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Next thing I know, I hear quiet voices and am sleepily aware that someone's touching my hair. Reluctant to open my eyes, I nonetheless wake up a little as I realize that I'm lying on my side now, head pillowed on something warm and… there are fingers running through my hair. Resisting the urge to recoil right away, I crack one eye open, see the purple fabric in my immediate line of vision and realize that I'm halfway draped over the Joker's lap, that the hands against my head must belong to him. I start instinctively, but the hands turn to steel against my scalp, holding me in place, and I hear soft shushing from above me.
I think about fighting. The henchmen are across the room, speaking in conspicuously low tones and occasionally glancing over at me, and I know how this must look, but something halts me, maybe the understanding that it's better that they don't see me as just an ordinary hostage to be kicked around. Still, it's unsettling. The positioning… it's like I'm his pet, something he keeps around to play with. A distraction.
Well, aren't you?
The thought is weirdly calming in its truth. Add this to the fact that this is about the only display of tenderness (however idle) I'm likely to get from him, and I'm suddenly less inclined to make a fuss. I exhale, shift a little to get more comfortable, and close my eyes again.
This is how people get Stockholm syndrome, that little voice in my head pipes up. Fixating on kindness where they can find it, convincing themselves that they're safest with their captor, and ultimately defending him against perceived threats. Two out of three isn't exactly a great sign.
I'm not fixating, I tell myself. I'm… this isn't fixating. And it's not. If anything, it's me finally acknowledging my confession earlier in the night, right after the kiss—maybe I am attached—and trying to adjust to it in the least traumatic way possible. Following that admission, I can see several potential courses of action available to me—a.) avoid him completely, b.) fuck him fast to get rid of the completely inconvenient tension, or c.) try to readjust and plan a strategy of self-defense, both physical and emotional, in light of the development. Option A is obviously not going to happen. Option B is still an idea half-repulsive to me (I'm not inclined to puzzle out the exact moment when it stopped being wholly repulsive), and anyway, leaving aside the fact that being so willfully vulnerable around the Joker is a terrible idea and that unprotected sex with him is a worse one… this thing with us has never been just about sexual tension, though physicality was admittedly a part of it from the start. Sex won't solve anything, and in fact has a very big chance of making everything worse.
That leaves me with Option C, which is of course the vaguest and most difficult of the three. How am I supposed to protect myself physically when he's bigger, stronger, much less predictable, and much more lethal than I am? How am I supposed to protect myself emotionally when I've gotten so far from my emotions that I can't seem to control them now that they're back?
Talk about unsolvable riddles.
He speaks suddenly from above me. "You fellas are lookin' a little… ehhh, jumpy. Why don't you hit the streets?"
I crack an eye open to see Grizzly looking a bit nervous. "The streets?" he repeats uncertainly.
"Yeah. Maybe start some fires, draw attention away from the rest of the guys. Get creative. It'll give ya somethin' to do for now."
Grizzly looks a little confused, but he doesn't argue. He nods, and Twitchy goes over and grabs the guy in the corner, pulling him up by the shoulder. Another moment and they're out the door pulling it closed quietly behind them, and I'm alone with the Joker again.
I close my eyes quickly, aware that the game has changed once more but uncertain of what to make of it. He's removed the goons from play, at least temporarily, and judging by the speech he made about the importance of waiting, it's unlikely that he did it just to cater to their restlessness. He doesn't cater to anyone, so he must have some loose plan for now.
I'm aware that I'm starting to tremble a bit, and to draw my attention away from my fear, I focus instead on the idle fingers running through my hair. The owner of those fingers is still terrifying, but purely physically speaking, I like the way the nails scrape my scalp, a little too roughly to be called gentle—and he knows it, too, clearly picked up on my reaction to it last night. Fixating, that smarmy little voice in the back of my head sings, but I squelch it, thinking instead, he likes my hair. At least, he certainly seems to take every opportunity to touch it. It's almost funny imagining him being drawn to the coppery brightness of it, like a magpie to shine.
He likes to decorate his persona with vivid colors—purple suit and coat, red grin, green vest… and now a little redheaded pet. Why not?
His hands go suddenly still, and I tense up right away, thinking irrationally that he somehow has absorbed my thoughts through his fingertips and taken offense. However, he only says, quietly, "I know you're awake, Em."
I don't move, aside from acknowledging the statement by opening my eyes. Although I know for sure that sprawled across his lap is a dangerous place to be for several good reasons, I also get the feeling that sitting up and facing him will signal willingness to engage. Right now I'm scared and tired, and my head hurts and my arm hurts and the last thing I want right now is a confrontation with the Joker.
He catches a strand of my hair and winds it around his finger, tugging lightly on it. It's irritating. "No questions? No… moral superiority? You've been a firecracker this time around, much noisier than last time. What's with the silent treatment all of a sudden?"
"Giving you the silent treatment is an exercise in futility," I mumble, closing my eyes again. "I'm just tired."
"Well, that's understandable," he says, sounding sympathetic, which only heightens my guard. "You've had a big night. Still, you can normally rustle up the energy to, uh, ask questions."
I pause, and then slowly open my eyes. "Yeah," I say, turning my head a little so I can look up into his face—he's peering down at me with a look of faint amusement on his face, playing with me again—"but normally, you just dodge them or spin me off-topic," I add, a note of accusation fresh in my tone.
"Well, you never know what you'll get if you don't even try," he says, looking down at me with a patronizing expression that I'd find infuriating if I wasn't caught up by what he's just said.
You're kidding me. Now Is the time he decides to open up? After all, I think I've got everything figured, but still… confirmation of my guesswork would be nice. I get the feeling I'm going to want to be watching him for this, so reluctantly, I sit up, and this time, he lets me go. I don't go far, sliding one leg off the couch, tucking the other beneath me, and turning to watch him closely—and boy, he is close, right in front of me, moving to straighten his cuffs as if preparing himself for an interrogation—or a performance. My knee is touching his thigh, but if I pull it back now, he might notice and comment on it, so I leave it where it is.
He licks his lips and turns his head to face me, looking placid and prepared. Performance, definitely, I think, but since I'm already upright, I proceed.
"You're going to take out Alberto Falcone."
I get a lazy nod in response.
"As a gift for Batman."
Another nod, this one a bit more self-satisfied.
I frown. "Don't you think he might be less than thrilled about that? I mean, you've already killed… however many people were in that building, and Batman's kind of known for not killing people. I mean, until Harvey Dent."
The Joker scowls suddenly, and I flinch back as his hands fly up, but he's only using them to gesticulate, fingers fluttering for emphasis as he says, "No, no—let me tell you somethin' about Dent, okay, Em? The guy was cracked. I mean, I oughta know—I scraped away that brittle little layer of white knight that had everybody fooled, and out came the rot. I mean, sure, everybody's like that, yeah, but Harvey… he had a special something. Like he'd been waiting for years for an excuse." He stares across the room for a second, lost in some old memory.
After a second, eyes still distant, he says deliberately, "Harvey Dent may be dead, but you can bet Batman didn't do it. He did take the fall for it, though. And I know exactly why."
"Why?" I don't doubt him, considering Batman's habit of sparing lives in all prior cases (not to mention the Joker's much better informed of the doings of the criminal underworld than I am), but I'm interested in the reasoning behind the decision.
"Because," hisses the Joker, "he doesn't want people to know what Harvey was. Dent was a hero to Gotham; he was supposed to be incorruptible. He was supposed to save everyone. If it got out that Harvey Dent was no better than all those mob bosses he spent his little life trying to corner and lock away… well. Score approximately eleven million for me."
"You think Harvey Dent turning criminal would turn all of Gotham evil," I say, sounding the idea out, thinking it might sound less insane if I shorten and rephrase it. It doesn't.
"Evil?" he says vaguely, as if the word is a foreign one to him. "No… not in their minds, at least. Desperate, though, sure. Once they realize that their heroes are just as bad as the street thugs, they start depending on themselves. Now, people are selfish as it is, but once they get it into their heads that their institutions have failed, that the protection they take for granted doesn't actually exist, never has? Well. Chaos." He pronounces the word with relish, adding a careless click of the tongue to signify the conclusion of his theory.
I consider it. I can see a sort of weird rationale there, though I can't believe it would work on such a large scale. A whole city doesn't go evil overnight, and even if it did, Gotham isn't a nation-state. We have a federal government that would intervene; the city's not going to turn into some anarchistic no-man's land without anyone noticing.
As if he read my mind, he says, "If you don't believe me, Em, all you gotta do is look at yourself."
Oh, here we go. He finally turns his head to look at me, and I lean back a bit reflexively but stay put. Knowing that I'm going to regret it but compelled by my damn curiosity, I ask, "What do you mean by that?"
"Well, think about it," he says, tilting his head encouragingly. "The police failed you, so you went out and got a gun. You've already killed people—"
"Men who were trying to kill me," I remind him yet again.
"Oh, sure, sure. Once the cops failed you, you took matters into your own hands—perfectly understandable. But that guy tonight—he never hurt ya, did he?"
"I didn't kill him."
"No. But you didn't stop it from happening, either." When I don't immediately respond, he lowers his chin and prods, "Did you?"
I drop my eyes and don't answer. He's trying to make me feel guilty, and I know it, but the bitch of it is that it's working. Baby or no baby, I didn't even say stop, much less try to get the gun away. I accepted that that man was going to die whether or not I intervened, so I decided to stay out of it and not make things worse for myself. It was an understandable choice, but it carried moral weight.
The Joker shifts, laying his arm out along the back of the couch, and crooking his elbow, lifts his hand up to tap my shoulder. Interpreting it as a command for my attention, I lift my eyes to his. He licks his lips and juts his head out a little, ensuring my attention before saying lowly, "You see… self-sacrifice and doing the right thing… it's easy to talk about until you find yourself in a difficult situation. Then, suddenly, it doesn't seem so relevant."
As difficult as it is, I look straight into the blackness of his eyes, aware that I'm breathing heavier and that there's pressure in my sinuses. No. Fuck him. I'm not going to let him make me cry, not about this. Keeping my voice quiet, just above a whisper so that it won't break and give me away, I say, "Recognizing an impossible situation for what it is does not count as evil."
"No… no," he says, pulling a thoughtful face. "But it is pretty cold."
"Interfering wouldn't have saved him. It would have put me and that baby in danger."
He holds up his hand with a theatrical wince, staving off my argument. "Hey, hey—you don't need to explain yourself to me. I understand completely—it's perfectly natural. All I'm saying is… well. Do you think a good person would have made the decision you made? Hell, all of the decisions you've made since I first picked you up, come to think of it. Standing by while people die, making nice with me and the goons to keep yourself safe—do you really have room to be making all your, eh, moral judgments?"
I drop my eyes again. Strangely, this last speech has made me feel better, not worse—the urge to cry is gone. Additionally, now that I'm looking down, something catches my eye—a little gleam, polished black metal, sitting on the cushion beside him. A folded knife.
It must have slipped out of his pocket. I force myself not to reach for it immediately, but I know right away that I want it. Taking a gun while his back is turned is one thing—it would have forced me to make a call right away, try to kill or be killed, and I wasn't ready for that. A knife, though… having a blade on hand would change the game, if only a little. It would give me hidden teeth, a means by which to defend myself from the perpetually-looming peril—and most of all, it would help me stop feeling so damn helpless all the time.
I want that knife. Already, I'm hatching a scheme to get it in my pocket unnoticed, and it's foolish and dangerous, but this whole stupid situation has consisted of me walking a knife's edge. Risks are inevitable, and this time, the payoff is worth it. I don't have time to think it through; at any moment he might notice and pick it back up. I swallow hard and, keeping my eyes down, I say, "You've overlooked a detail."
"Really," he keens, his voice high and interested. "Oooh. What?"
"I do try to do the right thing when I can, you're right about that. But it's only an effort to keep things in balance." Slowly, I lift my head, meeting his eyes again and hiding my fear behind cold resolve. "You see, I'm not one of your test subjects, one of those… citizens you work to disillusion and corrupt."
"Ahh, the cry of the individual," he purrs, but I refuse to let him derail me.
"You think I lost my faith in institutions when you turned those cops on me? No. I've been alone for much longer than that. I've been relying on myself, protecting myself long before I met you. Maybe I try to look after people who manage to earn my sympathy, but there's not a fucking rule that says if I protect one person, I have to protect them all. You see, I'm not a good person. I don't think I have been for a long time, if I ever was. I take care of myself, I take care of my interests, and whenever I can, I take what I want. That's it."
He raises his eyebrows, tilting his head towards me, and slowly, he asks, "Are… you… sure?"
Showtime. I don't let myself fully consider how seriously reckless this plan is. I shift, swinging one leg over his and settling astride his lap—completely vulnerable, my mind shrieks. He makes no moves, neither stopping nor encouraging me, just watching, those black eyes lit with curiosity and some kind of diabolical satisfaction, which only serves to set off more warning bells. Ignoring them, I say, "You tell me," and then press my lips against his.
He doesn't respond. That's not good. This doesn't work unless he's distracted enough for me to sneak the knife into my pocket, and right now, he's totally disengaged. There's also the irrelevant-but-still present fact that I'm immediately miffed at his lack of reciprocity. It's not exactly an ego booster. I crack an eye open, curious about his total lack of cooperation, and find that he hasn't even had the decency to close his eyes.
Okay, now I'm just mad. I pull back just a fraction and mutter, "Well, fine, fuck you, too," and then, without thinking about it, I duck down sharply and sink my teeth hard into his neck.
He reacts this time, all right. He tenses up, a growling sound escaping from deep in his throat as his hand snakes up to clutch at the back of my head, and, encouraged, I tighten my jaw to bite harder. He shifts beneath me and rasps, "I told you once, Em—don't play the game unless you know the rules."
His fingers tighten in my hair before I can react, and he jerks me sharply away. I barely have time to regard the gleaming dark spot on his skin with savage satisfaction before he lunges forward and latches onto my throat in turn, targeting the sensitive spot where neck meets the shoulder, and I feel each and every one of his teeth as they rip into the delicate skin.
Now, do it now, a distant voice in my head is screaming, but I don't seem capable of control, my body reacting instinctively from the pain and arching away from it, pushing into him. I can feel him growing hard between my legs as I draw in a sharp gasp, torn between the sharp ache at my throat and the sudden, unanticipated waves of warmth rippling up from my belly, and without meaning to, I clutch a handful of his hair and grind against him, a soft whimper escaping my mouth.
He pulls back from my throat with a wet squelch, lifts his head, and drags me forward, crushing his mouth to mine. This is the kiss I was expecting the first time around, suffocating and full and battle-ready, and I channel my fight into it, dragging my hand down from his hair and scratching deep furrows into the back of his neck. Even as I return the attack, the absence of pain allows me to get a better grip on myself, and I slip my right hand down cautiously to the couch, feeling as quickly and carefully as I can for the knife.
My fingertips brush cold metal. I palm the weapon and draw my elbow back, moving carefully for my pocket.
Right before I reach it, a hand closes over my wrist, so crushingly tight that I swear I can feel bones grinding together. I'm so disappointed I could scream, but my effort to jerk away from him is thwarted by the steely fingers gripping the back of my head, so I have to content myself with a half-frustrated, half-pained groan. He holds me in place for another moment, just long enough for me to come to grips with how terribly I've failed, and then releases my head and lets me pull back—not without getting a good snap in to my lower lip before I'm out of range.
His free hand isn't unoccupied for long—it quickly mirrors the other, imprisoning my free hand before I can do anything useful with it, and I arch my back away from him, hunching my shoulders protectively as I try to wrestle away. It's no good; his hands are vices, and so I go still and watch him, dreading his reaction.
He cocks one eyebrow high, lowering his eyes to the knife in my hand as he clucks his tongue disapprovingly. "Oh, no, Em—you think this is the first time somebody's put me in a liplock to try to get a blade off me?"
He twists the wrist sharply and suddenly, and I yelp in pain, immediately letting go of the knife. It bounces off the couch and clatters to the floor, and the Joker raises his eyes to mine again. "Of course," he says wryly, "I gotta admit, this was better than the last time. Last guy had stubble."
I astonish myself by laughing. It's just a quick stutter of a laugh, true, and it's half a sob, but it escapes before I can control it. His fucking weird-ass sense of humor, I swear.
Of course, he latches on to it, his eyes lighting up with glee. Adopting a ridiculous stern-paternal tone, he demands, "Was that an inappropriate emotional response to a frightening or serious situation? Careful, now, Em. Some people'll start saying you're crazy."
Ignoring the jab, I look up at him through the hair spilling over my eyes, summoning my best butter-wouldn't-melt smile and trying to ignore the fact that I'm still straddling him and have no immediate way to escape. If he's gonna joke about this, then fine, I'll play it off light, too. Softly, I say, "Well, c'mon. You'd have been disappointed in me if I hadn't at least tried it, am I wrong?"
I flinch as he gives my other wrist a little twist, thinking maybe that was precisely the wrong thing to say, but he just looks thoughtful and says, "No… no, you're not wrong. But I do have a couple of critiques."
Without warning, he twists his hips sideways, throwing me off of him and onto the couch. I immediately start to struggle upright, but he catches the back of my neck and forces my head down into the cushion, simultaneously pressing a knee hard into the base of my spine. I try to get my hands under me so I can get up or push away from the couch, but he's leaning over me, breath hot in my ear.
"Next time, don't start somethin' you aren't willing to finish. This isn't the playground, kid. Backsies doesn't work here." His fingers bite into the soft flesh of my neck and his mouth butts against my ear as he hisses, "Understand?"
I'm seconds away from telling him if he lets me the fuck up then I'll finish what I started, all right, if only for the chance to throw a few solid punches in the process, but I think better of it just in time. "I understand," I growl instead, jerking my elbow back uselessly in a fruitless attempt to catch him in the ribs and knock him away.
He holds me there for another few seconds, making sure I know just who has the power here, and then he releases me abruptly. I push off of the couch and fall to the floor, flipping over and scrambling a few feet away, but when I turn, he's just sitting back down, leaning over to pick up the knife.
"Second," he continues, flicking the jagged blade out and examining it with brooding interest for a moment before sliding his eyes sideways to me. "If you want a knife, you could always try just asking for it."
I stare at him for a second, and when he just raises his eyebrows and says, "Hm?", I say, "You're serious."
He lifts one shoulder in a non-committal shrug. What the hell, I think, it's not like I can get much more embarrassed tonight. "May I have the knife?" I test.
"May I have the knife…?" he prompts.
Oh. Of course. "May I have the knife, please," I add, trying not to grit my teeth and blow my chances.
He flips the knife over, holding it by the blade, handle extended towards me. On hands and knees, still not trusting myself to get on my feet (I might attack him, he might see it as an invitation to attack me), I warily crawl closer, looking at him again to make sure he's not changing his mind before reaching hesitantly for the handle.
Crack—he whips it down hard across my knuckles, and I swear profusely and jerk my hand back, holding it against my chest as he breaks into an awful, high-pitched cackle. He closes the knife with one swift move, though, and tosses it to the floor in front of me. Even as I glare murderously at him, I snatch it up.
"Hey," he says sharply, wagging an index finger at me. "Think twice before you consider pulling that on me. Got it?"
I tuck the knife into my back pocket and nod quickly.
"Good," he says, sounding satisfied, and he toes his shoes off abruptly, stretching his legs out long in front of him. "Don't ever say I never did anything for you," he adds as he laces his hands together behind his head and closes his eyes.
Wait, he's going to sleep? How the hell can he sleep? Granted, it's been a long day, and my body is completely drained, but after all that, I'm wired. I sit with my knees folded under me, back straight, watching him for a few more seconds, and I toy with the idea of picking a fight before dismissing it as a stupid, suicidal thought. Eventually I realize that yes, he's genuinely intending to rest while he has a chance (or maybe just to pass the time, who knows). With a sigh, I get up and drop onto the opposite side of the couch from him, pulling my feet up and tucking my knees against my chest, just watching him. If he's not going to be pulling a blade on me anytime soon, I may as well take the opportunity to organize my brain, reset certain defenses.
Of all the bewilderment and myriad questions spinning through my head, the one my mind lands on is why does he seem to be waiting for my consent?
I haven't consciously dwelt on it before now, but the latest incident has kind of drop-kicked it to the front of my mind. I'm not delusional. I know he doesn't exactly lie awake nights thinking about me, but I also know that some part of him is attracted to me, if only sexually.
So why wait around? There are any number of instances, opportunities he's had to just hold me down and take what he wants—not the least of which was the scene moments ago. I felt him; I know that his body at least was fully prepared for some kind of follow-up. He even had me pinned, for fuck's sake. And then he let me go—and gave me a knife.
Strangely, though, I don't feel totally surprised at the restraint. It was a huge fear for me once upon a time, but the more time I spend with him, the less I see him as a rapist. I frown, scratching at my forearm as I try to figure out exactly why, and eventually I arrive at a few conclusions: it's not that he necessarily has an aversion to the idea, but I think it might strike him as… cheating. I'm well aware by now of his proclivity for toying with people, and I think I'm standing on firm ground when I say that one of his big pleasures in life is systematically dismantling people, destroying everything they thought they were and revealing the black void taking the place of their now shattered self-image.
Leaving aside the fact that his sexuality only seems to emerge at all when he can use it as a tool and apparently is categorized as unimportant the rest of the time, rape just doesn't seem like his style. I can't speak outside of my own experience, but with me, he seems to be… waiting.
For surrender. For submission. He wants me to tell him I want it, because that's gonna be so much more interesting—the admission of the fact that I want the very same scarred, murderous Mephistopheles who's been terrorizing me (directly and indirectly) for nearly a year now.
My eyes grow wide as I realize that this whole process, this for-Christmas-you-get-to-hang-out-with-me, the dragging me along on his little murder missions—this isn't just a kidnapping or a frame plot.
It's also a seduction.
I glare abruptly at him and fight the urge to stretch out my leg and bring my booted heel down as hard as I can into his gut. I can't fucking believe it. I tighten my arms around my knees, letting out a soft, furious huff. He wants to prove beyond a doubt that I'm just as weird and twisted as he is, and what better proof is he going to get than me admitting to him that I'm somehow getting off on all this?
And the part that infuriates me about it all is that he's partially right. Not about getting off—I'm still capable of separating my disgust for his actions from my growing attraction to him, and I don't intend to let those lines get tangled anytime soon. But somewhere along the line, I did develop an attraction to him. Ostensibly, it formed in the confusion after his return kicked up a storm of dormant emotion—a guy who can make you feel anything after months spent feeling nothing is probably going to be the subject of all your mismanaged feelings, be they fury and frustration or appreciation and attraction. It makes sense to me, but… if I'm being honest with myself, really, this has been in development for a long time.
Not from the start. I remember my first meeting with Gordon, the cold horror in my stomach at his suggestion that the bite I'd received the first time I met the Joker was a mark of sexual interest, and I know that attraction hadn't even entered my mind then. But… after that. Maybe when he'd first broken into my apartment, cut the buttons of my shirt and run his rough fingers along the inside of my thigh—as twisted as it is, maybe the full understanding that there was some real sexual tension there paved the way from that point on.
Of course, for much of the time immediately following that moment, I was in direct fear for my life, and didn't exactly have the time or energy to process emotional developments. Not consciously, at least, but I remember the way I'd reached for him during that encounter in the warehouse, ignoring the knife against my throat to reach up and touch his face, and I remember how he let me. And I know that at that point, even just subconsciously, it had already begun. By the time he started making appearances in my dreams, it may as well have been set in stone, even if my emotional numbness kept me from realizing it right away.
Now, as for why… well. At first it could have been a Stockholm syndrome-type response—find him genuinely attractive so you can genuinely like him and then maybe he'll genuinely like you and refrain from hurting you. Maybe there's still a bit of that motivation left, too, but since the game is no longer make Emma kill or be killed, it's no longer a viable excuse.
No, the attraction isn't survival-motivated—quite the opposite, in fact. It's a weird, growing conglomeration of having frequently seen him without paint, of his power to kick-start my emotions, and—I guess—his ability to make me feel powerfully alive after a lifetime of what feels like sleepwalking. What did I have before this, really? A hefty dose of ordinary. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'd be averse to returning to the security of my old life, it's just… I'm not sure if I can anymore.
And that scares me way more than my burgeoning attraction to the murderous madman on the opposite side of the couch. Lusting for him, fine, I can handle that, control it—but developing a lust for the constant adrenaline rush that is life around him? That could spin out of control way too fast. I can't need him. I won't need him. Because the second I do, I can just imagine how hilarious he thinks it'd be to drop me cold, leave me stewing in frustration and wasted hours.
I close my eyes and lean my head against the couch, making myself a promise before letting the weariness sink in: if I get out of this alive, I won't go looking for him. If my life bores me, I'll change it up, I'll do what I have to do to find joy in it again—but I will not trail around at his heels like some sort of beaten-down mongrel. He'll never have that satisfaction from me, no matter what I feel for him.
Feeling a little bit better now that I've tentatively identified his play (I think) and started planning some defenses, I nestle into the cushions and let out a small sigh. I'm still far from at peace, but there's something reassuring about sharing this space with him for now, about the quick softness of his breathing. I relax my knees a bit, and finally, I rest.
A/N - Jeez, I'm tired. I almost just made the entirety of the author's note say "before you say I am making this a romance let me explain u a thing" but decided that would probably be... a bad idea.
But really. The inclusion of sexual tension (especially in a forbidding, traumatic environment where one's partner in sexual tension is unquestionably in the dominant position and possesses the authority to end one's life any moment) creates some fascinating opportunities. For instance, "is what I'm feeling genuine or is my subconscious generating it in hopes that it'll make him more inclined to be kinder to me?" It's just such tumultuous psychological territory. I can't resist. I enjoyed throwing them in this situation and then picking through their brains.
Also, I would just like to quote guest reviewer Banycackes' response: "Is the joker going to snuggle her again? Cause that's the funniest fucking thing ever." You guys are ENABLERS (a+ review, btw, great villain name for Em, and serious thanks to all my guest reviewers- y'all are fabulous).
SO you should leave me feedback and tell me whether I've earned your undying hatred. Or undying love. Or something in-between; as long as it's undying. And go listen to Walk Off the Earth's cover of "Fairytale of New York," cause it'll make you happy. Till next time!