And then we woke up (Harry/Dinah log)
Backdated. Takes place the morning after this thread
Waking up was a bit disorienting. She definitely wasn't in her bed at Wayne Manor, nor was she in one of Zee's guest bedrooms, despite the fact that she distinctly remembered planning to sleep at Zee's after girl's night out. There was an arm over her. Harry's. She smiled slightly as the memories from the night before began to come back to her. of course, once she remembered some of the things that had happened before Harry brought her home, she winced.
How had that even happened? She only remembered one glass of wine and one margarita and while she was by no means a regular drinker, even she wasn't that big of a lightweight. Not to mention the fact that her head didn't hurt, and she didn't feel even the slightest bit hungover.
----
Harry felt a bit of movement, and protested. He wasn't quite awake, just in the fuzzy place that was barely conscious, but feeling the movement under his arm, he wrapped the warm body beside him a bit closer and took a deep breath, breathing in the scent of her. He liked this fuzzy place. Memories from the night before began to drift back through his mind, and he smiled, eyes still shut.
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Dinah didn't complain about Harry snuggling closer. She closed her eyes again and just enjoyed the moment. Waking up like this hadn't ever been a regular thing with them. She hadn't been able to sleep over back when it was just Jake and her in the Clocktower apartment, and when she had been sleeping here after Jake had gone missing, waking up meant going straight back to the search-not lingering like this.
So she didn't speak for awhile, instead just taking the time to slowly put together the pieces of the previous night. After a little while, she turned over to face him and gave him a light kiss on the forehead.
"Morning," she said with a small smile. "Please tell me that the whole making an ass of myself thing was just a very bad dream."
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Eyes still closed, Harry's smile just widened. "I think I like that fae wine. Zee said you'd gotten into that. I might have to see if Toot-toot can teach me how it's made. I'd rather not contact my godmother for it, but... I think it'd be worthwhile."
Letting out a contented sigh, Harry finally opened his eyes. He focused on hers, and said, "Good morning, D. 'M glad you called me."
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"Fae wine?" Dinah asked.
Of course. While she might not have known the particulars, she wouldn't put it past Zee to have a stash of enchanted wine She supposed that's what she got for not paying attention to what bottle she'd grabbed.
"You are?" she asked, with just a slight hopeful smile. "Even though it meant that you had to come wrangle my obnoxious, drunk self? Sorry about that, by the way. And about the whole... assuming I could just invite myself over."
She was still trying to figure out the boundaries and where they stood with everything, especially since she was pretty sure she'd stepped over boundaries right and left before Murphy had shown up.
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"You should see your obnoxious, drunk self. It's like watching a candlelight dance around a meadow, lighting up a dozen tiny flames wherever it lingers. Mesmerizing and beautiful." He kissed the tip of her nose. "You have a key and a talisman to let you in, Dinah. That means something. I don't just give those out to trick-or-treaters."
He brushed some hair out of her face and behind her ear. "Look, I promise that if it's not alright for you to be here, I'll let you know. Deal?"
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Dinah smiled up at him.
"And that's one of the things I love about you-those rose colored glasses when it comes to me. Trust me, I'm pretty sure you were the only one thinking that." she made a face. "And at least now everyone there knows the reason why I don't sing karaoke."
She pressed her lips to his.
"You know I'd reciprocate-with the key thing-if I had a place of my own." she sighed. "Haven't really had that since getting to the City. Even the apartment over the shop was a little..." she shrugged. "Too much resemblance to an old place. Too many memories."
It was worth it, for Jake, to live wherever he could be most comfortable. But she wanted a place that felt like her home-like their home, not like somebody else's. She'd always just felt like she was filling in for Barbara living at the Clocktower and of course staying at the Manor, she was a guest.
"Maybe once Jake is doing better or once we've overstayed our welcome with Alfred, I'm hoping we can find a new place of our own. We can't exactly go back to the Clocktower now and it'd be nice to live somewhere that you could visit," she gave him a small smile. "I wouldn't complain about having a few more sleepovers like this... minus the public humiliation beforehand of course."
She didn't remember that she hadn't had the chance to mention Barbara being here to him or to explain why she didn't think the Clocktower would be a good place to live with Jake anymore. There was a lot that had happened both during their time apart and even before that when she'd been keeping her distance that just hadn't come up yet.
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Harry tilted his head a bit. "I understand about the apartment," he said, furrowing his brow, "but what about the Clocktower? I thought you two liked it there." His hand lingered on her hip, fingers running lightly over her skin. He wasn't feeling any pressing desire to get out of bed right now, and little moments like this could be treasured for their rarity. Between wizarding and superheroing, life hadn't left very many options for either of them to spent many quiet mornings together. Harry was going to make it last as long as they could stand it.
At the mention of public humiliation, Harry grinned again. "Should I get drunk next time? Or, wait, I'll try and find the City's version of the Larry Fowler Show. That guy had me on twice, and the effort of the damn suppression spell I was using left me loopy for days the first time." He snorted a bit. "The second time, one of his 'expert debunking guests' was a Duke of the Red Court. I didn't bother holding the spell, and the studio burned down. He's been trying to sue me over it ever since."
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Dinah laughed.
"Guess he's out of luck with that lawsuit now," she said.
She took a little bit longer to answer the question.
"Barbara's here. But she's not... well, she's the Barbara from my reality at least, but she's from over 10 years before my time." She frowned. "She's still walking. Which means she's not the Barbara who adopted Jake, and she's not-" she bit her lip, trying to think of how to explain it. "I don't even know how to talk to her. And I don't know how to tell Jake that she's even here."
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"He was out of luck then. The only way to prove I had anything to do with the fire would have proven I was a wizard. He was stuck either way, but he wanted to keep me in the red with lawyer fees." Harry shrugged. "Well, you're right. Now he can't even get that."
Harry was silent as he listened to her, waiting patiently for her answer, and taking a moment to go over it in his own mind. "Well," he said, after a long moment, "Jake's been here before, obviously. So he's got an idea of how the City works. You're the one who came for him, D, and you're the one looking after him. Are you worried that he'll be afraid of Barbara rejecting him, or that he'd reject you and want her instead?"
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Dinah shook her head.
“No, I'm not worried about anyone getting rejected. Barbara wouldn't-” she stopped and bit her lip. “The Barbara of my time would never reject someone that she'd once taken under her wing.”
She sighed and looked away as tears prickled at her eyes.
“It's just hard enough for me to have Barbara here and not be able to talk to her like I could back home. It's just a painful reminder of the friendships that I lost when I landed here.”
She turned her gaze back to Harry's then.
“With how fragile Jake's been, I just didn't know how he'd do with it.”
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Harry pulled her close, holding her gently and kissed her on the cheeks, chin, forehead, and then gently on the lips. "It's hard not having the people you want to depend on, even when they're looking you in the face," he said. "I know that. Too well. If she's your Barbara, she'll come around. If she isn't, then you've got a good friend somewhere that you know is still out there."
He wiped away a tear from her cheek with a thumb. "But Jake... I don't think I could see the word 'fragile' being used to describe him. From those books I saw, and from that boy I've seen, he's got something stronger than steel in him. Something might have broken, but he's got that kind of strength that can fit it back together." Even when the boy had attacked Harry, in the depths of his madness, he'd referred to Dinah as his mother. Harry remembered that. The psychic attack had been something he wouldn't forget in a long time.
"I can't tell you what to do there. No one can. But that's a boy who is always going to make his own decisions about what he wants, and what he thinks is right. I just pity anyone who tries to stand in his way."
He kissed her again, and then asked, "Could I meet him sometime? I mean, formally? Not just a few glances as we're chasing him or when he's so confused and out of it he doesn't even know who he is, let alone who I could be. Sometime when he won't attack me just because I'm with his mother."
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Dinah expression lightened.
“I'd like that. Of course, it's going to have to be up to Jake, so I'll let you know once I've talked to him about it, okay?”
She rested her head against Harry's chest, snuggling in closer. It had been hard not having him there while Jake was recovering, or being able to talk to him about this version of Barbara showing up in the City. But he was here now, and she was going to take comfort in that.
“You're right about Jake too. He's stronger than I ever would have expected. It's just... hard not to want to protect him after everything that happened, you know?”
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Harry nodded, shifting his hand to run through her hair. "Of course, it'd be up to him. I wouldn't want to step into his territory. Especially not if he's keen on protecting it." Those broken ribs had hurt after all.
He gave a bit of a chuckle. "Of course you want to protect him. He's your son. You're his mother. Nothing wrong with that. But some things you can't keep hidden. Some things you can't keep away. He'll learn about Barbara sometime, even if it's not until he asks why you're not going back to the Clocktower. If he's strong enough for you to start thinking about a new place to live, maybe he's strong enough to know why you're thinking about a new place to live."
----
He was right. Not to mention that Barbara was bound to learn about how she'd become Oracle sometime too. She hated that. As much as she loved the friend that she'd left back home, she knew how much it had broken Barbara to lose the use of her legs. She had turned a tragedy around and created a new role for herself, but that didn't mean happiness at what had happened to her. And it certainly didn't mean that this younger Barbara would want to hear about what might happen to her in the future, assuming she didn't stay here.
"Okay, I'll talk to him about Barbara soon. And about meeting you. Promise."
She tilted her head to look up at Harry and then kissed him.
"But for now, let's just stay here a little while longer and then maybe get some breakfast?" She smiled. "I promise not to try to cook again. I'd rather not risk almost burning down your kitchen yet again."