Kid Flash takes Jinx to meet his friends. His kind of odd friends.
My normal, not crazy friends!
Dick Grayson was wondering if it was too late to wear sunglasses. He had combed his hair back and was wearing a plain blue shirt and jeans. But, he still felt exposed. No cape. No mask.
He sipped at the coffee he had ordered. Dick Grayson in a coffee shop and waiting for his best friend to bring his new girlfriend to meet them. An almost, dare he say it, normal thing to be doing.
"Of course, you're the first one here," Roy commented the moment he entered. Dick just gave him a cheeky grin and wave in response. Roy had gone the same way as him and dressed in a plain red shirt and jeans. He had combed his hair back and was wearing sunglasses.
"And it would figure that Wally's the last to arrive," Dick mused when Roy returned with his coffee.
"When were we supposed to meet?" Roy asked. Dick raised an eyebrow at his friend's question. "What? I just knew it was afternoon around 2 or something."
"Close," Dick sighed. It was a good thing Bumblebee was in charge of Titans West. He dreaded to think what would have happened if Roy had been in charge. Titans West wouldn't make it to any meeting on time. "Two thirty."
"And what time is it now?"
"Two thirty-two." How was it that Wally was always the last one when Roy had a terrible sense of time?
"Three minutes then," Roy chuckled, referencing the old League joke that Flash was always five minutes late. "Do you know Wally's new girl?"
"Yes. You've met her. Remember Jinx?"
Roy rolled his eyes. "Of course. But do you know how much he's told her? About us?"
Dick sighed. "No." And it was eating away at him. Had Wally spilled their identities to an ex-criminal?
They both looked up as a familiar red head walked in. Wally had his arm around a cat-like girl with pink hair and eyes. He was grinning like crazy while she appeared to be nervous.
"Wally!" Roy and Dick called out in unison.
"My friends!" Wally greeted them in return. "My normal, not crazy friends!"
Jinx gave Wally a confused look while Roy and Dick shared a grin. That exchange told them a lot about what Wally had told her.
He had told her nothing about their other identities. Only that they were his friends, Dick and Roy. Not even about what they were like.
Oh, this was going to be fun.
Dick slid out of the chair and took Jinx's hand in his. "Hello. You must be the wonderful lady Wally can't stop talking about. Nice to meet you." He grinned and cupped her hand gently as he bowed a little. "I'm Dick Grayson."
"Uh. Jinx," she responded, pulling her hand from his. "Um… don't you live in Gotham? Or do I have the wrong Dick Grayson?"
"Nah, that's this guy," Roy informed her, placing a hand on Dick's head and ruffling his hair a little in a fond way. "I'm Roy Harper, by the way. I used to hang out with Oliver Queen before I moved out. Millionaires are way self-absorbed."
"I moved out of Gotham," Dick informed her quickly.
"Because Bruce Wayne is a dick. No insult intended to current company."
"Insult taken. I'll remember this, Roy Harper," Dick said in a playful but threatening tone.
Wally groaned into his hands. "Guys, please."
"Please what?" they both asked.
Jinx watched their interactions with a blank expression on her face.
"So, Bruce takes me to meet this forensic scientist he knows, because Bruce loves giving money to police around the country. Turns out it was Wally's Uncle Barry. He gave us a tour of the place and then his wife invited us for dinner. Lovely lady, great food. My first words to Wally, beyond your usual polite stuff, were 'you eat like a pig'."
Roy howled a laugh while Jinx snickered.
"He hasn't changed!" Roy snorted.
Wally's face was flushed with embarrassment.
"What's the 'usual polite stuff'?" Jinx asked.
"Your introductions and stuff about the weather and stocks."
"Stocks?" Jinx questioned.
"I'm not living here on just Bruce's money, you know? I have to make my money somehow."
"How old are you, grandpa?" Roy teased.
Dick gave him a friendly knock on the shoulder. "I'm eighteen and legal in a number of countries, baby!"
"Except here. Twenty-one, yeah!" Roy cheered.
"You're nineteen," Wally reminded him.
"Are we sure Dick's eighteen?" Jinx asked Roy. "He's kind of… short."
"Takes one to know one," Dick countered while Roy laughed.
"I like you. You're so wasted on Freckles here," he commented to Jinx with a wicked grin.
They decided to stay and chat. Dick went and ordered cakes and treats for them to snack on while Roy told Jinx a story about how he met Wally through Dick. Jinx gave them curious looks whenever the conversation waned. It was obvious that she didn't know what to make of them.
"Anyway, if you value your sanity, you will not give Wally coffee," Roy said to Jinx. "And it's probably best to not give… Dick anything that's mostly sugar."
"Excuse you?" Dick snapped. "What's wrong with me and sugar?" It wasn't a regular part of his diet, mostly due to Alfred's and then Cyborg's influence but, there was no reason he couldn't have it.
"Let's see, there's that time you decided it was a good idea to spray whipped cream over one of Bruce's cars." That was when he was eleven and the plan had been to make the Batmobile look like it had come from snow during the height of summer. Turn a few heads on Gotham's streets. "And that time you set a rabbit snare for me or Wally to step into." That had been funny. Wally had been the unlucky one and had flailed around, almost at super speeds. "And let's not forget the time you decided it would be a good idea to, and I quote, 'break into the Wayne building in Gotham through the vents'."
"Not my fault your fat butt got stuck."
"It was not my butt, I told you I wouldn't fit and my point is that before each of those incidents, someone thought it was a good idea to let you gorge yourself on sugar."
"Wally got in alright," Dick said with a shrug.
Jinx perked up at that and gave Wally a snide grin. "Wallace, did you break into a Wayne building?"
Wally's face went red. "Technically, we weren't breaking in since Dick is related to Wayne-"
"I'm just his ward."
"Would have been nice to have that clarified before the police showed up," Roy pointed out.
"You got arrested?" Jinx asked Wally in an excited tone.
"No!" Wally shouted before sinking into his chair and squeaking out, "maybe. Yes. It's not like they kept us overnight or anything."
"Wally!" Jinx laughed. "I always knew you had a little bit of criminal in you!"
"Thanks guys," Wally said with a hint of sarcasm. "I always wanted my girlfriend to know that I don't surround myself with normal people."
"I already knew that," Jinx said. He was Kid Flash after all, friend to Robin, the leader of the Teen Titans.
Wally groaned. Roy placed a hand on his shoulder.
"It's okay, Wals," he said in what was supposed to be a comforting tone.
"Normal is overrated," Dick pointed out as they walked out of the cafe. He did a twirl and grinned at them. "So, who's up for some after-dark activities?"
"Me!" Roy responded, raising his hand.
"Are we talking legal things here?" Jinx asked and didn't that feel strange. She wasn't usually the one who worried about things like that. But, it was worth it to feel Wally wrap her in a hug and thank her for being a voice of reason.
Dick grinned. Something about the grin made Jinx want to zap him. It was mischievous and knowing.
"Come on, Jinx, I assure you this won't turn up on your record."
Wally sighed. "This is going to have something to do with Wayne, isn't it?"
Dick seemed to think about that, his gaze turning to the Titan's tower, just visible on the horizon.
"Well, we could always break in and prank the Teen Titans."
"No," Roy breathed, moments away from breaking out in squeals if the grin and high pitch of his voice were any indication.
"No!" Wally cried out in denial. Suddenly, Jinx understood how he had been able to handle her criminal attitude and impulses when they first met.
Practice.
Dick laughed, a light and warm thing. "I'm kidding. But, if you could, how would you prank them?"
"What? You running out of prank ideas?" Roy questioned in a sceptical tone.
Dick winked at him. "Maybe I just want to know what I'm supposed to look out for."
"You're insane." Roy shook his head in a fond way. "Besides, I've already got an appointment alright."
"With him?" Dick questioned, his manner switching from happy to serious.
Roy sighed. "I know you're not on the best of terms-"
"It's not that. It's just, I don't understand how he can do what he does."
"I think you do," Roy responded. "And that's what makes you angry at him."
"I'm just... frustrated. Besides, wasn't today about fun and ribbing Wally in front of his new girl?"
Jinx felt herself blush as they both turned back to look at her. Dick took her hands into his.
"I'm sorry we have to cut this short," he informed her with a blander version of the smile she had been seeing the whole afternoon.
"That's fine." She thought for a moment before adding, "maybe you could switch the locations for Beast Boy's tofu and Cyborg's meat? I'm sure it would confuse them."
"A small but confusing act," Dick mused with a real grin. "I like it. I will see you again, Miss Jinx."
"Uh... sure," she responded hesitantly, the formal tone in his voice reminding her that this kid was rich. She had somehow forgotten among the talks of pranks and other things.
"Thanks for today," Roy said with a natural grin and a wave. "But I've got to go meet a friend. Jay doesn't like being kept waiting!"
"Hey!" Dick called as Roy started to move. "Tell him... tell him I say 'hi', okay?"
Roy and Wally both snorted. "Yeah, I'll do that."
"Jay?" Jinx asked Wally once Roy had dashed out of site and Dick had slipped into a car which smoothly pulled out of traffic to pick him up before smoothly pulling away.
"Dick's brother. There's a lot of issues there," Wally informed her.
Jinx wondered about that. She wasn't aware that Bruce Wayne had another kid.
"Don't worry about Dick's family. They'll get it sorted out. Maybe."
"Fine," Jinx huffed, shelving her curiosity for now.
Since Jinx had been meeting Wally's friends in Jump City, she had put in to stay with Titans West. Starfire had greeted her excitedly and pulled her into 'girly activities' with Raven.
The next morning, Jinx was ready to leave when the rest of the group were eating breakfast. She was stopped from announcing her departure by Cyborg's voice ringing out from the fridge.
"Hey, Green Bean! Where's my meat?"
"I have no idea," Beast Boy responded. He transformed into a rat to quickly slip past Cyborg and reformed between him and the fridge. He opened the compartment his tofu was normally in. "Hey! What the? Why's there meat here? Ew!"
"Don't ask me!" Cyborg said, pulling out tofu from where his meat was normally placed. "This was placed where my meat goes!"
They started ranting at each other, trying to get the other to admit to the bad joke.
"You okay, Jinx?" Robin asked. Aside from a glance at his friends, he hadn't paid much attention to the escalating argument. "I can almost see right down your throat."
Jinx snapped her mouth shut before pulling out her communicator. She moved to a quiet corner and called Kid Flash.
There was no way. No way.
"Did your friends break into Titan's tower?" she demanded quietly the moment Kid Flash picked up.
Kid Flash stopped in the middle of greeting her with a stupid pet name to stare in shock. He was gobsmacked. "Why do you-"
"Because someone switched Beast Boy's and Cyborg's food around!" she hissed.
"They have that stuff for breakfast?" Kid Flash questioned in a baffled tone, glancing away nervously.
Or guiltily.
"Kid. Did you know about this?"
"Mmmmaybe."
Another thought occurred to her. She had to ask, even if she was wrong. "Did you help your friends break in?"
On the screen, Kid Flash seemed to shrink. "Dick did most of the work. Roy thought it was a good idea to help him and Jay bond. We were there as kind of buffer between the two."
"You and your friends broke into Titan's tower?" Jinx was horrified. Okay, she had been guilty of the same crime but she didn't do it as a prank. Who risked prison for a prank? "They're insane."
"I have questioned their sanity on a number of occasions," Kid Flash pointed out in a matter-of-fact tone.
When she got into this relationship, she did not think that Kid's friends would be the ones most likely to have criminal records. It was shocking.
"Look, despite the pranks, they're good people," Kid Flash told her.
Jinx rolled her eyes. "Obviously." She had spent most of her life around criminals and Kid's friends were not criminals.
"Hey, Jinx. There's something here for you," Robin mused, having broken up Beast Boy's and Cyborg's fight with his status as leader. He held out a small box to her.
"Better get that," Kid Flash said with a wry grin before hanging up.
Jinx took the box and opened it.
"Chocolates?" she mused, a small grin coming to her face. The inside lid of the box had been signed with the names; 'Dick', 'Roy', 'Jay' and 'Wally' with a small scrawled message in Dick's handwriting stating 'welcome to the gang'.