Chapter Text
Dick came to see him later that night, in the dorm of Gotham Academy he was staying in "just on a trial basis, Timothy, just while we're out of the country". He'd wrapped Tim up in a tight hug before the door had even closed, locking his arms around him so hard Tim left the floor.
He explained that Jason's mom was sick, that she'd taken something, something that she'd had for a while and not used, and that it was too late for Uncle Clark to help.
"But, you really helped Jason." Dick said, running his hand up and down Tim's back. "If he'd had to do that alone...I'm so glad you were there, Tim."
Tim had a lot of questions. How sick was Jason's mom? What had she taken? Was Batman going after the people who gave her it? Was Robin? Did Jason know about Dick being Robin now? Had Jason seen the Batcave? Had Jason seen the Batmobile? Had Jason driven the Batmobile?
Instead he asked the one that had been running through his mind for hours. "Is Jason ok?"
Dick smiled sadly at him. "No. But, he will be. Eventually. It'll just take time, baby bird."
"Can I see him?" Jason had Dick, who was the absolute best person anyone could have for an emergency. But, Tim was still Jason's brother too. Maybe he might need Tim as well.
Dick hugged Tim close. "How about you come round this weekend?"
Tim nodded, then thought for a moment. "Is Jason going to live with you now?"
Dick nodded. "Yeah, B's already filled in the paperwork, he'll be staying with us for now."
Tim just nodded and leaned into Dick, tapping down the ugly thing that slipped round his ribs at the thought of Jason and Dick.
Dick and Jason weren't at school the next day. Or the day after that. When Mr Pennyworth picked Tim up outside his dorm the following morning, he felt like he was going to vibrate out of his skin the whole way to Wayne Manor. They parked the sleek black car in an enormous garage, filled with expensive looking cars. Tim tired so hard not to gawk as he followed Mr Pennyworth, but there were some incredibly cool cars there. He briefly wondered where the Batmobile was. Did it have its own special garage in the Batcave?
Dick, Jason and Mr Wayne were in the family room, Jason pressed against Mr Wayne under a thick blanket while Dick sat on the armchair, narrating his thoughts on the game he was playing. When Tim entered, Dick tossed the controller to the side, darting forward to wrap Tim up in a tight hug.
"Hey, baby bird, thanks so much for coming." He said, squeezing Tim tightly. Tim wrapped his arms round Dick and hugged back as tight as he could.
When Dick finally let him go, Tim could see Jason watching them with red rimmed eyes. He was absolutely swamped by an oversized sweatshirt; he'd rolled the sleeves up several times just so his boney hands could poke out to grip the blanket. He looked so small pressed up against Mr Wayne's massive frame.
"Hi." was all Tim could think so say.
Jason sniffed. "Hey."
"I'm really sorry about your mom." Tim said. That was something he'd heard his mom say, so that seemed like the right thing to tell Jason. It didn't make Jason look any less sad, but he didn't start crying and didn't tell Tim off. He just nodded slightly.
"Well, I was just finishing my game." Dick chimed in, completely changing the subject. "How about we play something all together?"
Mr Wayne nodded, smiling at Dick. "That sounds great, chum."
Jason just shrugged. "Sure, whatever."
They played Mario Cart for a while. Tim tried really hard to let Jason win, but he was absolutely terrible at it. After the fourth time he came last, Dick suggested they play something else. So instead, Tim helped Jason move his character round the Stardew farm he and Dick had started months ago. Jason wasn't very good at that either, he was slow and sluggish and didn't seem to know where the buttons were, but Tim tried really hard to be patient with him.
After about an hour, Mr Pennyworth called them through for lunch. Jason didn't want to talk much at lunch, instead poking at his food, being super careful not to get any soup on the massive sweatshirt. So instead Tim filled the silence by chatting away to Dick about school and staying in the dorm and what he was going to do with his parents when they got back.
Tim wondered if Dick and Mr Wayne discussed Batman business in front of Jason, now that Jason likely knew, or if they kept quiet. They probably didn't say anything; they probably didn't want Jason to know too much, since he wasn't Robin and wasn't a gymnast like Dick, and wasn't trained in anything like that.
Dick nodded along, occasionally shooting glances at Jason, who was glaring at his soup. After lunch, Mr Wayne suggested they watch a movie.
"The Little Mermaid." Jason pipped up from his ball of blanket on one sofa, interrupting Tim and Dick as they squabbled over the remote.
"What was that, little wing?" Dick asked, hand still pressed gently against Tim's chest to stop him grabbing the remote.
Jason burrowed deeper into his blanket ball, pressed against Mr Wayne's side again. "The Little Mermaid." He repeated. "I wanna watch that one."
Dick threw his hands up in delight. "The Little Mermaid it is!" He whooped with glee, then grabbed Tim round the middle, flinging him onto the other sofa and tossing the remote to Mr Wayne. Tim squealed with delight as Dick threw himself down on the sofa too, wiggling around before grabbing Tim and pulling him into a hug.
They got twenty minutes in before Jason started crying.
He wasn't doing it loudly, there wasn't great heaving sobs. He was just watching Ariel singing with tears running silently down his face. Tim noticed at the same time Dick did.
"Hey, Jay, we can turn it off?" Dick said softly, limbs still wrapped octopus style round Tim. "We can put on something else."
Jason shook his head frantically. Mr Wayne ran a massive hand down his arm soothingly.
"It's ok, chum," he started. "We can-"
"I want to help!" Jason shouted at Mr Wayne, voice thick with tears. "I can help!"
Something flashed over Mr Wayne's face, too quick for Tim to process. "Jay, we can talk about this later, I know you're feeling like-"
"No!" Jason shouted, fists clenched tight in the blanket as more tears started to flow. "I want to help! I- I'm going to do it anyway! I'm going to..." he broke off with a sob, burying his hands in his face as he wailed.
Quick as a flash, Mr Wayne scooped him up, pressing Jason's small frame against his colossal chest. Jason gripped the front of his sweater tightly as he sobbed into it, his shoulders shaking as he soaked the soft fabric. Mr Wayne just held him tighter, running his hand up and down his back. "It's ok, chum, I'm right here."
Mr Wayne shared a look with Dick, who just nodded and paused the TV as Mr Wayne stood up, still holding Jason against him. "We'll be back in a bit, boys." He said, before moving to the door.
Tim could hear Jason's wails down the corridor. "Is Jason ok?" He asked Dick, who had released him from the octopus hold and was now fiddling with the remote.
Dick sighed deeply. "No, not right now, baby bird. He will be. He just needs...just- give him some time, alright?" He said, looking at Tim sadly. When Tim just nodded in reply, Dick's face broke into a soft smile. "How about we play something until Jay gets back, alright?"
"Ok!" Tim cried, reaching eagerly for the remote.
By the time Jason came back, two hours later, he had calmed down a lot. His face was tear-streaked, and his eyes were red rimmed, but he seemed much more calm. He even looked slightly... determined. He watched Dick and Tim play games, and joined in for a while. After dinner, when Tim had to leave so Mr Pennyworth could drop him back at school before curfew (because you had to get permission from the school and your parents to be out after that, and Tim had definitely not asked the school and had maybe accidentally-deliberately forgotten to ask his parents), Jason has hugged him tightly. Not as tight as Dick, but it still left him feeling warm.
Jason's mom's funeral was a few weeks later.
Jason had only just started back at school, where he's been stuck on Tim like glue. Despite Mr Wayne's best efforts, word still got out about Jason living with Mr Wayne. Meaning he'd had to walk past reporters everyday to go to school. Dick had walked with him everyday, one arm around Jason's shoulders, the other making rude gestures at all the cameras. Tim really hoped that made Jason feel better. He had Robin walking him into school!
Tim's parents arrived back from their trip very early that morning. They'd picked him up from school, wrapped him up in a tight hug, then driven straight to the cemetery. His mom even sat in the back with him so she could hear all about how staying at school had been.
It was really sunny, which was slightly strange to Tim. He was sure funerals were meant to happen when it was raining. That was always what they showed on TV. But as they parked the car and walked through the cemetery gates towards the small group of people, the sun beat down overhead, dodging even the Gotham gloom. Jason stood with Dick, Mr Wayne and Mr Pennyworth. As Tim drew nearer he could make out Dick's uncle Clark and aunt Diana standing with them. Tim stamped down on the buzz of excitement at seeing them: it was probably not appropriate to stare at Superman and Wonder Woman at a funeral. Standing with them was a priest, dressed all in black, and a handful of other people who were all eyeing Mr Wayne warily. Tim didn't recognise any of them, and he doubted they were also secretly superheroes. They looked very ordinary, and when they spoke all of them had thick Alley accents like Jason.
Dick, Jason and Mr Wayne looked up as he approached. Mr Wayne gave him a small smile and exchanged pleasantries with his parents. Dick gave him a much bigger smile and a "hey baby bird". Jason just gave a small wave before looking back down at the headstone.
Jason's parents were buried together, just like Dick's were. Mr Wayne had pulled a lot of strings to get Jason's dad's body out of the prison graveyard, according to Dick. But Jason had asked him to. And Batman could definitely do that.
The funeral wasn't that long. The priest said some stuff about God, one of the women Tim didn't recognise said some stuff about Jason's mom, about what she was like. Then Jason spoke. He pulled a small, battered book out of his pocket, looked round hesitantly, then started reading, his voice cutting loudly through the warm air.
"You pierce my soul." He began. "I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are...are gone forever." Jason paused, sucking in a breath before continuing. "I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an... an earlier death. I have loved none but you..." He paused, screwing his eyes shut for a moment before continuing, voice thick. "For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes?" Tim could absolutely be wrong, but he was almost sure Jason was talking to Mr Wayne. "Too good, too excellent creature. You do us justice, indeed."
Jason closed the book quietly, staring down at it for a moment with glassy, unseeing eyes. Then he blinked slowly, holding the worn book against himself as the tears rolled down his face. "I love you, mom." he whispered into the bright sunshine.
Tim's mom was quiet all the way back to the car. Once inside, she sat staring off into the distance, back to where they'd been standing.
"Well, that's that done." Tim's dad said with a sigh. "How about we head back to the house. We can all get unpacked and then we can see about dinner. Sound good?"
"Yeah, sounds good." Tim nodded in agreement, half listening, mostly watching Dick and Jason standing with Mr Wayne over by their sleek black town car. He couldn't hear what they were saying, but Dick had an arm wrapped tight around Jason.
"Janet?" Tim's dad said. "Did you hear me?"
"Hmm." Tim's mom just hummed distantly in response, eyes fixed on Mr Wayne and the two boys.
"Jan?" Tim's dad huffed. "Janet?"
"Hrmm?" Tim's mom startled, looking back round at his dad. "Oh, sorry. What did you say?"
"What's got you?" Tim's dad asked with mild exasperation.
Tim's mom shot him a look, then glanced back over to the cemetery they'd just left. "Just...that poor woman. And now he's..." She trailed off, then turned suddenly to look at Tim, hand darting out to grab his.
"Yes, let's go home, darling. I want to hear all about what you've been up to when we were away!"
~
It turned out having two brothers was a lot like having one, except there was a whole other person to do things with. There was an extra person to play video games with, an extra person to steal snacks from during a movie, and another really, really fast person to help him win football games against Dick with. And having Jason in most of his classes was surprisingly nice, even if they were talking about moving him back up a grade now that he's caught up. So it was really fun having another brother.
Except, Jason got to live with Dick. And that was becoming really obvious.
It started small, little references and jokes about things they'd done the night before. Little quips back and forward. Never anything mean, just small, inconsequential reminders that Jason got Dick in a way Tim didn't.
It built and built until Tim thought he was going to scream. Every little inside joke, every little call back had him wanting to punch a wall and also probably some faces.
When Dick suddenly said "What excellent boiled potatoes!" during lunch, and Jason laughed for a solid five minutes.
When Dick shot Jason off the road with a shell and he responded with "Holly effing shirt balls, Dirk!" and Dick snort-laughed so hard he dropped the controller.
And he couldn't even say anything, because it absolutely wasn't on purpose! He did plenty of things with them both. They never left him out. Dick still picked him up and gave him the best hugs ever and played games with him and kept teaching him gymnastics. Jason still followed him around at school and asked for his help with computer games and watched all the movies he liked.
It was just... different. Tim tried really, really hard to ignore the slithering, slimy thing that coiled round his chest and through his gut at the thought of it. Tried to keep it contained, keep it locked up, stop it from ever getting out.
And one day, at the start of the summer, he couldn't stop it escaping.
He'd finally gotten a phone as an early birthday present from his parents, along with a laptop that "was absolutely only for school work, Timothy" that he'd already had fun modding. He was showing Dick a cool new game he'd started playing, and Dick had got his phone out to show him something.
And Tim had seen his lock screen.
"When was that?" He asked, cutting Dick off.
Dick paused, blinking at him innocently. "When was what, baby bird?"
"That." Tim repeated, jabbing a finger at Dick's phone. At the photo on his lock screen. At the photo of a smiling Dick and Jason, both wearing ski goggles in front of a snowy background, that sat taunting him on the screen.
Dick hesitated, eyes darting down to the device. "It was...we went two weeks ago." he said, his tone light. Across on the over sofa, Tim could see Jason's head shoot up from his book.
Tim could feel the anger build in him, feel his face start to flush. "You went skiing without me."
The sides of Dick's mouth twitched up very slightly. "You were away with your parents, remember?" he said, completely casually and even, like this was a completely normal response. "Jason needed to get away from here for a bit. He's never been skiing, so I booked us last minute tickets." He shrugged. "You were in France, or we would have asked your parents if you could go too, baby bird."
The ugly, slimy thing finally slipped out, wriggling up his spine, causing white hot blinding anger to course through his veins.
"You went without me!" he said, and he was shouting now, he could hear it, but he couldn't seem to stop. "You're always doing things without me!"
Dick blinked up at him, hands coming up in a placating gesture. "Tim, no. That's not-"
"Yes, you are!" Tim wasn't entirely sure when he'd gotten up, but he stood facing Dick with clenched fists. "Do you even still want me around anymore?"
"Of course I do!" Dick was up now too, springing off the sofa, hands out towards Tim. "Why would you ever think I don't?"
"Because you have him now!" Tim yelled, gesturing towards Jason, who was sitting hunched up in a ball on the armchair, still gripping his book tightly as he looked frantically between them. "So you don't need me!"
"Of course I need you!" Dick looked at him incredulously. "You're my brother, of course I do."
"But you prefer him!" Tim pointed to Jason again, who seemed frozen. "Admit it, you'd rather do stuff without me!"
"No! I wouldn't!" Dick was yelling now too, eyebrows tugged down in anger. "Why are you even saying that?"
"You do all that stuff without me! You went skiing."
Dick huffed in exasperation. "We've been skiing!"
Tim shook his head. He wasn't getting it. "An- and you watch all those movies with him!"
"I watch movies with you!" Dick gestured to the TV as if to prove his point.
Tim shook his head again. He could feel tears starting to build in his eyes and was absolutely not going to let them out. "And lately all you've done is hang out with him!"
"Because his mom fucking died!" Dick roared at him, his voice twisted in anger, hands clenched into fists. Tim took a step back. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Jason flinch. "His mom died, and he's alone, and I've been trying to actually be there! Can you imagine if he'd had no one!" Dick paused, taking a deep breath and running his hands through his hair. "Can you not see that? What's going on, Tim? Why are you angry about it?" He asked in a much softer, more Dick-like voice.
"Because he gets to have... he gets to have you." Tim voice sound small and pathetic to his ears. It must have sounded that way to Dick too, because he looked at him with a small, pitying smile.
"So do you." Dick sighed. "I'm not abandoning you just because Jay needs me too. Please see that, Tim. I still love you, I still want you around."
He could feel the tears threatening to fall. The horrid, slimy thing slipped back beneath his ribs, leaving a trail of shame and humiliation in its wake. He glanced over to the armchair, where Jason was sitting in a frozen ball, face white and eyes darting between him and Dick.
Suddenly this day wasn't fun anymore.
"I want to go home now."
Dick winced. "Tim, it's ok. How about we go outside for a walk? And then we can always play a game together, something all if us will like."
Tim shook his head frantically. "I want to go home."
Dick stood frozen, watching him for a moment, before nodding very slowly. "Ok. Ok, if you're definitely sure, baby bird. But you really don't have to go." He said softly.
Tim shook his head again. He wanted to go. He wanted to go back home and hide under his bed and pretend this whole horrid thing hadn't happened, that he hadn't completely embarrassed himself in front of Dick. That he hadn't been such an idiot and let everyone know how stupid he was. That Dick hadn't yelled at him. That he hadn't scared Jason. That he made Jason think he didn't like him.
Dick just sighed again. "Ok. I'll get Alfie."
When Tim got back, his parents were still out. He let himself in with the new house key they'd given him for his birthday, dumped his bag, rushed straight under his bed, and howled into his favourite plushie.
By the time his parents got back a few hours later, the stuffed goose was soaked, his face had been cleaned of any traces of tears, and he felt horrible. He felt like he'd been scooped out, like he was hollow. And he was absolutely, completely miserable.
He wrecked it. He should never have opened his mouth, never let the slimy thing escape. He was pretty sure Dick didn't hate him. Because he was Dick, he probably didn't hate anyone. But...
Jason might not like him for a while. He hadn't looked happy. Even though Jason got Dick all the time now...
Tim really hoped he hadn't wrecked it.
Tim's parents asked how his day was, and he lied and said he had a lot of fun, and that Mr Pennyworth brought him back earlier because he was tired, and Tim's dad made a joke about it. And all he could think about was how he desperately hoped Dick didn't hate him now.
Even if he did, he still texted Tim to say goodnight, and that he hoped he was ok, and that they were going to the zoo next week, if could come. And Jason sent him a funny video of a cat, so even if he did hate him, he was still talking to him.
Tim tried to get through the next week without thinking about Dick and Jason, and all the fun things they were doing, and how stupid and annoying he'd been. He tried to focus on other stuff, like playing with his laptop, and doing stuff with his parents, and working out how to encrypt files on his computer so he could make his BatNotes digital. He tried not to think of his brothers.
Which was proving pretty easy.
Because he was sure he was being followed.