(Don’t) Leave me Alone (part II)
Part two is ready to rock and roll! I hope to have part three with the full reunion up tonight or tomorrow. 💜
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Tim drops unceremoniously back into their overstuffed couch, sighing on impact, and dropping his head into his open palms.
Their movie is still queued up and the broken glass on the floor but he couldn’t Will himself to move any farther.
There had been a heavy debate regarding said couch, ultimately being won out by himself—he could be very persuasive, according to his vigilante boyfriends, at least.
The heavy smell of their favorite Chinese (Jason’s broccoli beef and Dick’s kung pao chicken), made his stomach twist and churn.
Is this my fault?
Maybe the bigger question was would they survive a fight of this magnitude, or would he be left alone in the rubble, trying to claw himself.
Should he leave now and save himself from the inevitable it’s-not-you-it’s-me talk? Because that’s how these sorts of things always ended, wasn’t it?
He just thought—he just hoped—that things would end differently this time. But hope is a nasty business, she always had a way of chewing him up inside and spitting him out, his soul a little more damaged than before.
Tim scrubs his scalp. It’s okay—he would be okay, he always was. He would take his weaknesses and turn them back into strengths. He was excellent at change but this… he didn’t want this change.
His eyes got hot and it was hard to swallow around the lump in his throat. He didn’t want to leave he loved this place he.
He loved their bed and waking up next to them every morning, he loved Jason’s books scatter around them house, tucked in between the couch cushions, tiny writing in the margin.
Dick’s attempts at cooking pancakes in the morning and nearly burning down the kitchen, and Jason having to jump in and take over before he did actually have a fire, while Tim sat the bar laughing.
He loves Dick’s dimples when he grinned and Jason’s frown lines when he’s had enough of their bullshit.
It was their nest and the first place he’s ever felt at home. It was always chaotic and a little unhinged, but he loved the it.
Tim froze, his scalp sore and his hands twisted in his too-long hair.
Oh, god.
He was going to lose them and he… he couldn’t say the word. Couldn’t think the word.
Tears spill over and his hands tremble, tightening in his hair. He takes a deep breath in through his nose, trying to stay calm, but it catches in his chest.
How could he be so stupid? Of course they don’t love him. If they did, would they really have left him alone?
He sits there for a few, painful minutes, silently berating himself for the very idea that they wouldn’t leave him, missing the window catch as it opened and boots on the hardwood floor.
“Aw, Sweets,” Jay says softly, startling him.
Tim jerks up in his seat, eyes wild until he realizes it’s Jason. He peels back the domino and white outs and drops it on the table along with his holsters and pistols. He sees the Chinese and grimaces.
Tim doesn’t say anything as Jason slowly drops down on the floor in front of him, hands out in the universal “I come in peace” sort of way.
They stare at each other for a long moment and he doesn’t feel like he can breath. Jason is the first to taking his face between his large, scarred hands.
They were calloused and rough against his cheeks but his touch was impossibly delicate, like Tim were made of fine china, and one wrong move would cause him to chip or break. “I’m sorry for leavin’ you alone like that. I didn’t think—I, just, I didn’t think. ‘s not fair ‘a me or Dickie.”
Maybe he was right to be so tender with him, because with those words, he felt a little crack form. A tiny, insignificant thing, really. It shouldn’t have been anything more than a chip. But it hurt. So. Much.
Tim bites his lip and shakes his head. His chest aches, like the crack were a canyon. “I’m okay. It’s okay.” It’s a mantra.
I’m okay, it’s okay, we’re okay. If he just sticks to it, everything will be okay. He just has to play the part.
I’m okay, it’s okay, we’re okay, I’ll get over it.
Jay’s frown deepens but he doesn’t let go. “It’s not. You need to understand this, what happened, is not okay and not your fault. This was ‘tween Dick and me. It was not your responsibility to handle and we shouldn’t’ve gotten you involved. I was an ass and you know it.”
“You and Dick are tired so it’s okay. Accidents happen.”
“But this wasn’t an accident. Even then, this-“ he says gesturing around them. “was not okay. I need you to understand, this wasn’t an accident. I lashed out at you to get back at Dick for a mistake I made. Not you, me. Y’hear me?”
“You were doing the best you could,” Tim replies simply. Because he had to have been, it was the only explanation. “You were tired, hungry, and in pain. I’m not angry, stuff happens.”
Because it does. Accidents happen. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. He should have been paying more attention, tried to mediate the situation and talk them down before things went sideways.
They wouldn’t purposefully do this to him otherwise.
It hurt when the left him but he wasn’t going to tell either of them that. He knows they were just doing what they had to, to get by. Bad missions happened and he was just caught on the cross fire.
Accidents happen.
“So, let’s reframe this. If you were in the way of a murderer and I knew I could bring him down by shootin’ both of you, is that an accident? If I knew you were going to get hurt or die just so’s I could take ‘em down, would you be upset?”
It’s an extreme but okay. Tim doesn’t need to think about it to know the answer.
“No,” he says. “If it was between them getting away and hurting more people, or accidentally hurting me, I wouldn’t be upset. It was necessary.”
It was. If he could stop more people from getting hurt just by getting a banged up himself, it was okay. He’d dealt with way worse than a gun shot would.
Wounds heal but people don’t come back from the dead (usually, save for Jason, the self proclaimed resident zombie).
The look Jason gives him, though, had him second guessing his answer. “That’s so fucked up. Wait ‘til Dickie gets a load of this.”
Tim frowns, “Why? It’s an accident. Necessary evil, right?”
“Doll, I don’t know how to break it to you, but that’s not an accident. You should be mad.”
“Why?” He presses, confused. “I don’t…it happens. It’s my job to protect the city even if that means I get hurt.”
“At the cost of your life?”
Again, another simple answer.
“Yes, of course it is.”
Because it was. He had the skills, and the practice, and the conditioning. He made it his job the day he adorned the mantle.
Jason searches his eyes for… for something and when he doesn’t find it, he sighs, and presses a long, tender kiss to his forehead. “We’re gonna fix this, I promise. Maybe Dickie can lay it out better than me.”
“Lay what out?”
