look out for the (flashofvenom) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2013-09-02 22:03:00 |
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Entry tags: | catwoman, flash thompson |
Who: Wren, Adam
Where: Supermarket
When: Recently
What: a small disagreement ok
Warnings: talk of some messed up MK stuff. like kidnapping, self harm, etc
Wren had dropped Gus off for his last day of preschool before stopping at Vons to pick up a few things. She was distracted, and she forgot the shopping cart, and (halfway through the bright yellow store) she decided she'd just carry the things she needed. It wasn't much, and she really didn't want to walk all the way back to the front of the store. It wasn't even that she was in a hurry to go anywhere, but her mind was all over the place. Gus was starting to panic about "real" school starting, and she was probably more panicked than she was. Luke was still working all hours, because a post on the journals saying the baby had been found wasn't anything the police could know about. As far as they knew, there was still a missing infant and a kidnapper at large, and Wren was starting to think Luke would never be home for more than a few hours at a time. And she was still terrified about nightmares, though she was trying not to think about that as much lately.
Nightmares made her think of MK, which made her sad and angry by turns. Sad, because she wanted so much more for her friend than she was receiving, and angry for the same reason. And she felt like she was missing something, like she couldn't get it right no matter how she tried. And guilty, too, because she'd stopped talking to MK abruptly on the journals, and she always felt guilty after that happened. She always felt guilty when she talked to MK at all lately, and she didn't know how to change that. She really, really wanted to change it, but she didn't know how.
She was in front of the milk section without even realizing her feet had carried her there, and she sighed and looked toward her left, where someone was walking into her line of vision. Dressed in a faded sundress that was too loose to show the added weight around her middle, and a pair of very worn flats that had seen better days, she didn't look anything like the wealthy dominatrix that had lived with MK the year before. She was just someone's mother, wedding ring and engagement ring in place, buying bargain milk, a few bruises from Gotham dotting one shoulder.
Adam was a mess. Adam’s life was a mess. His grave demeanor unnerved patients at the ER, nurses who remembered him from years ago at the clinic seemed wary of him now and whatever friends he had left in comic book stores and geeky hangouts had simply forgotten all about him. So many parts of his life were over for good and though Adam felt as logical as he always did, there was this thumping raw nerve under his skin made him unbearable for most. The only person that wanted to spend all her time with him was MK and she was just as broken as he was. So broken, in fact, that he had given up. He was done trying to be good. Trying to be sober. Trying to be normal. What was the point in any of that?
He had nightmares, too. Nightmares that were repeats of the one that gave MK a miscarriage with little, subtle changes. Sometimes the dead family were alive until he touched them. Sometimes his friend stared up at him with glossy, blue eyes and murmured something that sounded like traitor. Adam didn’t sleep very often because of it and made his whole situation even worse. His shoulders hunched forward. His tall, lean frame resembling a ghoul from a children’s idea of a haunted house. His eyes unfocused and uncaring. The only person who saw a glimmer of the old Adam under all of that was MK and only MK.
But, here he was in the milk section of the supermarket getting something for the white russians he told MK he’d make for her. His basket was between both hands in front of him and he slowly leaned forward to look at the tiny cartons of cream. A moment passed and he turned, seeing that familiar, soft form of Wren and immediately made a mental note of how differently she was dressed from what he remembered. He was right, Luke’s salary wouldn’t be enough. “Wren.” Adam said, voice dark and cold though it was clearly attempting some warmth. “How are you?”
Wren wasn't expecting to see Adam, and she stared for longer than could ever be considered polite. She tried to remember the last time she saw him in person, and she couldn't actually remember. She tried to remember if he'd looked like that the last time she saw him, and she couldn't remember that either. The problem with Adam, was that Wren had always hated him just a little. In Seattle, before Luke had killed anyone at all, she'd thought he pushed too hard. Once Luke had told her, here, that Adam had encouraged him to kill people during the years they were apart, she'd wanted to hurt him. She'd wanted to hurt him really, really badly. She'd made herself forgive him for MK. Because despite everything, she loved her best friend, and she wanted MK to be happy, and MK's happiness had (then) seemed completely dependant on the man standing there, in the milk section with her. Then, Adam had even wanted to help MK get dry, to help her get over the things that had happened to her. He'd wanted to help, and she'd been willing to set aside her own feelings about him for MK.
But now, now Wren couldn't do that anymore. Now, the man standing in front of her was just someone who abused the girl she cared so much about, and all the history with Luke was at the surface again, raw and fresh, and Wren had never been very good at forgiving. She held onto things forever, and this was no different, not really.
She pulled her hand back from the milk she'd been reaching for, and her voice was icy and cool, nothing friendly or even attempting to be so. "Adam," she said, and there was a pause, as if she was trying to decide what to say after his name, which (actually) she was. "I'm good. How are you? How's MK?" There was emphasis on that last question, because she knew how MK was. MK was drunk and hurting somewhere and thinking there was no purpose in living, that was how MK was.
Adam expected some kind of warmth from Wren, a strained attempt at conversation and politeness to keep MK happy. Truth be told, the doctor only knew of Wren’s feelings on them through MK and it had been a long time since he tried to contact the woman for advice directly. Still, he wasn’t one to give much of a visible reaction. He simply stood up a little straighter and turned his attention away from the cream. “MK is doing well. Well enough. Have a puppy now.” Adam said it like it was an accomplishment.
Then, without any inflection like he was hiding information or lying, he said, “Think she’s in recovery. Losing the baby was difficult, for both of us, but it wouldn’t have improved our lives the way she wanted it to.” Such a delicate subject spat out like they were discussing MK’s garden instead of her womb. Such a wrong statement said as if it were the absolute truth that both he and Wren knew.
If he'd been honest, she might have reacted better, but the second he started by saying that MK was doing well, she couldn't help but want to interrupt. It took all her patience to let him finish, fingers clenched against her palms in tight fists. She was angry a lot in Seattle, but it had been a long, long time since she'd felt like she did standing there and listening to him talk. "I know about the puppy. We talked, and she was really, really drunk, Adam. She's not in recovery. You convinced her there's nothing left to live for, and that life is going to be miserable forever. How can she possibly be in recovery when you told her that while she was at her lowest? As for the baby, she said you were happy about losing it. Do you know why? Because you told her over and over and over that you didn't want the baby, and because you put her through hell while she was pregnant, and now you're willing to be with her again, but only if she gives up any hope of being happy." She didn't raise her voice through any of it, didn't scream, didn't even shake with the anger she felt. She was icy and quiet, and she didn't look away from him even once. "Losing the baby wasn't difficult for you, because you kept telling her to get rid of it, if she wanted to be with you. You can't say things now and expect them to change the past, Adam." She glanced toward the creamer. "What's that for?" she asked, knowingly, making her own assumptions.
“Worse when she was sober.” Adam’s tone didn’t change. Partially because he knew it would get under her skin the same way it did for Maddie K. Partially because showing her anger or frustration felt a lot like losing. “Did not tell her we have nothing to live for. Sure that’s not what she told you. Not listening to her. Never listen to her, Wren. That’s your problem.” There was no doubt in his mind that he knew MK better than Wren, better than anyone in Vegas or Seattle. Maybe he knew her best back then, back when he was still alive, but he wouldn’t recognize MK for who she was now. He wouldn’t accept her the way Adam did.
Adam reached for a carton of cream, long fingers digging into the cardboard sides and he froze just like that. “Don’t tell me how I felt. Don’t tell me how I should react about my own child. Want everyone to be perfect. Can’t be. Won’t ever be.” He slowly, delicately dropped the carton of cream into his basket, looking down at it instead of her. “White Russians. Want to drink something different tonight.”
"How can you say that?" she asked about MK being worse when she was sober. "Once, you understood how important it was to get her healthy. Once, when she was slicing herself up, and drinking herself to death, and using drugs all the time. Once, you understood that meant she was hurting, and you wanted to fix it. Now you're just encouraging it. Why? Because it's easier? It's going to kill her, and you know it. You're smart, Adam. I know you remember, so why?" And she had to laugh a little when he said MK hadn't said what she'd said about not having anything to live for. "That's exactly what she said. Do you even listen to what you say to her? Do you even think of how it's going to affect someone who's depressed and hurting like she is?" She shook her head, disgust in the movement, disbelief in her grey eyes. "I listened. I can show you what she wrote. I know what she said, Adam." As for telling him how he felt about the baby, that just made her eyes go hard. "Adam, she told me what you said about the baby. She told me. She told Luke, and so did you. Why do you even bother lying to me?" she asked, because she didn't see the point, not when they all knew the truth. "You wanted her to get rid of it, and you said so more than once. I heard her cry about it for months. And I don't want you to be perfect, none of us are perfect." Her gaze dropped to the carton of cream. "I want you not to act like an abusive boyfriend. Because that's what you're doing. You hurt her, and you throw her away, and you break her, and then you take her back and tell her awful things, and then you toss her aside again. This is like four times, five times you've done this in the past year. Over and over, and you're a doctor, Adam. You know the signs. You know about the drinking, and the depression, and you know what an emotionally abusive relationship looks like." She looked up from the creamer. "I think you care about her. Why don't you stop being selfish and show it for a change. And she doesn't need to drink something different tonight. She worked hard to get clean, and you're sabotaging it."
Adam stared at the creamer while she ranted, finally looking up at that furious expression and thinking how similar it was to Maddie K’s. “Wrong about the baby. After that dream,” Adam’s voice was still so distant, but the chill was replaced by a sliver of hurt. “Was going to reconsider. Was going to try.” Adam set his basket next to his feet, knowing that this was going to be a longer conversation that a polite passing greeting and met her hostility with his typical, clinical nothingness “Used to want all of that with her. Wanted a family. Thought we could have a good family. But, then she changed and then I changed and here we are.”
“Don’t know how miserable she was sober. Hated domestic life. Constantly bored. Constantly on edge. Brutal. Now let her do whatever she wants again. Let her party. Tell her I love her. Best I can do. Nothing else works, Wren.” Then he shook his head. “Not abusive.”
Something about him putting down the basket made her calm a little. Maybe it was just the resignation of the gesture, like he was willing to let her stand there and berate him for as long as she wanted to. Maybe it was just that he looked so different from the Adam she remembered. It reminded her that Luke liked him, for whatever reason, and that Luke always, always saw him as the victim in these situations with MK. She could never do that. She saw everything through MK-colored glasses, seeing only how things affected the friend she was losing more and more everyday. She sighed. "She changed because she went through something terrible," she said in MK's defense, the old Alexander guilt there in the words. She hadn't actually introduced MK and Alexander, and she knew MK had forged that connection all on her own, but the guilt was still there; she couldn't help it. "And she wasn't miserable sober. We talked a lot when she lived with you. She wasn't miserable, Adam. She wanted you to be home, and she wanted you to do domestic things with her, but you were working all the time. She said that was the happiest she's ever been." She shook her head sadly at the end. "It's bad for her, Adam. I'm not saying her being alone would be better, because I think we'd lose her entirely if she was alone right now, but can't you help make it better? She needs something to look forward to. She really, really needs to believe there's a future out there worth having, and I don't think MK can see a future without you in it."
Adam made a noise, a very slight almost clearing cough sort of noise, and shook his head. A subtle sign that he didn’t always believe everything MK said and that whenever he dug deep enough, there were always new disappointments to be found. He used to be disappointed in himself, that he couldn’t heal her the way he promised so long ago, but now the disappointment was vaguely directed back at MK. And, he wasn’t sure if that would ever change, since MK herself was never good at letting things go. “Blame each other for everything. Don’t see that, Wren.” Adam said finally. “Know you’re right. Know what my concerns were before. Don’t have it in me to keep trying to be good.”
“Alter told me MK didn’t have anything to look forward to after miscarriage. That it was all she had left to live for. How do you expect me to make up for that? To make that better?” He challenged her, finally some sharpness to his voice even if it came from hurt and more selfishness.
Wren realized something, then, and it almost made her wish she hadn't ended up here, having this conversation. It was so much easier to hate Adam when he was just some name that was hurting MK. But she understood a little of the sentiment behind his words just then. It made her think of how hard she tried, herself, with MK, and about how it never, ever seemed to work. She could understand the disappointment in his voice, and she could see how he could blame MK for things. She'd done that too, hadn't she? But she knew MK didn't blame him. She knew that wasn't true, at least. "She doesn't blame you. She loves you. She just wants you to want a life with her. Why is that so hard?" she asked, picturing a perfect place where MK stopped drinking and she was actually happy. They could both be happy then, couldn't they? "You can't blame her for everything, and she doesn't blame you." She could at least say that with conviction, right?
"You can't just stop being good, Adam. It doesn't work that way," she insisted. "You'll both just be miserable then. And of course MK didn't have anything to look forward to. You left her because of the baby. Why would she think you would be there after? She lost a child, Adam, and she lost you. You're supposed to be there for her until she gets back on her feet. How? By holding her, telling her you care, telling her she can come back from this. You're not supposed to tell her she's going to be drunk and miserable forever, unless you want her dead." She gave him a hard look, something to counter that selfishness sharpness she heard in her voice. She stepped a little closer, almost invading his space, just to make her point. "That's not what you want, right?"
“Blames me.” He insisted, clear as day. Adam’s brow creased, because he didn’t know if Wren understood that love couldn’t erase blame. That most people had hidden things they found their lover guilty for. Those things only festered, grew darker and became yet another cancerous spot that threatened to destroy things in the future. “Wanted a life with her before. Gave it to her. Didn’t last. Never does.”
Adam almost took a step back as she got closer, uncomfortable now with any kind of violated personal space. It used to not be like that, but it was a knee-jerk reaction to keep people at arm’s length. He swayed a little, but his feet stayed planted on the floor. “Want to stop feeling pain. Will pick up the pieces once I can.” He tried to promise her, exhausted at the thought of doing anything but go home and drink with MK and their new puppy.
Wren knew about blame, but he was right that she couldn't imagine anything she wouldn't forgive Luke for. When she'd found out that Luke had killed people, she'd thought she couldn't forgive it. When she'd learned that he'd enjoyed it, she'd thought she would never be able to look at him the same. But she'd forgiven, and she couldn't imagine anything she couldn't forgive him. Maybe it was just another unhealthy facet of their relationship, and it maybe it was obsession, but it was just the way it was, and she didn't really question it anymore. But this wasn't that. This was just relationship problems. It wasn't killing people, and it wasn't losing a child to people that abused him for years. This was just MK and Adam, and their problems, and she didn't see why they couldn't make them okay. "She's just grieving," she said, countering his insistence that MK blamed him. "She was happy with you. She just wanted you home more, Adam. I want Luke home more too. It's normal, I think."
She didn't notice when he swayed. Instead, she just stared at him with that unnervingly direct stare, the one that went on too long and didn't waver even a little bit. "She'll be dead by then, and you won't have anyone to blame but yourself," she told him firmly. "Do you remember how much she was cutting herself? Do you remember the ODs? Do you remember how she was nothing but skin and bones in that facility? Do you remember, Adam?" She shook her head, moving a little closer without even realizing it. "You don't have a lot of time, and we both know that."
That inch forward was enough to ruffle his robot feathers and he put a single, long hand up between them and stepped back. “Don’t tell me how much time you think we have. MK cursed to live through everything. Seattle proved it. So did Vegas. Will live through everything. Have time to heal first.” And, of course, healing meant drinking to him. Adam didn’t know any other way to numb things out besides work and comic books, both of which were losing their potency lately. Adam reached to pick his basket back up and took another step away from Wren. “Really believed she doesn’t have much time you’d do more than lecture me. Want me to take care of it. Everyone wants me to take care of her now.” His shoulders slumped at the thought and he shook his head.
There was a time when Adam wanted so badly to be the person to bear all of Maddie K’s problems. He used to think he could take it all for her. But, he never was strong enough to be strong for someone else, was he?
She looked at his hand, but she didn't shy away from it. She realized he was scared of her, which she had trouble believing. She was all of 5'3, and she didn't have any muscle to her, not really. "MK isn't cursed to live through anything," she said, the disbelief on her face slowly, slowly changing to something like worry. "Are you okay?" she asked, and the tone was very much the kind that was reserved for people who maybe weren't all there mentally. She watched him pick up the basket, and her grey gaze stayed steady on his face, something like a new concern there. "You're supposed to take care of the people you love, Adam," she finally said sadly, because she'd at least held some hope that she could make him understand, but she didn't anymore. "You're supposed to want to. We'd help, but you both keep pushing us away by making us feel guilty all the time," and there was anger there for Luke, because she knew the things Adam said hurt him.
She nodded toward his basket sadly. "You better hurry home and get drunk, right?"
He didn’t like that tone, the way she asked are you okay that wasn’t for people having a bad day or a tough go at life. No, that tone was reserved for those who were different who might be mentally ill and he had enough of that in his adolescence. His intelligence, the way he talked and his defaulted reliance on logic made people see him as wrong and different. Adam leveled an empty look at her, one that told her that she wasn’t ever going to understand him or MK and then he took another step back.
“Am taking care of her.” Adam said simply and there was true anger boiling in him, but not for MK. No, Adam rarely got angry on MK’s behalf anymore. All that cold rage was for himself because at the end of the day, no one was more important than himself. And, every little thing, including Wren, revolved around him. “Try not to upset her the next time you talk to her.” Adam warned, turning without a wave or a goodbye and moved onto to the liquor section of the supermarket.