#kastledaily

[everthedevilyouknow]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

My first fic that I’ve actually posted😎 

Chapters: 1/7 Fandom: The Punisher (TV 2017), Daredevil (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Explicit Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Frank Castle/Karen Page Summary:

Karen and Frank learn more about each other and find that they have more in common than previously thought.

[ninzied]

gonna stand here in the ache by @redbelles

frank’s not the only one searching for an after.

[carry-the-sky]

been waiting on a touch to save me

summary

“Is this in my head?” Karen asks, feeling slightly dazed. She focuses her eyes. “I can see—a city. But I can see here, too. It’s like one is close and one is far away.” She relaxes her gaze, and the steering wheel swims back into view. “I can see—what’s in my head.”

“I told you,” the voice says. “This ain’t your head, lady. It’s New York City.”

Or: Frank and Karen discover that they are able to see, hear, and feel what the other is experiencing, despite being strangers.

chapter three

[ninzied]

things you said that i wasn’t meant to hear

for @heidiamalia. happy birthday to one of the loveliest and most talented people i know.

loosely inspired by a chat with @frank-kastle :)

rated e.

In the year that they’ve been together, Karen has come to learn that there are few things she loves more than waking up with Frank sleeping next to her.

Morning sex, though. Morning sex might have to be one of them.

[continue on ao3.]

[ninzied]

i’ll be the light and lead you home when there’s nowhere left to go

hireath (n); a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, a home which maybe never was; the nostalgia, the yearning, the grief for the lost places of your past

for @heartonfirewrites. [ao3]

Being with Karen – it’s one of the easiest things that Frank has ever done.

Even before he put down the vest and showed up at her place for good – because there was no turning back for either of them after that – he had known. It was part of what kept him away for so long.

Being with Karen was everything right, and good, and Frank hadn’t believed in a long, long time that those things should even be possible for him. That they could be what he deserved.

He only half-believes it even now. But if he’s going to hell for letting himself have this, then he might as well make the most of this one small corner of light and good things until then.

Still, they have their not-so-good days. The days that try to drag them back into those dark, buried places of their past, before they had this. Before they found something else that they could not afford to lose.

There’s the date of every funeral they’ve ever been to, every loved one they’ve had to bury. There are other kinds of anniversaries, too. Birthdays. Christmas. The day Frank got married. But they all carry with them the same kind of heaviness. They all came to an end the same way.

There are more of these kinds of days than either of them would like to count – days that feel like they belong to some other life, but will never stop haunting them in the one they’re living now.

Each one comes with a static kind of silence around it.

They have their own ways of dealing. Frank rises even earlier than usual and goes for a run down the Hudson. He runs until his whole body might be on fire, and then he just keeps on going. Karen throws herself into her work; if she’s not out chasing leads, she’s hunkered down at her computer, fingers flying over the keys.

It takes some navigating, but they’ve learned how to be there for each other without overstepping – how to be gentle with all that silence, how to cradle it close without it breaking. How to let the silence know that it is not alone.

Karen has coffee waiting for him after his long morning runs – black, and scalding, just the way he likes it. She doesn’t tease him for it like she would on any other day, and every kiss that he gives her tastes just a touch bittersweet.

Frank, on his part, cleans their apartment, cooks her dinner. She’s not great at remembering to feed herself on a regular day, so on the hard ones in particular he makes sure the table she’s working at is well-stocked with actual food.

They come back to each other in the twilight hours. Before they had this, their tomorrows had always been more of the same, but now, at least – now, their tomorrows actually mean something again.

…

Their own birthdays are on the quieter side too, but it’s nice. It’s soft. It’s them.

Nothing to fuss about, just the two of them curled up on the couch and, for once, not letting the rest of the world have any say in the matter. Frank takes the day off of work, and per Karen’s request stows her phone and computer some place she won’t think to find.

They’ve always promised each other no parties – and truly, a party is not what Karen has in mind when she first approaches Curtis for something small, something quiet, this year. She’d gotten the okay from Frank to include him, and there’s a bottle of whiskey she’s stashed in the cabinet just for the occasion.

But then Curt had asked if he could bring a mutual friend, which is how Dinah winds up greeting a slightly startled Frank at the door with wine and a meat-and-cheese platter. And then the postcard to Florida that Karen had mailed months ago gets returned to the sender – hand-delivered by a tanned and beaming Amy, who also brought a pink plastic flamingo as a “housewarming” gift, and a genuinely awful Hawaiian print shirt for Frank.

“I’m never going to wear that,” says Frank before enveloping her in a tight hug.

Karen wants to ask him if this is okay – really, she couldn’t have accounted for all of this happening – but then Frank looks over at her with shining eyes, and her chest could crack open from all the love she sees in them.

“Any more surprises I should know about?” he asks her, voice gruff as he steals her into their room for a kiss.

Karen puts a hand on his chest, and says in a half-apologetic tone, “I might have texted the Liebermans last week.”

“Did you, now.” He chuckles under his breath.

“I didn’t mention your birthday, but they seem like the type to put two and two together.”

“Unbelievable,” says Frank with a shake of his head. “How’d you even – never mind.” He kisses her again, lacing their fingers together before rejoining the others.

David and Sarah show up with their kids half an hour later.

It should feel like a squeeze – it was a small apartment even before Frank moved in with her – but instead, the only thing it feels is right, having the space filled with the warmth of everyone’s laughter, and the look on Frank’s face, every time their eyes meet and he breaks out into another smile.

…

So when Karen’s birthday comes around, Frank finds himself anxious about getting it right, in a way that he hasn’t before. In spite of what he’d told her he wanted for his own birthday, she’d done him one even better, and it was, hands down, one of the best birthdays he’d had in a long, long while.

He wants that for her, too. After all the shit that she’s gone through, after being the one there for him, the least he could do is make this day a really damn good one for her.

“This is exactly why we made those rules,” Karen has to remind him, when he ends up ruining the French toast in his agitation. He scowls at the remains before tipping them into the trash.

“Yeah? Rules say something about not being able to make my girl some goddamn toast?” Frank groans, reaching his hand out to hers and tugging her up against his side.

“No,” says Karen, tilting her head at him with a smile. “Rules say not to worry too much if you burn it.”

“I’ll try to remember that for next time.” He wraps his other arm around her, nudging their foreheads together. “Happy birthday, Karen.” He kisses her soft and slow, and she makes a small humming sound when they part.

Her hand comes up to touch his cheek. “Hey,” she says. “This is all I want, Frank.”

He sighs, head dropping down to his chest for a moment. She cups his face in both her hands, until he’s finally looking back up at her.

“Okay?” she says.

“Okay,” he says, and means it.

He ends up taking her to a little corner café for breakfast instead. Afterward, they stroll hand-in-hand down by the river before checking out one of the animal shelters nearby. They almost walk out with a dog, and make a pact to come back after they’ve found a bigger place to live next year.

They meet Nelson and Murdock for a late lunch on one of the piers, and by then Frank’s feeling fully at ease. He even has a good time with them. He finds Nelson amusing, not that he’d ever admit it, and even Murdock’s grown on him a little over the years.

Karen looks happy. And that’s all that really matters to him.

Frank’s at the bar getting them another round of beers when he hears the phone ring. Karen’s. He recognizes the ring tone. But he doesn’t think anything of it until he’s turning around with their drinks, and he sees the look on her face as she stares down at the screen.

Shit.

Karen excuses herself from the table, and makes her way down toward the water until she’s just out of earshot. Frank sets the tray down, watching her back tense as she talks, and nods with a pained kind of smile that breaks his fucking heart.

He should’ve seen this coming.

There’s a reason why Frank stashes her phone out of sight every year. It’s a reminder of the people who don’t call on their birthdays – the people who can’t, and the people who won’t. Or the people who send one lousy text a week late, and can’t be bothered to answer when she tries calling back.

Murdock’s face is expressionless, but Frank knows he’s listening in on the other line.

“That her piece of shit dad, isn’t it.” His hands are fisted so tight that it feels like the only way he can loosen them up is to just fucking hit something.

Murdock remains silent, which Frank takes as confirmation enough.

He stalks over to Karen in time to hear the tail end of her conversation.

“Sure, Dad,” she’s saying, with that same strained smile that makes it look like she’s halfway to bursting in tears. “I can make a few phone calls, see what I can do.”

Frank stops abruptly in front of her, his whole body seething. Is he seriously calling to ask for a favor? The shitbag even remember it’s her goddamn birthday today?

“Give me the phone.”

Karen holds out a placating hand, eyes steady on his. They’re watering slightly, but she musters up a small, genuine smile for him. He steps closer, swaying forward a little. His vision’s gone a little blurry too.

“C’mon, Karen. Let me talk to him.”

“Sure thing, Dad,” she says into the phone, and he hates how small that man makes her sound, how young and just – so fucking delicate, like the wrong word from him might break her. Like the right one could make some part of her whole again.

“Karen…” If he could just give him a piece of his mind—

“Bye.” She hangs up, and stares at the phone until the screen blanks out. She heaves a deep, shaky breath, looks over the railing, and then, almost in slow motion, lets go of the phone in her hand. They watch it tumble down to the water, where it slips out of sight with a splash that probably only Murdock could hear.

“Guess you won’t be able to make those calls after all,” says Frank after a moment, and it startles a watery laugh out of her, eyes bright as she looks at him with more gratitude than he’ll ever deserve.

“Not today,” she says, pressing the heel of her hand to one cheek and swiping away the moisture there.

“Not today,” Frank agrees, voice low and firm and final. But then she’s looking back out at the water, something distant clouding up her expression, and he feels a fresh, hot guilt churning around inside his stomach. “I’m sorry, Karen. I—”

She turns and slips her arms around him, burying her face into his shoulder.

He wraps her up tight, cradling the back of her neck and making soft shushing sounds to her as she starts to cry.

…

They’re curled up on the couch later that night. Frank’s not much of a baker, but he’d tried his hand at a cake, which hadn’t turned out nearly so bad as the French toast from that morning. What’s left of the cake now is on the coffee table in front of them, plus a stray crumb or two that he thumbs away from Karen’s bottom lip before planting a couple of kisses there.

“Thank you,” she tells him, and he knows she’s not just talking about cake.

Frank shakes his head. “I didn’t…”

“Stop.” She puts a hand on his mouth. He noses a kiss to the pad of her finger. Her eyes are still red-rimmed from earlier, but she hasn’t shed a tear since. He thinks she’s one of the strongest people he’s ever known. “You did,” she tells him. “You do.”

“Not enough.”

“It’s everything.” She snuggles up close. “And what I say goes. Don’t forget, it is still my birthday for another twenty-three minutes.”

He breathes out a laugh in her hair. “And after?”

“After,” she says simply, “is another tomorrow with you.”

His throat closes up, and it’s all he can do to just kiss her again for a moment.

He holds her gaze when they part, finger stroking over her cheekbone. “You’re everything, to me. You got that?”

Karen bites back a smile. “I think I have some idea.”

And for the next twenty-three minutes and counting, he proceeds to make doubly sure that she does.

[carry-the-sky]

been waiting on a touch to save me

summary

“Is this in my head?” Karen asks, feeling slightly dazed. She focuses her eyes. “I can see—a city. But I can see here, too. It’s like one is close and one is far away.” She relaxes her gaze, and the steering wheel swims back into view. “I can see—what’s in my head.”

“I told you,” the voice says. “This ain’t your head, lady. It’s New York City.”

Or: Frank and Karen discover that they are able to see, hear, and feel what the other is experiencing, despite being strangers.

chapter two

[ninzied]

things you said when you were crying

for @fortysevenswrites. [ao3]

The first time Frank brings Karen over to the Liebermans’ for Friday night dinner, he could swear David’s eyes almost pop out of his goddamn skull. Sarah is more discreet – if you can call that discreet when she pours out twice as much wine for Frank and Karen, while leaving a more modest-sized glass for herself.

The kids, at least, act more normal about it.

Of course, there’s nothing normal, exactly, about how Frank had come into their lives. But in the last few months since he started coming over with some regularity, they’ve fallen into a routine that feels like the closest to normal – the closest to family – that Frank’s ever going to get.

And then, Karen.

He doesn’t know what he and Karen are. All he knows is what Karen means to him, and for now, that’s enough. The last thing he wants is to fuck it all up. There’s no rush – only that sensation of the floor bottoming out when she looks at him a certain way, or that slip of warmth in his chest when he says something that makes her laugh.

The Liebermans let him off the hook for a while. He doesn’t offer them any status updates, and they don’t pry either – much.

“Listen. Frank,” David says to him one Friday, as they’re unloading the dishwasher. Karen and Sarah are upstairs with the kids, picking out the evening’s activities. “As great as we are at board games, you know this doesn’t count as a double date until you ask her out on like a regular date, right?”

Frank picks up a particularly sharp-looking knife and makes a point of drying the edge. “You want to run that by me again?”

“Nope,” says David. “Not at all.”

The kids are rightfully curious about her, but seem satisfied enough when Frank first introduces her to them as “just an old friend of your Uncle Pete’s.”

Leo ends up being especially impressed with Karen’s board game prowess.

“Got a lot of practice growing up,” Karen explains to her over Risk one night. “I used to play with my younger brother too, just like you.”

“Cool,” beams Leo. “So how old’s your—”

But Frank clears his throat, and says something about ice cream if they want to take a peek in the freezer. They’re bouncing off into the kitchen faster than he can say mint chocolate chip, and he squeezes Karen’s arm for a second before getting up to join them.

Zach, on his part, seems to go selectively mute whenever Karen’s around. He gets more agitated than usual if a game isn’t going his way, and turns fire engine red whenever Karen offers some kind words of encouragement.

Zach, it appears, has a crush.

“Good,” is all Sarah has to say when Frank mentions his theory to her. “You could use the competition.”

“Get out of here,” he scowls, and doesn’t make the mistake of bringing it up again.

…

But it turns out Zach’s not the one in this family that Frank should’ve been watching out for.

It’s early June, just after school’s let out for the summer. David and Sarah have been making threats about moving their Friday night dinners down to the beach.

“I don’t do the beach,” says Frank.

“What Frank means,” Karen cuts smoothly in, “is that he only owns things that come in black hoodie sizes.”

“Easy enough to fix,” says Sarah, looking sly.

“My thoughts exactly.”

“Christ,” mutters Frank, just as Leo’s coming into the kitchen. “Hey, sweetheart. Want to go outside for a bit?”

“Sure!” says Leo, and runs to grab a ball.

Zach’s at some all boys’ camp for the week, so it’s just him and Leo in the front yard, kicking a soccer ball back and forth to each other. It’s not really his thing; he’d grown up with a football practically in his hands at all times, but Leo’s trying out for the team, she tells him, so he’s game for whatever.

As they’re kicking the ball around, she tells him about school, how her favorite classes had gone, what she’s looking forward to with starting a new grade in the fall.

She’s really come into her own this year, he thinks. She’s fierce, and feisty, and it’s maybe more than a little bit terrifying to him, just how much she’s grown.

He can’t look at her these days without thinking of Lisa, and how she would’ve been at this age. But it’s a welcome kind of pain, more of a tender ache in his chest than the thousand-pound weight that he’d gotten so used to carrying alone.

Now, he has the Liebermans. Now he has Karen, and—

Leo’s making a run for the ball when she steps wrong on her ankle – out of the corner of his eye, he sees it twist unnaturally, and then she’s going down with a cry, and Frank’s heart just about stops right there.

He’s by her side in half a second. There’s a rock in the grass that must have tripped up her footing, and he tosses it out of the way before reaching gently down for her ankle.

“It’s okay, shh, shh, shhh. Hey.”

There are actual fucking tears in her eyes, and Frank cannot handle seeing her in any kind of pain. If that rock had been human, he would’ve skinned the thing alive by now.

“It – really – hurts,” she hiccups.

“I know, sweetheart. I know.”

He carefully examines her ankle.

“Listen, you’re gonna be just fine, all right? Nothing’s broken – it looks like a small sprain. We’ll get some ice on it, once we’re back inside.”

He’s crouched down next to her, pulse still hammering up in his throat somewhere. He’s about to ask her if she wants to try putting some weight on it when he notices her looking up at him shrewdly.

He also notices that she’s no longer crying.

“While I have you here,” she says, in a very different tone, “I have a few questions for you.”

“Shoot,” says Frank, rocking back on his heels and trying to decide whether to laugh or shake his head and sigh. He’s probably going to regret this.

“So, you and your friend. Karen.”

Yeah, he’s definitely going to regret this.

“Are you two, like…hanging out?”

He scrubs a hand over his face and says, “Don’t know what you mean by that.”

“I’m fourteen, not four. I’m not stupid. I know what it looks like when two people—”

“Whoa, okay, okay,” says Frank. He stoops down lower so that they’re level with each other. “Don’t say anything that’s gonna make it hard for me to look your mom in the eye later.”

“Fair enough,” says Leo. Then, after a moment, “So if you’re not…hanging out, then what are you doing?”

Frank lets out a sigh. “Your mom and dad put you up to this?”

“Nope,” says Leo, looking smug. “They’d only wish they had.”

“Yeah, you got that right.”

Leo stretches her legs and gives an experimental roll of her injured ankle. “Just suck it up and buy a swimming suit, okay? It’s not that hard.”

“That so?” Frank muses. “Why does it matter so much to you, anyway?”

Leo shrugs. “When I grow up, I want to be just like Karen.”

“Yeah? I don’t blame you, kid.”

“And I want to be loved the way Dad loves Mom. Or the way that you…well, you know what I’m going to say.”

Frank pulls her into a hug, kissing the top of her head as she snuggles into him for a moment. “You will be, sweetheart. You will.” He ruffles her hair before pulling away. “So it was that obvious, huh.”

“Yep,” says Leo, matter-of-factly. “Well. Except to Zach. You should probably break the news to him, after.”

Frank glances up toward the house, and tries to imagine walking back in there, facing Karen like nothing has changed. For all the Liebermans’ endeavoring, it’s their fourteen-year-old daughter who’s going to be the one that refuses to let him off the hook.

“All right,” he says. “You ready?”

“Are you?”

“Smartass,” says Frank. “Don’t tell your parents I said that.”

Leo laughs. He helps her stand, and she puts a foot gingerly into the grass. “Oh, it’s totally fine now,” she says, and Frank shakes his head, retrieving the ball on their way back inside.

Leo goes to help her mom in the kitchen as Karen walks up to Frank with two cold beers in hand.

“Hey,” he says lowly.

Karen gives him a bemused sort of smile. “…Hey,” she says back. “Drink?”

Frank takes the bottle, just to have something to do with his hands. “Look, I was thinking about the, uh – the beach.”

She’s shaking her head. “Frank, it’s fine. I was only teasing earlier. If you don’t want to go—”

“Actually,” he says, “I was thinking maybe we could. Go. Just the two of us.”

Karen blinks at him, disbelieving. “You’re serious.” Her smile is slow-forming. A sunrise. “Okay. Yeah. Let’s do it.”

Frank feels his heart back up in his throat, for entirely different reasons this time. “Okay.” He holds her gaze a moment longer, and realizes he can’t stop smiling either.

Somewhere, there’s the sound of the table getting readied for dinner, and Karen touches his arm before going to help Sarah set up.

Leo catches his eye from across the kitchen and gives him a double thumbs up. She’s grinning from ear to ear, but schools her features into something more neutral as David walks in with a fresh plate of steaks off the grill.

“Here, Dad,” she says. “Let me get that for you, too.”

Jesus.

“Thanks, hon,” says David, none the wiser.

Frank takes a swig of his beer and goes to help man the grill for a while, wondering how to break the news to the Liebermans that they’ve been raising no less than a teenage assassin in their goddamn home.

[ninzied]

things you said when you were scared

for @frank-kastle​. [ao3]

There are a lot of terrible things in life. Death. Taxes. Dirty cops. The list goes on and on. But right now, hospital coffee probably ranks up there amongst some of the worst.

“I swear this was brewed in the tenth circle of hell,” says Foggy to no one in particular as he pours himself his fifth cup for the night.

He dumps in a generous number of sugar packets, and some of that awful instant creamer stuff for good measure. It clumps at the top as he stirs, and has an unpleasant powdery texture when he takes a sip and almost burns his tongue off.

“God, that’s…not good,” he says with a grimace, and heads back to the room.

The hospital’s quiet this late in the evening. After the bustle around shift change at 7, Foggy hasn’t seen many people around. There’s one guy here now, checking in up by the front desk, but other than that it’s been—

“I’m here to see Karen Page.”

Foggy freezes on the spot. He could pick out that gravelly voice anywhere. Which feels like a pretty weird thing to admit, but it’s true.

“Friend or family?” The nurse behind the counter is asking.

Frank Castle looks intensely at the nurse and says, “She’s the only family I got, ma’am.”

The nurse gives him a sympathetic smile, and hands him a sign-in sheet and a pen.

He scrawls something onto the paper, and exchanges it for a bright red visitor badge that matches the one Foggy is wearing.

The nurse tells him the room number, and points helpfully down the hall where Foggy is standing.

He doesn’t know whether to wave or to run in the other direction, the end result of which is that Frank finds him lurking awkwardly behind a meal cart just outside of the room.

“Hey,” says Frank.

“Uh,” says Foggy. “Hey…y.”

“How is she?”

“She’s asleep,” says Foggy, and Frank’s eyes narrow.

“Asleep in what way?” His voice is dark and low and not to be trifled with.

“Right,” Foggy says hastily. “I see how that could have been misconstrued. She’s fine, she’s just sleeping off the anesthesia. The doctor said everything went pretty smoothly.”

“Good.” But it looks like Frank won’t quite believe it until he’s confirmed it for himself. He scans the small glass pane in the door, visibly relaxing a little when he sees her sleeping on the other side.

“So did Matt call you, or?”

Frank says, with a perfectly straight face, “Left a voice note, actually.”

“He did?”

Frank gives him a flat look. “What do you think.”

“I honestly have no idea,” Foggy tells him. “Not sure anyone does. Well, except for – you know.” He gestures at the window, but Frank’s already turned back to her, brow creased.

“I’m going to get some more coffee,” says Foggy. “Do you want anything?”

Frank is still gazing into the room. He rubs one hand over the other, but doesn’t make a move for the door. “What?” he asks, entirely distracted.

“I’m going to get you some coffee,” Foggy tells him firmly. He turns around and heads toward the little waiting area again, making a point not to look back when he stops by one of the vending machines.

He’s deciding between the red and blue Doritos when he hears the soft click of the door latch closed. He goes for the blue, and then takes a seat in one of the armchairs for a while.

He winds up falling asleep with the bag of chips unopened in his lap. It’s about one in the morning when he comes to, and it takes a moment before he remembers what he’s even doing here.

There’s a hell of a crick in his neck, which he supposes a cup of that truly terrible coffee won’t make any worse. As he waits for it to brew, he wonders if Frank is a cream and sugar kind of guy. Probably not. But Foggy had tried it black at first, and it was not a bad approximation of how he imagines motor oil would taste.

Frank is hunched over by Karen in the half-dark, chin in his hands when Foggy walks in with two cups of coffee. He thinks Frank might have fallen asleep, but as the light from the hallway slivers into the room he looks up, his expression registering genuine surprise as Foggy hands him one of the styrofoam cups.

“It’s not—” Foggy starts to warn him.

Frank downs the stuff without even blinking, and if that’s not a sign of someone who’s capable of murder, then Foggy doesn’t know what it is.

“Thanks,” says Frank quietly, and sounds like he means it.

“Sure.” Foggy hesitates for a fraction of a second before sitting down in the chair next to him. He sniffs at his own coffee and almost chokes on it.

“You not gonna go home to your lady?” Frank’s voice has gone so low that it’s practically inaudible. “It’s getting late.”

“I…” Foggy doesn’t know how to put this delicately, so he just tells him outright: “I don’t want Karen to wake up alone.”

Frank looks hard at him in the dim moonlit glow of the room, but it doesn’t appear to be out of anger.

“She won’t.”

“Okay.” Foggy nods. “I guess I’ll see you in the morning.” He pauses before getting up. “Do you want the rest of this?”

“Thanks,” Frank says again, and takes the cup from him.

Foggy’s almost at the door when he looks back. Frank’s reaching for a pocket in his jeans, pulling out a tattered old book that Foggy hadn’t noticed before.

He turns to a page that he’d marked, and starts reading quietly to Karen as Foggy slips out and closes the door behind him.

…

He returns the following morning with a trayful of coffees and some get-well-soon flowers that Marci had insisted he buy on the way. The coffees are from a deli down the street from the hospital – nothing fancy, but they have to be better than the crap that’s served here.

He fumbles with the handle a little while trying to juggle everything, but manages to get a foot inside before leaning his weight against the door and—

He thinks he’s hearing things at first.

But then he hears it again – the distinct sound of laughter, and as Foggy brushes some of the lilies out of his eyes he sees Frank and Karen there, both awake, and both smiling at him.

Laughing. Not smiling, Foggy corrects himself. The Punisher is laughing at him, and he has no idea how he’s even supposed to begin responding to that.

“Need some help there, counselor?”

Frank looks like he hasn’t slept a wink. He also looks like he couldn’t care less. Foggy blinks at him, feeling like he’s looking at a completely different person than the one he’d seen just a handful of hours before. Last night, Frank had been his usual tense and taciturn self. Foggy knew he’d been worried. But he’d also thought that that was just how Frank was.

Now, he looks – he looks like any other guy when he smiles. He looks relaxed. Happy. Relieved.

Huh.

Frank stands up to assist him, and Foggy can’t help but notice that he has to let go of Karen’s hand in order to do so.

He goes for the coffee tray and says, utterly deadpan, “Not trying to poison me this time?”

Foggy can only stare at him for a moment. “He’s got jokes.” He looks at Karen, still in some state of disbelief. “He’s got jokes. How are you feeling?”

“Like it hurts to laugh,” says Karen, but she’s beaming at him as he sets the flowers down at the bedside. “Those are beautiful. Thank you.”

Foggy’s momentarily distracted by the book next to her. He catches a single word – Brontë – before she puts it aside out of view and accepts a coffee from Frank with gratitude.

Frank sips at his own cup and then says to Foggy, “Not bad.” He sits down on Karen’s other side and takes her hand without another word.

“Good,” says Foggy. He meets Frank in the eye. “I’m glad,” he tells him, meaning more than just the coffee. Then he clears his throat, and gives Karen a quick peck on the cheek goodbye.

“I should get going.”

Karen gives him a smile. “And I should get my appendix taken out more often.”

“Too soon,” Foggy frowns.

But then he looks at the way they’re looking at each other – Karen with a fondly exasperated expression, and Frank on his part looking dutifully contrite but also like he’s never going to let go of her hand.

They’re also looking at each other like they’re the only two people in the world right now. And so Foggy sneaks out with his coffee, and lets them.