tinygwemlin

[tinygwemlin]

I can’t stop thinking about the way that when Robin hears Nancy’s name in Season 3 she rolls her eyes and calls her a priss, but then not five minutes later she runs into Nancy in the flesh who’s apparently in the thick of the insane situation Robin has become unwittingly wrapped up in. Her makeup is smudged and her hair is messy and she’s terse with Robin and all Robin can do is utter a flustered reply while giving her this look:

And then shortly afterwards Robin watches as Nancy plants herself in front of a station wagon full of kids and shoots at an oncoming speeding car with a pistol, fully ready to sacrifice herself to protect them. That night at the Star Court Mall changes everything Robin thought about this dainty, pretty, prissy girl who turns out to be a certified badass with nerves of steel. 

After this, Robin is smitten. She volunteers to go with Nancy the moment an opportunity presents itself. When they’re waiting in the library, she assumes that Nancy has some genius trick up her sleeve because since Star Court she’s built up an idea of who she is in her mind: brilliant and brave and tenacious. Robin is so desperate for Nancy to like her that she loses all pretense of sardonic aloofness that we see around other characters and the words start spilling out, exactly as she described when venting to Steve about how she behaves around girls she’s crushing on. 

Robin is self-conscious and apologetic about how she comes across to Nancy, she repeatedly tries to diffuse the underlying tension between them in any way that she can, and is particularly keen to emphasise the platonic nature of her friendship with Steve. Despite barely knowing Nancy, she starts using the nickname “Nance” right away. There’s a sincere and earnest effort to win Nancy’s approval and affection; Robin needs it more than she even realises.

And the thing is, it works. Nancy starts off cool and irritable and exasperated (which, one should point out, may be in no small part because she’d been up all night looking for her friend who she just found brutally murdered - cut her some slack folks!), but after those two hours with Robin in the library, she realises that she’s remarkably bright and creatively minded and complements her own logical way of thinking so well. You can see the journey she undergoes in that short period of time written on her face: bemusement and impatience soon give way to respect and the dawning realisation that she’s met her intellectual match, someone with the same insatiable curiosity and a whole new way of seeing the world to show her. 

Nancy has so many emotional walls built up from years of repression and trauma, especially surrounding having and losing friends (not to mention, potentially, her own repressed queerness), but Robin despite her insecurities over her lack of filter and tendency to ramble and her other personal quirks manages to steal in past those defences. After that first encounter together, Nancy wants Robin by her side at all times. Even though she knows Steve, Dustin, Lucas and Max so much better, she picks Robin to come with her to Pennhurst, she asks Robin to explore the Creel House with her, she has Robin ride shotgun with her in her car. They stick together as a pair at every turn. 

This is so, so important: Nancy grows to like and care about Robin because of her being totally and utterly herself. The Robin whose mouth moves faster than her brain, the Robin who is relentlessly inquisitive and goofy and clumsy, the Robin who is at her most overtly neurodivergent around her. And Robin is slowly but surely finding confidence in herself and courage through that relationship, she’s taking risks she never would have before, and learning that her perceived flaws are actually strengths. When talking to Warden Hatch at Pennhurst with Nancy, it’s her runaway way with words that saves them and leaves Nancy incredibly impressed. The unmasked, unfiltered, beautiful gay disaster Robin Buckley is the person Nancy comes to admire and develops a deep fondness for. 

It’s been said many times before, but Robin and Nancy complete each other. As we’ve just established, Nancy quickly becomes a source of reassurance, inspiration and affirmation for Robin. And Robin is someone who can keep up with Nancy’s laser-focused fixations and faced-paced thinking, who can challenge her to consider things she never would have otherwise. She also encourages Nancy to be more honest with herself and makes her feel at ease at a time when she’s more lost than ever. Robin is always carefully reading Nancy and respects her opinions and feelings; she’s the friend and confidant Nancy has been missing in her life all this time since losing Barb.

When they’re talking in the woods, it’s not what Robin says about Steve or Jonathan that Nancy latches onto. What truly takes her aback is the realisation that Robin considers them to be friends, and both quietly, bashfully blush and smile to themselves at that confirmation. However adrift Nancy might be from her complex feelings over Jonathan and Steve or her unhealed emotional scars, she’s found an anchor in someone. However insecure Robin might feel about herself, she’s found a girl who she doesn’t have to pretend with.

And then we come to perhaps the most revealing scene of the season so far: when Eddie, Steve, Nancy and Robin are on the boat over Lover’s Lake. The parallels to Tammy Thompson are evident as Robin stares at Nancy who can’t pull her eyes away from Steve, and the way in which the camera focuses on the two characters in the frame imparts so much more than Robin simply being happy for the rekindled feelings of her friends. Her longing expression breaking into a soft smile and the bowing of her head feels like the sad acceptance of something she believes to be unattainable for her. 

Nancy demonstrates her trademark reckless abandon to protect the people she loves when she dives in to rescue Steve without hesitation after he’s pulled under, but Robin’s reaction is gut-wrenching as she cries out Nancy’s name and reaches for her. And then Robin, who beneath her snarky facade is far more scared than she likes to let on, pushes down those fears and without wasting a second moves to go after her with a sense of resigned determination. The framing of this scene, the dialogue and Maya Hawke’s performance make it clear that Robin is willingly following Nancy Wheeler into hell. As Eddie says, that’s as sure a sign of true love as these cynical eyes have ever seen. 

Regardless of whether the romantic subtext is intentional or this relationship is supposed to remain strictly platonic, Nancy and Robin’s blossoming friendship is a very special one. Having swiftly dismantled their presumptions about one another, they’ve found true synergy, inspiring and pushing each other to be the best versions of themselves. In spite, or rather because of their differences, the two are slowly but surely forging a profound bond that is already one of the most charming and memorable on the show to date, and with any luck, we’ll get some meaningful and moving payoffs to their arcs together in Vol 2. Perhaps, through each other, Nancy and Robin will finally find the closure, catharsis and connection they’ve been yearning for. 

Thanks so much to @meanlesbianrobin for providing the accompanying screenshots! 

[tinygwemlin]

PSA

[tinygwemlin]

December Writing Challenge: MSR Ficmas // Day 28 - Huddle for Warmth

She keeps trying to convince herself to turn around and go back home as her car heater blasts uselessly in her face while she drives through the dead DC streets.

Going to Mulder's place isn't the only answer to being cold, she tells herself, Turn the heat up. Put warmer socks on. Add another blanket atop your comforter.

But she's already tried all those things tonight. She can't get out of her head how much she aches to be snuggled against him, warm and safe with her face pressed into that perfect notch in his collarbone. She doesn't know when it happened, but she's reached a point where she never sleeps so well as when she is lying in his arms. She misses him, has only recently allowed herself to embrace that sensation and do something about it.

And that's why she is driving to Alexandria in the dead of night on a Tuesday.

As soon as she pulls into a Visitor space in his parking lot she feels a sense of peace and familiarity at the sight of his building. So many movie nights, casefile discourses, sleepovers, even the occasional booty call. Hegal Place has become just as familiar to her as her own apartment #35.

She uses the stairs so he doesn't hear the ding of the elevator, toes her sneakers off before she's even fully in the door. She knows it's probably unavoidable, but if she can somehow manage to keep from waking him--

"Scully?" A soft call from the other room, "Babe, you okay?"

He appears in his bedroom doorway, sleepriddled but awake and rubbing his eyes. Though sex is the furthest thing from her mind she can't help but notice how the curve of his soft penis gently bulges the crotch of his sweatpants, how his biceps fill out the sleeves of his V-necked tee shirt. He's such a beautiful, loving man, and she feels the immediate flush of contentment and safety she always experiences when she sees him at this time of night.

God, she's got it so bad.

"I'm so sorry I woke you. It's cold in my apartment and I...missed you," she whispers, even though the two people in the apartment are both awake, "I can't get warm tonight."

He sniffles quietly and wordlessly stretches a hand out toward her with the sweetest smile, curving his muscled arm around the back of her neck and steering her toward the bed. She feels herself relax at the sight of his tosseled sheets, the untouched pillow beside his mashed one that seems to say, "ah, there you are, was wondering when you'd come by".

She's barely pulled the covers over herself with a comforted moan when he's wrapping his strong, downy arms around her and cuddling her into his chest. Her eyes roll back into her head with sheer pleasure at being held, and she feels something within her calm.

"When you're my wife you won't have to drive across town if you wanna snuggle," he's teasing her, but there's also something else there...she feels as if he's testing waters with her. They haven't talked about details yet since he gave her her ring, knowing him he's probably wondering if she's having second thoughts. Truth be told, the ring hasn't left her finger since he slipped it on in her childhood bed that breathless Christmas night.

The word forever used to scare her. Now she can't wait for it to begin.

"Or when I wanna wrestle," she teases back, and she pecks him on the tip of his nose. She feels him relax, his nose nudging hers as he softly seeks her lips out in the dark. She sighs into his kiss, feeling so happy and content she could burst.

"Good night, baby," he murmurs tenderly.

[tinygwemlin]

i’m not sure how to do all the fancy stuff with showing rating, category, etc

but here’s a fic i’ve been working on for a long, long while (too long tbh)

based around the idea of — what would happen if blanche never dropped the bottle, and what if bedelia were to find her?

[tinygwemlin]

just remembered i’m a lesbian. what a relief

[tinygwemlin]

“ i’ve often felt that dreams are answers to questions we haven’t yet figured out how to ask. ”       ♡ happy birthday, fox mulder ♡

[tinygwemlin]

[tinygwemlin]

not me disappearing from here for literal months

[tinygwemlin]

thank you @blanchedxbois for the tag!!💕

here are 10 of my (current) favourite songs, not in any order

Particles — Nothing But Thieves

Ship to Wreck — Florence + The Machine

Blood in the Water — Joanna Jones as The Dame

Bad Company — Yonaka

This Side of Paradise — Hayley Kiyoko

Hung Up — Madonna

Habits (Stay High) — Tove Lo

Arsonist’s Lullaby — Hozier

Jealous Sea — Met Myers

Angry Too — Lola Blanc

tagging @danascully77 @mulderandsculls @theskepticalredhead @gillian-scully

[tinygwemlin]

[tinygwemlin]

going through feels bc of that last line of dialogue and wondering if there are any fics based off of it

[tinygwemlin]

Oh no, wait, you first. It could be the lemon-lime.

[tinygwemlin]

Mulder’s apartment “Nisei”

[tinygwemlin]

Mulder and Scully in “Plus One” (11x03).

[tinygwemlin]

“I need a father, I need a mother, I need some older, wiser being to cry to. I talk to God but the sky is empty.”

— Sylvia Plath, from The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

[tinygwemlin]

[tinygwemlin]

Rewatching Orison, shame traps are laid for Scully from the outset. Early on, Mulder says only “nutbags” believe God acts through human beings. If it wasn’t divine retribution that possessed her to pull the trigger, she is either a fool or a murderer. Worse yet, Scully’s last line implies she fears she was seized by “the devil’s instant,” overcoming evil by brushing wings with it, liberation through transient but permanently altering union; transcendent horror.

The editing for the scene shows Scully entering, hollow-eyed. There’s no sound but that of ears ringing as the camera cuts to shells falling, a barrel being emptied, a chandelier exploding, and Scully loosely holding a gun. Scully’s body was strangled, thrown into glass, beaten, bound, gagged, and shoved in a closet. Scully’s body fought back and struggled free with rabidity. Scully’s body did not register the threat as apprehended. Scully’s body protected itself by carrying out the one goal it could comprehend as means for survival. Only when the scene cuts to black do we hear the retrospective gunshot. She is returned to herself, resuming the place that neither god nor the devil had occupied, but rather pure animal instinct.

Pardoner turned executioner, what she cannot answer is where the out-of-body actions of repeatedly unavenged victims stand under the law or the eyes of god. Justice by one measure is injustice by another. Scully’s perception of herself as a communicant with perversion and a harbour for evil is not new. She was afraid of it as early as Beyond the Sea. So many Scully-centric episodes are about her suspicion that there is something deep down wrong with her. In Orison, Mulder can only offer his own lack of judgement; Scully is left hanging with the severity of her own.