bestavocado | (no subject)

After her meeting with Matt Murdock, which certain did not make her day any less stressful or complicated, Francine heads home to knock back a few shots of something alcoholic and then spend the most of the rest of her night hanging over a toilet bowl.

The next day, Rosalind isn't feeling any more inclined to listen to reason about accepting Fisk as a client, and since the 'Sharpe' in the name of their law firm most definitely does not refer to Francine, there's not a hell of a lot she can do about it - just suck it up and pretend that the thought of representing Wilson Fisk is the only reason she's feeling queasy today. Of course, she's assigned work on the case because her mother might as well get some use out of the very expensive education she paid for Francine to have. And if there's one thing that she is good at, it's doing the groundwork.

She spends most of the day familiarizing herself with the full details of the case and hiding in her office to avoid running into Rosalind again, which is only partially successful. Rosalind stops her on the way out to wrangle her into lunch tomorrow because they shouldn't let their little work disagreement come between them as mother and daughter - though, honestly, Francine suspects she's either about to be set up on a blind date with someone influential or other or get another reaming out. She's not looking forward to either of them, regardless.

So she's already stressed and a bit jumpy when she heads home, and when she sees the devil waiting for her in the shadows, she all but jumps out of her skin. "What the fuck?!"

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Francine would likely be one of the latter group, if given the choice, but alas, no one's asked her yet.

The second comment gets her attention more, anyway. "And where did you hear that from?"

Matt frowns a little, realizing that may have sounded unintentionally threatening.

He offers a small shrug and tries to make his reply sound casual.

"Orderlies meeting for the night shift. I listened in to learn their rounds." So he would know no one would likely be by to interrupt them.

Which also sounds threatening. Damn it.

"I'm not here to hurt you." Although that probably isn't a comforting statement at all.

"Our relationship's come so far since you showed up with the intention of hurting me." Although she'd guessed that since he hasn't hurt her yet and told her he believes she's not personally involved in Fisk's criminal dealings.

"What are you here for?"

Matt turns his head for a moment.

That question is difficult to answer, especially since he doesn't fully know why he's here himself.

"I was in the neighborhood," he says, turning back again.

Rather than a flip reply, this time the words are truth. He had planned to be here, at least, but he won't say it was to track her mother.

"I also just wanted to make sure you were alright."

After the conversation he overheard earlier, and already knowing how unfit she was before landing here, he definitely means more than just following up on her injury.

"I'm fine," she says - lying through her teeth a bit because the situation she is in is not fine, at all, but he doesn't need to know that. "I don't know if you've heard, but I'm supposed to be released tomorrow."

"I think maybe you're not fine," he replies, back to being blunt, but how else is he supposed to broach the topic?

"Well, I am in a hospital," she concedes, "which isn't known for its high population of people who are fine. But it's not that bad."

The thing is - for his fancy lie-detecting hearing - that part she kind of does believe, even as her heart beats weakly and too slow for a healthy woman.

Edited 2018-11-13 00:57 (UTC)

He's not going off her words so much as the fact that he still doesn't know how she ended up in the hospital, and the lingering poor state of health her body is in.

That, and the overheard conversation from earlier.

"You had a visitor earlier," he notes, no inflection in his voice to give away feelings or opinion there.

Her tone and her attention sharpens. "Did you hear that from the orderlies, too?"

God, she hopes the answer's yes, because she doesn't want to add 'and also Daredevil is definitely stalking me' to the list of crap she has to deal with now.

For his part Matt's expression does turn slightly apologetic for a moment. Although there's a question on how much of that gets conveyed with the mask.

"She was here after visiting hours."

So not so much stalking as just bad timing.

Unfortunately for him, the mask does make it difficult to read apology into his face.

"I'm aware," she says in an even tone of voice that is meant to say and that is none of your business.

He hears that tone, and again feels guilty for being there. But, he can't quite just leave it alone.

Clearing his throat, he ventures carefully. "Is it always that way between you two?"

"Is it always like what between us?" she asks, her tone honed to a blade that suggests he might want to think very carefully before pursuing the rest of this conversation with her.

Matt's mouth opens, and then shuts, and it takes effort not to take an actual step back at her reaction.

Matt is obviously out of practice conversationally. Of course, the argument could be made that he was never great at it to begin with.

He knows two ways to communicate with people, as a lawyer and as a vigilante.

One tends to stay away from getting too personal, and the other involves his fists.

Neither of those styles are serving him here.

"She's... very intense," he tries, searching for the mildest adjective he can latch onto and it still doesn't sound great.

Her eyes narrow. "And you know she's intense because you were - what, hiding somewhere and listening to us?"

He's definitely cornered himself here.

Wetting his lips, he searches for a reply that's not going to come off badly and realizes there isn't one.

"I caught the end of your conversation," he admits at last. "I was just going to stop by, and I didn't realize there would be anyone still here so late."

Francine does not have Daredevil's unique abilities as a human lie detector, but she's going to guess that's, at best, some serious minimizing.

"Given that your opinion on my mother was neither requested nor wanted and you've asked how I am already, maybe you should consider saving us both some time and leaving now."

Matt frowns, letting out a frustrated sigh that is completely directed at himself; although it would be understandable if it wasn't interpreted that way.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you," he says, although it's perfectly understandable that she is given the way he's blundered through this conversation.

"I was concerned, I thought maybe I could help." That's highly unlikely now, so he throws in the towel on it.

"I'll get back to it." Assault and whatever other low opinion action she sees him doing.

Stepping back towards the window he unlocks the latch and pauses a moment to speak over his shoulder.

"It was nice talking to you." And he means that, despite how badly it went, and knowing the feeling is certainly not mutual.

Leaving through the window, he takes the moment to close it so she won't have to get out of bed. The rest of the night he'll spend having conversations he can actually handle, with whatever targets he can find stupid enough to piss him off tonight.