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“Then leave, Jon.”
They had this conversation far too often; every time Jon made another mistake, and each time he felt worse. He didn’t know he had even had the capacity to keep feeling worse and was surprised every time.
“When you’ve been cleared, put in your notice. Simple as that.” But it wasn’t. It really wasn’t. And he couldn’t make her see, because she didn’t need to, because she knew him best out of anyone else. Had always known him and how broken he’d been from the start.
How worthless.
“Georgie, I, I can’t.” Not without possibly, actually. Maybe? Dying. He was already, already! After so little time, feeling the lack.
“You say you want to stop being this thing, this monster, but I don’t see you doing anything proactive about your situation.” Jon could feel how his face fell, couldn’t even hide it with everything so close to the surface, and when the tears prickled in the corners of his eyes, he looked at the floor so she wouldn’t see. She wanted him to be better than this. She was helping him, looking out for him. “I’m sorry, Jon. I don’t.”
The way she said it, like she really wasn’t sorry, except sorry to know him, so matter of fact, pragmatic. Like she knew the answers that would put an end to this mess but refused to share them. Like he was too stupid to figure this all out. And wasn’t that the crux of it?
He was.
He couldn’t. If he. If he was just different. Or, or, or better. Maybe. Maybe he really did want all this to happen? Is that what--did he?
They knew each other too well. That was part of the problem and when Jon felt trapped in the corner he knew exactly which buttons to push to make Georgie lash out at him and that wasn’t fair to her no matter how good it felt to be in control of something directly affecting him. He just didn’t expect it to hurt so much or ring so true.
But he’d always been a slow learner.
“You’re an addict, Jon. And just like an addict, you make excuses for why you can’t stop.” Her arms were crossed and where she stood tall, Jon shrank away, hands clenching reflexively, hard enough to leave crescent shaped indentations in his skin. “I will not be your enabler.”
She wanted what was best for him, that’s all. She always had.
“Georgie, I.” Hadn’t the choice been taken from him? He hadn’t meant for this to happen.
“Have too? You know what you sound like.” He wouldn’t cry. He didn’t deserve to cry when he’d ruined so much for so many.
“You’re. You’re right. Of course.” Each word burned like salt pouring into an open wound and he hugged himself tightly, just to keep his disparate pieces together, “I’ll do better.”
Jon was bereft, grief stricken. The aching, empty pit devouring him from the inside like a disease was so overwhelming he couldn’t breathe, not without feeling like his ribs would shatter apart and expose who he really was. There were so many things she didn’t understand. Couldn't understand. And he can’t fault her for that. Of course the easiest thing would be to leave. Except it’s not easy at all. Even if he weren’t attached to the Institute itself, without statements he suspected he would be too sick to go far. Even now he felt a constant niggling hunger below everything else.
But he was trying.
He really was and it. It, it didn’t seem to matter. Regardless of which choice he made, it was wrong and he was at fault for the outcome. Who, who decided to make him the center of all things? It was already so heavy. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t hold it on his own and there was no other option but to hold it. There was so much pressure to do the right thing and Jon couldn’t tell you what that was if held at, well, gunpoint would be awfully mundane. But it was up to him.
Somehow.
And he just kept getting hurt and was trying his best, he was, he was, and it wasn’t good enough. He wasn’t good enough. Because he was a coward, constantly scared. And exhausted. And aching from top to toes. Things, people, kept hurting him and he didn’t know who to trust and it was so taxing when everyone he’d come into contact with suffered horribly and he just.
Just.
Just didn’t know how to deal with that. He couldn’t separate himself from it because it was all around him and he was drowning. Head shoved under the water until it flooded down his throat and the only thing left to breathe was the filth and rot he left in his wake. It rushed in his veins and flowed through his blood and burned, and burned, and burned until he was consumed by it and forgot what it was to be Jon and needed someone to confirm he was still human lest he disappear entirely.
And everytime he tried to reach out.
He tried. He tried to reach out.
Like he had with Georgie this evening--
And she’d been so upset with him.
Maybe he was blowing it all out of proportion. Making mountains out of molehills. Exaggerating because, honestly, he wasn’t quite sure how to feel anymore. Like he couldn’t trust himself to know.
But he needed help. And, as Georgie kept reminding him, he had help and refused to use it and after all the trouble he’d caused already--It was his bed. He had to lie in it. Trapped in a cage of his own fabrication. Beholden to a shattered promise he didn’t remember making.
He missed.
He missed Martin.
Soft, lovely Martin who. Who. Knew.
For now though, all was quiet, Georgie in her room and Jon in his, folded into a small ball on the bed around a pillow and pressing it close, a pressure bandage to keep everything inside from pouring out because if it started to he wouldn’t be able to stop it again. But for now, both of them were taking some time apart. He knew she worried, and he couldn’t do right by her.
He couldn’t do right by anyone.
She was a reminder of why he could never be loved. Couldn’t even be liked; too selfish. And now he was covered in awful, ugly scars marking him as a monster on the outside for all to see and claiming him as one of their own.
When the tears finally, finally came, hot and fast and uncomfortable on his skin, he felt so ashamed because he had no reason to cry, nothing other than feeling sorry for himself. Biting down hard on his knuckle to keep himself from getting too loud, from disturbing Georgie, he tasted the tang of blood and felt calmer for it. He wouldn’t want her to think he was manipulating her anymore than she already did because all he did was take and take and take.
Shameful. He had to be quiet. Be quiet. Don’t let her hear.
He was fine. He was fine. He was fine.
Because he was safe here, he was safe, he was safe, as safe as he could be, and nothing was wrong and everything was wrong and no matter how hard he bit into his fingers it wouldn’t stop. He wanted and the scope of it was so broad he didn’t even know for what, but it was big whatever it was. Too big, but it had to be to fill in the hole carved out in him somewhere behind his heart. The pillow was soaked, he was disgusting and foolish and guilty, his head aching so much he almost wished the fear would swallow him up and leave him numb.
In through the nose. Out through the mouth.
But he was sobbing in earnest now. Still quiet. Always quiet. Just be quiet.
Dizzy. Light headed.
He couldn’t take in a full breath of air. It wasn’t enough. It hadn’t been enough in so, so long. Chest tight, ribs a steel cage, unyielding. Suffocating.
Suffocating.
The Admiral nudged his sore hand, tiny paws poised delicately on his knee, and he traded the pillow for Georgie’s cat, nuzzling his damp face into the soft fur of his neck, focussing on nothing but the purr resonating from his little chest and stopping the hitching in his own.
He was being crushed into less than nothing. Stripped of everything.
And he just desperately wanted to be enough.
He just desperately wanted to be.