Oh look guys, a relevant chapter. Maybe. This is bs tbh. This entire story is me just bs-ing.
But in all honesty I really enjoy this and I hope you guys do too.
So here you go, have some fluff. This is one of the chapters I've had written for a minute, but I wanted to put some stuff between it. However after some thinking, I decided that I should just post it. What do you guys think, was it a good idea to just give you guys this one?
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Tim knew that while Rowan did have a fondness for closeness, this fondness only extended as far as her friends and family. And while she'd been born with the later, the former was something he'd noticed she didn't seem to obtain easily. It wasn't to say the girl didn't have any friends, because he and Damian were most definitely her friends, and he'd seen pictures of a few girls she seemed to favor, it was just that she was extremely shy.
Which was why during her first few months of middle school, Tim was sure to check up on her. The conversation was amusing to say the least. She'd been contemplating whether or not to join an actual school sports team, as she didn't actually enjoy things like practicing, but her friends had convinced her. She and the girls she hung out with had wanted to try out for the baseball team, but it just so happened that the only team was all male. Which meant they had to fight tooth and nail to even get the school to consider letting them join. Of course with a mother who was an absolute hell cat and an even fiercer grandmother, she and her friends were able to join the try outs.
He hadn't been surprised when she said she'd been accepted on to the team. He also wasn't surprised to learn that her teammates were not happy with this arrangement. She didn't come out and say it, but Tim could read between the lines. She was attending a school where the middle and high school buildings were on the same campus, and the sports teams were combined. Yes, the teams were split into two sections based on age, but that didn't do much to help the situation. It was an absolutely stupid move to Tim, but it wasn't his school so he couldn't do anything about it. The mostly older, testosterone filled boys were mad that a barely five foot tall girl who ran out of breath walking up stairs got on the team instead of someone bigger and stronger. The fact of the matter was that what Rowan lacked in strength and size, she more than made up in skill and speed. He was kind of proud to say that he'd somewhat contributed to that, what with the massive amount of time he'd spent with Damian playing games of cat and mouse with the smaller girl.
Despite her team's aversion to her and the other three girls who'd gotten on the team, Rowan seemed to be enjoying it. She'd said the girls, whose names were Tatiana, Monica, and Beth, always talked to her and made sure she felt comfortable. Tim was happy about that, as he knew it was hard to get the girl to feel at ease.
Besides baseball, Tim had learned about other parts of Rowan's school life. She out right told him she loved her history class, and he'd come to the conclusion that she hated science based on the fact that it was the class she spent the most time texting him from. That, and she'd admitted that her science notebook was filled with sharpie doodles more than anything else.
At that, he'd laughed and told her about the specialty pack of sharpies he'd found in a random store. While Rowan had a habit of going through sharpies, both he and Damian had a habit of picking them up for her. It had started when she had asked them to pick up some simple black ones for her if they saw them and it wasn't too much trouble, and had never stopped.
While she hadn't outright stated her dislike for science, she'd made her distaste for PE plain and clear with a simple 'Fuck PE' and a huff. He'd laughed for a long time, and she'd called him an ass. He'd laughed harder when she'd told him about her desire to burn the plaid uniform skirt. He'd never seen her in anything but pants before, and he couldn't even picture her in a skirt.
All in all, however, he'd summarized that she was having a fairly enjoyable time in middle school. As a teen himself, he had no shame in saying that other kids could be absolute assholes, but for the most part she seemed to be getting along fine with her classmates.
At least he'd thought she was.
He was sitting in his bedroom on a Friday thinking of somewhere to take Connor to for their one year anniversary when his phone vibrated with a familiar ringtone. Truthfully, he was kind of happy to be relieved from the task. It was a short clip of the song 'Bubblegum Bitch' by Marina and the Diamonds that had played. An odd choice for the 12 year old, but she'd been the one to set it.
'I eat a lot of sugar and Damian calls me a bitch under his breath all the time anyway,' was the only reason she'd given him. He hadn't really felt like arguing.
He smiled slightly at the thought of his small friend. She was a weird one for sure.
When he looked at the screen, however, his smile fell and he nearly dropped his phone. Instead of a text, as he'd expected, there was a picture of Rowan. Now while the fact that it was a picture of her didn't bother him, the fact that she was not wearing pants did.
As his thoughts assaulted him with possibilities as to why in the hell she would send him this. He discarded them one after another as they all sounded way too wrong. Finally he worked up the nerve to glance back at the picture and simply take in the facts. The facts he could handle. Facts led to answers, and answers led to him not having a heart attack over the fact that he essentially now had child porn on his phone.
He cleared his mind and pushed himself into what was essentially his 'detective mode', then looked at the picture.
It was slightly blurry, but he could still make out most of the details. There were lockers everywhere, and he concluded that it was most probably the female's locker room at her school. There was nothing else it could be. Rowan looked to be alone, and she wasn't actually looking at the camera. Her face was neutral. She was in a baseball shirt and bright yellow and black underwear that revealed way too much because now he knew that she not only had freckles sprinkled across her face but her thighs and hips where absolutely covered in them and he did not need to know that. While he'd seen and trained with girls in less, with Rowan it just seemed wrong. Probably because of the fact that she was barely twelve. She was turned slightly, and was reaching into her bag in order to pull out what looked to be her school's uniform skirt. With a small spark of anger, Tim realized that she probably hadn't realized that the picture had been taken.
And suddenly he had a vague idea of what had happened. Trying to keep calm, he waited about an hour, and then dialed her number. When she answered in that quiet voice of hers, he fought to keep his voice neutral.
"Hey Ro," he said softly.
"Hi," she replied distractedly.
Vaguely he realized that she was probably doing her homework right now, but since she hadn't called him freaking out yet, he figured she probably didn't know what had happened yet. And she needed to. Now.
He made sure to phrase his question carefully.
"Ro? Have you checked your texts today?"
She was silent for a second.
"Mmm, no. Why?" she replied softly.
"I got something weird."
"Oh, it was probably Greg. I let him borrow my phone today and he said he accidently texted one of my friends."
Tim sat for a second, and took it all in. He was relieved that it appeared he was the only one who'd gotten the picture. Anyone else probably would not have handled it well. Namely Damian.
"Who's Greg?" he asked, still keeping his voice nonchalant.
She hmmed in question and Tim repeated his inquiry. Rowan didn't pay much attention to the world around her at the best of times, and it was even worse when she had something she was invested in.
"He's on my baseball team. Why're you so interested? What'd he send?"
Tim was not looking forward to her reaction to this. While she may have been comfortable with them coming in and out of her room at all hours (Which was a bad habit he'd picked from Damian when he'd learned the younger boy had told her all about their nightly escapades. That had been a fun conversation.), she was not comfortable with them seeing her like that. She'd never told them specifically, but again, he'd figured it out himself. If she wasn't comfortable with them seeing her bottomless, there was no way in hell she'd be okay with someone else.
Clearing his throat, Tim answered in the least awkward way he could. Which was still pretty damn awkward.
"You might want to check your phone…"
She hummed her okay and told him to give her a second.
And then there was gravely squeaking sound and the line went dead.
Tim groaned and called her again, this time sitting up. She didn't answer, so he called her three more times. She answered on his fourth try.
"ImSoSorry!" she mumbled quickly.
She sounded extremely distressed and Tim felt for her.
"It's okay Ro, well not really but it's not your fault. But Ro, why would he do that?"
She made a small squeaking sound, and once again hung up. Sighing, Tim scrubbed at his face and stood up. The girl sounded as if she was freaking out, and he knew there was absolutely no way she would tell her mother about it. Rowan was normally very calm… But he could tell that right now, she wasn't in her usual state. She needed someone, and he needed to find out what the fuck was going on. Rowan, despite the age difference, was one of his closest friends. No matter how much he simply wanted to stay in bed for the rest of his weekend, he had the obligation to help her through this. Because while he was sure her friends were nice enough, there was nothing they could do to fix this. Aside from Damian, who could probably help, but would end up doing it in a very bloody way. So really, he only had one option. He needed to go to Gotham.
He ignored the fact that her ire wasn't the only reason he was going.
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Rowan woke up to the sound of quiet knocking on her door. She was disoriented for all of fifteen seconds before the feeling of sweaty clothes sticking to her skin and notebooks digging into her face set in. Then it all came rushing back and she buried her head right back into her bed.
She didn't even want to think about what her team mate had done. Frankly she should probably talk to him about that, but all she wanted to do was crawl under her bed and stay there for the rest of her life. She wanted to burn the image out of Tim's mind because Jesus, he did not need to see that. She wanted tape up all her windows and hoard all the food in the house and never ever leave-
But holy crap someone was rubbing her shoulder lightly. She bolted up at the feeling and was met with a concerned look from the one person she really did not want to see.
"Hey Ro," Tim said apprehensively.
For a second, she simply stared as her face pretty much heated enough to melt metal. With a start, she realized that there was really only one reason Tim would be here and she prayed that he hadn't told her Mama. Her Mama would be absolutely livid. She'd be mad at Greg and at the school, but most importantly she'd be mad at her for not standing up for herself. And then she realized she wasn't breathing anymore and Tim was desperately trying to get her to do so.
"You didn't tell her…" she asked, trying not to look him in the eye when she managed to suck in a breath. Tim gently laid his hands on her arms in a gesture of comfort and she flinched away from his touch. She hadn't meant to, and when Tim winced at the action she felt bad.
"No, I didn't, I told her I was here on a quick trip to visit Bruce. While Bruce knows I'm here, he thinks it's for something else," he said as he began to move the stuff she'd evidently slept on so he could gingerly sit next to her.
For a second, there was an extremely uncomfortable silence. There was no way she was going to break it, however, so she was glad when Tim did. As much as she didn't want to talk about it, she really did hate when things were awkward between them. Which was why she never brought up the fact that she caught Tim and Damian unconsciously checking each other out on a regular basis. Yeah, awkward.
"Ro, we need to talk about this. Do you know what happened?"
She recoiled at the careful tone he was using, and discretely moved away from him. Or not because oops now he was giving her pointed looks.
"You do, don't you?" he asked.
'Maybe,' she thought, still not looking at him.
She relaxed minutely when he reached out to gently tug on one of her even messier than usual curls. When he'd first started doing it she'd been kind of mad because she'd thought he was making fun of her untamable locks, but eventually she'd figured out that he actually just genuinely liked her hair. The movement had become something she associated as purely Tim, and so it was comforting.
She turned her gaze towards him, but still couldn't quite meet his eyes. She heard him sigh slightly, and suddenly her glasses were no longer on her face. It was odd, but not being able to see clearly any longer soothed her. In consideration, the action probably should have worried her, but it didn't. And Tim knew that. He was probably the only person that did. Not being able to see meant that she wouldn't have to face the reactions of those around her head on. It was a kind of a 'if I can't see you, you can't see me' idea. Foolish, but Tim had never faulted her for it.
"Ro, I just want you to talk to me. Please."
She was scared and embarrassed and she didn't want to talk but it was Tim and she trusted him. So she did.
"It was just a joke…" she said quietly.
His gaze hardened and she almost withdrew into herself, but almost immediately he softened again and poked her lightly on the cheek. It was a mimic of what she usually did to him, and it made her smile slightly.
"It's not a very funny joke. Why would he do that?" Tim said, keeping his voice low.
Rowan looked down at her lip and fiddled with the skirt she'd worn to school the previous day and hadn't bothered to take off.
"I dunno. I think it was kind of like hazing…" her words contradicted each other, but Tim didn't seem to mind.
"So you think the rest of your team knew?" he voice was really even. It held none of the playful emotion she was used to.
"Not all of them," she whispered," just a few…"
"Rowan that's not okay. You know they shouldn't have done that. You just turned 12 Ro, had that gotten sent to literally anyone else-"
She cut him off. She didn't need a lecture, she hadn't done anything wrong.
"I know, okay. I just… I don't know what to do…" her voice cracked at this, but she wouldn't cry.
He huffed and ran a hand through his inky locks, and Rowan simply sat, still messing with her skirt's hem.
"Look," he said, tugging on one of her curls once again," I'll go with you to talk to them. We'll figure this out together, okay?"
She hadn't wanted to talk to anyone about this, but now she was kind of glad she had. Where Rowan crashed and burned when talking to people, Tim… Didn't. It was one of the many reasons she was glad they were friends. The guy had a way with words that could put the best lawyers to shame.
"So how've you been?"
He smiled slightly at her off topic question and shook his head.
There was also the fact that he let her change the subject way too often. Not that she was complaining.
"Okay. I've just been trying to figure out where to take Connor for our first date."
At this, Rowan raised her eyebrow. It was about time the undersexed boy made his move.
"Yeah, he actually asked me out first," he stated, obviously seeing the question in her gaze.
It was another thing she liked about him; she never needed to be as vocal and blunt as had to when she was with Damian.
"Do you want to be dating?" she asked him gently. She'd begun to notice that he didn't talk about Connor as much lately.
He had the good grace not to look surprised at her question.
"Honestly? I don't know. I just…" he trailed off at this, shaking his hair out of its short pony tail and running his hand through it.
Smiling lightly, Rowan reached up and brushed her fingertips against one of his inky locks. He blinked at the feeling and turned his azure gaze back on her. She gave him a reassuring smile as she spoke.
"Is it like what happened with Stephanie."
When he nodded she hummed and poked him in the shoulder. She remembered when he'd broken it off with the pretty girl; he'd simply lost interest. It was nothing to be ashamed of, but he always seemed to get embarrassed when she told him that. It was probably because she was 12. Getting relationship advice from a 12 year old probably wasn't at the top of the list of things that inflate a guy's ego. Ah well, he'd get over it.
"I'm sure Connor would understand; I just have to figure out how to tell him."
Rowan nodded in agreement, and let the silence around them settle comfortably. It would be easier if she could ignore the queasy feeling left over from the whole photo fiasco.
After getting rid of the pencil that had been poking her in the butt for the last few minutes, Rowan leaned against Tim's shoulder.
"I don't remember giving you permission to get all cozy on me," he said teasingly.
"Rude," she murmured back, sticking out her tongue at him. He blew a raspberry back and she giggled.
They sat comfortably for a time, but then Rowan decided to ask something she'd been wondering for a while.
"What about Damian?"
The boy in front of her twitched and turned on her with a practiced stare. The corners of his mouth were twisted up, but his eyes were dead. It was a look she'd seen him use on people all too often. Something she didn't think he even noticed he was doing. She hated it.
"What about him?" Tim asked, voice just as false as his expression.
At this point, Rowan didn't want to say anything. She didn't want to make it worse. But if she stopped now, Tim would only get it out of her later. He had a habit of doing things like that.
So she looked down, fiddling with her skirt for what felt like the millionth time that day, and told him what she'd been thinking about for a while.
"You look at him a lot."
He was silent as he looked at her, and Rowan tried not to squirm under his stare. It wasn't easy.
"I do?" he asked eventually.
"You do," she confirmed.
At that, he looked more contemplative than anything. Rowan could only wonder what was going through the older boy's head.