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Robin Buckley considered herself a fairly handy person. She could fix odds and ends around the house, even if the end result wasn’t pretty. Once she’d taken apart the family toaster and put it back together when it had stopped working. Did it fix it? No. Did she absolutely put all the pieces back in the right way? …Maybe. She was at a total loss altogether as she stood in the local hardware store, a handwritten note in one hand, and a piece of metal she didn’t have a name for in the other.
Robin looked between the note and the metal with her eyebrows knit together. She pursed her lips and squinted her eyes, bringing the item closer to inspect it as though it would reveal its secrets to her in a whisper after some intense scrutiny. Steve had instructed her to run and get a ‘compressor foil’ for one of the Scoops deep freezers. They’d been standing around talking when Steve looked down and noticed a heinous mix of tutti frutti, chocolate and peanut butter goop dripping from the bottom of their overstock freezer. After cleaning up and a lot more standing around with their hands on their hips staring at the busted freezer, Steve had snapped his fingers, shouted “ah-hah!” and ran to scribble something on a napkin.
He’d returned with the gem she held in her hand. It was a crude drawing of the part he was certain they needed, the name, and a small self portrait of Steve giving a thumbs up. It wasn’t helpful in the slightest. The store clerk was decidedly ignoring her, instead chatting with one of the local farmers that practically lived in the hardware store. Robin was so engulfed with looking between various metal parts that she didn’t hear the bell above the door tinkle as someone else walked in.
Just as Robin was about to give up and tell Steve to come find it himself, she felt a tentative hand touch her shoulder. She turned, about to thank the store clerk for finally pulling his head out of his ass, when she noticed who was touching her. Nancy Wheeler offered her a shy smile, pointing at the items in her hand.
“You need some help?” Nancy asked.
Robin blinked owlishly, unsure how to respond. She dropped the metal part in her hand and the note all at once. The note sailed on the air, slowly drifting to the ground. Nancy grabbed it before it could land.
“I was just…y’know, finding some parts for the freezer at work,” Robin said, attempting to lean casually against the counter. Why was her heart racing? She saw Nancy Wheeler all the time at school. She took a deep breath and forced the blush creeping up on her cheeks back down to where it came from.
Nancy looked at Steve’s note and back up at Robin, her small smile turning into a grin as she fought off laughter. Robin willed herself to stay still and not turn tail and run, afraid that this was turning into some mean prank.
“Robin, did Steve send you to find this?” Nancy asked.
“Yeah, why?” Robin asked as she rubbed the back of her neck nervously.
“Steve doesn’t know a damn thing about how to fix a freezer,” Nancy said with a laugh. “This compressor foil doesn’t exist.”
“Wait, and you do?” Robin asked incredulously.
Instead of taking offense, Nancy just shrugged and smiled, averting her eyes. “I helped my dad out a lot when I was younger, before Mike was born. We fixed all sorts of stuff together. That’s something they push off onto Mike, now, although I think Mike would rather it still be me,” Nancy said. She held up her own handwritten note. “I’m still good enough to go shopping for him, though.”
Robin’s heart felt like it was going to beat out of her chest. Nancy Wheeler was good with her hands? Robin’s thoughts wandered to images of Nancy under a car, working on its engine with a wrench and a grease drenched rag. Nancy on the roof, handing her dad shingles and nails. Nancy looking at the freezer in Scoops, immediately diagnosing the issue and teaching Robin how to fix it. Robin had to lean heavily on the counter behind her, the blush she had fought so hard to keep at bay painting her cheeks a bright pink.
“That’s impressive, Nancy,” Robin managed to say. “You saved me from hours of searching.”
Nancy pressed Steve’s note back into Robin’s hand, their palms brushing. Nancy smiled, a similar blush on her own cheeks, though Robin couldn’t imagine why.
“I couldn’t leave you looking so lost,” Nancy said. “You looked like you were trying to will the metal to talk to you. It was cute.”
“Th-thank you,” Robin stammered, clutching the piece of paper to her chest. Cute? Nancy Wheeler thought she was cute? Had she stepped through a portal to another dimension? “I’m sorry I doubted that you knew anything about hardware. It’s really…attractive that you do.”
What am I saying? What am I saying right now? Stop it! Run away! Robin thought to herself. Instead, she chewed her bottom lip and managed to stay anchored to the floor.
“I’ll see you around school?” Nancy asked as she turned toward the register. She watched Robin over her shoulder, the blush still bright on her cheeks. “I’d stay longer to help, but I have to get these parts back to my dad.”
“Y-yeah,” Robin said. “See you around school.”
Robin watched as Nancy checked out with her items and left, casting one last glance over her shoulder at Robin. Robin’s head spun and her heart fluttered. Nancy Wheeler was beautiful and popular. It never occurred to her that Nancy would ever pay her any mind. Yet here they were, in the middle of a hardware store, blushing and paying each other compliments. Robin was going to need a long while to process this.
She left the hardware store with a small smile on her lips. She had to admit, it felt good to be on Nancy Wheeler’s radar.
—
The next day at school, Robin ducked through the throngs of students to get to her locker. She’d ribbed Steve real good about the compressor foil ordeal, but they were still left with a broken freezer and a visit from management that could happen at any moment. They were right back where they started - shit out of luck. She sighed, her shoulders slumped as she rested her books against one hip while she opened her locker.
Before she could heft her books up onto one of the metal shelves she noticed a note taped to the inner door of the locker. She prepared herself for the usual immature scrawlings of “loser” or “lesbo” but was instead greeted with a beautiful flowing handwriting. She sat her books down on the floor and grabbed the note.
“Robin,
I hope you aren’t in too much trouble at work. This is the part you need. If you need help installing it, let me know. I’ll be there.
-Nancy ❤︎”
Robin looked into her locker and noticed the heaping piece of metal resting on top of her other school supplies. She looked down both sides of the hallway, craning her head to see over the crowd. Nancy stood leaned against her own locker, watching Robin’s reaction. Their eyes met and Nancy smiled, twirling one of her curls around her finger. Robin felt a blush creep to her cheeks, and this time she didn’t fight it. She’d let Nancy and her beautiful smile lead her wherever she wanted, and right now it was going to be right down the hall to ask her over to Scoops.