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Robin Buckley sat in front of the oven, mindlessly watching a sheet of cookies slowly bake. Steve was beside her, arms and legs flailed like a starfish on the kitchen floor as he silently stared at the ceiling. It was late, probably too late to be baking, but they’d come to an unspoken agreement that neither of them would be sleeping that night. There was just too much. Too much to worry about. Too many memories that echoed around the walls of their brains. Too many years of grappling with the impossible. If she closed her eyes for long enough, Robin thought she could still see Eddie’s crumpled, bloodied body on the ground. A shudder ran through her.
The oven light was the only light on in the entire house. Robin supposed that was why both she and Steve were huddled so closely to it, like a moth to flame.
“I should turn on the lights.” she said plainly.
Steve nodded his head but didn’t say a word. Neither of them moved.
Minutes passed. The timer went off. Robin became acutely aware that tears were streaming down her face. Somewhere beside her Steve was getting up to pull out the cookie sheet. Everything was wrong.
She felt more than saw Steve sit down beside her, knees brushing as he wrapped an arm around her and offered a cookie. She sobbed quietly into it as she ate and glanced to the side to notice Steve starring, his face haunted.
“Nothing feels right.” He rasped and Robin felt a pang of both fondness and understanding. Only Steve could put into words exactly what she was feeling. He was her best friend after all. Her other half. Her soulmate. Platonic with a capitol P, of course.
“I just don’t understand how we got here. How can this be real? How did this happen?” the questions bubbled out of her like an unearthed spring, sudden and desperate to break free.
“I don’t know. We’ve never lost before. I don’t know where we go from here.” His voice broke and eyes shone with fresh tears.
Steve had been at this a lot longer than Robin. He’d been there when the demogorgan had torn through the walls of the Byers’ home and had fought tooth and nail when the demodogs had snarled their angry teeth at the kids. But this was different. The weight of it settled uneasily in his chest like something had simply shifted out of place and now the whole world was off kilter. Robin slipped her fingers through his. They were still stained with chocolate from the cookie and something like love rang through him.
“We’re going to be okay.” Steve said with a sudden certainty.
“Okay.”
“I mean it.”
“Okay.”
“Seriously.”
“Just let me mope for five minutes, Steve.” She groaned and buried her face in his shoulder.
“Nope, no time.” He got to his feet and pulled her up with him. “Come on lets go outside.”
“It’s two in the morning and outside was quite literally torn apart two days ago, dingus.”
“Please,” he said and something in his voice was a little desperate, “I can’t stay in my empty house anymore. I’m going to go insane.”
“Ugh. Fine, but if I step on a crack and fall into the upside down then I hope you know that I will haunt you for the rest of your life.” She agreed mostly because she couldn’t bare the strain in Steve’s voice and the slight shake to his hand. He’d never admit it, but ‘King Steve’ was made just as raw and panicked by the events of the past few years as anyone else. He could hide it from the others, but looking at Robin was like looking into a mirror. They were the same person when it came down to it and Robin knew from experience that lying to yourself was much more difficult than lying to anyone else. They might be a bit codependent, she thought.
“Just can’t get enough of me, eh?” Steve grinned cheekily and began to tug her towards the door.
“Shut up, dingus”
“You need a new insult.”
“Doofus.”
“Hmm.. doesn’t have the same ring to it.”
“No, it doesn’t. How about asshole?” Robin laughed and it was both unexpected and familiar in the way it could only be with Steve.
“Now that’s just mean.”
******
Robin watched the wind make ripples across Steve’s pool. Her pants were rolled up, feet dangling in the chilled water. She noted that Steve sat a few inches from the edge. She’d never actually seen him swim in it. The name ‘Barb Holland’ was etched into the pool in a way that only Steve could see, and the chlorine smelt like guilt.
Robin wasn’t an idiot. She knew that once upon a time Steve was your typical teenage asshole. She knew that he hadn’t always been above throwing unwarranted insults and playing girls just for fun. She also knew that the guilt of it all was silently eating him alive. Barb was a testament to that. Her death hadn’t been his fault, but Steve carried her around like a chip on his shoulder nonetheless. Maybe if he hadn’t been so caught up in charming Nancy or he’d never offered Barb the knife she had cut her hand on or he’d never let Tommy talk him into stealing his father’s beer or he’d never been friends with him in the first place, Barb would be okay and Nancy Wheeler would still have her best friend. Maybe if he hadn’t invited them over at all she would still be here. It hadn’t been his fault, but it was still his pool that Barbara Holland died in.
Robin pulled her feet from the water.
“Do you ever wonder what our lives would look like if that damn lab had never decided it was a bright idea to open an interdimensional portal?” Steve questioned, looking uncharacteristically thoughtful as he stared into the water.
“You might be off partying with Tommy H and Carol, and I’d be worrying over my calculus homework instead of having my face chewed off by an ugly, oversized dog.” She replied bluntly because it was true.
“We wouldn’t have been friends.”
“Probably not. Is it selfish that I’m a little glad it happened? Just so that we’d still have met and I’d still have you to test out all my new insults on.”
“Yes, I think it is. But I’m selfish too, and I would be an absolute mess without you.”
“How could you be a mess if you didn’t even know me in the first place? I’d still just be some girl who sat in the back of Mrs. Click’s class two years ago.”
“I’d still know,” Steve spoke seriously with creased brows, “Somehow I would. Something would always be missing. Like, the world would be shifted slightly to the left or my breathing would be all wrong. I’d just know it.”
Robin felt her chest squeeze and eyes prick. Oh, she hated him so much sometimes that she just wanted to hug him and never let him go anywhere ever if it wasn’t with her. “I’d know too. I’d miss you like a lung.”
A smile so genuine and fond that it actually hurts split across Steve’s face. His hand reached out to ruffle her hair. “Besides, I’d need you to put me in my place. Who else is going to tell me when I’m being a dingus?”
“Probably Henderson.”
They both laughed and it sounded like: love, love, love
Sometimes Robin thought that she would marry him. Not because she was in love with him. Sure, she loved him, but being in love with someone was an entirely different thing. Being in love implies kissing and romance which were both entirely out of the question on account of Robin being a lesbian. The thought of kissing Steve actually made her want to laugh then cry. But, still, she’d marry him because she was almost certain that she could never love a person as entirely and fully as she loved Steve Harrington, and it just didn’t seem fair to any nice girl that Robin may meet to pretend that the truth was anything otherwise. Steve would just always come first. Besides, she’d be happy with him. Steve could hit on anyone he wanted and Robin would flirt with Vickie, and they’d both be the talk of the town. Steve would love the attention, and she’d find the whole scandal of it absolutely hilarious. Did platonic marriages exist? If not, then they’d be the first.
“I love you,” Robin said because she did.
“I love you, too.” Steve said back because he did.
And that was really it wasn’t it? That was them. Just two friends who loved each other very much. Even as the world literally opened up and fell into itself, they were still steady because the other was still standing and breathing and so very alive.
“We’re going to be okay.” Steve said for the second time that night.
“I know.” Robin replied because this time she believed him.