The ache in his ribs was a live wire, a constant, humming pain that flared white-hot with every breath. Bruce lay in the grand, oppressive silence of his bedroom, a room that felt less like a sanctuary and more like a beautifully appointed tomb. The scent of beeswax polish and old money couldn’t quite mask the underlying notes of antiseptic and bruised flesh. Rain, a persistent, whispering drizzle, blurred the panoramic view of Gotham’s skyline, turning the city lights into a watercolor smear of gold and sodium-vapor orange.

Days. It had only been days since the fundraiser for the Gotham Arts Initiative. Days since a "structural inspection" of the venue had gone violently awry, courtesy of a new, brutalist faction with a grudge and a fondness for industrial-grade weaponry. They hadn’t been after Batman. They’d been after Bruce Wayne, the philanthropist, the man who kept trying to pour his fortune into shoring up the city’s crumbling soul. The irony was a bitter pill on his tongue. He’d spent years building a legend of shadows to protect a public life that had now been attacked in its own right.

The door clicked open, a soft sound that nonetheless sent a fresh jolt of tension through his body. He didn’t need to turn his head. He knew the rhythm of your footsteps on the Persian rug.

“Don’t say it,” he grumbled, his voice a gravelly thing. “Don’t say I look like I went ten rounds with a cement mixer.”

You set a tray on the bedside table, the china cup clinking softly against its saucer. “I was going to go with ‘a particularly opinionated dump truck,’ but sure, a cement mixer works.” Your tone was light, a deliberate counterpoint to the storm he could feel brewing in the room. In him.

You were still in your painting clothes—soft, worn jeans smudged with cerulean blue and a deep magenta, one of his old Oxford shirts draped over your frame. You’d been in your studio, then. Working. Or trying to. He could see the tension in the set of your shoulders, a mirror to his own.

He remembered the first time he’d seen those hands, at the charity gala he’d half-heartedly attended. You’d been standing next to a massive canvas, a swirl of moody blues and defiant gold, explaining your technique to a rapt crowd. He hadn’t heard a word. He’d just watched your hands, the certainty in their gestures, the life in them. He’d bought the painting for a sum that made the press gasp. Alfred had raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t bought the painting; he’d bought a reason to talk to the artist.

And now you were here, playing nurse. Because of him.

“You should be finalizing floral arrangements,” he said, the words coming out harsher than he intended. “Or tasting cakes. Or arguing with the wedding planner about the merits of buttercream versus fondant. Not… this.” He gestured weakly at his own broken body, at the tableau of convalescence.

You perched on the edge of the bed, the mattress dipping slightly. The movement sent another ripple of pain through his side, but he bit it back. You picked up the cup of tea, holding it out. “Drink this. It’s that herbal stuff Alfred swears by. Smells like death, but it helps.”

He took the cup, his fingers brushing against yours. The contact was a tiny, electric solace. “I’m sorry,” he said, the words quiet, meant only for you in the hushed room.

“For what? For having enemies with the subtlety of a sledgehammer?” You reached out, your thumb gently tracing the lurid purple and yellow bruise that bloomed across his cheekbone. “It’s not your fault, Bruce.”

He thought of your wedding dress, hanging in a sealed garment bag in the room next door. A vision of silk and potential happiness. He thought of the sleek, modern tuxedo in his own closet. A costume for a day where he was supposed to just be Bruce. Just a man, marrying the woman he loved.

“They’re messing with our day,” he muttered, the petulance in his voice surprising even him. He felt like a child, a colossal, bruised child whose toy had been broken.