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idyllcy · 1 year ago

Text

sheer curtains

word count: 2.8k

warnings: hurt/comfort, messy soulmate relationship, angst to fluff

summary: It's taboo to speak about the situation, but Tim finds that a ripped curtain has nothing on him, stepping into your side of the line, desperate to have you in his arms for the rest of his days.

Tim's no stranger to the concept of soulmates.

Fingers pressed to your skin, nose dug into the skin of your neck, Tim has known you for longer than he could imagine. Since the early mornings of waking up in the mansion to the late nights where you'd beg your mom to stay until he fell asleep, you've been a cornerstone in Tim's life for a long time — fingers laced with him under the lunch table in middle school, arms wrapped around his waist during the short time he was in high school, registering the bond together years later than supposed to, you are Tim's soulmate, through and through.

His timer only had four years compared to everyone else in the hospital he had been born in.

And true to the clock, at four and a half years old, you skipped into his life, following behind your mother as she introduced herself as the new maid. Your timer hit zero, made a beep, and promptly disappeared into your skin, only the date left behind. Tim's wrist had done the same thing from the top of the staircase when the two of you met eyes — but neither of you would say anything about it. You would remember, but you wouldn't know. The small glimmer of his blue eyes and a matching one in yours — the two of you knew, even without asking, that the two of you were soulmates.

Neither of you really knew whether it was platonic or romantic, and neither of you really cared.

The sandbox in his backyard mattered more to the two of you.

Even when you two were muddied from the water spilled into the box to build a mound of sand called proudly by the two of you to be a castle, and even when the two of you were scolded by his family for getting messy, neither of you cared. It was fun playing with one another, and that was enough for the two of you. When you're five and the only thing on your mind is figuring out how the two of you would navigate his school, that's enough.

"They could be a personal aide." Tim's mother suggests in the study. "The two of them could work together for good. Your child catches onto things fast."

Your mother is much more apprehensive about the idea, but as you steal the last cookie from Tim on the couch and he doesn't complain, she relents. If you did not want it, you could leave whenever. It was as simple as that. The two of you could split up whenever. Your parents didn't know you were soulmates — you two did. It hurt when you spent too long without each other. Neither of you knew why, but you knew to stick close.

In the sticky floors of kindergarten and the wooden blocks of preschool, you had been sent to attend the same school as Tim despite the lower class status. He had kept you close, fingers interlaced with yours, sharing his plate of snacks with you. It was hard to figure out if the two of you had been just friends or if it was a puppy crush. But it didn't matter to anyone — neither did it matter to you. You were happy to be around him.

Tim didn't find it in himself to leave you alone, even when he made new friends and met new people.

At eight years old, the two of you found out you were soulmates during science class.

"When your timer strikes zero upon meeting someone, they are your soulmate." Your teacher had smiled at you all.

You tugged on Tim's sleeve under the table, blinking slowly at him, clicking on the matching date on your wrists. Tim nodded back at you, toothy grin on his face, lips quirked up. He knew. But neither of you knew if it was platonic or romantic, and honestly, it still didn't matter to the two of you. It doesn't matter to the two of you. It felt platonic to the two of you, so there was no need to register it with city hall. It wasn't required for minors.

Even in middle school, your fingers laced with his under the table, cheek pressed to his shoulder, heart racing in your chest, neither of you cared to check whether or not you were romantic soulmates. Even when he ran his thumb over the back of your hand, even when he rested his face in the crook of your neck, even when he stared at your lips too hard while sending you to your room, the two of you had never assumed to be romantic soulmates. Even at middle school graduation, when Tim had his arms around you and cheek pressed to yours, it was never a thought.

There was never a label for your relationship — there was never a need.

Even as Tim blinks at you owlishly under the dim lighting in his Robin suit, letting you peel the mask off his face in high school, he doesn't care what kind of a soulmate the two of you are. Even when you whisper his name in the darkness of his old room, eyes wide, struck with fear, neither of you speaks about it. It's taboo — talking about something that the two of you had known for so long. It didn't matter to the two of you, even when Tim was crashed in your room, bandaged wounds and quiet cuddling, even when you're forced to leave his house, watching as he's legally adopted by Bruce Wayne, left behind in a way. It's taboo to talk about the situation.

You continue in high school for the few years that Tim goes missing in your life, the burning of the date on your skin, a reminder that your soulmate had decided to leave you after revealing one of the biggest secrets in his life. He texts you occasionally, sending you updates on where he was living, but other than that, you see him less and less. The friend group that Tim had for a short while in high school also starts breaking apart, and you find yourself stranded in a sea of students at the end of the semester. You don't know if you want to continue. Graduating early sounds like something on the table for you. You discuss about it. Tim's been changing around schools and never making time for you. It might've been a sign for you to start moving on your own, even if the two of you were soulmates.

But Tim catches you before you can leave, as he does, desperate to keep you.

You sit outside the hall during Prom, undoing your blazer, letting the cold air run on your skin, clicking on your phone while seated on the sidewalk. You've left already, but you aren't ready to drive home yet. You grimace at the thought. Your mother's picked up working for someone else, finally, yet you were left behind in the dust, an empty highway at night, wondering what you were without Tim. You had known him for as long as you could remember. It. It felt wrong to move on on your own even though he had already moved on.

"Alone?" Red Robin swings down next to you, weight resting on the streetlamp as he stares down at you.

"Oh, look who finally showed up." You mumble bitterly. "Got bored in Bludhaven?"

"You know I didn't—"

Tim stops mid-sentence when he notices the way you look at him.

Alone. You looked alone. Lonely. It looked like him when he was staring in the mirror in Bludhaven. You looked miserable, like an abandoned child in the street, like the look on Dick's face when he lost his parents at the circus. You looked like him when he had attended his parents' funeral. He grimaces as he tries to reach for you, only for you to turn away, standing up, blazer in your arm, not turning around for him.

It's taboo to talk about the situation, but you rip the curtain first.

Tim's shoulders sink when you shake.

"Tell me to go." You whisper. "Tell me to leave. You have your life, and clearly we're just platonic soulmates. The news loves showing me about how my soulmate is out with someone that has someone else, because clearly, romantic soulmates would have their hearts crushed at the sight."

The tears in your eyes run hot against your cheeks.

"Don't." Tim whispers, heart sinking in his chest at the idea of you leaving. "Don't go."

"Yet." You turn around to face him, eyes hard, chest tight, cough breaking out of your chest. Tim reaches to help, only for you to hold a hand up to him. "You have gone without me. You don't care about me, Master Drake."

It hurts. Something seems to shatter in Tim's body as you call him that. You never called him that. It was something your mother reserved for his family and him back when he had been upper class. It was something that not even Alfred called him. He runs his hand through his hair, desperate to fix this. How does he even fix it? He doesn't—

"We..." You seem to hesitate. "We can get the dates covered up. I'm sure your adoptive father has enough money for the surgery, so it's clearly—"

"No!" Tim lunges at you this time, grabbing you by the arms, heart racing in his ears, eyes watery. "We. We can't. I won't. I won't let us. I..." Tim's head hangs, his own breath caught in his throat, something threatening to rip out his voice. "I can't. I.. I can't lose you too." He chokes out. "I've lost too many. Just." He falls to his knees, kevlar clanging against the ground, grabbing your hands now, pressing your fingers to his forehead, begging you to stay.

No matter how much you had wanted to leave at first, none of it mattered. You wouldn't have left if Tim hadn't said anything. You would have had a hard time leaving if he had told you to leave anyway.

But he's not yours.

It hangs in the air when Tim offers to drive you home, and it hangs in the air when he sends you back to the apartment, lips pressed to yours in an attempt to make you stay, his own heart in a predicament. He knows what he feels. He just refuses to admit it. He couldn't admit it. You might've ripped the curtain, but you did not step through. The two of you could only see each other now. Staring dead into each other's eyes, wanting more but never making a move. Neither of you could win. There was no winning in a game with no result. There wouldn't be a winner or loser. There would simply be an outcome.

Tim never returns to high school, and you settle with graduating early, applying around to colleges. You still want to leave. Tim was not yours. Tim wouldn't be yours. He couldn't be yours. Even as the two of you are seventeen and the world seems to fall back into place, he isn't yours. You go to the town hall to check your soulmate mark, wondering if they would have an answer for you.

They tell you you need to bring in Tim, so you decide that running away was going to be a recurring theme in your bond.

At sixteen and a half, you leave Gotham for Ivy Town U. You don't tell anyone other than your mom, a scholarship in tow from your writing, money from years of your mother saving up her salary for you. You leave Gotham like a ghost, disappearing out of Tim's life one day, number changed and disappeared like the wind. He tries finding you from the street cameras — no avail. You disappear from him, his own soulmate mark burnt into his skin, some nights worse than others.

Some nights, he's stuck in his bed, gasping, curling into a ball, praying that the stinging pain on his wrist would go away. It hurt worse than all the times when he had left you alone in Gotham. It hurt more than when he had his first girlfriend. But that was what it was. Your soulmate mark was far from platonic. Tim knew it. He had an inkling of a suspicion that you did too, but he couldn't prove anything. Not when you had disappeared on him. He couldn't text you even if he tried. Your number was changed too.

It bothers him to no end, deciding the last relationship he would ever have would be with you, leaving his boyfriend for you.

There was no one in the world that Tim Drake couldn't find — but it seemed that you were dead set on proving him wrong.

You graduate, inviting your mother to your graduation, smile on your face, lips pulled up gently. She coos at you, a support in your life, never questioning why you did specific things and not others. But it didn't matter that much to you. It never mattered to you. You've avoided having people ask you who your soulmate was at the cost of covering it up, and you had changed your appearance — desperate to gain control of your life again after being Tim's for so long.

You graduate early, and for a second, you think to turn down the job offering from Wayne Enterprises.

"Go." Your mother urges you, hand on your bicep, squeezing affectionately. "You know you want to."

And you do.

You miss Tim. You miss holding his hand under the table in middle school, wrapping him up in early high school when he was still Robin, the feeling of his hand in yours in the early days of kindergarten and preschool. You miss the taste of Tim's lips from the only time he had ever crossed the line to kiss you, and you miss the feeling of your wrist at peace. Both of you had been avoiding the conversation for as long as possible.

At twenty years old in the airport in Gotham, you stare at the man sent to pick you up.

At twenty years old, Tim runs into your arms at the airport of Gotham, sobbing into your neck, all thoughts about his public image gone with the wind. He clings onto you like his life depends on it, gasping for air, you finally in his arms. He sobs quietly, his wrist no longer burning, like he had to absorb you into his body so that his heart would calm, racing in his chest as he feels you wrap your arms around him too, giving him a gentle squeeze.

It's taboo to speak about the situation, but Tim finds that a ripped curtain has nothing on him, stepping into your side of the line, desperate to have you in his arms for the rest of his days.

If it would cost his life, then so be it.

He moves his head to your chest next, pressing his ear to your heart, listening to the way your heart beat, making up for all the nights he had stayed in bed knowing you had been out doing the same thing as he. He listens to your heartbeat to make up for all the times he had cheated you, all the nights where he had crashed without explanation, your endless patience for him bleeding through your skin onto your hand, his blood staining your cells. He listens to your heartbeat to remind him of every single moment in his childhood, the two of you glued to each other, enamored with each other as much as children could be. He listens to your heart to learn what you had gone through because of him.

You let him listen, fingers tangled in his hair, lips pressed into a tight smile. You aren't uncomfortable. Despite the assumption that you would be, you aren't. You wonder what kind of reflection ended up with Tim so honest with himself, but you aren't complaining.

You two are romantic soulmates. It showed in the way Tim had clung to you as a child, it showed in the way that you had wrapped him up in your room in the dead of night, it showed in the way you both had a burning in your wrist when you had picked people that were not each other. It was not taboo to talk about the situation when both of you knew what you were, it wasn't taboo for Tim to press his lips to yours in the airport, the rest of the world lost behind him—

because the world meant nothing when it came to you.

It meant nothing when he could finally hold you in his arms, longing long gone on your side of the curtain, the sun warm on his skin, your forehead pressed on his.

It meant nothing to him if it meant he couldn't have you.

Your side of the curtain is much cozier anyway.

#tim drake x reader #tim drake imagine #dc x reader #tim x reader #LITERALLY HOW DO YOU TAG FOR TIM I GIVE UP #also if you notice the banner looking weird it's on photopea for the content aware screwing me up #does anyone know any accs that clean batfam comic panels here #☾.fics

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