fandomhighdorms | The Roof, Saturday Evening

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The Roof, Saturday Evening

It was so sudden. One moment, Eleanor had been carving up a harpie, and the next -- it was gone. So were the zombie piranhas. And Eleanor was ... Eleanor, again. Finally. Somehow.

But the memories of it -- who she had been, what she had done -- were clawing at her. She'd been someone careless and dark, and before that, the Messiah her mother had tried to shape her into becoming. An utter absence of self.

She spent at least an hour in the shower, scrubbing, but she couldn't get that feeling out of her skin, the itch, the memory of other voices speaking through her. As her. In place of her, in the empty space where she used to be, where no one was ...

She gave up, finally, and pulled clothes on -- not the shift. Maybe she would burn the shift. Maybe that would be satisfying.

Maybe she would go up to the roof and scream and find something to break. Or maybe she could sit and watch the stars. Anything, so she didn't feel trapped under a roof right now.

(OPEN. WARNING: thread with Celia discusses suicide of an NPC and its aftermath, in some really harsh terms. (Also, Eleanor's views are her own, not mine.))

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"You killed them because someone you loved and respected said you should," Joker countered. He put an arm around her shoulders, and beckoned her closer with the other hand. "You're worried you're not human; here's more proof that you are. It doesn't take much for normal ordinary people to do horrible, horrible things. I mean, shit, that's how you got Nazis."

He shrugged. the other question wasn't as important, but... "Leggy-me had no drive, no ambition. We were searching through the library for a way to save you -- to save everyone -- and he got bored. Hell, he even fell asleep. Giving up? So not my thing."

"I thought the Nazis were all anti-Semites," Eleanor frowned, letting herself be pulled over against him. It felt reassuring, to settle her head against his shoulder and breathe in. "It wasn't that he said I should. I just modeled him, I suppose. If no one cared about me ..."

Then why should she care about anyone else? Odd to think of how easily the human contract could be broken.

"You were ... trying to save me?" she asked. "I was in town, fighting monsters."

"Nah, we're just all naturally xenophobic. The ability to get the fuck over it and make friends is what separates us from the animals."

Joker gave her a squeeze. "But people do care about you. And your father did. You're not that person. She was in town fighting monsters. I was in the library, trying to find any information, any idea, of anything we could use to save you."

"Then ... you're a hero," she said softly. "You were doing what you could to save all of us, while I ... she was off enjoying herself."

There was something odd there, to the way he kept stressing you. Nonsense. He was just reminding her that she mattered, that it was all right to care about others, in turn.

"Are you bitter?" she asked. "That that other you ... had it so easy."

"Me? A hero?" Joker asked, with deliberately feigned modesty. He deepened his voice to something appropriately superhero-y, and put his free hand on his hip. "Why, yes. Yes, I am." He snorted, and in his normal voice said, "No, the real hero was that girl that showed up, Elizabeth. She's the one that fixed things."

He sighed, and laid his hand gently on the side of her face. "Babe, babe, babe, you ask if I'm bitter like you think I wasn't, before."

Of course. How was that not clear to her? That was ... that was what lurked behind all of his caustic jokes. That was the chip sitting on his shoulder. He couldn't be Jeff, so he'd be Joker.

It was heartbreakingly clear in that instant. Her eyes held his -- where was the blue? She couldn't see it. Maybe it was too dark, up here -- and she felt something inside her snap.

This time, when she reeled back in, it was so that she could hold him.

It felt nice to be held, and comforted, after everything, and especially since she seemed to be trying to heal a lifetime's worth of pain in a single hug... but... well, there were more important things. After a little bit he pulled away. "Thank you. I mean that, thank you. But... I'm fine. As fine as I'll ever be. and I don't... This was about you, here, right now."

"It doesn't have to be," Eleanor said, sitting up straight again. She felt ... oddly privileged, like he'd shown her something personal. "Look, I'm ..."

She shrugged, uncomfortably. "I'm all right," she said. "I guess I'm not? I will be. Probably. I can't say for sure. I'm not ... good at this."

Human interaction, being hugged, talking about her feelings, pick one.

"I can't see the blue," she said. Because it had been building up and somehow, chose that moment to spill out.

"The what?" Joker asked. Blue... blue what? She'd been looking into his eyes earlier, but his eyes weren't blue... Oh, right! "No, I don't have that," he told her. "I mean, I should, probably, but every case of Vrolik's is different, and... I shouldn't have survived more than a few days after birth, either. I guess what they did to save my life also kept off the blue." He shrugged. "Sometimes I think it would have been cool, to have freaky-weird eyes, but I doubt I would have made it through elementary school all right. Kids are tough."

"I thought ..." Eleanor was nodding. And somehow, still searching his eyes, as if the blue was going to magically appear. "I thought somehow I missed it, that ... I hadn't looked carefully enough. That your hat had been in the way. I thought I'd look harder, the next time, and see it."

She shook her head, suddenly feeling awkward. She was sitting too close, and staring at the whites of his eyes. She directed her eyes downward, instead.

"You ... might have died, at birth?" she said. Somehow, that ... was almost as sad as him being bitter, now.

"Yeah, well a lot of people almost die at birth. That's what doctors are for." Joker shrugged it off. "The miracle of modern science."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "You know, if you keep staring into my eyes like that, I'm going to start getting ideas."

And that was what got Eleanor to turn away, finally, leaving the reassuring circle of his arms so she could put her hands onto her own lap.

"Well, we can't have that," she said, aiming for a light tone. "You getting ideas. It's a good thing that I know what you're like, isn't it?"

Well... that sucked. Joker really liked having his arms around her. Unless she didn't want him to? He'd been burned before. "Unless, I mean, you want me to get ideas. I can be full of all kinds of ideas."

"I'm sure you can," she said, her tone just as playful, as she dared to look back at him. Which wasn't easy, the way it twisted her inside-out. "Is that level two of the Incorrigible Flirt package? The bit where you find yourself with ideas and share them freely with all who'll listen."

He had said that flirting was a game, but right now, it felt more like she was standing on very thin ice.

This was the part where he let her down easy, right? Because he wasn't looking for anything at the moment, and they were both not thinking straight because they were pretty shaken from everything the past few weeks, and she'd only break his heart later on down the line. He knew where things stood. Metaphorically speaking.

Or maybe it wasn't.

"Well, level two doesn't go to just anyone," he told her. "Only the best, the brightest, the beautifullest... Only the ones who are really special. I mean, you are special, aren't you?"

And that was the ice cracking, spiderwebs racing dangerously outward. She could run, if she knew which way to go. If worst came to worst, at least she could swim.

"Am I?" she asked. Which seemed far too slender a limb to be standing on. She was mixing her metaphors, now, standing on branches on top of cracking ice. Ridiculous.

"You see what you've started," she said. "You get ideas, and then I humiliate myself, and then where will we be?"

That... did not seem to be a girl who was giving mixed signals. Whether she'd regret it later, well... you only live once, right? But was it what he wanted? Right now, he just wanted to cling to her because of how glad he was that she was all right. Was that healthy? Maybe some space was best? Some time to figure it all out?

"Uhhhhh... Well, hopefully, we'll be at dinner together. Tomorrow night?"

Eleanor opened her mouth, and closed it again. And then opened it. And closed it.

She could swim. She just ... didn't seem to be doing it, right now.

"Are you ..." She could manage to look over at him now. "You're not."

It might help if she used actual words.

"Are you asking me on a ... a date?"

... Okay, well that wasn't good. Did he startle her, or did he misread things?

"Well, yeah, but if you want to say no, all you have to do is say it."

"I don't," she said. Wait, that didn't help. "I don't ... want to say no. I'm not saying no."

Those were certainly words.

"Why are you asking me on a date?" she asked.

You know what? She still had yet to actually answer him.

"Yes," she said. "That is, yes, I would like to. I mean, I will. But I don't know how to go on a date and I might be bad at it."

"Well, I said I might get ideas, and this happens to be one of them," Joker told her. "There's no right way or wrong way to do it -- I'll swing by your room at 6, if we're not already hanging out, and then we'll go for a walk down to the steakhouse. For dinner. You do know how to eat dinner, right?"

And that was when the absurdity struck her. It didn't matter that she was in the deep freezing water, or that she was the third Eleanor she'd been this week, or that she'd been up here on the roof trying to decide if she wanted to scream or cry (or both).

She laughed. Not a light one, but a deep peal, rippling out from her, over and over again. It was like all of the madness wanted to come out at once.

When it finished she had her head in her hands and was shaking, but only a little.

"Of course," she said. "Of course I've forgotten how to eat dinner. I'm the Messiah, but I'm evil, but I'm me. Father never loved me, and you'd like to date me. It all makes such perfect sense, doesn't it?"

And Joker was giving her a very worried look and putting his arms back around her. "Okay, you know what? Maybe we revisit the whole thing later. Life is too weird right now, and you... Shaking things up, probably not the best idea."

She let herself be folded back in. It was nice, to be held, and he smelled like soap. Not the kind she used. A different bar. She'd have to go to the store and see if she could find it.

"You promised me dinner, and I'm holding you to it," she said simply.

And maybe they could sit here for a while, and she could smell his soap, and maybe the world would stop being so crazy.

The world was always crazy. The best you could do some days was just to hang on.

He held her tightly. "Dinner it is," he said. But for now, maybe it was best to just sit here and hold her for a while.

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The Roof, Saturday Evening

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