It had been over two weeks since Watson had left. He might have been able to predict that her warning - that people wouldn't always abide his behavior - would eventually become reality. But he had expected others to relinquish their place in his life before Watson ever did.

Of all the things that he will miss about her – the targeted sarcasm, her cogent insight into human nature, her investigative adroitness - what he will miss the most, he reflected, are the sonic transformations that resulted from her move into the brownstone. A rather odd admission, he conceded, from a man who despised most disruptions, both from the amplified outside world and from the workings inside his head. But Watson's noises – Joan's noises – were of a different sort. The soft flapping of the rubber soles of her slippers as she walked across the hardwood floor. The clink of the unsolicited cup of tea being placed on the table in front of him after she had made a cup for herself. Her exhale of exasperation after he had gone off on one of his too-lengthy explanations. The sigh she would sometimes unconsciously emit while comfortably reading on the couch in the evening, he sitting across the room by the fire.

All of those noises were silenced after his implacable insistence that people – not people, Joan – would have to deal with the intransigent nature of his personality. Perhaps he will re-acclimate to the insignificant, quotidian noises that now mark his existence, he thought. Or, perhaps there will never be noise in the world again.


It had been over two weeks since she had left Sherlock. While she had been speaking about herself, and others, when she had said that people wouldn't indefinitely make allowances for his behavior, she hadn't actually intended to be the first.

Of all the things that that she will miss about him – the quiet dedication to his sobriety, his mental acuity, the sharp and inescapable penetration of his eyes – what she will miss the most, she contemplated, are the still-audible echoes of her former life. The almost undetectable sound of Clyde's chewing on his daily lettuce. The spontaneous outburst from some corner of the brownstone after Sherlock has deciphered a formerly oblique aspect of an investigation. The meditative hum of the rooftop apiary, daring to challenge the random cacophony of the city. Even the slight catch in his throat when he began to call her "Joan," but switched, mid-syllable, to "Watson," instead.

All of those noises were reduced to mere memory after her silent determination to prove – to herself and to him - that she wouldn't be manipulated by Sherlock's apparently willful, albeit occasional, cruelty. Perhaps she will adapt to the monotonous drone of her once-renounced, now-reclaimed, life as a sober companion, she considered. Or, perhaps there will never be noise in the world again.