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Jon hates this sweater. He doesn't know why he's bothered to keep it.
Except that he does. It was a gift from Georgie, for Christmas one year. Specifically, it was given before Christmas, necessitating that he wear it for Christmas, and the only blessing was that it wasn't garishly holiday themed, strung with ornaments or baubles or merry little critters frolicking across its front.
Just a sweater, in a color muted enough to fit the theme of Jonathan's wardrobe - namely, austere, and dark, all the better to hide that there was no theme, not really - a dark blue that she said brought out the color of his eyes. Or maybe it was supposed to go with his skin tone. Maybe it had been to go with her own outfit for the evening, though he does remember her as the more reindeer and snowflakes kind of celebrant.
It's not that it's bad to look at it. And when Jon had first pulled it out of the bag, he'd actually found himself a bit, well, charmed at how soft it was. He remembers rubbing his thumbs along it, bunching up the sleeves in his hands before Georgie had chastised him not to ruin the material. It was nice. He gave her her gift early, as well, and they'd spent the remainder of the evening in her living room, tucked together on a couch and watching what Jon still believes must be the only holiday ghost special ever recorded.
If that had been the end of it, Jon wouldn't mind the sweater at all. Of course, that’s never the end of it. When he'd put it on for the first time, he actually gasped at the rough, rigid scratch of its insides over his skin. Tearing it off immediately was not the best idea he'd ever had - it had, in fact, only irritated his skin more - but all he could do in the face of such betrayal was throw the thing to his comforter in disgust. And then pace back and forth in his room until he heard Georgie let herself in, come over to on his door and ask if he needed help, and there was nothing to do but throw her lovely, itchy gift back on and head out.
Even that wouldn't have been so bad. A low-grade discomfort, the most pressing of which was solved by the addition of an under shirt to the mix, though it still prickled at the back of his neck like the constant sensation of being watched. Or like ants skittering over his skin. The lengths of his arms, too, enveloped in a scratching sensation that never really ceased, just built on itself slowly, so slowly, until he had to excuse himself from the room to rake his nails over his skin in privacy.
And, really - that wouldn't have been so bad. But the most miserable thing about the sweater was the way people liked to touch Jon when he had it on. As if wearing something soft and vaguely more form-fitting than his usual attire was some kind of invitation, an open field day for touching Jonathan Sims, come one, come all. Friends (ha), acquaintances (more likely), even strangers seemed to become prone to just- touching him. Stroking down an arm or his back or chest, rubbing at his shoulder while cooing, oh, how soft. Even his personality wasn't enough to dissuade some people, and it certainly had never been enough to deter Georgie, who spent much of the night rubbing her hands up and down his arm, driving that low-grade discomfort into something just short of agony, his sensation of the entire thing heightened until he could feel the rub of every single sharp, snagging fiber as they pulled and plucked at his flesh.
Jon hates this sweater. Yet here he is, wearing it. Again. This isn't even the first time he's worn it after that night. It lurks in the back of his closet, carefully folded like some limp origami over a hanger. Obviously, it only comes out in the winter time. When his desperation for clean, work-appropriate clothing has reached an all-time high and the rest of his wardrobe has been found wanting (dirty).
It's gotten the same reaction at the Archives as it has everywhere else. Sasha had loved it, demanding to know who got it for him, as if it was so clearly something he could never have managed to choose for himself. Tim had looked shocked when their arms accidentally brushed - unbeknownst to him, sending a shudder racing down Jon's spine at the sudden sensory input - and then, even he had run a hand up and down Jon's forearm. Huh, Tim had said, and then it was back to work.
Martin... Martin. Jon supposes he can at least be thankful that Martin tries to be subtle about it. But it's pretty obvious how the man's proximity to him increases when it's worn. Martin stands closer to him, rather than the carefully considered hovering of his boundaries in which his assistant usually engages. There are more incidental touches, casual, soft, and brief: a tap on his arm, or shoulder, the back of Martin's hand lingering on the inside of his wrist when he hands him a cup of tea. None of it is enough to break any standards of decorum; it does nothing more than irritate Jon, turning his body into a sensory feedback loop of gentle, insistent discomfort, Martin's fleeting touches like throwing gasoline onto a guttering flame.
This time around, Jon has somehow managed to be inept enough to not even have a shirt to wear underneath it. His entire torso an itching, buzzing mess, hyper-aware of how the material shifts and drags against his skin. Moving is distracting, twisting, bending, hell, even breathing causes his skin to prickle, waves of gooseflesh coming and going as the day goes on.
And people touch him. Bump into him on his commute. Martin's hand on his spine in the breakroom. Even things touching him, like the back of his chair, the front of his desk - all of it has his skin absolutely crawling, and he's almost gotten caught more than once with his hand up his own shirt, digging his nails into chest and practically sighing with the relief the action brings, the endorphin-filled rush of satisfaction.
So. He's not exactly in the best of moods when Elias calls him into his office to discuss the Archives. How is organizing them going, how are you cataloguing the statements, oh you're making backups, tell me more, why are we spending so much on cassette tapes. Half of the discussion is spent with the bulk of Elias' desk a safe bulwark between them, and all Jon really has to do is try not to move too much - try to focus on the conversation and not the burning itch radiating across his limbs.
The worst of it always starts in one throbbing location, growing increasingly insistent as time goes by, spreading paint-dryingly slow across his skin, as more blossom into being with every awkward shift of his weight, every gesture, every slump or sigh. Jon's chewing the inside of his cheek, digging his hands into the armrests to keep them from wandering, when Elias calls him over to look at some sort of budget spreadsheet.
Every step is torture, friction sparking across his skin, but he comes around the desk to Elias' side. A crook of Elias' fingers beckons him down and Jon leans forward, a hand planted on the desk to keep his balance, and he gives it his honest best to summon up even a single vestige of interest in the discussion.
He knows, on some level, that funding is important, that the allocation of resources is a worthwhile task to pursue. He knows this like he knows that technically, the Earth isn't a sphere, but is actually sort of lopsided and ovular. In that he realizes it has ramifications, but it's not the sort of thing that actually matters to his day to day life, and is really quite boring overall to think about. Also, in that he has no idea what anyone - Elias included - should expect him to do about it.
The conversation serves as a poor distraction from the state of his body, crawling and itching and feeling tight, stinging. The sweater is coarse enough on its inside that Jon knows his skin will be red and inflamed for hours after he takes it off, to say nothing of the raised, criss-crossing welts he’s left behind himself. It’s getting harder to focus. The simple act of walking has scratched new patterns of irritation over the length of his back, across his chest, the underside of his arms. Elias closes the Excel file and Jon breathes a sigh of relief, but it's only so he can open a new version of the previous one.
"Here, Jon, this is what you really need to pay attention to. This is what I was talking about."
In emphasis, Elias snakes a hand around his wrist and squeezes, and Jon winces at the sudden flare of sharp stinging the action provokes. Elias’ hand relaxes but doesn't leave his arm. His thumb strokes up and down, a mindless action that has loose, pointy threads scratching up and down Jon's arm in its wake.
"You see, we've been able to move some funding around in recent years, redistributing the..."
Elias continues. Jon can't stop fidgeting, now, and it's only making things worse, and Christ, he wants to tear this sweater off and leave it on the floor of Elias' office, he wants to rub up against a cheese grater until his skin is lying in little curling piles, he wants to dunk himself in hot, blistering water - anything, anything that would make this stop. Elias isn’t helping, either, but when does he ever? Every slow drag of his thumb has Jon’s attention utterly fixated, strips away every sensation aside from the press of it over his skin, the prickling almost-pain left in its wake.
Elias stops. Jon has to back up when he suddenly turns his chair to face him. His hand is still around his wrist, so Jon can't go far. Might not have gone far, anyway, as Elias pins him with a gaze sharp enough to staple butterflies to a board. His employer is eying him critically, and Jon only now feels how his cheeks are flushed, feels even more heat suffuse them as he can only imagine that whatever Elias is looking for in him, he’s going to be found lacking.
"What is going on?" Elias asks, voice stern.
"N-nothing," Jon says. He swallows when Elias does nothing but continue to watch him, expression unchanging. He weighs the awkwardness of the situation against the embarrassment of telling him the truth.
"Why are you so restless? Do you have somewhere you need to be?" Why does Elias still have his hand on him?
"N-no. I mean, the Archives, eventually, but they're not going anywhere," Jon says.
"Am I boring you?" They might both know the answer to that. Elias raises an eyebrow. "Fair enough, Jon. But I really will expect more from you in the future. It may not seem like it, but these matters affect you - and your assistants - as well."
"It's not- it's not that," Jon contests. Yes, he might be bored, but the implication that he would just- not care, about any aspect of his job is, frankly, insulting. The idea that Elias might think him incapable or childishly short-sighted even more so, and damn it, his skin is still crawling and prickling. "It's- It's this sweater."
Both of Elias' eyebrows raise now, and Jon wishes a hole would open in the floor and swallow him into its depths. Maybe it could even deposit him in the Archives, leave him to wallow among books and statements and all manner of things that won't ask him questions.
"Your sweater," Elias repeats blandly. And then he's standing, firmly within Jon's personal space, hand still hooked around his wrist and keeping Jon anchored to the spot, even as the movement causes their clothes to brush against each other, causes a tremor to shake through Jon’s limbs. "And what, exactly, is so distracting about a sweater?"
Like he's aiming to find out for himself, Elias' other hand is on him, too. It lands on his shoulder, broad palm across his clavicle and it drags slowly, incitefully downward, the pressure just shy of being enough to relieve any of the boiling tension beneath Jon's skin.
"It's... uncomfortable," Jon says. He's not leaning into the touch. Or if he is, it's only because he's so, so close to getting some form of relief.
"Uncomfortable?" Elias questions. He pulls Jon just a bit closer. His wandering hand reaches the hem of his sweater, and he moves it to Jon's side, petting down from his ribs to his hips. "It's very soft."
"It's itchy," Jon deadpans. Elias huffs out a laugh. Jon can't help but to squirm beneath his touch, every long stroke straddling the line between irritation and- not. Stoking flames beneath his skin.
"How unfortunate for you," Elias says.
He releases Jon's wrist, but before the Archivist can pull away, Elias has wound both hands around his back, threaded them up beneath his sweater and he rakes, nails down, along the length of his spine. Jon has to strangle some sound in his throat, his own hands unthinkingly on Elias' shirt, holding on as his skin practically sings in response. Eight raw, burning lines, the sensation sharp and bleeding outwards as it dulls, saturating his skin until each row has blurred into the one next to it. Elias repeats the motion, shifting his hands, over and over until Jon's sure the whole of his back is marred by the throbbing lines Elias carves into him, and it feels so good that Jon just leans his head forward, concentrates on breathing, pushes back into every drawn-out motion that leaves his skin tingling and pleasantly warm in their wake.
Elias draws his hands horizontally, cutting through the length of the lines searing down his back and Jon shudders again at the short-lived sparks of pain as his nails intersect raw skin.
"Better?" Elias asks, amusement evident in his voice. It's enough to give life to a small amount of rancor in Jon's chest, but he nods, tension snapped and draining from his muscles. "Turn around."
Jon does, though Elias stops him halfway and coaxes him into leaning his weight on the desk, arms straight, bent just slightly at the waist. He's disturbed to find his arms trembling. Jon has to close his eyes when Elias presses up close behind him, when his hands slide along his hips and slip beneath his shirt. As those long, elegant fingers creep higher up his chest, not pausing until they reach his collarbones and then scratch down his chest in one firm, gentle stroke.
"That's good," Elias says, breath ghosting across the back of Jon's neck.
There's no way he doesn't feel Jon, held caged in his arms, shake beneath his touch. Jon's breathing hitches when Elias' nails catch across his nipple, and he's not sure whether to arch into the touch or away, but it doesn't matter anyway, because wherever he leans Elias is there, lips brushing over his neck, chest flush to his back, hands drawing sweet, burning warmth along his chest.
It's impossible to tell how long it lasts. Too long, and not long enough, which is a cliched enough sentiment that Jon's annoyed by having thought it at all. Elias' hands slide down the length of his chest, nothing but the soft touch of his palms and fingertips. He withdraws them from his shirt and backs away, leaves Jon feeling cold and shivering in the vacuum of his absence. All that prickling, itching discomfort is gone, like his nerve endings have been wrapped in cotton, even as the long lines scored by Elias' hands throb in time to his heart.
"I think that's enough for today, Jon," Elias says.
Jon's throat and mouth are dry. "Right."
It takes more effort than he's strictly comfortable with to ease himself back to standing. Jon turns, finding that Elias hadn't gone nearly as far as he'd originally assumed. Elias takes a step closer, so Jon can feel the radiant heat of him, and winds a hand around behind him again, gives him one final, lingering stroke down the center of his back - over his shirt this time - and hums.
"It's a shame about the sweater; it really is quite nice."
And that's that. Elias sidesteps smoothly around him to return to his desk, with a promise of forwarding Jon some of these spreadsheets so he can acquaint himself more fully with the inner logistical workings of the Institute. Now that you're in management.
Jon leaves. The flooded warmth left in Elias' wake lingers throughout the day, reigniting low in his gut every time his shirt catches on those lines. He examines them in the mirror when he gets home for the day. Thinking that, by all rights, they should have faded by now.
He places a hand over his collarbone, crooking and positioning his fingers to follow the trails Elias left him with. Drags his own nails down his chest, shivering and alone.
He hates this sweater. He suspects he knows why he's bothering to keep it.