Chapter Text
Seven wisps of smoke ebbed from the staling cigarettes, most stubbed out in a careless fashion next to Sherlock, where a companion might have sat if he had one. He had reserved a few of the smoldering butts, digging them into the fleshy part of his forearm and hissing at the flare of pain, his eventual sigh echoing the spark extinguished on his skin.
His left arm in particular was a veteran of abuse. Circular burns, rows of nearly white lines, scratches where the withdrawal bugs crawled, the tracks. Hell, his father insisted the tattoos were some elaborate shrine of self-injury, swapping one needle for another.
Sherlock recounted his physical exam during his admittance into Hemdale Rehabilitation Facility, when they documented every one of his scars, made road maps of his self-hatred. They wanted him in the dual diagnosis ward of a psychiatric hospital, but dear old Father persuaded them (verbally and financially) that the drugs were the only problem, not his son himself. (However, his treatment team could not deny that mental illness played a large part in his addiction. They couldn't agree on what combination of depression, bipolar II, autism spectrum, oppositional defiance traits, and obsessive tendencies addled his brain.)
The shriveled butts and resulting ash cooled on the numbing concrete, numbing not only in the penetrating frigidity of cement on a stark winter's night, but the gravity which pressed his body further into the comfortless bench. Well, one might label it a bench if its purpose was for sitting.
Sherlock perched on the ledge of the brownstone’s rooftop, his breath as visible as the cigarettes’ smoke. But no matter how hard he studied the pattern of air circulating from each exhalation, mimicking the rudimentary breathing exercises he was taught in rehab, it wouldn't seem to turn off.
The world was much like a room full of tv's to Sherlock; each of his senses tingled with smells, sights, sounds, micro-expressions, all fighting for his attention. Most of the time, when focused on a time-sensitive task, his high-functioning brain would revel in the challenge, healthily stimulated even when subjected to the unhealthy habits of sleepless nights and foodless days.
Sometimes, however, like an exasperated primary school teacher, he needed them to stop- the voices, the observations, the counterarguments, all sporadically increasing and decreasing in volume. And when this happened, no amount of deep breathing would release the steam agitating the cogs of his mind. He supposed the nicotine didn't help, but he needed something to do with his shaking hands other than...
It was perfectly logical, he reasoned. His brain was, by admission of everyone he had ever met, exceptionally unique, so why, then, did everyone refuse to believe this could be, uniquely, the only solution he ever needed?
But he couldn't give into temptation, not with everything on the line. This was no testament to inflated self-esteem, no gimmick of spontaneous self-worth; he needed to stay clean because his work was in jeopardy. Scotland Yard wouldn't have him back, not with the papers digging up every case he had ghost-solved for them, exposing their incompetency without him. And the number of times one of Lestrade's rank and file found him staggering around Camden at two in the morning, strung out and rambling to himself as he aimlessly dug through trash cans... No, he had a fine life here, a stable work relationship with Gregson and a brownstone almost all to himself for experiments or case webs.
He felt it was a fool’s errand to try and suss out the origins of an addict’s impulses. Therefore he did not stop to contemplate why exactly it was that, despite gratitude towards his current living situation, he was fingering a syringe full of smack in his coat pocket.
Yes- skag, dope, the H train, heroin- an impatient plunger at his fingertip. Knot a rubber strip, spit a needle cap, and he would sink into a sea of pleasure that would gladly swallow him whole (and he would gladly let it.) Any anger, disappointment, or pity directed at him would be meaningless, because everything beyond the high was a world away.
Sherlock stroked the familiar sterilized plastic, his pulse accelerating as need burned through his veins, as steam generated in the frantic cogs of his brain with no outlet to escape, a steady crescendo of maddening pressure. He took the filled syringe from his pocket and helplessly gazed into the yellow-orange-brown disgrace.
He looked past the syringe to the street below, the dress shoes dangling stories above ground. How long would it take to hit the pavement? Sherlock considered this on the roof any building, calculated the approximate distance with his weight, yet he knew from this height it was not a guaranteed death, and this was where he faltered.
He was brought back into reality by a sudden realization that it was snowing, and had been for some time now, judging by the half centimeter of snow accumulated on the ledge. Involuntarily, he shivered, not just from the cold nipping at his leather-gloved fingers and anesthetizing the sting of his burns, but the numbness in his heart.
One spoonful of liquid pushed into his veins, and his life would once again be in shambles, yet he could not bring himself to care. Just once, he would like to allow himself an indulgence that would never abandon him, and took no offense when he abandoned it.
A door slammed open. Three footsteps crunched on the blanketed rooftop.
"Sherlock!" Joan Watson exclaimed.