Work Text:
The weather in August was far more reasonable then the July heat had been. It was still hot, this was New York in the summertime, after all. But Mother Nature seemed to have decided to give them a bit of a break and the mercury never really ventured out of the eighties.
Not that Joan Watson would have known, under de facto house arrest as she was.
She spent the first two weeks of her convalescence ordering Sherlock around, making him do things for her that she knew she could and should do herself. He felt guilty. Would likely always feel some level of guilt for her wounds. But there was only so much she could take. So as August aged she started pushing back. The lotus pillow was long gone, her stitches had been removed and she was left with a flat pink scar curving down her left side and another on the side of her hand already fading to white. Sherlock insisted it would be permanent. Her instinct told her it would fade to a point she could ignore it. Even the nerve damaged induced finger twitching had diminished.
It took a week of her pushing back for them to argue. Not just the bickering they’d done before, or even the top-of-his-lungs confession of guilt that Sherlock had given right after the incident. But a real knockdown, drag out, shouting things best left unsaid fight that should have sent her packing. It was the kind of fight you could only have with someone you knew intimately. They each knew exactly where to strike to inflict the most damage. But even then, as angry as they were, she didn’t mention Moriarty (The Bitch, but she’d never called her that in Sherlock’s presence) and he didn’t so much as hint at the patient she’d lost. No, she poked at his god complex, his addiction and inability to be wrong and he pulled out her self esteem issues and dogged desire to both please people and fix them whether they required it or not. Joan went to bed certain their partnership was over and didn’t sleep a wink.
Instead, when she came down to breakfast she found Sherlock making pancakes. Hers had a smiley face made out of chocolate chips on it. Neither of them apologized out loud and no one offered forgiveness. Neither of them was right and neither was wrong. She was pushing herself too hard, bucking at his fussing. And he was too blinded by his guilt and self recrimination to listen to her. Which was how they ended up on opposite sides of the kitchen table, eating smiley face pancakes and silently agreeing to never speak of the argument again.
Life with Sherlock was never simple.
One morning she came down in her running clothes, braced for negotiations, only to find Sherlock in gym shorts, a faded Chelsea football shirt and brand new grey and purple running shoes. She stared at him.
“It occurs to me,” he said with the utmost dignity. “That a major breakthrough in our case came when you were jogging. Perhaps I have been to hasty in dismissing it.”
She smiled, almost certain there was more to it then that but fully able to recognize an olive branch when she saw it. “You’ll be good for pacing. So I don’t overexert myself.”
That afternoon she made sure he caught her looking through the files on self defense trainers. They had been sitting on his desk since spring. It was probably time to stop fighting that particular battle. She dearly hoped to never be in that position again. But she was a person who learned from her mistakes. This time it had been a knife. Next time it could be worse.
“I’ve narrowed it down to these two,” she finally told him, putting the files next to him. “I’m willing to do both if you think it’s worthwhile. Otherwise you can tell me which you think is best.”
He touched the files lightly with his finger tips, not looking at her. “You could try both. See if one speaks to you more.”
They might not be a masters of compromise. But they were trying and that’s what mattered.
She went to krav maga on Thursdays and jujitsu Saturday mornings if they weren’t on a case. He didn’t run with her every morning, but he tried to. Joan had once thought her relationship with her mother was complicated, full of expectations and disappointments things left unsaid or misunderstood. But that matriarchal minefield had nothing on life with Sherlock.
September brought the one year anniversary of Joan moving into the brownstone and starting this insane chapter of her life. She bought herself a new mattress to mark the occasion. She refused to let Sherlock come and help her choose it because no matter how many bed bug horror stories he told he did not get a vote on her sleeping choices. After they delivered the mattress she found a set of 600 thread count sheets sitting, neatly folded, on the bare bed. She would never have chosen the scarlet red but they were still the nicest sheets she’d ever seen.
“Happy anniversary, Watson,” Sherlock said from the doorway.
“You didn’t have to do this,” she said, fingering the fine cotton. “I didn’t-”
“Get me anything. Yes, I presumed you wouldn’t. It isn’t a gift giving occasion, really. I know the mattress was purely a practical purchase but still, I felt it appropriate to mark-”
She considered trying out one of her new martial arts moves on him, some of the holds could really come in handy when he started pontificating, but decided to just interrupt. “I was planning to give you something in six weeks,” she said over his yammering. “I’d rather commemorate the day our relationship became voluntary and not arranged by your father.”
His mouth closed with a snap. “I see.”
She smiled and started to unfold the sheets. “The sheets are lovely, though.”
Six weeks later she tossed a box wrapped with plaid paper and tied in a red bow into his lap. “Happy voluntary anniversary,” she said, flopping into the red armchair to watch him open it.
He pulled the ribbon off and destroyed the paper before opening the box and taking out a metal tangle of gears and cogs. “It’s a clock,” he said, before adding derisively. “A broken clock.”
“Yes. I thought you might like to fix it.” He looked at her with a face she couldn’t read. “You’ve picked every lock on the wall multiple times. You get out of handcuffs in less then ten seconds. I thought maybe you’d like a new hobby. Something to tinker with.” His expression didn’t change and she began to grow uncomfortable that she’d made a miscalculation. “It was that or knit you ridiculous socks.”
“Knitting might help you with the nerve damage in your hand,” he commented, turning the clock over in his hands again.
She covered her left hand with her right before the twitching could begin, giving her hurt away. She had been certain he’d like it. A different kind of puzzle to solve. But he was looking at the clock like it was a dead fish and poking at her sensitive spots to provoke a reaction. She sighed and stood, heading for the kitchen to make tea.
“Thank you, Watson,” he said softly before she reached the doorway but after she’d past him and could see his face. “It’s a lovely gift. Very. . . very thoughtful.” His voice was rough at the end and she had an urge to touch him, but fought it off.
“You’re welcome,” she said before continuing to the kitchen to make tea for both of them.
October brought crisp days and golden leaves. When a mid month windstorm howled through the eaves and rattled the windows Joan and Sherlock paid it no mind. He was knuckle deep in gears and cogs and Joan was turning the heel on the first of a pair of grey and orange socks.
Sometimes, when the wind was right and their hands were occupied and they both bent a little bit, life with Sherlock could be as simple as that.