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“Oh it’s the Cape section!” Stephanie sashays towards a side of the toy store filled with colorful soft things, the wheels on her cart squeaking obnoxiously, and Damian rips his eyes away from the children’s art section to follow her.
“Why are we here with you again?” Jason questions, picking up a mega slinky as he passes by one of the shelves and tucking it under his arm. “I thought I was on soup kitchen duty this year.”
“Because Damian owes me lunch and I need someone to help me carry things to the donation bin at the children’s hospital,” Stephanie says, coming to a stop in front of a wide swath of stuffed animals settled in big basket shelves under a huge Batman symbol sign. “You’re on soup kitchen duty tomorrow. Did you not check Tim’s Christmas schedule?”
“It’s color coded this year,” Damian supplies, squinting at the egg shaped bats and robins with little masks that boast a discount for being bought together.
Stephanie reaches past him to grab a blonde bear in a purple Batgirl outfit and a brown bear in a Signal outfit dropping them in the cart. “These definitely. Maybe one of each? Awe! Cass is a cat.”
“I checked it…” Jason scrunches his nose and looks up at the ceiling, something that shouldn’t be attractive at all but Damian’s been having issues where Jason is concerned recently… staring issues. “Crap, I think I might have checked last year. He does them all in the same spreadsheet, sue me.”
“You’re on rotation tonight for the first six with Cassandra and Kate,” Damian supplies, crouching down to grab one of the Nightwing monkeys and toss it into the cart. “Tomorrow you have soup kitchen duty with myself and Duke.”
“‘Ight.” Jason grabs a couple of the egg shaped plushies with his stupid large hands and tosses them into the cart. “We should probably grab stim toys and stuff, too; not the messy stuff but like stress balls, poppers, Rubik’s cubes.”
“Good idea!” Stephanie cheers, grabbing the handle of the cart to begin pushing it in that direction, barely missing where Damian is still crouching next to the shelves. Rocking forward on his toes to avoid the blonde’s path, Damian’s eyes land on a fake boot. Reaching out, he snags it, unearthing another bear from the pile. Red mask, red gotham knight symbol, white tuft on the head of an otherwise black bear. Red Hood.
In spite of himself, Damian is charmed and a small smile works its way across his mouth. The bear is soft, the clothes able to be taken off with the removal of the tags and Damian can’t seem to stop himself from slipping his fingers under the false armor and jacket to pet over the soft white fur of the belly. He’s a little old for toys but… well it’s a bear of Jason who Damian keeps waking up from dreams of distraught that the man isn’t actually laying next to him in the late morning light. It’s silly and stupid, but Damian wants the bear.
He didn’t see any in Stephanie’s cart, however, so he digs through the basket shelves for another one, holding his close to his chest. Only he can’t find another one no matter how much he looks. A Red Robin themed eagle gets settled next to his feet as he looks because he’s pretty sure Stephanie didn’t pick up one of those either, but no matter how much he looks he doesn’t find any more black and white bears.
“So this is where we lost you,” Jason’s voice says from behind him and Damian glances away from the plushies to find the man. He’s still got the slinky under his arm but somewhere along the way a propeller hat has been plopped down on top of his knit cap.
“Stephanie forgot some,” Damian mumbles, scooping up the eagle to shove it in Jason’s arms before turning back to the baskets. “I’m trying to find a Red Hood.”
“You’re holding one,” Jason points out.
Subconsciously, Damian’s arm tightens around his prize. “I’m trying to find another one.”
After a moment of Jason watching him dig through the selves, the older man lets out a small hum. “I’m sure that one is enough. He’s not as popular as Batman and Robin to the kids.”
Damian wilts, looking back down at the bear. With one last caress over its ear, Damian holds it out. “Here, I’m going to go look at the coloring books and crayons. We should donate some of those, too.”
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“Hey, Damian! Wait up a second,” Jason jogs to catch up with the younger man. Shifting his Christmas presents in his arms — simple considering most of it is art supplies and the rest is hanging from his elbow in the new medical bag Pennyworth got for him — Damian turns to look at Jason. The older man seems to have left his own stack of gifts in the family room and is instead wielding another bagged gift which he holds out when he comes to a stop next to Damian. “I got you something else.”
Damian blinks in surprise. “I assure you that your gift card to my favorite manga shop is more than enough.”
Jason scratches the back of his neck, looking a little red. He must have run to catch up with Damian or something. “This was a little bit of a last minute edition. It seemed like you wanted one.”
Curious, Damian takes the bag and rests it on his hip, curling his arm around it so that he can pull the snowflake tissue paper aside one handed. A black and white bear with a red Domino mask looks up at him from the depths of the bag and abruptly all the blood in Damian’s body shoots to his face. Swallowing, he clutches the bag a little tighter to his body. “You didn’t have to do that.”
Jason makes a soft but strange noise. “I was more popular than I thought, I couldn't find one in Gotham at all. I actually bribed Wally into helping me get this one.”
Overwhelmed with the emotions he’s been holding in his chest for months now Damian looks up at Jason once more, finding the pale man even redder than before. Stepping closer, Damian takes the risk and pushes up on his toes to kiss the other man on the cheek. “Thank you, Jason.”
Jason touches his cheek as Damian steps back, looking at Damian with wide blue eyes. “I– you– Uh… I mean, you’re welcome.”
Damian offers up a small smile and turns back towards the stairs to his room that he’d been heading for, not wanting to see Jason’s face if his next words aren’t taken well. “Maybe now my bed will stop feeling so lonely after patrol.”