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“Timothy Jackson Kent-Wayne!” Bruce caught the four year old as Timothy tumbled backward off the counter he had clambered onto. There was a cup on the counter top, filled half-way up with coffee.
Once Bruce’s heart found its way back into his chest, boy clutched tightly in his arms, he sat down at the kitchen table. “What do you think you were doing?”
“Getting a cup of coffee,” the four year old stated in a crisp tone, as though it should have been obvious. As though Bruce should expect all four year old children to climb onto the tops of counters and get themselves a cup of coffee.
“What happened?” Clark poked his head into the doorway, eyes searching for the source of the noise that had alerted him to trouble. Sometimes Bruce wondered if Clark had super hearing.
“I was getting a cup of coffee, and Bruce made me fall,” Timothy said, shooting Bruce a scathing look.
Clark blinked, and shared a bemused look with Bruce. “Did he, now?”
Timothy nodded and held his arms out to Clark, who plucked him out of Bruce’s arms. “Can I have my coffee now?”
“Why do you need coffee?” Clark asked, sitting across from Bruce, who gave him an exasperated look.
The four year old gave a world weary sigh, and turned doe-like eyes on Clark. “So I don’t fall asleep,” he said, speaking to Clark as if he was speaking to a very young child. The, duh, something Timothy had quickly picked up from Jason shortly after Bruce and Clark had started fostering him, was implied. The adoption had just gone through a few days ago, but there was apparently still a lot they had to learn about Timothy.
“And why don’t you want to fall asleep?” Clark asked in that soft way that he had when he wanted to get to the bottom of things with the boys. It was a skill that Bruce had no problem admitting he was a little jealous of. Bruce would have -- had already -- lost patience with Timothy and told him he was far too young to have coffee, and sent him to bed without asking for an explanation.
The four year old looked down at his hands, which he’d bunched together in his lap, and bit his lower lip. He shrugged a shoulder, and whispered something that Bruce leaned forward to hear.
“What was that?” Clark asked, tilting Timothy’s head up with a finger.
There were tears welling in the little boy’s eyes and his breath hitched, and Bruce’s heart lurched. His three sons were going to be the death of him yet.
“I don’t want to have a bad dream,” Timothy repeated. He wiped at his eyes with a fist, and swallowed down a sob.
Clark pulled the little boy close, and rubbed circles on his back. Bruce rose from his seat and knelt beside them. He ran his fingers through Timothy’s dark hair, and pressed a kiss to the back of the four year old’s neck.
“Everyone leaves me in my dreams,” the little boy whispered, and Bruce’s heart broke a little.
“We’re not going to leave you, Timmy,” Bruce said.
“Why would we leave you?” Richard asked as he entered the kitchen and plopped himself up on the counter that Timothy had fallen off of earlier. He picked up the cup of coffee and wrinkled his nose at it. The nine year old was not impressed.
“Who says we’re leaving Timmers?” Jason asked. He opened the fridge and poked his head into it. “Do we have any hot dogs?”
“Jason, shut the refrigerator door,” Bruce said.
“But I’m hungry!” the seven year old complained, even as he shut the door. “There’s nothing to eat.”
“It’s too late to eat hot dogs,” Clark said.
Jason rolled his eyes. “Well, then what can I eat?”
“How about some manners?” Richard said, sticking his tongue out at his younger brother. He jumped down from the counter.
“Ew,” Jason said, playfully pushing his brother. “Sounds disgusting.”
“Boys,” Clark interrupted before a real fight could break out, he looked pointedly at Timothy who had buried his face against Clark’s chest.
Both boys’ shoulders slumped and they took up positions on either side of Timothy and Clark, each putting a hand on the little boy’s back, offering support. “What’s wrong?” Richard (who’d recently insisted on being called, Dick, much to the mirth of Jason) asked.
“I don’t want to go to sleep, and Bruce made me fall off the counter when I was getting my cup of coffee,” Timothy said through hiccoughs in a tone that made Bruce sound like an absolute brute. The look that Jason shot at him made Bruce feel like maybe he was a bit of a brute.
“Dad,” Richard scolded. “Why’d you make Tim fall off the counter?”
“I didn’t make Tim fall off the counter,” Bruce said, exasperated. Clark hid a smile behind his hand, and Bruce glared at him.
“Yes, you did,” Timothy said, sniffing. He turned his face so that he could aim a glare in Bruce’s direction.
“Dad, it wasn’t nice to make Timbers fall off of the counter,” Jason said a little dramatically, adding a bit of a growl. He gave Bruce an exaggerated wink, and then glared at him.
Bruce held his hands up in surrender, and stood. “Fine, I know when I’ve been beat,” he said. “Tim, chum, I’m sorry that I startled you and that you fell off of the counter.”
“‘S’okay,” Timothy said. “Can I have my coffee now, please?”
“Yuck!” Jason said, screwing his face up in a look of utter disgust. “Coffee tastes like cow piss.”
“You’d know,” Richard said, giggling.
“Richard, that’s enough,” Clark said, and Richard immediately quieted. Had Bruce said that, the boy would have probably added a rejoinder.
“I’m sorry, Papa,” Richard said.
“Why’d you want coffee, anyway?” Jason asked, nudging Timothy with an elbow.
“It will help me stay awake, so I don’t have bad dreams,” Timothy said in a shy voice.
“Hey, Timmy,” Richard said, crouching a little so that he was at eye level with the younger boy. “I have bad dreams, too sometimes.”
“You do?” Timothy asked, eyes locking onto Richard’s and searching for any deceit there.
Richard nodded, and Jason chimed in with, “Me, too.”
“So does Bruce,” Clark said.
Timothy stared at each of them in turn, brow furrowing as he calculated the possibility that they might be lying to him just to keep him from his precious coffee. He sagged, and let out a shuddery breath and wiped at tears that he finally allowed to fall.
“What about you, Clark?” Timothy asked. “Do you have bad dreams, too?”
“Papa dreams of flying,” Richard said.
“And wearing blue tights,” Jason added with a snicker.
“Really?” Timothy asked, smiling a little.
“I once flew around the entire Earth in a dream,” Clark said. There was a wistful look on his face that made Bruce wish he could join Clark in his dreams.
“You don’t need coffee,” Richard said. He wrapped an arm around Timothy’s shoulder.
“I don’t?”
“Not when you’ve got us,” Jason added.
Timothy’s brow furrowed as he weighed their words. “Are you going to help keep me awake, like coffee?”
Jason and Richard shook their heads. “Uh uh,” Jason said. “A sleepless Timmy is a zombie Timmy, and a zombie Timmy is a Timmy that can’t go to the park on Saturday and play on the swings.”
“Or slide down the slides,” Richard added.
“Or climb on the monkey bars,” Jason rounded it out. The monkey bars, for some reason unfathomable to Bruce and Clark, were favorites of all of the boys.
“But, I don’t want to dream about people dying, or leaving me,” Timothy said, wiping his tears from his face. “They always die. They always leave me, and they never come back.”
“That sounds really scary,” Jason said. “You know what helps me when I have a bad dream?”
Timothy shook his head, and Bruce felt like a fifth wheel watching his family at work. He also felt like the luckiest man in the world.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Jay?” Richard asked before Jason could answer his own question.
Jason raised an eyebrow and nodded.
“Slumber party,” both boys said in unison.
“What’s that?” Timothy asked in a small voice.
“See, Timbo, it’s a party where...you slumber,” Richard said, teasing.
Jason shoved his brother, and rolled his eyes before giving Timothy a very serious look. “It’s where we gather all of the blankets and pillows we can find in the penthouse, and build a fort in Dad and Papa’s room so we can all sleep together. We can help keep away the bad dreams. And if that doesn’t work, Bruce’s snoring will chase them right away.”
Bruce’s, “I don’t snore,” was completely ignored.
Timothy’s eyes grew wide, and he shook his head. “We...I couldn’t do that,” he said.
“Why not?” Jason asked.
“I’m not one of you,” Timothy said. “I’m not --”
Jason placed a hand over Timothy’s mouth, cutting off the rest of what he was going to say. “You are one of us,” he said, shaking his head when it looked like Timothy was going to protest. “Or don’t you remember what the judge said?”
“Face it, Timmy, you’re one of us whether you like it or not,” Richard said, pulling the four year old from Clark’s grasp and setting him on his feet. “Now,” he said, taking Timothy’s hand in his. “Let’s see how many blankets and pillows we can gather before Jason can even make it out of the kitchen.”
“Hey, that’s not fair,” Jason called out as he raced after them. “I want Timmy. You can’t hog him!”
“He’s going to be fine,” Clark said, catching the hand that Bruce was about to run though his hair and pulling him close.
“I didn’t even know he suffered from nightmares, and since when does a four year old drink coffee?” Bruce asked.
“Kids learn by example,” Clark said, giving Bruce a pointed look.
Scowling, Bruce pulled away, and let out a frustrated breath. “Fine, I’ll cut down on coffee,” he said, gaze landing on the still mostly full pot and the cup that Timothy had poured. “After tonight. It wouldn’t be right to waste a full pot of coffee.”
“You’re hopeless,” Clark said fondly. He embraced Bruce from behind, and pressed a kiss to the back of his neck.
“That’s what we’ve got you for,” Bruce said, topping up the cup that Timothy had been unable to finish drinking when Bruce had found him. “You keep me sane.”
“You’re talking to the coffee, aren’t you?” Clark asked.
“Hmm,” Bruce said. “You know, Tim’s not half bad at making coffee.”
“We are not letting our four year old man the coffee pot,” Clark said, only half serious.
“He might become a barista one day,” Bruce said. “We might as well encourage his hobby. It could prove lucrative for his future.”
“You’re both incorrigible,” Clark said. “We’d better go claim our spot in the blanket fort. I don’t want to be banished to the outer edges again.”
Bruce shivered at the memory, and after refreshing his coffee, allowed Clark to manhandle him into their bedroom where their three boys were in the middle of constructing a blanket fort that was reminiscent of the Taj Mahal. If the Taj Mahal was made out of a hodgepodge of fuzzy throws, fluffy bedspreads, quilts, afghans, and pillows of various shapes and sizes.
“Given anymore thought to your parents’ offer for us to move into the manor?” Clark asked. “I think we might need to take them up on it just to accommodate the elaborate forts the boys make.”
Surveying their bedroom, Bruce had to agree. They could definitely use the room, and Jason and Richard were starting to take sibling rivalry to Olympic levels of competition. It was only a matter of time before their newest, and youngest, joined in on it.
“Dads, where’s the popcorn and snacks?” Jason asked. “You had one job.” He had his hands on his hips, and gave them an exaggerated eye roll.
“I don’t remember being asked to bring snacks, do you, Clark?” Bruce asked.
Clark shook his head.
“But you’re the dads,” Jason said, as though that declaration spoke for itself. “You’re supposed to bring the snacks, it’s what dads do.”
“I’ll have to go fetch my dad manual,” Bruce said. “I don’t recall reading that chapter.”
“I’ll go get the snacks,” Clark said. “You get us a good spot.”
“I love you,” Bruce said, snagging Clark by the waist and kissing him before he could leave the room. “I promise that I’ll get us a prime seat this time.”
“That’s what you said last time,” Clark said. “You’d better make good on your promise this time.”
“Dads!” Richard pushed them apart. “Timmy’s in charge of the placements. You’re in charge of snacks, Papa, and Dad, you have to make sure that no bad dreams get in. I told Timmy you’d keep them out.”
“Looks like we’ve got our marching orders,” Clark said, laughing as he hurried to go get the snacks.
Bruce let himself be led by the hand to ‘his’ spot in the middle of the fort (which was a huge improvement from last time) and soon found himself ensconced in a huddle of little boys, a pile of pillows under and around them, locking them into place. If Bruce had been given to claustrophobia, he’d be a hot mess right now, but thankfully he isn’t and this -- Timothy sitting in his lap, Jason draped against one side, and Richard on his other -- this was perfect.
When Clark joined them a few minutes later, snacks in hand, Timothy was already snoring, head lolling on Bruce’s chest, and Jason was halfway asleep, the movie that Timothy had picked, Lion King, was playing, though no one was really watching it, even Richard’s eyes had started to close. Clark had a fond look on his face. He placed the bowl of popcorn down between them, and joined the huddle, settling in behind Bruce.
Bruce leaned his head back against Clark’s chest, and looked up at him just as Timon and Pumbaa broke out into a song that both men had become intimately familiar with over the past few years. “Hakuna Matata ...it means no worries for the rest of your days...”
“It’s our problem free philosophy,” Bruce quietly sang, stroking Timothy’s hair and smoothing out the boy’s forehead when it wrinkled. He sang along with Timon and Pumbaa, careful to keep his voice soft, and soon all three boys were snoring, their brows wrinkle and worry free.
“I wonder if we can escape the pile to get some proper sleep,” Clark said, yawning. “Unless you’re too wired to sleep after all of that coffee you’ve had.”
“I’ll stay up and keep watch over the boys,” Bruce said, confirming Clark’s suspicion that he’s had a little too much caffeine (Timothy was not messing around when it came to making coffee - it was strong and Bruce was definitely buzzed, and would probably be awake for a few more hours). “Make sure no nightmares sneak in to disturb their sleep.”
“Wake me if you have a nightmare of your own,” Clark said, already laying back and rearranging the boys’s limbs until there was enough space for Bruce to lay down comfortably as well.
Bruce doesn’t think he’ll have any nightmares tonight. Not surrounded as he is with his family, content and secure.