Harleen #1

Harleen began to feel her thoughts resurface from her dreams. It must have been 3:00 A.M. She always woke up at 3:00 A.M. Normally she would simply check the clock, change position, and doze uncomfortably back to sleep. Occasionally, she might get up for a glass of water, or if she was really feeling restless, read through patient files in preparation for the next day.

One in particular had been costing her precious hours of sleep over the last six months. He had been showing some improvements with therapy; less violent towards staff and other patients, more compliant with medications; he had even been given recreation room privileges in the last month. His hands and feet had to remain cuffed, but it was an improvement nonetheless. The problem was, other than the events that had occurred six months previously leading up to his capture by Batman, absolutely nothing was known about this man. If she didn’t start making more progress in that area soon, he might be removed from her case load. At first she would not have objected. Treating a psychotic, mass murdering clown straight out of residency wasn’t exactly what she thought she would be dealing with when she had decided upon psychiatry as a specialization. Still, Dr. Harleen Quinzel prided herself on her innate ability to connect with and influence the extreme personalities of the residents of Arkham Asylum, and that is precisely why Dr. Arkham himself had recommended her for the job as The Joker’s doctor.

It had taken him a little over a month to finally begin really communicating in sessions, but Dr. Quinzel remained patient and vigilant. She knew she could connect with him, help him, cure him.

Clearly it would take some time, but she was willing to put in the effort even if he wasn’t. For the first few weeks he returned all of her questions with questions of his own, bouncing from topic to topic and refusing to cooperate. She quickly learned that if he was going to play her game, she would have to play his; dangerous as it was.

--

"Why do you think you do the things that you do, Mr. Joker?" she had asked in an early session.

He sighed at her and rolled his dark eyes, "Does anyone really know why they do what they do, Doc? I certainly don't, I just do things. You're the one who wants to psychoanalyze everything. So, why do you do what you do?"

"Treat patients?"

"Sure, if that's where you want to go with it," he shrugged, "Why do you pretend to care?"

"But I do care, Mr. Joker. I care very much. I even care about you."

A facetious grin of awkward complacency grew across his scared complexion, and he entwined his fingers between his cuffed wrists.

"Do you? Well, that's splendid! I think I must be cured now. All I needed for my repressed and tortured subconscious to recover was the genuine affection of a beautiful woman. Who knew?"

Dr. Quinzel raised her eyebrows, "Do you believe that your subconscious is repressed and tortured?"

"We’re all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad…" he retorted, rolling his head.

"Is that how you interpret the world? As either repressed and tortured or…in essence…'faking it'?"

He smiled and sat forward in his seat on the leather therapy couch in front of her. "That's an interesting black and white question, Doc. Tell me, do you ever… 'fake it'… or is it just standard protocol to look bored out of your pretty little head?"

--

She had heard about fifteen different stories regarding the origins of his scars by now. Each one more radical than the last and none of which she believed, but his demeanor had been dramatically altered since their initial sessions. Dedication to his full rehabilitative status was the constant forefront of her sleep deprived mind and it had become an increasingly taxing task that had unfortunately, and admittedly, clouded her better judgment.

As sleep left her, Harleen began to lift her head in her nightly routine, but paused in hazy confusion when she noticed the extra weight that lay across her rib cage. Her spine froze with her fear, as she lay on her left side, knees bent slightly. It felt as if someone was lying behind her, but it wasn’t possible. She tried to shake herself subconsciously, mentally rationalizing that she was still half asleep, but the rush of blood draining from her face and pounding in her ears soon rendered her completely alert as she felt the warmth behind her move and tuck its legs in behind hers. Her eyes grew wide with fear while she examined the dark room; completely still except for the curtains that rustled slightly over her open window. She hadn’t left that open. No one in their right mind slept with open windows in Gotham City. Terrified of discovering what she might find, she began to slowly turn her head and body around and felt her toes go numb with panic when his face rose up to meet hers, smiling.

"Did I wake you? I'm sorry, love," he whispered with a sarcastic pout. Harleen opened her mouth to scream, but was quickly muffled as he clasped a calloused hand over it. "Ah tatata shhh…let’s not wake the neighbors, Babydoll."

He hovered over her, resting his elbow into the mattress and pinning her right arm under his weight. She tried to pull his left palm away from her mouth to release the loud shriek sequestered in her tight throat, but he snatched her wrist with his free hand and pushed it into the bed. "Stop squirming!"

He was growing impatient as her lower extremities began to thrash wildly and he threw his right leg tightly over them, locking them within his strong thighs. She was completely trapped and could feel hot tears forming in her eyes as she stared helplessly up into his dark ones. Why was he here? How was he here? She passed by his heavily guarded and monitored cell with reinforced glass every day on her way out of Arkham. In fact, she had seen him not twelve hours ago locked tightly in his cell, reading comics on his cot, and whistling the theme song to the Looney Tunes.

He was gripping her wrist with incredible strength for his lean build and she was sure it would bruise. Her heart was racing and pounded so furiously in her ears that she could barely hear what he was whispering to her.

"I'm not gonna hurt you. Look, look!" he released his vice grip on her wrist and spread his fingers in the air above her terrified expression. "No knives, no guns. No shoes either, the run here was a bitch."

He wriggled his toes underneath the sheets and Harleen glanced down at his orange collar, realizing that he was still wearing his standard issue Arkham coveralls. He must have broken out in the last few hours and she wondered if they had even noticed. His face was still sans makeup, which was the way she had grown to know him in the last six months. Except for the puckered scars that etched across his Glasgow smile, she had always secretly found him to be very attractive. His dark brown eyes were captivating yet menacing, and he could often draw her in without saying a word; he knew this about her. The green dye had washed completely out of his curly, brown, shoulder-length hair ages ago, and he had it tied back away from his face; so that the only thing she could visualize clearly in the dim light were his piercing eyes. But they looked less sadistic tonight and she felt herself relax slightly. Perhaps he truly intended her no harm; but then, why was he here?

"Now," he continued, "I'm gonna take my hand off your mouth, but if you scream..." He pointed a finger close to her eye. "I'll be very upset. Understand?" He lowered his chin and raised an eyebrow to her.

She nodded shakily and let out a small sigh as his large hand slipped slowly from her lips and she felt the blood rush back into them. He had been pressing them hard against her teeth. Tears streamed down the sides of her face, tickling the insides of her ears as she mentally blamed herself for her precarious predicament, and reprimanded the naïve stupidity that had lead to this. She knew it had all started with the note left in her office, the issue she should have reported immediately but insisted to herself that she had the power to confront and resolve on her own.

--

Come down and see me sometime,

-J

She wasn't sure why she hadn't alerted anyone. It sent shivers down her spine to think that he could come and go as he pleased. And yet, he had never attempted to escape the Asylum; at least not then.

"Care to tell me how this got in my office?" she had asked him that morning through his cell door.

"I put it there," he replied casually.

"I don't think the guards would like it if they knew you were out of your cell, Mr. Joker. How did you even manage-"

"-If you were going to tell them you already would have," he interrupted, "and besides, I get bored locked up all day with nothing to do."

"Well, if you continue to show progress, I may be able to get you rec room privileges."

"Don’t patronize me, Doc," he growled.

She sighed, "Well, what if I provide you with some sort of entertainment? What do you like?"

The Joker had been lying on his back with his arms folded behind his head. He picked his head up with a smirk and raised an eyebrow to her, "You really wanna know? I can tell you, but it won’t be professional, Doc."

She giggled, quietly. "Ok, maybe not. How about some comics? Do you like Superman?"

The Joker lowered his head back to his bed and crossed his arms over his chest. "And Lex Loser? Nah."

"Well, my uncle owns a comic book store and gets a lot of overstock he sells for a fair price. I'll bring you a stack a week if you promise me you won’t break any more rules."

The Joker huffed. "Rules," he muttered under his breath. "Alright, alright. But only ‘cause you laugh at my jokes."

His doctor giggled again. "Deal."

--

Normally, it was unethical to provide gifts or incentives for patients, but she knew from the very beginning that treating The Joker would be far from conventional. She had honestly felt that they had been setting the foundations of a satisfactory professional relationship.

His past remained an expertly shrouded mystery, but his charisma had not gone unnoticed by the other physicians. Or the other patients, for that matter. His temper had diminished greatly, and he hadn’t tried to bite an orderly in a long while. In fact, he had caused the least amount of trouble out of any of the other inmates with a violent history; at least in the last three months.

There had been an incident which had occurred involving a nurse who tried to vaccinate him during a routine inoculation period. After that, it was mandated that The Joker be completely cuffed or tied to the hospital bed before any needles were brought into the room.

Prior to that, there had been an episode when another doctor attempted to treat him while Dr. Quinzel was out on sick leave. Apparently, when he said he wanted 'his doctor', he meant it. Since then, he had been very compliant and even pleasant during their sessions. She was even surprised to discover his alluring charm and sense of humor, sick as it sometimes was. So, Dr. Quinzel didn’t see any harm in providing her patient with a few necessary means to keep him on the right track to good behavior. She was glad to see that he enjoyed his weekly delivery of books and usually stopped by his cell to say ‘goodnight’ on the way out. Just as she had that very evening...

--

She had approached the reinforced glass on the front of her patient’s cell, and could hear him whistling and chuckling to himself between pages of his comic book.

"Is it a good one?" she asked through the slants in the glass.

He gazed up at her, resting on his elbows, stomach on his cot.

"Quittin' time, Doc?" he replied, and glanced at the clock in the hall across from his cell. "Here a little late, aren’t we?"

"I was working on a patient file."

The Joker looked back down at his book. "Say anything good about me?"

Dr. Quinzel smirked. "And what makes you think it was yours? I have other patients, you know."

He rolled onto his back and hovered the comic above his face with arms extended. "Yeah, but I bet none of those keep you up at night."

"Well, neither will this one, now that it's done."

He pressed his head into the cot and grinned slyly upside down at her. "Well then, sweet dreams, Cupcake." He winked at her and went back to reading his comic, whistling. She shook her head as she turned on her heels, and started for the security doors.

"It’s 'Doctor,' Mr. Joker," she yelled back at him.

"Sweet dreams, Dr. Cupcake," he retorted.

She attempted to stifle the chuckle that echoed back into his cell. As the security doors closed quietly behind her, The Joker slowly lowered his book to his chest and stared up at the dark ceiling, the corners of his scars lifting into a keen sideways grin.


To be continued!

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