Title: on the razor-sharp edge
Pairing: none
Rating: PG-13?
Warnings: sustained and sometimes irreverent discussion of mental illness, depression, suicidal ideation, self-harm, and drug use.
Spoilers: none.
Wordcount: 3739
Summary: Sherlock and John meet for the first time as patients in a psychiatric hospital.
A/N: Thank you to K for the beta and Eleanor for Britpicking.
They bring John in with nothing but faded hospital scrubs and the numbness of hypothermia receding from his fingers. He sits patiently while they take his vitals (decent, for a man fished out of the Thames the day before), answers questions with various degrees of honesty and signs forms where indicated.
It's only when he's perched on a narrow mattress that he finally musters up the energy to look around.
It's a fairly sparse room – there's another bed three or four paces away, its sheets rumpled with a crumpled shirt tossed on top, and a battered notebook is all that's on the bedside table. A chair next to the bed holds several hefty binders, and a wardrobe completes the furniture.
He hasn't quite decided what he's going to do when a gangly man strides into the room. "Oh," he says as he catches sight of John, faltering mid-stride, and then throws himself onto the other bed without taking his eyes off of John.
Cross-legged on top of his duvet, the man steeples his fingers under his chin and asks, "Afghanistan or Iraq?"
John blinks. "What?"
The man sighs, looking extremely put-upon. "Where did you serve, Afghanistan or Iraq?" And then, as John stiffens, he adds carelessly, "No-one's breached your files, you can keep the protests to yourself."
For a moment, John just stares at the man, unmoving. Then he says, very slowly, "Afghanistan. How—"
"Save it, it's noon." He waves a wild hand, and John's just suppressed a wry thought about what the man's diagnosis is obviously not when he leaps off his bed. He takes two steps towards the door, then looks back impatiently with a jerk of his head.
"What—what's at noon?" John sighs, grimacing as he pushes himself to his feet.
"Lunch," the man grins, then dashes out.
—
When John grabs a plate of pasta and looks up, the man is beckoning from a table at the very back of the room, a cup of coffee the only thing in front of him.
"All right." John slides stiffly into the chair opposite. "Who the hell are you?"
"Sherlock Holmes," he says. "And you're John." At John's blink, he clarifies, "It's posted on our door."
Right. So he's got a mad roommate. "Not hungry?" John asks as he tugs a plastic fork out of its wrapper.
"It's only Wednesday." Sherlock shrugs one lanky shoulder. "I'll be fine for a bit."
"What, no, that's not fine at all," John protests. "You need to eat."
Sherlock scoffs. "It's just transport," he says, leaning forwards. "The mind, that's what really matters."
"Well, your body's eventually going to collapse, mind and all," John says with disapproval. "And I'm speaking as a doctor, now."
"Doctor," Sherlock says in dismay. "Army doctor. There's always something."
"Right, let's talk about that." John gives him a narrow glance above a forkful of pasta. "You knew I was in the army."
"Military's obvious," Sherlock says, airy. "There's your hair, your posture. Your scrubs reveal an obvious tan-line, hence somewhere abroad. So tell me, where abroad does a soldier go nowadays to get himself so traumatised that he tries to off himself?" He looks at John, expectant.
"Who said I tried to off myself?" John tries.
"Recently-discharged soldier in a mental institution, you might as well have shouted it on your way in."
"Right," John says, looking down at his plate. "Wow, that's…"
"Invasive? Disturbing? Disrespectful of personal boundaries?" Sherlock's voice pitches upwards on the last, mock-disapproving.
"I was going to say 'fantastic'," John finishes, swallowing down his food.
"Oh." Sherlock sits back, wrong-footed. "You…think so?"
"I mean, frankly, it is invasive and disturbing," John says, "but also incredible. I've never seen anything like it."
"Well." Sherlock looks thoughtfully into his cup. "I'd expected you to punch me," he admits after a moment. "Military, private, on-edge in an unfamiliar environment. It was logical."
John digests that. "So is that what you do?" he asks.
"What?"
"Do things you know will hurt."
Sherlock shrugs one shoulder and takes a sip of his coffee, stiff-wristed. "It's boring in here," he says. "I do what I can."
"Hey, Sherlock?" a nurse calls, waving him over. "Can we check in?"
"Utter waste of time," Sherlock mutters, but he's pushing himself up anyway. "Might take a while, don't wait up."
He leaves before John can tell him he hadn't planned on it. John stares after him for a moment, then shakes his head and finishes his meal.
—
The nurses offer John toiletries and help him locate a spare shirt and trousers. When he gets dressed and arrives at his room, Sherlock's already there, sprawled across his bed.
"Not at group?" John comments. He sets his toothbrush down on the bedside table and watches it tip around in the tiny paper cup.
"Pointless." Sherlock looks up from his phone, lips curling up in disdain. "Thought you would've gone, though."
"Wanted some time to…process," John says. "I didn't exactly expect to end up here."
"No." Sherlock makes a thoughtful noise. "People don't always plan on failing."
And for the briefest moment, John remembers being breathless with disappointment when he hit the water and realised he was still alive—when he let his arms go slack and wondered what it'd be like to let himself slip under. He has to close his eyes to shake that feeling away and notices Sherlock watching him with a thin smile.
John clears his throat and grasps for something to say. "How—how do you have a mobile?" he asks. "They took mine away."
"Had to destroy the camera." Sherlock taps the lens and scowls. "A pity, but a line of communication is crucial for my work."
"You're not on leave? What kind of rubbish—"
"They don't know. Give me your opinion on this."
Sherlock's thrust his phone in front of John's eyes. "What do you mean, they don't know?" John demands, but he squints down at the screen all the same.
"Irrelevant. I consult."
"That doesn't—why am I looking at a stab wound?"
"Yes," Sherlock says, pleased. "What else?"
"Um, it's…several days old? Healing okay, though I'd watch out for infection—"
"Of course," Sherlock exclaims, snatching his phone back. "They never checked for medications – oh, that's good, that's very good."
"What?" John blinks, watching Sherlock run out the door. When he gathers himself enough to look out into the hallway, Sherlock's nowhere to be seen.
"John?" Someone approaches – a nurse, with clipboard in hand. "Hi, I'm Anne. Do you have a minute to check in, tell me how you're settling in?"
John takes another glance around and sighs. "Yeah, why not."
—
There's a walk scheduled in the afternoon, but John's not allowed outside until a doctor clears him. He settles for trying to regain his bearings while the unit's emptied, and gets as far as the activity room before he's ambushed.
"Good, you're still here," Sherlock says, like that's important.
"Not on the walk?" John raises an eyebrow, letting himself get dragged farther away from the nurses' station. "Someone like you, thought you'd hate being cooped up in here."
"No, it's just as boring outside," Sherlock groans. "And they won't let me smoke."
"Life is difficult," John says dryly.
They've reached an alcove, where Sherlock immediately climbs into a well-worn sofa. John claims an armchair for himself and waits for Sherlock to stop wriggling into the cushions. "So, tell me," he says, leaning forward, "what do you do?"
"What do you think?"
"Well, I just know it involves stabbed people, that's a bit dodgy."
Sherlock grins. "I solve crimes," he says, and there's a tinge of pride in the words.
"So you're, what, the police?"
"God, no," Sherlock says, aghast. "They're all so horrifically dull, I'd rather die."
John opens his mouth and then shuts it again, shifting in his chair. Sherlock blinks, pushes himself into a sitting position with his mouth twisted wryly.
"I'm a consultant," he says, more subdued. "The police come to me when they're out of their depth — that stabbing, for example. Man is stabbed during an illegal transaction, refuses to go to the hospital. He seems to have some medical knowledge by the way the wound's been treated, but dies some days later. Who killed him?"
John realises Sherlock's looking at him expectantly. "It wasn't the stabbing?"
"You said it yourself, the wound was healing fine. In addition, he took care to prevent infection with the aid of some leftover antibiotics. Unfortunately, he was unaware that macrolides may interact fatally with certain antihistamines—"
"Allergies," John cuts in. "You're telling me he had allergies?"
"Precisely." Sherlock spreads his arms in satisfaction. "Heart failure. A tragedy, I'm sure."
"Christ," John breathes. "You got all that because I told you about infection?"
"Just a matter of getting the correct perspective."
"Still, that's brilliant!"
"Do you know you do that out loud?" Sherlock says, head tilted curiously. "Is it a thing you do?"
John feels himself flush. "Sorry," he says. "I'll shut up."
"No, no," Sherlock says quickly, "I didn't mean—" He looks flustered, for the first time since John's met him. "It's. Good."
"Good?" John asks, beginning to smile.
"Yes."
—
The whiteboard tells him he's got two missed calls from Harry. John wipes the messages clean, briefly thinks about just walking away from the phones, but — well, he owes her an explanation, at least.
"Johnny, what the hell," Harry says when he gets her on the line, words tumbling fast, "the A&E called me, but you're not there anymore and they won't tell me anything — where the fuck are you, what's going on?"
"I'm—" John says, and fine is on the tip of his tongue but he swallows it down, grasps for something that's not so clearly a lie. "I was out for a walk, and there was this bridge—look, it's complicated," he sighs, and manages to crush something unsettled in his chest so he can give her the hospital's address, tell her to come visit.
When he finally hangs up the phone, he notices that his hand's started trembling.
—
Harry brings over a bag of John's clothes and an uncomfortable silence. John doesn't try particularly hard to break it, just waves her over to a seat.
"Jesus," Harry says after a while, looking down at her hands, "why didn't you say anything?"
John thinks about patting the curve of her shoulder, and doesn't. When she finally looks up he offers her a half-hearted shrug and an apologetic expression that doesn't sit as sincerely as he wants.
"It wasn't—I didn't plan on it," John says, picking his words haltingly though he's said the same thing to too many concerned faces before now. "What would I have even said?"
And that's close enough to the truth that Harry nods with a tightly drawn face and helps him unpack his things, afterwards; but John doesn't let himself voice his other thought: that it grows addictive to look at an expanse of skin and see only the frailty of the life beneath.
"I don't want her to worry," he tells Sherlock that night when the lights are off and he's turning over restlessly on the sheets.
"John," Sherlock sighs, "if you must lie to yourself at least try to be more convincing."
—
John nearly slips up, once.
He'd got off sharps the day after Harry's visit, and that night, he checks out a cheap, dull razor from the nurse's counter and shaves for the first time in three days, gamely bearing nicks just to feel somewhat like himself again.
The impulse comes as he's stepping out of the shower, and the razor is gleaming dully from the edge of the sink. He grabs it in water-slick fingers and slips out the blade in a moment, holding it carefully so he won't slice up the pads of his fingers.
He sits by the bathtub and visualises the arterial system, neat lines of red adorning bone: the subclavian and brachial, radial, femoral. His hair drips water down his back as he poises the strip of metal over his thigh and calculates the force he'd need to push past all the layers of skin and fat and muscle.
He's seen first-hand men die from bleeding out; it won't take long.
A knock, and the sound is sharp in John's ear. He blinks, looks down at his hand and drops the blade onto the floor.
"Checks," a friendly voice calls through the door.
He clears his throat. "John," he tries. "John Watson."
"Ta."
As the footsteps retreat John leaves his head between his knees for a while, just breathing; when he finally stands up, the water sliding against his skin leaves a sudden chill. He methodically towels himself dry and picks the blade back up in an easy motion.
When he leaves the bathroom his heartbeat hasn't slowed at all, but he smiles at the nurse before handing the razor back.
—
It's surprisingly easy to get used to the hospital. He has to assure the nurses that he's not suicidal every morning but appreciates them all the same; he checks out activities to learn everyone's names and ends up swapping stories about Afghanistan with a man named Bill Murray. The routine is easy to fall into, and his psychiatrist makes pleased comments about his progress.
Sherlock, on the other hand, seems like a wild, trapped thing. "It makes no sense, you know," he says one day over lunch, idly tapping on the table with a fingernail. "They won't let me have a charger in fear that I'll hang myself, but plastic knives are perfectly acceptable."
"You can't hurt yourself with that," John frowns.
"Oh, come on, just look." Sherlock rolls up a sleeve with a smirk. "It's so easy to harm a human being," he says, almost dreamily, letting the plastic serrated edge trace over a thin bluish vein.
"Sherlock." Alarm is prickling at the back of John's neck. "What — are you—"
"Just proving a point." Sherlock straightens up abruptly, letting the knife drop onto the table. John catches a glimpse of a reddened curve on skin before Sherlock buttons his sleeve back up in quick, neat movements.
"Right," John says slowly, lowering his gaze back to his plate, but the blood is still thrumming through him like he's witnessed something dangerous.
—
Sherlock's sprawled in his bed with his mobile, as is his habit, and it's on a complete whim that John asks, "Want to join us for art?"
Sherlock doesn't even look up, just curls his lip. "I don't think so."
"They don't actually make you do anything, you know," John coaxes. "I don't do art, but Bill likes to paint."
Sherlock only responds with a displeased hum.
"You could brood in a corner, deduce the occupation of the last person to use the charcoal."
"It won't be anything exciting." Sherlock shifts more deeply under his sheets. "This unit is mostly composed of recovering addicts and depressives — nobody really interesting."
John lets the silence stretch between them for a moment before he brings himself to ask, "So then, which one are you?"
He can see Sherlock look up; his eyes glint sharply, but he doesn't say a word.
"You don't have to answer, obviously," John adds hurriedly, letting his fingers curl into his sleeve. "But, well, you already know how I—what I did — hell, you can probably rattle it off for everyone in the unit, and I just…wondered."
He bites his lip as Sherlock just keeps staring, and finally offers an apologetic shrug. He's just turning towards the art room when Sherlock says, clearly, "I overdosed."
John stops in his tracks. "Oh," he says. "I see."
"My brother thinks it was an accident."
John can't think of any way to respond to that; so when the quick tapping of keys starts up again, he flashes a tight smile that goes unobserved and leaves, feeling oddly like he's running away.
—
Sherlock's got his shirt half-open and a pair of nicotine patches pressed onto his torso. "The nurses let you have all of those?" John asks, raising a sceptical eyebrow.
"No, of course not." Sherlock scoffs, smoothing a third patch just below his clavicle. "But I need a cigarette. Patches are a very poor substitute, but this way at least it's bearable." He re-fastens his top two buttons and falls into his chair with a sigh.
"You really are an addict, aren't you?" John marvels.
"Easier than being bored," Sherlock says carelessly.
It's just then that Anne walks by their room, pausing at the door.
"John, good," she says. "Oh, and you too, Sherlock. Would you mind going over to the vitals station when you have the time?"
"Sure thing." John smiles at her as she walks off, and gets to his feet. "Well, come on, then," he says, tilting his head at Sherlock.
Sherlock doesn't move, just blinking languidly up at John.
"Oh, really." John rolls his eyes. "It's not as if you've got anything better to do."
Sherlock heaves a theatrical sigh and springs from his chair. "If you insist."
—
"Thanks, John, that's excellent. Sherlock, if you can just have a seat here—"
"Not only is the concept very simple, Carl, but I also have been here for a week," Sherlock snaps. "Really no need for directions at this point, I should think."
"As cheerful as ever." Carl grins as he fastens the blood-pressure cuff to Sherlock's arm. "And just hold that under your tongue — yes, I'm sure you could have figured that out without help, but now you can't talk."
Sherlock wraps his lips around the thermometer, looking mutinous. John turns his laugh into a cough, though Sherlock probably sees through that in an instant.
"Temp's good; BP's…150/90. Hmm, a bit on the high side," Carl clicks his tongue. "Great, you're all set."
"It's probably all those patches," John says casually as Sherlock stalks away. "Nicotine, you know, terribly bad for you."
"Transport, John," Sherlock growls, "unimportant," but after a moment his shoulders loosen and when John laughs again he returns it, tentative.
—
For all that the days seem endless, time still drips by; Dr Jones is beginning to talk about "outpatient treatment" and "further options", and Bill leaves one morning after saying good-bye in a rather wet voice.
"You know, I don't understand why you're still here," John tells Sherlock.
Sherlock looks blankly at him.
"You. This." John waves a hand at the hospital walls, Sherlock's battered phone. "I know you're smart enough to play them all. You could be out in a couple of days, with better suits and more reliable wi-fi. And yet, here you are."
Sherlock looks away, but the tip of his ear is tinting pink. "I." He clears his throat. "That's what I did my last two times," he says, reluctantly.
"Oh."
"And besides," Sherlock flops onto his bed, tone careless again, "in here when I tell them I don't want to see Mycroft, they actually won't let him in."
—
And then there are referrals, and Harry promises to come pick him up, and John's finally signing his discharge papers.
—
When John walks in, the lights are off and Sherlock's pulled the sheets over his head, his back to John's side of the room.
John settles himself on his bed in the light spilling in from the hallway, clears his throat, and carefully says, "So I'm…leaving tomorrow."
Sherlock's shoulder twitches, but he doesn't say anything.
"You know, normal people think getting out of the mental hospital is a good thing—"
"Yes, fine," Sherlock snarls, yanking himself up with his fingers curled tight, "you're normal enough to go and lead a normal, boring life now, congratulations."
"Because it's so boring to stop pitching myself off bridges," John snaps. "Why do you have a problem with this?"
Sherlock gives him one contemptuous look and turns away from him again.
"I might not be as brilliant as you are," John says, almost bitterly, "but I'm trying to live my life, and you're hiding in a hospital from god-knows-what. So tell me which one of us is more pathetic."
He lies down and closes his eyes, but it takes him a while to fall asleep.
—
As John's limping up to the door of Harry's flat, there's a buzz from his pocket.
You're not pathetic. SH
John opens a new text half a dozen times, trying to say the right thing, and somehow ends up not responding at all.
—
They both try, he and Harry: he bites his tongue when she pours herself a drink right after work, and she keeps her thought about Afghanistan to herself. But it doesn't change the fact that being under the same roof isn't good for either of them; it sets something itching under their skin that comes out in snapped-off remarks, honed by long history and meant to hurt.
Then a week after his discharge, John goes to pick up the shopping and runs into Sherlock in the dairy aisle.
"Hello," Sherlock says, grinning, wrapped up in a ridiculous swath of coat.
"Jesus, has anyone told you that stalking is not good?" John asks after he's stopped blinking, his mouth involuntarily turning up into a smile. "When did you get out?"
"Probably wasn't listening," Sherlock says, unrepentant. "Got discharged yesterday. Took longer than I thought to convince them. Idiots."
"Yes, I'm sure it's all their fault." John laughs.
Sherlock keeps pace at John's elbow as he picks up a pint of milk and heads for the exit. "Looking for new accommodations, then," he says casually, hands in his pockets.
"How did you—well, yeah," John sighs. "Harry and I just never got along, even on our good days."
"You know, there's a nice little flat on Baker Street." Sherlock's looking sideways at him. "221B. Good location, and quite affordable for two people."
John stops walking. "Are you saying—"
"I play the violin when I'm thinking," Sherlock says in a rush. "Sometimes I don't talk for days on end. But I won't get high if you won't kill yourself in the flat. Mrs Hudson, the landlady, is oddly touchy about that — something about property values."
"Well then." John straightens up, his leg feeling quite steady and all his senses alert. "How could I refuse an offer like that?"
Sherlock laughs, a rich, delighted sound, and John laughs back under the bright light of Tesco's, feeling almost giddy and utterly, gloriously alive.