The clock in the library chimes 3 AM. And you are waiting, again. It has become your secondary vocation.

When the hidden elevator in the study whispers open, the air in the manor changes. Bruce emerges not as the specter of the night, but as a man moving through thick water. He’s shed the cowl, but the shadow of it seems etched into the severe lines of his face. He moves with a deliberate, hitched rhythm—left side favoring a rib injury, right arm held stiffly. A fresh, livid gash parts the stubble on his jawline.

“Hey, you,” he says, his voice a gravel road at the end of a long haul. He tries for a smile. It’s a cracked, fragile thing.

You don’t smile back. The word “again” hangs in the air, unspoken but as tangible as the Persian rug under your feet. For two, maybe three weeks, this has been the nightly liturgy. Your life, once red carpets, charity galas, and the polite fiction of “Bruce Wayne, charming billionaire,” has narrowed to this: the vigil in the library, the first-aid kit with its supplies dwindling faster than Alfred can restock, and the slow, corrosive drip of fear.

“Let’s get you cleaned up,” you say, your own voice surprisingly steady. It’s the voice you used for press conferences, a polished shell over a chasm.

In the cavernous bathroom adjoining the master suite, you guide him to sit on the marble ledge of the tub. The vanity light exposing every bruise in high-definition purple and yellow, every scar silvered with age, every new split in the skin. You peel away the tactical undersuit from his torso, the fabric sticking to a wound on his shoulder. He doesn’t flinch. But you do.

Your hands tremble as you dab antiseptic. You work in silence, the only sounds the drip of the tap and his controlled breathing.

You’re wrapping a bandage around his ribs, a procedure you’ve gotten terribly proficient at, when the dam breaks. It’s not a sob at first. It’s a tremor that starts deep in your center, a seismic shift that travels up your spine and dissolves the last of your composure. A hot tear falls. Then another.

“Hey,” Bruce says, softer now. His good hand comes up, knuckles brushing your cheek. “It’s okay. I’m okay. This is just… part of the job.”

The job. The mission. The city. The words you’ve heard a hundred times, a mantra that’s supposed to sanctify the broken blood vessels and the sleepless nights.

Something in you finally snaps.

“Stop,” you choke out, the word ragged. You drop the roll of gauze. It unravels soundlessly on the tile floor, a white spiral. “Just stop, Bruce. Please.”

You step back, wrapping your arms around yourself, as if holding your own pieces together. The luxurious bathroom feels like a prison cell.

“You’re okay? Look at you. You are literally held together by stitches right now.” Your voice climbs, fueled by weeks of swallowed panic. “Do you have any idea what it’s like? To wait? I sit in that library, and every siren I hear is a possible elegy. I can’t eat. The food turns to ash in my mouth. I can’t sleep. I just… I watch the clock and bargain with any god that might be listening.”

You see him watching you, his blue eyes like still pools trying to absorb a storm.

“I knew the package deal when I married you. The weird hours, the secrecy. I fell in love with the man and the mystery, I really did." You swipe angrily at your face, smearing tears. "But this is my husband. My person. And my job is to love you, and it is killing me.”

The confession hangs in the steamy air. Bruce is silent for a long moment. The performance, the stoic reassurance, drains from his face. He looks, for the first time since he stumbled in, not just injured, but weary. A weariness that goes deeper than bone.

He reaches out and takes your hand, lacing his fingers with yours. His touch is an anchor. “I don’t know how to do this any other way,” he says, the confession so quiet it’s almost lost in the hum of the ventilation. “The city… it’s a patient in triage, and every night the wounds are different, deeper. If I slow down, people die.”