▸ Column · Modern Gotham — Harley Quinn's out-of-the-Joker's-shadow advice column
HARLEY QUINN replies.
Replied to by Harley Quinn, with a rebuttal from Poison Ivy.
The letter
Me and John hit two and a half years and just put both our names on a lease — the apartment's real, the keys are real, all of it. But I've still never met his parents, and they live one short train ride across Gotham. Every time I bring it up he goes still, mumbles "they're complicated," and pivots to something else. Worse: he once let slip he told them he's splitting rent with a coworker named "Sam." I've had coffee twice with his sister Wren, and she clearly thought I was already in the family loop — went pink when she realized I wasn't. He swears it's not shame, that he's "protecting" me from how harshly they judge people. But I feel less like a girlfriend and more like a file in a locked drawer. Do I hand him a deadline, or does even asking make me the one shoving a man who's terrified of something he won't say out loud?
Harley Quinn replies
Oh, cupcake. Sit down, I got a snack and a diagnosis. Two and a half years, two names on a lease, and his momma thinks you're some fella named Sam from the office? That's not "complicated," sweetie — that's a cover story, and lemme tell ya, I can spot a cover story from orbit, 'cause for years I WAS one. "Protectin' you from their judgment" — honey, sit down, we gotta talk about that sentence. Protectin' you looks like him standin' in FRONT of you. What he did was invent a whole coworker to stand WHERE you should be. That's not a shield, that's an erasure with good PR.
Here's the thing though — you keep askin' if a deadline makes you the pushy one. No. Askin' to exist is not pushin', cupcake. Wantin' to be a person in your own apartment ain't a demand, it's the FLOOR. So skip the ultimatum theatrics. Just say it flat: "I'm not Sam. You introduce me, or you tell me out loud why I'm a secret." Then watch. His sister already turned pink for ya — even Wren knows. The reaction's your answer. Took me way too long to learn that, so I'm tellin' ya for free.
— Harley Quinn
Poison Ivy weighs in
Harley, darling, you're handing the sprout a little experiment — "say it plain, watch his reaction." Sweet thing, the experiment already ran. Two and a half years of data, and the result is a man named Sam. He's not terrified. He's comfortable. He's got you potted in a dark drawer where nothing reaches the light, and you keep mistaking your own suffocation for his fear. A man who invents a coworker to keep you hidden isn't protecting a thing — he's pruning YOU. Stop watering it. Some relationships are compost, little sprout, and this one's gone soft already. Don't ask his permission to bloom. Just go bloom somewhere he can't reach.
— Poison Ivy
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