Disclaimer: I do not own anything.
A.N. Sooo…last Let's Write Sherlock challenge (so sad about that!) asking us to write for any past challenge and I'm back at the one that made me actually join, the songfic challenge. This is the abridged version, one song for season. More songs (and the extended version of this fic) coming in the new year as I'll be busy writing other projects with actual deadlines until then. Also, thank you so much to Sendai that helped me pick all the songs for both version. This wouldn't exist without her. For the last time –alas -, enjoy (hopefully)!
All the songs suddenly make sense
Season 1 – Grande, grande, grande by Mina
Afghanistan left John with more than every night nightmares, luckily. He'd striken a friendship with people from every nationality there, and even if that bloody bullet forced him to leave them behind, when he feels nostalgic he has many ways to remember them.
Like Giorgio, a music-obsessed (and awfully tone-deaf at the same time) Italian soldier, who made him discover Mina because a. her voice is so good it's almost out of this world and b. her name meant mine and it started a number of jokes.
He misses Giorgio today, for no reason at all (but maybe that it's three whole days Sherlock doesn't touches his violin and he's gotten used to having background music in his life), and Mina sung romantic songs, so maybe he'll find something of hers to apologize to Sarah for that horrific first date. He didn't mean to get her kidnapped – though he should have guessed there was the chance of it. what was he thinking, following Mr. Not –my–area's suggestions?
Instead, browsing among her lyrics, he finds a song that makes him wonder if she's ever met his flatmate. No, it can't be, the song is older than that (he thinks at least). Though it is really amazingly on point. He ponders briefly making it his own ringtone for Sherlock's calls, but the detective only ever texts anyway.
Con te dovrò combattere – With you I'll have to fight
Non ti si può pigliare come sei – You can't be taken as you are
For all that he honestly likes Sherlock, and that he wouldn't dream to call him a freak or a psycho as so many do, John is only too aware that his flatmate needs some boundaries set for him. And that he'll have to fight to enforce them, as the sleuth will keep pushing and pushing at them, trying to overwhelm him entirely. Not with any ill intentions. Just because the detective doesn't see anything wrong with his actions.
"For the love of God, Sherlock, leave at least a drawer in the fridge for food only! Especially if you're growing bloody mould!" and, "I swear, Sherlock, if you don't leave the kettle alone while experimenting Lestrade will have to solve your murder! You drink tea, yes? Then let me the means to prepare it," are almost daily occurrences.
John is still trying to figure out why sometimes the detective obeys him without question and other times he's wilfully ignored. If he were Sherlock, he'd probably start a spreadsheet with all the variables, but he's not and is still floundering, trying to figure his mercurial friend out.
I tuoi difetti son talmente tanti – Your flaws are so many
Che nemmeno tu li sai – That not even you know them
Violin playing and not talking for days? How about adding, "I'll happily destroy your favourite things for science?" Or "I shoot the wall when I'm bored"? Just to name two at random. The list could go on and on, really. That's the problem – Sherlock is barely aware of his own flaws. Or that his actions could be considered flaws at all. It doesn't make for an easy cohabitation. John is far from a saint, himself, but sometimes he really has to flee not to react unduly. He doesn't want to hurt Sherlock, either physically or psychologically.
Sei peggio di un bambino capriccioso – You're worse than a moody child
La vuoi sempre vinta tu – You want to win everytime
Fine, it's not even about Sherlock wanting to have his way everytime – that's not it. But being like a child? The sulking king? Does John even have to mention it? He swears, sometimes he thinks Mycroft's money wasn't even meant to be for the spying (or perhaps it was, a simple test, and Mycroft would have him removed if he tried to accept – lucky him he passed with flying colours, then). No, at times he suspects that Sherlock himself thought Mycroft should pay him for babysitting the detective, which is why he'd been so flabbergasted by John's refuse.
Or maybe it really was a genuine offer from Mycroft, not a test, and he would not have been exiled to Antartica had he chosen to 'betray'Sherlock? Was maybe his friend used to the only people willing to stand his presence being on his big brother's pay roll? That would be so…sad. Oh, he hopes he's misinterpreting things.
Sei l'uomo più egoista e prepotente che abbia conosciuto mai
– You're the most egoist and overbearing man I've ever known
Fine, that's not exactly true either. Even if Sherlock himself would probably remark, "Sociopath, John. What did you expect?" But no, Sherlock can be selfless – towards the right people, and when he's in a good mood.
And he's not exactly overbearing either. John goes along with most of his requests too willingly to call him that. but he's used to having his way. Whether it is by persuading, buying or tricking. In fact, Sherlock is extremely hard to say no to – John knows that better than anyone. The consequences of that are sometimes risky – but John loves risk, doesn't he?
Ma c'è di buono che al momento giusto – But the good thing is that at the right time
Tu sai diventare un altro – You are able to become a different person,
In un attimo tu sei grande, grande, grande – In a moment you are great, great, great
Le mie pene non me le ricordo più – My troubles, I don't remember them anymore
And isn't this exactly Sherlock? One second he's making your life impossible. But whenever someone needs him – for a case mostly, obviously, but not necessarily only for that – he suddenly becomes great. And amazing. And fantastic. And brilliant. And sooner or later John is going to exhaust the English thesaurus, and will have to start either reusing adjectives or inventing new ones.
His flatmate is a bit of a grammar nazi, but who knows how he feels about neologisms? Maybe something like fantellous (fantastically marvellous)? …Or not. Maybe not. Probably he wouldn't appreciate that much.
But how can John adequately express how happy, and privileged, and honoured he feels to be by Sherlock's side if not through such much-due praise? And what's absurd is that he's almost the only one offering it. Everyone who knows his friend should extol him to high heaven. Sherlock surely deserves it. and John is so lucky that Stamford brought him to Bart's that fateful day. He should thank him someday. Get him a houseplant, maybe.
As Mina sings, when Sherlock is being wonderful there's simply no remembering his flaws. Even if he's making witnesses cry while he's being brilliant. All is forgiven, John swept up by sheer admiration (even if he does hi best to cushion people from the sleuth's ruthless brilliance).
Io vedo tutte quante le mie amiche son tranquille più di me
- I see all my friends are calmer than I am
That's true, of course. The lives of John's other friends are not a rollercoaster of madness and brilliance, thumbs in the food shelf and chases after killer-driven cabs. Mike has not certainly got fat by feeling his heart in his throat twice a day at least. Bill's highlight of the week is commenting on the football match – watching it his idea of excitement. Arthur's idea of being pleasantly scared involves participating to a séance. Nobody can even start to comprehend how marvellously unique life with Sherlock is, no matter how much John shares.
Non devono discutere ogni cosa come tu fai fare a me
- They don't have to argue about everything like you make me do
Certainly none of his friends are faced with never knowing what will be beside yesterday's leftovers in the fridge ("Leave at least one shelf for food, Sherlock!") or peculiar requests when doing the shopping which leave him red in embarrassment for half a day - and it's always, "For science, John!" or "A man's alibi depends on this, John!" and how can he ultimately refuse? Suggesting his majesty do his own shopping would be met only with incredulous stares, and he doesn't have the heart to subject the people at Tesco's to Sherlock in all his mad glory.
Then there's a line in the song about red roses, which John emphatically does not expect nor wishes to receive from his flatmate in any way. But the singer is a woman, and in love, and so of course that'd be part of the 'normal' package she apparently doesn't get, being in love with someone very much like Sherlock.
Though John suspects that if his flatmate ever fell in love with someone outside the Work and landed himself in a relationship somehow he might bring her roses. To manipulate her into letting him into keeping the brain in the fridge, most likely, but Sherlock knows how to behave. It's just that he doesn't care enough to, most of the time.
Dicon sempre di sì – They always say yes,
Non hanno mai problem e son convinte – They never have problems and are convinced
Che la vita è tutta lì – That that's all there is to life.
Well, maybe never having problems is an exaggeration. But it is true that his friends are never faced with absolutely outlandish requests (which include being guinea pig to various harebrained experiments) and live quiet, relaxed – in comparison – safe, ordinary lives.
They can barely conceive of life with Sherlock – always wondering if John isn't wildly embellishing his tales or downright inventing them all whenever he recounts something. Because for them that's not 'life'. It is, instead, a mix between a mystery book and things so absurd not even a book could contain without them scoffing at how implausible it is. Only John's tales are not plausible. They're entirely true.
E invece no, e invece no, la vita è quella che tu dai a me
- No instead, no instead, life is what you give to me
John will never be grateful enough to Sherlock. Because he was dying, contemplating his then-useless gun in a bleak bedsit, merely existing and wondering why was it worth to go on. Then Sherlock happened. He took John in his flat, his life and his work (even the all-important Work – John is so lucky Anderson has always been a git) and John started to breath again.
He now gets up (even at two and half in the morning – "We've got a case, and this one is at least a five, John!") looking forward to his day. To be entirely honest, looking forward to Sherlock and whatever he'll come up with at any given moment. His gun is once again a means of protection, and not a threat to his own life. He lives, doesn't just survive – his blood singing in his veins whenever he follows Sherlock in yet another new adventure.
In guerra tutti i giorni sono viva – At war every day I am alive
Sono come piace a te – I am as you like me.
And more than that, John's back to the man he himself likes to be (though his friend certainly has no objections to his nature). Mycroft was right. He missed the war. He languished without it. Now once again he has a companion to protect, enemies to fight. When he follows Sherlock, he feels like he's doing what he's born to do. Adrenaline addict, surely – but as long as he gets to shield the brilliant detective from this or that criminal and end up giggling with him like schoolgirls, or receive a soft, awkward not-quite-thanks from his friend, that's not bad, is it? What more could John want from life? (Nothing, he tells himself firmly. Nothing.)
Ti odio poi ti amo poi ti amo poi ti odio poi ti amo,
– I hate you then I love you then I love you then I hate you then I love you,
Non lasciarmi mai più. – Don't leave me ever again.
Now, hating might br too strong a word. But he is mightily annoyed by his impossible flatmate at times – and storms off as a result. Often – someone would say too often, even – but in the end, he always comes back. Not just because he lives there, you know. Because his anger drifts away quickly, and then the only thing he can remember is how bloody fantastic Sherlock is despite all his flaws.
And then Sherlock will be more than a bit not good again, and look as if he doesn't realise it all, and John will be angry again an wonder why he's stuck being a moral compass/parent figure to his toddler consulting detective/friend and storm away again, and come back in a hour, after a veritable barrage of contrite texts which he dearly hopes Sherlock really means. It's a never ending cycle.
Truth is, he could never even imagine leaving for good, and not for money reasons. He's addicted to the life his friend provides – and can't entertain the thought of him leaving, either. He's not about to go to Sherlock rehab, thank you very much (thank God the sleuth might disappear sometimes, but he always faithfully comes back too).
Sei grande, grande, grande – You're great, great, great
Come te sei grande solamente tu – You're the only one as great as yourself.
Ditto. The singer certainly has a point – if we're talking about Sherlock, at least. Well, great and – insert thesaurus there. Pick your own adjective. Personally, John's favourite is brilliant – like the sun. The one the doctor orbits around since he's found him. Sherlock would scoff at him so much for this kind of mawkish metaphors, but – it's true, isn't it? He's in Sherlock's orbit – and alive because of it. And he won't ever tell him outright. These are the sort of things John finds way too hard to verbalise.