If this gentleman had passed by on the street Alfred might not have recognized him as one of Zelda's many siblings, but the determination with which he was making his way towards them was a dead giveaway. He had been so busy prior to this evening, and so far during the event, worrying about Ari, and Zelda's father, and the bloody Minister and his wife that it had hardly even occurred to him to worry about this Fisk, but he was plenty worried now. For one thing, he wasn't even entirely confident that he knew the first name of this Mr. Fisk, which didn't bode well for his ability to get through a conversation with him without making a fool of himself.
(He did listen when Zelda talked about her family, and paid attention, but she had an awful lot of siblings and he could not be expected to remember all of them and their names when he had had such little face-to-face interaction with them. It didn't help, either, that none of them had easy, English names like John)
Alfred didn't like, either, the way that he said he'll be here shortly; it made it sound as though there had been a prior arrangement to this effect. They couldn't possibly have known anything like this was set to happen, since he knew both he and Zelda had kept it a carefully guarded secret. He had a dramatic and unwelcome vision of all of the Fisk brothers conferencing in the cloak room moments earlier and discussing the most subtle way to lure him outside and murder him in the alley. He gave a nervous glance to either side to ensure they weren't creeping up to ambush him already, but of course they weren't, because that was ridiculous. Wasn't it?
Zelda was going to know how to handle this, he told himself. It was her family, and her plan — and his attempt to try and smooth things over and act honorable and do the right thing was what had resulted in the disastrous Passover last year. He had to trust that Zelda could get through this, and that she'd be able to drag him through with her and they'd both come out the other end of it. He briefly and gently put a hand on her elbow, as a gesture of encouragement — and, without conscious thought, placed himself slightly behind her so that she was shielding him somewhat from her older brother.
MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER
(He did listen when Zelda talked about her family, and paid attention, but she had an awful lot of siblings and he could not be expected to remember all of them and their names when he had had such little face-to-face interaction with them. It didn't help, either, that none of them had easy, English names like John)
Alfred didn't like, either, the way that he said he'll be here shortly; it made it sound as though there had been a prior arrangement to this effect. They couldn't possibly have known anything like this was set to happen, since he knew both he and Zelda had kept it a carefully guarded secret. He had a dramatic and unwelcome vision of all of the Fisk brothers conferencing in the cloak room moments earlier and discussing the most subtle way to lure him outside and murder him in the alley. He gave a nervous glance to either side to ensure they weren't creeping up to ambush him already, but of course they weren't, because that was ridiculous. Wasn't it?
Zelda was going to know how to handle this, he told himself. It was her family, and her plan — and his attempt to try and smooth things over and act honorable and do the right thing was what had resulted in the disastrous Passover last year. He had to trust that Zelda could get through this, and that she'd be able to drag him through with her and they'd both come out the other end of it. He briefly and gently put a hand on her elbow, as a gesture of encouragement — and, without conscious thought, placed himself slightly behind her so that she was shielding him somewhat from her older brother.
MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER