Harley lay completely still for what seemed like the first time in her explosive life. She felt the cool cement cot beneath her, void of sheets or pillow, and breathed in the chilly asylum air.
Stiff and stagnant.
Familiar.
Lying on her back she examined the cracked ceiling looming high above her and the small squares of light cast from the high window, leaking in only enough moonlight to illuminate blurry blue shadows.
Her pale hands reflected the grey light with particular ferocity and the smooth porcelain was only interrupted by crude purple blotches, bruising from - what again? She couldn't remember a time she hadn't been dotted in bruising. She ran icy fingers over her face and through the tangled blonde locks of her hair.
Even in the darkness of her cell she could tell she looked a mess. Dried blood caked her hair and prison uniform, haphazard grease paint had been smeared from sweat and rain, and one eye was especially tender and bound to leave a pretty impressive shiner come morning.
It was nights like these, cold and alone in Arkham, that she dreaded the most.
It gave her time to reflect.
To regret.
Because when the last flare of an explosion died out and the smoke cleared with a familiar laugh, when things were still, memories and feelings unfamiliar started to bubble up from deep within. Why had she screwed up so bad? Why couldn't she ever be good enough for him? Why did he always leave her?
Why was she so broken?
She tries her best to ride lazily on the small high her medications provide her, high like a balloon in the clouds, up, up, and away from her memories.
Away from reality.
That's when she felt her best; when the frayed cord attaching her to reality was clouded by her 'delusions', as the Doctors say, and she was free to live in her own world. Free to shine bright and laugh, love and have fun.
But reality was a sneaky bastard, and if you weren't careful it could end up weighing you down until you fade away. Until you see through the pretty lies, and remember all the shitty choices you've made, that, you know, didn't seem that shitty at the time.
It weighs on you like a brick and chain wrapped around your ankle, pulling you under the stinging water of regret and mistakes and not-so-happy birthdays and dad's whiskey and bombs and bruises.
So she lets the medication pump her head full of cotton until the world is muted and quiet.
And she imagines in her mind's eye the face of her Baby, her world and purpose. The man with the shining grin and messy green hair. The world was wrong about him, very wrong, and it makes her sad she's the only one who can see it.
The way his rough hands can be soft when he wants them too, when a heist goes a little bit funny and she ends up hurt. The way he watches her sleep with focused eyes, although he will always deny it. The way he is after making love, calm and in the moment.
The way he pulled her out of boring old reality and made sense of the world by showing her it made none.
He was her savior, intelligent and rough. So when he tells her to grab her gun and follow him into the casino she does. Or when he tells her to kill the poor thugs and pile them out back she obeys. And when he pushes her out of the moving purple Caddy, and she lands hard on the pavement in from of the cops, she accepts it.
Because although he would never say it, he loves her.
He shows it through the little things, the gestures and jokes. Cutting off a mob bosses pinky and presenting her with the ring. Bringing her a coat when he picks her up for a bank robbery. Making sure to slow down to a cool 45 before pushing her out of the car.
So she lays and waits on her cool cot. Imagines her Baby's beautiful face in the hanging blue shadows. Misses his pale fingers entwined with hers when they run from the cops.
If she listens hard enough she can even hear his faint laughing out her barred window, somewhere far off in the distance.
And she laughs. Because she is so hopelessly, beautifully, explosively in love. And she waits for the moment he breaks her out of this joint, picks her up like any regular Joe - with the exception that any regular Joe wouldn't bring bombs and guns - and takes her hand to lead her out through a flurry of bullets.
Just the two of them; her and her Puddin against the world.
Screw Nicholas Sparks and his ideas about love. Love comes in all shapes and forms, for better or for worse, and she knows the fireworks in her heart are genuine when her and the Joker are together.
And that's all that matters.