Chapter Text
He sits with Bruce at his small dining table, a cup of hot chocolate in his hands. Bruce made some for Jason, and some coffee for himself.
“You've had a nightmare,” he had said as soon as he'd walked in, his eyes sharp as ever.
Jason had shrugged, looking down. Maybe Bruce could see it on his face– the terror and the confusion.
Bruce had put a hand on his back. It was warm and large, and Jason almost crumpled. "I'll make you something warm,” he'd said, like this was his apartment instead. Abbie went crazy when she saw him, of course. Abbie loved him. Jason had sat at the table until Bruce was done making the hot chocolate and the coffee, and then stayed silent even while he slid it over to him.
“Listen Bruce,” he says now, “not that I'm complaining or anything, but is there any reason you're in my apartment at four in the morning?”
“Yes,” Bruce says, crossing his arms, “there's actually a few that I can think of, right now.”
He sounds pretty pissed.
Jason studies the hot chocolate. They seem to have a lot of heavy conversations while drinking hot chocolate. “Leslie said my leg was okay. And that I could leave.”
Bruce scrubs a hand over his face. He looks tired. “I was at patrol before this. The Commissioner came up to me and said something about the Red Hood calling up the police and handing them some criminals. When was the last time that happened?”
Jason smiles a little. “Maybe when I was fifteen.”
“Yeah,” Bruce says. Abbie's curled up on Bruce's lap, bundled up in his coat. He's petting her, and she's looking at him adoringly with these huge mooncalf eyes.
What a drama queen.
“The leg’s fine?”
“It doesn't hurt at all.”
“That's good,” Bruce says. A pause.
“I thought you'd like to know,” he says, “Damian made me a drawing.”
“I know,” Jason says, “he told me. Did you like it?”
“It was wonderful,” Bruce says slowly. Jason looks at him.
Bruce is scratching the back of Abbie's ears gently, looking down at her with an inscrutable expression on his face. “He's been living with me for a year now, and I didn't even know he liked to draw. My own son. Did you know that?”
“He hid it pretty well,” Jason says.
“He thought it was something I'd look down on him for.” Bruce says, “He was embarrassed. And Dick knew too. And you were at the manor for all of two weeks before he told you.”
“Well,” Jason says, thinking, “I think he just wanted to impress you. You're like, his favourite person in the whole world, you know. He probably thought it was like a weakness, or something. And no one wants to look weak in front of you.”
Bruce frowns down at the table. “Am I really so unapproachable?” He says.
“Nah,” Jason says, “you're just kind of," Jason pauses, trying to articulate his thoughts, "II don' know what it is, but everyone just wants to be the best version of themselves around you,” Jason grins a little, “you inspire that in people.”
Abbie yawns, and then jumps off of Bruce's lap, plodding over to the couch, where she circles a spot once, twice, and then lies down. They watch her.
“Hnn,” Bruce says, “but not you.”
Jason snorts. “Are you kidding? Of course me too. I'm just such a trainwreck that this is the best version you're going to get for a long while.”
“Well,” Bruce says, “I like this version.”
A pause.
“And you're not a trainwreck.”
Jason snorts. “Maybe I'm not as bad as I was three months ago, or before I broke my leg, but you have to admit that I'm still pretty fucked up. I got back home from patrol today and I damn near had a panic attack. I'm pretty sure I spaced out in the shower for like, twenty minutes or something.”
Bruce frowns again, looking concerned. “You went out for patrol alone?”
Jason shrugs, “I always go alone,” he looks down. “Maybe this time it wasn't the best idea, huh?”
He gets up to put his mug in the sink, and Bruce gets up too.
“Dick told me you said that you didn't want to be anyone's problem,” Bruce says, “well I'm telling you now. You're not anyone's problem. I– I like having you around, Jay. I don't want you to leave. Just because you're better again doesn't mean you have to go.”
Jason feels something in his chest contract strangely, at that.
“I can't stay at the manor forever,” he says, weakly.
“Why not?” Bruce says, and when Jason looks up to see his face, he looks dead serious.
He laughs, a little wetly. “Because, Bruce, I'm not a kid anymore. I got sick, and then I got better.”
“My house,” Bruce says, “is not a rest home. You don't just stay there to get better. And if you wanted to leave, you should have said so earlier.”
Bruce is hurt, Jason realises. He's actually hurt.
Jason closes his eyes briefly. He'd never thought–
“And besides,” Bruce says firmly, “nineteen is too young to live on your own. You’re still a child, Jason.”
“No, I'm not,” Jason says, half heartedly. Sometimes he just disagrees with Bruce for the sake of it. He's starting to get tired of doing that.
“You'll always be a child to me,” Bruce says, his tone careful. “And I don't mean brash, or stupid, or any sort of thing like that. I mean my child. You'll always be my child.”
Jason sits back down on the chair heavily. Bruce is still standing.
“You really mean that,” he says, his voice small and shaky, “after all that I did. All those people I killed, and the horrible things I said to you.”
“I did horrible things too,” Bruce says, “I let you leave in the first place. I should never have.”
“I just– I fucked up so bad. And you still want me to–” Jason stops, his throat too right to finish that sentence. Bruce still loves him. He still does.
“That night I found you near the docks with your leg half blown up, it reminded me of another night. The wreckage and the flames, it was– it was a waking nightmare,” Bruce says. He sounds tired. Real tired. “I was the one that fucked up. And I paid for it everyday for five years. Every hour of every day. And I'm done with – with paying the price. With punishing myself."
When he looks up at Jason, his eyes are wet, “I just want to be happy again.”
Jason feels like all the blood in his body is too thick, too thick to do breathe, to do anything. He looks up at Bruce.
“Jason,” Bruce says, “come back home. For me. Please.”
*
They go up to the roof of Jason's building once it's stopped snowing, and they clear a space in the fallen snow and sit and watch the night. It's fucking freezing, and even though Jason wore his jacket and his sweater and carried two blankets, he moves closer to Bruce so he can get warmer.
Bruce puts an arm around him, pressing a kiss to his forehead.
“Dad,” Jason says, embarrassed.
“What?” Bruce says.
“Stop it.” Jason says, flushing.
“Stop what?” Bruce says. He's smiling though. So is Jason, kind of.
“Okay,” Jason says, “but you know that if I start living at home again I'll make you take me to that diner every time I have a nightmare, right? And you'll have to flirt with the waitress every night for the rest of your life.”
“Then I suppose that's just a sacrifice I'll have to make,” Bruce says, gravely.
And maybe the nightmares will never go away, and Bruce will have to flirt with the waitress every goddamn night of the year, but Jason feels oddly optimistic. He knows for sure that he doesn't have them as often anymore. Hell, maybe in a few months he'll barely ever have them.
In the cold, sharp clarity of the night, it feels like anything could be possible. Anything at all.
Because even as they look up, the last traces of night are disappearing from the sky, and with it, so are the stars– bringing forth the light of dawn.
And with it comes a whole new day.