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“What do I do with her?” Kara heard Bruce asking, sounding distressed or confused. Perhaps both.
Clark laughed. “Whatever you want to do. It’s only gonna be for a few hours… I’ll be back as soon as I can. You guys’ll have a blast.”
Bruce harrumphed, apparently unconvinced. “And if she misbehaves how will I handle that? She can blast me with heat vision and fly out the window is she’s ever so inclined.” Kara had to roll her eyes at that.
“Oh, come on,” Clark replied. “She wouldn’t do that. She’s a good kid… she won’t misbehave, and she certainly isn’t going to hurt you.”
“If you say so,” Bruce sighed, again. Then there were footsteps and the sound of a doorknob turning, and Kara tried to look as if she hadn’t been eavesdropping.
The two men walked out of the bedroom, where they had been talking. Clark knelt down to eye level with Kara and gave her a little smile. “Okay, kiddo. I have a little work emergency so I need to head out for a few hours. And while I’m gone, I want you to look after Bruce for me, okay?”
Kara looked around her cousin, to where the other man was standing awkwardly in the bedroom doorway with his arms crossed. She nodded. “Okay.”
“I’ll be back soon,” Clark reiterated, kissing Kara atop her blond head and giving Bruce a peck on the cheek. “I want you both to be good and have fun!” And with that he was gone.
Kara looked again at Bruce, and he forced a smile. “So,” he began. “What would you like to do?”
Kara thought for a moment. The longer she remained silent, the tenser Bruce seemed to grow, so she eventually said, “You don’t need to entertain me.”
Bruce sighed heavily and moved to sit beside Kara on the couch. “I’m sorry,” he began. “I didn’t mean to patronize you. I was just trying to be polite.”
Kara frowned deeply because Bruce had sat down before she had a chance to move her American Girl doll, and the doll was now stranded on the other side of him. But instead of addressing that, she asked, “What does ‘patronize’ mean?”
“Oh,” Bruce said, furrowing his brows. “That’s when you talk down to someone.”
“Because you think they’re stupid?” Kara asked, frowning again.
Bruce’s eyes widened in surprise at that question but he quickly schooled his expression into one of mild disappointment, presumably at the course of conversation. “I don’t think you’re stupid. That isn’t what I meant.”
Kara simply rolled her eyes. She found the remote on the end table and flipped the TV on. She watched Bruce out the corner of her eye as she flipped a few channels and found a rerun of The Powerpuff Girls.
She sat all the way back on the couch and crossed her arms. Noticing that, Bruce sat all the way back as well, but he folded his hands in his lap. They watched the show for several minutes in silence before Kara asked, “So you aren’t gonna complain about the show?”
Bruce laughed. “I like this show.”
Skeptically, Kara raised a brow. “You’ve seen it before?”
“Lots of times,” Bruce replied easily. Then, clearing his throat he gave a curt nod and said, “You know… I have a little boy.”
Kara’s eyes widened at that news. She’d only met Bruce a few times, sure, but every time she’d seen him, he’d hung around Clark and looked at her as if she was a stray cat that had snuck in an open window or something. He didn’t seem the parental type.
“You have a son?” she demanded.
“Well, he isn’t exactly…,” he began, voice sounding as if he was a bit unsure how to answer that. “In a manner of speaking, yes. I look after him.”
Kara nodded. “Uh huh. And… how old is this little boy?”
“About your age,” Bruce replied. “He’s nine.”
“Hmph,” the girl snorted. “I’m ten.”
Bruce put his hand over his heart and looked apologetic as he replied, “Oh, I beg your pardon.”
The girl rolled her eyes and sat silently again, chewing on this new piece of information. She wondered if Bruce was nice to that little boy. She wondered if they played together, and if Bruce helped with his homework. She wondered if they ever went fishing together or baked together, like she had done with Clark.
No. She didn’t suppose they’d do any of that.
Glancing back up at Bruce and remembering her doll, she cleared her throat and asked, “Will you hand me Samantha?”
Bruce wrinkled his nose and looked confused for a moment before ultimately picking up the dark haired doll in a pink and white dress with lacy pinafore and handing her to Kara. “I assume this is Samantha.”
“She’s not a ‘this,’ she’s a ‘she,’” Kara corrected. “And yes, she is.”
Bruce made a face that Kara didn’t quite catch and turned back to the TV. “My mistake,” he muttered.
“It’s a good thing you have a boy,” Kara grumbled. “They don’t care what you call their dolls.” With that, she grabbed the remote again and flipped the TV off. When Bruce looked at her questioningly, she merely cleared her throat and announced, “I think you and I have a few things that we should probably discuss.”
Bruce looked surprised. “Oh, well, I see. By all means.”
Kara nodded and folded her hands in her lap, holding her doll close. “We can just get this right out there. You don’t like me very much, do you?”
“You’re a lovely little girl,” Bruce offered. “Why wouldn’t I like you?”
She raised a brow. “That doesn’t answer my question.”
“I like you just fine,” he conceded. “I don’t necessarily know how to talk to you, but I have nothing against you.”
“The only reason you’re even trying to be nice to me is ‘cause of my cousin,” the girl went on. “You just don’t want him to see that you don’t like me because then he’ll know what kind of person you really are.”
Now Bruce looked borderline amused. She hadn’t expected that. Nor had she expected him to calmly ask, “And what kind of person am I?”
“A grump,” Kara replied easily.
At that Bruce laughed. It was the first time she’d ever heard him do that. “Don’t worry,” he replied. “Your cousin knows that I’m a grump.”
She nodded and hugged her doll. Looking straight forward, she found the courage to ask the thing that she’d been wondering about the entire time she’d known Bruce. “My cousin… do you… y’know… do you love him?”
Bruce was quiet, and Kara wondered if he’d heard the question. But then she heard him gulp, like he was swallowing a big lump and trying to find the ability or the desire to speak again. She chanced turning to look at him and she saw that his cheeks were growing red and he was looking down at his hands.
“Well?” she asked.
Bruce nodded weakly. “I do. I do love him. So, so very much.”
Good. That was the right answer. Holding back a smile but giving a businesslike nod, she asked, “And have you told him that?”
“Well… he knows,” Bruce replied.
“But have you told him?” Kara asked.
Bruce took a deep breath. “I’ve shown him.”
Kara frowned. “That’s not good enough.”
Crossing his arms, Bruce huffed. “Well, your cousin’s not complaining.”
The girl gave him a skeptical look but decided not to inquire after what he meant by that last comment. “You know, Ma and Pa always say that you have to be honest about your feelings or no one will ever hear them. And Ma and Pa are never wrong. So you should tell him.”
Bruce sighed heavily and tapped his fingers together. He seemed to be thinking. But his words seemed heavy with meaning when he finally did speak again. “I haven’t told him,” he admitted. “But perhaps you’re right. I should.”
Kara smiled. “I am right. It’ll make him happy, and he’s a good cousin… so he deserves to be happy.”
The man smiled. “Yes. He does deserve that.”
“You know, he loves you too,” she said softly.
Bruce smiled softly. “Oh? And how do you know that?”
The girl shrugged. “He told me so.” Bruce smiled to himself again and Kara was pretty sure she saw another blush creeping onto his cheeks, though this time she imagined it was for a slightly different reason. She wasn’t too sure why, but that made her smile and even giggle a little. Bruce even snorted a laugh and nudged her slightly with his elbow.
They both fell silent again for several moments after that. Kara had learned all she needed to from him, and that was enough for her to decide that she should really put forth the effort of making nice with Bruce, more than she just had. How to actually go about that was the difficult part, however.
“Do you, uhh, maybe wanna play Mario Party?” Kara asked softly. “Clark has like all of them.”
Bruce heaved a sigh and looked as relieved as he sounded when he said, “God, yes.”
When Clark returned two hours later (with burgers, fries, and milkshakes for all of them), he found Bruce and Kara sitting on the floor in front of the TV, very involved in the game.
“Hey, you two,” he greeted jovially. “I see you had a good time.”
“Good time, good conversation,” Kara replied playfully.
Clark set the food down on the kitchen counter. “Oh?” he asked. “And what did you two talk about?”
“About you and how Bruce has something he wants to say to you,” Kara replied before Bruce had a chance to open his mouth.
Clark came and stood behind Bruce and leaned over his shoulder. “Is that a fact?”
Bruce paused the game and looked over his shoulder at Clark. “I’m hungry,” he announced unceremoniously. “We should eat.”
“I was just getting ready to say the same thing,” Clark replied. “You two come on to the table.”
Clark walked away and Kara grabbed Bruce’s sleeve. “You’re hungry? Really?”
“I’ll tell him,” Bruce whispered. “I just can’t say any of that… stuff on an empty stomach.”
“You make sure you do tell him later or else I’m gonna say you were mean to me and we had a rotten time,” Kara replied.
Bruce raised a brow. “That sounds like blackmail, young lady.” Kara merely smiled innocently. Bruce opened his mouth to respond, but before he could, Clark called them again. They went quietly to the table and ate an uneventful meal, but Kara felt triumphant right up to the moment that she fell asleep on the hide-a-bed that night.