(((This is a little emotional response from my heart that has been dwelling on the aftermath of Sherlock's death for weeks. There's so much to tell but I hate over-explaining... If you like it, please say so. It will mean the world! Thank you. And, I have a sequel in mind. Kindof. *wink*)))
Upon returning from the grocer's, the unmistakable ennui that had been his characteristic mood before meeting Sherlock came over John. Unloading the skimpy shopping, he threw the comfort foods into the fridge: two cans of leek potato soup, a packet of cheese, three packs of crumpets, a jar of raspberry jam, two bottles of milk. He only left the carton of cigarettes on the kitchen table, not even bothering to take it out of the bag.
Putting the kettle on, he prepared two cups, one for himself, one for Mrs Hudson. Consuming a nice cuppa together in Sherlock's forlorn flat has become their unwritten custom, a routine not willingly broken, and then only for emergencies. Having her in the building was such a relief. She had always been kind to him in particular, but her finding him choking on his own vomit, half eradicated from life by the full bottle of pills he had taken a week after Sherlock's funeral had promoted her into the position of a confidante most intimate in nature. Having her around maintained the illusion of normalcy to a certain degree, and also, the ostensible belief that nothing has changed, that Sherlock might be alive, that he, John Watson would indeed be able to lead a life without his friend, however pointless that life may be.
When he turned to take his jacket off, the pack of digestive biscuits fell from his hands and landed on the carpeted floor with a muffled crashing sound.
The person he had thought dead for five months, two weeks and four days was sitting in his usual spot, the armchair against which the violin was still propped, untouched since afore-mentioned person had last put it there.
John stared, strained his eyes to see if they were deceving him, but the distance was so insignificant it could not have been a mirage. It looked like Sherlock. The person wore the usual overcoat, the purple shirt, the hair was the same albeit slightly longer and more unkempt than the last time John saw him.
After the first shock of disbelief a sort of so far suppressed rage ensued. To see Sherlock sit in his armchair so... imperturbably, in such a smugly unaffected manner made the doctor see red. He had to, or else he would have broken down.
He knew he would have to say something, eventually.
'Spare your breath, John', the man spoke, making his identity unequivocally certain. 'To your first question, that of „how", I shall reply when the time had made it possible or necessary. The query that I am sure you consider more pressing and important I can freely address, thanks to the circumstances. I had to disappear under the pretense of death to protect the few people I care about, whose safety was being fatally put at risk by my arch-enemy, more notably his associates, since you may well be aware of the demise of our dear Moriarty. Just before he blew his brains out he told me that you, Lestrade and Mrs Hudson were being watched and a hair breadth's away from being murdered by hitmen, unless I die of my own volition. So I did put on a show for the sake of the murderes and I made sure to render it indubitable for everyone who witnessed my fall from the building. Most distressingly, you had to see me die, too. For which I genuinely apologize.'
Watson realized he was shaking. He must have been shaking from the first moment he spotted Sherlock seated in his armchair. He tried to grasp the meaning of his friend's short speech and he was doing his best to come up with a suitable reply. Seeing Sherlock alive was confusing, frightening, blissful. He had carefully stacked up bricks in the wall that separated him from all things harm during the months that followed his suicide attempt. He had been leading a simple life, unadulterated by deadly threats or extraordinary events or intense human emotions. He had cut himself off everything that might have shattered his safe existence in the very least. Now those bricks were falling one by one, his desultory affairs and peripheral human relationships vanishing into thin air, demolished by the mere presence of someone who on his worst days could not be called a human being, and who, at best, was and would always be an insolent, sociopathic, egotistic genius with very sporadic displays of humanity. The fact that Sherlock Holmes, who despite his dubious character was and would possibly always be John Watson's best (and only) friend, was alive, was turning John's world upside down. He was literally shaking from dizziness and physical discomfort.
It was then that Mrs Hudson was coming up the stairs and John knew he would have a moment of respite. He inhaled gratefully as he waited for the elderly woman's genuine outburst of emotion. It came as expected: Mrs Hudson dropped the tray of sandwiches she was bringing for tea and stumbled a few steps toward the middle of the room where Sherlock was already standing to receive her. She sobbed her way into his arms that gently enclosed her minuscule, fragile body. As he was whispering words of soothing nature in his deep voice, John felt that there was so much to take in that the emotional load was literally pressing everything else out of his body, so he fled to the bathroom to relieve himself. It was soon over, the Persian lunch he had just consumed left him with ease, but he stayed there kneeling above the toilet basin, heaving and trying to steady his heart.
He lost track of time, he only noticed Sherlock standing in the doorway when he wobbled to his feet to wash his face and rinse his mouth. He looked at Sherlock in the mirror, finally ready to break the silence between them.
'Did you know I tried to kill myself a week after your funeral?' he asked, making himself sound as nonchalant and detached as he possibly could.
'It was me who found you and made as much noise as I could to alert Mrs Hudson without disclosing my being alive', Sherlock replied softly.
John stared some more. Yet another load of information that his boggled brain was to jam into the rumpled mix of incomprehensible and upsetting facts.
'And you couldn't let me know you were alive to save me further... inconvenience?' he asked, choosing to substitute the word 'pain' in the last moment.
'It was out of the question. Your candid nature would have destroyed my plan in a jiffy', Sherlock answered calmly.
John made to exit the bathroom, and Sherlock stepped aside to let him. The doctor knew he was being stupid. Pretended anger never worked on Sherlock, in fact, no human emotions ever worked on Sherlock. He could puff and scream inside or even crumble and fall to pieces and it would not deter Sherlock from doing whatever he had planned to accomplish. John knew that he might as well shed those well-earned tears and get done with it. After all, his suicide attempt must have been a rather telling exhibit of his inner life. Who the hell was he fooling now? He could certainly not fool Sherlock. No one could ever fool Sherlock.
'Are you hungry?' John asked, walking to the kitchen table to pour some tea out for his friend.
Sherlock followed him, suspiciously quiet. Watson stirred in some milk and turned to extend the cup on a saucer to Sherlock. He looked up into the probing eyes of his friend, trying to discern whatever there was in them. John knew he must have received a pretty good shock, because he thought he saw sadness in Sherlock's eyes, and Sherlock was never sad. Annoyed, confused, angry, excited, bored, those were his usual emotional states.
'Are you smoking? And you've put on weight. Is it three or four women that you've had intermittent sex with over the past five months?' Sherlock asked when he took the tea from John's hand.
'Yes, yes, and it was actually five, you overlooked Daniele', John replied noncommittantly. He had missed this. He truly had. Just like he had missed the towering physical and intellectual presence of the man in the white skin of a beautiful angel. As he was standing there so close to Sherlock, something that an hour before he would have not thought possible ever again, the beauty of the tall man struck him as strongly as never before. Alabaster skin, raven curls, lips the shape of miniature waves in a parting of concentration, eyes that reminded of a snake, a snake looming and hovering over its prey, a snake that would shed its skin occasionally nonetheless. Cold and calculated was the look in Sherlock's eyes, always prying, always searching, examining, and yet, or possibly because of that, the consulting detective seemed to exert a powerful effect over John, the one who had been accustomed to being ordered about in the military. Sherlock had a strong character and he knew exactly how to use it to his own advantage and gain. That, and his mindblowing intellect were the two most attractive traits in John's eyes. They probably beautified the mortal human being, too, so whenever John thought of Sherlock using his mind's descriptive skills, he saw Sherlock as slim, elegant, almost regal, smooth-skinned, delectably so, with fingers as slender as to take the mind of anyone who laid eyes on them.
But this was taking him nowhere. He had not given in to his incomprehensible urge to cling to Sherlock back then, he could not do it now. It was a ridiculous notion, one that surpassed anything that had ever nested itself into the scientific mind of John Watson.
'Your pupils are dilated, your breathing is laboured despite your commendable but useless efforts to veil that fact, and I can literally smell the pheromones you are exuding. You've always been attracted to me, John, everyone who knew us was aware of the fact, and so were you... and so was I. Why hide it now? Psychologically speaking, sexual attraction is a totally valid response upon unexpectedly meeting someone back from the dead... someone you cared for', Sherlock spoke slowly.
John swallowed.
'Go on, humiliate me some more', he muttered. His voice was raspy and almost whiny.
'That is not my intent', Sherlock replied almost gently. 'I merely wish to draw attention to the fact that I'm aware of what's happening between us. If you think it doesn't go both ways, then you are a bigger nincompoop than I ever thought. However, I think that we should continue to avoid gratifying our physical needs domestically... to preserve the tension and chemistry between us which, I believe, is the primal reason for our almost flawless professional collegiality'.
John Watson was forced to stare some more. It was too much, way too much for him to comprehend.
'I spent many a night in hiding with the marvellous Irene Adler, who kept me sane and physically satisfied', Sherlock continued, taking a sip from his tea. 'I shall wish to proceed with my visits, and I suggest that you, in turn, keep seeing your... respective female friends'.
John wasn't sure whether he should yell or send a punch into Sherlock's smug beautiful face that showed no sign of any stubble, contrary to his own that grew incontrollably.
'The fuck do I care', he finally said, resigned to everything. He was dizzy, happy, shocked, overdosed with bliss and information that changed his general mindframe considerably. 'Go on and shag Ms Adler while she beats you to a pulp. I'm just happy you're alive, that's all', he added and his voice trailed off.
Sherlock put the teacup on the table.
'Should we hug it off and get it over and done with? That obnoxious skeleton... it will fall out eventually, we both know it will', he said in a neutral tone, one that nonetheless contained traces of emotion.
John waited for nothing else. He sent his arms out and across the slender build of Sherlock who was taken aback by the quick emotional response, but who received it with as much grace as his general disposition allowed. Thus it happened that Sherlock Holmes and John Watson collided in an embrace that involved arms and chest and clothes and skin underneath and more than that, feelings nestling inside them. John knew he hadn't been as happy all his life. He didn't even care who knew and what they knew.
'I do turn you on, don't I?' Sherlock's deep, whispered vibrato reached John's left ear.
The mortification of an involuntary hard-on mostly caused by emotional turmoil sent John hurdling back from Sherlock's embrace, right into the edge of the table. His hand that looked for a steady place to grab upset Sherlock's half finished tea, pushed several apples off that rolled down happily and continued to roll, prolonguing John's general sense of ridicule.
'Don't...', Sherlock was extending a hand clumsily, as if trying to console. 'I'm flattered... very flattered.'
He stressed the last words, exhaling slowly, raspily. But that may have been John's imagination, rendered adventurous to say the least, by the recent events.
'I see the world's back on its right track', Mrs Hudson worded his happiness from the doorway where she had (hopefully) just arrived. John threw her an exasperated glance, uncertain about what she may or may not have heard from the frantically untypical exchange between him and Sherlock. It was something that he knew he wouldn't find out any time soon.
As she approached them, Mrs Hudson was smiling from ear to ear and she took the hands of the two men, bewildered according to their respective temperaments, into each of her own hands, giving them a loving squeeze.
'Tea is brewing and I have more sandwiches downstairs... I say you two boys come down and join me, and you, Sherlock, will have to tell... everything', she smiled at Sherlock.
The receiver of the smile reciprocated it, and before all three of them started to walk out of Sherlock's room, he gave John a smile, too.