Author's Note: Apologies for missing last Thursday. It was a crazy Easter weekend for me. Anyway, here's the latest chapter. Please enjoy and let me know how it is so far! Probably one of my favorite chapters so far!
Jason woke up that afternoon and refused to come out of his room. He showered, changed into a pair of sweatpants and that was all the effort he was going to put in for the day. He'd kept his blinds shut and dug through his backpack for his laptop in the dimly lit room. He opened it up and before he could think about what he was doing he typed her name into Google. He had gone through a few links before he found her bookstore website. There was nothing on her except her name and contact information for the store. He tried again and found out that she had a PhD in English Literature and had written several award winning essays and research papers in regards to modern literature. Her most famous essay was about the symbiotic relationship between young women and romance novels. Other than that, Jason came up with nothing. Jason cursed and tried a less than legal way of finding information on her. After a few minutes Jason managed to hack into the government database, something Tim could've accomplished in seconds and Damian even less. Jason had never been the smartest of the adopted brothers, but he could fight like no other. The damage he could dole out during a fight was unparalleled by any of his brothers. Jason wasn't so sure that being able to kill someone with his bare hands was something to really brag about. He discovered her social security number and other useless information until he wandered upon some more interesting details of her life. She was born November 13th, 1988, making her only 2 years older than Jason. She was raised in Gotham, like Jason; all of her previous addresses having been in the greater Gotham area. She had earned her degrees at Gotham University. She'd never left home, it seemed, which Jason found a little strange for someone who seemed so worldly.
Her parents were both deceased, her mother having died when she was 10 and her father when she was 18. Her mother died in a drug overdose and her father in a car accident that had killed several others. Despite the hardships, she seemed to have quite a comfortable sum of money in a separate bank account. It was managed by a man named Frank Webber and there hadn't been a withdrawal from it in several years. She had no siblings, or at least no record of any. Her blood type was AB negative and she lived alone with a dog she adopted from the Gotham shelter. There were some files, however, that he could not access. They were protected beyond Jason's meager hacking abilities, but Jason wasn't too curious. They were sealed medical files, intriguing but he felt like that might be a little too personal. Granted, he was basically spying on her, but even Jason had his limits. It was strange, though, how these simple little things could say so much about a person.
Jason could find out so much about this woman, this brilliant woman, who had earned her degree faster than the other students in her grade, and yet he was still so distant from her. As much as he could get to know her, she could never know him. Jason Todd was dead and nobody was willing to get to know a corpse, let alone have sex with one. If Jason had been like Dick or Tim, he could've gone to that uniquely named bookshop and wooed her as if he didn't know her at all, but he was neither Dick nor Tim. He was Jason Todd, the boy who died, the one who went insane. His name would haunt him. He considered approaching her under an alias but, again, he could not live a lie that long. Not to mention, a woman like Melody Baker did not deserve to be lied to. Very few women deserved to be lied to, at least when it comes down to sex, and Jason was certain he would have sex with her. It was all he could think about. It wasn't that he was overconfident in himself, but that he just knew deep down at his very center that he would have her naked beneath him. It was as if there were simply no other options.
A knock at the door disturbed Jason from his fantasies. That disturbance is what made him snap at the intruder with his uncontrollable temper. "Go away!" He shouted.
"My apologies, Master Todd. I thought you might be hungry . . ." Alfred trailed off quietly through the door. Jason sighed and opened the door to see Alfred standing humbly before him carrying a covered tray and a glass of water. Jason's anger fled him at the sight of the simple old butler who had tended his wounds and made him soup when he was ill or injured. Out of everyone in Wayne Manor, Jason cared for Alfred the most. Alfred was hard not to love, because 90 percent of the man's actions were completely selfless and coated with nurturing affection.
"Thank you, Alfred. You didn't have to." Jason said, accepting the tray and glass of water. Alfred peered into the dark room.
"Master Jason, there are clothes all over your floor." Alfred tsked. Jason blushed, embarrassed, remembering his anger the night before.
"I know, Alfred. I'll take care of it." Jason assured.
"Master Bruce is very happy to have you home again, as am I." Alfred said in that soft paternal voice that he had when Jason was just a boy entering this place for the first time.
"Sure beats where I was." Jason added with a hint of bitterness. Alfred frowned and Jason felt like apologizing. "Thanks for the food, Alfred."
"Of course, sir." Alfred turned and went down the hallway without another word. Jason shut the door and set the glass and the tray down on his desk. He opened the lid of the tray and bit his bottom lip to keep from smiling. It was scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast, but Alfred had fashioned the meal like he used to when Jason was a child and in a foul mood. The eggs were parted and formed into circular eyes, because Jason didn't like sunny-side up eggs, the bacon was molded into a smile and the toast, sliced in two, was placed on the edge of the plates to give the little breakfast face some ears. Jason's eyes watered, as they did on occasion, but he held back the tears and shut the lid on the meal, unable to bear this bittersweet memory. He went through the torn apart closet and grabbed a large cardboard box. He stuffed all the clothes inside the box and dug through his backpack for his emergency bottle of liquor. He headed out to the grounds of Wayne Manor, carrying the box and the bottle with him. He had to pass through the main room, where Bruce was reading a newspaper and Dick was playing video games with Damian. All of them looked at him as if he were crazy, which Jason was used to. He wasn't sure if they were following him so he continued out to the center of the lawn.
He heard Bruce calling his name but he was consumed by so much emotion the voices felt like they were miles away, muffled as if he were underwater. He cracked open the bottle and poured it the little boy clothes, tainting them with liquor. He pulled his lighter out of the pocket of his sweatpants, lit it, and let it drop. Someone had tried to stop him, maybe it was Dick, but it was too late. The whole thing was engulfed in flames. There was a commotion, one that Jason felt separate from entirely. It was as if his body was as empty as a puppet and another person was controlling him. He watched the flames grow and eventually heard the crackle of the fire and the sound of Bruce calling for Alfred to bring the fire extinguisher. Dick had his hands on Jason's shoulders, shaking him and calling his name.
"Jason, what were you thinking!?" Dick's voice rose as if someone were turning up the volume on Jason's ears. Jason pushed Dick off of him with bared teeth.
"Don't touch me, Grayson!" Jason snapped as Alfred trotted out with the fire extinguisher.
"I told you he was unstable, father." Jason heard Damian say to Bruce.
"Quiet, Damian." Bruce said, taking the fire extinguisher and using it on the remnants of the box. There wasn't much left, a few scraps of smoldering fabric and ash. Jason stumbled back from the scorched grass and then turned back to the manor. He started to move back inside but Bruce seized his shoulder with a firm grip. "What's wrong, Jason?" Bruce asked, firm eyes staring straight into Jason's. Jason couldn't bear to look; the light was too strong for him.
"Get off of me!" Jason snapped, pulling away from Bruce.
Jason turned away and ran back into the house. He went down the stairs into the liquor cellar and grabbed himself another bottle of whiskey, the cheap kind. He stalked back up the stairs and headed to his room, slamming the door behind him. He sat on his bed, opened the bottle, and drank. Sometimes Jason would get like this. He would lose it all and just want to burn, burn like the memories of Jason Todd. Little things would set him off, little things like memories of the rise and fall of his life. He had lived on the street most of his childhood, fighting for scraps just so he wouldn't go hungry during the night, and then he had come to Wayne Manor where things had gotten exponentially better. He still felt like he hadn't been good enough to deserve it. He was a sewer rat, the scum of Gotham city. He drank again, killing off half the bottle.
He blinked and looked up at his laptop, still glowing from the last page he'd been on. He went over to the computer, still drinking from his whiskey bottle. Melody Baker was the sun, the moon, and the stars, everything that was beautiful, glowing and alive. Jason locked his door and collapsed onto his bed, setting his 3/4th empty bottle onto the nightstand. Tonight, Red Hood will go to her. He can't be Jason Todd with her, he cannot force a girl so bright to love a corpse. He will go to her as Red Hood. Red Hood was alive. Red Hood bathed in blood and death, but he was alive. Jason Todd was dead.
Jason woke up face down on his mattress, his breath tasting like cheap whiskey and his head was hammering like there were gnomes with jack-hammers living inside his skull. Jason felt ill, but he wasn't prepared to get sick, not now. He had been drunker before. Drinking usually helped make everything less painful. It was painful, sometimes, to be so aware of the things that others ignore. Drinking helped him escape reality for a few moments of blissfulness, until he woke up and the pain of living returned to him. It was a vicious cycle. He stood up slowly and went to brush his teeth. He didn't feel much better, but he at least felt clean. He slipped into his Red Hood attire and left through the window into the night. He took his bike to its usual hiding spot. He had one destination in mind.