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For better or worse, Selina had known Harleen Quinzel before the girl went completely fucking bonkers.
The first time they ran into each other was when Selina had been twelve, and Harleen had just cusped thirteen. Back then, the Waynes were still alive, and sometimes sunlight would still filter down through the smog of the city.
It's a typical day in Gotham all around- grey, drizzly, and Selina's trying to outrun some recent grab, who's basically after her on wheels. He was a little more perceptive than she'd been anticipating, but his wallet is still stashed safely in her pocket. He's much, much faster than he looks- guess the bulge under his suit jacket were muscles instead of fat after all.
"Stop her! She's got my- mmph!"
Which is a good sign, probably- maybe he ran into a telephone pole. Quickly, she spins around on her heels to survey the damage, ready to keep sprinting if he's on his feet.
But instead of a telephone pole, there's a smudge of whitish blonde hair and skinny jeans standing in front of the collapsed man, a brown bag grasped in pale hands swinging out of its damaging arc to settle back against a belted waist.
It was memorable in the way everything Harleen did was memorable- jaunty and a little worrying. Selina clutches her jacket around herself a little more securely, and pauses, uncertain.
The attacker turns around to see Selina, and in profile she's even more conspicuous- the bright hair coupled with pale skin, an extremely thick bookbag, and lips painted a vicious red that's split into a bright grin. "Hiya!" she calls towards Selina.
Selina takes two steps backwards, still clutching her jacket possessively.
After a moment, the girl seems to pick up on how this situation might be interpreted as threatening, and her smile droops. She takes one cautious step forwards. "It's okay. I was just trying to help you out."
She has a funny accent- Selina can't place it, exactly, but it takes the g out of -ing and makes her 'o's and 'r's sound like 'ah's. Selina has to stand on tiptoes to see over the girl's shoulder- it looks like she clocked the guy pretty good with her bag. He isn't moving.
So she squints at the girl. "Why?"
"Oh," the girl says, and awkwardly tucks some hair behind her ear. "Well, maybe you can do me a favor. You know a place I could stay for a little while?"
Then it comes together- near-to-bursting bag, knocking out a bigwig. Selina and this girl are on the same side of the tracks.
Her shoulders relax, and she cracks a smile. "I think I got a place."
)(
The girl's name is Harleen, and she calls Selina Cat without question. The hub's a little far from the alley, but Selina had been heading there anyway. She's got some fancy scarves to pawn.
"You new around here?" she asks Harleen, who's gazing up and down at every skyline and sideroad with fascination. "Haven't seen you around before."
Harleen's gaze snaps back to her, and when she smiles it's a toothy, stretch-lipped grin that takes up nearly half her face. A little weird, but a little cute at the same time. "New around these parts. You a regular?"
Selina snorts. "You could say that. What's in the bag?"
With a casual wave of the hand, Harleen says, "Nothing you'd want. Textbooks."
"Textbooks?" Selina repeats incredulously. "Why? Well, I mean I guess they're worth something if you know some high-end college kid, but-"
"Nah," Harley says, and there's a hint of pride in her voice as she pats the bag. "They're for me. I'm studying."
The idea is so foreign that they're almost to the hub when Selina's done processing it. "Studying for what? It's not like you need book smarts when you're out here."
"Maybe not," Harleen says, her voice singsonging as she takes two steps around Selina, circling her, "buuut. I won't be out here forever. I'm studying to become a doctor. A psychologist."
That's a word Selina doesn't even know, but she doesn't ask, because they're here. She lifts the curtain, and Harleen steps inside.
She allows her to survey the premises for a minute before saying, "Well, I gotta ditch. If you need anything, ask Mike or Landa over there, okay? They're usually nice."
"Okay," Harleen says, and her eyes are sparkling with interest again, looking around at all the mangy kids, the makeshift beds, the dark-eyed groups gathered on threadbare rugs. "Thanks, Cat, it was nice to meet you."
"Yeah," Selina says, and shifts a little, wanting to leave but feeling like she's forgetting something. "And, um, thanks. For back there."
Harleen turns, and grins at her. For the first time, Selina wonders why a girl wearing red lipstick with a bunch of textbooks in a bag is out on the street. "It was my pleasure," she says.
)(
It's about a week and a half before they see each other again. This time, Selina's not the one in trouble- she's on the roof, hopping across fire escapes, aiming for the moors.
And it's funny, because it's a small thing that stops her- a small voice, two small figures on the ground below, a small flash of recognition in Selina's head. Still, it's enough.
Five stories below, silvery-blonde hair is flashing back and forth in the sun, and the bright voice it belongs to is saying, "Stop it, come on. You don't want it, it's nothing-"
The girl- what was her name?- has got a tight grip on the same big bag Selina had seen her with before, and is tussling with some punk over it, who can't be more than nineteen but is significantly taller than she is. Selina drops down one story to see better.
"Pretty nice bag, sweetheart, so don't mind if I-"
Harleen Quinzel! That was her name. Selina crosses her arms against the railing, and observes. It's a talent of hers.
"Hey, screw off, pal, all right?"
She's got balls, Selina will give her that- for a skinny blonde girl who's probably been on the streets for a max of two weeks, she sure isn't shy. The guy isn't as impressed, though. "What'd you say to me, you little bitch?"
There's a faint crack of skin hard against skin, and while her grip on the bag doesn't lessen, Harleen's head turns, blonde hair flashing in the sun once again.
And that's Selina's cue. There's a good vantage point from the fire escape, enough to vault over it from about a story up and pounce right onto the guy's face.
"And let me tell- agh!"
He lets out an ugly screech when Selina scratches him- it's not her best work, not even a clean cut, but she can feel her nails touch against something soft in the scrape so good enough. She lands on her feet, one hand down as balance, in front of Harley, who jumps back about a foot.
The guy immediately bolts, just shrieking. Weak. Selina wipes her hands off against her jeans, and angles a smile up at Harleen. "What's up?"
"Cat!" Harleen says breathlessly, one arm still protectively wrapped around the bookbag, the other pressed delicately to her chest. "Where did you come from?"
Smugly, she points upwards. "Saw that asshole harassing you, figured I would eye-for-an-eye you for it. Since you did the same for me."
Harleen has a lot of blonde hair- she shoves it back with both hands, looking flustered. "Um, thanks."
"Don't mention it," Selina says, and she means it- it'd ruin her street cred to be playing knight in shining armor. "Now we're even. Besides, what are friends for, right?"
Then the girl flushes- like, turns genuinely bright red, and looks down at the gravel. "Oh. Right."
Selina decides she's weird. Not creepy-weird, but an interesting kind of weird. "What?"
There's a short, awkward exhale, and Harleen shrugs with one shoulder, trying to seem casual in an attempt ultimately doomed to fail. "I'm just not- very good with friends."
And that's a strange thing to say, but all Harleen's ever said is strange things. Selina just smiles, a little ruefully. "Don't worry," she says. "I won't be a very good friend."
Harleen bites her still-red lip, and then fishes a torn-out page from her bag. She steps forward, and presses it, gently, to an unnoticed cut beneath Selina's nose, cupping her chin to lift her head up. Selina hisses.
"You can call me Harley if you want to," she murmurs.
)(
The Waynes are killed that night.
Selina stumbles her way back to the hub because she doesn't know where else to go, and it's jarring how nothing looks different. The kids are the same grimy disillusioned lot as ever, and they haven't even seen what she's seen.
She can't get that screaming boy out of her head.
In the corner where Selina usually sleeps is Harley, stirring uncomfortably under a blanket, her hair spread whitish across the dirty floor and her shoes still on. When Selina comes nearer, her eyes flutter open.
"Cat," she says, and yawns, her mouth closing into a sleepy smile. Her lips are still red with makeup. "Hey. It's kind of cold, you wanna share with me?"
Usually Selina's really not one for cuddling, especially not with someone who's stolen her sleeping spot and her blanket, but tonight she just slides beneath the blanket when Harley holds it up, and shivers. Her head knocks against Harley's collarbone.
Now that both of them are close and warm, Harley pillows her head with her forearm again and murmurs, "What's wrong?"
"Hmm?"
"You look upset."
She probably does; she's shivering way too hard and her eyes are dry from opening so wide and for Christ's sake she can still hear that boy screaming. "It's nothing. I'm fine."
Harley huffs, and draws the blanket higher up Cat's shoulders. "It's healthy to talk about your feelings, you know."
Some kind of amateur psychologist. "Go to sleep, Harley," Selina mutters, and curls in tighter.
)(
The next day, the next evening, Harley says, "The Waynes have been killed. You know them?"
It's all Selina can do not to choke on her bread. She's filched a loaf from downtown, and now she and Harley are sharing it. "Mm- uh, no."
"Well jeez, Cat, I thought everybody knew the Waynes," Harley says absently. She's reading her textbook today, crosslegged in their corner on top of the blanket and about halfway through the book. Reading something about dogs and bells. "They're the richest people in Gotham. And nice, too. It's a real shame they're dead, but I guess someone wanted them gone."
Selina swallows. "What happened?"
Turning the page of her book, Harley says, "Shot. The guy and his wife, in an alley. I guess they left their son alive, though. He's about our age, you know, so if he weren't a gazillionaire we'd probably have seen him around these parts by now."
That boy. The screamer. "Do you want to crash the funeral with me?" she says, as lightly as possible. Not suspicious.
At that, Harley glances up, faintly disapproving. "You're going to crash the funeral?"
"Yeah," she says, deciding the moment she says so. "Yeah. Don't look at me like that, I'm not gonna do anything. I just want to see."
Making a noise that sounds weirdly like a tut, Harley shakes her head, and returns to her book. "No, thanks. Tell me how it is."
She doesn't ask why Selina wants to go, and she doesn't ask how it was when she comes back, so in the end Selina doesn't tell her anything at all.
)(
When Selina gets back from checking out Wayne Manor, Harley’s in their corner, drawing a blanket around a very small, shivering redhead, who stares at the ground with a dark expression. Harley looks up at Selina when she approaches, beginning to rub her hands up and down the girl’s shoulders. “Where’ve you been?”
“Out,” Selina says shortly, dropping onto her knees beside the two. The redheaded girl doesn’t look up. “Who’s this?”
With a sad little hum, Harley rubs the girl’s arms a little more vigorously. “Her name’s Ivy,” she says. “Ivy Pepper. She’s been orphaned. Her father was shot by the cops and-” She leans forward to whisper, and Selina inclines her head, “she just found her mother in the bathtub, about an hour ago. Slit wrists. I found her wandering around outside her apartment and brought her back here before the police showed up.” She smiles, slightly. “Like you did for me, remember?”
Then she turns back to Ivy. “This is Cat, Ivy,” she says, slowly and clearly. “She’s a good friend of mine. If you need help and I’m not around, you can go to her, okay?”
Great. Just what she needs- more kids to keep an eye on. Ivy Pepper still hasn’t looked up, though, so maybe she’s not-
Hang on. Pepper. She’s heard that name before.
“Your dad was the one they had take the fall for the Wayne murders!” she says.
The girl twitches, and now she glances up. Harley gives Selina a warning look. “Cat-”
“No, it’s okay.” Selina says, and she looks directly at Ivy. “I know your dad didn’t kill the Waynes.”
Ivy’s expression doesn’t change from its empty gaze, but she does stare wordlessly at Selina for a full minute. Then she props herself up on her haunches to whisper in Harley’s ear, who leans in obligingly.
“She says her dad wasn’t very nice,” Harley repeats, one hand coming up yo stroke the girl’s hair. “So it doesn’t really matter anymore.”
Which is pretty sad. Selina’s not usually one for pity parties, but this might just be enough to make her feel a little generous. She pats around her pockets. “All right, how about the three of us get out of here for a little bit. I have cash, we can go hit up a McDonald’s or something.”
“I’m a vegan,” Ivy Pepper says suddenly. Her voice is quiet, and oddly raspy.
Both girls stare at her. Then Selina shrugs. “Then you can get a McSalad. Come on, let’s go.”
)(
At the McDonald's, Ivy picks pensively at her salad, and spends most of her time plaiting Harley's hair into a fancy, spiraling braid while the two other girls eat. Selina has two large fries, a large vanilla milkshake, and a bacon double cheeseburger, and dares Harley to chug three refills of cherry Coke, which is fun. The pimply guy behind the counter keeps looking at them funny, though, and after he makes a suspicious phone call Selina crams a bag full and gets the other two to hurry out behind her.
Once they're two blocks down, Ivy manages to wordlessly convince Harley to carry her the rest of the way, which is done cheerfully and without complaint. If it was up to her to say, Selina would think Harley might have a groupie- Ivy already seems pretty clingy.
She falls asleep on Harley's back. When they've returned to the hub, Harley draws the blanket up around all three of them, cradling a dead-asleep Ivy underneath one arm and pointedly staring up at Selina until she relents from her place against the wall and comes to lie down with them.
"This is stupid," she murmurs, as Harley hums and snuggles in closer. Her head knocks gently against Selina's; Ivy is squished tight between them. "The blanket doesn't cover all three of us."
"It's warmer this way," Harley counters. Her fingers are brushing Selina's hip from where her arm ends across Ivy's waist. "Besides, she needs some friends right now. She's so little."
With a small sigh, she draws some of Ivy's hair away from her forehead, and the girl murmurs in her sleep and curls in closer to her. It's a painfully affectionate gesture, and Selina can feel herself instinctually inch away from it.
"Hey," she says, because she can't help herself. "Don't let yourself get too attached, all right?"
Harley glances up, her big eyes shimmering dimly. "Hmm?"
"Don't get too attached to her," Selina repeats. "Kids disappear around here all the time. It's best to not rely on anyone, not get too fond."
Rather than taking this advice to heart, Harley frowns, taps Selina's side in reprimand. "What, like you?"
"Yeah," Selina says, unfazed. "I haven't gotten too attached to anybody. Never gotten hurt that way, you know?"
It's dark, but Selina can see in the dark, so she can see the flash of hurt that crosses Harley's face. Then she looks back down at Ivy, and her face falls deeper into shadow. The braid Ivy put in her hair falls across her cheek. "That's not very optimistic."
Optimism is a word Selina's only heard spat across alleyways, over bloodied knuckles, underneath umbrellas. It's always sounded kind of dirty; it's strange to hear it come clean out of Harley Quinzel's mouth. Reluctantly, her hand rests against Harley's ribs, to conserve space; Harley's eyes flutter closed as her fingers find the spaces between them.
It's very quiet. Only Ivy's slightly wheezing breaths fill the hub now, and all Selina can see is the top of Ivy's head and Harley's red red lips and the tiny movements of her eyeballs.
"Harley," she mutters. "I wanted to tell you something."
Immediately, the eyes glow open in the dark again. "Yeah? What?"
"About the Waynes," Selina says, and licks her lips. "I saw-"
But she can't. Harley's so thin under her fingers, and her face is so bright, and Mario Pepper's daughter wouldn't be shivering between them if it weren't for Selina. She can't tell her. She swallows. "I saw their son. At the funeral. Bruce Wayne."
"Oh," Harley says, her eyebrows drawing slightly in, disappointed. "Huh. What about him?"
He'd been so small, and so sad. Selina had wanted to say his name, hear his voice. Had wanted to see his face see hers. "He was little. Like Ivy. I was just thinking, they both lost their parents because of this."
"I didn't think of that," Harley says, and one hand strokes through Ivy's hair again, then goes back to toss away the braid tickling her cheek. The other still rests, comfortably now, on Selina's side. "That's pretty sad."
They lay in silence after that, and Selina's almost asleep when Harley whispers. "Hey, Cat? I think I trust you."
Selina doesn't know why she said that, and Harley doesn't explain or open her eyes again, so for a while after that she just lies there awake thinking, two girls asleep beneath her right arm.
)(
Selina visits the hub right after she ditches Gordon- she's majorly late on a deal, and she'd stashed a bunch of watches in the false brick near her corner. It'll be bad to be late, but definitely worse to not show up at all.
The hub's mostly empty when she gets there. Only a few ragged-looking kids are stumbling around, probably the ones who managed to outrun the cops. Selina figures it'll probably fill back up in no time, anyway. This is Gotham, after all.
"Cat!"
She spins around, fists up, only to be met with a hard embrace of arms around her neck, sending her stumbling backwards a couple of steps. At first, she's about to cut her assailant one, but then blonde hair fills her field of vision. "Harley?"
"Jeez!" Harley says, hugging her tightly before letting her go, hands remaining on her shoulders. "I was so worried about you! I heard you got nabbed by that program for taking kids upstate."
Her hair's still in that fancy braid Ivy had put it in when Selina had last seen either of them, messier and wispy now but certainly the same. Selina cracks a smile. "You wouldn't believe the story I've got, Har. How'd you manage to get away from the cops? I heard they'd cleaned this place out."
Harley shrugs, finally taking her hands off Selina's arms. "Managed to hide. But speaking of- have you seen Ivy?"
"Uh-uh," Selina says, and cuts across to her corner, kicks over the brick and bends over to scoop up the watches. Harley trails behind her like a puppy. "Sorry, but the last time I saw her was the last time I saw you."
"Oh, shoot," Harley mutters, and brings her nails up to her teeth. "Do- hmm. You don't think they would've taken her, do you? I mean-"
"I bet they probably did," Selina says, tucking the watches beneath her jacket. "I told you not to get too attached to anybody."
That just makes Harley look so despondent that Selina almost feels bad. With her free hand, she claps the girl on the shoulder. "Hey. I'll keep the word out for her, all right? And tonight when I get back, I'll tell you my story. Okay?"
At least that makes her smile, fingers still dragging slightly against her lower lip. "Okay. Thanks, Cat. I'm glad you're okay."
"Well, don't hold your breath or anything, but it might not last," Selina says. "I'll see you later."
She actually does, and when she tells Harley about the child snatchers the girl's eyes nearly pop out of her head. It's satisfying.
Still, though, she leaves out all that crap about the Wayne murder. It's bad enough that the word's out to Gordon already, but she didn't have a choice there. Harley doesn't have to know.
)(
After that, though, she doesn't see Harley around the hub, or around at all. Not for a week, then two, then a month and a half has gone by and she hasn't seen the girl once.
Selina kind of wishes she had told her the truth.
)(
Ivy's been back at the hub, alone, for two days, before Harley arrives. Her bookbag is still against her hip, but she looks different- her braid is longer and more ragged, she's in different clothes, and there's a dark bruise beneath one of her eyes.
So Ivy sidles up to her, as quiet as possible, and murmurs, "You still have my braid."
She nearly jumps a foot in the air, then gasps and scoops Ivy up in a hug, swinging her around. Despite herself, Ivy giggles. "Ivy! Jeez, I thought I'd never see you again!"
Even when Harley puts her down, Ivy keeps a hold around her neck. This is the first time she's actually smiled since her dad died. Probably since before that. Harley's smile is infectious. "Got taken upstate."
"Oh, no," Harley moans, sinking onto her knees. Ivy follows her down. "Cat thought that might've happened. Ivy, I'm so sorry. We should've watched out for you."
She shrugs. "S'okay. Not your fault. I managed to get back all right, so it doesn't really matter."
Now Harley's running a hand through her hair, in a way that's probably supposed to be comforting. It feels nice. It wouldn't have felt this nice if those fucking Isleys had cut it off. "How did you get back here?"
"Pulled a Cat," Ivy says. "Stole a wallet, got on a bus. Haven't seen her, by the way, is she still around?"
Biting her lip, Harley shakes her head. "I dunno. I um, I haven't been around much either. Before today. I know she wasn't taken by the upstate people, she got captured and then escaped. But... I dunno."
"So where have you been?"
Surprisingly, she winces, and Ivy prods her further. Harley's really pretty when she's uncomfortable. "Does it have to do with the bruise on your face?"
"Can we not talk about this?" Harley says, a hint of pleading in her voice. Ivy really likes that. Likes the sound of Harley's voice pleading. "Come on. I've got food, you can tell me about what happened to you."
That's fine too. Ivy's decided she likes talking about herself.
It turns out Harley's bag is full of food instead of books, but Ivy doesn't pay much mind to where the books might be. She tells her story, about itchy clothes and batty adopted parents and stabbing a hairdresser with tiny scissors, and Harley laughs. They eat, and it's the worst meal Ivy's had since she ditched the Isleys but the best food she's had in a while.
She curls in as tight to Harley as she can when they go to sleep, her arm loose over Ivy's waist, but it doesn't matter. In the morning, Harley's gone anyway.
And she doesn’t come back.
)(
Selina’s asleep in Jim Gordon’s bed when Ivy’s cold feet tap-tap her awake. “Mm, what? I don’t wanna catch whatever you’ve got.”
“It’s not contagious,” Ivy says coldly, curling closer to her under the sheets. “Besides, the person who’s sick should sleep in the bed.”
Her legs are bone-thin, reedy, and freezing. Selina closes her eyes again. “Fine, but I’m not going anywhere.”
Slightly labored breathing fills the air before Ivy whispers, “Where’s Harley?”
Thinking of it, it was kind of strange to see Ivy without her, back when Selina had showed up in the hub with Bruce. “Dunno.”
“I saw her when I got back from upstate,” Ivy says, “but then she disappeared. I thought maybe she was with you, but she’s not. So I was l-looking for her, but I-”
Ended up crashing beneath a dumpster instead. Selina doesn’t open her eyes, and waits till the girl finishes coughing. “Maybe she got snatched.”
Ivy kicks her. “She didn’t.”
“You don’t know what. It’s possible.”
“Harley’s your friend,” Ivy hisses. “You should be worried about her.”
When she finally opens her eyes, Selina’s vision is clouded by Ivy, her face scrunched into a red, angry ball. She sighs. “Look, I’m taking care of you, aren’t I? And I told Harley to begin with that I wouldn’t have much time for friends.”
Maliciously, Ivy says, “You seemed to have plenty of time for Bruce Wayne, though, didn’t you?”
Bruce. He’s skipped town; not forever, probably just lying low somewhere nice with that stiff butler of his. Quietly, she hopes he hasn’t been spooked too badly. “That was different.”
“It wasn’t!” Ivy says, with surprising forces, then she starts coughing again, and says, “It shouldn’t be.”
Before now, Selina didn’t think Ivy was capable of noise above a low, threatening murmur. Surprised, she says, “Damn. What’s it to you?”
Ivy’s quiet for a moment. Then she says, “Harley’s the only one I like.”
Well then. Doesn’t Selina feel special.
“She’s the only one who was ever nice to me just because she wanted to be,” Ivy continues. “Ever. And she cares about me and takes care of me. I wanna do that for her too.”
After that, Selina doesn’t say anything. She keeps her eyes closed, and pretends to be asleep.
Ivy is burrowed tight against her when she wakes up, but they don’t have to talk about it.
)(
It’s about two weeks after she’s ditched Wayne Manor when Selina runs into Harley again. It’s a raining Monday, and from a damp alleyway she spots Harley walking down the opposite street, a thick bookbag over one shoulder and a black umbrella over her head.
In a matter of seconds, Selina slips out of the alley, across the street, and falls into step beside her. “Keep moving. What’s up, Harley?”
To her credit, Harley doesn’t even flinch. “Cat!” she hisses, glancing at her through the corner of her eye. “Where’ve you been? It’s been ages, I was getting really worried.”
“Oh, you know,” Selina says, hopping over a puddle. “Places to be, stuff to swipe.”
Harley hums. “People have been looking for you,” she says softly, with a glance over her shoulder. “Not just around the hub. Asking if we know you, if we know where you are. You in some kinda trouble?”
Her stomach clenches, but outwardly she brushes it off. “Always in some kinda trouble. What’d you tell ‘em?”
With a shrug, Harley says, “Never heard of her, fellas. Sorry.”
“Thanks. Anyway, where’ve you been? Ivy told me you haven’t been around much either.”
They cross the street at a run, splashing each other with water. “Oh, you know,” Harley says vaguely, once they land on the crosswalk again. “Places to be.”
So Selina doesn’t pry. “Okay. You should probably check up on Ivy soon, though. She was pretty sick a little while ago.”
“I will,” Harley says, and stops beneath a convenience store awning. “I’ll be back to the hub soon, I just got some stuff I need to take care of first. This is my stop.”
Selina nods. “Okay. I’ll take off, then. See you later.”
“Wait,” Harley says, and passes her the umbrella. “You can have this, you need it more than I do. Watch out for yourself, all right?”
Well, Selina isn’t the type to refuse gifts anyway. “Thanks,” she says, “bye, Harley,” and hurries away. The blurry figure beneath the awning gives her a wave before she ducks the umbrella in front of her face.
)(
Harley’s back in the hub that same night when Ivy skulks in, shaking out her umbrella and dumping it on the nearest mat. When she sees Harley in the corner, curled up around her textbook, she makes a beeline across the room, landing on all fours in front of her. “You’re back again.”
She nearly jumps a foot in the air. “Jeez, Ivy! Don’t scare me like that!”
But Ivy’s grinning- a real grin, not the creepy smirk that sets Selina off. “I missed you,” she says, a little shyly. “I thought maybe you were taken upstate too.”
Harley shakes her head, and shuts her book. “Nah. Just busy.”
“You wanna go somewhere with me?” Ivy says, reaching into her pocket and withdrawing a crumpled, damp bill. “I’ve got twenty dollars.”
They manage to find a shady diner that’s not too crowded, only a little ways from the hub. Ivy wants decadence, so they get the biggest serving of fries available, water, and a strawberry milkshake for Harley.
“Heard you were sick,” Harley says sympathetically, straw wedged between her teeth. “Sorry I wasn’t around.”
Mouth full of grease-stained potato, Ivy waves a hand and swallows. “It wasn’t anything you could’ve helped with. Not a head thing. Cat snuck us into this nice apartment for a few days, and I got better.”
“Oh,” Harley says, and swirls her milkshake around. “That was nice of her. Anyway, where’d you get twenty bucks? Pickpocket somebody?”
Ivy reaches over and cracks open the water. “Nah. Easier. You know Cat’s rich boyfriend?”
Harley chokes on a fry, and Ivy grins wickedly. “So you haven’t heard?” she murmurs, in her slow voice. “It’s pretty wild. You know Bruce Wayne?”
Still coughing, Harley nods, eyes watering. Ivy passes her the water. “Yeah, who doesn’t. Why?”
“Cat shows up with the kid at the hub a few weeks ago,” Ivy says, leaning forward conspiratorially. “Dunno what they were doing together, but they were very touchy-feely. It was weird to see Cat actually care about someone, but she was definitely into him. Anyway, I ran into him on the street today, and he has this gift for her, probably worth ten grand. And he gives me twenty bucks just to tell her he wants to see her.” She fills her mouth with fries again. “He’s pretty cute and really jumpy. I want one just like him.”
There’s a long period of silence, in which Harley just stares into her milkshake. Hands curled in her lap. Annoyed, Ivy kicks her under the table. “What? You jealous?”
She’s supposed to laugh and protest, but instead she just shakes her head without looking up. “No. It’s okay. I saw Cat just a few hours ago, I bet we can still find her and tell her Bruce wants to see her.”
Ivy fishes the last few fries out of the carton, her other hand curling into a small fist against the tabletop. “We don’t have to find her. I already got paid.”
But Harley’s mouth has drawn into a hard little line, and she pushes her shake away. “No. If they really like each other, then they should be together. Love’s the most important thing in the world, right?”
Ivy just glances up at her with her big damp eyes. Then she sniffs and looks away. “I guess.”
“So we have to go find her,” Harley says, sounding more resigned than determined, and stands up, offers Ivy her hand. “Come on.”
A moment of debate flashes across Ivy’s face. Then she sighs, drops ten dollars on the table, and takes Harley’s hand.
)(
It’s embarrassing enough when Selina shows up at the hub red-eyed from crying. Even worse, Harley and Ivy are both there.
Weirdly enough, they’re not sitting together- Harley is buried so deep in her textbook it looks like she’s trying to pull her knees up into it, and Ivy is sullenly facing the wall on the complete opposite side of the building.
She’s close to the entrance, though, and she sees Selina come in. When she sees Selina’s face, she angles a mean smile upwards. “Date with your boyfriend not go so hot, then?”
“Shut the hell up, Ivy,” Selina spits, crouching down beside her because she has no intention of sitting and staying awhile. “What’s your damage? Why aren’t you with Harley?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know,” Ivy bites out venomously.
Selina blinks. Maybe this can be a welcome distraction. “I literally don’t know. Tell me.”
Ivy takes a deep breath, gives Selina a suspicious look, then says, slowly, “She tried to split up after we told you the Wayne kid was looking for you, but she’s been acting weird lately so I followed her home.” She pauses, to let the word sink in, and then looks up to meet Selina’s eyes. “She has a home. And a dad.”
After that, Selina doesn’t remember standing up and crossing to where Harley’s trying to disappear into her book. The next thing she remembers is dropping down onto her knees in front of her, and seeing the visible shoulders and calves stiffen up.
“I never said I didn’t have a family,” Harley’s voice says guiltily from behind the tome, “and Cat, it’s not like what you’re thinking-”
“I’ll tell you what I’m thinking!” Selina says, and right now she’s thinking about scratching that sad, you-don’t-understand-me expression right off Harley’s face, from where she’s sure it’s hiding behind Modern Psychology Fifth Edition. “I’m thinking you’re a poor little rich girl who likes playing homeless, who lied to the only two people who wanted to be her friends-”
There’s a sigh, and the book closes. Harley doesn’t meet her eyes. “I didn’t lie, I swear,” she says. “We’re hardly rich, my mom is dead, and I wish my dad was."
Selina pauses. Harley sets the book beside her, still not looking up. “He doesn’t usually motice when I’m gone,” she mutters. “Sometimes I have to go back, though. For food or money, or so he won’t call the cops. But when I’m there, he rips my books and does something really- hang on. Are you crying?”
Shit. She noticed. Selina ducks her head. “No. Shut up.”
“Does it have to do with Bruce?” Harley’s cold hand grabs hers. “Tell me.”
She’s silent.
Harley sighs again. “I should’ve been honest,” she says. “But you and Ivy are more important to me than anything else. That’s real. We're still friends, right?”
A strange question- Selina can’t even remember if they were friends to begin with. She pulls her hands out of Harley’s grip. “I have to go,” she says, “I’ll see you around,” and Harley doesn’t call after her so it must not have been that important anyway.
Bruce’s voice telling her she’s not nice keeps biting her in the ass, though, so she does pause by the exit, by Ivy. “Let her explain herself, kid,” she says. “You had a shitty dad too, you know.”
Ivy looks up, but by then Selina’s already gone.
)(
It's a cold day in the hub when the hitmen show up.
Selina's been staying away. She knows the assassins know to look for her in places like that, and there's no reason to put the other kids in danger. Still, though, a girl's gotta sleep somewhere, and the apartment's a no go for now- Gordon caught her there two days ago.
Naturally, Harley's there when she stops by, reading her thick book. Ivy's nowhere to be seen, but Harley doesn't seem concerned so Selina doesn't ask.
When she drops down to sit beside her, Harley looks up, and gives her a tentative smile. Selina just winks at her lazily, to let her know the fighting's over. She's too tired and too spent to keep picking fights with nice kids.
"What're you reading about?" Selina mutters, head lolling back against the wall they're steadied against. She can see the pictures in Harley's textbooks through her half-shadowed gaze; there's an image of a brain that doesn't look quite right. A chunk's missing from the front.
Harley flips the page. "Skinner's behaviorism."
"Whazzat?"
"Basically that people do stuff when you reward them, and don't do stuff when you punish them. It's called operant conditioning."
Bruce and Harley would probably get along, Selina thinks vaguely, closing her eyes. They're both a strange kind of smart. Then she remembers she and Bruce aren't friends anymore.
She doesn't realize that the entire hub's gone silent, that Harley's stopped flipping the pages of her book, until there's a shout of "Selina Kyle!"
Her eyes have barely opened when Harley hisses, "Get behind me, Cat."
Willing to do what she's told just this once, she crawls behind Harley's back, draws the blanket the girl was sitting on up over herself. Through the threads, she can see three figures shadowed against the light of the entrance. One's significantly shorter than the others, and standing very close to the tallest figure on the right.
"We know Selina Kyle is in this building," says the male voice again. "If you tell us where she is, no one has to get hurt."
None of the kids move, or say anything- they've never been ones to answer to a dark man with a gun. Harley leans back, sitting up higher, and Selina curls tighter against her.
The three move closer, and now Selina can see the imprint of a gun in the hand of the speaking man, pressed against the head of the smaller body. Her stomach flips- a hostage. A kid.
"You, blondie," says a different voice, this one very close. "You were pretty flip with us last time."
Harley's voice is cool when she speaks, "I told you, fellas, I don't know who you're talking about."
"Funny," says the first speaker, "that's what this little girl told us too. But word is you two are joined at the hip with Selina Kyle."
Holy shit. They've got Ivy.
"Leave us alone," Harley says, her voice growing testy. "I told you we don't know anything. Please, let her go. She's only ten."
The second man is so close now, Selina can see his thick face, the whites of his eyes, even through the blanket. "Whazzat behind your back, then?"
Selina lunges.
Even with the obstacles of shaking the blanket off her and Harley's weight pressing her against the wall, she still builds up enough momentum to rip a good chunk of the guy's face off. He shrieks, and the gun he was holding goes clattering to the floor. Selina ignores it, going this time for his eyes.
The moment her nails sink into the softest part of the flesh, he howls, and the sound is coupled with a gunshot.
The second guy's incapacitated now anyway, so she's safe in turning to look. For a horrible second she thinks Ivy, but then she sees.
Ivy's still being held by her thick hair by the first guy, a thin mustachioed man, who's now gaping stupidly with a hole in his sternum. Both he and Ivy are staring at Harley, who's standing now, smoking gun in both hands, her crumpled textbook at her feet.
Suddenly, she turns on Selina, eyes wild and gun still clutched steadily in both hands. Selina freezes, uncertain.
"Move!" Harley barks, and Selina tuck-and-rolls. There's a second gunshot, and Selina's victim keels over too, no longer twitching but firmly and surely dead.
After that, there's a long silence. The guy who was holding Ivy falls down, and Ivy shakes her hair loose of him. She's a little dirtier than usual, but otherwise doesn't look much the worse for wear. She and Selina and the entire rest of the hub are just staring, staring at Harley.
And Harley laughs.
It's a bubbling, hysterical giggle; the gun goes clattering to the floor as she claps her hands over her mouth. Behind them, she giggles again, and again; a full peal of laughter rips out of her, and she goes from cupping her mouth to clutching her stomach. Then the laughter stops, and there's an electric moment of silence before she shrieks at the top of her lungs.
Ivy runs forward, and catches her around the waist in a hug, her face burying in Harley's trembling abdomen; it's evident that without her Harley's knees would've given out. Selina absently thinks of helping her, too, but can't- she remains frozen on her knees against the cement, watching as Harley's red red mouth works itself through what seems like an endless stage of laughing and screaming, screaming and laughing.
Then the sirens start outside.
The kids scatter like rats, all of them disappearing in less than a minute. Harley's still making hiccuping noises that could either be laughs or sobs, and Ivy won't unclench herself from her waist. She throws Selina a challenging look over her shoulder, as if to make it clear she's not leaving.
Well, it's not as though Selina can carry both of them. She stumbles onto her feet, salutes Ivy, and turns around, ready to split.
"GCPD! Put your hands in the air!"
Shit. She's taken too long.
When she turns back around, Harley and Ivy are being wrested away from each other and led into a cop car. Harley's stopped laughing, thank god. The last Selina sees her, her eyes are completely blank. Ivy isn't looking at her, but Selina assumes she's fine.
"Selina Kyle, am I right? Detective Gordon's been looking for you."
Oh man. This time she's really fucked.
)(
Gordon's not even at the precinct when the three girls are rounded up there, so it's not as bad as it could have been.
They're not in a cell- either the junction's all full or they're cute enough that the cops don't feel good putting three little girls in with a bunch of big guys. Instead, they've been left on a bench in the lobby with one guy keeping an eye on them, bat in hand. It's charming, really.
Apparently Jim Gordon's coming, and apparently she and Ivy are the only ones who have to stick around, because no one cares about Harley-no-Wayne-connection, because Gordon doesn't want to waste any time on the accomplice girl, because that's how the Gotham legal system works. Harley's father has been called to the station to pick her up.
Ivy's kicking at the post, sullenly. Harley is sandwiched between her and Selina, bent over with her hands clasped, and is muttering to herself so quietly Selina can't be bothered to listen in. Selina's looking for escape routes.
"Are you gonna get us out of here or what?" Ivy snaps at her crabbily. "I haven't got all day."
Well, damn, it's not Selina's fault Ivy was wandering around and got herself hostaged. "Give me a minute, all right?"
Harley's shivering now. Selina can just make out what she's saying now.
"Skinner, Pavlov, Watson, Locke- yes, professor, I have them all memorized- Wundt, Titchener-"
Probably not good. Selina snaps her fingers under the girl's nose. "Hey. Harley."
That gets her a jump, but then all Harley does is sit up straighter and mutter a little louder. "Arousal theory, drive theory, hierarchy, um, theory-"
On the other side of her, Ivy's looking at the floor, her jaw clenched. "Cat, make her stop."
"I'm trying! Harley, come on-"
"Post-traumatic stress disorder, clinical shock, electric shock therapy-"
"Harley, stop!" Selina says, and cups the girl's face, bringing it around to meet her eyes. Harley's dart around her face as if trying to recognize it. "Stop it. You're fine, you're all right. You saved me and Ivy. You're okay."
Finally Harley's eyes settle on hers. "I've never seen someone die before," she whispers.
At least that's a real sentence. Behind her, Selina can see some of the tautness leave Ivy's shoulders. "Yeah? Well, welcome to the club, I guess."
"Have you ever killed anyone, Cat?" Harley says, and her eyes begin to dart again. Selina grips her face a little tighter. "Have you?"
She can't lie. "No," she says. "But... it's because of me that a lot of people are dead now. And I wasn't helping anyone. Not like you did. I was only helping myself."
Her breathing's becoming shallow. "That's not true," she says. "You tried to help Bruce. Because you love him."
Selina swallows. "I don't love him. But... I was trying to help him. It didn't work out, okay?"
But Harley either didn't hear her or isn't listening. "I did it to save you," she whispers. "Because I love you. And... Ivy. So that makes it okay. Because I did it for someone I love."
Hadn't this been a chapter in her textbook a few weeks ago? Justification by intrinsic motivation or something fancy like that. Selina decides not to bring it up.
Then Harley goes still, eyes focusing over Selina's shoulder. "My father," she whispers. "My father's coming. He's here."
Honestly, fuck Jim Gordon. He thinks he's so righteous. There is real fear in Harley's eyes, and when Selina turns to look, hands coming away from Harley's face, she can see a beefy, grease-stained man sidling up to the desk, looking around the precinct with bloodshot eyes.
He's the kind of big guy who hits little girls. Selina can tell just looking at him.
All Harley does, though, after the initial moment of panic, is give him a resigned look. She turns back to the other two girls. "We probably won't be able to see each other for a while," she says, her voice low. "I'm sorry things ended up like this. Ivy, take care of yourself, okay?"
She presses a quick kiss to Ivy's sallow cheek that makes the girl's eyes to wide, then she draws back, smiles, and turns to Selina.
"This will be the only time," she says, as her cool fingers spread gently across Selina's cheeks. "I promise. Selina, thank you for everything."
Despite context clues, Selina isn't entirely expecting the kiss Harley presses to her lips. Her eyes nearly pop out of her head, so she can see every flutter if Harley's lashes against her pale cheekbones.
It's nor as dry or as young as her kiss with Bruce has been, and of course it ends up lasting longer than the other's tenth of a second. Still, there's the same uncertainty in this kiss as there was in the last, the same bitter taste of parting.
But before she can do anything about the kiss other than assess it, it's over. Harley's pulled away, stood up. There's a small, rueful smile on her red lips. "I have to go," she says, and begins to back away. "Goodbye."
And if her father squeezes her a little too tightly when he slings his arm around her and ushers her out, no one mentions it. Not Selina, not Ivy, and certainly not the GCPD.
Inexplicably, Selina thinks of Bruce, how the last time she saw him he'd been a minute away from crying too. She's pretty good at making people who kiss her want to cry.
Maybe she should stop making friends.
"Hey," Ivy says irritably, and when Selina turns she can tell the girl's been trying to get her attention. There's a resentful look in her eyes that makes Selina want to complain that it's not her fault Harley kissed her. "You're really a magnet for the cute ones, huh? Wonder what your boyfriend would think."
Selina exhales. She's seen two guys get shot, been arrested, and kissed a girl in the last hour alone, and she's really not in the mood to deal with jealous, pissy ten-year-olds. "Don't tell Bruce, Ivy."
"Hmph," Ivy grumbles. "Maybe I won't. If you bust us both out of here."
They're out in ten minutes. Jim Gordon never even showed up.
After, she takes Ivy back to Gordon's girlfriend's apartment. Selina thinks maybe it's time the two of them worked out their differences, now Harley's gone.
Still, she can't rub the red from her lips for almost two weeks.
)(
The streets are cold at night, but the hub isn't safe anymore, and Selina's decided to ditch the apartment just for tonight, throw the ugly ones off her trail before going back again. She's got at least three cats curled around her inside the grate, so at least there's some body heat.
She's almost dozed off when someone kicks the grate, and she hits her head jumping up. "What the hell-"
A familiar voice says, "It's her. There's cats."
And suddenly, Harley's face, illuminated white in the city lights, is turned upside down to meet her. She's bent over, and her pigtails brush the gravel. "Cat! We've been looking for you."
Selina checks her watch, which is perpetually broken and stuck at 3:04. "It's three am! And I thought you were under house arrest, Harley."
"Snuck out," Harley says proudly, setting herself right again and waving Selina out of the grates. "Found Ivy at the hub. Come on, we're gonna look at the stars."
But Selina's not feeling romantic tonight. "We can look at the stars whenever we want. Let me sleep."
"Get out of there," Ivy says bluntly. "We're your friends and we want to look at the stars. You can parkour your way onto the roof, you love doing that."
Well. She does.
Five minutes later, they're all on the roof of the nearest building, laying on their backs. Harley's in pajamas, which makes Selina think she's probably not gonna be able to stick around long.
In the dark, Selina can feel Harley's hand nudge hers, with the intention of being held. She's almost about to push it away when she sees the bruises lacing just above her wrist, and doesn't have the heart.
Just as their hands link, a star flashes across the sky, in a thin white streak through the smog. Harley gasps.
"Quick, we have to make a wish," says Ivy's soft voice from Harley's other side. "Cat, you go first."
This is dumb, but there's nothing not dumb about lying on a roof, holding hands, looking up at the stars. So Selina says, "I wish... when I grow up, I'll be rich."
Maybe not Bruce's kind of rich, but rich enough. Enough to live on her own, wear jewels and nice clothes, take care of all her cats, go out to lunch and get three different kinds of dessert. Be a mysterious uninvited guest at the rich-people fundraisers, in an evening gown and diamonds, who keeps the host distracted all night.
Ivy's voice cuts across her reverie. "I wish, when I'm older, that I have a lot of plants, and every boy in the world is scared of me."
It's something Ivy would wish for. Creepy, but with something vulnerable hiding inside. Selina looks sideways, to see Harley and Ivy's hands clasped together, to see them both still looking up at the sky.
"I wish," Harley says, and her eyes are sad but her mouth is smiling, "that the three of us will always be together."
In her life, Selina will see a lot of magic, but right now she doesn't even believe in it. Still, for a moment, she closes her eyes, and wishes.
Maybe it comes true.