Work Text:
Beep. Beep. Beep.
<<Incoming Stimulus>>
Stimulus: Noise; Features: Consistent re: volume, duration, timing - Stimulus: Smell; Features: Antiseptic. Detergent (cheap, generic, strong). Perfume (floral, subtle, expensive, familiar) ANNOTATION: RETURN TO - Stimulus: Sight; Information irrelevant, conclusion reached.
Conclusion: Hospital.
<<Load memories>>
Case. Status: Failed.
Drugs. Status: Obtained.
High. Status: Spectacular.
Crash. Status: <<ERROR>>
<<INCOMING STIMULUS>>
"Sherlock? Are you waking up?"
Stimulus: Noise; Features: Soothing. Familiar; ANNOTATION: RETURN TO -Perfume; Conclusion: Watson.
<<INCOMING STIMULUS>>
Stimulus: Touch; Features: Cool. Dry. Soft; Conclusions: Watson's hand in mine. Hasn't moisturized in too long. Environment has prompted increase in hand-washing per day.
Conclusion: Watson is worried.
Conclusion: I worried Watson.
Conclusion: I overdosed.
"Sherlock, please."
Of course, Sherlock is helpless to open his eyes. Oh, she's really very angry with him. <<ERROR>>
Oh, she's really very disappointed in him.
That's definitely worse. The silence stretches too long. She's meant to be offering meaningless platitudes: telling him to go back to sleep, calling the doctor. Since she's not, she must want him to talk, to say important things right away. Pity, popular culture led him to believe he would be spared this conversation until he was home again, at least.
"I must confess Watson, that after-" <<ERROR ERROR REDACT REDACT>> "What I did-" <<REDACT>>"I didn't expect you to still-"<<REDACT REDACT>>
Watson hears the words he isn't saying.
"My Companionship was contingent upon your sobriety. My Partnership was not."
If Watson's joy fizzes like bottled oxytocin, and her approval tastes like blueberries drenched in honey, and her anger corrodes like fluoric acid, and her disapproval feels like evisceration, then Sherlock would have been better off dead, because he doesn't care to test the hypothesis 'Can I live like this?'
"Perhaps it should have been."
"Yes."
Another long silence. Watson likes to yell. She likes to talk about her feelings. She believes wholeheartedly in "I feel…" statements and honesty that makes Sherlock's chest hurt, and she's not doing any of that right now, and that hurts worse.
"Are you leaving, then? I can not honestly say I would be surprised if you decided to… but I would be honestly, genuinely-" <<REDACT>> <<ERROR - DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES REDACT, YOU BASTARD>>"-devastated if you did."
"Why didn't that occur to you before the drugs?" Her voice is so empty. Worse than Mother's, worse than Father's, all those times they said - <<"Busy, Sherlock, bother your brother" REDACT//"Sherlock, you're never going to worth anything if you don't learn to sit down and shut up for more than two seconds" REDACT//"Sherlock, why can't you just be normal" PERMANENT ENTRY - SUBTYPE: BEHAVIOURAL MODIFICATION>>
<<Why can't you just be normal>>
"The Work, Watson. The Work comes first. You know that."
<<Why can't you just be normal>>
"I'm not leaving."
Oh.
<<PERMANENT ENTRY - SUBTYPE: PENDING REVIEW; Maybe, I don't have to be>>
"Thank you, Watson-"
"Don't thank me, this is probably the stupidest decision I have ever made in my entire life!" Her face is pale, except her exquisite cheekbones, which are flamingly bright. Her hair trembles with the force of her anger, and her dark eyes flash, and Sherlock has never seen anything more agonizingly destructive in his whole life, and she's perfect."You, Sherlock Holmes, are going to listen to me very carefully, because you are a phenomenally stupid human being, and I cannot believe that you need me to explain this to you, but it's obvious that you do. I am not leaving because I have nowhere to go. Do you understand what that's like? Can you comprehend what that even means? I am a grown woman, Sherlock, and a god-damned over-trained professional, and I don't remember what life was like without you. Years, do you hear me, Sherlock, fucking years of serving a passion, a brilliant higher calling and suddenly I realise that if you hadn't been here, it wouldn't have been worth anything at all."
"Watson…"
"So don't thank me for being too goddamned cowardly to choose to find out what life is like without you again. And don't you dare make me find out the hard way. Don't you even think about doing that to me, Sherlock. You are not allowed to die." Her eyes meet his, and even if he thought for a second that he might wish to look away, he couldn't have done it.
"I'm hardly going to live forever, Watson… But, for whatever little it is worth… I've never done a thing in my life good enough to deserve your regard… But I shall try, for whatever is left of it, to never disappoint you in such a manner again."
They stare at each other for a while - a very long while, as the hospital thrums around them.
Sherlock can feel her heart beating, and wants to reach into her chest - achingly gently, exquisitely carefully - and wrap his hand around the organ - fingers over atria, ventricles cradled in his palm - to feel the singular beat against his flesh like the anticipatory fluttering of a bird preparing to take flight.
<<ACTION: REVIEW ENTRY #5 "Why can't you just be normal?"; PREVIOUS STATUS: PERMANENT ENTRY - SUBTYPE: BEHAVIOURAL MODIFICATION; NEW STATUS: TO BE REMOVED - SUBTYPE: ERRONEOUS SUPOSITION;
EVIDENCE: JOAN WATSON>>