We are all gathered in this crowded little community centre, breathing the same air, glancing over at but never touching the snacks. I shift around a little in my plastic chair, not wanting to be too still but scared of drawing attention to myself. This is the most emotion I've felt at once in the past year.

Of course, the chairs are arranged in a circle. How could they not be. How could this possibly be made to seem any less ridiculous than it already is. I feel like I'm at an alcoholics anonymous meeting. No, sod that. Narcotics anonymous. I'm missing my drug, and my drug was him.

The one year anniversary of his death feels not like a celebration of his life, but a reminder to everyone that our judgement of him drove him to this. It turned out pretty soon after his death that Sherlock wasn't a fake; the television shows 'Rich Brook' was supposed to have starred in don't exist, his friends and family are fictional. It was only a matter of time before it was uncovered. Surely Sherlock must have known that.

But I can't claim to know what goes on in that man's head.

Went on.

Donovan is in the corner, looking bored. Anderson is checking her out from across the room. Lestrade is talking to some PR reps with a serious face and his third coffee. Mrs Hudson isn't here, she couldn't face it. She prefers to mourn quietly and sadly rather than publicly and reservedly. I can't say I blame her – I don't want to be here. I wasn't trained to be so open with my feelings around so many people. I want to go home, or as close to home as I can get without Sherlock.

Lestrade coughs and asks if everyone could please take their seats. The thirty or so people mumble a bit and complain about the infancy of the chairs, but sit anyway, because they can't stand to stand up. I give my seat to someone else.

Greg asked me to speak at this – whatever this is, but I said no, I can't. No one knows Sherlock like I know him, and I can't even begin to describe him, and I wouldn't want to. The only thing that keeps me from letting him go is the knowledge that I was special to him. I was his one and only friend. If I let him go, no one else would hold on. He'd be lost forever, and I can't let that happen.

I press my hands together as if in prayer and sandwich them between my thighs for warmth I don't need. I lean back against the wall, mock casual. I even consider checking my phone. But no one would buy the nonchalance. I love him. And it's written all over my face, my body, my eyes, my very being, the very air around me, and the tears I'm jamming down.

"Thank you all for coming," says Lestrade, standing in a gap in the circle, his usual heavy accent subdued by the morbid words. "It's great to see so many people here, to celebrate the man most of us thought was a tosser." No one laughs, but it wasn't expected. "Sherlock Holmes was a lot of things. One of them was a genius. Another was a prat. And another was a man, and a good one at that."

Donovan snorts, catches my eye, and looks down. She's covering her guilt over accusing him with arrogance. I want to yell at her that she doesn't deserve to. But I don't. I'm too tired of it all to argue with anyone else.

"It's true," Greg continues, without hearing Donovan's rebuttal. He must be assuming that people are questioning the inherent 'goodness' of a man who enjoys murder and ignores feelings. "After Sherlock's death, I met with his older brother, Mycroft Holmes, who told me that Sherlock, when he was younger, wanted to be a pirate." This gets a few breathy laughs. But Lestrade is lying, for my sake. I told him that.

"Sherlock could have been anything. A scientist, a philosopher, you name it, he could do it. But he worked with the police, saving lives, catching killers. In the end, he died after taking down the most dangerous criminal in the country, maybe even the world. He was a hero." Now I'm trying not to snort. If Sherlock were here he'd be arguing incessantly with Lestrade about what makes a hero so much better than everyone else. Are good things better if they're done by heroes? Or does a sinner saving the world not count?

"One year ago today," says Lestrade, raising his cold coffee to the spirits in the sky, "we lost Sherlock Holmes. The world lost him."

I feel my phone vibrate in my pocket, but I don't check it. It'll be Mrs Hudson, or Mary. No one as important as his memory. I hear a few other text noises going off, but to their credit, I don't see a single person check their phone. Except Anderson. Now I see why Sherlock hated him.

The little bastard is trying to hide it under his jacket. I just sigh. What's the use of challenging him, really. At most I'll get a fight out of it, but that's only temporary relief. In a few hours I'll be back at the flat feeling just as shitty but with a few bruises thrown in to help. Or maybe not, it is Anderson.

I see him read the message as Lestrade goes on about all the cases Sherlock helped solve, going as far back as the year 1996 when he'd send highlighted newspaper clippings into his local police station. Anderson's eyes go wide and he looks like he's going to choke. I hope he's just found out... oh, never mind, no I don't.

"Stop," Anderson says, standing up, interrupting. I stand up straighter as he makes eye contact with me, staring at me. "Check your phones."

"What? Why?" Lestrade asks with that incredulous look on his face.

"Just check your phones. Everybody, everybody check your phones."

I reach into my back pocket and pull out my phone. Clicking on the screen, I slump to the floor, the weight of my thoughts pulling me down.

17:06 – (Unknown Number) – Wrong!

The message was sent just after... just after Lestrade said Sherlock was dead. He'd told me about Sherlock's little trick with the texts, because he'd never been able to work out how he did it. No one had. The man was capable of impossible things. Impossible. I saw him. I saw him on the pavement. Blood on the pavement, blood everywhere, his blood, him, him dead.

I feel the fresh air hit my face and I realise I've left the hall and I'm running, faster than I have in a long time, not since my army days, so fast that I can feel my old shoulder injury flaring up, but I don't care because I'm only half an hour's run away from 221B, away from Sherlock, my Sherlock, the answer to all the questions he forbade.

I slam the door to the flat and lean back against it for a few seconds, catching my breath. In, out, in, out, in out, in out, in out in out in—

I take the stairs two at a time, grunting with the effort. My mind is reeling. I don't even consider what will happen if I open the door to the flat we shared and it's empty, again, and I have to deal with seeing his chair, empty, again, and the fridge clean and the table clear and the bullet holes mended and everything neat and tidy and nicotine free and I can't bear it, where is he?

I manage to make it to the couch before breaking down into painful sobs, no tears, simply cries of what feels like oblivion. I haven't been here in weeks, months, maybe, and everything is the same and it still hurts. I wrap my arms around myself because no one else will, not even him if he were here, and I put my head between my knees because I'm worried I'll pass out. I haven't eaten in days and I just ran for half an hour. Why did I do that? Did I think he'd be here? Stupid, stupid. Hope gets you nowhere. Hope gets you here.

My body stops shaking a little and I lean to the side, lying down across the couch with my feet still firmly on the ground. "Sherlock," I whisper, then instantly feel like an idiot. People die, John. Even Sherlock Holmes. He was still human. He was more than that, yes, but he was still human.

All I want is to know why he did it. I can't help but blame myself, though I know that's ridiculous. But why would he throw himself off that damn building when he was innocent?

I hear Mrs Hudson move about in her flat. I hear her piercing sobs. I hear her sniffles and cries. I bury my face in the pillows because I don't want to hear these things.

A few hours later I wake up with a pain in my neck and the same amount of sadness that I had before. The flat is dark and cold. I sigh. I see my breath in front of me. The heating must be out again. I've always hated pathetic fallacy.

I take it one step at a time.

1. Put your arms on the couch, palms down.

2. Push yourself into a sitting position.

3. Don't think about him.

4. Face forwards.

5. Tuck your feet a little towards you.

6. Brace your arms.

7. Don't think about him.

8. Breathe.

9. Push yourself up so you're standing.

10. Breathe.

11. Breathe.

12. One foot in front of the other.

13. Don't think about him.

13. Don't.

14. Go to the kitchen—

15. DON'T THINK ABOUT HIM

15. You idiot, you fucking idiot, what are you doing

15. He's been dead for a year why would you

15. How could you still have hope left

15. Oh Christ I can't breathe—

I sit down at the table, placing my head on the surface. I don't even want to think about what kinds of chemicals have been spilled in this spot. I don't even want to think about how sterile it is now.

I'm ashamed at how much of a mess I have become.

I've stopped going to the therapist. She can't do any good; the relationship I had with Sherlock isn't in any kind of medical book, and I can't bloody well explain it to her. It was just, a feeling. Always this underlying feeling between us, that we needed each other. I was so alone, and so was he. We fixed each other. We made each other better.

I open my eyes. And that's when I see the huge scratch across the entire table.

It has to be about five millimetres thick, leaving a pale scar across the wood, almost perpendicular to the one Sherlock left a couple of years ago.

What

no

I don't

I cant i'm going insane

but who else could it have been not mrs Hudson for christs sake

sh

sher

sherlo

"Sherlock?"

No answer.

I keep saying it, I'm screaming now, as loud as I can, and I'm no longer ashamed, I believe it now, it's not hope, it's fact, Sherlock SHERLOCK I'm screaming so loud, can he not hear me?

I run out into the street, letting all of me crash out of my throat, leaving my inside empty and my outside outside of me so it's easier for Sherlock to see me, oh

"John?"

Someone says it from across the street, about fifty feet away.

I turn to the sound. A man in Sherlock's coat is staring at me.

"John, what are you doing?" He strides towards me.

"John, say something."

"John, I think you've gone into some sort of shock."

"John, I don't want to have to resort to slapping you in the face."

"John, for God's sake, I'll do it."

"John."

"It's good to see you, John."

"I've missed you, John."

There is a hand on my shoulder, an uncomfortable hand, and an uncomfortable man in front of me, a man I thought was dead. A man I love.

"Sherlock?"

A smile spreads across his face. "John." Pause. "I'm sorry, I was going to find you after the meeting, but you weren't there. I went out looking for a few hours, but—"

"Sherlock."

"Yes?"

"Sherlock."

"Oh. Yeah. I'll explain it all, maybe we should be getting inside."

I place my hand over the hand on my shoulder. "I... you bastard."

He laughs a little. "It was necessary. Come on." He uses his grip on my shoulder to guide me back indoors. Then he stops, turns to me, and I can practically see oh fuck it cross his mind as he takes my hand instead.