Chapter Text
Ed wakes up the next morning and feels, for lack of a better term, like shit. His leg, which he hadn’t bothered to do much with other than clean, disinfect, and bandage gives a throb of pain, and Ed thinks he might need stitches. Ed pull down his pyjama pants just enough to see his bandaged thigh, and notes just how much blood is soaking through the dressing. Ed then notices the little splotches of blood just barely staining his pyjama pants and resolves to go to the hospital in the next half hour.
Ed sits up in bed and scoots to the edge of his mattress, rising to his feet as slowly as possible. He has to put all his weight in his right leg, but he can still stand. Then several emotions rush through him all at once. Anger, sadness, and sense of loss . He’s offended, offended Oswald would even think that Ed would ever try to manipulate him in such a terrible way. Ed contemplates trying to resolve things, but then he thinks back to Oswald’s words.
“Ed, just let me go. Please .”
Ed limps over to his closet, pulling out a dress shirt and a soft pullover sweater with the baggiest, most comfortable pair of jeans he owns, so as not to put any pressure on his leg. He decides to leave Oswald alone.
Sitting back against the bar, Oswald surveys the club around him. People are dancing together, some band Oswald’s forgotten the name of up playing on stage. Other people are talking, catching up with friends, there are couples paired off at different booths, slipping out of the crowded room to go somewhere a bit more private. It’s half an hour until closing time and Oswald is itching to leave. A steady stream of people have been making their way out of the club for the past hour, and yet it’s still packed.
Oswald sighs, resisting the overwhelming urge to run his hands through his hair and yawn, his thoughts beginning to drift. It’s been just over a week since he last saw Ed, since Ed let him go. He fights down a wave of emotion, something that recently, seems to accompany any thoughts he has of that insufferable man. It pains him to admit it, but Edward Nygma managed to out wit him, taken him in his physically and emotionally vulnerable state and tried to befriend him. For what purpose, Oswald doesn’t know. But… there was something about Ed’s actions, something that he said that makes Oswald question whether or not he really was just trying for friendship. For something good.
“ I would never manipulate you for my own personal gain. ”
The words have been running through his head non-stop. Something in Ed’s eyes, in his voice. It was so sincere, and it’s maddening. And when Ed let him go… there was something, some look that flashed across his face before he stumbled backwards. It just makes him wonder-
No . There was something else, something that Ed wanted from him and he was just too blind to see it, didn’t want to see it because Ed was everything he’d needed at the time. He was a man with power, with money and influence, that was desirable. But not him . He wasn’t desirable. And that was Ed’s mistake, acting as if he desired Oswald instead of what Oswald was, what he represented and what he had. An amateur mistake, really. Oswald should have seen through it sooner.
Lost in his thoughts, Oswald hardly noticed the time passing. A voice, Gabe’s, is what breaks him from his trance like state.
“Boss?”
Oswald’s vision had gone blurry without him noticing, the dark colours of the nightclub bleeding together until everything morphed into one big splotch of green, black, blue, and purple. Oswald blinks a few times before responding.
“Yes?”
“Everyone’s left,” Gabe states.
Oswald looks around the room and notices that everyone has indeed left. His brows rise slightly in surprise.
“Well,” Oswald says, pushing himself down off the bar stool he was sitting on, “I guess you can go home now.”
Gabe nods his head, bidding Oswald a good night and heading for the exit. Oswald turns and begins to walk to the back door, where he’ll start locking up for the night, but Gabe’s voice stops him.
“Boss?”
Oswald turns around to see Gabe staring at him, halfway to the door.
“Yes?”
“Is something...up?” Gabe asks after a moment.
Oswald is taken by surprise, his brows once again rising slightly before he schools his face into a mask of indifference.
“No,” Oswald says slowly, “everything’s fine.”
Gabe looks a little skeptical, but he doesn’t press, “alright, Boss. G’night.”
Oswald stood in the club for another minute before starting to lock up.
Life went on as usual.
Something came up, a bunch of petty criminals who formed a group amongst themselves in an attempt to overthrow Oswald. They were dealt with easily enough, Oswald sent his men out to dispatch them the second he heard about their plans. Their bodies were dumped at the bottom of the ocean. Oswald prods absentmindedly at his forehead, which had been badly bruised after being slammed into Ed’s door, causing a lot of questions to arise. It was healing well enough, just a few splotchy areas of green now, so light it nearly blends with Oswald’s pale skin. Everything was as it should be. Except for one thing.
The small matter of Ed.
“I’m not sure where you got this idea from, but I assure you it is wrong .”
His every thought for the past few days seems to circulate around Ed, what’d he’d said and done, and Oswald hates himself for being so weak minded.
He misses waking up in Ed’s bed, Ed making breakfast for him, the two of them singing together, having someone to keep him company, calling Ed at work, having Ed take care of him, he just-he misses Ed. Each day Oswald questions Ed’s motives, and his own assumptions, more and more. He tries to tell himself that it’s just foolish hope, that Ed really was trying to manipulate him for...for whatever reason. But he can’t bring himself to believe it anymore. It’s been just over two weeks now and he hasn’t heard from Ed at all, hasn’t seen Ed at all, and it hurts in a way Oswald doesn’t understand. He’d left Ed’s apartment with the intent to get revenge for being so badly manipulated, but he couldn’t bring himself to begin thinking of a plan. And now he doesn’t want revenge anymore. He just wants to see Ed. He can’t get Ed’s look of- of something out of his head, the way he spoke to Oswald, they way he just let him go. Oswald thinks that maybe he’s made a mistake, and he wants to apologise.
Oswald resolves to pay Ed a visit later that day.
A body lays out in front of him on the cold metal table in the centre of the room, a young woman, about twenty five Ed would say, blonde, decently attractive, and horribly mutilated. Ed grins to himself. Leslie Thompkins isn’t in Gotham at the moment, off with Jim Gordon somewhere, so Ed doesn’t have to worry about being interrupted.
Cutting into the woman, Ed takes his time poking about inside, moving around organs and arteries, and he enjoys himself immensely. Ed, on occasion, feels really inspired to...well, commit a murder! Ed notes that whoever murdered this woman must have been very experienced, as the wounds littering her body appear to have been dealt with a deadly precision, enough to make her suffer immensely, but not enough to kill. This woman would have bleed to death. Ed feels a coldness wash over him, and he begins to grin again.
For the past two weeks Ed has been a bit of a disaster. He tries to convince himself that it has nothing to do with Oswald but, really, who is he kidding? He’d entertained the possibility of stabbing his pen through one of his co-workers eyes the other day because he refused to answer Ed’s riddle, but there’s just no grace, no sense of elegance or intelligence in doing something like that, Ed had to remind himself. A knife would have been better. And really, the riddle honestly wasn’t even that hard.
Ed begins to hum softly, and goes about his work.
He hardly notices the time passing by, so absorbed in what he’s doing, and soon enough it’s time to go home. Ed takes his time cleaning up, washing his hands thoroughly afterwards. The GCPD is nearly empty as he makes for the exit. None of the remaining officers pay him any mind as he walks past. Ed’s come to accept that the people he works with are not all that fond of him, although he can’t help feeling a little bitter towards them. Ed steps outside the GCPD to be welcomed by the cool night air of Gotham, instantly nipping at his skin. The buildings surrounding the area are lit up now, glowing like beacons in the cloudy sky. He pulls his coat tighter around himself and walks briskly to his car, head down and looking at the sidewalk.
The car ride home is nearly silent, aside from the music playing softly from the radio. The street lamps lighting the way blur past as he drives, at some point a little drizzle of rain picks up, dotting his windshield with water. Ed’s content to just focus on the road, his thoughts a hazy nothingness. Until Oswald’s words resound unbidden in his head.
“Ed, just let me go. Please .”
Ed’s hands tighten minutely on the wheel at the intrusive thought, and he tries to banish it from his mind. But then Oswald’s desperate, pleading face flashes behind his eyelids, and Ed can almost hear his voice in his ear, and then a sudden melancholy overtakes him. Ed doesn’t know how to feel about any of it anymore, how to feel about Oswald. He’s angry, and he’s hurt. Ed’s thigh, where Oswald stabbed him, throbs, and Ed begins rubbing his palm in circles over the wound. He’d needed stitches.
Ed turns up the music and tries to focus on the road the rest of the way home. Once he reaches his apartment building he parks in the garage below, walks to the elevator, and presses the faintly glowing button in the wall, causing it to turn green. The doors open up instantly and Ed steps inside the empty elevator, selecting the button with the number nine on it and leaning back against the cool metal walls. Shortly, the elevator doors open once more and Ed steps out onto his floor, pulling his key out from his jacket pocket and walking down the narrow halls of his apartment building until he reaches the door with the number thirteen adorning it in black.
Ed unlocks the door and steps inside, closing it behind him. Ed pockets his key and removes his jacket, throwing it haphazardly on his couch before walking into the kitchen. He makes straight for the fridge where he pulls out a plate of leftover chicken and mashed potatoes, sticking it into the microwave. He’s had about three bites of his dinner when a knock sounds from his door.
Ed’s brow furrows and he sets his plate down on the kitchen counter, striding towards the door. The very last person he expects to see as he opens the door is Oswald Cobblepot.