Chapter Text
Two and a half months.
It sounds like a lifetime. Dick doesn’t know how he’s going to make it. Two and a half whole months without Kory, without Mar’i, without Jake.
But he has to do it.
It’s for them. And he’ll do anything for them. And in this case, that means bearing two and a half months without them.
Mar’i and Jake are twelve and eight now, respectively. Old enough, Dick and Kory have decided, to visit Tamaran.
And so Kory is taking them there, and they're leaving today, now that it’s summer break. Dick can’t go; he can’t survive on Tamaran. Dr. Kind has been working on a solution for more than a decade; Dick has been paying him to. Once they decided that Kory and the kids were going to go to Tamaran, Dick hired a whole team of scientists to work on finding a solution. And as the date of their departure came closer and closer, Dick called more and more often for updates.
But no luck.
So now his family is leaving today. Without him.
And he’s devastated. But he wants them to go. Mar’i and Jake deserve to see Tamaran, to see part of where they come from. Kory and Dick have done all the can to bring Tamaranean culture (at least the parts of it that Kory likes) to them, but there’s only so much they can do, can experience, on Earth. They deserve to get to be completely part of it, to experience it all first hand for themselves. Dick wants that for them so bad.
And Kory… she hasn’t been back since she left.
So it’s important that all of them go, no matter how much pain it causes him. When he and Kory had started talking about the trip, he had originally proposed that they go the whole summer break, three months. He had wanted them to have all the time they could. But she had insisted that that was too long, and had insisted on two and half months instead. And Dick was secretly grateful and relieved.
But still… two and a half fucking months.
He looks up at their spaceship. The big, beautiful, dreadful spaceship. The spaceship that will take his family away.
He turns to Jake and Mar’i.
“Listen to your mother,” he tells them in his stern voice. “Anything she tells you to do, you do it. Anything she tells you not to do, you don’t do it. I’m really serious. You’re going to an entirely different planet than Earth. Obey everything mom says, no matter what. Do you understand?”
“Yes, daddy.” They both say, nodding their heads.
“If you disobey or don’t listen your mother even once, there will be consequences when you get back. Understand?”
“Yes, dad.”
“We understand.”
Dick smiles at them. “Good.”
Kory touches his arm. “It’s time for us to go.”
Dick turns and looks at her; she's looking at him sadly. He swallows a lump on his throat and nods. He turns back to his kids.
“You guys are going to have so much fun,” he tells them, voice breaking a bit. He turns back to Kory. “You have the camera right? You’re sure it’s in the bag?”
“Yes, I’m sure. I quadruple checked.”
“Pleas take so many p-“
“Photos and videos, I know. I will, I promise,” she says in a soothing voice. They’ve already gone over this, but now that they are actually leaving in the next minute, Dick feels panic building inside of him.
He leans forward and kisses her. She kisses him back, but not too hard as their kids are here. The last time his lips will touch hers in two and a half months. How will he survive?
All too soon their lips have to part. But they don’t go far from each other. Dicks pulls her into his arms, hugging her tight. She hugs him back just as tightly He buries his head in her hair and inhales her scent.
“Thank you,” Kory whispers into his neck. “Thank you.”
“I’m gonna miss you so much,” Dick whispers back. “I love you. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
And then they're pulling apart, their hands lingering, slowly sliding off each other. It’s like a knife to his gut.
He turns to his kids, his two amazing, beautiful, wonderful kids. He crouches down and holds his arms out, and they ran to him. He wraps his arms around them and holds them as tight as he can, not having to worry about hurting them.
“I’m gonna miss you,” he chokes out.
“I wish you could come with us,” cried Jake.
“More than anything,”echoes Mar’i.
Tears pool at the corner of Dick’s eyes. “I know, me too,” Dick says, voice getting increasingly rough and emotional. “But you guys are gonna have so much fun. And I can’t wait to hear all about it when you get back.”
He moves his head to the left and peppers kisses into Mari's hair and then he moves his head to the right and peppers kisses into Jake's.
“I love you both. So much,” he says, tears in his voice now. “I’ll be thinking about you every second of every day.”
“I love you too.”
“Love you daddy.”
He gives them one last squeeze and squeezes his eyes shut, trying to memorize the feeling. Then with herculean effort, he pulls away. Jake and Mar’i step back and Dick returns to his full height.
Kory steps up behind them. “Time to go,” she says softly.
She looks at him, eyes aching. He looks back at her and nods, forcing a small smile on his face.
“We’ll be back before you know it,” she tries to reassure him. He appreciates the effort, but it doesn’t work. But still he tries to smile back at her.
They, his family, turn around and walk into the spaceship, away from him.
Dick feels like his heart is being torn into a million pieces. He watches in anguish as the space ship lifts off and flies and flies and flies until it’s out of his sight.
There’s something missing. Something missing inside of him. He feels a gaping hole inside of himself. And he knows it's them, that they’ve took a part of him with them and he won’t be whole again till they’re back.
He doesn’t know how long he stands there just staring at the sky. It could be a few minutes or it could be a few hours.
He walks numbly to their minivan, opens the door, gets in, and drives away. After a while (he doesn't know how long), he pulls up to their house.
Usually, the sight of it makes him all warm inside. But today, it’s a looming sight that fills him with dread. He enters it anyway and turns on the lights.
He’s hit with a wave of pain.
He’s alone. All alone.
The house feel enormous and wrong.
And he doesn’t know what to do. It’s 7pm. He already had dinner with Kory and the kids before they left.
He’ll train. Yes, he’ll train until he knocks himself out. That’s what he’ll do.
He changes into sweatpants and heads to the training room. He blasts the music incredibly loud: has to drown his feelings out. He goes hard. He shuffles his feet and punches the punching bag again and again and again. He does pull ups until it feels like his arms are going to fall off. He sprints back and forth across the gym, until he’s out of breath, panting.
He then walks up to his room, takes the quickest shower ever, gets into his pajamas, plops on the bed, and promptly passes out.
Dick groans as his eyes flutter open. Something’s wrong. He pats the bed around him.
Where’s Kory?
And then he remembers… Kory’s gone. And so are Mar'i and Jake.
He rolls over on his back and stares at the ceiling. The bed is so big and cold and empty. And Dick longs for Kory so badly.
He abruptly springs out of the bed. It suddenly seems unbearable, to be there without Kory. He heads to the bathroom, feels a jolt of pain when he picks up his toothbrush, and sees hers right next to his. He makes quick work of getting ready and heads downstairs to get breakfast.
He opens the cabinet door and sees their row of cereals. Healthy ones for the weekdays. And the sugary ones that the kids are only allowed to eat on the weekend.
The sight of them flashes before his eyes. Jake running excitedly to the kitchen and grabbing Fruit Loops. Mar’i sitting in front of the TV, happily chomping down on some Lucky Charms.
Dick quickly closes the cabinet door.
He makes himself eggs. He sits down at the kitchen table and starts to eat. It’s so quiet: the only noise is the sound of his chewing. It’s eerie, usually the house is so full of noise, full of life. Talking. Laughing. Shouting. Running.
Unable to take the quiet, Dick takes his eggs and sits on the couch in front of the TV. He finds a Columbo re-run and turns the volume up real loud, trying to cover the oppressive silence of the empty house.
He finishes and then he has the whole day in front of him.
And absolutely nothing to do.
He sits on the couch for who knows how long and tries to think up ideas for things to occupy his day. He has patrol later, but he can’t spend all day patrolling.
He ends up spending hours and hours going through crime reports, looking for patterns, looking for a big case to keep him busy. That's what he needs right now. Desperately.
But there's nothing.
Where's a crisis when he actually needs one?
He supposes he should feel bad, wishing for a big crime, for a crisis, but he's just too miserable and desperate to feel guilty.
By the time he's done scanning all the reports, the whole day is almost over, thankfully. He quickly eats dinner and heads out to patrol. He patrols for two hours longer than he usually would, even though the city is fairly quiet tonight.
He returns home, showers, and changes into his pajamas. And then he stands at the foot of his bed, and stares at it.
The bed. The bed he shares with Kory. Except she's not here.
He can't sleep in it. He can't. He just can't.
Dick grabs some of his stuff, his phone, his laptop, a few books, and takes them to one of the guest bedrooms and settles down there.
Somehow, he feels like a stranger in his own home.
The first week continues like this. He's surviving, not living. Each day passes with an ache. Nothing excites him, nothing interests him. He's utterly bored and lonely.
This used to be what his existence was like at various points in his life. He doesn't remember it being this bad. This is worse? It's worse right? He guesses because he knows exactly what he's missing. He has love and happiness and home and family...they're just galaxies away.
He knows he's being dramatic. His family isn't gone. They didn't leave him. They'll be back. And yes maybe he is overreacting, but this is how he feels.
And his whole life revolves around them. He spends almost of his time with them. Taking care of Jake and Mar'i. Helping them with their homework. Driving them to school, to their various activities, to their friends' houses. Going to Mar'i's gymnastics competitions. Going to Jake's exhibitions at his art classes. Going to the park with them. Going to the movies with them. Eating breakfast and dinner with them. Going on dates with Kory. Looking after the kids with Kory. Patrolling with Kory. Taking down bad guys with Kory. Making love to Kory. Waking up to Kory.
For the past twelve years, almost of all his time has been spent in the presence of at least one of them. And so now...now he has no idea what to do. What did he do before them? There is so much time in a single day. How on earth did he manage to fill all those hours before?
Just...So. Much. Time.
And he's so fucking bored. Which just leaves him with ample time to dwell on how much he misses Kory and his kids.
The first week feels like an eternity. He can't believe it's only been a week. A week. One week.
How's he gonna make it two and a half months?