Dinah Lance’s tongue was pressed against her upper lip, her face one of fierce concentration. She held her right elbow high as she made a long sweeping motion, she repeated it over and over, each time her tongue changing position just slightly as she strained for perfection…
“There.”
She stepped back and wiped the razor off as she surveyed her fiancés now clean shaven face. She tilted her head and dabbed a damp washcloth on his cheek rinsing off the shaving lotion.
”I don’t think Jarvis could have done a better job.” She commented on when the butler had stopped by with the shaving kit.
“Just don’t get used to it.” She commented as she shook the razor in Tony’s direction before going into the bathroom and rinsing it off. She let the cool water run over her hands and sighed, a deep heartfelt sigh. She’d never spent this much time inactive before. She walked back into the room, drying her hands off and surveyed the flowers.
She walked over to the window and looked out. The sky over New York was clear and blue, a soft breeze coming in from the harbor, down below Dinah could see the clean up of rubble from the invasion, the Hospital had been hit hard in one wing.
Dinah clenched her fists.
“I should be out there helping Jay. Not in here….Tony how could you have been so stupid…” She caught herself.
“I’m supposed to be supportive, not judgmental.” She sighed and turned from the window, clicking the CD player on she slipped into the chair.
The music came softly from the speakers.
You are my fire
The one desire
Believe when I say
I want it that way.
She smiled slightly as the song took her back to Jr. High. She leaned her head back and brought her knees to her chest.
“Why am I so nostalgic all of a sudden?” She rolled her head forward and picked up the tabloid on the table next to the chair. One of the nurses had been ‘kind’ enough to bring it up.
A grainy picture on the front of it showed a picture of the back of a blonde head of a woman as she kissed a man obviously in a Doctors frock. The headlines were big and bold.
STARK FIANCEE HAS FLING WITH DOCTOR
…WHILE HE’S IN A COMA!
Dinah rolled her eyes, it was so obviously
not her.
‘Maybe I just need to get out…” She stood up and kissed her fiancée on the forehead, running her hand along his buzz-cut black hair. She smiled.
“I hope you wake up before you see that…but I had to make the other side match. “ she murmured smiling in a teasing manner. Many of the tubes had been removed and a physical therapist came in each day. Dinah slipped a coat on before looking again at Tony, picking up a few flower arrangements she leaned over him again and kissed him gently on the lips.
‘I’ll be back soon. Don’t go anywhere.”
Dinah stepped out into the hallway and shut the hospital door behind her quietly. She glanced around the hallway, balancing two large pots of flowers in her hand. Two more had arrived that morning and Dinah had decided that it was time to thin out the ranks a little.
“Hello there.”
Dinah peeked around the flowers and smiled at Karen.
“Hello. I was just heading for the Children’s Wing.”
Karen nodded.
“It’s good to see you getting out. Down that way, go up the elevator to the 4th floor, make a left coming out. Follow the hallway and then make a right.” She said before moving on down the hallway, her nurses shoes silent on the floor.
Dinah nodded at the back of the Nurse.
“Right…” She commented making her way to the elevator.
She followed the directions, though once she stepped off the elevator she didn’t need to follow the nurses instructions, merely follow the sound of soft laughter. Dinah came around the corner into a bright and open room, the sunlight streamed through the windows and danced on the brightly colored walls while more than a dozen children of various ages played and read. However when she came in they all stopped and looked at her expectedly, until it was clear they were not waiting for her and the play and reading was gone back to.
A nurse sitting on the floor rose and walked towards Dinah.
“Hello, you must be Ms. Lance.”
“Yes, I am.”
The nurse smiled and motioned towards a floral arrangement in Dinahs hand.
“Can I help you..?”
Dinah looked down at the absently, taking her eyes off the children.
“OH, yes, I brought them up since…well...we have a few more than we need and I doubt Mr. Stark will enjoy them.”
The nurse let out a laugh and Dinah smiled, following her lead and setting them on the large window sill.
“Well, the children will enjoy them.”
Turning Dinah watched the children some more, smiling at them, slowly her smile faded ever so slightly as she noticed that even as they played, sick as they were with their hairless heads, they seemed weary and haggard.
She turned to the nurse next to her a perplexed look on her face she didn’t even need to speak. The nurse gave her a sad smile and spoke softly.
“Many of them haven’t heard from their parents since the invasion. A few of them were lucky enough to have their parents with them.”
Dinah looked shocked.
“You mean…” She thought to Mia and Roy, both of whom were still at the mansion, their parents as of yet un-located.
The nurse nodded sadly.
“Also this is just a temporary children’s, the real one was hit in the invasion, they’ve gone through so much change in the last week. These are the healthiest of them. The others are in various rooms on this floor.”
“How many are there usually?”
“Over 100, we have one of the largest Child Cancer facilities in New York.” The nurse said as another nurse came in with a tray of drinks.
“Many of them are still stressed about it…while a few..”
She was cut off as another nurse brought in a paper and the children swarmed her.
“Is The Flash there!”
“What about the BIG guy!”
“Are there
any girls?”
A questioning look traveled across Dinah’s face as she actually looked around the room, instead of at the children, her eyes went wide at the sight of a small section of the wall with covered in a collage of paper clippings and pin-ups of the Super-Heroes….She walked over and looked closer…there was Jay...and…Tony...and...Dinah smiled with pleasure and blushed a little…yes...there she was…Black Canary.
Dinah reached out and touched it with her fingertips, her eyes traveling from one picture to the other, her fingertips stopping at a picture of Iron Man. She touched the paper cheek of the man in the iron suit.
She blinked her eyes coming out of her thoughts at the feeling of a small tug on her coat.
She looked down at a small boy, his shiny head pale and his blue eyes piercing.
“You’re Iron Mans wife!”
Dinah smiled and kneeled down.
“Not exactly..” The little boy smiled and ran off quickly whispering into his friends ear. The nurse came over to Dinah.
“They all know who Iron Man is and when they found out he was in this hospital we had to practically block the elevators.” She said smiling.
Dinah opened her mouth to speak but before she could do so she found herself swarmed with children.
“Tell us about him!”
“Can we see him?”
“Is he better?”
“How big was his band-aid?”
Dinah smiled broadly. Well…it wasn’t
Black Canary they wanted and she didn’t sign up to be Iron Man’s Celebrity wife, but years of watching her Uncles and mother handle fans she’d picked up a
few things.
Dinah sat down cross legged on the floor.
“Well…”
