Chapter Eight: The Scars

Strawberry: As this chapter is being written while I watch Casanova… Heath Ledger is especially appealing in this one ^_^ Anyway, this chapter is more routinely about the makeup and his character. It's very short. I think the end is kinda cute, judging by how far along the character development is…Hope you enjoy! Oh, and a huge thank you to everyone who added this story to their Favorites! I think…I think I love you guys! xD

The following day passed and was only mildly productive. He had gotten done everything that needed to get done, but they were all little things, such as having a nameplate made for a uniform. "Officer Rachel Dawes", it read. After the mayor, after Dent, it was Rachel's turn. He marveled at how fantastic his entire plan was. He had assigned twelve of the thirteen men he'd acquired to the task. What a show…

That day, Fana had taken to moving around, fending for herself. If she had done so two days ago, when he'd first taken her, he wouldn't have found himself watching the door so feverishly.

She was still, of course, wearing the dress she had worn to that…reception of Mr. Dent's. It was slick and fitted around her little waist. It was the color of the night sky under the moon's glow—a gentle, opaque blue. With such a dress, he would have expected some rendition of fancy heels in gold. But she had gone to the party in flat, black-fabric shoes that made her whole appearance look…

Different.

Fana was roaming through the refrigerator shelves in the food court, looking into the door of it. He strolled to the doorway of the entrance and took up rubbing his thumb and middle finger together to make dull snapping noises. He could tell that she noticed; but she continued to scan the shelves, quite obviously hungry. "You went to the grocery story, I see," she said, tapping her fingers against the door handle.

"I went to the grocery store?" he said, pointing to himself. She still did not look in his direction. "No…they went to the grocery store." She had begun taking things off of the shelves. First there was a tin-wrapped block of cheese followed by a cardboard box with curled noodles inside of it. He watched her lay eyes on the plastic silverware with quiet interest. She ran a plastic dish under the shoddy faucet of the sink until it was filled to the brim with water. Setting it aside, she ripped open the seal of the cardboard box of noodles and dumped several of them inside the dish of water. She walked to the microwave and opened the door of it, shoving the container inside of it and turning on the heat. Standing still for a moment, she then returned to the counter and carved two hearty squares from the chunk of cheese she had unwrapped. "Why would I go into a grocery store?" he said. He laughed breathily. "Why would I go in there and just…"

She looked at him at last. She could see his eyes soften.

"…Ruin everything?"

Fana set down the plastic knife. "When are you going to get tired of running?" she asked, her voice flavored with seriousness. He walked up at her side, smiling at the cabinets that resembled those of a kitchen. He began humming a mellow tune that he was creating off the top of his head.

"Mmm…when pigs fly," he answered simply.

"Honestly."

"When I stop having to." She nodded her head defiantly and swerved around him, leaving him staring at the side of the refrigerator. When he turned she had stopped the microwave, though the timer had not gone off. She cupped her hands around the bowl of noodles and water and set it carefully on the counter, steadily so as not to spill. She thrust her finger in the water, biting her lip and swishing the noodles around. He hardly had enough time to recognize how hot it was before she was saying, "Do you like having to run?"

He answered that he didn't.

"Then why do you make it so that you have to?" she prodded.

He threw his hands in the air, admiring himself. "Because I'm a little crazy."

"Do you want some?" she said, ignoring him. She gestured to the softened noodles swimming around in the cup of water. Blindly, he nodded. Seemingly unaware that he was still standing there, she went about making the food, draining the bowl over the sink. Behind the handles were paper bowls that were crinkled. They'll have to do, she thought, slopping in a relatively equal amount of noodles into two of them. Finally, she threw the cheese she had sliced on each pile of them, and said, "Here. The crappiest macaroni you'll ever eat." She shoved it against his chest and plopped herself down at a table in the corner.

"Macaroni…" He followed her footsteps, pulling one of the noodles out from under the slowly melting cheese. "Maroni…Maroni macaroni! Hah…" He slammed down in a chair across from her, pushing his foot against the wall and leaning back. He let the noodle slide down his throat, tickling it slightly and causing him to cough. "I like—"

"Why do you wear that makeup?" He raised his eyebrows. "Do you think you need to?" He considered it. It was something…routine; he'd been doing it for years. Why did he wear the makeup? Well, because it was a part of him, like his eyeballs or his skin. It identified the man he was, the man he would always be. Why didn't he wear the makeup? He let his mind trail back to the morning, when he had risen before the sun and trudged into the bathroom wearily. Mornings were when he felt the most human; he went to bed late and woke early. The most sleep he ever got must have been five hours, if he was lucky. But it did not bother him. He hated to be unaware of himself. He was tired in the mornings when he carried three jars in the room with him. It was his own little abode, where he'd paneled a bed against the wall and arranged it perfectly so that even if anyone broke the lock, they would still not see him unless they were begging to be killed.

He would walk into the bathroom across from the bed's foot and shut the door behind him before turning on the light. He would notice first the grayish, dead-look of sleeplessness under his eyes. He hated that appearance, but not more than he hated the normal, beige skin of his face. He did not want to look so normal. That was when he would open the bottle of white, caked paint. His fingers scooped it up and robotically wiped it across his forehead first. It smeared into his filthy hairline. Then he covered his temples and ears, running some down his cheekbones, paying little attention to his eyes knowing that they would have their own pigment. He left the scars untouched and scowled at them as if they understood how he hated the memory of them even being there at all.

Next, he had to take care of his sickly eyes. They made him look more than powerless. He threw the first jar into the corner and it made a loud rattling sound. At the opening of the second jar, he stared into a void of inky blackness that he knew to be sticky and cold. He squinted as he traced his fingers around his eyes, spreading the gooey black about his lids. There were smiling lines around his eyes, the wrinkles soaking in the color and leaving uneven splotches. He rather appreciated it that way, the unevenness of his face absorbing the demented colors with madness.

It was the red he liked best. It made him the angriest.

By this point, he was angry with himself. Angry that he was a joke, angry because some scars never healed, angry because he needed any source of coverage at all. He liked being the clown, the jester, the Joker… It was entertainment in its purest, most unfiltered form. But each morning, as he painted his face, he wondered if he would like it half so much if he were less disfigured. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn't. It was none of his business to even be thinking about it.

The red paint tasted like metal. It smeared on his teeth as he carelessly trailed it across his lips. He licked the excess away and stared at himself momentarily before finally tracing the scars—then he was smiling. Then he was ready to be happy.

His heart ached a little when his hands ran over the jagged scars for the millionth time. He slapped himself, making the red paint smear on one side. Looking at his hands, there was a tinge of white and red mixing together. The black was hardly noticeable. He rubbed his hands together and pulled his gloves over his hands. They would still be damp from the night before, when he had used them to wash the makeup away. That was the end of the makeup routine.

His eyes were glazed with thought as he tilted the bowl of noodles around so that the cheese was melting evenly. Fana noticed a new kind of expression on his face as he sat wordlessly before her. "You know," she said, feeling uncertain as to whether she should continue. The noodles before her squished around her finger as she stirred, making a sound similar to the one she could hear each time he chewed on his mouth. "I don't…I don't even know if—if I would've noticed them…" He looked up to see her gesturing to her own mouth, indicating his scars. Unconsciously, he sucked on the metallic red paint slopped on his mouth. "If you hadn't said anything. I can only see because…because you told me."

He shoveled a good amount of food into his mouth. "You've…answered your own question," he said, smiling. "You'd appreciate it…if you could see them." He saw her ready to protest but put up a hand to end the conversation. Her golden eyes were piercing his own bottomless, sick brown eyes. "Remember yesterday?" he asked suddenly. At first she made no appearance of having remembered anything at all. He remembered. His blood was still boiling over the simple feeling of the dangerous blade against his face, pressing up daringly against the scars. "When you were…telling me a story?" She nodded insecurely. "And—and I leaned forward? Our noses touched." She flinched, as if it were happening at that very moment. "Maybe I wouldn't have remembered. But I can tell…because…" He pulled off one of his gloves and gave his hand a good look before reaching for Fana's face. He ran his finger down the bridge of her nose and she winced several times before he said, "There's paint on your nose. It's still there…"

"Your…" She changed her mind, having meant to further confront his character. Noticing the way his eyes lit, she could sense the same craving for pain that she had seen in him yesterday. She shook her head and thought of something—anything—safer to say. "Your hands are soft." He smirked.

"Thanks, lamb chop." He smacked her cheek and got to his feet, leaving his empty bowl in front of her. She got to her feet. She hated the way he was leaving her with half a bone, peaking her interest and then walking away.

"Is that the only reason for the makeup?" she called as he exited. He stopped moving and seemed to consider the question. One of his shoulders shrugged as he breathed a light, "Ha…" He reached into the pocket of his jacket. "Is the only reason just to hide the scars? Is it the scars?" He smiled.

"Of course not."