A Little Sane

Chapter 107

"Our last day and night here.. Then home to the wonderful dump Gotham is."

Jerome's ears tugged upward due to the stretching of his grin. The laugh from Mercedes didn't seem as genuine as Jerome would have like it, but he let it slide. They were eating their room service breakfast on the bed. They decided to be cute and just share everything. 

"I mean... wasn't it great here though..? They have a really pretty museum, the zoo, parks, I hear the school system is incredible.."

Mercedes bit her bottom lip nervously. Jerome tilted his head with his eyes narrowed. He chuckled.

"School system? Why does that matter?"

She let go of her lip and nervously spoke. 

"Well, w-we do have two four year old twins who can start school next year..."

Jerome instantly glared and Mercedes could feel herself already cowering. He shook his head.

"I thought we talked about that. I know you want them to have an education and friends, but a school four hours away from Gotham? You want to get up at two in the morning just to make it here every day?"

Mercedes stood up and moved their food to the table in the corner of the room. Jerome was confused, but Mercedes didn't want food to go flying after her next statement.

"Well, we wouldn't have to get up so early if.... you know.. we.. lived here... we could go get the kids and just come back here.."

Mercedes let out a gasp as he started to laugh maniacally instead of trying to attack her. Her hand behind her back was glowing, but she stopped it. He stopped when he noticed Mercedes wasn't laughing with him.

"Wait.. you're not serious right?"

Mercedes looked away. She jumped when she heard Jerome get off the bed. It's sad that Mercedes had basically been trained for almost six years when to expect abuse. Jerome sighed. He slowly walked over to her and gently lifted her chin which confused her. 

"We can't leave Gotham."

Mercedes let a sigh of relief. Jerome gently leg go of her chin and stepped back.

"I'm not going to hurt you. I promise. You're free to speak."

"Why can't we...?"

Jerome sighed and unintentionally rolled his eyes. Jerome set on the edge of the bed.

"First off, we're criminals. Like I don't know... major ones!"

Mercedes walked closer to him. He looked her in the eyes.

"Jerome... we have a chance to start over.. We don't have to be that here... We can be.."

He shook his head.

"Baby.. we aren't normal... I know there's a part of you that wants to be... I know I'm not the white fence and office job man.."

He gently pulled her to stand between his legs. 

"We've already lied to the kids enough.. they don't know what we do.. I don't want to move somewhere else and changed my identity to do so, because you know that if they looked us up for background checks... they can find what has happened in Gotham.. I know you know that..  I don't want to pretend to be someone else.. I still want to be me and do what I want to do.." 

He could see the slightly sad look in her eyes. His thumb gently rubbed her cheek.

"You just got an entire city underground.. it's all yours.. you just want to give that up..? I thought you did that to protect us.."