▋ 𝟗𝑴𝑴 𝑪𝑶𝑵𝑭𝑬𝑺𝑺𝑰𝑶𝑵𝑺 . . . . . 🔪 𝙁𝙍𝙊𝙈 @atlatsofstories
▎ Reunions were stripped of smiles as their entire relationship was built on the foundation of death, pain, and vengeance. Dreams were littered with kind words and kind gestures they gave to one another. The sun was always pleasantly warm, and the air held only the scents of flowers, not of corruption. It was different in reality and under the haze of their struggles where Karen still invited him with open hand, and Frank only reciprocated with blood. It was all he had to offer. There was no point pretending otherwise, for as much as Karen Page deserved a gentle man holding a bouquet of roses, his very existence enticed trouble to her doorstep. He cursed her, but she was her single source of sanity.
Two gang members had taken adverse liking to Karen. One of them had a rap sheet filled with petty crimes and rudimentary acts of violence, while the other man had a darker history. His curiosity had not ended with Wilson Fisk motivating the men, instead it ended with broken teeth and ruptured organs. They had followed her home one evening, but Frank had been there, some sick version of a vigilante angel. Neither man received the opportunity to touch or threaten her when the Punisher baited them in an adjacent alley. Hell’s Kitchen was horridly overcrowded, but the noise of the city masked the tearing of flesh and grunts of cries. In anticipation of the moment, the tactician had pried open a manhole with a crowbar.
More than half dead, he tossed the criminals inside where bones continued to break in loud heaps three stories down. The rats could have at them. He could have left then and there with Karen none the wiser, but he had missed her company; and the sight of his battered, bloody body would only draw stares. For such a heavy man, he climbed up the fire escape with surprising agility and used muscle memory to land on her windowsill. Bloody knuckles knocked at her window, and he watched her body jump, startled, at the sudden source of the noise. The window was old and dirty, but the transformation of her posture and expression was clear when she recognized him.
What was there to say when the window was forced open with a god awful screech? No bouquet of roses awaited her, only a partial sheepish smile. The kind a toxic man wore when he was back on his shit. He gripped the wood of the window sill with both hands as he passed through, boots landing on the ground first. He shut the window behind him, wiped the blood from his hands on the thighs of his jeans, and moved to sit against the meager kitchen table
❝ You look healthy. Have you been drinking more water? ❞ And now that sounded like she usually did not look healthy, and Frank was kicking himself all over again.
