Chapter Text
‘Right,’ Tim says, too loudly over the fade-out of the music, sliding into the booth and knocking Martin’s elbow. ‘Snog, marry, avoid.’
Sasha giggles gleefully, the head of her pint spilling over her mouth and making her splutter.
Martin sighs, patting her on the back. ‘Aren’t we a bit old for this?’
He’s too tipsy for it too, really. He keeps his incriminating eyes on Sasha, on the table, on his glass. The whole institute is crammed into this grotty function room - too many people who could hear this conversation, watch where his gaze goes - and he really, really hates speculation.
It’s an open bar, of course - which somehow they have the budget for despite working on what look like the original computers. So gossip and all things gossip-worthy are packed in too. The cheap, twirling disco lights give the air that feeling of excusability.
Every few rounds they go blue and whirl around in the furthest, darkest corner. It makes Jon’s hair look like ink and his wine go a deep purple. Of course he’s drinking red wine at a party, Martin thinks. Pretentious arsehole. He holds it properly, his hand cupped around the bowl, keeping it warm.
Tim has pulled back and is studying him, eyes squinted. ‘How old are you again?’
‘Thirty-four,’ Martin says, with very little hesitation.
‘I don’t believe it for a second.’
‘No way,’ Sasha agrees.
‘Well thank you,’ Martin smiles, faking bashfulness pretty well, he thinks, ‘but I really am.’
‘Sure,’ Tim says, but he winks.
‘Why would I lie to be older? Who lies upwards?’
‘Listen,’ Tim waves him down, ‘either we’re playing snog, marry, avoid - or I’m asking this crappy DJ play some S Club and you’re all dancing with me.’
‘I love S Club,’ Sasha sighs blissfully, flopping her chin on Martin’s shoulder.
He pats her on the head before trying to shift. 'I’m getting another round - anyone?’
‘Sit down,’ Tim tells him, ‘come on, first office party we’ve had together. First Christmas get-together!’
‘Festive get together!’ Sasha reminds him.
‘Festive.’ Tim agrees. ‘The whole gang getting festive with some good old-fashioned gossip.’
‘Archive gang forever,’ Sasha sing-songs back.
‘It’s this or truth-or-dare,’ Tim says grimly.
Martin sits down. ‘Fine, but I’m not going first.’
‘Ohhh,’ Sasha bumps his shoulder, ‘secretive.’
‘I am not!’
’Do you not wanna hear who I’m snogging or not?’ Tim interrupts them.
They sit up straighter. He coughs and holds his hands up as if preparing a monologue.
‘Well. Avoid Elias, obviously.’
‘Obviously,’ they all agree, and Martin laughs.
Laughs for real. He downs the dregs of his pint, feeling the walls start to come down with it. He likes Tim and Sasha, and more surprisingly they seem to like him. Maybe silly games like this are worth the embarrassment.
‘Snog Rosie on reception.’
They ooh and ahh - Sasha actually claps a few times as if applauding an outstanding move.
‘And marry Martin,’ Tim grins, ‘if only for the tea and biscuits.’
Martin rolls his eyes at him, knowing it’s an attempt to make him blush and resenting the fact that he might still fall for it. Tim’s Hawaiian shirt is open at the clavicle. Martin had thought it was smart-casual.
’Cheers for that,’ he says. ‘I believe I’m entitled to this then -' he steals a sip from Tim’s JD and coke.
‘Aww,’ Sasha smiles dreamily, ‘you guys would be so sweet together.’
Tim shakes his head, and shares a fond laugh with Martin as he says ‘straight girls...’
Sasha pouts. ‘You would be!’
‘Somehow I’m not sure I’m his type,’ Tim tells her.
Martin’s eyebrows his his hairline. ’Aren’t you everyone’s type?’ he asks.
It comes out bitter, but Tim seems to catch whatever is underneath and tinged with JD. They’re at a party after all, and it isn’t a lie.
Sasha slaps the table. The moment passes. ‘You know what is Tim’s type? Shots!’
‘Sasha, it’s still only ten -‘
But it is no use, she’s off to the bar faster than Tim can call ‘tequila!’ after her.
‘Well then,’ Tim says, scooting over, ‘your turn.’
Martin twists his empty glass round and round, watching it spin. He’d rather be dizzy than nervous. Being nervous is so boring. That’s him. Nervous and boring.
‘Plenty of man-meat,’ Tim says ironically - the pickings are pretty slim on the ground in library science. Everyone’s either prim-and-proper Southern, too stiff-upper-lip to get into anything in a dingy booth, or really... not the best looking. And that’s not mean, Martin thinks, as he laughs out loud, he’s including himself in that.
‘Take your pick, we’re not playing teams. Though I happen to know Ed from reprographics is on yours, don’t ask me how.’
Martin makes a face.
‘Yeah, I know, repro doesn’t exactly reek of sexual energy.’
He’s not wrong, Martin thinks, but at least reprographics is less easy canon-fodder for teasing than their own department. There’s nothing less sexual than wearing your glasses on a string.
Of course, in trying not to look at Jon, he does.
Tim’s eyes light up. ’Nah...’
‘I’m just thinking!’
‘What?!’ Sasha demands as she slides back to base, spilling tequila on the sticky table, completely missing the look they’ve shared.
‘Nothing,’ Martin insists, staring at Tim, silently begging him not to. ‘I’m just looking -‘
‘Sasha... I think Martin might fancy our new head archivist...’
Sasha chokes on air as they both erupt in laughter. Martin doesn’t pat her on the back this time.
’I don’t!’ He tells them, trying not to whine, knowing that’ll only make it worse. ‘Shh!’
Sasha’s eyes are wide with alcohol and incredulity. She looks like she can’t believe what she’s hearing. ’But he’s such a dick to you!’
‘I know. I said I don’t.’
‘Is that your type or something?’ Tim asks through giggles, ‘Academic pricks? You can do better, Martin.’
‘It is not my type -’
‘He wears vests!’
‘Yeah, like I said...’
‘And he went to Oxford,’ Sasha says, as if there’s a hair in her mouth. Both her’s and Martin’s CVs list their academic history as strictly polytechnics.
‘So would you if you’d got in,’ he teases her, trying to pass the buck.
‘Oh no you don’t,’ Tim tells him. ‘You are finishing this round.’
‘Only if you drop it.’
‘Never. Avoid Elias, and..?’
Martin thinks about it. He looks back and forward, like watching a tennis match, laughing nervously. Over in the corner, the disco lights are pink and orange circles that catch Jon’s glasses. His stupid, square, rimless glasses that will never be attractive. Except that they make his eyes look bigger when he looks up over them.
Martin looks back at the table, mind searching for the least scandalous answer through a drunken haze that wants to find the truth. There’s very few options here that he likes.
He’s taken a second too long.
‘You wouldn’t marry me!?’ Tim asks with a very convincing mock outrage. ‘I married you!
‘For the tea!’
‘You can’t just use people for their tea, Tim,’ Sasha says, leaning on Martin’s shoulder again.
‘Does that mean nothing to you...’ Tim shakes his head, reaching for the tequila. ‘Come on, on three and then I wanna know who you’re picking over me.’
He lines the shot glasses up, hands them each a lime. ‘And if it’s Jon you’re doing another one.’
‘I am not.’
‘No salt,’ Sasha says sadly. But she downs it on three without even touching her lime.
The alcohol makes Martin’s tongue shrink back in his throat and he squints as he sinks his teeth into the relief of the lime. He chews on it, thinking.
Tim looks at him with an eyebrow raised
‘Well, I have to marry someone,’ he sighs, ‘and -’
‘Oh come on! You can snog the boss and marry me!’
Martin tries not to think about it. He looks over at the corner again. It would taste like warm red wine. ’I am not -’
‘Why not? You don’t think he’d be any good?’
Tim is getting loud now. The tequila gives a reverb to his voice that carries away from the corner and into the music.
‘Lower your voice,’ Martin hisses at him, ‘I’m not answering that!’
He very much doesn’t want to even consider it.
‘Does no one think he’s even remotely snog-able?’ Sasha asks, making herself laugh. Her elbow slips agains the table. ‘I mean is he... he’s not bad looking?’
Martin says nothing.
Tim looks. He looks with his chin stuck out and his eyes squinted. He looks so intently that Jon catches him. Across the dancing staff and spinning lights, he looks back. His glasses flash and he double takes, brow furrowed, looking at each of them in turn. Martin can feel his skin going blotchy beetroot.
Tim and Sasha erupt in childish giggles - year eight, pre-teen, anxiety inducing giggles.
He can’t laugh along with them. Not that he can’t laugh at his own expense. But he worries about Jon, seeing them laughing and looking over at him. He knows how that feels and hates it hates it hates it. Jon turns back to his conversation, frowning, and Martin watches his brain work with a warm pathos. He’s going to think about it now. If Martin were him, he’d think about it all evening.
The others keep laughing. And as they laugh the warmth turns to a chill of fear.
Jon’s not an idiot. He might realise. It would be bad. If he realised. Martin doesn’t even think he likes him, not all that much. He’s not in deep enough to look past the fact that Jon really is... well. Rude and demanding and awkward and untrusting and judgemental and a cynic and... well, there are probably layers. Martin is sure there are layers but... Anyway. It isn’t that deep. It’s just tequila and a cup of tea here and there. He likes hearing Jon say ‘thank you’. That doesn’t mean anything.
But it would be bad. His boss finding out he’s been looking twice. Been handing him files with his fingers outstretched. The thought chills him. That would be so so bad. Not least because -
‘We don’t even know,’ he starts, low over Tim and Sasha’s uncontrollable laughter, ‘we don’t know if he’s...’
He peters out. Tim drys his eyes and finishes the thought. ‘Who’s team he’s playing for?’
‘Ohhhh,’ Sasha says, eyes widening with the fun of speculation.
Martin seriously regrets bringing it up.
‘Place your bets now regarding the sexual preferences and activity of Jonathan Sims, head archivist of the Magnus Institute,’ Tim says, in his best impression of Jon’s rumble, holding his glass to his mouth like a tape recorder.
He makes himself laugh, and Martin begrudges him a smile. He hopes Sasha won’t join in again - she sets the whole table off and raises the volume tenfold.
But instead her smile turns into a plaintive whine - ‘is no one going to snog me?’
‘Is no one going to snog the bloody archivist?’ Tim answers, loudly, and Martin watches, horrified, as Jon’s eyes twitch over at the mention of him.
‘Martin?’ Tim pushes. ‘Office party’s the time for it. Maybe he’d stop being such an uptight -'
Martin snaps. 'Oh, give over, Tim!’
But it’s no use. Tim is already sliding out of the booth and eyeing a path across the dance floor. 'I will if you won’t!’
‘Don’t!’ Martin grabs at his arm, not knowing if it’s jealousy or protective instinct or embarrassment that compels him to grip so tightly, put all his weight behind it. ‘Tim, leave him alone...’
It’s not enough, and Tim manages to plow through their dancing colleagues, dragging Martin stumbling across the floor and over to the far corner. He sees it all happening - sees the next 20 seconds as if he’s moving down a conveyor belt of horror in a film. Slow motion, through treacle, powerless to stop. The image fills him with horror.
There is a second where Jon sees them coming and their eyes meet dead on. He must catch the dread. His eyes widen. Tim is leaning against the wall.
‘Alright boss?’
‘Sorry,’ Martin says, as he always says. He starts babbling furiously, his tequila-heavy tongue tripping over itself - 'he’s drunk, I’m probably just gonna take him home -'
But then Sasha is there. And her hands are creasing the stiff cotton of Jon’s collar. She kisses him squarely on the cheek.
Everyone stares.
‘Happy Hanukah, Jon,’ she says, laughing.
Jon blinks, his mouth parted in a small O. There is wine on his teeth, Martin sees, and he screws his eyes tight, cringing.
‘Happy Hanukah, Sasha,’ he hears Jon say, and it’s raspy but surprising fine, even amused.
He opens his eyes and everyone is smiling.
‘We should probably be going,’ he says, twitching a smile at Jon with his head ducked as he guides Sasha away. ‘Tim, let’s go. You’ve had your fun.’
‘Aw, but Sasha -’
‘Taxi’s waiting.’
He’s a good liar, and manages to shepherd them away, back to the light of the dance floor. He’s half carrying Tim - one arm around his waist.
Then - from behind him, he hears Jon calling after them:
‘And Merry Christmas, all of you.’
‘Merry Christmas, boss!’ Tim slurs, waving back at him.
‘Merry Christmas,’ Jon says. And then he says: ‘Martin.’
Martin turns his head to look back. It’s not far enough, he can’t see the corner without turning around, not with Tim flopped against him. He knows he’ll wake up with a crooked neck, but he doesn’t feel it now. He feels warm. This is much better than ‘thank you’.
‘You too,’ is what he manages.
He bundles Tim and Sasha into a cab, sends them off to Barking, settles himself on the night tube, and thinks about it all evening.