Bedside Manner [Mary-Lou]

[Dick Grayson]

He should have been able to get this out of his head. Honestly, this was no different than any other time he slipped past some cop and saved their ass. He hadn’t cared before. He shouldn’t start now. This was not only a smidgeon of a stupid idea, it was a colossal one. Sadly, he was not only a crooked cop but a masked vigilante. Stupidity seemed to flow in spades. So as he swung from one fire escape ladder to another, all he could really think of is why he was doing this. All of it, after all, was screaming, yowling, shrieking, and any other synonym for yelling to get caught. Still, he continued his climb.

It had been a good week since the Salvatore incident and probably a bit longer than he’d liked. He’d made a visit to the hospital as Dick. But now was time for the real test. At this point Nightwing made a mental note to visit Mary-Lou White. One part to see if she was okay (because his more timid visit hadn’t been enough it seemed) but another part because he wanted, and needed, to know just what all she’d shared about her injuries.

He rattled off her apartment number in her head and found the window. The rain pelting down against his dark cloaked frame. The water slipping from along his hood to drop off and crash into the bridge of his masked nose. You’re being careless, Grayson, he snarled in the back of his head. You’re going to get us found out. Killed. Then what? Then how’re you going to stop all of this?! He tried to overpower his logical side yet again as he pulled a knife and worked on the seems of the window’s frame.

He harshly, yet softly, snickered as the window gave way enough to pop up a bit from his prodding. He lifted it open and slipped inside; ignoring the cold he felt when the heat in the apartment hit him. His jaw clenched as he did his best not to shiver and he pocketed his knife and took a look around in the darkness of the place. Perhaps she was asleep. Perhaps she was out. Perhaps she was dead. The options whirred through his mind as he debated on taking another step forward. Instead he leaned back against the windowsill he’d just broken an entry at and waited.

[Mary-Lou White]

Mary-Lou White was not asleep, nor was she out or dead. Her roomie had gone out to some fabulous thing, though, and while Mary-Lou had politely waved off the invitation to join her the blonde wasn’t particularly thrilled to be at home on a Friday night. She was curled up on her small plush couch on her side, her bandaged right arm cradled to her body protectively. They had gotten out the bullet of course and technically after the stitches healed in a few weeks she’d be no more worse for wear than a scar. But still. She had been set up, and that was the most irritating thing to the young detective.

Who had it been? She had trusted each and every cop that had hands in that sting. She had coffee with them, asked about their families. It was very disillusioning to think that one of them wanted her dead for nothing more than the fact that she was on the true right side of Gotham’s law. There were other things about that night that she remembered; fuzzy things involving the strange masked man she had met on another occasion when she’d been in danger. Who was he, and how did he seem to know when she was in danger? He wasn’t dressed like Batman or she might have made that connection. But, whoever he was, he was the hero of the series When Dirty Cops Attack.

Her left arm flopped out over the edge of the couch, the remote she held in it weighting it towards the floor. Pressing a button, she began to flick through channels without interest, only stopping when a black and white picture of Jerry Lewis in a lab coat and ridiculous horn-rimmed glasses stood out to her. With a fond smile she settled again, letting go of the tension that had started building up in her at the disconcerting thoughts revolving around her mortality. The Nutty Professor wasn’t a very fitting term for the scientist that had come breezing into her life, but she did think he would fill a lab coat nicely.

Still smiling, Mary-Lou snuggled up against her favourite couch cushion and sighed. If she wasn’t able to do anything else for herself during the next few weeks until she was healed, at least she could catch up on her classic film watching. The young woman was non the wiser of the masked vigilante breaking in through her window, but one thing was definitely certain. There were no bad cops in her apartment tonight!

[Dick Grayson]

That would be a very bad assumption. For a few more moments, Nightwing paused; relinquishing his desire to move for his need to gain his bearings. He knew the apartment briefly from a previous visit sans mask and hood. He did not know it without light. But as he tried to focus he caught the sound of the TV. Taking in a deep breath, he quietly navigated down the hall to where he heard the noise.

There she was. Just watching television. It almost seemed like it hadn’t happened. He wished it hadn’t to her. Any other cop he knew on the force it really would have been a toss up as to if he would have given much of a damn. But twice in a row now Nightwing had yanked her out of trouble and twice in a row he found himself attached. The real question to him was why she was suddenly such a target and why Dick Grayson couldn’t just let this go. As he watched her watch the screen he contemplated leaving out the window; the patter of the rain was still consistent, nothing he hadn’t navigated through before. The niggling in the back of his head was different though.

“White,” he said in attempt to make his presence known as he walked in. “We need to talk.”

Wit had seemingly escaped him for the evening. Probably from resisting the urge to let his teeth chatter from being out in the rain. Regardless, his face remained stoic as he approached until he was standing a few feet from the couch. He wished there was something better to say. But, like always, Nightwing was straight to the point and not really willing to waste time with pleasantries.

[Mary-Lou White]

Somehow smiling, laying on the couch in her cute (and brief) pink filly pyjamas and watching an old movie for Mary-Lou equated to trouble. She had been so comfortable, so content in her apartment that she had never contemplated the fact that someone might ever break in. Even when she'd taken in the Commissioner's daughter as her roomie the blonde hadn't stopped to think that perhaps she was placing herself slightly more directly into the line of fire. In fact, until she heard a familiar, harshly gravelled voice from the end of the couch.

With a loud squeal of fright Mary-Lou attempted to leap up off the sofa from her ultimately relaxed position. The result was her tumbling to the floor in a heap of cushions and a flash of pink material. She banged her bandaged arm on the coffee table as she went down, grunting at the pain before she rolled over onto her stomach. From here she quickly lifted herself into a crouch, the coffee table laden with various items of the junk food persuasion the only barrier between half-naked her and the mysterious person who had broken into her apartment.

It was only now, as she looked up at him silhouetted against the light from her kitchen behind him, that Mary-Lou truly recognised who he was. She didn't have the strength to move; that and her arm was killing her, but right then she didn't care. “What the hell are you doing here?” she demanded, managing to sound as pissed off as the rather mild blonde ever got. “And don't you knock like normal people?”

[Dick Grayson]

Nightwing’s eyes narrowed; too focused to really let Dick Grayson fret about the fact that he hadn’t even remembered if she were decent. Terrible timing, but what would he have expected. She was supposed to be resting. His features creased into a more grave expression than before when she fell. Was it a tad comical with the slight squeal of danger and the stumble? Yes. Dick Grayson would have probably cracked up a bit and helped her. This was a different matter. Dick’s visiting hours were over and Nightwing was working on his own time now.

“Coming here to find out who apparently wants you dead.” He was blunt. But at this point, how could he not be? “And I go around in black with a mask taking out mobsters like some fucking comic book. You tell me if I do anything like normal people, White.” Perhaps it was a little harsher but honestly, as Nightwing, sarcasm was probably a bad idea and most likely a dead giveaway. With that, he walked over and picked her up and tenderly placed her back on the couch; not lingering long enough to think on the gesture or even to look at her through Dick Grayson’s eyes. He was getting better at it.

“Either you have the worst luck I’ve ever seen or someone’s out to get you.”

[Mary-Lou White]

At the first words from the mysterious stranger's mouth, Mary-Lou was shocked. Talk about not being the type to sugar-coat things! She frowned, lending her glare a seriousness that looked more than a little silly on her. She stayed where she was, staring up at him as he continued on his Journey of Painful Honesty. It bugged her that he pointed out things that she already knew in a way that made her seem stupid. Maybe he was just like the rest of the guys down at MCU. He just thought she was some ditz with a badge.

Why did he even care if she got killed, anyway? She didn't know him, even if he did happen to know her name, where she lived and probably how she liked her coffee. When he started towards her she flinched, not quite knowing what to expect. He had saved her life in that dive bar, but home invasion and telling someone how things really were kind of made her think he hated her anyway. So why would he save someone's life if he thought they were a waste of space.

Instead of hitting her or tazering her or cuffing her to her coffee table with her good arm, though, he slipped his arms around her in a slow, careful manner. She was in no position to argue, but the way his cold, wet clothes surrounded her sent an immediate chill through her bones. Freezeframe. Her blue gaze coasted over the sections of his chiselled features that weren't covered by his mask and his hood, searching for anything that might give her a clue to his real identity. She remembered that he had told her once to call him Nightwing, and she almost smiled at the memory before she snuffed her amusement out like a flirty candle in a stiff breeze.

His hands were like ice, one clasping her leg and the other at her waist. She was glad when he released her to the warmer climate of the couch, but noticed the way he avoided making eye contact. She remained for a moment, not wanting to thank him as she should and partly wanting to go off on him for being there in the first place. Three meetings in as many months. The first two times, she had nearly been killed. She didn't want Mario Falcone busting up in her place and putting a cap in her ass tonight, thank you very much.

The thought of the smooth criminal she had encountered thanks to Johnson sent a chill through her spine that even the comfort of her familiar surroundings couldn't stave off. His dark, dark eyes burning into hers, cruising the shape of her neck and the neckline of her shirt. She shuddered and stood defiantly, effectively ridding herself of those memories for the time being.

“Well, I sure as heck don't know why they would even bother!” she cried, throwing up her good arm in exasperation and regretting it the next minute as the pain from her most recent bump shot up to her shoulder from her elbow. “It's not like I'm a real Detective anyway. I'm just there to 'get the coffee and provide eye candy',” she added, levelling her eyes at Nightwing and doing a rather good impression of Johnson in the bargain. Without another word, she stalked off into the kitchen. He could crawl back out the window, for all she cared.

Clicking on the overhead, Mary-Lou made a beeline for the whiskey she and Susie hadn't quite managed to finish off the other night. It seemed like years ago, that night. Sitting here on her couch with her cousin watching a cheesy horror classic, eating junk and talking. Blinking back the tears of the truth she thought she had just delivered to whoever the heck that was leaving a watermark on her living room rug, Mary-Lou unscrewed the top of the bottle and took a swig. Gross. She took another straight away, and it still tasted disgusting but she it burned less. Another swig. Maybe if she drank enough and passed out he would just go away and she could pretend he was a figment of her imagination. Another swig. Did she really want to have pretend crazy people in masks in her living room?

With that sobering thought in mind, Mary-Lou strode back into the living room, the bottle still fixed to the hand of her good arm. She wanted to yell. She wanted to say something really hurtful to him and then tell him to get the hell out and leave her alone. But the bottom line was that he had saved her life, and she just really wasn't that type of girl besides. “Why did you just... leave me at the hospital?” she asked then, seeming more innocent than she really was. Like some kind of acid, Gotham had been eating away steadily at her innocence she she'd arrived. “Why do you even care if I live?”

[Dick Grayson]

Honestly, Dick Grayson would have flinched at his own words. The man usually had at least a way with words that lessened the blow. Usually humor was an excellent padding. Unfortunately, he had his mask on and his hood up. Humor was gone and the only thing that really emerged from his lips were harsh, biting, and almost sadistic in his tone. He hated that the woman he worked with for so long and considered to be one of the best cops in the whole damned force was someone who had to be at the sharp end of Nightwing’s pounding tone. The woman had been intersected him two times too many. There had to be something about this. A connection of sorts.

What it was? Fucked if he knew.

Don’t look for too long, he warned himself. Honestly, he wished this all could be Dick Grayson. A confession even. It, frankly, sucked to know that this was how he talked the most with Mary-Lou lately. Irritating even. But what was he supposed to do? He analyzed her as she stormed to the kitchen. The city was starting to get to her like it did anyone. Spreading into everything that was good about a person like a disease. He was shocked it took this long, to be honest with himself. But to see that kind of change was like watching something good rot from the outside in. He didn’t like it. He was a product of growing up in this city. Nightwing was the real Gotham. The Gotham that dealt in cruel absolution unlike the caped crusader who dealt in the deft idea of justice. There was something about seeing that absolution, the real Gotham, get to Detective Mary-Lou White that made him rethink his approach but not enough to take off the god damn mask and go ‘hey it’s me, Dick’.

His gaze softened just for a moment. “You are a good enough detective, honest enough, that you’re some kind of threat,” was his reply. Crooked cops were scary. You could never tell was side they were on and he was a perfect example. Who was under a mask, who was dipping in both mob pools before taking a swim, who was out to work their way into the organization.... they all at least had a spot or a color to them. The honest ones, however, the ones that wouldn’t bend at the idea of a cash sum or even exemption from their own coming death was something that sent a good number of bad people clamoring for a way to eliminate those that could easily bring them in. Accountability was almost like debt in the police force and the last thing anyone ever wanted to do was to end up knee deep in their sewage. “I’m trying to find out who’s doing this. I need your help to do that.”

He glanced at the bottle and back at her. Judgment was left out of it. This was the first time Dick Grayson and Nightwing saw what all of this was doing. She was something that was so light in that precinct it was hard not to picture her floating. With that in mind, he stayed stoic and in place. “I made sure you were in safe hands. I needed to make sure Salvatore was taken care of and in jail like you wanted.” He hated that he didn’t get to finish the mobster off but he’d be out in due time and Nightwing would be back. Honestly the idea of him waiting in the hospital for Mary-Lou to make a recover was a bit funny to Dick and it took a lot to keep a smile from coming to his features. “I just do.”

He hated that he said it. It was like a betrayal to his entire being to say that. But he did. For Dick Grayson, she was a friend to him. For Nightwing, she was an innocent person that a corrupt web was starting to cocoon around until it would consume her whole. His agenda was somehow being put on hold just to save this one person. It was reckless. It was stupid. Neither personas, however, could help it. “You are a decent cop, White, and probably one of the only people in this god damn city I would call good. If you could actually help someone like that, would you?” And just like that, both Nightwing and Dick Grayson had said too much.

[Mary-Lou White]

The fact that she had managed to extract more out of him than three harsh words strung together on a thin line of angst was an accomplishment in itself. She didn't know where he was coming from, who he was or what had happened in his life to make him think that taking such drastic, vigilante action was necessary. Mary-Lou didn't agree with the people out there who decided to take the law into their own hands and while they might have looked interesting in their get-ups at the end of the day it brought them dangerously close to crossing the line between righteous and criminalised. Mind you, if this particular masked wonder hadn't decided to walk this path then she would have been dead twice over.

She didn't know what to say. Her actions and her job spoke for themselves. She did want to help the good people of Gotham. She wanted to clean up the streets, be taken seriously and make her family proud. She wanted to honor the member of her brother, who had been murdered in cold blood not five blocks away simply because he had wanted all of those things, too. And then she found herself wondering what the heck made him the authority on who was good or bad in this town, anyway!?

“Yes,” she answered finally, her voice softer and her fingers clasping the neck of the bottle and letting her arm hang by her side in a way that looked almost defeated. She looked away from him for a moment, not wanting him to see any remnants of the tears she had almost shed in the kitchen. She wandered over to the table, putting the bottle down before making her way to the armchair that kept her couch company. Draped over its back was her robe, and she slipped it on and tied the belt securely. Feeling a little bit more like herself, she shook her head in disbelief.

“If you think I'm decent, then why can't you trust me? Showing up in my apartment like this and scaring me half to death isn't really conducive to getting my help.” Conducive. It had been on her Word of the Day calendar yesterday. “I mean,” she continued, walking past him and down the extremely short hall to the bathroom where she plucked a fluffy pink towel off the rack. “It's not like you don't know I'm straight.” She returned to where the stranger was standing, wet through to the bone. It was really coming down outside, and she was suddenly – and ridiculously – worried that he might catch cold.

“Here,” she said, holding out the towel to him. “You're going to dry off. And then were going to have a cup of something hot. And we're going to talk,” she said the last word with emphasis, as if she didn't think he was capable of the action. “Resolving Trust Issues 101 just started, and you're the star student.” She offered him a bolstering you-can-do-it smile. “You don't have to take off the mask,” she added.

[Dick Grayson]

It took everything for Dick not to bolt right out of there. It was a stupid thought even. But to let her have that glimpse into Nightwing, into Dick, was giving her leverage over him. He didn’t like it. She wouldn’t understand it and there was a part of him that was haunted by the fact that when it came to the end and he’d finished not only Nightwing but himself off and left his confession that all people would ever see Dick Grayson as was a murderer and crooked and a psychopath. He wasn’t doing this all to be understood though. He was doing it to knock Gotham’s crime down a few pegs by taking its legs out from beneath them.

His gaze tried to stay hard and unforgiving. Still, conflict was there and all he could really think was that somehow he was failing. Falling, even; grasping at what was left of Dick Grayson to try and ease his way out of something stupid. He’d gotten attached, he’d gotten involved. Nightwing should have left her to be found but Dick knew different. Anyone else would have walked in, saw a badge on her, and finished the job that Salvatore initiated. How could someone really say that he was doing the right thing anymore. He was so deep in that there was no way out except to reach the bottom of whatever sinkhole he’d gotten into.

“I would ask you to meet up at Starbucks but I think it would draw more attention than either of us would like.” He allowed a dry scoff at the idea. Well, he was royally fucked and taking her down with him. Why not toss in a quip? What else did he have to lose? His gaze went back to her after the robe was in place and the towel was offered. He’d never taken a look at the place much when he didn’t have a mask. Now, though, he was catching a glimpse at everything and analyzing it. The real detective in him was at work trying to figure out just who Mary-Lou White was and if it was any different than the woman Dick Grayson knew or the liability that Nightwing perceived her to be.

He took the offered towel. He didn’t really realize how cold he was until he’d started to dry off. It was a weird bright pinky terry-cloth piece offering, but he was going to take it. Anything he could get that Dick Grayson couldn’t was a serious matter. Anything that could get him closer to ending this mess and figuring out who it was that wanted her gone would help. “Thanks.” And it was then that Nightwing wanted to test her. He turned away for a moment, bringing the towel to his face when he was fairly sure he was finished with his body. Under the towel he took off his mask, bringing up his hood to wipe down his face. He kept it off for a moment and in that split second, Dick Grayson was there. It was just that, though. Brief.

He grabbed the mask and put it back on under the towel and pulled back his hood to dry his soaked hair. He let the towel rest on his shoulder, looking ridiculous wrapped in the pink. “Fine.” He paused, not sure if he should actually sit or something. He edged to the couch and took a cautious seat. He ruffled his hair with the towel a few more times before offering it back. “Where do you want to start?”

[Mary-Lou White]

Luckily, Nightwing's quip about Starbucks was made while Mary-Lou had taken her pilgrimage to the bathroom. She didn't care what he looked at in her apartment, and for some reason that the blonde detective couldn't fathom she actually trusted this guy. She was crazy. She knew that, straight up. But in the end, he had saved her life twice and she wanted to hear him out. When he took the towel she held out to him it was almost as if he were accepting a peace offering. Mary-Lou was pleased. They seemed to be making some kinda progress.

She didn't reply to his gratuity. As soon as she saw that he turned his back to her, Mary-Lou scrambled to do the same. It was a curious action and one that she committed to out of pure impulse. She didn't want to see who he was, yet there was part of her that was dying to know! Not only did she turn her back but she closed her eyes for protection against whatever curse might be called down upon her, were she unlucky enough to catch a glimpse of the face behind the mask that she had seen on more than one fateful night.

When she felt like she'd given him enough time and that he would have himself righted, she turned around. His hood was down now, his short hair spiked upwards in a way that was almost familiar to her. She looked at it for a moment, and though all she had been able to talk and think about in the past few weeks had been a certain young man that she had met in the park. Now, as this mysterious stranger stood in front of her with his wet hair, his fitted mask and his well-thought out and exceptionally well fitting assault gear, Mary-Lou was having different kinds of thoughts altogether.

It both frightened and thrilled her. And that scared the shit out of her.

She was unable to help a small, sheepish smile at the way he stood there, so masked and with her towel on his shoulder. She moved forward to take the towel from him, padding back towards the laundry to deposit it in the hamper. It served two purposes; her apartment was immaculate and she liked it that way, and she needed a second to think. She had a kind of game plan when she returned, but a pair of inquisitive green eyes turning to her as she re-entered.

“Coffee? Hot chocolate?” she asked, continuing straight through into the kitchen. She needed to be doing something with her hands to take the edge off of her nerves. She slid open the shuttered partition that blocked the kitchen and the living area, making it possible for them to continue their conversation. Putting the kettle on and resting her free hand on the counter as she peered at him, Mary-Lou realised that she should tell Susie about this. And about Nightwing taking her to the hospital. And about Nightwing saving her from the crooked cops that had tried to kill her that night. But she wasn't going to.

“First off, what do you want?” she asked. “If I know what you want, or what you're trying to do, then it might be easier for me to help you.” She held up her hand before he could answer. “No sarcasm, either, Mister.”