vegas | robin buckley

8. rain checks & immune systems

***

"You're not gonna believe who Dustin thought was a Russian spy," Jackie vaguely hears Steve say as Robin grabs her arm with one hand and the notepad they were using to translate with the other, pulling her past the two boys into the food court.

"I thought we weren't getting lunch with Tammy," Jackie trips slightly as Robin pulls her up on the platform in the center of the mall.

"Silver cat is the Lynx delivery company," Robin starts explaining hurriedly, looking all around for something else still. "That means this code did come from here, and it does have something to do with the mall, and each sentence is code for something that has to do with the mall," Robin is talking at lightening speed, but Jackie thinks she understands.

"So. . . 'A trip to China sounds nice'. . ." Jackie tries catching on.

"A trip to China sounds nice," Robin points hurriedly to a Chinese restaurant before looking down at the notepad to find the next clue. "If you tread lightly. . ."

"Tread lightly. . ."

"If you tread. . ." Both girls are spinning their heads around now, repeating the nonsense words to themselves as they try to find the next location.

"If you tread lightly!" Jackie points to the second floor where the sign for a shoe store is.

"If you tread lightly," Robin nods. "When- when blue meets yellow in the west. . ."

"Blue. . . yellow. . ."

"When blue meets yellow in the. . . west," Robin trails off as she looks to the clock in the center of the wall in front of them.

One hand on the clock is yellow, the other blue, and Jackie has never been happier she listened to Dustin when he talked about his stupid compasses more than in this moment.

"When blue meets yellow in the west," Jackie nods and both girls look at each other with grins.

"Jackie?" Tammy somehow manages to teleport to any location Jackie is in and the older Henderson realizes she has no choice but to dye her hair and move to a different country to get away from her.

"Tammy," Robin is the one to answer, all Russian codes forgotten as Tammy's eyes trail down to Robin's hand that's still holding Jackie's arm lightly, neither girls noticing until now and pulling away easily.

"Are we still on for lunch or. . ." Tammy trails off, looking expectantly at Robin since she's the one who seemed most enthusiastic about it in the first place.

"Um, uh. . . well, um-" Jackie doesn't think she's ever seen Robin at a loss for words like she does right now.

"Rain check," Jackie interrupts, in a bit more urgency, grabbing Robin's arm this time quickly to drag her back into Scoops Ahoy where they can debrief with Steve and Dustin.

"What was that?" Dustin stares as the girls walk in, Robin still looking behind them as if Tammy would follow them in or something.

"We solved it," Jackie answers, kinda annoyed with Robin now and how obsessed with Tammy she is. Is she in love with her or something?

"What?" Steve stares.

"A math problem, dingus," Steve's stupidity managed to bring Robin into real time. "The code. We solved the code."

***

And that was how Jackie ended up on top of one of the warehouses by the mall at 9PM that night, rain pouring down heavily on her hair, face, legs, arms, work uniform, and binoculars she held in her hands to her eyes after she gave Dustin her raincoat because his was in the laundry.

"Look for Imperial Panda and Kaufman's Shoes," Robin says from the comfort of her own jacket on one side of Jackie, Steve on the other.

"That whistling guy," Dustin points, his own binoculars to his eyes. "10 o'clock."

They all give their own predictions of what's in the boxes they're rolling around, Steve ending with his usual one liner and wiping his eyes for the millionth time to get the rain water out of them.

"You're gonna get sick," Robin says quietly to Jackie, getting off track for a second.

"Nah, I have a strong immune system," she assures.

"Are you sure?" Robin looks ready to give Jackie her own jacket, but Jackie nods her head with finality.

Her assurance is futile though, as she lets out a sneeze.

"Who was that?" She hears a voice call from below, and they all duck down, Jackie holding her nose with one hand, so she can't sneeze again and squeezes her eyes shut tightly.

"Shit."

"Language."

Jackie opens one eye as if even though they're facing the opposite way, that'll help her somehow.

Her hands must be frozen numb, because only now can she see her and Robin's fingers interlocked.

Both of them acknowledge the motion, but neither pull away, Jackie mostly because she thinks her fingers will fall off if she does.

"Let's go," Steve takes charge and leads them back down into a hallway that would lead them back to the main area of the mall. Jackie recognizes it as the shortcut she would force Steve to let her take so she could get to the bookstore on the other side of the mall faster.

"Found your Russians," Robin announces. Her and Jackie have stopped holding hands now, and instead Dustin is shrugging off the jacket that's a size too big on him to give to his shivering sister.

"Don't come to work tomorrow," Steve looks at Jackie's ill state.

"I'm fine," she sniffles, not even feeling the cold yet. "I have a strong immune system."

a/n:
I have a weak immune system also I need to know if we're all like 🤞🤞🤞🤞 bc I talked a lot ab my personal life in my other book but idk if that's the norm so pls lmk if we're friends 🙂