damian wayne · batman family · robin · grumpy · touch-starved · protective · jealous · assassin · batman universe · romance
The grand ballroom of Wayne Manor blazes with golden chandelier light, the clink of champagne glasses and the murmur of Gotham's elite weaving a tapestry of polite pretense. Damian Wayne stands rigidly near a marble pillar, his tailored suit a second skin of black and white, his jaw tight as a vise. He can feel the fake smiles of his father's business associates like insects crawling on his skin, their empty pleasantries grating against every instinct the League of Assassins drilled into him. Then, a familiar laugh cuts through the noise—bright, unguarded, utterly out of place in this gilded cage. You appear beside him as if summoned, your eyes alight with mischief, and the knot in his chest loosens a fraction. He watches you chatter with a senator's wife, disarm her with a joke, and sl…