alternate title: hi hello may I remind you that the concept of jonmartin with a cat exists ❤️
on today’s episode of “tired discovers the notes’ app and its magical properties”, yet another cute ficlet because my commute takes a long time and these make me happy alright. it was never meant to be 3k long but alas.
you know what though, we managed to get to the end of the week and we all deserve some fluff I feel like.
✨ if you prefer, here you can find it on ao3 ✨
enjoy! 🥰
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In an unexpected turn of events, it isn’t Jon who brings the cat home.
It happens on an otherwise unremarkable Tuesday evening.
It’s raining outside – in fact, it’s pouring, the sky growing so dark with black clouds he has to turn on the overhead lights in the living room, thunder loud enough to rattle the glass inside the window frames. It sends faint shudders through the walls and down his back, his teeth clenching against it in response.
Jon is– concerned.
He’s alone. Martin is due to come back any time from his shift at the bookshop, and he has been working on it and he can go hours without seeing him, these days, and it’s fine.
It’s fine.
There are some things – things like kitchen knives, and eye patterns on home decor items, and thunderstorms – that make up the stars of a fragile constellation, stretched out between them in the wide, metaphorical piece of universe connecting them to each other. Some parts of it, riddled with bright fracture points and pressure cracks, need special care to be navigated safely.
Some stars belong to only one of them.
(Martin has no issues putting lotion on his hands when they crack in the winter. He always, always makes sure to wipe it off completely before touching him, and he never buys any lavender-scented kind.
Their knives are kept separate from the rest of the cutlery. They go grocery shopping for the week on Friday evenings, after they both get home, and when they first arrived, Jon used to chop all the vegetables at once, on Saturdays, while Martin was at work, to store away neatly and have on hand ready to be used.
It’s getting better these days. It doesn't mean Jon will use the big vegetable knife, tucked away in its own drawer and wrapped in cloth, if Martin is in the kitchen with him.
There are many more things just like that. They work around all of them, some times more successfully than others.)
Thunderstorms are… bad. For both of them.
Something about this one is worse than usual. Jon can’t pinpoint what it is, exactly, that makes the hair at the back of his neck stand on end. The inevitable inky blackness of the clouds, maybe, or the way lighting crackles in geometric fragments across the horizon, shattering the sky, and the more he looks on, mesmerised, the more shadows and lights blend in a shape that could almost – almost – blink back at him.
It won’t. It won’t. The memory of the words, dragging themselves out of his mouth, still draws blood at the back of his throat. He knows it won’t, and he knows it never will again, he knows that.
He rips himself away from the window and pulls the curtains closed nonetheless.
It is, he realises as he tries to set up some documentary on his laptop – something safe and boring about early candy-making machinery –, very much about Martin not being here. He should be, already, the clock ticking on steadily towards six.
Jon is, just as steadily, crossing from mildly concerned into definitely worried territory. He is also, however, trying to implement the breathing exercises his therapist has been going over with him, because he can feel panic creep along his spine with its frantic, skittering legs, and it wouldn’t be conductive to anything at all to have a breakdown in the middle of their living room at five forty-eight on a Tuesday.
Coincidentally, that’s when Martin decides to barrel into the flat like he’s being chased, fighting to close his umbrella on the way in and failing quite spectacularly.
He’s holding the half-destroyed umbrella in one hand, glasses sitting askew on his nose with their golden frames a bit crooked, while keeping something close to his chest with his other arm. Jon looks on, amused, as he lets the umbrella drop on the floor, biting back a curse, and he stops dead in his tracks when he catches sight of him on the couch, laptop precariously perched on his legs as the documentary still drones on softly.
He’s… soaking wet. Completely, thoroughly drenched, with rainwater trickling down on the carpet from the lapels of his coat, his hair sticking to his face in dark swirls. It really shouldn’t be as charming as it is.
The immediate relief he feels at the sight of him – water on the floors and everything, smiling at him like he’s just as happy to see him, too, like he can’t believe how lucky he is to witness Jon, curled up on the sofa wearing three pairs of socks and earplugs to block out the thunder, which makes his heart skip just a little, his cheeks grow a bit warm – is overshadowed only slightly by curiosity.
What he’s holding, very carefully, tucked in close against him, is an extremely tiny bundle of cloth.
Interesting.
The plot thickens as Jon stands in order to investigate, shuffling towards him while studiously avoiding the growing puddle quickly pooling around his feet, and the cloth moves.
He looks up just in time to see Martin start to say something, looking down at him fondly. He hastily takes off the earplugs, and manages to catch the end of the sentence, just barely.
« …couldn’t leave her there–» he says, vehemently, like he’s trying to convince him of something, except Jon isn’t sure what he’s being convinced of, exactly. He could most likely be persuaded into it, in any case, whatever it is – he can count the times he has managed to say no to something Martin asked on one hand. And, actually, that’s quite generous. It’s... more like on three fingers, and one of those was because he refuses to taste anything with strawberry jam in it on principle.
But when he looks on, uncomprehending, forehead creasing in confusion, Martin simply sighs, possibly about to start explaining from the top again.
Then, with perfect timing, the bundle meows.
And-- oh.
The kitten can't be more than four or five months old. She emerges from the folds of fabric, and her bright green eyes blink up at him from a very, very upset little face, her wet fur mussed and dirty with dust, or soil, or some other ungodly substance. She's a lovely calico, orange and black spots painted like brush strokes on her head and back, her nose a pretty shade of pink. One of the black marks is right over her left eye, giving her the look of a rather ruffled pirate.
Jon falls in love on the spot.
«Oh.» he says, this time out loud. He brings his fingers up to let her sniff him, taking care to remain very still otherwise. First impressions are important and he's not going to scare the cat.
She proceeds to do so, and then immediately bares her little teeth at him, ears pointing back in distrust. He snatches his hand away before she can bite him, but he doesn’t take it too personally – it must have been a harrowing trip, all the way to the flat in the rain from wherever Martin found her.
He does not coo.
He’s an adult man, and he has some dignity left, and whatever sound might have escaped him at the sight of a very tiny, very cute kitten curled up in his boyfriend’s arms and wrapped up in his jumper can not, in good conscience, be classified as cooing.
Neither can the surprised noise he makes when Martin carefully thrusts the bundle towards him.
«I am freezing. Please hold her, I’m going to take a shower and… then I guess we’ll figure something out?» he says and, yes. Yes, that’s probably a good idea – he’s shivering, standing there in his wet clothes, thin undershirt clinging to him in a way that must be unpleasant at best and awful at worst. Even so, when Jon meets his eyes he’s wearing a quietly fond expression that he will tease him about later.
He tries not to hold out his arms too eagerly, but it’s a losing battle, hands wiggling with impatience the longer he goes without an armful of cat.
Once she’s safely secured in the crook of his elbow, Martin kissing his cheek in passing as he leaves, he realises there is much more fabric than there is cat. She’s surprisingly warm, however, more than he expected her to be, and though the small triangles of her ears are still flat against her skull, her eyes are focused and wide, a bit alarmed at the sudden change in positions.
Well, he can work with that.
He walks oh so slowly to the kitchen, taking great care to not jostle the kitten too much as he’s moving, and goes to work to retrieve their last can of tuna from the back of the cupboard without dropping her.
It’s quite an ordeal – what with the tin having ended up, somehow, behind all the boxes in their pantry – but eventually he manages to get the fish on a plate, setting it down under the table. He lowers himself to the floor as well, grimacing when his knee twinges painfully but unwilling to give up.
Then, he places the kitten down next to him, and he waits.
She doesn’t seem inclined to leave the safety of her temporary blanket, for a while – she glares at him, distrustful, her whiskers trembling as she hisses softly whenever she deems his staring too bothersome.
Eventually, however, the promise of food is enough to lure her out – one tense step at a time, stopping every few seconds to scan her surroundings. She hunches over in front of the plate with one last warning glare in his direction, least he gets ideas about what his place is in this transaction.
Then, she throws herself on the tuna like it might be the last meal she’ll ever eat. Jon’s heart twinges just as painfully as his knee did, as he looks at her with his chin in his hands.
«There you are. That’s a good girl, there.» he murmurs, low and fond, and he can feel a smile pull at the corners of his lips when her ears twitch back towards his voice, keeping track even as she wolfs down her food at frankly alarming speed.
God, how he loves cats.
He’s considering trying to approach her again, hand already halfway outstretched as she finishes eating, training an intense stare to his fingers when, suddenly, she tenses all over. And bolts.
Of course, she doesn’t decide to make for the convenient hiding place provided by Martin’s sweater, still crumpled on the floor next to them, but she disappears, instead, into the narrow space between the wall and the refrigerator. Naturally. It wouldn’t do to make life too easy for the humans trying to feed her and dry her off, would it.
Martin finds him like that, sitting cross-legged on cold tile – a choice he’s sure he’ll come to regret later – and glaring at the spot like he could convince her to come out through sheer force of will.
«Ah. She made a run for it, didn’t she?» he asks, and Jon humphs in confirmation, rolling his eyes as Martin chuckles, threading a hand through his hair. He leans into it, relishing the touch with a tired sigh, which in turn prompts a teasing «You are rather like a cat, too, aren’t you.» that wins him his own share of glaring.
He doesn’t deny nor confirm. Martin only snickers again, joining him on the floor with a groan. Oh, they are making bad decisions tonight – his hip has never been quite the same, either, after they arrived here. There is a very good chance it’s going to give him grief just as much as Jon’s knee, later, but he melts into his side anyway, deeming it a problem for future-Jon once again.
They stay like that, contemplating life and questionable choices on the kitchen floor, for quite some time.
«We should really clean.» Martin mutters, under his breath, examining a particularly stubborn stain of something that might be tea on the ceramic in between his feet. Jon burrows his face deeper into the soft fabric of his sleep shirt, grumbling.
«Tomorrow.» he says, muffling it into his shoulder, and he feels Martin stretch to kiss his temple, softly.
«Tomorrow.» he agrees easily, because he, in fact, does love Jon. He makes a noise of assent, and the comfortable quiet settles over them once again, broken only by their breathing.
That is, until he clears his voice and plasters himself just a touch more firmly against Martin’s side.
«I was a bit worried, earlier.» he says, because he’s working on expressing his feelings and accepting they aren’t a burden on the love of your life, Jon and his previous concerns are something he really didn’t want to share, which means he probably should.
He gets another kiss, the gentlest pressure on the crown of his head.
«I’m sorry, love. It took longer than expected to catch the little lady – she had gotten herself tangled in a fence.» he murmurs, and Jon does not get butterflies at the term of endearment and he especially does not get them at the softness in his voice at the mention of their guest.
They have been talking about getting a kitten for a while, now. Martin never got the chance to have one, before, and the idea of sharing that with him – all the little, silly things that make up living with a cat, something so simple that has been out of reach for so long – fills Jon with warmth all the way to the very tip of his fingers, makes him tender and pliant with yearning.
Still.
He hesitates, just for a second, before looking up to meet his eyes, tentatively setting the idea in the open.
«I was thinking… how about Corsair, for a name? She- no, don’t laugh, Martin, she looks like a pirate! Very dignified, she is.» he tries to defend his reasoning even as Martin’s face scrunches up in an actual laugh, at last, loud enough that it probably isn’t helping their current predicament.
Jon doesn’t pout, either. He is also very dignified, so whatever expression of discontent he’s wearing when his boyfriend finally stops laughing at him isn’t a pout.
It doesn’t seem to stop him from kissing it away in earnest – it’s light, fluttering kisses all over his face, interspersed with the occasional chuckle, that make him smile against his better judgement. Really, he’s lucky to be so cute and so hard to stay mad at.
«Once we catch her, you can call her whatever you like.» he says, and, yes, that’s fair, he supposes.
It still takes them longer than they both like to admit to get up.
Catching her, as it is, proves to be quite the feat.
They try everything from leaving the room, hoping she’ll decide to go back and finish her tuna, to making all kinds of bargains with the darkness behind the fridge.
In the end, of course, it’s heating up leftover chicken to entice her with the smell that works. They should have tried that first, probably.
But at last, Martin makes a triumphant noise and holds her up in front of him, grinning. She’s even grimier than she started off, and scowling at Jon with such intensity he has no doubt she would try to murder him, if she wasn’t so thoroughly immobilised.
When he approaches her with a damp rag in order to clean her off a little – a bath, they agreed, is out of the question for today – she doubles her efforts to wiggle free, yowling like they’re actively torturing her.
Her paw bats him on the nose as she moves, harder than he expected. He makes a surprised sound, reeling back, and Martin snorts, before getting hit in the face in turn, as God intended.
She’s a threat.
Eventually, though, through impressive team effort and a lot of patience, they manage to get the worst of the dirt out of her fur – enough that she actually looks almost white, rather than the ambiguous grey-brown she was before.
Predictably, when Martin sets her down again, she darts away to find another hiding place, a little blur of wispy fur and hissing noises. Jon looks over to where she disappeared with what he’s sure is an unbearably fond look already, and smiles when Martin hugs his waist, resting his chin against his temple.
«Corsair, you think?» he says, and Jon knows she’ll stay.
They don’t see her at all, after that, but neither of them expected to.
Jon prepares a plate with the chicken and a bowl of water in the kitchen, in case she gets hungry again, and they spend a lovely evening lazing about on the couch, planning the necessary shopping trips for the next day, and letting her adjust to their presence and the new environment on her own terms.
It makes it all the more surprising, when he wakes up in the middle of the night to a familiar sound.
It makes him smile even as he tries to re-orient himself in the dark, turning over to glance at Martin. And sure enough, when he does, there she is – curled up right on his chest, her nose tucked in the crook of his neck.
Purring. Rather loudly, too.
She must have been cold, he thinks.
When he wakes up again, in the morning, she’s still purring.
Introducing the cats featured on my main and side accounts (@lovemesomeartsstuff and @aroshitbcitstheshit)
This lovely orange cat with a single braincell is Mango. She is both the smallest and the oldest (5yrs), and the first adopted (2 yrs ago). Mango is the grumpiest and at least 6 times a day attempts to murder Ralph
This black behemoth is Ralph. He's the largest, the middle child at 4 yrs, and the most newly adopted (6 months ago)
This wild child is Willow. She's the middle adopted (1yr and 1 month ago), and the youngest at 1 yr and 3 months. She's the zoomiest and loves antagonizing Mango and Ralph. We're thinking she may be part Maine coon with her little tufts on her ears and how big she's getting and how she keeps growing. She also doesn't meow, she only squeaks.
