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Unmasking. It’s a word that has certain connotations for vigilantes.
To lose your secret identity is to endanger yourself. Batman’s mystique is powered by the idea that he is the night. He is everywhere. He is not one single person but an idea. If it ever comes out that Batman is Bruce Wayne, Gotham would fall apart.
The word has a different meaning to Tim now that he has read about it.
When he is five, he gets the diagnosis. It’s not the most surprising - a young white boy who is a bit too quiet and bites his hands. Tim struggles with playing well with others and he can’t seem to keep still. Asperger’s, it is called then. Autism Spectrum Disorder, it is called now.
It is a lifelong label. People don’t grow out of their autism, no matter how much his parents would prefer that. It’s a way their brains are formed. Janet and Jack realize this and, as if they’re doing him a favor, organize private tutoring until he is “well enough” to be around other children. The tutoring has another name; Applied Behavioral Analysis therapy. Tim is trained to meet their eyes, to keep his hands still, and to speak when spoken to. It doesn’t come naturally but he is the heir to the Drake empire. It is the rule, not the exception.
He gets into his habits and he masters the repression. He becomes so excellent at keeping still that he forgets how to identify if he really ever wanted to move or make noise in the first place. He dissociates from the uncomfortable feelings in his body and he expresses himself through fighting. He is Robin, Batman’s best soldier, Jason’s replacement, and he fights for Gotham. He stays steady. He does not disappoint.
“Why do you do that?” Dick asks, curiously, as they change out of their suits, tacky with blood from the night of fighting. He’s staring at Tim’s feet.
“Do what?” Tim cocks his head and looks down at his toes, which are rubbing against each other in his sock. Oh. He lets out a breath and stops.
Dick laughs, “You didn’t have to stop, Timbo. I just noticed that you’re always a bit twitchy after patrol.”
It’s no lie that the streets of Gotham’s criminal underbelly are filled with all sorts of unpleasant odors and sensations, even with the skintight suit protecting him from the worst of it. Tim’s a vigilante but he’s not a miracle worker. It still gets to him.
“Sorry.” He bites his tongue. Dick can’t call him out for that. It might be against the spirit of the rules but he does it anyway. A little pain goes a long way. “Just had something in my shoe,” he lies.
Dick shrugs and reaches over to give him a noogie. “Whatever you say, Timbarine!”
“Your nicknames get worse and worse,” he says, flatly, hiding a grin.
O-o
Now that Tim has noticed it, he can’t stop seeing it. Everywhere.
The little fidgets - self-stimulatory behavior, he reminds himself, after an all-nighter of intense research - make themselves known. It’s in the way he scoffs down his food when he can’t stand the texture but likes the taste. It’s how he holds his hand against the warmth of his coffee thermos as he sits behind the desk of Wayne Enterprises, overthinking everything he has to do as CEO. It’s how he feels when Bruce spars with him and Tim loses. It’s the heavy pressure of someone on top of him and how Tim wants to sink into the ground.
Autistic. I am autistic. He hadn’t allowed himself to think about it for a long time. His parents had always been ashamed of that mark against Tim, as if there was something wrong with his neurotype and it wasn’t simply a natural expression of humanity. That shame is passed down to him and Tim winces whenever he thinks or does anything autistic.
He hates how they still have a chokehold on his behavior even now. He hates how he doesn’t really know who he is, behind the mask of the perfect CEO and the perfect son and the perfect Robin. He hates how he doesn’t know what his body wants to do, how he’s trained himself so obsessively to ignore it that he can’t remember his hunger cues or when he wants to sleep or when he's in pain. He takes his medication for his missing spleen, he drinks his coffee, and he works tirelessly to be good enough.
“Did you know I’m autistic?” Tim says, one day, when he and Steph are hanging out together. Parallel play, he thinks, realizing how much more comfortable he had always felt with her when they did their own things. Tim works on his latest case and Steph plays Bejeweled on her phone.
Steph looks up and stares at him for a moment. She hums, thoughtfully. “Yeah, I can see that.” Then she goes back to her game.
It’s as simple as that, for her.
For him, it is more difficult. He doesn’t know where to start in unearthing who he is and what he wants. He doesn’t really know if he should. Is it a liability, like his parents had always implied? Is it safer to blend into the allistic masses and suppress his needs and urges? What are his needs and urges?
Tim experiments.
He hyperfixates on the topic of autism and watches tv shows with autistic characters. He watches Atypical, Everything’s Gonna Be Okay, and all twelve seasons of the Big Bang Theory. He’s disappointed and he’s transfixed and he wants to know who he is. He reads Devon Price’s Unmasking Autism and feels like it is a moment when he is supposed to cry, but can’t. His emotions are kept under a tight lid.
“It’s okay to cry,” he tells himself, flatly, in the privacy of his apartment. He doesn’t know how to do it. He buys a pint of ice cream and watches Lassie. That always makes Dick cry. It doesn’t work for him.
He looks at himself in the mirror and practices his gala smile. He remembers how many times Janet made him do it before she gave him her patented nod of approval. Is this the one? Tim thinks. Is this human enough for you? Am I a real boy if I smile like this, mom?
He buys fidget toys but he doesn’t dare use them. They sit in a drawer in his desk untouched. He tries to sway as he’d liked to do that when he was young but finds himself stopping short. A memory of being told to keep still follows him. The kindly smiling therapist holds his hands still. Tim doesn’t cry. Tim wants to but he doesn’t. He falls back into his routine and continues to research.
Somehow, he wants to be the best at this too - at being autistic, at being unmasked, at being Tim Drake.
“You seem preoccupied, Red Robin,” Batman says, when they team-up one night. They’d chased Scarecrow into Red Hood’s territory knowing that Jason wasn’t happy with the Rogue.
Tim wonders what would happen if he made that noise that burrows in the back of his throat. The high whiny noise that has so many meanings and would surely feel so good to let loose. Tim wonders if Batman would think he was a child, an idiot, or something entirely worse - not good enough to have Robin as even just a part of his name.
Tim keeps his mask firmly in place and says nothing. There is nothing he could say that wouldn’t be a lie and he’s tired of all of the secrets.
Tim can tell that Batman wants to press but he has never been the best at reading Tim or relating to him - his wayward not-quite-son who doesn’t open up under pressure but clams closed like an impenetrable nut. Hollow on the inside and golden on the outside, Red Robin’s cloak flutters as he grapples off into the night before Batman can work out his next move.
O-o
Tim practices in private. He rewards himself. It is like the opposite of his childhood therapy. When Tim opens up, when he follows an instinct in his body, he lets himself read through his message history with Kon. Slowly, oh so painfully slowly, a subconscious part of him starts to unwind and Tim learns what he likes.
He likes chewing. On his fingers, yes, but also objects. Pens, pencils, hair, food, nearly everything that he tries, he likes. He puts on special guards to protect his skin and lets himself chew to his heart's content when he works. It does wonders for his crabby mood and allows him to cut back slightly on the coffee.
He learns about what flavors feel good. The stimulation of taste has been doing its due diligence in the background of his life and Tim orders takeaway for a fortnight straight when he realizes what szechuan sauce does to his senses. He loves smelly candles and sharp scented medical soaps and that feeling when he puts his suit on before patrol. He likes to sway, to take up space, to rock and make noise. He sets up a soundproof room in his apartment and lets his body move in whatever way it wants to.
It is one thing to practice in private and another to be visibly autistic. He knows how this goes and as much as it hurts to stay still now that he knows of the alternative, he can’t do it. He can’t say what he thinks or let himself relax around his friends or let his expressions and words become too flat, too honest, too blunt.
“What are you doing, Timothy?” Damian is the one who first sees Tim unmasked. “That is not sanitary.”
Tim has his fingers shoved in his mouth and has been chewing on them frantically as he scans through his latest case file on human trafficking. It isn’t the first time he’s stimmed in the Batcave but it’s the first time he’s been caught.
He has a choice here. He can let Damian take this from him like he’s taken so many things or he can stand up for himself. I’m autistic, Tim says in his mind, telling himself it’s okay. I’m autistic and I stim in order to regulate myself and for enjoyment.
Woodenly, he removes his fingers and he apologizes to Damian.
Damian sniffs. He mutters something along the lines of, “Disgusting,” and leaves.
It is a lot easier in private and with no one watching. He sighs and decides that he will stay still in the Batcave, at least until he is more comfortable with this part of himself. It doesn’t matter how many times he tells himself that it is natural to stim, his parents’ shame still worms its way into Tim’s own feelings and thoughts about himself.
Two days later, when Bruce calls him into his office, Tim is entirely unprepared for the conversation that is about to ensue.
Watching him carefully, his pseudo-father says, “I’ve noticed that you are behaving differently in private than around us.”
Tim lets his leg bounce, lightly. It’s one of the stims that is more typical amongst allistics and is easier for him to do around others. Neutrally, he says, “Have you been spying on me, Bruce?”
Bruce watches the movement keenly. He folds his fingers together. “I was reviewing the security tapes of the Batcave as I usually do. I noticed that you stopped your behavior on Monday.”
Two days ago, after Damnian’s snide remark , Tim thinks. As sharp as sparking flint, he says, “So yes, you were spying on me.”
Bruce’s lips twitch. “Perhaps.”
He leaves an empty silence, knowing by now that Tim is too slippery to answer any direct questions honestly.
Bounce bounce bounce. Tim places a hand on his leg and lets himself feel. Carefully, oh so carefully, he gives an explanation. “I’m autistic, Bruce.” There is no flicker of surprise in Bruce’s steely eyes. “You already knew.”
A little awkwardly, Bruce’s eyes flicker back down to Tim’s knee.
“Yes, I know.” Tim says, impatiently. “I’m being obvious about it now. But you knew before then, didn’t you?”
“You seemed to want to keep it private,” Bruce settles on saying, after a pause. “It wasn’t obvious, at first. It took me some time to realize but there were little tells.”
“Like what?”
Bruce counts off of his fingers easily, listing off parts of himself that Tim had thought he was so brilliant at hiding. “Literal thinking and interpretation, fixation, rigid routines and mindsets, and, ah.” He looks back at Tim’s bouncing knee. “You bit the inside of your mouth.”
“You could tell. You knew?” Tim runs a hand through his hair, deliberately. It feels helpful and he follows his instinct. There is nothing wrong with stimming, he tells himself, wanting it to feel true, knowing that practice makes perfect.
The world’s greatest detective gives a consolatory smile. “That is not why I wanted to have this meeting, Tim. I have noticed that you are changing your perspective on it, chum.”
The familiar terms stings a bit. Bruce has never been the kindest to Tim. He has never been the safe authority figure that he was for his other boys. Tim shrugs, allowing himself to enjoy the impertinence of the gesture.
Drakes do not shrug, Janet hisses, when she catches him at it.
I guess I’m not a Drake anymore, Tim Wayne thinks. Or I am a new kind.
“It,” Tim repeats the word, caustically. “Autism, you mean. No need to beat around the bush.”
Bruce nods easily. “Yes, your autism. I have noticed you are not trying to hide it anymore.”
Bitterly, he says, “I am trying to find it. I forgot how to…” The rest of the sentence eludes him. He lets it hang in the air. He is so incredibly sick of doing things the correct way, of finishing sentences even when both parties already know the meaning. He is sick of smalltalk, of gala smiles, and of silent still little boys with no agency.
“I have spoken to Damian,” Bruce says, placidly. “He will keep his opinions on this matter to himself.”
“Or?” That is the crucial part. Damian does not come to heel without incentive or consequence.
“Or he will be benched.”
Tim lets out a shuddering breath and gifts Bruce a truthful toothy smile. Unpolite, inhuman (some say), and mind-bogglingly genuine.
O-o
Steph buys him a sparkling fidget tangle that Tim uses in the Batcave. It crackles pleasantly in his hands and he hugs her so tightly and for so long that she laughs.
There is no such thing as the right amount of time to hug someone, after all. There is only convention and those brave enough to reveal its rueful face.
Fin.