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Somewhere in the back of his mind is an echo that repeats, "He will always be the man who hurt you."
The act of violence left bruises on his skin, a stain on his heart. The bruises fade. But he never looks at his father the same way again. And the stain never washes away.
That is the man who hurt you. That is the man who chose to hurt you.
Yeah. It's not something he can easily forget.
He doesn't think Bruce will hit the others. (There once was a time when he hadn't thought Bruce would hit him either.) It wouldn't make sense, after all; there was a reason he had hit Dick. Without a reason, he thinks that nothing will happen. It hadn't been senseless violence for the sole sake of hurting him. He knows that. There had been a reason. The others? They're not going to get hit because there won't be a reason to do so. It wouldn't benefit Bruce. As simple as that.
Bruce hadn't hurt Dick just because he wanted to; there was a reason. He needed Dick to stop talking, to stop saying the things Dick had been accusing him with. It was to stop Dick. Cause leading to effect, as simple as that.
Sometimes... Sometimes Dick isn't sure. What if one of his siblings does give Bruce a reason? What is Bruce does decide it'd benefit him to do so? But no. No, that was one time in one very specific scenario that he doubts will be repeated. Only the situation and how Dick had escalated it had led to - well. Had led to Bruce escalating in return. There's never going to be a repetition of the events that had surrounded it. Grief and anger will never again converge like it had. There will never again be the first time Bruce loses a son. There will never be a time that anyone says the things Dick had said.
So the others should be safe. Right, yeah, himself too. Of course he is. It's not like Bruce goes around hitting him. It'd been a one time thing. It will never - most likely - happen again. But if it does, then it'd be him. Always him, who pushes Bruce too far. So the rest of his siblings will be fine. Will be safe. And, of course, Dick will be fine too.
He keeps a berth between him and Bruce, always. A small distance separating them. It's not - it's not anything out of the ordinary, not anything weird or overt. It's as natural as a moon orbiting a planet and never crossing its fixed path to be closer.
Just... Just in case.
Dick watches silently as Damian walks so close to the cape trailing the Batman. So close to the breadth of that strength, to the heavy fists as his side. Dick watches, watches.
And finds that he'd been holding his breath. Only catches it and exhales when there is a stride in between Robin and Batman.
It's not, Dick knows, that he had thought anything would happen. It just - it just consumes him sometimes. The knowledge he has in which before he'd been ignorant of: Bruce is the man who chose to hit his son. There are moments when it is so impossible to forget that. No matter the truth of the matter in that Bruce would never hurt Damian. Of course he wouldn't!
There are days where the weight of Dick's knowledge is a yoke upon his shoulders. An anchor in his stomach and heart that compels him to watch Bruce oh so carefully and to keep his breath safe inside until the world around him proves itself to be safe too.
Nothing is going to happen. Dick knows that.
He watches. And watches.
And when he's lucky, he remembers to breathe.
It's not, really, like it had been a choice to hit him.
It was all situational. Can a bull's reflex be held against it if one day it gouges someone with its horn? The person had gone in the arena fully knowing the power and strength of the bull, fully knowing the rage of the bull. Had gone in fully knowing that anger that had led it to charge again and again. Why is this time unforgivable? Just because it managed to make contact? Because it succeeded? Prodding of the creature had led to rage and speed and everyone knows that the bull has been taunted and aimed and is about to charge.
The bull does not choose to charge. It is instinct and ire all at once. It is and isn't over in an instant when the blood is drawn and the matador - always so talented at dodging all those times before - is left bleeding, dying, on the horns piercing his body-cum-corpse. The anger is left in the bull. It is not over for the bull. Still vicious and charging, and it is up to others to drag the corpse out into safety lest it be damaged to the point of defilement, desecration in the wake of the bull's unending anger. It is over for the matador. It is not over for the bull, even as it is lured into a stall. It is not over for the matador's family, who were cheering and then screaming in the stands. There is blood on the ground. And the bull cares nought for it.
Can a bull be blamed for an accident? Something rare and incidental and certainly not the norm?
Everyone knew that the bull was powerful and strong and angry and charging over and over again. Everyone knew that. Yet is still astonishing, still horrifying, still unbelievable and shocking when those horns turn crimson.
The next time the audience shall see the bull, it shall be strong and powerful and angry - but its horns will be clean.
The bull, after all, does not need to remember. Can move on to the next.
The matador? Well his blood stains the dirt floor. It has to be taken away, lest it tangibly haunt the arena to be stampeded on forever more.
The trouble is: sometimes Dick thinks he's carried away all the blood-stained dirt only to find specks of it beneath him. Red as sin and nearly as hard to ignore as a red cape to a bull. No one else, he thinks, can see the red on the ground, the proof of what has happened here. And certainly they cannot see it from the stadium stands.
Was it Alfred or Bruce who had scrubbed away Dick's blood all those years ago? And, Dick wonders, did they truly manage to get it all? Or are there little drops of evidence that betray the death of who Dick and Bruce had been before, who are now are so very dead and gone? Are they there? Underfoot is there tangible proof that father and son have died and come back wrong?
The matador is in heaven. His blood, however, haunts the grounds.
And Dick fears that it's only a matter of time before the bull smells it - remembers the piercing death on its mighty horns - and remembers that it can continue its blood-lust any time it likes if only it gets close enough.
Dick laughs at something Bruce says. The humor and smile fall as the ghost of blood seeps in. It is a reminder that he is betraying himself to forget - even for one blissful moment - that this man isn't the Bruce of before; it is the Bruce of after.
Dick dutifully places the smile back on his face. It was still funny, even though now he finds no humor in it, regardless of which Bruce had said it.
Pandora's box should never have opened.
Dick lays awake tonight and waits to forget the nightmare which has woken him. Dreams are usually so quick to be forgotten. This one is haggardly slow in its insidious crawl.
Pandora's box had contained all the evils of the world, released and never again contained after that.
There's supposed to be hope.
All Dick Grayson can feel is the fast beat of his heart and moisture in his eyes. And the faint echo of pain, as bright and as hot as his tears.
But maybe those were always coming. Maybe there was just a time he hadn't known it yet. Back when the box had been closed.
The second time Bruce chooses to hit him, there's also a reason.
If the first punch had surprised him, the second punch had downright shocked him.
He had never thought Bruce to be the type of man to punch him - until he did.
Worse, he discovers, is that he did have hope after all Pandora's contents had spilled, or so he had thought. Because as it turns out, Dick had still somehow believed that Bruce was maybe the type of man to hurt his son, but surely, surely Bruce was not the type of man to hurt his son twice. But he is.
He is.
Bruce, he thinks now, is not the type of man to hurt his son three times.
Except now, Dick can't be certain.
There's still blood in the dirt after all.
And all Dick can do is wait. He might be waiting for something inevitable. He might be waiting for nothing at all because nothing is coming his way, and Dick should be ashamed for even thinking it might.
He can't help but to wonder why Bruce hasn't ever been ashamed. To wonder why it's only him that feels this way.
When the next incident occurs, when there is a third time chooses to hurt him, Dick can't believe it still manages to take him off guard. Be amazed that even through the resignation and weary acceptance, he can still feel so surprised like this wasn't inevitable from the first time Bruce had punched him.
It is in the bull's nature. And yet...
And yet a bull was not a scorpion and Dick was not a frog. So, yes, even as he accepted it as his fate, he still could scarcely believe that he was drowning when he hadn't even entered the river. Only, he must've. Some time now ago. How else would this have happened?
The moon orbits the planet so faithfully, never straying. And it does not once draw too near to the planet. It is loyal, it is steadfast, it is there; it always keeps its distance. Stays away.
On planet Earth, there is blood beneath the hooves of a bull.
On planet Earth, there is a son whose father has thrice decided to wield violence upon him.
There won't be a fourth time. Probably. Surely. Most likely. Unless there was a reason.
In between the normalcy of daily life and the love and the mundane, there comes a thought in Dick's mind that cannot ever fully be quelled. Try as he might; and oh does he try, again and again. The thought, the feeling, it is as ineluctable as gravity - and almost heavier and more constraining than that force of nature. Seasons change. Years go back. It isn't the thought that haunts him because he is haunted by himself, what has been, and what he is mourning in his loss therefore of both. Again and again, there is a truth he cannot run from nor hide, even as he can manage to delay its claws on occasion; he is not always being shredded but oh the threat is ever constant, ever there, to rip him into pieces. Surprised but not, and bleeding without fail in its gory agony.
This is the man who chose to hurt you. He might hurt you again. But I don't think he will. Unless he does.
The bruises and injuries heal. The blood is scrubbed away.
There is something dark left permeating his being despite all the attempts to bleach it out and bury it.
He tries - and even often succeeds - to forget. But it is reoccurring. And the echo, well, it always bounces back.
And every time he is ripped asunder.