sister as she steered her back into the apartment. Romelle was still talking as Nyma waved to Keith and Lance over her shoulder and shut the door behind them.

Keith let out a low whistle. Some neighbors.

Lance materialized beside him, holding his bag. "Do you wanna stay the night?" Keith asked. He was only trying to be polite, but the way Lance's eyebrow quirked up suggestively made his heart pound.

Lance shook his head and Keith was confused as to why he felt relieved. "It's ok, I should be getting home anyways. It's getting late." Keith nodded reluctantly.

"Awww, don't give me those puppy dog eyes, cutie," Lance said sweetly, lifting Keith's chin with his finger and making him meet his eyes. "I'll see you on Thursday, after school, right?" Keith nodded reluctantly. Lance rolled his eyes. "You're such a drama queen."

Lance leaned forward and softly pressed his lips to Keith's cheek. "See you later, mullet."

Before Keith could say anything, Lance had disappeared down the hallway and into the stairwell. Keith stood in front of his apartment, his fingertips pressed to his tingling cheek, starstruck, while Romelle and Nyma stifled their giggles as they peered through their door's peephole at him.

...

hey guyzzzzzz
yes lol those r the space mice' real names hehehe they're so cute!!
sorry this ones still a little late, trying to get back into the groove of updating is hard haha

qotd: r u going back to school? when n how?

i'm doing fully remote lol we'll see how it goes

love u!!!!