Summary: All Robin Grimm wanted in life was to get through one AP English Lit class without a single hitch. But the Exalt boy sitting behind her had other plans. Now they're the infirmary, stuck in each other's bodies. Could this day get any worse?
A/N #1: Thanks to AStampedeOfChickens for Beta-ing! This is definitely in no way inspired by the first few chapters/episodes of Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches. Nope, not at all.
Huh? What was going on? Was she dead? Ouch. Her head was pounding. No, she wasn't dead. Robin didn't think dead people felt pain. She struggled to open her eyes.
Ah! It was so bright. She squinted her eyes. Why did everything look so blurry? And the colors were wrong. Why were the colors wrong?
And she was sore. Her body felt tense. Robin stretched her arms out. WHAT?! Since when were her arms this pale? And muscular?
She bolted upright. This was just some stupid dream right? She would wake up in her cozy bed any time now. She pinched her cheeks hard. Nothing.
Robin shook her head and looked around. What happened? Why was she in the school infirmary? It seemed to be empty. To her left were several empty beds. To her right was another bed, this one occupied.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHH!" she screamed in a voice that wasn't her own.
Because the person lying there was…herself?!
English was Robin Grimm's first period. Not that she minded much. Usually she enjoyed Ms. Tiki's, the narcoleptic AP Literature teacher, class, despite her rambunctious classmates or when their teacher slumped over in slumber while they were reading aloud. But there were days that she absolutely despised the class. Thanks to her favorite classmate.
Ding! Ding!
Oh. There was the bell. She shuffled to take her notebook out of her backpack, noticing that one of her shoelaces had become untied. Cursing under her breath, Robin was about to bend down to retie it, but she ended up being distracted by Ms. Tiki, who started going through the attendance in her soft voice.
Bam! The door burst open suddenly.
"Sorry I'm late, Ms. Tiki. There was a lot of traffic on the way here," a boy huffed, somewhat exhausted, most likely because he had to run up a flight of stairs to get to class. Served him right for being late!
"That's alright, just take your seat."
There he was. Chrom Exalt. His messy blue hair and matching eyes made practically every girl swoon. He wasn't the worst looking guy out there (okay fine, she had to admit he was aesthetically appealing, but nothing more!). And he was smart and athletic too. Life wasn't fair, honestly.
He sauntered in the classroom like he had done nothing wrong. And officially he hadn't. It wasn't as if Ms. Tiki was going to mark him tardy. Their teacher was far too nice for her own good. Couldn't she tell that if she never marked any of them late that certain people would take advantage of that?
Chrom plopped down into the seat behind her. Curse random seating charts. Robin sighed. If they had been seated in alphabetical order, they would have had several people in between them. And if they had the opportunity to choose seats, she'd pick the one with farthest from him!
"Hey, did I miss anything?" he whispered loudly to her.
"No," she replied curtly. "Just attendance."
Robin heard his desk creak as he leaned back in the old, plastic chair. She quickly returned her attention back to the front of the room. Ms. Tiki was just beginning to explain a newly assigned project. One that none of them wanted to do.
"Ms. Tiki, are you sure about this? This is an AP Class after all," complained Miriel, a friend of Robin's and the biggest nerd in their grade. "Should we not be preparing ourselves by writing essays or annotating classic literature?"
"Yes, Miriel, I'm sure. There are still months until the test and I feel that this project will give you an opportunity to explore the themes of Hamlet in a creative way," Ms. Tiki explained calmly. "Besides, the administration wants every teacher to assign at least one group project this year."
A group project? This was going to be terrible. Who would she even want to work with? Miriel? Sumia? Cordelia? Lon'qu? Henry? Robin shook her head. No, Sumia and Cordelia would probably want to work together, or even try to convince Chrom to join them. Their crushes weren't exactly subtle, after all. And Lon'qu probably wouldn't want to spend more than a few hours around her. Man, his fear of women really sucked at times like this. Like the time she needed notes from her chem class two years ago. She'd been absent one day and the only person she was even moderately close to in that class was Lon'qu. It had taken forever to convince him she wasn't going to defile his notebook with her womanly guiles or something. She wondered if Ms. Tiki would let them work with the other periods. Robin was sure she could rope her twin brother into doing the project with her.
"And to make things easier for everyone, I have decided on partners for everyone! Everyone will be in a pair. I always hated it when the other kids left me out of projects because I was sleeping through the instructions," Ms. Tiki delivered the news her students had dreaded.
She went around the classroom handing kids a grading rubric with their name and their partner's name written on it. Luckily for Robin, Ms. Tiki had started on the side opposite of where she was sitting. Because it was every student's dream was to be the last to know who'd they be working with.
The students wandered around to find their partner after being handed their paper. She mentally prayed to the probability gods that whoever she got would be someone reliable. Hopefully one of her friends. But one by one, Robin watched as they were gobbled up by another student. By the time Ms. Tiki reached her, Robin was almost sure that she had been cursed by the same gods that she had prayed to.
Name: Robin Grimm Partner: Chrom Exalt
Of course it would be him. Who else would it have been? Robin could have sworn Ms. Tiki winked at her as she walked past her to give Chrom a nearly identical piece of paper.
The only comforting thought she had was that apparently Chrom actually did his work in group projects. And that he was really smart. Except when he wasn't. Which was about ninety-nine point nine percent of the time.
"So, partner, what do you want to do?" Chrom asked plainly.
"What do you mean?"
"Like do you want to do a paper or a poster or what?" he sighed. "I thought I'd have a competent partner for once."
"Excuse me? We just got this project. How am I supposed to decide on something so fast?" she protested, whirling around in her desk to face him, waving her hands a bit too wildly.
"Jeez, calm down. I was just, uhm, joking."
"Hmph, sure whatever."
"Seriously," he said, getting up. "But we could just not do it. I'm feeling really lazy right now anyway. You think Tiki'll let me go to the bathroom or something?"
Robin knew that Chrom was just saying things to annoy her or something. He never said anything like that to any other girls, which made her extraordinarily angry. And pissed off. She just couldn't help but want to blow up at him. What had she'd ever done to this idiot to make her the only one he didn't flirt with? Not that she wanted him to flirt with her or anything.
"Hey, wait a minute!" she exclaimed, pointing a finger at him. "You can't just ditch. Ms. Tiki's not that dumb."
"I never said I was going to ditch," he said, but then paused for a bit. "But that sounds like a good idea. Why don't you come with me then? I'll tell her we're going to go 'brainstorming' or something."
"W-what?! No. I'm not ditching. Especially not with you."
"Suit yourself," Chrom shrugged, walking away from her and towards their teacher.
Robin jumped out of her desk and quickly followed him up to the front of the room. She couldn't just let him go off and meander around school!
"Oh, Robin," Ms. Tiki acknowledged as Robin approached the pair. "Chrom here was just going to ask me something. This is about the project then?"
She was going to tell the teacher of Chrom's true intentions (at the risk of being labeled a snitch, of course) when the jerk himself butted in.
"Yeah. Actually, I was wondering if we could go outside, since it's so noisy in here. It might actually help us with our project since I–uh, we were thinking about doing something that involves the school grounds."
"Oh? That sounds like a great idea! A scavenger hunt or something maybe. I trust that two of my best students will be on their best behavior then."
"Of course," Chrom flashed her a smile before heading towards the door.
Robin eyed his departing back and followed, thanking Ms. Tiki and waving to her friends, who probably didn't notice. She had to quicken her pace to catch up with Chrom, who paused near the stairway near the entrance of their classroom.
"What do you think you're doing?" Robin angrily whispered, afraid to be caught loitering in the hallway.
He shot back, "What do you think you're doing? I was just going to ask to use the restroom. I had to make something up since you just followed me up there like an idiot."
"You were going to ditch!" Robin started towards him, making him back up a little, hands raised.
"I was not! You just assumed I was. I actually need to take a piss! I was asking you to come with me as a joke."
"A joke? What kind of joke is that?."
"Yeah a joke. You know, something funny? But I guess you wouldn't get it."
"EXCUSE ME?"
"Seriously," he sighed, sounding exasperated. "It would be a lot better if you'd try to get along with me."
"Maybe it's because you're such a jerk to me," Robin said, her voice rising, stalking even closer to Chrom, who backed up as much as possible. "But you freaking flirt with every other girl in the school."
He looked insulted, "I don't flirt with anyone."
"You'd flirt with anything that wears a skirt EXCEPT ME!"
"All I was doing was being nice," mumbled Chrom.
"Nice my ass," she spat at him.
"I'm serious."
"Then why aren't you ever 'nice' to me?"
"Uhm, about that. I can explain." He ran a hand through his hair. "Well I—"
"Oh my gods, don't do that it's so annoy– ahhhhh!" she took another step closer to Chrom but she suddenly lurched forward, tripping over her untied shoelace. Damn, she meant to tie that.
"Hey!" he yelped as Robin fell on to him. Chrom managed to catch her before she hit the ground. "Man that could have gone a lot worse—"
The last thing she saw before everything turned black was the shocked expression on Chrom's face as they fell down the stairs.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Robin touched her chest. Flat. She rubbed her new(?) hands over it a few times to make sure. She didn't even want to think about what was below that. She fumbled around for a phone that should be somewhere on her body.
She found one in her front right pocket. She quickly opened it, hands shaking, and flicked to the camera.
"WHAT THE—" she threw the phone across the room instinctively where it landed on the floor with an almighty crash! She hoped it didn't break.
Robin drew her legs up to her face and brought her arms around it. This was not happening. This was not happening. She rocked back and forth. This isn't real. It can't be real. Nothing like this happens in real life. It's just a dream. She didn't somehow become Chrom, of all people, after they had fallen down the stairs together.
And where the hell was the nurse? Shouldn't she be here? Didn't anyone hear her terrified screams?
The Other Robin (she guessed it had to be Chrom in her body, after all, he couldn't have just died or something) began to stir. Crap, what was she going to do? Hide? No that was stupid. Pretend to be asleep? Play dumb?
"Urgh," she (he?) groaned, rubbing her (his?) head. "What happened? Where am I?"
"HUH?!" she (he?) shrieked. "What's wrong with my voice?!"
Robin just slunk down in her bed. She didn't know what to say anyway.
Other Robin (Chrom, she told herself) looked down confused at his hands and experimentally poked at his chest. Wait a minute did this count as sexual harassment?
"WAIT IS THAT ME?!" he squeaked. "DAMN THIS VOICE! Wait a minute, I know this voice…"
How did he even notice her? She must've moved when she realized that she could press charges against him. THAT WAS HER BODY HE WAS TOUCHING! Wait, no. That wouldn't work, since he was currently her. Or in her body. Or something. Robin honestly didn't know what was going on.
"I got it!" He snapped his fingers. "I'm Robin! Wait, I'm Robin?! Oh gods, that means..." He blushed.
"That I'm you, uh, I guess?" She awkwardly sat up.
"WAIT YOU WERE AWAKE THIS WHOLE TIME? WHY DIDN'T YOU SAY SOMETHING YOU PERVERT!" He crossed his arms over his chest and turned away from her, before laughing.
"This isn't the time for jokes, idiot. You're not some anime character," she said, exasperated. "This is serious. "
Chrom shrugged. "This is all a dream, isn't it? Who cares."
"Urghhh," she pulled at her hair. "It's not. I wish it was. I accidentally threw your phone across the room too."
"MY PHONE!" He scrambled out of bed to retrieve it. "Oh thank God it's not cracked."
"THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE WORRIED ABOUT? NOT THE FACT THAT WE'RE SOMEHOW IN EACH OTHER'S BODIES?"
Chrom ruffled his hair and laughed nervously, "What do they say again? Live in the present? Or something."
She glared at him so he continued, "Okay, okay. I just heard some rumors about weird stuff happening to people around school. So if it's not a dream those rumors gotta be true, right?"
"Rumors?"
"Yeah," he nodded. "One time I, uhm, overheard my sister talking to her girlfriend about something like this. Emmeryn mentioned that someone tripped her and made her crash into Phila, who's her girlfriend by the way. Then the entire day they could feel what the other felt. They could tell if the other was unhappy or angry, or if the other was in pain. I don't know how they got back to normal though, 'cause they caught me listening."
"Like an empathy link? That's so cool—wait." Robin had to blink several times. What? That couldn't be true. That was ridiculous. Why hadn't she ever heard of anything like that before? Wouldn't that be all over the school? "No way, that shouldn't be possible, why should I believe you?"
"There's no real reason," Chrom shrugged. "Just that there's no logical explanation."
"I—" Robin began, trying to come up with something to retort. She couldn't think of anything. "Fine. Give me my phone, it should be in one of the front pockets."
He nodded and found the phone easily. Chrom held it out for her, and she was about to reach out to grab it when she froze.
"Uhm, Chrom, do you remember how you needed to use the bathroom earlier?"
"Yeah what about it? Don't you want your phone?"
"What if I need to go now?" she whispered nervously.
"Mother F—"
After what was possibly the most awkward moment of her life, they returned to the main room of the infirmary. And the nurse was still missing.
"What time is it anyway?" Robin wondered. "What are we even going to do the rest of the day?"
"Ditch?" he smirked, but continued when she glared at him. "I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I guess we'll just have to go through it as each other then."
"I'm supposed to go around pretending to be YOU?"
"What else do you want to do. If you have any better ideas, I'd like to hear them."
"Hmph. Whatever. We'll just that. We have to figure all of this out after school though. There's no way I'm spending the rest of my life as you."
He ignored her jab. "Do you think the nurse is coming back soon? I do actually get out of here."
"Why? You want to go to class?"
"Good point. Uhhh…"
"Don't you dare say ditch again."
"But I'm bored," he whined. "You know what, I'm just going to leave. And not go to class." Chrom started to head out the door.
"Wait up!" she followed him. ""You can't go out there and walk like that. No girl walks that way."
"How else am I supposed to walk? And it's not like you walk any better in my body," he pointed out.
Robin huffed, "Maybe walk around like there's nothing between your legs. Which there isn't."
He paused. "Yeah, well maybe you should walk around like THERE IS something between your legs. Oh wait."
"Do you think I like having—" Chrom put a hand over her mouth. Which was a surprising feet since he was now a lot shorter than she was.
"Shhh. Someone's coming. Act natural."
Natural? She was in someone else's body and she was supposed to try to act natural? She pulled out her phone. Okay, yeah, it wasn't that hard. Thank gods for modern technology.
The blonde nurse walked in, surprised to see the two up and out of their beds. She immediately began to coo over them. Robin gave her a brilliant smile and told the nurse that they were both fine from the fall. The Nurse, or Natasha as she insisted they call her, wanted to keep them in for a few more periods, but they both insisted they were able to go to class. After a few more minutes, the nurse reluctantly gave them a hall pass. Robin politely thanked the nurse for all she had done before all but running out the door.
"What should we do now?" Robin asked Chrom as soon as the nurse was out of earshot. "According to the time third period started like ten minutes ago, so I guess we should go there."
He looked at her like she had grown an extra eye or something. "After all of this, you still want to go to class?"
"Don't look at me like that, it'll be weird if we didn't go to class the entire day after leaving the infirmary."
He groaned. "Fine, whatever. Thank Naga we have both third and fourth period together. We'll figure out what to do for fifth and sixth period at lunch or something."
"You're still walking funny, you know. And since you're wearing a skirt, make sure not to flash anything. Gods, that would be embarrassing."
"Don't worry, I think I got the hang of it." Chrom skipped around in a lame sort of impression of her walking.
"You look like a six year old playing pretend princess. Calm down."
"Hmph. Like you can do any better."
"Watch me," she said as she swaggered down the hallway. Perfect.
"Not bad. You know, if I was the biggest asshole in the school AND I was looking for a fight."
"Isn't that how you always are?"
He wasn't amused. "Ha-ha. I think that's you. Just stop looking so cocky and it'll be passable."
"Yeah, yeah, whatever lets you sleep at night. Hurry up. We're gonna be late."
"We're already late," Chrom pointed out. "Actually we're probably close to being truant."
"Gods, stop being annoying. And walk faster!"
"We have a hall pass, idiot. Besides who wants to go to physics?"
"Hey! AP Physics is a fun class." Still, Robin slowed down. "Wait. What about our friends?"
"We don't tell them, duh."
"No, not that. I mean we can tell them we fell down the stairs and that we were in the infirmary and stuff. But like, how do we act around them? They're bound to notice something's off."
"Oh. Right. Uhm. We both have amnesia?" suggested Chrom.
"That's not a lame excuse at all."
"What else are we supposed to do then?"
"Just go with the flow? Maybe keep quiet or something? Better than nothing, I guess," suggested Robin. "Not like they'd believe us even if we told them the truth."
He nodded. Robin noticed that his gait seemed more natural now. Maybe if someone looked closely they would notice that the walk seemed kind of forced, but she doubted if anyone would. It wasn't as if people went around everyday switching bodies.
They soon arrived in front of the Physics Lab. Which, if she was being honest, wasn't all that far from the infirmary in the first place. They both walked in at the same time, Chrom handing the teacher the note that the nurse had given them. He plopped down in the front seat where Robin normally sat. She had to resist the urge to go to the front of the room, and instead, slunk down to Chrom's seat in the back of the classroom.
"So," a spiky, muscular blond regarded her. "What are the deets."
Vaike, right? His plain white t-shirt looked as if it was threatening to break over his muscular frame. It was rather disgusting, actually. Well, it could have been worse. He could have been topless.
"What do you mean?" she replied in the best impression of Chrom's nonchalant tone that she could muster.
"You know. You and Robin. You guys were gone for like two periods." He waggled his eyebrows.
"Yeah, Blue," Gaius—her sweet loving ginger friend—agreed. "You don't just disappear with a girl and not tell us about it."
"I was in the infirmary. We fell down the stairs during first."
"Sure, sure. Whateverrrrr," Vaike grinned.
Cordelia turned back to glare at them for being so loud, her long red hair whipping wildly around. Or rather she glared at Gaius and Vaike. And gave her a flirty look before turning back to the front with a blush. It was weird to be on the receiving end of her friend's affections. Everyone, except for Chrom maybe, knew that Cordelia had a thinly veiled crush on him. It was still kinda creepy though.
Well, Robin sighed. She guessed she could at least take some notes. She shuffled through Chrom's backpack to find some notebook paper and a pencil. At the very least, she didn't have to talk.
Robin smiled uncomfortably, wondering how it would appear on Chrom's face. It probably still looked good, she thought bitterly. Curse his good fortune in the genetics lottery. She had just waved goodbye to a rather pompous girl with blonde ringlets who had been, up until just recently, talking to her. She had no idea how Chrom survived the onslaught of girls that swarmed him every day. In fact, she began to pity him.
"H-hi Chrom," Olivia greeted her shyly.
"Hello, Olivia," mustered Robin. "How are you today?"
Olivia was a friendly, if rather shy, dancer with light pink hair. Robin wondered if she had dyed it or if it was natural, but either way she had to say that it looked fitting on the petite girl. She had also thought, once or twice, about asking the girl if she had any tips for hair dying. She always wanted teal hair. Platinum blonde had always been boring to her.
"Oh, uhm, I-I'm good."
"That's good. Your shirt's really cute today," she complimented. If only she could ask her where she'd got it. But she was pretty sure it wasn't something Chrom would say.
Olivia blushed, "Oh, uhm, thanks. It's new, actually. From that shop that just opened in the mall."
"Maybe we could go there sometime together," she said absentmindedly. That shop probably carried really cute dresses, and she needed more of those.
"W-w-what? I-I'm sorry, I don't know if I can do that! This is all too sudden."
Crap. She didn't mean to say that. At least she didn't accept the date, that would have been hard to explain to Chrom.
"Oh. No, no. I didn't mean it that way. I meant it would be nice if we could hang out with our friends at the mall together."
Smooth Robin. She'll be picking up girls in no time. Wait, she didn't want to be picking up girls for Chrom. He could do that himself. That annoyed her for some reason.
"That sounds like fun. I'll think about it," Olivia giggled. "Anyway, see you later, Chrom."
"Bye, Olivia," she waved. She slumped her way through the hallway, heading towards her fourth period. Which was Calculus. Which she luckily had with Chrom.
"Hi Chrom, are you heading to Calc right away?"
"Oh, hi, Sumia. Yeah, I am."
Sumia was normally one of her closest friends. The two of them (and her brother, on occasion) practically haunted the library after school several days of the week looking for books to read. However that didn't change the fact that she was pretty sure the brunette like-liked Chrom. And that Robin was pretty much Chrom at the moment.
"Did you do the homework yesterday? I swear these derivatives are getting harder. But that's no problem for you, is it?"
"Uhm, no. Ha-ha. I guess not. I did do the homework this time though." She had honestly no idea if Chrom did his homework or not. Oh well.
"That's good. But really. Just because I like baking pies doesn't mean I like solving equations with pi in them," Sumia shook her head lightly.
Robin chuckled, still unused to Chrom's low rumble, "That's almost as bad my br—I mean Reflet's puns."
The brunette blushed lightly, but responded indignantly, "I'm not that terrible. How dare you say that."
"Because it's true?" Robin smiled coyly, leaning her arm on top of Sumia's head, nearly toppling over because of her new height.
"Hey!" Sumia swatted Robin's arm off of her. "Only Cordy and Robin are allowed to do that. Just because I'm short!"
Oh. Crap. Right, she was supposed to be Chrom. "Uhhh…"
They reached the classroom door, but Sumia gave Robin a pointed look, "You're not trying to make Reflet jealous are you? You know how I feel about that!"
"What?" Robin tried to ask. What did her brother have to do with this? Jealous?
Sumia giggled, "Just kidding, anyway we should get to our seats."
Sumia skipped towards her desk in the front, next to Cordelia and Chrom in Robin's body and began to talk excitedly to them. Cordelia (Robin knew for sure) happened to have a crush on Chrom. The two never really seemed to acknowledge that they liked the same guy, or maybe they just never noticed. Robin guessed the girl really was a hopeless romantic. And if Robin couldn't tell from the girl's book tastes, she definitely could tell now. And what was Sumia saying earlier? Something about Reflet? Robin was very confused. She opted to shake her head clear of thoughts and slumped to the back of the room.
Robin sighed for the millionth time today, dropping Chrom's bag at the foot of his desk. She sat down and placed her head in her arms. Was there any way she could interact with any girl without being flirty. Or without getting Chrom a date. Well, more like dates. That was going to be a problem. Robin groaned, rather loudly. How was she supposed to know everything that would come across as a nice gesture from a girl would come out as a smooth, flirty line from a good looking guy.
"Whatcha doin' there Chrom?" a gruff voice asked.
She recognized this voice. "Go away Sully. I don't want to talk to any more girls."
"Hah. I thought I was one of the guys. Is it Robin again?"
She looked up at the redhead, whose spiky haircut was eerily similar to Vaike's. Sully was chewing gum and constantly popping bubbles. It was true that she'd often hang out with guys like Chrom and Stahl but Sully had always just another girl to her. Robin wondered if Chrom also thought that she was one of the guys. Sure she was physically as tough as any of the boys, but she never acted down her feminine characteristics either.
"Huh? Just because you hang out with us doesn't make you a guy. You're a lovely girl," Robin voiced her thoughts. "But what do you mean, Robin again?"
"Yeah? You think so? I'm pretty sure none of the other guys think like you do," Sully popped another bubble.
"Well, I think of you as a girl as much as I think Olivia or Cordelia as a girl. Which is about one hundred percent girl. Just because your hair's short and you act tough doesn't make you any less feminine."
Oh, crap. She got carried away again. She mentally slapped herself. Focus. She needed to know what Sully meant by "Robin again." That and she needed to stop getting Chrom more dates.
"Oh yeah? You think so? That's awful nice of you." Sully's cheeks seemed to redden.
"Of course. But what did you mean by 'Robin again'?"
Sully looked at her funny but didn't get to respond as the teacher started to lecture. Robin put her head down. Should she risk sleeping? Today was only a review on derivatives, anyway. And it wasn't like anyone was going to care. Besides, she felt that Chrom never paid attention anyway. Speaking of Chrom, she saw him diligently taking notes as herself in the front of the classroom. True to her nature, he had sped off from the Physics lab to be the first to fourth period. Guess he was a better actor than she was.
Robin yawned. Then again, sleeping in class was totally Chrom's style. And it seemed like his body was used to a nap around this time. Whatever. If she got detention, Chrom'll probably be the one to serve it out anyway.
"Five more minutes, mom," Robin murmured, before she felt a pain in her head. "Ouch! What was that for?"
She looked up to see herself angrily staring back at her. Right, she was in Chrom's body and he was in hers. She stretched her shoulders. Her stomach turned a bit uneasily. Maybe she was getting hungry?
"Yeah, what is it Ch–uh Robin. Where'd everyone go?"
"Gone. The bell rang, it's lunch now. You promised we'd talk more about the Lit project now. Besides you shouldn't be sleeping in class, you know," he said amusedly.
"S-shut up. It's all your fault."
"Why, were you dreaming of me?" Chrom mimed a swoon.
"You know I was beginning to pity your sad existence, but I take it back. Not talking to you for two periods was pretty great."
Chrom pouted and rolled his eyes in a way that reminded herself of, well herself. What an ass.
"Aren't you a morning person? Let's go."
"What, you got a hot date or something?"
He laughed awkwardly, shaking his head, causing one of her pigtails to droop. "You're funny. Like I'd be able to get you a hot date."
"Hey," she pointed out. "Your hair's falling apart. You should fix that."
"Huh?" he reached a hand up to his hair. "Oh. Damn. I don't know how to tie one of these."
Robin sighed, finally standing up. "Fine. Come here, I'll do it for you."
He bit his lip, but walked towards her. She quickly took apart the white-blonde "tail," and brushed out the tangled portions. Robin carefully began to fix the hair back up into its natural place. She felt her heartbeat increase for some reason.
"Awww you two are so cute together! Now get the hell out of my classroom."
They both jumped to attention, faces red.
"Mr. Gangrel, sir. It's not what it looks like," Robin rushed to explain.
"Honestly, sir, we're not dating or going out or anything," Chrom backed her up.
"Pft, like I care about your social lives. All I want is my classroom back."
They muttered apologies as they walked out the door.
Mr. Gangrel chortled heartily, "HAHAHA. Well have fun at lunch, lovebirds." He slammed the door in their faces.
"Someone fire him, he's clearly insane," Chrom grumbled.
"Tell me about it," Robin huffed. "Let me finish fixing the pigtail. Gangrel interrupted before I could tie it up properly."
He nodded, and Robin tied up his hair tightly, to make sure it didn't fall again. She smiled and stepped away from him when she finished. They both froze when they heard voices behind them.
"Oh my gods, Chrom and Robin are together? I thought she hated him."
"I thought so too. Sigh, I was hoping to ask Chrom out eventually. He's so cute."
"Shit," she whispered to Chrom. "What do we do now?"
"Let's go off campus. You have an off campus pass, don't you? This way we can avoid our friends too."
"Yeah of course. Sounds like a good plan," agreed Robin, who began rushing towards the school's entrance. "Besides, I'm starving. Having a huge body absolutely sucks. Are you always hungry?"
"Unfortunately," he flashed her a grin. "Now you can't call me a pig every time you pass me in the cafeteria."
"Please," she flashed Chrom's id card at the security guard at the gate. "I can call you a pig for other reasons. So where do we go now?"
"Burgers?" he suggested. "Just a few blocks down."
"Sure, why not? I'd go for one. Or two. Or three."
Chrom laughed. "I know how you feel. Alright, burgers it is."
"So is this what you do on dates?" Robin asked Chrom, nonchalantly munching down on a burger.
"W-what?" he quavered. "What do you mean?"
She swallowed. "Wait, so you don't go out on a lot of dates?"
"Why would I?"
"Uh, well, I may or may not have gotten you several dates, some for sure and some will probably ask you later on. They all seemed to think I was flirting with them."
"YOU WHAT?" Chrom screamed. "But I—"
"You what? Ooh, does whittle Chrommy have a whittle crush on someone?"
He blushed, "It's none of your business. And I told you. It's hard to be nice without being flirty at the same time."
"Well you're always mean to me."
"Uh, well you see," Chrom coughed, ruffling his hair. "Uh, you scare me so much that I don't know what to say?"
"Hmph. I'm not that mean," she said, chomping down on the burger.
"Trust me, you are," he shot back. "It's better now that I'm you, though. We can actually talk without arguing!"
"I guess you're right this time." With another bite, she stuffed the rest of her food in her mouth.
Chrom rolled his eyes. "You done yet? We should be going soon." He glanced at the time on his phone. "Crap, we gotta go."
She felt Chrom grab her hand and pulled her quickly out of the fast food joint. "Hey! What do you think you're doing?"
He glared at her, continuing to drag her along. "I'm trying to get us back to school on time."
"You didn't have to be so rude about it."
"What's with that attitude?" huffed Chrom. "And jeez, work out more, it hasn't been five minutes and your body is already tired."
"Not everyone is athletically as gifted as you are. Cut me some slack."
"We're going to be late if you hadn't noticed."
"It's not like I can make my body any faster right now can I?"
"My legs feel like jelly, this is all your fault. Literally," he complained.
"Do you expect me to carry you or something?" she suggested sarcastically.
"Yes." She stared at him blankly. "What?" he continued, "I'm pretty sure you could lift me while you're in my body. You're like, what, fifty pounds?"
"God, that's not the point. I'll have to touch you."
"Well actually you'd be touching yourself," he said as he waggled his eyebrows. "And it's not like we have anything to hide."
"If it didn't look like abuse I would punch you right now," Robin threatened.
"How about you carry me instead, pleaseeeeeee? I'm so tired."
She blew out a breath of air. "Fine, but I'm dropping you off right before we get anywhere near the school."
"I love you," Chrom blurted out before blushing. "I mean, platonically. Like I'm so glad you're carrying me and I'm so grateful and, uhm, yeah. Stuff. "
Robin didn't reply, and instead picked him up and threw him on her shoulder. Much like a burlap sack. Fitting. Her stomach felt funny, though. Maybe she had too many burgers.
"Ahhh! Let me go!"
"You told me to carry you," she replied bluntly.
"I didn't mean like a sack of potatoes!" he whined. "This isn't comfortable."
"Shut up, at least I'm carrying you. Like you said, we're going to be late."
When they arrived at their school, Robin dropped Chrom, who fell flat on his back. Most of the students were gone, and only a few stragglers left in the halls. She didn't hesitate to dash off to her fifth period. She skidded to a halt in front of the psychology room. Robin composed herself, congratulating herself on not being late, before walking through the door.
Once she had walked into the classroom, Robin realized she made a huge mistake. She went to her fifth period. Not Chrom's. In her rush, she had forgotten that she was in Chrom's body AND that he didn't have AP Psychology with her.
"Chrom?" Reflet—her twin, her own white haired twin, asked her. He was looking at her with a peculiar face. "What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be in your fifth period?"
"Uhh…" She ruffled her hair, something she must have somehow picked up from Chrom. "I was looking for Robin?"
Her brother narrowed his eyes, "She should be here, but I haven't seen her since we got to school in the morning. Why are you looking for her anyway?"
"N-no reason. Anyway, I should be getting to class. Haha. See you," she said. "Sorry for interrupting," Robin added as an afterthought.
She quickly ran out of the room, embarrassed. She had no idea what Chrom had fifth period. She didn't even have his phone number. Should she just ditch? Somehow sneak back into AP Psych to listen to the lecture?
Lost in her thoughts, Robin accidentally bumped into someone, who let out a loud squeak. She apologized, hoping that she didn't sound flirty again. She held out a hand to the girl on the floor.
It was her. Or more specifically Chrom. She retracted her hand. He didn't deserve her help. She did momentarily feel a pang of guilt, if that counted for anything.
"Hey! Aren't you going to help me up? You knocked me over! Not that I need help."
"Lay off Chrom, that's a terrible impression on me. You can get up yourself," she said, still annoyed at what had just happened.
"Oh come on, you're such a tsundere, don't even lie."
"And you're a weeaboo, so shut up. You didn't even tell me what your fifth period was!"
"Well, I would've told you, but you dropped me and ran off. It's not my fault," he argued.
"This wouldn't have happened if you had told me earlier. You're such an idiot."
"Yeah, yeah, call me what you like. Just listen up. I have Comparative Politics fifth. It's the same room as the AP U.S. Gov. class is. Then, just head up to field for sixth. I've got football practice, but just check in with Frederick. It'll be fine, I'll talk to him about it once we've got everything sorted out," Chrom explained.
Robin nodded. "Right, uhm. I have AP Psych right now. Room 208. I may or may not have ran in there as you. Also my brother is in that class, just to tell you."
"Yeah, I know," he interrupted. "Sorry, go on."
"Right, you two are friends," she rolled her eyes. "I have AP U.S. Gov. sixth. I didn't know that we had Comparative Politics."
"We usually call it AP NSL. You probably know it as that."
"Hmph. Whatever. I guess I have to hurry, it's practically all the way across the school," she bemoaned. "Not that I won't be able to make it."
"Okay, see ya," Chrom gave her a lame two fingered peace sign and a wink, before skipping off to Psych. Her heart skipped a beat. From her hatred of his sheer stupidity.
She didn't give him a response. Instead, she hurried off to the government classroom. She wondered how Mr. Walhart was going to react. That man had a strict no tardies policy.
Which was the reason why Robin was so surprised when the man said nothing when she walked in a full seven minutes late to class. Mr. Walhart just lectured without pause while Robin took Chrom's seat—or what she assumed to be his seat, since it was the only empty desk left in the room. She sat down next to Sumia, who didn't even look her way.
"You okay, Sumia?" she whispered, concerned about her friend.
"Huh?" She glanced at Robin. "Oh, I'm fine, Chrom. I just, have a lot on my mind, I guess."
"You seemed fine before fourth," she blurted out. "Sorry Sumia, that was kinda mean of me."
"It's fine. You weren't there,but something happened in the library with Reflet—"
"Ahem," Mr. Walhart interrupted. "Next time either of you breathe a word aloud, you'll both have a detention slip in your hand faster than you can say sorry."
The two nodded their apologies, fearful for their lives, and shut up for the rest of class.
Robin felt dead. After what possibly the most boring lesson she had ever experienced (which was saying something, since she generally enjoyed every single one of her classes), she had to trudge through the muddy fields to find Frederick, as Chrom told her to do. Frederick was the scary brown haired muscular dude that Chrom hung around with, right?
"FINALLYYY," she said, letting out a tired smile out once she saw the brunet and several other boys milling around the field. They were all dressed in acceptable workout gear, except her. Oops. In her defense, Chrom never told her to change.
"Uhm, hi?" She gave a little wave, while the others glared at her. What did she ever do them?
"You guys start first, I'll talk to Chrom and then head out to meet you. No slacking, okay?" Frederick addressed them.
The guys nodded, some still giving her looks. Frederick led her aside, but didn't say anything.
"So, uh, Frederick, can I go?" she smiled nervously. "I technically checked in, right?"
"Why are you so happy today?" Frederick said, a bit too solemnly for her liking. "You weren't present in second period. Or lunch. And now, you're not ready for practice."
"Happy? I'm not happy!" Robin protested.
"You're carrying yourself differently. Like something's been lifted off your soldiers? Did something happen with Robin?"
"Wha-what?" Frederick must have mistaken the differences in the way Robin carried herself in Chrom's body as him being…happier? He was one of the most optimistically cheerful people she knew! Wait, what exactly did he say? "R-Robin? What's with everyone and thinking it's got something to do with Robin. First Sully, now you."
Frederick gave a low chuckle, "Don't deny it. You've been doing that for years, but we all know you like Robin. Something must have happened during that tumble down the stairs." He looked at her gaped mouth. "Vaike told me."
"I-I don't like Robin," she blushed. "N-no way."
Chrom…liked her? As in had a crush on her? Fancied her? There was no way. Why was her heart fluttering so much? And her stomach knotting itself in tangles. Everyone was just insane, she decided.
He gave her another look. And damn, were they scary, as if he was staring down intoher very soul. Which was very not Chrom, at the moment, thank you very much. Robin resisted the urge to shrink away.
"Come on, Chrom. You talk about her all the time. When she says even one word to you, even if it was an insult, you'd be ecstatic the entire day. The worst part is that you don't even know how to act around her!"
She sputtered. Some things started to make sense. Like how Chrom wouldn't tell her who he liked or that he couldn't act "nice" around her. Still…she couldn't believe it.
Frederick continued, "So I'm going to excuse you from practice, just this once. I know something happened." He slapped her on the back, hard, causing her to almost topple over for the second time that day. "Go get 'em tiger."
Robin kept protesting, but he didn't take any of it. Instead, he walked towards the group of exercising guys. Guess she had to go confront Chrom, now. They had to figure out what to do about the whole body switching thing, anyway. She couldn't wait to get out of his body.
Robin checked her phone. 2:56. Four more minutes. She didn't know if she could even last one more minute.
She was currently loitering outside of Mr. Walhart's room (again), waiting for Chrom, in her body, to get out of class so she could confront him. There were butterflies in her stomach. From worry, of course.
How had Chrom even develop a (metaphorical) crush on her anyway? The first time they met, he had run straight into her with his lunch tray, spilled his food on her, and insulted her. Something about there being better places to nap than on the ground. From that point on, she disliked him, and when he showed up in most of her classes, she had vowed to beat him on every test in every class. Robin even refused to talk to her brother for days when she found out that Reflet had become friends with him.
But if she hated Chrom so much, why did thinking about him make her feel tingly? She shook her head violently to clear her thoughts. It was probably his body being stupid. She had never felt this way before, and she wasn't going to start now.
The bell rung. Students started to pour from the classrooms. Robin tried to look disinterested, while keeping an eye out for white-blonde hair. It was harder than it looked.
"Robin," she addressed Chrom when he walked up to her. "Can we talk?"
He furrowed his eyebrows, "Uh, sure? I mean, whatever."
She lead him across the school to the top of the stairs they had fatefully fallen from earlier that day. It was empty. All of the other students must have already left.
Chrom looked at her, quizzically. "Are we going to fall down the stairs again? Honestly, I'd rather not."
"That idea did come to me, but that's not really the reason. To be truthful, I couldn't think of any other place where we could be really alone."
"Are you kidding me? We're in the middle of a freaking hallway, what makes you think we can be alone?"
"Whatever. I won't tell you why I dragged you all the way up here then," she crossed her arms in defiance.
"You mean," Chrom said slowly, "so we can figure out how to switch bodies again? Isn't that obvious?"
"Stop asking so many questions! But that's not it."
"Then what is it?" he asked, annoyed.
"You like me," said Robin bluntly.
"W-what? No I don't. What gave you that idea?"
The tone of Chrom's voice wasn't very convincing, as much as she wished it would be true. Robin blushed, "Don't lie to me."
He sighed, "Who told you? I bet it was Frederick, wasn't it? He's always talking about it." He looked away, most likely in embarrassment. "Fine. I like you. And I've liked you for a while. Happy?"
"Not really." She glanced at his blushing form. "I just want to get out of your body. I've been feeling the weirdest things in your body. Like, every time I thought about you, I had fluttering sensations in my chest and stomach and shivers down my back! Like I'm always nervous! I want out."
"Uhm." Chrom looked confused. "You mean, like you're attracted to me?"
"I've never had that problem before today. I doubt I could fall for you of all people in less than a day."
"Now that I think about it," he mused. "I haven't felt any 'butterflies' or anything after we switched bodies. That might be why I can actually talk to you without saying something stupid."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
He shrugged, "I'm not really sure. Still, it would be nice, if we could talk about this after we find a way to switch back. See, it would probably be better if I went home as myself."
"I guess you're right," she conceded. "Should we try falling down the stairs again?"
"If there's no other way, we have no choice."
She nodded grimly. "On the count of three?"
"I'm ready when you are."
"One, two, three…"
With a tumble and a crash, they rolled ungracefully down the flight of steps. Robin took a particularly nasty hit to her head. But while the blood pounded in her head, she realized she was still Chrom. They hadn't switched back.
"What? I guess it didn't work," Chrom dejectedly groaned. "Are we going to be stuck as each other forever?"
"No. Don't give up. Let's try again," she encouraged.
They ran back up the staircase. And they took the plunge down, once more. And again. And again.
"It's not working!" she moaned. "All I'm getting are bruises."
"Maybe we have to fall on top of one another," Chrom suggested. "Since that's what happened this morning."
"Anything's good, so why not?"
The pair marched up the stairs with much less enthusiasm than before. Neither of them were interested in any more injuries.
"So, uh, how do you propose we do this?" He ruffled his hair, which had fallen out of its normal pigtails.
"You'll fall in to me, since I would rather not crush you."
"Good thinking." He quickly moved into position. "Ready?"
"Ready. One, two, three…"
The duo toppled down the steps once more. But this time there was a huge difference. This time hurt hell of a lot more. Probably because she took the brunt of the fall for both of them.
"Damn, that hurt," she muttered.
"Sorry," Chrom apologized from above her, his hair making a curtain around her head. "I didn't mean to land entirely on you."
Their faces were inches from one another. She felt her heart beat faster than it had ever before. Why was this happening? No. No. She had an urge to do something stupid.
Chrom didn't even make a move to get off of her. That made it even worse. 'Fuck it,' she thought.
Robin leaned up and brought her lips to his. She briefly saw his eyes widen before closing her own. His lips were really soft. Wait. Or were those her lips.
Woah. Stop. She was kissing Chrom, of all people. Her first kiss happened because of what was probably (her temporary?) male hormones. She quickly pulled away. She opened her eyes to meet Chrom's blue ones below her.
Blue eyes? Below her? Huh? She looked down to see a shocked expression on Chrom's face. Robin stood up and checked herself out in the reflection of a nearby window. She was finally in her own body. She grinned broadly.
She cheered, reaching out and embracing the boy standing in front of her. She was so happy, so relieved that they had finally switched back. The shadows had seemed to grow faster than their progress.
Chrom cleared his throat, "So, uhm, does this mean you like me too?"
"I don't know," Robin admitted. His face went from hopeful to dejected almost immediately. "But," she continued, "I guess we could try it out. I'm not against it or anything."
She blushed as he hugged her again. He laughed happily. Robin smiled up at him. His laughter made her feel elated.
Robin felt something hit the top of her head with a tiny plop! She reached up to grab a small business card.
"Huh? What's that?" Chrom curiously prodded.
"I don't know, it just fell on top of me. Let's see," she began to read off the card. "'Welcome to the Club.' What's that supposed to mean?"
"Maybe there's something on the back?"
She flipped the card over. "'P.S. If you kiss and wish hard enough, you might just be able to switch bodies again.' Yeah, not helpful. Wait a minute, what—"
He interrupted her, plucking the card out of her hands. "I guess this means there really is something strange going on here. It would explain Emmeryn and Phila."
"Did you even hear what I just said?"
"Yeah, so how about we try it out?" he suggested wryly.
"No way, one kiss is good enough for me, lover-boy."
"Lover-boy?"
Robin smirked, "It's cute, isn't it?"
"No, it's not," he groaned. "This isn't how I imagined us getting together at all. Our first kiss wasn't even close to romantic."
"Wait, if our body swapping is connected to our kisses…" Robin trailed off, unsure. "Does this mean we kissed the first time we fell?"
"Son of a—"
~ Fin ~
A/N #2: Holy shit I finally finished editing this to a point where I actually feel I can post it. I swore to myself I'd post it before classes start, and wow am I cutting it close. Just a cute fluffy one shot that I may write spinoffs for if I feel like it. A chapter from Chrom's POV is coming up soon, hopefully within the next month, if I can stop playing Mario Maker for more than an hour or so after I rage-quit a stage lol.