Jo's heart was pounding as she fumbled with her keys, trying to unlock her door while simultaneously snogging her current boyfriend-thing. They had been on a couple of dates, but this time they hadn't even made it to dinner before she dragged him upstairs. She finally got the door open and she let Mike push her into the flat. He stripped off her shirt and began maneuvering her towards her bed. He pushed her back, but instead of hitting the mattress, she landed on a human shaped lump. She yelled and pushed herself back up, bracing for a fight. What she was not prepared for, however, was to see Sherlock Holmes sit up in her bed, looking sleep mussed and mildly terrified; it quite literally knocked the air out of her lungs.

"Who the bloody fuck are you?" David yelled, turning red. "Jo, what's this doing in your bed? I'm calling the cops!"

"Get out," Jo whispered, reaching out to stop David from going for his phone.

Sherlock nodded, looking like he was gutted and trying to hide it. "Alright, I'll just go."

"No, you stay," she ordered. "David, get out."

"What do you mean 'get out?'" David asked, still yelling. "Who the fuck is this Jo? If you don't start telling me what's going on, right now, then we're over!"

"Fine," she answered, not taking her eyes off of Sherlock. "We're over. You were getting boring anyway. Get out." David spluttered briefly before storming out.

Sherlock finally stood up, still looking nervous. "Jo I'm sorry; I can explain. I didn't mean to fall asleep, but you were later than I expected, and it's not like there's anywhere else comfortable to sit." Jo looked around at her sparse one room flat: the only place to sit other than her bed were the rickety, and admittedly uncomfortable kitchen chairs.

She snorted. "Somehow I'm less concerned about you falling asleep on my bed than I am about you sleeping at all."

"Right, of course," he answered, nodding. "I can explain that too. Just don't kick me out, please." She let out a laugh that sounded more like a sob and lunged forward. Sherlock braced for her to take a swing at him, but instead she wrapped him in a hug. He let out a shaky breath of his own and hugged her back.

Sherlock had never been this close to so much of Jo's bare skin at one time. He spread his hand against her back and buried his nose in her hair; he closed his eyes and reveled in the sensations of 'home' that Jo inevitably brought with her. Jo pressed her face against his neck and squeezed her arms around him. He could feel it when she started to cry and he just held her closer, trying to ignore the wetness in his own eyes. A long while later Jo started to pull away and he reluctantly let her go. She turned and looked around before grabbing a vest out of her dresser and pulling it over her head.

"I really am sorry about ruining your date," he said after they had been silent for a few more minutes.

She laughed, genuinely this time. "I never thought that you'd apologize for ruining one of my dates. But don't worry about it; this is much more interesting. I thought you were dead." She paused before adding, "Thank you, for what you did. At Bart's I mean. I don't think I can thank you enough for what you did. And for surviving it."

"I would have still done it," he answered. "If I didn't have a plan; I would have still done it."

She shook her head, sobering immediately. "Fuck Sherlock. You can just say things like that."

"Why not? It's what you would have done," he answered seriously. She just shook her head again, not knowing what else to say.

After a few moments she reached out for him again, grabbing hold of his arm. "I think I need to examine you. Because I saw you die, and I'm sorry, but I need to make sure that you're okay. So if you could please go into the kitchen, I'm going to get my med kit out of the bathroom. Please Sherlock; I just need to see that everything is okay because the last time I saw you, you were broken."

"Of course," he agreed. "Anything you want."

When Jo came back out with her med-kit, Sherlock was sitting on the kitchen table in his boxers. She nodded but didn't say anything. She went through her examination in silence, not even bothering to make her usual jokes. Sherlock seemed to be in good enough health — all considered. He was far too skinny with more scars than when he had left and she could feel that he had broken several ribs even without the aid of x-rays, but despite all of that, he was in relatively good health. She was in the middle of checking his reflexes when it all became too much for her. Her knees buckled and she collapsed into one of the kitchen chairs, her chest heaving as she hyperventilated. She pressed her forehead against his thigh as she squeezed her eyes shut against even more tears.

Sherlock began to gently run his fingers through her hair, hoping to be soothing. "It's alright, Jo. Just breathe. Focus on breathing." She nodded and focused all of her attention on taking deep, even breaths, and ignoring the fact that they sounded more like sobs than anything else.

She shook her head, which was still pressed against his leg. "I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm freaking out like this. I'm supposed to be happy; I am happy. Hell, I'm thrilled — beyond thrilled. I don't understand. This isn't okay, and I don't know why." She finally sat up, wiping ineffectually at her face.

"Jo, I don't expect you to be fine with this," he answered, forcing himself not to fidget nervously. "This isn't like finding a head in the fridge or mold under the sink. I don't expect you to just deal with this and move like you do with everything else I throw at you."

She shook her head, smiling a bit. "What does it say about my life that decapitation is placed on equal footing with mold?"

"It's definitely not dull," he answered, returning her smile.

She shook her head. "Life with you is anything but dull." She paused and her smile grew into a grin. "Life with you. Sherlock, you're alive! Screw everything else: we'll figure it out — we always do. But this is fantastic!

"Now put your clothes back on. I'm going to order us dinner, and you're going to eat it without complaining because you're bordering on dangerously underweight."

"Yes ma'am," he answered, amazed by his friend's ability to take everything he did in stride.