Archive of Our Own ^beta

The clouds are all pink and fuzzy when Martin opens the door. The early morning light is soft on his face, and so is his small, quiet smile. Georgie mentally catalogs the bags under his eyes, the stretched and frayed sweater sleeves going down to his knuckles, and his hunched shoulders.

“I made some tea,” he greets her.

“I could hug you right now,” she responds with feeling. She drove all the way out there on the single short coffee break she took halfway in. The exhaustion is starting to set in now, like a heavy blanket across her shoulders. But Martin takes a small startled step away before wincing, and that matters more than sleep for now.

“We’re working on that but… Maybe if you go slowly?”

“No pressure,” she adds, taking it in stride. Things have certainly been messed up enough lately for her not to question this. At least, not just yet.

Martin seems to give it a thought before he tentatively opens his arms. Georgie drops her bag by the door. She reaches out slowly to lay a hand on his shoulder and pauses, loosely draping her arms around him once he nods. If Martin shudders before returning the embrace, and wraps her in a warm hug that lasts a little too long to be casual, nobody else has to know.

“Hi Georgie.”

She steps back and turns toward Jon, who walks into the living room with three cups on a tray. Georgie can’t help smiling at the way his bare toes dig into the plush carpet. He appears just as tired and washed out as Martin, but the relief she feels now that they’re both right here, physically unharmed for the most part, outweighs her disquiet for the moment. He leaves their tea on the table and stands there eyeing them both, looking a little unsure.

“Can I give you a hug as well?” Georgie asks.

Jon blinks at her slowly. “Why?”

There are many possible answers, and she has no desire to start going through them one by one right now, so she picks the simplest truth. “I’ve been worried.”

He blinks at her again without a word, his brow furrowed. Georgie almost takes that as a no and moves on to another topic, but Jon shuffles closer and reaches out.

She lets him hug her the way he wants, his palms flat against her shoulder blades. He holds her stiffly at first, but she gives him time and he relaxes somewhat, and his temple comes to rest against hers for a few seconds before he lets go.

“How was the trip?” Martin asks as he sits down on the couch. He cradles one of the cups in his hands, close to his chest.

“Mostly quiet,” Georgie says as she grabs a cup of her own.

Jon nudges a blanket off the back of the couch onto Martin’s shoulders as he walks by to get his tea. “How’s the Admiral?”

She can tell from his pensive expression that he has other things on his mind, but there is no harm in giving him some more time with that, too.

“He’s been all snug on the couch with Melanie most days, lately,” Georgie says, and fondness colors her words. She hesitates and adds, “The last time he got that cuddly was when you stayed with me.” She turns to Martin. “You should see it someday. Jon is always on his best behavior with that cat.”

Martin chuckles. “So I’ve heard.”

“I have proof,” Georgie adds. “Have you seen pictures yet? I’ll show you later,” she promises when he shakes his head no at her question.

“How’s Melanie?” he asks then. Jon darts a glance at him sharply.

Ah. There it is.

Georgie takes a moment to think before she answers. Jon quietly watches her now, waiting. She remembers her encounter with Martin at the Institute, and how they argued when she told him she couldn’t keep being around Jon if he kept looking for trouble. She remembers Jon at her door, the haunted but resigned look on his face when she turned him away firmly and walked off to get Melanie back to bed. She remembers both of these moments and she looks at Jon now, thinking of how he and Martin came here to get away from it all, and she can’t regret picking up Martin’s call.

“She’s been doing okay,” Georgie offers, still cautious. “She’s still healing, but she decided to start learning braille, and you both already know how she gets when she sets her mind to something. So she’s been busy. Surprisingly, I’m the one who keeps tripping on the books she leaves by the couch.” She recalls her recent conversations with Melanie, and carefully adds, “And she’s been asking me how you’re doing. Both of you. She’d like to have a chat sometime.”

Jon immediately grimaces at that. “I’m not sure that’s safe.”

Georgie raises an eyebrow. Even Martin looks somewhat disapproving. “She could be the judge of that if we knew anything at all about what you two have been up to.”

“What we’ve been up to, as you just said, is the reason Martin insisted we call you.”

“You agreed it was our best option,” Martin points out.

“I did,” Jon confirms reluctantly.

“We can’t keep going that way. The Lonely still gets to me, and you know how many times you’ve been dragged into Seeing things and forgot you even exist for a while,” he says in a rush, clearly troubled, “and the worst part is sometimes both of those even happen at the exact same time. There’s no guarantee that it won’t eventually just… stick. That we’ll be able to pull ourselves back when there’s nobody else around.”

Jon takes a long, deep breath. “I know. You’re right. We did agree.” He turns to Georgie again, and repeats, “We agreed to call you.”

As things start making more sense, all Georgie can think of is how much they’ve been keeping hidden by omission. All that she knows for certain is that the Beholding’s ritual, which happened through Jon because of Elias/Jonah or whoever that man is, was interrupted before it could be completed. The details she knows beyond that are vague at best, beyond the fact that none of her friends died when the World somehow Didn’t End, and that the avatars they know of have been unusually discreet and wary.

She puts the cup back on the table and crosses her arms.

“Jonathan Sims, you are an idiot. Why did you leave all of this out of the updates you sent me? Did you just think it was irrelevant somehow? Did you think I didn’t care?”

“I didn’t want you to get pulled into this any further. Especially after… after what happened with Melanie. And everything else. You said so yourself, it’s been too much and I need to leave you out of it.”

“I asked you several times to get out of that situation if you could, and then, because you came to us looking for an ally of all things after Melanie stabbed her own eyes out to get free of this whole mess, I told you to leave us alone. That’s what I said. We’re friends, Jon. You were in too deep, and I didn’t see you trying to get out of it. I couldn’t just stand by and watch you get hurt again and again, and more so with the risk of us getting hurt as well.”

“I thought that was final.”

“We’ve been in touch since the World Didn’t End. Why did you think I kept asking about you specifically, if not because we’re friends?”

“Well… You didn’t say.” He seems so genuinely puzzled and lost that Georgie catches herself at once.

She exhales deeply. Her voice is softer when she replies this time, “That’s fair. And it’s not your job to guess those things if I don’t tell you myself,” she concedes. “You and I have never been great at communicating, and this is more of the same. I don’t expect you to just know how I feel or what I think, and I don’t want you to just assume either.”

“I could just Know those things, Georgie. It’s easier than not Knowing, now.”

“Did you?”

“Did I what?”

“Try it.”

It takes Jon a few seconds to admit, “No, I didn’t.”

“Good. Don’t.“ She rubs her hands over her face. “Listen, it’s fine if you Know things by accident, but it wouldn’t be fair of me to rely on that ability of yours and expect you to do all the work. Communication is a thing, and it goes both ways. I’m aware I wasn’t clear about what kind of relationship I wanted with you after you left the Institute. So you know what? Here’s my offer. Let’s work on that.” She adds, more gently, “I think if there’s a time to try and get better at being friends, now is as good as any.”

Jon is visibly speechless this time. Georgie lets it sink in, and eventually, he finds the words to reply.

“I’d like that,” he says gingerly. “I’m still surprised you even want to, but I suppose I shouldn’t be, considering that you just drove here for us after a single phone call.”

“You walked away, Jon. You both did. You packed up and walked away from it all. And it doesn’t matter to me that trouble found you here once. You didn’t go looking for it. You did what you could to be safe.” She glances at Martin, who has been listening quietly this whole time. “And this absolutely goes for you, too. The rant for being an idiot, the apologies for not being clearer, and the new and updated offer of friendship. All of it.”

“Thank you. I promise I’ll try my best,” Martin says earnestly. “And we really appreciate you coming here, you know?”

Georgie can’t help smiling. “I sure hope so,” she jokes, “and as good as it is to see you, I’m still going to need a nap in the near future.”

She notices then, as Jon retrieves Martin’s empty cup to put it away with his own, that Martin’s hands are shaking slightly. In fact, he seems to be shivering, and Jon must pick up on it too because his next words are, “Are you cold again?”

Martin nods, and Jon gestures toward the staircase that leads upstairs. “Warm shower?”

“Good idea. I’ll leave you for a little bit, then.”

He stands up, drapes the blanket over the back of the couch, and walks away.

Georgie joins Jon where he has settled into the previously occupied spot. The cushions are warm and soft, and her first thought is about how she wants nothing but to stay there for the next few hours.

Her second thought is about Jon, who is picking absently at his lip. She has seen him do that often enough to know at least one of the appropriate responses.

“Tell me,” she says, looking straight at him. He stares back, unblinking and still. Silence stretches out between them until, slowly and deliberately, Jon closes his eyes and leans back into the couch.

And so he tells her everything. By the time Georgie is caught up with the events, up to and including the interrupted ritual, Jon has melted sideways into the cushions. His head is by Georgie’s leg and she slowly, carefully cards her fingers through his hair.

“What about what Martin said? How has it been affecting you both, exactly?”

Jon hums in thought for a second. “There’s a lot to explain. The Lonely still has some power over Martin. There’s a lot of damage to undo, and the Watcher’s Crown really didn’t help. At all. Especially since it means I have a harder time than ever before trying to filter out all the knowledge that wants to pour in. Where there used to be a closed door I had to be careful not to push too hard, now there’s a nearly constant stream of everything. Sometimes it’s too much. It’s like I… forget myself. Forget that I have a body, and that I’m a person. And when Martin flickers out at the same time, there’s no telling when or if we’ll come back at all. “

“Would anchoring you help?”

“I think so? But we have to figure out how. Martin suggested having someone else around might make that easier. That’s when we agreed to call you.”

Martin walks down the stairs then, and he stands by the couch with indecision plainly written on his face. Georgie pats the cushions next to her encouragingly. “Sit with us?”

He glances down at Jon, who is still getting his hair petted, and he blurts out, “Touch has been difficult. Sometimes I can’t stand it at all. But I… I also feel like I really need some contact. That’s what I meant earlier. When you offered the hug, I mean.”

Georgie decides that being straightforward is the best approach there. “A Lonely thing?” she asks. Martin nods. “Are you comfortable with sitting close right now?”

“I think so, but I’m not sure I can tell before we try.”

“At your own pace,” she reassures him gently.

He takes the time to grab the blanket again and loosely wraps it around himself before he does sit down. His arm brushes against Georgie’s tentatively when he opens a well-loved book she hadn’t noticed him holding.

“Virginia Woolf?”

Martin smiles. “An old lady down in the village gave it to me. There’s only so much you can find in this house.” The arm comes back, just barely there.

They lapse into comfortable silence then. Georgie keeps combing her fingers through Jon’s hair, tucking some behind his ear, and she can feel Martin slowly ease into the closeness as he reads. He shifts a little farther into her space and their eyes meet for a second. As she only smiles without a word, he returns it with a soft, warm gaze, before going back to the book.

When Georgie wakes up, some time later, her cheek is pleasantly warm where it’s pressed against Martin’s shoulder. She doesn’t remember falling asleep, but as she realizes, all three of them did. Jon is still curled up on his side, her hand in his hair, and Martin’s head is tilted to rest on top of hers. Their deep breaths are the only sound in the room.

Seeing them so comfortable and relaxed is a pleasant surprise, the kind that feels fuzzy and light under her breastbone. She’s almost certain they haven’t been sleeping well. The dark bruises under their eyes are somehow less telling than the new weight to their gaze, or the silence between their words.

All is not well yet, but they’re different people now, with new resources and knowledge and powers, and together, they can build something. They can take things one step at a time, and as long as they tackle problems one by one, she can’t help but feel peacefully confident that there is hope for better things.

She lets her eyes close again, and goes back to sleep.