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There are very few things that can make Superman anxious. Very few.
The constant birth of new, stronger weapons suited to try and kill him, specifically ‘just to be sure’. Megalomanic, egotistical, sly billionaires hating his guts. The knowledge that climate change is turning the weather disasters more extreme and unpredictable. Whenever his mother calls him without texting him first.
There might be more, but one of the worst things on the list? Interviews. Not the ones he does, hidden behind a recorder and a notepad, no, but the ones where it’s him getting grilled, just like now.
And as anxious as they make him while he’s in costume, this might be worse.
There’s no blue ad shining red on him, nor his cape or family crest, it’s just himself, Clark, sitting on a squeaky chair with his crooked glasses as a shield and cream shirt and nothing else.
“I didn’t know we did this kind of thing,” He says, scratching his neck and watching the crew work around him. Cat Grant takes her place on a chair in front of him, right beside the main camera, make-up as sharp as her grin. Clark saw her on the field numerous times, and he knew just how terrifying she could be. Being, for once, her target is proving to be even more terrifying.
“I chose who gets the privilege,” She keeps grinning, notepad on her lap and perfectly pointy nails dragging in her hair, looping and twisting the strands in a perfectly imperfect bun behind her neck.
This is probably what the sheep feel whenever the wolves are in town, Clark thinks, trying to get his hands to stop sweating.
“And I chose you because I know you’ll talk about all the good things we can do as citizens, and not just about your love life.” She shrugs, “The interviews with puppies get the most views on social media, so.”
So Clark is going to owe her something. Probably a fancy dinner. Or another Birkin. Oof. But it’s sweet of her, in her own way. She is getting the scoop of the month (‘it’s the scoop of the year, Clark! The year!’), getting the exclusive on his and Bruce’s relationship.
They got married just a couple of months ago, after the better part of ten years together, and now that the kids are older, they sat down and actually talked about going public with their relationship. It’s not for lack of breathing room. Everyone close to them, Cat included, knows about their relationship. It’s old news, but the same can’t be said to the rest of the country.
They thought about it in the few weeks following their marriage, and discussed how and why it would be a good choice. But the answer was simple. Helping as many people as they could, and if making their relationship public was a good way to throw light on new issues they were working on in their civilian jobs, so be it. And it wasn’t hard to come up with such a thought.
Bruce has been known as the elusive, dark and private Prince of Gotham for the better part of his life. He never did interviews, and if he does it’s not to talk about himself, but to put light on a new charity or a new project to help Gotham City, nothing else. He is something of a myth in the circles of gossip magazines, because he is so good at being pretty much a ghost publicly that it sort-of became a challenge to hunt for news about him. Or, that's what Cat says, at least.
In their years together, as curious as she was she never asked them for anything, “I prefer to hunt my own scoops, Clarkie. If I asked you things, I’d be cheating, don’t you think?” Clark isn’t sure about that, but he was glad she was supportive in her own way.
She did have a request, though, just one, made on the night he told her, Lois and Jimmy about his and Bruce’s first real date after a couple of years of close friendship. She was tipsy, just like Lois and Jimmy, but she listened to Clark’s story with rapt attention.
“Okay, okay. Sunshines and rainbows, I get it. But, I have a request.”
“Cat!” Lois whined, clinging to her shoulder, “Don’t, please. Look how happy he is.”
“I’m not going to do anything, hear me out-”
“I don’t like where this is going.” Clark grumbled, feeling Jimmy pat his shoulders, barely awake with his face half squished on the sticky table of the pub they chose for the night.
“Nothing bad, I promise,” She grinned, perfect white teeth showing. “Knowing you two lovebirds, you have a long life together ahead of you.” Clark blushed, because– what. Did she– did she think that? Him? And Bruce? What– “Clark stop panicking and listen to me.”
He straightened his back, chastised.
“I need you to swear that when you decide to go public, the exclusive will be mine. Capisce?”
“Cat, we have gone on one date–”
She huffed, waving her hand in the air, “Oh, shush, as if you aren’t completely gone for him. Don’t be dense.”
Clark blushed more, if possible, but she interrupted him even before he got the chance to reply.
“And if he breaks your heart, I get the chance to destroy him. Deal?” Her smile sharpened, turning almost maniacal. Clark thought robots as tall as buildings, and aliens ready to conquer and destroy the whole planet, but Jesus Christ, Cat Grant has the power to make him shiver in his pants. So he nodded, sealing the deal with a handshake that is now making him regret every choice he made in his life.
“Come on, don’t be scared. It’s going to be fine.” Cat looks at him now, body relaxed and poised, a true professional if Clark has ever seen one, even if she’s interviewing Bruce Wayne’s spouse, rather than a globally famous celebrity or hero.
Five minutes pass, and who Clark thinks is the director gives the sign to start the interview, a quick ‘ciak!’ and Cat doesn’t spare a blink, going straight through the intro. Quick a few quick lines, she explains exactly what they’ll be doing, without spoiling the surprise news. At least not on tape, Clark has no idea what the title of the video will be.
Or the thumbnail.
Clark is really starting to regret giving Cat all the power over this interview.
“Now,”She finishes the intro and claps her hands together, as bright as the white lights that are threatening to blind him. That’s why he never does interviews like this as Superman. Oof. “Today is a special day, because as much as I love asking the hottest questions to our hottest guests, I promised to behave,” She winks at Clark, making him even more terrified of her, if possible. “And not send our sweet and dear Clarkie to an early grave.”
She crosses her legs, and signs something to a guy behind her.
“And yes, you heard me correctly, I said our, because we are interviewing none other but our dearest and sweetest colleague from the investigative Department at the Daily Planet, Clark Kent!”
A round of applause surrounds them, with a big cheering from the back of the room, where Lois and Jimmy are trying not to die laughing at Clark’s expense as he makes his way into the center of the set, right in front of the red background. He’s already blushing, because of Cat’s words or embarrassment, he’s not sure, but he reminds himself that it is all for a good cause.
“Hi,” He says, waving his hand to what he hopes is the main camera.
“Aw, isn’t he cute?” Cat coos, waving at him to sit down. He’s not sure if she’s serious or just messing with him, Cat is so good at making people blush you’d think it is a superpower. “Introduce yourself while we bring the puppies, will you dear?”
Clark sits on the ground, shoulder leaned forward and legs straight in front of him. He feels like an overgrown toddler, but at least he must look somewhat put together, because he doesn’t have his usual clothes on, but a fancy cream shirt with the first button undone and probably the nicest jeans he ever wore, high waisted and perfectly his size. Cat even made him put on a bit of make-up, tidying up his eyebrows and messing up his curls in a way she told him was stylish. Enough to separate him from his usual persona, so that he’ll probably be still pretty much invisible to the untrained eye, but not too cleaned up, so that he is still way far from the alien perfection that is Superman to the public.
She probably thought it all through. And probably spoke to Bruce about it, completely ignoring Clark’s opinion on the matter. Not that he cares, really, Cat and Bruce together are a force to be reckoned with, Clark has no chance to stop them.
“Hello, I’m Clark,” He says again, stupidly, his face on fire. “I’m here today to talk about a new project me and my husband Bruce have been working on for a while.”
Fortunately, just as he finishes stuttering his way into the first sentence of this damned interview, the first puppy is laid on his lap. He feels himself relax immediately, because oh my god it’s so small.
It looks like a tiny blue heeler, about three months old, and even though it is already biting Clark’s finger he coos at it. Cat is saying something, probably the first question, but he’s so distracted he barely hears it.
He tries to look at her for clues but another three puppies get released and he’s now in paradise. A fifth and a sixth follow their sibling, and he’s a giggly mess in under two seconds, sprawled on the ground with a bunch of puppies nipping at his shirt and hair.
“Clark is not used to interviews, so I’ll help him a bit.” Cat watches him giggle and rub the dog's tiny paws without breaking character because again, she’s a professional. Meanwhile Clark is about to melt in a giggly puddle.
“Oh, they have names,” Clark whines, grabbing the one currently sitting on his face and looking at the sparkly red collar around its neck, “Dear Lord this one is called Joey, Cat I’m going to cry.”
The crew starts laughing all around the room, meanwhile Cat is shuffling the papers on her lap, collected but smiling a bit softer now.
“Today’s puppies come from a new Metropolis-based operation, and are all adoptable.”
Clark sits up, still getting smoldered by puppies, but that’s his cue to start speaking. Fortunately they won’t be talking too much about his life, but he’s still nervous.
“Yes, exactly.” He swallows. It’s time, now or never.
“Me and my husband’s organization, Wayne Enterprises, have been working closely with Metropolis’ mayor to better understand how we could help animal rescues all over the city, and the first few upgrades will be installed in the next month or so.” He explains, trying to speak as clearly as possible, even if he feels the grip of anxiety trying to close his throat. “But everything started thanks to my stepson, Damian, and his friends at the various animal rescues, that gathered all the links and necessary paperwork to actually make it work.”
“Gotham and Metropolis are familiar with Damian Wayne’s activism, he’s a smart kid.” Cat raises one eyebrow, smirking. “Bruce Wayne and puppies, though. That’s a peculiar picture, uh.”
Clark smiles, grabbing ‘Angelina’ and raising her to his face to kiss her little orange snout.
“Oh he loves dogs. I think he’d love this if it wasn’t for the- uh- camera, you know.” Clark shrugs, “Sorry.”
“It is well known that the Prince of Gotham is skeptical towards the public, he might as well be a ghost if he wasn’t so active in his city’s reconstruction projects.” She raises her eyebrows, hidden behind the camera but tone clearly petty, “Unfortunate of him to date a reporter.”
Clark blushes. He can’t really say on camera that they met because one night Luthor thought that building his robot’s army in Gotham was a good idea. And that the first words that they shared was Clark’s squeaky “What the hell is wrong with you?” and Batman’s growly “Stay the fuck out of Gotham.”
“We met through mutual friends, actually.” Wonder Woman threatened to cut both of their balls off if they didn’t stop fighting. And not even Batman could go against her. “And it took a while but.” Clark raises his hands, letting the camera pan on his ring. A thick silver band with tiny cows engraved all over it. It took Bruce months to design it, all because he wanted Clark to have a reminder of home. “Ten years in, here we go.”
“You are a charming man, Clark, you could convince him to come here. For me.”
Three of the six puppies are fastly falling asleep in the space between Clark’s lap and the ground that his crossed legs formed while he spoke. The other three are currently enveloped in Clark’s arms. One is biting his shirt collar, while the other two are licking his face. If he comes back with six puppies Bruce is going to be pissed, but he’s really thinking about stealing all of them.
“You’ve been together for so long! Why not? I could get him to do any interview he wants, I could get him to go to Love Island if he asks!” Cat begs, half-serious. Clark doesn’t doubt her a little bit.
“You said that asking me for help is cheating!”
She huffs. “I said that like, a decade ago! Come on!”
The crew keeps laughing around them.
“If I asked him to go to Love Island I’d sleep on the couch for the next year, Cat.”
“What about Love is Blind then? I could make you the hosts!”
Clark starts laughing then, watching Cat’s pout. He knows she’s just messing around, and that maybe this interview will be cut in half but he’s glad he let her handle the exclusive. She’ll make the best of it, even if it’s a fluff piece for the gossip section.
“Oh he’d hate that.” He keeps laughing, something popping on his mind while Cat keeps going with worse and worse propositions.
“I could call him.” Clark said, blushing again and using a dog to cover half of his face. “If you don’t believe me.”
“Oh yes, please,” Cat glows, a fantastic exclusive on her hands and the possibility to mess with Bruce, all in one sitting? Perfect.
A person from the staff retrieves Clark’s phone from his bag, swiftly going from the back of the room to him and back, barely obstructing the camera. Clark unfortunately has to release two of the puppies from his arms, but they seem all content to just pile up on his lap, unbothered.
He leans a bit forward, covering the screen from the watchful eyes of pretty much all the people around the room. Mostly for two reasons, one, he wants to make sure not even one digit of Bruce’s number can get leaked, and two, his lockscreen is a very bad photo of Bruce asleep, drooling on his pillow. It’s Clark’s favorite photo, but it must remain between him and his phone, or Bruce will cut his head off. Or worse.
It rings three, four times before Bruce picks up.
Clark is calling his personal phone, and given the hour, there’s a big chance that Bruce was actually sleeping. Clark feels a bit guilty, but teasing his husband is his favorite hobby, and this is a really good chance to do so.
“Hi my dove,” Clark speaks softly, getting the phone closer to the microphone pinned to his shirt, turned enough that the camera can only see his worn, bright red phone cover. There is a muffled ‘mhhh’ coming from the phone, and Clark giggles. He loves Bruce’s sleepy sounds. “Oh, did I wake you up?”
Another soft ‘mhhh’, longer this time. Almost whiny.
“I'm sorry baby.”
Another ‘umh’, more content.
“It’s alright.” Bruce grunts, soft. “What is it, sunshine? How’s Miss Grant?” He slurs out, probably still with his face smushed into the pillows. If Clark were alone, he’d probably facetime him, just to see his cute, adorable, sleepy face.
He and Cat have a running joke of never calling each other by their first names, even though they’ve known each for the better part of a decade. It’s silly when they are with friends, but kind of perfect when they are in public, and in this case.
“Cat’s fine and well.” Lois and Jimmy walk through the room, standing to Cat’s sides. The three of them wave, like idiots, because they always do whenever Clark is on the phone with Bruce or his parents. “She says hi, Lois and Jimmy too.”
Bruce hums again, polite. He sounds like a cat, purring into the phone, too sleepy to form coherent sentences.
“Something kind of funny happened, actually,” Clark says, trying not to laugh immediately. “I might– I might have gotten an offer as the host for Love Is Blind.”
Silence. Cat slaps one hand on her mouth and the other on Jimmy’s to stop their laughter.
“Darling-” Clark snorts at Bruce’s disgruntled tone, “Wha- What?”
“You know the– the TV show? The one Ma was watching last week?”
“My love–”
Clark interrupts him, pouring his energy to not let his voice break into giggles again, “They said you could come too. It would be good, you know– As– As a couple.”
“Honey,” Bruce whines, a suffering sigh following, “Have you lost your mind?”
“It’s not that bad of an idea.”
“My love, please.” Bruce groans, devastated. “You–” He sounds way more awake than just twenty seconds ago. “Wait– Would you? Like to do it, I mean.”
“Only if you come with me.”
Silence again. Four, five seconds, Clark can hear Bruce’s brain working from here.
“I can…think about it.”
He speaks so, so softly into the phone, barely audible through the microphone and oh, Clark’s heart is going to explode. He sounds pained, but. He didn’t say no.
“Oh God, Bruce.” Clark groans, “You’re terrible.”
Cat and Lois start laughing now, loud enough that Bruce too can hear.
“Wait– What– Oh, come on,” Bruce groans again, understanding falling on him. “You woke me up for this,” He whines, the sound of shuffling fabrique telling Clark that he sinked his face into his pillow again. Clark keeps chuckling though, cooing into the phone.
“I’m sorry baby, but it was too funny.”
“Please, tell me I’m not on record, please, Clark.”
“Tecchnically no,” Clark blushes, feeling a tiny but guilty. Not enough to stop laughing though. “But this might go on the Internet though.”
“Nooo, I don’t want to,” Bruce groans.
“Come on, it’s not that bad,” Clark coos again, mocking but trying to actually comfort his very, very introverted husband. Bruce might be one of the scariest vigilantes of the country, but underneath the rough exterior and hard kevlar, he’s just a shy, quiet and kind man.
“I’ll smother myself with a pillow.”
“Please don’t,” It’s Clark’s turn to whine, “Please I love you, please, please, please.”
There’s an offended ‘mhh’, half muffled by what Clark assumes is his pillow, because Bruce likes to use Clark’s when they aren’t sleeping next to each other. Because he really is just an overgrown cat.
Clark smiles.
“I’ll see you in a bit, yes?” Another offended huffs comes out, then a softer one. “Love you, darling.”
A second of silence, then quiet, barely there “I love you too, sweetheart.” come out the call, before Bruce rudely ends it without saying ‘goodbye’, but Clark deserves it. He’s going to go back home to a very annoyed, embarrassed, adorable bat, but nothing that a few kisses and apologies won’t fix.
The puppy he’s been holding the whole time nips his chin, and he puts a hand on his hot face, having completely forgotten just how many people are around him.
“That was fantastic!” Cat yells, “And I was right, ladies and gentlemen, not even Bruce Wayne can say no to this handsome guy right here!”
Clark groans, flopping back down on the pavement. He’s never going to hear the end of this. But the motion startles the puppies that were sleeping on his lap, so he finishes the rest of the interview without having to actually look into the camera, too busy being smothered by tiny paws and fuzzy fur.
At home, he finds Bruce exactly where he knew he’d found him, out like a light under a frankly ridiculous amount of blankets. He changes out of the fancy interview clothes, and the quiet doesn’t last long, because the second he sits on the bed, Bruce' s pale, strong arms wrap around him like a giant octopus, dragging him under the blankets.
He spends a good ten minutes apologizing, but it’s so worth it.
Bruce isn’t as annoyed as Clark thought he’d be, and gives his consent to post the interview. The clip goes viral, and as soon as the first rescues in Metropolis get renovated, most of the animals get adopted.
Tiny Joey too, but that might be because he’s now snoring softly in Damian’s bed.
Oops.
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