February

It was Valentine's Day and Karen had nowhere special to go as she walked down the sidewalk in her heels, briefcase in one hand and bouquet of flowers in the other.

She'd tried to have plans, but it was hard when she only had two friends to try and make them with. Foggy had been her first choice, go out and get some rebellious single people drinks. But he was taking out a woman from his new firm, Marci, for dinner and from the excitement in his voice over the phone, she wasn't planning on calling him later that night to see how it went. Because they'd been talking more in the last few weeks, she'd tried Matt. It probably would've been awkward, but she was willing to brave that. He hadn't answered, so she'd figured that vigilante justice didn't take holidays.

When she heard the footsteps behind her, she reconsidered.

Without turning around, just pulling out her keys to get into her building's front door, she said with a smile, "Hi, Frank."

"Ma'am."

Shifting her belongings, she handed him her flowers, "Hold these for me for a second? Somebody tried to break in last week and the door still kind of sticks because the hinges are a little off."

As she turned the key and started tugging violently on the door, he asked, "How'd you know it was me?"

"Your footsteps. That night in the hospital, I just heard them coming after me. Not in a hurry. Not stopping for anything. You on a mission. The sound stuck. Come on, you son of a bitch." With a final grunt of effort, she hauled the door open. Panting slightly, she took her flowers and asked with a smile, "Do you want to come up?"

In his heavy coat but without his skull-decorated armor, he was staring at her and she couldn't quite figure out what his gaze was trying to say before he gave a quick nod, "Yes, ma'am."

They climbed the stairs in silence and it wasn't until she'd dead-bolted her door behind them that he asked, "Who got you the flowers? Red?"

"Oh. No, it was my boss. Apparently I qualify as married to the paper and he thought I deserved some flowers from my spouse on Valentine's Day." Looking over her shoulder at him as she slipped her heels off, she smirked, "I'm not sure how I feel about that exactly, but I am a sucker for lilies."

He smiled back at her but it was pained and quickly faded.

Frowning, she took a step closer, searching his face beneath his hat. The left side was badly bruised again, a cut on his chin and a little bit of blood running down from a nick on his forehead. His knuckles were as bad as always and his fingers were twitching with the nervous energy he was filled with unless he was holding a cup of black coffee in his hands…or a gun.

His faraway gaze zeroed back in on her at the movement, but she didn't move away. Almost immediately, his eyes flickered away, looking at everything but her and the switching of roles wasn't lost on her. He was the one who stared unyieldingly, steadfast and sturdy until she gathered her courage from him. She took one more step toward him, close enough that he couldn't ignore her.

Reaching out and resting her hand on his forearm, she asked gently, "Frank, what's wrong?"

He blinked furiously for a few seconds, still avoiding her gaze, until she tugged on his arm. Her thumb had started rubbing back and forth on his sleeve and he stared at it until she prodded, "Frank, come on. Talk to me. Please."

"I…I wasn't home last Valentine's Day. I didn't get to give her flowers. Not roses because she thought they were unoriginal and never carnations because they were for prom night corsages, not a grown fucking woman who'd had two kids." She couldn't help but smile at the fond exasperation in his voice before he plunged on, "I didn't get to take her to the Mexican place she loved. I didn't get to figure out a way to get the kids out of the house on a week night. I wasn't there to hear my little girl insist on making the stupid pink cookies that come in a roll. I didn't get to hear my son complaining about how the whole thing was stupid and so were girls. He-He'd cringe and screw up his face every time I kissed my wife. He was in that phase. She wore a red dress every year. She only did it because I liked it. She didn't even really like red, just liked the way I looked at her in it. I-I didn't get to do any of that and now this year it's too late."

She could see the panic on his face, the all-consuming terror that what he had left of his family, his memories were slipping through his fingers. She was almost positive that the catch in her throat was visible and she didn't think the tragedy that was Frank Castle's family would ever not reach into her chest, take her heart in its claws, and squeeze until she was leaking tears at the pain of it.

Blinking against her own tears, words started coming out, "There's…There's a shady and probably not up to code Mexican place around the corner. C-Come have an enchilada or something with me and tell me about her. H-How did the two of you meet? How long were you together? What was she like? Everything you can remember."

For a long moment, he didn't answer, just stood there with increasingly shallow breathing and tears running down his face.

"Okay." He ran a hand down his face, blinking more and still staring at her hand on his arm. He glanced from it to her face and then nodded, "Okay."

She smiled in what she hoped was an encouraging way, "Okay. J-Just let me throw on some different shoes."

After running around Hell's Kitchen all day, she wouldn't have minded changing her clothes, but the thought didn't even garner an honorable mention as she squeezed his arm one last time and hurried over to her shoe mat. Leaving her heels where she'd dropped them to be dealt with at another time, she slipped her feet into the pair of flats she usually did her laundry in. The battered slip-ons were about ten years old and their stripes didn't match her work clothes, but she didn't really care.

Pushing her hair back, she smiled at him again. "Ready?"

Her body had been hesitating as she stood there, her hand wanting to reach out and take his arm, give him just a little bit of physical reassurance. When he gave an almost imperceptible nod, her hand moved. So lightly she was hardly even holding on at all, she took his upper arm in her fingers and opened the door for them both.

The restaurant was perhaps half-filled, most of the patrons watching an old soccer game on the single television. With a smile she hoped would outweigh Frank's intimidating space beside her, she greeted the middle-aged woman at the counter in Spanish. She wasn't a frequent customer, but she supposed the blonde who spoke fluent if hesitant Spanish was memorable when the woman greeted her by name and pointed them toward any of the empty tables.

Thanking her, she pulled Frank along with her, stopping at the booth farthest in the back with the wall behind it. It was the booth he'd chosen when they stopped at that diner and she guessed it was so he could have his back to a wall, safe and easily defendable.

He fixed her with one of his gazes again as she slipped into the opposite bench. She had yet to figure out what precisely he was looking for in her when he looked at her like that, but if nothing else it indicated he wasn't quite so deeply stuck in that hole inside him anymore.

The waitress woman appeared before either of them could say anything, directing her fast-paced Spanish to Karen. Ordering herself some tamales and a Coke, she looked to him. "What do you want? They've got just about everything. She recommends the tortas. Do you want a beer or…?"

"Whatever that was sounds good. And coffee. Just ask her to bring the pot, please."

She relayed that to the woman who smiled at them both before walking toward the swinging doors in the back and shouting to whoever was in charge of cooking. Karen couldn't help but laugh at the couple of swear words she caught.

"You speak Spanish?"

"Yeah, German sounded angry and French had too many vowels for my taste in school."

He chuckled at that, shrugging in agreement. "Fair enough."

The waitress returned with his pot of coffee and her soda before moving off toward the front again, yelling at one of the men spectating to get his feet off the bar.

Pouring himself a cup, Karen saw his hands steady, though his trigger finger continued to tap against the ceramic. She smiled faintly at it. It made her bizarrely happy when she noticed his quirks, when the man shone through whether he wanted it to or not. Twisting the top off her Coke, she looked up at him expectantly. "So what was she like? What was Maria like?"

He flinched when she said the name, but she held her gaze steady. Voice soft, she added, "I already know they had to be special. You wouldn't love them so much if they weren't. Who was the woman who could hurt you?"

Unsure which part had convinced him to talk to her, to open up, she let out a small sigh when he released a shaking breath, tapping faster on his coffee cup.

"Strong. She wouldn't take shit from anybody, me especially. We both knew I was the lucky son of a bitch who'd somehow convinced her to love me. She never let me be the asshole who forgot that." Her mouth pulled into a smile and he soon peeked one back at her. "You know, in-in all those old family tv shows, it's always 'your father will hear about this'. Shit, not in our house. I was the pushover. The kids both knew that they were going to have to deal with mom if shit went south. But at the same time she was the sweetest woman in the whole world, was the best mom any kid could ask for."

His voice got watery when he pressed on, "She-She'd make them some dessert that was their favorite every week. It didn't matter if they were in trouble or if she was busy or if they were annoying the shit out of her. There were always peanut butter cookies for Frank Jr. and that cake with the little colored pieces in the batter for my daughter. Always cupcakes and always with green frosting because dinosaurs. My daughter was just like her, just with a good bit of my crazy in her. It drove Maria up the wall and made her proud all at the same time."

Biting her lip to keep her smile from getting too big, she asked when he fell into a lull, "How'd you meet? Did you have one of those romantic comedy meetings that everybody makes you retell?"

For some reason, that sounded right to her. Even without ever having met Maria Castle, Karen had long ago realized that Frank and his wife were one of those everyday love stories that were always so much better than any movie or book because they were real and raw and perfect in their own fractured ways.

"No," he laughed, pouring his second cup of coffee. "My best friend and hers started dating. They always dragged the two of us along, trying to multitask spending time with each other and time with their friends. Annoyed the shit out of both of us until we became friends. We left them to make out in movies and went out with each other instead. Six months later they were broken up and we were together. Rest is history. There was no way I could've stayed just friends with her. She was too amazing. I was a goner from the beginning."

"When did you know?" Karen paused when the waitress came back with their plates. Thanking her, she waited until she'd gone back to the bar before adding, "People always say that you just 'know'."

He stared dubiously at his food with a raised eyebrow before answering, "You do, usually not right at that moment, but you look back and can say exactly when you figured it out. I knew when she asked me why the fuck I hadn't gotten around to asking her out yet. She was a catch and was fun to be with and nice to look at if she said so herself and I needed to get off my ass. Shit, I would've asked her to marry me right that second if I could've. I asked her to dinner instead."

As she snickered lightly into her first forkful of tamale, he demanded, "What the hell is this exactly?"

"It's a torta. Think of it as a Mexican steak sandwich. It's got lettuce and tomato and onion and whatnot." He poked at the bun a little, still unsure, and she rolled her eyes, "Here, you can have my tamales instead if you want. They're good."

"What the hell's a tamale?"

"I thought you said you took her to a Mexican restaurant. What did you even eat?"

"Tacos."

"Jesus," she sighed in exasperation that felt strangely refreshing. "Take a bite of both and I'll eat whichever one you don't want to. Tacos, Frank? Honestly."

He gave her that look for a moment while smirking at her, only breaking it when she pushed her plate toward him.

He wound up taking her tamales and she ate the torta without complaint and they fell into silence for the most part. She didn't mind it. She'd found that she didn't with Frank. She only had one other time to compare it to during which she hadn't been scared out of her mind or looking at him in an orange jumpsuit, but it was enough. It wasn't one of those things she needed prolonged exposure to know was good for her.

She was picking at the last pieces of tomato that had fallen onto her plate when he gently nudged her foot under the table. When she looked up at him, he nodded toward one of the men at the bar. He was no longer watching the game and once Frank pointed him out, she felt the chills sliding down her back at a man looking at her that way.

"What's he saying?"

Somewhat flustered, she paused to listen harder. The man obviously thought she didn't understand Spanish or he would've lowered his voice a little more. "Uh, well, he's saying some very imaginative things about my legs that I'm not going to translate. He's got a thing for blonde bitc—women. He's annoyed that you're sitting with me and thinks…Okay, that's enough of that shit."

Turning in her bench, Karen shouted at the man in Spanish until the waitress was joining her in scolding him and his friends were chuckling to themselves. Red in the face, he hurriedly apologized before turning in his seat to squarely face the game again. She heard a few mutters about crazy gringas but she let them go.

When she turned back, Frank was smirking at her beneath his hat.

Raising an eyebrow, she queried warily, "What?"

He shrugged innocently, "Nothing. Nothing at all."

"Liar." He just flashed a grin at her again and she knew he was internally laughing at seeing her having tirades in Spanish. Narrowing her eyes, she got up, "Come on, taco man. I'm done if you are."

"Yes, ma'am. Whatever you say."

"Shut up."

"Yes, ma'am."

She only barely reined in the urge to smack his arm. Catching the waitress's eye and then putting a twenty on the table once she nodded, Karen glared at him at her shoulder, "Wow, he was right. I never would've thought."

"Who was?"

"The colonel." He stiffened slightly, but she ignored it because she wasn't taking her thought where he probably thought she was. "He said you were funny."

Though she didn't look back, she could hear, could feel, him start laughing beside her as they walked out onto the street again. Her resolve faltered almost immediately. It was too rare a sight, too precious to keep her eyes forward. Much like his tears, Frank's smile was infectious because just like his tears it was almost impossibly genuine.

As they walked, she was close enough that she could feel the short shotgun swaying beneath his jacket. She'd wondered what he'd been carrying and she felt better for it. Not for her own sake, but for his. Hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the cold, he walked her up to her apartment, pausing at the door when she opened it and did her initial cautious look around, hand on her gun inside her bag. Dropping her keys on the counter, peeling off her coat, she glanced at him. He was staring and as usual, she wasn't sure at what.

The silence aside from her movements stayed until he asked gently with that voice that made her want to crumple to the floor and sob because he'd understand and it wouldn't have to be a dark and terrible secret she kept alone anymore, "Tonight better?"

If he hadn't asked in that voice, she wouldn't have immediately understood what he meant. Pursing her lips as the initial barrage of tears started, pain coiling in her chest and throat, she shook her head. No, not yet. "N-Not tonight."

"Okay."

Somehow, she knew he wasn't going to stay any longer, that he had 'work' to do. Smiling against the tears welling in her eyes that she'd vigorously wash away in the sink, she said simply, "Happy Valentine's Day, Frank."

"Thank you, ma'am, for helping me remember."

Her voice was still a little shaky and her eyes watery, but she managed a more solid smile at the words she'd heard what felt like years before. "You don't have to thank me for that. You don't thank friends for that."

He peeked that small, almost disbelieving smile up at her when he said, "Good night, Karen."

"Stay safe, Frank," she replied as she stepped up to the door, ready to lock it behind him.

"Yes, ma'am." He said in in the teasing way he had last time, the way he'd laughed at her in the restaurant, but it was replaced by something else when he added, "See you soon."

With a nod, she shut the door and locked it with both deadbolts. She didn't hear the heavy cadence of his steps until the second one had slid into place.

The next week when she got home from work at half past dead tired and ready to singlehandedly murder the loan shark targeting single moms she was chasing, she heard them again as she put the key into her apartment building's front door. She made Frank and herself tacos for late dinner as he showered off the blood and grime of the city and then sat watching late night television, no longer so tired down to her marrow. That night wasn't the one either. He appeared the week after, too. A different day, but he was there just the same.


A/N: Short note I forgot last time, I've never read the comics or anything, so this is Netflix universe only. Also, I don't know where exactly they're going with whatever was in that news article on Ben's desk that freaked Karen out when she found it. I don't know, so I'm not going to touch it. I sort of figure that unloading a clip into a man threatening to kill everyone you love sitting less than three feet away is enough for Karen to deal with at the moment.

So, thanks so much for reading, review if the fancy takes you (I do answer them), and I hope you enjoyed. :)