I hate the first day back.
When something tragic happens, like a loved one dies, or some horrible accident befalls you, the first day back is always hell.
Everyone gazes at you with that I'm-so-sorry look. They look away and exchange glances of pity with each other and then make a small smile in an effort to boost your spirits.
Good morning Mr. McGinnis. How are you Mr. McGinnis.
They all know how I am. Or could at least deduce for themselves that I feel like taking a stake and driving it through my own heart.
Or that it's already been driven for me.
I wander down the halls of Wayne-Powers Enterprises, trying desperately to avoid all the co-workers I can.
Doesn't matter. They still find ways to get in my face, making sure that they give the boss their words of condolences.
I let myself be driven home. I don't have the energy to drive anymore.
As I walk in the house I try to step quietly, not to make any noise. It doesn't work. A mouse would make an echo in the halls of Wayne Manor.
My footsteps jar the eerie silence, and I debate whether or not to scream, if only to give the house a little bit of life again.
You can't put life into Wayne Manor. Death's been surrounding it so long that it doesn't know anything else.
I walk into the living room and sit down on the couch. I suddenly feel like I'm in some sacred museum- very beautiful and very cold. Everything's a relic, because everything's something Ben touched.
I feel hot tears beginning to sting my eyelids again. I gave up trying to control them. I can't fight tears shed over Ben. I doubt Wayne would think that this, my only comfort, is a weakness.
I can't think of Ben without tears coming. And the tears don't come because I miss him (which I do) but because I made a horrible mistake and I brought this on myself.
I hear a door closing softly. It's Lydia.
She didn't bother going back to work. Hell, she didn't even bother to call and tell them what happened.
She walks into the living room, stops, and watches me cry for a minute. I don't even look up. It makes me ashamed when I see her being strong and I can't be.
"Terry?" However, that's the first thing Lydia's said to me for a week. That might warrant a bit of attention. I glance up at her. She wavers for a minute, as if she doesn't know what to do, then steps forward. I finally notice the tears on her face.
It's like I woke up with a whole different person the day Ben died. It's hard to get used to this new creature who allows herself to be sad at her son's death and cries freely as opposed to the stalwart statue that you were married to for 11 years.
I hesitate for a minute, then hold my arms out to her. Lydia rushes into them.
"I'm sorry." She breathes out, and I can tell that she's got so many things she wants to say that she's worried I'll leave before she gets to finish.
What's she sorry for anyway? I smacked her across the face, Ben killed himself. So far Lydia hasn't done anything wrong.
"You didn't do anything, Lyd." I say softly.
"No, Terry. All of this is my fault, and I'm not going to try and blame it on you like I've been doing for years." For a second I think I see the old, tough Lydia breaking through, and then I realize the old Lydia wouldn't be sobbing into my chest as she said it.
"Why would you think it's your fault?"
"If I hadn't fought with you. If I hadn't interfered all the time, always blaming you. I drove you to it." I wonder what it is she drove me to, and then I notice the fading bruise on her cheek and instantly remember.
That was my sin, not hers. Lydia and I might not have agreed on many things, she might have spent a decade yelling at me for never being there, she might have made me feel like I wasn't doing good enough when I was doing my best, and maybe she shouldn't have jumped in when Ben needed the solitary achievement, but that was absolutely no reason to hit her.
"Look, you can argue that you're responsible for a lot of things, but that-"I spit out 'that' like the word disgusts me "that was entirely me. I'm so sorry for it. For you to think that you drove me to hitting you- How could I?" Some strange rush of revulsion comes over me, and I realize that I'm ashamed of myself.
Possibly because the fact that I hit my wife just sinks me down into the level of the criminals that I fight every night.
Or rather, used to fight.
"It wasn't you, Terry. It was Batman." She suddenly laughs bitterly.
"And God help me, I forgive him too for everything that he's done." Batman was the reason we fought so much. Batman was why I was always gone and why I hit Lydia.
She can forgive him, but I don't know if I can.
"I missed you, Terry." She begins, wiping away her tears. "You faded away into Wayne-Powers, Batman, Ben, everywhere but me. You push yourself too hard. You think you have to be just like Wayne was, or better. But I screwed everything up when I let you go on thinking that I didn't need you or that the only thing I cared about was Ben." She doesn't need me. She never did.
Now Lydia stares at me with her tearful eyes and weak face and I realize that maybe I've been fooled all these years.
"I was disowned, Terry." She wails. "Do you know what that means in Italy? Where family is more important than the air you breathe? It's what you live for, and die for. Everything you do reflects back upon it, and your main purpose in life is to protect the family. Everything else is secondary. To be disowned is worse than death. It's living without a purpose."
I've lost most of my family, but I'll never know the pain of being willingly cast out of it. It was a very long time ago, but Lydia apparently thinks of it like it happened yesterday.
"It was fine in high school," Lydia continues a bit more softly. "because I still had my father. Sure, he could run around trying to forget the fact that he ran away from his family and the memory of his wife and barely acknowledge that I existed, but he was still my family. And then you showed up." She glances up at me.
"I'm glad you showed up, but we went too fast. We do everything too fast." That's because both Lydia and I don't admit that we're human and we can make mistakes. We've always seemed to think we're above it because we understand each other and we understand ourselves.
"Ben is what made me lose my family. If something makes you lose what you most cherished, you're going to either kill it or hold onto it as tightly as you can." She laughs bitterly.
"I held on a bit too tightly. Hell, I practically choked him, not to mention you."
"I'm sorry." I murmur, staring back at her.
"I justified it by Ben. Everything was justified by Ben. Ben was the reason I lost my family, but I'd just as soon give them up for him. And for that reason I couldn't stand it when you unwittingly hurt him."
"I shouldn't have," She adds. "I shouldn't have tried to fight with you when you're the only family I have left, the only one that's never left me."
"I won't. Not as long as you need me." I glance up at her. I don't know if Lydia needs me. She never has, or at least never said so. Lydia's never needed much of anything, except her own freedom and someone to understand that she wants to need nothing, but can't.
That someone is me.
"I do." She whispers, crying harder. "It took me too long to realize that I had a family all along."
Ben may have taught her to need me, and he may have taught me that there are hidden darknesses in myself that I didn't even know existed, but it came at a terrible price.
He wanted to free us from pain, to free himself, but all he did was show us that we're not invincible and it just takes more of it for us to call it pain.
"It's almost 10." Lydia murmurs in my ear, tears still making a wet spot on my shoulder, but her voice out of its raspy tone.
"It doesn't matter."
"Aren't you going to go out?" She says, leaning back to stare at me.
Yeah. Like I can go out there without Ben.
"I'm not going. I'm never going again." Lydia's face instantly gets red.
"No! You have to go out there!" She says.
"I don't want any part of it. It killed Ben and it drove us apart."
"Ben killed himself. Being Robin had nothing to do with it. He loved it, Terry! He loved every second of it, being out there and helping you save people!" And God, what a Robin Ben made. He was great. If Wayne could have seen him, he'd have been proud.
Ben was probably the only Robin born out of compassion and love, rather than revenge and redemption.
But how can I go back out there? Knowing that he's not there with me, that he won't be at my side if I need him? Wanting to turn and say something and have to hear nothing but eerie silence instead?
"You have to go back out there. Terry." Lydia continues, standing up and pulling me with her. "Ben didn't want you to quit being Batman. He may have wanted the Terry McGinnis part to shape up, but he never found one thing wrong with Batman. If you quit, it makes his whole death meaningless."
"Don't you want me to quit?" Lydia shakes her head.
"I never wanted you to quit. What you do is noble. It's what you're meant to do. And Ben loved you for it." I wipe some more tears off of my face. She's right.
"It's not the suit's fault Terry. We're responsible for our own actions." Lydia says. Wayne said the exact same thing to me years ago. He was right too.
And so I kiss Lydia, something I haven't done in God-knows-how-long. We both smile, because we remember exactly how it used to be, and exactly how it will be again, because that's what Ben wanted.
That's what Ben died for.
I head down to the cave and don't hesitate. I'm out in the city. I think of Ben, but I don't think of how much I miss him. I think of how much I loved having him with me.
Do the work, and it'll repay you. Do it well and it'll reward you when you need it the most. For a while, I never knew what Wayne meant by it. All the work used to reward me with was injuries and reasons to fight with people, both in the suit and out.
Now I understand. I take down criminals, hear their remorseful cries and it soothes me, revives me. The pounding my own body takes cleanses me.
This is for you Ben. My one and only Robin that I'll never ever forget.
My son Ben.
******************************************************************
Thank you for your reviews and feedback! This story is concluded in Reckoning Pt. 3
When something tragic happens, like a loved one dies, or some horrible accident befalls you, the first day back is always hell.
Everyone gazes at you with that I'm-so-sorry look. They look away and exchange glances of pity with each other and then make a small smile in an effort to boost your spirits.
Good morning Mr. McGinnis. How are you Mr. McGinnis.
They all know how I am. Or could at least deduce for themselves that I feel like taking a stake and driving it through my own heart.
Or that it's already been driven for me.
I wander down the halls of Wayne-Powers Enterprises, trying desperately to avoid all the co-workers I can.
Doesn't matter. They still find ways to get in my face, making sure that they give the boss their words of condolences.
I let myself be driven home. I don't have the energy to drive anymore.
As I walk in the house I try to step quietly, not to make any noise. It doesn't work. A mouse would make an echo in the halls of Wayne Manor.
My footsteps jar the eerie silence, and I debate whether or not to scream, if only to give the house a little bit of life again.
You can't put life into Wayne Manor. Death's been surrounding it so long that it doesn't know anything else.
I walk into the living room and sit down on the couch. I suddenly feel like I'm in some sacred museum- very beautiful and very cold. Everything's a relic, because everything's something Ben touched.
I feel hot tears beginning to sting my eyelids again. I gave up trying to control them. I can't fight tears shed over Ben. I doubt Wayne would think that this, my only comfort, is a weakness.
I can't think of Ben without tears coming. And the tears don't come because I miss him (which I do) but because I made a horrible mistake and I brought this on myself.
I hear a door closing softly. It's Lydia.
She didn't bother going back to work. Hell, she didn't even bother to call and tell them what happened.
She walks into the living room, stops, and watches me cry for a minute. I don't even look up. It makes me ashamed when I see her being strong and I can't be.
"Terry?" However, that's the first thing Lydia's said to me for a week. That might warrant a bit of attention. I glance up at her. She wavers for a minute, as if she doesn't know what to do, then steps forward. I finally notice the tears on her face.
It's like I woke up with a whole different person the day Ben died. It's hard to get used to this new creature who allows herself to be sad at her son's death and cries freely as opposed to the stalwart statue that you were married to for 11 years.
I hesitate for a minute, then hold my arms out to her. Lydia rushes into them.
"I'm sorry." She breathes out, and I can tell that she's got so many things she wants to say that she's worried I'll leave before she gets to finish.
What's she sorry for anyway? I smacked her across the face, Ben killed himself. So far Lydia hasn't done anything wrong.
"You didn't do anything, Lyd." I say softly.
"No, Terry. All of this is my fault, and I'm not going to try and blame it on you like I've been doing for years." For a second I think I see the old, tough Lydia breaking through, and then I realize the old Lydia wouldn't be sobbing into my chest as she said it.
"Why would you think it's your fault?"
"If I hadn't fought with you. If I hadn't interfered all the time, always blaming you. I drove you to it." I wonder what it is she drove me to, and then I notice the fading bruise on her cheek and instantly remember.
That was my sin, not hers. Lydia and I might not have agreed on many things, she might have spent a decade yelling at me for never being there, she might have made me feel like I wasn't doing good enough when I was doing my best, and maybe she shouldn't have jumped in when Ben needed the solitary achievement, but that was absolutely no reason to hit her.
"Look, you can argue that you're responsible for a lot of things, but that-"I spit out 'that' like the word disgusts me "that was entirely me. I'm so sorry for it. For you to think that you drove me to hitting you- How could I?" Some strange rush of revulsion comes over me, and I realize that I'm ashamed of myself.
Possibly because the fact that I hit my wife just sinks me down into the level of the criminals that I fight every night.
Or rather, used to fight.
"It wasn't you, Terry. It was Batman." She suddenly laughs bitterly.
"And God help me, I forgive him too for everything that he's done." Batman was the reason we fought so much. Batman was why I was always gone and why I hit Lydia.
She can forgive him, but I don't know if I can.
"I missed you, Terry." She begins, wiping away her tears. "You faded away into Wayne-Powers, Batman, Ben, everywhere but me. You push yourself too hard. You think you have to be just like Wayne was, or better. But I screwed everything up when I let you go on thinking that I didn't need you or that the only thing I cared about was Ben." She doesn't need me. She never did.
Now Lydia stares at me with her tearful eyes and weak face and I realize that maybe I've been fooled all these years.
"I was disowned, Terry." She wails. "Do you know what that means in Italy? Where family is more important than the air you breathe? It's what you live for, and die for. Everything you do reflects back upon it, and your main purpose in life is to protect the family. Everything else is secondary. To be disowned is worse than death. It's living without a purpose."
I've lost most of my family, but I'll never know the pain of being willingly cast out of it. It was a very long time ago, but Lydia apparently thinks of it like it happened yesterday.
"It was fine in high school," Lydia continues a bit more softly. "because I still had my father. Sure, he could run around trying to forget the fact that he ran away from his family and the memory of his wife and barely acknowledge that I existed, but he was still my family. And then you showed up." She glances up at me.
"I'm glad you showed up, but we went too fast. We do everything too fast." That's because both Lydia and I don't admit that we're human and we can make mistakes. We've always seemed to think we're above it because we understand each other and we understand ourselves.
"Ben is what made me lose my family. If something makes you lose what you most cherished, you're going to either kill it or hold onto it as tightly as you can." She laughs bitterly.
"I held on a bit too tightly. Hell, I practically choked him, not to mention you."
"I'm sorry." I murmur, staring back at her.
"I justified it by Ben. Everything was justified by Ben. Ben was the reason I lost my family, but I'd just as soon give them up for him. And for that reason I couldn't stand it when you unwittingly hurt him."
"I shouldn't have," She adds. "I shouldn't have tried to fight with you when you're the only family I have left, the only one that's never left me."
"I won't. Not as long as you need me." I glance up at her. I don't know if Lydia needs me. She never has, or at least never said so. Lydia's never needed much of anything, except her own freedom and someone to understand that she wants to need nothing, but can't.
That someone is me.
"I do." She whispers, crying harder. "It took me too long to realize that I had a family all along."
Ben may have taught her to need me, and he may have taught me that there are hidden darknesses in myself that I didn't even know existed, but it came at a terrible price.
He wanted to free us from pain, to free himself, but all he did was show us that we're not invincible and it just takes more of it for us to call it pain.
"It's almost 10." Lydia murmurs in my ear, tears still making a wet spot on my shoulder, but her voice out of its raspy tone.
"It doesn't matter."
"Aren't you going to go out?" She says, leaning back to stare at me.
Yeah. Like I can go out there without Ben.
"I'm not going. I'm never going again." Lydia's face instantly gets red.
"No! You have to go out there!" She says.
"I don't want any part of it. It killed Ben and it drove us apart."
"Ben killed himself. Being Robin had nothing to do with it. He loved it, Terry! He loved every second of it, being out there and helping you save people!" And God, what a Robin Ben made. He was great. If Wayne could have seen him, he'd have been proud.
Ben was probably the only Robin born out of compassion and love, rather than revenge and redemption.
But how can I go back out there? Knowing that he's not there with me, that he won't be at my side if I need him? Wanting to turn and say something and have to hear nothing but eerie silence instead?
"You have to go back out there. Terry." Lydia continues, standing up and pulling me with her. "Ben didn't want you to quit being Batman. He may have wanted the Terry McGinnis part to shape up, but he never found one thing wrong with Batman. If you quit, it makes his whole death meaningless."
"Don't you want me to quit?" Lydia shakes her head.
"I never wanted you to quit. What you do is noble. It's what you're meant to do. And Ben loved you for it." I wipe some more tears off of my face. She's right.
"It's not the suit's fault Terry. We're responsible for our own actions." Lydia says. Wayne said the exact same thing to me years ago. He was right too.
And so I kiss Lydia, something I haven't done in God-knows-how-long. We both smile, because we remember exactly how it used to be, and exactly how it will be again, because that's what Ben wanted.
That's what Ben died for.
I head down to the cave and don't hesitate. I'm out in the city. I think of Ben, but I don't think of how much I miss him. I think of how much I loved having him with me.
Do the work, and it'll repay you. Do it well and it'll reward you when you need it the most. For a while, I never knew what Wayne meant by it. All the work used to reward me with was injuries and reasons to fight with people, both in the suit and out.
Now I understand. I take down criminals, hear their remorseful cries and it soothes me, revives me. The pounding my own body takes cleanses me.
This is for you Ben. My one and only Robin that I'll never ever forget.
My son Ben.
******************************************************************
Thank you for your reviews and feedback! This story is concluded in Reckoning Pt. 3