Tim Drake-Wayne (tjdrake_wayne) wrote in somerealityrpg, @ 2020-04-02 09:29:00 |
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Entry tags: | inactive: harley keener, inactive: tim drake |
Who: Tim Drake-Wayne & Harley Keener
What: A Late night drink talk
When: A few hours after this
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Underage drinking, sad feels
Status: Complete
Tim was feeling a bit better; he’d sat and watched movies with his friends and caught up on at least ninety minutes of sleep (because he refused to watch the Emoji movie, but had stayed away for most of Detective Pikachu because he was interested in that one and it had been a lot better than he’d expected). Heading away from Cassie’s room back up towards the roof, he took a detour past his own apartment and ‘liberated’ two bottles of liquor from the cupboard. He’d replace them later. Maybe. If his Alvin Draper ID ever miraculously appeared. Alvin was twenty-one.
He still felt a little feverish so he had a large, oversized hoodie on and he headed up to the roof where he’d agreed to meet Harley, pinging him a text to let him know that he was on his way up. The sun had long since gone down, the city lit up with lights that obscured whatever stars might be up in the night sky. He missed Gotham’s skyline and stars. He felt weird that Bruce and Dick had gone, even though they weren’t the ones he knew. They weren’t the Dick that had kicked him out or the Bruce that he’d been looking for.
He rubbed his hand over his face and tugged his hood up, sitting on a bench and putting the bottles on the floor, legs stretched out in front of him as he waited for Harley to join him.
Life was...complicated. Harley felt like his emotions were trying to kill him at this point. He had circles under his eyes, bruises on his left arm from his stunt with Morgan’s glove, and he just looked unamused in general. He clutched a tupperware container of tacos he had helped make as he headed up to the roof. The apartment was loud and yet another stray had been brought home. Okay, that wasn’t entirely fair, Cal had arrived with a pretty kick ass droid. Still, Tony was collecting people like fucking beanie babies. He shoved open the door to the roof and was faintly glad he was wearing his pastel pink hoodie from Disney.
"Hey," his Tennessee accent in full force thanks to the fact he was just mentally tired. He walked over to Tim and pretty much dropped the tacos in his lap before taking a seat next to him. "Fuuuuck," he drew out as he yanked his own hood up, causing hair to stick out slightly around the edges. Har needed a haircut, but it was just so easy to slap a hat on.
"Thanks for the escape. Tony brought home another stray." MJ being back was not helping his mood. She was going to steal Peter's attention and jealous mixed with fear were spiking in his mind. No one picked Harley, they all left. He reached up and rubbed his lower face with a hand as he tried to stop those thoughts. He was better than this.
"So drinks and being moody?"
“Drinks and being moody,” Tim said, tucking one leg underneath himself and resisting the urge he had just to perch where he was. Sitting like a normal person worked too. His secret identity didn’t really need to be kept secret here; he’d probably be able to do good as Red Robin here without needing to use a mask. No one else here seemed to guard their identity, but he wasn’t fond of the thought of everyone knowing what he could do. Or his connection to Bruce-as-Batman. Though… with the other Bruce that was here, it was likely that people already knew he was Batman?
God, it made his head hurt. More than the fever-induced headache anyway.
He sniffed and bent forward, picking up one of the bottles and held it out to Harley. “Here,” he said, “figure one each was a good idea. You can finish mine if I can’t.” Because he’d never really drunk before, a glass of champagne following Dick around that he’d immediately spat out and put back definitely didn’t count. According to the research he’d done on the internet earlier, drinking got a bit easier the more you did of it. So he’d just have to fight past the first few mouthfuls? He could do that. He made himself immune to half a dozen poisons, after all.
“Bad day?”
Drinking wasn't something Harley did. He had been so busy being a parent and big brother to Abbie back home that he hadn't bothered touching a bottle. While she had been… gone, well, he had been busy raising himself. Drinking just hadn't fit into his plans. He accepted the bottle with a nod before stretching his legs out in front of him. The question caused him to snort.
"Bad life," he retorted as he worked at opening the bottle. "I'm just being myself." The stuff smelled potent amd he wrinkled his nose in mild disgust before raising the bottle in a salute. "Cheers!" Harley took a large swig and regretted it immediately. Yes, he managed to swallow the mouthful, but he started coughing as it burned. "Fuck the bullfrogs," he winced as he covered his mouth with his arm as he coughed a bit more.
"Sweet Jesus, that is not what I expected." Despite that reaction, he took another swig and managed to cough less. He sat there in silence for a bit before he let out a sigh. "Tony… is basically the closest thing to a father I know. He is dead back home, but before that our relationship was just FaceTime and phone calls. I have to share him with so many people here. He is like the fucking sun and everyone wants to bask in his glow. It is really annoying, but I don't…. He is happy." He glanced down at the bottle as he frowned.
"People keep arriving for Peter and Tony and I'm just… on the outside. Not an Avenger, not a hero, just the kid who is doing nothing with his life and being a jealous little shit." Well, damn, he hadn't meant to say quite that. "So, yes, bad life."
Tim let out a slow breath as he listened, watching Harley out of the corner of his eye take a drink from the bottle and regret it but immediately go in for another. That kind of determination was something Tim could get behind, but he hadn’t opened his own yet. He nodded, shifting again so he was facing Harley a little better.
“Yeah,” he echoed, “that sounds… like a lot.” Because it was. “I’ve seen him posting on the network a bit, he’s got a big family, right? Or are they all just random people he keeps taking in?”
"...random people he keeps taking in," Harley said with scorn. "Tony was this billionaire back home. Ended up making this kick-ass suit, called himself Iron Man. I met him when I was a kid. Then he went off to save the world again." He took another drink and managed not to cough this time, but he did hiss in displeasure.
"Tony has this huge heart, I want him to be happy, I just wish he didn't have to have so many people around him. I hate people." Harley tipped his head back to look up at the sky as he frowned. "I hate that they always leave."
He couldn't talk about this stuff with anyone from back home so it was kind of therapeutic to talk to Tim. "Anyway. I think I'll probably just hide at work for awhile and work on VR. Maybe get Jason to beta more levels. If I am watching Jason then I don't have to talk to anyone."
Tim let out a sound that was supposed to be a laugh but sounded a lot more broken than that. It caused him to unscrew the lid of his own bottle and take a swig of it himself. It tasted more gross than he’d expected and he cleared his throat, but otherwise didn’t react. He pressed his lips together.
“I hate that people always leave too,” he shared quietly, looking down at his knees, picking at the label on his bottle. “But you know, it’s okay to feel the way you are. People always talk like jealousy’s a bad feeling and like, it doesn’t feel great, but there’s always a basic need not being met when you feel like that.”
Besides, he knew what that feeling was like. Intimately. Especially more recently with Damian turning up and getting everything.
“I never thought of watching Jason fight as therapeutic,” he admitted, “mostly because I’m either fighting with him or against him.” It was ironic that Tim was so close to Jason after everything. Including the whole… breaking into Titans tower to try and kill him thing. “Mostly it gives me a headache. His form’s all over the place.”
Harley pursed his lips together as he let that thought bounce around his head. Being jealous is okay… He shrugged and crossed his ankles as he debated what he would do with that new knowledge. Could he honestly tell Tony he was jealous? Somehow he doubted that. No, he was just going to keep stuff to himself and find other ways to release his emotions.
And then he found himself blinking as he looked at Tim with a startled look. "That isn't…" He couldn't help bursting out with laughter that was much needed at this point. "I meant," he managed to say once he calmed down. "Jason is easy on the eyes." His cheeks flushed faintly before he found himself staring down at his own bottle.
"I don't really get close to a lot of people. Peter will either be happy or jealous. Maybe both? That I'm opening up to someone at all. Normally I just bottle everything up and then blow something up." Peter, that was a sore topic. He didn't know exactly where he stood with the guy, but he knew he hated the idea that he might lose him to MJ.
"Whatever. I've survived this long without needing anyone. I will continue to be the jealous jerk I am," he rolled his eyes at the disdain in his voice. Har took another swig of the nasty alcohol and managed not to react at all this time. Progress.
The comment about Jason visibly caught him off guard. He’d never thought of Jason like that. He’d hero-worshipped him when he had been Robin, been somewhere between terrified and awed when Jason came back as Red Robin with the Pit clinging to him. Now… well, now Jason was a brother, and right now someone that Tim felt cared more about him than Dick did which was saying something. He blinked a couple of times before just lifting a shoulder. “Gotta admit I’ve never looked at him like that but I supposed objectively speaking he’s not ugly.” That was a true sibling response, a grudging compliment, complete with a shrug.
“Being jealous doesn’t make you a jerk,” Tim countered gently. “And I don’t get close to many people either. I was with my team for at least two years before I stopped wearing my- Before I told them my name.” He took another pull from the bottle. It burned, making his throat feel the same way it did after one of Ivy’s airborne toxins. Gross. Why did people do this? “I’m not sure who Peter is but yeah, one of my other brothers, he- he’d be really glad I’m talking to someone, even if I’m not saying much, y’know? Because normally I talk to him but he- he knows nothing about what I’m going through right now. Well, not now, but before I came here.”
And it was always easier to talk to a stranger. “Besides, sometimes when you’ve got things, you don’t want to bother the people you’re closest with. So they don’t look at you with pity or treat you differently.”
A snort of laughter escaped Harley as he shrugged. "I have no issues admitting when someone is nice to look at, but yeah I think I would have the same reaction if someone said that about my sister."
He raised an eyebrow and gave Tim an impressed look. "I thought I was bad, you've out done me. And Peter is… he is my best friend, my significant annoyance," he said with faint amusement. "I met Peter at Tony's funeral, we became text buds… it was nice to have someone to talk to since I pretty much cut myself off from everything back home. I normally talk to him, but… you are right. I wouldn't be able to someone like Peter giving me a pitying look."
Harley took another drink without really thinking about it. He felt warm and a bit sleepy, which was fine by him. "My sister is supposed to be older," he said randomly since he was clearly on a roll of telling his life story. "We had this really fucked up thing happen where this guy named Thanos made half the population of everything vanish… Abbie was eating the dinner I had cooked her because mom was at work and she just- my sister just turned to dust and vanished. You know what I told Tony when I talked to him again? I'm fine. How messed up is that? And then I get my sister back five years later, just reappeared in the same spot, because Tony sacrificed himself. I can't have a whole family at once it seems. I have Tony here and no Abbie and I have to share with Tony."
Harley let out the type of laugh that was breaking from the moment it left his lips. "God, I'm fine. Like always."
Tim hadn’t meant to try and ‘outdo’ Harley and it took him a moment of reflection to stop himself from trying to explain that he’d been trying to empathise, not compete. He struggled with people a lot, those that were closest to him even didn’t understand him half the time but that was as much his fault as anything else, maybe it was even more his fault than anyone else’s. After all, he didn’t exactly make it easy for people to get to know him. The ones who tried he consistently pushed away and they only got through because of a few weak moments (like this one) where he ended up telling them more than he’d meant to.
He nodded, leaning back a little and taking another sip. Still gross. Definitely still gross.
“That-” he chewed his lower lip, thumb picking at the label. “-that’s horrible. I mean, I’m glad you got her back but- but-” He shook his head, fighting the urge to reach out and touch Harley’s arm. He didn’t know him well enough to know how physical reassurance would be received: he didn’t take it well from those he didn’t know. “I can get why you’re… ‘fine’.”
He reached out and touched Harley’s arm, just for a moment and then drew back. “Though I don’t think I’d expect anyone to be fine after all that, and then to have to deal with having the person who’s meant to be looking after you not really being there. Even if you’re not letting him.”
Harley wasn't trying to actually say that Tim was one-upping, but he wasn't the greatest at communicating either. "I was supposed to go to MIT, I work as a mechanic back home so I can raise Abbie. I need to make sure she is fine," he blinked slightly at the arm touch. Touch was something he associated with Peter. The first time he had been hugged here he had tensed up, but now he was more relaxed about the whole thing. Actually, despite his issues, he had been slightly more open with his friends and family here. Hell, he had told Morgan he loved her.
"It isn't-" The words were hard and he reacted as if Tim was Peter or something by leaning against him slightly. "Tony would drop everything for me, if I asked. He just… people love him. He has been there for me, I just… I make things difficult. I don't want to stop him having people over or from adopting like nearly everyone. I simply don't know what to do with so many people. I suck at people. This isn't on him, this all on me."
Harley took another long swig from the bottle and still wasn't a big fan of the taste. The only thing he was learning is that alcohol made him chatty as fuck.
"Still want me to work with you? Now that you know I'm broken?"
Tim noticed that Harley leaned into him a little, so the touch wasn’t unwanted. He leaned the side slightly again, just letting Harley feel the reassuring pressure against his shoulder. Honestly, it felt nice. He sat with Conner like this too, though Conner was broader and radiated heat like he was a furnace.
“Have you asked him to just… do something that’s just the two of you?” he asked, “that doesn’t make you a brat. It just- it just makes you a kid that wants to spend time with his, like, sorta dad.”
If only Tim even took his own advice.
“You’re definitely not broken,” he reassured, turning his head to look at Harley. “And I do still wanna work with you.” He let out a breath, “I’m not about to judge anyone for how they feel. I mean, I’ll admit, I don’t exactly have the best track record of handling things well.”
"Just breakfast. I might start asking for more one on one time, I don't know." Harley raised his bottle up to eye how much he had consumed. At least half the bottle was gone and he wasn't sure what that really meant. He shrugged more to himself than anything before taking a large swig.
"Good." He didn't say a word about Tim saying he wasn't broken, instead just jumping to the still working together. "I want to work with you too." Harley glanced at Tim with mild interest. "You mean you don't normally get drunk with people to deal with things," he teased with a much thicker accent now. His words were maybe slurred, he couldn't tell. Tomorrow he was going to regret things, but right now he was oddly content.
"I think you aren't that bad. We should be actual friends."
Tim snorted slightly, “That’s glowing praise. ‘Not that bad’.” He took another swig of the bottle and this time let his grimace show, lifting the bottle to look between them. “This stuff is gross. I don’t know why people drink it for fun.”
He wasn’t sure if it was the penicillin or the anti-virals or the alcohol, but he was feeling a little dizzy now. And surprisingly tired.
“But,” he added with a soft giggle, “no, I don’t normally get drunk with people on the roof. I try and clone my dead best friend back to lif-” Oh, crud.
Harley snickered, "it is glowing praise from me." He burst out laughing as he nodded. The stuff was disgusting, but he had a feeling he would actually get some nice sleep after this. "I am not sure, honestly. I didn't do the whole house party scene."
The remark about a dead best friend had him biting his tongue. Harley was a nerd, comic books had kept him occupied when he couldn't sleep and this was one of those moments where his knowledge wanted to spring out his mouth.
"So you're a genius too," he settled on saying before a loud yawn escaped him. Even drunk he wouldn't break Tim's brain.
“No,” Tim said tiredly, slumping against Harley a little more than he had been before. “Just really tired of people leaving me.”
"That's a fucking mood. Here is to being left behind," Harley raised his bottle and didn't drink. Instead, an actually tired hiccup escaped him. "I wonder if Peter is still awake… you should meet him. When we are sober."
“Mm, when we’re sober. And you should meet Conner and Cassie and Cass. Cass is my sister. Sorta. Bruce looks after her too. When we’re sober.”
He did feel fuzzy. Fuzzy and sleepy. He didn’t like it. He felt drugged.
“I could still take down a bad guy though,” he grumbled, more to himself than Harley. “But maybe we should go inside. It’s late and cold.”
"Sounds good. When we are sober." Harley yawned again and debated if it was worth going inside. It wouldn't be the first time he fell asleep outside, but normally it was because he passed out working on something.
"Yeah, yeah, come on," he managed to stand up without falling over. Somehow. His head felt spinny, which was something he was not enjoying. "I am going to pass out so hard. Let's go before I sleep out here."
“Mm,” Tim agreed, liking less and less that his thoughts were spiralling to all the people he’d lost, how he’d managed to push Cassie away from him too, and even Tam. How he didn’t really talk to Ives anymore and Bruce was gone - twice now - and Dick didn’t want him at home and here hadn’t known him and was also gone and-
Nope, he needed to be horizontal. And sleeping. Sleep was good.
“Yeah, still,” he patted Harley gently on the upper arm, having to reach up now they were standing. “Good talk, Harley.”