♡It must be love♡
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Hi cutie pies, this is my first post on here and first time writing, so I don't really know what I am doing! But any notes or even criticisms are very welcome. I hope you enjoy x
Word count: 1.7k
Content warning; Female Reader who has hair, no other physical descriptions of reader.
Summary; The moment that Robby realizes he loves you.
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The shrill buzz of his phone shattered the silence of the bedroom. Robby groaned before he had even opened his eyes, blindly reaching across the nightstand for his phone until his fingers wrapped around it. The screen glowed painfully bright in the darkness.
Jack: Need you in early. Explain when you get here.
Of course. He scrubbed his hand over his face, exhaling slowly before glancing beside him. You were still asleep. One leg had escaped the blankets some time during the night while the other was hopelessly tangled in the sheets. Your face was buried hallway into his pillow, stealing more than your fair share of it, hair sprawled in every direction. One hand was tucked beneath your cheek, the other stretched lazily across the mattress, your finger tips rested against the place he had been lying only moments before.
You let out the tiniest sleepy huff, the kind you always made when the room changed around you without quite waking. His mouth twitched into an unconscious smile. He had only noticed that sound a few weeks ago. Now he couldn’t imagine living without hearing it.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, mostly to himself. Carefully, he eased himself out of bed, moving slowly enough that the mattress barely shifted beneath your weight. He had managed to escape without waking you, or so he thought. The dresser drawer gave its usual traitorous creak. Behind him came a quite mumble.
“Robby?”
He closed his eyes for a second.
“Damn.” Turning, he found you blinking at him through barely open eyes, your voice thick with sleep.
“Sorry,” he said softly, “didn’t mean to wake you.”
You pushed yourself onto one elbow rubbing at your face before squirting towards the clock that you couldn’t possibly read in the dark.
“What time is it?”
“Too early.”
That earned a sleepy little laugh that dissolved into another yawn. He pulled on a clean shirt and you watched him for a moment.
“Everything okay?”
“I got called in.”
The change in your expression was immediate. Sleep still clung stubbornly to you, but concern settled in just beneath it.
“Called in?” you asked quietly. “Is everything alright?”
“Probably just short staffed.”
You frowned.
“I can come with you.”
He looked over his shoulder.
“What?”
“I’ll come.”
“You’ll come?”
You nodded once, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. Something in his chest tightened.
“You’d voluntarily leave a warm bed before sunrise?”
A sleepy shrug.
“I don’t mind.”
He laughed quietly, shaking his head.
“No.”
“No?”
“You are absolutely not getting up.”
“But,”
“You need sleep.”
“So do you.”
He couldn’t argue with that.
“Yeah,” he admitted with a crooked smile. “Unfortunately the emergency department didn’t ask for my opinion.”
You made a face that pulled another laugh out of him. He crossed back to the bed and crouched beside you. Gently, he brushed a stray strand of hair away from your face.
“I’ll survive.”
“You promise?”
“I promise.”
You searched his face for another second, as though trying to decide whether he was telling the truth. Eventually, you sighed.
“Okay.”
Satisfied, he gripped your hand, pressing a gentle kiss to your knuckles.
“Go back to sleep.”
Your fingers wrapped loosely around his wrist before he could stand.
“Drive safely.”
“I will.”
He squeezed your hand gently before easing it away. Almost immediately, you curled back into the blankets, stealing his pillow again without even realizing it. He smiled to himself as he grabbed his keys and wallet from the dresser.
“Robby?”
He turned. Your eyes hadn’t really opened.
“Wear your glasses.”
He blinked.
“What?”
You yawned, words soft and slurred together.
“It’s still dark, wear your glasses when you drive,”
Your voice faded into another sleepy sigh.
“You forget when you’re tired.”
Before he’d even found the words to answer, you were asleep again. Your breathing evened out within seconds. A tiny snore escaped you. Barely audible. Followed by another little sleepy huff as you burrowed impossibly deeper beneath the blankets. He stood completely still. You probably wouldn’t even remember saying any of it when you woke up. There’d been no dramatic declaration. No long speech. No “I love you.” Just a sleepy reminder to wear his glasses. Because you’d noticed he sometimes forgot them after long nights. Because somewhere along the way, you’d quietly memorized the small things.
His grip tightened around his keys. Something inside him shifted. Not suddenly. More like the final click of something that had been slowly falling into place for months. Just two people stealing whatever time they could between impossible schedules and exhausted mornings. You’d never asked him for promises he wasn’t sure he could keep, and he’d never asked where this was going. Somewhere along the way, he’d stopped wondering.
He thought about the coffee that somehow always appeared beside him before he’d realised he needed it. The protein bars you’d slipped into his work bag after catching him skip breakfast one too many times. The way you never asked him to talk after a difficult day, but somehow always knew when to sit beside him in silence instead.
None of it had ever been grand. Just little things. Quiet things. The kind of care that never asked to be noticed. And now, a sleepy reminder to wear his glasses. Such a ridiculously small thing. But no one else remembered things like that. No one else knew he left his glasses on the kitchen counter half the time when he was running late. No one else had quietly collected all the little pieces of him that even he forgot about. He’d spent so long taking care of everyone else that he’d forgotten what it felt like to have someone looking after him. You did. Without keeping score. Without making a fuss. Just because it was him. His eyes drifted back to the bed.
His chest ached. Not with fear, but with certainty. Somewhere between the late-night takeout after an impossible shift, between falling asleep to the sound of your breathing, between you quietly making space for the life he never thought anyone could fit into, you had become his constant.
The person he looked for first. The one he wanted to tell about his day. The one he missed before he’d even left. He tried, briefly, to imagine what his life would look like without you in it.
The thought landed in his chest like a punch. Empty. Too quiet. Wrong.
It wasn’t casual anymore and maybe it hadn’t been for a long time. Maybe he’d simply been too afraid to call it what it was. A smile found him anyway.
He loved you.
You’d rolled onto your stomach now, one arm flung across the empty side of the bed as if searching for him even in your sleep. The sheets were wrapped around one ankle, trapping you in the same ridiculous way they always seemed to. He crossed the room one last time. Carefully, so carefully, he leaned down and pressed a kiss into your hair.
“I’ll wear my glasses.”
A smile spread across his face before he could stop it, his glasses already perched on his nose before he even reached the front door.
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The apartment was quiet again. The soft click of the front door had drifted into whatever dream you’d been having, becoming part of it until. Your eyes fluttered open.Grey morning light seeped through the curtains, painting pale lines across the ceiling. You blinked sleepily. The bed beside you was cold. Robby was gone.
You rolled onto your back, pulling the blankets higher around your shoulders. There was still a faint warmth on his pillow, and it smelled like him. Soap, coffee, and whatever impossibly clean scent always seemed to cling to his scrubs.
You smiled to yourself. Your mind was already beginning to drift back toward sleep when something tugged at the edge of your memory.
A feeling. Gentle and warm. You frowned slightly. Then you remembered. A kiss. Not on your lips. Not the lazy, sleepy kiss he always stole before climbing out of bed. No. On your hair. You could still almost feel it. So soft you weren’t even sure you’d imagined it. Your fingers lifted unconsciously, brushing the spot he’d kissed.
He’d never done that before.
You lay perfectly still, thinking. When this had started, neither of you had wanted anything complicated. You both worked impossible hours. You both had your own life. There hadn’t been rules. No labels. No promises. Just stolen evenings, takeout containers balanced on his coffee table, and falling asleep tangled together whenever your schedules happened to line up. It had been easy. Comfortable. Casual. Hadn’t it? Your eyes wandered around his bedroom. Your charger was plugged into the outlet beside his bed. A sweater you’d forgotten weeks ago was folded neatly over the chair instead of shoved into a drawer. There was an extra toothbrush sitting beside his. He kept your favourite milk in the fridge now because he knew that’s what you liked in your coffee. Somewhere along the way the lines had blurred. You couldn’t remember when his apartment had started feeling like somewhere you came home to instead of somewhere you visited. Or when reaching for your phone after a long day meant reaching to text him first. Or when hearing about something funny automatically came with the thought, I can’t wait to tell Robby.
You’d fallen into each other’s lives so quietly that neither of you had seemed to notice.
Until that morning. Until that kiss. It didn't feel casual. It felt tender and careful.
Your chest tightened. You closed your eyes, replaying the moment in your mind. The brush of his lips against your hair. The way he’d whispered, I’ll wear the glasses.
The warmth in his voice. Your stomach flipped.
You loved him.
Not because of one kiss. Not because of one night together. But because somewhere between waiting up for him after late shifts. Laughing over burnt toast on the rare mornings you had together. Learning how he took his coffee without asking. He had quietly become your favourite part of ordinary days.
You laughed softly to yourself, burying your face back into his pillow. That complicated things. A smile tugged at your lips anyway.
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