Philia VII

Selina walked past Bruce ignoring him, and went straight to her daughter gathering her in her arms and holding her tight.

'Hmmm? Mom?' She asked sleepy and confused.

'Helena what were you thinking?'

'I… Are you mad?'

'Of course I am mad! You leave the house, alone, in the middle of the night, without saying to anyone where you're going! What do you think?'

'Sorry, mommy.' She pouted, her eyes big and watering.

'Oh, I hope you are. I just don't understand why Helena? You know you can come here all the time.'

'Alfie wasn't visiting anymore…'

'Why didn't you just call him?'

'I thought you guys were fighting and he wouldn't want to come to see me.'

'Helena, what have we talked about assuming things about other people without asking first?'

'I know, mom… I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.' Helena held her mother hard, tears streaming down her cheeks.

'Shhh kitten, don't cry, hn? No tears.' Selina cleaned her daughter's tears with her thumbs. 'That's better. Just promise me you won't do this again.'

'I promise mommy. Am I grounded?'

'Of course you are.' Selina said still holding her daughter and rubbing her arms. 'What the hell did you do to Holly?'

'Oops?'

'Jesus, Helena. Go wait in the car.'

'It's late, you could stay.'

Selina turned back to Bruce alarmed like she just remembered he was also there.

'Yes, mommy! I miss my Mansion room.'

Bruce raised both of his eyebrows to that.

'No need. We're leaving.' Selina said dryly.

'Mommy!'

Selina glared hat her daughter.

'Helena, do you really think you are in position to bargain, now?'

'Didn't hurt to try.' Helena said sheepishly.

Selina raised her eyes begging for patience.

'Go wait in the car, Helena.'

'Okay…' She sighed defeated. 'Goodnight, Mr. Wayne, it was nice to finally meet you.'

'Goodnight, Helena.'

They silently watched the little girl walk away, her dark curls bouncing.

Selina then took a deep, tired breath.

'Thank you for keeping her safe.' Selina said holding herself.

'No problem. She is a very smart young lady.'

'That she is, sometimes I think she's too smart for her own good.'

'She is very much like her mother, then.'

Selina felt a wave of emotions hit her so hard after those words that she knew she has to leave before embarrassing herself.

'Are you okay? You are shaking.' He reached his arm to touch her but Selina avoided him. Bruce put his hands in his pockets. 'Are you sure you can drive?'

'I'm fine.' She managed to say in a strangled voice. 'And I'm leaving, bye.' She took another deep breath.

'Selina?' He asked when she was in the doorway.

She stopped.

'That night, why did you pretend you didn't know me?'

She took so long to answer that he almost thought she wouldn't. And then he wished she didn't.

'Because I don't. Goodnight, Mr. Wayne.'

ooo

Despite his tiredness Bruce didn't go to bed that night. The cave was far from being completed, but it was already in use. He had enough to make a working lab for the basics like DNA tests. He took the swab he used to collect saliva from Helena when she was sleeping from the vial in his pocket, then took another clear one and used it to collect a sample from himself. He already knew the result or hoped he did. In that moment he couldn't say which was scarier.

ooo

Next morning exactly fifteen minutes after Helena left for school Selina heard her doorbell ring. She was in no mood to see anyone after the hell she went through the night before. And after she brought Helena home and listed the punishments she would have to face from now on – which just "apologise to Holly" was the one that would actually stick – she called Barbara to tell what happened. Then called Lee to repeat what she had just said to Barbara, assure Jim that everything was fine and that she would personally kill him if he sent cops to her place, then back to Lee to ask her if Holly would be okay. Both women tried to pry into her life and how was things now that Bruce was back and what was he like with Helena, but she ignored them.

Selina then covered Holly with a warmer and bigger blanket, checked Helena again, she was asleep and for that she was grateful. After that, when the sky was brightening and she sent a text to her boss – the proper one – that she was sick and could go that day. And then, only then, she decided to take a shower – RIP relaxing bath with fancy salts – and go to bed.

Too bad in three hours she had a kid to wake, and feed, and get ready for school, and coach a grown adult woman to take said kid to school and go to work, but she had all the intention to go back to bed after all that when the bell rang.

And behind the door was the last person she ever wanted to see her in that state: Bruce Wayne. But when he took off the shades he was wearing indoors like a hipster, she noticed that even though he was not a mess of bed hair and rumpled silk PJs like her, he was also looking like hell.

'What are you doing here?'

'Good morning to you too, Selina. We need to talk.'

She rolled her eyes so far into her head that she went temporally blind.

'I have nothing to talk to you, goodbye.'

She tried to close the door on his face, but Bruce stopped her.

'I'm calling the cops!'

'Yeah, that will happen a lot. Stop being so childish, Selina! Let me in!'

'Oh, I did that, fifteen years ago, and what I got? A bullet in my spine.'

'Selina, come on!' He pushed harder, she let go, he almost fell. She smiled sadistically, but he was in. Bruce straightened himself and closed the door behind him. Selina made a beeline for the martini, she was sure whichever conversation Bruce intended to have with her, she wasn't sober enough to stand it.

'I'll give you a chance to tell me, who Helena's father is?'

She snorted, spitting the martini, then she had to put the glass back on the counter because her laugher was too strong.

'Give me a chance? Oh my God you are so arrogant. It's pathetic.'

'She is mine, isn't she? Tell me, Selina!'

The laughter was gone, her whole face was contorted with red fury now.

'I tried to! Don't you think I did? Ten years ago when you just left? I wanted to tell you right away, but you wasn't here! And how dare you, appear here like I owe you something, like you deserved any kind of explanation. How dare you say that Helena is yours. She is my daughter, Bruce. Mine. You are nothing to her. To either of us.'

Bruce felt like he just have been defeated in battle and in some ways he had. He remembered his training, tried to calm himself, tried to understand where his opponent was coming from. And then he thought about the Selina he left, the despair she must have felt after being abandoned once again by someone she loved. And what must have been her reaction to find out she was also pregnant. They were so young. Bruce closed his eyes, he thought about all the extensive research he made on Helena and Selina that night and morning. How Helena had a perfectly normal life, how bright she was. How Selina had tuned her life around even if she still kept her not so honourable practices, he was proud of her, and yet he knew he had no right to be.

'Selina…' He tried to touch her, but they were once again set apart when the door suddenly opened.

'Helena! What are you doing here?'

'School sent us back home. I came walking. Hello, Mr. Wayne, are you staying for lunch?'

'What? He is not. Why did the school send you back?'

'Haven't you checked your twitter yet or the TV? Scarecrow put something in the school water reservoir. A lot of sick kids having scary hallucinations.'

'You didn't drink it too, did you?' To Helena's surprise and joy the question came from Bruce.

'Nah, I take my own bottle to school.' Said wisely the little girl that just in the night before had roofied her own sister.

'Oh thank God!' Relief washed over Selina.

'I have to go.'

'What? Why? Stay for lunch! Mom can't cook' Selina gave her a mean look, but Helena ignored 'but we can always order Thai.'

'Although your offer is tempting, I really have to go. Bye, Selina. Until next time, Helena.'

'Bye…' Answered Helena gloomy.

Selina said nothing or moved to open the door to Bruce, they just held each other gazes for a while until he turned his back and left closing the door behind him. He was almost reaching the elevators when he heard his name. It was Selina.

'Let's talk. Later…'

'Where?'

'I don't know… Hm… The cathedral? The roof.'

'Ok. After the sunset?'

'Fine.'

'Selina?'

'What?'

'Thank you.'

Hi! I hope everybody is having a nice Sunday. See you soon.

To the person on FFnet sending the same review over and over, I get that you are trying to show your support and I thank you for this from the bottom of my heart. But I had to delete the repeated reviews because FFnet could flag them as spam and delete this story. If you still want to show your support, but maybe English is not your first language (it isn't mine either) you can write in your first language and I'll find a way to understand it.