Marten/Claire has the potential to explode so beautifully. It seems kind of essential to Claire's whole uptight assimilationist* office lady thing that Marten be a Progressive Straight Man who finds her attractive and loves her, and she really likes him best the more he fits into that mold and gets kind of insecure and upset when it shakes.
But like... Marten is obviously an egg, right? Marten "functionally only friends with queer women" Reed. Marten "insightful and self-sacrificing with everyone else but refuses to ever ever introspect" Reed. Marten "i'll run off to join a nunnery... as the gardener i guess." Reed. Marten "drifting through life in a miserable lightless haze" Reed. Marten "recurring dream images of being a woman" Reed.
Dora is so excited that Claire is bringing Marten out of his comfort zone and encouraging him to make plans but like. He's mostly just doing what Claire tells him to do and gesturing vaguely at what his friends do. This coffee shop thing seems so, so ill-conceived and mostly just a mimic of Dora. Which. Well.
Claire in turn clearly has some sublimated stuff that she hides from with her control-freak nature/mentally punishes herself for wanting (the whole puppygirl thing that she was so obviously interested in but instantly fled from) and really needs to come out of her own shell a little further and think about what she wants instead of what she's supposed to want or supposed to be, to escape this sterile image of femininity that she holds herself to with bolts and clamps.
And as her job and her lonely obsession and his passive-aggressive resentment push them apart I think it will be increasingly obvious that the relationship just does not suit them, and I think they absolutely won't notice or think about it themselves and instead it will twist and twist and stretch until they cheat on one another and explode.
One of the things I genuinely love about QC among all its faults is its willingness to just have stuff boil slowly in the background for years. Like Emily's whole "people don't treat me like a human being/I don't feel like a human being/I'd rather be an appliance" thing that passes as whimsy with everyone else but like. We saw her have an emotional moment about it. And that only really got resolved with her making friends with Dr. Liz years and years later. It just happens, and you notice it or don't.
Anyway. I think "Marten is a woman" is the obvious resolution of the background plot of "Steve is ostensibly straight but clearly wants to fuck Marten."**
How do I end this. Behold her cuteness.
*(cool with the freaks! just... don't tarnish her or hold Us back) **(jumps on the chance for full tongue during their supposedly fake kiss, "jokingly" suggests it when they get drunk together, supports it when others joke about it.)
Very interesting thoughts, I may be due for another reread. I still believe in them turning things around, tho. If things do fall apart, I don't think it will be through cheating. I remember Jeph saying specifically that not having the conflict come from lies was a defining quality of the story. I think that more likely is some inflection point will come that makes the boiling tension unavoidable, like when Dora walked in on Marten comforting Faye. But even then, I think that Current Gen Marten and Current Gen Claire have such a wildly different set of cognitive and emotional tools that it won't go the same way.
