They are both older, both exhausted from this city. As he said, they've been through so much, and he's happy that the reaction isn't what he'd imagined it to be. He's relived at the calmness that he finds within himself even. There are annoyances and frustrations of his own, but they all center around the stalker who doesn't seem capable of listening.
He'll talk to that guy again before he goes for the restraining order. Robin will tell him what will happen if he continues to stalk, if he continues to not listen to him. He can do that much, but he won't wait any longer than that.
Robin can't really blame her for the grumpiness or the possessiveness. In her position, he'd be acting much worse, insisting on hunting the stalker down to be absolutely certain that he will not harm her. After losing her for that week to a madman, he wouldn't be able to do anything else. He would be jealous and a little possessive.
He walked into this apartment, expecting a fight. Maybe they've both grown enough and become too worn down to let something like this come between them, even for a little while. Robin is relieved. They're still living on borrowed time, and they've lost so much time together already.
Robin nods when she says that they'll figure it out. Together. He looks sideways at her, reaching for her hand. "We will." He takes in a deep breath, running over that scene on the sidewalk again in his head, and then he focuses on her again, on how thankful he is that she didn't walk out on him. "Thank you."
He almost laughs at that. It's a rough, strange sound when it comes out. It's not quite a laugh, not quite any sound in particular.
"The two times I've ended up on crutches in the past year have been thanks to one person, and he has enough to deal with lately on his own that I'm hoping it won't be an issue for once."
Robin certainly doesn't want to engage Francis in conversation or anything else ever again. It doesn't mean that it won't happen.
"Then again, with Francis, you really never can tell."
It's not so much that she's too exhausted to react in any other way, so much as...her energy is better spent and better focused on other things. They have lost a lot of time, and they've just begun to make up for it. Her free hand toys with the necklace Robin gave her for his birthday, almost absently.
Rachel shakes her head at his thank you, linking their fingers together when he reaches for her hand.
She doesn't believe it's something he has to thank her for.
She feels awkward and hesitant, having never been confronted with this portion of Robin's past, and she doesn't really know how to stop feeling that way. It's strange, to be on the opposite end. For once, she doesn't feel like the ball's on her court for her to do anything.
Maybe it's just something that's going to go away on its own.
She can hope.
Rachel shifts back to her side, her back flat against the floor. Her clothes are...somewhere, and she'll put them back on soon and go about her day--maybe. She doesn't really know what you're supposed to do after this kind of thing. She can honestly say she's never had to deal with a situation like this before.
"That's very reassuring," Rachel says with a deadpanned expression, wiggling her fingers even as her hand remains in his. It's still so weird to think about, how just minutes ago it was a paw. "The man that enjoys stabbing you might be too busy to remind himself he has that particular fondness."
She doesn't know if she should laugh or cry and ends up doing neither.
Rachel looks up at the ceiling before closing her eyes against the pressure she feels at the back of them. At least it's not Francis. At least it's not her, running into that man at the park again even if he is out there, somewhere, because she's a Wanderer and justice didn't matter.
She wonders more often than she'd like where he is, if he's hurting someone else, if he'd ever come back. Her heart lodges in her throat just thinking about it.
At least it's not Wyatt and can't be, because the man is dead. She can't think about that or there wouldn't be any calmness at all.
She's a little afraid, and she doesn't think that's irrational or unfounded, with how infrequently she feels the emotion.
It may not be something that he has to thank her for, but the thanks comes anyway because he wants to give it.
Robin hasn't ever been confronted with this part of his past before either. A few times, people would see him again after he's had sex with them, months later. They'd shoot him a dirty look or they'd want to go another round. It's never been complicated like this. No one has ever hunted him down years later with binoculars and questions about eye color shade.
He can sense the awkwardness and hesitance within her. He doesn't know how to fix it. It's something that will likely take time before it goes away. When she lies out with her back to the floor, he reaches out to touch her hair a bit.
Robin is going to try not to smile at the deadpanned expression on her face. It's... cute, not that he'll say that out loud. "No, I'm nearly positive that he is too busy to really even think about me. It's been awhile since he's stabbed me anyway."
It's been since November, hasn't it?
Miracles do happen.
As her presence in this apartment has shown him, time and time again.
After a moment, he releases her hand, slides across the floor next to her, despite the suit that he's wearing, and wraps an arm around her waist. His free hand is in her hair again, playing with the strands. He doesn't know what she's thinking about, but he can guess. They've been through so much. They don't really ever get a long term break in any sense of those words.
"There's never really a break is there," he asks, and he's studying her face as he says it.
Rachel ends up nudging his shoulder with her elbow. "Being nearly positive no more stabbing will occur is of course far more reassuring, thank you, Robin," she says dryly, unable to keep the deadpanned delivery away.
Rachel turns to him when he slides across the floor. She sighs and leans into the touch. Her hair is finally back to its natural waves. She likes it when he plays with her hair. Rachel briefly wonders if it's something he just knows, like so many other things.
At his question, she shifts further to the side, her face open while he studies her. It's effortless to recall every moment her heart has broken, or when one of them has been in danger, or both times they broke up. It doesn't take much at all to recall that four-walled room, and the drugged, drunken haze she'd been enveloped in while he raged. The plagues, the Conrad destruction, earlier than that. It's a miracle they're still as whole as they are.
It's painful, and there's an ache in her chest while she goes through each and every one. When's it enough?
"No," Rachel answers quietly at last, voice thick and raw, eyes suspiciously bright. No, there's never a break. There likely never will be, but that goes without saying. There's more to life than that, and it makes it all worth it. That's something they've said before and it goes without saying here, too.
Her hand cradles the side of his face, knuckles brushing down the length of his cheek. It's a gentle, loving gesture pushing past whatever hesitance remains. "I may get tired sometimes but I'm never worn down for good. I just don't want you to be hurt again. The bad things can't be averted. I know that. I can't help that wanting, anyway. It happens when you love someone."
He's been through enough, far more than any person should ever have to. He's tired and he's finally come to grips with who he is, even wrote a book about it. They can each protect themselves just fine, but that doesn't change the fact she wants to protect him from what could be harmful.
Just thinking about the way he looked, waking up from that nightmare--Rachel never wants him to look like that again, for whatever reason.
Robin only smiles at her at the dryness of that statement and the nudge to his shoulder. "You're quite welcome, Rachel."
He has a feeling that she likes it. He likes it too, which is why he continues to do so and so often lately. It's one of those small details that he didn't realize he loved so much until she wasn't around anymore. It's why he can't help but be more affectionate with her than he's been before.
Robin wants to fill up every possible moment with her, with the things that he missed when she wasn't around, and he missed everything. He thinks that there are many relationships that when they end, the ex goes over all of the things that they're glad to have out of their life. But he loved and missed it all, weeks, months later. There's nothing that he was glad to be rid of, and it's one of those many reasons that he knows that he was meant for her.
It is a miracle that they're as whole as they are. It's more of a miracle that they're this whole and they're together after everything, and there's been so much. There's been more than any two people should have to suffer through, and they're still here, still running into trouble, but still here on their feet when the city has done its hardest to knock them to the ground.
They're still standing.
There's something miraculous in that. if he hadn't already found hope on his own, he'd see it in that. How could anyone hear their story and not realize why hope is never useless?
When she answers him with that sound to her voice, he leans in, pressing a gentle kiss against her face. His hand slides behind her neck. A crack feels as though it opens up through his chest at the sound of her voice and the look on her face.
Sometimes he really hates this city. He hates that there isn't ever a break. A month shouldn't be too much to ask for. Half a year shouldn't be too much to ask for, but in this city, it really is.
He actually smiles at her knuckles against his cheek. It's sad and pained, but it's loving too. "I know," Robin says, and he's quiet because he does. "I feel the same way about you."
He does know she can take care of herself, but loving someone means wanting to take care of them too, wanting to protect them. Robin wants her to never hurt again. They've both seen each other in some incredibly broken moments, and he never wants to return to those moments, even if they're inevitable, even if there's no escaping them.
Robin shoves those thoughts away as fast they come. His hand remains in her hair, and he kisses her again, lingering against her lips. He pulls back slowly with a hand on her face.
"We've been through so much, Rachel," he says, and there's a heaviness and a strength there. The two feelings combat with one another within him, and his throat feels tight. She doesn't need the reminder, of course, but it's all he could think to say. It's all that's on his mind.
So much.
The only guarantee that there won't be more is death, and he doesn't want to die. They've said it time and time again, this is worth it. Living is somehow worth it beyond all the pain and darkness.
Rachel was never so openly affectionate before him.
She's always been so rigid in her ways and that applies to everything, except it's always come so easily with him. Her relationship with Robin is so very different from any other relationship she's ever had. She's learned so much about herself and her own skin through him. Ever since that day in the plagues when she was first with him, and maybe even before that.
It's never far from her mind, how he was treated when he was just a little boy.
All the love in the world of her doesn't make up for what he went through but she still has the mind to try.
"I know that, too," she whispers, as if incapable of speaking any louder. "I'm always going to worry, but I'm going to trust you know what you're doing."
He already knows how she feels about it. That's about as much as she can do.
They weren't able to protect each other when it mattered most. She wasn't there those months Wyatt kept him as a lab rat, doing god knows what to him. She washed her hands clean of it, tossed the contract back into his hands, walked away when he was breaking. She still doesn't know how she did it. She doesn't know how she sent him away, where she found the will to walk. All she does know is she never wants to do it, not ever again. She missed him too much.
It felt wrong, despite all of the reasons why she knew it was right.
It's been a year since they met now. It feels longer than that.
It's hard to imagine in some other world she never meets him. It's already hard to imagine that for over twenty years, she never had any idea someone like him existed. It's too terrible for her to even contemplate, even with all the painful things they went through. She wouldn't take back any of them. Not standing in front of the Conrad building while he walked away. Not telling him to leave her room and to never come back. Not Wyatt. Any of it.
Knowing all of that, what could possibly make her break her promise to not leave this time?
Certainly not someone he was with years ago.
They've come too far and been through too much. Enough has been taking. She is honestly not allowing anything else to be ripped away if she has any say in it.
Anyone else might have seen them and taken it for a lost cause.
Rachel doesn't think anything is a lost cause. It's why she never gave up on Gotham, not even in the bitter end, and it's why she could never give up on Robin no matter what keeps being thrown their way. It isn't in her as long as there's hope. As long as she loves the way she still loves that terrible, beautiful city and the way she loves him.
The heaviness is sensed by her once he's pulled away.
"Hey." She lifts her head from the floor, catching that pained smile with her mouth, soft and quick. Rachel's nose brushes against his, almost playfully if not for the subdued feeling of the entire conversation. "That was all yesterday. It's brought us here. It brings me back home, back to you. Whatever happened, whatever you've done and who it was with, you don't need to be ashamed of it with me. I don't care, Robin."
Getting momentarily territorial over it and ruining a couch cushion doesn't count, okay.
Being openly affectionate comes easily for him when he's with her. It has since practically the day they met, despite how awkward and strange he may have acted in her presence. It has always been easy to reach out to her even when it shouldn't be, when it hasn't ever been easy with anyone else.
His hand rests against her shoulder as she says that she'll always worry. "And I will always worry about you," Robin says, about little things like if she's sleeping and eating enough and bigger things like the horrible, terrible things that can happen to them, that have happened to them before and have no reason to not potentially happen again. "Thank you for trusting me."
He can't imagine that it would be easy to do so. A lesser person might not be able to trust him, especially after how horribly he's dealt with situations in the past. However, he is older. He is aware that the maturity comes through in a way that must make it easier. Robin is aware of his previous mistakes and his shortcomings, and he plans to never let them get the best of him again.
It's strange to feel as though he has so much control, but he's faced his absolute worst fear, and they're both still alive, both here together. He's been separated from her time and time again. They've been through so much, which makes it feel like there's little that can't be handled in the future.
Robin faces each day differently than he ever has before. Yes, he's tired, exhausted really. There are times that he feels it down to his bones, and he knows that she is tired too. This city drains people so very quickly. However, they both wake up every morning, facing the world that tried to take so much from them. He wakes up in the morning with hope and with strength that comes from within himself, and then he sees her beside him and he faces the coming day with happiness and a feeling of being whole too.
She makes every day better, without even having to try. It's her presence. It's her love, and it's all so healing of what had been broken not only a few months ago, but years and years ago. It breaks through conditioning that no one would ever have believed, least of all him, could be broken.
He never wants to see her hurting or broken again. He loves her so much, and he wants to protect her, despite knowing how fruitless these wants are and how little he can do to protect her. Robin has faith in her too. They'll have faith in one another and themselves, and they'll move forward in this city, try to continue to put it back together.
Robin closes his eyes when she kisses him. His hand is in her hair again, sorting through the strands with a gentle care. He opens them again and the next smile that comes when her nose brushes against his is easier to manage, less pained. "Okay," he says, and he can't exactly put to words how much he needed to hear that.
It may be easier to shove the shame away if he reminds himself that he had to be that person to be certain that he'd end up here with her today.
"Okay," he says again, looking into her eyes and leaning in to take her mouth with his once more, a quiet intensity and heat. His hand slides down her neck, massaging behind her shoulders, warm against his fingers. "If it's part of what has lead me to you, it's... a little difficult to be ashamed. No matter how much shame I feel for what I have done in the past, I wouldn't change any of it."
If he didn't sleep with this stalker in the past, it may have set something else off, it may have never lead him to Chicago, it may have lead to his snapping. He doesn't know. It may not have. There's no way to know for certain, but he would never be willing to take that chance and lose what he has here with her.
I don't know how to hold on to someone that only wants to let themselves go. I don't know how. And you don't want me to. It's still to date one of the most painful things she's ever said to him. She remembers standing in that room, watching him with no will to live, pill bottle in his hand. He wasn't someone that lived for himself, he'd said.
He was someone that kept hanging on by the scrap of his teeth only until the world decided it was done with him.
Back then, she didn't understand in any logical sense why she'd still held on anyway. And now she knows it's so they could one day have this.
You're still here, she'd written to him, disbelief and ache and something else that's become a dead language.
Unfortunately.
That's not true anymore. It's a miracle but it isn't, and she kisses him back, the realization of it forcing out a single tear down her cheek with her eyes closed and her body beneath him on this floor of their apartment.
It forces her lips to tremble, however faintly, against his before she draws back to listen. "We're back to that?" she asks with a lopsided smile. "Because if that's the case, I'm not changing any of it, either."
Trusting him is no longer the blind leap of faith it used to be.
He is so different to that man walking away from the hotel that day in the plagues, because he couldn't deal. He's different from the man that signed away his life because it didn't matter, because he was worthless, because what difference would it make? He's not, while still being everything about himself she fell in love with.
She can't tell you when, exactly, just that she did.
Her hand finds his again, flattening her palm against it. She smiles at him, a lot less pained but still carrying with it the weight of what's been. "Let's stay in," she says softly, and she'd surprise herself with the request except she's different, too. "Let's just stay in."
There's more to life than her causes and her battles and her work, though it will always be one of the most important things in her left.
There's more to life like being here, on the floor, with him, not wanting to move from it.
Those were very dark times. They have both said incredibly painful things to each other throughout their journey together and apart in this city.
Every painful moment, every word that slipped out has lead them back to here.
He regrets ever having hurt her, and he knows that he has time and time again, but he wouldn't change it. He wouldn't take it back. Where they are, here next to one another after everything, it's where they are meant to be.
When he walked away from her in the park, he had thought that maybe everything had turned out the way that it should be. It was fate for it to turn out so horribly, for him to lose her. He had thought that she would be happier away from him and his destructive life, and it's how it was meant to be.
He had been right about fate, but not right about the story fate had for them. What he had thought had been an ending was only the start of a new beginning. He has never been more happy to be wrong.
"It never hurts to repeat," Robin says with a smile, watching her lips tremble and catching them with his mouth, slow and soft and sweet against that smile that he loves.
He is different. They are both different, but somehow they're the same too.
Older and wiser.
His fingers explore her hand when her hand flattens against his. He follows the lines, the curves and angles of the bones.
"Alright," he says, locking fingers together and leaning in to kiss her again. He doesn't pull back very far when he smiles, a breath away from kissing her again.
He'll talk to that guy again before he goes for the restraining order. Robin will tell him what will happen if he continues to stalk, if he continues to not listen to him. He can do that much, but he won't wait any longer than that.
Robin can't really blame her for the grumpiness or the possessiveness. In her position, he'd be acting much worse, insisting on hunting the stalker down to be absolutely certain that he will not harm her. After losing her for that week to a madman, he wouldn't be able to do anything else. He would be jealous and a little possessive.
He walked into this apartment, expecting a fight. Maybe they've both grown enough and become too worn down to let something like this come between them, even for a little while. Robin is relieved. They're still living on borrowed time, and they've lost so much time together already.
Robin nods when she says that they'll figure it out. Together. He looks sideways at her, reaching for her hand. "We will." He takes in a deep breath, running over that scene on the sidewalk again in his head, and then he focuses on her again, on how thankful he is that she didn't walk out on him. "Thank you."
He almost laughs at that. It's a rough, strange sound when it comes out. It's not quite a laugh, not quite any sound in particular.
"The two times I've ended up on crutches in the past year have been thanks to one person, and he has enough to deal with lately on his own that I'm hoping it won't be an issue for once."
Robin certainly doesn't want to engage Francis in conversation or anything else ever again. It doesn't mean that it won't happen.
"Then again, with Francis, you really never can tell."
Isn't that the truth?
One day, he's apologizing to him on the pier.
And the next, he's calling him a 'faggot'.
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Rachel shakes her head at his thank you, linking their fingers together when he reaches for her hand.
She doesn't believe it's something he has to thank her for.
She feels awkward and hesitant, having never been confronted with this portion of Robin's past, and she doesn't really know how to stop feeling that way. It's strange, to be on the opposite end. For once, she doesn't feel like the ball's on her court for her to do anything.
Maybe it's just something that's going to go away on its own.
She can hope.
Rachel shifts back to her side, her back flat against the floor. Her clothes are...somewhere, and she'll put them back on soon and go about her day--maybe. She doesn't really know what you're supposed to do after this kind of thing. She can honestly say she's never had to deal with a situation like this before.
"That's very reassuring," Rachel says with a deadpanned expression, wiggling her fingers even as her hand remains in his. It's still so weird to think about, how just minutes ago it was a paw. "The man that enjoys stabbing you might be too busy to remind himself he has that particular fondness."
She doesn't know if she should laugh or cry and ends up doing neither.
Rachel looks up at the ceiling before closing her eyes against the pressure she feels at the back of them. At least it's not Francis. At least it's not her, running into that man at the park again even if he is out there, somewhere, because she's a Wanderer and justice didn't matter.
She wonders more often than she'd like where he is, if he's hurting someone else, if he'd ever come back. Her heart lodges in her throat just thinking about it.
At least it's not Wyatt and can't be, because the man is dead. She can't think about that or there wouldn't be any calmness at all.
She's a little afraid, and she doesn't think that's irrational or unfounded, with how infrequently she feels the emotion.
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Robin hasn't ever been confronted with this part of his past before either. A few times, people would see him again after he's had sex with them, months later. They'd shoot him a dirty look or they'd want to go another round. It's never been complicated like this. No one has ever hunted him down years later with binoculars and questions about eye color shade.
He can sense the awkwardness and hesitance within her. He doesn't know how to fix it. It's something that will likely take time before it goes away. When she lies out with her back to the floor, he reaches out to touch her hair a bit.
Robin is going to try not to smile at the deadpanned expression on her face. It's... cute, not that he'll say that out loud. "No, I'm nearly positive that he is too busy to really even think about me. It's been awhile since he's stabbed me anyway."
It's been since November, hasn't it?
Miracles do happen.
As her presence in this apartment has shown him, time and time again.
After a moment, he releases her hand, slides across the floor next to her, despite the suit that he's wearing, and wraps an arm around her waist. His free hand is in her hair again, playing with the strands. He doesn't know what she's thinking about, but he can guess. They've been through so much. They don't really ever get a long term break in any sense of those words.
"There's never really a break is there," he asks, and he's studying her face as he says it.
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Rachel turns to him when he slides across the floor. She sighs and leans into the touch. Her hair is finally back to its natural waves. She likes it when he plays with her hair. Rachel briefly wonders if it's something he just knows, like so many other things.
At his question, she shifts further to the side, her face open while he studies her. It's effortless to recall every moment her heart has broken, or when one of them has been in danger, or both times they broke up. It doesn't take much at all to recall that four-walled room, and the drugged, drunken haze she'd been enveloped in while he raged. The plagues, the Conrad destruction, earlier than that. It's a miracle they're still as whole as they are.
It's painful, and there's an ache in her chest while she goes through each and every one. When's it enough?
"No," Rachel answers quietly at last, voice thick and raw, eyes suspiciously bright. No, there's never a break. There likely never will be, but that goes without saying. There's more to life than that, and it makes it all worth it. That's something they've said before and it goes without saying here, too.
Her hand cradles the side of his face, knuckles brushing down the length of his cheek. It's a gentle, loving gesture pushing past whatever hesitance remains. "I may get tired sometimes but I'm never worn down for good. I just don't want you to be hurt again. The bad things can't be averted. I know that. I can't help that wanting, anyway. It happens when you love someone."
He's been through enough, far more than any person should ever have to. He's tired and he's finally come to grips with who he is, even wrote a book about it. They can each protect themselves just fine, but that doesn't change the fact she wants to protect him from what could be harmful.
Just thinking about the way he looked, waking up from that nightmare--Rachel never wants him to look like that again, for whatever reason.
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He has a feeling that she likes it. He likes it too, which is why he continues to do so and so often lately. It's one of those small details that he didn't realize he loved so much until she wasn't around anymore. It's why he can't help but be more affectionate with her than he's been before.
Robin wants to fill up every possible moment with her, with the things that he missed when she wasn't around, and he missed everything. He thinks that there are many relationships that when they end, the ex goes over all of the things that they're glad to have out of their life. But he loved and missed it all, weeks, months later. There's nothing that he was glad to be rid of, and it's one of those many reasons that he knows that he was meant for her.
It is a miracle that they're as whole as they are. It's more of a miracle that they're this whole and they're together after everything, and there's been so much. There's been more than any two people should have to suffer through, and they're still here, still running into trouble, but still here on their feet when the city has done its hardest to knock them to the ground.
They're still standing.
There's something miraculous in that. if he hadn't already found hope on his own, he'd see it in that. How could anyone hear their story and not realize why hope is never useless?
When she answers him with that sound to her voice, he leans in, pressing a gentle kiss against her face. His hand slides behind her neck. A crack feels as though it opens up through his chest at the sound of her voice and the look on her face.
Sometimes he really hates this city. He hates that there isn't ever a break. A month shouldn't be too much to ask for. Half a year shouldn't be too much to ask for, but in this city, it really is.
He actually smiles at her knuckles against his cheek. It's sad and pained, but it's loving too. "I know," Robin says, and he's quiet because he does. "I feel the same way about you."
He does know she can take care of herself, but loving someone means wanting to take care of them too, wanting to protect them. Robin wants her to never hurt again. They've both seen each other in some incredibly broken moments, and he never wants to return to those moments, even if they're inevitable, even if there's no escaping them.
Robin shoves those thoughts away as fast they come. His hand remains in her hair, and he kisses her again, lingering against her lips. He pulls back slowly with a hand on her face.
"We've been through so much, Rachel," he says, and there's a heaviness and a strength there. The two feelings combat with one another within him, and his throat feels tight. She doesn't need the reminder, of course, but it's all he could think to say. It's all that's on his mind.
So much.
The only guarantee that there won't be more is death, and he doesn't want to die. They've said it time and time again, this is worth it. Living is somehow worth it beyond all the pain and darkness.
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She's always been so rigid in her ways and that applies to everything, except it's always come so easily with him. Her relationship with Robin is so very different from any other relationship she's ever had. She's learned so much about herself and her own skin through him. Ever since that day in the plagues when she was first with him, and maybe even before that.
It's never far from her mind, how he was treated when he was just a little boy.
All the love in the world of her doesn't make up for what he went through but she still has the mind to try.
"I know that, too," she whispers, as if incapable of speaking any louder. "I'm always going to worry, but I'm going to trust you know what you're doing."
He already knows how she feels about it. That's about as much as she can do.
They weren't able to protect each other when it mattered most. She wasn't there those months Wyatt kept him as a lab rat, doing god knows what to him. She washed her hands clean of it, tossed the contract back into his hands, walked away when he was breaking. She still doesn't know how she did it. She doesn't know how she sent him away, where she found the will to walk. All she does know is she never wants to do it, not ever again. She missed him too much.
It felt wrong, despite all of the reasons why she knew it was right.
It's been a year since they met now. It feels longer than that.
It's hard to imagine in some other world she never meets him. It's already hard to imagine that for over twenty years, she never had any idea someone like him existed. It's too terrible for her to even contemplate, even with all the painful things they went through. She wouldn't take back any of them. Not standing in front of the Conrad building while he walked away. Not telling him to leave her room and to never come back. Not Wyatt. Any of it.
Knowing all of that, what could possibly make her break her promise to not leave this time?
Certainly not someone he was with years ago.
They've come too far and been through too much. Enough has been taking. She is honestly not allowing anything else to be ripped away if she has any say in it.
Anyone else might have seen them and taken it for a lost cause.
Rachel doesn't think anything is a lost cause. It's why she never gave up on Gotham, not even in the bitter end, and it's why she could never give up on Robin no matter what keeps being thrown their way. It isn't in her as long as there's hope. As long as she loves the way she still loves that terrible, beautiful city and the way she loves him.
The heaviness is sensed by her once he's pulled away.
"Hey." She lifts her head from the floor, catching that pained smile with her mouth, soft and quick. Rachel's nose brushes against his, almost playfully if not for the subdued feeling of the entire conversation. "That was all yesterday. It's brought us here. It brings me back home, back to you. Whatever happened, whatever you've done and who it was with, you don't need to be ashamed of it with me. I don't care, Robin."
Getting momentarily territorial over it and ruining a couch cushion doesn't count, okay.
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His hand rests against her shoulder as she says that she'll always worry. "And I will always worry about you," Robin says, about little things like if she's sleeping and eating enough and bigger things like the horrible, terrible things that can happen to them, that have happened to them before and have no reason to not potentially happen again. "Thank you for trusting me."
He can't imagine that it would be easy to do so. A lesser person might not be able to trust him, especially after how horribly he's dealt with situations in the past. However, he is older. He is aware that the maturity comes through in a way that must make it easier. Robin is aware of his previous mistakes and his shortcomings, and he plans to never let them get the best of him again.
It's strange to feel as though he has so much control, but he's faced his absolute worst fear, and they're both still alive, both here together. He's been separated from her time and time again. They've been through so much, which makes it feel like there's little that can't be handled in the future.
Robin faces each day differently than he ever has before. Yes, he's tired, exhausted really. There are times that he feels it down to his bones, and he knows that she is tired too. This city drains people so very quickly. However, they both wake up every morning, facing the world that tried to take so much from them. He wakes up in the morning with hope and with strength that comes from within himself, and then he sees her beside him and he faces the coming day with happiness and a feeling of being whole too.
She makes every day better, without even having to try. It's her presence. It's her love, and it's all so healing of what had been broken not only a few months ago, but years and years ago. It breaks through conditioning that no one would ever have believed, least of all him, could be broken.
He never wants to see her hurting or broken again. He loves her so much, and he wants to protect her, despite knowing how fruitless these wants are and how little he can do to protect her. Robin has faith in her too. They'll have faith in one another and themselves, and they'll move forward in this city, try to continue to put it back together.
Robin closes his eyes when she kisses him. His hand is in her hair again, sorting through the strands with a gentle care. He opens them again and the next smile that comes when her nose brushes against his is easier to manage, less pained. "Okay," he says, and he can't exactly put to words how much he needed to hear that.
It may be easier to shove the shame away if he reminds himself that he had to be that person to be certain that he'd end up here with her today.
"Okay," he says again, looking into her eyes and leaning in to take her mouth with his once more, a quiet intensity and heat. His hand slides down her neck, massaging behind her shoulders, warm against his fingers. "If it's part of what has lead me to you, it's... a little difficult to be ashamed. No matter how much shame I feel for what I have done in the past, I wouldn't change any of it."
If he didn't sleep with this stalker in the past, it may have set something else off, it may have never lead him to Chicago, it may have lead to his snapping. He doesn't know. It may not have. There's no way to know for certain, but he would never be willing to take that chance and lose what he has here with her.
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He was someone that kept hanging on by the scrap of his teeth only until the world decided it was done with him.
Back then, she didn't understand in any logical sense why she'd still held on anyway. And now she knows it's so they could one day have this.
You're still here, she'd written to him, disbelief and ache and something else that's become a dead language.
Unfortunately.
That's not true anymore. It's a miracle but it isn't, and she kisses him back, the realization of it forcing out a single tear down her cheek with her eyes closed and her body beneath him on this floor of their apartment.
It forces her lips to tremble, however faintly, against his before she draws back to listen. "We're back to that?" she asks with a lopsided smile. "Because if that's the case, I'm not changing any of it, either."
Trusting him is no longer the blind leap of faith it used to be.
He is so different to that man walking away from the hotel that day in the plagues, because he couldn't deal. He's different from the man that signed away his life because it didn't matter, because he was worthless, because what difference would it make? He's not, while still being everything about himself she fell in love with.
She can't tell you when, exactly, just that she did.
Her hand finds his again, flattening her palm against it. She smiles at him, a lot less pained but still carrying with it the weight of what's been. "Let's stay in," she says softly, and she'd surprise herself with the request except she's different, too. "Let's just stay in."
There's more to life than her causes and her battles and her work, though it will always be one of the most important things in her left.
There's more to life like being here, on the floor, with him, not wanting to move from it.
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Every painful moment, every word that slipped out has lead them back to here.
He regrets ever having hurt her, and he knows that he has time and time again, but he wouldn't change it. He wouldn't take it back. Where they are, here next to one another after everything, it's where they are meant to be.
When he walked away from her in the park, he had thought that maybe everything had turned out the way that it should be. It was fate for it to turn out so horribly, for him to lose her. He had thought that she would be happier away from him and his destructive life, and it's how it was meant to be.
He had been right about fate, but not right about the story fate had for them. What he had thought had been an ending was only the start of a new beginning. He has never been more happy to be wrong.
"It never hurts to repeat," Robin says with a smile, watching her lips tremble and catching them with his mouth, slow and soft and sweet against that smile that he loves.
He is different. They are both different, but somehow they're the same too.
Older and wiser.
His fingers explore her hand when her hand flattens against his. He follows the lines, the curves and angles of the bones.
"Alright," he says, locking fingers together and leaning in to kiss her again. He doesn't pull back very far when he smiles, a breath away from kissing her again.
They'll stay in, on the floor, pressed close.
"There's no where else I'd rather be."
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