Chapter Fifty-Four: We're Good

"It is fascinating what twenty bucks will get you at the county reporter's office." Robin said, laying down a giant sheet of paper on the table. I raised my eyebrows as I saw that it was the building schematics. "Starcourt Mall. The complete blueprints."

"Not bad." Dustin told her.

"So this is us, Scoops," She said, pointing at the bottom of the blueprints, "And this is where we want to get." She trailed her fingers across the page to the top.

"I mean, I don't really see a way in." Steve said. I looked up, my eyes landing on the vent on the back wall. 

"There probably isn't...if you're only looking for doors." I said, glancing at Robin for confirmation. She nodded, picking up the blueprints to reveal another page.

"Air ducts." Dustin realized.

"Exactly. Turns out this secret room needs air just like any old room," She said, walking over to the marker board and grabbing the marker before walking back, and "These air ducts," She circled the vent at Scoops, drawing a path to the secret room, "lead all the way...here." She circled the secret room, and we all looked up at the vent.

~~~

Steve stood on a ladder now with a screwdriver clamped between his teeth. He took the great down, handing it off to Dustin while Robin and I stood by and watched. 

"Flashlight," He said to Dustin, who handed it up to him and took the screwdriver, "Thank you." He looked into the vent. "Yeah, I don't know man. I don't know if you can fit in here. It's like...super tight."

"I'll fit," He said, as Steve climbed down, "Trust me. No collar bones, remember?"

"Um, excuse me?" Robin asked as Dustin climbed the ladder.

"Oh yeah, he's got uh...he's got some disease? Chry, uh...its Chrydo, um..."

"Cleidocranial Dysplasia." I told her.

"Yeah...that." Steve agreed. "He's missing bones and stuff, he can bend like Gumbo."

"You mean Gumby." 

"I'm pretty sure its Gumbo." He looked at me, clearly waiting for me to smile and roll my eyes or something that I would normally do. When I didn't do that, his expectant smile fell.

"Steve, just shut up and push me!" Dustin shouted, half of his body in the vent. "Ok," He glanced at us again, pointing at Dustin before walking over to him, "I'll push ya."

He started pushing on his feet.

"Not my feet, dummy push my butt."

"What?"

"Touch my butt! I don't care!"  He climbed up the ladder, beginning to push on his butt. "Come on, Harder!"

"I'm pushing!"

"Push harder!" He screeched.

"This clearly isn't going to work! If we have to jam you in there you're probably not gonna have enough space to move anyway!" I yelled.

"You're playing with my legs."

"I'm not playing, I have terrible footing!' Steve argued, both of them ignoring me.

"Come on!"

"I'm gonna just shove you, ready?"

"They're morons. Absolute Morons." She said, causing me to chuckle halfheartedly. "Hey. You ok? You've been acting weird the past couple of days. You and Harrington haven't been all over each other like you usually are."

This was enough to cause Steve to stop pushing and turn around to look at us. I sighed.

"It doesn't matter. Its not important right now." I said, tearing my eyes away from Steve to look at Robin. "We're gonna have to figure out a plan B-"

I was cut off by the bell on the counter.

"Ahoy sailors, ahoy, all hands on deck, ahoy!" We turned around to see Erica Sinclair standing there and Robin and I clearly got the same idea, because we shared a look and smiled. "Come on! Get over here and serve me some samples."

~~~Erica climbed the ladder, shining the flashlight inside the vent to inspect it as the four of us leaned against the counter, watching her.

"Yeah, I don't know." She said, coming to face us.

"You don't know if you can fit?" Dustin questioned.

"Oh, I can fit. I just don't know if I want to."

"Are you claustrophobic?" Robin asked sarcastically. She chuckled.

"I don't have phobias." 

"She does have conditions though," I theorized, walking over and putting my hands on the table, leaning down to look at her. "What's it gonna take to get you in that vent?"

~~~

We all sat at the biggest booth now as Steve pushed a Banana boat across the table that was already filled with just about every flavor of ice cream we had. She pushed it back.

"More fudge please." She waved a hand. "Go on." I sighed, grabbing the bowl and walking back behind the counter, Steve trailing after me.

"Why are we letting this child walk all over us?" He whispered, standing in front of the counter as I ladled hot fudge onto the sundae.

"Because we need her, and we're potentially putting her life in danger, so I'd say this is a pretty even trade, wouldn't you?" I asked. I went to walk back to the table but he stepped in front of me, just like he had earlier. "We're not doing this again."

"Please, just tell me what's going on." He whispered. "I seriously have no clue why you're so mad at me, and you won't tell me and you just keep saying vague things about how I already know or should already know but I don't! I don't, and we've established that, and me not knowing why you suddenly hate my guts is stressing everybody out."

"Well then why don't you just do it already?!" I asked.

"Do what?!"

"Break up with me!" His eyes widened at this. "I know you want to, and I was dodging the conversation because I wasn't going to make it easy for you to dump me, but this is just complicated for everyone so just do it, already! Put us all out of our misery!" 

"Hello? I'm waiting!" Erica shouted. Steve grabbed the ice cream, walking over and handing it to her before coming back to me. I crossed my eyes, looking away from him.

"I was never gonna break up with you." He said. 

"Yeah, ok. So you've been acting perfectly normal recently and its all in my head? Is that it?" He sighed, raking a hand through his hair.

"Yeah...Dustin thought you might've looked at everything that's happened recently and think I didn't like you anymore or something."

"Well then maybe you should listen to Dustin more often." I crossed my arms, blowing out a breath. "But since we're on the subject of clearing things up...you weren't trying to break up with me?"

"No! Of course not!"

"Don't act like its obvious and I should've known, Steve! You've been acting weird and you know it, so don't say it like the very notion is ridiculous, I mean...the way you were acting, it just seemed like the tell-tale signs of Steve 'The Hair' Harrington getting bored with his most recent conquest." He furrowed his eyebrows.

"But...you know I'm not that guy anymore. Right?"

"If you had asked me a couple of weeks ago I would have said yes, without a doubt but I don't know what to think anymore." He shook his head, putting one hand on his hip and running the other one down his face before pointing at me.

"That's not fair."

"What about this is fair Steve?" I asked. "What's fair about you flirting with other girls right in front of me? What's fair about me feeling like I have to let you because I'm not enough for you to be satisfied with where your life is right now?!"

"Are you crazy?" He asked, causing me to furrow my eyebrows. "Don't you remember a few months ago, when I said 'That you were the only good thing I had going for me'?"

"Yeah, I do, but then I ask you to move in with me and you say 'No', no explanation and...I tell you I love you, and you can't say it back and then I tell you I'm not ready to..." I trailed off. "It makes it look like you're not interested in having a relationship with me, and you're bored because I'm not giving you what you actually want."

"No...Riley, no, I don't care about that."

"Then why don't you want to move in with me?" I asked. He paused. "Why can you still not say 'I love you', why do you have a desire to flirt with other girls, if that's not something that you care about then why does it feel like our relationship is frozen in place since I told you that?"

"Clearly you don't understand how that whole thing works, Barbie." He said, a half-hearted smile on his face. I shot him a look. "Look, Riley...if sex was all I cared about, I would be pulling out all the stops. I would be telling you that I love you and buying you flowers, and being as cheesy and romantic and obnoxious as possible. I would be saying and doing anything that I thought would get you into bed."

"So what, all of this crap is you showing me that you like me? I seem to recall your relationship with Nancy looking a lot different than this."

"That's because I was putting on a show with Nancy." He said. "I told you, I felt like I had to be the perfect boyfriend around her, so i was acting like one."

"Then what are you trying to do with me?"

"I'm trying not to screw it all up." He whispered. i furrowed my eyebrows.  "I don't want to screw this up, Riles. I don't want to destroy the best thing in my life, but I'm trying to figure out how to be a good boyfriend while still being me, and I'll be honest, I haven't handled it well, at all, but I'm just trying to be careful because I..." He trailed off, causing me to furrow my eyebrows. "I want to be absolutely sure that when we get to those milestone points in our relationship its everything its supposed to be, and...when I say that, I want to make sure that it means and that I feel everything that that word is supposed to represent. I don't want to just throw it out there on impulse or because I'm supposed to, I want to genuinely mean it, and feel it with my whole heart because that's what you deserve." I tucked my hair behind my ear. "I'm sorry that I've done such a crappy job of showing you that." I sighed.

"I'm sorry too."

"You're sorry? What are you sorry for?" He asked. I bit my lip.

"For acting like a psycho instead of just sitting down and talking to you about it." I explained. "I was so sure that I knew what you were going to say, when I should've trusted you and given you the benefit of the doubt. My dad told me to, but I didn't listen."

"Your dad said that?" I nodded.

"He said that when he met you, like when you came to pick me up for Prom and stuff that you seemed like a guy who...adored his daughter and would do anything to make me happy." He took a step closer to me.

"I am," He said, reaching up and putting his hands on the sides of my neck, lightly rubbing my jaw with his thumbs, "I would." I nodded, smiling and putting my hands on his wrists.

"He also said that guys can be stupid sometimes so it seems my Dad's a pretty wise man." He laughed, moving even closer to me and resting his forehead against mine. "As it turns out girls can be stupid too."

"I'm really sorry," He stated, "Do you forgive me?"

"That depends...do you forgive me?" He chuckled, pressing a brief but slow kiss to my lips.

"As if I could stay mad at you for long." I smiled, moving back and taking his hands off of my face, holding them between us.

"If you two are done canoodling over there, can we get down to business?" Dustin called across the store. I chuckled rolling my eyes.

"So, we good Barbie?" I met his eyes, nodding my head.

"Yeah...we're good." He pulled me closer by my hands, kissing my forehead before pulling me back over to the table to join the others.