I woke up this morning and realized that today was a very special day. It's my co-writer Robinrocks's 18th birthday! And I knew I had to write something for her. A thank you, or dedication, or birthday present, or whatever you want to call it.

So I was all like "Shazam! Let's do it! Fanfic for a friend!"

But my brain said "I got nothing."

And my muse was like "But I'm le tired…"

And my conscious sent a telegram "Don't you have a research paper to do?"

So I decided to do it by myself. Inspiration and writing blocks and school work be damned.

Robinrocks, this is for you. :)

--

"Spread your hands a little farther. There you go, shoulder width apart." Tiny fingers, still chubby with baby fat, gripped the wrapped metal bar. The arms belonged to a child, one that had barely grown big enough to stop being carried around by his father, and yet the boy was perched 30 feet up in the air on a small metal 2x4 platform.

He was preparing to jump from the dizzying height with nothing but a thin rope to hold him up.

And he couldn't be happier.

"Alright Dick, almost ready. Keep the bar at the base of your fingers, not the center of your palm." His father readjusted his hands to the correct position and then chuckled at the boy's overwhelming enthusiasm.

"You don't need to choke the life out of the bar to stay on. Just relax; it's like being on the static trapeze remember? Only now you are swinging with it, and the momentum actually makes the moves easier so you don't have to grip it so hard."

"I know dad!" The little boy chirped, childish condensation in his lilt like voice. He had been training on the grounded static trapeze for weeks now, doing hangs, drops, and poses. He knew all the grips, the catches, and had memorized his parent's routine after viewing it so many times from the ground. He knew everything that a boy raised in a circus should know. He just lacked the experience. Something he would have had long ago if only the rigging were designed for children. His parents trusted the strength and safety of the equipment, but could do nothing about the limited reach of his arm. So he had been stuck with the ground work until he was big enough.

And even now he was at the very edge of the platform, on his tip toes, arms stretched as far as they could possibly reach, leaning out off the plank in order to hold the bar. He was barely even on the pedestal board in that position, and the only thing holding him in the precarious stance was his father's callused fingers hooked onto the back of his belt.

"OK. You're almost ready. Don't leap out, just jump straight up and the bar will pull you out so you won't hit the platform on the downswing."

Dick just gave an impatient huff, and looked back at his father with a reproachful eye. "I can do it dad…"

"Not with that bent over back you can't." Dick immediately straightened up as much as possible in his overreaching leaning position and looked forward.

"I want you to swing out, lift yourself on the rise back and put your knees over the bar, and then throw your arms out at the far end of the second swing."

"Like mom does when you catch her?"

"Yes, except no one is over on the cradle to catch you so I just want you to hang. You understand?"

"Yeah! Can I go now?"

"Alright. Here we go, one…two…three!"

His father released his grip, and Dick didn't even have to jump up. He instantly fell forwards and was pulled along the arc of tension from the rope, with gravity speeding him downwards on the curve. His eyes gathered tears from the wind howling past him and he felt his stomach hurdle up to his throat as he swung down to the trench of the bend.

And suddenly, he was flying upwards and he could feel his breath returning to him as he remembered how to breathe. The ascension, the incredible, undeniable sensation of soaring was instilled within his tiny body at that second, and he knew that he would never tire of the exhilarating feeling.

This feeling of…

flying…

-

And falling…

The tampered carabineer warped and twisted until it snapped utterly, the rope lost its tautness and the glittered kaleido stars of the circus, the flying Graysons once celestial and untouchable in their thrilling lofty world of aerial silks and rosin dust, were loosed to the widening gyre- and Dick was lost to the blood-dimmed tide of horror that engulfed him.

Oncoming death is terrible enough, but worse still is the oncoming death with a few seconds to spare in which all the happiness that was yours, and all the happiness that might have been yours becomes clear to you. His eight year old self saw with utter lucidity all that he was about to lose. Losing a father whose guidance and help he depended on, who supported him as a tree trunk supports its branches. Losing a mother whose loving embrace and soft words comforted him, well, that was like losing the very sun above him.

He didn't know if there really was any blood or if he daubed it on later in his memory with a big brush. But he heard. Screams, gasps, a resounding thud that sounded wet, yet held a grotesque crunchy quality to it. Deniability was lost when the acrobats, his parents, slammed down on the sawdust without a single bounce or tremor. The crowd cringed in upon itself and the only red in view was not leaking from their mangled forms-

But on his own hands.

The rosin powder he had rubbed in only a few minutes before still retained its dark amber hued tint, and it stained his hands to a copper red brown as he tried to shield his eyes from the horror and was only faced with that color instead.

On my own hands…

-

Dick bolted awake, blubbering and quivering in a cold sweat, surrounded by twisted sweaty sheets. Tears were streaked down his unmasked face, framed by splayed ungelled hair. The nightmare was horrific, but it was always was; a flash of resonating terror that easily slithered back to the dark corner of his mind upon waking.

It was worse afterwards. When shame gnawed in his guts and opened up a festering wound in his chest, nestling guilt inside like a gangrene that would rot and destroy everything in him. Even the words with which to speak of his feelings of guilt would putrefy in the face of undeniable yet misplaced responsibility.

So he didn't speak of it. Not his parents, not the circus, not the feeling of flying along with them…

It stayed safely locked away only to be dredged up by nightmares in the night.