Chapter Text
“I guess we’re lab partners, then.”
Sherlock looked up at the girl who was taking the seat next to his. Eighteen, just like him. Orphaned. Only child. Grew up in a foster home or homes. She stayed in one for a long time. Nervous around guys. Had someone to look after her. Foster brother that took an interest in her. No dogs or cats. Textbooks are all ebooks but she carries around a fiction book in her purse. It’s doggy-eared to death so it’s hers and it’s one she doesn’t read anymore. It’s just sentiment.
“Emily Brooks.”
“What?”
“It’s my name. That’s the only thing you probably can’t figure out by looking at me.” She smirked. “You were saying all that aloud. Don’t worry, prof warned me when he told me where to sit.”
“That’s not how people normally react when I deduce them.”
“How do they normally react?”
“They usually tell me to piss off.”
She bit her lip trying not to smile. “What you said was all true. Why should I care if you know?”
“William Holmes.”
“Hm?”
“That’s my name.”
“I know.”
***
Emily was rather quick to call him Sherlock. “William is just too normal for a guy like you. So, you should just go by Sherlock, Sherlock.”
He rolled his eyes as she took a bite from her sandwich. “Only my parents and brother call me Sherlock.”
“And now I do too. Besides I know too many Williams. I’d rather know just one Sherlock.”
Something fluttered in his stomach when she smiled at him and Sherlock instantly squashed it down. Emily was his only friend at Uni. He’d rather not ruin it by doing something stupid.
***
The first time Emily Brooks slapped him was when she found him high in her flat when they were twenty. He wasn’t sure how he got there, but he could only guess that he broke in. She had found him sitting on her counter eating some crisps.
“What are you doing?”
“Eating.”
“Christ, what is that smell?”
“Cocaine probably.”
Her brown eyes widened. “Oh my god, are you high?”
“I’m fine.”
She dropped her bag and pulled out a penlight. Emily grasped his chin and tilted his head down slightly so he was looking at her directly.
“You’re really pretty.”
She scowled and turned the light on to check the dilation of his eyes. Inwardly, Sherlock guesses he came here because Emily wanted to work in a hospital, ergo, she probably knew how to handle this. She put the light away and put her hands on her hips, fuming.
“I’m fine.”
She slapped him. Once. Twice. Thrice.
“How dare you?” She seethed. “Say you’re sorry!”
“Sorry your boyfriend broke up with you.” He really wasn’t though.
“Stop it. Just, stop it.”
He kissed her. She gasped, allowing his tongue to slip in and claim her mouth as his own. His. She was his and no one else’s. No Sebs or Johns or Jims or Gregs or Toms could claim her. She was his. Emily Brooks was his. He moaned when he felt her fingers tangled I his hair.
She promptly yanked his head away from hers and stormed over to her bag and called Mycroft.
Sherlock was shipped off to rehab and Emily didn’t talk to him until two weeks after he came back.
***
“I’m sorry.”
She glared at him when she found him in her flat again. “Sorry for what? You have plenty of things to be sorry about, Sherlock. To which are you apologizing?”
“For everything that day.”
She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Are you sorry for getting high?”
He looked away.
“Christ Sherlock! This isn’t a game! You could have overdosed!”
“I didn’t take that much,” he muttered, slumping on her couch.
“That’s what every lucky addict says when they survive an OD!” She took a shuddering breath. “You obviously aren’t sorry for breaking into my flat since you’ve done it again!”
He looked away.
“Considering you’ve obviously been eating some of my food, you’re definitely not sorry for that!” She laughed. She stormed over to him, looking above him. Her fiery red hair glowed in the light. “Christ, Sherlock! You aren’t sorry, you’re just sorry Mycroft shipped you to rehab!”
“You’re right, I’m not sorry.” He glared at her. “I’m not sorry for slowing my brain down just so I could feel normal. That’s what you want isn’t it? Normal? That’s why you go around dating guys who will give you all those boring things like a house in the country and kids. You want normalcy since you couldn’t have it as a child. You want normal because your foster brother made damn sure you would never feel normal again after what he did to you.” Her eyes widened with every sentence. “So, no. I’m not sorry. Happy?”
“No. No, I’m not. Sherlock, I could have come home and found you dead.” She was crying now.
Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. He didn’t want her to cry.
“No, Emily, please, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.” He stood up quickly and cupped her face in his hands.
“Were you even thinking of me or your family when you did it?” She glared at him through her tears. “You could have died and I would have been the one to find you! Do you have any idea what that would have done to me?!”
“I’m sorry,” Sherlock repeated. “I’m so sorry.”
He kissed her again.
He pulled away and looked at her wide, almost black eyes. She was breathing heavily and searching for an answer he couldn’t really give her because for once he didn’t know.
He kissed her again, his arms sliding around her waist and pulling her flush against him. Her arms slid around his neck and her fingers tangled in his hair. She opened her mouth to his and moaned as his tongue slid against hers in a fight for dominance Sherlock didn’t mind losing.
They came apart for breath and Sherlock kissed her temple as he held her. “I’m sorry.”
“If you ever take drugs again William Sherlock Scott Holmes, I’m never going to do that again. I’m not doing anything for you ever again.”
He shuddered at the hot air against his neck. She pulled back to look at him. Sherlock bent his head and pressed his nose to her throat and nuzzled her neck. Emily tightened her arms around his neck and pulled herself closer. He groaned as his body let them both know just how much he wanted her.
“If you ever feel like it’s too much, you can have me. Wait! I didn’t mean…” Her breath hitches as he pressed his lips to her pulse point.
“Emily…”
“What do you need?”
He pulled back and looked at her. “You.”
***
Sherlock was clean and actually attending classes. He ate lunch with Emily every day and even sat in on some of her classes. She moved into his flat and, for once, Sherlock could actually say he was happy. He was really happy.
“Sherlock!” She flung herself into his arms and claimed his mouth as soon as they found their balance. She pulled away from him, beaming, as he held her off the ground. “I got a job offer!”
“I knew you would,” he smirked.
“No, you don’t understand! I’ve wanted this job for ages!”
“For longer than you’ve wanted me?”
She rolled her eyes. “Believe it or not, my world doesn’t revolve around you, Sherlock.”
He growled and kissed her again. “Well, mine does.”
He sat down on their couch and she straddled his lap, grinding against him as their kiss deepened. Her breath hitched as he pressed hot kisses against her throat and then sucked at her collarbone with the hunger of a man half-starved. His hands slid under her shirt.
“Sherlock, we’ve never…”
“I know.”
They hadn’t had sex. Regardless of what other people believed. Sherlock was too damn scared of hurting her and Emily didn’t want to push him into something he wasn’t a hundred percent sure about. Sherlock didn’t want to be like the foster brother that had hurt her—that had taken what wasn’t his or even Sherlock’s to take.
“I want you, Emily Brooks.” He pressed his hand against her cheek and brushed his thumb along her bottom lip. “I want to take all the memories of him and replace them with memories of me. If you don’t want it, I’ll wait. I’ll wait a hundred years if that’s what it takes. I want to worship you Emily. I don’t believe in god, but I believe in you.”
She took a shaky breath. “I want you too Sherlock. God, I think I’ve always wanted you.”
She pressed herself against him and Sherlock never felt more at home.
***
Sherlock came home from class to find Emily sitting on their bed. It was obvious that she had been crying. He dropped his bag and was instantly on his knees before her, cupping her face in his hands.
“Emily? What’s wrong?”
She opened her brown eyes and pressed her hands over his. “Sherlock?”
“What do you need?”
“Deduce me,” she whispered. “I can’t… I can’t say it.”
She was crying. She was disheveled. No bruises anywhere so she wasn’t assaulted. God he never wanted that to happen. He needed to ask Mycroft to keep an eye on her. She’s wearing that ridiculous hoodie she had gotten for him for Christmas. She wanted him nearby but didn’t want to bother him. She had been home all day. She was hiding something. Her hands here in the hoodie pocket when he came in. They hadn’t simply been in there they had been…
“Are you pregnant?”
“I took three tests.” She looked away. “But I have to go to the doctor to make sure.” She bit her lip. “I’m sorry. I know this isn’t what you wanted.”
Oh. She was afraid. Did she think he was going to leave her? Hadn’t he told her he loved her? Why would she think he would leave her? He closed his eyes and thought about all their interactions. He skipped over the intimate ones because getting hard would not help at all. His eyes snapped open. He never told her he loved her. He never said it. Could he say it?
She’d probably think he said it to make her happy because she was emotionally exhausted right now. He’d wait just a little bit longer.
“Emily, I want you,” he kissed her lips. “I want you more than anything I’ve ever wanted. I’ve dreamed about my life with you. We’ll move to the country after we save enough money. I’ll raise bees and sell honey while I solve a rousing case of ‘whose sheep is whose.’ You’ll be a town doctor everyone adores to the point where they just put up with me. We’ll give our baby ten brothers or sisters. Our children will be brilliant and happy because they have the best mum in the entire world, because to me, she’s the person who mattered most.”
She gave him a watery smile. “Ten?”
He sighed and pressed his face to her lap. “Is that the only thing you heard?”
She giggled. “I love you, Sherlock Holmes.”
He hummed and shifted slightly so his chin rested in her lap and he pulled her forward to kiss her belly.
***
“We should name her Anne.”
“What?” He looked up at her from his computer. His wife was sitting in his chair, rubbing her large belly.
“Anne. We should name her Anne after the pirate Anne Bonny. We can get a dog and name it Redbeard the Second.”
He smiled. “Anne Begonia Emily Holmes.” He set his computer aside and knelt down next to his wife. He pressed his cheek to her belly and listened to their daughter’s heartbeat. “I like it.”
***
“Sherlock, I have to go!” She giggled as he pressed her against the wall.
“Mm. No you don’t.” He pulled open her shirt and pressed his lips to her collar, knowing the fabric would cover it up as soon as it was righted. “Annie’s too sick to go, so you should just stay home.” He moved her up, so she straddled his thigh. “What’s the point of a parent-child staff meeting if you can’t bring your child along?”
She tangled her fingers in his hair. “Because we’re talking about how to make—” she gasped as he began suck at her pulse point— “we’re petitioning for more benefits as parents.” She moaned as he claimed her lips again.
“Stay with me Emily.”
She rolled her eyes, although those eyes were very dialated. “See, this is why I can’t stay. One of us needs to take care of Annie.” She pressed a ridiculously chaste kiss, considering their position, to his cheek. “Besides. I might be able to petition for more hours off to spend with you.”
Sherlock grumbled against her neck and sighed, letting her down. “I suppose I can spare you for a few hours. Besides, Annie likes sleeping on my chest.”
Emily giggled. “That’s because you snore and she likes your rumbly chest.” She kissed him again. “I’ll be home in a few hours.” She straightened herself out and headed out the door. “Love you!”
“I’ll see you soon!” He shouted as he went to check on his daughter.
***
Annie was asleep on his chest, a book about pirates on his lap, and Sherlock was proud at how quickly his daughter calmed down. She was already speaking in four word sentences. His daughter was a genius. She was going to be his partner in crime solving all those sheep cases once they move to the countryside.
His phone began to ring. Sherlock pulled it out and saw it was Mycroft. He answered it.
“What?”
“You need to get to the hospital, brother mine.” Mycroft’s voice was unnaturally tight as though he was crying. “There’s been an accident.”
Sherlock stood up, holding his daughter to his chest. She whimpered a complaint and he began to rock her carefully, pressing kisses to her curly red hair. “Are Mummy and Dad okay?”
“They’re fine, Sherlock.” He could hear his brother taking a shaking breath.
“What is it Mycroft? What’s wrong?”
“It’s Emily. She’s been in an accident.” Sherlock stumbled back into his chair. It was jarring enough that Annie began to cry. “I’m sending you a car, brother mine. It should be there in a few minutes.”
“Is she okay?”
Silence.
“Mycroft? Is she okay?”
“It doesn’t look good, Sherlock.”
***
He couldn’t breathe. Sherlock couldn’t breathe. He ran to Emily’s room. Whatever breath was remaining in his lungs was gone when he saw her hooked on life support. He staggered forward, clutching Annie who was strapped to his chest.
“Emily?” He clutched the railing of her bed. “Emily?”
She was covered in bandages that covered third-degree burns. Something had been wrong with their car and part way to the hospital it had… Mycroft’s people were looking at it. She opened her brown eyes to him and he could see how much pain she was in despite how much they seemed to be dosing her.
“Sherlock?” Her breathing mask fogged with her breath. “It hurts…”
“I know. I know, Em.” His voice was shaking. “It’s going to be okay.”
“I don’t want her to see me like this…”
“She’s asleep. She’s asleep.” He reached out to touch her. He needed to touch her to know she was alright.
“Sherlock?”
“What is it? What do you need?”
“I love you…”
Tears were dripping down his nose as he looked at his wife. “I know, Em.”
“Say it…”
“W-what?”
“Say it like you mean it…” Her voice echoed off the hospital walls and he almost couldn’t stand anymore.
“I…” Had he never said it before? He had. He knew he had. He thought it almost every second of the day. How could he have not said it? “I love you—” the beeping turned into a steady note before he could finish. “I love you! Emily, please!”
Annie began to scream as doctors rushed in and pushed him out. Sherlock stumbled back into the wall and slid down. Annie was wailing in his arms and began screaming for her mummy. He held his daughter to his chest and began to sob into her hair.
No. Emily. No. No. No. Emily.
***
Sherlock wouldn’t let anyone touch his daughter during the funeral. Some of Emily’s coworkers and friends offered to carry his daughter, but he pulled away the second they touched her. Annie was his. She was his and Emily’s and no one else could touch her.
It had been foul play.
None of these people could be trusted. None of them. Emily trusted too easily. She loved him after all. Didn’t make for a sound judgment maker on her part.
Emily. Emily!
“Sherlock,” Mycroft put his hand on his brother’s shoulder. “However hard this was just know—”
“All lives end,” Sherlock said, the bitterness choking him. “All hearts are broken. Caring is not an advantage.” He glared at his brother, holding Annie closer to him, throwing his brother’s old words at him.
Mycroft looked pained. “I know what you feel is different. But she was my sister in all but blood, Sherlock. I mourn her too.”
“Then maybe you should have watched her more closely or kept her far away from me,” Sherlock spat before storming away to go through every piece of evidence that might lead him to Emily’s murderer.
***
“Where Mummy?” Annie asked, softly against his neck, as they curled into bed that night.
“She’s far away.”
“Holly-day?”
“No, sweetheart.”
“Home soon?”
“No, sweetheart.”
“Can get her?”
“No, sweetheart.”
“Mummy bye-bye?”
Sherlock buried his face in his daughter’s hair. “Yes, sweetheart.”
***
It was a couple weeks later that Sherlock tried heroin for the first time. He regretted it almost instantly, but then remembered Emily couldn’t find him dead in their flat because she was already gone. Everything felt so clearly though. A rush of thoughts came to mind. He’d find who did this. Who took his Emily.
Emily. Emily.
He went to the bathroom and closed the door, away from Annie, who was crying for Emily in her crib. He thought about only Emily. He turned on the shower and walked in, unzipping his pants.
Emily. Tears began to stream down his cheeks to the point that he couldn’t see. He felt disgusting. His daughter was crying and he wasn’t helping her. Emily.
Sherlock rushed to the toilet and vomited. He sat there for a moment longer before going back to the shower and cleaning himself up. He changed into his pajamas and went to the nursery.
“Daddy!” Annie reaches up for him and Sherlock picked his daughter up and sat down in the rocker. She burrowed into his chest and Sherlock closed his eyes as he began to rock them both. “Want Mummy…”
“Me too, sweetheart. Me too.”
Sherlock liked the initial feeling. A higher dosage might be better.
***
“This is not what you think.” He looked up in a haze from the mess of his flat at his older brother. Annie was locked in her room, asleep. Sherlock always made sure she was asleep. “This is for a case.”
“What case could possibly justify this?” There was a slight growl in Mycroft’s voice that Sherlock had never heard before.
“Emily.” Sherlock narrowed his eyes, standing up shakily. “Emily Victoria Holmes.”
“I am already having it looked into, Sherlock.”
“Yet you’ve found nothing.” Sherlock went to the front door of his flat and opened it. “Bye-bye.”
A smartly dressed woman, Mycroft’s PA, stepped in and passed Sherlock and her employer. Sherlock narrowed his eyes and saw her going to Annie’s room.
“Unwise, brother mine.”
Sherlock growled and twisted his brother’s arm behind his back and pushed Mycroft into the doorframe. “Brother mine,” he hissed, twisting Mycroft’s arm harder. “Don’t appal me when I’m high.”
“She isn’t safe with you, Sherlock.”
“She’s my daughter!”
“Then bloody act like a father then!” Mycroft roared. He stomped on Sherlock’s bare foot and rammed his head back and cracked Sherlock’s nose. His younger brother stumbled back, letting him go. Mycroft grabbed Sherlock by the collar and shook him. “Is this what Emily would have wanted? Is this what she would have wanted? You overdosing while your daughter—HER DAUGHTER—was locked inside her room days on end?”
“Daddy? Unc-Myc?”
The two Holmes men looked over and saw Anthea holding a sleepy Annie in her arms, a bag packed with essentials slung over her shoulders. Annie was watching them with her large blue-green eyes. Sherlock’s knees grew weak and he stumbled back against the wall to find balance. Mycroft instantly cooled his expression.
“Hello, Anne,” Mycroft said gently, going over to his niece and picking her up. The little girl snuggled to his chest. “I’m taking you to Gran and Grad’s house. Doesn’t that sound lovely?”
She yawned in response and snuggled closer to him, resting her cheek against his shoulder.
“Don’t take her from me Mycroft. Don’t take her from me.” Sherlock sank to the floor, begging.
“Then get clean, brother mine.”
***
Sherlock tried. He truly did, but every time his thoughts about Emily became too much he found himself slipping back into the habit. It became easy.
Emily. Emily.
After two years he was on cocaine again. The drug that gave him the courage to kiss Emily for the first time. His father had called to let him know Annie had been diagnosed with childhood leukemia. She’d have to move to London soon for treatment. ‘You should visit, Sherlock,’ his father had almost whispered over the phone. ‘She needs her daddy, son.’
Somehow he was able to stumble to his parents home and break in. Well, he didn’t break in, he had a key. He stumbled through the house and found his daughter’s room. It had been his old room. It was the room he and Emily shared when they stayed here together.
Annie was four now. Christ. His daughter was four.
Sherlock fell to the ground after stubbing his toe on the doorframe. He began to curse under his breath. Annie shifted in her bed.
“Who’s there?”
Sherlock pushed himself up and stumbled over to her bed and sat on it. She blinked up at him.
“Do you know who I am?” He croaked.
She watched him, analyzed him. “Your my daddy, Uncle Sherlock.”
His heart dropped. “If I’m your daddy, then why do you call me uncle?”
“Uncle Myc said I should since you do bad things,” she said, pulling a pirate doll to her chest. “He says you do bad things so I can’t be with you. He says my mummy would be really sad because you do bad things.”
“She would be,” he looked away. “Your mummy would be very sad.” Emily. Emily.
Annie slipped out of bed and pulled something from her bookshelf. Still clutching her doll she handed a very realistic cast skull to Sherlock.
“This is Billy,” she said, as though this explained everything. “I talk to him about you sometimes. I talk to him about Mummy too. I talk to him when I miss one of you.” Sherlock glanced at her. “You can have him if you want.”
“Don’t you want him?”
She nodded. “I can’t take him to the hospital,” she pouted. She looked so much like her mother that a smile ghosted across Sherlock’s features. “And I have Gran and Grad and Uncle Myc to talk to when I get lonely. You don’t have anybody.” She looked at Billy the Skull. “He doesn’t have any body either, so you’ll get along.”
“Thank you, Annie,” he whispered, clutching the skull to his stomach.
“Uncle Sherlock?”
He felt his stomach hollow out and press into his spine. “Yes, sweetheart?”
“Can you stop doing bad things so you can come see me and I can stay with you?”
“I’ll try, sweetheart.”