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"This isn't what I thought dating would be like," Jason admits, enjoying the peace and quiet of the night.
With a kiss to the top of his boyfriend's head, Barry asks, "And what did you think dating would be like?"
They're up on the roof of Jason's flat, the blond spread out on a long lounge chair with the younger man in his arms, back to Barry's chest.
Watching as the rope lights sway in the breeze, tiny beacons casting dancing pools on the concrete, Jason shrugs. "I don't know. Always going out, I guess. A constant, tireless struggle to find something new to do all the time lest we end up at the same restaurant or coffee shop everyday. Always trying to find something witty or pithy to say lest I lose your interest."
Barry huffs a laugh, making Jason's head rise and fall gently and bringing a smile to the younger man's lips. "You're been reading again, haven't you?" His tone suggests that the raven-haired man has committed a minor sin.
Letting his head tilt back, Jason shoots a mock glare at his boyfriend. "Brevity is the soul of wit, and I fear I must diminish mine own lest you be dazzled by such a vision."
That one the older man at least partially recognizes. "Slaughtering 'Hamlet' now?" he asks with a raised eyebrow.
"Eh, he dies anyway," Jason replies as casually as if saying that water is wet.
The chuckle bursts from Barry's chest with a surprised gasp of air, and Jason grins as he feels it vibrate under his ear. "We've had our laugh out of it, and that is worth while."
Finding the warm skin under the hem of Jason's shirt with one wandering hand, the scientist asks, "What's that one?"
Trapping the hand in place, savoring how long fingers splay and stroke lightly at his stomach, the younger man thinks for a moment before again shrugging. "Some book on pirates, I think." His lips finding the underside of Barry's chin for a soft kiss, Jason adds, "Your turn."
"For what?" The blond pulls his boyfriend more tightly to his chest.
"Slaughtering famous quotes."
Barry's gaze turns skeptical in the low light, the shadows deepening the frown lines around his mouth. "I don't think they have many of those in forensics journals."
"Ah, but you knew 'Hamlet,'" Jason replies, unwilling to give up so easily regardless of Barry's eye roll.
"Everyone knows 'Hamlet.' That's probably all I remember from high school English." The older man pauses for a moment in thought. "Unless you want some 'Romeo and Juliet'; all that nonsense about star-crossed lovers and such."
Barry's derisive tone matches Jason's as the younger man dramatically groans out, "Please no. Anything but that."
The older man allows himself another chuckle and another kiss, this one to the sensitive spot behind Jason's ear. "Well, then I guess I got nothing," he says, tugging on the lobe lightly with his teeth.
Without conscious thought, Jason lets his head fall sideways, giving Barry more access. "I doubt that," he says with a sigh as his boyfriend kisses lightly up the shell of his ear. "Talk science to me." The older man's ministrations halt, and Jason feels a bemused puff of breath against his skin.
"What? Is that like talking British?"
Jason can't quite side-eye his boyfriend with the current angle of his head, so instead he turns his face into Barry's shoulder and plants a chaste kiss against the man's shirt. "Maybe? I don't know," he says into the fabric. "You're a scientist; talk science."
Barry stares at the back of his boyfriend's head for a very long, very confused moment. Jason just waits patiently, eyes drifting closed as he soaks up the heat from the older man's embrace. A quiet giggle is his only warning before Barry begins to sing.
"There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium." The scientist pauses for effect. "And hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium. And nickel, neodymium, neptunium, germanium. And iron, americium, ruthenium, uranium." He can't say the words as fast as the melody calls for, and he's totally off key, but he keeps singing because the way Jason's head has whipped around and the younger man is staring at him bug-eyed is almost as hilarious as the song. "Europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium, and lanthanum and osmium and astatine and radium."
"What the hell?" Jason asks softly, mouth agape, both appalled and fascinated by what he's hearing.
Barry continues, undeterred; his boyfriend did ask for it, after all. "And gold and protactinium and indium and gallium. And iodine and thorium and thulium and thallium." He emphasizes the "th" hard, and a laugh throws off his rhythm as Jason twists around out of his arms and scoots backwards on the lounge chair, wearing an expression of amused horror as he regards the older man. Barry sings on. "There's yttrium, ytterbium, actinium, rubidium. And boron, gadolinium, niobium, iridium. And strontium and silicon and silver and samarium and bismuth, bromine, lithium, beryllium, and barium."
Jason's now got his legs crossed, his elbows on his knees, chin resting atop laced fingers. His eyes are fixed on Barry's mouth, as if the words spilling from it add up to forty-two. Or the square root of i. It's a toss up.
"...And manganese and mercury, molybdenum, magnesium. Dysprosium and scandium and cerium and cesium." Barry trips over "praseodymium" in the next verse as Jason's shoulders start to shake and his face takes on a reddish hue that's visible even in the dusky light of the roof.
"...And also mendelevium, einsteinium, nobelium. And argon, krypton, neon, radon, xenon, zinc, and rhodium." The scientist emphasizes "krypton" like it's his own private joke, catching how Jason's eyes narrow in question. "And chlorine, carbon, cobalt, copper, tungsten, tin, and sodium. These are the only ones of which the news has come to Hahvard. And there may be many others, but they haven't been discahvard."
Barry finishes the last line with the best Boston accent he can manage, which is to say, one of the worst the world has probably ever heard. And as the last notes fade into the air, carried off to assault someone else's ears, he barely manages to maintain a straight face as he meets Jason's stunned look dead on.
"Did...did you just 'science' the 'Pirates of Penzance'?" It's the younger man's turn to sound like an egregious sin has occurred.
"Uh, I don't think so?" Barry's voice rises at the end as his face scrunches in confusion. "That's 'The Elements,' by Tom Lehrer." Jason's shaking his head, and the scientist fears he might find himself committed if his boyfriend looks at him like he's any crazier.
"That's the 'Major-General's Song,' by Gilbert and Sullivan." Fingers resting lightly against his lips, Jason meets Barry's blank stare with poorly concealed distress. There's a flash of indecision across the younger man's face before he takes a deep breath and starts singing. "I am the very model of a modern Major-General. I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral. I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical. From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical."
Jason's voice is only slightly better than Barry's, but no one would know it by the way the older man is staring in rapt attention.
"I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical. I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical. About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news, with many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse."
In the break between verses, Barry suddenly surges forward, his lips locking over Jason's just as they start to open to continue. Surprised and off-balance, the younger man nearly topples backwards, only saved by a quick tug at his shirt by the scientist.
"Were you really just singing math?" the older man asks breathlessly when they separate.
"I'm very good at integral and differential calculus," Jason manages to pant out off-beat, earning himself another searing kiss. Again they separate, leaving the younger man more than a little stunned at his boyfriend's reaction. "I have no idea what any of it means, but if you keep kissing me like that, I'll gladly sing what I remember of the multiplication tables, too."
"I'll kiss you even if you don't," Barry says, voice almost a growl against Jason's lips, saving the younger man the embarrassment of forgetting what nine times nine is. The kiss goes on for what feels like hours, heated at first until they both decide together that they're perfectly okay with letting their tongues do all the exploration as they caress each other lightly.
"So, umm, that was...hot," Barry admits when they finally break the kiss, a blush coloring his cheeks.
"Barry Allen, science nerd, a sucker for musicals?" Jason replies skeptically, raised eyebrow and all.
Said science nerd makes a face like he's just eaten something rotten.
And not in the state of Denmark. Or on Broadway. Jason snickers to himself as he imagines Barry in puffy pants and pointy leather boots. Welcome to the Renaissance, indeed.
"...Not at all. I meant you singing...whatever that was," Barry is saying as Jason pulls himself back to the conversation.
The younger man smiles as he lets his forehead rest against Barry's. "God, I never though I'd be the cultured one."
"Hey, Tom Lehrer was a brilliant mathematician, as well as a satirist and singer-songwriter," the scientist protests. "'The Elements' is culture!"
"Pilfered culture," Jason counters.
"I'm sure he had a flag!" Barry declares stubbornly. "Just like your major general."
Jason's laugh rings through the night, and Barry can't help but pull him close and swallow it down with another kiss. When they again separate, the younger man doesn't waste any time cocooning himself back in Barry's arms, his ear in its favorite place over Barry's heart, as the older man re-positions himself on the chair. They sit in companionable silence for several minutes before Barry starts humming quietly. Jason lets himself drift on the melody.
"On the roof, the only place I know where you just have to wish to make it so. Let's go up on the roof," Barry murmurs.
"Up on the roof," Jason echoes, stretching the "o" as he grins.
Surprised, Barry cranes his neck down so he can look his boyfriend in the eye. "You know this song?" Against his chest, Jason nods, and the scientist makes a happy sound. "It was one of my mom's favorites," he says wistfully, eyes on the moon as the memory comes to him. "Our house had a balcony on the second floor, and there were so many nights when I remember her and my dad out there dancing in each other's arms. It was one of their favorite things to do." Almost unconsciously he starts to sway gently in time to the melody in his head, carrying Jason with him as he hums a few bars. "She loved this song; they always played it on those nights."
"The sounds...nice," Jason says quietly, looking away into the darkness, images of his own childhood rising despite his best efforts to shove them down. Not that he didn't love Catherine, despite the drugs and...everything else that she brought into his life. Not that he didn't give up Gotham for Willis, even if that wasn't his intent. But while they were his parents, it's been a long time since he thought of them as "mom" and "dad" – at least not with any real affection. He can't remember the last time he did.
"What is it?" Barry prompts quietly when the silence stretches and he feels Jason's arms tighten around him.
It takes a few seconds, but Jason eventually whispers, "You're lucky. I know it sounds horrible because of what happened, but you're so lucky."
Burying his face in his boyfriend's hair, Barry returns Jason's hug as he mentally kicks himself. "I'm sorry," he says, punctuating the words with a kiss. "I didn't mean to bring up bad memories."
"Don't be, it's alright. Just because my parents were...special, it doesn't mean you can't talk about yours." Because Barry really doesn't talk about them often, but when he does, Jason usually loves the way his face lights up as he tells the stories of his childhood. For some reason, right now, it's just sitting wrong. "You loved them, and they loved you," he finishes, the words tasting like the ash from Catherine's cigarettes and the burn from Willis's cheap bourbon.
And I think I love you, Barry thinks, but doesn't say, ghosting his fingers over Jason's cheek. He doesn't want to push; their relationship is still so new. Instead, clearing his throat of the lump that's formed, he replies, "I did, and they did...so much. I know that. I...." Changed everything for a second chance – so that I could have them back, and we could be a family again.
"That song...," Jason says quietly, changing the topic before they can descend into further angst; he has no desire to ruin the night with phantoms and things they can't change. "I heard it on the radio when I came to Central. I was up here at night for the first time, and it was so quiet I couldn't stand it. I kept thinking someone was going to jump out of the shadows and stab me or something. So I turned on the radio, and the first station I found started playing that song."
Barry's laugh is uneven, but it's better than crying.
Mustering up as much indignation as he can, all of it fake, the raven-haired man turns his gaze upwards and says, "What? I'm from Gotham. It's never quiet in Gotham. Central at night scared the crap out of me, especially out here in the 'burbs."
Gesturing at the wide expanse of the sky above them, his face open as if standing before the most amazing thing he's ever seen for the first time, Barry asks, "How can you be scared of this? Millions of stars. Big bright moon. Even a breeze," he says as the wind ruffles their hair.
Jason scoffs as he rolls over on his back and lets his head rest atop his boyfriend's shoulder. Taking in the view, he allows himself a moment to breathe deeply, savoring the night air in a way he never could in Gotham. They're only two stories up, but the surrounding buildings are low and the lights few and far enough between that the sky shines brilliantly. "Have you ever been to Gotham?"
Barry's heart clenches painfully, as it does whenever he thinks of his last trip to that city. For a funeral. Dick's funeral. He knows it's ridiculous, but deep down he's never stopped hoping that Dick and Wally have somehow found each other – that the universe has granted them at least that much in death as a reward for all the burdens it heaped on them in life. "Yeah," he says simply, feeling tears bead at the corners of his eyes, thankful his boyfriend can't see them in the dark.
"The breeze in Gotham is the cars flying by trailing exhaust." Jason's eyes track the flashing lights of a plane thousands of miles above – a plane that would have been invisible in the swirling mists of Gotham's pollution. "The moon and the sun are the neon lights – electric billboards by day and strip clubs by night. And the stars..." He trails off, his gaze going to the bulbs he has strung up on low posts. "When I was a kid, some of the neighbors hung Christmas lights between the buildings like clothes lines. I used to sit in the window at home and stare at them as my parents screamed at each other. We never saw real stars in The Narrows."
There's such longing and sadness in Jason's voice that Barry suddenly finds it hard to breath around the tightness in his chest. Wordlessly, he holds the man tighter.
"My first night here, I jumped at everything," Jason says, a rueful smile on his lips. He imagines what all the little Birds would say if they saw big bad Red Hood firing off half a clip every time a squirrel chittered or leaves rustled (not that he actually had, but only because he was currently gunless). Artemis would never let him live it down. The thought brings tears to his eyes, and he has to take a minute to steady himself before he can say, "I almost left because it was too quiet."
Gently wiping away the twin tracks of moisture glistening in the moonlight on Jason's cheeks, Barry replies, "I'm glad you didn't," pouring as much love into the words as he can.
The younger man swallows audibly. "Me, too."
In the silence that follows, Jason's gaze lazily takes in the sky above. Despite the memories and the tears, his body and his mind are still lax and content in a way he can't ever remember feeling before he met Barry. It's a small thing, but he realizes that he hasn't even scanned the surrounding rooftops once in the last ten minutes looking for danger. In a weird way, he's proud of himself.
"You're beautiful."
Jason's breath catches. The words are spoken so softly he almost thinks he imagined them, but when he looks up and meets his boyfriend's eyes, he knows they were real.
"You are," Barry says, his thumb smoothing out the lines of disbelief that furrow the younger man's forehead.
Jason's mouth opens and closes several times before he finally quips, "You've seen me naked," trying to hide how flustered he is at the compliment in a bad attempt at humor. Because he's really not. His body is a patchwork of ugly scars. What lives in his mind is even uglier. The part of him that Barry sees – it's almost insignificant in comparison.
"Eye of the beholder," the older man replies, resting his chin on Jason's shoulder, pressing a kiss to the tender skin where it meets his throat. "You're beautiful. All of you." Brushing his lips against his boyfriend's neck, he hugs the other man close as he once more starts singing quietly, the words meant for Jason's ears only. "Right smack dab in the middle of town, I've found a paradise that's trouble proof. And if this world starts getting you down, there's room enough for two, up on the roof."