"To knock a thing down, especially if it is cocked at an arrogant angle, is a deep delight of the blood." -George Santayana (1863-1952)
There comes the softest rap on the door; whisper of knuckles on wood. It's secret enough so as to not disturb the mood. Even, perhaps, an imagined sound.
Dick's learned enough to listen sensitively (or so he would hope), and the sound is noticed.
So is the second knock, more insistent yet still polite. It is muffled. The neighbors down the hall will not hear it. It's as if the visitor is not really there.
Ghosts. Sometimes Slade moves like one.
A third, and Richard blinks.
It is close to three-thirty, the prelude to rush hour. Hardly time yet for moving, and so Dick remains drawn up on his chair. Undisturbed is the oblivion the boy's been entertaining, which reveals that being an adult now feels no more different than when he had been a child.
Helplessly without a clue. Only now, he's allowed to be alone.
More tapping.
Alone, Dick repeats. It's how he's felt in this second week after his birthday. And why would anyone care to bother with young Dick Grayson, anyhow?
Bruce won't.
The sink drips, another sad, hollow sound that carries. Dick shuts out the beckoning that tells him to relate the sound to ruffled clothing. He has no use for costumes if he's no longer owned nor wanted.
This strange new city with it's smothered balcony noises doesn't seem to need a vigilante at night, either. Why blindly wander into traps anymore? Dick feels as if he should be happy now that he's too old to fall prey.
Dick hasn't left his place for three days and it's not the same as locking himself into his room because someone always had been there to draw him out in the evenings. Always.
One solid, strong cuff.
Dick listens to his heartbeat in his ears.
If Mr. Wilson wants to see him so badly, he might as well throw the goddamn door off of it's hing--
Splintered wood, a horrendous crash and a single golden screw that arcs like a rainbow across Richard's field of view.
The thick weight of Dick's blood in his veins, collected after many days of "growing up" suddenly thins. The pit of his stomach twists when Slade speaks, using an achingly familiar tone.
"Be so kind as to invite me in."
The comforting instability returns, knocked back into Dick's life like an anticipated punchline to a joke, irony finally realized or Dick noting that it's going to be Wayne replacing the door.
His toes curl over the side of his chair; wood not yet broken.
"Make me."