A/N: Inspired by a day spent obsessing over Peter Lorre with a good friend. It's set a good few years after the events of the play/movie. This does contain slash of the Jonathan/Einstein variety, so if that's not your cup of tea, I suggest you hit the back button.
Disclaimer: I am not associated in any way shape or form with the writing of the play "Arsenic and Old Lace" or the production of the film of the same name. And that makes me sad.
It's the sheer indignity of this place that's killing him. The harsh lights, the antiseptic smell, the blank monotony of the endless tile floors are all contributors, but in the end, it comes down to the utter shame of not being trusted to hold a pair of scissors.
There's a man across the table who stares at him with wide and curious eyes, and Jonathan attempts to concentrate on his meal, if it can be called that, until his irritation grows to be too much.
"What?" he growls.
"Hey, buddy," the man laughs nervously. "You know who you look like?"
Jonathan cracks his knuckles and suppresses a facial spasm. "Who?" he asks, dangerously soft.
"Boris Karloff."
Jonathan lunges.
A half an hour later, in solitary again, Jonathan wipes his blood-covered hands down the front of his hospital issue shirt and grins through split lips.
It's easier in solitary, he finds. There's less idiocy to deal with. It's less humiliating, being alone. Except…well, he tries not to think about how cold it gets in that room, some nights.
If Jonathan recalls correctly, on the outside, there was a woman once. She was a good shot, she knew how to keep her mouth shut, and she didn't mind the pathos, so she stayed for a long time. If she had one major flaw, it was that the bridge of her nose had been smashed in an unspecified accident, and thusly, she had no sense of smell. As Dr. Einstein would explain to him a few years later, for all our reliance on sight and sound, smell is a highly valuable sense that most people use without quite knowing. And perhaps this is why she didn't notice when Jonathan quietly crept up behind her and snapped her neck.
Days slide by now, faster than ever, and he remembers eating, going to sleep, and as much as he'd like to forget, he remembers the shocks, but the little details are all a blur, and while he's aware of movement all around him, his eyes stay focused on some indeterminable point on the horizon.
The first time Einstein sees Jonathan after the incident, his heart sinks so low, it may well be in his knees. He was expecting murderous wrath, or at least seething anger. What he did not expect was to see Jonathan staring into the ether, a curiously blank look on his face and his hands placidly resting on his knees, and that is somehow worse than the other options. Einstein bends his knees a little, setting himself at eye level with Jonathan.
"Hey, Johnny," he sighs, voice quivering a little as he rests one of his small hands over Jonathan's. "You still remember me?"
He lets out a yelp of hysteria as Jonathan grabs the front of Einstein's shirt and drags him into a one-armed hug. He has to resist the urge to return the embrace as Jonathan begins to hiss into Einstein's ear every last horrible, brutal, nasty act of torture he will inflict on Einstein the instant he has the means, because, thank god, oh thank god, he hasn't changed.
"That doctor friend of yours is here," says the round-faced, disgustingly pleasant orderly. "If you want to see him any time today, you'd best get a move on, hmm?"
"I will rip your tongue out and feed it to you," Jonathan does not reply as he pulls on his shoes (cloyingly soft, like everything else in this place).
He allows the orderly to take him by the arm and lead him out of the room. "Come along, Johnny," he says, tugging him along gently.
"Call me 'Johnny' again and I swear to you, you'll be breathing through a tube for the rest of your short life," he does not say. Only he can call me that, he would never say out loud.
The orderly guides him towards a small room, where Einstein sits at a table, looking theatrically somber, with his hands folded on his bag. Jonathan is settled in his chair, and the orderly shuffles out.
"Get me out of here," he says the instant the door is closed.
Einstein smiles slightly. "Soon. Have you been polite? No death threats this week?"
Jonathan reaches across the table and clamps one hand around Einstein's wrist. "I've decided that I'm going to start by ripping your fingernails out one by one."
Einstein settles back and allows Johnny to vent, to rant and rail, as his thumb runs absently over the back of Einstein's hand.
Soon, too soon, there is a soft knock on the door, and the damned orderly sticks his head in, saying "Time's up."
"Yes, sir," says Jonathan, without a touch of sullenness. He's getting good at this.
Jonathan is loathe to admit that he enjoys Einstein's visits. And not only because each time they meet, Jonathan comes one step closer to sweet, elusive freedom. He thinks to himself it's because he's gone too long without intellectually stimulating conversation, or because he can be utterly honest with Einstein, or perhaps because being around him evokes a sense of life before this wretched institute. That's what he thinks to himself, because the long nights he spends tossing and turning before giving up and pushing himself into his hand, longing for release, are just a little bit too strange and humiliating to contemplate.
They hand him his old clothes back, piece by piece, and Jonathan doesn't think that he's ever gotten dressed faster than this, because even this old suit (a little big on him now, he notes with alarm) is better than that goddamned uniform. He walks out of the front doors shakily, as though at any moment he might be called back, but nobody calls him back, and he walks to the little black car idling in front of the hospital without incident.
"Well, Johnny," Einstein asks from the driver's seat, "You're free."
Jonathan doesn't answer; he just lies back against the seat and exhales a breath that he didn't know he'd been holding.
Einstein has been driving for about ten minutes when Jonathan begins to speak. "Where is Mortimer?"
He shakes his head. "I don't know. Probably left town, once he heard you were getting out. I don't blame him." Einstein turns his head and smiles at Jonathan. "How about we hold off on him for a while?" Please, he does not say, but it's there.
Jonathan nods thoughtfully, and almost smiles when he hears Einstein breath an audible sigh of relief. "Yes. That would be best. We'll do some traveling."
Einstein nods enthusiastically. "You'll need a new face, Johnny."
"Of course." Jonathan pauses suddenly. "Are you offering?"
"Well, yes," says Einstein, faintly confused, eyes flickering from him to the road and back. "Why wouldn't I?"
Jonathan shrugs. "I've been away a long time, doctor. I assumed you would have found employment by now."
"Oh, I have," he says, sounding reassured, somehow. "But, you know, it is so difficult to find anything long term in our business, so I remain unattached for now."
"Good." They drive the rest of the way to the hotel in silence, and it is only after the slow trudge through the parking lot and the endless elevator ride and the walk to their room that seems to last forever that Jonathan speaks again.
"Lock the door, doctor."
Einstein swallows hard, but did as he was asked, and turns around just in time to be slapped across the face and stumble backwards, banging his head against the door.
"I should kill you right now," says Jonathan dispassionately. "I should torture you and slit your throat and leave you for the maid to find in the morning." Einstein whimpers and ducks to one side as an attempt to escape, but Jonathan grabs him by the shoulders and forces him back against the door. "But don't think it's because you abandoned me in my time of need, or because you tried to warn Mortimer away; oh, no. Think of this, my dear doctor, as a severing of ties, if you will. A way of destroying the last remaining thing that still has a hold on me. And you do have a hold on me, my friend." He studies Einstein's face intently here. "I believe that you always have." His voice goes soft. "You ought to use that."
Hermann Einstein was not the brightest of men. He was scatterbrained, impulsive and more often than not, dead drunk. But he knew Jonathan just as well as Jonathan knew him, and if there was one thing Jonathan knew about Einstein, it was that the doctor would take an escape route when he saw one.
Einstein takes stock of the situation slowly before tugging gently at Jonathan's tie, bringing him down to look Einstein in the eye. They linger for a moment, though whether it is hesitation or anticipation, Jonathan can't say, and soon he can't even bring himself to think as Einstein's mouth covers his own. After that, there are walls, and floors, and beds and the swift removal of clothing, and Einstein nuzzling his throat, saying "You only had to ask, you know," and Jonathan muttering sweet nothings unashamedly (at the time) just before the end.
"So," begins Einstein as Jonathan lies on his side, looking tired and ecstatic. "Are you still going to kill me?"
"Not today," he says, eyes locked on the ceiling, face too serious.
And it is true.
END.
Well, that's that. Reviews are appreciated and constructive criticism is desired.