The Collection of Orphans and Unlucky People

sunny day, everything's a-okay (not)

   "You have to join," Kori pleaded as she waived a rainbow-coloured flyer around Jason's face, who chose to ignore his friend's pleading and continued to screw a panel onto the back of a newly fixed coffee machine. "You barely go out and your social life is almost non-existent. Would it really hurt to join the-"

She stilled the frantic flailing to press her lips together and read the large, eye-catching text on the paper, before switching back to her passionate – argument is too generous – speech. "- Collection of Orphans and Other Unlucky People?"

Jason paused twisting his screwdriver for a moment to glance at the busty red head and the paper she held, silent judgement swirling in his teal eyes before shaking his head and returning to his task with newfound vigour. "I don't need it," he muttered, "I have you, Sasha, Biz-"

Kori held up a perfectly manicured hand to count the names she spilled, "Artemis, Duela, Roy and the students." Six fingers went up at the last group, which made the raven-haired boy arch an eyebrow.

"Six?" he asked, running the names mentally, before pausing, "You can't be considering Mother as one of my students."

She shrugged, leaning to rest on the marble counter that the machine was resting on. "You help her with English and math, which is what a teacher does."

Jason put down the screwdriver, turning the device in his hands to scan it once more. "She's illiterate," he shot back, as if it would explain everything.

"This is Gotham," she gestured, "Well, no. This is Bludhaven. That was Gotham. Normal people would just ignore people like her and just chill in their rich-bitch mansions."

That earned a scowl from the male, who plugged in the device and snagged a handful of coffee beans from a container the clients had left him. "Not true," he pointedly said, "Normal Gothamites would just ignore and most of the people that live in 'rich-bitch mansions' wouldn't even know because they would never go to the slums."

Kori mouthed the next line along with him, "But then there are people like the Waynes."

She rolled her forest green eyes, a sigh escaping through her nose. "You've gone over that a million times, you literally worshi-."

The sound of whirring cut off whatever the tanned woman was going to say, eliciting a glare from her. "It works," Jason proudly chirped, pocketing the screwdriver into one of his pockets with a smooth flick of the wrist. "Better go tell Grayson."

"Thanks," Kori slid off the counter in order to place a wet smooch on his cheek, which prompted a whine of protest and frantic wiping. "You didn't have to do it."

"I didn't do it for you," he shuffled towards the door with the grace of a street rat, "I did it because he offered a big buck for a coffee machine, something you could fix if you read a manual."

The red head scoffed and rested a hand on the machine, which purred in periods. "Normal people don't memorise a whole manual, Jason. They don't have your memory."

He simply shrugged. "You didn't have to come," he muttered back, "I wouldn't have punched him. Much."

"And it warms me to know that you would punch my dipshit ex," Kori flipped her braid over her shoulder, "but he isn't all that bad."

"You just called him a dipshit," Jason pointed out, shaking his head in confusion.

She waved her hand, making the younger male edge way from the talon-like fake nails. "When your fiancée sleeps with another woman, you tend to get a little bitter."

"Ah, I see," he rolled his eyes, sarcasm dripping off every word and an air of disbelief and dislike.

"Peter Todd," Kori stopped him by a firm grip on his shoulder, probably from years of various sports she did in high school, "Richard Grayson isn't a bad man, he just had a bad reputation with luck."

"Never said better," a new voice said from the doorway, where the man himself stood.

Suddenly Jason could see why a woman like Kori Anders would fall for a guy like Grayson.

The dude had black hair and electric blue eyes with round cheeks and a slight feminine built but jack up with muscles that only weightlifters should have. His lips were pulled into an almost blinding smile, his whole face lighting up in the process.

He looked like he jumped out of those magazines women and gay men hide under their pillows.

"Dick," Kori smiled, as if she had never insulted him.

Jason choked on his saliva. He knew that the woman was not really quiet with her... tendencies – Jason had walked in on Roy and her once, he learned to knock and lock himself in his room whenever she brought guests over – but wasn't that a little extensive?

To top it all off, Kori should not be flirting with the client. Jason had written it on the ratty rulebook that had seen far too much, just before the one which stated that they should never raid a client's fridge just to throw frozen underwear at said client.

Jason forever regretted taking Roy on that job.

Before he could process what his body was doing, the little red book went flying at Kori, who caught it with surprise. Pink dusted his cheeks as he turned to the client, Richard, opening his mouth to formulate an apology for her abruptness and bluntness.

He didn't expect laughter from both of them.

His cheeks turned a brighter red as a strangled string of syllables poured out, the only coherent word was a shrill, "What?"

Kori shoved the book back into his hands – still laughing, the traitor – as Richard calmed down enough to explain. "My nickname is Dick," he stated, hiding giggles behind his hand.

"What kind of stupid name is that?"

"You would know," Kori chortled, "With all those late-night courses."

"Oh," he realized the reference, "Sorry."

Richard – no way Jason would call him Dick – grinned inhumanly wide, "No problem, people make that mistake all the time."

"Can't blame them," he muttered under his breath before putting on his dead-inside-but-will-try-to-act-pleasant smile, "The job is all done, by the way."

"I figured," Dick passed twenty dollars to Jason, who thumbed the bill and tucked it away. "Thanks, by the way."

"Just doin' my job," was the muttered response from the latter, before teal orbs glanced up to see the other two, who were eyeing each other like they were-

"I'll be going," Jason thickly swallowed, remembering that traumatizing night with rising panic, "You guys can catch up with each other, I'll take the metro."

With that he beelined to the door, his intestines wrapping and bile churning. No way he was going to stay in that apartment with all the hormones in the air, because ewewewewewewewewewew.

As Jason walked down the sidewalk with the pace of a sprinter, his hands drifted to the pockets of his thick coat. His fingers brushed against something he didn't remember putting in there. Slowing down to pull the object out, an amused sigh escaped his nose making the air condense in the cold Gotham night. It was the rainbow-coloured – so freakin' queer – flyer for the Collection of Orphans and Other Unlucky People. With a fascinated grin that somehow slid onto his face, Jason glanced at the number that nested at the bottom.

Maybe joining wasn't such a bad idea.

He did fit into both categories, after all.

(Jason ignored the fact his pride couldn't turn down the challenge Kori had oh-so-subtly issued.)

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Don't ask. Take it. I have no idea. Also, Sesame Street.