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Jason glanced in the mirror and sighed. His hair was getting long again, it tickled his cheekbones and fell into his eyes every time he moved. He tilted his head to the side and ran his hand through his hair to inspect it and, as he expected, his roots were showing as well. He bent down and rooted around his sink cabinet before sighing again. He was out of his black hair dye. He glanced at himself in the mirror again, squinting to see under the low light, his eyes were bloodshot and he had eyebags heavy enough to kiss his cheeks.
He debated between going out in the freezing cold weather, in the middle of the night, to buy hair dye or staying in the warmth of his apartment and getting some much needed sleep. In the end, his legs were the ones to decide for him when they buckled. He sighed again and walked to his bedroom on unsteady feet, his eyes prematurely fell shut as he flopped face first onto his bed, not even bothering to get under the covers.
He would buy hair dye and cut his hair when he woke up. Right now, he needed sleep more than anything.
—————
Jason woke to the sound of his phone’s ringtone blaring. He cracked one bleary eye open and felt around the bed for it. It had probably fallen out of his pocket when he was sleeping. He answered it without bothering to check who it was from.
“Yes?” His voice was thick with sleep, and a little slurred.
“Jason? Sorry, did I wake you?” Jason groaned, he should have known. No one other than Dick would call him this early.
“What do you want?” He was not in the mood to talk, he just wanted to go back to sleep.
“I was just checking to make sure you weren’t skipping out on coming to the Manor for dinner today.”
Jason sighed. Fuck, he had forgotten about that. He thought for a moment, he could skip out this time, but he had promised Alfred he would be there early to help him cook and he had told Damian he would be there to look at his art. He sighed again.
“Yeah, I’ll be there, I promised Alfie.”
“That’s great! I’m happy you’re coming. Sorry for waking you, Little Wing. I’ll let you go back to sleep now.”
Jason rolled his eyes and hung up without saying anything. He squinted at his phone, it was almost noon. He cursed and sat up. He had told one of his neighbors that he would come around to help fix their sink at around noon.
He stood up as quickly as he could and squinted, looking around for his glasses. His eyesight was getting worse, he should probably update his prescription. He jammed the glasses onto his face when he found them and pulled clothes from his closet to change into. He could wear his contacts later, he didn’t have time to put them in now.
—————
Ten minutes later, he knocked on his neighbor’s door with messy hair, eyebags and a pair of glasses perched on his nose. The door opened and with it came the noise of kids shouting.
“Oh! Jason, come on in!” Mrs. Garcia gave him a warm smile and ushered him into the apartment.
“Thank you, Mrs. Garcia. Sorry I’m a little late.” Jason moved inside, waving a quick hello to the kids sitting in the living room.
“No, no! You’re fine, I’m already grateful you’re doin’ this for us. You don’t need to apologize for being late when you’re doin’ us a favor.”
“Alright.” Jason smiled and made his way into the kitchen to start work on the sink.
He started by looking at the plumbing to make sure none of the pipes were messed up.
“Hey, Jason.” Lily, Mrs. Garcia’s daughter, called from the living room. “Mom said not to bother ya, but can I braid your hair when you’re done with the sink?”
Jason snorted lightly at her unexpected question and called back. “Isn’t my hair too short for that?”
“Nah, it’s fine cause I wanna practice braiding with short hair. Please? It’s just for a little bit.”
“Ok, but you’re gonna have to wait a while. And I might not be able to stay long.” Jason gave in, with only a little reluctance. Lily was amazing at doing hair, she was the only one who could get Jason’s hair to stay neatly in place.
“Alright! Thanks Jason!”
He got back to work on the sink and found the problem. It was a clogged faucet, easy enough to fix. He finished with it in around half an hour and walked out into the living room to talk to Mrs. Garcia.
“It’s fixed now. Wasn’t anythin’ major, it was probably cause of the hard water.”
“Oh! Thank you so much! Why don’t ya stay for lunch, as payment for your help.” Mrs. Garcia smiled with crinkling eyes and beckoned him to the dining table.
“Ah, nah it’s fine I couldn’t do that to ya.” Jason waved her off and started towards the door.
But, despite Jason’s protests, Mrs. Garcia urged him towards the table. She strong-armed him into the chair and walked into the kitchen to bring him food. Jason sighed, he should have known not to argue with her on anything, especially when it came to food.
Lily came ambling up to him a few minutes later. “Jason! Can I braid your hair now?”
Jason gave her a smile and nodded. “Alrigh’, where do ya want me to sit?”
Lily smiled before making him take off his glasses and sit on the floor. As she started fiddling with his hair, Mrs. Garcia joined them with plates of enchiladas. Jason smiled and ate the enchiladas gratefully, complimenting Mrs. Garcia’s amazing cooking along the way and making her promise to give him the recipe.
While Lily was braiding his hair, she asked Jason to tell her a story. He thought about it, and started narrating a story about a detective who couldn’t understand his emotions, while grinning secretively. Nina (Lily’s little sister) came and sat next to him to hear his story better and periodically chimed to ask questions about the detective’s idiocy in a grave tone. Jason laughed at her seriousness about the questions but answered them nonetheless.
A while later, Lily tapped Jason on the shoulder and told him she was done. He got up, put his glasses back on and thanked her for doing his hair.
“Alright’ then! I need to get goin’. Thank you for the food, Mrs. Garcia. Thanks Lily for the hair and Nina for the questions.”
He waved at them, promising to come back sometime soon, and made his way back to his apartment. He glanced at the time and decided that he had enough time to take a shower before leaving.
He walked into the bathroom and looked in the mirror to examine his hair. Lily had done two small French braids that curved around his head to meet in the middle at the back and had left his grey hair loose at the front. His roots were more visible this way too, going from an auburn to black in an abrupt line. It looked good, Jason felt a little apprehensive about undoing it, it felt like he was doing something wrong.
He thought about his choices for a few seconds, was it better to face the scrutiny of his family at his new hairstyle or was it better to destroy the hard work of a child. The decision was easy to make, he was already the family disappointment and his hairstyle didn’t really matter that much.
He took a quick shower, making sure not to get his hair wet or loosen the braids, and threw on some clean clothes. He looked around the counter for his contacts, but they eluded him. He groaned in frustration, that was the third time he had lost his contacts this month. At the rate he was losing them, he really needed to start buying them in bulk. He resigned to wearing his glasses for now and walked out of the room, because looking foolish was better than being blind.
As he walked by the kitchen, he wrote down a reminder to buy hair dye and contacts and pinned it to the fridge. He threw on a pair of combat boots, picked his keys and bracelets out of the dish, and grabbed his leather jacket from the coat hanger before he locked the apartment door behind him.
Idly spinning his bike keys on his finger, he went down the stairs and walked over to his bike. He paused for a second and looked over himself, he probably looked like an idiot, with prescription glasses sitting high on his nose bridge, a weathered leather jacket on his shoulders, pretty braids in his hair, a few inches of his original hair color showing, and multiple brightly colored bracelets (some of them were given to him by the kids in the neighbourhood but most were made by Damian) on both of his wrists. He nodded to himself with satisfaction, if he was going to a family dinner after months of avoidance, he was at least going to make a dramatic statement.
—————
He arrived at the Manor and parked his bike, trying not to make too much noise. Taking a deep breath, he knocked on the front door. It was still too early for everyone to be gathered, so he wasn't worried about facing his family just yet. The door opened to Alfred, standing primly with an unimpressed look on his face.
Jason sheepishly smiled, "Hey, Alfie. Hope I'm not late."
Alfred raised an eyebrow at his words and gave him a small smile, "You are not, Master Jason."
Jason's smile widened into a grin as he followed Alfred and stepped into the Manor for the first time in almost six months. Walking with Alfred into the main kitchen, he looked around for anyone, just in case he needed to avoid them. As they walked past the breakfast table next to the kitchen, Jason made eye contact with Damian, who was seemingly engrossed with petting Alfred the cat while drawing in his sketchbook. Jason smirked at him, and Damian rolled his eyes, getting up to follow them into the kitchen.
“Whatcha doin’ here this early?” Jason asked Damian, looking back to see him perched on the counter.
“Did the many months away from the Manor kickstart your descent into senility, Jason? I live here, in case you have forgotten.” Damian drawled with seeming boredom, eyes narrowing suspiciously.
Jason snorted, “I know ya live here, I’m jus’ askin’ what you’re doin’ at the breakfast table.” He turned towards Alfred and gave him a look, as if to convey his exasperation with the direction the conversation was going in.
“That is none of your business.” Damian sniffed haughtily and went back to petting his cat.
Jason rolled his eyes and walked over to Alfred’s side at the stove instead of responding. “So, what’re we makin’ today Alfie?”
He listened to Alfred as he explained the dishes and mentally categorized the ingredients they needed into a list. He turned to Damian and gestured for him to get down from the counter.
“Come on Dami, you’re gonna help with gatherin’ the ingredients.”
Damian sniffed again, “I do not wish to help in such asinine things.” But, as he was talking, he slipped off the counter and moved towards the pantry anyway.
Jason smiled and listed out ingredients Damian needed to fetch. Him, Alfred and Damian worked together to speed up the process of cooking enough food for an entire football team. Jason made sure to use this time wisely and catch up both Alfred and Damian on all of the things he had gotten up to in his absence from the Manor and weekly family dinners.
Abruptly, as Jason was in the middle of a dramatic retelling of how he had fought radioactive goo monsters somewhere in the middle of Europe two months ago, Damian spoke up. “Has your eyesight been getting worse?”
Jason paused, eyes narrowing. “Why’re ya asking me that all of a sudden?”
“You are wearing your glasses,” Damian pointed out, “You never do that unless your prescription has changed and you have not yet replaced your contacts.”
Jason laughed, “Yeah it’s been gettin’ worse, but I only wore my glasses today ‘cause I keep losin’ my contacts.”
At this, Alfred paused in stirring the soup. “Master Jason, you must update your prescription if your eyesight has gotten worse. Stalling will only lead to more problems in the future." He reprimanded in a soft tone.
“I- yeah.” Jason sighed. “I know Alfie, I’ll get it updated soon. I was jus’ busy with everythin’ so I haven’t had time.” He turned to Damian and added, “Ya don’t gotta worry about me. I’ll be fine.”
Damian nodded and went back to peeling the potatoes. He then smirked before adding, “Your real hair is showing too, I wonder if your eyesight has gotten so bad you haven’t noticed it.”
Jason snorted and shook his head in exasperation, waving his hand in the air dismissively, “I know that, I was gonna dye it last night but I ran outta hair dye. It’s fine, I’ll dye it tomorrow or something.”
He turned back towards Alfred to find him with a raised eyebrow. Jason tilted his head in a question and Alfred smiled. “Your roots seem to be more visible due to the hairstyle you are sporting.”
Jason flushed slightly, he had forgotten about that. “Umm, yeah. The kid next door wanted to practice doin’ hair and I couldn’t say no.” He shrugged sheepishly.
“Do not fret, Master Jason. It looks quite nice.” Alfred smiled again and went back to stirring the soup.
Jason turned back to the vegetables he was chopping, ignoring Damain’s muffled snickering, he was very clearly enjoying Jason’s embarrassment. He cleared his throat and restarted the dramatic narration of his adventures from where he had been interrupted.
—————
After a few hours, when they were done cooking and Damian had abandoned them to complete his drawings, Jason and Alfred sat at the breakfast table and officially caught up over tea and biscuits. Jason had sorely missed their weekly tea and gossip sessions during his long absence. He made sure to make up for it by enthusiastically explaining the logistics of the new underground illegal organization he had started in order to see how long it would take for the Bats to catch on. Alfred listened to him with a slight smile and an amused twinkle in his eyes, even going as far as to promise to not tell the others about it and ruin his fun.
As Jason was listening to Alfred’s account of what he had been up to for the past few months, the doorbell rang. He almost jumped, not expecting to hear the bell, and turned to squint at the clock. It was almost six in the evening, which meant everyone would start trickling into the family dining room. He stayed behind, stalling, as Alfred went out to open the door. He didn’t want to be the first in the dining room, because Bruce always sat down early and Jason did not want to deal with him.
He waited for a little while near the kitchen, until Alfred came back. He could hear Dick’s cheery voice in the background, calling for Damian, and almost shuddered. He would be smothered if he went in there right now. He turned away and decided to stay in the kitchen until he had to help Alfred set the table.
When he turned, he saw Cass standing in front of him, head tilted and a small smile on her face. He smiled back at her, he liked Cass, she was one of his favorite siblings.
“Hello, little brother.” Cass looked him over and nodded approvingly, “Did you cook?”
“Um- hello to you too, yeah I helped cook.” His smile turned a little embarrassed.
“Your hair is pretty.” She moved forward to lightly run her fingers over the braids in his hair.
“Ah- thank you. My neighbour’s kid did it for me.” His smile turned even more embarrassed.
“Good. You look nice.” Her smile turned toothy as she tapped on the frames of his glasses. “I missed you.”
“Thanks.” Jason cleared his throat and ducked his head to hide his pink cheeks, “I missed you too.”
Cass giggled at his embarrassment and gestured for him to walk into the dining room with her. Jason shook his head and made her go ahead without him.
He made a gesture to shoo her out of the kitchen and waved, “I have to help Alfred bring out the food.”
“You will do no such thing.” Alfred piped up from behind him, a slight frown on his face. “Go sit down with the others, my boy. I shall bring the dishes out myself.”
Jason walked over to Alfred’s side and picked up two of the dishes with a stubborn grin on his face, “No way Alfie, I’m helpin’ ya no matter what. I promised I would.”
Alfred sighed and shook his head, seeming to give up for the time being. “Alright, be careful not to hurt yourself.”
He followed Alfred into the dining room, hesitantly peeking through the doorway to check who was there. He let out a sigh of relief when he saw that the only person in the room was Cass.
“Where’s the others?” he asked, setting down the dishes on the table.
Cass only shrugged, “Steph is coming soon. I do not know the rest.”
Jason rolled his eyes, of course Cass knew where Steph was. She probably knew where everyone was and was just refusing to tell him. He sighed and got back to bringing everything out. He went back and forth bringing the other dishes out and helping Alfred set the table neatly. He walked back towards the kitchen after all of the dishes were set to make sure nothing was left behind, stopping to grab the water jug along the way back.
He paused in the doorway of the dining room, it had apparently filled out with the entire family while he was fetching water. He hesitated, but he needed to get it over with as soon as possible. He slowly slinked along the edges, hoping to make it to his seat without anyone noticing. He almost made it, managing to only make eye contact with Damian, but of course Tim had to call him out.
“Oh hey Jason, I didn’t know you were coming.” Tim’s eyes glanced at him absently and immediately flicked back to Steph, who he was currently having a conversation with.
Jason sighed at the number of heads that whipped around to look at him. Setting the water jug down on the table, he slid into his seat quietly hoping the others would look away.
“Little Wing! You made it!” Dick was beaming, his dimples on display.
“Yeah I did, didn’t I tell ya I was gonna come in when you called?”
“I- yeah but I thought you were going to skip anyway.”
Jason rolled his eyes and huffed, “Don’t be stupid, I promised Alfie I would help cook, no way I’m skipping on that.”
“You helped cook? That’s great! I’ll try everything on the table today.”
Jason snorted, “That doesn't count, you’d do that anyway.”
“Jaylad.” Bruce said abruptly, looking like a child who was given a piece of candy.
“Yeah, old man?” Jason’s eye twitched, it looked like his return was going to be a big deal after all.
“I- you’re here.”
“Uh- yeah, what’s wrong with ya? Are ya high or somethin’?” Jason was not going to give in first this time.
Bruce awkwardly tried to reassure him, “No, nothing is wrong. You just haven’t been here in months.”
“Yeah, cause I was travellin’ around Europe. It’s hard to come to family dinners when you’re halfway across the world.”
“You were in Europe?” Steph chimed in, asking from beside him.
“Yep.” Jason answered immediately, grateful for the shift in conversation.
Steph raised her eyebrows, “Why? You don’t seem the type to travel.” From beside her, Duke nodded his head, tilting it questioningly.
Jason abruptly became very aware that every conversation had stalled and that everyone was listening to what he had to say.
“I was there for work. Y’know, Alley business.” He vaguely gestured in the direction of Park Row.
“Dude, you went to Europe for Alley business for, like, five whole months?” Duke piped up, expression flickering between disbelieving and incredulous.
“Well, I wasn’t only in Europe, I also went to Asia. It also wasn’t just Alley business, I had to fight these weird ass radioactive looking slime monsters cause they were wreckin’ havoc in rural places.”
“Slime monsters?” Tim leaned forward, seemingly interested, “What did they look like?”
Jason held back a snicker, “I’ll tell ya all ‘bout ‘em later Timmy, first it’s dinner time.” He gestured towards the plate of food in front of Tim. “Eat.”
“Dude, that’s so unfair. What do you mean you got to fight cool monsters and we’re stuck fighting the same people every other week.” Steph whined, Duke and Cass nodding behind her.
“Boring here, nothing happened.” Cass added in a sagely voice.
“Well, I don’t know what y’all want me to do ‘bout it.” Jason shrugged, stuffing his mouth with the mashed potatoes, “Also, you’re wrong by the way.”
“Huh?” Steph asked, confusion flickering across her face.
“You’re wrong about the travel thing. I love travelling, it’s one of my favorite things to do.”
Steph nodded, a little confused and Bruce made a small sound from a few chairs down that sounded like he had been punched. Oops, Jason had forgotten about how he would go on tangents about wanting to see the entire world when he was still Robin. His words were probably bringing up painful memories for Bruce.
Jason ignored Bruce’s internal breakdown and smiled at Steph, turning back to his food and the others. He frowned lightly when he caught a glimpse of Damian’s glowering face (probably because he was sitting next to Tim), and subtly shook his head to tell Damian to relax and eat.
“Um- Little Wing?” Dick cut through the quiet hesitantly.
“What?”
“Your hair looks nice?” he offered unsurely, although it sounded more like a question than a compliment.
“I- oh yeah. My neighbour’s kid used it as practice.” Jason shrugged again. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately.
“Yeah, it looks good. But-” Dick started, in a tone filled with confusion, “Why are the roots of your hair red?”
Jason frowned, confused, what was Dick playing at? “‘Cause my hair is red.”
“What?” Bruce sounded confused too.
Jason whipped his head towards Bruce and stared at the way his fork was dangling in his grip, a look of pure confusion on his face. He almost answered with a sarcastic remark, but then a thought occurred to him that caused his mouth to slam shut.
He turned to Damian with wide eyes and said, “Oh my god, I forgot to tell them that I’m a redhead.”
Damian paused in his eating, looking at him confusedly, “Why would they not know? Of course you are a redhead, you have always had red hair.”
“Wait, what do you mean you’re a redhead? You’ve always had black hair?” Dick interrupted, sounding confused, tone edging on hysteria.
“Um, yeah no, I’ve always been a redhead. I just dye it black ‘cause it’s less conspicuous.”
“What, how did I not notice that?” Bruce asked, talking to himself more than anything. He seemed distressed at not noticing such an important detail about one of his children.
“Cause I hid it from ya, duh.” Jason rolled his eyes, man, family of detectives his ass. “Only Alfie knew about it, cause he would buy me hair dye.”
“And what about Damian? He knew about it just now.” Tim asked from the side, a tilt to his head and a glint in his eyes.
“Of course I knew about it. He did not bother to dye it during his time in the League.” Damian answered absentmindedly, more focused on eating his food.
“The League? Of Assasins?” Dick asked incredulously. “What the actual fuck do you mean?!”
Jason rolled his eyes again (for the hundredth time), “Damn, did y’all really think we’d have been there at the same time and not met each other?”
Bruce spoke up with a severe frown, having been knocked out of whatever trance he had been in. “You knew each other in the League?”
Damian looked up, “Yes, Father. I thought that had been clear, he was my bodyguard and aide for years.” He turned to Jason and gave him a look that screamed ‘are you sure they are detectives?.’ Jason just shrugged, mentally asking himself the same question.
As everyone seemed to be spluttering in shock, Jason turned to look at Cass, Steph and Duke. Steph and Duke seemed not as shocked as the others, having not known him before his death. They also sent him understanding glances. Being from around the Alley, they knew the dangers of having easily identifiable features. Cass, on the other hand, did not seem surprised at all. Jason should have expected that, Cass knew everything, nothing could be hidden from her.
“You’ve changed so much, Little Wing! Are there any other huge secrets you seem to be hiding from us?” Dick dramatically raised his fork in the air, but the smile on his face betrayed his teasing. He seemed to have gotten over his confusion extremely quickly.
Jason squinted his eyes, adjusted his glasses and went back to eating. “Uh, yeah, a lot of them actually. I ain’t tellin’ ya shit though.”
“Wait, am I hallucinating? Since when did you have glasses?” This question came from Tim, who didn’t seem very surprised, just curious.
“Nah you’re not, I usually wear contacts but I only started havin’ shitty eyesight after I died and came back. T told me it was probably jus’ a side effect of dyin’.”
“Hmm, makes sense.” Tim nodded, and followed it up by a rapid list of questions, “By ‘T’ you mean Talia, right? Also, how bad is your eyesight? And, why aren’t you wearing your contacts? Has it gotten worse, because you keep squinting even with the glasses?”
“Woah, slow down.” Jason held his hands up, thinking back to the questions to answer them, “Yeah T is Tals, that’s what I call her sometimes. Last time I got a prescription, it was -4 or somethin’ in both eyes. I lost ‘em, I keep losing ‘em every week it’s really annoyin’. And yeah it’s gotten way worse, I need to get my glasses updated.”
“What the hell? I’m so confused.” Dick had his head in his hands, shoulders slumped in defeat. Apparently he hadn’t gotten over it after all, oh well.
Duke nodded, “Yeah, man. That’s like an insane amount of information for you to drop on someone in such a short amount of time.”
“It’s not my fault y’all never noticed shit.” Jason said, not bothering to look up from his plate of food.
Bruce made another sound of despair, Jason looked up to see him frowning sadly.
“Jaylad, I’m sorry for not noticing-” Bruce started, in a tone that edged on pure despair.
“Don’t, old man.” Jason rolled his eyes, interrupting Bruce. “There’s a reason y’all never noticed. I didn’t want y’all to.”
“Okay, so lemme get this straight.” Steph started, making Jason snort at the last word. “What?” she asked suspiciously at his muffled laughter.
“Ignore him, he has the humor of a middle schooler.” Damian piped up from the other side of the table, frowning in apparent disgust.
“Okay, but I still wanna know what he’s laughing at.” Steph pouted, making Jason laugh louder.
“I no- it’s not that important.” Jason answered between laughter, “ Well- actually it is, but I don’t wanna drop it on y’all right now and give someone a heart attack.”
“No, it’s fine!” Steph said, perking up and gesturing towards the others, “Everyone’s fine! Right guys?”
“Uhh, Steph I don’t think-” Duke started, hesitance passing across his face at the looks on everyone's faces.
“Shhhh, Duke. You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Steph held her hand, palm up, in his face, making Cass giggle.
Jason made eye contact with Cass and she nodded, indicating that she knew what he was about to say. Jason smiled at her, he had already told her a while ago during one of their middle sibling movie nights.
“Okay, I’ll tell ya. But-” he turned to everyone, eyes completely skipping over Damian (because Damian had known for years), “Don’t, and I mean it, don’t freak out.”
Jason made eye contact with Alfred, who had been standing behind Bruce (sporting an amused smile at their antics), and smiled. Conveying that it was important that Alfred hear it too.
“Okay, I’m bi and demi,” He turned towards Steph, “Which is why I was laughin’ at you saying straight.”
“That’s amazing! Thank you for coming out to us, Little Wing!” Dick responded immediately, his voice full of excitement and warmth.
“Yeah, whatever. It’s not that big of a deal.”
“Are you serious? Your sense of humor is so stupid.” Steph said, crossing her arms and snorting. “Also congrats, I guess.”
“I told you, he is like a middle schooler.” Damian rolled his eyes, looking at him with disdain.
Jason snorted, “Shut up Dami, your humor is so much worse. You laugh at puns.”
“I do not! This is slander. I do not laugh at puns.” Damian’s tone turned incredulous and he sniffed.
“Oh really? Then what about that time with the cheetahs?” Jason smirked smugly, he only brought out that piece of blackmail when he wanted to really embarrass Damian.
“Shut up, Jason.” Damian warned in a grave tone, “Speak of that and I will tell Mother about the time with the pandas.”
“Please, Tals wouldn’t do anything to me. I’m her favorite.”
“You are not! I am!”
“Nuh uh, I’m her first-born so obviously I’m her favorite.”
“I am her first-born, you are the second! You do not get to steal that title from me.”
“For the last time Dami, just ‘cause I became her son later than ya doesn’t mean I’m the younger one. It’s the age that determines it!”
“Uh- what’s happening?” Dick spoke up unsurely, his face twisting into a concerned frown.
“Do we need to separate them?” Tim asked absently, watching the argument like a tennis match, head swivelling between Jason and Damian.
“Jason, I swear to everything good in this world, if you don’t shut up right fucking now, I will literally skin you alive with your own fucking katana.” Damian’s scathing insult silenced the room, he never dropped his proper grammar even when arguing, this was the first time anyone had heard him sound so teenager-like. Everyone at the table tensed, mentally and physically preparing for violence.
Jason only burst out laughing, “You’re learning so well, see, ya even dropped the proper grammar.”
Damian crossed his arms, his face dropping into a baleful stare, “I’m telling Mother about this.”
“I- no Dami, you can't, she'll be disappointed with me if she finds out I’ve been teaching ya to speak like a normal teenager.”
Damian smiled at him smugly, “I do not care. You have dug your own hole, you must lie in it.” He stopped for a second, a scowl forming on his face, and continued, “Besides, it is idiotic that you, as someone who loves literature, are telling me to speak without proper grammar.”
“Ugh Dami, we’ve had this conversation so many times before, just ‘cause I love literature doesn’ t mean I’ll speak with proper grammar.” Jason rolled his eyes and waved his hand to drop the subject, he wouldn’t get far arguing with Damian at the dinner table anyway.
“Um, what just happened?” Steph asked, voicing the question that was on everyone’s mind.
“Yeah, what just happened?” Tim repeated, brow furrowing. He then turned to Damian and asked, “And also, why does Jason get to be ‘Jason’ but I’m still somehow stuck with ‘Drake?”
“That is because you are not worthy.” Damian eyed him down with a deep scowl, “Jason is my brother on both sides of the family, hence he is ‘Jason’. He has been ‘Jason’ to me since before I knew anyone here.”
“I- wait. Jaylad, you said you were Talia’s first-born?” Bruce’s voice cut in before Damian and Tim could start fighting again.
“Oh, yeah. I forgot to tell y’all, T officially adopted me, like, a while ago.” Jason’s voice turned sheepish, he scratched his head and smiled awkwardly.
“What?! Wait, you were adopted by Talia al Ghul? You’re an al Ghul? What the hell, Jason?” Dick’s eyebrows were raised all the way into his hairline, his voice pitched so high, it almost squeaked.
“Man, you really gotta stop doing that. You’re gonna give everyone here like massive heart attacks.” Duke shook his head amusedly, “It is funny to watch though.”
“Holy shit, okay. So like I was saying earlier, lemme get this all sorted. You’ve been away in Europe and Asia for the past, like, six months fighting radioactive slime monsters, you have red hair and have been dying it black since forever so no one knew about it,” Steph listed, her smile so bright and manic it looked like the collective luminosity of a thousand fucking suns. “You got shitty eyesight when you died so you wear glasses, you and Damian knew each other in the League and became pretty close, you got adopted by Damian’s mom, you’re not straight and...what am I forgetting...oh yeah, you apparently love travelling?”
“Uhh..pretty much, yeah.” Jason cleared his throat, “Can we go back to eating now?”
He staunchly ignored everyone’s protests and Damian and Cass’ snickering and went back to eating his food. Soon, everyone followed, not being able to pull anything else out of him, and the conversations returned back to normal. Jason held in his own laughter at everyone’s faces until the end of dinner and continued to hold it in while helping Alfred clear the plates. He finally broke down gasping in the kitchen after they had cleared the table, clutching onto the counter for support, he laughed so hard that there were tears streaming down his face.
“I’m glad you find this amusing, my boy.” Alfred said from behind him, slowly maneuvering Jason into a chair. Jason just nodded, because Alfred knew of everything he did from their weekly gossip sessions, in fact, he found Jason’s adventures highly amusing as well.
—————
Later, after helping Alfred clean up and promising to visit him again next week, he walked into the sitting room where everyone was gathered to let them know he was leaving. Walking in, he almost got hit in the face with a stray flying pillow, ducking just in time for it to hit the wall instead.
“What the hell’s goin’ on in here?” Jason asked, spreading his arms out in exasperation. It had barely been an hour since dinner ended and the family was already pulling some bullshit.
“Oh, Little Wing! Don’t worry about it, Tim and Damian are squabbling again.” Dick bounded up to him with a smile on his face.
“Uh, okay. Well, at least they’re having fun.” Jason looked over Dick’s shoulder just in time to see Damian launch himself towards Tim, teeth bared like he was about to bite.
“Yeah! Oh, by the way, I meant to ask you earlier-” Dick started, not flinching the slightest bit at the scream of rage Tim had let out, in retaliation to Damian’s attempt at giving him rabies. “Where did you get these bracelets?” He pointed to the ones sitting on Jason’s wrists.
“Oh, some of ‘em are from the kids ‘round my block. Most of ‘em are from Dami though.” Jason winced in sympathy as he witnessed Damian get bludgeoned into the ground with a throw pillow.
“Wait, seriously? Dami made you bracelets?” Damian was back up again, lunging for Tim’s throat and digging his fingers into Tim’s shoulders. All of his other siblings were crowded around the edges of their fight, egging it on with obvious amusement.
“Uhh yeah.” He replied, a little distracted by the shitty impromptu version of the ‘don’t fall off the bull’ game playing out in front of him. God, where was Bruce when you needed him?
Dick turned around, noticing his obvious lack of attention, just in time to witness Damian being flung off Tim and crashing into a mound of pillows on the carpeted floor.
“Goal!” Steph shouted, her arms raised high, a wicked smile on her face. Cass was clapping and Duke was standing behind her with a look of vague judgement on his face.
“Oh my god! I told you not to take it too far!” Dick walked towards the chaos, hands running through his hair.
Damian hopped up from the pile of pillows and grumbled annoyedly as Dick walked up to him to look him over. Jason stared at Damian until he looked up and raised his eyebrow, subtly asking if Damian was okay. Damian nodded his head slightly and rolled his eyes at Dick’s fussing.
Jason shrugged and called out, “Okay, well that was fun. Anyways, I’m leavin’ now, someone tell the old man later.”
“Little brother, you are not staying for movie night?” Cass asked, tilting her head questioningly.
“Nah, I got work to do.” He smiled at her and moved to walk away but stopped for a second, “I’ll stay next time...maybe.”
“That’s great, Little Wing. Thanks for coming over, today was fun.” Dick gave him a thumbs up and beamed again.
“Yeah, man. It was fun, even though you almost sent everyone into a coma.” Duke piped up, Steph and Tim (who now had scratch marks on his face) nodding behind him.
“Yeah, yeah. Have fun y’all.” He rolled his eyes. Turning to Damian, he smiled mischievously, “Bye Dami, visit me again soon. I’ll cook somethin’ from home for ya.”
With that, he walked away, smiling smugly as he heard different voices raise in volume to ask Damian questions.
“You know where he lives! You have to tell me right now!” came Steph’s loud accusation.
“What does he mean ‘visit again’?” came Tim’s interrogation.
“How come you visit him, but scoff whenever I ask you to visit me?” came Dick’s incredulous whining.
“Fuck you Jason!” came Damian’s angry shout. “I fucking hate you, why would you do this to me?!”
It was fine, Damian didn’t mean that. He would come back around eventually. Jason got on his bike and looked up at the Manor’s windows. Through one of them he could see Bruce’s silhouette, he revved his motor hoping Bruce would hear him, and Bruce did. His eyes widened as he looked at Jason through the window. Jason smiled, all wide and happy, and gave him a wave before gunning it out of the Manor’s gates.
Jason laughed loudly as he drove past the Manor’s grounds, Bruce was probably having a heart attack right now trying to figure out what his smile meant. He smiled again and started humming an upbeat tune under his breath. He had just had such a nice day after all. Now, all that was left to do was to stop by the store and buy hair dye.