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Karen can tell the second she steps off the elevator that the apartment is quiet in the very specific way it only is when Frank is there.
It’s not the kind of quiet that feels like loneliness or the empty ache she’s learned to live with. This is the peaceful kind, settled, like the entire place has exhaled a long-held breath.
She steps through the front door and nudges it closed with her hip, juggling the purse on her shoulder and a takeout bag in her arms. Halfway to the kitchen she stops, her breath catching when she sees Frank asleep on her sofa.
Not just asleep, completely out. One arm is tucked behind his head, boots kicked off and forgotten under the coffee table, the television still on but muted. He looks more relaxed than she’s seen him… maybe ever.
And right in the center of his chest, purring loud enough to be heard from across the room, is the kitten. The tiny orange menace that has, apparently, claimed him completely.
It’s sprawled on its side, with its back legs stretched out behind it and its paws curled over its face. The kitten’s head is tucked under Frank’s chin, and his big hand rests lightly on its back, rising and falling in tandem with their slow, even breaths.
Karen stands there in the middle of the room feeling gobsmacked by the sheer tenderness of it — Hands made for destruction and the kitten he carries around in them like it’s something precious.
It’s the sweetest thing she’s ever seen.
Setting the takeout bag on the kitchen table, she fishes her phone from her purse and snaps several photos of the sleeping pair. She needs proof of this moment, needs to be able to see it, study it, and remember the way he looks with no war to fight.
She stares for a few long seconds, not bothering to fight the smile that spreads across her face. Then, needing to share this moment with someone else, she opens her text thread with Matt and Foggy and sends the photo with zero context. It basically speaks for itself anyway.
Dots appear on her screen immediately.
Foggy:
“Please tell me this is real?”
Matt:
“What the hell am I looking at?”
Karen:
“It’s very, very real. I found them this way when I got home a few minutes ago.”
Foggy:
“Amazing! I need this framed above my fireplace.”
Matt:
“He’s going to kill you when he finds out you sent us this photo.”
Foggy:
“No he won’t. He likes her too much. He’ll just kill us.”
Karen:
“Worth it.”
She stifles a laugh and pockets her phone, only feeling mildly guilty for giving her two best friends a glimpse of the Frank Castle that no one else gets to see. Slipping off her heels, Karen walks quietly to the couch and stands over them for a second, just watching, burning it into the part of her brain that holds every moment they’ve spent together.
The kitten stirs, blinking up at her with bleary judgment and bears its sharp, tiny teeth in a yawn, then settles back down with a little sigh. Karen covers her mouth, unable to keep the laugh from bubbling out of her this time.
Even still, Frank doesn’t wake.
She kneels down next to the couch and lightly traces her thumb along the still-healing cut over his eyebrow. Then before she can stop herself, she presses a kiss to his forehead, a barely there graze that feels like fire against her lips.
Pausing for another moment, she waits to see if he’ll wake, and when she’s satisfied that he hasn’t, she straightens. But just as she turns to head back into the kitchen, his hand reaches out to catch hers.
She freezes, her pulse stuttering to a near stop at the feel of his fingers warm and heavy around her wrist. There’s no force in his grip, just a gentle tether keeping her there. Karen turns back slowly, her heart thudding behind her ribs. Frank’s eyes are still closed, dark lashes twitching against his cheek, but there’s the faintest tug at the corner of his mouth that has her melting down to the edge of the couch.
“You’re home,” he murmurs, voice rough with sleep.
“Yeah,” she says, her voice just as soft. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”
“S’okay,” he says. His thumb strokes once over the inside of her wrist, a barely there touch that sends shivers down her spine. “Heard you laughing.”
Karen glances at the kitten now making biscuits against his chest, its claws catching in the fabric of his shirt, and lets out another quiet chuckle. “I mean, you both looked really cute asleep like that.”
Frank hums, eyes finally opening. They’re still a little bleary, and it hits her all over again how rare this is… How much she loves this version of him. Not the soldier or the weapon. Just Frank.
He turns his head toward her and holds out his hand. She lifts an eyebrow, confused about what he’s asking for. “What?”
“Lemme see the picture.”
Karen’s eyes go wide. “How did you…”
Frank just smirks. “C’mon, Karen. I know you.”
She tries to school her face into something innocent but fails instantly, feeling a hot blush creep into her cheeks as she hands him her phone. He taps in her security code and groans, throwing one arm across his face.
“Jesus Christ,” he says, the words muffled by the crook of his elbow. “You better not be sending this shit to your lawyer friends, Page.”
Karen chokes out a surprised laugh and covers her mouth with both hands. She doesn’t say anything, and he can tell by her reaction that she’s done exactly that.
“Fucking Christ,” he says, dropping his arm back down, his hand landing on her thigh. The words are laced with annoyance, but she knows he’s not mad. Not really. “They’re gonna think I’m all soft for a goddamn cat.”
Karen leans in close, brushing her lips over the shell of Frank’s ear. “You are soft,” she whispers, smiling when goosebumps erupt across his neck. “With me. And with her,” she says, nodding toward the kitten. “And that’s not a bad thing.”
Frank lets out a low noise, a half grumble, half sigh, and drags his hand down from her thigh to rest just above her knee. His thumb moves in slow, thoughtless circles against the skin just below the hemline of her skirt, and Karen does nothing to stop him. He’s always so careful in his touches when it comes to her, like he’s afraid to cross some unwritten line they’ve drawn. This feels like something else.
“When you talk like that…” he mutters, trailing off. His eyes flick to hers as he shifts into a semi-seated position, one hand cradled against the kitten as he moves. “You shouldn’t talk like that.”
“You carry so much in here,” she says, tapping two fingers against his chest, just over his heart. The kitten stirs with the movement, jumping off Frank’s chest and darting toward Karen’s bedroom. “A little softness doesn’t make you weak… It makes you human.”
Frank scoffs, a bitter smile pulling at his mouth, and drops his head back, eyes on the ceiling. “Being soft gets you killed,” he says, and Karen braces for the same debate they’ve had more times than she can count — the same one that keeps him just closed off enough to be infuriating. “Gets people I care about killed.”
“I know that’s what you believe, Frank, but it’s just not true. It doesn’t have to be true. Like it or not, you’ve already let me in. You already care more than you’re comfortable with,” she says. “You stopped trying to push me away a long time ago, but you’re still so careful with me… Like you’re afraid if you feel too much, I’ll disappear.”
His fingers stall in their lazy pattern against her knee, tightening into a fist, and Karen knows she’s struck a nerve. She slides her fingers under his, loosening their grip until his hand opens, then she presses it over her heart.
“Do you feel that, Frank?” she breathes, her eyes searching his, begging him to understand. “I’m alive. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
His throat works, and she can feel a slight tremble in his hand where it rests against her chest. For a moment, she thinks he’s about to shut down the way he always does when she tries to push like this.
“I am afraid of that,” he admits, voice rough and almost inaudible. “You, disappearing.”
Her chest aches at his admission, but it’s a good kind of ache. It’s the kind that comes from honesty and vulnerability instead of impenetrable walls a mile high.
“You don’t have to keep waiting for everything good to be taken from you,” she says, gripping his hand and bringing it to her lips. She presses a soft kiss to his palm, and the sound he makes is involuntary and almost anguished.
Frank turns his head to look at her, his gaze heavy and unguarded. “I don’t know how to stop, Karen.”
“Then let me help you figure it out,” Karen says, leaning in to kiss his cheek, but he turns his face at the last moment, and her lips land on the corner of his mouth.
They both freeze just long enough for it to settle over them, then she pulls back, searching his gaze. For what, she doesn’t know — permission, maybe? But she doesn’t need it because before she can decide anything else, Frank’s mouth is on hers, feather light, and only for a moment.
“I don’t deserve this,” he murmurs, running his nose along her jaw. “Don’t deserve you.”
She nods against his touch and exhales a shaky breath. “You do.”
He still doesn’t believe her, she can tell, but he doesn’t argue. He just pulls her down to his chest and wraps his arms around her back, holding her as close as she’ll let him, for as long as she’ll let him.
“Forever,” she thinks. “I'd let him hold me like this forever.”