Title: Invisible
Author: jordannamorgan
Fandom: Joker (2019)
Characters: Arthur Fleck
Rating: Mild PG.
Length: 200 words.
Summary: Sign-flipping jobs were the worst.
Note: Also for the prompt of “Isolation/Loneliness” at genprompt_bingo.



Sign-flipping jobs were the worst.

At least when Arthur worked birthday parties and children’s wards, his audience was happy to see him and easily amused. Kids had simple minds with rewardingly shallow reactions: a red nose and painted smile were enough to seize their attention, and the modest tricks he performed for them could hold it. No matter how rough a day he was having, they would accept him as funny for little more reason than that they expected him to be. Their laughter was not the mature response to sophisticated wit that he longed to earn from adults, but for now it was something to ease the craving for appreciation that gnawed at his soul.

On the other hand, there was only emptiness as he went through his motions on Gotham’s sidewalks. Emptiness within himself, indifferently shilling some run-down business he had never set foot in; emptiness in the sea of faces that passed by, countless eyes never meeting his. Those days, he felt like he disappeared more than ever into the endless urban background.

How ironic that one could be the most colorful thing in a gray desert of concrete and steel, yet not even noticed at all.

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2020 Jordanna Morgan