Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“So I stepped back 

And I saw myself 

And I realised that somewhere along the line

I got lost

Between who I was and who I wanted to be:

Between what the world had made of me,

And who I am.”

There was a polite smattering of applause around the cafe. The girl; Jon thought her name was Katie, smiled a somewhat watery smile and walked past the haphazard ring of white plastic chairs they’d made to take her seat, somewhere near the back. Her delivery had been lacking, voice shaking with nerves as she recited what could charitably be called an average attempt at verse. Jon did not clap.

Instead he sat with his arms tightly folded across his chest and squinted up at the clock. He was fairly sure it was slow, but if he’d gotten his math right then there should only be half an hour left of this ordeal. Jon’s stomach rumbled, and he pursed his lips as the next girl stood up. She clapped her hands, and he didn’t bother trying to hide his scowl. He hated the clappers. 

“Smack! You hit me and I hit back .” The rest of the poem was much the same, and Jon wondered whether the girl in question (Alicia?) wouldn’t be better off joining an amateur rap club. He was sure such a thing existed in the university’s frankly unnecessarily long list of societies, and Alicia clearly cared more about percussion than she did about language. She was probably just thrilled to escape the restraints of her undoubtedly upper class upbringing. For a second, Jon imagined her performing her travesty of a recital to a wealthy audience of passive aggressive relatives, all clapping along with the lukewarm enthusiasm of golf spectators. 

Jon didn’t actually mean to laugh, despite the opinion of every person his age that he’s ever met - he’s not that much of an asshole. But he laughed anyway, and Alicia went pink, and whilst Jon made a valiant effort to turn the thing into a cough, Alicia hurried back to her seat with bright red cheeks and Jon got a valiant attempt at an actual death glare from the society’s president, Felicity. Jon slumped down in his plastic chair and cleared his throat, feeling his own cheeks colouring. “Sorry, sorry.” 

No one replied. After a moment, another girl, wth a cloud of dark hair and bright pink converse trainers, hopped up to the stage. Her mouth is curled in half a grin and she’s about three times as confident as the rest of the evening’s ‘performers.’ Jon sat up a little.

“Hush, crash, sigh, breathe. 

Listen to the whisper of the roaring sea.” 

It’s the first decent performance of the evening, with the girl - Natalie - letting her voice rise and fall, accelerate and slow like the ocean on which she’d set her metaphor. When Jon applauded he meant it, and he wasn’t entirely paying attention to the empty plastic chair beside him. (He was in a small field of unoccupied white plastic. As the club’s only male member, Jon got the impression that he was tolerated but not welcome, and his attitude had not yet helped.)

When someone sat down heavily into the chair beside him, then, Jon didn’t really look round -  more interested in Natalie’s quiet explanation of her process. But then Natalie left the stage, and the person next to him elbowed his rib cage. Jon jerked, and turned to glare, and stopped. 

The girl beside him was soft, and freckled, and a study in copper. Her hair was a messy pile of red and orange, her eyes were brown but had turned gold in the evening sunlight slipping through the windows. Her lips were pink and full, and her cheeks and arms were covered in a generous scattering of freckles. The corner of her mouth was pulled halfway to a grin, and the denim strap of her dungarees had slipped off one of her shoulders. She smelled like vanilla and soap and she was wearing chipped green nail polish. 

She was very beautiful.

“So why join a Slam Poetry Society if you don’t actually like Slam Poetry?” Her voice was rough and lower than Jon had expected. There was a tiny scar just above her cupid’s bow, and Jon had to remind myself that asking people questions about their scars before you’d learned their name was not, apparently, what you did in polite company. 

“Um.” He said, instead, eloquently, as someone else got up onto the stage.

The girl snorted, eyes and nose wrinkling as she did so. Jon really couldn’t stop staring. “What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?” 

Jon cleared his throat, and leaned a little closer, and told himself it was for no other reason than to avoid interrupting the performance a few feet away from them. “No, I do like it.” 

The girl huffed, but she leaned closer too, and the space between their faces was suddenly both very small and very warm. Their shoulders bumped, and Jon swallowed and tried not to think about it. “Could’ve fooled me. I’m Georgie, by the way.” 

“Jon.” Jon paused, and tried to ignore the blind panic that has apparently replaced his higher functions. “What - what are you studying?”

The girl on the stage screamed, “VAGINA!” And Georgie suddenly doubled forward. Jon was half concerned about her, but then she sat back up and pressed a fist to her mouth and her shoulders were silently shaking and her eyes were squeezed shut. Jon found a smile coming onto his own lips, and felt laughter bubbling up in his chest as he watched her trying not to giggle.

Which was, of course, when the girl on stage decided to experiment with repetition. 

“VAGINA! VAGINA! VAGINA!” 

Georgie let out a muffled squeak, pressing her other arm to her abdomen as she curled forward, and Jon found himself beginning to chuckle, too, as quietly as he could. Felicity glared at them, but somehow, with the red faced girl behind her, that only made it funnier. Some of the cafe’s other patrons: unfortunate customers who had not yet realised that this was Oxford University’s latest Slam Poetry haunt on Tuesday evenings, looked over towards the stage, slightly perplexed. 

The girl in question: white and wealthy judging by her haircut and the Jack Wills jumper she was wearing, was red faced as she continued, with what Jon was sure was at least an amateur attempt at feminist literature. Of course, it was hard to concentrate with Georgie giggling beside him and him trying to contain his own laughter.

And then the girl moved onto her final stanza.

“Because for you it’s all about MY BUTTHOLE .”

That did it. Jon accidentally barked a loud laugh at the same time that Georgie took her hand away from her mouth to breathe and wailed with laughter, tears running down her now pink cheeks. The girl on stage immediately stopped, frowning, and Felicity got to her feet. Jon wanted to take her seriously, he really did, but his stomach and his cheeks were hurting from laughter and all he could think about was the expression on one particularly perplexed octogenarian’s face as their latest poet shouted what - he was sure - for her was a very radical sentence. 

“Both of you, out, now.” Felicity snapped, and Georgie nodded, getting to her feet and raising her hand when she tried to speak and failed, dissolving into further giggles.  Then she grabbed Jon’s arm, and pulled him with her towards the door. Georgie’s hand, soft and firm around his upper arm, was enough to sober him up almost immediately - but he did retain enough of his wits to grab his bag as they left, picking their way through the half empty herd of plastic chairs and making their way out into the later summer evening. 

Once they were outside, Georgie immediately began to laugh: a full belly laugh until her face was streaked with tears. Jon watched her and couldn’t stop smiling. He had his bag slung over one shoulder, and part of him thought that perhaps he should leave her to it. But the other part reminded him that it was a warm, clear summer evening, and the sky was threaded with cotton candy pink, and the street was empty and this girl was beautiful and he wanted to be with her. 

Also, she still had her hand wrapped around his arm. 

After a few minutes: in which time the poets recommenced, judging by the occasional muffled shouts that made their way through the cafe’s glass and plastic door, Georgie ran out of breath and sighed, straightening and scrubbing at her cheeks with the back of her hand. It was only then that she realised, apparently, that she’d been holding Jon’s arm, and she let go immediately with a breathless, smiling, “oh, sorry.”

Jon shook his head. “It’s fine.” He thinks he can feel the imprint of her fingers still, pressed into his skin. 

And Georgie had been beautiful before - but now, with her cheeks pink and her eyes bright from laughter, she’s breathtaking. She looks at him, and Jon isn’t sure if she’s waiting for him to say something, and he doesn’t know what to say if she is. The silence stretches, and Jon starts to panic, squeezing the strap of his bag. But then Georgie’s expression softens, and she grins at him. Her left canine has a chip in it. 

“Come on. Do you drink?” 

Jon nods, and Georgie starts walking down the street. After a moment, Jon follows her. Georgie glances back at him when he does. “Let’s get a beer.” 

Chapter Text

They’re not always friends. Jon is stiff and uncertain and still learning how to manage his pride. Georgie is tempestuous, still growing into her temper and what to do with it. They don’t always agree, and sometimes it’s on things that one or the other of them has decided in their youth is unforgivable (things like the best translation of Beowulf or the Star Wars prequels. They tend to agree where human beings are concerned, and even when they’re arguing, they make a good team of incisive jibes and loud recalcitrance against even the most determined bigots.)

Still, by the end of his first year, having managed largely through stubborn persistence to manufacture a very small group of friends, it’s safe to say that Georgie is Jon’s closest. Which is why she’s lying on his bed, underlining passages in a book from the university library, when he offers to make her dinner. 

Georgie sits up, and frowns. A strand of her hair has fallen over her face. Jon itches to push it back behind the white shell of her ear, and tucks his hand into his pocket instead. He has long since resigned himself to the idea that he is not what Georgie wants or needs. He is, he tells himself, content to be her friend and see her find someone else to be happy with. Someone who can give her everything a romantic partner deserves, and not just the limited menu that Jon could offer. And that’s fine. He’ll make it fine. 

Georgie puffs the strand of hair, and it floats up above her nose before falling back down on her face. Jon doesn’t entirely succeed at suppressing the curl of his mouth, and Georgie grins at him, wide and bright and crooked. “I thought the rule was that whoever isn’t hosting cooks? You’re the one with an exam in the morning.”

Jon lets himself smile a little more widely, teasing. “The rule is that I cook. Because you think grated cheese on pasta in a microwave is a healthy meal.”

Georgie sticks her tongue out at him, and Jon raises his eyebrows. She continues before he can comment, “I’ve never said it’s healthy. It’s a student meal, there’s a difference. One is boring, the other is cheap and delicious.” 

Jon looks at her steadily, unimpressed. “Sure. But since, as you mentioned, I have an exam in the morning, I’d like to eat something that has literally any vegetables in it.” He pauses, scratching the back of his neck as he glances away. “And, ah, since I’m cooking anyway - we can eat together. If you want.” 

Georgie laughs, and sits up. Her feet are bare, and she wriggles her toes against the blankets. She’d rolled up her jeans earlier, and she looks so right sitting there - relaxed and comfortable and happy - that Jon’s heart aches. “I’m not going to say no to a free meal, Jon.” 

Jon nods, and decides this is a good moment to beat a swift retreat, backing up in the small space of his room and turning to his wardrobe to retrieve a few ingredients from the top shelf. There’s a rustle of fabric as Georgie gets to her feet, and then she’s behind him and she’s warm and Jon nearly jumps out of his skin. 

“You’re worse than a cat.” Jon snaps, without any real annoyance.

“I mean, goals.” Georgie grins at him, and a stupid human part of him wants to kiss the freckles on her nose where it’s wrinkled with her smile. Jon ignores that, carefully stepping past her. She follows. 

“So how’d you learn to cook, anyway?” Jon doesn’t need to ask Georgie to open the door - they’ve done this enough times, and she steps past him easily enough, hand coming dangerously close to his side as she reaches past to pull the handle. Jon steps through, arms full; and then frowns.

“Did you -?” He doesn’t need to finish the sentence. Georgie holds up his keys in her other hand and smiles at him, and Jon smiles back at her. “Thanks.”

He steps out into the narrow hall outside his room. It smells faintly of disinfectant, which is an improvement on the vomit courtesy of his neighbours three doors down. Jon preferred student living to living with his grandmother, but beyond that he was fairly sure he’d prefer to live anywhere else. Georgie skips ahead of him to the JCR in bare feet, unbothered by the coarse red carpet, and flicks on the light with a plastic snap and an electric hum.

Jon follows, and collects his thoughts whilst he sets out his pans and ingredients, whilst Georgie leans against the door to the cupboard his college terms a communal kitchen. “Well, I learned the basics when I was eight.” Jon says, filling a pan with water and switching on the miserably slow electric hob. Outside the window, some students laugh on their way back to their rooms. It’s dark out, and the mock street lamps of the college spill yellow light onto the neatly cut grass. 

Jon smiles a little as he gets out a knife and tops and tails the garlic, peeling it before he crushes the cloves he’s using with the flat of his knife. “Of course, that couldn’t really be called cooking per se. It was mostly just dumping pasta in a pan of water and leaving it on the hob until I thought it was ready.” Georgie snorts, and Jon looks up to smile at her before turning back to chopping the crushed garlic, breathing the smell of it in as the juice stains the chopping board. 

“Did your grandmother teach you?” Georgie asks, and Jon can hear her smile despite the fact his back is turned. Not far off, a group of people make their way up the staircase, footsteps loud on the thinly carpeted wood. 

Jon frowns a little, pushing the garlic to one side before he starts chopping tomatoes. “Ah, no. She didn’t really have time - well, the energy. She hadn’t been planning to suddenly babysit an eight year old twenty four seven. And not, not one that reminded her of the son she’d lost.” Jon shrugs, and the movement feels stiff and tight. He focuses instead on the cherry tomatoes in front of him, carefully slicing them into halves, feeling the catch of the knife on their skin and then the soft satisfying thump as he slices through them. 

“Wait, so you were using the oven by yourself? Isn’t that sort of...dangerous for an eight year old?” 

Jon shrugs again. The water starts to boil, and he pauses to add pasta, salt and olive oil. “I wasn’t stupid. I understood the basic principle.” He offers Georgie another smile, but she doesn’t smile back this time. “It was just making pasta.” Jon thinks about it. “I don’t think I started using knives until I was...11, maybe? Before that it was a lot of cans and whole vegetables dumped in a saucepan.” Jon huffs, laughing a little as he pokes the pasta down below the surface of the bubbling water with a fork. “Pretty sure one of the biggest revelations of my childhood was learning that you could roast things.” He moves back to the chopping board, and gestures with his knife as he does so, scooping forward the last of the tomatoes. “Fun fact, boiled peppers? Disgusting. Just soggy. I still don’t really like them cooked.”

Georgie is quiet, but that’s not always a bad thing. Above them, the ceiling creaks as other students go about their evenings. Jon finishes chopping the tomatoes, and then goes into the overfull fridge to retrieve a block of cheddar.

“So did you mostly cook for yourself? What did your grandmother do?” 

Jon shrugged, grabbing a small plate from the draining rack and checking it was dry before he began to grate cheddar onto it. “She normally went to bed before I did, even back then. I think she ate around 5 o’clock? She said…” Jon hesitates, resting his wrists on the kitchen counter as he thinks about it. “I think she told me early on that she wouldn’t be able to cook every night. She got tired.” Jon starts grating again. “Not too tired for TV, mind.” He shrugs again, and again it feels tight and stiff. Jon frowns at the cheese grater, adjusting his grip on the soft block of dairy in his hand. “So I learned how to make do. It was fine.”

Again, the silence stretches. The electric light above them hums, and the saucepan bubbles, and once Jon is finished with the cheese he checks the pasta and switches off the hob, setting a frying pan on the other and drizzling a little olive oil into it. When the oil starts to sizzle, he scoops up the garlic and tomatoes, dropping them into the pan and rinsing his hands before reaching for a jar of chilli flakes. The smell of cooking garlic and tomato fills the small room, and eventually the silence starts feeling heavy. Jon turns around. 

Georgie is watching him, and there’s a faint dash of thought between her eyebrows. Half her bottom lip is pinched between her teeth, and her hands are in her pockets.

“Is everything alright?” There’s a part of Jon - the part that had been bullied every day of his school life and too often disliked - that still feels nervous of other people. There’s a stupid, irrational part of him that expects her to insult him, or hit him, or just turn and leave. He can feel his shoulders rising, and he makes a conscious effort to lower them and remind himself that he trusts Georgie.

For her part, Georgie blinks, and her frown eases, and she offers him a close-lipped smile that’s warm and reassuring. “Sorry, got lost in thought. Everything’s fine.” Then she steps forward, and looks at the pan, where the tomatoes have nearly finished frying and the garlic is golden brown. “Better than fine. This looks great!” 

Jon feels the tension fall out of him like rain from a storm cloud, and he nods, turning back to the pan and hurriedly dropping in a handful of chill flakes before mixing it all together. “Good. That’s. Great, ok, can you get some bowls?” He gestures to the cupboard, and Georgie dips to fetch them. 

Once Jon has served the food, Georgie takes the bowls and Jon grabs a plate of grated cheese and some pepper before dumping all the dirty dishes into the sink. He follows Georgie back to his room, and she awkwardly passes him his keys so he can open the door. They get inside and sit on Jon’s bed, facing each other with the grated cheese balanced carefully on the covers between them. 

Jon waits for Georgie to eat first, and she grins after her first mouthful, childlike as she tips up her chin and exposes the line of her throat. (Jon tries very hard not to think about kissing her.) 

“Delicious.” Georgie declares, and Jon smiles down at his bowl, digging his own fork into his pasta. 

Just before he takes a bite, he asks, “so how about you?”

“Hm?” Georgie gives him a questioning look, mouth full already. Jon huffs half a laugh and the corner of her mouth pushes up against her full cheeks. 

“When did you learn to cook?” He asks, starting to eat. 

Georgie swallows; and the same thoughtful wrinkle from before presses a crease into her brow. “Well, I mean. I didn’t really start cooking for myself until I was 16, I guess? My parents didn’t want me hurting myself in the kitchen. And then they didn’t want me in the way.” 

Jon snorts. “Judging by your current culinary skills, that seems wise.” 

Georgie smiles, but it’s not as wide as before. “Yeah, well. You know. Kids aren’t usually left unsupervised in kitchens, I think? Not with like. Knives and ovens and stuff.” She says the words slowly, and a little awkwardly, pulling at her ear and giving Jon an apologetic smile as she does.

Jon tries to smile back, keen to smooth over whatever awkwardness has been growing between them. “Yes, well, we weren’t all lucky enough to grow up with the doting messers Barker.” 

Georgie nods, and there’s the same thoughtful line on her brow again, but this time she shrugs her round shoulders and twists another bundle of spaghetti onto her fork. “That’s true.” Then she clears her throat. “Do you want to go over those quotes again?”

The question brings a surge of panic with it, as Jon remembers exactly how few hours remain until his first exam. He nods, and leans back on the bed, passing Georgie his flashcards. “Yes please.” 

Chapter Text

Jon still wasn’t entirely convinced that he wasn’t dreaming. He was in his second year at university and his studies were going - well, fine, but that was better than he’d worried they would be. More importantly, somehow, he was dating Georgie Barker. He wasn’t quite sure how it had happened. They had transitioned from spending half the week in each other’s rooms studying to spending half the week in each other’s rooms studying and...doing other things. 

The fact that Jon was ace (and he was still getting used to the word - still getting used to the idea that there was a word for this), was not apparently a problem. Nor was the fact that he did not only like girls - one which Georgie had met with a grin. ( “I mean, it’s only an issue if you mind the fact that I like them too.” )

If Jon had told himself three years ago that any of this would happen, his teenage self would have written it off as an experiment in delusion or masochism or both. As it was, he was...happy. Jon hadn’t realized that he hadn’t been before until suddenly he was. 

Georgie had dragged him to his first Pride, with her face painted and her t-shirt covered in sharpie and chopped short to expose the soft curve of her belly (she’d covered it in pink and blue and purple glitter, and Jon was still sort of amazed when he gave in to his impulse to touch her bare lower back and she leaned into him instead of pulling away.) Jon had gone dressed as casually as he could, with his primary goal being a vague desire to go unnoticed. 

But it was his decision to buy a black, white, grey and purple wristband from a seller on the street. He was still wearing it. Georgie had made them both blue, pink and purple beaded bracelets in a burst of enthusiasm about the occasion. Sometimes Jon wore that one too. It was a strange feeling, to so openly signal himself in this way, but it was also strangely reassuring. He wasn’t weird or inhuman or alien or broken. He was just himself. 

And apparently Georgie loved him for it.

They were relaxing, now, having just finished watching a vaguely entertaining documentary series on Anglo-Saxon kings. Georgie was curled up against Jon’s chest, and she was warm and soft and heavy, breathing deeply against his chest. Her thumb rubbing the back of his hand was the only indication that she hadn’t fallen asleep. 

Jon’s TV flickers back to the DVD menu, and he considers moving and thinks better of it, instead pressing a kiss to the top of Georgie’s head. Her hair is soft and silky and smells like coconuts, and Jon breathes it in deeply, feeling a rush of warmth rise up in his chest with it. Georgie shifts against him, tilting her head back, and Jon presses a quick kiss to the top of her forehead just because he can. Her skin is warm and soft against his lips. 

Georgie blushes, and Jon stills feel like that’s impossible, that he can make her blush. But he has, and she looks lovely with it. Elsewhere in the flat, one of his flatmates - Kieran, quietly strums an acoustic guitar. “What d’you think, out of 10?” 

“11.” Jon says, smiling, and Georgie rolls her eyes, huffing as she rolls over and sits up. Jon shifts to let her. 

“The documentary, idiot.” 

Jon grins. “Can’t a man be romantic at…” He pauses, checking his watch. “3:06am with his girlfriend?” 

“After watching a documentary on Anglo-Saxon kings?” Georgie asks, then presses her hands to her face with a groan. “Oh my god, I think this might be the nerdiest thing I’ve ever done. What have you done to me?”

Jon chuckles and leans forward, pulling her arms down gently. Georgie glares at him without any real venom. “I’ll remind you that this was your suggestion.” He reaches up, and gently pushes a handful of hair behind her ear. Georgie’s eyes flicker shut, and she leans into his hand, yawning. 

“Yeah but...it was only to impress you. So like. It’s technically your fault.” 

Jon huffs, and pulls her closer. Georgie folds easily, slumping against his shoulder, and he wraps his arms around the ample curve of her back. Jon runs slow circles on her upper back as he runs his fingers over her hair, letting his mind grow quiet with the simple fact of her. 

“You don’t need to do anything to impress me.” He says quietly, in the silence of his wide room under the impersonal glare of the electric light. “I already think you’re incredible, Ms Barker.” 

Georgie snorts, and cuddles closer, wrapping her arms around his chest. “You get so sappy when you’re tired.” But then she sits up, and presses a quick, firm kiss to his lips. Her mouth tastes like red wine and lip balm, and Jon smiles against the kiss. 

“You’ll have to find a way to forgive me, I suppose.” Then he kisses her temple, and gently extricates himself from her arms, setting her down on the pillow before moving to switch off the TV and pull on his pyjamas. Georgie lies on his duvet and watches him, half asleep. Jon switches on his pitiful bedside lamp. It buzzes, loudly, and illuminates the 10 centimetres of space around it, barely. Huffing, Jon switches off the bedroom light. Immediately, the room falls dark except for the bedside table and the little light that makes its way through the curtains above his desk from the street lamp outside. 

Jon goes to his drawers, and gets out an old soft t-shirt for Georgie, before heading back to the bed, gently nudging her to sit up. He carefully grabs the bottom of her t-shirt, and pulls it up over her head, and Georgie lets him, before sitting back and wriggling her jeans off. Jon dumps them on the floor whilst Georgie takes off her bra and pulls on the t-shirt. Then she gets under the duvet, grabbing Jon’s wrist and pulling him with her. Jon laughs a little and lets her, lifting up his thin duvet. 

Once they’re in bed, Georgie pulls Jon close, the soft warm curve of her chest and belly pressing into his back as she slips her thigh over his. “G’night Jon.” 

Jon shuts his eyes, and smiles, quiet and secret into the dark. Georgie’s arm is strong and warm around his waist, and she shuffles forward to press a good night kiss to the back of his neck, before nuzzling against his hair. Jon sighs, and relaxes into her embrace. 

“Night Georgie.”

They oversleep, which Jon supposes is what happens when you drink two bottles of red wine and stay up until 3am watching documentaries. It’s Georgie who realises that they overslept, and she jumps out of bed, half standing on Jon as she does and scrambling to scoop up her clothes.

“Fuck fuck fuck I’m late.” Georgie says, and Jon frowns at the noise. Sunlight is filtering through his curtains now, and his back is suddenly cold without the presence of another body to warm it. He squints at Georgie. Her hair is a pile of copper curls and tangles, and her face is pink from sleep. 

“Come back to bed.” He mutters, voice rough with sleep. Georgie grins at him and steps forward to press a kiss to his head. Jon sits up a little to grab a handful of the soft material of her t shirt and pull her down gently for a kiss. 

“I’m really late. Can I use your towel?” Georgie whispers, gently, and Jon presses his cheek into the pillow. 

Jon nods and gestures, and Georgie chirps a quick, “thanks!” Then she presses another kiss to his cheek before half running out of the room. 

The door swings shut, and Jon rolls onto his back, stretching as he stares up at the ceiling and considers getting up himself. Two minutes later, Georgie comes back into the room in nothing but a towel. “Jon! Where’s your shampoo?” 

Jon frowns. “I don’t have any?” 

Georgie bounces a little, already turning to leave. “Fuck, have you run out?” 

Jon’s frown deepens. “No? I just don’t have any? Because I don’t...need any?” He’s too tired for this, and now Georgie is frowning back at him again. But then her gaze moves from him to the clock on his radio and she swears again. 

“Fuck, ok, I’ll just steal some from one of your flatmates.” Jon nods, halfway back to sleep again.

“M’kay. Good luck.” 

Georgie is already gone. Jon smiles a little against his pillow, and lets his eyes shut. He can afford to sleep for five more minutes.

Later, Georgie meets Jon after her supervision for lunch. They’re eating in halls, though they’ve managed to find a fairly quiet spot a little distance away from other people. Georgie leans forward, elbows on the wooden table in front of her, and points at Jon with her fork. “So wait, you really don’t own shampoo?”

Jon blinks, trying to figure out how this connected to their previous conversation about 19th century French poetry and realising it didn’t. “Uh, no?”

“Really?” Georgie doesn’t make an effort to hide her surprise, and further down the table a maths student takes a moment to look up from his text book to glare at them. 

“Yes?” Jon can’t help but feel like he’s missing something. He’s not a fan of the feeling, and he doesn’t look at Georgie as he pushes his mashed potato around his plate. 

“Why though?” Georgie asks, sounding needlessly intrigued. 

Jon shrugs, feeling his chest and face heating with a blush and not really sure why. “I don’t need to, I have short hair.”

Georgie huffs a short laugh, and then catches it when Jon shrinks back. He glances up and down the table. No one’s paying attention to them, at least, and it’d be too much of a fuss to just leave. Miserably, he resigns himself to enduring this interaction. Georgie lowers her hand, going from amused, to serious, and then sympathetic. Jon stabs a chunk of sausage. “Wait, you’re serious.” 

Jon doesn’t answer, shoving a forkful of mood into his mouth. It’s not bad, as far as the cafeteria goes, and still mostly warm. He swallows, and glares at Georgie over his plate. “Is that not the case?” He asks, stiffly. 

Georgie sits up, and has the good grace to at least look contrite. She reaches forward to rest her hand over Jon’s, and Jon pulls away. It’s petty and they both know it, and Georgie purses her lips but breathes, looking down at the table before she meets his gaze. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have laughed. I just. I kind of forget, sometimes.” 

Jon frowns, the feeling of missing something important growing like an itch at the back of his skull. “Forget what?” 

Georgie sighs, quietly. In the rest of the hall, the quiet background chatter of students and staff provides a burbling backdrop that rises and falls like a tide, occasionally interrupted by the clatter of plates and chinking cutlery. “Never mind. You should get some shampoo though.” Jon opens his mouth, half planning to protest on principle, but Georgie reaches forward and takes his hand again, squeezing before he can pull back. Reluctantly, Jon meets her eyes, and they’re copper and gold in the early afternoon sunlight that’s pouring through the high windows of the hall. “For me?”

Jon huffs. “Fine.” 

He buys an all in one shampoo and shower gel the next day, and figures it’s a good compromise.

After a few weeks of using it, he buys an actual shampoo, half surprised at the way his hair brightens and curls under the new treatment - and pleased with the sudden attention Georgie gives him, pulling her fingers through the waves and scratching gently at his scalp. 

Jon’s never been a vain man, and he still doesn’t think much of his looks - but he can appreciate that his hair looks better now than the greasy mess he’d had before, and he walks a little taller for it, half liking his reflection when he looks at it in the mirror. 

Georgie doesn’t mention it again.

Chapter Text

It’s nearly the end of Michaelmas term. Things with Georgie are going well, as are his studies, and their respective friendship groups have merged into one larger one that troops down to the pub every Friday and seems to actually want Jon around. He should be happy.

Instead, Jon finds himself falling into a darker and darker mood as the holidays approach. He tells himself it’s the weather - and in general the irritatingly loud, plastic commercialisation of the Christmas holidays.

On his fourth argument with Georgie that week, however, he has to admit that it’s not just a general malaise. Georgie blinks at him, and her eyes are bright, and Jon’s chest aches and a vicious quiet voice in the back of his head snarls at him that this was always going to happen - he never learned how to really love anyone. He was always going to be a selfish, thoughtless boy with no real thought for anyone but himself, and there was no point in trying to make himself otherwise. It was just his nature. Might as well go back to his bedroom and his books and have done with it.

Jon opens his mouth to speak, and there’s a lump in his throat when he does, which is stupid, because the only one who’s been flinging insults is him. “Georgie - I,” He falters, and something crumbles in his chest, and he curses himself for the coward that he is. The handful of feet between himself and Georgie feels like a beige carpet chasm. He wishes he had the courage to cross it.

Georgie lifts her chin, and sniffs. “What the hell is wrong with you, Jon? You’ve been acting like an ass for weeks now.” Her hand curls at her side, bunching into a tight ball before she deliberately uncurls it and bites the inside of her cheek. Her brows pull up as she adds, earnestly, “has something happened? Was it Louis? Because you know he’s always been an idiot but if he’s been giving you trouble then -,”

“What?” Jon is so confused that he loses his grip on his anger. It escapes him like a restless bird, and with it goes what little energy he had left. He slumps, frowning as he runs over his memory of the past few weeks. Understanding dawns, and he half smiles, slumping further. “Oh, right, no. No, it’s not Louis.” 

Georgie relaxes too, unwinding a little from a posture that usually meant she was ready to go and pick a fight. A surge of warmth curls up in Jon’s chest. “But it is something, isn’t it?” 

Jon runs his hand over his trousers, wiping his sweating palm. “I - yes.” He hesitates, not quite finding the bravery to look up at her. Elsewhere in the flat, someone slams a door and both of them jump. Jon clears his throat. “Honestly I...don’t know. I thought it was the weather or Christmas or... something, but.” Jon trails off, and looks up, and braces himself. “It’s not an excuse. I shouldn’t be taking this out on you, George. I’m sorry.” He holds his breath, waiting for her to lash out or reject his apology or do something else equally awful. 

Georgie softens immediately, and sniffs again, and her chest jumps a little as she swallows half a sob, rubbing the tears away from her cheeks as they fall. Jon stands there stiffly, watching, wanting to go to her and unsure if he can. But then Georgie smiles at him. “I mean, you shouldn’t, but it’s ok. Come here, idiot.” 

Jon moves without thinking, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. She cuddles his waist, pressing her cheek against his chest as she sniffs, and Jon anxiously strokes her hair. Tentatively, he presses a kiss to her head, murmuring quiet apologies. 

After a while, Georgie stops crying and looks up at him. Her face is a red and pink mess of snot and tears, and Jon grabs her a box of tissues, wordlessly handing them over. Jon waits while Georgie cleans herself up. His room smells like instant coffee and the fresh laundry that he’s not yet put away. 

Georgie reaches out to take Jon’s hand, and Jon immediately winds their fingers together. “Thanks for apologising.” 

Jon huffs, and squeezes her hand. “Thanks for forgiving me.” 

Georgie smiles, and shrugs. “Yeah, well, I’m not a complete asshole. Unlike some people.” She grins up at him to soften the tease, and Jon nods solemnly. 

“That’s fair.”

Georgie snorts, and uses his hand to tug him down for a quick, fierce kiss. “You’re an idiot.”

Jon slips his other hand down to cup her neck, gently pulling her closer and trying to press all his regret and his affection and everything he can’t say with it into the warmth of their lips. Georgie sighs against him, and pulls back to nuzzle his nose before she moves away. 

“So. My vote is we figure out who or what exactly shoved a stick up your ass and remove it, post haste. Pun intended.” She grins at him, sharp and mischievous, and Jon laughs, running one hand over his face and pulling it back through his hair.

“Alright.” He lets her tug him to the bed, and together they sit. Georgie kicks off her shoes and crosses her legs, Jon sits on the edge. Their hands remain interlaced, warm and a little awkward, but a promise and a reassurance that what they’ve been growing together isn’t broken. (Yet).

Georgie digs into the pocket of her corduroy trousers and pulls out her reading glasses, pushing them onto her face. She gives Jon her best mock-serious look, and sits forward. The bed creaks as she does so. “Alright. When exactly did the bad mood begin, Mr Sims?”

Jon huffs, and leans back, looking up at the chipped plaster on the ceiling as he thinks about it. “Uh. A few weeks ago?” 

“Can you remember anything in particular that triggered this mood?” 

Jon frowns. The thing with Louis had been annoying, certainly, but he didn’t think it was the cause of his bad mood. He’d had to learn how to shrug off bullies when he was young, and the casual aphobia of an idiot was, whilst distressing in principle, something he could normally deal with. 

Next to him, Georgie waits quietly, and Jon listens to the soft sound of her breathing as he thinks about it. Eventually he shrugs, “I mean, I guess it was around the time shops started advertising in earnest for Christmas? But,” He scratches the back of his head. “Commercialisation is annoying, it doesn’t normally depress me.” 

Georgie nods, chewing her lip. “Right. Have you got any bad memories associated with Christmas?” 

Jon hesitates. “I suppose? It’s never really...I wouldn’t say it was my favourite time of year. It’s just sort of...” He stops, trying to find the words.

(He thinks about being nine years old, and missing his mother, and curling up with his arms around his knees and trying to cry quietly whilst his grandmother watched TV in the next room. He thinks about being jealous of the presents other children brought in to school, and glaring at his own small stack of dusty, random books. He thinks of being cold because his grandmother wouldn’t turn up the heating, and knowing his clothes smelled but also knowing he’d need to wait until after New Year to ask her to wash them. He thinks about trying to teach himself Christmas carols from books and video tapes and not quite getting the tune right. He thinks about sitting, bored and tired as a teenager, waiting for the holiday to end so he could go back to doing something useful.) 

“It’s all kind of the same.” Jon shrugs, and quietly pushes away the ridiculous child inside of him. Georgie frowns at him, and her brow wrinkles and folds like old cloth. 

“Right.” 

She doesn’t really sound like she believes him.

“I think you should come to my place for Christmas.” 

They’ve just finished watching the latest episode of Doctor Who, and making the most of a student deal on pizza that got them two for one. (Which was just as well, because Georgie liked pineapple on hers and Jon emphatically did not.) They’d had a few cans of beer, and term was winding towards a close. Jon hadn’t been able to shake his bad mood, but he’d decided to deal with it by withdrawing rather than lashing out at his newly formed group of friends. As a result, he’s been primarily been spending time alone or with Georgie, and his life was a vague haze of Keats and Saturday nights in watching TV. 

So now he blinks, a little blearily as the screen shouts at them about what else is on the BBC. “What?”

Georgie has lifted her chin and crossed her arms, which usually means that even Jon won’t be able to dissuade her. He sits up a little, bracing himself. “You should come home with me to Fort William for Christmas.”

Still vaguely wound up in Steven Moffat’s plot holes, Jon squints and rubs a hand over his head. He feels warm and slightly melted, and he doesn’t really want to be doing anything other than lying down. The smell of pizza is clinging to the peeling plaster walls of his bedroom like a fresh tomato-based wallpaper, and the more awake he is the more conscious he is of the fact. Jon wrinkles his nose. 

“Uh. You’re not from Fort William?” 

Georgie huffs, but her mouth curls into a hint of a smile, and Jon feels some of the tension ease out of his upper back when she does. Outside, someone hoots and shouts. Student halls: even the blocks of flats they moved into in their second year, were rarely quiet on a Saturday night. “No, but my family does. Like, my extended family. We always join back up for Christmas.” She smiles, and her smile is crooked and her cheeks are round and her eyes are bright with mischief and promise. “It’s great. Whiskey and board games and haggis. A proper Scottish christmas.” She puts on a convincing accent for the last sentence, and Jon finds himself smiling despite himself. 

He leans down over the side of his bed to pick up the remote whilst he thinks, switching off the TV. It shuts down with a buzz and a hum, and Jon drops the remote back onto the carpet, reaching out to tug Georgie down with him as lies back on the bed. Georgie snorts but shuffles up the blankets and does so. Jon slips one arm around her shoulders, and curls onto her side, pressing into him and resting her cheek on his chest, waiting patiently. Jon runs his index finger in light circles over the soft fabric of her t-shirt. “I fear I might put a downer on the festivities.” He says, eventually, squinting up at the faintly flickering light on his ceiling and the spider-web cracks in the plaster around it. 

Georgie huffs, and lifts herself up so that she’s hovering over him. Her hair falls past her ears and tickles Jon’s checks, until he’s caught between curtains of copper with only brown eyes and freckles to look up at. The corners of Georgie’s eyes crease, and her nose wrinkles when she smiles at him, simple and sincere and loving. “I like you, so they will too.”

She leans down, and presses a kiss to his nose, and Jon smiles and tilts his head up to kiss her lips, ignoring the pull in his neck when he does so. Georgie indulges him, and for a while they just lie there, soft and sweet and comfortable with each other. Eventually, Georgie breaks the kiss, mouth curling at Jon’s soft, childish sound of protest. “So? Do we have a deal?”

Jon looks at her. In the dark, her eyes are caramel and chocolate, a soft warm brown framed by black mascara and smudges of gold eyeshadow. Her eyebrows are thick and ginger and messy, and the scar on her lip (falling off a bike, when she was six, she said), is slightly pulled askew by the movement of her smile. He’s not sure that he can deny her anything. So he sighs, and smiles.

“Alright, fine.” He snorts as Georgie slumps down to lie beside him, satisfied judging by the quick impulsive kiss she presses to his cheek. “It’s not like I had plans.”

Georgie is quiet for a moment, and then she slips her arm under his lower back and hugs his midriff, tightly. Jon looks down at her, but all he can see is the top of her head. He can feel the soft warmth of her cheek pressing into his ribcage, and her voice is muffled when she speaks. “What about your grandmother?”

Jon shrugs, ignoring the sudden tightness in his shoulders as he does it. He wriggles, adjusting himself against the creaking, ancient springs of his cheap student mattress. “She’s not religious.”

Georgie’s shoulders shift and she makes a soft sound that Jon can’t really parse. “Yeah, neither’s most of Britain. You don’t see that stopping anyone else from breaking out the tinsel.”

Jon briefly entertains the mental image of his grandmother coming out with forty feet of tinsel, and nearly chokes on his own sudden laugh. Georgie finally turns to look at him, and there’s the same wrinkle between her eyebrows again that means that something’s on her mind. Jon’s chest aches. But he resists the urge to ask her. She’ll tell him, if she wants to, in time. Instead, he offers, like a white flag, “she’s not really a tinsel person.”

For a second, Georgie’s frown deepens. But then she smiles, tightly and a little restrained. “What about you? Can we make you a tinsel man?”

Jon raises an eyebrow at her. “What does that actually mean? Also, gender is a lie.”

Georgie nods solemnly. “Gender is a lie.” Then she grins, so bright she nearly hides the fact it’s still not entirely sincere. “I’m going full Dickens on you, then. By the end of this Christmas, we’ll have you singing carols and buying your employees turkey dinners faster than you can say Ebeneezer Scrooge.”

Jon raises his other eyebrow. “Ebeneezer Scrooge.”

Georgie snorts and punches him lightly, before sitting up a little. Jon barely has the chance to yelp, “NO”, before she’s tickling him. 

Half an hour later, both of them are breathless and red faced, clothes askew and limbs splayed, lying on their backs. Georgie giggles, breathlessly, and there are tear tracks on her cheeks. Jon looks at her, and then he moves closer, thumbs brushing the tears away from her freckles. Georgie’s eyes are still squeezed shut, and giggles keep bubbling out of her lips. “If you tickle me again, Jon, I will not be held responsible for my actions.”

Georgie’s chest shakes as she laughs, and Jon’s lips twitch. He holds her face between his hands, and she doesn’t move, relaxed and happy and trusting. Just for a second, Jon feels like he can’t breathe. 

Then he leans down and kisses her. It feels like jumping off a cliff, and Jon’s heart does a variety of inadvisable gymnastic manoeuvres in his chest. Georgie sighs, content against his lips, and slips her hands up under his shirt, running her fingers over his back. Jon shivers, and then rests his forehead against hers and shuts his eyes. He says, very quietly, “I love you.”

For a moment, Georgie’s quiet, and there’s only the sound of a few drunk students outside on the street and the faint hum of Jon’s bedroom light. Then the bed springs creak and the cover shifts, and Georgie squeezes one of her arms under Jon’s and lifts her hand to his cheek. The pad of her thumb brushes over the top of his cheek and past the sensitive skin at the corner of his eye, and her fingers curl around his ear and sink into his hair. She says, softly, “Look at me.”

Jon opens his eyes, and Georgie is dark and bright in the shadows between them. She meets his gaze, and holds it, and says firmly, “I love you too.”

Jon blinks rapidly, trying to dismiss the hot itching feeling in his eyes before he embarasses himself. But then Georgie tilts up, and her hand moves to curl around the back of his neck, and she kisses him, deeply. 

Jon melts into her, and throws away his doubts. For a moment, he lives only in the places where their bodies touch - a world where everything is soft and warm and dark and gentle. A world where somebody loves him. 

Chapter Text

The main problem with the Barker-Ross family, Jon thinks, is that they’re essentially an experiment in chaos. The Ross clan are Georgie’s scottish side, and it is now very clear where she gets her complexion from. Georgie had apparently inherited her diminutive height from the Barkers, who despite their stature and generally brunette demeanour, had become as loud and raucous as the Ross’ as soon as they were in close proximity with one another. Which all of them were, apparently, because Georgie’s Uncle Eric had bought a huge sprawling farmstead away from the town and the tourists a few years ago, and now there was enough space to sleep some twenty five people and spouses, partners, children and pets. More than once, Jon had nearly tripped over a border collie, and there was no point trying to avoid the terriers. More than once, he’d had the thought that the Barkers: loud and small and fierce and all talking at once over board games - were themselves something of a terrier pack. He hadn’t voiced the thought out loud. 

Whenever possible, Jon found a small corner in a tartan-clad living room that smelled of damp wool and dog hair and firewood. He buried himself in the books he’d brought with him: more of a security blanket than anything, he didn’t actually need to study. But both the Barkers and the Ross’, despite their volume in size, sound, and quantity, had all given him a respectful distance. Occasionally, Jon was joined by Georgie’s Aunt Mary’s grizzled old tabby cat - but that was it. And Jon rather liked Dennis, with his bony shoulders and a chunk missing from his left ear (a fight with a fox, according to Georgie’s second cousin Hugh). When Dennis padded over, mostly skin and bones, and curled stubbornly into his lap to avoid the various dogs and people and stereos, Jon couldn’t help but feel they understood one another. 

The people were another matter entirely.

Jon liked them, certainly. They were like one huge bright canvas of spilled paint, and between them all he could vaguely make out the colours that had made up Georgie: a dimpled cheek here, a curving shoulder there, a snorting laugh coming from the hall. But Jon had never been good with people, and the Barker-Ross clan was a lot of very vivid people who all knew each other very well. He mostly just tried to stay out of the way. 

It was certainly an improvement on Christmas at home. Jon hadn’t really processed how much he’d been dreading another grey, chilly Christmas with his grandmother in front of the television ( “We need to save on heating, Jonathan” ) before he was offered a way to escape it. And Georgie’s family Christmas was almost laughably picturesque: nearly every room had a fireplace, crackling with warmth and soaking the thick red rugs in the smell of firewood. Every room was covered in Christmas cards, hanging in haphazard strings from the rafters. Tinsel and golden glitter and pinecones and dried orange peel and bundles of cinnamon were scattered apparently at random on wide window sills and polished oak coffee tables. Outside, the highlands were covered in a fine dusting of snow - the likes of which Jon had almost never had at home in Bournemouth, and even less often at Christmas.

In the main hall of Georgie’s Uncle Eric’s house, a mammoth of a pine tree towers beside the staircase. The various nieces, nephews and miscellaneous relatives had been carefully supervised whilst they dressed it with every conceivable Christmas tree decoration known to man - occasionally getting parents or any other visibly adult relatives to help reach higher branches. Jon had seen more than a few adolescent cousins get roped into helping their infant family members. It was strangely heartwarming to see them shake off the irritable teenager act for a few minutes to bend down and smile hugely, before getting up on tiptoes to set a glitter coated pine cone or plastic robin onto the tree, supervised by various demanding five year olds. 

Of course, Georgie had also pressed a decoration into Jon’s hand: a red foil covered parcel with a bright ribbon tied on top, hiding the glue that kept it attached to the loop of golden string with which it could be hung. Jon looked at her, “Georgie…” 

Georgie had pouted at him, and pulled up her eyebrows, making her eyes big in a way that Jon had more than once pointed out was transparent manipulation. “Please? It’s tradition.” Knowing the battle was already lost, Jon carefully stepped over two cairn terriers and one three year old, reaching up and breathing in the smell of pine whilst he tried to spot an unoccupied branch. 

Eventually he found one, and pulled it. It was surprisingly easy, and Jon hesitated, unsure whether he was doing it right. He glanced back at Georgie, more to check if she was already laughing at his incompetence than to ask for encouragement. But she smiled and nodded, and Jon carefully slipped the decoration onto the tree, ignoring the prickle of the pine needles as he did so. The parcel dipped, and bounced a little, and then stilled. Against the riot of colour and decoration on the tree itself, it barely stood out.

But Jon felt something tight and hard in his chest rising anyway. He hadn’t had a Christmas tree at home since before his parents had died. His grandmother had reasoned that it was both too expensive and too messy for the two of them, and in general Jon was inclined to agree with her. But, looking at this one: glittering green and red and gold, with two very earnest nine year old cousins a foot away discussing the placement of a wooden nutcracker soldier, he could see the appeal. 

Georgie had bounced forward, scratching the ears of the Scottie that had been sitting patiently at her feet whilst she watched, and slipped her arm through Jon’s, pressing close to his side. “Welcome to the family.”

Jon had sort of planned to say something clever about the mess they’d collectively made of the tree, but he finds himself quite suddenly unable to speak. So he turns and presses a kiss to the top of her head, and one of the children says, loudly, “ EW! ” 

Jon laughs and Georgie does too, winding her arm around him and pulling him into half a hug.

And he thinks, looking up at the tree: that it is messy, and ridiculous, and cluttered and haphazard. But it’s also them , and terribly human. And that’s good too.

“Jon, dear, that’s your pile.”

Georgie’s Aunt Mary: a Ross - judging by the freckles, red hair, and ample curve of her shoulders - pushes a small stack at Jon. Jon stares at her. 

They’ve all piled into the living room. It’s the biggest living room Jon’s ever entered: essentially a barn that Uncle Eric had converted for this exact occasion. (Georgie assured Jon he rented it out for private events for the rest of the year). The room is full of almost cartoonishly plush, soft chairs and sofas. The wooden floorboards are covered in a haphazard mess of rugs, and all the furniture has been set up in a loose semi-circle around the great roaring fire in the stone fireplace. In front of that is another smaller christmas tree which is dwarfed by the small mountain of presents shoved beneath it. The smaller children are sitting on the floor, eating mince pies or playing with the dogs or falling asleep. The older teens have clustered on two sofas from which Georgie had said with a hint of real annoyance that she’d been evicted when she turned 20. Georgie was one of the only members of the younger generation who was no longer a teenager, so she and Jon were squashed onto a sofa with some older cousins in their 30s. Jon had mostly been enjoying sitting quietly and watching the chaos unfold (the smallest children had their presents first, and the room was now a minefield of crumpled gold and silver paper, scattered with plastic toys in bright primary colours.)

He looks at Georgie in a mild panic, wondering for one moment whether Mary has confused him with an errant Barker. Georgie just smiles at him, warm and loving and smelling faintly of the brandy they’d had after lunch. “You gonna take them, or sit there staring at me?” Georgie flipped her hair with a grin, and posed. “Not that I mind.”

Aunt Mary clucks her tongue at Georgie. “Don’t tease the boy.” She looks at Jon. “Don’t worry dear, we have a policy that guests don’t bring presents.” Mary huffs a laugh that’s as deep and rough around the edges as Georgie’s, and Jon finds himself liking her more immediately. She gestures at the pile, which has not apparently been diminished, despite the distribution of the first two generations’ presents. “Honestly, you’re doing us a favour.”

Jon opens his mouth, and closes it, and tries again. “Right, I, um.” He hesitates, and says, “thank you.” It comes out a little more earnest than he’d been expecting it to, and Mary softens, brown eyes warm and gentle.

“Of course. You’re part of the family now, aren’t you?”

Before Jon can find the wits to respond to that, she moves on - apparently one of an inner circle responsible for organising the day’s festivities. Jon stares at the small stack of packages in front of him. Next to him on the sofa, Georgie sits forward. She’d opened her own presents a few minutes ago: it had been one of the highlights of the day so far, watching her laugh and kiss and hug her family, opening present after carefully chosen present. They’d bought her books - but they were books she wanted, from authors she liked or series she’d been reading. They got her toiletries, but only things that smelled like vanilla and coconut. They got her notebooks and fountain pens and Uncle Eric had bought her a new Thesaurus and added a dictionary of quotations, because Georgie had said she’d needed the former and he’d thought the latter wouldn’t hurt. 

Jon had watched this and not received or expected anything for himself. Mostly, it wasn’t a problem - especially with the children. He’d long since outgrown toy trucks (though he and Georgie had agreed that the lego space set given to 13 year old Deirdre did look, academically speaking, sick as hell.) As the day had worn on though: over lunch, with the family singing and pulling crackers and talking over each other but still somehow listening, with dogs beneath their feet and Dennis the cat prowling by the walls - Jon had felt a growing sort of tension.

He wasn’t - he wasn’t jealous, exactly. He’d never been particularly interested in Christmas - not since he was eight, anyway. He wasn’t quite sad, this was one of the most ridiculously cheerful things he’d ever been witness to, and the cheer was infectious. But Jon had felt himself and his mind growing still and quiet as the day went on. He’d felt Georgie watching him, occasionally, and had gently brushed off her concern whenever she’d raised it. He wasn’t sure what was going on in his head, so he’d just sat back into the plush sofa and been quiet and watched and taken real enjoyment from that, despite the dark growing quiet in his chest. 

But he hadn’t been expecting presents. 

“Jon? You still with me?” Georgie squeezes Jon’s hand as she asks the question, quietly, and Jon’s grateful for the noise and chaos of the Barker-Ross clan, which gives them a loud colourful kind of privacy. It’s easy to go unnoticed in the festivities, and Jon suddenly very much does not want to be seen by any of these - very kind - but ultimately unfamiliar strangers. 

He breathes, and his breath catches, and his eyes are hot. Jon frowns, willing away the tears and not entirely sure where they’re coming from. He curls the hand that isn’t wound up with Georgie’s on his knee into a tight fist, and breathes again, and it feels sharp and high in his chest. He glances at the stack of presents. They glitter in the firelight. Some of them have ribbons, some of them don’t. Some of them are wrapped in dull blue or red wrapping, clearly reused. Others boast expensive looking cream paper, or carefully bandaged red tissue. The one on top is an oblong wrapped in glittering silver paper, and Jon thinks it might be a book. 

Jon is aware of a handful of eyes on him. The Barker-Ross’ are clearly trying to give him his privacy, but occasionally a well meaning relative will glance in their direction to see whether he’s opened any of their gifts yet. It’s Jon’s sense of manners that gives him the momentary stability he needs to reach forward and pick up the first parcel. He squeezes Georgie’s hand as he does, clearing his throat and collecting his thoughts for long enough to speak. He doesn’t look at her - he’s not sure he’d be able to keep the fragile tension keeping him stable in tact if he did. “I’m fine.”

Jon lets go of Georgie’s hand and carefully flips the parcel over, slipping his fingers under the folded paper and carefully pulling at the sellotape. (His grandmother hadn’t really bothered with wrapping presents herself, mostly just using gift bags or admitting she forgot. It wasn’t a big deal.) Jon unfolds the paper and carefully pulls out the book inside. It’s a plain black Penguin copy of The Táin in translation. On another sofa, Georgie’s Aunt Matilda leans forward, smiling.

“I know technically they’re not ours, but I think you’ll find that Cú Chulainn learned how to fight in Scotland.” Her accent is thick, and she laughs a little as she speaks before her attention is distracted by an errant five year old holding up a wooden toy boat. 

Jon manages a hoarse, quiet, “thank you.”

Carefully, he runs his hand over the front cover of the book. 

Then he gets to his feet, book held tightly in his hand. Georgie watches him go, brow pulled into a mess of wrinkles and worry. “Jon? Are you ok?” Jon waves her off, and hurriedly picks his way through the dogs and children.

“Toilet.” He manages, and flees. 

Jon sits in the white tiled expanse of the closest bathroom on the floor with his back to the door, letting the cold ceramic bring him back from the spiral he’d been spinning down. He has his knees curled up in front of his chest, and is holding the book carefully on top of them. He’s also crying. 

Jon isn’t sure why he’s crying.

Well, he is. He just never really thought it was a problem.

Because Jon had been a difficult child. He’d been stubborn, and proud, and selfish and arrogant and demanding. He had no doubt that he was hardly the easiest ward for his grandmother to raise, and he sympathised with her grief for his father because he had mourned him too. But Jon had still been a child and somewhere along the line of daytime Christmas movies and ridiculous scenes in Harry Potter he’d vaguely fantasised about a Christmas like this: that smelled of oranges and cinnamon and brandy, and was full of laughter and noise and warmth.

And then he grew up, and he’d written off all of it as what it was - plastic and fantasy. Real people were, surely, more like him. They sat quietly on Christmas day and they made themselves some toast and maybe they watched the Queen’s speech and maybe they didn’t. They had a hot chocolate if it was cold and they didn’t if it wasn’t. They got one randomly chosen present, and they were grateful for it, because they didn’t want to be selfish or spoilt or ungrateful, because that would make them a bad person.

And sure, maybe Jon had always made an effort to choose something his grandmother would like. Maybe he’d saved his pocket money, and later cash from his paper run, and later still money from his first bartending job - and maybe when that hadn’t worked he’d clumsily tried to make her things: poorly molded clay pots and bad watercolours. But it had never really worked, because despite the smile and thanks she gave him, the stiff hug and kiss, he’d known and she’d known that she wasn’t really interested in whatever it was and that was fine. It was fine. Jon was bad at loving people, was all. He couldn’t figure out what they needed or what to give them, and his grandmother was the longest suffering example of this. The least he could do is get over himself long enough to learn how to be better. 

So really, crying in the bathroom now because a stranger had given him a book he actually wanted on Christmas day, was just selfish. More proof that Jon couldn’t think of anyone other than himself. More proof that all he really cared about was what people did for him, because if he could love them properly then he wouldn’t even want presents. And he certainly wouldn’t suddenly feel the absence of them throughout his childhood so keenly that it felt like physical pain. 

Jon scrubs at his eyes, and tries to get his breathing under control, and moves to get to his feet. And that’s when there’s a soft knock on the door. “Jon? You ok in there? It’s been 20 minutes.”

Jon lets out a great gust of breath, and with it all the composure he’d been carefully trying to stack back together again inside himself. He makes some kind of sound, and covers it with a cough and hopes the echo and the heavy wood of the door are good enough cover. “No, no, I’m fine.”

There’s a pause. The bathroom is cold, and Jon can feel faint goose pimples pricking on his skin. The fan above him whirrs, and after a moment Georgie says. “Do you mind if I come in?”

Jon hesitates. If he lets her in, then the lie that he’d needed to use the toilet would be shattered. On the other hand, he desperately wants to see Georgie and let her put the world the right way up again for him. After a long moment, the latter desire wins out, and Jon mentally kicks himself for his neediness. “Alright.” His voice sounds almost unrecognisable, and Jon clears it again, all too familiar with the effect of swallowing tears in order to stay quiet. 

He unlocks the door and pulls it open. Georgie is standing alone - the rest of the family is still in the main living area. She takes one look at him, and her brows pulls up, and then she steps into the bathroom and throws her arms around him. “ Oh . Hey, hey, it’s alright. Oh, darling, it’s ok.”

Jon manages one hiccoughed sort of sob and then he folds around her. Georgie leans away from him for a moment to shut and lock the door again, and then she pulls them both down to sit on the tiles, gently pressing Jon’s head into her chest and running her hands over his hair, shushing him quietly. Jon, for his part, wraps his arms around the soft warmth of Georgie’s belly and tries to find the warm quiet peace that fills his mind when he’s with her. 

His body has other plans, and it shudders and shakes as he cries, great heaving helpless sobs that tear their way out of his chest and leave his throat raw. Jon keeps his eyes shut and eventually stops fighting it and just lets himself cry. Georgie carefully rocks him back and forth, and Jon doesn’t have any energy left to feel embarrassed. Eventually, he stops, and Georgie leans towards the toilet and grabs a handful of paper, passing it to Jon to help him clear up the snot and tears smeared across his cheeks. Her dress is smeared with it, and Jon frowns, blushing when he sees it. “Oh, sorry.”

Georgie huffs a soft laugh. “I’m surrounded by toddlers, this is not the worst mess I’ve dealt with today.” 

Jon nods, and his mouth tries to smile and it sort of shakes apart before it gets there. He thinks he should probably say something, and he can’t think of anything. His legs and hands are numb from where he’s been sitting on them. Georgie looks at him, and reaches out and cups the side of his face. She says, quietly, “talk to me.”

Jon sighs and runs his hand up through his hair, tugging it as if the pain will help him find the words for whatever his mind is trying to tell him. “I don’t know what to say.”

Georgie nods, and rubs his cheek with her thumb, catching a stray tickling tear before it can reach his jaw. “Just start. Whatever’s on your mind. We’ll go from there.”

Jon looks at her. Her hand is hot on his cheek, and it feels like the only thing keeping him attached to the ground. On the floor between them, the book sits black and still as ink blot. “I wasn’t expecting any presents.” He starts, hesitantly. Georgie nods, and sits quietly. After a moment, Jon continues. “I just. It’s all. This is really nice. It’s really nice. I just...didn’t think I would be part of it? Well, I am part of it. But not as - just as a stranger. I didn’t think I’d get to, to,” Jon can feel his chest stinging again, and he stops and takes a few deep breaths to ease the tears away before he continues. “I’ve never really had anything like this.” He swallows, and his throat hurts. “I don’t know what to do.”

Georgie smiles at him, and the expression is soft and warm and small and sad. “Then you’ll learn.” She moves, getting up on her knees to hold his face in her hands. She looks at him carefully as she speaks, gaze running over the lines of his face. Jon tries not to shrink away. “Jon, you’re one of the kindest people I’ve ever met. But no one’s ever showed you how to actually do kindness, instead of just being kind. Because people haven’t been kind to you. And I don’t care what you say, that’s not your fault. Because you were a child, and we all have to learn from someone, and your grandmother is cool and all but she clearly didn’t bother to teach you.” Jon tries to pull back a little, at that, and Georgie holds him fiercely. “No, don’t you dare. Jon, children need parents to love them, not just keep them alive. That means making you dinner every night, and if you’re tired getting takeaway. It means figuring out how to get you to eat your vegetables and teaching you to shampoo your hair. It means making things like Christmas special, even if that’s just going to some hotel or restaurant where they’ve done all the hard work for you.” Georgie stops to catch her breath. Jon feels like if he moves he’ll fall apart at the seams. “Your grandmother isn’t a bad person, but she failed you. And you can’t just wish away the scars of that through self-hate and denial. You deserve to be loved. You deserved to be loved. You deserved someone who had time for you, and the things you liked and wanted, not just the things you needed. And I’m so sorry you didn’t have that, and I’m so sorry that there’s nothing I can do about it. But I can give it to you now.” Georgie breaks off, hesitating, and glances away from Jon’s face with a quick, awkward shrug and a growing pink in her cheeks. “I mean. If you’ll let me. I guess.”

Jon breathes half a laugh, and reaches up to hold Georgie’s hand where it’s cupped around his cheek. “I…” He stops and starts again, and feels like he’s pushing the words past a balloon full of helium in his lungs. “What did I do to deserve you?”

Georgie looks at him then, and her expression is fierce, and she squeezes Jon’s face between her hands, fingers pressing gently against his skull. “Nothing. Jon, you were just yourself. That was enough. 

“It’s always been enough.”

Jon’s not sure which of them leans forward first, but then they’re kissing and their lips taste like salt and Georgie’s breath still has a hint of brandy and they’re warm and he has a cramp in his leg and it doesn’t matter. Because the world starts feeling the right way up again.

It’s not easy, untangling the threads of his life that are tied to his grandmother and his childhood and everything that happened between them. But with Georgie’s help, Jon starts to manage it. He reads some books about child abuse and toxic parenting. He voluntarily goes to their university counsellor. He starts to understand himself differently, and better, than he ever had before. His relationships get better; he doesn’t become a new person, by any means, and people who had disliked him before generally continue to do so. But Jon starts to understand why he’s feeling annoyed, or hurt, or upset by the things that his peers do or don’t do. He starts to fill in the gaps in his own personal education. Not academic ones, but the parts of his life he’d taught himself differently or strangely with no one else to guide him.

Jon doesn’t change everything. He still likes the way he cooks and washes his clothes, and he figures he doesn’t need to break every habit of a lifetime. But he starts feeling healthier, and cleaner, and more easily able to blend in with other people’s conversations. 

In a word, he heals. 

Jon and Georgie do not stay together, and it is one of the most painful things that has ever happened to him when they break up. Then his grandmother dies, and Jon spends a good six months unmoored and spiralling.

And then Christmas comes around, and Georgie calls him. Jon doesn’t pick up, mostly out of pettiness. But he does listen to her answer phone message, and it’s warmer and gentler and kinder than any of the sharp words traded between them before they’d parted.

“Hey idiot. Meet me at Fort William on December 20th. Uncle Eric is going to pick us up.”

It’s awkward, that first Christmas. But it also feels like a cessation of hostilities, and Jon has missed Georgie. So when she hugs him, he hugs her back. And things aren’t entirely straightforward, and sometimes they’re difficult - but Georgie distracts herself with her nieces and nephews and Jon befriends one of her cousins (an aspiring folklorist) and it’s still good. 

Jon goes back every year after that. 

Chapter Text

Something is wrong with Martin Blackwood. This isn’t Jon’s problem. It really, really isn’t Jon’s problem. Jon doesn’t even like Martin. The man is clearly incompetent - how the hell he got himself hired as a researcher at a place as prestigious as the Magnus Institute continued to be a mystery. He fusses and he fiddles, sighs and eats crisps at his desk. He clicks his pen. Jon categorically does not like Martin Blackwood, and he has no reason to change his mind. So the fact that something’s wrong with Martin Blackwood really, really shouldn’t be Jon’s problem. 

Except that despite all evidence and precedent to the contrary, including his own best efforts, Jonathan Sims is not actually an asshole. 

He tries - God knows he tries. But he’s never been able to successfully clamp down on the part of him that just, essentially, wants to be good to other people. He doesn’t want them to like him, exactly. He doesn’t need that. (And he resolutely ignores the voice in his head that sounds a lot like Georgie and says that he does.) But Jon doesn’t want to hurt people, and he is generally of the opinion that standing back and watching someone in pain without doing anything is not so very distant from active harm. 

And Martin Blackwood is clearly unhappy. Both of them are sitting in the Institute’s library. Jon has been trying to work his way through their collection of studies of the Wild Hunt across European folklore. The active word is trying. He has not been able to concentrate since Martin arrived at half past ten (and Martin certainly slacks off, but he doesn’t usually arrive later than nine o’clock. Jon only knows this because he has to finish his breakfast before that cut off point, otherwise Martin will catch him and try to engage him in small talk.) So Martin has arrived later than usual - his clothes even more rumpled than the usual barely professional state he chose to keep them in. His hair was a haphazard mess, though Jon pitied the comb that went to war with those thick curls. Martin has deep purple bags under his eyes, and a handful of red spots scattered close to his hairline. He doesn’t even look at Jon - which is Jon’s first obvious warning sign. Instead, he swings his dirty cotton tote bag onto the table. It’s so full of books that their corners bulge out of the material in a way that suggests it would make a decent improvised weapon. The slogan, “ Lets get one thing straight: I’m Not”, is written in bold black letters over the material. 

Martin drops down into his chair, and doesn’t immediately get out a thermos of tea (obvious warning sign number two.) Instead, he rubs at the corners of his eyes, picks up three books at once from the top of his bag, and gets out his notebook. Martin’s books are plastered with a veritable frill of brightly coloured tabs, which run up the sides and along the top of his books, and he has a stained pencil case full of coloured pens, which he lays out in a half organised row. He flips open his notebook, and even from halfway down the long wooden table on the other side, Jon can make out the messy scrawl of his handwriting. Martin pokes a pen lid between his teeth, and opens his first book as he chews on it absently. 

Martin has been researching mermaids, because of course he has. Jon is not yet convinced that the foundation of Martin’s paranormal knowledge has not come from Disney films. Everything he chooses to pursue is just, so, well, basic . Mermaids, fairies, elves, giants, dwarves. It’s like he watched Lord of the Rings (Jon doubts he’d have made it through Tolkien’s prose, and refuses to admit that he himself found it a slog) - and decided to build a career out of it. It’s insulting to the whole profession, it makes them look as if they’re a bunch of children pursuing children’s stories because they never successfully grew up. (Jon tells himself the voice in his head sounds nothing like his grandmother. It’s a lie.) 

Jon narrows his eyes at the bright primary colours of the book Martin’s looking at, Mermaids: The Myths, Legends & Lore. And he decides that even if something is wrong with Martin Blackwood, he’s not going to do anything about it. The decision sits jagged and uncomfortable in his chest, but Jon purses his lips and scowls at his own neat notes written with one black biro (because that’s all you actually need, Martin. ) 

The morning winds on. There are a few other researchers in the library - but beyond their breathing and the occasional turning of a page set against the hollow tick of the clock, it’s silent. It is, all in all, a good morning, and Jon has nearly forgotten about the jagged lump of unease in his chest, too wound up in a really quite lovely essay about the sources from which Shakespeare had pulled his own ideas around the Hunt. 

Someone’s phone buzzes. 

Jon is not remotely surprised when it’s Martin’s phone. The thing has a very distinctive vibration - what with it being about half a century old and more plastic than functional machine. Jon has no idea why Martin insists on keeping it, but it doesn’t so much vibrate as beat a violent drum solo against the wooden table. 

Jon glares at him as he picks it up, and for once Martin doesn’t notice, cower, and whisper a too-loud apology in the quiet space. Instead, Martin’s round shoulders stiffen. He bites the inside of his cheek, and glances from his phone to his book, pen still poised over his page. (It’s a yellow one now. How he can read anything written in yellow ink is a mystery to Jon.) Martin’s phone emits another tiny plastic earthquake. Jon keeps glaring. Martin puts down his pen, and picks up his phone. The click of the thick plastic buttons is loud in the dusty quiet of the library. 

The screen lights up, a faint sickly green. Martin reads it, and everything about him crumbles. His shoulders, which had been tense and brittle, slump in one great folding movement. His face - stiffly impassive, folds into an expression of exhaustion so deep Jon can almost feel it. Martin gently drops his phone on his notebook and slumps forward, hiding his face in his hands. Jon looks away, feeling abruptly as if he’s intruding on something private. Everyone else in the library has gone back to their work - at least everyone Jon can see. He should too. 

But Jon recognises that expression. He’s worn it himself enough times. His grandmother had never been great with technology, but she’d learned it well enough to send him the occasional chastisement, demand, or, more rarely, inquiry after his health. He knows the feeling of not quite disappointment so much as fatigue, flavoured with echoes of grief and frustration and pain, that leads you to curl around yourself and hide your face and hope for half a minute that the world will just go away and leave you be. 

Jon doesn’t know anything about Martin’s mother. He’s never really tried to learn. He knows he might be wrong. But he also knows that he spent 19 years just a little bit colder, and a little bit hungrier, and a little bit lonelier than he wanted to be. That no one had ever asked him what was wrong, because they were worried that they’d make the incorrect assumption. That he’d needed someone to ask him what was wrong, and that eventually Georgie Barker did. 

So Jon sighs, and the jagged lump in his chest dissipates, and he tries to ignore his own relief. Instead, he slaps his books shut a little harder than necessary - because he’s not cruel but he is petty, and he had planned to get more work done today. Martin flinches as he does so, and Jon is both vindicated and guilty and wishes his damn mind would pick a side. Of course, this only adds to his general frustration, and by the time he’s finished struggling to squeeze his books into the briefcase he’d found in a second hand clothes shop, he’s nearly forgotten the gentler feelings that have led him to this course of action in the first place. 

Still, Jon is nothing if not stubborn. So he slings his bag over his shoulder, and the strap pulls into his muscles, tugging them sore. Jon pushes his hand under the rough fabric of it to ease the pressure, and carefully slides his chair across the thick rug, tucking it back under the desk. Then he walks down the length of the table and around it, until he’s standing over Martin. 

Martin looks up at him, and he doesn’t look nervous so much as he looks resigned. The feeling of guilt grows. Martin bites the inside of his cheek, and when Jon takes too long to figure out how to say what he wants to say, Martin says, quietly, “Yes, Jon?” Even his words sound braced for disapproval, bitten and muted. 

Jon feels himself soften, and he does his best to offer Martin a smile. It’s a struggle against the pettier side of him, and he’s not sure how well it works, judging by the twist of Martin’s lips he gets in return. Jon persists. “I was wondering whether you would like to get a cup of tea. With me. Outside.” 

Martin blinks. Jon can see him processing the request - a faint wrinkle appears between his eyebrows as he does. (It’s the same one that makes itself known when Martin is particularly deep into a book, and Jon has never found it adorable. Ever. Not once.) After a few moments, with Jon standing stiffly over Martin’s desk and painfully aware of the handful of glances thrown their way by the researchers on the other side of the room, Martin’s mouth pulls down and he sits back. “Are you trying to make me leave?” Martin’s mouth gets a firm pinch to it, and he lifts his chin, “because I work here too, Jon, and I know you don’t like it but -,”

Jon cuts him off, and reminds himself to be patient. “No. I’m leaving too.” He lifts the strap on his shoulder and gestures at his empty desk. “You can leave your things here if you want to. I just thought you might,” Jon pauses, discards several different endings to the sentence and ends on, “like a cup of tea.”

Martin stares at him. Jon shifts his weight from one foot to the other. The lights of the library are low and dark, despite the bright blue glitter of the midday sun outside that filters into the room through the high narrow windows.

Jon clears his throat. “Is that a no?” He’s not entirely sure he manages to keep the waspish tone out of his voice. Martin flinches, and then gets very pink. Jon doesn’t notice how lovely it looks. 

“Oh! No. I mean, yes. Wait, give me a second.” Martin says all of it too quickly and too loudly, and now people are looking at them again. Jon doesn’t try as hard as he could have to suppress a sigh, and leans forward, helping Martin stack his books. This allows him to notice that Martin is apparently cross-referencing his work on mermaids with similar texts around other waterborne spirits and creatures, like selkies, kelpies, naiads and a handful of minor deities - with a focus on Northern Europe. Jon is resolutely unimpressed, though he is a little curious about the handful of pink tabs in one of Katharine M Briggs’ books on folklore. He files it away as a potential question to ask Martin later if things get awkward.

Apparently Martin didn’t catch the sigh, because when Jon hands him the books closest to him he gives him a bright, genuine smile that dimples his cheeks. “Thanks.” 

Jon thinks probably that there’s something wrong with the library’s heating, but he leans back and away from the light of the reading lamp on the desk in case his blush gives Martin the wrong idea. 

Martin gets up, and the back of his chair legs scrape over the wood of the floor not covered by the rug. Jon chooses not to hold it against him. Martin easily swings his much heavier bag over his shoulder and stands, and Jon looks up at him and wonders, not for the first time, how such a large man manages to make himself look so small. But Martin’s brown eyes are warm and he’s looking expectantly at Jon and the other researchers are still occasionally sneaking glances at them from the other table. So Jon nods, tries to think of something to say, fails, turns and walks out of the library. Martin follows him. 

Fresh air is, despite Jon’s best efforts to make himself think otherwise, really quite a pleasant relief after spending all morning in the library. It’s one of those bright winter days that’s almost warm, and the sky is wide and clear and blue, a rarity in itself in the vague grey haze of the London smog. Martin relaxes a little - not slumping now, just easing as he steps outside and smiles brightly up at the sky, squinting in the sunlight. “It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it?” He’s still a little pink when he looks at Jon. 

Jon shrugs. “It’s not raining.” Martin’s smile falters a little around the corners, and Jon reminds himself that he’s trying to do something kind. He pulls on another awkward smile. “It’s certainly an improvement on last week.” 

Jon thinks that there is nothing more uncomfortably British than discussing the weather with his co-worker on the way to get a cup of tea, and suspects that his French colleagues would find the whole thing hilarious. He decides not to worry about that. Instead he starts walking down the front steps of the institute, onto the half crowded pavement. Martin follows him. “So, where are we going?” 

Jon points across the street to a grubby looking cafe called Susie’s, and feels Martin wilt a little behind him. “It doesn’t look like much, but she’s got about fifteen different kinds of tea at half the price of the posh new place round the corner.” Jon checks the road for traffic instead of looking at Martin when he adds, “I thought you might appreciate that.” 

Jon realises that it’s irrational to feel like Martin physically brightens - but that is what it feels like, and a slightly more honest smile tugs traitorously at the corner of his mouth. He steps into the road, briskly crossing into the other side and shivering in the shade of the newsagents’ awning. Susie’s door is painted with chipped navy blue paint, and there’s a pane of glass that takes up most of the top half, revealing a cramped space stuffed with metal chairs and tables, and two workmen sitting over a pair of bacon butties and black coffees. Jon’s stomach rumbles, and the bell above the door rings as he opens it. 

Susie looks up and smiles when she sees him, her face folding into a map of all the times she’s smiled before. “Jon! Good to see you. The usual?” Jon catches Martin’s carefully managed surprise out of the corner of his eye, and chooses not to blame him for it. Georgie would have been surprised too, and there was no one in the world that knew him better. So instead of mentioning it, Jon steps closer to the glass counter - full of home made pastries and sandwiches, and gives Susie a small, honest smile. “Please, and could you add a bacon buttie to that?” Jon stops, and turns back to Martin, who has predictably found his way to the chalkboard behind the counter listing the teas Susie had in stock. “Martin?” 

Martin startles, just a little, and smiles at him. His shoulders are hunched, and he has one arm wrapped around his chest, hand curled around the fabric handles of his bag. “Oh, um, chai? Please? You don’t have to -,” Jon waves off his protests and hands Susie the money, dropping a handful of coins into a white plastic cup with ‘Tips’ written on it in black sharpie. 

Susie smiles at him. “Sit down love, it’ll take me a few minutes.” Then she leans forward across the counter, which hums quietly as the refrigerator works. She lowers her voice, and her dark eyes are bright with good humour when she says, “You’ll have to tell me all about your friend.” Jon goes red, and judging by the new pink on Martin’s cheeks, he’d heard her too. 

Jon stands back, spies a pair of chairs at a table by the window, and flees towards it. Susie chuckles as he goes. Martin squeezes into the space between the table and the wall before the door. There’s a small white china pot stuffed with a few fresh flowers next to another pot of salt and pepper sachets. Through the window, the Institute looms over the side of the street, raised a little above the pavement, narrow and dark. Martin carefully sets down his tote bag, but doesn’t take off his jacket. Jon doesn’t blame him - he liked Susie’s, not just for the prices and Susie herself, but it tended to be a little chilly, and a draught whistled under the door. 

“So.” Martin starts, and his mouth is curving halfway towards a smile but hesitating. “What’s, this, um...about?” His voice gets a little high on the last word, and his smile gets tight and tense. He fiddles with a packet of salt as he asks the question. In the corner of the room, the radio murmurs the latest pop song - a sound almost immediately drowned out by the rumble and hiss of the coffee machine. 

Jon pulls on a mask of studied nonchalance, and folds his hands together on the table in front of him, because they can’t both be playing with small paper sachets. “You seem unhappy.”  

Martin looks confused. “Like, now, or -?”

“No. Well, I don’t think so?” He looks up at Martin, and Martin shrugs his shoulders, still looking faintly bewildered. Jon presses on. “Earlier; with your phone.” Martin’s lips pinch into a line, and Jon hurries to continue, “No - I mean, you really shouldn’t have it on vibrate, the thing is a percussive instrument, but, no.” Now Jon does sigh, more irritated with himself than anything else. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Why is this so hard?” He says, mostly to the heel of his palm.

“What, being nice?” Martin asks, and there’s a wry smile in his voice. Jon glares, and Martin grins at him for a moment before his smile falters and he gets red. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t -,”

Jon huffs, but he’s still smiling. “It’s fine. I’m not...I’m a little rusty.” Susie arrives with Jon’s coffee and sandwich and Martin’s tea. Martin takes the tea eagerly, but his eyes are fixed on Jon’s sandwich. Jon’s smile curls a little brighter. “Could we get another buttie, please?” 

Susie nods, and quickly walks away. Jon pushes his plate into the middle of the table, and Martin sits back, tea cradled between his hands. “Oh, no, Jon, it’s fine.” 

Jon ignores him, picking up his half of the sandwich and liberally applying the contents of a packet of tomato sauce. “I’ve already ordered a second and I won’t be able to finish two of these alone.” He pauses, sandwich in his hands, and looks up at Martin over the bread. “You’re doing me a favour. Does that help?” 

Martin’s face is pink, but his cheek dimples and he sets down his cup of tea. The smell of cinnamon wafts over the salt of the bacon. “Well, if you insist.” He reaches out and picks up his own half of the sandwich. “Thanks, Jon.” His voice is low and soft and sincere. Martin looks at him, and then down at the table, and his eyelashes are long and dark. Jon catches himself staring, and quickly glances away - at the street and the intermittent traffic blocking their view of the Institute on the other side. 

They eat for a while, and Jon is surprised by how comfortable the silence is. Martin seems happy enough to sit back, occasionally looking out of the window or sneaking a glance at Jon. Once they’re finished, Jon tries again. “You’ve been unhappy recently. Not - not just today. But today something happened and. I just wanted to ask if everything was alright.” Jon manages the last sentence in a rush, and feels half a ton lighter once he’s said it. 

Martin’s mouth curves, but the little wrinkle appears between his eyebrows too, and he looks down at his half finished cup of tea. Jon frowns.

“What?” 

Martin shrugs, and drinks a little more tea before he speaks. “I just, didn’t really think you paid much attention to me.” Martin laughs, and rubs the back of his neck. “Let alone paid enough attention to notice that I was unhappy.” Martin’s still smiling, but there’s something sharp about it when he mumbles, “doesn’t normally happen.” 

Jon digests that. He thinks about being 11 years old, and getting home from school with a black eye and moving the pile of dirty dishes in the sink so he could fill the kettle with water and make a packet of instant noodles. He thinks about how obvious he felt: how obviously unhappy. How obviously hungry. How obviously dirty. He thinks about how no one said anything. 

Then he gives Martin a crooked smile, “Well, I am a researcher. Noticing unusual details is sort of in the job description.” 

This time when Martin laughs, the curve of his smile is softer and more genuine. His eyes squeeze shut with it, and his nose wrinkles a little. Jon feels something lurch in his chest. When Martin opens his eyes, he carefully schools his features into something like neutrality, and ignores the pull at the corner of his lips. Martin looks at him, and sighs, and Jon gives him the shadow of a smile that he expects. 

“So?” He asks, as gently as he can, and the corners of Martin’s eyes tighten. 

“It’s. Nothing, I just. You know I look after my mum?” Martin’s knee has started to bounce under the table. Jon nods, and Martin swallows. His fingers are dark against the chipped white ceramic of his mug. “Yeah, she’s just. She’s been kind of stressed, recently?” Martin’s voice pulls up, and he watches the few people hurrying down the street outside. At some point his shoulders have found their way up around his ears. “So. It’s just been sort of stressful. It’s fine, though. Just.” Martin hesitates. “Stressful.”

“Right.” Jon tries very hard to keep his tone neutral, and wishes Georgie was here. He sips the dregs of his own black coffee, and the taste is bitter and reassuring. “You, ah, said stressful three times.” 

Martin flushes, and runs a hand up through the thick black waves of his hair. Jon’s fingers twitch, and he presses them against the side of his mug. Martin’s knee bounces under the table. “Um, y-yeah. It’s been stressful.” 

Jon nods, and considers that. After a moment, he prods, “what’s your mother like?” 

Martin gets very very still. His knee stops bouncing, and his shoulders stiffen. “She’s. Fine, you know. Some days are better than others. Basic mum stuff.” 

“I wouldn’t know.” Jon says, drily, and nearly rescinds it when Martin’s eyebrows pull up and rumple his forehead. “It’s fine, Martin. I just. I really wouldn’t. Does she,” Jon frowns, thinking about his grandmother, and trying to match his experiences up with what he imagines of Martin’s mother. A jangling, sexed up version of a Christmas carol comes onto the radio and both of them flinch. Jon gives Martin half a smile, “not a fan?” 

Martin shrugs, and looks down at his mug. His knee is bouncing again. “I just don’t like this song.” It doesn’t sound quite like the truth, but there’s a fragility in the hunch of Martin’s shoulders and the way he’s curled around his mug. Jon isn’t great with people, but he understands a request to back off when he sees one. So he clears his throat. 

“The Katharine M Briggs - I was wondering, how does that pertain to your research?” 

Martin brightens immediately, and his teeth are bright and white and a little crooked. “Oh! So, well, I started with the mermaid stuff, but it’s. There’s this thing about claustrophobia, I think, with sea monsters like that generally. Getting trapped in the deep sea. I think maybe it’s reflective of early understandings of how things like pressure affect our body? Like, we interpret the bends as bubbles in our bloodstream - they interpreted it as death by Kelpie. Well, probably not kelpie. Those tend to be freshwater.”

Martin goes on for a while. It’s...pleasant, and more involved than Jon had given him credit for. About three minutes in, his knee stops bouncing. After five, his shoulders relax. By ten, he’s looking more like himself. Jon feels a hint of satisfaction and leans forward, resting his chin on his hand, occasionally interjecting for clarification.

All in all, Jon can think of worse ways to have spent the afternoon.

Chapter Text

They get tea a few more times after that, and Susie adjusts Jon’s usual accordingly. At first, it works. Martin is brighter, and smiling more easily again. He brings a hot cup of tea to Jon’s side of the desk when he arrives in the morning, and in response Jon curtails the six feet of distance he’s kept between them in the library for the last eighteen months. Instead, he sits opposite Martin. He has not yet admitted that it is sometimes helpful to have someone nearby with whom he can check a reference or talk through an idea. (But it is.) 

Martin, as it turns out, is not so much incompetent as he is unschooled, and Jon is a little embarrassed at how quickly and vehemently he’d taken the two to be synonymous. Martin talks a lot of sense, and Jon isn’t sure he’s ever met anyone who picks up ideas so quickly. What he lacks is discipline, and once Jon’s fairly certain it won’t come out as an outright criticism, he makes a few suggestions to add to Martin’s reading list. Martin gives him an expression that involves furrowing his eyebrows and half smiling which Jon has come to learn means that, whilst he appreciates that Jon is trying, he’d also appreciate it if Jon did so a little more politely. But he thanks him, and adds the books to his pile, and half a week later sincerely thanks him over their customary late breakfast - enthusing over folkloric archetypes. Jon drinks his coffee and lets himself feel just a little smug. 

Then Martin’s mood starts dropping. At first, Jon thinks it’s something that he’s done - so he does what any sane person would do, and gives him some space. He moves six feet back down their shared desk. He stops inviting him for tea. This does not have the desired effect: if anything, Martin’s mood plummets. When it becomes clear that he is visibly losing weight (the navy blue jumper Jon had always thought he filled out rather nicely now hangs a little around his sides and sleeves), Jon decides to do something he promised himself he’d never do.

He calls Georgie. 

“So, you noticed that he was upset before and decided to start asking him for tea,” there’s a teasing emphasis to the mono-syllable that Jon refuses to humour, “and his mood improved. And then he started going down again and you. Decided to ignore him. Have I got this right?” 

Jon clicks his tongue, glancing over at Tim, sitting two steps down on the other side of the Institute’s narrow door and smoking a cigarette. Tim gives him a wave and a waggle of his eyebrows, and Jon turns a little further into the doorframe, lowering his voice. “I’m not ignoring him. I was giving him space. Be honest - if someone’s unhappy in my immediate radius then the chances are it’s something I’ve done. What was it you said? I’m a miserably recalcitrant bastard.”

“Jonathan Richard Sims if you are using my words from five years ago against me in order to tear yourself down then so help me I will come to that institute myself and force you to get cake with me.” 

Jon’s lips twitch, and he sighs into the phone, exaggerated and long. He smiles a little more when Georgie huffs a soft laugh on the other end. “I don’t have a middle name, Georgie.”

“You do now. Anyone, back to your crush -,”

“He’s not my - !” Jon bites off the end of his sentence as Tim turns, raising his eyebrows at his raised voice. Jon clears his throat, “sorry, it’s, a, uh, bad line.”

Tim stubs out his cigarette, brushes his hands on his knees and gets to his feet. He gives Jon an easy smile. “Sure.” On the street, intermittent traffic roars quietly by. Tim’s smile widens a little in the doorway, curling into something impish as he presses closer to get past Jon and back inside. “You should talk to him, though.”

Georgie cheers on the other end of the phone, and Tim’s brown eyes wrinkle around the edges. Jon splutters, half-heartedly protesting, but Tim just walks away - offering half a wave over his shoulder. “Don’t take too long Sims. You’re on Institute time, after all.” His laugh echoes against the polished stone floor of the foyer, and then the door swings shut. Jon scowls at a random passer by, and the wind dances a chilling waltz over the nearby trees, pulling the leaves left and right in a susurration of movement. 

Eventually, Jon presses his phone back to his ear. The surface is warm against his cheek. “That was Tim. He’s new.” 

Georgie snorts. “He’s right, though. Just talk to him. Tell him you’re worried.”

Jon rubs his free hand over his trouser leg, flexing and curling his fingers. “I said that before.” 

“So say it again. He’ll appreciate it. Most people do.” Georgie’s voice is warm and gentle. Jon tells himself he isn’t being childish when he replies. 

“I don’t.”

“Well, you’re a miserably recalcitrant bastard. By which I mean, you don’t like talking about your feelings. It sounds like this Martin is pretty open - or, how did you describe him?” Jon can hear the smile in Georgie’s voice, and humours her.

“Obnoxiously friendly and insistently talkative. Again, I have revised my opinion.” Jon has not gone into much detail about his revised opinion. But he can certainly admit that Martin’s amiability is...less obnoxious when you’re used to it. And he does talk a lot, but he tends to talk sense, which Jon appreciates. 

“I love that you’ve got a crush on him. Makes me believe there really is a god.” Jon can hear Georgie’s smile down the phone, and he rolls his eyes.

“Again, I -,”

“Sure, sure.” She cuts him off before he can continue. “Anyway, I’ve actually got to go to this interview or I’m going to be late.” There’s a meow in the background, and Jon’s chest aches a little. 

“Give the Admiral my love.” He says, and ignores the look a passerby gives him when he does so.

“Already did.” Georgie chirps. There’s the muffled sound of clattering over the phone line, and then a whisper of her swearing under her breath. Jon smiles a little. 

“You ok?”

Georgie heaves a sigh. “Yeah, fine,” she speaks intermittently, punctuating her words with movement, “just, clumsy.” 

Once it sounds like she’s done, Jon speaks into the brief quiet. “About the other thing -,”

“Oh, obviously.” Jon relaxes, despite the chill wind now whistling down the street. He tucks his hand into his pocket. “Yeah, just tell me when you’re arriving. You know the drill.” 

“Not the drill.” Jon says, drily, and Georgie laughs. 

“God you’re a nerd. Remind me again why I ever thought you were cool?” 

Jon shrugs, and the wool of his coat is stiff around his shoulders. “It remains a mystery.” 

Georgie hums. “We’ll figure it out one day. Ok, good luck with lover boy. Bye!” She hangs up before Jon has a chance to correct her. Jon lowers his phone and stares at it for a moment, lips half curved in a smile, face red from something other than the biting cold.

Lover boy.

Ridiculous. 

Someone has decorated the Institute. This wouldn’t be a problem, well - it would be a problem. Jon disliked mess and the majority of the red and green foil decorations were tacky at best. They’d have been much better offer with something more traditional - pine cones and dried oranges and cinnamon sticks, maybe. He has no idea why the offending staff member thought an organisation full of folklorists and historians would want the cheapest, cheeriest possible holofoil offering from the high street, but he glares at the cartoon Santa over the library anyway. 

Still, this isn’t the problem. Jon doesn’t dislike Christmas - he hasn’t for several years. He’s not Christian, but he likes the excuse to spend time with friends, and he likes the excuse to express affection in a way that’s a little simpler than the other 364 days of complicated social cues and trying to judge what is or isn’t acceptable to say or do. So, in theory the Institute suddenly being plastered by half a ton of ocean killing nik-naks should not be a problem.

Except that Martin comes into the library, sees them, and looks like he’s about to start crying.

Jon has tried to explain to Georgie the specific horror of seeing Martin Blackwood upset about anything. This was a man who found time for everyone, including Jeremy from Artefact Storage (a man who was clearly delusional, Jon had put in several complaints.) Martin was almost endlessly altruistic. (Almost - Jon had been more delighted than he was willing to admit the first time Martin had slipped a barbed comment about Rachel in HR over his tea.) 

Martin was also, well - Martin. He was all curves and soft edges. He looked like he’d been built for hugging, and he held himself in a way that suggested he was open to the possibility. He was tall and broad, but he didn’t loom. (Though Jon has spent half a day reassessing his world view when Martin had casually leaned down and lifted one end of the very long, very heavy table in the library to help him get some cardboard under a leg so it would stop wobbling.) Martin had thick wavy hair and warm dark brown eyes and soft full lips and there wasn’t a hard line in him. 

So seeing him upset felt like watching someone punch a puppy. It was for this reason that Jon’s heart made a suicidal effort to tear its way out of his chest as soon as he saw the look on Martin’s face. It was also for this reason that Jon found himself standing in front of Martin without any real conscious decision to do so, hand half raised over the lavender sleeve of Martin’s jumper. 

“Martin - what’s wrong?” Jon speaks quietly, but it still sounds terribly loud in the silence of the room. Martin looks at him, and the mess of wrinkles on his forehead get worse, and his mouth twists and presses into a thin line. 

“What? Not ignoring me any more?” He snaps, a little loudly. Someone shushes him, and Jon glares in their general direction. 

“No, no, I was never -,” Jon can practically hear Georgie crowing, “I thought you needed space. I, I thought I’d done something to upset you.”

Martin huffs a laugh, and looks away, and his fingers curl and flex at his side. “Right. Right, of course you did. Well, next time, maybe ask if I need space before just, blanking me for a fortnight?” His voice is high and he’s smiling sharply but the corners of his eyes are tense and the bruises of fatigue under his eyes are bright and purple even against the rich olive of his skin. 

The aching in Jon’s chest gets worse, and his heart is beating entirely too hard for a fairly sedate physical situation when he leans forward and makes the decision to clasp Martin’s arm. Martin’s whole body stiffens, and he looks down at Jon’s hand - barely encompassing the soft breadth of his upper arm, before looking back up at Jon. His expression has eased and smoothed in his surprise, and his cheeks are pink. 

“Jon?” Martin squeaks, and Jon tries very hard not to smile. 

“Let’s take this outside.” He says, instead, quietly. Martin goes from pink to red. 

“Okay?” It’s slightly strangled, and Jon’s mouth flickers up into a traitorous smile before he regains control of it. Warmth bubbles up through his chest, and he leaves his hand on Martin’s arm a little longer than he needs to. 

Martin’s expression melts from startled surprise into something softer, and he asks quietly, “are you - are you going to get your stuff?” 

It’s Jon’s turn to flush, too red and too hot. He pulls his hand back from Martin’s arm, and carefully smoothes his abruptly sweating palm over the rough fabric of his trousers. “Right, right. Yes, just…” he turns, and quickly shoves his books back into his bag whilst Martin waits for him, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Jon is fairly certain that every other researcher in the library is staring at this point, and he tries hard not to resent them for it. The heat doesn’t fade from his cheeks - instead it spreads up to his ears, uncomfortably hot and prickling across the back of his neck and chest. 

But he gets back to Martin, and Martin smiles at him, and his cheek dimples, and it’s like rainfall from a heavy cloud. Jon feels the tension that had been curling heavy and electric in his brain ease, abruptly, in a wash of relief that trickles down from his head over his shoulders and through his chest. He breathes. Everything’s ok. This is Martin. This is alright. 

Jon smiles back at him. “Shall we?”

Martin ducks his head, ridiculously shy for a man grazing 6”3, and Jon gestures for him to go first. Martin walks on and out of the library, and Jon takes a moment before he crosses through the door to turn and glare back at the other researchers in the library. On the other side of the room, under the great tall window, Tim Stoker gives him two thumbs up. Jon flips him off.

Then he follows Martin outside. Tim’s laughter echoes behind them as they leave.

They don’t go back to Susie’s this time. Jon suggests a walk, imagining Martin’s knee bouncing under the table. Martin, whose foot had already begun to tap, accepts eagerly. So they walk. The streets around the Institute aren’t too heavily crowded, commuter traffic having eased an hour or so previous. It’s a grey, overcast day, but then it always is. The buildings do at least act as a windbreak, so the chill doesn’t bite too viciously. And, as they walk, Martin pulls an absurd woolen hat out of his bag and tugs it over his head. Jon tries not to stare.

“I made it myself,” Martin says, ruefully, hands tucked deep into the pockets of his coat. Jon startles a little.

“Oh, uh, I didn’t - I mean -,”

“It’s ridiculous,” Martin interrupts, pulling him back above the surface of their conversation before he drowns in it. “But it’s cosy.” As he says it, he sets his jaw. It’s an expression of stubborn determination entirely inappropriate to the situation, and Jon is abruptly reminded of videos of puppies he’s seen squaring up against such terrifying foes as soft toys and snowfall. 

He softens. He doesn’t mean to, but he does anyway. “It’s nice.” Jon says, softly, half hoping the traffic will drown him out. Judging by the pink that tickles Martin’s cheeks, it didn’t. 

For a while, they walk, hands in their pockets, side by side. Jon doesn’t know where they’re going but it doesn’t really matter. He looks up at the buildings, watching them transition from metal and plastic signs to looming marble facades and back again, occasionally punctuated by a bare stretching tree, reaching its knobbled fingers towards the pearly grey sky. He misses Bournemouth, sometimes. But he really does love London. Jon feels more of the tension ease out of his shoulders, and is half amazed at how much he’d been carrying there. 

After a few more minutes, Martin breaks the comfortable silence that had settled between them like an old and familiar blanket. Jon aches a little at the loss. “So...why did you invite me out?” There’s another question under this one, tentative and hopeful. Jon cannot for the life of him figure out what it is. After a few moments of trying, he just answers honestly.

“You’re upset again.”

Martin’s posture gets very stiff and very still. His arms, which had been lightly swinging, crooked as they were at his sides - stop moving. His shoulders hunch. And then he relaxes, painful and deliberate. Jon feels like he’s just punched him, and, worse, that Martin has forgiven him for it. He scrambles to fend off his own rising anxiety.

“I thought it was something I did, but if it isn’t, then,” Jon’s talking too fast, and he clicks his tongue, trying to force his thoughts back into something resembling a linear order. He scowls at the pavement. “Is it something to do with Christmas?” 

At his side, he can almost feel Martin’s surprise, and both of them move to let a man with a pram get past them. When Martin answers, his shoulders are a little lower. “Oh, I -,”

“Didn’t think I’d notice?” Jon suggests, wryly. Martin sneaks a glance at him, and his eyes are dark and warm and lovely. Jon doesn’t think Martin is the only one blushing when he shrugs and adds, “I told you, Martin, I’m an excellent researcher.”

Martin laughs then, quick and surprised and bright, and his body uncurls as he does so. Jon feels himself smiling before he’s thought it through. “Right, right, of course. Far be it from me to underestimate the observational skills of Jonathan Sims.” 

“Damn straight.” Jon nods, approvingly, stepping around a harassed looking woman in a suit as she hurries in the opposite direction. Martin sniggers.

“Nothing about either of us is straight.” 

Jon snorts, and it takes him a moment to register exactly what Martin means. “Wait, how did you -?”

Martin shrugs and gives him an apologetic smile, scratching the back of his neck. “Office gossip. Sorry, it just, came up.” 

“So it didn’t come out, then?” Jon asks, deadpan, and Martin keeps staring at him for another anxious moment before he recognises the joke, and his mouth curls back into another dimpling smile. 

“It came up and came out. We were all very proud.” Jon huffs, smiling, and together they turn a corner, walking past a hairdresser that looks more like an upmarket cafe, all fashionable neon lights and monochrome. 

They keep walking for a little while longer, before Jon catches Martin staring at him out of the corner of his eye. “Do you, um, mind if I ask? I’m gay. And, ah, also trans.” The shrug of Martin’s shoulders is quick and tense and defensive and Jon very much does not want to meet the person who put that tension there. He will not be held responsible for his actions if he does. 

Instead of lingering on revenge, Jon steps a little closer to Martin - not quite touching him, but trying to offer something in their physical proximity. Martin relaxes, fractionally, and Jon takes that as a success. They both wait for an ambulance to go blaring past before Jon answers. “I’m bi,” Jon says, and pauses, considering. In his pockets, his fingers curl. This isn’t something he usually talks about. It’s not something he usually wants to talk about, for a number of reasons. But he likes Martin. He trusts Martin. And part of him - a small, traitorous, longing part of him, wants Martin to know this. He wants to know how he feels about it. He just...wants to know. So he curls his fingers into fists and braces himself and clears his throat and adds, quickly, “And I’m ace - asexual.”

Martin hums, and Jon continues to brace, waiting for the questions that seem to inevitably follow whenever he’s told anyone other than Georgie this little tidbit. (It hadn’t happened often, Jon didn’t often meet people he liked well enough to tell. But it had hurt, every time.) A handful of pigeons scatter away from the steps of a church as they walk past it, and Martin says, “I get that. I’m demi, so.” He shrugs, but it’s a much easier thing this time, and smiles at Jon. Jon swallows past the non-existent lump in his throat.

He very suddenly, for no reason at all, finds himself wanting to hold Martin’s hand. 

Instead, he says, a little roughly. “Right. Good. Well.” Jon searches desperately for a way to change the topic, and instead settles on admitting, “I hate talking about this kind of thing.”

Martin nods, body relaxed again as he walks, occasionally turning his head to take in the buildings around them. “That’s cool.” He pauses, and Jon can feel Martin looking at him again. He resists the urge to meet his gaze. “Thanks for telling me.” 

They stop at a set of traffic lights, and Martin pushes the button. Jon replies whilst he’s distracted, taking the chance to drink in the soft curving lines of Martin’s profile. Just for a second, before he turns back to look at him. “Of course. We’re, well, we’re friends. Right?” Jon almost regrets the question, but he’s not sure he could have stopped himself.

Martin smiles at him again, and again there’s a hint of the tension from before when he does so. His cheek doesn’t dimple this time. “Yeah, Jon. We’re friends.”

They cross the road, and Jon takes the chance to soak up the warm reassurance of Martin’s reply. Then he nods, and gestures to the left. “Shall we start heading back?” 

Martin laughs. “Kind of forgot we were supposed to be working, if I’m honest.” 

Cars roar down the street like an intermittent mechanical ocean, and the wind plays a melody around the rooftops. Jon glances into the dark windows of a pub that’s not yet opened for the day. “It’s not like Elias ever comes to check on us. I’d be half surprised if he knew that we existed.” 

“Just as well we’re such hard workers, then.” Martin teases, and Jon looks at him sidelong. 

“I realise you’re joking, Martin, but I maintain that you are one of the hardest workers I’ve ever seen.” He says it firmly, and when Martin gets pink again Jon is fairly certain that it’s not the wind pinching blood into the soft curve of his cheeks. 

“I mean, I’m learning from the best.” 

Jon laughs. “Tell that to my supervisor.” At Martin’s silent question, Jon clarifies. “My teacher at uni. Let’s just say my relationship with my studies varied wildly according to my mood, and I spent most of my second year in a -,” Jon catches himself. “On extracurricular activities.” 

Jon refuses to acknowledge Martin’s raised eyebrow. They reach another crossing. Martin says, lightly, “it seems like you had a good time at uni.” He doesn’t exactly phrase it like a question, but Jon hears the curiosity in his voice all the same. 

He doesn’t need to think about his answer. “I did.” Martin is watching him, Jon can feel the gentle pressure of his curiosity like an almost physical weight. He tries to think of what to add, and settles, eventually, on, “I met a lot of good people.” Jon offers Martin a crooked smile before stepping aside to let a cyclist go past. “Who tolerated me, if you can believe it.”

Martin’s voice is gentle and firm when he replies, patiently, “I don’t think that’s so hard to imagine.” 

Blood rushes into Jon’s cheeks and up the back of his neck. He ducks his head, watching the cracked concrete pavement disappear under his feet. “Yes, well.” Jon hesitates. He glances up at Martin. His woolly hat has pressed down the thick black waves of his hair around his ears. Jon feels something bright and warm spark somewhere around his abdomen and spread up and through his chest. He looks away. 

“Thank you, Martin.”

It takes them about twenty minutes to get back to the Institute. It takes Jon about twenty minutes to remember why he’d invited Martin onto this damn walk in the first place. Both of them are a little cold by the time they walk up the short flight of steps outside the Institute’s front door, Martin’s rich olive skin is rough with goosebumps and pale where it hasn’t been rubbed red by the wind. 

Jon stops him anyway, grabbing his arm before he opens the door. Jon isn’t sure when he got comfortable being this physical with Martin, and he isn’t sure how he’d react if Martin had done the same to him (though the thought prompts a sudden sharp wave of curiosity and a desire to find out.) But it feels natural to curl his fingers around the ample curve of Martin’s upper arm, squeezing through the thick plastic and padding of his coat. Martin stops immediately, but he doesn’t pull away. 

“Jon? What is it?” The pull of Marin’s brows is an expression Jon recognises, one of concern. Affection curls over and around him, softening his edges, and Jon eases his grip on Martin’s arm but doesn’t let go.

“We haven’t actually spoken about what’s been upsetting you.” Jon says, unable to keep the frown from his own brow, feeling the ache of it around his forehead. 

Martin relaxes. “Oh, no, it’s fine. This helped, honestly.” He smiles, and it’s shy and sincere, and his lips are red and full and soft and - that’s really beside the point. 

Because Jon believes him. But. 

“I think it’s Christmas.” 

Martin pulls on a frown, and Jon knows it isn’t his real one because it’s missing the little comma of confusion that appears between his eyebrows whenever he’s puzzling through something he finds challenging (on occasion, this includes Jon himself). Martin frowns, and gives him a curving smile and keeps his lips shut. His cheek doesn’t dimple. “Christmas? Why would you think I had a problem with Christmas?” 

Jon scowls. “Because you came in today looking like a kicked puppy, and the only thing that had changed was that some bright spark had taken it upon themselves to go on a festive trip to Poundland.”

Martin does, at least, have the grace to give up on the frown. “It’s not my favourite holiday. That’s all.”

Jon’s scowl deepens. “Right. And this has nothing to do with your mother. Tell me, Martin. Who do you usually spend the holidays with?” 

Martin bites the inside of his cheek and looks away from Jon, through the glass pane of the wooden door at the front of the Institute. He doesn’t pull back, exactly, there’s no resistance in the arm that Jon’s still holding. But after a moment he gets out his phone and clicks the home button (there’s a quote on it - Ginsberg, Jon thinks). “I really should be getting back to work.” Martin’s tone is apologetic, and Jon doesn’t buy it for a second. He resists the urge to tut, but his hand squeezes around Martin’s arm.

“Martin, just,” Jon can feel a kind of pressure, behind his tongue in his head. There are a hundred things he wants to say and he can’t figure out how to say any of them and he hates it. An image of Georgie’s face, tear streaked and red, flashes into Jon’s head. He sets his teeth. He’s not going to do that again. He won’t. (He ignores the voice in his head that says that it’s inevitable. The voice that says that he’ll never learn how to care for anyone.) Jon sets his shoulders, and steps closer, until there’s less than a foot between them. To one side of them is the Institute, dusty and dark and looming. To the other is London, grey and cold and chaotic with life and movement. Jon looks up into Martin’s eyes. Martin is watching him, and Jon’s gut tells him there are a thousand things he doesn’t know about this man - a thousand secrets between them. He feels the need to know them like an almost physical ache. The wind rushes down the street, skating over the beetle-smooth roofs of cars and shivering through the trees’ naked branches. Martin’s hair is pulled against his cheek by the force of it, and Jon feels the cold running over his scalp. He half envies Martin’s hat. Martin says nothing, and watches him, and Jon thinks of a young woman with a mess of red hair and freckles. He lifts his chin. “Come home with me for Christmas.”

Martin stares at him, and now he does go to pull his arm back. Jon lets go slowly, and Martin stops halfway through the action. There’s something bright and fragile in his eyes, and he wets his lips, and they’re a dusky pink that reddens with the moisture. “What are you asking, Jon?”

Jon lets go of Martin’s arm. Both of them tilt towards each other with the loss of it, only half-conscious of the movement. Martin is still watching him. Jon clears his throat. “I. I spend Christmas with a friend, and her family, every year. I want you to come with me. With us. I’ve already asked her. She says it’s ok.”

Martin reaches up and pulls off his hat, tugging his hands through the thick mess of his hair, half squashed by the wool. “Your friend.” There’s a sharp humour there, and Jon doesn’t understand it. “Right. Um, well, thank you for the invite.” Martin pauses, and takes a deep breath. “Really, thank you.” He’s folding the hat between his hands, again and again, rolling it over the plump curve of his fingers. “But I’ll have to decline. My mother -,”

“Will make you miserable.” Jon says, folding his arms and chucking his chin at Martin. Martin opens his mouth, and Jon narrows his eyes. “Don’t deny it. How old are you?”

Martin makes a soft sound of confusion. “I - twenty-six?”

Jon nods, satisfied. “Right. And how many christmases have you spent apart from your mother?”

Martin looks down at the hat, folded between his hands. “None.” He says it very quietly, and part of Jon eases. His voice is quieter when he replies. 

“Then one won’t hurt.” Martin goes to protest again, and again Jon cuts him off. “She has nurses, doesn’t she?” Martin doesn’t back down this time. He starts turning the hat in his hands again. 

“She needs me.” There’s a well of something in the words - something fervent and almost desperate. Jon rubs his fingers and thumbs together and tries to think of something to say. 

The answer is obvious enough. He clears his throat. “My grandmother loved me deeply, but she didn’t want me.” It still aches, to say it, but the ache is old now, just a scar that reminds him of its presence on cold nights. Martin stops folding the hat. Jon presses on, “and I. Had a series of really rather terrible Christmases. Right up until I met Georgie Barker.” Jon stops, and tries to think. Across the street, a pair of workmen walk into Susie’s. The ringing of the bell reaches them through a gap in the traffic. “Her family are - it’s,” Jon searches for a word to encompass everything he feels about the Barker-Ross’, can’t find one big enough, and settles on, “they’re wonderful. And I honestly had no idea how much I was missing. How much I could have had,” and Jon looks at Martin - really looks at him, and he doesn’t break eye contact, “I had no idea how much I could have had until I saw it for myself.” He takes a deep breath, “So maybe you’re right. Perhaps your mother does need you, and spending one Christmas - one week apart from her for the first time in twenty five years - will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. But you need this, Martin. And,” Jon can feel the wind falling out of him as his frustration crests over its peak and tumbles back down into helplessness. He pushes his hands deep into his pockets, and keeps going. “I want you to come.” Jon hesitates, and can’t quite meet Martin’s eyes when he adds, “please.”

The distant roar of the London traffic rolls up into the late morning air like an ocean. Wind eddies around the rooftops above them. Through the glass pane beside them, the Institute is dark and draped in shadow. Martin Blackwood looks at Jonathan Sims. 

He says, “I’ll think about it.”

Chapter Text

Martin is late. This isn’t a problem, necessarily. Georgie had also been late. But now both of them are waiting on their platform at St Pancras, and Martin hasn’t shown up. He hasn’t even texted (and that had been a struggle unto itself, because Jon had not been prepared for exactly how flustered either of them would become upon his asking Martin for his phone number.) So now Jon is standing anxiously next to his suitcase, and Georgie is drinking something absurd and sugary and watching him. Pigeons fly amidst the high rafters of the station, and commuters mill past them in varying speeds and tempers.

“What if something’s happened to him?” Jon asks, quietly, curling and uncurling his fingers at his sides. It’s not the first time he’s asked the question, but Georgie answers him as patiently as she has every time before.

“Unlikely. But if it has, there’s nothing you can do about it from here.” 

Something in Jon’s chest lurches, cold and nauseating. “Do you think I should leave?” He looks at his phone for what must be the fortieth time at least. No new messages. He squints at the signal bar. It hovers at around two dashes. Jon purses his lips. “I don’t know how to find him.” He pauses, and breathes, and it feels too shallow and too sharp. “What if - what if his mother -,”

Georgie’s hand on his arm is heavy and soft. Jon looks at her, feeling the edges of the anxiety bleeding out of him like ice water dripping into the earth. Georgie waits until he meets her eyes, and they’re half copper in the sunlight spilling onto the platform in great curtains of yellow light. “Jon. Stop it. Worrying won’t help him, and it won’t help you. Just. Be in the moment. Here. Now.” Georgie squeezes his arm, and Jon breathes in through his nose and out through his mouth, and feels like he’s nineteen all over again. He gives her a tentative smile. 

“Thanks, Georgie.” Georgie smiles. She’s still holding his arm when Martin comes barrelling through the barrier, red faced and hair a mess, shirt riding up the soft brown curve of his belly where it spills a little over his jeans. Jeans which have slipped down a little to reveal a thin strip of pink cotton covered in small cartoon cats. Jon looks away, and up at Martin’s face. Martin is staring at Georgie’s hand on his arm. 

Georgie lets go and sticks out her hand to shake. “Hey! Nice to meet you, I’m Georgie.” She jerks her head at Jon. “His ex. Also, your host for Christmas fun times.”

Martin swallows, and looks at Jon, and tugs down his shirt. It’s soft and cotton and white. It suits him. Martin’s hair is half plastered to his face, and his skin is glistening with sweat, and his mouth and cheeks are red with exertion. He clears his throat, and wipes his hands on his jeans, and takes Georgie’s hand, shaking once. “H-hi. I’m Martin, Blackwood. Martin Blackwood.” He looks at Jon, “sorry I’m late, my Mum had some things she needed and I couldn’t - her carer doesn’t arrive till five o’clock so I,” Martin swallows again, fiddling with the fabric at the hem of his shirt. Jon feels something ugly and sharp and loud rise up inside his chest. He bites down on it, hard, and forces himself to smile gently. Because Martin’s mother isn’t here, but Martin is, and Martin needs him to be kind, not angry. And Jon is going to give him that if it kills him. 

“That’s alright.” He pauses, unsure of what to say next. Martin’s cheeks are a deep wine red and his eyelashes are long and his hair is thick and dark and Jon mostly just wants to run his fingers through it in an attempt to straighten the mess. 

Georgie slurps her drink. “He was about three seconds away from calling the emergency services.” 

Martin blinks at her, and looks at Jon, and Jon glares at Georgie. “Georgie is, as usual, exaggerating.” Their train begins rolling up to their platform with a series of intermittent metal screeches under the smooth voice of the announcer. Jon picks up his suitcase, and Martin grabs his too - it’s a battered looking black sports bag, and it looks half empty. Jon resists the urge to comment on it. Georgie wheels her own rose gold hard case towards their carriage. It is, as usual, loaded with enough christmas presents for her relatives to make it a decent weapon for anyone with the musculature to lift it without breaking their back. 

Georgie hits the button to open the doors and sets about trying to get the suitcase onto the train. Jon tosses his own bag into the carriage (there’s not much, though he’s taken to bringing more books in recent years, and a few presents for the relatives he’s convinced to let him). Jon moves to help Georgie, but Martin beats him to it - looking at Georgie shyly with a quick, “do you want some help?” 

Georgie nods, both hands wrapped around the handle of her suitcase. “Yeah, thanks.” Martin nods, and lifts the thing off the ground, stepping into the carriage without any apparent effort. Both Jon and Georgie stare, and Martin looks at Georgie, still holding her suitcase in his arms. Georgie shuts her mouth, and after a second lets go of the handle. “Damn.”

It’s hard to tell behind the wall of plastic, but Jon thinks that he can see Martin blushing. “Where - where do you want it?”

Georgie gestures to the luggage rack, and Martin slips the case gently inside before grabbing his own. Jon collects himself and jumps up into the carriage as the doors start to beep. He and Martin slip their bags into the rack over Georgie’s, avoiding the overloaded bottom shelf, and then the three of them squeeze down the centre of the carriage towards their seats. More than once, Jon finds himself with his nose all but pressed into the back of Martin’s shirt as they stop and start to allow other passengers to sit down. Martin smells like sweat and soap, and there’s nothing particularly special about it. Except that Jon feels his shoulders relaxing, and when they do get to their table, he sits down beside Martin without thinking about it.

Which, on reflection, perhaps he should have: because Martin stares and blushes and Georgie raises her eyebrows. Jon looks at Martin, whose thigh bumps his. Martin squeezes away, and Jon shuffles a little towards the aisle to give him more space. “Is - is this alright?”

“Yeah!” The response is quick and enthusiastic. Georgie’s eyebrows get higher. Jon clears his throat and glares at her. Georgie grins at him. 

The announcer comes on over the train’s loudspeakers, tinny and slightly too quiet to hear over the general chatter of the carriage, “...sorry to announce...delay...signal failure...please follow Virgin trains online for further updates.” Georgie groans, loud and over-exaggerated, and slides down a little in her seat before cutting her eyes to Martin.

“This happens. Every. Year.” 

Martin’s mouth curves a little at the corner. He’s holding himself carefully still, and Jon cannot imagine that he’s comfortable, but he suspects that pointing it out will only make it worse. “Is that an exaggeration, or?”

Georgie sniggers, and Jon finds himself wearing half a smile too. “No, I’m afraid she’s right about this. We’ll get there eventually.” He reaches down into his backpack, and pulls out a pack of battered playing cards in an old cardboard box. The plastic coating on the cardboard is peeling, and the packaging is washed blue and covered in mediocre photos of the Highlands. “We usually play cards to fill the time.” (This particular tradition had started the year after they broke up: when they began to sit opposite one another instead of together, and both of them had desperately needed something to occupy the growing silence. Since then, it had become a warmer thing, warm enough that Jon still had the cheap, grubby old notebook they kept their scores in.)

Martin looks at the pack of cards, and Jon can’t quite read his expression. “What do you play?”

Georgie sits up, setting her elbows on the table between them as she leans forward and huffs a strand of red hair out of her face. “Gin Rummy. You know it?”

Martin offers an expression Jon will not call a smile, because it is both far too small and too uncomfortable to be one of Martin’s real smiles. It’s a polite curve of his lips, as his cheeks spot red and he offers a small, stiff shrug. “I’ve...I’ve not really played a card game before.”

Jon thinks about being eight years old, and sitting in the hall outside the living room where his grandmother was sleeping, squinting to read his book in the dark. He nods, and starts to shuffle the cards - and keeps doing so when he looks at Martin. “It’s alright. We’ll teach you.”

Martin, as it turns out, is excellent at Gin Rummy. It takes him two and a half rounds to transition into winning every hand, and eventually both Jon and Georgie concede defeat, Georgie with a laughing complaint about beginner’s luck. Martin shrugs and accepts it, but Jon had watched the growing cleverness and humour in his dark eyes as they’d played, and the faint curve of his mouth as he’d put down each one of his winning cards. He says nothing about it, just files the observation away for later and carefully writes Martin’s name down beside his own and Georgie’s in the notebook. Jon writes the date, and then carefully underlines Martin’s name and writes, next to it, ‘ Winner - 2010’ .

The rest of the journey is spent easily enough: Jon and Martin read, Georgie occasionally plays games on her DS. Sometimes she sketches. At one point, Jon nods off, lulled by the rocking of the carriage and the company of two people he likes better than most others in the world. He wakes to the touch of cotton on his cheek. He breathes, and there’s the smell of soap and laundry powder, and the - arm beneath his head is warm and soft and giving. Jon sighs, unthinking in his exhaustion, and presses closer. There’s a very soft, high exhale when he does so, and Jon recognises it as Martin almost immediately. He considers drawing away: considers pretending to be shocked, and confused. Considers trying to dismiss Georgie’s skepticism and soothe Martin’s apologising. But Jon is fairly certain neither Martin nor Georgie have noticed that he’s woken up. His hand is still crooked awkwardly between his knees, and he’s half tumbled against Martin’s belly. And Martin is warm and soft and safe and the world behind Jon’s eyelids is dark and kind. 

So Jon sighs, and he presses closer, and he lets himself have this for just a little while longer. 

When they finally get to Fort William, it’s dark. The station is mostly empty, and the few people left on their carriage tumble out into the cold in a clatter of suitcases and the soft fabric hush of half a dozen coats being pulled on and wrapped tightly around bodies that have already begun to shiver. Martin helps Georgie with her suitcase, and Jon grabs Martin’s bag - which leads to Martin nearly getting stuck on the train looking for it. Both Jon and Georgie call out to him, and Martin jumps out of the carriage whilst the train doors are beeping in what feels like increasing distress. A conductor in a high visibility vest blows his whistle about them, and Georgie gives him a playful wave whilst Martin flushes red to the roots of his hair and starts apologising. Jon doesn’t wait for him to finish, instead he grabs Martin’s elbow and tugs him towards the stairs. 

They head outside, and the cold is the kind that slips into their lungs like ice water. Their breath puffs out ahead of them in little silver clouds that are incongruous in the glaring electric lights on the station walls, and make more sense in the softer shadow of the car park. Georgie leaves both Martin and Jon behind the second that she sees her Uncle Eric, dropping her suitcase and sprinting headlong into his arms. Eric bellows a laugh and picks her up off the ground as if she were a toddler, and Georgie laughs and buries her face into his broad shoulders. Jon grabs the handle of Georgie’s suitcase and tugs it along, giving Martin a reassuring smile. Martin clearly tries to return it, and doesn’t quite succeed. There’s a little comma of a frown between his eyebrows. 

Eric sets Georgie down. His face is red and covered in hair, and his eyes are brown and mapped by half a hundred laugh lines. Jon grins at him, and sets down his own bag, stepping forward. He doesn’t need to do anything else before Eric is stooping to embrace him, squeezing him into a crushing bear hug. Jon breathes in, and Eric smells like firewood and pine needles. He shuts his eyes, and feels them get hot, and keeps them closed for a second longer as he hugs Eric back. One of the many good things about Georgie’s uncle was that he was so ridiculously huge he dwarfed Jon even as an adult man. Jon’s arms don’t quite encompass his chest, so instead he bunches his hands in the fabric of Eric’s waxed jacket, and submits himself to the embrace. Eric pulls back, and looks at him, and his eyes are as gentle as his niece’s. “Good to see you, Jon.” 

Jon nods, and gives him a small smile. “And you, Eric.”

Then Eric turns to Martin. It’s a clear night, and Fort William is dark enough that they can see the stars where they’re cut out in the deep blue sky around the shadows of the mountains. Martin, with his back to the brick and metal and plastic covered signs of the station, looks terribly out of place. He bites the inside of his cheek. Eric beams. “You must be Martin Blackwood. I’m Eric Ross.”

Martin nods, and clears his throat. “It’s, um, good to meet you.” His voice is a little lower than usual, and rough with the effort. Jon frowns. Eric holds out his hand, and Martin takes it. They shake, and then Eric doesn’t let go.

“How do you feel about hugs, Martin?”

Martin’s eyes widen, just a fraction. “Good?” His voice slips an octave higher in his confusion, but that doesn’t matter, because then Eric is stepping forward to embrace him. Martin stands, stiff, for just a second. Then, slowly, shyly, he lifts his arms and hugs him back. Georgie bounces on the balls of her feet and tucks her hands into her armpits. 

Eric lets go of Martin, and Martin gives him a smile that wobbles a little around the edges. Eric claps Martin’s shoulder. There’s not much difference between them in height, though Eric is the taller of the two. Martin looks up at him, and then looks away. He taps his foot, and Jon steps closer, and nudges him with his elbow. Martin looks down at him, and some of the tension falls out of the hunch in his shoulders. Far off, a dog barks at something in the night. 

“Eric is Georgie’s Uncle.” Jon clarifies, and Georgie steps forward, tugging Eric’s arm.

“Can we go home now? It’s bloody freezing.” 

Eric turns back to Martin, jerking his thumb at Georgie. “Can you believe this? We let her move to Oxford, and already she’s gone soft.” Eric’s tone is one of pantomime disbelief, but he starts walking towards his car: a battered looking Landrover covered in mud. Martin nods, and fiddles with the strap of his bag. Jon bumps his shoulder. Martin looks down at him, and he looks terribly lost, and terribly young.

Jon smiles at him, deliberate and warm. “It’s alright. We’re nearly there.”

Martin’s skills do not, apparently, end at thrashing Georgie and Jon at Gin Rummy. When he’s beaten the assembled elder members of the Barker-Ross clan for the third day in a row at Scrabble, one of Georgie’s younger cousins presents him with a medal made out of tin foil, and he is declared the reigning champion wordsmith. Georgie elbows Jon in the ribs and waggles her eyebrows at him, “what is it with you and poets, hm?”

Jon glares at her, Georgie grins and sticks her tongue out at him. It’s not long before she’s tugged away by one of her cousins: Charlotte, this time, a 10 year old who’s having girl trouble. Martin’s halfway across the thickly carpeted hall when Jon stops him. 

The problem is that, so far, as far as Jon can tell, Martin’s been having a good time. But it’s been hard to tell, because Martin has also very clearly been avoiding him. So Jon carefully steps over Dennis (who is all but skin and bones in his old age but still clinging stubbornly to the comfortable life he’s made for himself) and deliberately steps in front of Martin - blocking his access to the kitchen. Martin frowns, and sways to the right, gesturing as he does so. “Oh, um, hi Jon. I was just going to get everyone some tea. Do you mind if I squeeze past?”

This was the other problem. Without Martin’s company, Jon had been left to watch and speculate wildly. And he had been. Martin was having a good time, apparently. He got along easily and well with everyone he met. He was good with the children, he was good with the dogs, he was good with the cats. He crouched to speak to the toddlers, the dogs came jumping at his knees in the mornings, and the cats wound themselves between his ankles, meowing loudly in response to his soft chatter as he greeted them. Martin, unlike Jon, had managed to infiltrate the Barker-Ross administration. (And whilst the more rational part of Jon understood that this was because Martin had looked hideously uncomfortable until Mary had let him feed the cats, the less rational part of him is unreasonably jealous.)

So Martin has been pottering about, collecting dishes, feeding the animals, making tea and wiping down surfaces. He has, in a word, been going to a great effort to make everyone comfortable except himself. Which was very much not the point. 

It had all nearly come to a head when Martin had been talking to Georgie’s Aunt Roisin, and had successfully managed an entire twenty five minute conversation half a foot from Jon’s head in which the only information that he’d volunteered about himself was, “I’m fine, thanks.” When the conversation hit the twenty-six minute mark, and Martin had still managed to carefully navigate any mention of himself, his wellbeing, or his family, Jon had snapped his book shut and sat up  with every intention of calling him out on his bullshit. But then Georgie had jumped up from the opposite sofa, grabbed his arm and pulled him to his feet, insisting she needed a hand with present wrapping.

Martin, still talking to Roisin, had offered them both a stiff smile as they left, and Jon hadn’t been able to escape Georgie’s stream of good natured commentary and gentle complaints about her family and their various social updates for nearly an hour. When he’d finally gotten back to the living room, Martin was gone, and he hadn’t seen him again until dinner.

So now here they were, at four o’clock on Christmas Eve, and Jon had had enough. He leans past Martin, and calls over to Georgie’s second cousin Iain, “mind if I borrow Martin? Someone else will have to get the tea.”

Iain raises his eyebrows, and gives Jon a smile that he isn’t entirely sure he understands. But he also nods, and so Jon smiles back at him and puts his hand on Martin’s arm. 

Martin pulls back, ever so slightly, and Jon is suddenly terribly aware of every easy touch that’s passed between them over the last three months and how this isn’t one of them. He freezes, and looks up, and Martin’s mouth is set in a thin line. Jon considers giving up: letting Martin continue to ignore him and swim in his own tightly contained misery. But he thinks about the expression on Martin’s face when he’d first seen the decorations at the Institute, and his resolve solidifies. Jon deliberately curls his fingers around the soft give of Martin’s upper arm, squeezing gently. Martin watches him and doesn’t look terribly impressed. Jon continues anyway. If there was one thing he’d learned how to do in just over a quarter century on earth, it was how to survive a critic. 

Jon lowers his voice as he steps closer to Martin, and one of the dogs comes skittering out of the kitchen and onto the soft carpet of the hallway, tail slapping against their legs as it trots past. “Could we talk for a moment? In private?” 

Martin’s mouth turns down, but he hasn’t pulled away again. “Do I have a choice?” 

Jon feels a snap of unease run through him like ice water poured down his spine. His hand loosens around Martin’s arm. “Of - of course.” 

Martin, still watching him, softens. He sighs, and his body curves forward, curling toward Jon. “Yeah, Jon. We can talk.” 

Jon swallows, and wishes he knew half of what he feels like he’s missing. “Ok.” He squeezes Martin’s arm again - he’s wearing some kind of cashmere jumper, and it’s a deep and lovely forest green. Then Jon lets go, and jerks his head towards another door in the hallway.

Both of them step into one of the spare rooms. It has two single sleeping bags set up on the floor, and looks like someone had set off a bomb made of plastic toys and candy canes. Martin and Jon carefully step around the small minefield of cartoon merchandise, and Jon shuts the door. Outside, the sky is already a dusty dark blue, and the snow fades from amber in the lights of the house, to a distant dark blue grey over the hills. The light makes a soft glass flickering as it switches on, and hums softly over their heads. 

Martin sighs, and folds his arms. “Alright. What is it?” 

Jon tries to decide where to start, and speaks before he’s finished thinking it through. “You’ve been avoiding me.” He doesn’t mean it to come out as petulant as it does, he hadn’t meant to say it at all. But it does and he does, and Martin’s nostrils flare when he huffs a sigh and looks over Jon’s shoulder at the door. 

“I was giving you space.” He says, and his mouth pinches at the corner. “Isn’t that your preferred method of conflict resolution?”

Jon frowns. “Are we - what conflict?”

Martin is tapping his foot. Outside the door, dogs skitter across the flagstones of the kitchen and children squeal in one of the playrooms. One of the cats meows, loudly, and scrapes at the door of the room they’re standing in. Martin clicks his tongue. “I should get back out there.” He looks at Jon, and his fingers curl and uncurl at his sides. “Both of us should.” 

Martin starts to move, stepping forward to walk past Jon around the plastic molehills. Jon catches his arm, frown deepening. “No, Martin,” he tugs on Martin’s sleeve. Martin looks down at Jon, and Jon tries to focus and not to think about how very easy it would be to close the gap between their lips and -, “what conflict?”

Martin makes a soft sound of frustration, and sways back and away from Jon. Jon releases his sleeve, satisfied at least that he isn’t leaving the room entirely. “Won’t Georgie be wondering where you are, Jon?” 

“Georgie…?” Jon starts, and then stops as the pieces fall into place. “Wait, is this about me and Georgie? Are you -,” Jon stops, because he can’t think that - he can’t hope that. Because if Martin was jealous then that would mean, well, and a man like Martin Blackwood would never fall in love with someone like Jonathan Sims. 

“I’m not jealous.” Martin snaps, and doesn’t meet Jon’s eyes. He shoves his hands in his pockets. “It’s just a bit rude, is all.” Martin’s red, and breathing heavily and fast. He’s frowning and his mouth is twisted into a narrow, unhappy curve, and he looks like he thinks he’s just said something terrible. 

Jon, who has been called rude more times than he knows how to count, stares at him and tries to figure out exactly what it is that he’s done. The smell of roasting meat slips into the room, spiced with berries and rosemary, woven around the rich flavour of potatoes sizzling in goose fat. Jon’s stomach rumbles. He asks, tentatively, “what - I’m sorry, Martin, I’m awful at this. What’s rude?” 

Martin tilts back and away from him, and his scowl deepens. “What do you think? You invited me - I thought you invited me here to, to make me feel better. And I get that that’s, that’s selfish and this isn’t about me but if the whole point of this trip was for you to get off with your ex then you could at least have told me.”

Jon blinks. “What?” 

For a second, Martin’s scowl disappears, and it’s like a cloud passing away from the sun. Jon feels himself start to physically relax. Martin swallows, and adjusts his weight, the rapid tapping of his foot briefly interrupted as he does so. “You - you and Georgie…”

“Yes, I don’t have any other exes in the vicinity.” Jon responds, quick and sharp and exasperated. “You think Georgie and I are, what, having sex? Making out?” 

Martin huffs, and the shadows of his frown start creeping back around his brow. His foot taps faster. “I know you’re not having sex. But you’re awfully close, and I’ve just, just had to feel like a third wheel for the last week and,” Martin goes red, and it’s an unhappy, uncomfortable looking flush that washes down his neck and across the sliver of his chest visible above the neckline of his jumper. “I know I probably wasn’t your first choice to spend Christmas with. But I really thought we were, well I at least thought we were friends. And you’ve barely spoken to me.” Martin blinks, and his eyes are bright and his eyelashes are long and dark and damp with tears. 

Jon’s heart lurches, but, “Martin, you’ve been avoiding me. I’ve been trying to speak to you.” Jon gestures once at the children’s bedroom in which they’re standing. “I’m still trying to speak to you.” 

Martin sniffs. “Yeah, but you’ve also been going off with Georgie whenever you get the chance. And, and there’s a picture of you two in the toilet.” Martin’s voice is high and wobbling a little and Jon sighs and rubs a hand up over his face, tugging hard at his hair.

“Georgie is like a sister to me. She is one of my oldest and closest friends. Neither of us are interested in reigniting our relationship, because we prefer being friends. And we only manage that once a year, these days. For Christmas.” Jon huffs half a laugh as he slips his hand into his pocket. “You’re the only person I’ve ever invited here. We are friends - I invited you because I was worried about you. And I’ve been ‘going off’ with Georgie because she’s been trying to stop me from doing something rash.” 

Martin’s mouth quivers, but his lips aren’t pursed any more. His foot isn’t tapping. “Like what?” 

Jon looks up at Martin, and meets the rich brown of his eyes. He bites the inside of his cheek. “Calling you out on your bullshit?” Jon says it as gently as he can, suddenly feeling very tired. Martin’s eyebrows raise and he stares, any tension erased by confusion and surprise. 

“My bullshit?” Martin sounds incredulous. Outside the room, someone has put on some music, it fades into the room through the door: something slow and rich and easy. 

Jon feels his mouth quirk towards a smile, and folds to sit down on one of the sleeping bags, gesturing for Martin to do the same. Martin’s gaze flickers towards the door, but after a second he does. The plastic material of the sleeping bags rustles beneath them, and they’re sitting so close that it’d take no effort at all for Jon to just fall into Martin’s round, soft shoulder and hide there. 

“You haven’t put yourself first once. All you do is look after everyone else, but you won’t even tell anyone how you’re feeling, not -,” Jon raises his voice when Martin opens his mouth to protest, “Not really. Not, honestly.” Jon hesitates, and looks at Martin. His dark hair curves in thick waves around his face, which is bronze and gold in the light. His lips are dusky red, and his ears are soft and brown. His eyelashes are thick and long and dark, and he’s looking at Jon and holding his breath. 

Jon tries to find his courage, and when he can’t he presses on anyway, ignoring the nauseating speed and force of his heart beating in his chest. Outside, night has fallen over the hills. Jon sits forward, and puts one hand over Martin’s, and meets his eyes. This close, he can see the fractals of gold and bronze and copper glimmering in the dark warm brown of his irises. Martin blinks. His hand is soft and plump and warm. Jon squeezes his fingers, and swallows the lump in his throat. “I know you’re not ok, Martin. And, you don’t have to talk about it. But you also don’t have to pretend. Not with me.” The sounds of the house go on outside the door: people and music and animals, metal pans banging in the kitchen and the creak and thump of doors. They all feel very far away. Jon looks at Martin, at the soft curve of his nose and the faint dark shadows under his eyes. “You can trust me, Martin.” 

Martin blinks rapidly, and he breathes, and his chest shudders as he does so. He lifts one hand to scrub at his eyes, and turns over the other, squeezing Jon’s fingers tightly as he weaves them with his. Martin sighs, and the sound comes out wet and muffled by his hand. “I’ve been a right tosser, haven’t I?” 

Jon laughs, soft and disbelieving, and leans forward. He brings his other hand up to gently pull Martin’s away from his face, and Martin looks at him, eyes red and cheeks wet. Jon brushes the tears from his cheeks, and more fall to meet them. Jon very gently clasps the side of Martin’s face. “You haven’t done anything wrong.” 

Martin swallows. When he speaks, his voice is very small. “Thanks, Jon.” 

For a moment they sit there, warm and vulnerable, surrounded by action figures and teddy bears and small explosions of glitter that glimmer in the electric light. Jon breaks the silence, when Martin’s breathing deepens and evens again. “Do you want to talk about it?” 

Martin bites his lip. He fiddles with the hem of his jumper. In the other room, one of the dogs barks, high and playful as the children laugh. Martin shifts, adjusting his legs, and nods. “Y-Yeah.” He stops, and Jon watches him, quietly - half worried that if he breathes too loudly he’ll break the fragile cocoon of safety that’s wrapped its way around them up from where their hands are still clasped, tight and warm. Martin’s mouth curls into a rueful smile. “I don’t know where to start.” 

Jon understands that. He shuffles closer, and squeezes Martin’s hand. “Start at the beginning.” He says, quietly. 

Martin looks at him, and his eyes are dark and tell Jon nothing. They tell him everything. 

“I always. I always kind of knew that she hated me. She had this way of looking at me, when she thought I wasn’t looking. Even when I was little, I knew to be afraid of it. And when I got older, I convinced myself that I was imagining things. That if I was just a bit kinder, or a bit quieter, or a bit, just, better - then it would go away.

“She didn’t. She didn’t hit me very much. More often she’d just throw things. Or break my stuff. I don’t know why - she’d be tired or stressed or upset about something and I think she just. Wanted to hurt me? It wasn’t. I hated it, but I think - the things she said were worse. I felt. She made feel stupid, and pathetic, and disgusting, and I. I never knew what would set it off. It felt like every day I was walking on broken glass, trying not to let it cut me.”

Martin talks for hours, and Jon listens, only interrupting occasionally to request clarification, or offer quiet reassurance. Martin talks until his voice gets hoarse, and both of them have pins and needles. Once or twice, Jon’s phone buzzes, but he ignores it. He knows that Georgie will understand. 

When, at last, Martin is done, Jon doesn’t know what to do with himself. He thinks Martin is the bravest, kindest, strongest man he’s ever met. He wants to drive to London and break Mrs Blackwood’s door down. He wants to rage against the world and the people who would let something like this happen to a man as kind as Martin Blackwood. He wants to burn it all down. He wants to make sure nothing like it ever happens again. 

But Jon is slender, and shy, and awkward. He’s never been anyone’s hero. So instead, he looks at Martin, Martin whose dark bronze cheeks are bright with tears, and whose round soft shoulders are hunched with old pain and grief. Jon looks at Martin, and doesn’t give himself time to think. He leans forward and wraps his arms around Martin, hugging him fiercely as he buries his face in the soft wool of Martin’s jumper. 

Jon feels Martin exhale, and the gentle give of his body in his arms, and he squeezes him tightly and shuts his eyes, pressing his face into Martin’s shoulder and ignoring the burning in the darkness behind his eyelids. After a second, Martin’s arms come up around him, enveloping him in warmth. Martin’s body shakes as he cries, and Jon rubs firm, soft circles over his upper back, making quiet mindless soothing noises. 

Jon holds Martin, and Martin falls apart. 

Chapter Text

Eventually, Martin stops crying, and he and Jon pull apart. Martin’s face is a red mess of snot and tears, and Jon reaches up wordlessly to brush a stray eyelash away from his cheek. Martin frowns, and reaches up to touch Jon’s face, and his palm is soft and warm. “Are you ok?” Martin’s voice is cracked and broken, and Jon blinks, laughing as a few stray tears slip down his own cheeks. 

“Yes. Yes, Martin, I’m fine.” He reaches up, and wraps his fingers lightly around Martin’s wrist, anchoring him. “Are you?” 

Martin’s brows pull up a little, and he breathes slowly and deeply. “I think so.” He smiles at Jon, and it’s small and shy and somewhat undermined by the tears. “I’m ok.” 

Jon nods, and moves, and hisses when he does as blood floods back into his thighs and calves. Martin makes a soft sound, somewhere between a sigh and a laugh, and catches his breath as he shifts too. They lean apart from each other, trying to shake life back into their sleeping limbs. Once the numbness has faded, Jon struggles to his feet, offering Martin a hand which he takes with a smile.

Outside; the night is pitch black and they can barely see the hills. Jon scratches his chin. “We’ve probably missed dinner.” He says, ruefully. Martin chews on his lip, and Jon touches his arm. “They won’t mind.” 

Martin’s shoulders lower, just a fraction. “They’re really amazing people.” He says, quiet and fervent. Jon smiles, and nods. 

“They are. But so are you.” Martin’s cheeks flush pink, and Jon squeezes his arm before he lets go. “We should leave, though. I’m guessing this room’s lodgers will be needing their sleeping bags sooner rather than later.” 

Martin nods, and both of them pick their way towards the door. Jon manages to step on a Lego rocket. Martin laughs at him silently, shoulders shaking, whilst Jon swears and hops on the spot - catching him when Jon starts to topple. 

Jon opens the door into the hall. It’s empty, as are the rooms around them. Martin steps forward, looking around before turning back to Jon. “Where is everyone?” 

Jon slips his hand into his pocket, curling his fingers around the smooth hard plastic of his phone. Far off, he can make out the sound of Christmas carols and laughter. He pauses. “They’ll be in the barn.” Jon’s mouth curves in a smile of remembered joy, “Margaret probably has the whiskey out.” He walks into the kitchen, and Martin follows him. Through the window over the sink, they can see great pools of amber light spilled onto the snow from the barn windows. One of the dogs trots through it, leaving little black paw prints in the dark as it sniffs about the courtyard. 

The kitchen is very quiet. Martin is standing next to Jon, and he smells of soap and wool and laundry powder. Jon pauses. “We could join them.” Martin hums, moving for the kitchen door. Jon stays where he is, and Martin stops, turning back to him with one toe in his shoe. “I have a better idea.”

Martin raises an eyebrow. 

It’s freezing cold. Both Jon and Martin huddle close together as they walk around Eric’s farm in the dark, Martin clutching a torch and both of them hunched against the wind and light curtains of snow that occasionally fall from the clouds, hidden by the night above them. Martin’s arm is tightly wrapped around Jon’s, and Jon’s teeth chatter as he leads them around the back of the barn and towards the main house. 

They step inside, and Jon reaches past the pile of waxed and plastic coats to switch on the light in the little hall whilst they stamp the snow off their boats. Martin switches off the torch and pulls off his coat, rubbing his arms. “Is - is it warmer inside?” 

Jon laughs. “Yes, don’t worry. Eric likes to keep things cosy.” He kicks off his shoes and hangs up his coat, the damp of the snow kissing his bare skin as his jumper rides up his forearms. Jon opens the second door, and together he and Martin step into the main hall of Eric’s house.

A huge dark wood staircase stretches up in front of them, pressing up against the right hand wall and stretching up to the first floor, where it turns at a right angle to the left into the first floor hall. To the left, next to the arch that leads into the dining room, is a tall dark grandfather clock. Nestled in the corner of the staircase is an enormous pine tree, branches spread dark and bristling with the fresh scent of pine needles. Multicoloured red and blue and green and gold fairy lights, hung haphazardly over the branches in a chaos of childish exuberance, glitter in the shadowed quiet of the hall. The glow of the lights bounces off shimmering foil and glitter, gold and silver trimmed ribbons and gleaming baubles in the tree, like stars or secrets in the dark.

Martin very quietly shuts the door behind him, and it closes with a click. For a moment, both of them stand there, dwarfed even as adults by the massive Christmas tree before them. Behind it, on the upper part of the staircase, a tall window opens into the snowy hills and the night. 

“Wow.” Martin breathes, quiet and breathtaken. Jon turns to look at him. The curving lines of Martin’s face catch the soft, coloured lights of the tree. His eyes shine, and his face is a map of shadow, thick and dark in his hair and eyelashes and around the corners of his lips. He’s beautiful. 

Jon slips his hand into his pocket, and pulls out a small felt robin. It has a red breast, and tiny black beads for eyes. It’s soft, and fits easily in his palm. A loop of red thread protrudes from just behind its head, above it’s nearly tucked felt wings. He holds it out, and Martin looks down at him, face painted in the colours of the tree. Jon smiles at him, gentle and restrained. “It’s for you.” 

Martin looks from the robin, up to Jon’s face, and then to the tree itself. Without a word, he carefully takes the robin from Jon, fingers brushing Jon’s hand lightly as he does so, still cold from the snow. Jon’s hand unfurls, fingers outstretched as Martin pulls away and turns to the tree. 

Very carefully, Martin stretches his arms up to reach an empty branch. His jumper rides up over the dark line of his belly, and Jon steps closer, following him until his knees are brushing the lowest branches of the tree. It shivers a little as he does so, and the lights shake, glittering like stars. Slowly, Martin slips the thread over the branch, and then pulls his fingers back. The robin hangs in the dark, sweet and small. Martin steps back and blinks, his eyelashes quick as butterfly wings. 

Martin turns to Jon, and his eyes are bright. Behind them, the clock ticks. Martin opens his mouth, and then the clock starts to ring. The chime echoes through the tall, quiet space. Jon and Martin look at each other. Outside, it’s snowing. 

The chimes end, and Jon steps forward, and puts one hand on Martin’s upper arm. With his other, he touches the side of Martin’s face. He’s not sure if it’s the shadows or the hour or the smell of cinnamon and pine, but he feels safe and warm and unafraid when he gets up on his tiptoes and brushes a light, chaste kiss over Martin’s lips. Martin’s mouth is soft and warm, and he makes a breathless quiet sound of wonder when Jon kisses him. Jon dips his fingers into the thick warmth of Martin’s hair, and smiles, and ignores the way his face is burning. 

“Happy Christmas, Martin.” 

A little while later, Jon remembers to check his phone. He has a few missed calls, and several text messages from Georgie. He reads the most recent one first:

“Dinner is in the bottom oven. Hope you’re having fun ;)” 

Jon huffs a laugh, and Martin hums a question, pressing a kiss to the back of his head. Both of them are sitting in the hall in front of the Christmas tree, with Martin’s back to the wall and Jon leaning against Martin’s chest, looped in his arms. Martin is warm and soft against him, and occasionally he runs his hands up and down Jon’s arms and makes him shiver. 

Jon shows Martin his phone, and Martin’s chest shakes a little as he laughs too, and Jon turns to kiss the smile on his lips. Martin hums, happily, and slides his hands up Jon’s sides, before moving one up to cradle the back of his head as he deepens the kiss, gently pulling him closer. Warmth floods through Jon’s chest, and he lets himself melt into it. 

For a while, all there is is darkness and warmth and the wet soft slide of their mouths against one another, fingers brushing over skin and sinking into each other’s hair. Jon doesn’t know how much time passes before Martin pulls back, lips wet and red, eyes wide and bright in the dark. He smiles, and his teeth are neat and round and white. “We should probably take this somewhere private.” 

Jon sighs, and sits back, one hand lightly wound with Martin’s. “You’re probably right.” 

Martin follows him, leaning forwards to nuzzle the side of his face and kiss his ear and cheek and neck. “Come to my room?”

Jon stiffens, and Martin pulls back immediately, though Jon holds on to his hand when he tries to pull that back too. Martin looks at him, and his brow is twisted up into a wrinkle of worry. Jon reaches out and smoothes the little comma of a frown just above his nose. 

“Is everything alright?”

Jon nods, and ignores the sudden dryness in his mouth. “Yes, yes, it’s just. I don’t.” He stops, and tries to find the words, and ignores the uncomfortable heat burning away the pleasant warmth they’d been sitting in moments before. Martin’s mouth opens a little, and his frown eases. 

“Oh, Jon, no, I didn’t mean sex. No,” Marin laughs, and Jon catches a glimpse of the pink on his cheeks when he leans a little further into the light, rubbing the back of his neck, “though I see in retrospect how that...is exactly what that would have sounded like. Sorry.” 

Jon huffs, still feeling uncomfortable, though now more for making the wrong assumption than anything else. His shoulders are stiff and raised, and his skin prickles. “No, it’s fine, it’s me. I’m the problem.”

Martin frowns, and gently takes his shoulder. “No. No, Jon. You’re not a problem. This isn’t a problem.” He leans forward, and kisses Jon’s nose, and Jon feels a little of the tension fall out of him. His shoulders drop. Martin pulls him closer, letting go of Jon’s hands to gently wrap his hands around Jon’s hips and the sides of his belly as he kisses his cheeks and lips. “No, I meant more like…” Martin kisses him again, “cuddling? Actually sleeping. Maybe more kisses, if I’m lucky.” He smiles against Jon’s mouth. Helplessly, Jon smiles back.

“I suppose that can be arranged.” 

The Barker-Ross family largely doesn’t comment on Jon and Martin’s new closeness, though they receive more knowing smiles and warm clasps on the shoulder than Jon can count. Martin flushes pink every time, and Jon pretends that he doesn’t do the same. 

Despite himself, and the fact that apparently Georgie has a new girlfriend called Melanie, Jon finds himself worrying about her response to the whole thing. Part of him - a stupid, selfish, anxious part - is worried this will mean he can’t come back for Christmas. But Georgie grins at him wider than anyone else when he sits next to Martin on the sofa for the exchange of presents, and shyly holds Martin’s hand. Later on, Georgie takes Martin to one side, and Martin comes back looking more than a little startled.

Jon has half a minute to laugh at him before Georgie is grabbing him, and telling him in no uncertain terms that if he does anything to hurt Martin Blackwood then she will be very unhappy with him. Jon squints at her, “Martin is my friend.”

Georgie folds her arms. “He’s your boyfriend. And he’s my friend now too, and if we’re going to have both of you round for Christmas, which we are, then you better not fuck it up.” Jon opens his mouth, and Georgie barrels on before he can reply, “you can break up. Sometimes that just happens. But don’t be a dick.” Georgie reaches out, and squeezes Jon’s shoulder, and smiles at him. “Don’t panic, ok? You’re kind of an asshole when you panic. Just. Call me, or that Tim Guy you work with, or, anyone. Get a second opinion. Promise me you’ll do that?”

Jon hesitates. In the kitchen next door, he can hear Martin’s voice, high and bubbling as he keeps up a steady stream of chatter with Georgie’s Uncle Eric. He thinks about all the ways that he could fuck this up, and they spiral out above and below and around him like an endless hurricane through which he’ll never stop falling. 

But Georgie’s hand on his arm is warm and heavy, and she squeezes tighter and says, softly, “Jon?” 

Jon blinks, and breathes, and remembers what it feels like to be inside his body. His lungs ache a little as they expand, and blood rushes past his ears. His lips taste like salt and his feet are warm in their slippers. He looks at Georgie Barker, and remembers what it looks like when she cries. “I don’t want to hurt him.” 

Georgie’s mouth twists at the corner, caught between curling up and pulling down. Her thumb rubs his shoulder. “You’re going to, and that’s ok. That’s just what people do. The hurt that’s harder to forgive is the hurt that’s cruel, the stuff you do because you didn’t think, or because you put yourself first, or worst of all because you wanted it to hurt.” Her eyes tighten, and she bites her lip, gaze slipping away from Jon to the window and the bright light of the day refracting off the snow and inside onto the thick cream carpet. Her chest rises and falls. “But. Jon, you’re allowed to love people. Even if you make mistakes. That’s how you learn.” Georgie smiles, and Jon smiles back and ignores the great tearing ache in his chest. “So just, get a second opinion. Ok?”

Jon nods, and swallows the lump in his throat, and thinks about Martin Blackwood. “Ok.”

On New Year’s Eve, the Barker-Ross family and Jon and Martin crowd into the barn. Georgie’s Uncle Eric has broken out several bottles of Buck’s Fizz, and nobody wants for food or drink. The children giggle and play on the carpet around the adults’ feet, and the dogs and cats squeeze onto arm rests and rugs, falling into sleepy piles around the fireplaces. 

The TV plays a live feed of the news showing Westminster and the count down to the new year. Jon and Martin sit next to each other on the sofa, and for once Martin isn’t trying to entertain anyone. Instead, he’s sitting back, relaxed and quiet, gently running his thumb over the back of Jon’s hand. Jon sits with Martin’s arm around his shoulders, leaning against the soft warmth of his chest. He and Georgie are arguing about Melanie’s podcast, and the relative merits of her research. The rest of the Barker-Ross family have bemusedly left them to it. 

The clock ticks closer to midnight. Occasionally, Martin interjects with a point or a question or a  tease, and Jon will interrupt himself to turn and smile at him, whilst Georgie makes an exaggerated show of rolling her eyes. 

Eventually Jon realises that Georgie isn’t going to concede the flaws in Melanie’s research and gives up. Georgie laughs and claims this means that she won, and Jon resists the urge to start the whole thing back up again. It’s not so hard to do, because Martin takes the chance to wrap his arms around him and cuddle him tightly, saying, “quick, Georgie, run while you still can!” 

Georgie grins, and makes a show of holding up her hands in mock fear as she slowly gets up and walks towards the drinks table to get them all a refill. 

Jon rests for a moment in the firm, soft bracket of Martin’s arms, before wriggling against the soft give of Martin’s belly to turn and face him. Jon’s nose brushes Martin’s chin, and he tilts his head to kiss it just because he can, watching the way Martin’s face colours when he blushes. “Feeling sappy, are we?” Martin murmurs, mouth pulling at a smile and eyes creased around the corners with it. 

Jon presses closer and sits up a little, pressing a chaste kiss to Martin’s lips. “It must be the alcohol.” He says, softly, and smiles - meeting Martin’s eyes. Martin’s smile grows, and his cheek dimples, and his arms tighten around Jon’s back. Jon had never really thought himself one for PDA, and he’s still fairly certain that he isn’t - but several of the Barker-Ross spouses and partners are cosying up as the night creeps towards the small hours of morning, and there is nowhere he can imagine himself feeling safer or more comfortable than this place, now, in the arms of Martin Blackwood. So he doesn’t overthink it, he just focuses on the soft material of Martin’s jumper and the faint smell of his new cologne (a gift from Georgie), and the warmth and the quiet chatter of the family and the burble of the reporter on the TV. 

Martin sighs, and it’s a happy sound, and he gently squeezes Jon’s shoulder. “That must be it.”

Dennis the cat jumps up onto the sofa, meowing loudly, and Jon laughs and shifts to let him climb into his lap, gently scratching the thin fur on the back of the old cat’s head. Martin raises an eyebrow. “I think I have a rival.” 

Jon huffs a laugh, and gently caps his hands over Dennis’ ears, “it’s ok. I prefer you.” He grins when Martin blushes all the way up to the tips of his ears, and kisses the soft curve of his cheek. “You’re ridiculous, Martin.” 

Marin crosses his arms and huffs. “Coming from Mr I-Know-Three-Different-Ways-To-Identify-Ectoplasm”.

“We work in an institute that researchers the paranormal!” Jon exclaims, and Dennis growls as he raises his voice, slowly kneading Jon’s leg. Martin looks at him, and giggles, and after a moment Jon starts to laugh, too. 

“We’re both ridiculous.” Martin concludes, still smiling, and Jon makes a show of looking rueful.

“I think you might be right.” 

“He’s definitely right.” Georgie says, leaning over the back of the sofa to hand them both fresh glass of Buck’s Fizz. “Heads up, it’s nearly time for the countdown.” 

Both of them look at the TV, and Georgie wanders away from the sofa to stand with her uncle Eric. Martin bites the inside of his cheek. There are minutes left till midnight. “Jon?”

Jon hears the hesitant catch in Martin’s voice, and shifts to look at him. “What is it?” 

Someone has turned up the TV, and they can hear the distant recorded cheering of thousands of people half a country away filtering through the speakers. The taste of orange juice and champagne is bubbling and sweet on Jon’s tongue. Martin looks down at the plush armrest of the sofa, covered in a thick tartan wool covering. “Is this...are you,” Martin stops and bites the inside of his cheek. A little comma of a frown appears between his eyebrows, and he starts again. “Does this - will this go away? When. When we go back? To the Institute, I mean.” Martin swallows, and continues not to look at Jon. The clock ticks closer to midnight. 

Jon blinks, and stares. The room is warm and bright and full of noise, but Jon suddenly feels as if it’s all very far away. He wets his lips, and swallows the dryness in his mouth. “It doesn’t have to.” He waits until Martin looks at him, and meets his eyes, and tries to say everything he can’t find the words for. “If you want. We could try. Staying together, I mean.” Jon takes a deep breath, and ignores the shaking in his chest. “I want to.” He admits, and his voice is a little rough with the feeling of it.

On the TV, the presenter starts the countdown. Martin stares at Jon, and his dark eyes are bright and copper and gold and his lips are slightly parted. He says, softly, “Yes. Yes, I want that. More than anything.”

Jon smiles, and ignores the lump in his throat and the sting in his eyes. He nods, and says, “Ok.” And then Martin kisses him. The clock strikes midnight, and the people on the TV shout in the new year, and the Barker-Ross family cheer and laugh and embrace one another, and the room is full of the tinkling of glasses touching like ringing bells. 

And Martin Blackwood kisses Jonathan Sims, and he’s warm and soft, and Jon shuts his eyes and wishes for it to last forever. 

They come back every year after that. 

"The weight of the world
is love.
Under the burden
of solitude,
under the burden
of dissatisfaction

the weight,
the weight we carry
is love.

Who can deny?
In dreams
it touches
the body,
in thought
constructs
a miracle,
in imagination
anguishes
till born
in human--
looks out of the heart
burning with purity--
for the burden of life
is love,

but we carry the weight
wearily,
and so must rest
in the arms of love
at last,
must rest in the arms
of love.

No rest
without love,
no sleep
without dreams
of love--
be mad or chill
obsessed with angels
or machines,
the final wish
is love
--cannot be bitter,
cannot deny,
cannot withhold
if denied:

the weight is too heavy

--must give
for no return
as thought
is given
in solitude
in all the excellence
of its excess.

The warm bodies
shine together
in the darkness,
the hand moves
to the center
of the flesh,
the skin trembles
in happiness
and the soul comes
joyful to the eye--

yes, yes,
that's what
I wanted,
I always wanted,
I always wanted,
to return
to the body
where I was born."

~ Song by Allen Ginsberg