The White Queen (S.Rogers)

Chapter 56

Brooklyn sat on the bed in Steve's room, staring out at the snowy landscape of Manhattan. It had started to snow again, the dusting falling down like an ash cloud over the busiest part of the city. From where she sat, high in the Tower, she felt like she was above it all, untouchable. It didn't help that she knew, now, for a fact that if the power went off in the rest of the world, the Tower would remain lit up, bright and warm. She wanted to be so mad at Steve, for forcing her hand, by basically just packing up her sister and her to bring them here. If she had even thought about digging her heels in, to resist his attempts, she knew he was simply going to pack up Juliana, and most likely throw Brooklyn over his shoulder at the same time.

He had been right, goddammit. They wouldn't have been able to stay at the apartment with no power. It must have been off, for quite some time, before Juliana had woken her up complaining that she was cold. The usually warm apartment had been chilly, even to her, when she had told her sister to crawl under the covers with Steve, assured that the large body of the man would provide enough heat to keep her little sister warm. Throwing on the first items that had come to her, she had stomped out of the apartment, down the stairs to the first floor, where she had banged on the door of the Super's apartment until the uncouth and unkempt man finally answered. He had stared at her, leering, when she had asked what he was doing about the power, until he informed her of the current state of things.

She knew the man had some sort of deal going on, seeing as the building was owned by Mr. Marino. On one hand she was unfamiliar how that worked. But she suspected, after doing a little research early on in her residency of the building, that Mr. Marino must have things set up with some sort of management group, who oversaw the daily running of the building. He certainly didn't strike Brooklyn as someone who was personally involved with anything the Marino family handled.

She imagined he must be somewhat competent at his job, as until now she had never really had a reason to have to talk to the man. Things in the building, for the most part, ran smoothly. Occasionally something would happen, a washer or dryer would break, but they were always repaired fairly quickly. She remembered, not long after they had moved in, there had been an issue with the drains in the kitchen sink. Unsure of what to do, she had called the number on the card Mr. Marino had taped to the fridge, and left a message about it. That same day someone in a uniform had come, and fixed the issue. She hadn't been in the best mindset at the time, and had spent the time avoiding conversation with him, by retreating to the hall, with her sister in her bedroom, watching him for any threatening moves. Instead, the man had fixed the drains, nodded a goodbye with a short smile, and left.
Since then, she had taken a few crash courses on how to fix as many things as she could, herself, to avoid letting strangers into her apartment.

On her way back up the stairs, she had paused for a moment to check on the elderly Mrs. De. Luca. The woman had answered the door, wrapped in a blanket, assuring Brooklyn that she would be fine. It was not the first time the power had gone out in the middle of winter, and she was more than prepared to wait it out. Concerned, Brooklyn had told her that she would put in a call to Mr. Marino, if only to make sure someone came over to keep an eye on the older woman. Mrs. De Luca had assured her she would be fine, but had agreed to let the younger woman do what she could to assure her comfort.

Steve had come into the living room just as she entered the apartment, while she had a small tantrum (she would admit to that) over the situation, before basically taking things into his own hands and putting his foot down over staying at the apartment in its current state. Her protests and plans to take her sister and her to either the Marino's house or even a hotel had been ignored. Even her refusal to go to the Tower had been ignored. Steve had simply bundled her and her sister up into his vehicle, and driven off, stopping to pick up breakfast ordered in earlier by phone at the diner they now were familiar with, the waitress being sympathetic to their plight.