Chapter Text
Even after everything, seeing Nancy Wheeler walk into the video store surprised Robin.
She had that same doe-eyed look on her face, gaze flickering over the displays and the people there. A mix of caution and attentiveness that reminded her of how Steve would get sometimes, like he had been in the weeks after the mall. Taking stock of everything, expecting anything.
Robin would’ve called it paranoia if it had been anyone but them.
And even though Robin didn’t know Nancy Wheeler, she had an idea of what she’d been through with the others. She knew of the history even if she didn’t have all the details laid out: the history that Steve had told her and made his voice just that bit softer when he called out her name from the counter.
Wheeler’s eyes locked on to him, and they relaxed just that bit. “Hey Steve.”
Robin watched from the aisles, crouched down to organize the “chick flick” section because people never put back the movies in the right damn spots. She could’ve popped up and said hey, it’s me, that other girl in the demon trauma survivor pack, but she didn’t.
Wheeler was Steve’s thing. His history. She wasn’t going to butt in.
She did keep an eye on Steve though. On his half-smile that looked like it was about to snap in half, and his eyes that somehow seemed both warmer and more distant. Uncertain.
The Byers guy was out of town now. Gone from this shithole. The older Robin would’ve been wary of the older Steve and what he would do with that knowledge, talking to his ex.
The newer Robin was still wary, but not of the newer Steve.
Wheeler said something about “that girl from the mall” and turned to look around the store. Fittingly, Robin chose that moment to drop the VHS she was holding and swear.
“How’s everything going over there, Robin?” came Steve’s call.
Robin heaved a deep sigh, then straightened herself up. Wheeler was looking at her with a single eyebrow raised—ostentatiously was the only way to describe it—and Steve wearing a grin more like the guy she knew than whatever the hell he had been for the last couple of minutes.
“Hey,” she said with a long, wide wave, pointedly ignoring the last ten seconds of her life.
“Oh. Hey,” Wheeler said, waving back with barely any motion. “Sorry. I didn’t recognize you without the, uh…”
“Sailor uniform?” Steve volunteered.
She laughed. “Yeah.”
Robin rolled her eyes, stepping over the mess of VHS tapes to walk over. “Yeah, well, sailors are more of an early summer look, so I had to find a new one.”
“And a new job. Together,” Wheeler said, looking between the two of them. “I had heard about it, but I wasn’t sure.”
Robin frowned. Heard about it? From who?
A glance at Steve showed the same flash of confusion, but he recovered more smoothly than her. “Yeah, Robin helped me get the job here. I would’ve been screwed without her, probably—”
“Definitely,” she interjected.
“Probably. But yeah, you did help a lot.”
“Still cutting it light, but I’ll take it.” She smirked at him, even as he rolled his eyes. Something he had picked up from her. He had definitely gotten the better end of the deal, because all she had picked up was his clumsiness and some of his kids.
(That and a few hair tips, even if she would kill anyone who dared accuse her of such.)
Wheeler pointedly cleared her throat, and Steve swung his attention back to her, like a kid caught doing something wrong.
Robin took a bit more time. She had always been a good student, never one who’d be doing anything wrong to get called out on, but occasionally there would be a teacher that pissed her off, and she knew the ways to piss them off.
Miss Wheeler was starting to remind her a little bit of that. The expectant look on her face when Robin did turn back to her didn’t help that impression.
“Well, I’m glad you two are getting along,” Wheeler said. “Robin, right?”
“That’s me.”
Her smile quirked at the corners of her lips, just a bit. Like she was trying really hard to smile and play nice, but just couldn't manage it. “It’s nice to officially meet you—now that we’re not fearing for our lives in a deserted mall.”
Robin glanced over at Steve’s imploring eyes, barely holding in a sigh. “Yeah. Same.”
“I don’t think your ex likes me very much,” Robin told Steve as they were closing. They stood side by side, placing the returns for the day back on the shelves. The store was quiet and empty, but they both left the lights on until the second they were out of there. Bad for the environment, but good for their mental states.
“She doesn’t hate you or anything,” he grumbled, handing her a copy of Sixteen Candles for her newly organized section of the aisle.
“But she doesn’t like me.”
He took a deep breath. “Yeah. Sorry.”
She gave him a light punch to the arm, jostling the tapes in his arms and earning a glare. “Don’t be sorry, dingus. I... wasn't being very nice, either, I know. I don’t mean to make it awkward for you.”
“You’re not. Things with her are… always awkward.”
“More awkward, then.”
He shook his head. She hated when he went like this. Quiet and sullen and… not himself. Like he was caught in something and couldn’t get out.
When he had explained the other demon stuff that had happened, the demi-goron or whatever the hell it was called, he had times like this. Robin had learned to just wait it out. She understood it. She was definitely going to carry a lot of trauma for the next few years, if not the rest of her life.
Here, it felt different. She felt impatient, anxious, like there was something that she should be doing to help, but wasn’t.
“You think she might be acting a little more..." Bitchy. "... rude because of… the Byers family moving away?” she asked carefully.
He gave her a look, unimpressed. “Jonathan, you mean?”
“Okay, yeah. Jonathan.”
“I’m sure it’s not fun for her. They love each other,” he said simply, shrugging his shoulders. “And it sucks not being able to be with the person you love.”
He didn’t have to tell her twice. She knew that feeling well. They both did.
Steve gave her a sympathetic look, nudging her shoulder. She nudged him back with a little smile that he returned.
Truth be told, he didn’t look upset or anything. But he had that same quietness that he had carried when she first asked him about Wheeler back at Scoops Ahoy. Back then, it had just been to get under his skin, but it was the first time she had felt genuinely bad about her teasing.
Nobody had known the details, of course, but all of Hawkins High had seen Nancy Wheeler go from being on Steve’s arm one week to basically spending all of her time with Jonathan Byers the next. None of the three ever said anything about it, but it wasn’t exactly rocket science for the school to figure out. The two of them were inseparable after that, even getting their internships at Hawkins Post together.
(Robin had applied for the same internship, but that Wheeler had gotten it was neither here nor there. She hadn’t even cared about the position, really; she just didn’t know what she wanted to do except for something less stupid than slinging ice cream.)
(Looking at Steve beside her now, and considering how jerkish the men in that office seemed from her brief interview, she figures she got the better end of the deal.)
Steve nudged her again, noticing her far-off expression. “Hey. Really, you don’t gotta tip-toe around it or anything. I’m happy for them. Nance and me…” He sighed, like he was giving out a line he had rehearsed too many times. “We didn’t work well together.”
She could believe that, but she wasn’t sure if it was for the same reasons he was thinking. “Well, hey—maybe she’ll get nicer about it soon. And maybe some distance will be good for them?” she offered. “I mean, they were basically glued together after they started dating. It’s disgusting.” She mimed throwing up to a small smirk from Steve. “How long have they even been dating for? Right after you two, uh, broke up?”
“Around then, yeah,” he said, turning away from her, smirk fallen from his face.
She paused, watching the back of his head.
Wheeler… It was like a flip of a switch. One day it was 24/7 with Steve, and then the next it was Byers. Barely even a gap.
“Or… before?” she asked, hesitantly.
“It’s… complicated.”
She was quiet, waiting for an explanation, but one never came.
She focused back on the tapes, shoving the copy of Sixteen Candles into its spot on the shelf a little harder than she needed to.
“That’s not a good answer.”
The thing was, Robin respected the hell out of Nancy Wheeler. Seriously, she did. Going after her dreams of being a journalist, being one of the top students at school, and keeping a cool head during all that shit at the mall, and apparently way before that as well.
Robin had crushed on her a little back in the day, and had been sad to add her to the list of girls who had fallen for the douche canoe that was Steve Harrington. She remembered hearing about the spray paint on the theater marquee and being bitter and angry that even someone like Nancy Wheeler had to deal with that shit because of Steve Harrington.
(No one had known the whole story there, since they were back together a few days later, and people talked about Steve going to clean it back up the same night. Now, she knew that fights against alien demon monsters and genuine attempts to be a better person are worth a lot.)
She remembered thinking Wheeler deserved so much better than Harrington.
The thing was, now she found herself thinking it had flipped around.