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It’s not that Dick doesn’t know what day it is, he just doesn’t consider the impact said day will cause or the headache it may bring. He’s never had to worry about it before, a fact that Dick tries to convince himself stands true even as he lingers at the threshold of their apartment with what he belatedly realizes is some equivalent to chocolates and roses.
It’s Valentine’s Day. A holiday Dick has always peripherally enjoyed, but that fucks him over now.
This wouldn’t be a problem if Dick did this for anyone else. That he’s actually sweating on his own doorstep really says it all. He’s not ready to confront whatever his subconscious is trying to push on him. It’s just an overpriced drink that Jason likes, jazzed up for the holiday. It’s just a (few) bundle(s) of flowers because Dick couldn’t say no to the vendors that seemed to be on every street corner he passed.
Dick hits his head against the door and keeps it there. He was supposed to be looking into a case, yet somehow careful reconnaissance led to the most willful distraction of his life.
It’s not like Dick has to give Jason the flowers even if that was his first impulsive thought. Because Dick saw them and thought Jason might like them. Because Dick thought it’d make Jason happy and blush that way Dick likes and—
Dick hits his head against the door again, tempering himself. He’s got to get it together, damn.
It’s fine. Jason won’t suspect a thing. He’ll sooner think Dick was getting picked up on before ever assuming that Dick was trying to pick up on…
He needs to dispose of the evidence. Even if Dick didn’t get anything because of the holiday, his intentions are somehow worse. Because there’s no obligation to what he’s done—he just wanted to. Wants to.
There’s no helping him, honestly.
Rather than rot away on the doorstep, Dick bites the bullet and shoulders his way inside. Because their place is so small, he catches sight of Jason right away. He sits on the living room floor in front of their coffee table, dutifully working on their case. He’d settled in at the same time Dick took off for reconnaissance despite Dick’s insistence he sleep more, stubborn because they’re partners; they work together. He looks like he’s hurting some now, tired after staring at a screen and fine print documents for so many hours. Compiling their case into something manageable and organized for them to work with.
“Were you spiraling out there?” Jason asks him, light and teasing. He smirks like a menace though he looks nothing but sweet, cheek squished in his palm. With how his sleeves fall over his hands, there are imprints from the frayed material left behind. It makes Jason look warmer, softer. The hoodie he wears is one commandeered from Dick’s side of the closet. Not an uncommon occurrence, but still one that makes butterflies tickle Dick’s stomach.
“Always.” Dick snarks, playful in his self-deprecation.
If only because he knows Dick too well, Jason looks up from his work to scrutinize him. Always sensitive and astute to some small tell that Dick hasn’t been able to correct in himself.
Dick catches Jason’s gaze, holds it, and prays that Jason’s assessment of him doesn’t ping any warnings that would make him call Dick out. Because he has more confidence in Jason than faith in himself, Dick takes control of the situation as best he can by way of distraction: shaking Jason’s jazzed up drink, jostling the ice together.
It serves its purpose in drawing Jason’s attention away. He brightens the moment he sees it, surprise melting into something pleased as he reaches out for Dick to hand it off.
That Jason is happy is a pleasure all its own. There’s no beating back the bashful smile that pulls at Dick’s lips nor the warmth in his chest. The little ‘thanks,’ Jason offers him is an afterthought for Dick compared to how Jason snickers around the lid of his cup–too pleased to even take a proper drink. Jason’s reactions to small gifts are always like this, so sweet that it charms.
It’s distracting enough that Dick forgets about the bundle(s) of flowers he carries until Jason looks back at him and finally takes notice of them. His eyes widen comically at the sheer volume and he sputters, shocked, “What’s with the flowers?” He doesn’t wait for Dick to give him an answer though, attention snapping back to Dick when he balks, “Did that many people try to pick you up? Seriously?”
Dick can’t help the quiet laugh that pulls from him. Keenly observant and unerringly sharp as Jason typically is, he can be oblivious, too.
“No one was trying to pick me up,” Honest as the statement is, Dick only says it because he knows Jason won’t believe him.
And he doesn’t. Jason breezes right over Dick’s proclamation, resting his elbow onto the coffee table to prop himself up to admire the sheer quantity of flowers–soft and vibrant and beautiful. None of them quite match because the vendors were all different, but they’re similar enough to be somewhat cohesive because of the holiday. Jason sips his drink before peeking up at Dick, a small furrow in his brow, “So then it was because one bold son of a bitch actually swept you off your feet or what?”
“They’re just flowers.” Dick says, smile small and fond.
Jason rolls his eyes, scoffs, “You’re a hard man to please, you know that? A gesture like that would’ve won me over, for sure.”
Hearing it makes Dick feel warm under his collar. Sheepish–bashful.
“Does that make me easy?” Jason asks. A rhetorical question that makes Jason grimace and Dick chuckle.
“I think that just makes you a romantic.” Dick says, holding the flowers out to Jason. The gesture makes Jason startle, eyes wide with surprise before his expression shifts to something dumbfounded, bewildered as he looks between the flowers and Dick.
Jason looks charmingly uncertain of himself, almost timid when he sets his drink down and reaches for the bundles, so careful with them that Dick’s eyes softens before they crinkle at their corners for how bright he grins when Jason snickers into them, cheeks dusted pink.
There’s so many that Jason holds them with both arms. There’s something sweet in the way he cradles them in his lap, looking all the flowers over and admiring the petals.
He looks happy. It makes Dick happy, in turn.
“Shut up,” Jason says, but there’s no heat in his words because he’s so quietly delighted by the endearing observation on his personality–because Dick doesn’t want to think about the alternative that’s likely more true–that Jason is simply relieved at Dick’s perspective on Jason not being easy in that way Jason means, though that doesn’t change the fact someone before led Jason to believe it and Dick hates it; the only easy this boy is is easy to–love want admire respect adore–
There’s no one thought or feeling that Dick can settle on that can begin to express how dear Jason is to him. His Robin, his partner, his.
“Kind of showing your hand between the flowers and the books–” Dick drawls with a contemplative hum, purposefully teasing. That Jason’s reading preference skews romantic is endearing.
The reaction is immediate: ruffled, indignant, and flustered. Jason sputters on a curse, swatting at Dick with the bouquets. It’s more a threatening wind-up, a warning that Jason will smack him, but although Dick tries to bait him by standing close and dodging away, Jason fakes taking a few swings before suddenly faltering.
It’s striking how noticeable it is–how Jason looks lost for a moment, stricken. When the bouquet hits Dick’s leg, it’s with a weak tap. Although it’s only for a few seconds, Jason seems to wander somewhere he’d rather not be, somewhere unexpected that makes him look terribly small.
Dick lowers himself onto the couch beside where Jason sits on the floor, knocking his knee to the boy’s shoulder. Showing concern without being obtrusive. It’s enough to get Jason to look back at him, startling. Laughing sheepishly in surprise while waving his hand like that might brush away whatever distressed him. As if to prove everything is fine, Jason swats him gently with the bouquets, but even though he smiles–it looks more a grimace, discomforted and perturbed.
“It’s nothing, just…I remembered sometimes I’d get my mom flowers. Try to cheer her up, you know?” It’s not often that Jason shares any stories about his life from before, so Dick doesn’t interrupt, patient as he listens. There are scars left from cigarette burns tucked behind Jason’s ear and more beneath all the layers he wears. Unwelcome reminders of more difficult times.
He tries not to assume when it comes to the things Jason has endured, but with this Dick can’t help but wonder what Jason’s mom did–if she didn’t take the bouquets Jason brought her and hit him with them or throw them aside entirely.
Jason cackles to himself, running his fingers light over petals. “Was never really in the budget.” He shrugs, then drifts off again. Lost for another moment until he abruptly comes back to. He turns to look at Dick with a sharp smile to play it off and Dick smiles back, lets it happen, “There was this old lady that lived on the floor beneath us. Ornery woman, but I think she was just lonely. I’d give ‘em to her, sometimes. Gave her the worst allergies, but she refused to get rid of ‘em. And there was this mom across the way. Always busy working because she was supporting all these kids. She did right by all of them best she could. Gave them to her, too. She was always looking real down, you know?”
He’s rambling.
“That was sweet of you.” Dick says, a soft interruption.
“Didn’t want them to go to waste. My mom didn’t always like ‘em.” Jason admits, steady although the memory must sting.
It’s not a confirmation of Dick’s suspicions, but it’s a near thing. He can’t begin to imagine what that must’ve been like. While Dick never got his mother traditional bouquets, he’d make his own of the wildflowers nearby wherever they stopped for their shows. She’d loved them so much she pressed them all between the pages of books until they had none left.
“Do you?” Dick asks, soft and steady in the space between them.
“Huh?” Jason asks, head tilting just enough to hear him better.
“Do you like flowers?” Dick asks again, as gentle as he can.
Jason considers it, looking at the flowers he holds before turning to look at Dick, his smile something small and a little brittle around the edges, but still brilliant, “Yeah. They’re nice.”
Simple as that, Dick knows he’ll be getting flowers for Jason until the end of his days. Bought from vendors or picked himself; whenever Jason is sad or just because Dick wants to. Until Jason presses so many between the pages of all of his books that he needs to buy more; until he finds them hidden around their home and thinks of these moments they share before anything else and can smile about it without looking so heartbroken.
“You like them?” Jason’s question pulls Dick from his musings.
It’s why he thoughtlessly answers, “I’ve never gotten any.”
Jason picks up on that right away, brow pinching when he asks, “Before today?” And well, shit. Dick keeps his expression neutral, but Jason must see that tell only he knows of or hears some sort of distress in Dick’s silence. “Wait,” Jason starts, eyes narrowed at him before suddenly they’re squinted closed and he laughs, bright and brilliant, “You got suckered into buying all this, huh?”
Again, Dick is saved by Jason’s obliviousness in this one facet of their lives.
“Yeah, yeah.” Dick gripes half-heartedly, shoving Jason companionably. “I was supporting small businesses.”
“Getting swindled, more like.” Jason cackles, utterly tickled by the assumed turn of events. Still, he turns back to their case. Takes his drink and laughs softly between sips.
They fall into a familiar routine of work after that. Reviewing everything Jason compiled for them and then going over what little Dick managed to scrounge together before he got distracted. Jason torments him for it, as he should, only to get distracted himself not a moment later. Content to chatter about other things and Dick more than happy to let Jason’s voice fill all the quiet spaces of their home.
Dick gets lost in him. Idly picking smaller flowers out of the bouquets to tuck into Jason’s curls. Smiling to himself whenever he gets swatted at only to do it again until Jason finally takes notice and rears on him with complaints that go forgotten on his lips because he catches Dick in the act, flowers in hand and not looking the slightest bit guilty despite all his earlier reservations. Dick is shameless, truly, but he can’t help it. Jason brings out the most willful side of him—the part that wants; to give, to take, to have.
With a small smile, Dick tucks the sprig of flowers behind Jason’s ear. Marvels him with his dark hair peppered in veil flowers, baby’s breath. He’s blushing that way Dick likes, just like Dick knew he would. It flushes pretty across Jason’s freckled cheeks, a soft red that’s become Dick’s favorite color.