#secretconfessions

Chapter 12

13. The Shape of Truth

Location: Clark’s apartment, Metropolis. No more places to run. Time: 2:13 a.m. State: Desperate after a week.

Clark hears the window before he hears the boots. Not because Batman is careless—Batman never is—but because Clark has spent an entire week listening for him and his heart has been racing ever since he heard him cross the bay.

The cape moves first in the darkness. Then Bruce enters the apartment, clad in black armor, shoulders rigid. A statue barely daring to set foot on the generic living room-kitchen floor.

Clark slowly puts down the book in his hands.

Neither speaks immediately. The rain taps softly against the windows.

Bruce looks exhausted.

Clark stands.

Clark: Hi.

Bruce clenches his jaw.

Bruce: I need to say something before I lose my nerve.

Clark feels his chest tighten instantly. Because Bruce never says things like this, and he wonders if it’s because normally he doesn’t feel them and is now in a crisis—or if he always does feel them but hides it, unnoticed by anyone.

Clark nods once.

Bruce doesn’t move further into the apartment.

Bruce: I owe you an apology.

Clark blinks.

Clark: An apol…?

Bruce: Let me finish.

The words come out rough, unmodulated.

Bruce: I’ve spent weeks trying to avoid this because I thought… because I believed it would taint something important.

A sudden chill runs through Clark.

Bruce: You’re my friend. My partner. The person I trust the most. And I…

His voice almost breaks.

Bruce: …I’ve tainted it.

Clark’s heart cracks a little. He steps forward immediately.

Clark: Bruce, no…

Bruce finally looks at him. The white eyes of the cowl, but even covered and in darkness, seem terrified.

Bruce: I constantly desire you.

The room falls silent. Bruce breathes once, and a human could have heard it. Bruce, who is shadows.

Then it all begins to spill out of him, as if truth has finally broken a dam.

Bruce: I think of you when you’re not here. I wait for you. I feel calmer when you’re near. I trust you with things I trust no one else with. Sometimes I hear or think something and wish you were there to share it with me. You make rooms feel safe. You make me feel safe. Me.

Clark checks that his mouth is closed. Bruce clenches his fists at his sides.

Bruce: I love your kindness. Your ridiculous hope. Your self-control. I love the way you look at people, as if they deserve to be saved. I love your voice. Your laugh. I…

He swallows hard.

Bruce: I think I’ve loved you longer than I know now, because I appreciated many of these things before the Rann mission, but I couldn’t admit it to myself because I wanted to feel there was something I hadn’t poisoned or ruined.

Silence.

Then Bruce looks away abruptly, embarrassed that these words exist outside of him.

Bruce: I’m sorry. The outburst and… I’m so sorry for loving you, Clark. You deserve better.

Clark crosses the room before he can think. He gently takes Bruce by the arms.

Clark: Better?

Bruce freezes.

Clark smiles, helpless, warm, face unmasked by relief.

Clark: Bruce… I love you too.

For a moment, Batman seems completely vulnerable.

Carefully, Clark releases one of his arms and reaches up to pull back the cowl. He’s never as handsome as with his hair mussed and stuck, his huge gray eyes.

Bruce blinks once.

Clark stares at him. A moment passes.

Clark: I’m going to kiss you.

Bruce breathes in, unable to speak, only nods like a starstruck teenager.

It’s a soft kiss at first and at the end.

Bruce’s gloved finger brushes Clark’s cheek as they part, staring without blinking.

Clark: Tell me the sky is red. Or that you voted for Mayor Hill. Or that… or that you don’t love me.

Clark’s voice is fragile. Bruce opens his mouth, ready to say any lie except the last one.

Bruce: It’s… it’s…

And he can’t.

Clark’s face falls, but Bruce just presses a little closer.

Bruce: Don’t be sad. It’s okay. At least you’ll never doubt what I’ve said.

A scant consolation, in Clark’s opinion.

Bruce exhales, exhausted, over Clark, as if he’s finally laid down the pillars of the Garden of the Hesperides.

Bruce: Diana was right. It’s a relief.

That’s a better consolation, if you ask Clark. So he laughs softly against Bruce’s hair, hugging him tighter.

The end.

What if Bob Ross was a serial killer,

and his paintings are the locations where he hid the bodies?

Chapter 13

Extra Scene 1

Location: Clark’s apartment, Metropolis. Time: Sometime later. State: Let’s pretend there’s a sheet.

Clark: There’s… something I need to tell you.

Bruce: If you have doubts, tell me n—if you have doubts, we need to talk about it now.

Surprised, Clark watches Bruce sit, even though just a moment ago he seemed to melt next to him, like water.

Clark pulls him down to lie back again.

Clark: It’s not… really bad. But… some inappropriate pictures of me might be circulating. From recently. I don’t want you to think that… I don’t know what I want you to think, but you should know I didn’t do anything.

Bruce narrows his eyes.

Bruce: Are they illegal?

Clark frowns, thinking.

Clark: I don’t think so. There were a lot of people, they would’ve stopped us.

Bruce relaxes slightly.

Clark: They’re…

Clark doesn’t seem able to finish the confession.

Bruce: With another partner?

Not ideal, but Bruce has horrid skeletons in his closet and Clark intertwined his fingers with his during sex. He could cry just remembering. Again.

Clark: No! Just… just me… well, in underwear and a little wet…

Honestly, if that’s Clark’s level of embarrassment, Bruce will have to make a dossier and tactfully explain a lot of the things someone could find online about Brucie…

Clark: … riding a mechanical bull.

Oh.

Oh…

Bruce blinks.

That’s… different.

Slowly, he nods.

Bruce: And who has these pictures?

He can’t add “so we can stop them from circulating,” though he’ll work on that after he gets them.

I am the seed from which oak trees grow, One of hundreds that they sow.

You are the star that lights my sky, My reason to be, my why.

I see you not now, not even then, All I know is the fact, not the when.

You will be my life long love, And my getting to you will be so tough,

It will be passion, anger and disgrace, But my eyes will stream when I see your face.

I have longed for you since the day I was born, To your well being, my heart was sworn.

You are not a lover, a friend, a foe, You are my child, only this I know.

There will be no other in my world, Your soul, around which I’m curled

I can hear you, crying in the dark, Each unshed tear a stab to my heart.

For though I love you with each strangled breath, Before I could give you life, my body gave you death.

I know not your touch, your soft embrace, But at every though, my heart does race.

I am sorry, my little lost lamb, I cannot help you, my body I damn.

Anything by the weeknd seriously