Misinterpretation: Stand-Alone Fic OR Sequel to 'All Through The Night'
Word Count: ~2100
A/N: This is a LONG overdue sequel to my original fic 'All Through The Night', but this can easily be read as a stand-alone fic, no need to go read the technical first-part, although I would appreciate it!
Background: post-Reichenbach reunion (3-4 months after, I suppose), slightly established John/Sherlock (by slightly, I mean early in the relationship, lots of boundaries, things like that). I wrote this at 1:00 am, please be gentle in your reviews!
Warnings: I have to warn you that I was half asleep when I wrote this and it took me two hours. Forgive any terrible grammar, spelling, or punctuation errors, please!
"Sleep with me tonight."
John slowly looked up from the medical report he was attempting to read through on his laptop and met Sherlock's hazel-blue-brown-green-always-changing eyes. The two men were sitting across from each other at the table; John reading a report on a elementary-aged girl who had been diagnosed with some strange disease he didn't recognize, and Sherlock sitting across from him, sipping coffee out of an oversized mug.
"Excuse me?" John asked, his right hand still positioned over the touch pad on his computer, left bent into a fist and supporting his drooping head (it was only 8 in the morning, after all).
"Sleep with me tonight," repeated Sherlock in the same tone of voice: monotonous, low, rough, yet sexy.
John swallowed hard and tore his eyes away from Sherlock, focusing his attention back on the medical report. "Is this some kind of social, verbal experiment?" There was a long pause.
"No, no, of course not, I don't—I'd never experiment on you, John." John felt the corners of his mouth turn up slightly. He was special to Sherlock.
"Well, then what is it? A test? Oh, can you get me a cup of coffee?" John added as he noticed Sherlock standing up. He lazily scrolled down the word document, his eyes out of focus and his brain not registering a word of what he was supposed to be reading.
Sherlock silently rose from his seat over to the coffee mug and poured the steaming brown liquid into an oversized mug similar to his own. "No, not a test. It's an instruction." John frowned slightly, still staring at his computer.
"Instruction?" he heard the mug clink gently against the table as the smell of coffee filled his nostrils.
Sherlock took his seat back across from John and positioned his long fingers artfully in front of his face as he usually did when he thought. "A suggestion, then? It would be mutually beneficial if you would sleep with me this evening. I have everything you'd need in order to be comfortable."
John nearly choked on the coffee he was sipping. "To be comfortable!" he hissed, closing his laptop with reasonable force. "Sherlock, just yesterday you told me to 'control myself' when I tried to kiss you for longer than three seconds at the restaurant. And now you want me to sleep with you?"
Sherlock was frowning slightly, his long fingers falling into his lap. He leaned slightly across the table and began speaking slowly. "I'm not quite seeing the problem here, John. It's really not that big of a deal, I don't find it to be, at least. It would be a nice, slow, easy advancement in our relationship, something the both of us could handle. If either got uncomfortable with that step, we could easily stop and-"
"Sherlock!" John near-hollered, his voice cracking slightly. His eyes were wide with confusion, horror, and even the slightest bit of excitement. "Do you not realize what you just said? You're implying that sex is 'not that big of a deal'!" John added extra emphasis around the quote of Sherlock's words, waving his hands dramatically beside his head.
There was a long, painful silence before John cleared his throat uncomfortably. Sherlock hadn't said a word, but only stared at John, his brow slightly furrowed and lower lip drawn in at the corner as though he were biting at it.
"Look, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to reject you, but Sherlock, honestly? You've been back here, what? A few months at most, I don't think we are quite ready to have sex when we haven't even gone beyond—"
"John, I didn't mean sex. I meant sleeping together, literally. Sleeping. In the same bed. Together."
"...Oh. So, then, by comfortable, you meant-"
"I have extra pillows and blankets. My bed is big enough for two."
"And when you said 'mutually beneficial' you just meant-"
"We'd both sleep. We'd spend more time with each other. We'd advance our relationship."
John took a long, long sip of his coffee despite the scalding liquid burning his throat and tongue before sighing. Sherlock was painfully oblivious sometimes. He was, hands down, the smartest man he knew, but little things like common phrases and the solar system and names of people he had known for years didn't seem to be important enough in his mind to keep clear. He was gorgeous and beautiful and John often, far too often, thought he was perfect. He had to remind himself that he wasn't.
"Sherlock, ninety nine percent of the time, when a person uses the phrase 'sleeping together', it is a more socially appropriate reference to sex," John said softly. Sherlock frowned harder and leaned back into his chair, crossing his arms across his chest.
"That is ridiculously nonsensical. Why not just say 'sex'? There is nothing risque about the word. It's a completely normal human action." John nodded slowly, not awake enough to bring up the fact that for being a 'completely normal human action' and 'nothing risque', Sherlock sure seemed to avoid the topic of the word alone at all costs.
"And it makes it completely impossible to say a purely innocent phrase without sending the wrong message!" There was a slight pause. "Let me try this again. John, would you care to sleep beside me in my bed this evening, clothed, minus any sexual relations?"
John snorted and set down his coffee mug, leaning across the table to press a kiss against Sherlock's cheek. "I'd be honored to sleep beside you in your bed this evening," he whispered against Sherlock's reddening face.
Sherlock turned quickly and caught John's lips in a chaste kiss. It was painfully brief, yet still perfect, given the circumstances of their relationship. "Go to work, I'll see you this evening," he whispered back. John could feel himself smiling into the kiss as butterflies rattled his stomach in anticipation for the evening.
John wasn't sure what was so thrilling about the idea of sleeping (literally) with Sherlock. He'd slept in close conditions hundreds of times in Afghanistan. When push came to shove and the injured needed beds, he was often forced to share a cot with another full-grown man or fit six men and sleeping bags in a three man tent. He never found anything slightly romantic or sensual about it, but then again, he never found men romantic or sensual until he met Sherlock.
John had slept (literally and figuratively) with women before, too, and even then he never quite found what was so thrilling about it, the actual sleeping part, that is. Sex was sex, and sex was great. But the afterwords never really gave him the feelings he expected to get. Cuddling was not something that John particularly enjoyed.
That evening, though, John tried to keep an open mind as he brushed his teeth in front of the mirror, paying special attention not to drip a saliva/toothpaste mix onto his shirt as he often did. In fact, he wore an almost brand-new pale shirt and freshly cleaned checkered trousers. John usually only slept in pants, but given the fact that he would be sharing a bed with Sherlock, he decided a little modesty would do no harm.
Plus, he wasn't sure Sherlock was ready for that yet. He wasn't sure he himself was ready for that. A lack of clothes meant more skin touching which often lead to various other things.
John finished up his evening routine and exited the bathroom, nearly running over Sherlock as he did so, who was standing inches from the door, eyes on the clock down the hallway.
"Really, John? Fifteen minutes? You're going to bed, not a wedding." John frowned and reached out to smack his arm, but Sherlock's reflexes were too fast and caught it mid-air. "Good try. Take whichever side of the bed you prefer, I don't care. I'll be there in about five minutes."
John felt his stomach turn as he slipped into Sherlock's room, the light dimmed in the corner setting an uncomfortably romantic vibe. John toyed with the idea of turning it off all the way, but he was sure Sherlock would deduce something out of that and ended up just leaving it on and sliding into the left side of the bed.
Sherlock's bed felt no different than his own; same level of firmness, same familiar chill of the mattress, same thick blankets. But, at the same time, it was so different. It smelt entirely of Sherlock. John wondered when he last washed the sheets, but didn't care. It smelt like him; cinnamon and vanilla and mint and pine and flawed perfection. At once, John relaxed and let himself sink in the mattress.
When the door finally creaked open and John heard subtle footsteps toeing across the room, he was almost too tired to register the movement. He cracked an eye open to view Sherlock, who was tampering with the fan in nothing but a pair of blue stripped pyjama trousers that hit right at his ankle. John felt a little over dressed, but couldn't bring himself to strip off the shirt.
After the fan was set on the lowest setting and the light had been turned off, John felt a weight on the right of the bed. "John?" a quiet voice whispered into the darkness.
"Yeah, m'awake," he murmured, moving a bit more off to the side to make extra room for Sherlock. There was a little adjusting and shifting as Sherlock's bed wasn't quite big enough for two men to sleep on without touching each other (John was sure Sherlock knew this before suggesting they sleep together), but they managed to make it work.
There was a long period of silence in the darkness, where Sherlock stared at John and John kept his eyes closed, despite being painfully awake and aware of the closeness of their bodies.
"John?" Sherlock whispered again. John's eyes flickered open and he turned on his side to look at Sherlock, their faces inches apart.
"Hmm?" he asked, his voice weak and tired.
"Touch me."
John's eyes widened along with Sherlock's as he realized what he had said.
"No! God, no, sorry. Not like that. Just, put your hand or arm on me. In some non-sexual way. I don't really see the point in us sharing a bed if it isn't pushing the boundaries on our relationship," Sherlock tried to quickly clarify.
John thought for a moment, then nodded, although slightly disappointed (yet relieved) that Sherlock didn't mean it in 'that way'.
"Right, yeah, right. Should I just, uh..." John's voice trailed off as he awkwardly swung an arm over Sherlock's mid-torso. Sherlock was surprisingly warm, but still rigid, and his body tensed up at the contact. "No, then?"
Sherlock shook his head. "No, this is fine. Really, fine. Just a bit awkward. Not really comfortable, is it?" John shook his head in agreement. It was terribly uncomfortably, his arm wasn't nearly long enough to wrap around Sherlock's waist comfortably from the distance between them.
"Right, well, let's try this. Roll over, bend your knees a little." John did this, his heart racing in anticipation as to what Sherlock was going to do. He felt Sherlock's warm body press against his back and quickly adjusted once he realized Sherlock was trying to spoon him.
"Good?" Sherlock said after a minute of adjusting and shifting.
"Yeah, good, you?" John asked, praying Sherlock returned the words. He was more than good. He was spectacular. He had never been so perfectly comfortable in his life. The combination of the entire length of Sherlock's body pressed against his back, Sherlock's wonderful vanilla/cinnamon/mint/pine scent capturing him, the warmth radiating off of him...it was all quite wonderful.
"I'm fantastic, John. How do I put this? You're very...cuddly?" John let out a loud chuckle and felt Sherlock's chest shake a little against his back. He moved his hand around blankly in the darkness before finding Sherlock's available hand and wrapping his own hand around it, bringing it up to his chest.
"I'm glad. But, I don't really see the whole point of sleeping together if we don't sleep."
Sherlock's deep laugh echoed in his ear, sending chills down his spine."Goodnight, John."
"Goodnight, Sherlock," he replied. In truth, though, John didn't fall asleep for another hour. He drew circles with his thumb around the back of Sherlock's hand. He brought it up to his mouth and pressed kisses as far down his arm as he could reach. Eventually, he turned over in Sherlock's arms and pressed their foreheads together, smiling when he noticed the corners of Sherlock's mouth flickering up for a brief moment.
The best part?
John had never slept better in his life.
A/N: Just a cute little fluffy piece I promised a few of you guys! Reviews make me SO happy, you have no idea. Please review :)