Chapter Text
Sherlock was at the door.
What was one supposed to do when they were on the fly?
The only thing John could manage was to stand, all taut mien. His limbs felt cold. His right hand was still holding the edge of the door. Fingertips were not enough sinewy to penetrate themselves through the wood as if his circulation just evaporated, vascular access deprived of corpuscles, only left with plasma to freeze him to death - a quasi anaemi. No strength to the body. Haemoglobine concentration might as well be below 10.0 g/dl. That would explain the sudden need of giving in to gravity, to cave in.
The amber light of the staircase was catching Sherlock's swirls of hair, flaring through tiny locks, making his entire semblance a dark silhouette. His face wasn’t the luminous in this twilit room of Baker Street but John could still make out his facade even if little, those aurora crystal eyes never failing to seize and reflect the perfect radiance. The man’s lungs must have been hungry for he took a seep-like breath, right before a familiarly timbre sound.
A silken, cultured voice said, “John.”
Thus, to cave in wasn’t so bad when one thought about it, John’s frosty brain concluded. His knees gave way, floorboards welcoming.
Let the gravity take you...
A pair of strong clamps of sort stopped him going down, helped him, then held him against a very warm, heaving wall of something. A chest. Those clamps were tiddering his back, going to and fro. Slowly, strokingly, the motion restarting some of the blood flow his body lacked. A tremour ran through the muscles on his thighs, slacking them as a calid breath blown on top of his hair tingled its way down his right ear. His neck cringed and cried to be lifted but his eyes disagreed, closed themselves and demanded to be stay dropped. As if they somehow knew if he peered them open there would be nothing but blurry shapes refusing to resolve into an image. A groan slipped out of his throat instead and long fingers cupped the back of his head, hunting the cringing feeling down and shooing it away.
Another groan erupted itself but this time it was slabbery. Deep intakes of breaths catching in the way of saliva and producing shaky exhales. John's jaw clenched as another, fuller wave washed through him, bringing tailspin in tow. He could feel cool dampness from where his brows were pressed against the warm heat of a wetted area on white shirt. The fingers on his neckline crawled themselves through his hair, ever the gentlest.
Gentlest, really? One could say nimble, but gentle?
“Shut. Up!”
The chest he was pressed at puffed stiffly. The fingers stopped short in his hair, slightly mid-air and there was no breeze through his right ear; breathing stopped. No, no. Not again. He cursed himself and clunched on the gaunt waist of Sherlock - Sherlock! - with fervour energy, riveting them together for dear life. His own breaths turning sharp at their edges once again, catching on sounds he could not stifle even if he tried. He could hear his vocal cords screeching with fever. Now, his throat was full with searing. A pain bubbling inside, trying its way out. “Please,” he rowned, though oblivious as to what he was calling for.
Soon enough the mission critical breathing resurged itself in the wake of a soft “Oh.” Gentle fingers were back again on the game, caring their way through strands on his skull. The other hand on the small of his back pulled him closer still, and then they were rocking. Dimly, he could make out low murmurs of sympathies against his temple. That deep rich acoustic phenomenon against his temple... There was a hot, fleeting press of lips to his hairline, then those lips were back on his temple to continue their quiet mumbles. Wafting on his burning skin. Leaving room for hypersensitivity to linger.
What was one supposed to do when they were on the fly? Because there was a long gone but very much alive Sherlock standing in his-
Our.
-their parlour with his hot breath down his temple and long fingers up his skull and- and...
With his eyes still shut, voice hushed, John said, “Sherlock,” and could hear the shake in his own voice. It was surprising that he wasn’t fuming the anger that was clandestinely bulking within him already. He tried uttering an acrid “Why today-” which didn't quite come out as an inquiry as he meant it to be though he wasn’t even sure if he meant it to be. Because, really, who cared if it was today or any other day as long as he came. And he did, came back. From the dead. God, he could still be dreaming and that was the very last thing he would ever want.
// TBC //