Missing You Every Day

By Remix17

“My goodness, you are so energetic! Always running around, always bobbing along.” She reached down and ruffled his black hair with her hand, smiling down at him with motherly affection. “You don’t get it from me, baby, that’s for sure.”

The alarm clock went off, blaring loudly through the darkened bedroom. Groggily, Robin opened his eyes beneath his mask. He felt a deep sinking in the pit of his stomach.

Today was May 9th, a day he never liked to acknowledge—a day where he found it hard to leave his bed. A day where he almost—almost—felt like his soul would tear itself in two before the sun set.

After a few moments, Robin let out a slow sigh, and he lifted his head off the single pillow beneath it. He pulled back his covers and climbed out of bed, strictly refusing to lay there any longer. He grabbed the white towel waiting on his doorknob, and left his room, heading down the corridor towards the bathroom to take a shower.

It was seven-thirty a.m., and he knew that no one else in Titans Tower would be up yet. The only possible exception was Raven, but if she was awake, she would be in her room, meditating or quietly sitting in the dark privacy she so often craved. So as usual the tower around him was silent as Robin walked, and today that silence felt oppressive and unnatural.

In the bathroom, Robin stripped out of the uniform he’d worn to bed yesterday and climbed into the shower. He spun the hot water on and stood beneath the warm cascade of watery needles that fell on top of him, flattening his hair and running down his face and mask.

His mask. He’d forgotten to take it off before climbing in.

Robin reached up and peeled it away from his eyes, and he studied it as the warm water continued to pour down on him. The white, expressionless mask stared back at him, almost accusingly. Why are you taking me off? it seemed to be asking. I thought we were a part of each other!

Robin frowned at the mask.

“Mommy, why can’t I come with you? Daddy said—”

“Sweetheart, you aren’t old enough yet. We’re performing without a net this time and you haven’t completely learned the routine yet.”

“But I can do it!”

“Oh, honey, I’m sure you can—just stay down here for Mommy, okay? I’ll do it with you tomorrow and maybe you can be in one of the next performances.”

He almost teared up as he heard her say these words, but he nodded anyway. “Okay,” he whispered.

“Good boy.” She kissed his forehead. “I have to go now. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Robin felt a sudden, inexplicable anger rise inside of him, and he flung the mask out of the shower, hearing it colliding with the bathroom wall. He clenched his fists angrily, and for a moment he felt like punching something, anything, to release the intolerable anger growing inside of him.

Damn it! He swore silently—he rarely ever allowed himself to curse out loud. He’d been taught this many years ago. Dammit, dammit, dammit! He repeated, his anger rising with each silent word.

He hated this day so much.

Robin finished his shower and turned off the water. He stepped out onto the floor and quickly dried himself off with his towel. Wrapping it around his waist, he walked to the mirror, studying his face.

Without his mask, he looked different. He looked…average. He looked like the kind of guy that would easily blend in with a crowd.

But he knew better. There was something in his eyes, especially today, that gave him away as something else. That gave his feelings away too.

Robin opened the medicine cabinet behind the mirror and took out his hair gel. Closing the door, he squirted a little bit into his bare palm and rubbed it into his hair, just as he did on any other day.

When he was finished in the bathroom, he gathered up his clothes and mask and quickly returned to his room to change. It was eight o’clock at this point, which meant that the others would start waking up soon.

Robin flung his old clothes into his hamper and went to his closet. There were five more uniforms in there, all matching the one he’d just tossed away into the dirty laundry. He pulled out one uniform and began to dress—slipping on the pants and tunic, wrapping his belt around his waist, slipping on his steel-toed boots, straitening his cape.

The costume was very important to him, in ways his other teammates never knew. It wasn’t just a uniform to him—it was a history, it was a symbol, it was a tribute.

There was a reason green and red were his favorite colors.

“These clothes are so stupid.”

”They are not!” Robin said to the taller boy standing next to him in the dressing room. “Mommy made them.”

”Mommy needs to get her eyes checked,” the boy answered--the boy that was his older brother.

Robin finished dressing and put on his famous—or infamous—mask. As soon as it was in place, he left his room, the door closing with a small swishing noise behind him. He marched down the hall to the gym. Once he was inside he set to work on a punching bag, intent on pounding on it until he forgot why he was in the first place.

It sort of worked. As he concentrated kicking and punching the swaying bag, the memories started to dissipate a little. He attacked the bag mercilessly, imagining ghostly faces that he’d for years longed to destroy.

He didn’t stop until he couldn’t attack any more. He stepped away from the bag, breathing hard, and wiped the sweat that was coming down his face. He checked the clock and saw that it was ten to nine. The other Titans were up by now, and they were probably getting breakfast ready and wondering why he wasn’t joining them.

Robin glared at the punching bag one more time and left the workout room, heading for the main room where his friends would be.

At least you have friends, he told himself. Back then, your family were the only friends you had.

Friends were a good thing, especially now. They helped to keep him sane when he felt like slipping away.

“Robin!” Starfire greeted happily as he walked into the room. The others were sitting down at the breakfast table, and Cyborg was at the stove cooking. The alien girl rose out of her seat as he came into the room. “Good morning!” she said. “Did you sleep well?”

“Fine,” Robin answered neutrally. He sat down in an empty seat and put one head in his hand.

“Breakfast is bacon and eggs,” Cyborg told him. “How do you want your eggs done?”

“I’m not hungry,” Robin answered. “I’ll skip it today.”

“You sure, man?” Cyborg asked.

It wasn’t like Robin to skip breakfast, especially since like many other people Robin considered it the most important meal of the day.

“I’m sure,” Robin answered his friend testily, snapping harder than he’d intended. The others exchanged glances, but they made no comment on his behavior.

As they waited for breakfast, Starfire piped up again. “I have glorious news!” she announced. “On my Earth calendar it claims that today is the ninth of May.”

Robin glanced up at Starfire.

“Yeah….so?” Beast Boy asked.

“Truly you know what that means,” Starfire said. “Today is the Celebration of Mothers…Mother’s Day.”

“Oh. Yeah,” Beast Boy said. “Cool.”

“I hate celebrations,” Raven replied. She was reading one of her poetry books at the table and didn’t bother turning her gaze to Starfire as she spoke.

“Don’t we all,” Robin said. This made Raven look up at him, actual surprise on her face.

“Excuse me?” she asked.

“Never mind.” Robin looked around at the table, and decided that he really didn’t want to be here. “I’m going back to room,” he told his friends. “I forgot to do something. I’ll see you later.”

They all watched him in surprise and confusion as he left the table. Not glancing behind him Robin headed down the hall for his room—the only place he really felt like being right now.

He didn’t turn on the light when he entered, instead going for his bed and sitting down on the unmade mattress, a strange, depressed feeling in his chest.

He’d been nine years old the day his parents and brother climbed the highwire for what was to be their final trapeze act. Robin, who was a circus performer back then along with the rest of his family, had been unable to join them because they had been enacting a particularly tricky act that he hadn’t mastered yet—an act performed without a net. Instead, he found himself watching his parents and brother swing through the air above him with everyone else.

It was supposed to be a normal night, just like any other night. But things changed, and under that circus tent his entire life changed. Criminals had entered the tent that night, dangerous men that had frightened him. His parents, in a heroic attempt that had surprised Robin back then but didn’t now, had tried to stop those criminals. Robin had been watching helplessly when those criminals cut the wires to his family’s trapeze act; watching helplessly as he saw his mother, father, and brother fell to their deaths through the air.

On his bed, Robin suddenly pitched forward, gripping his face with his hands, as if something tangible were tearing him up inside.

By now, he’d grown to accept his family’s death, and over the last six years Robin had accepted a new father, and he’d taken his own teammates as his family. But once in a while, on days like these, he remembered his first father, his first brother, and his beloved mother striking the floor before his eyes; on days like these he found he was unable to dismiss the image from his mind.

“Mommy, why do you call my Robin? My name is Richard.”

The kind woman picked him up, settling him into her lap. “I call you Robin because of the way you act and play,” his mother answered. She suddenly laughed, recalling his most recent antics. “You’re always jumping about, always so full of energy—“ here she kissed him on the cheek, though he tried to pull away. “But at the same time you’re always very good and sweet,” she told him, “just like a little robin.”

Contrary to popular belief, masks weren’t just worn on the face—they were also worn over people’s hearts. And sometimes, Robin felt like he was wearing the biggest mask in the world as he covered up the tragedy of his past and the hurt that came along with it.

He felt tears coming to his eyes, tears that hardly ever surfaced anymore. He let them fall, warm and bitterly soothing, until they pooled and leaked beneath the lenses of his mask. One dripped to the floor, then another.

He was Robin. Once, his name meant that he was a sweet and peaceful little boy. Now the name meant that he was, and should always be, tough and strong. He was a leader, a crime-fighter, the protégé of a great man, and no one would imagine or expect it of him to cry.

But here in his dark room, no one would know. Here, he let all strength wash away in his tears, as he remembered a past that he had never shared with any of his teammates—a past that, for the most part, he pretended didn’t exist.

“Oh, Mommy,” Robin whispered haggardly, and he was once again that nine-year-old little boy. “I miss you so much.”

I miss you so much.

THE END.

I felt like writing something for TT, but I didn’t know what it was exactly I wanted to write. I also wanted to take a quick break from my other fic, and get my creative juices flowing with a different, shorter story. In the end I decided to go with an idea I had of Robin. I really like his character, and I like how he honored his family by wearing the colors of their circus outfits and how he named his superhero identity after a nickname his mother gave him. I also like how he wore a yellow cape in the circus and still wears one today. (No wonder his capes are so short. He styled them after the original’s actual length I suppose.)

Anyway, this was the saddest fic I’ve done yet, and I was a little concerned about ending it here. But I wanted to. As Batman once said, there aren’t always happy endings.