10 minutes after T.O.D
Unfortunately Joan did not know how much of Harleen's heart was wrapped up in his case until she saw it right in front of her, literally saw her heart sitting in front of her. By then it was too late, the Joker had a good hold on it, his fingers intertwined in her heartstrings, able to play them like a puppet master.
It was another twelve-hour plus day for the two psychiatrists.
At least they were out of the asylum by ten o'clock.
Joan sat in the waiting room of Johnson Hospital on 30th, which was reserved for the rest of the Arkham entourage with her; Harleen, two maximum-security ward guards, and the Joker, who was the whole reason they were here; he had, for no rhythm or reason, broke two of his fingers. At least they were fairly sure it was an inside job, Harleen would've called abuse if she had even the slightest doubt it wasn't self-inflicted or accidental.
But then again Harleen hadn't been her usual feisty self come of late. A forlorn air had greatly dampened her upbeat spirit, which was expected from someone who just lost her mother, and to make matters worse still grieving, she came back, to what Joan knew Harleen would be worrying about the whole time she was away, the Joker getting hurt.
She should not worry herself sick over you. Joan thought resentfully at the clown seated across from them.
Her cell phone briefly vibrated in her purse, making an obnoxious humming noise. It was an agitating reminder of how frustrating it was to be sitting in this waiting room when Joan had frontloaded all her work yesterday in order to get to see her boyfriend tonight. Now the stress was all for nothing.
It wasn't even necessary in a functional sense for Joan to come with them since Harleen was the Joker's psychiatrist. Joan's presence was all for the image of the asylum, having a senior doctor accompany the controversial pair would save the asylum from more chastising by the city, at least that's what the hope was.
Due to a recent incident Joan had learned there was delusion among some of the other staff, especially the infirmary nurses, that Harleen possessed some level of control over him.
A couple weeks ago Joan had gone to the infirmary with nauseous Jonathan. Harleen was there with a concussed Joker.
Though Harleen never voiced any complaints about their small medical faculty. Whenever one of her patients was there, she would check in on them numerous times, saying she was making sure they were handling things okay. That was truth with Mallory or Leon, both got upset if the smallest thing changed in their daily routine. However the Joker loved change. It was just Harleen being as protective as a first time mother.
While she was waiting for Dr. Simon to look at Jonathan, the two caught up, Joan had thought it was odd the Joker was so quiet. Harleen said he was tired.
Though not even two minutes had passed after Harleen left to see another patient, did the Joker find the energy to nearly break Jonathan's nose.
"He was faking all afternoon, could have done that to anyone, anytime today" Joan overheard Christa whisper to Ann. "I told you, Dr Quinzel keeps him in check"
Joan knew better. It wasn't Harleen's absence that triggered him; the Joker had been provoked. She was close enough to hear Jonathan say something to the Joker, she wasn't close enough or paying enough attention to hear what was said. She thought she heard the words tight body but she must have misheard.
When she asked Jonathan about it later, he looked liked he really wanted to tell her, which was a rarity, but wouldn't say what he said to provoke his fellow inmate. Harleen questioned the Joker, who just said that he needed to hit someone.
The nurses here did not share this delusion as one of them came over with the forms. She kept an eye on the Joker, who kept an unwavering eye on her, she handed over the clipboard with the registration forms to Harleen and once it was out of her hands, she scurried away.
Harleen scanned it over, and sighed. Since they had nothing on the patient sitting across from them, every basic question was not simply answered.
"Last name patient ID, first name alias," Harleen ran by Joan.
"Nu-uh" the Joker shook his head clumsily. "First name Oberon, last name Sssex-ton"
"How are you feeling Oberon?" asked Harleen, jotting down his patient ID number, knowing it by heart.
"In the words of our mutual friend Scarecrow, dandy"
"Let me know if anything changes, alright?"
"Yes, ma'am"
It was no sign of respect. Joan knew that to Harleen, ma'am was an insult. She scowled down at the clipboard to avoid encouraging him.
She stole a glance at Harleen's neat writing on the registration form. With most answers being unknown she was almost done. Good they should be able to get out of here soon. The hospital would want them out of here as soon as possible.
"You ready to tell me how you broke your fingers?" asked Harleen tiredly.
"A magician never reveals his secrets" the Joker spread his hands as far as the handcuffs allowed and wiggled the fingers he could, it had to be the world's saddest attempt at jazz hands. The two broken digits hardly twitched under dirty, bloody gauze. "But do you wanna know how I got these scars? "
"Oh I don't know. Alcoholic father, loan sharks, junkie girlfriend, evil stepmother or everyone's worst enemy, yourself. Whatever bullshit story your marvelous imagination concocted, save it for therapy. The only thing I want to hear right now is the truth about what you did to your fingers. " Snapped Harleen.
She waited a moment, getting no response from a disgruntled Joker she scratched off the last blank on the form with a flourish and got up to take it over to reception so the timid nurse wouldn't have to come back over. Leaving everyone for the most part in shock.
Of course Joan knew that they fought, but this was the first time that she had ever seen Harleen snap at him. The first time she had witnessed anyone snap at him and from the look on the Joker's face she could tell he wasn't use to it.
Her cell phone started vibrating again.
"You gonna get that?" asked the Joker.
"Eventually" Joan replied, after getting over the split second shock of having him address her.
Once Harleen came back, she would look at it. Maybe she was being overly cautious but the more pairs of eyes on him the better. The Joker was way too alert for the amount of sedatives he was given. That meant they would were going to be here a little longer then she hoped. No doctor was going to get near him until that changed.
"You and Carter going through a rough patch?" he asked curiously.
Joan had no clue how he knew her boyfriend's name. It was a new addition to the ever growing list of things the Joker knew and shouldn't.
"That is none of your business."
"sheesh, I'm just trying to make conversation." Said the Joker innocently, yet with smirk.
He knew she didn't like him.
Surprisingly the Joker didn't say anything more, his attention shifted to Aaron Cash and Sean McQuaid, sizing them up.
"We forgot to sign in." Harleen handed her a clipboard.
Joan was confused, she had signed a plethora of papers before they even walked through the automatic doors and she really doubted the hospital administrators would let them forget about signing anything after all the noise they were making about bringing the Joker here in the first place. Not that Joan blamed them or wanted to bring the Joker here anymore then they did. This hospital wasn't set up to detain people as Arkham was. He might decide to take advantage of that.
Still she signed her name under Harleen's and when she was done Harleen took the forgotten forms to Sean, then Aaron, and even to…
"Sign it, whatever your name is." Her tone still making it clear she was not in the mood for games.
Harleen sat down beside the Joker. Aaron moved closer and stood at his shoulder. His magic pencil trick was legendary.
The Joker gave them each a suspicious look as if they were the ones that couldn't be trusted before manually bending his broken fingers to grip the pen, Harleen was the one to suck back her breath in hiss and flinch. Before he got it set right or did more damage, she took the pen away from him.
"I s'pose I could sign it in blood." He said picking at the gauze. " Seems a little dramatic, even to me."
Harleen gave him back the pen, sliding it in to his left hand. A little known fact about the Joker was that he was ambidextrous.
The Joker looked around Aaron to Sean.
"McQuaid, like the Boston Bruins player" he tilted his head. "Is that Irish or Scottish?"
"Irish" answered Sean.
Harleen reached behind her as swiftly and slowly as old western cowboy, pulling out a digital thermometer. She kept it low at her side, keeping the Joker blind to it. For good reason, an even lesser known fact about the Joker was he absolutely hated having things put in his ear. This whole sign in thing was a distraction. Joan watched on in anticipation.
"Huh, and your last name's Cash? He looked up at Aaron. "Bet'cha get a lot of tail with that name."
Harleen chose that optimal moment to make her move. She couldn't get the jump on him though.
The Joker dodged Aaron, who made a grab for him. Harleen already had a hold on him and was pulled down on to the ground with him when the shackles around his feet tripped him up as the Joker tried to get to his feet.
Before either guard could do anything. Harleen was kneeling on the Joker's chest, like she was trying to brand a calf.
"Hold. The hell. Still," she growled, managing to get the thermometer in his ear.
This whole scene might have been comical on some level, if it wasn't the Joker.
The thermometer beeped after a surprisingly quick ten seconds. Harleen let him up and sat back on the conjoined chairs across from Joan, blowing her bangs out of her eyes. Underneath his Arkham uniform Aaron's muscles were tensed up in case the Joker went for revenge. He only glared at her, Harleen didn't even see it as she wrote down the recorded temperature. If Joan had done what Harleen had, she wouldn't have taken her eyes off him.
"Was that really so bad?" she asked.
"Besides being rape."
"Rape?"
"Yes, ear's are technically an orifice and you penetrated mine without my consent, ergo rape." he explained.
"Now that is dramatic." Harleen shook her head, the corner of her mouth twitched but at least she had the sense not to dare smile and risk provoking him. Joan had seen the bloody tail end of what happened when the Joker was provoked.
He retook his original seat, right next to Harleen.
Get away from him right now, Harleen! Joan tried to send a telepathic order, needless to say it failed to be transmitted.
The Joker put his head on Harleen's shoulder. She jolted but waved Aaron off when he went to grab him.
"What are you doing?" she asked calmly.
"I'm not making you uncomfor-ta-able, am I?"
"No you're not. But your neck is going to get sore."
"Naw, I am pretty comfy" He nuzzled up to her slightly. "You smell nice."
"Subtle, J. subtle." She rolled her eyes, unphased.
Both Aaron and Sean looked over at Joan with matching Should-we-do-something expressions. If Harleen said it was fine, there wasn't any reason too. Joan's unease about their closeness was going to make the wait go by even slower. Passive aggressive was not anywhere near the Joker's style. Striking back when everyone was calmed down was.
The same nurse from before came back over, more nervous now, she probably saw what happened recently, she did the rest of his vitals; blood pressure and heart rate with not so much as a word from him.
"I'm really sorry but um, our X-ray technician on call got caught up with a urgent case in ICU, " said the nurse softly, looking at the ground. "I don't know how long he'll be."
That could easily be a lie. Joan rubbed her forehead, trying to keep the anger she felt growing rapidly off her face at least. It was not this woman's fault and there was nothing anyone could do.
"That's fine." Said Joan.
"Could we get some gauze please?" Asked Harleen.
The Joker looked puzzled at his bandages, apparently not seeing anything wrong with how they use to be white, not gray and red.
"No problem, " the nurse said.
They went back to playing the waiting game. A familiar hum filled the silence. Joan grabbed her cell. Not all the texts were from Carter, one was from Andrea, which made Joan feel a little better.
Carter - How long you going to be?
Andrea – How are things at the mad house? Want to do coffee tom?
Carter -?
To Carter, she replied: Xray tech held up, will be late. Sorry, I'll make it up to you.
To Andrea: Mad as usual, Harleen is back so less then last week. I would love too, usual spot?
Andrea was a drug rehabilitation therapist. She had an office at a private clinic downtown but she worked all over the city and was a familiar face around the asylum. She had met Harleen a couple of times, had even given her help with some drug research, even though it had been for the man that almost killed her. Joan probably held a bigger grudge against him then Andrea did.
It wasn't just because Andrea was more forgiving then she was. It was because what he did to Andrea wasn't personal, she was the victim of bad timing more then the Joker's victim. What Joan had seen him do to other doctors at the asylum, mentally crippling them or downright attacking them was personal. More then that Andrea was almost fully healed now and she didn't have to associate with him. Joan was getting emotionally torn open and she couldn't hide from him, couldn't even put him out of her mind most nights.
Bringing all this to the surface of her thoughts she couldn't help but feel more resentful towards the scarred, dark demon eyed man across from her.
I sincerely hope that one night things go too far. The thought sprung up from the most vindictive pit of her mind.
That one malicious wish of hers was the nightmare of the gentle woman sitting next to the Joker.
The drone of her phone distracted this raging thought. It was Andrea's reply; it hadn't even been minutes. Not a surprise, her sister lived on her phone.
How is she doing? Give her my condolences. Bring her tomorrow if you/she wants to come, won't be able to make it down there until 1230.
She studied Harleen. Her blue eyes were dead as if she had shut out the world. Joan read further into and felt guilty about feeling sorry for herself before, her problems weren't so bad. Harleen's mother had passed away due to cancer, Harleen had flown back home when the end was coming, she must have spent a lot of time in a hospitals lately, sitting here tonight, at another hospital, had to be hard for her.
With both thumbs she replied to Andrea. She's holding on. Will definitely bring her.
The nurse came back with more than the promised gauze, she also brought a roll of medical tape to keep it on. If it took that long to get gauze, Joan hated to think how long it was going to take get the x-ray done but having a new perspective it didn't bother her as much any more.
"Sit up," said Harleen, pushing him a little. The Joker didn't budge. "Come on, just for a couple minutes. I promise "
He raised his hand near her face.
"Aaron" said Harleen.
Aaron was more than ready and willing to pull him off.
"Now a little to the left" she said. "Thanks."
Aaron slid the Joker sideways to face Harleen. The Joker was more amused about how slippery the upholstery then mad about being manhandled.
"No problem." Said Aaron.
Harleen started tearing away the old bandages. Revealing two swollen, dark and lacerated fingers. They both stared intently, heads bent downward, at them while she cleaned off the blood that had been constantly oozing.
"Tell me if I start hurting you." She held a piece of gauze in place while pulling the tape around it.
Considering that he had been trying to straighten those fingers before and he had broken them in the first place, there was hardly a danger of Harleen hurting him.
"Well you did-" he started.
"Don't even start about the ear rape."
"That's not what I was going to say but glad you agree. My chest is sore from you sitting on it."
"What can I say, I learned from the best."
"Second best. If I taught you, you'd of put your knee here," the Joker poked her abdomen. "It makes it harder for them to push themselves up if you're squishing organs instead of sitting on bones."
As he usually did, the Joker used his hands almost as much as his mouth when he talked, making taping the gauze around his fingers difficult for Harleen.
"They're going to have to take it off." Joan reminded Harleen as she pulled some medical tape off to straighten it out.
"Oh yeah. Guess I shouldn't have bothered" said Harleen sheepishly.
"No, it was definitely worth it just to put clean ones on," said Joan to make her feel less embarrassed. She wouldn't have gone to the trouble though.
Silence settled in their little waiting room. Joan couldn't think of anything to say, she wanted to ask Harleen how she was doing but for obvious reasons she couldn't in front of the Joker. He could not know or have the slightest hint that Harleen was going through a tough time.
Harleen had kept her word to the Joker and allowed him to lean up against her again. They both looked perfectly at ease. Everything that had happened between them had been forgiven.
"By the way, how is your knee?" the Joker broke the silence, prodding the area in question.
Joan felt like she was missing something. Had he done something to Harleen's knee?
"Its good."
"Its this one right?"
"Yes"
"It looks funny"
"You can't see ligament damage on the outside. You knew because that's the one I'll limp on."
It was small talk.
"You can tell a lot about a person by how they walk," a smirk slowly crawled up his face, particularly unhindered by the scars. "I also know how you'd be in bed"
"Stop being perverted, its not a good color on you." Harleen told him.
"Better then this orange."
The Joker moved to rest his chin right up on her shoulder. Harleen didn't even flinch.
"You should get a xray too, maybe we could get a two for one deal." He licked his lips, his movements had slowed Joan noticed. " I probably have better health care coverage then you."
Someone chuckled. Their benefits were sad.
"Thanks for the concern but I'm fine."
"I'm not concerned." He said, a tad bit defensive.
"You were pretty concerned that time you thought I was pregnant."
Joan held back a laugh. She remembered Harleen telling that story.
She checked her phone. There was no reply from Carter; Joan wasn't going to hold her breath. Unless she sent another message, they were done talking for the night. She started a couple of messages to him but would clear them and start over.
While Joan tried to write a message that wasn't pathetic groveling for forgiveness for something beyond her control or just plain hostel, she caught the main portion of the conversation going on around her. Since the Joker had brought up the Boston Bruins earlier, Sean and Aaron had started talking about hockey, and Harleen and the Joker joined in, both with surprising knowledge about the subject. The conversation split off, Sean and Aaron started talking about hunting, the Joker and Harleen had a nonsensical conversation chock full of private jokes, only they could understand.
They ran out of things to talk about around the hour and a half mark of their wait, so they played Where's Waldo to pass time.
"There he is." The Joker said about every three to five minutes.
"Why is everything frickin' red and white?" Harleen cursed after her fifth consecutive loss.
"Its in Soviet Russia, they have to buy – wait a minute" the Joker pulled the page up toward him and squinted. "That clown is not wearing clothes."
"What?" Harleen exclaimed.
She looked where he was tapping the page.
"I'm offended." The Joker said.
"Maybe that's how it is in Soviet Russia," said Harleen, resuming her search for Waldo. "Maybe clowns don't wear clothes there."
"This is a children's book," he pointed out, for lack of another word, disturbed.
"You can't see anything"
"Why are you looking?"
"There he is" Harleen changed the subject.
"No, Waldo is over here," again he tapped the page, Harleen's excitement fell away.
"That's Herrraldo." The Joker rolled his r's.
Harleen glared at him before turning the page, whistling some little tune.
"ssshhhhhhh" he hit her mouth in a discombobulated movement. "You're making the angels cry."
Harleen nearly started crying, she was laughing so hard.
Another hour passed by. She still hadn't messaged Carter. Her eyes were starting to get sore from looking at the little waiting cursor.
Joan surveyed everyone; Sean had sat down at the end of Joan's row, Aaron had remained standing but was leaning against the wall, the Joker had pulled his legs up on the chairs so that he was lying down and he was still resting his head on Harleen, the sedatives were really starting to take effect now, he wasn't saying much and when he did it was slurred and he would more often then not drop the end of the sentence completely.
Another twenty minutes passed, the Joker hadn't moved or talked, he was definitely out and there wasn't any sign of the nurse or any hospital staff member, guess there was a real emergency after all.
Joan checked her email, she had a new one from Hugo Strange, sent two minutes ago.
"Strange just sent me a email." Joan shared.
"Tell him no" said Harleen.
"Yeah and I'll say Harleen said so."
"And then say you know why"
Joan saw Aaron yawn which made her yawn, which made Harleen yawn.
"What time is it?" asked Harleen.
"Almost one" Aaron answered, looking at his watch.
"What is he even doing up?" asked Harleen. "What is he Batman?"
She said the magic word to raise sleeping beauty. The Joker lifted his head, eyes flicked groggily around the room as if he thought Batman was actually there. Learning he wasn't, he put his head back down, only get back up and rub Harleen's arm with an exaggerated frown.
"Sorry Harley" he slurred.
"Don't worry about it" Harleen said, "I've had much worse."
Joan guessed that the Joker had drooled on her arm while he was sleeping.
Harleen put her arm around him and patted his shoulder absent-mindedly. The Joker, on the other hand, was very mindful of the action, looking at her hand with wide-eyed expression, like he had never encountered that before, it was strangely sweet.
"Uh, Doctor Quinzel?"
"Yeah" said Harleen, surprised at being addressed by her proper title.
That had to be some kind of honor. Joan didn't think she had ever heard the Joker call any of his past psychiatrists doctor before. She had just heard him call her Harley.
"I'm not going to have to take my pants off, I'm I?" He asked.
"No, I'm sure you can keep your clothes on." She cast her eyes down at him in a conspiring way. "We aren't in Soviet Russia."
"Good" he muttered before going back to sleep.
They ended up waiting a total of three hours for the x-ray. But after that things moved quickly, it took no time to stitch and splint his fingers.
Joan and Harleen had each taken their own vehicles so when it was all done they could go home. Sean and Aaron would escort the Joker back to Arkham.
Just before the three parties parted ways in the lobby, before either guard could do anything, the Joker slipped his arms around Harleen.
After the initial panic, Joan realized that he was just hugging her.
The mental image stayed with her as solid as any photograph she had seen. It reminded her a lot of the famous photograph V-J Day in Time Square.
The contrast between the orange of his uniform and her doctor's coat was sharp. As was the contrast between their expressions; the Joker looked dopey; his eyes were half closed with a sloppy grin across his face whereas Harleen's eyes were vibrantly alert with a bright smile, a natural one instead of the forced ones Harleen had been putting on. A long lost one that Joan had not seen on her in awhile.
Joan thought about that embrace as she drove home. It had to be the drugs, the Joker looked to be akin to drunk near the end and he was acting like it too. However there was something bugging her about the whole night.
The Joker could get into the troubled spots of peoples minds when the door was shut and guarded, it would easy for him to see how vulnerable Harleen was tonight, if he hadn't saw this afternoon during their first therapy session in two weeks. But instead of doing what would be expected of him to do with this insight, the Joker had done the unexpected and out of character. He had cheered her up.
Harleen had been withdrawn for days, Jeremiah wouldn't let her see the Joker for the first few days because of it but it had been the Joker had coaxed her out of the shadows she was trapped in.
Joan remember how he got her laughing so hard with the inside joke about crying angels. How Harleen had went back to that withdrawn state when the Joker stopped fighting sleep. Was he fighting it for her?
And at the end of the night, after he hugged her, the transformation was complete. Blushing and smiling Harleen looked like herself.
This was a strategic choice on his part, further twisting Harleen, even heavily under the influence of drugs the Joker could still manipulate people, signaling how dangerous he was.
Joan wouldn't have an idea about why he made that choice out till later.
Author's Note: Thank you for reading (this was a long one), subscribing and faving.
SmilinForYa: There is no such thing as a meaningless review. I loved hearing from you and getting your feedback. And I hope the Joker was able to redeem himself for hurting Harley
References: V-J Day in Time Square, you've probably seen it, its pretty famous, it's a black and white photo of a sailor kissing a nurse in 1945.
The nudist clown in a Where's Waldo book exists, I didn't make that up. I will put up the link to the demotivational picture on my profile page in the section for this story soon, its not on my laptop.
Aaron Cash is from Batman: Arkham Asylum video game
McQuaid was a name I found in the graphic novel Batman: Hush, (yay I finally have time to read things that weren't assigned), happenstance was that its also the name of a Boston Bruins player while they were facing my hockey team for the Stanley Cup.
This was getting long again, so it's an officially a 2 parter, chapter 11 is on its own. I'll wrap it up in the next update, and then go back to before T.O.D.
I want to leave you with a quote I read today on twitter just before I started this
"Generally speaking, the main POV character in a story should be the one most affected by the plot events"
In this story many characters have been affected in some way
