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If Dick is the captain of their shopping cart, then Damian is the trusted map-holder, the compass in their noble journey of grocery-shopping. “What’s next on the list, my dearest navigator?”
“Pasta,” Damian deadpans. “And some sauce. Unless you want to make some.”
He thinks about it. It does taste very nice when it’s freshly made, but…“We can keep a jar in the pantry.”
Damian nods, sharp and solemn. “And sauce.” He walks past Dick, and Dick can’t help but marvel at how tall he’s gotten. Puberty shot him up to be about two inches shorter than Bruce, about the height of Talia, just past Dick’s head.
It’s the lack of sleep—it has to be—that has Dick’s breath hitching when Damian turns back to look at him, and he thinks: he’s all grown up now.
“Hurry up, we don’t have all day.”
“Hey, I’m just going where you lead me, baby-” He nearly calls him baby bat, which is not really ideal for the place they’re in. But baby works too, he guesses.
“‘Baby’?”
“Well, can’t really call you–” he leans in theatrically and lowers his voice to a hush, “–baby bat in public.”
Damian pinches his lips together, and Dick chuckles at the irritated mirth lining his eyes.
“You know you want to laugh,” he sings.
Damian just scoffs, walking away into the aisle. Dick trails after him, pushing the cart until Damian comes to a stop at the sauce jars. It’s going to take a bit now. Their old convenience store got…inconvenienced by a robbery scare for the night, one of the many shops hit tonight after the nightmare of an event they had the other day, and there are new flavors and brands here—Damian’s bound to at least spend ten minutes scanning for options.
It’s sweet, really, the way he picks the healthiest option, Googling every brand to make sure they aren’t involved in some fishy business with animals, thorough even in his tiredness.
Dick’s mouth moves before his brain processes it: “You know, you’re better than this than you give yourself credit for.”
“Hm?” Damian is still scrutinizing the ingredients.
Being domestic, he thinks. “Grocery shopping,” he says. He’s given a quizzical look. God, he just wants to reach over across this cart full of space between them, smooth out the scrunched eyebrows, the one lock of hair by his focused, noxious green eyes, force the slight tilt of his head into a brush of their lips—
Wow, okay, interesting thoughts there, Richard John Grayson; maybe back off from your little brother who’s also your roommate?
“Are you going to answer me anytime today?” Damian demands, and Dick nearly chokes on the surprised bit of laughter that tears itself through his lips. God, he loves it when Damian gets mean. It’s the lack of sleep, he knows, which is logically not good, but the biteyness is a very good look on him.
“You said that you thought you wouldn't be good at grocery shopping, and doing your laundry, and being a good roommate—” a good person; to Dick; in general, “—when we moved in.”
Damian startles, looking up at him. “Tt, that was two years ago, Richard, what the Hell?”
“Okay, two years isn't that long ago.”
He scoffs a little, as if saying you can’t really talk about that.
Dick picks up a random box of pasta from the opposite side. But it is a long time. For their lifestyle or whatever, and for who they are as people. Dick thought he would die the day his parents did, and then, he made it, and then he thought he’d die when he was seventeen, and then, he made it, and he's continued to make it to now.
And Damian….the less said about that, the better, even in the privacy of his mind.
And two years is certainly long enough for them to be living together, too.
Damian’s twenty now, almost twenty-one. And Dick is…
Yeah, he’s not thinking about that.
He tosses the box into the cart and turns back to Damian, watching him when he blows a piece of hair out of his face. “Your hair is getting so long.”
He gets a side-eye. “I’m aware.”
“You should get it cut.”
“You should mind your own business about my hair.” He puts the bottle back onto the shelf, choosing another one to peruse its ingredients. “In any case, I’m not comfortable with a barber near my hair.”
“Steph could cut it,” Dick suggests automatically. “She’s really good at it– she cuts hers, and Tim’s, and Cass’–”
Damian shudders. “I would not trust Stephanie with my hair. She’s much too insistent on giving me an undercut because she thinks I’d look ‘hot’ with it.”
She isn’t wrong, but Damian’s not too keen on the idea, as Dick has heard many times from either side. “Oh, right.” Dick then grins, only partly malicious, the rest excited. “You should let me cut it!” At the skeptical look, he cajoles: “C’mon, I’m great at it! I’ve been cutting my hair since I was your age.”
“I really don’t think you should come near my hair, what with your opinions on decent haircuts at my age.”
“It was fashionable in my time!”
“It was an interesting choice.”
“A mullet isn’t that bad.”
“On you, maybe.” Damian rolls his eyes, shockingly casual. Dick rather likes him like this, snarky comments and wearing one of his oversized sweatshirts, pale blue hanging on his lithe body. Giving Dick compliments, back-handed as they are.
“And how do you know you’ll look bad in it, bittybird?” Dick smooths up next to him, tangling his fingers in the oiled strands of Damian’s hair. Damian scowls at him, but he very notedly doesn’t move away.
“I thought about it. Used this concept known as my imagination. I’m not quite sure you have the scope for that one just yet.”
“You should draw yourself in it,” he suggests. “Y’know, if you don’t want to take that leap just yet.”
“I do not want to stare at my face long enough to capture that.”
“I’ll stare at your face then,” Dick teases almost absently, mussing up his hair.
“I do not see how— tt, never mind, shut up.” Damian steps off to the side and turns away, batting his hand finally. “We still have items to purchase, Richard. Get it together.”
He smiles, wry, fond. “Of course, Dami. What’s next on the list?”
“Brown rice,” Damian informs him, tips of his ears red. “And some vegetables. I would like to pick up some okra later, if you’re amenable.”
“Sounds good to me.”
“And, uh- I would…” there’s something so very unsure about him, the slightest fidget in his feet.
Dick bumps their shoulders together lightly, keeps his eyes zeroed in on the cart. “You can tell me anything, you know?” He asks after a very long pause.
He opens his mouth as if he’s going to say something. “Peppers,” he blurts out instead. “We need peppers.”
“I’ll grab them for you.” He knocks into Damian again, shifting away, but his forearm is caught.
He lets himself be tugged back to face Damian.
“Richard, you-” he swallows. “You are not terrible at this either.”
“At what?”
The look in his eyes is something built of utter sincerity. “Grocery shopping.” Dick hears: being here. Being you at your best and your worst.
Dick can’t help it: he reaches out, and Damian falls into him like a star through the air, colliding gently at their foreheads. He cups the back of his neck, blinking back his teary sight. They stand with their softened faces in the middle of the pasta aisle.
“We still need the peppers, Richard,” Damian breathes out.
Dick laughs with the full-force of the warmth he feels, almost reflexively shooting up to kiss Damian’s forehead. He murmurs: “I’m proud of you.”
Damian’s cheeks are burning red as he pulls away. “You as well.” He clears his throat, stepping back. “I’m proud of how far we’ve come.”
“Me too, Damian.” Their hands are still interlocked, so Dick squeezes twice. “Me too.”
“Peppers,” he reminds sternly, but he doesn’t let go of Dick’s hand.
“Peppers,” Dick agrees. I love you, he thinks.