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Tim was meant to be the smart Robin. Tim was the smart robin, Cassandra reminded herself to not let her frustration make her mean.
Steph had explained to her that even when she was right (which she was often) it was still hurtful. It took a few more tries to get into Cass’s head exactly why it was useful not to alienate people. Overall, quite the productive conversation. The explanation was an example in and of itself. Steph maintained her cool instead of storming off or throwing some venomous insult, in turn making it easier for Cass to understand what she was saying. It helped her see the merit in being “tactful” as her friend had put it.
It was an interesting lesson, especially when she realized Batman had never learned it. Cass felt proud of yet another aspect in which she outdid the Bat himself. This little lesson was the only reason why she was trying to restrain her rightful ire at her brother.
Tim knew about his sister’s ability to read the human (and sometimes alien) body. He should have been more than aware that Cass could tell when he lied. All this time she was sure they had an agreement: Cass would use tact to not out Tim’s lies in front of the rest of the family as long as they weren’t detrimental to the mission. He could keep his precious intimacy as long as it didn’t interfere with their job, which it never did. Red Robin was almost as dedicated to Batman’s cause as Black Bat.
For a long time, they had carried out this agreement in peace. Cass felt really proud of her restraint. Most of her siblings thanked her for keeping their petty secrets. She’d told Jason he didn't need to feel ashamed of his feelings, masking them behind anger, but stopped calling him out on it anyways. She agreed to not point out every white lie Dick told his younger siblings, leaving him to deal with the fall out if they figured out. She allowed Duke his space whenever he visited his parents, offering help but keeping it to herself. She didn’t tattle on Damian about how many rescues he had on the property because…well it was harmless and funny. And she liked the cats. It wasn’t her place to tell as long as it didn’t cause more problems. Besides, it’s not like they were fooling Batman.
Tim never talked about it. He never thanked her, never offered further clarification. That was fine by her. She knew he knew she knew. She assumed it was that thing Steph had explained: you don’t need to say everything out loud. Considering how hard expressing herself was for Cass, she could agree with the sentiment. They worked well together, her and Tim. Her brother was very intuitive even if not on her level but then again, they rarely were. He was fast, never one to waste time overexplaining things. He trusted her to be able to follow his plans, so their team ups worked like a well-oiled machine. Much like Spoiler, Red Robin was absolutely spectacular dealing with the most social aspects of the job.
It was one of the (very) few things Cass wasn’t good at. She didn’t see the need in learning, but she appreciated having allies that could. She usually paired up with spoiler while Tim was busy with Batman but if they were together, it was a good time.
It happened after one of those rare occasions. They had been busting Scarecrow’s production of fear gas, easy enough for the both of them. They had the goons tied up, fear toxin safely in custody of the GPD. All that was left was checking the computers for any possible intel on Scarecrow’s plans. Black Bat had taken to investigating the rest of the warehouse, just to be thorough, while Red Robin copied the entire data of the pc to the batservers.
She was thankful to had brought her little brother in that moment. Oracle was busy on some life-or-death hacking of Lexcorp’s servers and Steph was following a very promising lead on one of her cases. Sure, Cass had been working on her reading and knew some of the basics of what Red Robin was doing. She could have probably cloned the pc, she’d seen Oracle do it a thousand times, but it would have taken her a painfully long time to do so. Time, they did not have because even if the commissioner was winning them some, the police would soon want to access the servers for themselves. She most definitely wouldn’t have been able to figure out the location of Crane’s next hit by reading the shipping logs while uploading the evidence to their system.
Truth be told, she would have struggled to even try to read the logs. So yeah, as they made their way to Gotham Academy, weather tepid and humid, she was feeling great about their collaboration.
Scarecrow was still on the loose, but his plan to gas the high school on their their last day through the fire sprinklers was easy enough to foil. It did take them an awfully long time though, painstakingly disarming all of the Fear Toxin pumps he’d installed, but they had nothing better to do. The mechanism was tricky, Tim explained, because Crane had rigged the things to go off if tampered with. So, they had to very carefully disarm the trigger before they could even attempt to retrieve the pumps. The Gotham Police Department was not equipped to deal with this and, as Tim put it, “It’s better for their own safety if we do it”. The creepy hallways echoed their chatter as they dismantled the poison. There were poster from the year prior, and Tim explained to her the project his class had done about the pollution in Gotham Harbor. The levels of different chemicals highlighted on a graph were surrounded by gorgeous pictures of the harbor. Her brother explained it was so bad, a dip in those waters could probably murder Aquaman which sounded like an over exaggeration to her. They were on their last traps when Cass started to feel a little bit worried.
“Do re-breathers protect you from the gas?”
Tim looked up from where he’d just finished freeing the pump. He reminded her of a confused bird, tilting his head to the side. “I mean, you’ve used them and been fine, right? Are you worried about triggering the toxin?”
Now Cass was the one confused. In Tim’s defense, he wasn't as good as her. He might have confused her agitation with fear for her safety. It was probably an honest mistake, so she clarified further.
“No, do they protect you?” She pointed to his chest to emphasize the difference. Tim seemed even more confused at that. She groaned. Understanding others was a piece of cake, but explaining herself was an absolute pain in the ass.
“You don’t have a spleen.” She went slowly, for his sake “Batman says a bit of toxin gets in through skin. Will that make you-“ she pointed again “sick?”
Tim had turned a really amusing shade of red. It was understandable, Cass would also feel a bit embarrassed for being so dense. But then, something changed. Tim’s shoulders rose up, his arms coming up in front of his body. He was shifting his weight slightly from his front foot to his back foot. Defensive, not ashamed. Now Cass was the one feeling confused.
“You knew about that?” Tim didn’t scream, he rarely did. He instead used that voice, the one reserved for bad guys and murderous robins.
Cass brows furrowed.
“Of course?” She suddenly wasn’t so sure it was evident “You know I can tell when you lie. I can tell when and where you’re hurt.”
Tim looked absolutely mortified now. All color drained from his face, expression livid, body frozen in pure shock. Shock of what? She wanted to scream. Everyone knew.
“No, you can tell when people lie.” What even was this conversation?
“You are people.” Cass felt dumb pointing it out, but she wasn’t the dumb one.
Tim was shaking his head, and Cass was starting to connect the dots. He wouldn’t. He was the smart one and this was the stupidest thing she had heard all week, and she'd been there when Dick tried to justify intradermally chipping Damian. Her brother was shaking a bit now, but his voice was resolute.
“You can’t be serious, I’m the Robin that can lie to Batman.”
That was it. She made sure her gas canister was secure, because first and foremost she was a professional, but then she exploded. “I am not batman!” She knew she was some furious shade of red under her cowl. There was spit on her mask, but Cass didn’t care.
“You-” She fumbled for words “You’re meant to be smart!”
She knew she just made it worse, but Cass still struggled to care. The only reason why she never forced him to come clean about that particular omission was the fact that he’d updated his medical records. Barbara told her. Her brother had his proper treatment and Batman would be aware of his limitations. Truth be told she hadn’t even known it was exactly his spleen until Barbara said.
Cass was aware he must have experienced some wound on his left side from the way he favored his right. It wasn’t on his limbs, so torso. From how long it took him to recover fully, even when he was moving mostly fine, it looked like an organ. Since he was alive and running fine, it couldn’t be anything vital nor his left lung. Spleen was one of the choices, although she had hoped it would be his kidney. He at least had another one of those and it would not affect his performance as much. She knew how much Red Robin cared for efficiency. Right now, it looked like he didn’t care much for how efficient her body language reading was.
“Wait,” She was waiting already, she could have stormed off “so you’ve been able to tell all along?”
Cass could -should- have tact. Be the bigger person. She could tell that Tim was troubled by the realization. But she was angry. Angry at the fact that he had thought he could trick her. Angry at being compared to Bruce as if that was her limit. Angry at not realizing sooner that her idiot little brother had been lying to her. She though they were in cahoots. She felt betrayed.
“I knew about your uncle,” She started listing as Tim grew paler “you’re scared of Jason, you lied about the Red Bird too.” She grasped at the air trying to find something that would upset Tim just as much as he had upset her. “You broke the rule.”
That seemed to be the proverbial last straw. It felt quite good. She was used to Tim always knowing what to say, always having the last word. It had frustrated her in the past. They didn’t argue much, but even on normal conversations it was annoying. He made it look so effortless while she struggled to put words to her thoughts. Tim, much like Dick, could play with double meanings, alliterations and the grammar of a phrase in that way everyone found witty; but always left her feeling like she was missing the joke. It was fine, she told herself, because his sharpness allowed Tim to understand what Cass was saying.
Cass knew she wasn’t as eloquent as her brother, but talking to him at least didn’t feel like talking to a brick wall. It helped her too; he didn’t talk down to her. Tim had explained to her the difference between “a” and “the”. It had been stupid really, another joke in a movie she didn’t entirely get. So now when she stated that he had broken “the rule” instead of “a rule” her meaning was clear. His teachings turned against him, oh the irony.
The triumphant moment died too fast. This was Tim. He had been an absolute idiot and she was still mad at him, but his shoulders were shaky in that way that preceded actual tears. He hadn’t run away. He made no attempt to fight her. He didn’t even tell her to fuck off. It was hard to enjoy putting your brother in his place when he looked so miserable. It wasn’t fair, he was the one that had hurt her. Cass almost wanted to grab the rest of the cannisters and go back home without another word. Maybe she should. At the same time…she needed him to react in some way. Trust supposedly smart people to ruin a perfectly cathartic fight by thinking too much about it.
“You know I know these things.” Cass started to pick up their things, needing something to do with her hands. She kept her brother on her peripheral vision, watching as he picked himself up. Tim went from trembling to rigid as he forced himself to breathe deeply. Cass wondered if he thought it looked convincing or if he was just trying not to cry. That made her feel a bit bad. Steph always said that Tim didn't cry enough.
“You didn’t tell Batman. He was surprised when I confessed.” Surprised and angry, Cass noted. They had crossed paths after that particular conversation and his stone-cold attitude had turned glacial. It had been the right call to let Tim go to him, there was no telling how mad the Bat would have been if he felt like one of his robins was trying to get away with murder. “If you knew, why didn’t you just tell him?”
She shrugged, “I knew you would tell. It wasn’t necessary to say for the mission. I don’t tell on people if not important” To Tim’s bewildered look she added “Anymore. Spoiler says it’s not useful.”
When she turned to fully face him after securing the cargo he looked frozen in time. A mixture of awe and pure horror could be felt from his slacked jaw and tense shoulders. Understanding, that was the thing. He looked like he'd put the pieces together. Only this time Cass was the one that had to spell it for him in very big letters. She allowed herself some smugness for that, she truly deserved it.
They did a last check of the school in silence and Red Robin informed the GCPD the place was cleared. They probably hadn’t put things together yet, but now they got to take credit while doing nothing. The Red Bird’s engine could be very quiet, so the drive back to the cave was eerily silent. The absence of friendly conversation would have bothered the others, but she was fine with it. It was a thoughtful kind of silence, not the socked and emotional one it had been at the school. Tim was thinking and that was good. He should be thinking about the absurdity of his assumptions. Cass didn’t look at him, focusing on Gotham through the windows.
It was a peaceful night all things considered. Red Hood would have his hands full with crime alley, but here in downtown it was quiet. Weekdays were usually boring, although Barbara would call them "Blissfully uneventful". Not many civilians in the street meant less victims to terrorize. Since most of the Rogues needed to put on a show, that left week nights for plotting and petty criminals. The different mobster families and organizations were doing their thing too like they always did. Cass had never liked them. The Rogues may be more dangerous when they stroke down, but they were very straightforward to deal with. They didn’t bother with alibis or covering their tracks, you just needed to win the fight and the trial was mere bureaucracy. Black Mask though, he was tricky. Not tricky in the way the Riddler hid away behind puzzles and word play, tricky in the way you couldn’t just grab him of the street and put him in jail.
That was it, wasn’t it? Life would be so much easier if things were straightforward. She caught sight of Robin’s cape flowing in the wind, jumping through buildings. He too struggled with how overly complicated justice seemed to be. Bruce, Barbara, Dick and Tim; they all thrived in their investigations. They didn’t chafe against the overt and unspoken rules of vigilantism, quite the opposite. The pure glee in their faces when they outmaneuvered their opponents was not reflected in Cass’s. She just felt exhausted. Cass was more than capable of finding the proof necessary to put people in jail. She was, in fact, better than them too. But it was hard to see the point, much like politeness. It was a thing you did because you were supposed to. Because that’s how things worked and people got pissy if you didn’t follow the rules. That's why she tried to be tactful and considerate, but Tim had gotten upset anyways.
In a way it, was destined to happen, Cass pondered as they entered the cave. Tim loved his rules. He loved breaking them too, but in a purposeful way. Cassandra hated them, but she only broke them on accident or by opposition. Jason had compared Tim once to a fairy. Fae had all these rules, he explained, and they tricked you through loopholes and double meanings. It fitted him well, a polar opposite to Cass’s no bullshit approach to things. It had also been his mistake: believing he could outsmart her simply because she disliked speaking in riddles. It was their mistake always.
Even Barbara spoke to her as if she was a misbehaved child or an angry kitten sometimes. Cass had to mentally go through katas just to calm down. She had tried to explain she wasn’t dumb or immature a hundred times. They always said they understood, that it wasn’t about that, but then they continued patronizing her. Yes, maybe she didn’t understand the “normal people stuff”, but that’s because she wasn’t one. She didn’t even interact with enough civilians to bother with it.
That’s why this hurt so much. Tim was one of the very few people that never treated her differently. Dick always said that Tim was awful with kids, especially Damian, because he refused to change his behavior around them. That he needed to be more considerate of their limitations and circumstances. Cass firmly disagreed, and Dick never dared say that kind of thing in front of Damian, so she was probably right. She thought she had something good with Tim, an inside joke! Turns out she was meant to be the butt of the joke. It was cruel in a way she had not expected her little brother to be. Damian and Jason were all about overtly lashing out, and Dick was the king of well-meaning offenses. But Tim?
“Why?” Was all that was left to ask in the silence between them.
Tim closed the door of the Red Bird a little too violently, his shoulders up to his ears “Well, I didn’t know you could tell, obviously-“ Cass cut him off because that wasn’t it.
“No. Why did you lie?” she clarified, “You believed I believed you, why lie to me?”
Tim didn’t answer immediately, booting up the Batcomputer and sitting down to type his report. In the meantime, Cass started unloading the Fear gas from the car. She refused to get annoyed at her brother for taking his time, even if it was -indeed- annoying. Too often did others get frustrated with Cass, forcing her to say things in a way she knows is not right just to get them out quick enough. Just because the correct phrases never came fast enough to her it didn’t meant she couldn’t recognize that she was using the wrong words. She’s not stupid.
How many times had Dick looked at her with that amused, well-meaning smug smile?. That smile that said “you poor thing, you don’t know how words work, do you?”. Jason would ruthlessly correct her grammar like it was a tick, raising in frustration the longer they spoke to each other. Even Steph and Barbara made well intentioned jokes at her expense. Sometimes she found them hilarious, but other times she just wanted them to focus on the meaning, not the technicalities of what she said. When most of her sentences had mistakes in them, stopping to point them out just halted the conversation entirely. Tim had always been so good at it-
The lights from the Batcomputer gave his skin a sickly pale-yellow glow. He was typing, but not too focused on his task. When Cass loaded the chemical analyzer with fear toxin, he opened the program in one of the monitors. She sat down in the stairs, knowing it would take some time to process. But, who didn’t these days? The Batcave was mostly silent, with the exception of Tim’s typing and the computer’s fans. The AC was way more comfortable than Gotham's sticky late June. She ripped the cowl from her head, allowing the built up sweat to drip freely to the floor. Cass wasn't a big fan of Climate Change. Looking up she caught sight of the only other sign of life in the cave, the fluttering mass of bats on the cealing. The rest of the family would be busy doing their rounds for at least another hour, guided by Oracle.
Cass considered a visit to the Clocktower while Tim thought of what he wanted to say. Maybe Barbara would have some insight. Alternatively, she could just agree with Tim, and Cass was not in the mood for that. She was Barbara’s favorite, but the oldest also had a soft spot for Red Robin and was a major proponent of the “Cass please, learn how to be a normal civilian, for your own good” club. Cass wasn’t sure if this fell under the category of her weird behaviors and didn’t care to find out. All of this had started because Steph had convinced her to try out a new social skill, so she better not get blamed for it.
The loading bar was at 60% when Tim turned to her, leaning back against the chair. Usually, leaning back was a sign of relaxation but he lacked the necessary openness for that. Tim probably just needed any extra space between them he could manage. He was often overwhelmed by closeness and physical touch, Cass found. He worked better from a clinical distance, while she dealt almost exclusively in close-quarters. There was an olive branch though, as Tim took off his mask, finally looking her in the eye. Cass scooted back a bit in turn, leaning against the railing. Her brother sighed in defeat, nervously combing his hair through his fingers.
“It wasn’t about you. Please, Cass, I need you to understand that it wasn’t my intention to lie to you specifically.” His eyes were darting around, clearly uncomfortable but not necessarily dishonest. In the field, Red Robin was the picture of calm, radiating I know what I’m doing energy. He made victims relax, and bad guys shit their pants. When he was alone though, the anxiety leaked out of him in imprecise yet constant movements. “It’s just…Stars! I don’t even know? I-“
Tim chewed his bottom lip, struggling to keep the tears from falling. The way he was rapidly bouncing his knee, twisting his fingers and hands, made him look like the picture of anxiety in the dictionary. The literal picture of anxiety that is, in the graphic dictionary Barbara had gifted her that first month. Cass gave him a reassuring nod but left it at that.
Tim could cry and be mad at her, but she wasn’t leaving until she understood why. Their family was really skilled at letting matters unresolved in the name of peace, but not Cass. If there was a problem she would fix it. Letting their issues unresolved never worked for anyone and, even if she preferred a more physical approach, she could talk it out if necessary. This had gotten big enough already. Tim realized there was no way out of this conversation, and he sighed again.
“Dick is the golden boy, star acrobat, too charismatic for his own good. Jason has that whole Ghost of Christmas Past thing working out for him. He’s also the edgy one. Damian is a ninja, super smart and can actually draw something other than stick figures. Steph is the funniest and prettiest amongst us. Duke is the one with powers. He was also a part of the whole We Are Robin thing; and you’re like, basically the best at everything.” Cass nodded, both to get him to continue and because it was true. “I’m just the guy that’s good at lying. That’s my best skill, being the Robin that lies to Batman. It sounds so lame when I say it out loud but it’s the only cool thing I can do.”
This time Cass shook her head, to Tim’s annoyance. “You’re the best detective too. And the smartest,” She thought about their earlier argument wincing a little “most of the time.”
“Exactly!” He practically jumped from the chair, pacing the same four squares. “I’m smart which, first of all, no I’m not! At least, not like, the smartest person ever. And everyone in this family is a genius. Second of all!” Cass was pretty sure that wasn’t how it went, but her brother was very clearly unraveling so maybe not the moment “that’s so lame. ’Oh, you’re a detective, what’s your special skill?’ ‘Well, I’m glad you asked, it’s being a detective!’. Being such a good liar you can fool the world’s greatest detective? Very mysterious, very cool. Spending your days in front of a corkboard with red string? Loser behavior. That’s the kinda thing that gets you bullied in middle school Cass.”
For her part, Cass was a bit confused by his sibling’s rambling. Why wouldn’t it be cool? Why did he care so much? She remembered one time that Duke, exasperated, had told her “You don’t get it because you’re too cool already. The rest of us need to work for it”. Cass had always thought Tim was cool. He was smart and had funny comebacks for everything, that’s what people found cool. Appearance-wise, he looked a lot like her, and she was badass. But apparently Tim had placed a lot of value on his lying skills, and that’s something she could relate to.
“So yeah, I was delusional enough to think I could lie to you. Because that’s what I’m best at.” The confession seemed to drain all the energy out of him, collapsing next to Cass on the stairs.
“I’m best at reading people.” Cass protested, checking him with her shoulder “Why do you get to be better?”
“I don’t Cass! That’s the problem. Don’t you get it? Put yourself in my shoes since you’re so great at it”
Once again, they were at a stand-still. The Batcomputer dinging gave them a little reprieve from the conversation. As Tim processed the new fear-gas composition, Cass thought about what he said. How would she feel if Tim had successfully lied to her? It wasn’t comparable. Tim was already so good at dealing with people, it wasn’t fair that he could also circumvent Cass’s only social skill. She already felt left in the dark enough as it was. But then again, what was that thing Tim had said? She never made it to an actual school, but she knew Bullying meant you had no friends.
Tim seemed to do great as Red Robin, yes, but why didn’t he had more civilian friends? The rest of the Bats, except Bruce, always joked about him being “weird” or “a nerd”. She knew from the movies Steph showed her that nerds weren’t cool. He was the only one that never gave her a hard time for being too blunt or not caring about civilian stuff. There had been a time where Cass had struggled to put on a friendlier face for the civilians, everyone else had laughed or tried to teach her bedside manners. Not Tim. “You can just pretend, you know? Copy what Steph does if you don’t know how to do it”.
She studied Tim now. The younger boy was doing a bit better, but his eyes were already red-rimmed. He was upset, and clearly didn’t know how to confront it. It was so different from Red Robin’s “Chill, cool and collected” persona. Being unable to control your feelings wasn’t a very nice experience. Sometimes it could be a good thing, like getting angry at a rogue and kicking their ass. Or crying with Barbara all bundled up in the Clocktower couch. That was cathartic. But there were other times, times where she had been the only one getting emotional. Times where everyone else had treated her like she was acting unreasonably. Those felt like shit.
Cass had admired her brother’s ability to remain calm when in costume. Sometimes it was like nothing faced him. It was easier, he told her, to remain calm if he was pretending to be Robin. Robin wasn’t scared of anyone, he was nice and kind to civilians. Robin was the one baiting bad guys into anger, not the other way around. But now he had to deal with this problem as Tim, as a brother, and Cass could understand why he felt uncool. It couldn’t be a nice feeling.
“I understand.” She said slowly. Tim turned around; brow raised. “But you hurt me too. You…” Cast thought about what she wanted to say while Tim waited her out. He better wait, She thought. She'd been waiting around for him this entire conversation. “I feel you think I’m dumb.”
“I don’t!” The denial was quick, like the color rising on Tim’s cheeks.
“Felt? Thought? Oof, never mind!” She was getting a bit frustrated and couldn’t figure the proper way to express it. It was easy to understand why everyone in the family avoided verbal confrontation. Things were easier to solve with fists “You say I’m not dumb. But you tried to lie to me? To my face!” she added the last part for dramatic effect.
Tim looked appropriately chastised. If he had a tail, Cass would wager it would be stuck firmly between his legs. “I told you, it’s not about you. I just…I wanted to believe I was good enough? Look, I can see why you’re upset, I’m really sorry. Not only is it mortifying but now I’ve upset one of the few people that don’t hate me in this family.” She wanted to point out people didn’t hate Tim, but maybe it would work better to threaten the others.
Tim rejoined her on the stairs. “This was a very embarrassing moment.”
“Correct” Cass added, because she was a little shit. Tim shook his head, trying to hide his smile.
“I’m sorry. That was pretentious of me.” To Cass’s questioning eyes he added “I thought myself smarter than I was. I didn’t mean to demean, or to make less of your abilities.”
“Oh, you couldn't even if you tried. Apology accepted though"
Tim looked a bit surprised, and Cass ruffled his hair. She took a couple more seconds to think about it, but yeah. It was just as Tim had said. She was still annoyed, but not enough to not forgive him.
“You can still lie to Batman.” She offered as a consolation price. Tim smiled “And being a good detective is cool. You’re smart even if others are too. I think you’re cool.”
It was that last statement that got Tim to look at her, really look at her. His eyes were glassy again, though this time for a different reason. “Are you serious?”
Cass nodded, hugging her brother. He had been pretentious, as he had admitted, and it had made her angry. Dick always preached that it was normal for siblings to fight, and this had been her first real argument with Tim. Dick also said that, despite the fights, you always loved your siblings; now she could agree. She didn’t want Tim to feel bad about himself, even if he had insulted Cass’s abilities. With his apology between them, she found herself wanting to comfort her little brother.
“You skate, that’s cool. You take good pictures, that’s cool too, and I like your music” Tim started laughing in a choked up way as she listed of her fingers. “You told Jason to fuck off, even while scared. You found Batman was Bruce.” Cass was nice enough to omit that she’d done it faster, “you were the leader of Young Justice”
“Co-leader” Tim clarified “I never thought you’d commit Cassie-erasure”
Cass laughed. Wondergirl would certainly not appreciate her slip up. “You dated Steph, she’s cool. So you're cool by association” She made sure to emphasize the last part, and was rewarded by Tim wheezing. See? She could make a joke, even when running out of social battery. Take that Jason. “You make fun jokes. I don’t understand most, but the others do. And you explain the jokes to me.” She added at the last second. That part felt important to her. ”That’s cool, I like being in on the joke”
Tim rested his head on her shoulder thoughtfully humming. Hopefully he would understand now why it had bothered her so much to be lied to. Well, unsuccessfully lied to. She could see up in the security cameras the Batmobile approaching the cave. Batman and robin would be there any minute now, and she didn’t feel like giving him the report. Her throat felt sore after spending all afternoon helping Steph buy stuff for college and now having to talk things with Tim. It was exhausting but, looking at the way Tim played with the end of her cape, it was worth it. Staying to also explain the Scarecrow situation to Batman would not be worth it, that much was sure.
“I’m taking first shower” She announced,getting up to Tim’s protest. Whether he was annoyed at having to deal with Batman or at loosing his comfortable human pillow, she wasn’t sure. Probably both. “You owe me.”
Tim shook his head, already walking toward the Batcomputer. “Not fair, are you going to use this as an excuse for everything now?”
“No” Cass said, and they both laughed. Tim may not have her ability to read body language, but one didn’t need to be an expert to know she was lying.