Halloween in Gotham City was always an interesting event. Historically, the Police Commissioner would put as many police officers on duty as possible, sometimes pushing the City's budget to the breaking point. The mayor would complain, bluster, and threaten to suspend the Commissioner, the Commissioner would bluster and complain right back and describe a city gone wild with hooligan kids on a sugar high getting into Halloween hijinks as their negligent parents partied into the night, indifferent and oblivious to the mischief unfolding underneath their noses. Faced with this potential anarchy, the Mayor would back down, the Commissioner would schedule every available officer, and hooligans got up to Halloween hijinks and negligent parents partied anyway. In the most pathetic way possible, it was becoming a Gotham tradition.
None of these issues ever deterred anyone from their Halloween fun. Children invaded the malls and suburbs and larger condominiums and co-ops, filling the building with their shrill laughter as they stormed home after home, store after store. Some community organizations would band together and put on Haunted House productions and tame, family-friendly Halloween parties, but this did little to stave the chaos of the evening.
Even in her home, eight stories off the ground, Annabeth could hear the Halloween revelries unfolding below. The cold snap had finally broken, and while it was still chilly, she opened up the window and let the biting air into the condo, freshening out several days of stale, sick air. As she sat on the couch, she listened to the neighborhood children's shouts, cries, and laughter floating in through the open window. To the west, a brilliant, reddish-gold glow filled the sky as the sun slipped away, bringing in another autumn evening in Gotham.
Annabeth leaned partway out the window and inhaled deeply, pulling the biting air into her lungs and feeling it burn there. Even though she was still sick, she didn't care. The cold air felt brilliant, and it revived her more than anything she had done all day. She had finally broken down and gone to her doctor, who said she had bronchitis and had given her a lecture on taking care of herself. But now she was getting better, little by little, and she had taken a long, steamy bath in the afternoon and spent the rest of the day cleaning up the apartment. Five days of being stuck inside as she wallowed in her depression and sickness had not been conducive to an orderly and pleasant home.
Someone knocked on her door, and she sighed and got up, suspecting that a brigade of children had finally began marauding through the building. Janey had obligingly brought her a bag of chocolate earlier in the week, and it sat on the console table by the front door, waiting to be distributed.
Without bothering to check the peephole, she opened the front door, prepared to be engulfed by a horde of costumed children—
—and instead found Bruce Wayne standing at her threshold, clutching a brown grocery bag.
"Trick or treat?" he offered with a lopsided smile.
Annabeth gaped at him. His appearance was about as expected as a genuine ghost or goblin. "You're not in costume," she said stupidly.
"Then you won't give me any candy?"
Completely befuddled, Annabeth stepped away from the door and opened it wider, a silent invitation for him to come in. Bruce obliged, sweeping past her, walking in, and setting down the brown bag, she thought with a vague sense of resentment, as though he owned the building. Oh, wait. He does.
She closed the door and began to go through the process of locking it-the basic lock on the handle, the three deadbolts, the chain. Turning around, she saw Bruce watching her with bemusement.
"It's Gotham," she shrugged.
He didn't answer. They stood facing each other, five feet apart, and it occurred to Annabeth that she hadn't seen him since the night of the fundraiser. They had talked the evening after, and made plans to straighten things out, but it seemed as though a year's worth of life had intervened, preventing that from happening. And now here they stood, separated with a seemingly impregnable wall of awkwardness. What would they say to each other?
At least I'm too sick for any more kissing. That's one less thing to worry about. Despite this rueful thought, Annabeth was honest enough with herself to admit that this was a little disappointing. She was distracted from this thought as she noticed her pets ambling towards Bruce, sniffing curiously at the new intruder. Wurzel gave one querulous meow before he licked Bruce's shoe, and Jed simply sat before him, wagging his tail eagerly. Bruce squatted down and gave each of the animals some attention, letting Wurzel sniff his hand as he scratched Jed's head with the other. The older he got, the more he liked animals—they were so much more open and simple. You knew where you stood with them.
Annabeth was amazed. "That's so strange. They're not usually that friendly with a new person. You usually have to be here a couple of times before they get used to your scent enough to be social." She squatted down beside Wurzel and added her own gentle petting. Thus engaged, they passed several minutes, just petting and playing with the animals. It was neutral territory.
Finally, Bruce spoke as he continued to fondle Jed's ears. "I heard about Marjane." His voice was soft. "I'm so sorry."
It was the tone of his voice-she could tell he was sorry, he was upset, he did understand. After all, he had been there when Marjane arrived at the doors of Safe Haven, he had been the first one to really help her. Annabeth began to see his sincerity, and that was enough to break down her final reserves. As he regarded her, his eyes filled with compassion, Annabeth's face began to crumble. "I-I'm sorry..." She sniffed noisily. "Oh, hell." And with no further ceremony, she plopped herself down on the floor and began to cry.
Without thinking any more about it, Bruce sat down beside her and simply threw his arms around her, encasing her in an enormous, strong hug. Passively, she leaned into his chest and simply allowed herself to luxuriate in the feeling of his arms tightening their hold around her. His jacket was cold against her cheek, and she heard the quiet whump-whump-whump of his heart, felt his chest rise and fall in time with his breaths, smelled his cologne and his faint personal scent.
After a moment, she began to pull away, and he released his hold. She struggled to stand, and with the vigor of a man who had not spent the last week battling a cold and bronchitis, Bruce sprung up and hauled her to her feet. She started to move back towards her armchair, but Bruce's voice stopped her cold.
"I heard about Marjane-and then I just found out...she's okay."
She stared at him with wide, surprised eyes. "What?"
"I just heard-she turned up yesterday in Metropolis. She got away. She's safe."
Annabeth gasped, and it was a noise choked with laughter and tears. "I don't believe it. I was afraid we lost her." Almost involuntarily, she shook her head and let out a delighted laugh, and this time, there were no tears. She hugged him, impulsively, and that was a surprise to both of them. "He pulled through." She said this softly, almost to herself, but not softly enough.
"Huh?" Bruce cocked his head quizzically to one side.
"Nothing." Annabeth was smiling. "Nothing. It doesn't matter. Marjane. Thank god." Shakily, she made her way to one of the armchairs and collapsed. "I was so worried about her."
"I was, too." Bruce had followed her into the living room, and hovered there uncertainly. "Alfred and I talked about hiring a private investigator to try to find her...and I was worried about you, too." He took in her pale, wan face, her red-rimmed eyes, her limp hair. "I have to say it—you look like hell."
Annabeth glanced down at her faded pajama bottoms and her grey sweatshirt, and was suddenly uncomfortably aware that she hadn't bothered to put on a bra. "I look like hell because I feel like hell," she retorted. There would be no embarrassment, no apologies from her. "You try rotting away in your home for a week and see how you look." She glanced over at the brown paper bag Bruce had brought with him and had set down so peremptorily. "What's that? Moonshine?"
"Close." He turned and began to rummage through the bag. "It's a cold care kit that Alfred and I threw together for you." He pulled a thermos out of the bag—"Chicken noodle soup. That's homemade, from Alfred"—a bottle of whiskey, a bottle of honey, and a lemon—"Also Alfred's idea," Bruce said mysteriously, but would not extrapolate—and a small bouquet of flowers. "That's from me." Almost bashfully, he stole a look at her as he handed her the cluster of mums and asters. Silently, she accepted the bouquet and stared down at the simple, cheerful blossoms for a moment before looking up at him again, her eyes shimmering with even more tears.
"You don't like mums?" Bruce tried to play it off. "That's it-Alfred's fired-"
Annabeth laughed weakly, but it was a sound choked with unshed tears. "No. Don't. I'm sorry, it's just me."
"It usually is," he agreed ruefully.
She laughed again, a little more robustly. "I deserved that."
"You usually do," he agreed again. "Wow, I like you when you're sick. So much more agreeable."
"I am sick. Be nice to me." She couldn't have sounded more pathetic if she tried.
'"I am being nice to you." Promptly, Bruce took charge. "I'm going to heat up this soup-"
"-do you even know where the kitchen is?"
"-and I am going to fix you this drink that Alfred told me about. It's called a hot toddy."
"So you're going to ruin my kitchen and get me drunk?" Annabeth was amused. "'Cause, you know, letting me have a lot to drink worked out really well the last time."
"You're going to have just enough to make you feel better." Bruce gave her a stern look. "And it wasn't my fault you drank all that champagne. You crazy social workers. Turn you loose at a party and you turn the whole damned place upside down." He left her in the living room and began puttering around the kitchen, where an occasional clink of a glass or clatter of a pot punctuated his conversation. "Nice place, by the way."
"You should know. You own the building."
"I do know." He poked his head out of the kitchen and grinned. "But you've done a nice job with it." Bruce meant every word-the lovingly-maintained houseplants, the carefully-chosen art prints, the eclectic assortment of books, all of it evoked a sense of warmth and homeliness he doubted he'd ever experience at the Manor. He found it to be both comforting and lonely.
"It's a ridiculously well-built piece of architecture," Annabeth grudgingly admitted. "Did you know that it's earthquake resistant?"
"I did, actually." Bruce looked absurdly proud. "It's something my father initiated, a long time back. He required all Wayne buildings to be built earthquake-resistant, and then he went right on and had all the older Wayne buildings retrofitted. It cost the company millions of dollars, and it drove some of the men in the company up the wall. Naturally, when I came back to Gotham, I made sure to continue the tradition." He disappeared back into the kitchen, leaving Annabeth to ponder the various eccentricities of Bruce Wayne and his ancestors.
Five minutes later, he emerged carrying a tray he had procured from the recesses of one of Annabeth's long-ignored kitchen cabinets. On the tray, he had placed a deep bowl filled with the soup, now piping hot and so fragrant it even penetrated Annabeth's congestion, as well as a glass tumbler filled with steaming, amber liquid. He placed it on the side table by Annabeth. "Down it goes. All of it."
She began to sip at the soup, more to humor him than anything else. After all, he had come here simply to deliver the news about Marjane—wait. "How did you find out about Marjane?" she asked.
"Huh?" Bruce had been wandering about her living room, studying the contents of her bookshelves and generally taking in her home. But when she voiced her question, he turned around to her, looking- strangely anxious. "Oh." He shrugged. "I think Maya called to give me the good news. They'll probably be calling you, too."
"Probably." Annabeth resumed sipping her soup, and soon found she was attacking it with some fervor. She was hungrier than she had thought, and Alfred must have acquired some amazing culinary skills somewhere along the line, because the soup was the best she had ever had. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bruce meander back toward the living room and settle down on the sofa—
"No!" she blurted, startling them both, but it was too late. He had settled himself down on the sagging end of the couch, the end that had long ago given up its ghost, although it presented a fairly benign face to the world. It turned malignant at the moment Bruce settled his weight upon the cushion, and with an ominous twanging crunch, the last of the springs gave way and Bruce sank much, much deeper into the sofa.
"Your sofa's broken," he pointed out in a mild voice from the depths of the indentation he now found himself in. With a joyous woof, Jed bounded over to the couch and leapt up onto Bruce's lap, which served only to further underscore the absurdity of the scene. With as much dignity as he could muster, he gently shooed Jed away, hoisted himself out, and scooted over to the sturdier end of the couch. Thankfully, it bore his weight. Jed immediately rejoined him, intent on transferring as much fur from his coat to Bruce as possible. "You ever think of replacing it?"
"Nope." There was a belligerent quality to Annabeth's voice; here again, there would be no apologies. "I'm socking away every cent I can spare."
"Really?" Bruce smiled. "Do you have deep ambitions? Planning to buy me out?"
Annabeth snorted. "Hardly." She continued sipping at the soup, and it appeared as though she was unwilling to discuss it any further. After a moment, however, she spoke again. "I'm saving up," she said, slowly, almost dreading his reaction. "I'd like to open up my own safe house someday." She glared at him fiercely, as though she expected him to laugh, or mock, or completely disregard her dream...none of which, of course, he intended to do.
"You want to establish your own safe house." Bruce repeated this as a statement, not a question. "Don't you like Safe Haven?"
"I do...but I do have some goals, some dreams of my own, absurd as it sounds." Annabeth began to sip at the hot toddy, and found its steaming, stiff alcoholic warmth to be both bracing and soothing. "I think it'd be nice to open up a place out in the country. Maybe on an old farm...someplace where there's actual nature, and animals, and trees. Someplace away from all this mess." She gestured towards her window, clearly indicating the vast metropolis sprawled beyond. "Someplace where there's more peace, and less noise, and less people trying to hurt each other. I'm so tired of all of us hurting each other, Bruce."
There were many things that Bruce could bring into his life—countless houses and cars and yachts; fabulous vacations and exciting thrills; an open invitation to the best parties with the most famous people; the security of never having to worry about money. But for all this wealth, all this bounty, all the doors that it opened, there were some doors that remained firmly closed. After Rachel died, one more door had closed, it seemed, and love and companionship had never appeared to be more remote and unreachable; his double identity as the Batman further alienated him. And yet now, as he listened to Annabeth reveal more of herself, more of her view of the world, more of the battles she fought, he began to wonder if perhaps something else were possible. Something more-something as simple and mundane, yet powerful and beautiful as love and a future with someone. And a partner.
"Some place on several acres of land...with some woods, and some fields, too. Growing up in the city, I missed that. I always wanted to get out to the country. Anyway...I think I'd like that...at least for a while," she added sadly.
"Just a while?" Bruce had actually been a little bit taken in by the idyllic picture she had painted. Annabeth feeding chickens, and herding a flock of children about the land-it was oddly fitting. Or perhaps he just liked the idea of Annabeth being away from the rotting city of Gotham, far away, where she couldn't be hurt by this place any more.
"I think I'd miss the city. I think I'd miss being in the middle of where everything happens." The toddy was taking effect and her tongue was loosening. "How is holing myself up in the countryside going to help anything? It's why I didn't go into the ivory tower of academia."
"You didn't want a cushy job as a professor?" Bruce shook his head. "I think you'd make a great arrogant, nutty professor, with flyaway hair, rushing about from class to class, picking on the fraternity boys."
"Not for me." Annabeth had rejected that life thoroughly, even before she had a chance to really get a taste of it. "Walling myself into a university, doing studies and focus groups? No. All of that is useful, and oddly comforting, if you don't want to live. But I wanted todo something. I wanted to be out there, fighting for these people, with these people. I wanted to be out there in the front lines."
"Is that why you moonlight as a crisis counselor, over at the hospital?" Bruce asked. "For the extra money, or to fight another battle on the front lines?" To himself, he thought, Jesus, no wonder she's sick. She's fighting too many battles on too many fronts.
And then: Yeah. You know all about that.
"A little of both, actually." Annabeth was unaware of Bruce's internal monologue. "Why does it matter?"
Bruce tried to play it casual, aware of how odd the question would sound. "I just get interested when I hear about people that have these missions-" he put the emphasis on those last words, and she could almost see the quotes he used- "and I wonder, what brought them to that point? What drives them?" His tone became serious. "What drives you, Annabeth? What's your story?" In for a penny, in for a pound. "No. If you answer me anything, answer me this, Annabeth. What happened the other night? Why'd you run out?"
There it was, the crux of the matter. The enormous elephant in the middle of the room. It was almost a relief to acknowledge it.
"I'm sorry about that, Bruce." Annabeth's eyes were imploring...but for what? "You have every right to be angry with me. And I screwed up."
"I think most of the single women of Gotham would agree with you." But he made this flippant statement with a twinkle in his eye, and she couldn't take him seriously. "I mean it, though. It was confusing. I'm still confused. And I know you're confused. And if you don't want to pursue this-thing between us-that's fine. No hard feelings. But, Annabeth, I want to know what I did wrong."
After he had left later that night, Annabeth would ponder what, exactly, prompted her to tell him. Maybe it was the toddy, or maybe he had simply never asked in such a straightforward way before. "It wasn't you, Bruce. You're a good guy, and I like you, god help me. But I'm...damaged goods. It's not a pretty story, and not every story has a happy ending, remember?"
"I remember." He gave her a pointed look. "I do know this."
"I know you do." Annabeth's smile was sad and gentle and it melted the core of ice that he sometimes feared was at the center of his soul. "Bruce..."
Something in her voice sounded completely different, and he looked at her sharply. Annabeth was looking at him with very real apprehension in her troubled brown eyes. Curled up in the armchair, she looked very scared and vulnerable, and her voice sounded very small and hesitant, completely void of its usual power and confidence. "Bruce," she began again, and her voice grew a little stronger as her words gained momentum, "there's something I need to tell you. I need for you to listen to me, and not judge me."
Never a good start to a conversation, Bruce mused, but schooled his attention onto her, waiting for whatever revelations she was preparing to present. This was what Alfred knew. This is what he found out, and what he wouldn't tell me. As this thought occurred to him, he also realized—and accepted—that the dynamic between he and Annabeth would be forever altered by whatever it was she was about to reveal to him. It was one thing to be treated in a certain way by a person, and another thing entirely to understand why. The question for him was, how would it change him? And how would it change the Batman?
He didn't know what to expect, and so he told himself to be prepared for whatever Annabeth was about to say. Nevertheless, her next words still crashed down upon him with an ugliness that curled around him like a filthy, polluted cloud. "Have you ever known someone who was raped, Bruce?"
The filthy pollution closed around him for a moment. He shook his head, and that cleared away some of the foulness. "If I ever knew someone who was, they didn't tell me."
"The funny thing about rape," Annabeth mused, and her tone was so thoughtful, so remote, and her eyes so distant, she could have been discussing the upcoming weekend weather forecast, "is that only a small portion of them ever get reported. There were just over six thusand reported rapes in Gotham last year—reported rapes. And only forty percent of victims call the police."
As startled as he was by where this conversation was heading, the seemingly-random fact caught the attention of the Batman in him. "Only forty percent?" he repeated. "But...how—forty percent?"
"It's sobering, isn't it?" Annabeth seemed morbidly amused at his disbelief. "You're wondering why so few men and women report rapes?"
He nodded. "I guess I can see why-the shame, the fear..."
"Pretty much. You know why, even if you don't understand. And that's okay. It's hard to understand the powerlessness, the fear, the trauma. And here's the part that really grabs my attention: there's so many women and men who are raped...so who's doing the raping? And who's being raped?"
"Those are awful thoughts." And it was a question he would be asking himself for a long time to come.
"They are awful thoughts," Annabeth agreed. "And frightening. To sit there and talk with your male acquaintances, day in and day out, and wonder, is that something he has done? Has he raped someone? It's not something you can ever ask someone, of course. But it's an important question. And it's a question I try not to think about. You could drive yourself crazy, scare yourself into never leaving your home. Because someone is doing the raping, Bruce, and you can bet your butler it's not always someone you can pick out in a crowd."
Her words were arrows, shooting straight into his heart-Bruce struggled not to internalize them, and failed miserably. "Is that what you think of me?" he demanded, not bothering to hide his hurt. "Is that something you sit there and wonder about me?"
"I don't believe you would do that, Bruce," Annabeth soothed him in a gentler tone than any she had ever before used with him. "I don't think you could. Something I'm beginning to see in you is an element of humanity and respect that you might not even be aware you have. I'm sorry...I'm not expressing myself very well. It's just something I think I could spend a lot of time thinking about, if I could. So instead of thinking about the people who rape, and wondering who they are, I try to focus on the victims, and helpingthem. It's much better for your sanity."
"It's horrible to think about-any of it. It's foul." He stated this with conviction, and he didn't bother to clarify what he meant. It was all foul.
She nodded. "You're right. But ignoring it won't make the problem go away-if anything, it only creates a society in which rape is allowed to happen. It creates a culture of silence, in which people don't report rapes when they happen. And it's an interesting thing about rape...you've heard that it's not about sex, right? That it's about power?"
"I think I remember something about that...from college." Now that he thought about it, Bruce was ashamed to admit—to himself, he had more sense than to tell this to Annabeth—that he hadn't really paid attention at the time; after all, how did it concern him? Oh, the arrogance.
"Back in the seventies, a feminist scholar published that concept. What it essentially boiled down to was that men have used rape as a tool-not just a way to hold power over women with the act itself, but with the threat of the act. And they can prove their own sense of dominance, through the use of women as an object. By instilling fear of rape in women, they can keep us in line." Annabeth ruminated over this for a moment. "I've thought about that countless times, and sometimes I agree, and sometimes I don't. Sometimes I think it might be some sort of learned, subconscious behavior, passed down through the centuries and reinforced. But I can agree—fear is a woman's constant companion, especially in this city. So maybe rape is about fear and power."
In the many years which had lapsed since he had watched his parents die, Bruce had ventured into some very dark places, both in his own head, and in the actual world around him. He had always entered those places alone, and never considered that others, elsewhere, might be wandering through their own darkness. Pain, he was beginning to realize, made people terribly self-absorbed. But now, it seemed, he was about to enter another dark place, only this time it would not be his own. He was about to be the guest in Annabeth's own nightmares.
"Do you see where this is going?" Annabeth asked this gently, with great care, and her eyes shone with compassion, as though she were anxious to protect him from the ugliness of her next words. "I was raped, Bruce."
With those three words, he plunged into the darkness with her.
Even after she revealed this pivotal information to Bruce, Annabeth questioned the wisdom of her decision. When push came to shove, what did she know about Bruce? This debauched playboy had somehow bumbled his way into her life, and despite their many differences and the fact that they went together like chalk and cheese, somehow they had been drawn together. Or, rather, he had been inexplicably drawn to her, and she had never gotten around to repelling him before he wormed his way past her defenses. And now that he had breached her walls, she was about to reveal to him that which she kept most closely guarded.
She scooched her armchair closer to the couch where Bruce sat. This, in and of itself, was a fairly strong indication that Annabeth was speak of something rather difficult and extraordinary- Annabeth never sought out an excuse to come in close physical proximity to him.
For the first time since she had met Bruce, she saw him looking uncomfortable. For one moment, she considered changing the subject, considered halting the story, considered protecting him. He knew enough of the shitty things that life threw at one, didn't he? But if there was thing she had learned, it was that despite outward appearances, she and Bruce were kindred spirits. She had judged him harshly and unfairly; in genuflecting at her own altar of overwrought pain and angst, she had forgotten to do honor at his. The least she could do was to allow him to truly understand her and try to explain.
"All my life..." Annabeth's voice, still hoarse from her cold, sounded thin and frail. "No. That sounds like something out of David Copperfield. And this sure as shit ain't Dickens. I'll try to spare you the Victorian sentimentality of the whole damned story."
"I never cared much for Dickens, anyway. Too long-winded." Bruce's feeble humors broke the mounting tension, and Annabeth actually looked a little grateful.
"Could you pass me that blanket?" she asked, gesturing towards the blanket she had burrowed under for the better part of a week, and which was now draped across the back of the couch. Bruce obliged, actually getting up and tossing it across her shoulders before re-seating himself, just as close as they had been before he had stirred himself.
"Thank you." Annabeth paused to cough, a deep-throated, rattling cough, and then swallowed more of her toddy. It bolstered her courage. "All my life, Bruce, has been a game of luck. Bad luck, good luck. It was bad luck that landed me with the sorry parents that I had. It was good luck, I guess, that I never had a really bad foster family. It was good luck that I got a good family at a time when I needed it. It was even better luck that I got a Wayne Foundation scholarship for college, it was good luck that I ran into Donna at the job fair just as I was finishing up my dissertation. It was bad luck that I decided to go out clubbing one night during my freshmen year of college."
She halted her story for a moment and studied Bruce. He had gone completely still, and his face was impassive, but the way that his intense gaze bored into her, she knew he was listening, and if the seeming nonsequetur had confused him, he gave no indication.
"In my spring semester, back in ninety-five, I turned eighteen...I had started college early, when I was seventeen. And living in a dorm, being somewhat independent, it wasnincredible. Freedom for the first time in my life, the closest thing to normalcy and stability..." Annabeth smiled at the memory. "To say that dorm life is stable and normal should give you a good indication of what the foster system was like."
Bruce inclined his head slightly in assent, but he was slightly preoccupied in trying to picture Annabeth as an eighteen-year-old college student.
"I was different then." Annabeth seemed to sense his thoughts. "Still had a bit of a wild streak in me. I had gotten my first tattoos by then, and felt pretty hard-core. Pretty bad-ass. I studied enough to get by, and I partied a lot. Janey was my roommate—she's my closest friend now, and that was how we met. We would go out quite a bit, just having a good time. Dancing, flirting. Every now and then, someone would slip us a drink. We were young and having fun." Annabeth took a moment to gather her memories. "Just after I started college, I started dating this guy. Gabriel. He was a tortured soul...you know the type. He fancied himself a poet, very anti-establishment, very scornful of modern consumer culture."
Bruce remembered the type, all too well, from his days-few though they were-at Princeton. They would eschew the company of all others, sulk in the shadows, make cryptic comments about the meaning of life and the nature of death. They were tedious company, complete and utter pretentious ninnies.
"I was in love," she said this part with bitter amusement. "And at first, he was very sweet. Very considerate. But the longer we dated, the more possessive he got. And then, one night in the spring, he and I got into a fight about something-I don't even remember what." She peered over at Bruce. "You ever have one of those lover's quarrels? You fight, and then later, it's like, what was it even about?"
There was no safe response for that question, and fortunately for Bruce, she didn't seem to expect an answer, for she continued on. It seemed almost as though, somehow, a dam had burst, and there was no stopping the words that were flooding forth...and the longer and darker her story became, Bruce began to wonder whether or not he wished to hear it. Strangely, though, Annabeth had never looked more beautiful than she did now, her face, her posture unguarded, her face practically glowing with the light of utter openness and honesty.
"Anyway. I was angry, hurt, annoyed, and I wanted to spite him. I got dressed in a nice little clubbing outfit-just a cute dress and some heels, a little on the revealing side. Nothing too fleshy. I loved that dress..."
"What happened to it?" Bruce asked, his voice quiet.
"Oh, I don't know. The police took it for evidence. God only knows what happened to it after that. But I'm jumping ahead..." Annabeth frowned. "Oh. Yeah. Janey had to work that night, so I ended up going to the nightclub alone. It was the place we always went, the bouncers and bar-tenders there knew us. It was a great little place. It was crowded that night, moreso than usual...it was the first really warm night of the spring, and people were coming out in droves. And I think some fraternities were initiating their new pledges, the guys they invited to join." She closed her eyes, and all at once she could almost feel the reverberations of the bass, smell the stale cigarette smoke and cheap beer and sweat mingled with cheap perfume, see the flashing, confusing strobe lights, and it was then that she felt a rising wave of panic-
"Annabeth?" Bruce prompted.
She opened her eyes. She wasn't in the nightclub. She was safe in her home with Bruce sitting right there, beside her. His strangely familiar, impassive expression was long gone, and now he only watched her with eyes filled with concern. "Sorry. I was lost in thought there for a moment." She resumed her story, determined to vomit it out like the black poison it was. Better out than in. "Anyway, I was having a good old time. Just dancing, flirting, the usual nonsense. Someone had passed me a drink, and I drank it, and then I drank another...I was dancing with several guys, clustered around me. Cute guys, clean cut, happy, friendly. And it was so crowded, and I was starting to get a little buzz going...I didn't notice, they had kind of migrated away from the main crush of the crowds." She glanced over at Bruce, suddenly apprehensive. "You know where this is going, don't you?"
Slowly, he nodded, careful to never look away.
"Well. Let's just say that they separated me from the herd like a pride of lions going after the weakest—excuse me, drunkest—gazelle. Before I realized what was happening, I found myself in an old storage room. With four of the guys with whom I had spent the last two hours dancing." Annabeth looked down and realized she had been clutching her glass, as though she could hang on to her story to the bitter end, prevent it from completely being told. Only the dregs of the toddy remained in the glass, and she decisively set it down with a clunk before she continued on. "They raped me, Bruce." She said it flatly, spitting out the foul-tasting words. "All four of them. They held me down on that nasty floor and took turns and they went on for almost two fucking hours."
From an early age, Bruce had been told that he was intelligent. His teachers at prep school had often been floored by his aptitude, and even his parents and Alfred had been a little cowed from time to time. He knew he was smart—but he also knew that, due to the circumstances of his parents' murder and his subsequent grief, he wasn't the best at empathy. But he had a vivid imagination...and he understood fear and pain, and he could visualize it. And he was visualizing Annabeth now, young and terrified and pinned down to the floor with leering, indifferent men clustered around her...a taste of bile rose in his throat, and he focused on Annabeth, who was still bravely soldiering on, reliving the battle once more.
"I won't tell you what all they did to me. I don't like thinking about it, now. But you can imagine. Never underestimate man's ability to conjure up new, degrading things to do to others, and I swear to christ, Bruce, it was like those boys had been thinking on it for a long time." Annabeth leaned forward, quite suddenly, so that she was very close to Bruce, and for one absurd second, he wondered if she was attempting to kiss him. But no, she was pointing to something on her face: a scar, high up, by her right eye. He remembered, suddenly, seeing it the night of the first fundraiser, so long ago.
"See this?" Annabeth said, touching the scar. "That's from that night. They were pressing my face into the floor, and there was broken glass, and they just ground my face into it as they kept hurting me." She temporarily lapsed into a euphemism, and then corrected herself. "As they kept raping me. I'm pretty sure they didn't even know about the glass. But it doesn't matter—the doctor said later, if it had been just a little closer, I would have lost my eye."
"What happened?" Bruce hadn't realized it, but he had slipped into another voice-a voice he used only when he wore a different mask. There was controlled power and rage in his words, and Annabeth looked at him, startled. "What happened, then?" he asked again, carefully keeping his voice lighter, calmer.
Annabeth shook her head. "At one point, towards the end, one of them kicked me in the head. I lost consciousness...I think they probably kept it up for a while, even after. But when I finally came around, they were gone. I was alone. Bruised, bleeding, scratched, sore...It hurt to move, even. But somehow, I managed to. I went back out into the club, and the bartender didn't want to call the police, because of all the underaged drinking...so I went home. Went back to my dorm. I don't remember how I even got there-I must have looked like a goddamned wreck. Dress torn, bleeding, staggering, crying. But I do remember that when I got to my dorm room, I headed straight for the showers."
Bruce released a sigh he hadn't realized he had been holding in. Annabeth heard and nodded. "You understand, right? Know what that means?"
He nodded. He was no expert on violent crimes against wome—at least, he hadn't been, before recently—but even he knew enough to know that showering was the one thing you didn't want to do: it washed away evidence.
"I was in shock...not really thinking." Even now, Annabeth was amazed at her own stupidity. "A million times since then, I've tormented myself with the thoughts, with the what-ifs: what if I had gone straight to the police? Or the hospital? But I didn't. And I didn't even tell Janey that night when she got in from work. I didn't say anything to anyone about it for almost two days. I only told Janey when she walked in on me, crying uncontrollably."
"What did she do?" Bruce probed gently.
"She made me go to the hospital. By then, it was too late. No evidence. They said I had a minor concussion, they treated the cut near my eye, they called in the cops. And Bruce...that was the worst part. The cop that I talked to, some horrible man by the name of Flass." Even now, the memory of his contempt chilled her blood. "He was so horrible. It was the standard victim-blame attitude. You know, 'what were you doing? Did you provoke them?' 'Why were you alone at that club to begin with?' 'You were wearing that?' Instead of trying to solve the crime, he shamed me."
The entire time Annabeth had been relating this horror story, her voice had been soft, almost detached, the buffer of many years having dulled some of the pain and the horror and the helplessness. But when she told of this part, her voice cracked, and a few tears gathered into her eyes, just as though she had just come from the hospital and the awful treatment she had received. Bruce knew Flass, remembered him from the early days of his return to Gotham; the man had been a horrible pig of a person, not at all the type to handle a traumatized girl with any sort of compassion or professionalism. No wonder Annabeth protected herself behind such a cold, reserved fortress...she had learned in a nightmarishly painful way to trust no one.
"He looked at me like I was filth. I could tell he didn't give a damn, probably didn't even believe my story. The look he had in his little, mean, piggy eyes—Bruce, it scares me to think of men like that, charged with upholding the law."
"It scares me, too." Bruce said this with sincere conviction. He sensed that Annabeth's story was not yet complete, and impulsively, he reached over from his perch on the couch and caught her hand. She glanced down, surprised, but didn't pull away. Instead, she kept her hand in his grasp, felt his grasp tighten, and they remained that way, two souls suspended between couch and armchair, despite the physically awkward angle.
"He took the dress as evidence," Annabeth sighed. "I really did love that dress. But it was ruined. And he left, and it seemed like there was nothing else to be done. So Janey and I went home…and you'd think that's when the nightmare ended, that's when I would start to heal. But no, it just got worse."
Something Annabeth had revealed to him came crashing back into his memory. "That was how you got pregnant, wasn't it?" Bruce asked, scarcely able to believe the horrible luck of it all.
"It was," Annabeth confirmed, and there was such sadness in her now, it almost radiated off of her. How had he ever thought her a simple man-loathing harpy? Oh, the reality was so much more complicated. "And that was the death-knell for me and my boyfriend. He blamed me, too, you see. And the pregnancy was the last straw. He was a possessive boy, and he didn't like to think of me sharing with four other men, let alone a baby."
"Were you going to keep it? The baby?" It seemed like an incredibly personal question, but hell, they were past the point of restraint, and Bruce was genuinely curious.
She didn't answer right away. Instead, she stared down at their joined hands for a moment, as though their sudden physical bond held the answer. When Annabeth looked up again, there were tears in her eyes, and on her face as well. "I don't know. I was conflicted…but I didn't have the time to decide, one way or another. I figured out I was pregnant when I was four weeks along, and I dithered for another three weeks—and then one night I was in so much pain I couldn't stand, and I was bleeding all over the place. They took me to the hospital, but it was an ectopic pregnancy, and of course, there would be no baby. No decisions to make, after all. Maybe…" she trailed off, following a path of dark thoughts. "Maybe that was for the best anyway."
Just then, a shrill scream floated up from the streets below and broke through the heavy atmosphere. Both of them sprang to their feet—Annabeth glanced at Bruce in surprise, not expecting his movements to be so fast, so sure—and hurried to the open window.
Annabeth leaned out for a moment, her eyes searching the dark streets below. A group of older children were running down the block, shrieking and laughing as they played about.
"Just some kids." Annabeth almost wanted to laugh. "Poor Commissioner Gordon's going to have his hands full tonight."
She turned around to head back to her seat, but realized that Bruce was right behind her. He placed his hands on her shoulders, preventing her from moving away. "Annabeth…" He struggled to find the right way to phrase his words; he was accustomed to halting crimes, not dealing with their aftermath, and this was an entirely new experience. "What happened? Did the police ever catch the men who raped you?" He used the same blunt words that she had done, knowing that the only right thing to do was to call an action by its true name.
Annabeth did not attempt to break away from him. Curiously, his hands on her shoulders were a comforting thing, steadying her, grounding her in the present, keeping her from wandering too far down the dark road of her own life. "You know, they did bring in a group of guys. I was fairly certain it was them…but it didn't matter, Bruce. They had wealthy parents, and remember…Gotham was a nasty city then, worse than it is now. I guess we can thank the Batman for something, huh?" She saw the quizzical look Bruce gave her. "At least he's getting rid of some of the corrupt cops. I'm pretty damned sure that the investigators were bought off…those guys walked free after a few hours. They claimed they had alibis, and there was no physical evidence—this was after the pregnancy, so I didn't even have the medical evidence of DNA. And that was the last I ever heard of the investigation."
"They didn't even try to press charges? Or pursue other leads?"
"There were seventy-two other reported rapes that week alone." Even now, as she cited that statistic-culled after she had found the courage within to pursue her own investigation, that number staggered her. "Seventy-two other women who were held down, who were objectified, who were completely robbed of their security and sense of self. There was no justice for me, and probably no justice for them, either."
"No justice?" Bruce didn't even have to ask. He knew about the perversion of justice in this city. If anything, Justice had been raped more times than Annabeth.
"That's when I decided I wanted to spend time being a crisis counselor. I understood how little justice we had...no justice…only the justice I could make for myself." Just then, as they stood there, a human island in a sea of sadness and injustice, Annabeth experienced the most satisfying sensation she had felt in a very long time—the genuine thrill of a human connection. "You know about that, don't you, Bruce?"
His heart plummeted in his chest for one moment, and his tongue felt thick and choking as he struggled to speak. "What?" he managed to gasp out.
"Your parents…" Annabeth was confused by his reaction. "If you don't like talking about it, that's fine. Believe me, I understand. But I know you know what it's like to wait for justice that will never come. You just…have to make your peace with it, I guess." She turned away then, breaking away from his hands, still gently gripping her shoulders, and gazed out of the window at the dark sky. Her voice was clear and strong. "I turned to work and studying to cope. I stopped sleeping, because the nightmares were too awful. I couldn't be in a crowded room, I'd start to panic. One really bad night, I tried to kill myself—slashed at my wrists. Janey found me, thank god, and when I was in the hospital, recovering, I began seeing a counselor. It saved my life."
Her back was to Bruce, so she didn't see him as he slowly approached. She knew he was there, however, and when he folded his arms around her and drew her back against his chest, she wasn't startled. They stood there, Annabeth enfolded within his much-taller frame, both of them looking out at the same city, but seeing very different things.
When he spoke, his voice rumbled against her back. "I know how hard this must have been to tell me. But believe me when I say that this…this doesn't change anything." Carefully, he reached for her arms and pushed back the sleeves, revealing her pale wrists and the even paler, incredibly faint scars there. He would not have noticed them, not for a long time, if she hadn't have told him. "You're incredible." He brought her wrist closer and gave it one soft kiss, just one, and then released it.
"In a way, Bruce, I'm damaged goods." She knew he would protest this statement, and hurried on to clarify what she meant. "I mean that I've got issues. Jesus, I still have problems being in a crowd, you've seen that for yourself. It's post-traumatic stress disorder...most of the time, I cope alright. But it still comes out every now and then...I don't even like being physically close to a lot of people—this," she indicated their current embrace, "is extremely hard for me. In a way, it's just easier for me to hide, and work, and try to fight my little crusade and stay alone."
"Is that why you freaked out the other night?" Bruce asked. "When I kissed you?"
Annabeth blushed, and then gently disentangled herself from his arms and faced him once more. "I felt so bad—we had both been drinking. And I know from personal experience you shouldn't take advantage of someone when they've been drinking. I guess I thought when you sobered up, you wouldn't be so gung-ho."
The look of disbelief he gave her made her feel extremely foolish, and so did his bark of genuine laughter. "I'm sorry," he gasped, and then laughed harder. "But…haha..you were worried you were taking advantage of me?"
Despite the seriousness of the entire evening, Annabeth smiled in spite of herself, and then chuckled a little. And then laughed. And then, her laughter turned into a fit of coughing, and Bruce sobered up as he watched her struggle to catch her breath. "You're still sick, Annabeth. I think I should leave and let you get some rest."
A glance at the clock on the wall revealed that somehow, it had gotten to be ten o'clock. "I think you're right," Annabeth sighed. "I need to get some sleep. This took a lot out of me."
As Annabeth led him to the door, it occurred to him that there was a peace between them, a feeling of cleanliness, almost as if, through Annabeth's story, they had purged all of the ill-will that had passed between them. Bruce knew this was not the case—between the two of them, they had enough issues to manufacture a thousand pounds of grief before they saw each other next. But it was a satisfying sensation, all the same.
"Bruce?"
He looked down at her, and saw that, for once in her life, Annabeth looked less than her normal confident, powerful self. She looked exactly like she was: a tired woman with a headcold gone awry, troubled by something which caused apprehension to dance across her anxious face.
"Would it sound strange if I told you I didn't want you to leave?" She tried to keep her voice casual, which she knew was ridiculous, because this was no casual statement. And yet, nor was it an invitation.
"It wouldn't sound strange at all." Bruce didn't want to leave any more than she wanted him to, but..."Would it sound strange if I told you that I think it's better that I do—even though I don't want to?" He touched the scar by her eye, letting his finger graze across the tiny indentation, and he watched her eyes flutter shut for a moment as she took in the feel of his touch. "Whatever it is that's going on with us...and I don't know what it is, and I bet you don't either...I think we should take it slow."
From where he remained perched on the couch, Jed let out one quiet woof. Bruce jerked his shoulder at the dog. "Even your dog agrees with me. I don't want to rush it, and I don't want to screw it up." And I have to figure out where you fit in with everything else—or even if you do.
With those parting words, he pulled open the door and stepped into the hallway. "I'll call you tomorrow. For now, get some sleep."
Annabeth leaned against the doorframe and gazed out at him. Scarcely did he realize he was doing it before it happened: he impulsively lowered his head and gave her a kiss—his lips firm, warm, and laden with a thousand unsaid words—on her forehead. "You're the bravest person I know, Annabeth."
It would be a long time before Annabeth realized just how much praise those words contained, Bruce knew-if she ever realized at all. For now, he could only honor her as Bruce Wayne, but the Batman inside of him was quietly doing honor to her as well, even though she did not, would not, could not know. Even though tonight had been a night for revealing secrets, there were some things which needed to remain caped in silence.
That night was when he finally understood that he was not completely alone. He was not the only victim, and he was not the only warrior on the streets of Gotham. And he began to see, firsthand, just how irrevocably the criminals of Gotham could damage good people if they were left to their own devices. If ever he had doubted his crusade—and there were many times he did—Annabeth's story served as a reminder: there was still work to be done.
When he fell into an uneasy sleep later that night, it was a sleep filled with silent horror and cruel, mocking voices, leering, sneering faces, and the terrified cries of people that he couldn't help. After that night, Bruce would never see Halloween in the same light again. All of the fear and spooks and ghosts that children and adults alike conjured for fun on that autumn holiday, all of the raucous parties and merriment, all of the horror movies and legends and tales of spirits and scares, all of it paled in comparison to the horror that Annabeth revealed to him. And it made the whole holiday of thrilling merriment seem like an absurd farce, a mockery of the real world and the genuine horrors it hid.