stephanie nashton does it all (forthem) wrote in rooms, @ 2014-04-17 03:35:00 |
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Entry tags: | !dc comics, *log, eddie nigma, stephanie brown |
log: steph/eddie.
WHO Eddie and Steph.
WHAT Post throwing Harl in Arkham talk.
WHEN Recently.
WHERE Their homestead, Old Gotham.
WARNING sads, some talk of PTSD/anxiety disorders.
I mean I’m not going to let you.
Didn’t that sound like something a real vigilante would say?
Eddie wasn’t one for heroics, or at least he didn’t think he was meant to be. An Eddie six years ago would have walked out of that candy store and let Harley do her own thing. An Eddie seven years ago would have joined in on the fun. And, Jesus had it all really been that long? He remembered each and every time he put on that bowler hat for nefarious purposes. He remembered simmering in Arkham thinking of a new and interesting way to escape. He remembered his old life as Riddler the same way a normal person remembers their frat boy years and he felt sick to his stomach when one of his old Arkham roomies still hadn’t grown out of those tendencies. He felt sick just thinking about bringing Harley into Arkham. It wasn’t just a little fight between friends, in a way it was a betrayal to all things rogue and he didn’t know how he even got to this point.
The riddled man came home in his crime fighting get up. The green coat with the cowl over his face and such a huge assortment of weaponry under it that it made him feel like an anime character. His dark hair was lost in a messy spiral. His eyes were rounded by ash circles and red from thinking too hard. He took off his jacket, the utility belts, the bullet proof vest and his violet glasses, making a riddled trail over to the living room sliding glass door and flopped down on the floor in front of it. A small sunbeam splayed over his back, Isis came over and sat on his legs and Eddie turned his brain off for just a half of a fucking second.
Then ping it was back on again.
He was a traitor to the rogues, to one of his best friends and it was all because he wanted this. He wanted an apartment, he wanted pets and he wanted the candy store down the street to stay in business.
Stephanie knew that the adjustment back home in their Gotham would be difficult. For all the romanticizing, she knew that she and Eddie were different after more than five years away. They didn’t line up with their people the way they used to. Sure, it was easy to slip back into certain roles and certain relationships, but it was just as easy to create friction again. Easier, in fact. She and Eddie had different priorities, different goals, different morals than they did before they blinked onto Earth-3, and they couldn’t go back to the old ways now. It would be dishonest to the people they are now, and frankly, impossible to do anyway.
She had expected the clashes between she and the bats and birds, but she hadn’t expected a problem between Eddie and Harley. Sure, the Joker thing was a big point of contention for everyone, and she hadn’t known how to approach the situation with Harl at all, but she didn’t begin to think that Eddie would help send her to Arkham. Her voice was said as she spoke to him on the comm, worried for her riddled man and the guilt that she was sure he was shouldering at the moment. Stephanie, for her part, wasn’t mad that Eddie had done that. Harley needed help, and while the state of Arkham was up in arms still, at least it was something. And maybe time away from the Joker would be helpful enough for the bubbly clown princess. Steph knew that a tiger didn’t change its stripes, apparently, but Harley could try. Right? Eddie moved past it, and while she was a little hardened, Steph still tried to give people the benefit of the doubt.
Still, the worry for her riddled man lingered, and as the hours passed, she fidgeted around the apartment. Working on her office was insufficient and quickly frustrating, so she made him one of his favorite dinners -- chicken quesadillas with roasted corn salsa (left in the oven to keep warm) -- and then after making sure everything else in the house was in order for him to come home to, she headed to their bathroom to draw him a bath. Eddie had installed a luxurious, spacious tub recently, with jets and different settings and room for both of them, and they had both taken to it as a place to unwind and relax. A ludicrous sort of piece of luxury that neither of them needed, but both kind of deserved.
As she turned the warm water off, she heard Eddie come into the apartment with accompanying thumps she prayed wasn’t him fainting on their living room floor. Well, she was half-right. As she slowly made her way down the hall and into the living room, she came upon her man slumped on the floor. It would’ve been funny if the circumstances weren’t so heartbreaking. Slowly, she picked up the trail he left behind until she had an armful of Riddler gear that she dumped on their couch. Bandit jumped up to sniff it as Steph, in a pair of shorts and one of his math t-shirts with triangle jokes, shuffled over quietly to Eddie, bare feet against the floor, and she crouches down next to his midsection. Knees on the floor, she reaches out to run her hand up and down his back.
“Hi, baby.” Her fingers slip under his shirt and begin to graze against his skin. “How did it go?”
He heard Stephanie walk over and decided to play dead man until she kneeled down to investigate. The sensation of her fingers on his skin brought him back to reality and he hummed out a pleased noise. Eddie couldn’t imagine coming home to an empty house anymore. That part of his life was long gone.
Eddie rolled over, Isis meowing as if her ship was sinking and wobbled off his legs just to climb on his belly instead. She was a fat cat and Eddie gave an oof as she settled square in the middle of his stomach. He looked up to Stephanie who always managed to look beautiful in her casual messiness and he smiled at her. No, maybe everything wasn’t so bad. How many times had he fought with Harley when they were both rogues? And, they always ended up being friends at the end of it. They were Gothamites. They were tough. The didn’t take silly little trips to Arkham personally.
“Hiiii.” He smiled loopy and tired back at her as Isis started to purr. “Riddle me this! When was the last time I got any shut eye! Wait, no don’t answer that. I’m not sleepy and I smell quesadillas.” Eddie wiggled his eyebrows a little half heartedly and then reached his arms up for her. “Look! I found a sunbeam! In Gotham! It’s a miracle someone call Star City!” He shook her shoulders as if this were a new scientific development. “Wait, no. They’ll probably think we stole it. And, they wouldn’t be wrong for assuming so.”
Stephanie smiled down at him, hand sliding to rest on his chest, outside of his t-shirt, when he rolled over. Greedy, yet comforting fingers twisted into the cotton fabric just above his heart. She looked tired as well, purple bags not from running around to clean up the city but from nightmares stealing away sleep. But, he looked downright exhausted, and there was a slight flicker of concern across her face before she slid her hand up his chest to cup his face, thumb brushing against his cheekbone. She tried to shoo away Isis, but she was a dumb cat as well as a fat one and couldn’t take a hint to save her life. The blonde ex-bat rolled her eyes before turning back to Eddie.
“Too long,” she offered as an answer to his riddle anyway, her hand digging slightly into his cheekbone to ground both of them there in the moment. Sometimes this still didn’t feel real; other times, like when Eddie had to throw his best friend into an insane asylum, it felt too real. She laughed at the shake of her shoulders, losing the intensity for a moment, and she gasped like she just noticed the sun for the first time at all. “Bottle it up, baby! It’s a scientific achievement! We can make millions.” She stooped down and pressed a lingering kiss to his lips as if testing out if he was alright.
“C’mere. I ran a bath,” she told him against his lips, sliding greedy fingers into his hair. She pressed more assuring kisses across his face. “Unless you want to eat first. Tell me what you need, baby.” She didn’t forget that he hadn’t answered her question, but she always had ways to coax things out of Eddie. It was Stephanie’s only superpower.
He pushed into the lingering kiss, still weak from a lack of sleep and making sure Harley got to Arkham safe, but all so eager for affection from her. He murmured he loved her between joking around about sun beams and lightly rolled a rogue strand of blonde hair behind his fingertips. “Can I eat in the bath or is that gross?” Eddie asked like a little kid wondering if he could eat cookies in bed. His eye squinted and he slowly shook his head as if he were afraid of scaring off her smattering of kisses.
“The food can wait. I ate like four chocolate bunnies today.” He told her, expression practically begging her to just ask what that was all about. Eddie turned his face to steal a quick kiss, his arms wrapping around her in a messy, desperate hug like he was starved for attention. Which he was. Eddie Nigma needed Stephanie Brown like he needed air. Gotham’s safety was important and so was living up to everything it meant to be a reformed criminal, but she was the center of his world.
“Bathtime.” He rolled Isis off him and stumbled to his feet, taking his shirt off and hopping out of his shoes and pants as he made his way to the bathroom. Inside was an enormous tub that looked like it belonged in a fancy hotel room. He had installed i before the Joker stuff as a homecoming present to Stephanie so they could take baths together. To be fair, though, it was just as much a benefit to him as it was to her. Eddie was getting old and he could feel his bones creak sometimes. They needed a good soak.
His boxers went off and were thrown on the towel rack before he slipped into the warm water. Eddie could feel all that tension from his toes to his neck fizzle out in the bath and he decided one day he’d invent a device that allowed him to nap in there safely. That would be living the dream.
Stephanie was definitely starved for his affection, too, never used to being denied any long periods with him after spending years and years almost exclusively by his side. She rumbled out a tiny noise as he pulled her into the hug, returning that murmured declaration with one of her own. The familiarity of love and attention from him crashed over her like a wave, and the invisible tension she had been carrying in her shoulders subsided considerably as he held her close. The readjustment would still be hard, as would any time away from him, but whenever he pressed his lips to hers or held her in his arms, the world seemed like it would be okay.
Following the trail of clothes towards the bathroom, she picked those up as well, going back to the living room to toss those on top of the belts and coat -- with an earned hisssss from a startled Bandit -- before slipping into the kitchen to pour them both a glass of red. When she padded into the bathroom finally, Eddie was already in the bath, and Stephanie flashed a smile as she knelt down on the cold, tiled floor next to the bath. She held out a glass for him and took a sip of her own before resting it on the floor near her knee.
“Is it good?” she asked of the water, casually wadding fingers through it to make sure the temperature was perfect. Satisfied (though Eddie could sometimes be difficult), she leaned her arms onto the porcelain mouth of the tub, resting her cheek on one of her forearms. “So what’s this you said about chocolate bunnies and not bringing any home to me?” she teased softly, concern clear as day in her voice. Well, at least it was clear for someone who knew her as well as he did.
Eddie sank his hands under the warm water, his tattoos turned into wavy blobs of color and then he brought them up to rub his face and thread his fingers through his dirty, dark hair. When she walked his his eyes were closed and he was mid-sigh. It took more than a bath to really shake off everything Gotham could do to a person. Luckily, she had a glass of wine and that always made things better. “‘s good.” Eddie replied in a vaguely Latino accent and then opened one eye as she took a seat next to him. The other eye opened and his gaze ticked into focus on her. “I made you worry. I’m sorry, Stephanie.” Honesty in his voice that was brand new straight from Earth-3. Before the war, he got a kick out of making her worry about him. It made him feel wanted. Now, Eddie didn’t need that kind of assurance if it caused her any pain.
He took the glass of wine and sat up to sip it, giving another small sigh like another part of his clockwork mind and heart clicked into place. “Well, the good news is I think we’re going to get a lot of free Easter candy this year.” Eddie rolled his eyes and took another sip of wine before placing the glass next to the tub. “I went to take a walk around the hotel to cool off and when I came back through the door, I walked through the front door of that candy store down the street...the one that sells those dots on the paper I like so much? Anyway, I walk through to the Gotham street and standing there are a bunch of clown goons and Harley.”
Eddie sank deeper into the tub, water grazing the bottom of his stubbled chin. “You know, except I didn’t see clowns. I saw owls. So I shot one in the stomach and another in the kneecaps like it was just a regular day in the Earth-3 neighborhood.” He splashed some water in frustration so lightly it didn’t even get out of the tub.
Stephanie smiled tiny and appreciatively as her cheek laid against her forearm. “It’s okay,” she assured him, sighing quietly and closing her eyes for a moment. “It’s not your fault. The worrying came back now that I have time to actually think about it.” That was a lie, and he knew that. She was always worried about him in some shape or form, even if she trusted him implicitly now. She would always be guilty of worrying about her riddled man, and he could see that in the way her blue eyes softened when she opened them. “I just know how hard all of this has got to be for you.”
She shot him an amused look. “Frank and Marie are going to be so mad when we give Frankie cavities.” She listened attentively, one arm slipping out from underneath the other so her hand to dip into the warm water. She didn’t seem surprised to hear Harley thrashing about, only sad for the clown princess who, she felt, was so much better than all of that. Maybe that was just her biased towards rogues’ redemption. Her arm swished back and forth, disturbing the warm bath water in tiny, barely there waves. She watched him slip further into the water, and she reached out to touch his jaw gently.
“You did?” she asked, sitting up slowly, hand dripping from the water and both going to grip the edge of the bath. “Oh, Eddie.” She said it like she understood. She saw Earth-3 in a lot of things here, and like a nightmare she couldn’t wake up out of, she found it hard to just shake it and blink away sometimes. “Did you see them as clowns after the fact?” That was another worry. If he couldn’t stop it, if they were both struggling like that, would they be okay?
Eddie leaned into her touch and she could feel his cheek flush. He wasn’t the kind of man who got embarrassed by many things, so to show shame over seeing ghosts from his past was telling. Truthfully, he didn’t understand it. Eddie was a rogue, he had been through hell and back. He had been possessed, hit in the head so hard he forgot how to do math, dunked in the Lazarus Pit and left to rot in Arkham more times than he could count. So, why was Earth-3 keeping him up at night? How could something get under his skin like that?
“As soon as I saw Harley,” He snapped his wet fingers, sending a spray of water in all directions. “I was back here. One of her goons tossed me in the candy store, I told Harley she had to stop- that Joker was already playing with Batman and it was only a matter of time before...” Eddie trailed off, splashing water with his fingers and then snagging them with hers. “She gave me this look I haven’t seen in years and years. The kind they’d show on tv when she was robbing joints. It’s the same smile I’ve seen on the Joker, on my own face, on any number of Arkham alumni. So, I knew.” He turned to look at her and then reached down for his wine glass. “I just knew she was in too deep.”
Some of the water got on her face, and she wrinkled her nose, but didn’t wipe it off. Instead, she leaned back towards the bath, chest pressed up against porcelain as he snagged his fingers with hers. She slipped hers in between his, tugging lightly to ground him there with her, and she reached out again to drag her free hand across his jaw when he turned to her. Fingernails grazing across stubble as she catches his puppydog browns with her clear blues. She gave him enough room to grab the wineglass, but she didn’t relent with her gaze or hold. Tugging at his fingers again, she tried to convey how much she understood. Because she was living with the baggage, too. Her sleeps were interrupted by gunfire that wasn’t there, by a panic unfounded, by a world that didn’t exist to them anymore.
“You did the right thing, baby. I hope you know that.” Finally, she let her fingers slip from his face and fall into the bathtub with a light splash before she sat back to take a long sip of wine from her own glass. Her other hand still held his, fingers entwined as she rubbed the back of his with her thumb. “It would’ve gone ugly if you hadn’t brought her in. The Bat would’ve found her, or one of the birds, and it would’ve gotten messy and violent and she would get hurt. At least now she’s away from all that. Maybe it’s what she needs?”
Eddie took a sip of wine and then turned his head to gnaw on one of her fingers gently, leaving a faint red stain there. “I do know that.” He confirmed, though he didn’t seem over the moon about doing the right thing. Eddie rarely was. “Can you imagine if Jason found her? I mean, Harley would win because she’s a superior fighter, but it would have gotten real bad, real fast.” He sat up in the tub, holding the wine glass to his lips in thought and then finally looked over to her. “I want Harley to keep getting chances. I didn’t get it right the first time or even the second time. But, no one is going to give her a chance if they think she’s some stupid girl who runs off with Joker every chance she gets.”
The riddled man was bad figuring out women despite how much he liked and respected them. He knew that Harley was smart, that she was one of the cleverest rogues in the gallery and he never treated her otherwise. Not many others saw it that way. To the birds she was probably just dangerous arm candy to the most vile person in Gotham and she’d never be anything more. Eddie didn’t want her to be branded with that for the rest of her life.
Another sip of wine and he closed his eyes with a satisfied hum. He set the glass down on the floor again and then turned to look at her. “The only time she went straight for a while was when Joker was out of the picture. He vanished for sometime while trying to help Grayson find Bruce and then ended up in Arkham. The second she saw him again it was over.” He gave a dry laugh. “See, that must be true love.”
Stephanie smirked, oww-ing quietly and look at him with eyes wide and blonde brows high like he had just hurt her. She pulled that hand back, shaking it dramatically, and then going for a sip of her own. The wine buzzed quick to her head in her exhaustion, and a slight flush was already growing on her pale cheeks. Tugging at his fingers again, she assured him silently that he did the right thing. “We all deserve chances,” she agreed, dragging her teeth across her wine-stained bottom lip. “Harley more than most. I think that she’s got potential, baby, don’t you?” Maybe it was that idealism always burning in her bones, but the way her blues flashed as they caught his gaze again betrayed that pesky little hope that still found its way into so much of her in spite of everything they’d gone through.
“I know that the Bat and the birds won’t want to give her a chance, especially after what Joker did and what she did. But,” she shrugged, taking another sip before sliding the glass across tiles and away from her. “Maybe if she gets the right care she needs. Or, at least if they keep her and Joker separated, she’ll have a chance. This Bruce is all about redemption, so maybe he’ll be willing to give her the chance that she needs.” The birds would be more difficult, but weren’t they always? How many of them still distrusted the riddled man soaking in the bath next to her. She didn’t even want to know.
Steph rolled her eyes. “Hell no.” Her free hand, the one not holding onto his like it would stop him from sinking into the bath completely, slid across his wet, slick chest before running down his arm. “If that’s true love I’ll bite my own fingers off.” She knew that Harley thought what she felt for the Joker was love, but the blonde ex-bat knew it was so far from the case. “He treats her like shit. She deserves worlds better than him.” A pout drew out her reddened bottom lip as she thought about their clown and how different things might be if he was running around instead of the clown prince of crime. Maybe Harley would be like she and Eddie -- straddling the fence, but so much closer to the light side of gray.
Eddie shook his finger at her, a sort of up and down no no no that was so old school Riddler it hurt. “No one makes Harley feel special except for Joker. It’s a lie and she knows it, but why would you ever want to live in a world where no one really wants or cares if you’re around.” Eddie sank back down into the tub, letting the last of the warmth electrify and decompress every last nerve in his body. He was a riddled mess, he always would be, so that feeling of unravel was precious to him. “It’s easy living a lie. Easier than facing the truth. Just like it’s easy for people to simplify and compartmentalize the world instead of accepting it as a giant mess of wires and circuits no one can ever figure out.”
The riddled man had a way of talking almost philosophically when he was running on no sleep and a glass of wine.
“I sort of envy her, actually. I can live without knowing, Machina taught me that, but I can’t live in a lie. If I didn’t believe every I love you from your lips, I’d go crazy. I’d break down who we are together until there was nothing left.” He ran wet hands through his hair again and he finally felt like the Eddie she knew him as. Living, breathing and human. More than just his riddles and tricks. He reached out a hand for her and smiled dizzily at her flushed cheeks and bright blues. “Though, you’re the only person that has ever made me feel truly loved. Maybe if you were lying I’d let it go on a little longer than it should. It feels good. Right?”
Stephanie shook her head. “I’d rather know the truth than keep believing in something fake.” That sentiment came not only from years of not being afforded fakeness and bullshitting, but also from her natural tendency to never take anything skin deep. She never took the first answer, the one on the surface. Steph always wanted more out of life, and she could never wrap her mind around people who didn’t. “I never get when people do.” Where the sleepiness and red wine brought out philosophies from the riddled man, it dragged even more honest out of his blonde. “It doesn’t seem like any sort of way to live, y’know? Like, what’s the entire fucking point if none of it -- the feelings, the commitment, the love -- is real?”
She brrrrrr’d a little as if to shake it off, returning his smile with one of her own. “It’s a good thing you’ll never have to find that out, huh?” She leaned into wherever his hand touched, a noise rumbling from her throat.”Of course it feels good. Being in love -- being in love with you? That’s the best thing I can ever feel, even if I worry about you or get hurt or whatever. That’s all worth it because it’s real. Not some wishing after the one or whatever.” She sighed, resting her chin on the mouth of the porcelain tub. “I’m glad you can’t live a lie because I can’t either. Maybe she’ll realize that she’s so much better than that, too. ”
Eddie gave a slight nod, her words sinking into him as most of her declarations did. He was no longer the sort of man who didn’t fully believe anyone could love him as deeply as Stephanie did. Even after the heartbreak on Earth-3, he knew what they had was something he earned. It might have been the first thing he ever earned fairly in his entire life. “What Harley has is complicated. She can look into the darkness and see things we never could.” Eddie murmured and maybe this time it frustrated him a little to know there would always be things in this world he didn’t understand. It was so much easier to accept the cosmic unknowns of other dimensions and their technology. But, Eddie always thought he was good at understanding the darkness, too.
The bathwater was turning cold. He gave a shiver and a smile up at her. “Quesadilla time.” He declared and then slowly sat up, popping the drain open while he was still in the tub (he liked the rush of water around him) and then slowly got up and reached for a towel. Eddie had never been one to feel body shame (he used to run around in spandex), but being completely naked around her was something anyone had to get used to. It was more about the feeling of being exposed than anything else. Years ago he would have practically pulled the towel around his waist before he even got out of the tub and he knew she’d do the same if the roles were reversed. Now, there really wasn’t any point in hiding from her, was there?
He dried himself off and then put a towel around his waist as he used another to ruffle his messy black hair. Eddie walked over to the mirror, ran his hand over his stubbled face and smiled at the visible lines and scars. Eddie was an old man who never got to see himself get old until now. His mind wandered and then he turned to look at her. “Should I go on medication again?” And, wasn’t that riddle out of the blue? “Sorry, it’s just- with this Owlman thing. Seeing those goons. Who’s to say I’m not going to walk into a diner and think the waiter is Superwoman? Or if I’m up in the Watchtower and one of the Leaguers sneaks up on me?”
When Eddie shivered, she smiled knowingly and slid back and away from the tub as he pulled himself out of the tub. She sat on the bath rug for a moment, wiggling her toes and rubbing her feet on the fuzzy fabric. Years ago, in this Gotham, it wouldn’t have been as easy to sit in the bathroom with him, to see him completely naked outside of the bedroom. Despite all the time between the sheets, the suggestive pictures, how often they saw each other like that, Stephanie was always uncomfortable letting him see all of her, especially in the light. She felt body shame, the scars across her body telling stories she didn’t want to remember back then. Even after all the times he told her how beautiful she was, the younger Stephanie would never believe his words..
Now, though, Stephanie and Eddie knew each other inside and out, knew everything about each other, and there wasn’t a point of hiding. She didn’t need to hide anymore. And she knew he felt the same way.
After a second of childish focus on the fuzziness of the rug, she slid back further, closed the lid on the toilet, and sat on top of it. She watched him inspect himself with a fondness that people with their intimacy felt. A light in her blue eyes and a constant want of affection, because god, six years down the road, and she was still stupidly in love with her riddled man. She hated the cliche, but it was true: she loved him more and more every single day. And being here, finally at home, it couldn’t get muddled away with all of the pain war brought. Right?
“What?” she asked, startled, affection sliding away for surprise instead. She looked at him for a moment, but there wasn’t that worry or fear that used to be there when he talked about his mental illness. Just a strange mixture of understanding and acknowledgement. “Do you want to?” Sighing, she glanced away. “I’m scared I’ll see things, too. I don’t know if you hear me waking up every night, but I do. I wake up to bombs going off and watching our people die,” she said, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes and sighing. After a moment, she looked back up at him. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Do you think it would help?”
He leaned back on the sink, palms pressed against the very modern looking slab of marble and he watched her. Eddie tried not to stare at her, that lingering, piercing gaze that he used when he tried to figure someone out. Oh yes, he knew all about the nightmares. About her clutching the sheets and then clinging to him as if she were afraid he was dead or gone. He hadn’t asked yet because of all the turmoil over what they wanted. It was as if they were fighting over a mess of knotted strings and once they agreed to share it, all that was left was the long process of untangling it.
“Are you losing a lot of sleep from it?” Eddie knew anxiety like the back of his hand and it was all about asking obvious, small questions. “Is it really every night?” He crossed his arms, inked color and pictures folded over his chest. “That’s when things get bad, Steph. When you consistently can’t sleep the entire night through...” He shook his head and looked away from her. Worried. Eddie knew that when he didn’t sleep, his riddles got worse and his mind could barely function without twisting reality into puzzles. She had seen it before. She had seen him turn his base of operations on Earth-3 into a riddle house overnight just from lack of sleep. And, the thought of Stephanie going through that changed the conversation from him to her.
She whined just a touch, shifting against the seat and rubbing her eye with the back of her hand before looking up at him. She didn’t want to acknowledge all the problems that she was having now that they were back home. They had just finished muddling through the problems of what they wanted from the future now that they weren’t fighting for their lives. She didn’t want to have to battle something else just because she couldn’t shake some stupid paranoid shit.
Stephanie waved her hand dismissively, turning away to look at the door. “We’re talking about you, Eddie. What happened with you.” She regretted bringing anything up at all about the visions that woke her up at night and haunted the back of her mind during her daytime hours. She wished that she could have just left all of that on Earth-3, in that other Gotham, but it clung to her like a parasite, like a disease she couldn’t get rid of. Eddie had been the focus, and she shook her head again as if that would work well enough to bring it back to him.
“Can we talk about you? Please?” she begged with a crack in her voice. And wasn’t that enough of a tell? Not wanting to face what was going on with her and her brain. She was supposed to be the support for him when he struggled with mental illness, and she didn’t want to burden him with something like that. “We’re talking about you,” she repeated, more forcefully, still not looking away at him.
Eddie was mostly just shocked that Stephanie was huddling up in her emotion cave and trying to lock him out. How long had it been since she’d done that? He made a confused noise. “Hey.” He didn’t move from the sink, simply waiting for her to look up at him again. “I’m allowed to be worried. I know you talked about it before, but we weren’t on the same page. Now we are. Now I get to worry about you, whether you like it or not.” There was a little sternness in his voice laced with concern. He recognized the harshness in his voice the second he spoke and took it out immediately. It wasn’t there because he was trying to punish her. Eddie just had a hard time accepting she kept some things about herself close to her chest and away from him. Still. At the end of the day, Stephanie didn’t respond to any of that and he didn’t want to turn this into a fight. He also wasn’t ready to drop it.
“You have to let me help you.” He murmured gently. “You said we’re partners. That you want to share your life with me. So, pretending a big deal is small and bottling it up right in front of me isn’t fair.” Eddie’s mind started ticking with solutions. With trying to figure out the scope of how much she was hurting. Guessing was the best thing he could do when she wouldn’t tell him straight out.
Another whine and a groan preceded another tired rub of her eyes. She shouldn’t have even brought it up, and she just wished she could rewind a few moments ago where he was laying in the tub. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to tell Eddie about anything specifically -- Stephanie Brown was an open book for Eddie Nashton. She just didn’t want to talk about all the bullshit out loud. That made it feel all the more real, and if she just pretended it didn’t exist, wouldn’t it go away? That was how all of that worked. Right? But Eddie would never get away with shit, especially shit that kept her up at night caused by something that they mutually experienced. She simultaneously loved and hated him for it.
“It’s fine,” she dismissed him again before she looked up at him and relented. Her face softened, and the exhaustion really showed on her face. “We are partners, baby. But I don’t want you to have to worry about stuff going on up here,” she said, tapping the side of her head, “when you have your own stuff going on.” Steph knew, however, that Eddie wouldn’t take that for an answer either. She rubbed her hands together nervously, and if she had the chance, she would have just curled into herself and waited until they could pretend like everything was okay.
“I haven’t slept a straight night through in weeks. Probably since we got here.” She sighed, rubbing her face with her hands with a groan of frustration. “I wake up every single night. Maybe after an hour of sleep. Maybe four. Sometimes I don’t even really get to sleep before it happens.”
Eddie bit back another sound of concern, trying his best to suppress a reaction and failing miserably. “That’s worrisome.” He gave her a long look and then sighed. “You could have woken me up. I would have stayed up with you and talked to you about it. We could have figured something out before it got worse, Stephanie.” Eddie put his hands up. “I’m not trying to be pushy, here. I’m concerned. I know what you’re going through and ignoring it makes it worse. Makes it permanent.” Some people believed that Eddie was born with riddles. In reality, they snuck up on him. One after another until it became a compulsion he held onto so tightly that now it was permanently woven into his brain.
He felt like apologizing, over and over for getting on her ass about it. Usually they didn’t need to be delicate about anything. This was different, though. This was a struggle she wasn’t used to, a disability that she didn’t want to admit she had. He got that. He knew all the different ways to cover it up and act like everything was fine. “Look.” Eddie walked over to the hanger and put on his robe (with a big W on it) and then slowly approached her. He knelt down, his hands intertwining with hers. “You’re right, I’m fucked up. My brain wrote the book on fucked up. Shrinks used to clamor to study my disorder. Not cure it. Study. You’re the first person who could walk me through my anxiety and help me help myself.” He ran his thumb over the back of her hand and he silently wondered how many times he knelt in front of her. Five? Did all of them remind her of that time like it did for him?
“I know you’re scared, but you don’t have to be. Your burdens are my burdens and I’m happy to help you carry them.” Eddie knew the risk of being candid with her. That just calling her afraid of something was like challenging a Gotham kid to a duel of toughness. His gaze moved away and he wished he had more practice with side stepping problems like he used to. Honesty was all they knew now, so how could he possibly keep up with this new game of keeping things quiet?
Stephanie scowled a little, wanting nothing more than to tug her hands from his and cross her arms, curl into herself and pretend like everything was okay. Here was that Gotham kid he feared, the one that just wanted to shoulder all the burdens and prove she was way tougher than some panic disorder that had her jumping awake every night. He was right; it was scary. She had never faced something like this. Sure, there were days where she thought about nothing but her father, or the cool metal of Black Mask’s gun against her forehead, but those were isolated days of darkness. Earth-3 lingered like a disease. It gnawed at her brain, burrowed into the crevices, and burned the insides of her eyelids. It wouldn’t leave.
But, she entwined their fingers when he pushed them between hers, chewing at her bottom lip and hating herself for taking the focus away from him. He just threw his best friend into an insane asylum. Why were they talking about here? She chanced a glance at him, a look that stayed on him far longer than she meant. “Baby,” she said softly, tugging at his hands and still biting down on her lip. She tried so hard not to think about the other times he knelt in front of her, but she always did, and it caused a twinge in her stomach that reminded her of why she didn’t want to burden him with this in the first place.
Her fingers wiggled out of his hold, so her hands could slide up his arms, then up his neck, to tangle in the wet mess of his dark hair. “We’ve just stopped fighting about…you know. All of that stuff.” Steph still found it hard sometimes to actually say the words. Engagement. Marriage. Babies. A real future. “I just want us to have a break. Don’t we deserve a break?” Her fingers twisted into his curls, desperately tangling and tugging until his neck curved back with the pull. She leaned forward to press a kiss there and there and there. His jawline, his collarbone, his Adam’s apple, and then she relented a little. Her blues stared into his browns, and then she finally admitted, with a whisper, “I’m really scared, Eddie. I shouldn’t be. I don’t wanna be. But I am.”
Eddie turned his head, encouraging her fingers to explore his wet, curly hair and sighed. “How are we ever going to get a break if you can’t sleep at night?” A riddle that was bright neon and glaring in the face of her protests. He closed his eyes and let her drag his head around wherever she wanted. His mind ticked with different ways to help her and none of them involved burying this for now and revisiting it later. She could hate him for it if she wanted. Eddie never much cared about anyone hating him so long as it didn’t rebound to hurt her. “It’s okay to be scared.” He whispered back and then opened his eyes so he could stare back at her blues. His dark eyes searched for what she wanted. If easy was the name of the game now and Stephanie didn’t want all the twisty turning questions he was made out of. The last time he felt like this was right out of Arkham, when he was pretty sure he was too crazy for anyone to love.
His eyes closed, squeezing shut and he rolled his tongue over his lips in thought before inhaling. “I’m going to a veteran’s anonymous meeting this week. I need help and that’s where I’m going to start.” He stood up and tugged at her hands so she’d wrap her arms around him. “You don’t have to go, but I’d really appreciate the support.” It was an obvious ploy, something a child could see through. To him, it was a test to see if she really wanted a break.
Part of her wanted to look away, but he always, always managed to arrest him with those deep brown eyes that held a hundred years of different lives stitched together into one single, riddled man. A riddled man she loved with all of her heart. And didn’t he have a list of his own problems that she always promised to look past? Wouldn’t he do the same? And Stephanie Brown never, ever did easy. Even if she tried to convince herself that was what she wanted, she never actually did want something easy and simple. She knew just as well as he did that the best things in life were never like that. Didn’t they have to fight for so hard just to be able to get there? Not just away from Earth-3, but for each other. For this life of ‘the farm’ and living together. To finally have that one person that would always be in their corner no matter what.
She stood up along with him, arms wrapping around his neck, and she buried her face into the crook of his neck. “I don’t want to be scared,” Steph argued, the sentiment almost lost in a muffle against his skin. “I hate it. I hate feeling so lost and out of control. I hate it.” Her fingers dug into the back of his neck, nails digging grooves into the skin there until her grip went sharp. She planted more kisses on his neck, like smothering him with affection would make her feel better in some way. It did, usually, and she could feel herself calming in his arms as her lips pressed against his clean skin.
She let it linger for a moment, the offer to go to the meeting, and then she nodded in the crook of her neck. “Okay, yeah.” What kind of harm could it do? She pulled back to look at him. “Am I gonna have to talk?”
Eddie liked being Stephanie’s anchor. He liked when she pulled and dug like he was the only thing at the edge of a cliff for her to hold onto. Stephanie did the same for him, more times than he could count. “I’m not going to let you get lost. As long as I’m here, you’re not lost.” He told her, arms wrapping around her waist and squeezing. Being scared wasn’t something he could fix, but he made a mental note to start waking up with her when she had an attack in case she needed to talk. Or hell, even if she needed a glass of water. Eddie fixed things through small, gradual solutions. He helped her by being there whenever she needed him.
He pulled back to look at her. “Little Miss Chatty doesn’t want to talk?” Eddie teased her lightly and reached to run his hands over her shoulders and down her arms. “No, you don’t.” He said more seriously. “As long as you sit there and listen with everyone else when I do, I don’t think you have to talk until you want to.” Because he knew eventually she would want to. Enough of those meetings and seeing brave soldiers admit that imaginary bombs and screams kept them up at night and she wouldn’t feel so alone in all of this.
In his arms, she felt safe. Whenever he wrapped his arms around her to hold her close, she felt almost invincible. It was the only way that she could feel any sense of security on Earth-3, those stolen moments when he would slide close or press kisses wherever he could reach. Those were her anchors -- his fingers as they slid across her skin, his mouth as it captured hers, his tattooed, muscled arms as they gripped onto her like she was his lifeboat, too. Maybe it was a little unhealthy, but Eddie was Stephanie’s lifeline, always would be, and nothing would ever, ever change that. She knew he was the one thing that would really help her pull herself out of this.
“I love you, Eddie,” she murmured, kissing the corner of his jaw then tracing a line down to his chin with her mouth. Her nails scraped against the skin at the nape of his neck before one hand moved to his hair again like a magnet. She shot him a look, and his hair twisted between her fingers. “Shut up, I’m not Little Miss Chatty.” That was such a lie, but this was different sort of situation. She could blabber for days and days, but anxiety was such a touchy subject. An elephant in the room that many people chose to ignore.
“I love you, too.” He said back in a grounded tone that no one outside of the apartment would believe existed. Eddie was like any of the other rogues. There was the face he showed everyone else, the smarmy little hacker who wrapped himself in Gotham’s darkness and Eddie Nashton, the man who once waited at Stephanie’s bedside without sleep or food until she got better. The man who carried a set of toy keys for his god daughter in his blazer jacket when he went to visit. Maybe he didn’t have a moral compass or a hold on how to keep friends, but when he cared about someone he gave it everything he had.
He rocked her in his arms a little, smile itching on the side of his face. “I’m surprised you have time to stuff your face with waffles between all the chatting you do.” Eddie kissed her and then let her go, walking towards the kitchen. “Though, I’m a hundred percent sure you do the talking and eating thing at the same time like a pro.” He said from the doorway, shooting back a playful smirk.
Stephanie looked up at him with that unadulterated sort of love and appreciation that no one else in the entire world -- in different universes -- got to see except for him. No one made her feel the way Eddie did. They never did; they never would. There was absolutely no contest, and the flash of her blues spoke volumes of all the adoration she had for her riddled man. He was the one who saved her life in more ways than one, who supported her no matter what, who stayed with her even when she had broken his heart into pieces and tried to deny him all of this. She was so glad, so grateful, so pleased that she had him in her life, and she wouldn’t give him up for the world. Any world.
She wrinkled her nose as he teased her and kissed her, swatting at him as he stepped away. “Are you calling me a fat-ass? First off, how d’you expect me to keep this figure?” She gestured at her body, but then looked at him shocked. “Jerk.” Grabbing a towel from the rack, she threw it hard at his head. “You know aaalllll about eating and talking, baby,” she retorted with a smirk, taking a nearby washcloth and tossing it at his head too.