Chapter Text
Roy typically didn’t like the dark. He will never find comfort in the shadows like Jason always has and he’s never quite managed to seamlessly blend into them like Dick. Roy especially didn't like how dark it was tonight.
He is cold, so very, very cold. His teeth painfully clatter against each other as shivers wrack his body. His eyes burn as they water uncontrollably, and his nose is rubbed raw against the denim of his jacket sleeve as snot continues to run down his face.
Bitter bile coats his tightening throat as he hunches down to heave over a shattered beer bottle and last Monday's newspaper. The sharp, burning pain in his stomach won’t cease, no matter how tightly he hugs himself or how much food he eats. He just wants it to stop. He wants his stomach to settle, his sinuses to clear, and his body to stop shivering and sweating and hurting.
He wants to be in Titan’s Tower curled on the couch watching movies with Dick or Donna or Garth or Karen or, hell, even Wally. He wants Oliver to call, and Roy wants to go home and have Ollie scoop him up into his arms, asking if he is doing okay.
God, he wants someone to care.
He is slumped on the ground, his back flat against a dumpster in an alley behind an old dry cleaners and ignored the ache in his bones as he slowly fumbled with the contents in his pocket. The stainless steel of the spoon felt ice cold against his fingertips. The sealed plastic dime bag felt simultaneously flimsy and as if it was filled with a thousand bricks as he clutched it in his palm. He fumbled with the cheap Zippo in his shaky hands and it took four tries till he could properly fill the syringe.
He roughly pushes up his jacket sleeve, clumsily unfastens his belt, tightens it around his bicep, and sharply inhales at the pinch of a needle sliding into the crease of his arm. The rush of it in his veins is almost enough to make his skin itch, and the flush of warmth that returned to his fingertips was enough to make the tears settling on his waterline run down his face.
The jagged gravel stones and broken beer bottles bite at his thighs through the worn denim of his jeans, but god, he can’t even feel it over the unadulterated bliss thrumming just beneath the surface of his skin.
Is there a feeling in the world greater than this?
Yes.
The incoherent buzzing of an old children's superhero cartoon filtering into the kitchen from the living room while he cooked breakfast.
A cup of coffee on the kitchen island next to the small plastic sippy cup he had bought half off from the dollar store a few months back.
The sound of his daughter's laugh as she smiles up at him, clinging onto his bicep with her smaller hands, her fingernails clumsily painted a light pink.
The faint smell of watermelon shampoo lingering in her dark hair, and her small form curled into his side when she insisted on sleeping in the bigger bed because she felt safer next to him than when she slept in her new big girl bed.
And Roy is fucking it all up, again.
He is curled around himself in an alley, with a syringe sticking out of his arm and enough beer circling through his system to get a football team tipsy. The rush of heroin in his veins feels more like shards of glass tearing through him from the inside out. The alcohol is settling in his stomach like mercury, his throat and eyes burning with the intense urge to start crying again.
The track marks on his arms that had only started to fade were now bruised and lightly scabbing over. The same fading scars that Lian had lightly traced over with her stubby fingers—more care and focus in her gaze than most kids her age were capable of—and declared that the marks showed how strong he was - because in her naive, childlike opinion, only scary people or strong people had scars and her Daddy could never be scary, not to her.
Blearily looking down at himself, though, he can’t trick himself into believing it anymore. This was a side of himself that he vowed never to let her see - the scary side. The side of himself that boiled over with rage and had gotten him thrown out by Ollie, the side of himself that is huddled in a back alley doing drugs instead of tucking his daughter into bed on her birthday.
God, she would’ve been… she is seven today.
“History is always trying its damnedest to repeat itself, try and make sure you’re not one of the reasons it succeeds.” Oliver had said it once; the memory was hazy, but he can still remember the deep timbre of his voice and the amused huff he let out at Roy’s furrowed brows.
And yet, ten years later, history was repeating itself; Roy had relapsed, he was disappointing the only person in the world that mattered, and was doped up in a random alley, wallowing in grief.
The hum of a ceiling fan lulls his fear-addled brain into a state of half-consciousness. The soft snoring of his daughter against his ribs is hardly audible over his hammering heartbeat and the overwhelming sound of blood rushing past his ears. A concerned hum from his right finally snaps him out of his haze and wakes him up enough to take in the rest of his surroundings.
He’s in his room, in his bed, lying on his back in a pair of old, thin sweatpants. The alarm clock that he keeps in his bedroom reads 2:43 in bright, blocky red numbers on his nightstand, and his breathing has finally evened out. At the lack of response, the concerned hum from earlier is repeated slightly louder and joined with a weak swat to his shoulder.
“Bad dream.” His voice comes out much hoarser than he’d expected. His dry throat screams at him to leave the safety of his king–sized bed and run into the kitchen to take a swig from the half-gallon of water in the fridge. In response, the hand limply resting on Roy’s shoulder lightly trails down his arm to squeeze his bicep in sympathy.
“Oh, m’ sorry.” Jason’s eyes are closed. A white, sweat dampened curl sticks flat against his forehead. He grumbles briefly in the way he always does when trying to force himself awake after long missions, though the attempt proves fruitless, remnants of sleep desperately pulling him back into her embrace.
Roy understands her desperation on a level that makes his stomach hurt. The overwhelming urge to want to keep Jason safe from the world by holding him close to his own chest and never wanting to let him go.
At the reminder, Roy jostles the grip Jason has on his arm loose to pull Jason closer. His head safely tucked into the crook of Roy’s neck and Jason’s chest firmly pressed against Roy’s side. Jason wiggles around for a moment to rearrange his limbs and settles on wrapping himself around Roy.
One consistently cold foot pushes beneath Roy’s calves—sending shivers up his leg where Jason’s toes brush against the warm skin left vulnerable where his pant leg had ridden up—and Jason’s arm is stretched over Roy’s hips to rest on Lian’s back, who is curled into Roy’s side on the left half of the bed, farthest away from the door.
Roy has to start double–checking whether Jason is taking his iron supplements because the tip of his nose, where it’s pressed against the skin of Roy’s neck, is as cold as the dead. Roy can’t ever bring himself to complain though, when faced with the pleased hum Jason lets out whenever he manages to siphon some of Roy’s body heat for himself.
The comforting weight of Jason anchoring him to the bed and Lian’s small hand twisting into the fabric of his sweats while she unconsciously nuzzles her nose into Roy—a trait she had apparently adopted from Jason—is enough to let him drift to sleep without problem.
The next morning, streams of sunlight break through the confines of their previously closed curtains and surround him in a blanket of warmth. Before bed last night, Lian had insisted that they all wake up early today to make special pancakes because she had gotten the highest reading score out of everyone in her class. Jason—of course—immediately agreed and whether Roy wanted to be up that early didn’t matter because he had been out voted.
He had been catching up on a few extra minutes of sleep splayed on the couch when a foam arrow hits him square in the face, startling him awake.
“Bullseye! That’s another fifty points for Lian Laurel Harper! Will she win the gold or go home medal-less? Find out after this commercial break.” Jason’s voice is abnormally cheery and has a noticeable lack of accent that confuses Roy for a moment before he processes the conversation happening.
“No, JayJay, why are we going on break?! I have all my stuff with me. I could win now!” Lian is crouched behind the coffee table. A plastic bow clutched in one hand and a small quiver of green foam arrows in the other as she continues her debate with Jason from across the room.
“Cause mija, your pancakes are almost done and even Olympic gold archers need breakfast. Just ask your Pa’, don’tcha agree Roytoy? ”
Roy accepts that he won’t be falling asleep again anytime soon and sits up to shake off the drowsiness clinging onto him. “Yep, when I was your age I ate all my br–” A yawn abruptly cuts him off and he reaches up to push back the hair that had fallen into his eyes when his fingers brush against a tacky piece of paper stuck to his forehead. He peels it off with a confused hum and turns the sticky note over to see “50 pts.” lazily scrawled in black pen.
After doing a quick survey of himself he counts ten yellow sticky notes with varying numbers written on them ranging from five to fifty on his arms, legs, and stomach. “Really, Jaybird? You use your Bat training to help my daughter use me as target practice but you won’t use it to help me break into the Bat-cave to test out the Bat-Bow. I see how it is.”
Lian, either realizing she isn’t going to be able to take advantage of her father’s lack of sleep anymore or simply preparing to chow down on her celebratory pancakes takes this as her cue to toss her bow and quiver onto the dog bed near the window sill and climbs up onto the couch with the tv remote clutched in her fist.
An amused snort sounds from the kitchen and the clattering of silverware is partly muffled by the slightly staticy music that fills the room from the radio. “I didn’t hafta do shit. You were so conked out, Lian did all the sneakin’, I just wrote down the numbers for her.”
“Oh, is that so?”
Lian is giggling on the opposite end of the couch, the bottom half of her face tucked into a Gotham Knights jersey that shallows her whole frame. Roy lets out a dramatic sigh, feigning defeat before quickly shooting out his arm and snagging her ankle. Her joyous scream fills the living room and Roy uses her moment of distraction to pick her up and he just as quickly deposits her into his lap.
“Looks like we’ve got a little bird in-training on our hands.” Lian’s laughter only increases when her father grabs her face with one hand and affectionately presses the tip of his nose into her cheek, taking an exaggerated breath in through his nose before exhaling and blowing a raspberry into her round cheek. “I bet you’ll be sneaking into the Cave and stealing yourself the Bat-Bow in no time.”
Roy turns around sending a pointed look to Jason, who is still cooking breakfast in the kitchen, his back to the living room. He’s curled over the stove in Roy’s old Great Frog t-shirt from their cross-country tour.
Duncan had gotten his size all wrong, the front was weirdly loose and the sleeves were so unbearably tight around his biceps it made drumming unnecessarily difficult. That night before their big show he had borrowed a pocket knife off Corey and chopped the sleeves right off.
As Jason turns back toward the kitchen island he can see miles of scarred tan skin and the small red script tattooed over his ribs from how far down Roy had cut the sleeves.
“Harper, ’m not gonna let our kid go sneakin’ around the Bat-cave to steal a stupid bow just so you can brag ‘bout it to Oliver.”
Our kid, God.
The honey-sweet scent of pancakes and peonies trickle into the sunlit living room from the kitchen. Lian is pressed against Roy’s side on their small couch prattling on about something to do with Grandpa Ollie and ponies, her pigtails swaying with every exuberant flourish of her small hands.
Jason strolls into the living room, managing to balance three plates of whipped cream-covered blueberry pancakes in his arms while maneuvering through the maze of scattered toys on their hardwood floor with ease. He carefully places Roy’s plate on the wooden coffee table by his knees and Lian’s smaller portion in her lap before he sits down, wedging himself in between Lian and the worn arm of the couch.
Jason is already halfway through his breakfast when his viridescent eyes—previously engrossed in the colorful, nonsensical talking animal cartoon playing on the television—meet Roy’s over Lian’s head. Even after so many years, having someone's whole and undivided attention—especially the one person you intend on spending the rest of your morning, noons, and nights with—is a heady feeling.
Blue eyes slowly trace over the details of Roy’s face before abruptly sliding down to stare at his throat. Jason’s previously reverent gaze turns cold, his expression souring and brows furrowing before his attention cuts back towards the television.
Roy knows it was the thin scar stretched over his adams apple that put Jason in a sour mood.
He had gotten it almost three weeks ago. Jason was just on the tail end of recovering from a shattered ankle and he had needed Red Hood to make an appearance in Crime Alley. So, to prevent Jason from taking the zeta out to Gotham and grappling through the city on a busted foot, Roy had suited up in the Red Hood armor instead.
It was a quiet, boring patrol, at first. Roy had stopped by a few of Jason’s buildings to check up on the families there. He’d swung by some of the halfway houses and Alley kids' hidey–holes to make sure everyone was accounted for, while double checking that Jason’s men were dropping off enough food and water for the kids.
He had personally met up with the lieutenants in charge; Rose, Brick, and Cardinal, to discuss business details. Brick was keeping surveillance up around the docks, last week a group of twenty or so of Black Masks men were reported sniffing around; opening crates and rifling through a few of the warehouses down by the waterfront. Rose said everything was clear over in Newtown and that they had successfully shut down a weapons dealing operation trying to set up shop in the Bowery.
As his right hand woman, Cardinal was put in charge of looking over Crime Alley and occasionally the Narrows in Red Hood’s absence. She reported nothing out of the ordinary besides a few suspicious people asking the street kids about Red Hood's whereabouts that had been promptly shooed away.
Roy dropped off the folder Jason had put together filled with their new patrol routes, spending budget, and whatever other information one might need to run a criminal empire, and left to grapple around Gotham a bit to make sure people would talk of Red Hood sightings.
Roy’s mistake, as per usual, was being just too hot to handle. Arsenal’s suit is breathable and sleeveless; suited for Northern California. Red Hood’s suit was made with Gotham’s temperatures and Gotham’s villains in mind; under armor, padding, thick reinforced cargo pants, a chest plate, an armored leather jacket, and a full face helmet.
Despite the helmet's internal cooling system, Roy was sweating buckets. He was lounging on a roof near the old opera house when he finally had enough and figured taking off one small piece of armor couldn’t hurt.
After Jason’s big confrontation with Bruce and the Joker, he had made many alterations to his suit to avoid injury from others. One of these additions being a modern gorget made from kevlar and nylon that tucked into his chest plate and helmet to ensure complete coverage, with fastenings on the back in case it needed to be removed quickly for emergencies.
Roy had, stupidly, unclipped the gorget and slipped it into one of the leather jackets internal pockets. He had just finished another lap around Red Hood’s territory when he saw a shadow hunched over on a nearby rooftop in his peripherals.
He was mid-swing but was just quick enough to jerk back from the blade flying at him. Unfortunately gravity was not on his side that night and the momentum of his swing pulled him forward, leaving a thin slice over the hollow of his neck.
After trying to find the culprit (with no such luck) Roy had stopped by Leslie’s to run a few blood tests in case it was laced and to make sure it got stitched up properly. Leslie had run various tests that had all come back clean, said it was practically a scratch and only needed a few small stitches.
Roy had gotten home in the middle of the night, thrown himself into bed, curled up next to Jason, and promptly forgot about it. So, when he had woken up hours later to warm, muscled thighs straddling his hips and a lap full of Jason Todd, he was in a very good mood. When he had eventually opened his eyes to the sight of Jason, stiff as a board, arms crossed, and glaring daggers at his throat, he was not in such a good mood anymore.
He had said then what he was about to repeat now; the truth.
“Jaybird, I’m fine.”
Jason looks up at him from where he’s curled over Lian’s plate, cutting up pieces of her pancake. He has the corner of his bottom lip tucked between his teeth but other than that his expression is startlingly neutral. Contrary to popular belief, Jason can, in fact, mask his emotions decently well. He just never wants to. He’d grown up around too many people—Bristol and Alley—giving him false smiles and indifferent glances to tolerate fake pleasantries when there’s an issue.
Jason can, and will, talk himself red about how he’s feeling, and why he’s feeling what he’s feeling. Jason’s openness and need to express everything he wants and is expecting out of Roy—even if that need is built from one too many of his loved ones disappointing him—is nice. After Jade, where their relationship was built on hidden identities, thrown fists, and conflicting loyalties, it’s so nice not being left in the dark on where they stand in each other's lives.
Roy knows logically that Jason’s doing it for Lian’s sake, but seeing Jason so closed off around him, when he knows something is bothering him, still leaves a bitter taste in his mouth. Jason turns back to Lian, whispering something in her ear that has her sliding off the couch and bouncing to her room; her half-eaten plate of blueberry pancakes in hand.
A guilty feeling of relief settles in Roy’s chest, when Jason turns back towards the coffee table and he can see all the concern, and frustration etched into his features. Jason begins slowly cleaning up the living room in silence. It would’ve worried him if he hadn’t been able to read Jason so well.
His face is still openly displaying all of his emotions but his eyes are far off, and his jaw is working like he’s physically chewing through his words. He isn’t giving Roy the silent treatment, he’s trying to figure out how to verbalize exactly how he is feeling, and Roy knows it’s better to give him time to think then to start pestering him into a conversation.
He starts with clearing the coffee table; slowly stacking his and Roy’s empty dishes in the sink, grabbing Lian’s discarded Nokia and slipping it into her overnight bag for Ollie and Dinah’s, and putting away his copy of Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve’s La Belle et la Bête before wiping down the table with a wet rag.
Old fairy tale books scattered around their home had become the norm a few months ago. Jason had gone into Lian’s room to read to her before bed as usual when she had declared she was too old for bedtime stories. When he had asked if that meant she didn’t want Jason to read to her anymore she had almost immediately burst into tears. So, Jason had promised that they’d start reading the grown up versions of her favorites together instead. He had started collecting them all in their original languages because he was a nerd like that he thought it would make good linguistic practice for him and Roy.
It’s also much easier to bullshit your way through a story about an evil stepmother repeatedly attempting to murder her stepdaughter, and a prince finding an assumed corpse in a glass coffin and deciding to carry her around with him everywhere he goes, when the six-year-old you're translating the story to can’t read German.
Jason is bent over the sink, washing the dishes when he finally deems himself ready to talk. He keeps his back to Roy and his hands busy with a ceramic coffee mug in a way that either means he’s embarrassed or worried how Roy’s going to react to what he needs to say. Roy hopes it’s not the ladder. He never wants Jason to be scared of opening up to him.
“I know you’re fine, but… I’m just worried one of these times you won’t be, and that scares me Roy. You scare me and I don’t know how to deal with that.” Jason’s facing him now, with those wide blue eyes and a worried scrunch of his nose. “But, I know I’m gonna hafta get used to it, cause as long as you're vigilante-ing I’m gonna worry, and you’re never not gonna be vigilante-ing ‘round in some way or another.”
Recognizing the serious tone of this conversation, Roy pushes himself up from his spot on the couch and carefully circles the kitchen island to stand in front of Jason’s stiff form.
“I’m alright Jaybird, really. I’m always gonna be alright–”
Jason cuts him off. “Roy, don’t lie to me. Don’t make promises ya can’t keep, that’s not fair.”
“I’m not lying to you. I never lie to you, remember? As long as I have you and Lian to come home to, I’m always gonna be alright. I might have some broken bones and a couple holes in me I might need you to patch up, but I’m always gonna come back for you guys. I’ll make sure of it.”
Roy gently reaches out to place a hand on Jason’s shoulder, when he doesn’t pull away from the contact Roy tucks him against his side. He runs a soothing hand up and down Jason’s spine and places a chaste kiss to the crown of his head before continuing his reassurances.
“But, if you’re doubting my stubbornness, then I can at least swear to you that I’m always going to try. I’ll drag myself miles through the desert, with two broken legs to be with you guys. I’ll use the last of my strength to reach out to you two and my last breath to say your names. The last pulse of my heart will be because I’m looking into your eyes and then—when you finally put me into the ground—I’ll crawl my way out and into your arms.”
Jason lets out a shuddering breath against Roy's throat and mumbles his response into Roy’s skin; “I’ll hold you to that.” Roy can hear the unsaid meaning behind those words; I’ll be waiting.
Roy answers with nothing but the unshakable truth; “I know you will.”
“You promise?”
“I promise, Jaybird.”
Roy tucks himself into Jason’s shoulder, as if to hide himself or as if he’s acting as a physical barrier to shield Jason from all the worries of the world. He takes a deep breath in through his nose and lets the smell of leather and faint artificial watermelon wash over him.
He can hear Jason’s hitching breaths and feel the faint tremble of his shoulders. Roy continues rubbing Jason’s back as he leaves a trail of barely there kisses from his shoulder to the soft skin underneath his jaw. Jason’s pulse is strong against his mouth and it’s a comforting reminder that he’s here, that they’re both here and alive and together.
He whispers it against Jason’s heartbeat, maybe it’s a question, or a plea, or a prayer to a God he’s never believed in, or maybe it’s the reading of a prophecy. A fundamental truth that he knows Jason will fulfill no matter the dangerous storms or crashing waves. Something that is engraved into Jason’s very bones in the same way loving Jason Peter Todd is engraved into his.
“All you have to do is wait for me.”
“Always.”
After helping Jason clean up the rest of the living room and packing the rest of Lian’s bags so she can stay at Ollie and Dinah’s for a couple days, Roy manages to convince Jason to get in touch with one of the Bats about the assassination attempt on Red Hood while he and Lian go grocery shopping.
Roy hadn’t been looking at houses in Arizona, at first. He’d been apartment hunting when Conner had stopped by and saw the tabs open on Roy’s laptop. He’d casually mentioned that Oliver had recently been trying to sell a property over in Arizona from an old league team up with Booster Gold and maybe he should consider talking to him about it.
Ollie had been utterly gleeful when he heard Roy was considering moving himself and Lian into the house in Phoenix. Jason had come to view the house under the guise of being too impatient to wait until after to talk to Roy about Outlaw business, and although that excuse had earned him an exasperated look from Ollie, he’d been allowed to stay for the tour.
It was a nice house; three bedrooms, two bathrooms, with a built in two car garage, and a small fenced in backyard. It was already vigilante-safe; an armory hidden behind a false wall in the hall closet, a doomsday shelter underneath a shed in the yard, and a meta human proof security system. It was within a few miles of a zeta tube and far away enough from the city to not be on anyone’s radar.
It was perfect.
Jason and Lian had both approved too, though they showed it in different ways. Lian had run from room to room, already planning on what color to paint her room and where her toy box would go. Jason had given an appreciative whistle and had said;
“Damn, it’s real convenient you’ve got a property down here. Almost too convenient. I’d never live in one’ve B’s houses.”
Roy could tell the idea of him moving closer to Star had put Ollie in a good mood because he’d wrapped an arm around Jason’s shoulders and said, “What? Your Pops still decorating all his places like his old dorm room in boarding school? All gothic and depressing.”
“Nah, it’s ‘cause he’d bug my damn phone to figure out what kinda places I’m lookin’ at, buy an apartment that matched, set up a shit ton of cameras and voice recorders, and forge the paperwork to pretend he’s had it all along. Plus he’d pay for it, and all the rent I’d force him to take he’d probably put in some weird trust fund for my birthday.”
“Okay then… Roy! I’d ever tell you how glad I am that I never took parenting advice from Wayne when I first took you in?”
“All the time.”
Lian had taken the move to Phoenix and the addition of Jason into their little family spectacularly. Well, Jason had already been a member of their family back in New York, when nine times out of ten Jason would spend the night on the pull-out couch in their apartment (or Roy’s bed) and make them all breakfast in the morning. But looking at places for the three of them and putting Jason’s name under the Parent/Guardian section next to his on Lian’s school paperwork made their family feel less like a convenient arrangement and more of an intentional decision.
Lian was on summer break at the moment, which was why they were currently sitting in the bed of his pick up truck eating ice cream; to celebrate the end of the school year. Or, that’s the excuse Roy had come up with when Lian had started questioning why they weren’t driving towards the local grocery store.
Roy isn’t actually worried, he knows exactly how this conversation is going to go, but it doesn’t stop the nervous drumming of his fingers against his thigh or the anxious biting of his nail.
“Lian, Sweetheart? You know Daddy tells you everything right?”
Lian is swinging her legs back and forth over the lip of the tailgate and her face is covered in melted strawberry ice cream when she turns her head towards him. She nods and lets out a pleased hum in what might be agreement or, more likely, due to the ice cream she just licked off her hand.
“Well, I’ve gotta tell you– I’ve gotta ask you something okay?”
“Uh-huh…” Lian’s looking at him like he’s being particularly amusing. Which he can’t blame her for with the way he’s stumbling over his words and chewing at his thumb.
“You know how JayJay and I are....friends?” He’s stalling. He knows he’s stalling and yet he can’t help the way his throat catches on the word friends. He also knows that Lian knows they’re more than friends.
She crawls into their shared bed a few nights a week to cuddle and insist Jason gives her and Roy extra goodnight kisses. She tells her teachers Jason is “Daddy’s Jaybird” and last year she made Jason a gift for fathers day that had him sniffling the rest of the week.
She must know that he knows this too, with the way she dramatically rolls her eyes and laughs at him. “Daddy, don’t be silly! JayJay’s your bird, not a friend.”
“What’ddya mean my bird? Jaybird can’t be my friend ‘cause I call him a bird?”
She says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, like she didn’t just flip his world upside down in a few simple words. “Yep! JayJay’s your Jaybird just like Aunt Dinah is Grampa’s Pretty Bird. So…” She pauses to take another spoonful of her ice cream. “JayJay’s like Aunt Dinah and you’re Grampa. He’s not your friend like Uncle Dickie is.”
He tries not to dwell on that; JayJay’s like Aunt Dinah and you’re Grampa. He also tries not to compare this to the time he was called in for a meeting with Lian’s pre-school.
He was on the phone when he looked down at himself then, at his faded jeans covered in grease, his tattoos, and his scars. He had received snide looks from a few of the mothers by that point already, whether it was due to him being on the younger side, the track marks visible on his forearms, or his obvious unease at being in the city, it didn’t matter to him, but what did matter was that his bad image didn’t rub off on Lian’s.
So, that afternoon he had gone out and bought the most “fatherly” outfit he could find; a pale blue dress shirt, a black pullover sweater, grey slacks, and a pair of second hand loafers. He trimmed his hair, used some of Dick’s pomade to style it, and shaped his beard. Before walking into the school he had untucked the shirt and pushed his sleeves up to appear more casual, like he wore this everyday and didn’t feel uncomfortable in it at all.
You could still see a few stray dotted scars on his left arm from when he was so desperate for a fix he didn’t care where he jabbed himself, but it wouldn’t be anything no one hasn’t seen before. He wasn’t trying to be someone else, he was trying to put a band-aid on his bullet wound of a reputation.
He remembers the meeting had gone well. Lian’s teacher had nothing but nice things to say and had only requested that they tone down the amount of superhero movies she consumes. Roy had laughed it off, they said their goodbyes, and he had gone into the other room to pick up Lian. She had looked up at the teacher calling her name and blinked at Roy a few times before running over and asking if she could dress up as Speedy if Roy got to play dress up.
He carried her to the car and as he was strapping her into her car seat he’d asked her what she meant. She looked him up and down, giggled, and said, “If you're dressing up as Grampa I wanna be Speedy!”
Him and Ollie had been going through a rough patch at the time. He had gone home, washed his hair, shaved his face until it was as smooth as humanly possible, donated the clothes to a Goodwill down the block, and had tried not to dwell on the fact that he had subconsciously been looking back on his memories with Oliver for parenting advice.
He had mentally tried to get back on track now, as well. He tried not to consider if he had also subconsciously been looking at Oliver’s relationship for love advice. Which was ridiculous because Jason and Dinah were nothing alike.
Gothamite, vigilante, bird based alias, skilled detective, skilled martial artist, in a relationship with someone older than them, way out of their current partners league—
Nothing alike.
“Well… you know how Grampa and Aunt Dinah love each other a lot?”
A small nod in response.
“And you know how JayJay and I love each other a whole lot?”
A faster, bigger nod.
“And do you remember being the flower girl at Grampa and Aunt Dinah’s wedding?” He’s stalling again, he knows, and at this rate it’ll take them all night to get through this conversation.
She pauses then, slowly looks back up at him from her cup of ice cream, her face breaks out into a blinding grin and she's nodding her head so fast Roy worries for a moment she might give herself whiplash.
Or, maybe it won’t take all day. Thank god his girl’s so smart.
She’s jumping up and hanging off of him, yelling a chorus of yes, yes, yes, and her enthusiasm to his unasked question has his face breaking out in a matching grin.
“You don’t even know what I was gonna ask yet, Princess.”
“Of course I do! You and JayJay are getting married and you want me to be a flower again!”
“A flower girl, and yes, if me and JayJay get married you’re the only flower girl I’d ever want.”
Her head pops back up so quickly he can barely move out of the way before her skull clips him in the chin.
“What’ddya mean ‘if’ you get married, Daddy?”
“Well, I didn’t bring you here to ask if you wanted to be the flower girl, Sweetie.” At the suddenly devastated look on her face he backtracks, “I do want you to be the flower girl, I was just gonna ask you another time.”
Once her face smooths out to that same curious excitement as earlier he continues. “I was gonna ask if you wanted me and JayJay to get married.” He puts a hand up to stop her outraged, defensive scoff. “I know you’re excited but I want to have a talk with you before I ask Jaybird. You know, Harper to Harper, okay?”
She throws herself down into her fathers lap and strokes her non-existent beard in deep thought before she decides that's an acceptable enough excuse for why he hasn’t proposed already.
They talk about future wedding plans, realistic expectations on what Jason marrying Roy will look like, and how this might affect Lian the whole time throughout their delayed shopping trip.
She asks on the car ride home if she can be there for the proposal because she wants to be the first one to congratulate them. Ever since the idea of marriage appeared in Roy’s head he’s been researching, and during a proposal having an audience of any sort (especially a child, their child) is a bad move. It can pressure someone to agree to the proposal when they’d otherwise say no or it can put a damper on the mood if the newly engaged couple wishes to… celebrate.
So, after some back and forth they agree that while she’s visiting Grampa Ollie and Aunt Dinah Roy will brainstorm and get everything prepared. He’ll propose the night before she gets back and he’ll make sure she’s the first one to know.
Back when they were running from the law as Outlaws, Kori had opened up about her short marriage to Prince Karras. Which had started a long back and forth between her and Jason on whether he had ever thought about getting married. The consensus had been; Yes.
He had dreamt about love his entire life.
He had grown up watching his parents dance around their one bedroom apartment in Crime Alley, disgustingly in love, despite the rotting floorboards and leaky roof. They had been each other's shoulder to lean on when the weight of the world was too much to carry. And when life was good, the only person other than Jason they wanted to experience that with was each other.
They were best friends and lovers. Each other's other half and confidant. They were equals and partners to the very end .
He had grown up around those cheesy romance novels you’ll find at your local drugstore for fifty cents. Lots of headstrong women getting kidnapped by unusually attractive pirates and bodices being torn to shreds. Though Jason prefers novels of manners with romantic sub-plots.
He had told Kori that night that it wasn’t a surprise he became such a romance nerd, that every kid wants to be like their parents and all that jazz. Roy had later found out during a stakeout that the books were, surprisingly, not Catherine Todd’s.
In fact, she had never understood the appeal of outlandish romantic fairytales, but Willis Todd did. Every Friday on his way home from the car shop, he’d buy a pack of Lucky Strikes, a six pack of 'Gansett, and a Kathleen Woodwhiss novel to last him for the rest of the week.
After Catherine passed and Willis was stuck serving time in Blackgate, Jason had befriended Ms. Parker; an older woman who worked at the Gotham Public Library. She would always leave a back door or window unlocked in the wintertime in case Jason needed somewhere to warm up for the night. He had always loved books, in the way everyone would enjoy the occasional story, but that was when he had started associating reading with comfort and safety.
It was a time in his life where he’d rather be living any other life in the world. Reading distracted him from the fact his stomach was empty, and that he had no home or parents to return to for a few hours. That was where he’d read his first romance book, curled on the floor wishing a knight in shining armor would save him and love him no matter what.
And in a way that did come true. If you consider the Bat-suit shining armor, perhaps.
He loved and was loved in return. He had family and safety and a future. He could sit in the gardens all day and dream of meeting a nice girl at some charity matchmaking gala. If that had happened Bruce would no doubt have hosted some extravagant wedding at the manor, with ice sculptures and doves and fucking Celine Dion performing at the reception.
But that hadn’t happened. Roy isn’t some fair maiden with a rich daddy for Jason to whisk away, and Jason doesn’t want extravagance, he wants intimacy. He wants a best friend and confidant, passion and desire, comfort and safety. Jason wants a life partner and Roy was his partner before he was ever anything else.
If there’s some things in this life Roy’s unsure how to do, loving Jason Todd isn’t one of them. In fact, he doubts he’s ever lived a life where falling in love with Jason felt like undiscovered territory instead of coming home.
A life where looking out at violent ocean waves during a storm didn’t conjure up memories of looking into Jason’s eyes and the faint aroma of leather didn’t remind him of the smell of Jason’s sweat slicked skin isn’t a hell he’d ever want to live through.
Not after he’d learn how good it felt to have Jason in his life.
He didn’t know if he could ever learn to live without it.