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Ric’s never seen the guy flirting with Bea before, yet there was something about him that was catching his eye. It wasn’t the too tight pair of jeans and the red muscle shirt combo, hugging both his ass and his muscles–well, not entirely. But, there was something about him, something that made Ric want to keep looking at him.
And so he does even when the redheaded stranger finishes grabbing his drink and offering Bea a tenner. He half-turns away from the bar, eyes glancing around as if looking for something until their eyes meet. His eyes are hard to see from a distance and in the low lighting of the bar (it’s one of the many reasons why Ric chooses to hang out here–sometimes, bright lights make his head hurt), but there’s no mistaking the slow smile that starts to spread on his face. For some reason, the sight of that smile makes irritation build up in the back of his neck even as something low in his belly shivers. Ric narrows his eyes back, and the smile starts to turn a little smug, and, suddenly, Ric has a suspicion as to who this guy is. Or rather, what he is.
Ric walks up to him, sure that the stranger’s one of those people. People like Barbara or Mr. Pennyworth, searching in his eyes for something, someone, who’s dead. The stranger just keeps looking at him, even when Ric’s right in front of him, still smiling in that irritating yet somehow attractive smug way. They stand there in silence, staring at each other, until Ric breaks the connection by sitting down in the seat next to him with a roll of his eyes.
“Want to introduce yourself?” Ric asks, setting his half-drunken Pilsner on the countertop. There’s no need to be rude unless he’s given a reason to be rude. (He might have gotten shot in the head and lost at least two decades’ worth of memories, but even Ric can admit to himself that the people in Dick’s life had lost him. As long as they can see that too the first time he says it, he doesn’t need to be mean about it.).
“Roy,” the other man offers, but he remains lounging against the bar instead of sitting down. Indicates that he’s not trying to stay long, maybe? “Roy Harper.”
He’d only been introduced to a small amount of people during his time in the hospital–Mr. Wayne, Mr. Pennyworth, Barbara, and Damian. He had been told there were a few other members of the family he’d been adopted into, but they hadn’t told him many details, just a few first names–Jason, Tim, Cass. A Roy had never been mentioned.
“You aren’t another kid taken in by Mr. Wayne, are you?” Ric’s almost startled by the loud laughter that wracks Roy’s body before the question fully leaves his lips. His head bowed, shoulders shaking–it’s a wonder that his drink didn’t spill. He’s just a man laughing, and yet somehow Ric feels entranced. He’s probably staring a little too much and it has to be weird, just watching Roy laugh, but if Roy noticed, it didn’t show even as his laughter started to slow down.
Yet, he’s still snorting a little even as he raises his head to say, “Man, you do not know how ridiculous that question is. No way in hell would I ever be one of Bruce Wayne’s kids. Shit, I can’t even imagine.”
“But you know him.” Ric’s not talking about Mr. Wayne.
“I know about him, yeah, and all about you.” Ric’s about to roll his eyes again and give him the same warning he’s told Barbara and Mr. Pennyworth, but he catches sight of Roy’s green eyes, and something in them stops him from saying anything. Yet. “I know everything about you, Grayson.”
“Yeah?” Ric says, challenge clear in that one syllable word, trying to see if Roy’s expression will turn just like Mr. Wayne’s, Mr. Pennyworth’s, and Barbara’s. Like they’re begging for some glimpse of recognition, like they’re looking for someone else in Ric’s head.
“Yeah,” Roy says, eyes solemn even as his lips quirk into a little smile, like he’s almost amused by all of this. “You ran away from the people who said they loved you not because you didn’t know them or didn’t care about them but because you were scared of disappointing them. It hurt you to hurt them every time you didn’t–couldn’t–remember them, and so you thought it would be better for them if you pushed them away. Better for everyone if you isolated yourself so they could mourn for the guy you’re pretty sure they completely lost. Sound about right?”
Even though he’s wearing a t-shirt, Ric somehow feels hot under the collar, heat rising up to his head. None of that were things he’s admitted, even to himself, and yet somehow it felt like Roy was able to pluck his thoughts directly out of his head. Roy tilts his head a little, showing a long line of neck, even as his little quirk of a smile turns as smug as his earlier smile, and with that reaction, Ric knows that Roy knows he got it in one.
He feels seen, and it causes him to recoil–breaking eye contact again to down the rest of his Pilsner. Ric makes desperate eye contact to Bea, who’s been polishing the same glass while near enough to listen in. (Bea’s a good friend and has been around every single time Barbara and Mr. Pennyworth blow into town to try to get him to come to Gotham, to try to remember them, everything, and more. She knows better than anyone else in New York about his present–about his memories, about his adopted family.). Bea stops eroding the glass away as she strides closer.
“You want the same or do you want something else?” Bea asks, and she must have heard Roy’s whole speech because she’s not bothering him about his mile long tab before giving him another drink.
Ric’s about to order another Pilsner when Roy cuts in. “You try a Stout yet?” Ric glances back at Roy, eyes narrowed, to which Roy replies with a careless shrug. Which, for some reason, brings Ric’s attention to one of Roy’s arms. It didn’t look any different from the other arm, but somehow that seemed… wrong. He looks back up at Roy to see a considering expression on the other man’s face. It slips away as he says, “You never really drank much, but the few times over the years I’ve seen you drank a beer, you tended to go for the darker stuff.”
Ric turns away from Roy to politely say to Bea, “a Pilsner is fine”, before he turns back around to glare at Roy. “Listen, whatever it is that you might know about my motivations, I’m not Dick Grayson any more. Anything you knew about him before, I don’t care about it now. I’m sorry you lost a friend or whoever he was to you, but the doctors say that I’m never gonna remember. So, I can figure out my own beer preferences, thanks.”
Roy raises both hands, finally letting go of his glass (and, looking at it closer, it seems to be some type of soda?), his expression the perfect picture of apologetic. (Somehow, Ric doesn’t think it’s that truthful.). “Hey, listen, it’s no skin off my back if you want to take my suggestion or not. Just thought there’s no point in looking when someone already knows.”
“There is a point,” Ric argues back, leaning against his seat and staring up at the water-damaged ceiling. Without hesitation, words that he normally would have kept to himself come tumbling out. “I can’t ever go back to the person who I was before I got shot, even if I got all of my memories back yesterday. Trying to cheat code my way into being a real person, using people’s knowledge about Dick Grayson–that person that everyone remembers is dead. Whether or not it’s about my favourite type of beer or my favourite food–it doesn’t matter. I can’t ever be the same again.”
He chances a look at Roy to see shock in the slight angle of his jaw but also deep pride in his eyes. Somehow, seeing that–it felt worse than the feeling of being seen, and so Ric quickly looked back up at the ceiling. Ric isn’t entirely sure where those words came from, and for that matter, why he felt the need to share it with Roy. He hadn’t even shared as much with Barbara, even though he was told that they used to be together. Why was he so honest–no, rather, so open, with Roy?
Bea replaces his old glass of Pilsner with a new one, and Ric drinks about half of the cup in one go. He looks back at Roy when he chuckles, head shaking a bit with what looks to be a genuine contrite look on his face.
“That’s me told,” Roy says with an easy smile, before he leans in to clasp Ric’s shoulder. It was a friendly gesture, and one that Ric had grown uncomfortable with from people from Dick’s past, but somehow from Roy, it didn’t seem to bother him. “Hey, as an apology, how about we play a friendly game of darts? Whoever loses has to tell the other a secret.”
There’s something in his instincts that’s screaming at him that it’s a trap, but there’s no real reason that Ric could think of to refuse. In one smooth motion, Ric picks up his Pilsner and makes his way to the dartboard. “You’re on.”
The dartboard was old, but the numbers and the colours were still visible. Ric often hustled newbies to the bar here and at the pool table–somehow, Ric could hit any target or shoot any shot he wants–but he had a feeling that Roy wouldn’t be like those strangers. He was a superhero, wasn’t he? Since he knew Mr. Wayne’s big secret. It wasn’t improbable to guess that if Ric could be able to aim everything perfectly that Roy would be able to too.
(Yet, somehow Ric still felt like he was walking into a bear trap whose hinges were about to clamp down on his leg.)
Luckily for the two of them, the dartboard was free, and so Ric is able to grab the darts without any issues.
“How do you wanna play it?” Ric asks as he hears Roy step up behind him. (One of the craziest skills he's realised he has is how he always has an ear out. He can hear the smallest brush of shoes on concrete, the faintest whisper of cloth. He would have thought he had superpowers if Mr. Pennyworth hadn't told him otherwise).
Roy tilts his head as he considers the hanging lamp above their head. Ric isn’t sure if Roy is just tall enough or if the lamp was just short enough, but Roy reached up overhead to push it just enough that it started to swing from side to side. “We both get three tries, one after another, and whoever can manage to land a bull’s eye first wins. What do you think?”
Honestly, Ric isn't feeling too confident. He’s managed to do some rather incredible things without knowing that he could, but he wasn’t sure that included these sort of trickshots with a dart and a dartboard. (Somehow, he felt like he could do something like this perfectly with a different projectile.) Yet, he could tell that Roy was feeling completely comfortable with the idea. Not only that, there was a hint of challenge in Roy's expression–like, he doesn't think Ric could do it, even if he tried.
It made something competitive in him flare up. (Huh. He doesn’t think he's ever felt that before. He's been a lot more easygoing before this.)
“You're on,” Ric returns with a grin, holding three darts to Roy for him to take. Roy reaches out to take the darts from his hands, and, for some reason, Ric feels a pang of disappointment that the exchange happened without the two of them brushing hands. (What the hell?).
“I’ll go first,” Roy says with a confident grin on his lips, “to give you a bit of a handicap.”
Before Ric could say that he doesn’t need a handicap (even if he probably needs one), Roy confidently and quickly tosses the dart up at the lamp (Ric notices that he doesn’t hit the lightbulb itself, just the inside of the lampshade). The dart lands in the top black space for the 20, not completely off, but definitely not the bull’s eye either. (Ric has to ignore the feeling of unease that slowly starting to rise. Why did he think that Roy was going to hit the bull’s eye first try?)
“Oof, bad luck,” Roy says, snapping his finger like he’s being watched by several cameras and they were characters in a sitcom. Roy grins at him, eyes bright, and Ric can’t help but grin back.
“Not so good at aiming, are you?” Ric taunts, even though it feels wrong to say.
“Guess not,” Roy says easily, but there’s an undercurrent of laughter there. Like he’s sharing a secret in a way that only he would know. “Your turn, Grayson. You can talk shit, but can you actually hit?”
Ric nudges Roy’s shoulder with a roll of his eyes before he aims a different spot inside of the lampshade. His dart bounces off and onto the dartboard, dangerously close to the bull’s eye in the inner white of 16.
“Still missed,” Roy taunts back, to which Ric replies back, “Still closer than you.”
They’re still ribbing each other even as Roy lines up his second shot. Without any hesitation, Roy hits a different spot inside of the lampshade (just a sliver off to the side of the spot Ric just hit, he realises) and Roy’s dart ends up right next to his own, just a little bit closer to the bull’s eye.
“Damn, so close,” Roy complains, but despite that, there’s still a hint of a challenge in Roy’s eyes. Except, it wasn’t about the dartboard, was it? There’s a part of Ric that’s annoyed, and there’s a part of Ric that feels exhilarated by the challenge. Do you get the game that I’m playing? Roy seemed to ask.
Ric doesn’t rise to the bait this time, instead he looks at the three spots that have been hit so far, all three of them just shy of each other. It’s likely that Roy has known the spot to hit the bull’s eyes all along, despite the fact that the lamp is still swinging back and forth. He tries to calculate it, but he has to admit that it’s more of instinct that has him choose where he aims for next. Even as he releases the dart, Ric realises he’s has to be just the tiniest bit off, and his prediction is accurate–he hits the green in the middle, but not the bull’s eye.
Roy claps his shoulder. “Good try,” he says, and it sounds like he means it, despite the fact that Ric failed to succeed at his hidden challenge. It’s without looking that Roy sends his third and final dart into the lamp where it ricochets perfectly in the middle of the bull’s eye. “But not good enough.”
It’s abnormal, but Ric almost wants to laugh. The jaws of the bear trap have snapped onto his leg, but it doesn’t feel like bleeding, he doesn’t feel hurt. He just feels like he's been made to stay still without feeling trapped for the first time ever since he woke up in that hospital bed. He catches Roy’s eye and, in the next moment, they’re both laughing, shaking their shoulders with their heads bowed down close to each other. After a minute, they stop laughing and just look at each other, probably smiling like idiots. Somehow, even though Ric remembers nothing about Roy, it feels like they two of them are just continuing on. He doesn’t even see Roy trying to search for Dick in his eyes.
The way that Roy regards him is so different from the way Mr. Wayne and the others used to stare at him. (Hope and frustration. Agony. Why aren't you better? Why aren't you healing? Why aren't you him?). There's no undercurrent of disappointment, no searching gaze as they lock eyes. They could be two friends just meeting up after a decade for how Roy looks at him, except for the love there.
He can't help it, Ric has to blurt out, has to ask, “What were you to him?”
(In a way, there's something sad there. Were. Him. Whatever Roy was, did it really matter anymore?)
There's a knowing look in Roy’s eyes and, for the first time since they started talking, he looks a little sad. Ric isn't sure how he knows that, considering Roy still has a smile on his face, but he does. He tilts his head, and the sadness Ric sees hides behind amusement as he says, “I'm pretty sure you're the one who lost and owes me a secret. But, ah, I guess it was pretty bad form to hustle an amnesiac, so how about you tell me your secret first, and then I'll answer your question?”
He had forgotten what had been the terms of the bet. Ric almost wants to scowl and demand the bet forfeit, but Ric’s not a hypocrite–he’s been hustling strangers for weeks now in order to get some cash. He can't complain if the tables are turned onto him, especially if it wasn't for money.
Ric works at his lower lip for a moment, unsure of what secret to say. Sure, he could talk about what he ate for breakfast (eggs that he filched from a couple who was on holiday), or maybe that he's living in his cab and when he isn't, he's breaking into homes to sleep, but somehow he thinks Roy knows about all of this already. Barbara certainly did, and he wouldn't be surprised if that information got its way around.
“I keep having these nightmares,” he finally says. Mr. Pennyworth might have seen one of them, but for some reason, unlike with Barbara, he doesn’t think Mr. Pennyworth would have talked to Roy about the information he’s gleaned from his visits. Mr. Wayne, definitely, but not Roy. “Bad ones. The kinds where I wake up screaming and fighting, no matter where I am and no matter who I’m with.”
There’s been a couple of times where he’s almost punched Tiny, Steve, Bea, or Jeff. One time he actually did punch a stranger who shook his shoulder to make sure he was okay and not too drunk, but Ric came up swinging.
“I say I don’t remember them, but that’s a lie,” Ric says quietly, unable to look at Roy. Even awake, he can taste the water-soaked panic in the back of his mouth, he can feel the chains wrapped around him and tying him down, he can see the ruins of a destroyed city (and feel the heavy weight of guilt and shame) all around him. Somehow, he can still feel himself cradling a body that used to run warm while it turned cold, a hole in the middle of a galaxy, blue eyes filled with tears that he somehow can’t bring himself to wipe away. His body, his head might have ached, but his heart hurt more–like it was ripped in two. Like he was ripped in two. “I just. How could you? How could you live through all of that pain and just keep going? He hurt so much that I can’t believe that he never gave up.”
Does that make him a coward? That he doesn’t want to return to that? All of the pain, all of that loss. Even as he is now, he still remembers the snap of the rope, can see the blood pooling beneath his parents’ bodies. Isn’t that enough? Shouldn’t that be pain enough that he no longer has to carry his pain too?
A hand falls on his shoulder, and Ric glances to look at Roy. He looks sad, except that doesn’t feel like a strong enough word. World weary, perhaps, like everything on his shoulders had suddenly pressed down on him. He’s staring at Ric like he’s just confirmed all of his worst fears, and somehow, standing in the middle of Prodigal Bar, it feels like it’s just the two of them there, alone in the world together.
“You asked me what I was to Dick,” Roy says, just as quiet as Ric had been. A conversation only for the two of them to hear, a moment only for the two of them to share. “I’ve known Dick since we were thirteen years old, but I’d heard of him for longer and this image of him got all built up in my head. He’d been the first kid out there, fighting mobsters and bad guys alike. But, the first time I met him, I thought he was a serious nerd. He would always be professional, trying to keep the rest of us on track, and because of that, he was the most annoying guy in the world to me. But, as I got to know him, he slowly grew into someone I admired. Even though we were the same age, he had ideas, strategies, and skills that I couldn’t have imagined up. Ideas that saved us in a situations we would have never gotten out of alive without him.”
Ric would normally interrupt someone exalting all about Dick Grayson, especially since Roy isn’t exactly answering Ric’s question, but there’s a promise in Roy’s eyes that keeps Ric quiet. It’ll make sense, he seems to say. The build up’s important.
“I could never get tired of seeing him move–whether it was to flip or to fight. He moved like liquid gold, like gravity could never bring him down.” Roy’s voice is fond, as if replaying back memories in his head. “Before long, he became one of my best friends. I asked him to help me get my daughter, just the two of us. He was one of the kindest guys I’d ever met. Even if it would hurt him, even if it would cost him everything, he was always willing to help anyone and everyone.” He laughs a little before he says, voice still fond, “But, he could also be such a major asshole.”
Ric had to admit, he wasn’t expecting that. Everyone he’d met would always talk about how the same shit that Roy just did–that Dick was kind, that he’d always help people (and he sees it himself, sometimes, when his first reaction to seeing someone in trouble is always to stop and help). They’d always make Dick sound perfect, like he was someone more than human. He’d never heard anyone say anything different. Ric thought that maybe he should feel offended, but all he feels is relieved.
“To be fair, he usually had his reasons,” Roy admits with a slight tilt of his head, his hand still warm on Ric’s shoulder. “But he could be secretive and manipulative like hell. And, not to repeat myself, he could be an ass. I was shot five times, pretty much all in the chest, and they didn’t think I was gonna make it. Somehow, I pulled through, but I was scared of getting back out there, of fighting. I couldn’t stop hearing the gunshots, couldn’t stop thinking that if I was dead, my daughter would be all alone without me. Years of fighting, and I was just going to give it all up. But, Dick came in and challenged me to a spar, and during it, he pulled out a gun on me.”
Ric can’t help the hiss that leaves his lips, and Roy chuckles a little in response. “I know, right? I froze, and he told me, ‘Take it. Take the gun from me, Roy.’ I couldn’t. I walked away, and despite all of that, he didn’t give up on me. He said that there wasn’t anyone else he’d rather have at his back other than me. That’s why he pulled a gun on me–to show me that he knew I could still be out there.”
“It was one of those ‘tough love’ things,” Ric murmurs, unable to stop himself, and the words rang true.
Roy’s grip on his shoulder tighten for a brief moment before he deliberately relaxes. “Yeah,” Roy says, voice quieter than earlier, eyes fonder than he’s ever seen them. “Yeah.”
Ric doesn’t want to break this moment, this quiet connection that they’ve built together, somehow, in the span of thirty or so minutes, but. “You still haven’t answered my question. Not really. What were you to Dick?”
“In all truth, sometimes, I really don’t know.” There’s a touch of a grin on Roy’s lips, but it’s not reaching his eyes. “We were best friends, we were brother-in-arms, but there were times that he pushed me away and times where I did the same. But, we always ended up right next to each other, no matter what else we’ve done to each other, and that’s really what matters in the end, right? So, to me, it doesn’t matter if you’re Ric and you’ll never be Dick again. You’re still someone I care for, and so I’ll be here for you, no matter if you want me to be or not. That’s the gig between you and me, Grayson. Always.”
No one from Dick’s past had ever said that to him before–that they wouldn’t care if he was Ric or he was Dick. They had only ever wanted Dick. He had always felt like an intruder wearing someone else’s skin, even though this was his body and this was his life. Everyone else had looked at him and found him lacking, especially in comparison to Dick. Roy looked at him and just saw him. Not the lack, not the emptiness, just what Ric is, what he could be, living in the present and looking towards the future without everything in the past tying him down.
Well, may not everything anymore.
“He loved you,” Ric says because he knows it, deep in his bones, it’s true. Even if it doesn’t feel like a word big enough to encompass the depth he has felt towards this man tonight, the comfort of having him be here by his side, something true even though he doesn’t know his past with Roy. “No matter what you were to each other, he loved you. And I think I’d like to get to know you too.”
There’s a smile starting to brighten on Roy’s face, and it makes him look ten years younger, like the weight on his shoulders aren’t so heavy anymore. Ric can’t believe that agreeing to get to know Roy again could cause that–that he could make anyone from Dick’s past so happy.
“I’d like that,” Roy says, grinning at Ric, and Ric can’t help but grin back.