16 | RINNEY

6

"Vance have you ever-" griffin peers around the room with a scandalous glint in his eyes before planting his palms against the surface of the table and pushing himself up, leaning over to whisper (not really it was rather loud) "had sex?"

Vance lifts his eyebrows at him but he doesn't really react, not nearly as roughly as the other boys do, Bruce gasps and robin and finney snap their heads toward them, a subtle (not really) interest on everyone's face

The blonde, who was drinking water as he was asked, puts his bottle down "griffin I'm
18 and you're 14 I don't wanna have this conversation with you id rather you fucking shoot me."

"You're 18?" Bruce asks, receiving a soft hum in response "when's your birthday?"

"It was 2 months ago," Vance says sheepishly, as if he's shy about it.

"Did you do anything special?" Finney asks, dropping his pencil in favor of letting it roll off the table and into robins lap

Vance shrugs "not really."

"Do something special with me, my birthdays in 3 days. Robins in 33."

"It's fine, was a while ago anyways."

"Did you atleast get a cake?" Bruce chimes in and Vance just slumps in his seat

"No I've never had sex." He says and griffin gapes

"Are you lying?" He raises his eyebrow, pointing an accusing finger at him

Vance rolls his eyes "no im not fucking lying. People would rather eat shit and die twice then be anywhere near me. How could I have possibly had sex??" He shoves gently at griffins shoulder, prompting him to sit down

"I dunno I figured you snuck into goth clubs or whatever " griffin says

Vance rolls his eyes " 'm not goth, idiot. I like metal. Total difference."

"Do you think about it?" Bruce asks softly, sweetly even "like.. wanting to? Or is that to tmi"

Vance shrugs, cheeks a flush red as the topics shift around the room with him main center. He's not used to it, people wanting to know about him, people being so judgement free and giving him their simple support and love. He's found there's something to love about gentle nods and gentle quiet agreeing hums, they're homely and they're safe. Sometimes you don't really have to get into detail for others to understand.

"I think about a lot of things, i don't really give a shit about all that I already told you I have a thing with touch."

"You like it? Like being touched normally or are you super against it?" Robin chimes in "you seem like the type to secretly enjoy silly shit like holding hands and whatever." He stifles a tiny giggle

Vance flushes and shrugs "I like when people are nice to me. That's all."

The boys share soft smiles across the table, griffin coos softly "you're nothing but a big sweetheart. I wonder if people would ever believe that."

"Doubt it." Vance scoffs

Bruce hums "well it's there loss anyways, right?" He's leaning his head in his hand, tilting his head at Vance with a tiny smile.

The blonde flushes and sinks further in his seat
"Whatever."

——

"Robin told me you had plans for your birthday." Bruce says to him amidst doing some math paper in class (5th period to be exact.)

Finney hums "not really. 'M just excited."

"Yeah he told me that too." He offers him a fond smile

"He's not excited. But I'm excited for both of us so it's okay." The sound of finneys pen scribbling against the paper fills the gap of silence that follows.