Joker Imagines | Heath Ledger

Depressive

DISCLAIMER: ANY AND ALL HATEFUL/NEGATIVE COMMENTS WILL BE IGNORED AND PROMPTLY REMOVED. THIS IS A SAFE SPACE.

word count: 1,482

warnings: heavy angst, language

description: Reader struggles with depression and low self-esteem - J does his best at comfort.

divider created by firefly-graphics on Tumblr. 

You were sobbing. It wasn't the kind of crying that could be explained away or covered up. This was a heart-wrenching, despaired and anguished sound that bled through the thin walls of your apartment until it reached J's ears.

He had come through the door at just the right moment. Earlier, you'd been lying on the couch with a blanket draped over your lap as the television droned it's nonsense in the background. Your dull eyes had watched it blankly, but all you could hear were your own tragic, depressing thoughts.  

You hadn't been yourself. A kind of darkness had taken over you and nothing felt right. You would wake up late and go back to bed no more than five hours later. Those were your best days. On your worst days, almost nothing could pull you out of the safety of your home.

It had begun to affect J the most when you didn't even budge from your spot on the couch when he came home at night. You'd stopped getting excited to see him after a long day apart.

When things were right, you'd run and jump into his arms the second he would walk through the front door. It was different now. You wouldn't even look at him sometimes whenever he came into the room. He wasn't too sure that you'd noticed he'd even been gone.

J wasn't proud of letting it get to him, but he was worried. He didn't know where to turn or what steps to take anymore. He would watch you drag yourself to the bedroom and flop down onto the mattress as your tears came pouring down. You cried like you had never cried before. You cried because you felt like you were losing yourself. You cried because you didn't know how to fix it. And you cried because you wanted yourself back.

You didn't know what to tell J, but you needed him just as much as he needed you. You were lost without him and he was the only person in your life who made you feel like you were truly alive. He gave your life purpose; you felt like you were living for something whenever he was there. J was your everything and you didn't want to let him go.

The love you held in your heart for him only drove you to fears that gripped your heart and threatened to drown you in pools of your own anxiety. You didn't feel like you deserved him. Surely someone else could love him just as good as you could. Why would he want you? What made you so special? The thought of him leaving you made you sick. You knew he would never do it, but why wouldn't he? There wasn't one thing about you that set you apart from the crowd. You were just an average young girl who had somehow stumbled her way into J's attention. It wasn't fate, just coincidence.

Your sobs had faded and soon stopped altogether. You didn't leave your room for close to another ten minutes. J was antsy as hell to know what was going on this time and why you were crying. The only thing that kept him from storming into your bedroom and demanding to know why you were crying was the way you had sounded. He lost himself in the desperate sound, got caught up in how defeated you seemed. He had never heard such a sad noise come from you before. It made him pause.

When you emerged from the bedroom, your eyes were red and puffy and your hair was disheveled and clung to your warm and wet cheeks. It was clear to J how hard you'd been crying.
He didn't speak a word as he walked to you. He took you into his arms and nestled up to you, arms tight around your middle. He buried his face in your neck and you felt his hot breath on your skin. You put your arms around him. J had always been so good to you. You felt guilty for making him worry about you. All he wanted was to be with you and he wasn't going to let you suffer alone.
You inhaled shakily, "J...?"
"What's ah...brothering ya, sweets?" J's voice grew in intensity with every word.

"What are you even here for?" your body had started to shake in his arms and you felt him squeeze you in an attempt to help you feel more grounded.

"Need ya to be more specific than that."

He was rubbing your back in gentle circles. J knew just where to touch and how gentle you needed him to be. It had taken him awhile to work himself down to that point, but he had trained himself to be perceptive of your body language and to be more calculated than impulsive. He had been having to comfort you much more lately than ever and he took it as good practice.

"It's like the whole fucking world is out to get me, J!" you wailed into his chest as you nuzzled into the soft fabric of his shirt, "I-I get worked to the fucking bone and it still isn't good enough. I have to come in on my days off most of the time. I never get to see you and when I do, I can't even look at you! I don't deserve you, J. You could find someone better, it wouldn't be that hard..."

J rested his chin atop your head as he listened to you carry on. J had fashioned himself into quite a good listener. On the odd occasion it would perturb you that he would just sit there and not say anything when you were pouring your heart out to him, but right now it felt like he wasn't even there. You held him tight but you couldn't feel his body against yours. You felt like he was gone before he had even left.

J didn't take it personally. You said things that you didn't mean whenever you were hurting and he had come around to accepting that the more he got to know you, "why do ya keep doing this to yourself, sweets? I thought we were on a good path right now."

"I was," you cried in despair, "but I screwed up. All my progress is fucking gone and it's too late to fucking fix it now."

You felt J quietly shake his head, "it's not," you could almost feel him deliberating on what to say next, "let's say...I woke up tomorrow and decided I was gonna...blow the Gotham City Bank sky high. Ya know? Poof! Gone. But...But then, that Bat-manshows up and deactivates the bomb. Well, then I don't know what to do, right? I worked so hard to make that bomb, place it, time it...then he just comes in and ruins it for me. So what do I do? Well...I can pout about it...or...wake up the next day, and try again."

The end goal you were working towards was not blowing up a bank, nor would it ever be, but he painted the scenario in a way you would understand. You had made progress and failed, gone back to your old habits and old self, but the option of trying again was always there. You felt disgusted with yourself for reverting back to the way things had been, but J was right: you could always try again.  

You tilted your head back and kissed his chin, "I'm sorry for always being like this."

"Don't be sorry," he shrugged, "just...talkto me. I don't like coming home and finding you crying."

You nodded quickly and sniffled as you wiped your tears. J didn't have to tell you that you deserved him. He wouldn't have anyway. He didn't like deep or emotional conversations, but he could be whatever you needed whenever you needed him. Sometimes his closeness was enough to calm you down when you felt like this.

You sighed into his chest, exhausted after having fought tirelessly with the world and yourself for months. You didn't believe in yourself. You didn't feel like you deserved any good thing that came your way and you definitely didn't deserve to feel like you were as good as anyone else. You started every day the same; you were fine until something triggered you and opened that wound once again. You didn't know if J knew what it felt like to feel so inferior, but maybe he did. You didn't exactly know what he knew about you or the world or emotions. You knew what he told you, but you didn't know what he thought. That was probably a good thing, because you couldn't handle a lot of new outlooks in this state. You clung to the J you knew, the one he had shown you. That was what kept you going.