Category : Books-Fiction

Sub Category : YoungAdult

The sky was a cold, leaden gray.  A steady rain had been falling for the past hour and would probably turn to snow before morning.  The rain had turned the freshly laid dirt on Thomas and Martha’s graves into a sodden mud.  The rainwater and dirt sucked at Bruce’s dress shoes as he stood in front of the gravesite.  He was all alone now, except for Alfred standing a few feet behind him with an umbrella.  The other mourners had all left an hour ago at least, he thought.  He had asked Alfred to leave as well.  But he insisted that he would not leave him alone, but agreed to give him his space.   Alfred watched the boy standing in the rain, his fear of him catching pneumonia from the cold, prompted him to break the silence. “ Master Bruce, if you wish to remain any longer, please let me stand with you so you can be under the umbrella.”  
Bruce didn’t turn around, but waved his small hand over the shoulder of his black suit in invitation.  Alfred carefully squished his way through the mud avoiding the deeper puddles left behind by the many feet of the funeral guests.  Small puffs of white steam escaped from his lips as he splashed softly up behind the boy, “ Master Bruce the sun is setting and the temperature is dropping. We really must go back inside”   Bruce finally turned around to look away from the grave and at Alfred.  Then he looked past him up the hill at the house.  His parents house.  His house now.  It had been four days since that terrible night.  There hadn’t even been time yet for the headstones to arrive.  Bruce turned and looked back at his parents blank gravesite and thought of them lying here tonight, encased in the freezing mud surrounded by the bones of all the generations of Wayne’s befores them.  That made him shiver more than the cold of the november evening.  “ I can’t just leave them here Alfred”  he whispered, turning his back to the man. 

 He had been so strong during the funeral.  He had listened to Mayor Lee and other luminaries of Gotham City businesses and government laude his father and mother with achievements and honors, and members of the many organizations they were involved with, gave eulogies as if they had been great friends.  His parents it seemed, really had no friends other than these people.  His mother’s passion had always been to try to save the city from itself.  She championed the causes of the downtrodden, the disadvantaged, and the unfortunate.  His father, gave much of his time to the city itself.  And much of his fortune.  He most recently, had funded the restoration of the San Marta Opera house in downtown Gotham, and was once again the number one contributor to the Gotham City Policemen's Fund.  Bruce endured while these people went on and on about how his parents would never really be gone because of these great works that would preserve their memory for years to come.  Bruce didn’t need a memory, he wanted his mom. He wanted his dad.  And you couldn’t hug an opera house.  Bruce let them say what they had  wanted to say and thanked each one of them for it when they were done.  It would be of no use to explain any of what he was thinking to them anyway, he didn’t know how to explain it to himself.  The worst was when they would say something along the lines of, “ so sorry for your loss,” as if his parents had just been misplaced. They weren’t lost, they were taken from him, he wanted to scream.  These people would leave after the burial and go about their lives unchanged, his mother and father soon becoming a memory and soon thereafter not even remembered at all.  But before the world could move on from Thomas and Martha Wayne, there was an army of lawyers and accountants that he was scheduled to meet with first thing tomorrow morning.  As young as Bruce was, he understood that once all the papers had been signed and the records notarized he would be the sole living heir of the Wayne fortune and business holdings.  And then his parents would be gone.  All the public works programs, the arts initiatives, not to mention Wayne Enterprises itself would all be in his name.  The world would keep going without Thomas and Martha, without skipping a beat.  The funeral had been held in the Ballroom of the manor, the grand fireplace roaring and crackling behind the caskets giving the ballroom a ruddy glow.  As the Pastor from All Saints Church of Gotham gave his eulogy, Bruce’s head began to buzz.  Sweat trickled down his neck and under the collar of his suit.  The room was warm with the fire and press of bodies sitting in attendance, and Bruce felt dizzy.  He was sitting in the first row and could feel the eyes of everyone upon him.  How would it look if he fainted in the middle of his parents funeral?  They would probably all suck their teeth in concern and fall over themselves trying to collect him off the floor.  And they would all whisper among themselves about what a pity it was and how sorry they were for him.  He couldn’t stand it.  So he loosened the black tie around his small neck and drew in a deep shaking breath.  His head cleared and the dizzy spell passed.  Alfred, seated next to him, as if sensing his turmoil reached down and found his small hand with his larger one.  He gave it a light squeeze and leaned ever so slightly closer to the boy.  “ Just a few more minutes young sir, and then we can get a breath of air outside before the rest.” Alfred whispered.  He needed a breath of air nearly as badly as Bruce did.  Alfred dabbed at the perspiration on his forehead with a linen handkerchief and tried to pretend he was listening to the pastor.  Alfred Pennyworth had never been a religious man, but hoped the words may bring comfort anyway.  Pastor Samson stood with the fire to his back, his face in deep shadow save the hawkish eyes gleaming out of the darkness.  “ Tragedy strikes at any time and can touch any one of us.  But it is not tragedy that defines us.” the pastor called out in a ringing, rich baritone, snapping Bruce out of his revery.  “ it is how we deal with tragedy that defines us.” he finished.  And then they had all shuffled out of the ballroom and through the gardens to the Wayne family graveyard.  The cool afternoon air chilled the sweat on his body, his small hands shivering.  Alfred produced a pair of gray woolen mittens seemingly out of thin air and Bruce accepted them without a word of protest.  He couldn’t recall much of the burial until after his mom and dad had been lowered into the muddy ground, rivulets of brown snaking down the sides of the hole to pool at the bottom of the graves.  The shovels threw thick clumps of wet earth on top of the caskets nearly immediately after they were lowered down, the gravediggers not wanting to spend any longer than necessary in the cold rain.  Each shovel load falling with a heavy, wet plop on the caskets and the soft grunt of the men doing the work.  Once the graves had been filled they made their exits, and left the boy and his butler to grieve.  


	Alfred reached out with a faltering hand and placed it upon the boy's tiny shoulder.  “You’re not leaving them alone Master Bruce, they will always be with you, watching over you. Keeping you safe.”  Bruce turned around to face him, his small eyes blazing with anger.  “ No Alfred, they aren’t,” he screamed. “ They’re dead and in the ground, they can’t watch over me or be with me or anything!” his little hands balled up into fists, “ Stop treating me like a baby!”  Alfred dropped the umbrella into the soft mud and sank to his knees in front of Bruce, heedless of ruining the slacks of his black suit.  He grasped the boy by both shoulders and locked his eyes onto Bruce’s burning gaze. He shook the boy gently but firmly, “ Master Bruce, I promise I will never treat you like a baby.  But please, come inside and let us get out of the weather.  Standing in the freezing rain isn’t going to help.”  He released Bruce from his outstretched arms and brushed away a raindrop that had collected at the tip of Bruce’s nose.  The fire in the boy's eyes began to dim and he nodded his assent. 

Later that night, Bruce was sitting in his father’s study.  He leaned back in his father’s favorite armchair, and ran his hands over the armrests, luxuriating in the soft feel of the dark black leather.  He surveyed the room that, as of this moment, had been left just the way his father had left it.  Every available inch of the walls were lined with bookshelves, and those bookshelves were laden with books.  Books on a myriad of subjects ranging from history and science to horoscopes and loch ness monster theories.  His father loved to read.  He could polish off a thick novel in about three days, which was remarkable considering the busy schedule Thomas had kept.  He had learned to speed read in college and it made it possible for Thomas to maintain his ravenous hunger for knowledge.  Bruce learned to read by the age of five, and had been trying to speed read like his father ever since.  He could do it in short bursts already and Thomas had been so proud of him, telling him he was going to be a great intellectual someday soon.  Bruce scooted off the chair and smoothed his blue pajamas down.  He crept over to the desk in the center of the room, his eyes drawn to a book laying open that had been left on top of it.  He picked the book up carefully, not wanting to lose the page.  He turned it in  his hands to read the title off the cover, “ The Count of Monte Cristo.”  He said aloud to the empty study.  He flipped the cover back open to his father's page scanning the words as fast as he could, trying his best to absorb the words without saying each one in his head, which would only slow him down.  “ your brain is much faster than your ears are, Bruce.  You don’t need to sound out each and every word, your mind puts it together before you can hear it anyway.”  His father had taught him.  He was an advanced student and had at least a seventh grade reading level all his teachers had said, and it took him longer to comprehend the words than it had to read them.  It was some kind of story about a prisoner.   “It is the way of weakened minds to see everything through a black cloud. The soul forms its own horizons; your soul is darkened, and consequently the sky of the future appears stormy and unpromising”   he read out loud this time.  He chewed his lower lip while he pondered those words for a few moments.  Was his mind weak?  Had his soul been darkened?  He certainly felt his future was stormy and unpromising.  His eyes snapped up to the books lining the walls, with an epiphany.  Maybe if he strengthened his mind, the darkness would lift from his soul and he would be free of this grief.  He scanned the desktop for a bookmark.  He found a bit of paper and tucked it carefully into the crease of the spine where his father had left off and then turned the book to the first page.  He stepped back to his father’s armchair and settled himself in it comfortably, the book cradled in his lap and his short legs not quite touching the floor, and began to read.  Hours later, Alfred was walking up the grand staircase.  The first rays of dawn dazzling through the stained glass windows, throwing splashes of rich blues and crimson across the tray of eggs and bacon he carried for the boy’s breakfast.  Last night, Alfred had managed to get Bruce dry, fed and in his pajamas and left him alone to grieve.  He had wrestled with that decision all night, after all he told himself every ten minutes or so, he’s only a child.  He would convince himself that the boy needed someone to be with him this night, but before he made it to his bedroom door he would remember the rage in his eyes when Bruce had demanded to not be treated like a baby.  “ No, Old chap, he would only tell you to bugger off.” he muttered to himself.   So he had given the boy his space, but the moment the sun rose, he whisked up the stairs to bring him his breakfast.  He walked with such haste the orange juice nearly sloshed over the rim of the glass when he came to a stop abruptly at the wide open door of Bruce’s bedroom.  The bed was still made,  Bruce had never willingly made a bed in his life and Alfred highly doubted he would start this morning.  He set the tray on a console table across from the doorway and called out calmly but forcefully, “ Master Bruce!”  He glanced down the hall, waiting for the boy’s answer.  None came.  Alfred swallowed nervously, his adam’s apple bobbing up and down.  He raced down the north hallway peering into guest rooms and lounge rooms that had been rarely used in the past century, and finally came to the study.  The double doors were open wide and the rising sun was filtering in the large skylights  on the vaulted ceiling, illuminating stacks of books on the desk in the center of the room.  Alfred quietly approached the desk with interest, perusing the titles on the spines. A curious assortment he thought.  A french to english dictionary, a history of Napoleonic france, and other similar titles.  Letting his eyes wander from the desk he looked past it to the plush armchair behind it and saw Bruce, his tired eyes darting back and forth rapidly.  The boy was so absorbed in the book he had not yet realized Alfred was there.  Alfred cleared his throat and softly spoke, “ Master Bruce have you been reading all night?”  Bruce looked up startled, his voice thick with weariness, “ Alfred? What time is it?”  he asked, “ Is it morning? Did we miss the appointment with the lawyers?”  Alfred looked at the boy with astonishment, “ No, Master Bruce we haven’t missed it yet, but if you have not been to sleep yet I propose we postpone till tomorrow.  Let’s get you to bed young man.”  Bruce set the book down on an end table next to the chair letting the heavy book fall with a loud thud.  “ I’m not very tired actually, but I am hungry.  Let’s have some breakfast and then the meeting.  I can always take a nap this afternoon Alfred.”  Bruce said in a firm, decisive tone.  Alfred considered and nodded, “ Very well sir, I have a tray of scrambled eggs and crisp bacon for you that I left in the hall, I had thought to serve you in your bedroom but I suppose we can make our way to the dining room after all.”  Bruce picked the heavy book back up, shaking his head, “ No that’s ok Alfred, I’ll eat in here, I’m nearly finished this book.”    He and Alfred ate together there in the study, Alfred sitting at the desk and Bruce in the armchair, his book on his lap while he ate strips of bacon, his plate precariously perched on the armrest.  Before he finished the last crunchy bite he slammed the cover shut and announced, “ Done.”  Alfred gulped his last bit of orange juice and asked, “ Did you read that entire book in one night?” Bruce nodded and turned in a circle, his eyes lingering on each book in his father’s collection.  “ Yes I did Alfred.  And it gave me some great ideas.”  Alfred looked at the book on the end table, his brow furrowing in confusion.    “Master Bruce what kind of ideas are you talking about?”  a note of worry in his voice.  Bruce froze in his survey of the books. He looked at his friend with hesitation in his eyes.  He’s deciding if he trusts me with this, Alfred thought with surprise.  Apparently, Bruce decided he could, and with earnestness said, “Alfred, I’m going to use my family’s money to stop all crime in this city. The man in this book,” he reached out and took the large book in his small hands, “came into a fortune and used it to right the wrongs done to him.  I’m going to do the same thing.”  Alfred took the book from him and thumbed through the pages, “Master Bruce, you do realize that the message of this book is that revenge consumes you in the end. I don’t think you fully-” Bruce interrupted Alfred before he could finish, “I see that Alfred, I do.  What I’m talking about isn’t revenge.  I want to help everyone not just myself.  With the money I have now, I could do anything.”  Alfred’s heart broke for the boy.  As smart as he was, he was still a child.  Still naive to the ways of the world.  He could still believe that this city could be saved.  Alfred didn’t have the heart to tell him that this was a childish dream, wishful thinking.  But Bruce was in higher spirits than he had been since the tragedy, so he wouldn’t dash his hopes.  So he just nodded wordlessly.  Bruce retrieved the book out of Alfred’s hands and placed it on the desk.  His tired eyes alight with purpose, he peered at Alfred with intense seriousness, “Alfred, I know that you think that’s crazy.  But I promise,” he said with just the ghost of a smile playing at the corners of his lips, “ you will see.”