Chapter Text
Martin Bouchard-Lukas ( née Blackwood) hadn’t had exactly what one would call a normal childhood by any stretch of the word. Not that he was complaining. It was a good childhood, just odd . He knew he had a mother, he had vague memories of her though he hadn’t seen her since he was five. He had no memory of his biological father and while curiosity struck him from time to time, well, he had two father’s already.
When he was seven years old, Martin had been taken from his mother, one too many calls from the school about missing lunches had brought child services to her door, and well, in all honesty she hadn’t put up much of a fight to keep him.
He’d spent two years in foster homes, running away from mean kids and neglectful parents, always trying to find his way back to a mother who didn’t want him. He never made it far before the police found him and brought him back to his foster home. It was on one such escape attempt that Martin had found himself in a public park around sunset, sitting alone on a bench. He was nine at the time, and couldn’t quite remember his way back to the foster home.
It was on this particular evening that Martin happened to get lucky, lucky enough, at least, to be found by a man out for an evening stroll. Martin had never seen a man so fancy, or at least that was what had gone through his mind when the man in the green suit cocked his head to one side, looking curiously at the boy.
“Well, hello there,” he frowned. “Are you lost?”
“No.”
“I think you are.”
Martin has started to back away from the man. “Not s’pposed to talk to strangers.”
The man had smiled at him, the expression seeming an attempt at friendly. “Well, Martin, I can’t be a stranger if I know your name now, can I?” The logic had been sound to Martin’s nine-year-old mind, and it wouldn’t be until years later that he would come to understand how it was that the stranger had Known his name that first night. "I'm Elias. There, now we're not strangers anymore, are we?"
Martin watched the man warily, but he was quite tired, and very lost, so he nodded, just once. "Okay."
“Well, I suppose I should get you back to where you came from. There’s… worse things out here than me,” he chuckled, seemingly to himself.
Martin shook his head. “I don’t wanna go back. Don’t like it there.”
The man looked at him for a long time, his eyes just a little too bright. “No, I don’t suppose you would. Not a very nice place is it? Well, I suppose…” he sighed, heavy, almost put upon, then nodded once. “Alright, come with me. I’ll take you somewhere better, but you can’t stay in this park can you?” he held out a slim, manicured hand. Martin stared at it for a long time, and then took it.
Elias had led Martin by the hand and taken him back to his home. “I don’t have any things for children, I’m afraid,” he had said with a dismissive flick of his wrist. “I have… books. Can you read?” he looked at Martin with narrowed eyes. “Yes, of course you can. Silly question. I’ll make something to eat, feel free to peruse the shelves for something to read just… try not to break anything.”
Martin finds a book on one of the shelves, an encyclopedia of spiders and flips through it on the couch, too tired to read any of the words but enjoying the pictures nonetheless. Eventually, the man had returned to the room, this time with a plate of toast and jam in one hand, and a glass of wine in the other. "I'm afraid I don't have much in the way of food, at the moment, haven't had time to do the shopping." He set the food on the table in front of Martin before perching awkwardly on the end of the couch, watching Martin for a long moment. “You like spiders?”
“Yeah.”
“Hmm… well, with any luck you’ll grow out of it,” he laughed, seemingly to himself. There was a long period of silence, Martin ate the toast gratefully, he hadn't realized how hungry he was. “You’ll stay here tonight," Elias said after a long pause. "And tomorrow well… You’re not going back to that place, not from what I’ve seen of it.”
Martin threw his arms around Elias, who stiffened suddenly, the impact causing his wine to slosh dangerously in the glass. He pat Martin awkwardly on the back. “Yes um… lets get you to bed shall we? You’ve had a long day.” He gives Martin a large t-shirt to sleep in, muttering something about taking him shopping later, and tucks him into bed.
Three days later the paperwork had gone through and Martin had been adopted. Looking back Martin knows the process was too fast, and he suspects blackmail may have been involved somehow, though he never could prove it.
He hadn’t met Peter until almost three months into his stay there, when the man had come home from a long voyage to find Elias sitting cross-legged on the floor helping Martin with a jigsaw puzzle. He’d stood in the doorway for a long moment, blinking in confusion.
“Elias?” he’d asked.
“Yes darling?” Elias had looked up from the puzzle, his eyes turning to his husband. “Do come in, you’re letting the heat out.”
Peter walked in, closing the door behind him. “Forgive me if this is a stupid question, but what is that?”
Elias grinned. “This is Martin, he lives with us now, which you would know if you bothered to check your emails dearest.” He turned his gaze to Martin. “Martin this is Peter, my husband.”
“Hi!” Martin waved one small, pudgy hand. “Wanna help us with the puzzle?”
“Yes, Peter,” Elias patted the floor beside himself. “Come help us with the puzzle.”
It had been almost twenty years since that, well, Martin is happy things worked out the way they did, all things considered. Sure, having two eldritch fear entities for dads certainly made slumber parties a little awkward -especially when no one of them could always tell you were still awake, no matter how quietly you whispered. But at the end of the day they were well… relatively good dads, in fact they both doted on Martin, and yes Peter was gone quite a lot, but he always managed to bring Martin back gifts from every voyage he went on.
Now Martin is twenty-eight, and running a moderately successful used book shop and he still has dinner with his dads every Wednesday night. Tonight is a Wednesday, and as usual, Martin doesn’t need to knock, Elias opens the door almost as soon as he arrives.
“Martin, right on time,” he pulls Martin into a hug, Martin, nearly half a foot taller than Elias, has to stoop into it.
“Hi dad,” he grins.
“Martin, there you are,” Peter gives him a hearty pat on the shoulder, he’s never been one for hugs. It’s the first time Martin’s seen Peter in close to six months, him having just gotten back from another of his longer voyages.
They catch up over dinner, Elias detailing recent events at the institute, the only particular noticeable thing being that he recently hired a new head archivist. Peter talks a bit about his time away, this time he’s brought Martin a small soapstone carving of a spider.
“You know I hate the things but, anything for you.”
Martin grins and tucks it into his pocket. “Thanks dad.”
“Speaking of,” Elias arches one eyebrow. “Martin, dear, I thought you were old enough to know not to bring pets to the table.”
Martin quirks his lips in a smile. “They're not technically pets, you know.”
“ Martin… ”
“Fine,” a pause. “Alright, you lot, off you go, you can hand out in my coat, father doesn’t like you at the dinner table,” on cue nine spiders crawl out of various pockets and sleeves on Martin, making their way in a neat line to where Martin’s coat hangs by the door. Peter shudders in his seat.
“And the last one,” Elias presses.
“Oh but Goldie gets separation anxiety-”
“You know the rules, Martin," he chides. "You're going to give poor Peter a heart attack, and that's my job."
Martin sighs, digging into his pocket to pull out a large, golden-brown tarantula, who sits happily in his palm, watching him with her eight glassy eyes. “I know, darling,” he murmurs, “but you have to go with the others, just for a little while okay? I’ll be back for you after dinner.”
Peter watches in mute horror as the spider drops down from the table, scuttling quickly across the floor, disappearing into the pocket of Martin’s coat with the others.
“I still blame you for that, you know,” he shoots Elias a glare.
Elias just scoffs into his glass of wine.
Peter and Elias had run something of a bet over the course of Martin’s childhood over which of their respective patrons he would come to serve. Elias had encouraged curiosity by teaching Martin things, buying him books, and encouraging Martin's enjoyment of reading. Peter, when he was old enough, had taken him on trips from time to time, showed him the ocean, waxed poetic about the merits of solitude, the beauty in loneliness. They were both so certain they would win that neither was quite sure how to react when they’d found their eleven year old son alone in his room reading poetry to spiders. Sometimes he wondered if his experience telling his parents he served the Mother was akin to what other kids felt when coming out as gay.
“So, Martin, how are things at the shop?” Elias raises an eyebrow.
“Good, business is steady. We even have some regulars now!”
“That’s wonderful!” Peter grins at him.
“How have you been otherwise?” Elias quirks his lips in the way that always means he’s up to something. “I can’t help but notice it’s been ages since you’ve brought someone to dinner.”
Martin knows exactly what this particular line of questioning leads to, and he sighs. “ Dad ,” Martin chides. “Why is it every time I come to dinner you ask me if I’m seeing someone.”
“I’m only pointing it out because I do worry about you. You should find someone, settle down, it’s not good to spend so much time alone.”
Peter snorts. “Speak for yourself.”
“Darling, you’re not helping,” Elias shoots his husband a quick glare.
“Well you know he doesn’t like it when you’re nosy, dear,” Peter retorts.
It’s true that Martin hasn’t brought a boyfriend home since uni, but to be fair the reason for that is that he very quickly learned if he wanted to keep a boyfriend, it was better not to introduce them to his dads early on in the relationship. Especially after Elias had blackmailed the last one.
“You know Martin, there are a number of nice young men at my institute, if you would like me to introduce you…”
Martin chokes on his sip of wine. "Absolutely not."
"Why not?"
"Seriously?" Martin glances to Peter for help but his dad just shrugs, his shoulders shaking with laughter. “No offence," Martin tries again, "but I would rather not date one of your employees,” he chuckles. “I just feel like it might be, you know, a bit awkward?”
“I fail to see how it would be,” Elias replies shortly.
Peter laughs, a full chested laugh that he fails to hide behind his hand. “Imagine that, you failing to see something.”
“ Peter ,” Elias chides.
“ Elias ,” Peter snipes back.
“Oh, don’t start, you two,” Martin glares, he knows well enough that if he lets the two of them get into it, this will be the rest of his night. “I come over once a week, you can fight all you want for the rest of it.”
“Apologies, Martin.” After a beat, Elias looks pointedly at Peter.
Peter rolls his eyes. “Sorry, kiddo.”
“Thank you,” Martin beams. “Now, what’s for dessert?”
*****
After dinner, they play cards. His fathers’ penchant for betting has rubbed off on Martin, and things do tend to get quite competitive on nights like this. They’ve been doing this since Martin was young, and Martin quickly leaned that games, with his fathers, aren't exactly played fairly . Depending on the game there were different strategies. As a kid they’d played hide-and-seek quite a lot, and with Elias’ sight and Peter’s penchant for disappearing, cheating was part of the game.
Now they're playing poker, and in this game Elias has the upper hand Beholding provides him, and is looking particularly smug about it. As he grew and came into his own patron, Martin had come to better understand the nature of their games, and where his fathers had gone easy on him as a child, now all three took the game quite seriously. Now, for example, they were sitting in a circle playing a particularly tense round of poker. They didn’t bet real money, just chips, though Martin was aware his fathers had their own betting system when they played off against one another.
Martin’s tactic is simple, he enlists the help of some of his smaller friends to check on his fathers’ cards. The spiders crawl back to him, whispering their answers in his ears, and with the Mother’s help Martin knows just the right strategies to deploy to win. He does pretty well, especially considering one of his opponent's is semi-omniscient.
Peter, however, is losing terribly.
“You’re cheating!” Peter barks at Elias after his third loss in a row.
Elias chuckles. “Now, darling, I’m sure I don’t know what you mean…” he holds a hand to his chest in a mocking gesture of offence. “And quite frankly, the fact that you’d accuse me of such a thing in front of my own son is positively slanderous.”
“Laying it on a bit thick, are we?” Martin snorts.
“Says you ,” Elias Looks at him, eyes lit from behind for just a moment.
“I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” Martin smiles innocently.
Elias looks at him with pride in his eyes.
“That’s you’re influence, you know,” Peter glares at Elias. "My own family, conspiring against me... how could you."
“As if you wouldn’t be playing the same way if your patron allowed it,” Elias regards his husband pointedly over his cards. “Your move, dearest.”
Peter folds.
Martin plays a few more hands, winning most of them, before removing himself from the game to lay on the couch. He puts one headphone in, playing his music at a low volume. His dads will be at it for a few more hours, they do love their games. Martin listens to the soft tones of his music alongside the quiet bickering of his fathers, and feels his eyes grow heavy with one too many glasses of wine. Goldie crawls out of his pocket, moving to settle against the side of Martin’s neck, curling up to sleep.
When he wakes again, the room is dark, and there’s a blanket wrapped around his shoulders. He rubs at his eyes, pulling out his phone and blinking tiredly at the screen. 2:14 am. He must have fallen asleep. He smiles to himself at the image of his dads debating whether or not they should wake him. He’ll open the shop late tomorrow, he thinks blearily as he sets his alarm. One of the perks of owning your own business. Martin tucks the blanket back over himself, careful not to disturb Goldie where she sleeps, and then he lets himself drift off again.
*****
This is the state of Martin’s life, and he’s happy with it. To be honest, in spite of Elias’ protests, he’s quite happy on his own. Martin isn’t particularly interested in dating, especially not after Jay had well… not after the way that that mess had ended. No, Martin is quite content with the company of his books and his spiders, maybe Peter had rubbed off on him a bit in that regard.
This is what Martin thinks up until one Friday Saturday afternoon, when Jonathan Sims walks into his bookshop.