{ @rp-batmans-sidekick }
Dick was panting heavily, cold sweat soaking his shirt. He looked around the dark room, immediately going to grab the pull chord to his bedside lamp. Once that was on, it was clear that it was only Bruce. Not… Well. Anyone else. Alfred would have also been an acceptable wake up call.
He wiped his eyes of tears, and wiped his forehead of sweat, before shucking his shirt and throwing it in the general direction of the hamper. Still, though, he made no move to respond to Bruce. The teen wandered over to the closet, grabbing a new shirt and pulling it over his head as he made his way back to bed.
“My parents,” he muttered, avoiding eye contact with the elder hero. “I… They…” He sighed. “Do they ever stop?” He looked up at Bruce. “The nightmares, I mean. Does it get easier?”
It wasn’t often the Bat roused for a nightmare, he was too far down the mansion wing to truly hear the commotion that may be wracking young Dick’s dreams; that’s not to say Bruce himself slept soundly, but was simply... Secluded. However, Grayson had the divine luck this fine morning to have caught the man on the way to bed, and it only seemed human to want to ensure the boy wasn’t legitimately wrestling with Talon - or worse - in that vast bedroom, which to the elder’s delight, he discovered this was far from the case... And perhaps, far worse.
Footsteps silent, measured, he only pauses under the warm glow of Dick’s bedside light, taking in the scene before him with a displeased frown. Those intelligent blues, so bright and loving, spilling tears like a geiser, his alabaster skin near mirroring the world with it’s sheen of sweat- poor kid, he looked about as much of an angel as he did a mess, and frankly, Bruce isn’t sure whether to hold him or leave the poor kid be. Alfred was far better at playing ‘father’, he was well-practiced and infinitely wise, though at least the Bat had sat himself down to a few self-help parenting guides in more recent days. Not that it’d made a difference beyond lessening the vigilante’s stoic and reserved nature.
“Yes and no,” he guides carefully, moving only to seat himself on the end of Dick’s sprawling bed, “There is no simple answer to a question like that. Losing someone, especially family, will always leave an empty space in your heart and soul, Dick; and I don’t think you should ever expect to replace it. But you see, sometimes we also need the reminder, no matter how cruel, for you to remember what you had, it’s beauty and it’s horror.” Steely blues focus on a fraying edge of the rug beneath his feet, thoughtful for a moment before he added, “It does though, get a lot less difficult - with time - to flush out the pain and replace it with glee, you just have to get past these moments first... Would it help, if you rested in my room? I doubt I’ll be sleeping tonight-- I could read? Though clockwork mechanisms and their likes are quite boring to hear about.”
