[for Selina]

[daretodo]

I’m still riding the adrenaline rush from a training session with Cap as I make my way back home. My t-shirt’s bunched into a ball in my hand, and I tip my face up to meet the sun through the trees. I wouldn’t say no to some rain to cool off, but the sky above me is clear.

Figures. When you want it to rain, there’s not a drop to be found.

I stop on the spot, taking in a deep breath — smelling the flowers, so to speak. When I look back ahead and see who’s coming down the boardwalk, my stomach flips, then drops out. There’s no room for a hasty exit, so I stand my ground, holding my empty hand palm out in a mocking gesture of surrender.

“I swear I’m not following you,” I tell one Selina Kyle. “It’s a free boardwalk.”

Comments

[daretodo]

I'm not expecting her to take me up on the offer, so when she does, I freeze. Letting out a slow, shaky breath, I remind myself -- a couple of times -- that we've danced. There was a lot more contact going on then.

"Right."

There was also a lot more clothing. She had her dress. I had a shirt. We were appropriately attired for two near-strangers. This, though, this is a little different. I think of anything else than what I'm about to do as I take the neosporin and get to work, quickly and efficiently. I tell myself I imagine the little shiver that goes down my spine when I first touch her bare skin, pulling back the moment I'm done applying the bandage.

Bad. Idea.

"There. Done."

[purrloined]

"Thank you," she says again, and lets her hair down. She turns on the rock, a simple, graceful pivot that leaves her cross legged and looking him over.

"How about you?"

[daretodo]

"I'm fine."

It's a reflex at this point, telling people I'm fine. Maybe we have something in common there, but I don't dwell on it for long. I just take up the tube of neosporin and start dabbing it over my own scrapes. I don't really care about adding more scars to my collection, but the tube's already out. Might as well use it.

"Klutz, remember? I've got practice."

[purrloined]

"If you're sure," she says, letting the offer stand. She doesn't necessarily foster feelings of obligation to people, but it's such an immediately available opportunity to repay a favor, she figures she'll offer.

[daretodo]

I look over her face, or at least the parts of it that aren't hidden behind her sunglasses. Instinct keeps telling me not to trust her.

I hold in a breath and hold out the tube, sliding the kit back over. I twist to give her access to the right arm.

"I dated a cat burglar once," I say, half to remind myself exactly why this is a terrible idea. "She tried to turn a new leaf. It never stuck."

[purrloined]

"Are you serious?" she asks, stopping in her cursory look over the back of his shoulder. Nothing seems too bad.

Her gaze narrows a little.

[daretodo]

I sigh, mentally kicking myself. I'd say I don't even know what I was thinking, but that much is obvious. I scoop up the kit under my arm, pressing curled fingers against my hairline in frustration.

"...forget it. I shouldn't've--"

[purrloined]

"I'm not judging your life choices, I just wouldn't have expected that given your general disdain for my person," Selina says mildly, then hesitates.

"Actually, if you tried to fix a thief that didn't want fixing and failed, that would entirely explain it."

[daretodo]

"Hey, I don't have disdain," I say, letting my hand fall back down. Distrust is not the same as disdain.

"You're the one with the insults about a socio-economic status that doesn't even matter here. The nicest thing you've said to me since we've met is that I wasn't boring you to death!"

[purrloined]

"You made it pretty clear you didn't want my type moving into the neighborhood," she says, but doesn't look exceptionally bothered by it.

"There's a little disdain. And socio-economic status always matters, Parker. You may speak the same language and get each other, but the world works differently for the people who were raised expecting it to go their way and the people who learned they had to make it go their way."

She absently brushes some sand off her thigh and doesn't shrug at him, exactly, but the set of her shoulders seems to imply it.

"Being nice isn't one of the skills I keep in my repertoire. You know why?" she asks, stepping forward and holding out the little tool from the kit that had the extendable blade in it, ostensible, she figured, for cutting gauze or thread. She'd removed it, idly, almost without thinking. She was giving it back.

"Because life doesn't give a damn about kindness. Thanks again."

[daretodo]

I blink at the tool sitting nicely in the palm of my hand, then back at Selina. I tuck it back where it belongs, trying to shake off the lingering and unsettling feeling of surprise.

Does it mean something that she gave it back? Am I reading too deeply into this?

"You're right. It doesn't." I've been dragged through the mud enough to believe that, just a little. I stare at her hard, my expression unreadable. "But I was maybe being a jerk about the neighborhood thing. You're as free to make a life here as anyone else." A beat, and then a brittle, bitter smile. "Until it all gets torn away."

[purrloined]

Freedom was quite the concept. It was a joke, really, her being there. Tabula Rasa, the blank slate, the thing she'd been working so hard for, for so long.

Only she didn't have one, if people knew her name and knew what she was. If that had followed her there. And anyway, it was one damn island she was stuck on. What good was freedom when you were literally trapped?

She tries not to think of the things she's done, that she'd had to do, to get her blank slate, to keep what excuse for a family she'd mustered safe. To save her own skin.

Peter Parker looks about as hunted as she feels.

"Then I'll avoid settling in. Thanks for the warning. I might owe you one." She turns and starts down the boardwalk, continuing the way she'd been originally going, and doesn't look back.