Chapter Text
Suffering is holy.
A lot of people seem to think that. It brings you closer to some god or other, elevates you above others, lets you repent for your sins. It's all bullshit, of course, but it's easier to hide behind a belief system to justify hurting yourself or others than to admit you just want to for the sake of it. Right?
Three weeks on from leaving the Chaos Cult, Bernard Dowd had had enough time to contemplate the whole affair fifty times over and more. He’d mainly tried not to think about it, but it's kind of hard to ignore being in a pain cult, go figure, so the thoughts tended to creep up on him- at night, trying not to toss and turn as to not disturb whoever had taken on the shift of staying with him through the night. Or at breakfast when his mother fussed over his appearance and his father started a fight because his stocks were low and he wanted to feel better about himself. Or when he was stuck in biology pretending he wanted to dissect the frog instead of himself.
He’d become good at that- at dissection. Opening yourself up, poking around, laying it all out on a table and asking questions with a scalpel in hand.
“Bernard? You all there, doll?”
He looked up, and smiled at his hosts- Alfred Pennyworth, the butler of the Wayne and co. family, and Harper Row, the sort-of-adopted sister, or more accurately cousin figure of the family, who'd asked if he was all there. She looked at him expectantly, but not in the way his father tended to be expectant- like there was a certain action Bernard had to make, and he’d be in deep shit if he chose the wrong one. With her, the expectation was just expectant, not demanding. Maybe she wanted him to talk.
“Present and correct, mostly,” he grinned. “Just please don’t quiz me on whatever you were saying, I don’t think my frazzled ass-“
Alfred cleared his throat.
“Sorry, I don’t think my frazzled self could deal with using that much brain power right now.”
“That’s quite alright, Mr. Dowd. We were just discussing tonight’s dinner plans, and whether we believed the family would all be in attendance at the gathering.”
Harper groaned. “I was trying to goad Alf into a bet over which supervillain would ruin our plans tonight.”
“Master Row, you will have no success in ‘goading me’ into placing any bets, and I believe you forgot the second part of your bet where Master Bruce would be late because he was adopting a new orphan.”
“Am I wrong?”
“I will not contest the accuracy of your claim, Master Row. Now, we have half an hour to complete our preparations, and the Yorkshire puddings are not prepared yet. Would you like to assist Mr. Dowd?”
If Tim were here, he’d have a stroke, what with him being banned from ever cooking in the kitchen at the same time as Alfred.
“Sure,” he grinned, jumping from his seat. “Just point me and shoot.”
For once, no villain, no orphan and no sort of evil love interest had stopped the Wayne clan from getting to the meal sort of on time- on time being anywhere from five to thirty minutes late. But in Gotham, schedules tended to be more of a suggestion. Hell, whenever Bernard thought he’d given away that he knew the Wayne family was also the bat-family, they’d all brushed it off with a laugh, assuming he was being wry about the state of civilian life. Harper’s bet never even risked revealing anything to him in their eyes because while she (and he, secretly) knew that this was an allusion to them fighting the week’s Big Bad, Bernard was just meant to assume she meant the buses had been stopped because Dr. Freeze was having another breakdown about his wife or something.
Tim had been the third to show up, closely followed by the legally dead Jason Todd, or ‘cousin Miguel’, as Tim had tried to frantically tell Bernard when he’d had had his first encounter with the zombie Wayne. Or vampire, maybe even Ghost, he didn’t really know. It would make sense if he came back recently, and was Ghostmaker, but Bernard had a few too many theories to really settle for anything conclusive yet.
Tim made a beeline for Bernard the second he’d kicked off his shoes, arms spread wide, and Bernard did his best to avoid the ribs he knew were fractured. Stupid vigilante boyfriends and their stupid hidden injuries. Sometimes he had to wonder if Tim’s secret identity was kept a secret for Bernard’s sake or Tim’s.
“Hey Bear, you good?”
Tim sank into the embrace with a sigh, and Bernard tried his best not to scrunch his nose at the smell of singed hair that brushed past his nose. So Firefly had been the reason Tim was late. Dick.
“Always better to see you.”
“Fucking hell, get a room for you two,” groaned Jason-Cousin-Miguel-Todd.
“Boys, please behave. Just let me get my shoes off at least before you start fighting. Please?”
Somehow towering over Jason, Bruce Wayne struck an imposing figure despite the harried expression marking his features. Exhaustion etched lines into his face, designer eyebags sat snug under his cold blue eyes, his skin a pallid colour doctors would call ‘interesting’, and a loosened tie marking him as the patriarch of the Wayne family. He ruffled Tim’s hair in passing, and laid a loose fist on Bernard’s shoulder, his own little tell of affection. His coat was flung onto the nearest stairway bannister, only to be quickly picked back up in a panic when Alfred rounded the corner. A sheepish expression crossed Bruce’s face.
“Hello Master Bruce. Master Tim, Master Miguel. I’m glad you were able to be in attendance.”
Bernard tried his best to keep a straight face, then settled for hiding his face in Tim’s neck to collect himself.
“You ok?” Tim murmured.
“Always,” came the response.
A full sunday roast dressed the table- mountains of golden potatoes, gravy boats that could be called ships, silver utensils stood sentry at each place. The dining cloth was a rarely seen silk piece that Bernard suspected to cost more than his car, a soft but dark red embroidered with a blue-grey thread. The chandeliers hung low over the table, dimmed to create an atmosphere reminiscent of some Mediaeval drama Bernard would watch.
He sat in between Tim and Cass, hands tucked in his lap. His eyes flitted across each face as the family sat, now all present, taking in the scars, the bruises hidden by day-worn make-up, the near-military posture all of them seemed in various stages of having- Alfred wore his with a near lifetime of experience, whilst Duke and Harper wore their stances like fledglings with adult feathers growing in. It was there, visible in the turn of his head, the stiffness of her shoulders, but only just. Tim, more seasoned, wore it like it was his own skin, now moving with the combined fluidity of the training and the military-like tension that had him ready to respond to anything immediately. His movement defined him, something that had drawn Bernard to him on the first day. He just looked ready. Everything down to the smallest expression reflected this- the slight furrow of his brow, the clench of his jaw, the smooth way a smile grew on his face when a joke began to form in his head-
“Earth to Bernard!”
He jumped, eyes snapping to Steph across the table, who held out a bowl of potatoes.
“Want any? Or are you too busy staring at Tim’s lips? Hey- I’m holding potatoes, careful!”
She glared at Babs, whose elbow had jabbed the blonde’s side.
Bernard laughed, shaking his head as he took the potatoes. “Thanks Steph. I’m sure you can see the appeal.”
Tim sunk down into his seat, head buried in his hands. “Why did I ever introduce you two? I think I'd prefer you to be the bitter ex Steph. Can we try that?”
The blondes shared a look.
“Nahhh.”
“I hate it here.” He leant in. “But are you sure you're ok..?”
“Yes, promise!”
“It’s just the last time you were ‘just tired’ you keeled over from a migraine.”
Bernard huffed. “You make it sound like I died or something. I only passed out.”
“For twelve hours and thirty one minutes, but who’s counting?” Tim bumped his shoulder into Bernard’s, taking the bowl of potatoes to pass over to Damian, not even bothering to fill his own plate.
Something slipped in Bernard’s memory, and he just… he just… stared. Down. his eyes felt wide yet everything had begun to dim. Was something wrong with the… the… his words, where had his words gone? They’d gone. They’d gone. They’dgonethey’dgonethey’dgonethey’dgone.
Something knocked him, and he picked up his fork, blinking. How long had he been staring? He looked up.
The word was lights. Was something wrong with the lights?
“How is your biology going, Bernard? I heard you’re beginning to look for training placements in animal rescue.”
At the head of the table, Bruce craned his neck to see above the heads of a handful of bickering Wayne-and-co children. He nodded, mouth pursing in his approximation of a smile.
“Oh, uh, I am yeah… I… I…” he swallowed. “I am. Yeah.”
Dead. Silence.
Tim leant over. The fabric of his jacket brushed the back of Bernard's hand. It was rough. Was it rough before? No. No it wasn’t. It wasn't rough before. It wasn’t.
He scratched his hand until the feeling went away. The creeping feeling. Tried to smile. “Yeah, I’ve applied to a few places. With my… my… resume, with my resume, I’m pretty confident I’ll get into where I want to go.”
“And where would that be?” Bruce asked, head no longer craned since the table went quiet.
“I’m not too sure yet, really, but I think I want to go to a smaller rescue team, one that isn’t run by a big company, so I can focus more on helping the animals, on community outreach, that sort of thing.”
“Community outreach?” Jason-Cousin-Miguel scrunched his nose. “For animals?”
“Well, sort of. It's for the owners, helping people understand how to care for their animals, safety precautions they should take in case of villain attacks, and helping homeless people keep the pets they have healthy. So in the end it is for the animals, really!” he grinned, his leg beginning to jiggle gently. “And, this kind of community outreach can help people too, because pets tend to have health benefits. Really good at improving mood, especially in the elderly. If I could do anything, I’d help get places like care homes more involved with local shelters, possibly alongside fostering or adoption regimes to help the animals find homes and the elderly to find some companionship, as age tends to separate you from others, and it can be quite lonely. Did you know, cat’s purrs can lower blood pressure? And keeping fish helps with your focus and attention span, because they tend to require regular care with set tasks, which is funny because people always say fish have bad memories.”
A few laughs raised up around the table, but not from Damian, who stared at Bernard with… fascination?
“I didn’t realize you had such high aspirations Dowd. I assumed you wanted to be something dull, as tends to be the case with…”
With civilians.
Bernard tried not to smile. How was he going to get himself out of this one?
“...Tim’s companions.”
Ouch. Nice recovery. Well, maybe not nice exactly, but oh well.
“Ever the charmer,” Dick groaned. “Go on Dami, you know that’s not something you say to a guest.”
“Of course, forgive my manners, Dowd. If it helps-”
“It probably won't,” Jason muttered.
“-If it helps, I was trying to compliment you. Not only do you aspire to work with animals, which I find to be an appropriate aspiration for a mind such as your own, but you have also taken this further and devised a plan for your own programme. As far as I’m concerned, your caring for both humans and animals is rather selfless, genuine and heroic in a way that doesn’t require a cape, unlike what most people in this age of superheroes believe. You’ll fit in well with this family.”
Stunned silence filled the room, as each Wayne member stared at Damian with varying levels of confusion, fear, distrust and awe. This time, when Bernard’s words escaped him, it wasn’t as concerning as the last time. Just… deeply confusing.
“What?” Damian scowled, much more in the character of a grumpy but sweet kid, as he assessed his siblings.
Then, the most unexpected of all- Bruce beamed. “Nothing Damian. It’s just nice to hear you getting along with someone new. That's all.”
“You do realize I enjoy the company of intellectuals.”
Jason spat out his drink. “You called Mar- um, John Jones a fool, and he’s, like, a scientist, right?”
“A poor scientist,” Damian huffed. “Besides, I can appreciate Bernard's ambitions, he-”
A spasm ran through Bernard’s arm, and he dropped his fork. He tried to pick it back up, but heat blossomed in his palm the higher he lifted it, pain pricking his fingertip. His nails felt as if they were about to tear off. Was there blood? No, just heat. He squeezed his eyes shut.
The smells of the dinner table had begun to change, and with his focus on the pain in his hands Bernard almost didn’t notice until the unmistakable stench of melted flesh met his nose. Growing up in Gotham, where fires and bombs and all manner of gas attacks occurred on a regular basis, it was a smell he’d become well acquainted with since a young age. The first time he’d smelt it was going for ice cream with his mum. The last time he’d smelt it, he was holding a handful of matches and seeing how long he could hold his hand out flat with his friends. His cult friends. Smoke. Smoke and flesh. Were his hands burning? They were. They were burning right up, and it was all because he left the cult-
“Bernard! Someone help me, I think he’s having a panic attack! Bernard? Bernard, can you hear me love? We’re going to help you, just breathe with me ok. Crap, he’s crying. Bernard?”
Hands grasped him seemingly everywhere- his arms, his shoulder, his back, bunching up his hoodie. The fabric seemed like sandpaper, and it was bound to peel his skin off. Good.
“Tim, calm down, you’re just going to stress him out more. Let us take over.”
Cold. So cold. Like that time he tried to see how long he could sit in a bath of ice with his cult friends. Hadn't Johnny drowned doing that? Can you even count them as friends if they were just in the same cult as you?
“Who’s Johnny, Bernard? Come on, talk to us.”
“I think he’s having a flashback. We need to help ground him- Jay, pass that candle. Thanks.”
Warmth. Light. Vanilla air. Had he forgotten to breathe? He wanted to try doing that again. Music filled the room, flute sounds floating around his head, blurring out the words that Dick tried to tell him, a hand gripping his shoulder, blue eyes assessing him for something- injuries? Had he hurt himself? He didn’t feel anything. Did he? He was meant to feel it, right? No. no, that was before, and he wasn’t really meant to feel it then, he was just told he was. Told to be holy. The flutes pulled him away, though he tried to reach out for- who was he again? The guy with the funny name.
He held his hands over countless candles before. Seeing how long he could last. They always had to test their endurance. How long can you stay there? Can you feel it? Can you see your skin begin to bubble? Candles. So small. Why was he thinking about candles?
Oh. the guy with the funny name held one out. Warmth, light, vanilla. Warmth. Light. Vanilla. Warmth… light… vanilla…
He stuck his hand out and gasped, bolting upright.
Yells rode around the room, bodies rushing to either him or Tim in the corner, who needed holding back by Bruce, Jason-Miguel and Cass just to stay in place. His face twisted in pain. Why? Sympathy pain.
A rooftop at dawn, watching red skies. Tim held Bernard close, one blanket wrapped around both of them, Bernard pretending not to know there were plenty more blankets, and Tim just wanted to be close.
Bernard held his phone in between their tucked up knees, showing Tim a video in youtube while they waited for a sunrise to come. It was some compilation, laughing at the failures of other people. They'd been maybe fourteen, fifteen then, just before Darla, before her past caught up to them all.
At one video, Tim winced, rubbing the back of his knees.
“You ok?” Bernard half laughed.
“Yeah, just the sympathy pain.”
“Sympathy pain?”
“Yeah,” he grimaced, “Like when you see someone else get hurt and feel the weird tingly pain behind your knees.”
Bernard laughed, and not just by half this time. “I’ve never heard of that. Maybe you’re magic.”
“Eh, I don’t think that’d be so fun.”
“Booo, magic is always cool. Who plays the human in DND, without even becoming a sorcerer or something?”
“Me. Magic isn’t all fun and games, you know.”
“You tell yourself that, Mr. Magic knees.”
“Bernard! Are you ok?”
He clutched his hand, where a small but angry blister had begun to form. Sucking in a breath, he nodded. “I’m back. Sorry. Sorry, I… Sorry. I didn’t mean to…”
“Hey, don’t do that, you did nothing wrong. It looked like a flashback.” Dick hadn’t moved his hand from Bernard’s shoulder, squeezing it gently. Grounding him, of course. That's what the smell of the candle was meant for. Well, it sort of worked, at least.
“My parents will want me home soon.”
Alfred shook his head. “Not until we have that hand sorted, Mr. Dowd. Forgive my demanding attitude, but you must at least let us tend to your injuries.”
He shrugged, brushing his thumb over the forming blister to feel the smooth skin. Aside from the stinging pain, it was a soothing sensation, like running his fingers across silk. He felt as fragile as silk, like one small tear could shred him in two with a single pull. Embarrassment heated his cheeks.
“I’m fine, it’s only a little burn. I just needed something to pull me back to reality, and it worked! I’ll slap a blister plaster on it when I get back. Easy peasy.”
Instead of the agreement he expected, the butler’s lips thinned. “Mr. Dowd, you hit your head, and though it's only a small amount, you are bleeding.”
“Just let one of us help, Bernard,” Babs implored. “Then we’ll take you home. Promise.”
“Cross our hearts and hope to die.” another gentle smack landed on Dick’s shoulder, and he grinned up at the redhead. “I really need to get out of your range whenever I'm being funny.”
“If that's what you call it. Come on, Bear, up you get hun.”
Of course there was a room in the house specifically for keeping medical supplies. Not a cupboard in a bathroom, where you’d have to put on bandages propped on the end of the bath, but a small room with a table to sit on, blanketed with blue cloth.
Alfred dabbed at the small cuts on Bernard’s head, where he’d apparently hit his left side into the floor during his scramble towards the wall. Little cotton buds speckled red lay asleep in a metal tray next to him, like sheep in a pen. He poked one.
“Mr. Dowd, please don’t play with medical waste covered in your own blood. It’s not entirely sanitary.”
Sheepish, Bernard pulled away, and began stroking the back of his finger over his blister. It had lost some of the redness already, but the smoothness of his now clean skin still captivated him.
“Sorry.”
“Didn’t I request you stop apologizing after the first dozen times you said sorry?” a hmmph, and another cotton ball fell into the bowl. It landed blood side up. “Mr. Dowd, I understand that I am not as close to you as other members of the family are, though I want you to know that if you ever want to discuss anything, whether that be issues of just the weather, I am here for you. I also invite you to speak now, if you’re ready.”
A pause.
“Is it melodramatic if I say it doesn’t feel like I ever will be ready?”
“I believe melodrama tends to be lessened when paired with self awareness, however, your belief isn’t melodramatic in the slightest Mr. Dowd. I understand. But as someone who felt the same, and has felt so many times, I can tell you you will be. I see it in you Mr. Dowd. you’re strong, and can take on much more than you should. Perhaps your issue lies in your strength.”
Bernard scrunched his nose. “That doesn’t make much sense.”
“Of course it doesn’t, these things tend to be quite difficult to grasp. I admit, I still find it hard myself.”
“And you’re ancient, so I have years to catch up on you. Decades even.”
A rare chuckle burst out of the old man, and he pulled the cotton bud away from Bernard’s temple briefly. “My, you are familiarizing yourself. You’ve definitely had too much influence from the boys, and Miss Stephanie I suspect. Now, I believe your head will be ok now, though I suggest you be careful about washing your hair for the next few days, until the scabs have formed at least. Would you like to stay for a while? I am quite enjoying our chat, wise remarks aside.”
“No thanks,” Bernard shook his head. “I really need to get home. Though this has been… helpful, even if it has left me with more questions than I had.”
“The best teacher tends to question the student, Mr. Dowd, rather than give them the answers. Some things you need to understand independently, and some you need someone by your side for.”
“So what’s the best question you could leave me with before I go asking myself all these questions?”
A glint formed in the old man’s eyes, and he began to clear away the mess. The cotton balls tumbled in the bin.
“Well, I believe it would be best to ask you this- who do you believe is the best person to be by your side throughout this journey? And do you think your first choice is really the best?”
Tim drove the two home, hovering so close to Bernard on the journey to the car he was practically stepping on his toes. Bernard was almost sure he had been given a pep talk by Bruce to not pick him up and carry him to the car, which was likely enforced by Cass lurking in a corner, Harper waving a wooden spoon at him, and Jason taking the piss out of him, because god forbid the guy be direct with expressing his emotions. Just to shut him up, and partly because he wanted to share the warmth Tim always seemed to lack, Bernard took his arm.
He didn’t remember most of the car ride, but he did remember the golden fields rolling past, the harps playing on one of Tim’s CDs, the drone of Tim’s voice, sounding like he was underwater.
Then he was home. The house. No welcome mat at the entrance, that had been stolen years ago, one night when he was maybe twelve or thirteen. It had a cat on it, ginger, and waving a pink paw as each guest stepped over it.
Tim offered to walk him up to the entrance, Bernard refused, kissed him goodbye, just a peck on the cheek in case anyone was watching, and ran off. Routine, really, a regular dance they tangoed in the fortnight since Bernard had first broken into the Wayne Manor. Ever since he began to integrate into the family, sneaking out at night when his parents were gone or asleep, making sure to be back before they returned or were awake for the first week, then not even bothering with that effort. Indifference isn’t something you really need to run from. Indifferent people never chase you.
His bed greeted him more warmly than either of his parents had, cool covers folded neatly from the previous evening. The last two nights, he didn’t even bother to pretend it was slept in before he left. No point, really.
He pulled the covers up to his chin, back pressed against the pillows between him and the wall, clutching the corner over his mouth. Was he hiding? This felt like hiding. Though his room wasn’t dark enough in the dawning autumn evening for the dark shadows to cast shapes on his wall, something that would have prompted his younger self to turn on the night life his mother had bought him. It was shaped like a frog, and he stared at it each night until he fell asleep, safe under his little green guardian’s unblinking watch.
When he was ten, he’d come home to find the little guardian gone. He’d already learnt not to cry when he saw his father in the doorway, shaking his head. Don’t be so childish, Bernard. You were named after your grandfather, and he never cried. Don’t you want to be strong like him? Like me?
He woke up trapped, legs kicking against the blankets weighing him down, his arm trapped between the bed and the wall. His head screamed, and the plaster on his blistered hand had long since been scraped off in his blind panic to get out of his trap.
Finally, he was free. Scrapes and splinters littered his arm and palm, the heel being the main victim. Elbow scraped to pieces.. But he was free. He was free.
Right?
When he woke up the second time, with the pillows lodged firmly in the gap and his covers torn off and thrown on the floor, Bernard realised why he’d work up in such a state.
He hadn’t fallen asleep alone in two weeks.
You’ll wake up alone too. Come back home, Bernard.
“BERNARD, GET UP!”
With a gasp, Bernard shot up out of bed. His heart seemed to be trying to hammer its way out of his chest, so loud he felt his blood roar in his ears.
The sheets on the floor tangled his feet as he tried to get his bearings, and he slammed into the floor, only saved by whatever soft thing he’d fallen onto. He was fairly certain he’d collected all the pillows in his room to shove between his bed and the wall, but maybe he’d pulled on out in his panic.
But when he looked, he saw the sheets were on top of it. The sheets that had been lying flat last night.
He poked the pillow that hadn’t been there last night, brow furrowed. It was firmer than his pillows tended to be, like the decorative pillows on his parents couch he never sat on.
It twitched.
Bernard screamed.
He threw himself back, jarring his back against the wooden bedframe, kicking out at whatever the fuck had wormed it’s way under his bedsheets.
“What the fuck what the fuck what the FUCK.”
Frantically following the tube-like shape of the thing under his bed sheets, Bernard's eyes travelled further… further… further. Oh. Oh. What the fuck.
What looked like a long, thin slug trailed out of the end of the blanket, covered in a black tar-like substance, which seeped across the wooden floorboards, staining the bottom of his cabinets, darkening his rug. The slug itself trailed across his floor, up the wall, looping around three walls until it reached his door, where it disappeared from view. The walls dripped with the tar-like substance, brown bleeding across the once white surfaces. The slug thing went left out of the doorway.
In the direction of his parents’ room.
Bernard bolted up, ducking low as he sprinted out of the room to warn his parents. The hallway was full of more of the Things lined the walls and ceiling of the hallway, crossing over each other, looping around furniture, sometimes in such thick bundles Bernard couldn’t even avoid brushing past them as he ran, his skin crawling with revulsion at the sensation.
“Mom! Dad!”
Their room was empty.
Taking a second to assess the amount of Things crammed into the staircase, Bernard decided he was already covered in enough of whatever the gooey substance was that any more wouldn’t really matter. He sucked in a breath, braced himself, and dove headfirst down the tubes. He slid down, tumbling just at the bottom, landing in a heap in the only bare patch of floor.
His head screamed with pain.
No. His mother screamed, voice wretched, ripping out of her as she sprinted closer.
“No, mom, no, get out! Get out! You need to run!”
“Darling, you hit your head, stay still!”
Footsteps approaching, almost running, but they weren’t allowed to run in the house.
“MOM, RUN!”
“I’m here darling, I’m coming.”
She rounded the corner.
He reached out a hand, wishing he could stop her but knowing he was helpless.
And she ran through the Things.
Not over, not around. Through them.
The Things recoiled as she ran through them like they were nothing more than smoke, bunching up, darting away, tar spraying everywhere.
But Bernard had touched them, had slid down them, and fallen on them. He was still covered in the tar, and the bits that were drying had even begun to pull his skin tight, tacky like the tree sap from the trees he’d play on as a kid, pulling off the bark to reveal the bloody syrup beneath. The Things, the substance they secreted, it was just as real as those trees all those years ago. Wasn’t it?
Emmeline Dowd, his mother, his frail, reserved mother, ran through the Things, falling to the ground beside him, cupping his cheeks as tears welled in her eyes.
Why was she see through? Was she a ghost? Was she… no, she couldn’t be dead. She was his mom.
“Oh love, what happened? Are you ok?”
“Mom, there were- there were these things- tentacles, or slugs, I don't know- I don't know! I just woke up, and then they were everywhere, and I thought you were-” he choked, sobbing as he tried to warn her. “They’re still everywhere, can’t you see them?”
“No dear, there’s nothing there-”
“What is the boy rambling about now?”
The hands cupping his cheeks twitched, then pulled him in, burying his head in her shoulder.
“He’s saying he’s seeing monsters dear, he’s scared, I think-”
“Oh damn what you think,” snapped Robert Dowd, somewhere to Bernard’s left. “If the boys got into some ridiculous new age drugs I’ll be ringing up that’s kook school of his and be giving them a piece of my mind. It’s that scholarship program, I tell you, letting all the wrong sort from the wrong parts of Gotham in.”
“Robert, you can’t say things like that,” Emmeline hissed, her posture tensing, like a snake coiled to strike. She never usually stood up to her husband, but having a more open mind than Robert, her own friendship circle expanded outside of the upper middle class areas of Gotham, and was one of the few things she stood up to him for. Sometimes Bernard made it onto that short list too.
“I can say what I bloody well please, I’m the man of the house, aren’t I?”
“You’re the prick of the house,” Bernard mumbled.
A crash, and a photo frame landed just at his feet.
“Don’t start thinking you’re smart, boy. You’re going to end up just like your aunt, a disgrace! You have no clue how good you have it!”
“You mean the aunt who has two doctorates and has a published research journal every other month? Yeah, a real disgrace-“
Something, or rather someone, ragged on his by pajama sweatshirt collar, yanking him up. His mother cried out behind him, and his father towered over him.
“I don’t know where you all of a sudden decided you’re a comedian, but I’d suggest you stop.”
Bernard scowled, biting back his own suggestion to cut back on the brandy that rolled off his tongue in noxious fumes.
“Did I make myself clear?”
“You articulated yourself well for a drunk.”
The next second he was on the floor, his mother yelling. Screaming.
She was crouched over him, berating the ‘man of the house’, hand swiping at his legs whenever he came near.
For once, he made it onto Emmeline Dowd’s list of people to stand up for.
Warmth swelled in his chest, despite the heat stinging his cheek.
Bernard stared at the Things around him, which recoiled at the slight light that emanated from above him. He tried to open his eyes, despite the pain in his left, and saw his mother was now fully opaque, a warm glow emanating from her bunched fists. He reached out, stroking one of her small hands, wondering if his aunt wasn’t the only odd one of the family.
“Mom?”
“Quiet Bernard. Your father and I are talking. Get out, Robert, or put down that glass. You’ve gone too far this time.”
A laugh. “Ohh, I’ve gone too far, have I? What are you going to do, Emmeline? Leave me? Take the boy? Talk to your tramp friends about how mean I am? Get over yourself. This is my house, my drink, my sweat blood and tears I put into trying to raise a good young man. But here you are, insisting on belittling my efforts, raising a soft little boy who still thinks what he does matters. He’s nothing without our name, without my family name, and neither are you. My father got it wrong with my sister, he was too soft with her, always treated her. But me? He knew what to do with me, and now look at me! I’m a real man, I provide for your lavish lifestyle, give him a good education for him to waste it on wanting to be a vet of all things, and I now have enough money I could retire and never run out of money for the next century. I always go far, but it’s never too far. I’m always right where I want to be, and have everyone else right where I want them to be. So either he gets in line, or he gets out of my house.”
“Go to your room Bernard, your father and I clearly need to have a conversation when our heads are more clear.”
A gentle push, and he was in his feet, stumbling up the stairs as his parents Carrie don beneath him.
“Clearly he got caught in a fear has pocket yesterday, this are always a problem in the weeks after attacks-”
“-Always another excuse-“
“-I’m sorry-“
Those last two words always came. They meant Bernard would just be in his regular level of trouble, and nothing would change. His father was off the hook, and he was on it in his place.
The Things in his room bristled nearly constantly, more filling the old oak-lined floors as the voices below fell off, the tensions yet again going nearly unaddressed. They’d stick around, no getting away from them, hallucinations or not.
Well…
‘…either he gets in line, or he gets out of my house’
Had he ever really been in line?
Maybe it was time to fully commit, play his part as the newest Dowd that no one talks about at the dinner table, join his aunt as one of the different ones. There was something appealing about only being mentioned in quiet voices, like he was some monster they didn’t want to manifest.
He flipped open his phone, and before five minutes was up, he’d opened a new bank account, transferred all his funds, and begun looking up the cheapest housing areas in Gotham. Crime Alley was the obvious answer, and not one he was entirely against. No one would care who he was there. If his parents came looking, they’d mind their own business. If his parents came looking.
Finally, he found somewhere. A one bedroom apartment, close enough to the dangerous bit of Crime Alley to be near criminally cheap (he wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth), and far enough from where Thomas and Martha Wayne were killed to not be weirdly pricey for the area. Only in Gotham would a public murder raise the value of the property around it. Either way, he was only a half hour walk from the Gotham Community College, so he could drop out of Gotham Prep no issue. Maybe he’d even change his degree, commit to the whole new doing what he wanted thing.
So, after three hours of arranging funds, hunting for both university courses and nearby jobs, and placing an offer on somewhere to live, Bernard finally knelt on his floor.
The Things still bristled, but seemed to retract whenever he neared.
With the housing possibly sorted, his money all quietly transferred, and his new place on the GCC animal management, behaviour and welfare course already applied, finally Bernard came to the last part of his great escape.
An empty suitcase sat expectant in front of him, open and waiting to be filled with whatever Bernard decided to take with him into his new life. He was torn between reinventing himself and still wanting to stay the same. The guy he was now was the guy who survived the cult, the guy who lasted eighteen years under the same roof as Robert and Emmeline Dowd, the same guy who Tim Drake fell for. Why would he want to lose that?
His head turned fuzzy, and the single lamp on his desk seemed a hundred times brighter, the light splitting into his head behind his eyes. He groaned, stumbling up to turn it off, not even noticing the Things retract as he practically fell across the room. Even with the light off, the soft autumn light filtering through his window seemed to drive nails into his face. Across the room. Blinds shut. Things shifted. He rose. No. He fell. Hit the ground. Crawled to his bed. Crawled in. Pulled every blanket, pillow and stuffed toy he could find over his head. The static that came with shadows filled his senses, replacing the pain. He curled up, tucking his knees so tight he couldn’t breathe without gasping for air.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of fighting for air, for the pain to go away, his exhaustion chased off the panic, even if the pain didn’t fully dissipate.
Sleep crept up on him, accompanied by the soft tones of flutes as he drifted off.