Chapter Text
Journalists and photographers stood three-deep in front of New Scotland Yard's main entrance, as John Watson, coming from St. James's Park tube station, turned the corner of Dacre Street and slowly ambled to the side door where a uniformed policeman waited for him.
'Doctor Watson?' he said. 'Detective Chief Inspector Lestrade sent me to accompany you to the conference room.'
'Thank you,' John said. Two years. It had been two years since Sherlock's suicide and although investigations into his affairs went on for just a little more than ten months before it became clear that he was innocent in all cases, it had taken the authorities this long to finally decide that an official statement and an apology at a press conference were the way to go.
John had been furious about Lestrade's role in the whole farce of Sherlock's arrest and the way his men had handled Sherlock, but finally he realised that the man had had no choice but to obey direct orders from his superiors. Lestrade's unjust suspension did the rest. So John had made his peace with him. They'd even met for a pint a few times since.
Upon entering the conference room he came to an abrupt halt and stared at the screen behind the podium. A portrait of Sherlock – not the one with the hat – coat collar turned up and looking down at the assembly with the typical look of haughty disdain John knew so well, filled the screen. The upper left side of the blow-up was crossed with a black mourning band.
John lowered his head and stared at his shoes. Dear God, he could not bear to look at that face. Had Sherlock really looked like that? So pale? Such piercing silver eyes? Mop of dark curls softening his chiselled features. Pink, pink lips. Slightly opened mouth showing a hint of small, very white and slightly irregular teeth. John swallowed. Was that inappropriate, a man thinking about his flatmate's teeth? He had no idea any more.
Memories of Sherlock flashed through his mind at the oddest times. Just details, like magnified cut-outs of photographs imbued with a significance he could not interpret. Long toes sensually curling and flexing into the soft leather of their sofa's arm rest. The wide-eyed orgasmic 'Oh!' when an epiphany hit home. Long white fingers steepled, the tips just touching his bottom lip. The lovely curve of a slender back exposed by a slipping bed sheet.
*****
Propriety was not a word easily associated with Sherlock. As evidenced by that memorable time when he'd requested to measure John's inside leg.
'No,' John said.
'Why not?'
'Because I don't want a bloke grabbing around between my legs.'
Sherlock stared at him. 'Your tailor would do it.'
'I don't have a tailor.'
'But, you're a doctor, you have to touch people in intimate places all the time.'
'Yes, but you're not my doctor. Or my tailor.'
'I'm a scientist and I need your measurements.'
'What for?'
'I'm writing an essay on the correlation between inside leg, shoe size, instep and length of toes according to step lengths on various surfaces. It's important.'
Sighing, John complied and let Sherlock take the measurements he wanted – it wasn't as awkward as expected, Sherlock behaving in a cool and professional manner - only to find that afterwards he was expected to walk, run and hop over their sitting room carpet, the lino in the kitchen, the wooden floor of the vestibule and the bathroom tiles (running in there proved to be a bit of a problem). John vehemently refused to repeat the exercise outside on various soil, grass and slab samples, though.
In order to obtain clearer prints Sherlock had dusted the various surfaces with flour. Repeatedly. Mrs Hudson had not been amused. But later John enjoyed a peaceful evening while Sherlock was happily occupied with studying carpet fibres under the microscope and calculating tensile strengths in correlation to pressure and momentum.
*****
Sherlock was always on his mind. At first it had all been 'No!' and 'Why?' howling inside him. Later came the anger: 'Bloody bastard!', 'How could he?'. Still later the regret: 'I shouldn't have left him alone', 'If only I hadn't called him a machine'. For months after the event he wasn't able to look at himself in a mirror without seeing the man who had killed his best friend through neglect. Finally he was too numb to feel anything, all emotions burned out of him.
That was when he started seeing Ella again. Therapy helped. Talking about Sherlock helped. Talking to Sherlock, standing at his grave site, even more. Only then John had truly been able to express what his friend had meant to him.
'I was so alone and I owe you so much.'
Too little, too late, and the one for whom it was meant couldn't hear it anymore and had never had much use for such sentimentalities anyway. Still, saying it out loud helped John come to terms with the fact that the most important person in his life had indeed been Sherlock – all questions of whatever that meant put aside.
He hadn't been back to Baker Street ever, since he'd helped Anderson and his colleagues pack up Sherlock's belongings to be examined at New Scotland Yard's labs. Too painful seeing all the things Sherlock had owned, used, touched lying around lifeless and without purpose.
He didn't know what had become of Sherlock's ridiculously expensive clothes, his chemistry equipment, his microscope and his cherished violin. Some of it might have found its way back to Baker Street after the investigation, as he remembered Mrs Hudson telling him that she wanted to give away the lab equipment to a school or something. He had left her to deal with it. Her and Mycroft.
He felt bad about never getting in touch with her again. But cutting all ties and moving on had been his only way out. At first he stayed at a small hotel, as far away from Marylebone as he could get and still have easy access to the city. For a while he had to go to New Scotland Yard almost every day, answering endless questions about his association with Sherlock.
'Look,' he said to Donovan, who was leading the interrogation, 'if you think that he was a criminal, I must be one, too. I was with him on almost every case. How do you think he managed to commit all those crimes without me knowing it? Don't you think I'd have noticed if he'd abducted those poor children? Either arrest me or stop being such an idiot!'
She was so damn considerate. Poor dumb John Watson, dazzled by a criminal mastermind into believing he was his friend. But time passed by, days and weeks blurring together, without any result one way or another. They didn't arrest him. He wasn't even prosecuted for breaking the Chief Superintendent's nose. Probably Mycroft's influence, but John didn't care. If he never saw that bastard again, it would be one day too early.
Money wasn't a problem as their income had steadily risen when he and Sherlock had still been working together and they'd always split it half and half. But, obviously, it wouldn't last forever. So he used the bulk of his savings as a down payment for a small GP's practice and the rest for a new flat.
He started working again and the routines of everyday life, getting up in the morning, going to work, seeing patients, staying after hours to do the paper work, going home, going to bed, provided a sort of scaffold to hang on to and move along on. Time passed like it always did, and if he woke up some nights from dreams of dark wings plummeting out of the sky, none of his patients were any the wiser. But life seemed drained of all colour, he found.
Living with Sherlock had been first and foremost fun. Yes, there'd been times when he'd forgotten that and had complained, if only to himself. Only now that Sherlock was gone he understood how lucky he'd been, how blessed. Sherlock had been endlessly entertaining, even without the cases. Honestly, who needed TV when there was Sherlock to observe? The sulking, the moods, the experiments, the body parts in the fridge. His reaction to Bond films and bad TV. The constant squabbling about buying milk. They'd laughed a lot. At each other. About each other. With each other. Mostly with each other.
'I'm never bored,' he'd said once and meant it to spite Mycroft. Now, in hindsight, he had to acknowledge how true that was. He was bored a lot now, if he was honest.
*****
Mary entered his life like a splash of colour, a ray of sunshine in a perpetual November, bringing back warmth and companionship into his life. She had answered his ad looking for a reception nurse and they had sort of hit it off right from the start.
'Do you want to talk about her?' she asked him one evening.
He was startled out of his thoughts and only then noticed that she must have been standing in the door, ready to say good night, for some time.
'Talk about whom?' he asked.
'Well, I thought... You often look so sad, staring into space, just like now. I thought you must have lost someone. Was she your wife?'
He huffed a short laugh. 'No, no wife. I've never been married. I... actually, he was my best friend. He... he committed suicide a while ago.'
'Oh. That's dreadful,' she said, stepping in and taking the chair opposite him.
'Yes. Yes, it was. I still can't quite believe he's... gone.'
'Was he ill?' she asked.
'No. He must have felt very depressed, but I never thought... I said some pretty hurtful things to him... right before.'
'I'm so sorry,' she said, taking his hand.
And before they both knew it, the night was over, the sun was rising and he found that he'd pretty much recounted his whole blog to her.
'I'm so sorry, I never made the connection,' she said over breakfast at the café around the corner. 'I mean, I remember now, it was all over the papers at the time. John Watson, the blogger. Friends of mine even sent me a link! But somehow I never got around to it.'
'That's fine,' he said, eating with appetite.
'He must have been very special.'
He grinned, dabbing his mouth. 'That he was. He was just totally and unashamedly himself. Sherlock Holmes, the great detective. Going to Buckingham Palace in a bed sheet! Flat out refused to get dressed.' He laughed.
Mary turned out to be his salvation, his reason to go on. She was warm and caring and understanding. Everything Sherlock was not. Some time ago she'd moved in with him and lately he'd started to think about proposing to her. Would she accept him? Married life. Perhaps there would be children somewhere in the future. Everything like it should be. Like he'd always wanted it to be.
No more running through dark alleys. No more rumours. No more Sherlock. Never again.
*****
'Doctor Watson? Doctor Watson?'
The young constable stood before him. The room had filled with people, chattering excitedly.
'Time to take your place on the dais, sir. Follow me, please!'
John shook his head. No time for memories now. Time to lay a ghost to rest, to restore Sherlock's reputation. That at least he could still do for him.
He followed the young man through the crowd and climbed the stairs to the podium. At the table sat the Deputy Commissioner, the Chief Superintendent at his right side, Lestrade, newly promoted to Detective Chief Inspector, to his left, and next to him Detective Inspector Sally Donovan. Mycroft Holmes was inconspicuously absent. John nodded at them all, smiled at Greg, and took his seat next to the DCS.
'How's the nose?' he asked softly. The man managed to suppress a glare and gave him a tight smile.
Donovan tapped the microphone and cleared her throat. The assembly fell silent.
'Ladies and gentlemen,' she said. 'We asked you here today to right a wrong that happened two years ago and has sadly had fatal consequences. The Deputy Commissioner of Police will now read a short statement. After that you will have the opportunity to ask questions.'
The DC rose and fumbled with his glasses. 'Ladies and gentlemen,' he began, giving them a short summary of the events that had led to Sherlock's arrest. He then stated that the police force had investigated 'the affair' after Sherlock's suicide. They'd re-opened old cases, researched every angle, but had found nothing to implicate him. Furthermore they'd looked into James Moriarty aka Richard Brook and had come to the conclusion that they were indeed one and the same and the real force behind the sensational criminal cases leading up to the arrest of the wrong suspect. He thanked the Home Office for their cooperation – John smirked – and mentioned the assistance of the French Sûreté as well as Interpol.
'Her Majesty's High Court of Justice has therefore ruled last week that the late Sherlock Holmes has been found innocent of all charges and ordered his good name to be restored. Press shall inform the public accordingly. The Metropolitan Police Service herewith wishes to apologise for any harm done – though unintentional and in performance of our duty – and to express our deepest condolences to the bereaved.' He bowed lightly in John's direction.
'Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated,' a resonant baritone resounded in the room as a tall dark figure appeared to the very left in John's field of view.
The press went wild.
Despite the flurry of camera flashes all light suddenly left the room as if taken out by the ebbing tide and darkness was closing in on John. When it came rushing back, all that he saw was red. He staggered to his feet.
Sherlock was standing not ten feet away. Dark suit and shirt, coat with upturned collar, looking the same as the last time John had seen him. Alive. Breathing. Not dead with smashed bones, a bloodied face and unseeing eyes staring into an empty sky.
He took small steps towards the apparition, his face locked into the grimace of a smile. Sherlock smiled at him, eyes sparkling, and opened his mouth to speak, but John didn't hear anything but the blood pulsing in his temples.
'You bastard!' he shouted and punched him solidly in the face. He didn't feel the impact and followed with a punch to the abdomen. Sherlock staggered backwards, his face suddenly drained of colour, but John grabbed at the lapels of his coat. They went down together, John straddling him. He didn't remember anything after that until Lestrade was on him, tackling him from behind and dragging him backwards, John still swinging.
All at once John's sense of hearing returned and he heard people screaming and shouting as a cascade of flash lights engulfed the scene on the dais. Lestrade and the Chief Superintendent held onto him as he struggled to reach Sherlock who lay crumpled on the floor. Sally Donovan was with him, trying to help him up and propping his shoulders against her knees when he went down again. Someone yelled for an ambulance.
The Deputy Commissioner stood still at the table, white as chalk, looking down at the broken glasses in his hand and mumbling, 'Oh dear, oh dear...'
Policemen came running up the steps to the dais as others tried to push the crowd of protesting reporters out of the room. Lestrade kept a tight grip to John's upper arm and dragged him down the steps.
'Come, John, come on now...' They left the melee.
*****
Mary was visiting friends for the weekend and the flat was dark as he sat on the sofa, downing a glass of whisky. The second? No, the third. 'Make that a double,' he said as he refilled it. Sherlock bloody Holmes. Large as life, not dead and gone. God, he was deliriously happy. He had not killed his best friend by abandoning him when he needed him most. No, he was bloody mad. What right did Sherlock have to be alive after all he had put him through? Those feelings didn't mix well. He would kill the bastard himself, even if it was the last thing he did. Gosh, but how very like Sherlock to pull such a stunt. Coming back from the dead. John wanted to kiss him. Ungh, perhaps not. Hug him, though. Kill him. Something.
'Two years!' he said to the empty room. Two years of grief and mourning and asking himself if he could have done anything different. If the outcome would have been – The doorbell rang.
'John,' Mycroft Holmes said, showing the most insincere of his fake smiles.
John closed the door. The bell rang again. Still Mycroft.
'Go away,' John said.
'I will. As soon as I've said what I came here for. Let me in?'
John went back into the living room, keeping his back to the unwelcome visitor standing in the door frame.
'It was my idea,' Mycroft said. 'We planned it together, but it was my idea initially. Baskerville. Remember?'
John slowly turned around. 'So you knew. The whole time you knew.' He stared at the elder Holmes.
'Afraid so.'
'Why?' said John, clenching his fists.
Mycroft sighed. 'Moriarty had to be stopped. The computer key code he bragged to possess had to be taken. We made plans, elaborate plans, for all eventualities. I prepped Moriarty with information about Sherlock that enabled him to destroy his reputation. Then we dangled Sherlock in front of him like bait. Did you never wonder why he agreed to all those interviews? We were sure he would approach Sherlock, one way or another. One final encounter to gloat and boast and show off how very clever he had been in engineering Sherlock's downfall. What we – or rather I – didn't foresee was that that cretin would kill himself and force Sherlock to follow him. As it turned out, Sherlock had planned for that, too.'
'He's dead then? Moriarty? I don't understand. How did he force Sherlock? And why didn't you tell me?'
'Any show of excessive grief on my part would have seemed absurd, don't you think? You on the other hand? His blogger – or rather biographer? If you believed Sherlock dead and acted accordingly, blogged about it in fact, nobody would believe otherwise. In a way your grief granted his survival. I am sorry, John.'
'That's nice.' John said. 'Real nice of you two to let me watch him fall to his 'death'.'
'Don't be silly, you weren't supposed to be there. Why do you think I had you called away to assist Mrs Hudson?'
'That was you!'
'Of course it was.'
John shook his head. 'I still don't understand. Why didn't you tell me later? And where has he been all this time?'
'Would you have liked me to tell you a year ago that Sherlock was alive - only to inform you a few weeks or months later that our ruse had become sad reality? He was dismantling Moriarty's network. That drugs bust in Marseille? Insider material whose origins could never be traced? That was him. The Trepoff murders in Odessa? Ukrainian mob. Sherlock played one side against the other. The rest took care of itself. In New York he -'
'And you sent him to do that by himself? I could have helped!' He should've helped. He would have.
'I just explained to you why you couldn't. My brother is an asset, John. An asset I cannot always afford to spare. But we were always in touch. He needed false papers, accommodations, money. Though three weeks ago we lost contact while he was in Serbia. I sent several tried and trusted agents after him and we tracked him down. He'd been caught invading a nuclear power plant, and was subsequently imprisoned and interrogated. Rather... harshly, I'm afraid. We were able to retrieve him.'
'Jesus. Is he all right?' Of course Sherlock had been hurt. Every time he'd worked for Mycroft he'd been hurt.
'You know him. Sherlock has a very stable constitution and surprising powers of recovery.'
'Jesus Christ,' John said again. 'I didn't know. I wouldn't have slogged an injured man!'
'Of course not,' Mycroft said. 'I told him this stunt wouldn't go over well. He wouldn't listen. If your time allows, you might want to listen to this.' He placed a black rectangular object on the coffee table.
'That's Sherlock's phone!'
'Indeed it is. Good evening, Doctor Watson.'
*****
The first thing he heard, very faintly, was the tune of 'Staying Alive' and then Moriarty's voice, 'Ah. Here we are at last – you and me, Sherlock, and our problem – the final problem.'
John shuddered and sat down, listening intently.
A few minutes in Moriarty screamed, 'There is no key, DOOFUS!'
John flinched, his sense memory flooding him with unwelcome sensations: a pool at night, it was hot and humid, and the straps of that vest were very uncomfortable.
Moriarty said, 'Now, shall we finish the game? One final act. Glad you chose a tall building – nice way to do it.'
'Do it? Do – do what?' Sherlock asked, sounding confused. 'Yes, of course. My suicide.' Defeated.
''Genius detective proved to be a fraud.' I read it in the paper, so it must be true. I love newspapers. Fairy tales. And pretty Grimm ones too.' Moriarty again.
Then Sherlock, 'I can still prove that you created an entirely false identity.'
'Oh, just kill yourself. It's a lot less effort. - Go on. For me.'
The perversity of that voice made John's blood run cold.
Then suddenly a high-pitched squeal, 'Pleeeeease?' and a short scuffle and Sherlock's voice again, 'You're insane.' Breathless.
Whatever had happened, things seemed to have turned physical at that point and John was beginning to feel sick.
'You're just getting that now?' Moriarty asked. 'Okay, let me give you a little extra incentive. Your friends will die if you don't.'
'John,' Sherlock said, sounding desperate.
John clutched the sofa's armrest so hard that his hand cramped. The pool. It was the pool all over again.
'Not just John. Everyone,' the devil whispered.
'Mrs Hudson.'
'Everyone.' The whisper again.
'Lestrade.'
'Three bullets; three gunmen; three victims. There's no stopping them now. Unless my people see you jump.'
Sherlock, John thought, don't. Just... don't.
Heavy breathing. Sherlock?
Then Moriarty again, 'You can have me arrested; you can torture me; you can do anything you like with me; but nothing's gonna prevent them from pulling the trigger. Your only three friends in the world will die... unless…'
'...unless I kill myself and complete your story.'
'You've gotta admit that sexier.' Moriarty mocked.
'And I die in disgrace.' Sherlock. Lost and alone.
John's right hand covered his mouth, stifling the enraged howl forming in his throat, while the fingers of his left shredded the armrest's fabric.
'Of course. That's the point of this. Off you pop. Go on.'
John ran. He reached the bathroom just in time.
When he returned to the living room, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, the recording was still playing and he heard Sherlock's voice, soft and sad, 'This phone call – it's, er... it's my note. For people do, don't they – leave a note?'
He turned the recording off and placed the phone very gently back on the table. He felt dirty. As if he had witnessed an act of rape.
*****
So, Sherlock had thrown himself off a tall building to save his friends, John thought, trying to soberly sort through the mess after he'd listened to the whole recording for a second time. The key code had turned out to be a fake and the whole set-up had had one purpose only, to destroy Sherlock once and for all.
His phone rang and Mary's breathless voice said, 'Oh God, John, I just saw it in the news! Are you all right? How is it even possible? I'm coming home.'
'No!' he said and then more gently, 'No. Please don't cut short your visit. I'm... I'm fine. I just need to sort this through. Alone. I need a little time...'
'I understand,' she said. 'But, please, don't do anything rash.'
He coughed out a laugh. 'I think I already did. He was just standing there, laughing, obviously happy to be back and I... Gosh, I was so mad. I literally saw red.'
'Of course you did. I completely understand. What was he thinking to put you through all this?'
'I – I just can't talk about it now, Mary. We'll talk when you're back, okay? It's... it's complicated.'
She sighed. 'Of course it is. We'll talk when you're ready. I'll be there, I promise.' They rang off.
He'd always wondered what the hell could have happened that Sherlock did something so out of character as committing suicide. The papers claimed he was a fraud? That was just stupid. Scotland Yard believed him guilty? Let them find out the truth. Destroyed reputations could be rebuilt. Of course Sherlock would have been disappointed that the very people he'd helped so often and without recompense disowned him like that. John had been mad himself. But how did killing oneself help that? You lived to fight another day.
And then Sherlock had told him – him of all people! - that he was a fake and that John ought to make that fact known to his other friends as well. It had seemed so wrong at the time and it had niggled at John ever since. Because if he was sure about one thing when it came to Sherlock Holmes, it was the fact that he was genuine.
On the other hand, what could Sherlock have said? 'John, I'm doing this for you'? That was not how you did this. It happened in war, someone giving his life for his friends. 'Go ahead, I'll cover for you and follow later', that's what you said. One didn't say melodramatic crap like, 'I'll sacrifice myself for you'. Sherlock had told them to go on. And he had given them an out: 'Believe that I'm a fake.'
And then he'd found a way to survive. Against all odds. One more miracle. Exactly what John had asked of him. He went undercover, into deadly peril, no doubt, aware that his fake death could become reality any time. Gave up his life for his friends, not physically perhaps, but in every other sense of the word. He dismantled Moriarty's network, was caught and interrogated. 'Harshly' as his brother so delicately put it. Imprisoned and all alone, not knowing if help would arrive in time.
Only to return and be punched in the gut for his efforts by a friend too angry to listen to him.
What kind of sociopath did that? Laying down your life for others was the ultimate sacrifice. This wasn't the action of an unfeeling, uncaring individual. Had all his assumptions about Sherlock been false? But how could he have been so wrong? When even Jim Moriarty had seen that Sherlock had a heart?
John turned the recording on again, punishing himself.
Afterwards he felt like crying, but in the end he just sat there waiting for the night to end.
*****
'John!' Mrs Hudson greeted him. She didn't smile and he blinked at her in confusion. Had she always been that fragile, that small?
'Just one phone call!' she said. 'One phone call would have done. After all we went through.'
'Yes, I know,' he replied. 'I am sorry. I just let it slide, Mrs Hudson. And it just got harder and harder to pick up the phone somehow. D'you know what I mean?'
'I understand how difficult it was for you after... after…'
'Yes,' he said. 'But now -'
'Now!' she said, suddenly beaming and looking years younger. 'Can you believe it? I still can't. I have to go and look in on him every half hour, because I still don't trust my eyes. Oh -' And all at once she was in his arms, and they were both clinging to each other and shaking with tears and suppressed laughter. 'But how? Why? I still don't understand. And I don't have to, I'm just so glad to have him back! Upstairs again. Alive!'
'Didn't he tell you anything?'
'Just that he was off doing something for his brother. Terribly secret and whatnot. Oh, John! But he's looking terrible. So thin and so worn. We have to feed him and look after him, make sure he gets a proper night's rest and all -'
'Mrs Hudson...'
'Yes, I understand. You go upstairs. Go talk to him!'
*****
Sherlock stood facing the window. Blue dressing gown. Violin in his left, bow in his right hand, arms hanging. Weak sunlight limning his silhouette, the way John had seen him a hundred times.
John stopped in the doorway and just watched.
Sherlock slowly turned around and placed violin and bow carefully on his armchair. 'John.' He sported a spectacular black eye and his lower lip was split and a bit puffy.
John stared at him. He had done that. Sherlock had offered no resistance, hadn't tried to defend himself at all when John had assaulted him the previous day. And John knew what his friend was capable of. They were quite evenly matched, he knew from experience. There had been a few tussles in the past, after Irene, when Sherlock had relapsed and John was forced to restrain him, though they'd never gone all out, careful not to seriously hurt each other.
'Sorry I ruined your triumphant return,' John said.
Sherlock's face was a mask, but his eyes showed his misery. 'It was a stupid idea.'
'And I'm sorry I hit you,' John continued. 'You didn't deserve -'
'Don't!' Sherlock said. 'Don't you apologise to me. I deserve - It's I who –
'Look, I know I owe you a thousand apologies. You have no idea how often I almost contacted you...'
How many times had Sherlock rehearsed that sentence in his head, John wondered. 'But you couldn't.'
'No.' Rough-soft voice, barely audible.
John stepped forward and Sherlock flinched.
'Oh God,' John said and enveloped him in a crushing hug.
Sherlock's arms came up slowly and wrapped around his shoulders. The body in his arms felt thin and fragile.
'Forgive me. Forgive me for everything I've done to you...' Sherlock said, his forehead resting on John's shoulder.
John wrapped a hand around his friend's bowed neck, feeling the soft tickle of curls on his skin. From this close he could see a few silver threads in that unruly mop of dark hair.
'I'm still mad as hell, but not at you,' he whispered. 'You are amazing! How on earth did you pull that one off?'
Sherlock's head whipped up. 'I am?'
Praise still worked its magic. 'Of course you are! You're Sherlock Holmes! Sit and tell me all about it.' He turned him around and gave him a gentle shove in the direction of his armchair.
Sherlock folded himself into it, careful not to crush the instrument behind him. John took his old seat. Home. This was home.
'Mycroft and I planned it together -' Sherlock started hesitantly.
'Yeah, I know that much.'
'Mycroft?'
'Mycroft.'
Sherlock nodded. 'When we left Miss Riley's flat I finally understood where it was all headed. That it had nothing to do with that idiotic secret code. But I had no idea how he intended to do it. I, of course, wanted to avoid dying if at all possible. So, I left you and went straight to Bart's to secure Molly's help.'
'Molly Hooper!'
'Molly Hooper. I needed someone to sign off my autopsy, you understand? Preferably without actually performing one. From there I set a few things in motion. So, when Mycroft had you called away to Mrs Hudson, I dosed myself with a blood pressure depressant – overdosed a bit actually, no fun - then went up to the roof. Jim and I had a little chat. He blew his brains out and I had to... do what I did. Imagine my alarm when you turned up again! The time frame was shortened dramatically. I had to position you, so you wouldn't be able to see my six homeless men holding the rescue net into which I jumped. Someone jostled you to give me time. The rest was window dressing, a squash ball under the armpit and holding my breath.'
'A rescue net! Do you have any idea how dangerous those things are?'
'Yes, well, I'd have preferred an air bag, obviously - I dislocated my shoulder, that hurt - but there wouldn't have been enough time to dispose of it, even if you hadn't been there, so a net it was.'
'You overdosed and you dislocated your shoulder.'
'Molly popped it in again.'
John shook his head. 'But all the people...?'
'A few were real. The rest were Mycroft's. Official Secrets Act. No problem.'
'And your homeless guys?'
'Mycroft took care of them.'
John raised an eyebrow.
'Oh, nothing like that. They're holidaying on tax payers' expenses somewhere out of the way.' He smiled, obviously pleased with himself.
'And then?'
'Well, you saw me rushed into Bart's where I landed on Molly's autopsy table. By that time I was rather out of it. Molly declared me dead, Mycroft officially identified my body and one of his men got me out of the city in a hearse. And then it was off to France.'
He was silent for a moment. 'I tried to tell you, you know,' he said softly. 'I said it was just a magic trick. You didn't understand.'
'Of course I didn't,' John said, anger seething up again. 'I was bloody horrified! Do you have any idea what it was like, seeing you like that?'
'Like seeing you with a bomb strapped to you?' Sherlock suggested.
They stared at each other.
'Yeah, well, there was that,' John muttered. 'Well, that's for the how. Now about the why. Why, Sherlock? Why the hell did you -'
'I didn't think you'd be so -' Sherlock started.
'So what?' John barked.
Sherlock jumped. 'So angry,' he said.
John raised both hands in a placating gesture. 'Of course I was angry. You were dead. I... I thought I'd killed you. I mourned you. For two years, Sherlock... you let me grieve for two years. And not only me. How could you do that?'
'I never thought – No! Why would you think that? - Look, I am sorry. I said I'm sorry. I thought you would be glad I'm back. It must've been so boring...'
John stared at him. 'You know what? For a genius you can be remarkably thick.'
'I never thought you would leave Baker Street,' Sherlock said, sounding bewildered. 'When will you move in again? We can get your things right now and -'
'I can't,' John said, trying to smile. Damn. This really wasn't something he'd wanted to discuss with Sherlock right now. By avoiding John's question, he had steered their conversation straight into even more dangerous waters. 'I – I've moved on. I had to. You were dead, don't you understand and there I was, left with the rest of my life. I've met someone and we're living together,' John blurted out, trying to get it over with as fast as possible. These things had to be said. No time like the present.
'A girlfriend,' Sherlock said.
'She's more than that. She's great. I... I'm thinking about asking her to marry me. You must meet Mary -' John faltered. This was probably not such a good idea.
Sherlock grimaced.
Definitely a bad idea.
And he wanted to say: 'Nothing really has to change that much. We'll still be able to see each other. I could have it all. A wife, a job, all the excitement, you.' But all that came out when he opened his mouth was an order: 'And you will like her!'
Sherlock said nothing.
'That doesn't mean that I can't help you with cases again. If you want me to.'
'Yes,' Sherlock said slowly. 'Of course.'
He jumped up and paced to the kitchen, his dressing gown billowing behind him. 'Tea?' he asked. 'Of course I'll meet your Mary, if I have time before I leave.'
'Leave?' John exclaimed, turning around. 'You've only just come back!'
Doing his best to stay calm and to ignore the sudden wild hammering inside his chest he got up and followed Sherlock into the kitchen.
'You've been hurt,' John said as reasonably as he could. 'And I've probably made it worse... yesterday. You need time to recover.'
Sherlock waved a hand dismissively while turning the kettle on with the other. 'It's nothing.'
He turned around and smiled brilliantly. 'It's probably for the best to be out of reach until the headlines have died down a bit. I can barely avoid all the calls asking for interviews. Had to unplug the phone. Inbox's full to bursting. I can't work with all the attention on me at the moment.'
'But where are you going?' John asked. 'And for how long?' He didn't say it, but he didn't bloody like this.
'I'll probably go to France for a while,' Sherlock said. 'My mother's house. Well, Mycroft's now.'
'You deserve a vacation,' John agreed slowly. Well, the weather in France around this time of the year was probably better and after two years of undercover work and being on the run and tortured and whatnot it was understandable that Sherlock wanted some time to relax and re-adjust, but inside him everything was screaming that this was a terrible idea and he couldn't possibly let Sherlock leave again so quickly. He'd only just got him back. And they hadn't even scratched the surface of all the things that needed to be said.
They settled down with their tea. Mrs Hudson came up and brought them sandwiches and biscuits, staying a while and chatting. Sherlock told tall stories about his adventures abroad. Cloak and dagger stuff. One big exhilarating adventure after another. A Sherlock Holmes holiday. All the while being just a bit too bright, too lively.
When Mrs Hudson left them again, John got up. He grabbed Sherlock's chin and turned his face into the fire light. Fever bright eyes, huge pupils. 'What have you taken?'
Sherlock jerked his chin out of John's grasp. 'Just pain killers. No need to worry, Doctor.'
'What happened in Serbia?' John asked, cold dread unfurling inside him. He knew what happened in such places. Not from personal experience, but he read the papers. And he'd known a few guys in the army schooled in prisoner interrogation. Nothing he wanted to do for a living. The thought of Sherlock subjected to... that made him sick to his stomach.
Sherlock hesitated. 'It got a bit rough. A few beatings. Nothing I couldn't handle. Mostly sleep deprivation and starvation. I can go days without eating and sleeping, you know. Really, totally unimaginative lot, those Serbians.'
John laughed despite himself. Trust Sherlock to complain about unimaginative interrogation techniques.
John knew that Sherlock could go without food for days. He always did on cases, claiming that digestion slowed him down. He'd made asceticism into an art form. When he did eat, he was normally not fussy and would be content with fish and chips or beans on toast or whatever could be provided quickly.
On the other hand, when he really indulged himself - normally in celebration of a successfully closed interesting case - he took John to the most fantastic restaurants John had ever encountered. Places he'd never heard of and which were only known to a select few. Real Szechuan, gloriously spicy Indian, the most excellent Italian. Once they had dined - unbeknownst to John at first – on fugu, the deadly puffer fish. Delicious.
Still, it couldn't have been as harmless as he pretended. John had seen his hands. Sherlock had beautiful hands. Strong, but delicate, with long, slender fingers, always immaculately manicured. Now his nails were worn down to the quick, the cuticles torn and rough. His knuckles showed abrasions and his wrists were bandaged. Sherlock, sensing John's gaze, at once hid them in the folds of his dressing gown.
John remembered how he'd first found out about the secret of Sherlock's grooming. About once a month or so Sherlock would vanish for a full day without any explanation. At first John hardly noticed, but when he did and asked what Sherlock was up to he just mumbled something about 'maintenance' and was gone before John could ask any further questions. Then, one day, when he took a taxi, the cabby asked, 'La Maison Balmaine?'
'What?' John said.
'I said, La Maison Balmaine. As in do you want to go there? Lookin' a bit rough, mate.'
John hadn't shaved that day. 'I've no idea what you're talking about,' he said.
The cabby sighed. 'Guess not. Took Mr 'olmes earlier today. Thought you were to join 'im. Whatever. Where'd you want to go?'
Maintenance day! John thought. 'You know what,' he said. 'You're right. Just take me there.'
The cabby shook his head. Why couldn't passengers just make up their minds?
They arrived at a posh location in St. James Street. 'La Maison Balmaine, Day Spa & Beauty Parlour' stated the elegant hunter green awning above the door. John gaped at it uncomprehendingly. Then realisation dawned. The vain git, he thought and grinned. For someone who maintained his body was only transport, Sherlock liked to present said transport in immaculate condition.
He could just imagine Sherlock succumbing to massages and pampering, probably purring like a cat, indulging himself like a lascivious odalisque in a Turkish bath. His very physical reaction to these mental images caught him by surprise.
'On the other hand,' he said to the cabby, 'why don't you just drive me to New Scotland Yard?'
The man gave him the side-eye, but did as he was told.
John never mentioned it to Sherlock, but did so to his girlfriend at the time and was treated to a longish discourse about how empowering it was for a man to not overemphasise his masculinity, but instead to embrace the female side of his personality. John didn't really think that Sherlock needed any more empowering, but didn't say so (he hadn't scored yet).
Amanda (was it?) was really excited to meet the hero of his blog. She was a blogger herself (something or other about feminism in the twenty second century), that was how they had met. But when he brought her home to Baker Street, things went downhill from the start when Sherlock told her that not shaving her legs did nothing to further the cause of feminism and that if she was so averse to the male gaze, why hadn't she avoided John's gaze in the first place?
The whole thing degenerated into what could only be called a bitch fest of epic proportions and ended with Amanda slamming the door on her way out and with John being on the brink of punching Sherlock in the face before he ran after her.
The next day John found an irate post - or rather a rant - on her blog about the terrible, horrible white male privilege appropriating women's own means and expressions of their femininity to further patriarchal power etcetera, etcetera. John hadn't bothered to make sense of even half of it. Amanda was history.
There probably hadn't been much opportunity for pampering in the two years Sherlock was undercover, John thought, gazing at Sherlock's hands tucked away in his dressing gown. And suddenly the idea of Sherlock all alone without even the simplest comforts of home – his armchair, his dressing gowns, his beloved violin – made him quite unbearably sad.
And he wanted to tell Sherlock as much. In fact he wanted to tell him a great many things. He just wasn't sure what and where to start. How did you say, 'I know you did what you did for me, for us, for your friends, and it was brave and heroic and I love and admire you for it' to someone who claimed to be a sociopath? How did you say, 'I mourned you and missed you and it was hell on earth, really, but what you did must have been as hard at least' to someone who would just make a joke about unimaginative interrogation methods in Serbia?
For some time they just sat there, saying nothing. Sherlock took up his violin, softly plucking a few strings.
In the past they had spent many a day in comfortable silence, neither of them feeling the need for meaningless chatter. John might have offered a 'Good morning!' on coming down from his room and finding Sherlock downstairs in his dressing gown. To which Sherlock might have responded with 'hrm...', hardly looking up from whatever he kept himself occupied with. Sometimes that was the only communication they shared for the day. It never mattered.
It felt different now with all these unspoken things between them. Dusk settled in and John looked at his watch. Blimey, it was late. And Mary would be waiting.
'I have to go,' he said reluctantly, getting up slowly and feeling like a coward. 'You look after yourself, will you? Eat, sleep, rest!'
Sherlock didn't answer.
Not sure where to look, John shifted uneasily from foot to foot. 'All right,' he said, aiming for casual and missing by a mile, 'I'll call you tomorrow and we'll set a date. I really want you to meet Mary.'
Sherlock still said nothing.
John went slowly towards the door and put on his coat. A last look at Sherlock, still lost in thought in his chair before the fire, and John was heading down the stairs. He thought he heard Sherlock's voice calling out to him, but couldn't be quite sure.
As he walked towards the Jubilee line on his way home to the suburbs, to Mary, he noticed the phone in his pocket. It felt far heavier than it should. Sherlock had of course dodged any explanation of the 'why' and John had been too gut-less to insist. He just couldn't go there now. Not now when it was all still so raw. Next time, he promised himself. Next time they'd really talk. About everything. And he'd tell Sherlock... what? What exactly would he tell him, for Christ's sake?
Something tickled his cheek. He swiped at it with his thumb and it came away wet. He put it down to joy.