Sunlight crept into the apartment and began to stroke my cheek with its warm spider webbed fingers of gossamer thread. My eyes were the first things to open, darting wildly from side to side, taking in my surroundings. He was still here, the small raven boy, slumped over on the coffee table. He never had a chance. The rush of last night's events hit me hard as the assault of smells and memories overwhelmed me and I had to close my eyes again momentarily, composing myself. My hands found their way to my face, allowing me to bury myself in the security of the only person who'd ever truly been there for me. The only person I ever allowed inside. Tim was still sleeping as I wandered over to the bathroom, but not before lifting him up (he was surprisingly light) and carrying him to the warm indentation I'd left in the cushions of the couch, draping a blanket over his shivering body. The man who gazed back at me from the mirror was hollow, eyes moist but not for wont of sleep. Each tear was a separate event in my life. One for mother, one for father. One for Bruce and Barbara and Kory. Even one for Jason. One for Tim. Then they stopped. I wiped these fluid people from my cheek and immediately they were gone and all that was left was the damage and the reflection. The hot streams of liquid had borne what seemed like trails, tunnels in my cheek where they had danced in wayward zigzags before falling off the end of my face into oblivion like their human counterparts. Why had I been so open, I wondered. So blunt, so forward, so everything I'm not. How could you fail me, I demanded of my body when recollecting the way it had collapsed the previous night. How will I ever live this down?
My feet make unfamiliar lines across the rug as I shuffle to the living room. The living room where all is quiet and a young boy is dead on my couch. No, not dead. Merely asleep, waiting for princess charming to give him the kiss of life so they can live happily ever after. I sigh. Tim moans and rolls over in his sleep, and I freeze, not wanting him to wake up and intrude on my somehow private moment. He doesn't wake and I sigh. Sunlight dances upon his straining shoulders and weaves its way through his hair. Even in his sleep, his body looks as though it is ready to pounce, sleek and intense. I scan his t-shirt for the hard, severe lines of deep definition I know are hidden behind the soft fabric. My hand lingers upon the arm of the couch, wishing to lift up his shirt and count the ribs I hope are there. My secret hope goes beyond that. It extends to the hope that his bones are all there, all intact. That God has not stolen from him in the middle of the night and made a perfect woman for him. I will not let myself be torn away yet. I am selfish, I am petty, I am cruel. I do not explore any further. The thick shadow of his lash cuts lines across his otherwise unmarred face and I wonder how long it will be until it is disfigured, or worse; until the flesh rots beneath the ground with the rest of my friends and loyalties. In this light, the pallor of Tim's skin is softened to a golden glow. I marvel at how peaceful he looks and long to join him deep in the aches of my bones.
I touch my own chest, and for some reason my fingertips don't hear the heartbeat underneath. Oh wait, that's right, fingers can't hear, Dick. You're such a… Yeah I know. Ha, funny. No, not funny. Overused. You're not funny, Dick. I have to stop talking to myself. Oh-Tim has woken up. His eyelids fluttered first and I could tell he was trying to assess the room blindly, perhaps trying to tune his other senses further. I perch on the leg of the couch and wait and watch like a silent animal of the night. I can only hope the blood from my wounds of the other night is clean for Tim is also a nocturnal predator but he is far stronger than I and I fear he would devour me if he smelled blood in the water. His eyes search my face, and I tilt my head naturally, questioning his movements. He has never held my gaze this long. I hold my breath and dare not break away.
I wanted him to be the first to look away. I wanted to grab a chicken bone or one of the saber cat claws I keep hidden in my bedroom and pierce his ear, unlock the secrets of his mind. What is he thinking of? He pulls back into the couch and allows it to engulf him like Jonah and the whale. I almost reach out to save him. Say something, little brother. I will just keep watching you until my eyes melt from my head. I give up, I give in, call it what you want. Typical Dick.
"Good morning." I try to keep my voice neutral, soft and low, as to not frighten the young buck. His eyes always seem so wide, like disco balls sparkling dreams in the bright morning light. He's here, Tim's here. In my House. My veins give a momentary skip of panic as my heart jumps in my chest. He is such a young boy, making awkward young boy movements. Jolting hand. Tufty hair. Smooth it back then put arm back on self before realizing the sleep drifting into one's deep blue eyes. Oh. Why doesn't one wish to go back to sleep, I silently wonder. Warm up the throat muscles; learn to speak once more after eons in a cocoon of silence. I wonder if Tim ever really knew how to speak. Perhaps I could teach him, perhaps, if he let me, I could draw him out of the cave of his wolfish nightmares. Perhaps...
"Good morning," he cracks. I cannot help but smile. "How are you feeling?" Of course, the inevitable question. How /am/ I feeling? Gee Dick, why didn't you think about this earlier? The demons in my head-is that bad? No, that's normal. You're so fucked up. Normal. I go with the safe response. Sicken crack of bones, popping of nitrogen bubbles. I do not shudder.
"I'm alright." Signature warm smile. I ruffle his hair, not being able to help my itching hands. Why do I touch him so often? I have to stop touching him. He told me not to touch him. Did he have nightmares about the other night? My sleep was blank and fruitless as always. Thank Bats for my stamina otherwise I probably would not be able to get through the day on the amount of REM I get. Air pressure dropping. Suddenly it's unnervingly quiet and I can hear the faint buzzing of electrical equipment in my home, echoing through the entire building.
He doesn't speak again and I don't expect him to. We simply watch each other in the little dance we do, more graceful even than the Russian Ballet. His movements have a clunking awkward stamina about them, something enthralling and dangerous like a tightrope walker without a safety net. I always walk with my guard up, net all around me. Tim doesn't do that, and I admire him. His walls are elsewhere, put up around his glazed eyes. Sometimes I watch him peel the mask, rarely, from his face. The whitened pupils don't seem to change, as he is blank. Expressionless. Gaunt. Waiting for somebody to come splatter some trace of emotion onto the marble and slate with pain or disaster or fear. Tim responds to those. I wonder what color he is underneath the cold blue. We are all raw beneath the surface, I suppose. Sometime I think he'd be smooth, though. Him and Bruce. Statues beneath their human veneer. All the scars would fade from their bodies into perfection. Tim stands, a coy smile upon his features, out of place. It doesn't belong there. I slink to the kitchen, vaguely aware that an angry cat was howling in my stomach. If I didn't eat soon, Tim would be sure to hear it and question me. I get out the frying pan and some eggs, all the while my eyes are on him and my hands are off elsewhere like always. My nose wrinkles at the scent of frying protein. Almost like burning flesh. I resist the urge to gag. Tim wanders over like a little faerie. Perhaps a nymph. My mind flashes to an image of him in a tutu and I half grin in horror and shake my head. He's hungry, the animal has smelled his kill. I look at him for a moment and realize how young he is. How small. I can see the soft skin of his hands and feel my own roughened, calloused ones. I suddenly feel like a gorilla. He wanders close to me, so close that the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
"I'm making enough for two." I venture to speak, like plunging into cold water.
"You had no choice to begin with," Cold water, yes. My initial description had been accurate. My eras perk up as he sounds like he's choking to death. Oh god, I panic momentarily, internally, reaching out to wrap my arms around him in the Heimlich. Did I kill him with the disgusting smell? I rush to open a window. Don't die on me, Tim. I'm so crazy sometimes. Crazy bastard. Great, now my thoughts are starting to steal from Salinger. I read too much. I think too much. I should lie down. I sigh. Tim's prancing around and I picture a little fruit basket on his head and the beginnings of a conga line. Wait, he's not prancing. Tim doesn't prance. Well, only when he doesn't mean to. I smile. I maneuver around the kitchen, weaving between Tim. He is looking through my things, almost slamming the cabinets. I grate my teeth a bit-only Tim could ever touch my things like this. My torso brushes his body and I shudder a bit. An orange mug catches his eye and all my annoyance fades as I watch him marvel with the innocence I worried he no longer possessed. My sigh was one of relief as I piled the eggs neatly onto separate plates beside the bacon and sausage, all specially without fat, of course. I examined the plates to make sure the proportions were even, equal, and aesthetically pleasing. The plates were a deep green. I remember buying them with Kory. I thought the green matched her eyes. Tim sniffs the food and I pray it gets his seal of approval. He's eating it, in any case. I just want to please him. Why do I want to please him? I set the plates on the table I hardly use. No time like the present to dish out special services. I pat the seat beside me, inviting him. It was a stupid gesture, really. Harmless. His eyes are so dark.
He elects to sit beside me, but not before glaring at me. I should be honored that the sparkling god, Timothy Drake, would sit beside me, a mere mortal. My eyes roll naturally as I realize there's some truth in my thoughts. This makes me frown. My shoulders tense up as I picture Tim in a toga and laurel leaves, wielding the lightning bolt of the gods. I realize I'm mixing classics here. Fuck it. He would really be Apollo anyway. Yes, my Phoebus. I look at him and wonder how perfect the dimensions of his body really are. I itch to get my tape measurer. I think about measuring Tim. /All/ of Tim. My mind blushes as I try to come up with potential sizes? What the fuck, Dick? I shake the thoughts out of my head. My mind begins to wander and I think about the last time I took a shower. I really am compulsive. I usually shower twice a day, at least. Nightwing showers once after each patrol of course. That's a separate shower, mustn't count the two together. I realize how strange it is to speak of my alter ego to myself. Myself doesn't respond. I think about the woman who lives in my building. MY building. I own a building. I own a circus. There's a 16-year-old boy in my apartment. I look up to a guy who dresses up as a giant bat. I contemplate the weirdness of my life. Anyhow. This woman was going out of town once and she asked me to watch her cat. Orange, tabby, really quite beautiful with green eyes. A mermaid cat. I asked her what she'd named it and she said Hamlet. An awful name for a cat, really. I mean, did she know what happened to Hamlet in the end? I kept the cat for a week-I never told anybody. Sometimes, in the quiet of my apartment, after I showered, I'd find Hamlet sitting just outside the bathroom door, waiting for me. It was nice to have someone there waiting. I don't realize it but my arm has made its way across forbidden territory. It has crossed the barrier and is now resting on Tim's shoulder, kneading his neck ever so gently. Christ. I snatch my hand away quickly. I was hoping he hadn't noticed, but no such luck. He looked at me with soft pleading eyes full of… something. I couldn't tell. His thoughts are always hidden by the dark blue sky. My hands are twitching on the table. I reprimand myself angrily in my mind. I chaste-tise myself. At times I wished I was Catholic so I could say my Hail Marys. Twenty for redemption. I shouldn't have touched him. I pretend I'm Catholic anyway and try to remember the prayer, muttering it under my lips to an invisible man in the sky whose existence I question everyday of my life. I'd make a great Catholic. Movement. My jaw twitches. I face my accuser. Tim. Soft, angular, oxymoronic Tim.
"Hey," his lips form the non-threatening word so softly, full cupid's bow opening and closing, working the tongue muscle, forming words. Words. Do Robin's speak in words? I thought we warbled. Then he does something unexpected. I feel the pressure of his warm skin penetrating my wrist, grabbing it, forceful. Like something I would do. Perfect. My eyes explode open from the shock and I almost moan for this is the first time in a long time anybody's voluntarily touched me at all. He puts my hand back on his neck urgently and I comply, rubbing the mess of bones, sinew, muscle and knots gently, trying to work the secret of his life out of his spinal chord. His flesh is malleable to my hands. Will they smell like him after this? I hoped so. I kept rubbing.
I keep rubbing and my fingers veer over the sharp angles of him. Turn right, turn left. Spinal column, lock of hair, careful don't pull. Not too hard. I hear something that sounds like a strangled moan and my eyes perk up immediately. Tim seems to be pressing himself against my hands much in the manner of the cat i took care of. I would sit petting him for hours each night. My hands need something to do-- I miss that. I explore the area around his neck. His severely sharpened jaw (in comparison to my own. I've a bit of David Hasslehoff in me. Ew, Dick.), the columns of his Adam's apple quivering as it protrudes from his strong milky throat. Tim reminds me of Plexiglas: cold and smooth and fragile, but sinewy and strong. My fingers even dare to brush over his bottom lip, as though by accident. His mouth is soft and succumbing. I feel the moan vibrate through my fingertips this time. My hands instinctively apply more pressure right on his throat-- i'm almost squeezing his airway. His eyes will glaze soon. I have to stop, what's wrong with me? I'm scared to choke him. My hands retreat into his hair. Safe.
He makes a small noise and I freeze, eyes wide and bloodshot. I keep willing my hands to stop moving but they don't seem to be paying any attention to my brain. He's closer now, I can smell his dooming sweat and cologne. Tim's too young to be wearing cologne. His hair is so soft and silky, I almost ask him which shampoo he uses. My fingers rubbing his scalp must make his skin prickle, trigger every electrical sensation. A shiver runs through my body instead of his.
"Dick, can I wear some of your clothes. You know I feel dirty if I don't have something to change into after a shower." He groans out a request. I nod but decide he cannot hear me over the hum of our bodies.
"Of course," my voice is low and rumbling like the heart of thunder. It is too close to his ear yet I move enough closer. This is soft, warm, inviting. His mouth invites me in with yielding parted lips and breathy noises. The unruly hand wanders back to his neck and for a moment it fools me into believing that all it wants is to give a neck rub. You are not that simple, Dick. You are not so pure. It is on his throat again, the thing, the beast, the five-fingered monster squeezing harder this time, definitely wrapped around his throat. There's no mistaking it now. I can feel his pulse quickening beneath my fingers.
The demonic hands continue to squeeze and stroke, exploring the sweet breaths he takes. They are coming short now, in ragged bursts as if about to spill all over my hands. His essence. I would lick my fingers clean. Now Dick, let us hope there is not blood in your eyes, desire. You don't even know what you desire. Do you desire to… stop? The hands keep going, manipulating the flesh. No, no stopping. He makes the softest, smallest of noises and that is enough to make my heart spike and my skin prickle with heat. I shift slightly as my body reacts to the hormones no doubt being secreted by my pancreas as I sit and rub and grow closer and sniff his skin and become dizzy and squeeze. I can feel the nubs of my non-existent fingernails raking lines along his throat as I apply pressure. His face is soft and angelic, everything I'm not. It contorts in pleasure or pain? I cannot tell, I do not wish to tell. I simply do not stop and my tongue darts over my lips on its own, trying to taste the electricity in the air. You don't know what you're doing to me, Tim. The urge to grab his chin is strong. It pulls at my navel like a terrifying creature from a Blake painting; digging its unseen claws in my flesh, compelling me and all that impedes me is memories of the previous night. It is more than enough. I am not sure but I think I may have accidentally let his name slip out, soft from my lips. He did not hear me, and I silently thank the gods and push my hand along the soft skin sprinkled with sparse hair. He turned and I could see his sharp profile. I outline his shape with my eyes, tracing it in my mind with my fingertips, picturing my finger caught between his lips like a gleaming fish on a hook. I do not think most fish wish to be caught but if I were a fish I would be one of them, sparkling blue and wanton. I am shameless. I think of his soft pink tongue caressing my flesh and my eyes shoot open.
"Thank you." His voice comes, hoarse and cracked, as he removes my hand from the nape of his neck. I let it rest on his thigh, feeling the heat pulsating from the flesh. The soft skin is already pink and a bit swollen where my grasping hands were exploring, squeezing and asphyxiating Tim's hand snakes clumsily into my hair and I get out a loud groan, leaning forward slightly with a small pump of my hips at the sheer sensation. My hand is stroking his thigh gently, in rhythm with his fingers tangled in my hair. Perhaps it is a precursor. He needed to shower-I remember. But not as badly as I needed it. I remember the way Garth smelled and how soapy he was, how salty like the ocean. Tim is not like that at all. He smells clean and defiant, and I detect the faint scent of the chill that comes before an impending rainstorm. Bruce will probably be wondering where he is. I extinguish a smirk as I picture the conversation in my mind. He's here, Bruce. At my house, touching me. I'm touching him. God that sounds so wrong yet my hand keeps weaving along the fibers of his jeans. He stretches and groans, releasing me from my fantasies. I bite my lip, hard.
"Where do you keep your towels?" Towels? Oh yeah, he's going to shower. But I need… at least I'll be alone while he showers. My eyes looked glazed over, I can tell. I remove my hand from his thigh, grazing him gently. My eyes are wide and I consider how bloodshot they must be, how messy my hair. I feel him straining against the fabric and my teeth sink into my lip even harder. I think I must be gushing blood by now and resist the urge to touch my mouth to make sure I haven't bitten it off. That would seem like an open invitation and I resist the urge. What would I look like without my mouth? It would just be a gaping hole in my middle of my face, sucking and vacant like the black holes in space. You can't see a black hole because it pulls light in before the reflection is made. That is what I am, an unreflective black hole. He's only sixteen, Christ Dick. My hand twitches slightly and brushes against him once more before finding its way to my own lap, dangerously close to my own burning skin. I look at him with darkening eyes and my throat is seared shut.
"In the...cabinet in the bathroom." The scorched skin seems to melt as my vocal chords find relief once more. He immediately bolted to the bathroom, trying to play it off as innocent, his footsteps like an owl's making no noise as they collided with my floor. I heard each resounding thud echo. I have remarkably good hearing. His doe eyes lock into my sparkling ones and I lick my lips. He looks bewildered as he goes through the cabinet, our eyes penetrating each other once more before he slams the door. I close my eyes, leaning back, allowing the sound of individual water droplets hitting the shower floor and Tim's moans to lull my stroking hand into a steady rhythm, and I groan loudly, allowing the sound to reverberate off the walls and enliven my fantasy that there was another person there from whom the noise originated. I hear the strangled choking sound Tim makes as he attempts to hide his state from me, even there, in the privacy of the bathroom. I imagine his soft ragged breaths and the image of him in the shower bores its way like a hot iron into my brain, causing my hand to move faster upon my aching flesh. I jump as I hear the water being turned off. Tim emerges from the bathroom rosy cheeked and freshly clean. I growl as my unfinished fantasy rubs against my erection upon the sight of him, and a moan is strangled in my mouth. I look up to find Tim dangerously close to me, smelling of my shampoo. I fight the smile that turns to a growl of frustration as I see his wet warm skin and now battle with the urge to suck the moisture from his skin. No scars, I can see. The towel is thrown about his waist haphazard and I itch to yank it from him and examine the rest of him. He is strikingly symmetrical as I have imagined and my eyes wander up and down his body without rest, making my flesh jerk urgently. I stifle a moan and look about wildly, trying to find something to cover up with. The darkness of the fabric of my pants will only do so much to hide my condition from the perceptive boy. He asks for clothes but I am afraid to stand and give myself away. I stand anyway, carefully, moving past him, my body brushing against his wet form. I am sure there are Tim-outlines in water on my shirt. The sensation of contact brings another noise to my lips, louder this time, and it escapes. I gape at him for a moment, comparing our heights. He is almost as tall as I am and that is threatening somehow.