The Voice And The Violin

by thestockholmsyndrome

One-shot. Sometimes, she heard him when the wind danced outside her window during stormy autumn nights. A long pause, and then a beautiful tune. A single violin that played the music of the midnight, and screamed for her. Irene Adler never accepted Sherlock Holmes leaving her world, and found comfort in the only remaining piece of Sherlock's former life. Slightly John/Irene.

She didn't know what to do when he died. Nothing ever happened between them, just a swift kiss in a shabby hotel room in Pakistan and a rigidly goodbye in a port in southern France. Still, she loved him with all her fragmented heart. She remembered his penetrating gaze, and large spider-like hands. She recalled his scent and his cold touch. She loved the idea of a man who couldn't love women, or men. She loved his intellect, his cold façade and the feeling that she controlled him, because she knew that she had made him feel. Feel her, feel lust, passion and possibly even love. Her affection for him had to be denied, even when he had broken her fragile bones, heart and possibilities to live another life. But she couldn't resist him, and she couldn't have him. And she couldn't deal with the loss. She didn't know what to do when he died.

She read the article once, and didn't bother to research it. Sherlock Holmes had left her life forever, but she would never accept it. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw him in front of her. His mocking smile and alert face-features. Sometimes, she heard him when the wind danced outside her window during stormy autumn nights. A long pause, and then a beautiful tune. A single violin that played the music of the midnight, and screamed for her. She never heard his actual voice, but the violin told her so much more about him than he had ever done. She sang with it, to please him. And at dawn, it fell silent and Irene Adler sang no more.

She met John Watson, because she wanted a part of him in her life and the army doctor was the only remaining bit. They started to meet more frequently and sometimes, he kissed her. She felt the bittersweet tears against her cheeks every time. She moved in with John after a year, and walked the paths he had walked, stood where he had once stood and lived with the people he had lived with. She was ruled by her love and her heart, and didn't want to forget. How could she ever forget him? How could she ever forget how alive she had felt when he had entered her rather meaningless life?

"I know why you're here." John whispered one night when she pretended to sleep. His hand rested on her chest and that made her feel good. The dark nights when the violin didn't play, she needed the only still living bit of him, John Watson, to heal her wounds. She was silent and felt her muscles tense as he continued.

"You want to be a part of him. You want to feel his presence, even now when he's gone. You're wearing his clothes, you're whispering his name in your sleep. You're helping Lestrade sometimes, you're living with me and when we make love, you always close your eyes. You loved the bastard and it still hurts, I know. I feel the same way. Look at us both, we still love him. We still goddamn love him, Irene." There. His voice broke and he started to sob quietly and snuggled closer to Irene. He cried so long and so intensely, that he didn't feel the woman's tears that ran down her cheeks. He didn't feel her broken heart, and he didn't feel her pain. But he felt his own, and that was more than enough.

He enjoyed listening to her singing. Though, he didn't recognize any of the songs she usually sang. But he assumed that she sang of him, because she often started to cry in the end of the song. He would then hold her, and tell her that everything was going to be fine. He started to cry too then, because he knew that the world never could be described as fine without him living in it. Their tears were pathetic, but necessary. Necessary for their survival.

She left one day, and he didn't raise an eyebrow when he read that she had committed suicide. After all, he was now rather similiar to them. Cold, unemotinal and constantly bored. There was absolutely nothing on earth that could interest John Watson after the death of Irene Adler. He visited her grave every year, though, and cried a little, simply because she had been the last remaining bit of him. His woman.

Sherlock Holmes returned to 221B Baker Street after three years. Things were not the same between them as they had been, but John was so grateful that he was alive that he didn't care. He still mourned the loss of the beautiful voice and the remarkable woman who had loved Sherlock, but he became John's reminder of her. They never mentioned Irene Adler, and he wasn't sure that Sherlock was aware of her death or her life with John.

He visited her grave a bright twilight in August, and a red rose he never had seen before smiled against him as he approached her marble. And suddenly, he heard her voice again and a violin that accompanied it. He closed his eyes and saw them in front of him, Irene Adler and Sherlock Holmes. The voice and the violin. The melody stopped as abruptly as it had begun, and John Watson left the graveyard to never return. The rose, however, never died and is still there, in the graveyard. Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler never met again, but sometimes when the wind dances over the mountains and hills, a voice can be heard. A voice and a violin.