Triviality
Summary: For she knew (and he knew) that she was a mere triviality; an insignificant nobody. Implied Watson/Mary, can be taken as Sherlock/Watson. Post-Movie.
Mary Morstan is a woman who is used to a routine. Everyday she would wake up, freshen up and dress, before going downstairs, down the staircase, to the Dining Hall, where she would have breakfast with John. Then John would head off to his practice, and she would go occupy herself with something, such as embroidery, or taking a walk in the nearby park. John would then come back in time for dinner, and they would sit in the Dining Hall again, idly chatting about whatever occurred during their day. Then they would head to their bedroom and go to sleep. This routine would repeat over and over again.
But there were times when the cycle would break, would take a different path. It was no surprise that this break in the cycle happened when they were no longer the doe-eyed, happy newlyweds. A month or two after their marriage, she found that the looks that he reserved for her (and only her) had withered and faded away into normal, dull glances. What happened to the fiery spirit in his eye, the gleam, which had made her fall in love with him in the first place? Why did he no longer talk jovially, instead choosing to use clipped tones and awkward silences?
She saw that spark once, when her cousin and her 8-year-old child came to visit (her husband was away on business). It was a duller, toned down version of it, but it was there, nonetheless. She watched as John told Rosaline (watered-down) stories of the cases he used to solve with Mr. Holmes, as Rosaline's mother (Jennifer), watched in amusement.
She wants to see that spark again, so she lets him go. She tells him that he doesn't need to go to his practice just to appease her. She lets him go back to Baker Street, 221B, to seek Mr. Holmes out. When she eats her dinner alone, with the food on the opposite end of the table turning cold; when she lies in bed alone and wakes alone, she wonders if it was the right thing to do, letting him go. Then she remembers that, during the rare times John comes home, he has his gleam back. His soul has been regained (for eyes are windows to the soul).
Sometimes, when she wakes up in a bed with only cold sheets with companions, she would childishly hate Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Hate him for taking John away from her. Then she realizes why Mr. Holmes probably hates her too.
She was the one who took away his soul, after all.
And it was then that she knew (and he knew) that in John's life, she was but a mere triviality; an insignificant nobody.
John Watson might have presented Mary Morstan with his heart, but Sherlock Holmes would forever possess his soul.
End