Work Text:
Your heart lurches as you stare at the television, your hands clutching the couch cushions on either side of you as you listen to the presenter on the news station that you'd idly turned on for background noise. He's talking about a current fight, some scuffle between some vigilantes and Two-Face downtown. He mentions Redhood - mentions that he was seen going down during the fight and wasn't seen getting back up again.
Suddenly, the walls of your apartment feel small - too small, closing in on you as the air leaves your lungs in a punched-out gasp. He's not getting up. He's not getting up and he's gone again . You stand abruptly, knocking the TV remote off your lap and letting it clatter to the floor as you begin to pace back and forth in front of your couch, trying desperately to keep listening to the news anchor and what he's saying about the current situation.
Maybe he's wrong , you think desperately. Maybe he's alright and no one really knows what they're seeing. Maybe he's… dead. Maybe he's dead again. Maybe you'll never ever see him again. Maybe you'll have to bury him again.
You drop into a sitting position on the floor ungracefully, leaning against the couch as you reach blindly for the remote, suddenly needing desperately for the news anchor to stop updating you on the situation. You fumble with it once you have it, your hands cold and numb as you turn the television off.
The silence, you realize immediately, is worse
The thought of having to mourn him a second time, you realize, might be more than you can handle.
The city moves outside, cars honking and pedestrians shouting - the normal turmoil of Gotham. You fit right in, you suppose, amongst the panic and the pain and the death that permeates this city. You almost, almost wish you'd left all those years ago when Jason became Robin - when you told him it was a choice that would kill him and you threatened to walk out.
And now, in the dull silence of your apartment, your gaze level with your coffee table that has two empty mugs, you wish that you really had left all those years ago… and you wish that you had never come back.
The thought punches out whatever air is left in your lungs as guilt, cold and heavy and choking, settles in your gut. You bring your hands to your face, digging the heels of your palms into your closed eyes as you try to get a hold of your rattling breathing. You had, at times, considered what your life would be like if you'd never met Jason, or if you moved on and gotten over him after his death - his first death. The thought makes nausea roll through your stomach. Of course, you'd thought about it. But you'd always come to the same conclusion - you were lucky to have met him and to have known him as you did. Even if it meant carrying his ghost with you for the rest of your life, you were blessed to have been loved by him.
Now, though, it doesn't feel like a blessing. Now, it feels like a rotten, undead curse, something dragged up from some unholy pit to pull him away from you again, and again, and again. There is nothing lucky in this life and there is nothing lucky in this love.
A clattering on your balcony rips you from your spiralling thought as your head snaps around to see Redhood heave himself up over the railing, stumbling with fatigue and obvious injury. You lurch to your feet, desperate to get to him, desperate to know he's alive, desperate to stop him from seeing you on the floor of your home, grief-stricken and terrified because of him .
No , you think. He doesn't need to know about that . And fortunately, he's dazed enough from whatever god-awful fight he was in that he doesn't seem to really notice anything beyond the way you rip the door open and pull him inside, your hands flitting over his armour to gauge his injuries. Not at first, anyway. He lets you sit him on the couch, lets you shush his worries about staining the fabric with his blood. He doesn't consider the fact that your soul is already stained from him. Not yet, at least.
It's not until his armour is off, sitting in the bathtub and dripping crimson blood onto the white porcelain. It's not until you've checked him over, the large gash along his side cleaned and the blood flow staunched. It's when you begin stitching him up, your hands trembling ever so slightly in a way that sends concern shooting up his spine. It's not concern for himself - he's had you do this countless times, and he's done it to himself with much less finesse even more times. But something wrong - something must be wrong for you to be unsteady, for your shoulders to be tense and your eyes to avoid his. The pain from his side is nearly blinding, but there's nothing that sobers him and centres him as resolutely as you on your knees in front of him and afraid .
"Baby?" his voice is quiet, the breath leaving his lips in a tired sort of sigh that he can't help.
"Don't distract me," is your only response.
"Talk to me," he pushes in that gentle, guiding way of his.
But you say nothing. The silence drips between the two of you as you tie the last stitch, cutting the thread and rubbing your hands with a towel. Jason makes a mental note to buy you new ones as he watches the white fabric blooming red as you try to scrub the blood off your hands.
But your skin doesn't come clean. There are places where the blood - his blood has dried around your fingers and you rub the towel on your palms until he reaches out, worried. Then, and only then, does it hit Jason, and he's not sure if it's blood loss or fear and guilt that makes him feel lightheaded.
It's his blood on your hands. And they're not coming clean.
He takes the towel from you gently, tossing it onto the other end of the couch before he grips your hands in his own. He's not sure who's trembling more between the two of you. He's not sure who's more blood-soaked.
"I saw it on the news," you say quietly as you rub your thumb over the knuckles of Jason's hand. "They said - they said you were dead ." Your breath hitches. Jason huffs, tightening his hold on your hands.
"Those reporters don't know what the fuck they're talking about most of the time - you know that, baby. They always get it wrong." He soothes, his voice low as he looks down at you. He's still sitting on the couch while you kneel before him, like an altar of violence that you pray to.
"I know , Jason. I just -" You take a deep, shuttering breath.
"What, baby?"
"I thought I'd lost you… again . I just - I couldn't take it. I couldn't bear it." You laugh, then - a humourless, hysterical sort of thing. "All this time you've spent trying to protect me and you're the thing that ended up hurting me the most and… no, I - Jason, I didn't mean that. I'm sorry, I didn't mean that, I was just scared."
But Jason's already lurched away from you, letting go of your hands as if you've burned him and pulling back in a way that stretches his stitches and makes him wince. You, on the floor in front of him, made the infamous Redhood flinch , made him recoil in fear and self-hatred and pain.
"I didn't mean that, Jason," you say again, a firmness in your voice as you surge up onto your knees. Your hands aren't trembling now, he notices distantly, as you lean forward to take his face in your palms and press your forehead against his.
"I hurt you," he says numbly.
"No," you respond instantly. "Life hurt me… life hurt us both. That's not your fault. It's never been your fault."
Jason sighs wearily, letting his head fall forward so that his forehead is resting on your shoulder as his eyes slip closed. There's a dull, throbbing pain in his head and his side aches and he's choking on too much hatred to stop you when you press kisses to his palms and his knuckles and the side of his head that you can reach.
There is too much weariness in him to stop you from loving him.
"Let's… go to bed," you say quietly, feeling the way he slumps against you as the fatigue begins to take its toll on him. "Come on," you coax. He lets you stand, takes your outstretched hand willingly as you guide him to bed. He lets himself sit on the edge of the mattress heavily, slouched over himself as you sit in front of him, a damp towel in your hands.
Jason thinks of the irony of it all as he watches you take his hands in yours, wiping the blood from them that you left on him . Granted, it's still his blood, but you're the one who made a mess of it. He thinks of that as you finish cleaning him up, listens to the sounds of you scrubbing your own hands in the bathroom sink as he falls sideways into bed, haphazardly tugging the covers up around him.
When you finally slip into bed next to him, reaching out so that you can cling to him like a lifeline, he wonders if maybe the blood on his hands isn't such a big deal, after all. Maybe it's the blood loss talking, maybe it's the post-fight dizziness muddling his judgement. Or maybe there is something to be said for the two of you cleaning the blood off each other's hands… again and again and again.