She hadn’t ever really interacted with the police before. Of course, she had a few patrons from the force, the chirpy rookie, the sergeant with four beautiful grandkids, people she’d stopped seeing as the law and started perceiving for their lives outside the precincts. But she knew for an absolute fact that she wouldn’t be this relaxed around them if they’d saved her. She certainly wouldn’t be joking about it. The world definitely seemed to need more people like her hooded hero. It felt good to make a joke of it properly, rather than the quick quips and eager anecdotes they’d made in Hydra, things to cling to rather than laugh at.
“That’s me, Queen Ashley of Stanley’s Diner!” She grinned, reaching up to pat an imaginary curled bob of hair. “I left my crown back in my apartment.” The nameless man was like a magnet, drawing out the joy she once believed she’d feel constantly in this city. Between that and saving her life, would she ever stop owing him?
His continued performance ensured her smile stuck around for a while longer, and she even extended her arms, lifting imaginary skirts and curtseying to the invisible masses. “I’ll bring a few business cards next time, hand them out so people know. Wouldn’t want a mugger to make a mistake!” She joked, shaking her head forlornly.
“You’re a modern day genius! Do you have a doctorate in urinology or is it more of a fine art you’ve honed over the years?” She wondered aloud, feeling a faint sadness as they drew closer to the apartment building. Once she went inside, the relaxed happiness would fade, replaced once again by the worries of rent, bills, and other costs of surviving in the city. No more joking with the friendly hero, once she closed her door.
But at least she could pay the bills now. Right?
To say he roared in laughter would be relatively accurate, though he always enjoyed referring to the joyous sound as a laugh born of an unlikely camaraderie; a laugh only friends heard, only those close to him could ever cause, and how she managed to join that list without even a flutter of her lashes or a particularly impressive feat, per Weasel nearly setting his hair aflame trying to do some asinine stunt to make the emptier nights guffaw, he hadn’t a clue and he didn’t really care to know. Embrace that which one would otherwise disregard, or something like that. Philosophical shit, etc., etc.
As they neared the building in question, he considered mentioning that he lived there as well, that he wasn’t going to be creepy by actually walking her to her door if she wished, but something continued to gnaw at him and force him to bury that want. Perhaps he could blame it on insecurities of her reaction, or even that she knew who lived in that building, what kind of a man occupied the lower floor, what that man did in his day-to-day life, what that man looked like under the mask and the hood.
What if he was the boogeyman she always feared crossing paths with on the way to the mailboxes? The thought alone nearly made him sigh and lose that warm smile she’d given him with no effort. Besides, once that door of her apartment closed and there stood an obstruction between their current revelry, what could he do? It wasn’t like he could drop by the coming morning to ask her to lunch or if she’d like company to work, or even to tell her that if she needed anything, she could call him, beep him, reach him in any shape or form she could. Nope. Once that door closed between them, his new friend would be nothing but a fond memory to keep him from pulling another trigger.
Eventually, good times come to an end and the main door of the building was mere feet away, glaring at him and staring like some...vile mockery of what he couldn’t have, what would never TRULY be his. Where the sigh previously stayed at the wayside, softly, he let one out and slowed to a stop to face her, an almost pained grin on his lips.
“THE WADE EXPRESS™ has officially made
it’s most important STOP of the night.”
