Disclaimer: Sadly, I don't own Sherlock. The story title is borrowed from Michael Nyman, it's one of the pieces from the soundtrack of "The Piano".
My thanks, as always!
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The Heart Asks Pleasure First
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Part 3: Technicalities
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After breakfast, Sherlock follows John into the kitchen: "Where did you put my equipment?" he asks.
"It's all in a box," John replies, "neatly wrapped up and labelled by Mrs Hudson. She's put it in the basement." He's fairly certain that their landlady never went through with her plan to donate it to a school, though he hasn't set foot in 221C once.
"Hm," Sherlock's gaze roams over the shelves; slowly, he ambles on into the living room. He looks at things, letting their familiarity emphasizing the feeling of being home, but the only item he actually touches is the violin.
"Better not play it yet," John advises, "Mrs Hudson will hear you and probably get a heart attack." He sounds completely calm now.
Running his index finger along the smooth wood, Sherlock smiles ever so briefly: "I won't."
John joins him at the window: "She'll be coming up anyway," he says. "She's been looking in on me every day. Well, whenever I was here." She may actually have saved him from starving during those first few weeks, which albeit he wisely doesn't mention.
Sherlock is glad that Mrs Hudson was there, just as he is glad that John didn't move out permanently.
"Should I go down to see her?" he now wonders aloud; John is better at judging these things than he is.
"No, definitely not." John frowns: "I should prepare her first." He looks up at Sherlock: "And you should be in bed anyway."
"You weren't so adamant about that yesterday," Sherlock grumbles.
"I didn't know half of it yesterday," John counters. "And in all fairness- the circumstances were rather unfavourable, don't you think?"
"Maybe. I'm sorry for springing it on you like that."
"Yeah. It's what you do. We don't want to spring it on Mrs Hudson, however."
Another "we": Sherlock feels vaguely compelled to count them.
Gently, John pushes Sherlock in the direction of the bedroom: "Off you go. I'll quickly do the dishes, then I'll join you."
"In bed?"
"On the bed."
"Oh. I'll be on the bed as well, then."
"No, you won't. You will be in bed, as ordered by your doctor."
"But I'm not really ill, why can't I stay on the bed? Or on the sofa?" John stares at him; Sherlock might not be feeling ill, but he looks far from healthy. He knows better than to discuss it with him though: "Fine. You can stay on the bed. You can't stay on the sofa in case Mrs Hudson comes in."
"I could hide."
"Where?"
"Behind the sofa maybe?"
"Now this is getting ridiculous. Come on, chop-chop!"
"Who's being ridiculous now?" Sherlock mutters, but he complies.
When John enters the bedroom ten minutes later, he finds Sherlock in bed, sans his dressing gown.
"Oh? Fatigue catch up with you?" he can't but tease.
"It's cozier this way," Sherlock replies, somewhat evasively; upon easing himself down on the mattress, he realized that he actually is rather weary. It resembles how he usually feels after two days into an intense case when sleep is something he simply can't permit himself.
Carefully, he arranges himself to lie on his side: "I'm not going to stay in bed all day," he informs John.
Whose gaze is unmistakably affectionate: "It's not even eight in the morning yet. We'll see."
Sherlock ignores the remark, raising the blankets with one hand instead: "Care to join me?" His voice is soft, any hints of insecurity there might be are ever so subtle. He doesn't know the boundaries of their... togetherness yet, can't quite fathom what John might want, or not.
The doctor shakes his head: "I'm going to have a shower first." He'll also call in sick at the clinic; he hasn't done so before, and he really can't leave the house now, or for the immediately foreseeable future.
"And then you'll join me?"
John smiles and turns towards the door. He rather abruptly pauses, however: "Didn't you wear your coat?" he asks as though suddenly having noticed its absence.
"No." Sherlock's voice is clipped. "Mycroft thought hiding it would prevent me from leaving."
Grinning and shaking his head, John disappears in the bathroom.
Sherlock has dozed off when the doctor comes back in with still damp hair and in fresh clothes. He stayed in the shower much longer than anticipated; it's the first one since Sherlock's faked suicide he truly enjoyed, since it was not going to be followed by a dull, empty day in a world which had lost its appeal.
Cautiously, trying not to shake the mattress too much, John slips under the covers. He has mixed feelings about this: a small part of him wants to keep Sherlock's at arm's length, which admittedly would translate into petty yet effective revenge; the other, larger part of him wants to be as close to him as possible, to just hold him and never let go again.
Sherlock briefly opens his eyes as the doctor gently snuggles close, shifting a little until his cheek rests on John's shoulder again, just as they woke up earlier. It's with natural ease and small sighs of contentment that they melt against each other.
"See," Sherlock mutters, pressing his nose against the material of John's shirt, "now we're both in bed."
John chuckles, tenderly holding him close: "Better than behind the sofa," he answers, eliciting an amused but already faint snort as Sherlock is already slipping back into sleep.
John needs a while until he can close his eyes; he keeps one hand on Sherlock's ribs where there are the least bruised, taking stock of the rhythmic motion of the other's breathing. He doesn't know how they'll proceed from here. Sherlock's name has been cleared, of course, which he's relieved about, and once it's out of the bag that he's back, he'll probably want to take cases again.
Lestrade had quite early on told him that the Chief Superintendent was not going to press the matter further either, something which reeked of Mycroft Holmes' influence and to this day still does.
John's heart accelerates at the notion that they might soon be working together again, Sherlock and he. His thoughts stray to all the other things they might be doing together in the future, which only makes his heart beat even faster. He has no idea if Sherlock has any experience at all, or if he is even interested in the physical side of a relationship. John's own experiences with men, of which there have been few and far between, are dating back to his student days. He doesn't worry about it, though, they'll figure it out. Right now he's happy with just this, having Sherlock in his arms while the detective is sleeping. How he managed to shut down his usually overactive mind so quickly is beyond John, though Sherlock has probably got a backlog.
John peers down at him, drinking in the sight; he could lose himself in just looking at Sherlock, who in John's opinion is the most beautiful man that ever lived. Even from this angle, John can't tear his gaze away for quite a while. Sherlock's quiet, regular breathing dampens John's shirt, but he doesn't mind, on the contrary: it makes the moment real. With another sigh, John rests his head against the detective's curls and closes his eyes.
Mycroft Holmes steeples his hands underneath his chin, unaware that he is subconsciously imitating his brother. "He must have been desperate to get away if he went without his coat." He shakes his head, frowning: "He has always been so stubborn."
His personal assistant knows better than to interrupt or even smile.
"Maybe I should have gotten John Watson here," Mycroft continues, "I just wasn't sure how he'd take it. He was, after all, entirely unprepared."
The way his frown is still deepening tells Anthea that her boss wishes they'd at least have kept the audio in the flat. He is curious at times, Mycroft Holmes, though he'd never admit it. He watches people as someone would watch a group of monkeys, despite their will impressed by the animals' cleverness and yet knowing it's nothing like their own.
"Do you want to send it to him?" Anthea asks when her boss remains silent, but he shakes his head: "No. I think I'll deliver it in person. This afternoon, in fact, after the meeting with the prime minister."
"Very well, sir." With a professionally blank face, Anthea makes a note of it.
John is startled out of his slumber when Sherlock begins to stir; he is mumbling something unintelligible and moving about restlessly, his body trembling and tense for a few minutes. John strokes him and hums soothingly into his hair: "Just a dream, Sherlock."
With a suddenly released breath, Sherlock opens his eyes, staring ahead unfocused for a moment: "John?" he then murmurs, flexing his hand which is lying on the doctor's belly.
"I'm here," John gently reinforces his embrace, pressing a kiss into the dark tangle of curls.
"I couldn't remember the right words," Sherlock mutters, obviously still tangled up in the remnants of his dreams, "all language was erased by pain."
John feels like weeping.
A tremor runs through Sherlock's body: "It would have been easy to give in." He falls silent, his hand motionless now. John picks it up, tenderly wrapping his own fingers around Sherlock's, and holds it close: "I'm glad you didn't," he murmurs. There's a faint but unmistakable pressure on his hand, which he returns. It seems they are doing this a lot now, haptics complementing the rest of their communication.
"Was close, though."
Is Sherlock questioning his abilities now? John knows how that feels. After having been shot, he spent countless hours in his hospital bed wondering if he could have prevented it. It's normal to revisit one's experiences, after all, though John also knows how it feels to be reprimanding yourself.
"But you succeeded," he says softly. "You were stronger than the pain."
Sherlock gives a feeble huff. The question he has been asking himself ever since his escape is whether he'd actually managed to get out of there. It had been only a small victory to get his interrogator to leave, and that had actually taken far too much effort. At that point, he'd not been able to even try and get his feet under him. If the second man hadn't been Mycroft but another Serbian, he'd very likely not have been able to free himself, his stamina having been weakened by days without sleep and food already, and that had been before the interrogation.
The knowledge that Mycroft had indeed come at the right time and is fully aware of that is not only annoying but also smarting quite a bit.
He concentrates on the present, on John's warm hands, his breath in Sherlock's hair, his beating heart. All those details provide a welcome anchor to the here and now, a reality he craves to keep.
Mrs Hudson walks up the stairs as quietly as she can, avoiding the creaking spots and going slowly, listening all the while. She thought she'd heard John talking last night, maybe he had someone over. It happens rarely, almost never, and she is always happy for him when it does. He is too lonely, too sad. Along with Sherlock, he seemed to have lost the will to live his life; he is merely functioning these days, no matter what his friends have tried to change that. He just won't come out of his shell anymore, not even for her. He'd sit through it whenever she had tea or dinner with him, but he'd barely talk, rarely smile.
She heaves a sigh: this is what a truly broken heart looks like, she thinks. If only Sherlock had known how strongly he'd been loved, maybe he wouldn't have... she interrupts her train of thoughts at this point, because it's too hard to think about, even now. Sniffling a little, she continues negotiating her way upstairs.
The flat is silent, which is not unusual; cautiously, she opens the door to the kitchen and looks around. It's clean and tidy, but her keen eyes notice that there aren't just one mug and one plate on the draining board but several, in fact. Huh. She listens again; she didn't hear John leave for work today, so he must still be sleeping. Hopefully he's not ill. Well, she'll make him some breakfast, it's past ten already. He usually doesn't sleep that long.
She's just about to turn to go when the door to the bedroom opens, and the doctor appears. His shirt is a bit creased and there is a dark hair on his shoulder which is definitely not his, but he is fully dressed.
"Oh, John," Mrs Hudson chirps, "I didn't mean to wake you. I was just going to make breakfast." She glances to the open bedroom door and back to him, clearly curious.
John runs a hand through his hair, looking a bit sheepish. She can't quite place it, but she hurries to reassure him: "It's okay," she whispers, "I'll just scoot if you've got someone here." She smiles conspiratorically.
"No, no," John clears his throat. "It's actually good that you're here, Mrs Hudson." He doesn't seem at ease though, and now he glances back towards the bedroom. Something definitely is very strange.
John seems to have gathered his thoughts now: "Why don't you sit down," he begins, clearing his throat once more.
"There's something I've got to tell you."
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To Be Continued
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