#i don't know why everyone paints jason as a casual smoker

[lambsouvlaki]

For the Hell of It - Smoke

Character: Jason Todd x civilian! Fem!oc

Rating and Warnings: SFW, cigarettes, discussion of addictions, discussion of bad parenting. Jason's perception of Bruce is questionable.

Word Count: 1,492

Summary: Jason and Andy drink too much and share a cigarette, then talk about their parents.

Masterlist

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The city was turning warm again. The balcony smelled of cigarette smoke and the potted rosemary plant that refused to die. Their empty beer bottles, more than Jason would normally indulge in, were lined up on the railing. The setting sun shone through the glass, throwing refracted green light over the two of them on their brittle old rattan chairs.  

“My dad thinks I’m his worst failure,” Jason said.

His mouth was set in a jagged scowl and his stomach churned with the anger that he had stewed in all day. The specific words Bruce had thrown at him on last night’s disaster of a patrol didn’t even matter anymore, what was a handful more thrown onto the towering pile? It was all the same. “Every time he looks at me, it’s all he sees.” 

Andy made an indignant noise in her throat. 

“Even my worst decisions, things that weren’t even directed at him, only count as his failures to self-flagellate over. And the good I’ve done doesn’t get tallied fucking anywhere at all.” He scoffed. He leaned his folded arms forward on the tiny outdoor table and his chin on his forearms, careful to avoid the burning cherry of his cigarette. “I may as well not be here. Could save us all the hassle and just write postcards of made up atrocities for him to agonise over.”

“Too easy,” Andy said, gazing with uncharacteristic coldness at the empty street her balcony faced. “If you can’t escape his disappointment, why should he get to escape yours?”

“I doubt he even cares if I’m disappointed. No, actually, I bet he prefers it that way. One more failure to nurse like a fine old whisky.”

Andy hummed. 

It was the first time he’d made any mention of his family without obfuscating. It felt good to let it out to someone who didn’t hold up the other parties in the farce of his life as unquestionable pillars of righteousness. To her Bruce was just another screw-up of a Dad. 

She hadn’t offered saccharine comforts or pity at his moping. Even the worst things he’d implied didn’t put dread in her eyes. 

“What about your mom?” she asked. 

“Dead. Both of them. I’ve got two of each.” 

“Huh.” 

He turned his thoughts forcibly towards Sheila. He wasn’t going to sully Catherine’s name by invoking her right now, stewing in misery and beer like he was.

“It’s funny. My birth mom hurt me more than Bruce ever did if you get technical about it, but somehow her apathy didn’t hurt near as much as his oh-so-dreadful regret.” He passed Andy the cigarette. “Still can’t fucking stand cigarette smoke though.”

“Me neither.” She took a long drag. 

He turned his head enough to look at her. 

“My mom said she didn’t smoke,” Andy said, smoke curling lazily out of her mouth. “Would swear her life on it. I’d have sworn it too, if anyone had asked, same for all her other lies. I worked so hard to make her love me.” She laughed: a hard, self-deprecating noise that was as foreign in her mouth as the smoke. “The perfect little girl for her to project onto. No wonder my brother thought I was insufferable.”

Jason snorted. He could see it, the leftover residue of that kind of relationship, the people-pleaser she must have been as a kid. Desperate to fit into whatever shape was asked of her. She was nothing like that now, and she never talked about family either. 

“The day I got arrested, I called her,” Andy said. “I didn’t have any friends left and I figured she’d know a lawyer, or just what to do in general.” A bitter smile cracked and twisted on her face. “She hung up on me. Last time we ever spoke.”

“What?” His brow creased.

“I looked her up on online the other month – my curiosity got the better of me,” she said in an embarrassed aside, not noticing his confusion, “And you do know what she’s done? She’s running a fake page for me. Apparently I’ve moved to silicon valley and achieved what was definitely my dream of becoming some kind of… of tech-genius business-woman. Her friends seem stupid enough to buy it.” 

He barked a horrified laugh, understanding at last. “I wondered what that was about.”

“You saw it?” she demanded, her eyes wide. “You didn’t say anything!”

He took a drag on the cigarette. He wasn’t about to let her know he monitored all online mentions of her name to make sure nobody tried to use their friendship against either of them. “I thought maybe it was a joke between you.”

“I suppose the photo edits are quite funny, in a desperately sad kind of way,” she conceded, grimly. “I hope her and imaginary Andy will be very happy together.”

“Do you?”

“Not really. Where does she get the gall?”

“Come on, nobody wants their failures looking back at them. Easier, nicer, to lie to yourself.”

“I kind of want to make a real account and go comment on her made up conversations. ‘That fuck is this, mom?’”

He hummed his approval. “Burn down the illusion, make her confront the truth, head on.”

“If I have to live this reality, so does she.”

The warm tide of alcohol in his veins kept the thoughts of vindication afloat longer than he would be proud of afterwards. He ducked his head as painful reality and old regrets of his own returned. He stubbed the cigarette out.

“Doesn’t feel as good as you think it will,” he said. “I suspected Bruce wished I’d just stayed dead. Can’t say I enjoy having it confirmed.”

Andy’s eyebrows rose, seconds before her face screwed up in anger. “Well fuck him.” 

His lips twitched. “Easy to say, right?”

Her head tipped back in her chair, looking very forlorn in the dying light. “Don’t go carving yourself open for narcissists. All they’ll see is the stain on the carpet. I should know this by now.” 

They fell quiet. Gotham was slowly swallowed by the oncoming night, shredded clouds rolling in from the sea hid the few stars stubborn enough to pierce the city smog. The cold was settling in too. It would be nicer indoors. 

The pack of smokes sat on the table between them, its lid closed. Andy’s fingers tapped the glass near it.

They had agreed they were only going to have the one. But technically they’d shared it, which meant they had only had half a smoke.

“You pick up smoking from her?” Jason asked. 

She shook her head. “St Marge’s.” St Margaret’s Penitentiary, Gotham’s low security women’s prison. “You?”

“Blackgate.”

Decidedly not low security. He wondered if she’d ask. She usually didn’t.

“Hn,” she said. 

She reached for the pack. A slender finger flipped the lid open. There were three left.

She scowled. Her fingers tapped the glass again in an idle staccato. 

“On the one hand, lighting up another would make my mom so, so angry, which is its own reward. But on the other…”

“Not her lungs,” he finished. “Do what you want. Fuck her.”

She sighed. “It is easy to say.”

They both eyed the packet. 

His throat was still tight and the frustration simmered in his chest. He swore he could remember every single time Bruce told him smoking reduced lung capacity and compromised stamina like he didn’t already know all that. As though Jason was delighted to have an addiction and had fallen back into it over and over again just for fun. 

He closed his fists and pulled his arms off the table. 

“Does my smoking remind you of your birth mom?” Andy asked suddenly. 

He blinked. “...Sometimes. You?”

“Yeah.” 

He winced. 

“So really…” she spoke slowly, as though she was testing the words for poison on their way out. “I’d be doing you a favour.” She tentatively flipped the lid shut again. 

He sat up straight. Well, if that was how it was. 

“No,” he decided. 

“No?”

“I’m doing you a favour.” He grabbed the pack and threw it off the balcony. He wasn’t going to be the reason Andy couldn’t quit. And like hell was he following in her useless mother’s footsteps and telling her to make a stand he couldn’t. 

She scoffed a laugh. “No, I think I get credit for that one. You’re welcome.”

He crossed his arms stubbornly. His throat still itched, and simmering frustration nagged at him. He dragged both hands through his hair. Next to him Andy took a fortifying breath. 

“Alright,” he said quietly.

“Alright.”

They got up, and went back inside. 

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#jason todd #red hood #dc #jason todd x fem!reader #jason todd x oc #jason todd x reader #red hood x oc #my fanfic #for the hell of it #slice of life #friends to lovers #i don't know why everyone paints jason as a casual smoker #surely if he's got a nicotine addition #he'd be mad about it