Chapter 6: Dinner with the In-Laws
(The music for this chapter begins with "Together at Last" and ends with "Le Coucher du Soleil.")
We sat there, on the couch, for quite some time. I don't even remember what we talked about, it didn't really matter as much as just being together, holding his bandaged hand, feeling the strength of his body next to mine. I was still trying to puzzle out how it had happened in the first place. By all accounts, it just didn't make sense, and yet, against all odds, there I was, sitting with him, laughing with him… cuddling with him.
The longer we stayed there, the more tired he seemed to become. It didn't surprise me, considering where he'd just been and what he'd been doing, but because of this, every time he yawned, I ended up yawning too, and before we knew it, we were dozing off together again.
Some unknown amount of time later, I opened my eyes. I was ridiculously comfortable, but… when had I laid down? When had either of us laid down? My head was resting on his chest, my body next to his, and the more I came to my senses, the more flustered I became. I started getting up, feeling all weird and squirmy and nervous inside, muttering, "0h… sorry, I didn't mean to—"
But then…
I felt his hand at my arm. When I looked down at him, his eyes were half open, laying there on the couch, and he whispered, so that only I could hear, "Don't go… please… stay."
I counted my breaths as he watched me with those big, pleading, blue eyes…
Slowly, I lowered myself back down, resting my head against his chest and listening to his heartbeat. His racing heartbeat. Then his arm was curving around my back, his hand coming to land at my waist. I couldn't help but smile, knowing once and for all that… yes. He did want to be with me. He was asking me to stay with him.
Gradually, the pace of his breathing lessened, and I could tell that he was asleep. I shifted until I was comfy, rubbing my face a little into his shirt. For some strange reason that I could not explain, he liked spending time with me. Just being together. He was at peace whenever we talked, which was probably why he kept nodding off. And… knowing that… made me unbelievably happy, especially since… I felt the same way.
I lazily traced my fingertip over the folds of his shirt, my eyes feeling weak in the firelight, and I thought about other ways I could make him happy. I wanted to keep making him happy. More than anything. So what could I do?
I was good in the kitchen… but so was Alfred. There probably wasn't a lot I could offer that he already couldn't, and in way better quality besides. I could draw… but not as well as I would like, at least for something like this. No, no, it needed to be something special, something that only I could give him. The longer I laid there, though, the more I realised that I simply didn't have that much to offer. The only thing left was… no, that was too cheesy. My dad had tried that with my mom and it had not gone over nearly as romantic as he'd hoped.
I sighed quietly. I still kind of wanted to make it anyway, even if I never gave it to him. But where to even start when composing a love song for someone like Dick? The notes would have to be just right, and the lyrics couldn't be generic or sappy, they needed to be earnest and they needed to mean something. Maybe it would help if I knew what sort of music he was into.
As I closed my eyes, I started to hum, playing around with the first few notes that came to mind. After what sounded something like Moon River, I was finally getting somewhere original. It was more… childlike than I thought it would be. You know, more innocent, in a way. It had a certain springiness to it, the notes going up and down playfully, but by the end, it became tender and sweet… almost like a lullaby. Yes. I didn't know why, but this sounded right. This sounded like Dick.
Now all I'd need to do is remember the tune so that I could write the lyrics later.
It had stopped raining now, and I was drifting off again.
This was nice. Just the two of us.
It felt safe.
It's a shame these things never last, for one reason or another. In this case, the reason was named 'Damian.'
"What are you doing?" He asked, his arms folded and green eyes squinted. This was the first time I'd ever seen him out of uniform, and to be honest… he looked like any other ordinary kid. An ordinary kid with an extraordinarily serious pouty face.
My head was lifted slightly as I looked at him, not sure of what to say.
"Go away, Damian," Dick muttered, not opening his eyes.
"Pennyworth says dinner is ready," he announced stiffly, eyes still firmly set on me, glaring hard. Was he always like this? Was it an act or was he serious? I still couldn't tell.
"We'll be right there," I said, glancing at Dick. I honestly didn't know if that was going to be the case, but I'd like for it to be, since Alfred had gone to all the trouble of making the food for us. And besides, it would be the first time since the movie night that a bunch of people would be together, sharing a meal. I'd really missed that.
Damian narrowed his eyes one last time, almost as if he was threatening me, and then went away. Hmm.
"How old is he?" I asked, laying my head back down.
"Like, twelve or something," Dick mumbled. "Why?"
I pursed my lips, deep in thought. I don't know how well my brothers and my years of babysitting had prepared me for this, but we were about to find out. If we were going to keep living together for the foreseeable future, this ice needed to be broken before something bad happened. Particularly to me.
"Just curious. Are you coming?" I asked, carefully getting up. I could smell the salmon and herbs from here, and they smelled good.
Dick sighed reluctantly through his nose as I moved away, and he seemed to be expending a great deal of effort just to open his eyes.
Before long, the two of us were walking together down the hallway, a bit drowsy still, and when we got to the dining room, Alfred, Bruce, Signal, and Damian were waiting. I noticed them all eyeing us as we took our seats next to each other, particularly Bruce and Alfred. Why did it suddenly feel like I was having dinner with the in-laws?
Alfred dished out the food and then Signal cleared his throat. "So, since secret identities are officially on the table, my name's Duke. Nice to meet you. Again," he smiled.
"That's a nice name," I said, picking up my fork. I'm terrible at small talk, so that was about the best I could come up with on the spot. "Have you been working with Batman long?"
"No, I'm what you'd call the 'new kid on the block.' I practically just started. Dick, though, he's been around longer than all of us. He was the first."
"Oh, really?" I asked, turning to him.
"You should ask him to show you his first Robin uniform some time," Duke chuckled, prompting Dick to give him a look.
"You were Robin?" I asked, remembering when I was younger and my family was gathered around the dinner table, talking about this new vigilante that was in the papers.
"Eh, it was a long time ago," said Dick, drinking some water.
"And at any rate, the mantle of Robin belongs to me now," Damian piped up, elegantly eating a piece of his salad. I noticed that there was no salmon on his plate.
"But why 'Robin?'" I asked, thinking out loud. I had always wondered about the choice to go with something so… campy. "I mean, don't get me wrong, it's iconic and all, but wouldn't something like 'Falcon' or 'Osprey' have fit the whole 'dark' theme a bit better?"
"It was a personal decision," said Bruce, not taking his eyes off his plate.
Well, whatever that meant, I knew better than to pry, so I dropped the subject.
"But what about you?" Bruce went on.
"What about me?"
"Dick tells me your family is somewhat musically gifted."
"You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," Dick suddenly piped up.
"It's fine," I reassured him. "Yeah, my dad started it. He just plays acoustic guitar and sings, but then, one by one, he kinda roped the rest of us into it. My older sister played guitar and piano, and did vocals, my oldest brother does the drums, then my next brother mains in electric guitar—although, he can play just about anything, really—then my third brother is the bassist, and then there's me."
"What about your other two siblings?" Bruce asked. It shouldn't have surprised me that he knew how many I had, given that he was investigating the car crash and all.
"My youngest brother tried to get into it a couple times, but he's always been more mechanically minded, so when we toured, he primarily ran the sound board and the merch table. And my little sister…" I smiled. "Well, she… let's just say she hasn't exactly found her calling yet."
I ate another bite of food and Bruce went on, "I took the liberty of looking up your band's music the other day." Oh no. "I can't say that I'm an expert on rock and roll, but I thought it sounded decent." Hey, it was a compliment, and that was good enough for me.
"So you, like, actually went on tour?" Duke asked, seemingly very interested.
"Yup." Then my smile broadened. "Actually—you'll get a kick out of this—when we officially went out for the first time, we dubbed our beloved touring van the 'Bandmobile.'" That got a few good chuckles out of the table.
Wow. The more I talked about it, the more the similarities seemed to stack up. Our families had a lot in common. You know, in certain ways. I'm not saying they were exactly the same, but I mean, really, what are the odds there'd be anything at all, right? Especially considering that this was the Bat Family, for crying out loud. Talk about hard to relate to.
"We toured in that old thing… I think twice? No, two and a half times. No suspension, no ac, driving through Texas in the summer—not a happy time. And then our third outing, that was 'the big tour.' Three whole months on the road. Broke down in Tennessee. Missed our next gig. So we scrapped the car and replaced it with 'Bandmobile 2.0' and finished the tour."
"Were you an opening act for someone?" Duke went on.
"No, we did our own concerts. They weren't big, mind you, but they were still concerts. There were a few festivals we hit along the way, too, but all in all, it's pretty boring stuff. I'm sure you guys have way more interesting stories."
"Interesting is one way to put it," said Dick through a mouthful of salad.
Batman "hmmed" his agreement and then said, "So I trust you've been settling in well?"
"It's been fine," I said, kind of getting the hint that he wasn't really in the mood to talk about work. "It's definitely the biggest place I've ever stayed at before." It was also the quietest, but it felt just the tiniest bit rude to say something like that in front of the owner of the house in question. "I love the whole layout and the architectural design. Was it built in the early or late eighteen-hundreds?"
"Mid eighteen-hundreds," said Bruce, smiling.
"I knew it!" I excitedly fist bumped the air, remembering when I'd thought that on the night I had arrived. I was getting good at identifying architecture.
"I'm surprised," Bruce went on. "Most people don't usually pick up on that."
"Ah, well, the Victorian era is a personal favourite of mine. Followed closely by the Edwardian era. My grandparents actually used to live in a little Victorian house, passed down from my great-grandparents. We'd go to visit them a bunch, and I just fell in love with the style of the turrets and the stain glass and the mouldings and the old brassy doorknobs."
"Do they not live there anymore?" Bruce went on.
"No, they recently passed away, and no one in the family really has the money to upkeep it, or the desire to move back to the old stomping grounds. Which is a real shame, 'cause my dad and his siblings grew up there, you know? If it had been passed down one more time, it would have been in the family for three generations. But it saw five generations walking its halls before all was said and done. There's a lot of history in it." I sighed again. Was every conversation going to be this heavy? They must have thought I was a right pleasure to talk to. "But so, mid nineteenth century Victorian manor—has it been your family that whole time?"
He nodded. "It was commissioned by my great-great-great-grandfather, Kenneth Wayne."
Wait… Wayne… why did that name sound so familiar?
"Hold on," I said, raising a finger and setting my fork down. "Wayne… heh… as in the Wayne Family? As in the multigenerational family business started by brothers Solomon and Joshua Wayne in the late seventeen-hundreds, currently known as Wayne Enterprises? That Wayne Family!?"
Everyone at the table looked stunned, for one reason or another.
"That's the one," said Bruce, caught between being amused, flattered, and confused that I randomly knew so much.
I leaned back in my seat, covering my gaping mouth with my hands. "I've been staying in Wayne Manor this whole time?!"
"No one told you?" Duke asked.
"Well I assumed it was a secret," I said, taking in my surroundings with an entirely new attitude. I kept moving my hands, trying to start into a sentence that encapsulated all of the many emotions I was feeling, and not being able to stay on just one for more than a second.
"What's wrong with her?" Damian eventually asked, frowning.
"I'm only sitting in one of the oldest, most elaborate buildings in all of American history—sorry if my brain is shorting out!" I cried, still processing everything. Then I looked at Bruce—realised that his full name was Bruce Wayne—and the whole thing started all over again.
"I take it you're a bit of a history aficionado?" Bruce smiled.
I made some sort of sound with my throat. "Yeah. A bit. I mean, it's not like I've spent hours upon hours of my life researching the Victorian and Edwardian eras or anything, and my parents totally never flew out here to stay at an estate very similar to this one on vacation once, which totally didn't prompt my research into the business tycoons of the industrial revolution, such as the legendary J.P. Morgan, Rockefeller, Vanderbilt, and Alan Wayne!" I had my hands down flat against the table as I ranted, running out of oxygen and still hardly believing that I was sitting at the Wayne Family dinner table. Then I had a thought. "Do you still have, like, all the original silverware and china and pots and pans and things?"
"They're in storage. Although, some of the pieces are unfortunately missing."
"And how much of the furniture is original?"
"Some. A lot of it succumbed to age and wear, though, particularly in the bedrooms."
I couldn't believe it. I thought I was actually going to tear up at the table.
"So that explains the Van Goghs and Ming vases and everything," I said, thinking back. I let out another long breath as I started to calm down a little bit and leaned forward in my seat. "And you're Batman, because… of course you are."
"Would you like to take an informed tour of the manor some time, Miss Brielle?" Alfred asked, refilling the water glasses.
My jaw dropped. "Is the Queen British? Yes! Thank you! Oh my goodness…" I was leaning on my elbows now, hands covering my face. "I was not expecting that."
"I don't think any of us were," Duke chuckled.
"I did," said Damian curtly.
"Okay, yeah, except the kid who was raised by assassins."
"Assassins?" I echoed.
"The League of Shadows," Damian corrected, sticking his nose into the air somewhat.
"It's a whole thing," said Dick, leaning over to me.
"…Well, I mean, everyone's got their quirks, I guess," I said innocently, taking a sip of water. That actually got Dick to nearly choke on his last piece of salmon, he laughed so suddenly.
"Yeah, cause that's just a fun little quirk of his," he snickered, covering his mouth with the back of his hand. That was the first time I'd seen him laugh that much, and he looked adorable. Duke was smiling too.
"You are all such plebeians," Damian sighed, looking away.
"Hey. Just because I was born into a working class family and had to share one bathroom with my six siblings for the majority of my life, does not automatically make me a plebeian, okay?" I said, trying not to laugh, because of course, that's exactly what a plebeian was.
"Right, it just makes you poor," he fired back.
"Damian," Bruce said sternly.
"It's alright. Being poor isn't a sin, after all." I wanted to finish with, "But being arrogant is," but I felt like that might be taking things just a little too far. We were trying to break the ice, not make it freeze more. Besides, I think my confident, unbothered answer seemed to annoy him just fine. There was one more thing I had noticed though. "So, am I seeing a little family resemblance?" I asked, pointing between Bruce and Damian.
"Damian is my biological son," Bruce explained.
"His only biological son," Damian added rather pointedly, sticking out his chin.
"Aw, cool!" I said cheerfully. When Dick had told me that the other vigilantes had kinda come together over the years, I had assumed that they were all adopted, either literally or emotionally. Guess I was wrong. "Makes sense, then, you being the new Robin and all."
"It does, doesn't it?" He said, dabbing the corners of his mouth with his napkin.
Was everything this kid said going to be this haughty? Well, good thing I knew the secret to taking down stuck-up jerks.
"Glad to see you're honouring the legacy of such a beloved and kind-hearted hero." I knew I ran the risk of sounding like my own brand of a total jerk, but that's why I said it in the most earnest, good-natured way possible, as though I was merely complimenting the title of Robin, and not insulting him. Most of the reactions at the table were subdued, so I have no idea how each of them interpreted it, except for Damian, who was now eyeing me. I just smiled back as though I had no idea what he was looking at me for. "I can only imagine the amount of courage and humility it takes to be a superhero, risking your life for others, expecting nothing in return." I was looking more toward Bruce when I said that part, trying to make sure Damian didn't feel like I was getting at him too much. And I did genuinely mean what I said. "You guys are really amazing."
"Thank you," said Bruce modestly. "But we hardly deserve all the credit. The police and the fire department and the hospitals work all night as well."
I nodded, trying not to let myself fire back with a, "But you're the only ones who can take down crazy people like The Joker." He was being humble and I wanted to respect that.
"Right then, so, ex-circus performer," I said, gesturing to Dick, "Ex-assassin," Damian, "…billionaire playboy philanthropist," Bruce, "…what's your story, Duke?"
He swallowed a bite of salad and said, "…high school student?" Then he let out a breath of a laugh. "I don't know, man. I mean, there was the whole 'Robin Movement' thing that happened, and I was a part of that."
"'You guess there's that?'" Dick repeated, smiling at him. "One of the only members of this family with superpowers and 'you guess there's that?'"
"Superpowers?" I repeated, intrigued.
"Oh, it's nothing special," he tried to say, but then Dick went on,
"He can manipulate light. That's why we call him 'The Signal.' You know, like the Bat Signal?"
"Oooh," I said, finally understanding. That made much more sense. "Cool! Can you, like, make light constructs? Can you generate light?"
"Nah, it's not that fancy," Duke said modestly. "I can absorb it, redirect it, bend it around me to turn invisible and junk. Oh, and there's also the 'ghost vision.'"
"What's that?"
"He can actually see where light particles were and will be—he can essentially see into the past and future," Dick explained.
"A limited amount, yes," Duke interjected.
"That is too cool!" I smiled. In that moment, I completely forgot that I had powers of my own, and wondered what it would be like to be a light-bender. "Can you show me some right now?"
Damian suddenly grunted softly and rolled his eyes, but Duke, rubbing the back of his neck some, lifted a hand and—
The whole room went pitch black.
"WOOOOHOOHOOHOO!"
Then the light suddenly came back.
I must have had the biggest, stupidest grin on my face. "That was really stinking cool!"
"Thanks," he smiled, shrugging just a tiny bit. "I've been practising."
That's when Alfred came in from the kitchen, holding another tray. "Would anyone care for dessert? I made devil's food cake." I assumed the head of the household was getting special treatment on account of the wound still healing on his chest.
"Ooh," I said, eyeing the chocolate confection he was holding out. "I'll take a slice."
"This is a bribe, isn't it?" said Bruce as the butler started dishing us up.
"Not at all," he replied congenially. "Does a butler need an excuse to make his master's favourite dessert? Although, if it did happen to encourage you to rest for a day, I wouldn't complain." Bruce eyed him but said nothing more.
"Yeah, wanna know why it's his favourite?" Dick asked, leaning over. "Cause it's dark and rich, just like him." A few groans were let loose at the table, my own included. Dark Batman likes dark chocolate cake, hardy har. I still smiled and chuckled, but it wasn't the funniest thing I'd heard all day.
"Do you have a favourite dessert?" I asked him, thinking that it would be good to know something critically important like that for future use.
He let out a sputter of air from his lips as he thought about it.
"I believe, in the past, you've enjoyed a good ciambellone," Alfred said as he set his slice of cake down and whisked away his empty dinner plate.
"Chi-am-be-lo-ney?" I repeated. "What is that, Italian?"
"It is, actually," said Dick. "It's this lemony tea cake. You should try it some time."
"Mm, interesting." Lemon. Not my personal favourite flavour for cake, but citrus in general was very much up my alley.
"And how about you? What's your favourite cake?" He smiled at me, bringing his fork to his mouth.
"Well, in stark contrast to tonight's dessert, one of the few types of cake that I would literally die for, is angel food cake. It's so light and fluffy and then you've got the top that gets all crispy and sugary and stuff—Mm!—and then you can eat it with strawberries and it becomes, like, the best version of strawberry shortcake—which is also another one of my favourites. And the best part is that you can take all the leftover egg yolks and use them to make custard, so really, you're getting three desserts in one!" Then, after realising that I'd gone on a little too long, I asked, "What about you, Duke? What's your favourite?"
"Boston Cream, I think," he answered through a mouthful of cake.
"And Damian?" I went on, hoping to get a genuine answer.
He had his eyes sullenly set on his plate and for a moment I was afraid that he was going to ignore me, but then he sighed, "Chocolate raspberry cheesecake."
I gasped. "I love chocolate cheesecake too!" If it was a choice between angel food cake and chocolate cheesecake, I think I'd die before I could actually decide. Damian made the tiniest little grunt as he turned his eyes away from me, and I could have sworn that he was sticking out his pouty lip again. Then I thought of another cake. "Have any of you heard of drømmekage?"
"Scandinavian?" Bruce asked.
"Danish," I smiled. "From my dad's mom's side of the family. In English it's called the Danish Dream Cake, and it is so good. I mean, there's coconut on the top, and I'm not a huge fan of coconut, but with how much caramely brown sugary goodness there is on top, you barely notice. It's mostly in the texture."
"I'm not a huge fan of coconuts either," said Dick.
"Aha! Glad to see we're on the same page then," I smiled back. I smiled on the outside, but on the inside, I was beginning to grimace. I knew myself well enough to know that I was starting to act very flamboyantly, and whenever that happened, it was usually a downhill slope into acting like a total idiot. I needed to start reigning it in a bit before I said something stupid. At any rate, Dick seemed to think that what I had said was funny. "Okay, but so… controversial food choices. Pineapple on pizza?"
"Aka the best kind of pizza," he quipped, which prompted me to lean my head back in sorrow.
"Nooo," I quietly moaned.
"Are you disrespecting my food choices right now?" Dick said playfully.
"But—pineapple on pizza… nooo," I laughed. "It's the sweet, acidic, wet thing that doesn't belong on the bready, savoury—"
"But that's what makes it so good, though," Dick insisted, leaning forward. "It's the juxtaposition."
"Normally I would agree, but no."
"But yes!"
"But no!"
"Yes!"
"No!"
"Yes!"
"No!
We sounded like a couple of five-year-olds, saying our answers faster and faster, on the verge of breaking out into a fit of giggles as we leaned closer, neither one of us wanting to give up on our quest for pizza opinion dominance.
Then, he calmly lifted a finger and placed it over my mouth. "Okay, okay, how about a compromise?" I puckered my lips into something of a cheeky pout, convinced that whatever he was about to say wouldn't be nearly as satisfactory as hearing him admit that he was wrong about his pizza preferences. "You admit that I'm right, and we both move on. Everybody winds up happy!"
I couldn't stop laughing. "Oh really—that's your compromise? Okay."
"Get a room," Duke called from across the table.
I had to hide my blushing face. That was the first time anyone had ever aimed those words at me. Usually it was the other way around. And in front of Bruce too…
"Okay, so if not pineapple, then what is your favourite type of pizza?" Dick asked, taking another bite of cake.
"Well, good quality for starters, but ingredients-wise, I am partial to the combos. You know, with the sausage and the veggies and such? So I can pretend that it's somewhat healthy."
"Okay, okay," he said, cleaning up his plate.
There was silence at the table. A little too much silence.
"You're gonna hold on to this, aren't you?" I asked, side-eyeing him.
"I think I have to," he replied, pushing his empty plate away. "Someone's gotta stand up to injustice in this city."
All I could think to do was roll my eyes and laugh some more.
I stole a glance at Bruce, worried that he might be finding all this bickering to be annoying, but to my surprise, when I saw him, he was smiling softly to himself. It actually kind of warmed my heart to know he found us amusing.
"Alright, well, I should get—" Bruce started, having finished his dessert, and he was about to get up, but then Alfred cut him off.
"—Into bed, I suspect." And he took the dishes from the table with a pointed look in Bruce's direction, who replied with a reluctant sigh.
"I guess I'm headed up, then. Goodnight, everyone."
He was out of his seat and about to leave the room when Alfred called after him, "And don't get any ideas about sneaking into the Batcave."
"Goodnight, Alfred."
Damian quickly followed suit, excusing himself from the table and leaving.
"I should probably hit the hay. Long day tomorrow," said Duke, rising.
I was left feeling somewhat disappointed. Dinner was over already? Back home, meals could last for hours. Oh well. There was no point in trying to force anything.
"I guess that's it, then," I said, getting up, Dick right behind me. "How's your arm doing, by the way?"
"Hm? Oh, it's fine," he said, gesturing to the bandage.
We were walking out together, Damian and Duke having already gone ahead.
"So, uh… will you be heading out?" I asked. "Given how you said you live in Blüdhaven and all?"
"Well," he started. "Yeah, I guess so. I've got work in the morning."
I nodded. As I thought about the subject of sleep, though, I found myself not wanting to be all alone up in my room. I liked it better when… I was with someone.
"Hey, so…"
"Yes?" I said, giving him my full attention.
He had his hands in his pockets and was hunching his shoulders awkwardly. "I kinda wanted to ask…"
"Go on," I prodded curiously.
"I don't suppose you'd like to hang out… at a certain time… at a certain place?"
"You mean, like a date?" I asked, feeling all fluttery inside.
His ears went pink. "Yeah, you know, just something casual. Or maybe dinner if you'd like? We could do that. Or maybe a movie or…"
"I think," and I thought about how little of the city I'd seen since coming here, "That dinner sounds nice."
"Okay. What kind of food do you like?"
I squinted thoughtfully. "Surprise me."
"You sure?"
"I like trying new things, and you probably know the restaurants here better than I do. So long as there's no pineapple pizza, I think we'll be fine." We both laughed.
"Alright, so… how about, Friday night, six o'clock?"
"I think that sounds like a plan," I smiled.
"Great."
An official dinner date. This was a first for me. I'd gone on about three dates before. None of them had received a second, and food was only involved in one. Takeout. I blamed it on the rural area I grew up in. There just weren't a whole lot of savvy, eloquent guys to be found. Mostly just hippies, surfers, stoners, hipsters, and farm boys. So, "excited" would not even begin to describe how I was feeling.
We walked for a little while longer down the hallways, at one point syncing up our footsteps.
"Bruce seems nice."
"He is."
"And a Wayne," I sighed, thinking back. "That still just boggles my mind."
"Yeah, I had no idea you were so familiar with the family history," he smiled.
"Again, it's one of my favourite time periods, and… yeah. Wayne Manor…" I looked up at the ceiling, realising how old each wooden beam was. "Did you know that Alan Wayne used to host Theodore Roosevelt here?"
"I did not know that, no," he said, watching me.
"Apparently their wives were good friends." I stopped when I saw the lights of Gotham City shining through one of the windows, glowing like a strange ocean liner in a sea of dark grey. "I've always loved the West Coast, but… I can't deny that there's so much more history here in the East. DC, Williamsburg, Boston… and a million other places. The oldest structure in my home town was a one-hundred-year-old bridge. And then it burned down." I sighed. "On Christmas morning. It was terrible." Wow… I think I just depressed myself. "But anyway," I said, turning away from the window.
I think Dick might have looked at me a certain way, but his expression only lasted for a second, and I missed it. He stayed close by my side as we started walking again, awfully quiet.
"Penny for your thoughts." I hoped I hadn't depressed him as well.
"Just thinking," he said, watching the hallway go by.
"…About?"
"Nothing."
I hated when guys did that. Was it really something so uninteresting, or so embarrassing, or whatever it was, that they couldn't at least give out a hint? I mean… maybe it was… but the alternative just left me frustratingly curious.
"So what do you like to do for fun?" I asked, trying to salvage the mood.
He gave a nervous laugh. "Honestly? I have no idea. Between my day job and being Nightwing, I don't have a ton of time for hobbies. I mean… I do still practise the trapeze, if you want to count that." I smirked sadly. I didn't know whether or not to feel sorry for him. Did he mind not having hobbies, or was he just embarrassed about it? "But, so, you like to draw?"
"Yeah, yeah. And sing. But you already knew that," I blushed.
"…You really do have a beautiful voice," he said quietly.
The blushing got worse. "Thanks. I still can't believe you were standing there both times."
"What? What's all this belly aching and moaning for?" He asked, gesturing to my hidden face.
"It's just that I wasn't expecting for there to be an audience. It's a little different when you're alone. You tend to be more… honest."
"But that's why they're the best performances."
I looked at him, feeling a bunch of different ways all at once. He always knew just what to say.
"Is it like that with the trapeze?"
"Sometimes. But I think it's especially true with music."
"Yeah…"
We were getting close to the end of our walk now, and… there was one more thing I wanted to ask him before he had to leave. It's just that I wasn't sure if it was a question I wanted an answer to. But again, my curiosity demanded to be satisfied… so I asked.
"So…" I breathed in deeply. "I hope you don't mind my asking… but I was kind of wondering about something." He gave me an attentive, almost worried sort of look. "The last few days…" Maybe I didn't need to ask. Maybe I was better off not knowing. But it was too late now, I couldn't stop mid-question. "You were busy, and I understand that, but…" He was biting his lip now. "…you seemed… distant. A lot more distant than tonight." That was an understatement. "So I guess what I'm wondering is… I didn't do anything to annoy you… did I?" I was looking up at him, fiddling with the ends of my sleeves nervously, meanwhile his face was looking positively pink.
"N-no, no, nothing—nothing like that," he stammered, and he coughed a few times, seemingly trying to maintain his composure.
"But so then why… didn't you talk to me?" Or look at me, for that matter.
He let out a long breath through his lips, his mind clearly trying its hardest to think of an answer. "I…" Why didn't he just say it? Just say it! "U-umm…" He swallowed hard.
This was getting too painful. "You know what," I said gently, "Never mind. Forget I mentioned it. It doesn't really matter." If it made him this uncomfortable just thinking about it, then I didn't want to make him feel that way just for a silly answer. He seemed to be acting a bit sheepish now, but he also didn't say anything else.
We had finally, and sadly, reached the Batcave, and it was time to say our goodbyes.
"So I'll see you on Friday?" He asked, grabbing the top half of his tattered Nightwing suit.
"I'll be here," I said, holding my hands behind my back. I wanted to say something funny, but everything I thought of sounded really stupid, and more importantly, not genuine. I wanted to be genuine with him. The only problem was, in that moment, I was also struggling to find anything genuine to say.
"Okay. Goodnight."
"Get home safe," I called as he made for his motorcycle. Finally, I'd thought of something that I really wanted to add, but… it was definitely not on the table just yet. So I had to whisper it to myself after he had sped away, the Batcave entrance closing behind him. "…I love you."
