Well. He does know how to knock, anyway. But one of Matt's kitchen windows is slid upward without any further exchange of niceties and one boot after another, Frank unfolds into the apartment. In the unlit room he's just another shadow against the neon and halogen backdrop of Hell's Kitchen.
His glance around looks casual. Is casual, reflected even in the strong, regular beat of his pulse. The Devil of HK might be less than an enemy, but Frank doesn't have many people left he'd go so far as to consider friends. This turf belongs to Murdock; steady pulse regardless, he's ready for anything.] C'mon, [Frank calls to the darkness, moving toward the coffee pot,] that was good. You said yourself you've got a great ass.
[He clocks Frank about a block away. It's easy to pick out the sound of his heavy boots and the way that he smells like gun oil, powder and coffee. He stays passive from where he's seated in the living room when the window to the kitchen opens and the Punisher slides into his apartment. It's not the first time. It definitely won't be the last.
He reaches to turn on the light to illuminate the way for Frank, even if he's sure the other man could navigate his apartment in the dark with ease now. He rises from his chair and moves toward the kitchen to meet Castle at the coffeemaker.]
You're probably the better judge but I haven't heard you complain.
[He reaches to retrieve a couple of mugs and sets them on the counter.]
[Red's a spook; so is Frank, but there's a difference and Frank's aware of it and can't help but trying to work it out. He leans a hip against the kitchen counter and pushes his hood back. There's a perversion to watching a man who can't watch you back and Frank feels the tug of do-do not as Murdock crosses the kitchen and pulls out the mugs.
Yeah, maybe he glances at the ass in question, though.] It ain't bad.
[He takes care of pouring the coffee into both mugs but other than that doesn't offer assistance. It's hot enough to burn but that doesn't stop Frank from putting his nose into the steam and taking a drink. Fuck. It's good coffee. Frank swallows and exhales in appreciation.] Yeah. Now that's a cup of coffee. [He takes another sip, watching Murdock over the rim of the mug.]
[In his own home, Matt doesn't bother with the glasses and when he pads barefoot across the floor in an old t-shirt and his pajama pants, he probably doesn't look too much like the Devil. He can change quickly, if it comes to it, but he can't say that he's really itching for a fight tonight. That's not why he let Frank come over.
The answer about his ass sparks a smile.] I'll just take the compliment and move on.
[He takes a sip of the coffee once it's poured.] I told you so. There's whiskey in the cupboard if you want to add to it. Good stuff is on the top shelf. Mid range is the bottom. I stick with the bottom unless there's something worth celebrating.
[He likes this - Murdock without glasses, without lenses of any kind. Eyes the color of the coffee they're drinking. It's a new enough discovery to be something he's still taking in, the almost oxymoronic idea that they're two feet apart and Murdock's eyes can't find Frank but it's damn sure his knuckles could. Something about the friction between those two things always causes a heavy pressure to uncurl at the bottom of his gut.]
Nah, I'm good. Use whiskey more to disinfect than drink. [Frank pushes off the counter and walks slowly around the kitchen as he sips the coffee. He uses a finger to check the cupboard. The level of amber liquid in each bottle.] Curious what you consider worth celebratin', though. Winning a case?
[He's gotten more comfortable with Frank now that it feels like their run-ins involving their fists seem to have come to an end. At least for now. They're still diametrically opposed in all of the ways that matter so he doesn't fool himself into thinking it won't happen again someday. But for now, he can feel an ease around having Castle in his home and seeing him as something softer than the Devil of Hell's Kitchen. He's aware of every movement Frank beside him while they stand drinking their coffee.]
For once, you're not bleeding. [He doesn't taste copper in the air.] There's beer in the refrigerator but I don't think that pairs as well with the coffee. [He makes the offer with an easy, charming enough smile.] Yeah, sometimes. Depends on the case. Sometimes victories don't always feel like it.
You can smell that, huh. Yeah, quiet day. [Black tee, black jeans, black sweatshirt. Some things don't change but it's true; no blood. The cupboard is knocked shut, softly enough. Frank turns to look at Murdock. Old t-shirt. Cotton pants. A blind man. A man a world away from the Devil he's fought on the rooftops but still there's a common thread, isn't there? The way the angle of his jaw tracks Frank's location. He does that in the suit, too.
Sometimes victories don't always feel like it.] I hear that. [There's a goad there, waiting, but Frank doesn't take it. Murdock doesn't seem like the type to drown his losses. He wants to feel them. Just like Frank.] So what about today? You whistle, and your dog without morals comes running? I'm not that, Red.
Yeah. I can smell that. I can smell that you were cleaning your gun earlier. There's still some oil under your fingernails. [Sometimes it feels like a bit of a party trick but it's the advantage that he has in the world and Frank knows about it so he doesn't mind making a point of it. He spends so much fucking time trying to be something that he isn't in a feigned helplessness that isn't really him that it feels nice to be honest. Comfortable. Maybe it's strange that he finds that with Frank Castle.
Yeah. Figured you would. [Matt takes another sip of his coffee.] Today was...one of those days. Sorry. I didn't mean to make it seem like you don't have a code or something. I know you do and I know it matters to you. It was supposed to be a fuck buddies joke, not a referendum on you as a person. [He's over explaining but he feels kind of bad about it now.]
[Frank brings his fingernails to his nose and then exhales a laugh.] Yeah, takes a real rocket scientist. [But he knows it's not just a guess.
That idea of comfort, it's not so strange. Guys like them, they're weapons. Murdock has his safety on. Frank doesn't. But they're still both weapons, walking down the sidewalk everyday with people who don't understand what they're brushing elbows with. Is Frank comfortable with Murdock? Nah, not the way those people on the sidewalk take comfort in each other - but there's a release in knowing he's standing with someone who understands guys like them, they don't get to have that. Even if they do make referendums on each other as people.
Frank laughs, the too-loud, too empty kind of laugh that is already falling from his face as he pulls a hand over his mouth.] Jesus christ, yeah; sure. [He looks at the front door, the window. Knows he ain't gonna use either. He's not offended. He doesn't care. Truth is that if Red decided to take the safety off, yeah, Frank would be there.
His boots are loud, antagonistic as he crosses the hardwood back to Murdock. Stops too close, slides his mug onto the counter behind but doesn't touch. Sharing space as a threat, but he's not sure yet of what kind.] 'm here, aren't I? [Frank's voice, already low, drops into a rumble.] Sure as shit ain't for the coffee.
[He flashes a quick smile when Frank disregards his appraisal. It doesn't matter. He knows that Castle is likely very aware that it's not the only thing that Matt picks up but he doesn't feel the need to list everything; what kind of soap Frank showered with, the last thing he had to eat, the detergent he uses or any of the other dozen things that Matt can tell just by his presence. It's nice both to not have to feign anything while also not have to prove anything either.
He doesn't have to like it, but he and Frank are warriors. Sometimes on the opposite side because of method and motivations, but they exist in a space together where it's easy. They both stand in easy confidence because there's a strange safety in knowing how unsafe either would be if the gloves came off. They both hit hard but Matt's hands aren't anything resembling fists right now, circled around a warm coffee mug while Frank effortlessly stalks through his apartment.]
I'm glad you're here. [It's about as close to sentimentality as he can muster for Frank and that seems fine with the both of them. He sets his half finished mug down behind him and stands still in Frank's presence. They're both assessing.] And I assume not for my sparkling conversational wit.
[It's perverse, yeah, and strange, being able to look at a man all you want without him looking back. Murdock's probably, certainly, keeping track of other things, but vision - Frank's way of it - is his alone. He looks at the sleepless night in the light purple of the skin under the man's eyes, the imperfect line of his shave that's regrowth, not fumble. How does Murdock shave? Huh. The corner of Frank's mouth twitches upward as he stands there, muscles not quite still. Never quite as still as when he's looking down a scope.]
You talk too much, that's for sure. [But the spark of intentional aggression, that's gone from his tone.] Looks like someone else thought so too. [Frank reaches up without hesitation, his hand moving toward the dark edge of a bruise peeking from the corner of Murdock's shadowed jaw - and stops, fingers hovering. He breathes out through his nose.
[Matt might not know the things that Frank sees in him like the shade of his hair and eyes or what color clothing he's wearing but he tracks a wide variety of other things in their proximity. He can feel the small movements of Frank's body next to him and the way that he shifts slightly on his heel. Sometimes he wonders what Frank is looking at when they stand like this but he doesn't seek to ask.]
I've been told that a time or two, believe or not. [Of course Frank would believe it. The remark about the bruise forces a small smile out of him, especially when he feels Frank start to reach and pause inches from touch. Matt takes a small step forward to close the gap between them so rough fingers can connect with the bruise.] Yeah, well, you should see the other guy. [He came out ahead on that exchange. He almost always does.] What color is it? The bruise. [It's a day or two old but shallow so he wonders how obvious it still is. That's something he can only guess at with experience.]
[Fingernails too short to catch trace through an inch of bristles before stopping, shy of anything that could be called a caress. There's no real pressure in the touch. Someone else, maybe anyone else, Frank would have handled to his liking - and maybe he will, later, when Murdock's doing the same to him. But not right now.] Green, yellow. [Like the sky just before a bad storm.
His thumb moves, settling just to the left of center, where the leading knuckle must have made contact.] And red. The color of your suit. [He's not Murdock's dog but that doesn't mean the metaphor is false. Frank's fingers curve against the sharp line of Murdock's jaw, turning the man's face just so into his own. Hangs there, breath heavy, mouths separated by not even inches.
There's loyalty for a hand that reaches out, even after it's been bitten. Especially then.]
[He instinctively closes his eyes against the soft touch. It's an irrelevant action for a blind man but maybe an instinctive one that comes all the same. It's nice, either way, how Frank's hand doesn't immediately pull or push. It's soft in the only way they're capable of being to one another; just on the fringes of contact in the spaces between.]
Sea stories. Same as all the other ones. [He says by way of explanation of where the bruises came from. One fight or another. It doesn't matter. Some brawl that ended in a way that Frank probably would disapprove of with the assailant in question in custody and maybe a hospital instead of a morgue. Standing in his kitchen, the gulf between them exists but it feels more shallow like this. They'll never really understand each other, not completely, but sometimes a little bit is enough. It is, anyway, when Matt tilts his head up to close some of the distance and height between them and presses his lips to Frank's in a ghost of a kiss.]
Frank stays still at the first press of Murdock's mouth. It's a whisper. A nothing, except a starting point. Consent that's so often denied from this man that it feels like a goddamn benediction to be weaponized. But that's good. Frank understands that. It's enough.
His mouth moves hard and sudden against Murdock's, teeth catching against lips and a thumb pressed into the tender center of a bruise as he backs them fully against the counter with a thud of weight and muscle.]
[He and Frank are complicated. They have been from the first moment they met and even as they have shifted from enemies to something else, it will never be easy. Matt accepts that and also recognizes that there are times when it's so breathtakingly simple because it happens in the moments when he turns off his over active brain and just lets things happen without care of code and the forever arguments of redemption against retribution.
Softness gives way. It always does and Matt never minds. He feels a spark of pain on the bruise push point and he kisses it back in kind while his hip bumps against the edge of the countertop. The corner presses against fabric covered skin, biting, but he doesn't complain against the kiss.]
[These night between them, they are a mirror of their paths across the rooftops of New York. They never start gently. Maybe that's Frank - maybe Murdock would have it different but Frank can't, won't. Doesn't want to know if the man yearns to listen to his angels instead of his demons in times like these.
So his mouth pushes Murdock's, his body angles to hem him in against the sharp line of the counter, knowing how easily the tables could be flipped. His fingertips curl into the neat, short hairs at the nape of Murdock's neck and pull as their bodies find a way to fit roughly together and Frank leans into that friction he always feels in the Devil's presence, giving it rein to spark toward an inferno.]
[If Matt sought out softness, he would look elsewhere. He knows what they're about when they're together and that it's not a matter of a search for something gentle. They only seek the peace that lasts in moments when the din is quieted and the world can go silent. Just for a little while. Frank has a way about him that allows Matt to close out the world and he doesn't seek anything else but that and to offer it as much as he can in kind.
It would be easy to shift things, to roll their bodies until it was Frank's back against the countertop but he doesn't. Instead, he presses his hand to the back of Castle's neck and pulls him in until they're flush against each other and the weight pushes Matt's hip even harder against the edge. He can feel Frank's heartbeat against his chest instead of just hearing it and the steady rhythm is a strange comfort.]
[Seek peace in the moments when the din is quieted and the world can go silent. Frank would say that's exactly why he does what he does. He pulls that trigger and the voices stop. Retribution gives him that.
But funny enough, so does this. Murdock's body against his, callused fingers scraping at his skin, his body, made lean and deceptive by those nice suits, taking up the space it's due. Frank pushes the man back over the counter just enough so that his other hand can palm a back and feel the arch of a spine before sliding down to fist into a cotton hem. It's a struggle, getting himself to back off enough to try and strip Murdock from the waist up.]
Right now, Matt isn't listening for a distant shout of pain or distress. He's not seeking out the sounds of a world to fight against. His focus is just on the sound of Frank's breathing and his heartbeat.
He breaks the kiss long enough to help Frank tug the old t-shirt up over his head to be tossed haphazardly onto the floor. There are new bruises on his ribs and shoulder but that's not unusual. He probably wouldn't be Matt Murdock if he didn't carry some wound of war and he doesn't let it bother him. They will mingle with the litany of scars and be forgotten like all of the other strikes that he wears. His mouth returns to Frank's as soon as the fabric is gone, crushing and eager.
[Later Frank might stop to catalogue Murdock's new scars. Later. Right now the man's mouth is back on his, hot and insistent, and that's all he gives a good goddamn about. The edge of teeth. The burn of facial hair.
Frank grabs Murdock's hips and sinks fingers in, giving the man a shove back against the counter only to drag him forward again. Pulling him in close. He bites, too-soft, at a lower lip before bumping his forehead against the other's and stepping back, breath a little too loud. Frank turns away, scraping himself out of his hoodie and throwing it over the back of the couch as he heads across hardwood toward the bedroom. His tee-shirt is likewise stripped and discarded as he walks, the motions perfunctory, efficient; blind men don't need strip teases.] C'mon, Red. Let's see what all this thread-count fuss is about, huh?
[The separation from the countertop and where it was digging into his hip is welcomed and he takes a step forward after the nip at his lower lip that breaks the kiss to start the shedding of clothing on the way to the bedroom. Matt doesn't give it much thought how items just get tossed onto his floor from Frank; the less between them, the better. He smirks at the comment about his thread count sheets and he knows that, even if Frank will never admit it, he doesn't mind the little luxuries that Matt Murdock brings into his life on the periphery of it. Good coffee, a soft bed, and then...whatever this is. Whatever label this strange intimacy takes on.
In the threshold of the bedroom, Matt wraps his arm around Frank's neck to pull him into a hard kiss while he backs them up against the bed so they can tumble back on the mattress. It's less graceful than what he's known for in a tangle of limbs but it's the thought that counts.]
What do you think so far?
I tried out "Murdock" but I hate it lol. "Red" just sounds more natural.
Frank still isn't sure when they became this - Red's mouth rough against his, his hands too-fuckin-sure on Frank's body; there wasn't some pound of flesh point in time, just a death by a thousand cuts. Frank isn't gonna lie, the natural antagonism between them always got him going. It's easy with Red, even when it's hard.
The bed... yeah, the bed's nice. Frank's muscle catches them in their fall back, lending some control to the tumble, but. It's Red lack of control that he likes. That he likes being the spark for. His hands push down the jagged topography of the man's sides, dig fingers into the corded muscles of his lower back before moving on to span the curve of ass through thin cotton.] Think maybe some people might actually know what they're talking about. [His hands squeeze as his head falls back to the bed.] As far as the sheets go, well, can't make a say without further testing.
[The way Matt figures it, it was either kill each other or end up in bed together and the latter seemed like the better option. They argue and fight like cats and dogs because of an incompatible ideology that seems to get left at the door in moments like these.
Frank's rough fingers digging into his skin force a gasp against the kiss and the grab at his ass through his pajamas has his full attention. He reaches down to start to tug them off to add to the ever growing pile of clothing scattered around his floor. He likes the sensation of the rough fabric of Frank's pants against his bare thighs when he pulls off the pajamas and he kisses Frank fiercely in response both to the grabbing of his ass and the remark about his sheets.] I think deep down, you're just as prissy as you tell me I am. [Those would probably be fighting words if not said with an easy smile and punctuated with another rough kiss.]
It's chaos, because of course it is. Frank was right, of course, that instead of waiting for them to come, they should get the drop on the task force. They don't have the same methods and Matt knows that there's no talking Frank down off of his ways, just like Castle can't convince him to take a life because it's the easy thing to do. They fight their own ways. Daredevil leaves unconscious men and broken bones and the Punisher leaves corpses. It's always the same. What strikes Matt is how the old instinct to fight against Frank's nature is dimmed. The acceptance of sin is its own kind, he knows, but God never tried to stop Frank Castle.
He circles back to his place, like he knows Frank will after getting separated. Matt's aches catch up to him by the time the adrenaline wears off so by the time he gets onto his rooftop, he's feeling every blow. The patio door remains unlocked and he goes inside to strip off the suit to take in the damage. He tastes coppery blood in his mouth and he spits it into the sink on the way to retrieve the first aid kit. Broken knuckle--again. Rib is probably a hairline fracture. No, make that two. He took a knock to the head that had him seeing stars and that could be a concussion. Shit. Lousy night. He's not sure how much better or worse Frank managed but he remembers the distinct sounds of the silenced rounds and slowing heartbeats, so Frank probably thinks it was all worth it regardless.
He carries the first aid kit out to the kitchen to wait.
God has indeed not reached down his hand. Nothing Frank has met yet has ever smote him. And still, as they both make their way through the ranks, those bodies that the Daredevil leaves unconscious and broken - Frank doesn't come back to clean them up. He knows better but he leaves them to sort their own sins with their maker. Maybe they'll understand they were spared by a better hand. Maybe they won't and he'll find them later, send them to hell where they belong.
Despite that; it's always worth it. A few rounds of ammo, a few less shitbags waving their cocks around on the street like they're worth something.
He ignores the familiarity of the space as he steps into Red's apartment through the patio door. This isn't home, isn't real. It's like a safe house - enough, for now. A place to expand, for a while. Not forever. Red's at the counter already, white box in hand. "Aw honey, you waited up."
Frank's alright, the cops were too confident and too off-guard to be much of anything at close-quarters. He's got a graze on his shoulder that cauterized itself at range, a bruised knee that'll need ice, a busted lip. But getting the drop on them turned the tables. Frank looks at the coffee maker and then lets it go. "Shame I missed out on the little red number, though."
The smell of pennies and gunpowder follows Frank when he walks in through the patio door. Matt doesn't lift his head; he knows who's coming and had him clocked a block out so there's not much of an element of surprise. "Of course I did, dear. Supper is on the table," he drawls with a short laugh.
Really, it's just the first aid kit but that's the joke. Not that he's feeling terribly funny. Stripped down to his underwear and standing in the living room, he feels over his ribs with his fingertips while Frank closes distance. "I'd put it back on but you can never really figure out how to effectively take it off." He winces when he finds the right place and sighs before going to the freezer to retrieve an ice pack. Two, actually. One for his ribs and one for his head. "Can you put coffee on? I'm going to go crumple on my new couch for a few minutes." Frank's a big boy and when he's not actively bleeding all over the place, he doesn't need Matt to tend to his wounds, nor does he expect anything in kind.
"Awfully close to your little fallout shelter. Do you think they knew or just got lucky?" he asks from the sofa where he spreads his legs across it to stretch out with an ice pack on his ribs and on his forehead.
"Thought part of the mystery was fumbling for the zippers." Secret is, Frank likes it when Red's a bit more asshole than caring do-gooder. Maybe it's not a secret. Just keeps him on his feet, makes the ground feel a little more stable. He moves to the coffee maker without question or gripe. He watches Red slump onto the couch from the corner of his eye.
Red makes his own choices, as fraught by guilt or bleeding heart as they may be. Frank doesn't feel responsible.
"Truth? Dunno." He's got warning systems in place but he'll sleep a little lighter for the next few days. Water and grinds in, the pot starts its magic. Frank leans against the counter and pulls the velcro on his vest, taking a deep breath. Yeah, there're a few rounds in white paint that'll be bruises tomorrow and forgotten the day after. He exhales. "Most of those clowns got their heads up their asses but there are a few with their caps screwed on straight enough to be bad news." He doesn't want to relocate, but he will if necessary. Packing up wouldn't be hard.
"Reminds me of fumbling with Stacy Gaffney's bra in 8th grade. Though I might've been more coordinated then than you are now," he counters while he shifts to find something resembling comfortable on the couch. It doesn't come. That's fine. He's used to it by now and he listens to the sounds of Frank moving around his kitchen to all of the places where he knows things are. That's bred of familiarity but he doesn't call it out.
Matt's not sure either. He doesn't love the proximity, that's for sure. "Yeah, I know. There are a couple I had some run-ins with before that aren't as completely stupid as I wanted to think they are." He considers making an offer for Frank to crash at his place but he decides against it for now. It feels like an overextension, and probably unnecessary. Maybe. Obviously he knows he can come to Matt if he needs anything and that feels unspoken anyway so he decides to leave it there. "At some point, you'd think you'd have stacked enough bodies in the morgue and I'd have sent enough hospitals and left them to eat through straws that they'd give up." That doesn't seem to be how it works. Not with the true believers.
Red's rollin' around, uncomfortable; still, not responsible. There's a way to finish off assholes so that they don't second a second go at you; Frank's standing here living proof. He throws his jacket over a counter chair. His vest hits the counter in front of it a moment later.
Frank rolls his neck, vertebrae cracking with a content moan. "Not the true believers, Red. You should know, you know? Not so easy to give up a code when you're indoctrinated." He hates, more than a little, that these fuckers are using his symbol. His fucking skull. They don't know but that doesn't make it right. They've all got flag tattoos like it means something to them, the stars, the stripes. They don't know shit.
He turns to the counter to watch the coffee drip into the pot. Breathes. "I appreciate the back up. You could have walked. This isn't your fight."
Matt doesn't blame anyone for what happened except for Fisk's task force. He made his choices and he made them a long time ago. Far before he ever crossed paths with Frank Castle.
"Yeah. I know. I don't understand how Wilson fucking Fisk is the cult of personality for these assholes though." He knows how much it bothers Frank that they seem to think they understand the Punisher. They don't. Matt doesn't either, of course, but he has got a hell of a lot better idea than assholes who have no real code. That's one thing he can never take away from Frank Castle; he lives and will probably die by a creed.
He could say something sarcastic to keep the rhythm going but he doesn't. It's sincere enough. "You didn't need me but you know, it's my fight too. This is my city."
Matt tilts his head back, turning his neck to seek that same satisfying crack he heard from Frank's. "I hit my head. My impulse control is probably shot so I'll offer you something to wear that's not a flack jacket and fatigues and hope you don't bite my head off."
"Your city." Deadpan, like he knew it was coming. And he did. "Got the fuckin' monopoly on New York." There's no heat. Frank's tired and the coffee's only at a half a cup. He pushes off the counter.
"That's a pretty excuse, Red, considering we both know you've offered me more for less." But he's moving across the room because, well, he doesn't fucking know. "Maybe I've taken off all the heads I need to tonight." Yeah, he's gonna go through Red's drawers. But it doesn't take long; he's not looking for evidence, for proof of anything. He's already got Red's biggest dirty secret.
Turns out that leg size doesn't matter so much in sweats - they're clean and don't smell like blood, and that's enough right now. Frank falls into the chair kiddy-corner to the sofa.
"I do when it comes to assholes like Wilson Fisk who think they own it and his boot licking task force who do his bidding," he mildly answers.
He decides not to look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth when it comes to Castle acquiescing about anything, even if it's just an offer for clothing for the night. Sometimes he likes to wear a size up in sweats anyway, so he figures that at least that part will fit. Not that either of them are putting on a fashion show any time soon.
Frank's steps across the hardwood echo and he winces slightly at the sound. Definitely a concussion. "Yeah. I remember."
The subject of Fisk isn't bait he's taking tonight - call it earned good will. Red's not all there, he can tell, probably a minor concussion. And to use a term that would be understood, Frank's not about hitting below his weight. Not here, not when Red had his back tonight.
He crosses his legs at the ankles, fingers laced over his stomach. "I was gonna enter the Seminary. When I was in high school, I thought. That's the way, that's where I'm goin'."
He knows they don't view Fisk the same way, or at least what should be done about him. He's pretty sure that Frank shares his views of Wilson Fisk as a human being but that's about where that line ends. Two paths forward and it doesn't feel like anything that'll be solved tonight.
Matt instead shifts, grabbing a throw pillow to tuck it under his head as he turns on his side, facing Frank. It's an illusion of attentiveness that's instinctive now, because somehow it makes people feel more 'heard' even if Matt could listen to Frank's voice from down the block. And this feels important. "It's kind of hard to imagine you as a member of the clergy." It's not a slight. Just an observation. "You went a different way."
"I was already fucked by then. Thought it would cure me. Save me."
Frank appreciates the gesture of the movement but he knows Red well enough by now to see it for what it is. He doesn't know if a blind man with a concussion will still get nauseous with a bodily shift but be it on his head, literally; Frank's never asked for Red to be anything but what he is.
"Thought didn't last long. I enlisted as soon as I got my diploma and got some sense beat into me."
He doesn't push about the ways that Frank considered himself fucked up or what he needed saving from. Either he'll say it or he won't, and that's fine either way. Matt will listen to any story that Frank wants to tell but he's not interested in pushing at old scars to see what springs from them.
"I briefly thought about being a priest when I was a kid. Then after the accident and I lost my sight, there was a time me and God didn't get on so well. Cured me of that," he admits to the quiet in the room.
They're both fucked up and broken, just in different ways. "Better with the law than the Bible. Seems like you're better with a gun than the good book." There's no bite or sarcasm. An acknowledgment and even respect for how Frank can handle himself, even if Matt might wish he took less deadly courses.
There's silence for a moment, space for acknowledgement of the truth of that. They're better where they are now, for better or worse.
Then Frank barks a laugh that ends in a wheezed exhale as he lets his head drop back to look at the ceiling. They haven't turned on a light; he didn't realize it until now. "Y'ever think there's some alternate path out there?" His fingers tap patterns against each other. "Some upside fuckin' down universe where we both became priests and ran in the same small fucking New York parish circle? Damn, that's funny." He wets his lips, closes his eyes, listens to the drip of the coffee. Smiles. "Yeah, that would be somethin'."
Matt smiles at that while he faces Frank. "That would be," he agrees. "I don't know. I think about the alternative paths a lot. More than I should. The only one I don't linger on is the accident, but yeah. We could've been priests." Those are the kinds of thoughts that a man could drive himself crazy with. The could-have-beens and the might-haves.
The coffee is done and the drips are slowing. He pulls himself up slowly to his feet, partially to test himself and to be a good host. His head spins and his ribs ache but he pushes through it to pour them both cups. Matt puts one in Frank's hand and he sits back down on the couch with the mug between his palms. "You probably would've found some way to be a pain in my ass, even as a man of god."
Frank's been in that kind of crazy, so deep in it that he sought it out. Now that he's started crawling out the other side he realizes that he doesn't want to go back. But his brush with the Seminary, that's not a scar, not a real might-have. Just a stop on a straight line where he didn't get off. He can't regret what the Marines gave him, even with what it led to.
He watches Red haul his ass up and get them coffee. "Dumb-ass," he mutters in thanks, fondly, as the heated ceramic is placed in his hands. Takes a burning sip with an appreciative sound. "Hells yes I would have. I woulda pissed in your holy water and chuckled about it."
Matt carries regrets so heavy that it sometimes feels like they'll crush him but he knows that he has to live with those choices. He sees the ways that his decision to put on a mask caused a butterfly effect of destruction in his life but it doesn't mean that he would have gotten a happy ending without it. Probably not. He just would have been less prepared for a fight that feels like it was inevitable.
"Yeah, of course you would've," he replies, smiling faintly over the brim of the mug. "What else did you want to be as a kid? Besides a priest. You know, before my accident, I thought I might have to join the army to get an education. We were poor and I knew a kid whose dad went to school on the GI Bill. Can't quite picture me that way." Swings and roundabouts.
"Bet you were a scrawny kid." Frank muses over the image in his head. He doesn't know much about Red that doesn't start with a kick in the head on a dark rooftop. Red didn't need digging into and he sure as shit already knew how to beat himself up when they met. They might only - still - have a tenuous ally-ship, but Red's never been anywhere close to being on Frank's list. Which leaves a big ol' cluttered room of his past that Frank's never even tried knocking on. He knows the old man's a part of it. And Elektra. But that's about it.
"Y'know I can't see it. You in fatigues, bitch' and moanin' about what's fair and moral in war." His knee's starting to ache. "With that silver tongue though you might have just fast-tracked to JAG. Huh." He snorts, breathes in the steam of the coffee. "Wouldn't look bad in that uniform, though." Red, the confidence in his body even when he's hiding it, buttoned up in sharp Dress Blues.
"But me? Nothin'." His thumb rubs the side of his mug. "There was nothin' except getting out. Creativity ain't my strong suit, Red. There was just my shitty little couple blocks in Queens, and when I was old enough the Marines gave me an out." An out of New York, an aggressive outlet for his rage.
"Yeah, I was. I didn't start putting on any muscle until I started to train after I lost my sight," he answers with a shrug. He knows a lot about Frank because of the case and the trial, but most of that is just words on a page. Second or third hand. He likes these times when they are actually talking and he can get the story directly. Perspectives shift.
He faintly smiles at that, "Without the accident, without all of that, I'm not sure where that morality would've landed. If I could still see, I'm not sure how much time I'd have spent reading Thurgood Marshall and forming strong opinions on social justice." Swings and roundabouts. Different paths. "Pretty sure my dad would've shut that down anyway. He was big on the idea of a better life than the one he had." Not that the opinions of the dead necessarily matter; he solves more things with his fists than Battlin' Jack would've ever wanted him to.
"Was it worth it?" he asks after a moment. "What it cost you compared to the bill coming due if you'd stayed?"
"Dads," Frank says, low, "really know how to swing their weight around." God knows he did, probably too much for how often he was gone. When he was back he felt like he had to make up for it. He knew then how hard that was for his family. He knows it now.
Another long sip of coffee; definitely better than his shit. For a minute he just tastes it and lets the question settle between them. Then:
"Yeah. Every second of it."
He looks into his mug then out the window at New York, the breathing sea of lights that never sleep. He used to hate this city, but Red was right. He's right more often than Frank lets him believe. Frank came back, was pulled back. Wanted to be back. He's no better than the stink of this place, he deserves it and it deserves him. Difference is now he understands that.
"If I hadn't joined I know I wouldn't have met Maria. Wouldn't have been sitting under that tree, at that time, with that guitar. I would have never got to hold my babies, see my face in theirs. Even if I had to do it all again knowing where it would end, I would. I would. I would just hold them tighter while I could."
"Yeah. He's been dead over twenty-five years and I still hear his damn voice in my head," he replies softly. He knows all of the ways that his father sacrificed for him and all the ways that Matt wished that he hadn't, but that feels like another one of those alternate realities. One that haunts him the most.
The answer makes him faintly smile before taking another sip of his coffee. He hears the world outside; the window is open in the kitchen and sound carries but he ignores it for the rhythm of Frank's voice and the steady pull of his heart. "I'm glad you had that," he says simply and leaves it at that. Frank Castle doesn't seek out or want his sympathy and Matt doesn't offer it. He provides only as much understanding as he can muster as someone who never had children but who has lost a hell of a lot in his life. He's buried too many people and that's something they have in common.
"Stick asked me if it was worth it after I buried Elektra. I think he was hoping I'd say no. But it's always worth it."
Frank snorts, shifts just far enough to slide the mug onto the coffee table. Shuffles it a quarter-turn. Wonders if he should pry further but has to be real with himself - he's never met a knife he doesn't want to twist, just to see what more there is. He pushes himself up and heads into the kitchen, the breeze from the window cool on his chest as he opens freezer.
"Watchin' you two..." Down the scope of a rifle. It wasn't his fight, wasn't his kill. But how it played out, well. Frank's hand lingers for a moment against the cold of another ice pack. "Watching you work. That was like watching a goddamned ballet. She was your ride or die?"
"Yeah, that's pretty much Stick in a nutshell. He was an asshole," he replies with a faint laugh.
The question doesn't bother him. He's had time to mourn and he's lost since then so it's hard to quantify where the pain of Elektra's loss starts to mold into others. "You will be surprised to hear this but me and Elektra were complicated." It's a flimsy joke. "She was my college girlfriend. My first love. Maybe my only love, if I'm being real with myself." People had come and gone out of his life before and after her but none held the sway over him that Elektra had. "Yeah. She was. You know that building that fell on me? I was only under it because of her. Once it became clear there wasn't a way out, that we were gonna die together? I found myself at peace with it. Only problem was I didn't."
Frank doesn't understand a whole lot, but he understands what two people who know the guts of each other move like together. It's like finishing each other's sentences but without the need to aggrandize about it: it just is. It's not flash, and bang, it's self-awareness that includes another person as self. He and Maria could move around their kitchen like that. He and Bill, fuckin' Bill, they had that once upon a time when they were shoulder-to-shoulder under a goddamn hailstorm of bullets.
Red and Elektra fought like that. Like they'd ripped into each other far enough to share the blood and came out the other side.
Frank grabs the ice pack and knocks the freezer closed. "Midland Circle? Yeah, I heard about that. Only thing is..." Frank drops back into the chair, chases his knee with the ice. "I don't see how a dead woman got under that building with you."
He and Elektra could move like they shared a single pulse. Cynically, he could say it was because they were trained by the same asshole who had forced them to a collision course with each other in some pathetic attempt to win Matt back to a war he wanted nothing to do with but it had felt like more than that. Especially in the end.
He faintly smiles in response and sets his empty mug aside to go back to resting on the couch. Even going so far as to pull the plush throw blanket off the back of it to wrap around himself while his head settles into a throb instead of a spin. "Yeah. They brought her back from the dead. It's a...long story. She wasn't her at first. But she remembered me. Remembered that I loved her in the end. That's the part that matters." Easy to say when he's just handwaving her return from the dead. "Mourning her twice--that's a bitch."
Frank accepts the hand-wave, though his mouth opens, stays quiet, closes. He knows there's shit out there that's happening that doesn't involve him. That he doesn't want to be involved in. Metas. Crazy shit. So what if it includes resurrection?
Yeah. So what.
"I don't think there's many things in this life anymore than can break me, Red." Frank roughs a hand over the top of his own head before settling his chin in his fist and letting go of a long, slow breath. "But that would do it. Gettin' Maria back, just to--"
Doesn't involve him. Never gonna. There wasn't enough left of her to come back. His hand in his lap is shaking; he curls it into a fist. "I'd eat a fuckin' bullet." The words are nothing but breath and gravel, too low for anyone to hear aside from this man keepin' him company, wrapped in a goddamn blanket and head-injury. Frank gets to his feet, scraping his face with a palm before dropping the ice pack onto the table and moving away. The bathroom door slams behind him.
It wasn't Matt's first introduction to crazy shit but it was a hell of a punch in the gut that, if he's honest with himself, he's not so sure that he's really completely recovered from. Even with all of the years that have passed, it's part of the what-ifs and the alternate realities that he thinks too much about. What if he'd been able to save Elektra? What if they'd just left together and, for once in his life, he didn't do the right thing?
"Yeah. When she came back...she didn't have her heartbeat. I didn't even know I was fighting her at first when she came back and came at me as an enemy. And then...I mean. I guess that's why I was pretty comfortable dying with her." He knows that Frank has taken in the words and lines were drawn. He doesn't follow when he backs away and flees to the bathroom. If he just found out about people coming back from the dead? Yeah, he'd probably do the same.
He stays where he is. He tries to focus elsewhere away from any sounds Frank might make or the way that his pulse is faster. Privacy. Some measure of respect. He listens to the world beyond the room instead. Strains for distant sirens and neighbors and any part of the world that isn't invading Frank Castle's space.
Frank runs the tap. Splashes cold water on his face. Grips the sides of the sink hard enough to turn his knuckles white and stares at himself in the mirror.
He's had a death-wish since his family died, never any use pretending otherwise. His heart was dead but it was still beating so he decided to put those beats to good use. Walking into bullets, abuse, dumb-decisions and dead-ends the way only a suicidal man could, and yet none of it stopped him. He'd said Maria and the kids were worth it and he meant that, he said he'd do it again. But another go-around is different then what Red's told him. That's a second chance. And to lose it...
He knows that he couldn't survive that. The only rage left in him would be pointed inward. He knows it, because he still has nothing else, and can't hold his own eyes in the mirror.
It takes a few minutes for Frank to come out of the bathroom. Walks past Red to pull down two glasses and grab the bottle of good whiskey. Dumps them on the coffee table and pours more than a finger into each before pressing a glass into Red's hand. His pulse is steady now, his breathing even. "I don't know what the fuck we're drinking to. Just feels like..." He shrugs and downs his own pour in a single swallow.
Matt would have been content to die under Midland Circle and there was a time when it felt like it was a tragedy that he hadn't. He's past that, he thinks. For the most part. Sometimes he thinks about Elektra and he wonders if maybe he could have done something different to save them both but in the end, death is supposed to be the end and as much as he hates it, he has to believe that things happened the way they did for some kind of reason. Faith. Blind and stupid faith but he doesn't talk about that part of it.
Frank returns and there's whiskey. He considers telling him that it's really only the celebration stuff, that the mourning whiskey is a different bottle where the taste doesn't matter, but he doesn't.
"To the women we've loved," he says, holding up his glass with a faint, nearly pained smile. "Elektra would've liked you. She didn't hold my same sense of morals so she probably would've loved how you bust my balls about it." He takes a sip of the whiskey and lets it burn on the way down before he drops his head back to the cushion.
Mourning should fucking matter, in every way, up to and including the whiskey. Mourning deserves the highest shelf shit there is.
But Christ, Red.
Christ.
Frank shakes his head and teethes whiskey from his bottom lip. "To the women we've loved," he just repeats, setting the glass back down on the table. Maybe Red's made his amends, made them good enough to say shit like that. It's only fresh to Frank. "To be fair, from what I've seen you know how to pick 'em." Maybe he would have liked Elektra too but they'll never know. Like Maria, she's just an empty shape where a woman once was.
He exhales. Lets it go. "You got anything tonight that needs sewing up? Gonna have to tell me; I can't sniff it out." But the first-aid box was taken out before he got here, so there's something.
There's no way to compare his college love who left his life in tatters and returned to blow it up again to the wife that Frank loved and lost and he wouldn't presume to. Except to know what it is to mourn, they were nothing alike and neither were their relationships. One was a marriage that, from everything Frank has ever said, was built in real love and the other was a love built in a push and pull of light and dark until neither one of them won.
"Foggy used to say my real super power was finding the most beautiful and morally questionable woman in the room," he faintly smiles.
Matt shifts, pushing the ice pack on his ribs over to the side. "No. Thought maybe the inside of my lip but it stopped on its own. Those always feel like mountains instead of molehills. Ribs and my head are enough to deal with for now." He doesn't ask about Frank. He already knows.
That line gets a breath, a laugh, yeah. "Yeah, I can see that. Got a lot fuckin' charm when you've got a tie and a cane." Asshole has an undeniable charm even when he's being an asshole. Frank hates it enough that it circles back around to a grudging respect. "Luckily I don't have the same problem. Never been in danger of anyone accusing me of being charming."
He's drifted during the conversation. Physically. Now he opens the fridge. Just looking. Shooting shitbags always eventually makes him hungry.
"They teach a course on it in law school," he deadpans as he stretches out on the sofa a little more. Elongating his spine feels good and he turns his hips to adjust his back. "You have a special kind of asshole charm." It's not the same thing, of course. Matt can lay it on thick in the straight world of suits and ties and day jobs and Frank doesn't have to these days, but there's still something about Frank that pulls him in all the same. The confidence in himself and that what he's doing is right.
He doesn't pay it much mind when Frank looks for food. There's leftover Korean, ingredients for a salad and a few other staples that would require some cooking to make into anything resembling a meal. He assumes Frank will go with the low energy leftovers.
If confidence was the same as charm, he'd have had a much easier time with all the badges in his life over the last few years.
"Yeah that's what they all tell me," Frank says as he starts opening the tops of leftovers, sniffing. He slides one onto the counter. Then he goes back into the fridge. "That my asshole's got a lot of charm." More shit hits the counter: lettuce, carrots. Two eggs are grabbed from a cutesy little holder like god didn't invent packaging for a reason. "You know I bet I fell into the same trap that everybody does, you tell me."
Water, frying pan, pot, the clickclickwhoosh of a gas burner catching. "Looking through the scope that night, you didn't have your mask on. And I thought, 'shit, Red kinda looks like that shitbird lawyer who never showed up for my case.'" Efficiently pre-cut salad vegetables in the pan, he scrapes them around before starting to open and close cabinets while they begin to sizzle. "But then, right, and it's funny, because the next thought comes - 'nah, that shitbird's blind. No way he's up here on a fuckin' roof in red jammies fighting...' Well, goddamn ninjas, I guess."
Red can probably smell it when the sesame oil is opened up. Soy sauce. Chicken bullion. Staples of anyone with half a taste-bud in New York. They hiss as they hit the pan. Water boils and the two eggs are dropped in. "So I told myself I was crazy and wrote it off. Then the next time I see you - got yourself to a hearing of mine eventually - you said my name. That was it, you know? I couldn't see past either suit, not until you said my name." Vegetables wilt, are stirred. "That's when I knew it, but you know, I'm not so sure most people can. I think most people thought just what I thought - no way a blind guy could be the Devil. Christ, Red. I mean. That right there is some kinda bait and switch."
Matt stays settled on the sofa while Frank makes himself at home in his kitchen. He has no objections. He’s comfortable with Frank’s presence and there are no secrets to be gleaned from the contents of his refrigerator except that he doesn’t take great care of himself. He eats clean when he can and it explains why he has what he does but not how bare it is for everything else.
The story doesn’t surprise him. He knows the broad strokes of it. He smiles while he lays on his side, listening to Frank’s voice and the sizzle. “I heard your heart skip a beat when you figured it out. I knew you had,” he confirms.
“If you want to call it a trap, sure. The same that everyone has. Don’t take it personally.” People tend to. As if they should have pieced it sooner. “I knew who I was defending even if you didn’t know about me. I remembered what you told me in the cemetery. One batch, two batch. I think that’s why I took the case. I knew you were more than a psychopath.”
Yeah, his heart had definitely taken a little tap-dance. A little tap-dance, in fact, had been necessary to get his brain around what he knew, what he saw on that roof and had talked himself out of.
Frank's going to say something about Red knowing who he defending when 'one batch, two batch' wipes it away. The spatula doesn't stop so much as stutter, one off-beat clunk against the side of the pan.
He'd forgotten that. Forgotten explaining it to Red. Hearing it now he can catch the edges of the memory, pry them away from some of the blood loss, pain, rage but... it's not all there. Talkin' about Lisa, yeah, but - not why, not how. Just the smell of the earth, the cold of the stone against his back, the shape of the Devil in the darkness. A Devil who'd saved his ass that night. Who thought - out of everyone else in the city - that he was worth that effort.
"Man you pissed me off that night." A dismissive sniff. Frank dumps the left-over container full of noodles into the pan. "Saving those assholes from me." Frank tips the pot into the sink and turns on the water to cool down the eggs. "I was too pissed off to even be impressed by that bouncing trick shot." Bowls are pulled from a cabinet, a pair.
He winces slightly at the clatter, not from the volume of the sound but because he knows that he has inadvertently struck a nerve with Frank and his memories that he hadn’t intended to pull on. He offers a weak smile of apology in response to it and doesn’t comment further on the remark. Of course he remembers what Frank told him. It was soft and tragic in the wake of a violent, terrible night.
“Is there a night that I haven’t pissed you off?” It seems rhetorical. Probably not. “I didn’t care about your revenge. I just wanted to get you out alive. That’s what matters.” He expects that could spark an argument and he doesn’t want that. Instead, he pushes himself upright with a soft groan since it seems like dinner is almost ready. “Was a pretty good shot though. You sometimes act offended that I call myself blind. I assume that sort of thing is why.”
Eh, he's all fuckin' nerves on his best day. He'll take the silver lining; more that he knows that his shit stinks too, the less of a fuss he'll make the next time it's pointed out. Frank hadn't offered that story to an impartial witness, any ol' Joe Schmoe walking down the street. He offered it to Red, because even though he was pissed at the guy, there was already some of their personal brand of fucked-up trust beginning.
No moral argument tonight, though, or maybe not about the point made: getting Frank out was what mattered to Red. Frank doesn't agree with it in general but that's only his opinion - and it's an opinion tempered by knowing now that he would have never found the real answers behind what happened to his family if he'd died in that place.
A bowl is tucked into Red's hands as Frank once again lowers himself into the chair. "Damn straight it was a pretty good shot. That's what pissed me off." He forks some stir-fry into his mouth, blowing at the heat of it around the chewing and swallowing. "And you're the hot-shot lawyer, you tell me. Is there a legal definition that I'm missing? I know you don't need that cane but I'm guessing when you're reading those big fancy books that you're not seeing the words."
Getting Frank out alive had mattered. Nothing was going to be made better by him dying at the hands of the Irish and he knows that Frank told him that whole story because he'd heard him whisper the words right before guns were fired and because he'd chosen to stay with him next to that gravestone instead of leaving him. They had been in a war together, even for just a night, and Matt had felt trust start there, even if he still didn't have any when it came to Frank's ability to have any semblance of self control. That's why he was there. The angel on his shoulder dressed like a Devil to forcefully still his hand, even if Frank bitched and complained about it.
"I'm legally blind by every definition that would be used to assess me, if that's what you mean," he answers as he waits for the contents of the bowl to cool a little bit. "I can't see color. I can't see screens or words in a book that aren't braille. Sometimes I can feel them, depending on how they were printed, but it's not sight. I have an idea of what you look like because of the sound of the room moves and how your heartbeat and your voice make the noise that vibrates, and from hitting you, from touching you, but I have no idea what color your eyes are. I can't see the sky or a sunset. It's more..." he pauses, tilting his head down while he considers the answer. "It's not all black for me. It's reds. It's like seeing the world on fire. The way people describe it as echo location or sonar or...it's a world burning, all the time."
He doesn't think he's ever really taken the chance to explain it but he knows Frank has made enough sarcastic comments that he probably deserves to actually know what he's fighting next to. "I don't need the cane but I don't navigate the world like someone with normal sight, so it's just easier to put on a facade." He takes a bite. "This is good, by the way. Thanks."
The sarcasm's always come from the fact that Red contradicts himself. He uses a cane and then leaps across rooftops. Fumbles a drink when it's convenient, catches an apple in the next moment. Frank's already seen Red fight - a description now isn't gonna change anything.
"Yeah you're welcome." Almost absent, pushing it away to continue on with the conversation at hand. "Why's it easier - because you'd have to stop and explain to people why you don't act like a blind guy? Easier to meet their expectations?"
He doesn't push on the thanks and just eats while he considers the answer to Frank's question. "Yes. I shouldn't be able to do what I do and people have an expectation of what it means to be blind. I can try to pass myself off as sighted, and it works in brief bits and pieces, but I can't make meaningful eye contact or do a lot of other things that you can do. So it's just easier to let people think I'm not as capable as I am than to have to explain chemicals in my eyes, super senses, training with a ninja, yadda yadda." He stirs the food around in the bowl. "People get weird about it once they know what I can smell or hear or taste. Some get self conscious. Some get worried." Frank doesn't seem to be capable of either of those things so it's easier to talk to him about it, and he figures after all this time, he owes some explanation.
Honestly, Frank realizes he's been thinking about Red's blindness in a purely physical sense. Not that he considered that Red was lying about the rest but in Frank's presence the guy is always so physically here, eyes generally covered by lenses or hooded in lust that there hasn't been a lot of room for the in-between - to the point that he understands he'd discounted it. That was an oversight.
No pun intended.
He's glad for the explanation. Doesn't know what he's gonna do with it, but is glad to know. Like seeing the world on fire. That's fuckin' something. "Still sounds exhausting," he says, after another mouthful. "I'm a prick, but at least I don't have to pretend not to be." But then again, he doesn't have to worry about maintaining a life, either.
He knows how he presents to Frank, who has seen him fight and bleed and move through the world in a way that most people with all of their senses can't. It makes sense that he might not understand and that's okay. Matt doesn't mind explaining it and getting to be honest about it in ways that he's typically not granted in the course of a normal life.
"It is," he admits between bites. "It can be, anyway. People might see you a lot of ways but I'm sure none of them look at you and see helpless. It's weird that way," he replies. He knows he feeds into it by virtue of his decisions but it's still difficult sometimes. "I catch myself even with you, reminding myself that I don't have to fake it. It's nice though. To be real."
It's not just that Red has two lives to Frank's one. Red has two distinct lives, as different from each other as almost humanly possible. It's not even something that Frank can wrap his head around - he's never been anything as much as he's been dug into being himself, the sum of his own parts.
"Is there a real for you when you're not in the suit?" Question's mild, honest, not asked to start a fight or pass judgement. "Yeah, you got your reasons, but doesn't that just mean you're making it easier on other people? You talk about fakin' it. You doing it for them? Burning yourself out for them?
"Maybe it would take just as much work to do it the other way. But you wouldn't be fake."
He's not suggesting Red live as the Devil. But he's thinking that Red maintains that helplessness so that the Devil can survive.
It used to matter more, having those distinct lives, when he had more people to protect. The numbers have gotten fewer over the years and sometimes he does wonder who he maintains it for. Selfishly for some part of himself still, but there might come a time when all that remains is the Devil. He thinks Frank would be fine with that outcome.
"I'm not in the suit now," he answers. "When I'm alone, of course. But around other people? I'm not sure there is," he admits and he can actually agree to that point that Frank is hinting at; Matthew Murdock is the disguise and Daredevil is who he really is. He's known that for a while now.
"It's a little late for that. I can't really have a 'miracle' recovery from an accident that happened when I was nine in front of the world," he shrugs before taking a couple more bites to finish off his bowl. He sets it on the coffee table and tugs the blanket back up over his shoulders so he can rest his head once again. "I know this life of mine is on borrowed time. It was from the second I put on the mask. Eventually something's going to give. Maybe when that happens, I'll be honest. But not yet."
Maybe Franks wants Red to be the Devil, yeah, but after tonight it's not gonna be the same. There have been new lines drawn in the grey in-between. He doesn't need Red to give into the reality that justice is never gonna be the Almighty thing that Red wants to believe it is, he can continue to battle his conscience and Frank will bat those battles back in face. But becoming the Devil means something different now. It means letting go of Matt Murdock.
And even Frank knows that's a trickier thing. Excuse the language, but fuck his personal life - Frank's seen the man stand up in court. He thinks that the tether.
"You got a timer on that, Red? Do you hear it? Tick, tick, tick." Frank makes a sound, almost amused, and stands to grab both bowls to take to the sink.
He remains still, faintly smiling at how almost domestic it is that Frank is putting away the dishes after cooking dinner for them. Of course, that's in the aftermath of a fight where blood was spilled all over the streets so it's not exactly a completely sweet image. All the same, Matt is grateful for it.
"Yeah. I've been hearing it tick down like the fuse on a bomb since this started," he answers as he pulls his knees up a little closer so he's lying in a half fetal position on the couch with the blanket up and his head on the pillow. "Been a while since I had a concussion," he mutters to himself while Frank moves around the apartment with comfortable ease. "Fuckers shoved me into the wall and I think my brain whiplashed against the inside of my skull."
Red's let alone to sit with his scrambled brain for a few minutes while Frank cleans up; he's a Marine - they don't less messes for other people to deal with, they keep tidy bed corners. It's habit made life style.
When Frank returns, he stops between the couch and the coffee table. "Gotta keep teaching those fanboys some manners. Sit up." He's got tylenol and water in-hand.
Yeah, he might be too fuckin' familiar with this place.
"C'mon. You'll sleep better in your fancy-ass sheets." Red needs rest, and Frank needs someone on the streets who doesn't want to kill him. Well, doesn't need it. Maybe he's gotten accustomed to it, though.
He pulls himself up with a soft groan that he doesn't bother trying to hide from Frank. Why should he at this point? His hand goes to his side while he sits up and he reaches to take the pills and the water. He downs them quickly. "Thanks." He doesn't elaborate farther than that because he knows Frank will just deflect the gratitude the way he usually does.
"What are you gonna do with yourself?" he asks as he plants his feet on the ground. Pushing himself from a prone to standing position is not a lot of fun but he manages it. "It's late." It's an invitation to stay. It'd be the smarter play; those cosplaying fanboy assholes were close to Frank's fallout shelter and staying off the streets after an ambush like that is the smarter play. He figures that Frank knows that, but he also gets weird about staying at Matt's place. He never does it with innocent or not-so-innocent offers so he's not sure he expects anything different this time. "I'm not sure I'm supposed to sleep with my brain sloshing around in my head."
"That shit's an old wives tale, Red. Thought you were supposed to be the smart one." He doesn't touch, but gets behind and just to the side of Red just in case. "Everything I know I learned from the best damn field medic ever to grace the Middle East, and he told me that not sleeping after a knock to the head is just macho bullshit. His words, not mine." Frank herds Red toward the bedroom. "When the brain's injured, what it needs the most is sleep. Rest. Repair, you know. So c'mon. Hup."
He's gonna sleep on the couch. Frank doesn't have the same death wish he used to and can always use the coffee as an excuse in the morning. But Red doesn't need to deal with that right now.
"I know the law. I'm not a field medic," he answers as he plants his feet and makes sure he's got a good sense of balance. He thinks he does but he stays still for a moment to see if he has his equilibrium. He does, so that's something. It's lowered again and he walks with Frank at his side like he's a sheep dog, drawing him to the bedroom. "Okay, okay, I'm going." It's actually kind of sweet in Frank's own strange way. It's what he's capable of and that's enough. He's not sure he's ready to sleep but Frank not answering his question does leave him with a minor worry that he is so locked in on the 'mission' to deal with the fanboys that he might make a bad decision.
"I'm a terrible patient," he says as he sits down on the edge of the bed. "I was as a kid but after that building fell on me? Christ, I was a pain in the ass to Sister Maggie. Just the biggest asshole about it. So you can kick my ass if I bitch too much."
"Eh I'd punch ya and put you out but, you know. Counter-intuitive." It's a joke, though the delivery's flat. "C'mon." He's only going to play nursemaid for so long. Curtis cares; Frank defends allies. But not against themselves. He stands near the bed, waiting. Impatiently shifting. "She kick your ass, that why you beggin' for it now? If she was able to whoop any sense into you then she sounds like the kind of sister I'd like."
It earns a smile all the same. "Just a little counterproductive," he agrees as he swings his legs onto the mattress and spreads out on top of the sheets. He takes a breath, letting a small wave of minor nausea pass with the movement. It is probably from the way that he tilted his head so he'll have to avoid that. "Pretty sure she wanted to but no, she didn't. She doesn't take a lot of shit for a nun though, so you'd probably like her." He reaches to adjust the pillow behind his head and closes his eyes. That feels more like instinct than anything, as if it might will sleep but he doesn't think he's really close to it. "Look. I'm not going to be weird about it. But you should stay." He just leaves it at that. Frank will do whatever he wants, and maybe it's crossing some weird invisible line in Frank's sense of code or the way that he wants to segregate his life from Matt's but whatever. He's hurting and his body is bone deep exhausted so his sense of self preservation isn't great.
Frank snorts. "Don't generally cook for someone if I'm not expecting something in return, sweetheart." And that's what Red'll get. He's not an idiot. Those cops were in his goddamn backyard; he's got some sorting to do tomorrow. He doesn't want to relocate but the sunlit hours will tell.
For now he just wants to fucking sleep, hope his knee will stop giving him shit, and pray that he doesn't dream of Maria. "Now go the hell to sleep."
"You don't have to crash out on the couch, you know. Bed's big enough," he offers. "Besides--not tonight, dear. I have a headache." He's obviously not in any shape for anything more than just falling asleep but Frank had his back tonight and it seems like a dick move to banish him to the sofa. It's a nice sofa, granted. Brand new and not covered in blood anymore. So maybe it's not the worst place to spend a night and he knows that the argument will be that Frank has had worse accommodations in his life. Still. He makes it anyway and he doesn't wait for the rejection he figures is coming before turning onto his good side, facing away from Frank so he can actually try to get some of that sleep he needs.
The comeback earns a laugh but Frank just turns to the doorway. Red's injured and needs his space, that's what Frank tells himself. He tells himself better not to jostle the wounded.
Nobody's banishing anybody.
"Eh. I've slept on worse couches. Night, Red." Frank pulls the door close on Red's turned back but don't latch it, leaves it open a crack so that--
Well. He's injured. That's all. He'll break in the couch; Red left a blanket for him anyway.
He's not surprised. Not even a little bit. Maybe disappointed on some level because he does feel like it's a dick move to make someone who has fucked him before sleep on the sofa but if it's a boundary that Frank wants to impose, that's up to him.
He listens to Frank's steps across his hardwood floor and the soft creak that closes the door most of the way. It's strange to hear someone in his apartment, moving around at a distance while he's alone in bed but he tries to ignore all of that. Frank's safe, at least, and tomorrow there's going to be the matter of figuring just how much, if anything, Fisk's good squad knows about Frank's living arrangements but he tries to ignore all of that in favor of a good night's sleep.
Frank's an early riser. He opens his eyes before the sun's properly come up over the jagged reaches of the city and he tries - hey, couch isn't bad - but his mind's already going. Red's apartment. Fisk's assholes. All his guns, his work.
So as dawn claws its way up over the buildings, the coffee's set to brewing and Frank's sitting in Red's sweatpants at the counter, intent on trying to sort out what's what but instead thinking about the last time he slept on a couch. Wondering how Amy's holding up. If Curtis and his girl are makin' do. He scrubs a hand over his face, looking at his jacket on the stool next to him. Instinct says go to ground, reassess, make a plan. Except his grounds been compromised.
He taps his phone screen awake to the headline from the Bulletin: Terrorist Attack Against Mayor Fisk's Task Force.
Sound startles him awake and for just a moment, he forgets where he is and who is in his living room. Then he takes in the sound of a familiar heartbeat and weighted steps in the other room and the smell of the coffee brewing. Right. The night before. His head is aching and his ribs feel like someone is digging a knife into his side but he'll be fine. He always is.
He puts his feet down on the floor and pulls himself up to his feet. He makes noise in the bedroom; opening a drawer, lifting and closing the lid of the metal hamper to swap out new boxers and put on a t-shirt that the braille on the label and the glossy print lettering on the front tells him is a grey Columbia shirt. He makes the sound so Frank knows he's awake. It gives him a chance to escape if that's his intention, or to not be startled when Matt slowly exits the bedroom to come into the kitchen for a desperately needed cup of coffee.
"Morning, Sunshine." Frank's still at the counter when Red makes his way out; doesn't even turn around, can clock the man in the reflection of the microwave door. Even in the distorted nothing of GE plexiglass he can tell that Red's still feeling last night.
"Our little party's already made the news." Frank reaches for the remote on the far side of the counter and turns on the TV, flipping through a few channels before finding a news network. "...confirmed deaths of eleven police officers on the Mayor's official task squad are assumed to be the work of a vigilante. Mayor Fisk, who has recently declared war on New York's vigilantes, is calling this an attack by local terrorists..."
Frank snorts. "Guess it's bad press to come out and say it's the Punisher's taking down the cops who love those stupid fuckin' tattoos."
"Good morning, sweetheart," he greets in return as he makes an immediate line for the coffee. He pours himself a cup and then goes to retrieve the bottle of tylenol that's still out and dumps four pills into his hand. He washes them down with a sip and tilts his head to the sound of the reporter on the television.
He faintly smiles at Frank's assessment because he's right, of course. It sounds bad to say that the Punisher is not only out in the world but that he's winning against the task force. Naming him would only spark a response that the mayor's office doesn't want. He doesn't linger on the fact that of the over twenty cops, Frank killed eleven of them. Maybe if he hadn't been there, it would have been all of them but he's started to learn that the time and place for discussions of morality is 'not here' and 'never' with Frank.
"Sad you didn't get any credit for your fine work?" he asks before taking another sip.
"Might be comin' around to the long-game," Frank mutters, pushing himself up to make his own way to the coffee pot. Is he sad? Sad wouldn't be the word he'd use, but it's not credit with the public he wants. The shitbags he wants to know, know. "Last thing I need right now is another man hunt." Better for the general focus to be obscured in whatever way; it gives him space to work. He fills a coffee mug as the anchor drones on behind him.
"...allegedly reported to have been working with another vigilante at the time. In a statement, Connor Powell of the AVTF warned the public..."
He wishes that it could go a different way but he doesn't argue about it. He's too tired, too sore and not awake enough to explore the moral quandary that is Frank Castle. "At least not a public one." The cops are going to be looking for him but that's not a new development.
Matt quietly scoffs over the brim of his mug. "Sounds like they've put it together that we're working together again." And that's what this is, isn't it? Going their separate ways now would be stupid because they've pulled each other out of the proverbial fire a few times now and splitting up when the task force is gunning for them would be foolish. "Though this makes it sound like I'm your sidekick," he faintly smiles.
So all Frank has to do to shut up about moral quandries is to get him tired, sore, and half-asleep? Noted.
"What, y'don't think any of these chuckleheads believe that you and Jones are out there together shootin' up the streets?" Rhetorical question. Frank takes a sip of his coffee and leans against the counter. "Don't know, Red. I'm not really into that sorta thing but I can't say you wouldn't look good with a little collar and leash get-up."
"I can't speak for her but I think where I stand on that sort of thing has been obvious," he answers with a shrug. He rolls his head and shoulders, trying to work out a knot that has been bothering him since he woke up.
That sparks a half smile, even as he tries to get comfortable with just the idea of standing upright. "Don't threaten me with a good time, Frank," he grins as he goes to grab his phone from where he left it on the kitchen island. He really shouldn't go to work like this, he knows, and maybe for once in his life, he's going to do the smart thing and give himself a day to rest. The concussion is really the factor; his head aches and there's just enough minor spin to make him think he should rest it. "Gotta make a call," he says before taking the phone to the bedroom so he can call Kirsten and tell her that he's sick and won't be coming in.
Frank chuckles as Red heads off, fills his spot at the counter again. With the TV still on he's not capable of eavesdropping but the truth is that whatever Red's saying doesn't matter to him; he's got more pressing issues. He checks the triggers on his bunker, the few contacts with scratch enough to follow the cop gossip. Can't trust em further than he could toss their asses, but it helps paint a picture.
Task Force hasn't found his place yet, but they're on the scent. Building back up his stash will take time and effort and space that Fisk's goons aren't gonna give him: he needs to get into his place and clear out.
Kirsten is worried again, because of course she is. He's fine, he tells her. Just needs a day to get over a head cold. It's...not a great lie. Most of his aren't. He doesn't think that much of the night before reads on his face because it doesn't feel too tender anywhere, even where he has a cut on the inside of his mouth, but he might need to ask Frank about that later. He finishes the call and comes back out to the kitchen.
"Called in sick to work," he explains, giving his phone a shake in his hand before setting it down. "When it was me and Foggy, at least I didn't have to come up with a creative lie after he found out." He doesn't have that relationship with Kirsten yet. He doubts he ever will. "Anything else come across the news?" he asks. He wasn't listening to anything except the worry in his partner's voice.
"Aw, McDuffie worried?" There's no heat in it, Frank's still focused on his own phone. "You should tell her you're in a fight club for blind guys." He looks up, glances back at the still droning TV.
"Nah. They're just releasin' enough to make the city feel like they're the good guys. Fisk's media team must be running on fumes for all the smoke they're blowing." He considers his coffee, takes another drink. "I got clean up to do. Far as I can tell the AVTF's still just sniffin' but eventually they'll find the right scent. Before they do I gotta get back to mine, pack up, find somewhere new."
"Yeah, a bit. I should probably come up with a better lie. How's my face? Any visible bruising?" he asks. It's hard to tell sometimes so he'll just have to rely on the guy with actual sight to tell him.
Matt faintly smiles in response. Yeah, he's sure that the mayor's office is churning out plenty of press about it and that of course they would find some way to spin it that their task force is doing the right thing. It's bullshit and Matt does feel like a lot of the city knows it but they just can't do anything about it. "I'm going to regret this but there's space in the storage locker if you need it. I'm not sure what fallout shelters go for in the city or how easy they are to find but, you know. If you need it for your gear."
Frank hears the offers, but he ignores it for now. Red's question lets him delay pulling that particular trigger. He turns to Red and looks, then pushes himself out of his seat and steps forward.
Knuckles bump Red's chin. Frank lets himself look over the face in front of him. "This--" He touches a cheek, probably matching the cut Red says he has inside his mouth. Already yellow, his fingers follow an almost a straight line that speaks of teeth impact. "Faint. Don't shave, you'll be fine."
His hand drops. "That why you called out? Or your head still ringin'?"
He stays still while Frank examines him and he draws in an annoyed breath when he finds out that his face carries the history of the night. The mask and helmet do a lot to protect against the worst of damage but he still sometimes carries the hints of what he really does with his life.
“I can lie about a bruise. My head is still a mess. My equilibrium is kind of off so I should probably take the day to shake it off.” He notices the way that Frank doesn’t address his other offer but he knows better than to push the matter.
It's when Frank lists Red's injuries in the back of his head that he realizes that he's accepted the man as a personal asset - with all the implicit trust and potential dependencies that come along with such a thing. "Yeah. You rest up."
He turns away, finds his coffee and finishes it in two long swallows. "I'll keep you in the loop." It's an offer he doesn't need to make, but he knows that this shit with the task force starts with Fisk and that's Red's fight too; this isn't Frank dragging Red in by association. They've both got a stake in what's to come.
Matt cares and he makes no secret about that with Frank. Why should he try to hide something that’s obvious? He wears bloody good intentions on his sleeve along with the scars that come with that kind of caring. It costs. It always does. He knows that Frank doesn’t carry the same amount of feelings of responsibility and whatever else he calls this and that’s fine.
“So what are you going to do while I rest?” He has some amount of trepidation about that question and what Frank might or might not do but he’s a big boy. He doesn’t actually need Matt’s help or even his offer of a kind of safe space in his apartment and in his life.
But he also didn't leave before Red got up. Frank's actions have always spoken for him; he's never had need for a bunch of fancy words like Red is so fond of throwing around in front of a jury.
Frank washes his mug. "Told you. I'm gonna clean out." It's put in the draining board and Frank puts his hands on the counter edge, hangs his head for a moment. Exhales. "Wipe it down, all of it. No tracks. Nothing they can use but maybe I'll leave somethin' that'll send them in a direction of my choosing." Something that would point them far away from the place both of them are standing right now. He stands, cracks his neck. "There are a few guys I can shake down for information."
It matters that Frank stayed. Even if it was just practicality and Matt reminds himself of that easily enough. He and Frank collide when it works and often when it doesn’t but it doesn’t mean that he doesn’t worry about what last night means. Being that close to Frank’s little bunker and the ambush they had to lay to deal with it all still lingers in his mind.
“Just be careful.” It’s not a necessary warning. Of course it isn’t. Frank knows what he has to do and right now Matt just needs to heal up or he won’t be any use to him. “I’ll leave the patio door unlocked if you need it.” It’s what passes as a real invitation between them.
Yeah, being able to walk in a door via the rooftop instead of crawl in a window via the rooftop. Almost goddamn romantic, Red, better watch yourself.
Frank claps Red on the shoulder as he passes him. In the bathroom he changes back into his own clothes, leaves the sweatpants folded on the seat of the toilet. He has work to do and he's never careless, even though that's not always the same on him as careful - but right now he's not trying to kick the hornet's nest. He zips his hoodie closed over flak vest.
"I'll see you soon, Red." Soon. Not later, not around. It's an answer to his question, if not a promise. A nine-mil is pulled from behind the back of a couch cushion, slide checked, made safe before Frank tucks it in the back of his waistband. Maybe the sound of it is another answer: last night was something more than practicality for Frank. He heads to the glass doors. "Stay outta that suit."
He would offer Frank a key and the door code if he thought that he would ever use it. That would put him directly in front of security cameras and the sort of things that the Punisher would actively try to avoid. The rooftop access and the patio is the most welcoming practical thing that he can offer in times like these.
He knew the gun was there. He can smell the powder and how it was freshly fired last night. If Frank sought to protect the apartment last night, it’s about as much of a sign of affection he thinks Castle is capable of outside of sex. “I’ll try.” He makes no promises and then Frank is gone. He takes another sip of coffee and decides he’s better off just going back to bed.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Something like that. I can hear you outside. I assume you don't need an invitation to come in.
no subject
Well. He does know how to knock, anyway. But one of Matt's kitchen windows is slid upward without any further exchange of niceties and one boot after another, Frank unfolds into the apartment. In the unlit room he's just another shadow against the neon and halogen backdrop of Hell's Kitchen.
His glance around looks casual. Is casual, reflected even in the strong, regular beat of his pulse. The Devil of HK might be less than an enemy, but Frank doesn't have many people left he'd go so far as to consider friends. This turf belongs to Murdock; steady pulse regardless, he's ready for anything.] C'mon, [Frank calls to the darkness, moving toward the coffee pot,] that was good. You said yourself you've got a great ass.
no subject
He reaches to turn on the light to illuminate the way for Frank, even if he's sure the other man could navigate his apartment in the dark with ease now. He rises from his chair and moves toward the kitchen to meet Castle at the coffeemaker.]
You're probably the better judge but I haven't heard you complain.
[He reaches to retrieve a couple of mugs and sets them on the counter.]
Kona coffee. Let me know what you think.
no subject
Yeah, maybe he glances at the ass in question, though.] It ain't bad.
[He takes care of pouring the coffee into both mugs but other than that doesn't offer assistance. It's hot enough to burn but that doesn't stop Frank from putting his nose into the steam and taking a drink. Fuck. It's good coffee. Frank swallows and exhales in appreciation.] Yeah. Now that's a cup of coffee. [He takes another sip, watching Murdock over the rim of the mug.]
no subject
The answer about his ass sparks a smile.] I'll just take the compliment and move on.
[He takes a sip of the coffee once it's poured.] I told you so. There's whiskey in the cupboard if you want to add to it. Good stuff is on the top shelf. Mid range is the bottom. I stick with the bottom unless there's something worth celebrating.
no subject
Nah, I'm good. Use whiskey more to disinfect than drink. [Frank pushes off the counter and walks slowly around the kitchen as he sips the coffee. He uses a finger to check the cupboard. The level of amber liquid in each bottle.] Curious what you consider worth celebratin', though. Winning a case?
no subject
For once, you're not bleeding. [He doesn't taste copper in the air.] There's beer in the refrigerator but I don't think that pairs as well with the coffee. [He makes the offer with an easy, charming enough smile.] Yeah, sometimes. Depends on the case. Sometimes victories don't always feel like it.
no subject
Sometimes victories don't always feel like it.] I hear that. [There's a goad there, waiting, but Frank doesn't take it. Murdock doesn't seem like the type to drown his losses. He wants to feel them. Just like Frank.] So what about today? You whistle, and your dog without morals comes running? I'm not that, Red.
no subject
Yeah. Figured you would. [Matt takes another sip of his coffee.] Today was...one of those days. Sorry. I didn't mean to make it seem like you don't have a code or something. I know you do and I know it matters to you. It was supposed to be a fuck buddies joke, not a referendum on you as a person. [He's over explaining but he feels kind of bad about it now.]
no subject
That idea of comfort, it's not so strange. Guys like them, they're weapons. Murdock has his safety on. Frank doesn't. But they're still both weapons, walking down the sidewalk everyday with people who don't understand what they're brushing elbows with. Is Frank comfortable with Murdock? Nah, not the way those people on the sidewalk take comfort in each other - but there's a release in knowing he's standing with someone who understands guys like them, they don't get to have that. Even if they do make referendums on each other as people.
Frank laughs, the too-loud, too empty kind of laugh that is already falling from his face as he pulls a hand over his mouth.] Jesus christ, yeah; sure. [He looks at the front door, the window. Knows he ain't gonna use either. He's not offended. He doesn't care. Truth is that if Red decided to take the safety off, yeah, Frank would be there.
His boots are loud, antagonistic as he crosses the hardwood back to Murdock. Stops too close, slides his mug onto the counter behind but doesn't touch. Sharing space as a threat, but he's not sure yet of what kind.] 'm here, aren't I? [Frank's voice, already low, drops into a rumble.] Sure as shit ain't for the coffee.
no subject
He doesn't have to like it, but he and Frank are warriors. Sometimes on the opposite side because of method and motivations, but they exist in a space together where it's easy. They both stand in easy confidence because there's a strange safety in knowing how unsafe either would be if the gloves came off. They both hit hard but Matt's hands aren't anything resembling fists right now, circled around a warm coffee mug while Frank effortlessly stalks through his apartment.]
I'm glad you're here. [It's about as close to sentimentality as he can muster for Frank and that seems fine with the both of them. He sets his half finished mug down behind him and stands still in Frank's presence. They're both assessing.] And I assume not for my sparkling conversational wit.
no subject
You talk too much, that's for sure. [But the spark of intentional aggression, that's gone from his tone.] Looks like someone else thought so too. [Frank reaches up without hesitation, his hand moving toward the dark edge of a bruise peeking from the corner of Murdock's shadowed jaw - and stops, fingers hovering. He breathes out through his nose.
Waiting for permission.]
no subject
I've been told that a time or two, believe or not. [Of course Frank would believe it. The remark about the bruise forces a small smile out of him, especially when he feels Frank start to reach and pause inches from touch. Matt takes a small step forward to close the gap between them so rough fingers can connect with the bruise.] Yeah, well, you should see the other guy. [He came out ahead on that exchange. He almost always does.] What color is it? The bruise. [It's a day or two old but shallow so he wonders how obvious it still is. That's something he can only guess at with experience.]
no subject
His thumb moves, settling just to the left of center, where the leading knuckle must have made contact.] And red. The color of your suit. [He's not Murdock's dog but that doesn't mean the metaphor is false. Frank's fingers curve against the sharp line of Murdock's jaw, turning the man's face just so into his own. Hangs there, breath heavy, mouths separated by not even inches.
There's loyalty for a hand that reaches out, even after it's been bitten. Especially then.]
no subject
Sea stories. Same as all the other ones. [He says by way of explanation of where the bruises came from. One fight or another. It doesn't matter. Some brawl that ended in a way that Frank probably would disapprove of with the assailant in question in custody and maybe a hospital instead of a morgue. Standing in his kitchen, the gulf between them exists but it feels more shallow like this. They'll never really understand each other, not completely, but sometimes a little bit is enough. It is, anyway, when Matt tilts his head up to close some of the distance and height between them and presses his lips to Frank's in a ghost of a kiss.]
no subject
Frank stays still at the first press of Murdock's mouth. It's a whisper. A nothing, except a starting point. Consent that's so often denied from this man that it feels like a goddamn benediction to be weaponized. But that's good. Frank understands that. It's enough.
His mouth moves hard and sudden against Murdock's, teeth catching against lips and a thumb pressed into the tender center of a bruise as he backs them fully against the counter with a thud of weight and muscle.]
no subject
Softness gives way. It always does and Matt never minds. He feels a spark of pain on the bruise push point and he kisses it back in kind while his hip bumps against the edge of the countertop. The corner presses against fabric covered skin, biting, but he doesn't complain against the kiss.]
no subject
So his mouth pushes Murdock's, his body angles to hem him in against the sharp line of the counter, knowing how easily the tables could be flipped. His fingertips curl into the neat, short hairs at the nape of Murdock's neck and pull as their bodies find a way to fit roughly together and Frank leans into that friction he always feels in the Devil's presence, giving it rein to spark toward an inferno.]
no subject
It would be easy to shift things, to roll their bodies until it was Frank's back against the countertop but he doesn't. Instead, he presses his hand to the back of Castle's neck and pulls him in until they're flush against each other and the weight pushes Matt's hip even harder against the edge. He can feel Frank's heartbeat against his chest instead of just hearing it and the steady rhythm is a strange comfort.]
no subject
But funny enough, so does this. Murdock's body against his, callused fingers scraping at his skin, his body, made lean and deceptive by those nice suits, taking up the space it's due. Frank pushes the man back over the counter just enough so that his other hand can palm a back and feel the arch of a spine before sliding down to fist into a cotton hem. It's a struggle, getting himself to back off enough to try and strip Murdock from the waist up.]
no subject
He breaks the kiss long enough to help Frank tug the old t-shirt up over his head to be tossed haphazardly onto the floor. There are new bruises on his ribs and shoulder but that's not unusual. He probably wouldn't be Matt Murdock if he didn't carry some wound of war and he doesn't let it bother him. They will mingle with the litany of scars and be forgotten like all of the other strikes that he wears. His mouth returns to Frank's as soon as the fabric is gone, crushing and eager.
no subject
Frank grabs Murdock's hips and sinks fingers in, giving the man a shove back against the counter only to drag him forward again. Pulling him in close. He bites, too-soft, at a lower lip before bumping his forehead against the other's and stepping back, breath a little too loud. Frank turns away, scraping himself out of his hoodie and throwing it over the back of the couch as he heads across hardwood toward the bedroom. His tee-shirt is likewise stripped and discarded as he walks, the motions perfunctory, efficient; blind men don't need strip teases.] C'mon, Red. Let's see what all this thread-count fuss is about, huh?
no subject
In the threshold of the bedroom, Matt wraps his arm around Frank's neck to pull him into a hard kiss while he backs them up against the bed so they can tumble back on the mattress. It's less graceful than what he's known for in a tangle of limbs but it's the thought that counts.]
What do you think so far?
I tried out "Murdock" but I hate it lol. "Red" just sounds more natural.
Frank still isn't sure when they became this - Red's mouth rough against his, his hands too-fuckin-sure on Frank's body; there wasn't some pound of flesh point in time, just a death by a thousand cuts. Frank isn't gonna lie, the natural antagonism between them always got him going. It's easy with Red, even when it's hard.
The bed... yeah, the bed's nice. Frank's muscle catches them in their fall back, lending some control to the tumble, but. It's Red lack of control that he likes. That he likes being the spark for. His hands push down the jagged topography of the man's sides, dig fingers into the corded muscles of his lower back before moving on to span the curve of ass through thin cotton.] Think maybe some people might actually know what they're talking about. [His hands squeeze as his head falls back to the bed.] As far as the sheets go, well, can't make a say without further testing.
He will always be "Red" to Frank
Frank's rough fingers digging into his skin force a gasp against the kiss and the grab at his ass through his pajamas has his full attention. He reaches down to start to tug them off to add to the ever growing pile of clothing scattered around his floor. He likes the sensation of the rough fabric of Frank's pants against his bare thighs when he pulls off the pajamas and he kisses Frank fiercely in response both to the grabbing of his ass and the remark about his sheets.] I think deep down, you're just as prissy as you tell me I am. [Those would probably be fighting words if not said with an easy smile and punctuated with another rough kiss.]
no subject
He circles back to his place, like he knows Frank will after getting separated. Matt's aches catch up to him by the time the adrenaline wears off so by the time he gets onto his rooftop, he's feeling every blow. The patio door remains unlocked and he goes inside to strip off the suit to take in the damage. He tastes coppery blood in his mouth and he spits it into the sink on the way to retrieve the first aid kit. Broken knuckle--again. Rib is probably a hairline fracture. No, make that two. He took a knock to the head that had him seeing stars and that could be a concussion. Shit. Lousy night. He's not sure how much better or worse Frank managed but he remembers the distinct sounds of the silenced rounds and slowing heartbeats, so Frank probably thinks it was all worth it regardless.
He carries the first aid kit out to the kitchen to wait.
no subject
Despite that; it's always worth it. A few rounds of ammo, a few less shitbags waving their cocks around on the street like they're worth something.
He ignores the familiarity of the space as he steps into Red's apartment through the patio door. This isn't home, isn't real. It's like a safe house - enough, for now. A place to expand, for a while. Not forever. Red's at the counter already, white box in hand. "Aw honey, you waited up."
Frank's alright, the cops were too confident and too off-guard to be much of anything at close-quarters. He's got a graze on his shoulder that cauterized itself at range, a bruised knee that'll need ice, a busted lip. But getting the drop on them turned the tables. Frank looks at the coffee maker and then lets it go. "Shame I missed out on the little red number, though."
no subject
Really, it's just the first aid kit but that's the joke. Not that he's feeling terribly funny. Stripped down to his underwear and standing in the living room, he feels over his ribs with his fingertips while Frank closes distance. "I'd put it back on but you can never really figure out how to effectively take it off." He winces when he finds the right place and sighs before going to the freezer to retrieve an ice pack. Two, actually. One for his ribs and one for his head. "Can you put coffee on? I'm going to go crumple on my new couch for a few minutes." Frank's a big boy and when he's not actively bleeding all over the place, he doesn't need Matt to tend to his wounds, nor does he expect anything in kind.
"Awfully close to your little fallout shelter. Do you think they knew or just got lucky?" he asks from the sofa where he spreads his legs across it to stretch out with an ice pack on his ribs and on his forehead.
no subject
Red makes his own choices, as fraught by guilt or bleeding heart as they may be. Frank doesn't feel responsible.
"Truth? Dunno." He's got warning systems in place but he'll sleep a little lighter for the next few days. Water and grinds in, the pot starts its magic. Frank leans against the counter and pulls the velcro on his vest, taking a deep breath. Yeah, there're a few rounds in white paint that'll be bruises tomorrow and forgotten the day after. He exhales. "Most of those clowns got their heads up their asses but there are a few with their caps screwed on straight enough to be bad news." He doesn't want to relocate, but he will if necessary. Packing up wouldn't be hard.
no subject
Matt's not sure either. He doesn't love the proximity, that's for sure. "Yeah, I know. There are a couple I had some run-ins with before that aren't as completely stupid as I wanted to think they are." He considers making an offer for Frank to crash at his place but he decides against it for now. It feels like an overextension, and probably unnecessary. Maybe. Obviously he knows he can come to Matt if he needs anything and that feels unspoken anyway so he decides to leave it there. "At some point, you'd think you'd have stacked enough bodies in the morgue and I'd have sent enough hospitals and left them to eat through straws that they'd give up." That doesn't seem to be how it works. Not with the true believers.
no subject
Frank rolls his neck, vertebrae cracking with a content moan. "Not the true believers, Red. You should know, you know? Not so easy to give up a code when you're indoctrinated." He hates, more than a little, that these fuckers are using his symbol. His fucking skull. They don't know but that doesn't make it right. They've all got flag tattoos like it means something to them, the stars, the stripes. They don't know shit.
He turns to the counter to watch the coffee drip into the pot. Breathes. "I appreciate the back up. You could have walked. This isn't your fight."
no subject
"Yeah. I know. I don't understand how Wilson fucking Fisk is the cult of personality for these assholes though." He knows how much it bothers Frank that they seem to think they understand the Punisher. They don't. Matt doesn't either, of course, but he has got a hell of a lot better idea than assholes who have no real code. That's one thing he can never take away from Frank Castle; he lives and will probably die by a creed.
He could say something sarcastic to keep the rhythm going but he doesn't. It's sincere enough. "You didn't need me but you know, it's my fight too. This is my city."
Matt tilts his head back, turning his neck to seek that same satisfying crack he heard from Frank's. "I hit my head. My impulse control is probably shot so I'll offer you something to wear that's not a flack jacket and fatigues and hope you don't bite my head off."
no subject
"That's a pretty excuse, Red, considering we both know you've offered me more for less." But he's moving across the room because, well, he doesn't fucking know. "Maybe I've taken off all the heads I need to tonight." Yeah, he's gonna go through Red's drawers. But it doesn't take long; he's not looking for evidence, for proof of anything. He's already got Red's biggest dirty secret.
Turns out that leg size doesn't matter so much in sweats - they're clean and don't smell like blood, and that's enough right now. Frank falls into the chair kiddy-corner to the sofa.
"You remember when I told you about Gabriel?"
no subject
He decides not to look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth when it comes to Castle acquiescing about anything, even if it's just an offer for clothing for the night. Sometimes he likes to wear a size up in sweats anyway, so he figures that at least that part will fit. Not that either of them are putting on a fashion show any time soon.
Frank's steps across the hardwood echo and he winces slightly at the sound. Definitely a concussion. "Yeah. I remember."
no subject
He crosses his legs at the ankles, fingers laced over his stomach. "I was gonna enter the Seminary. When I was in high school, I thought. That's the way, that's where I'm goin'."
no subject
Matt instead shifts, grabbing a throw pillow to tuck it under his head as he turns on his side, facing Frank. It's an illusion of attentiveness that's instinctive now, because somehow it makes people feel more 'heard' even if Matt could listen to Frank's voice from down the block. And this feels important. "It's kind of hard to imagine you as a member of the clergy." It's not a slight. Just an observation. "You went a different way."
no subject
Frank appreciates the gesture of the movement but he knows Red well enough by now to see it for what it is. He doesn't know if a blind man with a concussion will still get nauseous with a bodily shift but be it on his head, literally; Frank's never asked for Red to be anything but what he is.
"Thought didn't last long. I enlisted as soon as I got my diploma and got some sense beat into me."
no subject
"I briefly thought about being a priest when I was a kid. Then after the accident and I lost my sight, there was a time me and God didn't get on so well. Cured me of that," he admits to the quiet in the room.
They're both fucked up and broken, just in different ways. "Better with the law than the Bible. Seems like you're better with a gun than the good book." There's no bite or sarcasm. An acknowledgment and even respect for how Frank can handle himself, even if Matt might wish he took less deadly courses.
no subject
Then Frank barks a laugh that ends in a wheezed exhale as he lets his head drop back to look at the ceiling. They haven't turned on a light; he didn't realize it until now. "Y'ever think there's some alternate path out there?" His fingers tap patterns against each other. "Some upside fuckin' down universe where we both became priests and ran in the same small fucking New York parish circle? Damn, that's funny." He wets his lips, closes his eyes, listens to the drip of the coffee. Smiles. "Yeah, that would be somethin'."
no subject
The coffee is done and the drips are slowing. He pulls himself up slowly to his feet, partially to test himself and to be a good host. His head spins and his ribs ache but he pushes through it to pour them both cups. Matt puts one in Frank's hand and he sits back down on the couch with the mug between his palms. "You probably would've found some way to be a pain in my ass, even as a man of god."
no subject
He watches Red haul his ass up and get them coffee. "Dumb-ass," he mutters in thanks, fondly, as the heated ceramic is placed in his hands. Takes a burning sip with an appreciative sound. "Hells yes I would have. I woulda pissed in your holy water and chuckled about it."
no subject
"Yeah, of course you would've," he replies, smiling faintly over the brim of the mug. "What else did you want to be as a kid? Besides a priest. You know, before my accident, I thought I might have to join the army to get an education. We were poor and I knew a kid whose dad went to school on the GI Bill. Can't quite picture me that way." Swings and roundabouts.
no subject
"Y'know I can't see it. You in fatigues, bitch' and moanin' about what's fair and moral in war." His knee's starting to ache. "With that silver tongue though you might have just fast-tracked to JAG. Huh." He snorts, breathes in the steam of the coffee. "Wouldn't look bad in that uniform, though." Red, the confidence in his body even when he's hiding it, buttoned up in sharp Dress Blues.
"But me? Nothin'." His thumb rubs the side of his mug. "There was nothin' except getting out. Creativity ain't my strong suit, Red. There was just my shitty little couple blocks in Queens, and when I was old enough the Marines gave me an out." An out of New York, an aggressive outlet for his rage.
no subject
He faintly smiles at that, "Without the accident, without all of that, I'm not sure where that morality would've landed. If I could still see, I'm not sure how much time I'd have spent reading Thurgood Marshall and forming strong opinions on social justice." Swings and roundabouts. Different paths. "Pretty sure my dad would've shut that down anyway. He was big on the idea of a better life than the one he had." Not that the opinions of the dead necessarily matter; he solves more things with his fists than Battlin' Jack would've ever wanted him to.
"Was it worth it?" he asks after a moment. "What it cost you compared to the bill coming due if you'd stayed?"
no subject
Another long sip of coffee; definitely better than his shit. For a minute he just tastes it and lets the question settle between them. Then:
"Yeah. Every second of it."
He looks into his mug then out the window at New York, the breathing sea of lights that never sleep. He used to hate this city, but Red was right. He's right more often than Frank lets him believe. Frank came back, was pulled back. Wanted to be back. He's no better than the stink of this place, he deserves it and it deserves him. Difference is now he understands that.
"If I hadn't joined I know I wouldn't have met Maria. Wouldn't have been sitting under that tree, at that time, with that guitar. I would have never got to hold my babies, see my face in theirs. Even if I had to do it all again knowing where it would end, I would. I would. I would just hold them tighter while I could."
no subject
The answer makes him faintly smile before taking another sip of his coffee. He hears the world outside; the window is open in the kitchen and sound carries but he ignores it for the rhythm of Frank's voice and the steady pull of his heart. "I'm glad you had that," he says simply and leaves it at that. Frank Castle doesn't seek out or want his sympathy and Matt doesn't offer it. He provides only as much understanding as he can muster as someone who never had children but who has lost a hell of a lot in his life. He's buried too many people and that's something they have in common.
"Stick asked me if it was worth it after I buried Elektra. I think he was hoping I'd say no. But it's always worth it."
no subject
Frank snorts, shifts just far enough to slide the mug onto the coffee table. Shuffles it a quarter-turn. Wonders if he should pry further but has to be real with himself - he's never met a knife he doesn't want to twist, just to see what more there is. He pushes himself up and heads into the kitchen, the breeze from the window cool on his chest as he opens freezer.
"Watchin' you two..." Down the scope of a rifle. It wasn't his fight, wasn't his kill. But how it played out, well. Frank's hand lingers for a moment against the cold of another ice pack. "Watching you work. That was like watching a goddamned ballet. She was your ride or die?"
no subject
The question doesn't bother him. He's had time to mourn and he's lost since then so it's hard to quantify where the pain of Elektra's loss starts to mold into others. "You will be surprised to hear this but me and Elektra were complicated." It's a flimsy joke. "She was my college girlfriend. My first love. Maybe my only love, if I'm being real with myself." People had come and gone out of his life before and after her but none held the sway over him that Elektra had. "Yeah. She was. You know that building that fell on me? I was only under it because of her. Once it became clear there wasn't a way out, that we were gonna die together? I found myself at peace with it. Only problem was I didn't."
no subject
Red and Elektra fought like that. Like they'd ripped into each other far enough to share the blood and came out the other side.
Frank grabs the ice pack and knocks the freezer closed. "Midland Circle? Yeah, I heard about that. Only thing is..." Frank drops back into the chair, chases his knee with the ice. "I don't see how a dead woman got under that building with you."
no subject
He faintly smiles in response and sets his empty mug aside to go back to resting on the couch. Even going so far as to pull the plush throw blanket off the back of it to wrap around himself while his head settles into a throb instead of a spin. "Yeah. They brought her back from the dead. It's a...long story. She wasn't her at first. But she remembered me. Remembered that I loved her in the end. That's the part that matters." Easy to say when he's just handwaving her return from the dead. "Mourning her twice--that's a bitch."
no subject
Yeah. So what.
"I don't think there's many things in this life anymore than can break me, Red." Frank roughs a hand over the top of his own head before settling his chin in his fist and letting go of a long, slow breath. "But that would do it. Gettin' Maria back, just to--"
Doesn't involve him. Never gonna. There wasn't enough left of her to come back. His hand in his lap is shaking; he curls it into a fist. "I'd eat a fuckin' bullet." The words are nothing but breath and gravel, too low for anyone to hear aside from this man keepin' him company, wrapped in a goddamn blanket and head-injury. Frank gets to his feet, scraping his face with a palm before dropping the ice pack onto the table and moving away. The bathroom door slams behind him.
no subject
"Yeah. When she came back...she didn't have her heartbeat. I didn't even know I was fighting her at first when she came back and came at me as an enemy. And then...I mean. I guess that's why I was pretty comfortable dying with her." He knows that Frank has taken in the words and lines were drawn. He doesn't follow when he backs away and flees to the bathroom. If he just found out about people coming back from the dead? Yeah, he'd probably do the same.
He stays where he is. He tries to focus elsewhere away from any sounds Frank might make or the way that his pulse is faster. Privacy. Some measure of respect. He listens to the world beyond the room instead. Strains for distant sirens and neighbors and any part of the world that isn't invading Frank Castle's space.
no subject
He's had a death-wish since his family died, never any use pretending otherwise. His heart was dead but it was still beating so he decided to put those beats to good use. Walking into bullets, abuse, dumb-decisions and dead-ends the way only a suicidal man could, and yet none of it stopped him. He'd said Maria and the kids were worth it and he meant that, he said he'd do it again. But another go-around is different then what Red's told him. That's a second chance. And to lose it...
He knows that he couldn't survive that. The only rage left in him would be pointed inward. He knows it, because he still has nothing else, and can't hold his own eyes in the mirror.
It takes a few minutes for Frank to come out of the bathroom. Walks past Red to pull down two glasses and grab the bottle of good whiskey. Dumps them on the coffee table and pours more than a finger into each before pressing a glass into Red's hand. His pulse is steady now, his breathing even. "I don't know what the fuck we're drinking to. Just feels like..." He shrugs and downs his own pour in a single swallow.
no subject
Frank returns and there's whiskey. He considers telling him that it's really only the celebration stuff, that the mourning whiskey is a different bottle where the taste doesn't matter, but he doesn't.
"To the women we've loved," he says, holding up his glass with a faint, nearly pained smile. "Elektra would've liked you. She didn't hold my same sense of morals so she probably would've loved how you bust my balls about it." He takes a sip of the whiskey and lets it burn on the way down before he drops his head back to the cushion.
no subject
But Christ, Red.
Christ.
Frank shakes his head and teethes whiskey from his bottom lip. "To the women we've loved," he just repeats, setting the glass back down on the table. Maybe Red's made his amends, made them good enough to say shit like that. It's only fresh to Frank. "To be fair, from what I've seen you know how to pick 'em." Maybe he would have liked Elektra too but they'll never know. Like Maria, she's just an empty shape where a woman once was.
He exhales. Lets it go. "You got anything tonight that needs sewing up? Gonna have to tell me; I can't sniff it out." But the first-aid box was taken out before he got here, so there's something.
no subject
"Foggy used to say my real super power was finding the most beautiful and morally questionable woman in the room," he faintly smiles.
Matt shifts, pushing the ice pack on his ribs over to the side. "No. Thought maybe the inside of my lip but it stopped on its own. Those always feel like mountains instead of molehills. Ribs and my head are enough to deal with for now." He doesn't ask about Frank. He already knows.
no subject
He's drifted during the conversation. Physically. Now he opens the fridge. Just looking. Shooting shitbags always eventually makes him hungry.
no subject
He doesn't pay it much mind when Frank looks for food. There's leftover Korean, ingredients for a salad and a few other staples that would require some cooking to make into anything resembling a meal. He assumes Frank will go with the low energy leftovers.
no subject
"Yeah that's what they all tell me," Frank says as he starts opening the tops of leftovers, sniffing. He slides one onto the counter. Then he goes back into the fridge. "That my asshole's got a lot of charm." More shit hits the counter: lettuce, carrots. Two eggs are grabbed from a cutesy little holder like god didn't invent packaging for a reason. "You know I bet I fell into the same trap that everybody does, you tell me."
Water, frying pan, pot, the clickclickwhoosh of a gas burner catching. "Looking through the scope that night, you didn't have your mask on. And I thought, 'shit, Red kinda looks like that shitbird lawyer who never showed up for my case.'" Efficiently pre-cut salad vegetables in the pan, he scrapes them around before starting to open and close cabinets while they begin to sizzle. "But then, right, and it's funny, because the next thought comes - 'nah, that shitbird's blind. No way he's up here on a fuckin' roof in red jammies fighting...' Well, goddamn ninjas, I guess."
Red can probably smell it when the sesame oil is opened up. Soy sauce. Chicken bullion. Staples of anyone with half a taste-bud in New York. They hiss as they hit the pan. Water boils and the two eggs are dropped in. "So I told myself I was crazy and wrote it off. Then the next time I see you - got yourself to a hearing of mine eventually - you said my name. That was it, you know? I couldn't see past either suit, not until you said my name." Vegetables wilt, are stirred. "That's when I knew it, but you know, I'm not so sure most people can. I think most people thought just what I thought - no way a blind guy could be the Devil. Christ, Red. I mean. That right there is some kinda bait and switch."
no subject
The story doesn’t surprise him. He knows the broad strokes of it. He smiles while he lays on his side, listening to Frank’s voice and the sizzle. “I heard your heart skip a beat when you figured it out. I knew you had,” he confirms.
“If you want to call it a trap, sure. The same that everyone has. Don’t take it personally.” People tend to. As if they should have pieced it sooner. “I knew who I was defending even if you didn’t know about me. I remembered what you told me in the cemetery. One batch, two batch. I think that’s why I took the case. I knew you were more than a psychopath.”
no subject
Frank's going to say something about Red knowing who he defending when 'one batch, two batch' wipes it away. The spatula doesn't stop so much as stutter, one off-beat clunk against the side of the pan.
He'd forgotten that. Forgotten explaining it to Red. Hearing it now he can catch the edges of the memory, pry them away from some of the blood loss, pain, rage but... it's not all there. Talkin' about Lisa, yeah, but - not why, not how. Just the smell of the earth, the cold of the stone against his back, the shape of the Devil in the darkness. A Devil who'd saved his ass that night. Who thought - out of everyone else in the city - that he was worth that effort.
"Man you pissed me off that night." A dismissive sniff. Frank dumps the left-over container full of noodles into the pan. "Saving those assholes from me." Frank tips the pot into the sink and turns on the water to cool down the eggs. "I was too pissed off to even be impressed by that bouncing trick shot." Bowls are pulled from a cabinet, a pair.
no subject
“Is there a night that I haven’t pissed you off?” It seems rhetorical. Probably not. “I didn’t care about your revenge. I just wanted to get you out alive. That’s what matters.” He expects that could spark an argument and he doesn’t want that. Instead, he pushes himself upright with a soft groan since it seems like dinner is almost ready. “Was a pretty good shot though. You sometimes act offended that I call myself blind. I assume that sort of thing is why.”
no subject
No moral argument tonight, though, or maybe not about the point made: getting Frank out was what mattered to Red. Frank doesn't agree with it in general but that's only his opinion - and it's an opinion tempered by knowing now that he would have never found the real answers behind what happened to his family if he'd died in that place.
A bowl is tucked into Red's hands as Frank once again lowers himself into the chair. "Damn straight it was a pretty good shot. That's what pissed me off." He forks some stir-fry into his mouth, blowing at the heat of it around the chewing and swallowing. "And you're the hot-shot lawyer, you tell me. Is there a legal definition that I'm missing? I know you don't need that cane but I'm guessing when you're reading those big fancy books that you're not seeing the words."
no subject
"I'm legally blind by every definition that would be used to assess me, if that's what you mean," he answers as he waits for the contents of the bowl to cool a little bit. "I can't see color. I can't see screens or words in a book that aren't braille. Sometimes I can feel them, depending on how they were printed, but it's not sight. I have an idea of what you look like because of the sound of the room moves and how your heartbeat and your voice make the noise that vibrates, and from hitting you, from touching you, but I have no idea what color your eyes are. I can't see the sky or a sunset. It's more..." he pauses, tilting his head down while he considers the answer. "It's not all black for me. It's reds. It's like seeing the world on fire. The way people describe it as echo location or sonar or...it's a world burning, all the time."
He doesn't think he's ever really taken the chance to explain it but he knows Frank has made enough sarcastic comments that he probably deserves to actually know what he's fighting next to. "I don't need the cane but I don't navigate the world like someone with normal sight, so it's just easier to put on a facade." He takes a bite. "This is good, by the way. Thanks."
no subject
"Yeah you're welcome." Almost absent, pushing it away to continue on with the conversation at hand. "Why's it easier - because you'd have to stop and explain to people why you don't act like a blind guy? Easier to meet their expectations?"
no subject
no subject
No pun intended.
He's glad for the explanation. Doesn't know what he's gonna do with it, but is glad to know. Like seeing the world on fire. That's fuckin' something. "Still sounds exhausting," he says, after another mouthful. "I'm a prick, but at least I don't have to pretend not to be." But then again, he doesn't have to worry about maintaining a life, either.
no subject
"It is," he admits between bites. "It can be, anyway. People might see you a lot of ways but I'm sure none of them look at you and see helpless. It's weird that way," he replies. He knows he feeds into it by virtue of his decisions but it's still difficult sometimes. "I catch myself even with you, reminding myself that I don't have to fake it. It's nice though. To be real."
no subject
"Is there a real for you when you're not in the suit?" Question's mild, honest, not asked to start a fight or pass judgement. "Yeah, you got your reasons, but doesn't that just mean you're making it easier on other people? You talk about fakin' it. You doing it for them? Burning yourself out for them?
"Maybe it would take just as much work to do it the other way. But you wouldn't be fake."
He's not suggesting Red live as the Devil. But he's thinking that Red maintains that helplessness so that the Devil can survive.
no subject
"I'm not in the suit now," he answers. "When I'm alone, of course. But around other people? I'm not sure there is," he admits and he can actually agree to that point that Frank is hinting at; Matthew Murdock is the disguise and Daredevil is who he really is. He's known that for a while now.
"It's a little late for that. I can't really have a 'miracle' recovery from an accident that happened when I was nine in front of the world," he shrugs before taking a couple more bites to finish off his bowl. He sets it on the coffee table and tugs the blanket back up over his shoulders so he can rest his head once again. "I know this life of mine is on borrowed time. It was from the second I put on the mask. Eventually something's going to give. Maybe when that happens, I'll be honest. But not yet."
no subject
And even Frank knows that's a trickier thing. Excuse the language, but fuck his personal life - Frank's seen the man stand up in court. He thinks that the tether.
"You got a timer on that, Red? Do you hear it? Tick, tick, tick." Frank makes a sound, almost amused, and stands to grab both bowls to take to the sink.
no subject
"Yeah. I've been hearing it tick down like the fuse on a bomb since this started," he answers as he pulls his knees up a little closer so he's lying in a half fetal position on the couch with the blanket up and his head on the pillow. "Been a while since I had a concussion," he mutters to himself while Frank moves around the apartment with comfortable ease. "Fuckers shoved me into the wall and I think my brain whiplashed against the inside of my skull."
no subject
When Frank returns, he stops between the couch and the coffee table. "Gotta keep teaching those fanboys some manners. Sit up." He's got tylenol and water in-hand.
Yeah, he might be too fuckin' familiar with this place.
"C'mon. You'll sleep better in your fancy-ass sheets." Red needs rest, and Frank needs someone on the streets who doesn't want to kill him. Well, doesn't need it. Maybe he's gotten accustomed to it, though.
no subject
"What are you gonna do with yourself?" he asks as he plants his feet on the ground. Pushing himself from a prone to standing position is not a lot of fun but he manages it. "It's late." It's an invitation to stay. It'd be the smarter play; those cosplaying fanboy assholes were close to Frank's fallout shelter and staying off the streets after an ambush like that is the smarter play. He figures that Frank knows that, but he also gets weird about staying at Matt's place. He never does it with innocent or not-so-innocent offers so he's not sure he expects anything different this time. "I'm not sure I'm supposed to sleep with my brain sloshing around in my head."
no subject
He's gonna sleep on the couch. Frank doesn't have the same death wish he used to and can always use the coffee as an excuse in the morning. But Red doesn't need to deal with that right now.
no subject
"I'm a terrible patient," he says as he sits down on the edge of the bed. "I was as a kid but after that building fell on me? Christ, I was a pain in the ass to Sister Maggie. Just the biggest asshole about it. So you can kick my ass if I bitch too much."
no subject
no subject
no subject
For now he just wants to fucking sleep, hope his knee will stop giving him shit, and pray that he doesn't dream of Maria. "Now go the hell to sleep."
no subject
no subject
Nobody's banishing anybody.
"Eh. I've slept on worse couches. Night, Red." Frank pulls the door close on Red's turned back but don't latch it, leaves it open a crack so that--
Well. He's injured. That's all. He'll break in the couch; Red left a blanket for him anyway.
no subject
He listens to Frank's steps across his hardwood floor and the soft creak that closes the door most of the way. It's strange to hear someone in his apartment, moving around at a distance while he's alone in bed but he tries to ignore all of that. Frank's safe, at least, and tomorrow there's going to be the matter of figuring just how much, if anything, Fisk's good squad knows about Frank's living arrangements but he tries to ignore all of that in favor of a good night's sleep.
no subject
So as dawn claws its way up over the buildings, the coffee's set to brewing and Frank's sitting in Red's sweatpants at the counter, intent on trying to sort out what's what but instead thinking about the last time he slept on a couch. Wondering how Amy's holding up. If Curtis and his girl are makin' do. He scrubs a hand over his face, looking at his jacket on the stool next to him. Instinct says go to ground, reassess, make a plan. Except his grounds been compromised.
He taps his phone screen awake to the headline from the Bulletin: Terrorist Attack Against Mayor Fisk's Task Force.
no subject
He puts his feet down on the floor and pulls himself up to his feet. He makes noise in the bedroom; opening a drawer, lifting and closing the lid of the metal hamper to swap out new boxers and put on a t-shirt that the braille on the label and the glossy print lettering on the front tells him is a grey Columbia shirt. He makes the sound so Frank knows he's awake. It gives him a chance to escape if that's his intention, or to not be startled when Matt slowly exits the bedroom to come into the kitchen for a desperately needed cup of coffee.
no subject
"Our little party's already made the news." Frank reaches for the remote on the far side of the counter and turns on the TV, flipping through a few channels before finding a news network. "...confirmed deaths of eleven police officers on the Mayor's official task squad are assumed to be the work of a vigilante. Mayor Fisk, who has recently declared war on New York's vigilantes, is calling this an attack by local terrorists..."
Frank snorts. "Guess it's bad press to come out and say it's the Punisher's taking down the cops who love those stupid fuckin' tattoos."
no subject
He faintly smiles at Frank's assessment because he's right, of course. It sounds bad to say that the Punisher is not only out in the world but that he's winning against the task force. Naming him would only spark a response that the mayor's office doesn't want. He doesn't linger on the fact that of the over twenty cops, Frank killed eleven of them. Maybe if he hadn't been there, it would have been all of them but he's started to learn that the time and place for discussions of morality is 'not here' and 'never' with Frank.
"Sad you didn't get any credit for your fine work?" he asks before taking another sip.
no subject
"...allegedly reported to have been working with another vigilante at the time. In a statement, Connor Powell of the AVTF warned the public..."
no subject
Matt quietly scoffs over the brim of his mug. "Sounds like they've put it together that we're working together again." And that's what this is, isn't it? Going their separate ways now would be stupid because they've pulled each other out of the proverbial fire a few times now and splitting up when the task force is gunning for them would be foolish. "Though this makes it sound like I'm your sidekick," he faintly smiles.
no subject
"What, y'don't think any of these chuckleheads believe that you and Jones are out there together shootin' up the streets?" Rhetorical question. Frank takes a sip of his coffee and leans against the counter. "Don't know, Red. I'm not really into that sorta thing but I can't say you wouldn't look good with a little collar and leash get-up."
no subject
That sparks a half smile, even as he tries to get comfortable with just the idea of standing upright. "Don't threaten me with a good time, Frank," he grins as he goes to grab his phone from where he left it on the kitchen island. He really shouldn't go to work like this, he knows, and maybe for once in his life, he's going to do the smart thing and give himself a day to rest. The concussion is really the factor; his head aches and there's just enough minor spin to make him think he should rest it. "Gotta make a call," he says before taking the phone to the bedroom so he can call Kirsten and tell her that he's sick and won't be coming in.
no subject
Task Force hasn't found his place yet, but they're on the scent. Building back up his stash will take time and effort and space that Fisk's goons aren't gonna give him: he needs to get into his place and clear out.
Goddamnit.
no subject
"Called in sick to work," he explains, giving his phone a shake in his hand before setting it down. "When it was me and Foggy, at least I didn't have to come up with a creative lie after he found out." He doesn't have that relationship with Kirsten yet. He doubts he ever will. "Anything else come across the news?" he asks. He wasn't listening to anything except the worry in his partner's voice.
no subject
"Nah. They're just releasin' enough to make the city feel like they're the good guys. Fisk's media team must be running on fumes for all the smoke they're blowing." He considers his coffee, takes another drink. "I got clean up to do. Far as I can tell the AVTF's still just sniffin' but eventually they'll find the right scent. Before they do I gotta get back to mine, pack up, find somewhere new."
no subject
Matt faintly smiles in response. Yeah, he's sure that the mayor's office is churning out plenty of press about it and that of course they would find some way to spin it that their task force is doing the right thing. It's bullshit and Matt does feel like a lot of the city knows it but they just can't do anything about it. "I'm going to regret this but there's space in the storage locker if you need it. I'm not sure what fallout shelters go for in the city or how easy they are to find but, you know. If you need it for your gear."
no subject
Knuckles bump Red's chin. Frank lets himself look over the face in front of him. "This--" He touches a cheek, probably matching the cut Red says he has inside his mouth. Already yellow, his fingers follow an almost a straight line that speaks of teeth impact. "Faint. Don't shave, you'll be fine."
His hand drops. "That why you called out? Or your head still ringin'?"
no subject
“I can lie about a bruise. My head is still a mess. My equilibrium is kind of off so I should probably take the day to shake it off.” He notices the way that Frank doesn’t address his other offer but he knows better than to push the matter.
no subject
He turns away, finds his coffee and finishes it in two long swallows. "I'll keep you in the loop." It's an offer he doesn't need to make, but he knows that this shit with the task force starts with Fisk and that's Red's fight too; this isn't Frank dragging Red in by association. They've both got a stake in what's to come.
no subject
Matt cares and he makes no secret about that with Frank. Why should he try to hide something that’s obvious? He wears bloody good intentions on his sleeve along with the scars that come with that kind of caring. It costs. It always does. He knows that Frank doesn’t carry the same amount of feelings of responsibility and whatever else he calls this and that’s fine.
“So what are you going to do while I rest?” He has some amount of trepidation about that question and what Frank might or might not do but he’s a big boy. He doesn’t actually need Matt’s help or even his offer of a kind of safe space in his apartment and in his life.
no subject
But he also didn't leave before Red got up. Frank's actions have always spoken for him; he's never had need for a bunch of fancy words like Red is so fond of throwing around in front of a jury.
Frank washes his mug. "Told you. I'm gonna clean out." It's put in the draining board and Frank puts his hands on the counter edge, hangs his head for a moment. Exhales. "Wipe it down, all of it. No tracks. Nothing they can use but maybe I'll leave somethin' that'll send them in a direction of my choosing." Something that would point them far away from the place both of them are standing right now. He stands, cracks his neck. "There are a few guys I can shake down for information."
no subject
“Just be careful.” It’s not a necessary warning. Of course it isn’t. Frank knows what he has to do and right now Matt just needs to heal up or he won’t be any use to him. “I’ll leave the patio door unlocked if you need it.” It’s what passes as a real invitation between them.
no subject
Frank claps Red on the shoulder as he passes him. In the bathroom he changes back into his own clothes, leaves the sweatpants folded on the seat of the toilet. He has work to do and he's never careless, even though that's not always the same on him as careful - but right now he's not trying to kick the hornet's nest. He zips his hoodie closed over flak vest.
"I'll see you soon, Red." Soon. Not later, not around. It's an answer to his question, if not a promise. A nine-mil is pulled from behind the back of a couch cushion, slide checked, made safe before Frank tucks it in the back of his waistband. Maybe the sound of it is another answer: last night was something more than practicality for Frank. He heads to the glass doors. "Stay outta that suit."
Then he's gone.
no subject
He knew the gun was there. He can smell the powder and how it was freshly fired last night. If Frank sought to protect the apartment last night, it’s about as much of a sign of affection he thinks Castle is capable of outside of sex. “I’ll try.” He makes no promises and then Frank is gone. He takes another sip of coffee and decides he’s better off just going back to bed.