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“Why do I even bother?” Jason asked knowing his question wouldn’t be answered. The bookcase blocking the door finally got with the program and move enough so he could slide inside the dark apartment. The air was thick with stale food and cheap liquor. It was a mess and he didn’t need a light to see it. The floor was littered with clothes that tried to twist up his steps and various trash crumpled underneath his boots. Raising a hand he jerked the hood of his jacket down and leaned to flip the switch. The blub seemed to be on its last leg casting the room in a dim flicker of yellow tinted light.
Damn. The place was worse than he had expected. The TV had a busted screen and everything else was on the floor. Books were scattered and some were even gutted leaving trails of loose pages in their wakes. It was destroyed. There were firearms littered over the kitchen counters and some had even fallen to the floor. Ignoring the pang of guilt in his chest, Jason trudged through the debris of a once well put together ‘bachelor pad’ as Roy had dubbed it. The door of the fridge was wide open and bare minus a box of baking soda and an empty beer can. Alfred’s voice rang in his ear urging him to close the door. He resisted and started down the hall. The door to the bedroom was hanging by one hinge, shoved to the side with a dip the size of a fist denting the wood.
“Roy?” He called out, voice low from being forced through gritted teeth. “Roy?” He called again raising the volume as he walked into the bedroom. He should have guessed that the red head would be in similar state as the apartment, but nothing in the world could have prepared him for seeing his best friend face first in a pile of his own vomit. Rushing to the other man, Jason slid to his knees turning his friend over and shaking slightly. “Christ….Roy wake up.” He slapped the rough cheek of the other man not caring about the vomit that would surely be on his hand.
The man in his arms didn’t respond and his face was a shade of gray/green that was enough to force bile up from the pit of Jason’s stomach. Latching his arms underneath Roy’s, he hoisted his friend up as much as he could before dragging him toward the small bathroom. Careful to keep the redhead from banging against the porcelain of the tub, he groaned and strained the muscles in his back and arms until Roy was fully inside the bathtub. For all the apartments faults the owners hadn’t skipped out on making sure someone over 5’4 could fit in the damn thing. Small favors Todd, he reminded himself mentally. He turned on the water, adjusting it to a notch above freezing so he wouldn’t send Roy into shock. If Jason had been a praying man he would have sent up a quick plea, but he wasn’t a praying man. He had never even been a hoping man, but that was before he cut the shower on. He all but fell to his knees and his mind was doing a whole lot of that hoping business as he watched the spray cover his best friend’s face.
Roy shifted slightly under the assault before gasping. His hands fumbled to reach for the edge of the tub but he was weak and didn’t seem to be able to close his fists. His mouth tasted like shit. Hell he felt like shit. The pounding in his head rattled his ears before sending pangs of light through his eye sight. Or maybe that was pain from the water bleeding into his eyes? He hadn’t even realized he had opened them. Surging forward his chest hit the side of the tub, arms hanging over to the floor. It was easier to breath without water in his mouth and the colors of the room started to register after a few blinks.
“Fuck.” The word held the taste bile and liquor and sent shivers over his cold skin. How long had he been out? How did he get into the damn shower? The last few days were a blur at best and he wasn’t going to try to piece them together until his head didn’t beat in time with his speeding heart.
“Yeah. Fuck.” Jason echoed resting back on his calves before leaning against the wall. He stretched out his legs in front of him bending one knee so he could prop an arm on the ball of the joint. Roy jumped slipping a bit before meeting his friend’s eyes. Jason’s icy stare made the water feel like a hot spring. Of all the people that could have been sitting in that spot Jason was the one Roy wanted to see the least.
“C-can you kill the water?” Teeth chattered through the words before he clamped his jaw shut. There was no answer. “Figured.” He grumbled moving to reach for the faucet but his hands were still having trouble with the whole grip thing. Hiding his incompetence he tried again. And again. And again. The sigh that Jason expelled was heavy and weighted with all kinds of negative shit that Roy didn’t want to deal with or hear about. The water stopped.
“You can’t even turn a damn knob, Roy.” This time the other man’s words weren’t as hard and somehow that pushed Roy further down his dark hole. Anger he could handle. The other emotions? Not so much. Or at all really.
“Ollie send you?” He rasped, folding his arms over his chest for warmth.
“No.” Jason chunked a towel against Roy’s face. The archer shivered before wiping his face and wrapping the rough cotton around his shoulders. “Come on.” Jason didn’t wait on Roy to move, instead he drug him up by firm grips on his shoulders. Roy somehow managed to step over the tub on his own only swaying into Jason a handful of times as they walked into his room. God the place was a wreck.
“Wow. Way to go Harper.” He sighed, tossing the towel onto the vomit as he passed. “I think I can get dressed by myself.” Jason nodded taking long strides out of the room and down the hall. With a glance around the room Roy ran a shaky hand through his dripping hair. “Damage control time, Harper.”
It took Roy an hour and forty-five minutes to dress himself, brush his teeth, and clean up the contents of his stomach out of the worn shag carpet. Jason had busied himself with the living room and kitchen making quick work of the largest parts of the mess. He was assorting the guns on the kitchen table when his best friend made an appearance. He wanted to bitch the guy out for so many things one of them being the amount of time he took to do simple fucking tasks, but he remained silent. Hands working over a few guns ensuring that the safety was in place and the barrels empty.
“Jay, I’m sorry you had to see that shit.” The archer pulled out a chair, flopping onto the wooden seat. His hair was still damp but most of it was hidden underneath a red trucker hat. The t-shirt and jeans were clean as far as Jason could tell which was a welcome surprise seeing as how he thought everything in the apartment would be covered in shit either figurative or literal in nature.
“You were laying in your own puke this time. Unresponsive.” Jason spoke in clipped syllables. Roy knew it was his ‘mission report’ voice and he hated it. “What if I hadn’t been here?” Roy shook his head, eyes tilting up and being captured by Jason’s enraged stare.
“Listen, Jaybird, I’m not your problem. Stop tryin’ to take responsibility for me.” He saw anger flare in those hard blue eyes that still managed to take his breath away.
“If I don’t take responsibility who will? Huh? You’ve pushed everyone else away. I’m not gonna let you crawl in some hole and die.” Jason's voice echoed through the kitchen. Roy stood up, swaying slightly for a brief moment. He wasn’t a child and he wasn’t going to be berated. Ever.
“Stop talkin’ to me like I’m some fucking kid, alright?” The bark in Roy’s voice caused Jason to stiffen and take a step forward as his hands fisted at his sides.
“You were clean for a year Roy. A whole fucking year. And you threw it away just like that. Like it didn’t mean a damn thing. I thought you were tired of living in the gutter and here you are right back among the sewer rats.” Jason ran a hand through his dark hair and it was the first time Roy noticed that he had buzzed the sides.
“I know.” The response shocked both men and forced a break in the tension. “I know. I fucked up. I’ve never been good at managing the shit on my own, ya know?” Roy fell back into the chair he had abandoned. “I guess I have more pride than I thought because I couldn’t crawl back to Ollie or Dinah. Hell or even you. I skipped out on you and I’m sorry for that.” Jason watched with a furrowed brow but he could feel the tension easing out of his shoulders. Three months ago Roy had walked out of an assignment and away from their partnership. The dark haired male could have laughed at how much an ‘I’m sorry’ could mend when it was sincere.
“I’m scared of a whole lotta shit, Red. A whole lot of stuff…up here.” Roy tapped at his head with a bruised index finger. “When I can’t deal with it. I don’t. I get lost back in all this.” His voice caught in his throat when Jason squatted down in front of his knees.
“Harper, I get it. I get being trapped in your mind. You gotta let me help you out of it. If not me then someone. Damn Roy. Trust me when I tell you, you can’t do that shit alone.” In that moment, Roy remembered why he had fallen in love with Jason Todd. The memory hurt almost as much as the unspoken words in this throat. It was so much more than being a recovering addict. If Roy admitted all the shit that went on in his head he would be committed at the very least. To tell Jason that he loved him way passed the boarders of friendship would be the final nail in his coffin. The reason Roy had everything to do with his cowardice and nothing to do with his vices. In a way Jason had become his new drug of choice and he was smart enough to know that was a bad idea. A dangerous idea that made him feel like a stranger in his own skin. A dangerous idea that could cost him Jason.
“I can’t drag you down with me.” He whispered leaning on his thighs. “I won’t.”
“Then hold onto me.” Jason gripped his friend’s knees softly. “Let me keep you afloat. You won’t drag me down because I’m not gonna let you hit bottom again.”
“I can’t keep doin’ this. I can’t. I’m getting to where I don’t wanna wake up.” The admission burned his throat and tongue. He felt Jason’s grip tighten.
“I’m sorry but as long as I’m around you’re gonna wake up.” A strong hand tilted his chin up all but forcing their eyes to meet fully again. “I’m gonna wake you up every goddamn day, Harper. You’re gonna suck air into those lungs and I don’t give a fuck if that’s all you can do. I don’t care how long it takes. I don’t care if I have to spend the rest of my life waking you up.” Jason’s bottom lip quivered slightly but the rest of his expression remained hard.
“You got bigger shit to worry about Bat-Boy.” The attempt at a smile was feeble and judging by Jason’s wince it had been a poor excuse of one. “My issues and vices shouldn’t even be blip on your radar.”
“Is that what it boils down to, Roy?” Jason asked with knowing sadness in his tone. “You think you don’t matter?” Roy didn’t answer. He couldn’t. That wound was too new to poke. “You matter a hell of a lot. To Ollie and Dinah and Dick and Kori and Wally. To me.”
“Jason,” The name left his lips in a low rasp.
“No. You don’t get to do that. I pick who matters to me. That list is fucking short but your name is on it, alright? Pretty damn close to the top if I’m being honest.” The hand that had been holding Roy’s chin finally dropped.
“You really want to star in this shit show?” Roy closed his eyes trying to ease the stinging. Jason watched his friend for a few moments. It had been a long time since someone had meant this much to him. Too long. He would never admit it out loud but in that moment, in that kitchen he felt like a human being again. The emotions swimming over him helped to mind him that he wasn’t a robot or too damaged to feel. It was good. Really good.
“Every day. I mean it. I’m going to wake you up every single day.” Roy’s lips lifted into a smile. A real smile that crinkled the sides of his eyes. Later he would chalk the feeling of elation up to Jason’s kindness and friendship. The parade of excuses would roam over his mind in an attempt to trample the truth inside the memory. The thought of waking up to Jason every single day made the road to sobriety seem worth it. That was the God’s Honest beneath it all.