Chapter Text
June 1990
Nancy’s first mistake was letting Steve handle the roommate ad.
“You’re so busy, Nance,” he’d said, the top half of his body contorted over the counter of Family Video. It was the last weekend before summer vacation, and families milled around them, hunting for something to keep the boredom at bay. “Just let me do this for you.”
Nancy had made a habit of visiting him at work on Saturday afternoons, if only to get out of her apartment for a few hours–the apartment she’d finally been able to afford just two months ago, after three years of scraping by and saving most of every paycheck from the Hawkins Post, only to have her hours slashed mercilessly by the new Editor in Chief just a few weeks later. Now, she could barely stand to look at the shiny hardwood floors and crown molding. The place that represented everything she’d worked for–the safety and privacy she’d earned –was quickly becoming a reminder of just how precarious her hard-won peace actually was.
Steve had been unrelenting ever since she’d let slip that she might have to give her place up and return to her parents’ house. She tried not to think too hard about the pathetic state of her life, but the idea of having to move back home, tail between her legs, was more painful than she wanted to admit.
So we’ll find somebody to move in, he’d said, like sharing her space–trusting somebody like that–was as easy as deciding what to have for dinner. They’d been fighting about it ever since.
“Why would I let you write the ad?” she asked. “You’ll just screen the applicants based exclusively on their hotness and pick your favorite. I need someone who will pay half the rent, not suck your–”
The bell dinged, and Nancy bit back the rest of that sentence. Steve grinned at her thwarted expression, undeterred, and went to help the newly-arrived customers decide between Goonies and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids . She studied the candy selection until he bounced back behind the desk.
“I promise I will find someone financially solvent,” he said.
“Big words aren’t going to wear me down,” she said. “I just–I still don’t know, Steve. I don’t do well with women my age.”
“They’re girls, Nancy, not flesh-eating monsters.”
“Those I’m pretty sure I could handle. It’s the diet shakes and Jazzercise outfits I’m not certain about.”
Steve leveled her with a look she knew well. She put up a hand.
“Yeah, yeah. I know. I’m being prejudicial. I’m generalizing about a varied and expansive group of people, of which I am a part. God, college really did a number on you, huh?”
“Turns out the HCC Feminist Club is a great place to meet chicks
and
learn stuff,” Steve said with a shrug.
“I wish you could just move in with me,” she said, leaning forlornly on the counter, cheek pressed into her hand.
“As fun as it would be to watch you have an aneurysm over the dirty socks I’d leave everywhere, I couldn’t do Munson like that. I’m the only one in the house with a job. But what I can do is find you the best roommate options Hawkins has to offer.”
“Well, that’s going to be a depressing assortment of people.”
“Clearly you are incapable of impartially judging your options,” Steve said. “You can even approve the ad before I submit it to the paper. I’ll put my number down, and I’ll only send the top contenders to interview with you. Full control remains with Nancy Wheeler. Think of me as your incredibly good-looking secretary.”
Nancy narrowed her eyes at him. “I don’t understand why you’re being so stubborn about this.”
Steve shrugged in his usual careless, loose-limbed way, but Nancy saw something harden in his expression.
“You’ve saved Hawkins, what, three times now? The least this town could do for you is let you keep your own fucking apartment.”
She couldn’t argue with that. Which is why, a week later, she found herself staring down at the Hawkins Post Classifieds page, between an ad for a lost rooster and someone looking to hire a “strong, discreet man” for what had to be either a hit job or an escort service.
ROOMMATE WANTED. Shared apartment in downtown Hawkins, with your own bedroom and large closet. Ideal candidate is fun, neat, and employed. Blondie fan a plus.
It ended with Steve’s name and number. All good, at least on the surface. In the days after it ran, she repeatedly asked Steve if they’d had any bites, but he waved her off. It was a week before he finally told her to clear her Sunday, because she’d be holding interviews and tours at the apartment.
She spent Sunday morning cleaning, putting all of her books back on the shelf and making sure her (very adult, very curated) collection of stuffed animals were hidden away in her room. She tried three different outfits, finally settling on her favorite pair of jeans and a light pink button-down blouse, hair in a high ponytail. Cute, but casual. She was in charge here, after all. It was her place.
When she’d done as much as she could, she wiped her sweaty palms on her thighs and sat on the couch, waiting.
She didn’t realize her second mistake until later, which was not asking Steve for a list of names.
In the end, she had only herself to blame when she opened the door at the first knock of the day, a polite smile already in place, and came face to face with the last person on Earth she’d expected to see back in Hawkins.
“Hey, Nance.”
Robin leaned on the doorframe–she was always leaning –with that crooked smile Nancy hadn’t seen in years, but which punched her in the stomach just as forcefully as it always had. Her hair was long, longer than Nancy’s, and cut in a shaggy, effortlessly cool way that accentuated the sharp angles of her face.
Nancy was dimly aware that she was staring, but it took her a full second’s pause before she could speak.
“Robin. What are you doing here?”
Robin held up a piece of paper between her index and middle fingers. “221 Main Street, Apartment C, right?”
Realization struck Nancy like a hammer against a bell.
“You’re here because of the roommate ad?” she managed. No, there’s no way Robin was moving back here, after so long–
“Yep,” Robin said. “Robin Buckley, returning to Hawkins. And, uh, it’s good to see you, Nancy.”
They stood there for another heartbeat, Nancy unable to stop staring, Robin’s smile growing steadily until her grin cracked wide and suddenly she was wrapping Nancy in a bear hug.
Nancy barely remembered herself in time to weakly return the embrace. She was struck speechless by the warmth and strength of Robin’s arms, the brown sugar smell of her hair.
It was all relentlessly, impossibly familiar, even though the last time Nancy had hugged Robin, they’d been saying goodbye in Robin’s driveway over four years earlier, when Robin left for UCLA. And never came back.
After an age, Robin let her go, stepping back. “So, what do you think? Can I come in?”
Nancy blinked. Blinked again. And then, finally, she did what she always did, what she’d perfected in the years since Barb first disappeared: she shut the steel door between her heart and her mind, squared her shoulders, and tilted her chin to look up at Robin, who was watching her thoughtfully, expression inscrutable except for the tiny upward tilt at one corner of her mouth.
“Of course,” Nancy said, stepping out of Robin’s way. “Come on in. We’ll do the interview in the living room.”
“Oh, I made it to the interview stage, huh?” Robin chuckled, walking into the little entryway. Nancy followed her in, finally able to take in the whole of her, standing here in Nancy’s apartment. She was wearing baggy black jeans and a white t-shirt, an olive flannel tied around her narrow waist. When she sat on the couch, her bevy of silver necklaces jangled against one another.
Seeing her sitting there, Nancy realized the obvious truth: she could never, never live with Robin Buckley. The realization was a relief. All she had to do was make it through this conversation, and then she could keep Robin at the comfortable distance at which she’d always held her. It was far easier to do that when she was living across the country, but Nancy was an adult , dammit. She could get through this.
“So,” she said, sitting in the chair on the opposite side of the coffee table. “What’re you doing back in Hawkins? I thought you had some fancy Hollywood internship lined up after graduation.”
Robin leaned forward, elbows braced on her knees. Nancy knew from past experience that if she looked down at Robin’s slim, long-fingered hands, she would have an incredibly hard time looking away. So she kept her gaze fixed on the other woman’s face instead, which had its own set of problems–high cheekbones, delicate freckles, bright blue eyes. But where the hell else was Nancy supposed to look?
“Oh, yeah–I lucked into this writing thing with this little indie studio. But I, uh, put a pause on that for the moment.”
“To come back to Hawkins?” Nancy couldn’t keep the skepticism out of her voice. “Why would you do that?”
Robin’s expression tightened just a fraction, but she gave Nancy a sardonic half-smile.
“My own mysterious reasons, let’s say,” she answered. “But I’d really rather not crash at my parents’ place, and Eddie and Steve seem to be cultivating an as-of-yet undiscovered new species of mold on the piles of dirty dishes at their place, so I thought maybe you’d take pity on me and let me stay here for a few months.” She gazed up at Nancy through her lashes, and for a second, Nancy forgot her very prudent, very responsible decision to never, under any circumstances, live with Robin Buckley. She blamed those goddamn eyes .
“I, um–” she cleared her throat. “I’m looking for something a little more permanent than that. Like, a year-long lease type situation. Sorry.”
“Totally,” Robin said, standing up swiftly. “I get it, a hundred percent. But hey, we’ll hang out while I’m in town, right? I’ll be here through the end of August.” “Of course,” Nancy said. She could probably manage not to make a fool of herself in front of Robin in a large, casual group setting. As long as she kept a room’s length of space between them at all times.
Robin squinted at her for a second, deliberating something, then lifted her fist to gently tap Nancy’s arm.
“Alright, then,” she said. “See you around, Nance.”
“See you,” Nancy said at her back as Robin walked out of her life for the second time.
Thirty seconds later, she was on the phone with Steve.
“I thought it’d be a fun surprise!” he protested. “You love Robin!”
“I just would have liked some advanced notice,” Nancy hissed at him. She caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror on her bedroom door. She had high spots of color on her cheeks, and her hair was already frizzing. She looked frightful, and that stupid pink blouse–what had she been thinking when she got dressed that morning? She hated all of her clothes fiercely right then.
“Well, I’m sorry,” he said. “But at least now the roommate thing is squared away, right? Problem solved!”
“No, problem not solved,” Nancy said through gritted teeth. “I can’t live with Robin, Steve!”
“Why the hell not?”
Why not, indeed. She looks at me like we have some dirty secret between us, and it makes my skin itchy and hot. She hugged me like we’re best friends, but she hasn’t called me in over a year, despite the fact that she calls you all the time. She left Hawkins and had this amazing college adventure, while I’ve just been here, too afraid to leave in case the gates open back up. Because if I have to see her in a towel, or her stupid sleep boxers, my brain will melt out of my ears.
“Because I can’t ,” she muttered impotently, before remembering one legitimate, Steve-appropriate reason. “Because she’s only going to be in town until the end of the summer, and I need someone who will live here longer than that.”
Steve surprised her by saying, “Why?”
“What do you mean, why?”
“Well, having someone helping with the rent for three months will give you the opportunity to figure out what’s next. You can get a better-paying job, or turn that Nancy Wheeler charm on the EIC at the paper and get more hours, or whatever you want. It’ll give you a temporary cushion, and then you’ll have the place to yourself again. It’s a win-win.”
Nancy’s rage fizzled out abruptly, leaving a tired, empty feeling in its wake.
“Steve,” she finally said, “I want someone who will sign a year-long lease. I’m not–I don’t want to have to hunt down someone new in three months. I appreciate your optimism, but I don’t want to take that risk.”
Steve sighed. “I wish you’d bet on yourself, Nance.”
I did, Nancy didn’t say. And I lost.
Before she could say anything, Steve continued, “I’m sorry, though. And I hear you.”
“I suppose I forgive you, then,” Nancy said. “Who do we have next?”
“Next?”
“Yeah, you told me to clear my Sunday for interviews. So who’s scheduled to come by after Robin? I don’t want any more surprises.”
The line crackled, went quiet, crackled again.
“Steve,” Nancy said, a feeling of foreboding descending upon her. “Who’s next?”
“Yeah,” Steve said, dragging out the word. “About that. There isn’t anyone else.”
“Sorry?”
“I didn’t actually schedule anyone else. It didn’t even occur to me that you might not jump for joy at the chance to live with Robin.”
Nancy blew out a long breath. “So you’re saying—”
“Yeah. Robin’s your only option as far as roommates go. Sorry, babes.”
“Oh my god,” Nancy said, rubbing a hand over her face. “I’m never letting you do anything for me ever again.”