Title: Strip Mall Startled
Rating: T
Genre: horror/drama
Characters: Joker, OFC
Disclaimer: Nope, don't own it.
Warnings: none
Summary: Its time to help her replace those heels she lost…
Author's Note - yeah, I'm totally going with the more utilitarian style…it like it better for this story. Anyway, this is my favorite chapter so far – I love the emotional connection that the two characters get and I hope that you like it and think that it's appropriate. Once again, I would sincerely appreciate constructive criticism on the story and how I've characterized the Joker. But for now, simply, enjoy!

"Strip Mall Startled"

He was watching her, but it wasn't enough; it couldn't satisfy the cold in his stomach. He wanted to taste her fear again, but the essence of normal, everyday, you-look-like-you-saw-a-ghost kind of fear wasn't fulfilling. Joker wanted to savor the slow, rich burn of true terror on the curl of his tongue

It had come a few times before – when he'd first spoken to her - when the lights of the truck had flashed in her eyes.

Now she'd dimmed to a dull hum of nerves and cold anxiety. It was just enough, just barely enough, to keep his attention. He was so temped to dash out onto the street and feel someone else's dread…but the climax with this project had yet to truly come. This job required infinite patience, a lithe mind, a flair for the dramatic…Good thing he was the cat and she was the mouse…

She was in a department store when she should have been at work. Technically it was called "playing hooky", but surely her reason for this was good enough. Three nights ago she'd been attacked by a madman dressed in a horrifying take on a childish disguise. Every day since then, she'd called in sick with the not-so-24-hr flu. She felt that most of the time, her apartment was the safest place for her. Even there, however, an odd wakefulness plagued her incessantly.

Even though she'd left him dumbstruck on the ground, she could still feel his eyes on her. When she brushed her teeth, when she watched TV, when she ate the last of the very old TV dinners she had stocked in the freezer, she knew he was there. Paranoia and white skin slashed by red lips haunted her even in the bitter and unsatisfying sleep of the terrorized.

During her "interim" at her apartment, the thing that had disquieted her the most occurred in her bathroom. Every morning when she woke up, her tubes of lipstick - all fifteen of them – were organized in alphabetical order by the color name in a straight line along the front of her vanity mirror. Just the sight of those little black tubes lined up and reflecting in her clear mirror chilled her; and every time she swept along the counter and destroyed the perfect image the lipsticks formed her heart jumped to her throat. Made her feel like there was a bunch of high wire clowns jumping about on the slippery, flesh encased bones of her spine. Each jolt where their feet slipped and their imaginary forms crashed into the line of her back transferred violent trips of motion to her body and let them run wild. There was no explanation for how her home was infiltrated, but still…

This knowledge had forced her to realize the relative safety of a crowded public place. Surely there wasn't a madman in the world who was bold enough to attack her in a public place.

There were people everywhere in the popular mall. Mothers with strollers, kids without parents, acne prone teens flashing their braces. 'The ditchers…' she thought hypocritically, sipping from an empty soda and watching for a painted face.

Although the noisy and energy-packed food court and the make-up counter with its watchful salesgirls would have provided more confidence and security, she instead headed for quieter realms. The shoe department held the perfect number of patrons for protection and the perfect distraction. She needed to replace the heels she'd lost on…that night.

There was only one salesgirl meandering around the shoe department, glancing at the few customers trying on sneakers. Plenty of heels in her size sat on the shelves, so she didn't have to bother with the sullen woman.

She sat down by a secluded wall under an overhang lined by sandals with five boxes of shoes, all heels in different shades of black. The need for something somber and serious was overwhelming. The bright red or yellow heels so reminiscent of "Sex in the City" were shunned, bereft of her usual admiring glances.

She slipped on a pair of shoes, and stood up to look in the full-length mirror. Ignoring her unsightly jeans, she flexed her calf muscle and wriggled her toes. Too tight. She chucked them off uncaringly…

Joker watched her from behind a nearby stack of shoes, delighting in her unwariness. She'd fairly prickled with uncertainness and nerves earlier, but her new carelessness left his mouth watering. The time was ripe for terror.

He stood up, straightening the kinks in his back but remembered to duck down quick enough. He'd spotted what he needed and it was not far away. Joker crept backwards, snickering all the while. He stopped though, when he ran into the salesgirl who'd so balefully ignored him earlier.

Such an offence, although minor, need to be repaid. She hardly put up a fight as he tied and gagged her with nylon stockings from a nearby rack.

It was tricky business dragging her behind the cash register. He was in the process of stuffing her into the shelves when a customer impatiently rang the bell calling for service. Joker and the salesgirl stared at one another for a moment before he popped up. The customer's eyes widened exponentially. "Good day Madam. Were you able to find everything you wanted?" he said conversationally in a perfect imitation of a British accent. He kicked the salesgirl into silence as he rang the woman up and shooed her away.

Joker knelt down to pat the salesgirl's cheek before speeding off in reckless abandon, snatching what he needed…

She'd already gone through three pairs of shoes. The first was too tight, the second too loose, and the third was too gray to be called black. Her breath rushed out in a forlorn sigh; this was torture. She hated the actual shopping for shoes but she loved the buying. The gray shoes were tossed in a box as she reached back for the next pair. She froze when her hand came up with something unexpected.

Instead of black, one inch pumps, she held four inch stilettos that weren't black in any sense of the word. They were white, with tiny red dots all over them. She twisted around to see where they had come from and discovered that all her black shoes were gone, replaced by a mountain of stilettos; some were grass green, others a garish plaid, there was even a paisley pair. She clapped her hands over her mouth to contain a shriek when a purple pair dropped into the pile.

Her neck creaked painfully as she searched frantically for her tormentor. But strangely, there was no hint of a depreciating smile. No glimpse of argyle socks or striped purple pants. She breathed a sigh of relief at the absence and noticed a wall of bright shoes on the wall behind her.

She turned her back to face the mirror and the shoe she was still holding. It didn't look too bad. It looked rather…stylish actually. She spent a moment admiring the way it looked before tossing it back into the pile again. Her hand came up with the plaid pair of stilettos. They were purple, shot through with yellow and green and the tiniest bit of pink. They slipped onto her feet like a dream.

Her fingers were still running along the edge of the shoe and fingering the skin of her ankles when she looked back into the mirror…where she wasn't alone.

The clown stood behind her, and she could see that his big hands were resting on her shoulders and his body was pressed aggressively against her back. It was strange how she couldn't feel any of that.

The growing pinch of pain in her collarbone woke her completely to the situation, sending signals down her spine to her limbs in warning. Her stiletto clad foot kicked back under the bench on instinct, trying to reach and wound him. Instead, he hooked his leg around her foot in an effective trap. Suddenly he had her arms behind her back, her back arched under the terrible pressure and her whole body pitched forward in a dangerously precarious position.

She opened her mouth again but suddenly his cheek was pressed against hers, halting her in icy terror. The clown grinned almost boyishly, his teeth blinding white. The movement of his cheek against hers was discordant as he spoke. "Now, now funny one. Not a sound please, not a one. Promise you'll only speak soft words, soft words only, sweet one."

Their eyes looked in the mirror at each other, and a connection strengthened and solidified. Now, no matter how long he left her alone or she lay dead in the ground, one would always be in the other's mind. Lurking, creeping, slithering over the grooves of the brain. Or haunting, teasing, evoking savory feelings.

Her head bobbed back and forth in a nod. He grinned again. "I'm waiting pet, waiting. Ask me your questions. Is this what you want to know pet: Why?"

Even she could see the surprise bloom on her face. "I…yes, why? What did I do?" she forced out.

He laughed. "Nothing pet, nothing. But sometimes you don't need to do anything."

"Won't you ever leave me alone?" she gasped out, feeling tears bite at the corner of her eyes.

"No."

She stared up at him through the mirror, trying to find some home in his defenses so that she could forge on and destroy him. Shatter him and impact his life. Joker caught her staring at him and smiled slowly, more than he ever had in her presence. His teeth were revealed slowly, they were perfectly white, with only one bottom left tooth slightly crooked. They looked like they could belong to any cool, wholesome dad from the fifties, who patted his kids on the back and drank Coca Cola with them out of real glass bottles.

Then he licked his lips lasciviously, purposefully, and ruined the thought.

It seems that they stayed that way, touching that way – his hands on her arms and her foot caught by his leg – for a very long time. But then in a sudden, instantaneous movement he let go, released her. Her balance deserted her and left her flailing. She fell forward off the bench with an 'oomph'.

She slammed into the full length mirror in a way that was not unlike how male rams fight for dominance in the wild. She was lucky that the glass didn't crack, as her force was so great that the huge shelf of shoes the mirror was anchored to shook alarmingly.

Her whole head ached but she still whipped around to look at him. His face was grave, the total opposite of before. She thought he would attack her again, the madness within his eyes was so great. But instead he placed one hand on a free spot of wall. As he inched his hand across the wall, and pressed his fingers into the dry wall, letters appeared. Dripping like blood and gruesome like memories.

JOKER.

Then, with a laugh more suited to a Carnivale witch, he vanished.

AN – So that was the third chapter, and hopefully, you liked it as much as I do. Please, please, please review. I'm hoping to get the next chapter written and beta'd soon, but you know how it is…muses are so fickle. Lets hope mine's in a good mood.

Please review, as reviews are the food of an author's soul, and if you don't feed me…then I couldn't possibly write a thing! (smiles slyly)

THANKS!