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The ceiling fan whirs slowly above the bed while Tim stares at it and holds his cellphone to his ear.
“But why me?” he asks, in a voice that sounds too close to whining for his own comfort. “I don’t know what to do with a baby.”
“He’s not a baby. He’s three,” Jason answers. “And he likes you.”
This point seems feeble to Tim.
“Isaac likes everyone. What am I supposed to do with him? Why can’t Alfred watch him?”
“Fu–” There’s a squeal of laughter in the background. “–dge, Tim. Tomorrow’s Alfred’s day off. There’s no way in heck I’m asking him to give that up. He only takes like six a year and you know it.”
Tim flops over onto his stomach and buries his face in his pillow, then turns his head so he can talk again.
“Bruce?”
“Out of town.”
“Dick?”
“Working.”
“Steph?” Tim suggests, rolling again and sitting up a little.
“Volunteer hours for school. Trust me, I asked,” Jason answers. “I hate to break it to you, but you weren’t my first choice. I didn’t call you for a list of suggestions, either.”
And now his older brother is starting to sound pissed instead of pleading, his patience apparently wearing thin.
“He’s three,” Jason repeats. “I’ll give you a list of stuff to do. You can even pick where you watch him.”
“Ugh,” Tim says, dropping back to the bed. “Not to be overly critical, but shouldn’t you have found someone like, before now? Instead of a twelve hour notice?”
Jason makes a noise Tim cannot decipher. It might be a bitten-off swear. A high, plaintive voice is now wailing something incoherent in the background.
“Damnit, Tim. I already went over this,” Jason spits out. He speaks slowly, as if to someone stupid, and it irritates Tim. “I have a workshop tomorrow. I need the continuing education credit for my job and my foster parent file. Someone told me they would have childcare and I found out this afternoon they were wrong. I’ve been on the phone all day, and yes I tried everyone before you and before you suggest her, Cass has a ballet rehearsal and the last time she watched him all they ate was Twizzlers.”
“Don’t you have friends?” Tim says, his resolve wavering. As much as the prospect of watching a toddler for eight hours terrifies him, the idea of leaving Jason actually stranded bothers him more.
“Yeah,” Jason says sarcastically. “I work full-time and I take care of Isaac. I have a ton of friends I can pay to watch him all day. I’ll just scrape together $200.”
“I’ll give you two hundred if you need it,” Tim says.
“Tim,” Jason says, back now to pleading. Tim knows from experience in other things this means that Jason is ready to snap, swear at him, and slam the phone down and hold it against him for weeks. “If it’s gonna be eight hours after daycare all week, I’d rather him be with family. Please.”
It is the please, from Jason, that almost undoes him on the spot.
“What about Damian?” Tim says, wincing even as he says it. “Eighteen is old enough, right?”
Jason pulls the phone away from his face, Tim guesses, because he can hear a distant, “No, Zac, we’re not painting right now.”
There’s an angry, stomping cry.
Tim sighs and feels like the asshole he knows he’s being.
“Ten minutes. I promise, ten minutes, look, when the frog beeps that’s ten, and we can do bath crayons. Just let me tell Uncle Tim what you like to eat for lunch.”
“Uncle Tim!” the voice yells.
“He wants to say hi,” Jason says. “Say hi. No, he can’t see that, it’s not Skype. Yes, we can show Grandpa Bee. Later. Say hi.”
“Hiiiiiii,” Isaac says, his voice muffled. “Isawawobutithadlasershesmyfriend.”
“I didn’t get any of that,” Tim says after the sound of a brief scuffle when it’s clear Jason has wrangled the phone away. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “What time again? Can we do it at the Manor? My apartment is crap for kids and if I come to your place I won’t know where anything is.”
“The Manor is perfect,” Jason breathes in relief. “He’s got a bunch of stuff there and that room Alfred gave him. Thank you, thank you, Tim.”
“It’s nothing,” Tim says, covering his eyes with one hand. “I’m sorry I was being a jerk.”
“If it makes you feel any better-- ow, Zac, did the frog beep? Isaac Alfred Wayne! No! Tim, I gotta-- okay, he took it out of his mouth. I asked Damian first but he said something about katana practice swords and I can’t do that to Isaac, you know how D is.”
“Wait, you seriously asked Damian before you got to me?” Tim demands, sitting up straight. “Jay.”
“At least Damian said yes right away,” Jason shoots back. “I had to drag it kicking and screaming out of you.”
“I know, I know,” Tim says, crawling off the bed and dropping to the floor. He leans against the sideboards of the frame and drops his head against the twisted, trailing comforter. “I’m sorry. I just don’t want to mess him up.”
“Tim, it’s like, eight or nine hours tops. I’m sitting on the kitchen floor and he’s watching me while he licks a bath crayon. He’s pretty resilient. I think you’ll manage. Seven in the morning. I’ll try to feed him first but who knows how that’ll go.”
“Fine,” Tim says. “I can be an adult. Just…treat me like I’m dumb. Write it all down or text stuff or I won’t know what to do.”
“I will,” Jason says. “This is my fault. I should have made you watch him sooner. Thank you. I’ll bring you coffee.”
“No,” Tim says, sliding sideways until he’s slumped over on the floor. “Don’t worry about it. If you get coffee that means you have to leave sooner and if you’re in a hurry you’ll forget to tell me something important like that he’s deathly allergic to mangoes or something I should already know and just…make it up to me later. I’ll get coffee.”
“You’re a lifesaver, Tim, honestly,” Jason says, sounding suddenly exhausted.
“It’s fine. It’s kind of my family job,” Tim says. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” Jason says and it sounds like he’s yawning. “A fricking lot better now. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
The line clicks off and Tim doesn’t move for a few minutes. He’s twenty-three and suddenly feels younger and more foolish than he has in maybe a decade and considers texting Jason to apologize, again, for being such a stubborn, whiny shit.
He scrolls through stuff on his phone while lying on his bedroom floor and finds a gif he’d forgotten to send earlier, and sends it and the apology.
Almost as soon as it sends, the phone buzzes and he looks at the screen surprised by the quick reply.
Where are we gaming tmw? Do I need to come make your sorry arse clean first?
“Crap,” Tim says, moaning. He types half a message and then deletes it all and calls.
“Dev,” he says as soon as the call connects. “I’m so sorry, I forgot. We have to cancel.”
“You forgot our years-long tradition?” Dev questions. “The same one we’ve canceled two weeks now over bloody poor scheduling?”
“Don’t be pissed,” Tim pleads, even though Dev doesn’t sound too upset. “I told Jason I’d watch Isaac.”
“Oh, brilliant then, he found someone,” Dev says. There’s a pause. “Hold up, mate, he asked you?”
“He asked you before me?” Tim exclaims. “What the hell. You didn’t tell him no because of gaming day, did you? Because I’m gonna feel super awful if you did and I didn’t.”
“Bloody hell, of course not,” Dev says, now sounding offended. “I’ve a shift until seven in the morning. I’m to be on-call for the emergency department and didn’t want to leave him sodding stranded if I was called into surgery at the last minute.”
“Oh,” Tim says, relaxing against the floor again. “Well, I guess it doesn’t matter. I’m watching him and I’ll see you Sunday if it doesn’t end up in catastrophe. I mean, I know he’s a good kid, I just don’t know how to keep him alive all day.”
“I’ll swing by, yeah?” Dev offers. “If I’m busy all night and don’t get to sleep in my office, I’ll stop by my flat and catch a few hours and come ‘round at lunch. Are you at Jason’s, then?”
“The Manor,” Tim says a little less miserable at the prospect now.
“Lovely,” Dev says. “I’ll bring the relief effort.”
“And coffee,” Tim says, glancing around his room that he should probably clean now if he’s going to be gone all day tomorrow and won’t want to deal with Sunday. “Bring coffee.”
Isaac Wayne is a wonderful nephew and Tim knows it. He is sweet and affectionate and liberally gives out hugs and smiles.
He is also losing his tiny mind.
Tim, despite his better judgment, patrolled for four hours after cleaning most of his apartment. And now, having left a whirlwind of barely-touched breakfast and snack foods in their wake, he is exhausted and following Isaac around as the kid runs from room to room yelling for people and at things.
After Jason dropped him off, Tim managed to more or less follow the list and it is during Isaac’s first frustrated meltdown at not being understood that Damian emerges from whatever lair he’s been lurking in and watches, faintly amused. It does not help that he is almost as tall as Bruce now, head and shoulders over Tim.
“Don’t just stand there,” Tim snaps, a bucking, shrieking toddler just barely captured under one arm. “Help or get lost.”
Damian shrugs and leaves, which is not exactly what Tim was hoping would happen. Still, even if Damian has mellowed a lot in the past few years, it’s not like little kids are his strong suit any more than they’re Tim’s. Especially crying, screaming, angry ones. Maybe if Isaac had fur and soft, floppy ears, Damian’s tolerance would extend beyond good moods.
There’s the soft snick of a door locking that Tim manages to hear over a brief gap when Isaac stops to suck in air. That, from the direction of the front parlor, means Damian’s elected to retreat as far as the cave and Tim guesses he won’t even see him again until he’s out tonight, if then.
“Wanna go find a cat, Isaac? Where’s the cat?”
“No!” Isaac shouts, twisting hard.
“What about a car? Do you like cars?” Tim pleads, cussing inwardly at himself for all the times Stephanie prompted just go play with him, nerdbrain, you won’t always be able to just watch cartoons and he’d ignored her.
Swimming, he can do, but it’s too cold. Reading, he can handle but they’ve done all of Isaac’s favorites twice already. Jason had written in all-caps at the end of his page of instructions DO NOT LET HIM WATCH TV ALL DAY, TIM. ONE HOUR MAX.
Tim is saving that hour, clinging to it like a life raft.
“Cars?” Isaac sniffles.
“Cars,” Tim says again, relieved. “Wanna see cars? Real ones?”
Belatedly, he realizes Isaac might actually have toy cars somewhere in the playroom now across from the study, but the little boy twists in Tim’s grip so he’s somehow shifted himself from under Tim’s arm to perched on his hip. Remnants of tears glisten in his eyes and he nods.
“Yeah,” Isaac says, “yeah.”
So, second-guessing himself the whole time, Tim treks down to the garage with the kid and sets him down after flicking the lights on. He’s pretty sure Isaac’s been in the room before, by the way he heads straight for the pegboard of keys and bounces expectantly.
“We’re not going anywhere,” Tim warns, alarms now going off in his head. He’s not completely certain but he’s mostly confident in his belief that people Isaac’s size still require car seats. If there’s one at the Manor, he has no idea where it is.
Isaac’s face twists into a disappointed pout, his lower lip trembling.
“Wanna pretend to drive?” Tim offers hurriedly. “You can sit in the big seat and everything.”
The pout instantly transforms into such a look of unreserved rapture that Tim wonders if he’s letting Isaac do something that’s usually off-limits in any and every form.
“Pick one,” Tim gestures to the room. “Any of ‘em.”
Isaac makes a beeline for a bright red Lamborghini that was one of Bruce’s preferred social night cars when Tim was thirteen. It looks dated and not quite vintage yet, but still sleek and shining. It’s flashy and screams for attention and is the embodiment of everything Bruce tried to project his public image as at the time. That was before he’d somehow shifted to hapless dad with Tim, Cass, and Damian at his elbows instead of low-necklined 20-somethings in gala photos.
The last public photo Tim had been made aware of, by the office and by family, was Bruce in a suit with Isaac in one arm and a sippy cup in the other hand, cheerfully taking the toddler’s escape onto the stage in-stride at a building dedication ceremony.
Soft, to Bruce’s supreme frustration, was a word often paired with him in press descriptions now. Still, nobody could argue it wasn’t, at the least, an effective distraction.
Tim unlocks the Lamborghini and makes sure the start features are disabled and the brake locked, and then lets Isaac have at it. The toddler sits on his knees on the leather seat and makes loud engine noises while he turns the wheel, and then gets distracted by jabbing radio buttons.
As Tim leans back in the passenger seat, letting Isaac explore and pretend to drive, he watches to make sure he doesn’t press anything that could be dangerous and he relaxes a little. Isaac flashes him a crooked, toothy grin that, despite the lack of blood relationship, reminds him a lot of Jason.
For the first time in hours, Tim doesn’t feel on the verge of being massively overwhelmed. He wishes he’d bothered to talk himself down a bit from reactive panic earlier, because it’s actually kind of nice, just hanging out with a kid who thinks he’s one of the most important people in the world.
He’s always liked Isaac but there have always been other people around to deal with diapers and food and sleeping and tears and Tim has instinctively shied away from every close encounter to such things. Right now, sitting and watching the curly-headed kid grip his little brown hands around the leather-bound steering wheel, he faces the fact that he’s already survived an entire morning of being It and it isn’t as bad as he thought.
Isaac looks over and says, “You be a robot. I’m Robin Hood.”
“Okay,” Tim says, feeling dumb about pretending but also aware it is something he can do to keep Isaac happy. “Do I have a jet pack?”
He definitely has this under control.
An hour later and he has nothing under control.
Tim is in the kitchen with a bowl of macaroni and cheese he made from a box, a box Jason specifically packed because he claimed Isaac would eat it.
Isaac is on the floor sobbing that he will not eat that macaroni.
Or, that’s about as much as Tim has deciphered.
The little boy drags himself off the floor and stumbles toward the fridge, still wailing. He tugs ineffectually at the door, too weepy to get a good grip.
“Isaac, you like macaroni!” Tim says, half-encouraging and half-begging, the plastic bowl still in his hand. He’d managed to keep him busy at the table with crayons and paper while he cooked the promised macaroni but it had taken one glance for Isaac to fling himself down and cry.
“Wantowlcheese,” Isaac sobs back.
“It is mac-n-cheese!” Tim insists, wiggling the bowl. “Just look!”
He can’t remember if he ever gave nannies a hard time like this.
“WANTOWLCHEESE!” Isaac roars, slumping against the fridge and sniffling bitterly.
“I’ve either arrived too early or too late,” Dev says from the kitchen doorway.
“Thank God,” Tim exhales over the noise, when he turns and sees Dev with a drink tray. “Help me.”
“What’d you do to him, Timothy?” Dev asks impassively, holding the drink carrier out a little when Tim reaches desperately for the coffee. There’s another tiny cup nestled next to his and he didn’t even know they came in that size.
“Nothing!” Tim protests. “I made him lunch. He freaked out.”
“OWL. CHEESE. OWL. CHEESE.” Isaac punctuates the words with kicks to the fridge door.
“Mate,” Dev says, crouching down by Isaac. “I’ve brought you coffee.”
“Dev!” Tim exclaims. “Jason will kill me. Kill me.”
“Bloody hell, Timothy, calm down,” Dev says, turning with the cup in his hand. “Have a bit of trust, yeah?”
Tim nervously sips his coffee and taps his foot while watching, the abandoned macaroni bowl on the counter.
“Coffee?” Isaac asks hopefully, calming down to hiccups.
“Your own,” Dev says. “Come ‘round to the table, then, and sit with us. I’ve a tea and Uncle Tim’s got his own coffee.”
There is a brief moment when Isaac looks peaceful, like he might stand up and wipe his face off and listen. But then his tiny brows scrunch with betrayal and his mouth twists and he wails, even more loudly.
“NO. OWL CHEESE.”
Dev stands and sets the cup on the counter and takes his own tea. Tim is annoyed at how calm he looks.
“That’s it? You’re just giving up?”
“Where’s Alfie?” Dev asks, looking around.
“It’s his day off,” Tim says sharply. “And if I bother him in any way, Jason won’t just kill me, he’ll make it slow and painful.”
“He wants Alfie’s cooking,” Dev says, pointing vaguely in Isaac’s direction with his elbow while he sips his tea.
“Owl cheese,” Tim echoes, putting a hand over his eyes. “I’m an idiot.”
“Jay feeds him well enough,” Dev says, glancing at the box still sitting sideways on the counter. “But the tyke’s had everything from scratch here. Did you bother explaining anything?”
“He’s three,” Tim says, looking at the weeping boy.
“Oh,” Dev says, turning and hunting the cabinets for something. “So he’s not grown his brain yet. That comes a bit later, right.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing!” Tim says, exasperated. “It didn’t say I had to explain everything!”
Dev’s found a pepper shaker in the cabinet and he takes the macaroni and cheese and sits on the floor with it.
“Look, mate,” Dev says to Isaac, who flops over and glares at him. “Owl’s out for the day. He’s on a trip. We’ve got to manage by ourselves but I’ve found the specks he puts on the other kind.”
“How do you know all this,” Tim says flatly. “Am I just, like, super detached?”
Isaac sits up to watch Dev twist the grinder. Flakes of pepper drift down onto the boxed macaroni, black against neon orange.
“I’m about,” Dev says. “And with Alfie when I’m not with you, when I’m not suturing someone or setting bones.” He hands Isaac the bowl and Isaac sits with his little legs splayed out to the sides and begins eating.
“Yeah,” Tim says with a note of irritation, “but when do you spend time with kids? Like how do you just know?”
Dev reaches up to the counter for his tea while Isaac hums happily and spoons noodles into his mouth.
“I’ve pediatric patients,” Dev says. “Not a lot, but now and then. And Rani’s kids. And I was ten when Kam was born; I watched her when my mum was busy. Leena wouldn’t.”
Only halfway through the bowl, Isaac’s head dips forward and then jerks upward. The second time it happens, Dev’s hand flies out and catches Isaac’s face right before it lands in the macaroni.
“Did he nap?” Dev asks, sounding worried. “He’s not fevered.”
“Jay’s notes said ten in the morning, but when I asked, Isaac said he wasn’t tired,” Tim says, fully unprepared for the incredulous look Dev swings around to give him.
“You bloody asked him,” Dev says.
“I hate it when people are always telling me to sleep!” Tim protests. “He said he wasn’t tired!”
“Is there a bed made up?” Dev asks, shifting around and sliding the bowl out of the way with his foot. He lifts the slumped tiny body off the floor and hands him over to Tim. “I’m telling Jason to start dropping him off at your flat once a week.”
Tim lets Isaac’s heavy head drop against his shoulder and the boy snuggles drowsily into him.
“I’m the worst uncle,” Tim sighs, leaving the kitchen.
There’s a small bed in the room across from the study, surrounded by a mix of vintage and newer toys. Tim lowers Isaac carefully and the toddler startles and blinks.
“Shh,” Tim attempts.
“Uncle Robot,” Isaac mumbles, turning over. He’s asleep again.
Tim returns to the kitchen to find Dev rummaging through the fridge. The tiny coffee cup is sitting on a shelf next to a stack of yogurts.
“Coffee?” Tim asks.
“Steamed milk with caramel flavoring,” Dev says. “Rani’s kids order it. There’s lasagna. Have you eaten?”
“No,” Tim says, leaning against the counter. “I’m honestly so bad at this, Dev. It’s messed up. Give me a kid that’s hurt or been kidnapped and I know exactly what to do. But give me a few hours with my own nephew and I’m shit.”
The microwave buzzes faintly as it heats up the container Dev threw onto the rotating plate.
“You’ve not done as poorly as you think,” Dev says. “Stop expecting yourself to be bloody perfect the moment you give it a go. You’re not his da.”
Tim shrugs. “That’s true. I guess it hasn’t been that bad.”
“He would’ve shouted about Alfie’s macaroni even if Jason had been here,” Dev says confidently. “You’ll just have to stop panicking and treating him like a machine with an sequence of buttons to push. Talk to him.”
Tim feels the sting of this, an analogy similar to the same one he mentally leveled at Damian early, and he swallows.
“Wanna get some gaming in?” he asks, when Dev pulls the lasagna out and pokes it experimentally with a fork.
“Of course I sodding do,” Dev says. “I’ve been in withdrawal.”
And for an hour, Tim trades off eating and managing the controller of a long-neglected RPG in an alien landscape. They play until a small, sleepy voice from behind them asks, “Where’s my coffee?”
“I’ve saved it for you, mate,” Dev says, pausing the game.
“Can you get it?” Tim asks, glancing at the screen. “I just had an idea but I have to break into Cass’ room.”
If the idea of him picking the lock to his sister’s rarely used bedroom might have once surprised Dev, it doesn’t now, and the older man takes it easily in stride. He stands and holds a hand out to Isaac.
“Come on, then, you plonker. Let’s get your coffee.”
Tim sprints up the stairs and tries the knob before hunting around for a key. There’s one under the decorative vase on a pillar a few feet down the hall. Cass, in the past few years, has treated the room as a sort of holding place for stuff she’s fond of or considers useful but doesn’t want to try to cram into the apartment she shares with Steph. The one time Bruce suggested cleaning out the room, Alfred had given him a sharp scowl and reminded him when only Tim was in earshot, that at least she was now caring to save things instead of treating everything as disposable or free of emotional meaning.
The room, for all her saving, is still fairly neat and not anywhere close to hoarding. Under the thin TV on one wall, there is an old, dusty Wii U system and Tim texts her before unplugging it and blowing it off.
Downstairs, he hooks it up to the TV. He can hear Isaac giggling and Dev talking in that over-serious way he uses when he’s being ridiculous.
Tim turns on the Wii U just to make sure it will work and then heads to the kitchen. He finds Isaac sitting with both of his hands around the paper cup, concentrating on balancing it when he takes a drink. Dev has made another cup of tea and is building a tower out of sugar cubes. When it gets five or six blocks high, Isaac puts his cup down and knocks it over, then roars with laughter.
“I got it set up,” Tim says, sitting down with them. Isaac promptly abandons his destructive efforts to climb onto Tim’s lap. “Want to play a game?”
“Yeah!” Isaac says. “Chess?”
“You are not a normal three year old,” Dev says evenly, sipping his tea. “I’ll blame this one on Wayne.”
“I bet he makes him follow the rules, too,” Tim says, ruffling Isaac’s curls. They bounce back into place.
“Pawn hops forward,” Isaac says. “One hop.”
“Yeah, we’re gonna go play video games, Isaac,” Tim says, shaking the cup a little to confirm that it’s empty. “I like chess but you need to develop some controller skills.”
“I don’t like chess,” Dev says, “despite your da’s repeated attempts to prove to me otherwise.”
“That’s because you only ever play with Bruce,” Tim retorts, standing and lifting Isaac with him. “It’s like playing a brick wall. A really smart brick wall, but his no-talking rule makes it pretty dry. We should play sometime.”
“Bishop goes sideways!” Isaac comments cheerfully.
“No,” Dev says firmly. “You and Steph already bloody tried this with word game apps and I know my weaknesses. I’ll stick to games with proper button-mashing.”
They walk into the den together and Tim sets Isaac down on the couch, where the kid does a headstand on the cushions.
“Uncle Tim!” he cries. “Watch!”
He does something that might be an attempt at a flip, but looks more like falling sideways. Tim waits a moment to see if Isaac will express disappointment with the result, but he tumbles upright looking pretty pleased with himself.
“Wow,” Tim says.
“Brilliant,” Dev says. “You ought to teach me sometime. And convincing enthusiasm, Tim.”
“Shut up,” Tim mutters, getting the Gamepad. “You think Captain Toad is okay?”
Isaac bounces on the couch and reaches out with both arms. His face is split in a massive, excited grin and Tim kicks himself for not thinking of this months ago.
“That one’s lovely,” Dev agrees, leaning back on the couch and stretching out his legs.
Tim sits on the other side of Isaac and leans over, rushing through the start menu prompts before Isaac’s fingers can hit the screen.
“Okay, now you can do it,” Tim says once the level is started. “Move with this.”
Isaac sticks his tongue out one corner of his mouth while he concentrates, moving the avatar on screen in tiny, jerky motions as he manipulates the joystick.
“Oh, you got a coin, well done,” Dev says, when Isaac’s managed to move his figure around a little.
“Yeah,” Isaac agrees, his voice full of a smile.
“Walk this way,” Tim says, pointing. He waits while Isaac figures out how to turn around. “Yep. Go right for that bridge.”
They sit for close to half an hour while Isaac plays, his face tipping closer and closer to the screen until Tim has to remind him to sit back. He gets through two levels before Tim notices the time.
“You hungry?” he asks.
“No,” Isaac says.
“It’s snack time,” Tim says, glancing over Isaac’s head for Dev’s support. Dev shrugs.
“No,” Isaac says.
“I think we need to stop,” Tim says reluctantly, braced for explosion. “You need to eat something. You didn’t even finish lunch.”
“No,” Isaac whines, clutching the Gamepad.
“Two minutes?” Dev suggests.
“I’ll set a timer on my phone,” Tim says. “It beeps and we’re done.” He readies himself for this to backfire, already envisioning himself and Dev having to literally pry Isaac away from the game amid screaming.
“Okay,” Isaac sighs, dramatically.
The phone beeps in a sing-song tone two minutes later and Isaac slowly and, with much moaning, surrenders the Gamepad.
Dev shuts off the system while Tim takes Isaac to the bathroom, despite Isaac complaining he doesn’t need to go, and he waits just outside when Isaac pushes against his legs and says, “By myself.”
He has to go in and roll toilet paper back up and straighten out Isaac’s crooked pants, but they eventually end up in the kitchen again with peanut butter crackers and apple slices. By Jason’s estimation, there’s only an hour and a half left before he comes to pick Isaac up and Tim is faintly surprised that the time is already gone. It feels like it’s been both the longest and shortest day he’s had in a while.
Tim brews another cup of coffee and ducks out to find Dev sleeping on the couch. He goes back to the kitchen to hear Isaac talking to his crackers, just as Damian comes back in through the front door with an animal carrier.
“If it’s rabid, Isaac’s still here,” Tim warns, leaning his head out into the hallway.
“It is not rabid,” Damian says, sounding only mildly annoyed. He brushes past Tim and sets the cage on the kitchen floor. He opens the door and a kitten crawls out into his outstretched hand.
Isaac forgets completely about his half-eaten snack and tries to crane his neck and stand on tiptoes to see the mewling creature while Tim wipes his hands off.
“Whose cat?” Tim asks, feeling dumb for asking.
“A foster kitten,” Damian says. “I will only have him for a few weeks. The mother wouldn’t feed him.”
“Oh,” Tim says, lifting Isaac to see.
“I thought Isaac would appreciate him,” Damian says, holding the kitten out a little without giving it up completely. Isaac reaches out tentatively, his eyes wide, and pulls his fingers back with a tiny yelp of surprise when the kitten licks him.
“Rough,” he says, startled, and looking to Damian’s face for a reaction.
“The tongue is slightly abrasive,” Damian says, letting the kitten gnaw and suck on his own fingers. Isaac reaches out to try again and this time, giggles. Tim feels the little boy press more tightly against his side in giddiness, and his free hand clenches and unclenches as if trying to dispel his desire to squeeze the cat.
The kitten mewls at Isaac’s knuckles and Tim, by way of angling himself so Isaac can be closer to the cat, finds himself standing closer to Damian than he usually does. They’ve long since moved past their days of outright antagonism but they’ve never exactly been close, and even Damian’s closer relationships tend to have moments where physical contact or nearness flits in and out by his mood. Most of the time, his youngest brother carefully keeps a diameter of personal space Steph teasingly refers to as “Damian’s Sacred Bubble.”
Isaac is leaning his head over the kitten, almost touching Damian’s cheek with his own forehead, and Damian does not step back or move away. He pets the kitten’s back with a thumb.
“I do not think I joke well over the phone,” Damian says quietly, to Tim and not to Isaac. Isaac is meowing back at the kitten in a little voice that might be his attempt at a whisper.
“What?” Tim asks.
“Or perhaps I underestimated Jason’s level of stress and it was not good timing,” Damian continues, as if Tim hadn’t spoken.
Above Isaac’s head, for a brief second, their eyes meet and Tim has a flash of understanding.
“The wooden katanas,” he says.
“I am not inept. I have learned what is appropriate for small children,” Damian says, almost defensively.
“Jay was really stressed,” Tim says. “And I was a jerk. At least you were just trying to be funny.”
“Tt,” Damian says, his gaze on the cat.
“You could have stuck around and hung out with us,” Tim says, wondering now if he’d also somehow driven Damian away on top of it. He really needs to take some time off work and push himself. It’s been awhile since he’s really been very far from his, albeit often physically dangerous, comfort zone.
“I was angry,” Damian says simply, holding out an arm. Tim shifts Isaac up and slides him over, so Damian is left with a nephew crooked in one elbow and a kitten on his other wrist.
“Angry is okay,” Isaac says seriously, still enthralled by the kitten. “Biting is not.”
That gets a sudden flash of a smile out of Damian and Tim laughs and pats Isaac’s shoulder.
“I was slightly angry,” Damian amends. “I was also hurt.”
“Bandaid?” Isaac asks suddenly, his attention torn from the kitten as he leans back in Damian’s arm to look his uncle over.
“No,” Damian says quietly, without humor. Tim, however, is amused but only slightly. “A different type of hurt. I think I am doing better now. Is Alfred still sleeping?”
“He’s here?” Tim asks, surprised.
“Owl?” Isaac echoes hopefully.
“He often sleeps on his day off, but rarely past dinner,” Damian says. “If you have not seen him, he is likely still asleep or reading.”
“Owl is busy,” Tim tells Isaac. “Tomorrow you can see him.” Despite Jason’s threats, Tim seriously doubts Alfred would be much bothered by seeing Isaac if he was awake-- but Tim doesn’t want to risk waking him if he isn’t up on his own.
“D,” Tim says, finally petting the kitten for himself. Isaac returns to patting the kitten very gently on the head. “Do you want to P-A-T-R-O-L tonight?”
“Ice cream,” Isaac says, as if he understood a message. “Yes.”
“No,” Tim says with a grin. “But maybe I can find you a cookie.”
“Yes,” Damian says simply. “Do you want me to entertain Isaac?”
“As long as it’s not with katanas,” Tim says, yawning. “Yeah. I have no idea how Jason does this all day.”
“That was a joke,” Damian says flatly, his mouth slanted downward in that way Tim now recognizes as mild humor. “We will build with blocks. It is conducive to motor skill development.”
“Uncle Dev built blocks. I ate some,” Isaac says, struggling to get down. Damian lowers him to the tiled floor.
“Sugar cubes,” Tim clarifies. “I didn’t know he fed them to you.”
“Kiran employs methods of forming bonds that are not entirely satisfactory,” Damian says. “But they are effective.”
“Yeah,” Tim says, wondering if sugar cubes are the sort of thing that rate a mention to Jason.
“Cookie?” Isaac reminds him.
Cookies and sugar cubes seem, upon consideration, the sort of thing that can be overlooked.
Isaac leads the way to the playroom with a cookie in one hand, Damian trailing behind him slow and tall with the kitten still curled against one shoulder.
And in the sudden absence of responsibility, even briefly, Tim finds himself unable to decide what to do. He checks his phone and, almost as if by magic or summoning, it rings.
It’s Jason.
“Please tell me my kid is alive,” Jason says. “We got out early and I am fricking done with this entire day.”
“Alive and pretty happy,” Tim says, relieved that he can say it honestly. “He’s playing.”
“I’m bringing food. Don’t argue. Is Damian there?”
“Yep,” Tim says. “He was joking about the swords, by the way.”
“Shit,” Jason says, and Tim can hear a palm pound against steering wheel. “He’s probably pissed.”
“No, I think it’s okay,” Tim says, less sure but enough to attempt to reassure Jason. “Dev’s here, too. And Al, but he might be asleep. I can pitch in.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jason says. “Is Isaac tired?”
“Um,” Tim says, slowly, hedging. “He kind of, uh, took a late nap.”
“That’s fine,” Jason says, though the overall tone of his handwritten instructions had seemed to indicate otherwise. “I’m grabbing Chinese. Text me if you want anything besides the usual. Tell Isaac I’m on my way.”
The line goes dead without a goodbye and Tim wanders down the hall. He joins Damian on the floor among a massive supply of blocks. Isaac is alternating between stacking them for a bridge and checking on the kitten still in Damian’s lap.
“Your dad’s on his way,” Tim says.
“I miss him,” Isaac says forlornly. “I don’t want to leave. I like this cat.”
“I think you’re staying for dinner,” Tim says, by way of solace. He adds two green blocks to the bridge scaffolding.
“Yes!” Isaac cheers, startling the sleepy kitten.
Tim stretches out on the floor by the bridge.
“Wake me up before Jason comes into the room,” he warns Damian. “Or before you leave. None of that technicality sh–crap.”
“Alright,” Damian says, his voice startlingly like Bruce’s when he’s humoring someone. “Hold still. I am going to build over your legs to demonstrate support systems. Isaac, watch me.”
“I love today,” Isaac says. “I drove Grandpa Bee’s car.”
“Please let me retreat before you tell Jason this,” Damian says to Tim, who is already half-dozing.
“It was–” Tim begins to say hurriedly, but he opens his eyes to see Isaac bouncing slightly on his knees as he adds a blue triangle block to the tower by Tim’s ankle. His little face is full of serious focus. “Okay. Yeah. Sure thing, Damian. It was the best, wasn’t it, Isaac?”
Isaac sets a block down and nods.
“We went so fast.”
Tim is far more asleep than he intended to be when Damian nudges his hip, hard, and his eyes fly open and the towers around his feet scatter when he starts.
The toddler doesn’t even react because he’s already scrambling toward the door and the announcing yell, “Where the frick is everyone? I’m here!”
“Daddy!” Isaac shrieks, tearing out the door.
Tim and Damian follow, Tim still rubbing sleep from his eyes. Isaac is already in Jason’s arms, clinging tightly.
“Have a good day, kid?” Jason asks.
“Yes,” Isaac says fiercely. “I love you.”
“Love you, too,” Jason says, bumping his forehead against Isaac’s. “Tell your slowpoke uncles to come eat before it gets cold.”
“Come eat!” Isaac orders over his little shoulder.
Tim isn’t especially good at following orders, but this one he has no trouble with at all.