Sherlock Holmes looked up at the façade of 221 Baker Street with something akin to anxiousness. It had been three years since he last set foot on these steps, and very little, it seemed, had changed. The front door had a new coat of paint in the last few months, and someone finally fixed the doorbell to the upstairs flat. He assumed, from the unskilled workmanship, that it was John who had done the repairs.
Mycroft had been keeping an eye on the military doctor, sending his brother updates sporadically. Not long after Sherlock's supposed death, John Watson's psychosomatic limp returned, accompanied by severe depression and nightmares. 'He's regressed beyond the state he was in when you two first met, Sherlock. Can't you end this little charade?' Mycroft had asked him, for what seemed the millionth time.
'We both know I can't do that,' Sherlock had replied. It was only the whispers that the late Jim Moriarty's henchmen were regrouping in London that made Sherlock finally return home.
He tried his key in the door and, unsurprisingly, it still worked. It was quiet inside number 221, with only the sound of Mrs. Hudson's television to be heard. The stairs creaked as Sherlock started up towards apartment B, though not loud enough for either occupants to hear. The furniture in the landing had been rearranged and the wallpaper replaced, he noted as he paused at the door. A jiggle of the handle told him it was unlocked, so he entered without announcing himself.
At his desk, sat John Watson, typing furiously at his laptop. Without warning, he opened the drawer nearest his right hand and withdrew his Browning pistol, aimed, and fired at the person who had just entered his flat.
"Your aim has gotten terrible," Sherlock remarked, glancing over his shoulder at the door jamb where John's bullet had lodged itself, approximately eyelevel.
John looked up at Sherlock with a stony expression, replacing the gun in the right hand drawer. "Yeah, well, you look like shit," he replied, gruffly. Slowly, he rose to his feet and moved, with the aid of his cane, towards his estranged friend.
"John, I-" Sherlock began to say, though was silenced by John's fist meeting his face. Stars erupted behind his eyes and pain shot all the way down to his toes. "Jesus, God! You broke my nose!"
"THREE YEARS, SHERLOCK!" John shouted, grabbing the taller man by his lapels, completely ignoring the fountain of blood pouring from his friend's nose. "Three bloody years! We all thought you were dead. I thought you were dead—ME! "
Sherlock blinked through the tears that had welled in his eyes from the intense pain in his nasal region. Though he wasn't very good at expressing emotions, he really did feel bad about leaving things the way he had. "John…" he said, around the blood and snot and tears, "I'm sorry."
For a moment, John just looked up at him, his mouth set in a grim line. And then, all of a sudden, his bottom lip began to quiver. Sherlock was positive the man was about to start shouting at him again, when he unexpectedly burst into tears. "I-if you pull that again, I won't miss, next time," John said, finally, crying so hard he was practically laughing.
Sherlock studied his friend, drinking in the sight of how simultaneously upset and relieved he was. Sherlock could pick up the smallest detail about a person's personal life with the quickest of glances, but never had it occurred to him how much he actually meant to John. Careful not to jar the hand holding his freshly broken nose, Sherlock leaned in and hugged his weeping friend. "I'll keep that in mind, Doctor Watson."