Title: The Secretary
Words: 3,676
Quote: "You're Bruce Wayne's secretary? My, how the mighty have fallen!" — Selina Kyle to Valencia Carter
Song:
The Title
I always wanted to have uniformity across chapter titles. Whenever you hit the chapter drop-down menu on FanFiction.Net, it looks very neat when there's some sort of theme or pattern with the chapter titles. When I realized how well it would work out with the last chapter titled "The End," I knew I had to go with the "The [Something]" trend.
But Chapter 4 was the first time I faced a dilemma about the chapter title. Throughout planning and writing the chapter, it was called "The Billionaire" in my head, and the tagline would have been "Such is the life of your typical, bored, billionaire bachelor," an Alfred quote. But somewhere along the line, probably 3,000+ words in, I realized this chapter is so much more about Valencia than it is about Bruce.
Perhaps my choice of song, "This Boy" by Franz Ferdinand, should have been changed too, but it simply fit in so well with the playboy image that Bruce portrays to the public, and that is truly the cause of all the drama that unfolds in the office that day. My second choice would have been "Jacqueline," also by Franz: "It's always better on holiday / So much better on holiday / That's why we only work when we need the money."
The 40th Floor of Wayne Tower
There's a lot of description about the office atmosphere at Wayne Enterprises. When it became clear that most of the chapter would be from Valencia's POV, I knew I needed to include her perspective (and derision) about her fellow workmates, so I elaborated on the description of her fellow applicants from Chapter 2 and applied it to the whole office culture. The end result was something straight out of "Mad Men." Basically, think of the 40th floor of Wayne Tower as the offices of Sterling Cooper from the first two seasons: very 50s, well-dressed secretaries catering to executives' every whim, etc.
Also, side note, but the Wayne Tower I imagine is the one from "The Dark Knight" and "TDK Rises." (It's the moderately tall, black, rectangular structure, as opposed to the very CGI-looking one in "Batman Begins.") While the center-of-the-city, tallest-building theme certainly would have worked too, there's just something very real about the later alternative.
New Characters Abound
Chapter 4 saw the introduction of four new, albeit relatively minor characters. Let's start with the pair of security guards, Crispus Allen and Clancy O'Hara. I kept picturing the lobby of Wayne Tower as this glass and steel Mecca for the Gotham business district, as busy as a train station all day long. Of course it needed to have security guards, so, like I had in previous chapters, I turned to Batman wikia for name inspiration.
In the comics/original TV series, Clancy O'Hara was one of the "incorruptible" and had worked himself up the ranks to become the chief of the Gotham City Police Department. Crispus Allen was just a regular but dedicated cop who worked under Commissioner Gordon, though he had misgivings about working with the vigilante Batman. Cris and Clance are decidedly demoted in my fic to newbie security guards at Wayne Tower. My tentative future plans for them was to be side of comic relief for Valencia when she's on the job.
There's not much to distinguish between Allen and O'Hara, and they could easily have been compressed into one character, but I needed two security guards if Bruce had two ex-girlfriends. He was originally going to have only one, Selina Kyle, but I couldn't shake that image of him in "Batman Begins," walking in with a European model on each arm. After all, Bruce Wayne does what every billionaire playboy would do, only he does it bigger and better.
As almost everyone knows, Selina Kyle is Catwoman in the comics and movies. I gave her a very different background in this story, transforming her into a socialite from one of Gotham's first families. In the comics and now "The Dark Knight Rises," Selina has a much tougher, from the Narrows sort of childhood. Natalia Knight, also known as Nocturna, had a similar storyline as Catwoman in the comics and got a similar treatment in my fic.
Nicknames
I gave Selina and Natalia nicknames simply because I didn't want to say outright that Bruce's clingy exes were Catwoman and Nocturna. Throughout the chapter, Bruce refers to them solely as 'Lina' and 'Tali.' In fact, I was hoping someone might jump the gun and mistake Tali as short for Talia al Ghul. And such was my cheap imitation of the good Christopher Nolan run-around.
As much as I absolutely adore Valencia's name, I knew nicknames were going to be in order for her. We already have seen Alfred call her 'Miss Lenci,' and this chapter reveals her high school nickname was 'Valley.' At first it does look rather odd — I played around with spellings, and Vallie does NOT work — but 'Valencia' is just not for everyday use. Even 'Miss Carter' is shorter to say than that. In the future, Bruce will be shortening Valencia's name too.
Flamboyant Bruce
Okay, so Bruce Wayne admittedly dresses a bit more flamboyantly in Gotham's Cinderella than he does in the movies. As much as I appreciate Christian Bale in his staid Armani suits, I think he could afford to indulge in a little more flair. His flashier attire is in line with the philosophy that real men wear pink, which I subscribe to wholeheartedly. The dark grey and lilac combination that is described in this chapter was originally supposed to be his attire for Chapter 2: The Interview, but he went for something a little more showy (light gray and sunflower yellow) for his first meeting with Valencia.
The Pen Tuck Scene
For some reason, I sat on this chapter for a very long time. It's not that I really got stuck anywhere, but I did tweak it again and again. Originally, it was longer, pushing about 3,700 words (which is short compared to later chapters), but it was pared down to about 3,300.
It's hard to remember now, but I think the issue was that I wanted more Bruce/Valencia interaction in the chapter. There was this smoking lounge scene that was supposed to show a bit of their dynamic, a scene that was one of the first I ever wrote for GC, but I ended up cutting it pretty early into writing Chapter 3. (I will post a draft of it soon.)
The ear/pen tuck thing just came to me when I was trying to end the chapter after Selina and Valencia's showdown. Up to this day, it is one my favorite scenes because I think it conveys perfectly just who Bruce and Valencia really are. Valencia is trying very hard to be strictly professional, and I think that betrays how young she is and how desperate she is to be taken seriously. But there's an underlying passion in her that pops out, especially in the face of adversity, and that recurs again and again in future chapters. She is spurred into action when there's something to be worked against.
Perhaps this doesn't come across in the movies as much as I like, but Bruce flirts really well. It's like second nature to him, but he has to put in the extra effort with Valencia because she's holding him at arm's length, which no one else does. He likes the challenge; it puts a bit of the fun back into the charade he keeps up, an act that has become tired and jaded for him, as evident from his conversation with Alfred in the beginning of the chapter.
The seductiveness of Bruce first taking and then returning the pen she has tucked behind her ear also set the tone for future chapters. There's this ambiguity about whether they're doing or saying certain things. Is it a challenge to see how the other will react? A bit of a joke/for the sake of irony? Because they truly are attracted to one another? Frankly, it's a combination of all three, and that is the sum of Bruce and Valencia's complicated relationship.
So What Did Valencia Say?
To be honest, I had no clue what Valencia whispered to Selina when I published the chapter, and I didn't know for a long while afterward. (Yes, it's rather convenient Bruce didn't overheard what she said.) But that mystery has since been solved, and you will be let in on the secret in the very last chapter of "Gotham's Cinderella." How's that for a teaser!
