Saving Grace: a Batman fanfiction

Chapter 4

         Bruce marched up the stairs to find Alfred and Grace in the guest bedroom tucked away on the opposite side of the manor from Bruce and the boys’s rooms. Grace sounded mad and Alfred sounded patient-- but maybe she always sounded mad, Bruce thought.

            “Why?” she was demanding, eyes narrowed angrily, when he leaned against the doorway to the guest room. 

            “We thought you would be a boy, with all due respect, Grace,” responded Alfred calmly. Then Bruce looked around the room to see a black and green color scheme with a race-car decor theme. Any young boy’s dream room, but evidently not Grace’s.

            “Do you hate it?” said Bruce with a little smirk playing around his lips. It wasn’t that he liked to see her mad-- well, it was a little funny. A little ironic, considering that she was an orphan in Gotham and was rather lucky to have a room to sleep in at all.

            “Hate it?” Grace repeated slowly, like he was dumb. “Hate it? I abhor it. How do you expect me to sleep under vomit-colored blankets?”

            “We can change the blankets.”

            “How do you expect me to sleep on a racecar bed made for eleven year olds?” Bruce shrugged, eyeing the neon orange bed.

            “We can get you a different bed.”

            “I hate the stripe on the wall. Note that it’s that disgusting vomit green color I abhor.”

            “We can paint the walls.”

“Or,” Alfred interrupted, giving Bruce a dirty look of warning, “we can switch your room, Miss Grace.”

Grace grabbed her two suitcases and shoved them into Bruce’s gut somewhat violently before 

whipping past him and following Alfred out of the room.

Bruce sighed and lifted the surprisingly heavy suitcases, following them across the manor-- please not our hall, please not our hall, Bruce thought meanly, but he wasn’t sure just how much more of this Grace he could take-- to the room adjacent to Bruce’s own. 

Bruce glowered at Alfred over Grace’s head. Thanks to Alfred, it was now a hundred times harder 

to hide their secret identities, what with Grace sleeping right next to them.

The room, to Bruce’s shock, was painted a pale pink-- Grace’s signature color, he’d begun to realize. When it had gotten that way, he wasn’t quite sure. He supposed it was just another instance of Alfred’s magic-making and inwardly shrugged, throwing Grace’s bags roughly onto the simple white bed.

“Hey,” Grace cried, voice alarmed, as the zipper to one of the bags slipped back and a stuffed bear fell out onto the ground.

So Bruce chuckled a little bit at it-- so what? It wasn’t grievously offensive to laugh at a 

seventeen year old with a teddy bear. It was a little bit of an ironic sight to see what with Grace’s evident mean-girl personality. 

            But he guessed it was grievously offensive to her, because she launched herself at him and punched him in the stomach.

             It was probably the weakest punch Bruce had ever been subjected to. That was a problem, he noted to himself. In Gotham, packing as weak a punch as that meant almost certain death.

              He glanced at her, standing inches away from him, glaring up at him with clenched fists. Her nose was red-- that meant she was either really angry or really close to tears-- and stray wisps of brown and blonde hair floated around her face, eyes hurt and glittering (with tears? Or just anger?).

           "Ouch," he said in an unimpressed monotone, and she sidled away from him, crossing her arms defensively over her chest.

            "It's my room, get out," she said pointedly, and even though Bruce really wanted to point out that it's his mansion, and he could go wherever he damn well pleases, Alfred shot him a withering glance and he slunk out of the room, hands up.

             "Must you be so provoking around Miss Grace, Master Bruce?" Alfred questioned him later, clearly unimpressed.

             "She starts it," retorted Bruce, feeling rather like a child. Alfred raised an eyebrow.

             "I encourage you to start acting more welcoming. She is a guest in your house--" (a guest I never asked for, Bruce thought weakly) "--and has a troubled background. The least you can do is show her some kindness." 

             "Who?" Bruce and Alfred turned to see Tim stumbling down the stairs, reminding Bruce how early it actually was.

             "Miss Grace has arrived," said Alfred.

             "The foster kid," Bruce explained at Tim's furrowed brow.

             "You said it was going to be a boy," said Tim somewhat blankly, fumbling around with the coffee machine.

             "I was wrong."

             "What's she like?" Tim asked, sounding mostly uninterested.

             "She's a harlot," Damian answered, slinking down the stairs. "A filthy whore. Tt. A child."

             "Damian," Bruce snapped. "Enough. And she's five years older than you."

             "She had with her this ridiculous child's toy. I’ve only seen them in movies and childish picture books,” Damian sneered. “I was stealthily watching her unpack some items from one of her bags. She had all of those products that females use in a vain attempt to make themselves look prettier-- not realizing that it’s a hopeless cause. And other things, these little bottles of color with brushes in them. And bottles of fragrance-- why normal air isn’t good enough for her, I’m not sure,” he scoffed.

            Tim looked like he was trying hard not to laugh.

            That was when Bruce realized there were going to inevitably be some changes around Wayne manor. What with only men inhabiting the house Damian was never exposed to girlish things like nail polish and makeup-- and neither were the rest of them, really, either. ((**A.N. Of course, I don’t personally believe that nail polish, makeup, stuffed animals are for girls only or are ‘girlish,’ like Bruce does. That’s just his somewhat narrow-minded, gruff, masculine Bat personality shining through. Do what makes you happy! :)**))

            “The most ridiculous thing,” Damian continued, stabbing at his waffle violently with a fork, “was that she did not appear to have any pants in her bags. Only stupid things like skirts and dresses.” 

            “Everybody’s different, Damian,” cut in Tim, trying to hide his smile. “It’s okay for her to not be like us.”

            “But Oracle and Fatgirl are of the female variety and they are certainly not like her.” Damian snapped. 

            He was right, Bruce realized. Both Barbara and Stephanie were tomboys. Damian’s mother was certainly not the soft and girly type. Had he really never been exposed to a girl like Grace?

            “Everybody’s different,” Tim repeated, looking irritated with his younger brother. Bruce had a feeling he was only standing up for Grace so that he could oppose Damian on something, but appreciated it all the same.

            “Tim’s right,” he agreed.

This of course led to Damian scowling at him, enraged, and Tim smirking smugly at his waffles.