Chapter Text
Distantly, Bruce knew this was a bad idea that he was almost certainly going to regret.
That thought was gone almost as soon as it came, however, as he stumbled outside the large doors of the gala venue with his phone in hand.
It took a few minutes for him to type in the number correctly, his vision blurring all the digits together until he finally managed to get the world to stop spinning for long enough to confirm he had typed the right number before dialing.
He watched the screen as his phone rang once.
Then twice.
Three times.
Then, just as he was about to hang up in frustration—
“Clark Kent speaking,” a familiar, if not a bit groggy, voice suddenly spoke.
Bruce simultaneously felt like bursting into tears and jumping for joy as he slurred “Clark,” voice breaking on the word, “I’m sorry, did— I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“Um… no, no it’s alright. I’m always awake at…” the voice on the other end paused. Bruce heard shuffling over the line, “1:30am on a Sunday. Sorry— who is this?”
“Wh— who is this? Do you not—” Bruce felt his throat constrict as his eyes welled up. He tried, and failed, to swallow the wave of pure despair that washed over him at those words, “It’s me, Clark, I—”
“Bruce?! Is that you?” he cut him off suddenly, “is something wrong? Is—is everything okay? Why are you calling me?”
Bruce groaned, his brain struggling to keep up with the conversation as he simply muttered, “I miss you.”
“What?! B—”
But the floodgates had opened, and Bruce found that words were leaving his mouth before he could approve them, “I miss us, I—I don’t know what I did wrong— well, I know a lot of things that I did wrong, but… I don’t know what the breaking point was and—and I don’t know how I let myself lose you when you’re the only good thing that’s ever happened to me in my—fuck—” he held back a heave, hand coming up to steady himself against the nearest solid object, “—in my entire fucking life,” He punctuated with a weak sob, moving to sit down on the stairs to calm his stomach before he threw up all over himself.
“Bruce, are you… have you been drinking?”
“Yes. But that’s irrev… irrelevant. That doesn’t mean what I’m saying’s not true,” he protested, pouting slightly, “Clark… I need you. I can’t lose you. If—” he paused to sniffle, “—if I’m not good enough for you, I can change, I’d do anything for you to take me back. Please.”
“Baby, I am… so confused. I thought— never mind. Just, where are you right now? You sound like you’re outside,” the pet name slipped out accidentally but didn’t go unnoticed by either of them. Concern was dripping from his voice.
Sweet Clark, worried about Bruce. God, he didn’t deserve someone as good as him. He just couldn’t bring himself to let him go.
Caught up in his thoughts, Bruce almost forgot he had been asked a question, “I’m… was at a gala. Someone’s gala. I… don’t know whose. Not important anyway. It’s over now. ‘m outside, though. Not ready to call my driver yet. Don’t want to go home to an empty house, empty bed,” he had barely gotten any sleep in the past two weeks, too acclimated to sleeping with a warm body enveloping his. Any sleep he did miraculously get was riddled with nightmares anyway, so he had given up trying and accepted running on fumes until he passed out from exhaustion.
“Okay. I’m starting to piece things together here,” Bruce had absolutely no idea what Clark was talking about, he didn’t think he was unclear about anything, “how about you let me pick you up and get you home, yeah? Then we can talk about things when you’re a bit more… sobered up,” he offered, tone softer than Bruce had ever heard directed at himself.
Bruce feigned consideration for a moment, already knowing the answer. Time spent in Clark’s arms, even in a different context than he necessarily wanted, was better than nothing, “okay. Take me home,” stay the night, stay forever he stubbornly thought, hope blooming in his chest over a lack of rejection from Clark.
“Is there anyone near you?”
Bruce looked around, his eyes starting to be able to focus enough to confirm, “no—”
A gust of wind, and Clark was in front of him in an instant, smiling sadly. His hair mussed from sleep and the wind, still in his (horrifically ugly) plaid pyjamas and crocs.
He was the most beautiful thing in the entire world, Bruce thought.
“Let’s get you up, B,” he started, reaching out to gently hold on to Bruce’s arm for support as he stood shakily. The first contact between them in months had Bruce swelling with emotion, tears coming back with a vengeance, “come on, let’s go home.”
Bruce couldn’t look at him through wet eyes as he defeatedly shook his head and muttered, “…don’t want to throw up on you,” the nausea increasing tenfold now that he was upright.
“I wouldn’t mind if you did, baby, I just want to get you back home safe. I’ll fly us slow, okay?” his hand still holding onto Bruce’s arm slid down to squeeze his hand in reassurance, other arm coming up to wipe away the tears Bruce hadn’t noticed escaping as he nodded weakly.
Strong hands picked him up gently, so gently, and suddenly they were in the air, slowly making their way back to the manor. Bruce buried his face in Clark’s shoulder to attempt to contain the churning in his stomach as he started babbling uncontrollably.
“Sorry, ‘m so sorry, Clark. I just can’t— I can’t do this without you. I just want you to love me again. Please.. I’ll never argue with you again, I’ll—”
“Shh, don’t get yourself so worked up. We’ll talk about this tomorrow, Bruce, I promise you,” he soothed him, Bruce’s body instinctively relaxing at the comforting words as they continued their flight.
Bruce woke up to the feeling of touching solid ground again.
“See?” Clark started, landing them at the front steps of Wayne Manor, arms still wrapped around Bruce, “you made it back without—”
Bruce’s stomach chose that moment to empty its contents all over Clark’s t-shirt. Even in his (rapidly lessening) drunken state, he was mortified, pulling away from the other man immediately.
“Fuck! Clark, sorry, sorry, I’m so—”
“It’s okay, Bruce, let’s just get you to your bedroom,” Clark cut him off with a small smile to reassure him, approaching his door with a key in hand.
“You… still have that?” Bruce questioned as he unlocked the door and started to lead them inside.
“Yeah, um… you never asked for it back, and I haven’t seen you to give you it. I’ll just leave it here when I go, though,” he said as they made their way to Bruce’s bedroom, “do you think you can get yourself into pyjamas while I get cleaned up?” he gestured down at his ruined t-shirt.
Bruce nodded, avoiding looking at him, still wildly embarrassed at what he had done, as he walked over to grab some pyjamas, Clark disappearing into the en-suite bathroom.
A few minutes later, when Bruce had managed to wrestle his way out of his far-too-tight suit and into silk pyjamas, Clark emerged from the bathroom, clean, and now completely shirtless. Great.
He held up a glass of water before moving to place it on the bedside table, “for you, you’ll need it come morning,” he offered a smile as he put down the house key next to it.
“Thanks…” Bruce muttered as Clark helped him into bed gently.
“Call me tomorrow when—if you want to talk about this, okay?” Bruce nodded in response.
When Clark started to move towards the balcony, though, Bruce’s hand shot out to grab his arm, “stay?” he pleaded.
He could see the uncertainty in Clark’s face, though the man made no attempt at moving away, “I… don’t know, Bruce, I don’t want to shock you in the morning if you don’t remember this.”
“I’ll remember, I couldn’t forget anything about you if I tried,” he laughed bitterly, “just… humour me. Please.”
“Gosh, I can’t say no to you,” he heard Clark mutter under his breath before slowly moving back to lay on the bed with him.
Bruce barely let him get on his back before he curled up completely into the man, whispering, “just let me have this one last time,” as he placed his head on Clark’s chest and finally, finally, drifted into a dreamless sleep for the first time in weeks.