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It started with a slip up on patrol with Damian.
He and his Robin were going along the usual routes, both less energetic than usual. There was something in the air, Dick just didn’t have the bandwidth to figure out what.
Then they had come upon a heist, if you could call it that. Four people stood in the center of a brightly lit room, surrounding a few locked safes. There were cameras in each corner of the room and two of the idiots had their masks pulled up, clearly showing their faces. An array of tools were scattered around the safes as they painstakingly attempted to open them. It was honestly a little embarrassing. He was embarrassed for them.
But it made for a good, short training mission.
Robin and him looked in through the skylight and Dick explained the best course of action going in. He made sure to emphasize that they were going to cleanly knock them out, tie them up in a group, and leave them for the police in the morning. Cut and dry mission.
It was supposed to be a cut and dry mission.
Then Robin had scoffed and muttered something about this being ‘elementary’ and ‘beneath me’ and Dick watched his partner crash through the glass and onto one of the thieves.
Dick followed, because that’s just what Batman did, and it took seconds before the two of them were back on the roof.
And Dick was back in time, somehow living another moment, as he gave a fairly half-assed lecture. Somehow the boy in front of him, in another variation of the same colors, wasn’t Damian.
That’s where Dick fucked up. He watched in real time as the name of a dead boy slipped past his lips and this Robin looked at him with confusion and hurt.
His hasty correction hadn’t been nearly enough to make up for the mistake, but Dick couldn’t do anything else. The soft apology he gave in the Batmobile would have been insufficient regardless of however he had put it.
So, like his predecessor and mentor, Dick had fled.
The guilt had followed him out the door and the grief brought him to a bottle of scotch in his cabinet at his apartment.
Dropping down onto the floor in front of his couch, Dick had let the pain in his gut wash over him. It was freezing. Flashes of a younger brother popped into his head with every swig of the bottle he took. Toothy grins, curly hair, eager eyes. Things he never thought he’d see again, and, despite it all, he was right.
That brother came back, and Dick never saw that smile again.
If he tried hard enough, the guilt brought back more and more flashes of smiles he lost. The twist of failure gave him the bright, warm grins of his father and the expressive, loud laughter of his mother. They spun in circles in his head, following the sway of the bottle in his hand. He took another drink and watched them fall, again.
The pain in his gut had become a sort of numb tingle at some point but it had been replaced with warm tears down his face. Honestly he preferred the pain, way less embarrassing.
His head swam and he choked on scotch.
It was all too much. The room around him faded into nothing as he was lost in the flashing memories. It felt like it was going to crush him. It hurt so much.
With a breath, he forced himself to put the bottle down and wiped his face. He’s sure his eyes were red tinted so he pressed the cool heel of his palm against them, willing the flush to leave.
A few more breaths, another push into his eyes, and he was back. The floor was still beneath him and he could feel the scratch of the couch at his back. There wasn’t anything he could do but stare at the ceiling and hope the bottle beside him wasn’t as empty as he knew it was.
Dick blamed the alcohol for how he jumped at the door suddenly swinging open.
Maybe if he wasn’t currently dancing the line of black-out wasted and pleasantly inebriated he would have already grabbed some kind of weapon or been at least semi-prepared for a break in. But he wasn’t. He was laying against his sofa with a bottle of cheap scotch pretending he remembered who had an extra key to his apartment.
Dick had no idea who he was expecting to see walk through his door but he still managed to be surprised when it turned out to be Mister Tim Drake-Wayne himself. His younger brother was in a barely wrinkled navy blue suit, tie and hair askew. He had the same reliable determination Dick almost always saw him with. He kinda hated it.
It took Tim two sweeps of the apartment to finally spot Dick on the ground, looking both amused and disappointed when he did.
Dick spoke before Tim could, “Oh so you do know what doors are for.”
Tim grinned back and shrugged, having enough manners to at least lock the door and kick off his shoes before waltzing around Dick’s kitchen like he paid the rent.
“Windows are too predictable these days, haven’t you heard?”
“Obviously,” Dick laughed around the lip of the bottle. The sip turned into a long swig before Dick thought better of it.
He heard clinking in the kitchen but didn’t bother checking to see what his brother was doing. If Tim broke something he and his trust fund could buy another one.
Dick winced at the train of thought. Now he’s just being bitter. Dick has a trust fund too, he just doesn’t want anything to do with it. Maybe Tim doesn’t either, who knows. Not like he’s asked.
The burn of the scotch was cut short by a sharp kick to Dick’s side. Choking, he hazily swung his gaze to glare at his brother. There was little remorse in the asshole’s expression, which made the responding punch to the leg feel that much more satisfying.
“Ow! What the hell?”
Dick looked at him incredulously.
“You literally kicked me first, don’t pull that shit-”
“Are you seriously pulling a ‘you started it’ right now?”
“You did! What are you talking about?”
Tim rolled his eyes in response and set the glasses he was apparently holding down on the coffee table. Or, well it was more a leg rest Dick put a piece of polished wood on but whatever. Semantics.
The glasses turned out to be some old shitty shot glasses Dick had stashed away in his cabinets. One was a gag gift from Barbara a few Christmases ago, before they stopped talking and then started talking again; it had a massive four leaf clover and read “drinking like an Irishman”. He’s pretty sure it was a reference to some inside joke they shared at the time. He pretended it didn’t hurt to realize he forgot it.
The other was from a mission turned vacation Dick had taken in Miami. The tourist shops had been truly appalling but he refused to come home without some kind of cheesy knickknack. A shot glass covered in neon colored beaches, palm trees, and gators was just too perfect not to buy.
Neither had been used in years, Dick was amazed he didn’t lose them. But here they were.
Tim had decided to steal the bottle out of his hands at some point in his musings and was currently pouring two shots. Two shots?
“Excuse me, last I checked eighteen wasn’t the legal drinking age,” Dick commented.
“Please,” Tim scoffed as he set the bottle down, “Like anything we do is legal.”
Dick didn’t stop him from picking up the shot.
Tim looked at him expectantly and gestured to the other glass. With the most exasperated sigh he could manage, Dick sat up, and woah holy shit he’s dizzy did he eat? , and grabbed the glass.
Looking far too pleased with himself, his brother tapped their glasses together and they downed them.
Then the smug little shit started coughing and suddenly Dick couldn’t breathe as he laughed.
“Oh my god, that’s-” he wheezed “-I wish I was recording, holy shit.”
Tim glared at him and shakily flipped him off as he coughed. It only made Dick laugh harder.
“Fuck you, honestly. Why did you buy such awful stuff? This is so-”
He was cut off by another short cough. Tim grabbed the bottle again and inspected the label, looking properly disgusted the longer he stared at it. Dick rolled his eyes and snatched it away to open. Carefully, because his hand-eye coordination wasn’t exactly at its best, he poured them another shot.
There was maybe a quarter left in the bottle but he didn’t think too hard about that fact. He was far past considering the healthy methods of coping. This wasn’t the worst of them anyway. Murder was worse. Tim could understand that.
Dick drank his shot. He poured another. Poured one for Tim while he was at it.
He was too focused on the swaying of the amber alcohol in his glass to keep remembering.
He took another shot.
Burn after burn. Something familiar in his gut. It barely hurt but it was warm. Dick had always ran warm, even when surrounded by the cold. Everyone became so cold.
Jason was cold. Was Bruce, before he came back, cold? Were his parents?
Something warm landed on his shoulder and Dick startled.
Turning, Dick saw a gelled mass of black hair and a bit of navy blue. His little brother leaned against his shoulder and took another shot. He stared for a few seconds, uncomprehending.
Tim raised his glass for a refill. Silently, Dick poured him another. He shouldn’t, honestly letting Tim come in, letting him sit down, letting him see Dick like this, it was all a mistake. This wasn’t something he should be enabling.
But.
But there was an exhaustion in each of the kid’s breaths, and he was shaking just slightly against Dick’s side.
“Fuck,” Dick muttered, still not stopping Tim from taking the next shot.
“Mhm.”
The clink of glass kept the silence at bay for another few moments. Whatever scotch there was left would go untouched as Dick pushed it on the table, just out of reach.
Beside him, Tim rolled the neon Miami shot glass back and forth in his hands. Dick watched the movement, feeling like he was swaying with it. Like on a boat, he thought. A gentle rocking.
Abruptly, Tim broke the silence, voice clear and casual.
“I visited my mom’s grave today. I forgot flowers.”
Dick let the words roll over him, rocking along with the shot glass.
“Did she like flowers?”
Tim laughed, “No. Not picked ones, they died too quickly.”
He paused.
“She liked to grow flowers.”
Dick hummed, not quite knowing what to say to that.
“I visited my parents a few days ago,” he settled on.
He felt Tim shift to look at him but didn’t meet his eye. The dirt from the cemetery was still caked on the bottom of his shoes that sat by the door. They hadn’t been worn since, considering he hadn’t left the house since. Grocery delivery services were a godsend.
“Did they like flowers?”
Dick smiled despite himself.
“Yeah,” his voice was scratchy, “my dad never wanted to admit it, but one time my mom got him some, after a show.”
He remembered the way his dad had smiled. The memory was blurry but that smile was unfairly clear. There had been laughter and some comment about masculinity and flowers, probably.
“My dad kept those things alive as long as he could. It was sweet, my mom loved it too.”
Dick glanced down awkwardly, trying to see Tim’s face. There was a knowing look in his eyes as he smiled softly up at him.
“They sound like they were in love.”
It was a childish thought, not one he’d think Tim of all people would say out loud. But he was right. Simply put, they were in love.
“Yeah.”
Tim looked over Dick’s face for a second, seemingly searching for something. If he found it Dick didn’t find out.
It never got easier, sharing memories with people. There would always be a part of him that wanted to guard each one as aggressively as possible, keep them as close as he could. He didn’t want to give them up, it felt like giving them away.
Still, it was Tim. And he was drunk, so nothing was really off-limits right now.
“You asked me to go to therapy back when I was looking for Bruce.”
Dick startled at the non-sequitur. That was in fact a thing he did, yes.
“I remember,” his reply came out more cautious than he meant it to.
Of course Dick remembered, he had the woman’s business card in his wallet for months. Every chance he could get, Dick had wanted to give it to his younger brother, who was so clearly hurting and lost in his grief. They were alike in far too many ways.
“You were probably right, even if I wasn’t wrong about Bruce I would have benefited from it.” Tim’s voice is purposefully apathetic. The admission could only have come with the blessing of hindsight. Maybe Tim regretted something about it, Dick definitely did.
There was a lot Dick regretted about back then.
“We all could,” Dick muttered back.
“Yeah.”
They were silent for a while. Tim seemed to doze off at some point, or maybe he was just staring at the wall like Dick was. The scotch sat untouched on the table still, barely anything left in it.
He thought about his family, as he watched the wall spin and swirl. A lot of them died. A lot of them even came back.
Not Tim though.
Tim just left. Or maybe it was Dick that left. There was lot going on, he had missed his brother, he missed having an equal. Maybe, if Dick was feeling cliche enough, he would say they both left.
But they didn’t die.
That thought deserved a toast.
Dick reached up, ignoring the whine Tim let out as his spot on Dick’s shoulder was disturbed. Grabbing the bottle of scotch once again, he emptied it into the two glasses. It barely filled them but that didn’t matter.
Handing the Miami glass to Tim and grabbing his own four leaf clover one, Dick raised it up and waited until Tim sluggishly did the same. Tim shot him a look of confusion.
“To living when we really shouldn’t have.”
It was grim and borderline suicidal, but Tim laughed brightly. There was a familiar crinkle of his eye despite the morose look they both shared. It wasn’t a pretty sentiment, but it was a shared one.
“Mazel.”
They clinked the glasses together.
*****
Tim stumbles a little as he pushes through his apartment door. The too heavy bag on his shoulder pulls him forward, upsetting his balance. With what remaining energy he has, Tim heaves it up and tosses it on the couch. He doesn’t bother watching to see if it landed or not, instead making a beeline for the bathroom as he half-hazardly kicks the door shut.
Tripping over his shoes and slamming into the bathroom door, he barely makes it to the toilet in time to throw up his meager lunch. His knees land hard on the tiled floor as his stomach cramps.
His throat burns as he falls back to lean on the cabinet. The dress shoes are probably giving him blisters and his tie is far too tight.
Tim gives himself a second, just in case he needs to lean back over the toilet, before standing swiftly. He flushes the toilet and washes his hands, face, mechanically. As a kid, Tim didn’t make a big deal out of getting sick. He would get over any nausea pretty quickly and deal with it as quietly as he could. Despite his efforts as a kid, sometimes his mom would hear him and come check. Her soft maroon slippers would make gentle shuffling sounds against the hardwood as she left her room, Tim would hear the floorboards creak loudly in the dead of night and wait for her in the bathroom.
Sometimes, she wouldn’t say a word. His mom would pick him up carefully, grip more gentle than ever before, and lead him back to bed. She would bring him water and swipe a warm, plush washcloth along his face, still silent.
He remembered the look in her eyes as they reflected the light from his lamp, all business and care. It was the few times he could look at her and think, without a doubt, ‘This is my mom, and she will always love me’.
The last time Tim can remember a night like that was when he was nine years old, and he had known his parents would be leaving in the morning.
Now Tim stood in his own bathroom, no mother, no maroon slippers, just Tim.
He walks out of the bathroom quickly and hurries to his room, ripping off his tie. It came loose with a rough tug, falling to the floor, where his suit jacket and dress shoes soon follow. Standing there, looking at his too-big room, Tim decides he needs a drink.
Yep, he needs a cold, expensive drink.
Tim walks to his liquor cabinet (which easily compresses and folds into the living room wall, just in case) and looks for the priciest bottle of booze he owns. Most of them were his dad’s, but he bought quite a few as well. What’s the point in making fake IDs if you don’t buy booze with it anyway?
A needlessly long label sticks out and he plucks it from the shelf.
Because he has at least a little class, Tim scans his glasses for something to use. There’s a couple crystalline glasses, some champagne flutes, and one or two tumblers. But behind all of those, something pink and green catch his eye. Tim carefully moves a few glasses out of the way to see and-
Tim’s heart drops and his chest burns. A neon beach shot glass stares back at him from the shelf.
That…He didn’t remember putting that there. It should be put away, in a box, far out of sight where Tim doesn’t have to think about it and doesn’t have to remember.
Tim watches his hand move forward on its own accord and grab the glass. Cradling it in his hand, Tim sets down the golden bottle in his other hand and stares.
Something in his head shatters and Tim is no longer in the living room. His feet have led him to the bedroom again and he’s sat on the edge of the bed. The room is dark around him, with the only light filtering in through the cracked door. It’s barely enough to see the color of the garish design still resting in his palm.
Back in his own body, and unfortunately his own head, Tim remembers.
He chokes as the day comes flooding back along with the days, weeks, before that. It’s like a haze has been flickering over his memories and suddenly it crashes down, revealing the ugly, awful bits underneath.
The smell of grass, of dirt, and the sight of another headstone sits in his head. It hurts. His chest feels like it’s going to collapse inward, a black hole sucking in every breath he tries to take. The carved letters sit clear as ever, even as they flicker and change. Different names, different dates, the same Tim.
If he tries, Tim can picture different funerals. The solemn line of guests sitting facing a podium where someone grieving stands. Some of the groups are smaller than the others, sometimes it’s just him, sometimes he’s the one they all face. It’s all the same feeling though. The suit he wears is always uncomfortable and the hole in his chest never leaves. Fresh dirt makes the area smell of Earth. Mud inevitably cakes on everyone’s shoes (Tim’s sure if he checks, some will still be on his dress shoes) and the headstone always sits front and center. Maybe it rains, or it won’t.
This time, the group was huge. He stood at the podium for less than a minute. His suit was still irritating his skin with every second that passes. Mud definitely got tracked in. The sky was spotted with clouds but not a drop of rain came down.
Desperate for something else, anything else, to remember, Tim forces himself to focus on the shot glass again. And he thinks.
There had been so many emotions clashing in his head that day. He had unlocked the door with the fierce determination to talk , to force Dick to work out their issues and get over this stupid wall already. Because, and Tim really hated admitting it, Tim missed his brother. He missed having someone.
Dick was there to catch him, now he just had to listen.
But then Tim had shoved open the door, not even attempting to remain quiet, and watched Dick flinch. Dick, the first Robin, Nightwing, Gotham’s stand in Batman for fuck’s sake, had jumped when Tim very loudly unlocked and opened the door.
There were very few times in his life that Tim ever felt sorry for Dick. Not that he didn’t feel bad for all the man had gone through, but he rarely ever pitied him. Pity just wasn’t something you could attribute to the Dick Grayson. He was too kind, too resolved, too strong to be pitied. Dick Grayson was a leader; he was jaded but he still fought for a better world, he was the best of them all.
More importantly, he was Tim’s big brother. It was impossible to pity him.
That day, though, Tim had seen his brother truly hurting for the first time.
His plans of a tense, but necessary conversation had been discarded the moment Tim looked around the apartment and seen his brother grieving. Instead, Tim had just wanted a drink.
He remembered pulling out the glasses from the back of the cabinet and bringing them over to the couch, plopping on the floor next to Dick. They shared maybe, what, four? Five shots?
That day Tim was reminded of what he used to always know, Dick was alone too.
They were both alone, they both knew what it was like to lose everyone and be left with the remains of the life you knew. They had been stranded at some point, help just out of reach.
It was stupid but Tim used to feel reassured that at least, in some messed up way, Dick and him had lived together.
And now they didn’t.
Tim lifts the shot glass to his eye level, scanning over each chip in its dumb design. There was a bit of glass missing from the lip of the glass, carving over the tip of a palm tree and stealing its leaf away. It left the rim sharp. If you weren’t aware of it, it would be easy to cut your lip.
Running a finger along the edge, Tim watches as the glass just barely slices into the pad of his finger, leaving a single drop of red on it.
Tim has decided, just now, that the next funeral he’d ever willingly attend is his own.
He lifts the glass up in the air, a toast to the thought.
“Mazel.”
Nobody clinks their glass with his.