He looked so old.
Christ she had never seen him look so old not even when that nasty business with Barbara broke. She remembers finding him then, looking fragile and ancient slumped over a filthy bar counter somewhere in the Docks. He had been crying. He had always been very fond of Barbara.
Now he looked a thousand years past hunched over that little cup of hot chocolate. They were in a cafe, one of those cosy establishments that dotted the Barri Gothic with small neon signs mounted over their doors screaming hot xocolate y churros. Across the table, Pamela was quietly addressing a stack of postcards in a flowery script, her cup of hot water untouched. Next to her an equally silent Waylon thumbed through a dog eared copy of Frommers as he slipped his cup of café solo.
They were - All four - in the Barcelona of Gaudi's dreams, ostentatiously taking in the sights but really to keep Bruce company. He and Waylon were in Barcelona for work, an inventory one-shot piece outside the current Morrison continuity, where Bruce was still Batman and Batman meant a little bit of mystery, a little bit of detective work and plenty of action. God dammed it, how could they do this to him. They threw him out without an afterthought like he was nothing but a carton of expired milk. The thought of it made her seethe. He gave them everything and more blood, sweat, and tears that even she could account for. But it didn't matter in the end; he was simply shipped off with Waylon for a last Batman vs. Killer Croc piece de resistance amongst Gaudi's architectural wonders for Salo del comic de Barcelona. It was as Pamela once remarked, the Company version of sending him off into the afterlife with a big bang. Heros were after all expected to die in a blaze of glory not hang around and grow old and stale.
"Bruce, you okay? You want a coffee instead?" She smiled as she gently squeezed his hand.
"No. Chocolate is fine. You can't really say you're been to Barcelona if you haven't had the chocolate." He smiled back and took a slip of his cup. She noticed that his smile was worn and brittle, much like the man.
"Nice and thick, just the way I like it. Is your espresso any good?"
Waylon's yellow eyes darted up from his book at the sound of Bruce's voice. "It's very good actually. Do you want a cup?'
Like Selina, he had private reservations concerning Bruce's mental wellbeing. The man opposite looked like Bruce, sounded like Bruce and for all intents and purposes ate, slept and fucked like Bruce but he knew – they all knew - it wasn't him. It was like someone had hacked out Bruce's heart and put a block of ice in its place. This was a thing with ice water in its veins playing at being a man they loved and doing it very poorly.
When the offer was first mooted to do a one piece special for the Salo del comic de Barcelona, Waylon had grabbed it. He was a fan of Gaudi and the opportunity to work with Bruce in Gaudi's city was too tempting to pass up. Only they hadn't told him that it would be under these circumstances. If he had known, he would have thrown the offer and his agent out the window. But that wasn't really the truth, only something he told himself to make it easier to look at the face reflected in the bathroom mirror in the mornings.
He remembers wondering why such an offer wasn't doled out to the A list, Jack, Harvey, Eddie, or even Pamela, but to a marginal character like himself. He also remembers pushing that thought to the back of his mind and keeping his trap shut like his agent told him too. It was his chance at another go at the big time. He should have realized that the offer for Barcelona was too good to be unconditional. Now he had to bear guilty witness to Bruce's slow disintegration into oblivion and Selina's desperate and often painful attempts to salvage what remained.
He felt bad for her. She was here because she was in pain. She and Bruce were close and seeing him like this was murder for her. He could see it in her face, in the hopeless tilt of her head when she thought no one was looking. Pamela was there because Selina needed her. He had heard her crying on the phone to Pam that night the shit hit the fan. He didn't know which was more surreal, the sound of Selina Kyle crying on the phone long distance to Gotham or knowing that the person she was speaking to was Pamela Isley. It wasn't that he didn't know they were lovers. Life very seldom followed the Company storylines - Loeb, Dini, Morrison - Catwoman and Poison Ivy may be tearing at each other's throats on the cover of issue after issue but everyone knew what they did outside the pages was their own dammed business.
He was there because he felt dirty. Bruce had been one of the nicest people around and he had gone and stabbed the poor guy in the back. Et tu Waylon Jones. Way to go buddy, while you're at it why don't you eat the little girl next door's kitten and kick that old man in the wheelchair into the storm gutter. He had in his mind's eye become as much a monster as Killer Croc. He wasn't Grayson. He won't have been able to do what that punk did. He didn't have the stomache for it which was one of the reasons why he never made it to the Rogues Legends Club.
"The hot water's not bad too…but I don't think it's your cup of xocolate." Pamela suddenly purred in that sultry low voice of hers, flashing Bruce one of her incredible hot smiles. He leered back like he used to and they all laughed.
It was just like Pamela to try to take the tension out of the air, she thought gratefully as she threw a silent thank you kiss to her beautiful companion who simply crinkled her nose in response and went back to the serious business of flirting with the men at the table.
It was silly really; Pamela and Bruce had known each other for years. Pamela had her first break while still in yellow nylons and a green leotard in an issue of Detective Comics. It was the 60s. In all the years they had known each other, Bruce had never ever made a pass at her. It wasn't that he didn't find her attractive, quite the opposite but that he could see the stars in his best friend's eyes whenever she came into sight. That was the sort of man Bruce was. Correction. That was the sort of man Bruce is. The man sitting next to her was still Bruce only lost and hurt, she had to remember that, had to believe that she could still reach out to him. He was her best friend and she was his.
She knew that Pamela didn't really want to leave her "babies" to come to Barcelona. She had insisted. They fought and she had thrown her things into a suitcase in a fit of fury and stormed out, catching the first available flight out of Gotham. It wasn't the first time they fought over Bruce. Pamela didn't disliked him. He had been best man along with Jack at their engagement party. It was just that Pamela felt very strongly that she needed to give Bruce his own space to grief over his loss. She felt the complete opposite. She felt that Bruce needed her and that he needed to come home to Gotham.
Pamela flew out of Gotham a week later after she broke down over the phone. Bruce had disappeared 3 days earlier only to reappear in the lobby of their hotel lying half naked in his own vomit reeking of alcohol. Fortunately Waylon was able to haul him back to his room and wash him down in the shower but not before the camera sharks got their weight in photos. The more graphic of which made the front of Gotham's many tabloid papers for the grand price of 30 pieces of silver each. She had somehow failed him again, failed to protect him from himself. How many times had he come thru for her? Her Dark Knight swooping in from the shadows - Wham, Bam, Pow - but that was when he was Batman the fury incarnate, now he was just Bruce her friend and he was the one who needed protecting.
*****************************
This really isn't a Batman tale as much as a Somewhere Elsewhere tale.
This story gave birth to itself one night when it was too warm to sleep and I asked myself the question "How would Bruce Wayne feel about what they did to him? And what would he do with himself if he was no longer the Dark Knight?". I didn't see him redoing the wallpaper in the rooms in Wayne Manor but I did see him wandering the streets of the Barri Gothic and La Ravel with a motley crew of friends; I decide there would be Waylon Jones (Killer Croc), Selina Kyle (Catwoman) and Pamela Isley (Poison Ivy), mainly because they are the characters I like the most. I did find it ironic that his last appearance in the here and now would be for the Comic Convention in Barcelona. There is something very fantastic and unworldly about a place where organic buildings of liquid stone seem to sprout from the ground which blended perfectly with the images in my head and so I switched on the bedside light and an impossible story started taking shape.