* J *

Part Twenty-Six: Chapter 188: Buried

There was a chill in the air. The first hint of the approaching fall. The tree leaves were changing their colors. Red. Orange. Yellow. The sky was clouded, and painted a pale gray. A light misting rain floated on the air like snowflakes in the winter. Five people stood quietly, cloaked in black. The fall leaves lie wet at their feet. The umbrellas they held above their heads cast a cover from the rain. The plaques of the forgotten indigents lay a uniform grid to the cemetary. It had to be a private affair because no one could know that the Joker was presumably dead. The whole ordeal had to be a covert operation.

The Joker had left behind instructions for his funeral. He chose the same cemetery that his mother was buried in. It wasn't for nostalgia. It wasn't about family. It was for practicality. The Joker figured that his grave would go by unnoticed in the forgotten cemetary of the city's indigent. People would expect something grand for The Clown Prince, not a grave in an indigent cemetery. The name on the plaque that would mark his grave wasn't The Joker. Nor was it Jack Napier. The name read, Joseph Kerr. He had chosen this name himself. It was his final laugh. When you took the first two letters of the first word, and the first three of the second, you got the truth. Joker.

The five of them stood, heads bowed in sorrow, some real, some conjured, as the coffin was lowered into the hole. The weather seemed to reflect their moods, dreary and depressing. No one spoke any final words. They knew they weren't needed. They just stood silently with only their own thoughts and memories. Jason was the only one who didn't know the truth, that the body was a grand imposter. Nor does he know that everyone around him was merely playing a role in a ruse. It was probably the last thing he could ever suspect, because they had performed their parts so flawlessly and convincingly.

The coffin reaches the bottom of the grave. Jason takes a step closer to the grave. In his hand he held two white roses. He looks down at them in his hand. Standing at his brothers grave, he thinks of how much he would be missed. Even by him. He had learned that the Joker was more than just a criminal. He was a husband. A brother. A friend. A patriarch. He had redefined the criminal underworld. He had successfully reigned over Gotham for a period of thirteen years. He was and always would be a legend. Jason takes one of the roses in his right hand and tosses it on top of the grave. He gives a nod goodbye to the casket in the dim six foot hole. He then steps back to stand in his original spot alongside of everyone else.

A tear rolls down Harley's cheek. She held a small bouquet of carnations that had been specially dyed green and purple. She takes a step forward and looks down at the casket. She doesn't throw the flowers in her hand because she intends to lay them on the grave after it gets covered. Instead, Harley had brought something that would have made her Mistah J smile. She reaches into her purse. What she pulls out is a pudding snack. She lets out a sad giggle and wipes at her tears. Then she tosses the pudding to her puddin. She smiles at their own private little thing. No one knew why Harley called the Joker puddin. She had never told anyone that it was because she gave him pudding snacks when she was his psychiatrist at Arkham. When he was good, that is.

But Harley wasn't the only one with a personal inside thing with the Joker. Ivy too shared something with J that only they understood. Ivy got to know the Joker during a time that was difficult for him, during the first year as the Joker. He hadn't embraced the physical side of it yet. He was embarrassed by his reflection. He was confused and unsure. Ivy was the one who helped him embrace the clown. Ivy steps up to the grave and reaches into her purse. In closed in her hand was a piece of metal. The metal she held was a grappling hook. It was identical to the one that J had used the night that he dangled himself upside down at her window. She tosses the grappling hook in and it makes a loud thud. She smiles sadly and kisses her palm and blows it at the grave.

Frost leans on a crutch and cradles his stomach as he moves forward, awkward and unsteady. Clutched in his hand that cradled him was a burlap sack. When he reaches the grave side he fishes inside of the sack. He pulls out a red hood. It wasn't the real one that Jack Napier had used before his transformation into the Joker. The bat had taken the real one. It might have very well been the only remaining object that had been Jack's.  That's why Frost felt that it symbolically worked. Only he and Ace had known Jack Napier. Jack had more balls than anyone Frost had ever met. He was a man, despite his youthful face. He was a fighter. He was a leader. He was a man who loved. Every once in a blue moon Frost would see a glimpse of Jack in the Joker. He gives the Red Hood a long look before extending it out and letting it fall into the grave.