Sherlock curled on the couch as John washed dishes; both of them were silent. They had just finished a particularly disturbing case in which a three-year-old had been brutally murdered by his own father, and Sherlock hadn't been acting like himself since.
"Sherlock?"
No response.
"Sherlock, if you want to talk... I know that what happened to that kid has been affecting you."
More silence.
"What I mean to say is that it's okay. It's all okay now."
At this Sherlock sat bolt upright, his face contorting into an expression of rage. In a deadly whisper, he said "And how the hell would you know? You don't have scars that will never go away! You were never beaten to an inch of your fucking life! You were never locked in a basement or hit with a belt! So how the fucking hell would you know?" He got up and stormed out of the flat in his pajamas.
John wanted to scream at himself. "Stupid!" How could he have been so stupid? He had doctored Sherlock before, had seen the vast array of scars. But he had never even considered child abuse. Never said anything... god, he was such an idiot!
When Sherlock returned three hours later, he didn't so much as glance at John, but curled back up in his spot like he had never left.
"Listen, Sherlock, I'm sorry. That was a stupid thing for me to say and-"
"I want to talk."
"What?" John was speechless.
"Isn't that what you said earlier? That I could talk to you?" There was a hint of acidity in the consulting detective's voice.
"Yeah. Yeah, of course. Go ahead." As an afterthought, he added "Do you want some tea?"
Sherlock shook his head. "So. As I assume you have deduced by now, my... my father hurt me. Quite a bit, in fact. He used his hands and feet almost always, cane not so much, belt often. He was also fond of binding my hands and leaving me in the basement for days. There was one incident in which he took my new scarf and strangled me with it. He would tie me to the bed and then beat me unconscious. "Freak", he'd call me."
Sherlock had gone pale and was unable to meet John's eyes. "This all started when I was about five. It was my birthday, and I wanted cake and a party. My father told me I wasn't allowed to have any of that because I had killed my mother. She died giving birth to me and if I had never existed she would still be alive. I started crying, so he hit me a few times. I cried more, so he hit me more. Eventually, Mycroft heard me screaming. When he walked into the room, I was down on the floor, my father standing above. He was kicking at me. At my ribs, my stomach, my face. I was covered in blood and bruises and snot.
"Mycroft ran to me and tried to protect me, but my father wouldn't stop. After that... after that I don't remember. But I woke up to Mycroft washing my face and cleaning all the blood off of me. I had three broken ribs and some internal bleeding. He patched me up as best he could, but my father would never let him call a doctor.
"Everything just got worse from there. At first, I was defiant and I was punished constantly. But the beatings took a toll on me and I became afraid. Terrified, actually. I never spoke or smiled, hardly ate, and slept only a little, oftentimes in the basement."
Tears were rolling freely down Sherlock's face now. John simply listened with a mixture of anger, horror and sorrow.
"The first time he tied me down, I was eight. I suppose it gave him more control over me, and my father loved control. He would blindfold me, too, then beat me senseless. After that, he would make me scrub the floor and remove all traces of my blood and tears.
"Once, I came home from school and he was waiting for me by the door. He told me to lay on the floor, face down, and to take off my shirt. I did. He started whipping me with a rope. The whip was agony, even more so than the others. I realized he had tied broken glass into the it. He tore at my back for a long time, then made me clean the floor and take a shower.
"As I grew older, girls began to flock towards me. My father was smart. After the first few incidents, he never hit me anywhere people might see, so my face was untouched. I could have had my pick of beautiful girls, but I had learned that people are unreliable.
They'll let you down. Hurt you. I had learned that emotions were unimportant and to be ignored. After awhile, the girls lost interest, and I was glad.
"My fifteenth birthday came and went, and the punishments became more frequent, occurring almost every day. I began to want it all to end. I took knives from the kitchen and sliced them across my body, and razor blades were good, too. I started drugs and cigarettes... they helped a little."
John was crying now. Crying for Sherlock and Mycroft, crying for their broken childhood.
"Then, one day, I found myself kneeling on the kitchen floor, with my father pointing a gun at my head. I couldn't take life anymore, and all I wanted was for him to pull that trigger. Instead, he put down the gun, grabbed a knife out of the block, and stabbed the point into me. Over and over and over. The pain was washing over me in waves, but I didn't want to black out. I wanted to be conscious for my death... wanted to feel the freedom of being away from my father forever. Eventually he exchanged the knife for the gun and shot my stomach. Then he put the gun to his own head and killed himself."
John looked at Sherlock and quietly said "God, Sherlock, I'm sorry..."
"Don't be." Sherlock smiled wanly. "It's over now. It's over."