CrazyA: I is happy! Guys, Joker's on a lil' vacay (I can't be stuffed typing him in the intro every time ). But don't fret, he's in the story. ^^ Read and Review!
4. Measuring Up
'If you're good at something, never do it for free.'- The Joker
So, of course, after the marmalade incident I had to wash my hair. That was a hassle, taking about a whole hour in the shower. I used up most of my shampoo and was even tempted to cut my hair in order to get rid of the sticky substance. But once I was finally putting in the conditioner, I received a phone call from...oh come on, guess who.
"Hi Jess, it's Thalia."
Fooled you.
"Hi, how are you going?" I replied, wondering why her voice sounded so hoarse. Maybe she had a cold or something...
"So-so...I only woke up about half an hour ago...after a late night out with the girls I always feel tired..." she lied. "Anyway, Jack said that you tried coming over to discuss your outfit but I was still asleep. I hope that I didn't take you out of anything important...I don't really like to waste other people's time."
"Oh it's fine, really..." However, I was a bit peeved about the fact that I instead had to be around Jack, the real time-waster.
"Anyway, can you come around again now? I think we better get cracking on this project of ours."
And so, of course, I did. The first thing that I noticed about Thalia was a big black bruise near her eye, but I didn't say a word. She must've known that I'd seen it, because she kept trying to hide that part of her face all the time. Whenever her hair fell from behind her ear, she wouldn't put it away until five minutes later when she'd forgotten about what it was covering. I felt bad for her...and I loathed Jack even more.
He was obviously the one who had done this to her. Now they both had issues. She was a gambler. He was abusive. It was a wonder that they were still together. Jester was tempted to split them apart herself, but I knew it wasn't possible. But I'd have to talk to them about it...play the act of marriage counselor. I'd done it in the past with my friends and their rubbish boyfriends; I figured I could do it to these two.
"Hi, come on in," she said, waving me inside. She spotted the pile of papers in my arm and smiled. "Great that you brought over your sketches! I completely forgot about them!" I walked inside, sitting down immediately on their couch and putting the sketches on the table. Two mugs of coffee were on the table, indicating that it was just going to be Thalia and me talking. Brilliant, it was just what I wanted.
"I hope you like your coffee this way," Thalia said, sitting down opposite from me. In all honesty, I preferred tea with heaps of sugar to coffee. But I remained nice and nodded, saying that it was perfect.
"So before we start...how much will this whole thing cost me?" I asked her, getting my troubles out of the way early. Thalia nodded at the drawings, indicating that she wanted to see them.
"It all depends on fabric choice...pattern...detail..." I passed the drawings over, watching her eyes go huge. Yep...it was gonna be expensive. She smiled and chuckled slightly, skipping through the pages.
"You're a good artist..." she said. I shrugged.
"I can only really do cartoons...and I can never draw fingers..."
"Well the design looks...challenging...but, we accept any challenge." I smiled, knowing that it was a definite 'yes'. "But price...you're looking at about a thousand dollars." I nearly choked on my coffee. "But that's only because you need to buy all the material yourself. Is that okay for you?"
"Sure, I can do that."
"I'll probably ask Jack to go with you, he nearly never leaves the house and he's good with designs like this one..." Okay, can't do that. But I smiled and nodded for the second time in those few minutes. That's when I noticed something...where was Jack? Was he trying to sneak up on me or something? I looked around the room, wondering where he could be.
"Jack is in the work-room right now...he's got a project of his own in there that he's having a bit of fun with..." Oh yeah, the room from before...where he came out unexpectedly and slammed a door in my face. Good times. What was he making in there that was so important to him?
"Guess it's one of his many mysteries..." Jester said, flopping on the couch casually. "Ouch. Poor girl...maybe he isn't so charming after all..." she said as she spotted Thalia's bruised eye.
"Shut up, Jester," I replied.
"What was that?" Thalia asked, looking concerned. Damn it. No talking to Jester out loud.
"Oh nothing..." I replied quickly. Thalia stared at me for a second before closing her eyes as she took a deep sip from her mug. She suddenly put the mug down and quickly zoomed over to the kitchen counter, coming back with a black, office notebook.
"I just need to get a few details down before we start. Name and address are already taken care of...phone number, I have. (AN- Don't ask me how, she does, okay?) But we just need chest, height and waist measurements."
"What?" I snapped back into reality, finally peeling my eyes away from the workroom door.
"For the dress? We need your measurements so that we can get a right fit..." Thalia said, looking at me with more concern. "Are you alright? You're a bit...jumpy...Did Jack say anything to you?" I snapped into focus then, thinking that I could get a clue about him at last.
"No...Why? Does Jack say...things to frighten off people?" I asked, trying to tread on stable ground. Thalia smiled and shook her head.
"No, not at all. It's just that sometimes people get a bad first impression of Jack...I'm one of the few people who can look at Jack's eyes instead of his smile." Thalia went quiet, her voice growing far away until it disappeared from sight. She was smiling, though...probably deep in thought about something to do with him...remembering fond moments...their first kiss...something sweet and Disney-coated like that. Maybe that was why he stayed with her...
...she was all he had.
"Oh..." I said quietly, not sure how to react. "Don't worry, I'm not scared by him. He's kinda nice...besides, I've dealt with things that were considered frightening, too." Thalia smiled, breaking out of her own dream as well. "Anyway, where do we do the measurements?" Thalia stood up and knocked on the workroom door as I followed behind her.
"Jack? I just need to measure up Jessica for her outfit, can you scoot out for a second or two?" she called through the door.
"Oh no fair!" Jester whined from the couch. "I wanted to strip off in front of Jack!" She cackled away like a Halloween witch. At least she and Jack had one thing in common.
They could both be as scary as all hell when the laughed.
I heard the door unlock and Jack walked out, handing over a roll of measuring tape to Thalia. He kissed her on the forehead and walked past me, ignoring me completely. One minute he demands my attention and swipes marmalade in my hair, the next minute he's giving me the cold shoulder. But just as I was about to step inside, he did another one of those 'I-get-the-last-word-in-to-piss-you-off-as-you-leave' things.
"So I'm 'kinda nice' am I?" he said, mocking my voice. I kept walking, pretending that I didn't hear him at all, even though I was blushing. I do that often, don't I?
I'm going to spare the details 'cause I don't want any pervert coming and saying 'Oh so you're a double-D girl, huh?'. This isn't true, by the way. But pretty much Thalia used the tape to measure my waist, chest, height, etcetera and etcetera. But her bruised eye was still a mystery to me...even though I knew its cause. And what the heck happened to her car? It was in the driveway one day, the next it had disappeared completely. I had to ask...I had to...
"So what do you think of the new District Attorney?" she asked.
"He seems alright..." I replied. Okay...maybe I'd ask. Okay...now.
"I think he's just what the scum of Gotham needs..." she continued, noting down a measurement in her notebook. I shrugged my shoulders, which was what she had to measure next.
"I think he's too good to be true..." I replied. "No one can be handsome, smart and full of justice at the same time." Damn it. Stop getting side-tracked and just ask her!
"So you think he's handsome?" she said, smiling as she returned to me and my naked-ness. She measured my shoulders, and when she went away to note them down I shrugged them again.
"Yes and no..." I answered. "He's handsome in that sort of way...but not my way."
"So what guys are your way of handsome?" Thalia said, wrapping the tape around my chest. I thought about it for a second, there were a lot of answers that I could give. Cartoons...movie stars... fictional characters...there were many to choose from. But I just stuck with a simple answer: "Ones that are different."
Funny that I said that...'cause it's kind of what I ended up getting.
I love spoilers.
Wait, why haven't I asked her yet? Oh sod it. I'll do it some other time, when Jack is out of the house entirely. She closed the book and left me to get dressed, leaving the tape measure behind next to a sewing machine. I pulled on my t-shirt and black vest, the one spotted with five bright badges, and finally my black jeans. And, just as I reached out for the door handle to get out of the room...
...BANG! Straight into my head.
For the second time in two days, Jack had hit the door right in the middle of my face again. Coincidence? I think not. I took a few steps back, feeling dizzy. I heard Jack enter the room, probably smirking, but I had my head in my hands as I tried to stop the room from spinning.
"You know...you really should watch where you're going..." Jack said, watching me pinch the top of my nose to ease the pain. "There's only so much that a door can take-ah." He stroked the wood of the door lovingly as if it were a pet...or a person.
"Do you get paid to irritate me, or is it just a personal hobby of yours?" I snapped, blinking the world into focus. Jack laughed and grabbed my hand, making me look at him directly in the eye. Correction, glaring him in the eye.
"If you're good at something, never do it for free..." he whispered. He released me from his vice-like grip and pushed past me into the room. I rolled my eyes and started walking to the living-room, muttering something under my breath that might've changed Gotham forever.
"God, what a Joker..."
