Disbelieve all you want, Kent, if they were alone in this house, this morning would be going very differently, regardless of Bruce's disdain for the process of regaining consciousness. What, genuinely, could be better, than crawling over Clark's sleep-warm body and learning what kind of sounds he makes, what he tastes like, how fast Bruce can make him fall apart? Especially laying there like that, perfectly tailored to every stupid bisexual weakness in Bruce's body.
Coffee. Coffee could be better. Even as Clark slips in behind him, touches him, and makes Bruce want to lay right back down. His brain sympathetically twinges in pain, desperate for the caffeine and bitter heat. (Should have brought your meds, he thinks, but without any conviction. He'd rather be strung out than let anyone in this house see him taking them.)
He grunts an affirmative. It has nothing to do with being non-dairy or anti-sugar, it's just that he'd inject it directly into the vein if he could, and diluting it is a fool's errand.
Bruce reaches out, behind, hand coming up against the side of Clark's face. His fingers splay against his jaw and ear, thumb rubbing over his cheekbone and then ghosting over his lips. Clark is so beautiful it's almost obscene. For a moment he just sits there like that, looking at him, expression opaque. Neither of them have mentioned Lois, who Bruce assumed Clark would rather prefer to spend this or any holiday with; with anyone else he'd be worried, but he trusts Clark not to be fucking anybody over. They should discuss it at some point, though, probably. He's not so foolish as to think what's happening here is casual.
Without saying anything else, Bruce withdraws his hand and extracts himself from Clark with more grace than a man pushing 50 with a spinal chord made up of spare parts should have this early in the morning, and slips away into the bathroom.
The touch to his face has a strange sort of effect. 'Calming' is perhaps the closest thing to it, even if Clark was sleepily serene prior, but calm like thoughts quieting, a physical stillness save for how his mouth parts just a little when Bruce touches it. Closes it when he leaves, wonders only then what exactly it is that Bruce thinks he sees.
Remembers what he was doing when the bathroom door closes. Coffee. Right.
A quick detour to his room for proper pants before bounding downstairs, into the kitchen, kissing his mom on the cheek with a merry Christmas, ma, turning her around with momentum as he sets about arranging coffee. Clark is quiet, pointed. Mom is the same, back.
Handing him cream and cinnamon for his own coffee, and then not letting go when he goes to take it: don't you have something to tell me?
And a happy new year?
Clark Joseph--
Later, I promise. Please stop looking so worried.
But I didn't know that--
Me neither, trust me. C'mere.
A quick bear hug, and a tolerant sigh. Well, hell, he's a charmer.
Laughing: A common misconception.
But he is, maybe in ways Bruce does not consider charming, that most people might not, that Clark can't help but like. Half-whispered conversation in the kitchen over in moments, and he feels like he's dodged-- well, bullets as analogy don't work for him. He just feels like he's dodged too much of a close investigation into his love life from his mom before he's figured out what to say about it, which is what he imagines dodging bullets is like.
Clark charges two coffee cups -- good black coffee, and his own preferred concoction of cream and cinnamon -- and moves to meet Bruce with it.
Meanwhile, Bruce has found a detour in the space-time continuity that's let him get dressed and make himself presentable (ninja jokes with guys his size don't work, right?), and if not for the brittle look around his eyes, his struggle with consciousness earlier might be believed to be imaginary.
It's too bad that Clark decided to put pants on, he reflects upon being met. Probably a wise move, though. He finds himself slightly anxious to cross paths with the lady of the house, even while scarred hands curl gratefully around the offered cup. Visions of her with Lois dance in his head, set to festive music, and so on.
"Thanks," he says, as coffee is en route to his face. If it's too hot he doesn't seem to give a fuck.
It doesn't feel over, even now that they are fully dressed -- save that Clark ought to change into something more substantial than is sleep rumpled shirt -- and drinking some coffee in a comfortably neutral proximity. He thinks he'd feel it, if whatever was last night was just last night (a Christmas miracle, maybe).
He should probably figure it out to some finer details before 'later' with his mom arrives.
"Before you go," he says, after his second sip of coffee, "was wondering if you wanted to see the actual Smallville, not just this corner. It'll be freezing, and. Empty, and most things will be closed, but it could be nice."
Comfortably neutral proximity that feels like it's on the verge of being something else, to Bruce. What, he isn't sure - or maybe it's just that it could go either way. Bruce could leave; Bruce could reach out and put his hand on his waist, pull him closer.
Bruce should leave. Smallville sounds awkward and full of nothingness, and beyond that, full of reminders of the close community and acceptance that he's been desperate for his entire goddamn life but been unable to hold on to. Full of reminders of how destroyed it was by the Kryptonian insurgents, and how the people here still rallied around Clark, protected him and his secret.
Incredible how that never gave Bruce a fucking clue.
Anyway.
For a long, excruciating moment, Bruce seems caught somewhere too inexplicable for an answer, draining his coffee like it's buying him a stay of execution. Say no. Go to the airstrip, go home.
Bruce is rewarded with a bright smile, and a friendly hand to the shoulder as Clark makes for his bedroom. "You can give me the Gotham grand tour sometime," he assures, impervious to the intricacies of how Bruce might rather be doing anything else right now.
Goodbyes take place, then, when it's determined that Clark will drop Bruce off once they do a little sight seeing. Martha tells him to be careful out on those roads, and then gives Bruce a big hug when it seems like it might be welcome, her hand clapped to his back and her smile having taken on a different sort of shine, but a shine nevertheless. The way she smooths out his nice coat after is the same fluttery affection as when he'd first arrived.
She watches, hands on hips, as they go.
The truck is old but not badly kept, Clark driving as careful as he promised he would. Heading into Smallville's central business district means a ride through snowy, early morning farmland, the heater on blast, the radio off. Clark points out landmarks here and there, the properties of neighbours, or what things look like in the heart of spring.
The main own itself is as empty and cold as promised. Driving through sees a few people on their way back from church. Shop windows with Christmas displays. The gas station is open. There are buildings that were never replaced, empty lots, scars, from years ago.
Smallville is everything Bruce imagines it to be - and he does imagine, too much for his own good. Not Smallville specifically, but of course, being an orphan, being someone possessed of an awareness of his own lot in life, he's entertained many a daydream over the years about having been born into different circumstances. Somewhere normal, somewhere mundane, safe, and beautiful.
He looks at Clark more than the landmarks. This is perhaps not surprising. That there is something inherently funny about Superman driving an old pickup goes unvoiced; it, him, this, is all so charming as to take his breath away.
The urge to ruin it somehow is an ever-present ache.
I could get that fixed, he thinks, of the destruction. It wouldn't be a problem, and wouldn't be any more or less suspicious than him buying out Kiowa First American National (what a name). He is cognizant of course of the fact that if Smallville is keeping Superman's secret, that Smallville is also now collectively keeping the secret of a surly Gothamite billionaire who just happens to haunt the town, all of a sudden. Do they need bribed? Not for Clark, obviously, but he's-- you know, not as nice as Clark. Maybe it's a memorial, offers up another perspective on the remains of a destroyed shop.
They're at a stop sign - or rather, a light that seems to have never once been connected to a power grid - and a woman passing by waves at Clark, but doesn't stop to chat. Too cold, probably. Or perhaps because he's got company.
"Your mom saw us," he says. It's not an announcement, because if Bruce picked up on that, then Clark definitely did, and if anyone knows Clark's mother it's Clark. It's also not really a question. It's just-- a topic, shuffled up onto the table of discussion. Faintly curious. Something else, too, drawn in too deep and subtle to be identified as wryness. If it were Bruce's kid, he'd probably be pissed.
Frost and snow crunches underfoot. Truck parked somewhere empty, Clark's stride is lazy, hands tucked into pockets of a wool lined coat. He did not take the time to laser hair off his face, so there is something slightly more human about this morning's grown in grain around his mouth and being dressed against the bracing cold.
And something human also in the hiking up of his eyebrows as the topic of mom enters the conversation.
"On the porch, too," he agrees, after a beat, a sideways look that borders on bashful. "I think. I had too much going on with me to notice at the time."
"Mmm." A sound that could be anything, but is probably vague exasperation at being in a position to be busted making out by anybody's mother. And yet he's still here, tracking over snow-covered flatland ground, out here in the plains-- out here in the middle of fucking nowhere.
"Does she?" wry edge more audible, this time. "She's very close to your fiance, I wondered if that might be a perceived issue."
Bruce glances at him, reaches out to touch the back of his elbow, briefly.
"Just so you know: I've been operating under the assumption that Lois is fine with it, since I think the list of things you'd rather do before hurting her could giftwrap the Earth."
No expectation of this being an illicit affair, no demand that Clark leave her. It is what it is - or at least, Bruce hopes so. Maybe it will actually be a problem, and he's misjudged; it's worth it to watch him for a reaction, probably, but Bruce believes with the wild, blind faith of a man convinced of his ability to resurrect an alien that Clark isn't - won't be - a jerk about his love life.
A huff of a laugh, just a breath, steam striking the air. "Yeah. She's fine with it."
Clark stops, considers. It's not complicated, and Bruce sort of makes it seem easy, as easy as reaching across and kissing Clark that first time seemed so easy. Lois, too, had put everything in very simple terms. When he stayed the the night the first time, when he'd come back, when he'd proposed, and what their future would be.
He needs to call her, too. A couple of Christmas texts aren't gonna cut it.
"We talked about other people, before. And after, too, when I came back. And I talked about you," is said like perhaps he had decided against saying that in the first sentence, and then changed his mind, and said it anyway. Qualifies it with; "Kinda.
"It'll be the first thing mom asks about. Lo, and me."
That does something to Bruce's insides. Goddamnit.
"I..."
Mm, words, man. Bruce shrugs, but it's more like he's just loosening his shoulders, rolling them. Sifting through his head for what to say.
"I have nothing but bad advice, considering Alfred just thinks I'm a trainwreck and wishes I'd stop and get married." His tone is sympathetic. He is a trainwreck. Keep that in mind, Kent. "But I've always been--" A pause. "Open, I suppose. Maybe it's because of how I live, but I think I'd have been like this regardless."
Like this, like that aforementioned trainweck. But it means he's fine with Clark and Lois, whatever form they take - and it's not even a case of having to be, which he thinks should be strange, but it isn't. He's too old not to know himself in at least one or two ways, and this is one. His feelings for Clark are a whole other order of thing, but at least he's confident in open relationships and polyagony. Excuse me, polyamory.
Stop and getting married. Continue and get married. Martha is someone who does not have to understand to accept something, to love someone; else Clark's upbringing would have worked out differently. But Clark knows how much she likes Lois, roping her into a part of the family sphere, and maybe Lo's heart by now is as important to her as Clark's.
Maybe reassuring that no one's getting hurt is what matters. And yes, eventually--
Clark doesn't have time to graduate from that thought to the next, of openness, before Bruce says this last thing. Fortunate, because he's not sure what thoughts he has about it, except that so long as the people he loves are happy and love him back, that should be fine, right? Maybe that's too good to be true.
But no time to test that, because Bruce says this last thing, haltingly, into the cold air. His heart does a thing, a lift inside of him, even if 'this' seems so nebulous and undefined still, but maybe they can make it solid together. Give it shape and sense. Clark steps around to be in front, a hand touching the inside of Bruce's arm, pausing them properly.
"I am," he offers. The are you? is on the tip of his tongue, and forgotten.
What did he think Clark was going to say? No? Clark's taken him into his home, he hasn't been ashamed of his mother seeing, even before he has an explanation to give her. And still, Bruce's pulse does-- that funny thing it does, when Clark makes him feel a certain way.
He exhales, steam rising from him.
"Yeah."
(Are you?)
Bruce looks at him, expression serious, and a little shuttered in a way that means he's feeling vulnerable but doesn't want to look it. (Would probably be an easier sell on someone else.) "You don't-- have to be. Yet. I know it's a lot and it's not fair, strictly, to be expected to be serious after twelve hours, but people will expect that because of all the factors involved and-- I'm just. I need you to understand how not good at this I will be. And that no matter what expectations might be put onto us from anyone watching, from me, I'm fine with-- you."
This is what he meant. About charm being a common misconception. But it's certainly within the eye of the beholder.
Just on the tail of the word crazy, Clark's hand comes up, touches Bruce's face gently, thumb resting next to his mouth. "I don't care about the fine print," he says, serious eyebrows, smile still present at the corners of his mouth. Shh, in other words. That's as far as he can tell of what factors means, and anyone else, and expectations: details. "It's Christmas."
And if you think about it, it takes a lot of audacity to put on a cape and be a hero, let alone enter into unorthodox relationships without much in the way of notice, or kiss people on the street.
Which Clark does, this last thing, with enough cues telegraphed in eye contact and pause that Bruce can back up out of it before mouths touch, if his mom's house was fine but an open, if empty, wintry street in Kansas is not. (God only knows, Smallville's kept bigger secrets.)
It's Christmas like that solves everything, puts soft snowy blanket over every sharp edge and complication. That despite knowing each other in a few truly incredible, intimate ways, they do not really know each other at all, that their respective families are going to struggle to process it, that if they are to be teammates and co-workers at the most insane profession in the universe this could enormously, problematically complicate things, that Bruce is so difficult and has hurt Clark so badly already--
Maybe it does solve it. At least just for now. Bruce stayed. He can't have stayed just to dig his heels in and pull away. Right?
Bruce should know better, with his hard-won isolated privacy and his constant awareness of ending up in tabloids, but pulling away from Clark is an impossibility. Clark kissing him upends the whole world, shuts everything else away so that it's just the two of them out here in the snow. It might as well be, for how deserted this little town is. His hands find the younger man's sides and he holds him, returns that kiss, doesn't pull away.
As a big city journalist whom Perry delighted in giving bullshit stories ever since he was brought on fulltime and is probably Superman, Clark has no excuse either, and yet, here we are. Being serious, gently, under a flat white sky and a sign advertising Christmas trees now sold out. He kisses Bruce's mouth, shallow and then just a little deeper, and then against his cheek, his jaw, other hand hanging onto coat, before pulling back again.
"I hear you," he promises, in close proximity. "And it's okay."
Bruce doesn't have to be good at anything, as far as Clark cares. As long as he's this, and they can be this together. At the back of his mind: hadn't Lois worried, too? In different ways, with different concerns, but it's always the other person who worries.
('Always', like he's had this experience more than twice. But it 'always' ends the same, kissing it away, loving it to irrelevance.)
He pulls himself in closer, before letting his grip on Bruce slacken. "Thanks for the presents, by the way. I looked. Sorry." A by now familiar bitey smile. Welcome to this particular world order, Bruce Wayne. Lois hates this too.
Clark would probably have some kind of midwestern platitude about that; things moving on, lessons being learned, or-- something, and Bruce is projecting. Bruce, who should be the one with the willpower to stop this, or have never begun. He reminds himself that he made the first move. Because he wanted to. Wanted to so goddamn badly, and he still wants to. So much that he's sure he can't stop.
I'm sorry that I'm not a better person, he needs to say.
Instead:
"You aren't supposed to peek at Christmas presents." Vaguely affronted. That was sheer, unadulterated trust he showed you by not putting those in lead paper, Clark.
"I know." His pseudo remorse is more of a wince, like that's just how things go. "Bad habit."
Has to know everything. Like what Bruce got him for Christmas and the number of metal nails hammered into his spine, and the pills he didn't take with him and. On it goes. Clark kisses him again, shallower, briefer, and his mind never even enters the territory that Bruce's does. That it should not be okay.
Bruce brought him back. Bruce was manipulated. Bruce knows these things, besides, but maybe one is just evening the score and the other is unacceptable. They'll find out.
Not on Christmas.
Clark's hand finds Bruce's, pulling him along in the path they were headed. He doesn't keep that hand, but only after a lingering tangle of fingers.
Yes, it's a bad habit, but not in the same circle of hell as any of Bruce's bad habits. A charming quirk, even, without comparison to anything else. He tastes like-- like somebody's stupid mouth, and a little like snow, now.
Sometimes he allows cold logic to tell him that had he not made the kryptonite weapons, Doomsday would never have been able to be stopped. That had he never gotten involved, or had he been more utilitarian about his suicidal intent, there would have been no one to resurrect Superman. What a world.
Crunch, crunch, weather underfoot. Gotham is beautiful in the snow, too. He wonders if Clark would like it.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Coffee. Coffee could be better. Even as Clark slips in behind him, touches him, and makes Bruce want to lay right back down. His brain sympathetically twinges in pain, desperate for the caffeine and bitter heat. (Should have brought your meds, he thinks, but without any conviction. He'd rather be strung out than let anyone in this house see him taking them.)
He grunts an affirmative. It has nothing to do with being non-dairy or anti-sugar, it's just that he'd inject it directly into the vein if he could, and diluting it is a fool's errand.
Bruce reaches out, behind, hand coming up against the side of Clark's face. His fingers splay against his jaw and ear, thumb rubbing over his cheekbone and then ghosting over his lips. Clark is so beautiful it's almost obscene. For a moment he just sits there like that, looking at him, expression opaque. Neither of them have mentioned Lois, who Bruce assumed Clark would rather prefer to spend this or any holiday with; with anyone else he'd be worried, but he trusts Clark not to be fucking anybody over. They should discuss it at some point, though, probably. He's not so foolish as to think what's happening here is casual.
Without saying anything else, Bruce withdraws his hand and extracts himself from Clark with more grace than a man pushing 50 with a spinal chord made up of spare parts should have this early in the morning, and slips away into the bathroom.
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Remembers what he was doing when the bathroom door closes. Coffee. Right.
A quick detour to his room for proper pants before bounding downstairs, into the kitchen, kissing his mom on the cheek with a merry Christmas, ma, turning her around with momentum as he sets about arranging coffee. Clark is quiet, pointed. Mom is the same, back.
Handing him cream and cinnamon for his own coffee, and then not letting go when he goes to take it: don't you have something to tell me?
And a happy new year?
Clark Joseph--
Later, I promise. Please stop looking so worried.
But I didn't know that--
Me neither, trust me. C'mere.
A quick bear hug, and a tolerant sigh. Well, hell, he's a charmer.
Laughing: A common misconception.
But he is, maybe in ways Bruce does not consider charming, that most people might not, that Clark can't help but like. Half-whispered conversation in the kitchen over in moments, and he feels like he's dodged-- well, bullets as analogy don't work for him. He just feels like he's dodged too much of a close investigation into his love life from his mom before he's figured out what to say about it, which is what he imagines dodging bullets is like.
Clark charges two coffee cups -- good black coffee, and his own preferred concoction of cream and cinnamon -- and moves to meet Bruce with it.
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It's too bad that Clark decided to put pants on, he reflects upon being met. Probably a wise move, though. He finds himself slightly anxious to cross paths with the lady of the house, even while scarred hands curl gratefully around the offered cup. Visions of her with Lois dance in his head, set to festive music, and so on.
"Thanks," he says, as coffee is en route to his face. If it's too hot he doesn't seem to give a fuck.
Oh. Uh.
"Merry Christmas."
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It doesn't feel over, even now that they are fully dressed -- save that Clark ought to change into something more substantial than is sleep rumpled shirt -- and drinking some coffee in a comfortably neutral proximity. He thinks he'd feel it, if whatever was last night was just last night (a Christmas miracle, maybe).
He should probably figure it out to some finer details before 'later' with his mom arrives.
"Before you go," he says, after his second sip of coffee, "was wondering if you wanted to see the actual Smallville, not just this corner. It'll be freezing, and. Empty, and most things will be closed, but it could be nice."
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Bruce should leave. Smallville sounds awkward and full of nothingness, and beyond that, full of reminders of the close community and acceptance that he's been desperate for his entire goddamn life but been unable to hold on to. Full of reminders of how destroyed it was by the Kryptonian insurgents, and how the people here still rallied around Clark, protected him and his secret.
Incredible how that never gave Bruce a fucking clue.
Anyway.
For a long, excruciating moment, Bruce seems caught somewhere too inexplicable for an answer, draining his coffee like it's buying him a stay of execution. Say no. Go to the airstrip, go home.
"All right."
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Goodbyes take place, then, when it's determined that Clark will drop Bruce off once they do a little sight seeing. Martha tells him to be careful out on those roads, and then gives Bruce a big hug when it seems like it might be welcome, her hand clapped to his back and her smile having taken on a different sort of shine, but a shine nevertheless. The way she smooths out his nice coat after is the same fluttery affection as when he'd first arrived.
She watches, hands on hips, as they go.
The truck is old but not badly kept, Clark driving as careful as he promised he would. Heading into Smallville's central business district means a ride through snowy, early morning farmland, the heater on blast, the radio off. Clark points out landmarks here and there, the properties of neighbours, or what things look like in the heart of spring.
The main own itself is as empty and cold as promised. Driving through sees a few people on their way back from church. Shop windows with Christmas displays. The gas station is open. There are buildings that were never replaced, empty lots, scars, from years ago.
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He looks at Clark more than the landmarks. This is perhaps not surprising. That there is something inherently funny about Superman driving an old pickup goes unvoiced; it, him, this, is all so charming as to take his breath away.
The urge to ruin it somehow is an ever-present ache.
I could get that fixed, he thinks, of the destruction. It wouldn't be a problem, and wouldn't be any more or less suspicious than him buying out Kiowa First American National (what a name). He is cognizant of course of the fact that if Smallville is keeping Superman's secret, that Smallville is also now collectively keeping the secret of a surly Gothamite billionaire who just happens to haunt the town, all of a sudden. Do they need bribed? Not for Clark, obviously, but he's-- you know, not as nice as Clark. Maybe it's a memorial, offers up another perspective on the remains of a destroyed shop.
They're at a stop sign - or rather, a light that seems to have never once been connected to a power grid - and a woman passing by waves at Clark, but doesn't stop to chat. Too cold, probably. Or perhaps because he's got company.
"Your mom saw us," he says. It's not an announcement, because if Bruce picked up on that, then Clark definitely did, and if anyone knows Clark's mother it's Clark. It's also not really a question. It's just-- a topic, shuffled up onto the table of discussion. Faintly curious. Something else, too, drawn in too deep and subtle to be identified as wryness. If it were Bruce's kid, he'd probably be pissed.
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And something human also in the hiking up of his eyebrows as the topic of mom enters the conversation.
"On the porch, too," he agrees, after a beat, a sideways look that borders on bashful. "I think. I had too much going on with me to notice at the time."
His elbow nudges Bruce, idly.
"Good thing she likes you."
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"Does she?" wry edge more audible, this time. "She's very close to your fiance, I wondered if that might be a perceived issue."
Bruce glances at him, reaches out to touch the back of his elbow, briefly.
"Just so you know: I've been operating under the assumption that Lois is fine with it, since I think the list of things you'd rather do before hurting her could giftwrap the Earth."
No expectation of this being an illicit affair, no demand that Clark leave her. It is what it is - or at least, Bruce hopes so. Maybe it will actually be a problem, and he's misjudged; it's worth it to watch him for a reaction, probably, but Bruce believes with the wild, blind faith of a man convinced of his ability to resurrect an alien that Clark isn't - won't be - a jerk about his love life.
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Clark stops, considers. It's not complicated, and Bruce sort of makes it seem easy, as easy as reaching across and kissing Clark that first time seemed so easy. Lois, too, had put everything in very simple terms. When he stayed the the night the first time, when he'd come back, when he'd proposed, and what their future would be.
He needs to call her, too. A couple of Christmas texts aren't gonna cut it.
"We talked about other people, before. And after, too, when I came back. And I talked about you," is said like perhaps he had decided against saying that in the first sentence, and then changed his mind, and said it anyway. Qualifies it with; "Kinda.
"It'll be the first thing mom asks about. Lo, and me."
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That does something to Bruce's insides. Goddamnit.
"I..."
Mm, words, man. Bruce shrugs, but it's more like he's just loosening his shoulders, rolling them. Sifting through his head for what to say.
"I have nothing but bad advice, considering Alfred just thinks I'm a trainwreck and wishes I'd stop and get married." His tone is sympathetic. He is a trainwreck. Keep that in mind, Kent. "But I've always been--" A pause. "Open, I suppose. Maybe it's because of how I live, but I think I'd have been like this regardless."
Like this, like that aforementioned trainweck. But it means he's fine with Clark and Lois, whatever form they take - and it's not even a case of having to be, which he thinks should be strange, but it isn't. He's too old not to know himself in at least one or two ways, and this is one. His feelings for Clark are a whole other order of thing, but at least he's confident in open relationships and polyagony. Excuse me, polyamory.
"So are we. Serious. About this."
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Maybe reassuring that no one's getting hurt is what matters. And yes, eventually--
Clark doesn't have time to graduate from that thought to the next, of openness, before Bruce says this last thing. Fortunate, because he's not sure what thoughts he has about it, except that so long as the people he loves are happy and love him back, that should be fine, right? Maybe that's too good to be true.
But no time to test that, because Bruce says this last thing, haltingly, into the cold air. His heart does a thing, a lift inside of him, even if 'this' seems so nebulous and undefined still, but maybe they can make it solid together. Give it shape and sense. Clark steps around to be in front, a hand touching the inside of Bruce's arm, pausing them properly.
"I am," he offers. The are you? is on the tip of his tongue, and forgotten.
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He exhales, steam rising from him.
"Yeah."
(Are you?)
Bruce looks at him, expression serious, and a little shuttered in a way that means he's feeling vulnerable but doesn't want to look it. (Would probably be an easier sell on someone else.) "You don't-- have to be. Yet. I know it's a lot and it's not fair, strictly, to be expected to be serious after twelve hours, but people will expect that because of all the factors involved and-- I'm just. I need you to understand how not good at this I will be. And that no matter what expectations might be put onto us from anyone watching, from me, I'm fine with-- you."
Right, so.
"I sound crazy."
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Just on the tail of the word crazy, Clark's hand comes up, touches Bruce's face gently, thumb resting next to his mouth. "I don't care about the fine print," he says, serious eyebrows, smile still present at the corners of his mouth. Shh, in other words. That's as far as he can tell of what factors means, and anyone else, and expectations: details. "It's Christmas."
And if you think about it, it takes a lot of audacity to put on a cape and be a hero, let alone enter into unorthodox relationships without much in the way of notice, or kiss people on the street.
Which Clark does, this last thing, with enough cues telegraphed in eye contact and pause that Bruce can back up out of it before mouths touch, if his mom's house was fine but an open, if empty, wintry street in Kansas is not. (God only knows, Smallville's kept bigger secrets.)
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Maybe it does solve it. At least just for now. Bruce stayed. He can't have stayed just to dig his heels in and pull away. Right?
Bruce should know better, with his hard-won isolated privacy and his constant awareness of ending up in tabloids, but pulling away from Clark is an impossibility. Clark kissing him upends the whole world, shuts everything else away so that it's just the two of them out here in the snow. It might as well be, for how deserted this little town is. His hands find the younger man's sides and he holds him, returns that kiss, doesn't pull away.
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"I hear you," he promises, in close proximity. "And it's okay."
Bruce doesn't have to be good at anything, as far as Clark cares. As long as he's this, and they can be this together. At the back of his mind: hadn't Lois worried, too? In different ways, with different concerns, but it's always the other person who worries.
('Always', like he's had this experience more than twice. But it 'always' ends the same, kissing it away, loving it to irrelevance.)
He pulls himself in closer, before letting his grip on Bruce slacken. "Thanks for the presents, by the way. I looked. Sorry." A by now familiar bitey smile. Welcome to this particular world order, Bruce Wayne. Lois hates this too.
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Clark would probably have some kind of midwestern platitude about that; things moving on, lessons being learned, or-- something, and Bruce is projecting. Bruce, who should be the one with the willpower to stop this, or have never begun. He reminds himself that he made the first move. Because he wanted to. Wanted to so goddamn badly, and he still wants to. So much that he's sure he can't stop.
I'm sorry that I'm not a better person, he needs to say.
Instead:
"You aren't supposed to peek at Christmas presents." Vaguely affronted. That was sheer, unadulterated trust he showed you by not putting those in lead paper, Clark.
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Has to know everything. Like what Bruce got him for Christmas and the number of metal nails hammered into his spine, and the pills he didn't take with him and. On it goes. Clark kisses him again, shallower, briefer, and his mind never even enters the territory that Bruce's does. That it should not be okay.
Bruce brought him back. Bruce was manipulated. Bruce knows these things, besides, but maybe one is just evening the score and the other is unacceptable. They'll find out.
Not on Christmas.
Clark's hand finds Bruce's, pulling him along in the path they were headed. He doesn't keep that hand, but only after a lingering tangle of fingers.
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Yes, it's a bad habit, but not in the same circle of hell as any of Bruce's bad habits. A charming quirk, even, without comparison to anything else. He tastes like-- like somebody's stupid mouth, and a little like snow, now.
Sometimes he allows cold logic to tell him that had he not made the kryptonite weapons, Doomsday would never have been able to be stopped. That had he never gotten involved, or had he been more utilitarian about his suicidal intent, there would have been no one to resurrect Superman. What a world.
Crunch, crunch, weather underfoot. Gotham is beautiful in the snow, too. He wonders if Clark would like it.
Where are they going? Bruce has no fucking idea.
Not that it matters. He'd follow him anywhere.