It's the third day in a row he's come to Barts, loitering by the side entrance with his violin and a book. Sometimes he plays, but this area sports more surveillance than most so busking is difficult. The lack of funds is set to become a problem rather soon - he should really go back to hanging about one of the tube stations, a street corner or honestly anywhere else.
But... he doesn't want to go somewhere else. He wants to see John again.
Pathetic as it is, Sherlock finds he genuinely enjoys the company of the easily-impressed medical student. John seems convinced that Sherlock is some sort of savant, endlessly awestruck by even the simplest of observations. It's a marked change from home, where he'd always been second-best to Mycroft no matter what he noticed or accomplished. And certainly different from Vincent, who couldn't care less what Sherlock does so long as he continues to identify undercover policemen and comes up with new strategies to thwart the Met's ever-pathetic anti-drugs crusade.
Ugh, speaking of drugs. Sherlock leans his head back against the (rather uncomfortable) armrest of their usual public bench, blinking blearily into the dull haze of early-morning fog stretching like an endless abyss above his face. That batch of coke had been... unexpectedly potent. He'd stupidly mixed up a hit before testing the purity, overshot the correct dose by an absurd margin and now lay quietly willing his uncooperative body to stop trying to work itself into a seizure. How long until John is due out? Fifteen minutes? Ten? Fuck, he's not even sure how long he's been lying out here. His brain feels frozen; trapped in a block of crystalline ice. Attempting to keep track of the time is pointless because the concept of time has lost all meaning.
Seconds or minutes or centuries pass. He's staring thoughtlessly into the fog (which has begun to thin into mist with the rays of a slowly-rising sun) when a face appears above him.
"Oh," he says blankly. It takes a few seconds longer than usual, but he quickly identifies the boyish features and sandy brownish-blond hair of his new medical acquaintance. "Hello John."
John is staring down at him with a strange expression. Some odd mixture halfway between disappointment and exasperation. With perhaps just a hint of disturbed fascination. Sherlock blinks once and wonders how dilated his pupils are. Enormous, probably. He takes a stab at guessing the exact size based on the relative brightness of the still-lit streetlamp near the stairs, but quickly gives up when he realises he doesn't care.
Above him John heaves a resigned sigh. "Guess I probably should've known," he mutters. Difficult to pinpoint the emotion - flat, unsurprised. Not quite disappointed... but very close to it.
Disappointment... yet another emotion Sherlock has precious little experience with. Not because he's never done anything to disappoint anyone, lord no - he is, after all, currently lying on a public bench whilst utterly off his face on cocaine. It's difficult to get much more disappointing than that. But his predilection toward making astoundingly poor decisions has never been a problem before, because until now nobody has ever expected anything differently of him. Amongst his siblings Sherlock is defined by his insanity. Mycroft is perfect. Enola is charming. Sherlock is... strange.
For as long as he can remember he's been the 'odd one'. Prone to getting stuck in trees, tangled in poison oak or trapped in cramped spaces he should never have been exploring in the first place. People expect him to do stupid, absurd things. Hell, if Mycroft were to find him now - high as a kite and more or less incapable of coherent thought - he'd never be disappointed. Annoyed, most likely, and perhaps a bit smug (because even though the older man won't admit it Sherlock knows he's been predicting this outcome for years). But disappointed? No, never.
John, though... John looks genuinely let down. And it's strange, because despite the massive cocaine buzz Sherlock is finding himself feeling somehow... remorseful? He hadn't meant to upset the man. Hadn't meant to do anything at all, really, besides stave off withdrawal for a few more hours. Getting massively high had been an honest mistake.
"I'm sorry," he hears himself mumble. "Messed up the dose, more pure than I thought. M'not usually so..." he trails off with a vague wave of his hand, which flops back down over his stomach as the movement is too much bother. He tries a shrug instead. "Sorry."
John stares at him with that crestfallen look for a few seconds more. If he were any closer to sober Sherlock would be sinking in on himself with guilt. As it is he feels a faint twinge of something unpleasant, but past the surge of dopamine nothing is as bad as it could be. He's just opening his mouth to apologise again (always easiest, when he has no idea what to do - just keep saying 'sorry' until things are alright again) when John's face softens into a small, bemused smile.
"You're really out of it, huh?" he asks. His voice is still a bit melancholy but distinctly light in tone. And that's... so very strange.
"You're not angry?" Sherlock responds blankly. It occurs to him that perhaps John simply doesn't know the appropriate reaction. How many drug addicts can a medical student know, after all? So he tries to explain. "You're supposed to be angry. And then give up and leave me to, er... forge my own sordid demise, I think he said."
"Who said?" John inquires, looking bafflingly not-angry as he lightly prods Sherlock's legs out of the way to free space to sit down.
"Mycroft," Sherlock mumbles. He blinks and raises his head to try and see John better. Can't, not from this angle. He'll have to sit up. The process takes only a few seconds but it feels like forever.
"Your brother?" John asks curiously. "He said that?"
Finally the junior doctor's face pulls into the correct expression of disappointed anger. Only... it doesn't seem to be directed at Sherlock at all. How confusing.
"Something like that," Sherlock replies after a moment to get his bearings. His head is swimming a bit - heart rate's too fast, probably, messing with his blood pressure. "I wasn't entirely coherent at the time so I don't precisely recall the exact words. It's Mycroft though so they were probably a load of spurious bullshit wrapped up in a ball of condescension so thick you'd need an oil drill to reach the bloody point of it all."
John snorts in amusement, then shakes his head with a small laugh. "You've got a real way with words, Sherlock."
Sherlock blinks. Glances sidelong at John. Was that a... compliment? He thinks it might possibly have been... but then that might just be the chemicals making him over-optimistic. He reminds himself to always expect the worst. Was probably sarcasm, he thinks, and he just missed it. Nobody actually likes it when he talks.
It occurs to him that he should respond with some sort of comment, but by the time he remembers how conversations are meant to work it's been well over a minute and the time for a reply has passed. John is leaning back against the backrest of the bench now, staring into the middle distance with a contemplative expression on his handsome face. Sherlock doesn't really know what to do, so he settles for drawing his legs up to his chest and resting his chin on his knees while he watches the man beside him. John is really quite fascinating, he thinks, for an Ordinary Person. As he stares he feels the creeping frost of cocaine begin to take hold of his brain once more.
"It's rude to stare, you know," John remarks after a few moments. Or centuries? The world is beginning to freeze again. Time makes very little sense.
Sherlock blinks. (Very slowly, it seems to him, but he's sure the speed was normal.)
"If you were interested in appropriate social interaction you shouldn't have initiated an ongoing association with a maladjusted street busker," he hears himself say. Never really made the conscious decision to utter any of that, but it's fine because it came out well regardless. His brain is astoundingly good at making him sound coherent even when he's feeling anything but.
John laughs again. "Good point," he concedes. Glances over to Sherlock with a smile. Smiling... why is he smiling? Sherlock finds himself growing very confused. People shouldn't smile at him, not like that. Not in a friendly way.
"Why did you?" he asks, voice coming out more lost and plaintive than he'd intended.
"Why did I what?"
"Associate with me," Sherlock clarifies with a slight frown of annoyance at John's inability to follow his thought process. "You keep returning. Why?"
John shoots him a strange, sidelong look. "I could ask you the same thing."
Sherlock opens his mouth... but he has no reply. Nothing he could say, anyway. He returns because he wants to, because John is the first pleasant company he's had in... well in ever, really. And because despite all protests to the contrary Sherlock is in fact quite alarmingly vulnerable to the common human condition of loneliness.
But John... John has friends, and colleagues, and work and a family and people who care for him. Sherlock can read it all over his face, his clothes, his mannerisms. John isn't alone, isn't desperate. So why...?
"I associate with you because I like you," John says suddenly, cutting into Sherlock's thoughts. "Isn't that enough?"
Sherlock frowns again. Something deep in his subconscious tells him to argue - tells him that nobody likes him. It's a trick or a joke and he should be wary, should put up his guard, or leave. Should drive John away before the man's inevitable betrayal cuts another scour into the already-fragile landscape of his psyche.
But he doesn't do anything. The impulse is overpowered - whether by the cocaine or something else, he can't tell. Instead he feels his face shifting into a small smile.
"I suppose it is," he concedes.
"Well good then," John says. "Because I'm buying you lunch again today, and I don't feel like having a philosophical discussion on why."
Sherlock nods, then wrinkles his nose. "Not turkey this time," he mutters. "I don't like turkey."
John barks out a short laugh. "You don't? Then why'd you eat it yesterday?"
"Because you brought it to me."
John blinks, looks over to him. Sherlock turns his head to meet his gaze.
A second's pause... and they both smile.