I CAN'T QUIT YOU, BABY
Disclaimer: I don't own Watchmen, and I make no profit from writing this story.
Chapter One: The Postman Always Rings Twice
New York City, Summer, 1960
I: Sally
Sally had known for years that she needed Larry like she needed a hole in the head, but it had taken her longer than she thought it would to shed him, completely, but now, with the divorce final, the settlement concluded, and the temporary alimony period up, she never had to so much as think about him ever again.
She supposed, in the end, she kept him around as a father figure to Laurie, but Laurie had figured out Larry wasn't remotely related to her by the time she was about five and she seemed a lot happier without him being around.
It also meant Sally didn't have to spend so much time sneaking around; if she wanted to go out with a man, she could do it, and she did do it, and without shame.
Laurie had enough ashamed of her mother for both of them.
As for Sally, she and shame had parted ways 11 years ago, one afternoon with that SOB Eddie Blake.
She wished she could get him out of her life as easily as she got rid of Larry, but it wasn't possible to wash Eddie out of her hair.
It was crazy, but in a way, it was thanks to Eddie that she had the life she did.
Before she had Laurie, she was well on her way to becoming the kind of blowsy old drunk that the New York Post had a field day with.
1948 had been a real bad year. She'd gotten drunk every day, slept with at least three strangers a week; her life was really going down the drain and she didn't know what to do to stop it.
Moreover, she hadn't cared.
But when she had her daughter, a child she loved who was the child of, well, a man she loved, it gave her something to fashion the second half of her life after.
She got rid of the apartment and bought a brownstone; she was writing her memoirs; she had spent the last eleven years raising Laurie and training her, and other young female masks.
It was a good second act to a life as a superhero.
But she was always trying not to think about Eddie, but that could be hard, considering that she lived with a little bit of him.
Laurie looked like her, except she had Eddie's dark hair and dark eyes, and she had his bad temper.
Sally had a bad temper of her own, but Laurie didn't have any old bad temper, she had Eddie's temper, where she could go from a normal mood into a towering rage in seconds, over nothing.
And she was just a little girl, yet, but no doubt about it, she was Eddie Blake's little girl.
This and that about her daughter, little things that reminded Sally every day that there was something between here and that shanty Mick bastard that would never go away.
Sally didn't have any family left, and she had been an only child, but Eddie had family coming out of his ears.
Laurie's family, too.
She didn't know they were her family, but still, Sally tried to make up for it.
Since she was a baby, Sally had been taking Laurie to play in the same park in Bensonhurst where Eddie's sister, Edie, took her sons, Paulie and Patrick, to play.
Paulie, at least, spent a lot of time at her place on Central Park West; they had a way of hiding themselves in the park so you'd take hours to fine them.
Them and Liv Napier.
Laurie and Paulie and Liv, the Three Musketeers.
Sally had hired Edie Blake to be her cleaning lady; Edie was pretty much cleaning lady to the mask community. And if she had to go out at night, she asked Edie Blake to come over and watch Laurie for her.
As unlikely as it was; they had become close friends.
Edie was someone Sally knew she could trust.
At least, Laurie had some contact with her family that way.
Her little superhero trainee charge Liv Napier, Bruce Wayne's red-haired stepchild played in the same park; she used to come there with her mother before her mother died, and then she used to come with Edie Blake or Madge McClatchey, before her father got out of Arkham, and Bruce Wayne adopted Liv.
Liv and Paulie were already friends; they were in the same class in school; Bruce thought it best not to uproot Liv from her friends when he adopted her, after her parentage came to light.
They were like three of a kind.
They may have been outcasts, but they didn't care, so the three of them, who were all the same age, became the best of friends.
On occasion, Eddie brought Paulie to the park, himself.
You could just tell that Paulie idolised his Uncle Eddie.
He was like a second father to Paulie, who was the spitting image of him, the way Eddie and Edie were the spitting image of their father.
Laurie never took any special notice of him; he was just Crazy Paulie's uncle.
Eddie.
She'd made a good try of it, staying away from him.
After Laurie was born, she took her to see her father, when she was just a baby, and Sally spent the next ten years thinking about how Eddie looked as happy and as normal as any man with his baby daughter in his arms, and then she took her away from him.
Right there, in this very park; when she remembered the way Laurie had instinctively held onto his coat, and the look on Eddie's face as he turned away from her; it still brought tears to Sally's eyes.
It was hard for her to do, but Sally had to keep reminding herself of Eddie's bad side, which was very, very bad.
Sally loved to hate him, and hated to love him, and there had been times she'd talked to him on the telephone, and a few times they'd met in passing, and those occasional days in the park, but as long as she was married to Larry, she made sure there was nothing between them.
But she wasn't married to Larry, anymore.
And Larry hadn't lived with her and Laurie for two years.
Now, Laurie didn't take much notice of her mother's boyfriends, whom she might see, on occasion, around the house in the morning.
Sally still wasn't much for long-term relationships with men, and she didn't think much of women who paraded their lovers in front of their kids, making the kid call the guy uncle, or anything like that, so if she saw Eddie there a couple of times and Sally couldn't get him out the door before Laurie woke up, what would she know?
All Eddie was to her was her friend Paulie's uncle.
She didn't even know he was a mask, like her mother.
She was sitting at home, lost in her thoughts when the telephone rang.
"Sally?"
It was Aggie Blake, and she sounded upset.
Sally could hear Paulie's and Laurie's voices panicky and tearful, murmuring in the background, and Eddie shouting.
"What the hell is going on?"
"The kids got into a fight with some teenage boy in the park. Something about him trying to sell drugs. He attacked them. With a knife. Beat the hell out of Laurie and Paulie and they said he stabbed Liv. She hit him with a brick and ran away. Nobody knows where Liv is; they're all terrified the police are going to get them. Eddie's gonna go look for Liv. You'd better come over."
Sally didn't think twice, she put her costume on, and put a raincoat on over it, hailed a cab, and went to Bensonhurst.
***
There was a Rolls out on the street when she got there, and she found Bruce Wayne in his thousand dollar suit and his camel hair overcoat, in the Blake kitchen, looking for his stepdaughter, and Laurie and Paulie were at the table.
Edie had probably patched them up; Aggie couldn't stand the sight of blood.
Sally could see neither of them were hurt badly.
Unlike poor little Liv.
Eddie came up from the basement in his undershirt, it was a cold day, but he was wearing his undershirt because he had Liv Napier in his arms, wrapped in his shirt.
You could see where there was blood on her chest and dripping down her legs, and she hung onto Eddie, but she wasn't crying; she was pretty fucking rational for a little girl with some big holes in her when he handed her over to her stepfather.
"I'm tough, Sal. I can take it. I'll be back to trainin' in a week." Liv promised.
Bruce was going to take Liv to the hospital and she heard Eddie promise he would take care of this punk kid.
Sally got up.
"Laurie, you stay here with Edie and Paulie. I have work to do."
"No way! He hurt my friend! We're gonna kill that kid! Right, Paulie?" Laurie insisted.
"You mean, really kill him?" Paulie asked.
Laurie sprung up and got a kitchen knife out of the butcher block on the counter.
"I mean kill him till he's dead!" she replied.
Eddie took the knife from her.
"You're too little for that, kiddo. Wait till you get older, an' youse is a mask like your Ma, then you can go kill badguys."
"Well who's gonna do it? You? Ma?"
"That's right. Me and your Ma. Kill him till he's dead."
Sally wanted to tell him that was nothing he should be saying to a little girl, but, it seemed to pacify Laurie, and she sat down, with Paulie and Edie.
That's his bad blood in her, screaming for vengeance.
Sally pushed the almost biblical thought from her mind and she followed Eddie out to his car.
She watched him get a bag out of his trunk that she figured had his costume in it; he went around the side of the house and came out in his costume.
Sally took off her overcoat.
"Hey, Sal, I meant what I told Laurie. I'm not takin' this guy to the authorities."
"You think I got a problem with that, Eddie?"
They walked over to the park, where Mickey Blake, Eddie's youngest brother, now a cop in his old neighbourhood, and his partner were detaining the punk in question.
"Here he is now. The nice man we told you about who doesn't like punks that push dope to children and beat up little girls. And this is his friend. They've been waiting to meet you," the other cop said.
"No! No, don't turn me over to him! To her, either! I got rights! No! No, don't!"
"You stabbed my student, and beat up my little girl. You ain't got shit, asshole." Sally told him.
The older policeman, an Italian guy, shoved the punk kid towards Eddie and Sally and got in the cop car.
"Come on, Mickey. We're done here. Let's go have lunch."
"Sounds good to me, Al." Mickey said.
The police car drove away.
"What are you two gonna to do me?"
"Us? Nothin'. But, that girl you stabbed? That was Jack Napier's daughter. An' I can't say what he's gonna do to you, but trust me, when he's done, you're gonna wish it had been me and not him."
The punk made a lot of noise, and Eddie didn't want to hear it, so he cracked the asshole in the head, again, and threw him in the trunk.
He was still making noise, so Sally gave him another smack, and that knocked him out.
They got in the car and drove down to the docks, to make a delivery to Jack Napier.
Sally waited in the car while Eddie went to see his old friend.
When he came out, they just sat there in the car for awhile, the loneliest part of the docks all around them.
"If something's going on, Eddie, I want to know about it."
"It's my problem, Sal. It's my old neighbourhood, I'll take care of it. Jesus Christ. Stabbin' kids and pushin' dope to babies in the park. These fuckin' punks aren't gonna get away with it. I got Jack on the case. He's gonna give me the lowdown on these small-time cocksuckers, and I'm gonna make goddamn sure that my fuckin' neighbourhood doesn't go down the tubes like this whole crazy fuckin' city. You're retired, Sal."
"Fuck you, Eddie, I'm not that retired! My kid spends a lot of time in that neighbourhood. The costume still fits me, doesn't it? I train these kids, it keeps me in shape. And don't tell me how shit is gonna get rough. I know shit is gonna get rough. I want in, goddamn you."
"Yeah. Me too. Especially considerin' how that costume still fits you."
"Will you think with the big head for a minute, Eddie? Are you lettin' me in on this or not?"
"Yeah, Sal, sure. Sure I am. Of course. What am I gonna tellya? No?"
"You bet your ass you're not! I'm in better fucking shape than I was ten years ago. I been drinking a helluva lot less and working a helluva lot harder."
"Yeah, I know. I saw that one-handed fuck flick you just made for the dirty raincoat brigade. You know, the sequel to your last movie. An' I still don't see any fuckin' cellulite." Eddie chuckled.
"It was not a one-handed fuck flick! It was an art film! It did much better in Europe."
"Uh-huh. Silk Swingers in Paris. Real artistic. Showin' the whole world your tits."
"Fuck you, Eddie! You know what? Fuck you! I been showin' the whole world my tits since I was seventeen! I didn't fuck anybody on camera, it wasn't a fuck flick. I did more as part of my act on 42nd Street than I did in that movie!"
"Ya did?"
"Yeah. I did. But I never fucked anybody onstage, either."
"Wudja do?"
"Just drive the fuckin' car, willya, Eddie?"
"That's not fair, Sal. If you can blow some Frog in a Halloween mask under Vaseline lighting, why get all puritanical on me, now?"
That did it.
Sally raised her hand to slap him in the face and Eddie got hold of her wrist, and got close enough to kiss her.
Her ears started ringing like a fire alarm, but she shoved him away.
Half-heartedly.
"You shanty Mick cocksucker, I didn't do any such thing in that goddamn movie!"
"I know, Sal. I've seen it ten times. Yunno the part where they're playin the bad jazz and they got the funny lights on youse and the camera doin' weird shit while you're lyin there on the bed in that silk and fishnet job, thrashin' around like you're havin' a wet dream? That's the part I get off on. One of these days, before the show closes, the usher is gonna catch me jackin' off in the back of the movie theatre, but I don't give a shit."
Well, it wasn't exactly sweet nothings, but, what the hell?
No use closing the barn door eleven years after the horse got out.
They both opened the front doors of the Coupe DeVille, got out, got in the back, and slammed the doors shut.
Her costume was easy to get off, Eddie's, not so much so, they were both working on the straps of the armor and Eddie had just got it off when a very small part of Sally's powers of reasoning kicked in.
"Hey, Romeo, wait a fuckin' second. I already got one kid, I don't need two." She told him.
"I got rubbers in the glove compartment."
"You would."
He put his armor on the front seat, and his shirt, and got in the back, dropping a fistful of rubbers on the floor.
Sally had unlaced her corset and when Eddie got back in the car, he pulled it and the top of her costume down so that her breasts popped out of the top.
"I always wanted to do this." He told her.
"I know. That's why I didn't unsnap my garters."
In one part of her mind, Sally had to ask herself what the hell she was doing, in the back of Eddie's car on the docks someplace, with the polluted smell of the dirtiest part of the East River seeping in through every crack in every door and window, taking off Eddie's gunbelt and unzipping his black leather pants while he made short work of her underwear.
That, however, was not as important as the feeling that went through her when his hand touched her bare thigh above her stockings to unsnap her stockings from her garters just as his lips closed around her nipple.
They didn't even take their boots off; she didn't even pull his pants down; they were tight enough they were like a second skin, and she really had him going, she could tell by the way his hands were shaking as he tried to get the Trojan packet open.
"Gimme that! Jesus Christ, Eddie."
Sally opened it; she put it on him.
He seemed to like that.
"You got a lot of experience doin' that, I can tell."
"Shut up and kiss me."
Sally wasn't thinking if anybody was coming around, she wasn't thinking about how it would look if somebody did; she wasn't thinking hardly at all, and what she was thinking was hardly romantic.
She was thinking that eleven years was too long since the last time she got her legs around that son-of-a-bitch Eddie Blake, and then, she wasn't thinking anything at all.
***
Sally sat up in the back seat and pulled her nylons on, rubbing the back of her head.
"Ya smacked my head off the goddamn window, ya know." She said.
"Yeah? Well you scratched me up like a fuckin' alley cat. Here. Put this in your purse. A little somethin' to remember me by."
Sally swore, opened the window and tossed the used rubber out, amid Eddie laughing at his own joke.
"Real funny, Eddie. We're lucky the goddam thing didn't break. You wanna go and check if any of your tires are flat?"
"Hey, you was the one screamin' in my ear that ya wanted more. Goddam, I don't feel like I got no more. I can't move off this seat."
"Me neither. Gimme one of those cigars. I got no place to put my smokes in this getup."
***
They put themselves back together the best they could, Eddie put his street clothes back on and Sally buttoned her overcoat over her costume.
On the way back to Bensonhurst, Sally was quiet.
She wasn't sorry for what she'd just done; but she couldn't believe she'd done it.
"So, I heard your divorce is final." Eddie finally said.
"Yeah. It is."
"So, does that take me offa red and put me onto yellow?"
"You fuckin' bastard, ya never give up, do ya, Eddie?"
"Why should I? Look, I kept my distance while you was married, didn't I? And while you was gettin' a divorce. An' raisin' our kid. I never made no claims on her. I coulda. But, ya know, Sal, after this, they grow up fast. I know. I raised four of 'em. In two years, she'll be 13, and she'll start kickin' in the stall, an' you'll hafta be tellin' her all about boys an' rubbers an' shit, an' in five or six she'll be workin' or goin' to college, or gettin' serious about some asshole guy you'd like to kill, an' outa the house, soon enough. Whatta you gonna do then? Take up knittin'? You remember tellin' me you ain't the marryin' kind? Me neither. Ya like to run around with some a your admirers, ya don't want some guy hangin' round ya house, lookin' for you ta be Harriet to his Ozzie, right? Ya don't want nobody cozyin' up to Laurie, playin Daddy with all that Uncle shit, an' if a guy comes over ta see ya, youse want him there after the kid goes to bed and gone before she wakes up. I can do that. I won't hang around. I'm her father, for Chrissake. I got her best interests at heart. An' I can see she's already too much like me without me around, bein' a bad example."
The way he said it, it sounded like a good idea.
And, when Laurie got a little older, and God forbid, started to carry on like her parents had, if might be good to have Eddie around to discourage some of the more asshole of the asshole boyfriends.
And, when I get a little older, and I'm still carrying on like I did when I was 16, it'll be good to have Eddie around.
"Well, it ain't like I can tell you I'm not interested." Sally replied.
"Willya think about it?"
"Maybe."
"Hey, ya wanna go out an celebrate hackin' off the ol' ball an' chain? Friday night, maybe? Edie'll watch the kid."
Sally thought about his offer
There was no harm in that.
Going to the movies with an old friend.
"So, ya wanna go out?"
"Sure, Eddie. I ain't had a night out for a long time."
"I'll pick youse up around eight, then."
"You know where I live?"
"How?"
"Sal, c'mon, I'm a Level 10 S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent. Ya think I don't know where my own kid lives?"
They were in front of the house in Bensonhurst.
Paulie and Laurie were in the front yard, they ran over to the fence when the car pulled up, opened the gate, and got in the back.
Which made Sally glad she insisted on cleaning up the car.
"Ma said you would take us to the hospital to see Liv. They went to Brooklyn General." Paulie told him.
Paulie looked around in the back seat.
"If you killed that guy, shouldn't there be a lot of blood?" Paulie asked.
"Don't you pay attention at the movies? Whenya kill somebody, you wrap him up an' stick him in the trunk. Then you dump him in the river." Laurie told him.
"Oh yeah. Right."
***
They got to the hospital in time to see Liv walking out the door holding her stepfather's hand.
She tried to move the bandages on her chest and her legs to show Laurie and Paulie her stitches, but Bruce Wayne stopped her.
Liv was pretty mad that she had to go home and rest, and Sally decided Laurie was coming home with her.
Eddie dropped Sally and Laurie off at Sally's brownstone on Central Park West; he knew the way like he could have driven it blindfolded.
"Jeeeziz, Laurie, when I don't come over for awhile, I forget how loaded your Ma is." Paulie said.
"You gotta point there, Paulie. Nice joint, Sal." Eddie said.
"Thanks."
"Paulie, quit bouncin' around back there! I ain't gonna let youse out so you can go hide from me in fuckin' Central Park and I gotta walk around all day lookin' for youse."
"But I don't wanna go home. We're havin' the Old Man's favourite dinner, an' I can't stand that weird Russian food!"
"Alright, so I'll take youse to the movies."
"And to Grossmann's? C'mon, Uncle Eddie, I almost got killed today."
"You almost get killed every Monday?"
"No. But every Monday they gotta eat that weird food. It's really sick."
Sally said goodbye and walked with Laurie into the house before she could ask to go too.
"Ma, why'd you do that? I wanted to go, too!"
"You got beat up today. You're going to bed early."
"Jeez, Ma, it's just Paulie's uncle. He's not gonna drop me on my head, or anythin'."
"I still want you home with me, tonight, and I don't want to hear anything more about it, Laurel Jane!"
Laurie turned out to be more tired than she'd thought. She had just a bowl of Campbell's chicken noodle soup for dinner and then went straight to bed.
Sally was up for most of the night, thinking about everything that happened that day.
In the end, the only was she could go to sleep was to remind herself, well, he's just Paulie's uncle.
Keep it that way.