Crazy Little Thing

Chapter 3

Debbie loved the idea of education. Yet she hated school.

The blonde lived in St. Victoria's Home for Troubled Girls. A nice title for yet another orphanage in their sinful world. Jason himself made sure she was put into a good orphanage after her mother and stepfather died. He himself would continue to make sure the young girl was in good hands while he was busy, tending to his other businesses.

Debbie cared very little for the classes she was given. She often left the home in the afternoon, saying goodbye to her friends and sneaking away to visit the manor.

Damian often returned home from school to find the young girl waiting outside the manor gate. She fiddled with her uniform while reading a book. Her clothes were always wrinkled, her plaid skirt ruffled and her white collared blouse was smudged with some kind of filth.

He would never understand how she was accepted into their sophisticated family. Even Damian himself would keep his own uniform in order and clean. She was quite intriguing to say the least. 

Damian grew accustomed to having Debbie around. He at least had someone close to his age to speak with which honestly was a nice change.

"You guys have a bunch of books," Debbie admitted as they both worked on their separate homeworks in the manor's library.

Damian had roughly finished all his homework and instead was now sharpening one of his many knives while reading War and Peace. He paid very little attention to the blonde who was walking through the library instead of doing her homework.

"What are you reading?"

"War and Peace."

"Can I-"

"No."

Debbie seemed to love asking questions. She was getting more comfortable with him. Damian had scolded her before to continue working on her given homework but Debbie cared very little for it. She claimed that she would be able to finish it while in class which Damian  doubted very much.

She might have been a decent student under his guidance but Damian felt little energy to try and teach her anything that day. His studies came first and after he would be able to relax and do whatever he wished. Perhaps he would continue with his sketches although he quickly remembered he left his current sketchbook in his bedroom.

"What an impossible day," the young boy scoffed.

At that comment, Debbie plopped down in front of the young boy, her curls bouncing and engulfing her face before she pushed them aside, "Have you reached the sudden death of Helene?"

Damian gawked and bolted upright, staring the girl in her very stubborn eyes and growled, "I haven't gotten to that part thank you very much."

"I've read it three times."

"I didn't ask."

"You should read Macbeth."

"You should shut up," Damian remarked before standing up, book under his arm and trotting out of the library.

Maybe it was a bad idea to read while with the child. Damian had previously been able to have quite civil conversations with Debbie over classic literature and art but she would always become quite excited and ramble on about the books she'd read or pieces of poetry she found amusing. Not a terrible thing but Damian found that she spoke an awful lot when they reached a topic that peaked her interest. But then again she was still a child.

Perhaps he could give her another chance.

"York, what would you say your favorite book is?" Damian asked as they now sat together in the living room, Debbie in one of the larger chairs looking outside and Damian on the plush couch in front of her. The television was turned off but Debbie had let a light fade of slow music escape a radio they had by one of the windows.

The blonde shook her head and rolled her eyes, "My name is Debbie."

Yet still Damian would not refer to her as such no matter how many times she repeated her name to him. It was a habit of his most likely she had concluded. And although it didn't bother her as much as she made him think, Debbie still enjoyed the sass she would give which in turn would irritate him.

"Breakfast At Tiffany's"

"But you were named after the main character."

Debbie gave her cheekiest smile, "Exactly."

So she was a smart mouth. Damian knew that since they'd first began their unlikely friendship. There was that word... friendship. Friendship. Such an odd and foreign word. What were the things that turned an acquaintance into a friend anyhow.

They did very little together yet all the same they began to do everything together. The two would sit comfortably, each reading a book in the living room with faint music drowning out any other evidence of life in the world. Within the hour, Debbie always found herself speaking up once more. Either the young girl became hungry, sleepy, or her eyes began to hurt from reading so much. 

"Damian, do you know how to swim?" she then asked him. 

The young boy scoffed, "Of course I do. Everyone does."

For a few moments Debbie was silent and Damian looked over to her. She fiddled with her thumbs, clearly bored. Sighing, the boy asked, "You don't know how to swim, do you?"

Well it was not Debbie's fault that she had grown up in the city and never learned to swim. She had never even been to the beach, not that she remembered at least. The young blonde had only been inside of a pool a handful of times. During the summer she usually played on the shallow end of the public pool and those were only the few rare times her mother had the time to take her. 

Soon they found themselves in the backyard of the Wayne Manor. Debbie was forced in borrowing shorts from her frustrated instructor as well as a shirt to wear while he taught her. 

Damian crossed his arms over his chest, "You will first learn to float. After, you will begin holding your breath under water and by the end of today you will be able to fight me in the pool."

The young boy had high expectations from his student. He knew she would not let him down. Or maybe he simply refused to believe her stubborn personality would let her fail his lessons. He cared very little that she had to borrow a pair of his old swim trunks which were still a bit too large on her and he cared even less that she had taken the terrible red cartoon T-shirt Jason had gifted him some years before. 

Damian was a precise teacher. He was an accomplished swimmer. He still needed to work on certain teaching methods but Damian was professional in the way he taught. Even if his way of teaching was having Debbie practice in the deep end of the pool after only a half hour. 

It was surprising at first seeing how well Debbie held up when he put her in the deep end. She was stubborn which was nothing new to him. Water seemed to be something she loved. Naturally, innocently loved. She loved the way it made her feel. Even how dangerous it could be. 

"It's like rain. Water loves to give kisses, even dangerous ones," she explained. 

Debbie had a weird way of seeing things. Damian thought it silly. But sometimes her nonsense made him want to smile. Other times she seemed a lot more like a boy than a girl. Taking on challenges out of the ordinary. 

"York, you're a bit more of a boy, aren't you?" he asked her as they both dried themselves off once the evening breeze began to get chilly.

The blonde shrugged as she wrapped herself in her towel, drops of water rolled down her hair smoothly. Her curls would surely wreak havoc once they dried, "Maybe. But there's nothing wrong with that. I still like pink. And dolls."

And surely there was absolutely no problem with that. Even if it was a tad bit strange to him. Debbie was simply another mystery he would need to solve. One of hundreds of secrets which he never seemed to be a part of. 

"Get dressed, York. Father will be home soon, he will return you to St. Victoria's." 

At least he had taught her to hold her own on the deep end of the pool.