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Maybe it wasn’t that nobody had noticed, but more so that no one had really known how to bring it up.
At least that’s what Dick thought happened.
Tim had always been a little…cherubic.
Or maybe he hadn’t?
He’d always been on the smaller side for kids his age.
Or they just hadn’t noticed?
So when Tim didn’t grow all that much after their first, second, and third year of knowing him - nobody thought much of it. The most that had been said was an offhanded comment by Bruce about Tim eating more protein once when he came over for dinner.
Even when Damian eventually overtook Tim in height there’d been more amusement by the family than actual concern.
Maybe it was because they all worked so closely together that they never really picked up on it. The lack of perspective messed with their heads or something like that. Made it so they never questioned something that, by all accounts, was normal for them.
Oddly enough it was a harmless little comment made in passing that made Dick’s brain actually actually…stop.
They’d been gathered at Gotham Academy for the End of the Year Art Show put on by all the grades.
The walls of the dimly lit private school halls had been lined with pieces of taped up art. A different wing of the school had been dedicated to displaying the projects of a different grade. The ninth graders got the western wing on the second floor, the tenth graders got the eastern wing on the first floor.
There’d been a little plastic table outside the main office with napkins, cups of fruit juice, and various baked goods provided by the PTA; something for all the visiting families to snack on as they wandered around like it was an actual art gallery. The halls had been packed like a tin of sardines with family members, students, and teachers all conversing.
Kids had been slipping between the crowds, playing with friends and giggling. Dick had been able to see the elementary age kids taking their parents by the hand and leading them up the stairs or around the corner to show off their respective masterpieces.
People had been dressed nicely. Damian had even been sporting a sports coat and slacks (likely at Alfred’s insistence). There’d been a nice atmosphere and friendly chatter all around as Dick nursed a plastic cup of apple juice in one hand and a brownie in the other.
Dick even felt a little giddy because of the little kid part of his mind that went ‘haha i’m in school and its dark outside’ because there was something about being in a school after hours that just felt special.
Damian had been standing a few feet away, clearly doing his best to not preen at the crowd gathered around the baroque-style oil painting he’d done for art class.
Something Dick had been happy about because it would distract his baby bat from realizing that both Bruce and Tim were running slightly late getting to the school from Wayne Enterprises. Something Dick hadn’t been too worried about because Tim was good at getting Bruce where he needed to be. Especially if it was stuff like a school event for Damian.
Dick had been so focused on juggling his treats into one hand so that he could answer Tim’s text of-
‘b n me enroute eta 5 min’
-with the other, that he hadn’t even noticed Damian’s art teacher, Mrs. Soo, until she was right beside him.
“Mr. Grayson! Goodness, you’ve gotten big!”
Mrs. Soo was smaller than Dick’s high school memories of her. Probably because he’d shot up about half a foot after graduating. But she still wore that bright pink shawl and big butterfly hairclips she’d always sported when Dick had been young.
Mrs. Soo had been one of those teachers that had always been easy to talk to, so falling into step beside her as she gushed about what a talented student Damian was felt almost second nature.
Before Dick realized it, five minutes must’ve gone by when Mrs. Soo's brown eyes flicked over his shoulder and settled on a suited figure that stopped beside him.
“Mr. Wayne!” She greeted warmly, hand extended which Bruce gladly shook, “so happy you could come!”
On Dick’s other side, a smaller figure swanned up beside him and silently plucked Dick’s untouched brownie out of his hand.
Mrs. Soo’s eyes drifted over to and settled on Tim, a similar smile began to tug at the edge of her wrinkled mouth at the sight of him, recognition flashing in her dark eyes at another former student.
But then. Her smile froze and she…stilled. A strange look crossed her face, a look that had something in Dick’s brain standing up straighter and suddenly tuning into what was playing out in front of him.
“Timothy?” She asked slowly, forehead scrunching hesitantly. Unsurely.
Tim blinked owlishly at her, fingers in the midst of wrapping around Dick’s half-empty cup.
“Good lord,” she breathed before a large smile stretched broadly across her face and she took a step closer, “my boy! You haven’t aged a day, look at you!”
Tim’s babyface was legendary. It wasn’t something the rest of the family was unaware of. Sure it was brought up occasionally, usually in the form of jokes and lighthearted teasing.
But it was more something mentioned in passing, not something with any real consideration behind it.
It wasn’t until a former teacher of Tim’s marveled over it that it picked at something in Dick’s brain.
Maybe it was a mix of confusion that he felt at the fascination. Watching as Mrs. Soo waved over Mr. Greene and Mrs. Lanza, the statistics and freshman Spanish teacher, and watching as their expressions similarly creased in confusion and curiosity.
All of a sudden Dick’s old high school teachers, which had also been Tim’s old high school teachers, were now oohing and ahhing over Tim.
At the time it had been a little strange. A little odd. Sort of amusing to see the familiar furrow of irritation in Tim’s brow at the fussing as he stuffed his cheeks like a hamster with cookies and various homemade pastries.
It wasn’t a novel experience for Tim- being treated like a kid, being mistaken for a kid. Poor Tim was still so small, he really hadn’t grown much in their years together and Alfred never failed to insist that it was because of all the caffeine laden energy drinks Tim would consume as a child.
“Alfred, caffeine stunting growth is a myth and you know it!” Tim would always huff whenever Alfred brought it up.
It didn’t change that it was very…true. Tim looked the same.
Dick remembered being fifteen. He remembered his voice cracking, remembered the teen acne, remembered learning to shave to get rid of his mustache, remembered devouring all the food in the manor the same day Alfred went grocery shopping because of some weird body-hormone appetite thing that was preparing for him to grow five inches taller.
But Tim…
Dick tried thinking of ever seeing Tim with a pimple. Of ever hearing his voice crack while on comms.
Which weren’t things that were red flags. Some guys just didn’t get facial hair, some guys just didn’t go through the pizza-face phase of high school, some guys just had naturally high voices.
Maybe Tim just won the genetic lottery. When everyone was old and saggy and wrinkled maybe Tim would still look as fresh and young as he always did.
So Tim's unchanging, bright, youthful appearance. It wasn’t a concern. Not really. Not for Dick and not for anyone. There were a lot of things that warranted concern in their lives and Tim not having early stress-induced wrinkles wasn’t one of them.
Everyone, Dick included, had just figured Tim was a late bloomer.
So it wasn’t that odd. If Tim turned fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen- and still he didn't change. Didn't grow. Didn’t even really show any signs of it either. But if Tim felt fine, looked fine. Then why worry?
Jason had been a runt when he’d died and he’d shot up over a foot and gained nearly eighty pounds of muscle when he returned. A lot of men didn’t even finish going through puberty until they were in their twenties. So with Tim it hadn’t really seemed like a problem.
Not until Leslie said something.
Until Bruce had been at her clinic for something and they’d gotten to talking and somehow gotten onto the topic of Tim and Bruce had joked about Tim still being a little sapling of a boy and Leslie had gotten…a look when she learned Tim was nearing twenty and still…small.
It turned out that even late bloomers needed to get checked out if nothing had happened by age fifteen.
As soon as the words ‘health issues’, ‘concern’, and ‘genetic disorders’ left Leslie’s mouth, Bruce was pulling Tim off patrol to run tests. There were a lot.
Blood, saliva, urine, sperm, protein, enzyme, DNA- and they learned nothing from them.
By all accounts Tim was a healthy young man with healthy levels of everything.
He just…didn’t look it.
That was when they finally started really looking into it. Started digging in with questions and inquiries and scrutiny over what had been happening and not happening.
That was how they found out Tim was cursed.
By going down the list of possibilities. Biological, genetic, enviormental exposure, chemically induced, poisoning - magic was obviously on the list. It was just closer to the bottom and screening mostly consisted of requesting a consultation from a short-list of magic users they had access to.
It took Zatanna approximately five seconds into a scan to inform them Tim had been cursed.
It took about another minute for them to realize that whatever witch, warlock, wizard, sorcerer, or demigod who'd done it was long in the wind.
And with the amount of time the spell had been allowed to sit, it had essentially weaved its way into being part of Tim's being.
“Removing it may do more harm than good.” Zatanna had warned them, the hard edge of caution in her voice. “Curses that have been allowed to sit for a long time, especially on an organic host have a way of sinking their way in.”
The problem and biggest challenge with dealing with a curse like Tim’s was that it had grown with him. It had sewed itself into his neural pathways, muscle fibers, fat cells, and keratin layers. Trying to seperate it from him would be like trying to remove all the little blood capillaries in Tim in one piece with only a toothpick.
Tim was still aging though. His body was still enduring the passage of time, it wasn’t like Tim was immortal. That's what Zatanna said.
“Externally there hasn’t been any visible shift in appearance, but internally his chronological age is accurate.”
It was just that his body wouldn't show it.
Zatanna had tried to explain it simply, telling them that some witches used “cosmetic” spells to keep their skin plump and tight. She told them that when she was a teenager she'd used that type of magic to avoid acne or for hiding a bad haircut she regretted.
But with Tim's case it was...advanced.
Appearance shifting magic was always meant to be temporary.
The magic to sustain it as an illusion was costly so most magic users used talismans or cast a spell on an object a person kept close to their person.
For Tim to be stuck with a youthful appearance, it had to be a curse.
A sort of 'Peter Pan' never-grow-up kind of curse which could only be broken once the victim had either repented or met the curse criteria to break it.
There was nothing Zatanna could do.
She didn’t know the requirements, didn’t know the magic user or object that had laid down the original curse. Attempting to layer another spell over Tim to make sure his appearance reflected his age was dangerous with how tightly woven curse magic was.
Curses were like self-sustaining organisms. They could go hundreds of years surviving on things like cursed objects or places. Tim had an entire curse biome living and reproducing in his body.
Had the curse been parasitic they would’ve had no choice but to take the risk associated with removing it.
But from what Zatanna had been able to tell, the curse was relatively benign so...so there was no real reason to risk Tim's life over something so…aesthetic.
Tim had agreed. So Dick hadn't argued it but...still.
Walking around with a curse on you was heavy stuff. Knowing that it permanently altered your appearance and there was nothing you could do to change it? It…it was a lot to have to accept. Even if the curse, according to Zatanna and everyone, wasn’t as severe as it could be.
“At least I don’t have cloven hooves for feet or an elephant trunk for a nose.” Tim had joked when he picked up on Dick’s unhappiness with the decision to do…nothing.
Nothing. They were going to do nothing. His younger brother was trapped in a body that wasn’t his, that didn’t match who he was on the inside and they were all just supposed to be okay with it just because it was easier?
That wasn’t…right. That wasn’t fair.
When that thought entered Dick’s brain he couldn’t get rid of it, he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Which is how he started picking up and…noticing things about Tim. About how he was treated.
People in the street, complete strangers, liked to stop Tim when he was out by himself running errands and ask him where his parents were.
Dick only knew that because Tim had mentioned it at dinner, amusement tugging at his lips as he told them about how the security guard at the mall had asked if he was lost when he found Tim walking around with his bags.
A lot of the new capes either cooed over or condescended to Tim, not knowing that Tim had more field experience than them. A lot of the new, younger capes mistook Tim as a fellow side kick. Which is how Tim ended up getting invited to a lot of the new-gen parties and hangouts. Something Tim put a stop to when a few of them tried hitting on him.
Tim could only buy clothes from the kid’s section.
Something Jason found endlessly amusing. He thought it was hilarious that Tim’s t-shirt options were limited to minecraft, memes, and minecraft memes.
Corner stores didn't let him buy alcohol or cigarettes.
Even when Tim flashed his ID the cashier just accused him of it being a fake.
Tim had gotten pulled over and nearly arrested numerous times while driving because the cops thought he was a kid joy riding.
And the bars. God. Tim couldn't even hang out with his friends or them without a bartender or stranger coming over and kneeling down beside Tim and asking if he knew any of these people.
The first time it had happened had been the first time Tim had lamented his appearance. Had shown some dissatisfaction with his…condition. Dick had thought about broaching the topic of fixing it again, of asking Zatanna, of maybe even asking Constantine or someone in Justice League Dark. Zatanna wasn’t the only magic user, there was a possibility that maybe she’d missed something, that there was another way or solution that they just needed to look for.
Afterall, Captain Marvel had been in the same boat. Billy had grown up shifting and transforming to another form. From child to man in an instant and dealing with the weight and perception that shift carried. Surely the Wisdom of Solomen knew how to undo something so similar to what Tim was going through.
Dick didn’t get a chance to ask or suggest it before Jason “helpfully” provided a list of bars in Gotham that would look the other way about shady age stuff because of course there were dive bars scattered throughout the city that wouldn’t card someone who looked fucking twelve.
Dick stopped trying to go to clubs with his brothers because people would give them dirty looks for bringing a “kid" and that was only if the bouncer actually let them through the door.
It was a lot of shit, a lot of presumption, a lot of having to manage and navigate perceptions and Dick didn’t understand why Tim wouldn’t let them try to fix it.
If Dick were in Tim's shoes he'd probably go insane from everything.
Dick didn’t have fond memories of being Tim’s age. Of being a smaller and weaker version of himself. Dick had been able to take care of himself and Bruce had always looked out for him but…
But. It had been rough sometimes. Sometimes being a kid just sucked.
Dick still thought of Slade sometimes.
When things got…bad. When his memories grew too depressing and he reminisced too hard and his brain led him down a path he didn’t like going to. He thought of him.
Mainly he thought of Slade’s smell. Of a minty aftershave smell and the nosewrinkling heavy metallic scent of blood that clung to him. Nobody ever got close enough to Slade to smell him unless he let them. When he’d been Robin, Slade had let Dick in close. To taunt him, in a way, to show him the mile-wide gap of skill between them.
Dick only got close because Slade let him get close, because he’d wanted him to get close.
Dick had always known Slade wanted to fuck him. Slade all but came out and said it.
But Slade also wanted Dick to want to fuck him. The guy had a thing about it. About people crawling on their knees for him, and coming to him and asking him to ruin their lives. He liked fucked up people and playing in their messed up little brains like they were rats infected with toxoplasmosis. Little things whose warning signals in their brains just didn’t work right so they just ran into the arms of the nearest cat.
Slade was like that. He was such an easy man to despise because he was violent and he was cruel and there was next to nothing redeeming about him. But Slade, in Dick’s mind, didn’t get really dangerous until he opened his mouth.
Dick had always thought Bruce was bad. That his cutting words that had a way of striking to the core of Dick- he’d thought he’d seen and heard the worst from Bruce.
Slade was something else. He was so good at picking up on people’s insecurities. Dick didn’t know how. He didn’t know how Slade could see someone and just know what to say so that they’d bend, so they’d give in, so they’d shut off the part of their brain that told them to run.
He knew Slade liked pulling that stuff the most on kids. Because kids were easy and stupid.
Like Tara had been.
Like Dick had been.
Even after all their years and all their clashes, Slade’s interest had never waned but…
But Dick knew the intensity of it had. He knew Slade had never wanted him more than when Dick had been fourteen.
Dick thought of himself at fourteen. Thought of how stupid and small and weak he’d been.
All the rogues had fucked with Robin, gunned for Robin, targeted Robin because he was the “easy” target. The lesser party in the Batman and Robin dynamic duo.
Nobody fucked with Nightwing.
Dick thought of the agony of being fourteen. Thought of being stuck like that. Trapped like that.
Thought of how if it had been him who’d been cursed, Bruce would have never let him leave.
Robin had been discarded because he’d grown up.
Tim was never going to grow up.
Tim insisted it didn’t bother him.
It did bother Dick it did bother Dick it did bother Dick.
He said that his work as a Red Robin was easier. Tim told them that he could still fit into the same spaces as he did as Robin. That kids trusted him and let him help, that going undercover in schools was easy.That he had the advantage in fights because he always got underestimated.
For Tim it wasn’t some great inconvenience, it wasn’t some great problem to be solved.
It didn’t bother him.
It did bother Dick.
It did.
It worried him. Worried him in a way that sometimes it was all Dick thought about.
And it felt like he was the only one that did.
Bruce certainly didn't.
In fact, Dick was pretty sure that Bruce was secretly happy that Tim looked like a kid.
Bruce had always been...softer with Tim. Always more forgiving and willing to speak to him in a tone he barely ever used with him, Jason, or Damian. And Dick knew it was probably because Bruce was entranced by the nostalgia of Tim looking the same as the day they met.
Bruce had this habit of clinging to things of the past and here was Tim, a living relic of the past- forever soft and sweet.
Whether he liked it or not.
The way Bruce would hold him, tug him close, hold his hand when they were out as a family. Leading Tim around theme parks and the zoo and the park. Gripping Tim’s hand like a father trying to protect their child from being swallowed up by the crowd.
It pissed Dick off everytime he watched it. He hadn’t been sure why, only that a deep, ripping anger had sparked in him the first time he’d seen it when they all went to a Gotham Knights game together.
Dick didn't know what he'd do if it were him in that situation. Stuck holding his dad’s hand.
Bruce and Tim hadn't been...the closest when they met.
Dick knew that.
He'd heard from Alfred about how Bruce had been a harsher teacher than he'd been with him and Jason, how once he'd even made Tim cry. Dick knew it’d been because the loss of Jason had been so fresh. Dick himself hadn’t very pleasant company for months after Jason died, he couldn’t imagine Bruce would’ve been much better.
The two had gotten better though.
Dick had borne witness to their teamwork as Batman and Robin and at first sight he’d just known that what the two of them had going had been bigger than what Dick and Bruce had ever had.
Tim was good for Bruce. Bruce was good for Tim.
The two of them were good together.
But it hadn’t always been that way. That much Dick knew.
Now here Bruce was acting like a loving and doting father. Acting like he’d always been that way.
And Dick just knew if it were him, it would burn something fierce, to have to endure the way Bruce was acting. That it would feel as if Bruce was trying to write over the past.
But not for Tim.
Tim accepted the affection and sometimes...Dick felt like maybe Tim even… played up the naivety.
Acting or saying something a little bit more childishly than he normally would. Not that Dick could prove it. It was just a…feeling.
Maybe Dick wouldn't mind. He wouldn't feel... weird about it. All the bad feelings and anger he felt probably would’ve faded away eventually once he stopped projecting so hard.
But then Bruce had to go and ruin it.
Bruce had to go and spoil it by fucking Tim.
Dick had tried not to judge. Like Tim asked and he’d only tried so hard because it had been Tim who asked and Dick would always do anything for Tim.
To their credit, both had agreed to let Tim do the talking. To ease the way. To make it easier to swallow because it was a lot to swallow.
“We didn’t mean to Dick, I swear.” Tim whispered, body curled slightly into himself. “It just happened.”
Just happened. Like this was the kind of thing you could whoopsie daisy about. But they’d come to Dick first. Had wanted Dick to know first and Dick thought that was a shitty thing for them to do. Because they knew if Dick didn’t take it well then nobody would.
As much as Jason may not act like it, Dick knew he took Dick’s word seriously. Dick knew Damian did too. That everyone else tended to listen him too because he was more likeable than Bruce.
Which wasn’t a hard thing to achieve and while maybe Dick would internally chastise himself for it, he really didn’t want to.
Tim rarely asked Dick for anything. Of all his brothers, all his friends, Tim was the one who had asked the least of Dick.
He was asking Dick for grace, asking him to listen, to try and understand.
Even though Bruce had helped raise Tim.
But Tim pleaded with him. Asked him to not be angry with Bruce, that it hadn’t been all of Bruce’s fault, that Tim had wanted this too.
Dick still remembered how Bruce used to be. So callous. So vicious. So thoughtlessly cruel. The way he'd keep them all an arm's distance away even though they were family.
Dick thought of how Tim had helped make him better. Had helped him be better.
Dick thought of how it was an undisputed fact that Tim was Bruce's better half in every way.
Dick didn’t like it. He didn’t like the thought, didn’t like the image that kept invading his head unprompted.
.
.
.
But...Tim was an adult and he could do what he wanted.
It wasn’t as though it was Dick’s place to judge.
Dick had made awful choices too. So really…Dick wasn’t that much better. It wasn’t his place to pass judgement onto Tim who would never do it to him.
So Dick. Bit his tongue. He swallowed the bitter taste in his throat.
He watched Bruce and Tim go out and tell people what they’d gone and done.
And nobody else seemed to object or have a problem with it.
Only Dick.
And that…that was something Dick hadn’t expected. It’s not like Dick had been eagerly awaiting some kind of backlash but he’d been expecting something. The most Jason had done was wrinkle his nose and call Tim gross.
That was it, nothing more. No questions, no accusations, no demands for more information, no finger-pointing. Nothing like what Dick had wanted to do.
So that meant Dick was the issue.
Fine. Okay, Dick was the issue. He was the problem. But he couldn't help it.
Tim LOOKED like a kid.
He looked like a kid a kid a kid.
If you didn't know him you'd think he was one. Strangers thought he was one, fellow capes thought he was one, law enforcement thought he was one.
Didn’t that mean anything to anyone? Didn’t anyone see anything wrong with that?
It was a thought Dick had been harboring for a long time. One Dick had never told anyone about. Because it was weird as fuck that he should even have an opinion at all, let alone one that should be voiced.
At the end of the day, Tim was the victim. Tim didn’t ask for it and he was the one who bore the brunt of the consequences. Who had to field the inconveniences and continually manage the fallout.
Tim’s life was hard enough without Dick in the background hemming and hawing over how to share his opinion on it all.
Tim didn’t change. He didn’t grow. He didn’t age.
Nobody seemed to think that was a big deal.
Dick tried to feel the same.
So Dick kept his mouth shut, he kept his opinion to himself, and he did his best to stop his face from giving him and his thoughts away.
Dick tried to ignore it, he really did.
He tried to suppress the thoughts that bubbled up and spilled over, the morbid curiosity that tugged at something inside him. Maybe it was wrong to try and ignore it because it wasn’t like Tim’s situation was going to go away any time soon.
Pretty soon after Bruce and Tim started being more…overt. Dick had tried imagining it.
He'd laid in bed one night, alone. He hadn’t been able to sleep so he’d just been staring at his ceiling and listening to the sound of his own slow, steadied breaths. He thought of the other manor’s inhabitants. So his thoughts had, of course, drifted to Bruce and Tim. To the two who were sharing a room now.
Dick had laid there for about a minute before his hand had drifted to the band of his pajama pants. As cautious fingers had slipped into the fabric, drifted past the elastic band of his underwear and took his cock in his hand.
Dick he'd tried to..imagine it.
Not dating Tim.
That’s not where his mind went.
He’d tried to imagine what having sex with Tim would be like.
Tim was small. He’d always been small. Small enough to pick up and move around. Tim’s body was still soft. Not progressing completely through puberty meant Tim’s body tapped out at the amount of muscle it was able to develop and hold onto. So more of Tim was softer than Dick was used to. His face was still pudgy and soft, cheeks still holding onto the bounce of youth.
With a face so young- it had taken a while for Dick to get hard.
Dick had to keep palming himself, had to keep stroking to try and get interested at the thought of Tim. Dick did love Tim. It was hard not to grow attached to the kid. Dick had also known him for so long.
So…so the… guilt that fluttered in Dick’s stomach was understandable. The revulsion that lined his stomach everytime he tightened his fist and imagined the sound of Tim’s breathy voice in his ear-
It made sense. It made sense why those feelings had overwhelmed Dick as he tried to imagine what it would feel like to sink into Tim, to pin him down, and hold little hips still so he could fuck his cock into him.
Dick hadn’t been able to do it, he hadn’t been able to jack off even though his cock had been throbbing and hard and clearly aroused. It had just been too much. Felt too real.
But Bruce had no such problem.
He and Tim had a healthy and rich sex life and Dick tried so hard to not to be weird and give into the pained urge to cry when Tim would stretch his arms over his head as he left Bruce's room every morning.
Tim would walk down the hall, his soft, puppyish little neck littered with fat hickies, his thighs tucked into his little highschool PE shorts, the pale flesh blossomed with handprint bruises.
Dick tried to ignore it.
For his own sanity he had to just NOT think about it too deeply. Of Bruce and how okay he was with fucking Tim, who looked like a little boy, and the implications that went along with it all.
Sometimes Dick thought about grabbing Bruce by the neck and just throttling him, of shaking him like a dog did a chew toy and just screaming in his face, voice cracking with desperation-
“Why did you have to fuck him! Why did you have to fuck him! You could fuck anyone you wanted, why him?!”
It pained Dick to think about it.
Tim was so little. He was just a kid. How could Bruce ever even think of laying his hands on him? How could Bruce get so aroused by Tim that he’d lay him on their bed and fuck him while whispering about how much he loved him and how much he loved that Tim let him do this.
Dick got nightmares sometimes. Of Tim in the Robin suit and Bruce in the Batman suit. Sometimes those nightmares got twisted.
And it was Dick in the Robin suit again. Small again. Weak again. A kid again.
Dick never been more pathetic than when he’d been a kid.
One night it had been especially bad. The kind of bad that had Dick avoiding people for days because the badness wouldn’t leave his head.
The dream had been about Slade. Slade had been fucking Tim, holding onto his body like he was a ragdoll, the force of his thrusts rocking into Tim and making him sprawl out on the bed under them as he made little pained animal noises because Slade was going too fast, too hard, being too rough.
“Slade- wait, don’t!” Dick’s voice had been hoarse and choked, his body had been frozen. Stuck at the foot of the bed like he’d just opened the door to be greeted by the sight in front of him. Dick recognized it as his old room from Titan’s Tower. Tim’s hands had been white knuckle fisting the Superman sheets under him.
“Slade!” Dick pleaded, “please, he’s just a kid!”
Dream Slade had let out a short chuckle between grunts, one hand holding Tim’s hips up to meet him while the other kept Tim’s upperback pinned so his face was kept buried in the sheets.
Tim wasn’t like him, he wasn’t like Dick who could bounce back from this.
“Oh Grayson, if only you could’ve stayed. Like. This.” Slade punctuated each word with a harsh jab into Tim, carving into his insides while he whined like he was pleading for mercy. “You used to be such a sweet little dream.”
Tim’s hair suddenly looked a touch darker. His pale skin, darkening slightly to Dick’s complexion. The teary eyes peering up at him from behind little hands shifted to the wrong shade of blue, the one Dick only saw when he looked in the mirror.
When Dick startled awake he was drenched. The plain white wifebeater he always wore to bed was soaked. Dick’s hands wouldn’t stop shaking as he tugged the collar of it away from his neck because it felt like it was constricting around his windpipe. Dick’s throat felt paralyzed, like he couldn’t even swallow. Not that he wanted to try because Dick was certain he’d throw up if he did. And Dick didn’t want to do that. Not in his bed where the slurry of stomach acid and half digested food would soak through his sheets and down to his mattress.
It was the middle of the night. Dick could tell it was because the manor had fallen into the kind of quiet that only happened when everyone was already knocked out from patrol. So Dick didn’t have to hide the mess he was as he stood on shaky feet and stepped out into the hallway.
Dick just needed…a moment. A quick walk around the manor, a drink of water, maybe a quick shower in one of the bathrooms that wasn’t near his room.
That was it. Dick made it about thirty feet before he heard a noise.
Given the age of the manor, most of the building wasn’t exactly soundproofed. And oddly enough Bruce refused to renovate it as such. He always said soundproofing was a security risk.
He always said you needed to be able to hear what was happening outside a room in case of an emergency.
So as Dick walked slowly past Bruce’s bedroom. He heard it.
Dick knew he should’ve kept walking. He knew he should’ve just ignored it.
Dick’s head wasn’t screwed on right, he was in a bad mood, he wouldn’t make for good company.
In every universe, it wasn’t the right choice, stopping in front of Bruce’s bedroom door after hearing noises in the middle of the night. In every universe, Dick knew exactly what he’d see when he carefully twisted that bronze doorknob in just the way he’d learned to do so the ‘click’ of the lock would be silent as he pushed the door open enough just to see the barest sliver inside.
Bruce’s bedroom was a mixture of different earth tones. It was the color palette he found the closest to soothing. Dick just thought they were sad and beige.
A dark brown, walnut four poster bed lay against the western wall of Bruce’s bedroom, facing the eastern windows which were letting in enough moonlight for Dick to make out the two figures on the bed.
Bruce was on his back. The buttons of his linen nightshirt were undone and spread open enough for Dick to see his scarred chest riddled with various slashes and occasional bullethole scars from the nightlife. Bruce’s sleep pants were pushed down and bunched around his mid-thigh like he’d only moved the clothing enough to have access to his cock.
Tim was on Bruce’s lap. His pajamas were gone, discarded somewhere on the bed or the floor. Dick could see his little feet were tucked in fuzzy, white spa socks which were on either side of Bruce.
Dick felt his chest go tight as he watched Tim’s hips slowly rock against Bruce. Bruce’s hands were holding onto Tim’s sides, fingers stroking and caressing the soft skin as Tim sighed and softly pressed up and dropped back down onto his cock.
Dick could see it. He could see it. The strain of the pink rim of Tim’s hole tugging a cock out and swallowing it back down. Tim’s cheeks were red from exertion, little chest rising and falling with quick breaths.
Dick closed his eyes but he could still hear it. The quiet squeak of the springs, the wet slaps of a cock fucking into tight, wet insides. Bruce’s breathing was contolled and Dick could hear the soft, low hums of pleasure he was making, the little murmurs of Tim’s name as Tim fucked himself on top of him.
Tim was half Bruce’s size. Even with his eyes shut tightly Dick could still see it. He could still see the narrow shoulders that tapered down to slim hips and soft, fleshy thighs. He could still see Tim’s face. The one with puppy fat and red lips that parted so that the pretty little song of a Robin could echo around the room.
Dick’s bottom lip was trembling and only stopped when his teeth latched onto it and bit down.
“Bruce-” Dick heard Tim’s choked voice mewl, “mmph, Bruce hnngh Bruce I’m, I need-”
A pit in Dick’s stomach form as he heard Bruce let out a tender, amused chuckle. An indulgent sound.
It made Dick feel like ants were crawling up his back.
“It’s okay Tim, are you tired?”
A miserable sounding affirmative whimper. The shift of blankets, the rocking of springs, an out of breath ‘oof’ from Tim, and the familiar breathing pattern of Bruce getting comfortable.
Dick couldn’t stop himself from peeking back in.
Tim was on his back, his slightly long hair forming a soft halo around his head as Bruce nestled between his thighs. Tim’s slim legs were on either side of Bruce, hooked around his lower back at the ankles, socked toes slightly curled and locking them together.
Tim’s eyes were closed, his brow soft, as he mouth was parted and making sweet little ‘ah ah ah’ noises. Bruce’s hands were curled into fists beside Tim’s head. His face was tucked and buried into Tim’s neck where Dick could hear audible wet kissing noises. Noises that only barely covered the rapid, wet thrusts Dick could hear getting punched into Tim.
Bruce’s hips pulled back in quick, purposeful thrusts before spearing into Tim like he was trying to stab him to death with his cock. Every piston into Tim had Tim’s body getting shoved further and further up the bed until Tim’s palms came up to prevent his head from collinding with the headboard.
Dick could hear every noise. Every ‘ahn ahn ahn’, every soft plea to Bruce, every whisper of Tim’s name. He could hear the wet squish noises of Tim’s insides.
Worst of all. He could hear the care, the love dripping from Bruce and Dick knew it was love because he’d never heard Bruce talk like that while fucking any of his whores.
And that made it so much fucking worse. Because Bruce was doing this and he loved Tim.
It wasn't anyone's fault.
Maybe if Tim had never been cursed maybe he and Bruce would've still ended up together anyway. It was possible.
It was possible that maybe Bruce didn’t love fucking Tim solely because he looked like that, sounded like that, felt like that.
Even though Bruce fucked Tim more often than he’d ever fucked any of his exes.
Even though there was this light in his eye that Dick didn’t like when he caught sight of Tim in his old high school clothes because they still fit perfectly.
Even though sometimes Bruce pulled Tim into his lap like a Santa Clause at the mall and would wrap his arms around Tim’s waist and it just looked so wrong to see them like that.
Even though sometimes when they went out to eat Bruce asked for a children’s menu for Tim because Tim ate like a bird and didn’t want a full sized portion.
Even though Dick could hear Tim whining a soft, wrecked, “Daddy daddy please go faster, daddy more, I’m so close,” from the other side of the door.
It was possible, in another universe where Tim never got cursed, both he and Bruce would have ended up togther anyway.
But at the same time. It was also possible that neither Bruce or Tim even thought of it as a curse.
Maybe to them, it was a blessing.