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Shannon's first thought when she opens the door is that he's very large. Six foot two, easy, with the bulk to match, hunching in his shoulders to no avail. It would be easy to be intimidated if it weren't for the awkward, wobbling smile he gives her and the bright red gift bag he's holding out in front of him, comically small in his comically large hands.
"Hey," he says. "Uh. Is Percy here?"
"Well, I would hope so," Shannon says. "Seeing as it's his house and his graduation party."
"Yeah, well," he says, grimacing unsubtly to himself. "With the way he fucking lives."
"There's no way to know," Shannon agrees. He gives a short, sharp laugh, unpracticed and cracking in the middle. "Who knows? In the five seconds since I've looked away, he might have found a way to throw himself out a window to get away from a conversation."
"Or to prove a point," the man adds, and it's Shannon's turn to laugh.
"With the way he lives," she echoes. "You want to come in or you want to stand in the doorway all night?"
There's a moment where he hesitates, wavering, like he thinks she's about to take it back for whatever reason. Just a moment, and then he's stepping past her into the apartment with a quiet, "Thanks."
She shuts the door behind them. "Refresh my memory," she says. "One of his classmates? Former coworker?"
"I like to think of it as trauma victim," he says dryly, which is a good line. She'll have to remember that. "We're just, uh. Acquaintances. Met in passing a handful of times. And he mentioned he was throwing a shindig for graduation and I figured I might as well stop by." He lifts one shoulder up, looking like he would like nothing more than to shrug himself out of his own skin . "Anyway. You're his—"
"Mother," Shannon says. "Birthed him and raised him. Whole nine yards."
"Ah," he says, rubbing at the back of his neck. "Forget the trauma victim comment, then. He's. Um. An upstanding young man?"
"He certainly can be," she admits. "Probably about sixty percent of the time, even, so we'll take what we can get." This makes him smile, and Shannon finds herself smiling back. "You should probably also tell me your name at some point."
"Oh," he says. "It's—"
"Jason?" Percy says, half-stepping into the entryway. He's blinking their way, hard, like he's waiting for his vision to clear.
Shannon turns back to Jason, who's lifting one hand in stilted greeting. "Oh, you're Jason?"
"What," Percy says.
"What," Jason repeats. He looks over to Percy. "Why does your mom know my name?"
"I don't know," Percy says, sounding genuinely, impossibly baffled. As if the last few months haven't been an escalating series of anecdotes starting with this guy I know, Jason. "Mom, why the fuck do you know his name?"
She ignores him and turns back to Jason. "You're one of his favorite people to complain about, did you know?"
"Mom," Percy says again.
Jason's mouth is curving in on itself, like he's trying not to laugh. "That checks out, yeah."
"Ignore her," Percy says. "She's crazy." Shannon clears her throat. "She's a lovely and intelligent woman who just happens to be completely off her rocker. Is that any better?"
"In what world would that be better?" Jason wonders aloud.
"You just got here," Percy says, gesturing towards Jason with a semi-full red Solo cup. "So fuck off, maybe?"
Percy can be a lot. Shannon will be the first one to admit this because she was the first one to learn it, all the way back when he was a toddler with more stubbornness than cognizance. Not everyone can handle him. But Jason just clicks his tongue in faux-disapproval and says, "You treat all your guests this way?"
Percy narrows his eyes and gives Jason a sharp middle finger before he disappears back into the living room. Shannon turns back just in time to catch the last flicker of Jason's soft half-laugh.
"Do you want to stay in the entryway for the whole party or do you want a drink?" Shannon asks.
Jason blows out a breath and says, more to himself than to Shannon, "What the hell."
He follows behind her as she leads him over to the flimsy plastic table where they have a single punch bowl and a few assorted bags of popcorn and chips. Shannon had assumed that Percy, established adult that he is with the freshly stamped paramedic certification, was perfectly capable of party planning on his own. She had assumed wrong. Jason might be thinking something similar. His eyes flick over to Percy—gesturing exaggeratedly as he tells some shift story to a slightly-cowed fellow graduate—and then back to the lukewarm punch bowl.
"Okay," he says, sounding amused. "Not sure what else I expected."
"It's not even alcoholic," Shannon confesses. Jason coughs into his fist, an aborted laugh. "Some people here have the audacity to be underage."
This is directed over to Becca, her sweet, lovely, mulish Becca, who takes one headphone off of her ear to say, "You could have had me eight years earlier, you know."
"And we could have had vodka in the punch," Shannon says. "More's the pity." Becca rolls her whole head as she slips the headphones back on. Jason's reaching out to pick up a Solo cup, but Shannon beats him to the—ha—punch, serving up whatever godawful concoction of flavor packets and soda Percy threw together in the last five minutes before people started showing up. She holds it up Jason's way. After a beat, Jason takes it.
"Thanks," he says, like it's unfamiliar, like he's not used to saying it at all. "You didn't have to do that. I could have taken care of it."
"And I could have helped," Shannon says simply.
Jason smiles into his punch. "Nice to see where he gets it from."
Well, isn't that a warming thing to hear? She touches a hand to his elbow. He stiffens, reflexive, and she takes it away. "You're very sweet."
Jason's face pinches up as he takes another not quite concealing sip of the punch, glancing off and to the side. "Well," he says. "Thanks."
He doesn't say anything else. Shannon gets the impression he is, perhaps, not a particularly social person. That's alright. She's worked with plenty of reticent, quiet kids in her day. What's one more?
"So what do you do?" She asks.
It's a fairly innocuous question, all things considered, but Jason's mouth flattens out into something like panic.
"Um," he says. "Like. For a living?"
"Or in your free time," Shannon adjusts. "Any hobbies you have."
It's something he has to think about for a moment. "I read," he says finally. "When I have the time."
"Like book stuff or real stuff?" Becca pipes up from the couch.
"Rebecca Lynn Grant," Shannon says, turning to her with one hand on her hip. "What have I told you about eavesdropping?"
Unsurprisingly, Becca does not look sheepish in the slightest. "I'm learning," she says. "I'm absorbing."
To his credit, Jason takes it in stride. "Mostly book stuff, I guess," he says, sounding amused. "What do you mean by real stuff?"
Becca opens her mouth, but Shannon gets to it first. "It's a leading question," she says. "She's going to ask you about Lois Lane."
Jason looks startled. Becca looks disgruntled. "It could have been Ronnie Troupe."
"But it wasn't," Shannon says. Her children are singular with their obsessions. Percy with his EMT certifications; Becca with her Pulitizer Prize winning investigative journalists; even Conrad—and it hurts to think of him, still, but she pushes past it, works to remember him—but even Conrad with his careful cataloging of grades.
"Whatever," Becca says eloquently. She twists back towards Jason, pushing her knuckles into her cheek. "Anyway. Lois Lane. Has like sixteen Pulitizers. Taken down a bazillion corrupt organizations. You know her, yes?"
"I know her," Jason says, and then quickly, "I mean, I know of her. Read some of her work, I think."
"Finally," Becca says, self-serious. "Somebody who has actual fucking taste."
Jason chokes a laugh into the punch. Shannon has a few more years of practice on him, and she manages to keep her face straight when she says, "Becks. We can always try the swear jar again."
"This is Percy's house," Becca argues. "Technically, you have no right to enforce a swear jar here."
"Technically, I'm still his mother," Shannon says. "And your mother as well. In case you forgot."
"Well, you keep on reminding me," Becca says. Back to Jason, singleminded as ever: "What's your favorite piece of hers? Also, what's your name?"
"I remember enjoying the one on LuthorCorp union busting," Jason says, after a second or so of thought. Becca nods along. "And I'm Jason."
"Ohhhhhh," Becca says. "You're Jason?"
"Christ," Jason mutters, just quietly enough that Shannon's the only one who can hear him. "You're the second person to say that."
Becca shrugs. "He complains about you a lot."
"Trust me," Jason says. "I complain about him a lot too."
"We all do," Becca says. "That's old news." Jason tilts his head to the side in tacit agreement. "LuthorCorp union bust is a classic. I keep on trying to get my friends to read it, but they all want to read romance novels or whatever."
"Well, hey," Jason says, with a flush. "Those can be, you know. Entertaining." Becca squints at him sharply. Jason flushes deeper. "In the right circumstances, I mean."
"Sure," Becca says, slow and suspicious and absolutely cutting. "But not as entertaining as good investigative journalism."
"I don't know if anything could live up to good investigative journalism," Jason says, evidently sincere.
Becca gives him one last lookover with only a moderate amount of judgement, which is as close to approval as any of them are going to get, before inauspiciously ending the conversation and plopping a headphone back over her ear to curl into her phone again.
"That's all you're going to get out of her," Shannon says. "She'll be dead to the world for another hour or so. Teenagers."
"She and Percy are a lot alike," Jason says, a little distant. Shannon follows his gaze and finds that he's looking to Percy, still telling some story at the other side of the room. Jason looks back down to Shannon, but Shannon is still looking at Percy when he glances back over, lets his eyes flicker over Jason's frame before he turns away again. Hm. "I guess you would know, right?"
"No shit," Shannon says, turning her full attention back to Jason. "So. Reading. Real stuff and book stuff. What else do you end up doing?"
Jason's face pinches again as he hesitates. "Sales. With my—aunt."
An awkward, quiet six foot two twenty something is not the first thing Shannon thinks of when she thinks salesman. "Are you," she tries. "Do you like it?"
He shrugs. "Somebody's gotta do it."
Sure, she supposes. The other question, then, is—
"How the hell did you meet Percy?" She asks.
Jason's face consternates. It's the only word for it. "Ah."
"I don't love that I heard my name mentioned over here," Percy says, appearing from behind Jason's shoulder. Jason doesn't startle, but Shannon does, spilling punch on the floor. "Whoops. Sorry, Mom."
"Your mom was just asking me how we met," Jason says, to Percy.
Percy's face consternates too. "Ah."
Shannon raises an eyebrow. "Must be a hell of a story."
Jason and Percy look at each other. Percy scratches at his slightly-crooked nose. Jason frowns. Percy clicks his tongue and then turns to Shannon to say, overly casual, "It's not all that interesting, when you get down to it."
"We met at work," Jason says, rubbing at the back of his neck. "That's it."
"At work," Shannon repeats, doubtful despite herself. "How do an EMT and a salesman cross paths anyway?"
Percy looks up at Jason and mouths salesman, before he looks back at Shannon. He opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again. "Staple injury."
"Come on, man." Jason mutters.
"Yeah," Percy says, gathering steam. "Really embarrassing, too. I mean, how many people manage to staple their fingers to their desk?"
He looks up at Jason again, expectantly. Jason sighs, tipping his head back towards the ceiling, before he says, "Once. It was one time."
"Except for all the other times we ran into each other," Percy says, gleefully. To Shannon, "You'd be surprised how many mishaps salesmen can get into."
She's beginning to suspect Jason is not actually a salesman. Twenty plus years of childrearing—particularly her children—have not made her dumb. Clearly, there's something they're not saying. Clearly, it's something horrifically mortifying they both would rather bury. After all, Percy never does anything halfway, and Shannon would be very surprised indeed if Jason weren't the exact same way.
"And then what," Shannon says. "You eventually decided you might as well start running into each other on purpose?"
Jason tilts his head and looks down to Percy, who is distracted swirling the last dregs of his shitty, shitty punch around in the cup. "Sure," Jason says finally. "Something like that."
"Like it's my fault you keep—" Percy's face twitches with barely suppressed laughter. "Stapling your fingers."
"You know, I don't even want to give you this anymore," Jason says, shaking the bag he's been holding the whole time. "Not if you're going to be an asshole." A sideways look to Shannon. "Sorry, Mrs. Grant."
Before Shannon can even pull the, please, you can call me Shan card, Percy's blurting out, "Wait. Is that for me?"
Shannon touches a hand to her suddenly aching head. Jason says, "No, it's for the other paramedic certification graduation party I'm headed to after this. What do you think?"
Percy scoffs. "Like I'm supposed to know what you get up to when we're not hanging out?" He reaches out for the bag. Jason pulls it away. Percy's eyes sharpen as he steps towards the bag again. This time, Jason holds it up over his head, out of Percy's grasp. Percy huffs. "Jason. You can't be serious."
"Dead," Jason says, eyes sparkling. "Sorry. Too soon?"
"Go to hell," Percy says. He holds out for another two, three seconds, before he's fully trying to jump up Jason's frame, with Jason continuing to hold the bag just out of the way. "Jesus fucking Christ, you suck—worse than literally anyone ever has in the history of sucking—"
"Quit casting aspersions on my abilities to use staplers," Jason says.
"Quit casting aspersions," Percy mocks, in a surprisingly good rendition of Jason's voice. "Do you hear yourself? When you talk? I have to wonder."
"You're not going to get anything if you keep running your mouth—" Jason starts, and then Percy digs an elbow into Jason's side, hard enough that Jason doubles over with an audible oof. It takes a lot for somebody Percy's size to down somebody as looming as Jason is, and Shannon is bizarrely proud as Percy snatches the bag out of Jason's hands.
"Now was that so hard?" Percy says. Jason gives him the middle finger. "Sorry, Mom. I promise it was necessary."
They're very charming, Shannon decides. Percy, admittedly, has a lot going on at any given point in time, and it's nice to see him with somebody who can take it without blinking, who can even dish it right back. It's nice to see Percy comfortable, grinning sideways at a still-groaning Jason as he opens up the bag.
"Let's see the goods," he mutters.
There's a slow flush coming across Jason's face as he straightens, pulling compulsively at his jacket zipper. "It's not a big thing," he says. "I just saw it and. I don't know. Thought you might get a kick out of it."
Percy pulls out a white mug, takes a look at the front, and snorts. "I've been saying it," he says, flashing the mug back towards Jason and Shannon. It's a simple design—the bright blue, six-pointed EMS symbol, accompanied by the words I Can't Fix Stupid. He's still grinning disproportionately wide as he says, "I feel so validated right now."
Jason's smile comes slow and quietly pleased. "That's why I do it," he says. "Every time I do something, I think to myself, I wonder if Percy Grant is feeling validated right now—"
"Man, shut the fuck up," Percy says, shoving at Jason's shoulder as he steps past. "You show up to my graduation party and you have the fucking audacity to—"
He's still blabbing away as he moves into the kitchen. Jason sways towards him, hesitant for a second, before he falls forward and follows after.
"I got you a gift and everything," he says. "I said hi to your mom. I am a fucking excellent house guest."
"It's true," Shannon says. "He's been very polite."
Percy gives her a betrayed look as he opens a pantry haphazardly stacked with dishes. To Jason, he says, "I don't know who you are and what you've done with Jason Todd—"
Jason laughs, and Shannon watches as Percy's smile ticks up again in a quiet, victorious response. "And I thought I was supposed to be the paranoid shithead," Jason says, and then, "Why the hell are those plates stacked like that?"
"Oh no," Percy says. "Don't you fucking start—"
Shannon decides to leave them to it. There are other guests here, although admittedly not very many—some neighbors they've known for years, a handful of Percy's coworkers and classmates. Still more people than Percy probably expected, judging by how the meagre snack layout is already mostly gone.
He doesn't understand the effect he has on people, Shannon's found. Yes, he's loud and occasionally or often obnoxious and frustratingly headstrong about things both large and small. Shannon raised his stubborn ass. She knows. But it's impossible not to see how caring and dedicated he is to, well. Everything. People see that. They show up to the small, shitty graduation gatherings his mother made him throw because they see it.
Shannon gets to hear all of it, as she mixes and mingles while Percy and Jason are bickering over kitchen organization. Sunny from three doors down, who lived in their apartment building longer than anyone else and has plenty of stories about Percy and Conrad and Becca running up and down the halls. A teacher at the community college, who recalls Percy getting into arguments in class with a faintly traumatized air. Percy's current boss, a very tall woman who introduces herself only as Bassett, who describes Percy, very tactfully, as committed to his work.
"Oh yes," Shannon says, beaming with pride. "I know."
It doesn't take long for the party to wind down. It wasn't very large to begin with, and the nominal subject seems determined to spend the whole time arguing with one of the guests about plates. Probably, Shannon should pull him out and make him interact with everyone who came here to support him. But every time she pokes her head into the kitchen, Percy's smiling incredulously as Jason gestures into Percy's cupboards, or laughing outright at something Jason's said. He doesn't always smile like that. Shannon leaves them be.
Eventually, eventually, they emerge from their kitchen hideaway, following closely behind one another.
Percy puts his hands on his hips, surveying the scene. "Oh, thank God," he says. "Everybody left."
Bassett, who had not in fact left, touches a tired hand to the bridge of her nose as she stands in the doorway. "I'll see you at the station tomorrow, Grant."
Percy has the grace to look at least a little sheepish. "Yeah," he says. "Have a nice night, Chief."
She lifts her eyes to the heavens one last time before she steps out of the apartment. Shannon closes the door behind her. Honestly? The whole thing went far better than she expected.
Becca voices it before she can, with the incredible tact her age group is known for. "You didn't even yell at anyone."
"You sound disappointed," Percy says. Shannon crosses back into the entryway to see Percy coming around the couch to hang over Becca's shoulder. Becca shoves at his face, to no avail. "Did you want me to yell at people? Is that it? You got bored?"
Becca elbows up into his sternum as Percy wraps a loving, affectionate, bruising arm around her shoulders. "It's like, your favorite thing to do."
"That's true," Jason says. Percy twists to look at him, narrow-eyed. Jason flushes again, and then turns to the flimsy plastic table and starts clearing off the snacks.
"Oh hon," Shannon says, stepping up besides him. "You don't have to do that."
Jason gives her a wide-eyed, panicked look before he manages to tamp it down into an only slightly shaky smile. "I don't mind." His eyes flicker down to the floor, where they immediately pinch together again. "Oh, for fuck's sake, Perce."
"What is it now?" Percy says, and then, "Hold still, Becks, stop thrashing—"
Shannon watches Jason trace his steps back into the kitchen and whip a washcloth out of a drawer, because the alternative is turning around and watching Percy and Becca slap fight, and if she doesn't turn around to look she can pretend it's not happening. He comes back over to crouch over a spot of punch on the floor, dabbing at Shannon's spill from when Percy startled her earlier.
"Oh, come on," she says, bending down next to him. "That's my mess, I can take care of it—"
"You gotta let him do it, Ma," Percy says. Becca is making some sort of frustrated, strangled noise, which Shannon continues to gracefully ignore. "You gotta let him do it, otherwise he'll beat your ass—Jesus fucking shit, Becca—"
"I'm not gonna beat your ass," Jason tells her quietly, as if she were actually concerned.
"Thank you, Jason," Shannon says.
"I only beat his ass because he fucking asks for it," Jason continues, standing and pointing back at Percy. "I'm sorry to say it, Mrs. Grant, but it's true. He's the one who spooked you. If anything, we should be making him clean this up."
Shannon stands with him, dusts off her hands. "You make some excellent points."
Percy's detached himself from a too-smug Becca, clasping at his forearm. "Victim blaming," he says, nonsensically, and then, "Mom, she bit me. We need to put her down."
"Not if I put you down first," Becca mutters.
"We're sending you off to the farm," Percy tells her, and Becca makes a high, wordless noise of rage.
If they break anything, Shannon decides, it can be Percy's problem because it's his apartment. She picks up a stack of trash and moves towards the kitchen and after a beat, she hears Jason following after her.
"You really didn't have to help," she tells him.
He shrugs, placing a dish carefully in the sink. "I don't mind," he says. "Somebody's gotta do it. God knows he won't."
"Not everything I try to teach him sticks," Shannon confesses. Jason laughs, a soft huff. "He has other strengths."
"He does," Jason says easily. The Can't Fix Stupid mug is still sitting on the counter. Jason picks it up with a quiet quirk of his lips, putting it up in a cupboard. "I mean, I know I've spent most of the visit ragging on him. To be fair, it's very easy." There's a flush coming up his cheeks, she thinks, but he's turning away from her, back to the sink. "But he's a really good guy. A good friend. He—" He blows out a sigh. "Well. You know."
Shannon does. She rests her cheek in her palm. "I can see why he likes you."
Jason fumbles a plate into the sink. "Jesus fuck—" he mutters.
"You done rearranging my cupboards?" Percy says, leaning on the kitchen entryway. "Disparaging my cleanliness?"
"Never," Jason says, with a scoff. "The moment I leave, you're just gonna fuck it all up again."
"Damn straight," Percy says, inefficiently fighting another grin. "Every time I do something, I think to myself, I wonder if Jason Todd is feeling inconvenienced right now—"
"Man," Jason says, snorting, sounding amused despite himself. "Somebody has to teach you to shut the fuck up."
Percy crosses his arms, distinctly smug. "Many before you have tried."
"And failed," Shannon adds. "I speak from experience."
Percy's smug air drops into a woundedness. "Mom."
"Oh, hush." Shannon walks over to him to hold his dear, obnoxious face in his hands, ignoring his hissed out protests. "You said it first. I'm very proud of you. I love you."
His face is bright red, but he says, "Yeah, yeah. I love you too."
She pinches his cheeks and adds, sing-song, "Even though you're an annoying piece of shit—"
"Jesus, Mom, talk about mixed messages," he says, but his hands come up to squeeze warmly at her wrists. "Couldn't have done it without you, you know."
She thinks he could. There is nothing on this planet that stops Percy Thomas Grant from getting something he's gunned for. There's nothing that stops him from helping people. There's no way he ends up anywhere other than here. She's just extraordinarily grateful she gets to be there to see it. She squeezes his face again.
"Oh no," Percy says, voice warbling. "If you start crying, I'll start crying, and then Becca is going to make fun of us forever and Jason is going to mortify himself into the floor."
Sure enough, Jason is looking intently at a spot on the wall, distinctly pink around the cheeks. Percy snorts, fond and amused, soft enough that Shannon is the only one who can hear.
"You're fucking ridiculous," Percy tells him. "I hope you know that. Just a completely comical person."
"This from you?" Jason says, without any heat. Percy smiles again, wide and toothy. Jason grins back.
Shannon, for her part, catches Becca's eye. Becca sticks out her tongue with the elegant dismissal only a teenager can manage.
It's another second or so of this before Jason suddenly blurts, "Should probably head out."
Percy blows out a sigh. "Yeah, asshole," he says. "Get the fuck out of my house already. God, who even taught you manners?"
"No one," Jason says flatly. "I'm an orphan."
"Cry me a river," Percy retorts. Shannon whacks him on the shoulder. "Ow, Jesus, Mom—"
Jason just laughs, sharp and surprised, grinning over to Shannon to say, "It was nice to meet you guys."
"You're so sweet," Shannon says honestly. Jason's face does something terrifically crimson and Percy coughs into his fist. "It's nice to finally meet the man behind the bitching."
"You know what, we're done here," Percy decides. "Don't think we need any more of that—"
He's basically shoving Jason out of the room, all 5'6" of him shoved up against Jason's admittedly intimidating bulk. Jason, surprisingly—or maybe not that surprisingly—lets him do it, laughing meanly as Percy shoves him out to the entryway and down to the door. Shannon meanders behind, just out of sight.
"—need to quit embarrassing me in front of my mother," Percy is saying.
Jason laughs again. "But it's so easy," he says. Percy scoffs. "And it's so fun—" The sound of fist hitting flesh and Jason's subdued, pained grunt. "Jesus, man, I get it."
"God, you're an asshole," Percy says, but Shannon can hear the smile in his voice. "I have no idea how you tricked my mom into thinking that—"
"Your mom's really cool," Jason says, suddenly serious.
Percy's quiet for a moment. "Well," he says finally. "No shit."
Shannon stifles a laugh behind her hand. Percy can be sweet, when he wants to be.
"It was, um," Jason tries again, clearing his throat. "It was a good party?"
"It was a fucking awful party," Percy says, and Jason makes some vaguely affirmative noise. "I'm a godawful host, and I can't believe I let her talk me into it. I can't believe you deigned to come. Don't you have, you know—" Percy mutters something Shannon can't catch, and then he goes on with, "—and all that shit to be doing?"
"Yeah, well," Jason says. "You asked."
Another beat. Then Jason says, all in a rush, "Well, I should probably—" with Percy talking over him and saying, "Whatever, get the hell out of here already." Jason laughs and Percy snorts and then the door shuts. Silence.
Percy sighs. "Mom, I know you're listening."
Shannon gives up on the charade, sliding back into Percy's view. Percy's leaning back against the door, giving her a small, sarcastic wave. She says, "He seems nice."
"He's lying to you," Percy says instantly. "I don't know who that—charmer was, but it wasn't the Jason Todd I know. The Jason Todd I know is an asshole."
"Well," Shannon says. "So are you."
Percy makes a face as he moves past her and out of the entryway. "You're supposed to agree with me," he says. Shannon hums as she follows him back into the apartment. "You're my mother, for God's sake. You're supposed to support me in these very trying times."
"Trying times," Shannon echoes, bemused.
"Disastrous," Percy says. "You made me host people. You tried to get me to be social."
"I wasn't under the impression anyone could make you do anything," Shannon says. "Do you remember yourself as a toddler? Because I remember you as a toddler."
"You said I should do it, and I respect my elders," Percy tries. Shannon raises an eyebrow. He huffs. "Fine. I respect you."
"I'll take it," Shannon says dryly.
"Point is," Percy continues. "Trying times. Party bullshit. And on top of all that, I have to watch Jason fucking Todd somehow get into my mother's good graces! Unbelievable!"
"Hm," Shannon says. "You're taking this a little personally."
"And your little sister's good graces," Becca pipes up.
Percy stares at her for a second, inexplicably betrayed, before he narrows his eyes. "Wait a minute," he says. "That's not even true. You're just saying it to be contrary."
Becca shrugs. "Yeah. It's pissing you off. And I like that."
"I wasn't kidding about sending you to the fucking farm," Percy says.
"But he did say he'd read Lois Lane," Becca adds thoughtfully. "So that's kind of cool."
"Traitors, all of you," Percy says, with a accusatory sweep of a hand as he stalks away into the kitchen again.
"He's your friend," Becca points out. "You're the one who invited him." Shannon smiles at her. Attagirl.
Percy opens his mouth defensively. Shuts it. Turns away towards a cabinet and mutters, "He can be my—" An exaggerated gag. "Friend and also be a weird asshole. He contains multitudes." He twists back. "Contains multitudes. Did you know that's a quote from some poet guy?"
Shannon blinks. "You mean Walt Whitman?"
"Sure," Percy says. "I didn't know that until Jason told me. Who even knows that shit? It's like I've been saying, there's something fucking wrong with him."
Even as he says it, he picks the mug Jason gave him up off the shelf. He turns it around in his hand, his mouth lilting upwards so quietly that no one but Shannon would know how to spot it.
"He's a weirdo asshole," Shannon says, taking the cup out of his hands to put it back on the shelf. "But that's why you like him."
Percy's face scrunches up like a baby trying a lemon for the first time. "He's a really good guy," he confesses finally. Becca's got her headphones on again, dead to the world, so for all intents and purposes, it's just the two of them. "A good friend. He—" A huff. "Well. You know."
It's a very familiar sentiment indeed. It's good you have people like that, she wants to tell him. It's good that you have people who understand you, who show up to support you. But any more emotional honesty will likely give him an aneurysm, so Shannon tries a different tack for her last attempt: "And he's cute."
"Mom!" Percy hisses, snapping his head towards her so quickly she can hear his vertebrae cracking together painfully. "You can't just say stuff like that, are you insane?"
Again, seems like he's taking it a little personally. She lifts both hands in the hair, deflecting. "Just saying, baby," Percy bangs his head against the cabinet frame. "Have you thought about asking him—"
"He's straight," Percy says, with a gravity that's not actually necessary for the situation at hand. "He is absolutely, one hundred percent, definitely straight."
"Okay," Shannon says. "And he told you this?"
Percy hesitates. "Well," he says. "I mean. Basically."
"Basically he told you, or he actually told you?" Shannon asks.
"Let's stop talking about Jason Todd," Percy decides suddenly. "Let's move on. Becca!" He shouts out past Shannon into the living room. Becca takes a headphone off her ear, presumably to put her full attention into giving Percy the most withering look imaginable. Percy, of course, ignores her. "We're talking about something else now. Remind me, what has Lois Lane been up to recently?"
Shannon knows when to let things go—a trait she did not necessarily pass on to her children, but that's old news. The conversation rolls along, past Jason Todd and whether or not he is or isn't heterosexual. It really isn't anyone's business, she knows, but she suspects Percy's avoidance of the subject has less to do with respecting Jason's privacy and more to do with the flush still lingering around his face.
To prove the point: Halfway through Becca's breathless recounting of the latest incident Lois Lane's jumped off a building—a strange hobby for a Pulitzer Prize award winning journalist, but who is Shannon to judge?—Percy's phone dings. He pulls it out instantly, looks at the notification and snorts with his mouth lilting up in a familiarly quiet way.
"Dumbass," he mutters, typing out a response. She could see Percy smile like that every day and never get used to it, Shannon thinks. Never get sick of it. And, well. He could certainly do worse then 6'2", extremely handsome men with the kind of biceps she's used to seeing on TV.
One way or another, it's clear Jason Todd is going to be sticking around for a long time.