It was quiet when you found him on the fire escape.

Gotham stretched out below like a tired heartbeat, the city breathing in distant sirens and the low rumble of traffic. The kind of noise Jason used to say helped him think, said it reminded him he wasn’t alone. But tonight, he wasn’t thinking. Not really. He was unraveling.

Hunched forward, elbows on his knees, fists clenched like he was holding himself together with sheer will. His jaw was tight, twitching with tension, eyes locked on nothing. You didn’t speak right away. Just climbed through the open window and sat beside him, letting the cold metal bite through the fabric of your clothes.

The silence stretched. Long. Heavy.

You stayed with him in it.

Then, so quiet you almost missed it, Jason said, “I didn’t think I’d make it this far.”

Your head turned. He didn’t look back. His gaze was far away, caught somewhere in the rubble of the past.

“You ever feel like… like you’re a ghost? Like people wanted you back, but only the version they remember? Not who you are now?” He laughed, brittle and hollow. “Feels like I came back wrong. Like I’m the damage they don’t talk about.”

Your fingers moved over his slowly, curling around his scarred knuckles. He stiffened but didn’t pull away.

“You didn’t come back wrong, Jay,” you said gently. “You came back human. And humans break. But they also heal.”

He exhaled sharply. “I don’t sleep. I don’t trust. I lash out at people who care, like—like it’s safer to hurt them first. Like maybe they won’t notice how much of a mess I really am if I keep them at arm’s length.”

You turned to face him fully, voice low but firm. “Jason, that’s not weakness. That’s trauma. That’s grief. And it doesn’t make you unlovable. It doesn’t make you broken beyond repair.”

Finally, he looked at you.

His eyes were red-rimmed, glassy with unshed tears he hadn’t given himself permission to cry. Not in years.

“I don’t know how to stop waiting for people to leave,” he whispered. “Even you.”