Chapter Six
There's hardly any room to breathe between them when they enter the foyer, halfway to hanging up their coats before Sherlock's violin case thumps against the back of John's knee, nudging him closer with a not so subtle hint. John takes it, steps into Sherlock's space, eyes the line of the man's neck.
"I get you," John murmurs.
"Do you?" Sherlock muses, one eyebrow quirking high.
"Well, look at you. Hell, you could have anyone you wanted. Probably have." When Sherlock gives an airy laugh, John feels emboldened. "What I don't get is—why me?" John certainly hasn't raised his eyes (isn't ready for that scrutiny). "Because I'm here?" Convenience seems as though it'd fit Sherlock Holmes splendidly.
"Because," Sherlock says, and his neck moves as his head tilts sideways to peer at the ceiling in thought. "You're interesting. And that's far more difficult for me to find than a willing man in London."
John scoffs. "Me, interesting? Where've you been the last two days?"
"John," Sherlock says, and though it's low, it's strong and broaches no argument. "Trust me when I say that I find very little to be of interest in this world anymore, and more than half of what I do involves the dead or the dying and what put them there." And John feels something bump lightly into his chin, and Sherlock's violin case nudges John's face up to look directly into Sherlock's. "Now. With that out of the way."
At first, John opens his mouth to protest. And then he reasons that he has nothing to protest against.
Fortunately, John's used to the front, ears always alert, and he hears the footsteps coming before they have a chance to see anything incriminating. John takes an easy step out of Sherlock's space and quickly hangs up the coat that's been hanging heavy in his hand. Thankfully, Sherlock is clever enough not to follow.
Instead he turns and puts on a smile. "Mrs. Hudson. You're still awake?" But John sees Sherlock's smile drop just as soon as he registers the unwonted apprehension and sadness welling up in the woman's face.
"Mrs. Hudson?" John asked, taking a concerned step forward.
"I tried to stop them, Sherlock," Mrs. Hudson says, voice cracking. "I know you've got your little experiments on, I know you wouldn't want anyone getting at them. Oh, Sherlock, what's going on now?"
The detective's mouth presses to a thin line, and he's already hopping up the steps in twos before John can register to follow (not before giving Mrs. Hudson's shoulder a comforting squeeze). He's not too far behind, especially when Sherlock grinds to a halt in the doorway to the sitting room.
John's not sure if he's walked into another crime scene. This one's certainly more active than Jennie Wilson's flat, with uniformed bobbies striding through Baker Street like it were Wall Street, and it's a wonder they didn't hear the racket the moment they walked through the door (but, to be fair, John had had several more important things on his mind). John feels like a dog, perched behind Sherlock's shoulder and baring his teeth at the men invading his space. His space—he hasn't even moved into the nondescript flat in the middle of London and already it's his. John's territory, with unwelcome feet treading his carpet and upturning his sofa cushions and scattering his detective's newsprint all over the sitting room.
"What's all this?" John all but barks, and there's military in him still, enough to stop the three nearest bobbies in their tracks. And when they stop, that's when a familiar face appears from the kitchen to join them.
"You lot, keep working," Inspector Lestrade orders, and those who've stopped get back to their work. Folding his arms, Lestrade turns to John and Sherlock in the doorway with smug lines in his face. "You're in a lot of trouble, Sherlock."
"Get out," Sherlock demands, and John can practically feel the hackles rise on the man beside him. "You haven't got any reason to be rifling through my things—"
"I'm a Detective Inspector," Lestrade shoots back. "I can do whatever I want to get my work done. I can get through your door any time I want and find out what you've been hiding from me. And I know you're hiding something."
"Sir!" A horribly rat-faced man appears from the stairs that lead to the second floor (it's not even his room yet and John is still prickling with rage that someone's been in there). "Blue, right?"
Lestrade shoots them both a self-satisfied look that almost smolders in its own smugness. "Blue's right, Anderson. You got it?"
The man Anderson fixes Sherlock with a baleful sneer that speaks of so many past experiences, and produces the bright blue handbag. Lestrade takes it when offered and opens it up to inspect the contents. "This is police business. I could arrest you for this."
"For what?" John spits, and Sherlock goes still beside him. John spares a glance, and Sherlock isn't looking at him. But now there are eyes on John, eyes that had been on Sherlock (lanky, queer Sherlock; the anomaly they're all used to), and he feels as though he really should have stayed quiet.
"Withholding evidence on an ongoing investigation," Lestrade says, slightly stronger than he had been. Yes, dealing with Sherlock is something he's used to, but now there's a short ex-army doctor standing up to him as well. It makes John feel most unwelcome. "Stealing my case out from under me. Again." The last comes out at a bark, and now everyone is looking at John.
So John straightens his spine (and now he can see Sherlock's gray eyes peering hopelessly down at him, at the same time disapproving and intrigued). "You haven't got any warrants—"
"And you haven't got any right to walk onto a crime scene," Lestrade cuts in. Jerking a thumb at Sherlock, he adds: "Neither does he. I let you do your little dance because I need answers, but when you keep things from me, I have every right to make your lives a living hell. Got that, Captain?"
John literally clamps his teeth to his tongue to keep from shouting military-grade abuse at the man, but his eyes sear with everything he holds back. Lestrade must see it, but even John has to acknowledge him when he doesn't back down. But his shoulders do lose some of their rigidity.
"I want this bastard off the street as much as anyone," Lestrade growls. "But you've got to help me so I can help you."
Sherlock's mouth pulls down only minutely, and his fingers tense on the violin case still in hand. When he opens his mouth, his voice is no different from his normal timbre, but it's firm and dark and it seems infinitely loud in John's ears. "You'll not threaten my flatmate, Lestrade. I found the handbag, I kept it from you. Make no delusions on who you can and cannot arrest. Clear?"
John does his best not to stare rapturously. Not the best course of action with their flat full of bobbies. So he checks himself, just barely.
Lestrade grits his teeth. "What was in the handbag?"
"Nothing important," Sherlock replies almost flippantly.
"Bollocks," Lestrade shoots back. "Why keep it a secret, then?"
Sherlock shrugs. "I had a gig."
John turns his unexpected laugh into a snort.
"You've got something out of this," Lestrade says, taking a step forward and shaking the handbag in Sherlock's face as if at a disobedient dog. "You deduced something and you're not telling me, and that's a really bad idea, Sherlock."
"Just tell him," John cuts in. Both Lestrade and Sherlock fix John with a confused stare, nearly identical, and it's a wonder John remains as straight-faced as he does. "It's no good if he arrests you just because you won't tell him about the address."
For the space between blinks, Sherlock's eyes say oh I could kiss you, and then it's gone.
Lestrade's proverbial ears prick up, and suddenly John is the most welcome man in the room. "What address?"
Sherlock (who is clearly the better actor, neither of them care to deny it) gives a horrible, grumbling sigh, and the glare he pins John under is like brimstone.
"Sherlock, what address?" Lestrade demands, focus cleverly diverted from John.
"I don't see how it matters now—"
"Give it over."
"Fine," Sherlock snaps at last, and now he's stepped into Lestrade's space and sneering down at him. "And then you get out of our flat."
Our flat, it has a nice ring to it, John thinks.
John doesn't see what address Sherlock scribbles down for Lestrade, but he does a good job of playing up the reluctant informant (pouting a bit like a child and throwing scathing glances at all the bobbies that have stopped their activity to stare at him). Lestrade calls them off and they're off down the stairs in a rush of bodies that seem to blur by John. The inspector barking orders over his shoulder at the mass of bodies following after him, and in their haste, they completely forget about the two men left in the flat.
The very empty, suddenly very quiet flat. With Sherlock staring across the room at John in a composed, calculating way—John feeling inspected, but he lets it happen. Being alone in a flat with Sherlock Holmes hadn't been a problem ten hours ago. It technically wasn't a problem now.
"Clever," Sherlock says quietly, and he leans down to place his violin case carefully on the floor beside his desk.
"Thanks," John replies, not sure why he feels that the compliment is much more flattering coming from Sherlock Holmes rather than anyone else. He takes a breath, deeper than he thought he'd need, and there's something unfinished hanging in the air between them that he's sure both of them know is there. It's whether or not he chooses to act on it (and he's not sure why it has to be him, but it does) that matters.
John takes a step forward, and Sherlock doesn't move (apart from his eyes, which light up, alert, like there's a torch shining in them). Lingers for a moment, as if making up his mind, and then takes the rest of the space necessary to fully approach Sherlock. A respectable foot of space between them. A very calculated foot of space. John takes another breath (this one not tinged with chlorine or iodine or gangrene, but it may as well be for the way his heart is clamoring on).
"You'll take the second bedroom," Sherlock says at last, when John doesn't make another move. "The room upstairs is furnished in the late Mr. Hudson's things that were too useful to be thrown out. You're tired, and it's a long way back to yours. Besides, that mattress of yours was no good for your shoulder. So, you'll spend the night here, find you like it."
"Will I?" John laughs lowly, doesn't ask how Sherlock knows about his shoulder. "I haven't even seen the second bedroom. How am I supposed to know I'll like it?"
Sherlock gives a quiet, derisive noise through his nose. "You're welcome to go ahead and see if it's up to your standards before you sign anything, John."
John can feel the strain between his lungs that he's come to associate with the ticking anticipation between mortar drops, and now with staring up into two gray eyes. It's now; the charge is now. John bucks up his courage, leans in and murmurs: "Come with me."
At first, neither of them moves, and the moment goes until John's waiting for a rejection, a laugh, anything to break the silence that's settled in. What he gets is a smile. Slowly.
"Go to your room, John," Sherlock insists (how has his voice gotten deeper?), loosening the tie from around his neck. And he turns away.
"Sherlock," John calls out before he can stop up his throat, and he cringes at the sound of his own voice. But the detective does turn back, once he's five steps away and nearly to the kitchen anyhow. (His eyes look like smoke.) John gives a shaky exhale, which bolsters his voice. "Most people say yes or no."
"I'm not most people," Sherlock corrects him. "And neither are you. And you've done a marvelous job of avoiding convention so far, I'd hate to see you go for the banal now." There's a hint of his tongue when it thoughtlessly wets his lips. "Go to your room, John."
And the ex-RAMC man finds himself doing just that. It's only once he's up the flight of stairs and tucked into the surprisingly-spacious room that he realizes he's done so. By the way his heart is thumping, his fingers should be shaking as they undo the knot of his tie and slide it off. But they didn't shake when he sewed a man's face back together, and they don't shake now as he works his braces off and waits for Sherlock Holmes.
(The part of his brain that isn't focused to a sharp point by the memory of long fingers working up the neck of the violin actually does take stock of the room, and the far left corner would be an ideal place for all his books and it seems like there's an abundance of closet space where he can put his trunk so it won't take up room at the foot of the bed; thoughts of the old but clean-looking divan fight for dominance over those involving Sherlock's lips pressed around a cigarette, bowed to blow a line of smoke into the cold air, and John suddenly wishes for two brains so he can keep at least semi-coherent even to himself.)
He doesn't know how much time passes until he's aware that he's still alone in the upstairs bedroom, aware when a chill from some patch of cold air hits the collar he's undone just enough to be open and encouraging. John's sitting alone on the edge of a bed that isn't his (yet), where he's been sent, and no one's come after him. There's a shameful twist in his middle that translates to his ears, but he chokes both of them down with simple solidarity. He stands quickly, and thankfully there's blood in his head this time so he doesn't topple out his door and down the stairs in one graceless move.
Once he's made his way back down to the sitting room, John tentatively calls out, "Sherlock?"
It looks as though no one is even in, as if the police had stormed through, torn apart everything that they could, and vacated. Oddly, horribly empty with papers strewn about and books on the ground where they've been tossed. No sign of the consulting detective on the first pass through, and not even when he cautiously pads down the corridor to Sherlock's own room. John feels heated embarrassment crawling up his neck—he's been left. Told to go to his room and left. A spectacular fool, John Watson.
There's a niggling something, however, chewing at the back of his mind before he can gather up his things and storm uselessly away like a kid picked last for a game. Sherlock is gone, yes, but there's something that's not missing that troubles the spot in John's brain. Sherlock's coat, clearly visible on the peg behind the half-closed door to the stairwell.
John gathers himself—perhaps Sherlock stepped downstairs to clear up the situation with Mrs. Hudson, maybe speaking with her was taking longer than expected and John hadn't been so much abandoned as delayed. Swallowing hope (and the thought of where Sherlock would have gone without his coat in January if not to see the old woman), John heads quickly down the stairs to the ground floor.
"Mrs. Hudson?" John calls even before he's left the stairs, and he finds her already out her door with a tea tray in hand.
"Oh, John dearie," she says happily, "I heard all those dreadful policemen leave and I thought I'd come up with some tea for the two of you. I know how Sherlock likes his, but I wasn't sure about... What ever is the matter, John?" She finally notices the agitated state of John's eyebrows, the way his fingers are desperately clamping the banister.
"So you didn't see Sherlock leave?" John asks, and he hopes it doesn't sound as desperate as it feels.
"See him leave? No," she says, tilting her head to think. "Oh, but I did hear the cabbie at the door, maybe his cab came early. He does like to run off without telling anyone where he's off to, that boy."
John's stomach drops out. "Well, how long ago was that?" Dammit, he should've been paying more attention!
"Oh, somewhere about twenty minutes past, I'd say." She hardly finishes her sentence before John cuts off a curse and takes the last two steps at a leap and grabs his coat from the peg in the foyer. He's out the door, leaving Mrs. Hudson and her tea without another word.
He doesn't know what he's expecting when he bursts out the door and onto the street. Twenty minutes, that's long enough to get well into the city at this time of night.
(It could've just been a cab, Sherlock could've just got into a cab and gone off and forgotten John was there. But it doesn't fit right, because he remembers Sherlock waiting right at the gap between buildings—could have run on and probably would have caught the cab if he hadn't waited for John to jump after him, but he waited. He hadn't left John behind, and all thoughts of embarrassment are long gone, because he hadn't left John behind.)
And just when his warring brain tries to tear him down both ways down the street at once, there's movement from beside him. A destitute-looking young man, no more than a boy really, and he's looking right at John from under a ratty hat.
"You live here?" the boy asks pointedly, nodding at the door to the flat behind him.
John nods before he can stop himself (too focused on the thoughts Sherlock and cab to worry about much else), and the boy holds out a scrap of paper. With his duty done, the boy moves away quickly and disappears.
There's a single line scrawled to paper, and it feels as though John's heart squeezes tight enough to lay him out flat. He shoves the paper into his pocket, the pocket where he's had his pistol all night, and he runs.
AN: Cliffhanger! Mwaha. Anyhow, looks like there will be one more chapter after this one (maybe two if the next one gets too long, but after the 11,000 words of Year Five of Magic of Deduction, NOTHING is a long chapter anymore. Oh, and I suppose I should add that my jazzfetish basically translates into an overall violinkink, so I apologize even further! I CAN'T HELP IT! A million thanks to Lady Dan Beta. Anyway, hope this is still entertaining for you folks, leave us some love, and most of all STAY AWESOME!