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It isn’t a conscious thought that seizes Bruce, but rather a watercolor blush that seeps so slowly into the world that he doesn’t notice the brushstrokes and delicately blooming hues until it’s too late.
By the time he understands, there’s no turning back.
There’s just Clark, who smiles at him like the dawn of a new day. Clark, who loves humanity so deeply that his virtue alone could pull the earth closer to the heavens. Clark, who never fails to catch Bruce when he falls, who believes in second chances and looking for the good in everyone.
Gentle hands and arms that could carry the entire world. A voice that inspires both hope and confidence. When faced with someone so quietly brilliant, so patient and tenacious and deeply, unfalteringly kind, was there ever really any choice?
Did it happen when Bruce watched from the shadows as Clark looked fondly down at Earth, his unconditional love evident? Or when Clark took Dick on a joyride through the air, holding him up to do loop-de-loops across the sky because he knew if ever there were any human meant to fly, it was Bruce’s son? Maybe even just a moment as mundane as Clark allowing Bruce to steal his fries while staunchly pretending not to notice.
Perhaps there was no singular instance at all. These feelings are simply the inevitable outcome after years of Clark’s friendship. There was never anything Bruce could have done to stop himself from falling.
I love him.
It’s as if reality rearranged itself just a few degrees counterclockwise while Bruce was blinking. Everywhere he looks, this truth is staring him in the face.
But finding footing in this new world isn’t difficult. How could loving Clark ever be anything but easy and natural as breathing?
Bruce files the fact away like any other piece of data, storing it safely in the recesses of his memory. His heart belongs to Clark. His love is just one more immutable fact about the universe.
Nothing will change that.
Bruce hadn’t much intention of ever confessing his feelings. He was content with keeping the information to himself, forever loving Clark from afar. It wasn’t painful, exactly. More of an ache that he learned to live with, like every other healed break and fading bruise. Bruce’s whole life was an exercise in looking backward but pushing through. Unrequited love wouldn’t be the thing to kill him, not when his darling city had so much more in her arsenal.
However, with each life-threatening catastrophe, each alien invasion and mission gone wrong, Clark’s concern for Bruce grew. His protectiveness, his ardent pleas for Bruce to better care for himself, his palpable relief each time Bruce pulled through after another injury.
Sometimes, Bruce thought he saw a familiar emotion reflected in Clark’s eyes.
There might be the slightest chance that Clark felt the same way as Bruce did. And while Bruce’s optimism didn’t often win against his realist mind, Clark’s very being made him want to wish for the happy ending. The improbable world where they were in love.
Clark made Bruce hope for something more.
Today, the sun is setting over Metropolis as Bruce prepares to return to his own city. His visit here was uneventful for the most part, and he wants to get back to Gotham before night falls and the troublemakers rouse.
“I suppose we should be glad there were no lasers this time around,” Clark is saying as he scans the ground hundreds of meters below them. Bruce, while preparing his glider so he can return to the Batmobile, is distracted by the bow of his mouth, the unreal ocean hue of his eyes, the sheer breadth of him so solid and strong.
Bruce tears his eyes away, focusing on the gilded geometry of the Metropolis skyline to center himself.
“You sure you don’t want me to fly you back?” Clark asks, lifting off the edge of the roof with impossible lightness.
“And leave my car behind?”
“Well, I could carry you in it.”
“Not today. I can’t handle the indignity of being dropped off like a child at daycare.”
“What child brings a multimillion dollar armored vehicle with them to school?” Clark laughs. Bruce wants to press a kiss to the crinkle of his nose, the corner of his eye, the plush curve of his lip.
“Dick tried once,” Bruce says, wishing he could prolong this moment for long enough to purge from his system, to preserve in glass forever. But he’ll never say the words, and Clark isn’t a mind reader, no matter how easily he can predict the progression of Bruce’s thoughts.
“Now that’s a story you’ll have to remind me to get from him the next time I’m in town.” Clark begins to float away, to give Bruce room to snap open his glider.
He’s leaving again. Because this is the pattern Bruce hasn’t yet been able to break. But something about the crisp spring air, the descent into the golden hour, makes time and space itself feel infinite for just long enough for Bruce to make a snap decision.
“Superman,” he calls, his hand reaching for Clark before he has the forethought to stop himself.
Can he be blamed? Don’t all living creatures yearn for the sun?
Clark is radiance incarnate as he turns back to look at Bruce, his feet hovering inches off the roof, the wind gently ruffling his hair.
I love you.
“Hm? Something you need, B?”
I need you to understand just how much you mean to me.
But as Bruce collects the words that he practiced saying a dozen different ways, Clark’s attention is abruptly ripped away, his gaze stretching far beyond what Bruce can see.
“Trouble?” he asks, already knowing the answer.
“Yeah, out in the Pacific.”
“Better get going. I…I’ll follow up with you another time.”
“Tell me tomorrow?” Clark asks. His cape flutters behind him, a stream of ardent color in the dusk-dipped sky.
It would be so easy to blurt it out now. I love you.
But he isn’t yet Bruce’s to keep. Right now, the world needs Superman, and Bruce can’t hold him any longer.
“Tomorrow,” Bruce promises, and Clark smiles at him once more before taking off toward the horizon.
Tomorrow comes and goes.
Bruce rises early these days, his morning unfolding as the sun cleaves across the sky. Every day the same routine: he gets dressed, he eats the breakfast prepared for him by Alfred while making morning conversation with Dick, he goes to work. His evenings are spent at some charity event or another, sometimes in the company of a beautiful companion, and then he retires for the night after having some pleasant evening conversation with Dick.
Regimented as clockwork, Bruce’s days flow past. Meanwhile, Gotham tries her hardest to drown them all alive, but as always, her citizens persist in the face of crime and misery. Bruce does his best to fix what he can from up in his ivory tower, but it seems like he’s fighting a battle doomed to be lost.
Still, he’s never been one to quit.
As obnoxious as it would be to call his pampered life monotonous, Bruce wonders often if he isn’t missing out on something greater he could be doing. Some higher calling, a goal loftier than being the rich fool pouring pointless money into an incurable city that he loves too much to ever abandon.
He should’ve become a doctor like his father. Or chosen a profession that actually means something. It’s too late to change his ways now, he supposes. At least he has plenty of time to spend with Dick and Alfred.
But life all just fades into a blur, some days.
When the ennui builds to breaking, Bruce climbs to the highest point in the city that he has access to: the roof of the Wayne Enterprises tower. There, he looks down at the black and restless streets of his beloved city and he imagines a world where something more can be done. He contemplates why it hurts his heart so deeply when he sees Gotham laid out before him like a fractured jewel.
There’s something missing in his soul. Some undefinable yearning that feels bone-deep, encoded in his DNA.
But what could there possibly be for Bruce to ask for? He can’t bring his parents back, or Dick’s. He can’t heal Gotham’s wounds, no matter how much he wishes he could do more. He can’t absorb her through his own skin, burn the rot out of both of them in righteous fire.
There’s no choice but to keep moving forward and hope the future really can be better than the past.
Bruce might just be doomed to never feel complete. Maybe it’s in the nature of humans to always want more than they have. Maybe he was always meant to be broken in some way.
Tuesday morning, Bruce has an interview with a journalist from the Daily Planet. Nothing too arduous or hard-hitting. A piece about the newest Wayne Enterprises electric car. Bruce isn’t expected to get too detailed with the technical aspect, though that’s the most interesting part.
He’s in his office now, staring at the man interviewing him as he jots down notes about WE’s commitment to expanding its green energy initiative to its other subsidiaries. It’s probably a little bit rude, but for some reason Bruce can’t look away from his face.
Clark Kent, the reporter said upon entering the room. The name felt vaguely familiar, and as Bruce sits here, taking in his black curls and slightly hunched posture, he starts to look a bit familiar too. Thick-framed glasses, tanned skin, out of style tie — Clark paints a picture that Bruce feels like he’s seen in a different gallery, long, long ago.
As if Clark was someone he saw across a crowded room some champagne-scented, chandelier-lit night last winter. The sight of him prickles at some sleeping part of Bruce’s brain, triggering a backlog of unknown words to gather at the tip of his tongue, as if there’s some message he needs to deliver to Clark, but he let it slip his mind.
Do I know you? Bruce wants to ask.
A ridiculous question. Of course Bruce knows him. He’s been interviewed by the Planet countless times before, likely by this very man himself.
He shakes his head to clear his mind. With his reputation as a flirt, his focus could be taken the wrong way. It wouldn’t do to scare off a professional simply trying to do his job.
“Any other questions?” he asks when Clark looks back up at him. Even from behind his glasses, his eyes are startlingly blue, and they sink into Bruce like a stone into a well. It should feel unsettling to be observed so carefully, despite Bruce’s extensive experience in the media spotlight. But Clark’s gaze is without judgment. If anything, he looks perturbed. Like he’s searching for something in Bruce, but he doesn’t know why.
“Not about the car, no.”
“Something else then? I don’t usually go off-book for interviews like this, but I could be persuaded to give you a quotation or two, depending on the topic.”
Clark’s lips part, their eye contact unwavering, but no words come out. After a moment that stretches long enough for Bruce’s breath to grow thin, Clark’s posture slumps, shoulders softening and an apologetic smile slipping onto his face.
“That’s very generous of you, Mr. Wayne, but it’s probably best for me to stick to the script, or my editor will have me back here tomorrow hounding you for more.”
He stands, prompting Bruce to do the same, even as he offers, “How about one softball question then, to satisfy your own curiosity. Completely off the record, though,” he warns glibly when Clark raises an eyebrow. “If you even fantasize about publishing it, I’ll have my legal team after you faster than a speeding bullet.”
Bruce feels some instinctive need for Clark to find what he was looking for. This is the closest he can get to telling Clark that he can keep searching, if he wants. He can look and look until Bruce finally figures out why his mind wants to recognize him as more familiar than he really is.
“Alright,” Clark laughs. He walks over to the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook Gotham’s sprawling, complex skyline. Bruce joins him and they stare together out at the city that feels sometimes like it was excised from Bruce’s own heart, with the way they bleed into one another.
“Do you make a wish when you blow out your birthday candles?” Clark finally asks, his eyes still fixed on the sun descending toward the city.
“Sure.”
“Alright, then tell me the second to last thing you wished for.”
“Second to last?”
“Well, they say you can’t tell anyone your birthday wish, or it won’t come true. But whenever you make a new birthday wish, it replaces the last one. So your second to last wish is no longer active, and it won’t matter either way if you tell me what it was.”
“Is that how it works,” Bruce asks, amused when Clark nods solemnly.
“Yes. It’s all very scientific.”
“I can’t argue with science. Let’s see…” Bruce tries to think back to last year’s birthday. What was he doing? He must have eaten cake with Dick and Alfred, but the other details seem to fade into years past. He certainly can’t recall what his wish was. Still, most of the things that Bruce wants consistently revolve around one theme, so he’ll give Clark the closest thing he can.
“I wished that every day in Gotham could be a slow day.”
“A slow day,” Clark repeats, looking out at Gotham’s streets.
“No crime, no worries, no pain. Impossible, of course, but a man can dream,” Bruce says wryly. He can’t see the people on Gotham’s streets distinctly from here, but he knows them like he knows himself. All he wants is to give them hope for better days.
When he looks up, Clark is watching him again, the weight back in his gaze.
“It’s a good wish,” Clark says, like the truth is absolute, and Bruce’s throat goes dry. Perhaps it is.
“Thank you. I think I’ll make it again next year. Don’t tell anyone.”
“Your secret’s safe with me.”
For some reason, Bruce is inclined to believe him.
After his free question, Bruce walks Clark to the door, ready to accept that whatever strange déjà vu he was feeling would not be solved today. By the next time they see each other, Bruce will likely have figured it out, especially since it’s probably something as simple as a previous interview.
“Have a good evening, Mr. Wayne.”
“You as well.”
They clasp hands. For a moment, Bruce doesn’t want to let go, the fit of Clark’s grip so perfect around his own hand. He’s about to bring himself to pull away when he really takes in the sight of Clark’s face, caught in a ray of fading sunlight, dust particles swirling around them like stardust in the air.
There’s a flash of memory, so fleeting and pale that Bruce can only catch its frayed ends.
A beam of light through a porthole, the whisper of red fabric brushing against his arm, the tender white crescent of the moon above and the candy-colored rush of Gotham traffic below, the weighted warmth of a broad hand at his shoulder, the indistinct, distant sound of someone calling for him but not by name.
Bruce feels his eyes widen, his heartbeat quicken, but the memory slips through his grasp like water through his fingers. The dying embers of a fading dream that’s dissipated into nothing more than smoke.
He’a unbalanced, floundering, trying not to look ridiculous as he holds onto Clark’s hand like a lifeline, so off-guard that he doesn’t even notice at first that Clark is gripping his other elbow. He looks as stunned as Bruce feels, both of them at a loss for words, but anchored together like their lives depend on it.
Bruce waits for several seconds for some epiphany to come to him, but he feels just as lost as before. And even though Clark continues to look at him with wonder, he doesn’t seem to have anything to say either.
What was that? Just some flash of delusion? A glimpse of some fantasy? Bruce wants to investigate it further, but the details have already faded from his mind. As he tries to recall even a single thing about the lightning-strike of a daydream, the only thing that comes to mind is Clark’s smile.
But Clark isn’t smiling now, clearly as confused as Bruce is. When he notices himself clutching at Bruce’s arm, he pulls his hand away quickly, and the loss of contact breaks the last wisp of the spell. Whatever that was, it’s lost to Bruce now.
“I’m sorry,” Clark says, shaking his head. “A sudden rush of dizziness. Never had that happen to me before.”
Bruce would bet his fortune that Clark just experienced something close to what he did, but without any evidence or explanation, he can’t bring himself to pursue the point.
“Sounds like you need a hearty meal and some rest, Mr. Kent,” Bruce says, resisting the desire to brace a hand against Clark’s shoulder. “Can I order you a ride back to Metropolis?”
Clark swallows, before visibly pulling his wits back about himself. “No, that’s alright, I’ve already got transportation lined up, though I appreciate the offer.”
“Alright then. Have a safe trip back.”
“I will, thank you. Until next time.”
Clark gives him one last lingering look before he turns and departs; Bruce watches until the elevator doors close and Clark is gone from his sight. And then still, he remains in the threshold to his office, staring at the elevator until his eyes are strained and he can’t remember why he was standing there. There’s nobody in the hallway except his receptionist, who is looking at him in bemusement now. Bruce waves to her before closing the door.
Must have been an interview, though why he spent so long watching the reporter leave is a mystery. He can hardly recall what the topic of conversation even was; probably some new, cutting-edge WE tech that Lucius thought would be good press.
The sun is kissing the horizon now as he gathers up his things. He should get back home and spend the night in; Dick and Alfred will both be pleased.
When Bruce reaches for the doorknob, he glances back at the windows one more time.
Sunset has dyed Gotham gold and rose and red, the last embrace of sunlight warming the city before she greets the night. Bruce can’t explain why the sight makes his heart ache.
There persists the feeling that he’s forgotten something.
He can only hope it wasn’t important.