#part of me is telling me to get back into therapy | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ellesthots · 3 days ago

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Fateful Beginnings

XXXVIII. “for love”

parts: previous / next

plot: Bruce Wayne goes to therapy [NOT CLICKBAIT]

pairing: battinson!bruce wayne x fem!reader

cw: 18+, panic attack, vomit, blood, grief/trauma, yearning

words: 9.7k

a/n: more miscommunication, more of reader getting themselves into situations 💀 as far as I’m concerned, Bruce Wayne’s love language is ‘worry’. as always, i adore hearing allll of your comments!! please tell me everything lovelies, i adore interacting with you all <3

You’d probably bored him with your photos and reminiscing. Maybe he didn’t even have to go anywhere.

You’d hoped you’d been able to distract Bruce enough, even if he was just humoring you. In addition to the articles about the murderous stalker, you’d noted the bruises on his knuckles. After last Saturday when you’d learned he’d gone back to Batman, you’d been worried sick; worry tinged with anger at his immovable desire to get back into the muck, at his inability to let himself relax. You hoped you’d given him a sliver of that, a moment of reprieve so his system didn’t overload. It wasn’t realistic that his meds had fully set in yet. As Dr. Crane so diligently reminded you over the weekend, this time was fragile.

In a self-serving way that made your stomach hurt, in a way you didn’t want to fully admit to yourself and play off as a joke, the shock of the serial killer had sideswept your anxiety at having to see him again post-dream. The only time it had entered your brain again was when he’d made the comment about housing, blurting out so eloquently I thought I’d dreamt that. You’d wanted to sink into the floor, certain that your dream was plastered across your forehead.

At least he smiled some at the end of the night–he wouldn’t have sought you out at the rally’s end if he hadn’t wanted to talk to you, right? Or was this yet another thing fueled by his guilt? So soon off the heels of the attempt, and everything with Miller… yeah, he didn’t want to talk to you. Only felt like he needed to.

You waited at a separate intersection now, in an area of town you had never been to before. So holed up to downtown while being in classes, you hadn’t ventured much besides the places Mar dragged you every blue moon. Crown Point was separate from downtown, almost intentionally so—in your research for March’s rally, you’d learned that it was a neighborhood infamous for its poverty and crime. Most of the articles online spoke only about the latter, giving no credence to the reality of simply needing to get by. It had also been the neighborhood most impacted by the historic flood of 2022, never quite being resuscitated. You’d wanted to start hearing what the city thought of this campaign, and what better voices to highlight coming off the heels of Bruce’s first interview than the most abandoned?

Marginalized and disenfranchised didn’t even begin to cover it. It was like the city at large had tried to swallow up Crown Point—or better yet, tried to drown it in the depths of the river, desperately stomping out any signs of life. Cars were toppled over from accidents no one had bothered to attend to, or clean up from. Blood tinged all layers of the street, no street cleaners bothering to come by. Every apartment looked decimated; chunks of yellowed, dry grass sprung wild in cracks of concrete, surviving off blood, crude oil, and spite. Trash more than littered the streets, it became them; when you visited again, if you even saw a single soul, you’d need to wear boots. Some of the garbage was up to your knees.

You thought back to a group project in high school with Gabbi. She’d wanted to focus on the benefits of recycling, starting a campaign to expand the trash removal options at the school. She’d pulled up pictures of places like this, turning her nose up to the class as they presented. “We don’t want our city to turn into this, do we?” Even then, having never stepped foot outside your little town, you’d thought she was being callous and cruel.

The first sign of life presented itself as a rustle in some bushes. You cleared your throat of its gumminess on approach, suddenly feeling very much like an intruder. Street interviews were commonplace, it wasn’t supposed to be weird, but this side of town almost felt feral; like it’d been left alone for so long the buildings might bite back. What could I give them in return? Dr. Vry had always made it clear you weren’t supposed to give gifts in journalism; it was biased, and even if well-intentioned, demerited your work. Maybe it would be enough for you to see them, to help give their voice a boost. To know that someone was looking out for them.

Upon closer inspection, these bushes proved the entrance to a houseless camp. The residents had become very savvy, and you kept yourself tight to where you’d come in case they wanted you to leave. You had a penchant for walking unwanted into people’s homes, it seemed; but the tentative response was short-lived. A child emerged from a tent a few feet in front of you, and waved, running toward the back of the haphazardly-kempt wire fence lining the area. It was massive; hundreds of people could live here, easily. You noticed a couple sitting together eating some shelf-stable food on a nearby bench. Another kid playing with a stray cat in the far corner. Tents and tarps were plentiful, with the odd bike and mattress parked around.

“If you’re a cop, we don’t want you.” A tall woman sitting under a tarp gestured to you. “Lot of you have tried, but we won’t go.”

You shook your head. “I’m not, I uh, I’m a journalist with the Gazette. Wanted to know what the people of Crown Point thought about the upcoming election.”

A chorus of laughs erupted, many voices from places you couldn’t place. Some echoey, some dampened, some sounding like they were standing right beside you. The same woman shrugged, tossing her pillow to the side of her to lay back on. “The election doesn’t matter. Still leaving us to die.”

You went with her concern, probing it, validating it. “That’s why I’m here. I want to help your concerns be heard.”

“What’s the point of being heard if we’re gonna freeze anyway?” The man sitting on the bench chimed in, shaking his head with a tight, scrunched face. They were right; why would they want to speak if they were hungry, exhausted, and at risk of freezing to the cold, hard ground this winter? Your heart broke thinking of how many loved ones they’d already had to mourn.

The zing of it propelled the words out before you’d fully thought them through. “I could help all of you get housed, tonight.”

The man on the bench glared at you, the woman next to him looking up from her lap. The woman underneath the tarp that had spoken slowly sat up, eyebrow raising. “Is this a trick? Get us to leave so you can sweep the joint?”

Damn. What is Bruce gonna think about this? “No. I have… connections. At least for the time being. Hotels, motels, but eventually to something long-term.” What, there were a few hundred people here? Maximum? Some of them had to be families, couples. You swallowed a lump in your throat at the prospect of overpromising and underdelivering. You knew there were enough empty apartments, but not about hotels…

Rightfully so, they only became more suspicious, with more people peeking out from their tents to see who the hell was saying such things. “I worked with Bruce Wayne recently.” What to say?! “He talked about the housing crisis, he wants to help.”

“This isn’t more of that Renewal bullshit, right?”

“Wayne kid getting out now?”

“Why would he want to help us? Planning to run?”

They’d been hurt before. Led astray. They were just being protective. “I think he wants to follow his parents. I know they were philanthropic.”

“Can’t be too much, or he wouldn’t have his billions.”

You couldn’t believe you were standing here vouching for Bruce fucking Wayne, the man that just a few months ago scowled at you in his basement while essentially moralizing their existence. It dawned on you that you were promising them his money, and guilt washed through you yet again. “I’ll get in contact with his management. If that’s something you’d all want.”

The few people who were looking at you looked around at each other, and a pause hung longer than you thought it would. You stifled a sigh of relief at giving them a choice–you didn’t want to come in like some savior if it wasn’t what they wanted right now. You stifled another when they all nodded, and you disappeared back into the bushes after saying you’d only be a minute.

Calling him was hard. You stared at his contact in your phone like it was a mirage, and would leap from the screen and disappear any moment. Only once you heard a particularly strained meow from one of the camp’s cats did you press the button, all but slamming the phone to your ear. Ring one, ring two, ring three, ring four… you bit your cheek, already sore from biting it so much the night before. He isn’t gonna answer. He wants nothing to do with me. Rightfully so.

“Y/N?”

You loathed the way your body jumped when he said your name, a phenomenon you were becoming aware of ever since that night at your apartment. The request tumbled out of you, with both too much and not enough context; sudden, intrusive, and trapping. You were beginning to hate yourself, and the lengthy silence between your ask and his response had you jumping in place, holding tight, constricted air heavy in your chest. Fuck. I’ll have to tell everyone I was lying, that I didn’t have anything lined up. That you’d put your foot in your mouth, and felt entitled to his money. Maybe, in your emotional anguish, you’d even confess to them that you’d lied. That you’d lied to a big, important man about a big, important thing. All weekend you’d ruminated on his reputation, fully internalizing it for the first time.

“Be there soon.” His voice was flat, distant, and he abruptly hung up.

Not an okay, sure, or even a that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, stay away from me from him. Just another obligation. Another thing he had to swallow with you; another way you made yourself a menace, another way he couldn’t escape you.

He arrived the same way, eyes cast down as he slammed the door shut. His hair wasn’t done, but the rest of him was—donning a light brown sweater against tapered black pants rather than his baggy black-on-black, tattered tee look. As much as you wanted to mirror his avoidance, you had to bite the bullet, maintaining your eyes to his face and breaking the silence. “Thank you, I’m, I know this is unexpected,”

His eyes flicked up to yours and he flinched, his face scrunching together as he faced the concrete again. You felt queasy. His voice was low and mumbled. You could barely hear him, though the city din was much lower out here. “—fine.” He shrugged, his shoulders tightening. Your gut cinched as you led him to the camp, each step drawing the nausea more to the surface. After the rollercoaster of the past week, it’d been too easy to forget the fragile line you walked with him.

By the time you both stood at the entrance, watching everyone’s eyes widen at Bruce’s presence, you were almost positive you’d crumble to the ground. By some lucky break, he decided to speak first. He sounded nothing like he had when he’d been with you seconds earlier.

“I know the chill is coming in soon, and we want to help you get housed. For the first few nights you’ll be staying in a hotel or motel in the city. Beyond that, my team will get you set up in an apartment long-term. Fully paid.” Some people asked him why he was doing this, but others were already taking down their tents, shoving everything into their arms and into stray plastic bags. He answered with: “Money has no use sitting in a cell while people can use it.”

You tried not to linger on the we of it all, but it was hard. He didn’t look at you as you both helped residents pack up their things, staying to opposite sides of the encampment. After you did a headcount, you realized there were only about a hundred-fifty people living here. A handful of them were children, a few elders, but most middle-aged, and single. When people would turn to finish grabbing their belongings, you’d stare at Bruce’s back, or his side-profile, or his face if he was facing you. He never so much as glanced your direction, even when he was paused, waiting.

Once everyone was packed, you took out your phone to scour hotel sites, presenting the second time he’d acknowledged your existence in the two hours you’d been there. His voice was quiet still, this time with more discernible reasons as to why, though he kept his interactions short, clipped, impersonal. “My butler’s handling it. Marriot’s coming off a conference, everyone can go there.” He mumbled something as he walked past about Alfred sending cars for everyone, directing you to stay back for the time being. He walked to the group toward the front and followed them out, saying something else you could hardly hear, but sounded like leadership.

Nearly in tears by how coolly he was behaving, you’d threatened to crumble until a small boy walked up to you holding a tiny kitten. The kitten shivered, their orange fur standing up in the wind tunnel the fencing and bushes created. They had open scabs around their back, and on the pads of their paws. “Mommy says he needs a doctor.”

Crouching down to meet his eye level, you reached out to gently pet the cat’s head. You could feel how small and weak they were. “Is this your kitty?”

He nodded. “His name is Bouncer.” He said it pointedly, like people had been calling Bouncer ‘cat’ against his wishes. His face was pouty, frustrated. He held the cat close to him, like you were going to take him away. “Can he come?”

“Yes, he can. I can take him to the doctor too if you’d like.” Dr. Vry’s second paycheck had come in over the weekend, so this task wasn’t something you’d have to ask Bruce’s card information for. Thank god.

“Bouncer.”

“I can take Bouncer to the cat doctor, and bring him back to you. How does that sound?” Your heart squeezed as you thought back to what had likely gotten him that name, the bouncing, leaping, energetic presence of a new kitten, seeing how clenched and tired the cat looked now.

The boy looked over your shoulder and pointed, and you followed his finger to Bruce, stepping back into the encampment. “You and him.” He pointed to the cat, brow furrowed, then back to Bruce again. “Get him.”

He was already motioning at Bruce, and you counted the sound of his footsteps until you felt him beside you. He wasn’t wearing the cologne he always wore at city hall meetings, the universe giving you a millisecond of relief. His voice was gentler when he spoke now, crouching to mimic your posture in front of the kid. “Is that your cat?”

The kid stared at you like you were supposed to introduce them. You didn’t look at him, only at the small, shaky head of the kitten in front of you. “That’s Bouncer. He needs to go to the vet.”

“You guys will.” He shoved the kitten in your arms, and you felt how chilly he was. His body trembled and shook, and you cradled his head as you looked into his face. The kid said something to Bruce about ‘the buddy system’ and ‘illegal’ to not go with someone else, but their conversation faded into the green of the kitten’s eyes. Their eyelids were covered in grime, their nose runny. Poor baby. You caressed their head, their eyes fluttering, and they stretched into a yawn, the tiny claws poking at your arms.

“Landon, there you are.” A woman, presumably his mom, walked up to the child and grabbed his elbow. “The cars are coming.”

“Bouncer! He’s going to the doctor.”

The lady met your eyes, and glanced between you and Bruce. She shook her head and hoisted the bag higher on her back. “No baby, we don’t have the money yet.”

You opened your mouth to speak, but Bruce intercepted. “I’ll cover it.”

The woman blushed, an exasperated sigh following. She ran her fingers through Landon’s hair. “You’re already doing so much, we can’t possibly,”

He shook his head and stood, but you stayed crouched. You pulled the kitten close to your chest, hoping to warm them off your body heat. “It’s no problem. I’ll have someone bring Bouncer to your room later tonight.”

As they shuffled away, the boy blew a kiss at the cat and waved; you gently grabbed the kitten’s paw and gave the teensiest wave back, careful not to move him much. As they turned out of view, stepping out of the bushes to the cars that supposedly awaited them all, you caught Bruce staring at you, blank-faced. He held the eye contact only a second, but it felt like a lifetime after being wholeheartedly avoided. You wished he would speak, you wanted to know what he was thinking so badly.

Instead, he shoved his hands into his pockets and strode forward, mumbling again. “Get in the backseat with it.”

You didn’t like his tone, but you didn’t feel in any position to complain; you’d probably cost him upwards of fifty thousand dollars today, not counting whatever the vet bill would be, food costs, and the long-term investment of housing everyone. You hadn’t consulted with him, of course he was angry. Of course he was being short with you. You didn’t care much about the money aspect, especially not as you walked past the crowds of people buzzing with anticipation to finally get a warm shower and soft bed, but when you paired it with your previous behavior, it didn’t feel too stellar. Seemed that as quick as the smoke cleared from a past fuckup, you were slamming another between the two of you.

Slipping into the backseat was easier than you thought; the kitten was far from rambunctious, tired and tiny, so you set them in the seat next to you and slid in, scooping them up as quickly as they’d been set down. As you gently pet their head, down their back, and wiggled their toes, you could’ve sworn you felt the beginnings of a purr. You looked out the tinted windows at the people climbing into Ubers and Lyfts, and rolled down the window to wave again at Landon before he climbed in the back of the rideshare.

Bruce slipped into the driver’s side and turned the car on as one pulled up beside you. Alfred was messing with his seatbelt before stepping out, seemingly orchestrating the rides. He said something to the group and those who had just hopped inside the cars, but Bruce sped off before you could hear it. Every movement of his felt impatient, stilted, forced. You remained silent the rest of the drive, the mood soured, millenniums away from the night before. You shifted your focus to the animal in your arms, which was automatic; they’d begun to let out pitiful meows, opening their eyes as much as they could.

You pulled into the parking lot of a clinic you’d never seen before, a 24 hour emergency vet. Bruce turned to take the cat, but Bouncer had clawed his way into your shirt, clinging on for dear life. You cooed at him, rubbing behind his ears, and stepped out without thinking, only realizing once both feet were on the ground to look for paparazzi. The beaming of the sun, a rarity in the inner city, caused a momentary panic, and you scurried into the clinic as fast as you knew you could protect the terrified pet in your arms. After pretending you’d found a stray cat and wanted to rescue them, you handed him to a tech, giving your card information and phone number to the man at the front desk. They told you for security reasons they’d need you to wait in your car, but they estimated it wouldn’t be longer than an hour. Apparently it was usually much busier, and the wait averaged twelve hours. Shit.

Walking out to the car brought an anxiety you hadn’t felt toward him since the first night at Wayne Tower. He didn’t look up when you walked past his window, nor when you slid into the backseat. In fact, he didn’t say a word for multiple minutes after, seemingly staring down at his feet, or the steering wheel. Is he okay?

“How long did they say it would be?” Still mumbling. Still with no further acknowledgment outside the bare minimum.

“About an hour.”

The silence continued for a cluster of minutes before you forced an apology through your mounting nerves. “I’m sorry. I know I should have asked you before. They asked what good was it to have their voice heard if they were gonna freeze to death anyway, and—”

“It’s fine.” But it didn’t sound fine, it sounded like he had an armory of sharp words to stab into you; an unspoken tension so tightly wound you had a feeling you couldn’t even ask about it without things escalating. Whatever it was, you felt it; a thick, dense cord jammed between and through you.

“It’s not right of me—”

“It’s fine.”

This felt eerily similar to how standoffish he’d acted the night after you hugged, but it didn’t make sense. All he’d done was drive you home. His reassurance wasn’t gentle, it was tempered. A kettle barely kept from boiling. Whenever he acted like this, you couldn’t help the storm brewing within you to pull him out of it, make him explain himself.

But you’d done too much. So you sat, twiddling your thumbs, and counted the seconds as they passed until the clinic called back. You put it on speaker so you wouldn’t have to repeat yourself to him.

“Hi Y/N, this is Mountain Valley vet clinic calling. Bouncer has been seen by our staff.” They went on to let you know that he had dermatitis and was extremely dehydrated; they gave him subcutaneous fluid, a wash, and a cone, as well as trimmed his nails. You agreed to purchasing the hypoallergenic kibble they recommended, and walked out a few minutes later with a cardboard carrier holding a tiny, washed kitten in a large cone.

Bruce still didn’t say a word.

Bruce felt like he might die.

You left him in the car with the kitten after insisting on the ride back that you get the creature some supplies. He peeked in once to see if it was breathing, and its bleary eyes stared up at him. He gave the little thing a pet, but that was the most he could do. He felt like he needed a trip to the doctor.

He didn’t want you to come back. He’d been pacing his room before you called, cataloging what he might say to you the next day. He’d been too terrified to sleep, afraid to shut his eyes after the debacle in the shower. He’d tried to come up with an excuse to not see you, but nothing revealed itself, and now he was here. Stuck in this stuffy, cramped car with you. Stuck remembering the tenderness in your body as you held the animal, stuck with the insurmountable, immovable, horrifying thought that there was nothing he could do but grow fonder and fonder of you with each interaction.

He wasn’t mad you’d taken the initiative; he was mad that his body had betrayed him, and annihilated his footing, making the sight of you absolutely unbearable. Seeing you felt like a hot branding iron, like your hand was wrapped around his throat to make him suffer, cutting off oxygen to his limbs until he felt them shrivel and die. He ached to lean toward you, converse, connect; but in equal measure, with equal force, nothing had ever felt more dangerous. Not even cutting the wire and plunging into the blood-filled waters during the flooding, though he knew how illogical it was.

He looked at the cat again. How you held it. How it clung onto you like the world would end if it let go. He couldn’t resist looking at you then. Couldn’t stomp out the part of him that wanted to do the exact same thing. It made him sick.

You slid into the backseat and for a split second he considered folding. Indulging the questions that spun his thoughts all afternoon. Why Crown Point? Why now? What article were you working on? Had anyone heckled you? Had Gavenstein or the other men said anything? Had you recovered yet from your injuries? What questions did you prepare for the rally that weren’t heard? How were you, really? Were you still having nightmares?

“Which room are they in?”

Holy shit, he’d been driving on autopilot, the Marriot sign projecting beams of light through his eyes in the parking lot. This was precisely why he couldn’t ask those questions, why it was imperative he resist the dynamic forming. He was entirely ragged and unnerved.

The click of your seatbelt unbuckling forced him to speak. “I’ll do it.”

“No, I’ll run up there, I was the—”

“You can’t be associated with this.”

“I already am. Look,”

His hand knocked into yours as he grabbed the box’s handle, and he slammed his head back on the headrest with a scowl as he yanked his arm away. His hand was burning where you’d touched, his heart racing…

“Just admit it.”

If he thought his heart was racing then, he had no idea what it was doing now, certain it would tear out of his chest. You couldn’t know about last night, impossible. You couldn’t. “Admit what?” It was easy for his tone to be harsh when he was this thrown. He counted the split of each second between your answer by the pounding of blood in his ears.

“You’re mad at me.”

His brow furrowed, gaze fixed on the top of the steering wheel. You shifted in your seat, the thin plastic handles of the Petco bag deepening the crease under your knuckles. It was oozing off of him. You nearly snapped when he denied it. “I’m not.”

“I know what I did was entitled.”

“Take the cat in.”

“You’re angry. That’s fine,”

He scoffed, something which didn’t help whatever case he was trying to front. “Do you want me to be?” He turned to face you, his face flushed with frustration. His chest was heaving, causing you to press your back flush to the seat in a strange anticipation. Almost like he might grab you if you got too close. Or run away.

You hid your surprise when he spoke again, his voice embittered. “Do you want me to tell you you shouldn’t have done that?” The collar of his sweater snagged your vision, your eyes oscillating there and back again. To his deep blue eyes with their fiery, unblinking focus… “That I don’t want you spending my family’s money? That you should’ve given it more thought?” His lips were fascinating as they wrapped around his words. “What do you want me to say?”

“Whatever it is you’re thinking.” The words caught in your throat, coming out breathy. His intensity filled you to the brim with overwhelm, knocking the wind clean out of you. It began to feel obscenely difficult to only focus on his eyes. Something flashed across his face, like apprehension, or worry, and quickly settled. “Don't pretend you’re not upset.”

He glared at you another beat, one that you soaked up more than you cared to admit, before grumbling back into his seat. You couldn’t make out what he was looking at, but he was looking down. He suddenly looked a few years older. Is he okay? “Room 731.”

You reached around, taking great care not to brush his arm, and grabbed Bouncer’s box from the passenger seat. The cabin air was stifling, charged with whatever complaints Bruce was set on denying, but you couldn’t resist a last look at the frail little cat in the big, huge box.

You thought about how Bruce hadn’t held him yet, and, even though he was causing a well of something to toil in you, and his tone brooked no further conversation, you shoved through it. Hopeful it could help him off the edge of whatever he was dealing with. Walter always helped you regulate. “Do you want to hold him before I go in?”

“Why?”

“You haven’t held him yet.” And he had a shitty week.

Like nothing more than obligation, he twisted his body toward the box and reached inside, expression cross and unyielding. The kitten meowed, and Bruce’s face scrunched as he saw the bubble on his back. “What happened?” He held the cat up and looked at it from another angle, his concern mounting.

“That’s the fluid.” The kitten let out a sizable scream as he kicked his paws, scrambling. Bruce held him almost at arm’s length, confused. His serious expression and the wiggling kitten caught between his hands was a sight you burned into memory for when you needed to laugh later. “Bring him closer, he’s just cold.”

He folded his arms mechanically, and at such a snail pace you wondered if the cat might outgrow the cone by the time he reached the plane of his chest. The feeling that welled up in you when the cat snuggled into him had you interrogating your subconscious for an ulterior motive. Something about seeing a stony man holding the world’s most fragile kitten had you feeling woozy. You could’ve sworn you saw the sunrise of a smile glint in his eyes.

“Is that Bruce Wayne?!”

“Duck.”

You made yourself one with the floor of the back seat as he threw the car in reverse, one hand on the kitten, one to the wheel. Being this low to the ground in a vehicle made your head spin, all thought leaving you save making sure you didn’t vomit.

He parked sooner than you anticipated, wasting no time. “I’ll walk the cat back. Give me the bag.” He placed the cat delicately in the box, but your head was pounding. You didn’t like having to do this. Having to lay horizontal every time someone might see you with him, stay ducked behind bushes, across the room at city hall. You knew why. You knew it would destroy any chance of you making it on your own, typecasting you as Bruce Wayne’s mistress the rest of your life. You saw it at the rally the night before. The looks the women gave you. The snickers the men did as you walked past. The way none of the other press would interact with you. You hated how you’d done this to yourself, not thinking of the implications of actually getting the interview, getting it published, and sticking around.

He shut the door, walking off. You reminded yourself, not-so-gently, that you’d be leaving soon. If Bruce was so frustrated by your presence, the least you could do–after Dr. Crane gave you the clear–was leave. Swiftly. No more chance encounters, no more meddling… all would be right with the world. Maybe you wouldn’t even miss him.

Bruce had amassed an even larger aura of annoyance by the time he came back. He didn’t cloak his scowl, or pause to chat; he peeled out of the side street and booked it for The Moore. You sat up slowly, hoping he wouldn’t strike you down with another demand, though you felt like you deserved it. You stared at the back of his hair, dark and messy, covering his ears and half his neck. If you wanted, you could reach out and touch him. Run your hands down his shoulders to his wrists, slip through his palm back into his fingers. You drew a sharp breath, covering the sound of it with another apology, the envelope of the luck you’d pushed nearly bursting at the seams. “It won’t happen again.”

Nothing in the car changed. He didn’t care, and you couldn’t blame him.

You hadn’t lingered when he pulled into the same alleyway, trying your best to slip out of his sportscar like an apparition. The stale air threatened to snuff you out, and for once you relished the mildewed public air as you gulped back to your apartment, heart tumbling down your sleeve. Everyone who walked past was blurry. The key shook in the lock as you pushed inside. It felt horrifying having him pull away, and horrifying that it was over something so avoidable. What if he could’ve came back and watched a show? If only you’d called him before? Instead of crossing boundary after boundary, fuck.

You wished he would’ve yelled at you. Torn you up. But you weren’t worth that. You were only worth brooding; tense silence that would inevitably turn into avoidance, which would mean he’d never talk to you again. No matter how often you told yourself it didn’t matter, god… sitting in his car last night had felt fun. The happy, bouncing adrenaline of hoping he’d find you at the end of the night when he’d waited precisely for your spot in line to join. His presence felt so warm.

You prayed he wouldn’t ignore you at City Hall, but it wasn’t heeded. It was as if you’d stopped existing. Alfred had texted you an update earlier that day about the housing situation, letting you know he’d secured apartments for the last of them through this time next year, probably the most obvious confirmation that Bruce was done interacting with you. He’d ended the text with: We’ll take it from here. You’d crossed a line.

The crossbody bag hanging heavy on your shoulder mocked your spine, though you’d packed light. At the meeting’s end, you kept to the foyer wall as you dug through it, pulling out the plane ticket to make sure it didn’t rip on the hard edges of the recorder and notebook shoved between chargers and sweatpants. Pen…

“Thought you were staying through the election.”

The bag slipped off your shoulder and fell to the floor, masking your gasp. Positive he wasn’t looking at you, you chanced a look up after stooping to grab your bag. His eyes were fixed on yours, relentless. You wondered how any criminals resisted him. “Um,” you swallowed, hard, your mind drifting away. After a few embarrassing breaths that felt weird to do while in direct eye contact, words found you. “I’m visiting for the weekend. Mom stuff.”

The bags under his eyes were pronounced. He sprayed that cologne again. His hair was done, but somehow still in his face. His sweater switched for a black turtleneck. You caught it all in piecemeal, never spending too long in one place. He hadn’t blinked, something which made you feel wholeheartedly exposed. You broke the stare, flustered, pretending to fiddle with the zipper on your bag to escape it, his smoldering—but when you looked up he was gone.

Bruce took his time pulling out his wallet, making small talk with the valet about the weather while he thumbed through hundreds. Depending on how soon you got in the Uber, he’d be rich. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine–he needed to stop there. A thousand dollar tip for parking his car? He didn’t want the guy to get suspicious.

The guy’s face was pale, and he stuttered. “Sir, did you–”

“Feeling generous.” Waiting to see if you were about to get abducted. He nodded and took his keys, taking short, slow strides while he pretended to take in the air, maybe give the paparazzi more glamor shots.

The faintest whisper of your name from across the street pulled his attention to a man driving a blue Toyota Corolla. No dents, no scratches. He wished he could make an ID on the driver, a stocky man with a thick beard and dirty blonde hair. He watched you get in in pieces–first your hand on the back passenger door, then your bag, then your hips, then your head. He realized too late he’d been openly gawking, stowing his hands to hide their shaking. When the Corolla drove off, he jumped into the driver’s seat and sped to the nearest place of isolation, swallowing spoons of bile. Were you safe? His rapid breathing was speeding up his body’s rejection of breakfast. Would you come back in pieces?

The very instant he’d thrown off the cameras, he stumbled out and vomited, one hand stabilizing him to the brick, the other holding his hair behind his ear. It splashed over his shoes and freckled his calves. He gasped between spurts, gag reflex mingling salt pooling by his lips. His forehead dragged on the concrete wall, catching some hairs of his eyebrow. Retching turned to dry heaves, which evolved to wheezes. He couldn’t follow you. He couldn’t drive you. Fuck.

He got dizzy again when he thought of the plane ticket. Hysteria had taken over him, freezing his veins with pure panic. You were killing him. How long it had taken you to answer, leaving him standing there, frigid. You were going to kill him.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to look at it, he couldn’t. He couldn’t talk to you. He wanted to fall into you. Learn more about you. Be around you. It was actually killing him, he should’ve just let you leave. He shouldn’t have talked to you. He’d seen that you’d bought the ticket a week ago on the receipt dangling out of your bag, it wasn’t an emergency, and that should’ve been enough, but he’d wrestled with asking you about what prompted the visit, if your mom was alright, just to hear you talk. Just to hear you talk!

He’d deluded himself into thinking he could ignore it. But the fear that gripped him now, the damn terror, the grating, emulsifying anxiety that liquified his insides at seeing you get into the car. He hadn’t thought it would be that bad. That it was still this bad. Why was it this bad?! He barely knew you! Why did it feel like you were dying? Why couldn’t he breathe?

Logic hadn’t helped quell the worry. Not yesterday, not last night, not the night before, not this morning, not during the meeting, not now. He was being stupid. Stupid, stupid…

He pulled out his phone and fought the urge to throw it. 8:20, you were probably at the airport by now. It wasn’t far, you’d absolutely be there if you hadn’t been kidnapped. Barrel to your skull. He should’ve driven you. Should’ve. Should’ve. Should’ve.

Get there safe?

But he couldn’t press send. He couldn’t wait on a response. He dropped the phone with the earthquake that were his fingers, scraping indents into his nails as he clawed at the ground for it. His chest was tight, his mind going in and out of a red backdrop, the sounds of the cars on the highway searing through his eardums. His throat was closing up. It was closing up, and he wouldn’t be able to breathe, he’d die right here, he’d die.

His finger hovered on the dial below your name.

The next day Bruce found himself sitting in a small waiting area at three in the afternoon. The walls were the same shade of beige, and the same secretary took his name. The seats were the only thing different, a lot softer than he remembered.

Seeing her face again felt disorienting, nearly catapulting him back to the months after the murder. She was older now, her hair filled with shades of gray. Her smile was the same, and her voice unchanged. It was the only thing tethering him to the same room down the stuffy hallway, into a room far smaller than he thought it had been.

“Bruce, welcome back. It’s been a few years, hasn’t it?” Iris was the only name he knew of hers. He hadn’t looked at the directory when he’d called, he’d only left his name, number, and his preference of provider. He struggled not to feel ten years old sitting in front of her after all this time, his body already folding in on itself. His hands warmed themselves squished between his thighs, his shoulders trying their damndest to connect.

He nodded, and glazed over while she went over the consent forms he’d already signed. He had to blink back to the room when she said ‘tell me more about that’.

“I don’t want a lot of sessions. I just need solutions. They need to stop.”

Iris nodded at him, her brows knit just so. Her chair was thick and upholstered, the yellow sitting discordantly with the shade of blue on the walls. “The panic attacks need to stop?”

“Yeah.”

She wrote something on her clipboard, scribbling the only sound in the room. “What usually precipitates the panic, Bruce?”

Per usual, her eyes drilled into him. Like they wouldn’t let him get out of it. “Nothing.”

The silence hung for a few beats, something she did often, but he’d conveniently forgotten. The first few sessions of theirs they’d sat in mutual silence, with the odd prompting question to try to bring him out of it. She threw him a bone this time. “Seems to come out of nowhere?”

He immediately knew why he’d stopped coming. He loathed to sit in his body, to have someone point their finger at all the sticky points. Like she did again, not letting up.

“What’s coming up?”

“People. People cause them.”

“Tell me more.” She crossed her leg and sat back in the seat, anticipating Bruce giving a novel. It made him only want to say less, and he only shrugged in response.

The silence continued for another two minutes, like a game of tug-of-war.

“Is it certain people?”

There was always a sticking point, too. The first question that set him on edge, brought him closer to the jagged edges of his mind he desperately tried to drown. He nodded slowly, not wanting to give anything away, not wanting to sit and stare at each other.

But that was all it was. Silent, apart from the ticking of the clock by the door. He knew why she did this, and why she did it now. She’d explained it one day, letting him know this was his space, and she could only do with it what he gave. She’d been kind enough when she said it, but he’d still felt like he was doing it wrong. Still loathed why he was in there in the first place. He hadn’t wanted to sit in this room while Alfred waited in the lobby, he wanted to eat dinner with his parents.

He forced more words to fill the space, determined to rid his body of the emotional toxin as hurriedly as possible. He tapped his foot impatiently. “So what do I do about it? If I have to keep being around those people?”

“What do you think?”

He grunted, sucking on his teeth to abate a scoff. “Just tell me what to do.”

She nodded, setting aside her clipboard. “Sounds like you really want relief from something excruciating.”

He hated when she used feeling words. Hated when she’d pull out the feelings wheel, try to get descriptive with the toils of his head and stomach. He didn’t realize he was breathing harder, eyes shifting about the room, until she drew attention to it. Of course she did.

“Are you starting to feel it right now?”

His hands gripped the edge of the couch, shoulders tensing. He felt like something was about to spill out of him, bubbling to the surface, but it wasn’t clear, it wasn’t tangible. He focused on the carpet, counting the rings of thread, staving it off. He felt himself begin to sway, and nodded.

Her pointed, slow breathing filled the room, and he begrudgingly matched it until his shoulders dropped. She’d described deep breathing to him twenty years ago as ‘pulling in air’ to your body so it can ‘keep you on the floor’. God, he hadn’t thought about that in over a decade. Once his breathing was under control, she struck again.

“Are you fine with me asking some questions about what it feels like?”

He waited for her to speak, eyeing her cautiously. She caught his imperceptible nod, something that made him more angry than he wanted to divulge. Always under the microscope.

“Let me know if it’s too activating, and we can go right back to breathing.” She pulled up her clipboard again, clicking her pen open. “Does it feel like your throat is closing up, chest tight, like you’re worried you won’t be able to breathe?”

His face grew hot. “Yes.”

“Any images cross your mind, or repeating thoughts?” She wrote something down while he hesitated, squeezing his eyes shut more with each syllable. He felt small. Tiny. Smaller than that kitten.

“That I'm dying.” The color red smeared across his vision, recurrently. When he opened his eyes and refocused, the image unblurred. His face scrunched, nose crinkling. “And… blood.”

Iris nodded, giving him a moment to take another regulating breath. She waited for his shoulders to drop again before pressing on. “I noticed you started trembling. Is there anything else you noticed? Thoughts, feelings, physical sensations?”

He’d been trembling? He looked down at his hands, knuckles white from gripping the couch, buzzing. His stomach flipped, burning, springing saliva to his tongue. He hated this. “Nausea.”

“If you could describe how you’re feeling in one word, what comes to mind?” Her pen hung loosely in her hand, balanced on one knuckle. Her eyes had more wrinkles around them. Her shoulders sagged more. The bookshelf that had been to her right was now a side table with a glass of water and box of tissues.

He deliberately reminded himself that the faster he answered, the faster he could leave. Moreso than that, the faster he could get over the bullshit plaguing him. “Fear.”

“Mmm.” She nodded, clicking her pen into the top of the board. He didn’t like how she was sitting up. What was she about to say? Had she already psychoanalyzed him enough? Could she give him a plan to walk out of here and never break down again? “Thank you for exploring that with me.” Bruce sat further back into the couch when she resituated closer, nervous to bridge any of the distance padding their interactions. “Mind if I make an observation?”

He gestured for her to speak, wishing his body would stop trembling, giving itself away to her. Everything felt too charged, she was choosing her words too carefully… her tone too soothing, too soft. She pulled a paper from her stack, from the bottom of the clipboard. “You gave me the exact same answers after the death of your parents. What comes up when I say that?”

No shit. He didn’t suppress his eye-roll, a decision she’d praised him for years ago. ‘Expressing yourself is good, Bruce. Gets it out of your system. That’s what this place is for.’ She didn’t acknowledge it now. “That’s when they started.”

Her sigh was gentle, accommodating. It made him uncomfortable to sit in a room that felt like someone walking through his brain. “The reason I ask is that we identified some triggers and base fears in our previous work together. I’m curious if they hold up now.”

Bruce vaguely recalled a few, the general concepts of people and grief, but nothing specific. Still, his palms grew sweaty, the shaking increasing–so much so that he had to metabolize it by tapping both feet against the ground. The sticker-worthy cliches were coming back to him in whispers. ‘Go through to get through’ ‘feel to heal’, phrases that Alfred had picked up from their brief group meetings, employing incessantly at home in the year following their deaths. Maybe getting to the root will solve it. Make his brain a crumb more hospitable, no longer running completely loose. Maybe it was something about needing to save you somehow, like he’d felt with his parents. Finally, something he could logic through. You’d be gone from Gotham soon enough, and wouldn’t need any saving. You didn’t even want saving. Yeah. Bring it. Easy.

“Would you like me to read them to you?”

Bruce nodded.

“One of the activating events for you was making friends at school. You described it as being ‘scary’ to spend time with others. When I asked what was ‘scary’ about that, you said: ‘I don't want to be more sad’.”

Ah, shit. He felt like the room was swallowing him up, the walls closing in.

“Another activating event was sleeping. You used to have a lot of nightmares. We deduced the nightmares were flashbacks to–”

He cut her off, hoping it would salvage the last molecules of oxygen left in the room. “I remember them.”

She glanced over her glasses—when had she put those on?—and paused before saying the rest. “When I asked you what helps, you said being alone. You said ‘more people means more funerals’.”

More, more, more. He was shoved under a spotlight, her eyes the lens of a microscope, excavating all of what he’d so diligently buried. Was this therapy or suffering? Therapeutic, or torturous? The room began to spin.

“Do you think that’s still true for you?”

Stars entered his vision, blurring her features into one blob. She started her breathing thing again, which only made him more aware of his body. He felt claws around his neck, nails jamming into his skull, a bear sitting on his chest that he couldn’t roll out from under. “It’s bullshit. I don’t care about her.” He winced, like you might have overheard it. “I don’t have a reason to.”

If she was thinking something, her eyes didn’t give it away. “Do you need a reason to care about someone?”

His eyes could’ve bulged out of his head, a scoff rolling off his tongue, escaping the ropes of doom pulling him under. Obviously!

He wanted her to stay silent. Do the silent thing. Do fucking anything than keep her foot on his neck. “What’s the reason for others in your life?”

Speaking = leaving faster. “Alfred, Dory, they’re family.” He shook his head, the back of his throat lighting up in flames. Shocked the words were still coming out, certain his esophagus wasn’t open anymore, wishing these confessions brought any relief. “It’s stupid. Stupid.” His breaths were shallow, rapid, and he felt his brain shut down in one thunk. “She hasn’t, I don’t,”

“Take a deep breath in through your nose, then a long breath out–”

He started to wheeze, clamoring to his feet. “I can’t do this,”

Iris sat forward. “Bruce,”

He fell to the side of the couch, gasping. “I can’t fucking breathe,” he folded over the edge, clutching his chest. He needed to go to the hospital. She needed to call 911 now, while he was still partially here. He wouldn’t for long, one of these breaths was going to be his last, he knew it…

She crouched next to him, making him think of you. He slapped the thought down as quick as it came, unbearable. Dying. Chest. Air. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

The last ten minutes had been hazy, in and out, but he was sitting on the opposite end of the couch now, fiddling with a stress ball she’d handed him during a grounding technique he barely remembered. His throat was thick with snot, his eyes hot and dry. He didn’t even have the strength to feel embarrassed, though the feeling kept knocking to be heard.

“How are you feeling now?” Her low, even voice was more soothing now. He was utterly depleted. Worn. Avoiding eye contact. “That grounding exercise seemed to help. Do you think so?”

Now he felt silly. Now he felt stupid, but he nodded. How ridiculous was it that he couldn’t even handle something as silly as a passing emotion? Call 911? She probably thought he was an idiot, but couldn’t say it because of therapeutic rapport or something. Or something. Even his thoughts weren’t forming right. He felt hollow.

“Panic attacks are terrifying, and draining. Do you want to stop for today, and come back next week?”

He had a visceral response, jolting back to life. “No. I want them to stop. Now.”

Her weak smile told him everything he needed to know. “Panic attacks are tricky. Especially when they’re attached to early traumas. Avoiding can sometimes have the opposite effect, increasing the panic response, and that fear you described.”

His body clenched with defeat, the last kicks of anger pouting like a little kid. “So I have to feel like this forever.”

She shook her head, but he didn’t believe her. If he wanted to panic, he could do that in any alley in the city. Could do it in his own bedroom. No witnesses. “Becoming more aware of triggers can help. Help us be kinder, gentler, utilize coping skills early on, before a full panic response. Sounds like one of the triggers is someone new in your life. That’s something we could explore.”

Fifteen minutes left on the clock, he shoved through. Still time for a breakthrough. No need to come back. Rapid fire. “Doesn’t that mean I don’t care? This panic?” It wasn’t a good feeling, and definitely not one anyone with any sense would associate with anything positive.

“Depends on what it stems from. Are you sure you’re wanting to discuss this today?”

“I want it done.”

A resonant pause, absolutely there to help his words echo. “What situations with her cause the attacks?”

“A lot.”

“What’s the most recent?”

“Being worried.” Shit, speaking this fast, maybe they could get somewhere.

“Being worried?”

The thought that swerved into him made him still. Made his chest hurt all over again. Made him afraid it wouldn’t stop. He pulled a sigh from the depth of his chest cavity, swearing he could taste the blood on his tongue. “That she’s gonna die.”

“Is that a common thread with the other times?”

He hardly heard her as he stared off into space, his mind and body numb.

“If this is too distressing,”

Bruce felt the world fall away. “When she tries to help me. It’s too much.” The clock didn’t tick anymore. His lungs didn’t breathe anymore. His stomach shivered, pulling its lining into his throat.

“Overbearing? Overstimulating?”

Every breath was a swallowed knife. Every word spoken under his breath evaporating into mist. “It’s like I'm on fire.”

He was far away, but finally in the feeling. “Stay with that. What is it saying?”

The walls shifted and moved, glimmers of light fusing to the center of his retinas. “…Run. Everywhere.” His face twitched. “Closer. Farther.” A tear slid down his cheek, but he couldn’t move. Blood spurted in his ears. Globbed over his shoes.

“Is any direction louder?”

“No. Yes.”

“Which one?”

It came out in a gasp, thick with saliva. “Closer.”

“But the flames hurt.”

His body shuddered. Exhaustion split his spine, his shoulders calloused from the barbell welded to his skin. His empty voice showed how intensely he yearned for rest. “Yeah.”

“Is that why you were saying it’s stupid? Stupid to walk into a fire?”

His jaw quivered when he nodded.

“Sounds like there’s something that draws you in.” She followed his analogy. “Fires can destroy, but they’re also warm. Full of light.”

His eyes shut and his chin fell to his chest. No words flowed in or out, no feelings but the weight of his bones and a keen awareness of the flesh casing them. He didn’t know how long he sat there. He couldn’t feel time passing at all.

“What’s pulling you closer?”

He winced.

“Is the fire too bright?”

All the saliva left his mouth, and he blinked back into the room, orbs of light swimming in his periphery. “I won’t make it.”

“Sounds like your body trying to protect itself. Survival.”

His face squeezed in unison with his hands, his body coming back into focus. “I don’t want to go through any of that ever again. I can’t.”

“Or you won’t make it?”

“I’m not made for that.”

“For what?”

He thought of the slip of the grapple between his fingers when he wasn’t sure it took. The disorienting overwhelm of an elbow to the mouth while a chorus of shouts and gunshots peppered his chest. The metal-on-metal wrenching of a loose axle joint on a high-speed chase. Nothing frightened him more than the feeling of being around you. And nothing had ever made him feel more ridiculous.

Bruce packed up then, taking his copy of the intake forms from her clipboard on the way out. She thanked him for coming, sharing that her schedule was pretty available for the coming weeks if he wanted to dive deeper. “It was pleasant to see you again, Bruce. I hope you take care.”

He took a moment before going to the basement to haul his weary body to bed. He laid on his back and counted the dusty cobwebs lacing the ceiling; if he suspended disbelief enough, he could place himself there. Counting the boards on his ceiling and the creaks of the walls in the wind. Feel the dying hope in his chest that it was all just a nightmare. See the fading indents of his mother’s slippers until the carpet bounced back.

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to dive deeper. Maybe he wasn’t made for it, but god… you made the concept alluring.

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