A/N: Title stolen from the E/E. Cummings poem "I Carry Your Heart With Me (I Carry It In My Heart)"
This is a picfic. Picture not even actually Johnlock, but this was a challenge from Ashley, so the picture is here: tinypic [dotcom] / r / 2vah4yb / 5
Poem is here: w w w . poetryfoundation [dotorg] / poem/ 179622
I Carry Your Heart
Sherlock scanned through the news reports on his phone. Petty crimes and political intrigue and environmental concerns. Boring.
He needed something fun. A double homicide, maybe. Or a pseudo-homicide that was really a suicide designed to implicate someone else. Something interesting.
Sherlock sat on the underground train of London heading home. John had convinced him to take the train as the traffic above ground would be too hectic at this time of day.
They'd just finished their latest case fixing the ineptitude that was the police force of New Scotland Yard.
And John was beat. This case had been really interesting and thus had had Sherlock- and therefore John- up for weeks. Sherlock had finally deduced that it had been the butler that had poisoned the wealthy old bat and not the son, who had the clearer motive to inherit. The man had been drugging the crone's daily afternoon tea for weeks until she'd finally succumbed to the effects. And after a hearty chase all across London that had ended with the criminal in the custody of Lestrade's men- who were of course late and therefore almost missed him- Sherlock and John were finally on the way back to 221B.
John, despite his exhaustion, was still antsy in his rest. His head leaned against Sherlock's shoulder, their fingers intertwined, John dozed disturbedly. His fingers sometimes twitched in Sherlock's grasp. Sherlock knew him enough to know that John was still worrying about his most recent "brush with death."
So poison wasn't the butler's only method of murdering. So he'd had a gun and marginal aim and had barely missed hitting Sherlock, grazing the corner and lodging the bullet into the wall above Sherlock's head at the time. It wasn't Sherlock's first encounter with a gun-wielding criminal and would undoubtedly not be his last.
But John worried and to forgo any arguments on the matter, Sherlock let him do it. He wouldn't allow John to mother him- Mrs. Hudson's efforts in that department were quite enough, thank you-, but if John needed the extra physical connection to assure himself that Sherlock was fine, then Sherlock would give it to him.
John had all but ravished Sherlock at the crime scene when the police had taken the butler in hand.
Ever since they'd begun…dating, Sherlock assumed other people would call it. That was just putting an acceptable name on the change in their relationship. Sherlock just considered it a furthering of the relationship they'd already had. He and John were still the same- still laughed the same, argued the same, solved crimes the same. There was just more touching now. And sex.
Sherlock had originally prepared himself to take on the sexual component of the relationship to please John. He could only assume that it was the only reason John pursued women like he used to. He didn't seem to enjoy them much besides. And if John needed him to fill that role, he'd grin and bear it. Well, perhaps not grin, but he'd certainly put up with John using him to meet an end.
But to his surprise, Sherlock had actually enjoyed John's attentions. Thoroughly. Most times John was a gentle lover, taking Sherlock slowly higher until he crested over the edge and his orgasm was like silk, sweeping over him in a warm caress. Other times, when John was stressed or they'd just had a row, John could be rougher, bruising in his thrusts, venting the weight of his anger and frustration on Sherlock's willing body. Those times, the orgasms rushed through Sherlock, made his whole body pulse. And they were like a balm, soothing over the edge of annoyance he'd had with John and John with him.
And sometimes Sherlock reciprocated. Took John in the methodical way he did everything. Knowing just where and how to hit him so that John was reduced to a whimpering mass of nerves below Sherlock, shuddering in his release.
It was a very satisfying arrangement.
And Sherlock supposed there were more feelings now, too. More emotions. John had always worried about him; there had always been affection. But now everything was personal. John responded whenever Donovan or Anderson opened their mouths in a slight against Sherlock. John positioned himself in a defensive stance in front of Sherlock whenever they came upon a criminal. John even stood toe to toe against Mycroft for his constant interference.
And Sherlock had almost always been protective of John. He'd have both died and killed for him at almost any point. But the point to which Sherlock was willing to go for John now…. Even he wouldn't contemplate it. It wouldn't end well for anyone putting John in harm's way, though.
John's fingers clenched again briefly between Sherlock's, his eyebrows furrowing down as if in worry or pain.
Sherlock sometimes wondered if this life was too much for John. The constant brushes with danger, the meeting of death at almost every turn, the countless threats hanging over their heads. But Sherlock knew that as bad as John sometimes found their work, there was the same thrill to it for him that Sherlock experienced himself.
When John's fingers clenched again, his face scrunched up again, Sherlock turned and buried his face in John's hair briefly. Breathed him in to assure himself that John was fine. Acknowledge and assuage that part of him that too worried that John wouldn't make it out of one of their ventures in one piece.
Then Sherlock squeezed John's fingers in return and went back to checking his phone for their next case.
