Chapter Twelve
The Fear of Imprisonment
The Dodson Manor came with a gated access opening to a lengthy front lawn not all different from the cornfields and savannah of his granny's crumbling old place. Jonathan had sunglasses on for the duration of the time Elizabeth and her lawyer were speaking about the arrangements - he had to curse her as soon as they got off the plane for making him wear a baseball cap and these things when they first boarded - keeping his eyes, though, mostly on Elizabeth in her vintage dress with the ruffles and eyelet lace, gracing her front figure, hips and backside. The yellow set off her brown curls so well. In both yellow and blue, she was truly a belle of the south. He smirked at the word he nearly used for Belle herself, once again.
She unlocked the glass door and was the first one in. Taking off his shades, Crane took in his new surroundings with another sniff. The walls were white with enormous, customized moldings and a polished dark floor with squared white spots serving as checkered, the staircase spiraling upwards with the steps covered with a dark floral carpeting. He had to admit that he was stunned to think that his former pupil had been born and grown up in this place far better than he; the jealousy returned as a result.
"I don't even know where to start," she spoke quietly as she put the keys and envelope down on the oak table beneath the antique gold wall mirror.
Jonathan found himself staring down a hallway to their left, leading into an opened space which was the living/sitting area. More moldings of the ceiling and walls, this time the walls being buttery yellow, and the furniture custom-made Louis XVI inspiration, all sitting atop English rose carpeting. Hydrangeas were planted in various colors about, but it was the portrait of the woman far off near the airy window that caught his attention. Moving closer, he saw the woman bore a great resemblance to Elizabeth, and she wore an old-fashioned rose gown, her dark hair shorter and curled thicker. Her mother.
There was another doorway to his left, leading straight into a dining area with more luxury. The carpet, however, was lattice and average. The deep rose painted walls were hung with different murals of various scenery, a luxurious crystal chandelier suspended over the glass table with its wrought-iron chairs seating five people. Goodness, how many rooms downstairs will I find in one day? Crane wondered with a chuckle as he found himself staring into a warm and rustic kitchen with pale honey oak cupboards, drawers and so forth, the island in the center surfaced with slate granite, and the floor Tuscan stone. And at the far end was a door leading out to...
There was the sound of crying heard and a mild crash. "Elizabeth!" he shouted as he dashed back in the direction he came in until he came to the foyer and found her kneeling beside their luggage, on her knees and her face in her hands. He'd never seen her like this before; he rushed over to her side and helped her sit at the bottom of the stairs. She didn't look up, continued to sob while covering her face.
"Elizabeth, please tell me what is wrong."
"I-I-I don't know...if I can...take this..." she whispered, shaking her head and finally looking up at him. "I thought I could, but now...I don't know."
Returning to the place of her past proved harder than thought. It was to be expected if one grew up in the environment she had. Jonathan sat down beside her, their roles switched so that she was the patient and he was the doctor again. "It's going to be fine," he assured her. "Going back to the past is always difficult."
Her reddened eyes narrowed slightly. "I'm your doctor, not the other way around," she reminded him, her feistiness returning. He chuckled and brushed some hair out of her face.
"And I was once your professor. You may be my therapist at Arkham, but not here, my pet. You're obviously suffering a rush of the memories returning to you, and I promised you I would be here, so here we are. And I'm telling you that you will get through this no matter what." He helped her rise to her feet and guided her towards the hallway which he had come through. "Now, let's get you something to eat first." Crane seated her at the island in the faded oak chair, moving for the refrigerator down the end to the doorway, which he noticed led to the swimming pool and the backyard. Opening the fridge, he found something enough to serve as a snack for now, gathering cheese, an apple, and some blackberries as well as water from the sink, setting them down in front of her. She did eat it, taking it slow, but the plate was eventually cleaned save for the core of the apple, and she gulped down the water in one chug. "Not exactly a good homecoming," he said, purely out of habit. Of course it's not.
She didn't say anything, just stood and turned away. "Day's almost over. I'm gonna take a shower and unpack." He watched her go without another word.
~o~
Here, before her, was the room which had been hers as a child and still the same as she left it. Elizabeth deposited her suitcase beside the canopy bed still washed with sheer white; beside it, the nightstand was covered with an Old English rose cloth and the Blue Willow lamp. The two windows draped with striped yellow and blue were opened to reveal a setting sun. It had been a long day, and being back turned out to be not so easy.
Elizabeth sat down on the bedside and rubbed her eyes, sighing loudly. She cursed herself for breaking down in front of Jonathan like that. Yet she wanted him to see, because if it were anyone else, they would just tell her to suck it up as she'd been so good at doing her whole life. Despite the monster everyone saw him as and as he made himself out to be, he actually understood her better than Bruce, better than Dick and Barbara and any others she'd known. She felt herself getting closer to him more and more.
NO! her mind screamed at her. You may like him and care about him, see him as the man who taught you in college, find his Ichabod Crane resemblance a strange sort of cute, but he's still your patient! He's not even legally fit to reenter society yet!
But if I can still get him out, her other half reasoned. Then maybe after that we can talk about a future together.
Carrying her aqua rush and cherry blossom shampoo and conditioner, body lotion and wash, Elizabeth made way for her personal bathroom which was more fashioned like paradise instead of southern luxury. The shower was a shadowed, closed-door area next to the sandstone bathtub of marble. Elizabeth stripped and laid her clothes on the golden counter. Turning on the golden knob, hot water and steam filled the stall and welcomed her inside after a long day of flying.
Elizabeth thought she was going to fall asleep on her feet as her muscles and bones loosened from the tension of being couped on the plane as well as her earlier panic attacks. She loosened the knots her hair created under the stream, the smell of water and blossoms in the air, natural and sweet at the same time. The matching body wash soon followed, and once she was finished, she turned off the shower and stepped out to grab the towel off the rack in the shower stall, drying off and dressing up in the robe and gown set she brought with her that she didn't wear often but loved anyways.
For blissful days and blissful nights...Liquid blue gown paired with a robe swirling with a mystical animal print. It made her feel like the Nile Princess herself. She gave herself a twirl as she dried out much of her hair with the towel and draped it over the tub, opening the door and came face-to-face with the burlap mask that made her scream, and that was the last thing she saw before a hand was slapped over her mouth. She was spun around so her back was pressed to his body, and a needle jammed into her neck.
~o~
"You look so beautiful tonight, Elizabeth," Scarecrow told her as he carried her struggling and sobbing to her bed, laying her against the exquisite, virginal white lace covers - pure as she was before it was taken from her. Scarecrow had it in him now to take over Jonathan Crane completely and managed to get out the syringe of his latest batch of fear toxin he'd made while they were in Gotham, two days before today when she left for work unknowing what he was up to. Jonathan regretted deceiving her, but Scarecrow was impatient and couldn't wait any longer to discover what the fearless Elizabeth Dodson actually feared unknown to the rest of the world.
Indeed, she was beautiful in the liquid blue satin gown and magical robe, amid white to match her lost sexual purity, but that was not all. She was beautiful in her fear. "Oh, I'm sorry it had to be this way, my dear," Scarecrow crooned, brushing a hand against her cheek, making her flinch and jerk her face away from him. "But I promise this will be quick if only you tell me what you're seeing."
"Get away from me," she ground out, her head suddenly jerking back and forth with brute force, almost breaking her neck. "Get away!"
He laughed. "Oh, silly of me, you hate my mask. I'm a monster to you." He reached up and removed the burlap sack and hat to expose his face. "There, this is the face you prefer over the beast that I am. It should make things easier now. Tell me now, Elizabeth..." He leaned in, breath hot against her face. "...what do you fear?"
The response he gave her was both surprising and shocking altogether, not wholly unexpected but also not what he imagined.
"No, I won't go there! I won't join the crazies! Not because I care about them - and not because of Mama!" He was taken aback by her sudden determination. She was supposed to cry like a little girl like the other subjects before her, but no. She was terrified, but she was also strong-willed and determined to fight it off. What happened to her mother had driven her to become a psychiatrist and help the crazies, not simply lock them away - but with that determination came a great fear of being locked up as her mother had been. She must have believed that because of her pure love of helping people insane or not, she might end up becoming one of them someday. Except she never wholly been afraid, just closed it down and forced the vehicle that was her mind forward to what was in front of her regardless of the obstacles called stop lights and stop signs of panic.
"That's it, Lizzie." The pet name Harley and Wayne used was sweet and young on his tongue; she would probably hate it, no doubt. It would make her sound and feel like she was in grade school again. "I will be here by your side. Conquer your fear, like the strong woman you are. What happened to your dear mother will never happen to you. You are too good to endure what I and the others have. You must move on from the past - your mother and your deceitful love - if you want to proceed with what is in front of you for the sake of your future. Never mind the uncertainty ahead of you...believe in yourself and defeat the demons of your subconscious once and for all."
Her innocent brown eyes were so full of terror, the light in them too bright for the normal sunlight that had warmed his very core. Scarecrow was slowly subsiding and allowing him back into the driver's seat. "Please, Elizabeth," he begged. "Conquer your fear."
Jonathan said no more as he watched her convulse, baring and clenching her teeth together, eyes squeezing shut. He kept track of the time. Ten minutes were already up, the effects fading in the event of time. She was living up to his encouragement; her suffering had gone on long enough that she had to face it on her first day back in the house of her birth.
Another scream tore from her, and her body arched up before dropping down again. Jonathan hadn't lied when he said that she was beautiful when she was scared. Her eyes were filled with the water of dread, and her screams were country music to his ears. And then she surprised him once more. "Jonathan...I failed you..."
"No, you haven't," he tried to tell her, reaching and grasping her hand. Failed at what? "I'm here."
"I failed to save you, failed to get you out of Arkham..."
His mind was swirling like a twister. Was that what she was afraid of? She wanted him to get out of Arkham Asylum; she wanted him to have a normal life. He scoffed internally; normalcy was an illusion, but to think of a life with her...
Her howls brought his attention back to her. "No, no, no! No, I won't let you take him away from me! I won't let you!" One of her arms struck out and almost did the same to him; Jonathan stepped back to avoid it. She fell back against the bed then, and her cries were no more, replaced with soft fits of laughter of triumph. He allowed a small one to escape his own lips, sharing it with her while she was nearing the end of her hallucinogenic state.
Finally, Jonathan looked down at his watch. Time was up. Her crying had decreased, her breathing slow and steady, and the creases in her eyelids softened as she slowly came back to herself. "Elizabeth?" he asked gently, leaning over her just as her eyes popped opened. They were red from the crying, yet they were also fiery. Fiery with rage, disgust...and betrayal.
"What did you do to me?" she hissed, throwing out a hand and striking him across the face.
~o~
Too many emotions were jumbled in her mind and her whole body as she slowly regained herself and glared up at the man over her while she lay in her own bed, feeling helpless but slowly regaining her strength. He - he poisoned me. He drugged me and invaded my deepest, private secrets. He saw I'm afraid to fail, afraid of being locked up with him and the others without so much as asking me himself. He BETRAYED our trust.
And broke my heart.
She'd also hit him. She hit him, it was the first time, and yet she felt good because of what he'd just done to her. Her face was wet with both perspiration on her forehead and tears across her cheeks. "How could you do this to me?" She saw the look on his face - a range from stun to sadness and regret, but also remnants of twisted pleasure as Scarecrow watched her writhe in her delusions. Scarecrow had been there, not Jonathan. Elizabeth had struck the man who had been her teacher and her companion while she was here for her father's funeral, for the first time; it wounded both her and him, but it also made him regret his "mistake".
No, a mistake happens one time. More than once is pathological. He's done this to other people against their will, so now is no exception. I have been patient and tolerable of his experiments long enough. Bartholomew was right; I should have been on my guard. It was a mistake bringing him here.
"I did this for you," he responded, rubbing his face. "You never told me your fear directly, so I found out for myself. And you progressed much faster than I anticipated."
Elizabeth bolted up in her bed, making him slide backwards. "P-progress?! You're treating me like I'm one of your test subjects! I'm your doctor!"
He let out a harsh laugh; however, it wasn't wholly cruel, just...hurt? "Doctor? I believe now that we are far from Gotham, we are past that stage now. I always thought we were more than just doctor and patient, beyond friends even."
"Sweethearts, then?" Elizabeth spat. "Sweethearts never betray the other's trust! All this time, I thought I was making progress with YOU!" Now his face was of pure shock and disbelief. Bull's eye, he feels it now. The great Master of Fear finally knows what it's like to break that bond of trust with someone who finally treated him like a human being for his own sick amusement. Why did I trust him? After eight years and after what we were growing to cherish within Arkham's walls!
She jumped off the bed, more than ready to go to the police station and stay there to call the asylum, then maybe the police there ready to finally take him back in. He was a legally insane madman on the run; now she regretted ever remaining in Gotham. At least here in Georgia she could have lived in peace. Gotham and the crazies - including this man whom she had let her feelings get the best of for - was sweet tea with too much sour lemon to love. It was imprisonment.
"I thought you were actually more of a man than the monster you were made," she continued, stalking past him to grab her coat from her closet, then her brown flats. "For all this time, I actually believed in you. But now I realize I made a mistake. I should have turned you in to the police when I had the chance." Elizabeth hurried out of the room, down the hall and for the stairs. Jonathan's footsteps were behind her, closer than she'd heard for next she felt his hand grab her by the elbow and turn her to face him as soon as they were at the bottom of the staircase.
"Elizabeth Isabelle Dodson, if you would please just listen to me -" He was definitely mad now, not intending on letting her go just like that, but she wouldn't listen to him anymore. She angrilly yanked herself from him.
"Don't you DARE use my full name to try and stop me, Jonathan Thomas Crane!" she returned hotly, running over to the table drawer where the keys and her pistol were. "I don't know why, but I can't stand to stay here another minute!"
Oh, damn, Jonny really did screw up, hasn't he? :(
In another story I haven't read in awhile - and forgot the name and author - in the Batman Begins/Dark Knight category of this site, Thomas was Jonathan's middle name, and I thought it fit very well. :)
