Chapter Text
Jon felt lonely. It was no surprise, really. He had spent the entirety of his life feeling different and left out, and as a response to that he would often isolate himself even more. He had no right to feel lonely if he believed it was his choice.
But this time, he didn’t just feel lonely: he felt jealous too.
Walking around the streets he could see the people chatting, joking, going about their day beside each other. And he could see their happiness, their joy, their love seeping from every interaction or contact they had with each other, even with something as simple as a high five. He craved that kind of connection, he craved the feeling, of caring, of being dear to someone.
Jon hated admitting this but he really missed having friends. Because, if he had to be honest, he could consider none of the people surrounding him, friends. They barely tolerated his presence, and they showed it by being borderline, if not explicitly, hostile (see: Melanie).
He missed Sasha, he missed Tim and he missed Martin. Or maybe he just missed somebody caring for him, even if the few times they actually did so Jon was reluctant to accept their love. Because that’s what it was: love.
Every relationship is built on one particular emotion, and even if it always manifested in various and shifting ways, any real friendship had to be built on love. That was simply the basis. But maybe what they had wasn’t even a real friendship, maybe his mind was playing tricks on him. Or maybe it was just trying to keep him a little more content, to keep him from going crazy from the knowledge that no one ever truly cared. Either way, he once really felt like they were his friends. Even if it might've been his loneliness driving him to fill in the friend-shaped gaps in his heart, he ached for that false comfort anyway.
He simply couldn’t stop thinking about them, about the friendship they could’ve had if Jon hadn’t fucked up everything. So he liked letting himself drown in the guilt that Sasha’s death brought him, or the sorrow he felt when reminding himself of his relationship with Tim in the months preceding his death. If only he hadn’t been such an annoying ass, they would still be alive.
And Martin—oh god, Martin was… he didn’t know where to begin. They worked in the same goddamn building, but Jon earnestly thought Martin was always out on errands with the few times he had seen him. And their conversations weren’t at all satisfactory. The one time Jon had actually managed to catch him Martin muttered an excuse and, just like that, he was gone.
Just, gone. Who even leaves like that?! That was not only rude but also and most importantly, it was weird. And that worried Jon. But that worry was coming from his paranoia, Martin probably just didn’t want to see him. Jon was pretty sure he resented him. And it’s not like he blamed him for it. He was the one to survive after everything, leaving empty spaces where Tim, Sasha and Daisy would’ve sat. Martin had every right to ignore the very same person that got three of his coworkers killed.
Sometimes he surprised himself with his innate ability of driving people away.
He could probably beat the world record, if it was something that people would ever want to excel in. Nevertheless, it was probably for the best. He wasn’t the most positive of influences, and having less people to interact with definitely helped contain the damage.
Jon sighed and brushed his hair out of his face, leaning back on his office chair. He felt a migraine starting to form, and it would only worsen the aching pains spreading through his entire body. His eyes were starting to close against his best judgement. He felt so tired despite having slept for six months and having been awake for only one.
And he was alone, with no hope of fixing any of his previous relationships. He could try to form new ones but he really hadn't got the time to— Wait. He did have someone he could try to form a relationship with. He had gotten a roommate a week after waking up from the coma, knowing that he probably wouldn't be home much anyway. You were the one that saw the ad and accepted, so desperate to find a place to stay while pursuing your dream to become a writer. You took up a job at the local library, working on your novel in your spare time.
You were fun and nice—or at least he thought you were? You didn't interact a lot really—and you didn't seem to find him annoying or insufferable. Now that he thought about it, he could remember times you were actively trying to converse with him. Maybe you were actually interested in becoming friends. And he hadn’t even noticed.
He mentally face palmed himself: for being an avatar of the Eye he sure ignored lots of things. But maybe he could stop being lonely if only he actually let himself open up to someone. It had been too long since he had last felt appreciated. Maybe he could actually genuinely connect with someone.
Maybe he could start anew.
His mind was in a flurry. The new revelation felt overwhelming and scary. Not in the horror movie way, but the thought of being possibly rejected wasn’t exactly a comforting one.
Nevertheless, he was determined to go home with an objective in mind: to actually interact with you for once, in a way that preferably wasn’t forced by circumstances. For once, he wouldn’t let his fears stop him from living, from connecting with other people. Easier said than done.
But first he had to get up off that goddamn office chair. Which proved to be alarmingly difficult. Despite his legs’ protest, Jon got up. Not without risking falling on his face but it was still some kind of improvement. He stumbled, steadying himself with his hands on the desk.
His vision went black for an instant. He huffed in annoyance, trying to get into focus the bookshelves in front of him. Eventually they did, revealing the mess that had been there for the past week.
His legs still felt like jelly. Not surprising, considering that they have felt that way since he woke up, but still not appreciated.
Trying to take a step forward, he hissed in pain, face twisted in a grimace. He didn’t want to admit it, but he needed his cane. “Like a fucking old man” he thought. But there was no use complaining about it, it was either using that embarrassing thing or suffering the entire day. Jon wasn’t even sure he could walk at all without it.
In a painful bending motion he reached for the cane that was leaning on the opposite side of the table. Getting it to his side of the table was difficult, but that was mostly his own fault for refusing to keep his desk tidy. And for leaving it in such a difficult place to reach.
He tried putting some weight on the cane: it hurt less than without it, but it was still painful nonetheless. Jon was pretty embarrassed by that, but all things considered he knew just the fact that he survived was a miracle. Maybe it would’ve been better if he hadn’t. Jon shook that thought away.
He observed the cane in his hand, holding it up at waist level while leaning on the desk behind him. It was a rather beautiful model that he had gotten from his grandma when she died. Carved on the handle and the middle part of the cane were some pretty daisies colored in white and yellow, framed by leaves delicately engraved in the wood and colored in black. Its tawny brown colour was a nice add to the grey and green outfits he’s used to wearing. You told him so, the first time he brought it outside with him.
He told you he felt uncomfortable going around with it, and you told him that he looked just fine.
You told him that it fit his style and who cares if people stare. You told him that he looked “cool as hell” going around dressed “like a diva”. No idea if you really meant it, but knowing that you were willing to make him feel better about himself and the things he had to do because of his shitty health put his heart at ease.
It was comforting knowing that, right now, he had someone else to go back home to. It would probably be hours before you came home. He had time to get ready. What was he going to get ready for though? Now, that was a difficult question. A good start would maybe be putting on his coat and heading out. That was another thing he had to add to the “difficult things” list since he had woken up.
And so he did. Sure, it did take a much more prominent amount of effort than before, but once he realized that leaning on the desk wouldn’t hurt his legs as much as standing he felt like he had gotten the hang of it. He did briefly wonder if this is the way old people felt, keeping up with their daily activities, realizing that it was getting harder and harder everyday.
Jon looked at himself in the full-body mirror, the one right outside his door office. The one Sasha had insisted on putting, saying that it was necessary to do daily fit checks together. And it was still there. There was no reason to remove it (other than his remorse) but it didn’t feel right for it to be there. It belonged to another time, to an easier time. A time where Sasha was still alive.
Sasha and Tim were gone. And he could do nothing about it now. There was no going back, there was no way he could fix his mistakes. They were gone because of him. They deserved better than that. He had failed them. Just like he had failed countless times in his life.
Tears started streaming down his face and onto the wooden floor. Look at him. A pathetic, weak, worthless man crying out for his mistakes. A man that bore the guilt to be the only perpetrator of the countless things that ruined his life. That ruined him. He had no right to grieve the deaths he could’ve so easily prevented, nor the loss of humanity he could’ve avoided. If only he had just let go. It would’ve been easier, painless. Not only for him, but for everyone. Nobody cared about him after everything, and even if they did, he did not deserve their compassion.
He wiped his tears on his sweater sleeve. He focused on the post-it notes that his colleagues had stuck on the frame, full of encouragements, motivation quotes and little doodles. They were color coded, based on who wrote them. Sasha was yellow, Tim was pink and Martin was blue. And there, on the higher left side, a green one. It was a doodle of a cat sleeping, made in pen. It was supposed to be the Admiral, but the shakiness of the strokes made him almost unrecognizable. But he knew who it was supposed to be. The others didn’t, of course, but they were still happy that he participated in one of their stupid bonding activities.
“So cute! :)” said a blue post-it above his. “Unbelievable. Jon interacting with us for once?? The world is about to end guys” said a pink one. The yellow one was a drawing depicting two people sitting on the floor petting a cat obviously copied from Jon’s drawing. One of the two people was Jon himself, recognizable by his academic clothing and serious expression. The other one was Sasha, wearing a face he didn’t recognise. It was the real Sasha, and yet he couldn’t for the life of him find any familiarity in the little doodle. Her curly dark hair and round glasses looked so alien compared to the short blond hair and blue eyes he remembered. Nobody except Melanie remembered her, the real her.
The tears blurred his vision, turning the fluorescent post-it notes into fading blobs of colour. He held back a sob as he held a hand over his mouth. Muffling the sound he kneeled over in front of the mirror, hands over his face. The warm tears from his eyes felt like burns on his skin.
He felt stupid looking at that one lonely green post-it. The realisation that his colleagues wanted and appreciated him hurt more than anything. He could’ve had anything he ever wanted, if only he had accepted their affection. But instead he closed in on himself, enclosed in a protective shell that was bound to suffocate him. And it did.
Now he had a second chance to live, and he wouldn’t waste it despite the ache in his chest and the tiredness in his mind. But he still mourned the possibilities he had dismissed in the past. He had thrown away something he denied he had. And he was going to pay the consequences for it. He wasn’t going to pretend anymore.
Raising his head he looked at the post-it frame. He stared at it for a long time, the previous hurry and excitement over the realisation now subdued by all the feelings.
He got up at once, leaning heavily on his cane. He stumbled back into his office and started rummaging into all the drawers. At last he found what he had been looking for. He scribbled something, face still wet and eyes red from the crying. He went back to the mirror and hung it up. He then left to embark on the arduous journey towards the top of the stairs.
From then on, anybody who came in the archives would see a mirror full of countless yellow, pink and blue notes, and among them, two lonely green notes. One with a drawing of a cute little cat sleeping, and another one that just says “I’m sorry” in a shaky handwriting. And they would wonder what had happened. But no answer would come from the mirror, stuck in a different time. A past which leaves more doubts than answers, the mystery of where everything went wrong forever lost among the memories.