Archive of Our Own ^beta

Since the day Sherlock Holmes tested him by asking how many stairs led to their lodgings at 221B Baker Street, Watson counts those same stairs every time he climbs them.

Seventeen. Seventeen the first time, and this time, and all the times in between. Coming. Going. Trudging up slowly after a day of tedious calls. Dashing down at Holmes’ heels, struggling into his coat, surging with energy even after he had vowed to not leave his chair after sinking into it with the evening paper and a brandy.

Watson is determined to be better - to notice, to observe. To measure up to Holmes’ expectations.

No. Be honest with yourself, Watson.

To raise them.

Holmes seems delighted when he tries, when he contributes anything at all, no matter how obvious or insignificant. Which is ludicrous given Holmes’ brilliance, his stunning intellect, his remarkable ability to solve mysteries with little more than a magnifying lens and his astute understanding of human nature.

Today, mind occupied with counting the stairs as he climbs toward their shared quarters, Watson does not hear the sounds from within until he is near the landing. He cannot see through the door, does not know that his friend - his very good friend, Sherlock Holmes - is engaged in conversation with another man. Having a smoke with that man, in fact, and laughing - laughing - with him as they sit across from each other, knees nearly touching.

Watson hears Holmes laugh. Of course he laughs. He laughs when he has solved something, put the pieces together. Laughs at his own brilliance, or fondly, at Watson’s lack thereof.

Watson does not admit, even to himself, how much he likes the sound of Holmes’ laughter. Does not admit that he finds Holmes particularly ... pleasant when he is jovial, pleased with himself, or, better yet, pleased with Watson. That being the recipient of that Holmesian focus does more than please his ego. The intensity affects him viscerally, and he must look down, turn away, to hide the colouring of his face.

He does this even though he is absolutely certain he cannot hide anything from Sherlock Holmes.

But no matter how much Watson likes the sound of Holmes’ laughter, he does not like the laughter he hears now. Holmes is not laughing in delight at himself, nor in fondness at Watson. This laughter is altogether different, and it makes his heart sink. In reaction, Watson resurrects the cold strength he wore in his days in the service, and assertively seizes the door handle and steps inside.

The laughter ceases as the door swings open.

He pretends not to notice Holmes has company as he places his bag on the table near the door, and when he turns toward the sitting room at last, he is prepared to meet a new client, even though the laughter has told him this visitor is not a client, and not a stranger at all.

And, indeed, the man who turns toward Watson cannot be a client. From the moment Watson steps inside, this man shows far more interest in him than any client ever has.

Watson’s gaze travels from the stranger, to Holmes, and back to the stranger again.

“Ah - Watson. There you are.”

Watson watches the stranger as Holmes speaks. The man’s expression changes from relaxed smile to speculative study as Holmes smiles at Watson while resting his hand lightly on his visitor’s knee. Watson stares at Holmes’ hand, so casually placed, and must work to keep a scowl from marring his face. Who is this man to merit such a familiar gesture? A gesture of the type only rarely exchanged between himself and Holmes even after all this time of cohabitation?

He looks up to find Holmes staring at him, and realizes they’ve both noticed his distraction.

“Allow me to introduce Mr. Victor Trevor,” Holmes says.

His hand is still on Trevor’s knee.

Holmes’ hand falls away at last as Trevor stands and extends his own hand to Watson. Watson takes it, noting as they shake that the man is impeccably dressed, younger than he by several years at least, and drowning in both good breeding and money. He is tall and slender, with a neatly trimmed mustache the same colour as Watson’s, and eyes that slide between green and grey. His hand is smooth, uncalloused, (usually gloved, Watson deduces with satisfaction), long-fingered and pale. His flesh is warm. Too warm for the room, the cool evening.

“Trevor is in London for a fortnight,” Holmes explains as Watson pulls himself together with concerted effort and extends the expected cordialities.

Watson sits stiffly on the settee beside Holmes, his own chair now occupied. Trevor watches him settle in uncomfortably, clearly unused to this physical proximity to Holmes. Watson shifts, realizing he’s being studied by the other man. Studied and judged, no doubt, by this younger man, who must clearly see that he and the great Sherlock Holmes are not equals in any sense. Trevor looks curiously from one to the other, and Watson feels himself dismissed in importance before he has even contributed to the conversation.

And while Watson acknowledges his importance in their joint efforts pales in comparison to Holmes', Holmes never makes him feel inferior in the way Trevor does now. To the contrary - Holmes’ praise for Watson is often, Watson feels, unwarranted.

“Where are my manners?” Trevor blurts out suddenly, standing and gesturing to Watson with a smile. “I’ve your chair, haven’t I?” He moves away and gives Watson an apologetic look. “Please - I insist.”

He gestures again to the chair, and Watson rises slowly, then takes the few steps required to reach his customary chair, sinking into it without relish. His eyes are on Trevor, who shows no discomfort at sharing the settee with Holmes and who, indeed, settles beside him with his thigh nearly pressed against Holmes' leg. Holmes shifts only slightly as he leans forward to speak to Watson, seemingly unaffected by the closeness.

“Trevor is an old friend,” he explains. “From school.” He looks at Watson, turning his head slightly, questioningly. John takes it for the challenge it must be. Fortunately, he knows exactly who Victor Trevor is.

“Right. The Gloria Scott. Your first case, Holmes.” His eyes slide over to Trevor.

Trevor smiles tightly. It is clear he’d rather not discuss the misadventures of his now-deceased father. He steers the conversation away from the past, to topics more polite and benign, so that by the time Holmes and Trevor depart for dinner thirty long minutes later, Watson knows that Trevor is working in India, is not married, and is more interested in his and Holmes’ living arrangements than is seemly,

Watson does not like the self-satisfied smile Trevor gives him as he departs. He looks away as Trevor acts the valet and helps Holmes with his coat. He barely tolerates the goodbyes, Trevor’s casual remark that they’ll be out late, and won’t likely see each other again this evening. He surreptitiously pulls back the brocade curtain to spy out the window as they move to the street to find a cab, and does not like how close they walk together, or how Holmes throws his head back in a hearty laugh.

Holmes cuts a dashing figure as he hails a cab. He rarely uses a whistle, yet cabs seem to respond to his voice all the more. He stands back and allows Trevor to climb aboard first, then settles in next to him, smiling broadly and gesturing as he gives their destination to the cabbie.

Watson stands at the window, staring out at the street, long after the cab rounds the corner and disappears from his sight.

A little while later, sitting here in his room - in their room - with newspaper and books and cold tea, and all of London teeming outside his window with Holmes and Trevor at the very heart of it, Watson thinks.

Sherlock Holmes does not have friends. Sherlock Holmes has a friend. One friend. Sherlock Holmes knows a great many people and interacts with them by necessity, often in disguise. But these people are not his friends.

Watson has friends - many friends. Friends from childhood, from medical school, from his time in the service. But since he’s taken up with Sherlock Holmes, he sees them less frequently, his life revolving ever increasingly around 221B and the intriguing, enigmatic man with whom he shares quarters.

He is out of sorts as he sits alone in vigil, staring at the clock on the mantel. It is not altogether unusual for Holmes to leave him here alone, to go off on his investigations without word of any kind, but in all the time of their acquaintance - nay, of their friendship - Holmes has never so boldly departed in the company of such a companion as Victor Trevor.

What does it mean?

Watson has none of the deductive powers of his famous friend, but fine-honed detective skills are not required for a matter such as this. It takes only cursory self-examination to identify the unsettled feeling, but he cannot bring himself to acknowledge it by name.

The longer the evening drags on, the more Watson dislikes, and mistrusts, Victor Trevor. In all the time he has shared these lodgings, he has never felt anything akin to this tight weight in his gut. If Holmes does not see fit to include him when he leaves on an errand or mission, there is always good reason - a need for speed, or secrecy, or a regard for Watson’s other obligations. There has never yet been such an occasion as this - the appearance of someone from Holmes’ past, another man Holmes might call friend.

Watson is being ridiculous, and he knows it. He does not have sole claim to Sherlock Holmes; he has simply become accustomed to having his friend’s attention, being the recipient of his brooding intensity. Of that unerring focus.

Yet - has his steadfastness and devotion to Holmes not earned him the right to sip brandy contentedly by the warm fire, watching Holmes’ profile as he stares into the flames, basking in the glow of a hard-won case? Sinking into the ebb of low and comfortable conversation, speaking when need or want arises, shaking out his pipe, smoke curling from its glowing bowl. At ease with the room, the evening, the fire, the brandy, the company. Nights like those are Watson's reward for chasing down the stairs after Holmes, following his lead without question, leaving friends, and family, and more than one lovely lady behind.

Not looking back. Never looking back.

Watson lifts his glass of brandy. The lamp still burns on the table, but his book, open on his lap, remains untouched. Hours have ticked away. This is not the first time he has kept silent vigil, waiting for Holmes to return. He has waited, tense and alert and nervous, frequently checking the time while the minutes ticked slowly by. Waited for Holmes to return from his investigations. Looked up in relief when the stairs creaked with familiar footsteps - finally - and Holmes entered their quarters, dropping with exhaustion and exhilaration into his waiting chair.

Watson is ever the ready audience as Holmes relates his adventures, never as neatly packaged and synthesised as they appear in Watson’s retellings. But the tales, wandering as they might be, are always scintillating, holding Watson spellbound, and he consumes every detail hungrily.

A man of his age, not yet old by any reckoning, with a solid military career behind him and a stable medical practice to sustain him. Opportunities? Yes. Possibilities? Ample.

He’s not a confirmed bachelor. He’s imagined another life. A wife to warm his heart and his bed, children to fill his home, to carry on his name and care for him in his dotage.

Watson frowns.

He hasn’t dreamt of that life in some time, hasn’t wanted anything different than exactly what he has. Well, perhaps he’d like Holmes to eat and sleep with more regularity, and to abstain from his seven percent solution.

He smiles fondly at the thought, but his smile turns southward as he swallows a dose of self-realisation.

The pill sticks in his throat.

The care and concern, the attention and love, the emotions and reactions his colleagues and friends direct at their wives and families, all of these things Dr. John Watson directs at his friend Sherlock Holmes.

He stares at the window. He wets dry lips, finds that he is breathing too quickly.

Like Holmes, Trevor is unmarried. Like Holmes, Trevor is tall and lean, sharp-witted and perceptive. Holmes shares a past with Trevor, lived with him for a short time. Holmes launched his surprising career after Trevor’s father took an interest in him, and later Holmes himself investigated the elder Trevor’s death.

Watson blinks and finds his fingers gripping the arms of his chair. He forces himself to relax his grasp and picks up his glass, downing the remainder of his brandy in a single, tasteless swallow.

He has placed Sherlock Holmes on a pedestal. He has become too accustomed to the intellect, the brilliance, the passionate discourse. He has forgotten - oh God, how he has forgotten - that Sherlock Holmes is a man.

And by all appearances, Victor Trevor has not.

He is no longer safe in his assumptions that he is all Holmes needs.

Later, he will wonder at how quickly he gave way to his base need to possess. How he allowed his brain and body to join together and push aside every frightening taboo, every external and self-imposed stricture. He’ll examine his new reality and wonder exactly why it had taken him so very, very long to recognize the most primal of feelings, to see through the glaze of friendship and objective admiration.

He is pacing, heart pounding, when a Hansom cab finally pulls up in front of 221B. Watson watches in the dim light of the street lamps as Trevor emerges, then leans forward to offer a hand to Holmes. Holmes alights, and Trevor stumbles against him, still holding onto his hand.

The street is quiet this time of night. He hears the laugh clearly, and can characterize it only as something it cannot be - a smothered giggle. He watches as Holmes’ arm circles Trevor’s waist, allowing Trevor to lean against him as he maneuvers him around and back against the cab’s door.

Trevor laughs again while his knees buckle and he begins a slow slide down the side of the cab. Holmes grabs him around the middle and Trevor hangs on him, hands around his neck. For a moment, they seem to embrace, then the cab driver is there, helping return the obviously intoxicated man to the cab. Holmes exchanges words with the cabbie, and reached into his pockets for something - coins no doubt - which he presses into the other man’s hand.

Holmes watches as the cab rolls away, then turns to face the building. He stands under the streetlamp, close enough for Watson to see Holmes’ expression as he scans their building. A curious look - difficult to interpret. Regret? Amusement? Wistfulness? He glances toward the window where Watson waits in the shadows.

Had he wanted their evening to continue? Would Trevor have been accompanying him inside had Watson been out for the evening? Or better yet, not living here at all?

Holmes had once lived with Victor Trevor. They’d shared quarters for a short time. Why had Watson never once considered that? What it could mean?

Watson turns to face the door as Holmes opens it quietly and enters. He would have gone unseen, unnoticed, had Watson not been in the room, acutely aware of his approach. Holmes could easily have slipped into his own room and closed the door between himself and Watson, and this thing that fills the room, sucking out the air of civility, of proper places, of roles ingrained and unchallenged.

Eyes meet.

Holmes brings in with him the smells of the street, the odor of horses, and coal, and the sewer that is the Thames. But lingering traces of tobacco smoke swirl about him, the familiar smell of his pipe as he sits on the parlour divan, drawn up into himself, far into the night.

Watson stares, sniffs lightly, then steps forward.

His nose has always been sensitive, and now it picks up the foreign with the familiar. The oriental blend preferred by Holmes, but bastardized with the residual haze of a something too heavy, too acrid.

Artifice crumbles, abandoned, as Watson walks forward with purpose, as Holmes’ eyes widen in surprise, then quickly narrow. He makes no move to step away, to raise his hands against the determined advance of his friend. And Watson finds himself upon Holmes before he can think better of it. His hands close around Holmes’ biceps, and he thrusts his friend roughly against the door.

Holmes does not pretend to misunderstand. He neither resists Watson’s manhandling, nor does he immediately embrace it. His eyes, narrowed still, observing, slide quickly to the fingers of Watson’s right hand where they grip Holmes’ arm. Watson tightens his grip even as Holmes stares. Holmes’ arms are surprisingly firm beneath his fingers. He feels the flex of his muscles, the tension of his body as he leans against the hard door behind them. When Holmes’ eyes return to Watson’s face, Watson glimpses a spark of fire before Holmes' face sets seamlessly into blandness.

But Watson has seen it.

The jealous beast inside responds to the fire. It wants to mark its territory. Stake its claim. Eradicate the stench of the other. It is a primal thing, pushing past the long-cultivated civility of this friendship, this flatshare, this partnership of men.

Watson is caught on the cusp of desire, and there will be no going back once that line is crossed. It will change them. Change everything. Ruin them, wreck them.

His resolve falters. He vacillates. His hands are sliding now, down Holmes’ arms, to elbows, forearms, hands. Long-fingered hands, strong but delicate. Hands that wield violin bow and pipe and revolver. Hands that only moments ago held Victor Trevor upright as the man sagged against him.

Holmes’ fingers close over his own, and Watson, the image of Trevor in Holmes’ arms still in his mind’s eye, seethes once more. He lunges forward, pressing their joined hands against the door, and leans in to claim his forbidden kiss.

Holmes allows it. He neither recoils nor pushes Watson violently across the room as Watson’s lips press against his own. Watson is strong, and Holmes equally so, yet their hands remain joined, their bodies aligned from chest to hip as Watson tastes sweet wine and strong tobacco.

Holmes is unnaturally still against him, yet his hands grip Watson’s. Watson finds it intoxicating - the long body pressed so intimately against his, his familiar scent, the rough fabric of his coat, lips cool and dry, face so unlike any he has ever kissed before, yet so very familiar with its end-of-day stubble so like his own.

He’s crossed a line and cannot recover, cannot claim to be drunk as Holmes will not be fooled by so transparent a lie. If he has erred, he has erred grievously, but he will be honourable, and remove himself from this flat, from Sherlock Holmes’ lodging and life.

He begins to pull away from the kiss, ready to fling himself into his chair and gather his wits about him before doing the same with his possessions.

But Holmes does not release his hands. Instead, his fingers move and curl to grip Watson’s wrists, and he leans forward even as Watson steps back.

“John.”

His given name on Holmes’ lips is both plea and affirmation. The fire in Holmes’ eyes is back, lighting the way through to his soul. Watson knows that Holmes has deduced everything - from his too-rapid heartbeat, the flush of his cheeks, the taste of brandy on his lips, and the half-moon depressions on his palms from fingers clenched too long into fists. That Holmes knows that Watson has spent several hours in the parlour alone, obsessed with this man named Victor Trevor, and slowly sinking into a seething green pool of jealousy.

Watson thinks of Trevor again, pressed against Holmes in the small Hansom cab, head lolling on Holmes’ shoulder, recounting their shared past, the glory of days gone by.

Days without Watson. Days before Baker Street and Mrs. Hudson and the boys at the Yard.

Watson presses forward again to exorcise the thought of the other, pulling one hand away to curl into the small of Holmes’ back. He sinks his head into the juncture of neck and shoulder, and inhales. The beast inside him slinks back into its cave and he shudders, burrowing in even deeper, closing his eyes and absorbing the thrum of the heartbeat beneath his lips.

He is exquisitely aware of the body pressed against his own, of how it draws him in, how he fits against it.

There are lips at his temple now, a warm hand at his nape, and Watson closes his eyes and breathes in Holmes’ unspoken acceptance. He shudders as the quiet whisper of yes works through his skin, branding his soul. He lifts his head, scrapes his bristly cheek against Holmes’ clean-shaven face then catches those beguiling lips again. He kisses the breath away from his friend, heart soaring when his kiss is returned in full: but then, feeling himself harden, he pulls away in embarrassment.

“Forgive me,” he murmurs, squaring his shoulders bravely as he takes a careful step back, determined to face this thing he has created, to act the honourable man he believes himself to be.

Holmes’ arms are longer than his own, and their reach is greater. He pierces Watson with bright eyes, holds him with the smallest of enigmatic smiles as he reaches out, encircling his wrist with thumb and forefinger. He slowly, deliberately, sweeps his gaze down over Watson’s form, then tugs him forward.

“I’m afraid I’ve asked Trevor back for tea tomorrow,” he says quietly, watching Watson’s face as he speaks. His grip tightens on Watson’s wrist as Watson stiffens, bristling. “I think I shall rescind my invitation, Watson. You aren’t offended at my shocking lack of manners, are you?”

“No more than usual,” Watson replies with a smile he cannot contain, and Holmes’ answering smile lights his eyes. He seems as delighted with Watson as he is with the most intriguing of mysteries, as happy to lean against this hard door with Watson moulded against him as to stand at the window making love to his violin.

Watson has no idea what will come of this sea change, or how he’ll feel come morning. But Holmes is here, now, in his arms, and Trevor is nothing but a catalyst in the equation, already out of sight and all but forgotten. The floor of 221B is canted, tipped toward this door, and it is safe, and easy, and unbelievably comfortable, to remain precisely where they are.

That is, until they hear the ring of a bell down below, Mrs. Hudson’s footfalls on the stairs, and the echo of a low, accented voice.

“Client,” they mutter, one after the other in an almost-echo.

They push back from the door, from each other, and the floor rights itself at the precise moment that Mrs. Hudson knocks.

And as Watson rushes out of the flat after Holmes fifteen minutes later, everything on the outside is exactly the same, and everything on the inside is utterly changed. He is the same Watson, and Holmes the same Holmes, but together they are something new.

Holmes summons a cab, and they’re off again, on another case, another adventure, another mad rush about London.

When they return hours later, they fall, once again, into the gravity well of the door. And while it is more of the same, it feels entirely new. This day is another layer laid atop a life unlike any Watson has ever imagined. He’d already had a second chance, a gift of time he hadn’t expected after his wartime injuries, and now he’s been given a third. He steadies a jubilant Holmes, giddy with the success of his investigations, and Holmes leans against him, speaking low into his ear.

“John Watson, you keep me right.”

Watson grumbles that someone must, even as he recognizes these words as no less than a declaration of love. Victor Trevor no longer threatens him, and he dismisses his name and visage forever from his mind. With a tired sigh, he sinks into the welcoming warmth of Holmes’ arms, and rests his practiced ear over the beating heart Holmes swears he does not have.

Fin