nothing to fear

before the after

The past is your story told through scars. 

Chapter 4

4 months before

There is an art to falling out of love. 

An art that Robin never perfected. 

They are on the plane ride back from Tokyo, fingers still intertwined like their newfound relationship would wither if they let go. Not lasting 5 minutes without snaking their way back to each other. 

Their affair is anything but secret. Photos of their infamous award ceremony plaster various media outlets, looped through the infinite chain of the internet millions of times over. 

A text pings on Robin's com from an unknown number. We need to talk. Now.

From what he's been taught, alleyways and rooftops are where love takes place. Not in the limelight. 

Starfire hovers over him with curiosity. "Robin, are you ok? You seem...preoccupied." 

"M'fine. Just thinking." He nuzzles their noses together, and the lapse of understanding is gone. 

But not forgotten. 

If falling out of love is an art, secrets are the first masterstroke on the page. 

3 months before 

"Robin? Robin, please respond." 

The door whirs open. He is hunched over his desk, panting feverishly as if he had just run a marathon.

She yanks him by the collar so he is forced to look at her. "Robin, it is ok. I am fine."

"Rules." He slams a fist into the wood. The push and pull between them scorching like ice. "There have to be rules." 

A summer sun ignites between his teeth. He grits his weakness away. 

"If we're gonna do this, no kissing, touching, anything like that on missions. In fact, I'm putting you with Raven so it deters suspicion." 

Like 'doing it' was so natural, like a sensation wasn't simmering in his stomach and pouring out from his mouth into hers. 

Her hands encircled his wrists. Pale as glass and just as breakable. 

She clings not only to him but to her reasoning. "Suspicion? Robin, this will not stop villains from targeting me. They have seen the portraits from-" 

He tossed a lawsuit at her, the signatures of the other titans shakily jotted down. "I'm filing copyright. Unless the press wants a million-dollar hole in their funds, they'll be taken down within a week." 

The erasure of their relationship. All expenses paid. 

She tears clumps of orange into dead strands, enshrouding herself in her limp curls. "So...what do we do? Simply pretend there is no us? Act like our union in Tokyo does not exist?" 

A prickle of pain. She is not sure if it is hers or his.

His expression is mirthless. "Slade already knows, Starfire. He's going to use you to exploit me. And believe it or not, this preventative measure is necessary. For things bigger. Severe." 

Starfire grimly nodded. "The Joker." 

The clown prince of crime. Robin could almost see his bleached, manic, grin, munching popcorn as he watched their relationship unravel. 

"Exactly. He loves to annihilate anyone remotely close to Batman. Anyone who gets in the way of their crazy little game." 

"But Robin-"