"Hey you!"
John Watson carried on walking. They probably weren't calling to him. Not unless they wanted something.
Since the...thing happened he'd expected the followers of the blog to disappear. But only two days after the thing happened his views had tripled and so had his comment rate. Unfortunately a good third of those were people sending obnoxious and insulting messages and the rest all wanted to tell him they believed in Sherlock and were his warriors.
Which means nothing now...
He couldn't walk down a street without seeing that damn graffiti. Every bloody where.
Now it was February and over a year had passed and the initially hurrah was over. Strange really...he'd been able to cope when the press was constantly on his doorstep. He'd been able to cope while he told every reporter that the only comment he could give was that he would always believe in Sherlock. He'd been able to cope when he was helping Mrs. Hudson deal with her pain, when he'd had to cope.
It was harder now that the headlines weren't screaming FRAUD and the world didn't cry and howl its outrage. It was as if everyone had forgotten, as if the world had accepted the thing had happened and dealt with it.
John had taken an oath as a doctor to help people. He'd seen good men die; he'd seen bad men die. Sherlock didn't seem to fall into either category. Sherlock was just...Sherlock. The thing happened and everyone had moved on. Mrs. Hudson had smiled and joked when they'd last met and though he knew she was close to tears he wished she had cried. Because that would mean someone else felt pain and...
Pull yourself together John.
Still, the press liked to pull Sherlock's name into deeper mud when they could. In reference to another case or if they had a few pages to fill. They called him asking for his side of the story, for someone who knew the man...
He'd been attacked a few times in the street. Had stuff thrown at him. For being that Holmes' guys gay boyfriend. Not that he bothered to deny that he and Sherlock had been...intimate. Partly because he knew it wouldn't matter, Sherlock could be a woman or a hedgehog for all he cared, he would still have loved him.
He was my friend.
Mycroft had got the charges dropped, apparently it was beyond reasonable self defence to break the arm of a rugby player who tried to punch you, then shatter his kneecaps after that with the knowledge it would affect his career for the rest of his life.
John liked it when it rained. It gave him a right to be miserable. God damn he tried. He tried to be happy, to not yell at children playing noisily, to not scream at the Sherlock fans that kept asking for souvenirs and signatures. They were all heartbroken and kept trying to get him to be president of their stupid little fan club. They were so happily heartbroken it made him ache, it was as if Sherlock's fanbase had doubled after...it happened.
"Hey you!" came the call. "You with the face!"
A light hand fell on his shoulder and tugged him round. Usually he could become unaware of the crowds, letting their faces blend into one another. Now it was as if a someone had suddenly pulled open the blinds and allowed sunlight to flood a darkened room. The drizzly day blinded him.
"What do you want kid?" he demanded.
The young woman frowned. She drew herself up to her full height which was five foot nothing and tried to loom failing miserably. John sighed as he looked down at her (something he didn't get to do with a lot of people). At least she wasn't actually a kid. A lot of the fans were teenagers who graphitised walls and held protests and threw themselves off things.
Moriarty was real.
Believe in Sherlock.
John wished they wouldn't tell him that. It was nice that they wanted to support him but they ran off in tears when he span on his heel and screamed "Don't you think I know that?!"
"I've chased you for almost three streets!" the young woman announced. Her cheeks were red but she didn't breathe heavily, just placed her hands on her hips giving him a questioning stare.
Oh great, she's one of those types. "Listen I'm flattered and all and I'm sure Sherlock's looking down on us and smiling," he rolled his eyes. "Or do you want me to tell you about how much gay sex we had like all the time because two men living together are obviously gay? Or perhaps you want me to tell you that he was a fake and that I am too? Just what do you want?"
The woman brushed a strand of dark hair from her eyes and sniffed. "You dropped your wallet."
John almost laughed, she was holding out the old leather pouch towards him. "Thanks. Urm..."
Her face lit up as she grinned wickedly at him and pulled him out of the way of an expectant mother with a baby in one arm and the reins of a toddler in the other.
"Perhaps we could go for a drink?" she suggested.
He didn't bother to consider it as he stuffed his wallet in his pocket. He should have known. There was always an ulterior motive. "You don't know me. You people, you think you know me. But you don't. You look like a fan, I think you're a fan. You don't look like the other sort. But seriously...just leave me alone. I can't tell you about him, I can't give you anything that isn't already available on the web," his voice broke. "I miss him too and I'm sure you do. Just go home."
He began to walk again, pressing on the cane to support his weight.
The young woman hurried after him. "You know I've read your blog," she called. "It's quite good. But I skipped most of the bits about Sherlock."
It's a persistent one then is it? "What d'you mean you skipped the bits about Sherlock?" John asked as he turned to face her. His left hand trembled violently. He hadn't written much more on his blog, his hands shook too much to type.
"They were a bit boring," she replied. "Listen mate, I ain't going to lie-"
"It's not," snapped John. Why was he still listening? Every instinct told him to go home. He'd been to Baker Street, just to visit Mrs. Hudson, see how she was doing. Her niece was visiting too and had given him dirty looks each time she thought he wasn't looking. He was supposed to be meeting with Lestrade later, for drinks with him and Molly.
"Not what?"
"You're not going to lie."
"Oh," the woman paused. "Right," she clutched her handbag to her side. "Listen I'm not going to lie. I know who you are, you and Sherlock. It's kind of hard to miss you when you were on the cover of every newspaper last year. I read your blog a few times but it just wasn't my thing. Now I see a good looking guy and he drops his wallet, I give it back to him, I think, what have I got to lose?"
Molly hardly ever cried these days. She'd cried so much after the thing happened. He'd been so angry with her too. So angry with everyone. As if being angry might help. Then he'd been sad. Then he'd been on a strange kind of high. Now...his mood swings were about as stable as a teenage girl's.
The others had mourned Sherlock, they mourned him every day until they just stopped talking about him. John knew that they hadn't forgotten about him. They just started to move on. Slowly, but they did move on.
John didn't want to move on.
Scanning her with his eyes he managed to find out zilch about her. Because quite frankly he was John Watson not Sherlock Holmes. Her hair...was kind of brown and she had split ends? Meaning...meaning she hadn't cut it recently? Used straightners a lot?
Sherlock would already be listing things...bruising around the neck...indicating...hanging? You idiot John, not hanging, those were hand shapes. Someone tried to strangle her? No bruising on the face. Slight bruising on the wrist when she held out the wallet.
The clothing...indicated...she was female? John didn't know. Every skill he'd learnt of observation while living with Sherlock had disappeared almost twice as quick. He'd just stopped trying, giving up before he'd even begun.
It was then he realised he'd been staring at the poor woman who'd only tried to do him a favour. Her eyes brimmed with unspilled tears.
"So what about it?" she asked, her eyes flicked across his. "Coffee maybe?"
That was how it began. John ranted about heads in fridges and eyeballs in microwaves and told her about the harpoon and the boar because she'd skipped that one. John admitted how much he missed the late detective and how he'd not allowed Mrs. Hudson to touch any of the man's things.
She was annoying, John decided. Her voice was too nasal and she wasn't pretty like Sarah or Louise and she wasn't as well spoken as them either. But she had spark, spunk he supposed. She seemed to understand people in a way that Sherlock never would, reading their emotions and their body language like a pro...in fact she used it against unsuspecting victims thrice during their not date.
Sherlock would probably approve of the manipulating bit.
John texted Lestrade apologising profusely. He'd got just a smiley face in return.
They played a game that Sherlock and he used to play, choosing people and trying to deduce things about them. She turned out to be quite good at it and John started to get better, but they fell about laughing as their deducing became more and more ridiculous.
It turned out that she was more clever than she let on, funny too. Damn frustrating and stubborn mind. Insisted on paying half for the meal they'd ended up having. Mycroft kept pushing money onto him (calling it allowance) and after two months of refusing it he'd finally given in and accepted it so he might as well spend it. The woman was obviously less well off than him but she was stupidly stubborn. She ate, that was a change to his previous dining partner.
She lived in a not so nice part of town, and admitted that she was sleeping on a friend's floor until she found herself a place.
It was as he walked her to the door that he realised that he didn't know her name.
"It's Mary," she smiled, he noted that one tooth was chipped. "But people call me Mim."
He nodded, swallowing. "I had a good time Mim...thanks. I...I don't think I'm ready for a relationship yet. But, do you think I could call you sometime? We could get to know each other better?"
Her smile was thin. "That'd be nice. I'd like that."
She squeezed his shoulder tightly and he wiped his eyes. Then she leant in and gave him a gentle kiss on the cheek as she unlocked the door and slipped inside.
John Watson would never stop hurting. But he dropped to his knees outside the thin house and wept into the floor. He'd spent so long trying not to cry. Now he did, on a stranger's doorstep, he sobbed quietly as his soul howled.
Finally John Watson began to mourn.
Mycroft Holmes wasn't a smiley man. But he smiled at Anthea as she approached.
"He's going to be ok, isn't he?" she asked, hands ghosting his shoulders.
He nodded slowly. "I still want him watched. Take no risks."
Anthea caressed his neck, massaging the tension that often concealed itself there away. "Are you ok?" her voice was silky and dangerous like a serpent waiting to lock its jaws around its prey.
"No," he replied after much consideration. "But I'm sure I will be."
More than four hundred miles away the consulting detective put his phone back in his pocket. A smile crossed his lips.
"Thank you Mim," he whispered. Sentiment.
Sherlock Holmes was alive.
At long last John Watson was too.