Chapter Text
Gotham City Plaza wasn’t the fanciest hotel, but at six Jason had thought it was a palace and that all of the guests were visiting royalty. He also thought that meant all royals were assholes, because the guests certainly were. At least the ones that had stood out.
He stared at the building from where Alex had dropped him off across the street. It wasn’t as big as he remembered, there were fewer turrets, and the arched front windows weren’t quite as bright, but yeah, if he really looked, he could still see a castle.
A valet and doorman huddled together under the glass overhang, making small talk while they waited for guests. They weren’t supposed to be seen “goofing off” so if anyone who looked even slightly guest-like approached, they were supposed to separate and stand as still as chess pieces awaiting their first move.
“Hey,” Jason called as he crossed the street. They both looked up and immediately straightened.
“Good evening,” one of them said. The doorman, Jason thought. They wore the same uniform, but he was closer to the door, hand already positioned to reach out. “Is your family staying here?”
Jason stumbled in surprise. He didn’t expect them to know who he was—it had been years since his mom had worked there and neither of them looked familiar—but he still, for some reason, expected them to recognize him as one of their own.
But no, of course they didn’t. He was wearing designer jeans and a button-up shirt. No kid he grew up with had ever worn a button-up shirt.
“No,” he said, pushing past the lump in his throat. “My mom used to work here. I was looking for some of her old coworkers?” He turned to the valet. “Is Rickie here?”
“Rickie,” the valet repeated slowly, eyes glazed over. “Oh, wait, Rick Adams, right?” Jason wasn’t sure he’d ever actually known Rickie’s last name, but he nodded. “He moved downtown. Over at the Renaissance, I think.”
“Oh,” Jason said. That was one of the fancier hotels. “Good for him.” It was probably a promotion. The people were richer, at least. Maybe that meant they tipped better. Maybe not. “What about Tanya, the bartender?”
“Oh, yeah, she’s still here.” He thumbed over his shoulder at the door, and Jason stepped forward. The doorman rushed to open the door before Jason could reach for it.
“Thanks,” he said awkwardly.
As the door started swinging shut behind him, he heard the valet mutter, “His mom used to work here? Think she married rich?”
The doorman’s hushed replied carried through the empty lobby. “Actually, I think that was the new Wayn—”
The door clicked shut and Jason stood rooted to his spot. He knew people were going to start recognizing him, but it felt so wrong here, in a place that used to be a second home to him. Once upon a time, the people who worked here were like his family, a community that helped raise him when his mom was struggling.
He shook it off and turned for the arched, glass doorway that led to the bar. They’d renovated since he was last here. There were new light fixtures, more modern than the chandeliers that had hung throughout the bar before. The tables had changed too, he was sure, but he couldn’t quite remember what they'd looked like before. He tried, imagining dark wood… something more traditional and old fashioned, but he couldn’t be sure if that was a real memory or just his mind trying to fill in the blanks.
“Jason!” a deep, feminine voice called. He felt a rush of relief at the familiarity of it as he turned to see Tanya standing behind the bar, waving him over. It had been five years since he’d last seen her, but this, at least, felt exactly the same. Tanya had to be getting close to fifty, but she didn’t look like she’d aged a day in the whole time he’d known her. She had the same black curls pulled up into a tight puff and the same men’s uniform with the tie because she hated the ascot. “What are you doing here?”
“Hey, Tanya,” he said with a weak smile. “I had a couple of questions if you have time?”
“Sure, have a seat,” she said, motioning to the stools. He was pretty sure those were new too. He didn’t remember the bright silver and blue. “Do you want something to drink?”
A man sipping a beer a few seats down gave them an alarmed look, so Jason asked, “What do you have on tap?”
She laughed. “I’ll make you something special.”
The man looked like he might actually get up and go report this to someone until she started mixing fruit juice and soda water.
“You’ll like this one.” She stuck a couple of pieces of pineapple and a cherry on a wooden pick and plopped it into a drink that faded from orange at the top to deep red at the bottom. “I call it Sunrise Anywhere But Gotham.”
“Good name,” Jason said, turning the drink to look at all the colors. “I went to Metropolis a while ago actually.”
“Really?” she asked. “How was it?”
“Strangely bright and shiny.” He sipped the drink. It was really good. He wondered if he could convince Alfred to… He stopped the thought there, focusing on Tanya and the drink instead. “You should make a drink called Places that Aren’t Gotham Actually Have a Sun.”
“I might do that.” She smiled at him and pulled out a rag to wipe down the counter. “So what’s up, baby doll?”
“So, uh…” He lowered his voice. “I assume that you’ve, uh, heard.”
“About your dad?” she asked just as quietly. “Yeah.”
“You were here when I was born, right?”
Tanya busied herself cleaning glasses. Jason could tell it was fake busywork because there weren’t enough customers for there to be that many dirty glasses, and she was pulling them from the same pile she’d gotten his drink glass from. “Yeah,” she said vaguely.
“She… my mom…” He paused, and tried again. “She said that she’s not really my mom.”
The guy a few stools down suddenly seemed very interested in their conversation so Jason turned his face away. The last thing he needed was some rando going to the tabloids with this.
Tanya put down the glass she’d been cleaning, washcloth still wrung in her hands. A tiny part of him that still refused to believe it hoped she’d shoot him down. That she’d say she clearly remembered his mom being pregnant with him. That the whole thing was ridiculous. But he knew before she even opened her mouth that it wasn’t true.
“Yeah,” she said instead, voice so quiet he had to lean in to hear it. “We knew that. She just showed up with a baby one day. I still don’t understand the bit about your dad because how did that happen? But she had you. She said that a friend of hers was in trouble and had dropped you off with her, just for a while. Then it was a year, two years, and we kept saying, you know your friend’s not coming back, right?” Tanya laughed, a fond, distant look crossing her face as she remembered. “At some point she started just introducing you as her son, stopped mentioning the friend.”
Jason tried in vain to remember any time his mom had talked about a friend that dropped him off, but he would have been way too young even if she had said it in front of him.
“She said…” He leaned as far over the bar as he could and spoke barely above a whisper. “She said that I was the kid of a guest. That I was left in a room she was cleaning.”
“Jesus,” Tanya breathed, leaning her full weight against the counter in front of her. “She never told us that.”
“She said my, uh. My mother was a doctor?” He didn’t know what he was looking for. It had been thirteen years. “Do you remember..?”
Tanya was shaking her head before his question even started. “I have no idea. I’m sorry. You know the guests all blur together.” She stared down at the bar, lips pursed. “I’m not sure anyone would remember. Even reception…”
“Yeah, no, yeah,” he said. “No, I get it. I wouldn’t expect you to remember.”
He pulled back. What was he even doing here? Why had he thought this would help anything? He sipped his drink, trying to imagine his mom, eighteen years old with a baby that wasn’t hers. “She… she loved me though, right?”
“God, yes,” Tanya said immediately, voice raising. “She loved you so much. You were her world from the moment you came into it.”
“But she really…” He slowly untwisted the knot at the top of his wooden pick. “She didn’t seem like she was lying when said it was just for a while?”
Tanya thought longer this time, reflexively cleaning the already very clean glass. “No. I can’t remember ever doubting it, at least. She really seemed to think it would be just a few weeks, at first. Then a few months. And then it stopped coming up.”
He wondered what that meant. Had she tried to contact Bruce? Had she planned to take him to the police? Did she think his mother would come back for him?
A couple of guests in short skirts stumbled into the bar, looking like they’d already had a couple of drinks, and leaned heavily against the far end of the counter giggling. “Be right back,” Tanya said, giving him a comforting pat before moving down the bar to get their orders.
Jason nodded, more to himself, than to her. She was already gone. He sipped the last dregs of his drink, trying to figure out what to do next. He could go the Renaissance, try to talk to Rickie, or back to the Alley. Maybe someone knew something. Knew about...
What was he even looking for?
He looked down the counter at where Tanya was mixing a drink. He didn’t know what to say when she came back. Didn’t know what to answer if she asked any questions.
He took a twenty out of his wallet, fingers pausing on the small wad of bills. It wasn’t enough to run forever, but he had more than enough experience getting by on less than this. If he really wanted to, he could make this last weeks. If he really wanted to, he could steal and scam and hide and never go back.
He put the twenty on the counter. Tanya would never ask him to pay, but she needed the money more than him. Everyone needed the money more than him.
He slipped quietly out, gone long before she could notice he was leaving.
He found himself on the roof of a building not far from the hotel, staring out at the Upper East Side. He wasn’t high enough to see Crime Alley, was barely even high enough to see the hotel he’d come from, but there was something calming about being able to look down at the cars and pedestrians from a distance. He was starting to understand why Tim liked it so much.
When he was little, his mom would make popsicles in the freezer, and they’d eat them in front of the open window of their apartment on hot days. One of his earliest memories was his popsicle breaking and falling on the ground, and his mom giving him hers. He could still feel the rush of love that had filled his tiny body. It had seemed like such a sacrifice at the time, such proof of her love for him.
His mom had been everything to him for so long. He’d never cared who his father was. Didn’t care that she lied—he choked out a laugh—lied about Bruce Wayne being his father. She was offering him a fairy tale he didn’t need, because he had her.
But the fairy tale was the only thing that was true.
Had she tried to return him? Or had she just seen a baby and thought, mine now.
She loved him, he reminded himself. She really, really loved him.
But was that really enough?
He shivered in his light jacket. It had actually been pretty warm earlier that day, one of the last good days before winter, but now it was dipping towards freezing. The sun had set at least an hour earlier. It was hard to tell how long it had been. Time both seemed frozen and speeding far too quickly towards a future he didn’t understand.
What was he doing? Was he just going to freeze to death on a roof out of spite? But when he thought about going back to the manor, or to his mom, or even to Mateo, his mind ground to a halt.
A doctor. He was the son of a billionaire and a doctor. He pressed his face against his knees. Nothing he had ever believed about his life, about himself, was true.
I could have had her arrested for kidnapping.
He took a deep, shuddering breath that didn’t quite reach his lungs. He felt like he was suffocating, even as he continued to breathe.
Metal clanged against stone and he looked up sharply as the fire escape he’d climbed up jostled. He scrabbled his hand against the roof, looking for a loose brick or metal bar that he could use as a weapon. This wasn’t as dangerous an area as his old neighborhood, but there weren’t many reasons someone would be climbing a fire escape. Getting to a kid they’d seen loitering alone at the top was high on that list.
A smaller-than-expected head popped over the side of the roof, and his hand slowly relaxed. It was another kid. It was so unexpected, it took him several confused seconds to recognize—
“Tim?” he asked.
“Jason!” Tim yelled, sounding relieved as he scrambled onto the roof. “The men at the hotel Alex dropped you off at said that you went this way and I saw the fire escape ladder hanging down so I thought maybe, but I wasn’t sure—”
“Tim,” Jason repeated, synapses still struggling to fire. “Are you wearing my clothes again?”
“Oh,” Tim said, looking down at the oversized jeans and hoodie. “Yes. I actually thought you’d go back to Crime Alley so I dressed for that. Left the camera at home this time, too.”
Jason stared at him long enough for Tim to start shifting uncomfortably in place, then laughed. It was ragged, but genuine. “You’re a real piece of work, you know that?”
Tim smiled weakly and walked over, hesitantly lowering himself onto the ledge next to Jason.
“Does Bruce know you’re here?” Jason asked, scooting over to give him more room.
“No, but he knows you’re gone and he’s freaking out.”
Jason snorted derisively. He couldn’t imagine Bruce ‘freaking out.’
“He is,” Tim insisted. “I know what freaking out looks like on him.” Tim fiddled with the hoodie’s drawstrings, looping them around his fingers. “I, uh… I heard.”
“I know,” Jason said, the image of Tim wide-eyed outside the study flashing back into his mind.
“Are you—nevermind that’s a stupid question.” He ducked his head.
“Okay?” Jason finished. “No, I’m not.”
“I know,” Tim said softly. “What…” He swallowed. “What are you doing? Are you actually running away, or..?”
Jason laughed brokenly and covered his face. “I don’t know. I didn’t really make a plan before I left. I think I had some half-baked idea that maybe I’d go after her.” He glanced at Tim to see his reaction, but Tim was just sitting and listening patiently. “I thought I’d ask around and people would just magically know who she was, and it would be an easy trip to find her, and I’d… I don’t know.” He scrubbed at his eyes. “Why would I even want to find her? She clearly didn’t want me. What kind of person leaves a baby in a hotel room?”
Tim, who had been giving him his best, most practiced sympathetic look up until then, startled. “I don’t know. Is that what happened?”
“That’s what my mo…” He swallowed. “What... what Catherine said.” Her name didn’t sound right on his lips. She wasn’t Catherine. Had never been Catherine to him. “That I was left in a hotel room with a note addressed to Bruce. That’s how she knew.”
The edges of Tim’s mouth pushed down into a deep frown too big for his face. “That’s awful. You could have died.”
“I might have died!” Jason exclaimed, throwing his arms into the air. “She doesn’t know. She has to… she has to know I never made it to Bruce, right? Didn’t she ever check on me? Make sure I was okay? Or did she just leave me and then forget she ever had a child?” Jason covered his face with both hands. “I don’t want to see her,” he said, his voice muffled. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I don’t want anything to do with her.”
Conversations drifted up from the street below. Not words, but voices—a man’s, a woman’s, a child’s laughter.
Tim shifted next to him, their clothes brushing together. It struck Jason as surreal, suddenly. Tim in the grungy, torn clothes bought thrice-used from a thrift store, Jason in the latest styles of the wealthy elite. If things had gone just slightly differently, this could have been their lives. Jason could have been the one who grew up rich, and Tim could have been the one abandoned in a hotel room.
It was warmer up here with the two of them, even as the moon continued to rise and the temperature fell. He leaned against Tim, feeling his body heat and watching the ever-present clouds drift across the moon.
“Bruce…” He swallowed, tried again. “Bruce said he could have had her arrested for kidnapping.”
Tim pulled the drawstrings tighter around his fingers, until the tips started turning purple. “He didn’t, though. He won’t. He knows how much you love her.”
Jason heard what he wasn’t saying. It was obvious in the tightness of his hands and the way his legs kept kicking off the wall. “You don’t think he’s wrong, though,” Jason said.
Tim peeked over at him, guilt obvious on his face. “Do you?”
Jason wanted to shout yes. He wanted to say Bruce had no right to take him away from his mom. No right to him at all after thirteen years of not being there.
But he wasn’t there because he didn’t know about Jason. He didn’t know because his mom, because Catherine, had purposely hid him. Because she knew… she knew she had no claim to him, that he’d be taken away if she said anything. Did thirteen years of raising him, loving him, doing her best really make up for that?
He dropped his face into his hands. “I wish she didn’t tell me. I wish I never knew.”
Tim shifted closer and awkwardly put an arm around where Jason sat, without actually touching him. Jason laughed wetly. He wasn’t sure if Tim was actually, for once, trying to respect his boundaries or if he had just never learned to comfort people correctly. The latter seemed more likely. Jason turned and hugged him tightly, eyes squeezed shut to keep the tears from leaking out. Tim squeaked, then carefully hugged him back.
“I think…” Tim said after a while, his voice muffled against Jason’s chest. “I think it’s okay to have mixed feelings about your mom. I thought for a long time that I had to love my mom because she was my mom. That that was just how things were. But I don’t. And I think it’s okay for you to love your mom even though she did bad things.”
“My mom abandoned me in a hotel room,” Jason said flatly.
“Not her.” Tim shook his head. “Your real mom. Your mom that matters. Blood doesn’t make family.”
“It’s what made us family,” Jason said, pulling back enough to look at him.
“No,” Tim said, wiping at his wet eyes. “It’s not.”
Jason smiled despite himself. “You’re a corny little asshole, you know that?”
“Hey!” Tim objected. “I’m trying to be sincere!”
“I know.” Jason rested his forehead against Tim’s. “Thanks. You’re the best little brother I’ve ever had.”
Tim smiled wetly, bottom lip quivering.
“Hey, uh…”
Their heads jerked sharply towards the voice, which hadn’t come from the roof they were on. Across the street, on the edge of a roof a couple of floors higher than them, a guy wearing bright red and yellow waved. He stood out so sharply against the grayscale Gotham skyline that Jason was shocked they hadn’t seen him coming like a meteor about to smash into the city.
“Just wanted to let you know I’m here before I jumped over so I didn’t scare you off the roof,” he said, voice a great deal friendlier than any Gothamite’s voice had a right to be.
“Isn’t that a West Coast vigilante?” Jason muttered quietly to Tim.
“Speedy,” Tim supplied. That was right. The one that stole a name clearly meant for a speedster. He was either dumb or really inconsiderate.
Tim pulled on Jason’s arm and they slowly climbed to their feet and backed up to the center of the roof, Jason keeping a wary eye on the new vigilante the whole way. He wasn’t sure what the brightly colored teen was doing in Gotham, and he didn’t particularly want to find out. Speedy waited until they were settled before jumping over, handling the two-floor drop as easily as if he were jumping down the last few steps in a flight of stairs.
“What are you doing here?” Jason asked, puffing himself up like an alley cat preparing for a fight even though he was sure this guy could wipe the floor with him. He still had tears gathered in his eyes, but he refused to wipe them away. “Aren’t you supposed to be running top speed across America?”
“Funny,” Speedy said. “You’re the first person to make that joke.”
Jason shrugged, unbothered. Sounded to him like Speedy should have thought a few more minutes before choosing his name.
Speedy’s voice gentled. “I’m looking for you. Your family’s worried.” His eyes flicked over to Tim and back. It was brief, but enough to show that he hadn’t been expecting Tim there. Honestly. It was a good thing Jason had come along because somebody needed to notice all the shit Tim got up to.
“We’re fine,” Jason said, including Tim even though Speedy hadn’t. Tim had enough abandonment issues without thinking nobody had noticed he was gone. “It’s only been a few hours, Christ. Did they call the whole Justice League in?”
“Not the whole Justice League,” Speedy said easily.
“Guess that’s what money gets you,” Jason muttered. “Maybe you could go investigate an actual crime? You know, in your actual state? You’re not even dressed appropriately.” He motioned sharply at Speedy’s short sleeves, which could not be protecting him from the icy wind wailing across the rooftop. He had long yellow gloves, but they didn’t even reach his elbows.
Jason’s focus narrowed to the bare skin of Speedy’s inner elbows. A series of dots and dark lines rose out the top of his glove and trailed up his arm. Oh, of course. Why would he even be surprised that someone with the name Speedy did drugs. Was drug use part of his theme?
The marks were still pretty light, though, so he probably hadn’t had the habit as long as the name. They were barely noticeable in the dim light, less like his mom’s and more like…
Archery. I should wear an arm guard, but half the time I forget.
He froze, his eyes flicking from the familiar marks to the bow and arrow on Speedy’s back to his very recognizable red hair.
“Roy?”
He felt Tim startle beside him. Speedy’s eyes widened, then quickly reset to calm nonchalance, but it was too late. Jason had seen his surprise.
“Who?” he asked, with a casual smile. “I think you’re confused.”
“Roy,” Jason repeated. “Roy Harper. I recognize your track marks.”
“You…” Roy looked down at the the marks, then covered them self-consciously with his other hand. “I have got to start wearing long sleeves,” he muttered.
A rush of pride shoved aside any remaining awkwardness Jason felt. Everyone from street thugs to national reporters were trying to figure out who these people were, and he’d tagged one within five minutes of meeting him. “Does Dick know about this?” Obviously, his brain answered before Roy could. That’s why a vigilante from a different state was here. Dick had called his friend for help.
“Please do not tell your brother about this,” Roy said, dragging a hand down his face. Which, Jason noted, wasn’t actually an answer. “Actually, don’t tell anyone. You know that, right?”
“I’m not stupid,” Jason said. He almost started laughing when he thought about what all the stuck up assholes at the gala would say if they found out. His mind flashed back to Roy saying, 'you can wear whatever you want if you don’t care about other people’s approval.' He eyed the ugly yellow cap and ridiculous gloves. It had never been more true.
He also wasn’t stupid enough to think it was the stuck up assholes that Roy was worried about. He’d heard the whispered offers in the Alley for anything on vigilantes. Knew what they’d do with that info if they got it.
Tim stood beside him, head swiveling back and forth like an off-kilter bobble head, with an utterly befuddled expression.
“He’s Roy Harper,” Jason said. “Dick’s friend.”
“I got that much,” Tim said slowly, like it was the only part he understood.
“Will you please stop saying my name like that?” Roy hissed, searching the shadows of the roof for anyone who might be just hanging out up there, listening.
Which, it was Gotham, so fair.
“Okay, Speedy,” Jason said. His eyes fell back to the track marks still peeking out around Roy’s fingers. “I thought you were in rehab.”
“I was,” he said, frowning. At Jason knowing about the rehab or about the rehab itself, Jason wasn’t sure. “I’m out.”
That wasn’t very long, Jason thought. But, well… It had been two months, and Roy wasn’t like his mom. He hadn’t been addicted for years. He was just a kid. Maybe that was enough.
Just a kid. He looked at the costume Roy was wearing, and tried to remember how many years he’d been hearing about Speedy.
“Are you doing okay?” he asked. Roy looked like he wanted to give a smart aleck response, but faltered at Jason’s tone.
“Yeah,” he said, softly. “Better. Definitely better.” He took out his phone, and Jason felt the moment passing. He’d contact whoever he needed to—the police, or Dick—and they’d all move on. But instead Roy fidgeted with the phone, staring down at its still dark screen. “It was easier, in rehab,” he said. “But you get out, and all the reasons you used are still there.”
Jason thought of all the times his mom had tried to quit, the times she’d come so close, when he was sure she was actually going to make it, and then there was a bill they couldn’t pay, or an abusive boyfriend, or just her dealer showing up and offering her a free hit, and it all spiraled out of control again.
“You ever think about making a change?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Roy said, voice distant. “All the time.” He seemed to shake himself, and then Roy was gone and it was just Speedy. Speedy wasn’t a person with problems. Speedy had a job to do. He turned on his phone and started typing.
Jason carefully inched to the side, trying to make the movement look natural. Tim gave him a look, like he wasn’t a little hypocrite that spent half his life spying on people. Just another couple millimeters, and Jason was able to see the little bubbles of text on Speedy’s screen.
Blue bubble: ive got jason
Blue bubble: also tim did u know he snuck out too
Gray bubble: aodfnadawsdkfn
Blue bubble: im bringing them home now
Jason turned to Tim and tried to look like he had been just casually hanging out on the roof as Speedy lowered his phone. He guessed that answered the question of whether or not Dick knew.
Speedy stuck the phone in a pouch on his belt and crossed his arms. “Are you going to give me any trouble about taking you home?”
Tim looked at Jason, waiting for his lead. The rush of adrenaline that had come with Speedy’s arrival slowly petered out as he remembered why he was out here. He didn’t want to go home. Not really. He didn’t want to face Bruce. He didn’t want to think about what all of this meant, for him and for his future and for his relationship with his mom. He didn’t want to go to his too large, too empty room and realize what he’d lost.
But he had to face it all eventually, and he wasn’t going to find any more answers out here.
“No,” Jason said, offering his hand to Tim, who took it with a smile. “I’m ready.”
“Good,” Speedy said, ushering them towards the fire escape. “Let’s get you back before you give your old man a heart attack. He’s elderly. He can’t handle the stress.”
Jason snorted and Tim looked between them like they were singing an Italian opera and he couldn’t quite follow the plot.
“We know him,” Jason tried again.
“No, I get it,” Tim said.
Jason shrugged. He’d catch up eventually.
They stood at the front steps of the manor as Speedy pulled away in his way-too-flashy red Ferrari. It was like he wasn’t even trying to hide that he was a billionaire. How had no one made that connection?
He guessed people were used to that kind of thing from vigilantes. It wasn’t like Batman had any shortage of flashy vehicles.
“I can’t believe you did that,” Tim said quietly as they loitered at the bottom of the stairs, not quite approaching the entrance yet.
“Did what?” he asked. Run away? He thought they were past that.
“You figured out his identity—” Oh, yeah, that. He opened his mouth to explain his brilliant deductive reasoning, but Tim wasn’t done. “—and then just said it. Like it was nothing.”
His mouth snapped shut, and he actually thought about what Tim was saying. Tim, the kid who skulked about the house and listened, who had just hours earlier spied on his confrontation with Bruce. “You already knew,” he realized. Because of course he did. Tim collected secrets like they were stamps. If it was said even just once in the manor, he’d know.
Tim’s lips twisted towards a smile, but didn’t stick the landing. “For years.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
Tim stared down the dark driveway, after where Speedy—where Roy—had disappeared, then up at the manor. When he spoke, his voice was faint. “I guess I thought if people wanted me to know, they’d tell me themselves.” He shook his head. “We should go in before they send a second search party after us.”
They trudged slowly up the stairs. The closer they got, the more Jason wanted to turn around and run again. What were the odds they could sneak straight up to their rooms and pretend this never happened? Just avoid a conversation about it at all. Go on with their lives and act like nothing had changed.
The door opened just as they reached the top of the stairs, and Alfred stood silhouetted by the light inside. That was not good timing. That was Alfred watching them and waiting for just the right moment to act. They’d never had a chance.
“Young sirs,” he said in a tone of voice that was more of a reprobation than any punishment Willis had ever given him.
“Sorry, Alfred,” he said.
“Do you know how worried everyone has been?”
“It was only a few hours…” Jason tried, but just the twitch of Alfred’s mustache made him swallow the rest of his excuse. “Sorry,” he said again.
The foyer was empty when they entered. Maybe they had a chance of sneaking up after all. They could bribe Alfred or try to slip away while he got Bruce… Then loud, quick footsteps sounded down the hallway from the direction of Bruce’s study.
“What were you thinking?” Bruce demanded as they burst in and Dick tried to engulf Jason in a giant hug.
“No, no, no,” Jason said, pushing against Dick’s chest until he relented. Dick turned to hug Tim instead, but stopped when he got a good look at him.
“What are you wearing?” Dick asked, hands on Tim’s shoulder as he fully took in his appearance.
Tim looked down at himself with clear alarm. They’d forgotten all about his clothes. Jason had a quick, illogical thought that they should have switched outfits, but that made no sense. Then Tim would have been wearing clothes two sizes too big for him and that would have raised its own set of questions.
“I…” he said slowly, like he thought he might come up with a good explanation if he just took long enough to say it. “...just…” He looked to Jason for help.
“Stole my clothes like a little weirdo,” Jason supplied.
“Yes, that,” Tim said, sounding relieved.
“Why?” Bruce asked.
Tim’s eyes got wide again. He hadn’t been prepared for follow-up questions.
“I just…” he started again, slowly and deliberately. “...thought that I should be prepared… in case... I went to Crime Alley.” He looked as surprised as anyone at where that sentence ended.
“In case you what?” Bruce asked, voice more furious than Jason had ever heard it. He instinctively stepped in front of Tim.
Tim shrunk backwards, but rallied himself after a few seconds, standing straight and defensive. “I went to find Jason. And I found him. So you’re welcome.”
“Too far,” Jason whispered. Tim seemed to realize that too and shrunk back again.
“You could have died,” Bruce said, his voice breaking. The anger drained out, leaving it hollow. Jason remembered that his parents had died in Crime Alley. “What would we have done if something happened to you?”
“I thought I had a better idea of where to find Jason than anyone else would,” Tim insisted weakly. “And I did!” He motioned to Jason as if to say, see?
“Then you should have told us,” Bruce said. “You shouldn’t put yourself at risk. Leave that to the police, or to Batman and Robin.”
Tim’s face crumpled. “That’s not fair,” he said. “You…” He looked between Dick beside him and Bruce a few feet back. “I…” They waited, but Tim faltered, finally looking down at his feet. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“Please just promise me you’ll come to us, or to Alfred, instead of doing anything dangerous,” Bruce said.
Tim raised his eyes to Bruce, something burning in them that Jason didn’t recognize, but it sure as hell wasn’t regret. “I promise,” he said.
Jason didn’t even slightly believe him.
Bruce scrubbed a hand down his face. “We are going to discuss this,” he said to Tim. “But first, Jason.” Jason stiffened as the attention turned to him, but if there was one benefit of Tim’s whole fiasco, it was that all of Bruce’s aggression was gone, replaced with a deep exhaustion. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
Jason just nodded and followed as Bruce led the way out of the entrance hall. He didn’t know if he was about to be punished, or… He didn’t know what to expect at all, really. The anxious bubbling in his stomach grew the closer to Bruce’s study they got.
“Have a seat,” Bruce said, motioning to the couch as they entered.
Jason trembled as he sat. He took deep breaths, trying to control his traitorous body, but the day had been too long, and just too much. He couldn’t stop remembering when Willis had lead him into secluded areas. His calm, almost content demeanor right up until they were alone.
But that wasn’t Bruce. That wasn’t Bruce.
Instead of yelling, or crowding into Jason’s space, Bruce circled to the other side of his desk, unlocked a drawer, and pulled out a small, yellowed envelope. He rubbed a thumb along the edge, looking at it instead of Jason as he spoke.
“I should have told you the truth. I’m sorry that I didn’t.”
Jason’s shoulders jerked back in surprise. Not yelling was one thing, but he’d never expected an apology. He found himself shaking his head. “No, you were right. I wouldn’t have believed you. And I…” He looked down at his hands in his lap. “I didn’t want to know.”
Footsteps approached from the desk, and a weight settled on the couch beside him. The envelope entered his range of vision. Faded blue ink read, “Bruce Wayne” in an unfamiliar handwriting, much too narrow to be his mom’s. Even before the drugs made her hand unsteady, her letters had large loops that filled any empty space. The envelope’s edges were crumpled, like it had been handled often—by Bruce, or by his mom, he didn’t know. His hands shook so hard as he took it that the flap gave him a paper cut.
“Catherine gave this to me when she brought you to the Tower. It’s from your…” Bruce faltered, as uncertain what to call her as Jason. “...your biological mother,” he finished, finally.
Jason stared down at the envelope in his hands. The proof that he wasn’t who he’d always thought he was.
It took him two tries to pull out the single sheet of paper. “Dear Bruce,” was scrawled across the top in a neat, practiced script. Nothing to him. It didn’t say his name at all, he realized, scanning down the full letter. Catherine must have given him his name.
The whole thing was less than a page long. It didn’t even fill half of one side of the piece of paper. He flipped it over just to make sure, but the back was blank. No explanations, no apologies, nothing to the child she was leaving behind. Just a perfunctory this is your child from the fling we had in blah blah, he didn’t care. He doubted even Bruce cared. He remembered the way Bruce had run out of his office and looked at him when the results of the paternity test had come in. He didn’t think what mattered to Bruce was when they had the fling. Heat built behind his eyes as he put the paper back in its envelope.
“I can tell you about her, if you want,” Bruce said gently.
Her. Sheila Haywood, according the signature. A name that meant nothing to him. Because of her. Because of the choices she made.
Jason shook his head. He didn’t trust himself to speak. He stared at the envelope, wondering if there had ever been anything more to it. If she’d ever even thought about leaving something for him. If she’d thought about him even once since walking out the door.
“No,” he said, voice strangled. “She’s not my mom. She’s not anything. I don’t want to know.”
“If you ever change your mind...” Bruce said.
Jason held the envelope out to him. “I know where to find you.”
Bruce took the envelope and smoothed it out before sitting it on the coffee table. Then he just continued to sit there stiffly, looking at Jason. Jason shifted uncomfortably. Was he supposed to say something else? Was he supposed to leave? What was Bruce waiting for? Jason couldn’t handle anything else tonight.
“So, uh…” Jason said, starting to inch towards the door. All he really wanted to do was get in bed and shut off his brain for as long as he possibly could.
Bruce cleared his throat. “I’d like to hug you,” he said woodenly.
Jason stared at him, the words failing to register for a full thirty seconds. “Jesus,” he said finally, the huff that escaped less a laugh than a heavy exhalation. “You’re even more awkward than Tim. And that’s saying something.”
“I’m aware,” Bruce said, a smile playing at the edges of his lips.
Jason held up two fingers. “Two seconds,” he said. “That’s it.”
Bruce leaned forward and wrapped his arms slowly around Jason. Jason’s heart thumped in his throat, the instinctual panic he couldn’t suppress at a huge, muscular man in his space. It was different from hugging Tim, or even Dick, who was bigger and definitely set off some of his alarms, but somehow managed to be soft enough to feel safe. Bruce could really hurt him.
But he wouldn’t. Jason… Jason believed that. He slowly hugged Bruce back, leaning into the embrace.
He swore Bruce counted off exactly two seconds before pulling away. Jason wiped his eyes. “Okay, I’m going to bed now. For real.”
Bruce nodded. “Get some sleep. I...” He reached towards Jason’s shoulder, but didn’t touch. The hug was over, and he was respecting Jason’s space. “I know I’m bad at—” His fingers flexed. “—expressing how I feel. But you’re my son, Jason. I love you.”
Jason didn’t know what to do with that so he just said, “Thank you,” like an utter moron. He took Bruce’s still outstretched hand and squeezed it, also like a moron. Jesus, he needed to get out of there.
He shuffled awkwardly to the door, but paused in the doorway. This might not be the right time, but it needed to be said, and if he put it off now, he might put it off forever.
“You need to pay attention to Tim,” he said, hand gripping the door frame as he looked back over his shoulder at Bruce.
Bruce’s eyebrows furrowed. “I pay attention to Tim,” he said.
“No, you don’t. Not enough.” His eyes swept the hallway, making sure a few seconds too late that Tim wasn’t there spying on them. “I get it,” he said, turning back to Bruce when he was sure they were alone. “Dick and I demand attention. But Tim deserves attention, whether he demands it or not.”
Bruce’s expression closed off, his eyes distant. Maybe he was thinking about his interactions with Tim. Maybe not. Jason had done his part.
“Just think about it,” he said. “Goodnight.”
He swung by Tim’s room, even though it was in the opposite direction of his. The light was off and the door mostly closed. He knocked lightly and pushed it open. Tim was lying curled up on his side with his arms wrapped around a pillow.
“You okay?” Jason asked.
Tim’s arms tightened around the pillow. “You know I’m two years older than Robin was when he became Robin?”
Jason remembered Bruce telling Tim to let Batman and Robin handle things instead of sneaking out to do it himself. Good advice, as far as Jason was concerned. “You’re not Robin,” he said.
Tim rolled over so his back was to Jason. “No,” he said, voice muffled. “I guess I’m not.”
Jason hesitated. He wouldn’t have reacted nearly as well to Batman or Robin finding him on that roof instead of Tim. He probably would have run, or hidden, or fought. He would have been a lot angrier about being brought home.
“You’re better,” he said. Tim’s head popped up and snapped to him in surprise. Jason offered him a small smile. “Thanks for coming for me.”
Tim gave him a watery smile in return. “Anytime.”
“Christ, hopefully it never happens again.”
Tim laughed and flopped back down. Jason really didn’t think he should be encouraging the sneaking out, but… just this once was probably fine.
“Goodnight, Tim,” he said as he closed the door.
He walked slowly back to his room. He’d left the backpack downstairs, but it was sitting beside his bed when he arrived, already unpacked, like nothing had happened.
He sat on his bed and looked around the room, trying to imagine having lived his whole life here. It wouldn’t even have been here, in this room. It would have been the room in the family hall that he’d turned down, the one much too big and opulent. But he wouldn’t have thought that. It would have just been home. He would have never known what it was like to be hungry or scared that he wouldn’t have a place to live. He wouldn’t have needed to steal or con people to survive. He wouldn’t have had to deal with assholes like Willis.
And somehow that all felt like a loss. He thought about the charity meeting, about being able to tell them what it was actually like. He’d be able to do good things because he didn’t grow up rich.
And maybe that was all just rationalization, but he still couldn’t help thinking that things were better this way. That he was better this way.
But when he turned off the light and lay with his eyes closed, trying to sleep, all he could think about was the mother he’d never had and the life he should have lived.