Rounding errors
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synopsis: After waking up broken from the Joker's torture, you banish a guilt-ridden Jason from your life. Four months later, after maintaining strict distance, an encounter in your apartment hallway forces a shift.
warnings/tags: angst & hurt/comfort. heavy emotional distress. mutual heartbreak. physical trauma. descriptions of medical injuries.
The smell of old rust and heavy industrial grease did not belong in a hospital room, yet every time you tried to pull air into your lungs, it was all you could taste.
You woke up with a sharp intake of breath that immediately caught in your throat, triggering a fit of coughing. The instinctive motion sent a blinding wave of pain exploding from your left shoulder straight down your spine, causing a choked scream to tear past your cracked, dry lips.
The sterile, chemical scent of rubbing alcohol and heavy-duty floor cleaner was the first thing that broke through the fog. Then came the steady, rhythmic beep of a heart monitor.
When your vision finally cleared, you weren't in your compy bedroom, or a cozy safehouse. You were staring up at the tiles of a fluorescent-lit hospital ceiling. The light was harsh, casting a sickly hue over everything. A thick IV line was taped to the back of your right hand, pumping cold fluids into your veins. There was no tank, no zip-ties, and no Joker.
But he was there.
"Don't - don't move. Please."
The voice didn't come from a mechanical speaker filter. It was rough and sandpapered by exhaustion and crying, shaking with a desperate panic that made your heart beat frantically faster.
Your head snapped to the right, your neck stiff and aching. Your left shoulder was bound in an orthopedic immobilizer and pinned down with surgical pins.
Jason wasn't sitting in the uncomfortable vinyl armchair provided for hospital guests. He was on the floor, curled up against the bedside cabinet. He looked entirely unraveled. He had discarded the blood-splattered Red Hood armor. He had changed into clean clothes, he was dressed in a pair of gray sweatpants and a plain black t-shirt. His eyes were so bloodshot and swollen they looked bruised, and a poorly stitched cut ran along his jawline.
The moment you made eye contact, a massive wave of pure panic crashed over you. Suddenly, the hospital room didn't feel safe; it felt like a trap. All you could see was the image of him standing over the Joker's men and the sound of bones snapping.
You tried to push yourself to the opposite side of the mattress, your right hand desperately reaching out to the safety rail, but the movement shattered your collarbone, and a loud sob tore from your throat.
"Hey, hey - look at me, I'm not moving! I'm staying right here," Jason's voice cracked into a high, desperate tone as he panicked. He pushed his back against the hospital wall, shrinking his massive frame as much as humanly possible. He held his bare, trembling hands out. "You're going to rip the stitches out of your collarbone. I'm right here. I won't touch you. I swear it, I won't step a single inch closer. Just don't move your shoulder."
Tears immediately started spilling over your eyelashes and running down your cheeks.
"Get out." You whispered, "Get out of here. Call the police."
A devestated sob ripped out of Jason's chest at the words you spat. He buried his face into his trembling hands. "They're outside,' He wept, his voice muffled. "The police... They think you were caught in a crossfire between rival crews in Crime alley. I fixed the paperwork. You're listed under a fake name so nobody can track you here. No villains. No capes. You're safe from them. I swear on my life, you're safe."
"Safe? Just like I was supposed to be in my apartement before I was kidnapped?" You let out a weak, hysterical laugh. "You looked me in the eyes for months, Jason. You ate at my table. You slept in my bed. You let me talk about my day, about the books, about how much I love... how much I loved you"
"No... please don't say that- Don't say you don't-"
"And you knew! You knew what you were. You knew who was hunting you."
"I thought I had a handle on it," He begged, his eyes holding a desperate craving for a scrap of mercy. He began to drag himself forward across the floor, crawling on his knees, dragging his heavy boots behind him until he was at the foot of your hospital bed. He grabbed the metal frame so hard his knuckles turned white.
"I swear to you, I kept my operations entirely away from your district. I never took the secondary phones to your place. I never checked the drop-points within three miles of you. I thought if I kept the blood off my clothes before I walked through your door, It wouldn't touch you."
"But it did," you choked out, your right hand gripping the hospital sheet so tightly your knuckles turned white. "The Joker knew me, Jason. He knew my address. He laughed at me because I thought you were just a nice guy who worked random jobs… He made me feel like an idiot before he broke my bones."
"I am an idiot," he sobbed, slamming his forehead against the metal footboard of your bed, his large frame trembling. "I was so starved for something I wasn't meant to have. I haven't felt like a real person since I was a kid, and when I was with you, everything was better. I was selfish. I dragged you down into the gutter with me because I was too weak to stay away from you."
He slowly raised his head, his eyes burning with rage as he stared at your left shoulder.
"I'll kill him," Jason whispered, a flash of the raging Red Hood bleeding into his voice before he caught himself and softened his tone,not wanting to scare you further. "No, no – I mean... I'll handle it. I'll give it up. Whatever you want. I'll leave the territory to the gangs, I'll pack a bag, and I'll leave Gotham tonight. I'll go across the country. I'll never pick up a gun again. Just please... don't look at me like I'm… like I'm him."
You wanted to feel the soft, comforting love you had for him forty-eight hours ago. But when you look at him, all you could see was Red Hood's massive silhouette, reminding you of the double life he hid from you.
"I don't care what you do with your guns, Jason," you said, your voice lacking of the warmth he was desperately begging for. "And I don't want your promises. You don't get to play the hero who runs away to save me when you're the reason I ended up here in the first place."
"What... what do you want me to do?" He whispered, his hands falling limp to his sides.
"You're going to stay in Gotham. And you're going to pay for this hospital. You're going to use whatever dirty, blood-soaked money you have to pay for the physical therapy I'm going to need. You're going to pay for a new apartment, a safer one."
Jason nodded frantically. "Yes. Yes, absolutely. Anything. Every cent I have, it's yours. I'll set up a blind trust. You'll never have to worry about a medical bill or rent for the rest of your life. I promise you-"
"And then," You interrupted, your right hand sliding down to rest flat against the matress, far away from where he could reach. "You are going to disappear from my life."
The words caused a physical reaction in him. Jason froze, his chest heaving as if the air had been violently sucked out of the room. He reached a hand out, desperately craving a touch, anything to keep him grounded.
"No," he whispered, a pathetic, begging sound. "Please. Don't do that. Let me stay. Let me sit in the hall. I won't come into the room. I'll just sit outside the door and make sure nobody touches you. Let me do that much. Please."
"No," you said, looking him dead in the eyes, refusing to soften under his tears. "Every time I look at your face, I hear the Joker laughing. Every time I hear your voice, I feel the water going into my lungs. You aren't my protector, Jason. You are the reason I'm hurt and in this bed."
Jason let out a muffled, ugly sound of agony. He didn't try to argue anymore. He didn't use his strength or his power to demand your forgiveness. He was destroyed by the realization that he had permanently ruined the only good thing he had ever touched.
You turned your head away from him, staring hard outside the window. Eventually, you heard the shuffling of his heavy boots against the floor. He didn't say another word. He just dragged himself up, keeping his head bowed low, and slipped out of the room quietly.
For four months, Jason obeyed your orders. Physically, at least.
The anonymous trust was set up within forty-eight hours. The hospital bills vanished, paid in full by a ghost corporation. A private physical therapist was hired, paid triple her normal rate to come directly to the new, highly secured high-raise apartment Jason had purchased for you in one of the few clean, well-lit districts of upper Gotham.
Jason kept his word. He stayed out of your sight. He didn't call. He didn't text. He didn't show up at your window.
But he didn't disappear entirely. You weren't stupid. You knew the two security guards in the lobby didn't look like standard high-raise concierges. You knew the local grocer didn't suddently decide to offer complimentary delivery service that explicitly included the tea you liked and the exact brand dark chocolate you used to eat when you were stressed.
He was keeping his promise to say away - physically, but he was ghosting around the perimeter of your life. And you hated it. You hated that even in his absence, the weight of Red Hood was still dictating the boundaries of your safety.
The first true shift happened on a freezing Tuesday evening in late October.
The physical therapy session had been brutal. The therapist had pushed the scar tissue in your left shoulder to its absolute limit, leaving you shaking from the pain, and extrememly exhausted. Your right hand was trembling so hard you could barely move your fingers to retrieve your keys from your purse.
As you pulled them out, your grip failed. The heavy keys clattered loudly against the floor of the hallway. A low, frustrated sob escaped your throat. You leaned your forehad against your apartment door, trying to breathe through the pain.
Your eyes snapped open as you heard the heavy steel stairwell door pushed open, and every muscle in your body went completely rigid, the terror of the warehouse coming back to life in your chest.
Jason stood near the stairwell door, ten feet away. He looked different than he had in the hospital, but he still didn't look like the old Jason from the library. He was wearing his leather jacket, but not the crimson helmet. It was clipped to his belt, and his face was completely bare. He looked exhausted, like he had been living on caffeine and adrenaline.
"Don't scream. It's just me," His voice a breathless whisper. He immediately slammed his own back against the hallway wall, raising his hands, palms open and empty to show he wasn't a threat. "I wasn't coming to your door. I was just checking the stairwell. The precinct radio said a crew from the East Side was moving weapons through the blocks nearby. I just... I had to make sure the floor was clear. I'm leaving now."
Just then, his eyes caught the keys lying on the floor. Jason sank down onto one knee. He reached out picking up the keys, extending his arm, offering them while still keeping his hand as far from your personal space as possible.
You looked at the keys in his hand. Then you looked at his face.
The breakdown from the hospital floor was gone. He had accepted he was a monster in your eyes. He had accepted you would never forguve him, but was still stubbornly choosing to keep watch in the dark because he simply didn't know how to exist anywhere else.
"You're an idiot, Todd," you whispered, your voice shaking with a mix of anger and sheer exhaustion.
Jason flinched, a bitter twist appearing at the corner of his lips. "Yeah. That's a verified fact at this point."
"Did you tell the grocer to bring those boxes?" you asked, keeping your distance.
He swallowed hard, his adam's apple moving tightly in his throat. He wouldn't look you in the eye for more than a second, his gaze dropped to the floor. "The chocolate? Yeah. I… I knew you had a bad session scheduled for today. I knew you were going to be in a lot of pain. I thought… I didn't think you'd know it was me."
"The grocer doesn't know I only eat that stuff when I want to cry." You said, the coldness in your voice disappearing just a fraction.
Jason let out a sharp breath that sounded like a choked sob. He didn't move from his knee. He stayed down, completely submissive, waiting for whatever sentence you were going to hand down.
"I don't forgive you," You said, making sure your voice was firm and unyielding. You needed him to understand that the damage was permanent. "My shoulder still hurts when I lift it. I still can't sleep without a light on because the dark looks like the inside of that tank. You dragged the worst part of this city right into my life, and a few months of paying rent doesn't fix that."
"I know," he said softly, his head bowing until his dark hair fell over his eyes. "I don't expect it to. I don't deserve it. If..." He hesitated,"If you want me to fire the guards, if you want me to stop checking the floors... just say the word. I'll take my hands off everything. I'll let you go."
You stared at him, even if the memory of Red Hood was warred with the sight of the man kneeling in front of you, even if you didn't want him back in your life, even if you couldn't handle the lies, or the violence, or the danger; you don't want to live in absolute fear of him either.
You took two slow steps forward and you extended your right hand, your palm flat and open.
Jason carefully leaned forward, stretching his arm out to drop the keys into your hand, ensuring his skin didn't brush against yours by even a fraction of a millimeter.
"Keep the guards," you murmured, looking down at the keys before looking back at his face. "And if you're going to keep buying the chocolate and the tea... you can leave them on the doormat yourself. You don't have to pay the concierge to do it."
Jason’s eyes widened with a sudden spark of hope. He nodded slowly, his chest heaving as he fought down another wave of emotion.
"On the doormat," he repeated, his voice thick and raw. "Just the mat. I won't knock."
"Okay." You whispered.
As you opened the door to your apartment and went inside, Jason was still on one knee, his hands resting on his thighs, watching you with a quiet look. He knew he didn't deserve to step inside.
You were still angry, and you were still hurt. But as you set your keys on the counter, the heavy panic in your chest finally started to ease.
It wasn't forgiveness, but it was a start.














