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“When are they going to be done?” Damian asked in a tone that was embarrassingly close to a whine. He fiddled with the excess pieces of gingerbread dough.
“Not for a few minutes, bud.” Grayson spoke.
This was Damian’s first Christmas away from the league. Whenever he and his mother celebrated, it was always quietly. Grandfather wouldn’t allow holidays, but his mother would always hold their own little Christmas in her quarters. She would get Damian a little gift, usually a knife of some sort, and read him some Christmas stories.
However, now that Damian was living with Richard, things were different.
He had been living with him for over a year now. His Baba-
Older brother, he quickly reminded himself. Richard was not his dad. He was his brother, and that was it. He was only watching Damian until he was old enough to legally fend for himself. Nothing more.
It seemed that Christmas was a much bigger deal over here. Richard had decorated for Christmas a whole month before the holiday. He had put up lights, and he had even brought in an entire tree into the penthouse. He told Damian it was tradition, but his mother had never brought in the outside greenery.
Another strange “tradition” Richard had introduced was something called gingerbread houses.
Apparently, one could create a house with sugar.
Unfortunately, his brother had told him he couldn’t make a full sized house because their oven wasn’t big enough to bake a whole cookie wall. Even though Damian was disappointed, he was determined to make the best mini house as humanly possible.
Well, he would if the gingerbread pieces would finish baking.
“Why don’t we make the frosting while we wait?” Richard suggested, pulling a large bowl from the cabinet. Damian spotted a cup, with text on it reading “worlds best dad!”
It was their fathers before he passed, and one of the many items Richard had taken from the manor. Damian would never say it out loud, but he thought it fit Richard perfectly. “I make a mean royal icing.”
Damian cocked his head. “Frosting?”
“Yup. We have to glue the pieces together somehow, right?”
Damian considered that. He hadn’t exactly thought of how they would assemble the pieces. He had just been eager for them to be done. Now that he thought about it, it made sense. The cookies had to come together somehow.
“Right.” Damian agreed.
Richard patted the bag of powdered sugar. “I’ll let you pour this.”
Damian finally moved from his spot in front of the oven. He climbed up to sit on the tall counter seats, and grabbed the sugar. Ba- no, Richard’s eyes flickered to a file that sat on the counter. He had been staring at it the whole time they had been baking. Damian wasn’t quite sure what it was, but he assumed it was a case file from their latest patrol.
“We need one and a half cups.” Grayson spoke, grabbing the measuring cups from the drawer next to him.
“I can do it.” Damian insisted, taking the measuring cup from his older brother's hand. He reached down and scooped the powdered sugar.
“Not so fast.” Richard stopped him before he could pour it into the bowl. “We need to sift it first.”
Damian frowned. “Tt.”
Damian watched his brother pat the sifter, and the fine powdered sugar fell like snow down into the bowl. It resembled what was currently happening outside, the real snow gently padding against the windows.
The powdered sugar fell until all that was left was a few little sugar balls.
“How about you mix while I pour the rest of the ingredients?”
Damian crossed his arms, puffing, grumbling. “You said I could add the sugar”
His ba- brother smiled and ruffled his hair. “Sorry bud.”
“You did that on purpose.” Damian grumbled, throwing a piece of gingerbread dough at him. He compared this to a parent taking over a task they thought their child wouldn’t know how to do. His heart hurt when he compared Richard to a parent.
Grayson smiled cheekily. “I promise I’ll let you do it next time, okay?”
“Tt.” Damian tutted, but perked up when there was a quick ‘ding!’
“Looks like the first batch is done.” Richard clapped excitedly, looking arguably more excited than Damian was. He hurried towards the oven, quickly slipping on penguin themed oven mitts, and pulled the baking tray out of the oven. He replaced it with the tray of uncooked gingerbread dough awaiting baking on the counter.
“They’re done?” Damian asked. He never remembered being able to use such a childish tone in the league, even on Christmas. Something about Richard always brought out the childishness he thought he had gotten rid of. He just made Damian feel…safe. His brother was as warm as hot chocolate- a drink Damian had learned about recently.
“The first batch is.” Richard answered, placing down the hot tray on the counter. “Don’t touch it yet sweetheart, I don’t want you getting burned.”
Damian himself might not have gotten burnt, but his cheeks sure burned at the nickname, and he was glad his older brother wasn’t looking at him. If he was, Damian was sure he would have seen bright red painted across his cheeks.
“I’m not a fool, I won’t touch hot metal.” Damian argued in attempts to hide his embarrassment.
His brother smiled at him with soft eyes- the ones he only used with Damian. He often saw parents give their children that same look. But that couldn’t be what this look was. Richard saw him as a responsibility, nothing more. Even if the rejection hurt, Damian knew he would never be getting something like that. His father was dead, and Richard didn’t want to be his Baba. That was that.
“I know buddy. I just worry sometimes.”
It took a painfully long time for Richard to deem the gingerbread “cool enough” to finally leave together. It felt like hours before he was finally excitedly grabbing his pieces, although he knew it wasn’t actually that long.
“My house is going to look like the manor.” Damian decided, sticking out his tongue subconsciously in concentration as he slathered frosting on the sides of the gingerbread. Being an artist definitely paid off, since he was able to keep his hand mostly steady.
“Oh really?” Richard entertained, working on his own house. “That would take a while. I don’t know if we have enough gingerbread to make all the rooms at the manor.”
“I don’t need to make the inside,” Damian decided. He tried his hardest to only get the frosting where it was needed. He wanted his manor to look tidy and perfect. “Only the outside.”
“I don’t doubt you could.” Richard hummed. Unlike Damian, he allowed the frosting to be messy, and drip across unneeded areas. Unlike the mess Damian expected to see, instead it looked like a snowy house. A Christmas house. Damian looked back down to his, pondering how to replicate that.
“You know, Dames, my parents and I used to make gingerbread houses all the time when I was little. I remember making three gingerbread men to go with it. One for my dad, one for me, and one for my mom.” Grayson reminisced. “My mom used to tell me her parents did the same for her. It’s a family tradition I guess.”
Damian listened quietly, attempting to copy the snow looking shaped with his own frosting.
“I always told her I would keep it up when I had kids.” He smiled at the memory, watching as Damian finished up with the sugar. “When I was younger I thought I’d never get to keep that promise. After becoming a vigilante, I stopped thinking about finding a family…but I guess one found me. Now I can say I kept my promise.”
Damian paused, and looked towards Grayson.
His brother cleared his throat. “Uh- speaking of which. I have something I want to show you. I was going to put off till Christmas Day to show you, but I can’t wait anymore.”
He reached for the file on the counter beside him, and fumbled nervously for a second before picking it up. He took a piece of paper out of it, and handed it to Damian.
Damian took it, and scanned them over.
Adoption papers.
It was all signed. Everything but one line, where it awaited Damian’s signature.
“Merry Christmas, Dames.” He whispered, reaching out to run a hand through Damian’s hair. “I know you were really eager to get close to Bruce before…you know. And I’m sure he would have loved you if you two had more time together. I know I do. I’m not trying to take his place or anything, I just-“
“Give me a pen.” Damian demanded, ignoring the heat behind his eyes, and the water blurring his vision.
“What?”
“A pen.” Damian repeated, hating how close he was to tears. He hadn’t cried in years. “You gave me these papers but didn’t think to give me a pen?”
“I- oh. Oh. A pen. Yeah I’ll-“ Richard hurried to his office in the next room, grabbing a pen and quickly handing it to him.
“If you need some time to think about it, that’s okay. I remember how overwhelming this was when Bruce gave these to me. Take your time baby. I’ll always wait for you.”
Perhaps Damian would have needed time if he hadn’t already been dreaming about this for months. Damian already had his mind made up. It had been made up for over a month now. He just never thought he’d really get this opportunity. It felt like a dream.
“You don’t even have to sign them. I won’t be mad.” Richard spoke gently. “It’s completely up to you. I love you so much.”
“Baba.” Damian hummed, tears burning in his eyes, testing how the words rolled off his tongue. “Is that what I would call you?”
“You can call me anything you want to, Dami…but I’d like that.”
Damian signed his name.