It was horrible to see him like that. Laying there, looking out of the window and he didn't seem to care. I sat beside his bed in a chair, which a nurse gave to me. It was really uncomfortable, I sat in that chair for hours, but I didn't dare to make any kind of noise. My best friend was lying in a bed, his black curls were gone and his blue eyes which sometimes changed their color to green or brown seemed to be grey. Their shining left with the curls. He hadn't said a word since I was there. He didn't even say: "Hello."
When I left the room for a few minutes to get a coffee I asked the same nurse that gave me the chair, if he said anything. "No, he didn't even ask for water. The only thing he does is to nod or shows us his disagree with mad or sad glances." "All right, thank you." I got my coffee and returned. He hadn't moved. "Sherlock…" I began to say. "Sherlock… do you remember me?" He slowly turned his head to me and shook his head. "No."
I nodded, more for myself than for him. He turned his head back to the window. I drank a bit of my coffee just for something to do. An eternity passed till something happened again. He turned to me and looked into my eyes. They were so dead. I had never seen eyes that seemed to be so dead. He took a pencil and a piece of paper from the bedside table and wrote something down. He gave it to me. "Who are you?" The question destroyed the little piece of hope that had been deep inside my heart. I had to swallow the emptiness that took its place inside my throat. My voice broke and I had to say the sentence three times till anybody could've understood it.
"My name... is John Watson. We were ... we were flat mates before the..." my voice broke again. I tried to continue. "...before the accident."
He seemed to understand my words but he didn't know that he once had a flat mate. I guess he didn't even know that he was living in a flat in London. Sherlock started writing again, after he had looked deep into my eyes. He knew I was near crying. "Did we know each other well?"
I think a tear escaped from my right eye and ran down my cheek. "You are my best friend. And I was your only." I answered.
An emotion mixed into his dead eyes and I hoped it was joy about seeing me again or remembering. But I knew it was hopeless. He wouldn't remember me and the moment after I told myself he wouldn't remember me, I recognized the emotion he had. It was wrath. He scribbled on the sheet again and it tore. He threw the paper into my arms and the pencil on the wall. Then he turned to the window again. "I don't have friends." I remembered him saying that to me when we worked on the case at Baskerville. I hated him for that, because we had gone through so much. I nearly got blown up for him! I took the sheet and put it in my pocket, leaving the room, leaving him. I knew that I was not allowed to judge him. He had lost his memories. But I couldn't. He left me, for three years. Three years believing my best friend was dead. Three years in depression. Three years in that bloody apartment with Mrs. Hudson. Remembering him in whatever I did.
When I opened the fridge I missed the head staring at me. When I opened the microwave the human eyes were gone. The table in the kitchen was tidy and nobody sat in that modern armchair that would never fit in that apartment. It seemed to be the only modern thing, besides our laptops, mobile phones and Sherlock's microscope. I missed him sitting in front of me in that abnormal armchair, just talking. He never stopped talking once he started. He didn't stop, even if I left our flat. He once talked a whole weekend to me. I was with my sister Harry but he didn't seem to care. He didn't even notice and when I came back he blamed me for not giving him his book. He had been annoying, hated, provocative and loved.
Mrs. Hudson and I loved him truly and I don't know if he recognized that Molly, Lestrade and even his brother Mycroft did too. We all cared about him and he cared about us, but I let him down. I couldn't prevent the accident that had taken his memories. All the good and bad memories of the time we had together were gone. When I left the room I died inside. I died from knowing, that he'll never be able to remember what he did to me. He saved me. Because of him I went outside and saw England again. I threw away my crutch because of him. He took me out there with him and showed me all these murders. And it was great.
But we had our bad times too. The consulting criminal Jim Moriarty, as he called himself, made Sherlock jump from St. Bart's Hospital. He was the reason Sherlock made me believe he was dead for three years. It had been three very long years. I was near committing suicide because I wanted so badly to see Sherlock again.
The world hadn't been the same without him. It was boring without that mad genius. Molly had taken care of me after his death. She helped Sherlock fake his own death and he promised him to make sure that I'd be alive when he returned. She visited me after her work in the pathology was done and made sure I was alright. She talked to me, made me eat and made me go to bed. She left when I was asleep. We spent nights together, when I couldn't sleep because all these feelings made me sad and if I closed my eyes I saw his bloody dead face again. We spent nights of tea and talking; of crying and laughing. And also nights of silence. She was like a sister to me.
Molly had been really shy and the more nights we spent, the more I knew her and she knew me. She helped me to deal with my feelings and I helped her to become confident. So I decided to call her, right after I left the hospital. "Molly? Could you please come to 221B?" I asked her. She said she would leave the pathology and asked what happened. "It's because of Sherlock." "What? Is he alright?" "Molly, I'll explain when we see each other, okay?" I quit the phone call and took a cab. "As fast as possible to 221B Bakerstreet, please."
When I arrived at 221B Molly had already been there. She hugged me whispering: "What has he done now?"
I said, I'd like to go inside to tell her and she followed me. We didn't go upstairs, we went to Mrs. Hudson. She had to know it, too. We sat in Mrs. Hudson's living room, she got us tea. Molly finally interrupted Mrs. Hudson telling us about her day. "What happened John?"
"It's Sherlock..." I began and my voice was about to break again. Mrs. Hudson put her cup of tea away, her facial expressions turned sad and exhausted and suddenly a glance of knowing was in her face. Molly was confused. It seemed like everybody in the room knew what was going on, except for her. As I thought about the sentence I'd have to say, my eyes began to fill themselves with tears. Mrs. Hudson knew. She took my hand. As if she wanted to say that I should stay strong, for him; as I wanted to say what happened to Sherlock, my voice was gone. I couldn't stand the tears and they flew down my cheeks like a waterfall. It was a silent crying. Mrs. Hudson told Molly that Sherlock had an accident and that he had lost his memories. Molly was shocked. She asked what he'd remember and Mrs. Hudson answered that nobody knew, because he didn't talk to anybody.
Finally I had to say it: "He doesn't even remember me." It came out of my mouth with new tears and Molly came to me, laid her arms around my head and kissed my forehead. "It's all right." She whispered.
"No. No it's not. He doesn't remember me; he probably doesn't even remember Mrs. Hudson! Maybe he won't remember you!"
It burst out of me because it had been in my mind since I'd left the hospital. Then I started crying. Out loud. The last time I cried like that was when Sherlock jumped off St. Bart's. "How is he doing?" Molly asked as if I never said anything cruel.
"I... I don't know. He doesn't want to talk. His curls are gone. They shaved his head." "No, not his gorgeous black curls?" asked Mrs. Hudson and it made me laugh.
The only thing she worried about was his curls. "Yes, exactly those gorgeous black curls." I said and Molly had to smile.
I stood up and hugged her then I turned to Mrs. Hudson hugging her, too. I said I'd go upstairs, needing some time for myself. Molly followed me. "I won't let you alone now. I promised him once to take care of you and I will. I promised to take care of you if something unexpected happened. And this was completely unexpected." I didn't respond. I knew she would stay. I couldn't tell her to leave she wouldn't. We went upstairs and I sat down at the kitchen table.
"Molly, I need to call Mycroft. He deserves to know."
"I will. You're not able to talk about it at the moment."
She took my phone out of my pocket and dialed Mycroft's phone number. While the mobile phone dialed she went into the living room. As far away from me as she could. I heard her voice clearly anyway.
"No. Listen Mycroft, it's me. Molly Hooper, the pathologist. It's about your brother."
A break. I could imagine that Mycroft insulted his brother as a diseased, stupid man without any ability to think clearly about what he's doing. "Mycroft, he lost his memories. He had an accident. His brain is damaged, he can't remember. John visited him and he can't remember having seen John before. We're not sure what he remembers, he doesn't want to speak."
Another break. Molly was waiting for a response. After a minute she asked if Mycroft was still there. She listened to him and returned to the kitchen. The mobile phone in her right hand she asked, "Mycroft wants to see Sherlock. Is he allowed?" Why would he need to ask me? Sherlock was his brother; he didn't need permission to visit him.
"Of course."
"He'll allow you to see him." Molly said, talking to Mycroft again.
After ten seconds she asked: "He wants you to be with him?"
"Of course." It was difficult for me to say yes.
I didn't know why I should visit Sherlock again, he didn't remember me. He didn't know anything. The afternoon didn't want to leave my mind. His dead eyes didn't want to leave. Those dead eyes looking into my eyes and they seemed to see everything. As they always did. He noticed everything nobody else noticed, but did he know I wasn't a liar? He was so mad when I told him he was my best friend. Deep inside me a naive little John wished he knew, but didn't want to believe. The same little John Hamish Watson wished he had all these memories still anywhere in his head. I was about to kill the little John because it told me everything was going to be all right, he would remember me in a few weeks, he'd be alright in a few weeks and ready to solve murders again and deeper inside me, I knew it wouldn't.
I knew it would take very long till Sherlock would be normal, if he ever gets normal. Or whatever normal is. Sherlock had never been normal and he won't be. He won't be the Sherlock he was. And this realization cut into my heart. The tears flew out of my eyes again.
Molly told Mycroft to be strong and that he should be at St. Bart's at 11 o'clock. She hung up and came to me, laid her hand on my back and asked if I wanted a tea. I didn't respond so she just quit talking, sat down beside me and tried to comfort me with just being there. From time to time she went to drink a tea or coffee and I cried the whole night, staring at the work Sherlock had left unfinished.
The next morning I gave Molly one of my sweaters, we both looked very old, as if we hadn't slept for years. Molly drank 10 cups of coffee and my eyes were swollen because of the crying.
The cab arrived at half past ten at 221B and we arrived at St. Bart's twenty minutes later, traffic had been good. Mycroft was already there. His eyes were swollen, too. I didn't expect him to cry about his brother. They always seemed to keep distance to each other. When Molly and I left the cab he didn't say anything, he knew I could see that he had cried. We went into St. Bart's and Molly left us, going to her work; cutting dead people's chests. She told me to be strong before she was gone. "What is he like?" Mycroft suddenly asked. He was scared. Scared of meeting Sherlock and seeing, that his brother was gone. His brother, that had always been sassy, clever and quite annoying had left his body and was gone. "He's somewhere else. Doesn't talk, doesn't think about this world I guess. It's like he's physically here but his mind is somewhere else."
Mycroft swallowed. It must've been hard for him, to know, that his brother wouldn't be the same. "At least he will remember you." I walked faster. He sighed.
"John." He stopped walking and took me by my shoulders. "He had an accident. It isn't anybody's fault."
I ignored his trying to get me down and walked away. I didn't say anything till we arrived at Sherlock's room. Then I took a deep breath and opened the door. He still lay in his bed and it seemed as if he hadn't moved since yesterday. Mycroft stood right behind me and couldn't shut his mouth.
"His curls are gone, I know, I know." I said annoyed. I needed to keep from him that I was sad. So so sad. I didn't want anybody to think that I was weak. I was a soldier, a doctor and I was trained for losing a mate. But this was different. It wasn't the first time I lost somebody important, but nobody ever meant more to me than this great man called Sherlock Holmes. I was sobbing inside. Mycroft greeting Sherlock ripped my sadness apart. I sat down on the same chair I sat yesterday, nobody had taken it away. Sherlock gave me this look. He looked at me like I imagined him looking at a stranger. Then he looked away. At Mycroft and his look turned scared. I hadn't seen him scared since Baskerville. He took the same pencil like yesterday and another sheet and wrote something down.
"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE, MYCROFT? WHO IS THIS MAN?" An arrow pointing at me was drawn behind the last sentence. I felt like the arrow was not on the paper, it gave me the feeling of a pin in my heart.
"He's your best friend." was all Mycroft said and now the fear disappeared of Sherlock's face and it made room for anger and confusion.
"I DO NOT HAVE FRIENDS." It was written over the first two sentences and it made me want to cry again. His brother stayed calm. He knew how to deal with this amnesia. "Listen, Sherlock. Believe whatever you want, but you lost all your memories about this man. When he was lost, you saved him. You didn't know you did but you saved him, you showed him the world and made him happy again. And he did the same with you. You may not remember, but you were a heartless machine and he showed you friendship. When you betrayed all of us and made us believe you were dead, he still believed in you. He didn't commit suicide because of this little piece of hope in his broken heart. This little piece of faith stopped him from jumping off a huge building. This little piece was love. It may not be the kind of love you feel when you're in a relationship, but it was the kind of love that needs each other. He was the brother to you, I could've never been. And you shall not be bullying him around while he cries because of you. Look at this broken man. What may we deduce? Think about it Sherlock. Think about what you're doing to him. What you're doing to all of us."
He turned around and left. I was shocked by Mycroft. Sherlock seemed to be also. But as soon as he understood what his brother just told him, he turned to me and those dead eyes looked at me again. I knew he was deducing things about me. Maybe he already knew everything about my sister again, just as he did at the day we first met. He wrote something on the paper again and didn't stop looking at me while he did. Then he showed it. "What have I done?" I couldn't. I couldn't tell him about Moriarty about St. Bart's about what he forced Molly to promise to him. Sherlock saw that I just didn't want to, so he added another word: "Please."
"I... I don't... Sherlock, I don't know where to start." He wrote again.
"At the very first day."
"You want me to tell you everything you did the past 4 years?" He nodded.
"Yes." Then he pointed at the "Please." again.
It hurt me to think about everything we had done together since the very first day. I started and felt tears in my eyes again: "It all started with me, getting injured in Afghanistan. I served over there. They took me back here to London, giving me an army pension. It wasn't enough to get a flat by myself. Coincidently I met an old friend. He told me about you, wanting to get a flat mate as well. We met in St. Bart's. You knew everything about me, being a soldier and had got injured. I was so impressed."
A bitter laughter came out of my mouth. I had been so impressed by this mysterious man, knowing everything about me without asking. He just needed a look to see through me. Sherlock turned to the window again and with a little gesture of his left hand he told me to go on. "We met in 221B Bakerstreet here in London, you already knew our housekeeper, Mrs. Hudson. She always says she isn't our housekeeper but she is. Without wanting it, she is. She loves you as much as I do. She's an old lady, you saved her. You gave her piece in life, because you helped her take revenge." Sherlock took the sheet again. "I think I know about her. I helped her put her husband in jail, didn't I?"
And there it was again. That piece of hope that had been destroyed a few minutes ago began to rebuild itself. "Yes exactly, that woman." I had to take a deep breath. I don't know how long I'd been silent, but Sherlock wrote "Go on."
So it must've been a bit more than a deep breath. "Of course."
I took another deep breath; to be sure that I wouldn't faint because I was really exhausted and my thoughts weren't very clear anymore.
"You had already bought the flat, too. You had been so sure, that I was going to share it with you. When I arrived there you told me to call you Sherlock, it was a bit weird to me. I didn't even need to think about it in the moment we stepped into the flat I was sure that I wanted it. And another argument for taking it was you. You had been so interesting to me." I looked at Sherlock and saw that he was very very confused. Without looking on the paper he slowly scrabbled something. Then he showed it to me. "Am I your... Boyfriend?" I couldn't shut my mouth. Sherlock's look became more confused with every second I didn't answer.
"No! No! We aren't together. You aren't gay, I'm not gay! Although we were mistaken as a couple many times." An embarrassing silence took its place between us. I cleared my throat and continued. "After we decided to share the flat, we had a couple of adventures together. Catching a serial murderer, visiting a military base because of a hound and many other things I can't and don't want to tell you now."
I wanted to continue but Sherlock interrupted me with a simple "Why?" written on the sheet. "They aren't important now." Sherlock wrote something down again.
"They are my memories. I have the right to know what I've down the last 4 years." "Sherlock I'm going to tell you someday, but now there's one thing I got to keep focus on, alright?" He was a bit nasty, but he stopped asking, so I continued.
"In one of our cases we met someone who was as clever as you are. He even called himself a 'consulting criminal'. His name was Jim Moriarty. We met him once in one of our early cases; he tried to blow me up. Our first meeting was a bit weird, all three of us made it out alive. Since then he was always in your mind, he poisoned you. After we had solved a few other cases he showed up again. He broke into three of the safest places here in London and committed robbery and the court still let him go.
It was a miracle, but you knew it. So you started chasing him again and finally met him."
I had to take a break. The pictures of Sherlock's suicide took their place in my head. They blocked my other memories and I couldn't stop seeing these few minutes that destroyed three years of my life in my head. Over and over again. I couldn't hold the tears back, they flew out of my eyes and I couldn't do anything against it. I wanted to make it stop; I didn't want to be weak, not in front of Sherlock. He was in a worse situation than I was. Suddenly he did something I wasn't expecting. He laid his hand on mine and smiled. As I looked into his face I could see a bit of the Sherlock I knew; the Sherlock who remembered me. The Sherlock who seemed to be a heartless machine, when in fact everything he did to me was for a purpose. I wondered if he saw the accident coming. Without letting my hand go he wrote something down.
"What did I do to you, John?" He called me John. I was confused; I was expecting that he'd call me doctor or Mr. Watson. He noticed my stunning and seemed to misunderstand it as he wrote: "Is John to personal?" "Ah, no. No it's not. We called each other Sherlock and John. ", I stuttered. He smiled again, his hand still laying on mine. I was startled when the door suddenly opened and a nurse came inside. "Sir, I'm afraid you'll have to leave Mr. Holmes now." she said with a faked compassion in her voice. I turned back to Sherlock. "I'll come back tomorrow, alright?" He nodded. Then he touched my hand for the last time and gave me a smile that said: "You'll get through this. You're strong and you won't give up." I really hoped I would. I left him, giving him a last smile, although it tortured me. When I left the room with the nurse she closed the door and asked quietly: "Sir, I know it's impolite to ask but, are you homosexual?"
I was confused for a moment but I had been asked this question so many times and as always I answered with a nice smile: "No. Sherlock and I are not gay, we're not together. If you'd know through what we went together you would know why we are what we are. Not gay, not together, but needing each other." Now it was the nurses turn to be confused. "Have a good night." I said, shook her hand and left the hospital, leaving her confused.
The next day I showed up in the hospital as soon as I could. It had been a torture to tell Sherlock his life, but I wanted to have it done. When I entered the hospital the nurse I confused yesterday gave me a bright smile, she seemed to feel guilty for misinterpreting the relationship between Sherlock and me. I gave her a little faked smirk, only to make her feel better. When I arrived at Sherlock's room I stopped. "John Watson.", I thought, "You'll have to tell him the whole truth. Tell him what he did to you. Don't make him feel comfortable; don't change the details to make him believe, that it wasn't that torturing for you. He deserves to know and he wants to know. If you lie to him now, he'll discover the truth. For god's sake he's the cleverest man you've ever known; of course he'll discover the truth. Tell him everything." I opened the door, slow and very carefully. I took a look inside to see if he was sleeping. Of course he wasn't, but that day he had moved. He now sat up in his bed, being thoughtful and attentive at the same time, something that only a few people could do. His hands were steepled under his chin. A pose that reminded me of nights we spend together, nights without even a nap when we had to solve an interesting murder. Old memories came into my mind that made me tear up. When I stepped inside his head turned to me and he gave me a smile. I must've looked very awful because the first thing he wrote on his college block was a question. "Didn't get any sleep last night?" I nodded.
"Me neither."
"What've you been thinking 'bout?", I asked and tried to sound as if I was alright. As if I weren't in that abyss of feelings.
"What could I have done that made you so sad, so so sad. I can't find the answer. If you please could continue where you stopped yesterday, when that nurse interrupted our meeting." He held the college block under his chin. He gave me a begging look. I was dazed by this behavior. In the whole time I had known him, he always had acted like this when he had a new case. When somebody had been murdered under weird circumstances. When he was working. "Sure. Um, where did I stop?", I asked more to test him. I knew exactly where I'd been interrupted, but if this was work for him, he'd know it better than me. I wanted to see if this was a case for him, the case of his life, literally. He scrabbled on the block in great curving letters as if he needed to write as fast as he could. He never told me, what he felt in that moment and I never asked but he seemed to fall into his ecstasy.
"You stopped with that consulting criminal. My nemesis. Jim Moriarty."
He looked like a nine-year-old you're telling a horror story.
"Right, Jim. As I told you, he once tried to blow me up."
Interrupting me he nodded. Sherlock seemed to be very impatient. I knew he was, he had never been different, but he usually didn't interrupted the teller because he knew, that if he bothered the teller, he would get the needed informations later. He made a hand gesture. "Go on." I formed the next sentence carefully in my head. Nobody ever said something like this to him. It might insulted him.
"When you met him on the roof of St. Barts many things had happened and you weren't equals anymore, no, he was better. After you came back..." Sherlock raised his hand, telling me to stop for a moment. Again. He just proved my point, that this was work for him. He gave me the college block. "Back from where?" I handed it back to him explaining that he'll know if he would stop interrupting me. "After you came back, you told me, that you'd planned everything, that Moriarty had never won. But in the moment you two were meeting, you made it look like he had won, to please him. I can't tell you everything what happened, I wasn't there. The only thing I can tell you is that Moriartys body was found on the roof of St. Barts. And when I arrived there you stood on the roof. You were trying to convince me that you were a fake, that you weren't that clever. I couldn't believe it, I didn't want to. After your try to make me believe that everything you said was a lie you fell of the roof."
I had to take a break. All the tears filled my eyes again, all the feelings were burning inside my chest and nearly made me faint. All this, Sherlock losing his memories and the whole story couldn't be real. "What have I done to deserve this torture?", I mumbled and tried to wipe away the tears. Sherlock stood up and left. He didn't came back for a half hour. In those thirty minutes I first cried my heart out of my chest, then I tried to arrange my feelings. When I was ready, or almost ready Sherlock showed up again; he held two cups of tea in his hands and gave one to me. Then he returned to his bed, wrote something down and gave it to me. "I see your emotional constitution isn't even nearly in the area of "all right", take a break." I nodded, grateful.
A few hours must've passed when he started writing again, my tea was cold I hadn't drunk it. We had remained in each other's company, in a silence that wasn't embarrassing, more welcomed. We didn't have to speak, there was nothing to say any more. Sherlock knew now the rough story of our time and I saw that his thoughts were racing through his mind, deducing, making up theories, working.
"Do you want to go home? It might be more comfortable than seeing me all the time. And I need to think.", said the writing on the college block. I stood up. "I guess I'm putting you off. I will leave now Sherlock. Tell a nurse if anything is wrong, all right? I'll leave my number there." Without waiting for a response I left the room. I was hurt. I needed someone to talk, or not to talk just to be with, so I called Molly. She was downstairs in the pathology so we decided to meet in ten minutes at the entry. I left my number at the and went downstairs. Molly already waited there. She hugged me when I arrived. I must've looked really bad because she ordered a cab and we drove to her flat. In her flat I sunk on the couch and drowned in the tears I hadn't wanted to show Sherlock. Molly hugged me tight and waited till my tears had stopped flowing down my cheeks. "It's going to be all right.", she said finally and kissed my forehead. Then she left to make some tea. I thought about the whole day I had spent with Sherlock. Every move he made was in my memories, every emotion showing up on his face. My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of my ring tone. "Molly could you...?", I asked. She ran in and picked up. "Molly Hooper?" A break. "No, no it's all right. Dr. Watson is here but he doesn't want to answer the phone at the moment. What's the problem?" A very long break in that she walked through the whole flat, making some noises of understanding from time to time. Finally she hung up with last words of gratitude. Then she returned to me. She was very serious. "John. I'm so sorry...", she said an laid her hand on mine. "What's going on Molly?"
I feared the worst. "It... It was Sherlock's doctor. They discovered the cause of his amnesia, a congestion in his head, and want to try to get it out. But it's an operation that only a few survive. And because of his accident, he is even more likely to die. It is necessary so they're going to do it tonight. He requires you to come to the hospital tomorrow, because the nurses said you were very close to Sherlock. Are you going to go there?"
"I'll have to, right?" That wasn't a question.
"Yes you'll have to go. You can sleep here."
She didn't even wait for me to answer and stood up to get me blanket. When she gave it to me, the last thing she said was a simple "Good night." I thanked her and wished her a good night too.
The night wasn't very good. I laid there and thought about everything. About the day, about tomorrow, about Sherlock. I didn't close my eyes.
The day of the meeting with the doctor meant to be a torture. I waited two hours in the gangways of the hospital before a nurse showed me the way to the bureau of Dr. James Middleton-Brown. We shook hands and I could see the faked compassion everybody who was working here showed to me. It seemed like everybody knew my story already. "Why did you call yesterday evening?", I began the conversation.
"So your girlfriend-"
"Friend. Molly's my friend."
"Sorry. Ms. Hooper told you?"
"Yes, she did."
"I'm afraid I have sad news for you." He said and his voice was soft. It tried to prepare the listener for what's going to follow. There was the little John inside me again, saying everything was alright, they would just need to keep him for a few more weeks, but today there was a great other voice inside me. It told me what I already knew, that something went wrong. That there's no happy end. And finally Dr. James Middleton-Brown said it:"Mr. Holmes unfortunately died while we tried to remove the congestion."
I woke up. It had all just been a dream. Nothing had been real. I was glad to escape from that hell but also sad to lose Sherlock's face again. It wasn't the first time I dreamt this. Strictly, I had this dream now for over four weeks. The order of events is always completely the same. I never know how I got into the hospital, I never know how Sherlock came back or what the accident is, but the earliest memory I'm having of the dream is always in the hospital beside Sherlock's bed. And it always ends in the same way. He dies. Again. And I can't do anything to stop it.
I laid in my bed a warm body beside me. I turned around and recognized that it was Molly. She lay beside me and held my hand. Soon I remembered why she was here. It was the anniversary. The third anniversary of Sherlock's death. Three years since he left me, three years of depression and suicide thoughts, three years in this apartment without him and he didn't came back. Slowly I began to believe that he was dead.
A tear ran down my cheek. I stood up; leaving Molly in the bed to sleep. She had been here for me for three years. She was a gem. All the time I had been unable to do anything and she was so brave. The man she had loved, the man who didn't know how in love she had been with him, who hurt her, was gone forever. Everything he had done to her couldn't have destroyed the love she had to Sherlock. That was the similarity between Molly and me. We both loved him with our whole hearts. In two different ways, but that didn't matter. She knew my pain and tried to relieve it a bit.
I left her in the bedroom; she needed the sleep more than I needed company now. Before leaving her I opened the night table very quietly and took my gun out of it. Then I walked out and closed the door. In the living room I looked out of the window down on Baker Street. It was empty.
"Of course," I thought," it's 3:40 AM on a workday you moron."
I opened the window and the cold air of the night blew in my face. It was refreshing and I enjoyed it as well as I could. It smelled as usually like London, the place I loved the most on earth. When you travel to many places as I did in my carrier as a soldier you learn to love one place and breath everything in it in.
221B became that place for me. Although it tortured me the last three years to live in here. I hadn't thrown anything away that Sherlock had left. It still looked as if he would live here. The skull was still on the mantelpiece, the Cluedo-Board still with a knife stabbed in the wall above it and the most important thing, his chair, hasn't been moved for three years.
I closed the window. My head was clear, I knew what I was going to do now. The gun still lying in my hand I sat down in my armchair. The old one of the two that stood in the living room. The yellow graffiti on the wall right from me got my attention. The holes of Sherlock's shots were still there. Mrs. Hudson never called somebody to fix the wall.
I looked back at the gun lying cold and heavy in my hand. I loaded it. A last time I thought about my family, the part that was alive, so basically my sister Harry. I thought about the people I loved Molly, Mrs. Hudson, Lestrade and even Mycroft, although we had some personal difficulties in the past. And then I thought about Sherlock. That man, that impressed me that much, that man that made me cry, laugh and angry. Would I meet him up there? Would he even be up there? I decided, I would know when it was time.
With that last thought I pointed the gun at my right sleeve and closed my eyes. The trigger felt so elegant at my shaking finger. I knew the feeling I got when I pulled it. I knew the pain of a bullet in your shoulder. Would it be the same pain in the last seconds of your life?
When I was about to pull the trigger I heard a calm voice saying: "What do you think you're doing?" Molly stood right behind me in the kitchen.
"Please, don't... Don't try to put me off."
"John, he wouldn't have wanted this."
"He wasn't aware that he would die first. I don't think he ever thought about what the people would do when he was dead."
"Don't kill yourself. For me."
She came closer, was only one step away. I closed my eyes and had to weep again. The cold metal of the gun still pointed at my sleeve.
"Molly, I can't live in this hell on earth anymore. He is gone. Forever. I saw him jumping. I felt his pulse. He is dead. Every day without him is a wasted day to me.", I said.
"I know.", she sighed.
"I'm having the same dream now for over a month and you know what happens in it? He comes back and then I lose him again. He is just back and he loses all of his memories and the end is always the same, his death. I can't live with it anymore. I see his face everywhere. Now that he is in my dreams every stranger with a turned up collar is him and I want Sherlock back. But now I know he'll never come back and now that I realized this I don't want to be anymore."
"I know.", Molly's voice was soft.
"Then why do you try to put me off?"
She did the last step that she needed to lay a hand on my hand. She pulled my right hand with the gun in it away from my sleeve and took the weapon. Then she unloaded it and let it slide in the pocket of her trousers. Her arms wrapping around my neck she said:"Because you should keep hoping." She kissed the back of my head and left me alone, taking the gun with her.
I remember that I sat in that chair till dawn. Back then, when the sun showed up behind the houses of London, I didn't know that I was going to live out my nightmare.