joe's arms are warm around his waist, and michael doesn't mind it. the condo is getting warmer, the coffee is on, and he feels better now that he's slept. safer. the sky hasn't fallen, joe hasn't looked at him in a bad way, and there's a real comfort with the weight off of his shoulders.

"what time do you have to leave?" he asks, feeling joe's chest against his back, able to see the shadows of his wings.

"i don't," joe says.

over and over again, the memories overlap with each other, in a different tune, in a different times but all the fundamentally same event: a movie theater, parents there together for the last time, the bang of a gun and the world collapsing around him.

it feels okay, in the end, to tell joe the truth. he doesn't want to talk about it again, and joe doesn't rush out, doesn't make light of it.

it would be easier if it didn't crash up against the overlay of memories going on his head that has him crying every so often, rushed over by emotions of upset, betrayal. confusion when he grasps for a woman who's not there, when he finds himself mumbling at night, i'm sorry. i shouldn't have asked to go see the movie.

joe understands though, what it means to lose a parent in any life.

just sometimes, michael isn't sure if he's crying about bruce or himself.

angels ain’t just flesh & feather. they come in different palettes- sea foam, cherry bark, rose thorn. in the right heaven-yellow light anything could be holy enough to save you. — keaton st. james

"tesoro?" his mother asks, glancing at his phone.

she always knows, somehow, and michael doesn't bother to hide the photo of him, ace, and joe. he just gives her a little smile, and his mother seems pleased, for once.

it doesn't seem right, that bruce wayne is lurking in the back of his brain, that he can feel memories with connective tissue between them, that he starts to think about whatit would be like, to go out into the night and do what does. not when he keeps at least three pistols in the condo, not when he hasn't prevailed in some ways thathe knows bruce has, not when he knows that if it came down to it, he could squeeze the trigger.

yet the messages, the videos, are undeniable.

there's not any real honor in the scars that he bears on his back, not in comparison to joe's. sometimes when he feels joe's fingers on his scars, touching those old reminders, he thinks of how he can explain them to him. the things that were done to him by people who he should've called real parents. hunger he used to lie with while they argued over details of witsec, the appreciation he had when the marshal had given him snack after snack, under a suspicious look. that he should've told the man before he'd left—even though things were fine in the end, carried away to a family that does love him.

michael though, just hums in the bed, saying, "feels good, joe. don't stop."

in flight movie options

THE SNOWS OF KILIMANJARO (1952). — The life of celebrated American writer Harry Street (Gregory Peck) flashes back before his eyes as he lies dying from a wound suffered at the foot of Tanzania's Mount Kilimanjaro. As he is tended to by his traveling companion, Helen (Susan Hayward), he recalls many things: his first wife and Paris literary inspiration, Cynthia Green (Ava Gardner) ; his second wife, Countess Liz (Hildegarde Neff) ; and his formative years with uncle Bill (Leo G. Carroll).

THE BIG SLEEP (1946). — Private investigator Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) is hired by General Sternwood to help resolve the gambling debts of his wild young daughter, Carmen (Martha Vickers). Sternwood's older daughter, Vivian (Lauren Bacall), provides assistance when she implies that the situation is more complex, and also involves casino owner (John Ridgely) and a recently disappeared family friend. As people linked to the Sternwoods start being murdered, Marlowe finds himself getting ever deeper into the case.

NO WAY OUT (1950). — Robbers Ray Biddle (Richard Widmark) and his brother are shot and taken to the local hospital. There, the two are treated by Dr. Brooks (Sidney Poitier), the hospital's only black doctor. The brothers assault Brooks with racist slurs. And, when his brother ends up dying on the operating table, Ray accuses the doctor of murdering him. Blind with rage, Ray works to turn the white community of the city against Brooks, who finds an unlikely ally in the dead man's widow, Edie (Linda Darnell).

michael's february playlist

Che Vuole Questa Musica Stasera — Armando Trovajoli, Peppino Gagliardi

la banda — mina

Sapore di sale — Gino Paoli

she's a fool — lesley gore

ain't that a kick in the head — dean martin

summer wind — frank sinatra

il paradiso — patty pravo