Chapter Text
The First Time
It was a typical night at Baker Street. John was tapping away at his computer on one end of the sofa, white light illuminating his face, and I was on the other end, making notes, texting, reading, fidgeting, driving John crazy.
“My god, Sherlock if you can’t keep still, can you please sit somewhere else? I am trying to write, and I can’t think when you’re bouncing all over the sofa like a puppy.” John was staring at me. Those denim blue eyes. Long lashes. His eyelid twitched. Angry. Pulse heightened, breathing only through his nose. His tell, when he was upset. The nose breathing.
I narrowed my eyes, shooting him a nasty grin that I knew would make him even angrier. God, why did I do this? Because it’s how you deal with it, Sherlock, the voice in my mind answered. You piss him off so you don’t have to think about the other things.
“No. You move.” I flopped on my side, stretching out along the length of the sofa, and digging my toes under John’s warm thigh, as I was wont to do lately. “Anyway, I don’t believe *thinking* really enters the picture when it comes to your blog.”
The things I said to him. Pushing, always pushing, seeing where the line was where he would walk away, or start to hate me. The same self-destructive instinct that made me not eat. How miserable can I make myself before I actually have to do something about it?
“Fuck off, Sherlock.” John slammed his laptop shut, set it on the floor, and stalked into the kitchen.
He was getting a beer. There were usually 3 possibilities when I made him just angry enough to leave the room I was in, but not angry enough to leave the flat. The most common choice, the one he chose 57% of the time, was to get a beer.
He flopped back down on the sofa when he returned. He made no effort to remove my feet from his seat. My toes were under his arse now. I wiggled them experimentally. Oh. He shivered, and I saw a slight flush rise up on his cheeks. He didn’t say anything. I pushed them a little further under him. He swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat.
He picked up his laptop again, set it on his legs, opened it. He drained his beer in one long gulp. “I am going to work now, Sherlock.” He pointed at me. John’s fingers. Strong. Rough. John’s face, jawline tight, giving me that look that confused me, made my stomach clench involuntarily. My body reacted to John in ways it never had reacted to anyone in my life.
He nodded, more to himself than to me, and went back to typing. I picked up my phone, pretended to be texting. I was actually observing John, as I often did. While his blog truly was unimaginably shite, I did enjoy watching his fingers moving over the keyboard. Sure, confident. He rarely deleted words. He knew exactly what he wanted to say. And his face when he was concentrating. Lips pursed, brow furrowed. He had a habit of looking down to the right - only to the right, never left - when he was thinking hard. I liked watching his eyes shifting. I liked the colour of his eyes. I had never LIKED anyone’s eye colour before John. I always made note of it, in case it turned out to be important data, but I never had a preference.
A half hour passed. Some wretched pop song was playing on John’s computer. I sighed, something that usually got his attention. He made no show of having heard me. I sighed again, louder. Nothing. Wiggled my feet under his arse. He dropped a hand to my ankle, fingers tucking under the hem of my pyjama bottoms. Thumb rubbing over my ankle bone. New data. This had never happened before. My own skin vibrating under John’s fingers, pulse picking up.
He typed with one hand for several minutes, his hand still on my ankle. Finally, he snapped the laptop shut and put it down. He looked at me. Affection? Some. Irritation? Certainly that.
“You know, Sherlock, if you want my attention, you can just talk to me, like a normal person. All this sighing and fake texting, it doesn’t do it for me, mate.” So he knew about the fake texting. Damn.
His hand still had not left my ankle. In fact, was slightly higher now, thumb pressing into the more fleshy part of my calf, inside my pyjamas, slowly rubbing a rhythm into my skin. This was new. And not something I believed he would have done with anyone else he called “mate.” I tried to imagine John rubbing Lestrade’s ankle. The thought made me laugh, and also oddly...what? Jealous?
I sat up, bending my knees, crossing my arms over them, feet still tucked under John, and rested my chin on my crossed arms. I allowed my fringe to fall across my forehead. He liked that. I had seen the change in his eyes when my hair got messy. Reason I kept it long.
I looked into his eyes. Blue, so blue. Could not remember what I was going to say to him. Pulse quickening.
“Sherlock?” John’s voice was an octave deeper than it normally was, husky. Colour on his cheeks. “What’re…”
Our faces were extremely close to each other - 10 centimeters, give or take. John reached up, taking his hand off of my leg, and brushed the hair off of my forehead. I knew he liked that. His breathing had quickened, his eyes focused on my mouth. Gooseflesh on his arms. I didn’t know what I wanted to happen. I just liked to have John’s attention on me, completely on me.
He leaned forward - 2 centimeters. Our eyes were boring into each other. The air between us felt...thick. Charged with electricity. John licked his lips, swallowed hard. He was going to kiss me. Finally.
“Yoohoo!!!” Mrs Hudson ascended the stairs, bursting to 221B without hesitation, as she always did.
John leapt away from me, actually got up off the sofa, the warm weight of his arse leaving my feet cold. My jaw clenched in frustration. Do not yell at Mrs. Hudson. John will be angry with you, Sherlock. Do not yell.
“Mrs Hudson! Do you not ever KNOCK?” Dammit. Yelled at Mrs. Hudson. Look at John, is he angry? Yes. And uncomfortable, and oh, a little aroused, look at that.
“Oh, Sherlock. This is my house.” She flipped a hand at me, walked into the kitchen, set a plate on the counter, “I brought you boys some biscuits, just made.”
“Ta, Mrs. Hudson.” John sounded much more normal than I felt the situation warranted.
“Well. I’ll leave you to it then, boys.” She looked between us a few times, over-lipsticked mouth pinched, clearly thinking. Don’t try and deduce, Mrs. Hudson. You’ll just embarrass yourself.
After she’d gone, John looked to me, biting his upper lip with his bottom row of teeth, his arms behind him, wrists clenched in opposite hands. Ah. He was closed to me again. The moment of opportunity had passed.
“Well. Sherlock. I’m off to bed. Early day at surgery tomorrow, you know.” John rocked on his heels. Another nervous habit of his.
“Alright John. Goodnight.” I stood up, took two long strides to where he stood in the middle of the room. What would he do?
He looked up at me, mouth tight. He would do nothing. Oh, wait. I was wrong. I was so often wrong about John. The only person I knew that I couldn’t dissect within seconds. Here was his hand coming up, resting on the side of my face, warm and strong. The only hand I would ever care to have touching my face this way.
He stared at me a long moment, not moving. Then he smiled. Sad smile. Regretful. Shit. “Goodnight, Sherlock.”
He dropped his hand and walked upstairs. I laid down on the sofa, putting my hand over my own face where John’s hand had been. Why was I doing that? Makes no sense. I lay there for hours, not moving, feeling his hand on my face, until I pass out, those denim blue eyes filling my dreams.