"Creeeak-"
The flimsy wooden door was shoved open, and a cold draft from the hallway, tinged with the briny smell of the sea, instantly filled the cramped rented room.
"Jack, the rain's gotten heavier again."
A woman in an oversized old trench coat walked in. She held a rain-soaked brown paper bag protectively against her chest. Her heavily swollen belly made even bending down to change her shoes a struggle.
"Janet!"
Jack sprang to his feet, fumbling for the ragged towel draped over the chair back as he hurried over. "God, how long were you in line? Your hands are freezing! Come on, sit down!"
Jack wiped the rain from his wife's hair with the towel while carefully helping her to the only reasonably intact wooden chair beside the bed.
Bruce sat on the bed, still holding the unfinished half of a moldy piece of black bread.
With eyes honed by elite operative training, he coldly scrutinized the woman named Janet.
A sallow complexion, signs of severe anemia; thick finger joints, evidence of years of hard physical labor; frayed cuffs on her old trench coat, though it had been washed clean.
Most telling of all were her eyes.
They held none of the numbness, cunning, or greed so common among Gotham's underclass, only a tired but gentle light.
Janet set the paper bag on the table. Two shriveled potatoes and a small piece of hardened cheese rolled out. That was all the food she had gotten after waiting three hours in the bitter wind.
She raised her head, looking past Jack's shoulder, and saw Bruce sitting on the bed.
"You're awake? Thank God." Janet let out a long sigh of relief. Her tense shoulders sagged, and she gave Bruce a somewhat weak smile.
"Do you know me?" Bruce's voice was