Two hours until my next class, so I thought I'd post this and the next chapter of Sortis. I HOPE YOU LIKE THIS. IT FEATURES BARBARA GORDON. Yayyyyy. COMMENTS ARE LOVED AND APPRECIATED, THANK YOU SO MUCH.


Tim shifts his weight from foot to foot, and contemplates knocking on the door, as he has been for the last fifteen minutes. He really should knock. He did show up, after all. And leaving would be offensive, especially since he knows she knows he's here—

"Okay, bucko, you have been standing outside my door—" Barbara is there, her voice getting ready to lay into him, at least until he pulls down his hood. "Oh. Tim." She sounds confused. "Come in. What's wrong? Is everything okay?" Is Dick okay? The unasked question hangs between them.

"Everything's fine," he says. It's only eighty percent a lie. Twenty percent is covered in truth, because Dick is indeed fine, and he is what Barbara really cares about anyhow.

"Are you sure? I have seen the papers..." She trails off, looking Tim over as he sheds his jacket and drapes it over his arm. "Oh, God, Tim, you're so thin..."

"I'm looking into being Wayne Industries' new spokes model," Tim replies dryly. Barbara doesn't seem amused, as indicated by her pursed lips. She gestures to her couch, wheeling herself in front of it as Tim sits down.

"Does anyone know where you are?"

"They know I'm out, but not where I am. I'd like to keep it that way."

Barbara sighs. "I've heard things, Tim. Are you sure you're alright? They had pictures of you in Arkham, rumors of the Joker's broken collarbone..." She looks at him with pity. It hurts to see it.

"I just can't be home right now." He smiles sardonically. "Did you know Jason and I are sort of a couple?"

"No," Barbara replies. Her eyes are scanning his face and registering the expressions of self-hatred. "I hadn't heard. That's good news though, right?"

"I'm the emotionally compromised half of the couple." He takes a deep breath. "Dick sent me to Arkham and I'm afraid that my mind has been completely warped by my stay there and events prior. Barbara, what do I do? Right now I'm so—" he clenches his fists, "...right now, I'm so angry and so upset... what if I stay like this forever? Angry and sad and—"

Barbara heaves a hefty sigh, cutting him off. "Tim, there's no way a kid like you can stay so angry and depressed forever. There's too much goodness and happiness in you, regardless of the fact that it's buried under your current stress." She says nothing about Dick or Arkham. She doesn't ask questions when she gets to the root of a problem.

It is why Tim came here.

"Your friends," she continues, rolling her chair into the kitchen, "wouldn't want you to be so unhappy. Or so unstable." It sounds like she is making tea, or coffee.

He wants her to tell that to Conner, who feels that Tim is a murderer. A cheating murderer, no less.

"I loved you first."

Tim holds his head in his hands.

"What do I do?" He asks desperately. His voice cracks.

There's a steaming cup of tea on the table in front of him. "Drink this tea and just... calm down."

"It's... so loud, in my head. It's hard." He sits up and leans back.

Barbara has a small smile. "And there's only one person that can keep it quiet. But you're not sure where you stand right now. Yes?"

"You are the all-knowing Oracle." Tim is sure Barbara is referencing Dick somewhere. It must hurt to see him with Wally and so very happy. But it must also be great to see him happy.

"By the way," Barbara says, "you have a visitor. He hovers at the door just like you. Is everyone too nervous to knock on my door?"

"Wait, Barbara—!"

But she opens the door anyway, and Jason is standing there, his hair wind-blown and his cheeks pink from the brisk outdoors.

"You are really hard to find when you want to be. But Bats bugged that jacket." Of course he did. "Tim we—...we need to talk."

"Yes. Yes you do." Barbara says. "But next time you drop by, don't dither around outside my door. Knock." Barbara practically pushes them out the door and gently shuts the door. "Men," she says as the lock clicks.

Tim is staring at the floor. Or, rather, he's staring at Jason's boots.

"Tim," Jason says. It takes a minute for Tim to lift his eyes.

"Mm?"

Jason's lips were chapped (but Tim didn't really picture them feeling any different) and he pushes a little hard (also expected) but the small kiss that Jason places there makes Tim's face heat up to remarkable proportions. And the raging that had been going on in his head since Bart's release silences.

"I've decided," Jason says, the pink on his cheeks now a deeper red, "that we're officially together, since neither of us seemed to know that we were. So. I'm—I'm here to share your problems. Because that's what couples do. Or. What the fuck ever."

That is such a typically Jason thing to say that Tim can't help but laugh.

"Okay," Tim says, the happiness Barbara had been talking about simmering under his skin, "I'm glad."

"Me too," and Tim could tell that he was.