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He kissed John's fair hair lightly, noting once again how the silver strands were slowly far outnumbering the ash blond, then slipped silently from his embrace and trod quietly to their shared desk, sat down and opened his laptop. He stared at the empty screen and wondered how John kept doing it year after year. It was different, he supposed. John had been writing little more than a fairy story - he had created a character, more a myth than a flesh and blood human being - not that it was his fault, he had given him the raw material, and John had run with it. He had given him an untouchable, seemingly indestructible machine? Yes, that was the word he had used - and it was deserved, at least it had been then, before. Before he had let everything go straight to hell.
It had been his arrogance and pride - he thought, then paused.
Perhaps.
Or had it been just showing off? Perhaps it was a bit of that too. Okay, yeah, yeah it was a lot of showing off. But it was all he knew - he hadn't known how to - he didn't have the language. Yes, he knew the things one was supposed to say. There were the words people always said, but they didn't feel enough, and he hadn't known, still didn't know, how to express his feelings in a way that didn't feel overly - fluffy? And yet, there was no rational, logical way of putting how he felt without sounding like a textbook. He had spent nights reading the great poets, hoping for help - he had all the sonnets in his head, Neruda's odes, alphabetised, and ordered just so - Auden - cummings - even the ancient haiku writers, there was nothing he could point to in a book and wake John up and say, "this. This is what I've been trying to tell you since the moment I laid eyes on you." He had no guidelines, no net. Yes, John and he were - they were what they were, together, yes, finally together, he could kiss him and touch him, and they made love in a way he didn't even know was possible, he felt safe for the first time in his life when he was in John's arms, feeling his pulse under his fingertips. He hadn't even - he hadn't even guessed that people, no - that he could ever know what that sensation was like, flying and yet completely connected to the man who made had made him - human. Human? He closed his eyes and ruffled his hair in frustration.
"How do people do this?" he growled.
"Do what, love?" John yawned from his chair.
"Damn. How long -"
"Long enough. I was curious what was keeping you up at night."
"I -" Sherlock turned to face his laptop. "At this point a blank screen."
"A month now?" John rose from his chair and walked over to him and laid his hands on his shoulders, just enough pressure to -
"Hmmm... yeah, I suppose, perhaps longer."
"Can I help?"
Sherlock sighed. "I thought, have been thinking - since we are now - have been - you know - as we are, since -"
"Two years now, last week. Monday, no.... Tuesday, yep, Tuesday, I remember because we got that client who -"
"That long?" Sherlock turned and looked up at him.
"Uhmhmmm."
"Damn. I didn't even realise." Sherlock turned away and glanced down at his trembling hands as they hovered, frozen over the keyboard, as if the words would decide to come now.
"I'm the one who keeps track of those kinds of things, it's not important."
"You should have said something."
"Sherlock."
"It matters to some people - anniversaries - symbols - things - you should have someone - who remembers these things... how these things are supposed to go."
John snorted. Definitely a snort. "You think - " He stopped as Sherlock lowered his head. "Damn. This has been - you've been worrying - I - should have noticed, I've just - I've just been so ridiculously, blissfully happy lately -"
Sherlock lifted his head and studied John's face. The worry lines in his face did appear to be lessening, he did laugh more often lately, it hadn't occured to him that it - "why?"
"Why?"
"Yes. What is it -"
"Not a what, a whom."
"Whom, then?"
"You really need to me to tell you?" John sighed. "Hell. I - uhm - ever since - to be honest - I don't, can't remember a day when I didn't love you, and - the last two years, since you came back to me -"
"Say that again - the part -"
"I love you?"
Sherlock nodded. "That - is that - I didn't think - is it really that simple?"
"It can be. But you've always liked things to be more complicated than they need to be."
"Is it enough for you?"
"You have always been enough. Always. Now - I can make us a cuppa and I can listen to all of your poems, alphabetically or otherwise, or -"
John pressed a kiss to Sherlock's forehead, and sighed as Sherlock leaned into him, then heard him whisper carefully, "I love you, too. Can we just - I'm - just so tired, John."
"Shhh. I know, come, time for bed, love."