Title: It'll Always Be You (So Don't You Worry)
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~1,800
Characters: Dick/Zatanna
Summary: Prequel to the College 'verse. Dick's pretty sure jealousy is an understatement of what he's feeling considering that he's already contemplating the most inconspicuous ways to get rid of this guy in a roomful of witnesses.
Prompt: jealous Dick
Note: This is the same party where Wally and Artemis first hook up. And yes, I do have their version of this prequel in the works ;)
It'll Always Be You (So Don't You Worry)
It's stupid, this dorm party he got dragged into going to. He's really only here because Wally begged him to come, though Dick has no idea why because Wally's gone to parties by himself before. At least Dick knows the guys hosting this thing and, looking around, he recognizes at least half of the people in this room from shared classes or chatting with them on campus or whatever, so that gives him an excuse to mingle and not be stuck with Wally all night while he makes an epic fool of himself by flirting with every girl on this floor.
Sometimes he wonders why they're best friends.
Anyway.
He's talking with this girl from his Human Bio class when there's a little commotion by the front door. He looks over and nearly drops the beer bottle in his hand when he sees Zatanna and her best friend, Artemis, walking in, getting these looks from people as they pass.
She looks good. She always has, for as long as he's known her, and he's known Zatanna for a long time.
Wally likes to call them a Nicholas Sparks novel, because they had this thing where they were childhood friends and he really, really liked her, and he had a strong feeling she felt the same way. But then she moved away and he never really moved on. He saw others girls, yeah, but no matter how hard he'd tried, he just couldn't get Zatanna out of his head.
And then by some miracle, they bumped into each other during freshman orientation. Out of all the colleges she could've ended up in, she's here with him.
She's here right now.
"Just pick your jaw up off the floor and talk to her."
"Linda—"
"Wally told me all about you two," she explains. Dick rolls his eyes. Of course he did. Only Wally would remain good friends with an ex-girlfriend and hand over Dick's personal life to her like it was nothing. Not that he had anything to hide from Linda.
He looks around the room for Zatanna again and finds her and Artemis standing against the far wall, laughing with a few girls he recognizes from around campus. He's nervous just like he always is whenever Zatanna's in the room, and yes, he'll admit this if he needs to even though it's stupid, really. They're still friends and good ones, at that. This is far from the first time that he's seen her since orientation, and when they're together, it doesn't feel at all as if they'd been separated for as long as they were. It's amazing. She's amazing.
He just hasn't told her this yet.
You can't exactly blame him, though. He's pretty sure if he told her how much he thought of her over the years, and how he honestly thinks he'll never be able to feel as strongly for anybody as the way he feels for her, it'd freak her out. He just got her back in his life and he's not about to put more distance between them.
And, okay, he sort of means that in the literal sense, too, because she's across the room and he's watching as this guy is walking up to her with this look on his face that's as subtle as a train wreck when it comes to hiding how he intends on taking her home tonight.
Dick's hand tightens around his beer.
"I've never seen you so jealous before," Linda points out. She sounds amused by this. No wonder she and Wally had a lot in common.
"I'm not," he lies.
"Dick," she says, almost scolding.
He mutters, "Whatever," as the guy put his hand on Zatanna's shoulder. The feeling that shoots through his veins as he's watching all of this isn't jealousy. No, Dick's pretty sure jealousy is an understatement of what he's feeling considering that he's already contemplating the most inconspicuous ways to get rid of this guy in a roomful of witnesses.
He knows a few pressure points that'll… Well, he wouldn't be dead. He'd just be very, very unconscious.
"You are so jealous." Linda sounds giddy, like this is the most entertaining thing to her, ever. Dick scowls and she shrugs, predictably unaffected by it. "Go over there, then."
"I can't," he says. She raises an eyebrow at him. "I don't feel like being arrested tonight."
She laughs.
The guy keeps inching closer to her, his hand sliding lower and lower, and Dick can feel his skin tingling with the urge to go over there. It's not just his jealousy, either, even though that's a large part of the reason. Dick watches as Zatanna shifts away just a little bit, very subtly, but it's more than enough for Dick to tell that she's uncomfortable.
He barely hears Linda telling him that he should do something about this, because his feet are already taking him through the crowd to where they're standing. And he's literally like, two seconds away from them when Artemis suddenly pushes the guy away.
Well.
"Not going to happen, pig," Artemis snaps.
The guy gives her a shitty look and starts to raise his hand, and Dick feels like he should be guilty about how satisfying it is to shove the guy into the wall, hard.
"I know you weren't about to hit her," Dick says just loud enough so he knows the guy can hear him. A few people are staring, but they're the same people that have been watching this whole time so they saw just as clearly as Dick did how the guy was ready to slap Artemis. They know he's justified. "Get out."
The guy looks Dick over and this is where Dick's really glad he'd gone through puberty, because the guy is sizing Dick up and he knows his odds are slim. Dick was a pretty scrawny kid for most of his life, and then he turned into a teenager and started working out and everything and, well, that's that. It's not like he worked out just to get ripped or anything, because he just likes flowing off steam with a few weights and a punching bag. The physical side effects of that are just bonuses, and they're clear enough for the guy to get the message not to pick a fight because he just scowls, clearly pissed off as he's muttering under his breath and walking away.
"Thanks, Grayson," Artemis says, punching his bicep. "But you know I was perfectly capable of kicking his ass myself, right?"
"I know," Dick answers, meeting Zatanna's eyes as he adds, "I just couldn't stand by."
Zatanna bites her lower lip and looks at him like… Well, let's just say that he's prepared to lock Wally out of the apartment if there's any chance that Zatanna will be leaving this stupid party with him. God, he hopes she will.
"Would you two cut it out with all your sexual tension? God, be considerate," Artemis mutters, but she's smiling like crazy, so he doubts she's really pissed off. "'Tanna, be a dear and get me a few beers before Grayson drags you home and locks you in his bedroom, would you?"
Dick chuckles as Zatanna rolls her eyes. Artemis winks.
"I'll go with you," he tells her, and Zatanna grins and slips her arm around his.
It's considerably quieter and cooler in the kitchen since there's basically no one in here. There are open boxes of pizza and glass beer bottles covering every counter space, some of them unopened but most of them already emptied. This is probably the main reason why he'll never, ever host a dorm party. Clean-up would absolutely suck. And, of course, there's the fact that random people come and get drunk and do stupid things and, as the heir of an international billionaire, throwing one would be nothing but trouble for his "celebrity reputation" (even though his family hates calling it that).
"That was really sweet, what you did back there," Zatanna says as she's opening the fridge.
"Shoving a guy into a wall?" he asks. He's teasing her, obviously, and she gives him a look that tells him she knows this as she hands in another beer. He drops his empty one into the recycling, which is ironically full of trash. Whatever. He recycled his correctly and the rest is someone else's problem.
"Intervening," she corrects. "God, the guy was such a creep. I'm glad you and Artemis were there because I really didn't know how to tell him to get away from me."
"I'm pretty sure Artemis would've done the job herself."
"But you came over, anyway." She looks up at him from underneath her eyelashes and, god, this wouldn't be the first time she's given him this look, but it may just be the first time he's going to actually do something about it. "I'm really glad that you did," she says, putting her hand on his forearm. "I sort of thought you'd been avoiding me."
"What?" he asks with a laugh, because honestly, that's ridiculous.
"Then why have you been acting so strange?"
"Huh?"
"Dick," she says softly, "You've been acting weird around me. I mean, it feels like you're always holding back… like you're hiding something."
"I am," he says, and then he hates himself because she looks so hurt by it, so he quickly adds, "I'm trying to hold back how much I've missed you, 'Tanna." She blinks a few times and he rubs the heel of his hand into the back of his neck. "I didn't want to freak you out by telling you…"
She steps forward so that they're almost pressing against each other. "Tell me what?"
"I haven't stopped thinking of you since we were kids." He watches her exhale sharply, gripping his forearm a little. "I thought it'd freak you out if you knew that."
"Dick," she breathes.
"I didn't want to scare you off by telling you," he admits.
She laughs a little and he smiles because he'll always, always love the sound of her laughter. "I thought you were supposed to be the genius here," she says, then slides her hand over the back of his neck and brings their lips together, kissing him deeply. He groans a little and sets his beer onto the counter, slides his hand over her waist and presses it against the small of her back. She lets out this sound from the back of her throat, and he thinks he hears a few catcalls around them, but he's too distracted right now to be sure.
When he pulls away, he feels her hand move from the back of his neck to grip his collar, like she's afraid to let him any further from her than this. He chuckles softly, brings her as close as physically possible and kisses her cheek gently.
"Can we get out of here?" she whispers.
"I thought you'd never ask."