March

The low but persistent knocking woke Karen up from a dead sleep, one that only almost forty-eight hours of sleep deprivation could give her. Snorting awake, she was immediately upright and had her pistol in her hand, pointed at the door.

The click of the safety and her own ragged breathing was the only sound for a long moment.

Then his voice rumbled through the door. "Karen. Karen, open the door. It's me."

Heart racing but still drowsy, instinct hauled her out of bed and had her running to her door, hearing something in Frank's voice she hadn't before: pain. Not the kind that had to do with his family, either. The other kind, the physical kind.

Habit made her look through the peephole for all of a nanosecond before undoing her locks and hauling the door open.

"Oh my God."

Her grip on the door tightened as her knees weakened and the back of the hand holding her gun came up to press against her mouth. An initial glance at Frank was enough to have her stomach curling. She wasn't sure how much of her nausea was purely because of the blood and gore standing before her and how much was because it was Frank's blood and gore.

She didn't give herself long to dwell on it as she opened the door wider, gently ushering him in. With a swift look down the hall and toward the stairs, she quickly shut and locked the door once more. More than that, she had no idea what to do except for stare at him wide-eyed and dying on the inside.

From beneath his coat, his rifle slipped from his grip and she snatched at the bloody grip before it could clatter to the floor. There was blood and bits of hair and something mushy and greyish on the butt. She tried not to think about it as she leaned the weapon against her cabinets, put her pistol on the counter, and looked expectantly up at him.

He'd come to her for help and she was going to give as much of it as she could. He just had to tell her how.

"I-" he winced, the arm not held tightly to his chest going to his side. "I'm sorry. I would've taken care of it myself but I can't reach some of them. I'm sorry."

"No, no, i-it's fine. Just…"

She found herself having trouble making eye contact because her eyes were too busy seeking out all the blood and cuts and infant bruises and trying to keep herself from touching them. Finally, taking a deep breath that she immediately regretted as the smell of blood filled all five senses, she all but physically pulled herself together. Looking up at him, she said with a steady voice, "Just tell me what to do."

"Bathroom."

"Okay."

Karen tried to help him cross the space to her tiny bathroom, but she got the feeling he didn't really need it. He was too fucking stubborn to need help staying upright from anybody. Seeing him so clearly hurt and only having her to help him, the thought was actually incredibly comforting. It was nothing he couldn't handle. He just needed help to reach. His very life wasn't dangling from her shaking fingers.

Wordlessly, she helped him shed his coat and Kevlar once they were in the bathroom. With a grunt, he nodded to his coat, "The left inside pocket there's a first aid kit."

She pulled it out before putting the bloody parts of his uniform in the bottom of her shower. When she turned around, he was hissing as he peeled his long-sleeved thermal off his body. He somehow seemed bigger without all the layers, an even bigger mass of skin and muscle and Frank standing there dripping blood on the tile.

She took the shirt from his hands and put it in the shower, too. Setting the compact first aid kit that looked military issue on the toilet tank, she looked up at him and said somewhat stupidly, "You're tall."

When he raised an eyebrow at her, pained smirk on his face, and agreed with a flat 'yes, ma'am' she rolled her eyes and added while gesturing to the toilet, "You'll have to sit."

Eyebrow still raised, he looked dubiously from her to it. "How well do you do with blood? I need stitching…a lot of stitching."

For the first time, her eyes were drawn to the vicious, ragged cut that ran from his side to his back, leaking copious amounts of blood into the band of his pants. Something that tasted like coffee and the Indian take-out she'd had for dinner rose up in her throat.

Swallowing it down, she nodded, "Good point."

She tried to squeeze past him, inadvertently getting blood swiped all along the right side of the t-shirt she slept in. With all she had, she tried not to think about it or how vibrantly the red stuck out against the pale blue of the shirt.

Glancing at the assault rifle sitting silently, unassumingly in her kitchen, she grabbed the stool right beside it. For a moment she contemplated also grabbing the whiskey on the top of her fridge but decided against it. If he wanted it, he'd ask for it. Her hands were shaking badly enough without any extra help.

Frank was her friend and he needed help. She could fucking do this. She wasn't timid Karen who covered her mouth and averted her eyes. She might throw up a couple of times, quite possibly break down into tears at some point, but that didn't matter. She had a job to do.

Setting the stool down just outside the bathroom door, she slid back inside. Frank's large frame made it impossible not to brush against him again. But honestly, what was a little more blood?

Pulling her hair back, she grabbed the first aid kit as he pulled the stool in and hauled himself atop it with a groan. Unzipping the kit, she held it open to him, "Pick your poison?"

He smirked at her again before pointing a bloody finger to a curved needle and a length of thick, black thread beside it. "There should be gloves buried in there, too."

Scrubbing what blood was already on her hands, under her fingernails, off in the sink, she pulled the too-big black gloves on and pulled out the needle, threading it and knotting it at his instruction. Letting out a deep breath, she asked with a weak smile that was mostly for her benefit, "Do I need to hold it over a match or soak it in whisky or something?"

"No, I keep them sterilized." He brought his right arm away from his chest for the first time aside from undressing and held it up to her. Partway between his elbow and wrist, a large gouge was dribbling blood down over his wrist bone and dripping off his fingers. As he moved the limb, she could see muscles and tendons moving inside.

She blinked at it once and then twice. For a short second she thought she'd breathed through it. In a sudden rush, she knew she was wrong.

"Nope."

Holding her breath as her stomach mutinied, she put down the needle and tore the gloves off just before throwing up that coffee and Indian taste into her toilet. Bracing herself with both hands on the seat, she couldn't stop until her stomach was empty. Halfway through, she felt a warm, sticky, comforting hand on her back.

When she was finally through and she had spit the last of her vomit into the water and wiped off her mouth with toilet paper, she let out a deep breath. Flushing, she turned back to him and washed before putting the gloves back on. "Sorry. Okay, where was I?"

"It's okay." The stare he fixed her with stayed in his eyes even when he proffered his arm again and said gently, "Use one of the antiseptic wipes to get the extra blood out of the way."

She did and then took the needle back up. Glancing uncertainly from his wound to his eyes, she asked, "Do I just…stick it through?"

"Yeah, poke it through one side and use the curve to poke it through the other then pull." He added after he probably saw some of the sick hesitation in her eyes, "It's not gonna hurt me any more than the cut already did."

Nodding, she almost reached up to push her hair out of her face. She paused halfway there because her gloved hand was bloody and her hair was already back. The smirk he sent at her brought one out on her face before she leaned toward his arm. "Okay… Okay."

The first few stitches were the worst as she tried to keep whatever little bit was left still in her stomach where it was. His skin stretched more than she thought and, even though he never made more noise than a slightly sharper inhale, she was acutely aware of the fact she was sticking him with something sharp and then pulling it through his skin.

Usually she enjoyed the silence with him, but this time it was just buzzing in her ears alongside the metallic tang of blood in her nose. "So, um, you seem to know what you're doing. Do the Marines teach everybody how to do this?"

"Yes, ma'am." As strange as it was and as much as she wished he'd just call her by her name most of the time, wondered what he had against her name, the well-known phrase helped quiet her stomach. If Frank was calling her ma'am then things really were okay. "Though I've had quite a bit of practice. Never have learned to stay out of trouble."

Glancing up at him, she quirked a smile, "The understatement of the century goes to Frank Castle, ladies and gentlemen."

His laugh stayed in his throat so it wouldn't move his arm, but she could hear it for what it was. A few minutes later, he rumbled in his low voice, "How about you? Were you the type to get broken arms and shit when you were a kid?"

"Not quite," she replied with another smile, welcoming the distraction for the part of her brain not intensely focused in on sewing his skin back together, wiping the leaking blood away as needed. "I fell off my bike a lot. After the training wheels came off, my knees were in a constant state of scraped. I always went too fast down the hills and was too late with the brakes. I had this scar that was black from the asphalt for years."

Without looking up, she could hear the grin in his voice. "Frank Jr. was like that. He almost gave himself a concussion crashing into a car parked on the street when he was six."

She laughed, "I thought you said Lisa was the one who got your crazy. Crashing into cars sounds like your sort of crazy."

"Oh, she did. They both got it, he was just quieter about it, snuck it in when nobody was expecting it." He proceeded to tell her the story of the boy's fourth birthday when, after he blew out his candles, he took two big handfuls of his cake and started throwing like they were chocolate and frosting grenades.

Laughing so hard she was almost crying, she wiped her nose on the back of her wrist. "Okay, how do I tie it off?"

"Just loop it under and pull it tight." She did so and pulled her hands back slightly to show him her work. With a grunt, he nodded, "Good enough."

She snipped off the thread with the pair of scissors in the kit and immediately fell in to threading the needle again. After telling him to turn on the stool so his side and back were in the light more, she started the routine once more. Antiseptic wipe, soak up some of the overflowing blood with her closest hand towel, knot off the needle, and poke it through.

As she started the second stitch, she missed the conversation that kept her distracted. Not even entirely sure she wanted to know, she asked the first question that came to mind, "Were you just unlucky tonight or was…work worse than usual?"

Frank didn't answer right away and she knew he was pondering how much to tell her precisely. She knew he wouldn't lie to her, but at the same time the less she knew about specifics the better. She wasn't supposed to be spending at least one night a week cooking the Punisher dinner, let alone patching him up at three in the morning and knowing who did it to him. He was trying to keep her safe and it was with such a subtle touch that she didn't mind, actually appreciated it.

"I'll probably hear the specifics in the morning. The criminal element of Hell's Kitchen is as much a part of my job as yours."

That seemed to satisfy him when she met his gaze in the mirror. "No, there were just more of them. Came at me from a couple of sides instead of just lining up to get killed."

"People do that?" she asked with a frown.

He grunted a laugh, "You'd be surprised. I think it saves Red's life quite a bit. They see this guy who's famous for not killing and they try to take him on one at a time, prove they're badass."

"They must be slow on the uptake with you, then."

She still wasn't always one hundred percent sure what she felt about what he did, usually was lost somewhere in the grey of it, whether he should actually be in jail or if he was doing what the law couldn't manage, but he never lied to her about it, tried to hide it. Just like Matt, anything she said trying to convince him to stop wouldn't do any good, but, unlike Matt, Frank wasn't trying to bring her to his side. He was what he was, believed what he believed, and he afforded her the same right. She saw no reason to shy away from the very apparent, bloody truth in that moment just because she hadn't found a solid bit of moral ground to stand on.

He quirked a grin in response to hers and nodded, "Yes, ma'am."

Karen had one hand braced against his bruised back, pulling another stitch through, when she felt his voice rumble through his ribs and into her fingers. When she glanced up, he was staring at her in the mirror again. "You had to point that .380 at anyone lately?"

"Almost but no. Maybe in the next couple of days, though." She'd tried to keep her voice light, just like her thoughts whenever she considered it, but didn't quite manage. Nor did she manage to figure out why she was telling him in the first place. Answering his raised eyebrow, she added, "I'm working on an article about this group of Wall Street assholes. They come down here in their nice cars and beat the shit out of the nearest black prostitute they can get to go with them. The only thing I can figure is that they think they're in Grand Theft Auto or something. I've got all their names, where they work, how they all met at Yale. The police can't tie them to the crimes with enough physical proof to charge them, but I can print all that I know, warn people."

"Be careful."

She forced a smile, "Always am. That's why I got a new lock. Besides, I don't think they actually have the balls to do more than threaten me. I'm not exactly their type."

He didn't smile back and even as she directed her gaze back to the wound before her, she felt his gaze on her like a physical weight. She was readying herself for warnings, entreaties to take a less dangerous job, keep quiet and keep safe. They didn't come and she immediately realized that she shouldn't have expected them.

"You have enough bullets in there for all of them?"

No, not if she followed her previous method of emptying the whole damn clip into each chest, pausing after the first shot to make the instinctive, deep in her stomach decision to make damn fucking sure, to remove the threat, make sure she saw the life drain out of its eyes.

She'd stopped mid-stitch and she caught her chest constricting. Taking her free hand, she wiped at her forehead with the back and focused again.

"Yeah. There's only four of them. I'll be fine."

Silence descended and she knew what he was asking with his gaze. Tonight better? That was what he asked every time. But no, not yet.

She hated trying to pinpoint why she was so reluctant, especially when she knew, she knew, that she'd feel better afterward, that he'd understand. He'd look at her with those eyes she didn't have to explain anything to because he already got it. He'd say something that made her feel better, maybe even laugh, in that voice that made her jealous of his family. But she knew why she hadn't.

The secret, the dark and terrible secret that had blood on her soul, had been inside of her for so long, so long it was a part of her, like a tumor. But it was still a part of her. One she was ashamed of and scared of whenever she thought too long or too hard, but it was still her. It was her secret. If she let it go, let it out, gave it to Frank, would she crumble without it? Would there be this hole inside of her that couldn't be fixed? Would openly admitting that she was broken inside make it visible on the outside to the people who couldn't read her soul?

She wasn't ready to find out the answers.

"Not tonight, Frank."

"Okay."

She finished off his stitches, cutting the thread and wiping away the remaining blood. As she stood, setting the bloody needle on the corner of her sink, he nodded to the kit. "There's gauze and tape in there."

And just like that, the weight of her fear was gone. The weight of everything else was still there—blood in the air, bruises under her fingers, an assault rifle leaning against her cabinets, the probability that she'd be threatened for doing her job—but that one was gone and she let out a relieved breath because of it.

Pulling her gloves off so the gauze wouldn't be too bloody, she took the roll and started wrapping it around his arm. His side was next and she managed to tape on a few bandaged-sized layers. Setting her supplies on the sink, she took the moment to take stock of the rest of him. He had a cut along one side of his nose and both eyes would be black tomorrow, the right was swelling badly. His ribs were rather mottled, but the bruises looked a few days old. There were a couple of still bleeding nicks on his forehead and one across his eyebrow that she decided to butterfly bandage. His knuckles were their usual mess. And his hair was buzzed shorter than usual. It was still slightly longer on the top, sitting lightly on his forehead, but he'd clearly taken the time to clean it up since she last saw him.

Digging through the kit for the butterflies, she asked lightly, "You ever thought of wrapping your hands? Don't they hurt?"

"I never really feel it until afterwards and I don't want it to mess with my trigger finger."

"Oh, makes sense," she noted absently as she stepped in between his legs and wiped off the cut on his forehead. He'd asked for her help and she wasn't going to half-ass it. She was bandaging everything she could get her hands on. He stiffened slightly when she got that close, but she ignored it, along with the stare he was sending at her. Sitting on the stool he was at about eyelevel with her so that was a bit difficult.

Reaching behind her to grab them, she said as she unwrapped the bandages, trying to distract the both of them again, "You cut your hair."

"Yeah, was getting shaggy. I can't stand it when it touches my ears. Don't know how Red does it."

She laughed at that. Matt's hair wasn't even that long and she doubted Frank had actually felt his hair touch his ears in years. Pressing the butterflies to his skin, she smirked at him, "If Matt's shaggy, do I even want to know what you think about Foggy?"

"Hey, to each his own, ma'am, but I'm not saying he wouldn't benefit from a pair of clippers."

"Never mention that to him. He's very proud of his hair."

"Whatever floats his boat," he said with a shrug. "Long hair or not, he's a pretty damn good lawyer."

"Yeah. He is. I think he misses Matt, though. It was their dream since college, open up their own law firm and save the downtrodden, fight for the little guy."

Frank made a throaty noise of acknowledgement before he shrugged, "I guess Red only had time for doing that one way, huh."

"Something like that," she agreed. Throwing the wrappers in the trash, she took a step back and grabbed a new washcloth out of the cupboard. Nodding at his stitched-up arm, she asked, "You can't get those wet, right?"

"Probably shouldn't, no."

"Okay, hold still." Washcloth in hand, she ran it under the warm water and grabbed a bottle from the shelf in her shower. She raised an eyebrow and fixed him with a look immediately after, "And don't whine about my body wash."

He smirked at her. "Wouldn't dream of it, ma'am."

"Smart ass."

Without another word, she started wiping the blood off his face, going over his bruises as gently as she could, washing it out of the scruff on his cheeks and chin. She'd finished with the left side and his eyes had blinked closed when he said roughly, "I can do this myself, Karen."

"Yeah, because you won't just make it worse with those knuckles bleeding all over the place." When he peeked an eye open at her, uncertainty and something else looking back at her, she added more softly, "Just let me help you, Frank."

A long, deep breath that showed just how tired he was, how dark the bags beneath his eyes that were hidden by bruises were, how he'd probably almost died that night, escaped from his throat along with "Yes, ma'am."

She smiled faintly at it and resumed her work, absently humming some song she couldn't name as she did. After getting the worst of the blood off his face and his massacred knuckles, she rinsed the washcloth and moved to his hair. In that moment, she was glad he wasn't 'shaggy' like Matt. Though, she wasn't sure she'd like him shaggy at all. It just wouldn't fit him.

She was right above his right temple when her finger sunk slightly. With a short shriek of surprise, she jerked her hand away as his eyes snapped open. She immediately felt guilty when she realized he'd basically been asleep. Holding her hands up as his eyes darted in all directions, one of his hands already on her waist to shove her behind him, she apologized breathlessly, "I'm sorry. Sorry. I just…"

She gently placed her fingertips back on the spot, rubbing her thumb over it a few times. "…I think I just found the bullet hole in your skull."

Embarrassed, she sent him an apologetic smile, "I wasn't expecting it."

He grunted, giving as much of a yawn as she'd ever seen from him as he rubbed a hand down his face. "Yeah, I never do either. I've got it from here. Thank you."

"Okay. I'll try and find something that might fit you."

"I just needed stitching, ma'am. I'll be fine."

Sighing, she glanced at the clock on her microwave. It was going on four. She had to be at the paper in four hours unless she decided to call in, which wouldn't sound like a terrible idea if she didn't have a mandatory staff meeting. She also had an assault rifle covered in blood and brain matter in her kitchen, her shower was filled with blood-soaked clothes and body armor, and she had a wounded Punisher sitting in her bathroom.

Whether or not she'd get anymore sleep was already iffy at best, but if he left, she'd just spend the rest of the night worrying. That was a certainty.

"You've got a hole in your arm and across your back and I'm not sure you're going to be able to see out of your right eye in the morning. Frank, just…stay. Please."

He stared at her with that look she didn't understand and she kept eye contact, but she knew that if he stayed quiet for too long she'd break down and say that she'd worry about him, that she cared, that she'd stood on a dock next to a burning ship once and thought he was dead. She hadn't liked the feeling and she wanted to avoid it tonight, just flesh wounds or not.

"Alright."

She probably should've said thank you, but she just gave a grateful nod and handed him the washcloth. Squeezing past him got more blood onto her pajamas that wouldn't come out, but she was far beyond caring. Closing the door behind her, she peeled her shirt, pajama pants, and underwear all off and shoved them into her trash can. She'd take it out on her way to work. Pulling out something new, she slipped into the clothes before starting to rummage in the farthest reaches of her drawers for something, anything, that might fit him.

Karen had a penchant for sleeping in oversized t-shirts, so she easily found an XL that would hopefully stretch across his chest. Forgotten and probably just thrown in a bag during her hasty move, she almost squealed in happiness when she found the pair of men's sweatpants in the very back. She honestly couldn't remember where she'd gotten them, whose they'd been—one night stands weren't exactly a habit of hers, but she'd had a couple, especially when she first came to the city and was lonely—but they would work. They might be a tad bit short, but he'd survive.

Balling the clothes up, she cracked the bathroom door and held them out. Their weight left her hand and she closed the door once more. She fought a yawn for a moment before padding over to the kitchen. Frank's rifle was still sitting there, quiet and unassuming and so damned terrifying at the same time. A small bloody pool had formed at its base.

Glancing back at the bathroom door, she heard the sink running. She'd gotten most of the blood from his shoulders up taken care of, but there was plenty more. It would probably take him a while. She might as well do something useful.

She poured herself a cup of her coffee from the previous morning and grabbed the roll of paper towels. Sinking to the floor, she took a long swig of the cold, bitter liquid before tearing off a couple of sheets and pulling the rifle into her lap, careful to keep the blood as far away from her as she could and making special note of the safety being on.

Some part of her knew that she should be angry, annoyed, outraged that Frank had brought this to her doorstep. But she wasn't.

She could fight herself on the morality of what he did every single day for the rest of her life and she knew that wouldn't keep her from wanting to be his friend, wanting to be in his life and have him in hers. She'd never set out to stand beside him and pull triggers of her own, but she'd always want to help. She wanted him to be safe. She wanted him to think about his family with that grin on his face instead of the tears. She wanted him to remain more Frank Castle than the Punisher. And somewhat more selfishly, she wanted to keep him around to stare into her soul and understand her even when she just kept saying 'not tonight.'

If all of that meant she sat on her kitchen floor in the wee hours of the morning and cleaned blood off of the butt of his rifle because it was getting on her floor, then it was something she could do. He'd never ask it of her. She knew that, knew it, and somehow that made it that much easier to do.

The worst of the blood was gone and she'd started on the floor when the bathroom door quietly clicked open. She rose and looked at him standing awkwardly in the doorway. He looked at her with that look of confused annoyance, "I don't wear sweatpants."

Without warning, laughter bubbled up from her stomach and escaped before she could stop it. Raising an eyebrow when she finally got her breath back, she simply said, "Well, you'll have to rough it for tonight, Marine."

She could see the urge in his eyes to reply with his usual snarky 'yes, ma'am,' but she beat him to it. Nodding at it, she offered, "You can have the bed. I have to be up in a few hours anyway."

"It's your bed."

"You're injured and have fresh stitches."

"I'll get blood on it."

"That's why you washed."

They stared at one another for a few more breaths before she knew she wasn't going to win going her current road. Pushing her fingers through her hair, she yawned as she looked to the microwave clock once more. Though there was nothing wrong with her couch, her bed sounded a hundred times better. It wasn't like either of them was going to 'try something' anyway.

Fixing him with a flat look, she offered bluntly, "It's a queen bed. I hadn't slept in two days before tonight, you were literally torn open earlier, and it'll fit both of us and we can sleep." When he hesitated, she added, "I'll just be up cleaning the bathroom if either of us is on the couch."

Though he looked distinctly displeased, he shuffled across the space with a slight limp she hadn't noticed earlier. For the life of her, she did her best not to show that she was feeling awkward as all hell when she brought her pistol, laid it on her nightstand, and crawled beneath her covers.

She made sure to stay very rigidly to her side as Frank basically collapsed beside her, letting out a low, pained groan as he finally lay down. When she went to fleetingly glance over at him, he was already looking at her. Much like in the bathroom, just how very tired he felt was painfully clear.

"It's a nice bed," he noted.

Laughing lightly, she smiled, "Good night, Frank."

"Good night, ma'am."

When Karen woke up in the morning, Frank was still dead to the world and she made sure not to wake him. With a small sigh, she decided to deal with the shower and rest of the bloody mess in her bathroom when she came home from work. Moving as quietly as she could, she got ready and made herself her usual breakfast of yogurt and coffee so black it warmed her blood.

She made sure the pot was still on the warmer and a clean mug was next to it when she locked her two deadbolts and made for her office.

When she came home, her bed was made, her shower spotless, and all her trash taken out. She was still smiling widely, just happy down to her soul, when she picked up the call from Foggy and agreed to go out for dinner and drinks half an hour later.

A/N: So, I hope FF gets this posted correctly today (I had some issues yesterday), but here's hoping. Thanks so much for reading, review if the desire takes you (I love hearing people's thoughts), and I hope you enjoyed. :) Until tomorrow!