The first time Kyle witnesses Jason’s nightmares is two months, one week, and five days into their relationship.
They are curled up next to each other, under the same sheets albeit not touching. Jason always cautions against touching, tersely explains all the ways he could hurt Kyle if he forgets he’s sharing the bed with his boyfriend and not an intruder. It’s a cumbersome rule only when Kyle comes home from space and wants nothing more than to curl up into his boyfriend and sleep for a week, but he would choose death over disrespecting Jason’s boundaries.
Which is why he’s only mildly surprised when he’s jolted awake by a sharp scream and the sound of the mattress protesting from too much movement.
He doesn’t think much of it, instinctively rolling off the bed and rounding the entire thing to lean over the curled up body of his boyfriend.
Kyle feels a part of his heart break at the agonized way those green eyes blink up at him, unshed tears glistening in the corner of his eyes.
Jason, wild-eyed and feverish, pants as he stares up at the sight of his boyfriend looming over his body, moonlight painting his skin with soft light.
“Jay,” Kyle whispers, voice barely audible over Jason’s harsh breathing. “Jay, it was just a dream.”
No, he wants to say, wants to sob, really. Bad memories.
Instead, what comes out is “don’t leave.”
Kyle feels himself soften, reaching out to smooth out the ruffled curls stuck to Jason’s forehead. He shivers in response, stiffening against the touch before leaning in closer.
“I’m right here,” he finds himself saying. “I know you’re scared, but I’m right here and I’m not going anywhere.”
Jason’s eyes flutter close, and Kyle takes it as a sign he can climb back into the bed. He carefully tucks Jason’s body against his side, noting how damp the bare skin of his torso felt and feels a spike of worry. The sweat, coupled with the harsh December weather, will inevitably lead to a cold down the road. But for now…there is more pressing matters at hand.
He returns his attention back to Jason, and finds him gazing at him with tired eyes. He knows this raw vulnerability isn’t something he was comfortable sharing, knows Jason thinks of it as a burden.
Tonight, he is going to change that.
“You’ll never be alone,” Kyle’s eyes are fierce, incandescent in the darkness. Jason finds himself drowning again, but it feels good; the loss of breath had nothing to do with death and torture, nothing to do with shitty memories that will not fade.
Kyle is throwing out a lifeline, and Jason wants to grab it. Anchor himself back to reality, someone constant, someone here.
They’re standing at the edge of something beautiful, and Jason leaps.
He pulls Kyle down, steals a desperate kiss. He feels the wandering fingers, the gentle kiss of the silk sheets settling back over their tangled legs. He wonders if it’s normal, the perfect way their bodies fit together.
He finds himself not caring.
They break for air, Jason’s lungs burning as their heavy breaths warm up the air between them. He has no words to share, none of the witty remarks he knows Kyle is used to. But he is sure he got his point across, his silent plea and gratitude rolled up into one action.
“I’ll be with you from now ‘till the end,” Kyle promises softly, carding his fingers through Jason’s damp curls. He leans down, slants his lips across Jason’s again, tries his hardest to drive out the demons. “Be here ‘till you’re sick of me.”
His heart wrenches at the way Jason melts into his touch, a shudder running through his body as he pressed upwards and into Kyle’s embrace.
“I’ll never get sick of you,” Jason rasps, his first smile of the night making its way onto his face. “I might get sick of Gardner, but not you. Hell, you’ll get sick of me first.”
“I think not,” Kyle snorts, flopping down onto the pillows and turning his head to grin at his boyfriend. “And in Guy’s defense, he has nothing on Batman. I was sick of that dude before I met him.”
Jason lets loose a bark of laughter, shoulders shaking as they both remember Bruce’s reaction to them dating; more specifically, the sight of Hal Jordan himself in Bruce’s study, breaking the news.
Through peals of laughter, Hal had informed them that a hefty bottle of vodka was involved.
“I bet you’ll get sick of me before I get sick of you,” Jason shoots Kyle a dangerous smile. “Winner gets to choose how to piss off Batman the next time we’re being stupid.”
Kyle feels a spike of affection shoot through him like a burst of flame, all warmth and happiness, at the unspoken promise of ‘even when we’re sick of each other, we’ll be together’. It sounds like forever, and forever sounds perfectly fine to him. Even if it meant pissing off the scariest man on Earth every other week.
“Deal,” he says just as the first streaks of dawn colour the midnight sky.
I’ve touched the darkness that lives in between the light. Seen the worst of this world, and the best. Seen the terrible things men do to each other in the name of hatred, and the lengths they’ll go to for love. Now I know. Only love can save this world. So I stay. I fight, and I give… for the world I know can be. This is my mission, now. Forever.
pamelas replied to your post: I, as someone who loves canon and bases all my...
God this and the whole “Bruce said he liked girls!!” Thing is so silly because literally everything from that panel seemed like the writer didn’t know anything about jason and just went for the most stereotypical things like ok. Male. Cars. Girls. Fighting. Ice cream. Can’t pick color blue because that’s dick. So Green.
It was in 2004 when Jason was long dead and everyone at DC had spent the previous 16 years proving they both hated Jason and had no idea who he was or even how he actually died.
In the midst of the gross victim blaming, suddenly we’re meant to accept that everything stated in that one issue is the honest truth and not up for interpretation or misrepresentation or idk...that maybe Jason at 14 years old was either 1. bi 2. closeted or 3. thought he did like girls because it’s generally what’s expected.
