Prologue: Nightmares

John Watson stares confused into the darkness.
The shout which has woken him up reverberates in his head.
A loud and desperate shout.

Sherlock.

Again.

The third night in a row. And John has stopped to count, how often it has happened during the last weeks.
He sighs and sits up in the bed. He feels as killed. Nevertheless, he forces himself to get up and walk down the stairs to Sherlocks bedroom.
"Sherlock?" he asks quietly when he stands in the door to the pitch-dark room. He cannot see Sherlock. Everything what he can hear, are quiet, hectic gasps. Then there rustles a blanket.

"John?"

"Yeah. Its just me. I turn on the light, okay," John says quietly and presses the light switch.
Sherlock lays groaning, an arm over his face when the light blinds him.
John enters the bedroom and sits down sighing on the edge of the bed.
"Nightmare?"
Sherlock just nods.
John looks at his friend exactly. Sees the weird hair. Sees how Sherlocks clothes sticks bathed in sweat to him. Sees the absolutely got mixed up sheets.
"Badly?"
Sherlock does not react.
John sighs,"Sherlock, you have these nightmares really very often. Why do you simply not tell me from what they act? It helps to talk about that, you know. "
"No."
John is surprised about the hard and prompt answer.
And a bit hurt somehow.
"Why do you not want to tell it to me?"
Sherlock takes his arm off his face and looks at John.
John gets a fright when he sees pain in Sherlocks eyes.
"I am not able to, John. I'm sorry."
With this Sherlock slowly gets up and leaves the room in silence.

John stays down a moment. The thoughts race in his head. Why only Sherlock does not want to talk about his dreams...They torment him quite obviously. John himself knows a lot about nightmares. This Sherlock knows certainly. This John thought at least.
Finally, completely confused he also gets up and goes in the direction of the sitting room where he supposes Sherlock.
Really there sits his friend on the couch and has switched on the television.
He zaps from one programme to the other without stopping at one. His fingers drum a worried rhytmus on the couch armrest. Sometime he growls irritated and switches off the television again. Buckles on the back and stares to the cover.
John shakes his head and decides to make tea. Now of sleep is not to be thought probably any more.
Outdoors the sun already starts to rise.

Silence rules between them. Also when they drink the tea together.
Sometime Sherlock interrupts the silence.
Unexpectedly.
"I dream of the past," he says quietly and John looks up from his tea.
"Past?"
"Yes. There, there is something... Something what you do not know, John," Sherlocks says and his voice, besides, trembles easily.
John swallows affected.
"Then tell me about it."
Sherlock quickly shakes his head. "I am not able to do this."
"Sherlock, you are my best friend. And I...I know practically nothing about you," John says seriously. "You look at me, and you can read in me, like in a book. However, I am not able to do this."
"It is better thus," Sherlock says moody.
"No. It's not," John says stubbornly. "All the same what it is which has happened to you, so badly it cannot be that you cannot tell it to me!"
Sherlock looks at him firmly. "If you know everything about me, you will go, John," he says hard.
John swallows. Then he slowly shakes his head. "No. I would never do this. Please, Sherlock...I want to know everything. No more secrets!"

Sherlock takes a deep breath. Then he looks at John with a nearly desperate look.
"Swear it. Swear that you will not leave me, John Watson. All the same what you hear."
John nods immediately. "I swear it."
However, in Sherlocks eyes there stands still doubt. "Everybody always goes," he says quietly, hardly audible.
"I am not everybody, Sherlock."

A moment long both are quiet. Detailed in their own thoughts.
Then Sherlock sighs deeply and nods. With a swing he drinks up his cup.
"OK. Tomorrow we'll start."
And with that he gets up and has disappeared in his room.

John sits there and drinks his tea to an end.
He is incredibly excited.

Sherlock will tell him everything what he wants to know...Only John, only him. And something in John says him that it must cost unbelievable overcoming to Sherlock. And trust.

In John a warm feeling climbs up.


Opinions?

Mistakes?

Because: English is not my first language...

I hope, you had fun while reading :)

(This story is also on my german account, my name there: Melancholy Sky)