Klance: Far too close (College AU)

Cuts, Bathrooms & Painful Mistakes

"Lance. Lance..... LANCE!"

"Uh.." Lance opened his eyes, the pressure of the world pushing down on his eyelids.

"We're here buddy," Hunk said quietly compared to Pidge yelling in his face. 

Lance squinted, "Uh okay..."

Hunk looked to Pidge murmuring, "We can't leave him here."

"Well, we've gotta hurry- the 4th floor of the library is gonna close in an hour."

Hunk looked at Pidge criticizing him in his mind. Pidge shrugged. Hunk sighed, "Here are the keys- lock up. Pidge and I are going to research some stuff in the library."

Hunk tossed him the keys and walked off with Pidge in a hurry.

Lance was in a complete haze. He locked the doors and blacked out again. The sound of a bike revving floated into his mind not to long after and he bolted up. It had to be Keith. Who else had a motorcycle? 

Lance opened his car door on complete autopilot. Not really thinking through the consequences of seeing Keith or the fact he had locked the door. The car alarm went off and there was a thump followed by another thump. The first had been Keith tripping over his kickstand and the second being Lance trying to get out of the car but stepping on Keith's hand and also falling over.

"Fuck!" Keith said alarmed pulling his hand close to him.

Lance looked at both himself and Keith on the ground. Keith was upright knees up to his chest and holding his own hand, with Lance, on his elbows and knees, across from him. They were in the space between the motorcycle and car and the blaring of the car still going off. Lance quickly sat up and fumbled with the keys to turn it off.

"Fuck- your hand- I'm sorry-" Lance looked at Keith's face which was red around his eyes. Definitely. "Are you okay?"

"I-" he started off sad but switched to angry, "I don't want to talk about this... with you"

Damn, that 'with you' statement stung though I probably deserve it.

A trickle of blood ran down Keith's arm. Lance's body tensed, adrenaline shooting into his veins. 

His eyes went wide and Keith tried to cover his arm. He stood up quickly and Lance followed his action. "Let me help."

Lance reached out to Keith's hand and Keith backed away. "No. You've done enough."

Lance's eyebrows creased, "Keith I was going to be a nurse. I can help." Keith remained silent. "Do you have hydrogen peroxide or bandages?"

"I don't."

"Well, I do."

Keith reluctantly held his hand out, "Fine."  Lance slipped his glove off and looked at the damage.

Keith's thumb was scratched up and his knuckles were already bruising. There was a cut right above his wrist which Lance quickly realized it was poorly sewn together with stitches. 

Lance looked around for something to cover it with and remembered the old towel they kept in the trunk of the car. He grabbed it and wrapped it around Keith's hand. "The lighting is poor here. Let's go inside, I have the bandages and other stuff in my dorm room anyway. Go to the dorm bathrooms I'll be there a second."

Keith and Lance walked into the building together and split off. Lance practically ran and grabbed the medical kit in Lance and Hunk's room that Lance brought from home and a few other things. He opened it as he speed walked to the bathroom, opened the bathroom door with shoulder since he was searching through the bag with his hands.

Lance set the bag down and pulled out the bottle of hydrogen peroxide. He put the bag down on the sink counter and looked at Keith and patted the counter.

"Seriously? You want me to sit on the-"

"Just do it."

Keith hopped upon the counter, feeling like a child. Lance took the towel off his hands placed it over Keith's legs so blood won't get on Keith's pants. Lance rinsed the blood off of Keith's hand with the sink next to him.

Lance grabbed a few paper towels next to him and poured the peroxide on them over the sink. "This is gonna sting a little." Keith rolled his eyes and kept his hand out. Lance put the soaked paper towel on his hand.

"So... Your stitches have come apart."

"You don't have to be a Nurse to see that," Keith said dully. "I could've told you that." Lance pulled a bag of ice from his bag. "Damn... where did you get that?" 

Lance placed it over his knuckles. "My fridge. Now, what's that cut from? It's pretty deep and recent." Keith blinked. "Well? I don't want to sit in silence."

He sighed, "The first day I got here I rode my motorcycle through the back. I've never gone that way before but my brother suggested it since everyone else would be coming through the front. There were some beer bottles and the turn ahead of me was tight. I went too fast, got to close to the turn and the back of my hand knocked into the bottles and some of them were broken. Not a big deal. Just a painful mistake."

Lance had wrapped his thumb in a bandage. "Oh.  How'd you clean it up?"

"My brother's girlfriend has a place on campus and swung by there since she had stuff and did it myself. You bumped into me on the way there."

That's why he was so angry when I met him. And why his stitches are god awful.

Lance had finished with his knuckles and thumb and looked to the cut. He moved the ice pack to the cut. Hoping to numb it since what was going next was painful.

Keith must have recognized the gesture and tensed. "Are you going to stitch it?"

Lance grimaced, "I have to."

Keith grimaced too.

Lance pulled a beer out of his bag. 

Keith smirked a little, "Damn... where did you get that?" 

Lance had a little smile too, "My fridge." He opened it.

"Didn't think you were the type."

"I'm not, but this is gonna hurt. As a former nurse in training, I wouldn't suggest it since it thins your blood... but as a college student who's gotten stitches before even with lidocaine, I'm going to suggest it."  Lance took a sip and handed it to Keith, readying his needle. "It's cheap as shit, FYI. But it gets the job done."

Keith took a deep breath, knowing it was going to hurt. He heard his phone buzz. The world felt like it started to crash since he knew who it was. His smile left his face, his tired eyes returning and he stared at Lance who looked after he dipped the needle in peroxide. 

Keith raised the bottle at Lance, who was staring into his eyes deeply.

"To painful mistakes," He said weakly.