Chapter Text
Bruce woke up when he felt something off in his home. He didn’t know what but something was wrong. He had put Clint to bed just a while ago after their New Year’s celebration. He sat up and listened, he heard a muffled scream. Clint.
He staggered out of his bedroom and headed straight for Clint’s room. Had someone gotten into the house? Were they trying to take Clint? The door was open and he slid inside, Clint was face down on the bed, squirming in the sheets, he heard another muffled scream. Shaking Clint awake would probably not help right now. He turned on the lights and started saying the boy’s name over and over again.
“Come on, Clint,” Bruce said aloud. “Time to wake up. Clint?” He remembered his own nightmares as a child, most of them about his own father, and how he was just happy to wake up and remember he was gone.
“Clint? Clint. Clint? It’s Bruce, wake up.”
The boy shook his head and shot upright in the bed. “Bruce?”
“Hey, Sprocket. It’s almost four in the morning…”
“Sorry,” Clint whispered, wiping the sweat from his face with the sleeve of his thermal shirt.
Bruce stopped him. “It’s okay, do you want to talk about it?” He already knew the answer.
Clint shook his head.
“Okay, can you sleep? Do you want to watch a movie?”
“A Coke and a movie?” Clint asked, grabbing his blanket and heading to the front room.
“Sure,” Bruce agreed. “Want me to stay with you?”
“You can sleep if you want… but… can you leave your door open?”
“How about this?” Bruce brought his own blanket out and laid down on the corner of a couch, tuning out the sounds of Clint opening a soda and the movie starting as he fell asleep.
When he awoke a few hours later, Clint was busy writing in his journal, carefully drawing each letter as he wrote. Bruce moved a little and let Clint know he was awake.
Clint looked at Bruce out of the corner of his eye before going back to finishing his writing. The older man let himself absorb the early morning silence, relishing the softness of the couch and his blanket. “Did you get any sleep?” Bruce questioned, around a yawn.
The boy shook his head.
“Well, while I make breakfast do you want to take a bit of a nap?” Bruce asked standing up and shaking himself awake.
Clint nodded, closing his journal after a few minutes.
“I’m going to take a shower, then what about a quiche for breakfast? We have some good cheese to finish off.”
He knew Clint had no idea what a quiche was but seemed to trust Bruce’s judgment enough to eat anything he put in front of the boy.
When Bruce came out of the shower, drying his ears out, Clint was curled up in Bruce’s blanket, dead to the world. Bruce smiled fondly and went to quietly start breakfast. The journal was out again, laid on top of the kitchen counter and open.
[[I had a bad dreem. BRuse was gon. They sed i had to go bak to my daddy mama was there to. she was crying daddy was smakin her. They sed I had to stay. Mama went to sleep and daddys smacks weren’t waking her up. So he started smakin me and then blood was comin out of me and i was kwiet and he kept smakin. then I thot I was gonna die but daddy still kept smakin. So I cried and he smaked harder. I didnt die. Then Bruse woke me up.]]
Bruce dreamed for one brief moment about killing Mr. Barton but he was dead and with any luck burning in the deepest recesses of hell.
~*~
A few days after New Years Day, Bruce was getting a reluctant Clint ready for school. Until Bruce had approval for home schooling he would have to take Clint to school. He had convinced the boy to have some fruit filled oatmeal and get dressed but getting him out the door was challenging. Bruce had pleaded with his department head to be allowed to meet with him a little later in the morning, the man had agreed after hearing what Bruce was doing for Clint and the fact that he was still very productive, despite the added strain of a child.
“Please, Bruce,” Clint whined, loose-limbed on the couch. “Please.”
Bruce frowned as he closed Clint’s new lunch box, Clint was never eating another school lunch as far as he was concerned. “You have to go, Clint. Get your backpack.”
Clint looked longingly at the fire escape but pulled himself to his feet and dragged his feet to the car. The fight really began when they got out of the car at school. Bruce escorted Clint to his classroom and met the teacher at the door. He explained the new situation and Bruce asked to be kept informed of everything going on.
Clint was oddly clingy through the whole conversation, staying pressed to Bruce’s side, his body rigid and turned away from the other kids entering the room.
“Okay, I need to get home.” He took Clint’s face in his hands. “I’ll be back at 2:30. Meet me outside the gate. Do not… and I repeat… do not go try to find me. Do not go with a stranger. Don’t try walking. No buses. If I’m late I’ll meet you in the office. Be at the gate at 2:30.”
The blonde nodded, wrapping his arms around Bruce’s middle and burying his face in his chest. “Please,” he heard whispered.
Bruce had been mentally preparing himself for this reaction. He gave Clint a long hug, rubbing his back and trying to convey all the reassurance he could. He imagined this class was not a class for the emotionally stunted and socially phobic.
“You’ll be fine. I’m going to be here at 2:30. Eat all of your lunch.” Clint nodded but didn’t release him. “I love you very, very much… Can you go inside for me?” The boy shook his head.
“Okay,” he took each of Clint’s wrists and gently pushed him away, folding his arms to his chest and crouching to his level. The younger man was crying but not making a noise. Bruce felt like a horrible person but knew it was for the best. Clint needed to be able to separate.
“You’ll be okay here. Be at the gate at 2:30,” he reminded one more time. He went to step away and Clint followed. He stopped and firmly told Clint to stay at the classroom. One the class assistants stepped out and went to put a restraining hand on Clint’s shoulder.
Bruce stopped him. “I can handle this.” Clint would only freak out if someone was holding him back. “Stay here, Clint,” he reaffirmed before stepping away. Clint stayed, his head bowed while Bruce walked briskly away. He gave Clint a little wave when the boy looked up. If Bruce sat in the school parking lot for twenty minutes, nobody was the wiser.
~*~
Clint watched until Bruce’s feet disappeared from his vision and then looked up to watch his back disappear around a corner, he felt tears form again when Bruce waved. He tried to be logical, he really tried, but he felt as if Bruce was dumping him off. He wanted to go home.
Soon enough the teacher beckoned him in and he took a seat as class started. He stayed silent through class and kept to himself at recess. He couldn’t help his smile when he opened his backpack and saw the coloring pencils and sketch pad, both Christmas presents. He set them out and carefully began sketching the school as he sat pressed against the wall outside his room.
Mr. Allen walked down the overhang and Clint pretended to be frozen in rock as the older man crouched beside him. “That’s a really nice set you have there… did you get it for Christmas?”
He nodded but continued drawing, his eyes carefully watching Mr. Allen’s movements. “I heard you were placed back with your foster dad.”
He didn’t respond. “If you ever need to talk, Clint, you know where I am.”
The boy didn’t say anything as Mr. Allen disappeared.
At lunch, he took his seat at the far end of the table and opened his lunch. Bruce had sent him with a reusable bottle of water but he didn’t know what else he had packed.
Inside there was a short note. ‘Be great and I will see you at 2:30. <3 Bruce. PS: Eat!’ He smiled at the note, he’d seen kids get notes on TV but never gotten a note himself. He stuffed it in his pocket and looked in his lunch. It was cold chicken pasta, a mix of fruit, and a carefully wrapped Oreo.
He ate it all and he started to believe that Bruce was coming to pick him up.
When 2:30 rolled around he walked with the aide that waited with the “pick-up” kids. He wasn’t disappointed when Bruce’s little car was waiting for him. He ran to the car and slid inside to get out of the bitter cold.
“Bruce!” He leaned over to hug the older man without a thought, smiling when Bruce hugged him back.
“Did you have a good day?” the older man questioned.
Clint shrugged as he buckled himself in. “Words,” Bruce reminded as he started the car.
“It was fine. I got to draw with my new stuff at recess.”
Bruce nodded. “Did you like lunch?”
Clint nodded, but added, “It was good. I liked the Oreo best.”
Bruce laughed, “Of course, you did. That was much healthier than what your school cafeteria was feeding you.”
“Cafeteria lunch is good!” Clint argued with a little grin. This was the most smart aleck Clint had ever been and Bruce was going to run with it.
“It was greasy!” he argued back with a smile.
“Greasy and delicious!”
Bruce rolled his eyes. “And smelly.”