Work Text:
Dick rubs his twinging shoulder. His blanket shifts and he absently tugs it back up. He breathes to assuage his mounting headache when the pattering of feet on thin carpet draws his attention. He lifts his chin and spots his four year old daughter.
Mar’i’s hair is thick, tightly coiled, and as big as her personality. Her nails are painted a tourmaline orange as pretty as her mother. She is dressed in a vibrant patterned shirt and vivid colored stockings.
She pushes herself up, stuffed cow in hand, giving a dopey grin. “Babo!” she cheers and giggles when he picks her up and spins her around in a toss.
“Cikni!” He hoists her up and nuzzles his nose to hers. “Do you need food? Do you need a kiss? Mwah!”
“Mwah!” Mar’i chirps back with her tone as bright as her eyes.
He cups his hand over the back of her head and smoothes her hair before he rests his chin on her crown. His eyes drift down to watch her fiddle with the plushie she calls Moo-moo. Moo-moo is a lovingly worn orange-patterned cow with floppy limbs and a chamomile scent pack in its tummy.
The stuffed animal was a present from Donna for Mar’i’s first birthday. It was an instant hit with his daughter. Her favorite gift by miles. The first time he tried — and he did try — to separate his girl from her plush, she threw the fit of all fits and didn’t calm down until he finally relented, letting her hug the cow close as he walked circles to soothe her.
Dick learns from his mistakes. He got creative with outsmarting his tiny daughter, which is to say he never forced Mar’i to let go of her Moo-moo again. He made her a backup Moo-moo.
He settles Mar’i on his lap. He picks up his phone to check his notifications. He scrolls through social media and stops at the pictures Linda posted of her and Wally at a petting zoo. Dick smiles as he shows them to Mar’i. She appraises the animals with glee.
“Babo,” Mar’i starts in a curious tone, hands playing with her stuffy's fabric ears and horns, “Why does Bibi Linda call me squash?”
He huffs a laugh and replies, “Because you’re so tiny your bibi thinks she’s gonna squash you in a hug.”
“I am not that tiny!”
“I don’t know,” Dick says in a teasing voice. “You used to be pea sized.” He pokes her belly. “Itsy bitsy. Teensy weensy.”
She lifts her stuffie and asks, “Like Moo-moo?”
“Smaller than Moo-moo,” he tells her and watches his daughter’s eyes go comically wide, like she can’t even fathom a person (let alone herself) being that little.
“...No,” she hesitantly denounces.
“I tell the truth,” he assures as he nods.
Mar’i presses her lips together and falls into some other juvenile thought before informing him, “I’m hungry.”
“Well, let’s fix that, then.”
He gives her a chance to get down before heaving himself up and stumbling over his little heelbiter toward the kitchen. He washes his hands and makes sure Mar’i washes hers properly. Opening the fridge, he surveys the near barren shelves and settles on heating up last night’s chicken and steamed vegetables for lunch.
The microwave chimes upon finishing its task and Dick takes their warm food to split into two bowls. One for him. One for Mar’i.
They have enough plates, but Mar’i can be messy, and at home Dick works smarter not harder.
He finishes his after his daughter is done with her chicken. Instead of moving on to her vegetables, she looks beyond his shoulder into the kitchen.
“Maritza,” Dick says, “eat your veggies.”
“They’re yucky!” She exclaims as she puckers her lips.
“Cikni, just one?” Dick takes a carrot from her bowl. He makes a point to slowly chew it and smile. “Didn’t hurt a bit. Your turn.”
Mar’i puts a carrot in her mouth and judges it. Her mouth scrunches, her nose screws up, her eyes squeeze shut, and Dick leans forward with a napkin just in time to catch the vegetable she spits out.
“It’s orange, your favorite color,” he tries, just to be met with the closest thing to a deadpan his daughter can do.
Dick sighs and concedes, “Well, we tried. Will you eat your fruit?” Her eyes snap up to him and he grins. “Okay, we’ll do fruit.”
He stands and gathers her from her chair, settling her across his side, where she cuddles like a koala. He rocks up and walks them to the kitchen to examine the fruits they have on the counter.
“Let’s see… Do you want an apple or a banana?”
Mari grabs the banana and pulls it from her dad’s grip. “Banana.”
“Vâde!” he says, affirming her choice as if it were the only natural outcome. “Then I guess the apple’s mine.” He bites into the apple only for Mar’i to put her hand over it and tug.
“Yours?”
“Mhm, this is my apple,” he reminds her. “This,” he pokes his daughter’s banana, “is Mar’i’s banana.”
She tugs on the apple again and says, “Mine.”
“We can share?”
Mar’i squints at him, her mouth screwed in a cute pout. “No.”
“Mar’i, mo čerhen, your babo needs food too.”
“Babo, no.”
“Babo, yes.” He lets Mar’i take the apple into her hands to inspect it. In doing so, she drops her banana, which he catches. Dick peels the fruit and takes a bite. “Yum! Want some?” He tilts the banana to the little girl.
She breaks off a chunk of banana and mashes it in her mouth. “Yum!”
“Yeah? You’re silly,” Dick jokes, settling her over a clear space on the kitchen counter.
Once Mar’i’s finished her banana, she grabs at Dick’s hand and messes with his fingers. He huffs.
After thirty minutes playing with her, Dick stands and prepares himself to leave. Once he’s confident he has everything he needs, he heads back to the corner Mar’i’s playing in.
He claps his hands and bends down to his daughter’s level to ask, “Are you ready for time with babysitter Steph?”
Mar’i leans into him as she buries her head in his shoulder and says some muffled word.
“What was that? Say that to my ear, not my shoulder,” he teases his daughter.
“No.”
“Why no?”
“You said we can go to the playground,” she tells him with a pout.
Dick scrunches his brow, trying to remember when he said that, but he comes up empty. “When did I say that?”
“Last night! You said it’s too dark to go now so we can go in the morning.”
Well, that would explain why she got herself ready so fast before breakfast. He was exhausted when he put her to bed the night prior. Always was after a hectic day at work. Thinking about it now, he does recall Mar’i talking about completing the monkey bars.
“Oh,” he hums with a hand to his forehead, “I remember now. Your monkey bars.”
She nods and he sighs.
“I can’t today. I have to go to work,” he explains.
“We can go right now,” bargains his daughter.
“I’m sorry, Mar’i. I can’t watch you do the monkey bars today,” he considers and continues, “but I can once I’m off from work tomorrow. You can practice with Stephanie. She’s a really good spotter. She spots for me all the time.”
Mar’i hangs her head and tells him, “No.”
“Mo čerhen, mo xurdi bebe, my silly girl, I need you to go with Steph today.”
She slaps her hands on his cheeks. She attempts to give him a discerning stare before asking, “What do you mean?”
“My star, my tiny littl—”
“I know that,” she whines.
Smiling, he carries on saying, “Baby bird.”
“I’m not a baby or a bird!” she squawks.
“All Graysons are birds and you’ll always be my baby,” promises Dick.
Someone knocks on the door as he finishes talking. Mar’i, the clever girl she is, takes her cue and runs into her room, pulling her door shut. He huffs. Her door doesn’t lock, so it’s not as if he can’t get in, but he respects her attempts at establishing a boundary. It was something he always wanted as a child, but couldn’t get while living in a cramped trailer with his parents.
After heaving himself up from his crouched position, Dick approaches the front door and opens it.
“Howdy do!” Stephanie greets, miming a tipping of the hat.
He swings the door to let Stephanie in.
“Hi,” he replies with a humorous smile at his daughter’s inconvenience. “She’s in her room. Doesn’t want me to leave today.”
Stephanie hums in acknowledgement, her tone exaggeratedly enlightened for one being informed of the usual Mar’i shenanigans.
“Are you okay dealing with her?” Dick asks while grabbing his bag and checking if his laptop is secure. “I really do have to leave now.”
“Yeah, go ahead, I got this.” She winks and pats his shoulder. “Hey, Mar’i,” she calls, beginning to walk down the hall to the girl’s room as she continues, “what’s the plan for today?”
Dick just barely catches the sound of Stephanie tapping on Mar’i’s bedroom door before the front door latches shut behind him.
Dick returns home right after eleven at night and long past Mar’i’s bedtime. Stephanie gives an exhausted smile from her spot on the couch, her collection of school work scattered across her lap, and chocolate chip cookie in hand.
“Hi, I’m sorry I’m late,” Dick apologizes as he drops his keys on the counter. “You can stay the night if you’d like.”
“It’s all good. I still have an essay to finish so I’ll just head out and finish it at home,” explains Stephanie. She gathers her materials, placing them back in her bag, as she forces her eyes awake. “Goodnight, Dick.”
“Night, Steph.”
“Oh!” She starts, telling him, “We made a batch of chocolate chip cookies and a couple snickerdoodles. I put the extra in a container by the fridge.”
“Thanks.”
“Anytime.”
After seeing her safely leave the street in her car, Dick turns and walks down the hall, but not before nabbing a cookie to munch on. He sneaks a glance into Mar’i’s room. Surveying her bed he spots her scrunched up under her quilt with a stuffed animal.
Satisfied with that, he glides the door shut, then heads to his own room to get ready for bed. He makes quick work of his routine — only a brief shower and brush — before throwing on whatever he finds for pajamas and collapsing against the mattress to sleep.
It’s half past two in the morning when Dick feels an intruder rustle his covers and worm into his side. A clammy hand pokes his cheek to rouse him from his feigned slumber.
“Hey, cikni, what’s going on?” he asks, voice hushed for the night.
His daughter sniffles and adjusts herself and her plush cow. She hides her face in his shoulder when he rolls to look at her. He cards his fingers through her hair to soothe her shakes.
“I had a bad dream,” she tells him. “It was scary.”
He pulls her into his arms and coos at her. His hand cups her head, guiding her forehead under his chin, allowing his lips access to her crown to impart a comforting kiss.
“It’s okay. I’ve got you, Mar’i,” he assures her.
She clutches his arm as tight as her little hand can. His heart aches that she had such a scare. He knows a bad dream isn't inherently a cause of concern, kids get them often enough, but he can’t help reading into it.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he suggests.
“Uhm, I don’t know,” Mar’i whispers, “I’m sleepy.”
“That’s all right. You can take your time,” replies Dick, then begins a soft humming to her.
She relaxes her grip on Moo-moo. Her breathing slows, shifting to a content rhythm.
After a couple minutes, he stops humming and just rubs the girl’s back. When he lifts his arm to shift his weight, Mar’i whines her dissent, then snuggles closer to his chest.
“Okay. Do you want to talk about it now?”
She shakes her head no.
Continuing, he asks, “Do you want me to take you back to your room or do you want to stay here with me tonight?”
Mar’i wrangles an arm free while she nods her head, so Dick settles back to sleep with an armful of child.
His daughter likes to be coddled and he’s not inclined to deny her that. He figures she’s only five, what could it hurt.
When the morning alarm goes off, Dick coughs into the fuzz of his daughter’s stuffie as he reaches out to snooze the alarm, repeating three more times until he huffs and pulls the plug. It’s his day off. The only obligation he has is to Mar’i and her monkey bars.
For breakfast they’ll have yoghurt or pancakes and only the juiciest of blueberries while they watch whatever is airing on the kid’s network before getting dressed and heading to the promised playground.
Heaving himself up to face the day, Dick knows he wouldn’t have it any other way.