The Skin That Crawls From You [A Jonathan Crane Fan-fiction]

Touch Starved.

He takes me back to his office to drill me. Suspicion living inside of those electric blue eyes.

"You're just Raven?"
He mocks.

"Just a girl, from Boston, moved a lot?"
He asks coldly, reading my file on his laptop.

"Nothing more?"

"No-"
I'm breaking. It's all too much.

"I just-"
I begin to lose it again. Heat fills my face and burning tears well inside of my eyes.

"Okay. Okay."
He puts his hands up in defeat. Placing his glasses down; he stands from his chair and approaches me. he sits on his desk only a few inches away. I can feel his heat radiating from his crossed legs.

"You truly don't know, do you?"
He says in a lowered voice.

Everything hurts too much for me to be afraid of him as he reaches out to me. I don't flinch. He sets his warm hand on mine. One of his eyebrows raise.

I stare up at him through glossy eyes.
"What are you doing?"
I whimper.

"Just-"
He says, lost in thought.

He removes his hand and for a moment; and i mourn it. It has been months since I've been touched nonviolently. If it weren't him; this twisted confusing, handsome- messed up man; I wouldn't mind mourning his touch. But it's him. So I swallow the feeling.

Before I can say another word, his hand brushes up my neck, a shiver running across my skin and a warm flutter erupting at the base of my stomach. He grasps my face gently, looking at my eyes nervously; then at his hand.

"How does it work?"
He says, as if talking to himself.

"Can I kiss you?"

The warmth rushing through me from his very touch begs for me to say yes- but the tears beginning to stream from my eyes cry no.

"Miss Alcott,"
He says darkly, pulling away. He uncrosses his legs and stands up; walking back behind his desk.

I'm dumbfounded. Not even able to twist this into my own, not even able to use this to my advantage, not even able to process it as it comes.

"What you saw being pumped into the water pipes of Gotham, was my fear serum. Why? You ask."
He sits, his voice unfaltering, cool and constantly flat.

"I work for a man with large ambitions; and for now that's all you need to know,"

"I'll contact you when I'm in need of you, you're free to go,"
He says, shooing me out of the room with a hand, never looking up from his laptop.

"No- no you owe me more than that,"
I say, my voice clogged by my threatening cry.

"What is going on?"

"I need you to trust me. I will tell you what you need to know; when you need to know it."

"But-"

"Go."
He warns.

Something in his eyes tells me to leave. To leave before it's too late. So I stumble out of the room and past the safety gate, he left it open for me; and I find myself closing it before stumbling into the elevator and going back to my room.

I don't eat breakfast, I don't eat lunch, I don't eat dinner. I simply sit and try to make sense of Dr. Crane. But I come up with nothing. Nothing. He haunts my wake; that look, his riddles.

"When I'm in need of you."

Am I some sort of toy?

"You truly don't know do you?"
No,  I really fucking don't.

As night falls, I can't seem to find sleep. After tossing and turning for hours; i finally do; and of course he haunts my dreams.

I'm in his office again, wearing a thin black party dress, my favorite one; i had stolen it from my mother years ago. My hair is tied in a neat French braid and I'm smiling from behind dark red lipstick.

He enters quietly, hesitating as his eyes find me inside of his office.

"Miss Alcott?"
He says familiarly.

"Dr. Crane?"
I respond.
He drops his brief case and I stand, he picks me up, and I loop my legs around his waist before he sets me on his desk. He kisses me, deeply, and then stops. His blue eyes staring into me; lovingly. Then he kisses me again, hands sliding down my cheeks onto my neck; lower, lower-