Chapter Text
There was no ‘right’ side of Gotham. Every single inch of Gotham City was very much the ‘bad’ part of Gotham. So when you grew up in the really bad part, you learned from an early age how to survive. Chances were that at least one, if not both, of your parents was a really bad person. Most people were in and out throughout her childhood. Parents getting arrested or killed, children being taken by social services, people getting cleaned up and bettering themselves before falling right back into old habits… and then there were people like Artemis who had spent her whole life in the same crappy house with the same peeling wallpaper and the same drafty windows. People with parents like her father who never seemed to stay caught for long are the ones on this side of the city that ended up in gangs and turning out just like their parents.
Artemis has always assumed she would never leave that part of Gotham. She thought surely she’d be just as bad as everyone else. She thought she’d follow in her father’s footsteps and never really make a name for herself in anything that wasn’t completely illegal and immoral. But then her mother had finally come home and kicked daddy dearest out of their lives. And then… then she’d became a hero. It had taken a long time to earn really anyone’s trust, but it had finally happened. And in the process she’d met a boy, retired from the hero business, and went to college. It felt like for once in her whole life things were going right . So of course that was when things had taken a sharp nosedive.
She had taken an undercover mission as a favor to an old friend, watched her boyfriend die saving the world, and then only weeks later found out that she was pregnant with his baby. Of course both her own mother and Wally’s parents had offered to take care of her when they’d finally found out. Even Barry and Iris had offered to let her stay with them knowing that Iris had twins on the way. Of course Artemis had declined, refusing to leave the apartment she’d lived in with Wally for the past couple of years. Everything she had left of him was in that apartment and she couldn’t bare to go through it. Then one day Stephanie Brown quite literally just walked herself right into Artemis’ life without warning.
The blonde was only a few months into her pregnancy and it had been one of the rare days that she had actually left the house to do ‘adult’ things like getting groceries and vitamins and dog food for Brucely. Even though she had only been away for a few hours, by the time her errands were finished she was ready to just go home and crawl back into bed and not move again for who knows how long. At least those were her plans until she had pulled into her driveway to find a younger blonde sitting on her porch. Life always had other plans for her. It had turned out Dick had told one of his friends about her and, having had a baby before, she’d taken it upon herself to offer Artemis aid and company.
Steph had started coming around more and more over the following months, helping with groceries, exercising, cleaning, appointments, and eventually birthing classes. Over that time they had learned a lot about each other, especially once it got later into Artemis’ pregnancy and the other girl practically moved in with her. She found that she really enjoyed Stephanie’s company, cherished it even. While she was around there were a lot of moments that she could feel at peace , like there wasn’t some gaping hole in her chest left by the absence of Wally. It felt like… it felt like she wasn’t actually alone through all of it. Like someone genuinely cared about her in a way she thought only one person could.
Then the baby was born and Steph continued to stay to help with dirty diapers and 3am screaming fits from the infant who already acted like he had his father’s appetite. She stayed . She stayed until it finally came to a point where Artemis wasn’t sure if she could let her go again whenever she grew tired of playing nanny to a woman she’d known less than a year. And since she said she would stay until Artemis no longer needed her, the woman selfishly decided that she was just going to need her for longer than either of them expected.
Artemis smiles over at Stephanie as she rocks the baby and coos at him while his mother is finishing her breakfast. The other blonde catches her watching after a moment and smiles at her too, and they just stay like that for a moment just staring and smiling at each other before the archer goes back to her breakfast, eventually finishing it and ditching her dishes to move around the counter and press a light kiss to Steph’s cheek.
“Thanks for everything, hon.”