A./N. Sorry it's been so long since I updated! However, I did write a chapter that's about 1,000 words longer than my usual ones. Hopefully that'll make up for it! Anyways, I won't be able to update for the next week or so =( I have to get my wisdom teeth cut out. The good news is, seeing as I'm already on summer break, I have about three months to continue updating! Hope you enjoy this chapter! Also, thanks to those of you who reviewed =)
Disclaimer: I do not own Batman Begins/ Dark Knight or any of the characters.
Lizzy and I talked for almost half an hour before she realized that she had to make her rounds. As she walked out of the door to my room though, she promised to see that I get some real food during my stay here. She also promised to come back to talk to me. That promise made me feel much happier than it should have, leaving a slight goofy smile on my face after she left.
She is so real! She talks about interesting things, like whether or not gurple (combination of green and purple) should be a word. Yes, she is a bit quirky, but I find it endearing and cute. I seriously need to stop using the word 'cute'; it could kill my inner reputation. Besides, Batman isn't supposed to think anything is cute, or endearing, or beautiful, or so completely interesting that thinking about it for hours is okay. And I could think about her for hours if I wanted to.
No. I need to do away with this infatuation that I seem to have on Lizzy. If I let her get to close – if I actually develop deeper feelings for her – she could get hurt. She will get hurt.
I can still be her friend though right? Yes, that's what I'll do! It can't hurt to have a friend or two – a real friend, not those idiots who act like they want to be my friends. And perhaps when Gotham doesn't need Batman anymore, I can pursue a relationship beyond friendship.
My smile widened at the thought of having a relationship with someone. God knows that I've longed for female company. You can only take solitary for so long you know.
Alfred chose that moment to wake up. I suppose I shouldn't say he chose that moment seeing as he had no say as to when he would actually wake up, but he really did wake up at a bad time.
"Master Bruce! You're awake! How do you feel? Should I call for your nurse? Are you…smiling?" he asked in shock.
I quickly sobered up and answered with a blunt, "No." No need to have him suspicious of my feelings. "Oh, and Lizzy, the nurse, has already been in to check on me. She left about five minutes ago." I saw Alfred's eyes go from a knowing look (one that I am beginning to hate) to a stern one.
"Why did you not wake me? It would have been quite nice to be informed of your wellbeing you know," he grumbled. I laughed at him because Alfred never grumbles.
"Now you're laughing, Master Bruce? The world is coming to, as the children these days put it, a zombie apocalypse," Alfred deadpanned. For some reason, this made me laugh harder. Just hearing Alfred, my old English gentleman of a butler, say 'zombie' and 'apocalypse' in the same sentence pushed me to loud guffaws. "I do have hundreds of stories worth of blackmail on you, you know," Alfred said while blushing.
That shut me up. Alfred gave me a smug look. "Now, about your nurse, when did you start calling her 'Lizzy'?" he smirked. Stupid, observant, stubborn, old man…
"When she asked me to," I replied, willing the blood away that was threatening to go to my face. Alfred raised an eyebrow. "What?" I asked warily.
"Does Miss Elizabeth catch your interest Master Bruce?" he asked.
"No!" I replied quickly – too quickly. Alfred gave me another look. "Well…yes. How couldn't she, though? She's a very bright, intelligent, and sociable young woman," I said, defending myself.
"And," Alfred began, "she is quite lovely as well, isn't she Master Bruce." I began to splutter and blush under Alfred's gaze and his smirk from earlier returned with full force. "So?" was all that I came up with in reply.
"So… you seem to be harboring a little 'crush' on Miss Elizabeth. Wonderful!" he beamed. I felt my face go red despite my efforts to retain the rush of blood to my cheeks and neck. The old man never fails to make me lose a hold of myself. "Alfred," I grumbled. He had the nerve to chuckle at my embarrassment.
"You know that I can't afford to develop any sort of… romantic… feelings for anyone right now. Maybe when Gotham doesn't need Batman I can pursue a relationship with Lizzy, but if I do now, she will only get hurt. Besides, I'm not sure what I actually feel for her. It's probably just an infatuation on my part." My mini-speech caused Alfred's cheerful and teasing expression to turn grim. "Master Bruce," he started, "I understand that you believe that Miss Elizabeth will be hurt if you develop feelings for her, but relationships are built on trust. You must trust her and yourself that even if she is harmed – emotionally or physically – you will push through that little bump in the path. As for Batman…Gotham may have a time that it does not need Batman, but will there ever be a time when you will not need him?" he asked.
I looked down at my I.V. in sudden interest. After a few incredibly long seconds, Alfred cleared his throat. Sighing I asked, "What do you want me to say Alfred? That someday I'll finally be able to retire the cape and cowl and live my life? No, I have to keep fighting. No eight year old boy should ever have to go through what I did!" My voiced cracked on the last sentence, and Alfred rushed over to my side and placed his wrinkled hand over mine.
"As true as that may be Master Bruce, you have to let yourself be happy. Your parents wouldn't have wanted to see you put your life on complete hold and deny yourself any sort of comfort. They would be proud – and worried – of your nightly activities, but they would want you to be happy as well," Alfred said softly.
Tears were threatening to form as I looked up at Alfred – the man who has raised me as his own. "How can I be happy when there are others who are hurting, Alfred?" I asked. Alfred leaned down and gently pulled me into an embrace. "Even those who are hurting find happiness, Master Bruce," he whispered.
A small gasp alerted me of a newcomer's presence. I looked over to the source of the noise and caught sight of Lizzy, frozen in the doorway with a hint of a smile on her lips. "Did I come at a bad time?" she asked, bringing her clipboard up to her chest to hold on to.
"Of course not, Miss Elizabeth," Alfred said with a smile while pulling away from me. "I was just finishing my lecture to Master Bruce about why he should have woken me once he had regained consciousness."
Lizzy gave a bright smile. "Now Alfred, part of that was my fault; I distracted him with a conversation. Besides, we didn't want to wake you! That was the only time you had slept peacefully since you've been here! And how many times have I told you to call me Lizzy? 'Miss Elizabeth' is entirely too formal and it makes me feel like my old Language Arts teacher from sixth grade." At her last sentence, Lizzy gave a small which Alfred and I laughed at.
"I apologize for making you feel like an old sixth grade Language Arts teacher, Miss Lizzy," Alfred apologized. Lizzy gave a mock glare.
"You're still putting 'Miss' in front of my name, but I suppose we're getting somewhere with it. Anywho! I just stopped in to see how you two were before I finished my rounds! See you in about twenty minutes!" she said. With a wave, she was gone.
Alfred and I were silent for an immeasurable amount of seconds until he spoke. "Master Bruce, I'm begging you to court her. She actually calls me by my name instead 'Butler' like some of your other fake lady friends," he said.
I rolled my eyes. "I'll be her friend Alfred. Friendship is all that I can afford to go through with right now… especially since Rachel is dead," I said in a sad tone.
Alfred's face softened. "Of course, Master Bruce, I understand the situation. Perhaps, though, Miss Lizzy's friendship can help ease the pain of Miss Dawes's passing." And with that, Alfred patted my hand and walked back over to the recliner he had been sleeping in earlier.
Shortly after the discussion I had with Alfred about Lizzy and Rachel, another nurse walked into my room with a cart. There was a tray sitting on top of the cart with what looked like lunch on it. The nurse flashed a smile at me. "Here's your lunch Mr. Wayne. Can I get you anything else?" she asked while setting the tray on my lap. I didn't fail to notice the double-meaning in her words and internally rolled my eyes.
"No thank you. You may go," I stated in as polite of a voice as I could muster. The nurse gave a small pout, but winked and left the room with a sway of her hips. Once she was fully out of the room, I snorted in disgust and humor at her actions. Alfred seemed to agree with me according to the look he gave me.
Turning my attention to the tray, I assessed my meal. A sandwich. They gave me a sandwich. My glass contained water and a straw. Scrunching my nose, I opened the sandwich and checked the contents. With a huff, I placed the sandwich back on my plate. It's peanut butter and jelly, and I'm allergic to peanuts.
"Is that all that they served you, Master Bruce?" I heard Alfred ask. I nodded and looked at him with a grimace. "It's peanut butter and jelly, isn't it?" he asked. Again, I nodded and frowned. "I specifically told the staff to not serve you anything that contained peanuts! I'll go speak with the kitchen," he assured me.
Alfred stood up, picked up my tray, and walked out of the room. I huffed again and crossed my arms over my chest in another pout. Well, I tried to. I ended up hissing in pain as my arm and cast came in contact with my broken ribs.
My heart monitor began to pick up the pace in its beeping as little bursts of pain shot across my chest. Eventually, the pain died down and the monitor's beeping slowed down into its regular pace. Stupid peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
I took a good look around the hospital room as I waited for Alfred to hopefully come back with some food that wouldn't cause my face to get puffy and my throat to close up. There were two darkly tinted windows in the room that had no locks or ways of opening them. I guess the hospital doesn't want anyone jumping out of the windows. There was a small table to my left that had a phone, clock, and a vase with a red rose inside. The clock informed me that it was 12:04 P.M. I sighed and continued to examine my room. White tiles… grey walls. All in all, the room looked boring. In the right corner of the room, where two walls and the ceiling meet, there was a small flat-screen TV. I glanced back at the clock. 12:07 P.M. Another huff. Only three minutes have passed. I leaned my head back on the stiff pillows behind me and closed my eyes. Maybe a short nap would help me pass the time.
Just as I was drifting into unconsciousness, I heard a small whimper. Immediately I opened my eyes and looked around the room – no one. My eyes narrowed. I hadn't imagined that whimper. "Hello?" I called out. Just seconds later, a small head poked inside my room. "Hi," the head said. The small body of a little girl soon followed the head. "I'm Madison," she said with a hesitant smile.
I gave her a small smile in reply and motioned for her to come on into the room. She slowly walked a little further into the room before running to the chair that Lizzy had been sitting in earlier. She boosted herself onto the chair with her arms and turned around to face me. Madison's eyes were a little red and puffy as if she had been crying. She didn't show any sign of crying in her body language though. "Who are you?" she asked in a high soprano voice.
"I'm Bruce," I replied. She nodded thoughtfully with a finger on her chin. Finally, she said, "I like that name."
I smiled a bit wider at her statement. "How old are you Madison?" I asked. She looked to be about five or six at the most. "I'm five!" she exclaimed proudly while holding up five fingers. "See? I'm a whole hand full!"
Laughing I agreed, "You are aren't you?" Nodding she began to look me over. Every time her eyes passed over one of my injuries, her little mouth turned down at the corners and her eyebrows scrunched together. She carefully slide off of the chair and walked around to the other side of my hospital bed to look at my other injuries.
"Mr. Bruce?" she asked sweetly. "How did you hurt yourself so much? Were you in a car crash like my momma? The mean people in the long white jacket things said that car crashes can hurt someone really bad." She then leaned in as if telling me a secret and whispered, "They said that sometimes people's boo-boos are fatal. What does fatal mean? Daddy and the mean people that made him cry won't tell me."
My heart broke for this little girl. It sounds as if her mother has been the victim of a car accident with injuries that may be fatal to her. These "mean people in the long white jacket things" must be the doctors in the hospital. I hate having to tell people bad news, but first things first. "Well Madison, I was actually spelunking. That's just a big word for cave diving. Anyways, when I was jumping from a really high place in the cave, the cord that was holding me broke and I kept falling." I purposely left out the meaning of the word 'fatal' hoping that Madison would forget that she even brought it up.
"Oh, well that sounds really scary. Were you at Mammoth Cave? My momma and daddy took me there last year! It was huge – like this!" She stretched her arms out as wide as she could.
"No, I wasn't in Mammoth Cave. There are a few caves just outside the city that I used," I explained to her.
"Oh," she said with a slightly calmer tone. "Hey, you forgot to answer my question!" She pointed an accusing finger at me. "If you didn't look so hurt, then I would poke you!" Her expression and statement made me laugh. "Now, what does fatal mean?"
I felt my face fall. "Well Madison. When someone has a fatal injury, it means that they might not wake up when they fall asleep." I tried to put it as gently as possible. She had a confused look on her face. "Like in one of those things called a coma?" she asked.
"Well, sort of but not really. When you're in a coma, you have a chance of waking up. When you have a fatal injury then… you go join the angels like my momma and daddy," I said softly. Madison gasped and tears came to her eyes.
"You mean my momma might die?" she cried out. The next thing I knew, small arms were wrapped around my neck – avoiding some of the tubes at least – and Madison was sobbing with full force.
I rubbed her back awkwardly with my good arm and tried to console her. "There, there. The doctors didn't say that your momma had fatal er… boo-boos did they?" Madison sat up, sniffed, and shrugged.
"I don't think so. They said that they weren't sure if her boo-boos were fatal or just serious," she said while hiccupping.
"See?" I said, clinging to that fact, "Maybe your momma is going to be okay." Madison stared at me with red-rimmed eyes and nodded her head. "Yeah, you're right," she agreed.
"Of course I am. Now… how did you get in my room? Are you lost?" I asked. Madison nodded sheepishly.
"I was looking for my mommy's room, but I couldn't remember the number. Your door had a number that looked like it so I came in here," she explained.
"Well," said a new voice, "I guess it's a good thing I can find your mommy's room for you!" We both looked up to see Lizzy smiling in the doorway. Madison looked back at me questioning whether or not she should go with Lizzy. I nodded and unwrapped my arm from around her so that she could jump back down to the floor and follow Lizzy. "I'll be right back, Bruce!" Lizzy called on her way out.
"See you in a few," I called back quietly.
A./N. I know that he may not be allergic to peanuts, but oh well. My storyline, my decisions. So how was it? Let me know in a review! All you have to do is press the button down there! \/\/\/
~batfangirl \/