They say that you can never go home again, which on the surface is patently absurd. Of course you can go home again. Home is always there, steadfast and unchanging. That's the whole point of a home! What the writer actually meant, though, is that once you leave home for the first time – for longer than an afternoon, anyway – you grow. You change. You may be able to return to the same building, but it will never quite have the same air of protection and warmth and, well, homeyness as it once did. Once it's gone, it's gone forever, and no amount of wishing or pretending will bring it back.
Arkham Asylum, as halfhearted a home as ever there was, was missing a few inhabitants tonight. The Riddler, with some minor assistance, had located Jackie within the long, cold corridors of the asylum and offered her her freedom. Jackie, in the heat of the moment, had sprung through the open window and followed Eddie into the chilly spring night. They'd made their way through the city, trotting quietly through unlit streets and abandoned alleys until they arrived at the nearest lair – the pink-drenched apartment that they'd lived in for most of last November. Jackie, shivering with the excitement of freedom (and the chill of cold sweat mixed with fresh, damp air), had stayed right behind Eddie, trailing him along paths that she was pretty sure were safe. It had probably only taken a few hours to cross the city, but to Jackie, it felt like this night had lasted for years.
Most people leave a key under the mat in case they lock themselves out. The Riddler usually had higher standards for his entryways. At the very minimum, each door would be fitted with a puzzle lock, and then ideally, rigged with a nasty surprise built in to scare off wandering salesmen and nosy ne'er-do-wells. Then again, his lairs were not usually smack-dab in the middle of a street full of civilian apartments packed with civilians who would probably eagerly call the police at the merest hint of a supervillain lurking in their midst.
This door, puzzle-lock free, was guarded by a mere triple deadlock. The key, contrary to tradition, was buried deep in the twisty twigs of a pink-flowered wreath that clung to the door like a marauding patch of mold. With a few moments' work, the door to the lair creaked open. Eddie and Jackie hurried inside and shut the door with a sigh of relief. After a brief check to make sure that the blackout curtains were still firmly closed over the windows, Eddie flicked on the lights.
Time is not kind to prisoners, but it's also not a friend to unlived-in homes. No one had been inside the pink apartment since Thanksgiving. It looked much the same as they'd left it, except now the pink was muted under a layer of thick gray dust.
Three deadbolts snapped into place behind Jackie. Eddie dusted off his hands and grinned happily at her around his swollen lip. "I'm going to go get changed, and then we can find thome food." Humming a happy tune to himself, he disappeared into the bedroom that held all of his clothes.
Jackie was just as eager to get anything stamped with ARKHAM off of herself as Eddie was. She went to her own closet and sorted through her clothes, skinning out of the itchy gray jumpsuit with a sigh of happiness. Her own underwear – underwear that hadn't been worn by a selection of mentally unstable Arkhamites. Bliss. A soft purple t-shirt with sleeves big enough to fit over the cast on her arm, a pair of jeans, and her warm, thick sweater - there. Feeling much more comfortable, she padded in her fuzzy-socked feet out to the kitchen.
Eddie was already there, pawing through the cupboards in search of food that hadn't expired. Since none of his question-marked clothes were there, he'd opted for one of the countless red t-shirts and pairs of blue jeans that Jackie had bought for him last year.
Jackie bit her lip as she watched him. The jeans, which had been a little small on him before, were hanging loosely on his hips. His arms, which had never been that bulky, were alarmingly thin. And his face - in the darkness of the asylum and the back alleys of Gotham, she hadn't been able to see the large black bruise splashed cruelly across his jaw. "What happened to you?" she whispered.
He shrugged and tossed a box of long-expired donuts at the trash can. "Arkham," he said, as if that was some kind of explanation.
Horrible, burning guilt surged up inside Jackie. If she'd been a proper henchgirl, she would have protected him from Batman. Instead, she'd run off by herself, abandoning him to Batman's limited amounts of mercy, and that had landed him back in Arkham. He was hurt because of her. "Sit down," she said, pointing to a chair. "I'll get you some food."
He gratefully slid into one of the pink-cushioned kitchen chairs, settling his feet on the seat of another chair and lounging comfortably as Jackie bustled around. She opened the fridge and immediately slammed it shut, coughing at the reek of moldy, spoiled food.
Maybe there was something edible in the freezer. She cracked it open. When no horrific odors threatened to gas her, she opened it a little wider.
A stack of individually-wrapped pieces of lasagna towered over a Tupperware container of chicken paprikash. Her mom always did make too much food. She pulled two pieces of the lasagna out and plopped them onto small plates, stuffing them both into the microwave at the same time.
Slowly, deliciously, the scent of sausage and tomato sauce began to fill the air of the tiny kitchen. Jackie stood, her back to the Riddler, watching the food rotate in the microwave. Her unicorn necklace, tucked under her sweater, was still chilly from their cross-city run. She toyed with it absently as she stared at the spinning lasagna.
She was out. She was out and she was free, and according to Harley Quinn, she might be able to stay that way if she didn't do anything else that made officials suspect her sanity – like, say, helping Eddie in any way, or going to the Iceberg, or doing anything that she'd gotten accustomed to doing in the handful of months since her apartment had burned down.
If she didn't misbehave – if she stayed on the right side of the law – she could have a real life again, with a real home and a real future, solid and stable, prearranged and predictable. But if she did give it up – if she packed her bags and left Gotham and all its super-residents behind – where would she go? What would she do?
The microwave beeped. She snatched the plates out and laid them on the table, eager for the distraction.
The next few minutes were filled with the reverent, radiant silence of people tasting real food for the first time in weeks. Eventually, after the ecstasy of homemade leftovers had died down a bit, Eddie caught Jackie's eye and gave her a lopsided smile. "Tho tell me," Eddie said, winding a strand of cheese around his fork. "What'th the damage?"
"Hmm?" Jackie, mouth full of pasta, gave him a startled look.
"Your thententhe," he lisped. "How many yearth?"
"Oh." She chased a little chunk of ricotta cheese around her plate with her fork. She might as well tell him now. Waiting wasn't going to change the truth, and it wasn't like you could keep anything from the Riddler if he really wanted to find out. "Nothing."
"Nothing?" he repeated, one eyebrow raised.
"They dropped the charges. They forgot to file some papers, I guess." She poked a piece of spicy sausage carefully back into her lasagna, avoiding his eyes.
He took another bite, chewing it carefully as he avoided irritating his injuries. "Hmm. Tho...I wath thinking for our next heitht, we could -"
"Next heist?" she interrupted. Her fork dropped onto her plate with a ceramic clatter.
"Of courthe," he said, taken aback. "What did you think we were doing after we broke out?"
"I thought...well...maybe there shouldn't be a next heist. Not for me, anyway," she added hurriedly as a closed look of denial shuttered over Eddie's face. "I mean, look what happened! You're all beat up, you're half-starved, I've got a broken arm, well, it's almost healed, but still...I'm not a very good henchgirl," she mumbled. The lasagna felt like a cold cannonball in her stomach. "They're not pressing charges. Maybe I should just…quit."
His fork hit the table with a quiet, deliberate thud. "You're leaving," he said flatly. She looked up to see him staring at her – not with an angry glare, or a sad gaze, but with the kind of dull resignation that said that he must have been expecting this.
"No. Yes. I don't know," she said, burying her hands in her hair and resting her elbows on the table. This was impossible. She drew in a shuddering breath, trying not to cry. "Do you even want me to stay?"
"Yeth."
She raised her head and saw the determined look in his eyes. "Really? I thought that...I mean, you did break me out, but...it's my fault we were in Arkham anyway." She dropped her head into her hands again, drowning in a sea of misery.
Two hands took her by the shoulders and turned her to the side. "Lithen to me," Eddie said, crouching in front of her. "Are you lithening?"
Jackie sniffled and nodded Yes.
"Our capture wath not your fault. No," he said, overriding her immediate protest, "it wath not. It wath Batman'th fault. He'th the one that put uth in Arkham, not you. Robin ith the one that broke your arm, not you." He paused. "How did he break your arm, anyway?"
"He threw me into a table," Jackie mumbled.
Eddie sighed. "You thee? He broke your arm for no reathon."
"Well, it wasn't exactly for no reason. I...kind of tried to break his skull with a hair straightener," she admitted, hunching sheepishly backward.
"And you thay you're not a good henchgirl," Eddie chuckled.
"I'm not!"
"You are. I've theen grown men wet themthelveth the firtht time they thaw Batman in action. Do you remember what you did the firtht time you thaw him and hith brat? You marched right up there and tried to thtop them. That'th all it taketh to be a good henchgirl." He grinned at her, that saucy, clever grin that always made her feel like a silly schoolgirl with a crush. "Anyway, I love you. Ithn't that enough?"
"I love you too," she smiled, squeezing his hand where it rested on her shoulder. "But...I just don't know what I should do."
The smile disappeared from his face. He gripped her shoulders tightly for a moment, then stood up and padded back to his seat. "You don't have to dethide tonight. It'th late - well, it'th early," he corrected, noticing the clock ticking gently past five AM. "It'th been a long night. We can talk about it later."
"Okay," Jackie said as they returned to their meal. There were decisions to make and choices to choose. But for right now, later meant the chance to spend one more night with Eddie, consequence-free, and right now that was all that she could hope for.
The next few days passed in a blur of careful mediocrity. Eddie, who disliked few things more than having to be seen with a face full of injuries, stayed resolutely indoors, making great use of the refrigerator's automatic ice dispenser.
Things had been strained, to say the least. He didn't often break someone out of Arkham only to have them immediately voice their desire to leave him. Well, okay, that happened all the time, but that was with other rogues.
He'd expected a lot of things when they'd gotten back here. He'd expected her to jump back into training, or call up some of her henchgirl friends, or at the very least that she'd express some kind of interest in what they'd be doing next. Instead, she was spending a fair bit of her time in the spare bedroom, the one that they'd designated as 'hers' for her parents, only coming out for meals, and even then barely saying a word.
What was the matter with her, anyway? Okay, so the court had canceled all of her charges. So what? She'd left Arkham with him anyway. She had to know that breaking out of Arkham, and breaking out with him, would send everyone from the cops to the Bats after her. She was already committed, as it were. Why was she suddenly all nervous about going forward?
He glanced out of the kitchen. She sat, folded uncomfortably into an armchair, scraping at her plaster cast with a steak knife.
At least this was one thing he knew how to fix. He set his half-melted ice pack down on the counter and stuck his head into the living room. "Come here."
"Why?"
"Just come in here."
She appeared a moment later, steak knife still wedged in a tiny scrape mark in the cast. He popped it free and set it aside, guiding her arm into the sink. Nozzle in hand, he turned the sprayer on, soaking the cast from top to bottom. When it was softened, he pulled a pair of kitchen shears out of the knife block and started slicing through the leathery remains of the cast. Once he'd carved a suitably large hole in the elbow, the rest of her arm slid out like a peeled shrimp.
"There," he said, tossing the plaster-flecked shears into the sink.
"You're good at that," she said, examining her thin, pale arm.
"I've had a lot of practice. Wiggle your fingers?" She did, also gingerly flexing her elbow. "Good as new."
"Thanks," she murmured, watching her arm freely moving around.
"You're welcome." Casually, he shifted so that he was between Jackie and the doorway. "We need to talk."
"About what?"
"About you hiding in that room. Jackie, what's wrong?" he asked, stepping into her path as she tried to dart around him. "You can talk to me."
"It's…I…"
Rapid-fire fists hammered on the door. "Hello in there! You guys home?" Before Eddie could answer, the door handle began to melt under a stream of neon green acid.
Eddie hurried to the door and wrenched the deadbolts open, jumping aside as the door swung open to reveal Harley Quinn, pigtailed and perky, in the middle of breaking in with the help of an acid-spitting flower. "Hey, Riddles," she greeted, casually cheerful, as if she hadn't just ruined his cover, his carpet, and his door.
"What do you want?" he snapped.
"What is with everyone today? Mr. J's in a mood, Red kicked me out – well, her plants did," she said, rubbing a tattered scratch on the shoulder of her tight red shirt. "An' I've got this great plan! Hiya, Q," she waved over Eddie's shoulder. Eddie glanced back to see Jackie stopped dead in her flight trajectory toward the spare room. She waved hi weakly back with her newly uncasted arm. "Hey, yer arm's better! 'Bout time." Harley bustled inside, tucking the acid flower back into her smiley-face purse.
"Come in," Eddie invited crossly.
"Thanks, Riddles. So anyway, I've got this great plan to get into the art museum, but here's the thing – it needs at least two other people, and since Mr. J and Red aren't interested, I thought maybe you two would want in."
"Oh," Eddie said, trying to think of a polite way to say that of all the rogues in the city, he'd rather team up with just about anyone rather than her. "Ah…"
"Q? How about it?" Harley beamed enticingly, eyebrows quirked above her bright blue eyes. "We're out of Arkham – thanks for leaving the window unlocked, by the way," she added happily. "Time to have some fun!"
"I can't," Jackie blurted.
"Why not? You got something else on your schedule?"
"Well, kind of. I'm, uh, going to, um…Vermont. Tomorrow."
"Awww. You sure?"
"Yeah…"
Harley sighed disconsolately. "Guess it'll hafta wait 'til Mr. J's in a better mood. I could do it with the boys, I guess, but the last time I pulled a job with them they tripped the alarm by accident and the Bat took 'em all out before we even got in the vault." She rolled her eyes at the memory and yanked open the acid-eaten door. "Have fun in Vermont, Q!"
Perky footsteps clattered down the hall. When they'd faded into silence, Eddie leaned up against the door, or at least a part of it which was only slightly melted. "Vermont?"
"Well, I didn't want to…I mean…" She rubbed her wrist.
Eddie sighed. She didn't want to go on a heist with Harley, not because doing anything with Harley meant a much greater chance of ending the evening in a straitjacket, but because she didn't want to go on a heist with anyone. Including him.
"And if she comes back?" he inquired softly.
"I could…I could hide in the bedroom, I guess," she mumbled.
"Or you could go to Vermont."
"What?" She looked up at him, baffled – and while he loved seeing that expression on nearly anyone else's face, it wasn't nearly as enjoyable on Jackie's.
"What if Harley decides to come and see you? She does things like that, you know. I assume that you chose Vermont because that's where your parents live. Do you want them to have to deal with her by themselves?"
Jackie's fingers twisted the hem of her shirt, rolling it back and forth across her knuckles. "You want me to leave?" she asked in a tiny voice.
In an instant, he was across the room, folding her into the hug he'd wanted to give her for days. She stiffened, then relaxed against him, resting her head on his shoulder. "I want you to stay. But you're clearly not happy here. Go visit your parents. Take some time off. I'll be here whenever you decide to come back."
"You're sure?" She pulled back, searching his face for reassurance.
"Positive," he smiled, kissing her forehead. He was positive, all right – positive that a few days back in insipid suburbia would drive her back to Gotham in a heartbeat. She'd go, she'd be bored, and she'd come home – end of problem. And once she came to her senses and came back, they could get back to life as usual – or as unusually usual as it ever got in Gotham, anyway.
(to be continued)