thinking about your first christmas as a family after bruce adopts dick grayson.
bruce is nervous because every christmas since becoming batman has been piss poor. there’s been no big dinners because it’s just been himself and alfred for so long. gifts were exchanged not on christmas morning but left on beds and desks and in elevator shafts because the holidays were such a strange time for the two of them without thomas and martha around. sometimes it was easier to give each other the space. alfred always left the fireplace on for when bruce would get home from holiday patrol, perhaps with a cup of hot cocoa just the way he liked it left on the hearth, always suspiciously steaming as if alfred had stayed up until bruce got back to leave it there.
then you come along and there’s dinner again, and sometimes bruce is even home some of the day to celebrate with you. the tree comes out of storage and you add a novelty ornament to it every year because the others are all for show and it just doesn’t make the tower feel like home. bruce bakes with you, stealing fudge from your mixing bowl. you almost (almost!) get to send him off with tinsel around his cowl ears and jingle bells on his belt. warmth is returning to gotham in december with you around.
but then dick comes along and everything is different! bruce doesn’t really realize it until he takes dick out shopping for a winter coat and an employee gives dick a candy cane on the way out, but it’s going to be christmas soon and he hasn’t planned anything. he’s been fine with the way things are for so long that he hadn’t realized that dick is still young, that christmas is still something to look forward to, that he’s a father now.
you walk in one day and bruce is stringing lights around the fireplace with dick running around the tree, wrapping it in ribbon and tinsel. bruce hoists dick up to put the star on the tree and they both nearly knock the whole thing over. dick hangs christmas wreaths in the batcave, super glues a bright red rudolph nose on the hood of the batmobile, builds gingerbread houses with little gingerbread bruce and you holding hands while gingerbread dick beats a gingerbread bad guy with a peppermint carved into a batarang. it sits very proudly in the kitchen. you’ve never seen bruce so flustered before. alfred has never seen the tower so badly decorated. he loves it.
on patrol, you lament about how cold dick must be in his robin costume and force him into leg warmers and a sweater, even as he whines about how it’s never bothered him before. bruce watches as you tug a hat over dick’s hair, tucking the little black strands underneath and placing your warm hands to dick’s flushed cheeks. you warn them both that if they don’t stay warm, you’ll be restricting their vigilante privileges. the boys just share a look because they know you really mean it.
you worry so much when they’re out together. try as you might to pretend to be asleep once bruce settles in beside you, you always sneak out of bed to check on dick before returning to your room. bruce pretends he’s too exhausted to notice and just pulls you closer.
dick gets you two out of the tower, too! bruce takes you both ice skating in gotham square, stumbling around on his skates like a 6′1, beefy newborn dear as you and dick skate circles around him and laugh (you really don’t mean to embarrass him so bad that he skates over to a bench and pouts for ten minutes, but you and dick convince him to skate between the two of you until he can stand on his own).
the snow in gotham is dirty, but that doesn’t stop dick from initiating snowball fights with you when you go out past the city lines. bruce takes the two of you to an old family friend’s estate and catches you two from the window pelting each other with handfuls of snow like your lives depended on it, and you bet your asses he’s coming for blood when he meets you both out there. none of you are dressed for getting covered in snow and alfred gives a very stern talking to you three by the front door when you get home.
and when christmas morning comes, bruce feels his heart clench as dick throws himself on top of you and bruce’s sleeping bodies in bed, begging you both to get up so he can open presents already. alfred stands by the bedroom door with this fond look on his face, mumbling something about how “familiar” this all was.
dick loves every single gift you guys give him. he runs off to his room to play with his new toys and video games the minute you let him. by the end of dinner, dick is passed out on the couch with a full stomach, so bruce laughs and takes a few pictures to tease him before scooping him up to take him to bed. it isn’t until dick is tucked under his sheets that it really hits him: he loves this kid. he’s got a family now. he’s going to do everything in his power to protect it. he gets misty-eyed at the thought that it’s his turn now, something that seemed so far out of his mind ten years ago.
he’s still kneeling by dick’s bedside when you come in and wrap your arms around his shoulders, pressing a kiss to his hair, “dick left us a gift. wanna come see?”
it’s a little foreign to him when bruce first sees it. he’d seen it maybe a few times at christmas parties at boarding school, almost always managing to evade getting dragged underneath it save for the few times he’d been given a sloppy, eggnog-spiked kiss by a classmate.
you stand under the mistletoe hanging from the lowest arch in the house (probably the only one dick could reasonably reach), giggling conspiratorially.
“was this your idea?” he accuses, slinking closer to the plant but not quite giving in just yet.
“dick wanted me to tell him about some christmas traditions and picked this one out. he’s never had a traditional christmas before, ya know?”
“and did he already get his kiss?”
“a big, embarrassing one right on the forehead from me AND alfred. he’s had his fill of this tradition, I think.”
bruce can’t help but laugh. he’s so full of warm food and joy. he’s happy dick’s happy. he’s happy you’re happy. he’s so happy. “can’t say the same for myself.” he cups his hands on either side of your throat and grins, breath scented from the candy cane he’d been sucking on after dinner. he kisses you and the mint passes to your tongue, a cool contrast to the feverishness of his mouth. he hadn’t felt this warm in years.
