"When you're smiling…when you're smiling…"
Quinn didn't open her eyes immediately when she woke up. No, first she tried to piece together what had happened the night before. The last thing she remembered was sitting at the bar and watching the lounge singer, wasn't it?
No, no it wasn't. There was something else there, buried in the back corner of her mind. There was a brief second she could recall. A moment that was growing more unclear by the second. The inside of a car. A face. Thin black hair. A song that she hummed along to.
"When you're smiling…when you're smiling…"
Quinn's head throbbed when she sat up. She wasn't at a bar anymore. Instead, she lay inside of a studio apartment, in the center of a king-sized bed. The alarm clock on the bedside table told her that it was a little past six in the morning. The apartment felt dark, even though the sun had almost finished rising outside. About ten feet from the bed was a dining room table, and directly across the room from that was a fridge. Standing between the two was a man. His smile was thin, and tight. A pair of glasses rested on his nose, and his body was clad in a suit and tie.
"Good morning." His voice was far too peppy for Quinn's liking at the moment.
"Who are you?" Quinn asked, swinging her legs out of bed. "Where am I?"
Confidently, the man strode over to the bed. It only took a few steps with his long legs. He placed his hands on her shoulders and pressed her back down into sitting position when she tried to stand. This was almost okay with Quinn, because her stomach felt bloated and nauseous.
"My name is Ed Nygma. You're in my bed, in my apartment."
"Oh friggin' Christ, did we—"
"No! No, no, no, no, no. Mr. Cobblepot seems to think you remind him of his mother, he would extremely unhappy if…anything were to happen. I slept on the couch. You were passed out again by the time you got here anyway."
"I passed out?" Quinn buried her face in her hands. Maybe she had overdone a little, especially considering she'd been too nervous to eat before she left for Gotham and too upset once she'd finally gotten the information she was looking for.
"I fill minds with euphoria, but also pain. I give you invincibility while I slowly kill you. What am I?" Ed's smile had broadened to show his teeth, creasing his face.
"I give up. I dunno." Quinn doesn't even try to play along with his little game.
Ed bounces on the balls of his feet as he replies, "Alcohol." He then points a finger at her in a quick, stabbing motion, "Which you had too much of last night. And fell asleep at Mr. Cobblepot's lounge. He said your hair looks like his mother's, so he wanted to take you home. I do not understand it, but he asked me to keep you here. I, however, have to go to work. He should be back shortly." All of Ed's sentences were spoken quickly, but altogether it was choppy, as if he was consciously breathing when he came to each period at the end of his sentence. Ed began to back away, towards the sliding front-door. "Rest some more. There is food in the refrigerator. The spicy mustard is on the top shelf, if you happen to be wondering. And…uh…Don't open the freezer." With that he was gone, sliding the metal door closed behind him.
Quinn closed her eyes and breathed, willing herself not to puke when she stood up. She crossed to the counter beside the fridge and began opening cupboards, in search of a glass to fill with water. She found one, and filled it on the sink that sat on the other side of the fridge. She eyed the top handle on the refrigerator as she sipped the water. She hadn't realized how thirsty she was until just then as she finished the rest of the water, then put the glass into the sink.
The only stipulations Ed had set were for her to get some rest, and that she don't open the freezer. She didn't feel like resting. She felt like leaving. But first she wanted to know what was wrong with the freezer. She placed her hand on the handle and took a deep breath before yanking it open.
Quinn gasped, her mouth remaining open and gaping, but she couldn't bring herself to make a sound. Blue eyes wide open, staring at her was a human head. Red stained the ice that had built up on the bottom of the freezer and short brown hair on the man was frozen together in clumps. That's not what had her heart racing though. She had seen gore before. It was familiar. What brought a chill to her spine was how familiar this was. Because the man's face was mutilated in a way she'd only ever seen done to mice and stray cats before then. Someone had used a knife to extend the corner of each side of the man's mouth up to his ears. If the head were not frozen the skin would have sagged down loosely, revealing his teeth on either side all the way back to his mouth. But someone had gone to the trouble of making sure his face froze in the permanent smile it was intended to be.
Quinn threw the freezer door closed as she took a stumbling step backwards and tried to catch her breath. Hand pressed to her chest, Quinn managed to finally get air to return to her lungs. Her head was swimming. She should be horrified but there was something else mixed in with her emotions. Something nobody else would feel at the sight of decapitated, mutilated man. She felt a hint of excitement swirling in the midst of the sickness that threatened to make her puke up the water she had just drank. The song she could just barely remember humming was suddenly hilariously ironic and she let out the tiniest of giggle as the tears brimmed in her eyes.
"When you're smiling…" she sang softly to herself and then giggled again. Jim Gordon had said Jerome was not only dead, but twice-missing. However, this was all so familiar that the little voice in the back of her head—her intuition, maybe—told her Jim Gordon was a fool.
When she closed her eyes she could almost see Jerome sitting out in a field with her when they were eleven. Quinn had been weaving a crown out of dandelions while Jerome slowly removed his hands from around of a stray cat they had found wandering around Jerome's trailer. It hadn't moved. It was dead. Jerome then pulled out the switchblade he had snatched from the knife-throwers' trailer while they were doing a show. With his left hand he held open the fat, grey cat's mouth, and with the other he hooked its cheek. With one motion, he sliced the cat's cheek as far back as its jaw would let him. Then his hands switched jobs, and he sliced the other cheek. He had held the cat up by its face, his fingers dripping with its blood as they held its face together. "Look, she's smiling!" He had gleamed and then began to roll with laughter as he dropped it to the ground. Quinn had laughed with him. It really did look like it was smiling, and she had loved seeing him so happy.
"Miss?"
Quinn gasped as she looked up, the sudden motion brought back the throbbing inside of her skull. She hadn't even heard the scraping of the metal door opening, she had been too enveloped in her own memories. Hovering over her was a tall, thin man. His black suit had been perfectly ironed and looked far too nice to just be wearing around in the early morning, especially the purple, checkered vest tucked away beneath the jacket. His face looked so familiar: pale, with a slightly large nose that seemed to point ever so slightly at the ground. And his hair—
It was him. The man from the car she could hardly remember. She recognized that thin, black hair. Quinn wiped away a tear she hadn't realized had slipped down her cheek, and quickly rose to her feet.
"What's your game, huh? Gonna chop off my head too?" Quinn asked, backing away towards the bed. For the first time she noticed her backpack leaning against the bedside table.
The man moved closer, but slowly, with a limp that made it look more like he was waddling than walking. Like he was some sort of animal. Quinn snatched up her bag and breezed past him. He whipped around and caught onto her arm. His thin fingers had a strong grip.
"I'm afraid I cannot let you leave. I'm not sure why Mr. Nygma has taken to keeping souvenirs in the freezer, but I have no reason to believe you won't go straight to the police. I'm afraid I'll have to detain you."
"Detain me?" Quinn chuckled. "Detain me? Sounds more like a kidnappin' to me." She set down her backpack, leaning down and yanking up its zipper and sliding her hand inside. She felt the handle immediately. She always kept it on top.
"I ask you please not to make this difficult, miss. I only meant to help. It's extremely unfortunate things have played out as they have. I am very sorry that—" The man didn't get to finish his sentence before Quinn pulled the small, rubber mallet she always cared with her from the back pack and swung it into the back of the man's left knee. The leg gave way and he fell to the floor, giving Quinn the chance she needed to snatch up her backpack, yank open the metal sliding door, and sprint down the hallway to the staircase.