Four years later

"Dad! Look what I caught!" Jack yelled as he bustled over to his father.

The Joker was conversing with his men about a hit that they had been tailing, and Ringo turned away and rolled his eyes when his Boss turned around to give his attention to his son.

"Whatcha got there?" he asked.

Jack slowly opened his hands to reveal a small, brown lizard. "Can I keep him, please? I can put him in a jar with holes in the lid."

The Joker grinned, but shook his head. "Jack, if you were that lizard, would you want to live in a cramped jar?"

Jack's smile slowly faded as he said, "But...I caught it."

"I know," The Joker continued. "Lizards are fun to catch. I used to be eight-years-old, too...but, I happen to know a thing or two about...being caged up. You follow me, kiddo?"

Jack gave him a curious look. "Were you in jail, Dad?"

The Joker licked his lips and sighed. "Arkham isn't really a prison, son, but...I was locked up just the same...doesn't feel good."

Jack took another look at the lizard in his hands and then gently set it on the ground.

His father chuckled. "Good boy, Jacky," he said as he ruffled his son's hair. "Your mom's fixing lunch. Why don't you go wash up?"

"'Kay!" Jack shouted as he ran to the front door. "Mom! I caught a lizard!" he announced as it slammed behind him.

Harley, who was relaxing on the sofa, tossed her magazine on the floor. "Keep it outside, mister," she scolded. "I told you: no reptiles in the house."

Jack plopped down on the kitchen floor and pulled off his shoes. "Dad told me to leave him where I found him...said he didn't want to be in a jar..."

"And he's right," Harley agreed, picking up her son's muddy shoes and placing them by the door.

"Hey, Mom? What's Arkham?"

His mother looked at him with wide eyes. She never expected to hear that word come out of her son. "Who...where did you hear that name, Jack?"

"Dad told me that Arkham wasn't really a prison," he explained as he climbed into one of the dining room chairs. "What is it, then?"

Harley gulped as she went to the refrigerator to retrieve essentials for her son's bologna sandwich. "Well, honey...he's right...in a way." She paused as she set the mayonnaise jar on the table. "It's just a place that...Dad had to go to from time to time..."

"Were you ever there, Mom?" Jack asked with inquisitive eyes.

"Do you want milk or orange juice with your sandwich?"

He looked down at the dark grooves in the wood of the table as he sneered. His parents always avoided answering any questions he had about themselves, like how they had met, why his Dad watched the news so intently, and why he always had to work at night.

The Joker's face paint had been explained as merely part of the job description and Jack didn't chance springing any further questions on that subject.

"Milk, please," he muttered, once again let down.

The front door opened and Jack turned to see his father sauntering to join him at the table, and he smiled at him as he draped his purple coat over a chair and sat. "What's for lunch, kiddo?"

"Bologna and cheese," Harley responded for him.

"Again?" The Joker asked. "You keep eatin' all this deli meat, son, and you're gonna get the gout..."

"What's 'gauwt?'" Jack pronounced crisply.

His father smiled. "If you eat too much salt, then you get the gout. It's this painful illness where your feet get really, really big."

Jack grinned. "Nuh uh!"

"You callin' me a liar?" The Joker asked as he grasped one of his son's ankles and gave a playful look of surprise. "Oh...my...God! It's happening!"

Jack craned his neck to see. "No it isn't!" But before he could prove his father wrong, The Joker proceeded to tickle his trapped foot.

Harley smiled as she listened to their playing, but shushed them as she brought his lunch to the table. "Okay, children. Enough now. Jacky, after lunch, we'll do some more math problems, okay?"

Her son groaned. "Aw, man..."

The Joker folded his arms on the table and pointed a finger at him. "Hey, kiddo, you better pay attention to the math; it'll help in the long run."

"It's the fractions that he hates, Dad," Harley chimed in.

"Ah, no sweat," The Joker said, waving his hand nonchalantly. "You can do it." His cell phone buzzed and he flipped it open. "Yeah?"

Jack watched him intently, trying his best to listen to his Uncle Townshend on the other end of the line as he chewed his sandwich. He knew that The Joker would be going out again tonight and he was accustomed to his nightly excursions, but Jack couldn't help the anxious feeling in his stomach that his growing curiosity was letting stew.

After his brief conversation, The Joker slammed his phone shut and walked over to Harley who was coming to join them at the table. He looked back at Jack and then at her, muttering, "Towser said this thing with Cuccino is going down tonight."

Harley's eyes widened again. "Tonight? I thought he was outta the country..."

"Shh..." he hushed her gently, not wanting their son to hear. However, Jack was once again eavesdropping.

"I want Jack to stay inside and be put in bed by eight o clock. " Harley furrowed her brow at him to which he sighed. "Don't give me that look, Harl. This is not a Maroni job and we're talking profitable goods, here."

"He's coming here? For a few measly guns?" she whispered.

"For a few measly automatics that Gordon's stooges would be glad to book him for...but they're not going to. We had a deal..."

She shook her head. "Stop making deals with the Mob, Mistah J."

"No more, Harley. Cuccino is the last -"

"That's what you said about Maroni...and that was nearly eight years ago, and you're still dealing with him." She glanced at Jack and turned away, making The Joker follow her. He noticed her concerned expression and lifted her face to his and kissed her gently on the forehead.

"Just watch our boy...okay?" he whispered.

She nodded, but sighed as she walked past him to sit at the table with her son.

Later that night, after his bath and after he struggled to pay attention to his mother's reading from The Grapes of Wrath, he tossed and turned in his small bed as he thought about what he had heard between her and The Joker.

Who was Cuccino and what were automatics? Why was his mother worried about this man coming to their home? And more importantly, what was the Mob and just what kind of deals had his father been making with them?

Jack finally sat up and looked toward his window and he bit his lip as he got up and peered through it. He could see in the distance near the alley where the lot was secured by an old chain link fence his father's silhouette along with two of his men standing by the car. The Joker was pacing back and forth, looking toward the end of the alley and back at the theatre.

Jack quietly crept to his closet and put his bare feet in his tennis shoes, not worrying about the warmth of his socks that would protect him from the growing cold outside. As he sneaked to his door, he briefly thought of the little lizard he could have brought inside to keep him warm under his bedside lamp, but he shook his head, knowing there were more important matters at that moment.

He cracked open his door and peered into the dark of the den, where all that was lit was the glare of the television screen and a single lamp. He saw that his mother's attention was instead engaged in the magazine in her lap and he took advantage of this by slowly walking down the stairs, being careful not to make his shoes squeak on the old wood.

He was soon outside the front door and he ran to the fence and crouched as low as he could. He darted through the first lamppost that illuminated the edge and he saw his father's silhouette wandering toward the alley. He watched him as he hid in the shadows and Jack got on his belly and crawled underneath a bush that was across from his father so that he could get a closer look.

Townshend was leaning against the car reading his usual Auto Trader magazine as Ringo clutched his arms to his chest trying to warm his ungloved hands. Jack turned his eyes to his father and they squinted to try to make out what he was holding. As The Joker turned toward another lamppost and was caught in the light, Jack took in a quiet gasp when he saw the big revolver his father was clutching.

He concluded that this Cuccino had to be a bad man if his father had to carry a weapon, but he came out of his wonder when he saw another car approach the men and The Joker pocketed his gun as he greeted them.

Jack hugged his chest as a cold breeze blew through the shrub in which he was hiding, but he continued to crouch low as the new men, one of them wearing a crisp blue three-piece suit, walked to The Joker's car where Townshend opened the trunk. The blue suit and one of his men opened two briefcases, both of which contained even bigger guns than his father's.

Jack looked at The Joker, who was smiling triumphantly as he handed the man a huge wad of bills, the sight of which put a lump in Jack's throat as he wondered where the money had come from.

The Joker, after Ringo took both suitcases, looked behind him and gave a signal as he walked away. Suddenly, Jack saw Buddy appear from the darkness and knock Cuccino's man in the head with a Billy club as a confused Cuccino was punched in the stomach and forced to his knees.

Jack watched with wide eyes as his father walked back to the man and put his revolver to Cuccino's forehead, saying, "Nice doin' business with ya," and squeezed the trigger.

The echo of the shot couldn't mask the sudden rustle in the shrubs as Jack shot from his hiding spot and sprinted to the theatre.

Jack could hear another shot ring into the still night air and he ran faster to try to reach the back of the lot where there was a shed. He had been told that he wasn't allowed to play near the shed and he never asked why, but at this moment, he would do anything to try to avoid the same fate as Cuccino.

He reached the shed and forced open the door, shutting it tightly behind him and turning around. Jack gasped as he saw, on the shelves and on the walls, different weapons of all sizes. Guns, piles of old knives, shards of glass, pieces of sharp metal, but most worrisome to him, an open box that contained sticks of dynamite.

He panted as he froze in his place, but forced himself to sit on the cold wooden floor. He brought his knees to his chest, wondering how he was going to get out of this situation, and his heart began pounding when he heard footsteps slowly walking to the door.

It violently opened and he met his father's angry glare as he pointed his gun at his target.

The Joker's countenance changed instantly when he saw the frightened look on his son's face and his own heart began to race. "Jack!" he shouted in both shock and anger.

Jack gave him a pitiful, apologetic look as The Joker sputtered, "What the hell are you...?" He finally licked his lips and his angry expression returned with even more fury. "Come here."

The firm tone in his voice gave Jack chills, but he didn't move. "Jack!" his father shouted again. "Now!"

Jack yielded, rising from his place on the floor and soon feeling his father's fingers wrap tightly around his arm as he escorted him back inside the theatre.

"Harley!" he exclaimed as he kicked open the front door, and Harley jumped up from the couch and gave a shocked look toward the both of them.

"Jack? What are you doing out of bed?" she asked him, her hands planted firmly on her hips.

The Joker released Jack from his grip and stomped toward her. "That's exactly what I was gonna ask you, sweetheart," he said, derisively. "I told you to make sure he was in bed by a certain time and he-"

"I put him to bed at eight o clock, Puddin'," she told him.

"I told you to watch him, Harley! You can't even watch him when he's supposed to be sleeping? What kind of mother are you?"

"How dare you!" she screamed. "Who's the one that stays with him every night while you go out making bogus deals? Who's the one that spends time with him?"

"I'm doing what I can to provide for him and you; have you forgotten that, Princess?" he shouted back.

"Don't call me that, you son-of-a-bitch!"

The Joker brought his hand back and was about to bring it across Harley's cheek, but was interrupted by their son's yell, "Dad!"

He looked at Jack who was visibly shaken, not only by the discovery he had made just a few minutes ago, but by the violent words and potential acts that were about to be played out in front of him. The Joker gulped and brought down his hand as Harley said, softly, "Jack...", but their son pivoted as he choked out a brief sob and ran up the stairs, slamming his bedroom door.

Harley brought her fingers to her lips as The Joker quietly walked past her and slumped onto the couch. She looked up at her son's door and then walked toward The Joker, who was now leaning forward, his face in his gloved hands. She sighed as she sat beside him. "He..." she started and then licked her lips. "If he was out of bed...then, he...saw you...didn't he?"

The Joker slowly bobbed his head in answer to her question. "Oh, God..." she whispered, trying to hold back tears. "I...I heard the shot...I was scared it would wake him, but when he didn't-"

A loud sniffle emitted from The Joker as he kept his face in his hands. "Baby?" she cooed as her tears fell upon her cheeks.

She reached for him, gently taking his wrist and moving it toward her, but she was thrown off guard when he suddenly wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in her chest, leaving smears of black paint on her tank top.

After a moment, he took a deep breath. "I can't believe I was going to do that...right in front of him...the look...on his face..."

"Puddin'," Harley whispered. "He's okay..."

"I'm no better...than my fucking father...when Jack called out to me-"

"You were reminded of...how you would do that...to your dad, right?"

The Joker nodded as he hugged her tighter. "I promised...myself..."

"Honey, come on..." she said, tenderly lifting him off her and looking at him. "It's time we talked to him. We've kept our own lives secret from him...he deserves to know-"

"He deserves everything," The Joker said in a deep voice. He locked a pitiful gaze with Harley and blinked slowly. "He's my boy..."

Harley grinned. "I know he is..."

He licked his lips and softly caressed her cheek. "And you're my girl..." He sniffed. "Harley..."

"Stop it, now," she said. "Just calm down...let's wait until morning. Let him sleep it off..."

"He's afraid of me now," The Joker concluded.

"No!" Harley told him, firmly. "Never. Do you understand? You...are not your father."

The Joker blinked and looked past her and suddenly turned away and wiped his eyes. Harley turned to see Jack standing a few feet from them, his hands twitching in front of him and his blue eyes red from crying. "Baby," Harley said to him. "Come here."

Jack carefully walked over to them and his mother ran her fingers through his hair as he looked at The Joker who was hanging his head so he couldn't see the redness in his own dark eyes. However, Jack stepped closer to him and his father lifted his gaze to his son, who quietly asked, "What does Mom mean...when she says you're not like your dad?"

His father sighed deeply as he pulled Jack into his lap and held him tightly.