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John can’t sleep.
It’s been a long time since he’s had a woman spend the night at his place; he was always more comfortable going to their apartments and leaving his own home as a sanctuary. And a lot of the women he saw weren’t spend-the-night types, anyway. That seemed even more important once he inherited the caves - he’s careful to leave nothing at home, but there’s no such thing as too careful with a secret like that. Besides, he wouldn’t want anyone to wake up and find he’d gone out to patrol and wonder where the hell he’d gone.
But it seems easy - natural - to bring Barbara back after dinner, to brush a hand over her knee in the car, to have her pin him against the door and press her mouth to his and grip the back of his neck. Everything after that follows like the turning of tumblers in a lock. It feels right.
Except it leaves him lying awake and staring at the ceiling and listening to her breathe beside him. He can hear the noises of the building settling, people coming home from late shifts driving buses or waiting tables, water knocking in the pipes. For a while he listens to Barbara’s breath steady and even, and then wonders whether it’s creepy to listen to her breathing, and then berates himself for being a creep as he watches the beams of passing headlights slide over her bare shoulder blades.
Eventually he can’t take lying there anymore and gets up, pulling on an undershirt and boxers and heading into the bathroom. He washes his face and looks at himself in the mirror, washed out under the light, and realizes there’s a bruise purpling up on his collarbone. John can feel his ears heat up. She gave him a goddamned hickey. Like he’s fifteen and stupid and hiding in the back hallway of the school with some girl whose name he can’t even remember now. Somehow he doesn’t think Barbara is going to let him go that easily. She’s not the type to walk out on anyone, either.
“John?”
For a moment he panics. But no, she’s not leaving, nothing’s wrong, she’s just sitting up and squinting against the slice of light from the bathroom door. He shuts it off and walks back, thinking he can still see the red of her hair like an afterimage against the dark.
“Still here,” he tells her. He slides back into bed and she lies down next to him. She stretches one arm over his waist, warm even through the cotton of his shirt, and rubs her cheek against his shoulder and goes back to sleep. He slows his breaths down to match hers, in and out, and closes his eyes.