Notes: Hello! It is I, writing again after a week's absence. I'm so ashamed… But I was on holiday, visiting family and eating much more chocolate than is probably good or necessary.
Oh! Also, Mycroft may seem OOC, but really, I never saw him as utterly emotionless. He had potential. So don't hate, 'kay?
Disclaimer: I wish I may, I wish I might…own Sherlock, John, and Mycroft. Alas, my wishes never come true, and this one hasn't either.
This Is What Comes Of Interacting With People
I chose not to inform Dr. Watson that Sherlock was alive after Reichenbach, despite the fact that Sherlock asked me to.
Why, you ask? The answer is quite simple:
Because I am a jealous man. I have always held the secret wish that the doctor be MY friend, instead of Sherlock's.
Sherlock never deserved him, you know. Constantly belittling the doctor, criticizing his intelligence, his writing, and countless other things. Always dragging him into danger without a second thought. Letting him take the bullets.
Is it any wonder I withheld the information? I had the perfect chance and I most certainly was not going to lose it.
I knew that the doctor would turn to me after Sherlock's 'death'. I was, after all, the person who had known Sherlock best in this world, besides the doctor himself.
The doctor did not cry when he visited me at my Pall Mall lodgings, although sorrow was etched deeply into the lines of his handsome face, making him look older than he really was.
I told him that my knowledge of the particulars of Sherlock's 'death' was no greater than his own. He accepted this lie silently. Of course, he believed that I spoke the truth.
I was more than a little surprised when the doctor had lurched towards me and embraced me. I had not been expecting that.
I brushed my muddled thoughts aside and put my arms around him, not saying anything, just comforting him in his grief.
In that moment, I felt like a terrible person, first for not informing the doctor that my brother was alive, and second for wishing for a small minute that Sherlock would never return.
It would be better for the doctor if he didn't, I reasoned to myself. The good doctor would never again be dragged into Sherlock's harebrained schemes, never again be put in more danger than was ever necessary.
Dr. Watson pulled away, dabbing at his red-rimmed eyes with a well-used handkerchief.
I have often been called misanthropic, but when I saw this proud, strong man, whose only fault was that he never did anything by halves and therefore had an unwavering loyalty to my brother, reduced to weeping like a woman, something inside me broke.
I had stepped forward, towards him. "How can I help?" I asked softly.
He shook his head like the stubborn mule I know he can be and kept his mouth firmly shut, refusing to answer me.
I was at a loss. What was I to do, what could I say?
How could I comfort him, knowing that he should not have been grieving in the first place? Knowing that it was my own selfishness causing him to feel this sorrow?
Knowing that I wanted him to stay by me, rather than Sherlock?
What could I do?
What did I do?
Guess.
Go ahead.
I told him. Of course I told him. What would you have done when you saw one of two people in world that you actually cared about sunk in immeasurable sadness, hurt and lost in pain?
I told him the truth, and he glanced up at me with a pained look on his face.
"That really isn't funny at all, Mr. Holmes."
He stood, and he left.
He did not look back and he did not visit again.
I hated myself.
It was I who did not deserve the attention of the good doctor. I had hurt him and I hated myself for it.
Now which Holmes brother was being an inexcusable fool?
Damnable feelings. This is where interacting with people gets you.
I should have just stayed at the Diogenes.