Chapter 17:
Love or Infatuation?
Terry rode his motorcycle into the Batcave. As he removed his cowl, he seemed a bit frustrated.
"Rough night?" the former Batman asked in a mono tone as he walked towards Terry.
Terry set his mask on the table, "Well…it's not that. I just—."
He decided to stop this 'beating around the bush', "Argh! It's this 'Catwoman'! I can't get her out of my head," he squinted his eyes as if trying to remember the image, "I get such a thrill out of chasing her, and I don't understand why!"
Terry stopped himself, "Haha, sorry Mr. Wayne. I feel a little awkward telling you this."
"No, no. I understand. All boys your age have these…" now Bruce was feeling uneasy and choked on the word, "urges," but he soon became his professional self again, "But you mustn't let these 'urges' get in the way of your crime fighting. It's unhealthy," he paused and looked away mumbling the words, "…I would know."
The old man walked to his chair and had a seat as Terry tried to examine the matter, "It not that she's affecting my crime fighting…"
"Well obviously it's doing something unhealthy," he turned his seat around to face the computer.
Terry shuffled to a vacant spot beside Mr. Wayne, "You see, it's not that she's affecting my Batman life. But I'm afraid she might interfere with my normal life."
Bruce typed at his keyboard. He appeared as if he was paying no attention, but his attention was full, "Go on."
Terry continued knowing that Mr. Wayne was interested, "There this girl at school. And she's so perfect. She understands when I have to go do things," he looked around the room, "important. I'm just afraid that I'm going to slip up and call her Catwoman or something," Terry laughed at the thought of what Isis' face would look like if he called her 'Catwoman'.
Mr. Wayne looked up from the computer to Terry, "Terry there is a large line between love and infatuation. Our brains are just too clouded to see such a difference. If you really love this girl so much, your mind will uncloud and show you the difference. If it just infatuation, you will most likely end up calling her 'Catwoman'. So I suggest you find out how you really feel about her. Or you'll have a lot of explaining to do."
Terry was intrigued but this response. It was as if this cold old man had wiped some of the dust off the rarely used heart of his.
Bruce smirked a little realizing that Terry was finally over Dana, "So who is the lucky girl?"
Terry smiled slowly when he realized they were bonding, "Her name is Isis and—"
Mr. Wayne's smile quickly faded, "What is her last name?"
"…Smith," Terry became worried when he saw Mr. Wayne grab onto the table in front of him, "Sir, are you ok?" he reach down to Bruce.
Mr. Wayne was breathing deeply, "Could you…go…go…fetch me my medicine."
"Of course sir!" Terry ran off as quickly as possible.
As Terry searched through the medicine cabinet he could only think, was it her name that set him off, that not possible, how could he know her?.
Terry found the medicine and made his way back to Mr. Wayne.
"Here you go Mr. Wayne," Terry gave him the pills and helped him out of his chair.
"Thank you McGinnis. Just take me to my bed and then you are dismissed."
"But sir, shouldn't I call a doctor?"
Mr. Wayne voice became harsh at the suggestion of a doctor, "No, no, no! It's just one of my little spells. I'll be fine in the morning."
Terry backed up his struggle for a doctor knowing that Mr. Wayne just wouldn't have it and the argument would just wear both of them out. So when Terry got him to his bed he tried to leave as if nothing had happened.
The next morning all Terry could think about was the night before. Mr. Wayne's advice had been quite helpful. Today was a Sunday and seemed like a lovely date for a hot date.
Terry lazily rolled out of bed into the floor and then caught a whiff of himself, "Ugh, I'm disgusting."
He looked up at his clock. It was 9:30, "Now how did I manage that?"
Still too lethargic, he hadn't gotten up yet. But he figured that he couldn't just lie there all day and he wasn't going to fall back asleep anytime soon, so he pulled him self to his feet. A large stretch got him prepared for a walk to the kitchen.
When he got to the kitchen, his brother Matt was there watching TV and eating cereal. On the counter was a newspaper just waiting for him. On front page was the image of a motorcycle chase. Terry scratched his mess of hair, looks like I've made the front page again.
But then as he scanned the article he saw words such as 'Batman is more trouble than he's worth', 'thousands of dollar in damages', and so on. Terry threw the paper at the table, "Ah, who reads this junk anyways."
Matt looked back to his brother, "I wonder why people still hate Batman."
"Who knows? The people of Gotham are crazy…" he rolled his eyes as he walked away from the kitchen carrying a breakfast bar with him.
All morning Terry struggled to sort out his confused thoughts. But of his problems that he knew he could solve today was the distinction between love and infatuation.
Terribly sorry for these slow moiving chapters...such as this one. But they must be added for story development. I really wasn't expecting this story to last so long. but I believe it's only about 3/4 of the way done. But please don't fret, all this building up is sure to come to an incredibly high climax ;-)