"And When I Say 'Friend'..."
By GE Waldo
Rating: Mature but with some humour.
Pairing: John/Mary and Sherlock/OMC and eventually Johnlock.
Summary: John's new life makes him long for his old and Sherlock's new beau makes John just...jealous! Takes place in a possible future universe after John and Mary's baby has arrived.
Disclaimer: Not mine but a fantasy never hurt anyone.
SHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSHSH
It was worth the cab fare to get to Baker street all the quicker. John silently drummed his right heel on the floor carpeting, willing the driver to hurry up, though without actually saying a word. He had never mastered the boldness – at least in civilian life – to bark at the anonymous man behind the anonymous wheel to go faster. Particularly when it wasn't the cabbie's fault that the traffic was at a bloody stand-still.
Not like Sherlock who could snap out an order like a general and most people, strangers or not, would usually hop into action in a flurry of flapping arms and gaping mouths, even while they resented him for it. Not that their irritation would serve to slow them down much regardless. Sherlock was nothing if not a stunning Spencer Hart-attired, stylishly coiffed force with which to be reckoned.
John smiled to himself at the reels of memories of Sherlock doing just that. Or the detective leaping over brush, scaling fences, hightailing it down greasy alleyways or simply swirling his great coat around him like batman's' cape with all the flamboyance programmed into his very nature. It was genetic. That unstoppable need for flair. John suspected it was one of the reasons Sherlock kept his hair long. Longish anyway. Longer than was fashionable among his age and class and upbringing.
Yet it suited him. All that swish and swing. Without it he would be ordinary.
Then John chided himself. Not ordinary. Never ordinary. Sherlock could never be that.
So perhaps less incredible? Yes, that. Slightly - though almost not measurably so - less amazing.
John did not let himself think about Sherlock's swish and fling, the sharp expression, the alien looking eyes, skin the colour, well, no colour actually. Smooth with few blemishes other than a few well placed marks or moles. Like white Stilton cheese but without the fruit. Eggshell-white perhaps? Or maybe Devonshire cream. John also refused to turn his thoughts to the balance and lines of Sherlock's lithely muscled form. Yes, it was a lovely shape, as males went, he supposed. But it would not be on to dwell on it. That train left the station a long time ago, Angelo's strategically placed romantic candle not-with-standing.
And that's all. He, John Watson, had a wife and baby and a good job and a high rent and diapers etc, thank you and he loved it all. For the most part.
Nothing is ever perfect.
He loved Sherlock too of course. And Sherlock knew this. Now. Maybe not all the years John had known him but then who loves anyone on sight? Never happens in real life. Nonsense. Sentiment.
Certainly it never happens to Sherlock Holmes. Of course not. Silly to even consider it. Sherlock had said the word at his wedding and John had been both surprised and pleased by it. So Sherlock understood love. Friend-love, familial, brotherly (although Mycroft was, he had to admit, a bit of a stretch in that regard), but certainly Sherlock loved those closest to him, who had shown him love in return.
But nothing more. The man was asexual. John was certain of it. Pretty certain. Probably. Had to be. Even the beautiful Irene Adler, Sherlock's intellectual equal in almost every way, had been rebuffed by the great sleuth.
So, yes, asexual or the next best - er – thing. Whatever. The Work was Sherlock and Sherlock was the Work.
John loved him of course. Sherlock was his best friend.
John nodded to himself, his thoughts resolved in his mind as they always did, back to the most logical corner of his feeling though stoutly British-and-therefore-we-shall-not-talk-about-these-things-openly heart. Sherlock was just that. A best friend. What the hell is taking this cabbie so damn long?
~!~!~!~!~!~
John was late. Close to an hour. Sherlock did not need to glance at the clock above the mantel to know that. John had forgotten about their dinner plans. Or Mary had distracted him. Or the baby. What was her name? Eliza? Lisa? Elise? Cute, as babies went. Blonde of course and of a size and features averaging genetically between her parents. Four months old. Ten fingers and toes. Existing in that bubble in which all babies dwelt for a time; drooling, gurgling and smelling faintly of urine and talcum powder. Mary's brow. John's nose. Mary's shrill vocal chords. John's fierce stubbornness.
John's smile.
This is what happens to people. People like John. They meet someone, they get on, they fall in love (he supposed it was possible), they get married and they get pregnant. And then they get very, very busy.
They get distracted by many things, none of which belong to their former life.
Fifty-seven minutes late. Sherlock took up his phone and pulled up John's number, in-putting a text. Then erasing it. Then in-putting it all over again.
Where are you? SH
Backspace-backspace-backspace.
John? Meet me at Angelo's instead? SH
Erase-erase-erase!
John - did you forget about me? SH
Backspace-backspace- for God's sake!
Sherlock dropped his phone on the arm of his leather and chrome chair and then drumming his fingers. Misses Hudson was 'out with friends.' He had no tea made. There was tea in the cupboard. He kept thinking about it. How good it would taste and he was thirsty. But tea did not appear.
Naturally. He was not stupid. You had to make tea. Boiling water, sugar cubes, milk, teabags...in a pot. How many? Six? Eight? Steaming up from his mug into his nostrils. That first aroma so welcoming. And scones with jam and fresh butter. It all sounded lovely.
Sherlock kept thinking about the tea as his mind remembered that John's tea was much better than his. He hated his own tea. The one time he'd made it. He hated making it. He did, when necessary – hadn't he? Once. He was almost certain...but anyway it never tasted as good as John's. And John knew how to make a fire in the grate. In moments he'd have a good roar crackling in there. Toasty on a cold night. Much like this one.
He knew how to make a fire too of course, he was a chemist after all, and it was simple chemistry. Pathetically simple. Very. Simple. Chemistry. That and tea making.
Still...
One hour, four minutes late now. Sherlock scooped up his phone and all but leaped from his chair, suddenly needing to move with fury and intent. A snake shedding its skin. The walls had been closing in for the last half hour and he had to shake off this jumble of feelings. Such needless, pointless emotions. Sherlock even felt the itch to shift his shoulders a bit in agreement with the thought. Slough off the human things.
Who needs tea and fires when there's a whole city waiting for him?
Wrapping himself in his Belstaff and winding his scarf around his throat he set off, bounding down the stairs in seconds as he went, sweeping away into the crisp, inky black cold of mid- December. He thought about texting John but what was the point? If John could be here, he would be. He was not. An hour was sufficient time to spend waiting on a man who was obviously not going to show. Sherlock supposed it was not John's fault. As a physician now working full time with a new family to support, John had less free time than most.
Sherlock was not a man to embrace any hint of feeling sorry for himself. On the contrary, he was doing them both a favour by remaining silent on the matter. Not texting John simply meant he would not have to read John's excuses this time as well. It was better this way. They were friends after all. He was doing them both a good turn by not texting with queries as to John's location, activities or why he had stood up his former flat-mate yet again.
This way John did not have to make up any uncomfortable excuses and Sherlock would not be required to indulge them. Perfectly sound reasoning.
~!~!~!~!~
John tossed a few notes at the cabbie and raced up the stairs to 221B, not even using his key as the door to the street had been left unlocked. "Sherlock? You've not been answering my texts. Sorry I'm late. Damn work again. Ready to go?"
All levels of the flat were empty.
"Shit." John took his phone from his front jeans pocket and dialled.
'This is Sherlock Holmes. If you know me then you know I prefer texting so unless this is an emergency, go away. Or text.'
"Sherlock. I know I'm over an hour late but could you at least pick up your phone?" You bloody childish...
John ended the call and ran fingers through his hair. His one night off in weeks. Now what? He didn't feel like going home. He punched in a new number. "Greg? Yeah, it's me, John. Look, I just wondered –hm? No, no, nothing's wrong -what? Yes," (with a spike of irritation at Lestrade's immediately asking after Sherlock before even saying hello to his former blogger who was the only one of the two who ever made social phone calls to anyone!) "Sherlock's fine, he's good – you haven't seen him, have you? Just - no, me neither. Look, I wanted to ask if – of course I'm not 'covering for him'." For chrisssake! "No-no, I just wondered if you'd like to go for a pint? Right now er – or later this evening maybe. I've a few hours. Yeah? Okay, great. No, Sherlock won't be joining us." He's off sulking his great twat of an attitude somewhere I hate to guess. Sherlock in a pub? Lestrade had to be kidding! "Meet you at the usual place. Right. Good. See you then."
John ended the call and looked around at the dusty, disorganised clutter. It still called to him as home in a way. Reached put to him like a branch being passed to a man at sea, tossed and turned with every gasp of the wind.
John shook his head at his own sentiment, a feeling he rued and one Sherlock would sneer at. "Christ..." What's wrong with me? But it still felt like maybe a part of him belonged here. Out of habit, John opened the fridge. Nothing that could be called food was present. A plastic tub of ear cartilage sat undisturbed alongside part of a forearm. A litre of milk and a jar of apricot jam. A jar of dill pickles which liquid appeared cloudy and swayed back and forth a bit with every movement of the fridge door. John checked the stamp on the lid. Two months passed date.
Sherlock's lab equipment sat stained on the table. On the worktop his microscope was unplugged from the wall.
With all the mess and the feeling of near-abandonment by its sole occupant, somehow the pace still felt like home. John shook off the nostalgic feeling.
Sherlock where the hell are you, you twit?
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Sherlock, after passing the welcoming glow of tavern after tavern, and forgoing any door into the lighted, busy interior of Tesco's or other shops at hand, found himself sitting on a cold bench made of steel beside the largely iced-over pond in Regent's Park smoking a cigarette. His sixth of the evening.
It had seemed prudent, at the time, freeing even, to take up the habit again, after John had stopped coming around as often. Even knowing it was bad for his health and might even possibly shorten his life, never-the-less he liked smoking. It sharpened his mind and gave his hands something to do whenever he felt –
Whenever people annoyed him and he needed to get away. It gave him an excuse to leave and go outside for a puff. It made perfect social sense. Even if he was doing it for himself he was also doing it for John. Because John hated it when Sherlock snubbed people or dismissed them or ignored them, or made light of their pain.
So he would go away from them and smoke instead. It made perfect sense, in a way, to pursue the habit. Addiction had nothing to do with it, unless one could call the need to be in a quiet place away from all that emotion and sentiment and noise, an addiction. Then so be it.
It was getting later, well past nine, and there were only a few scattered people using the park. A man with his three Pugs. Sixty-something. Heart problem. Drinker but only recently –ah! -widowed. Still wears his ring. Loved her (or him). No kids so possibly him. Dogs instead of children. Lonely. Walks here every night most likely.
The man passed him with a sad nod while two of his dogs sniffed Sherlock's legs and the thirds tried to pee while walking, it coming out in fits and starts.
Two teenagers walked through across the field farther away. Harder to deduce...oh...walking in a bit of a hurry toward the more popular shops in the area. Dressed warmly so intend to be out for some time. In a hurry in acceptable clothing, yes, but not clothing that would normally be acceptable among their peer group. Talking to each other quietly in urgent whispers, but minds intent on a goal beyond the park. Not even stopping to light up therefore up to no good. Off to do a B&E perhaps yet no large break-in tools though hard to be sure at this distance. Going to rob some poor tourists at knife-point then, the little bastards were.
At least during his years as a less than upstanding citizen he had never resorted to frankly violent crimes. No terrorizing anyone. Stealing, yes. Exchanging one thing for another. Cash for cocaine. Turning fake tricks. Sherlock smiled. A neat device when underage. People were so gullible. Arrange to sleep with a John and demand half the money up front. It was the promise of sex that was the crucial factor. Act like you really want it; like you want them and then, when the time is right and they're emotions are ripe for the plucking, let them find out you're underage and most will panic and run. After demanding their money back of course.
But not getting it. Not all of it anyway. Forty or fifty quid most every time. Easily done.
Most every time the con had worked. Once in a while, unfortunately, it had not worked and he'd ended up with some bruises or marks to hide from Mycroft. But that also had been easily done. Mycroft still did not know about the fake tricks. No one had ever gotten into his pants.
Sherlock found it highly annoying that, while recalling with pride his deviousness, he also felt that same stabbing sense of shame at his youthful indiscretions. The contradiction bothered him. His orderly sense of mind. It was another thing to shake off. Sentiment. Merely the inexperienced machinations of youth.
Nobody was perfect.
A man approached, walking with his dog. A Golden Labrador. Five or six years old. The dog, not the man. The man was young, well, middle aged, a bit older than him. Thicker of body but not over-weight. Not overly tall – one-point-seven-eight or nine meters - but comfortable with it. Physically fit. Well muscled. He worked out. Hair shorn almost to his skull but not receding. So he liked it that way rather than buzzing it in an attempt to hide premature baldness. Interesting.
Tattoos but only a few and discreetly placed. A cross, a name around his left wrist where the sleeve of his coat had ridden up enough for Sherlock to see it. No 'dog-tags' so not military. A small gold chain around his neck. Jacket brand name – Trading Post; Sierra. Not commonly sold in London. He was a foreigner. American most likely.
The tattoo in letters was on the inside of his left wrist and spelled Grace. Not displayed openly so nothing to do with religion. Instead a girl's name. Not a former lover because of its placement. A name just for the man alone to see. A reminder. His daughter. So divorced and the daughter is with the mothe – no, of course the daughter is dead. That's why it's hidden. That's why it's just for him. This man does not wear his grief upon his sleeve. This man keeps his grief deeply buried and private. No wedding ring. No mark of one. He's been in country for a while. Mother not in the picture at all. Both dead most likely.
The man sat down on the freezing metal bench, not too closely, to Sherlock. "Evening." He said.
"Good evening." Sherlock said, polite but without much encouragement. He was sufficiently intrigued by the man (his story at least), to not want to immediately leave but not so curious that he wished a lengthy conversation about the weather or other mind-numbing trivia.
"I recognise you from the papers. You're Sherlock Holmes."
Directly to the point thank god. "Yes." Another long drag of his cigarette. The smoke burning in his lungs was glorious.
"You caught that bomber. The one who murdered all those people. Moriarty."
"Yes."
"Did he really come back from the dead?"
Was he obtuse? "No, he really did not."
"Then why..?"
"I saw him die. He is dead beyond repair. We are currently hunting he, or they, who are trying – poorly I might add – to cash in on Moriarty's name."
The man nodded. "The FBI figured he was responsible for bombings in the US too."
Sherlock knew of them of course. Mycroft had held a dossier on Moriarty two inches thick. "They are undoubtedly correct." Oh..."Your wife and daughter..?"
The man nodded. "Yes. Six years back. The British consulate in New York."
He had no accent, other than one not British. Sherlock nodded and took another drag.
"My name is Anthony O. Williams." The American stretched out his hand and Sherlock looked down at it for a moment before shaking it. Anthony O. Williams did not let Sherlock's hand go before he said "I'd like to thank you, Mister Holmes, for seeing to the death of that soulless son-of-a-bitch who murdered them."
Sherlock took a few seconds to nod in return while looking at Anthony's other wrist where there was no tattoo and so understood something more. Only the daughter's name. Not the wife's. A divorce, in the past, before their deaths. Well before. Anthony had come to understand sometime into his marriage (after his wife gave birth to their daughter but before their deaths), that he was
"Gay." Sherlock said.
Anthony frowned a bit at the statement, if it could be called that. But he swiftly recovered his aplomb. Again, thought Sherlock, interesting.
"Yes. Yes, I am Mister Holmes." He chuckled a bit at the sleuth's blunt deduction at his expense and then released Sherlock's cold fingers from his warm ones. With a lift of thin eyebrows - "Does it matter?"
Sherlock lifted one corner of his mouth. "No, Mister Williams. Not in the least," he said. "It's fine. It's all fine."
Somewhere, in the far reaches of his mind, Sherlock felt an indefinable shift in his perceptions, as though a door had been shut with a soft resonance. Click.
Then, startling him with its clarity, an entirely new door opening up and with it the sensation of wind coursing across his mind. He could almost feel the freshness of it.
Sherlock suddenly remembered that this could be what John had often called 'a fresh start'.
~!~!~!~!~
"He wasn't there?" Mary asked. Elicia was wriggling in her arms, kicking her tiny legs with vigor as she sucked contentedly on a bottle of formula. The first of two more she would demand before dawn. It was 11:PM. John watched his infant daughter with a captivated love only a parent can understand. A star sparkled in his heart and it was shaped like a tiny human with turquoise coloured eyes and hair that shone like the stars themselves. He was hopelessly in love with his daughter.
"Well, I was an hour late. An accident tied everything up." His one night out blown all to hell by the careless driving of strangers.
"Why wouldn't he wait for you?"
John knew Mary knew why. What he didn't get was why she needed to ask at all. "You know Sherlock. Impatient. Well, maybe I can find some time on Sunday."
"We're taking Elicia for photos on Sunday."
Right. It was always something. Not that he didn't want photos of his perfect little girl, he did. He most certainly did. But he also wanted to see Sherlock. He hadn't had a good run through darkened streets in the hunt for a killer in months. Sherlock was out there in the dark on his own. "Then maybe the Sunday after next." John said feebly, wondering what else might appear between now and then to upset his tenuous plans. "I'll text him."
Then during a week busier than normal, he simple forgot to.
When the next Sunday rolled around Elicia turned feverish, not dangerously so, but enough to keep Mary home with her, and John stole his chance, slipping away with a quick kiss to Mary's cheek and a softer one to his daughter's over-warm forehead.
He climbed the stairs without knocking as the door had been left unlocked again. Misses Hudson did not like it when Sherlock forgot to lock the door (which was always), or when people showed up without calling first (which Sherlock always did. Even his parents never got a call. Once Sherlock remembered walking in on Mom and Dad's bedroom while they were in the middle of some afternoon sex. Sherlock had explained with horror how it had scarred him, seeing that, not that it altered his habits in the least. He still visited without calling first. John suspected Sherlock made these visits as a fulfillment a promise to his mother, but did not call ahead on the chance that he would happily find his parents not at home. After John learned that Sherlock had been a strapping twenty-seven years old at the time of the sex incident John hadfought the urge to make a call to Mister and Misses Holmes to find out whether or not the tale was true. Being a properly reserved British male, he resisted acting on such an out-of-the-question inquiry of course. Later Mycroft had filled him in (there were times when Mycroft was almost tolerable). It was true.
Sherlock answered his firm knock right away, opening the door and staring at him as though he were some weird apparition. Finally – "John?" sounding thoroughly taken aback. Confused even.
John always called first. Except for today. "I figured I might catch you at home." He announced.
"You have." Sherlock said, still staring. It was then John noticed that Sherlock's shirt was un-tucked from his pressed black pants. It was even a bit wrinkled as though someone had reached out their hand and grabbed a fist full of the lovely material for some reason as yet unknown to the doctor.
John also noticed that he had not yet been invited in. Sherlock must also have come to this realization as he then stepped aside enough that John could shimmy passed him, while the sleuth said at a barely audible level "Um...yes, John.." A small cough. "Please come in."
"Thanks." John turned to find his way to his old chair.
Only to find it occupied by a tall, broad specimen of a man with a broad face, shorn hair, hazel eyes and a curious expression. The stranger smiled and nodded.
Sherlock appeared to John's left elbow and cleared his throat. "Ahem, John, this is Anthony O. Williams. Anthony, this is John Watson my...he was, is...that is we used to be flatmates."
John nearly swallowed his tongue in shock at hearing Sherlock Holmes stumble over words. But he held out his arm for a hand-shake.
Anthony stood to give it a proper go. "Pleased to meet you Mister Watson."
"Doctor," For a reason he could not immediately identify John suddenly felt as urge to assert a modicum of, if not authority, then position over this strange man. "But please just call me John."
"You're Sherlock's blogger as well?" Anthony phrased it as a pseudo question as he retook his seat, obviously unaware that he was sitting in John's chair, but it was clear he already knew.
"Well, I was, yes, but I'm a family man now. Not that much time to spare for the blog I'm afraid." Or for anything else.
Anthony nodded kindly, seating himself again. John glanced at Sherlock who did not appear inclined to sit down, so John took Sherlock's chair, feeling the deep warmth in the seat that the detective's body had left behind. Sherlock's metabolism always had run high and hot.
Sherlock stepped through the archway into the kitchen – which to John's astonishment – had been cleaned. The worktop sparkled, the table was free of beakers and such and the clutter by the fridge had been shoved to one side. When it came to chores for Sherlock it was practically a cleansing purge.
Sherlock was keeping his head turned to the wall behind the stove. "Tea?" Sherlock asked the wall socket.
Both John and Anthony replied in the affirmative. Both with a word of thanks.
John had found himself in some pretty mind bending situations over the years starting with his own upbringing, then through medical school, then Afghanistan and finally working alongside William Sherlock Scott My-Brain-Ought-To-Be-A-National-Treasure Holmes for several years. He had a self-proclaimed sociopath for a former room-mate and best friend (and who would announce a thing like that as a badge of honour as Sherlock did? No one else, that's who), an assassin for a wife and a new baby daughter out of it all who had his heart so well twisted around her teeny and perfect little fingers he may as well be a string of over-cooked spaghetti.
But watching Sherlock make tea while John sat in Sherlock's sitting room with a man named Anthony O. Williams had to take the cake. Sherlock did not make tea. Sherlock never made tea. It was not at all known whether Sherlock knew where the tea container in his own flat was stored.
The resulting concoction Sherlock served to them was enough to make John want to swear off the stuff. If only he wasn't a perfectly hopeless British gentleman who would simply perish without it. After a single herculean sip of the murky beverage he set his cup aside without further venture.
Anthony took a sip and, perhaps not as big a man as John Watson, Captain of the Worst Afghanistan Had on offer, spit it back into his cup. "Um, Sherlock..." He began, and then he looked up and saw Sherlock's expression.
God, the expression on Sherlock's face. Did John ever remember that expression! It was all hound-dog and apology and innocence melded into the sorriest, heart squeezing look you'd never want to beat the tar out of and God strike you down if you did! Anthony looked up at Sherlock who hovered over him staring down at the tea as though it was his greatest triumph of culinary art and how could anyone not like it?
Then Anthony took the nearest appendage belonging to Sherlock Holmes (his left arm), and bringing God's Best of Humanity digits up to his mouth, kissing them with a gentle pucker. The noise was like the pop of a tiny, tiny, tiny champagne bottle. "It was a lovely thought, Sherlock."
Sherlock's expression changed from one of frank hurt at the rejection of his arduously produced tea to one of restrained horror at what Anthony had just done. Except not so much at what Anthony had done because Anthony had done much, much more than that the previous evening and night, but that this time John Watson had witnessed it.
Sherlock remained frozen in place, his body turned toward Anthony, his head turned to John and his eyes...
His eyes looked about ready to pop from his skull and roll away in scout of a good hiding place for the rest of him. "Um, yes, you're...you're welcome."
John shook his head. Sherlock was using his manners. Sherlock was being polite and saying words like please and you're welcome. Sherlock was having his fingers kissed by a man John had ever met until today. A man was sitting over there, across from him and he had just kissed Sherlock's fingers in a very intimate way, his lips lingering on them as though they were stalks of tenderly steamed asparagus in delicate lemon butter. As though he really, really liked Sherlock. As though he, Anthony O. Williams knew Sherlock very well. Very well. As one does when one is extremely interested in another. Interested in them. In their body. As in the biblical sense of the word.
John stared, his mouth gaping open. It seemed an improbable development. Impossible even. Sherlock had someone. A friend that was not John Watson. A friend who had touched Sherlock before and undoubtedly not just on his beautiful white fingers (John tried to block out any images of other parts of Anthony O. Williams touching his Sherlock with any part of his tattooed rock hard flesh!).
William Sherlock Scott Holmes, London's good looking self-labeled sociopath and socially retarded genius sleuth extraordinaire, had a boyfriend!
Somehow during the last several weeks John had completely missed a crucial turning point in Sherlock Holmes' life.
And now Sherlock was using manners and saying...nice things for no reason at all but to be - for God's sake – polite! The universe itself had to be feeling the shockwaves.
John suddenly felt as though his whole world had slipped sideways without his input and he was now standing on a greased slope in bare feet staring down into an abyss, his next step unsure and absolutely out of his control.
What in hell had this man done to his Sherlock?
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Next part asap.