"Merry Christmas To All, Now You're All Gonna Die!"
And Somehow I’ll Return Again To You
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
“Ta-da!” Uncle Barry says. “I noticed your best friend wasn’t able to make it to your little impromptu welcome home party-”
“Picked the short straw, which is totally not crash,” Bart informs them.
“-And so I thought it’d be nice if I invited him over!” Uncle Barry beams.
Dick lifts his hand in a self-conscious half-wave, but changes his mind. He stuffs it into the pocket of his leather jacket. “Hey.” He shuffles and glances up at Wally through his lashes. While his body language says nervousness and shyness, his eyes are sharp and intense.
Nobody else seems to notice.
“Dick!” Aunt Iris exclaims, sounding delighted. “How wonderful! I haven’t seen you in such a long time!” She almost manages to keep her voice from wavering and she throws another watery, loving smile in Wally’s direction. “Would you like some pancakes?”
“Maybe just one,” Dick says, eyes barely even flickering over to Aunt I in acknowledgement. “I wouldn’t want to have too many and then have to fight off hungry speedsters for them.”
She laughs while Bart protests loudly and Uncle Barry tries to pretend he would never (but Aunt I is making some for him as well, right?). Wally makes himself smile and goes back to his own vanishing stack (it looks suspiciously shorter than it did two seconds ago and Bart’s mouth had a strange sheen and crumbs stuck to the corner of lips).
Dick is-as always-endless charming and he chats easily with Aunt Iris and the others, but Wally can see the tension coiling tighter and tighter as the conversation continues on and on. He doesn’t know what has Dick so on edge, but it’s starting to worry him a bit.
“Oh, look at us, monopolising your time like this!” Aunt Iris suddenly exclaims. “You came to see Wally, and here we all are, talking your ear off! Why don’t you both go to the family room, and I’ll make sure nobody bothers you. Barry and Bart, you two will be in charge of the twins when Jay brings them home so they don’t go bugging Wally and Dick.”
“You’re a gift,” Dick declares, smiling, and he’s so beautiful Wally has to look away before he does something stupid.
“Yes, I know,” replies Aunt I and she shoos them out of the kitchen.
The intense aura Dick’s radiating hits new levels the moment he and Wally are alone; apparently, now he doesn’t have to hide it.
It makes Wally feel like he’s about to be dissected.
He swallows hard, and forces a casual grin to his face. “So-”
Dick holds up a finger, and then he gestures for Wally’s ankle. Wally doesn’t think twice and offers it up and Dick does something to Batman’s monitoring device. “Okay, we can talk without being recorded now.”
“Won’t that send Bats running over here?”
“O made me something that won’t trigger his alarm systems. He’s not going to interrupt us.” Dick straightens, but he doesn’t step back. He narrows his eyes slightly at Wally and he looks a little pissed. Wally has no idea why he’s mad, but it makes him want to put some space in between them.
“Batman had me verify the dates you gave him,” says Dick after a very uncomfortable couple of moments.
It takes everything Wally has not to flinch. “Oh.” Well, fuck. He should have known Bats would have gone to Dick, but he just wanted to go home, so he didn’t think. This isn’t going to be pretty.
No wonder Dick’s so furious.
“Look, I’m really sor-”
“And Artemis was with me.”
Wally freezes as all the blood leaves his face. He didn’t know it was possible for things to get worse, but clearly, they can and they have. Oh damn, this is not good.
Dick is still talking. “She told me all sorts of fascinating things. Like how you two broke up because you, apparently, were still in love with someone else, someone whose name she could never get out of you. Someone you never mentioned to anyone, not even to me, your so-called ‘best friend’.”
“Dick-”
“So imagine my surprise when I get that list from B, and right there, among the most important dates of Wallace Rudolph West’s life, are the dates of us. No other relationship, not the one with Artemis or Linda or Francis, are mentioned, yet that’s the one you put down. That’s the one you consider to be worth mentioning.”
“I-”
“I want to know why. I deserve to know why!”
God, he didn’t want Dick to ever find out, much less find out like this. Dick didn’t need to know how pathetic Wally is, unable to move on.
“Well?”
Wally rounds his shoulders and puts a little bit of space between them. He can’t keep looking down into those pretty, angry eyes. “I…thought the list was self-explanatory,” he finally mumbles. “They’re the most important events in my life. And…that was one of them.”
“So you’re telling me that two ‘bros’ ‘helping each other out’ was a defining moment in your life?!”
There’s something in Dick’s voice and words that strike Wally as strange, but he’ll have to explore that later, when he isn’t facing the destruction of everything. “I never said that. I never…you’re the one who called us that. Not me.”
“Don’t you go throwing this back on me! First off, you agreed with me, and secondly, I only said it because it’s what you wanted to hear!”
“What?” Wally’s so taken aback that he can’t stop himself from looking at Dick. “What are you talking about?”
Dick rolls his eyes. “Oh please. Like you don’t know!”
“I don’t know. What are you talking about? I never wanted-it’s not-why would you think that?”
“Uh, maybe because you said you didn’t want to do thing anymore?” Dick sounds scornful and biting.
“When did I say that?” Wally demands. Something akin to anger flickers down his spine, but it’s hotter and more electric.
“Right after I told you Zatanna had asked me out! You immediately rolled away and said you didn’t want to do it anymore!” Dick’s voice waivers the tiniest bit. “You just…ended things, as if it didn’t even matter to you!”
“That is not how things went! You’re the one who ended things! I told you I wanted to be more than we were, and you…you pushed me away, talking about how you were going on a date with Zatanna and how what we were doing was just ‘stress relief’!”
“I did no such thing! I had everything I ever wanted-why would I sabotage things like that?”
“Are you saying I destroyed everything? Because I would never-not when everything was perfect! Not when I had the love of my life right there!”
Dick gets very still for a moment, and then he snarls. He bites out “you fucking imbecile!” before grabbing Wally’s face and smashing their mouths together.
It’s aggressive and messy and borderline violent, and Wally’s whole body is alight. Dick shifts to the balls of his feet so he can press the entire lean length of his body against Wally’s front, fitting even better now than he had back then. Wally manages to grab Dick’s waist and he can’t think. All he can do is hold on and soften his mouth against Dick’s.
Slowly, the anger bleeds out of the kiss, but none of the intensity vanishes. If anything, it grows. Dick pushes one of his hands into Wally’s hair and lets out a groan of approval when Wally tries to pull him even closer. He melts, and moulds himself even more against Wally.
Damn. Damn. Damn. He never thought he’d ever have this again, but Dick is in his arms. Dick’s mouth is under his, open and desperate. Dick is pressed up against him, and his hips are shifting again Wally’s in an erotic pattern.
He can’t seem to touch Dick enough and Dick can’t seem to get close enough to him. They press up against each other so hard they start to stumble around the room, Wally’s hands fumbling a bit at Dick’s clothes and Dick hooking a leg over Wally’s hip while tightening his grip in Wally’s hair.
The doorbell rings and they both freeze. Dick is hanging off of Wally in a way that would be awkward and uncomfortable had it been anyone else, and one of Wally’s hands is halfway down the back of Dick’s stupidly tight jeans.
What are they doing?
Before Wally can say anything, Dick speaks up. “Come home with me,” he says as he unhooks his leg and smooths out Wally’s hair a little bit. “I’ll talk to your uncle or cousin or something, and I’m sure either would happily wear B’s little spy band for a night. Come home with me and we’ll”-his dark eyes slide down to Wally’s mouth-“talk,” he finishes roughly in a lower register than he started with.
"I…"
"Please." Dick curls his hand in the front of Wally's shirt, not letting him put space between them. "Come home with me."
"I…I can't agree to anything until I've talked to Artemis."
"Why?" Dick sounds frustrated, but the dark, unsteady timber of his voice hasn't completely faded yet.
Wally lifts one shoulder in a half-shrug. "Mostly for closure, I guess. I mean…I know she's probably moved on, but…I think I owe both of us that."
Dick takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. He drops his head against Wally's chest. "Okay. Okay. That's…valid. Just…when you're finished, come to me. Please."
The doorbell rings again and Dick very reluctantly steps back. He lets go of Wally’s shirt, but it looks like it pains him to do so. “Why don’t…” He pauses and clears his throat. “Why don’t you…give her a call, and…see if she can’t come over and you two can…get that closure. And then…come to me. I’ll get square things away with everyone here so you’ll be free and you won’t have to worry about B interrupting us.” He reaches up and touches Wally’s mouth, an aching longing written all over him. “Please.”
Wally leans into the touch as those clever fingers move from his lips to his jaw. “Yeah. Okay. I can…I can do that.” He turns his head and nuzzles a kiss into the palm of Dick’s hand.
Dick’s breath rushes out of him. “Don’t,” he whispers, fine aftershocks running through him. “Don’t…do things like that. Not when I can’t do something about it. If I start…I’m not going to stop.”
Heat flares through Wally. “Way to calm the situation down, Rob!” He tries to say sarcastically, but he’s too aroused to carry it off. He wants. He never thought he would have another chance with Dick, and now he’s discovering-even with all their dumb-ass teenage inability to communicate properly-Dick still wants him, so he’s getting another shot. He needs to get things right this time. He can’t lose Dick again. He won’t.
Dick flashes him a crooked, charming grin. “You have nobody but yourself to blame.”
“Oh? How am I responsible for this?”
“Well, if you weren’t so hot…” Dick waggling his eyebrows shouldn’t be as sexy as it is. It’s unfair.
“Yeah, well-” Wally starts to say, but Aunt Iris pokes her head in.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you,” she says, looking a little apologetic, “especially after I promised not to, but Wally, sweetheart, you’ve got another visitor.”
Wally blinks. “What? I do?”
“Yeah, you do.” Artemis steps around Aunt Iris. She smiles at him.
Well, speak of the devil.
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