Chapter Text
It couldn’t have been more than a few hours after drifting to sleep when you hear a loud bang from somewhere in your kitchen, and you swear you heard someone’s hushed curse following the noise. With nothing but your heart in your throat, an oversized t-shirt that used to be your dads draped over your body, and an old textbook from before you dropped out of college as a weapon, you—as silently as possible—make your way to the origin of where the noise was coming from. It seems like every God dammed step you take makes a creak louder than an atomic bomb and with each noise you wince as you hope that the intruder doesn’t hear you. Knowing Gotham, part of you figures it can be anyone…but the other part of your brain knows who it is. As you turn the corner that opens up into the living room and kitchen, you see a silhouette of someone illuminated by the light of the refrigerator. The figure is looking through your minimal food that’s left in the fridge—what’s in there is spoiled considering you haven’t been home to eat any of it. Much like a dog, your head is tilted as you stare at the person who seems to glow as the light casts gently over the curves of his body. He would almost look like an angel if it weren’t for the devil-red hair atop his head.
“Not much to choose from here, gorgeous.” You jump as a small yelp escapes your throat at the sudden boom of his voice. “Now that’s a noise I’d like to hear again.” He says matter-of-factly with a slight drawl.
Still not looking in your direction, he turns to the pantry as he begins to check the next place for food. Settling on a bag of generic corn flakes, he finally turns to you while hopping up onto the counter and sits crisscross as he begins to pour the cereal into his mouth.
While crunching loudly, bits of cereal falls from his mouth as he begins to say, “You really should keep a clip on these because they’re kind of—”
“Why the fuck won’t you just leave me alone?” You interrupt. The brashness of your tone surprises both you and the man sitting on your counter. He raises his eyebrows as you try to pretend that you were confident in your choice of words. Slowly, he puts down the cereal and smiles at you with an inquisitive look, checking you up and down in the process. Watching him watch you, you suddenly become aware of just how little you’re wearing. With the book raised, the hem of the thin, white shirt barely covers your panties as you stand there in the defensive position. Once you realize this, you slowly lower the book just enough so that you have a little more coverage than before.
“Stale.” He finishes as he swallows the remainder of the contents in his mouth. At that, he jumps off the counter and begins to walk towards you at a painstakingly slow pace. The closer he gets, the more you back up with the book still raised.
“Don’t come any closer!” For emphasis, you raise the textbook even higher and his eyes dart down to your legs and then back up towards the book.
Stopping his advance, the smallest of smiles paints his lips as he lets out what can be described as a faint chuckle while he clasps his hands behind his back. “So, your plan is to kill me with—” he cocks his head to the side and he squints his eyes to read the title of the book that’s in your sweaty and shaking hands, “Introduction to Pharmaceutical Chemistry?”
Thinking for a moment, you realize that maybe your “brilliant plan” wasn’t so brilliant after all. You lower the book back down until it’s hanging loosely by your side—you’re still ready to swing at a moment’s notice.
Once the book is no longer being used as a potential baseball bat, his smile grows wide.
“Good girl.” He practically growls it. There’s nothing you can do to help the shiver that licks up your spine and the back of your neck; goosebumps erupting over every inch of uncovered skin. You try to shake it by justifying that you shuddered because you’re scared and not because…shut up.
Even though he’s not that close to you, he sees your obvious change in posture and takes a mental note to make sure to remember this later.
“At least tell me your name.” There’s desperation in your voice and this only seems to fuel his impish smile to grow further.
“Oh! I forgot that you don’t even know that.” He pauses while looking down, almost solemn. “And yet I know nearly everything about you.” His eyes dart up and both of your eyes lock together while he grins, knowing just how invasive what he just said truly is.
It’s getting harder to control your breathing as he’s staring at you like this.
“I-I know you’ve b-been sleeping in my bed.” Damn it. Keep it together! “Why don’t you just sleep at your own place? “ Or anywhere for that matter, you think.
“I live with my mother. And you see, besides fucking lots of random men, my mother’s other favorite hobby is to beat me,” he deadpans, never breaking eye contact. Not an ounce of emotion can be found on his face, but yours is twisted into a horrified expression of shock as you soak in what was just said to you. Somewhere in your stomach you feel a pang of guilt; no one deserves that…no wonder why he has problems.
“I’m sorr—”
“Oh, don’t be.” He says while holding up a hand to stop you before you can really even start. “That’s all in the past! The bitch won’t lay another finger on me…not again after tonight.”
You’re not sure what to say to this—or if you should say anything for that matter—so you stand there awkwardly while chewing your lips. However, this doesn’t last too long because you realize that he’s waiting for a response; some kind of reaction, any kind of reaction.
Finally giving in and with obvious hesitation you ask him, “And why is that?” Do you really want to know the answer?
“The same reason why I didn’t kill that man nurse that had issues.” He laughs at his newspaper pun that he finds wildly funny; you, however, do not. Still not entirely understanding, you think back to your conversation that you had while you were still in the hospital. I wanted my first time to be with someone that I’ve wanted dead for a very long time.
He didn’t kill Scott because he wanted his first kill to be special…like some sick form of losing his virginity.
He was waiting to kill someone who wronged him.
He was waiting to kill someone he hated.
He’s going to kill his mother.
Tonight.
He knows that you know what he’s going to do; it’s evident on his face and yours. Neither of you say anything for a few moments until you whisper a soft “Please don’t.”
Quite audibly, he groans and rolls his eyes. “Why the hell not?”
“It’s not right. You don’t want to do this.” You’re frantic and quick to answer. His past words bounce around in your head like shrapnel. It changed something within me. You feel sick.
“Oh, but trust me. I really,” he comes in closer and closer now at a dizzying pace, “really,” he keeps walking until your butt hits the table that’s against the wall and by the time he says “do” he’s almost against you. “How is this any different than what you did?” he growls just inches from you.
Scrambling, you wrack your brain for the words, “It was self-defense! It w-wasn’t premeditated. H-he was going to kill me if I didn’t—” You don’t get to finish.
“And my whore of a mother doesn’t pull her punches. Tell me she doesn’t deserve it.” At that, he slams his hands down on either side of your hips, locking you in as you drop the book. There’s no point in trying to hide your erratic breathing because his is the same. Each thump of your heart echoes in both ears and pumps liquid fear through your veins and straight to in-between your…shut up. Only a thin ring of green is left in his eyes as his pupils turn them seemingly black while he stares directly at you. It’s like you can no longer speak English with him staring at you like that. Glancing quickly, he looks down at your breasts, unashamedly, that are only covered with the sparse, white material. The only possible color your face could be is bright, bright red.
“Tell me!” He shouts in your face and you flinch back.
“She deserves it!” You scream almost as loudly back. After a second or two, you whisper again, “She deserves it.”
He sighs heavily, “Was that so hard?” A smile returns to his face as he gently pats your cheek twice before he backs up enough so that you can stand up straight again. Before completely walking away, he checks you up and down again as you slightly tremble in front of him and he takes a deep breath.
“Thanks for the pep talk, doll. I’m off to kill the Wicked Witch of the West.” Practically skipping, he saunters over to the front door and opens it. “I’ll see you soon.”
“My name is Jerome Valeska by the way. Go ahead and call out that name while you’re touching yourself later tonight.”
With that, he shuts the door and leaves. And he locks it, meaning he must have somehow gotten a key. Since he moved his hands from the table, you haven’t moved an inch. Even now that he’s gone, you don’t move a muscle. Pure shock is left on your face; you’re completely dumbfounded. When you finally wake up from your trance, you’re left utterly concerned, afraid, and…aroused…shut up.