Chapter 4 up! I hope you enjoy it, and thank you to everyone who has been reviewing, your comments really make my day :).
I don't own the characters!
4. As a mistake
Holmes knew before he even opened his eyes that he was not in his bed. He knew he was not even in his room, and listed the reasons why in his head. Firstly, it was too warm - his room was always cold in the mornings because it had a draught. Secondly, the sound of the traffic on Baker Street was coming from the wrong direction. And thirdly, he could feel an arm lying on his chest that was not his.
He had a nagging idea, however, that he knew exactly where he was.
The hesitant opening of his eyes was accompanied with a blast of pain, as morning sunlight flooded relentlessly into his head and brought with it memories of just how much he had had to drink the previous night. He closed his eyes again with a muffled groan.
The arm on his chest twitched. Forgetting the pain, Holmes reopened his eyes and glanced quickly over at the other side of the bed, where the owner of the arm lay, fast asleep and cuddled up to his shoulder.
It was Watson - of course it was Watson, and a naked Watson at that, and he was in Watson's room, in his bed, and good lord he was in trouble now - !
He gulped and looked up at the whitewashed ceiling instead, and tried to piece together bits of his memory of the night.
They had solved a case, an important and quite difficult one, and they had gone out to celebrate, and, thanks to a rather large payment from Holmes's client, had managed to see their way into becoming extremely intoxicated…and then, after the memory of the seventh drink, Holmes's mind went fuzzy and all he could remember were odd details; the way Watson's lips had glistened in the half-light after he had kissed them, the banging of the door when they had finally stumbled together into 221B, the scrape of the wall against his back when Watson had pushed him there, the feel of hands, soft, steady, gliding down his body, and murmured extracts, and the removing of clothes and - oh god -
He glanced once more over at the slumbering Watson, guiltily. The damned man looked as innocent and unthinkably untouchable as he had the previous day - there was not a mark on him to show what they had done. Holmes vaguely remembered them attempting to clean themselves up after the deed. He dug his toes into the sheets and thought.
It was all his fault. Watson had been more drunk than him, and yet Holmes had been the one taking the advantage. All those strict words, those late-night lectures to himself - where had they gone? They had abandoned him when he needed them the most, and now he had done the unthinkable - to uptight, proper, quietly religious Watson. My god! He would never forgive Holmes. He would wake up soon, and realise what had happened - although he probably wouldn't remember it - and then he would leave, and Holmes would be left alone, and that couldn't happen because he needed Watson, he was absolutely lost without him, and the thought of losing his friendship was too much, far too much to bear.
There had to be a way. He had to do something.
He looked over at Watson. Watson, Watson. The sleeping, untouched Watson…
An idea occurred, almost making him lunge out of bed. How much alcohol had Watson consumed last night? More than Holmes, and Holmes had had quite enough. Plus Watson was a surprising lightweight when it came to holding his liquor. There was - Holmes calculated it - if Watson had had ten - no, eleven - drinks, then there was around an eight-five percent chance that he would remember nothing, and that whatever memories were left would seem vague and dream-like to him. And since there were no physical marks, just the presence of Holmes lying in his bed…
If Holmes left, and pretended nothing had happened, that he had slept in his own bed…well, then Watson would be none the wiser. And things would continue as if this had never happened. Which it shouldn't have in the first place. If he crept out now, the whole episode could be forgotten…
Of course, he would feel guilty about lying to the old boy. But then, he felt guiltier about what he had done…
His mind was made up. Very gently, he took Watson's arm and shifted it off his chest and onto the pillow, then slowly extracted himself from the bed. He was just slinking to the door when an awful realisation struck him. His clothes. He certainly wasn't wearing them; they were scattered all over the room instead - even his hat, he noticed, was tastefully perched on top of the lampshade.
As silently as possible, he retrieved his clothes from their various locations, counted them to make sure they were all there, then fled noiselessly across the hallway and into his own rooms without a backward glance, in case it made his determination waver. Once there, he dressed himself in his bundled clothes quickly, swept his many experiments off his bed, ruffled up the bedclothes to look as though he had slept there, then perched himself in his usual chair, opened the newspaper, and waited.
It was a long wait. Breakfast came and went, delivered by Mrs Hudson. Holmes chewed nervously on his pipe and pretended to read the newspaper again. His mind was constantly plagued by memories of the previous night - words he had said, cries Watson had cried, the feel of his lips, his fingers - it was all far too aggravatingly arousing, and nothing he could do would make him forget.
He glared at the newspaper again, and as he did so, the door opened and Watson entered. He was freshly washed and dressed, and so it was only the dark circles under his eyes and the rather unkempt hair that told of his heavy antics the previous night.
The important thing, Holmes told himself, was to act completely naturally. Don't look up from the newspaper. Take a slice of toast. Now speak calmly.
"Up rather late, aren't we, Watson?"
"Holmes," said Watson.
Nonchalance not working. Put plan in action.
"Not that I blame you after our little drinking session. Do you remember anything? I don't. It all became a bit of a blur after that last pub!"
"Holmes."
"And then here I was, asleep in my own bed, no idea how I got there. In my own bed, I mean. But I managed to put my experiments away neatly despite the fact I could probably hardly walk, how odd. I mean, before I slept. Last night. In my own bed."
"Holmes."
Holmes desperately cast around for more to say.
"May I surmise from your late appearance to breakfast that you slept well?"
"Holmes."
Holmes glanced up guiltily from his newspaper.
Watson held up a white shirt.
"You took the wrong shirt this morning. You're wearing mine. This is yours."
Holmes's stomach squeezed tightly. He glanced down at the shirt he was wearing, noting - too late - the tidy collar, the extra looseness, the maker's symbol on the cuffs. The smell of ale coming from it had disguised the smell of Watson, and he had been too intent on getting out of the room to even think of checking…damn it, what kind of detective was he to miss that? And now Watson knew everything…and knew that he had tried to lie about it…
"Oh," he said. He looked up at Watson, but the man was poker-faced, neatly locking his emotions away as only Watson could do.
"Sorry," Holmes said, trying to make the apology sound meaningful enough to cover everything that had happened from when they had started drinking, but instead only succeeding in making it sound offhand and flippant. Damn it doubly!
He reached for the buttons of the shirt, but Watson coughed loudly and turned slightly away, halting him. Holmes glanced up at him.
"You can…you can give it back tomorrow," Watson said faintly. Holmes noticed that the tips of his ears were red.
"Oh," he said again. He seemed to have become tongue-tied. "All right. Erm. Thank you."
Watson nodded once, tightly, still not looking around.
"I have patients to see," he said quickly, and all but fled the room, leaving Holmes's shirt on his chair to glare at him accusingly.
Holmes waited, and it was only when he heard the bang of the front door that he let himself slump in the chair and drop the newspaper on his face with a loud groan.
R & R please! Next chapter is the last chapter!