The first time he asks, she laughs- which seems cruel, but it sounds like a joke to her and she responds accordingly.
"I think you're still a little drunk," she tells him. After last nights shenanigans, it wouldn't come as a surprise. They didn't get back to her apartment until the sun was beginning to rise.
She's pretty hung over herself. Coffee is helping. Magic is too.
Dick reaches across the small poker table to take her hand in his. He'd tried to convince her to buy an actual table on multiple occasions, to no avail. "Let's do it. Today."
Zatanna sips her coffee through smirking lips. She arches a brow incredulously.
"There's a minister in Denver who owes me a favor. We could get on a plane right now. We could do it."
She laughs again because it still sounds like a joke. She gets up to take her plate into the kitchen leaning over to kiss his cheek before she goes. "C'mon, Wonder Boy. The world needs you."
Dick stares after her, smiling like an idiot. The rejection floats right past him. It's not enough to derail his plan. And yeah, maybe he's still a tiny bit drunk, but he's sober enough to know two things for sure: he will never love anyone as desperately as he he loves Zatanna Zatarra, and one day he's going to marry her.
She doesn't laugh the second time. No one has laughed all day. No one's even cracked a smile. Dick has been served with another near death experience and while he managed to pull through in the end, the memory of the monotone wail of the flatline still lingers.
His hospital room is swelled with teammates and mentors, none of which have met his eye since he woke up hours ago. He watches Zatanna, staring down at her hands folded in her lap as she slumps forward in the plastic chair.
When he calls out to her, his voice doesn't really sound like his, but she looks up, her gaze tired.
"What are you thinking?" He asks in that same, not-quite-his voice.
Zatanna's eyes narrow, "What are you thinking- going out there and getting the crap beaten out of you."
"Well, right now, I'm thinking I don't want to die without having married you."
The others stay silent, observing. Artemis shakes her head, because really, proposing in a room that smells like formaldehyde and death is not her idea of romance. Wally would have been ashamed.
Zatanna feels on the verge of tears. She won't cry now, because she's too strong to let the others see her cry. She won't cry because Dick is alive and here and okay. She will, however, shake her head and give him a warm, weary smile and call him an idiot. She doesn't say she wants to be his wife, but she doesn't really reject him, either, so Dick considers it a step forward.
The third and final time he asks, he does it while he's on a mission in Paris and she's in Vegas for a show. He stays up all night to catch her before she heads out for the day, and when he calls her he's half asleep.
"I think it's time for you to hit the hay, wonder boy," she tells him, laughing when he grunts tiredly in reply.
"I'll see you when you get back," she says, "I love you."
She waits for him to respond. She thinks he might have fallen asleep until the line suddenly crackles back to life, "Marry me, Zatanna?" he slurs into the receiver.
She laughs again, "Alright," she says, already knowing he won't remember, "I will."
He's fallen asleep and she hangs up, grinning to herself. The next time she sees him she pulls out a ring. Neither of them has to ask again.
AN: Short, stupid, ridiculousness, just because. Thank you for reading! Please review if you have the time 3