It had been a sunny day in the city, and Harley and Ricky had been heading out to play in the park.
"Mom reminded me to stay together, and not to talk to strangers," Harley was complaining, her face pulled down in a scowl. "She still treats me like a kid."
"We are kids, Harley," said Ricky.
"Yeah, but we ain't stupid," retorted Harley. "We don't need to be constantly reminded not to do stupid stuff."
She picked up a pebble and threw it at a nearby tree. "Anyway, life would be so boring if we didn't have a little danger once in a while. And I ain't gonna live a boring life, Ricky. No, siree."
"Well, what do you wanna be when you grow up?" asked Ricky as they headed over to the swings. "I know you wanna get away from the city, with your two kids, Arleen and…"
"J.J.," finished Harley, nodding, her pigtails bobbing between the red bow in her blonde hair. "Arleen and J.J."
"Yeah, but what do you wanna be? What's not boring?"
"I dunno," said Harley, shrugging. "My Dad wants me to be a doctor, but that sounds like a lotta work to me. I don't want a hard, serious job – I wanna do something where I can have fun every day."
She began swinging. "Maybe I'll join the circus. I ain't afraid of heights, y'know. Maybe I'll be an acrobat," she said, leaping off the swing and landing on her feet.
"I'd be too scared to do that," admitted Ricky.
Harley kicked at the ground, her red sneakers caked with dirt. "It's a shame we gotta grow up, Ricky," she murmured. "Kinda wish we could stay like this forever. That we could be kids without the school. Y'know, like a forever summer vacation."
Ricky laughed. "That'd be great," he agreed. "No teachers, no homework, just long, sunny, fun days. The two of us, together, all the time…"
"Yeah, that's what I want my life to be like," she murmured. "Full of long, sunny, fun days. That's what I wanna be when I grow up. I wanna be happy."
"I'm happy now," said Ricky. "I think I always will be with you, Harley."
She smiled. "You're sweet, Ricky," she murmured, starting to swing again. "Wanna play a game?" she asked. "See who can jump the farthest off the swing?"
"You'll win," he said.
"C'mon, Ricky, at least try to compete," she said. "I don't like a guy who lets me win, y'know. I like challenges."
"Ok, if you want," he said, kicking his legs to climb higher. When they both reached as high as they could possibly climb, Harley leapt off the swing, landing several feet away. She turned to watch Ricky jump – he pushed off, but instead of landing on his feet, he slipped and fell on his face, scraping his arm across the ground.
"Oh my God, Ricky, are you ok?" cried Harley, racing over to him.
"Yeah, I think so," he said, picking himself up gingerly. "My hand really hurts though…"
"You're bleeding!" cried Harley, horrified at the amount of blood that covered his hand and the ground. "We gotta get you to a hospital right away!"
She ripped off the red bow in her air, untying it and wrapping it around Ricky's wound. And then they headed home as fast as they could run.
It turned out some older kids had been drinking in the park, and had left some glass bottles lying around, some of which had broken and scattered shards of glass everywhere. Ricky had got one of these embedded in his hand when he landed, but the doctors at the hospital removed it fairly painlessly. He bore a scar on his palm from the incident, however, a scar which the doctors told his parents might never go away.
"This is all my fault, Ricky," said Harley, as she visited him at the hospital later. "I'm so sorry."
He shrugged. "It's worth it, for you," he said, smiling at her. "And hey, I'll always have this to remind me of you," he said, holding up his scarred hand to her. "Looks a little like a heart, huh?"
"Yeah, it does," she agreed, smiling back at him.
"This way I'll always have something to remember you by, even if we're apart," he said, studying it. "But I hope we never are."
"Yeah, me neither," agreed Harley. "But you'll always be my best friend, Ricky, no matter what happens."
"And you'll always be mine, Harley," he said, taking her hand in his. "No matter what happens."
…
Harley awoke from the dream-memory to daylight. She was still lying in Mr. J's arms, and he was still asleep, his beautiful face calm and relaxed. She stared at him tenderly and then planted a gentle kiss on his lips.
He grunted, stirring in sleep and rolling over. "Why doncha go do something useful like make coffee?" he muttered, his eyes still shut. "And feed the mutts?"
This was his way of saying good morning, and Harley was used to it. She nodded, sitting up and climbing out of bed. She suddenly felt somebody spank her, and turned to smile at him. "You want coffee or you wanna play?" she murmured, grinning.
"Coffee," he retorted, smiling at her. "First, anyway."
She giggled, kissing him again and then leaving the bedroom and heading for the kitchen. Bud and Lou had been locked in there – they were curled up asleep by the door, but awoke the instant she entered, leaping on her and licking her.
"Yes, it's good to see you too, babies!" she cooed. "I'm sorry about last night – I bet you're hungry boys now, aren't you?"
She opened the fridge, pulling out two slabs of raw meat and dumping them into their bowls. They devoured them greedily.
"Your Daddy's a hungry boy too," she murmured, grinning, as she turned on the coffee machine. "And he's got quite an appetite when he's in the mood. Mommy can't wait to have his meat."
Bud and Lou shared a look. They had been hoping for a little attention from their owners after last night, but that clearly wasn't going to happen anytime soon. They knew Harley's tones of voice by now, and this one meant that she had a one-track mind about her animal urges.
Harley let them out the back, and then poured the coffee into mugs, heading back to the bedroom. "Here's some energy for my puddin'," she purred, kissing him as she placed the mugs down on the nightstand. "I think he's gonna need it."
Joker chuckled, sitting up in bed as Harley handed him his mug. She climbed back under the covers, taking hers. Joker sipped the drink slowly, gradually waking up and remembering all that had happened last night.
"This guy Ricky," he began. Harley had been sliding her hand down toward his lap, but paused at these words.
"What about him?" she asked.
"Why did you stop seeing each other?" he asked. "I mean, was it just too awkward being friends with each other when you knew he wanted more?"
"Yeah, kinda," she agreed. "I ain't the kinda girl who likes breaking guys' hearts, not like Red and Selina. But it wasn't really a conscious decision – I moved to Gotham for college and we just naturally grew apart."
"He didn't follow you to Gotham?" he asked. "Only he seems pretty dedicated, and he's obviously here now."
Harley was silent. "The last I heard from him…was a letter he wrote to me…after I got together with you. I think we had been on the news or something, and he wrote to me in Arkham begging me to reconsider my decision to be Harley Quinn…he said whatever was wrong with me, he could help make it better. He said I shouldn't give in to the madness, that he would help me fight it, that I could still be saved if we were together…"
She trailed off. "I never wrote back to him," she murmured. "It wouldn't have done any good. He would never have understood that I didn't want to be saved."
She paused. "He asked me a long time ago what I wanted to be when I grew up. And I told him I wanted to be happy. In his letter, he told me I didn't have to do anything so drastic to be that, that it didn't have to come to this, transforming myself into a…clown."
She looked at Joker and smiled. "He thought I did it outta desperation. He would never understand how clearly I see things now. And how happy I am now. Because I love you."
She kissed him tenderly, and sighed in happiness as he pulled her down into his arms. It was true, a lot of people didn't understand her, but Harley didn't consider herself to be that much of a mystery. She was a girl who wanted to be happy, and she was always happy with the man she loved. What was so hard to understand about that?