Chapter Text
Damian was a perpetual claimant to the front seat. If it were up to him, he would have taken the driver’s seat outright. But Dick was the one who would never graduate from Bruce’s passenger seat.
So when the two of them stood by the car, bickering over who would ride in back, Bruce had to count it among the top ten strangest things he’d ever witnessed.
“I’m looking after your brother and sister.” Dick gestured toward the open rear door, where the twins sat strapped in their car seats, giggling. They loved outings. “You sit up front, Damian.”
“No. You should be by Father’s side. I can take care of the little ones, Mother.” Arms folded, Damian refused to yield.
“You’d let an eight-year-old look after two toddlers? Am I that incompetent?”
“I’m nearly nine,” Damian corrected stiffly. “I can manage.”
“Richard.” Bruce stepped in, ending the pointless tug-of-war between mother and son. “Let Damian sit in back. He’s too young for the passenger seat anyway. It’s not safe.”
Damian shot him a glare when Dick’s back was turned. He hated being called too young—especially by his father. Bruce kept a poker face, refusing to acknowledge the boy’s lethal look.
And so Bruce solved a family problem that was utterly absurd: no one wanted to sit at his side. On the drive, Dick kept twisting around to check on the children, leaving Bruce with hardly a word. Though part of him was jealous, another part was moved. His Alpha instincts told him: his Omega cared deeply for their cubs.
At the fairgrounds, another quarrel broke out—this time about the stroller Bruce had refused to bring. Dick insisted the twins would tire; Bruce countered that they needed to walk, to burn their boundless energy.
They compromised: when the twins grew tired, Bruce would carry them. But he soon discovered he wasn’t wrangling three children, but four.
The twins were drawn to everything—costumed mascots, rainbow-colored cotton candy, glowing stalls. Bruce rarely took them out, partly for safety, partly because they reminded him so vividly of their mother as a child: restless, uncontrollable. Now he recalled Dick once suggesting toddler leashes. At the time, Bruce had dismissed them as absurd, like walking dogs. Now he regretted it. Terry and Elainna bolted in opposite directions, and Dick, with both hands full, would veer off toward whatever game caught his fancy—with Damian inevitably trailing after.
Elainna’s bug-eyed unicorn plush came courtesy of Damian at the ring toss. Terry’s dinosaur was won by Dick at the basketball booth.
When the twins smeared cotton candy across everything, Bruce and Dick scrambled to keep their sticky little hands from turning clothing into hand towels.
When Damian declared he wanted the roller coaster, Dick tried to follow but was turned down. He was too busy preparing dinner for the twins on the picnic blanket, Bruce at his side. Damian argued it would take time anyway—he could stand in line alone. There was only one entrance and exit. Nothing could happen.
In the end, Dick relented under Bruce’s firm persuasion.
With the twins settled, Bruce tugged Dick down beside him, wrapped an arm around his waist, buried his face in the crook of his neck, and breathed in the sweetness of his Omega’s scent—perfectly at home even amid the chaos of the fair.
Dick squirmed, whispering, “There are a lot of people here…”
“No one cares.” Bruce’s hand slid over Dick’s abdomen. “You know, you should eat more.”
“I eat plenty.” Heat rose in Dick’s cheeks. His belly, for many reasons, had grown lean, the lines of his abs nowhere near as sharp and powerful as Bruce’s. “I’m too thin, aren’t I?” He feared Bruce disliked what he saw in bed.
“I just want you healthy,” Bruce murmured. “You’re training again. You’ll need the strength. Watch your meals. Cut back on the drinking.”
“Mm.” Dick nodded, watching the children happily spoon bread porridge into their mouths. “You really do hate alcohol.”
“I rarely drink,” Bruce admitted. “I don’t like losing control.”
“You’ve never wanted to escape something?”
“I have. But Richard—there’s no reason to drink yourself numb anymore, is there?”
The outdoor heaters roared in the background.
“I’ll grab more food!” Dick wriggled free of Bruce’s hold. “If we don’t eat soon, your stomachs will start hurting.” He flashed Bruce a smile, then slipped into the crowd like a darting fish.
He was afraid to promise Bruce he’d quit drinking. He had cut back a lot, but he still drank every day. He had tried. But without it, the anxiety gnawed at him. Were people looking at him, or at the memory of the man he couldn’t remember being? The perfect, dazzling Dick Grayson—rather than this clumsy, ignorant, quick-tempered Richard Grayson?
He wanted to cry.
The joy was still there—he was glad to be out, glad to be with Bruce and the children—but something in him was falling, an emotion the opposite of joy.
He knew he was moving forward, that he should be searching for food stalls, for something vegetarian for Damian.
But everyone seemed to be walking the opposite way. He felt himself float loose from his body, watching from behind as Dick Grayson’s frame halted before an exhibition board.
In the glass, a blank-faced man stared back.
Gotham Historical Photographs Exhibition.
So the placard read.