Saving Grace: a Batman fanfiction

Chapter 8

    Grace woke up because the mattress sagged suddenly and pinned her to the ground. She choked in surprise (and because the mattress was making it hard for her to breathe). At the sound of her choke, the mattress creaked and quickly shifted a different way, letting her scramble out from under the bed and bee-line for the door. 

    Only, before she could bee-line for the door, big arms wrapped around her and swung her from the floor onto the bed. 

    The room was dark so it took a bit of time for her eyes to get adjusted to the strange figure, during which she could just squirm uncomfortably in their arms. 

    She squinted at a man that looked strangely like Bruce for not being his biological son. 

    Dick Grayson. She recognized him vaguely from magazine covers and tabloids. 

    Only, he was different in person, she noticed, her squirms subsiding. His hair was a little floppier-- his jawbone a little more defined-- eyes more friendly, and a more electric blue-- his lips-- no, she couldn’t think about his lips, what was she thinking??

    She finally wrenched away from him; and subsequently tumbled backwards onto his bed, by his feet.

    He grinned at her, eyes twinkling with recognition.

    “Hey, Li’l G!” 

    “Li’l G?” she repeated, dazed. One of his blanketed feet nudged her in the thigh playfully.

    “Yeah, Li’l G!” he repeated cheerfully. “I already came up with a nickname for you. Dami is Dami, Timmy is Tiny Tim, Jason is Little-wing, you can be Li’l G! So, what brings you to the wonderful room of Dick Grayson?”

    “Oh.” Grace pulled a piece of her hair over the side of her face shyly. (Shyly? She was not shy.) “I was sleeping here. Or-- under here. Under… the bed.” Her voice trailed off as she realized how pathetic that sounded, and she thanked God it was dark and he couldn’t see her blushing. 

    He cocked his head to the side, curious.

    “Why?”

    “He-- Bruce, he-- locks me in my room at night, but I can’t be in locked rooms, I can’t, so I had this idea to sneak into this room and sleep here instead because… well, I didn’t think anyone still slept here.”

    Dick’s expression was conflicted. “You can’t tell him,” Grace said, fisting the blanket on his bed. “You can’t tell Bruce. Okay?” she was concerned when he didn’t respond and gripped his ankle over the blanket desperately. “Dick, promise you won’t tell.”

“For now, I won’t tell Bruce,” said Dick slowly. “Your secret’s safe with me, Li’l G.” And then, before she knew it, Dick was reaching for her again (he was very touchy-feely, she’d begun to notice,) and wrapping her into a bear hug. “Nice to meet you, Li’l G who doesn’t like hurting animals. One question-- where’s your stuffed bear?”

Oh, she was SO going to kill Bruce. 

“It’s-- I don’t sleep with it, obviously,” she lied, mumbling into his shoulder. 

“Oh yeah?” he said, sounding unimpressed, keeping one iron arm around her back, pulling her into him (pulling her. Into him. Could he feel her heartbeat fluttering against his?), and using the other one to grope in between the crevasse of his bed and the wall. 

He pulled up Ted and put him in Grace’s arms, and she knew he was smirking even in the dark. “Look at you. Adorable.” Dick grinned at her and reclined onto his bed, leaving Grace sitting at the foot of his bed like a damn dog, clutching Ted in her arms.