NB: Thought I'd go for something more fluffy... hope you like! Still trying to avoid un-Johnlockian over the top declarations of love ;)
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"John? John, where are you?"
"Here, Sherlock," John calls back. "I've just got in the shower."
Predictably, Sherlock immediately enters the bathroom. Without knocking.
"What's wrong?" John asks from under the water, not bothering to glance around the shower curtain.
"I need you to do that thing. The 'listening' thing."
"Can it wait until I'm out of the shower?"
"Does it have to?"
John hears Sherlock drop the lid of the toilet and assumes he's now sitting down. "I'm in the shower, Sherlock. I'm naked."
"I talk to you all the time when you're naked."
"Yes, but usually you are too."
"Do I need to be naked too, then?" John can picture Sherlock's confused face.
"I doubt that would be productive."
"Fine, shut up and listen then. I need to think."
"Go ahead," John says, reaching for his shampoo.
"Basically, I think it comes down to the length of the grass. Obviously there's other ways it could be short, perhaps someone else could have cut it. Is that a secure enough alibi for the gardener? Probably not. He didn't do it though, that much is obvious."
"How?"
"Well, his hands are small, aren't they? Like yours. There's no way he could have made bruises like that. No, though, I'm missing something… I'm definitely missing something. John. John?"
"What?"
"John!"
"What?" He pulls back the shower curtain and is confronted by Sherlock smiling at him.
"I just wanted you to kiss me."
"Seriously?"
Sherlock steps forwards and puts one of his hands on John's wet cheek. "Seriously," he murmurs, in that irresistible husky voice.
John complies. He touches his lips to his friends but Sherlock pulls him deeper, biting his lower lip, causing John to let out an inadvertent moan and forget that he is standing dripping wet in the bath. He runs his damp hands through Sherlock's curls.
"I know!" Sherlock suddenly declares, breaking off the kiss like a slap in the face. "Of course! The pesticide!"
"What?"
"The pesticide on the gardeners clothes! Thank you, John, that was exactly what I needed." And without another word the detective darts from the room, leaving John dripping wet and bemused, with the shower still running. He can't help but feeling he's been used somehow.
He broaches the subject with Sherlock later, after the case has been solved and Sherlock is doing god knows what on the doctor's laptop.
"You haven't been bored recently. Not in a while," John comments, turning off the TV.
"Well observed." Sherlock doesn't look up but then adds. "I assume you will also deduce that as the work flow hasn't altered, nor has my diet, habitat or circle friends, my lack of the usual ennui between cases is thanks to the minor alterations we have recently made to our relationship."
"Minor alterations?"
"Additions?" Sherlock suggests.
"Minor?"
Sherlock smirks at him. "Improvements?"
John accepts this with a nod. "So it helps you then, us having a physical relationship."
"Well, it's a sociably acceptable way to get kicks, isn't it?"
"Kissing me?"
"Yes, and it helps me to think."
"You do think while we kiss then?"
"You don't?"
"Not really, no."
Sherlock makes a face to show that this is interesting, but doesn't surprise him.
"Why does it help?" John presses.
"Naturally the release of chemicals increases heart rate, brain activity – you're a doctor, John."
"So basically," John says, confirming his suspicions, "I'm just your new drug."
"Of course," Sherlock replies. "Testosterone, pheromones, dopamine, norepinephrine, serotonin; the release of the chemicals is what makes me want you in the first place. Most people, boring people, just ignore these facts for the sake of sentiment, but why not put these things to good use?"
John shrugs, trying hard to not show Sherlock that this bothers him. "Cheaper than heroin, I suppose."
"Yes, and more available. And better for my health."
"Fantastic. Good for you."
"What?" Sherlock asks, suddenly twigging that John isn't impressed. "Not good? John? What?"
"No, not good, Sherlock. Excuse me if I don't fancy you solving your cases while we're meant to be making love."
"Love?" Sherlock says it as if it's an alien concept, something he's 'deleted'.
"Yes, love, it's what humans feel for each other. It's what I stupidly thought you were capable of feeling. Stupid."
"Oh please," Sherlock sneers. "You're offended by this? How completely uninteresting of you."
"No, there's a difference, you know, between 'uninteresting' and 'normal'," John counters. The derision in Sherlock's eyes cuts him.
Sherlock looks indifferent to this nuance. "Is there?"
"I'm allowed to want you to love me, Sherlock."
"Yes?"
"Yes. That's not boring."
Sherlock holds his gaze with an unreadable stare.
Machine, John thinks. When he least expects it, Sherlock will speak like this and John feels like they are back to day one and the detective is wearing an unreadable metal mask.
Eventually, Sherlock turns back to the laptop, clearly thinking the conversation is over.
John begins to storm up the stairs to the bedroom that was never used anymore. Then he changes his mind, walks back into the living room, snatches up his laptop from in front of Sherlock and then leaves.
John starts by sitting on his bed and writing up some of the blog but finds it an impossible urge to add in comments to the effect of 'Sherlock is a heartless bastard'. Instead he picks up a book.
Around ten o'clock, his phone chirrups.
Come downstairs. SH
When John doesn't reply, this is followed up a few minutes later with:
Please.
John fingers his phone for a moment then taps in:
Sorry, you're going to have to go cold turkey.
To John's surprise anddisappointment, Sherlock doesn't text back again. He tries to imagine what the detective is doing downstairs. Would he have gone to bed? Probably not. It's possible he's already forgotten that John had left him in a sulk. He may not have noticed in the first place.
Then again, he may have had a surprise visit from one of his more stealthy 'enemies'. It wouldn't be unheard of. At this very moment, Sherlock may have a wire tightening around his neck. John would go downstairs in the morning to find a lifeless flatmate and an eternity of guilt.
This is why John dislikes spending time away from Sherlock. This and an irrational fear that the next time John claps eyes on his friend, Sherlock will have found his way onto another rooftop.
John pulls off his clothes and gets under his bed sheets, refusing to go downstairs to brush his teeth. Before he turns off the light, however, he detects a creak on the stairs outside his room.
A note of folded paper slides under the door.
John pauses momentarily then, when he hears retreating footsteps, he slides out of bed and picks it.
The traditional psychological view sees love as being a combination of companionate love and passionate love. Passionate love is intense longing, and is often accompanied by physiological arousal (shortness of breath, rapid heart rate); companionate love is affection and a feeling of intimacy not accompanied by physiological arousal.
SH
John picks up his phone and texts:
You had to look it up on wikipedia?
Immediately there's a reply, as if he'd been waiting.
Come to bed. SH
