[Inspired by a tweet from VeryShortStories]
"I found an old picture of us while cleaning out the attic. We looked so happy together then." Jim leans back against the trunk of a tall oak tree and crosses his legs.
"Of course we looked happy. We were happy. Until things got fucked up anyway. It was all your fault. Maybe. Maybe it was my fault. Or both." He shakes his head. "No. No, definitely your fault."
Jim picks up a blade of grass and sticks it between his lips, chewing on the end of it. "You had to go and be all involved and all having emotions and being such a normal person. Why did I even bother keeping you around? I don't want normal people around me, you're too boring." He frowns, eyebrows coming together over his nose with the motion.
"You weren't boring, though. Boring people can't shoot someone from half a mile away and shag me senseless on a rooftop because they're so turned on by it. " He pauses "Followed by twenty minutes of really annoying bitching about how you were two inches off your mark. I mean, the man was dead, Sebastian, did it matter which lobe you got him in?" He scowls again and throws the piece of grass away in frustration. "You always cared too much. Even if you weren't boring you were certainly normal that way."
Jim slips his hand inside of his jacket and pulls out a crumpled pack of cigarettes. He waves a hand in the air dismissively at no one in particular. "Yea, yea I said I was quitting. Well, what are you going to do? You're dead, remember? Don't think you could forget a thing like that." He takes a long, slow drag from the cigarette and tilts his head back, blowing a lazy plume of smoke into the air. "I know I can't."
"I can still remember the look on your face when…." He presses the heels of his hands against his eyes. "You're so…so stupid. God dammit, I trained you better than that. I taught you to think with your head and not follow your gut like every other dumb primate walking around the city." He drops his hands and takes another drag from the cigarette, glaring angrily at nothing in particular. "Mycroft wasn't going to shoot me, not really. He wanted information, Sebastian. He couldn't have taken that if he'd killed me! And if you hadn't fucking pulled your gun on him, then his men wouldn't have….you are so stupid."
He kicks out with one leg and slams his head back against the tree, the dull pain sharpening his senses again and bringing him back into focus. His voice is low, tired.
"That's why what you wanted wouldn't have worked. Couldn't have worked." He presses his foot against a small clump of dirt that hasn't been properly packed back down like the rest of it.
"I made sure to get you back, though. One of my stipulations. I told Mycroft all about this…key," the mockery in his voice is clear, "in exchange for information about Sherlock… and for your body. They probably think I'm doing weird things to you." He cocks his head to one side and taps the ash off the end of his cigarette. "Not that I would. You weren't really in there. It was just cold, flesh and bone and nothing else." The face had been damaged too, from the bullet tearing him apart. It didn't even look like him.
"I just knew you wanted a proper burial. Payment, I suppose, to give you that in exchange years of excellent service. Couldn't get you the actual funeral though. Don't know why you wanted one either, you were a shit Catholic while you were alive, I doubt you'll be a better one in death." He tosses the cigarette down near his feet and grinds his heel into it.
"I warned you. But did you listen? No. You let your fucking heart get in the way and now you're dead. You're fucking dead, Sebastian! For all of my intellect and connections, that's the one thing I can't fucking fix!"
He draws his knees up to his chest and rests his chin on them. "I should have made you leave. As soon as you told me…that. You weren't supposed to have feelings for me. That just…" he drops his forehead against his knees. "I should have made you leave."
He sits still for what feels like a very long time before slowing unfolding himself and rising to his feet. "Maybe it was my fault then. Almost makes me want to dig you up and apologize." He brushes the dirt from his trousers and straightens his jacket. "But then," he gives a small, crooked smirk, "we both know that I never apologize for anything."
He looks around and shifts awkwardly from one foot to the other. "That's all I have to say, I guess. I should go, things to do, crimes to commit. I'm breaking into the Tower of London, the Bank of England, and Pentonville Prison today. That'll be fun." He tugs his baseball cap down lower over his face. "I've got a lot of things planned for the next few months, Sebastian. And who knows? Maybe I'll be seeing you again sooner than you think."