Bruce Wayne stretched both arms over his head and tilted his neck to one side until he heard the satisfying popping sound. Then he re-read the information he’d typed into a file labeled “Fray” and closed it out.
The show Martha Kent wanted to watch would be on in about 15 minutes; he assumed she’d arrive a few minutes early, to chat with Alfred and get settled. Bruce’s eyes shifted to a live map of the security grid that surrounded Wayne Manor, then he stood up and ran a hand through his damp hair. It didn’t seem like a bad program to watch – a report on the treatment of violent offenders whose behavior was influenced by chromosomal irregularities. He’d see how the first few minutes of it went – it might be worth starting out an hour late.
A tiny red-orange oval appeared suddenly on the security map, just outside the mansion’s service entrance. Bruce headed up the stairs that separated the cave from the rest of Wayne Manor. It wasn’t until he reached the top step that he remembered he had a butler to open doors for him.
Alfred had apparently left the back door open; Martha was standing alone in the kitchen when Bruce got there, looking a little unsure of what to do. A large container of cut vegetables and a carton of home-made salsa were stacked in her arms and she was wearing a plum-colored business suit with a short skirt and black heels. It was a considerable change from her usual jeans and spaghetti-strap tops.
“Alfred’s not here?” he asked as she offered him a tentative smile.
“I guess not. I just got here,” she said. “Meetings today,” she added as she noticed his gaze move back along the contoured lines of her purple suit.
“TV’s in the other room,” he said, shoving his hands in his pockets and rocking slightly back on his heels. “Should I get a bowl for your junk food there?”
This smile went straight to her eyes. “That was practically a joke,” she said.
“Give me a break, it was an actual joke,” he said. “Maybe not a –” he felt suddenly conscious of her warm, dark eyes and he faltered. “– maybe not a good one.”
“No it was –”
“I’ll get a plate,” he interrupted. “And we can –” he tossed a hand over his shoulder, indicating a room beyond the kitchen doors.
Alfred walked through the door, sparing Bruce the ordeal of figuring out which unfamiliar receptacle the butler had deemed appropriate for salsa. Alfred had always been picky about proper dish use; over the last few years, he had become nearly fanatical about it.
“Welcome,” Alfred said, gracefully relieving Martha of her containers as he slid out of her one-armed hug. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here to greet you properly.”
Martha assured him that this was OK and Alfred started to shoo them out of the kitchen. Bruce pushed open the swinging kitchen door and held it for her, his arm high on the door so Martha could move easily under it. She started walking toward the living room, but stopped under the door frame, frowning, and turned back to look at Alfred.
“Alfred, what’s wrong with your leg?” she asked.
The butler had extracted a crystal dip platter from an upper cabinet. He placed it on the counter and started arranging rows of baby carrots, broccoli and celery.
“Just a slight muscle pull,” he said serenely. “Nothing at all to cause concern.”
Wayne Manor had a screening room, but Bruce had decided using it to watch a medical program was a bit pretentious. Instead he led Martha to the den. He did so wordlessly, disturbed by her exchange with Alfred.
“I didn’t notice anything wrong with his leg,” he said, as they moved toward the overstuffed black leather coach.
Martha shook her head. “It’s something he’s doing with his foot. It’s just a little bit… off,” she said. “He’s probably right. I mean, it’s probably nothing.”
Bruce reached for the remote control, which sat in a tray in the middle of the coffee table and moved to sit at the far end of the sofa. Still bothered, he said, “He hasn’t complained about anything.”
“Would he ordinarily?” Martha asked, smiling slightly. She sat at the opposite end of the couch, slipped off her shoes and tucked her legs under her trim body.
“No.” Bruce aimed the remote control at a wall and it instantly broke apart to reveal an enormous flat-screen TV. He hit the power button and started searching for the channel.
“I’m surprised you don’t subscribe to this channel. Seems like a resource a doctor might want to access frequently,” he said.
“I usually do,” she said sheepishly. “My satellite is out.”
He was puzzled. “I haven’t heard of any outages.”
Martha traced a slow circle around her knee. “Well,” she said, “it’s out in the sense that they’ll turn it back on when I pay the bill.”
He ran the events of last month back in his head. There had been an unusual amount of Justice League activity since Halloween. She must have missed a lot of work. Persky had been allowed to hire Martha only if she agreed to be docked for the time she missed while working as the League’s doctor. Her paycheck had probably been pretty small.
“Doesn’t Lian give you money?” he asked. Wayne Industries bankrolled a stipend for full-time Justice League members. Bruce didn’t like Lian and would not have been surprised if her flighty ways included stiffing her hardworking roommate on the rent.
“She pays for half of everything,” Martha said. “She’d probably insist on fronting me the rest, but she hasn’t been around enough lately to notice the lack of life on Lifetime.”
Without thinking, Bruce asked, “You wouldn’t let me loan you –?” He closed his mouth quickly on the rest of the offer as her face flushed with embarrassment.
“
Thankyoubutno,” she mumbled, staring at the black marble coffee table that sat a few feet from the couch.
He felt like an idiot. They did not know each other well enough on a personal level for him to offer to loan her money and Roy had once said something about Martha being funny about that sort of thing. The show was still minutes away from starting. He pretended to watch the coming attractions for a series on Alzheimer’s disease and tried to say something to offset the unnerving silence.
“I… ah… let Bennett run for a while,” he said.
Martha looked up at him, grateful for the change in subject.
“Thought maybe he’d scamper right back to his boss.”
“I guess not?” she asked.
He shook his head. “He wandered the Narrows for an hour looking like he had no idea where to go. I’m sure he knew I was watching him. He finally climbed through a hole someone cut in that abandoned playground and just sat on the rusty sliding board platform until I came to get him.”
“So you took him to jail?” Martha asked.
“No,” said Bruce. “It was late. There was a police car outside the Wawa’s on Hilton Street. I stuck him in the back seat and cuffed him to the cage while the cops were getting coffee.”
Her eyes lit up. “So there was definitely a warrant – oh, here it is.”
The program she had come to see had finally started. They both settled against the cool, soft leather. Bruce thought for a moment and then reached over to push another button on the remote. A little red dot flashed briefly in the lower right corner of the screen.
Alfred carried a serving tray into the room. His eyes slid from Bruce at one end of the couch to Martha at the other and he seemed to barely suppress the urge to roll them. With an ease and flourish developed over decades of service, he spread a long cloth placemat over the middle of the coffee table, then placed the dip tray upon it. He had added sliced wedges of steamed fingerling potatoes and hummus to Martha’s vegetables and salsa. On either side of the dip tray, he laid an appetizer plate. A shot glass filled with two fingers of salsa and garnished with a floret of broccoli sat in the center of each small dish.
“Oh, Alfred,” said Martha, whose eyes had left the television the moment the butler had lowered the tray. “Please marry me.”
“Let us wait until your program is over to make the arrangements,” he said dryly. “We would not want to be too hasty.”
Martha bit back a giggle and reached for the shot glass. But she watched him as he started to leave the room, and suddenly, she was across the floor, taking him by the arm.
“Sit down,” she said.
Alfred started to protest, but there was a small chair within her reach and she positioned it behind him, urging him to sit so she could examine his leg.
“Your program…” he said.
“I’m recording it,” Bruce said. He was standing next to Martha now, hands in his pockets, concern stretched across his normally expressionless features.
The old man glared at Bruce and sat reluctantly. “Truly, this is wasted time,” he said, as Martha knelt and began to roll his gray trouser leg up past his left knee calf.
Bruce watched her carefully manipulate Alfred’s calf and remembered her gentleness, last year, when it was his leg – and his life – that were in her hands.
“You have a marvelous bedside manner,” the butler observed.
Bruce silently agreed.
“Chairside,” Martha corrected, grinning up at Alfred. She continued her examination for a few minutes more, then rolled down his trouser leg.
“I think you might have a DVT,” she said. “A deep vein thrombosis,” she added in response to his puzzled expression.
“A blood clot?” Alfred asked.
“Could be,” said Martha, nodding. “I mean, it might be nothing, but you need to make sure.”
Bruce wet his lips. “Should I take him to the hospital? Now?”
“Absolutely not,” Alfred protested. “There is no reason to interrupt your plans for this evening.”
Martha responded to Bruce as if Alfred hadn’t spoken. “Well, if you have to sit in the ER all night and… Oh.” She seemed to realize who she was talking to. Billionaires weren’t kept waiting in the emergency room. “You don’t. Then, yeah, I think you should.”
“Perhaps you should accompany us,” said Alfred. “So you can report your findings to the physician on call.”
Bruce turned to her anxiously. “It might be a good idea.”
“Sure.” Martha’s eyes shifted away from his. She appeared slightly flustered. “I – I hope it’s nothing.”
—
