Work Text:
It’s cold on the porch.
Robin curls her fingers around the coffee mug in her hands and tries not to think about it. She’s been trying not to think about anything this week. She almost didn’t come to Philly, but Jonathan had pleaded hard, babbling about how none of us really know your uncle yet and I need the boiler room and it’s only month three so it’s a pretty bad idea to already flake. He was right, but she doesn’t feel particularly good about it. It isn’t his fault. She still hasn’t told anyone about the breakup.
“I can’t do this anymore,” Vickie had said, dragging her fingers down her face. “I really like you, Robin, but you— you’re so much. Everything is so much.”
Robin hadn’t said anything. She’d just walked out. Nothing has been the same about them since the near-end of the world, and she can’t blame Vickie for that. They’re just two high-strung people whose strings have snapped.
That’s what she keeps telling herself. When she thinks about it. She’s really, really trying not to.
She takes a sip of the coffee. It’s bad, which is probably because Jonathan made it in a room he’d already hotboxed, so it has a certain je ne sais quois. Well, no. Robin sais quois. It’s Palm Tree Delight. It’s fine. They’ll need her downstairs again soon, she thinks, so she should enjoy the fresh air she has while it lasts.
The front door creaks open and Robin jumps. “Sorry,” says Nancy. Her brows are knit together in the signature Wheeler fashion. Always frowning.
“You’re good,” Robin spills. It’s two words, and they still manage to feel too fast.
“Are you okay?” Nancy asks. “You’re being…”
“Crazy? Hermit-y?” Robin offers.
“Sad.”
“Oh.” Robin looks away. “Um, yeah, maybe. It’s really not a big deal.”
Nancy frowns deeper, which Robin didn’t know was possible. She crosses the porch to sit in the chair next to Robin’s and leans forward very seriously. “What’s wrong?”
Robin sighs. She slumps back farther in her own chair, posture reminiscent of an old man or maybe a fried shrimp. “I…” She swallows. The words don’t want to leave her mouth, which is a new feeling. “Vickie and I broke up.”
Nancy’s eyes widen, and she looks sad, and that manages to make Robin feel worse. “Oh,” she says, “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s really, really fine,” Robin starts, and she can feel motor-mouth mode starting up before she has the chance to stop it. “I like, saw it coming for months now, we were both being kind of control freaks and anxious and I started to feel like, leashed? Which is definitely not good, but it’s not like she did anything wrong, but I can’t stop feeling like I did something wrong. You know? And like, she and I were so similar, so if someone so like me doesn’t, you know, like me, maybe I—”
“Robin,” Nancy cuts in.
Robin raises her shoulders. “Sorry.”
Nancy reaches out and Robin doesn’t know what she expects, but then Nancy’s fingers are laced through hers. It’s girl stuff, achingly platonic. Robin knows this. It still makes her heart skip a beat in a way she did not expect it to. “You have nothing to apologize for,” Nancy says. “And you didn’t do anything wrong. Sometimes things don’t work.” She laughs. “Look at me. I’m pretty sure my exes are kissing in your uncle’s basement, like, right now.”
Robin snorts. “That can’t be your fault, though.” The humour only lasts a moment, and she finds herself setting her coffee down and pulling her knees to her chest. “Vickie… it was supposed to work.” She swallows. “And like, I told myself it doesn’t matter, because it’s supposed to be about me. I don’t need a girlfriend. But I still—” she blinks, and horrifyingly, there’s tears behind her eyes. “I still liked it, and I don’t like that I stopped liking it.”
Nancy is still holding her hand. “I get that. I really do.” She hesitates for a few seconds, and Robin can see the mental exercise every Wheeler has to go through before they say something nice and/or emotional playing out on her face. “And I don’t think it means anything if Vickie doesn’t like you anymore. It’s her loss. You’re easy to like.”
Robin can’t help but smile. “You didn’t even like me when we met.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not good at meeting people.” With Nancy’s free hand, she brushes her hair behind her ear. It seems more like an anxious tic than anything, considering Nancy is still rocking her short cut that Robin has to admit makes her look really, really gay. Good. Gay. Cute. Something like that. Nancy continues, “I didn’t want to give you a chance, but you made me, and I realized how wrong I was. You’re amazing, Robin Buckley, and no high-strung ex girlfriend can change that. Ever.”
Nancy looks really nervous now, and Robin frowns. “Are… you okay, Nance?”
“Are you asking me if I’m okay because I’m being nice to you?” Nancy replies with a laugh, which does nothing but make her sound more nervous. “I’m not that emotionally constipated.”
“I’m asking because your leg is shaking like a chihuahua that wants to puke in a purse. I would know.”
Nancy stands very suddenly, and her voice is that high, airy, Nancy-Wheeler-is-freaking-out voice. They aren’t holding hands anymore, and Robin’s fingers feel cold. “I’m okay. Why wouldn’t I be okay? I just—” She cuts herself off. “Do you feel better? I want you to feel better.”
“I do,” Robin says slowly. It’s true. Her stomach still hurts and her heart feels tight, but she’s not about to burst into flames stoked by self-pity and post-breakup-misery.
“Awesome. Mission accomplished.” Nancy coughs. “Maybe we should go back.”
“Did I say something?” Robin asks, worry surging in her gut again.
“No, no, no,” Nancy says quickly. “You’re good. Really. You’re really good. Um—” Nancy screws her eyes shut. “Fuck.” She begins to pace, and Robin thinks an outsider couldn’t tell the difference between this Nancy and a Nancy about to fight the Mind Flayer. Actually, that Nancy might be calmer than this Nancy. “I just like, had a plan before you got here, and now you’re miserable, so…”
“Nancy.” Robin stands and grabs Nancy by the shoulders. “I can’t lie, you’re like, kinda freaking me out right now.”
“I like you,” Nancy blurts out.
Robin blinks. Slowly, in a way that makes her wonder if Jonathan’s secondhand smoke has gotten to her. “You what?”
“I like you,” Nancy repeats. She sounds miserable. “And you were with Vickie, so I wanted to clear the air, because god knows I’ve had enough of weird, unrequited love triangles, but now you and her aren’t dating anymore, so I look kind of evil.”
Robin, whose brain is operating about thirty years behind, says, “Less evil than Vecna.”
Nancy laughs so hard she starts crying. It’s really—
It’s cute? It’s so, so cute.
Oh. Shit.
Robin Buckley has fumbled many, many things in her life, but she’s fairly sure she’s doing it right this time when she grabs Nancy’s face and kisses her.
Nancy is slack-jawed with shock for approximately three seconds, which is just long enough for Robin to regret everything she’s ever done, but then Nancy is kissing her back. And—
It’s good. It’s really good, actually.
They separate, and Nancy’s eyes go wide again. “I… Robin, why did you do that?”
“I like you,” she replies. “Which probably also makes me look evil.” She clears her throat. “If it helps, I didn’t realize it until about thirty seconds ago.”
Nancy moves forward and lightly bonks their foreheads together. “You’re very cute, Robin Buckley.”
“You’re a very good kisser, Nancy Wheeler,” Robin replies.
“Kiss me again?”
Robin does. Nancy is soft and warm, and the feeling of cradling her face in Robin’s hands is electric. For the first time in a good, long while, Robin allows herself to think: in this case, she’s thinking about how she felt when she first met Nancy— how her stomach lit up with a hundred, maybe a thousand, butterflies.
Nancy’s chapstick is slightly sticky against Robin’s lips when they pull apart again.
“I don’t know how this goes,” Nancy admits. “I don’t have a good track record.”
“Neither do I.” Robin gives her a sheepish smile. “I’d be more than happy to figure it out together.”
“Are you sure?” Nancy asks.
“Very.”
Nancy’s smile is electric, no Wheeler frown in sight. “Count me in.”
Nancy isn’t Vickie Two. Robin knows that. And Robin really, really likes that, actually. Nancy Wheeler is kind of crazy, she’s headstrong, she’s opinionated, she’s almost always right. And she’s beautiful. God, she’s beautiful.
It’s cold on the porch, but Nancy’s fingers are warm as they hold hands on their way back inside. Robin’s shitty coffee lies forgotten.