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"Look what I got ya, Red!"
Harley climbed into the greenhouse through the window, as was her custom, even if she'd had a key for a while. Pamela figured it'd become a sort of tradition at this point and chose not to fight it.
"I stopped by that banker's place. Remember the banker I was telling you about? With the--"
"The jewelry collection?"
"Right!" Harley grinned, clearly delighted with Pamela's memory. "So I stopped by his place to... y'know. Get acquainted with it."
"And you got me...?" Pamela tried to steer Harley back to the topic at hand, but even she knew it was mostly a lost cause. Harley would meander for as long as she needed to, and she'd arrive at the actual message when she felt like it and not a second before that. That was tradition, too.
"Well, I wasn't gonna take anything on the first visit! I'm way smarter than that," Harley tapped her temple and winked at Pamela, "but when I was walkin' past this guy's office I saw this! And I knew it belonged with you."
Harley's triumphant smile contrasted sharply with what she held in her hands as if it was the shiniest trinket she could've possibly brought Pamela. Her face looked like she was hearing a rousing drum roll in her head. Her hands held... a clay pot with some dirt inside?
"I uh..." Pamela struggled to find the right words. She knew a little gratefulness could go a long way, but she was a bit too stunned to engage the polite area of her brain. She'd been friends with Harley for long enough that she was pretty sure she actually understood the beautiful mess that was the shorter woman's mind. But sometimes Harley still caught her completely off guard.
Bringing her a dirty pot as a present was one of those times.
"Thank you. For such a... well-crafted pot? Looks... sturdy."
"What?" Harley frowned, looking at Pamela like she'd grown a second head and then down at the pot as if she was worried she might have shown Pamela the wrong one by accident. "Oh! No, no, no, Red, look!" She took a couple steps forward, officially invading Pamela's personal space as she held the pot up so the taller woman could take a closer look. "See?" Harley pointed at a particular spot inside the pot. "There's someone in there!"
Green eyes narrowed as Pamela looked in, and the line of her jaw hardened when she saw what Harley was pointing to. A sad-looking, nearly dead little stick that had probably been a healthy green stem at some point, pitifully poking out of the dirt.
"Bastard," Pamela said simply, nearly spitting out the word as she gently took the clay pot from Harley. People let plants die as if they didn't matter at all. They weren't much better to animals, but at least most people were on board with seeing animal abuse as a crime. Plants, though? Nobody cared about plants. She figured it had a lot to do with them not crying out in pain. If they could feel their pain like she did...
She placed the pot on a nearby table, in a spot where it'd get all the sunlight it'd need. The plant looked more dead than alive at this point, but Pamela knew it was nothing she couldn't fix. She'd just breathe a bit of life into it, and--
"Hey, Pammy. Red? Hi. Remember me?" Harley flashed her a goofy smile that never failed to charm Pamela and take the edge off whatever was currently making her see red.
"Sorry. Got a little carried away, didn't I? Thank you for bringing it to me. Most people wouldn't even have noticed it."
Harley shrugged. There was something about the look on her face that made Pamela think if Harley was capable of blushing, she would've been doing just that. "Eh, no biggie. Greenery's kinda been on my mind lately, y'know? What with spendin' time here in the jungle with you."
She motioned around the greenhouse, which was of course full of the vegetation Pamela loved so much. Plants and flowers everywhere, claiming every inch of the space. Just the way Pamela liked it. Just the way it was meant to be.
"Still. Thank you, Harley."
"Aw, c'mon, stop it! Gonna give me a big head and mess up my balance."
Pamela let out a quiet chuckle at the mental imagery and focused on the plant - what was left of it, anyway - instead. She could fix its sad state in no time flat. She just had to touch it and--
"Uh... Pammy?"
"Yes, Harley," her tone was drier now. She was grateful, but her patience had a limit and Harley's constant interruptions were getting very close to it.
"Can I keep it?"
What?
Pamela turned around, forgetting the plant for now to stare at the shorter woman and try to make sense of whatever she was trying to say. "Can you keep what?"
"The plant!"
Green eyes blinked, slowly, just once. She would never fully understand Harley Quinn, would she?
Harley sighed, as if she couldn't believe she had to clarify what she meant because it was so obvious already. "Can it be my plant?"
"You want to... take it home with you?"
"No! No way!" Harley shook her head emphatically. "It'll live here, with you and its buddies. But I'll take care of it! It'll be my plant."
Pamela couldn't find the word to say exactly how Harley's request made her feel. It was... strangely charming. Endearing, almost. Something else.
"I'd be fine with that. You come over all the time anyway."
"YAY!" Harley bounced on her feet in a way that made Pamela fear a hug was incoming, but it ended up as a false alarm. "I'm gonna call it Cupcake."
"Cupcake", Pamela echoed, making no effort to hide just how ridiculous she found it.
"Right! Gonna be good to Pammy, ain't ya, Cupcake?" Harley ever-so-gently tapped the little dry stick, "Red, you can't do your green... thing with it, okay?"
"Come again?"
"Y'know, the thing! Where you'll make plants grow with magic."
"It's not magic, Harley, it's--"
"Oh, I know, I know," Harley said, waving her hand dismissively, "but you can't do it. Not to Cupcake, all right? Cupcake's my plant. I wanna take care of it myself."
Pamela hesitated for a moment. Ultimately, she figured there was no reason she couldn't let Harley give it a shot. She could always intervene if she absolutely had to.
"All right. Your plant. I promise."
***
"Ugh. Do I have to?"
Harley eyed the needle with a mixture of dread and disgust in her eyes. Pamela pointedly ignored the way Harley's bottom lip stuck out in a pitiful pout. Cute. But not cute enough to change her mind.
"Yes, you have to. It's for your own safety." Pamela filled up the syringe with a light green serum and tapped it with one of her fingertips to make sure there were no air bubbles within.
"But Pammy," Harley had a way of saying Pamela's name that made something tighten in a very peculiar way in Pamela's chest, "I'm immune to toxins. To yours, to Mistah J's... No need to get pokey with that thing, y'know? I'm fine!"
Pamela felt her jaw tense. It was an involuntary reaction, she swore. A sort of Pavlovian response to hearing his name coming from Harley.
"I've explained this, remember?" Pamela said, gently nudging Harley's elbow until she relented and held out her arm so Pamela could dab at a spot with an alcohol-soaked cotton ball, "it's not for my toxins, it's for my--"
"Pheromones. I know, I know," Harley rolled her eyes, "but hear me out: I trust ya, Red. All right? I know ya wouldn't do your mind-control love potion thing to me."
Pamela couldn't help but smile. "Not a potion, Harls," and she didn't bother explaining because the way Harley winked at her let her know she'd been joking all along, "but still. We're partners. Think of this as a... partnership contract. Something more solid than trust."
Harley took a moment to consider Pamela's words. There was a slight frown on her face, and then she opened her mouth to argue, but closed it again before any words came out. And then, finally, she made up her mind.
"All right, fine," she said with a dramatic sigh, looking away from her arm and the needle and focusing her gaze on her mallet that rested against a nearby chair instead, "do your thing, Red."
Pamela nodded once. Even if it'd been her idea all along, she hesitated for just a couple of seconds before injecting the serum into Harley's arm. She still thought it was the right thing to do. She hadn't lied when she told Harley it was a sort of contract. A partnership couldn't be equal when one of them had the means to control the other's mind, could it? And yet... maybe she hadn't told Harley the true reason she was receiving this shot.
"All done," Pamela said, placing a small band-aid over the barely-there spot where the needle had been.
"Really?" Harley looked from the band-aid to the discarded syringe and then into Pamela's eyes, amazement written all over her face.
"Wasn't so terrible, was it?"
"Barely even felt it. Ya got some skills, Red!" Harley grinned and hopped down from the table where she'd been sitting, immediately walking over to the small clay pot where her plant was struggling to recover.
"How's it looking?" Pamela asked as she disposed of the needle and tidied up the space around her.
"Sad," Harley said, her own tone as downcast as the little plant in the pot.
Pamela nodded. She knew the plant - Cupcake - wasn't doing great. She cared a great deal about that plant and its recovery. And at some point in the last couple of weeks, she'd had an epiphany and realized her concern wasn't just for the plant's well-being. No. She wanted the plant to thrive because she knew any other outcome would break Harley's heart.
And that. That was what kept her up at night thinking about the plant and its progress.
Which brought her back to the true reason she'd insisted on making Harley immune to her pheromones. It wasn't just about trust and an equal partnership, even if those were very real and logical points to make. What Pamela truly wanted, if she forced herself to be perfectly honest, was to know this was real. This... friendship they shared. She wanted to know without a shadow of a doubt that Harley's smiles were real. The way she looked at Pamela, the way she invaded Pamela's personal space, the way she wanted to spend seemingly all her time with Pamela. Pamela wanted to know it was all real.
"Pammy?" Harley's concerned voice made Pamela turn around to look at her, and the look in the blonde's face made something twist uncomfortably in Pamela's chest. "Is Cupcake gonna be all right?"
There was something deeply moving in seeing a woman with plenty of blood on her hands look like she was on the verge of tears over a dry little plant's well-being.
"Of course, Harl," Pamela walked over and looked into the pot, "you're doing great. It just needs some time."
And maybe the serum wasn't the only thing Pamela Isley hadn't been completely honest about. Because if she had truly honored her promise and stayed away from Cupcake - oh, that name - it would very much have been dead by now. But a little help wasn't a big deal. It counted as a white lie, right?
A green lie.
"Wait. Look. Red, look!" Harley pointed at the spot where Cupcake's stem met the dirt. And right there, if you squinted and looked very closely, you could almost see the tiniest hint of a new leaf pushing through. "Cupcake's alive!"
Harley grinned, bouncing on her feet for just a second before she turned around and threw her arms around Pamela's neck, pulling her into a tight hug that nearly threw the taller woman off-balance.
A real smile, and a real hug. Who cared about a little green lie or two?
***
"Ain't she a beauty?"
Harley proudly held up the brand new pot where Cupcake now lived and thrived. Harley had painted the clay pot herself, a mishmash of poorly drawn green vines and diamonds painted black and red. It toed the line between beauty and ugliness in a way that made Pamela think it may very well have been a work of art. It certainly made her feel things, didn't it?
"So Cupcake's a she?"
"Yep," Harley nodded confidently, placing Cupcake and its pot on the perfect spot where the sun hit just right, "one of us, Red. A survivor."
Harley wasn't looking at her, but Pamela didn't need to see her face to imagine the look in Harley's eyes. A survivor, indeed. And maybe that's why she let her guard down for just a moment, because she was too busy thinking about Harley and her life outside the safe haven of Pamela's greenhouse to fully engage the walls she always kept around herself.
Maybe that's why her hand moved without her permission, hovering right next to Harley's for a split second before Pamela came to her senses and put it back in her pocket, where it belonged. Not on - or in - Harley's hand.
"Hey, Red?" Something in the tone that echoed right under the surface of Harley's question let Pamela know she'd noticed exactly what had almost happened between them.
"Yes, Harl?"
Harley's pinky finger lightly brushed against the fabric of Pamela's shirt, right above the waistband of her pants.
Pamela's breath caught in her throat.
"What happens if I touch ya?"
"What do you mean?"
"If I touch ya. Skin to skin." Harley's voice sounded different all of a sudden. Just a little lower than normal. Her eyes looked slightly darker, too, when they looked up into Pamela's. "What happens then?"
"Nothing," Pamela said, pretending they were only talking about her toxins, "you're immune, Harl. Remember?"
Harley nodded. Pamela watched her worry at her bottom lip with her teeth. She watched her eyes roam down Pamela's body until they settled on the hand in her pocket. She watched Harley's own hand move towards Pamela's, fingers hesitating mid-air for a second before gently wrapping around Pamela's wrist.
"Can I?"
Now it was Pamela's turn to nod as she let Harley pull her hand out of her pocket and hold it in her own. Harley looked at it for a moment, almost as if she was seeing it for the very first time. As if they hadn't been partners in crime for so long now each other's hands should've been more than old news.
Harley started by tracing Pamela's fingers, and then the vines on the back of her hand. She followed the swirly lines with her own fingertips, across Pamela's hand and past her wrist, into the sensitive, soft skin of her forearm.
"Pammy?" It was barely above a whisper. Pamela couldn't remember the last time she'd breathed.
"Yeah, Harley?"
"What happens if someone else touches ya?"
Pamela smirked, even if her heartbeat was still very much all over the place. What would happen if someone else - anyone else - tried to do what Harley was doing right then?
"They die," Pamela said matter-of-factly, with maybe a hint of poorly hidden amusement in her voice. She wouldn't have been able to explain why the thought of someone dropping dead after touching her was funny, but it was.
And of course, Harley let out a quiet giggle that reminded Pamela of the fact that she didn't need to explain. Harley got it. Of course she did.
"And what if ya touch me, Red?" Harley's eyes found Pamela's again. "What then?"
Pamela could've said something. She could've said nothing would happen. But instead, she found herself reaching up to tuck a few flyaway hairs behind Harley's ear, letting her fingers brush against the soft skin of Harley's cheek on their way back down towards her neck. And then-
Then an obnoxious horn seemed to shatter the air between and around them, its festive fanfare making Harley drop Pamela's hand and take a step back.
"Shit," wide eyes looked around the room in search of a clock until they landed on the watch on her own wrist, "I forgot I told Puddin' I'd meet him ten minutes ago."
Pamela wanted to say something - do something - but she was rooted in place, her heart still struggling to recover from their moment and its abrupt end.
"I'll see ya soon, Pammy," Harley said, a twinge of sadness dimming her otherwise wide smile, "keep Cupcake company for me!"
***
"I don't wanna talk, Red. Don't make me talk."
Pamela pressed her lips together and took in the sight in front of her. The bruises, the dried tears, the scrapes, the spot of blood on a swollen lip. The cut right above Harley's right eyebrow, red and angry and still bleeding.
She looked until she couldn't do it anymore, and then she clenched her eyes shut and forced herself to breathe. She wanted to kill him. She wanted him dead more than she wanted anything else in the world. But she knew Harley needed her here, with her. Revenge would have to wait.
"Is she getting a flower?"
"What?"
Pamela opened her eyes and saw Harley looking at Cupcake in her homemade pot. The little plant kept growing, with a little help from Harley's well-intentioned care and a lot of help from Pamela and the Green. And yes - she had a little bud which looked about ready to bloom.
"Sit down, Harl," Pamela sighed, shaking her head, "let's take care of you first. Then we can look into the flower, all right?"
Harley didn't seem too convinced, but she hopped onto the nearby table anyway, one fingertip gently tapping the still closed bud as if she wanted to reassure the little plant that she was going to be all right.
Pamela gathered her first aid supplies and arranged them on the table next to Harley, focusing on the task at hand instead of the many slow and painful ways she wanted to end that bastard's life. Harley needed her here, now. And that's where she had to stay.
"Let me see that cut," she said, one hand gently cupping Harley's jaw to turn her face so the light would hit the small gash on her forehead. Pamela frowned at the sight.
"That bad, huh?" Harley tried to sound like she was teasing, but for once it fell flat. There was nothing funny about the situation, and even Harley Quinn could tell.
"The lip's not too bad," Pamela said, "but that cut's going to need at least a couple of stitches."
Harley winced in anticipation, and the thought of hurting her was enough to make something twist in Pamela's chest. She'd seen Harley get far worse injuries than these a million times before. She'd seen her laugh it all off like she was made of rubber and nothing could ever hurt her. But this was different. He'd done this.
"Hey," Pamela said, covering Harley's hand with her own and giving it a gentle squeeze, "I'm here. You're safe."
Harley just nodded and looked down at the plant on the table next to her. And in that moment, Pamela would've given anything to be able to breathe life into her, just like she did with that little plant. But that wasn't how things worked.
"Don't worry about the pain," Pamela said as she walked towards a nearby cabinet and started going through the vials it contained, "I'll give you a shot of the really good stuff. You won't feel a thing."
Light pink vial in hand, Pamela winked at Harley and hoped that'd be enough to lighten up the mood just a little bit.
It wasn't.
"Here," she said, opening the vial and offering it to her friend, "drink up. It'll stop hurting right away."
Harley took the vial from Pamela and studied it for a moment, holding it up in the light. But instead of drinking it, she placed it on the table next to the other medical supplies.
"Where'd ya get that, Pammy?"
Pamela's eyes narrowed slightly in confusion. "What do you mean? I didn't get it anywhere. I made it."
Slowly, Harley's gaze moved from the vial to Pamela's hand, and then up, up, up, until she was looking straight into green eyes.
"Ya made it?" Harley tapped a spot in the middle of Pamela's chest, and Pamela knew exactly what she meant. Did she make it in the lab, or did she make it?
Pamela nodded.
"Why'd ya give me that lil' bottle then?"
"What do y-"
"Ya don't give Bats and the others their poison in lil pink bottles, do ya, Red?"
Oh.
Pamela licked her lips, her eyes subconsciously glancing down at Harley's mouth.
"Right," Harley said, a smirk slowly appearing on her lips, "that's what I mean."
"You know your lip's hurt, right?"
"I'll live, Pammy."
So after a moment of pause - more to savor the moment than anything else - Pamela leaned in and kissed Harley, gently, letting the blonde set the pace until the anesthetic kicked in.
And once it did... well. By then they were both a little too distracted to think about stitches or injuries or anything that wasn't each other and their kiss. Harley's fingers slid into red hair, greedily pulling Pamela closer and closer until they were pressed flush against each other, and even that didn't feel like they were close enough. And then, just as Pamela's hand started its trek up Harley's thigh...
"Look!" It took Pamela a couple of seconds to focus blown pupils enough to see what Harley was excitedly pointing out, "Cupcake got her flower!"
"Good for her," Pamela said with a grin as she captured Harley's lips with her own once again. For once, a plant didn't seem like the most important thing in the world.
***
"I've left him."
Pamela looked up from her microscope and stared at the woman on the other side of the greenhouse. They'd been sharing one of their comfortable silences for the better part of an hour, and Pamela hadn't been expecting Harley to speak at all. Let alone to say... that.
"What?"
"I've left him, Red."
Pamela sighed as she stood up and walked closer to her friend. As much as she wanted to believe her, they'd been through this before. Harley got hurt, she left him, Pamela helped her heal, and then she inevitably went back to him. It was a destructive, toxic cycle Pamela had no idea how to break without losing Harley's friendship in the process.
"Harl..."
"No. I mean it. I've left him. For good." Harley held Pamela's gaze, and Pamela saw something in her eyes that she'd never seen before when talking about him. Something like... confidence. "I told him right before Bats got him."
Pamela narrowed her eyes just so. There was something in Harley's tone and demeanor that made her think Batman had had a bit of help from the inside when it came to getting that bastard this time.
"He's in Arkham?"
Harley nodded.
"And you...?"
"I wanna stay here, Pammy. With you."
Pamela stood where she was, unable to make up her mind. She wanted to believe what she was hearing. She wanted Harley. Hell, she loved Harley. She'd loved her for so long, in fact, that a part of her refused to believe this was real.
"No rush, Red," Harley reached for Pamela's hand and tugged lightly, encouraging her to come closer, "Bats said he's gonna be locked up for a real long time."
"And when he gets out?"
Harley shrugged. There was a hint of embarrassment in the way she smiled, like she knew Pamela had every reason to doubt things would truly be as easy as they seemed this time.
"I dunno. Maybe we'll be off in a tropical island by then."
Pamela chuckled. "A tropical island?"
"Wherever ya want," Harley said, and in the silence that followed Pamela could hear her own heartbeat telling her how real this whole thing truly was, "I love ya, Pammy. I really do."
Pamela's eyes fluttered closed for a moment as she let the words wash over her. Harley loved her. Harley wanted to be with her. Harley--
"Have you been lyin' to me?"
"What?" Pamela opened her eyes to see Harley looking at Cupcake and the very nearly radiant flower she'd just sprouted. Crap.
"Have you been keepin' her alive all this time?"
Pamela kept her best poker face on, but she felt her cheeks warm up with guilt.
"I have no idea what you're talking about, Harley."
The blonde tilted her head to one side, eyeing Pamela as if she was trying to read the truth in her eyes. And then, without saying a word, she leaned in and kissed her - soft and sweet, and keeping an eye on the plant next to them. And as if on cue, the second Harley deepened the kiss, a second flower bloomed next to the first.
"Oh, Pammy," she sighed, and Pamela didn't know if it was the tone of Harley's voice or the look in Harley's eye that was making her knees feel weak, "ya better buckle up, baby, because I'm about to turn this place into even more of a jungle."