#the beginning of a saga | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

ellesthots · 3 months ago

Text

Fateful Beginnings

XL. “priorities”

read on AO3 🦇

parts: previous / next

plot: Bruce’s priorities shift, unwittingly meeting you right where you are.

pairing: battinson!bruce wayne x fem!reader

cw: 18+, sexual content/yearning, mention of deaths in the family, mention of illness, mention of unstable sense of reality, subtle mention of past suicide attempt

words: 5.7k

a/n: all i’m saying is you all are gonna like this one 😇 !! the subtle mention is very subtle, basically Bruce mentions NOT wanting to die, and a single line of discomfort about not remembering it.

“Oh, Y/N. I would’ve made more if I knew you were coming.”

Though everything looked the same, it felt different. The constant thrum of your clamoring heart made the shadows brighter and the rooms suffocatingly small. Whatever dish boiled in a gleaming silver pot on Alfred’s stovetop smelled stunning, but you didn’t have time to catch up with him before Bruce motioned for you to follow. As embarrassing as it was to your pride, the image of his head gesturing up a grand staircase, loosely toward his bedroom, was the wind the butterflies in your stomach sailed upon. Gripping the railing far too tightly, your unsteady legs followed.

Your energy channeled between his shoulderblades, praising each step climbed, celebrating the ripples in his back with each shift of his weight. His feet pulled you enough out of the stupor to be lucid when they surprised you with a right turn. The blood rushed from the tips of your fingers. Between this and the backseat, these insinuations seemed a blatant mockery. “Gonna change. If you go up two more levels, it’s the first door on the left.”

You knew it was unseemly to think like this, with the guilt pulsing in the background of every breath, but you were powerless to the whims of your mind. Rather than follow his instruction, you paused to stare at his shut bedroom door. Thoughts of him pulling off his shirt and slipping off his pants made your mouth pool with saliva. Though you’d never, standing here in this sinful haze left you wondering what might transpire if you walked in and laid across his sheets.

Forgetting he had an alter ego that prized himself on being an unofficial emergency responder, you startled when he stepped out not thirty seconds later. You pretended to retie your shoe, and let him lead again. He never strayed from that same outfit: a tattered black tee and loose black pants. You found yourself fixated on his lack of footwear, drinking up any and all of his visible skin, holding the railing with increasing fervor. The skin on his neck looked especially inviting, as it was arguably the most well-protected space on him. It was so hard to smell him with the fragrance of Alfred’s dinner cutting through the air, and the desire to had you eating your words when he stopped and you bumped into his back. He was so dense, and his detergent, body wash, shampoo, sweat… whatever it was stole your oxygen. Wordlessly, you sped past him through the open door and planted on the far end of the couch like a new pet trying to make itself invisible.

Bruce walked to the counter, and at such an angle that he could see if you stared at him. You forced your gaze to travel the room and admire the enormous flatscreen across the way—its vast, blank screen reflected the image of you and him totally and completely alone in the empty room. A plush rug gave a good bounce to your impatient, nervous feet. You hoped he had more sense than you tonight; if he gave a single cue of reciprocation, you’d fold. As impossible as the thought was.

“Want anything?”

A few bags of candies sat on the counter above a softly whirring mini fridge. You grinned at his thoughtfulness, and more at the image of him perusing a candy aisle. He stared at you like he’d hear you speak a single decibel. It was so cute. And you were down a dire amount to be thinking that way. “Do you have any caffeine?”

His ensuing laugh was buried under his breath, but it jostled around in your gut with a sharp, bright merriness. Of course he had caffeine. “Yeah. I’ll grab some.”

It was awfully fun to watch him leave. The ability to stare at him without risking him seeing you was thrilling. The realization had hit and left you like a live-wire; attuned to every syllable of his words, every step that he took, even the smell of him and the scent of the new couch you were sitting on. The room looked sterile, like an Ikea showroom. He hadn’t put it together just for you, had he? Why would he do that?

You already heard footsteps in the hallway. So swift. The sound rushed adrenaline to your already frenzied brain as if it were an emergency. How close would he sit? Could you look at him without blushing? He’s gonna hand me the drink… yes! You considered lingering, but how long would be too long? Could you pull off putting your hand over his and pretending you misjudged hand placement? Would you have the guts to do that? How would he react?

He appeared in the doorway, leaning his shoulder against the right side of the frame. His already tall body looked even larger against it. He crossed his legs with the pose, which straightened his hips toward you. You could’ve fainted, and your body grew warmer.

“Think of a movie?” He tossed you a Red Bull, and you pulled together a grin to even out the frown that threatened to dominate. Dammit. He grabbed a remote from the top of the TV and wandered over to the couch, where you floundered a response through held breath.

“I thought you could pick it.”

He sat closer than before, but not a distance that soothed your mounting desire. Enough to be thrown and calculating how loud your breathing was, but not enough to feel the warmth off his skin, or truly bathe in the smell of him. Why were you so obsessed with memorizing his scent? You wanted to lean in and indulge in the selfish enjoyment of getting to see him so close, but he wasn’t saying anything, which left you scrambling, and your anxiety took the wheel.

Bruce struggled not to make it obvious that he was fiddling with the remote to buy time. It felt ridiculous telling you he couldn’t think of any movies; that he’d essentially stopped watching them entirely once his parents died, because it was the one activity they did together, regularly, as a family. Without words to fill the space, he tried to make it look like he was deciding which service to log onto.

He pulled up an on-demand video site, and before you gave the obligatory hey, those cost money for a single view, let’s choose something on streaming, you remembered he was a billionaire. With such low stakes you wanted to joke around, be silly, tell him to close his eyes and randomly stop on something, but your throat was tight.

“Anything stand out?”

Something did: the remote had a circular scroll tool, his thumb moving in tight circles as he flipped through movies. Slowing down, speeding up, switching directions… your thighs pressed together instinctively.

“What about this one?”

Left in a trance from the subtle movement in his wrist, and the nearly imperceptible movement up the inside of his forearm as he massaged it, meant you didn’t internalize his question enough to give an answer. His hands were so warm fresh out of gloves, but you imagined they might be cooler now, a salve to the burning heat that gathered in your core. Would he talk to you while he touched you? Would he be silent, forcing your moans to be the only sound between you?

Hearing him say your name made you clamp down on your tongue, wanting to sprint out of the room before you screamed. You muttered something about ‘yeah, sounds good’, desperate for him to stop scrolling so you could reign it in before you did something reckless.

And so it was for the next half hour. Trying not to squirm, trying to control your breathing, and desperately fighting lewd thoughts that wanted to break the fourth wall. It was exactly the childlike feeling of avoiding-but-not-avoiding a crush. The sneaking glances, overanalyzing their body language or if they looked at you, if they didn’t, how close their hands were, if you were coming off ‘weird’. So peculiarly placing you back to feeling like an awkward, shy kid.

Bruce broke the bubble of the latest headline in your thoughts—how woody and delicious he smelled, and if the scent would linger after a particularly intense uh, session—and turned toward you. He paused the movie, your thundering heartbeat surely filling the room with its bass-boosted echoes. “You’re not interested.”

You couldn’t look up at him. You’d melt more than you already were. His voice was too concerned, with that constant edge of being matter-of-fact that made your gut twirl. “It’s fine. I’m just. Distracted.” By the thought of your hands on me.

Goddammit, you felt his eyes studying you. It didn’t help your fragile, racing heart, and the timing couldn’t have been worse with the activation of the caffeine throttling it anyway. You chose to instead focus on the accomplishment of your words coming out stronger than a squeak. You felt caged by the goosebumps that painted your skin at the mere sight of his hands.

“Let’s talk.”

Jesus, fuck. A piece of hair fell in your face and you wanted to move it away, but lifting your hands from their forceful clamp atop your legs revealed their tremble. Against all better judgment, you jumped off the cliff. “Sure.”

You twisted toward him and your mouth went dry. So pathetic, I’m so fucking pathetic… your eyes trailed from his jaw to his mouth, from his cheeks to his eyes. Your shoulders pulled inward when you wondered how disheveled you must look from the flight, and the stuffy city hall foyer lacing sweat to your skin. Your eyes dropped to his lap as soon as they’d landed on his unwavering eye contact. Suddenly the brazen behavior of the women at city hall seemed a lot more admirable. They’re so much braver than I am.

“How’s your head? Your leg?”

Were you ovulating? Was he testing some new pheromone to use on the people he fought? You felt impossibly agreeable right now, a cloud drifting closer to the light of the moon. You blushed. “Better.” You were too nervous being under his attention to say any more. Sitting with a broken pencil but too nervous to stand in line behind your crush at the sharpener.

In the corner of your vision, his eyes narrowed; only slightly, but enough. Enough to imagine what moves you could pull on him to recreate it. You would’ve never, ever thought you’d feel this way. He’d never reciprocate, no, and you didn’t really want him to. Then you’d have to answer the guilt, and interrogate how fleeting this enchantment was before falling into his bed. For all you knew your brain was keeling over itself from sleep deprivation.

Yeah… you felt your hands steady and moved your eyes down to take another sip. Endless nightmares cruelly stealing your rest had left you unstable and reeling.

“Still having nightmares?” It wasn’t uncommon for him to ask about injuries before he left a scene; it felt routine and distant, no matter how gruesome their response might be. But with you he was invested—he needed to know you were alright, and how he could help if not. You jumped when he asked, and he didn’t know why.

You scraped at your cuticles. Open up. I’ve wanted him to. “Yeah. Freaked out my parents over the weekend.” Your mouth shook by the last word, cementing that your responses needed to be shorter than ten words until you could get your bearings. The room was starting to spin. You wanted Bruce to catch you.

“What helps?” He was asking too many questions. Unsettling you. You seemed uncomfortable, and he didn’t want this to feel interrogative… did he know how to talk to someone in a way that wasn’t interrogative? He endured another white-hot moment of feeling subhuman before you spoke.

“It was nice having someone there.” You rubbed your arm, pulling it close to your chest.

“I’m usually up if you need someone.” He watched your blush deepen, your fingers moving from rubbing your arm to clenching. He felt terrible. He didn’t know if he’d ever be able to resist the urge to rescue you, and felt like a broken record. “You’re not forcing me.”

“There’s no way to untie them. Me knowing, all this. I mean, c’mon.”

“C’mon what?” Another question. Stop that.

You sighed, oblivious to Bruce’s harassment toward himself, too busy directing it inward. “Every time I’ve been here you’ve hated it. And I don't blame you. But you keep doing it.”

“I don't hate it.” But what more could he say when you’d overheard him with Alfred? Could his words be a bandage when his actions were so cutting? God, it felt strange to have personal history with someone.

“Don't like it.” You hated when he tried to play nice. Acting like your presence wasn’t menacing and disruptive. You knew he’d rather be out as Batman right now, but he was compelled to humor you in a room he hadn’t done more than pass by in years.

Your face had the slightest pout to it. It… hurt. He forced his shoulders to relax, sensing you might feed off his tension. “I'm coming around.”

You sighed, and his ears perked to its timbre. “What about you? How have you been?”

“Fine.” His shoulders tensed again.

“I’m starting to think that means ‘bad’.”

He side-eyed you, a flicker of something sweeping his eyes. “What's my favorite color?”

“… Black?”

“Orange. Was starting to think you could read minds.”

He leaned back into the couch and put his hands in his lap. When you managed the courage to look back at him, he grinned. It didn’t reach his eyes, and it ached to see him force it. You swallowed a grimace, with no concept of how effectively you’d masked it. “Trying to make me comfortable?”

He paused. “Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Why not?”

“I don't see you making anyone else comfortable. Alfred seemed shocked to see me.”

If only you knew you were the only guest he’d ever had over. You’d probably think he was a freak, if you weren’t already thinking it. “He’d be shocked to see anyone. More shocked if it wasn’t you.”

“Not a lot of people come over?” Your eyes glinted with amusement, the first genuine sass he’d heard from you in days.

“Constantly.”

“Mmm.”

Silence hung thickly between you. Seconds passing like minutes, minutes passing like hours. “… I don't do this. Like I said.”

“Keep to your own, I get it.”

Bruce’s face twitched like he was about to speak, and his lashes fluttered when he didn’t. It relieved you to know he still got a rise out of you, and you clung to that rope of indignance for dear life. “Say it.”

“What do you think I’m gonna say?” His brows were set to a loose glare, more confused than angry.

“Something about how I shouldn't feel bad.”

His glare tightened, though his tone was gentle. “Why won’t you believe it?”

“Guess it’s my own guilt.”

“What if I forgive you?”

You drew a sharp breath that stung the lining of your lungs. Forgiveness for the least of your crimes was the opposite of relieving. “Still there.”

“What if we kept talking anyway?”

“Is that what you want? Not what you feel like you have to do?” As far as tearfulness was concerned, it was easier to speak than let his sentence linger. Where did the grumpy, rude stranger go?

“Could say the same to you.”

You folded your trembly hands together in your lap, still avoiding looking at him directly. “I asked first.”

His eyes followed your hands that were clenched far too tightly. He ached to reach out and touch them. To feel you soften. “I like knowing you’re safe.”

He watched your shoulders shrug. “I like knowing you’re safe.”

Silence visited again. He knew he’d have to be the one to break it, given your jittery leg and white-knuckled grip. Good exposure. “How do we move past that?”

This wasn’t fleeting. This wasn’t your mind creating stories off of sleep deprivation. Your ears clung to every millimeter of insinuation, spinning his words in the naughtiest ways possible. Hearing him refer to you like you were a team was thrilling. And it was impossible to ignore the empathy and care that bubbled somewhere underneath it all. This clarity, however, didn’t fix the issue: both of you were caught in a standstill of chasing the other’s tail around Gotham.

When you tried to think of ways to shift the conversation away from hypervigilance, you came up empty-handed—and you hit a bullseye. “Maybe the problem is we only know each other’s problems.”

He shifted where he sat, and it was close enough to rustle the cushion beneath you. You ignored the whirl in your chest and the tingling of your fingers, and the tingling elsewhere when he blessed the room with his voice, and a question, that made your thoughts roam wild. “What do you want to know about me?”

Many things, but the most persistent of them: what was that already spoken for about at graduation? But you couldn’t say that. The only other non-explicit thoughts were the most bland and benign questions you’d been asked relentlessly over the summer by recruiters. “God, I keep thinking of interview questions.”

“Didn’t know you wanted me for another column.”

“Job interview.”

“Hit me.”

Where do you see yourself in five years? What are your weaknesses? “‘What are three words you’d use to describe yourself’?”

He started to count on his fingers. “Social,”

“Oh my god.” Without thought, you shoved his knee as you both chuckled. The contact left a singe on your palm.

“What do you think?”

You stilled. “About you?”

He nodded, and you chanced a look at his face to see if there was anything hidden there. His face was neutral, but engaged. Surprisingly, the first words to crop up weren’t lustful whatsoever. At least, not until you said them aloud and overthought how he might receive them. “Discerning. Analytical. Intimidating.”

“What about me intimidates you?” He said, as he inched closer in a thoroughly non-intimidating fashion that definitely didn’t make your pupils dilate.

You shoved out a quick explanation while your heart skipped beats. If he ever did make a move, you were suspicious that you wouldn’t realize what was happening before you blacked out. “The first two.”

Your pulse hammered in your throat as you pitched it back at him. “What about me?” You crossed imaginary fingers that he would say something obviously suggestive and break the dam. Maybe he’d say: My. Bedroom. Now. Oh, you needed to STOP!

“Perceptive. Investigative. Daunting.”

You hid your disappointment with a tease. “Those are just synonyms.” Does he not care to actually think about me? To tell me what he really sees?

“I answered.”

His tone was light, but the letdown consumed you. It was enough fuel to get you to clarify, always with an overlay of sarcastic, fun teasing, though you wanted to sink into the floor. “What about me is daunting?” You couldn’t be the first one to make a move, not with the lie, not with the meddling; yet another way of imposing yourself.

“First two.”

You couldn’t interpret his actions the way you wished; his tone was playful, but he was just parroting you. Giving you nothing outside of what you’d already given. Low-effort, low-interest. No longer shaking, you rested your hands flat to your thighs and met his eyes. Your heart glittered and twirled into the clear blue ice of his irises, but you swallowed the fireworks. His eyes made quick flight across the plane of your face, and you swallowed harder. You weren’t that girl.

“Your turn, since you wanna be so creative.”

There was sadness in your eyes. You leaned back into the couch and he wanted to follow. He did his best to gulp it back, not wanting to get into the weeds of following an unplaceable shift. He knew the general answer to this, but with how miserable you were, and officially graduated, and interviewed, and finally, hopefully, at least slightly more comfortable with him, he wanted to dive deeper. “Why’d you come to Gotham?”

He nearly gasped when you broke the mutual gaze, like he’d been physically dropped. “I thought we weren’t going to talk about our problems.”

Back to picking your nails. “I’m curious. If it’s not too much.”

“My mom’s cancer. Got sick soon after I graduated. They had to use everything for the medical bills.”

His chest pinched at the slump that took over your body. His shimmered with anxiety; a prickly tension that shallowed his breathing and manipulated gravity to push him closer. “You wanted the scholarship here?”

“Yeah. But my family didn’t want me to come here. It started a huge fight, I… I’ve never seen my family like that.” He followed your absent eyes to where they drifted in the corner. An image of you crying while they screamed at you made his thoughts go white. “Happened at Thanksgiving, actually. Argued all night, all the way home, all weekend. Decided to take another gap year. Hoping maybe things would relax.”

“You didn’t deserve that.”

You came back to your body with the tightening of your shoulders. “I don’t know, this stuff doesn’t even matter.”

“Please.” He leaned halfway through the space between you, withholding the extent of his plea. He cared a lot. An inordinate amount. After some hesitation, you talked about how your grandfather died at the end of that year, and you didn’t want to leave your grandmother. He envisioned you sat in some house in Washington while an old lady knit as you described spending the next two years with her. How gutted you were when she died. How grateful you were to be able to say goodbye, something you hadn’t experienced with your grandfather. How excruciating it was to sit in a grieving, sick household, and how you found refuge in community college classrooms soon after.

Though most of his energy was spent feeling like a throbbing, aching heart bleeding in your lap, parts of him were refreshed to have someone talk with him about death that wasn’t his own. Since that day, everyone avoided talking about it like he’d split in two if someone reminded him that people die. But he remembered it alone, every single day.

He ensured he didn’t look at you with pity, an effort that was initially intentional becoming second nature as he settled into your story. A soft rage lurked in the pit of his stomach at how easy it was not to isolate someone who was grieving. How simple it was not to squint your eyes and pout your lips like they were a sick puppy. How instinctive it was to sit and listen, instead of giving a gruff pat on the back or a dismissive shoulder tap before rushing away. It would’ve been so easy not to have that countenance engraved behind his eyes. It was easy for him not to do that to you.

“I’m sorry about your grandparents. And the fighting.” He was sorry for the fighting he’d done with you, too. It was hard to say the apologies he so hated to hear, praying it was different coming from him. He hoped you knew he understood. That he could take it. You thanked him and after a tender silence, he nodded for you to continue. He didn’t know if you’d oblige for a few seconds, and a lump rose to the back of his throat.

You carried him through another few minutes of delicate conversation; speaking of the flooding two years prior, and how people were leaving Gotham in droves. Talking about how you couldn’t believe the extra stuff they threw in; in addition to the free tuition, they began to offer free housing to eligible transfer students, desperate for any boost to the local economy. By that time you said your conflict avoidance was less painful than sitting in the tension, so you left. Wanted to see something outside of your town, and he mirrored your grin when you spoke of your grandfather as the only one who supported you going to Gotham. Your smile faltered when you said he’d always known you were ‘itching’ to get out of your small town.

“You don’t agree?”

Your sigh could’ve moved mountains, instead it moved him. “Makes me sad to think so. I didn’t want them thinking I wanted to be rid of them. Just wanted to see something else too.”

He was certain your grandparents knew that, but didn’t know how to articulate it. “Now you’re here.”

The tension in your body deflated with the force of your scoff. “And how welcoming everyone’s been.”

“I’m sorry for my part in that.” He yearned to be someone you felt seen by. Someone you knew understood.

“No, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t even, yeah.” You shifted away and sniffled.

He didn’t know how to tell you he wanted to hear everything. That it was courageous how candidly you spoke of your pain, and there was nothing wrong with it. So he kept it cloaked and subtle, instead asking another question to let you know it was okay. “How’s your mom now?”

Your sniffles became tears that fell in straight lines down your flushed cheeks; yet another reminder of how uncomplicated it was to let someone cry. He couldn’t imagine telling you to ‘buck up’. Telling you to ‘get over it’, or ask ‘hasn’t it been years?’ It was so fucking easy. If anything, he was considering asking to hold you again, guiding your hands around his back to take it out on his shirt. He moved to say as much when your watery eyes met his.

“You’re the only person who’s asked me about these things.”

He’d never felt so tender. No one else? He didn’t know what else to do but apologize on the world’s behalf, and it fell out of him like getting kicked in the stomach. “I’m sorry.” It was hard to think as he felt his body shift into new territory, feeling the door lock behind him.

You shook away his apology and continued, blinking incessantly from what he imagined to be stinging, tired eyes. They were red and bleary. “Still sick. Don’t know how bad. In a wheelchair now, but it helps her. Good to have. I don’t know.”

“You can keep talking.”

You choked out a scoff that was cradled in tears.

“I want to listen.”

He felt like he had levitated from his body when you quite literally spilled out before him. He heard the drop of your defenses with the cracked edges of your voice. “You know what helps?” You were breathing fast, and he’d unconsciously matched it. He wondered if you would say he did. He edged closer.

“Your interview. The writing.” Him. He set his hand flat on the couch, right in the empty space between your hips and his. “Talking about how anxious you get in crowds. Feeling like you died with your parents. You’re actually naming the things everyone wants to hide.” His hands began to quiver. “Those thoughts swirl and circle inside me,” you were lost in your words. He was getting a portal to closely kept thoughts. Wow. “And I’ve felt insane my whole life… it makes me feel like you can hold it.” His breath caught. Yes, yes, you were seeing him. He could. He could hold it. He could hold you. “My dad can’t even say the word ‘cancer’. No one wants to talk about how sad they are. When I cry in front of others, they just…”

“Leave.”

You blinked at him. “Exactly. It feels horrible.”

“It does.” All those days with his face down in the pillow where he could hide his tears. All the nights where he wanted the world to swallow him up so he didn’t have to wake up with the pain, with no one to listen but Alfred, who always turned it into a lesson or a look to the bright side. Sometimes there wasn’t one.

“But you just let me be sad.”

His lashes fluttered. He was overcome with weakness in mind, body, and spirit, like a snapped tourniquet. “I’m glad it helps. Glad I can…” he trailed off as he stared at your tear-studded lips, feeling a shiver at the base of his spine. His pulse pounded in his wrists and throat. You’d lit him on fire.

“Tell me.”

Your forgiving, sweet voice could unravel him, but right now it was pulling his grief to the surface. He stammered through damp eyes. “I’m not fine. It’s terrifying not to trust my senses.”

Your hand cupped his elbow and the first tear fell. You followed it the same way he did yours. “It’s a big adjustment.” You squeezed his arm and his chin fell to his chest. “You rely on them so much with Batman, too.”

“Completely. To make sense of cases and clues…” You shifted toward him, shoving your knee up to look at him more fully. He felt like he should shy away, but he didn’t want to. “How do I do that now? How do I trust myself ever again? When I see things that aren’t there, and misremember such crucial, dangerous…” you didn’t frighten when he ranted, his tone almost murderous. “I couldn’t remember the shooter that night. I still try, all the time, decades… that can’t happen again. It can’t.”

Your smooth hands grabbed his, and he jumped. Your thumb ran over his knuckles, separating his mind from his body. The heat of vulnerability had him meet your eyes in a panic. He sprung forward and threw his arms around you, shoving his shaking body into the crook of your neck. His hands pressed hard into your back until he heard the tiniest whimper emanate from your chest. His eyes snapped open and he yanked back, flustered, panting, and painted with sweat. “Sorry, I didn’t ask–”

In a blink, he was in your arms again. Your body wrapped around his this time, squeezing his back harder than he had yours. He folded into you and let his body relax, his arms finding their place against your back once more. As you held him, he mourned how he’d ever find this again when you left. He spoke into your shoulder, muffling him. “I can’t believe I actually tried to. I don’t remember it. At all.”

He felt you press firmer. He felt like your ribs might fuse. Your voice was right in his ear, closer than it had ever been. “Do you worry you’ll do it again and not know?”

His body all but went limp, and you fell together the few inches between your shoulders and the back of the sofa. “Which is strange.” With the snapping of the tourniquet, he no longer felt a weight tugging back attempts at honesty. The words formed on his lips, just as they did in his journals.

“Why is it strange?” Your fingers rubbed his back with reassuring scrapes. His eyes drifted shut, and when he pulled you closer, he felt your heartbeat against his.

“I’m not afraid to die. But I don’t want to do it to myself.” He felt tears rise again, and he gulped. For a few seconds, he felt the beats sync. It was surreal. Floating in a bubble of nirvana. “I want to know what’s happening to me. I don’t want to lose myself.”

A sympathetic sound rumbled from your chest. “You haven’t seen any owls since starting treatment. Now you know what to look out for, you know? You can call me, or Alfred, or your doctor.”

His body tensed like he was on the edge of a cliff, but he’d never been more at ease. Your next speech was honeyed, tying a velvet ribbon around his heart.

“You’re still discerning, and intuitive; that didn’t go away. You won’t ever stop being you. They can coexist.” You leaned your head against him, and he felt your mellow grin against his ear. “And I don’t pity you.”

He took a deep breath. Your chest caved in to make space. He could kiss you.

… He could kiss you.

“Bruce,”

Oh my god.

“Your heart’s racing.”

He loosened his grip on your back and pulled back his head to be side-to-side with yours. Electricity pulsed in the single inch between his lips and your neck. He gripped the fabric of your shirt into a loose fist, his blood rushing between his ears. All of his nerves and all of his courage gathered at the very back of his throat, narrowing it. Make a move. He needed to know you wanted this too.

He couldn’t bear to impose. You were just being kind…

Kiss me. All earlier hesitation fell away. Please, please, please.

He pulled back a little more, the tip of his nose brushing your ear. The world narrowed to his mouth and yours, but he couldn’t close the distance, or face you. Not when he was so lightheaded—but fuck, that was only getting worse. You were so sweet, so attentive, headstrong. How you looked when you argued with him, how that heat rushed to your ears, how indomitable you were, how sharp and soft you could be… your fingers curled into his back, and he accidentally sighed into your ear. Ask.

“Master Bruce?”

He spun his head toward the door but you looked toward him, the opposing angles skimming your lips. Before either of you had time to react, Alfred appeared in the doorway. “Lieutenant needs you.”

His cheeks scorched as he hesitantly looked toward the old man, keeping his eyes low. Batman could wait a few minutes… maybe he’d don the armor on the drive. If he got up from this couch, he knew he’d never have the guts again. He’d rationalize away the breathless longing of sinking into your kiss, selfishly keep his touches to himself… “Can it wait?”

“He’s here.”

109 notes · View notes