a/n: my first time posting for steve! this is just a little vignette from a whole henderson!reader universe that i have partially written. hope you enjoy!
“No, come on! Come on. I promise I’ll catch it this time. Gimme another chance.”
Steve’s eyes narrowed as he looked at her, Reese’s Pieces of failed throws past scattered around the tile floors.
“Oh yeah? Why should I?”
She shook her hands out, loosening up with an exhale before bending her knees slightly, looking determined.
“I’ll bet you your tips that I catch this one, Harrington.”
Steve looked down at the handful of candy in his palm, popping one into his mouth and taking his time working on the sugary shell before responding. “And if you lose?”
A smug sort of smile comes over her face, a knowing twist of her lips. “What do you want me to give you?”
The crossing of a thin line, the toying of a boundary-- the start of a game he is not gambling on, not with Robin wiping down the counter right behind them. “Fine— if you win, you take the tips, but if you lose, I get to have all the Reese’s.”
Her face automatically contorts, her sultry smirk transforming into a grimace. “Off the floor? That’s disgusting, Steve!”
“Who cares? Free candy!”
She rolled her eyes, still sitting in her crouch, ready to pounce. “That sweet tooth is gonna be the end of you some day, I swear.” She opened her mouth, tipping her head back and raising a challenging eyebrow. “Now throw.”
Scoops was dead— as was to be expected at 11:30am on a Monday, summer or not. No one goes to the mall that early— except Y/N, of course. If she wasn’t working at the video store with Keith, she was at Scoops, much to Robin’s very obvious dismay and mall hours’ determined defiance.
“As fun as it is WATCHING you have fun, the rush is going to hit soon. I might need you, if you don’t mind...you know, working. At work.”
Steve watched Y/N’s face fall, her stance straightening as she curled into herself, looking sheepishly over Steve’s shoulder. A physical representation of the end of any fun they might’ve been having. He turned to scowl at Robin over his shoulder, picking at her nail polish from behind the cash register, the wet rag she’d been using sat in a soggy pile in front of her. “What rush? It’s noon.”
Robin blinked, her eyes quickly darting around the dining room for an answer— but, no need, apparently, not with Y/N running up from behind him, passing him and heading through the swinging door to the back room, and coming right back out before it even had the time to close on the image of her hurriedly looking up at the wall clock.
“Shit, shit, shit, shit, SHIT!”
Steve shot another pair of glare-originated daggers Robin’s way before turning back to Y/N, who was scooping her bag off the floor and hastily throwing the sweatshirt around her waist inside, looking at her with his hands on his hips. “You Hendersons and your language, Jesus Christ...”
She was already halfway across the dining room by the time his sentence was up, spinning around to face them. “I fucking forgot my mom was picking Dustin up today! Jesus, I feel like an ass! He’s gonna be PISSED!”
(Watching her flit around under such stress made it ridiculously hard for Steve to fight the urge to kiss her back to sanity— but the habit of keeping THEM on the downlow somehow stuck even past graduation and slimily crept its way into the haze of summer. Sneaking around was fun, sure, but things like this, like watching her getting upset, were what made it hard for him to not get to be her boyfriend anywhere but her locked bedroom and the backseat of his car.)
“You’re not even gonna clean up your mess?”
Y/N huffed, looking right past Steve with knitted brows towards the cash wrap, where Robin inevitably had her smug little arms crossed, that asshole. “I’m sorry Robin, honest, but I’m already running late-- God, my own little BROTHER...Steve?”
And yeah, he was already wholly annoyed by Robin’s overall shittiness, and yeah, he was, for the millionth time, wondering why exactly the two of them couldn’t just be together, why he couldn’t kiss his own girlfriend goodbye, for God’s sake, but, regardless: it was Y/N, looking at him with those panicked, needy eyes— agreement was practically contractual. He half-heartedly shrugged in a sort of nonverbal agreement, not even bothering to look anywhere but at her, letting the small smile that was fighting its way onto his face find its place painted on his lips. “Yeah, yeah, just get outta here already.”
That beaming smile was what made it all worth it, the nervous tug of the strap of her bag back onto its place on her shoulder, like it’s the first time she feels flattered by his attention and not the millionth. “You’re the best.” She opens the door, steps halfway out before turning back to him: “You’re still coming over tonight, right?”
Steve blinks, the overtness of the question (and right in front of Robin!) punching the ability to form thoughts right out of him. “Uh-“
“I’m sure Dustin misses you.”
(And there it was, the ever-present ‘Dustin’ excuse that neutralized any cross over the bounds of friendship-acceptable intimacy they met.)
He nods, gesturing nonsensically before putting his hand back on his hip. “Yeah, no, of course. I miss the little shit too.”
And there was that smile again. “Cool. I’ll see you at eight, okay?”
There wasn’t any time to answer before a quick “Bye, Robin!” bounded back into the shop behind her, any last trace of her presence following her squeaky Converse right out the door.
He swallows the urge to follow her and scoop her up in his arms and love on her until the mall was closed and they got kicked out, pushes it (through all its violent kicking and screaming) down into his gut and turns back to Robin. “You don’t have to be such an asshole to her, you know.”
Robin just rolls her eyes, grabbing the broom from the corner and holding out to him until he tugs it from her hands. “No reason not to be.”
(DON’T GET TOO DEFENSIVE, STEVE, STAY COOL...)
“What did she ever do to you, anyway? You don’t even know her.”
(GOOD.)
Robin sighs, looking up at the ceiling with a shake of her head. “She’s just so...empty.”
“Are you kidding? She’s fucking amazing, is what she is! Do you know where she’s headed off to in the fall? She’s amazing, and I’m proud of her. She’s doing way better than slinging ice cream like us losers, that’s for sure.”
(NOT AS GOOD.)
He clears his throat, rubbing his nose awkwardly and letting the heat of his outburst cool, just for a short, silent moment, before speaking. “She’s not empty, is all I’m saying.”
Robbin scoffs, hopping up onto the counter. “Wow. You NEED to find a girlfriend, Harrington.”
The very sound of the g-word practically had his heart stopping— he HAS a girlfriend, thank you very much, a beautiful, funny, compassionate girlfriend who was going to college and had a future and was going to do WAY better than working for her dad someday, unlike some people wearing sailor’s uniforms on a Monday morning in July.
Not that he could actually tell Robin any of that.
“You know, actually, I’m good, thanks. More than happy.”
She rolls her eyes again, crossing her legs on the counter. “Come on, Steve! You were the king of Hawkins High! Maybe not anymore, but, y’know...” She raises her shoulders, opening up her hands in an attempt to find her words. “Listen. I know you think this is the end-all-be-all, but it’s not. Okay? I promise. You can do so much better than Y/N Henderson.” Her eyes fall down to her lap, where she starts picking at her nails disinterestedly before her eyes widen. “SO much better.”
(Better? Better than Y/N? No way. There was no such thing as better.)
(Well— maybe not having to be someone’s secret boyfriend is better.)
(Maybe.)
“I’m not— we’re not dating.”
He can’t bring up the same passion from his bleeding heart that he’d felt only moments ago, echoes of “so much better…” dribbling around in his skull, one good free throw away from his breaking point.
(It stung extra hard that time, for whatever reason, like embarrassed salt in the wound of growing doubt.)
Robin hops off the counter, unfurling her legs as her sneakers THWAPPED onto the tile flooring before giving Steve a pat on the shoulder. “I know. That’s what makes it sad.” She backs herself into the break room, saluting to him from the base of her stark white hat. “I’m taking a fifteen. Let me know when you’re done cleaning up all those Reese’s, dingus.”
The door swings back and forth, in and out, matching his slow, steady heartbeat as his gaze falls to the floor.
