Chapter Text
If you had asked Karen Page for the most impossible thing she could think of, she might have thought of Nelson and Murdock reuniting, or Wilson Fisk getting out of prison and donating all his time and money to making an actual difference in Hell’s Kitchen.
What she wouldn’t have thought of was Frank Castle, fast asleep and wrapped in a floral duvet, broad body crammed into an antique bed while sunlight streamed through lacy curtains.
She definitely wouldn’t have thought of herself, wrapped up right next to him, one of his strong arms locked around her waist. She could feel the heat from his body and fought the urge to snuggle closer to him.
It had been hard enough to convince him not to sleep in the rickety old rocking chair by the window. The last thing she needed was to spook him when they were four hundred miles out of the city and planning to leave it in the rearview mirror.
He made the decision for her, just like the decision to go on this road trip in the first place, tightening his grip on her and pulling her back flush against his broad chest. She could hear his heart thumping between the beats of her own and felt his lungs rising and falling with hers. Soft noises started on the floor below, clinking plates and clattering knives signaling breakfast.
Karen was hungry, but the cozy warmth of Frank against the cool air of the morning was too tempting to leave. He mumbled something against her hair and she froze, trying to decipher his words.
His arm tensed and then released her. “Morning,” he said, and she turned to see him rubbing sleep from his eyes. Rays of sunlight softened the harsh lines of Frank’s face. A gentle smile crossed his face and Karen relaxed into the pillows.
“Good morning.”
“Sorry about that,” he mumbled, rolling onto his back. His eyes studied the ceiling, but Karen could almost see his mind whirring.
“Sorry about what?”
“Didn’t mean to grab you like that.” If Karen didn’t know any better, she would have sworn he was blushing. But the Punisher didn’t blush. Neither did Frank. Or, at least, she didn’t think he did.
“Oh, it’s okay,” she said, clenching her fists to keep from reaching out for him. It was more than okay, and she hadn’t slept so well in months, but she couldn’t exactly tell him so. Not when they were going to be spending so much time together. He wasn’t hers. Not like that.
Frank grunted a response and rolled out of bed. His hair was long enough to be slightly messy from sleep, and he ran his fingers through it, messing it up further.
Karen stared up at the plaster over her head and stretched, groaning a little at the cracking and popping of her joints. Six hours in the car the previous day had not been kind to her body. But then, neither had months of hunching over her computer at the Bulletin.
She knew that was why Ellison had suggested this whole thing. She had spent the last six months working until she fell asleep at her computer, dragging herself home, and sleeping for as long as she could force herself to keep her eyes closed. Every time she tried to sleep, she dreamed of gunfire and bombs and blood, and she never slept for long. There were too many ghosts in her head to let her sleep.
So, she knew he had only brought up a book deal and a sabbatical because he was worried she was going to drop dead, and she appreciated that. She hadn’t been about to take it, though, until she told Frank.
Karen had been so startled by the offer she had gone to take a walk to think about it. Before she knew what she was doing, she had dialed the number Frank had left her in a note on her fire escape. He had attached it to a new pot of flowers, daisies this time. She had seen him a few times since the carousel. Since after. But only for a quick cup of coffee and a check in to make sure he was okay. That she was okay. As if she could be okay.
“Where do you want to go?” he had said, surprisingly unsurprised by her call. She could still hear the unspoken question in his voice.
“I don’t know. I don’t know if I even want to do it,” she had replied. She had never been out of the Northeast. Where didn’t she want to go?
It was like Frank could read her mind. “I’ll pick you up in a half hour. Pack your stuff.”
And that was that. She hadn’t even asked where he was taking her. She knew Frank would tell her if she asked, but it felt exciting not to know. She had been trying so hard to control everything in her life when it flew into chaos, it was freeing to let someone else take the wheel, literally.
She had watched flowers and leafy trees fly past the windows while he drove a startlingly clean Mustang down winding roads and broad highways. The season had just shifted into that moment when it really felt like spring. She knew it wouldn’t last, but the farther they drove from the city, the more she could believe they could live inside this bright, warm day.
And now, here they were, in a bed and breakfast in upstate New York, most of her belongings in the trunk of the car.
“You’ve never been to Niagara Falls, right?” Frank had asked her, after two hours of humming along to the radio.
Karen had shaken her head and watched his face split into a grin. A real one. One that went all the way to his eyes.
“Me neither.”
They left too late to get there in a day, though Karen knew Frank had it in him to drive all night if she asked. She didn’t ask.
Instead, he pulled into the driveway of a place with some cutesy name and bought them a night in the “Victorian Room.” It was the only room left. He ignored the way the innkeeper smiled at them when she handed them their key. Karen hadn’t been able to bring herself to tell the woman they weren’t really together. What did it matter, anyway?
She could hear the water running in the bathroom and forced herself to sit up. The smell of eggs and bacon wafting up from the dining room was making her stomach growl.
She stretched again, one vertebra stubbornly refusing to crack into place. Sighing, she wrenched her body out of bed and padded barefoot to her hastily packed overnight bag. She pulled out a flowery dress and laid it on the bed.
The water turned off in the bathroom, but Karen didn’t rush. She slid her pajamas down her legs and let them pool on the floor. Her top followed, leaving her nearly naked in the middle of the room. Catching herself, she felt heat flood to her face and grabbed at the dress to pull it on, just as Frank emerged from the bathroom, towel slung around his hips. Drops of water clung to his hair and his skin. He froze when he saw her, half-turning away.
“Sorry,” he grunted. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe Frank did blush.
Karen brushed past him and locked the door behind her. Hands gripping the edge of the sink, she stared at herself in the mirror.
“Stop being ridiculous,” she muttered, splashing water on her face. She brushed her teeth and tried to slow her racing heartbeat. They weren’t like that. Whatever this was, it wasn’t like that. Frank was just trying to help her. He was her friend. He always had been.
Maybe if she kept telling herself that, she might actually be able to convince herself to stop wondering. Stop wishing. Stop hoping for something that Frank couldn’t give her. That he didn’t want to give her.
For now, though, she needed to get herself out of this bathroom to face the man on the other side of the door.
Frank was sitting on the bed, back straight and hands on his knees, like he was back on patrol. His face relaxed when he saw her and she tried to focus on making her legs move like they were supposed to.
“Hungry?” he grunted, nodding at the door.
“Very.” Karen slid her feet into her shoes and led the way down the creaking staircase. The plush carpet muffled the sound a bit, but in the deafening silence between them, it felt like each step was an explosion.
“Morning, sleepyheads!” the innkeeper chirped, beaming at them. “We weren’t sure you were going to make it down for breakfast at all.” She winked.
“It smells good,” Karen said, ignoring the implied message in the woman’s words.
“Sit, sit.” She waved at them to take two chairs at a table laden with more breakfast food than Karen had seen in a very long time. Frank didn’t quite meet her eyes over the top of his coffee cup, but she knew he was watching her.
They made it to Niagara Falls that morning, and stood overlooking the waterfall, spray cooling their faces. The sky was an incredible blue. Like Karen’s eyes.
Frank watched as she closed those eyes, inhaling the cool air and smiling. She was relaxed in a way he had never seen her. Of course, when he usually saw her, she was being threatened, or he was on the run.
This time, he was protecting her from herself. From her own instinct to work until she collapsed. She had broken more stories in the last six months than anyone else, but the strain showed.
She was thinner now, so thin she looked like she might blow away if the wind picked up too much. She had shadows under her eyes that never quite went away, and her smiles were forced and faint. She carried the weight of the world on her shoulders, as much as he did.
Not now, though, and not this morning. He had woken to find her in his arms, and thought he was dreaming. It wouldn’t be the first time he had dreamed of waking up beside Karen. It had been hard to admit, at first. He felt like he was betraying Maria. But Curt and the other guys at group kept reminding him that it was okay to move forward. It was okay to feel again. It was okay to want again. He didn’t have to keep punishing himself forever. He could practically hear Curt saying it in his head.
But he couldn’t quite do it. He had let her go, pushed her away, taken an icy shower, and now he was holding himself back from her. He kept space between them. He couldn’t touch her. It wasn’t what they did. No matter what he wanted, he didn’t want to put that on her.
She looked at him then, eyes searing into him, burning him with something that made his heart jump painfully.
“Thank you,” she said softly, squeezing his arm. “This is amazing.”
He nodded. The air was cool, water misting up at them from the falls. Frank saw a rainbow far below and wanted to point it out, but stopped himself. Karen was the one good with words. Not him. He didn’t need to ruin the moment by saying something stupid.
“Fr-Pete?” she said, studying his face. She had always struggled with using his pseudonym. He hated hearing her call him Pete.
He shook himself out of his own head and met her eyes. Those impossible, infuriating, incredible blue eyes.
“Coffee?” he blurted. It was the first thing he thought of. He couldn’t stay here. He couldn’t keep gaping at her like this. He could still hardly believe she had agreed to come on this crazy trip with him in the first place. Falling down the rabbit hole of why she had and what she might want wasn’t something he was in a position to do at this moment. Not here. Not in this place, with a force of nature in front of him and another one beside him.
“Yeah,” she said, still smiling. She took his arm like it was easy, like it was normal, and they walked through the milling crowds to a little coffee shop a few blocks away. It was a crisp, spring day, and the walk was nice. Feeling the weight of her hand in the crook of his elbow was nicer.
They got a pair of coffees, and kept walking. Frank would keep walking forever if she asked.
She didn’t, and they found a bench away from the crush of people, but close enough they could hear the falls. The sound was soothing, like ocean waves on a constant loop. He had never liked the beach much. Too much like the desert. But Maria had. So had his kids. He had spent more days building crooked sandcastles and wrestling with sun umbrellas than he could count.
But this wasn’t that. This was a waterfall. This was falling over a cliff, with nothing to catch him but this impossibly beautiful blonde woman who was looking at him like maybe he really wasn’t a monster. She had done it before. She wouldn’t let him fall.
Oh, but he was falling. Heart in his throat, he was falling. The ground was dissolving beneath him the longer she stared at him.
He coughed, and she seemed to realize she was looking too long. She blinked and her eyes rested on the lid of her coffee cup. She bit her lip, and he wondered what she wasn’t saying.
“Where to next?” she said softly, so quiet he almost didn’t hear her over the rushing water.
“Where do you want to go, ma’am?”
She smiled again at that, but it was an echo. A shadow of her real smile.
“I don’t know. Everywhere.”
“Then let’s go.”
“What?”
“Let’s drive. See where we end up.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “Really?” Frank nodded. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Okay.” She stood, extending her hand to help him up. He didn’t need it, but he took it anyway. He felt a stab of guilt for taking the excuses she gave him to touch her, but she was like a magnet. He couldn’t help himself. He needed it, and he took it.
She even let him open the car door for her. He cranked up the radio and they drove. Away from the congested roads around the falls, and out. Out into the country. Out into whatever awaited them in the next place they stopped.
There were two beds at the motel outside Cincinnati. Frank was barely asleep when Karen started screaming.
He sat bolt upright, hand finding the gun he kept on the table. He stared into the darkness, but he didn’t see anything. Standing silently and padding over to the other bed, feet bare and cold on the rough carpet.
He flicked on the light and Karen wasn’t bleeding. There was no one there. Just her. Head buried in her pillow, ragged sobs tearing their way out of her throat.
“No. No! Please! No! Stop!”
Frank put the safety on and dropped the gun. He didn’t think. He couldn’t. He had to help her. He knew what nightmares could do to a person. He gathered her to his chest and stroked her hair.
“Karen,” he said gently, over the sound of her cries. “Karen, wake up. You’re okay. It’s okay.”
She woke with a start. He felt her stiffen, fists clenched, eyes wild. She blinked up at him, like she almost didn’t recognize him. Her eyes widened when she finally saw him, and tears welled up. She shook her head, tried to push him away, but he wasn’t letting go. Not now.
“Hey, hey, hey, relax,” he said, and she stopped struggling against him. “You’re okay. I’ve got you. Take a breath. It’s okay.”
She let out a shaky breath. She wouldn’t look at him. “Frank,” she whispered, hand clutching at his shirt instead of pushing against him.
“You want to talk about it?”
She stared at him for a long moment, then shook her head. She was trembling. He could feel her shivering against his chest.
“Will you stay with me?” she asked, in a small voice. Frank’s heart swelled with something he didn’t want to examine too closely. He’d do anything she asked. He knew that.
“Yeah,” he breathed, smelling the flowery perfume of hotel shampoo in her hair. “Yeah. I’ll stay.”
For the second time in as many nights, Frank found himself sharing a bed with Karen Page. This time, he knew what he was doing when he put an arm around her waist.
He did it anyway.