Disclaimer: Don't own Sherlock

Warnings: References to childhood sexual abuse and coercion. That's a warning for the whole fic, I will add chapter warnings if any more are needed.

A/N: This is a response to a kink meme fill, the summary is basically the prompt, and the chapters are quite short. Really hope you like it :)

~III~

Boredom drives him into John's room. There's been no cases for over a week and Sherlock's resorted to inventing a whole host of puzzles and experiments to keep himself occupied.

First, there was the 'How many times can I prank call Anderson before he realises it's me?' Seventeen, as it turned out, and all worth it to hear Anderson spluttering about mutual respect and entitlement with all the threat of an incensed vicar. Then there was the 'Dismantle the toaster to see how it worked'. John did not like that one and offered no sympathy for the mild electric shock Sherlock sustained. And now there was the 'Guess what's John's got hidden under his bed'.

As puzzles go, Sherlock has to admit it's pretty weak, but after upturning John's mattress and finding precisely three pens, under fifty pence in loose change, and an AA battery, all exactly as he'd predicted, he cheers up slightly.

There's something else under there too though. Sherlock slides it out and finds it's a leather-bound photo album. He flips open the cover and finds an inscription inside reading: 'Dear John, Happy 30th Birthday! Hope this album brings back a few happy memories for you, lots of love, Mum and Dad xxx'. Sherlock briefly wonders why John would shove a family photo album under his bed, but concludes it most likely fell under there in the confusion of John moving in.

For want of anything better to do, Sherlock seats himself cross legged on the floor and begins to flick through the pages absently.

It's standard family photo album fare. John as a baby, cradled in his mother's arms. Toddler John on a merry go round. John at about ten, standing next to a small girl (presumably Harry) at the seaside.

Sherlock isn't sure why he keeps looking really, he's always found family photos to be rather sentimental items – often invaluable in cases, but dull otherwise. But seeing as he's never met John's family, the album holds a certain fascination. He knows John's mother (Helen, was it? Helena?) died several years ago, and that his father (James, he's pretty sure) lives in Southampton. He presumes John goes to visit him there, although come to think of it, he hadn't yet in the time they'd lived together.

He didn't know much else. To be perfectly honest, he'd never been that interested. But the photos hold their own appeal.

He stops on a picture of a teenage John and his father beside a Christmas tree, amused to see John's bright red snowflake pullover, a precursor of the many terrible jumpers to come.

He goes to turn the page and then stops. Something about the picture is… off. Just slightly. He peers again and notes how James Watson leans into his son, how tightly his fingers grip John's shoulder. And John's expression… the awkward rictus grin of a fourteen year old forced to smile for the camera, perhaps. But there is a strange look in his eyes. Almost like… desperation.

Sherlock shakes his head. His recent boredom must have sent his brain into overdrive. He's started to look for clues in everything. He flicks on, hoping to find another picture to make him smile.

John's school photo, John's mother and Harry making biscuits, John holding up a fishing rod, John onstage in a nativity play, Harry's birthday party… And more of John and his father, all tinged with that slight same feeling of… of wrongness, that Sherlock can't seem to shake off.

Then he stops again, on a photo of John in his bedroom at about sixteen. It's night-time and he's caught off guard, wearing only pyjama bottoms, his face half turning towards the camera. He looks thinner than in the photos before, but not like a teenager shedding puppy fat. He looks like he's lost weight too fast, cheekbones hollowed out, collar bone protruding.

And there are hand shaped bruise on each side of his hips.

When deducing, Sherlock makes a point of collecting all the possible facts together. He knows full well that a few awkward teenage photos and a hand shaped bruise do not evidence make. Just because the bruises are the exact right position and size to suggest an larger male assailant holding a person down from behind and forcibly…

Stop it.

Sherlock shakes his head rapidly. He's being ridiculous. Not to mention sloppy and presumptive. He's letting his imagination overpower his analytical sense. The best thing to do would be to put the photo album away and go and devote some time to a useful experiment.

But he doesn't. He stares down at the photo again, at sixteen year old John with his half hidden face and one arm raised, as though in defence. Then he looks behind John and something catches his eye.

A pile of clothes on the floor. Removed in a hurry clearly, shirt at the bottom, then trousers, then underwear on top. And further back on the carpet, two balled up socks and an upturned pair of shoes.

Not John's clothes. Not his socks, not his shoes, not his underwear…

And like a terrible magic eye puzzle, he sees it. The half opened wardrobe door at the back of the room. You'd have to squint to notice, you'd have to really be looking, but Sherlock is, that's all he's doing, and so he can make out the tiny flesh coloured blur at the bottom of the wardrobe door.

A foot. Belonging to a man. A naked man who is hiding in John's wardrobe.

Sherlock's mind is going too fast now, like it does at a crime scene when everything begins to slot into place… but no, not like that at all, because at a crime scene he feels wired and excited as he puts it all together, and now he feels sick and giddy, like he's in a car that's driving too fast, and it's wrong, it's all wrong, because it's John and it makes no sense and he want his mind to stop, just stop, stop it…

It could be any man. It could be John's boyfriend, or his classmate. It could be a completely consensual sexual encounter.

But it's not. It's not, it's not, it's not.

He closes his eyes, hoping his mind will slow down, will stop attempting to fill in every second of John's life up to this point with terrible images, with things he doesn't want to think about…

Then the door clicks and he opens his eyes, and John is standing in front of him.