X X X
Bravura
"I will tell you a story every night before bed."
X X X
When Gwen thinks back on her childhood, her earliest memory is of Mary, and learning how to skip down the marble hallway of her parents' home. Most all of the children Gwen played with as a child had nannies, and she was no exception. Her parents had found Mary through a friend of a friend, a quiet woman in her forties who had no children of her own - no family at all, that she spoke of - and came highly recommended when dealing with "precocious toddlers."
Gwen never thought of herself as precocious, though in hindsight, she supposes she was. Whenever her parents hosted parties at their house, the one they lived in before moving to the top floor condo on 75th East, she had always refused to wear her pre-chosen outfit for more than an hour. One time, just before her sixth birthday, she had marched right down the stairs in a polka dotted swimsuit and red rain galoshes; it was mid spring.
This was when Mary took her by the hand, a smile crinkling the sides of her light blue eyes, and led Gwen back upstairs. They left behind the sounds of the party and her mother's disapproval retreating to the upstairs floor, Gwen's sanctuary. She and Mary spent the rest of the evening reading stories from Gwen's bookshelf, a quite impressive collection, and Gwen asked her all the questions that her mother never had time for.
"Why didn't the princess ever escape the tower on her own?" Gwen wondered aloud, tilting her head up at her nanny. The two sat on Gwen's bed, she in Mary's lap, her caregiver's gentle arms wrapped around her. The pages of the storybook lay splayed out before them.
"She needed help," Mary told her. "Even the heroines of the story need a little help sometimes."
Mary's voice was always quiet, soft and ever patient, and it always made Gwen smile. It was nothing like her mother's voice, or her father's.
"What's a hare-oh-in?" Gwen asked, her nose crinkling in confusion.
"She's the main character in the story," Mary replied, and gave Gwen a little squeeze with her arms. "The one you follow and go on the adventure with. She's the one who fights for her happily ever after."
Gwen had thought about this for a moment. Glancing back down at the illustration on the pages, her young mind tried to work out what her nanny was telling her. One thing didn't add up.
"She alwaysgets her happily ever after?" Gwen finally asked, skeptical. She wasn't skeptical of much at that age, but when she sensed something fishy, she didn't hold back in voicing her doubts.
Something had passed over Mary's face then, and, young as she was, Gwen hadn't understood - the fleeting sadness - but it was gone in the next moment, and her nanny nodded, always with that warm, reassuring smile.
"If she fights, and doesn't give up," Mary whispered to her, a treasured secret, "She always will." Gwen never questioned her on the matter again.
But when the elevator doors open to reveal the chaos in the foyer, Gwen thinks for a moment on how utterly ugly the ending to this night is. She has to force herself not to retch right on the spot; the stench of blood and chemicals and bodies is so overwhelming. The air conditioning wasn't running during the party, and with all the drinking and dancing, the temperature had risen considerably throughout the night.
Now, this unfortunate fact seems to exacerbate the smells around her. Black tarps are draped delicately over still, lifeless forms. She can picture the possible faces of those beneath and it makes her heart sink all the way down to her stomach. A camera flash goes off as a forensics investigator documents every detail of the scene before him; the destroyed tables, chairs - even a chandelier that lay shattered at the center of the crowded foyer. It's crowded for a very different reason now.
"This way," she hears the cop say next to her, the one whose jacket she's wearing.
He presses his hand to her back to gently urge her on, and she doesn't fight it. He leads her towards the entrance, staying on her left and blocking most of her view of the carnage. When she turns to follow the natural curve of the wall, however, she catches sight of a tarp half the size of all the others on the floor, and freezes.
There were four children at the party. It had been Gwen's job to meet and greet all of them as their parents were whisked away to some important introduction or other, and Gwen had been the one to encourage them to play hide and seek amongst the guests. She whispered to them of the secret stairwell behind the potted amber tree and the hidden alcoves tucked away off to the side. Nobody would find them there. . .
Gwen takes a step back and cuts behind the cop before he can react, quickly making her way to the small, black tarp. It might be Casey, the petite five-year-old with bouncing brunette curls, or Gianna, with her pale skin, freckles, and even paler blonde hair. She recalls the faces of the other two children - Thomas and Jackson - and her already sunken heart drops so low she's not sure if she'll be able to recover it any time soon.
She kneels, and her fingers reach out to touch the outline of a small nose and sharp curve of a chin, but a hand on hers stops her.
"You don't need to do this to yourself," the cop says quietly from beside her, his voice suddenly tight.
Something she hears in his tone makes her look at him. He's squatting beside her, a dark look in his eyes despite his stoic expression. She can see the buried hatred for what's been done, and feels her own anger bubble up within. Where were the kids' parents when the shooters broke in? Where the hell are they now? Her anger, however, slowly gives way to guilt as she looks back down at the tarp. The guilt is a creeping, painful ebb in the center of her chest.
Why hadn't she been there?
"What's your name?" the cop asks quietly.
She blinks, slightly jarred by the question. "Gwen Gallo," she answers after a beat.
He nods, and takes his hand from hers. She didn't realize he was still holding it.
"I'm John," he tells her, "John Blake." He pauses for a moment, then stands. His gaze drops back down to the body, but flickers up again to her and then to the entrance outside where she can see flashing blue and red lights, and the large, dark crimson form of a fire truck.
She doesn't see the anger in his eyes anymore, but she's sure it's still there. Fury like that doesn't just fade.
"There's nothing more we can do here, Gwen," Blake tells her finally, and she hears the note of sadness that's crept into his voice. He must be allowing her to hear it on purpose; he sounded so calm and level-headed on the top floor just moments earlier. "But you can help these people by telling me everything that happened tonight, and maybe that'll lead somewhere we can follow."
The words make sense when he says them to her, and for some reason, they make Gwen want to trust him immediately. She hasn't been around many cops in her lifetime (those aren't the kind of men that her father deals with) but this cop, John Blake, his words don't seem rehearsed or forced, and the anger. . .well, that certainly wasn't an act.
So she pulls his jacket around her shoulders tighter, and tells him, "Okay."
X X X
They walk out together in the bitingly cold Gotham night air, and Blake actually shivers from it. He's uncertain if it's because of what he just witnessed, or because the temperature is approaching freezing. He's leading the girl - Gwen - to a vacant ambulance off to the right, away from the gathering crowd, when a woman's voice cuts through the air.
"Please, that's my daughter! Right there, you have to let me through. Gwen!"
Blake's head snaps in the direction of the voice, and the girl beside him stops in her tracks the same time he does. He sees a woman just behind the barricade, struggling to move past the cop blocking her way; tall and slender in a glittering silver dress, auburn hair piled in a mess on the side of her head. He glances back at Gwen for confirmation, and she silently nods, hugging his jacket tighter around her still.
"We can meet her at the hospital, if you'd like," he offers.
Gwen looks surprised at that, but shakes her head. "Can I get a minute?"
"Sure," Blake replies, motioning for her to go to the barricade. They have all night to straighten out what happened and, quite frankly, he doesn't want to have to deal with a frantic mother berating him for keeping her from her daughter later on. His jacket is full enough of complaints already.
Blake watches the mother envelop his barefoot hostage victim in a bone-crushing hug. Words are exchanged, and Blake sees the woman's look of relief turn to annoyance and then resignation. Gwen's shoulders stiffen from underneath his jacket, and he wonders if she's finally going to collapse from all the stress of the night, or lash out in anger at her mother. Those seem to be the two roads hostage victims take, despair or anger. Victim or avenger.
He realizes, after a moment, that she's emulating neither reaction - at least, not for right now. The girl honestly seems more concerned with the dead bodies inside the building than her own well-being, and now she's pacifying her mother from going in to hysterics.
Shouldn't have left your daughter behind, Blake thinks, and he knows a glare is slipping through his carefully schooled features in the older woman's direction. The commotion around him - the cops, flashing lights, witnesses gathering on the street - all of it fades as he considers the fact that two children, one grown and one who won't ever grow again, were very likely left behind by their parents who were trying to save their own skin instead.
The very thought of it makes his fist clench. He pictures all the boys at the orphanage he grew up with, hollow from the inside out because of the actions (or inaction) of their parents, teaching all of them exactly how cold the world can be when you need its warmth the most. . .
"Hey, you okay?"
Her voice snaps Blake from his thoughts, and he realizes Gwen's standing there, studying him, head tilted to the side.
Blake shrugs automatically, slipping back into the practiced calm he's become so good at over the years.
"You shouldn't be the one having to ask me that," he tells her, walking towards the ambulance.
She falls in step beside him. "I shouldn't," she returns, and he sees her face soften, "but I am."
Blake's mouth quirks, and he uses the excuse of helping her into the ambulance to avoid answering her question. The paramedic nods to both of them, and begins down a checklist of questions directed towards Gwen as Blake closes the ambulance doors and sits down on the bench across from them.
X X X
"Blake, building's clear. We're headed to the precinct now," a voice comes over the radio clipped to the cop's vest.
The paramedic is applying butterfly stitches to Gwen's knee for a cut she doesn't even remember sustaining, and she forces herself to focus on Blake's face in an attempt to distract herself from the stinging pain.
"On my way to the hospital with the girl. We'll report to the precinct after she's cleared," Blake replies into the radio. "Mother's been notified," he says after a beat.
"Ten-four. What about the dad?" The male voice on the other end questions.
Gwen turns away at that. Her father was nowhere in sight when she walked out of the building, scared and freezing, wearing the jacket of a police officer she'd just met. He's never been the nurturing type, but Gwen is his only daughter and heir to the shadowed business he has built from nothing. If anything, he needs her to carry on the family trade, though the idea repulses her.
"All set," the paramedic tells her, leaning back and packing up his supplies. He moves to the front of the ambulance and takes the passenger seat, leaving Gwen and Blake alone in the back. They sit there, unsure for a moment, until Blake breaks the silence.
"I should've gotten you some shoes," he says, a little awkwardly.
Gwen's confused for a second, but then glances down. Sure enough, she is barefoot. She remembers now that she'd taken off her shoes earlier, when she first went up to the ninth floor, and ran into the cat. . .she curls her toes underneath her feet, and shakes her head.
"I'm sure that's the last thing you could be worrying about right now," she tells him, taking a deep, cleansing breath. The inside of the ambulance smells like metal and cleaning supplies, crisp and sterile. Nothing like the bloody foyer.
Blake tilts his head to the side, glances towards the paramedics up front, before his eyes are back on her.
"That's gotta be a first," he tells her, and she swears she senses the irony in his tone. "A victim worrying about me."
Gwen immediately tenses up at the term victim, and breaks eye contact with him. The bodies in the foyer. . .they are the victims. She's lucky she survied.
Clasping her hands underneath her knees, she leans forward slightly. She can feel the edges of the thick, winter jacket brush up against her bare calves, and notes the sounds of traffic rushing by just outside the confines of the ambulance.
When she looks back up at Blake, his expression is unreadable. She wonders if she's evoked the anger she saw before, but his look softens as he flicks his chin towards the stitches on her knee.
"Where'd you get that?" He asks, and his tone is noticeably warmer. It throws her, changing how his voice sounds so quickly, shifting emotions around like water over river rock. "Don't think it was from the hallway. . ." he trails off, as if thinking aloud.
Gwen debates for a moment whether or not to tell him the truth. She considers how much danger it'll put her in with the wrong people, if it'll lead to more questions which could involve her father, and then suddenly she stops herself.
She looks up to realize Blake is studying every emotion that's no doubt passing over her face, and feels the heat rise to her face, ashamed. There's a little boy or girl lying dead on the foyer floor, and she's wondering whether or not she should tell the truth.
She considers the possibility that it isn't just the situation making her nervous, that the actual cop sitting across from her has something to do with it, but she quickly dismisses the thought.
"The cat," Gwen finally tells him. "Did you know she wears steel-studded heels?"
His stoic mask slips for just a second, and she can see the genuine surprise on his features. Eyebrows knit in confusion, Blake shakes his head. "And how would you know that?" He inquires.
"Because I interrupted her," Gwen replies. She feels the nerves begin to settle in her stomach, and sits back. "Earlier, before the. . .shooting. She must have nicked me when she-" Gwen stops, her hand unconsciously going to her neck, just below her ear.
She sees the realization dawn on his face. "Knife?" He confirms quietly.
"How'd you know?" Gwen drops her hand to her side, suddenly self-conscious of the act.
She hears chatter come from the front of the ambulance, and realizes they're pulling into one of the emergency bays at Gotham General. The ambulance comes to a halt, and Blake's up before he can answer her question. He opens the ambulance doors and steps out, turning back around to hold his hand out for Gwen to take. She's curious to know if his mother taught him this, like Mary taught her how to be everything her parents refused to be.
There's a hint of a smile in his face as he finally replies, "Call it a hunch."
Gwen takes his hand as she steps down and out of the ambulance. Before she can register the nerves in her stomach again, Blake pulls his hand from hers and they walk towards the entrance, ambulance zooming off to some other emergency-ridden neighborhood of Gotham.
It's then that she takes note of the faint lines on his forehead, and the square angle of his jaw; dark brown eyes, slightly arched eyebrows. It seems ridiculous that the few required art classes she attended in college are resurfacing in her mind now, but she can't help but wonder if John Blake always looks so somber. He can't be much older than her, and while she isn't ignorant to the suffering of those in Gotham, he seems to be carrying more than his fair share of it on his shoulders.
As they walk through the automatic sliding doors of the hospital, she catches the quick flash of a smirk out of the corner of her eye.
"Known me less than an hour, and already you're trying to figure out what's wrong with me," he remarks, a subtle note of humor in his voice.
As horrible as the night has been, Gwen allows herself to smile, but keeps her eyes on the floor as she follows Blake to reception, and then down the winding white halls to their assigned room.
"You're doing the same, aren't you?" She returns as they approach Exam 3.
Blake presses down on the handle to the room, and pushes the door open against his back. The smirk is gone, but she can still see it in his eyes as he watches her walk in to the room and take a seat on the exam bed.
"Part of the job," he replies, almost mechanically.
Nothing he's said all night has so sounded automatic like that. The only reason - at least, she hopes the only reason - she has been so honest with him is because of how honest he seems to be in return. It's a little less difficult, less daunting, to offer up a piece of yourself when the other person is doing the same.
Gwen looks at Blake as he settles into a chair in the corner of the exam room. She catches his eye and shakes her head once, a slight gesture.
I don't buy it, she thinks and, for a second, she sees uncertainty flash across his face, and she thinks of Mary.
Even the hero needs a little help sometimes.
