Living with Dick was completely different from living with Bruce. Where Bruce gave her space and free reign, Dick was constantly around once he was out of work and set limits for her when he wasn't home. Their super, Bridget Clancy, had also been finagled into keeping a hawk-like eye on her. Hailey did like Bridget. She did. She just didn't like it when she stepped out of the building and heard Bridget call out to her from one of the upper floor windows. "Get that cute little butt back inside before I call your brother, Lil' miss!"
Hailey knew the building didn't have any surveillance cameras. And Bridget couldn't be watching the front doors all of the time. She surmised that Bridget had help. Her theory was proven right when she noticed the curtain of the basement window move. Hailey had found her snitch.
"Who's the person who lives in the basement?" Hailey asked Dick one evening during dinner. They were eating a pizza in front of the TV. Superman was on the news again. And not for saving a cat from a tree in Metropolis, believe it or not. Superman had been spotted all over the world following the demise of Gotham. Not with the Justice League either, he was on a mission to save everyone he could from any natural disaster and or man-made fires that had gone out of control. He'd given up trying to convince the Senate to lift the No Man's Land order on Gotham after a few weeks. Bruce stayed behind trying to appeal to anyone he could. Bruce's calls to check-in and update Dick and Hailey on what was going on in DC had come further and further apart.
"Huh?" Dick asked having been caught off guard with the question.
"The creepy person who lives in the basement, who is it?" Hailey asked with a tilt of her head. "I didn't know there were apartments down there."
"There's only the one. But why do you say he's creepy?" Dick said, giving her his full attention.
"He's always watching me," Hailey said and shrugged. She didn't say he was the watchdog keeping her from leaving the building. But Dick didn't need to know that.
Dick kept staring at her but Hailey didn't say anything else. Dick furrowed his brows and after setting down the slice of pizza he was eating, got up and went to the door.
"Where are you going?" Hailey said standing up all of the sudden. Dick looked very upset.
"To have a chat with Amygdala," Dick said and pointed at her. "Finish eating. I'll be right back."
"Crap," Hailey said and rubbed her hands together anxiously. She hadn't meant to get the guy in trouble, just get her off her back. She ran after Dick and caught up to him in the staircase. "What are you going to say to him?"
"Hailey, get back inside," Dick told her in a stern voice.
"No, you're super upset, and whoever lives there hasn't done anything. I've never even seen him. He just, you know, creeps from the curtains. Like a nosey Nellie. Nothing nefarious, I don't think."
Dick stopped and turned to look at her carefully. "From the curtains?"
"Uh," Hailey said and looked anywhere but at Dick.
Dick sighed and started to go back up the stairs. He gently pushed Hailey to get her moving. "You're not supposed to leave on your own."
"I know! Every time I try your warden stops me! And I'm sick of it! I can't go anywhere! I hate it here!" Hailey said and ran back up the stairs and slammed the door to the apartment after going inside.
Dick sighed again and then rubbed the bridge of his nose when he heard the second door slam. Hailey had gone straight to bed. Then he started to chuckle when he realized that Bruce had taken him in as his ward at about the age Dick was now. Dick was a handful at first but only because he was pushing his limits wanting to know how much he could get away with. He could usually get Bruce to bend in the beginning and later it became harder and harder when Bruce started to act more like a father and less like his buddy.
For Dick, with Hailey, it was completely different. He was her older brother, not her parent. Plus he would only be her guardian temporarily. He just couldn't get over the fact that the first time he was asked to look after her, she ran out on him without supervision and an earthquake hit Gotham. Dick couldn't let her out of his sight because there was no telling what would happen the next time she went out on her own.
Unlike Bruce, Dick wasn't going to be her guardian until she turned eighteen; he just had to ride this out until Bruce returned from DC. He was certain he could handle a thirteen-year-old girl for a couple more weeks. Besides, he had an apartment building full of tenants willing to help keep an eye on her. And even though Hailey did try to pull a quick one on him, she was too much of a good girl to actually get anyone in trouble just to get her way. Dick was actually proud of her for that.
"She didn't mean it," Bridget said from the first floor while leaning on the staircase banister so that she could get a better look at Dick. "She's just trying to get you to loosen your reins a bit."
"I know," Dick said with a chuckle. "I was the same way. Actually, I think I was worse. And thanks, for keeping an eye on her while I'm at work."
"What are neighbors for?" Bridget said with amusement. "Just the same, come back with some ice cream next time and we'll call it even."
"Deal," Dick said loud enough for her to hear and went inside his apartment.
Summer school was not what Hailey expected it to be. She assumed she'd have a teacher and a class size similar to what she had back at her old school. Instead, everyone was thrust into the school gymnasium and placed in groups according to their last names. Hailey hadn't even seen anyone from her old school. And when she automatically went to the group for students whose last names began with the letter T, her name wasn't on the list. She was sent to the office to sort out her registration.
The first thing the secretary asked her was her guardian's name. After that, her registration was found. Turns out that she was registered as Hailey Grayson. When she tried to explain that it wasn't her legal name, the secretary told her that everyone was registered under the last name of their parent or guardian to make it easier to due to the large volume of children that were displaced from family during the quake. Hailey didn't say anything after that. She knew first hand what that was like since she and Dick volunteered to help with the families that had lost homes or loved ones. Slowly but surely, the survivors were placed in homes within the city or had moved elsewhere thanks to the help of many charities. The tents that had housed the Gotham refugees had slowly disappeared. Even so, there were still a large number of children from Gotham that needed to finish off their school year. Hailey was included in that number.
As Hailey made her way back to the gym, she felt like she was sacrificing her identity. She hadn't taken her fathers' name before; not Jasper's or Bruce's. She idly wondered whether Dick was aware that the school registered her under his surname.
As soon as she reached the G section, the teacher checked her name and asked her to sit down. A body slammed into her before she got the chance, however.
"Uff!"
"Hailey! It's you! I thought you were dead!"
Hailey recognized the voice. It was Ben. She was glad he was there. At the very least she knew one person.
"Hailey?" a small tentative voice said. Hailey turned to face the speaker. It was Brittany. She smiled shyly and waved. Hailey smiled back. "Sit next to me."
The first thing they had to do was take an assessment test. As soon as they finished it, they were allowed to leave. Hailey and Brittany were the first to finish within their group. Ben finished soon after them. It had taken them a little over three hours to finish every subject. Mr. Carr who was the one tasked to oversee their group smiled and said he'd see them the next day. Since he didn't say anything else, Hailey and Ben assumed they were free to leave campus without having to notify anyone. Brittany was the only one with the foresight to call her aunt to let her know that they were let out early. Meaning, she was the only one who actually had permission to leave the campus entirely.
Ben didn't need many words to convince them to go into downtown Blüdhaven to get food. Afterward, they walked around with no destination in mind. Hailey was happy to finally be out of the apartment and was in no rush to get back. They were kicked out of a toy store because Ben decided to play a game of catch in the aisle with the two girls and knocked down a display case full of trading cards. The shopkeeper was mad but Hailey and her friends were laughing excitedly. They ran out of the store when the shopkeeper threatened to call the cops. They stopped near an alleyway where a desperate man threatened them with a knife.
"Give me all your money!"
Ben yelped in surprise and hid behind Hailey. Brittany froze with a hand over her mouth in shock. Hailey pushed Brittany behind her and took a defensive position. She would fight the man if she had to but she was taking small steps back creating a bigger space between them and the man. He reeked of alcohol and his clothes had seen better days. Hailey felt a pang of sympathy but she was also scared. She had never been mugged before. And the one time she should've used what she'd learned in her self-defense classes, she hadn't. Robin had rescued her. She had no idea if she could even fight a man with a knife. She tightened her fists trying to be brave but her bottom lip wobbled. It didn't help her resolve to hear Brittany sniffling and Ben declaring that they were doomed to die right behind her.
"Don't try anything stupid, little girl! Just give me your goddam money!" the man said and began to move towards them.
"Run," Hailey told her friends. Her voice came out hoarse. She cleared her throat and said it louder. But Ben held on to her tightly. And Brittany started to sob. They weren't leaving without her.
Hailey turned to tell them again but was shoved back. She fell on top of Ben and looked up in time to see a lady wearing a yellow halter top and black leggings beat the crap out of the man.
"Go home, kids," she said, turning to face them after she'd knocked the man unconscious. She was wearing a mask and had a black spider emblem on the front of her halter top. She picked up the man and threw him over her shoulder. She walked off into the alley with the man and didn't bother to look back.
"Holy fucking hell!" Ben shouted once the lady was out of sight. "Did you see that?! Oh my god, I thought we were goners, and then she just," Ben made a few noises and gestured with his hands, "and she knocked that fucker out!"
Brittany didn't say anything. She wiped her face and pulled out her phone.
"What are you doing?" Hailey asked her.
"I'm calling the cops, Hailey. We almost died and that crazy chick probably took that man somewhere to kill him. We have to tell somebody."
"What?" Ben asked, having heard her. "You're going to snitch on her? She saved us!"
"She had knives and guns! We're lucky she didn't try to kill us too!" Brittany said defensively.
Hailey was shaking her head. She didn't want Brittany to call the cops. Dick was a cop. And if he found out that she was not in school…
"No, Brittany! You can't!" Hailey told her but it was too late. Brittany was already telling the dispatcher what happened.
"Ugh! I can't believe you, Britt," Ben said with his hands in his hair. "When the cops get here, I'm telling them you lied. 'There wasn't a hot chick in spandex kicking some wino's ass, officer'."
"Shut up, Ben," Brittany said in a low voice and turned away from him to continue speaking to the dispatcher.
"You should kick her ass again, Hailey," Ben told her.
"Shut up, Ben," Hailey told him in annoyance.
The last thing she wanted to think about was the bullying that ended in a bathroom brawl and Brittany getting expelled. After the quake in Gotham, everything that had happened before that was unimportant in her book. And Brittany's too. Otherwise, Brittany wouldn't have asked Hailey to sit with her. She had no idea that everyone had thought she was dead. Ben told her that everyone knew that Bruce was in Metropolis when the Quake hit and that the news had coverage of him in DC. Brittany added that since she hadn't been seen with him, everyone had assumed she was dead and that Bruce was fighting to get the ban on Gotham lifted so that he could recover her body. Seeing Hailey alive and well made any grievances the three had for one another fade away in an instant.
"'Shut up, Ben. Shut up, Ben,'" Ben said in a whiny high pitched voice.
"Shut up, Ben!" The two girls said simultaneously just as a cop car pulled up by the curb.
Officer Richard Grayson stormed up to Hailey.
"Crap," Hailey said under her breath.
