Sherlock's homeless network only went so far. John obviously wasn't in London.
He had, of course, gone immediately to 221B. Where else was he supposed to go? It was late, yes, but he couldn't resist.
In his eagerness, even the great detective failed to take certain things into consideration, ignored the data.
Which is why he was surprised to find the entryway repainted a gaudy shade of red (Chinese tradition, often done so to invite good Karma into the home and ward off evil spirits.) and an elaborate wreath hanging on the door (Evergreen. Sombre. Four white bows. Catholic in origin. It's Christmas already?). Why would Mrs. Hudson of all people invest in such superstitious behavior? Was she going through a phase?
The key he had kept for all these years, the one he found himself absentmindedly toying with during times of intense concentration. His last link to his old life. It didn't fit the lock. He fumbled with it for a good ten minutes before he realized.
"Oh."
Somberly, he rang the doorbell.
A young woman answered the door, bouncing a child on her hip. Single. Working two, no,three restaurant jobs. The trace of fruity perfume suggested a babysitter had just left, "Can I help you?"
He couldn't keep the shock out of his face. Dim memories of an orange blanket and crime scene giggles played back like an old movie, "Who are you?"
The young woman frowned. Took a step back. Widened her personal space. Breath quickened. Eyes dilated. Fear.
He couldn't blame her. He hadn't seen a mirror in ages. His dark hair drooped into eyes shadowed and sunken by countless hours of waking and brief moments spent in sleep. Sallow cheeks and chapped lips, a product of his forgetting to tend to his body. Trembling limbs, sweat beading on his lip despite the bitter cold, universal sign of a druggie in withdrawal.
He composed himself a bit, took a step back, "I'm sorry. It's just... Are you the landlady?"
"Yes," Clipped, short, guarded tone. One hand grasping for something behind the door. Pepperspray, most likely. But he wouldn't be surprised if this young, obviously single mother kept a .44 magnum in the household.
"And... Where's Mrs. Hudson? The former landlady?"
"She's gone."
"Gone?" His voice cracked with sorrow.
"Pneumonia's what I heard. Just last winter. Look, I'm sorry, but it's Christmas Eve and I've just gotten home-"
"What about 221B? Is anyone living there? Is there a Joh-"
"221B is now home to the lovely Harold and James Tulley, now if you'll excuse me," She slammed the door in his face.
He stood there a moment. Lost in the cold.
He'd been telling himself over the years that it was silly. To think of a home. Illogical. It was just a flat, nothing more.
But deep down, he knew. It wasn't the flat that was home. Home was the smell of coffee and the crackling of a fireplace. Home was Mrs. Hudson, tittering and pittering and fussing about his skinniness, his rudeness, his sloppiness.
Home was the promise of a good case knocking at the door.
Home was violin notes drifting through the air.
Home was something he'd never thought he had. And, as a result, home was something he never expected to love or lose.
Shut within himself, somewhere he'd never even considered existing, Sherlock knew.
Home was John.
He clenched his fist and turned into the dismal, frozen London streets, melting into the darkness. In 221B, Harold and James Tulley smiled at each over eggnog, laughing along with the merry fire as Christmas Eve drew into Christmas Day.
Even if the homeless network couldn't find John, there were other things to be found. He spent Christmas morning in a stranger's empty bathtub, sleeve turned up, the belt he had used as a tourniquet still wrapped loosely around his arm.
The pale forearm, usually spotted with nicotine patches, was now sporting spots of a different sort.
It was the only way he knew how to grieve.
He had never mourned before. Not when his cold mother had died, nor when his cold father had disappeared, leaving him in the care of a university enrolled Mycroft.
An inhereted flaw, his coldness.
He was a freak.
The arm twitched as its owner dreamt of horrors that had been all too recent. Horrors he had been ignoring.
The stranger's dingy flat vibrated with loud music and raised voices and landing blows and people dancing, but the exhausted, chemical ridden detective slept on through Christmas night.
He didn't stir as a pair of warm arms lifted him out of the basin, and brought him him into a car, where his head drooped onto the shoulder of a rather haggard looking Mycroft.
The driver slid in behind the wheel and turned back toward Mycroft "Where to, Sir?"
"Just take me home," He looked out of the window as the London lights flashed past him like shooting stars. Any other man might have stroked his little brother's hair, put an arm around him, maybe even look at him.
But it would appear that the Holmes brothers were both in possession of a rather frosty genetic code.
Three days later, Sherlock awoke to a room reeking of the aftershave Mycroft favored. Though initially outraged that his brother had been spying on him with public surveillance cameras yet again, Sherlock did see an opportunity. The government does keep an eye on its citizens, does it not?
After bribing Mycroft with his services for a good three weeks, (14 separate cases. Petty things such as finding Marie Antoinette's diamond belt and solving the real Da Vinci code. Child's play.) he had finally procured John's address.
He was living out in the country, working at a small surgery. Sherlock frowned, silently hoping he didn't find another Sarah.
Though Mycroft had offered to fly him there on a jet, Sherlock took the train, one that made frequent stops, partly out of pride and partly out of nerves. He was nervous. Sherlock Holmes, the man who picked apart the spider's web, was nervous.
He wrote it off as a side effect of the drugs and examined his newspaper, attention split between current events and the couple sitting a few seats ahead. As the sun sank beneath the sky, so too did Sherlock sink into the hum of wheels on track. He flexed his trembling hands and longed bitterly for a cigarette to steady them.
It was New Years Eve when the train finally pulled to a stop in the right station. Sherlock waited until everyone left the train, including the young couple: Her with a baby on the way and he waiting to confess to an affair.
Sherlock took his time wandering around the picturesque town, had a visit to the barber's and went through two packs of cigarettes as well as several coffees. He couldn't fight off the nerves that had haunted him since he first stepped foot on that train.
Finally, as he found himself yet again in the dark, Sherlock headed home.
-
As he stood in front of his home, for once his engine-like mind rolled to a halt and his heart took over, thawing itself out in the cold.
The house was nice, Sherlock thought.. Nothing fancy. It possessed a certain dignified grace, an old world charm, stoic and firm.. It was so like John.
The windows were hung with Christmas lights. Sherlock grinned, remembering a Christmas at 221B. John had indulged in Mrs. Hudson's request that they liven the flat up. It's Christmas, John. You should at least try to look like you enjoy it. He'd gone to the store and picked out the cheapest lights he could find, as well as a particularly horrid sweater he wore as he strung them up.
"Well while you're at it, why don't you deck out Kevin over here, make it really festive," Sherlock had said mockingly. John, out of spite, did indeed wind the most colorful lights he had around the horns of Sherlock's second-favorite specimen.
Through a frosty window, Sherlock could see him. His pulse quickened. John hadn't changed much at all. Perhaps a bit more lined and a bit more grey. Sherlock felt somehow responsible for that, and one of those frustrating surges of guilt -the ones he denied having- rose to his throat.
He was reading a book by the fire, wearing a rather horrid sweater. Just as he had been many winters ago. Sherlock watched him as he read, noted every quirk of the lip or furrowing of the brow, soaking in the familiarity that was John Watson.
Then, something drew his attention away from the novel. Sherlock saw his lips form the word "Mary." He watched in horror as a woman, red haired and ruby lipped, came into view. He watched in horror as she pressed those ruby lips to John's mouth.
He took an involuntary step towards the door, then stopped and turned back toward John.
Those new lines on his face... They weren't frown lines. They were the creases that deepened when he smiled.
Sherlock look from John to the woman named Mary.
"Oh."
He couldn't stay here. Couldn't barge in on John's life. Not when he smiled in that way Sherlock had never seen before. Not when his eyes twinkled up at this warm woman with the pretty face.
Sherlock wasn't someone happy people associated with. For the first time, he realized that perhaps John had been just as broken as him once.
But not anymore.
Sherlock may have healed John's limp, but he could never hope to heal his heart. May have saved his life, but not his spirit. If anything, he had crushed it.
And so, he hardened his own heart once more. As the snow began to drift down in lazy flakes, he whispered to the wind, "Happy New Year, John," hoping the air would carry it to him, fill his lungs and never leave.
Quickly, before his resolve left him and he barged into John's life yet again, he turned and disappeared into the winter's night.
John turned towards the window and peered furtively into the darkness, wishing for a miracle.
As Mary counted down the seconds to New Year with the radio, his smile slipped and his eyes dimmed, glazed with memories of the past.
She let out a cheer as clock struck 12. She dodged down into the cellar for a bottle of champagne.
John sighed and walked toward the window, staring out into the dark, hoping against hope that somewhere in the world, a clever detective with a funny hat was coming home to him.
"Happy New Year, Sherlock."