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Sherlock stares down at his shoes. His perfectly clean shoes. They’re two years old and they’ve hardly been touched. He doesn’t particularly enjoy looking at them but it’s better than looking at John.
“What was I supposed to think?” John goes on. His voice is raised but his eyebrows are wide, a sure sign he’s more likely to cry than anything else. His shouts are desperate, not angry, and Sherlock can hear the hurt in his tone.
He’s afraid to say anything. Not because he thinks John will attack him. Quite the opposite—he’s afraid John will leave. Like he left. Of course, he knows that John will eventually go. He has a fiancée now, and without the great Sherlock Holmes dragging him down, the world is John’s oyster.
“How was I supposed to accept that you were gone?” His voice breaks. Any semblance of anger fades as tears spring unwittingly to his cheeks. “You were gone,” he repeats sadly.
He stares at Sherlock for a long time, but buries his face in his hands when Sherlock finally looks up. Unlike his shoes, John has changed. Two years, full of grief and transition, have aged the man, and the bags under his eyes are proof enough that it’s not been a good two years.
“I should’ve done something.” John’s voice is hardly above a whisper and Sherlock’s chest throbs with the struggled beating of his own heart as it fractures.
Sherlock’s eyes search John’s face, looking for the same sort of salvation the doctor has always offered before. He realizes slowly that John can’t save himself. He’s spent so much time saving others, namely Sherlock, that he can’t save himself anymore.
Inhaling slowly, Sherlock prepares his voice. It’s time to speak. To use the words that he know might save his friend. He hates to think he has the power to do so, but it’s better than watching as John Watson falls apart in front of him.
“John,” he whispers. The doctor’s crying halts suddenly and he looks up, surprised to hear his friend speaking. “It wasn’t your fault. I didn’t do it because you drove me there. None of it. It wasn’t your fault.”
Something in those blue-green eyes changes. Slowly at first, but then faster as John’s expression transforms from one of horror and guilt to one of gratitude. He seems like he wants to say something. Perhaps ‘thank you’, perhaps ‘sod off’, but nothing comes out.
This time, when the sobs come pouring out of him, he’s not alone. He buries his face against Sherlock’s chest as the taller man embraces him in a gentle hug. They’re not sure whether it means anything. Perhaps it does, perhaps it doesn’t. But it means they’re going to be okay, and that’s rather enough for right now.