Children hold onto familiar things. For some, it's a blanket, or a stuffed toy, or a favorite piece of clothing. For Robin, it was books. Curled in a chair and desperate for touch, she pushed her head against the spine and inhaled the familiar scents of old paper, ink and dust, wondering if her mother was smelling the same thing. Even alone, she had the scholars reading alongside her, history holding her hand through grievances and triumphs, and the mother she never knew guiding her stained fingers along the lines.
And later, when her mother's shadow could no longer guide her, Robin could not quite let go of books. Nights provided comfort in shelter and concealment, but days became steadily more difficult. Under the harsh daylight, she would still press her nose into a book. Breathe in, breath out. It was the only way to get by, day to day. If she dared to close her eyes for but a moment, she could almost pretend that she was back in Ohara. Home, where such small misdeeds had once seemed so unbearable.
Thoughts of home soon dwindled, yet she still clung to the few familiar things trickling between her fingers, holding her while the sand surrounding her filled her, choked her. Ink-black coffee, the printed word, the darkness of Crocodile's eyes-you did what you had to do to survive, and if that was it, she would do it. Slowly, the longing to live was being swallowed by a different longing, to rest, breathe, stop.
On the Thousand Sunny, this all stopped. When she closed her eyes, she could smell the ink of the newspaper, Nami's maps, Usopp's drawings, but she did not think of Ohara, of home.
Because, she realized, when it came to homes, she had found hers at last.