Chapter Text
Dammit.
For the fifth time in three days, John turned on the hall light switch and remembered the bulb had blown the previous Sunday. This wouldn't have posed any problems six months before. But now, number three on the ridiculously long list of things John was Not Allowed To Do, courtesy of Dr. Hanrahan, was: Raise arms above shoulder level.
Couldn't run. Couldn't climb. Couldn't lift anything heavier than Casper, and that included Toby. The great lump of a cat didn't understand the sudden change in his favourite human's body language and was taking it personally.
With any luck, that last rule wasn't going to last much longer. John suspected a baby quickly became heavier than a cat.
Stay away from crowds. Avoid being cold or wet. Have the most careful sex imaginable.
The whole thing was pissing him off.
And just then, the hall being in deep shadow at three in the afternoon was pissing him off most of all.
He'd kept meaning to remind Molly about it: no big deal for her, of course, requiring a chair and about two minutes of her time. But he'd forgotten to mention it, and anyway, it seemed unfair to burden her with something so petty. She was rushing out the door to work in a disorganised flap most mornings, and coming home tired and hollowed-out ten and sometimes even twelve hours later.
But at least she'd stopped throwing up every ten minutes, and was back at work again at all. Those first two weeks after the hospital had been the pits for both of them. She had made the sweetest and most patient nurse in the world—and John had found, with a lot of bitterness and self-loathing, that he made the surliest, sulkiest, most difficult patient in the world. It sure as hell hadn't been a time of quality marital moments. He was fairly sure they'd both hated every second of those weeks.
Dismissing the light with another flick of the switch, he went back into the kitchen to make a cup of coffee. Before leaving for work that morning, Molly had done a round of the house, taking down anything on high shelves, for his easy access. Coffee. Cup. Dishes. Cutlery. Not allowed to lift arms above shoulder level. Seething, John boiled the kettle.
There was one thing he could go ahead and do without fear of that disappointed, worried look Molly did so well…
He refused to go back to Ella, or to any other kind of therapist, because to do so would be to admit that anything was wrong. He'd had the odd visit from the hospital therapist—and once, the Catholic chaplain—several times in his last fortnight in hospital, but had consistently brushed off their offers of help with thinly-veiled hostility. He didn't need a shrink, or a priest, or anyone else to tell him to get a hold of himself, that he was lucky to be alive and should be more grateful for it.
But the basic principles learned over the years of enforced army therapy had stuck: Get it out before it eats you alive, even if you only write it to yourself. No point in returning to his actual blog—it had been inactive for years now. But when he was alone and sure to be undisturbed, John still opened the occasional Word document and furtively pecked out something awkward.
I don't think anyone understands how bored I am.
I'm trying to not blame anyone.
They said they didn't have a choice.
Sherlock saved my life. He explained it and I believe him.
Things are going well.
I'm alive, Sherlock's alive, Molly's alive. We're having a baby and everything's great.
Inevitably, the program would ask him: do you want to save changes you made to Document1?
And he would click the appropriate button: No.
Aside from the occasional 'blog post' nobody ever saw, he also had the rest of the internet for his perusal, and eight lone hours a day to peruse it with. Some sites that could be discussed in polite company. Some that couldn't. And Sherlock's personal website, an odd sort of no-man's-land between the two, and which he had necromanced back to life after the events of the previous December and January.
I'm alive and have resumed work. My number has changed. See side panel. Thank you.
- SH. February 16th.
No work since then, apparently. No work Sherlock had been offered via his website and was prepared to take, anyway, though as the days and then weeks had passed, even the most casual observer could see Sherlock was agonisingly bored, and that his grand reentrance to London had been a disappointment in more ways than one. A press release at the end of January, after an investigation headed up by Detective Inspector Tobias Gregson, had exonerated Sherlock of any suspicion as to the kidnapping of Max and Claudette Bruhl and the subsequent murder of Max Bruhl. It had been all over the papers, and on every news channel for two cycles. But if everyone genuinely believed Sherlock was an innocent, railroaded genius and not a kidnapper and murderer, surely he would have regained at least something of his former popularity by now, John thought. Wouldn't he…?
Loading up the website, coffee at his elbow and both cats at his feet, John immediately noticed there had been an unusual lot of activity since he'd checked things out the weekend before.
Dear Mr Holmes,
Forgive me for contacting you like this, but I couldn't get an answer to my email. My name is Caroline Edalji. My son George has been sentenced to twelve months in prison. My niece suggested you and gave me your website. Please help. We are willing to pay.
I don't work for money.
SH.
Then work for good.
No, I don't work for good, either.
SH.
We've heard such good things about your work. I've been looking through your past cases here on your site and they are amazing. I'm sure you'd be able to help. Could I phone you?
I don't talk on the phone. Text only.
SH.
Then I'll come to London to see you. We need help, please.
Then pray your case interests me. What has young George done, then?
SH.
He hasn't done anything. He's been accused of pony mutilation.
The eleven minutes between this proclamation and Sherlock's reply gave away that his interest had been piqued, and he was probably searching for details on the case online. The corner of John's mouth twitched as he read on. Pony mutilation? Sounded like something Sherlock would sink his teeth into. In a manner of speaking.
I'm the world's greatest detective, Mrs Edalji. It sounds like your son needs the world's greatest lawyer.
- SH
Yep. Google. The bloody cheater.
He's innocent!
As I said, lawyer. That is what lawyers do.
- SH
Mr Holmes, just an hour of your time. Please.
Another gap in the posting times—this one just over half an hour.
Text me the details. My mobile number's on the sidebar.
- SH
Hope you take the case Sherlock. You've been growling at everybody like a bear with a sore head lately.
GL.
Yes, thank you, Lestrade. I don't need your commentary. In addition, I am begging you to learn how to use a comma correctly.
- SH
See what I mean?
GL.
All of these messages were timestamped between 7:03 and 8:46 the night before last. John had spoken with Sherlock on the phone just the evening before, and he hadn't said a word about any of them.
Bastard.
He snapped the laptop shut in a rage (regretting it at the last minute: can't-afford-any-new-gadgets-we-are-now-a-one-income-family.) He got up, found his phone on the kitchen counter, and shot off a text to Sherlock's number.
When were you going to tell me you got a case?
3:04pm
I haven't got a case. I saw Caroline Edalji yesterday. Boring.
SH
3:07pm
You saw her without me.
3:07pm
You'd have been as bored as I was.
SH
3:08pm
Doubt it. And why do you keep signing your texts anyway? That's so annoying. Nobody signs their texts.
3:13pm
Mycroft does.
SH.
3:15pm
Nobody normal signs their texts.
3:16pm
It's polite.
SH
3:16pm
HA!
3:17pm
Stop sulking and answer your phone.
S
3:24pm
Answer your phone, John.
S
3:26pm
Don't ignore me.
S
3:28pm
I am calling Molly in five minutes if you don't answer your phone.
S
3:30pm
And Harry.
S
3:31pm
And Mrs Hudson.
S
3:32pm
And Lestrade.
S
3:33pm
One minute.
S
3:33pm
"Oh, that's mature of you," John snapped down the line when he picked up ten seconds later. "Yeah, great, call half of London and worry them just because—"
"Mature?" Sherlock sounded shocked and aggrieved that anyone would dare accuse him of immaturity. "You're the one being childish. All because I saw a client without you—"
"You've never seen a client without me before. That's not the way we work, Sherlock."
Silence.
"Oh," John said flatly. "Um. It's… like that, then."
Sherlock sighed. "Like what?" he asked. "John, I had a mad parson's wife spamming my website. To get her to stop it, I went to Staffordshire to see her yesterday. The case was boring. Some village drama so unbelievably petty, I wouldn't even do Lestrade the disservice of recommending the case to him."
"A parson's son who's been accused of gutting ponies sounds bloody interesting to me."
"I applaud your choice of words. Anyhow, it isn't interesting, and I'm not going to take it. The End."
"You seemed to be having a very interested conversation with Mrs Edalji on your website."
"I changed my mind."
John thought this through. No. Sherlock didn't bother with online searches unless he was interested in the first place. Nor did he go out all the way to Staffordshire for something he thought would be boring. He wouldn't walk from his bedroom at Baker Street to the kitchen for something he suspected might be boring.
"Sherlock, listen, I want you to take cases," he said. Just then Toby, demanding attention, jumped onto the kitchen counter beside him. John swatted in his direction. Not-allowed-to-lift-the-cat. "I want you to take cases with me. I'm going stark raving spare over here all day with nothing to do."
"Any reason less... self-interested?"
"Because you..." John paused. "Because we operate better when I get 'round victims and witnesses and suspects, and you do all that looking around and deduction stuff I can't do."
"I'm perfectly capable of interviewing people on my own."
"No you're not. Look, I don't know who's been in your ear about this—" John suspected strongly that it had been Greg Lestrade—"but I'm not made of glass. It's been four months since I took that bullet. I'm fine."
"How's the physiotherapy going?"
A second later, Sherlock found himself listening to the ominous silence of a disconnected line.
Hmm. Perhaps… perhaps he shouldn't have made that remark about the physiotherapy…
No. Sherlock did not require a second person to think for him, or even with him. He needed someone who was physical, able to move. A companion who was still not allowed to raise his arms above shoulder level was useless to a case, and John needed to accept that.
Sherlock threw the phone down onto his bed, so hard that it bounced off the mattress and hit the floor with a loud, satisfying clatter. Ignoring this—even though the phone may have broken, judging from the sound—he stalked back down the hallway. As he reached the sitting room, he adopted the almost-manic false smile that was the best he could do under certain social circumstances, and which made most people uneasy.
"Dreadfully sorry about that. Personal matter. Not important," he said cheerfully, addressing the middle-aged, sleek woman sitting in the old patchwork armchair. John's armchair. He threw himself into the one opposite her, perched up on the back of it like an owl, steepling his fingers to his lips and looked penetratingly at her with his pale grey eyes. "Now tell me, Mrs Edalji: clearly, concisely, and in a non-boring fashion. How did all this start?"