Chapter Text
Even Robin has to admit, George Michael is a hell of a performer.
He's been strutting and dancing and moving for nearly an hour, somehow managing to keep a crowd over twice the size of Hawkins' entire population engaged. Not just engaged—enthralled, enchanted. Despite that fringed leather jacket—which can't be anything but warm—despite the leftover heat of the day and the focus of the crowd, he doesn't show any signs of wilting. He's launched into a dance that's more than a little suggestive—a lot of pelvic thrusts—Robin glances over at Steve, laughs at the stunned and delighted and frankly horny look on his face. Watches as Billy's arms tighten around him, possessive, or perhaps promising.
Technically, there are seats, but none of them are sitting—they’re standing in front, dancing in the aisles, singing and clapping and cheering and screaming. More than twice the population of Hawkins is in this space, celebrating this band, heartbreak and joy and love and anger spilling out in rivers, in waves, a flood threatening to sweep everything along with it.
They're having the time of their lives.
Admittedly, it’s hard not to when you’re standing next to Steve Harrington in his preppiest polo shirt, watching his rapturous face as he sings every lyric and chants every chant, completely in his element. When you’re watching Billy Hargrove, who could pass for a fan in his black jeans and too-small tee, clear out anybody who gets too close to his boyfriend with little more than a scowl and a flex of his muscles. When you know him well enough to know just how much fun he’s having, despite his refusal to sing along. When you know the three of you will ride the Tube back to your hastily-booked hotel room, after, spend the night drinking and making plans for your future—plans that’ll be changed at a moment’s notice, a script you’ll be forced to throw out, chords you’ll have to improvise over—but that’s okay, because you know that whatever shape your story takes, it’s not going to be sad or lonely—it’s going to be ambitious and surprising and awe-inspiring—
"Happy Christmas!" George shouts, and the band breaks into the opening chords to "Last Christmas", midsummer weather notwithstanding. Robin laughs and shakes her head, piles her hair on top of her head in a loose sweaty bun. She mimes to Steve and Billy that she's going to get drinks. Her throat is starting to rasp, with the singing or the shouting or even the dancing, who knows. Steve's looking misty-eyed, snuggling back into Billy's arms right there in the open—Robin wonders if they're likely to get any looks, decides that Billy's scowl is probably a strong enough deterrent to anybody likely to do more than look. She turns and climbs up through the bleachers, avoiding the people dancing in the aisles, humming along because if there's one thing Wham! can do, it's write a damn catchy hook—
She's been in line for a couple of minutes, entertaining herself with people-watching, when she catches a hint—just a whiff, overlaying the smells of tens of thousands of people yelling and moving about—geraniums. And lemongrass.
Her head whips around practically of its own accord. There's so many people around; even if she isn't imagining things, it'd be hopeless—too much, to expect to find each other in this crowd—
The song ends, and the crowd goes every bit as wild for it as they have for the rest of the show. But Robin isn't clapping, she's scanning the rows before her, searching for—yes, there, four rows up and a little to the right—the other figure in the crowd that isn't clapping or cheering or jumping up and down. The other face that looks every bit as delightedly dumbstruck as she is.
"Ginny!" Robin waves, starts to make her way through the dancers, practically bounds up each riser. Ginny's squeezing out of her row, coming down to meet her—someone gets between them, and Robin almost panics as her line of sight is obscured—no, they can't lose each other again—Jitterbug, comes out of the speakers, and Robin starts laughing, hysterical, overjoyed, because of course this is how they would find each other, lose each other, find each other again—this goddamn infuriatingly catchy song—
You put the boom-boom into my heart...
And there it is. Ginny's soprano, singing along with the giant image of George Michael on the TVs. Robin picks it up on the next line, sings for all she's worth, parting the crowd, her head turning this way, then that—and there she is, barely more than in impression of dark hair and laughing eyes before she's practically hurled herself into Robin's arms, until Robin is drowning in her scent, until she can't hold her up any longer, has to put her down—only for Ginny to clutch her hands, for the two of them to dance together, with each other, with over seventy thousand other young people whose stories have yet to be written. They sing, triumphant, the music giving form to the chaos around them, and Robin trusts it, trusts Ginny, trusts the crowd—trusts this magic they've all created, that it will buoy them far into the unknown future.