He chose to stand far away but so that he could still see him. But he had to be careful, because he should not see him. He should never see him again in the next time.
Sherlock stood behind a tree on the graveyard and saw how Mrs Hudson and John slowly walked up to his own grave. Mrs Hudson had flowers in her hand which she slowly put down in front of the gravestone before she looked up to John.
John's eyes looked empty, his face looked empty, even how he stood there just made this feeling of emptiness and sadness visible. For Sherlock, the great deducing and observing machine of the 21st century, it was obviously not ignorable, he could see everything and still his face did not change its expression.
But inside Sherlock, inside the Consulting Detective, some things seemed to change, although he actually wanted to ignore what happened there inside his head. But even one of the most rational thinkers of our time could not hide his feelings before himself. Maybe he was able to easily store them away so that other people around him were not aware of what he thought and above all what he felt.
Feelings…
Sherlock had always tried to divorce himself from feelings, because they had no real use for him. They just distracted him from work and obscured his brilliant mind that he needed to be free to catch some of the most dangerous men in Britain. He had never been some kind of emotional person, no one had ever seen him laughing with great joy or shivering with fear or crying with sadness.
Well, almost no one…
Sherlock looked over to John again who now stood in front of the grave on his own. Sherlock saw how John moved his lips and said something but he was not able to hear it, because he stood too far away. But he did not need it to hear, because he could see what John tried to say. He could see it from his gestures, from his face. Now John took a step forward and touched Sherlock's grave. Sherlock saw this, saw how the brave and strong military Doctor from Afghanistan touched a grave stone with so much care how Sherlock had never really seen from him. John turned away from the gravestone but immediately turned back and again said something to the gravestone but this time with a more begging posture. Sherlock thought to have seen his name in John's movement of his lips but from his position it was difficult to say. Then John covered his face with one of his hands and his shoulders shrugged but they did not stop and it was sometimes slower sometimes faster. He was crying.
Sherlock's breathing actually stopped for the fraction of a second.
John cried. Sherlock had never seen him cry before. Sherlock had seen many things of John but he had never seen tears on his face, there had never been something that brought him so far. Until Sherlock had 'died'. He did not know how John looked as he saw his body lying on the pavement in front of Saint Bart's Hospital but now that he saw this he did not really want to know how John must have looked and felt liked when he saw him lying there. 'Dead'
At least he had spoken to him before he had carried out his plan. It seemed to be the right thing to do. Sherlock did not want to leave John without giving him anything before they see each other again and his words also should help that John would not mourn about him too much. Sherlock wondered if his words might not have effect the opposite…
But he had meant it.
Well, the fact that he was fake was of course not the truth but the last thing he had said to John and how he had said was the absolute truth.
"Good Bye, John."
Sherlock had used this tone in his voice never before and had never used it since.