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Overhead the unsheathed claws of the trees raked against a sky suffocating under the weight of snow. Below, brittle spikes of frosted grass framed a driveway lightly glazed with ice, and from the warmth of the fireside, Oswald watched one of the staff navigate the worst of the ice on his way back from collecting the mail. By the time he made it as far as the study to present the meager pile of mail on a silver slaver, the man was pale from the cold and barely able to suppress his shivers.
Dismissing him, Oswald eyed a letter from a realtor keen to know whether he planned on selling the mansion, then a bank statement addressed to his dead father before picking up a red envelope addressed simply to ‘Oswald’. Tearing it open, he discovered a Christmas card adorned with a cartoon of a penguin wearing a pair of antlers. The speech bubble emerging from its beak said “Joy” in the least joyful manner possible.
The message inside was handwritten. Something to get you in the Christmas spirit… It was signed from Jim Gordon. Under the signature, squashed along the bottom as if he’d not planned on writing it: How about a drink? Meet at 8pm on the 24th by the old bandstand.
He wouldn’t go.
The city was bitter with cold and Oswald didn’t need to spend the night before Christmas freezing on a bench only for Gordon to stand him up. Propping the card on his desk, Oswald made to throw the envelope in the fire, almost missing the tatty orange card that fluttered onto the hearth.
No bigger than a credit card, Oswald read the words Get Out of Jail Freeand laughed.
He still wouldn’t go.
Gotham always looked good by night – at least to Oswald, who thrived on the uncertainty of the shadows and reveled in the violence the dark invited. Tonight, though, the incandescence of Christmas flooded the streets, washing away the shadows and bringing with it a facade of goodwill and an over-abundance of naivety. Strolling through the park, Oswald saw four successful lifts before pausing to admire the crowd that the carolers drew – and the art of the thieves who dipped a hand into their carrier bags as their marks sang along.
A different kind of beauty to the one he usually admired, but a pleasure nonetheless.
The benches around the bandstand were mostly occupied – some by parents wearily watching their charges hurl bread at the ducks in the lake, others by couples who’d noticed the mistletoe dangling from the garlands looped around the eaves of the roof. Sickened by the sight of so much snuggling, Oswald lurked by the trunk of a nearby tree.
And waited.
As night settled more heavily over the park, the parents took their children home for something more substantial than hot chocolate and roasted chestnuts and the amorous couples conceded victory to the cold. Before the vendor moved on to somewhere more lucrative, Oswald bought a coffee and a cone of hot chestnuts and took a seat on one of the benches.
And waited.
Long after the coffee had cooled enough to drink and all that was left of his food was the salt on the paper, Oswald took his phone from his pocket. Nothing. Putting it back, he scowled up at the swollen blue-black bruise of snow clouds yet to break.
Time to leave.
***
“Aw, don’t be such a Scrooge…” Jim fended Harvey off as the other man pawed at him from the bar stool. “It’s Christmas Eve and we’ve just pulled a double.”
“You’ve pulled at least six doubles in the last hour,” Jim said, nodding at the empty glasses lining the bar. “I’ve got places to be.”
“Like where? With who?”
“None of your business.”
Harvey slumped so far forward he nearly fell off his stool as he wagged an unsteady finger at Jim. “If I didn’t know better I’d say you were off to meet a woman.”
“Promise you I’m not.” Jim almost smiled as he turned the collar up on his coat and waved Harvey a farewell.
He was already late and the journey across town made him later by the minute, traffic lights thwarting him at every junction as Jim fought his way through last-minute shoppers, turning away from the brawls that broke out from the bars and onto the streets. Maybe he should have sent a text… but pride had stilled his hand when that decision should have been made, a doubtful little voice whispering that Oswald wouldn’t be there anyway, that to send a message would only show that he cared too much.
Picking up the pace, Jim ran out through a gap in the cars, ignoring the curses hurled at him from the taxi that missed him by a whisker and the sharp scritch of tires from the cyclist braking to avoid a collision. In through the park’s main gate, he slowed to a walk, controling each breath as it clouded on the air and running a hand through his hair to set it straight.
Long before he reached the bandstand, Jim could see there was no one on any of the benches. Just to be sure, he walked round the railings until he found himself back where he started. Sighing, Jim sat down, weary from his shift, weary from running across town, weary from hope.
He didn’t even know why he’d sent that card. Only that he’d seen it on a shelf by the till and hadn’t been able to resist and once he’d bought it, well… who else was he going to send a sarcastic little penguin to?
And the message?
Jim winced at the foolishness of thinking Oswald might give a crap.
Propping his elbows on his knees, Jim stared down at the ground beneath his feet and wondered what he was supposed to do now. Go back to the bar? Go home? Go to the office and finish off some paperwork just to feel like there was a point to all this? That choosing to serve the city had been worth it?
Worth losing Barbara and Lee and…
No. Not Oswald. You couldn’t lose something you never had.
As Jim shifted, ready to stand, the light caught something by the foot of the bench. Leaning forward, he picked up a weighty silver cufflink with an umbrella embossed on the metal.
“Shit.”
***
He had been tugging his cuffs straight after trying to hail a cab when Oswald realized he was missing a cufflink. He had others – enough to fill tray in the top drawer of the dresser in his wardrobe – but he wasn’t so far from the park and there was only one place it could be. Recently he’d developed a habit of twisting the catch of his cufflinks whenever his thoughts strayed toward something they shouldn’t, and he’d had a lot of time to think, waiting on the bench by the bandstand. Craving the company of darkness and the gentle cosseting that only solitude could bring, he took the west gate, following its narrow, secluded path rather than taking the more direct, more cheerfully lit, main thoroughfare.
When the path opened up as it neared the lake, Oswald instinctively moved closer to the edge, wrapping himself in shadow…
And stopped.
Jim.
Even from here, collar turned up, head down, Oswald would have known him in an instant.
He watched as Jim leaned forward to pick something up from the ground and reached instinctively for the cuff of his shirt, feeling for the cufflink that Jim now held in his hand.
He should step forward. Show himself. But Oswald sank further back into darkness and watched as Jim pocketed the cufflink, stood up, and made his way out of the park.
Oswald hurried back the way he’d come, aware of the cold that permeated the ache in his leg, of the roar of traffic on the road and the bitter burn of disappointment. Then, just as he’d spied some shoppers climbing out of a taxi, Oswald felt a message buzz through on his phone.
A photo of his cufflink. Yours, I believe? I’m having a drink in Bernie’s, opposite the main gate if you want to come get it.
***
The nearest bar was full, but after a second sweep of the room, a booth in the far corner had freed up and Jim slid into the worn leather seat, thanking the woman who turned up seconds later to clear the empty glasses.
“Expecting company?” She nodded at the expanse of empty seating.
But Jim had no answer for that. There’d been no reply to the message he’d sent ten minutes ago.
Instead, Jim ordered a hot buttered rum. Scotch tasted too much like drinking with Harvey – besides, it was festive.
He was part way through his second drink and waiting on some fries when the crowd around his table shifted a little and a familiar figure slipped into the far side of his booth. While the tips of his ears and the top of his cheeks had warmed to a delicate pink, Oswald’s expression was glacial, his eyes colder than ice, lips thinned in an unforgiving line.
“You came,” Jim said.
“Of course.” He didn’t even grace Jim with a look, merely directed his gaze across the room as if looking for service – which, as it happened, was headed right their way. After ordering a mulled wine from the person who dropped off Jim’s plate of fries, Oswald removed his leather gloves and laid them on the seat between them. He kept his coat on, though, tugging it tighter around him. Still, he kept his gaze averted, his profile cutting a sharp line in the dim lighting of the bar.
“Your food’s getting cold, Detective.”
Now that Oswald was here, the appetite with which Jim ordered had deserted him and he barely managed a mouthful. When offered some, Oswald waved them away.
“Why did you call me here?”
Jim reached over to put Oswald’s cufflink on the table in front of him. “To return this.”
Oswald fixed it to his shirt sleeve without a word. “I meant why did you ask to meet in the first place?”
“I wanted to see you.” An hour drinking with Harvey and one-and-a-half buttered rums turned the truth into a slippery bastard.
“For a third time, I ask why?”
“Does there have to be a reason?”
“There usually is.” A twitch of a supercilious brow and a sneer tugging at the corner of his mouth. “A favor you want to trade, information to intimidate out of me, a little leak when your detective work meets a dam.”
“Dammit, Oswald, it’s Christmas...” Jim lowered his voice as the server returned with Oswald’s mulled wine. “Can’t we just forget about all that and have a drink in peace?”
“A drink it is.” And finally finally he looked across at Jim. “But I make no promises about peace.”
Good. The day Oswald Cobblepot stopped putting up a fight was the day they were finished. Figuring out what they’d started might be a constant headfuck, but it wasn’t something Jim wanted to live without.
***
Oswald blew across the top of his mulled wine, sending a curl of steam and the scent of cinnamon and spice in Jim’s direction. Then he nearly threw the whole lot over him as a chill juddered through Oswald’s body.
“You’re cold.” A statement of a pretty obvious fact from someone whose job title was ‘detective’.
“Yes, well, it’s close to freezing and someone left me to sit on a bench for two hours.” Regret rushed in as soon as the words left Oswald’s mouth.
“Huh.” Jim frowned as Oswald tried again with the wine. “If you’d been waiting two hours from when I said to meet then I’d only have missed you by a couple of minutes.” When Oswald didn’t respond, a smile crept into Jim’s voice as he added, “You sure it’s not the forty five minutes you spent waiting out on the street after you got my message that chilled you through?”
“Don’t flatter yourself.” The sip of warm wine did nothing to ease the chill that had seeped into Oswald’s very bones.
“Either way, you came.” There was a flicker of a glance between them then, a tacit non-acknowledgment of a poor choice of wording, then, “I didn’t think you would.” Jim’s voice was almost too low to hear – his head was down as he poked at his fries like a child.
“Was that why you left me waiting?”
Regret flashed across Jim’s gaze as he looked up. “I didn’t mean to – I’m sorry – I got caught up—”
“Given that you sent me a message asking to meet you here, in this bar, we can safely assume that texting was an option.”
“I didn’t—”
“Care enough to bother?” Oswald finished, his anger gaining momentum.
“—think you would be there.” Judging by the sheepish way he avoided Oswald’s eye, even Jim knew how feeble that sounded – however, before he could capitalize on that, a shiver passed through Oswald so violently that this time a little wine splashed onto the table.
“This is ridiculous,” Jim muttered and without warning, he picked up the gloves that Oswald had so carefully placed as a barrier between them and scooted across the bench until he was pressed right up against Oswald’s side, one arm sneaking around his shoulders, hugging him closer…
Oswald made a furious attempt to wrest free, but Jim was bigger, stronger – and he was so warm that Oswald could already feel the heat of him through his coat.
“Here.” With his free hand, Jim reached for Oswald’s left and pulled it down below the table and then… he tucked it tightly in the warmth between his thighs. “Jesus, Oswald, you could give Fries a run for his money.”
But Oswald was barely listening. Having Jim this close had thawed more than the chill on his skin and it took a lot of concentration to keep the lid on the memories he’d torn to shreds, sealed in a coffin and buried so deep there that was supposed to be no risk of them escaping. Memories, feelings, and a familiar ache of desire that yearned for Jim Gordon and him alone.
When Oswald breathed in, he took in Jim’s warmth, the alcohol on his breath and the scent of his clothes; breathing out, he felt his body relax into Jim’s embrace and feared that this one move, this gentle solicitous hug would undo everything that he’d built since the night they’d killed Galavan.
The first time, anyway.
***
Oswald was close enough that, for a moment, Jim fantasized about planting a kiss on the side of his head. What if he did? Would Oswald melt into him? Would he curl his fingers beneath the table and dig his nails into Jim’s leg? Turn his head a little so that Jim’s mouth would catch his own in a hint of what might happen later…
“When have I ever stood you up?”
Oswald’s question roused Jim from his fantasy. “Mm?”
“You thought I wouldn’t show up. Why?” Oswald traced a pattern on the table top with his right hand before twisting within Jim’s hold to meet his gaze. “Never in the time that we’ve known each other have I failed to attend a meeting that you’ve called.”
A meeting. His choice of words, the formality, stung enough for Jim to reply with the truth.
“Maybe I don’t trust you anymore.”
That did it. Oswald squirmed, dislodging the arm that Jim had laid across his shoulders and pulling his hand from where it had rested so snug between Jim’s thighs.
“Are you serious ?” Oswald’s incredulity was as genuine as his anger. “You, Jim Gordon, think I'm the one who isn’t to be trusted? Excuse me while I choke on the hypocrisy. Or are you merely deluded? Have you truly forgotten that you left me in Arkham? I came to you for help, told you what they were putting me through and you – you just—”
“You left me .” Jim snarled back.
“What?” Again with the incredulous sneer. “When?”
“After we… the night of… After Galavan. I woke up to a note . After we’d… I thought…”
“You thought what, exactly?” It was almost impressive how fast Oswald could move through his his emotions, how swiftly they wrote themselves on his face, a patronizing smile, a slice of sarcasm. “At the time you were with Lee. She was pregnant. I was doing you a favor.”
“A favor? We slept together and you left.”
There. The facts, laid bare between them.
Oswald scanned Jim’s face, eyes quick and bright, mouth parting a moment, then, as if his mind had changed direction, he pressed his lips together briefly, then said, “What lie are you living in, Detective, that tells you it would have ended any other way?”
“It didn’t have to end—”
“It did .” Oswald’s hand slammed down onto the table hard enough that the glassware jumped. “Those are the steps to this dance. You tell me you want me, you look for me, you find me and then you leave me. I just beat you to it – and you punished me for it.”
“I wasn’t—”
“At least now I know why you turned your back on me. After I lied for you. After I saved you.” A seethingly cruel edge crept into his tone. “Jim Gordon, Barnes’ little puppy, beloved of the GCPD gets to bite another day. Oswald Cobblepot. Criminally insane sent to Arkham to be fixed through torture.”
“I didn’t know.”
“You didn’t want to know.” His eyes were ablaze with triumph, a petulant press to his lips and Jim wondered if he’d ever seen someone look so miserable in victory. Because Oswald had won – his prize a truth that neither wished were so.
“I’m sorry.” The apology slipped out. Low, urgent, truthful. There was nothing more Jim could do but apologize and but it felt so small, so inadequate…
He reached for Oswald’s hand, but Oswald edged away and Jim’s fingertips brushed nothing but the cloth of his coat.
***
They finished their drinks in silence and left. The quickest way to Jim’s apartment was to cut through the park, and since the best place to hail a cab was the far side of the park, Oswald walked with him through the main gate. Up ahead, garlands of holly festooned the lamps that lit the way and pin-pricks of snow waltzed lazily down from the sky.
If it hadn’t been for the way Jim had warmed him in the bar then Oswald’s shivering would have been supercharged by now. As it was, his breath plumed before him and his hands, fisted deep in the pockets of his coat, thrummed with warmth. If Oswald hadn’t considered regret a waste of energy, he might have acknowledged the peevish way he dug his heels into the gravel with every step, or how his shoulders tensed and his neck kept his head locked in position, scowling at the air in front of him. There had been better ways of handling things with Jim, but those would have taken a patience Oswald didn’t possess – a humility so far beyond him it would have been easier to grab a star from the sky than to admit even a fraction of a fault.
Now that the clouds had finally relinquished their hold, the air grew thick with flecks of falling snow that settled lightly on the path and across the grass. By the time they reached the central grandstand, the park was accented prettily in white, a promise of a white Christmas to come. One that Oswald will spend alone for the first time in his life.
That moment, when Jim stopped him taking his revenge: He killed my mother, Jim. Jim’s low, sympathetic: I know.
If he’d stepped aside, let Oswald kill Galavan when he first set out to do so… then the night that followed, only a few short weeks later, would never have happened. Or maybe it would. Maybe Oswald and Jim would always have found their way to that conclusion. To this epilogue.
“I already forgave you.”
Oswald’s voice came out low, but in the kind of silence that only comes with snowfall, it’s enough for Jim to look across sharply.
“I always forgive you,” Oswald said, stopping under the eaves of the grandstand waiting for Jim to do the same, collar turned up against the cold, snow catching in his hair, his lashes, only to fade in the heat of his skin. “But you can never forgive me. For coming back, for being a constant reminder of your greatest weakness.”
Those eyes, dark beneath his brows searched Oswald’s face a moment, then, “You’re my greatest strength, Oswald.”
But as Oswald arched his brow, Jim only stepped closer.
“There are days when the fact that you walk these streets feels like the only evidence there is that there’s good in me. That once I knew how to choose mercy over death.”
Mercy . A quality Jim called strength and Oswald called weakness.
***
Jim knew it was a risk to step closer. Knew the risk of doing it again, and yet that’s what he does, just to get closer to that clear, pale gaze, the sharp crease of Oswald’s frown. A frown softened by proximity, lips parting a touch to give him that slightly incredulous look that Jim once took for granted, arrogant enough to believe that Oswald would always want him more than Jim wanted him in return.
“Was it mercy, Jim, or was it pity?”
“Both – then, but not now.”
Oswald smiled, a cruel twist to his lips. “No mercy for me?”
Jim sighed. “I’ve grown hard. And you don’t like mercy any more than you like pity.”
His gaze slid to the nearest bench and Jim wondered what might have happened if he’d come here when he intended. If Oswald had seen him honor a promise. But a part of him knows that was never going to happen, that doubt and insecurity – mistrust – would always muddy the waters under whatever bridge Jim built between them.
Maybe it was for the best. Maybe all they should ever be to each other is an empty bench in the park or a seat at the table, a drink waiting for someone else to lift it to their lips.
“You’re right.” Oswald stepped in so close that he was forced to tip his head right back to look up at Jim – something that should look like supplication transformed to intimidation, his eyes sharp, brows arched as his words. “I don’t want your mercy, or your pity. I don’t want anything at all from you.”
“But you do,” Jim murmured.
Oswald searched his face for a moment. “Maybe once, Jim, but not anymore.”
“OK,” Jim whispered leaning in until their mouths were but a breath apart. “But you’ll give it to me anyway.”
And he kissed him; tasted the chill of the air on his lips, then the heat of his tongue and the sweetness of the mulled wine he’d drunk in the bar. Jim kissed him and he tasted the memory of a night that he’s thought about every single day since, that he wished he could relive, that if Oswald caved now, if he suggested they go somewhere warm, somewhere private, Jim would accept and worry about the consequences tomorrow.
When Oswald pulled back, his breath came in long deep draws and his eyes blazed with fire enough to keep the both of them warm for the rest of their lives.
“Goodnight, Jim.” He glanced up to the garlands overhead and laughed, a mirthless, bitter chuckle. “Merry Christmas.”
Oswald was already walking out into the night, snow flurrying to hide his figure when Jim looked up at the mistletoe above. Looking back, he called out, “Merry Christmas, Oswald.”