SPOILERS FOR SUICIDE SQUAD (2016) ABOUND
Warning(s): Mentions of Domestic Violence, Drug Use, Non-Consensual Assisted Drug Use, Suicide Attempts (Sort Of), Self Harm (Sort Of), etc.
It had been six days, thirteen hours, and twelve minutes since Harley had walked out on him. He couldn't even remember what had caused their little lover's spat, but whatever it was had certainly been bad enough to ruffle her sensitive feathers.
Which also meant that it had been six days, thirteen hours, and twelve... no, thirteen minutes now, since he'd slept.
He didn't know how he hadn't simply collapsed from sheer exhaustion. After all, he was only human. A human that had miraculously survived a dip in a vat of acid, but a human nonetheless. Going so long without sleep had all sorts of nasty effects on the body - like cognitive dysfunction and hallucinations. And while he might occasionally dabble with hallucinogenics, he'd also been on the wrong end of the Scarecrow's fear toxin. His hallucinations were never pretty.
She was his obsession, his perfect little toy. It delighted him to test out all the different ways he could twist and bend and break her, as if she were some sort of doll. But it was something else, as well. It was the warmth that built up in his chest when he was pulled from one of his nightmares by her gentle fingers weaving through his hair, the way his heart flew up into his throat when he watched her lavish attention upon the other men in the club...
The way he'd wanted to tear that sick bastard apart for even thinking about laying a hand on his Harley.
He'd meant what he said when he said that he'd do anything for her. If he could, he'd find a way to string the stars into a necklace more radiant than any diamonds, to match her million watt smile. And part of that was reminding the sorry saps, who thought they could touch what was his, of their place.
"Boss," sparks flew in the air as he sharpened one of his many knives with quick, efficient strokes. Sharpening his knives always helped focus him, providing him a way to temporarily anchor a mind that had long ago set sail on the S.S. Insanity. "We've found her."
Suddenly, the knife flew through the air, impaling itself in the wall beside the goon's head. "Didn't anyone ever tell ya it's impolite not ta knock before entering?"
The man found he was glad he'd worn brown slacks to work that day, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. "My apologies, boss. I just thought, 'cause you said -,"
"Ya see, that's the problem. Ya were thinking." The Joker flopped back, completely at ease amidst a sea of weapons. "Thinking is best left for those with brains, don't ya think? The little bitch comes home on her own, or not at all."
He'd never admit the reason why he wouldn't look directly at his newbie henchman. The twenty-something's body had been transformed into that of a gruesome monster, a hideous cross between what looked to be a panda and the Bat. Blood and other unidentifiable bits dripped from it's horrendous maw. There was no Harley to tell him that the monster was simply a figment of his over-active imagination battling his overly-tired brain.
"Bring me my meds." The Joker said suddenly, simply assuming that the poor henchman hadn't scuttled off in fear.
"But boss, aren't they -," he was cut off by a bullet slicing through the air, catching the very tip of his ear before disappearing into the hall.
He couldn't say for certain when the Joker sat back up, but when he drew his bloody hand away from his injured ear, he found his deranged boss licking the smoking pistol with a manic gleam in his eyes. "Don't make me ask twice. Because next time, I won't miss."
Harley wouldn't approve... but then, Harley wasn't there, was she? And wasn't she the reason he needed this fix in the first place? At least, that's what he told himself. The Joker's eyes widened marginally when he was presented with the sterilized needle and a vial filled with a whitish liquid. Quickly, the Joker rolled up his sleeve and presented it to the henchman. If the boy hadn't already soiled himself, he was probably close now.
"Well? What the hell are ya waiting for? Let's get this over with." Then, thinking perhaps the boy didn't know how to fill the syringe, he slipped the needle into the vial and jammed down the plunger, doing it for him. "See? I got it all ready for ya."
"I'm not going to shoot ya up with heroin, boss. What are ya, out of your fucking mind?" He regretted the words as soon as they came out of his mouth, "Not that there's anything wrong with that - being crazy, I mean. You're a genius, sir. Ya wouldn't want to ruin that with drugs."
The Joker cocked his head to the side, "Ya know what I think? You'll look real pretty with a bullet between your eyes."
There was a pop as the gun went off, before the boy collapsed at the Joker's feet, his blood staining the nice creme carpeting. Harley would have a fit...
"Oh well. Ya just can't find decent help these days..." Grabbing the needle, he finished what the henchman couldn't, jamming the needle into his skin and injecting himself with the drug.
Twenty seconds later, his breath shallow and his chest tight, he collapsed in a heap on the floor. He laughed weakly as unconsciousness claimed him, his erratic heartbeat like crashing waves in his ears...
Four hours later, he woke to unimaginable pain. Harley was standing over him, shaking her head in disbelief. He blinked a few times, clearing the sleep from his eyes, only to see the needle clenched between her tiny fingers. Ah, so he'd been discovered. The world was blurry around the edges and his brain was buried in a dense fog, the cloud so thick that the scene before him was barely registering. Until she started to bleed...
Harley had a bullet hole in the middle of her head, but the Joker seemed to be the only one who noticed that it was there. "Why'd ya do it, Puddin'?" She waved the needle around like a mini-baton, "Ya promised me that you'd stay clean!"
"I know I did, Harley girl. I just... If ya hadn't of left, I'd be able to sleep and I wouldn't need my fix. So what are ya screaming at me for, when this is your fault?" The Joker snapped. "If ya hate it here so bad, why do ya keep coming back? Get the hell out and stay gone, bitch."
Harley was silent for a moment, before she whispered, "Why do ya always hurt me, Mistah J?"
"Pain is love, my dear." The Joker whispered, sounding so very tired. "When ya promised yourself to me, I thought ya understood that."
"All of this is my fault? I wasn't the one who put a bullet between my eyes!" And with that, she collapsed at his feet, blood slowly pouring from the bullet wound. The Joker's eyes widened in disbelief as she lay there, unmoving.
"Harley? Harley!" He didn't realize that he was screaming, his voice sounding like it was traveling through a body of water.
It was only when the drug-induced fog lifted from his mind that he realized the one that had collapsed in his arms was not Harley, but the henchman. Blinking a few times to ensure that this was reality, he quickly shoved the henchman off of him and rose to his feet unsteadily. Perhaps it had been unwise to take such a strong dose after Harley had forced him to detox...
Stepping over the fallen body, he made a mental note to cut off one of Dr. Crane's fingers the next time they had the misfortune of crossing paths. The slimy bastard had taken one of the last true pleasures he had in this world... Aside from his Harley, of course.
The grin that had formed at the thought of dismembering Jonathan Crane fell immediately when he remembered the horrific hallucination he'd just endured.
He remembered now, the reason that she'd left. Funny how a four hour stint of unconsciousness could clear the mind after six days of being on high-alert. He would've never pinned Harley for the jealous type - he'd thought he'd made it fairly clear about how he felt for her when he'd staked his claim all those years ago. She was his, and he'd placed her on an untouchable pedastle from which she could be properly loved and adored.
In the end, it all came back to business. The Joker had needed extra muscle for his latest heist, which the DiAugustino family had been happy to provide - at a price. One of the girls, Laura, had taken a liking to the Joker and it was expected that he 'show her a good time' to earn the family's favor. Now, under normal circumstances, the Joker was the one leading discussions - in other words, offering a life or death ultimatum for other's cooperation. But he'd been... intrigued by their unusual proposal.
Harley, on the other hand, had been far from amused.
"I ain't gonna play second fiddle to some two-bit tramp who would spread her legs for just about anybody!" The Joker's blood was practically boiling - who the hell did the little brat think she was, to be yelling at him?
"Don't be ridiculous, dollface." It took everything in him not to smack her pretty little mouth, if only because he knew the customers would complain about a beaten-up dancer. "I ain't just anyone. I'm the Joker. I could have any woman I wanted, Harley girl, but I chose ya."
She threw her drink at him, the red wine burning his eyes. "Go screw yourself, Mistah J!"
And that was when he lost any semblance of control he might've been struggling to maintain, "Get the hell outta my sight, and don't bother coming back!"
Of course, Harley had ruined the fun, and the business proposal had promptly gone down the drain when the eldest DiAugustino brother found his sister's battered body in the back alley the next day. Damage control had resulted in him being sent one of his henchmen's heads in a box.
Harley, for once, had wisely done what she was told and laid low. Nobody foiled one of the Joker's plots and lived to tell the tale.
It was nearing the middle of week two and Harley had yet to return home.
After two more days without sleep, he'd tried the heroin again. This time, Rocco, a seasoned henchman who had more experience handling the addictions that the Joker had developed over the years, was the one who administered the dose. He stayed with him after, monitoring his erratic heartbeat and making sure that, when he finally went out, he was merely unconscious and not actually dead.
When he returned an hour and a half later, the Joker had his favorite knife to his neck and a far-off look in his eyes. Thin lines of blood were already apparent on his porcelain pale skin, leaving ruby red streaks down his chest and staining one of his favorite purple shirts. The Joker would be having a fit at the mess, were he in the right mind to comprehend what was happening.
"I can't hurt her anymore if I'm dead, right?" The Joker asked, beaming brightly. The almost manic grin on his face went against the severity of what he was about to do, "Think about it: the greatest punchline of all. The greatest criminal mind there ever was, snuffed out by his girlfriend!"
He laughed, as if this were all one big joke that only he was able to understand.
Rocco held up his hands in a show of innocence, "Boss, think about what it is that your doing..."
"Oh, I know exactly what it is that I'm doing. That's what makes it such a great punchline." He said, his grin turning manic.
He'd cut two little x's, which looked like eyes, and had positioned the knife just a little lower, meaning to make a giant smile to complete the illustration. It was the greatest punchline of all, going out with an eternal smile carved onto his body...
He pressed the knife down harder, his hand too fast for Rocco - by the time the henchman realized what had happened, the Joker was laughing maniacally as his body slumped forward, blood staining his shirt. Rocco fell to his knees, forcing the smaller man onto his back and applying pressure to the wound, but it was too late. The blood was coming too fast... The wound was too deep...
And the Joker died with a smile on his face, for once feeling the peace that he had so desperately craved in his lifetime.
"HARLEY!" The Joker woke with a start, grasping at his neck and feeling relief flood over him when he realized that it was still in one piece. A quick glance to his side confirmed that the bed was still empty - Harley had not returned to him.
Maybe it was time to lay off the injections for awhile...
Since sleep had been taken off the table, the Joker turned to his second drug of choice: Adderall. All it took was one 30 mg tablet to keep him awake and alert for twenty-four hours, and he entered week three without any recollection of the last time he'd slept.
But he knew it had been sixteen days, three hours, and four minutes since Harley had left him. Not that he was still counting.
Honestly, he wasn't sure which was worse. The hellacious nightmares from sleeping, or the freaky shit that seemed to keep happening after seventy-two or more hours awake. He was so wired that he couldn't sleep, couldn't even force himself to relax. He had to constantly be moving, to have something to focus his mind on other than the empty bed beside him.
The henchmen had threatened to strap him down to the bed until he detoxed. He had promised to put a bullet through their skull if they didn't shut up.
It was the longest they'd been apart since Arkham, and the Joker had convinced himself she wasn't coming back this time. His Harley girl had probably found another Daddy to take better care of her, one that wouldn't beat her within an inch of her life for screwing up a heist, one that would treat her like a person instead of property. Something twisted painfully in his stomach and he barely had enough time to roll over before getting sick in the trashcan beside the bed.
"Aww, Puddin'... It ain't fun dealing with all the nasty side effects of that shit, is it?" Harley cooed, slipping into bed beside the Joker and rubbing his back. She didn't miss the way he tensed at her touch, "What's wrong, Mistah J?"
Oh God... if this was another hallucination, he didn't think he could handle it. "Harley, I -,"
After three or more days of dosing himself with Adderall, his speech was slurred and he was tired. He was twitching and in pain and he knew that the hallucinations were sure to follow. There was simply no way for him to avoid them forever. So this... this had to be...
Harley slipped her small leg in between the Joker's, wrapping him up tightly in her arms. The twitching stopped as soon as he smelt the familiar scent of her perfume - it was the expensive one he'd bought her for their first Christmas together. The scent was real, and it grounded him. This wasn't a hallucination. Harley had really come home.
"Here, I want ya to drink some of this." She handed him the cup, laughing when he made a face at the gross smell. "Hey, I wasn't the one who put all that nasty shit in my body. So drink your detox smoothie like a good boy and ya might just get a little..." she tapped his chin lightly, "treat."
He took a sip and almost gagged again, before trying to speak once more. His speech was slurred and decidedly not menacing at all, but Harley just smiled and went along with it, pretending to buff his ego back up again. "Ya ever leave me again, little girl, so help me -,"
Harley smiled, "I know my Daddy's only got eyes for one girl." She ran her fingers through his hair soothingly. "And I know that, even though he'll never say it, he missed his Harley girl while she was gone."
"Harley..." his voice was scarcely above a whisper, her name floating over his lips.
"And ya know what?" She leaned in, her lips brushing against his ear. "I missed Daddy, too."
The Joker's grin turned dark. "Then why don't ya come down here and give Daddy some sugar?" He set the smoothie aside, before grabbing her butt and pulling her down against him, their lips connecting in a kiss that was all teeth and tongue.
And that night, she held him close as the first wave of withdrawl hit, hushing him softly with a lullaby until he slipped off into a fever induced sleep.
A/N: So, not exactly a happy ending, but after watching their dynamic in Suicide Squad, I feel like this was a scenario that could totally happen. I mean, the Joker spent the whole damn movie trying to get her back, only for Harley to be flirting with every male member of the Suicide Squad. I don't think Harley would take it so well if the roles were reversed... hence, this little brain child was born. Be sure to let me know what you think!