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It’s been a slow day at Family Video.
Or, you could say it has just been an average day at Family Video, given that more than half the town of Hawkins had evacuated and no one really had the time to rent out a fucking romcom.
Whatever kind of day it is, Robin doesn’t have a lot to do.
Steve had left early, apologizing profusely the whole time because for some reason Dustin had suddenly just really needed a ride and the little shit couldn’t convince anyone else to do it.
Robin hadn’t asked that many questions, shaking her head in fond exasperation as she told Steve to just leave and attend to his motherly duties. She could put on her big girl pants for a night and lock up by herself. She’d be fine.
She reiterated the last point more sincerely when she noticed the barely concealed worry in his eyes.
They’ve all been on edge since Vecna’s…disappearance. Espcially Steve. She gets it. She does.
But things were getting better; Max was out of her coma and doing physical therapy to try and walk again someday, even if she couldn’t see anymore. Eddie was out of the hospital and wasn’t an actively wanted man anymore, even if he gained some new scars to boot. And, somehow, Family Video and its unethical business practices had survived the ‘earthquakes’, and her and Steve were back behind its counter, getting paid the most minimum of minimum wages.
Well, currently just Robin is, but her point still stands.
She huffs, eyeing the clock hung on the wall. Hour and a half. She has an hour and thirty minutes left before she’s allowed to go home. That wasn’t that long. She could figure out how to entrain herself for another hour and thirty minutes. Yeah, no problem. She’s wasted entire days doing nothing more than daydreaming before, she’s got this.
She anxiously taps her finger on the counter, her eyes fitting around the store. She had already reshuffled the shelves, like, six times since Steve had left, and that was six times too many. And it wasn’t any fun to watch bad movies alone.
Robin lets out a long winded sigh, deflating on the counter near the cash register, opening one of her eyes to glance at the clock again.
It’s been five minutes.
Robin feels like she might just scream. It’s not like anyone’s around to hear her.
Instead, she just groans. Their boring hours always went by so much faster when Steve was here.
God, why did he have to be a responsible babysitter. That jerk.
She blows a stray hair out of her face. Watching as it falls back down.
She’s going insane. She thinks. This is insanity.
Then, suddenly, maybe even graciously, something actually happens.
The front doors fly open, and Mike Wheeler comes storming in.
The first thing Robin thinks is: oh god not this kid.
Then he gets closer, and she can hear his strangled breathing, the next thing she thinks is: oh shit is he crying?
“Hey, kid, uh-,” She feels way out of her depth as she almost throws herself over the counter to set a tentative hand on Little Wheeler’s shoulder, “This is a very stupid question but I’m not exactly sure what else to do in this situation so- um. Are you okay?”
Mike draws himself up and opens his mouth to respond, only for a choked sob to come out. He covers his face with his hands and folds into himself again.
“Oh- hey. None of that. Let’s, uh, let’s take this behind the counter, okay?” None of this is okay, obviously. But the least she can do is give the kid some privacy to deal with- well, whatever he’s dealing with.
She leads him away from the very big shop windows and they both stumble into Family Video’s teeny tiny break room and slide down the back wall. Mike buries his face in his knees and keeps crying and Robin really doesn’t know what to do.
Is it some new Upside Down shit? Why would he come to her? The random chick he’s talked to like. Twice total, probably. Oh god did someone die? Did Steve die? And everyone’s too busy fighting whatever new disgusting evil that they had to send Mike to break the news to her? But that doesn’t make sense because shouldn’t he be there for El? Aren’t they like, dating? Or whatever?
There’s too many variables and she’s most likely just working herself into a frenzy over nothing like she always does. Mike obviously needs someone comforting right now- someone stable. They can’t both be having panic attacks in the back of a Family Video. That’s just pathetic.
She’s the adult in this situation, oh god.
Robin steadies herself, willing her hands to stop shaking. Once she’s sure that her voice won’t instantly hike to dog whistle levels, she awkwardly clears her throat and tries for the soothing and reassuring tone her mom uses on her to get her to relax. It doesn’t usually work on her either, but it’s something. And something is more than nothing so she starts talking, “I- I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s going on, kid.” Gosh, this was really a Steve job.
Mike just gasps and keeps his face firmly in the fabric of his jeans.
“Or-or that’s cool too. Totally cool, dude. Just get it out of your system.” She shifts to put an arm over his heaving shoulders. He flinches, but doesn’t pull away, which Robin considers a win.
They stay like that for a hot minute, or maybe a few—Robin isn’t checking—when Mike mumbles something under his breath.
“What was that?”
He finally lifts his head up from his knees, but he’s still turned away from her,
“I’m a fucking freak.” The words come out stilted and shaky, and they immediately send a jolt of recognition under Robin’s skin.
“Woah woah woah. Hold up.” Robin wants to put up her hands up out of habit to gesture, but she doesn’t want to disturb the tense physical contact she’s allowed so she resists the urge and stays put, “Now. Why…” She hesitates on the wording, “Do you think that?” Smooth Robin, smooth. Very classy.
“Because,” His voice hitches, and the volume of his voice drops to a whisper, like he’s about to spill a secret. His already tense shoulders tense impossibly further, and he still isn’t looking at her when he sobs, “Because I’m gay.”
Within the next second, Robin’s brain stops and completely restarts.
Mike Wheeler is gay? Since when? How did she not clock this sooner? She thought for sure out of all of the kids to be a Friend of Dorothy, so to speak, it would’ve been Byers Jr. (he wasn’t exactly subtle when you knew what to look for) but Mike? He wasn’t even on her radar. She didn’t even think to look out for him like that.
Robin’s eyes fit to his, small, shaking form, and she thinks maybe she should’ve.
“You…you know that doesn’t make you a freak, right?” Her voice is unsteady, hell, she’s unsteady- but she powers through. Because Little Wheeler is like her, and he’s scared, like her.
Mike scoffs with a roll of his eyes, “Please. It’s not normal for boys to like boys. That’s just not how it works.” He says it like a fact. Like it’s an undeniable truth.
“Mike.” Robin says, her fragile heart free-falling down past her stomach to somewhere near her toes, “Mike, no. You’re not a freak. At least not for that. You’re a weirdo, sure, and a bit of an asshole, but you’re not a freak for being gay. That’s ridiculous. I mean, you can like, reclaim, the term freak, I guess, if you want, but you’re obviously not some alien just because you like dudes.” She's rambling, wrap it up, Robin, “You just like dudes, and there’s nothing wrong with that.”
His eyes are big and red rimmed, a tragic mix of skepticism and hope, and they make Robin sad right down to her thin bones.
She makes herself keep going, voice a bit stronger now, even though she is quite literally straining every muscle to stop herself from shaking with him.
She cannot believe she’s about to come out to some freshman she barely knows.
Then again, she couldn’t believe that she came out to Steve Harrington of all people last summer, so how much scarier could coming out to a fourteen year old be?
Short answer: absolutely terrifying.
“…and, I mean, you don’t think I’m a freak, do you?” She says gently, letting the sentence and all the weight it carries settle in the air between them.
Mike squints, like he doesn’t get it. And, despite what Steve will tell you, Robin’s patient, she can wait.
After a few moments, it’s like a light bulb turns on inside of his head.
“You-You’re-?” Mike chokes out, and Robin just nods. It’s all that needs to be done.
They lapse into silence again, but it’s not as uncomfortable as before, somehow.
Robin squeezes Mike tighter into the crook of her arm, he doesn’t resist, so suddenly she’s blurting out, “…well I guess we’ll just both have to be freaks, huh?”
Mike unexpectedly snorts, the sound disgustingly wet but happy nonetheless, and Robin finds that she can’t find it in herself to be grossed out about it.
“…Yeah. Reclaim it.” He says into her shoulder, and it feels like victory.
Robin runs her fingers through the hair at the base of his neck, straightening out the tangles, and she feels him melt into the touch.
They stay like that for a while, Robin trying her best to keep her mouth closed for once in her life as Mike lets himself cautiously relax.
“If you don’t mind me asking…” She speaks out into the void, Mike still tucked into her shoulder, sufficiently calmer now, “Why me?”
He doesn’t answer right away, and for probably the hundredth time Robin asks herself if she can ever just shut up—then he speaks, “I…I didn’t want to tell anyone who knew me.”
And doesn’t that just make her heart break in horrid familiarity.
“Oh, kid.” She mutters softly.
“Because, because I know they’d start asking me all bunch of questions and they’re- oh god they’re going to hate me-”
“Oh, hey. None of that.” Robin understands this line of thinking a bit too personally. She isn’t going to let Mike go on believing it, “Though I heavily doubt any of your friends will react badly to you being gay,” Especially not Will, if I’m right, she thinks but doesn’t say, “Because none of them are like that- I at least know for a fact that Steve won’t hate you.”
Mike narrows his eyes, “You do?”
“Of course I do, doofus. He knows about me.”
His glassy brown eyes meet hers again, comically disbelieving, “…He does?”
She giggles, pulling him into a mess of an embrace, still a little disbelieving herself, “Yeah bud, he does.” Cause, really, who’d have thunk it?
After a bit, he scoffs out a laugh against her neck, “Never would’ve pegged him as the ‘accepting’ type.”
“Honestly? If you had told me that the ’King Steve’ was an ally a year ago, I would’ve said the same thing,” She shrugs, “But he really is a good guy. Made me feel normal, even though I like girls.”
Robin plants her hands on Mike’s shoulders and pushes him out so they’re face to face again, “Because it is normal. Sometimes people are just gay, Mike, that’s nothing to be ashamed of.” She tries to say it casually, like it’s as simple at that, even though it’s a sentiment she’s still trying to get through her own dumb brain everyday.
That’s okay, she can pretend for a little bit. For Mike. Maybe even just for her.
Mike stares at her, swallows, glances away, and says in a voice that’s he’s very clearly willing not to crack, “Okay.”
Robin drags him back into a hug, a proper one this time.
“Okay.” She smiles into his hair.
Yeah, she can pretend.
Even if it’s just for Mike Wheeler.