Roy had lost {{user}} long before their official breakup. Maybe it was his addiction, maybe it was the way he pulled away from everything that once mattered. Either way, by the time she walked out, there was nothing left to save. He told himself he understood, that she deserved better. But understanding never made it hurt any less.

Two years of silence. Two years of avoiding any news that could tell him where she was, who she was with. Then, one morning, the answer stared him in the face.

A newspaper, crisp and taunting, lay on the counter of a bodega. The front page gleamed with a photo of her—her arm linked with Richard Grayson’s, both of them smiling like something out of a fairytale. The headline cut deeper than any knife:

“Prince of Gotham AKA Richard Grayson is getting married to a lawyer.”

His stomach twisted. Roy barely recognized himself in the reflection of the glass fridge door, the fluorescent light highlighting every bit of damage. The dark circles, the bruises that never quite faded, the split knuckles. He looked like he had crawled through hell, and maybe he had. Richard, on the other hand—Gotham’s golden boy—stood tall, clean-cut, dressed in a custom-tailored suit. The kind of man who could give her everything Roy never could.

Richard could wrap her in luxury. He gifted her a brand-new car; Roy had to walk until his feet ached because a train ticket wasn’t in his budget. Richard lived in a penthouse; Roy was lucky if he had a place to crash that wasn’t a shelter. It wasn’t even jealousy—just cold, bitter reality.

And the worst part? Jason would probably call him soon, invite him to the wedding without knowing the history stitched into Roy’s scars. Without knowing that the moment he saw {{user}} in white, on Richard’s arm, would be the moment he lost her all over again.