TRUE LØVE WAITS|NYGMOBBLEPOT

1|what yøu're pretending nøt tø knøw

[takes place sometime after 3.14 and before 3.17]

Edward was close to ashamed at how desperate he was.

This wasn't how a man with nothing to lose should feel.

Well, the best way he could put it was that he couldn't feel anything. Everything was a blur. A surrealistic blur. He couldn't focus. He couldn't made sense of anything Barbara would say or want him to do. He didn't have any plans. He just didn't feel anything, and he hadn't felt anything sense he pulled the trigger.

Oswald Cobblepot was dead. Oswald was rotting at the bottom of Gotham harbor.

Edward had put him there. He'd died thinking Edward hated him.

And while that was true... Edward felt the blurring feeling coming back. The nothingness that he felt constantly at full swing. He tried to regain his breath, hyperventilating in the Siren's bathroom. Holding the pill bottle shakily in his hands, staring at himself in the mirror.

He knew they weren't safe. He didn't know the amount of pills he should take in 24 hours, not that it would matter considering they were probably illegal anyway. He didn't care if they ended up killing him, at this point it was either die at his own hands, or die at Barbara's.

He'd tried other things to see Oswald again. Oswald would show up in his nightmares, which had completely replaced any future dreams, but he'd found he needed Oswald when he was lucid. He'd tried absinthe, alcohol in general, but nothing seemed to stick. Hopefully these would prove different.

He shoved the bottle in his pocket, knowing he'd have to start using them in a stable environment, and he didn't want to die here in case anything went wrong. He hoped Barbara wouldn't notice his absence.

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Edward quickly reached for the teacup, spilling water over himself as he desperately tried to get the taste of the pills out of his mouth. He coughed, shakily setting the teacup down, wiping the water from his mouth. He scanned around the room, hoping for the effects to occur as fast as possible.

"You're looking in all the wrong places, baby." Edward recognized the voice immediately, turning to find the source. Oswald was laying on Edward's bed, wearing his regular three-piece suit, hair done up so parts of it were falling over his face, but the reminder of his death was noticeable, blood splattered over his chest were the gunshot wound was, and a bit of blood trickling from Oswald's mouth, along with the fact he looked dead, there was no light in his eyes and his skin looked awfully pale.

Edward bit his lip, taking a deep breath. The hallucination shut it's eyes and tilted it's head back. "If you wanted to see me so bad, I wonder why you pulled the trigger." It said teasingly, smiling.

"You're not him, don't act like it," Edward whispered, eyes locked onto Oswald's.

It chuckled, fluttering it's eyelashes flirtatiously before twisting it's expression into a painful cry. "Edward, why?! I've given myself to you, why can't you see that I love you?!"

"Shut up!" Edward hissed, shutting his eyes and slamming his wrists on the table the teacup was set on.

"If you don't want to see me-"

"You're not him!" Edward shouted, pointing a figure at the hallucination accusingly. "You're not Oswald! Don't...." He took a staggering breath, staring at the floor.

"Baby," not-Oswald cooed, hulling itself off the bed towards Edward, "I can only help you with this, but you're going to have to figure this out for yourself." More blood dripped from his lips.

Edward held on to the table, eyes staring without seeing, starting to feel the room spinning. Perhaps it's a side effect of the drugs, he suggested to himself, grip growing tighter. "Why did I kill him?" He said, barely a whisper.

The hallucination leaned up against Edward, putting it's hand over his. Edward's eyes widened, feeling Oswald's hands were cold and clammy, suddenly remembering the reality of the entire situation that kept slipping in and out of his head. "If you want to say it, baby, I promise I'll never tell," it whispered.

"I love you, Oswald." Edward choked, biting his lip harder as a single tear ran down his cheek.

The hallucination just smiled and disappeared, leaving Edward completely and utterly alone.