There was a soft knock on his door.

"Keith? It's me."

Shiro.

Keith swept a hand over his eyes and breathed a moment.

"Are you alone?"

"Yes."

He opened the door. He didn't have to look to know Shiro had on his "disappointed in you" face. But if nothing else, he was grateful that Shiro closed the door behind him.

"Keith," Shiro began. Keith didn't want to hear it, but he did. He needed to hear ANYTHING. And what he heard was, "I'm getting pretty worried about you. Is something going on?"

Yes, Keith thought. I want you to love me and I want to spit on your boyfriend and I want to actually be important to someone and I want to know why you don't love me and I want to know why you love HIM and I want to know where I went wrong and I want to know if anything will ever change and I want to spit on your boyfriend so fucking bad, I completely would if it wasn't for YOU.

"No."

He felt Shiro's hands on his shoulders and he knew it was one of those "look me in the eye" moments, but he just couldn't. He just couldn't. He couldn't cry in front of Shiro, not now, not this time.

"Keith… I'm pretty lost here. I thought you'd be happy. For all of us."

Shiro was a perfect human in every way, but fuck if he wasn't the most oblivious. Keith kept his eyes down.

"I think I might know what's going on," Shiro added gently. "Can you tell me if I'm right?"

Keith risked him a short glance. Maybe Shiro wasn't as oblivious as he seemed. But speaking was too dangerous, so he nodded instead.

"I'm wondering if you're upset about seeing a family back together. I'm sure that's hard to be around."

Nope.

"Yeah," Keith managed to choke out. "That's it."

Shiro gave him a sort of sad smile. Seemed that was the only kind he'd get anymore.

"I hope you know that no matter what, you're always family to me. And if you need anything, I want you to be able to talk to me, okay?"

Why was Shiro both the best and the worst person to be in love with? What the fuck did MATT do to deserve him?

"I know."

And fuck, why were there tears coming down his face? That wasn't supposed to happen.

"Don't worry, it's okay," Shiro said, bringing him close. "You're gonna be okay."

But Keith would never believe those words again.