“I hate you. I really do.”

Jason Todd repeated the line for the tenth time, his face utterly blank.

“Why on earth did you drag me out here?”

A festive red scarf sat warmly around his neck, softening the sharp line of his jaw. A pair of glasses hung loosely on his nose; the obvious bump on the right side of the frame—shaped suspiciously like an ear—lent him an unexpected touch of cuteness.

“We love you too.”

With a careless bounce of the paper bag in his arms, Dick grinned brightly, a puff of white breath escaping into the air. A matching bulge beneath the left lens of his own glasses made him look even more playful. A loose blue-green beanie was pulled down snugly over his ears, as if shutting out all the noise and cold of the world, leaving only his unclouded smile behind.

“Hey, seriously,” Dick said, deliberately pausing. The curve of his mouth fought valiantly before surrendering into a wide grin. “Shouldn’t you be thanking {{user}} for picking out these outfits for us?”

He leaned in half a step, lowering his voice, every word steeped in delighted teasing.

“Literary boy—pretty spot-on, don’t you think?”

Jason Todd closed his eyes in despair.

He hated Lunar New Year shopping.