Chapter Text
Sherlock didn't think he needed such a thing as a friend.
He had friends, unlike what his little sister thought, he did have plenty of friends. People he met on the field, people with great minds like his – not as great, obviously, yet still smart enough to entertain him with their conversations. The neighbours next door, a lovely elderly couple who owns a fat cat that somehow always finds a way into Sherlock's flat, resulting in the detective having to retrieve said cat to its owners and always being invited in by the sweet couple for tea and biscuits. And a few old school mates who Sherlock – although, truth be told, doesn't actively seek their company – still considers friends. Well, it's not like Sherlock seeks anyone's company, really, other than his siblings' (more Enola's than Mycroft's, obviously) and mother's. He just doesn't feel the need.
That is, until a certain young detective all but forces him to.
He wasn't on his right mind, when he offered Enola the opportunity to be his flatmate. Right? Not because only an insane person could possibly want her to live with them, far from that, but because what any other reason is there for him to not have found out that his sister had planned on setting him up on some sort of flatmate interview with a man he never met in his life? He was the World's greatest detective. He couldn't have been played. Could he?
But the truth was, Doctor John Watson had been the one waiting at his doorstep that morning. Not Enola. And Sherlock, like a fool, just stared at the man before him, uterly confused , before pulling himself together and inviting him in. Had this been some sick way of proving him how unable to socialize and make new friends he is? Well then, there was nothing he could do but prove his sister wrong, right?
And for all of Sherlock's initial awkwardness during the process of getting to know Dr Watson, even if just to make sure he wasn't a paid killer ready to murder him in his sleep (and Sherlock did not sleep with a knife under his pillow during the first few weeks, of course he didn't) , John was nothing but bubbly excitement and friendliness.
He never bothered Sherlock when he was working, never asked about the cases he was investigating, like everyone else does. He never went looking in his office when he wasn't home – and, yes, Sherlock did set traps in his office in hopes of catching the little snoop in action, but none of them were ever activated – never spared a second glance at his evidence board, never asked anything further than an absent-minded "How was work yesterday?" while reading the newspaper in the morning.
And it delighted Sherlock.
Because for all Watson didn't seem to care about his work, he was unthusiastic in getting to know the man behind it. He would seat Sherlock down and together they'd spend hours and hours speaking of themselves. Their childhoods, their hobbies, their families, the music and art they enjoyed, and books they were reading, the funny or perhaps embarassing memories they had from moments where they were too drunk to be polite gentlemen, or just about the weather, the places they've been to, the wonders of nature they've seen, the moments when they were simply so greatful to be alive. And Sherlock, who never once felt the need to confide these mundane, little things to anyone, found himself unable to stop talking to John about them. And he, just as well, couldn't stop wanting to hear more and more about the doctor as well.
For some reason, however, the topic of romance and love wasn't one that came up many times.
For starters, Sherlock was never a man of romance. During his younger years, a good book or a great mystery was all he needed to entertain himself, and later, when all men his age around him started getting married, he was too busy building a phenomenal career to even think or perhaps feel like there was a part of his life "missing". He didn't feel like there was something "missing". He felt whole .
He, obviously, had fancied some women throughout his life – he was forty years old, after all. He had invited ladies to dance with him, sometimes even held their hands and whispered sweet nothings into their ears just to see how beautifully they would smile and blush and giggle. He loved to make them feel happy. He loved women.
But he never saw himself marrying one. Not because none of them were fit or worth of him – quite the opposite, really. For all his charms, he wasn't, and would never be, a good husband. He would never be the husband a good wife deserves.
He was "married to his job", as his colleagues always joked.
But John Watson – he was a lover . A romantic, hopelessly so. He loved to love. He spoke of love so… passionately. And he loved so passionately. He was always gifting lucky ladies bouquets of flowers, flowers he personally handpicked, the freshest of the season; he took them out for romantic candle-lighten dinners; he left them handwritten verses of poetry he loved and hoped they would, as well, love. Because that's John Watson – someone who shares, with who he loves, the things that make him the happiest, that bring him joy. That's his love language.
And he tells, once in a while, Sherlock about these romantic adventures. Not frequently, as like mentioned before, romance is a topic they rarely visit. But Sherlock Holmes doesn't need to be told things to know them – he investigates . He notices when Watson comes home smelling of lily-of-the-valley, when he's reading a book and periodically taking anotation of his favorite lines; when, later in the night, as Sherlock is almost falling asleep on his desk, deep in a case, he stumbles through the door, tipsy, his lips a shade deeper, his hair a little tussled, excitement barely contained in the smile that adorns his face – and Sherlock, the great Sherlock Holmes, is hidden behind a barely open office door, peeping through the open crack, watching a drunk post-coital John make his way to his own bedroom, attempting to be as quiet as he can because he knows Sherlock is either sleeping or working and the last thing he'd want is to bother the detective.
They make Sherlock feel weird , those nights. They make him stumble back from the door and fill up a glass with his strongest drink; they make him feel like something very precious cracks and shatters behind his ribcage. Like there's an empty pit in his chest. Like, maybe, he is not as whole as he had previously thought, before meeting John Watson.
But he cannot talk to John about these things, these– these feelings. And if he doesn't have John, his best friend and confidant, to talk to, then he does not have anyone to talk to. And it dawns on him, with near panic-inducing desperation, that he's gotten so used to having a friendly ear always ready to listen, that he doesn't remember how to function without it anymore.
Maybe it's envy. He knows for a fact Watson is almost 10 years younger than him – and he's always dating so many women. He's dated more women than Sherlock. Well, Sherlock, he– he had never really dated any women, in all honesty. He has, sure as hell, never bedded one.
The thought colours his face red to the tips of his ears, and he almost asphyxiates from choking on his morning tea, freshly made by no one other than Dr Watson. The man in question stares at him quizzically, perhaps a little worried for the detective's wellbeing. Sherlock gets up and leaves for work, half a cup of tea left to go cold and end up down the drain.
Sherlock doesn't need love. He's not like Watson. All he ever needed and all he's ever gonna need, is his work as a detective.
The first time John mentions the name Mary , is on the first day Sherlock asks him to join him on a case, almost 2 years since they started living together.
It's a murder, something that looked very simple, yet the more Holmes digged, the more complicated it got. He had been neck deep in the case for two weeks now – and nowhere near a concrete answer as to who was the murderer. Dr Watson was home. It was worth a shot.
"John." Sherlock calls out from his office, knowing the doctor would hear him from anywhere in the flat. A few seconds later, he appears at the door.
"Sherlock?" He greets, a smile on his face and ink smudges on his hand. Sherlock's eyebrows furrow.
"Did I interrupt something?" He asks, although he already knew the answer. The doctor's gaze met the floor, seemingly suddenly shy.
"Oh, not at all, just writing Mary a letter. Anyway, what's the matter?"
Sherlock doesn't ask who Mary is. He doesn't care. He cares about the case, enough to ask his flatmate for help.
And, who would have thought, they made a great team.
Watson is nowhere near a detective, at least not for now, but he's got the brains for it – he's smart, quick, quite deductive. He notices bigger connections where Sherlock doesn't, by staring at the bigger picture, when the detective gets stuck obsessing over the smallest of details. He entertains and encourages and enables Sherlock's brainstorming. He makes things easier. He, in a way, completes Sherlock's work. He's the missing link to every missing link.
Sherlock Holmes and Dr John Watson. It sounds quite right.
Enola isn't surprised when he tells her about him and John working together. She says she's proud. Whatever that means. But someone feeling proud of you is always good, right?
Sherlock is proud of her as well. He's also proud of John. He loves them both a lot.
And, strangely enough, it is the first time "John" and "Sherlock's love" mix together in his head. Because John is love, John loves and is loved – by many. By Mary , most likely. But John being loved by Sherlock is a reality, a fact, that albeit irrefutable, had never really been put into words, not even only in his mind.
It shakes him up a little. Makes him scared, and giddy, all at the same time. But, of course he loves John – he's his best friend.
But if Sherlock truly loved John, if he really was his best friend, it would only make sense for Sherlock to be happy for his good friend when, only a couple of months later, the doctor tells him he wants to marry Mary.
He's met Mary. They didn't speak much, only polite greetings really, before off they went, John and her, arm in arm, whispering to each other and smiling in pure joy. He knows she used to be a nurse who now worked in journalism, that her favorite flowers were tulips and she always drank red wine, the red wine that stained her lips and, as a result, ended up staining Watson's as well. Because John doesn't drink red wine. He says he dislikes the taste. Why does he not mind it, when he's tasting it from Mary's lips?
And she's a beautiful woman. All a man could want. And John, John is certainly all a woman could want. John would be a good husband.
But John marrying meant John leaving. No more late night chats over a warm cup of tea, or a bitter glass of scotch. They'd still work together, sure, they'd still be friends. But Sherlock's life before he met John now seemed like a distant memory, from a past, a little miserable, life. John had changed Sherlock.
But John deserved a life. Just because there were some things Sherlock could and would never be able to have in life, like finding love, having children, growing old next to someone, that didn't mean John shouldn't be able to.
He wanted, he so desperately wanted John to have those things. Because love looked beautiful on John. John loved beautifully. The spark in his eyes – it was one Sherlock had never seen, one no writer could ever have the words to describe, one a painter would never be able to capture on canvas. It was a wonder of Nature. Beauty in its most gracious form. It made the gaping hole in Sherlock's chest widen and widen until he felt empty and emotionless.
"I dream of being with her every day, for the rest of my life. You know that feeling, Sherlock, to want nothing else but to hold and be held, that aching feeling, of never wanting to part, like your souls are two halves of one, like the day you lose them is the day you lose yourself?" John speaks, oh so elonquently, a hand on his own chest as if holding his heart so it won't burst, with how full it feels, his dark, beautiful eyes on Sherlock's, his hair and beard perfectly trimmed, and wearing the most beautiful suit any groom has ever worn. Sherlock thinks, unable to stop his own thoughts, that this is the most beautiful any man has ever looked. That John Watson is the most beautiful man on this Earth.
"Yes." He answers, truthfully. "I know the feeling."
By the end of the day, Mary is officially Mary Watson, and John and her ride away on a carriage. John won't be coming back home tonight, or tomorrow, or any day in the future. For the first time in 3 years, John Watson won't be coming back to their home.
And John was right. Sherlock was never going to feel whole again – half his soul was ripped off from him. And it was never coming back.