Chapter Text
Leslie walks you through some things first, general care mostly but you can't help but feel sick at her implications. I suggest rest and not to walk on those feet unless you have to, I'm sure Alfred will help. You weren't supposed to stay at Wayne Manor, you were supposed to get here and well- you didn't really know you only wanted to meet your father.
Alfred's words still catch in your mind, the man you spent months travelling by yourself to get too isn't even here.
"Alfred?" You ask, your still at the kitchen table, Leslie left awhile ago her number on a card for you to use when needed sat between two of your fingers, you didn't have the heart to tell her you didn't have a phone settling that maybe if worse comes to worse to borrow someone else's.
It was a pleasant off white colour with a simple handwritten scrawl.
"Yes Master (Y/n)?" Alfred is preparing another meal, the hours stretched long just staring at the wall, you were encouraged to go lay down earlier but from the exhaustion slowly weighing down and the pain slowly receding from the medication you didn't want to be alone.
"Please just call me (Y/n)." You say looking over to watch him, he's turned around to look at you when he heard you call.
"I am a butler, Master (Y/n)-" He starts and you swear you can see a feint hint of a smile tugging at his lips. "And as is now you are the son of my employer." He finishes blandly and you feel your lips twitch upward, not from the words, no, but for seeing a hint of something in Alfred's eye.
You always felt like you were sensitive to peoples micro expressions, it took a long time to really get what people were expressing so you learned them rather mechanically.
Alfred was fishing for something, for what you had no idea.
You look at the card in your hand again, flipping it over and feeling the texture of the ends, humming in thought.
"You let me in, you saved me, you get me a doctor and your letting me stay." You said counting off the things with a melancholic voice, you tip your head toward him, giving him a soft genuine smile. "I think that is more than enough to call you my guardian angel than my new butler. Please call me (Y/n)."
You passed, whatever it was that Alfred was fishing for was laid bare, it was in the way he smiled pleasantly. "Very well, (Y/n)." Alfred then turned around to continue his prep.
Maybe the pain meds are hitting you harder than you suspect, you haven't talked that much out side of your explanation and what was necessary and suddenly fear that maybe by switching up suddenly was uncharacteristic of what Alfred new him as.
You take another glance at Alfred, he's still cutting something on the counter seemingly just focused on his task and not worried or anything like you were scared of.
You take a deep breath that pleasant joyful feeling you had when Alfred called you by just your name gave way to a deep uncomfortable pit in your stomach, you look at the wood grain, then the cabinets on the wall before settling your eyes on the window.
There was only one way to settle this you think while on pain meds.
I need to talk more.
It was simple, if Alfred was upset it would surely show up in the way he talks right?
"Does it always rain this much in Gotham?" Dumb, stupid motherfucker. You don't take your eyes off the window.
"Oh yes, Gotham is rather known for it's miserable weather reminds me of my time in the UK." Alfred says conversationally, this time you can still hear him continue his task like normal instead of facing you.
"I think it's really beautiful." You say even though you nearly got hypothermia in the beginning of Autumn because of it.
"Gotham I mean, when I was walking in everything was just stunning." You say getting lost in the honestly fuzzy memory.
The soft chink chink chink of the knife stops at that, the silence stretches off for a second, you turn to look at Alfred only to see him just standing there. Maybe you did talk too much?
"You went through the city to get here? Not the outskirts road?" He's moving on to continue his task, now cut vegetables being poured into a hot pan.
You can breathe again but it's a tenuous thing. "I didn't have a map." You wish you would stop talking now. "I don't have a phone, well I had one but I kind of um- misplaced it in the beginning, well the point is I couldn't use GPS or something to see where I was or what the best oath is so I went and found a map in the city." You really wish you would stop talking now.
"Then I am just happy you made it." Your eyebrows furrow and you once again look at Alfred how much do your eyes wander around the room instead of the person your confusion must be blatantly obvious because when Alfred looks back after placing the pan to the side he sighs deeply and walks closer.
"(Y/n)-" He starts with a small pause before continuing. "-I cannot blame you for being unaware of Gotham's reputation but it a very dangerous city and to say you walked through them without seeing or anything happening around you or god forbid too you than you have more guardian angels than just me."
You ponder in thought for a moment, thinking back to what you remember from your walk here, it was fairly quiet and even for walking in cold rain it was stunning to see.
You nod in agreement after a moment. "No I- I didn't know that." You look back to the table again the more you think about what it took to get here the luckier you felt.
"All it means is that you have much to learn." Alfred gently affirms before walking back and starting the kettle once again but there it was again, learning implies time, a lot of it that you didn't think you have.
"What is Gotham like?" You ask an almost obsessive interest claws it's way out, over the last couple months you have been depriving yourself of information just so you had something to figure out when you got to Gotham, you want to know from the inside, wanting the adventure of discovery, spent days in public libraries contemplating whether or not just to search your fathers name. You didn't, you had better restraint than that but now your here, and you had questions and someone who seemed like they wouldn't mind them.
"Dangerous." Alfred states again and you can't help but smile.
"City's seem bigger than a single adjective."
"Very funny." Your smile widens at the deadpan tone from the older man as the smell of stir-fry fills the air.
"I will get a phone by tomorrow morning you can look it up again." You freeze, breathe once again stuck in your lungs his tone was bland and a bit teasing but that is not what you expected, far from it, a part of you is grateful and the other annoyed which you rush to extinguish the negative feelings, being annoyed is not something you'd ever be proud of.
"Pardon?" It's almost a whisper in the air. "I can't let you do that." You quickly add on. "I just, thank you for everything really but this is all a bit sudden." The words are just out of your reach struggling to find what is acceptable to say and what isn't.
"Yes it is rather." Alfred confesses easily, not denying the absurdity, the sizzling of the pan and the pan melding into one homey feeling that you feel as if your destroying just by being around.
"But that is no excuse to let you run around without a way of contacting anyone and it's not an inconvenience." Your shifting in the chair, unable to find words for any of this, like your tongue is tucked perfectly behind your teeth.
"Why are you so welcoming? I'm grateful don't get me wrong but this kindness-" You shift forward, you usually wouldn't be this forward, this open but but Alfred's demeanour makes you question so much, it claws at you with tiny hands you want answers that's always what you wanted. "-It's too much."
"You are a young man, alone in a strange environment, I do not know what circumstances that led you down to coming here but I do know that it takes a lot of courage to do so and that it is tiring I see no reason to act any other way in the face of your determination." The words made you uncomfortable in their own earnest nature.
"Most people wouldn't have done what you did." It was a lame retort, something you can just cling to.
"I think you fill find that no one in this family are what you would consider 'most people'." You swallow around nothing, you keep coming back around to you fucking this conversation up but there is no out but forward.
"No one? There's others?" Do you have siblings? Aunts or uncles? There was more besides your father.
"Ah-" The tone shift makes your back straighten as you look over at Alfred who's starting to plate the food he's made, it smells amazing. "I keep forgetting you don't know much about Master Bruce, his life is rather public being the CEO of Wayne Enterprises and a prominent philanthropist in Gotham's circles." Oh, that's why the house is massive. Your first thought suddenly hit with the second. Oh god, my fathers a public figure.
Will that be an issue? Will he try to hide you? What happens if someone finds out and it's leaked, will it paint him in a bad light not knowing he had a son until now?
"Oh." You look at the plate that Alfred set down besides you, the meds are still on the table, you much preferred sitting in the kitchen than alone in the room you were so graciously offered.
"Who are they? The family I mean." You poke at the food, before you start eating, food waste was out the question even if you weren't very hungry.
"Not in order Bruce has a few children, Dick, Jason, Tim, Stephanie, Cassandra, Damien, Duke and a few others not officially adopted or a ward I'm afraid he has empty nest syndrome." Alfred jokes and you almost choke on your food.
Siblings. You have siblings. A smile flitters across your face before falling They might not see it that way. "A full house then." You hope they at least find you tolerable.
Where did they all come from? Alfred implied they weren't all blood related? Who was? Who wasn't how much did it matter or not matter in the internal house politics? The whole line of thinking makes you frustrated so you squash it down only to get hit in the face again.
"Dick is the eldest and Damian is the youngest you'll find this Manor to be empty most of the time, most of them have their own places growing up one supposes, it's mostly Master Bruce and Master Damien living here but I'm afraid they are the adventurous sort." It's bordering on too much information too keep track of so you take another bite of food.
Alfred called Bruce and Damien, Master, you wonder if they are as uncomfortable with the term as you are but you doubt it, they have known each other a much longer time was it Alfred just playing along with your request he seemed pretty rigid on the role he takes on, it all adds more and more questions.
"You are an amazing cook." You compliment instead of touching the bomb that just exploded. Siblings a lot of them. "Where did you learn to do it all?" The food really was divine as you let Alfred regale you with stories of when he was younger.