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Stupid fucking galas.
Jason hated them. He had always hated them, but he found that the more that he grew, and the more that he disagreed with Bruce, the more he absolutely despised these stupid fucking galas. Kissing old white people’s asses so that Wayne Enterprises could have funding for something he hadn’t bothered to research about. So fucking stupid.
Stupid fucking Bruce for demanding Jason to come to this stupid fucking event full of stupid fucking people. He wasn’t supposed to be there, stuffed in rigid suit pretending that everything is okay when his relationship with Bruce is damaged. True, it had been worse, but why the fuck was he in this fucking stupid gala when Bruce couldn’t even accept the fact that Jason didn’t share the same M.O as dear old Dad.
“Jay, I know that look,” Tim started next to him. “Look at the bright side, at least Bruce invited you.”
Jason groaned as he angrily took a sip of his whiskey. “He didn’t invite me, he demanded I’d come,” he grunted.
“Still, you’re here, as family. It could be worse,” Tim argued.
“Bruce only wanted me here so we could look like the picture-perfect family that he thinks it’s great for his PR,” Jason argued back. “But he forgets: I’m not good for PR, Tim. I shouldn’t be here,” with that he downed the rest of his whiskey. “I’m going to get some more.”
Jason turned towards the bar. He sat on one of the stools, away from the view of Tim. He ran his fingers through his hair ruining all the styling he had done previously. It didn’t matter, he didn’t like it anyway. As he waited for the bartender to fill what would be his third glass of whiskey, he let his eyes wander through the room. All the people there were all the same as he remembered when he was a kid and Bruce hosted these things every month or so. Except one.
A quiet girl, standing awkwardly by a table, lonely, fidgeting with an empty glass. She was wearing a very pretty red dress, and if that wasn’t enough to catch Jason’s attention, she quickly looked at him, before adverting her gaze somewhere else, embarrassed at the quick eye contact she had made with a random stranger in a random party.
Jason grabbed his glass and hastily thanked the bartender. He debated on whether to approach the lonely lady for a mere second but couldn’t get over the fact that he had nothing to lose if she out right shut him out. She couldn’t magically make this stupid fucking gala any better.
He downed the glass in a split second, rested it on the bar and made his way to the pretty lady in a pretty red dress. He quietly approached her, leaning elegantly against the table she was standing next to. She fidgeted nervously at the presence next to her, and awkwardly looked up to him.
He was blown away. It took a second for him to pull himself together. This woman was beautiful, he thought to himself. And extremely awkward.
“I hate this stupid thing. Don’t you?” he said, as he smiled brightly at her, trying to pretend he wasn’t just shit-talking Bruce’s event.
“I can’t say I particularly enjoy, no,” she laughed softly. “It’s not really my scene.”
Jason noticed she hovered her hand slightly above the bridge of her nose, trying to pull glasses that were not there. A nervous tick. “Then what is your scene?”
“Labs,” she looked down at her hands, smiling. “I really like my lab.”
“So, you’re a scientist, then,” Jason concluded.
“Yes, a physicist,” she looked up at him smiling still. Jason fought hard not to have his breath knocked out of him. “I’m kind of the reason Mr. Wayne threw this party,” she said quietly.
“I hardly think so. In my experience Mr. Wayne,” he said sarcastically, “really likes the attention.”
“I’m serious, though,” she contested. “It may be a fund raiser for a charity, but I came here to convince the board members to approve of my project. Mr. Wayne said that I needed to do a little, uh, politics to make it work.”
“Then why aren’t you doing it?” Jason smirked.
“That’s the thing, I already did it,” she said smugly. “It was easy, actually.”
Jason hummed. This lady was really something else. “I’m impressed.”
She smiled. “Really?”
“It’s not easy to kiss old people’s ass, and you seem to have mastered that art,” he said, a smirk creeping its way on face. His voice had a hint of sarcasm on it.
She flushed terribly. “Thank you…”
He extended his hand. “Jason,” he smiled.
She smiled back, shaking his hand, “Jason. I’m Y/N.”
The way his name left her lips made his heart beat erratically. Oh boy, he was in for a ride. “Y/N,” her name felt like the sweetest thing he had ever tasted on his lips, “would you like to dance?” he offered her his hand.
She looked at the dance floor and considered for a second. She took his hand and said: “Sure, why not.”
He took her to the dance floor, soaking in the slow and almost soothing music playing through the hidden speakers of the room. Her hands rested on his shoulders and his hands found their way to the middle of her back. They swayed calmly to the sound of the melody, a smile creeping its way onto Jason’s face.
“I don’t usually accept offers from strangers in parties, but I’m quite liking you Jason,” she said honestly.
“Well, I don’t usually talk to pretty strangers in parties, but I’m glad I talked to you,” Jason said to her with a smile on his face.
“Thank you,” she answered shyly. “So, Mr. Jason, what is it that you’re doing here?” she said calmly.
He sighed. “I’m here on,” how would he phrase that he came to this stupid gala because his adoptive father made him come? “family business.”
“Really?” she said, slightly impressed. “Who is your family? Maybe I’ve met them today.”
Unfortunately, for Jason because he was having such a great time dancing with a beautiful woman, they were interrupted. “Jason!” Tim said across the dance floor. He went towards their direction, Y/N looking confused between Tim and Jason, as he dropped his hands from her waist and subtly notified her that their dance was cut short.
“Bruce is looking for you, he wants to take some pictures now,” Tim said kind of out of breath. He glanced over Jason’s dance partner, before recognizing her. “Oh, hey, Y/N! I see you’ve met Jason,” he said, too enthusiastically in Jason’s opinion.
Jason rolled his eyes at Tim, and Y/N saw it, earning him a small yet charming smile. He smiled back. “Yes, we’ve just met,” she said quietly.
“Great! I’m sorry to interrupt, but my brother and I have some business to attend,” Tim said while dragging Jason towards an impatient Bruce Wayne.
“How do you know Y/N?” Jason inquired.
“I worked with her some time back. She is brilliant,” Tim answered. “She’s really shy, though, I’m surprised she was comfortable around you.”
Jason looked back at where he left her, in the middle of the dance floor, to see she was not there anymore. “Yeah,” he said under his breath.
Jason was relentless. He had felt something different with Y/N, and he was willing to risk it and found out what it was. Because he couldn’t get her out of his head. Well, not exactly. He could, she would just creep in back and would stay there, until he said enough.
He had to talk to her. Wash her off his system. He needed to see her again.
He got into the empty Wayne Industries elevator. He could count the number of times he had been there. Most of them just to pick up Tim for lunch. This was a whole new venture for him. He pressed the number for the floor of her lab.
He was sweating through his shirt. He shouldn’t have done this. He lost all his cool. He was supposed to be the cool and collected one, why was he so fucking nervous, it was just a girl. Maybe he should have left the house without his leather jacket. Maybe he shouldn’t have left his house at all.
But then again, he would have to listen to stupid fucking Tim pointing out the stupid smile Jason was suddenly sporting most of the times. And he would have to listen to stupid fucking Tim drop, not so subtly, Y/N’s break times, or her favorite foods, something Jason would rather have discovered by himself.
He had made the right call, coming here. Tim would get off his back, and Jason would finally get her off his mind.
The door opened with a sound of ding. Jason stared at the white wall with a huge sign. ‘Research Laboratory: Light and Energy’, it read, pointing Jason towards the right direction. It was definitely her lab. Her element. Why did he come again?
He gulped. He took of his jacket, leaving him only in his white t-shirt. He carried his jacket over his shoulder, shoved his other hand on his pants’ pocket and headed towards her lab. Jason hadn’t felt this nervous since he was a teenager, and even back then he wasn’t one to overly care about stupid dates and teenage romance. But, then again, he wasn’t a teenager anymore, and this wasn’t just asking someone to a dance. If he wanted to do this, he would be inviting her to his life, his fucked up and crazy life, and that could put a lot of things in jeopardy. So, yeah, he was nervous. But maybe it wasn’t exactly because of her.
He had reached her lab. Her element. The doors were made of glass, so he could see her perfectly from where he was. She was so carefree. Her hair in a messy bun, chewing on a pen, furrowing her eyebrows at what he assumed would be an incredibly difficult physics problem—at least to him it would be. He had always preferred the humanities.
He took a deep breath. His hand curled around the doorknob and pushed it open. He stood there, jacket in hand, leaning against the frame lazily. Jason waited for her to notice him, but she was so engrossed in her little world she didn’t even acknowledge him. Jason stood there admiring her from a distance. He stopped before it got creepy though. He pushed himself off the frame and smiled.
“So, this is where you feel most comfortable,” Jason commented, startling her.
Y/N pushed her glasses up to the top of her nose and smiled shyly. “Well, yeah, it is my lab,” she said quietly. “Not that I’m not, um, glad to see you, but I didn’t imagine that I would see you here of all places. Tim said that Wayne Enterprises is not your favorite place,” she explained herself.
“Well, I have made an exception today,” Jason smirked back at her. “I was hoping to take you out to lunch. That is, if you’re free, I mean.”
She shoved her hands on her lab coat’s pockets and smiled brightly at Jason. “Yeah, I’m free.”
Jason felt a smile creep on his face, and he didn’t stop it like he usually would. “Great, let’s go then. I bet you’re starving.”
Her eyes twinkled with something Jason couldn’t quite place, as she took off her lab coat and hanged on the hook next to the door. She continued to lightly chat with him—something Jason took as a sign of her being comfortable around him—as she took her things, turned the lights off and locked her lab door.
“So, Jason, how are things going with your girlfriend?” Damien said, taunting Jason.
Jason rolled his eyes, not bothering to lift them from his book as he answered Damien: “Fuck off, Demon Spawn. It’s none of your business.”
Damien scoffed, not interested anymore in getting a reaction from Jason. Tim looked up from his computer. He took a sip of his coffee and then asked: “But how are things, though? You’ve been spending an awful lot of time with her.”
Jason groaned. He plucked his finger in the middle of the book before shutting it and getting up to leave that dreaded place. “How I spend my time is none of your business, Tim. You fuckers should stop prying on my life and take care of yours,” then turned his back and left.
It wasn’t that things weren’t going well, they were. Actually, they couldn’t be better. Jason just wanted to keep those good times to him and Y/N. It felt as if he were to say something to anyone, he would jinx it, and his source of happiness (he wasn’t so pathetic as to have a relationship as his only will to live, but he couldn’t deny that she was his main source of happiness) would suddenly and tragically disappear in a wave of overly fussing relatives, or something worse, into his… night life.
Tim followed him, much to Jason’s doom. If he hadn’t sworn to Bruce he wouldn’t kill anymore, he would be this close to actually murdering one of his brothers. “Jason, please, we are just trying to, you know, take an interest in your life,” Tim reasoned.
Jason stopped and turned towards Tim, his eyes menacing in hopes to scare away his little brother. “You don’t have to ‘take an interest’,” he mocked, “in my life, Replacement.”
“Yes, I do, Jay. Because you’re my brother, and I—” he hesitated, “I care about you. I want to know if you like her.”
“You just want to gossip about it to Bruce,” Jason retorted. “I don’t want Bruce snooping around on my life. It’s enough I have you and the others wondering around.”
“That is not true at all,” he almost seemed like he took offense to it. Admittedly, he wouldn’t necessarily gossip to Bruce about Jason, but he would definitely gossip about him to someone. And so, Jason glared at him, surrendering Tim.
Tim sighed defeated. “Fine, you don’t want to tell me now, that’s fine. I don’t need details. I don’t want details. I want to know if you’re happy.”
If Jason was taken back about Tim’s defiance, he didn’t show it. Jason remained angry faced, his default mode, and narrowed his eyes at Tim before turning around to leave. He stopped for a millisecond, considering if he should answer Tim on that question. Well, if he dwelled on it too much, he wouldn’t do it, so Jason just muttered a small ‘Yes’ before bolting out of the entrance hall to hide away in his room.
Jason looked at Y/N with the softest eyes. The lighting was shit, they were sitting in the greasiest diner he had ever seen (and he had been to some really sketchy places) even if the food was really good. The setting had everything to make Y/N look unattractive, ugly even. She had just gotten out a long day of work—something about quarks and leptons that, to Jason, just sounded like she was talking gibberish. His days of physics were left behind in high school—her hair was greasy, he could see specks of dirt in her glasses, and the bags underneath her eyes were present and making an appearance. And yet, she was the only thing he saw. The most beautiful thing he saw.
She noticed him staring and stopped talking. Y/N smiled at him—she had the prettiest smile, he swore—and he smile back. A genuine smile. A rare one from Jason. He saved those for the deserving. And currently, Y/N was the only one deserving.
“You know, Tim stopped by my lab to chat the other day,” she said. Jason ran a hand through his hair and groaned. “He doesn’t usually do that.”
“What did that fucker want?” Jason growled.
“Oh, nothing specific. We chatted a lot, actually. He wanted to know how things were going between us.”
“And did you answer?” Jason asked, dreading the worse.
“Well, yeah. But I didn’t feel like you were comfortable enough sharing a lot of things, so I told him the bare minimum,” Jason fell in love with her right there. She knew him better than anyone of those motherfuckers could ever know. “Besides I don’t know what is our, um, relationship status, so I wasn’t comfortable sharing too much too. I’d rather keep things between us, for now.”
Jason let out a breathy laugh and once again ran his fingers through his hair. “I swear, those little shits are asking me to kill them with their prying.”
She smiled smally and stirred her drink with her straw. “I don’t know, Jay. He looked like he genuinely cared.”
“He doesn’t,” Jason closed his eyes as he said.
Y/N sighed and reached for his hand. Jason was startled at the sudden touch but didn’t flinch away. Instead, he turned his palm to face hers, and grabbed delicately. “He really does, Jay,” she looked deeply into his eyes. Jason swore he could see the whole universe within those. She was so full of life. “I know you guys have, um… history. But Tim is trying to move past that. Give him a chance,” Jason opened his mouth to argue against it, but she was faster. “And before you deny it, you don’t have to talk about us, or your inner demons. Just be a tinsy bit more open with them.”
Jason shook his head and smiled. He didn’t want to argue with her. Or more like he couldn’t. It felt as though she had a grip so strong on his heart, that if he defied her, she would walk away and leave him empty. And he was so tired of feeling empty, of feeling lonely. Maybe he should talk to his brothers more. “Okay, fine. I’ll try and talk to them more.”
She tightened her grip and smiled brightly, reaching her eyes. “Great.”
They remained quiet for a bit, soaking in each other. Their hands intertwined, a light smile adorning Jason’s face. His mind wandered to something she had said moments ago.
“Do you wanna discuss it? Our relationship, I mean,” he said, a bit hesitant.
She looked at him. “We don’t have to, if you’re not ready. I know these things are difficult for you,” she said, and Jason’s mind flashbacked to the night he had told her just a snippet of his fucked-up past. She was so understanding, more than anyone in his life had ever been, and he was so grateful for that.
“I want to,” he reassured.
Her eyes twinkled. “Okay, then. What do you want to discuss?”
He gulped, and fought the butterflies rising in his stomach. “I want you to be my girlfriend, if that’s alright with you.”
She smiled, full of adoration. “Yeah, that’s alright with me.”
He leaned in closer, smiling. “Great,” he said. “I’m going to kiss you now.”
She smiled, coyly. “Okay.”
Stupid fucking galas.
Jason hated it. But his heart held a special kind of hatred for The Annual Wayne Christmas Party.
The stuffy suits, and the expensive drinks, and the wrinkly old people pretending to know something about the current world, and the tacky decorations made Jason want to chuck all the stock they had of alcohol.
He held his glass of scotch—neat, no ice, like always—and he took a sip as he looked at his wrist watch. He took a deep breath and leaned on the bar. His eyes scanned the gigantic room, looking for her. She was late, and Jason couldn’t wait another minute until he saw her. He needed her.
“You really need to lay off the drinks, Jay,” Tim said, behind him. “You’ll get drunk before this party even starts.”
Jason rolled his eyes and took another sip. “You and I have very different definitions of what a party is, Tim.”
“Aw, c’mon,” Tim lightly shoved his brother, “lighten up a bit.”
“I’ll light—” he trailed off. Speechless, that was the word. He suddenly felt out of breath.
There she was, looking like an angel. Y/N. Her light silver gown trailed behind her, it made her even more beautiful than she already was. Her hair was in a pretty hairdo and maybe Jason really wanted to ruin that by running his hands on her soft hair. But it wasn’t only that. She was glowing inside out.
She was far away from him, so he could only watch her. She was truly the only person in the world that moment. Jason couldn’t hear or see anything, he only saw, heard, and though about her.
“Wow,” Tim lowly said. “Who knew?”
“I knew,” Jason replied, but not loud enough for Tim to hear. “I’ve always known.”
Tim narrowed his eyes at Jason, seeing the sight of his older brother—the toughest of them all—weak in the knees because of a girl. It was a sight to see. “Okay, lover boy, I’ll let you go see your girlfriend,” he said. As if rehearsed, Jason laid is half empty glass of whiskey and walked towards her, not even listening to Tim’s protests of a lack of word from him.
He reached her. She was facing back to him, talking to a group of old nerds—Jason knew they were nerds because he had seen them in so many of them on these fucking stupid fundraisers, all gathered up on the corner, fumbling over random notes made on paper napkins; he always assumed they were too busy comparing maths, or something. Her eyes twinkled with the kind of wonder only reserved to her. Jason laid his hand delicately on the small of her back, earning him a surprised squeak and a quick smile.
“Excuse me, gentlemen, Miss Y/N is needed elsewhere,” Jason came up, with this lame excuse. Y/N gave him a knowing look but didn’t complain. He guided her towards the other end of the ballroom, far away from the prying looks of the elderly gossips.
“Jay, you could’ve just said that—” he kissed her. She was taken back for a split second—maybe less—and soon crossed her arms behind Jason’s neck and melted into his touch.
If it depended only on Jason’s will, he would’ve stayed liked that—engulfed in her arms—for the rest of the night, hell, for the rest of his life. Alas, time couldn’t stop, and they weren’t alone in the world, so eventually they got interrupted.
Alfred cleared his throat behind the couple, Jason’s back facing him. Y/N interrupted the kiss, pushing Jason back, leaving him silently whining for more. “Master Jason, would you like to introduce me to your companion?” Alfred said, politely.
Jason was always very coy around Alfred, and even after his death he hadn’t really lost that. He scratched the back of his neck, awkwardly. “Right… Alfred, this is Y/N my, huh, girlfriend.”
Y/N opened her shy smile, her hand hovering for a second on the bridge of her nose. She extended her hand to Alfred. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Alfred. Jason has talked a lot about you.”
Alfred shook her hand. “Likewise, Miss Y/N.” He dropped her hand and turned to Jason. “Master Bruce is requesting you.”
Jason groaned in annoyance. “Can’t you just say I ran away? Left this stupid ass party for something less boring?”
Alfred gave him a stern look, and Y/N stifled a laugh. It was amusing Jason wilted at just a look. “It is for family pictures, and as far as I know, you are still family,” that left implied so many things and Jason hated it. Y/N cut her laugh short at the comment. She understood the undertones too.
He ran a hand through his hair, completely ruining the styling done. But, then again, he didn’t really care about those. He turned to Y/N. “Stupid fucking party,” he mumbled. “Is it okay if a leave for just a second?”
She smiled brightly. Her hands found his and she gave it a light squeeze. “Of course,” that twinkle again that made Jason crazy. It made leaving so fucking difficult. “I’ll be right here when you get back.”
He smiled, that true smile. Alfred pretend not look at the moment the couple shared, but he couldn’t help but notice Jason’s happiness just at a simple look he gave her.
Jason gave her forehead a kiss, a silent way of telling ‘I love you’ only the two of them shared. She squeezed his hands one more time. ‘And I love you’ it said.