"Well that was tedious."
"You went on the Tube like that?"
"None of the cabs would take me."
Good old Sherlock. He was always coming back to the flat dragging the cat along with whatever a cat would normally drag back. Always getting into trouble. Always getting out of trouble. Sometimes he caused it, but other times he would be a not-so-innocent onlooker who just happened to be in the right place at the right time to get sucked into that sort of thing. John tried to tone him down a tiny bit, but it wasn't usually possible to avoid the whirlwind of Holmes crashing about London. And John missed it. He most certainly did.
Yesterday...
"So, John. Do you have any more blog entries?"
John forcefully snapped his mind back into the present. "Sorry, what?"
Ella hid it fairly well, but John could easily tell that she what somewhat irked by his repeated lack of focus.
"Your blog. How is it coming?"
"Err... Uhh... It's fine." John quickly added, "I suppose."
"You don't seem very convinced. Are you sure?"
John gave a slight smile to cloak his annoyance. She really knew how to pick his brain. "Well... I haven't had any entries since Baskerville. So... Maybe it hasn't been going."
The therapist remained silent. John began to wonder if there was some sort of mind control device planted in her room somewhere since he felt compelled to start telling her about everything.
"I mean, nothing ever happens to me anymore. It just feels like I'm back where I started. Only this time, I got a tiny bit of a good life, but I can't have it anymore. I got to have a taste of something incredible, but the Fall stole the rest away before I got to sink my teeth in."
"And what is that?"
"Real living. Something outside of a bedsit and an army pension. I had Sherlock. He was my best friend... I owe him so much... He helped me cure my limp! And now look-" John swung his cane up. "The bloody thing's coming back again."
"These things take time. You will heal, but it will take time."
"I know. I just... Everything feels like the world is forgetting him. Even the scorch marks in the table are starting to lose their smell."
"There are burn marks in your table?"
"Oh, sure... Four of them. Two were accidents with fire and one was spilled acid."
"That's only three."
"Sherlock only set fire to the table on purpose once. There was a fight with Mycroft and he needed to let out some steam."
"Or, smoke, as it were." She jotted down some more words on her notepad.
"Yeah. The whole building had to be evacuated and fumigated. That was a good day."
Ella's eyebrows arched with interest. "Well, if that was a good day, I'd hate to see what a bad day would be."
"Once, we were chasing a serial killer through the sewers. We didn't catch him, and when we got back, Sherlock didn't want to take a bath because it would waste time." John smiled broadly. "He stayed like that for twelve hours. I made him take another bath because he still smelled like soggy dog and cat crap after the first one." John stifled a giggle. Ella did too. John stopped as his face fell.
"Are you OK?"
"Oh, just thinking about Sherlock. He'd insisted that he didn't need a bath. But he always was that way. I had to make that man-child eat, almost. He never slept. He always seemed to be going full blast." John's eyes became wet.
"And then he wasn't."
"Yeah." John looked blankly beyond the wall.
"There's something else. I can tell."
"After Sherlock smelled vaguely civilized again, we had to wash the coat, too. I didn't want him wearing a filthy, soggy coat that's been dragged through who-knows-what in a sewer. Health reasons, you know."
Ella remained silent, but kept writing.
"I guess that the coat always brings back guilt. I lost it, you know."
"A month now?"
"Yeah... Mycroft never called back. He should have found it by now."
"Maybe this is a good lesson, John."
"How? I lost the biggest reminder of my best friend. How could that be a lesson?"
"Maybe it's what will allow you to let go."
"I don't want to let go. That's the thing. I don't ever want to let go of him. Guess that's just another reason why I'm here."
The rest of the appointment didn't go so well. John shut himself back in and gave one-word answers. When he left, Ella reassured him that he was making progress and that he would heal in time. She also told him that it was okay to talk once in awhile.
Back in 221B in the now...
John wondered if Ella was right. It was possible. Even so, the bitter part of the doctor told him that she wasn't right. It was Watson tradition to be somewhat stoic. Harry got her open streak from wherever, but mother internalized things, and father turned to alcohol. John knew that he used to be more like Harry, but turned to the old Watson tradition after Afghanistan.
War did strange things to John Watson. War made boys into men, and men into numbers. That way, if you were killed, it wasn't grief or loss. It was just another digit. John learned quickly that he couldn't look into a patient's face. Faces would remind him that soldiers were people, and all people have souls. Numbers didn't have souls. But war turned souls into numbers. Just another digit. Another set of clothes. Another rifle. Another helmet. Another bullet. Another grave. Another KIA letter to a grieving family that the government couldn't care less about in the big scheme of things. Just a number. And just as expendable as the number behind him. John hated that. He hated that the war had turned him into an uncaring monster. Yes, he considered himself a monster. Anyone who could look directly into someone's eyes and then kill them was a monster in John's book. And he did that once. He killed a man. John never forgave himself.
Still, that was war; you couldn't care. You didn't have time to. There was a man about a hundred yards away who would want nothing more than to put a piece of three-quarters inch long piece of metal through your forehead before somebody put one through his. John always found himself conflicted. He was a doctor. He was meant to help people. He was meant to give aid, not a death sentence. He was meant to care. But he couldn't care, because he was also a soldier in the Army. If you cared, you would sink into a slump and probably get yourself killed. So John didn't care. But he also did (if that makes any sense to you whatsoever... it certainly didn't make sense to him).
John brought himself back to reality and turned off the Telly. There wasn't really anything important. For that matter, he wasn't paying any attention, either. He picked up the newspaper. Something there might be interesting.
Two minutes later, John put the paper down. He couldn't focus on anything at the moment.
He walked over to the center to see if there were any texts. He took a look at the screen, but there weren't any.
Cuppa. What?
Tea. Now.
John sighed. His stomach was a never- ending pit. He fetched the kettle and filled it with water. He thought about it again, and reminded himself that maybe the tea was just his body telling him to relax once. He put the kettle on the stove and began to heat it up.
He walked back to his chair and waited for the kettle to sing.
While John waited, he continued to think about what Ella had said. Maybe he was simply expecting too much too soon. She had said it would take time. But still, he reminded himself, Sherlock was my best friend. That would take a lot of time to start healing.
John was snapped out of his daze by the chirp of the kettle. He finished making the tea, then moved to go back to his chair.
John would eventually realize in retrospect that one of the biggest events of his life could very well not have happened. But then, that's how life usually is, isn't it? Something happens that you would think is miniscule, but it isn't. Not really. After all, the chair leg was standing at precisely an angle as to make the doctor catch his foot, trip, and spill his newly made tea all over the wood floor.
"Oh!..." John hissed a series of expletives. It wasn't bad enough that it was his cup of tea that had just spilled all over the floor; now he had to clean that up before it soaked through the wood and caused damage.
He found some towels in the pantry and went to clean up the spilled tea.
"What the-" John didn't find anything. That is to say, there was no mess or tea, only a steaming wet spot on the floor.
John got on all fours and inspected the site of the spill. Surely the tea couldn't have soaked through already! John felt around the area. There was a hot, soggy area, but no standing tea. He looked at the floor boards. The soggy area was perfectly in the shape of a 7 inch by 8 inch rectangle. He whipped out his jackknife and began to poke around the wet floorboards. His knife caught on an indentation in the wood. So that's where all my tea went, John thought.
John levered the board up with his jackknife, then grabbed the wooden panel. It was a decorated plywood- one of those affairs that aren't really wood boards, but are made to look like them on the top.
John lifted a box out of the hidden hole in the floor. The box was probably no more than five inches long and four wide. It was about four inches deep, and solid oak. He gingerly caressed the top. It had an almost celestial flower shaped design. The artisan must have been very proud, John thought. John wiped the lid of the box. Indeed, it was the beautiful oaken box, not the scuffed up floorboard, that had taken the brunt of the tea's vengeance.
He carefully removed the lid, making sure that the contents of the box would not be touched by the former contents of his teacup.
And perhaps that was the turning point for John Watson.
First Cliffhanger style ending. Do you hate me?
Super super long chapter! Nonetheless, due to my 'next chapter is 100 longer' policy, I'm not going below 2000 words per a chapter from here. (heaven help us all...)
Oh! Six follows! I love you! I love you! I love you! (read in rapid succession like a screeching fan girl.)
Sooo... On to business.
Yes, I know. Don't curse me out- I just don't curse. That kind of doesn't mix with 'Martin Freeman' but... I try to do my best to 'Martin Freeman' without swearing. Whenever you hear 'string of expletives', just make up your own whatever. Because I most certainly will not.
No review thanks this chapter... Please review. I promise I will personally respond to all reviews for this chapter before the next chapter is out, as well as list you.
Not beta'd. Not Brit picked. Not worrying. Not flaming. (Please!)
All rights to respective owners.