Fic: Change My World 7/8 (Batman)
Mar. 3rd, 2008 08:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficTitle: Change My World 7/8
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Dick/Babs, Robin, Batman
Word Count: 7,899
Series: Change My World
Summary: Dick has a few issues with the new world he’d found himself in. He works through them.
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
I can’t be with you, Dick. Because when I am, you make me want to be someone I can’t be.
Dick was floating in pain, bathing in it, sinking, drowning. Something dark in his ear whispered you’ve had worse, Grayson and he concentrated on rising above it. Memories tugged at him. Mired him. He remembered being shot before, through the leg, a cop, a fucking cop shot him, Jesus Christ…
Barbara, always there for him and not there for him, what’d I do wrong, damnit, tell me, I’ll fix it, fix you, fix me…
Because when I am, you make me want to be someone I can’t be. But I still try and it hurts. Stop hurting me, Dick. Please.
The pain coalescing, fading, leaving. He just had to force it down, just had to live with it. It wasn’t so bad, once he got used to it. Already it was withdrawing from his extremities, focusing on his chest. That was where he was hit, where the bullet had struck, not his leg, his leg was fine, so why am I not standing?
Stop hurting me, Dick. Please.
The pain died down as quickly as it had flared, leaving Dick looking up at the stars. He squinted and the world came into focus. The driver was standing over him, gun held on Spooner. Must’ve only been a few seconds. Dick forced his legs into working and they crossed upward, kicking the gun out of the driver’s hand. It flew off the fire escape and shattered on the street.
The driver swore and tried to get a kick in, but Nightwing rolled away, came up to kick off the handrail, and returned with fists swinging. The driver went down, a bruise already darkening one side of his face.
Above, the assassin Robin had been fighting screamed as he dropped. At the last minute he jerked to a stop, a de-cel line wrapped around his ankle. Robin tied it to the handrail of the level he was on and dropped down to meet Dick and Spooner, who was hyperventilating.
“You guys alright?” Robin focused on Nightwing and then startled. “Geez, Nightwing, you’ve been shot!”
Dick poked a finger into the dimple in his suit. “Kevlar caught it. I love this stuff. Still hurts, though.”
“Yeah, that inertia has to go somewhere.” Robin’s head swiveled to regard Spooner. “Let’s get you to the cops. It’s obvious you’re not safe on the streets.”
***
That morning, Dick worked himself out of his suit. The top came off easily enough, although every motion against his chest sent fresh pain burning through him. When he got the sleeves off, he turned to the mirror to see a gruesome bruise where the bullet had been stopped. Shirtless, he fetched some ointment from the first aid drawer and spread it over his wound.
The check-up station had always struck Dick as being a bit like an actress’s vanity. Several mirrors were positioned to allow him to check his body for injuries. And since the last time he’d used it, scanners had been added to it. They threw up a diagnostical holo-chart of his body on the mirror in front of him.
Batman was scrutinizing it before Dick even turned around. When he did notice the older man, it almost gave him a heart attack.
“Jesus, Bruce, don’t do that!”
“Sorry. Thought you were used to it by now.” He leaned over Dick to take a closer look at the read-out. “A foot higher and that bullet would’ve gone through your skull.”
“Well, glad I’m so tall.”
Batman held out a tube of solvent and Dick took it with a nod, then used it to peel his mask off. Then Batman made a gesture and Dick laid back, exposing his bruise to the light. Batman looked over it, carefully probing its edges with one hand.
“So tell me about him,” Dick said, his breath hiked with pain. Batman gave him a look and Dick clarified. “The new kid.”
“Tim. Tim Drake, son of Jack and Janet Drake. You know them?”
“Our neighbors.”
“Good.”
“Don’t give me the facts, tell me about him.”
Batman straightened and took off his gloves. “Any pain?”
“With you poking and prodding? Yeah.” Batman gave him The Look. “Kinda sore when I breathe.”
Batman reached into a drawer and brought out a pill bottle, which he opened.
“I don’t need drugs.”
“Aspirin.” Batman showed off the label. “If I thought you needed anything stronger, I’d shove it down your throat.”
He would, too. Dick took the pills and dry-swallowed them. Then tapped his toes as Batman went to get a cold compress.
“Tim’s good. Different. Not as athletic as you. Doesn’t have Jason’s edge.”
“Thank God.” Dick almost smiled, but turned to look at the mirror instead. His expression. Jason, rotting, hurting, bad…
“But he’s smart.”
“As smart as you?”
“Some day. Maybe some day soon.” Batman paused, then took off his cowl. Dick stopped looking at the mirror and turned to regard his mentor head-on. “I adopted him.”
“Why?”
“His parents died. I gave him shelter. And I didn’t want to make the same mistake I made with you.”
“Mistake?” Dick repeated, doubtful. Bruce didn’t make mistakes.
Bruce shoved the cold compress against Dick’s bruise, brought Dick’s hand up to hold it in place himself. “Of trying to deny how I felt, of trying to shut myself off from you when you needed a father.”
“Bruce, I…” Dick stood. “I got what I needed. I don’t need a pat on the head or a slap on the back. From you, or anyone.”
“Be that as it may.” Bruce stepped back. “There were things I always assumed you knew that apparently you had… have doubts about. And there are things I said to you that it took me time to say. But for now, all you need to know is this: I care for you, a lot more than you realize. And losing you would destroy me. It took a long time for me to admit to myself that you’ve become… everything I could ever want in a son. That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier. That’s how much I care, that I had to put it into writing. You’re my son, Dick. Legally, as well as in my heart.”
Dick was floored. He knew Bruce loved him… there was evidence of that everywhere you looked, if you knew how to look, and you’d have to be blind not to know how to look unless you didn’t know Bruce. But hearing that there had been doubts, that it was even conceivable that he would come to have doubts about Bruce’s loyalty to him, was an impossible preposition for him.
And then to hear Bruce say out loud how important Dick was to him, to remove all hypothetical doubt…
Dick felt like he might cry.
He tried to settle on one of the emotions Bruce had kicked up, and finally just bit his lip. “I didn’t know you could be a father.”
“I have to be. Dick, there will be times when you’ll want to withdraw. Cut yourself off from emotion. It may seem less painful, but if I can’t do it…” Bruce looked away. “I’ve seen you happy. Safe. Loved. Those are the times in my life when the night doesn’t seem so dark. If you have a choice, between being that way and being like me… don’t take my path. You’re not Batman. You shouldn’t be.”
“Jesus, Bruce, this is a lot to lay on a guy.”
Bruce picked up Dick’s uniform shirt and dug the flattened slug out of it. “You should’ve been able to dodge this.” Before Dick could interrupt to point out that was the opposite of what he was trying to do, Bruce continued. “Your musculature has changed, you’ve gotten taller, your limbs have gotten longer. Your muscle memory no longer matches your conscious memory; and now that you’re aware of that it poses a problem. Meditate until you’ve achieved oneness between body and spirit.”
Dick snapped off a crisp salute. “Righto.”
Was that a grin on Bruce’s face as he turned away? “Dismissed.”
***
“Meditation” in Bruce’s world was “strenuous physical exertion” in Dick’s. He ran the obstacle course and didn’t stop at the end, just kept going. Hit the uneven bars, the rings, the horse, the trapeze, the vaulting horse, the mat, the high bar, chi shi, ishi sashi, makiage kigu, and so on. Then he hit the obstacle course again and worked up a sweat.
He took a few hits, including one painful punch to his bruise from an animatronic, but he rapidly shaved milliseconds off his reaction time. He’d had no sleep since a nap on the car ride there, and when sleep called, he listened. A quick shower, fresh clothes, and he was up the stairs to a less drafty environment.
The kid, Tim, ran into him on his way to the guest bedroom.
“Hey, Dick.” Dick glanced at him, surprised. “Sorry, don’t mean to be too familiar.”
“Be as familiar as you like.” Dick knocked on his head. “Maybe it’ll jog something loose. Besides, what else would you call me?”
“Richard.”
“How well do you know me?”
“Well enough to know you’re going the wrong way, if you’re headed for your room.”
Dick rubbed his bleary eyes. “Oh?”
“Bruce always keeps a room set up for you, right near where you used to sleep. East wing. Close to the Batcave entrance, so we can get to safety quick if there’s an attack.”
“We? Tell me there aren’t bunk beds.”
Tim laughed. “No! I sleep down the hall. Listen, you wouldn’t want to sleep in the guest bedrooms. They’ve got all sorts of cameras and stuff to make sure our guests aren’t shapeshifters or whatever.”
“That a big problem?”
Tim shrugged. “Better safe than sorry, right?”
“But what if the shapeshifter is sharing a room with us?”
Tim looked at Dick. “Would you take a girl home to Wayne manor?”
Dick shook his head.
“Me neither. Problem solved. Try not to get too much sleep, you wouldn’t want to become a night owl like some of us.”
“Will do.”
“Oh, and Barbara called while we were on patrol. She wants you to call her back.”
“Think she’ll mind if I catch a few winks first?”
“It’ll hold.”
“Well, did she say what it was about?”
“She just said she wanted to talk to you. It’ll hold.”
***
Barbara stared at the phone. The phone sat there like it had no idea what a bitch it was being. Dinah returned from her trek to the kitchen, having slept over. She gave Barbara bottled water. Barbara didn’t uncap it, instead loosening and then tightening the cap as she stared at the phone.
Dinah hunched down by her friend. “I hear it works better if you pick up the handset and dial some numbers,” she said, tapping on her temple.
“I already called. Don’t want to seem obsessive.”
Dinah rolled her eyes. “You’ve got it bad, you know that?”
“Don’t judge me. I can’t concentrate on anything else. Your fault.”
“My fault?”
“You said ‘follow your heart.’ Didn’t say it would lead me to a dead end.”
Dinah smiled and kissed Barbara’s cheek before snuggling against her, to the redhead’s squirming protest. “Babs, hon, you have a plane.”
***
Dick looked at himself in the mirror. Alfred had laid out some casual wear, most of it Italian… a sports coat, shirt, and linen pants. It looked a little Miami yacht set for his tastes, but fit him well. Damn, I look halfway respectable.
He tried on a pair of sunglasses he’d found and actually looked like the man he’d thought he’d grow up to be. Namely…
“Bond, James Bond,” Dick said, considering himself in the mirror.
“I’m glad you so approve of my countryman,” Alfred said. He was standing in the doorway, a tea tray in his hands. “Tea? Biscuits?”
“No, thanks. If you want to clean the room, I’ll be out of your way in a moment.”
“No hurry, sir. The memory of your old environs has me putting off this particular cleansing as far as possible.”
“Hey, maybe I’ve gotten… cleanlier since then.”
“So why, Master Dick, is your bed unmade?”
Dick groaned and slumped down into a chair. “Okay, okay, guilt trip underway.”
“That was not my intent. I merely wish for you to give Miss Gordon a ring.”
“Oh yeah,” Dick remembered. “Where’s the nearest phone?”
“In your pocket.”
Dick patted his cell phone. “Right. I’ll do that.”
Alfred beamed with pride, but a note of caution. “Do take care, Master Dick. If a heart is broken enough times, enough pieces may be lost that it never becomes whole.”
“I would never do that to Barbara.”
“What made you think I was referring to her?”
Dick exhaled and shook his head, psyching himself up. “You want to play moral support?”
“It would be my honor.” Alfred sat down across from them and poured them both tea. “To soothe your nerves,” he said, passing a cup to Dick.
Dick sipped it. Helped a little. Probably psychosomatic. The phone still felt heavy in his hand. It would’ve been so easy for it to slip out of his sweaty fingers. But he tapped in Barbara’s number with his thumb and raised it to his ear.
***
Leaving Zinda’s winking innuendo behind (“I go to Chicago if I want deep-dish; I guess you go to Gotham if you want Dick!”), Dinah drove Barbara from the airport. As if some goddess had sensed their mood, the traffic was light and the radio was playing something upbeat.
“We could visit my father,” Barbara suggested.
“You check your voice mail every thirty seconds. I don’t think you’re fit company for him at the moment.
“So where are we going?”
“Gotham Hilton.”
Barbara’s face quirked with suspicion. “Why?
Dinah smirked suggestively. “If you need a place to be alone with a guy, it might as well have a hot tub… and a mattress with no lumps.”
“Dinah! I’m not going to just hop into bed with him!”
“Why not? He’s gagging for it, you’re gagging for it…”
“It takes time to build a relationship to that level…”
Dinah refrained from smacking her head against the window. It might break it. “Babs, you’ve been building relationships since you first made a construction paper Valentine’s in kindergarten and where has it gotten you? Try jumping in the deep end for a change.”
Barbara had her mouth open to answer when her phone rang. She jerked it out of her pocket like an Old West gunslinger slapping leather. “Crap, it’s him!” Barbara began finger-combing her hair.
“He can’t see you over the phone.”
“Right. I might be a little nervous.”
She was about to answer the phone when Dinah snatched the phone out of her hand. It continued to ring plaintively.
“Dinah, phone?”
Dinah pulled over to the side of the road. She brandished the ringing phone at Barbara. “Let it ring for a while. Make him sweat. Then we’ll—“
The phone stopped ringing.
Barbara blinked.
Dinah blinked.
“Now, Barbara, remember your blood pressure!”
Barbara’s eyes were narrowed. “My blood pressure is perfectly healthy.”
“But it might not be if you get upset!”
***
Dick stared at the phone. “I got her answering machine.” He began dialing again. “Maybe she’s in the shower; I should call again.”
Alfred stopped him. “Wait just one moment, young sir.”
“Why?”
“Patience. We wouldn’t want you to appear desperate.”
“I am desperate.”
“Do you want to appear that way?”
“No.”
“Then patience!”
***
“Do you have a paper bag?” Barbara asked. “I need a paper bag. I haven’t hyperventilated since I was twelve.”
“Look, this can be fixed. Here.”
Dinah pressed redial.
***
Dick started as his phone rang.
“It’s Barbara!”
Alfred nodded graciously.
***
Dick answered and Dinah held the phone out to Barbara, who looked as if she really needed a paper bag. As Dick chorused “Hello? ... Hello?”, Barbara reluctantly took the phone.
“Hi, Dick? It’s me.”
***
“Hey there, I was just… returning your call…”
Dick looked to Alfred, who gave him a thumb’s up.
***
Barbara tried to look anywhere but Dinah, who was doing a very provocative series of pelvic thrusts against the steering column.
“Oh, yeah, someone tried to hack my system, probably just a script kiddie. I crashed their service provider for a half hour, then switched my IP address. Nothing big.”
***
“Oh, that’s cool.”
Dick gave a shrug to Alfred, then pointed a mystified finger at the phone.
Alfred gestured for him to keep going.
***
“Listen, I’m in Gotham for the weekend to…”
Barbara looked to Dinah for advice. Dinah had formed a V with her fingers and was enthusiastically flapping her tongue between it.
“…visit my father…”
Dinah made a face.
“And I was wondering if you wanted to get together sometime?”
***
Dick put the phone to his shoulder and mouthed she wants to get together sometime.
Alfred tapped his watch, signaling what time?
“I don’t know, I’m a little busy,” Dick said into the mouthpiece.
Alfred very nearly slapped his forehead.
***
“Oh. Okay then.”
Dinah was by now rubbing her hands up and down her body, and Barbara thought she was starting to enjoy it a little too much.
***
“I could make time, though.”
***
“I wouldn’t want to pull you away from anything.”
***
“Hey, it is no trouble. Just say when.”
***
“Say… seven-thirty?”
***
“Said.”
***
“You can just come over to my place. I’m staying at the Gotham Hilton.”
***
“Which room?”
***
“…I don’t know. Yet.”
***
“Oh. Well, you can call me back when you’re settled in. I won’t start any long books.”
***
“Right. I’ll just unpack my things and give you a call.”
***
“Great.”
***
“Good. Bye.”
***
“Bye.” Dick hung up and looked at Alfred. “See? Easy.”
His phone rang again. He answered it. Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe was playing in the background.
“I miss you,” Barbara said. “I miss having you with me, sleeping under the same roof as you. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Good. Because I don’t.”
She hung up.
“She always has to have the last word,” Dick said lovingly.
***
“Did I just do that?” Barbara asked, switching off the radio and ending Dinah’s try-out for an Herbal Essences commercial.
“Yes. You, my friend, are getting laid tonight.”
***
Dick shined his shoes, watching his reflection in them. He was just about as polished. Alfred had shepherded him into the shower with an armful of soaps he was expected to use, which made Dick look positively luminescent when he got out. The sporty outfit they kept, but Alfred tried to comb Dick’s hair into a dorky Alfalfa part. Dick immediately ruffled it up when Alfred had his back turned, and the next time the butler approached with a comb, Dick dropped into a karate stance.
They agreed to disagree.
“My memory’s spotty, but I do remember how to dress myself,” Dick said.
“Unfortunately, Master Dick, one cannot remember what they have not learned in the first place.”
“I think he looks just fine,” Bruce said, making one of his trademark entrances. He rustled Dick’s hair some more, ironically prompting Dick to try to smooth it out. “You’re doing the right thing, Dick.”
“We can hope.”
Bruce clapped him on the shoulder. “Remember your mistakes. Remember to learn from them. You’ll be fine.”
In parody of Bruce’s sudden touchy-feeliness, Dick straightened Bruce’s lapels. “Now you tell me.”
***
Dinah was waiting for Dick in the hotel lobby. Dick shook her hand brightly.
“You’re Barbara’s friend, aren’t you? I just remembered all the things she’s told me about you.”
“All good, I hope.”
“Yes, of course… I never would’ve guessed that you dye your hair…”
Dinah flipped him the room key hard enough to sting. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
“Not much chance of that,” Dick said as he stepped into the elevator.
***
“I was thinking we could stay in tonight.”
Barbara nervously rearranged her hair after saying it, flipping it off its carefully neutral position on her shoulder. The room was intimately lit, not by candlelight or anything overtly romantic, but just with the lights dimmed and the curtains drawn back to let the light of the city in. One thing Dick had to admit about the new skyline, it looked spectacular at night. Not oppressive or imposing, just… beautiful. Without shadow. Not that the shadows weren’t there, but they were invisible.
Dick was spending a lot of time not staring at Barbara, who was wearing something elegantly straddling the line between explicitly dressing up and casual night on the town. There was a gold chain around her neck, dipping toward the modest cleavage her evening dress showed. Something, a little of Dick’s nervousness disappeared when he saw a pair of slippers at the end of the long legs coming out of Barbara’s middling hemline.
Barbara fiddled with her finger, her third finger. “You know how Gotham dining is.”
“Actually, I don’t. All I can remember is fast food and the occasional all-you-can-eat buffet at Ming’s Chinese Palace…” Dick tapped his head. “I don’t think I’m forgetting anything.”
Barbara smiled. “Yeah, you’re not exactly a gourmet. But the reservations are usually booked, if you can get in they’ll seat you right next to the kitchen if you haven’t been in People in the last six months, and they probably won’t let you order a milkshake.”
“Bourgeois swine,” Dick cursed, affecting a Russian accent.
He collapsed onto a couch, putting his feet up on an armrest before he realized Barbara wanted to sit there as well. He moved and almost offered assistance, but she swung herself onto the far end of the couch from him with practiced ease.
“Pizza’s on the way, milkshake’s in the fridge, Transformers is in the Blu-Ray player.”
Dick flipped over the back of the couch and made a beeline for the kitchen. “What’s a Blu-Ray?”
“It’s like a DVD.”
“What’s a… never mind.”
Dick came back, pouring half of his milkshake into a lowball glass, which he set before Barbara on the coffee table. While he sat down, Barbara put a coaster under it.
“So… Transformers,” Dick ice-broke, as Barbara fiddled with the TV remote, stereo remote, and Blu-Ray remote. “Didn’t know you still watched cartoons, Miss Maturity.”
“I don’t. They made a movie.”
Dick’s eyes went wide and something in his soul took flight as Peter Cullen began to orate…
***
“So are you?” Dick asked as the credits rolled, the last two slices of pizza growing cold between them.
“Huh?”
Dick grabbed the last piece of pepperoni pizza and spread a pip of ground pepper over it. “Glad you got in the car, put on the mask?
“I am. For the most part.”
“Am I part of the most part?” Dick asked before taking an apprehensive bite.
Barbara grabbed her own slice. “You are the most part.”
“That can’t be true.”
“I’m exaggerating for dramatic license.” She lolled her head against the couch as she chowed down some more. “It comes with the territory.”
“You helped a lot of people. You put a lot of bad guys in prison.”
“They got out.”
Dick socked her on the shoulder. “So we put ‘em back in. Yeah, it’s aggravating… but what else are we gonna do? Launch ‘em into space?” He leaned back. “Why’d you lie?”
“I didn’t want you to make a beeline for Kory and get in over your head with an ex-girlfriend.”
“Not about that… though if that’s your reason, why didn’t you stop me from seeing Dinah?”
“You and Dinah!?”
Dick pointed at her. “You deserved that. Don’t try to deny it.”
“Evil. Evil boy. You lost your memory and now you’re a supervillain.”
Dick scratched his head. “Why’d you say you weren’t paralyzed?”
Barbara set her pizza down, pushed it aside. “I just didn’t want to get into that.”
“I think it’s more than that.”
“You know, right in the other room there’s a briefcase? I can open it and summon up a virtual desktop. Through holograms I can manage all of the Birds of Prey. I am so much more than just Batgirl now. But, for a while, it was nice… to…” She shook her head. “I’m not the girl you know. Carefree, fun-loving, devil-may-care… that’s not me anymore. I can’t keep up with you now.”
Dick saddled up closer to her. “Then I’ll slow down. Don’t have second thoughts, I’ve already had them. And third, and fourth, and fifth… there’s a reason I couldn’t be with Kara, and it wasn’t that she reminded me of you. Actually, it was, in a way. She was like… mirror universe Batgirl. All fun and games, no maturity. And that’s what I love about you. You take on this responsibility without anyone even asking you to. Just… because it’s the right thing to do. You don’t back down or give up… you fight. Because you’re a fighter.”
“Not anymore.”
“Forever…” Dick put an arm around her. “There are only two things I don’t remember.”
“Really?”
“What I did to deserve you, and how I could ever let you go?”
“Cheesy.”
“Sometimes the truth is cheesy.” She moved to take another bite and Dick grabbed the slice from her, setting it down on the box. “I’ve done things, horrible things, things I never would’ve imagined I could do… or become. I threatened Superman with Kryptonite. I helped Deathstroke. I hit Roy. I hurt you. I am nothing like the boy I once was. There’s only one thing about me that hasn’t changed. One thing about me that’s a constant. And that’s you. I’ve never stopped loving you. Not ever. Not for one minute of one day.”
“Shut up.”
Dick moved the pizza box onto the coffee table and scooted closer to Barbara. “I won’t say I would’ve left Kory if you’d beckoned. At the time, I loved her more. That was the man I was back then. But the man I am now… he has no reservations. No one else is in my heart but you. There’s no more room.”
He wiped some pizza sauce from Barbara’s mouth, paralyzed with indecision. He couldn’t go any further, couldn’t do all the work when he didn’t know if Barbara was receptive. This time, she had to return his affection. This time it had to be different.
“This isn’t you,” Barbara said resolutely, too deep too fast and sinking faster. “You’re not yourself.”
Dick sighed with dismay. “Not myself? Just because of a few piddling memories I’m missing? Memories don’t make us who we are, choices do. The choices you make and the choices I make. And if they didn’t, then my memories were keeping me from being who I really am. Because whoever I am, I love you. And do you honestly believe the real me ever stopped loving you? Or that he even could? Or would want to?”
“No. But it’s not that simple.”
“Yes it is. You just want it to be complicated.”
“Don’t say that!” Barbara put a hand against his chest. “I don’t want this to be complicated. More than anything, I want this to be as simple as when we were kids. But it isn’t and if we pretend, we’re just going to wind up back where we started. And I need more than that.”
“I do too.”
Very slowly, as if Dick were some skittish creature that would run off if she moved too fast, Barbara pulled herself closer to him and finally set both arms around him, lowering herself into his embrace. He held her once more, for the first time in far too long, and God, she’d forgotten how good it felt not to have to worry or care or fret, because Dick would protect her. It was an illusion, but most comfort was.
“Do you remember our first time together?”
“New Gotham.” Dick patted her back slowly, though his voice was far away and flush with memories. “The city was being rebuilt. So were we. New beginnings and happily ever after.” He smiled and the pads of his fingertips rested warmly on her shoulder blade. “Your pillow talk was all about how you were going to rebuild the Clocktower.”
“That’s when I came up with the idea of rotating the roster,” Barbara recalled. “But… that wasn’t our first time.”
She moved her hand up to gently take hold of his arm along the bicep, pressing it down so his fingers trailed off her back. If he could, he would’ve seen her biting her lip and marshalling her courage. This was one of those times photographic memory was a real bitch.
“The wedding invitation.”
She could still see Dick and Kory, together, smiling happily off the cover of that invitation. The one real bright spot of her life post-Joker, the one thing that’d made her feel whole, and it’d been ripped away just as she’d started to lean on it. It was so fucking Gotham it hurt.
“I remember,” Dick said quietly. His voice sounded so unlike him, and Barbara realized it was the man Dick was so hesitant to let her, or the world, glimpse… mature, haunted, and blind from seeing far too much of the world’s evil.
“You wanna know the funny thing? The excuse I used to beat myself up over that, because God knows I couldn’t let you take all the blame? If our situations were reversed… and Kory were the one lying in a hospital bed… I wouldn’t have let you comfort her. She’s fine with loaning you out, but I’m not. I’m the selfish one.”
Hesitant to touch her, Dick finally gave in. He laid his hand down on the top of her head, thumb brushing her temple, and stroked her hair back until his palm was traveling down her spine. He repeated it, over and over again, feeling the tension leave Barbara’s body as she seemed to melt into him, yet still retain a core of rigidity that had to be his fault.
“It was an impossible choice and I fucked it up. But I never meant to hurt you. It was either reject you or… what was I supposed to do? I just wanted to make you feel better. I still do. And I don’t know how and it hurts, like you wouldn’t believe, to see you like this and know that there’s not a damned thing I can do about it.” He took her by the shoulders and lifted her up, sitting up himself, so they could look in each others’ eyes. “So I’m doing this. I’m going to stay with you until you need me. And maybe you already need me and you just need to admit it. But I’ll be here til you do. Until then, I’ll wait. Because you’re worth waiting for.”
Barbara looked away. “No I’m not.”
And Dick cupped her chin and forced her to look at him, look into his eyes. He wouldn’t allow her to doubt his conviction for a moment. “You wanna wait until they fix your legs? I’ll wait. You wanna wait until the world doesn’t need Nightwing and Oracle? I’ll wait. Ask me to wait until the stars grow cold and I’ll wait. But don’t ask me to stop loving you. I can’t. It’s not in me.”
Tears were gleaming in Barbara’s eyes and by force of habit she tried to hide them from him. When that didn’t work, she took off her glasses and wiped her eyes. And then she looked at him, the pits of her eyes darkened with runny mascara. And to think, I put on make-up to look pretty for him.
“I could never…” her teeth gritted “even think you didn’t love me. Tell you why.” She dug the gold chain from her chest and held it up to the light. A ring dangled from the end of it, its diamond catching the city lights. “You gave this to me… promising you’d come back when you knew who you were. I know that man, a little. I’ve always known that he loves me. Do you?”
Dick took the ring in his hand. Then he gently removed it from the necklace it rested on. He took Barbara’s hand.
“I don’t quite know who I am. But I know something more important. Who I want to be. I want to be the friend Roy relies on. I want to be the son Bruce is proud of. I want to be the brother Tim can learn from. I even want to be the ex Kara drunk-dials.” Barbara laughed, just a little, and Dick smiled before turning serious. “And I want to be your husband.”
“Oh, God…”
“Not right now,” Dick clarified quickly. “Maybe not for a long while. But we can start down the road now. Start shopping for bargains on tuxedos and wedding dresses, asking friends if they can recommend a good caterer, picking out songs for the DJ to spin…”
“Rick Springfield. Love Somebody.”
Dick grinned, ecstatic and so excited he could burst. “Is that a yes?”
Barbara took the ring from him and slipped it onto her finger. “That a big enough clue for you?”
“Well, I was trained by the World’s Greatest—“
“You could be kissing me right now,” Barbara said, before making sure he was.
“Barbara,” Dick moaned, low and needing, when she slid her lips down to his neck.
“Call me Babs.”
“Babs…” Dick held Barbara’s face for a moment before he kissed her. “I like it.”
“So, uh…” he continued, some time after becoming painfully aware of how cramped his erection was. “Here, or the bedroom?”
“Silk sheets.”
“Bedroom it is.”
He picked her up, turning it into a caress before he actually lifted her.
“If you could just put me in the chair, I’ll need it in the morning anyway…”
Dick laid her down on the bed, back against the pillows and headboard. “Actually, I’d kinda like this to be special.”
“Don’t you remember?”
“It’s fuzzy,” he said defensively.
She kissed him, and it took just a moment for Dick’s lips to part and her tongue to slide across his. “Let me remind you then.”
Barbara guided his hand to her left breast, feeling his fingers tremble slightly inside her grip. Then they were pressed against her flesh, slowly squeezing, and she let go a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. Her breast filled his hand, and even the soft material of her sundress was grating to his expectant hand. With his other hand, Dick slipped the thin shoulder strap off. Barbara handled the other strap herself.
Between the two of them they got the dress down to her waist. That was as far as Dick could go before he dipped his face into the hollow of her stomach and kissed her there, the fleecy hair of her stomach tickling her lips. His tongue laved into her belly button and Barbara moaned as her fingers tangled into his hair.
She took him by the ears and urged him upward. His nose trailed over her stomach. Not as hard and muscled as he remembered, when he had dared to slip his hand under her shirt, but soft. Dick buried his face in the skin between her ribs, breathing her in.
His hands traveled under her, so warm in contrast to the cool sheets, found the hook of her bra and tried to suavely undo it. Barbara giggled when he failed. Frowning with consternation, Dick rolled them over so that she was on top, then looked over her shoulder as he did it. This time Barbara felt it spring open. She pushed off his chest until she was straddling him, then, with one arm still holding her up and him down, she took off her bra and dropped it off the side of the bed.
Eyes wide, Dick’s hands wavered aimlessly between their bodies before he cinched them on Barbara’s outstretched arm, its palm flat on his chest. “I want to remember this. This moment, right now. If I forget everything else, I still want to have this moment, so I’ll know I had you.”
She smiled, already feeling her heart going a little faster. It had been far too long since someone looked at her like Dick was doing. “You have me. So what’re you going to do?”
His hands ran up and down her arm, warming her more than she’d care to admit. “Hardly seems fair.”
A waver of fear went through her. Because of her paralysis, because she couldn’t compare to how he must’ve pictured it?
“That we only have one night, I mean.”
“There’s always tomorrow… morning,” Barbara amended.
“It won’t be the same.”
“Right. It’ll be better.” She leaned down closer to him, propped herself up on her elbows over his prone body. “That’s your department, man wonder. But for tonight…”
He gripped her and rolled her over, the nervousness leaving his smile. Now they were on their sides and Barbara trembled as his hands danced over her body, the faded scars and the slight flab she couldn’t exercise away and the fractures where her ribs had knitted themselves back together. She felt examined, memorized under his touch. But his eyes never left hers.
Belatedly, she realized she’d been far too passive, trying not to intimidate him. Hell with it, let him be intimidated. She grabbed his shirt and pulled it upward, Dick wiggling accommodatingly to help it reach his armpits. Reluctantly, he stopped his exploration of her to pull it off, then rolled back over to her.
The touch started at his face, feeling down through his stubble to his neck and the heat of the sweat dampening his chest, the hair there drifting under Barbara’s palm like clouds. His abs were a joy to touch, tensing with power, but he winced when she touched an old scar. His coarse body hair thickened as she approached his groin, though there was a hairless stretch of rubbery scar tissue where he’d been burned by acid. It felt gummy and she avoided it, redirecting her hand lower. Fingers slid under his waistband and rubbed up and down across the juncture between his underbelly and thigh until she rounded her way to his cock, cramped in the space allotted it.
Dick gasped, his hands no longer exploring her but instead crushing against her body as if holding on for his life. Barbara reached down with her other hand and popped his belt buckle, tugged on it just enough to free a length of leather, then undid his fly. He groaned and tightened his handholds on her when she tugged his erection out of its confinement.
When Dick loosened his grip on her flesh, there were vivid red marks where his fingers had been.
Automatically, his hands went to push her dress down further, to reveal more of the sparse pubic hair poking out from the crotch of her panties. She resisted him for any number of reasons. Self-consciousness about the legs that act would unveil, the knowledge that doing so would take them further down the road they were traveling before she was ready, and the simple desire to make things perfect.
“Here,” she said, guiding his hands to the full breasts he’d been so reluctant, yet perversely eager, to touch. “I’m very sensitive here.” And not down there.
He nodded and squeezed, too hard, she opened her mouth in pain and he relaxed his fingers before kneading her flesh again, this time more pleasurably. She let her approval be read as it flowed through her body, seeming to unburden her. As one hand consistently pleasured her, the other experimentally pinched a nipple and tugged on it.
In counterpoint, Barbara ran her fingernails down his chest, not too hard, not drawing blood. But she didn’t stop until her hands were at his crotch again, unbuttoning his pants and struggling until his cock was out from under the waistband and she could shove his trousers down. They were rolling closer to each other, now having to crook their arms to touch each other. Barbara groped his ass, squeezing and digging her fingernails in. It felt hard as ever, and thankfully unscarred. Then her hand moved lower until she felt the old scar in his thigh. Even aside from the crude hardness of the scar tissue, she could feel the way the muscles tensed differently after they’d repaired themselves.
Dick grabbed her hand by the wrist and brought it up to his shoulder, where naturally it circled to the back of the neck and pulled him into a deep kiss. Then he apparently thought better of it, because he took hold of her hand again and moved it between his legs. She smiled in the millisecond before they kissed again and took hold of him, jacking her hand up and down with firm, slow strokes.
He outright moaned, like an animal, and Barbara grabbed him by the hair to crane his head down to her breasts. It was slightly awkward, her trying to jack him off while he buried his face in his breasts, but he bent at the waist to make it easier for her.
Her nipple, dark and hard, was rough compared to the skin surrounding it, and the prickliness of her areola was downright abrasive next to the silk-smooth skin that covered her breast. Dick felt out the difference with his tongue, tried to see how hard he could make her nipple with just his lips. His teeth. His tongue. The suction of his mouth gave her moans that made him want to end it right then and there, jackhammer into her and come thirty seconds later, but what a thirty seconds they would be. But instead he kept suckling, alternating his mouthing to some instinctive rhythm.
She arched up to meet Dick’s mouth and he rolled on top of her to keep giving it. When he brought his hands down to part her legs, he found her inner thighs slick with her own fluid.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?”
Dick put arms up on either side of her, holding himself up as if he might crush her. His lower body, what she could feel of it, was twined with hers. “I’ve been ready.”
She kissed him and brought him inside her with unerring accuracy, her arms now wrapping around his back, feeling the muscles there tense as she enveloped him. Barbara wasn’t sure who was whimpering for it, him or her, but she agreed wholeheartedly. Dick lowered himself all the way into her and just held, breathing heavily, panting. He got his breath under control as Barbara relaxed her vice-like grip on his back. She didn’t want to let him go.
Slowly, he pulled himself out a ways and then dove back in. Too hard, too fast. Barbara groaned in pain and Dick’s face was instantly apologetic.
“No, no, that was good,” she said. “Just a little slower, a little…”
He dipped his hips, perfectly, pulled out a little, back in, setting up a rhythm. Barbara wasn’t sure what she could do with her hands, what she could do other than just lay there and accept his love. So she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pulled herself up to kiss him as hard as she could. From the quickening of his hips, that did the trick.
Barbara wasn’t even sure she could speak, but somehow she managed “Harder, I won’t break, harder!” like a croak and he did as she asked/ordered/begged, making her writhe like she hadn’t done in so long. At some point Barbara had a brilliant idea of what to do with her hands and as she kept one tensed at the small of Dick’s back to make damn sure he didn’t stop, the other slid along her underbelly until it found her erect clit.
And after that, Dick stopped holding himself up and fell upon her, which just made things go faster. One of his hands followed hers to her clit and her climax was so good that when it was over, she was sweating.
He wasn’t finished yet, and she had to wrestle his hands away from her clit, it hurt to touch. For a while they kissed, him still inside her, throbbingly erect, the slightest motion of his lower body sending flames licking through her bloodstream. Then eventually Barbara grabbed his ass and pulled and they started again. Barbara clasped her hands to his neck and shoulders and felt the muscles there tighten like metal cooling.
He came in never-ending gulps, arms around her, nails dug into palms. It took an eternity for him to unclench his teeth and gasp in air, and longer for her to roll him off of her.
Dick hit the bed beside her and chuckled. She chuckled too, as she laid her head down on his chest. Her sweat-knotted hair skimmed across his pectorals, tickling him. She looked down at her body to see if it had changed (her dress was still hanging from her legs, her panties pulled down to her knees) and found it covered by a crimson blush. Barbara smiled. She was glowing.
The scars accumulated on Dick’s body stood out in sharp relief to his exerted skin, like they were glowing. She kissed his lips, ignoring the shining cut marring the pink of his scalp, and collapsed against him once more.
Gradually, sensation beyond tingling returned to her body and she shivered. Dick got up, undressed her and then took his socks off. He briefly sojourned to the bathroom and she saw him through the open door, splashing himself with water from the sink. He dried himself with a handtowel and returned, pulling the covers over them both when he laid down.
“Feels weird?” she asked.
“Little bit. Good weird, though.”
“I’m glad.”
“We could stay here all week. Make it an endurance contest… who can go the longest without getting out of bed?”
Barbara ran a hand through his damp hair. “What if we want to use the hot tub?”
“Okay, longest without sleeping.”
Barbara yawned. “I forfeit. A winner is you.”
He kissed her hand. “Wuss.”
“Soon to be a well-rested wuss. Come here.”
Once more Barbara pulled him to her, this time threading his arm over her shoulders as she turned on her side. It left him spooning with her, and after a little difficulty placing his other arm, he was flush against her, feeling the pulse of her breathing against his chest.
“Sweet dreams,” he said as he rested his head against their pillow and spiraled down into sheer, violent terror.
***
“Bad dreams?” she asked the next morning, irony thick in her voice. He had awoken in a cold sweat, breathing heavily.
Her sarcasm melted into concern and she pushed a lock of hair out of his face, finding his eyes wide with fear.
“Dick?”
“I killed him,” Dick said slowly, turning to face her. “I killed Roland Desmond. And it’s your fault.”
Chapter 8
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Dick/Babs, Robin, Batman
Word Count: 7,899
Series: Change My World
Summary: Dick has a few issues with the new world he’d found himself in. He works through them.
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
I can’t be with you, Dick. Because when I am, you make me want to be someone I can’t be.
Dick was floating in pain, bathing in it, sinking, drowning. Something dark in his ear whispered you’ve had worse, Grayson and he concentrated on rising above it. Memories tugged at him. Mired him. He remembered being shot before, through the leg, a cop, a fucking cop shot him, Jesus Christ…
Barbara, always there for him and not there for him, what’d I do wrong, damnit, tell me, I’ll fix it, fix you, fix me…
Because when I am, you make me want to be someone I can’t be. But I still try and it hurts. Stop hurting me, Dick. Please.
The pain coalescing, fading, leaving. He just had to force it down, just had to live with it. It wasn’t so bad, once he got used to it. Already it was withdrawing from his extremities, focusing on his chest. That was where he was hit, where the bullet had struck, not his leg, his leg was fine, so why am I not standing?
Stop hurting me, Dick. Please.
The pain died down as quickly as it had flared, leaving Dick looking up at the stars. He squinted and the world came into focus. The driver was standing over him, gun held on Spooner. Must’ve only been a few seconds. Dick forced his legs into working and they crossed upward, kicking the gun out of the driver’s hand. It flew off the fire escape and shattered on the street.
The driver swore and tried to get a kick in, but Nightwing rolled away, came up to kick off the handrail, and returned with fists swinging. The driver went down, a bruise already darkening one side of his face.
Above, the assassin Robin had been fighting screamed as he dropped. At the last minute he jerked to a stop, a de-cel line wrapped around his ankle. Robin tied it to the handrail of the level he was on and dropped down to meet Dick and Spooner, who was hyperventilating.
“You guys alright?” Robin focused on Nightwing and then startled. “Geez, Nightwing, you’ve been shot!”
Dick poked a finger into the dimple in his suit. “Kevlar caught it. I love this stuff. Still hurts, though.”
“Yeah, that inertia has to go somewhere.” Robin’s head swiveled to regard Spooner. “Let’s get you to the cops. It’s obvious you’re not safe on the streets.”
***
That morning, Dick worked himself out of his suit. The top came off easily enough, although every motion against his chest sent fresh pain burning through him. When he got the sleeves off, he turned to the mirror to see a gruesome bruise where the bullet had been stopped. Shirtless, he fetched some ointment from the first aid drawer and spread it over his wound.
The check-up station had always struck Dick as being a bit like an actress’s vanity. Several mirrors were positioned to allow him to check his body for injuries. And since the last time he’d used it, scanners had been added to it. They threw up a diagnostical holo-chart of his body on the mirror in front of him.
Batman was scrutinizing it before Dick even turned around. When he did notice the older man, it almost gave him a heart attack.
“Jesus, Bruce, don’t do that!”
“Sorry. Thought you were used to it by now.” He leaned over Dick to take a closer look at the read-out. “A foot higher and that bullet would’ve gone through your skull.”
“Well, glad I’m so tall.”
Batman held out a tube of solvent and Dick took it with a nod, then used it to peel his mask off. Then Batman made a gesture and Dick laid back, exposing his bruise to the light. Batman looked over it, carefully probing its edges with one hand.
“So tell me about him,” Dick said, his breath hiked with pain. Batman gave him a look and Dick clarified. “The new kid.”
“Tim. Tim Drake, son of Jack and Janet Drake. You know them?”
“Our neighbors.”
“Good.”
“Don’t give me the facts, tell me about him.”
Batman straightened and took off his gloves. “Any pain?”
“With you poking and prodding? Yeah.” Batman gave him The Look. “Kinda sore when I breathe.”
Batman reached into a drawer and brought out a pill bottle, which he opened.
“I don’t need drugs.”
“Aspirin.” Batman showed off the label. “If I thought you needed anything stronger, I’d shove it down your throat.”
He would, too. Dick took the pills and dry-swallowed them. Then tapped his toes as Batman went to get a cold compress.
“Tim’s good. Different. Not as athletic as you. Doesn’t have Jason’s edge.”
“Thank God.” Dick almost smiled, but turned to look at the mirror instead. His expression. Jason, rotting, hurting, bad…
“But he’s smart.”
“As smart as you?”
“Some day. Maybe some day soon.” Batman paused, then took off his cowl. Dick stopped looking at the mirror and turned to regard his mentor head-on. “I adopted him.”
“Why?”
“His parents died. I gave him shelter. And I didn’t want to make the same mistake I made with you.”
“Mistake?” Dick repeated, doubtful. Bruce didn’t make mistakes.
Bruce shoved the cold compress against Dick’s bruise, brought Dick’s hand up to hold it in place himself. “Of trying to deny how I felt, of trying to shut myself off from you when you needed a father.”
“Bruce, I…” Dick stood. “I got what I needed. I don’t need a pat on the head or a slap on the back. From you, or anyone.”
“Be that as it may.” Bruce stepped back. “There were things I always assumed you knew that apparently you had… have doubts about. And there are things I said to you that it took me time to say. But for now, all you need to know is this: I care for you, a lot more than you realize. And losing you would destroy me. It took a long time for me to admit to myself that you’ve become… everything I could ever want in a son. That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier. That’s how much I care, that I had to put it into writing. You’re my son, Dick. Legally, as well as in my heart.”
Dick was floored. He knew Bruce loved him… there was evidence of that everywhere you looked, if you knew how to look, and you’d have to be blind not to know how to look unless you didn’t know Bruce. But hearing that there had been doubts, that it was even conceivable that he would come to have doubts about Bruce’s loyalty to him, was an impossible preposition for him.
And then to hear Bruce say out loud how important Dick was to him, to remove all hypothetical doubt…
Dick felt like he might cry.
He tried to settle on one of the emotions Bruce had kicked up, and finally just bit his lip. “I didn’t know you could be a father.”
“I have to be. Dick, there will be times when you’ll want to withdraw. Cut yourself off from emotion. It may seem less painful, but if I can’t do it…” Bruce looked away. “I’ve seen you happy. Safe. Loved. Those are the times in my life when the night doesn’t seem so dark. If you have a choice, between being that way and being like me… don’t take my path. You’re not Batman. You shouldn’t be.”
“Jesus, Bruce, this is a lot to lay on a guy.”
Bruce picked up Dick’s uniform shirt and dug the flattened slug out of it. “You should’ve been able to dodge this.” Before Dick could interrupt to point out that was the opposite of what he was trying to do, Bruce continued. “Your musculature has changed, you’ve gotten taller, your limbs have gotten longer. Your muscle memory no longer matches your conscious memory; and now that you’re aware of that it poses a problem. Meditate until you’ve achieved oneness between body and spirit.”
Dick snapped off a crisp salute. “Righto.”
Was that a grin on Bruce’s face as he turned away? “Dismissed.”
***
“Meditation” in Bruce’s world was “strenuous physical exertion” in Dick’s. He ran the obstacle course and didn’t stop at the end, just kept going. Hit the uneven bars, the rings, the horse, the trapeze, the vaulting horse, the mat, the high bar, chi shi, ishi sashi, makiage kigu, and so on. Then he hit the obstacle course again and worked up a sweat.
He took a few hits, including one painful punch to his bruise from an animatronic, but he rapidly shaved milliseconds off his reaction time. He’d had no sleep since a nap on the car ride there, and when sleep called, he listened. A quick shower, fresh clothes, and he was up the stairs to a less drafty environment.
The kid, Tim, ran into him on his way to the guest bedroom.
“Hey, Dick.” Dick glanced at him, surprised. “Sorry, don’t mean to be too familiar.”
“Be as familiar as you like.” Dick knocked on his head. “Maybe it’ll jog something loose. Besides, what else would you call me?”
“Richard.”
“How well do you know me?”
“Well enough to know you’re going the wrong way, if you’re headed for your room.”
Dick rubbed his bleary eyes. “Oh?”
“Bruce always keeps a room set up for you, right near where you used to sleep. East wing. Close to the Batcave entrance, so we can get to safety quick if there’s an attack.”
“We? Tell me there aren’t bunk beds.”
Tim laughed. “No! I sleep down the hall. Listen, you wouldn’t want to sleep in the guest bedrooms. They’ve got all sorts of cameras and stuff to make sure our guests aren’t shapeshifters or whatever.”
“That a big problem?”
Tim shrugged. “Better safe than sorry, right?”
“But what if the shapeshifter is sharing a room with us?”
Tim looked at Dick. “Would you take a girl home to Wayne manor?”
Dick shook his head.
“Me neither. Problem solved. Try not to get too much sleep, you wouldn’t want to become a night owl like some of us.”
“Will do.”
“Oh, and Barbara called while we were on patrol. She wants you to call her back.”
“Think she’ll mind if I catch a few winks first?”
“It’ll hold.”
“Well, did she say what it was about?”
“She just said she wanted to talk to you. It’ll hold.”
***
Barbara stared at the phone. The phone sat there like it had no idea what a bitch it was being. Dinah returned from her trek to the kitchen, having slept over. She gave Barbara bottled water. Barbara didn’t uncap it, instead loosening and then tightening the cap as she stared at the phone.
Dinah hunched down by her friend. “I hear it works better if you pick up the handset and dial some numbers,” she said, tapping on her temple.
“I already called. Don’t want to seem obsessive.”
Dinah rolled her eyes. “You’ve got it bad, you know that?”
“Don’t judge me. I can’t concentrate on anything else. Your fault.”
“My fault?”
“You said ‘follow your heart.’ Didn’t say it would lead me to a dead end.”
Dinah smiled and kissed Barbara’s cheek before snuggling against her, to the redhead’s squirming protest. “Babs, hon, you have a plane.”
***
Dick looked at himself in the mirror. Alfred had laid out some casual wear, most of it Italian… a sports coat, shirt, and linen pants. It looked a little Miami yacht set for his tastes, but fit him well. Damn, I look halfway respectable.
He tried on a pair of sunglasses he’d found and actually looked like the man he’d thought he’d grow up to be. Namely…
“Bond, James Bond,” Dick said, considering himself in the mirror.
“I’m glad you so approve of my countryman,” Alfred said. He was standing in the doorway, a tea tray in his hands. “Tea? Biscuits?”
“No, thanks. If you want to clean the room, I’ll be out of your way in a moment.”
“No hurry, sir. The memory of your old environs has me putting off this particular cleansing as far as possible.”
“Hey, maybe I’ve gotten… cleanlier since then.”
“So why, Master Dick, is your bed unmade?”
Dick groaned and slumped down into a chair. “Okay, okay, guilt trip underway.”
“That was not my intent. I merely wish for you to give Miss Gordon a ring.”
“Oh yeah,” Dick remembered. “Where’s the nearest phone?”
“In your pocket.”
Dick patted his cell phone. “Right. I’ll do that.”
Alfred beamed with pride, but a note of caution. “Do take care, Master Dick. If a heart is broken enough times, enough pieces may be lost that it never becomes whole.”
“I would never do that to Barbara.”
“What made you think I was referring to her?”
Dick exhaled and shook his head, psyching himself up. “You want to play moral support?”
“It would be my honor.” Alfred sat down across from them and poured them both tea. “To soothe your nerves,” he said, passing a cup to Dick.
Dick sipped it. Helped a little. Probably psychosomatic. The phone still felt heavy in his hand. It would’ve been so easy for it to slip out of his sweaty fingers. But he tapped in Barbara’s number with his thumb and raised it to his ear.
***
Leaving Zinda’s winking innuendo behind (“I go to Chicago if I want deep-dish; I guess you go to Gotham if you want Dick!”), Dinah drove Barbara from the airport. As if some goddess had sensed their mood, the traffic was light and the radio was playing something upbeat.
“We could visit my father,” Barbara suggested.
“You check your voice mail every thirty seconds. I don’t think you’re fit company for him at the moment.
“So where are we going?”
“Gotham Hilton.”
Barbara’s face quirked with suspicion. “Why?
Dinah smirked suggestively. “If you need a place to be alone with a guy, it might as well have a hot tub… and a mattress with no lumps.”
“Dinah! I’m not going to just hop into bed with him!”
“Why not? He’s gagging for it, you’re gagging for it…”
“It takes time to build a relationship to that level…”
Dinah refrained from smacking her head against the window. It might break it. “Babs, you’ve been building relationships since you first made a construction paper Valentine’s in kindergarten and where has it gotten you? Try jumping in the deep end for a change.”
Barbara had her mouth open to answer when her phone rang. She jerked it out of her pocket like an Old West gunslinger slapping leather. “Crap, it’s him!” Barbara began finger-combing her hair.
“He can’t see you over the phone.”
“Right. I might be a little nervous.”
She was about to answer the phone when Dinah snatched the phone out of her hand. It continued to ring plaintively.
“Dinah, phone?”
Dinah pulled over to the side of the road. She brandished the ringing phone at Barbara. “Let it ring for a while. Make him sweat. Then we’ll—“
The phone stopped ringing.
Barbara blinked.
Dinah blinked.
“Now, Barbara, remember your blood pressure!”
Barbara’s eyes were narrowed. “My blood pressure is perfectly healthy.”
“But it might not be if you get upset!”
***
Dick stared at the phone. “I got her answering machine.” He began dialing again. “Maybe she’s in the shower; I should call again.”
Alfred stopped him. “Wait just one moment, young sir.”
“Why?”
“Patience. We wouldn’t want you to appear desperate.”
“I am desperate.”
“Do you want to appear that way?”
“No.”
“Then patience!”
***
“Do you have a paper bag?” Barbara asked. “I need a paper bag. I haven’t hyperventilated since I was twelve.”
“Look, this can be fixed. Here.”
Dinah pressed redial.
***
Dick started as his phone rang.
“It’s Barbara!”
Alfred nodded graciously.
***
Dick answered and Dinah held the phone out to Barbara, who looked as if she really needed a paper bag. As Dick chorused “Hello? ... Hello?”, Barbara reluctantly took the phone.
“Hi, Dick? It’s me.”
***
“Hey there, I was just… returning your call…”
Dick looked to Alfred, who gave him a thumb’s up.
***
Barbara tried to look anywhere but Dinah, who was doing a very provocative series of pelvic thrusts against the steering column.
“Oh, yeah, someone tried to hack my system, probably just a script kiddie. I crashed their service provider for a half hour, then switched my IP address. Nothing big.”
***
“Oh, that’s cool.”
Dick gave a shrug to Alfred, then pointed a mystified finger at the phone.
Alfred gestured for him to keep going.
***
“Listen, I’m in Gotham for the weekend to…”
Barbara looked to Dinah for advice. Dinah had formed a V with her fingers and was enthusiastically flapping her tongue between it.
“…visit my father…”
Dinah made a face.
“And I was wondering if you wanted to get together sometime?”
***
Dick put the phone to his shoulder and mouthed she wants to get together sometime.
Alfred tapped his watch, signaling what time?
“I don’t know, I’m a little busy,” Dick said into the mouthpiece.
Alfred very nearly slapped his forehead.
***
“Oh. Okay then.”
Dinah was by now rubbing her hands up and down her body, and Barbara thought she was starting to enjoy it a little too much.
***
“I could make time, though.”
***
“I wouldn’t want to pull you away from anything.”
***
“Hey, it is no trouble. Just say when.”
***
“Say… seven-thirty?”
***
“Said.”
***
“You can just come over to my place. I’m staying at the Gotham Hilton.”
***
“Which room?”
***
“…I don’t know. Yet.”
***
“Oh. Well, you can call me back when you’re settled in. I won’t start any long books.”
***
“Right. I’ll just unpack my things and give you a call.”
***
“Great.”
***
“Good. Bye.”
***
“Bye.” Dick hung up and looked at Alfred. “See? Easy.”
His phone rang again. He answered it. Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe was playing in the background.
“I miss you,” Barbara said. “I miss having you with me, sleeping under the same roof as you. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Good. Because I don’t.”
She hung up.
“She always has to have the last word,” Dick said lovingly.
***
“Did I just do that?” Barbara asked, switching off the radio and ending Dinah’s try-out for an Herbal Essences commercial.
“Yes. You, my friend, are getting laid tonight.”
***
Dick shined his shoes, watching his reflection in them. He was just about as polished. Alfred had shepherded him into the shower with an armful of soaps he was expected to use, which made Dick look positively luminescent when he got out. The sporty outfit they kept, but Alfred tried to comb Dick’s hair into a dorky Alfalfa part. Dick immediately ruffled it up when Alfred had his back turned, and the next time the butler approached with a comb, Dick dropped into a karate stance.
They agreed to disagree.
“My memory’s spotty, but I do remember how to dress myself,” Dick said.
“Unfortunately, Master Dick, one cannot remember what they have not learned in the first place.”
“I think he looks just fine,” Bruce said, making one of his trademark entrances. He rustled Dick’s hair some more, ironically prompting Dick to try to smooth it out. “You’re doing the right thing, Dick.”
“We can hope.”
Bruce clapped him on the shoulder. “Remember your mistakes. Remember to learn from them. You’ll be fine.”
In parody of Bruce’s sudden touchy-feeliness, Dick straightened Bruce’s lapels. “Now you tell me.”
***
Dinah was waiting for Dick in the hotel lobby. Dick shook her hand brightly.
“You’re Barbara’s friend, aren’t you? I just remembered all the things she’s told me about you.”
“All good, I hope.”
“Yes, of course… I never would’ve guessed that you dye your hair…”
Dinah flipped him the room key hard enough to sting. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
“Not much chance of that,” Dick said as he stepped into the elevator.
***
“I was thinking we could stay in tonight.”
Barbara nervously rearranged her hair after saying it, flipping it off its carefully neutral position on her shoulder. The room was intimately lit, not by candlelight or anything overtly romantic, but just with the lights dimmed and the curtains drawn back to let the light of the city in. One thing Dick had to admit about the new skyline, it looked spectacular at night. Not oppressive or imposing, just… beautiful. Without shadow. Not that the shadows weren’t there, but they were invisible.
Dick was spending a lot of time not staring at Barbara, who was wearing something elegantly straddling the line between explicitly dressing up and casual night on the town. There was a gold chain around her neck, dipping toward the modest cleavage her evening dress showed. Something, a little of Dick’s nervousness disappeared when he saw a pair of slippers at the end of the long legs coming out of Barbara’s middling hemline.
Barbara fiddled with her finger, her third finger. “You know how Gotham dining is.”
“Actually, I don’t. All I can remember is fast food and the occasional all-you-can-eat buffet at Ming’s Chinese Palace…” Dick tapped his head. “I don’t think I’m forgetting anything.”
Barbara smiled. “Yeah, you’re not exactly a gourmet. But the reservations are usually booked, if you can get in they’ll seat you right next to the kitchen if you haven’t been in People in the last six months, and they probably won’t let you order a milkshake.”
“Bourgeois swine,” Dick cursed, affecting a Russian accent.
He collapsed onto a couch, putting his feet up on an armrest before he realized Barbara wanted to sit there as well. He moved and almost offered assistance, but she swung herself onto the far end of the couch from him with practiced ease.
“Pizza’s on the way, milkshake’s in the fridge, Transformers is in the Blu-Ray player.”
Dick flipped over the back of the couch and made a beeline for the kitchen. “What’s a Blu-Ray?”
“It’s like a DVD.”
“What’s a… never mind.”
Dick came back, pouring half of his milkshake into a lowball glass, which he set before Barbara on the coffee table. While he sat down, Barbara put a coaster under it.
“So… Transformers,” Dick ice-broke, as Barbara fiddled with the TV remote, stereo remote, and Blu-Ray remote. “Didn’t know you still watched cartoons, Miss Maturity.”
“I don’t. They made a movie.”
Dick’s eyes went wide and something in his soul took flight as Peter Cullen began to orate…
***
“So are you?” Dick asked as the credits rolled, the last two slices of pizza growing cold between them.
“Huh?”
Dick grabbed the last piece of pepperoni pizza and spread a pip of ground pepper over it. “Glad you got in the car, put on the mask?
“I am. For the most part.”
“Am I part of the most part?” Dick asked before taking an apprehensive bite.
Barbara grabbed her own slice. “You are the most part.”
“That can’t be true.”
“I’m exaggerating for dramatic license.” She lolled her head against the couch as she chowed down some more. “It comes with the territory.”
“You helped a lot of people. You put a lot of bad guys in prison.”
“They got out.”
Dick socked her on the shoulder. “So we put ‘em back in. Yeah, it’s aggravating… but what else are we gonna do? Launch ‘em into space?” He leaned back. “Why’d you lie?”
“I didn’t want you to make a beeline for Kory and get in over your head with an ex-girlfriend.”
“Not about that… though if that’s your reason, why didn’t you stop me from seeing Dinah?”
“You and Dinah!?”
Dick pointed at her. “You deserved that. Don’t try to deny it.”
“Evil. Evil boy. You lost your memory and now you’re a supervillain.”
Dick scratched his head. “Why’d you say you weren’t paralyzed?”
Barbara set her pizza down, pushed it aside. “I just didn’t want to get into that.”
“I think it’s more than that.”
“You know, right in the other room there’s a briefcase? I can open it and summon up a virtual desktop. Through holograms I can manage all of the Birds of Prey. I am so much more than just Batgirl now. But, for a while, it was nice… to…” She shook her head. “I’m not the girl you know. Carefree, fun-loving, devil-may-care… that’s not me anymore. I can’t keep up with you now.”
Dick saddled up closer to her. “Then I’ll slow down. Don’t have second thoughts, I’ve already had them. And third, and fourth, and fifth… there’s a reason I couldn’t be with Kara, and it wasn’t that she reminded me of you. Actually, it was, in a way. She was like… mirror universe Batgirl. All fun and games, no maturity. And that’s what I love about you. You take on this responsibility without anyone even asking you to. Just… because it’s the right thing to do. You don’t back down or give up… you fight. Because you’re a fighter.”
“Not anymore.”
“Forever…” Dick put an arm around her. “There are only two things I don’t remember.”
“Really?”
“What I did to deserve you, and how I could ever let you go?”
“Cheesy.”
“Sometimes the truth is cheesy.” She moved to take another bite and Dick grabbed the slice from her, setting it down on the box. “I’ve done things, horrible things, things I never would’ve imagined I could do… or become. I threatened Superman with Kryptonite. I helped Deathstroke. I hit Roy. I hurt you. I am nothing like the boy I once was. There’s only one thing about me that hasn’t changed. One thing about me that’s a constant. And that’s you. I’ve never stopped loving you. Not ever. Not for one minute of one day.”
“Shut up.”
Dick moved the pizza box onto the coffee table and scooted closer to Barbara. “I won’t say I would’ve left Kory if you’d beckoned. At the time, I loved her more. That was the man I was back then. But the man I am now… he has no reservations. No one else is in my heart but you. There’s no more room.”
He wiped some pizza sauce from Barbara’s mouth, paralyzed with indecision. He couldn’t go any further, couldn’t do all the work when he didn’t know if Barbara was receptive. This time, she had to return his affection. This time it had to be different.
“This isn’t you,” Barbara said resolutely, too deep too fast and sinking faster. “You’re not yourself.”
Dick sighed with dismay. “Not myself? Just because of a few piddling memories I’m missing? Memories don’t make us who we are, choices do. The choices you make and the choices I make. And if they didn’t, then my memories were keeping me from being who I really am. Because whoever I am, I love you. And do you honestly believe the real me ever stopped loving you? Or that he even could? Or would want to?”
“No. But it’s not that simple.”
“Yes it is. You just want it to be complicated.”
“Don’t say that!” Barbara put a hand against his chest. “I don’t want this to be complicated. More than anything, I want this to be as simple as when we were kids. But it isn’t and if we pretend, we’re just going to wind up back where we started. And I need more than that.”
“I do too.”
Very slowly, as if Dick were some skittish creature that would run off if she moved too fast, Barbara pulled herself closer to him and finally set both arms around him, lowering herself into his embrace. He held her once more, for the first time in far too long, and God, she’d forgotten how good it felt not to have to worry or care or fret, because Dick would protect her. It was an illusion, but most comfort was.
“Do you remember our first time together?”
“New Gotham.” Dick patted her back slowly, though his voice was far away and flush with memories. “The city was being rebuilt. So were we. New beginnings and happily ever after.” He smiled and the pads of his fingertips rested warmly on her shoulder blade. “Your pillow talk was all about how you were going to rebuild the Clocktower.”
“That’s when I came up with the idea of rotating the roster,” Barbara recalled. “But… that wasn’t our first time.”
She moved her hand up to gently take hold of his arm along the bicep, pressing it down so his fingers trailed off her back. If he could, he would’ve seen her biting her lip and marshalling her courage. This was one of those times photographic memory was a real bitch.
“The wedding invitation.”
She could still see Dick and Kory, together, smiling happily off the cover of that invitation. The one real bright spot of her life post-Joker, the one thing that’d made her feel whole, and it’d been ripped away just as she’d started to lean on it. It was so fucking Gotham it hurt.
“I remember,” Dick said quietly. His voice sounded so unlike him, and Barbara realized it was the man Dick was so hesitant to let her, or the world, glimpse… mature, haunted, and blind from seeing far too much of the world’s evil.
“You wanna know the funny thing? The excuse I used to beat myself up over that, because God knows I couldn’t let you take all the blame? If our situations were reversed… and Kory were the one lying in a hospital bed… I wouldn’t have let you comfort her. She’s fine with loaning you out, but I’m not. I’m the selfish one.”
Hesitant to touch her, Dick finally gave in. He laid his hand down on the top of her head, thumb brushing her temple, and stroked her hair back until his palm was traveling down her spine. He repeated it, over and over again, feeling the tension leave Barbara’s body as she seemed to melt into him, yet still retain a core of rigidity that had to be his fault.
“It was an impossible choice and I fucked it up. But I never meant to hurt you. It was either reject you or… what was I supposed to do? I just wanted to make you feel better. I still do. And I don’t know how and it hurts, like you wouldn’t believe, to see you like this and know that there’s not a damned thing I can do about it.” He took her by the shoulders and lifted her up, sitting up himself, so they could look in each others’ eyes. “So I’m doing this. I’m going to stay with you until you need me. And maybe you already need me and you just need to admit it. But I’ll be here til you do. Until then, I’ll wait. Because you’re worth waiting for.”
Barbara looked away. “No I’m not.”
And Dick cupped her chin and forced her to look at him, look into his eyes. He wouldn’t allow her to doubt his conviction for a moment. “You wanna wait until they fix your legs? I’ll wait. You wanna wait until the world doesn’t need Nightwing and Oracle? I’ll wait. Ask me to wait until the stars grow cold and I’ll wait. But don’t ask me to stop loving you. I can’t. It’s not in me.”
Tears were gleaming in Barbara’s eyes and by force of habit she tried to hide them from him. When that didn’t work, she took off her glasses and wiped her eyes. And then she looked at him, the pits of her eyes darkened with runny mascara. And to think, I put on make-up to look pretty for him.
“I could never…” her teeth gritted “even think you didn’t love me. Tell you why.” She dug the gold chain from her chest and held it up to the light. A ring dangled from the end of it, its diamond catching the city lights. “You gave this to me… promising you’d come back when you knew who you were. I know that man, a little. I’ve always known that he loves me. Do you?”
Dick took the ring in his hand. Then he gently removed it from the necklace it rested on. He took Barbara’s hand.
“I don’t quite know who I am. But I know something more important. Who I want to be. I want to be the friend Roy relies on. I want to be the son Bruce is proud of. I want to be the brother Tim can learn from. I even want to be the ex Kara drunk-dials.” Barbara laughed, just a little, and Dick smiled before turning serious. “And I want to be your husband.”
“Oh, God…”
“Not right now,” Dick clarified quickly. “Maybe not for a long while. But we can start down the road now. Start shopping for bargains on tuxedos and wedding dresses, asking friends if they can recommend a good caterer, picking out songs for the DJ to spin…”
“Rick Springfield. Love Somebody.”
Dick grinned, ecstatic and so excited he could burst. “Is that a yes?”
Barbara took the ring from him and slipped it onto her finger. “That a big enough clue for you?”
“Well, I was trained by the World’s Greatest—“
“You could be kissing me right now,” Barbara said, before making sure he was.
“Barbara,” Dick moaned, low and needing, when she slid her lips down to his neck.
“Call me Babs.”
“Babs…” Dick held Barbara’s face for a moment before he kissed her. “I like it.”
“So, uh…” he continued, some time after becoming painfully aware of how cramped his erection was. “Here, or the bedroom?”
“Silk sheets.”
“Bedroom it is.”
He picked her up, turning it into a caress before he actually lifted her.
“If you could just put me in the chair, I’ll need it in the morning anyway…”
Dick laid her down on the bed, back against the pillows and headboard. “Actually, I’d kinda like this to be special.”
“Don’t you remember?”
“It’s fuzzy,” he said defensively.
She kissed him, and it took just a moment for Dick’s lips to part and her tongue to slide across his. “Let me remind you then.”
Barbara guided his hand to her left breast, feeling his fingers tremble slightly inside her grip. Then they were pressed against her flesh, slowly squeezing, and she let go a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. Her breast filled his hand, and even the soft material of her sundress was grating to his expectant hand. With his other hand, Dick slipped the thin shoulder strap off. Barbara handled the other strap herself.
Between the two of them they got the dress down to her waist. That was as far as Dick could go before he dipped his face into the hollow of her stomach and kissed her there, the fleecy hair of her stomach tickling her lips. His tongue laved into her belly button and Barbara moaned as her fingers tangled into his hair.
She took him by the ears and urged him upward. His nose trailed over her stomach. Not as hard and muscled as he remembered, when he had dared to slip his hand under her shirt, but soft. Dick buried his face in the skin between her ribs, breathing her in.
His hands traveled under her, so warm in contrast to the cool sheets, found the hook of her bra and tried to suavely undo it. Barbara giggled when he failed. Frowning with consternation, Dick rolled them over so that she was on top, then looked over her shoulder as he did it. This time Barbara felt it spring open. She pushed off his chest until she was straddling him, then, with one arm still holding her up and him down, she took off her bra and dropped it off the side of the bed.
Eyes wide, Dick’s hands wavered aimlessly between their bodies before he cinched them on Barbara’s outstretched arm, its palm flat on his chest. “I want to remember this. This moment, right now. If I forget everything else, I still want to have this moment, so I’ll know I had you.”
She smiled, already feeling her heart going a little faster. It had been far too long since someone looked at her like Dick was doing. “You have me. So what’re you going to do?”
His hands ran up and down her arm, warming her more than she’d care to admit. “Hardly seems fair.”
A waver of fear went through her. Because of her paralysis, because she couldn’t compare to how he must’ve pictured it?
“That we only have one night, I mean.”
“There’s always tomorrow… morning,” Barbara amended.
“It won’t be the same.”
“Right. It’ll be better.” She leaned down closer to him, propped herself up on her elbows over his prone body. “That’s your department, man wonder. But for tonight…”
He gripped her and rolled her over, the nervousness leaving his smile. Now they were on their sides and Barbara trembled as his hands danced over her body, the faded scars and the slight flab she couldn’t exercise away and the fractures where her ribs had knitted themselves back together. She felt examined, memorized under his touch. But his eyes never left hers.
Belatedly, she realized she’d been far too passive, trying not to intimidate him. Hell with it, let him be intimidated. She grabbed his shirt and pulled it upward, Dick wiggling accommodatingly to help it reach his armpits. Reluctantly, he stopped his exploration of her to pull it off, then rolled back over to her.
The touch started at his face, feeling down through his stubble to his neck and the heat of the sweat dampening his chest, the hair there drifting under Barbara’s palm like clouds. His abs were a joy to touch, tensing with power, but he winced when she touched an old scar. His coarse body hair thickened as she approached his groin, though there was a hairless stretch of rubbery scar tissue where he’d been burned by acid. It felt gummy and she avoided it, redirecting her hand lower. Fingers slid under his waistband and rubbed up and down across the juncture between his underbelly and thigh until she rounded her way to his cock, cramped in the space allotted it.
Dick gasped, his hands no longer exploring her but instead crushing against her body as if holding on for his life. Barbara reached down with her other hand and popped his belt buckle, tugged on it just enough to free a length of leather, then undid his fly. He groaned and tightened his handholds on her when she tugged his erection out of its confinement.
When Dick loosened his grip on her flesh, there were vivid red marks where his fingers had been.
Automatically, his hands went to push her dress down further, to reveal more of the sparse pubic hair poking out from the crotch of her panties. She resisted him for any number of reasons. Self-consciousness about the legs that act would unveil, the knowledge that doing so would take them further down the road they were traveling before she was ready, and the simple desire to make things perfect.
“Here,” she said, guiding his hands to the full breasts he’d been so reluctant, yet perversely eager, to touch. “I’m very sensitive here.” And not down there.
He nodded and squeezed, too hard, she opened her mouth in pain and he relaxed his fingers before kneading her flesh again, this time more pleasurably. She let her approval be read as it flowed through her body, seeming to unburden her. As one hand consistently pleasured her, the other experimentally pinched a nipple and tugged on it.
In counterpoint, Barbara ran her fingernails down his chest, not too hard, not drawing blood. But she didn’t stop until her hands were at his crotch again, unbuttoning his pants and struggling until his cock was out from under the waistband and she could shove his trousers down. They were rolling closer to each other, now having to crook their arms to touch each other. Barbara groped his ass, squeezing and digging her fingernails in. It felt hard as ever, and thankfully unscarred. Then her hand moved lower until she felt the old scar in his thigh. Even aside from the crude hardness of the scar tissue, she could feel the way the muscles tensed differently after they’d repaired themselves.
Dick grabbed her hand by the wrist and brought it up to his shoulder, where naturally it circled to the back of the neck and pulled him into a deep kiss. Then he apparently thought better of it, because he took hold of her hand again and moved it between his legs. She smiled in the millisecond before they kissed again and took hold of him, jacking her hand up and down with firm, slow strokes.
He outright moaned, like an animal, and Barbara grabbed him by the hair to crane his head down to her breasts. It was slightly awkward, her trying to jack him off while he buried his face in his breasts, but he bent at the waist to make it easier for her.
Her nipple, dark and hard, was rough compared to the skin surrounding it, and the prickliness of her areola was downright abrasive next to the silk-smooth skin that covered her breast. Dick felt out the difference with his tongue, tried to see how hard he could make her nipple with just his lips. His teeth. His tongue. The suction of his mouth gave her moans that made him want to end it right then and there, jackhammer into her and come thirty seconds later, but what a thirty seconds they would be. But instead he kept suckling, alternating his mouthing to some instinctive rhythm.
She arched up to meet Dick’s mouth and he rolled on top of her to keep giving it. When he brought his hands down to part her legs, he found her inner thighs slick with her own fluid.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?”
Dick put arms up on either side of her, holding himself up as if he might crush her. His lower body, what she could feel of it, was twined with hers. “I’ve been ready.”
She kissed him and brought him inside her with unerring accuracy, her arms now wrapping around his back, feeling the muscles there tense as she enveloped him. Barbara wasn’t sure who was whimpering for it, him or her, but she agreed wholeheartedly. Dick lowered himself all the way into her and just held, breathing heavily, panting. He got his breath under control as Barbara relaxed her vice-like grip on his back. She didn’t want to let him go.
Slowly, he pulled himself out a ways and then dove back in. Too hard, too fast. Barbara groaned in pain and Dick’s face was instantly apologetic.
“No, no, that was good,” she said. “Just a little slower, a little…”
He dipped his hips, perfectly, pulled out a little, back in, setting up a rhythm. Barbara wasn’t sure what she could do with her hands, what she could do other than just lay there and accept his love. So she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pulled herself up to kiss him as hard as she could. From the quickening of his hips, that did the trick.
Barbara wasn’t even sure she could speak, but somehow she managed “Harder, I won’t break, harder!” like a croak and he did as she asked/ordered/begged, making her writhe like she hadn’t done in so long. At some point Barbara had a brilliant idea of what to do with her hands and as she kept one tensed at the small of Dick’s back to make damn sure he didn’t stop, the other slid along her underbelly until it found her erect clit.
And after that, Dick stopped holding himself up and fell upon her, which just made things go faster. One of his hands followed hers to her clit and her climax was so good that when it was over, she was sweating.
He wasn’t finished yet, and she had to wrestle his hands away from her clit, it hurt to touch. For a while they kissed, him still inside her, throbbingly erect, the slightest motion of his lower body sending flames licking through her bloodstream. Then eventually Barbara grabbed his ass and pulled and they started again. Barbara clasped her hands to his neck and shoulders and felt the muscles there tighten like metal cooling.
He came in never-ending gulps, arms around her, nails dug into palms. It took an eternity for him to unclench his teeth and gasp in air, and longer for her to roll him off of her.
Dick hit the bed beside her and chuckled. She chuckled too, as she laid her head down on his chest. Her sweat-knotted hair skimmed across his pectorals, tickling him. She looked down at her body to see if it had changed (her dress was still hanging from her legs, her panties pulled down to her knees) and found it covered by a crimson blush. Barbara smiled. She was glowing.
The scars accumulated on Dick’s body stood out in sharp relief to his exerted skin, like they were glowing. She kissed his lips, ignoring the shining cut marring the pink of his scalp, and collapsed against him once more.
Gradually, sensation beyond tingling returned to her body and she shivered. Dick got up, undressed her and then took his socks off. He briefly sojourned to the bathroom and she saw him through the open door, splashing himself with water from the sink. He dried himself with a handtowel and returned, pulling the covers over them both when he laid down.
“Feels weird?” she asked.
“Little bit. Good weird, though.”
“I’m glad.”
“We could stay here all week. Make it an endurance contest… who can go the longest without getting out of bed?”
Barbara ran a hand through his damp hair. “What if we want to use the hot tub?”
“Okay, longest without sleeping.”
Barbara yawned. “I forfeit. A winner is you.”
He kissed her hand. “Wuss.”
“Soon to be a well-rested wuss. Come here.”
Once more Barbara pulled him to her, this time threading his arm over her shoulders as she turned on her side. It left him spooning with her, and after a little difficulty placing his other arm, he was flush against her, feeling the pulse of her breathing against his chest.
“Sweet dreams,” he said as he rested his head against their pillow and spiraled down into sheer, violent terror.
***
“Bad dreams?” she asked the next morning, irony thick in her voice. He had awoken in a cold sweat, breathing heavily.
Her sarcasm melted into concern and she pushed a lock of hair out of his face, finding his eyes wide with fear.
“Dick?”
“I killed him,” Dick said slowly, turning to face her. “I killed Roland Desmond. And it’s your fault.”
Chapter 8
