Title: Mockingbird
Author: m.jules
Rating: PG-13
Verse: "Hush" arc
Disclaimer: Not mine. But boy howdy, I wouldn't kick either one of 'em out of bed for eating crackers.
Author's Notes: There had to be "Hush" fic. That's all I have to say. Well, that and thanks to devildoll and Firedog for looking over it and offering opinions and amusing comments. :-)

The word nearly killed me, coming out of her mouth. All I could see or hear was Crane, croaking that twisted lullabye at me, mocking me. It was all I could do not to fling her backwards when the joints of my knuckles itched to feel her chin crack beneath them. So much anger -- I couldn't even see Selina.

She spoke of trust. I had trusted her, once, before the doubts set in. I trusted her enough to show her my face, tell her my name. Her eyes had been honest at that moment; her body had been honest as it curled around me. I'd felt the craving in her fingertips, in the pressure of her thigh as she hooked it behind mine. That hadn't been a lie. For a few hours, I trusted her completely.

Alfred has told me my one fatal flaw is that I can never stop thinking, analyzing, tearing apart. Maybe what Selina and I had wasn't meant to be pulled to pieces and put under a microscope, at least not so early in the proceedings. Maybe it needed a little more time to solidify, to find a tottering balance without all the drama that was surrounding us, before I started dissecting it.

But it's too late for what ifs and maybes, and Selina has too much self-respect to stand around while I question a vulnerability that didn't come easily for her. She was all-in with barely a moment's hesitation, and though she hid some things behind her defensive walls of humor, she was already showing a devotion to me that was based on years of Catwoman's fascination with Batman and of Selina's friendship with Bruce. If anything was going to be the best thing that ever happened to me, it was going to be Selina.

I guess that's why I couldn't handle it.

Regret burns within me like a dull red coal when I think of the taste of her mouth, the litheness of her body under mine. We hadn't quite managed anything beyond a lot of very heavy petting, but there's an honest-to-God smile that threatens my mouth at the memory of the two of us necking like teenagers in the front seat of the Batmobile.

There's a motion that trembles in the muscles of my thighs before I realize what is happening, a reflexive impulse to go after her. I want her. I do care about her, deeply, but this isn't something I'm familiar with. She has the power to break me, if she chooses to exercise it. Maybe it's better to let her walk away; she is simply one more point of vulnerability for a man who already has too many cracks in his armor. The way I reacted to an illusion of Jason proved that -- what would I do if someone took Selina from me?

No; it is better to watch her walk away under her own power, knowing that I encouraged her to, than to wait for her to be snatched out of my reaching grasp by fate, death, circumstance, or the simple wearing-down passage of time that dulls all sharp edges, even the double-edged sword of love and desire.

Somehow I suspect, though, that the distance we're putting between us now will not always be observed. There is too much strength in this chasm I feel yawning in my stomach to forget the warmth her kiss stirred in my chest when I was chilled to the bone by injury, isolation, and the weight of all the iniquitous conspiracies pressing down on me.

I know this is not the end; I know I will not be satisfied without feeling her body yield to me, without feeling for one, unacknowledged moment my soul surrender to her. I won't stop until my mocking, incessant need for forensic thought is silenced in the surge of her beauty against me.

I won't let her go until I learn to be still... until I hush.