The Sound of Silence
Author's Note: Title and quotes are taken from the Simon and Garfunkel song of the same name. Quotes in the story taken from BBC's Sherlock.
Warnings: Drug use.
Chapter One
"Hello Darkness my old friend."
He was walking alone down the cobblestone street. Hands pressed deep into pockets, collar turned up in his unique way. Every few meters a streetlamp would illuminate his next few steps. His eyes rarely strayed from his path, he knew without looking that he was alone. No one would be up at this hour. No one, save him perhaps.
As he walked his focus was on the cacophony in his mind. It bounced from one subject to the next, but always returned to one image, before scattering off, only to inevitably return a few moments later. It was her, as she should have looked, as she whispered those words to him. Whispered the words that would save her life. She loved him, he knew. He also knew that love was not an advantage and that sentiment was a chemical defect found on the losing side, but he was still haunted by the image of her.
She would have been barefoot. She was at home, so she would have been relaxed. She would have been wearing her favourite pair of sweatpants. Grey, patched in the knee. Elastic in the waist and ankles. They bore an old stain on the right thigh from when she had dripped wax from a candle during a blackout. They had a hole in the left leg at the seam below the waist. A hole that she "had been meaning to get to for a long time." He didn't know why she just didn't wear her new sweatpants.
Her shirt would have been similar in evidence of the wearer's love for it. It would be the one that had a frayed hemline. It was purple, so it bore less visible stains, but what it lacked in stains, it made up for in holes. There was one in the bottom right-hand corner from when her cat had expressed his disdain at her moving one cold morning. The hole was small, but it showed a round circle of pale flesh. There was another to the right of her navel. This one slightly bigger, from when the shirt got caught on a jagged edge of a door frame. The third was near the round neckline was about the size of a walnut. She couldn't remember what had caused it, and had given up on sewing it closed as the fabric just kept fraying.
Her hair would be tied up loosely, untidily. Almost as if it was an afterthought as she made them both tea. In his mind's eye, she would have called his name to let him know his tea was ready and then she would have been startled to find him only a step behind her looking down at her intently. He would take the tea from her hands and thank her quietly. She would look up at him and she would see it in his eyes. The words that he was unable to say. The feelings that he had been taught not to feel. So she would say them for him and allow him to feel for her what he had been longing to feel since he was a child.
He reached his destination at precisely 3:17 am. The chair beneath the neon sign was vacant and irritation rushed through his mind. This was why this source was to be used in emergencies only. This source was not on time. Time is a resource not to be squandered. After waiting two minutes in the cold night air, the short, thin man appeared out of the darkness.
His skin reflected the green of the neon sign and gave him an ill-looking pallor. He stunk. His coat was ancient, worn well in the sleeves and in the elbows. Obviously, it had had two previous owners before its current wearer. His shirt collar was torn on the left-hand side and stained with a fair amount of blood. A pub brawl that had not ended in the wear's favour. The trousers had neither a belt nor suspenders, they were cinched in the waist with a dirty piece of string. He was the worst of humanity. He took what was not his and sold it for more than it was worth. The preyed on those who showed the slightest weakness and used every opportunity to his advantage even if it was to the detriment of others.
Sherlock held out his hand to the man. Between his fingers was the agreed upon amount. The man took the notes greedily and counted them quickly.
"You're short," he said.
"Check again," said Sherlock quietly.
The man did so.
"Ah," he said, "my mistake," he smirked. Sherlock had no doubt that this line was often used by customers in order to get them to pay extra for the product they needed so desperately.
After pocketing the money, the thin man pulled a box from his pocket. Sherlock checked its contents before turning away from the man, eager to put distance between himself and the man's stink.
"Pleasure doing business with you," the man called out after him. Sherlock rolled his eyes at the lack of subtlety.
This man was not his usual source. Sherlock had a contact who was based in a hospital a few miles outside of London. This source had, however, decided to take a vacation in Scotland, leaving Sherlock with the name and number of the thin man in the case of an emergency. This was an emergency.
Sherlock was used to his brain's constant activity. It was what he used to solve the cases no one could solve, see the things no one could see, deduce things no one could deduce. There was, however, no off switch. Sherlock had had to learn at an early age what was acceptable to say to and about people and what was unacceptable. His brother had helped somewhat, but he had mostly learned on his own through trial and error as Mycroft's methods, while effective, left him feeling alone. While time spent alone meant time spent away from idiots, it also meant he was lonely.
So Sherlock developed his own methods for dealing with "other" people, but after Redbeard, he grew more like his brother in order to never feel such pain again. He isolated himself, it was easy considering his ability, not just for deduction, but also for offending anyone who got too close.
It was hard, now that he had friends to not automatically say the things he saw that they did not wish for him to see. John's sleepless nights. Rosie's sick on the shoulder of his jumper. Molly's lack of lipstick, the bags under her eyes. Sometimes he did not want his brain to process everything he saw. Sometimes he needed his brain to quieten down enough so that he could get some sleep. So that he could sort through the mess that his last case had become and file everything away into its correct place in his mind palace. He needed time to order his thoughts, especially his thoughts of her. Molly. His thoughts of his pathologist were getting severely out of hand. He needed to put them back into her room in his mind so that he could think clearly again.
This is where his contact outside of London came in. The man owed Sherlock his life for solving a case that concerned his wife, her foot and a scandal fit for the stage. So supplying SHerlock with morphine every now and then was a small favour. Sherlock had not expected this emergency. The contact was due back in London within a week, but Sherlock could not wait another week. He could not endure another week of sleepless nights or another week of an unquiet head.
Upon his return to 221B Baker Street, Sherlock wasted no time in taking his usual dosage of morphine. He felt it as it made its way through his veins. He felt it as it calmed his heartbeat. He waited for it to reach his mind. As it did, he realised that Molly's room had become a hall. Rows upon rows of cabinets full of files that were filled with details about her. Her favourite coffee, her favourite tea. How she took each, what she meant by 'enough' when he observed how much milk she took in each. Which crisps she liked, which ones she never touched. Which perfume she wore, what shade of lipstick she favoured and what each shade meant for her mood. Details. So many details, but not much information. There was much he did not know about his pathologist, but for now, he was content to be able to quieten his mind down enough so that sleep came and his thoughts did not overwhelm him so much. In his last waking moments, he allowed his mind to focus on her hair and how it shined in the sunlight. And how the smile on her face was all the sunlight he would ever need.