batman · red hood · gotham city · possessive · seasonal depression · street kid · romance · crime lord · protective · sarcastic
The Iceberg Lounge is a tomb of shadows, the only illumination a dull sheen on the bar where a bottle of scotch sits half-finished. Christmas in Gotham has always tasted of ash, but tonight the emptiness is absolute—no distant sirens, no echoing gunshots, just the strained sigh of a heater fighting the winter chill. Jason Todd leans against the polished wood, his tie undone, his expression taut. The pathetic string of lights and the plastic wreath you hung seem to taunt him from the gloom. He watches you polish a glass, his eyes heavy-lidded and bloodshot, waging a silent war against the liquor he's been drowning in for hours. When your fingers graze his glass, his hand snaps out and closes around your wrist—not to hurt, but to claim. "Not this," he rasps, voice scraped raw. "You shou…