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Dick is kind of drunk. As in, Couldn’t pick up an escrima stick if he tried kind of drunk. Poison control on speed dial kind of drunk. Waited until every one including Alfred was out of the house so nobody would see him like this kind of drunk.
Wait, back up, does poison control do alcohol poisoning? Dick doesn’t fucking know, but he thinks maybe he should figure it out before that becomes a more pressing question. He fumbles his phone out of his pocket, knocking it and his elbow against Bruce’s excessively large mahogany desk in the process.
He really should have taken the alcohol out of Bruce’s office and to the kitchen to drink, but he couldn’t stand to do this in Alfred’s domain. He knows what the man would say, and he doesn’t need that guilt right now.
So Bruce’s office it is. Or, Hush’s now. Technically speaking. God, dying as a vigilante is such a legal cluster fuck.
Dick is trying and failing to get words that make any semblance of sense into the little search bar on his phone when it starts buzzing in his hand. He has to squint to read the name at the top, but when he does, his body instinctively hits the answer button before his alcohol soaked brain can consider if it’s really a good idea.
“ Wallllly ,” he slurs. “I miss you so much, man. We haven’t seen each other in forever . How’re you?”
There’s a long pause before Wally answers. “Dick? Are you drunk right now?”
Dick shrugs, even though Wally can’t see him. “Well you can’t get drunk, and Roy really can’t get drunk, so I’m drinking enough for all of us.” He straightens his spine and raises the rest of his glass in solemn salute before downing it.
Wally makes a noise on the other end of the line like he’s been punched, but Dick can’t parse if it’s disgust, pain, or something else entirely. He glances between his now empty glass and the still half full decanter of whiskey on the desk with a calculative look. Or, it’s supposed to be calculative. The effect is somewhat diminished by the way he’s swaying back and forth, his hair sticking up at all angles and his clothing rumpled.
“Dick, where are you,” Wally says at last. “I’m coming to get you.”
“‘M fine,” Dick says indignantly as he wedges his phone between shoulder and cheek to free up his hands. Multi tasking enough to pour without spilling and talk at the same time is no small task. “I was totally responsible about this. I didn’t go out, so no baddies to steal my virtue, and nobody else is here so I don’t even have to worry about my pseudo son insulting me in Arabic over my slovenliness or whatever. This is totally safe.”
His assertion is immediately undercut as the decanter slips from his fingers and thunks heavily against the desk, rolling onto it’s side and spilling alcohol everywhere, including Dick’s lap.
Dick yelps at the liquid seeping into his shirt and pants. “Shit,” he says, but it’s not concerned. It’s bubbly, and suddenly he can’t help but giggle. “ Shit .”
Then he’s laughing. Deep guffaws that resonate out from his chest in a way that makes it ache. Tears stream down his face, and in his disarray he barely hears Wally say, “I’ll be right there.” He still hasn’t righted the decanter. Given it’s shape, he probably could have saved most of the remaining alcohol if he’d reacted quickly enough, but now he can’t even remember that that’s something he’s supposed to do.
He’s nearly slipped all the way out of his chair when Wally comes skidding into the room, adorable red eyebrows already scrunched up in concern. Wally surveys the room quickly before striding over to Dick at normal speed. “Are you alright?” he asks urgently.
Dick grins at him, loose and easy in a way his smiles usually only pretend to be. “Never better, sugar,” he says.
Wally frowns. “You smell like a distillery.” Then, as he finally comes close enough to make out the alcohol against Dick’s dark clothes. “Shit, it’s all over you.”
Shrugging unconcernedly, Dick tells him, “I’d rather it was all in me, but accidents happen.”
Wally’s lips purse. “Come on. Let’s get this cleaned up.” He reaches toward the decanter— probably just to right it— but Dick’s hand is there first, snatching the alcohol away and pulling it close to his chest as he kicks out his legs enough to launch backward and away from Wally on the wheeled desk chair.
“Ah, ah, ah,” he protests, “I’m not finished yet. Enough for the three of us, remember? Figure I’m only up to about two.”
Wally always looks a little like a storm. It clings to the edges of him like lightening right before it strikes, and usually, Dick is as in tune with it as a meteorologist, reading Wally’s moods by the smell of rain or the rumble of thunder. Now, the clouds in Wally’s eyes are dark and heavy, but Dick can’t quite figure out what that means. Like being able to see a rose but having no sense of smell.
Then it eases, and Wally just looks sad. “Dick, what happened?”
Dick sniffs, imperiously taking a swig of his alcohol just to prove that he can and Wally can’t stop him. “Why’d something have to happen?” he asks. “Can’t a man just drink to drink?”
“You don’t,” Wally answers plainly.
“Maybe I’m starting.”
“Dick.”
Hearing Wally say his name like that would cut through anything. Anger, sorrow, grief—hell, Dick could be deaf and he’d still respond to that sound. A little alcohol haze is nothing. Dick lowers the decanter until it’s resting on his knee and stares at Wally’s feet. “You know what really sucks? I was right. I was right— and I lost him anyway.”
“Are you talking about Bruce?” Wally asks gently.
Dick snorts. “No. What sucks about that is how royally he fucked me over on his way out.” He doesn’t mean it, of course he doesn’t, but the alcohol says different. Makes his brain feel soppy and slow, emotions boiling up faster than he can push them down and not pausing to check with his common sense before they spill out his mouth.
Wally doesn’t reprimand him though. “Then who are you talking about?” He still sounds kind.
Dick doesn’t answer right away. He takes another long drink first. Contemplating if he’s even going to say anything at all. He’s slumped so deeply in the chair he’s in threat of falling off, but he doesn’t do anything to secure himself. He just stares at the crystal decanter with it’s many facets. It’s the sort of thing that you own because you’re expected to. Because at a certain level of wealth, the standards move from usable chairs and solid doors to old paintings and decanters that sit on the side board filled with appropriately impressive sounding alcohols. This one’s older than Bruce, Dick thinks. A remnant of Thomas Wayne, or maybe even an ancestor predating him.
Dick wants to smash it, just a little.
Instead, he says, “I gave Robin to Damian,” and then he stops. This isn’t a revelation to Wally, it happened months ago, but it sounds like a confession on Dick’s lips anyway. It rings like the an axe falling, and he can’t help but let it sit a minute— respect for the dead— before he goes on. “I knew it had to be done. Damian was going to go back the the League of Assassins unless I did something, and Tim was… old.” He shakes his head. “No— mature. Grown?” He gives up. “He was seventeen, and I thought that was old enough. It was old enough for me.”
“But then,” he adds with a dark chuckle, “I guess I hated Bruce for throwing me out too.”
“You didn’t— ” Wally starts, but Dick cuts him off.
“Tim has made it very clear what I did,” he says sharply. He looks to the side. “And what I failed to do.”
Wally sighs, walking closer until he can kneel in front of Dick. “You did the best you could.”
“That’s exactly it!” Dick says, laughing like he’s been punched. Like he’s been gassed. “I did do the best I could. This is the good ending. I was right, and this is how that feels.”
“Right about what?” Wally asks cautiously.
Dick explodes. “Robin! ” he says. “I knew Damian needed it, and I knew Tim could handle giving it up— and I was right. Tim was able to stabilize. He found a purpose and pulled himself out. Damian wouldn’t have been able to do that if he went back to the League— that would have been the end for him. No more holding back, he would have just been gone. Unreachable.”
His lets go of the decanter and it immediately slips off his knee, but Wally’s there in a flash, catching it. Dick only registers the motion in the corner of his eye as he brings his hands up to fist in Wally’s shirt, pulling his friend in until Wally’s nose scrunches up at the smell of alcohol on Dick’s breath. “Do you understand?” he asks desperately. “I was on the fucking lifeboat with two drowning brothers, and I picked one.” He chokes on the words, and suddenly he can’t hold it all back anymore. He bows his head against Wally’s chest, his body becoming one long curl of misery as tears blur his vision. “I picked one,” he sobs into his friend’s shirt. “I picked one.”
Wally doesn’t hesitate. He wraps his arms around Dick, gathering him close and murmuring soothing noises into his hair as Dick shakes apart in his arms. He doesn’t say anything, but he holds him. Heedless of the alcohol seeping from Dick’s clothes to his, heedless of the snot and tears soaking into his shirt, heedless of anything in the world besides his need to comfort his friend in the way Dick has spent his whole life comforting others.
When at last he can breath again, Dick doesn’t pull away. He lets himself keep leaning on Wally, imagining his words are caught in a bubble between them, never to reach anyone else. “I made the right decision. With the information I had available, I made the only decision. Even now, I don’t think I’d change anything except to give Tim more support with his theories about Bruce.” He has to screw his eyes shut against another wave of tears. “But it hurts so much more this way. I don’t even get the luxury of regret or what ifs, I just have to live knowing I sacrificed my relationship with my brother, and it was the right decision. How awful is that? How awful does that make me?”
“That doesn’t make you awful,” Wally murmurs, his hand absently rubbing soothing circles over Dick’s back. “The situation you were in was awful— there’s a difference.”
Dick huffs a weak laugh. “Is that supposed to make me feel better? It’s not me, it’s the world? That’s still pretty grim, Walls.”
Wally shrugs, the small motion shifting both their bodies, but not dislodging them. “Maybe. I don’t think so though.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
It’s the certainty in his voice more than anything that finally makes Dick pull back and look him in the eyes. He keeps his grip on Wally’s shirt more to keep himself from tipping over than anything, but it has the added effect of keeping them close enough to count the freckles on Wally’s face. Dick knows he must look something awful, but Wally doesn’t recoil. He just gazes at Dick with a fond expression. Like even now, covered in snot and tears and whiskey, Dick is worth loving.
“What do you mean?” Dick finally says.
The corner of Wally’s mouth quirks up, like he’d just been waiting for Dick to ask. “The world kinda sucks. It always has. You and I know that, but you know what doesn’t suck? People. They’re what makes it worth it. So yeah, you were in an awful situation, and predictably, awful outcomes came of it, but that doesn’t make you awful. It just means you’re human. Fallible and mortal like the rest of us, but that’s okay because things get better, and this is one of them.”
“How do you know that?” Dick asks weakly.
Wally shrugs again, smiling. “I don’t. I just believe it.” At Dick’s skeptical look, he softens and adds, “And because you were right. Tim isn’t happy about what you did, but he’s alive . He’s okay, and he’s getting even better. I know how angry you are at yourself for not being able to keep your family together, but Dick— you saved them. It’s hard for you to see it that way while everything is still so bad, but you saved them. That’s not nothing.”
Dick pulls Wally into a proper hug, hiding his face in his friend’s shoulder as he takes deep, rattling breaths.
“It’s okay to fall apart,” Wally says, his breath tickling Dick’s neck. “But just remember there’s light, okay? Once you’ve got this out of your system, there’s light.”
All Dick can do is nod.
It’s a long time before he finally pulls back, wincing at the mess he’s made of Wally’s clothes. “Sorry,” he says, but Wally shakes his head.
“It’s alright, but we should get you cleaned up and to bed.” He turns away, sizing up the mess Dick made of Bruce’s desk before turning back to him and saying, “Let me take care of this, then I’ll come back for you, okay?"
Trying very hard not to feel like a small child, Dick nods, but the warning was hardly necessary because Wally is back before Dick can take more than a few breaths. Over his shoulder, Dick sees the desk is sparkling and smells faintly of cleaning product.
“Now you,” Wally says, pulling Dick’s arm over his shoulder and helping him stand. Dick wants to say something about not being an invalid, but the way his knees buckle and the ground shifts beneath him says he might as well be. He lets Wally guide him carefully through the manner, taking extra caution on the stairs, until they at last arrive at Dick’s room.
Wally manhandles Dick into the bathroom before setting him down on the toilet. He rolls up his sleeves and turns the shower on before glancing at Dick and thinking better of it. He starts drawing a bath instead, holding his hand under the water to get the temperature right. All Dick can do is sway back and forth and try not to throw up as he watches his friend exit the bathroom and return with a fresh set of clothes.
Seeing something in Dick’s face, Wally blanches and says, “Are you gonna— ”
Dick nods just in time for Wally to pull him off the toilet and get him turned the right way before he throws up into the bowl. Wally makes a few generally sympathetic noises and cards his fingers through Dick’s hair to pull it back. It’s not long enough to really be in danger of getting in the way, but Wally’s cool fingers against his scalp are a godsend, so Dick doesn’t protest. When he’s finally done, he presses his forehead to the cool porcelain and waits for the last of the nausea to fade.
With soft hands, Wally pulls him upright again, offering a cup of mouthwash that Dick hadn’t realized he’d poured. That too is a relief as he spits it back out into the toilet and flushes the whole mess away like he wishes he could flush this evening.
No, that’s not true. While Dick is momentarily regretting how much he drank— particularly given how much more the whiskey burned coming back up— he doesn’t regret the rest of it. Already he feels lighter.
“How long have you been holding onto all of this?” Wally murmurs almost rhetorically.
“How long has Bruce been gone?” Dick murmurs back.
Wally purses his lips. “Come on,” he says, turning off the tap and helping Dick to his feet. Methodically he strips Dick down, turning away when Dick is in his underwear to give him some semblance of privacy. It’s a little laughable given how much of his soul Dick’s bared tonight, but he appreciates the thought anyway and gladly uses Wally’s shoulder as a balancing post.
Naked and starting to shiver, Dick steps into the tub and sinks slowly into it’s waters. It’s a newer model shaped to look old: golden clawed feet and high walls. The water rises to his chest and feels like bliss against his skin.
Wally sits down against the door, the walls of the tub more than tall enough to protect whatever modesty Dick still has.
“Scared I’ll drown?” Dick asks, dark amusement in his voice. He knows it’s a little cruel, but he can’t help it.
Wally grins at him lazily. “I’ve got nowhere better to be.”
They sit there a long time before Dick feels ready to move again. With a little coaxing, Wally agrees to step outside while Dick does the actual washing up with the promise that if the splashing stops for more than a minute, he’s coming right back in. By now Dick is a little more sober and a lot more tired, so he makes quick work of it and towels off. The clothes Wally brought for him are soft and clean. They smell like Alfred’s signature detergent and it grounds him.
When he opens the door, Wally is waiting, all patience and freckled smiles. Dick can’t help but smile back, just a little. Wally offers him a glass of water that seems to have appeared from nowhere and waits until he’s drained it to ask, “Do you need to eat something?”
Knowing he’ll regret it, but beyond caring, Dick shakes his head. “I just want to sleep.”
“Okay.” With a woosh of wind, a fresh glass of water and some ibuprofen appear on the bed side table. Dick doesn’t need Wally’s help to make it to the bed, but he feels his friend’s vigilant gaze on his back as he makes the unusually arduous trip himself. Wally closes the curtains and turns off the lights as Dick slips under the covers.
“Are you going to be okay?” he asks, and for the first time tonight, there’s real vulnerability in his voice. An uncertainty that makes something in Dick’s heart twinge. He never meant to worry Wally so much, but he also knows exactly what tonight must have looked like. He’s been on the other end of these situations often enough to know how shitty it feels.
“Yeah,” he rasps. “I think I am.”
There’s no telling in the dark, but he thinks Wally nods. “Okay. I trust you,” he says. Then, “But I'm coming back tomorrow to check on you. Drinking enough alcohol for three people means three times the hangover y’know.”
Dick groans. “I know.”
Wally chuckles. “Goodnight, Dick.”
“‘Night, Walls.” Dick says, and that would be that except just as Wally reaches the doorway, he adds, “And thanks.”
Wally pauses. “Anytime,” he says after a moment that very nearly stretched too long. There are a lot of layers beneath it, and Dick isn’t near sharp enough right now to parse any of them, so he just accepts the blatant love and affection his friend gives him so freely and lets it roll over him. Lets it lull him to sleep, and to better dreams.