Chapter Text
The first time Nancy calls her at midnight, Robin is, inherently, not surprised.
Over the course of about one short week, and then one long week, they have grown substantially close. To make that clearer, over the course of Vecna and then consistently throughout the course of the result of Vecna they have become actual friends.
Surprising, she knows.
They have nightmares. All of them. And even though they all never say that they do, the dark bags present under everyone’s eyes does wonders in proving it. Robin visits the hospital often, to see Max. And Eddie, plus Steve by association. Nancy often drives her. Well, she always does.
So they talk. They exchanged numbers. They never call, though.
Selfishly, Robin thinks that she knows it’s Nancy before she even picks up, despite the fact that it's never been Nancy. More likely, it’s stupid optimism and a firm belief that Steve is too busy watching over Eddie in the hospital to call.
Selfishly, it is Nancy.
“Oh, Robin.” Nancy says quietly once she picks up. Maybe she hadn’t been expecting Robin to be awake. That theory is proven when Nancy’s next words are “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“You didn’t.” Robin insists, fighting down a smile. It’s been three seconds. She’s said two sentences. Stop fucking smiling.
Silence spans across the line and through the night air. Robin thinks it tethers them, somehow.
“I had a nightmare.” Nancy admits after a while. “Can’t go back to sleep.”
“I never went to sleep.” Robin replies. “What was the nightmare about?”
Not being able to see Nancy and yet still hearing her voice is odd. Someone might pertain it to auditory hallucinations, if not for the receiver clutched tight in her hand. Robin doesn’t normally call anyone. There’s normally no one to call. Or, oppositely, to call her. Probably why she’s being weird about this. Friends call each other all the time, surely. Too bad she’s never actually had any friends other than Steve, who may just show up at her door unannounced if he had a nightmare. Well, he would. There’s no doubt about it.
Nancy pauses again, clearly tasting the words on her tongue, rolling them over. She does that a lot around Robin. In the car. In the hospital. After she had Vecna show her the world splitting into four. (It didn’t happen. Nancy killed him before Max died for a few minutes).
“Just… things.” Nancy says vaguely. “The things that happened.”
“There were a lot of things that happened.”
“Can you come over?”
“Okay.” The word quite surprises Robin, forced from her throat unbidden. Like it was just there. She guesses it might always be there. Stuck. Waiting to be presented to someone, someone, Nancy. Only Nancy, probably. Definitely.
“Really?” Nancy asks, surprised. Robin wonders why she asked if she didn’t expect her to say yes. She should have demanded it instead, if that were the case.
Already sitting up, Robin throws sleep to the side, because it never really was upon her anyways. “Yes. For you.” And then she hangs up. Maybe sleep was a little close. She would never say that normally. This isn’t exactly normal, though.
She throws off her pyjamas and throws on normal clothes that are not actually normal but just aren’t shitty. As she does this, struggling to button arguably shitty jeans and then giving up and instead pulling on sweatpants, Robin thinks. She imagines she’s having an auditory hallucination of Nancy telling her to hurry the fuck up, and then she hurries the fuck up out of the front door.
Robin finds her bike where she left it a while ago and switches on the scrappy headlight she bought years ago. It does next to nothing in the darkness. She’s reminded that it’s around midnight, and then has to remind herself that they killed him. Vecna is quite literally a nightmare now. Nothing more.
It’s habitual to use the slant of her driveway to start up, and so she does. It’s not as habitual to abandon her helmet, but she doesn’t want to wear it right now. Or ever, for that matter. The clip used to fasten it in place suddenly, without fail, feels like it’s choking her. Like it’s slimy and blue and tightening until she can’t breathe, can’t speak, can’t— Yeah. Robin never wants to wear it again.
The ride from her house to Nancy’s takes about ten minutes on a normal day. Robin knows not because she does it often but because she used to pass by the cul de sac on her way to Hawkins High. Not that she memorised the distance of her house and Nancy’s house. She just memorised the street signs and when they would show up.
Anyway, none of that is important except for the fact that the ride from her house to Nancy’s takes about ten minutes on a normal day. But this isn’t quite a day, and nor is it normal. So she takes several minutes instead.
Randomly thankful that Steve is a complete dingus, Robin successfully climbs onto the roof and to Nancy’s window. She’s actually not sure, now that she’s here, if Nancy expected her to come in through the window like a creep or the front door like a sane person. She figures it doesn’t really matter because she’s there now.
There is little to no preamble in her knock, not even a thought. There is also none when Nancy opens the window and ushers Robin in. Clearly, she had been waiting.
“I didn’t think you’d actually come here in the dark, crazy lady.” Nancy scolds, but she’s smiling and soft and wearing pink pyjamas. Of course they’re pink. Or maybe they aren’t, it’s hard to tell in the lighting.
“I didn’t think you’d actually ever call me, let alone in the middle of the night.” Robin says, patting her hair down and hoping it doesn’t look completely messed up from the wind. At Nancy’s quiet laugh, she presumes it does or she’s actually said something funny. Somehow the latter is infinitely less believable.
Robin immediately feels as though she’s taking up too much space. That’s her natural reaction around Nancy, who is small. And it’s rather stupid, considering everything Nancy is surrounding her right now. If she really tries, Robin swears she can make out a Tom Cruise poster in the darkness. She attempts to stop feeling as though she’s taking up too much space.
Without saying a word, Nancy steps forward and hugs Robin tightly. “I’m glad you came. I’m glad I called.”
“Me too.” Robin lies and hugs Nancy back. Maybe if Nancy knew it wouldn’t make Robin so guilty. But Nancy doesn’t know, and so Robin is guilty and shameful and maybe she shouldn’t have come. Although, it’s far too late now.
Nancy pulls back, letting her hands rest on Robin’s shoulders. She trails them to her elbows. Her wrists. Robin wishes more than anything that she’d stop there, but then the shorter girl’s fingers twine with hers. And she drags her to the bed.
“I’m tired. Aren’t you?” Nancy asks, lifting the covers for them both and sliding to the other side of the bed.
“A little.” She’s not, not anymore. Robin stares at the empty space yawning beside Nancy and knows that she’s supposed to occupy it. As if she doesn’t take enough space already.
With the way Nancy is watching her, Robin might have thought that she wanted her to take space. In this light, it’s hard to tell. And yet it can’t be true for anything more than friendship. Robin let’s it be true for friendship, ignoring the ache growing in her heart.
Maybe it started at Starcourt Mall, after a younger El threw a car with her mind at Russians who most certainly wanted to kill them all. I’m sorry, who are you?
Maybe it started at the Hawkins Public Library, after she tried to constitute silence with rambling that most certainly wasn’t helping. So why don’t you just call Steve?
Maybe it started at Pennhurst Mental Hospital, in borrowed clothes and borrowed makeup and borrowed words. You really are a weird runner.
Maybe it started at Vecna’s house, with the cold and linked fingers and snaking vines. It’s okay. You got this.
Or maybe it was always there.
Robin gets under the covers and turns so her back is facing Nancy. They don’t speak, and even though Robin is trying to sleep she hasn’t even closed her eyes yet. Nancy is shifting for about ten minutes before she settles. Robin doesn’t move once, for so long she might be asleep without even knowing.
Probably because of this, probably because Nancy thinks Robin is asleep, she eventually lets out a shaky sigh into the darkness. Whispers, so quietly, “Love you,” to the night.
And Robin isn’t entirely sure if it even happened.
The next morning, Nancy acts like it never even crossed her mind, to say those words. Robin leaves before breakfast.