Luckily this crowd is best at buttering you up to your face and trash‑talking you behind your back. Bruce had just finished speaking when the blond guy sitting in the very middle started playing along: "Oh, my family has a farm down in Mississippi too. I really like farms, we have barbecue parties there all the time. The taste of fresh beef is just different from what they sell in supermarkets. Sometimes I even envy the farmer's son."
Bruce rolled his eyes in his heart, feeling a bit sick. These people all talk in the same key: on the surface they're agreeing with you, actually they're secretly showing off themselves, and on top of that they have to step on you once. No wonder Stark doesn't want to come; Bruce is nauseated by this routine too. If he didn't like the dorm environment, he wouldn't have come at all.
In fact Bruce knew in his heart that this was because his and Stark's situation was rather special. On one hand, they're both only children, with no one competing with them for that massive family business—everything's theirs from birth, and they don't need to play fake nice with anyone. On the other hand, neither of them lives off socializing. The shareholders of Wayne Enterprises and Stark Group can't afford to mess with these two young masters; they usually steer clear when they see them. They have no need to use this kind of fake socializing to gain benefits, so naturally they're not used to it at all.
Bruce forced himself to go through the motions: "That's great. If there's time, I'll invite you to our farm to hang out."
"I'm afraid I won't have time lately." The other guy immediately showed his true colors. "After all…"
After saying that, he started glancing around, then the few of them shared a knowing laugh, and then all turned to look at Bruce, muttering something in low voices. It was exactly that kind of volume where Bruce could hear they were talking about him, but couldn't quite make out the content.
You could say that if Bruce really were a small‑town boy, he'd already be sitting there all nervous and on edge. But Bruce simply couldn't be bothered to act with them and pretended not to notice. Just then Eric started his self‑introduction.
Eric hadn't even gotten halfway through when the mixed‑race guy in glasses sitting next to him cut him off: "Sorry, could you wipe your snot first?"
The crowd burst into raucous laughter. Eric frantically touched under his nose and sure enough, there was clear mucus running. His face flushed a violent red in an instant; he fumbled around looking for tissues, then fled in panic under everyone's laughter.
Bruce was genuinely speechless. As long as a Human race stands in that kind of freezing wind for an hour, of course they're going to have a runny nose, right? Hard to say it wasn't on purpose.
But this was fine too—spending too much time with this crowd makes your IQ drop. Eric didn't look particularly short of money either; he didn't need to freeload free dorms and parties. It's pretty good for him to keep his distance.
Bruce went back to his seat; the recruitment meeting was over. He did get a second‑round interview invitation, but it was handed to him last. And the person delivering it shoved the letter at him with obvious disdain, saying, "Last one, it's yours. Come later next time, otherwise we'll run out of the snacks we prepared."
Another round of laughter from the crowd. Bruce glanced at the invitation; the workmanship was fairly delicate, but there wasn't even any gold stamping on it, yet they still required formalwear and hair gel. Bruce usually isn't this venomous, but he still wanted to call them a bunch of hillbillies.
Bruce walked back to the dorm and sat on the edge of his bed, starting to think about where to get a set of formalwear. The money he had on hand definitely wasn't enough for a custom suit, but buying a decent off‑the‑rack suit should still be possible. After all, in this era the US Dollar has strong purchasing power, and a few hundred bucks can buy pretty good clothes.
Right then Stark happened to come back, swept his eyes up and down Bruce once, then said, "You got accepted?"
"Yeah. I was just about to go buy some clothes. Do you know any clothing stores around here that sell suits and shirts?" Bruce saw Stark dragging a burlap sack—he'd clearly gone to the junkyard again to scavenge, and this time he'd brought back a lot. No idea what contraption he was going to cobble together.
"There's probably some over by the Lakefront Trail," Stark said. "There's a whole strip of commercial streets over there; there's gotta be clothing stores. Your Body Type doesn't need anything specially tailored, you should be able to buy something there."
Bruce nodded. He didn't keep asking, just pulled on a thicker hoodie and then his coat, and headed out. With no car and no bike, he simply walked. Good thing classes hadn't started yet, so he had plenty of time to wander around.
It wasn't long before Bruce reached the commercial street Stark had mentioned and walked into a clothing store, but he came out again shortly after. He had still underestimated Chicago's prices—or rather, this era was exactly when Chicago was booming, and the prices were no less than Gotham's. The money he had could indeed buy a full outfit, but only in thinner fabrics; if he wanted heavier cloth, the money wasn't enough.
Bruce really wasn't trying to buy a thick suit just for appearances; it was purely because Chicago was too cold. Buy a better cashmere suit and it would get him through the interview and keep him warm for everyday wear.
If a Human race stands in that kind of strong wind for over an hour, they'll be shivering like crazy. Bruce wasn't immune to the cold; he was just very good at shivering on the inside. But he also knew that if he kept freezing like this, all his money would end up going to hospital bills.
It's not like he hadn't considered buying a normal thick coat—that's actually fairly cheap. But then he'd still have to buy a suit separately; add up the two sets of expenses and it's not much cheaper, so it's better to solve it in one go. Bruce went into another clothing store, but it was still expensive and nothing fit his taste.
Bruce let out a sigh. At least he'd adapted pretty well to being short on cash. Ever since the Gotham renovation plan started, there hasn't been a moment when he wasn't short of money; he's gotten used to pinching pennies. Batman, down to this level, is pretty much one of a kind.
Too bad that in this world there was no Selina to help him out, and no Joker to lend him money. He didn't even have a driver's license yet, nowhere he could drive a truck. Seems like he'd have to buy some ordinary clothes first and improvise.
Bruce had planned to turn back and continue browsing the commercial street, but then he felt this place was probably a tourist area; even buying ordinary clothes here would be relatively pricey. Since he had plenty of time anyway, he might as well walk farther and see if he could find some other area that sold clothes.
Bruce cut through the park. It was midday on a weekday, and with today's drop in temperature and the especially strong wind, the park was almost deserted—basically nothing there at all.
Bruce turned a corner and saw a corpse.
The sky was bright, the trees stood grim, the forest's shadows reflected against the sky with a faint blue tint. And that man in the gray-brown suit was lying under a tree, with a deep ligature mark around his neck.
Bruce felt a chill run through his whole body.
Even so, his brain was still instinctively analyzing the information in front of him, and the most important piece was that this man's body type was not far off from his own, and the suit he was wearing was quite thick.
More than an hour later, Bruce opened the door to the dorm. Stark, who was busy tinkering with something, looked up. He froze for a second and then said, "Did you go rob a tailor's shop?"
Bruce, dressed in the gray-brown suit, shook his head. He smoothed out the creases at the hem and brushed off the sleeves, answering, "Had a bit of an adventure."
"What kind of adventure gets you a suit worth tens of thousands of US Dollars out of nowhere?" Stark snorted lightly. "Robbing a bank wouldn't be this fast, would it?"
"A friend gave it to me." Bruce told the literal truth. A former friend is still a friend; doing the stripping himself still counts as accepting a gift. It's not that he has no hang-ups about wearing a Dead Man's clothes, but there's only one disease in this world, and that's being broke. Chicago really is too damn cold.
"This damned weather." Stark dropped the questions and said, "There are a lot of anglers in the Great Lakes Region, and there's even a competition coming up. A boat-rental shop asked me to help them fix their motor. I'm also planning to rig up some simple radar to track schools of fish and sell it. I'll probably go this weekend, want to come along?"
"No." Bruce answered very crisply. "I have zero interest in fishing and absolutely no desire to go anywhere near Lake Michigan. But you have my moral support, and I'll make sure to pick you up at the river as early as I can."
Stark glanced at him and then said, "Did you see Shiller today?"
"Didn't fully see him." Bruce was still being literal.
"What do you mean, 'didn't fully see him'?" Stark thought Bruce was deliberately splitting hairs. "You either saw him or you didn't. Don't tell me you just caught a glimpse of him?"
"Didn't see the man, saw the work." Bruce said. "We haven't met in the flesh yet, but we've already had some spiritual interaction, and might even have generated a bit of enmity."
"How do you end up with enmity when you haven't even run into him?"
"I borrowed a little from his artistic creations." Bruce lowered his head again to straighten his cuffs. "But you really can't blame me. I was too cold."
"You really are strange." Stark lifted his eyes and looked into Bruce's blue ones. "I know you think Shiller is dangerous—he might actually be dangerous—but have you ever considered that you're the one tirelessly trying to dive headfirst into the pit?"
"I know." Bruce's expression could almost be called despairing. "You often say I'm not like Batman, but this is exactly the one way I'm most like Batman—I'm always drawn to Madmen. Uncontrollably. Incurably."
Stark didn't even know what to say to that, and just muttered, "There isn't a single normal person on your side of things."
Bruce said it, but he didn't really take it to heart. He quickly took off the jacket, sat down opposite Stark, and started watching him work on the simple radar. This thing was actually pretty easy to make—after all, it was only for finding fish—and for Iron Man's level of tech, it was a piece of cake.
Still, the materials were all scavenged from the scrapyard, and each piece had to be disassembled and rebuilt, which was a real hassle. Bruce thought about it, went to change into another set of clothes, and came back to help. He didn't get involved in any critical steps, just helped tighten a few screws and so on.
Unfortunately, Bruce hadn't enjoyed the peace for long before a commotion rose in the hallway and someone knocked on the door. When he opened it, he saw that it was actually one of the interviewers from today—the blond guy standing outside. He was wearing a cashmere coat, and the watch on his wrist looked expensive, completely at odds with the general vibe of the dorm building.
"Hello." Bruce said to him. "Can I help you?"
"Bruce Wayne, right?" His tone was very gentle. "Cecilia Wickton. Just call me Dali."