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“You need to wear your raincoat, sweetheart.”
Lily, Dick’s six-year-old daughter, pouts at Clark. “But I don’t wanna ,” she whines.
Clark crouches down to look Lily in the eye. Bruce’s knees twinge in sympathy. “Is there something you don’t like about your coat?”
“It’s annoying,” Lily insists. “And it’s not even raining!”
“It will be soon,” Bruce reminds her. It’s not the first time he’s told her that, but at six, Lily’s listening is still selective at best. She’s not exactly hanging onto his every word.
Clark rubs her back. “How about we take your coat with us, and then when it starts raining, you can wear it. Does that sound fair?”
Lily thinks about that for a minute, her little brain working hard to decide if that’s an acceptable compromise. After a long pause, she nods.
“I guess that’s ok. Can you carry it?”
Bruce holds back a laugh. In other words, Lily will only agree to this if she doesn’t have to put any extra effort in. He can understand that.
“Sure, honey,” Clark says with a soft chuckle. “Let’s get your rainboots on, and then we’ll go.”
Thankfully, getting her boots on isn’t quite as much of a fight. Lily’s rainboots have frogs on them, as she believes all things should. She’d wear them all day if Bruce and Clark let her.
“Hands?” Lily asks hopefully.
Bruce and Clark both reach down to hold her hands and with all her needs finally met, Lily is ready to go outside. She lets go of them almost immediately when they reach the garden and breaks into a run.
“Not so far ahead,” Bruce calls. Lily certainly isn’t faster than Clark, but Bruce’s own old joints don’t take to running well anymore. He likes to have her in his reach. The older he gets, the more he finds himself worrying about his children and grandchildren. Something about the fact that he can’t protect them as easily as he once could makes it harder to let them go.
Clark wraps an arm around him, giving one of his love handles a gentle squeeze. “She’ll be alright, dear. She just needs a little freedom to grow.”
Bruce doesn’t reply for a moment. He keeps his eye on Lily, as she tests the boundaries of what “not so far” means.
“I just worry about her,” he says finally, softly, as if keeping his voice quiet will keep the words from being true.
Clark hums. “So do I. I think that’s just part of loving someone.”
Bruce suspects Clark is right. For decades, he resisted letting new people in for just that fear: that he’d have too many people to worry about, and not enough love left to spare. He accepts, now, that the presence of worry doesn’t mean the absence of love. The two go hand in hand. Bruce has plenty to offer his family now, as big and sprawling as it’s become.
“Grandpas! Flowers!”
Bruce and Clark exchange a fond smile and head over to join their granddaughter. Lily is pointing at some of the newly blossoming daffodils and bouncing on her toes with excitement.
“They’re very pretty,” Bruce notes. Lily nods emphatically.
“But we’ve gotta leave them outside, right?”
Clark had told her that when they’d gone out last week and seen the first buds of spring appearing. She’d wanted to pluck the flowers and take them to her dad, while Clark had gently reminded her that pulling flowers up meant that no one else would be able to enjoy them anymore. If she wanted to show them to Dick, she could always bring him to them.
As it turns out, Lily does listen to her grandpa occasionally. Just not her grandpa Bruce.
“That’s right,” Clark agrees. “We could take a picture for your dad though, if you want.”
“Yeah!” Lily exclaims. Clark releases Bruce and pulls his phone out, letting Lily direct the photoshoot as she wants. By the time she’s satisfied, Bruce suspects that half of Clark’s camera roll is flowers.
A sudden drop of rain has Bruce taking his eyes off his granddaughter and glancing at the sky. The dark gray clouds that had been looming for most of the morning have finally arrived. Another drop falls, then another, and then suddenly it’s raining hard enough that Lily doesn’t even protest when Clark zips her up in her jacket.
“Do you want to stay outside?” Bruce asks her, though he already knows what the answer will be.
“Yes!” Lily agrees emphatically. “More flowers!”
And then she’s off again, eyes trained on the flowerbeds. Later in the season, the manor’s gardens will be bright and in full bloom. But in mid-April, the ground is still mostly bare, only the smallest of green shoots poking their heads up. Lily doesn’t seem to mind much. She’s more interested in the hunt.
“If you want to wait out the storm inside, I won’t judge,” Clark says, with a slight smile on his face.
“I’m not that much of a spoilsport,” Bruce grumbles. He can’t tolerate all weather as well as he used to, but he’ll tough out a little rain for Lily's sake.
Clark pulls Bruce to his side and presses a kiss to his cheek. “Then off we go again.”
They continue following their granddaughter around the gardens, stopping for her to jump in puddles or admire more flowers (it’s mostly daffodils, but the lack of variety doesn’t dull her excitement). The rain is coming down hard now, making Bruce’s raincoat cling to him and soaking through his slacks. Clark, in jeans and an unzipped coat, doesn’t seem to feel it at all.
“Reminds me of working in the fields in a rainstorm,” he says, his eyes still on Lily. “Pa would usually have us wait in the barn for the worst of it to pass, but I never cared. I’d run out into the fields with no coat on til I was soaked to the bone.”
Bruce hums to show he’s listening. They both know Clark has told him this before. After as many years as they’ve been married, stories become less about the words and more about the act of telling them. It’s a way of reliving the memories while they last.
“Ma always called me silly when I got back. She’d toss a couple ratty old towels out onto the porch and tell me to come inside once I wasn’t going to get water all over her clean floors, but she never got mad about it.”
“She told you that you’d catch a cold out there, didn’t she?”
Clark laughs ruefully. “Course she did. Even when we knew I couldn’t get sick she’d still make me a big bowl of soup for dinner and tell me to go to bed early so I didn’t come down with anything.”
“That’s the thing about parents,” Bruce says, not just meaning Martha. “They worry even when there’s no need to.”
Clark nods, the smile slipping off his face.
It’s been three years since Martha’s death, five since Jonathon’s. Stories like these mean a little more than they used to.
“Always thought she was being overbearing,” Clark says softly. “Sometimes, I think—”
Twenty feet ahead of them, Lily stumbles. The words die in Clark’s mouth. Just as Bruce is panicking, realizing that there’s no way that he can get to her in time, Clark is at her side, catching her in his arms. Immediately, Lily bursts into tears. Bruce’s heart pounds as he runs to them as quickly as he can manage.
“Shh, it’s ok,” Clark is saying, resting Lily against his belly. “You’re ok, sweetheart.”
“Is she hurt?” Bruce asks urgently.
Lily’s only response is a wail. Clark speaks for her. “Not hurt, just a little startled. I caught her before she hit the ground.”
The tension in Bruce’s chest eases. Startled is easy to handle. He rubs Lily’s back gently and presses a kiss to her temple.
“Lily, would you like to go back inside and have some hot chocolate?” he suggests.
As if by some miracle, her sniffles start to subside. “Hot–hot chocolate?”
“Mmhmm. I’m sure grandpa Clark could be convinced to make you some.”
Lily takes another big sniff. “... With whipped cream? And sprinkles?”
Clark smiles at her. “I think we can do that. Let’s go warm up.”
It’s a good time to go inside anyways. The rain isn’t letting up, and Bruce’s joints are starting to ache. They make their way back to the manor with Clark still carrying Lily, her tears fully dried up at the promise of sweets.
“Do you want to help me make hot cocoa?” Clark asks Lily as he helps her out of her raincoat. Bruce hangs it on one of the hooks in the mudroom beside his own. “Or would you rather cuddle with grandpa Bruce until it's ready?”
“Cuddles!”
Bruce smiles. It's hardly a surprising answer. Lily does enjoy baking with Clark, but she'd always rather be pampered when visiting them.
“Let's go to the sitting room,” he says, taking her little hand in his.
Clark presses a kiss to the top of Lily’s head and another on Bruce's cheek, and promises to bring them hot cocoa when it's ready. With the way Lily is leaning up against his leg and trying not to yawn, Bruce isn't sure she'll be awake by that point.
He leads the way to the nearest sitting room and lowers himself onto the couch slowly. His knees creak in protest. Lily clambers up next to him and cuddles up against his belly.
“Hi, grandpa.”
Bruce chuckles. “Hello, Lily.” He runs his fingers through her hair, combing out small tangles. “Did you have fun today?”
“Uh huh,” she confirms. “I liked getting to take pictures of all the flowers.”
Her eyes are already drooping closed. She's treating Bruce like her personal pillow, completely boneless at his side.
“Should I wake you up when grandpa Clark brings us cocoa?” he asks her softly.
“... M not tired,” she mumbles insistently.
Bruce just smiles, soft and fond. He rubs Lily’s back without another word, watching as her breaths even out. In less than five minutes, she’s out cold.
There’s no way to put into words how deeply Bruce loves this precious girl. She’s his and Clark’s first grandchild, the first child he’s cared for who doesn’t come from a background of pain. All Bruce’s children were older when they came to him, carrying far more weight than Lily has ever had to.
He wouldn't wish an ounce of that trauma on her. But without it she's sometimes foreign to him, the culmination of everything he's hoped for his family, and yet at the same time, so distant from his own upbringing that he isn't sure how to handle her. She holds an innocence he can't remember knowing.
The only thing he can be sure of is that it's his job to protect that innocence. He can't allow her to ever be hurt, to let this city take from her what it took from him. Lily might not be his child, but she's his responsibility nonetheless.
He watches her as she sleeps. Her face is entirely slack, no tension held anywhere in her body. She trusts him entirely. She doesn’t know what it’s like not to trust someone.
He hopes she never knows that feeling.
Caught up in his musings, Bruce almost startles when Clark enters the room. He arches his eyebrows at the lack of mugs of hot chocolate.
“Thought I’d check in on you two before I served anything,” Clark explains softly, glancing down at their sleeping granddaughter.
“Best to wait until later,” Bruce agrees. Waking Lily up from a nap is rarely a good idea.
Clark nods. He joins them on the couch, sitting beside Lily. Like Bruce, he can’t help but smile at her, nothing but fondness and pride on his face.
“She’s a sweetheart, isn’t she?” he murmurs.
Bruce just nods. “She is.” He couldn’t have asked for a better grandchild.
Clark brushes a stray hair out of her face. “How long until Dick’s coming to pick her up?”
“Three hours,” Bruce says, glancing at his watch. “If you want to keep her a bit longer, I’m sure we could ask.”
When Dick first told them he was having a child, Bruce’s initial reaction had been hesitance. He didn’t want to acknowledge how old he was getting. He didn’t want to be, as many grandparents are, nothing more than backup childcare. He didn’t even feel ready to retire yet, something he had assumed was a requirement of having grandchildren.
It’s strange to him, all these years later, to feel the exact opposite. Lily has captured his and Clark’s hearts, completely and unconditionally. He spends every minute with her that he can.
“We’ll see how long she sleeps for,” Clark says, a hint of reluctance in his voice.
Bruce grunts, as if agreeing. With his free hand, he pulls his phone out of his pocket to send a message to Dick.
“Dear, you don’t need to—”
“It makes more sense for her to stay until dinner at this point. Dick can pick her up after.”
Clark doesn’t offer anymore protest. He gives Bruce a grateful smile.
“That means I have to figure out dinner,” he points out, though he doesn’t seem upset by the idea.
Bruce shakes his head. “I’ll take care of it. You’ve done a lot for us today.” He does a lot for them every day. It’s Bruce’s turn to take care of him.
“Should I trust you with that?” Clark teases.
“I’m better at cooking now,” Bruce grumbles. He’s not winning any awards, but he can make a decent meal from scratch without burning the kitchen down, unlike some in his family would like to believe. “I can make macaroni and cheese at least.”
“You can. As long as you don’t use the box mix, I won’t complain.”
“I wouldn’t. You and Lily deserve better than that.”
Clark laughs. “Thank you for taking such good care of our tastebuds.”
Bruce answers him with an easy smile. “I try to take good care of all of you.”
It’s hopelessly sappy, but it’s true. Bruce is past the point in his life when he tried to solve all his problems by fighting his way through them. These days, he tries a softer approach. A little love goes a long way.
“Thank you,” Clark murmurs, his face soft. “I love you, darling.”
“I love you, too.”
“Do you love me enough to share your pie with me for dessert?”
Bruce narrows his eyes. Just because he loves his husband doesn’t mean that he’s willing to abandon his principles. “Lily can have some. I’ll have to think about whether you should get a slice too.”
Clark just smiles, bemused. “It’s good to know where I fall on your hierarchy.”
“... Hn.”
Clark chuckles. “I might take a nap before dinner,” he admits with a small yawn. Only now, Bruce notices the deeper lines in his face. “Cloudy days always drain my energy.”
Bruce inclines his head. “I’ll stay up, in case Lily needs anything.”
Clark hums, closing his eyes. “No you won’t. You’re going to fall asleep the minute I stop talking to you.”
“I am not ,” Bruce grumbles. He might nap more often now that he’s older, but surely he’s not that bad.
“Whatever you say, love. See you in a few hours.”
Bruce watches as he dozes off. He can’t help as his own eyelids start to get heavy, lulled into sleep by Lily and Clark’s soft, steady breaths and the patter of rain on the windows. They’re safe here. There’s no need for Bruce to stay alert and keep watch. Bruce is out in minutes, his heart full of love for his family.