Insanity // J.Valeska

Part One: Before the Start

"Miss Harlem! What has exactly has happened? You are required to make a statement as the only witness and sole survivor..."

"Miss Harlem, if you could, what do you remember? Miss Harlem, Stephanie, please. We just need for you to answer a few more questions an-"

"Excuse me! Hey, handsy, keep your gorilla paws off my niece before you lose them!"

Stephanie Harlem raised her head from its spot from between her knees. The new voice sounded very familiar unlike the shouting officers around her, and higher-pitched. Her usual bright baby blue eyes scanned the crowd, landing on a beautiful, frustrated, blonde.

Said blonde shoved people out of the way until she was standing in front of Stephanie, where she crouched down and wrapped her petite arms around the young girl's shoulders. Stephanie collapsed entirely into her aunt's comforting arms, sniffling and sobbing until she couldn't tell up from down.

Well, she cried on the inside.

She felt numb. All over. Was this what the rest of her life would be? Would this emptiness ever end? And what of her newfound title as the sole survivor of the Harlem's murder? The press would have yet another field-day, fawning endlessly over the newest celebrity in all of Gotham. And Stephanie would just sit there, always an orphan, a constant reminder that her parents were dead.

And yet, through her dull numbness, a pair of riveting green eyes haunted her every thought.

The eyes of the killer who stole her life from her. Casting the lonely girl huddled in the corner one last glance before driving the knife into the stomach of her screaming mother.

*********

My mother always taught me that we lived in a man's world; that I, as a woman, could only hope to survive by playing with them as if they were my dolls. She would whisper to me as I pretended to sleep: "hush darling, sleep now. You need your beauty to be well rested, my love."

That was my first sign of my parents failing and loveless marriage.

The second appeared at random. Surprisingly when my uncle came over during one Christmas holiday with his new girlfriend, Barbara.

I admit, I loved Barbara. She possessed this older sister quality which was endearing, as well as this authoritative air about her. Plus she had Uncle Jim wrapped around her little finger. She was my first hope, my first ray of sunshine that I could survive in this man's world.

I recall one night that I had come home, feeling utterly heartbroken due to some prepubescent boy's rejection, and she was there. A complete and utter stranger - hell she could've been a random hooker from the street corner for all I knew - but she was still there.

While my parents did their best to ignore both the obvious issues plaguing me as well as the problems dividing their marriage, they kept the small talk at dinner... Small. My mother had long since given up on the whole maternal instinct and instead chose to parent me by increasing the sufficient sums of my bank account on a monthly basis. Her philosophy for parenting was that as long as I had money and could feed myself, her job was done. Clarissa Gordon-Harlem was many things, but a natural caregiver was not one.

And as for my father, the great Jefferson Harlem: current CEO and president of Global Incorporated, the second largest corporation in all of Gotham and fifth leading brand in the United States of America. My father was a hard-worker, however that was usually only for his career. As for his marriage and family life... he felt okay with letting it slowly dwindle downwards. I suppose he only kept his marriage going for legal purposes; so that he would still have an apparent heir for the company that he'd nurtured instead of me, his only daughter. So that he could appear in the headlines of newspapers and magazines, all claiming that he had everything. I think the scary part was that he was in denial the whole time; my father was an intelligent business man, however take away his title and he was just another lost boy.