A wondrous mirror
by Te
May 20, 2008

Disclaimers: No one and nothing here is mine.

Spoilers/Timeline: References to older storylines. Veers AU after The Killing Joke.

Summary: Tim moves, Jason loves, Bruce fails, and excellent cocoa is consumed.

Ratings Note/Warnings: Sexual content which doesn't really have anything at all to do with the content some readers may find to be disturbing. Additionally, this is probably one of the most sugary things I've written in my life. If tooth decay is a worry for you, you just might want to give this a pass.

Author's Note: AU-ish sequel to "All the things of the world." I played around with the timeline, a little. This one still won't make much sense without the other.

Acknowledgments: Much love to Pixie, Mildred, and Jack, all of whom helped to make this much better than it would've been.

*

The kid who steps out of the back of the Rolls --

The kid who's thanking Alfred and being gently pushed toward the door, toward Jason --

The thing is -- the kid looks, of course, exactly like the pictures in Bruce's file. Tim Drake, and the fact that the file has been there for nearly as long as there's been a new Batgirl --

It would've been cheating to look before. He wanted BG to *tell* him her name, to maybe whisper it against his mouth in the seconds before a kiss, a grope -- something.

But that was before Tim Drake's parents died, before *this* --

Batgirl is moving in.

Batgirl is --

Tim Drake is moving toward Jason, head down and strong-looking hand (small, though -- the gauntlets make them look bigger) wrapped around the handle of one medium-sized suitcase. And --

"You gotta have more stuff than *that*," Jason blurts, and kind of has to hate himself for it, because Tim freezes up right there, freezes without *looking* up, and -- hell.

Jason jogs down the steps and reaches for the bag --

Tim pulls it back, twisting just *so* -- oh. "BG..."

*That* makes Tim look up, and it's hard not to wince. There are deep, dark hollows under his -- her. Her eyes are terrible, and the simple, severe buzz cut is making them look even worse. But they *are* blue, a lighter and greyer blue than Batgirl's, and -- she's just looking at him. Waiting.

"Hey," Jason says, and strokes Tim's forearm where the spikes aren't, right now. He's never gotten to touch her there, or anywhere *skin* other than her face. It's impossible to tell if the hair feels strange or not, if it's what he'd expected...

Alfred is pulling around to the garage. Tim is *watching*.

"I want to say something about how it's going to be all right, but I -- really do know that's stupid," and he strokes down to that small hand and taps. "Let me?"

Tim colors for that, or maybe for... he still doesn't have a real handle on what makes BG blush, and he has no idea if they're the same things which make *Tim* do it.

"C'mon, it'll make me feel like I'm doing something useful."

Tim looks down again, mouth twisting dangerously *hard* for a moment, just --

Would the Drakes still be alive if Bruce had brought Jason *with* him to Haiti? If Bruce had found out sooner? Jason shakes it off as best he can. "Please, BG --"

"You. You don't have to call me that," Tim says, and her voice is flat and a little... not dead, not that, but -- missing something.

It makes Jason want to chase her somewhere, want to make her move, feel something other than the black fucking pit that has to be eating her alive, right now -- "Would you... you never told me your name," Jason tries, smiling a little.

"You know it," she says, and shakes her head. "I can't. I -- can't," and when she looks up, there's a plea in her eyes, and Jason doesn't want to chase her anywhere he can't *catch*.

Jason squeezes her wrist. "Say my name. Please?"

"Jason," and it's more of a sob than anything else, and Tim looks unsteady, *hurt* --

Jason pulls her into a hug, and a part of him is only cataloguing the feel, the lean hardness of the body against his own, the lack of armor, the warmth -- the rest of him is leaning in, just a little. "Tim..."

Tim's breath hitches in just the wrong way, but this -- this is something Jason wants, too.

"I'll call you whatever you want, whenever you want it."

He hears the suitcase hit the steps and fall over, and he waits, *wants* --

And Tim wraps her arms around him and holds on tight, strong like Batgirl always has to be. When she starts crying, it's quiet and rough, like maybe it's physically painful in addition to everything else. Maybe it has to be.

Jason strokes her back and listens to the wind in the trees.

*

He's not going to stalk her or anything like that. It's enough to know that she probably won't be diving out the windows of her bedroom to get away, that she has nowhere to --

Nowhere else to go, maybe, and *that* makes him feel more than a little sick to his stomach, makes him remember those last few days with his mother, and the days after that, after he'd slipped away from the overworked social workers and everyone else and gone right back to the streets.

No one, as far as he can tell, had come looking for him.

The streets weren't a *home* or anything like that, but he knew them well enough, how to hustle and how to *hustle*, because his mother hadn't been able to do anything once the sickness got her bad, and his father had been gone for a while, and because -- because.

The *point* is, Jason knows where Tim is, and her door is closed -- not even a little bit open, not even a crack -- and... yeah.

Jason rests his hand against the door -- three away from his own, five away from Bruce's -- and then gets himself moving again. If she needs anything --

What had he needed? Really... to be away from the people who didn't know enough to really care, to have someplace safe and warm, something to eat... to know how to get through to the other *side* of everything eating him up and spitting him out to bleed on the fucking pavement.

Jason frowns and catches himself trying to will Tim to open the door, to make some kind of sound loud enough to hear, *something* --

And then he heads down to train.

The thing is --

The thing is, Tim could've moved in with Babs. Maybe that's even what she wanted, to be with the first Batgirl, Oracle -- the woman who'd trained her and helped her become who she was. Jason's not sure why she hadn't, and he's not all that sure how Bruce had finagled things to get her here, beyond the whole 'Bruce Wayne never met an orphan he didn't want to help' thing that the press eats up with a fucking spoon.

Had he gone to her as Batman? Showed up at that townhouse to apologize for fucking up and offer, promise...

("You'll always have a home, Jason.")

He could ask.

Bruce is right there at the monitors, working on something that looks like one of the ever-changing, ever-edited maps of the city that take in things like gang activity and construction projects... had he watched Tim's arrival?

And Bruce tenses up a little, the way he always does when Jason watches him a little too long --

Jason clears his throat and tries to figure out if he *wants* to have this conversation with Bruce, if --

"Jay...?" He turns around in his chair and he looks about as open as he ever gets, like maybe he's a little messed up and worried, too --

Feeling guilty about the Drakes? That -- maybe it's fucked up, but that's easier. "What -- what happened with the Drakes, Bruce?"

Bruce frowns -- it seems to take all of him, including everything *behind* his face -- and nods. "I took down the targets, but neglected to --" Bruce sighs. "I never imagined the Obeah Man would poison the water he was torturing them with. They were both dehydrated, desperate..." Bruce sighs. "If I'd spent more time studying the man's modus operandi, perhaps... perhaps."

"Had he... had he kidnapped others?"

"For intimidation purposes, not for ransom. He was looking to... branch out. And I don't think you're asking me what you'd like to," Bruce says, and his voice is gentle for everything but himself.

Because Bruce is Bruce. Jason scrubs a hand through his hair and looks around the Cave a little, tries to imagine Tim here training, changing, *being* -- "Why not... why isn't Tim staying with Babs?"

Bruce -- blinks. It's not too fast or anything like that, but Jason can still tell that the question had thrown him a little bit. He stands and moves closer, hands on Jason's shoulders -- "Did you not want... is it all right that Tim's here, Jay? For you?"

His turn to blink, and kind of do it a *lot*, because -- "What -- no, that's not -- it's *fine* with me, Bruce, better than fine," Jason says, and reaches up to cover Bruce's hands with his own. "I just thought... maybe she'd prefer staying with Babs?"

Bruce's eyebrow goes up a little -- Jason would bet it was for that 'she,' because it's not like he and Bruce had ever actually *talked* about Batgirl, and who she really was, but --

Not now. Really not now. "I mean, if this is going to be..." Jason shakes his head. "I don't want it to be any harder for her than it has to be."

"No, of course not. I... I talked to Barbara about it, and she expressed some concerns about her home, and how it wasn't really set up for more than one person -- or for inspections from the Division of Youth and Family Services. She also felt -- and I believe she expressed this to Tim -- that spending time with *you* would be the best possible thing for -- for Tim."

Did that mean Tim talked to Babs about him? What did she say? What did Babs *think* about their relationship, other than liking it well enough to trust it for *this*?

Jason nods and moves away from Bruce, trying to put it all together in his head, trying to focus on more than the weird *pull* in his chest that wants him to know *exactly* where he'd left Tim, where she is right now, maybe needing -- something.

"I just -- I guess. We both know how much she's hurting, right now," Jason says, giving up and looking back toward the stairs.

Bruce cups Jason's shoulders again and squeezes before letting go. "I don't think you should worry about not being exactly what Tim needs, Jason. The fact that you're here for her, that you are yourself --"

"I'm just a kid, Bruce --"

"You have never been 'just a kid,' Jason," and Bruce's tone is low and almost lecturing.

Jason waves him off. "You'll help me? I know Alfred will do his best and everything, but -- you'll help me out with this, help me give her what she needs?"

And when he turns back to Bruce, he gets a nod, solid and promising. It's not enough against the pull he feels, but it's something. Enough to let him hit the weights for a while, anyway.

*

There's another place set at the table for dinner, and that kind of slams things home more than anything else has up until this moment. It's across from Jason's own, on Bruce's other side, and -- he's going to be *eating* with her, watching her mouth move, her eyes close with pleasure at whatever ridiculously incredible thing Alfred prepares...

Probably not for a while. It's all going to taste like *ashes* for a while, but still -- *still*.

And he's watching that place so hard that he barely notices when Alfred sets Jason's food in front of him, and -- Tim's not actually *here*.

Jason looks up and catches Alfred's eye --

"I'm afraid young Timothy feels unwell this evening, Master Jason. I'm preparing a light meal she can take in her bedroom."

The disappointment is so strong he can't *think* for a minute, but -- Jesus, of course it's too much to ask right now. Of course it is. He should've *thought* --

Bruce rests a hand on Jason's own --

"Alfred, perhaps Jason could bring the tray up himself."

Oh -- yeah. Really -- Jason pulls on a smile. "I promise I won't drop it all over the carpets, Al --"

Alfred nods. "Very good. I'll have the tray waiting for you in the kitchen," he says, and turns to leave.

Jason takes a breath and wonders what's wrong with him -- no, he knows. Nothing is going to feel the way it should, feel *right*, until he knows that BG is... okay. Or close to it.

Before, he could always relax a little, figure somewhere in the back of his mind that if anything was *really* wrong that Babs would take care of it. Now it's up to *them* --

It would still feel like it was up to *him* even if she *was* living with Babs now, because this is just too big. Too much for any of them to handle on their own, and that...

Well, that's always been kind of the point, hasn't it? Bruce had Alfred when he was falling apart, and Dick had Bruce and Alfred, and he's had all kinds of people -- even if he didn't have them right at the time he needed... everything he needed. And --

"You should eat, as well, Jason," and Bruce squeezes Jason's wrist lightly.

Jason blinks and shakes himself out of it a little. "Yeah, I -- sorry," Jason says and twists his wrist free absently. "Just thinking about... things." He looks up, and Bruce is smiling ruefully and generally looking like he'd heard a million things Jason hadn't said or even thought at the top of his mind. He's Bruce, and he does that. Jason smiles back and focuses on his food.

"I know how much Tim means to you. And I think -- I think Tim will know that, too, if she doesn't already."

That would be... he needs that. Jason nods and keeps eating -- just slow enough to avoid getting any pursed-up looks from Alfred.

And Alfred just nods at him when he walks into the kitchen, and the tray is right there... he goes.

The door is still mostly closed when he gets up there, but someone -- probably Alfred -- had left it open just a little bit, which will make things easier. Jason uses the tray to knock gently --

"Come in."

That flat voice, but -- at least it's an invitation. Jason pushes in and stops in the doorway. Tim is sitting in a chair and staring down at the little matching table -- vanity. Alfred had picked this room because it was decorated for a woman. It must have been empty since Bruce's parents were alive, and a part of Jason's brain is wondering about them, if they'd imagined having a daughter to be Bruce's sister...

What would that have been like?

Jason shakes it off and clears his throat a little --

And Tim tenses all over and looks up into the mirror. Her eyes are wide and she's pale as *hell*, and generally looks like she needs to eat everything on this tray, whatever it turns out to be.

"I brought you... well," Jason says, lifting the tray a little higher and generally feeling like an idiot.

"I was expecting -- don't you have to go get ready for patrol?"

It's such a huge relief to hear her tone change -- even if it's just for a question -- that Jason has to blow out a breath. "Not right away. I -- you know I go out on my own, sometimes."

Tim blinks like it's something she's forgotten, and... damn. Just --

"Look, Tim, I..." Jason shakes his head and sets the tray on the big, canopied bed. "I don't have to stay, but I'd really... you shouldn't be alone."

"I don't need..." Tim's mouth twists hard, just like on the steps -- "God, I'm at a *vanity*, and you're --" Tim pushes up to her feet roughly and it looks... strange.

Like she's pulling on a skin that doesn't really belong to her, or... something. Jason shrugs. "It's a nice vanity. Didn't you have one at home?"

Tim's eyebrows go up and she smoothes her hands down her hips -- stops and crosses her arms over her chest --

And Jason realizes that Tim is trying really, really hard to look anything but girly, which is the craziest thing he's ever seen her do, and that includes every time he's seen her flip backwards off a rooftop without doing more than taking things in with a glance. "Tim, what -- you don't have to pretend for me."

"Pretend? I -- I don't know what you're talking about. I'm not doing anything."

"Tim --"

"Look, I -- I'll eat. You don't have to stay here, right now. I'm fine. I'll be fine."

It feels a little like being punched, only BG has never hit him that hard, even when she *really* wanted him to back off. Jason frowns and reaches out --

Tim takes a step back -- and knocks into the vanity. And blushes, and all of a sudden the crossed arms look a lot more like Tim is hugging herself.

"Tim, seriously, you -- you can *talk* to me --"

"I don't. Want to talk."

"Or we could just sit together, and you could --" He's hit -- *hard* -- by the memory of BG in his arms, tense with nothing but how *hot* Jason was making her, kissing him just as hard as he was kissing her, moaning --

No, not now. Not even *close* to now. Jason takes a deep breath and raises his hands in surrender, taking a step closer and trying to will her to meet his eyes.

Her lips are thinner than they look with the makeup on -- still no. "BG..."

Tim's eyes, when they meet Jason's own... they're almost *panicked*, but she's looking at him, *seeing* him even though she's shaking her head, shifting back into a wide-legged stance that probably fools all kinds of people, but just looks wrong to his eyes.

"Tim --"

"Jason. Please."

Close, now. Close enough to touch, close enough to smell her -- no trace of the light perfume Batgirl always wears, no hint of her sweat -- Jason doesn't touch. "I'll go if you want me to. I -- I promise. The *last* thing I want to do is make anything harder on you, but -- that's just it. You don't have to be anyone but yourself, here, and I want... God, I want to see you so *badly*, BG --"

"I'm not -- I'm not always that. You shouldn't think --" Tim bites her lip and closes her eyes, tilting her head up and back for just a moment -- she's incredibly tense, and Jason knows what that feels like, too --

"I know you're Tim, too. But I -- you've had to lie a lot?"

Nothing for a long moment, long enough that the air starts feeling thick, hard to *breathe* --

"Tim --"

"Yes. Yes, I've --" Tim's laugh is rough and cracked, and she doesn't open her eyes. "There've been... a lot of lies. To. To my --" She bites her lip *hard* this time, and it's all Jason can do not to reach out, try to *soothe* --

"I get it. I -- I think I get it."

"Jason --"

"Just -- please don't ever stop saying my name, BG, Tim..."

A harsh breath, and Tim opens her eyes again, seems to almost *search* him, beg him for something --

And Jason wants to promise her anything, wants to -- "You don't know... you've done so much for me, Tim. You've been there, been *you* when I've been so fucked up in my head I couldn't even *think* --"

"I -- I haven't --"

"You *have*," and Jason can't -- he cups her shoulders and squeezes lightly, *lightly* -- "You have, okay? You mean so much to me, and I can't stand to see you *hurting* like this. I know -- you have to hurt right now, there's no way around that, but -- *please*, Tim. You don't have to do it *alone*."

"And I don't. Have to lie."

Jason shakes his head and just -- wills her to believe, *needs* her to believe --

"I don't. What happens if I'm not sure... if I don't know how not to lie in --" And she takes another shaky breath and unfolds her arms... gestures at herself. The jeans, the t-shirt -- does she really like that band?

No jewelry, nothing... nothing sleek, nothing *pretty* -- if that's even what she means. Jason smiles a little cautiously, watches her look at his mouth, maybe remember how his teeth felt against her lip --

Maybe something.

Maybe -- anything. "I get one fuck of an allowance here, BG. We can go *shopping*."

And she blinks at him rapidly, lashes dark and thick even without the makeup, eyes that jarringly *sharp* blue that Jason wants to spend a long damned time getting to *know* --

"I bet... I bet Alfred already has *plans*, Tim --"

"I can't. I can't just --"

"You can do anything you want. I -- I promise. It's what I want for you, for both of us --"

"Us. I. Jason..." And Tim's looking at his mouth again, looking shocky and looking -- *here*, right fucking here, where she belongs.

Jason squeezes her shoulders a little harder, lets his thumbs brush her neck -- warm skin where the cowl would be protecting her, thudding pulse -- "Hey..."

Tim closes her eyes and relaxes, all over, and that does *not* mean lean in and kiss, lean in and *feel*, but it's taking so much not to that Jason thinks he might lose some important parts of his mind.

"Tim..." His voice is too low for this, too --

"I -- I should eat," Tim says, opening her eyes and visibly pulling on something like a bright, brittle *skin* over her real one. Another one, and maybe this one's better than the other, but --

Jason winces -- and watches the skin start to crack. "Food -- yeah. Food is good," Jason says, letting himself cup the back of her neck for just long enough to tug before letting go and backing off.

Tim nods and walks to the bed. Her body language isn't *perfect*, but it still looks one hell of a lot more natural than it had before, like the real Tim is in the tiny and half-absent sway of those lean hips, those loose but *controlled* strides. She sits at the foot and opens the tray --

Soup, sandwich, and a salad, and the way Tim is looking at it makes Jason think she might not make it through more than *just* the salad -- and yeah, that's what she reaches for. He should... do something. The door is yawning open behind him like a particularly unsubtle *hint*, but -- he's the one who'd left it that way. "Um. Did you... should I go?"

Tim pauses with a forkful of cucumber -- and looks down at her lap. "I. You have. Work to do. I'm not. I'm not fit to go out."

Jason drops into a crouch and just -- covers one knee with his palm. Lightly. "You really aren't right now, no, and I *will* be heading out later, but there's no rush --"

"You don't -- you really don't have to watch me eat, Jason --"

"And if I want to?" Jason smiles again and lets it stay on his face until Tim looks at him again --

"Robin."

It makes him want to shiver, want to lunge up for her, kiss her throat until she sounds like she sounds when he's kissing her and in his dreams --

So many *dreams* --

"Right here, BG. And --" Jason snags a grape tomato from the salad and pops it in his mouth. "I'm *always* hungry."

The laugh is quiet and brief, but it's there, and it's for him, and the way she's looking into Jason's eyes --

"You could look at me like that all day and I'd be fucking thrilled."

She raises an eyebrow --

Jason raises his own --

"I -- noted," she says, and eats the cucumber.

*

It's not the first patrol he's spent with the sound of BG's laughter running through the back of his mind, running *him* and making him feel like the best and baddest thing on the fucking *block* --

The one not going by *Batman*, anyway --

It's not the first time, but it feels that way, because it's the first time he knows she'll be right there when he gets home. It almost makes it okay that he *knows* he won't meet her out here tonight, that he won't swing around a corner just in time to see a bright yellow boot slamming into the face of someone having a *real* bad night --

Yeah. He's about as focused as he always is, and he can see it in the way Bruce is relaxed around him when they hook up, the way they hit every mark and *do* it.

It's the way it has to be, because he damned well *is* going home tonight, and he's *not* going to get himself too fucked up to be right there for her. No playing around.

And the time passes the way it always does, slow enough to drive him a little crazy, fast enough to make him feel breathless and a little lost in the big, dirty, living *thing* that's Gotham, that's the suit he wears.

It's late when Bruce signals him for a stop, and Jason follows him to a rooftop near what, he knows, *used* to be the center of the town that was Gotham hundreds of years ago. Not far from --

"Oracle mentioned that she wanted to see you tonight, Robin," Bruce says, and cups Jason's shoulder.

It's a little like -- he wants to go home as fast as he *can*, because he'd gotten Tim to eat the salad, the soup, *and* half of the sandwich, and he could probably get her to eat a little ice cream or something with the night's cocoa, too --

"I don't expect that she'll want to keep you for very long."

And Jason -- snorts. "Okay, so my poker face is kind of nonexistent, hunh?"

Bruce's smile tugs at the corner of his mouth just a little more than what belongs on the street.

"Got it. I'll head there now and grab one of my bikes from the garage to get home...?"

Bruce nods and squeezes Jason's shoulder. "I'll see you there," he says, and strokes Jason's shoulder a little before nodding and leaping off the edge of the roof.

Babs wants to see him. Okay. Probably she could give him some pointers, and -- and whatever. He won't *let* her keep him long.

Except --

When he gets to the Clocktower, he realizes that it's actually been *months* since the last time he'd seen her face anywhere other than a monitor, that he hasn't been *here*...

He hasn't been here in a long, long time. And it's not like he's a mystery to himself or anything. The Clocktower is a lot like stepping into her *brain*, and it's always -- *always* -- a reminder of how much he just hadn't gotten to know her before the fucking Joker had taken her away from all of them, and it's a reminder that he *had*.

Even though she'd found her way back, fought and *clawed* her way back --

He wonders how often Dick makes it here. Dick has so many memories of her as Batgirl... he doesn't know, and he really has to suck it the fuck up. The fact that he'd spent months having nightmares about the hole in her back, the fact that the nightmares didn't really *stick* to the times when he was in bed, asleep --

He spent a lot of time angry and scared and *more* angry, all twisted up in his own head about this whole fucking *life*, thinking maybe it didn't really matter what Batman and Robin did if freaks and fuck-ups like the Joker could just walk up to the door of one of the best people -- one of the best *families* in the city and shit all over everything --

"If you spend too much more time lurking outside my window, Robin, there'll be a certain loss of plausible deniability."

Babs' voice -- not Oracle's -- in his ear. Right. He is just kind of -- lurking's definitely the word for it. Jason shakes it off and pushes in, reflexively resetting the manual alarms he knows she tends to leave off in favor of her *other* alarms, and --

Babs is right there in her little living room. The place is cluttered with books -- she's clearing one of her shelves.

"Moving things around?"

"Thinking about it. Just -- just in case," she says, and wheels around to face him. "It's good to see you, Jay."

"Back at you," Jason says, smiling and moving further in, sitting on the couch. It's one of the extra long ones, like maybe for someone like Dick to crash on if he ever came by... he doesn't know. *This* part of Barbara's place is just like any other home, if you don't think about all the hidden cameras, alarms -- probably traps, too. Or even if you *do* think about them, because Babs is one of them, right down to where it counts.

And right now she's just looking him over, an absent little smile on her face that makes her look both friendly and exactly as much older than he is as she is. She'd always looked young in the Batgirl suit.

Maybe anyone would.

"Jay... how is she?"

Jason sighs and scrubs a hand back through his hair. "I guess you haven't talked to her in a while...?"

"A brief call, a few moments at the funeral. I wish there'd been any excuse for you to be there. As it is, I had to make up some lies for the social worker..." Babs shakes her head, and she isn't smiling anymore. "This *life*..."

He nods. "I hear you. I -- man. She's hurting, really a lot. And I wonder how much of it is the fact that her parents are dead versus... well..." He's blushing. She *knows* Tim, and he really -- doesn't. Except on the inside, and that counts for a lot, but --

"Go on, Jason."

"The lies. The lies came up. *You* know what it's like to have to lie to your father --"

Another head-shake. "It's nowhere near the same thing, Jason. *My* father *lets* me lie to him, and wants me to lie, because it makes everything work more smoothly. I might as well not be lying at all, most of the time," she says, and smiles ruefully. "Can I get you something?"

Jason scrubs his hands on his thighs. "A drink? Maybe some juice? And I can get it --"

"*Please* don't make me give you the independent living speech, Jay, I'm nowhere close to being in the mood," and she waves him back and wheels herself into the kitchen.

He feels himself blushing and -- right. He leans back against the couch and waits.

"Anyway, Jay... the two of us *joked* about everything her parents didn't know about her, and I would tease her, sometimes..."

Jason can't *hear* her sighing over the sounds of what she's doing in the kitchen, but he can *feel* it, and -- yeah, he's wincing. "Fuck, I think it's maybe killing her a little, Babs."

Babs is silent, and after a minute she comes back with glasses of orange juice for both of them on a tray in her lap. Jason can see how the tray snaps on to the chair, and it's perfectly steady as she wheels back in. He wonders if they make things like that for the paralyzed or if she'd had to design it for herself. He shakes it off internally and reaches to take his juice before leaning back again and waiting for Babs to say something.

She's clearly thinking hard about it, and... he can wait.

After another minute or so... "She's always a girl for you," she says, and she's smiling again, a soft smile that makes him feel about ten years old.

She's more than a girl, she's *Batgirl*, but -- that's only a part of it. Jason smiles ruefully. "There was a moment, when she was getting out of the car, and she just looked like hell warmed over, and I couldn't -- I couldn't *see* her."

Babs nods.

"But then she moved this certain way..." Jason shrugs. "She'll either correct me or she won't. You -- you know a lot more about her than I do."

Babs unsnaps the tray and lets it swivel out, leaning back in her chair and taking a long drink. "And that was hard for you to say. You... I have to say, Jason, when she told me about that little conversation the two of you had between making out like the teenagers you *are*... you surprised me."

Jason stares at his juice because... because. "I think... you know I used to hustle. I saw a lot out there. I *learned* a lot. And there are things you just kind of learn not to miss, no matter how good the person in question is."

"And Tim is very, very good..."

Batgirl fighting, Batgirl flying. Batgirl laughing like he needs her to again, like he'll do anything to have again -- "It's who she is, Babs. Or -- I *think* it's who she is...?"

Babs nods. "You're on the right track, Jay. Trust me on that."

Jason nods back. "Yeah, so... maybe when she's eighteen she'll have a couple of painful and scary operations, or maybe she won't. It won't change... it won't change what I see."

Babs taps her glass with her short fingernails a couple of times and then nods once. "She's a lot shyer than Batgirl, quiet and as likely to stay quiet in a corner with a thick book or a computer game as anything else. She'll never push for anything she wants. Never, no matter what. She has a wicked sense of humor -- but you knew that already. She knew who all of us were before she ever came to see me in the hospital --"

"Wait -- *what*?"

Babs' smile isn't so friendly anymore, but it's -- proud. Warm. "Oh, yes. She's a natural detective, along with everything else. That's how she knew to find me. And if I wasn't hopped up on painkillers at the time, I probably would've sent her to Bruce -- no. No, that's not true. She came to *me*, and I needed that more than anything."

Jason... blinks. And tries to *think*, but mostly just blinks. A lot --

"I'll wait."

It makes *sense*, because he'd never really figured out how Babs had even *found* someone to train to replace her between all the renovations on this building and her physical therapy and -- everything else, but -- damn. Just -- "Damn."

"Mm-hmm. I do remember the incredibly young boy who used to come to the library all the time looking for articles and information about vigilantes, remember the camera around his neck -- but she remembered me *better*, Jason. She told me, when I asked, that I didn't move like a civilian... well. What else do you need to know?"

"Does she --" Love me. Jason tightens his grip on the glass of juice -- Jason chugs back the rest of his juice and tries to think, actually *think*. "How... how do I make it better for her?"

"At a guess...? Be there," Babs says, and reaches for Jason's glass. "And remember there's a Tim inside the Batgirl."

The number of times he's called her BG instead of Tim... yeah. Okay, he has to deal with that. Jason nods and stands up -- stops.

"Yes, Jay?"

"You said she'll never push for what she wants -- but what about her coming to see you in the damned *hospital*?"

Babs smiles again. "You can't guess...?" The smile gets a little wider and Babs rolls the glass between her fingers -- still just as strong as they were when she was Batgirl. "'Gotham,' I was informed, 'needs a Batgirl.'"

And yeah, he's blinking again, but -- okay. Okay. That tells him something, right there, and... okay. Jason nods and heads for the window.

"Jay... tell her to come see me when she can...?"

"I will --"

"And don't be shy about coming *with* her."

Jason pauses at the window -- and then walks back over and hugs Babs, more than a little surprised that she lets it happen. It's their first hug ever, and it feels so good...

It feels better than he ever would've guessed.

No one ever said that he was the smart one.

*

Bruce isn't at the console when he gets back, which is a little on the weird side. Jason's used to him monitoring his tracers -- and doing a dozen different other things with the reports and everything else -- whenever he comes back late and alone. There's a tray of fruit, though, and Jason goes for it once he's off his bike -- the clank of the weights.

He looks over, and Tim's benching. Bruce is there spotting her, and apparently most of his brain is hopelessly slow, because somehow he hadn't really come to terms with the thought -- the *possibility* -- of working out with Tim.

Just -- wow.

They could *spar*. And Bruce leans in to tap her elbow -- she's locking it a little -- and a wave of jealousy hits him like a fucking brick. It's just her *elbow*, and it's not like Bruce wants her -- does he?

*Would* he? And okay, now he's jealous and a little freaked *out*, because that would be incredibly fucked-up, and also... he has no idea. Possibly this is just the inevitable result of having spent hours anticipating coming home to Tim, *being* home with Tim --

She can bench more than he would've thought. Or... possibly she's going this high so that Bruce can measure her potential?

Possibly he's walking over with a nectarine in his hand and a lot of need he can't quite *control*, and --

Bruce signals Tim to stop and smiles at him. "Jay. How was Barbara?"

"You saw --" Tim sits up -- almost seems to be at *attention*, just that fast. Jason smiles at her and thinks about touching her shoulder, rubbing at the tension he can see --

Bruce, right. "Uh -- she's good, Bruce," he says, and turns to Tim. "Worried about you. I think --" She wants you to move in with *her*, or at least stay with her, and -- he should say it, should let it *out*, but what if she wants to go right away? Tomorrow?

"Jay...?"

Jason looks up at Bruce and knows he's seeing the panic written all over him. He looks *worried*, and this -- maybe this is a little more ridiculous than he can *remotely* get away with. He turns back to Tim. "Babs misses you, and -- we talked, some."

"About me," Tim says, and it misses being a question by about a mile. She doesn't so much cross her arms as grip them, a little, and it looks like she's testing her own muscle and it looks like she's thinking about all the patrol she'd missed tonight, and maybe a dozen other things that aren't really *good* for her to think right now --

Jason can't. He tucks the nectarine into one of his belt pockets, drops into a crouch in front of the bench, and reaches to cover one of her hands with his own. The skin is smooth except where it's *too* smooth -- scars. Her knuckles are hard, sharp things, and she's warm with exertion, and -- he can smell her with the next breath he takes. Some kind of sweet-smelling soap he can't name, clean sweat - "Uh. Yeah, we talked about you. She's really... I think she was trying to figure out how to make her apartment work for. Two people."

Tim's eyes go wide and she tenses even harder for a moment. "She's not -- it's *her* place, Jason --"

"Yeah, it really is, and -- no pressure or anything, but I... really like having you here?" Could he *sound* any lamer?

Bruce hums a little under his breath, that noise that means he's trying really *hard* not to just bust out laughing, and yeah, Jason's blushing.

Tim shifts, bringing her hands down to curl them under the bench a little, forearms flexing as she squeezes, and Jason's left with a hand *almost* touching her, and just -- hell. She's wearing *his* old workout clothes, some of the first ones he'd had, and they're worn and don't quite fit her right, and Bruce *had* to have given them to her, which means Bruce is clearly trying to drive him right out of his mind --

"I... thank you, Jason. And Bruce, thank you, too, of course --"

"You never have to thank me for this, Tim. You're always welcome."

And Tim blushes and looks like *she* feels a little panicked, like maybe they're crowding her? Emotionally? Shy. *Quiet*. Doesn't like being the center of attention... unless she's got her Batgirl on.

And Jason thinks about pulling the makeup kit out of the disguise closet, but -- he doesn't know if she *wants* that. He clears his throat and Tim focuses on him again. Her eyes are still wide, and she's still *really* tense -- change the subject, stat. "Were you working out all night?"

It makes her lift her chin a little, take a *deep* breath. "There's a lot of space to run, here. Alfred showed me the way down."

Jason nods -- and watches Bruce rest one hand -- just his fingers -- on Tim's shoulders. "You're always welcome to take advantage of this space, Tim."

Tim looks up and smiles at Bruce. It doesn't seem one hundred percent real, but it's not all a lie, either. "Thank you. I -- I will."

Bruce nods and steps back. "Why don't you let Jason spot you? I need to work on the reports."

He needs to work on his *own* reports, but when Bruce looks at him, there's only another smile. So -- okay, he's got some free time, then. He smiles at Tim and nods back at the weights, a part of him watching Bruce move away out of the corner of his eye --

Tim raises her arms and flexes them, raising an eyebrow, too --

Jason snorts. "We *could* just wrestle a little. I'm fine with that, too."

"Aren't you always...?" And she lowers her hands to the bench again and leans in, mouth curled in a sharp little smile and eyes narrowed --

Batgirl, all over her sudden and *complete*, like all the panic and shyness was just a *lie* -- but it wasn't. It *wasn't* a lie, and he's going to remember that just as soon as he can make himself stop looking her up and down like the meal he's been starving for -- yeah. Jason shakes himself like a fucking *dog* --

"Jason...?"

And if he listens -- and he *is* listening -- there's something a little unsure under the soft purr of her voice, and that unsure thing means that Tim is right there, was *always* right there, and now -- *now* he's got a handle on himself. Jason puts his hands on her knees and squeezes before looking up into her eyes. "There are a lot of ways you can pretend to be someone other than who you *are*, Tim, but I don't think -- none of them are really *okay*."

For a second she looks hurt, *really* hurt, and Jason wants to backpedal like *crazy* --

"Tim --"

"You don't." She looks down between them and shudders once, all over. "There's a lot you don't know about me, Jason."

"I get that. I'm *getting* that. I just -- maybe it's really fucking selfish -- *probably* it's really fucking selfish, but I just don't want you being any of the other people in your head unless you're really *feeling* it, Tim --"

"Not even... BG."

"Not unless that's how you feel," he says, and realizes that he means it with absolutely everything he is, even the selfish parts. It's kind of terrifying, and maybe that's why he lets go of one of her knees and touches her gently beneath the chin, pushes up until she's looking at him again.

Her eyes are haunted, searching things, and the blue is perfectly real, and --

Do you love me? He doesn't say it, and he doesn't *say* it, and after a minute Tim nods and smiles, small and rueful. Quiet.

Jason smiles back.

"I... those weights aren't going to lift themselves."

"They almost never do, no," Jason says, and forces himself to let go and stand up. She looks up at him for another long moment, and then lays down and starts lifting.

As it happens, that *is* the weight level she's at, and knowing that makes Jason feel...

It makes Jason think of the way Barbara smiles when she thinks of Tim. *She* has the right to feel proud. He's just -- insane. He can go with that.

She spends about an hour lifting, and it's clear that it's something she knows how to do well enough, even though the thought of Babs spotting her is one that makes him feel a little queasy and scared -- how did she get the chair close *enough* back before Tim was experienced enough to at least mostly watch out for herself?

It also makes him wonder a little about the locked elbow earlier -- rookie mistake -- but looking at her, *really* looking... the answer is right there, really. She's a about a million times less tense than she was when Jason had got in, and whether or not that has anything to do with him, it feels good to see her relaxed and just -- working herself.

Even though she doesn't say a word.

Jason fights back a yawn as she finishes her third set on the leg press --

"You should sleep, Jason."

Jason jumps a little internally and the smile is a reflex -- and a good one, since it almost seems to *pull* a smile out of her. "I'm fine."

She raises an eyebrow. "Even Batman -- even Bruce is out of his uniform."

Is he? Jason looks, and -- yeah. Bruce is at the console in one of his robes, suit bundled away for Alfred to clean and mend. "I -- wow. I can't remember the last time Bruce stripped down first without being *injured*." He shakes his head and smiles at Tim again. "Guess I was distracted."

"Because I'm absolutely scintillating company," she says, and it sounds like she's beating herself up some -- no. Just no.

"Hey, you want me to strip, I will *absolutely* strip," he says, and waggles his eyebrows a little --

Tim snorts and shakes his head. "I didn't mean --"

Jason raises a hand -- and brings his other hand up to the catches of his cape. "We have to get used to each other, right? Out of the suits and everything..." He catches his cape before it slithers all the way to the floor and sets it on the bench.

"Jason..."

Like I *haven't* wanted to see your body since fucking *forever*, BG -- no, not that. Jason works on the tunic. "I'm not -- I'm not asking you to peel off in front of me, okay? It's just --"

"I don't -- it's okay. I'm not really. Ah. Barbara sees me naked all the time and so does Dinah. I'm..." One of those cracked laughs, high and not really all that full of humor. She's not looking at him, anymore.

Jason pauses with the tunic open halfway and thinks about it, tries to figure out what he'd done *exactly*... he isn't sure, but -- "Barbara sees you. *Dinah* sees you -- and no guys, right?"

"Is that it? I'm -- hell. It can't be. It -- can't. I go to private school and I'm..." She's blushing *hard*, staring at her own knees. Or maybe at Jason's old sweatpants.

Jason rests his hand on her knee -- and feels her tense. She relaxes pretty much immediately, but still -- "Is it me? Or -- us?"

She looks up, mouth a tight line and eyes wide and *frustrated* -- "It shouldn't be."

"Not what I asked, Tim --"

"It *shouldn't* be. We -- we *work* together --"

"And sometimes we *work* together --"

"Jason --"

Jason squeezes her knee. "I know, I'm sorry, sometimes my mouth just gets way the fuck ahead of me. I -- uh. I just meant that it maybe has to mean more than just... any two vigis stripping down for the night?"

She doesn't answer him, and Jason tries to think of something else to say, something else to make this *okay* -- she pushes his hand off of her knee, not roughly, and stands up away from the machine.

"Tim --"

And she pulls off the t-shirt in one smooth motion, laying it on the bench next to Jason's cape, and he really doesn't care about the cape, because she's so *lean*. Almost too lean, and he knows what that feels like against his body, and he *needs* to know what that feels like against his fingers, his palms --

Her nipples look stiff from the chill of the Cave. She --

She's not looking at him at *all*. Jason takes a step closer --

She steps back, graceful and more sure than he wants her to be for *this* -- she shoves her thumbs under the waistband of the sweatpants, and this is where he says something about how she doesn't have to, that she can go over by the lockers, or he could, or --

Jason's throat is dry, and he's *staring* now, tugging his tunic open the rest of the way -- Bruce is still right over there at the *console*, and he's been naked in front of Bruce fucking hundreds of times, and he's been *hard* in front of Bruce, too, he's a teenager, he's --

He's making excuses in his mind, because Tim's still just standing there with her thumbs between fabric and skin, because Tim is bare from the waist up, fucking *sleek* --

And then she's shoving the sweats down over her hips, and Jason can see that she's wearing briefs, simple and white --

That she *was* wearing briefs, and the hair there is dark, of course, but it catches a shine from the fluorescents, and Jason's mouth isn't dry, anymore. Isn't --

She's not hard. Not --

Not even a little. "Tim..."

A hitched breath and she steps out of the briefs and the sweats, another and she looks up -- past Jason's shoulder. No. *No* --

"Look at me, Tim. Look -- look at my *eyes*..."

And for a long moment he thinks she won't, that she'll just stand there, naked and this close to shivering until he turns away, *walks* away --

"Please, Tim --"

And when she does look at him he has to try hard not to flinch. There's so *much* in her eyes, seemingly everything from rage to grief to *terror*. They almost look like they belong on a wild animal, something hunted and a little too *small* for those eyes. But then --

Maybe she sees him, or maybe it just took that long for her to *understand* what she was seeing, because the wildness starts to fade and she curls her hands into loose fists --

"Jason..."

Jason nods and tries to think non-threatening thoughts, non-*demanding* thoughts, because the jock is biting into him *hard* and everything he wants is right there, naked in front of him and too screwed up in the head for -- for more. But. "Can I...?" He tugs at his gapping tunic.

And she looks confused -- "There's nothing -- you don't have anything to hide. From me."

Which is what he needs to *hear*, but -- "Tim, I..." Jason shakes his head and smiles ruefully. "I'm kind of... uh." He gestures at the shorts. "At the moment."

She blinks rapidly again and shifts on her feet, the muscles in her long thighs -- strong thighs, and if he hadn't seen her use them a hundred times, he'd still *know* by the look of them --

"Fuck, you're hot," he blurts, and she looks even more *confused*, shaking her head and opening her mouth --

Closing it again, and -- he gets it. He *gets* it.

"Jesus, Tim. Did you think I was looking for tits and a smooth little..." He strokes down with one hand over the shorts that he *really* needs to get out of -- "I already knew... you knew I already knew," he says, and shrugs out of the tunic, kicks off the boots --

She looks down at his feet, back up *slowly*, and it looks like she *wants* to cross her arms over her chest, but the fists at her sides are tight things now. She's holding *on*, and he fucking --

He loves her for it, and for so many other *things* -- "Used to each other, right?"

"I -- getting there. I suppose. Jason, I -- what do you *see*?"

And maybe that's the biggest question she's ever asked him, the most important one, and so it feels like stalling to push and shove himself out of the shorts and the jock even as it also feels like the most necessary thing in the *world* --

She doesn't look down really *loudly*, and she swallows once, eyes widening before she clenches her fists even harder --

He can see the tension all over her, and he has to be just a little bit *closer* --

"Jason -- please."

"I see -- I think I see you." Finally. "Like I... like maybe we don't have to play any more games with each other, or --"

Or something, because that line on her forehead is a frown which doesn't seem to have anything to do with *this*.

"Tim...?"

"I --" And it's like watching Zatanna do something amazing and impossible, like watching the way dawn hits certain parts of downtown and turns everything to fire, like --

Like Batgirl, rolling her shoulders back and flipping the hair which is only not there if you're an *idiot*. Watching her tilt her head to the side, raise an eyebrow --

"I thought you liked the games we play... Jason."

Robin. She was going to say *Robin*, and that's reason enough to let himself smile the way he wants to, let all of it onto his face and into his voice when he says, "yeah, well... sometimes I'm not sure what the rules are. Tim."

And the light doesn't catch on any lipstick when her mouth twists, purses, when she cocks her hip -- "That sounds like the kind of excuse a loser would make."

This time she doesn't move when he steps closer, when he's close enough to feel her heat in the Cave's chill, when she tilts her head up and narrows her eyes -- "Sometimes losing feels pretty fucking good --"

"I wouldn't know," she says, and she's shorter than she should be -- no heels -- but that just means he has an excuse to lean in as close as he can, to breathe against her pretty little mouth --

"I could show you..."

"Could you, Jason?"

Robin again, and it's a dare, a *push*, and it doesn't matter that they aren't on a rooftop or in an alley, it doesn't matter that Bruce is only a couple hundred yards away -- nothing matters but the feel of her mouth against his own, and her slim little waist against his hands, those hips --

No curve, no padding. Just skin and the tickle of hair when he strokes with his thumbs --

And the way she sighs into his mouth feels like finally, feels like *everything*, and he definitely loses the game by moaning, but when she shivers and presses close he thinks he wants to lose like this all the *time*.

Just -- she should be touching him, hands between them so she can shove him away, and he backs off just a little --

But she pushes her hands into his hair, tugs and opens for him, hot and wet and right, so *right*, and he wants to know what it's like for her, if she likes feeling how hard he is, how *hot* he is for her, if that's what's making her press even closer again.

Naked together, and he's tried to picture it so many times, tried to piece it together from what he knew and what he could guess, but there's nothing in his memories and fantasies like the feel of her dick just barely sliding against his thigh, soft and vulnerable --

He wants to make her *hard* for him, wants her slick and hot, dark and crazy for him, crazy like he feels when he slips his tongue into her mouth, when she makes a sound so soft and brief that it's not even a moan and tightens her fingers in his hair.

He could slide his hand between them, grip her and *stroke*, make her *know* how he feels, what he sees and what he *feels*. It's probably the best idea he's had in his *life*, and he thrusts deep with his tongue and does it --

She bites his tongue. Not a tease, not even -- it feels like shock, and she's tensed all over again -- she pulls back and grips his hand, tries to push it off her --

"Tim --"

"N-no. Jason, don't --"

Too much. It's -- she feels so good and he doesn't want to let *go*, but she's looking back and forth, she's hard everywhere she *shouldn't* be and *shaking* --

Jason lets go --

"Sorry, Tim, I only wanted --"

"I -- no. Sorry. I shouldn't have -- oh -- fuck."

Jason snorts -- and regrets it immediately when she looks at him and it's the wild look, the *scared* look. "No, I -- I was agreeing. With that 'fuck.' Tim, we could -- uh. Shower?"

Her nostrils flare just a little, and Jason can't *not* wonder what he smells like to her, if she likes it, *wants* it --

"Or we could -- hell. There are... help?"

She blinks at him for a moment -- stops and takes a breath. Batgirl in the way she stands up straight, the way she nods sharply and -- meets his eyes almost steadily. "Showering -- would probably help. I should... upstairs."

"We could -- I mean, it's a big shower here, and there are robes...?"

She looks -- like she wants to touch him again, kiss him or hold him, and fuck, they could do that, too, anything she wants, *anything* she wants, and --

"I'll keep my hands -- I'll keep 'em to myself. I promise. We really --"

"We really should. Get used to each other."

Jason takes a deep breath and resists the urge to reach down and *grip* himself -- she doesn't need to see that right now, and -- she doesn't. He nods dumbly instead and then nods toward the showers.

Tim sets her mouth -- and her shoulders, too -- and starts walking in that direction. Jason follows.

*

He spends the night -- probably too *much* of the night -- thinking about that shower, and the way Tim hadn't looked at him until Jason had given up on anything like subtlety and blasted himself with the cold water.

*Then* she'd looked, and --

Hurt in her eyes, and more apology than he could *remotely* deal with. He'd told her it was okay, promised her it was okay, but he really doesn't think she'd believed him.

And the cold water hadn't really done all that much --

She'd all but *fled* the shower when she was done, muttering goodnight as she went --

And Jason had spent some serious time beating his head against the wall.

Her door was closed when he got upstairs, and that meant that the only thing *he* could do was leave his door open and hope. God, just --

He's an *idiot*. He has no idea what kind of experience Tim has with sex, but he's willing to bet that it isn't much. She'd had a lot of reason not to let him get too far when they were just being Batgirl and Robin -- or thought she had, and that might as well be the same thing --

He can't stop thinking about that one night. That -- that *one*, when it had all come out -- or almost.

She'd been under him, *moving* under him, kissing him hard and moaning, *moving* --

She'd reached for the catches on his tunic and he'd been the idiot who'd *stopped* her, because he wasn't sure if she was ready to give up *all* of the games. He'd asked her a bunch of questions, and -- okay, they were *good* questions.

She hadn't answered a single one, and then she'd gotten past his guards like they were *smoke* and gone over the side of the roof, bringing the game right back.

They hadn't done more than kiss and touch a little since then, and he'd been okay with that, okay with giving her time to do what she needed to do, figure out what she needed to figure out --

And tonight he'd just lost that, all of it, because he's *not* okay. He needs --

He needs her, her smiles and her teases, her strong, hard hands and her tongue in his mouth. He can *guess* why it had blown the whole thing for him to grab her dick, can theorize that maybe she's not all that happy about *having* a dick, or -- something.

("I'm not -- I'm not always that.")

Which -- did that mean she wasn't always a girl inside? Wasn't always *Batgirl*? Wasn't always sure she wanted *him*?

He doesn't know, and a part of him is already out of the bed, knocking on her door and opening it before she has a chance to say word *one*. Going to her and begging, demanding, *needing* --

Do her sheets smell like her, yet? Would she maybe try to distract him with more kissing, more touch...

Jason groans aloud --

"That didn't sound pleasant," Bruce says, from *right* next to Jason's bed --

Jason sits up and reflexively calms his breathing, because it's Bruce, and he will *always* be able to appear out of fucking nowhere and give him heart attacks. "*Jesus*, Bruce. Did you do this to Dick, too?"

"Often," Bruce says, and sits down on the side of the bed, reaching out to -- hand him the nectarine he'd left in one of his belt pockets.

Well, he'd been distracted. Jason takes it and sighs. "So how much of that... that were you paying attention to?"

"I wouldn't say... paying attention," and when Bruce sighs, he seems only a deeper patch of shadow -- until he reaches and turns on the light. "How are you."

More of an order than a question, and... Jason sighs, himself. "A little... twisted up inside, I guess. I -- pushed too hard, tonight."

Bruce nods and his eyes are full of sympathy. "There are... I think it would be fair to say that there are a lot of things on Tim's mind, right now."

Jason nods. "I know that. I -- I *knew* that, but I still... fuck, Bruce, I don't know what to do. I mean, sometimes I think I *have* it. I can guess where the landmines are and kind of... steer us around them. But sometimes all I can see is *her*, all I can think about is how much I *want*..."

Bruce rests his hand on Jason's. "There's nothing... there's nothing I can do to help you with that --"

"No, I know, it's not like I can make you live in my head and tell me the right things to do or say --"

"Jason," he says, and squeezes Jason's hand. "Love and desire... they can be very difficult things. Very *painful* things, but..."

Jason closes his eyes -- and Bruce touches his face with his other hand until Jason opens his eyes again. "Bruce...?"

Bruce's smile is small and quiet and rueful -- and not all that different from some of Tim's smiles, when he thinks about it.

"I'm -- I'll be *okay*, Bruce --"

"I know you will," he says, and he's still smiling a little. "There's nothing wrong with how you feel about Tim, Jason. That -- you must hold on to that, and remember it, even when things are difficult."

"But -- it's how I feel that got me *in* this mess --"

"No. It's what you let those feelings allow you to *do*, Jason, and there's a very large and important difference between the two."

Jason frowns. That was -- that was really serious, and said almost in the same voice Bruce uses to tell him things designed to keep him *alive*. "I -- okay, but... it's kind of hard to see the difference right now."

"Is it...?" Bruce sighs again and pats Jason's hand before leaning away again. "All right. Just -- hm. Try to remember that she cares for you, that you may very well be the most important person in her life right now --"

"That's *Babs*, Bruce --"

"And *that*... is a very different sort of important. I think, perhaps, you could trust me about that...?"

Because *Bruce* is important to him, but not... yeah. All right. Jason takes a deep breath and lets himself lie back down. "She was so -- I've never seen her *scared* before, Bruce."

Bruce hums and stands. "Love is not so far from fear as we might think, or wish to believe."

That -- "That sounds really fucking *grim*, Bruce."

Bruce laughs softly. "I'll take your word for that, of course, Jason," and he moves toward the door.

"Goodnight, Bruce -- and thanks."

"You're welcome. And do try to watch your language," he says, but it still sounds like he's laughing and that --

That's okay.

He *does* feel a little better, even if he's not all that sure... no. He's known for a good long while that Bruce *approved* of Robin's relationship with Batgirl -- he probably loved it when it was Dick and Babs, too. He's just -- he's *like* that.

But knowing that he's completely okay -- *more* than okay -- with him and *Tim*... well, it would be really fucking easy for him *not* to be, especially since it's not like Jason has any idea how it would go for a Wayne heir to start dating a -- guy.

He can *see* Tim all dressed up in a tux at some damned party, and he can see *himself* dragging Tim back into a cloakroom and peeling her out of it --

And he never actually got *soft* from before, but now he's really fucking hard again, because it would be a fucking gorgeous kind of *obscene* for Tim to be in a tux, moreso than those jeans or sweats and t-shirts --

The way she'd *move* --

He was trying to think about how this would work. He was -- he was really *thinking*, for a minute there, but fuck, she's three doors down and she *does* want him, *does* care. She wouldn't have been half so scared, so freaked *out* if she didn't.

And yeah, Bruce is cool with that, and that's *great*, but it wouldn't matter if he wasn't. He'd -- he doesn't know how it would work, but he would *always* go to her, camp out in the alley behind the Clocktower if he had to, beg for anything he could have and tell Bruce to fuck *off*, because she's beautiful, because she kisses him like it's the only thing she's ever really wanted to do, touches him like maybe *she* can't believe he's right there needing her, wanting her --

And this time when he groans it almost feels *good*, like he's letting himself off a leash.

Love and fear --

And the scent of the nectarine in his hand is sweet and heavy and *nothing* like Tim, but there's something about the *feel* of the scent that's the same, that same kind of drugging *thing*, like maybe if he bites down there will only be a *little* give --

Tim's throat, long and slim, unmarked -- by anyone?

What would've happened if he'd kissed her there instead of reaching for her dick like a fuck-dumb idiot? If he'd licked and bit --

She likes it when he bites her lip, when he grabs her hard by the waist and pulls her close --

So *close* --

Jason puts the nectarine on the end table and reaches down to rub his thigh, the place where her dick was rubbing against him so *soft* --

And he's hit, hard and fucking *rough* by the image/sense of her under him as he thrusts, grinds himself against her, slides and pushes, leans in and kisses her as he moves, rolls them until she's on top of him, looking down at him with her blue eyes wide and that smile on her face.

*That* smile, shy and hungry at once in the moments before she closes her eyes --

Jason bites back another groan and takes himself in hand, feels himself and tries to imagine *her* hand there, hard and -- would she be unsure at first? Hesitant or awkward until he moaned for her, pushed *into* her fist once, again --

"Tim..." His voice is too low, too hungry, but there have been times when she's liked *that*, too, when it's made her lips part, her face *heat* so close to his own --

He can smell her in his mind, he can push himself out of this bed and down into himself where every kiss, every touch and smile and kiss *lives*. He's *used* to this, it's nothing *like* the first time --

Even though it's the first time she could maybe hear him if she opened her door, if she stepped into the hall --

He wants her to *know* this about him, and everything else, too. He wants her to know that sometimes he can't stop himself from stripping himself fast and hard, chasing every hint of memory before they leave him alone in this bed again, before he's just himself again -- too desperate to be Robin and too hungry to feel entirely like Jason.

*Jason* --

Jason doesn't want to be alone.

*

It's summer, and he usually sleeps in -- especially when he's spent the night patrolling and training -- but he can't really make himself do it today. He could blame it on the light from his window -- warm and bright and promising -- but that really doesn't have anything to do with it.

He throws on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt and thinks idly about getting in more training downstairs --

He *tries* to think about that, but of course he doesn't head right for the stairs when he gets to the hall -- her door is open.

The sudden *knock* in his chest would tell him all he needed to know about where his head was at he if he didn't already know, and he knocks, lightly, trying not to just shove his head in --

Alfred clears his throat behind him, and Jason -- mostly -- manages not to jump.

"Young Timothy is taking her breakfast downstairs with Master Bruce," he says, and Jason turns around and smiles ruefully at him.

"I'm just gonna be... completely obvious for a while, aren't I?"

"I'm sure I don't know, young sir," Alfred says, and there's a light in his eyes that -- yeah.

Makes Jason want to blush and makes him feel warm, too. Right. "Enough chow for me down there?"

"One does what one can," Alfred says, and raises an eyebrow.

Jason waves and heads down. The table is set the way it was last night, with Bruce right in the middle, and Tim is there, dressed pretty much the way Jason is -- the clothes aren't his. Maybe Alfred had gone by the Clocktower to pick up some of Tim's own things?

It shouldn't feel like a *loss* that Tim isn't wearing his clothes, but... damn. He's standing here just *staring* -- and so he can see Tim tensing, and Bruce looking at her --

Jason walks in. "Hey, good morning," he says, and his voice sounds shaky to his own ears, but he can fucking well cope.

He grabs his plate and pulls some things from the sideboard without really looking. He knows Tim isn't looking at him, but he can still *feel* her -- feeling him. Too awkward. He really has to -- something.

He sits down and notes that Bruce is eating oatmeal, and Tim has cereal with some fruit in it. "Guess I'm the only one being a pig this morning?"

Bruce hums and smiles --

Tim blushes. "I'm not really used to... ah. I usually eat light in the mornings."

Jason nods and feels himself filing it away, something else for him to *know*. "Bacon *is* eating light," he says.

Tim looks at him from under her lashes, and there's a really kind of *cautious* smile in her eyes.

Something else for him to just -- feed on. The bacon might as well be a fried piece of cardboard. But -- "Seriously, the frying process -- uh. Gets rid of all the fat?"

Bruce shifts -- and doesn't say a word.

Tim looks at Bruce for a second and then turns back. And raises her eyebrow in a way that somehow doesn't have a thing to do with Batgirl. "I'm reasonably sure it doesn't work that way, Jason."

Jason grins and takes another bite -- better. Much better. "Were *you* in the kitchen when Alfred was frying it up?"

"No, but --"

"Then how can you be sure? This particularly delicious-looking bit --"

"With the grease actually shining *on* it, Jason...?"

"That's the one," Jason says, and bites it off. "Mm. Yeah, that might be just -- uh. Meat. No salty, wonderful --"

"Fatty."

"*Fatty* -- fat. None at all," and he licks his lips and reaches for another piece...

Tim hums and -- hunh. Jason looks at Bruce again, and he's *not* looking at Tim, not really, but he also seems a lot more aware of her than he was a second ago. That *hum*...

Bruce looks up at *him*, and there's a question in his eyes --

And Tim is looking at both of them, and is starting to look a little wary again.

"Uh -- you laugh a little like Bruce. Sometimes," Jason says, and feels himself blushing, and -- lives with it.

Tim dabs at her mouth with her napkin and -- up goes the eyebrow again.

"I like it. I... heh. I'm used to it?"

*Bruce* hums this time and goes back to his oatmeal, and Jason watches Tim really *look* at Bruce, take him in like maybe she wasn't paying all *that* much attention before, or -- no. He's betting Tim *always* pays attention. Just -- maybe she was only paying attention to Batman, before.

Jason thinks about reaching across the table and just... running his fingers over her knuckles a little, but he settles for just smiling at her --

And knowing, inside, that when she closes her eyes and ducks her head slightly that *that's* a smile for him. Maybe more important than the one tugging at the corner of her mouth.

The rest of breakfast is quiet and easy, and Jason congratulates himself for only staring a *little* every time Tim tilts her head back a little to sip her juice. That *neck* -- yeah, only a little.

He's *fine*.

And then Bruce is leaving for WE and Tim is kind of... she's *not* playing with her spoon, not really, but the way she's holding it says that there's the *potential* for that. Like maybe she doesn't want to leave the table just yet, but isn't sure what to say or do to give her a reason *to* stay.

And that -- okay, so he *could* be fooling himself, but really, what if he isn't? He picks up his own spoon and taps hers --

"En garde...?"

Jason blinks and grins. "If you tell me that Babs taught you fencing along with everything else..."

Tim blushes -- and spins the spoon over her fingers, quick and easy. "Ah... Dinah had picked it up from some members of the JSA."

That makes sense... Jason thrusts a few times and gets blocked, parried -- and has his knuckles spanked with the spoon's handle. He laughs and brings his spoon to his forehead, bows. "Noted. Babs and Dinah are pretty close?"

"Best friends, I believe. I think... I think Babs learned a lot from her when she was Batgirl."

Because she didn't really have *Bruce*, at the time... Jason nods. "So who else did you learn from?"

Tim smiles ruefully. "Richard Dragon and ah -- Selina Kyle."

Jason blinks. "Fucking *Catwoman*?"

"She -- as near as I can tell, she owed Babs a rather big favor. I don't have much in the way of acrobatics, but what I do have... I learned from her."

"Hey, I've *seen* you. You're pretty fucking bendy out there."

The smile gets a little wider. "Not like Nightwing."

Jason waves a hand. "*Nobody* is like Dick. And don't pretend you didn't know his name. Babs *told* me you figured it all out."

"She did? I..." Tim bites her lip. "I had a lot of free time as a child."

And -- there's a question in there about her parents. There really is, starting with how Jason can't figure out how they could've been *remotely* in Tim's life and not noticed what she was *doing*. But --

Everything in Tim's eyes is telling him not to ask it. Maybe begging him, a little.

Jason nods again and tries to think of something else to ask, something... "How do you like Bruce?"

For some reason, that makes her start a little, right there in her chair --

"Uh -- was that a bad question?"

And another blush. "Ah. Not as such, no. I..." She shakes her head and looks at him, smiling ruefully. "He actually came to talk to me last night. Perhaps I mean 'talk me down.'"

Well... hunh. It would be really *like* Bruce to make sure *neither* of them were spending too much time beating up on themselves, but... hunh. "You... it was a good conversation?"

Tim looks down at the table, smoothes the cloth a little bit. "I was really... kind of a mess."

Jason winces. "Yeah, I -- I'm really sorry --"

"It *wasn't* your fault," she says, sharp and hard -- and blushes a little deeper before looking up again. "I think, maybe, that it's easier to be Batgirl around you than it is to be Tim, except that I can't seem to keep it up."

Which is... really kind of a lot to say in one little sentence. Jason nods and -- gives up and reaches across the table to cover one of her hands. "I'm not -- I won't ever pressure you. For anything."

"I know that -- I know. It's just --" She shakes her head again. "Bruce -- he's a very caring man. Very... I never would've expected him to be quite so... warm?"

And that... Jason grins. "He's the best. I didn't know *what* the hell he wanted from me when he dragged me out of that alley -- I actually thought he was some kind of freaky pervert -- but... yeah. He made me something."

"I suspect..." Tim looks down at their hands for a long moment -- and then turns her hand over, so that they can just kind of... hold each other.

"I like that," Jason says --

And Tim smiles at him, small and almost soft. "I was going to say -- I suspect he saw something in you... well. I don't think he'd take all the credit for who you've become, Jason."

It was probably just his *turn* to blush. "I'm not --" I'm just a kid, he wants to say, but the Bruce who lives in the back of his mind is kind of scowling at him for that. "Uh... well. Mutual admiration society?"

Tim laughs and looks away again, only it feels more like Tim offering her cheek, the twist of her throat --

Jason swallows and squeezes her hand just -- loosely. Not too hard or anything like that --

She shivers anyway, and maybe she's thinking about Jason's hand other places. Or possibly that's just him.

"Uh -- so. I was just going to get some training in, maybe hit the weights myself for a while..."

And Tim frowns *hard*, face twisting up --

"Tim...?"

"I just. I was about to. I was about to say something about. Needing to get home. I -- excuse me," she says, tugging her hand away and standing up, keeping her face turned *away* --

Jason stands up. "Are you sure -- you don't have to be alone right now, Tim --"

"Alone. Alone. Oh." Tim covers her face with her hands and rocks on her feet -- stops and stands *rigid*, like maybe there's a stiff wind running through the dining room that Jason just hadn't *noticed*, and -- he gets this, too.

"When I was -- my mother was sick for a real long time before she died. I was -- I thought I was used to the idea, that I'd be okay when she *did* die, but..."

Tim shudders and doesn't say a word... but she also doesn't *move*, and that's something. Jason walks around the table and moves -- not too close. Just enough that he can reach out and rest a hand on her shoulder, feel her stiffen and *not* twist away.

"I had -- I had a lot of other things to think about, a lot of things to focus on just to survive out there --"

"I know I'm not -- I know I'm really *fortunate*, Jason, and I -- I'll be all right in a minute," she says, *scrubbing* at her face before dropping her hands and seeming to stare right through him.

Jason winces again and rubs her shoulder, shifts until he's cupping the back of her neck. "That's *not* what I meant, Tim. I just -- I wanted to say that I wasn't okay, not even a little. And I pushed and pushed and thought about everything *but* my parents, and it all just meant that I was fucked up for longer than I might've been if I'd just let myself..." Jason shrugs. "Deal with it."

Tim's expression twists again, milder this time -- "I don't think -- I wouldn't call that *dealing*, per se --"

"You were feeling it, though. Letting yourself really..." Jason waves his free hand. "You know what I'm talking about."

"I do, I really -- but. I keep wondering how my father would feel about this, what I'm doing, where I'm living..."

Jason squeezes the back of her neck. "Your Dad didn't know the real Bruce Wayne."

"No, he certainly... didn't. The only problem is that I'm not sure it would've made things any better if he had, Jason."

"Oh. I... oh." What is he supposed to do with *that*?

"Yes, that." Tim sighs and closes her eyes for a moment, and when she opens them *this* time she looks a little better, a little closer to being herself, as opposed to the somehow solid ghost who would never, ever need a minute just to cry a little.

Jason can't help smiling at her for that, and doesn't bother to try --

"Jason. You're... I think I always knew you'd be like this. That you wouldn't let me..." Tim shakes her head and steps back, reaches up to catch Jason's hand in her own and squeeze. "I could spot you on the weights...?"

Jason nods and doesn't pull her in for a hug. He squeezes her hand, though, and gives himself a second just to feel her calluses, her strength... "Yeah, sure."

And he expects her to slip her hand free and go, but -- she doesn't. She's waiting for him to do -- something, and *that* has to be improvement, so he *does* pull her in. Slowly, carefully until she sighs against his jaw -- "I. Didn't think you would."

Jason squeezes her. "I didn't think you wanted me to."

"I always -- um."

Definitely his turn to shiver. "Tim," he says, and he doesn't know what comes after that, unless it *is* one of the dozen things he's pretty sure it's not the right time to say. He doesn't kiss her forehead, but he does nuzzle her a little at her hairline --

She squeezes him back. "You're making this. I think you're making this too easy for me, Jason. I think it shouldn't be --"

"It *should*, as easy as it can be -- which just isn't all that fucking easy at all, Tim. I -- if you ever need, if you ever *want*... I'm here."

"I. I really -- fucking -- hate crying."

Jason smiles against her forehead. "I kinda figured that out."

"Mm." And Tim strokes Jason's back before pulling away. "Weights?"

"Weights," Jason says, and gives her a little 'after you' gesture --

And gets a narrow-eyed *look* that's pure Batgirl for the half-second it takes for her to turn around and start walking. Easily, lightly, and the *way* she moves makes Jason wonder if she misses her heels.

Was the uniform one of the things Alfred had brought over?

Are her toenails still painted to match Batgirl's lipstick?

Is he going to make an ass out of himself before they even get down to the Cave?

Maybe -- no. He's under control, and he's not going to do *anything* to shake that fragile-looking control she's working with right now, certainly not anything like spending a good solid minute thinking about those loose-fitting shorts of hers, and how the ass under them is lean and curved and *hard*, and would feel fucking fantastic in his hands --

She pauses at the clock and turns, a question in her eyes...

"Uh -- go ahead. I was just... thinking."

That eyebrow says she knows exactly what he *was* thinking, but the little smile on her face is fond and really kind of *sweet*, and he doesn't pin her against the wall next to the clock, and he *does* follow her down the stairs.

When she reaches the mats, she speeds up, raises her arms -- flips up onto her hands and into a spring, another one, sticks her landing --

On her *toes*.

Jason grins and whistles. "We could probably find you a pair of heels down here if that would be more comfortable...?"

The Cave makes her brief laugh echo strangely and seriously, like maybe she's changing some of the more solid-*looking* carved out places just by being here -- "Ah... Alfred brought some of my uniforms. I was thinking -- Batgirl can't stay down long."

And what about Tim? "You *know* that's not what he was saying, right? That it's not what *anyone* is saying --"

She raises a hand and rocks on her heels, pushes up onto her toes and stretches up with her arms -- "No one but me. I *do* get it. Whether or not I can -- believe it," she says, laughing again and turning into a series of cartwheels, faster and faster until she flips up again, turns a somersault in the air --

Down on her toes. "Fuck, Tim --"

"Ohh, this feels... very, very good. It's been almost two weeks," she says, and bounces up, higher, spins into a ready position --

The first moves of the *second* kata Bruce had taught him --

Another ready position --

Jason stalks onto the mats, pulling on something like Robin with every step until he knows there's a *hard* light in his eyes and his own kind of spring in his step --

She dances back, tosses the hair that isn't there --

"Grow it out," Jason says, and winces internally because that sounded like an order, and Tim isn't dancing anymore. "I mean -- hell. I just think... I think it would look..." Jason scrubs a hand back through his own hair.

"I -- heh. The wig has a lot more body than my hair can manage on its *best* day, Jason," she says, and she's still in a ready position, but -- Batgirl isn't here.

Not entirely. Okay, they're still talking and that's... they can do this. "Your hair is... thinner?"

"Finer, too," she says, kicking out -- and drawing a line on the mats with her toes that's only invisible if you're an idiot.

"Oh -- really."

The smile on her face is almost too *cheerful* for Batgirl, for all that it's small and a little hard to catch.

Tim, all over her in this moment, and a part of Jason just wants to sit back and *watch* -- but the rest of him is in his own favorite ready position... *is* that her favorite? He'd lay money that it is, even though it's not like she goes with any one position over the others on the street.

"Of course," she says, and starts to circle, "it's been a rather long time since my hair has been much longer than this..."

"It could've changed," and Jason turns with her, watches her eyes and keeps himself balanced, breathing evenly --

The kick comes out of nowhere, but she isn't tall enough to tag him from there, so Jason doesn't move from his ready position even to block.

The smile on her face gets narrower even as she acknowledges his cool --

"I've looked at pictures of myself with longer hair," she says, and starts to circle faster. "I can hardly see myself at all."

"How much," Jason says, and *moves* for her --

Blocked, blocked --

Blocked again where Bruce would've gone for a catch --

She drops and goes for a leg-sweep that Jason leaps over, strikes down and hits nothing, because she rolls into a somersault and back onto her feet.

"'How much,' Jason...?"

"How *much* do you see yourself *now*?"

"Ooh. That's not a very friendly question at all," she says, and the laugh is silent, but it's all over her, all through her and absolutely in the sudden spin-kick that Jason *just* manages to rear back from --

He reaches for her ankle and misses, and --

She's coming for him, fast and *hard* --

"Should I apologize?" He blocks her, blocks again and spins, twists, strikes out and gets blocked hard enough that he might have bruised her forearm --

"Never. Not -- not *you*," she says, and doesn't even pause before she's using that arm to jab for him, *strike* for him at every nasty little place Bruce had taught him about --

She's *fast*, and Jason has to dance back a little -- and *move* for her again when she swallows the bait --

She jumps up over the kick he'd aimed at her shins, comes down with his thigh between her legs and flips back --

No, she stops herself on her hands and goes for a double-kick that would've bruised his ribs if he hadn't bent himself *back*, but he's fast enough to catch her ankles, spin her --

And she twists in the air when he lets her go, managing a three point landing --

No pause before she makes it four and kicks for *his* shin, grazing him with the heel of her trainer --

And if she *had* been wearing heels, he'd have a *nasty* cut coming up. "Good one," he says, and punches down for the meaty part of her calf, forcing her to pull back, spin up onto her toes again --

He doesn't give her time to get all the way up, but she blocks every blow easily, reading him *just* like she'd spent every night they worked together *learning* him as opposed to wanting to get into his shorts --

And then she kicks out *from* her crouch, solid and strong, and Jason doesn't stumble, but he does have to move back --

And then she's up again, spinning into kick after kick, and she's exactly as flexible as she should be, and every time he blocks he thinks about the time she must have put in to make her lower body as strong as Babs' had been, to make herself Bat*girl* --

"Oh, don't you fucking *stop* --"

"Wouldn't," she says, and starts going for his legs again as she twists and shifts her upper body away from Jason's punches and strikes -- "Wouldn't dream of it --"

"What *do* you dream of?" And he picks up speed, forces her back again, forces her to focus on *her* blocks and dodges --

"Gotham," and she's spinning and moving, dancing on the heels she's not wearing --

"More," he says, and goes for her knee -- gently --

But it doesn't matter, because she flips from her stance, spins and kicks for his *head* --

Jason bends himself *all* the way back --

"The night, the -- I move and I run, I fly and I -- I *dance* --"

"Fuck *yeah*, you do," and Jason tries his own flip, feels a kick *just* miss his back, gets back to his feet and *attacks*, because this is what she wants, what they both *want* --

And it's still not Batgirl. There's no tease here, and the viciousness doesn't come with a flirt. It's Tim, and everything she's learned, everything Babs and Dinah and Richard Dragon and fucking *Catwoman* --

He can see them if he looks, he thinks, if he can make himself focus on more than the heat of her when she closes, when she smiles so sharp and fucking *deadly* as she tries to numb his arms, turn his legs to fucking jelly --

Close means he can *punish* her a little, see just how much of that speed can protect her from having to block him, because it's the blocks that are going to end this, make her *need* to end this --

And he can feel it when she dances back again, when she starts using her kicks more and more --

She can do this all *day*, but she has to know that he'll catch her again, eventually, throw her *hard* --

There, her ankle in his hand and she's up on her other toe, panting and staring at him, fucking *glittering* at him --

"Jason..."

"*Don't* give," he says, loosening his grip enough that she can twist free --

And immediately kick for his face again, *absolutely* busting his nose all over his face with the reinforced heels she's not wearing --

And then it's just motion, and the fact that Tim is perfectly silent even when he *knows* the blocks must be starting to hurt her.

It's the sharp smile on her face and the sharper one in her eyes, it's the way she moves *exactly* like she was born to do just this, and fuck everyone and anyone who would try to keep her from it.

It's the fact that he's getting the kind of hard that just makes this *better*, and the fact that even though she's slowing down, she's not *stopping*, not doing anything but giving Jason more, and *more* --

She loves this. She -- she loves this as much as *he* does, and he can see it, and fuck, they should've been doing this every fucking *night*, chasing each other across rooftops and never letting themselves get too far *away* --

"Better than fucking *tag* --"

And she laughs and closes again, cries out sharp when he makes her back away from a head-butt --

Laughs again and hums and *moves*, all around him now, coming at him from every angle she *can*, and maybe this is what desperation looks like when it's sweet and perfect, when losing just means --

*There*, he catches her arm and flips her like a wrestler, and the mats knock the breath out of both of them --

She rolls, but he catches her again, pins her arms and her legs and *holds* her --

She's still laughing even as she gasps, and the color is high in her cheeks, spilling down her throat --

The scent of her is *high* in the air, shoving right up inside him where he lives and breathes and *needs* -- "*Now* you can give. If you want."

"Oh, can I...? Really?" And she laughs more, and Jason doesn't think he was being all *that* funny, but -- it's really good to hear, and maybe she needs to let it out.

"Yeah, well. If you wanna punk *out* on me..." Jason grins and watches her struggle a little to control her breathing. It's good -- no, it's fucking incredible to watch, and -- yeah. He shifts off her legs --

And she lifts them immediately, bending them back and digging her knees into Jason's sides just a little --

"Or we could do *that*. Or maybe I can just picture Catwoman teaching you how to bend that way..."

Tim smiles and shakes her head, setting her feet down on the mats with her knees still bent up. "Ah -- Barbara taught me quite a bit *long* before she called in... reinforcements."

"I'm *okay* with the image of Babs twisting you up like a little pretzel for justice."

"Mm. Extra mustard," Tim says, and twists her wrists back and forth in Jason's hands --

And Jason remembers that he's *seriously* hard at right about the same time he realizes that yes, he *is* still pinning her -- he lets go, but can't really make himself stop leaning over her, fucking *looming* --

But she's still smiling. And -- "Jason... thank you."

"*Any* time. I -- that was *fantastic*. I mean, I spar with Bruce pretty often, but it's not like *that* ever lasts long enough to make it *good*."

"Good. I -- yes," and she closes her eyes for a moment, lashes dark on her cheeks --

"You're so -- you're beautiful."

Tim opens her eyes wide, searches him for... he doesn't know. He thinks he *might* know, but --

Jason wets his lips with his tongue and braces his weight on one hand so he can touch her face with the other, feel the fine bones, the sweat at her temples, the curve of her eyebrows. It would be incredibly easy to superimpose the image of the cowl over her features -- he's *seen* her like this, *had* her like this -- but. "I just realized -- you were being Tim for me out there, a lot of the time?"

"I -- it's not something I could really. Help. Jason --"

He brushes his fingers over her lips, and he doesn't really mean to make her stop talking, and he can *keep* himself from pressing, but... It's the first time he's ever touched her mouth, and he wants that memory for himself, that *feeling*. Hard little mouth, soft only once he's kissed it hard a couple of times, bitten it a little --

"Jason..." And her voice is soft, low and *soft*, like maybe he should be straining to hear it over the sound of the generators of the bats, like maybe he shouldn't be able to *feel* it absolutely everywhere, and especially at the base of his dick.

Jason licks his lips again and he knows that he's frowning in the same way he knows that he's kneeling between her legs. It's knowledge he doesn't know how to *deal* with, what to *do* -- "I. Tim..."

She gasps like maybe *his* voice is doing things to her, like --

"Please," he says, he -- he fucking *begs*, and he doesn't even know what he's *asking* for when he has her like this, when he can press against her mouth with his thumb, stroke and --

She licks her lips, licks his *thumb*, and maybe she didn't mean to do that --

They're both moaning, and Tim closes her eyes again, and Jason can't --

He leans in slow, presses his body against hers *slow* --

She *bucks* under him and gasps again, and now she's *squeezing* her eyes shut like she doesn't want to *see* --

"Please, Tim, I -- you could. I could stop. I can stop, and -- just tell me what to *do*."

She tenses so hard it makes Jason feel a little sick with the fear that he's pushing too much again, *demanding* too much -- he pulls his hand away from her face, takes a deep breath --

And she grabs his hand *hard*, squeezes it and brings it back to her face, her mouth --

"I -- Jason..."

Breath against his fingers, warm and damp, and Jason hears himself groaning. It's nothing against the feel, the *warmth*, and this time he touches her tongue, pushes in with two fingers just to stroke --

And she sucks his fingers, licks them and sucks, and her *eyes* are still closed --

"Jesus, *Tim* --"

And it's more of a whine than a moan, high and lost. She --

She's *shaking*, and his body wants him to know that he can *help* with that, that he can press down with more of his weight, hold her still, hold her *steady* --

Hard. She's *hard* against him, still shaking and so -- Jason doesn't thrust so much as drag himself against her, giving her that friction, giving it to both of them --

And she cries out loud and high around his fingers, grabbing his shoulders and squeezing --

Shaking her head --

"*Please*," Jason says again, and "no, no wait, I'm sorry, I --" He pulls his fingers out, completely incapable of not sliding them wet over her lower lip, but -- "Do you need me to stop?"

"I want -- I don't want --" And it takes a long moment to translate that sound to the cracked and desperate laugh it *is*, and even once he does he has no *idea*.

"I just -- you feel so good against me, under me --"

"*Jason* --"

"Oh fuck *me*, Tim, *please* --"

"K-kiss me --"

*Yes*, and it feels so right to slip his hand under her head, to lift her into it and hold her there while he sucks on her lips, gets them a little swollen, a little soft --

She bites him hard and almost lunges for his mouth, slipping her tongue in under his own and stroking -- coaxing. And the sound she makes when he thrusts into her mouth makes him feel almost disconnected from his own body, or --

Like something just cut *loose* inside of him and now the only thing he can do is thrust against her, drive them together and God, fuck her *mouth*. Had she liked the taste of his fingers? The feel?

Would she ever want to -- just the *thought*, and the images are impossible, sweet and wild, and he groans into her mouth and rolls them until she's over him, because that has to be better, easier --

Something --

And now her hands are on his face, cupping his cheeks and shaking so *much* even as she sucks his tongue. Her weight on him is so good, pressing down where he needs it, and Jason can't stop rocking his hips. She's not really thrusting so much as pressing against him, riding him a little --

His body wants him to know that he can come *just* like this, that all that needs to happen is more of this, and more of the little sounds Tim's making into his mouth.

Little -- like she can't stop, like she's maybe trying to *tell* Jason something even though she's sucking and licking into his mouth just as much as he's doing into hers -- break.

She pants against his cheek and keeps pressing against him, keeps --

"Look -- look at me, Tim. Please -- oh, fuck, you --" She looks almost *hurt* and *definitely* desperate, definitely *lost* -- "Tim --"

"I can't -- you feel so good, Jason. You..." She closes her eyes again and shakes her head, shudders hard and moans, bites her lip --

"That's -- that's all I want. To make you feel good, touch you, taste you --"

"It's so -- so hard, I -- I don't think I know how to *do* this, Jason --"

"It's okay, it's --" Jason turns and kisses her cheek, reaches to cup her hips, hold them --

"Oh -- your hands --"

Jason squeezes and strokes, squeezes again -- "We don't have to do *anything* --"

"Sometimes -- sometimes all I want is for you to touch me everywhere, Jason, sometimes I can't even -- I dream of *you* --"

His turn to buck, almost fucking tip her *off*, and he's holding on too hard now, he *knows* he is, but she's thrusting against him now, and he can guide her, make it right, make it *perfect* --

"I want -- I want my *control* --"

"Not for this, not -- let *go*, Tim, please --"

Another terrible laugh, so rough it sounds like it *hurts* -- "You don't -- you don't *know* --"

"Then *tell* me, I'll listen, I'll -- I *hear* you --"

"Batgirl is the one who gets to have this, she's so much -- she *understands* this, and she knows what to do, what to feel. Her body is right for it, and she's always been --"

"Fucking *hot*, yeah, but so are you, I --" Jason stops thrusting for long enough to sit up, feel Tim straddling his lap, press them *together* --

"Jason --"

"I *want* you, I've wanted you for so long --"

"You want *Batgirl* --"

"Her, too, always, just --" Jason cups Tim's face, gripping just enough to make her stop shaking her head, just enough that they can look into each other's eyes, *see* each other. And maybe he can think a little, put together a few of the pieces --

("She's always a girl for you.")

Just --

("She'll *never* just take what she wants.")

And -- love and fear, all wrapped up together in the body he wants to feel against his own all day and night, all wrapped up with the two of them *together*, because if he pushes too hard and makes her run from him again -- he thinks he'd survive it, but it would feel like ashes, fucking *death*.

"Jason, I'm -- I'm so sorry. You shouldn't have to -- I should be better than this --"

"No. *No*, Tim. You should be *just* like this, because it's you, because it's what you feel. And I -- never mind my fucking *dick*, because you have to know that I'm *grateful*, that it means fucking everything that you'll talk to me, tell me this stuff --"

"I don't -- I don't remember ever knowing who I was."

That -- he's squeezing too hard again, only this time it's her *face*, and Jason gets that she's so far from complaining right now she's in danger of coming out the other side, but --

Coming out. *There's* a phrase. Jason lets up on his grips and strokes her face, tries to soothe -- *something*. But.

"You don't know...?"

Tim bites her lip and shakes her head, once.

His body -- the way they're pressed together -- he can focus. He can -- he *can*. Jason licks his lips and just cups her cheek again, teasing his fingers with the buzz of her hair, silky-fuzzy and warm scalp right there, waiting for a wig... "I think. I think *I* know. Or -- everything I've seen. I can tell the *difference* between you and Batgirl, now, Tim."

"I wasn't -- that wasn't Batgirl --"

"When we sparred. No, not even a little bit," Jason says, and smiles. "It was all you, and maybe a little bit of everyone who had a hand in training you up?"

Tim nods, cautious and slow.

Jason nods back. "And see, I *get* that there's not always a big difference, and that sometimes there's no difference at all, and -- I guess I always just assumed that you had dealt with that, because you're so *good* out there. Never hesitating, never getting all wound up when the assholes called you a bitch instead of an asshole or a prick -- okay, maybe that's not the best example -- uh."

Tim just looks at him for a moment -- but then she snorts. "I -- think I get the gist. You thought I was *okay* with the fact that I spent a good part of my life... being a woman."

"You *are*, though. At least -- at least part of you is, or you'd be a completely different person, Tim. Right?"

"Maybe I'm not okay with the part that's okay," Tim says, and shakes her head. "I'm... I'm your girlfriend?"

It should feel stupid to have her say it like that, or -- no. It should feel stupid that having her say it like that makes him feel so *high*, but it doesn't, and that's all there is to it. "If you want -- hell. There are some really *painful* songs I could quote here, but I won't. Just -- yeah. You are. And I told Babs -- you can correct me any time you want. Maybe you *are* just a guy who's sometimes Batgirl, but..."

"That's not how I -- read," and Tim looks past Jason's shoulders and seems to just be thinking about it, which is impressive considering how hard she is, and means Jason has to keep focusing on more than just how hard *he* is. Still --

He strokes her buzz while he waits, and squeezes her hip a little with his other hand, and just -- enjoys the feel of her.

"It used to just... feel good. I felt free, and happy, and I could play with Babs, and be Dinah's little... little *sister*, Jason. I -- and then I would go home."

Jason winces and nods. "And you were... your father's son."

"I tried to be. Not hard enough, but -- that worked, *too*, most of the time, because if he -- if he wasn't paying too much attention to me... if I wasn't what he wanted me to be, or. Or." And her face is knotting up again, and --

Jason wants to tell her that she's everything *he* wants her to be, that she's perfect and he wants her, loves her so much -- can he? Shouldn't he be encouraging her to *talk*? "Tim..."

"No. I -- no. I know this all makes perfect sense to you. I don't *get* it, but I -- I understand. I'm just the girl who's a fucking *cocktease* --"

"You're a *lot* more than that, Tim --"

She raises her eyebrow, and her smile is a hard little twist of a thing -- "I note that you're not denying that I *am* a cocktease, Jason."

"Uh -- I could --" Something. Jason gives up and laughs. "Look, I *know* you're not doing it on purpose, okay? I don't blame you, and most of the time it just gets me crazier for you, and then you're right here where I can see you, touch you -- fucking *smell* you --"

"Jason --"

"It's *great*, okay?" Jason squeezes her hip a little harder. "Because I know that you're just as hot for me as I am for you. Because you let me *feel* it, and because I know that one day you'll be able to relax, let me *really* touch you -- what?"

She looks sad and hungry all at once, desperate and -- and *sad* --

"Tim?"

"What. What if I can't? God, Jason, it -- every time I start to relax a little bit I start thinking of my parents, of the little jokes my father would tell about the gay people who worked for him, about my m-mother and what she'd think if she saw me in a pair of her heels... ah. I'm supposed to -- they don't deserve for me to be like this, and now they're *dead* --"

"Jesus, wait, *wait*, okay? I --" Jason pulls her tight against him and holds on, rocking them a little until he can feel her forcing herself to relax a little for it, feel her feeling *him*, and -- shit. Just -- "I never had to deal with my parents about my -- sexuality. Um. I can fucking *guess* how my Dad would've reacted to the fact that my girlfriend has a *dick*, but I think maybe my Mom would've been -- amused. Happy I had someone who made me feel like you do, Tim..."

"I'm not --" Tim laughs and it shudders her body against Jason's own, and it goes on for a while --

She's crying again, but she's not trying to pull away, and so Jason holds on tighter, tries to think of something to *say* --

"Oh God, Jason, what if I *am* a girl?"

"Then you're the smartest, sexiest, toughest --"

"Jason, *please* --"

"What? Tell me -- tell me what to say, Tim, tell me what you want to know, or -- I can't. I love you. I'm in love with you and I have been for a while, now, and I -- I can't let you beat up on yourself. I can't let you just *hurt*, and I --" Jason shakes his head and turns enough to be able to kiss her cheek, her forehead, and he knows he's holding on too tightly -- he can feel how she's struggling to breathe a little now, but --

He's not letting go.

"You have to know I'll do anything for you. You -- you have so much to deal with right now just with your *parents*, and -- God. This doesn't have to be about sex. You don't even have to try to *think* about sex. We can just hold each other --"

And Jason immediately makes a liar out of himself by moaning at the feel of her short nails digging in against his back, through his t-shirt --

"Shit, *sorry* --"

"No. No, don't be sorry. Not --" She sucks in a breath and laughs again, cracked and low. "You're so good to me. So -- why can't you just *stop*?"

What... *that* -- "You want me to not love you?"

Another laugh, and now she's rocking them, or maybe rocking herself and Jason's just along for the *ride*. "A *condition* or two wouldn't be amiss. Something --"

"Something *familiar*? Jesus -- Tim -- I'm not. I'm not your fucking parents, or any of the lousy fucking friends you've had who made you think you weren't good all on your own, weren't perfect and *right* --"

She gasps and stiffens, and Jason knows -- *knows* that he'd just said the exact wrong fucking thing.

Just -- "Tim, no, I'm sorry, I didn't mean --"

"You *did*. You -- I think I should --" And her hands are between them just that fast, pushing --

She stumbles to her feet, grace entirely absent for a moment until she draws herself up, strokes her palms down over her shirt --

Jason stands up, too, raising his hands when she takes a too-smooth step back, begging with everything he *is* when she starts looking around, panicked and *clearly* looking for something she can do that doesn't involve *him* --

Fuck. "Tim, let me... can we pretend the last couple of minutes didn't happen? I don't -- I didn't even know your parents or your friends --"

"Friends. I -- I have people who played D&D with me. I had -- I could call them up and. Some of them were at the funeral, but what you have to understand --" Another laugh, and she scrubs a hand back over her buzz and keeps looking around, and she rocks up on her toes -- "God, I want my *boots* --"

"Let's go *get* them, Tim --"

"No, no, there's something -- I don't have *friends*, Jason. I never -- I was too wrapped up in my secrets, even before I was Batgirl. They don't know me and they *can't* know me --"

"*I* can know you."

"I don't *want* you to," she says, and she covers her face with her hands, rocks on her toes again, again --

And Jason tries not to feel like she's just hit him, just -- tries not to fucking *beg* --

"That -- came out wrong."

"Did it?" She flinches, all fucking *over* -- "Fuck, no, not again, please Tim, I'm sorry --"

"Don't *fucking* apologize to me until you -- you fucking well do something *wrong* for once, Jason -- Jason --" And she *rips* her hands away from her face, hugs herself hard and rocks *again* --

Lets go of herself and fists her hands at her sides, stares down at the mats, and Jason still has his hands up, still -- he's still *apart* from her, and maybe that's what she wants. Needs? She doesn't want him to know her. She -- "Tell me. Tell me what you meant --"

"One day you're going to know everything, absolutely everything about me. Because that's just -- that's just the way things *are* now. I can't hide from you and I can't run from you --"

"Do you want to?"

"Always. Never. I --" She looks up, then, and there's something in her eyes that's just begging Jason to *understand*, even as she holds herself like -- like some kind of fucked-up weapon that might go off at any time.

But. "Go with never...?"

"It would feel so good if you really -- there's nothing like --" She growls, low and serious, seriously *frustrated*, and Jason catches himself patting the air where she isn't like an *idiot*.

"Tim, it's *okay* --"

"No, I -- I hurt you. A moment ago --"

"It doesn't matter. *Everything* has to be fucked up for you right now --"

"I. I love you."

"I -- oh." Jason lowers his hands and tries to think, tries not to just -- the grin that's all over his face on the *inside* wants out, but --

"I'm afraid of you. Fucking -- fucking terrified, because. Batgirl is supposed to be *strong*, and care deeply for Robin, of course, Robin is *important* to her, Robin is her partner, her friend, but maybe not her best friend, because there's Batman to consider, to be considered..." Tim shakes her head, crosses her arms and rises up onto her toes for a moment. "Possibly I'm babbling --"

"I'm listening," Jason says, and takes a step closer. Just one -- and another because she doesn't back away, because she *loves* him, she'd said it, and that means everything else has to be okay *somehow* --

"One day you're going to *know* me," she says again, and smiles ruefully, painfully --

"I already feel like I do," and he can keep his voice quiet, a little soft -- he can move *closer*, until she has to look up to meet his eyes, maybe have something physical to focus on instead of everything ripping her *up* inside --

"I don't want. I don't want to lose you, Jason."

"You won't --"

"You don't *know* that --"

And he has to cup her face again, hold her head still so she can look into his eyes --

"Oh. Jason, please --"

"You love me --"

"Yes --"

"You *want* me --"

"So much. So -- all the time, and when I was alone last night -- I --"

Jason kisses her hard, sucks the sharp little noise she makes into his mouth, strokes her cheekbones and licks, sucks -- yanks himself *back*. "You -- you don't know how many times I've jerked off thinking about you, how many -- I can't touch anyone else, can't even think about anyone else without needing *you* --"

"I -- I can't."

*Fuck*, he's doing it *again*, and maybe he's the one who should be wishing for control, because -- because. Jason nods and backs off --

"No, *don't* --"

"Tim...?"

Reaching for him and shivering, *wanting* --

Jason pulls her against him and strokes her buzz -- "I'm right here, I won't -- I'm right here for as long as you want me --"

"I just meant. Sometimes I have a hard time... masturbating," she says, so quietly it's almost not even a *whisper*, and --

Did she just say that? Really? "You -- you don't jerk off?"

Another laugh, and he really wants to hear her laugh when she's actually *happy* again, just *please* --

"Tim...?"

"Sometimes it just." She's looking past his shoulder, biting her lip... "Sometimes I can't stop myself. Sometimes I just... against the sheets, or."

Jesus. *Jesus* -- cope. "It doesn't... feel right?"

"I don't. I don't know. Oh, God, I can't believe I'm *saying* this --"

"No, it's good, it's --" Jason squeezes her against him and tries to imagine what he'd be like if he couldn't deal with his own fucking hand -- or his own dick. "Okay, it's really fucked up --"

Another laugh, and she kind of beats her head against his shoulder. "I know it is. I guess I just don't feel... like myself. When I do it."

And the hurt -- it's huge and it's -- it's fucking *impossible*, like maybe if he tries to swallow he won't be able to get *past* it -- "Is that -- is that why you freaked when I touched you there?"

"Yes. No. Sort of. I don't -- I really don't know, Jason, and perhaps you can see why I don't feel very *smart*," she says, sharp and *angry*, but he knows that it has everything -- and nothing -- to do with him.

Jason sighs and cups the back of her head, strokes her back. "I'm not -- I'm nothing *like* an expert about this stuff, but I... I think you *have* to go with what feels right, whatever it turns out to be."

And she doesn't say anything for a while, just rests her head against his shoulder and holds on, maybe tries to feel him and only him --

No, that's what *he* wants, and -- wouldn't it be easier if she was a guy? If she could... if *he* could -- Jason doesn't know how it works, and what he wants shouldn't matter. *Doesn't* matter, so long as he can have... her. All of her, just like this, and a part of him -- he knows himself.

A part of him needed *just* this, for all that she wasn't exactly cradling his head against her fake breasts when he was screwed up and angry all the time -- she was.

She just *was*, with every smile and every tease, with every *demand* that he get out of his own head and be with *her*, if only on rooftops and in alleys. He *needs* to be this for her, to give this back and *take* it for himself --

He's so fucking *greedy* -- She sighs. "Tim...?"

"I love... I love being beautiful for you, Jason. That feels. That always feels right."

Jason shivers and clutches her, turns and kisses her ear until she's shivering, too. "You always are."

"No. I mean --" This laugh sounds a little better, and --

"I'm still listening."

"Maybe if I could... maybe if I wasn't Batgirl when I -- ah. I couldn't help noticing the... disguise closet."

Jason blinks and pulls back a little, just enough to see her face. She's smiling ruefully and she keeps looking *away* -- and blushing. "I... hey. I could *help* you with that --"

"No," she says, looking at him again, and the smile gets harder. More... more. "Let me. You just... I've already kept you from training for quite some time, and I -- let me?"

Jason wets his lips with his tongue -- she looks at his mouth and blushes more. "You just want me to... I'll. Uh. I'll hit the free weights and kind of not look in that direction for a while?"

She smiles a little wider. "Thank you. I -- thank you," she says, and pulls back.

Jason nods and keeps nodding -- stops and just takes one more moment to look at her like this, flushed and tensed, cheeks wet -- "You know -- it's *going* to be okay," he says, and thinks about feeling *completely* lame --

She raises her eyebrow -- and points toward the free weights.

"Heh. Noted."

He goes, and does his level best to focus on his curls and extensions, really -- really focus, and not listen to the small sounds from over *there*, and not think about what beautiful means to Batgirl --

She likes being beautiful for him, likes --

That doesn't really sound like just being beautiful, full stop, but he has no idea how to parse that out into something that'll *just* make sense to him. Just --

So many *pieces*. Fucked up parents who had no idea what they *had* in her, and he gets that they couldn't ever *have* an idea, that it wouldn't have worked if they knew, but... still. Never takes what she wants, which means that she'd never pushed them, never tried to give them *half* a reason to look at her --

They shouldn't have needed one. They just -- no. He'd told her that his mother would've understood, and he believes that, but he hasn't told her anything about those papers that he'd found, once upon a seriously fucked up time.

Adoption papers. He -- he hasn't even talked to *Bruce* about that. He doesn't know if Bruce *knows* that somewhere out there is the woman who actually gave birth to him, and maybe the