Chapter Text
They were long nights under the stars and the glow of a bonfire. Being lulled to sleep by the rock of a train and landscapes passing. Early mornings, always space for an extra helping hand or two. Friendly faces, training routines and his father’s smiling words ‘Sore but grateful’. Maybe it wasn’t a normal life, but it was a good one. Filled with warmth, applause and family.
It was just before Dick’s fifteenth birthday when the strange visitors first came. Men dressed too nice to not be here for a show or booking. Let alone wandering through home-base with a confused frown, bearing the sort of entitled aura that said they weren’t about to ask for help anytime soon.
The teen had shook his head and smiled before vaulting down from his perch on a few of Tawny’s feed crates. Landing close enough to startle the man and going for a friendly sort of apologetic look.
“Say sir, you wouldn’t happen to be looking for Haly? Because he’s usually helping crank up the big top right about now. I can take you to him if you’d like.”
“I uh-no actually.” A cleared throat but kind smile. Dick got the feeling that whoever this guy was, he was used to working with children and teens. “I’m actually looking for the, well ‘The Flying Graysons’? But it seems I’ve hit a stroke of luck after all. Richard, I presume?”
The teen beamed and bowed with an enthusiastic flourish. “Call me Dick, mister. What can I do for ya?”
What happened next was something he never could have expected. The newcomer had a long, cold and angry conversation with his parents. Haly’s soothing tone heard through the walls Dick was banished behind. ‘Let the grown-ups talk, Dickie.’ As if he didn’t know they were talking about him. For him. Deciding his future through closed doors.
Dick sat with his back against the wall in their cozy trailer. It was home, and he couldn’t stop taking in every detail as if it were the last he’d see of it. Listening to them argue and talk, bringing money and the circus’s hard times into it. He bounced the clown ball against the wall and back into his hands half a hundred times.
And he knew from the way his father’s voice grew more tired and resigned than argumentative that it was going to happen. That the man in the suit had prepared too thoroughly, had too many good points that even Dick had to agree with. They’d be taking him away.
"Well fuck." A whispered sentiment as the ball bounced itself to a still along the floor. As Dick tried to process just how much of his life was about to change.
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Thomas Wayne tried to smile as he waved his assistant in. Peggy hardly bothered with much of a grin either as she laid out his business for the day, perhaps expecting his sigh when she mentioned his attention was needed in the casino after lunch. By the time she gave a small dip of the head, leaving a stack of paperwork along with today’s copy of the Gotham Gazette, Thomas was ready for a drink.
But Martha would know if he started this early. She always knew. He suspected Peggy was in on that somehow, side eyeing the closed door as he instead reached for the vitamin enriched orange juice.
The front page of the Gazette was covered with word of the mayor’s reelection campaign. Thomas still wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but the article just under it made him smile.
‘Gotham Darling Bruce Wayne heads Prestigious Providence’s first scholarship program.
Hundreds of years of precedent has been shattered by our very own prince of prosperity. Thomas and Martha Wayne’s son, and now Professor, Bruce enabling an athletic scholarship program the likes Providence, and other schools of such prestige have never seen before. The identity of the first lucky kid granted this honor has been kept tight under wraps thus far but the year is still young. Whoever it may be, a congratulations is in order. The big question now is, will other of these top tier boarding schools follow suit? And will this mean that Bruce Wayne will have too much on his plate to visit home for the annual city-wide celebration benefit in honor of the Wayne family?’
It was always good to see his son’s name in the papers. Thomas making a mental note to have Peggy write up a letter of congrats to send him. Things were tense in the city anyways. It was better that Bruce would be busy, not tempted to attend anything here.