by Tara Wimble
The next part of the night was already planned. The four of them would wait out for Amy and head to King’s to buy celebratory milkshakes and food and generally freak out over the win.
After her failed attempt to follow Officer Sorenson down the street she’d strolled back home to find Robin trying to stuff some of her bike parts underneath her bed, while Laurel and Amy cuddled from a distance. Needless to say they didn’t part fast enough and Janice had spent an hour grilling Amy about her intentions towards her friend while Laurel attempted to kick her out of the room.
It’s the first time they’ve all hung out together though and she’s looking forward to getting to know everyone that’s going to be living with them in this future apartment of theirs. Everything is still in motion when Janice hustles them out of the stands up until the moment Robin and Lexie walk in front of her.
It’s cute really. She’d tried not to stare too much at them when she’d found them in the Bike Store, both leaning over the pedals while Lexie explained the differences in inner tubes or something, unaware that Robin’s hand was on her back probably because it’d been there for a while. But now it’s harder to ignore.
Janice has to scrunch her face up for a second as they fall into each other’s side without realizing it. Lexie stands straighter than Robin, who’s backpack weighs her down, but their steps keep them in time. Robin messes with the bands on her wrist and with the hem of her shirt. Lexie has been checking her face paint with her every few minutes.
(It looks terrible, or it must do, because if Janice can’t pull blue off, no one can).
A part of her wants to push this. It’s been obvious since she tricked Robin into going to her class that Lexie totally threw her out of her zone but then again they’ve still got so much to find out about each other. To be honest, the first dancing months are the best of times, in her opinion.
Lexie doesn’t blink when Robin reaches up to untuck Lexie’s pony tail from the back of her jacket.
“Hey,” Janice grabs Laurel’s wrist before she can hurry everyone along. “Robin just said they’re gonna skip out.”
Laurel’s face falls. Obviously looking forward to everyone meeting Amy for the first time. “What?”
They’d thank her later. Or in their wedding speech or something. “Lexie has a quiz tomorrow she hasn’t looked over and you know Robin, she doesn’t like anyone walking alone at night.”
“Alright. You’re still coming?” Janice nods and Laurel brightens up. Seemingly forgetting the trauma that Janice put her through when she found out Amy was her girlfriend. “Cool. I’m just gonna grab Amy.”
Janice smiles as Laurel wanders off. “First shake is on me!”
When she turns around, Robin and Lexie have already left.
“Do I get brownie points for that?” She utters to the sky. “Thought so.”
***
TUESDAY night, 7.03pm, is the night Lexie decides she hates fun. Not fun in general but the band. The band, fun. is forever blacklisted from her life.
“You need to stop laughing or someone is gonna think we’re breaking in.” Lexie whispers with a smile. Robin hovers behind her, close, and shaking.
“We are breaking in though.”
Lexie unlocks the door and flashes the keys over her shoulder. “Is it breaking in if I work here now?”
She pushes open the door just enough for them both to squeeze through and closes it behind her. Robin feels the wall for the lights, only switching them on when Lexie finishes keying in the alarm code. There’s no rule against this, Jake had told her, as long as she didn’t get caught.
“Twist it to the right.” She tells Robin, and the lights dim just enough for them not to be noticeable through the glass in the front door.
“We’ll work at the back.”
“And be verwy verwy qwuiet?” Robin mocks her.
Lexie shucks off her bag and places it underneath their workspace. Robin’s bike is still there from earlier, a new black color, after they’d realized that the Bike Store had access to a sandblaster. “I can still kick you out you know.”
“Sure you can.” Robin puts her bag down too. “You won’t though.”
She wanders to the sink at the back and starts running the water.
“Yeah?” Lexie challenges.
Robin splashes her face and starts to clean off the blue paint. It drips down her neck and onto her collar. “Yeah, you like me too much.” She tosses a wet cloth over for Lexie to wash her face as well.
“I got you there right?” Robin teases.
Lexie starts to pick up where they left off on the bike.
“Thought so.” Robin turns off the tap and dries her hands on the way back to the table. Lexie has mastered the art of looking busy while keeping track of her out of the corner of her eye. At the same time though, she hasn’t managed to control the flustered look that happens when Robin catches her doing it.
“So are we going to finish this thing tonight?” Robin sits on the workspace watching as Lexie adjusts something on the back wheel. She alternates scratching at her knee, pulling it into her chest, and glancing over at Lexie. Once or twice Lexie has caught her looking and stopped just to take it in. The glimpses have grown longer and elicited less laughter. They’ve started to shift. Comfortable.
Lexie points to the crank. “Hold that.” Robin quickly complies and Lexie brings the chain over. Janice had walked in after the most tense part of their whole build, the brakes, and now the rest of the bike is starting to come together. “Okay.”
She lays the chain over the crank, passes Robin’s hand as she does, and finds her chain tool. “We have to put the pin though and then loosen it just a bit.”
Lexie comments more for herself than anything, but Robin nods along with her. She fixes the ends together and then goes back.
“No kinks.” Robin announces. “Awesome.”
“So I did teach you something.” Lexie jokes. “Just check the cables at the back for me?”
Robin does. It’s a simple action in her mind. Just checking the cables, but Robin has to move to her left, behind her back, letting go of the crank. As she does, there’s a full moment of Robin pressing against her, a fleeting but breath holding moment that she can’t just recover from straight away.
“It’s good.” Robin announces. “You needed to run it to the brakes right?”
Lexie’s hands flutter to complete the motion without saying anything. Her eyes try to focus in the dim light even with the soft glow it’s giving Robin’s features. She tunes the derailleur and then stops. They’ve done the hard and heavy stuff, so she shouldn’t be surprised that when Robin caught her arm as they waited outside the stadium and suggested they sneak in here to work on the bike, that they’d actually reach this point.
She’s aware of how she’s being watched as her mind runs through her checklist. Mentally ticking off every part they used and the tools and the steps and the things that under no circumstance can she forget, like brakes, until there’s a completed list being filed away.
“Take it out of the clamps.” She tells Robin.
Her arms fill Lexie’s vision as the black bike is brought to the ground in front of them. She takes the handlebars and grips the brake, moving it to check for any knocks.
Lexie smiles to herself, looking down at the bike, before bringing it up to meet Robin. She eagerly awaits Lexie’s verdict, bending her knee and reaching out for the seat of the bike. As much as she could spend another week just laboring over this to spend time with Robin, it’s done.
“She’s all yours.”
It all plays out the way she thought it would. Robin actually throws her head back with a muffled celebration only to clench her fists and throw them up too. Lexie has to move out of the way while Robin straddles the bike for the victory lap that she’d talked about since the second day. Luckily she doesn’t crash into anything and the bike doesn’t fall apart either.
Lexie laughs and lets her chest do whatever and feel whatever
because she’s just done this, she’s just made Robin do this from something that she built and that’s not a feeling she wants to hide.
It all plays out the way she thought it would until it doesn’t.
Robin puts on the brakes and jumps off her new bike, only halting her enthusiasm to make sure it didn’t fall over, before she moves in on her.
“Woah!”
The next thing she knows Robin is picking her up, laughing a lot louder than two girls sneaking into a shop after hours should, and spinning her around in glee, yelling; "You build me a bike! Are you serious?” - like she hadn’t been there every step of the way with her mostly quiet curiosity.
“This day has been awesome.” Robin declares, giggling with her as Lexie kicks her feet uselessly in the air, before putting her on the workspace. It’s cluttered with nuts and bolts and tools they have to put away, but for now it’s perfect and puts Lexie eye level with the extent of Robin’s happiness.
“I can’t tell you how glad I am that we did this together.” A bashful blush flickers to life over Robin’s cheeks as she admits this, that she’s sure is infectious as Lexie feels the heat in her own face as a response to her words.
“You’re welcome.” Her voice cracks in its quietness. The bike is settled behind Robin, the source of her excitement and achievement and-
Robin isn’t looking at the bike.
Robin’s looking at her.
She can practically see the uneven lines of the tan around her eyes, where she’s been wearing sunglasses, to the flickering flecks of color in her eyes. There’s no doubt paint behind her ears from the match where she couldn’t tell if there was anything still there. And her lips...
Robin starts to tilt her head, the tilt that says in no uncertain terms that someone is about to get the heck kissed out of them, and that someone is Lexie Freaking Jameson. Heck yes. She’s practically vibrating with the thrill that runs up her leg when Robin touches the back of her knee and says;
“Isn’t that your phone?”
“What?”
Robin’s hand is running up her thigh to the phone in her pocket, not in the happy way that Lexie wishes she was and then she hears the ringtone start to play.
Janice’s ringtone.
Everything is ruined. Robin’s lips are definitely not kissing the heck out of her and she’s taken her hand from her leg, instead she leans back on the against the counter behind her. Lexie’s only relief is that she looks as disappointed as Lexie feels. The energy from finishing the bike fizzles out without the bang the both of them had subconsciously expected.
She presses the ‘accept’ call button to stop ‘Some Nights’ playing with some force. She has the urge to hide her face and her frustration. “You don’t know why yet but I’m so mad at you.”
Janice’s nervous laughter doesn’t fill the call.
“Is this Lexie Jameson?”
“Yes?” Lexie’s stomach drops at the official tone. Robin looks back up as Lexie is struck silent.
“I’m calling about your friend Janice McPherson.”
"What's happened?" She utters.
When she hangs up, all thoughts of kissing Robin have flown the nest.
Chapter 3
SHE’S spent a good couple of weeks wanting to stare into the eyes in front of her. Up close, they take her breath away just as she imagined, yet send much more than shivers rocking through her. The ice that she’s been offered is the only barrier between her and that gaze.
“How’s that?”
“It really fu- hurts.” Janice swallows back the curse word with difficulty and presses the ice to her eye harder. The cold distracts her from the heat flushing her face.
Officer Sorenson sighs at her. “Well, getting punched in the face will do that to you.”
She can’t believe she ever asked Laurel do to this to her a few weeks ago. Little bursts of pain erupt underneath her damaged skin. She’s going to look like hell tomorrow, if she doesn’t look it already- slumped in a chair in the station waiting to be let go, in front of the woman who basically saved her.
“Did you call my parents?” Janice murmurs. Officer Sorenson had taken her belongings from her on the ride back. She wasn’t being arrested or anything but Officer Sorenson didn’t say anything but ‘get in the car’ after she’d called for someone to take the other guy away. Her parents might just have a fit.
She always thought that sometime of her college experience would end up with them taking a trip to the police station. She just didn’t think it’d be this soon.
Officer Sorenson places a knee on the floor and cleans the bits of gravel from Janice’s knuckle where she’d grazed it on the floor. “No.”
The relief that flooded through her was temporary. She holds her breath while Sorenson touches her with care and tries (and fails) not to stare at her as she does. (Once she apologizes to Laurel about tonight, she’ll tell her that Sorenson’s cheekbones are somehow more stunning close up).
“Who did you call then?”
It’s then that Lexie runs through the glass door out of breath, looking pissed, with Robin following close behind holding two helmets in her hand. Those kudos she earned earlier would be handy right about now.
“I’m looking for Janice McPherson?”
“Oh, this is way worse.” Janice groans. At least her parents couldn’t physically berate her from Georgia. Lexie was going to murder her.
Lexie turns to see Officer Sorenson kneeling with her before her eyes widen over the state Janice is in. There’s no avoiding it so she gets up from the line of seats, and with a tired smile, starts walking towards them.
“What the hell happened?” Lexie exclaims looking at her eye.
“Nothing serious.” Officer Sorenson tells her before Janice can make her excuses. Robin takes the form that’s slid across to them. “Just a bit banged up.” She utters about signing out Janice’s belongings.
“You should see the other guy.” Janice jokes but her face is white.
Officer Sorenson purses her lips, her face showing judgment for the first time. “The other guy could have done a lot more damage.”
“How did you get here?” Lexie checks over Janice for any sign of damage. Her fingers flutter like she wants to reach out for her and despite knowing Lexie isn’t happy with her, she wants to be held. “What happened? What other guy?”
Officer Sorenson takes the forms Robin has completed back. “I thought she might want to wait somewhere that was warmer than a parking lot. I sent her other friends home. They’re a little shaken up obviously but they’re fine.”
Lexie must forget she’s pissed for a second and pulls Janice into a strong hug. It’s everything she wants and needs until her ribs protest. “Did someone hit you?”
“Just some guy.” Janice waves off. “Not too bad.”
Officer Sorenson’s face doesn’t seem to agree. Then again, anyone would disagree if they’d seen Janice attempting to avoid getting beaten up in the parking lot outside King’s without context for it. She was just being a good friend.
“C’mon, we’ll get you home.” Robin touches the back of Janice’s head. Their dorm isn’t too far away. Before they can turn though, Sorenson calls Janice back.
“A word of advice McPherson?” Officer Sorenson murmurs to Janice when she stops grimacing over her ribs. “Almost getting arrested isn’t the right way to impress a police officer.”
Janice, despite her pale, shaken appearance, feels a little color come back to her cheeks. “What would you say the best way is then, Officer?”
Robin coughs to hide a bad laugh which Lexie frowns at for some reason. Officer Sorenson places the form away and brings up a zip lock bag with Janice’s bracelets and wallet in. “Staying out of trouble.”
Janice takes the bag back and, with a wink that Lexie groans over, says: “That’s no fun.”
Officer Sorenson seems to give them a faint nod as a dismissal. Janice purposely strides out of the station with her head held high, holdin
g her ribs, until they get four or five steps out of sight of the door when Robin shoves her shoulder.
“What the heck?” The cool on her face is nowhere to be found as she confronts her roommate’s reckless behavior. “How did you end up being taken down here? Where’s this ‘other guy’?”
Janice bristles and rummages in the zip lock, putting bracelets back on and checking her phone. This is much worse than her parents because at least she didn’t have to see the disappointment in their faces. “What? I didn’t start it! Some guy was harassing Laurel and Amy outside the King’s and I told him to back off-”
Homophobia in the 21st Century everyone.
“With your fist?” Lexie keeps a level voice as she unchains her bike from the rack.
Janice scoffs. “With my words. He just happened to be drunk.” Drunk enough to think that going after a girl half his size and twice as fast was a good idea.
Robin gives her a disbelieving look.
“And he didn’t have much of a sense of humor.” She tacks on. The punch he got in was a lucky one. Luckier for her, it was the only one and it ended with a siren being blasted through the night air startling them all. She’d never been so happy to see a police officer.
Lexie fumes. “You could have gotten kicked out of school!”
Janice sighs. “You do not need to remind me. Officer Sorenson was thorough with the lecture.”
Robin smirks, humor flickering back to life. They all cope with stress in their own ways. “Was she as thorough with the strip search?”
This time it’s Janice that shoves Robin. Lexie really wants to hold a grudge over the interruption, she really does but in the midst of this emergency rescue and Robin not hesitating to follow her as she raced across town on her bike, the whole thing has become kind of funny.
“If there was a strip search do you think Janice would be out with us right now?” Lexie counters. Janice gasps like she’s offended. “Or did you just start taking your clothes off when she pulled the cuffs out-?”