Work Text:
So, here's the thing: Martin is basically incapable of crying about anything that actually matters.
His boss yells at him for accidentally mixing together the pages from two separate statements, and it’s fine. (How was Martin supposed to know that two different Jack Johnsons had given statements to the institute in 1987? How does that even happen?)
His mom screens his calls for the third day in a row, and it’s fine. Maybe she’s...maybe she’s having a bad pain day. A few bad pain days. It happens.
He’s indefinitely confined to his workplace after a near-death experience with a homicidal worm woman, and it’s...well, obviously it's not fine, but he’s dealing with it. He’s alive, at least, and he hasn’t been hollowed out and stuffed full of carnivorous worms like some kind of grisly piñata, which is more than can be said for most people who have had a run in with Jane Prentiss. He’ll be okay. Eventually.
The point is: Martin can take what life throws at him, and he takes it all with determined optimism on a good day, and numb acceptance on a bad day. Hell, sometimes he even tries to cry about that stuff on purpose, just to see if he can. Mostly he just ends up feeling kind of tired and awkward and stupid, like even his own body doesn't think his petty problems are worth the effort of shedding a tear over.
But give him a sappy romantic comedy, or a half-decent poetry anthology, or even a sufficiently cute picture of a baby animal, and suddenly his eyes and nose are streaming like he’s turned on a bloody faucet. It doesn't even have to be a good movie. He teared up at 50 First Dates once, for god’s sake. It’s not exactly high art.
Sometimes it’s a bit of a hazard, honestly. Thinking about Two-Headed Calf by Laura Gilpin can get him bawling at the drop of a hat if he's not careful. In other ways, it’s really, really convenient. Like having a valve he can turn at will when he needs to relieve some emotional pressure.
Today has definitely been one of those kinds of days. So, because this is apparently his life now, Martin sits in his pajamas in the break room, fluorescent lights buzzing quietly above him, slurping cold lo mein out of the carton while he tries to decide if today is a crying day or a wanking day.
(Hopefully not a "both" day. He really doesn't like the "both" days.)
In the end, he decides on crying. He always finds it kind of difficult to relax into a good wank here. Somehow he always feels like he's being watched.
So Martin finishes up dinner, cuddles up under a blanket on his cot, makes sure he’s still logged into the institute’s wifi, and brings up youtube on his phone. He ends up on a video about a grumpy old rescue cat who hated everyone until the owner brought home a kitten, at which point the two cats instantly became best friends. The video pans slowly over the image of a scarred, scruffy tomcat with a little baby kitty snuggled up against his side, while soft, emotional music plays, and it’s not long before Martin is sniffling like a fool. They just- those two cats just love each other so much-
“Martin?”
A hesitant voice sounds from behind him, and Martin just about jumps out of his skin. He sits bolt upright, clicking his phone off as hastily as if he’d been caught watching porn. Jon is standing in the doorway. Jon is standing in the doorway of old document storage, which Martin must have forgotten to close, because Martin is an idiot who somehow failed to predict that his boss would have no compunctions about lurking around their workplace at 11:56 PM on a Tuesday for god-only-knows what reason.
Martin realizes what he must look like right now, with his watery eyes and splotchy-red face. Oh god. Oh no.
“Hey, Jon!” he says, in a brittle, too-cheerful voice. I swear this isn't what it looks like. “I, uh. Kind of late for you to still be here?” Why the hell are you still at work, it’s almost midnight, you absolute maniac-
Jon doesn’t reply, at first. He’s looking at Martin with such an openly concerned expression that Martin kind of wants to die on the spot. Martin isn't sure he would have actually preferred for Jon to walk in on him wanking, but it's a close, close contest.
“Martin,” says Jon, after a very long pause, “Are you...okay?”
“Oh, yeah, no, I’m fine. Really, don't worry about it,” says Martin, and ugh, his voice is all wobbly, and now it sounds like he's trying to be brave and keep a stiff upper lip. All he wanted was to watch some cat videos, why is his life like this.
Martin turns his head and tries to surreptitiously scrub the tear-tracks from his face, and Jon sort of...shifts where he stands, looking increasingly guilty, which makes Martin feel increasingly guilty, and then they spend an intensely uncomfortable minute just silently stewing in that feedback loop of guilt. Then Jon proceeds to astonish Martin by walking over and sitting gingerly beside him on the edge of the cot.
“Martin,” he says, eyes firmly fixed on the far wall, hands twisting in his lap. “I’m sorry that...I know things haven’t been- lately- that is. I, I know all of this was my- it’s- I shouldn’t have-”
Martin goggles uncomprehendingly while Jon struggles his way through an increasingly incoherent sentence, words falling out of his mouth one by one like extracted teeth. He's still not looking at Martin. Martin has no idea how to process this. This is not a scenario he ever could have envisioned. He would have been less surprised if Jon had leapt at him with a knife.
And if Martin was astonished earlier, that’s nothing on what he feels now, because when Jon finally gives his attempt at communication up as a bad job, he apparently decides that his only recourse is to carefully, delicately wrap an arm around Martin’s shoulders. He’s stiff and awkward and clearly uncomfortable, but the fact that he's doing it at all is enough to tilt Martin’s entire world on its axis. He thinks his soul may have just left his body.
And, well. Because there’s no sense in looking a gift horse in the mouth, and it seems unlikely that the universe will ever grant him another chance to be held in the arms of Jonathan Sims, and Martin is lonely and weak and very, very gay, Martin leans against Jon and lets himself be hugged.
It’s really, really good.
-
At first, Martin had been inclined to dismiss it as a once-in-a-lifetime fluke. Or a dream. Or some kind of stress hallucination. Jon, for his part, certainly seems to be doing his level best to project the image of a man who has never hugged anyone in his life. A man whose shirtsleeve has never once felt the touch of Martin’s tears and snot. A man who would never, in a moment of weakness, allow Martin to nuzzle his gross damp face into his shoulder.
Then allergy season hits.
It’s a routine annoyance that Martin deals with every year, one that he has no choice but to suffer through until whatever the hell is currently blooming finally dies off. His allergies aren’t even that bad, honestly - they don’t make his eyes water, or anything - but he does sniffle once in Jon’s hearing, and a little while later a gently steaming mug of sweet chamomile tea appears on his desk.
Not only that, but the way Jon sets it there is- it's just- it's really something. He does it furtively and too-casually, like he’s trying to avoid notice, barely slowing his stride as he passes Martin’s desk. And then he wordlessly disappears into his office without having once made eye contact.
Jon just delivered tea to Martin like a drug runner doing a dead drop. In plain view of Tim and Sasha. And now Martin may actually cry from sheer mortified hilarity.
As soon as the door to Jon's office clicks closed, Tim and Sasha simultaneously turn to stare at Martin. They're looking at him like a leprechaun just appeared and handed him a gold coin.
"Martin," says Tim, after a pregnant pause, "What the hell?"
Martin buries his face in his hands. "Don't ask. Please don't ask. It's a...it's a whole thing."
They don't explicitly tease him about it, but for the rest of the week, Tim and Sasha have a new office game. Whenever they need to give Martin something, instead of looking him in the eye and talking to him, like good and normal coworkers, they slide it secretively onto his desk as they walk by. Martin ought to report the both of them for workplace harassment.
(For no particular reason, he starts skipping the benadryl a lot more often than he used to. He tells himself it's because it makes him too sleepy.)
-
Martin tries to justify it to himself. He doesn't do it all the time - not every day, not even every week. He doesn't do it to get himself out of doing work, or to distract Jon when Jon is annoyed at him. And, he reasons, it's not like he's not actually crying. He's just...not doing it for the reasons Jon probably assumes he's doing it.
He thinks of the words someone, I tell you, will remember us, even in another time, and gets a tiny bit misty-eyed, and before he knows it Jon has sidled up to him and laid an awkward hand against his back, resting warm between his shoulder blades while Martin rinses out his mug in the break room sink.
He thinks of the baby mine scene from Dumbo, has a bit of a sniffle, and the next time he goes to fix a cuppa, his favorite tea, which had been running low, has magically been restocked. Along with a box of biscuits Martin definitely doesn't remember buying.
And on one glorious occasion, after Tim and Sasha have left for the day, Martin thinks of Sam telling Frodo don't go where I can't follow, and the expression that puts on his face causes Jon to glance nervously over his shoulder and then give Martin a proper two-armed hug that leaves Martin feeling like he's floating for hours afterward.
And then he feels like manipulative human garbage for the rest of the day. But, well, that’s pretty much par for the course, for him.
-
Sometimes it happens without any conscious planning on Martin's part.
One day, he's sitting at the break room's single rickety table, doing battle with his lunch. He's pretty sure the restaurant he'd ordered from must have gotten his order mixed up with someone else's. Either that, or their definition of "medium spicy" is very different from Martin’s, because he thinks this pad see ew might actually be trying to murder him via capsaicin.
He's dabbing his watering eyes and nose with a paper napkin when Jon walks in, looking tired and stressed in that particular way that always makes Martin want to wrap him up in a blanket and put him to bed. Jon gives Martin a perfunctory nod of greeting on his way to dump half a cup of cold tea down the sink. He must have gotten too distracted to finish it while it was hot.
"Hey, Jon," says Martin, as casually as he can manage. "Ready for lunch?"
"I forgot to bring mine," says Jon distractedly, waving him off. "I'll grab something from the canteen later."
He won't. Martin already knows he won't.
Hesitantly, Martin says, "I've got some extra egg rolls, if you want-?"
"No, no, it's fine."
Martin knows what he should do. He should mind his own business. He should nod or hum noncommittally or give some other normal coworkerly response.
Because Martin is the scum of the earth, what he actually says is "Oh," in a small, quiet voice. The faint waver in his voice, kindly contributed by his noodle-scalded throat, really sells it.
One minute later, Jon is seated across the table from Martin, chewing his way through Martin’s egg rolls in a manner that can only be described as begrudging. He's once again studiously avoiding Martin’s eyes.
Martin thinks he might be going to hell.
-
Time goes on. Things get worse. Prentiss happens, and the tunnels, and Gertrude, and Jon grows strange and sharp and scared. Martin misses him with a pang of grief for a friendship smothered in its cradle, misses those ill-gotten glimpses of awkward, careful sweetness that Martin had stolen from him like a pickpocket. He doesn't quite dare to try to bridge the gap, and the idea of pulling any of his old tricks when Jon is already jumping at shadows leaves a sour taste in his mouth.
Jon doesn't drink his tea anymore.
And then, one day, without warning, Jon goes right off the deep end, cornering Martin at his desk and ranting about- about secrets and conspiracies and hidden killers and god knows what else. For a second Martin thinks that Jon might actually be about to strike him, which is ridiculous, Jon would never-
And, oh, Martin hates yelling, he's never been good at dealing with yelling.
And then Jon is snarling into his face, demanding what are you hiding with a strange, bright-eyed intensity Martin has never seen from him before, and Martin thinks god, maybe he should just come clean about his CV, Jon thinking he's a fraud can't be any worse than Jon thinking he's a murderer-
Martin opens his mouth to speak. To his absolute horror, what actually comes out is: "I used to pretend to cry because I liked how nice you were to me when you thought I was upset!"
Jon’s eyes go wide with surprise. Martin's eyes go wide with panic. Martin tries to blurt out a reflexive denial, to somehow take the words back, but they just keep coming, like the world's worst magic trick. Like pulling a chain of scarves out of his sleeve, only instead of scarves it's possibly one of the most shameful secrets Martin has ever harbored.
"I mean, the crying was real, but usually it was just because I, like, watched a video about a stray dog getting rescued, or, or read a poem I really liked! I almost never cry when I'm really upset, not since I was little, anyway, and now that I think about it that's probably something I should see a therapist about, but I've been kind of busy with, you know, everything-"
Jon looks as dumbfounded as Martin feels. His mouth is hanging open slightly. And it still doesn't stop.
"-and it sounds like such a weird and desperate thing to do when I describe it like this, but I swear I didn’t plan it, it just kind of happened, and, and I just get so lonely and sometimes I just really wanted a hug, okay-"
Jon, for some reason completely beyond Martin’s comprehension, is starting to relax. His shoulders are lowering. The furrow of his brows is easing.
Martin, on the other hand, feels like he might genuinely be on the verge of a panic attack. In desperation, he tries to clap a hand over his mouth, but his arm won't obey him. It twitches spasmodically when he tries to move it.
"-and I really really never wanted you to know about this, and I don't understand why I'm telling you now, and as soon as this conversation is over I'm going to have to, to pack my bags and move to Siberia, or something, I don't know! I'm definitely never going to be able to look you in the eye again!"
And then finally, finally, it stops, and Martin is left gasping in horrified relief, his breathing too loud in the ringing silence. His lungs don’t seem to be inflating properly. He feels like someone just dropped a fishing line down his throat, hooked some vital organ, and pulled it back up out of him, ripping it free of his body.
And then Jon starts laughing.
It’s not a cruel or scornful laugh - it’s more of a borderline hysterical laugh, the same adrenaline-jittery way a person might laugh after narrowly avoiding getting hit by a car. He's wearing an expression that Martin has no idea how to parse. He doesn't look angry, at least.
“Jon?” says Martin, because the suspense is killing him, and some morbid part of him desperately wants to know just how deep a grave he just dug for himself.
"I’m sorry, Martin," says Jon, in a wan sort of voice, after his laughter trails off. "I’m just...I'm really rather relieved."
And now he’s smiling for some reason. (His eyes, Martin can't help but notice, are the loveliest, warmest shade of brown.)
Well. If the best thing that can be said about the situation is that Jon thinks Martin’s bizarre confessional sounds better than admitting to literal murder, Martin supposes he’ll have to take it.
And then the worst possible thing happens.
Martin’s eyes start to water.
Martin just got done confessing all of the awful, creepy, manipulative things he did, and now he has the nerve to start crying, like he has the right-
"Oh my god." Martin cringes, reflexively shielding his face behind his hand. His voice sounds choked, his throat trying to close up around the words. "I'm sorry, I know what I just said, but I swear I'm not- I'm not doing it on purpose-"
"Martin, it's- it's okay." Jon looks somehow smaller now, deflated, all of his manic frustration drained out of him like air from a punctured balloon. His expression is growing increasingly abashed, like it's just now occurring to him that this entire confrontation may have been a bit extreme, in hindsight. He dithers with his hands, makes an abortive motion as though he's about to reach out, and then crosses his arms instead. "...in the future, if you need a hug, I'd prefer if you just asked."
"...what?" What?
"There's only so much scheming my nerves can take, these days," he says, as if that was the part of his statement that needed explaining. Once again, Jon isn't meeting Martin’s eyes. The sight is almost painfully nostalgic.
And, well, that’s. This is. Okay. Wow.
"...wouldn't mind one right now, honestly," says Martin tentatively, after a long, nervous pause.
Jon hesitates, and for a second Martin is terrified that he's having second thoughts, that he's going to come to his senses and take it back. Then he walks around to Martin’s side of the desk at the same time that Martin stands up, and they sort of collide in a clinging tangle of limbs. If he didn't know any better, he'd swear Jon must have needed this too, because he's leaning fully into Martin’s chest, pressing his face into Martin’s shoulder, like getting closer to Martin’s gross, snotty, sniffly self is something anyone would want to do.
And then he squeezes Martin, arms tight around his middle, and maybe Martin is a terrible, awful person for thinking so, but it feels so good he could die.
-
Things continue to get worse. So much worse than Martin could have ever imagined, even in the wildest depths of his most pessimistic anxiety fantasies. Every time he thinks they've hit rock bottom, somehow they find a way to keep digging.
But sometimes, when the weight of it all feels like too much to bear, he screws up his courage and asks Jon for a hug.
Jon never says no.