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Being a doctor was a job unlike any other. Or so I had thought until I joined in the work of a detective. Both jobs had a few key points in common; we often saw people on their worst days, we often got to solve the mystery and save the day, lives improved and sometimes lives saved, and- sometimes- those things didn't happen. Some days we saw everything come crashing down, a life ended in one way or another.
Today was one of those days.
She had been a house call. A young girl stricken with a high fever. She lived with her grandmother and two younger siblings. They had been there through the whole ordeal. My eyes burned, dry from lack of sleep and from all the tears I could not shed in the presence of the already crying family. Remembering them in my mind, my heart felt heavy with iron grief. Remembering their faces, they blurred into so many other families in my memory. Remembering the girl, she changed too, into all the other young girls, and then into all other lost patients. In the hospital, in homes, on cases, in tents, in the battlefield… and as always, all the faces were too much to bear.
So for the moment, I pushed away the thoughts, focusing instead on the odd quietness of the streets; it was as if everyone knew to mourn for this young girl tonight. I heard the horse hooves beating softly against the wet roads, and shivered against the cool in the air. It was more cool, damp and cloudy than it was truly cold, but I supposed the nerves I felt had me shaken too.
When I finally made it back to Baker Street, it seemed my flatmate was the only one for a mile who hadn't heard the wave of silence. I heard crashing mixed with violin screeching, and as I opened the door his voice boomed. "Watson! I believe I finally have it! When I changed the amount of sulfur in the mixture I-"
It must have been then that he caught a glimpse of my face. He stopped and I tried to flick a weak smile at him, but my face would not hold the expression. In one look, he had seen everything he had needed to see. He was no stranger to these awful days, and all their haunting echoes.
"Watson," he started carefully, "if you should think-"
I held up a hand gently to silence him. I knew. If I thought talking would help, he would listen. If I could think of anything I needed, I should let him know. It wasn't easy for Holmes to talk of the more tender human emotions. He always felt them foreign and awkward, like a minefield he did not know how to navigate, he'd said. But he would always offer his ear.
I nodded my acknowledgement and thanks. I set down my stick and my bag and stumbled into my chair. For a moment, Holmes busied himself with his violin and shuffling the papers around him into some kind of order, and then it fell quiet. There was a fleeting moment where the silence felt awkward, and then Holmes took a deep breath and sat down in his own chair. I heard the floor creak, the firewood crack, and Mrs. Hudson busy in the kitchen below us. The silence then felt more natural. Holmes shifted in his seat with his fingers steepled, as he so often did when our clients started telling their stories. He seemed to signal that he was ready to listen should I decide to talk. But I knew I had no words tonight. All I could see was the girl's face, and then all the other faces. Moving pictures with no sound.
Holmes had remarked before that I had a 'grand gift for silence' and that it made me 'quite invaluable as a companion.' I shared those feelings toward him as well. Especially on nights like tonight. He was fluent in the language of silence. There was nothing that could be said to change the events that had taken place; but it felt right to let the quiet fill the room. When life seemed to take more than it should, and I couldn't see the next step ahead, I would always be thankful for the silent company of my steadfast friend.