Chapter Text
You can add up the parts but you won't have the sum You can strike up the march, there is no drum Every heart, every heart to love will come but like a refugee. Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That's how the light gets in. --”Anthem,” Leonard Cohen
This time, Moriarty is completely, undeniably, blessedly dead.
John is absolutely certain of it.
Less than twelve hours ago, he and Sherlock saw his broken, disfigured body (minus several large, rather important chunks) sprawled gracelessly out upon a derelict tarmac, saw the grey matter trickling out of a gaping, fist-sized hole in his skull, saw his wide-open brown eyes grown sunken and clouded in death.
(Taking no chances, John had dropped to his knees, fingers seeking out a carotid pulse his common sense told him he would not find. All he had gotten, in the end, was the slimy clotted gore of Moriarty’s blood and cerebrospinal fluid all over his hands for the trouble.)
Yes, Moriarty is dead for real this time, and thanks to the machinations of a certain minor government functionary, Sherlock’s name has been officially cleared of all wrongdoing. The papers, of course, have pivoted in another complete 180-degree turn overnight, lauding him as the hero of the hour, the saviour of the United Kingdom.
Sherlock and John made it through the ordeal alive and relatively unscathed. Moriarty is dead, his network shredded, the threat hanging over them neutralised at last. Their happy ending has been secured. All is well.
Except for one, last, not-so-minor task in front of John Watson.
John has just one final set of affairs to see to before this entire nightmare can be declared fully over, put behind them, placed firmly in the past forever and for good.
He and Sherlock currently sit in a windowless, nondescript conference room in a windowless, nondescript building somewhere in the City. John is seated at the enormous, battleship-grey conference table; in front of him a paper cup of tea sits cooling and untouched next to a pen and a single sheet of A4 paper. Sherlock sits, watching him closely, protectively, from two chairs away-- far enough away to afford John some personal space yet close enough to provide a calming, supportive presence.
The final problem, of course, is Mary.
Barring a few minor bumps and bruises, Mary is alive and well and currently locked away in a cell in this same building, somewhere several floors beneath their feet.
To John’s utter surprise, she made good on her end of her bargain with Mycroft, helping them bring down Moriarty in exchange for a new, safe, protected life.
A life she doesn’t deserve. Not by any system of measure. But in the end, a deal is a deal, and Mycroft will keep to his end of the agreement, and Mary will have her freedom.
The only question for John to answer, now, is what’s to become of the child still living in the belly of his estranged wife-in-name-only.
It had only taken a five-second swab to the inside of John’s cheek to make plain what everyone involved already knew to be true.
So the question, then, is this:
“You can still keep her,” Mycroft murmurs from where he is hovering, at the far end of the shadowed room, near the closed door. “Mary has agreed to whatever terms you state. We can bury this information, and you can be her legal father, and she will not interfere. If that is what you wish.”
John stares at the cup of tea in front of him; after a protracted moment of consideration, he lifts it to his lips and swallows. It’s long gone stone cold, and he realises he has no idea how long he’s been just sitting here, his mind a blank fog of trauma and exhaustion.
He looks up at Mycroft, slowly, blearily, as if surfacing from a great depth.
“Will she be safe with Mary?”
Mycroft nods. “They’ll be in witness protection. A small town in the American Midwest. She’ll be safe as long as Ms. Morstan abides by the terms to which she’s agreed. “
“Small town America.” John laughs without a shred of mirth. “And you think she’ll actually be capable of living that life?”
“The conditions have been set,” Mycroft replies, “and she has agreed to abide by them. If she doesn’t, well. Sadly, my control doesn’t extend that far. And neither does yours. We do what we can, Doctor Watson.”
John sighs, nods, knowing his words are the truth.
That knowledge doesn’t change a thing, not really.
“I can’t…” He trails off, scrubs a hand over tired eyes, begins again. “If she was my biological child, maybe I would. But as it stands, I need to be out of this nightmare. And--” he takes another sip of tea to moisten his parched mouth. “No matter what Mary’s done, I can’t take her child from her. I just can’t do that.”
He looks up at Sherlock in silent entreaty.
Sherlock’s gaze is warm and steady as he gives John a tiny nod of agreement, their communication needing no words whatsoever, and John knows his choice has already been made.
He picks up the pen on the table in front of him, scribbles a signature at the bottom of the page. He drops the pen and sighs, a sound of bone-deep weariness as he pushes the chair away from the table and stands, his hips and spine creaking in protest.
He feels a million years old. He feels embalmed.
“Is there anything else?” he asks Mycroft.
“I will take care of everything,” Mycroft replies. “Get some rest. You’ve earned it. Both of you.”
John nods, then turns to Sherlock.
“Let’s go home,” he says.
“Of course,” Sherlock says as he rises, taking his leave with a single curt nod to his brother before placing a large steady hand on the small of John’s back, guiding him out the door and taking him back home to Baker Street.
***
That first night, John is in an undeniable state of shock, a fugue of confusion and loss, his memory and perception gone thick and grey around the edges.
At the foot of the stairs that lead up to his room, the room where he’s lived ever since the night Mary shot Sherlock (he never went back to Mary, to the townhouse, could not stand to be in the same room with her alone for five minutes, even in the weeklong “reconciliation” between that terrible Christmas and worse New Years) John hesitates, his feet pausing for just half a moment in indecision, or doubt, or maybe just an instinctive need to not be alone right now, left with only the dark shadows of his own grief to keep him company.
Sherlock looks closely at him, sees his indecision written plain on his tired face. Without a word spoken or a moment’s extra deliberation, he steers into him into his bedroom instead.
“I don’t want to impose--” John begins, halfheartedly.
“Nonsense,” Sherlock says dismissively, guiding him down onto the edge of his bed with a hand on his shoulder, then bending to tug off his shoes. The caring yet efficient way he attends to the task tells John nothing about this is sexual, or even particularly romantic; it is instead borne from Sherlock’s need to keep John close, watch over him, care for him and keep him from harm as best he can on this difficult night.
(Underneath the hazy fog that makes it so hard to concentrate, John marvels again at how changed a man Sherlock is, and then wonders if he is really so different, or if the events of the past three years simply wore away at the cold uncaring façade until the true man underneath finally was able to emerge. He doesn’t really know the answer, and is starting to suspect that perhaps, in the end he never will.)
“Lie down,” Sherlock directs him. John complies, folding his hands over his abdomen as he stares, unblinking, at the ceiling. Sherlock rises to toe off his own lace-up oxfords, shrugging out of his suit jacket and hanging it up carefully in the open armoire before going over to the other side of the bed and stretching out carefully, still fully dressed and on top of the striped coverlet.
Sherlock watches John for what feels like hours. John feels his gaze but doesn’t look at him, eyes fixed resolutely on the ceiling.
Neither one of them are even close to sleep.
After some time passes the hazy, numbing fog begins to recede a bit, enough to allow John to begin to catalogue the jumble of confusing feelings in his head and heart.
Out of everything, he makes one important discovery.
“I’m not sad,” he finally says quietly into the darkness.
Sherlock doesn’t answer right away.
John turns his head just slightly. Even in the barely-there glow of the streetlamps, he can see the fringe of Sherlock’s dark lashes, the pale edges of his sharp cheekbones, the slight bob of his throat as he swallows once, twice, composing his thoughts.
“I’m not sad,” he repeats, with just a touch of emphasis on the last word.
“How do you feel, then?” Sherlock asks.
“I don’t know,’ John replies, then shakes his head just a bit. “I don’t really...I don’t know.”
“You’re in shock,” Sherlock says. “Understandably so.”
“Maybe,” John says. “I...maybe.”
For several more minutes they lay side by side in the dark silence, with the stillness of the room punctuated only by the muted growl of the occasional van trundling down Baker Street.
“I have regrets,” John murmurs. “So many regrets. I wish...I wish a lot of things had happened differently.”
“I know.” Sherlock’s voice is so low it’s almost subsonic. “I do, too.”
“But I’m not sad,” John says one last time, in an oddly defiant whisper, as if daring Sherlock to contradict him.
“Nor am I,” Sherlock replies, and there’s a gentleness in his voice, an understanding that makes the tight, strangling knot inside John’s chest loosen just a little, makes breathing just a bit easier.
He turns his head to look at Sherlock. “Does that make us bad people?”
“I don’t think so,” Sherlock replies. “There may be other reason we are bad people, to be honest, but no, I don’t think this is one of them.”
John makes a low, choked noise that sounds something like a laugh.
“That is true,” he allows.
The pair lapse back into quiet, but the silence now is just a bit less strained, the quiet between them made more intimate by the mutual confession.
Emboldened by the moment and the darkness, John reaches out, brushes Sherlock’s wrist with the backs of his fingers. His skin is warm and dry, the hairs sparse and silky soft.
Such a simple touch, just a gesture of sincere affection. It shouldn’t affect John the way it does, sparks of electricity traveling up his fingers, lighting up something private and secret in his brain.
But it does. Oh, how it does.
“Thank you,” he murmurs, his voice rough and low. “I don’t know what I would do without you.”
The words cannot help but conjure up older, not-quite-healed wounds. There’s nothing to be done about that. John knows that. It happens, it will continue to happen. It is part of who they are, now.
Sherlock is silent for a moment, and John knows his thoughts are running in a similar vein.
“You’re welcome,” is what he finally says in reply.
The tightness inside of him somewhat relieved, his shoulders and neck more relaxed, John suddenly feels profoundly tired, like he could sleep for an entire week straight. He turns to his side, facing Sherlock, adjusting the pillow and curling his knees into a fetal position, making a tiny, almost involuntary sigh.
“G’night, Sherlock,” he murmurs.
“Good night, John,” Sherlock replies, but his voice already sounds far away as John slips into a heavy black sleep.
***
Late the next morning, John is muzzily contemplating his second cup of coffee and Sherlock is poring over maps of Argentina and muttering to himself in Spanish for reasons unknowable to anyone but himself when the trill of a ringing phone interrupts the peace.
Sherlock glances at the mobile next to his elbow.
“Lestrade,” he mutters, and then to John’s considerable surprise, he picks up his phone and answers.
In the old days, Sherlock would have glanced at his phone briefly, made a face and then let Greg’s first call go directly to voicemail. If it’s anything above a four, he will call back between two and four more times, and if it’s above a six he will arrive at Baker Street in person within the hour.
But today, Sherlock picks up the phone and takes the call.
“Better be good,” he sighs in lieu of a polite greeting, but the tone of indifference is a sham, and John can hear the barely-restrained eagerness underneath.
He listens for a minute.
“Text me the address,” he says in reply, “and we’ll be along shortly.” He rings off, pockets the phone, as he looks up at John with a diffident, almost shy grin.
“Male victim, late fifties, unusual rash on the feet. A possible injection site indicates it may have been poison. Barely a five, but, well.” Sherlock looks down, then up again, his expression almost bashful. (If he were anyone else, John would almost call it flirtatious.) ”I would certainly appreciate your professional opinion. If you’re so inclined, of course.”
John is no deductive genius, to be sure, but in the current scenario he immediately understands two important things.
One: this is the first normal case (well, “normal” being a relative term) Sherlock’s been asked to take after his exoneration in the papers. Lestrade may truly need his assistance, but he is undoubtedly also trying to be a friend and help Sherlock publicly re-establish his bona fides after the recent beating has name has taken.
Two: Sherlock wants something to keep John’s mind from dwelling on the events of the very recent past, and as with so many of Sherlock’s day-to-day dilemmas, he’s figuring a bit of murder might be just the ticket.
The thing is, John feels he may well be right.
“Coming?” Sherlock asks, tone just a bit overly casual as he stands in the kitchen doorway, winding his scarf around the impossibly long column of his neck.
John counts to ten before looking up from his lukewarm coffee. Wouldn’t do to look too eager, after all.
“I’m not…” John looks down at his clothes, the same clothes he had slept in the night previous. “I really need to take a shower.”
“That’s fine,” Sherlock says mildly. “The victim won’t be any less deceased if we get there twenty minutes later than planned.”
“I…” John pauses, considers, decides to make Sherlock work just a little for it. “If you need my assistance.”
“You’re indispensable to me.” The words ring in the air with an unexpected intensity, making John look up sharply at Sherlock despite himself. Sherlock goes stock still, as if he surprised himself with his vehemence. John thinks he can almost see the pale pink flush of embarrassment creeping up past the collar of his criminally snug slate-blue shirt.
Something twists in John’s heart, hard.
“Well, then,” John says. His tone is carefully neutral, but he knows the look on his face is undoubtedly giving far too much away. “If that’s the case, how could I possibly say no?”
***
Very late that evening they return to Baker Street, quietly hanging their coats on two neighboring hooks next to the door before they climb the stairs. They are tired but somehow deeply, primally satisfied. both of them full to the brim with Indian food and the satisfaction of a (admittedly not-very-difficult) case solved--and also, John thinks fleetingly to himself, the indescribable, incandescent relief of finally getting back a tiny shred of something like they used to be.
And that feeling of rightness, of togetherness, seems to supersede any need for conversation. They quietly mount the seventeen steps, both carefully avoiding the creaky fifth riser out of an ingrained habit that’s grown into a reflex. Sherlock unlocks the door to their flat.
John pauses briefly in the front hallway, suddenly (not suddenly, not really) terribly loathe to let this lovely feeling slip away.
“Do you…” John begins, then presses his lips together, begins to turn away, self-conscious, closing himself off from Sherlock before he even begins.
Sherlock looks at him, head tilted, unspoken question forming in his eyes. Half a moment later his eyes widen in understanding, and the edges of his mouth soften just the barest fraction.
“John,” Sherlock murmurs, and takes hold of his upper arm, firm but not rough, steadying, supporting. “I don’t mind at all. I’d rather. Not that you need looking after, but--I’d rather, in fact.”
John looks up at him. Sherlock’s eyes are warm and tender, and the depth of vulnerability he sees there makes him feel dizzy, almost vertiginous, like standing at the top of a very tall building with no guardrail to stop you from falling.
Or jumping.
The intensity is disorienting, overwhelming, and John looks away, nods briskly. “That’s settled, then,” he says, in a casual tone that rings utterly false even to his own ears.
No more is said about it. Sherlock merely nods, ducks into his bedroom, leaves John to follow of his own volition.
He does so, without hesitation. Of course he does.
***
John sleeps in Sherlock’s bed, without comment or question or calling attention to it in any way, for the next eleven nights.
He is careful to keep to his own side of the bed, a body’s width of space always between him and Sherlock, even in sleep.
The reasons for the carefully maintained distance seem so important, at first.
It’s not about Not Being Gay. John’s gotten over that bit of fiction ages ago, at least in the privacy of his own heart. His feelings for Sherlock are deep and complicated and utterly romantic.
John’s spent his life in the closet, spent his life being somewhat less than brave about his true self, but he would change that in a heartbeat for Sherlock Holmes. He would. He knows that, now, and can only hope that when the moment is finally right, he’s not too late.
But at this moment, the bridge between them is a damaged, oft-repaired, jury-rigged tenuous thing. And after the events of the past few months, neither one of them are in a place to embark on anything complicated or dangerous right now. That’s what John tells himself.
It’s about Not Getting Hurt Again. It’s about Not Risking Their Friendship, and it’s about Sherlock Not Feeling Things That Way.
Except the last one...well, that isn’t looking to be strictly true these days. He sees how Sherlock looks at him, sad and soft-eyed when he thinks no one is looking. He sees how careful Sherlock is now, how tender, his usual fussing and dramatics and name calling lacking even a hint of bite where John is concerned. He calls John an idiot with a smile in his voice and affection in his eyes.
And the first two-- with every moment that passes, John finds they’re mattering less and less. Not too long ago, John privately swore he’d never let himself be that vulnerable ever again, that he’d never hand Sherlock the keys to his heart. Now, though...now, sometimes, it almost seems worth the risk, just to find out. Just to know if they actually would have some kind of a chance at something real and true.
As the days and nights go on and Sherlock is there, right there with him, keeping something that almost looks like a normal human sleep schedule just in order to put on pyjamas and lie down in bed next to him, looking at him with something like love in his eyes…
It begins to almost seem worth the risk.
So in short, John sees. Of course he does. And as the first week in Sherlock’s bed rounds the corner into the second and neither of them makes any move to end this ostensibly temporary arrangement, John struggles to remember exactly why that distance between their bodies had been so bloody important in the first place.
***
On the twelfth morning, John wakes early to a still-deeply asleep Sherlock sprawled out next to him, one arm flung across the safe zone between them, his hair a riot, his full lips parted as he snores just ever so slightly.
He looks...precious, John thinks, wrinkling his nose a bit at his own florid adjective but unable to find another nearly as fitting. Sherlock in slumber is young and vulnerable and defenseless in a way he could never be when awake, and John suddenly sees the level of trust and intimacy Sherlock is giving him by allowing himself to be seen like this.
He suddenly, viscerally understands that he doesn’t ever want to wake up anywhere else, not ever again in his life.
This epiphany, huge and earthshaking though it may be, doesn’t lessen his need for a piss, however.
He rises, slips out of bed as quietly as he is able, uses the loo and brushes the morning funk out of his mouth. He spits, rinses, stares blearily at the creased, somewhat worn-looking man staring back from the mirror.
“So what should I do about it?” he asks his reflection.
His reflection has no helpful advice to offer.
John straightens his shoulders, gives a curt nod to the tired man in the mirror, and returns to bed, sliding between the still-warm covers.
Sherlock shifts slightly, then groans minutely and rolls to his side, facing John. John watches him sleep for several long minutes. It’s unreasonable, he thinks, that any human being should look like this-- long dark eyelashes against palest flesh, a face like a sleeping angel, like a living breathing seraphim lifted straight from some third-rate Italian Renaissance painting.
Honestly, John thinks, I never had a fighting chance of NOT falling madly in love with him.
It’s just criminally unfair.
At some point in these ruminations, Sherlock has begun to stir under the intense, laser-like scrutiny. He opens one eye, clear and deep as the Aegean Sea--again, just fucking unfair--and gazes sleepily at John.
“What?” he mumbles, eloquently.
John smiles, soft and tender and hopeful and a bit sad underneath, sad for all the time they’ve stupidly, stupidly wasted.
That’s done now. Almost as an afterthought, he notices that somehow he’s not anxious at all.
He’s ready.
“I’m an idiot,” is all he says, quietly, then leans forward, slips a hand around the back of Sherlock’s neck, and kisses him.
Sherlock kisses John back and he’s slow, careful, clearly inexperienced but without an iota of hesitation. His lips are soft and sleep-warm, his breath morning-sour, and it’s perfect in a real, imperfect human way.
After a few blissful moments of their mouths pressing clumsily together, Sherlock makes a belated deduction, pulls back, suddenly self-conscious. “I must taste terrible,” he says.
“I don’t care,” John says truthfully.
“Give me thirty seconds,” Sherlock says. “Even the playing field.”
John huffs a breath of laughter and nods, grinning as takes his hand away from Sherlock’s neck.
“I’m counting,” he replies.
Sherlock untangles himself from the sheets and rises. John can’t help but notice, with a shock of surprised arousal flooding his nervous system, that his erection is plainly visible, tenting the fabric of his loose pyjama bottoms as he clambers out of bed and ducks into the loo.
So that’s one question answered, he thinks, a warm, almost giddy feeling in his stomach.
The toilet flushes, water runs in the sink, and then Sherlock returns, slipping back into bed. He’s still disheveled and morning bleary, his hair a frizzy mop of riotous curls that would befit the image of any mad scientist, the scruff of his beard surprisingly ginger in the morning sunlight. There’s a tiny whitish spot of toothpaste in the corner of his mouth that he missed in his haste to get back to bed.
He’s altogether the loveliest sight John has ever seen.
“Hey,” John murmurs, warm and low.
Sherlock’s eyes flick up to meet his, self consciousness apparent in the way he can’t quite look at him directly, the way his teeth dig into his lip, the touch of pink flush staining his pale cheeks. There’s nothing else for it, John thinks, except to kiss him again.
So he does.
They kiss slowly, almost carefully, exploring the boundaries of this new interaction. Sherlock seems--not hesitant, not uncertain, but inexpert, perhaps, a bit unsure of how to proceed. John takes the lead without hesitation, gently nipping and pulling at his full lower lip, dipping into his open mouth, seeking out his wet tongue with his own.
Their hands tangle in each other’s hair, fingers tracing along the backs of necks and across shoulders but no lower. Their bodies are still carefully, deliberately separate, and John is fine with that, well aware of how easily all this could overwhelm both of them. They have time, time enough for everything at last, and this singular new expression of physicality seems like far more than enough to deal with at the moment.
John breaks away, panting a bit, presses his lips to Sherlock’s stubbled cheek, suddenly feeling the need to both reassure and be reassured.
“Is this all right?” he asks, simply, directly.
Sherlock nods. “Yes,” he answers, just as simply, and finds John’s mouth again with his own to answer the question more emphatically.
They kiss and kiss, lying on their sides facing each other as morning melts away towards the afternoon, their hands moving across shoulders and backs, not yet quite daring to venture underneath clothing. After what feels like an age, John hooks a leg around Sherlock’s longer ones, drawing him closer, sighing into his mouth as they finally allow their bodies to press more fully against each other. With a jolt, John feels how both of them are undeniably aroused, John hard against his stomach as Sherlock’s erection pushes against his hip.
Emboldened by the evidence of Sherlock’s desire, John presses small kisses to the sharp edge of his jaw, down the line of his throat, strokes his torso through the thin material of this worn sleep tee. His fingers slip under the thin cotton knit, press into the warm skin of Sherlock’s flanks.
At the touch of fingers to bare flesh, Sherlock’s breathing stops and he goes very, very still under John’s hands.
John senses the change immediately. His gently questing fingers still.
“Is this…” John exhales against his neck. “Is this too much for you?”
Sherlock nods, just barely, and the way they are pressed together John can feel his heart hammering away, beating wildly against his slender ribcage. He takes his hands away from Sherlock’s body and pulls back, putting a bit of space in between them.
Sherlock rolls onto his back, looks at the ceiling. “It’s just,” he begins, and John thinks his deep voice sounds rough, strained, almost as if he were about to cry.
“You okay?” he murmurs, concerned.
Sherlock exhales. “Of course I am,” he replies, still sounding a bit shaken, not really sounding completely okay at all. “It’s just...a lot. To process.”
John hums a low affirmation, sweet and understanding. “It’s a bit overwhelming, isn’t it?”
“Somewhat,” Sherlock admits softly.
“And you haven’t, ever,” John says.
“Have you?” Sherlock counters.
“Course I have,” John says, “after all, I was m--”
The way Sherlock turns his head and looks at him with (rightfully) condescending disbelief, John feels an absolute moron for not catching the actual question.
“You mean with men.”
Sherlock quirks an eyebrow.
“Yes,” John replies. “A long while back. But, I’m betting you already knew that, didn’t you?”
Sherlock looks a bit bashful but also a touch smug. “Of course I did.”
“That doesn’t mean…I’m not...” John hesitates a bit, fumbles for the right words. “I have no timetable here. No set expectations. I just--” He reaches out, feeling a bit uncertain, and strokes Sherlock’s arm. Sherlock stills, but doesn’t flinch. “I’m just. Shit. I’m really just happy to be here. Whatever you want. You set the pace, all right?”
Sherlock, nods, still looking anxious. “Can we just…”
“Take it slow?” John says. “Of course we can. In fact, we absolutely should.” He tilts his head up, kisses Sherlock, a chaste press of lips. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Sherlock replies, and the words come out with a level of vehemence that takes John a bit aback. “There’s nothing for you to be sorry for. I’m the one who--”
“No,” John strokes his cheekbone with his thumb, tucks a lock of hair behind Sherlock’s ear with careful tenderness. “You don’t ever have to apologise. Not ever, all right? We have time, we’ll take time. And it’s absolutely fine.”
“Thank you,” Sherlock says, nervous and oddly formal.
The pair are silent for a moment, the awkwardness suffusing the room, making the air between them feel palpably thicker, heavier.
“Can we…” John begins, then cuts himself off with a short-self conscious chuckle as he rests his head on Sherlock’s shoulder. “I like being close to you,” he murmurs. "Can we just...”
“Cuddle?” Sherlock asks, and there’s a hint of a smile in his voice, yes, but no derision or mockery in it. “Yes. I like...yes. And also,” he clarifies, “the kissing. The kissing is...good.”
“Good, huh?” John says with a glint of amusement, and stretches upwards to kiss him again, with an open mouth and just the barest hint of tongue. Sherlock returns the kiss with enthusiasm.
“Kissing and cuddling,” John murmurs against his warm, pliant lips. “That’s...yeah, that’s a great place to start, I think.”
***
For three weeks, everything is nearly perfect.
In almost every way, those twenty days are as close to total happiness as John has ever known.
To his pleased surprise, casual daily affection seems to stoke a fire in Sherlock, a hunger for touch and connection he had shut down so ruthlessly that John suspects he didn’t even know he had been starving for it all these years.
Daily they indulge in lingering looks over tea, socked feet pressed together under the table, casual kisses pressed into Sherlock’s hair as he bends over his microscope. They watch crap telly on the sofa, Sherlock pressed up against John’s side as John strokes his fingers up and down the curve of his bicep until both of them are barely watching the programme, instead waiting for the earliest permissible moment to turn a cuddle into a leisurely snog on the sofa, John stretched out top of Sherlock, tongue in his mouth and hands in his hair, running up and down his arms, his torso, their hips slotting together, their hard cocks pressing together even through several layers of thick fabric.
But they don’t rock against each other, they don’t undress each other. John is careful to be patient, asking permission at every new touch. He stays mindful of Sherlock’s small tells, of the tensing and shallowing of his breath, backing off immediately at the first sign of discomfort.
He restrains himself, restricts himself to keeping his hands above the waist. It’s so absolutely new to John, taking things this slowly, slower than he’s ever taken things before in his life, and it turns every tiny gesture into a new frontier to explore.
It’s sweet and slow and careful; a bit frustrating to be sure, but lovely in its own way and John enjoys every moment of it.
“Is this okay?” he murmurs as his fingers stroke over the firm swell of Sherlock’s pectorals, thumbs circling his nipple through the thin material of his buttondown shirt.
Sherlock gasps, nods.
“Need to hear you say it, love.”
“Yes,” he hisses through gritted teeth. “God, John. Yes.”
“All right?” he murmurs, pressing a row of kisses over the fine expensive cotton covering the prominent line of his collarbone.
“Yes,” Sherlock breathes.
“And this?” John murmurs, nimble fingers tugging the top button free from its corresponding hole.
Sherlock tenses, goes completely still.
“It’s all right, love,” John murmurs, carefully putting the button back into place.
“I’m...” Sherlock murmurs, but doesn’t continue.
John finds himself wondering what the second half of Sherlock’s sentence would be, and realises he doesn’t really know, at all. It’s an unsettling feeling.
He strokes Sherlock’s arm in silence. The frozen, anxious stillness passes, and Sherlock’s body language relaxes just a fraction.
“In time?” John finally says, low and quiet, and after three weeks in, three weeks of incredible care and patience, he hears it in his own voice, the barest shade of...concern. Worry.
If Sherlock hears it, he doesn’t make mention. “In time,” he echoes, and wraps his hands around the sides of John’s head to bring him up for a kiss, a slow deep meeting of lips and it’s lovely, of course it is, but John can’t shake the feeling that Sherlock is deliberately distracting him from a current of something odd and worrisome underneath it all.
John wants to ask, he does. But he really, truly doesn’t know how, and a moment later he thinks (hopes) maybe he imagined that chilly, unsettling feeling.
And in the end, it really just seems so much easier to kiss and cuddle and then drift off to sleep on the sofa together, instead.
***
The problem with the not-talking-about-it approach is this: John is not an idiot.
Far from it, in fact. John is a doctor, after all, and a good one, and has seen far more in his life travels than Sherlock tends to give him credit for, experienced things that have honed his instincts to a razor sharpness.
Barring the whole Mary debacle, where he was fogged by grief and exhaustion, John’s instincts are seldom wrong--and as the days pass, John becomes increasingly certain he’s not wrong about this, either.
Things come to a head unexpectedly, late on a completely unremarkable Saturday night.
They’re in bed after a long day of not much at all. John puttered around the flat, spending the morning engaging in some much needed tidying of the kitchen cabinets and counters before putting a new washer on the dripping tap, then in the afternoon finally unboxing the few mementos he had brought with him from the townhouse and finding a home for each item.
Sherlock solved two barely-fives from his inbox without ever even bothering to put on shoes.
For dinner, John bakes a couple of jacket potatoes, topping them with broccoli and grated cheddar. They eat in front of the telly, polishing off a leftover half bottle of white wine before turning in for the evening.
Before this, before the two of them, Sherlock would have stayed up the entire night, dissecting mouse livers or finding something to roast with his blowtorch--seemingly desperate for anything to distract himself from the constantly swirling maelstrom of just being him, of thinking, of analysing, of processing the endless streams of data that he could never seem to disregard.
Now, though? Now he follows John willingly to bed at eleven p.m, exchanges long leisurely kisses and murmured good nights as he curls his warm body around John’s and falls asleep, his breathing growing sonorous and deep.
Tonight, in the dark grey gloom, the kisses are slow, deep, their tongues twining together wet and messy as their bodies press tightly into one another, their cocks hard, achingly hard against each other. John is making soft, needy little noises into Sherlock’s mouth, his hands running restlessly up and down his back before sliding down to the crest of his hips, skimming across the waistband of his worn blue track bottoms.
“Sherlock, I….” John exhales roughly against his collarbone, slips his fingers in between the hem of his shirt and the elastic waist of his track bottoms. “God. I want to touch you. I want to make you feel so good, please, I--”
The warm safe feeling evaporates in an instant. Sherlock goes still, his hands around John’s back curling into tight fists.
John goes quiet as well. For a moment the only sound in the room is their breathing, then John rolls away from Sherlock, onto his back. He makes an almost noiseless sigh as he presses his head back into the mattress.
“I’m sorry,” Sherlock says, and it comes out so small, so tiny as to border on microscopic.
“Sherlock, I…” John begins. “No. Please don’t be sorry, okay, I just--”
He considers for a moment. Decides to be brave, takes a fortifying breath, and jumps in with both feet.
“Sherlock. I don’t think… it doesn’t seem to be that you don’t want to, going by.” He inhales, decides to plow ahead, embarrassment be damned. “Going by your, um, reaction.”
“I do,” Sherlock says, his voice a bit clipped, a bit defensive. “I do, as you so eloquently put it, want to.”
“This, though. This, um, hesitation.”
“You said it was fine.”
“It is fine! Of course it is. I just…” John gathers up all his courage, plows forward with the question he knows he has to ask. “I don’t think...this isn’t about being new to all this, is it?”
“I’m sure I don’t follow,” Sherlock says, and when John hears the brittle coldness in his voice he knows his suspicions are far from baseless.
“When we...there’s very specific boundaries in place, and when we come up to them...you shut down, Sherlock. You just..remove yourself. That’s not first time nerves. That’s something else.”
Sherlock is absolutely still and silent.
“Sherlock,” John continues, careful and quiet. “I’ve seen your back. I know you were hurt. I don’t want to pry, I don’t want to cause you discomfort but...I’m starting to think something else happened there. In Serbia.”
Sherlock rolls away and sits up on the edge of the bed, his back to John.
“A great many things happened in Serbia,” he says, flat and remote. “None of them were pleasant.”
“That’s not an answer,” John replies.
“I’m not--there isn’t--” Sherlock’s measured breathing falters.
John waits out the interminable silence.
“I can’t,” Sherlock finally says, voice almost a whisper, and John hates how shaky and uncertain he sounds. “John. I can’t. You want me to tell you things that I--Don’t ask me to. Please.”
It’s the please that does him in, makes John’s chest tighten and his stomach lurch as the suspicion hardens into a black, cold certainty.
“All right,” John says, and he cringes at the way he sounds, at the measured, careful tones of his own voice. “It’s all right. Come lie down with me?”
“In a bit,” Sherlock says, and rises from the bed, moves to the door. “I’m terribly behind on case notes, I haven’t even--”
“Sherlock.”
“I’ll be back in a little while, I promise,” Sherlock says in a rush as he opens the bedroom door and slips through, closing it behind him, closing it on John.
Both of them, of course, know full well he’s lying.
John lies awake, alone in the rumpled bed, as the scent of contraband tobacco drifts to his nostrils. He hears Sherlock pacing back and forth across the sitting room as he smokes, and his heart aches.
He considers going out there and trying again, pushing harder, forcing a confrontation, but in the end decides against it. He has no clue what he’s doing, he’s flying blind, but though he’s not sure of much at all right now he knows he doesn’t want to cause Sherlock any further pain. So he doesn’t.
John doesn’t think he could possibly sleep, but he does, falling into a thin, restless dream-plagued slumber for a few hours sometime after dawn.
He wakes late in the morning, feeling distinctly ill and unrested. Knowing more sleep is out of the question he rises, goes into the sitting room to find Sherlock unconscious, sprawled messily over the sofa, long pale bare feet dangling over the upholstered arm.
John covers him carefully with the blanket from his chair, goes into the kitchen to make coffee.
It’s close to noon, and he’s halfheartedly struggling with the crossword at the kitchen table when Sherlock rises. He passes by John without a word on his way to the bathroom.
Over an hour later, he emerges, perfectly put together, scrubbed and shaved, hair carefully styled, dressed in a dark grey suit and crisp white shirt. His face is perfectly bland and calm, his eyes remote to the point of robotic blankness.
“I’m off to Barts,” he tells John from the doorway between the hall and the kitchen, buttoning his cuffs. “Molly’s got herself a situs inversus totalis, and I’ve not seen one in ages, so.”
John looks up from the five across he’s been looking at blankly for far too long.
“Sounds interesting,” he says cordially, knowing Sherlock hears the unspoken request in his tone. I’d say yes, if you asked me to come.
Sherlock chooses to ignore it.
“Most likely be late,” he says instead, and his voice is cool and self-possessed, but he’s not quite able to meet John’s eyes. “Don’t stay up.”
He disappears without waiting for an answer.
After the front door slams, John puts down his pencil with a sigh and rubs at his sore, tired eyes. He feels like he has been crying, or maybe that he could cry, and for hours. He doesn’t quite know which.
“Fuck,” he says out loud, his voice reverberating in the empty flat. He feels impotent, helpless. He feels angry, not at Sherlock, God of course not, but at the idea of somebody hurting him--
The anger solidifies into a hot, terrifying rage, and it’s pointless. It’s useless. It’s beyond useless, in fact, it’s actively detrimental and does nothing to help Sherlock, nothing it all. John knows this, he does, so he pushes it down, slows his breathing and empties his mind, allows the fury to flow around and past him, doesn’t allow the rage to burn him up.
He sits there a long time. Eventually it passes. He is, in small ways, getting better at this.
Still, it’s fucking exhausting.
Not knowing what else to do, he gets up and pours himself another cup of coffee before tackling the growing pile of washing-up.