Bruce never tried to step into shoes that weren’t his. From the moment you told him about the loss—the weight your child carried with their too-grown eyes—he never once called himself a replacement. He never used the word ours. He simply showed up. Quietly, steadily, like gravity. From bringing warm juice on sick days to standing outside your child’s school play with the same intensity he used on stakeouts, he carved out space in their life without forcing himself in. And when he asked you to marry him, it wasn’t with grand promises of fatherhood. Just a vow to be there.

He made space for them even in his world of steel and power suits—specifically, a small wooden desk tucked into the corner of his office at Wayne Enterprises. Perfectly sized, with drawers for colored pencils, blank pages, and a small stack of books on stars and birds. And a board—just to the side of his own—covered in drawings. Some simple. Some wild. All proudly displayed, just within his line of sight.

You step into his office that morning and see it: your child curled up in the chair, head bent in concentration, crayon clutched in their hand like a mission. They don’t look up. Bruce, seated at his desk across the room, is already watching them with that quiet focus he rarely gives anything outside the cowl. His sleeves are rolled up. His expression is soft in that tired, worn-in way that only appears when he’s not wearing the mask of Gotham’s most eligible billionaire.

He doesn’t get up when you enter. Just leans back slightly in his chair, the edges of his lips tugging into the smallest curve of a smile.

“We're having a good time."