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SWEATERS and HOT CHOCOLATE
Dick Grayson knew that if Bruce Wayne was left to his own devices, Wayne manor would not stop for even a second to acknowledge the fact that it was Christmas. There might be a small Christmas pudding or the obligatory roast or ham courtesy of Alfred, but there would be no decorations, no gift giving, and no holiday cheer. In fact, Bruce Wayne had always treated Christmas as though it was no different to any other day of the year, or at least he did whenever there wasn’t someone around to remind him otherwise, whether that someone happened to be Dick, or Clark Kent or one of the other Robins.
In Dick’s opinion it just wouldn’t do. Not at all.
After all, Bruce had Damian to think about these days, and even though Dick had never actually asked Damian about it, he had a sneaking suspicion that the League of Assassins weren’t exactly the type to stop and celebrate any holiday at all, let alone Christmas. Damian had probably never experienced a real Christmas even once in his life, and to Dick Grayson that seemed almost unbearably sad.
So, come Christmas Day, he showed up at the manor, bags of gifts in both hands and determined to bring at least a little holiday cheer to the manor even if the attempt killed him.
He had been imagining, rather naively he knew, that Damian’s eyes would light up as soon as he caught sight of the presents. Instead when he found the younger Wayne, Damian stopped training for only a moment; just long enough to take one look at the sweater that Dick was wearing and screw up his face at it.
“What?” Dick asked, glancing down at the red and green Christmas tree pattern. As far as Christmas sweaters went it wasn’t terrible. He had seen a lot worse, but Damian had looked at the sweater as though he was two seconds away from burning it, possibly with Dick still inside.
“What on earth are you wearing?” Damian asked.
“A Christmas sweater,” Dick replied, and then, in case Damian had missed the point completely, or Bruce had kept his son so busy that Damian could no longer keep track of the date, he added. “It’s Christmas.”
“I know,” Damian said, before scoffing loudly. “That thing is hideous.”
“Well, you’ll be happy to know that I’ve got one in here for you as well,” Dick said, smiling optimistically and holding one of the bags out for Damian to take.
“Don’t be ridiculous Grayson. You will never get me to wear one of those… things.”
No. Dick didn’t think that he would. Still, he was glad that he had shown up with one, if only so that he got to see the look on Damian’s face when he opened up his own sweater and saw the tiny kittens and bows on the sweater than Dick had picked out for him.
“What are you even doing here?” Damian asked him. He didn’t look upset; not by the standards of Damian Wayne at any rate; more just curious.
“It’s Christmas,” Dick repeated. Obviously the message hadn’t sunk in yet. Good lord, it was even worse than he had thought. “I brought presents and stuff.”
“Oh,” Damian said, his eyes darting, not for the first time, to the bags that Dick carried.
His features had softened a little bit. He wasn’t smiling. Of course he wouldn’t smile, but he didn’t look as though he was ready to murder someone, so Dick hadn’t completely screwed up when he had decided to bring Christmas to the Waynes. Was Damian happy that Dick had brought him presents? Dick couldn’t quite tell. He had a feeling that more than anything else, Damian was surprised and didn’t know how he was supposed to react.
“I’ll find Father,” Damian offered, before nodding briefly at Dick, giving the bags in his hands one last look and then running off to find Bruce.
Dick wondered whether he should have warned the Waynes that he was coming over. He felt a little awkward now, standing in the hallway outside of the Waynes’ gym and waiting for Damian to return.
Of course Damian hadn’t known how to react. The kid clearly wasn’t used to people doing nice things for him.
Before long the four of them had gathered together; Dick, Damian, Bruce and Alfred, although Bruce wouldn’t stop complaining about his having been pulled away from the case he was working on.
It was possibly the most awkward Christmas Dick had ever experienced. The only one that was potentially worse was the first Christmas he had spent in Wayne Manor, when he had first suggested they should start preparing Christmas celebrations, to rather disastrous and embarrassing results.
Alfred at least did his part to try and add a little bit of Christmas cheer, but Bruce clearly didn’t want to be there, and Dick couldn’t for the life of him work out what Damian thought of the whole thing.
Dick hadn’t warned Alfred that he would be bringing Christmas to Wayne Manor, but he hadn’t needed to. Ever since that first disastrous Christmas Alfred had been Dick’s secret co-conspirator, and the butler had already prepared a Christmas ham with roast vegetables and gravy, and a vegetarian nut loaf for Damian, with fruit mince pies and hot chocolate for desert.
Dick grinned as he settled into a chair with a cup of the warm, glorious liquid. Alfred always made the best hot chocolates; warm and thick and smooth, without being too sweet; proper hot chocolate that Dick had never quite been able to recreate on his own.
Bruce didn’t drink any. Damian sniffed at the stuff as though he thought it might be poison, and Dick’s heart broke all over again for the youngest Wayne when he realized Damian had probably never had hot chocolate before then either.
Damian’s face lit up as he tried the drink though, and Dick promised himself that he would take the youngest Wayne out to a coffee shop or two in the new year. Damian had been missing out on so many little things, and now when he was finally experiencing them, it was only with Dick, Alfred and his less than co-operative father for company.
Dick wished that he had thought to invite some of the others, but he had a feeling very few of them would have agreed to show up. They all had their own lives these days, and other people to spend Christmas with; people who would undoubtedly be in much more festive moods than Bruce Wayne.
Even bringing the presents out didn’t seem to help all that much. Bruce sighed as he pulled out his own sweater. Dick knew that he would wear it when no-one outside the family was around to see, if only to keep Dick happy, but Damian…
Well, Dick had been hoping at the very least that Damian would screw up his face when he got a look at his own sweater, but instead when he held it up and contemplated it his expression was almost completely blank. Dick knew that Damian would often keep his emotions well hidden behind a mask of indifference, so he was probably feeling something, but it was frustrating not knowing what it was.
There were other presents too; all of them frivolous rather than practical. Bruce had all the money in the world with which to buy necessities, but often he forgot to take care of the little things. There were body scrubs and a nice scotch for Bruce, herbal teas for Alfred and children’s literature for Damian. Actual children’s literature at that; not Faust or Machiavelli but Tolkien’s the Hobbit and a few of Dickens’ novels. Heavens knew that Damian didn’t often get a chance to actually be a child all that often.
The gifts were received in the same manner as the sweaters; bare tolerance from Bruce, gracious warmth from Alfred, and an uncomfortable and mysterious silence from Damian.
They hadn’t bought him anything in return (although Alfred had made Dick a small Christmas pudding to take home with him, which Dick was endlessly grateful for) but that was okay. He wasn’t expecting anything in return. He just wanted them to be happy.
Christmas at Wayne Manor became a tradition. Dick made sure that it did.
Most years it was just the four of them; himself, Damian, Bruce and Alfred, but some years they had company; Tim a couple of times, Babs when she could make it, and one time Dick even convinced Jason to show up, which had made for a rather memorable Christmas, although considering that Bruce and Jason had only broken into an all-out shouting match once Dick still considered it a success.
He made the sweaters a tradition as well, at least partially because of Damian’s reaction to them. At first it was blank shock, but then as the years rolled by and Damian grew more open with the rest of the family, Dick started to take a sort of sadistic delight in picking out especially weird sweaters for Damian. There was a Christmas sweater featuring cows, and another referencing one of Damian’s favorite books. Oh, he always made sure that Damian would be able to appreciate them somehow, but in his opinion the brighter and kitschier they were, and the more likely they were to make Damian roll his eyes, the better.
Dick was possibly most proud of the sweater he gifted Damian when the younger man was sixteen. It was red and green (normal enough), but featured, of all things, a dinosaur in full Santa get-up, and even by Dick’s standards it was completely hideous.
Damian’s reaction did not disappoint. As soon as he removed the sweater from its bagged confines he rolled his eyes, scoffed, and then fixed Dick with a look that suggested he thought Dick might suffer from mild brain damage.
“Where the hell do you even find these things Grayson?”
And yet when he folded the sweater and put in back into the bag he held it as though it was one of the most precious things in the world.
“You know I never wear them, right?” Damian asked him. It was true. Dick had given Damian plenty of Christmas sweaters, but he hadn’t seen Damian wear any of them, not even for the few seconds it would take to check the size.
“I know,” Dick replied, to which Damian immediately scoffed.
“This whole thing is just so stupid,” Damian murmured. “Just… stupid.”
Damian seemed genuinely annoyed or upset about something. They’d made a lot of progress over the last few years, but the kid still kept his emotions so close to his chest that Dick still occasionally had trouble figuring out how he felt, and for a moment he wondered whether he had actually made some sort of mistake. Had he been too insistent when it came to the whole Christmas thing? Did Damian actually not like him coming over after all? Or did actually hate the sweaters?
Whatever was bothering him, Damian seemed off for the rest of the day, barely smiling or even rising to Dick’s playful taunts. It didn’t feel right, not at all, and that year they finished celebrations before they had even gotten as far as the hot chocolate.
That Christmas was quickly forgotten for the most part. If something had been bothering Damian then he was back to his normal self soon enough, and after what felt like no time at all Christmas came around again.
Dick showed up on Christmas Day, unannounced as he always was, and with presents and sweaters in hand like normal. About the only thing that was different this year was the time that Dick had chosen to show up; he was a couple of hours earlier than normal.
When he arrived at the manor he found it to be almost completely silent. When he tracked down Alfred the butler explained that Bruce was down in the Batcave, and Damian was upstairs in his bedroom, possibly still asleep. Batman and Robin had been up exceptionally late the night before thanks to the case they were currently working on. Bruce hadn’t even made it as far as going to bed and getting some sleep.
Dick didn’t have anything else planned for the day, so he decided to wait, and spent a few moments in the kitchen enjoying an early hot chocolate courtesy of Alfred, but when he had finished the drink and there was still no sign of either Damian or Bruce, he made up his mind to go upstairs and check on the younger Wayne.
He wouldn’t wake him. He wouldn’t dream of it. He knew how hard of a task-master Bruce could be. Damian needed his sleep. But he was secretly hoping that Damian was still awake so that he would have someone to spend the time with. After all, Alfred was always lovely company, but he was too busy preparing Christmas lunch, and if Dick offered to help in the kitchen he would undoubtedly just get in the older man’s way.
Dick listened at Damian’s bedroom door for a moment for any sign of Damian being awake, but there was nothing. He pushed the door open slowly, praying as he did that it wouldn’t creak and wake up the sleeping teenager.
Damian was still sound asleep, which Dick had expected. What wasn’t expected was the position in which he found Damian. The teen had barely made it out of his Robin costume the night before, and was lying on top of the blankets, still wearing the same pants that he would have worn when on patrol. He wasn’t wearing anything on his top half, but he was clutching a piece of clothing tightly to his chest. As Dick cautiously moved closer to the bed he discovered that the clothing in question was one of the sweaters that Dick had given him.
Damian had practically wrapped himself around the clump of blue and white wool. His hands were tangled in it, and one cheek was pressed against the sweater’s folds. He looked as though he was completely at peace; more at peace than Dick had ever seen Damian when he was awake.
Damian had grown up a lot over the last couple of years. He was almost as tall as Dick now, and his body was starting to fill out. Dick doubted he would ever be as muscular or broad-shouldered as his father, but it wouldn’t be long before he outgrew Dick. In fact Dick was starting to wonder whether he had bought the right size sweater for Damian, or whether he would have been better off getting the next size up. Oh well, it wasn’t like it mattered. Damian never wore the sweaters anyway.
Apparently he just cuddled with them.
The sight was so ridiculously cute that Dick had to resist the urge to curl up on the bed with Damian and wrap his arms around the young Robin.
And maybe wake him up with a kiss?
The treacherous thought came so suddenly that Dick froze with his hand paused halfway between himself and the sleeping teen.
For a moment he couldn’t move. He could barely think, except to question what the hell sort of thought had just passed through his brain.
What the hell had he been thinking? Waking Damian up with a kiss? That was ridiculous. Damian was only seventeen; way too young for Dick to be thinking of him in that way.
He tried to reason it away as a stray thought. That was all it was, right? Just one little stray thought?
And yet when he took another look at Damian’s sleeping form, Dick realized that it wasn’t just one stray thought. Sure, it might have been the first time that he had considered kissing Damian, but it hadn’t been the first time that he had looked at him and well… and craved his attention… his affection… his touch. It wasn’t anything as fleeting or as easy to ignore as lust. No, it was something else; something deeper, and the realization shook Dick Grayson to his core.
The realization hadn’t taken all that long to sink in, but it felt like an age before he finally came back to himself with enough clarity of thought to actually pull his hand back from where it still hovered just over the sleeping form of the younger man.
He contemplated waking Damian up, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that. Not when he had just caught himself thinking of Damian in such a treacherous manner.
He couldn’t stay. He had to leave.
He left the room as quickly as his legs would take him, and then ran down the stairs.
“Master Richard?” Alfred inquired as Dick sped into the kitchen.
“I shouldn’t be here,” Dick said as he hastily gathered his things and swung his jacket back over his shoulders. “Damian was right. This… this whole thing is stupid.”
Damian could feel that he had been completely relaxed and comfortable before he had been forced back to waking life. He had felt safe… warm… loved… And yet something had awoken him; had torn him from his completely perfect little world, and from pleasant, half-remembered dreams of bright blue eyes and a warm, loving embrace.
It wouldn’t have taken much. Damian had always been a light sleeper after all. He didn’t know what it was that had caused him to stir; perhaps a faint sound? Whatever it was he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.
There was a smell in the air. It was faint, but Damian could identify it immediately. Only one man that he knew wore cologne that smelled that obnoxious.
“Grayson…” he murmured.
The older man had probably been in Damian’s room. He had probably seen Damian curled up with the sweater too. It was an embarrassing realization, but one that Damian would live down. A younger version of himself would have been mortified had he been discovered in such a vulnerable, sentimental state, but Grayson had seen him in much more embarrassing situations than just curled up with a piece of clothing.
Damn it. He wouldn’t be able to act like he hated the sweaters anymore. He still thought they were hideous. He was reasonably sure that any person with a working pair of eyes would think the same thing. But the fact that the sweaters had come from Grayson meant that Damian treasured every single one.
He never wore them, instead hording each and every one of them away as the precious things that they were. The one that he had been clutching in his hands that morning had been the one that Grayson had given him two years before and was tasteful enough, at least by Grayson’s standards; a simple white snow-flake pattern on red; and Damian had been planning to wear it that day, assuming that it fit. It would be a first for him, but he had thought that maybe, just maybe, the sight of him wearing one of the horrible things would make Richard Grayson smile.
He sighed and pushed the sweater to one side. It seemed like he would do anything to make Grayson smile these days. It was pathetic really.
He made his way downstairs, expecting to find the other man down there somewhere, probably in the middle of handing out presents and forcing good cheer on the other residents of the manor, but when he reached the bottom of the stairs he saw no sign of anyone but Alfred.
“Alfred,” Damian greeted him with a nod, before looking around the manor, thinking that he might have missed some sign of Dick’s presence. Alfred nodded in reply, but Damian didn’t miss the slight hint of a frown that passed over the butler’s features. The old man had an impeccable poker face, but Damian had lived with him for enough years now that he could spot when Alfred was worried about something.
“Did you and Master Richard have a falling out?” Alfred asked before Damian could actually open his mouth and ask after the other man.
“No,” Damian murmured. “At least, I don’t think we did. Why?”
For months Dick avoided Damian as much as physically possible. He couldn’t risk being around Damian anymore lest those treacherous feelings make themselves known again. Besides, he didn’t deserve to be around Damian, not now.
He ignored the blatant worry and desperation in the messages Damian sent him, trying to convince himself and those around him that everything was fine and normal. No, he and Damian weren’t fighting, and no, he wasn’t avoiding Damian (which was a blatant lie). He just thought the kid could do with a bit more space. He was a teenager after all, and teenagers needed space, not some arsehole almost twice their age hanging around and embarrassing them.
It was a lonely year, and it was going to be a lonely Christmas as well. For the first time in his life Dick Grayson did not make any plans for Christmas.
He allowed himself the luxury of sleeping late, and spent several more hours simply rolled up in blankets and trying to will the rest of the world away. The few hours after that were spent curled up in front of the television watching old Christmas specials and trying to convince himself that he was not horribly lonely and depressed.
It lasted until around sunset, when suddenly Dick heard someone knocking on his apartment door. He hadn’t been expecting anyone, but he wouldn’t have put it past a couple of his friends to swing by and make sure that he was all right. He knew that at least a couple of the Titans had realized something was bothering Dick, and it had only grown worse as Christmas approached.
Dick opened the door to find Damian Wayne standing there, clutching a couple of gift bags in one hand. He began to glare at Dick as soon as the door was fully opened.
“Where the hell were you!?” Damian demanded, shoving past Dick and into his apartment without waiting for an invitation or even saying hello.
“Here?” Dick tried.
“Well then you could have at least answered your phone!” Damian yelled.
Dick glanced quickly over to where his mobile was resting on the coffee table in front of the television. He had switched it to silent earlier in the day.
“And I suppose it would have been too much to ask for you to inform us beforehand that you did not intend to visit Wayne Manor for Christmas this year?” Damian continued. “I put up Christmas decorations. I instructed Alfred to prepare hot chocolate and a roast dinner. I invited everyone to the manor; even Drake.”
Damian launched himself at Dick, his hands reaching up to tangle in the thick fabric of Dick’s not-so-festive, plain blue sweater. Dick became suddenly, painfully aware of the fact that Damian was now taller than him by an inch or so.
“So why weren’t you there!?”
How could he possibly explain his absence? If he told Damian the truth then he would probably hate Dick, and he would have every right to do so.
“I can’t tell you,” Dick said, finding that he was unable to meet Damian’s eyes.
“You can’t tell me?” Damian repeated, sarcasm and disbelief dripping from every syllable.
“You probably won’t like what I have to say,” Dick said. “You might even hate me for it.”
“That doesn’t mean I don’t deserve an answer.” Damian paused for a moment, and then, almost as though someone had flicked a switch, the anger disappeared from the other man to be replaced by something much softer.
“Besides,” Damian muttered. “Whatever it is you think you have done, I doubt it would ever be enough to make me hate you.”
Dick froze. How the hell was he supposed to respond to that? Just those words alone were enough to make his heart flutter, and to give him just a tiny glimmer of hope.
“You’ve grown a lot in the last year,” Dick fumbled as he searched for something to say that wasn’t horribly awkward and failed miserably.
Damian fixed him with a look that was half annoyance and half something else entirely.
“I’m not a child anymore Grayson.”
Dick had been avoiding Damian’s gaze since he had shown up at Dick’s door, but now he forced himself to look at the younger man. To really look.
“No,” he finally admitted. “You’re not.”
In fact Damian was far from the child that Dick still often pictured him as. His shoulders had become broad; much broader than Dick’s own, and the more Dick looked the more he became aware of how much taller and larger than him Damian was now. And was that stubble on the younger boy’s… no… the younger man’s (because there was no mistaking Damian as anything but a man now) chin.
There was no getting around it. The last year had changed Damian. He was an adult now, and he deserved to be treated like one. No matter how uncomfortable it might make him, Dick owed him a proper explanation.
“I…” he began, and already found his words failing him. “Lately my feelings for you haven’t exactly been… honest…”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean? If you don’t like me anymore or if I’ve done something to upset you then you should just come out and say it.”
“No… It’s nothing you’ve done. I promise. It’s not your fault. I just…”
This time Damian was silent. Dick sighed and moved over to the couch. The remains of a half-eaten pack of supposedly holiday-themed chips still sat there and he tossed the packet onto the coffee table with rather more anger than the chips perhaps deserved.
He forced himself to look at Damian again, and this time took a moment to gather his words. It was still harder than he would have ever imagined to actually say them.
“Lately my feelings for you have been less platonic and more…”
“Sexual?” Damian suggested.
“Romantic,” Dick immediately corrected, although Damian’s own suggestion had not been far from the truth either.
“I’m sorry,” Dick said. “I know that I shouldn’t be thinking of you in that way, and I know that it’s wrong. That’s why I’ve been avoiding you, all right?”
Damian didn’t say anything. He just sat there, staring at Dick as though he was confused by something the older man had said. He must have only sat there for a few seconds, but to Dick those seconds felt like years. Had he just completely ruined their relationship forever? If Damian had gotten to his feet, told Dick that he never wanted to see him again and stormed out of the room then it would not have surprised Dick, and it certainly wouldn’t have surprised him as much as what Damian did end up doing.
The younger man still didn’t say anything, but he did reach down to pick up one of the small bags that he had been carrying when he showed up at Dick’s door, and thrust it towards Dick with all of the urgency and seriousness that most people would reserve for a live bomb.
Dick took the bag; a silver thing that had the words ‘Happy Holidays’ emblazoned all over, and peeked inside.
“For me?” he checked with Damian. The younger man nodded enthusiastically, and Dick reached in to grab the dark blue object at the bottom of the bag.
When he pulled it out of the bag Damian’s present turned out to be a relatively plain blue sweater with a geometric pattern that mostly consisted of lines and snowflakes. It was clearly handmade, and while it wasn’t necessarily neat or elegant, it was clear that a lot of love had gone into the creation of the garment.
“I taught myself how to knit,” Damian finally said. “Pennyworth helped. He also suggested that a handmade garment might mean more to you than a store-bought one.”
Dick had been staring at the sweater in his hands, but as Damian finished speaking he found his attention drawn to the younger man once more. Damian was staring at him, not with the contempt or disgust that Dick had been expecting, but with… what the hell was that? Fascination? Anticipation?
“You were missed,” Damian told him. “And I don’t just mean for Christmas morning.”
“I missed you too little D,” Dick said, finding himself clinging to the sweater as though it was his only lifeline. What he really wanted was to wrap his arms around Damian and hold him close until the hole in his heart was filled completely, but he didn’t deserve that. Damian might have been willing to forgive him, but that did not mean that he would be comfortable with Dick touching him.
Before Dick could contemplate his own actions any further Damian flung himself at the older man and wrapped his arms around Dick’s shoulders. Dick’s eyebrows shot up, and he opened his mouth to ask Damian what he was doing only to find Damian’s lips suddenly pressing against his own.
The kiss was sudden and clumsy, but Damian was nothing if not enthusiastic, and once Dick recovered from the initial shock of the younger man kissing him he finally thought to kiss back. Dick’s eyes had only been closed for a second or so when Damian ended the kiss.
When Damian pulled back his cheeks were flushed and his breathing was uneven. The kiss hadn’t even lasted that long, but it had clearly had quite a large effect on Damian.
“Your feelings are not unrequited,” Damian said. “In fact, I have been in love with you for several years now.”
Dick tried to speak, but his mouth failed to make words that made any sort of sense.
“I love you,” Damian told him. “So you should stop worrying.”
On the contrary. There were so many things that Dick needed to worry about now; like what the hell Bruce would do if he found out that Dick and Damian were… well, whatever they were going to be and do now.
“This is when you say ‘I love you too Damian,’” the younger man prompted him.
“I love you too,” Dick muttered, still hardly able to believe that any of it was really happening. “But are you sure? You’re really sure that you… that you actually love me back? I mean…”
Damian rolled his eyes and then leaned in for another kiss. This one was slower, and more expected, and Dick found himself closing his eyes and giving in to the kiss a lot quicker this time. Before long Damian had climbed into his lap and they had set a slow, relaxing pace which nevertheless brought forth a small whimper or gasp of pleasure from one of them every so often.
Eventually they parted, although Dick was hesitant to move his arms from where they now sat resting around Damian’s waist. The weight of the other man in his lap and the feeling of him in Dick’s arms was so right and felt so comfortable that Dick had a feeling he might never want to move again.
“I love you,” Dick murmured as they sat there, staring at one another.
“I love you too,” Damian replied immediately.
Dick cleared his throat and tried to clear the fog from his brain.
“So… it’s Christmas,” he said, feeling rather less intelligent or eloquent in that moment than he would have liked.
“Yes,” Damian said.
“I know that my apartment is a far cry from Wayne Manor, and I can’t cook for shit, especially when compared to Alfred, but there’s a pretty good Chinese place down the road that has some good vegetarian options, and I’ve got some off-brand hot chocolate in the pantry. Will you spend the rest of Christmas with me? Please?”
Damian’s smile at that moment seemed bright enough to light up the entire apartment block.
“I would love to.”
THE END