A.N - I said five chapters. Might now be six. I think. Sorry (not).
There were two days of peace. John was moved to a ward (though a private room), Sherlock's visiting hours were restricted to annoyingly respectable limits, the case was solved, John's tubes and monitors and drips and goodness only knows what else were removed. It was all going swimmingly, guilt-ridden apologies had given way to casual mockery.
Until once when, completely as usual, John got up to go to the bathroom. It was nothing new, he had done it a few times by now, Sherlock had stopped offering to help, or suggesting the use of commodes and bedpans. Except this time, John had made it half way across the room and paused. He looked up to Sherlock, who had also looked up at the lack of movement.
"Sherlock..." his eyes were wide, his voice quiet.
He was on his feet in an instant, across the room, a bloom of adrenaline burning into his stomach as he grabbed hold of John's forearms, avoiding the dressings extending up from his burnt hands.
"Nurse!" He yelled, watching the wide eyes slowly close as John swayed. "Doctor! Somebody!"
He caught him as he passed out, of course he did. He had plenty of warning and sufficient sense to see what was coming. It was the seconds after that he was lost in. The long moments of John's limp weight against his chest, the slow slide as the final support of his dead legs gave. He flung an arm around John's back, trying not to squeeze his bruised and broken ribcage and gripping his fingers into the cotton gown. The medical staff finally appeared, whisked John from his arms and onto the bed.
Everything ended up being plugged back into his unconscious body, but when he came round this time Sherlock was sitting alert beside his bed.
"God, did I die again?" John wheezed.
"Not another heart attack, no. In fact they aren't exactly sure what it was, just a drop in blood pressure."
"Oh. I'll be on twenty-four ECG then?" John checked, pouting delightfully at Sherlock's nod, "Oh, I thought I'd be getting out of here soon."
Sherlock hummed gently in woeful agreement. Though if he examined it a little more closely, his woe was less that John would have to stay in a bit longer and more that he was now pretty certain he had done him some serious permanent damage. The ribs would take a while to heal, the weakness a while to fade, the heart – who knew? Who even knew what Sherlock had done to it? No matter what John said to the contrary now, if they discovered permanent damage it was so very much down to the detective and his ridiculous experiments and the blame could be placed nowhere else.
Oh God, John would leave him. This whole affair would drive an irremovable wedge between them, their friendship would fade. No, not fade; it would sour around the edges, curling and darkening, becoming sharp and acidic. The taint would spread, slowly, unevenly, weaving in around the cords and skins that held the pulp of them together. And they would either break apart spectacularly in a rancid explosion or just slowly ferment and rot and eventually dry out.
John's voice permeated Sherlock's painful ponderings, "Will you just chill out?
"I am perfectly chilled out." He was. Well, to all intents and purposes he appeared so. He was sat straight and still, arms relaxed on the rests of his uncomfortable rubber-coated posture-correcting chair. He had been staring, but only at the foot of the bed.
John simply raised an eyebrow, "Whatever."
"I am!" He insisted, which was stupid, because now he really didn't sound chilled out. What was the matter with him at the moment?
"I don't know what was going on in that head of yours, whose palace quarters you were exploring, but the look of... devastation and... panic was not comforting in the least. So please, close that imaginary door and leave it alone."
"I don't want you to go." Where the hell had that come from? Had he lost complete control of his faculties? "I mean..." Shit.
"Go? Die? You don't want me to die?" John rolled his eyes and sat himself up a little against his pillows. "Well, thanks, that's very reassuring. Neither do I really."
"No," Sherlock snapped. He wasn't quite that ridiculous, yet. "Don't be dense. Of course I don't want you to die, surely my efforts to keep you alive over the course of our partnership have been testament enough to that. Why would I bother to verbalise something so obvious?"
"So go where? I'm not going anywhere." John grumbled. Then Sherlock saw the moment of comprehension flow down over his face and his stomach sank. John sat up in his bed, sending the monitor lights flashing and the beepers beeping. "You think I'm going?!"
Well, this conversation was a mistake. It had been in the beginning, and it was only getting worse. "John, please calm down."
John was not listening, "Where exactly would I go? Or is this some kind of manipulation, planting the idea in my head so I dwell on it and... Oh Jesus, you don't want me getting in the way. I'll be too slow and... crippled now, more so than ever befo –"
"John! Will you just –"
"You can't fix this one, can you? It's not in my head this time."
Something somewhere in the region of Sherlock's own heart gave a squeeze at that. Now John was the one looking devastated. "John..."
John was drawing in shorter breaths, puffing them out agitatedly, the figures on his monitors rising disturbingly. He was going to turn sour now, his defences were up, his skin trying to thicken. Whatever came out of his mouth next would be sharp and cutting. It was beginning.
"Will you just listen!" Sherlock slammed his fist down on the wooden arm of his chair. It made a disappointingly dull sound, and hurt more than he had expected. He glanced down at it accusingly, distracted momentarily – the upholstery and rubbery-vinyl wipe-clean cover must have an insulating effect on the resounding vibrations.
There were squeaking footsteps and a nurse dashed into room (early thirties, toddler at home, bi-sexual tendencies, missed lunch-break) and took in the scene. "I think it would be best if you were to leave," she snapped at Sherlock.
"Excuse me?!"
She placed a placating palm on John's shoulder. He flinched from the touch, Sherlock observed, feeling oddly pleased by it. Old scar-tissue, instinctive reaction.
"He needs rest, not... this," she gave a mystified wave at the room, "Whatever this is. You are winding him up. Which is not only affecting readings and results, but pushing him back in his recovery. Out, please."
Sherlock stood, trying to be furious, but not quite managing. Because she was right; all he ever did was wind John up. And it was far less enjoyable this time than it normally was. John was looking resolutely away and letting the nurse lay him back onto the raised bed. Sherlock paused at the door, "I'll be back later."
Which was a lie. He never actually left the building. He waited a few hours, until after the next shift change, sneaked back onto the ward with a pilfered security card, and slipped straight into John's room.
He was asleep. It was quite a relief really. Sherlock listened to the reassuring bleeps of his various machines. He knew precisely what each one was and what they were telling him, but he filed them into a half-monitored section of his brain. The steady whirring and regular rhythm was enough to tell him what he needed, otherwise he'd find himself obsessing over the numbers and lines and he had better things to obsess over at that moment.
The flicking of John's eyelids as he slipped in and out of sleep cycles and dreams. The rise and fall of his chest under the thin cotton of his hospital gown (he really should bring him in some pyjamas, but that would involve leaving the building – Mycroft perhaps? Or Mrs Hudson?). John was uneasy sleeping on his back; he was a side-sleeper, a foetal-position-curler, but he had no choice in this bed, with all his leads and drips. His sleep was lighter in this enforced position, his fingers twitching against the blanket.
Sherlock pulled his chair closer to side of the bed, lifting all four legs an even distance from the floor to avoid noise, and descended slowly into it. There was a puff of air from the stitching running down the sides of the cushion, but no squeak. He leaned forwards, resting his elbows on the top edge of the dropped side-guard of the bed and listened to John's breathing. Was there any way, he wondered, to detect oxygen saturation and lung performance simply by watching and listening? Different flushes of skin colour, rate of inhale versus length of exhale, regularity of nostril dilation, frequency of those soft little snuffly snores that he let out.
No, Sherlock came to the conclusion fairly quickly, it was fairly impossible without more subjects and reliable data to compare to. But it was still nice to pretend that was what he was doing.