The Littlest Wayne
Alfred hasn't held a baby in years when Martha Wayne brings home her late-life child. He's a beautiful boy, with dark hair and big, deep eyes. Thomas, the proud father, says they'll hire a nurse or a nanny to help care for the child while his wife, who's not the youngest of mothers, regains her health.
The butler says no. The moment he takes the boy in his arms and stares down into the face of Bruce Wayne, he knows that there will never be a need for another caretaker. He's besotted with the child, a perfect combination of two people he has come to love deeply.
He takes to caring for the baby with relative ease, the way he's always been able to care for people, no matter their ages. Bruce doesn't cry often. He's more given to quietly looking around him, as if he's memorizing every detail about the world.
On long winter nights, while Thomas and Martha attend an endless stream of charitable functions, Alfred sits at home in the giant wing chair in the library, with the littlest Wayne held to his chest, and he is happy.
Six months after Bruce's birth, Thomas and Martha ask Alfred to eat dinner with them. They wouldn't mind if he ate at the table every night, but he likes to preserve the formalities. This time, though, he honors their wishes and sits down to supper with them.
"Alfred," says Thomas, smiling, "we have a request for you. Please don't feel obligated. It's not part of your job."
Martha takes up where he left off. "We're going to modify our wills to include Bruce, and—we'd like to ask you to be his guardian if anything ever happens to us."
Alfred stares down at his plate of roast beef and wills himself to breathe evenly. He has done many things in his thirty-eight years, but suddenly, none of them seem important any more, not as important as this moment. No one has ever trusted him with something so precious.
"If you'd like to think about it, that's fine," says Thomas, still smiling in his easy way.
Alfred does think about it. He thinks of the tiny boy asleep in his crib and the smiles that catch him off guard every single day. He imagines the future, of picking Bruce up from school, hearing about his first girlfriend, watching him learn to drive.
He says yes. Of course he says yes. He cannot imagine a world in which anyone else takes away the privilege of caring for Bruce Wayne.