A/N: Just a quick ficlet I wrote for this prompt on Tumblr: "Friends can help each other. A true friend is someone who lets you have
total freedom to be yourself - and especially to feel. Or, not feel. Whatever
you happen to be feeling at the moment is fine with them. That's what real love
amounts to - letting a person be what he really is." Enjoy!
What real love amounts to.
When Sherlock was a child, he didn't have any friends. He had Mycroft, of course, but he was more of an enemy than a friend, controlling and annoying. Besides, he was his brother.
When Sherlock grew up, he still didn't have any friends. He didn't need them anyway; other people were stupid, pointless; they got in the way. They expected sentiment, and that was something Sherlock was neither willing nor able to give. He didn't have feelings, not like other people did. Nevertheless, he did feel lonely. And bored. So he turned to drugs.
Several years later, after Sherlock had come out of rehab (horrible place, full of idiots; he'd only gone there in the first place because Mycroft had forced him), his brother persuaded the newly promoted Detective Inspector of Scotland Yard to let his brother help out on a few cases here and there. At first, Greg Lestrade had been reluctant at letting an amateur in on all sorts of private police information, but Sherlock had shown up to a crime scene without taking no for an answer and had impressed Lestrade with the speed at which he managed to solve the triple homicide that had stumped Scotland Yard for weeks. Sherlock would solve occasional crimes to stave off the boredom and in return, Mycroft wouldn't watch him day and night or constantly interfere in his life. Sherlock had always loved solving crimes, pitting his wits against the criminal masterminds of the world (and usually winning) so he accepted the compromise with something approximating to grace, at least for Sherlock. Although the consulting detective (for that was the title Sherlock had fashioned for himself) frequently drove Lestrade up the wall, he respected the man and looked up to him, and although Donavan and Anderson complained about letting him in on cases, Lestrade insisted, maintaining that he needed the infuriating younger man. And Sherlock respected Lestrade to, in his own fashion. He was a bit less idiotic than most of London, anyway. But neither of them would really call themselves friends.
Then there came John. John who did not freak out and tell him to piss off when Sherlock observed every little detail of John's private life out loud. John who called him amazing, brilliant, extraordinary. John who ran the length of London with him to chase a taxi despite having a psychosomatic limp, John who laughed about it afterwards and called it the most ridiculous thing he had ever done. John who had killed a man for him days after meeting him.
And not only did John stay with Sherlock, put up with Sherlock, do things for Sherlock that nobody else had ever done; no. John changed Sherlock. Except to Sherlock, it didn't feel like a change, not really. More like...fulfilment, he supposed. All Sherlock knew was that he was different around John; better. John let him be who he was, complaining at his experiments and occasionally reprimanding him for the way he treated other people; but he never demanded change. John understood, somehow, like nobody had ever understood, that Sherlock was not being cruel, or callous; nor was he unaware, necessarily, of other's emotions. He just didn't understand them.
And John lived with that, accepted that. Of course, he might have wished, sometimes, that Sherlock would show affection for him or at the very least an appreciation for his efforts, but they were more than just flatmates; they were friends. And Sherlock did acknowledge that, in his own way. He may not have been one to understand or show sentiment, but he understood, possibly from the moment they laughed together after running across London, certainly when he realised John had saved his life, that that was this was. Friendship. He had introduced John as his friend to Sebastian, and John, staggered that this genius, this brilliant, lonely man, considered him, John Watson to be his friend, had muttered something about being Sherlock's colleague, certain that Sherlock must be mistaken.
He had regretted this later, as Sherlock had not referred to him as his friend again in very long time. Mentally he berated himself for not realising what this acknowledgement was; for Sherlock, this was sentiment, this was Sherlock making himself vulnerable by admitting that he had a weakness, and that weakness was John, and John, it seemed, had just thrown it back in his face. He wanted to tell Sherlock how much he appreciated it, that it meant a lot to him, but he knew now that the moment had passed and Sherlock would scoff if he tried it; he had put his defences up again. But from then on, John tried to show Sherlock how much he appreciated the consulting detective's friendship, not through words, but through actions. John Watson had always been a man of action after all.