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Steph won’t ever admit it out loud, but more often than not, on the night’s she just can’t fall back asleep after a nightmare, she can commonly be found sneaking into Wayne Manor to dramatically lament and brood in the kitchen. She’s usually not the only one that makes her way in there either.
Some nights, she sits and stirs a mug of hot chocolate as Tim recounts vague and- frankly- quite horrifying tales about what he was up to while Bruce was assumed dead. Steph’s always been a good listener, no matter what everyone else says, and Tim doesn’t just talk about what’s bothering him with anyone, so she makes sure to never make him feel like she’s not there for him every step of the way, no matter what it is. Tim is her best friend, was the first one in the world of superheros, and for as long as he’ll let her, she'll hold on tight.
Damian does not talk about his problems, and the first few times he found her in there before him, he simply turned around and left. After a while, though- he would begrudgingly stay and ignore her presence, and after an even longer time, he would allow her to fill the silence. There was never anything specific she’d ramble about, and heaven forbid she talk about her own problems, but it was nice. It was comfortable.
Dick has this nasty (read: begrudgingly comforting and warm) habit of trying to talk through whoever’s problems after he listens intently to them speak, and Steph is no different. He’s not allowed to use the stove, no one but Alfred and Jason are, but he can make a mean fanta-float. While Steph quietly learns into his side, he works, and once it’s done, he says the same thing he always does- that he’s always there to listen, that if she needs him to take care of something he will with no hesitation, that she deserves the world and more. She’s been hearing those words since his reign as Batman, and he’s not Batman anymore, sure, but Steph will never stop seeing him as her Batman all the same.
Steph never has to say anything, not with Cass. All Cass has to do is take one look at her and she knows what Steph needs, and it’s moments later that she will find herself sprawled across the couch with her girlfriend cuddled up on top of her. They’ll stay like this, quiet but comfortable with each other’s presence, and on special occasions, Steph is able to get the other to whisper her worries and fears. Steph listens, she always listens, because Cass is a woman of few words and she will never let herself miss a single word she says.
Duke is easy, with bright smiles and calm words despite the fact that both of them know they are in the kitchen this late for a reason. Steph always returns the smile, and they talk until the sun peaks over the horizon and everyone else ventures into the kitchen. Sometimes all either of them need is someone who can distract them from the horrors they dreamed of before.
Jason is a different story.
Unlike everyone else, who she tries to comfort or who she receives comfort from despite her lack of explanation, Jason does not want comfort from her. She doesn’t want comfort from him. On the nights they find themselves in the kitchen, both of them will just exist together like meeting here is nothing out of the ordinary. Jason will cook sometimes, Steph will do homework, but they don’t talk.
Well, no- they don’t talk normally. Sometimes though, sometimes they are the only people either of them can really ever talk to about things.
Some nights, under ushered tears, Steph will retell the night that forever lives in her nightmares. She’ll tell Jason about how Black Mask beat her, tortured her, about how he chained her up afterwards, about how she was barely able to release herself, about the bullet he put right above her heart. She’ll tell him how she still got back up and flew across the roofs until Batman finally found her. She’ll tell him that her last moments were that of Batman’s cowl, and that once she woke up again, nothing was ever the same again.
And in turn, he’ll tell her of his legacy, eyes glassy and conscious not quite there. That Shelia was never his mother, not after she gave him away to Joker, and how absolutely heartbreaking it had been, how heartbreaking it was. He tells her of pain, pain, pain and tick, tick, ticks, and that even in his last moments, he tried to shield the woman who never really loved him from the blast regardless. He speaks of crowbars and doors and that the first thing he woke up to was the dark of a coffin.
They don’t say anything after. Neither of them ask when the pain will stop, neither of them answer when it will. They both know better than that by now.
Sometimes they don’t even stay in the kitchen, not for long, because Steph will follow Jason up to the library and sit with him as he reads, and some of the time, he’ll read aloud to her too. Sometimes he’ll help her with her literature homework, too, or she’ll convince him to take her down to the cave and show her some of his Batman-Disapproved moves.
But even on the nights they say nothing, even on the nights that they seem to ignore each other in that kitchen, Jason will still hand her a plate of whatever he’s cooked up, and Steph will still hand him the first draft of her most recent essay. They simply need no words, no looks, to understand.
They’re the only ones who can understand, anyway.
Until they aren’t.
Because after he’s revived, Damian finds them both together, wherever they are, and curls against one of their sides. He basks in the quiet, and he basks under Jason’s words, and he stays with them til morning.
Because after Dick comes back from Spyral, after he has a panic attack in the cave just because someone tried to give him a pill to help with the pain, after he has no choice left but to truly explain what Bruce had hid, what he had done, Jason all but forces him to join too. Steph will play with his hair while Jason reads or cooks and Damian will sit in his lap.
Some nights, it still ends up just her and Jason, just the two original dead Robins, and that’s okay. Sometimes it needs to just be her with Jason, or her with Dick, or her with Damian or Tim or Duke.
The pain doesn’t stop, but it gets easier to deal with so long as she has them here with her, too.