#erule

Her fists meets with an unyielding surface, her knuckles cracking painfully. “Motherfucker!”

A deep rumbling laugh vibrates in the chest she’s pressed up against. “That’s a dollar in the swear jar, Jessica.”

She should have known it was Luke. He still uses the same soap, still has surprisingly gentle hands. Still calls her occasionally to make sure she hasn’t fallen off the face of the planet. He carries her like she’s weightless, and she wonders who the hell at the bar mustered up the courage to dig through her jacket pocket for her phone. She’s too fucked up to wonder for long, her eyes drifting shut. Luke’s stride is like a gentle rocking, and she’s asleep again in seconds.

And there’s the demon again. This time he’s on his knees, head bent in prayer. She goes to move toward him, to shove him, to scream at him to fucking move before everything falls down around them, but she’s frozen, and she starts to shake with anger, tears streaming down her face. “You fucking martyr!”

When she opens her eyes she’s in an apartment she doesn’t recognize. The lighting is soft and the decorations are homey. Someone is brewing peppermint tea in the kitchen. Wobbly, Jessica follows the sound of two people talking softly. She sees them before they see her. It’s a picture of gentle domesticity. Claire with her head bent, stirring sugar into her cup of tea, Luke behind her, hands gently resting on her hips. They’re talking about Jessica.

“Are you sure… this isn’t just… normal?” Claire’s voice is so soft, so concerned. Jessica feels the urge to cry was over her. What the hell is wrong with me? She’s never been an outwardly emotional drunk, but her nerves suddenly feel exposed and the slightest breeze feeling seems to set her off.

“This is different. It’s… grief. I know what it’s like.”

Guilt slashes through her at the mention of Luke’s pain. She clears her throat awkwardly, the contrived sound echoing in the tiny kitchen. “Hey, uh, your neighborhood lush has slept off the worst of it, so I’ll be heading--”

Claire shakes her head, cutting Jessica off. “You’re not going anywhere. Drink this and about a gallon of water, and then maybe we’ll talk about setting you loose on the streets of New York again.”

Jessica’s too tired to argue, and she’s lying about sleeping off the worst of the alcohol. It’s easy for Claire to guide her back into the living room. The nurse is motherly in a way Jess has long forgotten, and stern too. For the first time in a long time, Jessica feels compelled to do what someone else tells her.

The tea is warm, the smell of peppermint filling her sinuses, waking her up. Claire brushes away a clump of hair that’s fallen in front of Jessica’s face. “We all miss him, Jessica.”

Jessica rolls her eyes, or at least tries to. It looks a little more like a failure to execute a wink. God, Luke sure wins this round. With his perfect girlfriend, and her perfect tea, and her perfect reading of my pickled brain. She feigns ignorance. “Who do we miss?”

Claire sighs, taking the cup of tea from Jessica’s limp hands and setting it aside. She draws Jessica into a tight hug, and even though Jessica has the all the strength in the world, the tenderness is what breaks her. Tears stream down her face noiselessly.

Eventually she manages to eke out a strangled question. “Why do I feel like this?”

“That’s what he does Jessica. He’s charming and kind and good… easy to love. He makes you care about him and then self-destructs.”

Jessica wasn’t lying when she told Matt that she reads people, but it’s still a surprise when she looks into Claire’s eyes. They are filled to the brim with sadness. Jessica sniffs, “What an asshole.”

Claire laughs. “Yeah.”

-

She thinks she might be losing her mind when she starts to see the demon during the day. Out of the corner of her eye there’s a flash of red, light bouncing off of round red lenses. It happens at least three times before she pinpoints a source. Whoever it is disappears into a dark alley, and they’re gone before she can push through the crowd of people milling on the sidewalk. Her heart thunders in her chest and her hands shake as she scales the side of the building.

Looking out across the rooftops she finds nothing at all, disappointment like a boulder settling on her chest. She stops by the liquor store on the way home, using the last of her credit card balance to purchase a measly pint of whisky.

When she gets home, she notices the lock to her door has been fiddled with. All of her internal alarms start sounding, fight or flight building in her muscles. She eases the door open as quietly as possible, eyes scanning for signs of an intruder. She checks every nook and cranny, fear coiled inside of her like the spring of a bear trap.

The last thing she notices is the brand new leica camera sitting on her desk beside a fancy leather case. There’s no note to accompany the strange gift, but her heart leaps into her throat anyway. There’s only one person who owes her a camera, and only one person who’s guilt would prompt him to come back to the grave just to buy her the most expensive camera that exist. She can’t fucking believe the asshole is alive.

-

Once she knows she’s not losing her mind, it’s not hard to catch him following her again. He likes to watch from up high with an easy escape route. And he’s Matt Murdock, she just knows he’s hiding out in some quiet religious nook. It’s not long before she realizes all of her sightings center around a monastery in Brooklyn.

She watches from afar for a full day, lying on her stomach on the roof across the street, her new camera with it’s telephoto lens clicking away. He doesn’t make her life easy and just walk out into the open. She does notice a nun making trips to one of the side buildings on a regular basis, taking fresh linens into the building and leaving with a bad of dirty laundry. No one else approaches the dwelling.

She waits until it’s dark before vaulting over the stone wall. A rose bush clinging to the brick and mortar swipes across her cheek, leaving angry red marks. She hisses out a curse, stifling the urge to rip the bush right out of the ground.

She’s not stealthy, doesn’t even bother to try. Matt knows she’s coming. She makes sure he can hear her muttering under her breath, panting with anger and pent up frustration. She’s about to rip the door to the stone lodging right off its hinges when it swings open.

Her heart stops when she sees him, something she hadn’t anticipated at all. She wants to send him flying into the wall with a swift kick, wants to beat the soft expression off his face with her bare knuckles. He’s not wearing his shades, and his unseeing eyes are wide open, surprise fluttering across his face. She can’t fucking move for the life of her.

He breaks the strange tension, one hand coming up and reaching toward her face. “You’re hurt.”

There it is, the damn is broken. “You’re damn right, I’m hurt.” Halfheartedly, she shoves him. Even at half strength it’s enough to send him stumbling across the room. She stomps after him. “You made me like you.” She shoves him again. “You fucking martyr, you made me care about you and your stupid devil ears, and then I couldn’t save you.”

Wavering, her voice breaks. Her eyes are glassy, and she can barely see what she’s doing, but she steps forward again, pushing him one more time. He lands with a thump on the bed in the corner of the small dwelling.

“Jessica…”

His voice makes her so mad she can’t think. He’s sorry, she can hear it. He regrets what he did. She moves forward again, but this time he catches her around the waist with his arms and pulls her down on the bed with him.

He holds her tight, letting her bury her face in the crook of his neck. She hates crying, hates the way the salty tears feel slipping down her cheeks, hates how her nose gets all stuffy, hates how it makes her feel like she’s baring her jugular to a wild animal. She mumbles into his skin. “You asshole.”

He’s so warm beneath her, wearing nothing but a soft pair of sweats. She can feel the pulse at his throat, and she needs to know if he feels any of the things that have been ravaging her for the past couple months. She presses her lips against the skin, sucking gently, kissing a tentative trail up the side of his neck. “That god damned camera was cost like three thousand dollars. How the hell am I supposed to repay you?”

His arms tighten around her, body shaking as he chuckles. Oh, she fucking missed that, his amusement at her prickliness. “I can think of a few ways, although I’ll have to immediately go to confession in the morning.”

She laughs. “I can’t believe I fucking like you.”