Chapter Text
It was all Martin’s fault. Jon wasn’t qualified to teach English, let alone Year 11s, yet here he was. Going to his first class. It’s just Martin had looked so...excited when he suggested teaching. And it’s not like there were a lot of other job opportunities in the middle of nowhere Scotland. But that didn’t alleviate the anxiety that Jon felt as he walked to his first class. It didn’t make him want to sink into the linoleum any less. (They didn’t make you teach in the Buried, right? It was all dirt and claustrophobia? Jon could Know, but if he didn’t focus exclusively on walking in a straight line he was going to collapse in a ball of anxiety.)
How many horrors had Jon faced? How many horrific creatures of nightmares had Jon fought? And yet here he was, staring at a door that didn’t even lead to an infinitude of doors and hallways, feeling more nervous than he had any right to. He gripped the door handle and turned it. And Jon wished the door had just been one of Helen’s.
The room was full of children. Well, they weren't children per se, but it didn’t matter. There were so many of them, chatting to each other, laughing, looking at their phones. Martin had said not to make eye contact. That had been his big advice, though Jon couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. I mean, they weren’t wild animals. It’s not like they’d take it as a challenge, right? They were just people. Just Year 11s that he was unqualified to teach in a job that he’d lied on his resume to get. Everything was fine.
Jon set his things on the desk and picked up the yellow chalk that sat on the metal tray in front of the massive green chalkboard. He could do this. Martin believed in him. He wasn’t here with him now, holding his hand and telling him that it was all going to be alright, but he believed in him. Jon started to write. It was just like in the movies Martin had shown him in preparation. Martin had said that Jon was always going to have to watch those movies because apparently, Jon’s lack of knowledge about popular culture was “embarrassing, but kind of cute.” He wrote the subject, the course, and his name. He was a Mr. Sims now. It felt weird to write. He turned to the class and cleared his throat.
The class went silent. That was...that was bad. Students never shut up for the teacher in Jon’s experience, and yet here they were, ready to hang onto his every word. Jon tried not to pick at his jacket. Is this what his victims felt like? This abject, crushing horror of being seen, truly seen? Jon didn’t like it, but he didn't have a choice. He cleared his throat again.
“H-Hello class,” Jon stammered. Fuck! He was already fucking up! He couldn’t show any weakness, and he didn’t need Martin or a movie to tell him that. These were Year 11s for fucksake! “As you know Ms. Laurie has retired, leaving me as your new GCSE English teacher.” Miss Laurie hadn’t retired. Or, she hadn’t meant to. It felt convenient to Jon, the opening, the timing. The Eye probably did something. Which wasn’t the best sign, but you never looked at a gift mysterious job opening in the convenience of the circumstances.
“You can call me, er, Mr. Sims, I suppose.” That’s what he’d written on the board right? It felt weirder to say than to write. “Or Jon? Well, that may be inappropriate actually.” He was sweating in his patch elbow jacket. “Anyway, I suppose it’s only fair that I let you ask me questions since Ms. Laurie worked here for 40-odd years-” It was exactly 43 years. Almost to the day. The knowledge popped into Jon’s head and sat there like a fat slug, smug in its place in the garden. “-And you all knew her pretty well, so...ask away.” That was normal, right? He’d seen it in one of the movies Martin had shown him. Jon hadn’t been a Year 11 in sixteen years, and he’d blocked out most of it. Hands rose. Fuck. Jon pointed at the first one he saw.
“Uh, yes Miss…?”
“Lily,” said a girl with bright red hair and a pinched face. “Have you ever taught English before?”
“Uh, no.”
“Then why are you teaching us?” the girl demanded.
“I believe they were desperate.” Crushingly desperate. The woman who’d interviewed him barely looked at his resume. Jon’s eyes scanned the room and landed on a pudgy boy with a fledgling mustache just starting to come in. “Yes, Mr…?
“Ivan. Where did you work before here?” he asked, playing with his loose tie.
“A research institute.” Technically true. The Magnus Institute was officially a research institute.
The boy raised an uninterested eyebrow. “What did you research?”
Jon looked away quickly. “Anyway!” His eyes drifted to a student with a shock of pink hair and nearly as many piercings as Melanie. He pointed at them. “You, uh-”
“Ari.” They leaned back in their chair. “Are you married?”
“What? No-”
“How old are you?” Ari’s eyes bore into Jon’s with an intensity that, if Jon didn’t know better, Jon could have sworn was that of an avatar of the Eye. Or just someone who didn’t like Jon.
Jon rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh, no.”
Ari shrugged and looked away. “Fair.”
Jon glanced around the room again, feeling like it was getting smaller. Maybe there was teaching in the Buried, Jon felt like he was suffocating. He pointed at the tallest student in the room.
“Yes, uh-”
“Abdul. What made you want to teach after research?”
Martin.
“Um, I have a 2:2 in English Literature.” Abdul made a face.
“That doesn’t seem like enough.”
It wasn’t.
“Well-” Jon pointed at the closest person to him. “Yes, uh...”
“Alfie.” The boy looked like a young Jon. Or like what you’d expect a young Jon to look like. “What’s your favorite book?”
Jon almost wept in thanks. “House of Leaves.”
Alfie looked disappointed. “Never heard of it.”
Of course not. No one had. He was forcing Martin to read it to finally get someone to talk to about it. “Oh, well, it’s quite good.”
Alfie nodded, uninterested. “I bet.”
“Um, Miss…?”
“Olivia.” She was short and her face was more freckle than anything else. She had the most piercing eyes Jon had ever seen. More so than Ari’s. More so than Jonah Magnus himself. Jon shuddered. “Are you English?”
“Yes?” A smattering of sighs and I-told-you-sos erupted from the class. Jon could have sworn he saw money exchange hands. But Olivia was undeterred. She didn’t break her eye contact.
“Then why are you here in a tiny Scottish village?” Olivia demanded. “Are you running from something?”
“...where is your uniform tie, Miss Olivia?” Jon said lamely. He looked at the class and their hands like flagpoles and he clasped his hands together. “Okay, enough questions!” He slunk behind his desk and the din of chatter returned to the room. “I’ll take attendance and review the syllabus.” Jon looked through his papers and tried to ignore what the class was saying.
“How d’you think he got all those scars?”
“Maybe he was in a gang?”
“No way, Look at him! He’s too spindly.”
“That’s twink-ist, Kyle. Twinks can be in gangs if they want to.”
“My mum said she saw him at the shops.”
"What, are gang members not allowed to go to shops?"
Jon glanced at the clock and his heart sank. The day had barely started. He was going to kill Martin.
If you had told Jon that he was only in that room for seven hours, he would have called you a liar. And he knew, objectively, that it had only been seven hours. But he also knew, deep down, that it had been an eternity and then some. It was an indescribable relief to make it back to the Safehouse, which Jon felt was going to be a safe house from more than just what he and Martin had left behind in London.
“Martin, I’m home!” he called into the cabin.
Martin glanced up from the couch. He didn’t start work until next week. “Oh, hello Jon! How was it?”
Jon sank onto the back of the couch and smiled weakly. “It’ll get better."
Martin rested House of Leaves on his chest and looked at Jon. “You have the rest of the year.”
“God, don’t remind me.” Jon rolled his eyes. "It’s like having twenty Eliases in a room, Martin.”
Martin snorted. “Well, to ease your new fear, how’s a rooibos sound?” Martin was already halfway to the kitchen, mug in hand.
“Sounds lovely, thank you.” Jon flopped over the side of the couch and started kicking off his shoes. They were his nice shoes because he’d wanted to make a good first impression, but they pinched like hell. Jon could hear the water starting to boil in the electric kettle. Martin called it sacrilege, but it had been in the cabin before they got there, but Martin needed tea to survive, apparently, and they didn't have the funds yet to waste on kettles if they already had one.
“Get yourself sorted then, love,” Martin called.
“Alright.” Jon sighed. He would in a minute. For now, he was just going to lie on the couch and take in the sounds of tea brewing. It was nice to have a break every once and awhile.