maskormenacelogs | you’ve got me rockin’ and a-rollin’

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you’ve got me rockin’ and a-rollin’ | closed

WHO: Babs and Joker
WHERE: Her place
WHEN: The night of Friday, Aug. 2
WHAT: A slumber party, of course
WARNINGS: Almost certainly some ableism and sexism. Possible discussion/memories of assault.

Barbara Gordon has been on his mind for hours.

At first, Joker tries to ignore his thoughts of her. He slumps in front of the television at home, trying to distract himself with some they’re-not-scripted-we-swear reality dating shows, running his fingertips over the rough edge of the pretty red crystal he found in the yard. But his mind keep stubbornly returning to her, and as the afternoon transitions into dusk, he finds he can’t seem to think about anything else. He misses her, though he has absolutely no reason to. He wonders if she’s eaten supper yet and if she’s watching the same program he is, and if the feet and legs she can no longer use ever itch or ache. He tries to imagine how many different ways she’s fantasized about killing him, and which of those ways is her favorite.

On the tv, a pretty young woman is talking about just wanting a real connection with someone, and Joker nods along as she speaks. A real connection, yes, that’s precisely it. There are things he needs to confess, things he needs to have someone understand. They tug at his chest, an almost physical presence inside him, begging to be let out. They want to be shared, and not just with anyone, but with someone truly special. Someone like Barbara.

He’s never thought of her as special before, not really. She’s just another piece of collateral damage in his never-ending dance with Bats, another hanger-on who never deserved to be in Bats’s presence in the first place. But as he sits there in the growing gloom, fiddling with the crystal, Joker can’t shake the sense that, in some bizarre way, Barbie Girl would understand him if he just gave her the chance. And, worse: the nagging sense that perhaps there’s something in her that’s worth understanding, too. Which is stupid, an utterly nonsensical thing to think. But there it is.

He has to see her. That’s just all there is to it. And, since he knows full well she probably won’t want to see him, he needs to show up bearing treats.

Thirty minutes later, he’s standing outside her door, wearing a crisply-pressed Hawaiian shirt and balancing a tub of rocky road atop a pizza box. He knocks on the door, the exact same rhythmic knuckle-rap with which he summoned her long ago, and he waits—body carefully relaxed, smile carefully encouraging—to see if she’ll let him in.

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Barbara recognised the red shard for exactly what it was, glittering on the sidewalk like a beacon. Really, it was sheer hubris that made her grab the thing; she assumes it will stoke peoples' rage, and better her than someone with less control and more destructive powers.

She's not expecting it to do the opposite; to bleed all of her anger and bitterness and paranoia away, to leave her brimming with compassion and forgiveness, with the utter certainty that everything will turn out just fine. All you really need is to believe in people, to encourage their better natures. How did she ever forget that?

She's making tea, when she hearts that knock, as she hums absently to herself. (It's a tune her birth mother would sing to lull her to sleep, one she thought she'd lost a long time ago.) Usually, that rhythm - carved into her as surely as her scars - would make her blood run cold, make her lunge for the nearest weapon. Now, she doesn't even touch the eskrima sticks stored beneath her chair; she just turns the kettle off and heads to the door.

When she opens it, her gaze is scrutinising, but not aggressively so; she's curious, and the sight of pizza and ice cream even makes her smile.

"I hope you're here to be a good neighbour." Her tone is chiding, expectant, as if she's in her classroom.

Her smile feels like confirmation of his thoughts. She is special; she will understand! The carefulness drops out of Joker’s expression, and his smile turns earnest and open.

“Yes.” He nods as he speaks, instinctively responding to her tone with the grateful, eager nod of a child: Yes, please, I’m ready to come back from Time Out now; yes, Miss Gordon, ma’am, I’ll be a very good boy now, promise. “That’s it exactly.”

He’s not the sort of man who waits for permission to stroll through doorways, but he’s waiting now, eyes searching hers. “I thought you might be hungry." And then, as if the type of pizza might make a difference in her decision: "It’s pepperoni. The stuffed crust kind.”

Nothing but the best for Barbara.

She nods, and the smile deepens; she's not quite far gone enough not to be a little wary, but he really is acting like a contrite teenager, and isn't she supposed to nurture that sort of thing?

(She remembers saying, a very long time ago, that wearing a bat on your chest wasn't about vengeance; it was about hope.)

"Pulling out all the stops, are we?" Wry, acknowledging the inherent bribery of it all, but not harsh. In fact, she wheels backwards to let him in.

"I was making tea, but soda will probably work better."

She’s actually letting him in.

Joker steps inside, and shuts the door behind him far more gently than he typically closes his own. The door belongs to Barbara, after all; it must be treated with the proper respect. He wants her to see that this time is different, that he is different. That she was right to trust him in her home.

He gives the room a sweeping look-over. He wants to see all of it, to linger on all the details that make it hers: the pictures on the walls, the furniture choices, the knick-knacks. But the most important order of business is to see to it that she’s comfortable, and to lay his meager offerings in front of her, so he limits himself to that one take-it-all-in-quickly look. The expression on his face suggests he’s standing in the original Barnum big-top, or perhaps Steeplechase Park before the fire: he looks awestruck, like he can’t quite believe his good fortune at being in a place so full of meaning. Then he’s setting the pizza carefully down on the coffee table and nodding, registering what she’s said.

“Soda, yes. A fine idea—just the thing.” He gives her a smile. “We can have tea after.”

That sounds lovely, actually. He’s not normally a tea drinker—soda is much more to his tastes—but he likes the thought of curling up on the sofa with her, of holding warm mugs and chatting, their voices low and conspiratorial, about all the things they’ve never told anyone else.

That mental images relaxes him a bit more, melting the tension out of his shoulders and putting a little more of his usual ease into his movements. He picks up the ice cream and heads for the kitchen. She’s already let him in, and like a vampire, Joker needs no further permission to make himself at home. “I’m sorry to barge in on you like this, Barbie. Or, ah— Miss Gordon.” The ice cream goes into the freezer (where he can’t help but notice the things she keeps in there). “You just… popped into my head, you know. And wouldn’t leave.” He opens a cabinet at random, then another, looking for plates and glasses.

The town house's living room is a blend of every resident's belongings. There of the pictures are Barbara's - one of her, Jim and Sara at a baseball game; one of her and Dick curled up together in his Bludhaven apartment; one of her, Dinah and Helena at their favourite restaurant. She's also claimed a corner for her sewing supplies, stacked inside and on top of a small table.

His scrutiny doesn't put her on edge, and when she follows him it's to help, not to keep an eye on him. "It's 'Ms.', usually, but Barbara is fine. Plates and glasses are in that cupboard over there - some of them, anyway." She points to a lower one, that she can reach easily. "So I'm like a song stuck in your head, huh?"

He hadn't thought to look in the lower cabinets; he'd gone straight for the upper ones that he himself would have used. Joker averts his eyes, trying to ignore the strange feeling of heat rising in his face. He should have thought of that. Should have thought of the Ms., too. He'd meant Miss to be a compliment--you're young and lovely!--but of course it would sound old-fashioned and patronizing to her, wouldn't it?

If he's going to have any hope of understanding her on the deepest of levels, of truly connecting with her and figuring out all the wonderful things he suspects are lurking inside her mind, he's going to have to do better with the little things, too. Put himself into her shoes, or at least her stocking feet. See the world the way she sees it. With his red crystal tucked into his pocket like a talisman, Joker feels certain he can manage this.

He focuses on the good news: She's making a special exception for him by letting him call her Barbara. That means he's already off to a good start! He just needs to sustain that momentum. Easy, breezy.

"You're my very own earworm," he agrees, making it sound like a term of affection. "But one with tricky lyrics." Joker crouches in front of the proper cabinet as he speaks, carefully selecting the most attractive plates, the most soda-sized glasses. "And the more I listen to you... the more I start thinking I've been singing you wrong, all this time. Talk about embarrassing!"

He glances back at her. "You ever make a mistake like that, Barbara?"

"Hasn't everyone? There's so much beneath the surface, you need to dig pretty hard to see everything." She speaks with gentle authority, because she's one a whole lot of digging and unearthed her fair share of surprises.

"And you do that less when you're just using people." There's her lecture voice, but it's not exactly bitter; he should just know better, that's all. It would be hypocritical to just condemn him for it, wouldn't it? "Trust me, I know."

It's a good thing that she apologised to Helena before the Porter nabbed her. The rest of her list isn't here.

That comment about using people sours his smile a little. Joker's never taken well to being chided, even when it's done gently. Underneath all the warm feelings currently clouding his mind toward her, a fragment of his normal self offers up a muted protest to the rest of his brain: Can't she see I'm trying? He's brought her dinner; he's being civil; he even genuinely gives a damn about her. And this is how she repays his efforts?

But the annoyance doesn't last: it's just the faintest of flickers, and her next words snuff it right back out. She's not judging him, she's bonding with him! Though Joker suspects that he and Barbara have different ideas of what using people means.

His facial muscles relax back into an easy, amused smile. "Do you really, now?" He straightens up, with a soft pop of protest from one of his knees, and goes to the fridge in search of soda. "Or is that just something somebody told you? Some ex-boyfriend, maybe." He finds cola, which seems like a fine enough match for pepperoni pizza, and sets to work filling their glasses. "Said you were emotionally unavailable, when the truth is he just couldn't hold your attention?"

Her eyes sting, and she looks away, blinking hard and reminding herself that he probably doesn't know.

"No. No, that isn't our problem." Well, not exactly. She knew damn well she could hold herself at a distance, but they'd gotten past that. She was the one who broke it off, and then -

She looks back, and raises her hand, showing the engagement ring. "My fiance is in a coma, back home."

Joker makes no attempt to hide his surprise, or the rush of empathy that follows quickly on its heels. He knows what it's like to be unable to protect a loved one, to have the Universe flaunt its power over someone by going after the people they cherish most. To let the most important person down, in the most crucial of ways.

He just didn't know that she knew.

He abandons the filling-glasses project in order to return to her side. None of the normal calculations--Who's the fiance? How can I use this?--are taking place at the moment. He just wants to be near her when she's hurting, in the hopes that perhaps he can make it better.

"Oh, Barbara." He drops to a crouch beside her and reaches for her hand. "I'm so sorry." His gaze flicks back and forth over her features, his eyes full of compassion. "But that's not your fault, surely."

She lets him take it, and doesn't worry about how easily he can exploit the vulnerability; clearly, his priorities have changed. He's trying so hard to comfort her, and it draws a bleakly grateful smile.

"Thanks. He got hurt trying to save people, because that's the kind of person he is. I couldn't have stopped him. I just - it's not fair. We were finally going to make it work. We were going to be happy." They'd find a way to balance personal happiness with their personal missions, to embark on a new kind of future.

Her words remind him of Bats, of course, and he nods along in full empathy. Some people are simply driven to save others, the sweet fools, and no, you can't stop them. In all his years of dancing with Batman, Joker has never, ever seen the man opt out of trying to save someone if there was someone who needed saving. It's endearing, and it's maddening, and everyone involved knows it will eventually prove lethal. But what can you do, besides learn to embrace it?

He gives Barbara's hand a gentle squeeze. Of course she would fall for someone similar. That fits.

"It always goes that way, doesn't it?" His tone's all sincerity: he's commiserating, not placating. "Right when you think you've got a real shot, when you might actually win this time... That's when the punchline hits. Never fails."

His thumb strokes the back of her hand, soft and slow. "But the thing about a rigged game is: they'll always give you more chances to play. And when you're betting high enough, well. You've only got to win once."

She seems to take strength from that, her nod imbued with new determination. "And the more helpless you look, the better chances they hand you."

She smiles, turning her hand to squeeze his back. "You've dealt with this too, haven't you? I never really saw beyond what you did to people. But you've had your own life." His own loves and losses.

Barbara Gordon is squeezing his hand. It triggers an emotion so unusual that Joker can't quite name it at first: a thickening in his throat, a tingling all along his arms, a warmth in his belly. She doesn't owe him this. She doesn't owe him anything. He's brought her nothing but pain, yet here she is, smiling at him through her heartache and speaking to him like he's just as much of a person as she is.

It's adoration, he realizes. That's what he's feeling. Adoration, and humility. Gratitude for a kindness he knows he doesn't deserve.

The realization only strengthens his crystal-fed desire to be candid with her, to open his heart up to her. It's the same sort of impulse he remembers feeling in church as a very small boy, the sense that, perhaps, he can confess to his mistakes and thereby begin the process of correcting them.

"I haven't given you much cause to look beyond what I've done, have I?" He drops from a crouch down to one knee beside her, his head lowering, and trains his gaze on her hand in his. He's thinking of how comforting it had felt to cut her clothing away that night, to arrange her limbs for the camera while her blood pooled around them. He'd felt like a visionary that night, like Warhol and Vonnegut combined, and her sounds of pain had been nothing more than a soothing soundtrack. It's been one of his favorite memories ever since, a happy place he can return to when the world seems too mad, too chaotic to be endured. Now, it just fills him with shame.

"If anyone deserves a square deal in this life, it's you." He raises his eyes to hers. He can't say he's sorry; sorry is appallingly inadequate for what he's done to her. Neither can he say that he's sure it'll somehow all come out right in the end, because that's a lie, and she of all people deserves the truth. Instead, he says, very softly, "I'd like to help you get that. If ever I can."

She'd never once considered the possibility of the Joker apologising to, or attempting to make it right. That's not what the Joker is. There wasn't an ounce of empathy in the laughter that rang in her ears as she fell. The rest is blurred with agony and shock, but she remembers how the camera flashed, how her blood seeped across the floor and stained her bare skin.

She's learned how to cast off the shackles of memory when they try to paralyse her, but under the kryptonite's influence it's easy; just as easy as taking him at his word.

For a moment she's speechless, sheer astonishment plain on her face. Then she smiles, bright and warm. "You really mean it. Thank you. But I'm...I've come a long way, since then. Dick and I didn't even start dating, until...after."

With her free hand, she gestures at the pictures hanging on the wall. "All of those - "
Her eyes catch on Sara, and the proud reassurance dies on her lips.

Even in the midst of this strange connection he's sharing with her, part of the Joker's mind can't help but take note: Dick, huh? Well, well, well...

But that's a factoid for later, to be filed away for safekeeping until he can give it the attention it deserves. Right now, what matters is Barbara, and the way she's smiling at him, and the warmth of her hand against his. Joker can feel the pressure in his chest loosening; he feels better already, and they've only just begun.

He lets her guide his eyes toward the photos on the wall, and the reminder that she's Gordon's daughter puts a sour taste in his mouth. She seems too good to be the fruit of those loins. Too bold, too strong, too clever. Must take after her mother.

It's odd to see her in these happy family photos. They don't look real at all to Joker; they're like something out of a movie. Nobody actually lives like that and means it, do they? Not in the real world.

His gaze snaps back to her as her voice cuts out, and he has only a split second in which to guess what she's upset about. Is it what her father would think of her, if he could see her here with Joker now? Or is it the floozy step-mom he offed back in the NML?

Probably both. Though Joker himself barely remembers doing the latter. The shooting itself hadn't been all that interesting, except for the stink of babies everywhere. He damn sure remembers the look on Gordon's face afterward, though, and the shot that followed. In his own mental calculations, Joker figures he and Gordy are about square on that one. But Barbara, she won't see it that way, will she? No. Almost certainly not.

Yet another thing he can never make right with her.

He releases her hand, figuring she won't want him touching her at the moment, and gets to his feet. "We ought to get to that pizza. Much better when it's hot."

Joker turns his back to her, giving her what privacy he can in which to process what she must be feeling, and finishes filling their glasses. He's all too aware of the space between them, and of how much he wishes he could go right back to her. He'd like to put his head in her lap, maybe let her tell him how best to atone. Can a man ever atone for the things he's done to her? The things he's done in general? His throat feels tight; his chest is too warm. He's fussing with the soda bottle, taking his time screwing its lid back on and putting it away.

"Was it you," he asks, carefully, "who suggested I be sent to the Slab?"

She lets him go, nodding her acknowledgement, though her gaze doesn't shift an inch. For once, all three of them had relaxed, left the job behind them; they weren't crusaders on an endless mission, their relationships straining beneath the weight of it. They were just a family.

Sara never knew Dick, not really. Certainly not as someone who Barbara loved, or who Oracle trusted. Even if Dick woke up and their wedding went forward, she wouldn't be there to see it.

She needs to make the Joker understand what he took from them, that night. Who Sara was, what she meant. When she turns to him, there's a ferocity in her eyes, but it's one of hope, not hatred.

His own question catches her off guard, and she blinks. Then she smirks, a little. "You know, I wondered if you'd realised." She shrugs; it's not something she can regret, no matter how compromised she is. "You'd advanced out of the little leagues. Not for the first time, even. Seriously, how do you convince people to make you a diplomat?" Even at the time, she could see the bleak, sickening hilarity in it.

He sneaks a glance over his shoulder at her, just in time to see that smirk on her lips. Joker mirrors it back to her.

One of the many things he admires about Barbara: she doesn't bother trying to bullshit him. Nor does she offer up some weak-sauce apology for something they both know she'd do again in a heartbeat. She did it; she admits it; she stands by her choice. Joker nods his approval.

He can't even fault her for the choice itself. It was the right call, and frankly a flattering one. It means she saw him for what he was, what he is. There's something vaguely insulting about anyone assuming Arkham could actually control a man like him, and Barbara, by sending him elsewhere, demonstrated a deeper respect for him and his capabilities. He'd hoped it was her, and not just some Feds' rubber-stamping. From her, it's a compliment.

At her question, he turns back to her fully, and his smirk spreads into that wide, famous smile. He feels more like himself when she talks to him that way. More confident, more in control. "Oh, it's just a matter of finding the right people. Like anything else." He plucks the glasses and plates from the counter, handling them with a juggler's ease, and leads the way back to the coffee table where he left the pizza.

"You find someone with whom you share a certain camaraderie of spirit"--which for him almost always means terrorists and crooks, but why linger on that?--"and you have a few drinks and cigars together. Chat about the fuckery of the world, and the latest Taylor Swift album, and all that. And before you know it, poof: there you are, in New York." He's arranging things on the coffee table as he speaks, setting it up to look as appealing as he can. "About to share your buddies' dreams with the world."

He finishes fussing with the table and turns to her, his expression uncharacteristically affectionate. "Unless some hot-shot redhead decides to stop you, that is." His voice softens, going lower, gentler. "Come eat with me, Barbara. Please."

He smiles, and she doesn't flinch. Barbara listens, and nods, and it's not bitter or cynical or frustrated - no, she's respecting his craft, because is what she does really that different? In a soft murmur, "Find the right lever and you can move the world."

What could the Joker do, aimed in the right direction?

She doesn't hesitate when he asks her over, her grin both warm and proud. "Can't let the cowls have all the fun, can I?"

That's not bitter, either, but it's wistful.

She misses him. She's missed him for a long time.

That comment about the lever sharpens the look in his eyes, just for a moment. It's the sort of expression a professor gives an unexpectedly bright student, a look that says, Why, yes, that's exactly right.

The idea of leverage is neither new nor complicated, but it's one that Joker's noticed many hero types have trouble with. They all seem to want to be the muscle-bound lone sheriff in the narrative, even when they're working together; they want to swing into action and stop all the bad guys and save all the hostages and be the brave and virtuous face of Justice-with-a-capital-J. He, however, prefers to be the one who guides the pieces of the Rube Goldberg machine into place and then gives the final piece that vital flick. Everything worthwhile he's ever managed was the result of clever leveraging, of surrounding himself with the right people and knowing how to make them jump when he said boo. None of it's hard, once you know how to play.

And of course Barbara would have had to learn that game, he realizes. He took away her chances of a lone sheriff career when he used her as an art prop. He left her with no other choice.

He nods as she comes over (with that oddly yearning comment about fun, of all things, and oh, Barnum bless her for that), and he's looking at her now not just with tenderness but with actual respect. He was right to think she was special, but he realizes now that that's not the half of it. Not only is she capable of understanding him, she might even be the very same sort of creature he is: watchful and clever and ruthlessly pragmatic in the pursuit of her goals. Someone who knows how to see the big picture, and who accepts reality for what it actually is instead of the fairy tale they've been sold.

It's not the sort of thing Joker's used to thinking, and it only strengthens his conviction that he needs to get to know her. He wants to learn everything about her: what sort of comedy makes her snort, what memories keep her awake, what type of explosives most thrill her. And above all else, what makes her tick? What's locked in the deepest and best-guarded corners of that heart of hers?

"Tell me about him," he encourages, once they're settled at the table. "Dick. He must be special, to have caught your eye."

It shouldn't matter to her that he never cared who she was, that none of her own triumphs or strengths mattered, but it does. It would have been easier to bear, if she'd been shot on the job by someone who saw her as a threat.

Now, he's looking her with an expression she's only ever seen him aim at Batman. With the kryptonite softening her soul, burying all of that bitter hatred beneath new layers of hope and understanding, it makes her feel downright delighted.

He says Dick's name, and it doesn't flush her with terrified adrenaline; her smile turns warm and soft. "He is. Sweet and funny and brave. Clever, too, he's got to be, and stubborn as hell. He became a cop in Bludhaven, of all places." The smile fades into something tired and grim. "When the city was destroyed, he almost killed himself trying to get people out." Well, at least she can comfort herself with a few huge bites of pizza.

That smile of hers catches him off-guard. She looks positively radiant, in the most gentle and feminine of ways; the haughty, smart-mouthed girl who taunted him in Brooklyn is nowhere to be found. She looks like Hollywood's idea of a woman in love.

Heat prickles in Joker's chest, and his jaw sets. This, too, unsettles him, because it's obviously the wrong reaction. He wants to know all about her; he needs to know about Dick, and what happened to the Blüdhaven she knew, and everything else that makes her who she is. So why should the idea of her sighing over some cop make him feel like this?

Must just be that she's a pig fucker.

Joker knows what cops are like--he's certainly killed enough of them--and he knows that Barbara deserves better. It's all too easy to picture her welcoming her man in blue home after his shift: running her fingers along the button placket of that cheap polyester duty shirt, reassuring him that he's a good man who's helping keep the sheep safe. Politely neglecting to ask how many people he throttled in the name of justice today.

It's beneath her, it's all beneath her.

Though he supposes it was inevitable. A cop raised her, after all, and what pretty young thing doesn't have Daddy issues these days?

He notes the moment when her smile changes. And, god, it must be tiring for her, to have to replay thoughts like that all the time. Joker wishes he could help her with that. Introduce her to the life-changing power of not giving a shit. Maybe one day he can, and wouldn't that be glorious to behold? For now, though, he'll just have to content himself with trying to comfort her in more conventional ways.

He consciously relaxes his jaw muscles, and lets his empathy toward her soften his expression. She's already shown him what she values in her fiance: the bravery, the selflessness. The lone sheriff ideal all the way, which she was undoubtedly force-fed all her life. He can work with that.

"Oh, but only almost. And how many lives did he save that day?" He gives her a knowing look. "How many has he saved in all?"

Joker drops his gaze to his own plate, realizing as soon as the words are out of his mouth that that's never the number heroes actually care about. Bats isn't at home right now thinking about how many lives he's saved. He's thinking, undoubtedly, about the ones he failed.

Just like Barbara is now.

"It's funny, isn't it?" His smile gains a touch of sad amusement: Joke's on us, baby. "You think you'd give anything to change a person. To save them from themselves. But at the end of the day... The things that make you want to strangle them are the very same things you admire them for."

She sees his gaze drop, and her smile turns rueful. "I think you know the answer is 'not enough'." And it's so hard to pull him out of that when she falls into the same pit. She could do it now, she thinks, when she feels so buoyant and bright, but he isn't here.

Even if he was, he couldn't hear her.

"I did convince him to give himself some goddamn breaks. Eventually. He wasn't just doing the job, he was investigating corruption in the BRPD." Also being a masked vigilante, but she's not so far gone that she'll admit that part. "Just like Dad, back when Gotham was even worse." Yes, of course she's seen the commonality there, and there's a big helping of fond exasperation.

Her eyebrows arch, turning her smile into something sly. "I guess we both like the obsessively stubborn ones." It's not the right term for his fixation on Batman, probably, but it's close enough.

Oh, even better! She didn't just go for the standard-issue lone sheriff, she had to fall for the one who was too much a rebel to even fit in with the rest of the pork. No wonder the guy's in a coma, Christ. Clearly, Barbara needs to watch more crime movies, because that routine never ends well.

This willful naivete should annoy the socks off of Joker; it's precisely the sort of thing he most despises. Yet somehow, tonight, it seems endearing. Barbara's not a fool--she's proven that already, hasn't she?--which means that she just has a romantic streak, just like he used to. And of course she wants a bold man, the kind of man who takes risks, who's not afraid to make enemies! Anyone less than that couldn't keep up with her. The only thing she's really done wrong here is choosing a cop, and considering her history, why, even that's forgivable.

But he misinterprets that last comment of hers. An obsessively stubborn person people think that he likes? Surely she means Harley.

His smile sours. "Oh, no. No, no! I've tried to kill mine, believe you me. But stubborn really is the operative word here. My god."

He shakes his head, his shoulders slumping, and tosses his pizza back down to the plate so he can gesture with both hands. "I've tossed her out a window. Shoved her in a rocket. Thrown her at Batman I don't even know how many times, not that he's any help... I'd just shoot her point blank, but she moves too damned fast."

Her brow furrows for a moment, and then she realises where the lines had crossed.

"I meant Batman, actually, but I suppose this confirms that you have a type. You've tried to kill both of them enough times." She takes a sip of her soda, aiming to keep the conversation casual; this isn't the time for lectures. "You know, for a while, I didn't accept how I was really feeling about Dick. It scared me. And when I'm scared, I get mean. Not defenestration mean, granted." It's a joke, but there's a stern edge to it.

"What do you think you'd do if you really killed her? Or if she really left, for good?"
Lord knows the latter is something Barbara has wanted for Harley - something she's even been optimistic about, a few times - but for the first time, she cares about what that would do to him.

He might have protested the whole you're-into-Batman thing. Because it's... well, it's complicated. But after her comment about being afraid of ~feelings~, there's no way to say boo about it without sounding like he's protesting too much. Which leaves Joker no recourse except to sit there feeling impotent and awkward and a little embarrassed.

Is this what all the goody-goods think? That he's continually chasing after the man who's broken half the bones in his body because Batman's his type? Why, it's absurd!

Not to mention that it's an insult to everything Bats is to in any way compare him to Harley.

So the change of topic back to Joker's own personal hell-in-a-jester-costume comes as a welcome relief. He leans back into the couch cushions and allows himself a moment to really think through Barbara's questions.

Life without Harley, hm. No one to pester him. No one to screw up his plans. No one to fling an arm or a leg over him in the night, or feed him half-scorched dinners before he heads to work in the evenings, or give him a headache at any and every time of day with that godawful voice of hers.

"Well, I'd get a better night's sleep, for one thing. And I'd certainly get more done."

Though he'd have to lay off the sedatives entirely, without her there to keep watch over things. And there'd be no one to pull close to him when the worst of his nightmares jerks him awake. No one to stroke his hair and calm him down when he's in a manic state, either. But that's a small enough price to pay for some peace and quiet.

"Probably eat better, too."

Though he'd have to pick up all the carryout himself. No more sending her out on a Chinese run (or sending her back when she shows up without those crispy noodles he likes for the egg drop soup). Well, he can handle that. Beats choking down her cooking.

Then he realizes how this must all sound to Barbara. He sounds heartless, doesn't he? Which, of course, is the exact opposite of the impression he'd hoped to make on her tonight.

Joker leans forward again, hands clasping together between his knees, and gives her a pleading look. "You've got to understand--what she and I have, it's not like you and Dick. We were more of, ah." How to put this? "A workplace romance, see. One of those things that's more a product of circumstance than of any real connection. And now she wants some epic love story, the whole kid-and-caboodle, and I... I just want to keep working."

The words are flippant, but she can see the conflict beneath. Doesn't mean they aren't true, but there's something more. They both know Harley isn't actually faster than a speeding bullet.

"If the two of you really want different things from your relationship, your future, you should try talking without..." She takes a bite from her pizza while gesturing at the air with her other hand. "Violence. Insults. Denial. Maybe come to some kind of compromise. You're both smart people."

Maybe that's a more attainable goal than Harley leaving the Joker behind - making their relationship something better.

"And you can't really blame her for putting you above everything else, can you? She left behind everything for you."

Joker's actually opening his mouth to say, I never asked her to, when he looks at Barbara's face and feels the words die on his tongue.

He came here to be honest with her, taking a leap of faith and trusting that, somehow, she'd understand all the things he'd never been able to explain to anyone else. And what's the point, if he's just going to turn around and lie to her the second things get dicey?

He drops his gaze and slowly exhales. Quietly, and with none of his usual pomp and swagger, he says, "You know, you're right."

He did ask Harley to, of course. Down in the sub-sub-sub-sub-basement of Arkham, he promised her the world, if only she'd throw away everything she'd ever worked for. He'd always seen this as a favor he'd done for her: the liberation of Harleen Quinzel from the tyranny of sanity! And was it his fault, really, if she'd been too naive and needy to realize the story would never end the way she wanted? He'd still done plenty for her. Had listened to her when no one else would, had delivered her from the chokehold of her ambitions, and had made her feel--for once in her sorry life--like she could actually be the sort of woman people would remember. Hell, she ought to be grateful!

But with Barbara sitting there and calmly pointing out that perhaps violence and insults aren't the best way to handle a woman, and that perhaps all his annoyances with Harley really just boil down to how important he is to her... Well, now he's wondering if maybe he's the one with the problem here, not Harley. It's an uncomfortable feeling, made all the more so by the fact that Barbara's sharp enough to see through Harley's dumb blonde routine.

She really does see damn near everything, doesn't she?

"How'd you get so clever, anyway?" He looks up from beneath his brows and flashes her a teasing, knowing smile. "Don't suppose you can tell me how to fix things with Bats while you're at it?"

Harley has a mask that goes far beyond face paint, just like Bruce's goes beyond the cowl - or the shining, vacant smile he gives to the cameras. It's not hard to recognise when it's so damn familiar.

When she grins back, it's delighted; he's really listening. They could be making actual progress here. "I'd like to say hard work, but some of it was luck. I didn't earn the perfect memory. Earned college, sure, but lots of people don't even get the opportunity." She's always wondered what would have happened if Uncle Jim hadn't been there to catch her.

"As for Batman..." Her smile withers. Her voice doesn't turn savage, just sad. "I don't know if that's possible. Not after Robin."

Even her comment about college--another reminder of all the ways, large and small, in which he'll always seem less than in her world--can't stifle the joy Joker feels at having her grin at him like that. She looks genuinely happy, like he's saying the right things for once. Like he's actually pleasing her, and like this moment means as much to her as it does to him. He didn't know he could still make people smile quite like that.

He scoots closer to her, basking in her expression...just in time to see it wilt.

Robin. Right.

The loss of her smile is, fortunately, enough of a blow to keep him from instinctively grinning at the memory. Killing that kid remains one of the highlights of Joker's career, a happy place he can return to in his mind whenever he feels frustrated. Every detail of the day was perfection. The wet thwap of the crowbar. The look of panic in the mother's eyes when she realized she was going to die. And, of course, the raw, heady hope that maybe this would be the thing that finally got through to old Bats.

He'd really thought it might, too. Slaughter one (very annoying) little bird, and perhaps Batman would finally understand the lesson Joker had been trying to teach him for years, the one he himself learned the night his apartment turned into a blast furnace with his wife still inside. The one he'd tried to teach Jim Gordon with Barbara: None of it fucking matters. You can't save the people you most want to protect. No matter how hard you try, no matter how much you love them... In the end, all your efforts in this life amount to nothing more than a bad joke.

He searches Barbara's face, at a loss for what to say.

He wonders if Bats has talked with her about it. Seems unlikely. He pictures her looking for clues in Bats's posture, in his tone of voice, in all the things the man doesn't say. Joker knows exactly what Bats's anger toward him looks like when they're face-to-face. But what does it look like when he's alone with her? Does Barbara reach for his arm, and murmur to him the same wise sorts of things she's saying to Joker? And how intense must Batman's hatred be, if even she believes there might not be a path out of it?

"No," Joker admits. "Perhaps not."

But the implications of that are too awful to linger on, and his mind quickly shuts the thought down. Nothing's impossible, after all! If his life has proven anything, surely it's proven that.

"On the other hand." His voice is still quiet, but it brightens now, warming back up into something more like its usual self. "I'd never have guessed you and I could be friends, either. Yet here we are, in our brave new world. Chatting like old pals." He manages a more hopeful smile. "Life does so love a curve ball."

"There is that." Her smile is weaker, this time, but it's a sincere agreement. "Not the first time I've reached out to someone who's tried to destroy me, or my people, but you're..."

She shakes her head. "I never even considered the possibility with you. It's one thing to care about that kind of thing - compassion, redemption - but I never saw...a reason. To try. Maybe I should have looked harder."

There's so much more here than the cackling monster in her nightmares who took her legs, took Jason, took Sara.

"But Robin wasn't - I loved him, but he wasn't mine, not like - " She cuts herself off. No, they aren't there yet. She's bared a lot of her soul, but not that, not her daughter. "You destroyed a part of Batman that he can never get back."

Joker’s eyes narrow just a little as he tries to fill in the words she’s omitted: not like what, exactly? Not like Dick is hers? Not like Robin was Bats’s? Or not like something else altogether?

He puts a mental pin in that to reserve it for later consideration, though his interest, for once, has no ulterior motive. He doesn’t want the information to use against her; he wants it in order to understand her…and, of course, to understand Bats.

What must it feel like, he wonders, to have Barbara Gordon call you hers? To know that you could come to her at any time and have her welcome you with a warm smile and some good advice? To know that she saw all of who you were—for Barbara, clearly, misses nothing--and loved you anyway? She feels so solid, so clever and watchful and steady. What would it be like to have a woman like that looking out for you, accepting you, fighting alongside you?

He imagines it must be like the exact opposite of knowing that you and Batman are fated to kill one another. The same thrill is there, and the same mutual respect. But the emotions involved, those are night and day.

“Oh, we’ve destroyed all sorts of parts.” He shakes his head. Gestures at his face. “I’d say he started it, but…” And there’s that smile again, along with a muted chuckle. “Truth is, half the changes he’s made were for the better.”

She studies him, for a moment. What would she think of that face if it hadn't been seared into her nightmares? If she'd never associated it with the scent of blood in her nose and screams in her ears?

She remembers the early days, when he was dangerous but didn't cut bloody swathes through Gotham on the regular. When she could laugh, in between strikes and dodges. When he wasn't the man who brutally murdered a kid that she taught, and fought with, and flew with.

Occasionally, she's wondered if they could have stopped him from going that far. Even redirected him, somehow. Was falling into that vat a point of no return? No, that doesn't seem right.

"You were changed. Doesn't have to be a bad thing." She gestures, almost absently, at her chair as she takes another bite of pizza. "Do you really blame him?" It's not defensive, really, just curious. "I'm sure he blames himself, that's his raison d'être."

Her gesture at her chair sends another thud of regret through him, tightening his chest and belly all over again. That's the thing about this game he and Bats are playing, isn't it? There are no take-backs or mulligans. Every move they make has permanent consequences.

Normally, he likes that. So much can be taken away in an instant in this life; there's comfort to be found in the permanence of scars. But while Batman has mostly only succeeded in making him more beautiful and creative, Joker can see that what he himself has done to Barbara is more along the lines of snapping a bird's wings. He's not prone to regretting his decisions--fortune favors the bold, and you gotta crack a few eggs, and all that--but this one, he does. And there's no way to correct it.

And how embarrassing, too, to have her thinking that he blames Batman for any of this. Batman started the game, sure, but Joker adores it: the exhilaration, the challenge, the violence. And to have Barbara thinking he pities himself for being involved in it, when she's the one who was reduced to mere collateral damage... No, he can't have that.

"Blame him?" he repeats, and shakes his head again. "No. He freed me."

He averts his eyes and reaches for his glass. Tries to figure out how to explain something he's never before put into honest words.

If anyone will understand, he reminds himself, it's her. He just has to find a way to let her in. And doesn't she deserve to know, if she wants to? It's the least he can do.

"Before him, I was..." Small. Desperate. Scared. "Nothing. Just another timid man in a cage." His gaze shifts back to her. "He took away all the illusions I was clinging to, all those nasty bits of sanity that were driving me insane. Made it so that I could never be bound by them again." He nods, his eyes imploring her: Understand, please understand. "I don't blame him; I could never blame him. I want to repay him. To save him, like he saved me."

In normal circumstances, she'd roll her eyes and turn away. She'd assume he was manipulating her, or stalling her, and even if he wasn't, what does it matter now?

But now she meets his gaze with solemn empathy. "He does that. Gives people wings." Of course it's a reference to Robin, drawing a very purposeful line, but she wants him to know she understands.

"In your case, that meant leaving behind everything else. Maybe...that's what you need to do, sometimes. All you can do." She's seen so many people kneeling in the rubble of their lives. So many catastrophes that leave only fear and grief and shame in their wake.

"...I'm not going to ask what happened to you." Later, she'll curse herself for that. "But I'm sorry it came to that." She pauses, then, worrying at her lip. "I can't tell you I'm glad you became who you are. Not with all of the consequences. But I'm glad you weren't just another statistic."

Overwhelmingly, the people Joker meets wish he was another statistic. That's the thing everybody always says to him, some variation of, God, I wish Batman would just kill you already. He's used to being hated; he even likes being hated. There's a satisfaction to be had in knowing that even with virtually everyone clamoring for his death, nobody's yet been able to finish him off for good.

So to have someone look him in the eyes and say that they're glad he survived--and not just because they need something from him or have been brainwashed to love him--is a disconcerting experience in its own right. To have that person be Barbara, from whom he's taken so much, is flat-out surreal.

And he can see in her eyes that she means it. She may not like him, but she's glad he's alive.

Ordinarily, he'd be laughing his ass off right about now, hooting with delight over her foolishness. Today, however, he watches her in silence, his expression betraying precisely how touched he is by what she's saying.

Barbara is, clearly, a genuinely good person. Which is something Joker doesn't typically believe can be said about anyone, and certainly not about the people who claim to be! He knows what the good guys do, and he knows the self-righteous rage with which they do it. Yet here she is, proving minute by minute just how compassionate someone can be, even to the man who deserves her mercy the least. There's no one here for her to be impressing; there's no camera crews ready to document her demonstration of decency. She's saying these things solely for him, and she means them, and none of that fits with his worldview at all.

He won't apologize to her, not again, because what would be the point? Nor can he promise to stop trying to get through to Batman for her sake. But he wants to give her something, to show her that he's heard her and is grateful to her. She seems like a comforting hearth of a person, a source of light and warmth and strength, and he wishes he knew the right way to convey that, and to tell her how much it's meant to him to be able to sit beside her for a while. He wants her to know how much he respects her for what she's said tonight, and for simply being who she is.

"You really are extraordinary," he murmurs. Which doesn't begin to do her justice, or to say what he really means. Joker shakes his head again and looks away from her. He's never been good at putting emotions into words, mostly because they're not worth talking about. And now--now, when they seem urgently important--he's not sure how to proceed. His fingertips drum against his glass.

"If the world were more like you, Barbara, I..." He licks his lips. Hesitates. Everything he can think to say feels either false or melodramatic, and while both of those would normally suit his tastes just fine, they're not what he wants tonight.

So he abandons the sentence half-finished and changes course, looking back at her with a hopeful expression. "Say. Why don't you come down to the Laugh Factory some night?" His smile goes a little bigger: Please? "Let me give you a few good memories for once. Change our script."

It feels good, to give him that. She cares so ferociously about redemption, most of the time. She cares about life, regardless of whose it is, because it's something precious. (Tonight, she couldn't imagine ever ending one; even when she does, it had damn well better be worth it.)

She's seen this look on other people, people she's managed to give another chance to. (Though cameras, these days, but she managed it as Batgirl, and as Congresswoman Gordon.) People who just needed someone to believe they were worth something.

There's a tender sort of triumph in her smile, and a faint blush in her cheeks, as she says, "It might be a little closer than you think."

Then her smiles deepens, brightens. "And I'd like that. Can't exactly spy on it, these days, unless I send a bird in there." It's a sort of confession - she certainly would if she could - but that's no surprise, is it? "Now I don't have to feel guilty for laughing."

The idea of her spying on him, which should probably annoy him, instead sends a pulse of satisfaction through him. She thinks he's worth keeping an eye on.

Was she watching back in the Slab, he wonders? He knew there were cameras--there are always cameras, even when you can't see them--but he'd assumed the feeds went to the Slab's beefy security team, and perhaps to the Bat. But what if Barbara Gordon was out there watching, too? Now that he knows she's the reason he was sent there, it suddenly seems very possible.

He'd like that, he realizes. To know that she was present, an audience of the highest caliber, watching over him even when he was alone.

"I could put a camera in for you, too," he offers. "If you wanted." Not in the club's back rooms, of course--even in his current state of mind, he knows better than to let her see everything--but focused on the stage. That's something he really could give her: all the laughs she cares for, all from the comfort of her own home. No birds required. "For the nights when you'd rather stay in."

Her eyes widen, and she's clearly touched by the offer; it would be so different than the branch of her surveillance system dedicated solely to that cell, analysing everything with obsessive intensity, right up until the moment it would have actually been worth a damn.

"That would - yes. Thank you." Her smile turns wistful. "People underestimate the power of laughter, but I'm sure you realised that a long time ago."

He's watching her eyes, eager for her consent and approval. And when he sees that the idea actually pleases her--that it maybe even means something to her--Joker lights up like a schoolboy who's finally made Teacher proud. He loves the way she's talking to him, too: that validation she's offering of his work, and her acknowledgement that he's capable of understanding things.

So many of the heroes he knows condescend to him, or act like he's some sort of crazed animal with nothing of value to offer the world. But not Barbara. No, Barbara's a completely different sort.

"Oh, I've underestimated plenty of other things." He's still gazing into her eyes, sustaining the connection for longer than he should as he memorizes the exact expression she's wearing. Later, when he's in his right mind again, he'll return to that memory and turn it over and over in his mind. Wonder how much of what he saw in her eyes was real, and how much was just him imagining what he wanted to see. Either way, he'll hate her for it, and for the odd pang he'll feel when he thinks of her. "But once I learn a lesson, you know... I don't forget it."

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you’ve got me rockin’ and a-rollin’ | closed

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cw: memories of assault

Re: cw: memories of assault

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