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Steve spent the morning as a wolf sunning himself next to Robin who spent her morning studying for finals. The end of the school year had been pushed back a week to honor the deaths and injuries sustained by so many Hawkins High students over Spring Break.
Eddie was getting a diploma based on his grades before he became the injured Hero of Hawkins. No one else in their group had gotten as lucky, no matter their injuries, and they were all panicked for finals next week.
Nerds. All of them. Even Max.
After lunch, they both sat down on the carpet staring at the backyard behind the sliding glass door. Neither of them could muster the energy to do anything else. Even inside, in the air conditioning, the climbing heat and humidity of the day leached their energy. Rain had been threatening all morning. Every hour, the air has been hotter and more stifling.
"Everything is sticking to everything else," Robin pulled at her tank top, hovering it away from her skin. “We’ve been inside for an hour and I’m so hot my bones hurt. Why is this the week your parents decide to do maintenance on your pool?"
Steve wanted to give Robin a million reasons why the pool was empty this weekend of all weekends. It was only mid-May, and this was an unprecedented heatwave. They said so on the news last night. That his parents were so obsessed with having a heated pool throughout autumn they didn’t service it then like normal people. Instead, the maintenance was done in May as school let out. Their logic was this way the pool was prepared for when the heat actually came and ruined an otherwise great time of year without sacrificing the luxury of autumnal swimming.
It didn’t matter what he wanted to say. Like every other word for the last month, it didn’t get past his mouth. Since the end of spring break, Steve hadn't been able to talk. Before Eddie woke up his thoughts were a jumble of pictures and feelings. None of his thoughts was clear enough to form into words. It was disconcerting when he had been in human shape, so he spent most of his time as a wolf. At least, in that shape, it felt almost normal.
Once Eddie woke up, once a member of his pack was no longer on death’s door, Steve’s thoughts settled and formed into words again. It was a relief but he couldn't figure out how to get them past the arch of the palate in his mouth. It was like a glob of peanut butter was stuck there and no matter how hard he worked to clear it, the gunk wouldn’t budge.
A lot of people, almost everybody in Hawkins, including everyone in their weird group bonded by the Upside Down, looked at him with some level of pity. Robin was the only real exception because she treated him like nothing was different. To be fair, Robin could essentially have a conversation with him even with his continued silence. It wasn’t like she understood the complex stuff, like his parent’s pool maintenance schedule, but she understood the necessary stuff, and that was all that mattered.
He sighed to let her know that he, too, was annoyed by the heat and the lack of a pool.
"I know it’s scheduled for the same time every year," she sighed. “But the timing sucks.”
Steve looked over at her, startled. How the hell did she know that? Were they actually psychically linked?
"I'm not psychic, nor are you. It's on your calendar in the kitchen,” she said as if in response to his thoughts.
Okay, that made sense.
They were both glaring at the empty pool when the first drops of rain hit the cement. Small dark gray dots appeared out of nowhere and disappeared as they sizzled on the hot pavement. That lasted a few languid moments before the summer deluge swamped the pavement turning it from the sun-bleached dirty white of a hot summer poolside to the dark gray of relief.
The rain came down in torrents so hard it painted the air in front of them a rushing gray. "Oh shit, rain," Robin gasped like she could finally breathe for the first time that day.
Steve glaced away away from the water outside and really looked at Robin. She was slack jawed in awe. He didn't even have time to laugh at her dumbass expression before she opened the sliding glass door and ran out into the rain, bare feet smacking across the pavement.
It was good she was turned away from him and preoccupied with the rain because he stripped as quickly as he could. He pulled his tank top off over his head with one hand and tugged shorts and briefs off in one smooth move before, in the span of a breath, he turned back into his wolf shape.
He bounded outside behind her and felt the rain pour down on his fur. He barked and yipped in delight as Robin's shouting matched his joy and strengthened it. Their happiness grew together like the clematis in his mom’s garden, flowers open and vibrant in the sun.
When she was finished jumping and hollering, Robin collapsed onto a chaise lounge. It was the same one she used that morning when it was still cool enough to be outside, to study for her upcoming finals.
Steve collapsed onto the cement next to her, his same spot from this morning as he kept her company. They lay there, letting the water flood over them. Steve relaxed into the feeling of the air as it cooled down with the rain burst.
Robin stroked and scratched between his ears, Her mind was somewhere else but she had a small smile on her face so Steve wasn’t worried.
Steve lost all track of time until he felt Robin's hand shivering in his fur. He stood up and cocked his head. Posing a question that needed no words.
"It's time to go inside, isn't it?" she asked while her teeth chattered.
He barked once for yes, the only speaking he could still do, and led the way inside through the open sliding glass door. He waited till she was fully inside before he backed out of the doorway again. He shook himself off underneath the overhang of the second floor above him. The glass between him and the house kept Robin and, more importantly, his carpet, from the splash zone.
"I needed that," Robin said as he trotted inside.
Steve barked again, happy there was no one else in the house and no need to stay quiet. He was getting desperate to be able to say anything and it was relieving to say something, anything to Robin. Even if it wasn’t really speech.
Robin looked down at the pile of his clothes as she plucked at the now-actually-soaked clothes she was wearing. "I'm going upstairs to take a shower. I expect you to be fully dressed by the time I get out."
She said it like she wasn't the one who had a tendency to stumble in on him when he was naked. He had never done that to her.
"Yet," Robin called out from the stairs. "You haven't done that to me, yet."
Seriously, when he could speak again, he was going to have to talk to El. There was no way this was normal.
"We're not psychic," Robin called out now from the top of the stairs while Steve grabbed his discarded clothes in his mouth. "I just know you really well, Harrington."
Steve thought she was probably right. He never had anybody in his life who knew him as well as she did. He didn't even know it was possible until she had stumbled into his life in that clearing last June.