A/N
I was riding on the bus to school last week and the thought just popped into my head. That is all. Nothing too fancy for this story idea!
Summary: Because before the Team, before Batman, before the fall, he'd made everything himself. The sewing machine just brought it all back.
Song(s):
Keep the Streets Empty for Me- Fever Ray
Disclaimer: YJ is not mine to claim...
Trapeze Boots
It sat on the top shelf of the antique store, dusty, old and unwanted. Robin hadn't noticed it, noticed her until his tinted sunglasses swept upward in search for cameras.
He gasped.
Thread was still wound, a cloth mid-stitch. It brought back so many memories.
His Mama, "Treat her good and she'll always reward you."
His Tati, "An essential skill, something to always hold us together."
It just came flooding back.
Robin was glad he was alone in that store, the shopkeeper busily rummaging in the back, because he fell to his knees, arms uncrossing to lay uselessly at his sides. His glasses slipped off his face from the tears, and then he was Dick Grayson, a young boy who'd never gotten to mourn his parents.
Shakily, he stumbled to his feet, using the bookshelf as a footstool to scramble to the top, arms and legs crawling, and grab the object. He let out a sob.
The sewing machine sat proudly in his arms, needle pointed and silver, despite years of disuse. Dick ran his hand along the side, dust tickling his nose, thinned red lips trembling as he held it all back. Bright blue eyes blurred from tears, memories swirled in his mind, and he found himself breathing heavily-
-only to jump off the shelf and swiftly put on his discarded glasses as the older women came back to the register. She beamed at him. He bought the machine, and then he was out the door, turning down an alley, and on the rooftops a moment latter.
Hidden in the shadows, he dropped to his knees once again and held the machine closely, a reminder of his past. Because he could remember all those times he threaded the string, pushed down on the pedal, and mended a rip, a tear, a hole. Creating a masterpiece from bare materials; the plainest, the oldest fabrics becoming theirs to wear, theirs to share. There wasn't that much money to be made, so they made everything from scratch, made the best of what they had. Nothing else had mattered because they were family. They were together. So every day, they continued on. Fixing his costume, exersize cloths, normal cloths, and his trapeze boots.
Oh, the trapeze boots.
He remembered every single little hole that formed in the worn leather from over-use, the tough material the machine had to push through, all the little stitches needed to make the seam invisible.
Boots like his parents, who were always so brave and caring, always protecting. Like his family, worn but always loving, always tender. Stitches like pieces of Dick's heart, sewn into them to hold them together.
But then they'd broken, and he sat on the side, and though it saved his life, his mind had shattered. And no longer were his boots holding onto the family because there was no family to hold together, and he'd been alone in the world with his broken boots.
Broken boots that stayed with Dick and his broken mind, in a broken prison that wasn't meant for him.
But then he'd come, Bruce had come, and Batman had taken in the little Robin. And, like his sewing machine, both his and his guardians families were remade, broken materials becoming something new and beautiful, mending and stitching together to create a masterpiece. Every now and then a stitch came undone, and Dick was the one to pull out his trusty machine and fix the broken bonds, making the seams invisible to all but his trained eyes.
He gasped and cried and held onto her like a life line, a piece of his past, a part of his soul. Because wasn't this who he was, wasn't this the summary of his whole life? He had the power to create new things and make them beautiful. The power to create ugly things, the power to rip apart everything.
It was humbling to think of, terrifying to think of, and he curled farther into himself. Because no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't change who he was, but his emotions, his raw feelings could change everything else. And no matter how many ways he fought it, he'd always be the puppet master, doomed to create reality through his actions and reactions, no matter how terrible.
It was who he was, and although he wanted to change (he wanted to change it so bad) that's what he'd always be, all he'd ever be.
A sewing machine.
A/N
We always see Dick angst-ing over actions others make, words they say, old costumes and people, but never inanimate objects (though a costume is one).
For me, that's one of the most powerful things in a persons life. Not always the object itself, but the memories behind it, the symbolism from within it. Emotions are so much tougher to deal with because there's no one else to comfort you, it's just you and the object; free to be as sad as you want, to let all those emotions run free. It's a reminder that you have the power to change everything, that everything you do creates everything else; a reminder to be careful with what you say and what you do, because every little thing changes everything.
Anyways, I hope it was as deep to you as it was to me (though I'm usually not very good at this...so this story could actually be very terrible).
Also, thanks to Red Rosiecals who pointed out a few confusing things. I was just thinking that since Dick and his family lived with the circus and didn't earn much money, it was only natural that they sewed a lot of their own cloths and mended older cloths. They probably spent a lot of time together with the sewing machine, so it resurfaces old memories. I forgot to write that he's supposed to be younger in that fic, maybe in his starter years as Robin, so he's also more emotional because he's still grieving.
R&R
Kisses!
Alyss