Post Reichenbach Sherlock and Irene fiction, there's no implied relationship in this fic, yet I hope you like it! It's my first Sherlock fanfiction ever, so please be kind.
I don't claim to own any of these characters.
His picture is all over the papers. "Suicide of a fake genius," the headlines scream, "fraudulent detective takes his own life."
White letters on a black background. The contrast of the colors almost hurts her eyes as she picks up the paper from the newsstand, her fingers with red nails –shorter than the first time she got her hands on this picture- caress the smooth paper. The owner of the newsstand looks at her, and she shakes her head: she's isn't buying anything.
She isn't buying any of those words.
She knows better. She knows never to trust any kind of media, as their only goal is spreading lies.
She believes in Sherlock Holmes.
She believes he's a living legend. Emphasis on living.
She knows he's hiding somewhere, and she thinks about the time she needed to disappear. She knows from experience it's surprisingly easy to disappear in the crowds of London, if only one has the right connections.
She has the right connections, which means it doesn't take her too long to find him.
He doesn't look surprised in the slightest when she turns up at his hiding place, but something tells her he is relieved to see her again.
"Miss Adler," he says, his voice even lower and graver than usual. She sees it as a sign of lack of speech: his vocal chords aren't used to talking anymore.
He's skinnier than she remembers him, and he looks even paler than his body double in the morgue. She knows how it's done, as it's all been done before.
She doesn't ask questions, because she knows he won't answer them. Yet.
"We're not dead," she says, "let's have dinner."
He takes his time. She's never been good at waiting, she's always been able to pressure the other party into getting what she wants, but this time she's willing to wait.
She lets him tells his version of the story, his facial expression never changing as though he is feeling numb. She tells him it's alright to feel remorse for what he has done, for what he is doing, but he waves her remark away with his hand.
She promises she'll believe in him no matter what. He shrugs.
The numbness stays for a while, and she knows better than bringing it up again.
She takes him to America - under an alias of course. He's disguised and no questions are asked. They're fugitives living a lie. She still owns a seventh floor apartment from that one time she just needed to be a face in the crowd. When she opens the door, the layers of dust on the furniture fill their lungs. She opens the window, breathing in the city air.
His eyebrows shoot up and she reads it as a sign of relief -they've escaped.
It would be a lie to say that they start living together.
It would be better to say that they start surviving.
They have to, there's no other choice. She is his lifeline.
She knows about his past – and she quickly realizes he has picked up his smoking habit again when she notices the remains of ash on the window sill in the morning. She's very cautious, and she refuses to get out and get a job for the purpose of keeping an eye on him, making sure he stays clean. She tries too hard to be nice, and it's breaking her up. Sometimes she snaps, and regrets it right after, even though her words hardly even reach his ears.
She knows that he's hurting.
Even though she's damn well aware that he only understands the mechanics of emotions and tries to hide them himself, she knows he's living in pain. His guilt is piling up and he's missing the people he knew as much as he's capable of missing people.
She realizes that he probably doesn't recognize the feeling of loss because he has never cared enough before.
He needs to be forgiven, but there's no one to say sorry to.
He doesn't need to say sorry to her. She owes him more than the other way around.
There are good days and there are bad days.
On a bad day she finds him unable to eat, sleep, or even move. She's given up trying to pretend he's a normal human being, because she knows there is no use in trying.
She starts talking to herself, because she's used having relatively normal conversations with people, but Sherlock doesn't respond.
She can hear herself whispering encouragements as she tries to open the lock of the door with her rusty key, then telling herself that she really ought to see a locksmith. The man living on the other side of the hallway looks around and asks if she needs help in a thick Indian accent. She looks up and shakes her head, muttering to herself that she should to be able to do this.
Their neighbors probably think they're insane.
They're probably right.
Sometimes she picks up girls from the bar down in the street. She does it because she is bored, because she longs back to the thrill but it just isn't the same.
She can't enjoy anything anymore, she just cannot be satisfied, even if she ties them down. Most of the time she just lets them ravish her body, but they're tame and don't leave any bruises.
She's highly aware of her own moans, and once a smile appears on her face as she remembers the time she recorded the text alert noise for the man sitting in the next room.
None of the girls ever stay the night, and after they leave she's just lying in her bed, naked, sometimes drunk, sometimes completely sober. She doesn't know what's worse. In the mornings she feels hung-over either way.
She knows she's only a thread of that one woman she used to be.
She favors dark classical pieces over any kind of modern music.
She knows he's secretly proud when she decides to blast her music at 3 AM to annoy their neighbors. The first time she does it, she swears she can see a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, but it's dark so she isn't completely certain.
Sometimes, when he drives her insane, she puts her headphones in her ears and listens to her iPod, turning up the volume until her ears hurt. Sometimes she just sits in a chair, eyes closed, legs pulled up, and she listens and listens, conducting an orchestra in her mind. It's her method of escaping reality.
She buys him a second hand violin, even though she knows he won't use it. She's right. He looks at it, and doesn't lay a finger upon the instrument.
One night she wakes up, the tones of an unfamiliar tune filling the air. She gets out of bed, slipping into her dressing gown, tiptoeing to the living room. She leans against the door and smiles when she sees his shape standing in the moonlight. When he stops playing and turns around, she's back in her bed, fast asleep.
One morning, he's gone. No note, no clues, yet she knows.
She knows he's gone back to Britain.
She doesn't know whether to feel abandoned or happy because he apparently knows Moriarty's web has fallen. She decides not to try to contact him, and after twenty four hours she already misses his sneering remarks. She finds a piece of paper under her chair, and she realizes it's sheet music. The hastily scribbled down notes tell her it's his own composition.
It's titled T. W.
She immediately knows what those initials mean and that he planted the sheet music there because he knew she would find it.
A few months later she's picked up her life in the United States. She's found a job as a waitress in a restaurant downtown. It's extremely dull work and among her colleagues are some of the dumbest people she has ever encountered, but it's better than doing nothing of importance. She works the late shifts, waving her boss goodbye as she takes the subway home, tired and unsatisfied.
She takes over the American accent. At first she's disgusted to hear herself use the harsh r, but she gets used to it quickly and after a while she doesn't even notice it anymore.
One evening, she's taking a five minute break, and when she checks her phone and sees she's gotten a text from an unknown number. Her smile widens when she sees the directness and the signature. One of her colleagues asks her what is going on, but she ignores the question.
She quits her job the same evening.
When she gets home, she looks at the text again, the letters lighting up from her screen.
"You know where to find me -SH"