Chapter Text
I bolted awake, breathing heavily, then flopped back onto my pillow. Another night, another nightmare. I couldn’t remember what it was about. Only unmated people who would soon meet their soul mate or people who had undergone recent traumatic situations got nightmares. Since I had just returned from the war after being shot in the shoulder, the latter was most likely the case.
I glanced at the clock: 5:30 am. Groaning, I rolled out of bed and limped to the kitchen. My mind drifted as the water boiled. Part of me still wished that my nightmares were due to a mate, but I refused to get my hopes up. I was a 35-year-old man with a bum leg and gunshot wound to the shoulder. I had just spent 10 years as an army doctor in Afghanistan. There was no reason to think that I would meet my mate now.
Several hours later, I found myself walking through the park by my flat on my way from my government-mandated therapy session (“Write a blog, John. I promise it will help.”). It was a relatively nice day in April, and the park was filled with people. One of those people smiled at me and waved me over.
“John Watson! It’s Mike Stamford, from St. Bart’s, remember?” The heavy set man held out his hand.
“Yes, of course.” I took in his suit and tie, as well as his briefcase. “Teaching at Bart’s now?”
Mike huffed a laugh as I took a seat next to him on a bench. “Yeah, couldn’t stay away. What are you up to these days? Last I heard you were somewhere getting shot at. What happened?”
I couldn’t help but twitch my left shoulder. “I got shot.”
As Mike lapsed into an uncomfortable silence, I took note of the marking on his left ring finger: twin black spirals outlined a light blue ring in the middle. I pointed at it.
“How long?”
Mike smiled, rubbing his thumb over the mating marks. “Five years. We met at a medical conference in Sydney.” Mike pulled out his phone and showed me a photo of a petite blonde woman with bright eyes the same shade as the ring on Mike’s finger. “Her name is Amy.”
I forced a smile, trying to ignore the loneliness tugging at my gut. Mike must have noticed my discomfort, or my bare ring finger, and chose to change the topic.
“So where are you living now?”
I pointed west. “Live about four streets from here in a temp flat. Been looking for a possible flat share or something, but haven’t found anything as of yet.”
Mike made a humming noise. “I’ve an acquaintance looking for a flatmate. Would you be interested in meeting him?”
I thought about it for a sec. Oh, what the hell. “Sure.”
Mike stood up and grabbed his case. “Ready?”
I stared at him. “What, now?”
Mike nodded. “I’m headed back to Bart’s, and he spends a lot of time there in the labs.”
I sighed, then climbed to my feet. “Lead on.”
The man standing in the middle of the lab could only be described as gorgeous. He had black curly hair and pale, pale skin. He was impossibly tall, even bent over a microscope as he was now. He glanced up as we entered the room and I got a view of high cheekbones, a pointed nose, and beautiful sea foam eyes.
“Mike, can I borrow your phone?” the man asked. I tried to resist shivering at that deep baritone voice.
Mike rolled his eyes. “What’s wrong with the landline?”
“I prefer to text.”
Mike patted down his pockets. “Sorry, left mine in my coat.”
I quickly pulled out my phone, holding it out. “Here, use mine.”
The man looked at me, surprised. “Thank you.” He reached out to take it, and our fingertips brushed.
The zap traveled from my coccyx to my brain, and then spread throughout my body. It was a feeling I had only ever heard about in sex ed classes. It was the mating spark. In that instant, I knew a bunch of things about this man. His name was Sherlock Holmes, he was 32, and was 6”1’. He was underweight at just 11st 1lb. He had an older brother named Mycroft. He worked as something called a ‘consulting detective’, a term he had personally coined. He lived at 221B Baker Street and was looking for a flatmate. He played the violin and detested sleeping.
I snapped back to reality to see Sherlock ducking his hands under the table to text on my phone. I could already see his ring forming, that strange shade of indigo that the government always listed as ‘blue’.
Sherlock’s eyes flicked up as he texted. They moved from Mike, who was across the room examining a Petri dish, to me, and back again. Ah. He didn’t want Mike to know. I shook my jumper sleeve over my left hand, covering the grey-green ring that had formed. Seeing the corner of Sherlock’s mouth turn up informed me that I had done the right thing.
“Afghanistan or Iraq?”
I looked up surprised. If Sherlock had undergone a mind meld similar to mine, he would most certainly know the answer to that question. I noticed Sherlock’s eyes slide over to Mike again, who was now watching us, and I understood.
“Afghanistan. How’d you know?”
He slid my phone across the tabletop and started to pull on his coat. “Do you like the violin?”
“Sorry?”
“I play the violin when I’m thinking. Sometimes I don’t speak for days on end. Potential flatmates should know the worst about one another.” He pulled on a completely unnecessary scarf.
I glanced at Mike, who just smirked and shook his head. “Who said anything about flatmates?”
Sherlock switched off the microscope. “I did. I had just mentioned to Mike this morning that I was looking for a flatmate, and here he is several hours later with an old classmate clearly just home from Afghanistan. It’s hardly a difficult leap.”
He walked towards the door. “I’m off. I think I left my riding crop in the mortuary.”
“Wait!” He stopped and turned. “We’ve just met, and now we’re going to look at a flat together? When and where are we meeting? I don’t even know your name!”
He smiled. “The name is Sherlock Holmes and the address is 221B Baker Street. Tomorrow at 7pm.” He left.
I glanced at Mike, who grinned. “Yeah, he’s always like that.