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The morning after his unexpected visitors, Bernard blearily pulled himself out of bed at 10am. If it wasn’t for the bloodied towels on his floor and vomit in his trash can, he’d be tempted to think the whole thing was a bizarre, disappointingly unsexy dream.
Bernard dropped a random pod into his coffee machine and scrolled through his phone.
A text from Tim, sent at 6:43am, was reassuring.
“All good. Agent A was prepped but lung’s fine so far. RH and A say thanks for the assist. You ok?”
Bernard sent back a quick thumbs up and checked the time. He had a shift in… urg, forty-five minutes. Bernard needed a day off.
Adding milk to his coffee, he flicked through to the next text. It was from an unknown number, featuring a selfie of Arsenal giving a bleary thumbs up. There was no accompanying message. Bernard saved the number as “RH”, knowing that there was every chance it was already burned.
He was about to open a text from a colleague about swapping shifts when there was a knock at the door.
Bernard knew he needed to stop being surprised by his life, but he wasn’t expecting a maskless Red Hood to be standing at his doorway, holding a brown paper bag.
“I didn’t know you guys knew what doors were,” Bernard found himself saying to Jason holy shit resurrected Todd. He wondered if he could get footage of this from his ring cam to rewatch over and over again.
“Yeah, sorry about the break-in last night.” Out of costume in the daylight, Jason looked less menacing and almost awkward. He shifted his weight and held up the bag. “I got you a thing.”
“Oh! Come in.” Bernard ushered the Red goddam Hood into his apartment. “Can I get you a coffee? It’s just Keurig, but I’ve got a few blends to choose from?”
“Nah, I’m good,” replied Jason, setting the bag down on the counter and pulling out a selection of small cakes. “They’re from the bakery up the street,” he said, as Bernard’s brain exploded. “I didn’t know what you liked so I got a bunch. You can feed them to Timmers too, he’ll eat anything.”
“That’s- Thank you.” Bernard looked from the treats to Jason. “Sorry, I’m just waking up and my head’s still spinning a little from last night. Are these thank you pastries?”
Jason shrugged, folding the paper bag for something to do with his hands. “Yeah, I mean, I know we broke into your place in the middle of the night, but you were super cool about it and, yeah.” He cleared his throat again. “It was a stressful situation and I was kind of abrupt, so I wanted to apologise and say, you know, thanks for helping out and making me pull my head out of my ass. Taking Roy to the Cave was the right call. Sorry I was weird about it.”
He looked deeply uncomfortable and wasn’t making eye contact. It all sounded a little rehearsed, his tone and word choice not flowing quite right.
“Did someone make you come here?” asked Bernard suspiciously.
Jason scratched his cheek. “Roy kinda chewed me out on the way to the Cave, said I was being an asshole and shouldn’t have given you such a hard time. He’s right, I shouldn’t have been hung up on my issues with Bruce right then. It wasn’t okay to be a dick to you, plus you had Roy as your top priority and I should have too. So yeah, thanks for pulling me into line, and sorry for being a jerk about it.”
Bernard could have hired ten thousand monkeys to use ten thousand typewriters and none of them could have topped this.
“Don’t worry about it,” was his response. “It was a stressful situation. People swear at me and argue all the time, it’s part of the job.”
“Still not okay,” Jason frowned. “I’m used to this shit. There’s no excuse.”
“Sorry, but being used to trauma doesn’t make it easier to deal with,” countered Bernard, slicing an almond croissant in half. “I actually think it's the opposite.”
He handed half of the croissant to Jason, who took it with a hum.
“Well, apology accepted,” said Bernard, picking up his coffee cup with his free hand. “It’s also nice to know you’re just as capable of being whipped as the rest of us.”
Jason stared at him in true befuddlement. “Whip- wha- Roy?!” Bernard had the impression that if Jason was capable of squeaking, that’s what he’d be doing right now. “We’re not like that. We’re- he’s straight, we’re friends.”
Bernard rolled his eyes. “I’m not here for your weird crisis. Do that in your own apartment. Whatever you two are, he was concussed off his ass and delirious with pain, but he still got through to you.”
Jason bristled. “Yeah, ‘cause he was right.”
“And you buy pastries for random good Samaritans every time someone raps your knuckles about being rude?” Bernard flicked his gaze up and down Jason’s hulking form, noting the worn jeans and jacket that likely concealed at least four deadly weapons. “Though I guess not many people rap your knuckles, because of the whole…”
Bernard’s ability to mime “eight severed heads in a duffle bag” was unparallelled. Don’t even try to beat him at charades, you’d only embarrass yourself.
Jason didn’t seem impressed but he did understand was Bernard was getting at. “What about it?”
“Just that you seem to have kept at least one person around who’s not just willing to call you on your shit, but that you respect enough to listen to. Even when they’re super concussed.” Bernard shrugged, sipping his coffee. If Red Hood hadn’t maimed him yet, he probably wasn’t going to. Today, anyway. “Seems like a good choice. It’d be easy to only deal with Yes Men that you scare the shit out of.”
Jason gave a hoarse bark of a laugh, looking at Bernard oddly. “Tim doesn’t talk about me much, does he? All those Bat assholes do is bust my ass about shit. It’s not like I’m short on naysayers.”
“Yeah, but that’s family,” Bernard dismissed with a wave. Jason looked appalled. “They’ll do that. Family doesn’t count.”
“Kid, Timbo REALLY hasn’t talked about me if you think we’re family.”
“Chosen family is still family, even if you didn’t do the choosing,” said Bernard. It made total sense to him. Jason had called Tim his brother when he’d first met Bernard - even if, in hindsight, that might have just been to unsettle Bernard. “Tim’s your brother whether you agree or not. And for what it’s worth, he’s only told me good things about you.”
Jason didn’t seem to know what to do with that. “I’m not a good person.”
“Okay.” Bernard took a sip of coffee.
“You shouldn’t relax around me.”
“Okay.” Bernard took a bite of croissant.
“Kid, seriously, you shouldn’t let me into your house. You shouldn’t accept food from me. I’m bad fucking news. You’ll get eaten alive if you keep being this trusting.”
Bernard spoke around a mouthful of pastry. “Are these poisoned?”
“What? No!”
“Are you gonna shoot me or set off a bomb in my apartment?”
“Of course not.”
“Okay then.” Bernard licked his fingers. Fat and carbs and sugar really were better than therapy sometimes. “Look, I get it. Compared to you, I’m some naïve idiot who doesn’t know what goes on in the big bad shadows of Gotham, right?”
He looked Jason right in the eyes. “I don’t know what Tim’s told you about ME, or what you’ve figured out from your stalking, but I’m not naïve. I’m super lucky. I grew up with money, I’m a white cis guy, and I’m aware of my privilege. But no one really gets out of this city unscathed. I’ve got my scars too.”
“Sure.” Jason’s response wasn’t unkind but it was glib. “I know, we’ve all got issues, we’re all dealing with adversity-“
Bernard was sleep deprived and fed up. “No, I mean, I’ve got scars.”
Before he could think better of it, Bernard had rucked up his shirt and turned to show Jason his back.
The scars from the cultists’ whips were vivid ugly keloids that turned purple in the cold. He didn’t hate them because the experience had been a necessary one, but he didn’t advertise them. He wore t-shirts to sleep, even with Tim, and never went shirtless at the beach. He felt exposed in a singlet. He didn’t want to explain where they were from. He didn’t want to have to make up a twee lie or rehash the story to strangers over and over again.
Bernard felt his face burn as he quickly lowered his shirt again. He took a breath before turning back around. What the fuck was that. What did he think, that the Red Hood would be impressed with a couple of superficial scratches, caused by his own idiotic choices? Red Hood saw atrocious acts of violence every day, worse crimes against the bodies of more innocent people. He wouldn’t give a shit about Bernard’s stupid first world cult problems.
Bernard wasn’t expecting Jason to look utterly shattered. He looked like he wanted to reach out and grab Bernard, but was fiddling with his coat sleeves to restrain himself.
“Kid,” he said in a raw heartbroken voice. “I’m so sorry.”
Bernard shrugged, like it was no big deal. Even though he’d brought it up because it WAS a big deal. “Not your fault.”
“When did it happen?”
Bernard blinked. “Not everything that’s happened in Gotham since you’ve been around is your fault.”
“I should have known about something like this.” Jason looked so angry, so remorseful, so old and haunted. “They- whoever did this. They’re dealt with?”
Bernard nodded. “Red Robin sorted it out,” he said with a sardonic grimace. His mouth wouldn’t make a proper grin for some reason.
“Good.” Jason took a deep breath. “Look, Blondie, I didn’t mean to come here and bring up all sorts of shit for you. I was meant to dump the food, apologise, and get out of your hair. I’ve imposed enough.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a Red Hood business card, which he handed to Bernard. It had Bernard’s full name handwritten on the back, with a hasty “RH” scrawled underneath.
“That number puts you straight through to my priority line,” explained Jason. “If I’m not the one who answers, it’ll be one of my higher ups, and you can trust them as much as you’d trust me. Keep this card on you. If you run into any trouble, ANYONE hassling you, show it to them. The card lets people know you’re under my protection. If that doesn’t work, call the number. Memorise it. I’ll be available, any time. No questions. Okay?”
Bernard was surprised to find his heart racing. He was sleep deprived and it had been an unexpectedly raw conversation. He wasn’t used to people putting themselves on the line for him like this, except for Tim. He didn’t have older siblings or parents who were really… Yeah. He didn’t really have much experience with people wanting to protect him, or thinking he was worth protecting.
Bernard didn’t raise his eyes from the card at first. “Uh, okay. That’s. Thank you. Hopefully I won’t have to use it.” He put in into his pocket, already planning to memorise the number by the end of the day.
Wiping crumbs off his mouth, Bernard’s gaze hit the oven. More specifically, the clock on the oven. “Ah, nutcrackers,” he muttered, embarrassment gratefully forgotten. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’ve gotta be at work in half an hour and I needed to catch the bus six minutes ago.”
“You need a lift?” Jason offered like it was no big deal to use Red Hood as a taxi. Bernard wondered if he’d ever get familiar enough with the man to not mentally see the caption “RED FUCKING HOOD!?!” underneath his face at all times.
“Uh, yeah, that’d actually be amazing. If it’s okay? It’s in Edithvale, maybe twenty minutes west on the freeway if that’s not too out of your way?”
Jason nodded. “I know it.” Bernard cringed, of course Red Hood knew all the suburbs and pockets of Gotham. Of course he’d probably already known where Bernard worked.
“Come on,” Jason continued. “Get dressed, I’ll take you to work. I got nothing else to do today.”
Bernard was positive that wasn’t true, but he dashed off to his bedroom to change.
Exactly two minutes before his shift was due to start, Bernard wobbled into work, windswept and shellshocked from spending the last twenty minutes on the back of RED HOOD’S MOTORBIKE, wrapping his arms around the RED HOOD, clinging to the RED HOOD’S LEATHER JACKET and wearing THE RED HOOD’S SPARE MOTORCYCLE HELMET.
Bernard wasn’t some lame vigilante fanboy. He wasn’t. He was dating Red Robin. He’d met Batman. He was chill. But something about this whole scenario was just too insane. He’d had the hysterical urge to ask for an autograph and then realised that he already had one on the business card.
A business card he was sure he’d never have to use. Surely.