Disclaimer: I own...uh, well, actually, I do own Sherlock Holmes, along with every single person in the world. Hooray for the public domain! Don't own Sherlock, though, that's the property of the BBC, The Moff and Godtiss.
"If all our life is but a dream
Fantastic posing greed
Then we should feed our jewellery to the sea
For diamonds do appear to be
Just like broken glass to me."
- Northern Downpour, Panic! At The Disco
"It's beautiful," John breathed.
"Must be worth a lot," Lestrade commented, bringing the diamond up to his eye level.
"It's glass. Worthless." Sherlock swept past them, grabbing the 'diamond' from Lestrade. "Unfortunately for him."
John glanced at the body sprawled ungracefully upon the dusty wooden floorboards. "He was killed over that?"
"Obviously." A pause, a short sigh that somehow managed to convey both 'how do you always manage to miss the obvious?' and 'why are you making me waste my time explaining?', then came the usual flurry of genius that spun from Sherlock's mouth with all the power of a tropical hurricane and yet surprisingly more grace.
"Right." John nodded slowly in the silence after. "No, actually, I didn't get any of that. What?"
"The wife!" Sherlock exclaimed. "She was going to leave him, he bought her this," – at this point he thrust the fake diamond towards John and Lestrade – "she realised that it was a fake."
"And…she killed him. Because he bought her a fake diamond."
Sherlock tossed the glimmering glass towards John, who caught it instinctively and turned it over in his hands. Even knowing that it was worthless, it was still as breathtaking as the real thing. As it was slowly rotated, it glittered innocently in the frail rays of light piercing through the gaps in the boards nailed over the glassless windows.
"Look at the bullet hole in the floor. She accidentally discharged the gun, no-one who knows how to handle one would do that," Sherlock was again explaining his brilliance to the world in general. "Therefore, it wasn't her brother. Hands! He often uses guns."
Perhaps it wasn't the material value that made things important. The beauty in broken glass could be compared to that of diamonds if viewed through different eyes. There, standing in a murky, abandoned flat looking down on the corpse of some poor, murdered husband whilst trying – and failing – to keep up with the hundred mile an hour explanations of the world's only consulting detective, that was the broken glass. A life that no-one sane would choose.
A life of broken glass masquerading as diamonds. And yet, John wouldn't want it any other way.