Where to begin? Joan wonders as she shifts from side to side on the hard plastic of a breed of chair that can only be found in the basements rented out cheaply to sundry support groups. Joan is at one of said support groups, sitting on this hard plastic chair in front of a group of strangers trying to explain to them why her life fell apart. It feels, most of the time, as if these people with their boring lives cannot imagine what Sherlock had done for her, the rush of adrenaline she feels whenever her phone vibrates in her pocket, even now. But these people do know, not about the adrenaline, not about Sherlock, but about loss, about coming down off the high.
Which brings us back to the present, where Miss-not-Doctor Watson, M.D. is sitting on a hard plastic folding chair trying to find the proper words to begin her story of Sherlock Holmes. Logically, the beginning is an very good place to start, yet where is the beginning in this story? Is it when Boy is born squalling into a world that refuses to understand him? Is it when Boy gets drop-kicked out of one of the world's most prestigious universities? Is it when Girl is born, wherever that might be? When Girl commits her first crime, gets that first taste? Or is it, like every good romantic comedy, simply the story of Boy meets Girl?
There is Boy; Sherlock, The Deductionist, brilliant, scared, lonely, alone, misanthropic, genius. A boy from nowhere unravelling the mysteries of the world.
There is Girl; Irene, The Woman, Moriarty, brilliant, artistic, manipulative, misanthropic. A girl from everywhere who has the whole world dancing on threads around her.
Boy meets Girl.
Fine. 'Boy meets Girl'. That seems like as good a place to start as any.
Girl is more impressed by Boy then she would like, yet Boy is so perfect, a mind unlike any she's ever seen before and is likely to see again. Boy is equally impressed, if not more so, as, until the moment he walked through the door to her studio he was quite ready to write off the entire XX population. Yet Girl is special, unique, comprised of endless variables. Girl, who steals masterpieces to preserve them with all their imperfections and ravages of time. Girl, who looks unimpressed at the skills which had won him many an easy fuck with many a stupider girl.
They fall in love. Which is odd, because Joan Watson is quite sure in all her years of life she has never met two people less likely to find someone who loves them and they can love in return. Yet, they do. They find each other and for a short period of time it is perfect.
Like all good things in life, it comes to an end. Girl must go back to running her international crime syndicate and so she leaves a finished painting and a pool of carefully preserved blood on the floor of her apartment for Boy to find.
Boy dies too, maybe not in body, but his mind breaks, driven to the point of exhaustion by a combination of drugs, adrenalin, and pent-up emotion he does not fully understand that threatens to drown him with every breath. So Boy dies with Girl, except Girl doesn't die and neither does Boy.
Eventually, Boy gets himself together, pulls himself out of the pit he has dug himself into, goes back to work creating his glorious miracles and for a little time, Boy is happy.
But, despite her previous cruelties, Girl still loves Boy, despite everything, Girl still knows that he's the only one who is able to get her pulse racing. Boy might be the one in rehab but Girl knows she needs it just as much. He's the one society labels an addict and makes go to NA meetings but she's the one who wakes up in the night in cold sweats not thinking about how much she misses it. Misses him.
Eventually life catches up with them because that's what happens and you can't outrun your past forever, she gets reckless and he gets in over his head.
Joan opens her mouth to speak. The woman in the second row looks down to her watch, wedding ring tapping idly on the plastic seat of the chair, creating an irritating clacking noise (A voice in her head that sounds suspiciously like Sherlock rambles about the woman's beach walk that morning with her lover and later meeting with her lawyers to discuss her impending divorce, her two cats, no children, though her soon-to-be-ex-husband wants many.). The man in the third row (Accountant; one dog; three children, the oldest at a prestigious university and the other two at an upscale private school, he 's having an affaire with his secretary) surreptitiously checks his phone, but is given away by the sound of the keys clicking.
Joan is surrounded by obscure Nobody people, they won't care, and maybe that's what makes this best of all, not the anonymity but the apathy. Any maybe that's the war Sherlock was fighting, not crime or corruption, simply the public apathy to the world around them.
'To Sherlock Holmes she is always the woman...'