It was the third headline from the top when I opened my browser. "SUICIDE OF FAKE GENIUS", with a picture of Sherlock in his deerstalker hat right beside it. My hand froze on the mouse, and it felt like everything was frozen around me…unreal…dreamlike…

"Bull," I croaked out, and with that single word my body started moving again. I moved my cursor to the story and started reading, but with every word that passed before my eyes my heart beat harder and harder in my chest—not faster, harder. By the time my eyes reached the journalist's name, my heartbeats literally hurt. "…in the wake of journalist Kitty Reilly's sensational exposé, the alleged fake genius Sherlock Holmes jumped to his death from the roof of St. Bart's Hospital. The medical examiner reports immediate death upon impact from major trauma to the head…"

I don't know how long I sat in front of my computer screen, eyes wide, tears pooling above the lids.

"Miranda," I thought.

I opened my Skype IM window and pulled up Miranda's profile.

Mira, you there?

After a minute, there was a reply.

Wotcher, Jane?

He's dead, Mira. Sherlock's dead.

WHAT? You're kidding me, right?

No. Check the web headlines.

I knew it would only take a few minutes for Miranda to find it as well. As I waited for her reply, it began to sink in for me, and tears ran down my face as I closed my eyes. How could this possibly be? Sure the news slanders recently had been bad; it had outraged me to no end for the past two weeks or so. I had actually broken a vase of my mother's, I got so angry. It had resulted in a fifty quid withdrawal from my bank account.

But Sherlock had not struck me as the type to care about what the media said of him, let alone to the extent of jumping to his death! What the bloody hell had happened at St. Bart's?

My Skype window pinged. Miranda was back.

What the bloody hell happened?

I don't know…I can't believe it…

Hell, I'm crying now…

Join the club.

Poor John. I can't imagine what he's going through right now.

John! Right! Is there anything on the blog?

I scrolled down the Skype window, pulled up my browser again and clicked John's blog from my favorites list. There was just one new entry:

Untitled

He was my best friend and I'll always believe in him.

Comments disabled.

"Jesus, John…"

I got my Skype window back up.

Did you see the entry? He still believes.

Course he does! We do, don't we?

Hell yeah.

Poor bloke…

No kidding…it makes me want to do something…anything to show him he's not alone…

Why can't we?

I could practically see the "I've-got-a-wicked-idea" look on Miranda's face.

What are you thinking of?

I'm thinking we rally everybody we know who's been reading the blog. Posters. Yellow paint. Plaster this city.

We better be careful with the yellow paint.

You think I don't know that? Come on, Jane, it'll be great.

Like she had to tell me.

Let's do it.

Brilliant. How about this Friday?

Mad horses couldn't keep me away.

Miranda's powers of persuasion are bloody awesome. On Friday there had be almost twenty people at her place by the time I got there. Someone had brought a duffle bag full of yellow paint spray cans, and several people—myself included—had brought stacks of posters in backpacks.

"Ready, Jane?" Miranda said, clapping me on the shoulder.

"Always."

"Wait! Wait!"

Ginny was struggling to get the zipper on her backpack open, and when she did she brought out fistful after fistful of buttons bearing the slogans: "I Believe in Sherlock Holmes" and "Moriarty Was Real".

"Everybody take one!" Ginny said, beaming.

"Ginny, this is inspired!" I said.

Everyone Miranda had recruited was zealous about our mission. We plastered posters on light posts, walls, windows, bulletin boards, parking meters; and those of us accustomed to using spray paint left the message "I Believe in Sherlock Holmes" in bright yellow characters on billboards, messageboards, walls already covered in graffiti. They refrained from painting on walls and windows untouched by paint, but I found out later that one boy from my neighborhood, Tom, actually went back to the city during the night with a whole duffle bag of paint cans and emblazoned "I Believe in Sherlock Holmes" on a huge movie poster on the side of a building.

"I don't plan on stopping, Miranda," I said as I stapled several posters to a messageboard. "I don't know about you, but I'm gonna keep doing this every so often, even if I do it alone. I won't stop until someone comes forward with the truth about Sherlock."

Miranda squeezed my shoulder. "I'm not stopping either."

SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH- SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH

John was on his way back to Baker Street, weighed down by bags of groceries, when he saw a bunch of teens busily scurrying around with stacks of posters. They all wore buttons that said either "I Believe in Sherlock Holmes" or "Moriarty Was Real", and the posters they were putting up bore the same messages.

Two of them, girls, a brunette and a blonde, saw him, stopped for a second and smiled at him. The blonde raised a hand in greeting, and the brunette called, "You're not alone, John."

They both went back about their work, but the brunette's words imprinted themselves on John's heart, spreading warmth through him.

The grief left in the wake of Sherlock's death would be long and slow in fading, but those few words spoken by a complete stranger gave John some small measure of peace. He was not alone.

I claim no ownership over the stories and characters created by Steven Moffitt, Mark Gatiss, Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman.

The story of the spray-painted message on a "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows" movie poster is based on a real event.