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organabanana · 3 years

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Leaves of three, let it be [1/?] || harlivy

Chapters: 1/?

Fandom: DCU (Comics)DCUHarley Quinn (Comics)Harley Quinn (Cartoon 2019)

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence

Relationships: Pamela Isley/Harleen Quinzel

Characters: Pamela Isley, Harleen Quinzel, Selina Kyle

Additional Tags: Mentions of alcohol, mentions of batman fucking bats, most of this is straight up idiocy tbh, i just finished watching the cartoon so everyone swears like a sailor i'm sorry, rated for (ahem) happenings later on, ivy/harley/catwoman frenemies

Series: Part 1 of the Cliché a Week 2021 series

Summary:

Aided by a terrible hangover and a severe lack of impulse control, Harley accidentally drinks an unknown substance at Ivy's apartment and suddenly remembers why Ivy goes by Poison Ivy in her professional life. Luckily for Harley, she's immune to Ivy's toxins. Unluckily for Harley, she may not be immune to her love pheromones, and turning into a human-plant hybrid is not her idea of a good time.

Telling Ivy so she can give her an antidote may seem like the obvious course of action, but there are very few things Harley hates more than disappointing Ivy with her poor decision-making skills. Besides, like Selina said, if she'd drunk pheromones she'd be in love with Ivy by now, right?

And Harley Quinn is absolutely not in love with her best friend.

Notes:

This was (loosely) inspired by Prompt #1104 by @promptsforthestrugglingauthor: “Hey, do you know if potions expire?” “I think it depends on the potion. Why?” “Well, I was really hungover this morning and grabbed the wrong glass and I feel super weird right now.” And "Everyone knows they’re dating except them” from the Cliché A Week Challenge by @montocalypse. The plan is for this to be 4-5 chapters at most BUT I'm not ready to commit to a number just yet so we'll see how that goes!

[ao3 link]

Harley wakes up with a pounding headache that makes her wonder if someone stole her bat and tried to crack her skull with it last night.

"Ughhh..." she groans, squeezing her eyes shut. Her mouth feels like sandpaper. Her throat feels like... like sandpaper. Listen: she's not in any kind of mood for elaborate, imaginative similes right now. Everything is pain and/or sandpaper. Deal with it.

"Fuck me." It comes out in a whiny, pathetic little voice, and Harley is almost more pissed off about that than about the hangover itself. Where is she, anyway? She forces herself to sort of... perceive the world around her without moving a muscle or opening her eyes, which may not be the best approach but it works anyway because she totally knows Ive's apartment by smell.

As friends do.

Once that's settled, and she knows she's in fact safe (how could she not be? She's at Ivy's!) Harley moves her right hand and feels around for the bedside table, but apparently she didn't climb into her usual side of the bed (friends have sides of their friends' beds, obviously) because what she feels on her right side is soft and warm and definitely not a bedside table.

"Sorry." She mumbles, affectionately patting Ivy's ass before turning over to the other side and trying again. She does find a table this time, and she nearly cries in relief when she finds a little water bottle waiting for her parched lips to drink.

Score.

It's only when she's downed the whole thing that she realizes two things:

One, that did not taste like water.

And two, there is a reason Pam goes professionally by Poison Ivy.

"Shit," Harley stage-whispers, blue eyes now wide open as she stares at the empty bottle in her hand, "shit, shit, shit."

Harley knows she's not dying. She knows she's immune to toxins, and she's cuddled the fuck out of Ivy (as friends do) on enough occasions to know she doesn't break out in hives at Ivy's touch. But the thing about Ivy is, she's kind of an overachiever. There aren't just toxins to worry about. Harley could be about to turn into a fern or something, and nobody could do anything to prevent it.

Well, except Pam.

But you know what? Considering the kind of mood Ivy gets in when Harley makes a less than stellar choice, she's gonna risk turning into a plant rather than waking her up.

"Morning, sunshine." Selina walks -- nay, prances -- into the bedroom looking flawless as always, which is pretty fucking unfair considering her presence at Ivy's can only mean she was there for whatever hangover-causing shenanigans they all happened to get into last night. But of course, Selina Kyle is above looking like shit while hungover.

" Selina ," Harley all but hisses (which is fitting, considering Selina's... you know), showing her the empty bottle, "I fucked up."

"When do you not fuck up, Harley?" It comes off as both smug and somehow charming, which is, again, pretty fucking unfair. "What did you do this time?"

Harley shows her the empty bottle once again, shaking it slightly like she cannot believe Selina isn't getting the gravity of the situation right away.

"What? I don't get it-- ohh ." Selina lets out a quiet chuckle that sounds almost like a purr. "Yeah, you fucked up."

"Dammit, Selina! What if I turn into a fucking succulent?"

"Oh come on, don't be dramatic. What color was it?"

Harley stares at her. "Don't you think I'd have known not to drink it if I'd looked at it?"

"I mean, I tend to assume people look at things before putting them in their mouth. But you did fuck Joker, so..."

"Hurtful." A beat. "Fair, yes, but still. Hurtful."

As if on cue, Ivy rolls over in her sleep, draping her arm across Harley's lap. Harley smiles, momentarily forgetting the bottle and its contents and the potential result of her having drunk them, because Ivy is just such a good friend. Protecting her from Selina's... well. Selina-ness even in her sleep.

"You guys need some privacy?"

Harley doesn't stop gently tracing the vines on the back of Ivy's hand, but she does look away from soft green skin to shoot Selina a teasing look. "Aw, does someone need scritches? Here, pussy pussy..."

Selina rolls her eyes. "Fine. Turn into a fucking sequoia for all I care. At least you'll be good for climbing."

The soft movements of Harley's fingers stop as Selina's words fully sink in. "Wh- what?" Harley's voice sounds a bit deflated, like one of those sad clown balloons after a sad balloon fart.

"I'm just saying. Pheromones and chill forever as a human-tree abomination? Kind of her signature move."

Harley just stares at Selina, horrified at the prospect of spending the rest of her life as a brain-dead tree and trying (and failing) to come up with a plausible reason why there is no way Ivy's pheromones were in that bottle.

"Anyway!" Selina sighs, stretching her arms up over her head. "I should get going. I have cats to feed."

"Wait. Wait!" Harley stage-whispers, and she's suddenly extremely thankful for Ivy sleeping like a log.

Heh. Like a log .

"You can't leave me, Selina! What if you're right?"

"Oh, come on, kitten," Selina says over her shoulder, already on the way to the door, "if it was pheromones you'd be in love with her by now."

The sound of the door slamming shut behind Selina is enough to finally wake Ivy, and Harley feels her best friend's arms tighten around her as Ivy stretches awake.

"Mmmhey, Harls." Ivy mumbles, voice rough and heavy with sleep as she moves even closer to Harley.

Normally, Harley would've just sunk back into the most comfortable bed ever (there's a reason she rarely sleeps in her own!) and gone in for a round of lazy morning cuddles. She'd have basked in the smell of Ivy in the morning (freshly cut grass sparkling with dew drops) which is so different from the floral notes of Ivy at any other time of the day. She'd have pressed a kiss or two to Ivy's warm skin, felt her lips tingle with the sweet taste of a poison she's very much immune to, and maybe even fallen back to sleep listening to Ivy's heartbeat and the soft rhythm of her breaths.

You know. As friends do.

But today, thanks to Selina (the fact that nobody forced Harley to drink that stupid bottle is irrelevant, of course), Harley can't relax. She stiffens, even, becoming virtually un-snuggable and making Ivy fully open her eyes to give her a questioning look.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah, of course, Ive!" The enthusiasm is as fake as her smile, and the way Ivy's eyes narrow tells her it's been very much noticed. "Bit hungover, that's all."

It takes a couple of seconds for Ivy to speak. Like she's pondering whether to mention there's never been a hangover bad enough to keep Harley from getting her cuddle on or to just let it go for now. Harley's delighted to see the second option win in the end.

"Want me to give you something for the headache?"

"Nope!" Harley's on her feet in two seconds flat, practically jumping away from Ivy's warm body and her warm eyes and the warm offer of some nice natural drugs. "Thanks, though. You're sweet as pie, butter...fly."

"Butterfly." Ivy deadpans from the bed, looking more and more like she's mere seconds away from researching actual mental health facilities in Gotham (Arkham does not count).

"Buttercup doesn't rhyme with pie. Listen, I should go. I have so much to do. There are-- well, you know! Havoc won't wreak itself, right? Gotham needs me."

"To... wreak havoc."

" Pre cisely. Gonna wreak it real good. You know me! Won't settle for a half-wroken havoc."

"Wro... ken?"

"Oh, for sure, for sure!" What is she even saying? Harley grabs her bat and swings it a little like she's holding a purse and not a weapon, but thankfully she doesn't break anything in Ivy's room, which is great. "Text ya later, yeah?"

Ivy looks like she's struggling to even begin to process everything that's happened in the five minutes she's been awake. And honestly, Harley's grateful for it. She hasn't noticed the missing bottle, and she's not forcing Harley to stay and answer questions, so it's a win/win/win situation if you ask her. You know... other than the potential mutant tree issue.

"Okay!" Harley grins. "Good talk. Bye, Red. Love ya!"

Shit .

Harley freezes for a moment. She's told Ivy she loves her before. Of course she has! She loves Ive, and Ivy loves her. They're pretty vocal about that. But today isn't just any other day. She always loves Ivy as a friend, of course. As her best friend she adores and would absolutely kill and die for. The most important person in her life. The one person who's ever made Harley feel safe and loved and appreciated unconditionally. She loves Ivy in a way that makes her feel like her heart is a bit too big for her ribcage and sometimes it gets so crowded in there she's afraid she may pop a rib out of its socket or something, but then Ivy holds her and everything settles again.

You know. A friendly kind of love.

But does she love Ivy? Harley looks at her hands like she's expecting a few leaves to have sprouted there already.

"Harley. Seriously, are you okay?"

Ivy's voice snaps her out of her funk, and Harley knows she needs to get out before she's forced into a whole conversation about this thing.

"Peachy keen, Pam-a-lamb." Harley forces herself to walk towards the door without looking back, just in case. Just in case suddenly Ivy's surrounded by a pink fog of love, or whatever the fuck people see when they look at her while under the influence of her pheromones. I mean, she can't look even more beautiful than she does normally, right? That's not even possible. So it must be like... a heart emoji filter or something. She really doesn't want to find out. "Talk later!"

***

Harley looks at the melting cheese on her third egg sandwich like she's expecting it to hold the meaning of life. Or, at the very least, an answer to today's big conundrum. Is she or is she not turning into a tree?

And sure. Sure! She could ask Pam. This would be solved immediately, she knows. She could just ask Pam what was in the bottle and confess she's drunk it and just... put up with her mood for a while. No big deal! Except she really fucking hates disappointing Ivy, you know? When she gets all... cold and detached, and feels more like lettuce than lush tropical foliage.

Listen, trust her, okay? Sad salad buffet lettuce Ivy is just the fucking worst.

So she takes a bite of her sandwich and tells herself whatever she drank can't have been anything too dangerous. It's been a couple hours now, so she should've felt some kind of effect, right? She should be feeling a bit plant-y, at the very least. Maybe a bit nauseous or something. But she feels fine.

Well-- not fine , fine. She's still kinda rattled, but that's Selina's fault.

She's fine.

***

"Are you sure you're up for this?"

Ivy lets Selina handle the entry point (you'd think Gotham millionaires would've given up on skylights by now) and looks at Harley with a mixture of concern and distrust in her eyes. She clearly hasn't forgotten about their conversation in the morning.

"I'm fine!" Harley swings her bat around just to loosen up her bat-swinging muscles. She's fine. Not a plant, not in a love fog, not in any way dying. Totally fine. And , most importantly, not dealing with limp lettuce Ive. "It was just a hangover."

Ivy's eyes narrow just enough to make it crystal clear how little she trusts Harley right now, but for once Selina Kyle makes Harley's life easier instead of harder when she speaks.

"Ladies. This is a truly riveting conversation, but I have shit to do.”

“Like fucking a bat-fucking bat?” It may be a cheap shot, but it makes Ivy stiffle a laugh, and Harley kinda thinks that makes it the best joke ever.

But Selina simply cocks an eyebrow at Harley. “Are you sure you want to discuss regrettable sexual partners?”

Ouch. “Fair enough,” Harley concedes, already jumping through the hole Selina’s cut in the glass, “come on, we have an oil tycoon to kill.”

“Not an oil tycoon, Harls.” Ivy glides down on a vine, looking all majestic like some kind of forest nymph, and Harley simply has to stare and smile because how can she not? Look at her friend! “He’s been using an experimental fuel that causes—“

“Does it matter?” Selina sighs like even interrupting Ivy is exhausting, plucking a shiny gold ornament from a nearby table and making Harley wonder (honestly, not for the first time) if she just keeps shiny trinkets hidden in her catsuit like a magician to make it seem like she’s finding them everywhere. “Guy’s loaded.”

“It matters to me, Selina. Not all of us have the moral compass of a magpie.”

Harley giggles at Ivy’s joke. You know what? It may not even have been a real joke, because Ivy’s sense of humor is not exactly her best quality. But it was funny anyway.

“And if it matters to Ive, it matters to moi .” Harley points at herself with her bat and winks at her best friend, and honestly, who the hell cares what this guy does, exactly? Maybe he’s single-handedly destroying the Amazon, or maybe he just happens to walk through the grass instead of using the little paths when making his way across the park. Whatever it is, it’s important to Ivy. And if it’s important to Ivy, it’s important to Harley. And if it’s important to Ivy in a way that makes her smile like she does when Harley winks at her? Well, then this is absolutely Harley’s top fucking priority.

Things get interesting as soon as they turn a corner and step onto the plush carpet of the experimental fuel (hey, she actually listens when Ivy speaks) tycoon's private wing. And you know what? Harley's delighted to hear the alarms go off and a bunch of goons crawl out from their hidey holes like buff armed cockroaches. She knows Ivy and Selina prefer the whole... well, you know. In and out, clean and easy kind of approach to murder and robbery, respectively. But Harley's an action gal. She has the energy to burn and a bat to swing, and most of all, she has shit to not think about.

So she's delighted when this guy's goons happen to be relatively okayish at fighting, which is much more than can be said for most men she fights in this city.

"I'll go deal with him before he can escape," Ivy says, already walking towards the door to his office. "You guys all right out here?"

"We're great ." Selina says in that tone she has where she pretends she's annoyed but you can tell she's having a blast.

Honestly. Who wouldn't be having a blast? It's like whack-a-goon!

"So," Selina says as soon as Ivy's out of earshot, which Harley can appreciate as an act of friendship, "no pheromones, I take it?"

"Nope!" Harley punctuates the word by slamming her bat into some guy's face. "None at all."

"Huh."

"What?" She's distracted enough by Selina's reply that she actually takes a punch to the face, which only manages to piss her off. She turns to look at the guy who delivered the blow just so he can see the look in her eyes before she completely obliterates his face. "Holy shit, dude. Can't you see we're having a fucking CONVERSATION !?"

For the next few minutes, Harley focuses on getting rid of the last few men around them so they can finish talking. Sure, beating up idiots is fun, but that little 'huh' was just mysterious enough to grab Harley's interest. What could possibly be so huh-worthy about her being fine?

By the time they're done, there are a number of unconscious goons scattered all over the place. Harley pants, using her hand to wipe blood (mostly not hers) and sweat (mostly hers) off her face as she catches her breath.

"Whew. That was fun, right?"

Selina, as usual, manages to look spotless even if Harley saw her deal with several men with her own two eyes. Is Selina Kyle secretly magic?

Could be.

"I've had better." Selina uses one of her claws to unlock an ornate little box and gather the jewels inside. Can she smell expensive stuff? "Come on, let's go get Ivy."

"No, no, wait." Harley lowers her voice like she's scared Ivy may hear them somehow. "What did you mean earlier?"

"What do you mean, what did I mean?"

"You know," Harley motions in the general direction of the spot where Selina was when they were talking before, "with the huh."

"The what ."

"The huh, Selina! The huh!" Dark olive eyes narrow in confusion (and annoyance), and Harley groans because she can't believe Selina Kyle is being this thick. "I said no pheromones. And you said huh."

"Oh, that." Selina uses a polished silver platter as a mirror to reapply a lipstick Harley is frankly not sure where one would even carry in a skin-tight leather jumpsuit. The more time she spends with Selina, the more convinced she is she just doesn't abide by the laws of physics.

And the more time she waits for Selina to elaborate, the more Harley realizes she just... isn't going to, apparently.

"Uughhh!" Harley groans and uses her bat to smash a nearby sculpture. "You're killing me, Selina! What the fuck did you mean!?"

Selina cocks one perfectly manicured eyebrow (Harley can tell it's happening under the mask) and gives Harley a look like she can't believe she'd have the audacity to speak to her in that tone.

"I meant," Selina's tone is a warning, like she wants to make it clear she could have made Harley suffer more if she wanted, but she's choosing not to, "I found it surprising. You looked a bit loved up to me."

"What? Pffft." Harley lets out a chuckle and nudges one of the pieces of the sculpture with her foot. "Cut back on the catnip, Selina."

Loved up. Ridiculous. Does she love Ivy? Of course. Is she loved up? Of course not . There's no heart emoji fog. None at all.

"If you say so." Selina gives her A Look. The kind of look says she doesn't believe Harley, and she wants Harley to know that even if she won't engage in an argument about it right now. Selina Kyle can say a lot with one look.

For a moment, Harley considers pushing the issue. She could insist. She could give her a list of reasons why she's absolutely not loved up at all whatsoever. She could tell Selina how what she shares with Ivy is actually true friendship, and Selina would know if she was capable of bonding with anything other than cats and jewelry. She could tell her how there's nothing even remotely mind-foggy about her feelings for Ive (she could bring up she's seen that mind fog in action the many times Ive's put Batman under her spell, even). Harley could tell Selina how her brain always feels a bit foggy in a vague kind of way -- just foggy enough to keep Harleen quiet and let Harley take the wheel -- but being with Ivy makes her feel more lucid, more real , than anything else in the world. How when Ive says she loves her Harley feels it right in her bones, in the very marrow of them, in the deepest, darkest, longest-forgotten parts of her brain where no other feeling can ever reach.

She could tell her how wildly different all that is from a silly potion-induced love fog. But she doesn't think Selina would understand their friendship even if Harley actually spelled it out. So she doesn't.

Instead, she silently follows Selina towards the office where Pam's been doing her thing. Where Pam's still doing her thing, actually, and Harley can't help but smile and lean against the doorframe to watch her best friend doing what she loves most (after Harley) in the world: eco-conscious murder.

"I fucking swear ," Ivy hasn't realized they're there, so she must be talking to what Harley can only assume is the tycoon himself even though only one of his legs can be seen outside the enormous mouth of a very happy-looking carnivorous plant, "how hard is it to not print out e-mails? Look at all this shit. Do you know how many trees had to be killed so you could print out your shitty... whatever the fuck this is?"

Ivy groans like she's frustrated she can't use her powers to just will all the papers scattered everywhere to turn back into trees. There are vines everywhere -- like nature reclaiming the furniture and the walls and the floors and really every surface of his office. There's a strange beauty to it, Harley thinks. Haunting, like those pictures of abandoned buildings covered in grass and moss and weeds. Even when she's angry -- and oh, she's angry right now -- Ivy really can't help but make the world a more beautiful place, can she?

Even when she was on the other side of the reinforced glass, wearing her glasses and her white coat, Harley never fully understood why Poison Ivy was lumped in with the rest of the psychos in Gotham.

Harley doesn't know how long she stays there. Selina's happily working on the safe next to the carnivorous plant, and Harley's more than content to just watch Ivy in her element for a while.

And then, it happens.

Ivy's going on a rant about a bunch of single-use coffee cups she's found in the trashcan by the desk when she suddenly stops in her tracks. Harley can't see what she's looking at until Ivy turns around with a small flower pot in her hand, a sad-looking, mostly dry plant limply hanging off its side.

"Fuck him."

Ivy touches the plant and her brow furrows, and Harley knows she's feeling the thirst and the pain in the little plant as if it was her own. "You're okay now," Ivy says as the plant starts to recover, and her voice is so soft -- so full of love for a dry, nearly dead plant -- that Harley swears she feels her heart grow at least a couple sizes. She watches her best friend breathe life into a little plant, watches it turn from brown to green, brighter and taller, watches it sprout new leaves that make it look like it's stretching after a long sleep. And then she watches a bright yellow flower bloom, and when Harley finally manages to tear her eyes away from the flower to look at Ivy instead, she swears she feels her heart stop dead in its tracks.

Ive's always beautiful. Always, without fail, no matter what time of day or night, lounging at home or brooding in an Arkham cell. Pam is beautiful always. But Harley doesn't think she's ever seen her look more beautiful than she does right now, with her hair slightly disheveled after a fight and some blood (not at all hers) splattered on her face and clothes. It's the way she's smiling at that little plant. The way her smile grows and softens when she notices Harley looking at her. Harley's so enthralled by Ivy that she doesn't realize what she's thinking until it's been running through her mind for a while.

God , Harley's in love with her.

And that's when she realizes. That's when she hears the proverbial record scratch in her brain and her eyes widen in horror because there it is. There's the pink fog before the botanical mutation, right? I mean she can't exactly see a literal pink fog, but she may as well. She can feel her heartbeat all over the place. The butterflies in her stomach. The nearly all-consuming need to grab Ivy and kiss her until neither of them can breathe.

"Shit. Shit, Red, shit, shitshit shit ."

Ivy's no longer smiling. At all.

"Oh God, Pammy. I fucked up." Harley feels her eyes well up with tears as she rushes towards her best friend because this is no longer a hypothetical: this is happening. She did drink something dangerous. And suddenly keeping Ivy from finding out and getting mad at her feels less important than fucking surviving. "I fucked up, Ive, I drank a potion and now I'm turning into a fucking plant, please tell me you have an antidote."

"Harley. Harl, look at me." Ivy looks so genuinely concerned Harley's sure the ridiculous amount of love she can see in green eyes must be part of the potion's effects. She's hallucinating, isn't she? "What potion? You're immune, Harley, you know that. Calm down."

"No, no! Not poison, I mean--" Harley shakes her head but has to stop when Ivy places her hands on Harley's cheeks to hold her head steady and look into her eyes like she's wondering if Harley's on drugs or something. "I mean a love potion, Ive! Shit, I thought it was water and I just drank the whole thing and I thought maybe it was nothing because I felt fine but now I know for sure I fucked up because I'm so in love with you like-- just feel this!" Harley grabs one of Ivy's hands and moves it from her cheek down to her chest, pressing it right where her heart is still skipping all over itself. "Right?"

"I-- I don't-- Harl, what potion ? You're immune to all of my--"

"The pheromones! I don't know what it was! God I'm such a fucking fuck-up and now I'm just-- shit I hope I at least turn into a rhododendron bush or something because I don't want to be a succulent, Ive. Don't let me turn into a succulent." Harley's really crying now, black mascara running down her cheeks and staining Pam's hand as she struggles to breathe through her words. "I know I should've told you but I didn't want you to be disappointed and now I'm in love and it's just-- Selina, you tell her!"

"Selina?" Ivy turns around like she's just realized Selina is still in the mansion, let alone in the room with them. "What's going on?"

Harley was expecting Selina to tell Ivy exactly what happened that morning. She was expecting Selina to tell Ivy all about Harley being an idiot who drinks things without looking first, about the pheromones and chill, about Harley's refusal to tell Ivy right away. Instead, Selina looks... almost like she's the one who's been caught in a lie.

"Selina, what the fuck did you do?" Ivy's voice sounds like she's mere seconds away from feeding Selina to the plant, too. Harley can feel the anger like tingles where Ivy's hands are still pressed against her skin. "What did you give her?"

Selina lets out a sigh. "Margarita mix."

"What?" Harley feels a lightbulb go off inside her brain. That was the weird taste when she drank whatever was in that bottle. Fucking margarita mix. But just.. "Why? What the fuck, Selina? Why would you let me think it was pheromones? I know Batman doesn't actually fuck bats, probably. Come on, it was a joke! Mostly!"

"Will you relax?" Selina sounds like she can't believe Harley may be a bit agitated after spending a whole day thinking she's going to die and/or mutate into a plant. "I'm sick of watching you two idiots pretend that ," she points in the general direction of Harley and Ivy, "is just a couple of gals being pals. Figured I'd help you out."

"Help!?" Harley could just-- God , she could just smash Selina's face in with her bat. But she suddenly realizes there's a much more pressing issue to handle before revenge can even begin to be considered. "Shit, Red," Harley takes one step back to look at Ivy, and for the first time ever she's surprised to see she can't read the look in her eyes, "I didn't mean-- you know I didn't mean any of it, right?" For a split second Harley swears something like pain flashes behind green eyes, but it's gone as quickly as it appeared. "I was just worried and I-- I got in my head about it. But you know I didn't mean it. You know , right? Pammy?"

It takes Ivy a few seconds to answer, and when she does she sounds... different. "Yeah. Yeah, I know."

For some reason, it doesn't sound as reassuring as Harley though it would.

"Come on, Ive--" Selina tries to keep talking, but Ivy cuts her off.

"Listen, we're done here. So I'm just gonna..." Ivy shakes her head like she's trying to physically clear it of thoughts and feelings and general clutter, "I'm just gonna go home."

Harley feels like she's stuck to the floor. She just stands there, silent and frozen in place as she watches Ivy leave. She knows this isn't right. She knows something just happened -- something she can't quite wrap her brain around right now. All she knows is Ivy's leaving, and she wants her to stay but she doesn't know how to make her body move or make any noises until her gaze drops to the desk and she sees the little plant right there.

"Ive!" Harley grabs the pot and runs out just in time to see Ivy's vines lifting her up through the same skyline they used to get in. "Ivy, you forgot the plant!"

But Ivy doesn't come back.

#harlivy #harley x ivy #fic #harley quinn/poison ivy #cliche a week 2021 #this is my first chaptered fic i can't guarantee it won't be a hot mess #comics #dcu #poison ivy

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multiverse-ofbookreviews · 5 years

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Kiss me at Christmas Excerpt

CHAPTER ONE

London, December 1818

Lady Regina Haversham’s thirtieth birthday was precisely one month away, which didn’t leave her much time to lose her virginity. Not that she wanted it lost. She wanted to know where it went and choose to whom she gave the dratted thing.

Her coach came to a stop in front of the offices of the Bow Street Runners in central London, and she drew in a deep, unsteady breath. She pressed her hands deeper into the white fur muff that sat atop her lap and willed her pounding heart to slow its nervous beat. Christmastide was her favorite time of year. She was in high spirits, but she was also as nervous as a young lady making her debut on her way to see the queen. This particular outing had every chance to end in disaster.

She glanced out the window. She probably should have hired a hackney. It would have been less conspicuous than her uncle’s resplendent coach. There were already several on- lookers staring up at the black-lacquered conveyance with

2 Valerie Bowman

the Duke of Colchester’s seal on the side. She glanced down at her clothing. No doubt her ensemble was too elegant for marching into the offices of the best private investigative team in London, but she had no other clothing to wear, and this particular message was best delivered in person. She didn’t know Daffin Oakleaf’s home address, and she hardly thought a note to him for what she had in mind would be ap- propriate. No. Regardless of the stares, she had to see him in person.

Regina had settled on the perfect birthday gift to herself. She would spend the night with a man. Not just any man. The finest candidate. One who had the face and body of a Greek god. Thirty years old. Tall, fit, and handsome. Blond hair and green eyes that held a twinkle she found irresistible. She’d met him last summer at her uncle’s estate. Her family had been gathered there for the unfortunate purpose of her cousin, the marquess’s, funeral. John had been murdered, and inappropriate or not, the man Regina had come to covet was the Bow Street Runner who’d helped investigate his murder.

She hadn’t seen Daffin since he’d left the estate that hot July day taking away the two murderers in shackles. Rarely a day passed since that Regina didn’t think of him. She’d read about him in the paper, too. Lately, there’d been a se- ries of articles in the Times focusing on his exploits. He’d caught criminal after criminal and, according to her cousin Nicole, made hefty bounties doing it. Now that Regina’s period of mourning was over and her uncle was forcing the issue of her marriage, Regina was here to ask Daffin Oak- leaf, legendary Bow Street Runner, to make mad, passionate love to her.

Her stomach performed a somersault. Could nerves make

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one physically ill? She suspected they could. Suspected hers would. She winced. It wouldn’t do to cast up her accounts in front of the man. That certainly wouldn’t attract him.

She glanced at her maid, who sat on the seat facing her, back ramrod straight. If the proper young woman knew what Regina was thinking, no doubt she’d be scandalized. Pre- cisely why Regina had said as little as possible about their outing today. Genevieve hadn’t asked many questions. Thank heavens.

The coachman opened the door and Regina took one more deep breath. “Wait here,” she said to Genevieve. “I shouldn’t be long.”

After all, how long could an indecent proposal possibly take?

CHAPTER TWO

Daffin Oakleaf pushed himself away from his office desk and scrubbed both hands across his face. He was tired. Bone tired. He hated Christmastide. He’d been running himself ragged chasing a particularly nasty thief across London for the last fortnight. Daffin had nearly had him, or so he thought, when a clue he’d been pursuing had turned to nothing. He was back to the start of his investigation, and severely out of sorts.

Daffin loved his work. It was perfect for him, and it had made him a wealthy man, but days like this were frustrating as hell. He much preferred to be taking down criminals and delivering them to gaol, instead of pacing his office with little to go on while they roamed free.

He was obsessed with each one of his cases, but this one kept him up at night. This case made his blood boil. A child had been injured by the bloody thief, and if there was one thing Daffin couldn’t countenance, it was a grown man being

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violent with a child. He would track down this monster if it was the last thing he did.

Most of Daffin’s investigations were done with the prom- ise of a hefty purse at the end, but he was doing this one for free. He always took on a case or two for charity at Christ- mastide. It was the least he could do. Not to mention it kept his mind from the blasted season. Focusing on his cases made the holiday easier to ignore. Easier to forget.

He pulled a notebook from his inner coat pocket and scanned the words he’d written on the case so far. Perhaps he’d missed something, some detail that would finally lead him down the right path to Henry Vickery.

“Oakleaf!” came the voice of Paul, the secretary, who sat out in the offices’ main room and fielded inquiries from people who came in off the street.

“I’m busy,” Daffin called back, not in any mood to be taken away from his case. It was probably someone else who’d read about him in the paper and wanted to make his acquain- tance. The papers hounded him of late. One reporter in par- ticular. Mr. H. J. Hancock.

The man seemed obsessed with following Daffin’s cases. Week after week, for months now Daffin had been mentioned in his articles. The stories made him sound like a bloody hero. They described how he chased down bad men in the dark of night, vaulting over walls, climbing up to rooftops, and taking more than one bullet. He’d never have answered the reporter’s bloody questions if he’d known the man would go and write things like that. Being a hero wasn’t Daffin’s pur- pose. Never had been. He did his work to put the scum of so- ciety behind bars. To get evil people off the street. To spare their future victims.

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