[This isn't going at all how he wanted, but Wally can't bring himself to stop.] You think I haven't told you stuff I don't tell anybody else?! You know everything about me except this one thing! [And couple other things that he's not really in the mood to share right now.]
I'd trade a lot of that other stuff for knowing you die, Wally! You could've— you— you didn't even want me to be part of your support for this? Or am I too Batman for that?
You'd trade- I'm not a problem you get to fix, Dick! What the hell would you trade?! My birthdays? Going on patrol? You'd trade knowing what I wanna be when I grow up?
Oh but maybe you'd only trade the hard stuff, like when I broke my nose and you were the first one I called! Or maybe you'd trade the stupid pointless stuff, just delete all our text logs from your brain 'cause it's not important enough for you! I don't wanna be a cause you can rally behind, you jerk! All I want is a best friend!
You think that's what this is about? You think— you actually think this is just some kind of puzzle for me? Like your death was gonna be just, just a case I'd get to crack and feel good about myself?
Everyone else you told, all those people you've known for entire months, I guess they really care about you, right?
...I didn't want to tell you that you'd...that you could lose another person important to you.
I didn't want you to obsess over it. You- Dammit Rob, you get so caught up in fixing things and- When we all thought Artemis was gonna die back home, you barely ate anything. I don't even know how often you slept. You get so determined to stop it from happening again that you wreck yourself, and if you can't fix it you just crash and burn. And you get this look in your eyes, like there's a car coming for you but you're not planning on moving outta the way and it's just- [it's terrifying]
I just... I just didn't want to be the reason behind that. That's it.
Dick is silent for a moment. He can't move, can't talk, can't even breathe. And then the tears start to prick at the corners of his eyes. ]
... You're so stupid. You're so so so stupid, you unbelievable—
[ He winds up and punches a wall, and the skin on his knuckles splits and bleeds and that sharp, bright sting of pain feels better than crying. ]
What happens if you can't fix it, huh? What happens then? Were you just gonna surprise me? Because you didn't think I could handle it? You've never lost anyone, you don't know what it's like... I'd give almost anything just to say goodbye, just to tell them I loved them. Don't you dare try to tell me that knowing's worse!
[What what that sound-] I don't know! I don't know, okay, I just wanted- I wanted to find an answer before I had to tell you! [He shoves a hand into his hair, paces in their shared bedroom and resists the urge to kick all of Dick's things over.] God, what do you want from me Dick?! What do you want to hear, what d'you want me to say? I was scared, okay?! Just tell me what you want me to say and I'll say it already!
I don't want you to say anything! You can't fix it that easily! You can't take it back! Don't you get it? I wanted to matter! I wanted you to come to me first!
[ His voice cracks, his breath starting to tremble, and he just wants Wally back. He wants him back the way it was before, when all they needed was each other. ]
I told you I'd stay and I meant it. I'd give up my whole life to stay with you. Do you even care? Do you even want me to? Or would I just get in the way?
[It's kind of amazing how the mind and body work in tandem to make a person feel something. Chemicals and nerve endings and hormones, adrenaline, endorphins, everything cooperating to make sure that a person who feels awful in their heart feels awful everywhere.
Wally can't feel his fingers. Or, no, it's more like he isn't aware of them because he almost drops his phone.
Seriously?
Robin doesn't believe him. All the times when he's said it, when he purposefully seeks Robin out to just be in his presence because he feels like he doesn't have to try, those nights when Robin falls asleep in front of his computer and Wally puts a blanket on him. When Wally gets them lunch from the places he knows Robin likes the best, because he makes sure to listen when they go on lunch break together, because he loves that pleased look on Robin's face when he opens the container and goes, man, I LOVE this stuff! Thanks Walls.
None of that mattered in the face of this. It's not good enough. And that's what sticks in his head, that not good enough because he's felt that way about almost everything and he's had to work, really struggle to get over that and tell himself he's good enough. But now his death hinges on it and all he hears is Barry's disappointed 'I never wanted a sidekick' tone muttering if you were just a little faster Kid, if you just hadn't done it wrong when he stares at the ceiling at three in the morning, silent because he doesn't want to wake Robin up by freaking out.]
Are...are you serious?
[His voice sounds high and wounded and that's not Wally wants, because it sounds like he's crying but he's angry and hurt and feeling lower than he's ever felt before, and really Robin's the only one who can get him to hate himself this much.]
You don't- You don't remember? [No, he wouldn't have. It was probably just another conversation to him, unimportant. Maybe that's Wally's fault. He doesn't care.]
"Official best friend request." [He sniffs, angry and frustrated and hurt.] "If you're staying, I'm staying."
[It had been so important to him, to hear Robin say that. So important, and Robin didn't even remember.]
[ The thing about seeing someone you someone you care about — someone you really love — hurting is that it hurts you almost as bad. Dick's chest squeezes painfully; something burns right in the center of his ribs, and every breath aches. He knows that tone. He knows what it means. He did this.
He's angry, and he's still wounded, and he wants to lash out, wants to grab Wally by the front of his shirt and shake him and just yell everything he feels until Wally gets it... but Wally's hurt and it's his fault. He's supposed to protect him from that and he messed up.
When did everything start going so wrong? ]
Of course I remember. [ Quiet and honest. ] I remember everything we say to each other. I just didn't know— I didn't know what it meant.
[ Robin takes a deep breath and screws his eyes shut tight and clutches the phone like he wishes he could hold onto Wally's hand. ]
I know people grow up and grow apart but I don't want that to be us. [ His throat hurts like he's trying to swallow needles. ] And I don't want you to stop having other friends — of course everyone thinks you're the best, I just noticed it first — but— it's like you don't come to me for anything anymore, and I feel like you're going to outrun me one day and — Wally, if I can't even help you when you're scared I don't know what the point of being a hero is.
Stop, god, stop it, [Wally says over the end of Robin's last sentence.] Stop calling me the best, stop calling me great, nobody else thinks that! I'm not the best at anything! I'm literally not the best in any aspect of anything I do! If I was then I wouldn't be dead five years from now, would I? So stop!
You keep- [Wally's voice goes far away because he throws his phone down on the bed and takes a second to just calm himself down because he wants to chuck his fucking phone in the fucking lake and watch Alli eat it.] You keep making me sound like this gilded god who- Who can think his way out of anything or- or just run or just do it and fix it but I can't and I don't and- And stop it! You're not allowed to say one nice thing about me ever again unless you finally swallow the idea that you were my hero first, you idiot.
I don't care what you can't do! I don't care, I don't care, I don't care. Why do you think you're not the best? You— you give me 200-mile-an-hour piggyback rides, and that's so unbelievably cool, but... Kid Flash is amazing because of who Wally West is! I'm never gonna care who can run faster than you or do complicated stuff at lightspeed. I don't care what Barry or Bart can do because they're not you! If one day you woke up and your powers were totally gone, you'd still be my favorite person. I'd still love you, you stupid, stupid jerk! You're my best friend!
[ Crap. Now he is crying. And he knows Wally can hear it, but he doesn't care. Maybe he needs to hear it. Maybe— he doesn't even know anymore. God, he doesn't want him to die, please, please, please. ]
Don't you get it? God, you're so— I-I don't want to be your hero, I want to be your partner!
Why do you think I could tell everybody but you about this?! You think it's 'cause you're not important enough but you're wrong! I can handle Bart giving me that look back all during June, I can deal with Jaime shutting up whenever the topic comes up but you think I could look at you and just talk normal about this? With you?!
I couldn't! Not in a thousand years! Not because you aren't important, you idiot, it's because you're the most important person I've got! God, Dick, do you seriously not get that? What do I have to do, run into another explosion with you?!
No! I don't need some big dramatic gesture, Wally, I just—
I feel like I failed you, okay? I wish I'd been there when you found out! I wish you'd thought, "I want to talk to Dick." I don't need you to shelter me, I don't need you to protect me, I just need you!
For the first time since learning about his death back in December of last year, Wally begins to question his decision not to tell Robin. He'd known Robin would be angry; he knows he would be, in his place. He'd known Robin would be upset he wasn't told, but he'd thought his concern for Robin, his desire to keep Robin from being hurt again would override that. Or maybe- maybe it was more like he thought Robin would see that.
But he doesn't.
Of course he doesn't. When had any of them ever preferred secrecy and safety over sticking together?]
I wasn't trying to- I just didn't-
[There it is again, huge and encompassing, that acknowledgement that if Robin knows -if Wally stops being stubborn, if he continues to refuse any fault in this, that he's going to have to accept that he's going to die. Not in that long-off, distant sort of way teenagers like him look at old age and death but immediate, like looking at a train bearing down on him, like looking at the gun of a barrel, like-
Wally realizes his hands are shaking.
He hadn't told Robin to protect Robin. Well, he had, or that's what he'd convinced himself, but that was wrong. No, Robin knowing- that means nothing is normal anymore. But he'd gone and fucked that up anyway, hadn't he? Somewhere between then and now, he'd already started to push Robin away, maybe in yet another misguided attempt to protect them both. When did he start doing that? When Robin told him he loved him? When Bart told him that he'd quit the team, or was it after, when Bart told him he was going to die? When had he started disentangling himself from Robin's life in a subconscious effort to save them both the heartache?
Wally's vision swims and he sits down heavily.
No, there's a simple truth here and it's this: Robin was his last chance to deny that it happens. Robin was his last puzzle piece before getting the whole picture, the keystone to the bridge that's slowly been building itself in his head between denial and despair and now that Robin knows, that's it. That's the end of all of it. The train's going to hit him, the gun's going to go off and in five years, if none of them can figure out a way to change the fabric of reality that doesn't tear about the structure of their universe he, Wally West, is going to die.
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performance) wrote2014-04-10 06:52 pm
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Oh but maybe you'd only trade the hard stuff, like when I broke my nose and you were the first one I called! Or maybe you'd trade the stupid pointless stuff, just delete all our text logs from your brain 'cause it's not important enough for you! I don't wanna be a cause you can rally behind, you jerk! All I want is a best friend!
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Everyone else you told, all those people you've known for entire months, I guess they really care about you, right?
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[ That's it. No longer retort. Just stunned silence. ]
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...I didn't want to tell you that you'd...that you could lose another person important to you.
I didn't want you to obsess over it. You- Dammit Rob, you get so caught up in fixing things and- When we all thought Artemis was gonna die back home, you barely ate anything. I don't even know how often you slept. You get so determined to stop it from happening again that you wreck yourself, and if you can't fix it you just crash and burn. And you get this look in your eyes, like there's a car coming for you but you're not planning on moving outta the way and it's just- [it's terrifying]
I just... I just didn't want to be the reason behind that. That's it.
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Dick is silent for a moment. He can't move, can't talk, can't even breathe. And then the tears start to prick at the corners of his eyes. ]
... You're so stupid. You're so so so stupid, you unbelievable—
[ He winds up and punches a wall, and the skin on his knuckles splits and bleeds and that sharp, bright sting of pain feels better than crying. ]
What happens if you can't fix it, huh? What happens then? Were you just gonna surprise me? Because you didn't think I could handle it? You've never lost anyone, you don't know what it's like... I'd give almost anything just to say goodbye, just to tell them I loved them. Don't you dare try to tell me that knowing's worse!
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[ His voice cracks, his breath starting to tremble, and he just wants Wally back. He wants him back the way it was before, when all they needed was each other. ]
I told you I'd stay and I meant it. I'd give up my whole life to stay with you. Do you even care? Do you even want me to? Or would I just get in the way?
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Wally can't feel his fingers. Or, no, it's more like he isn't aware of them because he almost drops his phone.
Seriously?
Robin doesn't believe him. All the times when he's said it, when he purposefully seeks Robin out to just be in his presence because he feels like he doesn't have to try, those nights when Robin falls asleep in front of his computer and Wally puts a blanket on him. When Wally gets them lunch from the places he knows Robin likes the best, because he makes sure to listen when they go on lunch break together, because he loves that pleased look on Robin's face when he opens the container and goes, man, I LOVE this stuff! Thanks Walls.
None of that mattered in the face of this. It's not good enough. And that's what sticks in his head, that not good enough because he's felt that way about almost everything and he's had to work, really struggle to get over that and tell himself he's good enough. But now his death hinges on it and all he hears is Barry's disappointed 'I never wanted a sidekick' tone muttering if you were just a little faster Kid, if you just hadn't done it wrong when he stares at the ceiling at three in the morning, silent because he doesn't want to wake Robin up by freaking out.]
Are...are you serious?
[His voice sounds high and wounded and that's not Wally wants, because it sounds like he's crying but he's angry and hurt and feeling lower than he's ever felt before, and really Robin's the only one who can get him to hate himself this much.]
You don't- You don't remember? [No, he wouldn't have. It was probably just another conversation to him, unimportant. Maybe that's Wally's fault. He doesn't care.]
"Official best friend request." [He sniffs, angry and frustrated and hurt.] "If you're staying, I'm staying."
[It had been so important to him, to hear Robin say that. So important, and Robin didn't even remember.]
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He's angry, and he's still wounded, and he wants to lash out, wants to grab Wally by the front of his shirt and shake him and just yell everything he feels until Wally gets it... but Wally's hurt and it's his fault. He's supposed to protect him from that and he messed up.
When did everything start going so wrong? ]
Of course I remember. [ Quiet and honest. ] I remember everything we say to each other. I just didn't know— I didn't know what it meant.
[ Robin takes a deep breath and screws his eyes shut tight and clutches the phone like he wishes he could hold onto Wally's hand. ]
I know people grow up and grow apart but I don't want that to be us. [ His throat hurts like he's trying to swallow needles. ] And I don't want you to stop having other friends — of course everyone thinks you're the best, I just noticed it first — but— it's like you don't come to me for anything anymore, and I feel like you're going to outrun me one day and — Wally, if I can't even help you when you're scared I don't know what the point of being a hero is.
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You keep- [Wally's voice goes far away because he throws his phone down on the bed and takes a second to just calm himself down because he wants to chuck his fucking phone in the fucking lake and watch Alli eat it.] You keep making me sound like this gilded god who- Who can think his way out of anything or- or just run or just do it and fix it but I can't and I don't and- And stop it! You're not allowed to say one nice thing about me ever again unless you finally swallow the idea that you were my hero first, you idiot.
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[ Crap. Now he is crying. And he knows Wally can hear it, but he doesn't care. Maybe he needs to hear it. Maybe— he doesn't even know anymore. God, he doesn't want him to die, please, please, please. ]
Don't you get it? God, you're so— I-I don't want to be your hero, I want to be your partner!
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Why do you think I could tell everybody but you about this?! You think it's 'cause you're not important enough but you're wrong! I can handle Bart giving me that look back all during June, I can deal with Jaime shutting up whenever the topic comes up but you think I could look at you and just talk normal about this? With you?!
I couldn't! Not in a thousand years!
Not because you aren't important, you idiot, it's because you're the most important person I've got! God, Dick, do you seriously not get that? What do I have to do, run into another explosion with you?!
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I feel like I failed you, okay? I wish I'd been there when you found out! I wish you'd thought, "I want to talk to Dick." I don't need you to shelter me, I don't need you to protect me, I just need you!
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[He did.]
...I just- [Robin already knows.
For the first time since learning about his death back in December of last year, Wally begins to question his decision not to tell Robin. He'd known Robin would be angry; he knows he would be, in his place. He'd known Robin would be upset he wasn't told, but he'd thought his concern for Robin, his desire to keep Robin from being hurt again would override that. Or maybe- maybe it was more like he thought Robin would see that.
But he doesn't.
Of course he doesn't. When had any of them ever preferred secrecy and safety over sticking together?]
I wasn't trying to- I just didn't-
[There it is again, huge and encompassing, that acknowledgement that if Robin knows -if Wally stops being stubborn, if he continues to refuse any fault in this, that he's going to have to accept that he's going to die. Not in that long-off, distant sort of way teenagers like him look at old age and death but immediate, like looking at a train bearing down on him, like looking at the gun of a barrel, like-
Wally realizes his hands are shaking.
He hadn't told Robin to protect Robin. Well, he had, or that's what he'd convinced himself, but that was wrong. No, Robin knowing- that means nothing is normal anymore. But he'd gone and fucked that up anyway, hadn't he? Somewhere between then and now, he'd already started to push Robin away, maybe in yet another misguided attempt to protect them both. When did he start doing that? When Robin told him he loved him? When Bart told him that he'd quit the team, or was it after, when Bart told him he was going to die? When had he started disentangling himself from Robin's life in a subconscious effort to save them both the heartache?
Wally's vision swims and he sits down heavily.
No, there's a simple truth here and it's this: Robin was his last chance to deny that it happens. Robin was his last puzzle piece before getting the whole picture, the keystone to the bridge that's slowly been building itself in his head between denial and despair and now that Robin knows, that's it. That's the end of all of it. The train's going to hit him, the gun's going to go off and in five years, if none of them can figure out a way to change the fabric of reality that doesn't tear about the structure of their universe he, Wally West, is going to die.
Wally feels lightheaded when he says,] I-I got-
I gotta- I gottago, I gotta-
[and he hangs up.]