fort ticonderoga

[bossymarmalade]

"I didn’t do anything."

”Oh, you didn’t? Okay, then. Good to know.”

"I attacked you with too much force. I apologize."

"That’s not it. I understood that part."

Bruce grits his teeth. “So what. What is it, Oliver. What am I apologizing for? Coming to you the way you want me to, instead of going to Selina? Attempting to have a moment with you before we have to talk about anything else, anyone else? Or making you take care of yourself when you obviously don’t care enough about me or Kate or even yourself to do so?

Oliver looks up. “Is that what—

He stops, takes a breath. “Is that what you thought was happening. That we were having a moment before we needed to talk about the serious stuff. That’s what your rationale was, Bruce?”

Bruce stares at him, his gaze dark and hollow.

"What did you think it was, Queen?"



"I didn’t know."

Ollie, oddly enough, folds his hands in his lap, between his knees. With his knobbly swollen and banged-up fingers the motion is even more incongruous than it would have been ordinarily. “All I knew was that you’d beaten the hell outta me, and you couldn’t even talk to me before we fucked. I mean—” he looks up, eyes rounded and steady, “I’m good about not forcing you to talk if you really don’t want to, Bruce, I’ve made my peace with that. I know what you’re like. But I needed you to talk to me then. I needed to know you cared at all about what happened.”

"Of course I fucking cared," he snaps at Oliver, his brow furrowing. "I came to make sure you were alright, make sure that the damage wasn’t more than you can handle, but you’re not some delicate bloom. I know you can handle.."

Bruce stops, presses his lips together. “And then you wouldn’t answer me about Jason, and I know that you—” He stops, again, growing frustrated with how his throat closes off, in the middle of what he is saying. “—and then you went and you took more of what made me move against you in the first place, because.. what? Ibuprofen wouldn’t cut it?” Bruce’s voice grows louder, his lip curling back as his hands tighten into fists. “The vicodin and the percocet I’ve got nearly on tap.. not enough? You had to take some fucking drug that one our enemies is selling to the people—the people I’ve sworn to protect—to.. what. Prove a FUCKING POINT?!”

"I don’t like taking opioids." Ollie clasps his hands around his knees, cradling the caps of bone. "And I wasn’t trying to prove any kind of point, Bruce. I didn’t take it to hurt you. I took it because I was in pain and I don’t have time to be in pain. And I don’t mean managing it, I mean I didn’t want to feel it."

He rubs his mouth against his shoulder, not looking at Bruce. “I’m not a delicate bloom. I can handle a lot. Physically. I just … needed to know that you … could still talk to me. Could bear to talk to me, after I attacked your kid.”

Bruce’s eyes narrow, and his voice is hard, unmoved from it’s point of anger. “You don’t think I knew you were under the influence of something, Oliver?” There is new insult there, under everything else. “You don’t think that I knew? I /had/ to be as rough as I was with you because you’re not some Titan, you’re not..” He shakes his head.

"That’s not what I’m saying." Ollie rubs his face, sitting forward to try again. "I know all that. I understand exactly what it was you had to do. All I’m saying is that I needed you to connect with me after, Bruce. I needed you to check in with me and make sure it was all right. That’s all."

“Understood,” he states, and picks up his coffee, taking a slug of it. Then, pausing, he turns and looks at Oliver, a thought occurring: “Don’t you think I would have, after? Or do you think I’m just that fucking stubborn that I wouldn’t have taken the time to—“ He shakes his head.

Ollie stands up, walking over to a window, opening it and leaning out to look around. “All right,” he says. “I should have waited till after. All right.”

Bruce watches him for a moment, before he finishes his coffee, rinsing the paper cup and lid in the sink before tucking it into the recycling bin. “I’ll be at the lab, finishing the analysis on the Deep Freeze.”

"So that’s it, then. I should just be patient, when I’m not, and you’ll get around to talking to me when I need it." Ollie turns from the window, hands braced in the frame. "I thought I answered you about Jason. I thought that’s what you were asking about, that you were worried I’d wouldn’t want to be alone with you, or something."

“No, I thought you wanted to fuck him.” The statement comes out, and Bruce does not back pedal. “And what about what I need, Ollie? I haven’t shied away from apologizing for what happened with Selina, but I don’t know how else to explain to you that all it was was that. One night that wouldn’t have even turned into one if I had known I could come to you, that wouldn’t turn into last night.”

That /does/ turn Ollie away from the window, and his expression grows more and more aghast as Bruce goes on. “Okay,” he says, “lemme get this straight. You thought I wanted to fuck your /teenaged son/, the one who was brutally murdered by the Joker and has a relationship with you that’s more tense than fucking bowstring? And the reason you screwed Selina is because you assumed that I’d react the same way I happened to because I got /drugged/ and you beat me up and then wanted to fuck me without talking to me first? Really? Is that REALLY what you’re saying to me right now, Bruce?”

Bruce responds, immediately, his voice snapping out: “You fucked Dick.” He continues: “And no, you fucking moron, I’m stating that if I had the precedent set for what I should do, where I should go, when my city, my—“ His voice cracks, and he gnashes his teeth against the sound, the weakness of it. “—the night my /parents/ bodies were obliterated while I could do nothing more than watch.. I wouldn’t have found myself there. I didn’t go meaning to /fuck her/ and I’m not sure how many more goddamn times I have to say that.”

"I don’t understand." Ollie shakes his head. "You just said you didn’t know you could come to me, that it wouldn’t turn out like last night. What does that /mean/, if you had the precedent set? What, this was some kind of failing on my part?"

Bruce’s voice pitches up, hollowing out, all of the tenor gone and replaced by a deep baritone, verging on bass. “It has nothing to do with /failing./ I knew she would be hurting the same as I did, if I had /known/ that you would too, that you would get what this would mean to me, I don’t know where I would have ended up. But it was almost sunrise, and I hadn’t stopped running, I hadn’t stopped running because I was looking for the way /back/—“ He grits his teeth, taking a step forward, his hands bunching, his eyes bright and slick with tears. “—I was looking for the place I misstepped, the clue I didn’t see, and I ended up there because she loves this..” Bruce licks his lips. “God-forsaken place just as much as I do.” He looks at him. “You never have.” It isn’t an accusation, it’s just the truth, and it deflates Bruce as he stands, his shoulders dropping, millimeter by millimeter. “And at the end of the day, she’s what I’ll have left to define my life, from start to finish.” He looks at Oliver, the dark cobalt blue of his eyes darker now, almost pitch. “..I know, in retrospect now, that if I knew that I could come to you without the modification, just for one night, just one night where I could just—“ He stops, and shakes his head, the language leaving him. He moves back to the sink, and fills a glass with water.

"But I’m not mad about that." Ollie goes over to Bruce, rests one hand on his back as Bruce gets himself water. "Bruce. I know that already. Didn’t I already say that? She’s Gotham. We’re not. I get it. What I’m upset about when it comes to Selina is just …" he considers, running his fingertips along a shoulderblade. "I dunno. It felt worthless to not be able to help you or comfort you, is all." He presses his forehead against Bruce’s shoulder, briefly. "It was never about resenting the fact that you needed to be with Selina. With Gotham. I don’t begrudge you any of that."

Bruce doesn’t respond to any of this, lowering the hand that has the water glass, staring at the backsplash over the sink in their—Kate and Ollie’s—condo. His expression is blank, eyelashes unmoving, breathing normally. “But you made me talk about it,” he says, finally. “You made me stop kissing you and touching you, to make me talk about what I don’t want to talk about.” He swallows, his eyes unmoving. “To make me think about how I’m losing track of the loose threads, because if I’m not talking I’m not doing what you and Kate want me to do. So then, I’m failing you. Failing you both.”

"I wasn’t trying to do anything like that!" Ollie moves back, bumping against the opposite counter. "I wasn’t trying to make you feel inadequate, for fucksake, or like you’re failing at anything. I wanted you to /talk to me/. I wanted to hear you say my name." Ollie reaches up to run his hand through his hair, tugging at it, leaving it standing on end. "And you have some nerve, after you thought I wanted to fuck your goddamn CHILD!!”

Looking over at Ollie, Bruce doesn’t say anything else, and washes the cup he had used, clean of fingerprints and his mouth, setting it down to dry on the rack. He waters a plant Kate keeps by the sill, before drying everything off. He doesn’t say anything else to Ollie, gathering up his duffel. “Gotham’s been partitioned. I’ll be forwarding you and Manhunter any relevant details.”

Ollie moves forward, wrapping his hands over Bruce’s on the duffel bag handle. “Don’t go,” he says. “Bruce, don’t go like this. I don’t want to fight. I don’t want to fuck Jason, I’m not mad about Selina.”

“We already fought,” Bruce points out, but doesn’t move from where he is, either to step back inside or leave. “There’s nothing left to fight about.”

"Then let’s not fight. Stay and let’s do something else." Ollie surges up against Bruce, slanting his mouth over the other man’s, hands still clutching Bruce’s.

“Stop it.” He looks down at Oliver, but there is no anger or blame or any sort of emotion, really, as he states it. “I have things I have to do. If I can finish before dawn, I’ll come back here, but otherwise I have to sleep at the tower.” His expression shifts. “I’m still angry that you took the drugs. That you’d be so reckless with your life.”

Ollie lets go, stepping back; for a moment his eyes look wild, desperate, and then a sort of fog comes down over them and he nods. “You’re right,” he says, voice level. “It was reckless. It won’t happen again.”

Bruce notes all of this and states, quietly. “Don’t punish me for needing time.”

"Don’t…" Ollie stops, swallows. "Don’t blame me for needing you to talk to me before fucking me after I was drugged."

Bruce nods. “I’ll be on the comms if I find something.”

The hurt on Ollie’s face at this reply is palpable, so much so that he takes a step back, eyebrows drawing together incredulously. He doesn’t say anything else, just turns and leaves the kitchen, haphazardly, locking himself in the bathroom. Bruce hears the shower turn on.

Bruce locks the door, the deadbolt, behind him when he leaves.

Ollie turns it up hot and gets in, clothes and all, sitting in the tub under the stream of steaming water for almost an hour, until he’s so drained and tired that he falls asleep the minute he gets into bed.