Chapter Text
There was no reason why recipes had to be so complicated.
Jon understood the benefits of having a well-stocked spice cabinet, in theory, and it was something he really ought to get behind. To be able to reach in and grab whatever seasonings that he needed, instead of having to make not-one-but-two-trips-to-the-shop in order to get everything for the recipe. Jon had thought that he had got everything, only to turn the page and find three more bullet points of items that he hadn’t considered.
What was the point in all of this elaborate nonsense, anyway? He would bet any amount of money that Martin would appreciate a meal that only required two dishes and a microwave. Oh, hell, this was Martin he was talking about. Jon could push kibble in a bowl at him and Martin would tell him that it smelled delicious.
“Oh, hell,” Jon muttered to himself, leaning against the counter and lightly pressing his thumbs against his eyes. If he wasn’t careful, then he’d rationalize himself right into getting takeaway. And he didn’t want to do that.
Even if there were annoyances in the moment, Jon wanted to make something elaborate. There were candles (unlit, for now) and a red tablecloth that he’d thought to throw over his old pockmarked coffee table. He had passed the florist on trip #2 and genuinely debated on getting some roses for the table, too, but – god, Martin would definitely think he was proposing if he walked into all that.
Which, he wasn’t. The idea didn’t revolt him, but it did fill him with bone-aching anxieties about commitment. Which was silly in and unto itself. Two weeks ago had been their six months anniversary. Martin had given him an anthology of the best science fiction novels of the late 1960s (it was nearly as thick as his head, and god was he excited). Jon had given him a pair of pajamas with the implicit threat that he was going to commit homicide if he ever saw Martin sleeping in jeans again. This had all been conducted two weeks after they had both agreed “not to make a thing of it”.
And they hadn’t! Not really. Yes, Jon had recited poetry to him (and had quietly filed in the back of his mind that poetry was one of Martin’s new interests, he’d been bringing it up recently) and Martin had gotten misty-eyed. And they’d gone out to dinner. And they’d had an excruciatingly simpering heartfelt conversation while laying nose-to-nose with him in bed. And they said they loved one another (a memory that always brought up firework exclamation marks in his mind, even still). But they hadn’t made a thing of it, necessarily.
That Jon was currently in the process of making an exceptionally elaborate dinner for Martin was unrelated. Sort of.
He’d been thinking about it for ages, probably far too early. The thought had first occurred to him about two weeks after the incident at the Magnus Institute, that it really would be easier if Martin started keeping some things at his flat. He would look like a loon if he brought it up then, though. No, instead he had just let the thought snowball in his mind over the months. If anything, he was surprised Martin hadn’t brought it up himself.
Martin admitting that he loved him had been the catalyst. Jon hoped it wasn’t too early – that it didn’t look like he was just reacting to the confession. No, he would be clear about it, that he had been thinking about it for ages. But he wouldn’t admit that it had only been weeks into the relationship when it started, that was madness. Three months in sounded more reasonable, even if it was technically a lie.
They would eat a nice, lovely dinner. They would cuddle on the sofa. Jon wouldn’t let Martin distract him. And then Jon would ask Martin to move in with him.
It would all be very neat and lovely.
Things had been going very well. Jon would call them ‘rocky’ perhaps a week after their argument, but after that … well. They had sailed right along, hadn’t they?
Perhaps not much had changed structurally about their lives. Martin still worked in a job that he didn’t care much for. But, as Martin often said, he didn’t hate it and little stopped him from gossiping with Jon on his phone all day. There’d been some discussion about taking online courses somewhere (“Oh Martin, they’re probably not going to check your GCSEs anyway”), and they’d started taking first steps to getting Martin on testosterone again. If Martin was unhappy with any aspect of his life, Jon didn’t hear about it. He wasn’t sure how much that meant – prying anything deeper than surface-level frustrations was like pulling teeth with his boyfriend.
Jon had moved from shelving books at a library to doing research for a small university. It’d been a gradual switch that Jon had been deeply resistant to at every step of the way. At first he’d just been working with a history department to find books for their work, and then he was being told there was a position open. Martin had been the one to really urge him into it, and now Jon had a desk. It was nice. He had put a photo of Martin and himself on it, because certainly that was the right thing to do.
The research scratched the itch for productivity, but – and Jon would not admit this to even Martin – it did not feel quite as compelling. The research into dusty old tomes and literature was not a provocative knowledge, it actually rather wanted itself to be known. And, sometimes, Jon yearned for something slightly more … secret.
He managed to shove those feelings down well enough, however. And the urges now were not as bad as they had been right after. For some time, Jon still slept excessively, still suffered from worst pain than normal, still had paralyzingly intrusive thoughts about the whole matter. They had abated. Jon thought it might have all been a little easier if he’d shared those feelings with Martin, but he also thought that he put the man through enough.
Physically, he’d been improving leaps and bounds. His physician had prescribed some physical therapy exercises, as well as a different medication for pain. Jon had relented and finally gotten a cane, which he used whenever he thought there might be a lot of walking involved. He had far fewer bad days now. He’d also convinced Martin once to lay on his back, and it had cracked so loudly that Martin frantically started to apologize.
There was only one factor that brought Jon some pause. He’d received an email two weeks ago, just before their six-months not-a-thing thing. An email, from ‘G. Barker’.
He hadn’t yet read it. From the notification bar, he’d been able to catch the first few words.
I want to know -
And then it cut off. Jon had pulled up the email in his notifications so many times, and then stopping himself, and then debating whether he ought to just delete it altogether, and then wondering what the fuss was all about, reading never hurt anybody.
Eventually, he had decided upon a perfectly reasonable compromise. He was going to tell Martin about it, and together, they would read it. Decide what to do as a singular unit, because whatever it was, it involved Martin’s past, too.
That opened the possibility that Martin would simply shut down the entire idea. It wasn’t a stupid option, either. Prying into their past lives hadn’t exactly ended well the last time, and Martin was more strongly opposed to the idea than he was, and they were happy now. There was little point rocking the boat.
But Martin was also eager to please, perhaps too much so. If this Georgie woman wanted something from them, some sort of closure or something – Jon seriously doubted that Martin wouldn’t give that to her.
What Jon wanted was for Martin to act as his voice of reason. To let him know when he was too close to the edge.
They would approach this as a team. Nothing more, nothing less.
But nothing would be broached tonight on the topic. No, tonight Jon had much more domestic issues in mind, like asking his long-term (was six months the cut-off for long-term? He never had any sense for these sort of things) boyfriend if he wanted to cohabitate. Leave his shoebox of a flat and come live with him and his absurd amounts of bookshelves.
Even if Jon had drawn a pro-con list and the ‘pro’ had a much better advantage, Jon was nevertheless itchy with anxiety. He wasn’t going to call this dinner a bribe, but perhaps it wouldn’t hurt to remind Martin that he could be a perfectly lovely and desirable boyfriend? On occasion?
Martin practically lived here anyway. There was a section of Jon’s closet taken up by Martin’s work button-downs and his ragged t-shirts, a shower shelf dedicated to his toiletries. Martin had even managed to convince him to get a television for his front room – with the idea that there might be enough room, still, for an aquarium. Jon privately considered that a cat tower would be more space-efficient, and also a more appealing pet overall. Things to consider. He didn’t think he’d ever pet a cat, at least not since he woke up. One could only hope he wasn’t allergic.
He jumped when he heard the doorbell. Christ, got him every time. “Come in!” Jon shouted from where he stood in front of the bubbling pot. Was this considered a rapid boil?
The lock in the door turned and then Martin practically sprinted in, not bothering to lock or even fully shut the door behind him. Before Jon could even turn around, there were thick arms around his stomach and he was being lifted up off of the ground from behind. Instinctively, Jon squealed and brought his legs up like that was going to do much.
“You – little – wank!” Martin was playfully growing in his ear. “I cannot believe you!”
“Good to see you too.” Jon hadn’t the faintest idea what was going on. Frankly, though, his attention was rather taken with how strong Martin’s arms were around him. Had Martin grown stronger, or just more willing to throw his weight around? Martin had squeezed the breath out of him, he felt like, just a touch hoarse when Martin set him back on the ground. “Have I done something unbelievable?”
“Mine eye hath painted the painter and hath stelled thy beauty’s form in table of my heart?” Martin accused him. Oh, yes, he did know what this was about, actually. Christ, Jon tried and failed to keep a smile from spreading on his face. To combat this, he pressed his hand against his mouth to stifle back any laughter.
“Yes, Martin?” Jon asked innocently. He hoped he didn’t sound like he was about to cry from laughter. “The poem I wrote for you for our six months anniversary?”
“I knew you didn’t. You sod. I asked you, and you gave me those big – those big ‘who, me?’ eyes and said that you came up with it during lunch. Oh my god. Shakespeare’s sonnet fucking twenty-four.”
“In my defense, I never thought that you’d believe me. You really thought I would write you a love poem – much less one that includes the phrase ‘hath stelled thy beauty’s form’?”
“I – I - “ Martin’s face was entirely red. “I was a little distracted, thanks.”
“Yes, I do seem to remember that.” Martin had been, in a word, lovesick. He usually was, when they were practically nude and entangled in bed together, with Jon’s hands delicately cupping his face. Jon had initially made the off-handed remark (of course I wrote it, Martin, that seems like a thing I’d do) as a joke, but then Martin’s eyes had grown wide and nearly shattered Jon’s heart with how earnest they were.
(Also, it was very funny to let Martin think he wrote Shakespeare.) “But never think that I didn’t mean every word of it. I just don’t have the originality required for love poetry.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.” Martin sighed impatiently. Let down on the floor, he planted a firm kiss against Jon’s cheekbone. “Arse.”
He detached himself from Jon’s side to go back and handle the front door. Every few steps, Martin would call something out in a tone that suggested he was moments away from dissolving into laughter. “Deception! Fraud!” There, Martin was practically giggling at himself while he locked the door. “Liar!”
Jon supposed he couldn’t judge much. He was giggling, himself, standing there with a spoon in hand. Martin swept back into the kitchen and threw his arms around Jon’s middle. This time, he was not picked up into the air. Martin just gently knocked his nose against Jon’s temple. He even managed to stop his laughing. “I love you,” he whispered.
It still felt strange to say. Not in a bad sense, not in the sense that it was untrue. There was only the sense that it was a little secret between them, a whispered confessional. Lovely, of course – made Jon’s stomach flutter every time – but occasionally overwhelming, as it was. “Funny,” Jon murmured, staring down into the pot. “I love you, too. What a coincidence.”
Martin hummed happily in response, staring down to the small concoction Jon was alchemizing on the stove. “That smells lovely.”
“You have too much faith.”
“I’ll do the dishes after. Thanks for cooking dinner, this all looks fantastic.” A beat passed. “This isn’t some, ah, special occasion that I’ve forgotten about,, is it?”
Bless, a look of concern did pass over Martin’s face. Jon couldn’t help but smirk. “Well, let’s consider, shall we? It’s not my birthday, that’s in October. Obvious reasons, not our anniversary. You don’t have a birthday. No, Martin, I think the mood just struck me.” Or something like that, anyway. How hard was it going to be to ask? Martin, would you consider moving in with me?
“How are you so sweet? Honestly. I need to shape up. You’re leaving me in the dust with this romance thing.”
Jon bumped his hip against Martin’s own. That isn’t burning, is it? Jon found a spatula and reached for the fish, flipping it over. It was … dark. But probably fine. And if all else failed, then he’d have a sink full of dishes and Chinese takeaway to look forward to. “I’m glad that I’m exceeding expectations in that regard.” And he was, really. His life was rapidly growing towards normal, and while he understood that being normal wasn’t a checklist – god, it felt good that he could handle a steady relationship.
“Oh! Reminds me. I think I’ve chosen a birthday.”
“Can you do that?”
“Well, I’m certainly going to make my case to some men in suits about that. Think I know the year – I mean, close enough, anyway. And I’ll need to have some date of birth to put on things. I’ve just been making up different ones for every form I get.”
“Martin!” Jon’s voice was chiding. It seemed like Martin was in an awkward bureaucratic situation every other week. He’d practically become an expert in knowing the right words to say and what strategy to take. A few months ago, Martin had even danced with him to the hold music that they’d been put on for thirty-seven minutes. “What date did you end up choosing, anyway?”
“March 24th.”
Jon frowned. The date didn’t mean anything to him. “Why?”
“Well – “ Although he wasn’t looking at Martin’s face, he nevertheless practically heard the shyness in his voice. “It’s the day that we met.”
Jon heard all of the words individually. He even knew the dictionary definition of all those words. They were one syllable long, for the love of god. And yet it took a few seconds for his brain to supply the necessary feedback about what they all met strung together.
He had hoped that he would have a better reply to it. Instead, all he could get out was: “Jeeeeeesus, Martin.”
“It’s not too much, you don’t think? Not, like – weird?” At Martin’s obvious nervousness, Jon reached up to give his shoulder a reassuring rub while he thought his words through.
It was hard to conceptualize it, really. The only thing that Jon could think of was, when Martin finalized that date on all his forms and licenses – that was that. That was his birthday. Their meeting would be a part of Martin’s life forever, even if (god forbid) things didn’t work out between them. It was much more permanent than a tattoo, this was a baseline point of knowledge about Martin Blackwood.
Suddenly, asking Martin to move in with him seemed much less daunting.
“It’s the most romantic thing anyone’s ever done for me.” Jon confessed. “And really makes me hope that dinner isn’t crap.”
“Shush.” Martin swayed next to him, bumping his hip next to Jon’s, as if he were dancing. “It’s not like that. It’s just, you know. Whatever happens, meeting you was, like, a formative event in my life.” Martin broke out into a grin. “I’m saying that it would have to be a really crap dinner for me to decide that my birthday was actually, like, Christmas or something.”
Jon make a dramatically stressed showing of stirring the sauce, causing Martin to giggle. “I love you,” Martin sighed out, as if Jon had forgotten in the last five minutes. And Jon had to admit that, given the history for the two of them – well, constant reminders wouldn’t be the end of the world. Lightning could yet strike twice.
“I love you too, sweetheart.” Jon’s voice was breathy, practically a whisper, but Martin’s happy hum confirmed that he heard it anyway. Martin would soon detach himself and go put places and glasses out on the coffee table (they didn’t eat at the dining table, they weren’t eighty). They would have a nice dinner, Jon would ask the question, Martin would say yes, and there would be a generous amount of kissing on the sofa. They would make half-concrete but nevertheless excited plans about packing up Martin’s things and what would need to be done at Jon’s flat. They would go to bed and practically chortle at the idea that it would be their bed at some point in the future. They would sleep, and then it would be tomorrow.
He had no idea whether any of that would happen, but Jon could certainly hope. Whatever yesterdays he had – more than being traumatic, it was over. Jon couldn’t ever reclaim it. The thought still gave him sadness, and Jon didn’t know how to begin to process that kind of grief. He figured it would hit him again and again and again, a rain that didn’t know when to stop.
However, he had todays and tomorrows in ample abundance. Fingers crossed, anyway. And they were so much more precious. The feeling of Martin’s hand against his, the light striking and lighting up the hairs on his face just so, the absolute hurricane of emotions a single look of his could produce. They were more than some stilted movie-memory of a man that he was no longer. They were things that Jon could plan for, control, experience. Hell, todays and tomorrows gave Jon a chance to make things good.
And Jon was going to savor every single one.