The Secret Life of Bruce Wayne
By Glenn Reed
Many of those in Gotham remember where they were when they first heard that Thomas and Martha Wayne had been killed, nearly thirty years later. It was a warm June evening; a night reportedly spent at the movies; The Mark of Zorro starring Tyrone Power. At 9 pm on June 26th Thomas and Martha Wayne were watching the 1940 film with their son, Bruce, who was eight years old at the time. At 10:31 pm calls were made to the Gotham City Police Department about reported gunshots near Park Row. At 10:47 pm both Thomas and Martha Wayne were pronounced dead at the scene.
According to a witness statement given by Bruce at the time, they had been the victims of robbery gone wrong. The lives of two of Gotham's most prominent philanthropists were snuffed out a matter of seconds. News of the Waynes' demise hit the local press by morning. Bruce's statement and further cooperation with then Sergeant Detective, James Gordon, enabled the GCPD to identify a primary person of interest and a massive manhunt went underway across Gotham City.
Joe Chill was discovered attempting to stow away on a freight train less than 48 hours after the murders, no doubt attempting to get out of Gotham City for good. Not much is known about Joe Chill other than he was a career petty criminal. He immediately confessed and plead guilty to the murders "saving a poor, young boy from any further trauma by having to testify at a criminal trial," Interim CEO of Wayne Enterprises, Kevin Knightly, noted at the time. Joe Chill would be killed during a riot at Blackgate Prison less than a year later.
This article, however, does not seek to rehash one of Gotham City's most well-known tragedies. What it seeks to do is answer the question that plagued the minds of many Gothamites thirty years ago, that many continue to wonder to this day. How did the simultaneous murders of both of his parents affect the man that Bruce Wayne grew up to be?
By all accounts Bruce Wayne grew up to be a seemingly well adjusted, albeit typical socialite. He is on the board of his parent's namesake charity, the Wayne Foundation. He pursued an education at Yale University before dropping out in his sophomore year for unspecified reasons. He has spent a lot of time living the type of life the heir to the world's foremost industrial conglomerate would live. He's bought summer homes, dated supermodels, and bought things that are not for sale. Casual acquaintances can recall stories of Bruce Wayne jetting off to France in the middle of a work-day because he felt like having fresh Parisian croissants.
To local Gothamites he is known for being as generous as he his idiosyncratic. He has regularly offered to cover the tab of every patron in whatever restaurant he happens to be dining in at the moment. One college intern recounted the time her small talk with Bruce Wayne during a shared elevator ride resulted in him covering the cost of her university tuition and fees.
"It was crazy! I talked to him for all of three minutes. I honestly don't remember what I said but I must've mentioned that I was in school. When I called my financial aid department the next week they told me Bruce Wayne had taken care of my fees. It was incredible; he changed my life," student Kerry Tyler told me. The Gotham Gazette was able to confirm this account from the university.
The consensus, or at least majority, of Gotham locals see Bruce Wayne as a kind, generous, albeit a bit naïve Gothamite. A recent twitter poll executed by KZB Channel 4 news indicated that the three most used adjectives to describe Bruce Wayne by Gotham Locals are: billionaire, playboy, and philanthropist.
His former classmates have different words to describe him.
"He was kind of a weird kid," a former classmate from Gotham Preparatory Academy (hereafter Gotham Academy), Igor Kunis, told me in a phone interview. "He was quiet, and I don't think he had a lot of friends."
This seems to be a startling contrast to the extroverted dandy that is a frequent subject of human interest pieces that we know today.
"I thought he had anger issues. It was never anything huge; he didn't get into a lot of trouble or anything. It just seemed below the surface. Like he was seething. I don't know. He could be different now," Igor added.
Igor recounted a time the then twelve-year-old attacked another classmate. The story goes that during a study period an older peer, Henry Bonnum, approached the young man. Allegedly there was a brief exchange before Bruce leaped over the table, tackled him to the ground, and began punching him.
"He just started whaling on him. It was like nothing I'd ever seen. We were all shocked because we never expected that from him. He didn't even get suspended for it."
When asked what exactly Mr. Bonnum had said that triggered such uncharacteristic violence Igor told me, "I never found out. It must've been bad."
Igor's account was corroborated by six other classmates who witnessed the event. When asked for comment we were told by the administrators, "Gotham Preparatory Academy does not publicly comment on individual students; present or past." Henry Bonnum could not be reached for comment.
If Bruce Wayne has a history of violence, he has done well to hide it. Nothing notable seemed to happen in Bruce Wayne's life thereafter. His Yale colleagues had no alluring anecdotes to share about the young socialite, other than to say that he was quiet but highly intelligent. As stated previously, Mr. Wayne dropped out of school during his second year despite being at the top of his class.
During an infamous episode following his departure from Yale, Bruce Wayne disappeared from the public eye altogether. He was not photographed in public nor was he seen at public events. His longtime employee and close family friend, Alfred Pennyworth, explained briefly to the press at the time that Mr. Wayne was "merely taking a sabbatical. All is well, and he thanks you for your concern." When he reemerged three years later, Mr., Wayne told the Gotham Daily News that he had been backpacking in remote locations.
The episode seemed to spark an intense interest with the young mogul. His exploits constantly made the society pages, though he rarely granted personal interviews. A brief engagement to fellow socialite and event planner, Silver St. Cloud, captivated Gotham City. The engagement ended nearly as quickly as it began with both parties remaining silent on the reason for the breakup but both insisting that it was an amicable and mutual decision.
This alleged cordialness was questioned when during a tense interview, supposedly about her charity work fostering entrepreneurship for young girls, Ms. St. Cloud let it slip that she had ended their engagement. When asked whether there was any possibility for a reconciliation Ms. St. Cloud was quoted as saying, "There's no reconciling your fiancé falling in love with someone else."
Ms. St. Cloud declined to be interviewed for this article.
After the scandal Mr. Wayne's romantic life seemed to perpetually fall into turmoil. He had no other long-term relationships and was never seen at a public event with the same date more than four times. A notable exception was the mysterious Selina Kyle, who at the time was thought to be just another frequent in the upper echelons of Gotham Society. Ms. Kyle had been seen with Mr. Wayne at various events, on oversea trips, and casual night outs for several years. They were described by many as "on-again-off-again" lovers.
That is why it came as such a shock to many when Selina Kyle confessed, not only to being Gotham's most infamous jewel thief, the Catwoman, but also the murders of 237 alleged terrorists. As we now know much of Ms. Kyle's criminal past had been committed as a juvenile. Her sealed record prevented detection that a person so close to Gotham's son, was a convicted criminal. According to a source within the GCPD Ms. Kyle was never even considered a suspect for the crimes committed by Catwoman.
"She wasn't on our radar at all. If she hadn't confessed, we would've never known."
District Attorney Janice Porter declined to pursue charges against Selina Kyle regarding any alleged crimes she had committed as Catwoman, many of which could not be proven with physical evidence or the statute of limitations to prosecute had expired. It was widely suggested that the District Attorney's office, already handling an overwhelming caseload, simply did not feel the need to pursue additional charges considering Ms. Kyle's guilty plea and death sentence for the murders.
Mr. Wayne made no public comment on Ms. Kyle's charges at the time. When asked whether Mr. Wayne was aware of his former paramour's double life his publicist released a statement saying, "Mr. Wayne denies all knowledge and involvement regarding any and all of crimes or alleged crimes in which Selina Kyle has been accused. Mr. Wayne is just as shocked about these revelations as everyone else and asks for privacy during this time."
Selina began to live out the beginning of her sentence in the women's correctional facility of Blackgate Prison but was transferred to Arkham Asylum after only six weeks for repeated acts of violence. As Arkham Asylum is a classified mental health facility, all records regarding inmates and patients are subjected to confidentiality. Not much can be verified about Selina Kyle's behavior during her time there, nor did Bruce Wayne make any reported visits. A guard at Arkham did tell the Gazette that he believes on one occasion they sent each other letters, but this could not be confirmed by the Gazette.
It came as a surprise to very few when, in what seems to be tradition for those incarcerated at Arkham Asylum, it was reported that Selina Kyle had broken out and was now on the run. The circumstances regarding her escape are unknown, and there have been no local sightings of Ms. Kyle since. There have been sporadic reports of Catwoman being seen in various parts of Gotham City but ultimately no leads that have resulted in her being rearrested.
It has been two years since Selina Kyle was last seen publicly during her sentencing. Notably, even as a fugitive wanted for 237 counts of murder, Ms. Kyle fails to make GCPD's top ten list of most wanted criminals. With competitions between clinical psychopaths such as The Joker and other violent criminals with high probable violence indexes such as Calendar Man and Zsasz, it seems that capturing Catwoman is just not a high priority for the GCPD or the FBI.
It was even said that Bruce Wayne was using his considerable wealth to assist Ms. Kyle in evading capture, though that may have been said in jest. The rumor has become somewhat of a popular online meme among Gotham locals and the subject of intense theorizing and investigating by amateur internet sleuths. Dozens of threads on popular unsolved crime websites point to Mr. Wayne's apparent lack of public presence in the last year or so as indication of his involvement.
"They disappeared at the same time; I doubt it's a coincidence" EagleEyeDetective27 wrote in a forum on .
A quick observation reveals that Mr. Wayne has indeed made fewer public appearances in the past nearly two years than previously. In October he sent his regards to a fundraiser for the Wayne Foundation, an event he has attended every year since the charity's inception. There may of course be nothing suspicious about Mr. Wayne's public life which has always been tentative. Some attribute this to getting older and finding less of a desire to perform for voyeuristic gratification. He is, after all, one of the wealthiest men on the planet and fame never seemed to truly satisfy him.
I met with EagleEyeDetective27, real name Marquis Stanton; a Gotham artist with a degree in forensic psychology. He showed me nearly a year's worth of "investigative material" relating to Mr. Wayne and the whereabouts of Selina Kyle. Mr. Stanton explained that in the last 16 months Mr. Wayne had been photographed on only four occasions with a female associate. On three of those occasions, once at the Gotham Metropolitan Opera in January and twice visiting a local orphanage, Mr. Wayne appeared with a thin blonde woman. He was spotted with a dark-haired brunette in Ibiza last summer. None of the women could be positively identified.
Mr. Stanton notes that all of Mr. Wayne's female cohorts have similar facial features and body types; thin and medium height.
"Between five-five and five-eight. I'd guess around 130 pounds."
Curiously enough according Selina Kyle's intake information from the time of her arrest lists her height as 5'7 and weight as 125. From the photos provided by Stanton it is impossible to say whether all the women seen with Mr. Wayne are the same person, however they do bear a striking resemblance to Selina Kyle. One could write this off as a mere coincidence or that Mr. Wayne simply has specific physical preferences but given their history one would not be unreasonable to ponder the possibility that Mr. Wayne has been hiding a known thief and wanted criminal in plain sight.
I began this report as what was intended to be a mysterious if not tongue-in-cheek article about the wildest theories surrounding Gotham's favorite bachelor. As I went further and further down the rabbit hole I began to realize how little the public knows about who Bruce Wayne really is. The man versus the myth. A man who seems to relish in the public eye, a person everyone knows and has an opinion about, yet we know so little about who he really is and what he's capable of.
"The heart wants what the heart wants," the popular saying goes; but is it possible that one of the richest and most famous men on the planet met and fell in love with someone from so opposite the side of the tracks? Could this passion enable a man with so much to lose to risk it all, harbor a fugitive, and build a secret life with her?
The answer, as I discovered, is yes.
A marriage certificate, provided to the Gazette by an anonymous source, shows that Bruce Wayne married Selina Kyle in a secret ceremony nearly two years ago on July 4th, 2018. The certificate was signed by Judge Wolfman. Legal analysts were able to confirm that the certificate is valid and legal. Judge Wolfman, a known alcoholic, claims to have no memory of presiding over the union. He did releas-
Bruce had gotten a text message from Selina, sometime around 4 am, telling him to read the email she had just sent him immediately. She always avoided disturbing him when he was on a mission for the League or sleeping. He was currently doing both. Noting the urgency Bruce rolled over onto the side of the bed and reached for his laptop which had been left on the hotel side table.
The email Selina had sent him was encrypted; something she'd never done before. There was nothing in the subject line and the body of the email only instructed him to read the attachment and call her right after.
He didn't have the same chills as Selina did when she had read the article. He knew this wasn't going to stay a secret forever. Underneath the looming sense of dread Bruce felt a tiny bit of relief. At least this meant that they didn't have to look over their shoulders anymore, wondering, worrying, living with this secret. An exposé by a second-rate newspaper was a best-case scenario. It was a lot better than one of rogues, like the Joker, finding out about it and coming after his family.
It was in that moment that he decided that they would be okay no matter. No matter how hard they had to fight, they were going to survive this. Having kept Selina waiting on pins and needles long enough, he dialed her number.
She picked up on the first ring. "Bruce?"
She didn't sound panicked or even surprised; just concerned.
"Did you see it?" She asked.
"Yes."
An uneasy silence followed before she spoke again. "What are we going to do?"
"We knew this could happen one day. We planned for this." He told her.
His mind was already running through the best approach. He had, of course, come up with a dozen different contingency plans the moment they had decided to marry. He was a bit too tired and overwhelmed now to decide the precise course of action, and he would need to get all the information first. They could figure that out later; right now, his priority was placating his wife. He wanted nothing more than to be with her right now the way she'd always been there for him. To hold her hand or play with her hair the way he did when she was feeling upset or unsure about herself. He couldn't offer her physical affection, but he could offer her peace of mind. At least for now.
"I'm coming home," he said. "I'll be there by noon."
"You're on a mission." Her voice sounded strained, almost as if she were holding back tears.
"It's almost over. They can manage without me."
"You have a duty."
Selina hated feeling like Bruce was giving up the fate of world for her. She knew who he was when she agreed to marry him. She knew she'd always come second to the mission and she accepted that; she loved that about him.
"I do," Bruce explained. "But I have a duty to you too. Really it's okay."
He could hear her sigh on the other end of the line. "Earth isn't going to be invaded by intergalactic parademons because you're going AWOL or something like that are they?"
This was her attempt at making light of the conversation. Bruce offered a token chuckle.
"No," he said quietly. "I promise."
That seemed to be enough for her. She told Bruce about her chat with Glenn. Bruce held back a sigh. Confrontation was never his first course of action, but Selina was who she was, and he expected nothing less from her. Where Selina and Bruce both agreed it was good that Selina was able to buy them more time and that they found out about this before the news hit the media. Better to prepare than to be blindsided, though they would have to worry every day from now on about the story getting leaked before they could work out the situation completely.
They were both, however, still concerned that Glenn Reed was not a man of his word. This made them vulnerable. Bruce decided he would also pay Glenn a daytime visit and maybe sweeten his end of the deal. To his credit he had been truthful when he said that he believed that Selina was innocent. The other draft of the article, which Selina found on the laptop that she'd swiped from his apartment before their little chit-chat, went into a great amount of detail questioning the legitimacy of Selina's confession and the GCPD's history of using enhanced interrogation methods to obtain false confessions. They'd have to watch him, but it would do for now.
Bruce was unable to sleep for the rest of night. It wasn't uncommon for him, but his mind couldn't shut off. He hadn't said anything to Selina on the phone, though it could be surmised that she already figured it out on her own, but someone else knew about their secret; whoever had tipped Glenn off. This person had malicious intentions, and something told him that this person wouldn't be so open to negotiations like Glenn.
If the news became public their entire world would be turned upside down. Bruce knew he'd be okay (although his reputation would be permanently besmirched), but it was Selina who would bear the brunt of it. He was the Son of Gotham. His family was the foundation of the city. His lawyers would get him out of any charges for harboring a fugitive, at worst with a fine, but Selina would have to go back on the run or be dragged back to Blackgate for the rest of her life. He couldn't bear the thought.
That had been a source of the most tension and debate between the husband and wife. Selina was innocent, at least of murder. All she had to do to exonerate herself and win back her freedom was turn over Holly Robinson, who she had taken the fall for. They could live their lives free and open, without constantly looking over their shoulders. Selina wouldn't hear of it. He tried to under, but he found himself unable to. He would do the same without hesitating for one of kids or Barbara and Selina, but Bruce didn't trust Holly. There was something about her.
"You just don't like her because you let her get the jump on you, and she almost killed you." Selina had said.
Yes; there was that too.
However, in Bruce's mind it was more than that. Bruce thought it was peculiar that while Selina didn't vacillate to take the fall for Holly and was willing to be put to death for her, Holly was perfectly fine to let her. When they had visited Holly in Khadym they went intending to find a mutual resolution, but Holly was angry at Selina's mere presence. From Bruce's perspective Holly resented Selina, even more so now that she wanted to live her life for herself and be happy without her. Something told him that this was not a new development. He often wondered what their supposed friendship was like outside of Selina's rose-colored glasses. Shared experience was a powerful bond. Bruce hadn't been there when Holly had, as Selina constantly reminded him.
"You can imagine. You can empathize, but you'll never really know what it was like," she would say. "Holly was right there next to me going through it too."
That was the end of it. As far as Bruce knew Holly was still in Khadym being used by Talia al Ghul for God-knows-what. Khadym was a closed country. Even so keeping track of Holly was nearly impossible so long as she was under the custody of the League of Assassins.
They'd have to find a way to clear Selina's name without implicating Holly. That would be Selina's only non-negotiable condition.
Bruce made his travel arrangements as the sun was coming up and sent Victor a message that he wouldn't be returning to the remainder of the mission. He simply said that something had come up that required his immediate attention along with the coordination that he was originally in charge of. Victor didn't follow up immediately which meant that he wouldn't question Batman's sudden and less than ideal departure. Victor had proven himself to be a capable leader and Bruce confided in him that he was planning on phasing himself out of the League altogether. It was probably best that they start to get used to him not being around.
Right now, he needed to focus on his family. He'd see it to that they'd make it out of this mess with as little filth on them as possible. He set the alarm on his phone for one hour and let his eyes drift into a shallow, dreamless sleep.
Back at the manor Selina let herself fall into a similar slumber. Though hers was not so undisturbed. She dreamt that she was on a beach. The sun was setting, and she was standing at the edge of the water as the quiet waves swept across her feet. There was a sandcastle at the edge of the water. Simple but impressively made. The walls were high but smooth. There were no lumps of clustered sand. There were perfectly detailed windows and fixtures. It reminded Selina of Wayne Manor; opulent but full of warmth.
Selina stood there just staring at the sandcastle as it began to dissolve into the water. She looked from the place where the sandcastle rested out onto the horizon as a slow wave swept over the shore and washed it all away.
