Chapter Text
Harleen Quinzel was the youngest in her class at med school, having skipped multiple grades in high school and speeding through college. Often folks would ask her, Harleen, what kinda kid genius do you gotta be to make that work?
Simple! She didn’t go to any parties or do much besides get shit done. Listen, she had a scholarship that made the rules simple-- she could survive this whole college thing if she budgeted out her food and got this whole thing done fast.
That’s a real fancy way of sayin she had no friends.
Regardless, she was hardly 20 and already on her way to being a proper psychiatrist--a person worthy of respect and dignity and finding an actual career even though gymnastics went to shit–-take that, ma!
Harleen was a genius and she was so goddamn lonely she could burst.
Half of her life was spent up in her own head trying to find something meaningful in a big sea of emptiness and pain and loss and maybe it was stupid to think but some part of her was so sure that once she got outta the house she’d find her own way and things would start making sense.
She was halfway to being a doctor.
And she was just as lost.
Part of her wandered if it was Gotham’s fault. Maybe if she got out of there, then everything would change. But every time she traveled out of the city she couldn't help that feeling in the back of her head that said no mater how far she traveled, it would never be about the place. It would just be about her. Something wrong. Something not built right.
“You ever just stare at the wall till it makes colors show up?” she asked a classmate, some mid-twenties square who wished more than anything he hadn’t been paired up with her.
“No, Harleen, I can’t say I have.”
“Sucks for you, it’s a fun pastime.”
He glared at her and continued working.
And that was one of the better interactions she had with her classmates!
This is all to say, when Harleen Quinzel saw a kid that looked her age walk into her class, she lit up.
“Heya, I’m Harleen.”
A dark-haired kid with the eye bags of an insomniac running off of energy drinks and the worst posture she’d ever witnessed stared at her wide-eyed, like he was surprised someone was talking to him.
“Me?”
“Yeah, unless you’re not interested, to which I say, fair nuff but also your loss.”
His mouth gaped open before he nodded.
“I guess I, well, I could use a companion here.”
“Companion huh? What’s your name?”
“Bruce.”
“Harleen.”
“You already mentioned that.”
“And I’m repeating it so it sticks, Brucie.”
Bruce furrowed his brows at her and she smiled. He hadn’t run away yet.
That was an improvement.
…
Bruce didn’t talk much. More often than not he stared into space, something sad beneath his eyes waiting to come out. Sometimes Harleen would spot him staring at his hands as he tapped his fingers on any flat surface nearby.
Harleen tried real hard to get him to chat that first month, and more often than not she ended up with one-word answers, or, if she was lucky, half a sentence.
Bruce didn’t talk much, no, but he sure did listen. And he listened like he was actually hearing what you were sayin. He listened like what you said meant something to him. He stared at people when he listened to em; she’d noticed that other folks found that a little odd, but she didn't mind. It meant everything wasn't going over his head.
“Didya know that there are 86 billion neurons in the brain Brucie?” he stared at her intensely as she shared this fact.
“Yes.” he responded.
Harley stared at some notecards she’s already memorized for class and sighed.
“Bruce.”
“Mhm.”
“Can I tell ya something?”
“I don’t know when I’ve ever said no to that.”
“I can’t tell what I think about you.”
Bruce raised a brow.
“Not in a bad way. I can tell you’re a nice guy cuz you haven’t made fun of me or nothin shitty like that. It’s more that I can’t read you. And I think I’m pretty good at readin people. Maybe you’re hidin something or another, I just can’t figure out what makes you all… you.”
Bruce took a moment to think.
“You’re going to be a psychiatrist, right? You’ll figure it out, I’m sure that’s what you’ve been wanting to do.”
“I mean, yeah. I just told ya.”
“No, I mean… the other reason.”
Harleen raised a brow at him.
“The reason that you spend all this time with me. For a… I don’t know, book I guess?”
Harleen let out a cackle of a laugh.
“Big ego you got there, thinkin Imma write a book bout the random guy in my organic chem class.”
Bruce frowned, more than usual, though. A deep thinkin kind of frown.
“You said you were from Gotham.”
“I am from Gotham.”
“Do you…do you know who I am?’
Harleen scooched back from him.
“Dunno… did you commit a crime I’m supposed to know about?”
Bruce was silent for a moment then he… he laughed. And it was quiet but wow did it seem loud in the room. She’d never heard him laugh before.
“No crimes, I promise. Did I never tell you my name?”
“Brucie, don’t insult my intelligence.”
“Wayne, Harleen. Think on it.”
She did.
Her eyes widened and she clasped her hand over her mouth.
“You’re a billionaire?”
Bruce shrugged.
“My parents were, so… yeah?”
“Holy shit!” Harleen watched Bruce shrink back into himself a bit. Like he was waiting for a shoe to drop.
“You let me pay for burgers last weekend, you asshole!” she shoved him and he laughed.
“You offered!”
“And it’s your job to decline, Mr. Billionaire.”
Bruce laughed again.
“You still want to be my friend?”
She softened.
“You’re kinda the only one I got. I ain’t scared of ya. Just be honest with me next time, okay?”
“Okay.”
A moment of quiet passed between them.
“Do you ever stare at the wall until it makes colors show up?”
“All the time.”
Harley smiled and went back to her flashcards.
Maybe she’d made a real friend this time.