PART IIII.
We All Have Demons
They'd dragged Harley out of the Joker's room at exactly seven o'clock. She was lying, curled up on the end of the bed, asleep with a pulsing black eye. They had grabbed the Joker roughly by the scruff of his neck like he was some dirty bone gnawing animal, and pushed him onto the bed where they wrestled him into an even tighter straight jacket than the last.
He had managed to take one of the nurses out, however. He had grabbed him by the shoulder and gave it a hard tug, hearing the tendons rip as the nurse wailed in pain and horror. He had recoiled from the Joker like he was a deadly anaconda. The Joker certainly felt like wrapping his hands around the nurse's ginger head and giving it a good old squeeze.
He was currently sat in the dining room, on a plastic old orange chair, with his plastic knife and fork and a plate of mash and sausage. The Joker wasn't a big fan of mash. Not unless it was someone's brain that had been mashed or the make-up on his face. God, he did wish they'd fucking give him back his make-up already. Joker recalled he had been told he'd get his lipstick if he ate all his bangers and mash for the next two weeks. Fuck that, he thought.
The Joker stared down at his bangers and mash, not looking up to the two, no, three nurses and a security guard – no wait, there was another one by the door – that were sitting opposite him on his table. He chose to ignore them, like he always did. This is how it went every day. They'd sit there and watch him just stare at his food, his knife and fork in hands which rested on the table, for a good half hour of lunch, until they got fed up and dragged him back to the room.
"I want to go back to my room." The Joker said, giving the corner of his mouth a compulsive lick.
"Tough. Your half hour isn't up yet." The nurse said, glancing at his watch. A minute. The Joker rolled his eyes and snapped his knife in two. They all flinched, much to his delight. He didn't do anything with the broken pieces. However the Joker wondered how fast his reflexes were; would he be able to jump up fast enough to ram the fork in the nurse's eye and the knife in another's?
"I want, I want to go to my room." The Joker mumbled, watching his hands pound lightly against the table as he clenched his fists around the two broken pieces of knife and his fork. Lick lick went his tongue in the corner of his mouth. Seconds ticked by.
"Now your half hour is up." The nurse said smugly, amusement in his voice, as he stood up, motioning to the two security guards who grabbed the Joker from behind, under his arms and yanked him up from his orange seat. They confiscated his untouched food and plastic cutlery, which they rudely snatched from his curled up hands.
The Joker allowed himself to be dragged along the floor, his legs limp and his arms held up high in odd angles. Retina scan, beep beep, swipe card.. The normal boring procedure, the Joker recognised. It was beginning to sound like a stuck record.
They threw him in his room and walked out. No straight jacket today, the Joker thought. He must have done something right.
"Oi!" The Joker yelled as he rapped on the window of his door. He motioned threateningly to one of the nurses, with his dirty index finger, who reluctantly turned back. She peered at him.
"What about my suit?" The Joker said.
"Suit?" The nurse asked, puzzled.
"Yeah, the one with the handsome buckles." The Joker gave a laugh.
"Somebody requested you not have to wear the straight jacket for at least a day." The nurse replied. Harley, the Joker thought. Bless that bitch.
"But I like my straight jacket!" The Joker wailed like a small child. And he did. He liked the feel of it squeezing his body tight, like he almost couldn't breathe, paralysed, and escaping by dislocating his shoulders. Admittedly, it did get boring after being in the straight jacket for a good couple of hours, but the beginning thrill was exhilarating.
The nurse left, leaving the Joker staring out the window at the wall opposite. Harley, was all he could think about. He narrowed his eyes and turned away. He sat down on his bed.
Joker wondered where she was. She was probably at home with a bag of peas on her black eye. He couldn't even remember why he had socked her one in her pretty blue eye any ways. He couldn't recall her pissing him off. He shrugged; sometimes he just liked to hit people, and it wasn't like Harley would really resist to being his personal little punch bag.
Oh, how the Joker found himself longing for her. Longing. He wanted to smell her strawberry scented blonde hair and stroke her bare skin... The Joker punched the side of his face suddenly. He rammed his head against the wall, screaming as he did so in rage. He tugged at his hair and scratched at his skin.
He didn't like this. This whole, feeling business. The Joker hated emotions, repulsed by them. This feeling made him want to double over and retch them up, until they don't inhabit his body any more. He'd only ever felt glee, and triumph, and pride. This, this was new. So foreign, alien. He hated it, and in some truth, he was completely terrified.
"Calm down Clown." The guard said threateningly from the other side of the glass. The Joker growled at him, but didn't move off the bed. He was tired, but he refused to sleep, or else he'd dream about her.
Joker put his head in his hands, his fingertips scrunching up his hair. What the hell was happening to him? He needed to distract himself, he couldn't bring himself to comprehend the fact that she was changing him. He had hardly realised that he was changing Harley, too.
Harley was sat at home, curled up on the sofa, a bag of peas on her pulsing eye, just like the Joker had envisioned her. She sighed to herself, flicking through the channels on the television, her eyes wandering the screen, hardly focusing. Her head was starting to freeze over, the cold of the peas spreading to her entire face. She threw the peas across the room in a huff, where they burst open, the frozen peas rolling across the floor, sounding like hail. She watched them roll across the laminate flooring, wondering when she'd gotten so violent.
Harley figured it was since she'd taken up the Joker's case. He was rubbing off on her. He was changing her, she realised with such a stomach churning epiphany she thought she was going to be sick.
She was also beside herself with worry. She had no idea what had happened earlier, one minute she was next to the Joker, next he'd socked her one in the eye. She wasn't sure why. Harley gnawed on her lip, worried she'd said something that had upset him.
Harley rolled over on the sofa and cried, cried until she felt like she'd been completely dried of tears. She cried about the Joker, about her whole life. She tried to cry some more, not quite venting everything she felt, but nothing happened. She desperately wanted to go back to work, to see him, even if only for a minute, but her boss had told her she was to spend at least a morning off. A morning was all she got? Not that it mattered, she wanted to go back right now.
Break me out of here, baby. Joker's words swam around in front of her eyes. How the hell was she going to break him out of there? Arkham had the highest security available in Gotham City – that didn't stop him the first time, Harley thought to herself darkly with a chuckle. She wondered how he did it. He needed a retina scan for starters, and a swipe card. Maybe he wouldn't break him out. She liked him being in there, as much as it pained her to think that. There were ways to break him out, but she hadn't figured them out yet and she didn't seem to want to.
Harley suddenly found herself craving for information on how he killed that night nurse. She craved every little detail, wanting to know every movement, every thought he had, how much blood... She craved all this and the Joker so much she thought her heart was going to fail her as it drummed wildly in her ribcage.
Joker scowled at the wall. He was so bored, bored of being here, in this God forsaken room, bored of being so fucking alone. The Joker had been alone most of his life, even when he was a young boy, and honestly, he couldn't really remember that far back. Maybe it was his mental shields that he'd put in place, ignoring the memories, or maybe his brain had suppressed the memories so far down into his unconscious mind that he'd learned to keep them there, without even thinking about it.
He remembered his mother. She was a beautifully distorted woman. Joker couldn't remember if it was a drug problem, or an alcohol problem that had corrupted his mother. Either way, they were both demons that had equal chance of inhabiting his mother's broken vessel, her soul and spirit had long ago been destroyed.
Joker knew all about demons. They've lived with him ever since he was born. Somehow, he'd swallowed one at birth. It clawed away at him, everyday. He'd always felt, slightly at peace with them. They'd been there all the time, they were a part of him, part of what made him the psychotic clown he was. They were something he could familiarise himself with, he didn't like foreign things much. Now he found himself with a new demon, one that he's actually fighting.
Joker screwed his eyes shut, rocking backwards and forwards. Harley – no, he didn't want to think about her. His psychologist, whom he wanted to consider a completely person to Harley, had told him that he was in a state of denial. He'd scoffed at that. He was completely aware of everything he was, everything he still is and everything he'd done.
"The past is past, Doctor." He had said, shrugging at her, when she'd said she thought he was denying a lot to himself.
"Still, it helps to talk about these things." Harleen said, tapping her pen lightly and patiently on her clipboard. Joker leant towards her in his chair slightly;
"Who says I want to talk about these things?"
"So you admit, there's things?" She observed. Joker leant back, defeated. "Are they like, demons?"
Joker stared at her. He shrugged, looking away. Harleen looked at him patiently, waiting for an answer. He sighed and rolled his eyes towards the heavens, knowing she'd sit there all day until he answered her.
"I suppose." He mumbled. Joker hated exposing himself to her, opening up, but he found he told her the truth at the oddest times. He knew he'd think that again soon.
"Can you describe these demons?"
"See Doc, you can see these demons."
"I can?" Harleen asked, momentarily puzzled, until she noticed the Joker indicating to himself, a slight gleeful look on his face. She realized that Joker meant he is the demons.
"We all have demons, Joker." She said, surveying him carefully, her perfectly plucked and shaped eyebrows furrowing slightly, her perfect skin breaking out into lines.
"Really, tell me some of yours, doctor."
"We're not analysing me." Harleen said, lifting her chin up in defiance. He noticed she does that. Alot.
"I tell you what. If you want to analyse me, I have to analyse you."
"Joker-"
"Come on. What have you got to hide?" Joker said, folding his arms, knowing there was alot that Harleen Quinzel was hiding. He could tell by the look in her eyes, the way she was always fumbling with her fingers, the way she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear which he found to be quite charming. He knew she wasn't nervous around him at all, which made him nervous.
"This is only our second session, Joker. I need more on you first." She looked down at her blank sheet on the clipboard.
"Ah ah. You see doc, this will work like a vicious circle. You'll try to get information out of me, but I won't give you anything until you share what's hidden behind your perfect breasts." Harleen's cheeks flared up instantly, the exact reaction he'd wanted from her.
Harleen sighed before huffing out;
"Okay, Joker." She capped her pen. "Ask me one question, then I ask you a question. Deal?
"Willing to shake on it, doc?" He said, his lips curving into a smirk.
Joker also knew the reason for his mother's corrupt soul. His father. Oh, he hated his father with an undying passion. He was the reason his mother was lying six feet under the polluted sky. He'd hit her, like he normally does, pushing the Joker away from him as he tried to run towards her. She'd fallen, slicing her head open on the side of the kitchen table, or something like that.
His memory was a bit foggy. Joker liked it that way, didn't like to remember. The day of his mother's funeral however, was a memory he'd never forget.
Joker stood outside the hearse, not sure whether or not to go to the funeral. Fifteen years old and detached from his mother in every way possible. Ripped from her. He knew this would mess his head up even further that it already was. He had his father to thank for that, like every other shit thing in the world, in his life. He had enough problems to deal with, he didn't want to have to think and witness putting his mother in the ground.
Joker shuffled his feet, finally deciding he should. Opening the black shiny car he got in, not bothering to put on his seatbelt. All the time there, all he thought about was opening the car door again and flinging himself out, leaving it up to chance whether he got run over or not.
His life in Gotham City was depressing. He wanted nothing more than to get out of there, go abroad somewhere, maybe. Joker wasn't at all into the whole ambition thing, he couldn't see himself sitting in a bank, or sitting in court defending someone. That thought repulsed him. Ever his father's son, he was just as obnoxious as he was.
He couldn't think about the fact that his mother was going to be in the ground soon. She might have been suffering, but she was always there for him as best as she could. He'd had a tough childhood, watching his mother get beaten up, then taking some of the beatings for himself. He was beaten, bruised and broken, and his mother always added another B to that too; Beautiful.
They had reached the outskirts of the graveyard now, and Joker had slumped so far down in his seat that he couldn't see over the top of the door where the window started. He hoisted himself up with some reluctance and scrambled out the car, slamming the door shut. Joker walked slowly over the ceremony, he was about five minutes late.
Everyone looked up as he approached, sad looks in their eyes for the loss of his Mother, and he could see sympathy in their eyes. Something seemed to snap inside him. He didn't want their sympathy, he didn't want anything from them. Just his mother back. Joker looked back at them passively. A woman at the back of the crowd suddenly burst into hysterical tears, sobbing into a handkerchief. The noise startled Joker and everyone else, who just like that, followed suit as the guy in the black robes finished paying his respects. He was quite glad he'd missed that actually, he didn't want to hear all that heart felt stuff.
It started to rain as the Joker stood there, watching his mother being lowered into the ground. Her coffin was quite nice actually, despite the fact that Joker had grown up not quite the richest kid in Gotham City. He knew all eyes were on him, expecting him to cry or at least feel something. But he didn't. He felt absolutely nothing, and momentarily it scared him. Maybe he was just numb.
Joker stood there, suddenly hating life, the world and everyone in it. He blamed God for this, God was the soul reason that his mother was dead. Joker was all alone in the world now, at just fifteen. He'd had his mother taken away from him. He felt like someone had taken his heart. He loved her. What had he ever done to deserve this? What had she done? We all have demons, he'd thought bitterly. Both she and he had done nothing, nothing. God was just a kid playing on the sand, with no fucking clue about life, letting the burning grains slip between his fingers.