The dark and gloomy nature of Gotham City was never something that Damian Wayne would claim to be a fan of, but he'd also be lying if he said that it wasn't something that he was used to.

Trained to be an assassin since birth by not only his mother but also his grandfather, he'd lived all 12 years of his young life accustomed to the shadows. Taught to lurk and blend in at all times and whenever necessary─a skill that had been the entire reason he'd been sent to live with his father in the first place. To turn that skill and hone it into an art.

At least that's what he told himself when he'd walked into his new art class at his new school first thing in the morning, and was promptly blinded and caught off guard by the explosion of light and obnoxious amounts of color consistent throughout the entirety of the room.

The only thing Damian disliked more than dullness was overt liveliness. He got enough of that at home with Brown and Grayson.

So the sight of what he assumed was his new teacher wearing a bright blue knit cardigan and a floral print dress immediately had him tensing up and a scowl taking over. The smile that was plastered over her face along with the kindness in her eyes certainly didn't help either. Nice people can be deceiving, Damian.

Before he could decide to just turn back around and walk out, however, she'd spotted him and immediately excused herself from the student she had been making conversation with to make her way over to him.

The closer she got, the more obvious it was to him that she'd be one of those teachers who'd simply never stop smiling─not that he'd know anything about that of course, but he'd heard countless stories from the others.

"You must be Damian," she started, her pink-tinted lips stretching wider as her smile grew even larger. "I'm Ms. Arroyo, I'll be your art teacher for the rest of the year."

Ms. Arroyo held out her hand for him to take but when he only stared blankly at the offending limb, she retracted her arm and nodded awkwardly.

"Right," she smiled. "My apologies...uh if you would follow me, let me show you where you'll be sitting for now."

Well, at least he didn't have to pretend to care about formalities. His father would sigh and Pennyworth would surely scold him for his impoliteness, but right now Damian couldn't find it in himself to care. Not only was he forced to endure a class that was an insult to all artists with talent but now he was forced to endure it with somebody as undeniably polarizing as Ms. Arroyo. Somebody who looked as though they believed that anybody was capable of art if they put enough work into it.

An idea that Damian personally disagreed with. You either possessed the talents or you didn't. To him, this was the exact same as training with the League of Assassins─you either sink or you learn to swim. There was no patience to baby the weak and coddle the afraid.

"─if you have any further questions please feel free to ask, I promise that I'll always do my best to answer them if I can," Ms. Arroyo said with a smile, and only then did Damian realize he had begun to tune her out.

Not smart, but her constant enthusiasm was nauseating. It was as though the sun had cloned itself and given it a human form─always bright and always warm.

"Thank....you," the words felt foreign on his tongue but Damian figured that a response would serve him better in the long run than a simple head nod.

"Of course, Damian! My job is to help you," she said, tapping the desk cheerfully with her fingers before excusing herself from him and finally leaving him alone and to his own devices.

Setting his things down, a ways away but not too far out of reach to where he couldn't see them─this was still Gotham─Damian let himself perch on the edge of his seat. His green eyes scanning the room with a cold and calculating detachment that a normal 12-year-old shouldn't have. He took in everything─from the paint stains splattered across the walls, desks, and floors, to the assortment of potted plants that Ms Arroyo kept near her desk without causing a fire hazard.

Everywhere he looked, there was evidence of the organized chaos that Ms Arroyo so obviously harbored in her classroom. It was both a comfort and a horrifying realization to him─a comfort because she, like most civilians, wore her heart on her sleeve. Damian would be able to tell what her intentions were in any action that she took─not that he wouldn't have been able to anyway, but it was the principle of the matter. She was not a threat.

Yet.

This, however, was also horrifying to Damian because it meant one thing was absolutely certain─Ms Arroyo was genuinely that naturally cheerful. It would be a struggle not to bite her.

Maybe it wasn't too late to take up Brown's offer of running away...

He was well aware that it was a joke offer made in an effort to mock him, but right now that was inconsequential to his inner thoughts. The ones that begged him just to gather his things and make a run for it off the property and into the safety that solitude provided. The ones who were pleading with him not to take this insult of a class lying down. The ones that─

"Damian, while the rest of the class continues working on their projects, I'd like you to make a list of things in your life that make you happy," Ms Arroyo called out to him. "The assignment is to create something that depicts what makes you feel fulfilled in life, something personal."

Personal?

The thought alone was enough to have Damian's entire body go rigid. There were no individual personalities in the league, there was only the league. You lived it, you breathed, you died for it. There were no other options. Damian had never considered there being other options either─he was in Gotham to learn his father's trade and that was all. At the end of the day, he would return to the league and make his mother and grandfather proud.

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With his short stature, stiff body language, and a suspicious gleam in his eyes, Damian Wayne had caught and piqued Brisa's interest from the second he stepped foot into her classroom. The way his eyes scanned the room in scrutiny and his lips twisted downward in disgust at what he saw, was a far more cautious approach to new environments than most kids his age had. At twelve, most kids were still learning to leave behind the easygoing carelessness of childhood and embrace the inherent awkwardness of pre-teen life. So to see him, all scowls and tense shoulders, with an aura about him that was much older than someone his age should have─well it was like a beacon of distress calling her name.

  It would be negligent of her not to answer that call. It was, after all, the entire reason she had become a teacher. So she played the part, she introduced herself to the boy and welcomed him like she usually would─with open arms.

Then she went on with her beginning of class routine as she normally would. She said good morning, gave her students their instructions for the day, and walked around the class to help wherever she was needed. Everything was fine.

Until she saw Damian sitting at his desk, staring unseeingly at the blank paper before him, it had been thirty minutes since she had instructed him to list his favorite things and still, he had yet to move a muscle.

Brisa frowned.

"Damian?" she called his name softly as she peered down at him. In an instant his jade-green eyes snapped up to hers, his brows were knit in confusion causing a small line to appear between them, and his lips were set into a flat line─all signs pointing to his discomfort.

He hid it well, it was almost imperceptible to even her─and wasn't that concerning in of itself─but Brisa had spent a few years working with children with behavioral issues─she knew how to spot when somebody was hiding what they were really feeling from a mile away.

"You haven't written anything down, is something wrong?" she questioned the boy, walking over to her desk to pull up a spare chair, before sitting directly across from him.

"What's the matter?" Brisa asked.

"This is pointless," Damian grumbled, "I do not understand why I have to do this."

Brisa frowned, "It's a year-long subproject, you have time to think of something and make it work. You don't have to force yourself to do it now, but you haven't written anything..."

He clicked his tongue and looked off to the side, "I could not think of anything..."

Like I'd believe that, Brisa thought. The refusal to meet her eyes, even for a second, was a dead giveaway to the fact that Damian had clearly thought of something but didn't deem it appropriate to share with others.

Deciding that it would be much more beneficial for her in the long run not to say anything, Brisa decided to let Damian keep his secrets for now. You will never gain somebody's trust by forcing them to speak with you before they're ready.

"Well why don't you just freehand for today," Brisa offered with a reassuring smile, "and then tomorrow we can work on your list together?"

However, instead of a verbal response, Damian just stared blankly at Brisa. She watched patiently as his expression slowly morphed from one of disbelief to one of utter confusion.

"I do not understand," He muttered, "What do you gain from helping me?"

"What do I-" Brisa was baffled. What did she gain? It was such an odd question to have been asked, and one that she had a difficult time comprehending.

Damian was only twelve years old, what reason did he have to be so suspicious of somebody offering genuine help? It made Brisa's heartache and her mind run miles a minute. There was only one reason for someone so young to be so cold to the world─if they'd already been exposed to the worst parts of it.

"I don't gain anything from this Damian," Brisa said gently. "I just want to help, honest."

"I do not trust you," Damian stated bluntly.

"I don't expect you to," she agreed easily, "But-"

A triumphant look crossed the young boy's face, as though he'd just been proven right. Good thing Brisa had never been good at falling into other people's assumptions of her─nobody's but her own at least.

"But," she said again. "I would really like to earn it."

"What?"

"If you'll let me, I would like to earn your trust," Brisa smiled at the boy. "Trust is not something that is simply given because I'm your teacher, I have to earn it. And I would very much like to earn yours."

Damian paused. He'd never had somebody be so open with their emotions with him so willingly. It was weird because he knew deep down in his gut that Ms. Arroyo was not lying about her desires nor did she have any underlying intentions.

She meant what she said.

He didn't know how to feel about that. His entire life he'd been trained to see through people's lies and to be able to sniff out half-truths. Never once was he taught how to react in the face of being told undeniable truths directly. It was always the default suspicion, something that had been strengthened when he came to Gotham under the tutelage of his father.  This was uncharted territory for him.

So, Damian decided to take a page out of Grayson's book. He took a leap of faith.

"I am...willing to offer the opportunity," Damian said.

"Wonderful!" Brisa's smile was so blindingly bright that Damian feared that he would lose his vision.

Maybe he's made a mistake.

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╰┈➤𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑𝐒 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄

big thank you to my pookie, kenn for being my beta reader and my personal damian wayne expert!! i really wanted to make sure that damian was as in character as possible, because i adore him and wanted to do him justice, so hopefully this is something that fits the bill!

also brisa interacting with batfamily members is already going to be my favorite thing to write, i just know it!

until next time,
charley xx