If I can't be everything to you.....you will be nothin to me

Tim is worried about dahlia but aren't we all ?

He wasn't sure what was wrong with him. A good comedy was on, he had Steph under his arm, it was a Saturday, and he'd closed his latest case just twenty hours earlier. He should have been riding a wave of serotonin right into Monday afternoon, but he couldn't turn his brain off.

It kept running back to the Demon Spawn, to his snotty little fiance, to the weirdness surrounding them.

There was a case there, and he knew it, and he was trying so hard not to stick his nose in Dahlia 's business because he just knew he'd catch hell for it when word got around, but he couldn't. Stop. Thinking about it.

Steph glanced up at him from where she was laid at his side, big blue eyes blinking up at him under pretty eyelashes as she noticed him, well, not relax.

He tried to smile at her. Her eyes said you serious ? "Okay, that's it. I haven't seen you like this since Conner got you stuck on the riddle he made up with no answer. You've gotta spill, babe. What's on that obnoxiously huge mind of yours?" She graced his temple with her finger and he laughed and smacked them away.

"Nothing, really! Just..." He paused, pursing his lips in thought. "Something isn't sitting right with me about the dupain-chengs ."

Steph sat up and propped her chin up by resting her elbow over the back of the couch. "Oh, you mean the fact that they're filthy rich and yet no media here or in the US has coverage of them?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Find anything yet?"

She shrugged. "Not yet. Guessing you haven't either?"

"Ugh, no. Nothing beyond, like, attending fashion shows or, apparently, funding cancer research. Demon Spawn was right, they're as clean as they come." Unless, of course, they were just really good at hiding it. Clearly, that was the case.

He knew it, Steph knew, Bruce probably knew it, he wouldn't have been surprised if Alfred knew it.

There was a chance that they'd let those media-happy walls down once Dahlia got inside, let him see the ugly corrupt part of being a family of eccentric billionaires.

He was sure, if that was the case, Dahlia would pick up on it. As annoying as the brat could be, even in her later years, she was capable, and smart, and could see a facade for what it was a hundred miles away, better than any of them could. Each brother, each Robin, had their own thing, the thing that set them apart from the other robins, and his was his uncanny ability to see right through bullshit.

He wasn't good at handling people, like Dick was, but he knew people . He understood them, and if there was something as up uncanny valley as he was expecting, then he knew Dahlia would see it.

"Oh no," Steph ran a hand down her face, looking beyond her spread fingers with exasperated eyes, but he could see the humor in the quirk of her lips. "You have that look again, Tim-Tim. You don't really think the Baby Bat would tell you of all people if something was horribly, inconceivably wrong with her in-laws, do you?"

"Well," He gave her a sheepish grin. "She's my little sister , Steph. Even if she doesn't wanna tell me, I'll figure it out."

She smiled at him. God, he loved that smile. She had dimples, and the apples of her cheeks bloomed such a sweet shade of redpink that it made his stomach do flips.

Not matter how long he was with her, no matter how many times she kissed him breathless or knocked him out (be that with her amazing flexibility or a brick to the face) she still gave him butterflies. Gross. She grabbed him by the collar of his greenblue sweater and pulled him into another breathtaking kiss.

Damn the TV, the couch just became a case he was planning on pulling an all-nighter to close.

_______________________________________

Jon shot up in bed, gasping, eyes wide in the rising sun of Hamilton. Far from the streets of Gotham, far from that rooftop so long ago. Farther than he'd ever been away from Dahlia.

He grimaced, reaching up to run a hand through his already bed-messed hair. No doubt he'd find a surprise if he dared pull the covers off right then, so he wouldn't. Because that dream shouldn't have happened, because he'd made his choice, and Dahlia had made hers, and god if Iris ever heard he'd fantasized- had a dream - about knocking boots with somebody she didn't even know was (technically) his ex , he knew he'd have to go live under a rock somewhere and die the Boy of Mineral and Erosion.

He went to move his other hand, the one that was so limp over the side and hear the faint sound of a paper crinkling.

He pulled the hand back, and found it clutching helplessly to a familiar essay, My Best Friend . Even now, the words were so familiar, held so near to his heart and so true that he didn't need to look at the paper to see every Times New Roman letter, that he knew every word so well it would be less reciting essays and more monologuing. Contemplating.

Truth is, we got along right away. Mostly.

In the movies you always see these kids grow up together and share every experience together...

I call her my study buddy. She loves it.

No matter what, when the chips are down, she always has my back. And she always takes care of me. I know I can trust her no matter what trouble we find ourselves in

He winced, rubbing at the bridge between his eyes. Yeah, he should have known digging up that old thing would send him down memory lane.

A suddenly X-rated memory lane, apparently, despite the original memories being innocent and not at all... whatever that was.

He was just feeling a little tense, hadn't seen Iris in a long time, had a new world opened to him now that he'd finally taken a bite of the cherry.

Dahlia was on his mind, he wanted Iris, but he'd used to kiss Dahlia who was getting married, who wasn't his friend anymore, who hated him now because he'd messed up. That was all.

He pulled his legs up to his chest and laid his forehead at his knees, willing away the yearning in his chest. So stupid. He'd forget the dream by the time he was done with his chores.

He was tempted to throw the old A+ essay away, but instead, he took the packet in gentle hands, opening the drawer of his desk where he set them gingerly upon the empty wood.

1181 words
This one didn't have dahlia in it but I deemed it necessary nevertheless so I write it anyways I like how tim has a hint of what's going in I think he will be the first to discover .

Arrevedercci 😅