John looked down at the haphazard hand writing that was as familiar to him as the man who'd laid it on the page. A letter of confession after all these years, hand delivered this very morning along side a second hand written piece, Sherlock's wedding invitation. John almost laughed. Almost.
William Sherlock Scott
Elliot Prince
Are to be joined at Dunstanburgh Castle
Dunstanburgh Road, Craster, Alnwick,
Northumberland, NE66 3TT
September 9th, 9AM
Sherlock Prince. Ha! Like hell! Sherlock may have ignored what was between them in the past, but John was not doing to stand idly by as the man he loved walked into the arms of another. Sherlock alone, he could handle. Sherlock married to...not him. No way.
It had been two years since John had told Sherlock how he loved him. It took nearly a year after that for the gaping whole of nothingness to consume everything around them. At fist it was just awkward between them, the silence that had once been a haven to them both had become filled with tension doubt and unasked and unanswered questions. It ripped them apart slowly and painfully until one day John simply left. Thinking it was best for them both. It hurt too much to watch the man he loved so, recoil from him. John had questioned his decision to leave a million times. Perhaps if they had talked John wouldn't be standing here now with a wedding invitation in his hand with the wrong names on it. He looked up at the castle on the hill complete with horse drawn carriage. Dunstanburgh, was elegant, beautiful, and ridiculess. Just like Sherlock.
John wondered around the castle unnoticed in the hustle and bustle. He glanced into the nave of the chapel at the chosen few in attendance. Friends he hadn't spoken to in months no matter how doggedly they tried to get in touch. John couldn't bare Mrs. Hudson's pleas for him to return, or Lestrade, and his constant updates on Sherlock's cases and his boredom, or Mycroft's thinly veiled threats and innuendos. If he couldn't be with Sherlock then he also couldn't live at the edge of his world. But this new knowledge had thrown him back in to it way over his head. John found the solar with Sherlock's initials on it. John smoothed his hands over his best midnight blue suit (that Sherlock had given him and John felt was wildly over priced) before stepped through the doors none too quietly. "I half expected you to be in some white frock. "
"I'm not RuPaul John." Sherlock greeted John from across the room with his razor shape wit as if he'd known the words and John were coming.
"No. But you are most certainly a drama queen. If not you wouldn't have sent me this letter and your wedding invitation together. You wanted me here, in Northumberland (which also did not go unnoticed) you wanted me to stop this wedding didn't you?"
"What letter are you referring to?"
"This letter." John held up the piece of stationary that Sherlock could see was his favorite brand. "True north, always whatever. This letter." John felt silly repeating the words that had brought him to tears the day before.
Sherlock's face blanched and his eyes glassed over with unshed tears. "Where did you get that?" Sherlock asked just above a whisper, taking a fraction of a step back. "You where never supposed to see that. Never supposed to know." He said the last so softly John nearly missed it.
"I was never supposed to know that you loved me as much as I loved you?" John was confused and hurt."Why?"
"Because I didn't know what to do with it at the time. With the love that it is. I didn't know how to return it, express it. I wasn't worth your love, and I didn't want to disappoint you. So I closed myself off, hoping your feelings would just fade. Eventually they did. And you left."
"You're such an idiot. I didn't leave because I stopped loving you, I left because I couldn't stop loving you. Never have. Never will."
"Well it doesn't look like I'll be needed here after all." A lilting American voice drifted from the doorway as Elliot Prince walked in. "John Watson. I'd know you anywhere. I've been competing against your ghost from the start. I knew I'd never win. Not really. That's why I sent you the letter. And the invitation. He writes them to you constantly. Hundreds of them. Once maybe twice a day, all of them short, like thoughts that linger in his head that need to get out and then he burns them. After he'll play the violin for hours, sad beautiful pieces that sound like longing and loss."
Sherlock's eyes flicker between the two very different men as he half listens to their words, half processing the possible out comes.
John just frowned at the speaking man. At Elliot. He was nearly as lovely as Sherlock. John couldn't help but think as ridiculous as it was that they would have beautiful babies. But that's not what comes out of John's mouth.
"You...live with him?" John hears the jealousy and disbelief in his question. So dose Elliot.
"No. Not for lack of trying. He wouldn't let me. I live two doors down." He smiles. "And I think that's where I'll be off to now."
"So you're just going to walk out on him on your wedding day?" John's voice now held an edge to it that seemed to bring home Elliot's point in a nutshell.
"Oh this was never meant to be my wedding day." Elliot's smile was cheeky.
"Why then?" Sherlock finally found his words.
Both men turned sharply toward the thick baritone and John had to wonder if Elliot where similarly effected by the dulcet tones as he was.
"Because, if even a fraction of the things I know about this man are true, there is no ones else aside from him that should be standing here with you Sherlock." Elliot seemed rather happy with himself.
"So you're saying you lied all this time, and I missed it. Impossible." Sherlock's chin jutted up a bit.
"Oh I never lied. Do I love you? Unfortunately yes. Do I love you the way he dose?" Elliot gestured to John. "No. And no one else ever will. Some love stories are beyond this world. Yours is one of them. I'll be off now."
John shook his head in the negative. "I still don't understand."
"I do. Thank you Elliot." Sherlock extended his hand, Elliot gave it a rueful look, and a firm shake.
"Of course." He said quickly, as he turned to leave and John was sure he spotted tears in his eyes. John could sympathize.
"Well then." Sherlock looked down at his shoes a little dejected, unsure hands clapped behind his back.
"Well I think those people out there came here for a wedding." John said causally.
"I suppose I'll just have to bare their disappointment." Sherlock shrugged his shoulders.
"Or?" John pulled a round blue box from his breast pocket. "I didn't just come here to stop a wedding." He popped the box open. Inside where two white gold bands, one set with a single diamond, the other smaller and plan.
"I've seen that box in your possession before." Sherlock said with a far away look on his face that said the gears of his mind where working quickly. "Three years ago. That's when I first saw the box. You were going to ask me...three years...but you never did..." Sherlock trailed off.
"I'd like to now." John's voice was low.
"Yes!" Sherlock said vehemently his eyes crinkled at the corners as his smile grew.
"I haven't even asked you anything yet." John was laughing.
"Oh go on then." Sherlock huffed impatiently.
"I know we still have a lot to work through..."
"I know we do, but when have things between us ever come easy in this area. John I trust you implicitly, you know me completely and...I...love you."
John, let Sherlock's words wash over him, warm him, fill him with a joy so great it brought tears to his eyes.
"Marry me?" John was too emotional to say more. He stepped close and looked up into Sherlock's aqua blue green gold eyes.
"Perhaps repeating myself isn't so bad after all. Yes John. With all my heart yes. And I'm sorry I made you wait so long." Sherlock smiled softly.
"Thank God, that's over. John stands on tiptoe and brushes a chaste kiss on Sherlock's lips. "Now let's go get married." Sherlock giggles, dose John and they loop arms and head for the alter.