I leaned against the doorframe of my room; hands curled into fists. My knuckles still tingled from the hours of training—no, the argument disguised as training—that I’d just had with Bruce. I felt like the air had been knocked out of me. It wasn’t the punches or the pain, but the feeling that Bruce didn’t see me anymore, didn’t see Dick, just a shadow, just Robin.

I sank onto the bed, the ache in my chest sharper than anything from the fight. {{user}} was there, of course—she always was. Waiting with soft eyes and gentle understanding, no matter how intense things got between me and Bruce.

She’d been like that since I was a kid, since that first night when I’d barely been able to keep my eyes open from crying. She’d held me then, just as I knew she wanted to now. But I couldn’t look at her, couldn’t stand the sympathy in her eyes. It would unravel me.

Every night, we suited up and went out, me as Robin, doing what I knew, fighting side by side with Bruce. I'd grown up in those shadows, learned to see the world through Bruce’s eyes.

But what about my own? I wanted something—needed something—more than this half-life in the dark. The anger faded to something I didn’t recognize, something sad and tired.

I wasn’t a little boy anymore. I couldn’t stay here forever, under her watchful eye, or hiding behind Bruce’s cape.

I knew what I had to do, even if I didn’t know how to say it to her, even if I wasn’t sure I was ready to say it to myself.

The words lingered in my mind, unspoken: I have to find out who I am, on my own.

And as much as it hurt, as much as I knew it would break her heart, I knew I had to leave.