#amberspirit

Author’s Note: The only AU thing here is that Bruce would ever agree to this dinner! It’s the night of the gymnastics show, so let’s just say Bruce never came back early, Dick never rushed off, Richard never got the wrong idea and kissed him in the locker room. Bruce never saw them together, Richard never mouthed off to him, Dick never turned against Richard. Dick’s going to escape tomorrow, Saturday, so they still have tonight. Richard invited him out to the team’s celebratory dinner at a fancy restaurant after everyone else had left.

I SHIP IT. I ship this pairing too hard.

  Dick tucked a stray rumple in his shirt back into his slacks as he approached the restaurant. It was a fancy place, stratospheres above anywhere Dick would have gone before Bruce sunk his claws into him, but it probably wasn’t quite the kind of place Bruce would go. It was fancy, but it wasn’t the kind of place that was closed unless a certain type of person made a reservation. So Dick was wearing a suit, a white shirt, a tie. Alfred had helped him, producing the suit on a hanger in a long slate-coloured sleeve that reminded Dick of a body bag. Dick was also wearing one of the watches Bruce had supplied him with, as well as cufflinks, a tie pin, a designer leather belt... He’d done his hair as best he could. He felt ridiculously over-dressed, but he still worried that somehow he didn’t look the part.

The Rolls stayed on the curb behind him, ignoring the traffic, as Alfred watched to make sure he actually went inside and sat down.

Taking a deep breath, Dick opened the heavy wood and glass door and stepped into the near darkness of the restaurant. He was immediately set upon by the Maitre D’, who appeared to want to help him find another place to eat. Dick managed to mumble enough about the Allen Bex gymnastics team and its captain, Richard Rawn, to eventually be shown to a table. The man led him into the main body of the restaurant, and it was only once they’d reached the table that Dick was able to see around him, and when he did...

Shit.

Richard was sitting alone at a table for two.

Richard was wearing a tuxedo.

His golden hair was slicked back somehow into supermodel waves.

Shit.

Richard leapt up instantly, flustered. The Maitre D’ bowed himself out and left.

“Dick, hi, glad you could, um,” Richard cleared his throat. “Glad you could make it.”

“Yeah... Hi...” Dick was looking at the small, intimate table for two, with its artfully half-melted red candle and spotless white table cloth.

“Okay, I can explain,” Richard began, sitting down again, clearly hoping Dick would do the same, so he did. Dick eased onto the plush pink cushion like his body hurt, keeping his legs out from under the table. He found it hard to look at the other boy. This was the Richard Dick had always known Richard could be; monied, handsome. It made Dick feel small and squalid, like he’d done something wrong just by being here, taken a wrong turn, opened the wrong door, walked into the wrong room. Maybe it was just the dark pink walls reflecting the candle light, but Richard looked flushed, like maybe he was blushing, and he was avoiding Dick’s eyes. Dick looked across the room to the large window onto the street, expecting there to be paparazzi or something, but no. None of the passers-by even looked in.

“Okay...” Dick replied, still casting his eyes about for the trick, confused and not sure how to feel.

“I know I gave you the impression the rest of the team would be here...” Richard began. Dick shot him a sharp look. “Alright, I know I told you the rest of the team would be here... but when I said it would be a team celebration, I didn’t lie... exactly.”

Dick was watching him now, and the senior seemed to have got over whatever had made him avoid Dick’s eyes when he’d first arrived. Now Richard was looking at him with something close to that familiar playfulness, that cheekiness that was so charismatic that it usually let him get away with anything. It was similar, but not quite there, as if Richard was struggling to make it fit properly on his face. Dick suspected that the whole restaurant didn’t smell like cologne and it was Richard he could smell.

“It is a team celebration. We’re on the team and we’re celebrating. We did great tonight. You did great tonight,” Richard explained.

The waiter chose that moment to interrupt for their drinks orders. Dick panicked, having been too distracted to even open his menu, and he felt worse when he noticed Richard already had a glass in front of him.

Richard noticed his alarm and jumped in to order a coke for him. The waiter broadcast snobbish disappointment, but went away.

Dick looked at Richard from under his lashes, self-conscious. “I always feel too embarrassed to order coke in places like this,” he offered.

“Yeah but they always have it, don’t they? So who should be embarrassed?” Richard replied, giving Dick a crooked smile and the rest of the room a scowl. “Anyway, as I was saying, you did really great tonight, and I know the team would want to celebrate you, so I thought I’d take you out.” Richard was sipping from his water a lot, and maybe Dick still looked hesitant because he continued. “You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to. You can leave. No harm, no foul. I just thought it would be fun, you know? Since it’s almost the end of the year and everything...” He wasn’t smiling now, and his knee was jumping and stopping under the table.

“I don’t... I only have Bruce’s card.” Dick said.

Richard shrugged one shoulder, his glass at his lips again. “On me,” he offered as if it was nothing.

“I’m not dressed right.”

“You look great, you’re just making excuses.”

Dick looked around the restaurant. No paparazzi had jumped out at him yet; Bruce was out of town. The restaurant was really very dimly lit; all the wall lights seemed to be pointing at the ceiling, creating a heaven of golden-white, but at the table level, Richard’s face flickered and glowed with the candle. The cutlery looked like silver, the glasses crystal. At the other tables sat older couples and businessmen held the booths. A few women in glamorous dresses might have been going to the opera or the ballet.

“This kind of feels like a date,” Dick all but whispered.

Richard seemed to go still, but he brought his glass to his mouth and asked “Does it?”

That wasn’t much to go on. It wasn’t a denial. Was Dick being stupid?

Richard put his glass down suddenly and said “Come on, Dick, it’s not like this is the first time we’ve eaten together.” His voice was a little harsh.

“Sorry, you’re right,” Dick apologised immediately. He was being stupid. Of course it wasn’t a date. Richard would never...

“Hey, don’t do that.” Richard tapped Dick’s leg with his foot under the table, and smiled apologetically. “Don’t just... fold to me like that. Like you think I’m gonna get mad at you or something. That was... If you don’t want to be here, that’s fine. I just got a little ahead of myself. After all, it’s not like I asked if you wanted to come. I did trick you. You’d be perfectly within your rights to leave me here...” He tilted his head and pouted. “Alone...” He lowered his head more, as if trying to catch Dick’s eye. “By myself...” He fluttered his blonde eyelashes. “On my own...”

Dick laughed. He couldn’t help it. Richard was so ridiculous sometimes. Dick didn’t know anybody else who could make him laugh like that.

The waiter returned with their drinks, putting the glass bottles down on the table. “Are you ready to order?”

Richard gestured towards Dick, who sighed. “What do you recommend?” he asked the blonde, sliding his legs fully under the table and picking up the menu. Richard perked up immediately.

The food was great, of course. And while the prices made Dick feel guilty, they didn’t make him outright cringe. It only ended up costing as much as a dinner for three, if everyone had two drinks. Dick stayed because, well, the only thing that really mattered was whether or not he wanted to be there with Richard. And he did. And there was no way he was going to call Alfred and get him to come back after only ten minutes, if he’d ever even left.

It went well. They laughed and talked like normal, as if there’d never been any awkwardness. And if Richard reached across the table for his hand, it was only to look at Dick’s watch, and if his leg ended up resting against Dick’s, it was only because he thought it was the table leg, and moved it after a couple of minutes, though Dick didn’t say anything. It was just an accident, why make things weird?

Eventually, when they’d gone through three unreasonably small courses, Richard slipped a card into the little leather envelope with a wink and, after it was returned, they left. Dick pulled out his phone, knowing that a car would be there for him in under ten minutes once he gave the word, but Richard stopped him.

“I have my car, we could drive around for a bit, maybe go to my house,” he said. As he spoke, he untied his bowtie and pulled it through his collar, then undid the first few buttons on his shirt as if he’d been uncomfortable. The change in the way it made him look was shocking. Before, he looked ready to accept an Oscar, or a diploma or something. Now he looked like he was about to seduce an heiress away from her rich daddy. The open collar framed his Adam’s apple and revealed just a little too much of the dip between his pectoral muscles to be proper, but not enough to be slutty - just inviting. The light from the restaurant made gold flash in his hair. The black jacket fit his broad shoulders perfectly. Richard stood just a little too close to Dick, like they were sharing an umbrella, but it wasn’t raining.

“I wish I could,” Dick started, “But... Alfred’s going to be expecting me back.”

“Isn’t there anything you can do to just, like, put him off for a few hours? Just for tonight?” His voice was husky and teasing, but there was a whiny note under it all sounding like he was trying not to plead. “I want to spend time with you, now that the club’s over, and we’ve only got like six weeks until exams, and then graduation, and then... I’m gone. You know? I’m off, outta this city.” Dick watched Richard tentatively wind his fingers through his. “What if this is our last chance?”

Dick groaned. He was being pulled apart. On one hand, he knew what would happen if he went with Richard, if he lied to Alfred. He knew his phone must have a GPS tracker in it. Sure, Bruce wasn’t in Gotham, but so what? He’d be back by Monday, and then Alfred would tell him everything, faithfully, because that was what he did, it was what he was. Faithful. But Dick would be gone by then wouldn’t he? He was leaving tomorrow. His plan was all in place. He wouldn’t be here to receive that punishment. But what if Alfred locked him up somehow after this? If he misbehaved tonight... It wasn’t impossible.

But... Richard was right, more than he knew. This was their last chance. If Dick left tomorrow, he’d never see Richard again. He’d never be on this side of the country again. He’d change his name, live off the grid, with no address, no phone number... Tonight was all they had, all he had to say goodbye to the only friend, the best person he’d ever known.  Maybe he could do it, with a little lie and careful timing.

He put his phone away and smiled at Richard. “Let him think we’re still in the restaurant,” he said, his heart pounding.

Richard grinned and pulled Dick by the hand down the street to where his car was parked. Richard’s car was a small second-hand hatchback. It was boring to look at, kind of old, and the inside had a faint smell Dick couldn’t identify. It was nothing like the fleet Bruce maintained. It was functional. Dick liked it immediately.

Once they were both seated inside, Dick expected them to drive off somewhere, but instead Richard took a moment to get comfortable. He took off his jacket and threw it onto the backseat, running his hands through his hair, leaving tracks in the styled smoothness of it. He unbuttoned his cuffs and folded his sleeves over and up past his elbows. It was as if the older boy was boiling hot and wanting to expose as much skin as possible, but Dick felt fine in his tie and jacket. Summer was coming up, but they were still firmly in late Spring. It might be warm during the day, but it was getting dark now, and the car wasn’t stuffy at all. Casting his eyes over Richard’s body, Dick saw that the boy wasn’t sweating; in fact, the fine golden hairs of his forearms were raised and Dick noticed with a guilty twinge the small hard points of Richard’s nipples sticking out through his shirt.

“Sorry, I’m just no good with these monkey suits,” Richard said, and Dick realised he must have noticed him staring.

“I-it’s okay. Me neither,” he answered.

“Really? I thought... I mean, with Wayne being your dad now-”

“He’s not my dad!” Dick bit in sharply.

“Sorry! Of course not, that was... incredibly insensitive of me, I’m sorry.” Richard sighed. “I just meant, he must take you loads of fancy places and stuff.”

Dick shrugged and looked out the window.

“I thought you would have, like, really high standards.”

“I’m not like him,” Dick said. To cover the awkwardness, he added “That’s why we’re friends, right? Because we’re not like them; Bruce, and the kids at school.”

“Right... So, er, I guess I should have just taken you for a burger or something, huh?”

Dick heard something in his voice and glanced at Richard, who was staring at his hands, which were hanging by the fingertips from the steering wheel.

“Next time.” Dick knew there wouldn’t be a next time, but Richard looked sad.

“Next time?” Richard looked at Dick hopefully, and Dick had one of those absurd moments where it was like he’d forgotten that Richard’s eyes were blue, struck by their shape and size and exact glittering shade as if he was seeing them for the first time.

“Yeah,” Dick answered, and Richard’s face slowly widened into a grin.

“Hey, we could go now if you want, I know a great burger place, we could get milkshakes-”

“Urgh!” Dick interrupted. “I couldn’t eat another bite. Seriously,” he laughed, laying his hand on his stomach for dramatic emphasis.

“Okay,” Richard relented, his smile softening. He reached out and turned the key in the ignition. The car grumbled to life. “So where to? I could take you to Ma- Look Out Point.”

“... Make Out Point? Is that what you were going to say?” Dick smiled as Richard visibly squirmed, turning his face into his shoulder like a guilty dog.

“It’s just what they call it,” he groaned. “I didn’t mean anything by it...” He glanced at Dick quickly.

Dick laughed. “Where is it?”

Richard looked surprised that he’d asked. “Er, it’s on a hill on the edge of the city. You can see all the lights and everything. It’s pretty.”

“You’ve been there before?”

“I go there to... think. Sometimes.”

“Think?” Dick laughed as Richard blushed and got all twisted up.

“Well, yeah, sometimes!” he protested.

Dick decided to let Richard off the hook. He was 18 and Dick knew he’d had at least one girlfriend already, and he must have had more. They might go to an all-boys school, but Richard was hot, with his gold hair, blue eyes, and gymnast’s body, plus he had money by most people’s standards. He was smart but not stuck-up. Girls would be all over him. Sex might be something that Dick might never be able to enjoy, ever, but he was well aware that other boys had... urges. Needs. Other words like that, that prudish school teachers use when they want to be obscure about it. There were chemicals in Richard’s body that would make his cock hard and make him want to do something with it, find a warm wet hole for it, just like Bruce-

No. Not like Bruce. Richard was not like Bruce. Richard was the opposite of Bruce. Richard was doing this nice thing for him.

“Sounds too far away,” Dick said, dismissing Make Out Point. Alfred might be lenient about timing tonight, but he would almost certainly be checking the locator in Dick’s phone, and there was no way Dick was going to bring the cavalry crashing down on what was so far a good night by driving out of the city. “Let’s just go to yours.”

“Okay,” Richard said. “The house is empty. Dad’s at a conference, and Mom’s at a spa, I think. Or visiting her sister or something. She wasn’t very clear.” Richard pulled the car out into traffic, and they followed the current through the city. Neither of them spoke, silenced by the vibrant, dirty nightlife around them, so colourful and happy, with so much so very wrong with it, until they pulled into Richard’s drive. He parked the car and shut the engine off, and Dick roused himself with an effort as if he had been asleep. He rubbed his hands through his hair and over his face. Richard sat and watched him until eventually, not knowing what else to do, he opened the car door and got out.

The night air was cool but not cold, it was calm but you could still smell the city on the breeze. Richard followed him out of the car and gestured him over as he went to unlock the front door to the house.

Dick could tell the house was empty as soon as the door was opened. Richard strode in and tossed his keys on a side table, totally comfortable, but Dick stepped in with the reverence reserved for mausoleums or murder scenes, places where the structure has its own history and purpose and mind capable of judgement and anger or approval. An empty house is like that. A living space with nothing living in it becomes, itself, so dead that its death is felt like a presence. Dick had forgotten that. Wayne Manor was never empty, never totally empty, not with Alfred ghosting around behind the walls at every hour of the day or night.

Dick took his phone out to text the butler, just in case a SWAT team had already been deployed to black-bag him.

Going to watch a film with Richard at his house

If Alfred had a problem, he could text Dick back, but God, Dick hoped it wasn’t worth the old man’s effort. He hated Dick after all. He was probably hoping Richard kept a pool full of alligators for Dick to fall into.

Richard flipped some lights on and kicked off his shoes. “Make yourself at home,” he instructed, so Dick took his shoes off as well. “You want a drink or anything?”

“No, I’m good thanks.” Dick followed him through the house, remembering the family photos and other landmarks from his first visit as he passed them. Richard took them upstairs, into a cramped room with a surprisingly bohemian two-seater sofa and a TV. The sofa was covered with a knitted blanket and the seats had collapsed with use, while the TV against the opposite wall was so close Richard wouldn’t have been able to stretch his legs out. There was a small coffee table made of some thin, pale wood with a couple of empty cans and coffee rings on it, and a dirty cereal bowl sat on the floor next to the armrest. Video games were stacked under the window, and a console spread wires like vines across the floor that flowered into matching controllers.

“This used to be my and Rob’s playroom when we were kids,” Richard explained, moving some stuff around, the bowl out of sight. “When we got older, we just put a TV in here.” He flopped onto the sofa, one arm stretched over the back of it, which he patted to indicate Dick should sit down. Dick shrugged out of his suit jacket as he walked over and sat, tipping his head onto the back of the sofa as his fingers fumbled with the knot on his tie at his throat. He was vaguely aware that the ends of his hair had fallen against the tips of Richard’s fingers, and that he didn’t move them away, but it didn’t seem to matter. He felt Richard pinch the ends and flick them back and forth as he continued to fight the knot of his tie.

“Do you need me to-?” Richard was cut off as the tie finally slipped loose and Dick was able to pull it off. Dick leaned over the arm of the sofa to drop the tie with his jacket, and he looked over at Richard as he came back up. The blonde had turned his upper body to watch Dick, his hand hadn’t moved, and he looked oddly... stunned. Struck. He wasn’t smiling, but he wasn’t sad, and not exactly serious either. He seemed to realise how he looked because he cleared his throat suddenly and turned his chest towards the TV, taking his arm away. “So do you want to watch a movie or something?” he said.

“Sure,” Dick answered.

Richard pushed himself out of the sagging sofa and went to look at the DVDs on the shelves, while Dick undid his top buttons free of scrutiny. “Now that I’ve got you here, I don’t know where to start your education. There’s so many you need to see,” Richard teased.

Dick shrugged. “What was that one you were telling me about on the bus to New Carthage?”

“Uhh, Fight Club? Yeah, I have that one. You want to watch that?” he asked, pulling a case of the shelf. Dick shrugged again. He didn’t know anything about movies, and so didn’t particularly care what they watched. It just seemed like a good starting point, and he had been curious about it ever since Richard had mentioned it.

As Richard was putting the disc in and setting the TV up, he said “God, that trip feels like ages ago now. Doesn’t it? That room was insane. And McTravis was such a dick- er, bastard, as usual.” Dick gave him a look for that little slip, but he wasn’t really mad. “I had a good time though,” Richard continued as he came and sat back down next to Dick. He chuckled, “I can’t believe we shared a bed. Yeah, that was totally kosher. I’m lucky I’m not in fucking jail right now.” He reached over his arm rest and brought up a can of beer, holding it out to Dick who hesitated. “You don’t have to,” Richard said.

Dick took the beer and popped the lid. What the fuck. Who cared. A beer wasn’t going to change his life. He winced at the taste, it was bitter and foul, but he could feel the alcoholic warmth tingle through his stomach almost immediately.

“Sorry if it’s warm,” Richard said, getting one for himself and taking a swig. “I’ll be going to fucking jail for this too,” he added as the film began to play some kind of monologue narration.

“Why?” Dick asked, trying not to pull a face as the beer’s flavour did not improve.

Richard looked at him sideways and gave him his signature twisted, crooked grin. “’Cause you’re like, twelve,” he said.

Dick elbowed him hard, and Richard feigned being hurt. “Okay, okay, fif-fourrrrr, err...”

Dick rolled his eyes as Richard made a show of forgetting his age. “Losing your memory, Grandad? And I wasn’t talking about the beer,” he said.

“Neither was I.”

Dick looked at him.

“Hey, all I’m saying is they wouldn’t have put me in your room if you were a girl. Never in a million years. And I’m legally an adult as far as that is concerned. But I guess I got lucky there.” Richard’s eyes were on the TV as he took a long pull on the beer can at the end of his speech.

Dick didn’t know how to reply. What Richard said had confused him. Was Richard saying he... enjoyed sharing a bed with Dick? Like that? Like he would have if he was a girl? An image sprung unbidden into Dick’s mind of Richard in bed with a girl, the same bed from their hotel room, his tanned shoulders curving round her smaller body as he rolled her between the sheets, the muscles making divots in his back, arms, chest... All Dick could think was that they were lucky, both of them, that they could have that, have each other, in pleasure instead of pain and violence.

After that, neither of them had much to say and a natural silence fell between them. Dick asked questions about the movie as he nursed his warm, acrid beer, and Richard pointed out things he thought were important. Pretty soon though, the beer and the soft sofa started to get to Dick, and his head lolled against the wall. When he replied to one of Richard’s comments with a slur, the older boy looked over at him in surprise.

“Are you drunk?” he asked, scandalised.

“No,” Dick scoffed.

Richard sat up with an appalled look on his face. “Holy shit, you are.” He took the can out of Dick’s hand and shook it to feel that it was basically empty before putting it on the table. “That was one beer, Dick. Was it your first?”

Dick grumbled and tried to shove Richard away, but his arm was heavy and uncoordinated, and Richard had to catch his hand before it fell painfully into his lap. He didn’t let go.

“That was cute. You’re cute. You’re a cute drunk,” Richard teased, getting in Dick’s face to make patronising little pouts as he spoke. Dick turned his head away in disgust.

“Urgh. How many have you had?” he said.

“I don’t know. Three, two and a half,” Richard replied, casting a glance over his shoulder at the empty cans on the table and floor.

“So you’re not exactly sober either,” Dick pointed out, noticing that Richard was still leaning over him, and was holding his arms tangled up in front of his chest as if to restrain him, but for some reason Dick wasn’t freaking out. He managed to get a few fingers free to push against Richard’s chest. He meant to push the boy away, but his fingers slipped into his open shirt collar and along Richard’s skin over his heart. He tried to get his hand out again but just made clumsy swipes. It was like Richard was holding his hand there, or leaning into it. Recognising it was futile, Dick gave up and allowed his hand to rest there, feeling Richard’s heart galloping under his fingertips.

“Guess not,” Richard replied, his voice suddenly rougher, quieter than it had been.

Dick met his eyes. He’d never seen eyes like that, so focused and watchful. Even Bruce’s eyes never seemed to really see him, though obviously he saw everything that Dick did. With Richard though, it was like he was really looking, or like he was begging Dick to look back into him. Like he wanted to hold all of Dick’s attention.

“You have really pretty eyes,” Dick said, half-drunk and almost hypnotised.

“Do I?” Richard whispered, leaning closer. Dick didn’t think anything of the fact that he was now lying against the armrest with Richard above him, their arms being pressed between them.

“Yeah,” he sighed. “I wish I was more like you.”

Dick felt a shift in the rubble of limbs and a warm hand came against his stomach. He breathed a little harder and the corner of Richard’s mouth twitched up.

“Why? Your eyes are pretty too,” Richard asked. Dick found his hands were now resting on Richard’s shoulders as if keeping him away, but he couldn’t exert any pressure. His whole body felt warm and heavy and sleepy. Richard’s hand slid up Dick’s front, his fingers digging as they crawled through the soft but narrow space. It felt very intimate somehow, to have this squashed thing moving between him and Richard.

“Because. You’re... innocent.”

“Innocent? I’m not that innocent,” Richard replied, his eyes dropping to Dick’s mouth.

“Everyone loves you,” Dick continued.

“Everyone?” Richard’s hand had now passed over Dick’s chest and the tips of his fingers rested against the base of Dick’s neck. His other hand was pressed into the sofa cushion next to Dick, taking most of his weight.

“Yeah, you’re cool, and ridiculously attractive, and a good person...”

“Dick, I don’t think you know... what I’m really like,” Richard said, staring into Dick’s eyes, looking for an answer. “What I really think about you sometimes. If you did, you might not be here with me now, like this.”

Dick couldn’t quite grasp what Richard was saying. “I like it here, Richard. It feels nice.” Richard’s house was nice. Even if his family wasn’t perfect, at least he had one. He liked Mrs Rawn, he liked that she made cookies even though they were terrible, he liked that Richard had an older brother that he had a good relationship with, even if they never saw each other. Being here made Dick feel normal, like any other kid round at a friend’s house.

“I like it too,” Richard whispered.

And then Richard was kissing him. Dick may have made a small surprised sound, and closed his eyes as he flinched, but he could handle it. Richard was being gentle. Maybe the beer had gone to his head more than Dick had realised, but he wasn’t totally losing his mind the way he would have expected to. Richard’s lips were teasing his to respond, not crushing, not violating. He could breathe. Dick tentatively laid his fingers against Richard’s cheek, soft from whatever products he’d used for shaving before their dinner. The boy smelt so good. He felt Richard’s jaw move under his hand and against his mouth like the tectonic plates moving, rewriting the surface of the earth, and somehow, feeling it like that, sent a shockwave through Dick that he’d never felt before, like electricity. He pressed his body up, wanting to feel Richard move again. How did this boy move? How did his body work? What was the mechanism of his bones and tendons and muscles? He had the rare opportunity to feel it turn beneath the skin under his hands and he suddenly needed to feel it again.

Something soft and wet touched his lips, at first indistinguishable from Richard’s lips, but as it moved against him again he realised it was Richard’s tongue. How strange. What should he do? What was he expected to do? Richard licked plaintively along the seam of Dick’s lips, like a starving stray begging at the kitchen door, terrified of humans but too hungry to stay away, and Dick couldn’t help himself. He relaxed his lips, opening his teeth almost by reflex. Richard’s soft wet tongue touched Dick’s and the sensation was so odd that Dick felt compelled to explore it further, running his tongue up Richard’s.

Richard jerked up suddenly, and Dick could feel saliva cooling on his lips as his hands were pulled from where they had been holding Richard’s head.

“Shit, oh shit, I have to take you home, I have to take you home, Jesus, Dick.” Richard was sitting on the other end of the couch, running his hands over his face and through his hair roughly. Dick pulled himself up slowly until he was sitting and composed. “Jesus Christ,” Richard continued.

“What?” Dick asked. Sure, he hadn’t planned on kissing Richard, would have expected such a thing to be impossible, but he didn’t think he’d done anything that wrong.

“‘What?’ ‘What?’?! You’re fourteen! And, I got you drunk! I am definitely going to jail for this, and God, I deserve it for the things I want to – Anyway, we have to stop. I have to stop. God. I’m scum. I’m really scum. Doesn’t matter what you said about me, I shouldn’t have – I -”

“Richard, it’s okay,” Dick said, reaching out to pull a hand away from Richard’s face.

Richard slumped back against the sofa, staring at the ceiling, but the hand Dick had taken curled around his, their fingers threading together.  “Yeah, you would say that,” he murmured, unconvinced.

“You were drinking too, and I... didn’t tell you to stop. I would have told you to stop if you were doing anything wrong, and you would have stopped, I know you would have,” Dick told him.

Richard rolled his head to look at Dick. “Sorry. Doesn’t work that way. But thanks anyway. You don’t hate me now, or think I’m gross? You’re not going to dunk a drink on my head and tell me you never want to see me again?”

“No, I’m not going to do that.”

Richard pulled their hands into his lap and stroked his fingers over Dick’s. “Good. But I still have to take you home.”

“Er, can you drive right now?” Dick asked.

“...Probably shouldn’t, you’re right. Shit.” He looked at the ceiling again.

“I can call Alfred, but I kind of don’t want to. I mean, I can still stay a bit longer. The movie’s still on,” Dick said.

“Right.” They watched the TV for a few moments, unsure how to be interested in it now. “You know... I really care about you as a friend, right? I mean, as well?” Richard asked, breaking the fresh silence.

“Yeah,” Dick replied. “You’re still my best friend, Richard.” It was more candid than he’d ever been.

Richard looked down and blushed hard, looking like he was trying to keep from grinning. “...Shucks,” he eventually fought out. Then he pulled Dick under his arm, settling them comfortably side-to-side. “Just watch the movie, Circus Boy, huh? My heart can’t take it, you keep saying stuff like that.”