loficharm | Resurfaced // for Harry

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harry goodsir

Resurfaced // for Harry

September 17th, 2019

It'll be nice to see Harry again, apart from the novelty of spending time with someone outside The Archive. Things are moving along well enough, and he's... well, it feels a bit weird and in some ways quite awful to say it, but he feels happy. He and John have made good progress, both in terms of their own survival here and with their relationship, such as it is. And Martin's started making friends again.

Or, well, he's trying. He wasn't good at it before he fell in with the Lonely, and now, well, he's rather out of practice. He sees Eliot and Kat just about every day, and there've been a few others with whom he's having some regular contact, but it's still piecemeal. At least it's getting markedly easier to feel like it's something he deserves, something he ought to be doing. Having people in his life again. It is better than not.

As embarrassed as he is by how long it took him to follow up with Harry after their initial meeting, he's far more embarrassed about the botch he made of his overtures. Harry is, at least, terribly gracious, and agrees to lunch, so he must not have made too big a mess.

He's sitting at an inoffensive little place about an equal walk from Candlewood and Ocean View, a blandly pleasant sort of gastropub, if he had to describe it. He got there much too early, of course, and is now sitting a bit nervously with a beer that's steadily dripping condensation onto the table. There is no reason to be nervous, absurd texts notwithstanding; and yet, he is. It takes him a moment to parcel out that most of his anxiety stems from the fact that he's just... looking forward to this. Sitting down with someone and just having a chat, like all's normal. It feels like cheating. Like he shouldn't be allowed. But he is.

He smiles to himself and runs his thumb up the side of his glass, clearing a little line in the condensation, entreating himself to relax. This will be nice, and it's allowed. That's all.

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"She is, yes," Harry answers, though he isn't entirely certain if that makes things easier or harder. Easier, perhaps, because at least Zoe understands some of what he's been through and she knows Darrow isn't the only place in this universe, isn't the be all and end all of the world. But he hates that it means she's been through so much, too. A woman like her, someone so kind and so aware of herself and who she is, she deserves a wonderful life.

"And your friend," he says. "Is he... is this a date?"

There is hesitation in his tone, though not because he disapproves. Harry had known of men who had quite thoroughly enjoyed the company of other men in his time, though such preferences had of course been mostly hidden and had been rather illegal. He had disagreed with such laws at the time and is glad Darrow doesn't hold with such terrible, discriminatory things, but even still, he's had to adjust to the openness of it.

Martin nearly chokes on his drink. The server chooses this moment to return with their food, regarding him awkwardly until he waves her off, finally leaving him with only Harry and the question he's just posed.

It's a fair question, especially after Martin had been asking after his personal life. It shouldn't make him want to bury himself in a hole in the ground. But he can't even look at Harry as he struggles with the answer.

"Erm," he coughs lightly, "sorry." He heaves a sigh, wishing he had managed to cling to a modicum of composure, not that that's ever been a particular strong suit. "Not... not a date, no. I mean it's - he's - it's not like that." He considers trying to just move away from this subject as fast as he can but after this whole fuss he's made over it, that ship has probably left the harbor. He laughs weakly and without much humor. "I suppose you might say it's complicated."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to suggest..."

But he had, hadn't he? Right now, given all the information he's learned in the last several minutes, Harry isn't entirely sure which way is up, which means his manners are hardly at their best. He's trying to work out what this all means, how someone seemingly as gentle and as kind as Martin could be friends with someone who demands the memories of Harry's most horrific experiences.

Then, he's not entirely certain of that either. Had John demanded them? Harry knows he had felt utterly compelled to tell the entire story, leaving out no details, but he can't remember John's words now that he looks back.

"Well, complicated then," he settles on saying and offers a smile over their meals. "Should you need a friendly ear... well, I know my time is quite a bit different than yours, but I've been told I'm rather open minded."

Martin's a bit surprised that he hadn't already considered Harry's, well, 'historical' perspective on his own proclivities. He'd spent so much of his adult life fighting and dragging his way up into a place where he felt comfortable with himself, and that confidence was hard won and matched by almost nothing else in his life, so he rarely expends much effort worrying over it anymore. And he'd been rather fortunate, too, suffering blessedly little in the way of cruelty or judgment after he dropped out of school. Easy to live in a bubble of relative acceptance, forgetting how the world is when there's so much else to worry about. To be reminded that someone like Harry, who seems so inherently safe, is from a time where he'd have been viewed as a criminal is a bit of cognitive dissonance that almost knocks him out of his own mire of embarrassment. Almost.

"I - thank you," he says with a belated smile. "I'm sure you are." That was never in question. He considers the option of actually talking about it. Greta had asked him, and he'd felt relieved knowing that she was unlikely to tell anyone else. And now Harry's guessed, and... well, it's not like he'll spread anything around. No harm in a second confidante.

"He..." How does he start, though? "I... I wish he saw me that way." Ugh. The truth makes his insides squirm, and he looks away briefly. "But I don't think he does."

Christ, he sounds so pathetic. He forces himself to look back at Harry and manages another weak smile. "And... and that's fine, really. Just something I have to deal with."

It puts Harry in the mind of Lady Silence, just a little, because although he's aware such their situation would not have been ideal for developing any kind of romantic connection, he had felt -- and still feels -- very strongly for her. And although they'd come a great distance in their communications, he knows he would never have been tell her how much she meant to him. He can never expect he meant the same to her, however, not a woman like her. The Arctic had been her world and what would they have done together? She'd have never been happy in London.

"I understand," he says softly. "Although, perhaps... you've said you don't think. But you don't know. Not for certain."

Those are different things. And they're both in Darrow. Perhaps it's worth taking a risk.

Martin's smile remains faint, but with a little more warmth to it. It's kind of Harry to offer that reassurance. He's not sure how much he can follow the implicit suggestion, that he... do something, try to get a more defined answer. There's more to it than he knows how to explain. His sense of John's proclivities, or lack thereof, which are John's personal and private business; their complicated history, the fact that John must know how he feels to some extent, having listened to all the tapes. It's true, he doesn't know for certain, but it's equally true that things are strange between them, that their current companionship still feels tenuous at best, and that Martin is terrified of shaking anything loose.

He takes a moment to eat, contemplating what to say, if anything. Looking back at Harry, eager to steer things away from himself, he says, "And your... friend? How long have you known her?"

"Since very shortly after my arrival here," he says. "I met her on the day I was released from the hospital, in fact, which was sometime in mid-March."

There had still been snow on the ground, but very little, and Harry will remember that until the day he dies. Going from the Arctic, where there had been nothing but snow and ice and rock as far as the eye could see to Petros Park, with green grass growing under the melting snow, to the hospital room where he had been able to look out and see a bright blue sky and a shining sun.

"To be honest, it's that she's known me for so long that I find myself a bit reluctant to... well, pursue anything," he admits. "When I left the hospital I was in terrible shape. Skin and bones, truly, and still suffering some symptoms of scurvy. I can hardly believe I made any sort of good impression as I was, with the follicles along my hairline still bleeding and bruises all up and down my arms."

But Zoe hadn't seemed to mind. Zoe seems to take most things in stride, which is part of what Harry likes so much about her.

Martin sobers as Harry describes his state on arrival - or, well, after having been cared for a bit, which paints an even graver picture. He knows Harry's ultimate fate - and he knows that Harry is well aware he has no home to return to. But he hadn't wanted to pry into that, to ask just how far along things were, if he'd... actually died. From the sound of things, Harry was either on the cusp of death or... Christ, would Darrow have resurrected him only to leave him in the same state in which he died? Either way, it sounds horrible.

He's quiet for a moment, uttering only a small hum of acknowledgment; it's awful to imagine him that way, but there's very little he could say in response to it that doesn't fall into pitying territory, and he refuses to step there.

"Well," he says, drawing a breath and letting it out slowly, "I think there's two things to consider there. First, she's seen you at your lowest, and she still wants to spend her time with you, right? Which really just... feeds into my other point, which..." He lifts a shoulder in a sort of half-shrug, gesturing loosely toward Harry. "I think you maybe underestimate what kind of impression you make just by... who you are? Maybe that's... sort of presumptuous to say, I mean, I know we've only met a couple times, but... you were very kind then, and you're the same now, and I have trouble believing you'd make anything other than that same impression no matter what. Scurvy or not."

This is almost certainly terribly presumptuous. He reddens a bit and refocuses on his food. "S-sorry, I just... that's what I think, anyway."

He wonders, briefly, if Martin realizes much of what he's said could be applied to himself as well and then he smiles, mostly to himself, before busying himself with a bite of food. It isn't that he feels uncomfortable or doesn't want to reply, but he doesn't want to give Martin any reason to think he should feel at all awkward about what he's said.

"You needn't apologize," Harry says a moment later, then pauses again to sip his drink. "You paint quite a flattering picture of me and I can't imagine anyone would want you to apologize for that."

While Harry knows there are certain reasons his opinion of John aren't particularly favourable, he feels oddly defensive of Martin now. If a man can't see the kindness in him, then he's a fool, surely, and is worse still for that reason than having just forced a story out of Harry.

"I hope she sees me as well as you do," he says with a chuckle. "She does seem to have forgiven me for nearly busting down the door to her flat during the snowstorm we had in June."

Harry makes a good point - that most might not consider a kind word, even a presumptuous one, an offense for apology. But it's difficult to train out the instinct. So often his attempts to say the right thing have ended up making things worse. But Harry appreciates it, and the reassurance is nice to hear.

"I'm sure she-" he starts to say out of hand when the rest of Harry's remark catches up with him. "Sorry, in June? Does that... happen a lot? Or is just Darrow being..." He wiggles his hand in the gestural shorthand for 'supernatural and/or weird'. He almost echoes the 'wooOOoo' noise Basira once made to communicate the same, though he doesn't think he can replicate that without sounding like an ass.

"I honestly couldn't tell you," Harry admits. "I had been here for barely three months at the time and it was... a bit unsettling. I had come from a place with storms not unlike it."

And yet he had walked through the whirling snow to get to Zoe, worrying about her alone in her flat in the dark. The power had gone out so many times in his own flat that he had hated to think of her alone without light or heat. He remembers even now how horrible that had been, the way the cold got into the joints of your hands and made them feel as if they were made of stone.

"It wasn't just the weather," he adds. "There was something up at the chateau on the mountain that brought it in. Some kind of... darkness."

Martin frowns at the thought of it, not just the improper timing of the weather but how discomfiting it must have been for Harry, reminded of his time in the Arctic. But before he can remark upon that, Harry mentions something else that has him sitting up a little straighter.

"Darkness?" he echoes, his frown growing less empathetic and rather more serious. "What... what sort of darkness?"

That can mean many things, he supposes. It doesn't have to connect directly to the Dark. But the Buried and the Lonely and the Eye can all reach through the gap between his world and Darrow, and there is no reason to believe the others can't as well. He and John had settled into an uneasy theory that the entities were only really interested in them, but... if that isn't true... if there's evidence to be had they reached across even before he and John arrived...

He knows he's getting ahead of himself, but it's difficult not to, when the consequences could be so dire.

"I-I'm not entirely certain," Harry admits. "I felt as if I were in a dream for some of it."

Having spoken with his doctor at some length now, he recognizes what he was experiencing during his time in the cell at Kagura, that he was suffering from what he's been told is a flashback, something that happens to people who have been through traumatic experiences. He remembers, just barely, seeing Zoe and thinking she was Silence. Seeing the things that had grabbed him and feeling certain one of them was Cornelius Hickey. He knows better now, but that doesn't help him work out the reality of what happened.

"It was dark almost all the time," he says. "I left Zoe's flat to get some food as she had none left and there was something in the shadows, some sort of... creature. They overpowered me and took me to the lodge on the mountain, though it didn't look at all like it does now. There were others there as well, we were kept in cells in the dark and I..." He had heard talk of people being eaten, but he can't form those words. "I heard people talking of some other creature. They just referred to it as the darkness and I never saw it, so I can't tell you any more than that."

Martin watches Harry intently as he describes what he remembers, trying to make sense of it. He lacks John's gift for that, and he briefly entertains the thought of suggesting that Harry go and give a Statement, but... he doesn't want to treat the friends he makes here like utilities. Which does of course make things a bit difficult, but... he's sure he could ask if John were in particularly desperate need.

As it is, what details Harry can give are a bit piecemeal, and they don't sound much like anything he remembers about the Dark. It's certainly not impossible that there's a connection, but it seems equally likely this is just some awful thing of Darrow's own creation.

"Christ, that sounds awful," he says quietly. "I'm sorry."

He hesitates before saying more; he doesn't want to press Harry too close on this subject, but perhaps it's something and John could look into themselves. "What lodge is this, exactly?" he says. "I've really only gotten familiar with the city proper, so far."

"Oh, it's up the mountain," Harry answers. "To the north of the city. It's called Kagura and it seems that it's only open for part of the year. I've been told there are often Christmas and New Year's Eve celebrations that take place there. Besides my... experiences there, I haven't seen the inside of it, though the outside looks quite different now than it did in June."

He can't really explain how that's possible, only that it is. When he had been dragged up there, it had looked like a castle, dark and foreboding, with stonework and bars on the windows. Now it looks like a cheerful enough place. Shuddered for the season, but still just waiting to be reopened again and to welcome people inside.

It's all Martin can do not to pull out his phone and note this all down. It certainly merits some kind of followup, though it sounds like that will have to wait a few months. He wonders if John has heard anything about Kagura or this 'darkness' - it doesn't sound like a subtle event. Perhaps someone who'd been here longer than Harry would know more.

Still, it's hard to swallow his curiosity, and another question slips out before he can stop himself: "How did you escape?"

He grimaces immediately, and hastens to add, "Sorry, I shouldn't - you don't have to talk about this if you don't want to." He'd meant to be offering, well, encouragement, if not advice, on the subject of Harry's courtship - that it led to all this was unforeseeable, but he still feels guilty for perpetuating it. He's recounted enough of his own traumatic experiences by now that he ought to know better.

"No, it's quite alright," Harry assures him. "I'd not have said anything if I wasn't comfortable."

Perhaps that isn't entirely true, he realizes, thinking again of John. But this, speaking with Martin, it doesn't feel like that at all. Martin isn't dragging him into these memories against his will and Harry doesn't feel as if he's somehow separate from himself, saying things he doesn't want to.

"It seems as though there was a bit of madness," he admits. "Fights that broke out and there were people who escaped and freed the rest of us. I don't remember a great deal of the escape either, only that someone led me down the halls until we were out in the snow."

Martin frowns thoughtfully, but there seems little more to ask - it's clear Harry has a limited recollection of the event, but perhaps if he asked around a bit, he'd find others who'd know more. Something to hang onto. It always rubs him a bit wrong, collecting awful stories. It was always easier when he'd simply believed they were investigating the veracity of claims toward the supernatural, an earnest and perhaps noble cause. Now, it's really much simpler, and also more complicated.

"Well, I'm glad you made it through all right," he says. "And... I'm sure Zoe didn't mind you checking in on her. Especially when it was all so dangerous." He smiles and takes a moment to eat a bit more before he says, "Someone risking themselves for you is... it's not something you forget, or... something that needs to be forgiven. It's a good sign about that person. You know?"

He's not sure he could say John ever risked himself for him, specifically, but he's always done it with noble bloody intentions, and as maddening and awful as it always was, it certainly never dimmed his view of John or challenged his feelings for him. It only ever made those stronger and more difficult to ignore.

Harry would like to think that's true, but he knows plenty of men who would think otherwise. Who would be offended that someone felt as if they had to come to their rescue, although he knows Zoe isn't at all like that. But then, he reminds himself, he doesn't truly know what Zoe thinks of him. He believes them to be friends and is confident she would say the same, but whether it goes beyond that is something he can't quite work out.

"Well, I must admit my experience with women to be... limited," he says. "So I have little to compare it to, but I do believe you're right. Zoe seemed grateful I was there, although I had to wonder if it was an intrusion."

He had been unable to leave, after all. He'd been forced to sleep on her couch and while he still doesn't think she had cared, he had felt a bit like he was forcing himself into her space.

If this Zoe has any sense, Martin thinks, she'll have found both Harry's so-called intrusion and his subsequent concern over it very charming. He hides a rather fond smile under another sip of his beer.

"Experience isn't everything," he says gently. "Speaking as someone who had very little for a long time, it... it doesn't really come down to men or women or whatever else. Every person is sort of their own experience, and I think if it seemed Zoe was grateful to you, and that she likes having you around, then... that's all you need."

He shrugs; he still feels like he's not the best person to be dispensing wisdom here, but when he'd been a terrified virgin who'd never even tried to get a boyfriend he thinks he'd have been grateful for a kind word, no matter how offhand. "You'll have to let me know how it goes at the party."

It's kind of Martin to say so and Harry knows things have changed in the time that has passed between his world and this, but he still knows he's different from most others. His attraction to Zoe is undeniable and yet it had built so slowly, coming to him piece by piece as he had gotten to know her better and come to care for her as a dear friend. The same could be said of how he felt for Silence. The longer he was with her, the more he had found himself attached to her and then from that had grown the physical desire for her.

That is not how it is for most other men, he's seen. His brothers had teased him relentlessly for having never married, had finally, in his late twenties, purchased a prostitute for him, worrying he'd yet to experience sex. They had been right, of course, but he hadn't found the interaction particularly enjoyable.

He's never known what that says about him, what it means.

"Well, I suppose we'll see, won't we?" he asks, smiling faintly. "And I'll be sure to let you know, unless I make a complete fool of myself."

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Resurfaced // for Harry

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