Flashfic based around the first verse of "Love Somebody" by Maroon 5. I don't know what possessed me to connect that prompt to this character, but once upon a time I did promise myself that somehow I would try to make some form of Riddler/Two-Face work in something that is decidedly NOT the (admittedly ship-inventing) Schumacher-verse.
I don't fall in love.
Theoretically, I'm capable, of course. It's the human condition. But it's not relevant to my work (my first love, as it were) – I just don't have the time to pursue these things – and anyway, when I am already the cleverest person around, who should be able to impress me enough, who should I be able to find so utterly fascinating…?
And yet here you are, tempting me, wresting my focus from more pressing matters so I can think of nothing but you, your passion and conviction, your forthright shrewdness, your principled unpredictability, your raw voice and barely-bridled fury and expressions that seem to say several things at once, and all your coexisting contradictions that I need to puzzle out and know more intimately…
Ha, but I'm sure you'd try to put me out if you even had an inkling of any of this. I might too, if I were you. It would all ring hollow for you, wouldn't it? You've been burned too many times before, figuratively moreso, and though you'd like the chance again, you wouldn't trust it – if you even think you'd deserve it. And you might not even believe it, not from me. I wouldn't believe it from me, either. I still don't quite.
And yet here I am, still pondering it. Though I don't know why. Though you would balk at the notion of me being in love with you. Though I don't fall in love. But if I do – and I'm dangerously close – I won't be the same.
And then what will I do?