The Sound of One Finger Tapping

Sometimes I think the sound of that infernal tapping will drive me mad. Why can't they make keyboards silent? What is it with plastic that it has to have a flat voice that sort of sings off-key?

Stupid.

Really stupid. That's it, Barbara, keep your mind off of it. Pretend the body lying on the bed isn't there. Pretend the tears that are rolling down your cheeks aren't soaking your blouse so the edges of the white fabric have gone all pink and funny with the skin underneath.

Pretend he isn't almost dead.

Anyhow, where was I?

Oh yes, keyboards. When one of them has become your best friend, you think about things like that. What could I do to engineer it better? If I added an additional pad underneath, something soft or filled with gel, would what annoys me go away? I mean, I have to have it. It's like my life-blood, but still... At times it intrudes, making me step outside that place where I am comfortable. Maybe if I gave it a little more time. Dealt with it.... Maybe then it wouldn't draw my attention. Maybe then it would leave me in peace.

Have I done enough?

Oh God, he's moaning.

I can still see him standing there, framed by the white light that crashed and burned like some out of control air jockey. See the sweat and the blood pooling on the floor beneath him like it did with me, after....

No. Won't go there.

I looked up and it was like a newsreel, all black and white, only I was out of the frame. There was only him. Dick. Nightwing. He was the subject this time. Former sidekick betrayed by boss, sent to die in stinking, reeking Hell-hole.

Film at eleven.

I wish I had caught him. But I couldn't. This damn chair, these metal legs wouldn't let me move fast enough. I heard him hit the floor.

Dear God. How could anyone abide such a noise?

The infernal tapping. The tapping of the rain on the window. The slow drip of blood on the floor.

I have my problems with monitors too. Bright and glaring. Reflecting back my own face when I don't keep busy enough; when I momentarily forget to occupy myself with some new website or the billionth byte of trivial information no one but Bruce Wayne could ever possibly need. And I think I'm obsessive. Sheesh.

Still, when I don't push hard enough, she's there Staring at me, accusing.

Cold.

Like his hands.

I prayed it was the flash-bulb lightning that made him look that way. White instead of tan like always. But prayers never availed me much. My legs are still round and edged with rubber, and have spokes instead of taut muscles. So I stopped praying and started to do what I do best.

Tapping.

The sound filled the apartment I share with my ghosts like water dripping in a sewer, resounding off the hollow pipes. It echoed my fear and pounded like my aching heart. What could I do? I had medical supplies, but not nearly enough.

I had strength. Just enough.

Somehow I got him across the room. I had more than enough nerve for the both of us - stripping him, bathing him like a baby while thinking he was anything but –

But I had no hope.

No hope as the gruesome grinning white-faced jackal stared me down, entering my apartment like a well-acquainted guest. No hope as the bullet struck my spine and the world went numb.

No hope that he could ever forget not being there.

No hope that I could either.

No hope he could love a cripple when the very air he breathes is freedom.

Oh God, is he breathing?

I had to reboot. Had to start over. The screen was black as the squid-ink sky outside. What was I doing?

Oh yes, tapping. Tapping. Incessantly tapping. Like I did in grade school – only then I did it with my feet. Now I dance with my fingers until they are weary to the bone and sometimes refuse to bend.

Have I refused to bend?

You know, search engines are wonderful things. Tap in a word and a world opens up at your fingertips. I put in 'Greek god' and it gave me him.

A world. At my fingertips.

All I have to do is bend.

All I have to do is let myself hope.

All I have to do is allow myself to enter the newsreel, to become a part of it.

Of him.

"Dick?"

It's not like a computer. You input and it outputs. He remains still.

"Dick? It's me, Barbara."

Try it again. If not reboot, and scoot.

I hear a slight sound.

Tapping.

He can't reply. His head is bandaged. There's more muslin than man in my bed, but I see it then.

His finger. Tapping. Moving ever so slightly as it strikes the firm mattress.

Victory!

I think the keyboard is jealous.