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1.
Nancy thinks Robin is going to kill her.
She’s survived literal hell, she can survive this right? Right?
Robin being nice absolutely cannot be the thing that takes her out.
She was the one that was fine with walking back from the movie theater, she was the one that didn’t bring a coat because how the hell was she supposed to know it was going to go from a hot spring day to a chilly spring night. She brought this upon herself.
Robin was just being Robin.
Kind, Wonderful, Robin, and her three layers of clothes.
On that note… Robin’s jacket is great. It was already big on Robin, because of her thing for oversized clothes, so Nancy, who is a good four inches shorter than Robin, is swallowed by the bomber jacket.
She spares a glance over Robin, who is looking ahead, hands shoved in her pockets and slightly hunched over. Her face is relaxed and she’s humming something. She wonders what Robin is thinking, because like ten minutes ago, instead of looking relaxed she was stuttering over her words in an attempt to ask Nancy if she wanted to borrow her coat.
She had smiled softly at Robin and nodded, saying, ‘That would be great, thank you,’ and then followed it up by asking if Robin was sure she didn’t need it. In response, Robin gestured to her t-shirt and unbuttoned-button-up.
Robin was fidgety then, moving the ring on her pointer finger back and forth, over and over again. Now, as they walk in almost complete silence -save for Robin’s quiet humming- she seems mellowed out. The only outward sign that Robin was still the same clumsy nervous person, was the fact that she kept glancing down at the sidewalk, carefully stepping over cracks as they appeared in the concrete, seemingly aware of her own ability to trip over the slightest thing.
When they get to Nancy’s house, there’s a light on in the living room, and either her dad forgot to turn it off or her mom was waiting for her. She stops as she’s about to open the front door and turns to Robin, who looks like she got caught stealing something, blinking rapidly, and shuffling her feet.
“Do you-” She starts, but pauses for a moment when her speaking causes Robin to jerk her gaze from her boots to Nancy. “Would you like to spend the night?” Robin’s eyes open a little wider, and it makes Nancy continue talking, despite her better judgment, “I mean you certainly don’t have to, it’s just late you know and I wouldn’t want you walking home by yourself and I’m sure my mom would love to meet you.”
Robin just blinks for a moment and then smiles, “Yeah, yeah that sounds good, I’d love to, thanks.”
When Robin leaves the next day, just before noon to go to work, she leaves her jacket hanging on the back of Nancy’s desk chair, and Nancy feels like it’s mocking her in some weird way, so she hangs it up on the inside of her closet door and tries not to think about how it smells like Robin’s perfume.
2.
Nancy trips.
She trips down the stairs on the stupid nailhead sticking out of the 4th to last step. The same one she’s been meaning to fix for the last two weeks.
She means to walk around it like she usually does, she means to tell Robin to step around it, but she doesn’t do either of those things. Because Robin touches her back, and even though her shirt is separating Robin’s fingertips from her skin, it feels like lightning shooting through her nerves.
So she gets distracted.
She yelps as she falls and Robin reaches out, trying to pull her back. But in her haste to steady Nancy, she falls forward and seems to think it’s a good idea to put herself in front of Nancy as they both fall. Nancy desperately tries to stop Robin from falling even though she’s already falling, by grabbing onto Robin’s shoulders as she falls backward. In the very short amount of time they’re falling she tries to get her fingers under Robin’s head before it hits the hardwood floor.
Her head hits the ground hard anyways and so do Nancy’s knuckles, which burn like she just punched a wall, but she’s more worried about Robin.
Robin whose entire body just hit the floor with the added weight of Nancy landing on top of her.
Robin groans out a slew of curses as her face scrunches up in pain.
Nancy moves her hands to the side of Robin’s head and pushes herself up to hover above her, and only then does she notice that Robin has a grip on her waist. But her shirt had ridden up in the fumble to stay upright and Robin’s hands had made contact with her bare skin, and they… well they’re staying there.
Robin’s hands are soft everywhere except for the tips of her fingers, and her skin is cold, not clammy, just cold. If she wasn’t worried about Robin, she could focus on how her hands on her waist are a completely comforting weight.
“Oh god, are you okay?” Nancy asks, trying to ignore Robin’s hands.
Robin blows out a harsh breath, “I’m- Ah fuck.” She cuts herself off when she moves her head back an inch and it hits the floor again. “I’m good, I’m really good.” She grits out, looking Nancy over, keeping her hands on the other's waist. “Christ, are you okay?”
Nancy scoffs and carefully moves off of Robin, but keeps her hands on the back of Robin’s head so she doesn’t hit it on the floor again. “Robin, I just landed on top of you.”
Robin’s brows scrunch up and she opens and closes her mouth for a second before shaking her head in Nancy's hands while Nancy tries to hold her head still. “I’m sooo fine, Nance.”
Nancy almost laughs, but she’s worried about Robin. “Is the rest of your body okay?”
Robin blinks at Nancy and then giggles, and Nancy definitely thinks she’s slightly out of it. “Oh, the rest of my body is great .” Okay, maybe she is more than slightly out of it.
There are footsteps coming from the living room and both of the girls look over to see Mrs. Wheeler standing in the doorway. “Are you two okay?” She asks, coming over to kneel next to Robin.
“Robin’s not,” and, “I’m fiiine .” Are said at the same time, and Robin and Nancy’s voice’s threaten to drown each other out.
Robin turns to give Nancy an expression of mock offense and it makes Nancy give her a small smile back as she tries to ignore the heat that crawls up her neck to her face.
3.
Robin was running from a bee.
She is running across a field at full speed… From a bee,
Flowers and their petals are whipped into the air as Robin rushes through them.
She was fine a moment ago when the bee was buzzing around her knee as she sat next to Nancy under the shady tree at the far end of the field. But then the bee decided it wanted to- in Robin’s words ‘get all up in her space,’ and Robin made a run for it, shouting about how Nancy was the one with flowers on her shirt.
Nancy leans back against the tree, smoothing her hands over the blanket she’s sitting on, and watches as Robin does another lap possibly just for the fun of it because she’s not screaming about ‘stupid fucking bees.’
Robin finally wanders back over to where Nancy is sitting and plops down next to her, sighing heavily, Nancy watches her lean back against the tree and close her eyes.
Maybe Robin won’t be able to tell Nancy is staring at her if her eyes are closed. So Nancy stares. She tracks the splatter of freckles across Robin's face and notes the small scar at the top of her left cheek.
Then Robin’s eyes suddenly open and Nancy jerks her head away so fast she almost hits her head against the tree.
She can feel Robin’s gaze on her and holds her breath, trying to figure out if Robin is going to mention anything about Nancy’s totally creepy staring. But she doesn’t, instead, she turns to the surrounding grass and starts pulling up flowers.
Nancy goes back to watching her after deeming it safe to do so and watches as Robin carefully selects a mixture of yellow and purple flowers and piles them in her lap. Nancy raises an eyebrow and moves closer to Robin, snagging a couple of flowers.
Robin spares a glance at Nancy before looking back over to her own pile. Nancy carefully keeps her eyes downward, and hyper-focuses on the flower stems she braids together so the purple and yellow flowers stay close together.
When Nancy looks over at Robin again, she finds that Robin is already giving her a certain look. It’s curious and soft, and it makes Nancy want to do silly, silly things.
Then Robin drops something on Nancy’s head and sits back, giving Nancy a weirdly nervous look. Though Robin looked nervous more often than not, it was a different kind of nervousness each time, and around Nancy, Robin always gets this certain nervous look on her face that’s the same every time.
And what Nancy would give to figure out that expression.
She reaches up to feel the thing sitting on her head, and she’s met with the feeling of thin petals and leaves, stems woven to hold everything together.
“My mom taught me how to make them,” Robin blurts, looking startled by her own voice. She continues when Nancy doesn’t say anything and just stares, “Before she decided that I was mildly annoying and too old to make flower crowns,” She’s talking faster now and rapidly twisting the rings on her fingers. “But, they’re really pretty and I thought it would fit you and now I’m realizing that I didn’t even think to consider that you might be allergic to flowers or it might ruin your hair and I just put it on your head and I can totally take it ba-”
Nancy promptly cuts into Robin’s rambling by pushing the hair falling in her face behind her ear and fitting the braided flowers alongside the brown strands.
Robin opens and closes her mouth, and looks a bit like a lost puppy.
Nancy tilts her head and smiles calmly, “They look nice on you too,” she taps the crown on her head, “This is nice too, I really like it, Rob, thank you.”
Robin nods slowly and a tint of pink covers her cheeks and nose, “Yeah, yeah,” her eyes widen a bit and she continues rapidly, “I mean thanks, thank you, I really like-” Nancy watches as Robin fastens her mouth shut, then blinks, “Thank you,” and it sounds final, like Robin isn’t going to risk the loss of her own dignity by talking anymore,
As they stare at each other for probably an abnormally long time, Robin catches sight of something out of the corner of her eye. “Oh fuck the bee’s back,” She half yells as she darts up from the ground and runs, leaving Nancy to listen to Robin’s rapid mumbles of ‘shit shit shit shit.’
Nancy catches her breath, closes her eyes, and tries to remember the freckles across Robin’s nose.
+I.
There’s little to no noise in Nancy’s bedroom, not since she got rid of the clock because of the incessant ticking noise that makes her want to lose her mind. It’s too quiet now, so she gets up from her bed and sifts through her music collection. She ends up on an Elton John one and when she presses the play button, the quiet noise of “Your Song” floats through the air.
Robin is laying on the bed when she turns back around, though really she should say that Robin is still laying on the bed when she turns back around. Robin is essentially half asleep and sprawled out on the comforter, half under a lighter blanket. Her shirt is oversized and envelops her, but the collar is low enough that Nancy can see her collar bones, and her wide-leg yoga pants ride up on her leg, just above her knees.
Robin has freckles on her knees.
Actually, she has freckles everywhere.
Nancy loves it.
Robin is a bit like a painting, she thinks, in a way. She’s kind of gorgeous, to Nancy at least. She’s all pretty eyes, and freckles, and knobbly knees, and gangly limbs, and Nancy loves it all.
She wants to kiss Robin’s freckles, and she’s willing to dedicate a sizable amount of time to it.
Robin twists to face Nancy and gives her a sleepy smile. “What’re you staring at Wheeler?”
Nancy doesn’t run, she never has, she thinks she never will. “You,” she mutters, sitting down on the bed and bringing her knees up to her chest, hugging her legs.
Robin blinks away the sleep in her eyes, her hands clenching and unclenching, Nancy watches carefully to make sure Robin doesn’t dig her nails into her own palm. “You- I-” Robin breathes out, staring at the ceiling and moving her eyes back and forth, seeming to consider something for a moment. “Why?” Is what she settles on.
“Well,” Nancy says, still quietly, and really she doesn’t know why she’s whispering but it feels right. “Maybe I like looking at you,” She continues, laying down next to Robin.
Robin can’t seem to do a lot but blink and fiddle with her own hands. She turns her head to look at Nancy and her hair splays out over the pillow. “You like looking at me.” And Nancy can’t tell if it's a question or a disbelieving statement.
How big of a risk is Nancy willing to take?
Well, it is for Robin.
“I like your freckles,” She whispers, watching for Robin’s reaction.
Robin looks like she wants to bring a hand up to her face to touch the freckles there, but stops halfway there and lets her hand fall back down to the bed, closer to Nancy’s body than before. “I don’t think I really expected that,” Robin mutters as her eyes flit over Nancy and it almost makes her want to squirm under the searching gaze.
Nancy is too articulate to just blurt her next words out, but she comes close to it, and she’s thankful that Robin doesn’t flinch back at the volume. “Your hands too.” Robin just blushes heavily and raises her eyebrows. “I mean I like them, I like your hands,” Nancy explains, trying to unnecessarily clarify her words.
So much for being articulate.
“Nancy,” Robin whispers it like a prayer and Nancy wants to scream or cry or fucking laugh, maybe squeal.
All in a good way of course.
“Robin,” She whispers back and she hopes it sounds like a prayer because she needs Robin to understand.
“I don’t-” Robin starts and then purses her lips together, her fingers that are closest to Nancy twitch, and the ring on her middle finger glints in the light. “I want to be sure about what you’re saying because I think I know- like I want what I think I know to be true but I’m also not sure. It’s just like I never expected this… Well I kind of did expect this, but not really, and- oh god that didn’t make any sense.” Robin mumbles, covering her red-tinted face with her hands.
“Robin,” Nancy says again, a soft, mildly concerned smile on her lips. Robin spreads her fingers so she can see through them to look at Nancy. She reaches out to gently move Robin’s hands away from her face. “You’re right,” She mumbles, lacing her fingers with Robin’s, and the cold metal of her rings sends sparks through her hand and arm.
Robin’s eyes are wide and there’s a hopeful glint to them. “I’m right,” She mumbles back, half a question, looking for reassurance at the very least.
Nancy turns slightly and moves onto her elbow to give herself more leverage over Robin, keeping her hand in Robin’s, she whispers, “I like you.”
Robin crackles a smile, almost giggles but suppresses it halfway through by biting her lip. “Nancy Wheeler likes me.” She raises her eyebrows at Nancy, teasing, “You like , like me.”
Nancy kisses her, and it’s a little awkward at first, because Robin is smiling, and Nancy is half smiling, but it works. Robin brings her free hand up to Nancy’s waist and Nancy releases her other hand to hold onto Robin’s neck and face with both hands. She braces herself with both her elbows and Robin’s empty hand comes up to the other side of her waist.
Their lips move in sync with each other and it’s sweet. It’s so very sweet.
Nancy pulls away first to breathe and Robin is still smiling, this time a little dopey. “Yes Robin, I like, like you very much.”
Robin, sighs, content, and Nancy presses a kiss to Robin’s jaw, and Robin’s hands tighten and loosen on her waist.
Robin smells like citrus and her eyes move across Nancy’s face, adoration swimming in them and it makes Nancy want. She wants and wants and wants .
And she has .
Robin has her, and she thinks that she has Robin too.