The Wonderful World of Robbins/Dawson
Hey, everyone!
It's Kai, and this is a fanfic I wrote for something that should have its own fandom, but doesn't yet. Maybe reading this'll make you ship Robbins/Dawson? Thanks to Olivia and Royee for the help!
Mm'kay. Cool. Have fun reading!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
“Robbins, you suck. I swear, you’re the worst at this,” Dawson cackled maniacally, his head tilting back and his unreasonably blue eyes lighting up as he did. The two boys sat in Dawson’s room, their backs erect against the metal frame of his bed. They each clutched a game controller in their hands, and the sound of buttons going rhythmically up and down and the plethora of noise coming from the carefully planned Halo 4 campaign tactics of the duo created an unmistakably boy-like cacophony of sound.
Robbins pressed the home button to pause the game as he reached over to grab the cheap 7-Eleven jumbo cup filled with hot chocolate and a hearty dose of canned whipped cream. “Pass the marshmallows,” Dawson leaned forward and felt around for the ceramic bowl. Once he felt its smooth surface, he carefully edged his fingers around its base, and pulled it towards him.
As Dawson was executing the task set out for him (getting Robbins his marshmallows), Robbins glanced over at his childhood friend and was taken aback at how...different Dawson looked. When had he gotten so muscular?
“Here,” Dawson extended his long (toned) arm with the bowl grasped firmly in his hand at his friend. His eyes were now gone of their earlier playfulness, and a different tone of a simpler, perhaps even sweeter feeling, had come to reflect in his gaze. A shy half smile hid somewhere behind his serious facial expression, and Robbins knew that smile was reserved only for when they were together, or when Dawson felt (rarely) completely comfortable and happy in the presence of strangers.
Unnerved by the sudden blush that he knew had turned his ears and cheeks an even more prominent tinge of cherry blossom pink, Robbins ducked his head and begrudgingly accepted the marshmallows.
The game resumed, but the waves of pure awkward wafting off Robbins like B.O. kept Dawson from saying anything for almost the entire time it took them to finish the campaign. The tension was occasionally cut through by Dawson’s enthusiastic exclamations and spastic gesticulations as he let the game take over.
By the time their marathon gaming time was over, it was obvious to the two that:
1. Everyone in Dawson’s house was already asleep, and
2. their hot chocolate required the heating embrace of a mother ship microwave to rejuvenate itself to its full delicious potential.
“I-i guess I’ll just go down and...put this in the microwave,” Dawson grasped the plastic cup in his hand, and gingerly stood up, making sure not to disrupt a seemingly frozen Robbins. He made his way across his room, and had opened his door and made it out into the completely silent, darkened hallway when Robbins emerged from his semi-stupor and grabbed Dawson’s arm.
“Wait,” the word lingered inconclusively in the air, then shot its way towards Dawson, stunning him. Robbins’s voice conveyed desperation, and something else that was hard to describe, but disoriented Dawson with an overwhelming feeling that something was going on -- and the thing that he hadn’t know he was missing was suddenly out in the open. The hot [lukewarm] chocolate dropped to the ground.
That one word held so many memories for the two: the constant times when Dawson would go off to camp without Robbins, and the word was uttered as a last ditch attempt to stop the separation of the pair. The moments in preschool when either of the two would utter it so they could do their secret handshake before letting go of each other. They had so much history together, so wasn’t that worth something? What was meant to happen…?
“I-i didn't mean to grab you like that,” Robbins stuttered nervously as he ran his hand through his hair, and slowly began backing away towards the partially open door of Dawson’s bedroom.
“Shut the fuck up, Robbins,” Dawson’s voice partially broke on the last word, which only served to reinforce the shocked silence that engulfed the two. “No matter what you say, and how much you apologize about ‘not meaning to’, I’m pretty sure the entire world knows that you’re just talking bullshit. You did mean to touch me, and I’m positive that you have some kind of weird feelings about me that you just haven’t been brave enough to say for the entire time we've been friends.”
Robbins turned sharply around, and glared at Dawson with an uncontrolled anger that tangled his features with a mess of what could only be described as emotional conflict. “Okay, Dawson. Maybe I DID mean to touch you. What will you do about it? Are you going to just stop being my friend because there’s something that doesn't make you comfortable? I knew you were a baby, but I didn't know just how much of a wimp you are about every. Freaking. Thing. I mean, seriously. Have you just not been paying any attention this whole time? You know I look at you sometimes. You've finally acknowledged that fact, thank the fucking universe for that.
“Maybe you don’t like me that way. I totally get that. OR -- did you ever think about this? -- maybe you’re just a pussy who’s scared to admit that you could actually fall in love with someone that knows you more than you know yourself.”
Dawson observed Robbins through partial tunnel vision as he watched his friend lose his sanity within the span of 5 minutes. One tear ran down Robbins’s super red face, and he seemed slightly out of breath. Dawson, hesitantly, took a step towards the nutcase that had replaced his confidant, and closed the literal and unspoken gap.
“Yeah, okay,” Dawson put his face approximately two inches away from his friend’s so that his low, quiet whisper could be heard over the hard breathing of Robbins regaining his composure. His lips formed a small smile as he spoke. “I’m a lot of things, Robbins. I’m a pussy, sure. I’m a socially awkward guy. I’m. . .whomever I am.” His face drew closer and closer to Robbins’s as he spoke each word, and by now they were nose to nose, eye to eye. “I’m an infinite number of things, but I need you to answer one simple thing: am I yours?”
Their eyes met, and each subconsciously seemed to decide that 2 centimeters was too much space to have between two people.
As humans are natural copycats, lips followed what the eyes did, which is to say that they met.
What happened was later described by Dawson as [being], “Even better than Robbins’s battle tactics, which aren’t very good, y’know?”
--------------------------------------------------------------------