Title: Moving On

By: forsummertime

Pairing: Jack/Ianto

Rating: PG

Note: Set before Jack returns at the start of season 2.

Summary: I stopped. Like the stopwatch we'd used that one night. It wasn't because I didn't care about you, sir. I did, I cared very deeply. Sometimes, though, it's better not to feel at all, than feel too much and break.

 

***

It's Monday. I hate Mondays. I hate Mondays, because that is the day when I have to go back to work. Half-day Fridays, no-work Saturdays, and no-work Sundays just aren't good enough for me. I never want to go back to that wretched Hub again, but I do. The Hub isn't the same. We're all robots; we take care of everything efficiently, sir, don't worry. Unless it's on Saturdays or Sundays. Because those are the days that keep us sane, sir. Every Monday.

There was a point in my life when I loved my job. I guess that was back when I had a reason to. I was Ianto Jones, part of Torchwood three—management of the front of Torchwood and the backbone of the real Torchwood. I knew that nobody realized how important I was to the team. I indulged it, I pleasured in it. I was invisible. To everyone but you, that is. I liked it that way. I thought that you knew, sir. "Would you like a cup of coffee, sir?" I would ask, like a proper little tea-boy. Often you said yes, but then came one day when you didn't. You couldn't. You weren't there, sir.

You broke Gwen's heart, I always have surmised. She was secretly in love with you, though she hid it behind her marriage to Rhys and her affair with Owen. She was a wreck for exactly four months after you left. It's month five, day 6, hour seven now. I was always good with numbers, and now is no exception to that. Numbers are clean, orderly; I am clean, orderly. She moved on.

Toshiko hid behind her computers and became even more of a recluse. She lived at a bar for a month and a half, before Owen knocked some sense into her. Now we can never mention your name around her, sir. If we did she would fall back into that steady pattern of alcohol. But we've been off that path for four months now, and we're clearly not going back. She moved on.

Owen didn't talk about you for a month. After the initial "he's gone" statements, he never mentioned you. But we all knew that he thought about you. The first time we saw any emotion out of him was when I asked him to talk to Tosh. No one noticed her, he was too busy forgetting and Gwen was too busy being a wreck herself. I couldn't do anything for anyone. I was invisible. They hardly knew me. But Owen helped Tosh through her hard times, and then Gwen through hers. Without sleeping with her once, might I add. He moved on.

I stopped. Like the stopwatch we'd used that one night. It wasn't because I didn't care about you, sir. I did, I cared very deeply. Sometimes, though, it's better not to feel at all, than feel too much and break. There was a good possibility that I might have fallen in love with you, had you stayed only a bit longer. But I see now that leaving is what you do. You left whatever form of life you had before you came to us here at Torchwood, and it was inevitable that you would leave us now. I just wish—but wishing isn't effective now, is it?

I bought a cat. Tosh thought it might help. Better than a dog, I suppose. I named him Jack, sir. Black Jack to be more precise, as he is a black cat. I named him after you. I couldn't help but want you to come back so you could laugh at me for that, perhaps even tell me that the rhyme was cute. But you aren't coming back, I know that now. I've accepted it.

I've not moved on, sir. I doubt I ever will. I'll keep masquerading behind this plaster face until one day I break. That will be the day when I leave Torchwood, sir. So I can be ret-conned and forget everything about you, sir. Because sometimes remembering hurts more than forgetting.