Satellites of Sociopathy
noun: something that is separated from something else but is nevertheless dependent on it.
It's moments like these that John forgets they're supposed to be just friends.
The weight of Sherlock is steady, breathing. In, out. The strange mixture of oxygen and carbon dioxide filling the space between them and John is still not entirely sure what Sherlock looks for from him whenever they find themselves this way. But never does John refuse. Sherlock is resting across the couch, pillowed by Johns lap and legs tucked up like folded paper to make space, bare feet looking cold. One hand lays mute and patient across his stomach while the other spills out like ink down the side of the couch, fingers curled up from the hardwood of the floor.
He looks too thin in his white shirt and slim pants and John feels the tug in his stomach. He doesn't eat enough.
John rests his face against the palm of his right hand, anchored on the arm of the couch as the television murmurs in the corner. His left fingers trace the familiar line. Down Sherlock's cheek, along his jaw, smooth his chin. Work back up, and repeat. The feeling of Sherlock beneath him is a reminder, a note marked out in finger-prints against alabaster skin. The same words over and over, never spoken but John knows Sherlock can read them every time from the crinkle of skin and the smell of rain.
Not today. Not today. Not today.
John ignores what he knows Sherlock to be thinking. He knows the man who's stretched across him like clothes on a line. Knows each quirk, each delicate shift. Notices everytime Sherlock falls out of the skin of the world, leaving John behind with the ordinary and dull. John always waits. Always pretends he can't see the two words Sherlock regurgitates in the grand workings of his mind. But John's practical and he knows that he won't be able to avoid them forever.
In his worst moments, John thinks the world will end before Sherlock ever addresses them. Such sentimentalities are, of course, left to lesser-beings.
In even darker ones, John knows the truth of them and knows Sherlock is holding back because despite everything, he knows and he cares. Sherlock understands, Sherlock sees. John catches his eye the odd time, catches the way the grey cuts the blue just a certain way that promises something John would rather not think about. So John decided long ago that he'd rather follow Sherlock blindly.
Can't be scared of what you can't see.
Sherlock hums lowly from his resting and John knows his friend is approaching those thoughts again. John pauses momentarily, hand ghosting flesh like frost on grass. It's the closest they ever come to addressing it. Moments like this.
Sherlock opens his eyes and regards John with a benign interest that John usually associates with petri-dishes and the smell of acetone. Then he sees it. The shift. The thin vein of blue catches the light and winks in a dark way, striking across the bright grey of Sherlock's eyes in a warped line. Johns heart taps that way it always does when he spots it. Like it has lost its breath. John reads the emotion in Sherlock's eyes and sits up a little straighter, his right-hand now free to tangle its tingling fingers in Sherlock's curls.
Still damp from the rain.
Sherlock sighs through his nose and closes his eyes, head tilting back into the touch, feeling heavy and warm on Johns legs. The moment has passed. Once again, John has managed to escape it. He thinks his mantra, writing the words over and over in his mind. Not today. Not today. Not today. His other hand returns to Sherlock's skin and John catches the way his dark eyelashes quiver. Contentment. Sherlock never has to say; John knows.
John watches the way his friends chest rises and falls like a tide, breath rolling down between them like waves. John traces his hand down lower, just to the very accent of Sherlock's neck, where his jaw meets. Sherlock says nothing, but John knows he is waiting. Knows he expects it. And John knows it's ridiculous, and excessive as Sherlock is right here, but he does so anyway. His fingers find the grove so familiar and count.
Thrumming. Pulse. John counts the beats. Feels the veins and arteries pump beneath the skin. Undeniable proof that Johns friend is alive and breathing beneath him.
When John moves his hand back to the curve of Sherlock's face, he sees that Sherlock is watching him again. There's a different emotion moving in the cuts and groves of the grey, warm water beneath ice. John feels his breath catch slightly and his hands still, one tangled in skin and the other tied in curly knots. He almost says something, but doesn't.
John never says anything because he knows that Sherlock has probably taken the words from him a hundred times. Picked them out of the wrinkles in his face and the way his laugh turns breathy whenever Sherlock would look at him that way. John wishes sometimes that Sherlock would ask him for them, instead of merely collecting whatever he felt like from John. But he knows that they never worked like that, that they'll never work like that as long as they're with each-other.
Maybe with other people it would be different. But John doesn't like to think about other people when they're like this.
'John,' Sherlock says, the name mingled with the scent of tea in the baritone John had grown so used to. Johns fingers twitch from the word and Sherlock is looking at him with cracked eyes, like scratched marbles. John feels the thunder swell outside. 'You know-'
''Course I do,' John interrupts, his voice cracked and sounding slightly choked. His throat is dry and the usual response tastes almost bitter. Sherlock doesn't need to say, but he does. And John doesn't need to hear, because he knows.
John knows that Sherlock is his best-friend. He knows that they could never be anything more than this. There would be no kissing, hand-holding or walks in the park. They would never fall into bed together and they would certainly never tell each other- well, they'd never say anything. Because that's just not how they are. John is Sherlock's best, (and perhaps only), friend. He's straight, he's Sherlock's flat-mate, (and a bloody good one, mind), and partner. Colleague. John winces. That word, the one Sherlock and John always shove between them whenever they feel like reminding the other.
This is what we are. You are my friend. You are my rent.
He never asks why, but John knows that Sherlock will never ask for more, or take any more, from John that what they have now. This lull. This moment where one came so close to dying, (again), that the other is left winded and sore and clinging, clinging, because they are oh, so lucky this time. Not today, but maybe tomorrow. The moment is always filled with something else- an ordered meal, a quiz-show and silence because both Sherlock and John know what is wanted and know what is needed. And in moments like these, they forget that they are just good friends and fall into the bad habits that keep John tender against Sherlock's face and Sherlock heavy on John's skin.
But still John always holds the question with his teeth; what are you looking from me, Sherlock? Why is this enough?
Sherlock is reading him. John hates when he does that. He doesn't need to take; Sherlock could always ask. John would never deny him. He can see the colours twist in Sherlock's eyes as the thoughts churn like paint. Thick and stewing. John can count the shadows on his face as the window flares with silent lightning. Sherlock's face is illuminated suddenly, pale and striking and John is suddenly overwhelmed with how close he came to losing him tonight. Again. As expected, Sherlock takes the thought straight from Johns head and presents the response he always does, the one he thinks John wants to hear;
'I'm sorry. For leaving you tonight,' Sherlock says slowly and John knows he doesn't mean a bloody word but he can't help but feel grateful that at least Sherlock cares enough to lie. Sherlock would leave him a thousand times over if he felt it would help the case, help John. Selfish twat. John sighs heavily and returns to his ministrations, fingers tying bows with hair and leaving invisible lines of claim on skin. He stares ahead and looks at the television screen, fully aware of Sherlock's gaze.
'Don't worry about that. We both know you don't mean a single word of it, anyway, you git,' John laughs resignedly, closing his eyes and listening to the hush of the rain outside. Sherlock says nothing, but John feels him turn into his left-hand, lips brushing against the skin of him. John freezes at the contact, but tries not to let Sherlock see just how affected he is by it.
Sherlock will never tell John he loves him.
John knows this. He will never ask for the words because John also knows that if they're ever spoken aloud, they would lose themselves and each-other in the fray. The collapse. The fall. But not today. Not today, John prays to himself, his fingers tightening on Sherlock. He opens his eyes and looks down. Sherlock looks as though he is sleeping into Johns hand, his mouth loose and slightly tilted, like flowers to the sun. The motion that graces the lips before a smile.
And in a moment like this, John sees the truth of them. Peels back the lies they tell. John knows that he loves Sherlock. He loves the daft, infuriating, brilliant man before him with everything and anything he has. He knows that the love he has is wasteful, but so irreversible that John can not remember what it is like to not have Sherlock in his life.
John also knows that Sherlock loves him, too. He knows that while he may flit away with women and work, John is the only thing for Sherlock. John is Sherlock's life outside of the cases, outside of the observing and deducting. John is what Sherlock needs, what Sherlock wants. The heart of him.
But Sherlock wants and needs the work more. And relationships are messy. Frivolous and tiresome. Waste of valuable time, energy and brain-space. What is love really? A trick of the mind. Easily overcome.
A nice thought. But one they both know to be false as they rest together in the storm.
Slowly and tenderly, John moves his left-hand to cup Sherlock's face, tilting his chin up. Sherlock opens his eyes, bright and intuitive as ever. Not a shadow of sleep in them. They watch each-other for a long time and John knows Sherlock is doing his best to just see and not observe. John feels himself smile at the effort his friend makes. His heart jumps like a frightened bird in his chest. Sherlock does not smile back, but John can see the weight of everything in his eyes and he knows.
Sherlock will never say the words. But he'll mean them everyday.
John holds Sherlock for what feels like not nearly enough. Sherlock moves his hand from being cast over the couch to take Johns, his fingers cool from the floor and making John shiver. The blue is back and they are venturing ever closer to those words again. John opens his mouth, but finds the words dry and missing. Instead, he prays again to himself. Not today, not today, not today.
For one, frail moment, John almost thinks Sherlock will do it this time. Start the conversation, say the words out loud and break the ruse John so heartily follows, blind and stumbling, but oh, so willing. Sherlock's hand crumples Johns fingers like paper and takes them away from his face and as John does every time their moments end, he sees the words flash in the blue crack of Sherlock's eyes. He had ignored what Sherlock was thinking earlier, but now it was present and within seconds, Sherlock is up and heading to the kitchen. John remains on the couch, hands left in the air where Sherlock had been mere moments before.
Sherlock loves John. John loves Sherlock. They are merely two of a collection of truths.
And now, as John slowly falls back into the world, he remembers that Sherlock and himself are just good friends. The final truth of them revealed by Sherlock is stubbornly unacknowledged. John runs a hand over his face and reaches for the remote, turning the television up a little louder and shouting something towards Sherlock about keeping the clanging of pots down. They say nothing for hours, merely live and breathe together but John can't get the words Sherlock never says out of his head. They swing in his mind like a clocks pendulum, counting down the pulses.
Because they could lose each-other at any time, but John always leaves with the knowledge that it's not today.
Sherlock is different. Sherlock sees everything and he knows what John refuses to witness in them because the fear is just too much. Sherlock does not think "not today"'s or "thank, God"'s. Sherlock only thinks what John dreads. Only sees what John covered his eyes to so long ago.
They haven't lost each-other.
Not yet.
A test of the waters. I've never written Sherlock FF before, so constructive criticism is welcome. I promise I won't be offended. This could be interpreted as romantic, I suppose...
~ATGNT