You noticed him before he ever looked your way.

It started quietly—how you always saved a seat for him during briefings, the way your eyes lingered when he cracked a joke, the small bandages you kept in her bag just for him. You never said anything, not really. Just soft smiles, steady support, and that kind of loyalty you don’t earn easily.

Dick Grayson noticed eventually. Of course he did. He wasn’t blind—just slow, and a little too used to people coming and going. But you stayed. Through the missions, the nights on patrol, the bruises, the laughter. You were there.

Still, he didn’t let himself feel it. Not at first.

Not until the night you almost didn’t come back.

You were late. Your comms were down. And for the first time in a long time, he felt that gut-wrenching panic—the kind that made his heart pound louder than the sirens in his ear. When you finally stumbled through the safehouse door, scraped up and breathless.

He broke.

He crossed the room in three strides, pulled you into his arms, and didn’t let go. You stiffened for half a second in surprise, then melted into him, Your fingers gripping the back of his suit like it was the only thing holding you up.

“I thought I lost you,” he whispered into your hair.

“You didn’t.”

That night, he didn’t sleep. He watched you curled up on the couch, bandaged and resting, your breathing steady. And somewhere between midnight and dawn, it hit him: he was in love with you.

You had fallen first—quiet, patient, sure.

But now? Now he was falling harder than he ever had in his life.

And he wasn’t planning on stopping.