Chapter Text
Tim shut the door gently behind him, locking it and engaging the security system with quick, silent hands. He stepped lightly through the front entry hall, not wanting to wake his dad up. Jack Drake had a bit of a temper, and Tim had never known his dad well enough to be able to determine if this was a new thing caused by the traumatic accident and death of his wife. Even on the best of days, Tim didn’t really know how to talk to him without setting him off over something.
It seemed the only time his dad was happy was when Dana was around. But lately Dana had been putting her foot down about Jack’s drinking. She was concerned he was drinking too much. Tim had never heard them fight like he used to listen to Jack and Janet as a kid, but harsh whispers behind closed doors were often followed by Dana rapidly packing a bag or a suitcase and leaving for a few days. Whenever she left, Jack would restock the liquor cabinet and work his way through it before he’d finally call her up and make promises he didn’t intend to keep and buy her apology gifts in an attempt to appease her and distract her from the problem.
Jack and Dana were currently on the outs, right now. Tim had watched Dana pack her suitcase a couple days ago, sniffing and wiping at her smudged, tear-stained makeup. When he’d grabbed the door for her, he was surprised when she put her hand on his shoulder and told him that if it ever got to be too much for Tim, she’d come get him if he needed her to.
Tim had been touched by her concern, but he had politely declined. Leaving wouldn’t sit right with him.
When his dad had woken up from his accident, Tim had been there while his dad learned about his mom’s death for the first time. It was the longest conversation Tim could remember ever having with his dad one on one. They’d cried together and his dad had patted Tim’s back while telling stories about Janet that Tim had never heard before.
Stories about their life before they’d had Tim, and Tim had had a hard time connecting the person his dad described as Janet Drake to the person Tim had known as his mother.
It felt like they were grieving two different women. The mother who’d never had time for him, and the woman he would now never get to know.
As Tim visited his dad more and more in the hospital, Jack started to realize just how little he knew about his son. He talked about how short he realized life was. How there were only a few years left for him to be Tim’s father, and he wanted to make the best of them. He said when he got better and things were sorted, he wanted to do things with Tim, take him to a Gotham Knights game, and show him how to golf.
Spending time together sounded good to Tim. He wondered what his dad would say if he didn’t get better, though. Because listening to the doctors, it seemed like there was a pretty big chance Jack wouldn’t be able to walk again.
But Tim tried not to think about that.
When his dad was ready to come home from the hospital, Tim moved back in with him.
Tim was still benched from Robin at the time, thanks to almost getting murdered by his undead childhood hero, whom he’d idolized for only most of his childhood. He was doing physical therapy for his ankle and his wrist, so he really wasn’t much help to Bruce and Dick.
His dad, though... Jack needed to do a lot of physical therapy after he came home from the hospital if he ever wanted to walk again, so Tim thought it could be something they would do together.
And they had for a bit. The cover was that Tim’s injuries were from a mugging. Dana worked with his dad and Tim worked alongside the both of them, encouraging his dad and enjoying chatting with Dana. But when it became apparent that Tim was becoming more and more of a third wheel, Tim made excuses so he could get out of the house more.
It had taken some convincing, but Bruce eventually allowed him to work cases in the cave while Batman and Nightwing scoured the city for the Red Hood, under the condition that Alfred would make sure he didn’t strain his injuries when he used the cave’s equipment to do his physiotherapy. Maybe a little too excited to get away from Drake Manor, he’d told his dad he’d decided to continue his Wayne Internship.
His dad initially hadn’t had a problem with it. But as time went on and his dad’s new hobby seemed to be drinking expensive liquor, he seemed to form something against the internship almost overnight.
He always acted jealous or annoyed whenever Tim brought it up. His new attitude about the internship only got worse when Dana wasn’t around. And when Dana wasn’t around, the drinking was worse.
It was a rough cycle.
Tim tried his best to not bring the internship up around his dad anymore. He would slip out if his dad and Dana were spending time together, or he’d leave a note saying he’d gone out to see a friend.
He figured after everything his dad had been through, Tim could afford to be a little sensitive to things that might upset his dad.
On late nights, instead of coming back home and risking his dad’s ire, especially if he and Dana were on the outs, Tim would spend the night at Wayne Manor if his work with cases ran particularly late. He would text his dad that he was at a sleepover, and his dad would send back a thumbs up if he was in a good mood.
Staying away from Drake Manor on those later nights was convenient for everyone because Tim could be useful to Bruce and Dick without worrying about missing a curfew, and he was still out of the house so he could give Jack and Dana plenty of time alone. It was also convenient for Tim on nights when Dana wasn’t home because Tim didn’t interact with his dad as much when he’d been drinking.
But then Bruce and Dick brought Jason home.
Apparently, Tim being out of commission and unable to fly as Robin was what everyone needed for Bruce and Dick to work through their own stuff to work together and get through to Jason during Jason’s grand showdown.
Tim wasn’t exactly clear on the details, but suddenly Jason was recovering upstairs in the manor from apparently having brought a building down on top of himself, and the reports Tim had glimpsed over Bruce’s shoulder mentioned the Joker was recovering from a nonlethal gunshot wound.
No one had tried to talk to Tim about it, and when he’d tried to snoop himself, Oracle stopped him. She told him that it was between Jason, Bruce, and Dick, and that someone would fill him in. But that was almost two weeks ago.
Being benched as Robin and unable to escape to Wayne Manor or hide out in the cave had Tim talking to classmates at school and volunteering for after school projects. More so on the nights Dana wasn’t staying over. His dad still wasn’t the nicest drunk, even when Tim told Dana he'd taken 'a break' from the internship due to Mr. Wayne having a family emergency when she'd asked him over an awkward dinner with just the three of them.
"That's too bad," she'd hummed. "I've seen how much you seem to enjoy it, Tim. I hope for your sake whatever Mr. Wayne is dealing with gets resolved quickly."
His dad didn't say anything and Tim pretended he didn't see Dana nudge Jack. Jack grunted before offering a lackluster, "Yeah, that's too bad."
Tim had always known that him being Robin was just a temporary gig. He had suspected that Bruce would get tired of him, like how his mom and dad had when Tim was younger. He didn't expect it to come to a close so abruptly.
He wasn’t expecting how much it all hurt.
He had yet to be officially fired. Maybe Bruce appreciated all the cases Tim had been working on in the cave? Maybe he was just waiting for Jason to recover from his injuries before breaking the news to Tim? Either way, once Tim was cleared, he took to the streets as Robin with a new fervor.
Knowing that the time he had with his heroes, the time he had in Gotham’s skies, the time where he finally felt like a part of something, was coming to an end, Tim had been determined to make the best of his numbered patrols.
Maybe if he could prove he could continue to be useful, maybe then they’d let him stick around and work cases in the cave.
Losing Robin would be devastating, sure, but Tim could still be useful, right?
The guardianship thing with Bruce was only ever meant to be temporary, anyways. Just until his dad woke up. So, he didn't need to come up to the manor anymore. It was fine!
But those hopes were dashed when Tim had received the text from Bruce, suggesting Tim take time off as Robin to focus on his end of semester finals. Tim asked if Bruce wanted him to go over any cold cases at the cave, and Bruce told him that he’d rather Tim take the break.
A week was a long time for a “break” but Tim got the hint. It was probably better for Jason’s recovery that he knew Tim wasn’t lurking anywhere near the manor, anyways.
Once he was fired, officially, at least there wouldn’t be any more awkward tension between him and his dad over his internship. So. That’s good, right?
Currently, he was coming back from hanging out with one of his classmates he’d befriended since taking his “break” from the superhero community.
Bernard, who made Tim laugh and could help take his mind off of how everything was falling to pieces around him. Bernard was probably the best thing that’s happened to Tim in a long while. He was easy going, funny, and always had something to talk about. It was nice to have someone to talk to who Tim didn’t feel like he was walking on eggshells around. It was nice to spend time with someone who never seemed anything except honest and genuine with Tim.
Before Tim could get out of Bernard's dad’s car, Bernard grabbed his hand, stroking a thumb over his knuckles, and told Tim he’d had a good time and that he really liked Tim. Like, maybe more than friends.
Tim had been outwardly stunned and taken aback, and Bernard had backpedaled desperately, telling him it was okay if he didn’t feel the same way, that even just being friends was okay with him, and it was just a little crush that would go away.
Tim hadn’t thought about what he was going to say in response. But he could see it, could see them in that moment together, maybe. Because Tim liked Bernard a lot. His mouth was moving before his brain could catch up. “Well, what if I don’t want it to go away?” he’d asked, and it was Bernard’s turn to be stunned and taken aback.
They’d stared at one another before Bernard broke out into a slow grin, cheeks turning a rosy color. Tim’s face mirrored his, and Bernard pushed playfully at Tim’s shoulder.
“Shut up, you did not just say that?! That was so smooth, Tim, oh my god!” Bernard had said, laughing, and Tim could only grin, heart pounding, his own cheeks flushing up to the tips of his ears. “You’re serious?”
Tim’s brain caught up to the conversation and started making a fool of himself right away, “I’ve never - I know I like you a lot, Bern, and I don’t want to hurt your feelings or, like, lead you on. But I’ve never - I mean, I don’t know if I’m -”
“Hey, don’t worry about it,” Bernard cut him off gently, still smiling, but it was softer now, understanding and Tim could melt at how wonderful Bernard was and how easy he made everything seem. Yeah, he could definitely see it. Tim could picture a lot of things, if Bernard kept looking at him like that.
“We can talk more about it later. No pressure, okay?” Bernard said fondly, “There’s plenty of time to figure things out. Text me whatever, whenever, okay? If you change your mind, no worries. But if you don’t, just so you know, I’m taking you out on an actual first date. A proper one. With me picking you up and there’ll be reservations and a whole plan and stuff. And flowers! Unless you’re allergic.”
“I’m not allergic,” Tim said, feeling a little giddy and dazed. He’d opened the car door, getting out before he could make even more of a fool of himself or ruin the good mood. “I’ll text you!”
Bernard rolled the window down after Tim closed the door, calling after him, “I’ll be looking forward to it! You’ll get a wooing like you’ve never been wooed before!”
Tim snorted, shaking his head at Bernard. He said honestly, “I’ve never been wooed before.”
Bernard responded easily, “Well, it’s Gotham. Most people here are crazy. That’s probably why.” He waved at Tim, “Seriously, though, there’s no pressure. Take your time and think things over, and if you need someone to talk to about this stuff, you can message me.”
“You got it,” Tim promised, mind already half made up.
He felt like he was floating as he unlocked his front door and slipped inside. Once his back was against the door and he’d armed the security system, he took a moment to check in with himself, listening to Bernard’s car drive away down the long driveway, asking Do I really like boys, or do I just like Bernard? Because the more Tim thought about it, the more he liked the idea of going on a date with Bernard.
Tim was still standing in the front entryway, smiling to himself like an idiot, and tapping nervously on his phone as he thought about what he was going to say to Bernard and how long he should wait until he said it when the light in the entryway flicked on above him. Tim jumped, making startled eye contact with his bleary eyed father.
“Where have you been?” His dad asks, filling up the doorway to the kitchen, face red and twisted, and it’s in a tone of voice Tim recognizes but hasn’t heard in a while. Hasn’t heard since Janet Drake was alive and Tim’s excitement at his parents being home soured and curdled in fear when their fighting began and things started breaking. Hearing it directed at him had dread creeping down Tim’s spine. This is more than his dad’s usual upset about his internship. “It’s late,” his dad says, face darkening. “Makes me question what exactly you were doing at that damned ‘internship.'"
Tim swallows reflexively, putting his phone away in his pocket so it doesn’t fall from his sweaty hands. “I was out. I thought we talked yesterday about how I was going to hang out with a friend tonight?”
Jack swirls his glass. In the hall light, his alcohol flushed face makes him look feverish. Tim wonders what’s happened. Wonders if Dana had come home and if they had fought again. He mentally goes through everything he did this morning before leaving for school, and can’t remember having done anything to warrant the third degree.
“Yeah, a friend ,” Jack says, mockingly, and Tim feels his breath stutter in his chest, dread solidifying like a solid weight in his stomach. Had his dad been watching them from the window? Had his dad been listening from the window? Jack, normally unobservant, must catch something in the expressions that twists alarmingly across Tim’s face before he’s able to get ahold of himself. It shouldn’t have been possible, but his dad just gets angrier, snarling, “Who was your 'friend,' Tim?”.
“Um, well, there were a few of us that were gonna go see the movie, dad,” Tim says, honestly, trying to keep calm despite his heart pounding in his chest. He needs to act normal, and show he has nothing to hide, otherwise his dad will just think he’s lying. His dad hardly reacts, still staring at Tim like he’s gum on the bottom of his shoe. Tim swallows nervously, “I-I’m sorry. Did you need me for something? Was there a curfew I missed?”
“Don’t act dumb,” his dad snaps, eyes hard, and Tim feels dread pooling sickly in his stomach. Once his dad’s started, it’s near impossible to calm him down. “I got a phone call today from some fuckin’ reporter asking if I had met my son’s boyfriend, and what I thought about your relationship. I said, ‘you must have the wrong kid, Miss Vale. My Tim is a good kid. He’s got a good head on his shoulders. He wouldn’t be running around with some boy.’ You know what she said, Tim?”
Tim could hardly breathe. He shook his head weakly.
“She said she was certain it was you. She even got a picture of you holding hands. A picture, Tim!” Jack yells, smacking the wall with the flat of his hand.
Tim jumps, breath hitching, he stammers, “I - we weren’t - he’s not my boyfriend, dad. I don’t-“
“Stop lying to me!” Jack roars, face flushed red with drink and rage, and Tim feels sick with anticipation. Just get it over with , he thinks. Just hit me and send me to my room, please. He’s tense, looking up at his dad with wide eyes, and his dad turns away from Tim with a noise of disgust, stalking into the kitchen with quick strides. Tim can hear him snapping things under his breath as he does so, but it’s nothing Tim can make out.
In the kitchen, his dad tops his drink off, movements rigid. Tim has a fleeting thought about going upstairs while his dad’s back is turned, but he dismisses it as quickly as it came, knowing that doing so would only make things worse.
Tim’s always been very careful not to make things worse.
Jack whips around as Tim uneasily steps into the kitchen, knocking the liquor back and groaning at the burn. “I’m sick of the lying,” his dad says after a moment, voice low and trembling with an intensity that has the hairs on Tim’s neck standing on end. “Always back talking and asking fuckin’ questions, and I’m sick of hearing that I need to do better by you, for you. Sick of hearing Dana say you never got to be a kid, never got enough attention, boohoo poor little Timmy. Well, how the hell am I supposed to do that when you’re lying and running out the door every chance you get? And now you’re out there fucking boys! Is that - how could you do this? Do you have any idea what this will do to us? To the company? To me ?”
Tim ducks back quickly when his dad throws the empty glass across the room, and Tim watches it explode next to where he’d been standing in a shower of shards and whiskey. Here it comes, Tim thinks, and he puts his hands up defensively, backing up and widening his stance in preparation for the blow, but relaxes when he sees his dad hasn’t moved towards him.
Jack Drake is standing close to the kitchen island, still glaring at Tim, chest heaving rapidly and fists clenching and unclenching. “Or is this a cry for attention? Because you have it, Tim,” his dad snaps. “Got something you wanna tell me? Or is this not the attention you were hoping for? Too. Fuckin’. Bad. You’ll certainly have everyone’s attention tomorrow with whatever Vicki fuckin’ Vale decides to put in the paper!”
Tim rushes to explain, “Dad, just listen to me, please. I don’t have a boyfriend, or a girlfriend! I’m not lying, dad! I was hanging out with my friend Bernard. We’re just - good friends, that’s all. She must’ve just seen us at the skatepark! I was trying to show him how to stay on the board.” Jack doesn’t say anything, just grabs the bottle off the kitchen island, eyes not leaving Tim as he takes a drink straight from it. Tim eyes the bottle warily, noting how low its contents are. Isn’t alcohol a depressant? Why couldn’t he have been asleep when I got home? He takes a quiet breath, taking his chances, and asks in a rush, “Can I be excused?”
The bottle hits the table with a heavy hand and Tim tenses, apologies already on his tongue, but his dad gestures between the two of them before saying, “We’re having a conversation, Tim. Man to man. Father to son.” Tim nods, opens his mouth to apologize, but his dad bulldozes over him, saying, “I know your mom and I weren’t around much when you were younger, Tim. I’ve tried, now, to be more involved. Tried to kind of make up for lost time because life is short, and after your mom - well - I realized that I wanted to spend time with my son. I wanted to do the things we never got around to doing when you were younger. I wanted to find out who your favorite teams and players were, and wanted to cheer you on at some sporting event… I wanted to throw the football around in the yard, take you golfing with some friends of mine, take you to a ball game, spend time together, just me and you... But you don’t like hanging around with your old man much.”
Tim shook his head, feeling guilty, “No, dad, that’s not it. I like when we spend time together! I’ve just never really been into sports. It’s not really my thing. But I wouldn’t mind going to a ball game with you sometime? Just… maybe we can also do something I like to do, too?”
“Yeah? Like sucking face with your good friend ?” Jack snaps, and Tim inhales sharply at the whiplash and the reminder of why Jack was initially upset with him.
“No? I - I -” Tim stutters, and he stops trying to say anything when he sees the look on his dad’s face.
“What else do you like to do with your friends, Timmy?” His dad’s tone is so ugly. The disgust and contempt is evident in his voice. He looks disgusted with him, like he's the unexpected pile of dog poop he’s just stepped in. Tim feels his eyes prickling and his face burns in humiliation as he struggles to blink back tears, trying to look unaffected. Because his dad always seems to be able to get him to this point, like he wants Tim to cry. But Tim knows that crying just adds fuel to the fire.
Tim tries to speak. He opens his mouth, but the words push painfully against his constricted throat. He tries to force them out anyway, but all he can manage is a rasping breath.
His dad just looks at him impassively, watching him open and closing his mouth like a fish out of water, before asking, “Well? Are you going to cry?”
Tim shakes his head, and his dad takes a step forward. He still tries to speak, but it feels like there’s something around his throat, like something is physically keeping him from speaking. He blinks tears back, focusing on keeping his breathing steady and smooth, but it hurts. It hurts and why can’t Tim just talk? Just one word. Just say something.
“Oh,” his dad says, all fake sympathy. He gives Tim a mocking look of sympathy, lip stuck out, and it just reminds Tim of the classmates who used to pick on him because he was a couple years younger and so much smaller than them. “It’s okay, Timmy. Go ahead. Cry, Timmy. Cry .” His dad says, but he’s lying. He doesn't mean it. It’s not okay. It’s never okay. Because crying always makes things worse, and his dad's doing this on purpose. He's mocking him.
It takes a moment. A moment that is not helped along by the fact that his dad is now standing chest to chest with him, face inches from his, repeating other variations of the same mocking statements, crowding him. Tim takes a step back, feeling like he can hardly breath, and needing to smell something other than the alcohol on his dad’s breath. He blinks furiously, too scared to wipe at his eyes, to take his eyes off his father and swallows harshly. Words begin to scrape out his throat, “No, d-dad...We weren’t..... doing that. W-we went a-and saw a... m-movie... ate food... and went to th-the skatepark.”
“And this was all just you and this ‘friend?'” Jack sneers, and his tone makes it sounds like the idea itself is so vile and revolting, and Tim’s shoulders hunch defensively. What was so wrong about that? This wasn’t fair! Nothing about this was fair. There are kids out there getting into drugs, or skipping class all the time, or taking the car without telling anyone! If Tim had done any of that, maybe - maybe - this degree of scrutiny, and the anger and frustration his dad so clearly has for him would make sense. But, they’d just held hands. They'd just hung out. And Tim had told his dad he'd be gone, and it's not Tim's fault someone got a picture and got the wrong idea, and -
Tim wasn’t even sure if it meant anything at the time. Now, of course, after the last conversation he and Bernard had had, obviously it had meant something, but it’s not like Tim had known the reporter was there! Bernard was nice and funny, and Tim’s been so happy to have him as a friend, especially with everything that’s been going on. Tim doesn’t know what he would have done without Bernard these last couple of weeks.
He’d been able to tell Bernard about how he felt guilty for initially not wanting to move back in with his dad, and Bernard had listened. He understood and said he didn’t think that made Tim a bad person. He agreed with Tim about giving Jack a chance. That, unfortunate as it was, maybe his mom’s death was a sort of wake up call for his dad. But even so, moving back in to help take care of his recovering and grieving father shouldn’t be any reason for Tim to stop going over and seeing Bruce, Dick, and Alfred if he wanted to.
Tim couldn’t exactly tell Bernard about Jason being alive, and trying to murder him , but he did tell Bernard that he didn’t feel as comfortable going over there as often anymore. But the only thing he could tell Bernard about it was that sometimes it seemed like it made his dad jealous, which Bernard thought was crap.
Tim tries to focus on breathing, and taking slow, even breaths. “I -I -” He stops, swallowing down a sob. He sniffs and his dad is looking impatient, irritated, and Tim spits out in a harsh whisper, “Ives was going t-to come with us b-but he got a call a-and had to go home. W-we weren’t even going to see it without him! But he said i-it was fine because i-it wasn’t really his thing a-anyways. So, y-yeah. After he left, it was just us.”
“Us,” Jack scoffs, and Tim flushes with indignation because that’s not how he meant it, but it didn’t matter because his dad didn’t care. Not really. He wasn’t - wouldn’t - listen to Tim. Never has. “Dinner and a movie? You expect me to believe that that wasn’t a date? What’d you do at the skatepark afterwards, huh?”
Tim frowned, body language subconsciously matching his dad’s, clenching and unclenching his fists. He’s hurt and angry, and so confused because it seems like no matter what he does, he’s either in the way or doing something wrong. His voice cracks embarrassingly, when he tries to talk, “I was just trying to show him some stuff on my ska-skateboard. We weren’t doing anything wrong!”
“Really? Nothing wrong with boys messing around together?” Jack asks coolly, faux casual, and Tim just wants this to be over with. Just get it out in the open. Stop dancing around the topic. His dad’s a homophobe, got it. Things just keep getting better and better, don’t they? “What about when our shareholders see whatever pictures Miss Vale has in the paper tomorrow morning, huh?” Jack is yelling now, “Did you think about that, Tim? Because once something like that is out there, you can’t take it back!”
Tim snaps back, “It’s hardly like it’ll make front page news, dad! We held hands. So what? It’s the twenty-first century! The shareholders should mind their own business instead of worrying about a couple high schoolers! Other kids my age are running around doing so much worse, and doing way more than just holding hands!”
“‘So what’?!” Jack throws his words back at him with a snarl, closing the distance between them. “It’s a matter of public opinion, Tim! Think about what an article like that could do to the company? Think about what it’ll do to you! To me!” Jack is back in his face, and Tim can smell the alcohol on his breath. He can see the bloodshot veins in his dad’s eyes, can see the way the anger moves through his dad’s shoulders, into his clenching fists.
Fear is something Tim is intimately familiar with. He’s known it ever since he was little. Fear of people leaving, fear of upsetting his parents, fear of being forgotten, lost, left behind, alone forever. Bruce says that it’s good to be afraid. Because fear protects you. ‘Fear is just your instincts telling you that something is wrong.’
He trusted his instincts the night of the attack at the tower. He’d known something was wrong and he’d done everything he could to call for help and to make sure he couldn’t be cornered, to fight back, and then to ultimately run, and because of that, he was alive today.
Looking at his dad, Tim is afraid. His heart is pounding and he can hear the blood rushing in his ears. He feels the fear and adrenaline coursing through him, but Tim can’t... He can’t fight his dad. Because that’s just insane. This is his dad. Tim has been trained to go toe to toe with metahumans, to fight opponents much larger and stronger than himself, but this feels somehow bigger than that.
This is not something he’s prepared for. All that training Bruce meticulously drilled into his head. Everything all of his instructors had taught him is shoved into a mental box and hurriedly snapped closed and chained down because he can’t. This is his dad. His dad’s a civilian. He can’t fight his dad. Jack is recovering from a traumatic accident, from a head injury and freakin’ coma, for chrissakes!
Tim takes a hesitant step back, but his dad follows, face almost purple with anger, still yelling, “We’ll be what they’re whispering about at the next gala! There will be assumptions, rumors, scrutiny, Tim! Everything your mother and I have worked for could be ruined because you’re a fuckin’ faggot!” He flinches back when his dad throws his hands up, saying, “God! I can’t believe this. This is why you keep your hair so goddamn long, like a girl’s, isn’t it? You never picked up sports as a kid, not real ones, anyway! Just fuckin’ gymnastics. I told your mother it was strange.”
Tim hears more than feels that he’s breathing just as harshly as his dad is. His hands are shaking, and he doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t know what to do. His dad keeps yelling, bringing up one thing or another from when Tim was a child, or a particular habit or hobby of his, and crediting it to the fact that he’s a faggot. Tim can hardly breathe, backing up another step, but his back hits the wall. Something crunches painfully underfoot, and Tim glances down at his socked feet, seeing his dad’s glass from earlier, drops of booze mixed with blood smeared around it.
Something hits the wall abruptly right next to his ear and Tim jumps, letting out a startled sob, and he looks up, nearly knocking his forehead against his dad's arm. He's startled at how close his dad is, shocked at the sight of his dad's fist sinking into the plaster of the wall next to Tim's head. They’re inches apart, and their difference in size has never been more clear. His dad’s no Bruce, but he’s still a much larger man than Tim is.
“Are you really okay, going through the rest of your life being known as ‘the gay one?’ How do you think your poor mother would feel, if she could see you now?! She’d be disappointed in you, Tim. Disgusted. She wouldn’t even be able to look at you. I can barely stand to look at you!”
“S-stop,” Tim stammers, words falling numbly from his mouth. “Please. Stop saying things, please.”
He’s just drunk, Tim tries to tell himself. He’s drunk and angry and he’s found out about this in the worst possible way. No one would have reacted well under those conditions.
Hands grab him by his upper arms with bruising force and Tim is shaken so roughly his head knocks against the wall a couple times, as Jack’s angry, “You don’t tell me what to do!” echoes in his ears.
The world stops shaking, and Tim leans against the wall shakily, taking a breath and blinking tears back as he looks up at his dad. His dad just glares at him, still disgusted. Looking betrayed. Disappointed. Tim feels sick, and when he speaks, it’s like the words are catching inside his throat. “‘M sorry.” He wants to go to his room, curl up on his bed, and not leave for hours. He wants to be alone, where it’s safe to do what he needs to get control of himself again, so he can finally just talk without feeling like his vocal chords have gone through a paper shredder.
Jack sneers, “At least your mother didn’t have to know you as this unnatural, disgusting, thing you are.”
Tim’s breath hitches and he tries to swallow the sob but he can’t. He can’t. This isn’t fair. None of this is. Would his mom really have-? It didn’t matter. His dad wasn’t supposed to find out like this. Tim wasn’t even sure if he was gay.
“He’s just a friend, dad,” Tim says, tremulously, sniffing and wiping his eyes. “I promise. We held hands, yeah, but we don’t know what’s going on y-yet. I don’t even know if I like guys o-or if I just like him? I’m just - I’m still trying to f-figure things out.”
Jack slaps him, and Tim yelps, stumbling back into the wall and he’s reminded sharply of the glass underfoot again. The glass in his foot. He hadn’t seen the hit coming through his tears, and he doesn’t see the second, either, when another hand cracks across the other side of his face. Tim starts side stepping for the doorway, throwing his hands up to ward off another attack.
Jack Drake bears down on him, face almost purple with rage.
“Dad, stop!” Tim cries. Jack lunges at him, and Tim dodges clumsily, ducking into the hall and making for the stairs.
He takes them two at a time and his dad is hot on his heels. But Tim’s faster and Tim’s Robin, so he doesn’t need to recover his breath at the top of the stairs. He sprints down the hall to his room, getting the door open and slamming it shut. He locks it with shaking hands. What - what should he do?
Jack slams against the door, and it rattles in the frame. Tim inhales sharply, stepping back and stumbling as Jack hits the door again.
“Open this door, Timothy!” Jack yells.
Quickly looking around his room, he makes quick work of pushing his dresser part way in front of the door.
“Dad, you’re drunk!” Tim yells through the door. “You- you hit me and you’ve been drinking, and I don’t think you-“
“Open this door!” Jack yells over him, and he slams into the door again. Tim watches as the frame begins to give. “You’re just making things harder on yourself, Tim.”
“Dad, seriously, you need to stop!” Tim yells, pleading, begging. He wipes his face, sniffing harshly. “You need to - to take a moment and cool down. Just go cool down, please.”
Jack stops slamming the door, but Tim can still hear him heaving on the other side of the door. A moment passes and Jack says, no longer yelling, but still terrifyingly angry, “Something you always seem to forget, Tim, is I am your father. I’m the adult here, you’re not. You don’t tell me what to do. It’s the other way around. You open this door, you hear me? You open this door right now!”
Tim chokes down a sob, trembling. “Okay! I will, just - calm down, okay? I-I’m going to open it. I will. Just give me a moment, please.”
He pushes the dresser back into place, straining his ears over the sounds of his beating heart to listen to his dad’s heavy breathing on the other side of the door. He hesitates at the lock, but he doesn’t want to somehow make this worse for himself. How can it get any worse? He’s never seen his dad like this. Never seen him this angry.
Besides, Tim is Robin. Robin talks himself out of all kinds of situations. Robin is able to use his opponents’ anger against them. He’s quick-witted and fast on his feet, able to take on opponents much bigger than he is. He’s fought people way scarier and far more dangerous than his dad and he’s won.
Tim unlocks the door and is forced to back up as his dad storms in, door slamming into the wall. His dad’s face suddenly a scant few inches from his as he yells, “This disrespect stops now, hear me?! This attitude or teenage rebellion fuckin’ bullshit stops today!”
Tim stumbles over his fallen laundry basket in his haste to put any sort of distance between himself and his dad. He falls on his bed, mattress bouncing, and stares up at his dad, wide-eyed. His dad’s hand snaps out, and Tim flinches, but his dad just holds his hand out and says, coldly, “Phone.”
Tim’s reluctant to hand it over, but with his dad leaning over him the way he is, he’s not in a position to protest. He fumbles with it, getting it out of his pocket and handing it over with a trembling hand.
His dad pockets it, snarling, “You’re grounded until I decide you’ve learned your lesson. No phone, no computer, no tv, no electronics.” As he says this, he turns and grabs Tim’s TV and he wrenches it off the wall before throwing it out into the hallway.
It lands with a crash and Tim flinches. His dad spins back around, grabbing Tim’s closed laptop off his desk and raising it high before bringing it down on the footboard of Tim’s bed, right next to where Tim was sitting. The laptop explodes into plastic pieces, and Tim closes his eyes as a few splinter violently towards his face.
“No going anywhere after school. You come straight home. You will stop seeing that boy. You won’t talk to him at school. This nonsense is just that, nonsense. You’re not gay. You’re not. This was some prank or cry for attention. You will do these things and not question me because otherwise I will find a facility where I can have you committed so they can fix you, understand?”
Tim tries to respond, but his throat is too tight from tears. He coughs, instead, throat burning from the attempt to speak. He can’t get words out, so he nods, hoping his dad’s looking at him and sees it. That he knows Tim’s not ignoring him. He can't stop shaking, why can't he -
There’s another crash and Tim looks up to see his dad pulling his cameras off his bookshelf, throwing them to the ground and stomping on them. He grabs individual lenses and slams them on the corner of Tim’s dresser, glass tinkling to the ground. He sweeps everything off the top of Tim’s dresser and pulls the bookshelf to the ground. He’s breathing hard when he’s done and Tim doesn’t dare say anything.
“I said, ‘understand?’” Jack snaps, and Tim nods, but his dad’s still glaring with blood freezing intensity.
“I-I un-under-st-stand,” Tim manages, hardly able to speak with how tight his throat is. He has to hold his breath so he doesn’t sob. So he doesn’t shake. So he doesn't do anything. He’s afraid to blink, knowing that blinking will make the tears fall, which will bring about more anger, and he’s afraid to let his dad out of his sight or give him anything more to rage about.
Jack looks unsatisfied. “You’re fuckin’ pathetic, you know that?” He practically snarls, and Tim does nothing. He just sits like his strings have been cut, too afraid to move, too afraid to breathe. Jack sneers at him, looking around the room, and makes a wild gesture with a hand, making Tim tense up. “Clean this shit up,” his dad spits, before stalking out of the room, ripping photographs and posters off the wall by his bedroom door as he goes.
Tim moves off the bed, onto his knees. He leans over, arms folded around his head, forehead pressed into the debris-littered carpet, and he just breathes .
It’s maybe fifteen or twenty minutes before Tim sits back on his feet, looking around his room and feeling utterly empty. He can breathe somewhat normally. He doesn’t think he’d be able to talk without breaking down again, so he stubbornly ignores the tightness and pain in his throat. He goes to his bathroom, blows his nose, cleans his face up, and drinks from the faucet.
Back in his room, he wavers, taking in the destruction. His cameras, his pictures… He takes a deep breath, slowly letting it out until he’s able to do so smoothly.
He doesn’t have what he needs to clean this up, he realizes. Stepping carefully over the carnage on the floor, he makes it out into the hallway, looking up and down the hall warily before heading to the top of the stairs.
He hears the TV downstairs, and inwardly cringes. It’s not like he’d thought his dad would pass out. He’d just kind of hoped it would be one of those nights.
Of course when Tim actually wanted his father to drink himself into oblivion, Jack wouldn’t provide.
Tim really doesn’t want to go anywhere near his dad right now. But he also doesn’t want to risk the consequences of not cleaning up the mess in his room.
So he steadies himself at the top of the stairs, calming his breathing, waiting until his heart slowed down, before descending the steps on light feet.
His dad sits in his recliner, a new glass in his fist, bottle set up on the table next to him, and Tim very carefully and very quietly moves past him. He doesn’t make eye contact, but he can tell his dad is looking at him. He makes his way into the kitchen, making as little noise as possible, hoping Jack would just forget about him or be pulled back into his TV show.
He grabs a couple garbage bags, a broom and dust pan, some work gloves from underneath the sink, and then heads back towards the stairs. His dad pins him with a look in the living room, and Tim’s movements stutter to a stop. His dad looks at the cleaning supplies Tim’s holding, nods, and tucks himself back into his drink, turning tensely towards the TV.
Tim is just as tense as he makes his way past his dad, taking the stairs quietly once again, two at a time, and breathing a sigh of relief at the top. He was so sure his dad would have followed or at least said something but he’d take whatever victory he could get.
When he gets to his room, he gets to work.
He fills the garbage bags quickly, trying not to think about how one of these cameras is the last thing his mom had ever given him. He puts the gloves on before picking up larger shards of glass or plastic. He picks through the shattered remains of the computer he and Ives had built together before just gathering it all and dumping it in the trash as well.
It’s painful. It’s more painful than Tim could have imagined. Picking up the pieces of his broken things, putting it all in the trash.
There’s a shattered coffee mug that Tim recognizes as having been from the Wayne house. Dick had started filling the cabinet up with ugly, obnoxious mugs, gifting them to Bruce, Alfred, and even Tim on occasion. Tim hadn’t had much to pack when he told Bruce he was moving back in with his dad. The mug wasn’t even really his, but it had been in the guest room when Tim was emptying it out. He took it on impulse because it was his favorite of the ones Dick had gotten for Bruce. A novelty mug with a cartoon depiction of Batman, Robin, and Nightwing.
It reminded him of how things were before everything got all screwed up. Before Tim was almost murdered by one of his childhood idols. Before his dad’s accident. Before his dad woke up and decided he wouldn’t be jet-setting all over the world anymore, and that he wanted to try with Tim all over again.
The pieces of the mug were swept into the dustpan and dumped into the garbage bag as well. Tim tied the bags off, getting up. He grabbed them and made his way downstairs. Walking past the living room, into the kitchen, he took the trash out the back door. He slipped the work gloves off after the bags had gone in the bin. He wiped his face, under his eyes and turned to go back inside.
His dad was standing in the kitchen doorway, a new glass of whiskey in hand. He pointed to where the night’s earlier whiskey glass lay in pieces. “You mind cleaning that up when you bring the broom back down?” He sounds gruff, impersonal, distracted. Tim hopes it means he’s getting tired.
Tim nodded unsteadily. “Yeah, I-I can do that, dad.”
He goes to pass his dad, but his dad makes no move to get out of the way. They gaze at one another, his dad looking him up and down, and Tim shifts in discomfort before pressing himself on the opposite side of the door, as far from his dad as he can, squeezing past.
He’s on the steps when he hears his dad snort and mutter to himself, and Tim’s ears burn because he’s never been good at these games.
But he focuses on the task at hand, knowing the sooner he gets this over with, the sooner he can go to bed and the sooner this horrible day can be done.
He grabbed the broom and dustpan, bringing them downstairs and cleaned up the glass in the kitchen. His dad watches from the doorway and Tim tries to still the tremor in his hands. He shook the dustpan off into the kitchen garbage, painfully aware of his dad’s eyes on him.
“I was thinking,” Jack said after Tim had put the broom and dustpan away, studying his whiskey, and Tim tenses. “You said you were trying to ‘figure things out ’. What does that even mean? You’re just going to stick your dick into things until you figure it out ?”
Tim was stiff, but the words still shook him at his core. Shame and humiliation had a cold sweat breaking out on the back of his neck. His mouth stayed dry though and he couldn't bring himself to say anything. He wasn’t sure he even could say anything, with how tight and painful his throat was from the night’s nonstop emotional upheaval. But he didn’t have to. His dad had more to say, anyway.
“How’d you get the idea of fucking other guys in your head, anyway?” Jack continued, “I mean, your mom and I weren’t even around, so it wasn’t us. Not our fault, I mean. Even if we were around, you’d have to have enough common sense between your ears to know that that kind of thing isn’t natural.”
“It is natural, dad,” Tim said, sounding much cooler and calmer than he really felt. “Some people are just born wired differently.”
“You mean ‘sick,’” his dad corrects him and Tim can’t stop himself from cringing away. “Some people are born sick. You’d always been such a quiet, well behaved kid. Always seemed to have a good head on your shoulders. Independent, responsible… Well, respect went out the window a while ago, but that’s most kids, isn’t it? We never saw anything that would have led us to think….” He trailed off, taking a long drink from his glass, eyes narrowed at Tim.
Tim can only gaze back, hands clenching and unclenching. His skin feels alight with a kind of crackling static electric anger that can only be worked out against a punching bag. He’s never felt this angry before. Never felt this betrayed. Never been this humiliated. Never felt this ashamed and disgusted with himself.
“It wasn't until you started hanging around Wayne when you started acting up,” his dad finally said.
“That - what?! Dad! !” Tim snaps finally, raising his voice, and what is he doing? Stop it. But it’s too much, and Tim refuses to let this fester, giving his dad more fuel for whatever pyre of disdain and jealousy he has built for the Wayne’s. “Listen to yourself, do you hear the things you’re saying?! The Wayne’s have nothing to do with it! I don’t even know what ‘it’ is! And ‘acting up’?! That’s not how it works!”
“Tell me how it works, then, Tim,” his dad snarls. “Because you seem to know an awful lot about ‘it’ while claiming to also not know what ‘it’ is. So which is it?!”
Tim blinks in shock, suddenly feeling unsteady and unsure. He’s not lying, he’s not! But also, this stuff is confusing and Tim is still trying to figure it out. Figure himself out. But… if he really tries to explain it to his dad, well… That’ll just be enough confirmation for Jack to believe he’s sick in the head and needs to be ‘fixed’.
Oh, Tim suddenly realizes, and wishes desperately he could rewind the past few minutes and take back everything he’d said because it was a test, and one Tim had failed spectacularly. “I - I don’t -“
“I-I-I -‘“ his dad mocks him again. “You got the idea to start sucking cock from somewhere. So who was it? You were just a couple years behind that alley trash in school, weren’t you? The one Wayne 'saved.' Was it him? Practicing on you so he could be good for his daddy back at home?”
“No, dad! Stop it!” Tim said, the protest coming out louder than he’d anticipated, but he couldn’t stop it with the hurt and betrayal welling up inside like blood rushing to the surface of an open wound. It bubbled and spilled over. He almost wished his dad had just hit him again. That would’ve hurt less than this - this. His dad talking to him like this felt degrading. “Bruce isn’t like that! Jason never even noticed me when we went to school together! I - I haven’t even kissed a boy, never mind any of that other stuff! The Waynes were like family when I was staying with them.” Well, sort of. Things got kind of awkward when your undead son or brother tried killing the kid you’d replaced him with. “Look, you can be a homophobic piece of shit to me all you want, but the Wayne’s stepped in and did you and me a favor for not reporting you and mom to CPS years ago! This is between you and me, not them.”
Jack Drake closed the distance between them quickly and Tim saw the satisfaction beneath the rage on his dad’s face. With a sinking heart, Tim realized Jack had been goading him. And Tim had fallen for it. With the realization came the feeling of failure. He should’ve known better. Robin should’ve known better. But Tim couldn’t see through the emotions that had clouded his judgment, too exhausted to compartmentalize and separate himself from the conversation. Too exhausted to conceal the disgust and upset and anger he had over the things his dad was saying.
“Oh, I’m sure he did you many favors, Tim. I suppose with the alley brat kicking the bucket, Wayne would have needed another kid to warm his bed. If the rumors are true. A fag would have gone all too easily,” Jack spits down at him. Tim felt like the floor had dropped out from underneath him at the accusation, like he was falling. His stomach felt like it was dropping, like his first time grappling through the city.
“Or maybe it was the older one who had the idea to bring you into the fold. He’s always been a little strange, hasn’t he? A fuckin’ fairy if I’ve ever seen one.”
Just like that, the free fall is over.
Tim steps back and throws a dirty look at his dad, “You’re just mad that the image of your perfect family, the one you and mom worked so hard to maintain, has fallen apart and is still falling apart because even Dana can’t stand your bullshit anymore. Bruce was more of a dad to me during the few months I stayed with him than you’ve ever been to me my whole life!” Tim dodges the hand that comes towards him, quick to get out of his dad’s range. Mouth still moving, he feels like Robin. “Dana knows how much of a stranger I am to you, how much of a shit father you are! That’s not on Bruce or Dick, and it’s not on me!”
Jack sneers at him, opening his mouth to say something, but Tim bulldozes over him, much like he and mom had always done to him, much like his dad had done to him earlier. He moves out of his dad’s range as Jack keeps approaching, fists clenched.
“Don’t worry, dad!” Tim snapped, sarcastically. “Like you said, it has nothing to do with you or mom! Seeing as neither of you could stand being home with me more than a week or two at a time! And when you were, you and mom were so busy fighting and breaking things and pretending like I didn’t exist!”
“We were doing important work! It was groundbreaking research! We discovered lost civilizations! And then we would come home to this kid who cried at night about a trip to the circus we’d taken years ago. This hyperactive little bastard who never shut up because he always had to be the center of attention! This weird, pushy little kid who was always underfoot, never leaving us alone, shoving pictures in our faces, and showing off the girly shit he learned about in gymnastics!” His dad snarled. “Who could blame us? We just wanted a normal kid, but we got you instead.”
Jack might as well have sucker punched him in the gut. This was everything Tim had been afraid of. This was all his fears being proven correct. Tim took small, careful breaths, blinking tears out of his eyes. He tried to swallow the painful tightening of his throat, but knew it was a losing battle.
“You know what?” He asked, and his voice cracked, but he kept going anyway. They were already this far, weren’t they? “ Normal parents would celebrate the fact that the boy their child likes is a nice boy. That he’s sweet. That he makes me laugh!” Tim sniffed, glaring at his dad. “He’s a really nice boy who wants to take me on a proper date. With flowers. Oh, I’m sorry, is that too gay for you? How about I could have probably kissed Bernard in the car outside earlier, if I’d wanted to? Oh, but I guess I wasn’t in the mood to act out in the privacy of his car!” He’d yelled - screamed - the last part, maybe.
He caught his reflection in the dark kitchen window, him and his dad squared off in the kitchen, Jack towering over him, and Tim matching his dad’s rigid, tense, angry body language. He suddenly felt sick. What was he doing? His dad was drunk . Tim should have just let him say his piece and then gone to bed. Locked the door and called it a night.
Instead, he was looking at a reflection of himself, looking eerily similar to the man next to him.
He caught the movement in the glass of the window, deflecting the punch that was coming for the left side of his face. It glanced off his forearm, and okay. Okay, this was fine. He’d done this plenty as Robin before. He could do this. He slipped under his dad’s arm, moving on a sort of autopilot. Took a glancing blow to the ribs, but Tim was still moving, until he wasn’t.
Choking as his dad grabbed his hood and pulled him back, Tim scrambled to unzip the hoodie. But then Jack got a firm hold on the back of his neck, spinning Tim around and kicking him towards the kitchen island with an angry grunt.
Tim tried to catch himself, but his arms were in the process of shrugging the hoodie off and he was still stumbling around with glass in his foot. He met the kitchen island head on, forehead striking the stainless steel of a silver drawer knob. Pain exploded at the front of his head and his vision went black and fuzzy as he tried to regain his bearings.
Somebody was yelling at him, but Tim couldn’t understand what was being said. He felt like he’d been dunked underwater. He gasped raggedly when his vision cleared and noise started to filter in through a wide mouth funnel. He tried to sit up, but was kicked one, two, three, four times until he was curled on his side, legs pulled up to his chest and arms around his head to protect himself. He blinked up at the fuzzy shadow that was looming over him. For a moment he was sure he was seeing the glint of the Tower’s emergency lights off of a red helmet.
The shadow leaned over him, striking him in the head, and Tim blinked and saw this wasn’t the Red Hood. It was Jack Drake, but the hatred and rage behind the force of these hits had certainly felt like Hood. Tim whimpered, struggling to keep his arms up to protect himself. Maybe Jason did something to his dad? No, that’s ridiculous. Has to be the concussion talking. Jason was at the manor, recovering from dropping a building on himself.
Sound cut back in, making the pain in his head spike, “- you won’t forget! Talking back to me, you ungrateful -” His dad, the shadow figure, was yelling, and Tim had finally managed to wiggle his arms out of his hoodie. He recognized the tile on the floor, recognized his kitchen. This was not the Tower. But nothing about this situation made him feel any safer.
He was grabbed by one of his arms and turned, kicked in the stomach, and moved until he was face down on his stomach, trying to breathe around the pain. “- good for nothing faggot! If your mom was here, she’d know exactly what to do with you -” His arm was twisted, and Tim telegraphed the motions before they happened, but it was like his brain and body had some sort of disconnect and he was several seconds behind, and suddenly his arm was pushed up and Tim panicked, trying to pull himself forward to slacken the grip and ease the pain in his wrist and shoulder. But he had nowhere else to go, other than head first into a blood-stained cabinet and the person behind him wasn’t stopping -
He felt the fracture first. Felt the bones in his wrist give out, felt the pain surge through his veins, up his arm and down his hand. He cried out, caught off guard, and sobbed at the brutal grip, feeling panic and nausea welling up in him when he felt broken pieces in his wrist grind against one another.
He yelped, as his arm was forced up his back, inhaling sharply, - nonononono - and Tim heard the pop of his shoulder and the numbing pain startled him, quieting his cries as everything in his arm went numb and cold and his vision wavered and blurred. Movement on his arm, still, and everything was thrown into sharp relief.
Tim’s eyes watered at the instant fire at his shoulder, and he begged, pleaded, “Let me go, please, it hurts! Let me go, le’ me go, lemmego please ! It hurts! It hurts!”
The man at his back - his dad, this is his dad doing this to him - switched arms, pulling Tim to his feet by his good arm and Tim hardly had a moment to catch his breath before he was slammed face first down on the kitchen island. There was a hand at the center of his back, pressing him down in a hold Robin could get out of one handed on a normal day, but nothing about this situation was normal.
His dad grabbed him by the hair, yanking his head back, and Tim gasped, cringing as his bad arm was jostled, causing pain to spider web outward from his shoulder. Jack glared down at him and there was nothing in those eyes except for anger and disgust, all directed at Tim. “If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t even be here,” Jack snapped. “Everything you have, Tim, everything that’s yours is because of me. You owe everything to me.” He shoves Tim down again and his head bounces off the granite countertop. Tim feels himself go boneless, and his dad lets him go as he topples down onto the floor.
He might’ve hit his head again. Everything’s spinning, and Tim closes his eyes, trying to focus on breathing through his nose and choking down the bile that stings the back of his throat. Fuck, this isn’t good.
His dad must walk away because there’s the sound of drawers opening and closing on the other side of the kitchen. Tim should get up. He should get up and get out. Call for help. Tim’s also trying not to throw up, and all he can manage is blindly fumbling for the kitchen island, taking a breath and bracing himself, and pulling himself up with his good arm.
Even that sends his stomach rolling.
A drawer slams shut again and it’s like Tim can feel it in his head , ouch. “I paid your school tuition,” his dad is saying. “Birthday and Christmas presents? Came out of my pocket.” He’s getting closer, and every bang and slam is like a physical strike to his head. Tim counted his breaths, and slowly eased his eyes open.
“Self defense classes, I paid for! Same with whatever silly hobby you picked up growing up!” Jack says, like he hadn't just complained earlier about how Tim had tried showing his parents his photos every time they came home. Tim sees Jack about an arm’s length away, and he’s carrying something in his hands. Tim tenses, widening his stance, and when Jack gets closer, he tries to get him with a left hook.
The hit lands, but Tim must be worse off than he thought because his dad had seen it coming and ducked enough that a hit that should’ve landed him on his ass instead merely glances off his cheekbone, making his dad stumble drunkenly to the side before righting himself with a snarl on his face. Tim expects the hit to the stomach, but he wasn’t prepared for his dad to go in for a grapple.
Tim struggles as best as he can, taken off guard with a concussion, while trying to protect his injured arm. He kicks and hits his dad wherever he can, but Jack Drake didn’t stop using the home gym when he regained use of his legs, and he easily has a hundred pounds on Tim.
His dad is still berating him. “The least you could do is show some respect and goddamn gratitude. That’s all your mom and I have ever wanted from you, Tim.” In no time, Tim’s chest meets the granite countertop again, and Tim’s cry of pain is cut off as the wind is knocked out of him. He gasps desperately for air, panicking as he just can’t seem to catch his breath. He tries to calm himself, focusing on the bruise he can feel forming on his sternum, but it doesn’t stop there.
“I suppose we were too soft on you, though,” his dad says quietly. Tim tries to orient himself, focus. But before he can take stock of the situation, his dad grabs him by his bad arm, and Tim makes a noise that doesn’t even sound human to his own ears as both arms are forced above his head. His dad lets go out of surprise and then scoffs at him, muttering something Tim can’t make out. He’s grabbed again, this time harder, and Tim lets out a strangled scream and flinches back, but is unable to get far, and movement only brings more pain to both his shoulder and wrist. He’s near dizzy with it, vision getting soft and fuzzy around the edges before he feels the bones in his broken wrist move, and then things get sharp and bright. He cries out, unable to even struggle lest it hurt anymore.
His face is wet and there’s nothing Tim can do but sob, trembling in his dad’s grasp as his limp wrists are manipulated, so his dad can twist cheese wire around them, leashing them together, and attaching the rest to a drawer handle or cabinet door knob - whatever is on the other side of the island. Jack pulls the makeshift bonds tight by the two wooden handles on each end and Tim tries to tense so he can create slack in the bindings so they’re easier to slip, but Tim isn’t sure if he managed or not because he can’t even move his right arm with the shoulder dislocated. He thinks, logically, even if he did provide himself with the slack needed, his right wrist would swell so much around the irritated break to be of any use, anyway.
As soon as his dad lets go and steps back, Tim can feel the strain of his own weight pulling on his shoulders and the blunt pressure of the marble countertop on his sternum. His sock covered toes barely brush the floor beneath him as he tries to get his feet underneath him so he can take some of the pressure off of his injuries. He hears his heart pounding in his ears, his breath coming fast and shallow as he tests the bonds with his good wrist, finding himself wholly and completely bound and stuck.
He looks up, eyes wide and tear-filled, and he can see the blurry outline of his dad looking down at him from the other side of the island. He says, “You’re a privileged kid, Tim. Growing up in a house like this with a silver spoon in your mouth since birth... You’re part of the top one percent, and you didn’t have to work for any of it! I never meant to spoil you the way I have. I should’ve been around more as you were growing up, at least so I could have enforced enough discipline so you didn’t turn into such a rotten little brat.”
His dad turns, examining the knife block and Tim, panics, voice cracking, and yells, “Dad? What are you doing, dad?! Dad!” He’s struggling, despite all the pain in his body because his dad’s looking at knives. His dad’s been hurting him all night, and this isn’t right. This doesn’t make sense! Sure, Jack Drake has always had a temper, but Tim’s pretty sure he would’ve known his dad was this unhinged. Right? Right?!
“Dad, please,” Tim tries, desperately trying to lean so he can see around his dad. So he can see what he’s grabbing. What’s he going to do? Oh god, what is he doing?! “Please, dad, this isn’t you. Something’s wrong. I think - maybe - I don't - dad, this isn’t you!” It can’t be. Tim couldn’t have messed up this badly, right? Surely he wasn’t that terrible of a Robin that he wouldn’t have picked up on if his dad was a sadist. Or maybe someone really did do something to his dad because wouldn't that be another way to torture him?! This will rip him apart. This is ripping him apart.
And there's the other thing. He's good at this, and - is he enjoying this? What's taking so long? One of the worst parts of torture is the suspense. Not knowing what your torturer is doing, having no clue what’s coming next.
His dad grabs a steak knife and walks around the kitchen island, and Tim panics when he’s completely out of sight. He sobs, “Dad, don’t. Please, don’t.”
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic, Tim,” his dad scoffs, and there’s a hand on his back, patting him gently and Tim’s never been more horrified by what should be a kind gesture. “Be a good boy and stay still. Wouldn’t want to accidentally cut you.” His dad pulls his shirt up, and Tim whimpers as it pulls on his swollen shoulder. He can hardly comprehend what’s going on. He just tries to stay as still and quiet as he can be, hardly daring to breathe during the rough back-and-forth of his dad sawing at the bunched up material.
“Dad?” Tim croaks, and his dad makes an acknowledging sound but otherwise doesn’t respond, hacking away. Tim presses himself to the countertop, making himself smaller so he doesn’t get nicked. “Dad, let’s just talk, please? Please don’t… Just let me get up. Please, dad.”
There has to be an explanation for this, right? This isn’t all over what Tim’s said, right? Because his dad said so much worse. This can’t be punishment for Tim’s behavior, and Bernard.
Something else is going on, right?
There’s been a huge misunderstanding, and once Tim clears this up with his dad, his dad will see reason. Except... Except what kind of reasonable person accuses their son of all the things his dad has? And what kind of reasonable person leaves their kid home alone more often than not, and then gets mad at the kid for the fact that their father-son bond kind of doesn’t exist?
It’s got to be all the alcohol, then. It’s just the alcohol.
Or. Mind control? Maybe? But, where are the clues ? Jason was right, he’s such an awful Robin. Get your head in the game .
His dad finishes, parting the tattered remains of his T-shirt off of Tim’s back and Tim barely breathes until he hears the knife set down on the island. “Dad? Can we talk about this?” he tries again, not much louder than a whisper.
Finally, finally , his dad comes around the kitchen island, looking at him with eyes so dark they’re practically black.
“Yeah, let’s talk, Tim,” he says coldly, and Tim shivers, heart seizing in fear at a vitriol he’s only ever heard bad guys direct at Robin . Tim can hardly breathe with all the terror and dread settling so heavy in his chest. “Of course it’s not like I can believe anything that comes out of your mouth because - well - you’re a teenager . A disrespectful, spoiled, bratty teenager .”
Tim’s eyes are still welling with tears that won’t seem to stop no matter how hard he tries, and a sob escapes before he forces it all back again. His dad - his dad really hates him now, doesn’t he? And Tim’s crying over it, crying over someone who’s hardly ever been around or even bothered to notice him.
“You must think I’m stupid, like I don’t know what happens under the bleachers at the football games at school. I’m sure it’s the same thing that happens at the skatepark . I’m not stupid , Tim.” His dad turns from him, angrily pulling open drawers, pulling items out, before slamming them shut. Tim wets his lips nervously, unsure how to turn this around. If he were Robin right now, he’d have pushed the panic button, kept the villain talking, and waited for a rescue. But he wasn’t Robin.
He was stupid Tim Drake, and stupid Tim Drake had left the Robin panic button with the suit at the cave. He’d left it there with the suit the night before Bruce had sent him that text, telling him to take a break.
“Dad, please , I - this is too far - please -” Tim stammers, flinching when his dad moves suddenly. His head rocks to the side abruptly when he’s struck from behind and he yelps, swallowing harshly, and coughing as bile stings the back of his throat. His head hurts so much, too much, and his dad’s yelling again, asking Tim if he thinks he’s stupid, and slamming things, and Tim's head hurts so much . He just squeezes his eyes shut and tries not to vomit.
He yelps as glass smashes dangerously close to where his broken wrist is bound - another bottle - stretched over the counter’s edge. Glass shards and alcohol fly everywhere, and Tim tries to shield his face in his forearms when his dad brings what’s left of the bottle down again, more glass flying everywhere again.
When he’s done, his dad grabs his hair, and wrenches his head up to look him in the eyes, and Tim’s eyes lock onto the meat tenderizer in Jack’s other hand, and - oh god - he panics, words tumbling from Tim’s mouth. “Please, no. Stop! I’m sorry. I - I’m really, really sorry, and I - I don’t think you’re stupid, dad! Dad, please, I don’t think you’re stupid! I - I think m-maybe there’s been a m-misunderstanding, but it’s o-okay. W-we can talk about-”
His dad’s face is almost purple with rage and the meat tenderizer comes down on his left hand, eliciting a piercing shriek from Tim.
He had known his days as Robin had been numbered. He’d thought it would be easier for everyone if Tim started making the severance between him and Robin himself, no matter how painful it would be. However, Robin had become one of the only things that really kept him happy. So, knowing how hard it would be to let go, Tim had thought maybe if he let go of little things at first, like starting with keeping all of his gear at the cave, then maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much.
Except, past-Tim who’d made that decision was stupid , because leaving the panic button behind? Even if Bruce or Dick got upset that he’d used it outside of Robin and fired him for it tomorrow, then at least Tim wouldn’t be dead .
The fridge door is opened and closed with enough force that glass bottles rattle inside. Cabinet doors are similarly slammed open and shut, drawers are rifled through, and the last time this happened, his dad had restrained him with cheese wire . The realization of how absolutely fucked the whole situation is sends him into a panic. Tim frantically pulls at his bindings, hoping they’re just hooked over a knob and he can unhook them and get out of here - but no, they’re looped through the handle of the drawer on the other side of the island.
The insistent tugging just has the wire cutting into his wrists, so Tim stops, knowing that the only thing he’d be able to do with that is just cause more damage.
“-if you’d stop disrespecting me. It would have never come to this if you weren’t so dead set on being an embarrassment, on destroying everything I’ve worked for, taking everything I’ve given you and throwing it back in my face, none of this would have happened!” His dad’s saying, and he almost sounds sorry , like Jack isn’t the one with all the control over the situation, but he can stop! He can stop!
“But there’s something I still don’t understand,” his dad says, and Tim can only listen with horror. “See, you said this is natural, that some people are just ‘ wired differently .’ But you also said you needed to ‘figure things out.’ So which is it, Tim?”
Tim makes no move to answer, and he yelps when his dad grabs him by the jaw, hard enough that it’ll leave bruises. “When I was your age, I was twice the man you are,” Jack spits down at him, and Tim just says nothing . “You can’t even look me in the eye,” his dad says, snappish. “How many times has your mom had to tell you? You look people in the eye when they’re talking to you!” Tim can’t stop crying, can’t stop shaking, but he manages to look him in the eye, and his dad smiles.
“Oh, enough of that. Things will be alright, Timmy. Your old man’s gonna help you figure it all out,” Jack says, and - Tim - Tim can’t - can’t comprehend. ‘Figure it out,’ he said he’s going to - oh god. This can’t be happening . He can’t. He won’t - doesn’t want to understand. Because that - there’s no way - that doesn’t make sense and Tim doesn’t - won’t - accept what’s happening. Because it sounds like his dad just - just insinuated - but no. No! No, that’s not- that can’t - no.
But the countertop is cool against his chest and Tim is still lying over the kitchen island like a sacrificial lamb. Please, please , Tim just wants this to not be real. He wants to not be real. He wishes his dad had just killed him. Just - shot him or something. Not - none of this. Not this.
“Open up,” his dad says, squeezing his jaw so tightly again that Tim is sure he’ll have bruises on his face tomorrow. That is, if he lives through the night.
If someone told him yesterday that Jack Drake would bind him with cheese wire and smash his finger’s with a meat tenderizer tonight, Tim wouldn’t have believed them. If someone told him that Jack Drake would be doing this with the handle of said meat tenderizer, Tim not only would not have believed them but he probably would have talked to the police, asked them to do a welfare check on that individual. Make sure they’re okay.
As far as Tim’s concerned, he needs to be prepared for anything if he wants to make it past tonight. He doesn’t know what this man is capable of.
His dad’s still holding the meat tenderizer in the other hand, while trying to push a thumb into his mouth, between his teeth, but Tim clamps his jaw as tight as he can, grinding his teeth together. His dad brings the tenderizer up warningly to the side of his face, smacking Tim lightly in warning along the side of his face, and Tim just glares at him.
His dad hits him in the face, cracks him on the meat of his cheek, and he’s sobbing, gasping, and his dad takes the opening. The meat tenderizer hits his mouth, clacking painfully against his teeth, splitting his lip, and Tim can’t breathe. This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening. His dad smacks the side of his face, irritated, saying, “C’mon, you can do better than that. Open up. You had a big mouth just a minute ago.” And Tim shakes his head, trying his best to pull away, to bite down on the thumb locked in his jaw, and then he gags.
“Enough of that. This is what faggots do , Tim,” his dad says, cajoling, his thumb pushing between his teeth to the back of his jaw. He can’t close his mouth, and Tim tries to snarl, tries his best to bite, except his dad’s pushed his jaw wide open, so wide open that Tim can’t do much of anything except struggle. He’s never felt so helpless. Even in the Tower, when Jason was beating him with his own bo staff, Tim had had a plan.
There was always an alternate solution, a backup plan to his backup plan. It was one of the things Bruce had drilled into his head over and over again.
Trust no one. Suspect everyone.
Bruce had trained him to look over the contingencies in case there was any reason to go up against any member of the Justice League, whether it was mind control, an alternate universe, evil clones of them, etc.
Robin made contingency plans without pause. Robin trusted no one, was suspicious of everyone, and had to be prepared for anything.
Tim didn’t do that, and look where that got him.
The hardest lessons to learn are most often the most valuable. Someone said that to him - maybe Shiva? - and Robin had listened, agreed, acknowledged it during his training, but Tim should have held onto that, utilized it as well.
His dad tries to press the meat tenderizer in, but it's too big. It hits his teeth, clacking against his jaw roughly, and the sound rings his ears, hurting his pounding head. His lips hurt and Tim thinks he can taste blood, but he’s not sure. His dad tries several times before finally turning the tool around and forcing the thick rubber handle in instead.
His dad pushes it in and pulls it out, and Tim really does start gagging, then. Not that it hit the back of his throat, or his uvula, but just the action itself and what it’s supposed to represent and that this is his dad doing this. Because his dad hates him. His dad hits him. His dad’s looking at him with undisguised rage and disgust. All of that is directed at Tim. Because Tim held hands with a boy. But that was all Tim did! He didn’t - didn’t do what this was supposed to represent! Had never done this! But it doesn’t matter anymore because no matter what he says, his dad doesn’t believe him!
And then his dad’s going too fast, and the thing in his mouth is too hard, too rigid, and it hurts and it sits heavy on his tongue, and Tim thinks he could die like this, if it damages his throat enough, or if his dad won’t let him get enough air .
His dad ignores his choking, resting the handle heavily on Tim’s tongue until his ragged gasping slows, and then he pushes it in and pulls it out again. Tim chokes again, gags, and his dad shakes his head at him and says, “ Really ? It’s not exactly like this is rocket science. Just pretend it’s your boyfriend.” Then shoves it in harder, deeper, angry because he thinks Tim’s faking it , he thinks Tim’s lying.
Until Tim actively starts retching around it
His dad pulls the tool out when Tim’s throat convulses, bobbing, and it’s a full-body effort, throwing up while lying down the way he is. The strain on his aching, sore body leaves him gasping for breath. His dad makes a disgusted noise, as he steps back, before coming forward to slap Tim across the face, and Tim moans as his head rocks from side to side.
“I don’t think you’ve really taken into account what men fucking men means,” his dad says. “You’re not some pretty little girl, Tim. You’re supposed to be a man! Of course, right now you’re just doing it with boys-”
“Dad, please,” Tim gasps, sobbing, coming back to himself, and struggling to speak with how much his throat hurts. He sounds like he’s been gargling nails. His voice is a whispery rasp, and talking hurts . God, everything hurts. Tim thinks he can taste something metallic along with the burn of bile at the back of his throat. His dad pauses, and Tim latches on to the silence. He just needs to convince him. “I’m not. I haven’t. I swear. I only held his hand . I promise! And I won’t do it again! I promise! Please! ”
Something is pushed up to his mouth, and Tim flinches back, but his dad sets the meat tenderizer down and it’s just a cup. A cup, and there’s something in it. His dad is brushing the hair away from his forehead and shushing him. Tim looks up, locking eyes with his dad, who says, “It’s just water. Wash the taste out.”
Tim drinks slowly, taking small sips. It hurts to swallow, and he almost can’t, panicking with the water in his mouth, and it takes him several deep breaths through the nose before he unsteadily swallows. Washing away the burn of bile at the back of his throat does give him a small bit of relief. He struggles to not break out into a coughing fit, but the small sips of cooling water help.
His dad takes the cup away and comes back, hand going back in his hair, pushing sweat-soaked bangs back. It feels nice. It feels really nice. Tim could’ve used more water. But this is okay, too. If they just stay like this, everything will be fine. Please. Let it be over. Let everything be fine.
There’s a hand at his jaw again, except it’s at his chin, lifting his head up, but he still flinches, inhaling sharply at the pain in his shoulder and wrists. He must look bad when he locks eyes with his dad because Jack looks almost sympathetic.
It’s not enough to stop him from grabbing the meat tenderizer again, though, picking it up, and Tim jolts back, shaking his head in panic.
Tim’s breathing picks up and he can feel himself trembling all over. “Dad,” he begs, his voice cracking, still an awful ragged hiss. It hurts to talk but Tim is panicking, pleading, “Stop it, please, dad.”
His dad pushes the rubber handle to his lips, and says, “Just once more. I might’ve been too rough the first time around. It’ll be gentler this time.”
Tim whimpers. But it doesn’t matter what he wants. Because soon enough his jaw is gripped tight again, thumbs dig into his cheeks, prying his jaw apart, slipping in his mouth, pushing back, and wedging between his teeth again. The rubber handle is pushed into his mouth, and Tim shudders as it slides across the top of his tongue, still slicked up with his cold saliva from earlier, and it dips back even further, slowly . And he can’t breathe, can’t think , and he starts coughing, and his dad pulls the handle back, eyebrow raised, and says, angry and talking to him like he’s stupid, “Calm down. Maybe try breathing through your nose?”
And the horrible thing is, it helps.
He breathes through his nose, and his dad seems satisfied to just sit and manipulate the meat tenderizer into a steady rhythm for a while, until.
“You’re supposed to suck, Tim.”
Then,
“Don’t you know you’re supposed to watch the teeth?”
His jaw is sore from the bruising grip and how long he’s been forced to keep his mouth open wide and uncomfortable to accommodate what his dad’s doing to him. He can feel drool trailing down his chin, thick and sloppy. His eyes are swollen, and they hurt from how much he’s been crying, and the tears dry on his face, crusty and itching. There’s snot on his upper lip, and he can taste it whenever his dad pushes the tool back in. But still, Tim slowly and steadily breathes through his nose.
He starts to panic slightly as his dad has the handle going into his mouth deeper and deeper, until it’s in his throat . It hurts. But he keeps his eyes closed, lashes tacky and sticking to his cheeks. Tim keeps breathing through his nose.
He tries to imagine he’s somewhere else, tries to separate himself from the situation, but he can’t ignore the way his dad speeds up, moving more erratically. It’s disgusting, but Tim hopes once his dad reaches the ‘climax’, that it’ll be over. He struggles to keep breathing slow and steady. His throat burns and the tool keeps dipping down and catching, or pausing, completely blocking his airway just long enough that he starts seeing black spots.
It doesn’t stop long enough for Tim to get a good look at his forearms, but he’s been unable to stop pulling at the wire with the way his dad has been moving him, and his skin feels slick around his wrists.
It’s torture.
It seems to go on forever before that rubber handle comes to a stuttering stop before it’s slammed back further than ever before, causing Tim to gag and choke around it, and he’s wide-eyed, desperately trying to catch his dad’s eyes, fists clenching as he struggles to breathe. But his dad’s just got a hand intently gripping his lower jaw, eyes only on the act itself. Tim’s lips touch the metal head of the meat tenderizer, and he feels his heart skip a beat because all of that is down his throat right now. How is that possible?! And no wonder it hurts so much, and burns because it’s stretching and - his dad moves his hand to his throat, squeezing around the tool inside of him, thumb tracing his Adam's apple. Tim is wide-eyed and keening in panic the longer his airway is cut off. His dad’s palm rests over presses against his Adam's apple for a moment, where the handle of the tenderizer no doubt bulges out and Tim squeezes his eyes shut, feeling tears slip out and he can’t stay like this, he’s going to pass out -
Abruptly, his dad pulls back, wrenching the tool out too fast, and Tim’s coughing and hacking violently as the rubber handle is ripped none too gently from his throat. “And that’s the happy ending,” his dad says slowly, quietly, facial expression carefully neutral - almost too neutral. His Robin brain would be examining that if he weren’t coughing his lungs up.
His dad drops the meat tenderizer into the puddle of vomit before putting his hands on his knees to stand up.
Tim’s jaw is sore, even as he closes his mouth, and every wracking cough makes a rattling, wet noise in the back of his throat. Pink-tinged drool dribbles from his mouth in a sloppy string, getting on the counter and his arms, and Tim realizes distantly that somebody shoving something repeatedly into someone’s mouth of that size with that kind of force could probably cause some kind of throat injury. He’d never thought of that before. Granted, he’d never really thought about, well, any thing of this sort before.
Sure, he’d been curious. But that curiosity had never progressed further than some extra time in the shower, or some general over the clothes groping when he’d been dating Stephanie.
“Almost seems like you’ve never done that before,” his dad says, and Tim snorts derisively, and chokes, and then bites his lip because ouch, bad idea.
“What?” his dad asks, sounding put out. “What’s so funny?”
Tim shakes his head, “Nothing...” and oh wow, his voice is wrecked . “Just, that’s what I’ve been saying from the beginning, dad.” His dad looks at him, and Tim can see the doubt starting to form on his face.
It makes him feel... It makes him feel happy, almost. There’s a sharp satisfaction at the idea that his dad might finally realize that he was wrong all along. Tim usually isn’t one to say I told you so, but he feels especially vindictive right now. He wants to see the guilt on his dad’s face, see dawning horror. He wants to see his dad agonize over what he’s done. He needs it because then it means Tim didn’t deserve it, right? This was all a horrible drunken mistake. It won’t make anything better, it won’t fix any of this, but it’ll reinforce the fact that this was just a fluke and no one deserves this. Right? Not anyone. Not a disrespectful son. Not a faggot. Not Tim.
Right? Right?!
Nothing of the sort passes over his dad’s face, though. Instead, he just looks confused. Like he’s done the math so many times but he’s still not getting the answer he’s supposed to, and Tim hates him for it . He can’t stand his dad looking at him like that, so he sniffs, spits blood on the floor next to the pinkish vomit, and thinks I am not cleaning any of that up.
“I wasn’t lying, dad. Only thing we have ever done is hold hands.”
“You’re sixteen years old, and I’m supposed to believe you’ve never done more than hold hands ,” Jack says flatly, and he’s still giving Tim that look.
“Yes!” Tim cries, feeling more than a little hysteric. Why did it have to go so far for his dad to believe that Tim was telling the truth?! Why did it take so much for his dad to believe him?! Tim bites back the sob, shaking his head and forcing out incredulous laughter that sounds awful coming from his abused throat. “You finally get it and you still sound disappointed!”
His dad says nothing. He circles the island, out of sight, and Tim tenses, trying to turn to see where he’s going, but he isn’t able to move much. A hand rests on his lower back and Tim flinches, breath going shallow and quick. His hands clench, and he pulls at the wire but it’s still taut, still fixed in place, and Tim’s not going anywhere. His dad leans over him, and Tim swears his heart stops beating when he feels breath on the shell of his ear. “We’ll just have to rule the other thing out then, too, won’t we?”
His dad’s fingers hook onto his waist band and Tim’s breath stutters in his chest.
The slightest amount of pressure on his hip sends Tim into a frenzy. He flails, kicking back as hard as he can. He feels his heel make contact with something soft, and his dad wheezes, and Tim kicks again as hard as can.
He’s gasping for breath, in a panic, and he should really calm down because he needs to keep aware of where his opponent is. But he’s running on adrenaline and desperation, and those are the only things that help him pull himself up onto the island, rolling and scrambling to get his legs up and under him. He pulls himself across the island, grunting through the pain screaming in his shoulder. He manages to make it to the other side of the island, stepping down so he’s stood in front of the drawer that he’s been bound to.
He’s breathing hard, and he’s in a terrible amount of pain, but he’s in a much better position than he was before.
Standing on his own two feet, he’s not as helpless as he was before. He takes as deep a breath he can manage - because shit that hurts - and thinks to himself, okay, Robin.
He tries to take in the situation the way he would if he were in costume, except he’s never been in this situation before. Still, he tries, and he sees his dad’s recovering from having had the wind knocked from him, and is baring his teeth at him from the other side of the island. Tim’s arms are still bound, wire cutting painfully into his skin, breaking it in some places, and his swollen wrist and swollen fingers don’t look good. But Tim thinks he’s seen worse before?
His dad snarls, coming around the island, and Tim panics, yanking furiously at the drawer. It slides open, and shuts again, gliding smoothly, and Tim yanks once more, backing up and trying to lift up and out so the drawer will come off the rolling rack.
It’s awkward because he can hardly feel his fingers unless they’re moving and when they are moving, it hurts . The ones hit with the meat tenderizer have gone a dark purple and are swollen. Definitely broken. His other fingers are still dark red, but they’re tingling, blood now able to flow to them since he’s stood up and not hanging over the island, cutting his own circulation off with a majority of his weight pressing into a cheese wire. But they’re still pretty useless, so Tim works with what he has. Which just isn’t working .
He’s unable to keep ahold of the drawer once his unbroken fingers aren’t tingling as much, and he’s panicking too much by the time his dad’s made it around the island.
Tim cries out as he’s shoved back into the island, arms pinned between his body and the counter. His dad grabs the back of Tim’s head, trying to force him down so he’s lying on top of the counter again, but Tim fights back. He tries to kick again, but his dad’s watching for that already, leaning out of the way and hitting Tim in the ribs with his fists.
Tim grunts, bucks, reeling his head back, and his head makes contact with something while his dad swears, hands releasing him.
His victory doesn’t last long before there’s a kick to the back of his knee and Tim goes down, nearly clocking his chin on the counter. He’s on his knees, but he needs to move, and he’s pulling the drawer back with his wrists, fingers scrambling to grasp the face of the drawer. His dad has a hand on the back of his neck, another in his hair, and he’s pulling Tim up, but Tim struggles against him, until he’s just rasping snarls that sound like a wounded animal, all elbows and headbutts.
The drawer finally comes loose from the kitchen island at the same time his dad changes tactics, getting a hold of his ankles, pulling his legs out from under him, and it’s Tim’s turn to go down swearing.
He lands heavily on the drawer with his forearms and the cheese wire cuts fresh wounds into his wrists, but Tim is free , dammit. He just needs to get up , and get out of the house.
He’s grabbed by the hips, and then there’s a heavy weight settling astride the back of his thighs, and Tim bucks but he’s hit in the back of the head and his vision wavers when his forehead cracks the edge of the drawer.
When his surroundings blink into focus, his pants are being tugged down none too gently, and Tim let‘s a harsh, “No!” which ends up just sounding like a strangled gasp. He tries to slip out from underneath his dad, thrashing and kicking like a wild animal. He turns, trying to strike with his good elbow, trying to get a grip on the drawer so he can use that as a weapon. His dad jerks him back towards him, and the utensils still in the drawer slide around. And Tim desperately wishes he could do something - anything - with the rolling pin right there but he has to get his hands free first, and there’s really no plan. He’s just fighting blindly at this point. He’s terrified.
His dad’s weight lets up a little bit, and eagerly Tim does his best to army crawl forwards, realizing all too late that his dad had only allowed him to do so to help him out of his pants even further. “ No! ” Tim screams, trying to roll and turn, but Jack just leans forward, putting a hand on the middle of his back, and pinning Tim with his weight while his other hand works steadily at inching his briefs down.
His cheeks are wet, and his breaths are coming too fast, and it’s humiliating as he feels himself becoming more and more exposed. Cool kitchen air hits his bottom, and he’s never felt more angry and ashamed. Ashamed he didn’t fight enough, and angry that he didn’t just get the hell out earlier. How could he be so stupid?! God damn it. He sobs in terror, kicking as best he can.
But his dad finishes pulling them down as far as he wanted them, and he takes the hand off of Tim’s back, and Tim is able to get his elbows underneath him, trying to raise himself onto his knees, hoping his dad will topple backwards.
His dad hits him in the back of the head again, and Tim goes down with a defeated sob.
There’s hands on him then, grabbing him, and Tim wants to melt into the floor as his dad spreads him apart. His pants are tangled around his upper thighs, and his dad’s knees are on either side of his legs, trapping him and pinning him under him. Every movement has Tim jumping, tensing. Every noise. But so far it just seems like Jack is… inspecting.
Tim is mortified, humiliated. Why didn’t he just kill him? Except, he wasn’t wishing his dad had killed him. He was thinking back to that night at the tower. Because he’d give anything to go back in time, because this was so much worse and honestly, Tim would rather have been killed by Jason on a rampage. It would’ve been a mercy .
“Hmm,” his dad says, “Maybe you haven’t been taking it up the ass.”
Tim sobs, wanting to hit him, scratch him, something , “That’s what I-“ but he’s cut off by his own strangled scream as something - two fingers - abruptly shove inside without warning, carving a stinging, burning path, and Tim squeals , breathing and crying raggedly around the forced intrusion. No, no, no! He thinks, and he tries to fight, tensing and trying to twist out his hips, get away , but he’s trapped, pinned, and speared. Mouth open in a silent scream that ends with a litany of hysteric, gasping sobs, as the intrusion goes deeper, deeper, deep -
“Oh yeah,” Jack says with a chuckle, and Tim can’t breathe . “ Definitely not taking it in the ass.”
Those fingers push harder and twist and Tim keens , going still, head falling on his forearms in defeat. He’s unable to do anything. He’s completely helpless . He can’t get away.
Then, Jack pulls his fingers out, and Tim sobs in relief, nearly going boneless with it and he’s able to breathe again, gasping for air like a drowning man -
“If a couple fingers gets you that upset, Tim, what do you think a whole dick’ll do?”
Something blunt settles against him and Tim freezes, breath hitching, and he shakes his head vigorously, screeching, “No, no, no, please! Don’t -!” He can only scream as it pushes in abruptly, but Tim’s so tense, it stops just after the initial breach.
It burns , and it’s probably the worst pain he’s ever felt because it’s so intimate and sensitive and Tim’s being forced to just take it . But then his dad’s hand is on his lower back, pushing him down, and his weight presses down, and the penetration continues, albeit slower, rougher, and Tim’s hyperventilating because when did he - how - Tim didn’t even hear the belt buckle, and -
It’s too hard, too rigid, and it’s dry and burns . “Hmm. This would’ve been the right length, I think, for most average men. But it’s too thin.” The intrusion is removed, and Jack tosses it to the side, and Tim yelps at the motion, inhaling in sharp horror at the sight of the large wooden serving fork that lands near him. He doesn’t know what to think . Should he be relieved? What -
His dad shuffles, pawing through the utensils that litter the ground, the ones that fell out of the drawer once Tim had gotten it off the track. With his dad distracted and not actively holding him down with anything more than his lower body weight, Tim does his best to turn on his side - grimacing because it still burns - bringing the drawer down abruptly into his dad’s knee as hard as he can.
His dad cries out, and Tim feels his dad’s weight shift to one side. So he thrashes, pushing himself back onto his good elbow, and kicks his legs free. His dad grunts, crawling after him, and Tim turns, bringing the drawer up and trying to slam it into his dad’s face. His dad catches it, though, and Tim sobs as he’s pulled up by his arms, standing on trembling legs.
“You’ll learn, even if I have to beat it into you,” his dad thunders, and Tim is pushed back, tripping and stumbling over his own feet, stepping on glass shards from the whiskey bottle that had met its end on the edge of the kitchen island, but his dad keeps forcing him back. Tim keeps trying to swing the drawer at his dad, and his dad eventually gets a hold of it with a snarl on his face, loosening the cheese wire enough that he slips the wooden handles back through the handle, before tossing the drawer aside.
They end up in the living room, and Tim is just feet from the front door, but he doesn’t dare take his eyes off his dad. He stumbles, nearly tripping over a throw pillow that was on the floor, and that’s what makes him glance away.
He cries out as he’s grabbed by the face again, and his dad’s eyes are dark. Angry. Tim’s hands are still bound, but he brings them up to strike his dad but his dad seems wholly unfazed. “This is what happens to faggots in this house,” his dad says, and he shoves Tim back by the hand on his jaw, and Tim stumbles, can’t catch himself, and the glass coffee table shatters under him as he falls into it.
Tim’s gasping, pulling in deep lungfuls of air, but he lies still and frozen, taking stock of his body, trying to differentiate new hurts from old ones. His dad’s kicking him over, and glass crunches beneath him, and Tim manages to get his arms beneath him and that’s probably what saved him from getting glass shards in his lower region.
On his front, there is definitely glass in his arms, but he can’t do anything about it. His throat itches so bad, and he’s coughing and coughing, and he can’t stop. He can’t. He can’t catch his breath and he can’t stop coughing, coughing, and then he’s sobbing, and he just - he just feels so bad . He’s so scared and he feels like he’s dying and he’s lying in glass and if his dad walked away now, he doesn’t think he’d be able to get up. But of course his dad won’t walk away now because it’s still not over. Please, please . He doesn’t want to die. Please. He’s sorry. He’s so sorry . Please .
Tim hears his dad’s belt buckle clink together and Tim tenses up all over again, fearing the worst, and he strains his voice again, begging, “Dad! I’m sorry! Please, dad, I’m so sorry. I-I-I’ve learned my lesson, please . I’m sorry!” He’s gasping sobs and he sees the shadow on the wall of his dad pulling his arm back, and he’s glad his dad isn’t settling down on top of him again, but I can’t take anything else, please. Please make it quick . “No! I’m sorry!” The leather whistles in the air and it’s like flames licking up his back.
“You’re not sorry, Tim,” his dad says, and the leather whistles again, and Tim grunts, flinching, as it burns up his back once again. It’s a new pain, and he never would have guessed the source would be something as common as a belt . The shock of it steals his voice. He never would have guessed his father , despite the anger issues and the drinking, would be capable of inflicting any of this abuse on someone, let alone his child .
But maybe that was part of the problem. It’s not like he and Jack were very close. Sure, his dad had made somewhat of an effort to try and get to know him quite recently, but the attempt became a secondary concern when his dad had started dating Dana. He and Jack had never bonded, not even when Tim was small, and perhaps that made it easier for Jack to do this to him. Because they’d never had the kind of bond fathers and sons were supposed to have. So, to Jack, it didn’t matter if Tim was his son or not. Because Jack didn’t see Tim the way other dads saw their sons.
Tim sobs, resting his head against broken glass out of frustrated exhaustion, “ I am! ” He’s too loud, voice high-pitched and strangled, and Tim doesn’t recognize himself. He sounds like a child having a tantrum, but he’s not . Please, he’s not . Someone help me!
“Not sorry enough,” is the impassive response he gets and the leather whistles again. “That’s three. Start counting them.”
A blow lands again and Tim flinches, stuttering a tearful, “F-four.”
As Robin, he was put in many situations where he ended up injured. Whether it was a beat down from an opponent much larger than him or a lucky hit by some nameless thug, Tim knew it was an occupational hazard. Something not quite expected but not unexpected, either. A risk he accepted every time he put the suit on.
He’d been shot, beaten, stabbed, strangled, drugged and more. He’s broken numerous bones. Hell, he’d had his throat slit and been left for dead after being shot and beaten with his own bo staff just a few months ago.
But this was worse than all of that. Because he wasn’t Robin. He wasn’t in the suit.
He was Tim Drake.
“Fi - ah - Five.”
Being Tim Drake wasn’t supposed to be an occupational hazard.
“S-six.”
Only a few months ago, he was attacked as Robin in a place that was supposed to be safe. Tim’s only been back there once since his recovery, and he knows logically that Jason doesn’t have access to the Tower anymore. He knows that B and O made sure his codes were taken out of the system.
But Tim still finds himself watching his back there, wary of blind corners, and darkened hallways because the tower doesn’t feel safe anymore.
If the Tower , a place hardly ever empty, where other heroes lived, where people Tim could trust stayed, no longer felt safe, what did that mean for Drake Manor?
“Se - heh - ven!” His throat hurt with his gasping cries. Breathing was hard when you were sore, still taking a beating, and couldn’t stop sobbing.
How was he going to live here, after something like this?
“Eight!”
He can’t. He won’t. He’s not staying here after any of this. If he makes it through this.
“Ni - aye - ne!”
Something’s wrong. Things are fuzzy. He’s looking at the glass under him, but it’s getting further and further away and it’s starting to look like Tim’s looking at it through a long, dark tunnel.
It’s hard to hear when he’s this far away. But he can make out someone’s counting.
“Ten!”
Wasn’t he supposed to be counting? There’s the noise of something being hit.
That’s him, isn’t it?
He wonders if it’ll be over soon, or if his dad will torture him all night. He wonders if his dad’s getting tired, if his arm is sore. He wonders if Tim’s learned his lesson yet.
Wait, he’s Tim, isn’t he?
No, Tim Drake isn’t supposed to be an occupational hazard. Maybe Jason’s trying to show him who the better Robin is again.
But that doesn’t make sense either. This is Drake Manor, isn’t it? This is the living room?
It’s faint, but there. If Tim focuses, the tunnel starts to shrink. But as the tunnel shrinks, his back smolders like coals in a dying fire. His chest hurts, hard edges slicing into his bruised parts. His throat is dry, sore from gasping for breath, pleading, begging, screaming. He feels his skin, wet and clammy. There’s a chill in the air. His face is swollen, his cheeks are wet. Someone’s crying.
He lets himself slide back into the safe place, letting the tunnel get longer. It doesn’t hurt as much, like this. It’s better. It’s better to not be in that horrible place. It’s better to not be an occupational hazard.
If only he weren’t such a disappointment. If only he hadn’t upset his dad.
He could’ve done so much so differently. He could’ve, but he didn’t. He should’ve.
He wished he wasn’t such a failure. He wished he hadn’t come downstairs for the broom and dustpan. He wished he could have lied to protect himself from this. He wished he didn’t have these confusing feelings about Bernard. He wished he’d never gone to the skatepark. He wished he hadn’t come home when his dad woke up, or that he’d dumped the alcohol before he left for school this morning. He wished his dad had left him, jetting across the world again on a dig. He wished Dana hadn’t left. He wished he’d asked her to stay. He wished he asked if he could go with her. He wished he hadn’t left the Robin button at the cave.
He wished he had gotten emancipated after his dad’s accident.
He wished... He wished his dad hadn’t woken from his coma.
The world comes back to him a little bit and he feels leather spreading fire across his shoulder, and he sobs around, “El - ele - Elev -“
He wished he didn’t wake up that morning. He wished he had died back at Titans Tower.
Because of him, Robin will be out of commission again. Batman will be without a partner again .
He regretted everything. He hoped it would be over soon.
He was sorry . Please. He was sorry .
He doesn’t realize that the belt has stopped until his dad’s slippered feet come into view. He’s floating somewhere where the hurts don’t go away but they’re numbed. He hopes it’s over.
Air shifts and someone’s crouching next to him. Please, let it be over.
A voice in his ear, breath hot on the side of his face. He can smell the whiskey.
“This is because I love you, Tim,” Jack says. He’s holding a glass again. When did he get that? Must’ve been while Tim’s eyes were shut. “You needed some humbling. A lesson in respect. You will never talk to me in that way again.”
Amber liquid drains from a glass. A throat swallows. His dad holds the glass out, and it goes out of sight, where Tim can’t see, and then something warm is poured onto his back and all of his aching, stinging wounds are lit on fire, and Tim screams, strangled and voice cracking.
The air is heavy in the darkness of the living room as Tim slowly comes back to himself.
He’s in a lot of pain. He’s not sure if there’s a part of him that doesn’t hurt. His head is pounding. His face is swollen from crying and is a mess of tears and snot. Air scrapes his throat every time he inhales, and his chest and shoulder hurt with the movement of breathing. His wrists hurt terribly, too, Tim realizes.
He rolls over and he sees his hands are slick with coagulating blood. He’s still cupping himself protectively, lying atop glass shards, and he can feel the sticky tackiness of drying blood transfer onto his genitals as he rolls fully onto his side before pulling himself up into a sitting position.
Nausea rolls through his stomach again, and Tim whimpers, closing his eyes and trying to control himself.
Breathing through his nose is hard, but he can take steady, slow breaths without his throat itching too much. Jack walks around but it’s further away, maybe in the kitchen? But he’s away from Tim, finally, and the nausea settles as the dread in his stomach grows lighter.
“Now,” Jack says from some distance away, and Tim’s heartbeat picks up at the foreboding tone, but otherwise he has no reaction until he opens his eyes and sees his dad looking at him from the doorway, hammer in hand.
There’s no guilt, no sympathy, no satisfaction, just promise that this nightmare isn’t over yet. “I think you’ve earned a timeout to think things over. Figure things out,” his dad spits at him, and Jack’s moving, but he isn’t moving towards Tim. Tim continues to take stock of his injuries, slowly extracting himself from what is left of the coffee table. Jack is examining their coat closet in the hallway when Tim gets his feet under him. His dad’s back is turned.
Next to him, most of the metal frame from the coffee table is still standing. There are some sharp shards of thick glass still surrounding the bolts where the top had been fixed to the table. Tim is able to cut the cheese wire on the glass, barely registering as the glass slices into his already shredded wrists.
His dad is bent over, halfway in the closet, tossing things out over his and he says, “There’s no lock on it but I can nail it shut until I get one.”
Tim takes a breath, drops his good shoulder low, and runs into his dad while he’s faced away, making him stumble inside the dark coat closet. He slams the door shut as he hears his dad crash into the back wall.
He holds the door shut, looking around for anything he can put in front of it to buy extra time, and there really isn’t much in the front entrance, other than a decorative half table with delicately carved spindles for legs and everything that his dad’s thrown from the closet.
Tim’s breathing is wet and hurried, and he can’t stop the harsh cough when he dips down to move a nice pair of oxfords to wedge them beneath the door, using it as an improv doorstop. The coughing strains his aching body, and upon standing back up again, he nearly loses his balance as he’s hit with a wave of vertigo.
He swallows a few times, feeling a thickness at the back of his throat, like he normally would have if he’d had a bloody nose recently.
His dad pounds on the other side of the door, making Tim jump, and he quickly disarms the security system before tearing back down the hall towards the kitchen. He’s grabbed a flashlight from the junk drawer by the time his dad’s started turning the handle from the inside the closet.
He keeps his footsteps light as he comes back down the hall, giving the closet a wide berth. His dad’s yelling in there, pounding on the door, the walls. He sounds rabid and Tim wants nothing more than to leave, but he needs to be smart about this. Because the closest house is almost two miles away, and that’s a long way to walk when you aren’t at your best.
Especially while he has glass in his foot. Which, now that he’s thinking about it… shoes? Or no shoes?
Shoes obviously, but how? Is what he’s thinking as he leans against the wall, bringing his foot up so he can examine the damage. He swallows thickly at the glass he sees in his foot. Unfortunately, there is nothing he can do about it now with his time constraint.
The door slides out of frame, startling Tim so hard he nearly drops the flashlight. He must’ve made some kind of noise, because Jack yells, “I know you’re still here! Open up this goddamn door, or so help me…! Tim! Timothy!”
Tim numbly shoves the closest pair of shoes on, which just so happen to be a slightly large pair of winter boots. They’re lined with a soft fur of some kind, and Tim hopes if he steps with his toes, he won’t make the damage on the heel with glass in it any worse.
The closet door slides out of the frame a few centimeters before stopping on those nice, leather oxfords. They’re his dad’s actually, Tim realized. One of the ones he’d wear to the office or to a press conference. Good quality, thick leather.
The shoes seem to hold up against the door, but Tim knows he needs to move it. They won’t hold up long, and Tim’s already wasted enough time staggering around.
He bends down again, a sharp wheeze squeezing out of him as he catches a sweatshirt with his fingers.
He pulls himself back to standing when the handle on the closet clangs. His dad’s blindly striking the door with the hammer now. It’s shuddering in the frame, catching on the oxfords, and his dad starts trying to kick the bottom of the door out.
Tim quickly hobbles to the front door. He’s unlocked it and flung it open, glancing over his shoulder to at the moment his dad’s hand makes its way out of the closet, slapping against the wall. Jack’s upper arm and shoulder are trying to bully their way through the thin opening as well.
Tim catches a glimpse of his dad’s beet red, livid face, and then he’s turning, stumbling down the front steps, and hurrying as quick as he can off the front driveway, into the shadows and out of sight.