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“It was a quiet way -
He asked if I was his -
I made no answer of the Tongue
But answer of the Eyes -
And then He bore me on
Before this mortal noise
With swiftness, as of Chariots
And distance, as of Wheels.
This World did drop away
As Acres from the feet
Of one that leaneth from Balloon
Upon an Ether street.
The Gulf behind was not,
The Continents were new -
Eternity it was before
Eternity was due.
No Seasons were to us -
It was not Night nor Morn -
But Sunrise stopped upon the place
And fastened it in Dawn”
E. Dickinson
He remembered it all. He remembered being unmade - the searing, white hot pain that had ripped through him as everything that he was and would be was torn apart and put back together again. He remembered the after, once they had finally landed. He remembered that once the all-consuming pain had finally subsided, once they were no longer in between, he was suddenly aware that his hands were sticky. He hated being sticky. Why was he sticky?
Oh.
Blood. Right. He had been stabbed - Martin had stabbed him. He had kissed him, tenderly, so sweetly, and then -
No. He couldn’t. Not now. Now was here, and now was better. It was so much better Jon almost couldn’t believe it sometimes. That after everything that had happened, everything that he had done, they could be happy. But then Martin would smile that way he did now, completely unconsciously and carefree in a way he had never let himself, Before, and he’d remember. That this was real. That they had escaped.
It was wonderful, the life they had now. It was wonderful learning about all of Martin’s little domestic idiosyncrasies, his pet peeves, his likes and dislikes. They hadn’t really had the time to learn about each other in the way they should have, Before. Certainly not for how close they were, how Jon ached for Martin, longed for him all-consumingly, in a way that probably wasn’t entirely healthy.
Since they had settled into this new universe (that was not unlike their own, albeit with some notable key differences) Jon had learned that Martin cried over the death of any and all animals, even insects. He had learned that Martin liked all vegetables, except for peas. He hated peas. He had the habit of talking to himself as he puttered around the house, little mumbles of ‘Are you serious’ and ‘Well that's much better, isn’t it?’ that were far more endearing than they had any right to be. He discovered that Martin liked to collect vintage books. Dusty, leather-bound things that had no real value other than that they were old, having survived the forty or fifty some-odd years of their existence. A fact that, inexplicably (at least to Jon), made them irreversibly special in Martin’s eyes.
Jon didn’t think he’d ever get tired of learning new things about Martin. Didn’t think he’d ever get tired of Martin, in any aspect, point-blank, and all the time that stretched out in front of them now. And they had so much time. More than Jon had ever let himself imagine they could have, even during his most self-indulgent, unrealistic fantasies. It reminded him of a poem that Martin had read him, shortly after they had first arrived, as Jon had laid in a hospital bed, surrounded by the stifling stench of hand sanitizer and the endless beeping of machines. Jon remembered one couplet that had stuck out to him, bringing tears to his eyes in an embarrassing way he had tried his best not to let Martin see.
Eternity it was before
Eternity was due.
And it certainly felt that way, didn’t it? That they had fought for so long, endlessly, only to come out the other side with all of time stretched before them.
And so when Jon woke up, several months after being ripped apart and put back together again, to the early rays of dawn streaming through the window of their bedroom he felt no sense of panic nor the urgency of impending doom. Not anymore. He simply opened his eyes to Martin’s sleeping form, splayed out on their bed in that starfish-like way of his, and took him in. With all the time in the world.