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Norfolk, 2006.
Small bronze plaque in a pew. No body to bring home. Only this reminder to signify the end of a line. The end of many things, but mainly just one heart.
He’d come to Norfolk on a case, but now that he had solved it, he couldn’t pretend that it was anything but his own choosing that brought him to this last vestige of thought for V.R. Trevor- 1978-2004. The daughter of the town postman had taken up the collection for it, apparently. No one else to do it.
So now he came as close to poetry as he’d ever been. Victor, after all, was the closest he’d ever come to loving a poem.
“You were like the sun on the back of my neck. So it didn’t matter that my feet were cold.”
***
London, 2011.
And how could the sun rise upon London. A London where Sherlock Holmes would never be again. For the thousandth time in the last few hours, John felt his throat constrict and his knees begin to give up, and he moved away from the window.
And yet it did rise. John’s mind went blank. Shock, he knew. Pulse slowed, gaze unfocused. It would hit him tomorrow, he knew. And the day after that. And after that. And the merciless sun would rise and chase the moon. Laughing at the hope that anything could ever be better after sleep. Rising up brilliant and without decay, like the day before, like the day before that.
***
Sarajevo, 2013.
The coach turned a corner, and a beam of 7.25 AM brightness struck Sherlock full in the eye. He shivered and pulled his hood down over his eyes. Last chance to sleep. Last chance to think.
His hood didn’t cover his whole face, so his cheeks and lips and nose grew beautifully warm, as the sun poured itself into the cracks and planes of his face.
92,960,000 miles away from the Earth and it still felt like a hand on his cheek. How the hell did he know that? Why hadn’t he deleted it? He needed that space. Vital. Urgent.
Oh, right. He’d memorized it one morning to make John laugh.
John laughing. Laughing his name. Calling him ridiculous. Smart arse. Brilliant. Amazing. Calling…
No. Don’t. No. Sherlock! No, he’s my friend. He’s my friend. Please.
No. No. Not that part.
One more miracle, Sherlock. For me.
1,277 miles away and he still felt like a voice in his ear.
He hugged his knees to his chest and drew maps in his mind’s eye. Maps of forests, maps of cement compounds, maps of back doors air vents and basement windows. These things would somehow bring him back home.
Hopefully he’d still find some way to make John laugh again.