Chapter Text
The sounds of the movie dialogue became muffled as you hurried behind Dustin. Limping to catch up to the boy who was hastily making his way to the stairwell up to the projector room you reached out to grab his shoulder. He immediately flinched at the contact and let out a shriek which had you letting him go to cover your years.
“Shhhh it’s just me!” You reassured the younger boy feeling bad at surprising a literal scream out of him.
“Shit y/n I thought you were a Russian soldier. I’m going to try and get in touch with Mike to see if Nancy can come get us.” Dustin Let out a relieved huff before he provided an answer as to where he was going before you could ask him.
“Yeah ok just…be careful. I think I’m gonna wash up in the bathroom ok??” You weakly patted him on the head, ruffling his hair just a bit when he shot you a concerned look.
“Yeah you be careful too…you look really rough y/n.” He stared hard back at you, concern and worry dripping from his words. You let out a bark of laughter as you brought your hand from his hair up to under your chin.
“Rather rude of you Henderson you should never say that to a lady, how will you ever get a girlfriend like that huh??” You poked fun trying to lighten the mood, knowing you probably looked far worse than just rough. To your surprise instead of grumbling and complaining like you expected the boy’s face broke into a huge smile, pride coming off him in waves.
“Actually I already have one, Susie. I’ll tell you all about her if we live past tonight haha” and with that Dustin turned and ran up the steps. Your heart swelled as you turned and made your way to the restrooms, some good news that you had missed apparently lifting a tiny sliver of anguish left from the past two days of hell.
The fluorescent lights above the sinks stung your eyes as you peered at the reflection staring back at you. You didn’t recognize this person, one eye swollen to half open, hair plastered to clammy skin with dried blood and bruises blooming across sunken cheeks painting a macabre kaleidoscope of color. Dark circles accompanied the bruises blending together to form a picture of sleepless nights and violence. You brought a hand up to lightly touch your busted lip, watching your reflection wince as your fingers made contact, feeling the sharp sting. Dustin wasn’t kidding, hell ‘looking rough’ was generous of him, you would say you looked halfway dead at this point. You gripped the sink, flashes of the previous day flooding your mind as you clenched you one good eye shut. Your mom putting you in a chokehold, Billy Hargrove and your sister staring with twisted grins, blood stains on the carpet, then two soldiers dragging you into a room, Steve screaming your name.
Your breath begins to quicken as you try to shake the memories from your thoughts. But even with your eyes open now staring back at you with desperation and terror, flashes of memories filled your mind. The gate, the huge laser thing, the soldier’s fist connecting with your flesh, the sound of lurching broken sobs. The memory of those sobs mixing with the ones bursting past your bloodied lips. Tears stung your eyes and burned a trail down your cheeks, while you tried to suck in air as if you were drowning. Knuckles growing white, your fingers ached as they gripped the porcelain sink tighter as your body leaned over chest heaving with sobs as you stared in fascination at the teardrops falling into the sink, a pink hue gained from the tears mixing with your blood. You struggled to keep your breathing even as you continued to cry, not caring that someone could walk in any moment or about how loud your sobs echoed in the empty bathroom.
You thought about how if you didn’t get that damn mind flayer out of your family then you would be left alone. While you didn’t get along with your family that didn’t mean you wanted them dead, hell there were some days where it all felt real. Your family would share a dinner and Heather would ask about your day. You all would feel like a real happy family, not just a facade put on to impress the neighbors. You cried harder thinking about how scared you were when you didn’t hear from them, how terrified you were when seeing how disheveled the home you grew up in was. You cried over the soldiers beating you, beating Steve, about your worry over Dustin and Erica. You cried and cried and each tear stung your swollen eye, the tear tracks wetting the once dry blood on your cheeks and lips.
The sight of your tears and taste of your blood had your head whipping back up, you ignored the pain deep in your bones and the way your vision swam for just a moment. Your hands frantically went from gripping the sides of the sink to turning both faucets. This wouldn’t break you, now was not the time to freak out you needed to make sure everyone else was safe. It was those thoughts that had you pushing the panic and bone crushing terror back, bottling it up for a time where you could process everything after you were all safe.
You grabbed paper towels and wet them, warm water soaking into the material before you brought it up to your forehead to wipe the blood away. It’s stung but by this point that minimal amount of pain left you unfazed as you continued to meticulously clear your face of the dried crimson painting your features.
❀
You were just about finished, dabbing the last bit of blood from the corner of your mouth when the bathroom doors burst open causing you to jump. To your surprise it was Robin followed by Steve, each falling to their knees in the first two stalls. Before you could even take a step forward the two of them were violently vomiting into their own respective toilets. Your nose wrinkled in disgust as you turned you back to them quickly covering your ears with your hands in a futile attempt to block out the gagging sounds that filled the bathroom. Your vision swam as nausea made its way through your body, stomach rolling at each heave and wet splash. You always felt sympathy sickness when faced with a sick friend.
After what felt like hours but was most likely fifteen minutes at most the sounds of retching stopped and you felt your shoulders ease and your hands fell from their protective position over your ears. Their voices filled the bathroom and you debated whether or not you should let them know of your presence. You paused and then pondered why you were hesitant to reveal yourself, maybe this was a chance to see how close the two were, to see if Robin was really replacing you in Steve’s life. You knew it was childish, petty, and you knew there were way more important problems going on at the moment. But despite knowing you couldn’t help the anxiety you felt deep down because before you had to worry about your family, or the Russians, or the gate they reopened, you had been worried about Steve.
That little tingle of worry started a couple weeks back at the mention of his new coworker Robin. He talked about how funny she was, and how smart and different she was. Before you had to worry about all this world ending bullshit you were worried about Steve replacing you before you could come home. You knew in the back of your mind that it was stupid, that even if Steve Harrington didn’t talk to you as often as you had become accustomed to that you’d be fine. You had Nancy and Jonathan and the kids, hell Nancy was your best friend so it would be weird if your other best friend was her ex boyfriend. But then he was calling you every weekend, he was spending hours on the phone just talking and sharing and it was the most relaxed you had ever felt talking with another person. He was on the phone making you laugh, keeping you busy from being too homesick. You tried not to be jealous whenever he talked about his new pal Robin, which was even stranger for you when you met the girl. The past two days had you realizing how much you liked her too. You couldn’t even be mad because she was genuinely one of the nicest girls you ever met and occasionally her awkward rambling would remind you just a bit of Barb. You could see the similarities in their personalities and you honestly couldn’t bring yourself to dislike the other girl.
You really liked Robin, and sure you had only known her for two days now but something about life threatening situations forms bonds quickly. She was smart, and didn’t take shit from anyone and was fun and honestly you could see yourself becoming fast friends. So no you couldn’t hate the girl, you didn’t even want to entertain the little jealous feeling you had as Steve and her became fast friends because you wanted the same for yourself. You just had this feeling that Robin would be a ride or die friend for life if you just gave her a chance.
Your thoughts were interrupted by movement you caught in the mirror. You listened to the two of them, while back still turned you glanced up at the reflection of Steve sliding under the stall to join Robin. You cringed at the movement thinking about how gross the bathroom floor probably was. Robin spoke out exactly what you were thinking “this floors disgusting” and you smiled.
Steve just shrugged “yeah well i already got a bunch of blood and puke on my shirt so…” he trailed off before ending with a question.
“What do you think?”
“About?” Robin asked back her head tilting to the side.
“This girl…” Steve responded and you kicked yourself for not paying attention and letting your mind wander. What girl, what was he talking about?? You were finding it hard to focus on anything at the moment which you chalked up to having your head beat like a drum multiple times. You turned and stepped closer to the stall the two were in, fully eavesdropping on their conversation. If Steve liked someone else other than Nancy he would have told you right??? The two of you had talked pretty much two months straight. You feel like he would have mentioned liking a new girl.
“She sounds awesome” Robin spoke softly, eyes never leaving him while he replied with an equally soft “She is.”
“Who is??” You spoke up finally, no longer feeling like skulking in the background like some creep. The other two teens jumped, Steve letting out a shout while Robin whipped her head over to you. Before they could say anything you plopped down on the floor, legs crossed and elbows resting on your knees while your hands held your head.
“Y-y/n!! Were you listening this whole time??” Steve stammered out which kind of stung a little, did he not want you to know? Then a thought slammed into you. Oh shit was he like literally confessing to Robin and you just torpedoed that?
“Well I was here first…but I was a little busy cleaning all the blood off my face to pay attention so now I’m trying to catch up.” You straightened your back and turned a little more to Steve voicing your concerns.
“Look I’m really sorry if I just interrupted some grand love confession I can leave??” You pointed a thumb at the door, while asking. In your life you found asking way better than assuming and it always avoided potential problems for you so you just came out and asked what was going on. Instead of letting your concussed mind come up with all sorts of things the two could have been talking about you thought asking would just be easier.
“W-what no! No that’s-“ Steve stammered out while Robin was talking over him.
“I’m don’t like Steve!” Robin literally screamed this. And oh boy did that shut both you and Steve up as you whipped your heads over to Robin. She looked panicked, and sad, and just overall like she was about to burst into tears any moment. You felt sympathy for your friend who looked crushed by her outburst.
“I….I am not like your other friends. And I am NOT like Nancy Wheeler. Do you remember what I said about Click’s class?” You answered with a “no?” And Steve with a “yeah.”
Which had her letting out an amused huff before continuing. “It wasn’t because I had a crush on you Steve. It’s because she wouldn’t stop staring at you.”
Then it clicked for you, just a moment of understanding as a weight was lifted and your heart swelled.
Oh.
You took a moment to acknowledge how scared Robin must be feeling, how she must have worked her way up to be brave this moment. Truth serum or not, this type of baring your soul is monumental. This didn’t change your worry of Robin taking your place as Steve’s best friend but it did let you understand where Robin stood.
And while you were about to ask who ‘she’ was, Steve’s voice beat you to it with a slightly concerned and very confused “Mrs.Click?” Which made you snort in an embarrassing attempt to cover your laughter.
“Oh my god nooo” you mumbled while Robin let out an exasperated laugh before continuing.
“Tammy Thompson. I wanted her to look at me but she couldn’t pull her eyes away from you and your stupid hair. And I didn’t understand because you would get bagel crumbs all over the floor and you asked dumb questions and you didn’t even like her” she was kind of rambling at this point before Steve cut her off.
“But Tammy Thomson is a girl??” You rolled your eyes before turning your head to Steve. “Really Harrington?? I know it’s not just all hair up there…” you were mumbling while waiting for it to click in his mind.
The look Robin sent him propelled you forward, scooting across the disgusting bathroom tiles to pull Robin into a bone crushing hug. You missed Steve’s expression of confusion which morphed into understanding and concern.
Meanwhile the hug surprised both you and Robin and while Steve let out a soft “oh” you squeezed her to your chest and felt her arms cautiously wrap around you to return the hug. You didn’t normally just hug people but the desperation to not be judged coming off Robin had you moving before you could think.
“Robin I know we just met but we like almost died together so that sped up the bond making process in my mind and I just want to say thank you for trusting us with this.” You pulled back from her hands both resting on her shoulders as she stared wide eyed at you.
“Genuinely and truly thank you for sharing this part of you.” You tried to convey how supportive you were for her through your gaze before scooting back out of her personal space and into the stall doorway once more.
“Holy shit” Steve muttered out and you could see the fear return to Robin’s eyes. You chose not to interrupt Steve, knowing how far he has come from being the homophobic asshole he portrayed in highschool that first year he was dating Nancy. You knew he has grown as a person far past the bully and dumb preppy kid you and Robin both remembered so you kept quiet, waiting. And you were proven right when instead of being disgusted with Robin for liking girls it seemed his problem was that she liked Tammy instead.
“I mean Tammy Thompson is cute and all but…I mean she’s a total dud” this of course earned a glare from Robin and a snicker from you.
“She is not!” Robin protested while Steve just continued on.
“Yes. She is. She wants to be like a singer. She wants to move to, like Nashville and shit” with this you had your hand pressed to your mouth to suppress the giggles. While they argued back and forth before Steve turned to you.
“Back me up y/n! I mean she’s practically tone deaf right?? You’ve heard her!” He pleaded with you and as you removed your hand from your mouth you let out a horrible impersonation of Tammy.
“You see me noooow tonight!” Your voice had this awful pitch that has you sounding closer to Mickey Mouse. This was all you could muster before letting out another round of giggles. Steve looked at you with a smile plastered on his face while Robin laughed with you.
“She does not sound like that!” Robin was trying to hold in her laughter and failing miserably.
“She sounds exactly like that, ‘you see me now tonight you see me more than- ‘“ Steve was singing in a horrible high pitch voice which had you grabbing your sides and you laughed.
“You sound like a Muppet!”
“She sounds like a Muppet! She sounds like a Muppet giving birth!”
The two went back and forth while you were just wheezing at this point, your body ached and each laugh was accompanied by a twinge of pain but you kept laughing. The other two were singing now and you were joining in, the worries you had fading for just a moment. For just this one moment it was just you, Steve, and Robin, sitting on the disgusting theater bathroom floor covered in blood and singing your hearts out while laughing.