Chapter Text
Jon has a plan.
It is not a particularly complicated plan, but that will probably work in its favour. Simpler is better. Fewer things that could go wrong.
Of course, there are still plenty of things that could go wrong. He could forget his lines. He could get sidetracked by a statement or something and forget about the plan altogether. He could suddenly take ill and have to be rushed to hospital.
Martin could say no.
Right. He needs to not think about that, because if he thinks about that he’ll lose his nerve and give up on the plan altogether and he has to do the plan. Things simply can’t continue as they have been. It’s too much. Even if Martin says no, even if it makes Martin hate him, he has to tell Martin how he feels about him. It isn’t fair to Martin not to. People should know when other people are constantly watching every tiny expression that flits across their face, hanging onto their every word, having appallingly sentimental thoughts about them all the goddamn time, if only so that they can ask to be transferred back to the library if it makes them too uncomfortable.
Also, it’s begun to affect Jon’s work. Sometimes he comes back to earth after a delightful, soft-edged daydream about Martin making himself comfortable on Jon’s sofa and eating something Jon’s cooked for him and smiling at him with that smile and those blue eyes and those dimples, and realises he hasn’t done any work at all in the last half hour. Honestly, it’s getting embarrassing. The other day, Tim caught him in the breakroom smiling fondly down at a wadded up ball of clingfilm Martin never threw away after his lunch, and now he keeps on asking Jon, in Martin’s hearing, increasingly ridiculous questions about clingfilm and laughing when Jon gets all flustered and hot about the ears, while Martin looks on in confusion.
It’s simply unsustainable. The only options are to fall out of love with Martin, which seems completely impossible, not to mention utterly undesirable, or to… well. To tell him. To ask him if he’d like to…
Jon honestly hasn’t thought any further than that. Not because he doesn’t want to, and not even because he hasn’t imagined a hundred times what it might be like to be in a relationship with Martin, because he definitely has. A lot more than a hundred times. He hasn’t made an actual tally, but if he takes three as a ballpark per day figure, perhaps four, and then multiplies it by… no, never mind. Better that he doesn’t know the answer. What he hasn’t thought about is what might happen in the immediate aftermath of his confession and concomitant question, because what if Martin says no? What if Martin says yes? Imagining either option tends to inflict upon Jon the urgent need to take several antihistamines and lie down for a nap.
But he’s got to tell Martin. He’s got to. At least, if he doesn’t want to have to try to explain to Elias a sudden drop in archival productivity, he’s got to. And he doesn’t.
Thus, the plan.
The plan is good. It’s simple. It’s straightforward. It can’t fail, really, providing that Jon remains steadfast and follows it through to the end.
The plan runs thus: Jon will go to work. Jon will immediately seek Martin out, because if he doesn’t he won’t be able to think about anything else for the whole day. Jon will take Martin aside to some private area, not his office, too official, but perhaps the scrubby, dusty little courtyard at the back of the Institute where the bins are stored. They were emptied yesterday, so it shouldn’t be too pungent. Not anywhere in the archives, at any rate, where there’s far too much chance of being overheard. The courtyard is not the most romantic of settings, but it serves all practical needs. Thus ensconced, Jon will tell Martin that he likes him and invite him to dinner. As a date.
Simple.
The first spanner in the well-oiled machine of Jon’s plan arrives in the form of a large hole in the elbow of his favourite cardigan. It’s not a lucky cardigan or anything, that would be a ridiculously sentimental and superstitious item of clothing to own, but, on balance, Jon always feels slightly more competent when he’s wearing it than he does when he isn’t.
But that’s fine. It’s fine! Jon has other cardigans. His second favourite is in the wash, but his third favourite, which is a deep autumnal red, is available. It has a button missing, and Jon has long since resigned himself to the fact that he’s unlikely to ever sew it back on despite the fact that he has both the detached button and the necessary sewing supplies readily available. He’d prefer to do the plan wearing a cardigan that has all its buttons, but needs must when the devil drives. Jon will not let this minor perturbation disturb him. He pulls the cardigan on and sallies out in the direction of the tube station.
The second fly to inconsiderately inhume itself in the otherwise perfect, health-giving ointment of Jon’s plan is that Jon becomes so immersed in daydreaming about his and Martin’s possible future relationship, a daydream in which Martin teaches him to knit and Jon knits him a scarf and Martin wears it every single day between October and April, that he’s two stations beyond his tube stop when he realises what he’s done.
By the time he finally makes it to the Institute, he’s almost eight minutes late and Tim, Sasha, and Martin all give him startled, accusing looks when he rushes in, scowling.
It’s not a problem, though. Jon mumbles some half-hearted excuse for his appalling lateness and retreats to his office to regroup. He can still do the plan. Not right now, he’s flustered and a bit sweaty from jogging from the tube station to the Institute, but once he’s cooled down and soothed himself by doing a bit of work.
Lunch time. He’ll do it at lunch time. It will seem perfectly natural for him to ask Martin for a quick word.
Perhaps he could suggest they eat their sandwiches together on one of the benches on the street near the Institute. Yes. That’s actually an improvement on his original plan. Far better to do this off Institute grounds and not in the vicinity of a gaggle of distressingly aromatic bins. Buoyed up by his cogitations, Jon pushes his sleeves up to his elbows and gets to work.
The third and final nail in the beautifully polished, silk lined coffin of the plan is hammered in, solidly and irretrievably, by Jon himself.
At first, it all seems to be going so well. Jon keeps an ear out for the sounds of his assistants decamping lunchwards, and hies him to the breakroom a few minutes later, as though just happening to arrive as Martin’s getting his lunch out of the fridge.
“Ah, Martin!” he says.
Martin turns, tupperware box in hand, and bestows a smile upon Jon. Briefly and regardless of architecture, the sun shines down upon them, the dingy breakroom is bathed in a heavenly glow, and the Hallelujah Chorus may or may not ring out joyously. Jon blinks a couple of times and reorientates himself in the room, vaguely bemused to realise that flowers have not, in fact, spontaneously sprouted from the linoleum.
“Yeah?” Martin says.
“I…” Jon says. “Ah. That… that is to say, I… ah…”
“Is everything okay?” Martin says.
All Jon has to do is ask him if he wants to have lunch with Jon on a nice bench in the fresh air. It’s simple.
“I…” Jon says.
Or, failing that, which appears to be what’s happening right now, ask him for a quick word, as per the original plan.
Jon clears his throat. Then he clears it again.
“Jon?” Martin says. He’s staring at Jon now. So are Tim and Sasha.
Jon opens his mouth. He closes his mouth. He opens it again. Martin, a quick word, if I may. That’s all he has to say.
He clears his throat yet again.
“Martin,” he starts.
“Yeah?”
Unfortunately at this precise moment he accidentally catches Tim’s eye, and it’s the look on Tim’s face that undoes Jon, because he doesn’t look amused at all, isn’t holding back laughter, is evincing no desire at all to make fun of Jon. His head is tilted to one side, just slightly, and there’s an oddly soft look on his face. Jon suddenly becomes convinced, deeply and absolutely, that Tim knows exactly what he’s trying to do and is genuinely delighted about it.
Jon’s face, Jon’s entire body is suddenly flooded with mortified heat.
“Nothing,” he croaks. “I… sorry. Carry on. Enjoy your lunch.”
And he turns and flees the room.
Back in his office, he collapses at his desk and buries his face in his hands. That could have gone worse, he supposes. He could have set fire to the breakroom or accidentally punched Martin in the face. But it wasn’t great. It certainly isn’t how he’d hoped his confession would go.
He refuses to speak to anyone for the rest of the day.