artist's comments: Hello C: Thank you for taking the time to click on this I wrote this a little while ago and decided that I ought to upload it onto here.
I hope you enjoy it C:

Perhaps I should try to explain – though that is all I ever seem to do – where exactly upon I stand, if that makes sense.

I apologise in advance for readers that are keen to explore discourses that pertain mainly to solid fact; this piece of writing is not entirely appropriate to that approach, and after spending far too much time reading John's writing I seem to have inherited his habit of telling a story backwards.

As I alluded to earlier, I am explaining where I stand. Obviously, as you have little context, I could be standing on an upturned bath with a drawing of a bull pup on my head declaring that the end is nigh.

I am not.

I suppose by writing this, I am trying to explain John Watson to myself.

It is a part of my life I have never fully understood – and as one who's business it is to fully understand, this has left a small niggle firmly wedged into the pit of my mind, grinning at my lack of comprehension for it. Possibly if ever I have been short with John, it was this niggle that was bothering me at the time.

Meeting him was so commonplace, I had no cause for alarm. Besides the obvious deductions that I could make about his background, there was nothing to suggest to me that he would be particularly extraordinary in any way.

I can reminisce very easily about the first moment I knew we had developed an understanding that went beyond what I had originally planned.

The shock took me with such force that I still wobble when I think about it now.

He looked up at me, as he often does, with an unwavering gaze, standing amongst the tall grass of a meadow on one of our many jaunts into the countryside. His face was always so set and decisive in the expressions it choose to portray. This was one that I saw often – a mix of disbelief and admiration. Having just solved something that, to others, seemed entirely too complex a knot of thread to know where to start, it was no surprise to me that this was the feeling I had conjured within him, and I sat upon the grass allowing the sun to wash over me. John curled beside me, his head resting on my elbow; and there we lay, in perfect contentment for not a short amount of time.

This was a level of intimacy that I was not unfamiliar with, and became more frequent as time progressed. I must commend John, in an odd sort of way, for the fact that he chose to withheld this from his narrative – not because I think it inappropriate in any way, but how we felt toward one another had little to do with the bare facts.

Late morning sun amongst long, cool grass is one of the few true joys in this world. And evidently John felt a similar way, as after some time I began to notice a light snore shaking his body. I have never felt warmth or fondness within myself as I did at that moment looking upon his sleeping form. I have never experienced action without thought – if ever I do something it is for a particular reason – but at that moment, with nothing to justify it, I curled around him, my arm following the curve of his back and my lips gently brushed against his forehead.

Had I not been too flushed from recent success, I could have easily fallen asleep myself.

A sharp rush of surprise singed through my limbs as I felt his arms slide under my jacket in order to pull himself closer. It seemed I had woken him.

"You feel thin again," he mumbled, "we should walk back into town and find somewhere to get lunch."

Taking a long breath into my lungs and curling around him more, I said, "just a while longer. We'll stay here... just ten more minutes."

I felt him smile.

"But you promise that you will then eat something?"

"Mmmmm," I nodded slowly, eyes still shut.

Over those ten minutes I tried to figure out what it was we were trying to achieve with this level of intimacy. It was like John had eked away a little ledge for him to curl up in over the years that we knew each other.

It started with a smile; then maybe a pat on the shoulder; a hug.

And now we're here, wrapped around one another like children, in the English countryside.

One of the few moments of my life that could ever be described as 'idyllic'.

And who else could I do this with other than John Watson?

So it was then, from legs and arms interlocked, that I knew I could never allow him to tread through life without me.