Chapter Text
Ronin Buckley hates airports. She always has. Between all the people hustling to make it to their gate on time and the loud atmosphere, it was her own personal nightmare. And that’s not even including the worst part of all; airport security. Sure, it was a necessary evil, but that didn’t make it any less stressful. There was something about all the machines and the annoyed glares from the TSA officers that never failed to make her feel like she was doing something wrong.
Robin moved forward in line, finally making it up to the front after what felt like hours. Who knew an airport in Indiana of all places would be so busy. Then again, it was the start of summer vacation.
She handed the officer her boarding pass and ID, and answered the typical ‘what’s your full name and date of birth’ questions. After finishing their interrogation, they let her through. She grabbed a bin, moving as fast as she possibly could to get all her things situated. She just barely remembered to grab her laptop out from her backpack, and remove her camera from around her neck before she went through the machine. A part of her always wondered just how much the officers could see with the scanner. Another part didn’t want to know.
She rocked back and forth on the balls of her feet as she waited for her bins to come through. Eventually she was able to grab everything and take them over to one of the few unoccupied benches. Robin carefully removed her camera from the bin and returned it to its place around her neck, then slipped her beat up converse back onto her feet. She let herself breathe a moment. The worst was over. Now she just needed to make it to her gate. She pulled up her phone, glancing at the time a few times before registering what it meant. 5:38.
“Perfect,” she thought out loud, “still got an hour till boarding.” Plenty of time to fill up her water bottle. Well it would be if she had it. It was just her luck to lose her only water bottle a week before her trip to one of the hottest states in the US. But hey, there are worse things she could’ve lost.
Robin slipped her laptop back into her backpack and slung the thing over one shoulder. Taking another look at her boarding pass, something she’d likely done a hundred times since she’d gotten it about an hour ago, she found the gate number once more. A11.
Following the hanging signs she made her way through the terminal, passing by plenty of other gates before finally finding hers. She held up the ticket comparing its number to the one on the wall before finally taking a seat.
Robin closed her eyes, finally letting herself truly relax. For a few moments she could forget about the airport on the other end of the plane ride.
In what felt like a minute later, but was likely much longer, Robin found herself awoken by the sound of the gate agent inviting the first group to board. Eventually, when her section was called he gathered her stuff together and joined the line. Not long after she was settled into her cramped little airplane seat. At least this time around she didn’t have anyone sitting next to her.
She popped in her earbuds and hit play on her music. In a few minutes they were in the air. Robin only lasted 15 minutes before her lack of sleep the night before finally caught up with her. Laying her head against the wall her eyes slowly opened and closed a few times before finally remaining closed.
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Robin yawned, slowly waking from her around 5 hour long nap to the sound of the intercom. She couldn’t pick out specific words over the sound of her own music, but if she had to guess they were something around the lines of ‘ladies and gentlemen, fasten your seatbelts cause we’re about to land.’
Twenty minutes later they had officially touched down in San Antonio. As the plane parked at the gate, she and the many other passengers began to get up and retrieve their items. In another Twenty minutes she was stepping off the plane and into the airport. She followed a couple of other passengers hoping they would take her to wherever Steve was waiting for her. Fortunately she dint have to look long before she saw a familiar hairdo popping out of the crowd.
“Steve!” she shouted racing over to greet him.
As soon as they were close enough they enveloped each other in a hug. It had been so long since they’d been able to do that. Since elementary school at least.
“Robin, it’s so good to see you!” Steve smiled, “Almost doesn’t feel real.”
“Well it is dingus. And the best part is you’re stuck with me all summer.”
“Oh no, what ever shall I do?” Steve’s playful sarcasm earning him an eye roll from Robin.
“I don’t suppose you know where the baggage claim is,” Robin asked, “Not that I’m not enjoying our little reunion, but the sooner we can get out of the airport the better.”
“Wow still scared of airports Rob?”
“Not scared, just a strong dislike.”
“Sure.”
Robin rolled her eyes, “Alright where’s the baggage claim, dingus.”
They made their way across the airport to the carousels, struggling to find the one that belonged to their flight. Surprisingly in the nearly ten minutes it took for them to get across the airport, their flights baggage was just starting to be returned. They sat their for another ten or fifteen minutes before a familiar looking bag shot down the shute.
“Fiiiiiiiinally,” Robin groaned. She hauled her bag off the rotating metal belt, and made her way back over to Steve.
“That everything?” he asked.
“Yup,” she smiled, “We can finally leave this awful place.”
With that they headed out onto the parking ramps to find Steve’s car. Robin shoved her bag in the back, climbed into the passenger seat, and almost immediately after they left the parking garage fell right back to sleep.