Smile for Me
A Joker's taleI looked into his eyes. They were cold, merciless, and inhumane with every elaborate twitch of his evil being. Encircled with black face paint, he had put large, attention-grabbing emphasis on them. They appeared just as a clown's eyes should, the only difference, is that it was not for the purpose of making people laugh. He wants to see suffering. He wants to witness the torments that he puts them through. He wants to manipulate the 'schemers' and watch as their 'little worlds' fall devastatingly apart. He wants to change things, forever. He wants to savour the little emotions people show him in their last moments. He wants fear. He wants anarchy. He wants blood. He wants laughter, his at them.
He looks into the distance, smiling at the fireworks display. Buildings explode into heavy showers of rubble, ash and flame. His grin widens as the authorities go hysterical; police scattering, trying to regain control of the chaos. Fire fighters burning alive to save those burned to death. Ambulances were being force-fed with corpses, and the people ran in all directions for their lives, screaming in terror. He lifted his head and breathed in deeply, as panic spread like an unstoppable plague.
His ears picked up a sweet sound. He shot a sick grin at the scene of a lady violently shaking with all her strength a police officer who had called back the fire fighters. Her child was trapped in his bedroom, could they not save him? His mouth, scarred beyond any healing, curled back and made the stitched skin fold together. These scars were his prize features. He made sure everyone notices them with the blood-red paint he had applied over that long mouth. The stitches were to sew his mouth back to its original width, after it was sliced through the corners, up into his cheeks. From these crude attempts of repair, his face bore gaps and so his mouth kept secreting saliva. He often made sharp clicks with his lips and tongue, to stop himself from drooling. It made him appear like a freak, but don't ever let him hear you call him that. He will find you and make you squeal. He knows the squealers when he sees one and...Wait, why so serious, dear reader?
He will make you smile. He never fails to put a smile on that face. With his most cherished razor, a two inch blade that has a lengthy gap in the centre, he has sliced his victims into a grinning grave.
Oh! Shh...Shh...Shh...Shh... Shh...Shh!
He can do it, and he will, but if he's good at something, he'll never do it for free. He rips off the mob-dealers who pay him to do the dirty work for them. He burns them alive in their money. He cuts them up into little pieces and feeds them to their pooches. And he puts smiles on the faces of those who threaten him. But as he had shown on live television, he likes to play with his prey before killing them.
He had kidnapped a Batman imitator, one of those ridiculous fools who dress up like the Dark Knight, and showed Gotham there was a new criminal on the block, a better class of criminal. He sliced the sides of the mouth of the youth in a black hockey vest and video-taped his private interview with him. The man was crying in pain and fear, and would not look at him until his voice deepened into one of merciless evil, demanding him to look. He then turned the camera onto his own face, painted an ashen white, and declared happily as his face filled the whole screen, that unless the real Batman reveals himself, he promises that people will die. He is a man of his word. He then laughed maniacally and turned to kill the man. The camera moved so fleetingly, it was impossible to sight his doings. But the screams emitted from the prolonged murder were clear and disturbing, rocking the public to their core. The cruel irony is that it was all clearly seen from the video that the deed was done in a commercial meat freezer, where many butchered parts of dead animals were kept in for freshness.
His tall, comically straight figure stood on a pair of thin, untrained legs which were a square distance apart to his broad shoulders. His head was hunched down, his neck bent forwards as if inspecting a miniscule specimen he is experimenting on. His dark purple overcoat blowing in the cold, unfeeling wind, he stares through the straggled strands of his yellow-green hair, smacking his tongue over his charred lips. He fingers his knife, caressing the sharp blade he took so much pride in. Suddenly his treasure cuts through his glove and carves deep into his finger. He hisses in pain, short-lived however, for his inhuman wit told him otherwise to do with the blood.
He walks to a shop with frosted glass windows, a dandy little house selling year-round Christmas treats. His finger is bleeding profusely now, and he smears the red liquid on the smooth glass. He writes his favourite phrase, laughing while he does it. WHY SO SERIOUS? He ends the bloody vandalism with his trademark smile, drawn to the absolute likeness and accuracy, so anyone who looks upon it will know who done it.
Stepping back a few odd, jerky paces, he admired his little artwork while removing his glove to suck at the cut. He pulls the finger from his mouth, impassively watched it bleed then popped it back in his mouth again.
His gloves were self-customed; it was just too much fun. Rude stitches had joined strips of dark purple leather to fittingly over his hands, so there were numerous lines of jutting material protruding from them. The bleeding stopped and he slipped his glove back on, stretching the fingers. He dusted himself, brushing down the purple cloth from fluttering around. Now, this overcoat he did not make himself. Rather he used the money he stole from the mob and sent one of his goons to fetch a tailor, doubtlessly killing him after the clothes were made.
A dark purple he wanted, with the length not below his knee and three loose flaps of cloth at the end. Made with silk insides, of an awkward red-orange colour, greatly mismatching the cover; the point exactly. Then a purplish-grey waistcoat jacket, which had the same weird red insides. These he wore with smugness and delight. But he was not bothered with looking clean, and grime lined the edges of his suit.
A pair of pants, same colour as the coat, which would fit his legs comfortably with no looseness. A vest, eerie green on the front and greyish-purple at the back, wrapped his slim body warmly. He wore a thin striped tie and collared long sleeves that were patterned with dark purple hexagons over a diluted lavender. A prick tapped at the bottom of his foot. He crouched and pulled off his dark brown, dusty shoe, unbothered to untie the laces. He turned the fellow upside down. Three little pebbles fell out. He dropped the shoe and turned his foot over to pick out the finer grains clinging onto his socks; socks that were chequered with squares of black, purple, tan and turquoise green randomly patterned together to form, again, a most mismatched appearance. He slips his shoe back on and adjusts his vest, it having folded inwards, like a bra strap.
"There he is!"
"The murderer!"
"Where's that lousy Bat?!"
"Men! After him!"
He rolled his eyes, sighed and pulled a bomb activator from his waistcoat. He traced his bloodstained finger over the buttons and chose the shiny yellow one. The pavement his pursuers were running on erupted with an ear bursting boom. Debris flew around him as he unplugged his ears and waggled his head vigorously. He turned to absorb his masterpiece of disaster, smacked his lips then strolled down the dark road. He suddenly scrambled onto the pavement, as if a car would collide with him any moment in a busy street. Then he swung himself to face the road. His head turned right. He smacked his lips then looked left, then right again. He raised his right arm high, followed by walking briskly across the empty road.
He walked like a stiff, happily, as if knees were absent in his body. Strolling down the long damp alley, his jerking figure and dishevelled hair was set against the flickering silhouette of the flames behind. He saw his van, bullet marked and chipped all over, and hopped over to it.
The click of a gun pierced the silence.
He froze in his tracks then calmly swirled around. His nose came in contact with the loaded barrel of a gun. The man at the end of the gun was trembling before the unblinking criminal mastermind. He knew not who he was up against, but he will risk the nothing he now had to end the life of this monster. His family, his beloved family, he had watched them burn on live television in the hands of this heartless murderer. His hands were white with the grip he had on the gun. He was sweating with fear and hate, his eyes never once leaving that face from hell. "You're going to pay, Joker." He cursed through clenched teeth, "I'm going to kill you. You're not gonna take another step, or another life, you shit."
He smacked his lips and smiled. "Now, now, let's not be so hasty with our words." His coaxing nasal voice sent the man's hair standing.
"Shut up! Don't talk!" In his desperation, he found he had nothing else to say.
He replied with a calm that froze blood. He cocked his head up, opening his arms in a welcoming-cum-pleading gesture. "The night is still young and full of opportunity!" He takes a creeping step forward. "Why don't we just –"
"SHUT UP, FREAK!" He stumbled back in panic.
He stopped, his right foot behind the other.
His neck bent lower. He kept eye contact with the frightened man, his eyes staring upwards. The man's breathing began to heaven as fearful beads of sweat trickled down his face. As his shoulders slowly stooped and gaze grew intense, ensnaring the man's soul, his bloodstained glove moved behind his back. He rotates his head to the other side, letting the hair fall over his face, as his hand waved up and down. A knife slips out from his purple sleeve.
In that instant the blade pierced the man's wrist and sliced it, tearing the ligaments apart. The man screamed and dropped his gun. His hand dangled from the strand of flesh that still held it to his arm. He fell to his knees. The knife then found its way into his mouth. Another gloved hand held his head steady. His attacker bent low to look him in the face, pressing the blade to the corner of his mouth, ever ready to slice it.
The freak sighed and smacked his lips. "Why so serious, hmmm?" He casually sways from side to side. "What makes me...a freak, hmmm?" He smacks his lips, rolling his tongue over the scars. He presses the blade harder. The man whimpers. "C'mon. Answer me. C'mon, c'mon. What makes me a freak, hmmm? C'mon. C'mon. Answer me. What is it, hmmm?" His voice becomes deep and his mouth contorts into a snarl. "What? What?! WHAT?! ANSWER ME!" His tone lightens, "Is it the scars? It's the scars isn't it?" He pauses to smack his lips. "You wanna know how I got 'em?" The knife draws blood.
The man squeals. "I'll take that as a yes." Then his eyes harden, "But no." He slices the face swiftly. The flesh was cut clean and blood flowed freely. The body of the man weakens with the immense pain and he pushes the face away. The man falls on his side, screaming and clutching his face as blood poured over his hands.
"I'm not in the mood for bedtime stories today, sonny. Ah! Ha! Ha! Ha..." He flicks the blood on his knife over the man then wipes the blade clean on the man's shirt. "Eh, heh! Heh! Hee...Maybe next time!" He skipped away and let himself into the van. He would be his own driver, for he had exploded his own goons while they were planting the bombs for him. He reverses, turns the wheel in the direction of the bawling man, and drove at full speed. His van bounced over a live road bump and he slowed his pace. Briefly putting his head out to glance at the now quiet, flattened body, he dashes away, just like that, not looking back to the horrors he left behind.
In the sky, the Batman sign fades to nothingness as it is encased in arising smoke and ash. The dark empty alleys fill with his freakish laughter.
It's been a party.
End