"Bruce, did you see this?"
Bruce Wayne's head shot up at the sound of Alfred's concerned voice. He took the newspaper that Alfred was holding up to him and read the frontpage.
SLEEPING WITH THE FISHES: BILLIONAIRE FOUND DEAD IN THE HUDSON
On August 9, around 4:30 AM, Michael Wayne was found dead in the Hudson River by two local fisherman...
Bruce stared at the article for a couple seconds before looking up at Alfred.
"Is this...? Is this...?" He was at a loss of words.
"Yes, I'm afraid so."
Michael Wayne was his late father's brother-calling him his uncle seemed inappropriate since they had never met-and after a falling out, the Wayne brothers parted ways and never spoke again.
He went back to reading the article until he read something that startled him.
"He has a daughter?"
"Oh, yes. Poor girl, her mother died when she was eight."
"What from?"
"Drug overdose."
"So now she's an..."
"An orphan, yes."
"I'm sooo sorry for your loss, Darcy."
"If there's anything we can do..."
"Everything will be okay, dear."
Darcy Wayne spent the entirety of her father's wake responding to these mind numbing sentiments. Her head was spinning from the moment she arrived at the church and all she wanted was some air. Just a little air... was that too much to ask?
Apparently it was, because whenever she tried to slip away someone always pulled back inside to receive a million more unhelpful condolences from people she didn't even like.
People her father didn't like either, for that matter. They probably didn't even like him, Darcy realized after a while. The realization of this was too much to handle. She blew off Mrs. Montgomery without a moment's hesitation and ran for the nearest door.
She noticed a bit too late that she was in the kitchen. Luckily, no one was paying much attention to her since they were too busy working on the meal for after the funeral.
Or maybe they were just used to people hiding out in the kitchen during funerals.
"Getting a little heavy out there?" a gentle voice asked. She whipped her head around to see a cute brunette boy with a kitchen apron on, holding a giant bag of garbage.
"Yeah," she breathed and held the bridge of her nose. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine a world without any people.
And it was beautiful world.
"It's kind of hard to breath in a stuffy kitchen, dontcha think?" Darcy look at him and he smiled and nudged his head towards the back door. Wordlessly she followed, too drained to make some sort smile at his line.
Outside was a grimy alley for delivery trucks, along with a couple dumpsters. Darcy leaned against the brick building and shut her brain off for a couple minutes, a feat that proved impossible thus far.
"Want one?"
She opened her eyes to see the cute brown haired boy holding her a pack of Marlboros.
She took one without swiftly and held it out for a light.
They stood there for a could minutes without speaking, and listed to the sound of cars honking and screeching to a halt in the constant city traffic. Finally, the boy turned to her while stomping on the butt of his cig.
"I half expected for this to be your first smoke," he confessed with a smile, referring to the way she didn't cough once while she puffed on her cigarette.
"I'm 17 and this is New York, of course I've smoked." He smiled at this and then looked down at the black Converse sneakers peaking out from underneath his dirty old jeans.
"Very true, but what am I supposed to think when good girl, Darcy Wayne shows up in an expensive dress?"
She knew he meant it more tongue and cheek than anything but something about his playful statement bothered her.
Darcy's change in mood was obvious in the way she dropped her cigarette and crushed it aggressively with her heel.
That was her claim to fame in the upper crust of Manhattan and now apparently the rest of the island knew it too. She was always in magazines as "Manhattan's Girl Next Door,"-or something to that effect-which isn't something people at her infamously racy prep school want to be known as. This was in stark contrast to her best friend, Bex McAdams, who was known as the biggest party girl to ever hit the upper east side. Many morning interviews she had to attend for her band were usually spent nursing a hangover.
And on the day of her best friend's father's funeral, she failed to make an appearance. After Darcy called her a couple hours after her dad died, she hadn't heard from her since, and it didn't help that it was probably one of the shortest conversations Darcy had with her best friend ever.
And now she was alone with some random guy who'd probably tell this whole encounter to People.
"Look," he began saying, trying to correct his poor choice of words.
"Don't worry about it," she said curtly and side stepped around him. Then she disappeared back into the kitchen, read to jump back into the shark tank.
Later, Darcy was driven back to the Wayne Penthouse where she'd spend her last night in the place where she grew up.
She shook off her heels and let them clank onto the hardwood floor that ran throughout the apartment. It had been a long tiring day that was filled with pent up anger and a strong craving for a scotch. She went to her dad's office and opened the liquor cabinet where her dad supplied something to suit everyone's preferred drink. Darcy never drank very much but when she did, it was because she was angry at her father, which was the exact case now.
Darcy slugged down her scotch in no time and poured herself another. She was angry, very angry. She was angry at her father for leaving her, for leaving her all alone and so soon. She was even more angry that even when he was alive she was alone. And that he got in too deep with the sharks down in Hell's Kitchen, which ended up leaving him at the bottom of the Hudson...
She, at that last thought, commanded herself to stop thinking. With a shaking hand she downed her fourth drink and then pulled out the Captain Morgan.
Then the phone rang. She took a swig out to the bottle and clumsily shuffled away from the cabinet.
"Ah... hullo?"
"Hello, is Miss Wayne available?"
"Yeah it's me... I mean, uh-" she tried to remember her manners.
"Miss McAdams is here to see you, would you like me to send her away-?"
"No, no, it's fine. Send her up," Darcy sighed. Her loneliness outweighed her anger.
She hung up and then took another long drink of her liquor and tried not to let the guilt get to her. She was allowed one night to go crazy, right?
Which was what Bex was most certainly going to propose. If Bex McAdams ever showed up at Darcy's door after ten, it was because she want to go partying.
Darcy stumbled to the door to answer the familiar tap of Bex's dainty hand.
"Hey, Darc. Whoa, looks like you started having fun without me." Her friend nodded to the bottle in her hand that she forgot to put down making Darcy blush madly.
"Oh, I-"
"Don't worry about it, kid. Now, let's get your party clothes on." She darted past her, sashaying her hips in preparation for the nightclub that awaited them. Bex led the way to Darcy's massive bedroom, where she pushed through the mess Darcy made when she lost her wits upon hearing of her father's murder.
"How much is that window going to cost?" Bex asked, nodding to the broken bay window that was temporarily fixed with duct tape and saran wrap.
"The building guy said not to worry about it," she answered in a monotone, which was what her voice began sounding like as the funeral progressed, because there are few things more depressing than sitting alone in the front pew at their father's funeral.
They went into the closet where Darcy waited on the long sofa while Bex rummaged through the clothes in the "party" section of her closet. This was a usual occurrence when Darcy and Bex were going out.
"Here," Bex said and tossed her a piece of clothing, as if disgusted and then rummaged to find something for herself.
She looked at the outfit and put it on without protest. She looked at herself in the mirror and groaned.
It wasn't bad, but... meh
"C'mon, it's been awhile since you've been shopping. It's the best I could do... Wait a minute. Darcy, you vixen! What is this?" Bex pulled out a skimpy black dress from the back of the closet. "And I thought I knew all your dirty little secrets!" Darcy blushed madly and tried to snatch it from Bex.
She bought it on the spur of the moment back when she was seeing some guy from St. Bart's, where it was common knowledge that they were the wildest of all the private school boys in the city. But she ended up being too afraid to wear it, but it didn't matter because she saw him with Beckie Schumacher, who had the biggest rack at her school, so Darcy didn't really care anyways. There was no competition between the bodacious blonde and the plain-jane brunette.
"You have to wear it!" Bex shouted and practically pulled off her old outfit herself before Darcy pushed her away and grabbed the dress from her best friend's hands.
"Fine, fine, chill out, will ya'?" Darcy put it on and looked in the mirror.
It was tight and had large slits on the sides. It reached her mid thigh, making her acutely aware of her toned legs.
"Ow, ow!" Bex hooted at the sight of her best friend, who usually had on clothes that didn't give her gymnast body enough credit.
"Oh, stop," Darcy blushed and tried to shove her dress down as much as possible without making her boobs fall out on top. Bex just laughed and grabbed a matching pair of black heels and handed it to her friend as she walked past her to the door.
"Okay, so first we'll probably go out to Valentino's downtown, then we'll head over to Aaron's party after and then maybe to Karlee's if it hasn't been crashed by the police yet. You game, Darc?"
Bex gripped the handle of the door and waited for Darcy to make the final decision.
"Oh, I am so game," Darcy breathed before downing a gulp of the Captain Morgan bottle from earlier.
And that was the last thing she remembered.