Chapter Text
SANSA
“It’s true!” Robb protested.
“Neither of us doubt it’s true,” Jon smirked.
“What we can’t believe is how you get yourself into these situations,” Sansa added.
It was baffling to her, truly. If she had been asked in high school who the first of her and her siblings would be to get married, she would have said Robb without hesitation. It wasn’t merely that he was the oldest, though of course that did come with its own set of expectations. Rather it was because of who Robb was.
Robb had always been, well, Robb. He was their father’s heir, varsity everything, mostly APs, full ride though he didn’t need it. He’d dated a girl really seriously in high school and everyone had thought there’d be a proposal some time in university, but Catelyn Stark had gotten her way (as she usually did when it came to her eldest child) and that had quietly ended the summer in between his sophomore and junior years. After that there had been a string of Theon-induced nightmares, but by the time graduation came around he had been straightening his tie, ready to start in his office at Stark industries.
Ten years later, he’d moved into a corner office and a gorgeous loft downtown, but he was still getting into trouble with Theon and dating girls he shouldn’t.
It wasn’t that she expected everyone to be like her and Jon. They had gotten together her freshman year of college and had known from the first instant that they were going to spend their lives together. That hardly ever happened. She just thought that it would happen to Robb.
He said that he wanted it to, but his actions suggested a different story.
“Bit-“ Robb started and she glared at him. He grinned, “Girls be crazy.”
“Not all girls,” she argued.
“If we can’t use that then neither can you,” Jon told her.
She laughed, “Fine. I’m just saying, clearly there are women out there who for instance wouldn’t change every girl’s name in your phone to hers. Including your sisters.”
“Well in her defense she didn’t know your and Arya’s names,” Robb pointed out.
Jon shook his head, “Well then why the fuck does she have access to your phone?”
She raised her eyebrows at Robb who had to concede the point, rolling his eyes and nodding.
“Are you going to finish this?” Robb grabbed her plate.
She pushed it towards him, and glanced at Jon who was looking Robb over. They had grown up as close as brothers, and still were, but his influence had waned since they’d gotten married. It wasn’t that they didn’t see each other, they did all the time, but Robb and Theon were both single so it was different.
She didn’t think she was a particularly possessive wife, but she couldn’t help that she and Jon liked spending time together. The last time he’d gone out with Robb and Theon he had been sick for three days and had made her promise that she’d think of some awful excuse so that he could blame the missus the next time they invited him. They spent a lot of their time on their own or with her family or with other couple friends of theirs, like Sam and Gilly.
According to her siblings, all of this behavior meant that she and Jon were ‘smug marrieds’. Anytime they tried to give advice at least one sets of eyes would roll because apparently the fact that she’d met her husband when she was still in her crib meant that she didn’t understand the woes of modern dating. Which thankfully she didn’t.
But she knew enough to know that Robb wasn’t going to meet his wife at work or in an after-hours club at 4 am.
“Do you actually want to be with someone?” Jon asked.
Robb looked at him, “What kind of question is that? Of course I do.”
Jon shrugged, “Because you want to or because your mom wants you to?”
Robb ran his hand through his russet curls, “Honestly, a little bit of both. Why?”
“Because you’re somebody who has succeeded at everything you’ve ever attempted and you’re failing fucking miserably at falling in love,” she answered.
“Harsh,” Jon coughed.
“Well he is!” she protested then looked at Robb, “Look Robby I just… you say you want to settle down and get married and have kids and that’s great but it’s also okay if it isn’t what you want. You don’t have to do those things. But if you do want to do them, you’re not going to do it the way you’ve been acting.”
Robb sighed, “I know but I work ninety hours a week. The only girls I meet organically are ones that I meet out at night. It’s not like I have time for a pottery class.”
Jon chuckled, “Damn there goes that foolproof path to love.”
She giggled and Robb smiled, so she took the opportunity to suggest, “Maybe it’s time to think about getting some help.”
Robb winced, “Like a matchmaker?”
“No like your sister because I actually do meet lovely women all the time, and since I know you and your tastes better than anyone-“
“Back up,” Jon interrupted. She looked at him, there was mirth in his charcoal eyes in spite of the crease in his brow, “You do not know him better than I do.”
“Is that a joke? Like before I get annoyed, honey, I need to know if you’re having a laugh,” she told him.
“The use of honey kind of mitigates the threat, doesn’t it?” Robb asked Jon.
Jon sighed, “No, unfortunately.” Robb chuckled in surprise and Jon said, “But no, baby, I’m not having a laugh. I’m his best friend, I know who he got his first boner for, I know him better than you do, it’s not even a contest.”
“Oh my mistake!” she threw her hands up for, “You know who got his perverted 11 year old self all hot and bothered? How could I ever trespass on something so deep and profound?”
“If you’re going to discuss my middle school erections I feel like I should get to eat dessert,” Robb interjected.
“Grab the plates,” Sansa told him and she went and grabbed the crisp she made with the late summer berries and early fall apples. “Do you want ice cream with this?”
Robb glanced at her like she was crazy and Jon pointed out, “I wouldn’t have had to ask. It’s in the BOND.”
“Well ice cream is in the FREEZER,” she waved him towards it.
Jon brought the vanilla ice cream over and for a few moments they just settled into dessert. Robb got up and put on a kettle for tea as Jon cut them all portions, commenting on how good it smelled. She nudged her foot against his and he looked at her and gave her her favorite crinkly-eyed look, rubbing her calf gently. Robb got them all their tea of choice. Earl Grey for him and Jon, lemon for her.
Though she loved spending time with all their siblings and her parents, she liked when it was just the three of them. There was an easy to everything, a coziness.
And every time Robb brought a girl around that ease was disrupted. Either the girl got annoyed because she didn’t understand their inside jokes or would go the other route and be overly familiar, which was a pet peeve of Robb’s. She was lucky if one of them offered to help with the dishes and anytime they’d go to the powder room she or Jon would say noand Robb would nod and they’d never see her again. Gilly liked to say that they would never think any girl was good enough for him, which wasn’t true, but Robb deserved the best. Or at the very least someone with basic table manners.
As Robb waited for the water to boil, the dogs lined up and he fed them leftovers.
“Don’t you want a nice mom for Grey Wind?” she asked.
“Low blow, Sansa,” Robb grinned, scratching his dog underneath his chin, “What do you say boy?”
“Obviously Grey Wind wants a super hot mom,” Jon noted. “And Uncle Jon is going to find one for him.”
“You literally work with all men and any time a woman speaks to you you get so nervous that it constitutes as cheating that you turn into a complete ass,” Robb informed him.
“Ha!” she grinned.
“Not so fast,” Robb warned, “You are a total snob and intimidate girls for fun.”
“I do not!” she argued. Both Jon and Robb looked at her in disbelief. She held her head high, “If they can’t hold their own that’s their problem.”
The guys chuckled and the kettle started whistling so Robb poured water into each of the mugs. He brought them over steaming and sat down, scooping up some crisp and some ice cream. He smiled a closed lip smile as he chewed.
“It’s so good,” he informed her.
She shrugged, “Nan’s old recipe. Come on Robb! What are you afraid of? Would meeting the love of your life really be so terrible?”
Jon nodded, “Maybe we can even find one who won’t hack your phone.”
She giggled and Robb rolled his eyes but smirked, “I mean, it would be a good way of testing which one of you knows me better.”
She and Jon determined that no actual prize needed to go to the victor because the ability to lord it over the other was more than sufficient. After that they moved onto other topics of conversation, one of Robb and Jon’s favorite: Arya, and what the hell they were going to do about her. They were almost as bad as her mom. Besides, Arya at twenty-seven was doing just fine. She wasn’t settled but she didn’t want to be.
Robb stayed another hour or so and then thanked them and left, taking Grey Wind with him. Ghost and Lady sat at the door, waiting for them to return until she urged them to come into the living room with her while Jon cleaned up.
She checked her work emails and then picked up her latest needlepoint project, which was going to be a pillow for her Dad’s office. Lady laid with her head in her lap and Ghost went to the stone in front of the fireplace and was asleep within moments.
She must have nodded off as well because when she opened her eyes, Jon was gingerly removing the needle from her hand.
“I don’t want you to poke yourself or Lady,” he told her and she let him take it and put it and the canvas and thread back in the bag.
She made a grabby hands motion at him and he sat down on her other side, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and petting Lady’s head with his other hand. Their dog made the satisfied near purr that she reserved for him, and Sansa turned and burrowed her face in his warm neck, making a similar sound when he started to play with her hair. She twisted more fully, lifting her legs carefully so as not to disturb Lady and lay them across Jon’s lap, wrapping her arm around his torso.
“She changed all the names in his phone to her own,” Jon mused. She giggled into his neck and he held her tighter, “I told him once that was how he’d know.” She lifted her head off his shoulder to look at him and his eyes crinkled at her as he tucked her hair behind her ear, “I told him he’d know he’d found the one when her laugh was his favorite sound.”
She crumpled and leaned her forehead against his, relishing the feel of him and the smell of him and the absolute certainty of all of it.
“No wonder they call us smug marrieds,” she teased though and he chuckled. She closed her eyes at the sound and realized he was right. She beckoned it again by saying, “And don’t think just because you’re lovely I’ll go any easier on you.”
He pulled away from her and looked at her solemnly, “If you go easy on me I’ll feel betrayed. That’s not who I married.”
She grinned, wrapping her arms around his neck, “You’re right.”
“About more than that,” Jon mused, looking at her smugly, “I told you we could distract him enough that he wouldn’t notice you didn’t have any wine.”
She smiled, placing her hand on her still flat stomach, “We’ll tell him soon. We’ll tell all of them soon. I just want it to be ours for a little while longer.”
Jon grinned, covering her hand with his, “Who knows, by the time this baby comes around maybe they’ll have another auntie, too.”
“Oh they will,” she mused, cooing at the baby, “Because mommy’s going to take care of everything.”
“She exaggerates,” Jon said at her stomach, before pulling her towards him and catching his favorite sound on his lips.