More often than you would expect, you see curious folk in the library. Maybe it's something about London's Grimmauld Library's certain mystique that draws them here like cops to a crime scene. The elderly folks that look as if they wouldn't remember how to get home again, the young teens who cluster by the comic books, and toddlers who traipse about squashy armchairs as if they were in a candy shop. Whatever whimsical aura this quaint old library has, I know it has been responsible for keeping me working here for the past year or two. Not that a struggling young author needs much of an excuse when they find a consistent paycheck.
I check my watch, thirty minutes until my lunch break. Work's been slow, not many patrons have stopped to ask for a librarian's help finding material, preferring to tackle the labyrinth of bookshelves on their own. One young man in particular has been here for hours, surrounded by enough books to entertain a small army. He'll skim a few pages before setting a book aside and picking up a new one. He's of the tall sort, tall and lanky, clothed in a pair of fading jeans and black T-shirt. A beanie sits precariously atop his curly dark hair, and as if he senses I'm watching him, he promptly turns to face the opposite way.
Next to me, my colleague Rashida snaps her gum loudly and impatiently stares at the clock. She always dresses in clothes fit for the dumpster, looking as if she'd been dipped in tar with the black clothes and inky hair that I'm certain is naturally blonde.
"Has anyone helped that man over there, yet?" I ask, and she shrugs her shoulders noncommittally.
"Don't think so, darling." Rashida says, her accent warping 'darling' into 'dah-ling.' "But he doesn't look like a chap who wants to be bothered, if you catch my drift."
She pauses, staring outright at the tall young man without even a hint of embarrassment, who at this point has moved to one of the library's overstuffed armchairs. "But I wouldn't mind 'helping' him myself, if you know what I mean," she waggles her pierced eyebrows suggestively.
I frown. "What?"
Rashida sighs. "You need to get out more, dah-ling."
"So, does this mean you're going to help him?" I ask, pushing my glasses up my nose.
"Don't do that," Rashida smacks my hand. She seems certain I lack all the social skills of a normal human being. "You look like a complete dork already."
She looks at me for a bit, drumming black fingernails against our shared help desk. "You go help him, if you're so keen."
I quail a little at the suggestion. "Why?"
"You said he needed help, go help him. You're a librarian, for god's sake." Rashida cuffs me on the back encouragingly. "Get your act together, you're a disgrace to book-shelvers everywhere."
I frown. Something about that man over there intimidates me.
"You go over there and talk to him. He won't bite." Rashida says insistently. "If you don't, I'll yell at him to come over here. Loudly."
As if there's any other kind of yelling other than loud yelling. I stand up hurriedly, knocking my chair over. To my dismay, it attracted a number of "shhs!" and curious stares. I could sense Rashida's quiet fit of giggles behind me.
"Go on," she makes a shooing motion.
Squaring my shoulders, I approach the tall young man. Something about his face looks familiar, but I can't place it. Someone I knew from college? No, it's not that. Maybe I had seen him in the papers.
"Um-" I begin. Without looking up, he responds immediately. "No, I don't need help. I have everything I need right here."
"Oh." I say, and spout out the next thing that comes to mind. "You've left quite a few books on the floor."
He raises his eyebrows, but still doesn't look up from his book. He sounds rather bored. "So I have."
Unsure of what to do, I stand there for a few seconds. Finally, he glances up from what he's reading and gestures at the books strewn about. "You could pick them up. That's your job, isn't it?"
He's making it quite clear that my very presence is annoying him. Since he's so engrossed in his reading, I stick my out my tongue.
He looks up immediately, his eyes like ice. I flush scarlet. I beat a quick escape to get a book cart to pick up the young man's books, which consist of heavy tomes about the solar system.
"You know," I say, trying to use my best librarian voice. "If you're interested in the solar system, there's a book by Stephen Hawking that might interest you."
"What makes you think I'm interested in the solar system?" He asks, raising his eyebrows as he looks up from Our Universe, Wormholes to Super Novae.
I look at him incredulously. "You've been reading about it for hours. Do you need assistance finding something that might actually interest you, or do I need to bring in Carl Sagan to inspire just a modicum of interest?"
"Oooh, sarcasm." He rolls his eyes. "How original."
He checks his watch. "I was waiting for someone, but if they haven't come by now, they're not coming at all today."
Hah, I chuckle inwardly, making a mental note to tell Rashida he's got a girlfriend.
Standing suddenly, he offers his hand in a handshake. For a moment, there's something other than piercing clarity in his eyes, probably the closest he ever gets to a faraway look. I shake his hand uncertainly.
"If someone named Dr. John Watson comes, tell him that someone much wishes to see him this Wednesday, at 9:00 am." The strange young man instructs, very serious. "He's a…dear friend of mine, and I haven't seen him in a while."
"I haven't seen him in a very, very long time…."
_()_
He hadn't had to use his cane in ages, but now John Watson stood at an awkward angle in front of London's Grimmauld Library, like a painting hung crooked from its nail. Whatever had cured his awkward limp, it had faded a few weeks after Sherlock's funeral. Life had become boring, dreadfully so, and he had considered signing up for the service again. His current life was going nowhere, boring job, no girlfriend, and a flat all to himself. It was hateful, drab, and dull.
Pushing through the Grimmauld Library doors, John headed for the front desk, and the clomp of his cane alerted the librarian to his presence. She was a young woman, with brown hair cut short in a bob.
"What can I help you with?" She asked, smiling kindly.
John read the name placard on her desk, Hazel Kenworthy. "Hazel, is it? I was, erm, looking for information on psychosomatic limps?"
"Of course," she stood and disappeared into the labyrinth of warmly lit bookshelves. John heard the creaky wheels of a ladder, and then quiet footsteps as she returned, loaded down with three thick books of varying lengths. She lay them out on the desk and summarized each one. One was a dull looking dissertation, another a self-help book, and the third a guide consisting of basic information and recovery statistics.
"If you're looking for something to help you get over a psychosomatic problem, the third option is probably your best bet." Hazel was being polite, but John knew she was looking at his leg. Her concern, however, sounded genuine. "Therapy would help, I imagine."
"Bloody therapy-sorry, don't even get me started." He gave her a strained expression. "I'll check out all three."
"Sure," she said, opening the checkout window on her computer. She smiled apologetically at him. "Didn't catch your name…."
"'Course. Watson, John Watson."
Her head jerked up suddenly, looking rather intrigued. "You wouldn't happen to be a doctor, would you?"
"Yeah, I was an army doctor," John said, feeling apprehensive. It had been a while since someone who read his blog had stopped him to ask him about Sherlock and their cases, seeing as the Sherlock hubbub had died down abruptly after his suicide.
"Brilliant!" she said, clapping her hands together and beaming. "I thought he was nutters, when I first met him, sounding so certain that you'd come around. He wants to meet you here, 9:00 am, this Wednesday."
"I'm sorry, who?" John asked, frowning in puzzlement.
Hazel shrugged, her grin fading regretfully. "He didn't give me a name. Just said he was an old friend who hadn't seen you in a while."
"An old friend….." John muttered, mulling it over. Picking up his books, he thanked Hazel and left Grimmauld in a considerably more cheerful mood than he had entered it.
It took him awhile to realize he had forgotten his cane.
_()_
"What's going on?"
"Hmm?" I murmur, looking up from paperwork on my desk at Rashinda.
"You know what I mean. This morning when I told you to re-categorize the manga, and you just smiled. I know you're a book dweeb, but no one is ever that happy about categorizing weird Japanese comics. You've said yourself you hate them. So why are you in such a bleeding good mood?"
"Oh shut up, Rashy." I beam, taking amusement from Rashinda's confused expression. "It's almost time."
"Time for what?" She sputters. But I choose not to answer, because at that moment, the Grimmauld Library doors swing open, and the strange young man with dark curly hair enters. He doesn't deign to look at me, instead heading straight for the chair he had occupied previously.
"You told me he had a girlfriend!" Rashinda accused. So she does remember him.
I look at her, confused. "What do you mean-" suddenly her reasoning hits me, why I'm so cheerful that morning. "No, no, no, he's not here for me. 'Course not. He set up a meeting with an old friend."
"Oh."
She tries to return to her papers, but I know her. She hates missing any excitement. Rashinda grins slowly at me. "Mind if I watch too? This library can get so dreadfully boring."
"Just be, I dunno, unobtrusive." I tell her, hushing her with my finger. I hold back a smile. It's hard for some smartass goth to be unobtrusive, but I thought I'd ask.
Once more the Grimmauld Library door swing open, and in walks John Watson. It takes him a grand total of five seconds to locate his "old friend," and when he does, time stops.
_()_
The tea John had ordered from Speedy's began to grow cold in his hand, but he just couldn't find the desire to finish off the rest of it. Thoughts swilled through his mind like the last dregs in his tea cup. Was the mysterious friend Sarah? She was one of his longer-lasting girlfriends, and he hadn't seen her in ages…Or maybe one of Sherlock's clients, Henry Knight, that young, rich bloke who lived out on the moor. He should have asked Hazel for more details.
The library doors swing open as they usually do, scraping slightly against the carpet floor, making a sound almost like hushed whispers. Watson's footsteps sound unnaturally loud as he walks through the door, and the blood screams through his head as he looks around.
His eyes widen.
His heart stops.
His cup of tea from Speedy's crashes to the floor.
"But…You're dead."
John could have stood there for an eternity in Grimmauld Library's lobby, staring with abject disbelief at the person he thought gone. But Sherlock wasn't one for sentiment. No, of course not. He broke the silence with his customary diplomacy and tact.
"Clearly I am not dead. I'm sitting right in front of you, talking to you." He gestures impatiently at the squashy armchair opposite. "Care to join me?"
John collapses into the proffered chair. He squeezes his eyes shut, and then opens them, blinking rapidly. "I saw, you, Sherlock, die. Right in front of me. You fell of a building, I saw it!"
"Well, that was a while ago, Watson. I'm better now." Sherlock smiles in that antagonizing way of his. "Do try and keep up."
"You certainly haven't changed a bit." Watson mutters, rubbing his forehead.
"Hmmm?" Sherlock asks offhandedly. He flips through a few newspapers to his left, scanning the headlines. Sighing heavily, he sets them down again with a swish. "Still nothing of interest."
Watson eyes his friend wearily. "So…that's it? You're back and that's all you're going to say?"
Sherlock looks genuinely confused. "What? What do you expect me to say?"
"I dunno…how about sorry?"
"Sorry." Sherlock says promptly without any thought. He eyes his companion for a few moments. "What am I apologizing for?"
The shorter man threw his hands up in the air. "I don't know! Maybe the fact you faked your own death without telling me! Me, Sherlock, your best fr….I don't know, I really just don't know. I thought…"
"You thought that because you were my greatest friend, and had accompanied me on a number of abnormal adventures, that you had a right to know of my faked suicide?" Sherlock surmises, steeping his fingers together. "Well, that's a rather outdated sense of friendship, isn't it?"
"Is it?!" Watson exclaims, tempted to once more throw his hands in the air. "What's your new 'sense of friendship,' then, if you're so educated?"
"I thought a good friend, such as yourself, would understand my reasons. You see, it's one thing to fake one's own death, but it's quite another to have other people believe it. You were quite instrumental in that belief. Wouldn't it be difficult to write your precious blog without truly believing that I was dead?"
Watson was silenced for a few moments. He stares at his friend, not quite comprehending.
"What you wrote was….stirring. Much better than your usual dramatized drivel. It was a great thing, your unshakable loyalty, the way you always…you always thought I was genuine." Sherlock pauses for a second, and sincere emotion crosses his features. Blink, and you could've missed it. Voice modulated once more, he continues. "That's why I didn't think the sentiment 'sorry' was quite appropriate. I….I thought it was much more appropriate, given the circumstances, to thank you."
A charged silence hung in the air.
"Thank you, John Watson, thank you for being a great friend. Thank you so much."
-The End-
Author's Note: My version of Sherlock and John's reunion, (very) loosely based off of the Conan Doyle version. The addition of Hazel the librarian was to experiment in different POVs, as I tend to write in the 3rd person all the time. Sorry if she was distracting. As always, thanks for reading and I hoped you enjoyed!