"Hey, I don't think so, Dude," Harleen warned as Anthony went to set his bottle back in the fridge. "You need to drink that entire thing before you get in the car."

Anthony pouted. "How come?"

Harleen was strapping Jolene into her high chair for breakfast. "Because special boys need special drinks, alright? Just, please. You're gonna make Mom late."

Anthony grumbled as he begrudgingly returned the straw to his mouth, attempting to suck down the horrible liquid. "Mom, can you do-up my tie?" He asked Pam as she emerged from her study, briefcase in hand.

"Mama's better at that," She admitted. "But I can tie your shoes…"

"Pfft, Mom, I'm not a baby anymore. I can do that all by myself."

Pam smiled to herself, turning to the sink to get a glass of water. "Well excuse me…"

"OK, come here," Harleen beckoned Anthony over as she finished slicing Jo's banana. "You know you don't have to wear a tie to school, right?" she wrapped the fabric around itself.

"Mr. Wayne said it's how come he has such a big house. Because he wears ties and stuff." Anthony explained.

Harley laughed while Pam scoffed, setting her water down. "Mr. Wayne has such a big house because Mr. Wayne was born into a billion-dollar fortune. I can guarantee you it has little to do with his business acumen, let alone his wardrobe."

Anthony frowned, doing some mental arithmetic. "Does he wear a tie when you go to work for him?"

Harleen froze, turning to look at Pam where she leaned against the counter, drumming her fingers on the surface. Narrowing her green eyes, she let slip a muffled, "touché" before pushing off and grabbing her brief case. "But not for long," she gave an oddly cheery smile.

Harley finished with the tie and stood up. "Backpack?" She prompted.

Anthony slid it off the table and strapped it onto his back. "Check!"

"OK," Harleen smiled, leaning down to kiss him on the forehead. "Have a good day, alright? And you too…" Out of habit, she leaned in to give Pam a kiss, but quickly realized her mistake when the redhead moved back instead of forward.

"Yes, and you," Pam offered, cordially, taking Anthony by the hand and walking out the door.

"Bye, Mama!" He said before the door shut.

So…that's not gonna work anymore, Harley decided, turning back to Jolene. It had been a month and a half already. "Are you ready to do some work today?"

"Mmm—mm—mm—mm," The girl hummed, a satisfied smile on her face as she pushed another piece of banana into her mouth.

"I'm going to take that as a 'yes'," Harleen grinned. "First thing's first, we're gonna need to make a few calls…Does our fax machine work?"

Jo slapped her open palm on her tray, smashing the banana that was stuck there.

"You're right. Of course it does. My wife is like 90 years old," Harley started down the hallway to Pam's study. "Don't go anywhere."

Leeland, leeland, leeland… She scrolled through her contacts as she plugged the fax machine into the wall. The doctor picked up on the 3rd ring.

"Hello?"

"Joan! Hi." Harley said, glad to have caught, her given her busy patient schedule. "This is Harleen—Dr. Quinzel. How are you?"

"Oh, I'm…doing well…" Joan was clearly surprised to hear from her. "Are you…calling to negotiate your return?"

"No." Harley answered quickly. "I'm calling for a favor." A loud clattering rang out from the kitchen.

"What was that?" Joan asked.

Harley jogged back to the kitchen to make sure Jo hadn't knocked her chair over. Nope. Just pushed the glass Pam had used off of the table. "Nothing," Harley assured her through the phone, scolding Jo with a look as she spoke. "My daughter is just…fascinated by chaos."

"Daughter?" Joan asked.

Oh, right… "Yes. But listen, I need a favor."

Joan was cautious. "Alright…"

"I need Poison Ivy's file. I just need you to fax it to me." Harleen said, getting the request out as quickly as possible.

Joan didn't answer right away. "…You want me to send you your wife's insane asylum mental health file?"

"Yes." Harley confirmed.

"Dr. Quinzel…" Joan almost laughed. "That is so…morally corrupt, I can't…I mean, no. My God, no."

Harleen sighed. "I'm desperate here, Joan. Please. Pam's hanging on by a thread." OK, so maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration. "I just need a refresher so that I can circumvent a possible blow up, alright? It's a public safety crisis."

"Harleen..." Joan said through what sounded like clenched teeth. "You've got me in tough spot here."

"Yes, well…it's not as if Arkham has a sterling record of ethics, Joan. And Ivy hasn't been a patient for almost 20 years. I have her best interest in mind."

A half hour later, she had the file in hand. And man, was it thick. Harleen had somehow forgotten that. Easy to gloss over a few faults—or red flags, maybe—when you're sleeping with the patient. "This is a bunch of paper that tells me why your mom is crazy." She explained to Jo, who was now sliding around on the living room floor on her stomach because Jo was sort of a weird kid and that was one of the many weird things she liked to do.

Harleen pulled down the dry-erase board that they sometimes used to make grocery lists and whatnot and uncapped the pen. "Alright…" She poised the tip at the surface. "The basics…" She wrote down the names "Ivy" and "Pamela" at the top of the board. "So here's the deal, Jo. There are two distinct sides to your Mom's personality. Now before you get all, 'wait a minute, Ivy doesn't have DID!' you are correct. But you also don't need to have Dissociative Identity Disorder to compartmentalize aspects of your psyche. That's a valuable lesson, Jo. I'm serious. Everyone's always rushing to make that diagnosis the second someone dissociates or proves they might be multi-faceted and it's super fucking annoying, alright?"

"Mama-mama-mama," Jo said, in what Harleen considered a confirmation.

"Good. So there are two distinct eras to your Mom: Pamela and Ivy." She circled the corresponding names. Or, 'BW and AW'. Before Woodrue or After Woodrue, of course."

Jo tucked her head into her neck, attempting to eat a piece of smooshed banana off of her collar, but it sort of looked like she was nodding, so Harley continued.

"Ivy was a reaction to what happened to Pamela," she explained. "Ivy is angry, and mad is always either sad or scared just disguised. In your mom's case I suspect it's both. Now, what she's sad about is clear: Woodrue took her life away. She was, I'm guessing, a bit socially awkward, didn't know how to connect with people as well as she did plants, and so here comes this guy who tells her she's smart and gives her a job, and she trusts him. For the first time she trusts somebody and how does he repay that trust? By violating that trust. Because what is rape if not a violation?"

Jo rolled onto her back to stare at the ceiling.

"I know," Harleen sighed. "I know." She wrote the word 'violated' under 'Pamela'. "So enter Ivy. The coping mechanism. Ivy was a modern woman before it was cool and that was scary for people. Well…that and the whole serial killer thing."

Jo giggled from her spot on the ground.

"Sadist," Harley shook her head. "Her connection to her Pamela side ebbs and flows, but she seems able to channel the Ivy persona whenever, so very rarely do temperamental or environmental changes affect her ability to perform her Poison Ivy related tasks. When I met her at Arkham, she was almost completely out of touch with her humanity, or…with her past, at least…well…I don't know, maybe I'm giving myself too much credit." She paced for a moment. "Or, maybe not. I don't know. Doesn't matter right now. The point, the first few months of our relationship—after she got out of Arkham—she was Poison Ivy, or…Pamela, because she's always Pamela, but Pamela-leaning-Ivy." She drew a circle around 'Ivy' and then connected it to 'Pamela' with a thick line. "So then the whole Joker thing went down."

Jo's tongue lazed out of her mouth and she slobbered on the floor.

"Well I'm not gonna get too much into it," Harleen told her. "But, bullet points: I got shot because Joker insulted Pamela and Ivy couldn't control her temper. It's like she sees her former self as this…innocent that still, to this day, needs a champion. I think she idealizes her, or that time in her life...but anyway, your mom has a nasty temper."

Jo didn't have much to say about that, so Harley shrugged. "It's true," and then moved on. "So Ivy got triggered, like…pretty severely because of allusions Joker made to her assault—she has PTSD, by the way—but the weird thing is that afterwards, in her affected period, the flashbacks were about her childhood. Her mother, specifically." Harley stopped pacing and turned to Jo. "Which is probably exactly what happened this time. I triggered her by referencing the rape, but last week in the kitchen…I mean, it must have been the domestic setting, right?"

Jo was humming to herself again.

"Exactly," Harleen agreed. "So if…ugh." She came back to the table and opened the file. "Jason Woodrue, Jason Woodrue…" she flipped past his picture to the crime scene photos of the basement, a section of Pam's file she'd skipped previously. "Fuck, Jo…" She studied the weathered photographs, the bloodied table, the broken straps. According to the police report, after Pam woke up from the coma, she told law enforcement officials where she'd been held and they were able to connect her account to a crime scene they'd discovered some months before. They found the room before they found Pamela.

Harley's stomachache returned. "So this…this was the breaking point, where she lost her ability to regulate," Harley tapped her finger on the photo. "But the trauma…Jo, what if she had PTSD before Woodrue? Look, I mean, that's how I beat her the first time…or, not beat her, relationships shouldn't be a competition. I love her. Have for a very, very long time, but it took a little push to make it livable. The thing is, though, when I…broke her, I did it by invoking her mother. It's almost like…Ivy's "monster" is Woodrue, and Pam's is her mother." She made a quick note on the board before resuming her pacing.

"But see, she lost a bit of her confidence after that. Sort of took on this 50s housewife thing, which doesn't exactly match up with the typical Ivy characterization, but was amazing and fantastic and totally what I needed for that time in my life…and I think it was good for her too. So maybe that was Pamela. Or, maybe that was her mother's Pamela." Harley drew a little offshoot of the name and added the word 'mother'. "But Pam's also a perfectionist through and through. She has to be the best at everything. So maybe…maybe that was her being the best wife possible. Proof that she was or is, in fact, perfect."

Harley glanced down at Jo where she was gnawing on a Battlesuit Batman she'd found under the couch before turning back to the file. "I remember the whole murdering her parents thing not being in her file, but there should at least be some background. I mean, she was a ward of the state, so there should probably be a…birth certificate."

Jo stared up at her questioningly.

"Yours is forged," Harley told her, quickly. "Let's see…7lbs, 14oz. Aww!" Harley smiled. "Guess how much I weighed. Seriously, Jo. Guess."

The girl threw the toy across the living room.

"6lbs, 6oz, born on 9/11." Harley told her. "I think I was meant for some terrible fate or, like, I was meant to be the antichrist or something. Probably am in your mom's eyes at this point." Harleen cleared her throat, getting off that train of thought. "Pamela Lillian Isley," she read "Born to Howard Isley and…Lillian Isley." Harley frowned… "Lillian…Dr. Lillian Rose. Rose. Jo, that's weird, right?" Jo was bobbing her head up and down. "Because her mother, Lillian, was obsessed with roses, right? That's what the…" she looked down at the engagement ring on her finger above her wedding band, the white gold rose holding a sapphire. "That's either just a weird coincidence or some cosmic fuckery, I guess. But she does use that name a lot. Lillian, I mean. It was always 'Pamela Lillian Isley', not just Pam Isley."

"Mama-mama-mama," Jo mumbled.

"Well yeah, it's her middle name, but you don't see me going around introducing myself as 'Harleen Frances Quinzel', do you?"

Jo was preoccupied with knocking the Batman on the ground.

"OK," Harleen sighed, shaking her head. "So what questions do I need answered? Because the Mom angle was how I fixed things last time. 1: Why is she still so important to her? 2: How do I use that to my advantage? Can't answer the second without the first." She took a deep breath. "If I had a shitty mom, I would want to do everything different with my kids, right? I mean, I already do. That's like—human nature. To want to improve upon bullshit you had to put up with as a kid. So what does Pam do that her mother didn't? What does Pam do? Pam insists on taking Anthony to school in the mornings. Pam shows a lot of physical affection with the kids. Pam…says 'I love you'. All the time. She says it all the fricken time, so much so that Anthony asked me if she thought he would forget. Oh, holy shit." Harley laughed, not cruelly, just continually in awe of how the mind's most complex problems are often rooted in something so simple. "Pam's still trying to earn her Mother's love."

Jo smiled, her green eyes twinkling.

Harley grinned too and sat down next to her on the ground, pulling the girl into her lap. "I could probably get her in two questions. But…there's no way she's ready for any sort of therapeutic conversation with me. I totally obliterated the trust necessary for that relationship." She absently stroked Jo's round cheek. "I need leverage. I need…to call that relator."

/

The worst part this whole mess was that Harleen had initially been in the right. She'd had a strong argument. Pam had, indeed, been an asshole uprooting their family like that. But…Harleen took it too far. She just totally nuked the human decency that was supposed to be an example for Pam in their relationship. She just…she broke it, and now any argument Harleen raised on any other subject was essentially null and void. And so here she was, pushing herself around the 4th listing on the relator's list, trying to pretend like this wasn't all complete and absolute bullshit. She was doing it for the leverage and because it was necessary to move forward.

Pam was carrying Jolene on her hip and discussing something with the relator. It was probably about money and Pam was paying for the house anyway. Harleen sighed as she came to a stop in the middle of the living room. She liked the open spaces, but it just seemed so…cold. They'd spent 16 years making their house a home and the thought of starting over wasn't just frightening, it was frustrating.

"Honey, how were the ramps? Could you get up them OK?" Pam called over.

Harleen knew Pam was just putting on a show, since she hadn't called her by any term of endearment in over a month, but she'd take what she could get. "Yes, fine." She smiled.

Anthony was sliding on his butt down the carpeted stairs. "If we live here I want the room close to the stairs so I can do this before school," he informed Harleen.

"Understood." She nodded

"I"ll give you a moment alone," the relator said with an almost frighteningly bright smile before she exiting in favor of the front lawn.

"Well…what do you think?" Pam asked. "What. Do. You. Think?" She repeated, smiling down at Jo and bouncing her with each word.

Jo giggled and covered her face with her hands like she was embarrassed. Pam was rarely playful like that, and the kids always loved it when she was. So did Harleen, actually.

"Jo likes it much better than the last one." Pam smiled. "How about you, Anthony?"

"Well…" He said, thoughtfully resting his chin on his hands. "I don't like it as much as our house."

Harleen sighed. "We can't live in that house anymore, Bud.

"Why not?" He asked, genuinely curious rather than upset.

"Yeah, Pam. Why not?" Harley passed the question along.

Pam narrowed her eyes at her before turning her attention to Anthony. "Because I'm getting a new name and a new job, so we need a new house."

"Wait," He stood up, suddenly concerned. "But we don't have to get new moms, though, right?"

Anthony could always make Harleen laugh, even if she wasn't exactly in the mood and he wasn't doing it on purpose. "No, you don't. I think you're stuck with us," she saw an opportunity to plant a seed for she and Pam's later conversation, so she jumped on it. "Do you want new moms?"

Anthony's eyes grew wide at even the suggestion. "No way."

Harley glanced over at Pam to see one of those rare, completely unadulterated expressions of happiness on her face. A dazzling smile with slightly flushed cheeks.

She just wants to know she's doing a good job.