Chapter 23 โ The Mattress | +18
แฏโก fandom: The Batman (Reevesverse) | STRAYS
แฏโก word count: 1,645
แฏโก synopsis: Sofia discovers Julian has sent her a personal letter. Witnessing the woman stress, Elara, gently proposes a change
แฏโก warnings: Trauma and PTSD โข References to past institutional abuse โข Anxiety and hypervigilance โข Emotional vulnerability and trust-building โข Parental harassment โข Strong language
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Sofia was at the loft' table staring at the laptop, Bruce Wayne's latest encrypted message glowing in the screen: "Legal pressure applied to Arkham board re: Rush's research protocols. Journalist inquiry filed with state medical board. Timeline: 2-3 weeks for meaningful impact. Your father's Brazilian interests experiencing increased regulatory scrutiny. Compliance inspections scheduled quarterly. - B"
She should feel relieved. The machine was moving, and Bruce's resources were doing what fists and bullets couldn't: applying systematic pressure. Instead, she felt the familiar itch of wanting to do something concrete rather than wait for bureaucrats and lawyers to slowly strangle Julian's access to power.
Her phone buzzed with a forwarded message from Selina, sent two hours ago: "Intercepted this at the door, don't open it, I'm handling it."
Below it was a photo of an envelope made of expensive, cream-colored paper, addressed to "Ms. Sofia Gigante, c/o Current Residence."
She'd recognize Julian precise and controlled handwrite anywhere, her jaw clenched so hard her teeth ached.
Sofia's head snapped up, spotting Elara was watching her from the floor, red crayon paused mid-stroke over a drawing of what looked like a Digimon wearing a chef's hat.
"What?" Sofia's voice came out sharper than intended.
Elara flinched slightly, then steadied. "Your hands, are doing the thing."
Sofia looked down, and her fingers were pressed flat against the table, nails digging into the wood grains, a tension pattern she'd developed in Arkham when the walls closed in.
She forced herself to release, flex and breathe. "Sorry," she muttered. "Just... work things."
Elara set down her crayon, shifted from cross-legged to kneeling. That in-between voice, not quite small but softer than campus-Elara "Bad work things? Or just annoying work things?"
Sofia closed the laptop. "Julian sent a letter."
Elara went very still. "What did it say?"
"I don't know, Selina intercepted it." Sofia rubbed her eyes. "But I can guess. 'Concerned colleague checking in.' 'Hoping Sofia's getting the support she needs.' Maybe some veiled threat about 'the young woman I've heard she's taken under her wing.'"
The regressor's hand drifted to her kandi necklace, fingers finding the ice cream cone charm. "He knows about me."
"He's known for weeks, Dr. Lowe was watching you, remember?" Sofia's voice gentled slightly. "But Bruce's people scared Lowe off, and the legal pressure is working. Slowly, but it's working."
"Slowly," Elara repeated, the word tasting wrong. "What if this slow isn't fast enough?"
Sofia had no answer, because she'd been thinking the same thing.
Her phone buzzed again, and this time it was Gabriela, the neutral Falcone who'd helped identify Dr. Lowe. The message was in Italian: "Il padre del tuo amico si lamenta di 'molestie' da parte degli ispettori agricoli. Dice che qualcuno lo sta prendendo di mira. Non ha torto. Chiunque tu abbia fatto questo, รจ scrupoloso. - G" โ "Your friend's father is complaining about 'harassment' from agricultural inspectors. Says someone's targeting him. He's not wrong. Whoever you have doing this, they're thorough. - G"
Sofia allowed herself a grim smile, as Bruce's reach was long.
"What's that smile?" Elara asked, blinking curious.
"Your father's farms are getting audited repeatedly, he thinks someone's targeting him." Sofia met her eyes. "He's right."
Elara glance at the wall as processing. Then, very small. "Good."
They sat in the quiet for a moment, the ambient Gotham noise filtering with sirens, distant shouting as the ever-present hum of the city that never truly slept.
Elara picked up her red crayon again, but didn't color, just held it. "Do you think... do you think it'll be enough? The lawyers and the inspections and the pressure?"
"I don't know." Sofia's honesty was automatic now, around Elara, no performing. "But it's better than nothing, and it's better than me going after Julian directly and ending up back in Arkham."
"You can't go back there." Elara's voice was fierce, surprising both of them. "You can't, I won't let them."
Sofia's chest did something complicated. "Tesoro, you can't stop-"
"I'll tell Bruce Wayne myself," Elara interrupted, stubborn. "I'll... I'll call the newspapers, I'll stand outside Arkham with a sign, I don't care," she continues. "You're not going back there."
The fierce protectiveness from someone so small, so vulnerable herself, was almost unbearable. "Come here," Sofia said quietly.
Elara stood and padded over to the table. Sofia pulled her into her lap, not roughly, but firmly. Grounding. "I'm not going back, that's why we're doing it this way; legal, slow, boring, but safe."
Elara nodded against her shoulder. "I just... I don't like waiting," the girl says. "What if he tries something before the lawyers finish?"
"Then Selina and I handle it." Sofia's voice was like steel. "But we're not alone anymore, Bruce is watching Julian, I have contacts watching your father. Selina's watching everyone." She squeezed gently. "We're not helpless kids anymore, piccola." The Falcone says. "We're the ones with teeth now."
Elara was quiet for a moment. "Sofia?"
"Your back, does it hurt? From the floor?"
The change of subject was so abrupt Sofia blinked. "What?"
"You rubbed your shoulder this morning, like it was sore." Elara's voice was careful, testing. "I just... wondered."
Sofia's jaw tightened. "The floor is fine."
"Okay." Elara didn't push, just stayed in Sofia's lap for another minute, then slid off to return to her coloring spot.
Elara didn't push when Sofia said "the floor is fine." Just went back to coloring, but five minutes later, "Sofia?" She was using it more now, after the night they talked about their nightmares.
Sofia took a moment to reply, still adjusting to her new title and to figure out what the hell she was supposed to feel about that. "Mm?"
"What if... what if the mattress could be safe?" The regressor scratches her own cheek, which was a little redder. "Like, uh, like maybe if we tried the mattress together, it wouldn't be the Arkham bed or the mansion bed. It'd just beโฆ ours? Because we'd both be there?"
Sofia looked at her, at this tiny regressed person using her lap as way of safety and a mattress to closeness.
"What if I can't," Sofia said. "What if I wake up and-"
"Then we go back to the floor," Elara said immediately. "Nothing wrong with it, we just tried, that's allowed."
That's allowed. The war happening behind the Falcone' eyes was visible even in the warm glow as every Arkham-trained instinct screaming that vulnerability is danger, softness is weakness, sharing space is giving someone power over you.
"Okay," Sofia said. "We try."
Who made eggs without being asked, who cried over failed finals, got drunk on cocktails, and compared mobsters to anime characters. Who was asking, not demanding, as offering her own fear as currency for Sofia's, but for a moment, she thought about this tiny woman who made her eggs without being asked, who quietly and unilaterally decided that Selina and Sofia were family.
"Just tonight," Sofia said finally. "We try it, if I- if it's too much, I go back to the floor, no questions."
"No questions," Elara agreed immediately.
They approached the mattress like it was a tactical objective. Sofia sat first, at the very edge, with her back straight as ready to bolt.
The regressor climbed on from the other side, leaving space between them, pulling the burgundy, fuzzy blanket over her legs.
They sat like that for a minute, then two. Not touching, just coexisting on a soft surface.
"It's... weird," Elara said finally.
Sofia considered, and the mattress didn't feel like Arkham or like her childhood bed in the mansion either. It felt like now, this specific moment with this specific person in this specific loft that smelled like cats, gun oil, and Selina's bergamot shampoo.
"Not bad," she confirmed.
The Brazilian girl shifted slightly, still holding Tikuri. "Can I... can I lie down? Or is that too much?"
This way, Elara curled onto her side, facing Sofia, the otter tucked under her chin. Her eyes were already heavy. "You don't have to stay sitting," she mumbled. "You can lie down too, or not. Whatever feels okay."
Sofia looked down at her; this small woman who'd survived her own monsters and was now offering Sofia an optional proximity.
Slow and careful, Sofia lay down. On her back first, staring at the ceiling while the mattress held her; Didn't betray her, or transform into restraints.
After a second, she turned onto her side and faced Elara.
The regressor's eyes closed, breathing even out, with Tikuri's fuzzy head visible between them, like a buffer and a bridge.
"Elara," Sofia whispered.
"Thank you, for... this."
A tiny smile curved on Elara's lips. "S'okay, we both needed light." Then she was asleep.
Sofia stayed awake longer, watching the salt lamp's glow paint warm tones across the brick walls, listening to Elara's soft breathing. Feeling the mattress beneath her; soft, real, and solid with both the weight and Elara's.
The dark was still there, her shadows still had names; Julian, Carmine, Arkham, Oz, the ECT technician's hands, but not here, in this amber-lit corner with a regressor and an otter and a mattress that didn't lie because it held two people who refused to.
Sofia's hand moved without conscious thought, coming to rest on the fuzzy blanket between them. Not touching Elara, but close enough that if the regressor reached out in her sleep, she'd find something solid that wouldn't disappear when the nightmares came back. Two hours later, Sofia feels Elara's hand curling around the edge of her sleeve like an anchor.
Sofia Falcone, who'd slept on floors and stone and thin Arkham mattresses designed for punishment, closed her eyes on an actual bed for the first time in years.
And slept, fleeting and brief, no peacefully, without dreams, but she slept.
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