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jokerownsmysoul · 3 days

Text

soothing away sorrow.

summary: nightmares of the past revisit arthur. he finds his way through them with the help of someone who stays by his side, listening and loving him through it.

warnings: heavy angst, (soft) smut.

word count: 3387

notes: pieces of this were written back in december, other parts in february, and then it all came together when the teaser trailer was released a few weeks ago. it became sort of a response to that. wanting what i've wanted for the past 4.5 years, which is to give arthur all the love and warmth in the world. special thanks to @fleckcmscott for her ongoing support & encouragement! & thanks to anyone/everyone for reading ♡

Birdsong was the new morning alarm as spring arrived in Gotham City. The clocks had sprung forward, making the days stretch longer into night, and the blossoms on the trees had begun to pop. The air was warm. Though smog still hung thickly in the sky, the sun broke through it more often. Though the city seemed a permanent state of gray, the grass was becoming greener, and there were flowers beginning to break through cracks in the pavement.

It was a particularly nice day today, the warmest so far in the year. The warmest feeling came from Arthur’s hand in yours as you walked side-by-side, bumping into each other every few steps as you kept close to one another. You had decided to go for a walk together, to soak up some sun and drink in the fresh air.

Despite the day’s beauty and the day off for both of you, Arthur was quiet. He had been for a few weeks now. This wasn’t uncommon for him, and you tried not to think too much of it, to not worry more than you needed to; but with the way you loved him, you couldn't help yourself.

You looked over at him and watched his eyes fall shut as he took a deep breath in through his nose. His nostrils flared slightly as the breath passed back through. He was focusing on his breathing. You ran a soothing thumb over his knuckles, light as feather, not wanting to pull his focus too much. When he opened his eyes a few breaths later, he threw a glance your way. He still managed to make your heart skip a beat and then make it soar.

A soft smile pulled at your lips instinctually at the look in his eyes before you raised your arm up above your heads. You gripped Arthur’s hand tight as you twirled yourself fast, spinning on your toes until you landed in front of him. It was less of a landing and more of a stumble. He caught you with a soft laugh, making sure you didn’t trip again over your own two feet, guiding you to the side of the walkway. You came to a standstill together. You took a small bow and he offered you a melancholy smile that you knew was only for show.

You leaned in and kissed the upturned corner of his mouth.

“Are you okay?” you asked in a hush before pulling away to look up at him. He nodded, but the look in his eyes gave him away. Try as he might, he couldn’t hide himself from you. But now wasn’t the time to counter him. You reached for his hands where they had been hanging at his sides and held them between you.

“Have any other errands you want to run? Any other stops we should make while we’re out?”

He thought it over. “Oh, I used the last coffee filter this morning. We should stop and get some more.”

Luckily the corner store close by had some in stock. Arthur grabbed a box of those while you browsed. You grabbed a bottle of hand soap that was on sale and the last box of dryer sheets on the shelf.

When you stepped back outside, Arthur shoved the hand holding the bag of necessities in his pocket and took yours in the other. A gust of wind billowed by suddenly, blowing his curls awry and drawing a large cloud bank across the sun.

“Oof. It got cold, didn't it?” you asked, wishing you had grabbed your jacket.

“A little bit.”

You watched his bottom lip wobble as a shiver ran down his spine, giving him away yet again. You leaned in to give him another kiss, hoping your lips would offer him a little warmth.

“We better hurry.”

You picked up the pace as rain drops started to fall. It was coming down in sheets by the time you got back to the apartment. Arthur took his damp shirt off and tossed it by the radiator before taking a seat at the dining room table with his journal. He mulled over old notes with a cigarette tucked between his lips, the window next to him cracked open to let the smoke out and the cool air in.

You busied yourself, wanting to make sure he had the space he needed. You gathered the damp clothes and tossed them in a basket, heading to the laundry room in the building’s basement. When night fell, you popped some leftovers in the oven. There was an episode of Murray Franklin you had missed earlier in the week but had recorded on an old VHS tape, so you popped that in to watch while you ate together. He didn’t laugh as much as he usually did, but he did give a chuckle here and there. He didn’t finish his plate.

He had mentioned a shower earlier, so you insisted on doing the dishes. You ushered him away from the kitchen and he finally gave in to your insistence with a loving eye roll. When you finished the dishes and cleaning up the kitchen, you turned the T.V. off and went to the bedroom to get it ready for bedtime. You turned down the sheets, making an inviting space for Arthur to fall into when he joined you. You set a record on the turntable. Some nights you liked to put music on to fall asleep to - just to listen to, and sometimes, to sing along to. Singing to each other like a lullaby, to calm the voices in your heads, or singing just to make each other laugh.

You turned the record on when he made it there. He sat sideways on his side of the bed, feet still planted on the floor, and flipped his journal open in his lap to jot down one last thought for the day.

In a safer, more private place now, you decided to check on him again. “You sure you’re okay? You seemed quiet today,” you asked as you crawled into the bed on your knees, going towards him and putting your hands on his shoulders. You pecked the prominent blade on his left side before beginning to massage them lightly.

“Mhm. I’m fine.”

When he finished his thought, he set his journal down on the nightstand and laid his palms on the edge of the mattress. He let out a sigh as your hands worked his muscles and rolled his shoulders with your movements, willing them to relax just a little bit. You leaned in to sing a line from the song that was playing in his ear before giving him one last squeeze.

He clicked the lamp off as you buried yourselves under the covers. He leaned over to press a kiss to your forehead, a gesture of gratitude for working his weary joints, before he laid down fully. He slid himself so that he was laying on his side, head propped up in his palm. You reached your hand for his in the dark and he found it, holding it between you.

“I can’t wait to hear what you’ve been working on.”

“I hope I can get this one punchline figured out. It’s been giving me trouble for weeks.”

“You’ll get it. Sometimes we just have to wait for the right time for things to come to us.”

“I guess so.”

“Maybe we can go to Pogo’s sometime this week. I can call tomorrow to see if there are any open reservations. It's been a while since we've been.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

Your eyes started to fall shut and you struggled to reopen them. You yawned as he let out a sigh.

“You sure nothing's on your mind?”

“Nope. I'm...I'm just tired is all.”

You relentingly accepted his answer for now, hoping sleep was tugging at him the way it was for you. “Sleep well, sweetheart,” you whispered as you dozed, drifting off before the record finished.

* * * * *

The next morning, it wasn't the birds that woke you, but the feeling of soft, calloused fingers gently skimming down your neck. You shifted and stretched, peaking your eyes open at Arthur. Awake, he met your gaze anxiously. Pale sunshine had just started to seep through the curtains. It sparkled in his eyes, but exhaustion resided in every deep wrinkle adorning them. You reached over to brush a thumb across his crow’s feet.

“Hey, you. How’d you sleep?”

His hand dropped, as if embarrassed now. He gave a one-shouldered shrug. Your stomach dropped as you watched his jaw clench. It was clear tension had been building inside him throughout his sleep, and now it had made itself at home in the fibers of his being.

“What is it, baby?”

His brow furrowed as he took a breath in but couldn’t quite let it back out. You reached out and ran your hand up and down his arm, hoping to soothe him with a gentle tone and touch.

“You can tell me,” you whispered, sitting up slightly to inch closer.

“I had a nightmare,” he finally confessed, voice hoarse and thick as his breath left him in a heavy sigh.

Your heart twinged at the childlike simplicity of the confession. “I’m sorry, Arthur.” You wondered what to do next, what you could say. But you knew the answer wasn’t in you; it was in him. All you could do was give him the space, give him the shoulder to lean on and the ears that listened.

“You want to come over here and tell me about it?”

The more he closed in on himself, the more you craved to be let in. You laid back down your back and guided him towards you, bringing his head to rest on your chest. He let you. Slowly his arms came up and clung to you. You brought your hand to his bedhead, nails gently grazing his scalp, fingertips patiently threading through the waves and working through sparse knots in his curls.

“You only need to talk about it if you want. If it’ll help.” You paused, mulling over whether to say more. What you really wanted to say. You opened your mouth before you could stop yourself and continued. “You don’t have to hold onto this all by yourself, Arthur. You can let me help you hold it.”

You laid in silence for a while longer. Slowly but surely, you felt him relax into you as he listened to your breath, felt the dull thud of your heartbeat. It seemed to calm him and let the tension ease. Finally, he spoke again.

“I was back in Arkham.”

“Back in the hospital?”

“Yeah. Everything just felt so…so real. It was like I had never left.” His hands gripped you tighter. They slipped up and down your sides, repetitive motions of feeling you fully there, solidly in his grasp.

Tears pricked your eyes but you blinked them back. You knew his time in Arkham State Hospital had been difficult for a lot of reasons. In the back of your mind, you knew there was always the possibility he may need to be readmitted, and even though the thought was unbearable, you knew it would be something that could be necessary. You wanted him to know that no matter what, you were here to stay and that if that were to happen, it would be okay. You wouldn't leave him.

“It was always so cold there. Even the water from the showers. The blankets they gave us scratched my skin. It just always felt...uncomfortable, and I still can't shake that feeling sometimes. I still have nightmares of being dragged through the halls if I started to laugh and couldn't stop. There were some guards there that actually thought it was all an act.”

“An act?” you questioned, trying not to sound in too much disbelief.

“Yeah. They’d ask me if it was part of my clown act, if I just was practicing for when I got out. They didn’t care that it was embarrassing or that it hurt.”

“That’s terrible. Were they all like that?”

“Not everyone.” He pondered a bit. “Some of the staff was nice. But a lot of them just didn't know how to help someone like me. So they'd take me back to my room, or any room, away from the other patients until it stopped. I know the medications and the therapy sessions helped in the end, but there was so much else. They’d come back and I’d be hitting my head against the wall just to feel some other kind of pain. Just to try and wake myself up from what seemed like a nightmare. Or to knock myself out so I wouldn’t have to face it the fact that it wasn't a nightmare. It was real. It was my life."

“Arthur." You angled your head down to kiss the top of his. You hated that, no matter what you did, how hard you loved him, you couldn't undo the wounds of the past. You would give anything to heal them.

“The worst part of the dream was not knowing it wasn’t real. And it just scared me because I still find myself worrying that one day I’ll wake up, and you won’t be next to me. That I’ll walk through the door and you won’t be here, and you won’t ever come home. By choice, or because you were never here at all.”

You watched his head go up and down with your breath and tried to keep it controlled, not wanting him to sense the agonizing worry that coursed through you. “Never here at all?” you asked, continuing to run your hands through his hair.

“It wouldn’t be the first time I imagined something like that. Like this.”

You paused and contemplated what to do next. What you could say to ease the worry. You shifted so that he lifted himself back up and you could lay next to him, side by side. You brought your hands to his face and cupped his cheeks, looking into his eyes. Sadness welled in them, an unshed pool full to the brim. You could see the fear in them from scars that would last a lifetime.

You leaned in closer to him, sensing the heaviness of confession still catching in his breath. “I’m here,” you whispered before kissing him. Finally you felt the tears fall. They dripped down and slipped between where your cheeks pressed together, meeting your lips. You tasted the salt and kissed him harder. You pulled away only to whisper it again. “I’m here.”

Finally his lips pressed back. Soft hands came up to cup over yours. Your fingers locked together as he rolled himself on top of you.

“I’m right here. I’m right here with you,” you peppered in between his fervent kisses. “I’m not going anywhere.”

A new tension started to build. You spent your sweet time making sweeter love, basking in the feeling of each other; basking in this feeling that you made for each other, that you made with each other. After a while, Arthur pulled out of you.

“I can't finish. But I want to see you.”

With his lead, your still-interlocked fingers glided down from where they had landed above your head to meet the tender ache between your legs. You reached up with your other hand to brush tumbling curls out of his eyes, tucking them behind his ears so he could see you. His fingers unclasped from yours and slipped gently inside you. He positioned himself above you as you arched your back into his touch.

He listened to the hilt of your breath leaving you in gasps, felt the responsive roll of your hips moving in time with his wrist. His cock twitched at the way you whimpered when his thumb gently brushed your clit. He wanted to remember this feeling forever, the way you moaned his name, and hold onto it for whenever the bad thoughts threatened to overcome the good. For whenever doubt clouded over his better judgment. He pressed his forehead to yours when you finally came, committing this moment to memory.

Your hands circled his neck and you pulled him to you. You held each other in the afterglow, clinging to each other’s shaking limbs.

You caught your breath and held him closer - as close as he could possibly get. You thanked him for letting you in, for sharing what still haunted him. You told him how this is what you wanted, to help him hold what was so heavy. He looked at you, and you knew he understood.

"How do you feel?" you asked, fingers finding their way to his hair once again.

"A little better. I feel like when I tell you these things, you really listen. You really hear me."

"I do, Arthur. I may not be able to fully understand everything you feel, but I understand you. I love you so much. Please keep talking to me. Please keep letting me in. Especially when it's hard."

You laid in bed and talked some more before getting up, cleaning yourselves off, and heading to a nearby diner for a short stack and cup of coffee. Sun streamed through the grimy glass windows and warmed you as you ate. You smiled, watching him take a sweet, sticky bite. His sorrows lingered but he seemed a little lighter now. He looked so beautiful in the morning light. Shadows shifted with the sun and you couldn't help but fall a little more in love as they danced across his features. Outside, the city buzzed. Sirens wailed, and cars honked at people jay-walking nearby, but muffled chatter and laughter filtered in from people passing, and the birds were still singing.

“You want to know something?” you asked as your tongue darted out to lick syrup from your bottom lip.

“Hm?” he hummed through another swig of coffee.

“You give me a smile that no one else can give me.”

His brows knitted adorably, a curious but genuine smile widening across his own face. “What do you mean?”

“I mean…I feel different when you make me smile. Yeah, it may look the same as any other…but…you give me a smile that I can feel all the way down in my heart. I know that sounds cheesy, but…I don’t care, Arthur.” You laughed, shrugged to punctuate your indifference as you laid that out on the table. “It’s true.”

His own curious smile transformed into a beaming grin. The realist smile he had given you in weeks. He reached to take your hand across the table.

“That’s all I’ve ever wanted to do.”

You each got a refill of coffee and continued talking about nothing in particular. Your feet brushed against each other under the table as you discussed what you’d still need to do at home, what the week held, what you wanted to make for dinner that night. Suddenly Arthur released his hand from yours and starting to search his pockets.

“Do you have a pen?” he asked, still patting himself down.

You dug around in your handbag and pulled one out, handing it to him. You watched as he rapidly scrawled out something onto a spare napkin. As he wrote, the waitress stopped by to drop off the check. He barely registered her, reading over what he wrote and nodding. Finally, he met your eager and expectant gaze with his own of relief.

“I think this might be the punchline."

“We better get home so you can try it out.”

You dropped some cash on the check and headed for the door. He held it for you before offering his arm to hold as you made your way back home. The walk was quiet, but a different kind of quiet than the day before. You held him tight and thanked whatever was responsible for bringing him into your life.

You knew that everything wouldn’t magically be okay, but not everything needed to be okay. Him sharing what scared him the most, the things that kept him up at night, being comfortable to let you in – that was a start. And it was only the beginning.

The door was open now, and you could walk onward through it together.

tag list: @mama-mischief @fleckcmscott @ralugraphics @jokerownsmysoul @ajokeformur-ray @forever-fleck @soulsdontbreaktheybeeend @flowerglitterwoman

#There's nothing more beautiful than when the right time and inspiration to finish a story we've been keeping in the drawer for a long time #Finally come <3 #He always knows when the right time is #This is so so beautiful 🥹 I love that we all are taking something as worry-inducing we weren't ready for as a sequel only to give him #even more love and stories than we already do <3 and to see so many stories and drawings inspired by just a little trailer #is wholeheartedly beautiful 🥹 can't wait what a movie will do #Your Arthur is always on point girl <3 I could imagine him say those words so easily #Idk how to explain it but sometimes I read dialogues whose words feel like they're coming straight from his mouth #And in this story I felt it so vividly #He was just Arthur 🤎🤎 giving him love in times like this is a little mending patch on the heart both ours and his #It was perfect the pace of how much time he needed to let the reader in. That was SO Arthur and it was beautiful and gentle #I bet thousands of rainbows would flow inside him if someone told him they have a specific smile just for him<3 a smile of the heart #which is the only one to matter. Not only his dream to make laugh coming true but knowing that said smile is special and was born for him #SIGH!!!! beautiful story girl as always #I've so many stories of clown friends I've to catch up on but I will 🥹 little by little #i admit I've been a little lazy sloth for a very long time on this front but I'll read everything be the last thing I do #Fic rec #🌹#The little segment before and after the middle angsty part is beautifulll too #I love when stories don't focus just on a single part but we can see entire days of their lives #It makes it feel more real and closer #And it isn't a you piece if there isn't even a small NSFW little part 😌#Also the way they reacted to Arthur not being able to finish as if it was a ordinary thing and no big deal - yessssssss #It *is* a ordinary thing and no big deal!!!!! Sometimes it happens and it's normal so let's go to the rest of our days #Always beautiful to see it in a story

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