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Tim is curled up in front of the fireplace in one of the blue wing chairs, his half-finished Latin homework resting on his knees. It had taken months of gentle reassurances from both Bruce and Alfred as well Dick for Tim to take them up on the offer to spend his afternoons before patrol at the manor. He still goes home each night to sleep, but he has to admit it’s nice not to be alone that much and the manor feels so much more like a home than the empty halls of his own house.
He yawns and blinks sleepily down at his notebook. He should get on with it before Bruce comes to get him for patrol, if he doesn’t want to stay up all night, but the warmth of the fire and the soft patter of rain against the windows makes it hard not to let his mind drift off to sleep. His eyes burn and every time he blinks, they stay closed for longer periods of time.
Coffee. He definitely needs more coffee.
He grabs blindly for his mug on the small table beside his chair and misses. The sound of glass shattering on tiles reverberates through the whole room and for a second Tim is frozen in terror, blood rushing in his ears. The echoes of what will happen next drowns out everything else – yelling, threats, worse.
Maybe, if he just stays still, he can turn back time.
Bruce, or at least Alfred will know that the lamp is gone and that Tim is to blame, but if he cleans it up before they find out, maybe he won’t be thrown out. Won’t be punished as harshly.
Bruce isn’t like your parents, a voice whispers in the back of his mind, but it’s quickly drowned out by terror.
His knees hit the floor with a painful thud that he barely notices, and he chokes on a sob as he sees the beautiful lamp laying in colourful shards on the floor. It’s a stark contrast to the dark grey tiles and distantly he thinks it almost looks like an art piece. A beautiful still-life. His fingers tremble as he starts picking up the pieces, his breath coming out in short and fast puffs. It doesn’t take long until his face and fingers start tingling with lack of oxygen and he barely notices cutting his fingers open as he gathers the shards in his hands. His blood mixes with the glass, but he can barely see through the tears in his eyes.
He needs to –
Tim freezes at the sound of footsteps and he blinks rapidly against the burn of tears. Crying only ever made his parents angrier with him.
“Tim?” Bruce asks, and Tim’s whole body goes cold. If it were Alfred, maybe he could explain, but Bruce… “Everything alright? I heard a noise.”
The steps come closer and he knows he should turn around and face his punishment, but he is frozen in terror, as he stares down at the shards of the life he just threw away. Maybe Bruce won’t take Robin away from him, but he will never welcome him back into his home.
He waits for the shouting, for the anger that always comes, but instead Bruce crouches down beside him. He hears Bruce’s sharp intake of breath and flinches as a hand reaches out, landing on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” Tim whispers tonelessly, right as Bruce says: “My god, Tim, you’re bleeding. What happened?”
Tim stares down at his fingers, only now really registering the blood staining his hands and t-shirt. He doesn’t remember when he started bleeding. Red drip, drip, drips from his fingers onto the dark tiles and colourful shards of the lamp, but he still doesn’t feel pain. It almost looks beautiful.
Bruce turns Tim so that he is facing him and even though he just wants to be gone, he dutifully raises his head to look him in the eyes. Instead of the expected anger, all Tim finds in Bruce’s expression is concern.
Strange.
“What happened?” Bruce asks again, and despite himself, Tim flinches.
“It was an accident,” he says softly, his voice wavering, even though he knows it won’t matter. “I swear.”
Bruce’s eyes flicker to the broken lamp on the floor, before settling on him again, a gentle understanding in his expression.
“Okay.” He says the word so easily as if Tim didn’t just break an expensive lamp. He says the word so easily as if it doesn’t even matter. “I’m not mad at you,” he continues, and Tim doesn’t understand. “Let’s get you cleaned up and Alfred can deal with this, sounds good?”
Tim swallows. He can’t quite get enough air, every breath a strangled sound in his throat.
“But… but I broke it.”
A tear runs down his cheek, and he wants to brush it away, but his hands are still full of blood, and he doesn’t know what to do. Bruce’s grip on his wrists is firm but not forceful, hands stained with his blood.
“It’s not the end of the world, Tim. I care far more about the fact that you are hurt than about a stupid lamp.”
Tim’s parents never shared the same sentiment, and he doesn’t quite believe Bruce either. Intellectually, Tim knows that parents aren’t supposed to hit their children, but that never included him. Tim hasn’t been a child in a long time.
He doesn’t move as Bruce lets go of his hands and reaches for him, though his eyes close on their own accord. Bruce lifts him up as if he weighs nothing and Tim is left blinking up at him in confusion. He gets carried down the stairs to the kitchen, and Bruce holds him close. He sits him down on the kitchen counter and turns on the faucet, guiding his hands under the water stream. The sting of pain is the first real thing that registers again and he stares unblinking at the water as it turns red.
“You did quite a number on your hands,” Bruce says, but not unkindly. He almost sounds sad.
He grabs a towel from one of the cupboards and carefully dabs Tim’s hands dry. Tim watches, chest still tight, but slowly breathing gets easier. His life has been littered with blood, but never before had someone else cleaned his wounds for him.
“Stay put, I’ll get some bandages,” Bruce says, once his hands are dry.
Anxiety is still cursing through Tim’s veins as he stares at his hands. The cuts are still bleeding and slowly the pain he didn’t feel before starts to creep in. When Bruce returns Tim still expects anger or at least disappointment and is met with neither. His hands are gentle and his movements careful as he dabs antiseptic on the cuts, before wrapping them with bandages. The pristine white looks wrong after the bright red of the blood.
“Good as new,” Bruce tells him with a smile, lowering Tim’s hands to his lap.
“Thank you,” Tim mumbles. “I’ll… I’ll go now.”
It shouldn’t hurt as much as it does, because this was never his home in the first place, but Tim’s heart still splinters in his chest. He’s about to hop off the counter, when Bruce stops him and Tim freezes. He should have known that Bruce wouldn’t let him leave without a punishment.
“Wait, Tim, I… I need to ask you something and I need you to be honest with me.”
He waits for Tim’s nod, before continuing.
“Have your parents ever punished you for breaking something? Or for anything else?”
He can almost hear his mother’s sharp words and feel his father’s bruising grip on his arm, every time they thought he needed a lecture. He nods.
Why is Bruce asking him that?
“Okay. Did they ever physically harm you?”
Sometimes, when he looks in the mirror, he thinks he can still see the red imprint of his mother’s hand and every time he showers, he pretends not to notice the scar on his hip from when his father pushed him into the glass table. Again, he nods as the tears he’s been fighting so hard run down his face.
“Oh, honey,” Bruce mumbles, and suddenly he’s pulled into a hug, his head cradled against Bruce’s chest and still, he doesn’t understand. “I’m so sorry you had to go through this. You never deserved any of this. We’ll figure this out together, okay? I won’t let them hurt you ever again.”
He shakes his head, even as he clings to Bruce.
“But the lamp…”
Bruce’s hold tightens and Tim never wants him to let go.
“You could break every single lamp in this house and it still wouldn’t mean you deserve to be punished. No child deserves to be punished. No child deserves to be hurt.”
Sobs rip out of him, and he hears the words Bruce is saying to him, but if he’s right, if what he says is true, then Tim’s whole life has been a lie. He almost wants to tell him that Tim isn’t a child, that it doesn’t apply to him, but the words get stuck in his throat as he cries so hard that he can barely breathe.
Bruce allows him to cry and simply holds him close as he rubs a hand up and down his back. The words he whispers into his hair get lost between Tim’s sobs, but it’s alright. It will all be alright. Maybe one day, Tim can actually believe him.
Slowly, the tears stop and Tim feels exhausted but weirdly floaty. A headache has replaced the ache in his chest, and he lets out a muffled sound of protest, as Bruce moves back.
“Not going anywhere, bud. I’m just getting you a glass of water. We don’t want you to become dehydrated.”
Tim drowns the glass in a few gulps and hands it back to Bruce with a small “thanks”. He puts it aside and reaches up to cup Tim’s face, cleaning away the tear tracks with the sleeve of his sweater.
“Feeling a bit better?”
Tim hesitates a moment, taking stock of himself, before he nods. A low level of anxiety is still thrumming through his veins, but the crushing weight of panic is gone. He feels almost light.
“We’ll talk about this some other time, when you feel a bit better, okay? For now, I just want you to know; you are not in trouble. I’m not mad at you. You did nothing wrong and I love you, okay? Everything will be alright, I promise.”
All Tim can do is stare. He knows he should say something, but his tongue seems to be stuck to the top of his mouth, so he simply throws himself forward, trusting that Bruce will catch him. Warmth envelops him and he presses himself closer, as more tears run down his face. He doesn’t think he’s ever cried that much before.
“Oh, honey,” Bruce mumbles.
A kiss lands on top of his head and Tim shudders. It’s what finally snaps him out of his stupor and he blurts out: “Can we watch a movie?”
A startled laugh rumbles through Bruce’s chest, but it sounds nothing like his father’s. Instead of cruel and mean, Bruce’s laugh is filled with warmth and love.
“Of course, Tim. We can watch movies all night long, if you want to.”
Tim feels a pang of guilt about patrol, but he’s also selfish. For once, he doesn’t want to have to share Bruce with Gotham. He steps out of the embrace and discreetly wipes his eyes. Bruce doesn’t mention it and instead turns to take out two mugs from the cupboard.
“How do you feel about hot chocolate and cookies?”
A small smile tugs on Tim’s lips and his insides turn all warm and fuzzy.
“Sounds good.”
His voice is still a bit scratchy and his throat hurts from crying, but it’s easy to ignore as he watches Bruce prepare the hot chocolates and rummage through the shelves for cookies.
“Snickerdoodles okay?” Bruce asks, as if he doesn’t know they are Tim’s favourite.
Tim offers to carry the plate of cookies, but Bruce is having none of it, and Tim reminds him with an eyeroll that he didn’t lose his arms and he’s had worse before. Bruce pretends he can’t hear him, as he balances the plate on top of their mugs and carries them out of the kitchen. They make their way upstairs to the family den and Tim has almost managed to forget how tired he is. Exhaustion comes rushing back as soon as he slumps down on the sofa and he blinks sleepily up at Bruce when he hands him his mug.
A soft blanket gets draped over Tim’s shoulders and a moment later he’s pulled to Bruce’s side. He shuffles a bit until he’s comfortably squashed against him, accepting the cookie Bruce hands him.
“What do you want to watch?”
Tim shrugs, taking another sip from his hot chocolate. The flavour is rich and sweet, and Tim thinks there’s a hint of cinnamon and something christmasy he can’t quite place.
“Something nice.”
Bruce squeezes him closer.
“I think we can do that.”