Gardens of Wayne Manor: Event Horizon (33/40)
I'm not caught up enough, but maybe enough to post, I hope! Thanks so much for your patience...and thank you to the people who gave anonymous v-gifts for Help Japan, they made me sniffle!
Title: Chapter Thirty-Three: Event Horizon
Pairing/Characters: Clark/Bruce, Alfred Pennyworth, Martha Kent
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: None necessary
Continuity: The Gardens of Wayne Manor is an AU series in which Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne's lives intertwine at an early age. Click here for the complete series and series notes.
Word Count: 5900Summary: Scenes from a summer.
Running home from school, up the drive, struggling to run normally when he could be there already and it had been all day since--
He saw him waiting at the gate of the moon garden, and then they were inside its tall hedges, safe from the world. Hands shaking to pull him close into the first kiss of the day, the best one.
The second one was better.
For the first month, they did nothing but kiss.
: : :
"I will not tolerate it a moment longer, Master Bruce." Bruce looked up, startled, at Alfred's vehement tone, to find the butler holding a pair of scissors. "Perhaps you are content to look like a teenage werewolf, but I insist on a trim. Soon you will have to pull it back in a ponytail, and that is simply beyond the pale, sir." When Bruce didn't leap into action, Alfred said, with the air of someone playing his trump card, "You need to look your best for Master Clark, do you not?"
Bruce almost dropped his book. "What?"
"Aren't you going to his graduation in a few weeks?" Alfred's frown was ominous. "I can't imagine you wouldn't want to look presentable."
"Oh." Bruce relaxed again. "I guess you're right."
"Of course I am." Alfred bustled him into the kitchen and sat him down on a stool. "Hold still."
Bruce closed his eyes and listened to the crisp silvery sound of the scissors, felt Alfred's presence hovering near him. "You haven't asked me if I'll be staying this time," he said.
The busy scissors didn't pause. "It's not my business, sir."
Bruce frowned, feeling a flicker of unexpected anger. "Of course it's your business. You're always here for me, always taking care of me, you're--you're my only family."
The scissors slowed, stopped. For a moment, Alfred rested both hands on his shoulders. "My dear boy," he said. Bruce could hear him swallow in the silence that followed. Then the scissors went back to work, more slowly this time. "I have always wondered," Alfred said, "If I should have insisted on going with you to Europe. Or even to Milton. Your parents made me your guardian, but I have--failed to guard you well, I fear."
Bruce kept his eyes closed, feeling suddenly almost shy. He and Alfred had never talked about things like this. They'd never seemed to need to. "But I always knew," he said haltingly, "That--that you were here if I needed you. That you'd always be there for me."
"As long as I live." Five simple words, but Alfred made them sound like a vow.
"I might--" Bruce hesitated. The vision of the future loomed large and dark and formless before him. "I might not live the life my parents would have wanted. I might not come home to get married and have kids and give garden parties."
"Master Bruce." Alfred's voice had an edge of irony to it. "You were unlikely at any time to live a boring life. Believe it or not, I have made my peace with that."
"It might be--dangerous."
"I have made my peace with that as well."
"I might need a lot of help."
The laughter was very close to the surface now. "Master Bruce, I am an extremely peaceful man." There was a final flurry of snipping noises. "There. You look presentable now."
He held up a hand mirror and Bruce blinked at his reflection. He looked like a young businessman. Admittedly, a slightly emaciated young businessman. "Thank you," he said, meeting Alfred's eyes in the mirror.
Alfred looked away, busying himself with putting away the barber's tools. "I live to serve. We shall speak no more of it," he announced.
Bruce stared at himself in the mirror. When had he become an adult?
How had he become an adult without accomplishing anything he had set out to do ten years ago? Was it too late? Had he wasted the last decade?
It couldn't be too late.
: : :
They did nothing but kiss because sometimes kissing was overwhelming enough, sometimes it frightened him how the world could narrow to nothing but touch and breath and the rush of sensation. A mere hand on the hip was fodder for deliciously fevered dreams: the way the index fingers brushed the edge of the jeans pocket, the way the thumb rested on a hard hipbone, so tantalizingly near other hardness. There were countless ways to kiss and he intended to try them all.
"You cut your hair."
"Alfred did, actually."
"You cut your hair."
"You sound disappointed."
"I liked touching it."
A silence broken only by breathing.
"I can kiss the nape of your neck now."
"Yes. Yes, you can."
: : :
Clark was still asleep when there was a thump and something heavy landed on top of him. He startled awake, half-dreaming that he was fighting Cosmic King, but realized where he was before he threw his assailant across the room.
Which was good because it was Bruce, a newspaper clutched in one hand, straddling him on the bed with a fierce grin on his face.
Straddling him on his bed--!
Clark struggled to a sitting position. "Bruce!" he hissed. "My mother!"
"She's out working in the parterre garden, don't worry," Bruce said. He bent and kissed Clark's neck, swift as a striking falcon. "Look at the news." He held up the newspaper, folded to the headline: "Former Juror to Testify Against Mannheim".
"What? Let me see," said Clark, for a moment forgetting the alluring presence of Bruce on his lap.
Bruce opened the paper. "Mireles is going to testify that Mannheim threatened him to make him recant his verdict. He and his family have entered the Witness Protection Program."
"They'll have to leave Gotham, be given a new name," Clark said. "That's hard, leaving everything you know." A memory rose up in his mind for a moment: the scent of hay and the sour smell of the cows mingled, their lowing a part of the morning song.
Bruce brushed his lower lip with a thumb, his eyes sympathetic. "Renee will come back someday. I can tell. She belongs here." For a moment his eyes held that familiar gleam of possessive pride that always made Clark feel a little sad he didn't seem to have that bond to Gotham. Then he bent to nibble Clark's lower lip, letting the touch shift slowly to a deep kiss.
Eventually Clark broke the contact. "Geez, Bruce, what if my mother comes in?" He pushed Bruce gently off of him and climbed out of bed, trying not to show how reluctant he was to leave the embrace. "I'd better get dressed."
Bruce bounced on the bed very slightly. "Yes, you do that," he said.
Clark crossed his arms and looked at him.
"What?"
Clark felt his face heating up. "I'm not--You're not--"
Bruce's smile was both impish and sly. "Come on, Clark, it's not like I haven't seen it all before. This is your old buddy Bruce, remember? The one you used to go skinny dipping with?"
"We were eight! It's a little different now."
"Is it really?" Bruce raised curious eyebrows and moved his gaze downward. "How so? I mean, obviously bigger, I can tell that much, but--"
"Bruce!" Clark spoiled his outrage by starting to snicker uncontrollably. "Well, since you're so curious..." He hooked his thumbs in his pajama bottoms and slid them down an inch.
Bruce's eyes widened.
The screen door slammed.
Bruce was out of the bedroom almost faster than even Clark's eyes could follow. "Good morning, Mrs. Kent!" he chirped from the kitchen as Clark eased the door shut, heart pounding.
He was dressed a few minutes later and joined them in the kitchen, where his mother was pouring herself a cup of coffee and talking with Bruce about his plans. "Asia this time, I think," he was saying. "Japan, China, maybe Nepal."
"Oh my, that's so far away," Martha said with dismay. "Will you be leaving soon?"
Bruce shot a quick smiling glance at Clark. "Not until at least September. I want to spend the whole summer here."
Clark was glad his mother was looking down at a seed catalog and not at his flushed face at that moment. She finished up her coffee, rumpled Clark's hair, and invited Bruce to stay for supper, since Alfred was taking the night off to go to the movies with Dr. Thompkins. Then she was off to the gardens again.
"So what's on the agenda for today?" Bruce asked. "I have to go back and go over some Manor finances with Alfred, but I'll be done with that before lunch."
"I need to re-gravel the walks in the moon garden. Once I'm done with that, I'll be free to, um, to read," Clark said.
"Can I borrow that Sagan book when you're done with it? It looks interesting," Bruce said. When Clark nodded, he leaned in and kissed him--a kiss that was somehow more thrilling for being so matter-of-fact and casual. "I'll meet you over in the pine barrens? It's quiet there."
: : :
Rough tree bark against his back. Books tumbled on the ground forgotten. A blue jay shrieked and fell silent. Clark slipped his hands into Bruce's jeans pocket and Bruce could feel his fingers stroking, yearning, making it difficult to think at all. "So good," Clark murmured. "You feel so good." There were rusty pine needles in his hair and his eyes were dark with longing. Bruce pulled him close, grinding their hips together, pushing his leg between Clark's until Clark's mouth fell open and he made that sharp abandoned sound that Bruce would hear in his dreams for the next four years. He gasped and pushed hard against Bruce until his head dropped onto Bruce's shoulder as if exhausted.
"Damn you," he muttered into Bruce's shirt, his voice blurry and content.
"Hey, it's not my fault I have more self-control than you," Bruce said.
Clark's head came up and Bruce realized what the gleam in his eye was only as Clark was fumbling at his jeans button, and then pulling down his fly, and--Bruce heard himself moan as Clark wrapped a warm hand around his erection, Clark was touching him, and he hardly had time to register the fact before he was long past thinking. At some point during the climax his knees gave out and he eventually find himself sitting on the ground with Clark straddling him, looking quite pleased with himself. "Yep, you're Mr. Self Control," he smirked.
"Hnh," said Bruce, mostly because he was still too dazed to think of a snappy comeback.
"And look what I remembered," Clark announced, producing a small pack of tissues from his discarded jacket.
"Okay, you win," Bruce said.
Cleaned up and (mostly) recovered, they sat for a while under the tree, their arms around each other, listening to the birds and squirrels chatter. Bruce found himself tracing the "L" on Clark's gold ring. "You haven't seen your friends for ages," he said.
"Oh." Clark was silent for a moment. "About them." He seemed suddenly to be struggling for words. "They're--I'm--" He stopped and took a long breath. "They're...not as important to me as you are," he said finally, as if he had wanted to say something else but couldn't bring himself to do so. He muttered something that sounded like a curse under his breath.
"Hey, it's okay," said Bruce. He felt embarrassed at his jealousy now, since Clark had barely left his side all summer. Whatever this group was, it was clear they were no threat to what Clark and Bruce had together. "I hung out with Marc and the other kids you saw. You have your League."
"Legion," blurted Clark. "They call themselves the Legion. I wouldn't--" He ducked his head, hair falling across his eyes. "--There's only ever been one League."
Bruce lifted his hand and traced the gold "L" with his lips. L for laughter. L for lust and light and loyalty and--
--And everything else, he finished hurriedly before pulling Clark into another kiss.
: : :
Superboy was sitting with his chin propped in his hand, staring out of the Legion headquarters window with a distinctly dreamy smile on his face. Saturn Girl waved a hand in front of his face. "Saturn to Superboy," she said.
"Oh, Imra, I'm sorry," he said. "What were you saying?"
"Well, I was talking about the Legion election and who might win, but your thoughts seem to be elsewhere."
Superboy looked chagrined. "I'm sorry, I've been so--"
"--Distracted," she finished. "That's okay, Kal. It's been really quiet around here lately, no major emergencies. We only called you in to vote in the election, we know you're busy. You're heading to college soon, that's got to be almost as distracting as being in love."
"I'm really nervous about school," he admitted. "All the packing, and living in a dorm, and--wait, what?" He stared at her. "What was that about me being in--in--" He broke off and his eyes narrowed. "Have you been reading my mind?"
"What? No, I'd never do that!" she said vehemently. "Well, besides the sort of...really loud thoughts that are...kind of hard to block out sometimes." She noticed the tips of Superboy's ears were turning red and she added hurriedly, "But mostly I just kind of assumed, from the way you were acting--I'm really sorry, Superboy!"
Superboy's blush had spread to his entire face by now, but he smiled ruefully and shook his head. "That's okay, Imra," he said. "It's--it's okay." He let out a long breath. "It's a funny thing, you know? It can just sneak up on you, I guess."
"What, love?"
"Yeah," he said. "That."
: : :
The dark t-shirt was soaked with sweat, sticking to Bruce's chest in fascinating ways. His breath was coming in great gasps as he threw himself down on the grass next to Clark. Clark clicked the stopwatch and checked it. "Six minutes the first mile, eight the second, and eleven the third."
"Better," said Bruce after catching his breath. "I want to get the total down to twenty-one minutes." He rolled over and started to do push ups, but Clark knocked his hands out from under him and sent him tumbling.
"Time to rest."
Bruce made an annoyed sound that shifted into something else as Clark kissed him. "Granted, your incentives for resting are pretty compelling," he said breathlessly as the kiss broke.
"You can train to get stronger, but I'm not letting you kill yourself," Clark said, catching up Bruce's hands and kissing the fingers, tasting sweat and grass. He moved his mouth to the wrist, feeling the sweet murmur of life beneath his lips.
He kissed the crook of Bruce's elbow and Bruce flinched away, covering up the fading scars with his other hand.
There was a long pause, and then Bruce laughed shortly, an uncomfortable sound. "That was a stupid thing to do," he said, looking down at his arm.
Clark cocked his head to the side, considering. "I think crazy is a better description."
"Okay, stupid and crazy," Bruce said. He pushed himself away from Clark and looked away over the long, sloping lawn to where Wayne Manor sprawled in its decadent luxury. "I did it four times," he said. "Enough to get physically hooked." He rubbed at the crooks of his elbows. "It was easy," he said. "Warm, and nothing hurt, and I was safe and happy. A beautiful lie." He sighed, a long, slow sound. "And when it comes right down to it, I still don't understand what drives someone to it. I experienced the physical reactions, but not the--the despair. The need to escape suffering. I always had..." He paused. "Things to hold on to." He reached out and grasped Clark's arm without looking at him, his eyes cast down. "I always had hope to hold on to."
Clark put his arm around him, and after a while Bruce relaxed into his touch, leaning against him. Clark held him close, not really understanding, not really needing to. It was enough to be together for a while.
: : :
Martha Kent hung up the phone as Clark came in. "Oh, good timing," he said. "That was Rebecca."
Clark poured himself a glass of milk. "How are things going?"
"Well, there are some minor complications. Nothing major," she added hastily. "The doctor told her not to worry about it. But...I offered to go there and help out for a few weeks. Cook and clean, give her time to settle in with the baby. Mr. Pennyworth has told me for years I can take a vacation."
"All the way to St. Louis?" Clark tried to hide his spike of panic at the idea of having to leave Gotham--leave Bruce--for even a day. "But I need to pack for college and--and--"
Martha smiled. "I wouldn't expect you to come with me, Clark. Besides, I'd need someone to take care of the gardens while I was gone."
Clark tried to keep his expression neutral while inside his thoughts were churning--mainly with the realization that he might have two weeks of not worrying his mother might walk in on him and Bruce. Luckily, she had no idea something was up between them, or she would never consider leave him alone for so long.
"I can do that!" he said. "Though I'll miss you," he added maybe just a touch belatedly.
"And I will miss you too, little Star," Martha said. "But you're eighteen years old--even putting aside your time with the Legion, you're no child. You're a responsible adult who I can trust."
"Um, right!" said Clark, unsure whether helping kids flee hit men or making out with his best friend was a greater breach of responsibility.
Martha shook her head, laughter lurking in her eyes. "I need to talk to Mr. Pennyworth and then start packing. I'll make a list of things you need to get done while I'm gone."
: : :
A patch of sunlight falling across Clark's throat; Bruce kissed it, breathing in the scent of warm skin. Clark stirred and pulled the blankets up over both of their heads, trapping them in a cocoon of cloth together. The sunlight filtered through the blue flannel, filling their refuge with an unearthly blue glow.
Bruce was in bed with Clark. There was something different about being in a bed together rather than on a bench or the ground, Bruce thought. It was cozier. Also, sexier. It was right there in the verb: to bed.
Bruce contemplated the idea of bedding Clark and couldn't resist slinging a leg over Clark's hip and pulling him closer. Bruce was in jeans, but Clark was still in his flannel pajamas, and Bruce strongly suspected he wasn't wearing any underwear beneath them. The thought pulled a small noise out of him, like a startled whuffle.
"Mmm," said Clark, and kissed him.
Bruce couldn't seem to stop his hands from slipping under the pajamas to Clark's bare back, warm with sleep and sun. They slid down slowly, slowly, inch by inch, until they encountered the waistband. A quick exploration quickly determined that indeed, there was nothing under those pajamas. The knowledge seemed to freeze him in place, even as he cursed his clumsiness--he'd always been so glib and skilled when it didn't matter, so why was he an awkward, groping idiot now?
"Mm," Clark said again, and shifted under Bruce so that Bruce's hands ended up substantially lower than before. There was a lot of warm skin under Bruce's palms, and--God, muscles. He squeezed experimentally and Clark gasped and opened his mouth more and Bruce felt like he couldn't possibly get deep enough to be satisfied, ever.
"Touch me," said Clark as the kiss ended. "Please."
"I'm--I am touching you," Bruce stammered.
Clark chuckled and tensed his hips, sending delightful shocks of motion shuddering Bruce's hands. "Touch me everywhere," Clark clarified.
Bruce made an inarticulate noise that sounded desperate in his own ears, but his hands didn't move. The idea of being that intimate with Clark--with Clark!--seemed to paralyze him utterly. The concept was too big, too hot, too...frightening. An expanding sun that could engulf a solar system, setting everything ablaze. "I want to," he managed after a moment.
"Mmmm," Clark said, his voice sleepy and relaxed. "We've got time." He snuggled up against Bruce, trailing kisses along his neck, seemingly content.
Bruce, however, was not. Because based on his calendar with a late-August day circled in ominous red, they didn't have time. Clark would be leaving the Manor soon. Leaving him soon. The thought made him feel like things were falling apart, like he was falling apart inside.
He wrapped himself around Clark as if that would hold him together.
: : :
It was harder now, with his mother back. They'd gotten used to having the bungalow to themselves, and now it was difficult to not be able to kiss Bruce whenever he wanted to. Clark listening to his mother in the kitchen cooking, looked at Bruce perched on his bed next to his shabby old suitcase, and sighed slightly.
"You're not leaving for eleven more days," said Bruce. He was frowning, his arms crossed, and looked possibly even more adorable than when he was smiling. "There's no reason to pack so early."
"It makes Ma nervous if I don't start packing way in advance," Clark said, folding an argyle sweater.
"Are you really bringing that?" Bruce said.
"What's wrong with my sweater?"
"The color's all wrong for you. It makes you look washed-out. And the cut's bad. If you wear that, no one will look at you twice." Bruce stopped and pondered for a moment. "On second thought, pack that." He hopped off the bed and started rummaging through Clark's closet. "Do you have anything else in that color?"
Clark wasn't sure whether to laugh or blush, so he settled for touching the back of Bruce's hand, a fleeting contact. Then he picked up a long, thin box from the desk. "Can't forget this," he said, snapping it open to show Bruce the little letter opener.
"Hey, my present," said Bruce, his voice pleased.
"As if I'd begin my illustrious career as a reporter without it," Clark said. "I need to get you a matching one sometime, since we lost the original." He flashed a quick smile at Bruce. "Then we could duel each other with them."
Bruce laughed, a surprised bark. "You're a romantic," he said.
"And you're not?"
An aloof and haughty look. "Don't be ridiculous," Bruce said. Then he sneaked a quick glance toward the kitchen and pulled Clark into a corner for a kiss, apparently unaware that his fervor contradicted his words.
: : :
The entrance to the little cave in the cliff wall seemed smaller than it had been ten years ago; Bruce could wriggle through but Clark struggled a bit, cursing, and Bruce had to to tug at him until they both broke down into giggles in the dark.
When Clark finally got in, they stumbled and crawled together in the blackness to the flat stone near the back. There was no light at all, the darkness an absolute void all around them, but Bruce didn't find the darkness terrifying anymore.
Clark was leaving tomorrow.
Bruce's world was narrowed down to only the touch of Clark's hand in his, and then Clark's lips, greedy and giving, and for a moment Bruce let it narrow. In the dark, Clark's breathing seemed louder. Hands slipped under Bruce's shirt, brushing up along his ribs, and Bruce didn't even try to repress the shudder of desire and delight that rippled through him at the touch.
"I don't want to go," Clark whispered, a tiny thread of sound in the dark.
"You need to."
"I know." A silence broken only by soft wet breaths, by clumsy blind touches. "Remember we swore we'd be best friends forever, right here?"
"Yes."
"Will we be? Bruce, will we?"
Things had been uncomplicated then; now everything was a snarl of emotions and needs and things Bruce could hardly bear to look at. He wasn't sure friends felt like this about each other, but if friends didn't feel like this, he didn't want to be Clark's friend. He wanted to feel like this forever, shaking with a need to keep Clark close, to touch him, to share everything with him--his thoughts, his dreams, his body. Too big, too strong: a black hole with an event horizon long passed, a supernova with a shock wave as fast as light itself.
Words failed him in the face of the titanic forces ripping at him. So instead he kissed Clark again, his hands fumbling down Clark's chest and lower, to find a button and then a zipper, the small sound loud in the silence of the cave. He tugged and Clark breathed in, almost a gasp, and lifted his hips, the jeans sliding downward at Bruce's pull.
He slid his hands up along Clark's thighs to find the underwear and pulled that down too.
"Bruce," said Clark. His voice was disembodied in the inky blackness of the cave, not even a smudge of light to indicate where his face was. Bruce could feel him shaking. "Bruce," he said again.
Bruce went down on his knees in the darkness, pushing Clark's thighs gently apart, pushing up his t-shirt until he was pressed up against Clark. Clark groaned and Bruce could feel his erection pushing against his chest, hard and insistent.
He slid downward, trailing kisses along Clark's impossibly perfect abdomen, until his mouth was at the base of Clark's cock. He licked it lightly, inhaling the scent, and Clark said, "Oh God," with a sort of blank amazement in his voice. "Oh God, are you--Bruce, you're not going to--"
Bruce wrapped one hand around him and took the head of his cock in his mouth.
Clark made a sharp noise and his hands were suddenly in Bruce's hair, trembling. His thighs were trembling too, as if he were trying to keep from surging forward.
Bruce relaxed and took Clark's whole length into his mouth.
He'd done this before, and developed a sort of remote technical skill that he was abstractly proud of. But it hadn't ever been Clark, hadn't been Clark panting and groaning and saying his name, and there was nothing remote or abstract about this at all. Bruce rocked forward against his own aching erection, savoring the hot silky wetness, the sound of Clark's voice. "That's--that's--oh, yes, that," Clark stuttered. "Do that, do it, do it more." Meaningless phrases, stammered into the dark, each one like a touch of rapturous electricity along Bruce's own cock.
He heard himself make a purring, throaty sound of delight, and Clark's hips bucked against him. "Bruce," Clark said, alarm staining his voice. "I think you'd better--I think I'm going to--" His hands found Bruce's shoulders in the dark, started to push him away.
Bruce shook off the touch with a growl, lost in a delirium of sensation, wanting to feel the moment he made Clark climax, needing to feel its reality. Clark made a high, lost sound, raising his hips high, and Bruce swallowed until he went limp and shaking.
Still rapt and aroused, Bruce raised his head as if to meet Clark's eyes, but of course he could see nothing, just blackness on blackness. He realized what a sight he must be, his eyes half closed and the pupils dilated with lust and darkness, face flushed with abandonment and naked need, and he was relieved for a moment Clark couldn't see him. He licked his lips with an almost wanton relish, enjoying the safety of the dark, and Clark groaned achingly.
Clark's hand touched Bruce's cheek in the dark.
Bruce leaned into it, still staring at where Clark's face would be if they could see each other. He felt his lips move without sound, silently shaping the three words he couldn't say, words he had never even let himself whisper. He wasn't sure if he was sorry or relieved that the darkness hid his face from Clark.
Then he moved up to find and capture Clark's mouth with his own.
Clark shivered against him, and when Bruce touched his face his fingers came away wet. But by the time they collected themselves and left the cave, his eyes were dry again, and Bruce decided not to bring it up.
: : :
The morning sun was merciless in Bruce's eyes. He stood with Alfred, watching Clark swing his last suitcase into the car trunk. Martha was in the front seat, the motor idling. It was time for Clark to go.
Clark closed the trunk, then walked slowly over to Bruce and Alfred, his feet shuffling on the driveway, his eyes down. "I'll see you again soon, Mr. Pennyworth," he said, shaking Alfred's hand. Then he turned to Bruce.
"I hope your trip to Asia goes well," he said. His voice was formal. Behind the thick glasses, his eyes were anything but. "I--I--I'll miss you." He stuck his hand out.
Alfred and Martha were watching them. Bruce took his hand, pumped it politely. "I'll think of you often," he said.
"I'm sure I'll see you when you come back."
"I'm certain of it. Good luck in classes." Clark hadn't let go of his hand, and Bruce couldn't bring himself to release that last bit of contact, that final warm touch.
Martha Kent leaned out the car window. "For heaven's sake, Clark Kent, are you going to hug him or not?"
Clark's eyebrows went up. Then he stepped forward and swept Bruce into a hug.
Bruce wrapped his arms around him and held on with all his might.
"This is hard," mumbled Clark. "I didn't think it would be so hard."
"I'll see you again," said Bruce.
Clark turned his head and pressed a hasty, clumsy kiss into Bruce's hair, blurting something out in a low voice. He turned and ran to the car, and was closing the door before Bruce realized what he had said.
He waved goodbye until the car vanished around the bend, letting the words sink into him like a stone into dark water, plunging toward his heart.
"I love you, Bruce Wayne."
: : :
The Manor seemed to ache with emptiness. The moon garden was as blank and meaningless as the moon itself. The roses nodded to no one. Even the statues gazed with fixed marble eyes at nothingness.
: : :
Martha Kent was coming down the path in the rose garden, humming to herself, when she rounded a corner and found Bruce Wayne sitting on a bench, staring at the twilight sky.
"Excuse me," Martha said hastily as Bruce turned to look at her. "I didn't know you were--"
"--It's all right," Bruce said. "I was just reading."
Martha decided not to mention that it was easier to read if the book were not closed and discarded on the bench beside you. Instead she moved closer and picked it up: Cosmos, by Carl Sagan.
"It's Clark's book," Bruce said. "He loaned it to me."
"It's one of his favorites."
"I know. He's crazy about all that star stuff, he always has been."
Martha sat down on the bench beside Bruce, watching his profile. Sometimes it was hard to believe that the little boy who had run around playing with her son was an adult now.
"You're not?"
Bruce made an impatient gesture. "Sure, but--it's so big. Countless suns in countless galaxies, and even our sun is just the tiniest speck. How could--" He shook his head. "How could any of us mean anything in something that vast? Why do any of us...why do any of us matter..." His voice trailed off and he swallowed hard.
Martha put a hand on his back, the shoulders tense beneath her touch. "I miss him too," she said.
She expected him to shrug off her hand, or at best to tolerate her touch--Bruce had never been a cuddly child, and over the years he had grown downright prickly. So she was shocked when he turned into her touch and buried his head on her shoulder. Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around him, rocking him slightly.
"It's all so big," he said, his voice muffled by her shoulder. It might have been shaking.
Martha Kent sat with her arms around him for a long time, watching the stars come slowly into view as the skies darkened.
: : :
The duffel bag gaped open, only half-full. Bruce had learned to get by on very little in the last year. "Might I suggest another warm sweater?" Alfred suggested.
Bruce pulled a heavy black sweater out of the drawer and added it. "I don't need much. Yoru-sensei said to bring only essentials."
"You seem skilled at paring things down to essentials," Alfred noted. "I shall go bring the car around, if you're ready to leave."
Bruce nodded. He was ready to leave. One summer together, he had told Clark, and Clark had seemed okay with that. It had been all he could safely promise.
But the future was starting to come together in Bruce's mind. He'd be back someday, with the knowledge and the skill to fight for Gotham. He wasn't sure how Clark fit into that vision, but he knew that he would never be content with just the memory of that one summer.
Car wheels crunched on gravel as Alfred came up the drive. One last thing to pack.
Reaching into the back of one drawer, he pulled out a long, thin box. He ran one finger across the top of it, then opened it, the hinges stiff, as if he did this only rarely. He touched the silver letter opener inside, brushing the glass gems--dark blue where Clark's were red--like beads on a rosary.
Then he slipped the Sword of Oaths into his bag, slung it over his shoulder, and ran downstairs to meet Alfred.
(End of Arc 4. The final arc picks up four years in the future with Chapter 34.)
Title: Chapter Thirty-Three: Event Horizon
Pairing/Characters: Clark/Bruce, Alfred Pennyworth, Martha Kent
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: None necessary
Continuity: The Gardens of Wayne Manor is an AU series in which Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne's lives intertwine at an early age. Click here for the complete series and series notes.
Word Count: 5900Summary: Scenes from a summer.
Running home from school, up the drive, struggling to run normally when he could be there already and it had been all day since--
He saw him waiting at the gate of the moon garden, and then they were inside its tall hedges, safe from the world. Hands shaking to pull him close into the first kiss of the day, the best one.
The second one was better.
For the first month, they did nothing but kiss.
: : :
"I will not tolerate it a moment longer, Master Bruce." Bruce looked up, startled, at Alfred's vehement tone, to find the butler holding a pair of scissors. "Perhaps you are content to look like a teenage werewolf, but I insist on a trim. Soon you will have to pull it back in a ponytail, and that is simply beyond the pale, sir." When Bruce didn't leap into action, Alfred said, with the air of someone playing his trump card, "You need to look your best for Master Clark, do you not?"
Bruce almost dropped his book. "What?"
"Aren't you going to his graduation in a few weeks?" Alfred's frown was ominous. "I can't imagine you wouldn't want to look presentable."
"Oh." Bruce relaxed again. "I guess you're right."
"Of course I am." Alfred bustled him into the kitchen and sat him down on a stool. "Hold still."
Bruce closed his eyes and listened to the crisp silvery sound of the scissors, felt Alfred's presence hovering near him. "You haven't asked me if I'll be staying this time," he said.
The busy scissors didn't pause. "It's not my business, sir."
Bruce frowned, feeling a flicker of unexpected anger. "Of course it's your business. You're always here for me, always taking care of me, you're--you're my only family."
The scissors slowed, stopped. For a moment, Alfred rested both hands on his shoulders. "My dear boy," he said. Bruce could hear him swallow in the silence that followed. Then the scissors went back to work, more slowly this time. "I have always wondered," Alfred said, "If I should have insisted on going with you to Europe. Or even to Milton. Your parents made me your guardian, but I have--failed to guard you well, I fear."
Bruce kept his eyes closed, feeling suddenly almost shy. He and Alfred had never talked about things like this. They'd never seemed to need to. "But I always knew," he said haltingly, "That--that you were here if I needed you. That you'd always be there for me."
"As long as I live." Five simple words, but Alfred made them sound like a vow.
"I might--" Bruce hesitated. The vision of the future loomed large and dark and formless before him. "I might not live the life my parents would have wanted. I might not come home to get married and have kids and give garden parties."
"Master Bruce." Alfred's voice had an edge of irony to it. "You were unlikely at any time to live a boring life. Believe it or not, I have made my peace with that."
"It might be--dangerous."
"I have made my peace with that as well."
"I might need a lot of help."
The laughter was very close to the surface now. "Master Bruce, I am an extremely peaceful man." There was a final flurry of snipping noises. "There. You look presentable now."
He held up a hand mirror and Bruce blinked at his reflection. He looked like a young businessman. Admittedly, a slightly emaciated young businessman. "Thank you," he said, meeting Alfred's eyes in the mirror.
Alfred looked away, busying himself with putting away the barber's tools. "I live to serve. We shall speak no more of it," he announced.
Bruce stared at himself in the mirror. When had he become an adult?
How had he become an adult without accomplishing anything he had set out to do ten years ago? Was it too late? Had he wasted the last decade?
It couldn't be too late.
: : :
They did nothing but kiss because sometimes kissing was overwhelming enough, sometimes it frightened him how the world could narrow to nothing but touch and breath and the rush of sensation. A mere hand on the hip was fodder for deliciously fevered dreams: the way the index fingers brushed the edge of the jeans pocket, the way the thumb rested on a hard hipbone, so tantalizingly near other hardness. There were countless ways to kiss and he intended to try them all.
"You cut your hair."
"Alfred did, actually."
"You cut your hair."
"You sound disappointed."
"I liked touching it."
A silence broken only by breathing.
"I can kiss the nape of your neck now."
"Yes. Yes, you can."
: : :
Clark was still asleep when there was a thump and something heavy landed on top of him. He startled awake, half-dreaming that he was fighting Cosmic King, but realized where he was before he threw his assailant across the room.
Which was good because it was Bruce, a newspaper clutched in one hand, straddling him on the bed with a fierce grin on his face.
Straddling him on his bed--!
Clark struggled to a sitting position. "Bruce!" he hissed. "My mother!"
"She's out working in the parterre garden, don't worry," Bruce said. He bent and kissed Clark's neck, swift as a striking falcon. "Look at the news." He held up the newspaper, folded to the headline: "Former Juror to Testify Against Mannheim".
"What? Let me see," said Clark, for a moment forgetting the alluring presence of Bruce on his lap.
Bruce opened the paper. "Mireles is going to testify that Mannheim threatened him to make him recant his verdict. He and his family have entered the Witness Protection Program."
"They'll have to leave Gotham, be given a new name," Clark said. "That's hard, leaving everything you know." A memory rose up in his mind for a moment: the scent of hay and the sour smell of the cows mingled, their lowing a part of the morning song.
Bruce brushed his lower lip with a thumb, his eyes sympathetic. "Renee will come back someday. I can tell. She belongs here." For a moment his eyes held that familiar gleam of possessive pride that always made Clark feel a little sad he didn't seem to have that bond to Gotham. Then he bent to nibble Clark's lower lip, letting the touch shift slowly to a deep kiss.
Eventually Clark broke the contact. "Geez, Bruce, what if my mother comes in?" He pushed Bruce gently off of him and climbed out of bed, trying not to show how reluctant he was to leave the embrace. "I'd better get dressed."
Bruce bounced on the bed very slightly. "Yes, you do that," he said.
Clark crossed his arms and looked at him.
"What?"
Clark felt his face heating up. "I'm not--You're not--"
Bruce's smile was both impish and sly. "Come on, Clark, it's not like I haven't seen it all before. This is your old buddy Bruce, remember? The one you used to go skinny dipping with?"
"We were eight! It's a little different now."
"Is it really?" Bruce raised curious eyebrows and moved his gaze downward. "How so? I mean, obviously bigger, I can tell that much, but--"
"Bruce!" Clark spoiled his outrage by starting to snicker uncontrollably. "Well, since you're so curious..." He hooked his thumbs in his pajama bottoms and slid them down an inch.
Bruce's eyes widened.
The screen door slammed.
Bruce was out of the bedroom almost faster than even Clark's eyes could follow. "Good morning, Mrs. Kent!" he chirped from the kitchen as Clark eased the door shut, heart pounding.
He was dressed a few minutes later and joined them in the kitchen, where his mother was pouring herself a cup of coffee and talking with Bruce about his plans. "Asia this time, I think," he was saying. "Japan, China, maybe Nepal."
"Oh my, that's so far away," Martha said with dismay. "Will you be leaving soon?"
Bruce shot a quick smiling glance at Clark. "Not until at least September. I want to spend the whole summer here."
Clark was glad his mother was looking down at a seed catalog and not at his flushed face at that moment. She finished up her coffee, rumpled Clark's hair, and invited Bruce to stay for supper, since Alfred was taking the night off to go to the movies with Dr. Thompkins. Then she was off to the gardens again.
"So what's on the agenda for today?" Bruce asked. "I have to go back and go over some Manor finances with Alfred, but I'll be done with that before lunch."
"I need to re-gravel the walks in the moon garden. Once I'm done with that, I'll be free to, um, to read," Clark said.
"Can I borrow that Sagan book when you're done with it? It looks interesting," Bruce said. When Clark nodded, he leaned in and kissed him--a kiss that was somehow more thrilling for being so matter-of-fact and casual. "I'll meet you over in the pine barrens? It's quiet there."
: : :
Rough tree bark against his back. Books tumbled on the ground forgotten. A blue jay shrieked and fell silent. Clark slipped his hands into Bruce's jeans pocket and Bruce could feel his fingers stroking, yearning, making it difficult to think at all. "So good," Clark murmured. "You feel so good." There were rusty pine needles in his hair and his eyes were dark with longing. Bruce pulled him close, grinding their hips together, pushing his leg between Clark's until Clark's mouth fell open and he made that sharp abandoned sound that Bruce would hear in his dreams for the next four years. He gasped and pushed hard against Bruce until his head dropped onto Bruce's shoulder as if exhausted.
"Damn you," he muttered into Bruce's shirt, his voice blurry and content.
"Hey, it's not my fault I have more self-control than you," Bruce said.
Clark's head came up and Bruce realized what the gleam in his eye was only as Clark was fumbling at his jeans button, and then pulling down his fly, and--Bruce heard himself moan as Clark wrapped a warm hand around his erection, Clark was touching him, and he hardly had time to register the fact before he was long past thinking. At some point during the climax his knees gave out and he eventually find himself sitting on the ground with Clark straddling him, looking quite pleased with himself. "Yep, you're Mr. Self Control," he smirked.
"Hnh," said Bruce, mostly because he was still too dazed to think of a snappy comeback.
"And look what I remembered," Clark announced, producing a small pack of tissues from his discarded jacket.
"Okay, you win," Bruce said.
Cleaned up and (mostly) recovered, they sat for a while under the tree, their arms around each other, listening to the birds and squirrels chatter. Bruce found himself tracing the "L" on Clark's gold ring. "You haven't seen your friends for ages," he said.
"Oh." Clark was silent for a moment. "About them." He seemed suddenly to be struggling for words. "They're--I'm--" He stopped and took a long breath. "They're...not as important to me as you are," he said finally, as if he had wanted to say something else but couldn't bring himself to do so. He muttered something that sounded like a curse under his breath.
"Hey, it's okay," said Bruce. He felt embarrassed at his jealousy now, since Clark had barely left his side all summer. Whatever this group was, it was clear they were no threat to what Clark and Bruce had together. "I hung out with Marc and the other kids you saw. You have your League."
"Legion," blurted Clark. "They call themselves the Legion. I wouldn't--" He ducked his head, hair falling across his eyes. "--There's only ever been one League."
Bruce lifted his hand and traced the gold "L" with his lips. L for laughter. L for lust and light and loyalty and--
--And everything else, he finished hurriedly before pulling Clark into another kiss.
: : :
Superboy was sitting with his chin propped in his hand, staring out of the Legion headquarters window with a distinctly dreamy smile on his face. Saturn Girl waved a hand in front of his face. "Saturn to Superboy," she said.
"Oh, Imra, I'm sorry," he said. "What were you saying?"
"Well, I was talking about the Legion election and who might win, but your thoughts seem to be elsewhere."
Superboy looked chagrined. "I'm sorry, I've been so--"
"--Distracted," she finished. "That's okay, Kal. It's been really quiet around here lately, no major emergencies. We only called you in to vote in the election, we know you're busy. You're heading to college soon, that's got to be almost as distracting as being in love."
"I'm really nervous about school," he admitted. "All the packing, and living in a dorm, and--wait, what?" He stared at her. "What was that about me being in--in--" He broke off and his eyes narrowed. "Have you been reading my mind?"
"What? No, I'd never do that!" she said vehemently. "Well, besides the sort of...really loud thoughts that are...kind of hard to block out sometimes." She noticed the tips of Superboy's ears were turning red and she added hurriedly, "But mostly I just kind of assumed, from the way you were acting--I'm really sorry, Superboy!"
Superboy's blush had spread to his entire face by now, but he smiled ruefully and shook his head. "That's okay, Imra," he said. "It's--it's okay." He let out a long breath. "It's a funny thing, you know? It can just sneak up on you, I guess."
"What, love?"
"Yeah," he said. "That."
: : :
The dark t-shirt was soaked with sweat, sticking to Bruce's chest in fascinating ways. His breath was coming in great gasps as he threw himself down on the grass next to Clark. Clark clicked the stopwatch and checked it. "Six minutes the first mile, eight the second, and eleven the third."
"Better," said Bruce after catching his breath. "I want to get the total down to twenty-one minutes." He rolled over and started to do push ups, but Clark knocked his hands out from under him and sent him tumbling.
"Time to rest."
Bruce made an annoyed sound that shifted into something else as Clark kissed him. "Granted, your incentives for resting are pretty compelling," he said breathlessly as the kiss broke.
"You can train to get stronger, but I'm not letting you kill yourself," Clark said, catching up Bruce's hands and kissing the fingers, tasting sweat and grass. He moved his mouth to the wrist, feeling the sweet murmur of life beneath his lips.
He kissed the crook of Bruce's elbow and Bruce flinched away, covering up the fading scars with his other hand.
There was a long pause, and then Bruce laughed shortly, an uncomfortable sound. "That was a stupid thing to do," he said, looking down at his arm.
Clark cocked his head to the side, considering. "I think crazy is a better description."
"Okay, stupid and crazy," Bruce said. He pushed himself away from Clark and looked away over the long, sloping lawn to where Wayne Manor sprawled in its decadent luxury. "I did it four times," he said. "Enough to get physically hooked." He rubbed at the crooks of his elbows. "It was easy," he said. "Warm, and nothing hurt, and I was safe and happy. A beautiful lie." He sighed, a long, slow sound. "And when it comes right down to it, I still don't understand what drives someone to it. I experienced the physical reactions, but not the--the despair. The need to escape suffering. I always had..." He paused. "Things to hold on to." He reached out and grasped Clark's arm without looking at him, his eyes cast down. "I always had hope to hold on to."
Clark put his arm around him, and after a while Bruce relaxed into his touch, leaning against him. Clark held him close, not really understanding, not really needing to. It was enough to be together for a while.
: : :
Martha Kent hung up the phone as Clark came in. "Oh, good timing," he said. "That was Rebecca."
Clark poured himself a glass of milk. "How are things going?"
"Well, there are some minor complications. Nothing major," she added hastily. "The doctor told her not to worry about it. But...I offered to go there and help out for a few weeks. Cook and clean, give her time to settle in with the baby. Mr. Pennyworth has told me for years I can take a vacation."
"All the way to St. Louis?" Clark tried to hide his spike of panic at the idea of having to leave Gotham--leave Bruce--for even a day. "But I need to pack for college and--and--"
Martha smiled. "I wouldn't expect you to come with me, Clark. Besides, I'd need someone to take care of the gardens while I was gone."
Clark tried to keep his expression neutral while inside his thoughts were churning--mainly with the realization that he might have two weeks of not worrying his mother might walk in on him and Bruce. Luckily, she had no idea something was up between them, or she would never consider leave him alone for so long.
"I can do that!" he said. "Though I'll miss you," he added maybe just a touch belatedly.
"And I will miss you too, little Star," Martha said. "But you're eighteen years old--even putting aside your time with the Legion, you're no child. You're a responsible adult who I can trust."
"Um, right!" said Clark, unsure whether helping kids flee hit men or making out with his best friend was a greater breach of responsibility.
Martha shook her head, laughter lurking in her eyes. "I need to talk to Mr. Pennyworth and then start packing. I'll make a list of things you need to get done while I'm gone."
: : :
A patch of sunlight falling across Clark's throat; Bruce kissed it, breathing in the scent of warm skin. Clark stirred and pulled the blankets up over both of their heads, trapping them in a cocoon of cloth together. The sunlight filtered through the blue flannel, filling their refuge with an unearthly blue glow.
Bruce was in bed with Clark. There was something different about being in a bed together rather than on a bench or the ground, Bruce thought. It was cozier. Also, sexier. It was right there in the verb: to bed.
Bruce contemplated the idea of bedding Clark and couldn't resist slinging a leg over Clark's hip and pulling him closer. Bruce was in jeans, but Clark was still in his flannel pajamas, and Bruce strongly suspected he wasn't wearing any underwear beneath them. The thought pulled a small noise out of him, like a startled whuffle.
"Mmm," said Clark, and kissed him.
Bruce couldn't seem to stop his hands from slipping under the pajamas to Clark's bare back, warm with sleep and sun. They slid down slowly, slowly, inch by inch, until they encountered the waistband. A quick exploration quickly determined that indeed, there was nothing under those pajamas. The knowledge seemed to freeze him in place, even as he cursed his clumsiness--he'd always been so glib and skilled when it didn't matter, so why was he an awkward, groping idiot now?
"Mm," Clark said again, and shifted under Bruce so that Bruce's hands ended up substantially lower than before. There was a lot of warm skin under Bruce's palms, and--God, muscles. He squeezed experimentally and Clark gasped and opened his mouth more and Bruce felt like he couldn't possibly get deep enough to be satisfied, ever.
"Touch me," said Clark as the kiss ended. "Please."
"I'm--I am touching you," Bruce stammered.
Clark chuckled and tensed his hips, sending delightful shocks of motion shuddering Bruce's hands. "Touch me everywhere," Clark clarified.
Bruce made an inarticulate noise that sounded desperate in his own ears, but his hands didn't move. The idea of being that intimate with Clark--with Clark!--seemed to paralyze him utterly. The concept was too big, too hot, too...frightening. An expanding sun that could engulf a solar system, setting everything ablaze. "I want to," he managed after a moment.
"Mmmm," Clark said, his voice sleepy and relaxed. "We've got time." He snuggled up against Bruce, trailing kisses along his neck, seemingly content.
Bruce, however, was not. Because based on his calendar with a late-August day circled in ominous red, they didn't have time. Clark would be leaving the Manor soon. Leaving him soon. The thought made him feel like things were falling apart, like he was falling apart inside.
He wrapped himself around Clark as if that would hold him together.
: : :
It was harder now, with his mother back. They'd gotten used to having the bungalow to themselves, and now it was difficult to not be able to kiss Bruce whenever he wanted to. Clark listening to his mother in the kitchen cooking, looked at Bruce perched on his bed next to his shabby old suitcase, and sighed slightly.
"You're not leaving for eleven more days," said Bruce. He was frowning, his arms crossed, and looked possibly even more adorable than when he was smiling. "There's no reason to pack so early."
"It makes Ma nervous if I don't start packing way in advance," Clark said, folding an argyle sweater.
"Are you really bringing that?" Bruce said.
"What's wrong with my sweater?"
"The color's all wrong for you. It makes you look washed-out. And the cut's bad. If you wear that, no one will look at you twice." Bruce stopped and pondered for a moment. "On second thought, pack that." He hopped off the bed and started rummaging through Clark's closet. "Do you have anything else in that color?"
Clark wasn't sure whether to laugh or blush, so he settled for touching the back of Bruce's hand, a fleeting contact. Then he picked up a long, thin box from the desk. "Can't forget this," he said, snapping it open to show Bruce the little letter opener.
"Hey, my present," said Bruce, his voice pleased.
"As if I'd begin my illustrious career as a reporter without it," Clark said. "I need to get you a matching one sometime, since we lost the original." He flashed a quick smile at Bruce. "Then we could duel each other with them."
Bruce laughed, a surprised bark. "You're a romantic," he said.
"And you're not?"
An aloof and haughty look. "Don't be ridiculous," Bruce said. Then he sneaked a quick glance toward the kitchen and pulled Clark into a corner for a kiss, apparently unaware that his fervor contradicted his words.
: : :
The entrance to the little cave in the cliff wall seemed smaller than it had been ten years ago; Bruce could wriggle through but Clark struggled a bit, cursing, and Bruce had to to tug at him until they both broke down into giggles in the dark.
When Clark finally got in, they stumbled and crawled together in the blackness to the flat stone near the back. There was no light at all, the darkness an absolute void all around them, but Bruce didn't find the darkness terrifying anymore.
Clark was leaving tomorrow.
Bruce's world was narrowed down to only the touch of Clark's hand in his, and then Clark's lips, greedy and giving, and for a moment Bruce let it narrow. In the dark, Clark's breathing seemed louder. Hands slipped under Bruce's shirt, brushing up along his ribs, and Bruce didn't even try to repress the shudder of desire and delight that rippled through him at the touch.
"I don't want to go," Clark whispered, a tiny thread of sound in the dark.
"You need to."
"I know." A silence broken only by soft wet breaths, by clumsy blind touches. "Remember we swore we'd be best friends forever, right here?"
"Yes."
"Will we be? Bruce, will we?"
Things had been uncomplicated then; now everything was a snarl of emotions and needs and things Bruce could hardly bear to look at. He wasn't sure friends felt like this about each other, but if friends didn't feel like this, he didn't want to be Clark's friend. He wanted to feel like this forever, shaking with a need to keep Clark close, to touch him, to share everything with him--his thoughts, his dreams, his body. Too big, too strong: a black hole with an event horizon long passed, a supernova with a shock wave as fast as light itself.
Words failed him in the face of the titanic forces ripping at him. So instead he kissed Clark again, his hands fumbling down Clark's chest and lower, to find a button and then a zipper, the small sound loud in the silence of the cave. He tugged and Clark breathed in, almost a gasp, and lifted his hips, the jeans sliding downward at Bruce's pull.
He slid his hands up along Clark's thighs to find the underwear and pulled that down too.
"Bruce," said Clark. His voice was disembodied in the inky blackness of the cave, not even a smudge of light to indicate where his face was. Bruce could feel him shaking. "Bruce," he said again.
Bruce went down on his knees in the darkness, pushing Clark's thighs gently apart, pushing up his t-shirt until he was pressed up against Clark. Clark groaned and Bruce could feel his erection pushing against his chest, hard and insistent.
He slid downward, trailing kisses along Clark's impossibly perfect abdomen, until his mouth was at the base of Clark's cock. He licked it lightly, inhaling the scent, and Clark said, "Oh God," with a sort of blank amazement in his voice. "Oh God, are you--Bruce, you're not going to--"
Bruce wrapped one hand around him and took the head of his cock in his mouth.
Clark made a sharp noise and his hands were suddenly in Bruce's hair, trembling. His thighs were trembling too, as if he were trying to keep from surging forward.
Bruce relaxed and took Clark's whole length into his mouth.
He'd done this before, and developed a sort of remote technical skill that he was abstractly proud of. But it hadn't ever been Clark, hadn't been Clark panting and groaning and saying his name, and there was nothing remote or abstract about this at all. Bruce rocked forward against his own aching erection, savoring the hot silky wetness, the sound of Clark's voice. "That's--that's--oh, yes, that," Clark stuttered. "Do that, do it, do it more." Meaningless phrases, stammered into the dark, each one like a touch of rapturous electricity along Bruce's own cock.
He heard himself make a purring, throaty sound of delight, and Clark's hips bucked against him. "Bruce," Clark said, alarm staining his voice. "I think you'd better--I think I'm going to--" His hands found Bruce's shoulders in the dark, started to push him away.
Bruce shook off the touch with a growl, lost in a delirium of sensation, wanting to feel the moment he made Clark climax, needing to feel its reality. Clark made a high, lost sound, raising his hips high, and Bruce swallowed until he went limp and shaking.
Still rapt and aroused, Bruce raised his head as if to meet Clark's eyes, but of course he could see nothing, just blackness on blackness. He realized what a sight he must be, his eyes half closed and the pupils dilated with lust and darkness, face flushed with abandonment and naked need, and he was relieved for a moment Clark couldn't see him. He licked his lips with an almost wanton relish, enjoying the safety of the dark, and Clark groaned achingly.
Clark's hand touched Bruce's cheek in the dark.
Bruce leaned into it, still staring at where Clark's face would be if they could see each other. He felt his lips move without sound, silently shaping the three words he couldn't say, words he had never even let himself whisper. He wasn't sure if he was sorry or relieved that the darkness hid his face from Clark.
Then he moved up to find and capture Clark's mouth with his own.
Clark shivered against him, and when Bruce touched his face his fingers came away wet. But by the time they collected themselves and left the cave, his eyes were dry again, and Bruce decided not to bring it up.
: : :
The morning sun was merciless in Bruce's eyes. He stood with Alfred, watching Clark swing his last suitcase into the car trunk. Martha was in the front seat, the motor idling. It was time for Clark to go.
Clark closed the trunk, then walked slowly over to Bruce and Alfred, his feet shuffling on the driveway, his eyes down. "I'll see you again soon, Mr. Pennyworth," he said, shaking Alfred's hand. Then he turned to Bruce.
"I hope your trip to Asia goes well," he said. His voice was formal. Behind the thick glasses, his eyes were anything but. "I--I--I'll miss you." He stuck his hand out.
Alfred and Martha were watching them. Bruce took his hand, pumped it politely. "I'll think of you often," he said.
"I'm sure I'll see you when you come back."
"I'm certain of it. Good luck in classes." Clark hadn't let go of his hand, and Bruce couldn't bring himself to release that last bit of contact, that final warm touch.
Martha Kent leaned out the car window. "For heaven's sake, Clark Kent, are you going to hug him or not?"
Clark's eyebrows went up. Then he stepped forward and swept Bruce into a hug.
Bruce wrapped his arms around him and held on with all his might.
"This is hard," mumbled Clark. "I didn't think it would be so hard."
"I'll see you again," said Bruce.
Clark turned his head and pressed a hasty, clumsy kiss into Bruce's hair, blurting something out in a low voice. He turned and ran to the car, and was closing the door before Bruce realized what he had said.
He waved goodbye until the car vanished around the bend, letting the words sink into him like a stone into dark water, plunging toward his heart.
"I love you, Bruce Wayne."
: : :
The Manor seemed to ache with emptiness. The moon garden was as blank and meaningless as the moon itself. The roses nodded to no one. Even the statues gazed with fixed marble eyes at nothingness.
: : :
Martha Kent was coming down the path in the rose garden, humming to herself, when she rounded a corner and found Bruce Wayne sitting on a bench, staring at the twilight sky.
"Excuse me," Martha said hastily as Bruce turned to look at her. "I didn't know you were--"
"--It's all right," Bruce said. "I was just reading."
Martha decided not to mention that it was easier to read if the book were not closed and discarded on the bench beside you. Instead she moved closer and picked it up: Cosmos, by Carl Sagan.
"It's Clark's book," Bruce said. "He loaned it to me."
"It's one of his favorites."
"I know. He's crazy about all that star stuff, he always has been."
Martha sat down on the bench beside Bruce, watching his profile. Sometimes it was hard to believe that the little boy who had run around playing with her son was an adult now.
"You're not?"
Bruce made an impatient gesture. "Sure, but--it's so big. Countless suns in countless galaxies, and even our sun is just the tiniest speck. How could--" He shook his head. "How could any of us mean anything in something that vast? Why do any of us...why do any of us matter..." His voice trailed off and he swallowed hard.
Martha put a hand on his back, the shoulders tense beneath her touch. "I miss him too," she said.
She expected him to shrug off her hand, or at best to tolerate her touch--Bruce had never been a cuddly child, and over the years he had grown downright prickly. So she was shocked when he turned into her touch and buried his head on her shoulder. Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around him, rocking him slightly.
"It's all so big," he said, his voice muffled by her shoulder. It might have been shaking.
Martha Kent sat with her arms around him for a long time, watching the stars come slowly into view as the skies darkened.
: : :
The duffel bag gaped open, only half-full. Bruce had learned to get by on very little in the last year. "Might I suggest another warm sweater?" Alfred suggested.
Bruce pulled a heavy black sweater out of the drawer and added it. "I don't need much. Yoru-sensei said to bring only essentials."
"You seem skilled at paring things down to essentials," Alfred noted. "I shall go bring the car around, if you're ready to leave."
Bruce nodded. He was ready to leave. One summer together, he had told Clark, and Clark had seemed okay with that. It had been all he could safely promise.
But the future was starting to come together in Bruce's mind. He'd be back someday, with the knowledge and the skill to fight for Gotham. He wasn't sure how Clark fit into that vision, but he knew that he would never be content with just the memory of that one summer.
Car wheels crunched on gravel as Alfred came up the drive. One last thing to pack.
Reaching into the back of one drawer, he pulled out a long, thin box. He ran one finger across the top of it, then opened it, the hinges stiff, as if he did this only rarely. He touched the silver letter opener inside, brushing the glass gems--dark blue where Clark's were red--like beads on a rosary.
Then he slipped the Sword of Oaths into his bag, slung it over his shoulder, and ran downstairs to meet Alfred.
(End of Arc 4. The final arc picks up four years in the future with Chapter 34.)