I Forget Everything That I Don't Want to Remember

Raining.

It was raining.

Rain was nice. Martin liked the rain. It was calming and peaceful and it smelled nice. It washed away everything, left a new slate. It was sustenance for some wildlife, like plants and things. So, it was obvious that it was nice.

But it also was... painful. Because it echoed his inner thoughts sometimes. Just sometimes.

Like now.

The damn van had broken down. It figured, didn't it? It just figured, when it had starting pouring down rain, that the damn van, which had been on its last leg, would finally break down. He'd been pushing it, but he hadn't had the money to fix it. He hadn't even taken it to the shop because he hadn't wanted to know what was wrong. Hopefully, he could target the problem and set aside a bit of money to get that part fixed and get Icarus Removals back in business (not that it was particularly booming, anyway).

He was walking.

It was raining.

The damn van had broken down.

His dad had given him the damn van that no one else would have even wanted, much less a van that someone would make a living off of. Martin was the man with a van and it was his only source of income- happy about that, Dad? I'm a pilot with no pay and the van that you gave me goes towards getting me low-income housing in the attic of a shared house. Are you proud of your son yet?

Rain. Cold. Life is cold.

Martin shivered, attempting to zip his hoodie up more even though it would do no real good. He was already soaking wet. And cold...

Because the damn van had broken down. It wasn't like his parents hadn't been able to fix it. Five grand to each of his siblings and his father wouldn't even get him a good van.

He had to work for it. He was working for it now- stupid Martin, you're not doing a good job and you know it, everyone knows it- but it wasn't going well. The shared house wasn't so bad; the students didn't bother him and he didn't bother them, but the idea was that they actually had a life and he didn't.

MJN. He had MJN. He was a pilot, he was. Maybe- Maybe it had taken him a long while to get there- seven was just his lucky number!- but he was a pilot now and that's all that really mattered in the long run, right? That's what he had wanted to do and he had done it. He might live on toast and pasta and not be able to afford to fix his van like he should or get nice clothing or-

He didn't notice his eyes stinging until after hot tears had started to fall. It surprised him, at first, and he dashed the tears away quickly before he realized that it was raining anyway, so no one would know.

He was mainly surprised because he really didn't cry. Well, okay, not for a long time. Not really since MJN, not since he'd hit that high point in his life that involved really flying high, taking off in the plane, looking back down on everything and letting himself think that his problems were really that small, so many miles from earth-

A small, choked noise made him flinch, before he realized it was coming from him. He pressed his hand over his mouth- damn it, Martin, stop crying, you have no reason to cry, you're a pilot, it's your dream, you have no reason to cry!- biting his tongue and trying to maintain normal breathing. It didn't work and his vision got blurry and he stopped for a moment, pressing the drenched, ratty cuffs of his hoodie to his eyes.

He was fine, it was fine, it was perfectly all fine; he had no reason to complain, no reason to complain at all-

He took a deep breath, swallowing hard. He shivered hard and continued walking, ignoring the urge to wipe away his tears. No one could see them, no one would know, because he wanted to make sure that people didn't know, he didn't want people thinking that he was ungrateful because he really wasn't, he was really quite thankful, but sometimes things just got a little out of hand with his stomach growling from a missed meal of barely-warm pasta and the damn van breaking down and the rain and being cold and not having a proper coat or umbrella because he hadn't even known it was supposed to rain today!-

"Skipper!"

Martin stopped, looking up as a car pulled up next to him. Arthur was already halfway out of his window, waving at him. Martin could hear Carolyn yelling at her son to close the window before you ruin my upholstery, so help me, Arthur!

"Skip, we've been calling you!"

Martin blinked quietly, blinking away raindrops (or tears) clinging to his eyelashes. He resisted the urge to rub his eyes, to wipe away any trace that might give him away. "... What?"

"We saw your van back there and wondered what was happening, and we called, but you didn't answer!"

"Oh... Oh, yeah, sorry. The, uhm, the mobile died earlier. Battery's dead. And it's raining and I'm walking, so I couldn't have brought it, anyway..." He felt absurd. He was standing in the pouring rain, talking to his friends (at least, Arthur, but there was Carolyn in the front, too) like everything was completely fine.

The passenger window rolled down. Douglas's face peered out at him.

"Carolyn says to get in the car before she drives away. One time offer. I would take it, seeing as how it's lightning in the distance."

"Arthur! Close that window!" Carolyn ordered from the front.

Arthur made a face. "Come on, Skip! We'll give you a ride to the port-a-cabin!" His face vanished from the window, and it rolled up. Martin had only a second to process all of this before the door was thrown on. "Come on, get in!"

"When I meant for you to close the window, I didn't mean for you to open the door- Oh, get in, Martin!"

"Oh, right!" He scrambled forward, sliding into Carolyn's car. The seat from where Arthur had had the window open was cold from the rain that had managed to get past Arthur's form, but Martin didn't care. He was already cold and wet, anyway. He pulled the door shut and fumbled for his seatbelt, but Carolyn had already started driving. Martin almost smiled as he clicked his seatbelt on.

Arthur was beaming, his smile widening as thunder crashed from above. "Isn't this weather brilliant, Skip? It's like a great big drum is echoing in the sky."

"I do think that if you had been out walking in it, you wouldn't be saying that, Arthur," Douglas mused, pressing a few buttons in the front. "Now, how do you work- aha!"

"Don't touch my car, Douglas!"

"Just turning on the heat so we don't have an ice lolly of a Captain. If he gets too cold, he might freeze to the seat. You'd never get him out of your car and how dreadful that would be for you."

"Wow, a permanent Skip in our backseat! That'd be brilliant."

"Except that he couldn't fly the plane, Arthur, if he was stuck to your backseat."

"Oh, yeah, that's true..."

Martin's half smile finally broke to something genuine due to their bicker and the heat blasting in the backseat of the car. No, he had been wrong.

He did have reasons to complain. But he also had reasons to be happy. Really happy.

As many times as he experienced the bad things in life, he got to witness a few of the good ones, too.

And those moments? Those good moments? Well, they kept him smiling, and he couldn't ask for anything more than that.

Really, really hesitant. That was how I was thinking about writing this. Because angsty!Martin is grand (oh my goodness, I love h/c/angst paired with Martin so, so much) but how many times in Cabin Pressure do we actually get to hear that angst? I doubt if there's a lot, if any, moments, so I was hesitant to write a fic where Martin just kind of... unraveled. I'm a stickler for staying in character, but... The desire to write this won out, and hopefully, it's believable.

And... I heard that the delivery service he runs is Icarus Removals and I heard that his siblings both got five grand, but that was just through a bit of research, so please correct me if it is not canon! And tell me if it is canon. Because I'm still not positive.

Thanks for reading, and I would love to hear your thoughts! Still trying to determine whether or not I'm capturing them well. :)