Work Text:
.1.
Upon arrival at 221B Baker Street, he makes a comment about the state of the flat, and Sherlock gets to tidying before he's barely finished his sentence, straightening papers and shifting piles. He doesn't think anything of it at the time, but later--after dead bodies become recreation, after "a bit not good," after John watches, panicking, as Sherlock inspects a single pill in his palm--he remembers: Sherlock, caught off guard, wanting to impress him, wanting to fix it so he'll stay. And it works.
.2.
He is "friend" when they meet Sebastian. John is too quick to correct him, already too used to thinking of what they do as work. He doesn't want Sebastian Wilkes to think he's some idle tagalong. It's easy to disappear in the shadow of the great Sherlock Holmes. But Sherlock goes still beside him, and it's too late to explain.
.3.
After they escape Moriarty, shaken but unscathed, in the early morning hours just on the edge of dawn when John is finally able to drag his exhausted body upstairs and collapse into bed, there is the sound of feet on the stairs, the tired creak of old door hinges, the dip of the mattress. John pries his eyes open and watches Sherlock slip in beside him, and Sherlock stares back, always waiting for the inevitable piss off, waiting for freak. But John just shifts across the sheets, out of the center of the bed, waits for Sherlock to settle himself, and drifts back to sleep with Sherlock's thumb stroking the pulse in his wrist.
It's a bit strange, but then, so is everything about them. And seeing as Sherlock seems to think it's acceptable to have clandestine meetings in the middle of the night with the most dangerous man John has ever met, he'll deal with a bit of strangeness if it means keeping Sherlock close enough to stop him from rushing back out after him again. Or at least until John's rested enough to go running off with him.
.4.
After Switzerland, John moves through life on autopilot. He goes to Sherlock's funeral, which is remarkably well attended for someone who claimed to have no friends. He packs up Sherlock's things in boxes for Mycroft to collect and has a spectacular breakdown in the middle of it all, leaving him a sobbing, undignified mess on the floor until Mrs. Hudson finds him, clasps his shaking hand in hers, and sits with him until he can catch his breath again.
He tries to make a new life for himself even though he already knows what a disaster it will turn out to be. He picks up shifts at the surgery to pay for a dingy flat far from the oppressive silence of Baker Street. He forces smiles and ignores the nightmares when they creep back in the dark and reminds himself that his limp is psychosomatic even as he clutches the doorframe, rubbing aching muscles.
Everyone assures him in quiet voices that ooze sympathy that it takes time, that it will get better, and it does, eventually. He can forgo the cane most days and hide his hand in his pocket, and after about two years, he finds he's finally mastered the art of barely getting by.
.5.
"You absolute bastard," John rasps when Sherlock shows up three years later, bedraggled and rail thin and very much not dead.
"I know," Sherlock says, and he at least has the decency to look a bit ashamed of himself.
"I thought you were--we all thought you--"
"I know," Sherlock says again. "John, I--"
"Three years," John bellows, and he shoves Sherlock hard enough to send him stumbling back into the wall.
"Three years, two months, and...two weeks? Maybe three. I'm not sure. What day is it?"
"You are unbelievable," John says, his fists clenching at his sides.
"I had to see it through," Sherlock mutters. "I couldn't--"
"Couldn't tell me? Couldn't let me know you were all right? Couldn't let me help?"
"No. I couldn't."
John doesn't realize he's punched Sherlock square in the face until Sherlock's head snaps back against the wall with a thump, and John's knuckles are aching.
Sherlock blinks and rubs his face, working his jaw. "Reckon I deserve that."
"Three years, Sherlock. You deserve a bit more than that."
"Right. You're right." Sherlock gives a nod and starts to sway on his feet. John rushes forward and grabs the lapels of his coat to steady him as Sherlock slides to the floor.
"Jesus, when's the last time you slept? Or ate?" John asks, ghosting his hands over Sherlock's face and the back of his head, checking for injuries. There are dark circles under darker eyes masked by colored contacts and a full beard that hides the gauntness of his cheeks. John would have passed him on the street without a second thought.
"Don't really remember," Sherlock mumbles, staring up at him.
"You're an idiot," John tells him, tugging at too-long hair that hangs lankly over Sherlock's ears. "You are a classic, proper idiot."
Sherlock curls his fingers around John's wrists, his thumb pressed to John's pulse like that night in John's bed that seems so very long ago now. He leans forward and presses their foreheads together. "It's finished now, John," he whispers. "It's done."
"Good," John says. "Good."
They sit together, breathe together, breathe properly for the first time in three years.