Chapter Text
Watson snorted and jolted awake, running a hand over his face.
‘Please tell me that we have arrived,’ the doctor grumbled.
‘Just about,’ Holmes replied, not looking away from the passing London streets. The early morning fog wound around each building as their carriage rolled along the cobblestone.
‘Our wives will certainly be glad for us to be home,’ Watson remarked idly. ‘Though she never wrote it in her letters, Mary did hint at being worried about us.’
Holmes hummed distractedly.
‘How did Mrs Holmes seem? Married not yet three months and you called away for a case in Scotland. I can’t imagine it was an easy decision for you to take it.’
‘Why would it not be?’ Holmes finally turned and looked at his friend, a frown on his face. ‘I agreed to this marriage arrangement under the condition that she understand my work comes first.’
Watson shook his head. ‘She’s your wife, Holmes. You need to understand that now there is another person in that little world you inhabit and you need to have a care how you treat her.’ He furrowed his brow in thought. ‘Did you write to her at all during this case? Reassure her of your safety?’
Holmes rolled his eyes. ‘How many times must I tell you, when I am on a case, I have no need for distractions, especially of the ‘marital’ kind. She knew this when she agreed to the arrangement.’
‘Bloody hell, Holmes! A whole month without a word from you? You never sent her a letter or anything? Not so much as a telegram? She must think you dead!’
‘Oh, don’t be ridiculous, Watson.’ Holmes waved him off. ‘If she were so inclined to think so, I am sure either my brother or your wife would assure her of my continued existence. Why should I be expected to waste valuable time doing such an unnecessary, domesticated chore?’
Watson gaped at him, then grimly shut his mouth and shook his head. ‘You’re a fool, Sherlock Holmes. A bloody fool.’
oOo
It was just past 7 when Sherlock strode through the front door of his Baker Street home. Having dropped Watson off at his house beforehand and witnessing Mrs Watson rush outside to welcome her husband home with a warm smile and open arms, Sherlock had spent the remaining ten minutes ride fighting down an unfamiliar sense of foreboding and the stranglehold of guilt.
Perhaps he should have taken a moment or two during the case to send word to his own wife. He barely knew her beyond what Mycroft had told him when he’d drafted the contract, but as their first few months of marriage passed he found himself contemplating the mystery of her. Shy, a bit bumbling, not at all the sort of woman he’d expected his brother would force him to marry. But the inheritance her late father had left her, on the condition of her marrying, was enough to keep him happily solving crimes until a ripe old age, should he live to see the day. And she would be free to do…. well, whatever it was a woman of society did. Embroidery, gossip, and other such ridiculous frippery, he’d assumed, bracing himself for a life of mindless chittering.
Yet, to his surprise, she had slid into his life with ease, leaving him to his experiments and cases, but nearby with a cup of tea or some bread before he knew he needed it. She quietly read or scribbled in that journal of hers while he sojourned into his Mind Palace. She listened as he talked himself through his cases and experiments. She offered the occasional question that, on more than one instance, had led him to the right conclusion.
She had been perfectly attuned to what he’d needed in a companion. But truth be told, he knew very little of her. And until this moment, he’d never considered it a bad thing.
Tossing his coat over the banister, he strode down the hall. Upon entering the lounge, he found it practically undisturbed from how he’d left it. His violin rested on the table, his music sheets scattered haphazardly about, his books and notes on his experiments were in disarray on the coffee table.
Nothing in the room spoke of another person living here. In short, there was nothing to warrant the growing sense of unease in his gut. His wife’s things were relegated solely to her room and her timidity prevented her from encroaching on what she considered his space. Yet there was something amiss in the empty room that sent a foreboding rolling over him.
Sherlock spun on his heel and made for the stairs, taking them two at a time. The door at the top was cracked open and he shoved it open, letting it bang against the wall, and came to dead stop.
He had not been upstairs since they’d been married. The only time they had shared a room, his bed, had been their wedding night. But he had slipped out while she slept. When she came to him the next morning and said she would take the upper room for herself, he had assumed she was as uncomfortable with their arrangement as he was and wanted her own space.
His heart pounded and his hands clenched into fists at his side as he took in the room: bed was made and hadn’t been slept in for at least four nights and a thin layer of dust had settled on the nightstand and bureau. He stormed over to the wardrobe and flung open the doors, staring in growing horror at the empty rack.
She hadn’t given him space because it was what she wanted; no, she’d done it because she thought it was what he had wanted.
Watson had been correct.
He was a fool.