Archive of Our Own ^beta

Thursday 10:30 am

The air was so still and heavy that John knew a storm was coming. He quickened his pace past the open doors of the other shops while the milk, jam and bread jostled against his legs in their plastic bags. As he looked at the sky, he noted white tendrils snaking their way across the deep blue thunderheads.  The clouds were very close to the ground now, pressing in against the city.

John frowned, not for the first time that day. The morning had not begun well; Sherlock was notably absent from the flat. Refuse, including sheet music, a broken mug and used nicotine patches littered the space around the desk and window. A faintly pink gelatinous material covered the second shelf of the refrigerator, seeping through the cardboard bottom of the milk. John stirred himself to wipe the container but lacked the confidence necessary to add the milk to his tea. He thus suffered without it, and only moments later found the remains of the last two bread slices lining the bottom of four petri dishes sitting out on the windowsill. In each dish, a different colored solute lay puddled into a familiar thumbprint – pink, green, blue and orange. John snorted and left in a huff for the grocery, hurling his now-empty mug in the direction of the sofa. It defiantly refused to break, not leaving any additional shards for unsuspecting flatmates.

As he strode home, a pressure began settling across the bridge of his nose in response to the increasing closeness of the atmosphere. It occurred to him that the day should not have begun so badly. A day with such a preceding evening had no right to start so poorly, but John thinks to himself that the days have not gone as usual since the conclusion of the last case. The conclusion…but perhaps that wasn’t the correct term at all.

 Tuesday, earlier that week, 7:00pm

Meet us at 1142 Chistlehurst Park – Randall brothers in the area. L

Seen by whom? SH

Just get down here and bring John. He has a better bedside manner than you. L

I had no idea the brothers Randall needed their boils lanced. SH

I’ll have Anderson start processing the scene, then, shall I? L

“John! Let’s go!” Sherlock shouted upstairs.

He flung the laptop onto the chair across from him, causing a delicate wave of dust to spring forth from the cushion as it bounced. He heard three steps above him, crossing toward the door, then one step back. Sherlock heard faint grumbling, a muttered ‘wot’ and then one step forward, a hand to the doorknob, and four steps toward the stairs. He grinned – John was nothing if not predictable.

“Sherlock, I just dropped off. It’s flu season and I’m just trying to get the music of inflammatory mucosal infestation out of my head. Is this really the appropriate time? When I’m having a nap?”

Each comment was punctuated by a hesitant downward step down the narrow stair. Wrinkled pants cuffs and then knees came into view. Sherlock pulled his gloves on, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.

“Lestrade says the Randall brothers are involved.”

John took three more steps down, quickly, bringing his waist into view. Four more steps down, rapidly, and John appeared with a hand to his hair, eyebrows raised, looking into the living space.

“Really, now? We haven’t seen anything out of them since they…..”

“Yes, yes, no need to go into all that,” said Sherlock, cutting him off abruptly.

“I was going to say, since they pulled off that twin heist at Lewisham and Sydenham,” John said innocently.

Sherlock looked briefly down toward the floor, a nasty gleam in his eye. “Yes, twin. So glad you brought that up.” Sherlock was chagrined by reminders of past lapses in deductive powers, but what went unsaid was that only John was allowed to prod him about this. Baiting Sherlock had the immediate consequence of amusement and, of course, danger.

So it was to John’s complete lack of surprise that Sherlock chucked his shoes out the window and told him to wipe the drool off his chin before stomping down the stairs.

Chistlehurst Park was a posh area situated on the outskirts of the city. It played host to a gathering of upwardly mobile professionals and wealthy retirees. Ivy trellises clung to the brick exteriors of the homes and a quiet atmosphere prevailed.

John was nevertheless unprepared for the sight that awaited him in the ambulance. Sherlock bent like a willow wand around the ambulance door behind John, who stood in front of the woman. All things being equal, she had a blanket wrapped around her to hazard off any potential shock.

It wasn’t the blanket that drew John’s eye, however. The woman’s eye was blackened, her nose undoubtedly broken, now surrounded by a splint. She gave off an air of placid despair as she met John’s eyes, then Sherlock’s, then John’s again.

As the woman examined John and introduced herself as Mary Fraser in a shaking voice, Sherlock made deductions. He noted the woman’s injuries - caused by two closed fist blows, both from right handed man – and bent back fingernails – scratches to the assailant with the first three fingers of the left hand. He observed red fibres crossing diagonally over the front of her grey silk blouse and saw subtle indentions on her forearms – bound, red rope, no - curtain cord?

He turned once more to the woman’s face to observe her nose and accidentally met her eyes. Sherlock was stunned. One eye squinted, swollen, but both eyes were blue – that was not surprising in and of itself, but the look of pain, betrayal, anguish, worry, love….

It rocketed Sherlock back to a memory he tried to squirm away from, as if touched by fire.

That same look haunted Sherlock’s dreams, those troublesome specters of his subconscious. It was brief enough when he had encountered it, but the recall of how quickly it was shunted aside was just as painful as the look itself. Guilt swam up through his body in a wave at the recollection, and there were more feelings, regret and possessiveness that he could not bear to delete the memory that so troubled him. Pain.

Sherlock winced and looked away, an action that was not lost on John.

John was immediately concerned – he was used to Sherlock’s utter nonchalance on the job, off the job – it was unlike him to exhibit any kind of physicality whatsoever. In the months since his return, John had accustomed himself again to the rare manic grins and the even rarer belly laughs when the two of them had outfoxed an enemy or a colleague or Mycroft.

Sherlock’s return.

The return – there had been some flicker of sentiment on Sherlock’s face, then, it was true, but John considered now he had imagined most of it. When he first saw Sherlock, when he first saw him…..he had felt his own knees swim, and his brows draw down. A lump had risen from his stomach, and there had been….that knowledge in his face that he could not hide, that betrayed feeling that it had all been a magic trick after all, and John had not been clever enough to share it with him. John had not been enough to know the truth.

He had forgiven Sherlock as soon as the words began to fall from his lips, as soon as he began to explain – John was an intelligent man, and he realized the lengths that Sherlock must have been driven to even before the full story came out. He couldn’t take back that initial reaction, though, that first expression of gut-punching disappointment.

At Sherlock’s deep, joyful laugh, though, he had laughed, too, felt the corners of his mouth and eyes draw up and coughed away the anguish, quickly. Laughter was safe, safer to indulge in with Sherlock, and at least that was something. Something that didn’t rely upon his imagination to fill in, to subsidize for what wasn’t really enough, wouldn’t ever be enough, but what there was.

So John and Sherlock had picked up where they left off, solving unsolvable crimes, drawing the attention of prospective archenemies, irritating Mycroft. They wove together a satisfying stasis of adrenaline-fueled nights and days, which substituted for life. John didn’t crave more, truly he didn’t, but he suspected his dreams did. They were easy enough to ignore. 

Sherlock wincing? Was that a physical response toward mental stimuli or was his friend catching the flu?

John coughed away his concern and turned toward the woman, Mary.

Her nose really was an absolute disaster. A crime had been committed in this affront to her person. It was difficult to look on her lovely and even features, as they must have been, with the disfigurement that obvious rage had caused. The Randall brothers were not known for violence. A madcap disregard for societal conventions and the belongings of others seemed to be their trademark, but John supposed Lestrade had his reasons for bringing them in.

Dignified and sedate in spite of her discomfort, Mary began to explain to them both how the twins – or, at least two equal-height masked men -  had surprised her in the bedroom as she walked out from the bathroom. She explained how she had heard the sickening thud from below – she used the word, sickening – and how the twins tied her up with the curtain cord after bullying the information about her husband’s family’s heirloom silver tea set out of her by breaking her nose.

Apparently, the curtain cord was ineffective after an hour. Mary worked her hands free and dialed 999 as she ran downstairs, only to find her husband of just a year with his blood soaking into the carpet from a gruesome head wound.

Throughout Mary’s calm recounting of the events, Sherlock stared at the ground, listening.

She’s lying.

Sherlock tried to conceal the mad dash of pride racing through his veins as he watched John’s forehead creasing in disbelief. Dear John, he was able to display just the right bedside manner on his pleasant face, but his tells were so obvious to Sherlock. John saw through the woman, too. Sherlock tried not to smile.

Then he took another chance in looking at the woman, met her eyes again.

Something was very wrong here.

The clues did not mesh with the expression in her eyes. The woman was undoubtedly lying, but she was also terribly hurt. Her injuries were legitimate, not the result of the typical connivance for attention or the misdirection of a petty crime. Her eyes told the story of a betrayal.

It was not the betrayal of a deal gone wrong. It was the betrayal that wore on someone over time, of ceding a piece of one’s self a bit each day. Sherlock wished he did not have that knowledge. Parts of Sherlock he was unwilling to recognize uncurled and ached up inside of him.

Unable to tolerate the woman’s cutting stare a moment longer, Sherlock unbent and brusquely excused himself to go into the house.

The home was flawlessly arranged. Each object had its place as if by design, not a curtain or tapestry was out of place. The bowl of flowers on the tea-table was placed exactly in the center of the table, with five and ¼ inches to spare from each of the narrow sides. The stripes on the blue and white Italian silk sofa were precisely flush with the planes of the walls. Recent hoovering, perhaps from early that afternoon, divided the red plush carpeting upstairs like tidy farm plots; the effect was spoiled only by a smattering of footprints mashing the pile. The towels in the kitchen were symmetrically arranged over the handle of the stove, and the neatly stacked folded dishcloths had creases sharp enough to cut.

It was a house of unparalleled oppression. Sherlock saw exactly what he expected to as he gazed at the body of the husband downstairs. The blood had ceased to flow from his wounds and the carpet mat was now irrevocably stained. He had fallen forward, his legs bent, hands stretched in front of him. The brass rack near the fireplace was notable for its missing and essential poker, undoubtedly the murder weapon.

As Sherlock crouched and took in the scene before him, he heard an indignant sniff behind him.

“I ought to have known you’d show up here for the twins. I’m thinking they’re long gone by now, swanking over putting another one over on the world’s only undead consulting detective,” Anderson said smugly.

Sherlock didn’t move, but did stir himself enough to comment:

“You needn’t worry at all, Anderson, an entire zombie horde couldn’t locate your brain.”

Lestrade took that opportune moment to stroll back into the room from the hallway.

“Well?” he asked gruffly.

Sherlock made his way for the exit and into the driveway. Sherlock bent his head briefly over his phone and then paused, waiting for Lestrade.

*text sent*

“Seriously, Sherlock, what’s going on here?” Lestrade was becoming impatient.

Sherlock turned his eyes toward him and assumed the comfortable and oft-used position of one speaking to an imbecilic and enfeebled macaque:

“Clearly it’s not the twins since you couldn’t be bothered to note that the curtain cords reach all the way up to the ceiling and were cut from the top first. The twins stand only 1.6m thus allowing them to squeeze into a variety of unexpected settings but not this domicile in particular. Furthermore, the footprints mashed into the lush carpet upstairs suit the proportions of much taller men than the Randall twins. You are indeed looking for two men, but they are not twins at all. One man weighs much more than the other. This was a robbery motivated by desperation and complicated by slaughter, so I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the men were addicts-“

Lestrade raised his eyebrows at the last, inhaling quickly to interrupt.

“-oh, don’t comment on this at least Lestrade, fatherly concern is unbecoming of you, and besides the presumption that homes in this neighborhood would contain unconsidered trifles easily sold for ready cash is something that would have occurred to the most casual of observers, drug-addled or not. In short, you have summoned me out of my flat for a simple and above all boring, random and unintentional murder. I will wish you good evening and good luck finding the twins before I do, but of course you will not.”

And abruptly, Sherlock bounded away from Lestrade, calling “John! We’re off!”

They hailed a cab rather quickly and climbed in, settling themselves opposite one another. John shifted uncomfortably and he murmured, “You were a bit short with him.”

Sherlock, unperturbed, replied “I’m not well suited for long and meaningful conversations, especially when I am lying. Even a tactical diversion requires more artifice and effort than I can usually be bothered to invest. The name?”

John pursed his lips together and looked out the window.

He spoke out flatly, “Jack Crocker. Captain Crocker, United Airlines.” John looked back at the glow of his phone, at Sherlock’s previous text message:

Received 8:46

Ask her ‘what is his name?’ SH 

Five minutes later, Sherlock emerged from his apparent fugue state and stirred himself to address John.

“Thank you, John, I didn’t wish to linger over the victim, it seemed she needed some space.” At that, John huffed and crossed his arms. On the matter of space, John felt that he had it in abundance. It was not space that created the growing sense of discontent in his mind. Sherlock had never lied quite so blatantly to Lestrade before. What was he playing at?

He had quite obviously, to John at least, been moved by his encounter with the woman. Now it was clear to John that he wanted to protect her, and seek out this man, Captain Crocker, to continue his investigation unfettered by the police. John felt a stab at the exclusion. The nerve of him – when he had said before that John was essential…..A red haze began to rise up through his mind.

Sherlock broke into his thoughts,

“John, I can hear you from over here. Your breathing is elevated and I can tell you’re disappointed. Just….I will not keep you out of it….ever again. I will explain later.” He swallowed hard and resumed his study of the window.

John sniffed loudly. Sherlock reading him in this mood caused him a different sensation in the pit of his stomach that had nothing to do with anger. So Sherlock was watching him, then? Just how closely did he watch John? How much was he aware of? It was likely far more than John ever felt comfortable discussing out loud, or even thinking about in the confines of his own head.

And, yet, John found himself thinking of Sherlock, wincing earlier. He had only ever seen Sherlock not in total control of his physical reactions those few, few times….the flicker of pained betrayal when John stepped out at the poolside, recoiling from the hound, reaching out a hand to him from the top of St. Bart’s…..no….

No, he couldn’t think of that now. He felt his stomach pricking again, knowing it had nothing to do with his appetite. And Sherlock had winced after looking at Mary Fraser. Another twinge of pain sparked across his gut. Jealously is cruel as the grave…..and that was a rich joke, as Sherlock had already been in the grave once.

It hit him suddenly that he was indeed jealous of the way Sherlock had looked away from the woman. John snorted to himself to clear the awful thought – at the expense of the beaten woman, surely John was a sick, sick man – and he thought hopefully of the bottle of Scotch he had tucked in the back of the pantry from last Christmas.

Sherlock continued staring out the window but had not ceased to listen to John. He could tell his friend was upset, could hear it in the way he sighed, cleared his throat, shifted his body and then snorted to himself, but he was sure that John did not understand the depths of Sherlock’s discomfort. He hoped John did not understand. Sherlock’s last defense was that John not understand, was that a distance remained between them. A safe distance would keep away that terrible and physical pain of betrayal on his friend’s face. He was only grateful he had not been able to see John’s face before the Fall. Had he known John could be so terribly wounded, he would never have been able to fling himself from the building, thus condemning them both. It was bad enough now that Sherlock had to carry the memory of John’s first expression at his return. He had never expected to hurt him so deeply, had never wanted that. The memory of John’s pain lingered in his veins like ice, and Sherlock resisted the sudden impulse to bury his head in his hands.

Sixty centimers from one another and worlds apart, they rode in silence back to the flat.

Thursday, later that week, 10:45am

John felt a light ping of moisture on his hand, the first of the day. The air smelled thickly of turned over earth, a surprising smell in the concrete jungle of London, which boded for the mother of all storms.

He couldn’t help slowing his pace as he thought over the events of the last several days. Sherlock had indeed solved the case but in a most…unusual fashion. John had become accustomed to expecting the unexpected from Sherlock, but the result of this was singular. Sherlock – demonstrating compassion? Was this sentiment, then? John knew that Sherlock described himself as loathing all sentiment but he found his brain turning on its wheels helplessly looking for a different word to describe his actions.

John gave up, sighing, and continued the walk back to the flat. He found his mind wandering back to the events of the previous night.

Tuesday, earlier in the week, sometime around 10:00pm

John was darkly pouring himself a third glass of Scotch at the table after their return from Chistlehurst Park. John’s plan for the Scotch was that it burn his jealous thoughts of Sherlock right out of his head, just as it would burn his throat.

The first glass had indeed gone down hotly and had almost no effect, but the second glass….

The second glass had begun to blur the motionless figure on the sofa and the related memory of a flinching Sherlock outside of an ambulance. John was simply delighted to chug down the third glass and send it to keep company with the first two. He giggled to himself as he thought of the Scotch commiserating with his organs to keep him dulled and insensitive. Emotions….now those were boring, according to that machine on the sofa. At least Sherlock and the Scotch had something in common. John snickered again.

“I hardly see it as amusing that you’ve got your mind set on drinking yourself into oblivion,” Sherlock put in sulkily from the sofa.

John’s eyes focused slowly to where he lay, back turned toward him, and narrowed. John heard himself reply, rather sluggishly,

“Piss off, Sherlock. A man’s got a right sometimes to drown his sorrows.”

A sigh.

“And what exactly are you sorrowing over?”

Dissembling quickly, or so he thought, John sniggered, “Right now I’m sorrowing that there’s not more Scotch. Could use another bottle soon at this rate. Time for glass four!”

Ignoring his friend pouting on the sofa, he sloppily poured another glass, spilling amber liquid on the tabletop. John wasn’t exactly an expert at getting roaring drunk – two beers at a time was his usual limit.

He was brilliant at it just now.

His lips were completely numb, which suited John just fine. The Scotch tasted like water, which John knew was a sign of how intoxicated he had become. Down went glass number four. The room was completely spinning now, bathed in the gentle yellow of the lamp near the sofa.

Ah, John could get used to this. His senses were almost completely dulled, and that was fine by him. No pesky reminders of hurts long buried, no images of dear friends jumping off of buildings, no jealousy pricking the back of his eyes….

So, time for another glass, then.

Sherlock listened as the glass was placed onto the table more heavily than usual, the result of drink number five working its way through John’s alcohol-laden system. He eyed the back of the couch, unmoving, and then closed his eyes.

“Piss off, Sherlock.”

The words echoed around his head, and Sherlock tried not to think about this. He was used to them – not those words in particular, but the sentiment was all too familiar – except it hurt coming from John. He knew that he was sometimes a disappointment to John but this different. This was John deliberately being cruel to him. One of their first conversations stood out to him with perfect recall, and he knew John remembered it, too, even in his alcohol-induced stupor.

“And what do people usually say?”

“’Piss off.’”

For once, Sherlock wished it was as easy for him to dampen his thoughts with the relief of drink. Even when he did imbibe, the alcohol never bothered to stop in for a chat with his brain. Sherlock never achieved the release for his mind that he craved, but it had been fulfilling at times to speed up his body to match his brain.

John was enough to put off that craving for rapidity. John’s belief in him, his esteem, was thrilling.

No, wait. It wasn’t thrilling at all. It was soothing. Sherlock’s eyes flew open, his mind fumbling over the word. Yes, it was soothing. Like the time that John had produced a blue jar of white cream from somewhere in the refrigerator and used his fingers to smooth it over a scald that Sherlock had garnered from a suspect flinging a full coffee pot at his head. Sherlock had ducked, ungloved hands covering his face. They apprehended the suspect, and Sherlock had watched, satisfied, as he was cuffed and stuffed into the car, but Sherlock then growled away Lestrade’s urging to go to hospital for something so trivial as a scalded hand.

John had insisted then that they skip the usual takeout and return to the flat, shuffling him into the chair by the fireplace – the same chair John shifted to the table tonight – and he had pulled out the burn cream from the refrigerator.

Crouching over Sherlock, he had said, “I always keep some on hand – around here, you never know what may catch on fire, boil over or explode. One day Mrs. Hudson might see the state of the microwave and decide to throw tea at us. Now, hold it out.”

And generously – the man was always generous and considerate – John had smoothed the cream over the top of his hand, covering the angry red mark, smiling to himself at a job well done, a hurt assuaged.

Sherlock rubbed the spot now, noting where the skin had healed slightly tighter. The texture was barely different from the rest of his skin, but the knowledge that John had healed the spot made it feel different to Sherlock now. A cocktail of chemicals in his brain fired all at once, and Sherlock almost gasped at the sensation. This wasn’t adrenaline at all, not the first rush of glimpsing a crime scene, or the thrill of the chase, but a flood of serotonin and oxytocin. Sherlock at last gave recognition to the explosions amongst his neurons and clenched his body together in a spasm of resultant agony, and it was just as well for him that John’s body seized this moment to pass out and collapse onto the floor.

Sherlock observed the unconscious John, standing over him. He was slumped on his side, his right hand reaching out loosely. His left hand was crushed up under his chin, and his eyes were peaceful, unmoving beneath his lids.

As Sherlock knelt down beside him, he became aware of an indescribable tightness inside his chest, and he catalogued his heart beating faster. He ignored it, refused to dedicate further use of grey matter to track his breathing in response to his friend’s proximity.

But Sherlock could tell something was troubling his friend, even in his alcoholic repose. His eyebrows creased down toward the middle and the corners of his mouth were slightly turned down. The well-known furrows in his brow suddenly stood out to Sherlock, and he sat on his knees, rocking slightly. He rubbed his thumb over the top of his hand, and the sudden urge to heal, to make better, came over him.

Sherlock took his thumb and gently, hardly touching, ran it from the top of John’s hairline to the center of his brows. He was stunned at the way that the scrunched up skin responded to his touch, smoothing and relaxing. A satisfied grin came to his lips at his accomplishment and he flexed his fingers, running two again from the hairline to John’s eyebrows. A sigh escaped from John’s lips, along with the smell of stale Scotch, and Sherlock tensed to spring away.

But John remained curled on his side, motionless save for the deep breathing that moved his chest out and back in.

An absurd, absolutely absurd urge to gather John in his arms came over Sherlock. He classified it as absurd because in his entire life Sherlock could never remember aching for human contact. Sherlock had instead rejected it wholeheartedly. But a rejection to what?

Freak.

Virgin.

Weirdo.

Oddball.

Nutter.

Piss off.

It occurred to him suddenly that John, only John, was the whole category of humanity who had ever thought him worth complimenting, worth spending time on, worth smiling at, worth laughing with.

John was a category. And Sherlock had repaid him for being himself by putting distance between them purposefully.

Sherlock reached a decision.

He tucked his left arm underneath John’s knees, turning him slightly, and slid his right arm underneath his shoulders. He placed his feet on the floor, carefully, and clutched John to his chest.

He was so light in Sherlock’s arms. How could so slight a man wield a gun so confidently, invade Afghanistan, shoot murderous cabbies and stand unafraid in the presence of a madman like Moriarty whilst covered in explosives? John was a genius beyond compare.

Sherlock grabbed him tightly, walking the steps up the turning stair, and then Sherlock was inside John’s room. It was smaller than Sherlock’s, but he never recalled John complaining about this. The room featured a small window near the top corner, a simple bed covered in a plaid blanket and a dresser with a lamp. It had changed little in the months since Sherlock had last been in to nick John’s laptop from where he had carried it the night before.

Better not to think of the motives behind the laptop’s removal above-stairs, mused Sherlock with a wry smile.

Sherlock laid John gently on his left side facing toward the door and began the process of removing his shoes. He didn’t think John would mind about the shoes, but he resolved to disturb the rest of him as little as possible.

Except. Except that John had stretched his head out, lolling backwards a bit, sighing. His brow was creased back up, with three ridges that Sherlock could count.

He couldn’t stand it. He bent down next to the bed, moving his left hand, the one with the burn on it, to smooth out the furrows once more. That being done, he placed one finger over the crease between John’s brows, each touch soothing.

Sherlock had never comforted anyone in his life, including himself.

He reached out both hands, intent on touching John’s face to smooth away the creases and the cares that he knew he had put there. As he stroked John’s forehead, he brushed up against his hair.

It was nothing like Sherlock expected. Sherlock’s own hair was wiry and springy, but John’s was smooth as silk. He reached to stroke it once more with the back of his fingers, and then he turned his palm outward to rub his healed flesh against John’s cheek.

It was like a jolt of electricity shot through his spine when his scar touched John. He almost felt as though he were being soothed again, as though John was gently easing the soreness of the burn once more.

The sensation of it all pumped his heart faster, blood racing through his veins. He surrendered to the sensation and the terrible, terrible recognition that shouted its way up through his bones and lungs that he needed John more than air, more than breathing. John healed.

Sherlock gave himself over to his impulses and curiosity, completely comfortable in the presence of John the physician.

He stretched out fingertips to John’s face, gliding over cheekbones, grazing eyelids and tracing a gentle line over his nose. He circled one long finger underneath his chin, experiencing the day’s worth of stubble, knowing that John would shave the next morning. His own stubble was not bristly, it was barely evident, and Sherlock hated to think of other stubble [corpses’] he had grazed with the same fingers in comparison.

So Sherlock focused instead on his present exploration of John’s sleeping face, finally peaceful under the ministration of Sherlock’s gentle fingers. Sherlock was smiling to himself now in satisfaction and even happiness.

Inhaling slowly, he reached out a forefinger to trace John’s lips. They were palest pink, and he began at the corner, slowly pulling his finger down and across the fullness in the center –

John jerked quickly backwards, moaning sharply as he did so, and a single plaintive cry escaped from him.

“Sherlock!”

Sherlock froze in place, blood freezing in his veins, before his heart started beating again and he noted quickly that John’s breathing had not altered, his eyes remained shut, and that he surely remained locked in his subconscious.

That was quite enough, then. He pulled his hands away, shaking slightly, placing them silently on his knees, staring but not quite comprehending. It took a few moments before Sherlock could reassure himself once more that John was still sleeping. He worked on slowing his breathing down and plotting his course of action for the next ten seconds thinking that he would quietly rise up and-

make him say it again

He breathed in sharply as the rest of his thoughts screeched rapidly to a halt. Sherlock scrambled up far more quickly than he had intended and walked rapidly, no, ran from the room and down the stairs.

He collapsed onto the sofa, this time really placing his hands into his head and groaning, trying to drown out the thud of his own heartbeat in his ears and the entirely unbidden thoughts in his mind, using his own voice, dialoging with him for Christ’s sake.

Felt good, did it, hearing that?

It’s not necessary to feel good. It’s all just transport.

And if it were just transport, why on earth would it need soothing?

Sherlock had absolutely no response to this last obscene query and so dashed the nearest thing at hand onto the floor, the mug used for yesterday’s tea. It broke into several pieces and Sherlock’s mind seized onto it instantly, measuring the pieces, imagining them reconstructing themselves and breaking it again into a different tableau of crockery.

And so he continued into the night, counting the digits after pi, imagining the most stable elements in combinations and then chronologically reciting the major crimes in the first half of the 19^th century while John slept off the Scotch upstairs.

John came awake to the sounds of the city, listening to the familiar noises of passing cars, a garbage truck lifting a skip, and a distant siren.

He opened his eyes, in spite of the warning from his splitting headache, and was surprised to find himself in his own bed. He was hardly aware of a groan from his own mouth as the events from the previous night presented themselves out of order. He remembered the Scotch – was almost sure he had emptied the bottle. He remembered the murder in Chistlehurst Park.

He groaned again as he remembered Sherlock’s reaction to the pretty victim and his chilly disapproval of his drinking.

But he couldn’t remember how he ended up in his own bed. According to his headache, sitting up was another mistake but he needed to lay eyes on the situation.

He was tangled up in his plaid blanket but was still fully dressed. Apparently, he hadn’t even taken off his coat before he started drinking last night. He wasn’t wearing any shoes, so he turned his head in spite of his headache’s urging and located them precisely six inches away from the bed, placed side by side toward the wall. A neuron fired. His shoes would not have landed that way if he had kicked them off in his sleep.

This massive undertaking of deductive reasoning thus concluded, John had no other choice but to reason that…..Sherlock had carried him upstairs last night.

But why? As John reflected, he considered that it would have been far more likely for him to wake up with a full test tube lodged in his ear and some memos stuck to his back than in his own bed.

He had not expected this at all. How had he missed his flatmate picking him up  and maneuvering him into his bed? Still worse, did he have over Lestrade and company to take pictures of him while he lay helplessly sprawled?

These thoughts were not comforting, so John decided to banish them once and for all by getting up and trudging downstairs. His whole body protested and his stomach lurched, but he managed to grab his robe and towel.

Sherlock was conspicuously absent. The bottle of Scotch still stood on the table, eyeing him innocently. John imagined that a vapor curled its way out from the bottle, because its odour still permeated the flat.

John could still smell the Scotch in the shower with him, and he came to the realization that it was actually leaking from his pores. When was the last time he drank so heavily? It must have been fifteen years at least, when he was still in his twenties and the novelty of intoxication hadn’t yet worn off. He avoided strong drink as a rule, Harry’s influence, he knew.

John scrubbed that much harder to rid his pores of the Scotch. He turned the water up until his skin pinked, closed his eyes, and tried not to think.

He felt a tingling sensation on his lower lip and shuddered in spite of the heat, eyes opening. What on earth had he dreamed of last night? He knew he had dreamed because he had wrapped himself up in his sheets; he tossed and turned when he dreamed.  He heard an echo of himself moaning, and he rubbed his scalp in confusion.

Whatever he had dreamed of left him hard and aching this morning. He was surprised by his arousal in spite of the blistering headache, but he had heard the best cure for a headache was a rush of endorphins.

Picturing the breasts of his last date, Margaret, as he pulled off her white shirt, John took himself in hand and began to stroke. Margaret’s breasts were a nice handful, plump and tight, with sweet, red nipples. John had loved sucking on those nipples, carefully tonguing the tip with his lips all around them until she moaned with desire and begged for him inside of her. The sex had been good, even if the relationship had fizzled out.

The relationship fizzled out as most of them had recently. John was still able to convince women to go out with him and even have sex with him – but his dedication to the mission had altered. He didn’t intend to place their happiness after Sherlock’s, but Sherlock and his involvement in The Work was all-consuming. It was beyond fascinating to watch Sherlock on the hunt and to participate in the chase.

Since that last date with Margaret, John had stopped looking for additional encounters, stopped trying to hook up with the women he met casually. He hadn’t lost his interest in beautiful girls – Anthea still drew his eye every time they chanced to meet. John simply stopped making the attempt to form new relationships. Since Sherlock’s return, especially, it was difficult for John to expend the effort to involve new people in his life. It seemed all his energies were focused on retaining the one relationship that really mattered to him, that he thought had been lost forever.

John continued to rub himself, unabashedly – he knew that it was normal for the brain to wander idly while the body’s chemicals started to mix and fire.

Sherlock. How did John miss that Sherlock carried him upstairs? What had that even been like, being in his arms? After all that had happened, the two men had never even embraced, although John was used to Sherlock’s invasion of his personal space on a near-daily basis. Sherlock consistently appeared behind his shoulder, leaning over him, and would invite him to dig in his pockets for his phone.

John’s thoughts started to derail from their usual track as he remembered the feel of his hand slipping in front of Sherlock’s smooth shoulder, trailing down his front to enter his jacket pocket. He slipped his fingers once over the head of his cock, and suddenly imagined Sherlock’s dark head leaning over him as he lay on his bed, unconscious and unaware.

He twitched inside his own palm and quickened his pace at the thought of Sherlock’s voluntary nearness to him– not the momentary closeness of convenience or the necessary evil of grasping one another to ease the escape from a desperate situation, but the idea of his desiring John, wanting to be with John. John wasn’t sure if Sherlock desired anyone – he knew, at least, that there were things he desired, some of them dead bodies – but John’s imagination caught fire at the prospect of occupying Sherlock’s sole attention.

A warmth rose up from deep inside his core, and he welcomed it, firming his grip and speeding up. His heart pounded in his ears and he started breathing raggedly, riding on the crest now. He couldn’t help but picture Sherlock’s black curls, long fingers, a deep look of concentration in his pale eyes and a half-smile twisting up on his pink, thick lips.

John recalled those lips in every way he had ever seen them – sneering, smiling, drawn up in a shout, pursed – and he completely lost it just as he pictured himself touching them with a forefinger…

Moaning and breathing shallowly, John shook all over as his strokes slowed down and his mind raced. He was covered with his own sticky fluid all over his fingers. He held his trembling hands under the shower stream, rubbed them fiercely and kicked water over the ejaculate left over in the tub, forcing it down the drain.

He allowed the water to rinse over his body several times and his hair once before shutting it off, and he stepped into the steam in the rest of the bathroom.

The headache had subsided at last but John was stunned nearly insensible by the realization that Sherlock, in addition to inhabiting their flat, had taken up residence in the most private parts of John’s head.

Sherlock stubbed his cigarette out on the step before swinging the door of 221B open. He was well aware that this transgression would not be lost on his flatmate but given last night’s spectacular performance in self-destructive behavior he did think it would go unmentioned.

He strode up the stairs, opened the door to the flat and tossed the bacon sandwiches onto the table, where they lay next to the mostly empty bottle of Scotch. He fully intended to follow up with his suspicions from the previous evening by an interview with Captain Jack Crocker, and he wanted John to be sufficiently fueled to accompany him. He was more likely to go hungover if he had first been plied with food.

John was awake and in the shower, indicating that there was no occurrence of intense alcohol poisoning in spite of the mass quantities of drink consumed. There were not likely to be further incidences of passing out, so Sherlock turned instead to his laptop to conduct research on the culturing of bacteria in mixed settings.

Time passed.

The door to the bathroom swung open and John strode out, tying the sash of his robe. He looked down briefly and then looked out into the light-filled room before noticing the sandwiches.

“Oh, God, I must be still drunk or dreaming. Sherlock, you’ve brought food.”

He walked blearily to the table, retrieved the bottle of Scotch and tossed it into the kitchen bin. Then he slumped over to one of the chairs, where he remained, motionless.

Sherlock scrutinized him from his place on the sofa. All at once, he took in John’s comportment this morning, face smooth – shaved before entering the shower, skin moisturized by soap  - hair drying at the roots but damp at the tips– last few seconds spent with a final rinse to the hair - cheeks flushed – water ran very hot, there may not be any more until this evening – slight curvature of the right hand still present as he lifted his hand to the first sandwich – significant amount of shower time spent in the activity of masturbation –

John looked up and caught Sherlock scanning him and then flushed all the way up to the tips of his ears – he had never seen John such a bright, delicious red – Oh God, how much does he know-

And Sherlock, for the second time in two days, looked sharply away from his analysis and started coughing to distract himself. It was true that sex had never alarmed him, but he was beginning to realize, rather quickly, that there were first-hand aspects of the subject that had somehow escaped his grasp.

Sherlock knew, of course, that his flatmate was interested in sex. He spent a good deal of his time and brain matter persuading women to have sex with him. He knew also that John had been successful in his efforts in the past on at least three continents – it was in the way he interacted with other women, the way his body language showed associations with these past women of different cultures. Women liked John, and he definitely liked them. Sherlock was also aware that John masturbated on a regular basis – no surprise there, Sherlock did, too.

Masturbation was an activity that Sherlock indulged in to satisfy a biological urge, most usually in the morning. He had boiled down the activity to those strokes most likely to produce results in the least amount of time. During the act, he usually reran the best episodes from the Case Files of Sherlock Holmes, those moments in his life that were most pleasurable to him. Sherlock had never seen the point in involving other people in his life and had likewise never seen the point of involving others in his physical impulses. It hadn’t been alarming to him because it was not his concern.

He had even managed to evade the potential hazardous encounters of the typical junkie, all those years ago; even when he was strung out, he was able to trade favors of a less intimate nature by using his wits to point out a hidden entry to a home abandoned for the weekend or another equally easy mark.

But as he stared at John now, he imagined what it might be like to touch himself while thinking about John crying his name and he felt a hot flush spread up from his groin to his chest. He breathed in sharply and turned his attention back to the laptop.

“Are you ok? Are you choking over there? You’re coughing and your chest is all red.”

Sherlock instantly regretted leaving his top two buttons undone in spite of the fact that this was his habit.

He spat out, “No, fine, breathed in some dust” and tapped rapidly and randomly on the laptop. He turned to John again, not meeting his eyes.

“Eat those sandwiches, we have the case to finish.”

“Jack Crocker?”

“Yes.”

Thursday 10:45am

There were errands that Sherlock ran for himself from time to time, and this was one of them. He was driven by necessity rather than desire – the prospect of functioning without this simple essential grated on his skin, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. The sensation was nearly unbearable.

He concluded the transaction with the seller, and the seller, well aware of the man’s eccentricities, gave him a simple nod, knowing that he would return in the future. Sherlock stuffed the packet deep into his coat pocket.

Stepping out into the street, Sherlock observed that the air crackled with tension and that the clouds he had seen earlier were pressing closer to the street. The wind from earlier in the day had slacked and Sherlock popped his collar back down in response. There was still nearly a mile to walk before he reached Baker Street.

Wednesday

They met Captain Crocker at Heathrow Airport in the afternoon; he had agreed to see them outside one of the many grotty airport diners two hours prior to his next flight. He was a handsome American – blond, tall and broad about the shoulders.

He greeted them, shaking their hands, and then sat down uneasily, smoothing his navy uniform down the front.

“I know who you are – both of you. I’ve spent enough time in London that I’ve read the papers. What I want to know is…why you’ve come to me?”

Sherlock leaned back, hands idle, and John could fairly imagine that they pretended to hold a cigarette. He stared at Crocker, analyzing, and then said,

“If you know who we are…then you need to tell me everything, and now. Leave nothing out and don’t let your nerves run away with you.”

Crocker exhaled slowly and said, “I met her three years ago on a flight back from Boston. She has a sister there, and I was ferrying back to prepare for a next-day flight to Tokyo. She was already engaged to Brackenstall, but we quickly became friends. We were never more than friends.”

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed and his lips flattened suddenly, but then his features unexpectedly softened before he said, “Yes, I see.” John watched another expression flicker briefly across his face, but was not able to identify it before Crocker carried on with his story.

“What can I say? She is an incredible woman who is beautiful inside and out. It was easy to be friends with her, and I always felt comfortable being around her. It wasn’t until last year, after she married him, that I noticed her changing...becoming smaller and sadder. We would always meet for coffee or dinner, and sometimes she invited me to their home, but then she started missing our…appointments. There were times she didn’t text me back for weeks, or wouldn’t answer my calls. I emailed her several times, telling her about what I was doing, new places I had seen around the world. She loved to talk about the places she wanted to see, where she would go when she had the chance…she had been with her husband to Italy, and she wanted to go to Morocco, India, Australia…but she stopped replying.”

He trailed off, staring at his hands.

“I thought she had told her husband we were friends, so I called her home phone. The first time I called I was hung up on. I called the next time I was in London, about three weeks ago, I heard someone answer and then….they put the phone down. I heard what sounded like….slapping, and then Mary cried out….before the phone was put down again. It was like I felt the slap, and I could barely stand it. I spent three hours sitting at the gate I was going to fly out of, just staring, before she texted me ‘All right, just an accident.’”

At this, Crocker’s fists curled tightly and he squeezed his eyes shut.

“She never said when we could meet again. She never said she was in trouble – but I knew. And the last email she sent me from work was only one sentence, but it was enough to make me drop my coffee over at JFK and call in every favor I had to get to London that day.”

His eyes were brimming over with tears.

“She wrote, ‘United, fly me away to anywhere.’”

He paused and bunched his fists into his eyes unselfconsciously. John met Sherlock’s eyes briefly, uncomfortably, before Sherlock looked quickly away. Crocker’s voice was broken, and he stared into his lap as he carried on.

“Do you--- do either of you, have any idea what it’s like? To have a friend who is literally drowning to death in sadness? To have to watch them slowly sinking, not being able to pull them out? That’s what it was like all those weeks, with Mary. If you had a friend like that…wouldn’t you do anything you could, even if it meant you drowned with them?”

John coughed suddenly to dispel the lump rising up sharply in his own throat. He couldn’t look at Sherlock just now, he couldn’t. Crocker raised his head up and tugged at his cuffs.

“Mr. Holmes, I’m ready to go to the police and turn myself in. I have no defense at all, we can skip the extradition. I beat that son-of-a-bitch to death with the poker before he had a chance to lift it to her. And I would kill him every day for the rest of my life if it kept him from touching her again. It was my idea to tie Mary up and blame it on the twins – saw them in the papers, too. I never wanted her to be involved in this and if I can I will bargain for the full penalty to be measured on me instead of her. I love her, she’s my friend.”

With that, Captain Crocker turned a stony and determined face away from the two men.

John watched Sherlock’s jaw clench and unclench as he processed. He leaned forward, placing his elbows on the table and steepling his fingers.

“Captain Crocker. I can only imagine that you are suffering intensely from prolonged jetlag as is characteristic of someone in your profession. Dr. Watson and I did indeed visit Mary Fraser last night at Chistlehurst Park, but it was obvious to me then, as it is obvious to me now, that the abuse of Ms. Fraser and the murder of Mr. Brackenstall was the result of a drug-fueled robbery gone wrong…”

Crocker listened to Sherlock’s clinical and cold recitation but at the last his head jerked up in shock and he interrupted – “What-“

Sherlock cut him off by snapping his fingers and continued,

“and I have deduced from the evidence that while there has been a crime there has also been justice. I would expect that as a concerned friend you would send a brief message of condolence now and resume regular correspondence after a year’s time? I am sure Mary Fraser would welcome the comfort of a friend.”

Sherlock raised his eyebrows to see if this message had sunk in. It had.

“Then, John, I believe we have kept Captain Crocker from his flight long enough. Get us a cab…please.”

John stood up sharply and avoided stuttering out any reply – his brain was moving too slowly, so he acted on orders alone at this point, military instincts kicking in.

Sherlock waited until John was twenty paces away, almost lost in the crowd, before he turned to Crocker again. He looked into his eyes, and Crocker shivered. His voice low, Sherlock said quietly,

“Yes, I do. And yes…I would.”

With that, Sherlock rose gracefully, slightly tilting his head to the right before he turned to walk after John.

The men sat silently in the cab, the pale evening light beginning to fade as they rode back toward Baker street.

John turned his head to the left and tentatively spoke.

“Sherlock? Back at Heathrow…?”

Sherlock sighed, “I know what you’re asking, even if your question is annoyingly incomplete. The only answer I can give you…the only solution to this case…is that if anyone ever harmed you I would kill them and then follow them straight into hell and bring them back and make them wish that they were still there. And I would do it again and again. If you were dead because of them I would go looking for death…theirs first and then mine.”

John was stunned into silence. And suddenly, he knew what to say, it came to him.

“Yes. Absolutely, bloody hell, yes. Me, too.”

It wasn’t eloquent, but it was true and it sufficed, and the two men rode in a slightly more comfortable silence back home.

They stuffed themselves on Thai take-away later that night, watching telly with no particular ambition, and John crept upstairs much earlier than usual owing to the continued aftereffects of the Scotch.

Sherlock could not sleep. This was perfectly normal for him, usually, but he found his mind dwelling on his earlier conversation with John and on the unusual case he had just concluded.

Sherlock was used to the ugly side of human relations – he loved crime scenes, after all, loved the challenge they presented and was not squeamish about the brutal motivations behind most peoples’ actions. He even acknowledged that love was a far more powerful motivator than hate. Love as motivation….he turned the two ideas around in his head and thought about the crimes he had described earlier to John. Crimes he had condoned and crimes he would willingly commit. Crimes John would willingly commit.

Something had to be done, and Sherlock, as garrulous as he was sometimes, was far more a man of action than of words.

John rolled over in his sleep and then started, jerking awake. There was a rush of air; somehow the door had come open.

But John stilled as he realized that Sherlock was playing. He was used to Sherlock playing at any and all hours of the night, and he relaxed, closing his eyes. With the exception of the frantic arpeggios and hyperactive blues scales reserved for Mycroft’s presence, Sherlock’s playing was actually quite nice. He listened.

And then John sat up abruptly as the piece permeated the flat. He had never heard Sherlock play anything like this. Sherlock’s usual repertoire consisted of popular tunes, played for Mrs. Hudson’s benefit or social occasions and showy pieces, usually Mozart, Vivaldi or Bach. He also played concertos or orchestral pieces from time to time, but John could tell that Sherlock preferred compositions designed exclusively for violin.

Sherlock was playing a love song.

John was not familiar with the full extent of music designed for violin, but he knew that most pieces were created to showcase the player’s technical expertise and tone. This piece, though…..it cut to the soul. Parts of it sounded like a praise piece from the time before Bach’s works hit the scene. Three notes in particular sounded in succession, decreasing by a step down the scale. Then a different four notes climbed back up, then repeated, beseeching the listener. There were rises and falls in the progression, and then the four notes wove back into the piece.

John’s mouth hung open as he drew on his robe and began walking downstairs, stumbling.

In this piece, John could hear his own voice, pleading over his mobile, “no, no.”

He could hear Sherlock’s voice in response, “Do this…for me…will you?”

Tears started in his eyes, and he paused, standing, hearing himself saying again, “no, he’s my friend…”

Petrified and listening, John stood, gaping, as the world spun and was turned on its head. All he could do was watch as his friend, eyes closed, poured forth his heart in music. Sherlock wore only a pair of pajama bottoms and he was rail thin; the light outside reflected off his pale chest and arms and John could see the outline of his hips just above his trousers.

He was so beautiful it hurt. John wanted to run to him and wrap him in his arms so he would never be cold again – Sherlock greatly suffered from the cold. He was the only man John knew who would wear an overcoat in May, and it wasn’t just for style.

The playing went on and on, and John never wanted it to stop. It was a timeless moment, and John didn’t have the heart to interrupt it with his clumsy words. He slowly crept back upstairs but never made it back to his bed. He curled up next to the door, drowsing, until the song gently ended and the violin was laid down. This last noise was completely lost on John, however, who had already fallen asleep with the music echoing in his head.

Sherlock knew that John had crept downstairs to listen to his improvisations on Biber’s Passacaglia in G minor, and was pleased. He loved it when John listened to him play and he had ensured that he would do so tonight by opening the door to his room.

He hoped that John had heard what he was not able to say with words. Sherlock was not a believer in guardian angels but he was a firm believer in John.

The night’s performance had taken its toll on Sherlock and the violin bow, and he resolved to do something about it later that morning.

Thursday 10:55am

Thunder crackled in the sky, crackled everywhere and sounded directly in Sherlock’s ear. The storm was upon the city of Westminster, and then the sky opened up. Rain fell in fat drops all at once, descending like a curtain, and the rain and thunder nearly drowned out the rest of the world.

Nearly, because Sherlock suddenly saw John in front of him by about ten meters, running. The world seemed to tilt slightly, battered back by the rain. At the sight of his only friend running away from him, John’s song in his head, Sherlock’s body completely bypassed his brain and he ran after him, determined at last to end all the nightmares.

John should have known that he would not make it back to the flat before it started to rain. His black cotton duck coat was already soaked, and he knew that by the time he opened the door he would be wet all through his pants. His sole concern at this point was to preserve the bread. He ran, doing his utmost to avoid tripping over himself, and actually made it to within three meters from the flat when he felt a strong hand gripping his right elbow from behind. He whirled around toward the threat, a knee bent to kick up sharply and a curse on his lips when he realized that it was Sherlock grabbing him with his long, white fingers. He put his left foot back down on the pavement and stared, looking up. He lifted his voice to shout because the rain was deafening while Sherlock shifted his hold on his arm.

“Sherlock! Could we maybe chat another time? It’s pouring and…”

And whatever thoughts John was going to voice at that moment were obliterated forever, because that’s when Sherlock pulled him tight and kissed him. The milk, bread and jam fell unnoticed to the ground.

Sherlock’s dark hair was plastered to his face and his face was plastered to John’s. Rain poured from their foreheads into their eyes. Sherlock’s left arm held John close to his chest and his right hand cradled John’s neck, angling him up into the kiss.

Sherlock had never kissed anyone before, never put his lips to another person’s lips, but he was a fast learner. He pressed himself into John’s mouth and then sucked gently. He broke away from John and saw John’s blue eyes blown wide open. Sherlock pulled farther back, turned his head away, getting ready to bolt, when John, rain rolling down his cheeks, pushed himself back into him and reached up for him, hand circling behind his head.

Thinking that he had at least not read these signs incorrectly, Sherlock bent his head and put his lips back to John’s.

And Sherlock was surprised at how John kissed into him, lips parting slightly. John sucked on Sherlock’s bottom lip and then slipped out the tip of his tongue, running it lightly over his top lip. He gasped at the sensation and then mimicked it perfectly back to John. He was rewarded by John’s gripping him even closer to his body and they began to melt together in the rain.

John tasted of bitter tea and peppermint and rain.

He sucked and licked Sherlock’s lips again and then angled his tongue up into his open mouth; he gave a low moan and a tremor went through his body. John did it again and then broke away before Sherlock could slip his tongue into him.

They stared at each other in the downpour and John, who had more experience with the practical aspects of romance, pulled Sherlock by the arm the rest of the way into 221B.

The thunder exploded in their ears as they carelessly slammed the door behind them and stumbled up the stairs, clinging to each other. They fell into the flat horizontally, John gripping Sherlock tightly to him. He scooted his body up, placing his head level with Sherlock’s, and dug his fingers into his hair, pulling him to him and kissing him hard. They were wet everywhere, soaked, and water puddled off of them onto the carpet. Sherlock licked his tongue into John and he shivered and sucked on it. John broke the kiss and a put finger up to his friend's lips, tracing the top bow of his mouth.

“Agh, oh, God!”

He started shaking all over and John chuckled. John took the opportunity to kiss his chin and trace the line of his jaw. He pulled Sherlock’s sodden blue scarf down, nuzzled into his neck and kissed him beneath his ear.

Sherlock was trembling all over, going to pieces the more John touched him. John pulled the scarf away from his neck, letting his fingers linger for a moment, and he started undoing the top of his thick, black coat. He gasped and lay stunned as John’s fingers unhooked the first and then second buttons.

Rallying, he took John’s hands and stilled him.

Sherlock’s voice shook but his words still spilled out, “John, I…will warn you that I made it a point to never become involved in any physical partnership and will likely make a very poor companion for further activities…”

“Are you telling me that you’ve never…with anyone?” John interrupted.

“If you mean me to complete your awkwardly unfinished phrase with ‘had sex,’ then the answer is no, I never saw the slightest purpose in it.”

Of all the thoughts in John’s heads, the first one that he gave utterance to was:

“And now? You’re seeing a purpose to it, because...?

Sherlock looked into his eyes and John was stirred by the sight.

“You are my friend, I cannot imagine myself living without you and I am now surprisingly physically attracted to you.”

Chuckling, John said, “I could have done without the ‘surprisingly’ comment.”

Sherlock let go of his hands and began to wriggle away but John pulled him back, gripping his shoulders and wrapping his legs around the back of his knees.

“Sherlock, dammit, wait. No, don’t pull away, please. I…look, this is going to come out all clumsy and stupid because it’s me but I have to say it anyway. I am not worried about your…lack of experience here. I’ve never been with a bloke, Christ, never even wanted a man until…well, we’re pretty much on the same footing and you can tell I’m apparently physically attracted to you. I think if we…pursue this thing that we’ll figure it out together well enough, kind of like everything else we do. Really, it’s unexpected, but it’s all…fine. But…but…”

He knew he was stammering now, but this had to be said.

“I’m the one who’s surprised. You’re a genius, you’re mad, you’re…terrifyingly beautiful and I’m just…just, me, is all.”

Sherlock stared at him with a soft expression and then tentatively placed a hand on his cheek -

the same wonderful feel of stubble as before, less creases

“You…make it all better, around me. You take the world and make it mean something and it’s less horrible because you are there. I…and you…”

He had no way to finish, so he pressed his lips to John’s, curling his fingers back around his neck, stroking cautiously.

John kissed him back, then breaking away from the seal, said,

“Yes, yes, I know. ”

John was happy to kiss him again, until the end of the world in fact, but was becoming increasingly aware of the harsh chill from their wet clothes. Sherlock was shivering all over, whether from nerves or cold it was difficult to tell at first. John was titillated to note, however, that as he unbuttoned Sherlock’s coat and began to touch his chest, he began gasping and flushed from his shirt collar up to his ears.

John grinned but took pity on him – he backed away and stood up. The thunder sounded again, this time in the attic of 221B, and Sherlock looked stricken. He propped himself on one elbow.

“John?”

“Sherlock, it is amazing to lie there snogging you on the floor but I know you’re cold and you hate it. Take off your coat and try to get dry.”

With that, John stripped off his coat and jumper, pulled off his shoes and socks and strode off into the bathroom. He returned with at least half a dozen towels and dumped most of them on the sofa before handing two of Sherlock’s own (white and fluffy, designer) to him.

“Sherlock, take off your clothes. I won’t look at you…unless you ask me to.”

Sherlock shyly turned his head, taking the towels but not saying anything. He had at least taken off his sodden coat and scarf and John picked them up, smiling to himself before turning back into the bathroom.

He shucked off his own clothes into a damp puddle on the floor and wrapped himself in his bathrobe and a towel. He hung up Sherlock’s coat in the shower – it would likely have to go to the cleaners. After listening for the sounds of Sherlock’s movements to subside, he returned to the den.

Sherlock was sitting on the right side of the sofa, wrapped in towels up to his neck. He was still shivering and he looked both beautiful and vulnerable. John couldn’t quite gauge the expression on his face and desperately hoped he had not changed his mind about their newfound intimacy. His heart started pulsing rapidly and he was sure the detective could hear it from across the room.

Sherlock held out a hand to him from his mummy wrapping, not speaking. John answered his silent invitation and walked slowly to sit beside him.

He couldn’t help it – giggles started to burst forth from his lips.

“Are…are you wearing any pants this time?”

“No…are you?”

John spluttered, choking out a “no!” before Sherlock’s laughter joined his. John quickly scooted over to him with a towel.

“Sherlock, even though you’re wrapped up you’re still soaked. Bend your head down.”

John took the towel and covered Sherlock’s hair with it, rubbing gently, drying him.

“You have beautiful hair, you know. I love to look at it…would love to touch it some more.”

Sherlock froze underneath him, lifted his head and met his eyes. He nodded slightly. John removed the towel and turned to face him, knees bent, robe carefully draped. He leaned his head down, and John placed his forehead on his cheek. John ran his fingers up that lean neck, before lightly nesting them in his hair. Sherlock breathed in deeply, and John slowly moved his fingers at the base of his neck. As John continued to entwine his fingers in his hair, he started panting and trembling, grasping his back.

“You like this…?”

“I…do…very much. But I…”

Sherlock left off speaking and pulled John’s face up to him. He smiled into the kiss and then slowly broke away, continuing,

“...also like the way your mouth feels.”

John’s brain stuttered a bit and he let out a groan, his fingers still in Sherlock’s hair. His friend took this opportunity to place a finger on the corner of John’s lower lip

yes

and he moaned into his touch as he traced it, his shoulders shaking.

“Sherlock, please!”

He laughed, his voice low and rich.

“Can I do it again?”

“Ye-yes...but, I’m warning you...”

Sherlock had no premonition of what he was going to do but John had the benefit of experience, albeit from the receiving side. John watched Sherlock’s eyes carefully as he reached out with two fingers and placed them gently on his top and bottom lips and before Sherlock could drag them across his mouth again he parted his lips, took in the fingertips and sucked.

“Oh, oh, John!”

It was better than John had imagined - Sherlock's hips bucked wildly, once, then twice as John sucked on his fingers. Sherlock let them fall from his mouth and he pulled John to him tightly. John crushed his lips to Sherlock’s and they kissed wildly; Sherlock dug his fingers into John’s robe close to his spine and John ran his hands over his shoulders and bare arms.

They muttered into each other’s mouths, hands frantically grasping one another and panting wildly. The towel that remained over Sherlock's chest became rumpled and was quickly discarded.

Sherlock broke away, resting his head on John’s shoulder, “breathing…has never been this difficult before,” he said, gasping.

John smiled, short of breath himself, “Yes, that’s a normal reaction, trust me, I’m a doctor. But this…with you…this isn’t normal at all…this is bloody fantastic.”

He cradled Sherlock’s cheek until he backed away and looked at him, his thumb tracing a circle around that impossible cheekbone.

“More, love? Is that alright?”

“Oh, God, yes.”

John gently kissed him on the lips.

“Did you like it when I sucked on your fingers?”

Sherlock twitched when he heard the word ‘suck’ and a fine flush spread from his cheeks to his alabaster chest. John followed the flush with his fingers this time, tracing a line down to his waist.

“I….yes, very much.”

“Are you comfortable with my lack of experience?”

A familiar petulant scowl crossed Sherlock’s face.

“I thought that was implicit given the scope of our recent activities.”

John grinned because he enjoyed the prospect of upsetting Sherlock’s applecart.

“Good, because I’d like to suck you until you come in my mouth.”

He was rewarded for this lewdness with a sharp gasp and the fine flush on Sherlock’s face blazed up into a tomato red.

“I…”

“No response, Mr. Punchline? None required, my friend. I’ll just do the best I can.”

John’s heart thudded in his ears. He had experience with this activity in the same way that a person going out to eat had restaurant experience – but that didn’t mean the person had waitstaff experience. He would have to bluff his way through the rest and trust that he could translate his experience in pleasing women to pleasing Sherlock. Just the thought of pleasing Sherlock, Sherlock, got his motor running.

Sherlock who was flushed all over his lovely face and chest…Sherlock with his lips red and open…Sherlock with faint freckles on his pectoral muscles, his nipples hard and rose pink…Sherlock with fine black hairs peeking just over the towel in his lap…Sherlock completely undone at what John had done to him…

Oh God, I’m going to come in my robe

Thinking quickly of throat cultures and one particularly awful athlete’s foot case, John backed away with his robe clutched closed and slid down to his knees between Sherlock’s legs, moving close enough to Sherlock that his chest was directly parallel with his lap. The remaining towel disguised nothing; Sherlock was clearly erect. John ran his hands up and down his chest, allowing the fingers of his right hand to brush against Sherlock’s nipple. He twitched and writhed underneath John’s fingers.

“Sssss!”

John smiled and twisted his other nipple just slightly, cataloging his reaction and filing it away for later, but he could tell that he was growing impatient. 

Sherlock had wrapped the white towel around his waist earlier. John saw where it was tucked around itself and gently began pulling it free. He watched the rapid rise and fall of Sherlock’s chest as he sat with his hands beside him, unmoving. Sherlock seemed transfixed, so John continued to pull the towel away from him with his right hand while running his left hand up into his lap.

He allowed John to unwrap the towel from him and gaze at him. Sherlock had a long, pale pink cock, the head of which was already covered with clear fluid. His cock nested in a small thatch of short, dark hairs. For the first time in his life in this context, John reached out and wrapped his hand around another man, placing his fingers on top and his thumb around. Sherlock swallowed tightly and wriggled underneath him, then he thrust up into his grasp.

“Oh, John…”

John loved it far more than he had ever expected – he loved the sound of his name on his friend’s lips, loved the feel of him in his hand. He stroked him gently but firmly and Sherlock’s head flopped back onto the sofa, his eyes squeezed shut. With his forefinger, John rubbed his fluid around his glans gently, and Sherlock trembled. This was the moment, and John licked his lips completely and darted forward, taking Sherlock into his mouth.

“John…so good…how…I…”

The normally verbose man was reduced to incoherent mumblings as John’s mouth surrounded him. He felt Sherlock stiffen over his tongue and tasted a slightly familiar bitterness and suspected that this would not last much longer. John knew enough to leave his jaw slack and his tongue pressed to the bottom of his mouth but was not confident with more refined techniques. He wrapped his hand around the base, concentrating on keeping his teeth away from him and working on building up a steady rhythm. When he felt secure in his movements and noticed fluttering fingers petting his hair erratically, he raised his eyes up and felt himself grow even harder as he met Sherlock’s gaze. His friend was watching him, panting, the same red color mottling up his face and even as he watched, a series of spasms shook his body and he clenched his fists into the towels beside him and shouted John’s name as he spurted into his mouth.

John was surprised at the sensation of the rhythmic jerking of Sherlock’s cock in his mouth, the sudden warmth and bitterness flooding his mouth. It was similar to the taste of himself on girlfriends’ lips and John swallowed him down without too much thought.

Sherlock continued to pant above him, his frantic breaths finally slowing down, and John gently detached himself, the corners of his mouth wet and shiny. Sherlock had slithered down the sofa somewhat but raised one trembling hand to cradle John’s cheek.

“John…my incredible John, truly luminous John…”

John grinned with satisfaction.

“My pleasure, mate.”

They stared at each other for a minute or so, giggling slightly, as Sherlock basked in the afterglow of his orgasm, John still mostly hard. Sherlock recovered quickly, though, with a wicked gleam in his eye.

“Turn around.”

“What?” John was still a little hazy, his head swimming with pride and arousal.

Sherlock pulled himself shakily forward toward John, pushing against the top of his left shoulder gently.

“Turn around.”

John began shuffling around on his knees, a little concerned at this point.

“Sherlock, is everything alright?”

Sherlock continued to nudge him at the back until he was facing away from the sofa, and then his knees shot forward to surround John. Sherlock wrapped his arms around his chest and John was completely encircled by the gangly man’s limbs. He put his mouth to John’s ear, purring, still a little breathless, but fully recovered in vocabulary.

“I truly enjoyed that, John, as I’m sure you observed. If I’m not mistaken, the typical customs governing this situation suggest the exchange of pleasure between partners…and now it’s your…turn.”

John hitched in a breath at the tones in the low, seductive voice and a moan slipped out…he couldn’t help it. Haltingly, he stuttered.

“Don’t feel…obliged? Because of...”

Sherlock didn’t let him finish this sentence because he swiftly untied and parted John’s robes with both hands, stroking down his chest and belly with long, swift fingers before reaching down with his right hand to grasp John’s cock.

“Oh, God! Sherlock, please!”

Sherlock kissed the space next to his ear gently and then brushed his tongue along his earlobe. John twitched and writhed as he pulled him; Sherlock cradled him with his left arm, letting his fingers occasionally brush up against John's nipples.

Sherlock spoke into his ear again, his breath warm.

“I love the way you say my name when I touch you. It’s very stimulating for my ego.”

John chuckled even as he moaned in pleasure at the way Sherlock stroked him.

“I’m going to warn you that this will be over rather quickly but I can promise that you will enjoy it immensely.”

John opened his mouth to explain that, no, it would be fine, he wasn’t even on the edge yet, but then Sherlock’s clever fingers stroked him, applying pressure in a systematic manner, running over him in a slightly rhythmic pattern and his bollocks clenched up tightly, a heat burst up from inside of him, and he was coming suddenly, unexpectedly, and it was the best of his life, flames dancing underneath his eyelids, and he screamed out Sherlock’s name over and over.

They both lay on the sofa; John’s head was sprawled in Sherlock’s lap on top of a pile of towels. Sherlock had his hands cupped around John’s face with his thumbs on his eyebrows while John’s fingers curled up into Sherlock’s hair.

“Sherlock, I love being able to touch you. There’s been too much separation between us, even since you’ve been back. I want this closeness with you from this point forward.”

“Yes.”

“That’s it? That’s pretty easy. Almost too easy for you.” He raised an eyebrow.

Sherlock smoothed it back down.

“I had already decided that I wanted this closeness with you. You are my friend, my only friend, and I wanted more of us together.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re telling me this.”

“There’s something else I should tell you – about the night you got drunk.”

John stilled, a frown on his face.

“What?”

“I carried you upstairs when you passed out.”

“Yes, I’d deduced that at least.”

Sherlock took John’s hand out of his hair and placed his fingers carefully over his left hand, over a burn mark that had fully healed a month or so ago.

“All I could think about was how you alone have always given me a chance. You have always believed in me, you have never stopped being my friend, even when I have been cruel to you. You looked so troubled, even when you were unconscious, that I wanted to comfort you. I touched your face…I intruded on your personal space without your knowledge and I am sorry for that. But when I touched you, you called out for me and I wanted you like I’ve never wanted anything in my life. John, I am an incredibly difficult man who has very few endearing qualities, but I want to stay with you and I want to be your friend always, like you have been mine. I want to be…close with you always, you and me, together.”

While Sherlock spoke John tensed up suddenly but then let out a slow breath and relaxed as he responded.

"I've always known you're no sociopath. You only said that to wind up Anderson - not that he doesn't deserve it, of course."

Sherlock chuckled softly to himself and gave John the "we both know what's going on here" look from above. John continued,

“That morning I woke up…I thought that I had dreamed that you touched me. I wanted you then, too, I’m not sure how long I’ve wanted you before I knew that I did. There’s no way, Sherlock, that you touching me could have made me want you, so you don’t have to apologize for that…but maybe your touching me reminded me to call for you. You are definitely a difficult man, but you do have endearing qualities – you’re brilliant and amazing and while you aren’t charming in the least you have an integrity that defines you, even if you only show it to me. I need you, my friend, I want you and there’s nothing in the world I wouldn’t do for you.”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

And nodding together in agreement, they placed their foreheads together and kissed one another.

Outdoors, the storm had passed at last, and everyone was happy.

It was around three in the morning when Sherlock crawled back into his own bed. John was wrapped in his sheets, almost exactly where Sherlock had left him sleeping earlier. They had gone to bed together at a more regular hour, curled around each other, but John had known that Sherlock’s insomnia would keep him up.

John stirred as Sherlock put his arms around him.

“Sherlock?”

“Yes, what is it? You can go back to sleep, you know.”

“I have to ask…”

“Yes?”

“How did you get me off so fast?”

Sherlock cleared his throat.

“Well…I’ve always thought that the point of masturbation was to reach climax as quickly as possible.”

John was silent for a time before responding.

“Sherlock…your technique is…impressive. But I think I’m really going to enjoy teaching you about the joys of prolonging the act. Starting tomorrow.” John nuzzled his head into his friend's arm and closed his eyes.

“I look forward to it. Goodnight, John.”

“Goodnight, Sherlock.”

It was the next morning. As the sun lit the flat and John began to stir in Sherlock’s bedroom, Sherlock went into the bathroom to retrieve the essential item he had purchased yesterday morning from his slightly damp coat pocket. Fortunately, he had wrapped the velvet pouch tightly in the store’s plastic bag before burying it in his pocket and it was still dry.

He unrolled the pouch and was pleased to see that the seal on top was unspoiled. The rosin was intact, a thick mahogany-colored medallion, ready for use. Sherlock took his bow and, holding the rosin in the center of the pouch, rubbed it along the bow gently.

When John padded into the kitchen, Sherlock was already moving the bow along his violin idly and randomly, pacing near the window in his robe and pajama bottoms. John put on the kettle and retrieved the milk from the refrigerator (last night’s trip to the grocery had been fruitful at last).

Sherlock began a jaunty piece with some folk elements. The playing continued throughout breakfast and as John tried to read the paper. The music went on as John’s attention began to drift away from the paper.

He finished the piece with a flourish and smirked over at John, who was now watching him with interest.

“Well,” he said, wrinkling the paper nervously, “that was a lovely little tune. What’s that one called?”

“It’s Division in G Major on a Ground.”

“Ah, yes. Alright.”

Sherlock laid down his violin and began walking languidly across the room toward John, still smirking.

“Its other name is ‘John, Come Kiss Me Now.’”