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Jason laid on his back, watching Tim as he leaned back against the couch, idly zipping and unzipping one of the pockets on his pants and talking vaguely about color. More specifically, the idea that there is no inherent color in an object and color is transient since it doesn't actually have color at all in the complete absence of light and the very thing that makes it that color is it reflecting certain light so it is therefore colorless in the dark, versus the idea that the color is still inherent to the object and unchangeable and even in the dark it is still that color even if it's not currently reflecting the light for us to perceive it as that colour, because it holds an inherent property within it that makes it consistently reflect certain wavelengths of light, so it is therefore always that color even if it is imperceptible because it always holds that property that makes it a certain color in visible conditions. Which was…brilliantly pointless and engaging.
Jason fucking loved this, he loved their evenings or early mornings sprawled on the floor together talking about everything and nothing, he loved getting to spend time with Tim. Their friendship may have seemed like an unlikely one, considering their beginnings, but it worked, god, it worked so well, and Jason found himself able to be a level of comfortable around Tim that he really only could be otherwise around Roy and Kory. It was…it was nice.
He didn't even exactly know how it had happened, it had just felt so natural the way they'd drawn together and fallen into it. Conferring on cases, turned to asking to confer when it really wasn't necessary, turned to continuing to talk after, eventually turned to hanging out with increasing regularity with no pretence of cases anywhere in sight half the time. And it all just felt so easy and right, and honestly the days he hung out with Tim tended to be the highlight of Jason's week.
"Okay, but then how does that compare to other things that only appear a certain way under certain conditions?" Jason prompted when Tim trailed off. "It depends on the thing kind of, right, whether we call it as having that trait full stop or not, so where is the line?"
Tim's face lit up and he started babbling away, dumping a metric shitton of information all at once like he always tended to do when he got to talking about something he was really into.
Jason fucking adored the way his face lit up like that, how happy it made him, how beautiful he looked like that. It was endlessly endearing the way he got so excited, the way it made him trip over words and leap around topics trying to explain everything at once, the way he talked with his hands and sometimes just made excited little flaps and flutters of his hands when he got particularly into what he was saying.
Jason was fucking enraptured. He thought he could stare at Tim for hours, just sit there and take in every little part of him.
His eyes were drawn up to Tim's intense eyes, focused slightly to Jason's left, bright with a spark of passion, and occasionally flickering as he sorted through the information catalogued away in his mind. They were alive with interest, looking like a light, clear sky seconds before lightning struck. Jason was in love with them. Jason was in love with Tim.
His gaze wandered up to the stray locks of hair that had escaped Tim's ponytail, which were fluttering around his face with the force of his gestures, and then finally down to his mouth. Running a mile a minute, lips slightly chapped, cracked at one corner, and absolutely perfect. Jason wasn't even thinking about what it would be like to kiss him — although it would be a lie to say he never had before — he was just...admiring.
He liked to admire Tim. Wholly, and focusing just on little details, either way was just as compelling. What else could Jason say? He liked art, and Tim was definitely art. Very well made art.
Living art was totally a thing, right? Like avant-garde exhibitions, and, well, theatre was living art, performance art, and Jason had been a fan of that as soon as he'd been introduced to it. Tim was definitely art. And Jason was going to continue to admire him every chance he got, because really, he could never imagine getting sick of it.
Tim...would probably notice. Maybe already had. But hopefully he just wouldn't say anything, and would maybe just assume that all the staring was just Jason paying attention to him. If he had noticed, he didn't particularly seem to care, and until Tim seemed uncomfortable or specifically asked him to stop, Jason wasn't going to make himself. It was one of the intimacies with Tim that he treasured, knowing that he was never going to get any more.
To Tim he was a friend. And Jason liked being his friend — loved it, even. But he didn't want to be his friend. Hadn't wanted to for a long time now. He wanted something even more impossible than their friendship had seemed: he wanted to be allowed to kiss his lips and take him on dates and tell him how much he loved him. He wanted to be a lover, a boyfriend, a partner.
But he wasn't.
And he wasn't going to be.
So Jason sat, and he admired.
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Tonight they actually had been working a case together again, but they had long given up working for the night and talk had turned to other things. And now Jason was fully turned to face Tim, one leg curled partially under himself, with his elbow propped on his thigh and his cheek resting in his open palm as he stared at Tim dreamily, a half smile on his face, while Tim went on at length about the three gyms he'd taken over that day — because he was ever so endearingly one of those stubborn motherfuckers who still played Pokémon Go in the year 2022. Jason knew his face was probably abominably loudly broadcasting Holy shit I'm so in love with you, but he really couldn't bring himself to try to hide it better. He'd been at this for months and months and months, and he just. Really couldn't bring himself to try to hide it better anymore. Tim was just so...Tim. And it made Jason so fucking soft inside.
Tim abruptly interrupted his own analysis of the stats of the Pokémon he'd left to guard one of the gyms, and just before Jason could open his mouth to ask more about his Dragonair, Tim lurched forward.
Jason's brain bluescreened for a moment, and it took a few seconds to actually process that Tim was...kissing him. That thought seemed so alien — as much as he'd fantasised about it, he'd never thought it would actually happen.
He had jerked his head upright out of his hand in surprise, but Tim had stubbornly kept contact, just as he now stubbornly held the kiss despite Jason's lack of reaction, waiting for him to gather his wits about him.
Jason's hands hesitantly fluttered to Tim's shoulders, as if he wasn't sure the simple touch would be okay despite the kiss. And then, slowly, carefully, as if he was handling something extraordinarily fragile, he kissed Tim back.
Tim's shoulder's relaxed — and only then did Jason realize how tense and stiff they had been — and he gave a small, pleased little hum into the kiss, bringing his hand up to lightly touch Jason's cheek. His fingers, then the edge of his palm, brushed the skin, hovering for several long seconds before his hand finally settled, warmly cupping Jason's cheek.
At long last, Jason pulled back, unable to resist one final, brief kiss, half afraid he might never get the chance again. "What was that for?" He murmured.
"What do you mean?" Tim did not sound as if he was teasing, he sounded fully sincere and curious.
Jason huffed out a small, incredulous laugh. "What do you mean what do I mean, you just kissed me!"
"Yes." Tim squinted at him, searching his face, as if he was looking to see if he was serious. "Jason, you've been staring at me like you're in love with me constantly literally every time we're around each other for months now. Are you telling me you didn't want me to kiss you? You clearly weren't going to make a move, someone had to."
Jason blinked, and then a slow smile made its way onto his face and he began to laugh. "It didn't occur to you that maybe I thought you could never return my feelings and I didn't want to push you?"
"It didn't occur to you that you could just ask? Asking is pushing now?"
Jason gave a final, amused huff. "You are into me though, right?" He checked.
"It would be awfully cruel to kiss you, especially knowing all that, if I didn't return your feelings." He kissed Jason briefly again. "Yes. I am."
"Okay good." It came out in a whisper as Jason brought his hand up to push a stray lock of hair out of Tim's face. And then he leaned in and kissed him again, much more deeply this time.
He felt Tim's mouth open and opened his in response, and then his hand was burying itself in the back of Tim's hair and they were kissing hard and intensely, again and again, like they'd never be able to get enough.
Eventually, however, their fervor cooled again, and Tim was left lying on top of him, panting slightly.
Jason felt a little short of breath himself as he stared up at Tim.
"So," he prompted after a moment. "I think you were telling me about your Dragonair?"
Tim's eyes lit up again. "Oh! Yeah! I left it guarding the gym in the cathedral on 5th Street, and it's…"
Jason smiled as Tim chattered away, and he slid his arms a little further around him, holding him tightly. Yeah. He really fucking loved this.