reader that isn’t a bimbo? Reader that is put together and likes dressing up? Reader that’s older than 18-20? Reader that’s not white-coded??? Reader who doesn’t have daddy issues? Reader who does have daddy issues in a “man hater” way? Reader who’s taller than 4’11-5’0?? Reader who’s quiet and reserved and not in a robotic way or stuttering way? Reader who’s Tina Belcher coded? Reader who gives off the vibe of a creepy barn owl but somehow it’s endearing? Reader who’s charismatic and charming? Reader who’s-
Pairings: Dick Grayson x Reader (one-sided), Jason Todd x Reader
Summary:
Imagine Dick Grayson falling in love with you.
And it happened so slowly, so quietly, that he could believe he wasn't falling in love at all.
At least until he heard Alfred speak.
CW: Pining, unrequited feelings, reader has she/her pronouns
Imagine Dick Grayson falling in love with you.
It happened so slowly, so quietly, that he could believe that he wasn't falling in love at all.
It was in the little things, the way it always was.
The way his gaze lingered, when he was sure no one else can see it: at the line of your shoulders, and the way the tension would leave them as you laugh at whatever joke he made. At the gleam of intelligence whenever you find something interesting, at the way you would slowly piece together clues just as well as any vigilante.
(And he thought to himself that perhaps Bruce would have liked you.)
His gaze lingered, most of all, on the corners of your lips whenever you smile.
(Here, he should not have allowed himself to think about what it would be like to kiss you there. Whether you would laugh or smile into the kiss, and the sound would vibrate down to his chest or whether you would simply kiss him back.)
(He should not have allowed himself to think of dangerous things.)
(And yet he did so anyway.)
Imagine Dick Grayson falling in love with you.
And it happened so slowly, so quietly, that he could believe that he wasn't falling in love at all.
At least until he heard Alfred speak.
"You're a good man, Master Dick."
The old butler said it casually, in the same tone he would use to describe the weather or a particularly mundane bit of news. It looks like we're in for a spot of rain tonight. I heard that another criminal escaped Blackgate again.
You're a good man, Master Dick
Dick blinked, caught off guard for a few seconds. Looked around as if to remind himself where he was.
Movie night at the Clocktower. Rain falling softly against the rooftops, because the rain never stopped in Gotham. Barbara and Tim on a quick supply run for snacks.
And Dick.
Dick had been staring.
You had been laughing at something in your video game, and he couldn't help but think about how the sound of it warmed him from the inside out.
There was a smear of dried blood on your cheek. Your own, perhaps or someone else's.
(He was sure it wasn't yours. He had checked you for injuries as soon as you stepped into the tower.)
And all Dick could think about was how much he wanted to reach forward and wipe it away with the edge of his knuckles.
Dick blinked away the image.
(It was hard. God, it was hard.)
He fixed his own face into a smile. Relaxed, easy. A smile that was more reliable to him than his domino mask. When he next spoke, his voice was light, teasing.
"Now, what brought this on, Alfred?" he asked.
The old man didn't answer right away. Instead, he set the table in front of Dick. Fixed the teacups and the plates with the sort of meticulous care that told him that it was a question Alfred didn't want to answer.
First, the tablecloth, worn thin with age but still a gleaming white. Then, the platters of sandwiches. Smoked salmon sprinkled with dill. Thin slices of cucumber slathered with cream cheese. Slabs of grocery store white bread smothered in cheap peanut butter and cheaper jam.
The last one, Dick knew was for him. Alfred served it to him with an expression of distate, though the two of them had long learned to live and let live with each other's preferences.
"Thanks, Alfred," Dick said, looking down at the plate.
The crusts were cut off, the same way they were always were since he as a kid.
It was nice to know some things didn't change.
"Now, what's this about me being a good man?" Dick said.
His grin was real this time. Dick always was a sucker for compliments. And while Bruce was a miser when it came to them, Alfred was a little more generous.
Alfred glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. He knew that look. It was the same look the old butler gave him when he was nine-years-old, standing in the foyer of the Wayne Manor and swearing that he didn't know who broke the chandelier.
Or who ate all of the imported chocolates from France.
It was a look that said that Richard Grayson wasn't fooling anyone.
Except this time, Dick had incurred no property damage that he knew of, and he certainly hadn't eaten any imported chocolates in the past few days.
And yet, it always made Dick feel as if he did something wrong and that he should probably confess to it.
"Come now, Master Dick," Alfred said. "I may be old, but I'm neither blind nor deaf. And I'm sure if I started showing signs of dementia, you boys will be the first to tell me."
"What are you talking about?" Dick asked.
Alfred must have seen something sincere on his face, at least Dick hoped he did. A vigilante's life was so rife with lies that sometimes Dick worried that he wouldn't be able to look honest if his life depended on it.
The old butler pulled up a chair to sit across him, and Dick winced at the sound of metal scraping against stone.
"I'm talking about that little crush of yours. I'm talking about her."
(Dick didn't mean to think of you. Really, he didn't. But sometimes his thoughts rushed too fast for him to catch, like the shadows of fish darting underneath the waves of Gotham Bay. And suddenly, he was thinking of your laugh again, and the tension leaving your shoulders at a joke he made, and the corners of your lips and whether or not you would smile if he kissed you or if you would simply kiss back.)
"I don't know what you're talking about." Dick knew he said it too fast for it to be believable.
(He was thinking of the broken chandelier again, the chocolate wrappers he hid under his bed. He was thinking about how he had never been able to lie to Alfred his whole life.)
Perhaps it was this that made Alfred take pity on him, because he didn't aswer. Instead, he glanced across to the Clocktower to the corner you were sitting in.
With Jason.
You were playing with an old, borrowed Switch, and he could still see the dried blood on your cheek, and Dick thought that if it had been him, he would have wiped it away already.
But Jason was reading some horror novel or other, and he didn't notice. A traitorous thought wormed its way across Dick's head.
(Dick would have noticed.)
Another thought quickly followed on the heels of the first: Dick is an awful brother.
He looked away, stomach clenching so painfully that he wondered why he thought he was ever hungry in the first place. He pushed away his plate, feeling ill. The tablecloth wrinkled, the teacups rattled dangerously as if threatening to fall over.
"We do not get to choose who we love, Master Dick." Alfred's voice was already soft, low, and still Dick wanted to snap at him to keep his voice down.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Dick said again.
This time, it comes out through gritted teeth.
Alfred didn't look at him (and Dick felt a sharp relief in that, because he used the opportunity to steal another glance at you. And he felt a longing so profound that it was a wonder that Jason never saw it on his face).
Instead of answering, Alfred carefully rearranged the rest of the setting on the table.
Delicate porcelain cups, some chipped from long years of repeated use. Alfred's cup was decorated with smiley faces and childish scribbles. A red #1 was scrawled over its surface.
It was the only thing there that seemed less than professional.
Dick recognized one of the drawings as his: a blue robin drawn near the bottom.
He didn't mention it.
Instead, he watched as Alfred poured the tea.
First Dick, then his own.
Before Knightfall, and before the fire, Alfred used to make tea with herbs from the Wayne greenhouse, carefully picked and dried before being served on the table.
Dick recognized the brew by scent, if not by name. Lavender, chamomile, clove. A few other herbs he couldn't name.
He remembered that Alfred used to serve this whenever Dick came home after a long patrol, sopping wet and miserable, Bruce's criticisms still ringing in his ears.
He served it again when Dick and Barbara first broke up, the first of a string of on-again-off-again relationships before things between them finally fizzled out for good.
He served it the night of Jason's funeral, when the old man's hands had shaken so badly that the tea had spilled across the worn while tablecloth and nobody had bothered to clean it up.
(The thought again, like a knife twisting in his gut: Dick was a terrible brother.)
He took a deep breath, forced his voice to take on a lighter tone, as if his own thoughts weren't crushing him.
"There is nothing to talk about, Alfred," Dick said.
(Smile, smile so no one knows what's happening. Smile so they think that everything's all right.)
"There isn't…there isn't anything."
Alfred's face was impassive.
"If you say so, Master Dick," he said.
The old butler pushed the teacup towards him, just the same.
Lavender, chamomile, and clove. Some other herbs he'd never been able to name.
(Long nights on patrol.)
(The night he and Barbara broke up for good.)
(It had been, he remembered, a week after Jason's funeral.)
Dick tried again, fumbled through his words in a way that was unfamiliar to him.
"Even if there was, I don't…I couldn't…" He couldn't even voice his own thought.
(Some things are too terrible to say out loud.)
Alfred took a deep breath, sipped his own teacup. The blue robin gleaming at him in the dim light.
"I didn't say you were going to do anything, Master Dick," he said quietly. "I said that you were a good man."
Something in his chest caved, like the crumbling of loosened rocks, just before everything came crashing down.
"A good man wouldn't think about…he wouldn't…" His mouth felt dry. He swallowed and tried again.
And the words that come out next felt like broken glass. They cut him on the way out. "Jason's in love with her, Alfred."
Dick glanced at you, at Jason. And he did not miss the way Jason leaned his body toward you, the way he inclined his head whenever you spoke. When was the last time he had seen his little brother so relaxed?
"Yes," Alfred said.
He said in the same voice he used to call Jason a good man. Like it was the weather or some mundane bit of news. As if it was a truth so simple that it was barely worth mentioning.
Another sip. The tea was almost gone now.
"He looks happy, doesn't he?" Alfred asked.
And Dick looked. Really looked. You playing some video game on an old, borrowed Switch. Jason flipping through his book with the sort of forced casualness that told Dick that he was anything but.
The two of you in your own shared space.
And when Jason reached out to wipe the blood off your cheek, Dick's felt something bitter rise in the back of his throat.
(He was going to be sick.)
"Yeah," Dick said quietly. "He does."
A beat.
"He deserves it."
(Deserves her.)
Alfred didn't answer. Instead, he poured another cup. Stirred in the milk so slowly and so carefully that the sound of the spoon scraping against porcelain set Dick's nerves on fire.
"And yet," the old butler said in a slow sad voice. "You love her, too."
(It hits him like a knife to the gut: the simple truth of it. Jason was in love with you. And Dick Grayson was in love with you. And he was longing so badly to be in the space Jason inhabited that he could feel his soul half-hanging out of his body, the ghost of his fingers brushing the corners of your lips so that he can feel them curve upward when you laugh.)
"Yes."
He said it in a single breath, as if it had been punched out of him, the word exploding from his lungs. It should have been screamed, for all the damage it did to him. Instead it was whispered, like something shameful.
Alfred didn't answer.
Didn't even look at him.
"Shouldn't you be calling me out?" Dick forced on a smile, as if it was a joke.
(Smile, smile, smile.)
"Telling me what a bastard I am?" he continued. "I'm in love with my brother's girlfriend."
"Do you intend to do something about it?"
The question caught him off-guard. He could feel his smile slip, and suddenly, he was left defenseless.
"What, like steal her from him?"
Alfred took a sip. "Something like that."
For a moment, Dick let himself think about it. Tried to imagine himself beside you instead of Jason. He wouldn't be reading, Dick had never been much of a reader. Instead, he would be sitting beside you, playing whatever video game you had with you. Maybe you'd be laughing as you beat him, or pouting as he beat you.
Maybe you'd be sitting on his lap, and he hated himself as he thought about how perfectly you would fit against him.
He would have no trouble touching you. He would have no trouble wiping the blood off your cheek.
But then he thought of Jason.
Jason who never took off his helmet, until he met you. Jason, in a dingy donut shop, asking through gritted teeth what sort of flowers to buy you. Jason, who must have noticed the blood the same time Dick did, but spent forty minutes trying to force himself to touch you, because it would mean showing you the scars on his hands.
(And yet he did it anyway.)
Jason, who is finally learning to let himself be happy.
"No," he said.
The truth of it was not explosive, like before. It did not come screaming out of him. Instead, it settled in his gut as heavy as a stone, where he knew it will sit forever.
"Of course not."
Alfred looked at him, smiled over the rim of his cup. And Dick was reminded what the old butler told him before this whole conversation began.
A good man.
Perhaps he was.
Dick watched you quietly across the room as you laughed, as he watched Jason lean in just to hear you laugh, and his fingertips ached with the urge to trace the the upward curve of your lips.
But instead, he wrapped them around his tea cup. Took a sip. Let it warm him from the inside.
Jason has lots of scars. They’re littered all over his skin, some are a little pinker, indicating the freshness of some of his injuries. Some are larger than others, some straight, and some jagged. You drag your finger along each one on his back, taking the time to count them to yourself. You hold your breath when he goes quiet for a second too long. You resume your petting when his snores pick up at their regular intervals. He looks so pretty like this, with the sun has barely risen, the room still in that pretty blue shade. Limbo between day and night. Jason deserves the rest, but his strong arms around you aren’t enough, feeling your palm against his back slightly quells your neediness. Knowing you can be with him in this way. Watching him with his guard down, no yelling, just seeing him…peaceful. It’s more than lovely, it’s a privilege you wouldn’t trade for anything. You fall asleep again easily, maybe after the hundredth time of tracing every notch in his spine. You want to be intimate with every dip and curve of Jason’s body, even the obscure ones.
Jason is on a similar level of domestic voyeurism, if one can call it that. He wakes up with you drooling agains his skin, you’re shielded by his chest, the warm rays of light not reaching your eyes keeping you deep in dreamland. You’re not prim, nor proper, and he really, really enjoys that. The drool against your cheek, and the little extra roll under your chin because your jaw is slack. He smiles so wide the dimple in his cheek becomes increasingly prominent. He carefully shifts, pulling you a little closer to him, sliding his hand up the back of your shirt. He can feel your skin react with goosebumps, If you weren’t such a blanket hog his hands wouldn’t be cold, you sow what you reap baby.
“Ugh, Jay.” You grumble, no one could sleep through his cold, calloused fingers stroking their skin. “Ugh, Jay.” Jason mocks your sleepy tone, giving you some nice back scratches, from your shoulder blades all the way down your spine, then back up again. He can sense you’re upcoming cold shoulder, mocking so early in the morning usually is a bad decision, but he can never resist. He squeezes you before you can roll away. Jason cups your cheeks so hard your lips pucker. Perfect, now you have to shut up and accept his affection. Morning breath be damned. He smacks kiss after kiss until you’re trying to bat him away. “You’re crazy.” You say breathily, looping your freed arms around him. He’s successfully gotten himself out of the dog house. “Yeah, crazy for you.” He laughs at your reaction to his cheesy line, the way you scrunch your nose up, trying not to smile, so fucking cute. “You liked that? Ewww, don’t tell me you’re gettin’ soft.” Jason is teasing, with you, it comes easy. “Shut up, you’re the soft one.” You scoff, he grabs your hand, pressing it against his chest, and down his abs, even when he’s relaxed like this, his muscles are defined. Firm, you can feel each notch. “This is not soft. I’m a lean mean muscle machine.” He says, playfully giving you a knock to the chin. You laugh and he can’t resist kissing you again, your hand travels up his abdomen to his chest, you can feel the steady thump of his heart. Jason has had a lifetime of cruelty, but a lifetime of gentleness is what he deserves, you’ll do your best to provide it.
dividers by @cursed-carmine
a/n: i just know he snores, that septum deviated asfff
Call me sappy but. Affirmations while he’s dicking you down. Him holding you softly, tenderly, while he whispers the reasons he loves you in your ears. Him telling you that he adores you, that he loves you, that there will be no one else for him. Him telling you that you’re so beautiful, you’re perfect, while his hands dig into your hips, pulling you back into each and every one of his thrusts. He fucks you deep and hard— like he’s trying to pound the very evidence of his devotion to you into your body, so you never doubt it again.
We have to let Dick be more insane about the fact that Jason died and he wasn’t there. What do you mean he’s not twitchy anytime Jason leaves his line of sight when the Joker is out of Arkham??? What do you mean he’s not showing up in Jason’s apartment in the middle of the night because he had a nightmare about him still being dead??? What do you mean he’s not sometimes convinced Jason is a hallucination???
are you a “filters tags from my mutual’s new obsession” Tumblr user or are you a “learns about their new obsession (semi-forcefully) by osmosis” Tumblr user
hi everybody please reblog this and tell me your go-to coffee order right now and if you don't like coffee feel free to include your go-to tea order instead
jason doesn't say much else after becoking you or when he shows it to you, he doesn't generally say much at all. just lifts the black case onto the table, pops the latches and steps back like he's offering you a sacred relic. inside, nestled in foam cut to shape is a sleek matte pistol; compact, deadly and beautiful in its own brutal, violent way. he doesn't need to explain because you recognize the etched name before he even opens his mouth.
"it's you," he says simply, a light shrug accompanying it. "figured if anything was gonna keep me alive through all of this bullshit, it should be something that never misses."
you try to laugh - you want to, at least - but there's a weight that settles in your chest. it's not a joke, not really and if you laugh, what does that tell him?
"And here I thought romance was dead," you say, careful and with a small smile. you want to reach but you know better than to touch it. not without him actuslly handing it to you.
you glance between him and the case a few times. you've seen the way jason fights. reckless, calculated in his own way and always a atep away from death's door but never without purpose; he doesn't draw unless he needs to. now he's named one of his most trusted weapons after you and is presenting it like a trophy. not because he sees you as cold but because you're the one thing he trusts to never fail him; the one thing he'd draw without hesitation if everything was falling apart. a last resort, in a way.
he doesn't say i love you right then, not with words, he usually saves those for quieter, more private places. he just looks at you, steady and searching, because he's already said it a hundred times with his hands and gestures and now, with this.
a weapon bearing your name. carried close, used rarely. cleaned religiously. something his hand lingers near just to remind himself of what he has back home. it's not romance in the traditional sense, it never is with him, but for jason todd, it's as close to poetry as it gets.
In which Dick Grayson tries to give Jason some relationship advice. And ends up learning a few new things about his little brother.
Pairing:
Jason Todd x Reader
(AO3)
Imagine Dick Grayson wanting to talk to Jason about his new girlfriend. That is, you.
Imagine Dick Grayson, talkative Dick Grayson, whose laughter and words bubbled easily from his throat, like air released from an opened soda can.
Imagine Dick Grayson, who's used to going into any situation utterly confident in his ability to coax a smile and a story out of even the grumpiest civilians.
And now imagine him being utterly on the back foot ever since Jason came back.
The smile that's more reliable to him than his own mask now feels more like a grimace whenever Dick is around his little brother. His jokes and short little stories meant to put people at ease dry up on his tongue, and he's often left with his mouth hanging stupidly open like a fish washed-up on Gotham Bay.
For all of his hard-earned people skills, Dick Grayson simply couldn't find the right words to reach his little brother.
Perhaps it's because his last image of Jason Todd was that of a prepubescent boy, growing so fast that their father barely had enough time to put clothes on his back before he's outgrown them again.
And now, in his place was a hulking giant that Dick had to crane his neck to look in the eye.
Perhaps it's Jason's voice, and the fact that before his kidnapping, he hadn't come into adult voice yet. It was still high-pitched and bright and excited whenever they bent their heads to look over maps of Gotham. This new Jason, on the other hand, had the voice of a man, harsh and gritty, like stone grinding against stone.
One that often made him seem far too old than his actual age.
Or perhaps it's the simple fact that a decade ago, the Joker took away Dick Grayson's little brother.
And the man who came back was now a stranger.
Dick tried, of course.
He tried his best, like anyone would, given his position. After all, how many people were given a second chance to make their family whole again?
It's just that he didn't know how.
While the previous Robin had been talkative and curious and hung onto every word Dick said as if it was gospel, this new Jason was quiet, taciturn.
He spoke with a wince, as if every word hurt him, and Dick had to work hard not to wonder why this was.
He wasn't usually interested in drawing up battle plans, often choosing to do missions alone.
Now imagine Dick Grayson, crammed in what feels like the world's tiniest Jetta during a stakeout, quietly trying not to go insane. He had never done well with silence, even before Jason had been kidnapped. He hated the idea of sitting in it, stewing in his own thoughts until he could feel them scratching along the inside of his skull.
But try as he might, Dick just couldn't draw his little brother into conversation. His answers, when he bothered to give them, were short and irritated. As final as a door slammed shut.
"So, you know much about this guy we're staking out?" Dick tried.
"About as much as you. Wanted for human trafficking." Jason paused, massaged his throat as if speaking two whole sentences hurt him.
Someone's phone pinged. They both looked at theirs.
After a minute, Dick tried again.
"Barbara said he used to work out of Peru. I wonder what made him move to Gotham. Got any ideas?"
Another ping. Jason looked down at his burner phone. Caught Dick's expression out of the corner of his eye and mutely shook his head.
"Well," Dick pretended to stretch, more to have something to do than anything else.
He decided to try a third time.
"Seen the Bloodhounds’ game last night?"
Jason looked at him as if he was speaking in tongues, and Dick decided that it was high time he tried shutting up for a while. He tapped his fingers on the wheel, fidgeted with the radio, trying to decide which station was the least likely to drive him insane over the course of what seemed to be a very long, very boring stakeout.
Dick settled on easy R&B. Leaned back in his seat, or at least pretended to, as he watched Jason fiddle with his phone.
"Barbara got any updates for us?" he asked as Jason read over a text.
There was an awful moment when Jason startled, and the first thing he did was reach for his guns. It must have been instinct, his hands flowing smoothly from one location to the next. And it was only the quiet click of the safety turning off that seemed to bring Jason back to himself.
Dick could practically see his little brother forcing himself to relax: the visible unclenching of his jaw. The conscious decision to let go of his guns.
And Dick tried, very, very hard not to think about how he must have spent the past few years, if his first reaction to being surprised was violence.
If he could somehow revive the Joker just so he could kill him again, Dick would do it. He could have sworn he could hear his own teeth grinding. The air in the car suddenly felt thick, the silence suffocating, as both of them tried not to acknowledge what just happened.
And just as Dick was mentally rehearsing his speech to get coffee and stale donuts from the shop across the street, Jason spoke.
"It wasn't," he said.
Dick blinked. The number of times that Jason initiated conversation was few and far in between.
"Pardon?" Dick said, wondering if he heard it right.
"It wasn't Barbara on the phone," Jason clarified, this time slower, as if he was talking to a particularly dim child.
"Alfred, then," Dick guessed.
"No. And I didn't."
"Didn't what?'
"I didn't watch the Bloodhounds' game last night. I was on patrol and must have missed it."
"Oh."
Dick wasn't even sure if Jason watched baseball anymore. It was just another conversational Hail Mary he threw out there. But at least Jason seemed willing to talk, even if it was in broken fragments. But if Jason was on patrol the night before, and he was on stakeout tonight then he must not have gotten much sleep.
"Want to get some coffee?" Dick said, jerking a thumb at the corner store he was eyeing earlier. "My treat."
While Bludhaven didn't have the abundance of street vendors and overnight kiosks that Gotham City offered, it at least offered similar 24-hour joints that could offer the same overpriced, watered-down coffee that one could get in Gotham City.
And in its own small way, it was like Dick Grayson never left home.
Josiah Johannes Salazar was almost certainly the made-up name of the man they were staking out. A small-time thug, at least by their usual standards, he mostly dealt in human trafficking and came under Barbara's radar after a rash of missing person reports were linked back to him.
A gifted art student from the local college.
A stand-up comedian who often performed to packed bars on rowdy weekends.
A used-car salesman from the Burrows.
Nothing out of the ordinary, really. Just your usual run-of-the-mill scumbaggery. Kidnapping people to be bought and sold on the flesh market. Or so, that was Barbara's current theory. An easy enough case. Sure to be closed by the end of the week. In fact, Tim already had several hopeful leads on the victims' possible locations.
Which was why it was such a mystery that Jason insisted–insisted!–on accompanying Dick on this particular stakeout.
It wasn't like he was unwelcome–Dick would jump at any chance to bond with his little brother again–it was just unexpected. Certainly, when he had rounded the parking spot where he kept the second hand Jetta, he hadn't expected Jason to be there, a duffel bag slung across his shoulder and a scowl on his face.
And as soon as Dick unlocked the car, Jason opened the door and planted himself so firmly in the passenger's seat that for a moment, Dick wondered if they really did have a prior agreement he forgot about. But now in the garish yellow light of the donut shop, one fact was becoming increasingly obvious–his little brother was tired. The lighting made him look positively jaundiced, and the shadows under his eyes were as fat as bruises. His clothes were rumpled, and Dick found himself wondering if he had changed into them immediately after his patrol.
The scar on his face looked more terrible than ever.
There was a sudden tension in Jason's shoulders that made Dick realize he was staring.
He immediately dropped his gaze.
Only to find an even more incredible sight.
"Hey, Jason..."
Jason frowned at him, and glanced around the shop to see if anyone was listening. But apart from the cashier, a pimply teenager flicking through skin magazines, the place was empty.
Jason never did like hearing them use their real names while out on missions. And it was only after careful assessment of the area did he finally speak.
"What?"
His response was short and irritated, a clear sign that he was beginning to weary of conversation. But Dick couldn't help himself.
"Are you drinking iced coffee?"
The cups in their hands were nearly identical, condensation beading on the cheap plastic surface, although Dick was sure that Jason didn't have the same obscene amounts of caramel syrup pumps in his. But back when he lived in the manor, Dick was sure that Jason was strictly a hot coffee kind of guy.
A hot black coffee and cigarette type of guy. The result of spending most of his childhood in East End. Alfred despaired at the state of his diet, and Dick would often hear him lecturing Jason on the dangers of nicotine and caffeine addiction.
Jason glanced down at his drink, seemingly unbothered. "Yes."
He seemed content to leave it at that, despite the fact that this new information had hit Dick with the force of a bombshell.
Jason drank iced coffee now?
What else did he like?
Did he like matcha? Chai? Perhaps those overpriced flattened croissants dipped in chocolate? Did Jason still like soft tacos from food trucks? Or did he prefer burritos now?
For a moment, Dick envisioned inviting Jason to go shop-hopping with him and Barbara, the way they used to back when Jason was Robin. Maybe even invite Tim along, now that Jason was finally speaking to him.
Eat questionable street food until their stomachs roiled with grease. Or even better, haul it all back to the Clocktower and make a movie night out of it.
He could even imagine Alfred, somehow unchanged, hovering at the edges, making sarcastic comments about everyone's cholesterol level.
Maybe he could even convince him to try a fry or two.
Maybe Bruce–
The ping of Jason's phone broke Dick out of his thoughts.
"Not an update," Jason muttered at him, before opening his phone to take a look at it.
There was the barest flicker of emotion on his face before he was deleting the message and pocketing it. But not before Dick caught a glimpse of what was on the screen: a grainy image of the interior of a pizza parlor outfitted like it was from the 70s. A bottle of cheap beer and what looked like someone's Scrabble tiles were front and center.
Dick blinked. "Jason..."
The iced coffee. The constant texts from someone.
How could Dick Grayson, son of the world's greatest detective, had missed it?
"Jason, are you texting your girlfriend?"
It was like an explosion had gone off in Dick's chest, like someone had shaken a can of soda and pulled the tab to watch the glorious release of carbon dioxide and sugar. Finally, after struggling all night to find something that he and Jason could talk about, finally Dick found something that he could relate to his little brother about: women.
"Fuck off, Dick," Jason muttered, but he knew his little brother enough to realize there was no heat in it. "It's none of your business."
"Holy shit, you totally are. And while on a stakeout, too!"
Dick felt giddy.
It was unfamiliar, this ribbing. But it was welcome. It felt like the sort of thing that a big brother should do.
"You know Bruce wouldn't approve," he prodded.
He made his voice sound deep, mimicking their father, "Distractions on the field can be a fatal mistake."
"I don't give a rat's ass about what Bruce approves of," Jason said with a shrug, but he failed to hide the amusement in his voice.
"Besides,” he added. “He flirted with Selina Kyle all the time. In full costume, the hypocrite."
Dick laughed, partly because it was true, partly because he was actually bantering–bantering!–with his little brother again.
Jason's phone pinged again, and this time Dick couldn't resist another jab.
"She's got you over a barrel, huh?" Dick said.
"What?"
"Are you in the doghouse?"
Jason frowned at him, and Dick decided to elaborate. "Whenever I took missions one after the other, Barbara would let me have it. Especially if it made me miss date nights. She used to send me these walls of text..."
Jason shook his head. "She's not angry with me."
"Oh." It was nice of you to be such an understanding girlfriend. "It's good that she understands. How long has it been since you took her on a date anyway?"
Jason looked uneasy, shifting his weight from one foot to the next.
"Two weeks," he muttered.
"Two weeks?" Dick was flabbergasted. "Dude, Barbara would definitely have put me in the doghouse for that."
A night on the couch at the minimum.
"I've been busy," Jason said defensively. "We're nearly closing in on this case."
Right. Dick nearly forgot. Josiah Johannes something.
"Well, maybe you should do something nice for her, at least," Dick insisted
"You know, remind her that you care."
He thought of his father, who used to buy bouquets of flowers for his mother, to give to her after every successful performance. The night of her death, there had been a large bouquet of orchids left in front of her dressing room mirror that went unclaimed.
Dick shook his head, dusting away the mental cobwebs.
"Got any ideas?" he asked.
Jason shook his head mutely.
"Come on, give me something," Dick said. "You must have some idea growing up."
Bruce, he knew, was notoriously tight-lipped, so it was unlikely that Jason got any ideas from him. But maybe, once upon a time, Willis Todd did something nice for his wife.
"The men in East End would tip an extra five dollars to whores they like,” Jason snapped.
Dick felt his heart drop to his stomach. He could feel a flush rising to his cheeks.
"Yeah, don't...don't do that..." he muttered.
They grow quiet for several minutes, sipping their coffee and occasionally throwing glances at the building they were supposed to be staking out. It was Jason who eventually spoke first.
"She's not upset," he said quietly. "I just...feel like I should do something for her."
It struck Dick then, that Jason looked woefully young. It was likely that this was Jason's first real relationship. And he had nothing to go on except what he had seen men do to sex workers in East End.
And Bruce...wasn't exactly a model for healthy relationships.
"How about flowers?" Dick suggested gently. "Those are always a classic.
Do you know what kind of flowers she likes?"
A pause.
"No."
"I used to date a girl," Dick began. "Bit of a gardener. She loved roses. She'd snip the ends and put them in water to make them last longer. She loved white roses best of all, because she'd try all sorts of experiments with dyes."
Jason didn't answer, fiddling with the straw of his drink. And when he next spoke, it was in a painfully unsure voice.
"Is that...something I should know?" he asked quietly. "Her favorite flowers?"
Suddenly, Dick hoped–wished–violently that this wasn't Jason's first relationship. That sometime after the Joker and before the Arkham Knight, he carved some semblance of peace for himself. Maybe met a girl or a guy during those few sunlit months in Santa Prisca. Dated. Fooled around. The kind of things that he should have done growing up. The kind of things that Joker stole from him.
"Not necessarily," Dick said, his voice soft. "But it doesn't hurt to pay attention. Girls like that sort of thing. Well, people, really. If she ever mentions something like that, just make sure to take a note."
The nod Jason gave him was oddly solemn, and Dick realized, with heartbreaking clarity, how much his little brother wanted to make this work with you.
"What about chocolates?" Dick suggested again, not wanting to dwell on darker thoughts. "I'm sure we can find a confectionary here somewhere..."
Jason snorted. "Sure. In Bludhaven, the peak of romance."
He grew quiet again, before saying, in hesitant voice: "She likes old movies. There was that one about an urban legend..."
"There you have it," Dick said, trying not to let the relief show in his voice.
"You can have a movie night or something! Hell, you can even go now. Make a surprise out of it–”
But the contemplative expression on Jason's face–the one that made him look so young–suddenly fell away, and what was left now was pure Red Hood.
"Can't," he said, in a tone that brooked no argument. "We're on a mission."
"For some two-time smuggler? Please, I can solve this case with my eyes closed."
Jason looked at him as if he was insane.
"What?" Dick asked.
"Dick," Jason said slowly, with gravity. "What do you know about Salazar?"
"Hm?" Dick was still mentally going through the catalogue of nearby confectioneries the two of them could go to. "Some human trafficker...don't worry we got Tim tracking down his victims."
"A sculptor who's selling out entire galleries as a student because her work is so lifelike," Jason said, a bite of impatience in his voice. "A comedian who's always performing to packed crowds because everyone says his jokes make their entire week. A used-car salesman who never misses a sale."
Jason paused, waiting for Dick to put the pieces together.
Dick had never thought of the victims that way, and now that Jason was pointing it out, it all did sound rather strange. The realization came to him with slow dawning horror.
"Jason..." he said. "You think he's trafficking metas?"
Jason sighed, and there was something weary in it. Dick remembered that his little brother hadn't seen you in two weeks.
"You think he might target her," he concluded. "That's why you're working so hard on this case."
Jason didn't answer. He didn't have to.
"Does she know?"
"No." Jason's answer was immediate. "It's just...a working theory, anyway. I don't want her scared over a theory."
"It might make her a little more careful if you told her," Dick nudged Jason with his shoulder. "It wouldn't hurt. Plus...well, it's not nice to keep her in the dark, you know?"
Jason looked at him, and for a moment, Dick could see the boy from the manor. The one that used to hang on to his every word as if it was gospel.
He pulled out his phone.
And sent you a quick text.
"Thanks," Jason said quietly. "I'm still...getting used to...all this."
And he gave Dick a small, grateful smile. Just the barest quirk of the corners of his mouth.
But it was there.
Dick smiled back. "You're doing great. Besides, working for two weeks straight on a case to keep your little girlfriend safe? You're a regular romantic. She's going to think you're from one of those old movies she likes."
The smile was gone. The scowl back in place. Jason shoved him, with perhaps more force than he intended to, but Dick rolled with it, laughing.
Maybe getting to know his little brother all over again wouldn’t be as bad as he thought.
As a barista iced coffee is optimal but iced lattes are peak. My snobbish opinion aside-
This was fun, lighthearted, and beautifully written. It’s going to be a comfort fic for at least the next 5 months and I’m gonna reread it every night like a bedtime story.
I love big brother dick dotting on his little he’s canonically fucking massive brother jason 🥹
you find him in your apartment. again.
window cracked. boots still on. jacket slung over the back of your chair like it belongs there.
he’s sitting on your couch like he owns it, flipping through a half-read paperback he definitely didn’t bring. probably something you left lying around — some crime thriller he’s already tearing apart in his head.
“make yourself at home,” you say, dropping your keys.
he doesn’t look up. “already did. your lock’s still crap, by the way.”
“you say that every time you break in.”
“because it’s still true.” he finally glances at you, eyes tired but sharp. “what if i was someone else?”
“then you’d be bleeding on the floor right now.”
his mouth twitches. “cute.”
you toe off your shoes, drop your bag, move toward the kitchen. “what do you want, jason?”
“wow. straight to the point. no hi jay, how was patrol? want something to drink? here, take my couch and trample my boundaries some more?”
“you don’t drink anything that isn’t ninety percent caffeine or eighty proof.”
“true,” he says, stretching his legs out. “still rude.”
you eye him from the kitchen. his holsters are off, but the rest of the suit’s still there — the compression shirt, scuffed boots, scraped knuckles. he’s vibrating under the surface like he hasn’t slept in two days and isn’t planning to.
“you get hit again?” you ask, softer.
he lifts one shoulder in a shrug. “nothing important.”
“so yes.”
“do you want a play-by-play? i can act it out, real dramatic. throw myself against a wall. bleed on your furniture.”
“you already bled on my rug last month.”
“and it really tied the room together.”
you exhale through your nose. grab a glass of water, bring it over. he takes it without comment, drinks half in one go.
“why are you here, jason?”
this time, he doesn’t have a joke ready. his fingers tap the side of the glass, jaw tight.
“quiet,” he mutters. “it’s quiet here.”
you sit beside him. not close. not far.
“you ever gonna just ask to stay?” you ask.
“don’t need to.” he leans his head back, eyes closed now. “you always let me.”
“that’s not the same thing.”
“yeah,” he says, voice rough. “i know.”
the silence stretches. his foot nudges yours, casual, like he didn’t mean to. like he did.
“you gonna yell at me if i fall asleep here?”
“depends.”
“on what?”
“if you do that thing where you mutter weird half-words and twitch like you’re being electrocuted.”
he opens one eye. “that’s called trauma. look it up.”
“ever heard of therapy?”
“yeah. didn’t vibe with being psychoanalyzed by someone who’s never been shot in the face. weird, right?”
you huff a laugh. he shifts a little closer, not quite touching.
“you still smell like gunpowder,” you say.
“better than blood.”
“barely.”
he doesn’t look at you right away. just stares ahead like he’s watching something you can’t see. then, like it costs him, he says,
“couldn’t sleep.”
that’s all he gives you. not can I crash here? not I don’t want to be alone. just that.
but with jason, that’s enough.
you don’t ask.
you just nod toward the blanket on the armrest.
“you want that, or are you gonna steal mine like last time?”
“wasn’t stealing. it was strategic heat distribution.”
“you’re unbelievable.”
“you say that a lot,” he murmurs, already leaning back into the cushions.
it took all night but im still not completely done. still figuring out navigation stuff. School starts again soon so imma finish my drabbles now or just keep starting new ones ig
Other than that though learning how to use tumblr has been kinda cool
..never knew about the archive system til last night. idk what to do with that information rn but it's very organized and i appreciate it a lot!
Ngl this took me by surprise 😂. I can’t do commissions and can’t guarantee regular updates, so I doubt anyone would be interested in any KoFi page I put up!
Me when i try to throw money at my moots but they tell me to sit my ass down: 😔😔😔
tHIS IS A JOKE BTW DONT FEEL PRESSURED TO DO ANYTHING I KNOW RUNNING A KOFI IS NOT SOMETHING EVERYONE HAS THE CAPACITY TO MAINTAIN JUST KNOW YOUR WRITING HOLDS SM VALUE TO ME!
