So another year is just about over, which means it's time for Christmas fics! Yay!
This had to be the saddest Christmas dinner in the history of America. Harley poked listlessly at her sandwich, which consisted of bologna made from meat scraps too unidentifiable for Spam, and a lonely slice of cheese. She didn't want to be ungrateful, but how was Professor Crane even still alive if this was the best food he had?
"Hey, Professor, uh...where's your turkey?"
"I'm one person. Why would I have a turkey?" Crane replied.
"But it's Christmas! What about just a little one?"
"There's no such thing as a 'little one' to the agricultural industry. The smallest bird you'd find would weigh at least ten pounds."
Harley couldn't help but glance at Crane's painfully angular frame. Ten pounds of turkey would do him some good. Not to mention some potatoes, and corn on the cob, and pie, and a different kind of pie, and a scoop of ice cream to put on both pies and-
Crane wordlessly forced a paper towel into Harley's hand. She snapped out of her delicious reverie and noticed she was drooling. Blushing slightly, she dabbed at her chin.
"It was real nice of you to make me a sandwich, and super nice to give me the last piece of cheese, so I gotta return the favor!" Harley exclaimed, hopping up from her chair. "I'm gonna get dessert."
Crane could have asked what store Harley expected to be open on Christmas, why she hadn't eaten a single bite of the supposedly super sandwich, or why, whenever the holidays rolled around, Harley always seemed to show up on his doorstep like an unwanted orphan. Instead of wasting his breath, Crane sat back and nibbled his own sandwich while Harley flitted around the room, gathering up her coat and accouterments.
"I'll be back in no time," Harley promised.
"You'll be back in Arkham in no time if you do anything stupid," Crane muttered.
Harley didn't hear him, as she was too busy trying (and failing) to turn the door knob with her thick mittens. Crane watched her struggle for a few seconds before he took pity upon the poor clown. Once she was gone into the night, Crane returned to his meager dinner.
Her enthusiasm and burning desire to eat her weight in pie carried Harley three blocks before she realized she had no idea what she was doing. The same truths that had been self-evident to Crane now settled on Harley. Nothing except gas station convenience stores were going to be open. That might be okay if she needed cigarettes or lottery tickets, but she couldn't cover either of those things in whipped cream and stuff them in her face.
Okay, so she couldn't be an upstanding citizen and buy her pie. There were other options. Options the parole board wasn't going to like, but desperate times called for desperate measures.
Harley scoped out the neighborhood. The idea of sourcing local pie evaporated moments after Harley considered it. Crane had chosen a derelict section of town where many of the surrounding buildings were rundown or vacant and people knew not to stick their noses where they didn't belong. That was great when you were brewing chemical weapons, not so great when you were hoping to pilfer a cooling dessert from a window sill.
It would also be pretty mean, Harley figured, to steal from people who had so little. Bruce Wayne could buy a gold-plated pie every ten seconds with the money his company made. Crane's neighbors...not so much.
That settled it. Harley needed a ride to the ritzy side of town. And though she'd just written off stealing food, nobody would mind if she "borrowed" a car and returned it no worse for wear.
The cars in the neighborhood were rather like the buildings: in various states of abandonment, decrepitude, and neglect. A few of them were just sitting on cinder blocks or on four flat tires, never to run again.
After a bit of scouting, Harley located a car that looked like it would actually make it across town and maybe even back home. Harley quickly checked the area for witnesses and then crept up to the car. She tried the driver's side door and found it locked. Of course.
Harley was heading to the passenger side when the car emitted a loud beep and its headlights flashed. The clown princess of pies yelped like a scalded Pomeranian and almost jumped out of her boots.
"Yo, don't break the windows, I just got them fixed last week!"
Harley peered around, looking for the voice. She found it belonged to a young man who was shouting from a nearby window.
"Come on, man, it's Christmas! Don't do this crap on Christmas! You're gonna make Baby Jesus cry!"
"I was gonna bring it back, I promise!" Harley yelled. She forgot all about the car, now too guilty to do anything except run back to Professor Crane and drown her sorrows in processed meat.
A second figure, this one a teenaged girl, appeared in the window. She muscled the young man out of the way. "Wait a minute. Are you-"
"There's no freakin' way she is. The hell would she be stealing my car for?" the first voice cut in.
As though she hadn't been interrupted, the second voice continued. "Are you Harley Quinn?"
Harley pulled back her coat's hood, revealing her blonde pigtails. "I sure am! Unless you're a cop, then I never heard of her."
The girl punched the young man playfully. "I told you!"
"Why are you stealing my car, Harley Quinn? Huh? I need that to go to work on Monday."
"And I need it to get those sweet after-Christmas deals at the mall tomorrow," the girl added.
"It's kinda a long story. Okay, it ain't that long. My friend's got no food, so I was gonna find some fancy-pants Christmas dinner and make 'em share," Harley explained. "I just needed a ride. I really was gonna bring it back."
The two figures stepped away from the window. Harley couldn't hear what they were saying anymore, but she could see them gesture out the window and towards her. A third person approached, taking the place of the pair. Harley gave them a shy wave.
A middle-aged woman stuck her head out the window. She looked enough like the younger two for Harley to figure she must be their mother.
"Your friend isn't the Joker, is it? Because, girl, if you went back to him-"
Harley shook her head. "No way! Me and Mr. J called it quits a long time ago."
The woman nodded, evidently pleased. "And he's hungry? Your friend, I mean."
Harley held her thumb and forefinger a few inches apart, like she was demonstrating a fruitless encounter in the bedroom. "He's like this skinny. I went to see him 'cause it's Christmas, and all he had to eat was bologna!"
"That poor man. Nobody should be hungry, especially not on Christmas. Just stay right there." The woman turned from the window and disappeared from view. Her kids joined her a moment later, leaving Harley alone.
Just when Harley began to consider it had all been a ploy to distract her while the family inside called the police, the front door opened. The girl who had recognized Harley by her voice alone stepped out. She had a laundry basket in her arms.
"Sorry, it's the biggest thing we had to put stuff in," the girl explained.
Instead of dirty clothes, the basket was full of plastic containers and plates covered in tinfoil and cling-wrap. There were even a few cans of vegetables and cranberry sauce for Harley to open at her leisure.
"You want to come get this? It's pretty heavy."
Harley wiped her suddenly misty eyes and trotted over. Up close, the basket looked even more packed to the brim. There was enough food to provide a full meal for twenty people with normal appetites, which meant it would probably last Professor Crane until he was ready to retire.
"I don't want to take all your food," Harley said softly.
The girl laughed. "Please don't rob us when I tell you this, but my aunt made bank off her weed startup this year. She went a little overboard, with me being her favorite niece and all that, so we still have too much. Feel free to come back for seconds."
"You saved Christmas!" Harley accepted the basket, and as she did so she began to bawl. "You're even better than Rudolph!"
Slightly taken aback by a grown woman sobbing and invoking cartoon reindeer, the girl wasn't quite sure how to respond. She considered patting Harley on the back but figured that would just be awkward.
"Sasha, maybe just...come back inside?" a female voice suggested from the doorway.
"But Mom, look at her. Oh, wait, I got this. Harley. Hey, Harley!"
Harley sniffled and put down the basket so she could rub her streaming eyes. When her vision was less clouded by tears, Harley looked at Sasha.
"If you want to pay us back, you can do one thing for me," Sasha said.
"Whatever you want! Do you need me to beat somebody up? Who's bullying you?"
The girl froze in complete confusion. "Uh, nobody? I just want a selfie. Or ten."
"Let me get in on that!" The nearly-stolen car forgotten, Sasha's brother joined in.
A few dozen selfies later, Harley felt less like an undeserving leech and more like a friend. She showered her Christmas saviors with thanks, apologized again for causing trouble, and picked up her unusual gift basket.
Harley couldn't wait to see the look on Professor Crane's face when she dropped an entire feast on his table.
The End.
The title of the fic is borrowed from a line in the song White Christmas.
This fic will be published on FF and AO3.
Happy holidays, folks. Thanks for reading.