Note: By now, you've probably realised that the case is loosely based on "The Problem Of Thor Bridge". In this chapter, some lines of the dialogue are taken directly from that story. Fantastic how it works without people noticing it immediately.
(Dream. Same every night. Seventeen times in a row now. Inside the mind palace. Normally safe haven, glowing and warm. Now getting dark and cold. Decay everywhere. Pictures crooked. Wallpaper torn down. Glow of walls fading. A chair knocked over. Dust everywhere.
The normally welcomed quietness turning into loneliness somehow. Darkness creeping in. Light and life draining away. Every room is the same. Empty and wasting. The terror of losing the only refuge in the world is swelling up inside.
The lab: shattered glass on the floor. Chemicals spattered. Walls stained. Blood? Samples thrown onto the floor. Equipment broken, dead. Elements on periodic table in disorder. Portraits of scientists looking in disdain. Some faces twisted in hatred.
The library: some shelves on the ground. Most of them still standing, but books pulled out. scattered on the floor. Backs torn off. covers painted over. Carpet ripped up. Chairs shattered. Tables scratched. The smell of old books gone.
The stairs in the hall: banister broken. Carpet torn off every step. Chandelier half ripped off the ceiling. Broken in so many places. Stale air gets thicker and thicker with every step. Like fluid. Filling the lungs. Slowing you down. Breathing is hard.
Last room to fade into darkness is always John's. Door half-open. Doorstep creaking. Sun still shining through windows, but setting already. Shadows growing longer. Warmth fading too. Walls dimming. Getting cold and lonesome and sad. No hope of ever being warm again.
Looking around, the sadness increases. Everything's wrong. The bottomless boxes including every little detail about John sealed. The comfortable armchairs soaked with cold water. The fluffy blanket gone. Twilight changing to darkness.
Liquid air filling the room, cold and wet. Filling the lungs with unhappiness. Drenching the body. Drenching the soul.
Tears sting. Heart hurts. Lungs hurt. Hope is lost. Tears are falling.
But then ...
But then, a gleam. A spark of light in a corner. Next to the books John likes. Fluid air turns warm. Walls slowly brighten up again. A gentle breeze washing away the dust, drying the armchairs, magically repairing the carpet. A gentle breeze of light, dry air. In the air a whispering, soft and golden. John's voice.
Breathing is easy again. The sealed boxes springing open again, the beauty of this room restored. So wonderful that more tears fall, but happiness and hope and warmth are flooding the body now.
Sherlock sighed deeply in his sleep, rolling onto his side, once more unaware of John sitting by his side, chasing away the bad dream only by the gentle touch of his hands and a few hushed words.
On the morning of the eighth day, the atmosphere somehow had changed. To his surprise, John found Sherlock at the kitchen counter, busy with the coffee again. "Ah, John," he greeted him, "there you are." He held a filled mug in John's general direction, smiling slightly. Forcing him to come nearer to get the coffee. Wishful thinking? John shrugged the question off, happily leaning against the counter next to Sherlock, sipping his coffee.
"What about a more nutritious breakfast than yesterday?" Sherlock asked innocently, looking at John.
It was more than obvious what he was up to, and so John cut it short, "Brilliant idea. How would you like your eggs?"
For a second, Sherlock appeared to be mildly surprised, but then he couldn't really hide his smug grin. "Oh, you want to make breakfast? I wanted to, but if you insist ..." Yeah, sure. Bugger.
"So," John wondered when they were eating, "why are you having breakfast while you're on a case?"
"Technically speaking, I'm not on the case yet," Sherlock explained, "I'm still waiting for a hypothesis to be proven before really getting started." Knowing there was no way to get a better explanation, John let the comment pass.
"While we are waiting for that to happen, would you mind joining me for a walk again?" Stupid question.
They strolled into the mountains, and John couldn't help but notice the change in Sherlock's behaviour. He was chatting all the time, telling John how bees were so much more interesting than people usually believed them to be. "When we're old we'll need a cottage in the country, so I can keep a hive or two." We? Well, no objections here.
The peaceful summer mood of the mountains found its way easily into John's soul, and he relaxed a lot more than he would have usually done. But then, so did Sherlock, it seemed. When John stumbled on their way up a rocky path, he was caught instantly, with a tight grip around his waist. And it was not just his imagination that the arm lingered there slightly longer than necessary.
Enjoying the feeling, John stumbled two more times on purpose. The second time, their eyes locked after Sherlock had let him go again, and the knowing grin on Sherlock's face did really funny things to John's stomach.
"You know I'm sorry for what I said about your parents," Sherlock said earnestly when they had a rest at the small lake.
"What about your violin?", John asked when they walked towards the coast again. "I thought Mycroft mentioned it was an old family heirloom. But you said your mother broke yours."
Sherlock flushed a little. Which did funny things to John's stomach, too. "Father had more than one. Mycroft gave me his after my last detox."
"Oh, well, that was ..."
"Yes, it was," Sherlock cut him short, flushing even more, "... and yes, I do, but don't you dare tell him."
By the time they reached the shore, John could have learned a lot about nearly extinct butterflies, reticulated willows and red deer if he hadn't been so busy concentrating on the sound of Sherlock's deep, rich, content voice.
He had also been busy with finding harmless excuses to touch Sherlock's arm six times.
Walking along the beach it turned out that Sherlock had never learned how to skip a stone over the water. It took John about five minutes to teach him the basics. After mastering the skill with breathtaking ease, Sherlock spent forty minutes trying to teach John how to do so more effectively. "Come on, John, eight skips aren't an impossible goal."
"You are the only person I've ever told about my father's death," Sherlock blurted when John was watching a seagull circling above them. Despite the gentle breeze coming from the sea, John felt warm inside.
"Thank you," he answered earnestly, watching Sherlock gaze at him shyly. A wonderful expression.
"I finally understand it," Sherlock stated matter-of-factly while he was mimicking John's favourite I'm-at-the-oceanside-pose, arms outstretched, facing the sea with closed eyes, feeling the salty wind prickling on his face. John broke the pose to take a closer look at Sherlock. He was smiling, eyes still closed, hair completely undone by the wind, looking young and relaxed and happy.
"What do you understand?" he asked curiously when no explanation followed.
"People talking about this perfect moment thing," Sherlock answered without opening his eyes, "and I'm sure this is one of them."
It must have been the energetic mixture of sun and wind, or maybe the easiness of the entire day, or maybe it was just the bravery of a fool that made John say, "No, it's not."
Sherlock broke the pose then, too, staring at him in bewilderment. "It is wonderful, yes," John bravely went on, not quite knowing why he was not scared to death, "but to make it a perfect moment something crucial is missing."
"What would that be?" Sherlock's eyes were shining with sheer puzzlement, his guard completely down. He genuinely seemed to have no idea what John was up to.
"Oh, "John said, feeling even more of this strange courage swelling inside of him, "it's hard to explain. But I could show you."
Not waiting for an answer, he stepped forward a little, gently pulled Sherlock closer and kissed him.
(sensory overflow!)
Sherlock was taken completely by surprise.
(lips, warm and soft and wet and gentle, hands on my back, need to breathe, his smell and his taste and his fingers and his lips, so close and so warm and I need to breathe, his hand in my hair and his lips still kissing, not letting go, never letting go, his hand tugging my hair gently)
He moaned without realising it, pressing closer to John.
(why is he, he can't be, must be pure lust must be … wouldn't be bad, but it feels more like … but that can't be, no-one would ...
need to find out, need to oh those lips and that tongue and what are his hands doing there? Want more! What was I thinking before?)
His hands seemed to work on their own accord now, one finding its way to John's face,
(so warm, so real, he's moaning, kissing me makes him moan, his hair so soft and short and too short to be tugged his neck tilted to reach me)
the other one sliding up and down John's back.
(strong and real and made for leaning onto and that makes him moan even more how can he make these wonderful sounds because of me he must be … but he can't no-one can, only … )
He broke the kiss for a second, looking down at John
(yes, pupils definitely dilated, is breathing as hard as I am, can feel his penis reacting as well, but there is more to his look than lust, looks happy and content and … loving? But no, can't be, need to ...)
only to pull him in again, kissing him once more.
(more hungry now, so is he, his lips hot and swollen and not stopping and sucking at my lip and more more and his hands on my oh more don't stop now and that feeling inside of me so hot and strong and desperate and need to breathe again but don't stop now his tongue in my mouth demanding and searching and don't stop and my tongue in this mouth now and this is not just lust but how can he he can't, I could only be loved by an …)
Suddenly he understood, finally found the solution to the mystery that had kept him thinking for so long
(and it was easy and obvious and I should have seen it so much earlier)
and Sherlock couldn't help but laugh even though his tongue was still deeply stuck in John's mouth.
He broke the kiss once more and buried his face deep in the curve of John's neck.
(warm and safe and he loves me)
John heard the laughter rising from Sherlock's throat while they were kissing, deep and rich and honest, the most wonderful sound he had ever heard. Besides the moan that he had evoked from him just seconds before that, of course.
And now Sherlock was cuddled against him, his face pressed against John's neck, completely vulnerable, his body pressed so close John could barely breathe, and the intimacy of this gesture aroused him even more than the kissing had.
They stood like that for a lifetime, John gently stroking Sherlock's back, Sherlock still hiding from the world in the curve of John's neck. Then Sherlock raised his head, and Lord, that expression on his face … He was not just looking happy, he was literally beaming, happiness seeping from every pore of his body, eyes blazing, cheeks flushed delicately.
He brought their foreheads together, slightly bumping against John's, cupping his face gently. "You are ..." he said, voice deep and hoarse and happy, "... an idiot."
At that moment, John knew that their relationship would never, ever become boring and ordinary. He couldn't help but giggle,"Whatever it takes to make you happy."
Sherlock giggled too, still making sure their bodies were pressed together tightly. "You must be," he explained, "you couldn't love me otherwise."
Well, he had a valid point there. John looked at him, into those wonderful eyes, felt himself grinning like a fool, and when no good answer came to his mind, he simply kissed Sherlock again and again.
To give Sherlock credit, he really tried to hold still for five more minutes when the hypothesis he wanted to prove came back to his mind. John could not hide a smile when he watched the subtle fidgeting for a while before he felt too sorry for his … what, boyfriend? Lover? Partner? Sherlock.
"You really want us to go back to our cottage and find out about your theory, don't you?" he asked, grinning at the immense relief that spread over Sherlock's face. So they went back. Sherlock kept his arm quite demandingly slipped around John's shoulders, happily chatting about mica schist and the last glacial period.
The cottage came into view, and from the distance they saw a figure sitting on their doorstep. "Yes," Sherlock exclaimed, becoming his smug self again for a moment. Then he looked at John, and his expression turned into an honest version of his puppy look. Oh hell, John thought, if Sherlock was going to use that more often, he would surely be in trouble.
"We need to make agreements," Sherlock stated, gazing at John intently, his hands squeezing John's firmly. "That's what couples do, isn't it? Make agreements?" John found it was impossible to hear him say they were a couple, to be at the receiving end of this gaze without kissing Sherlock, and so he did. Amazing that from now on he was to do that regularly.
"What was it you wanted to talk about?" he asked a while later, when they both had found their breath again. It was sad to see how Sherlock's face instantly fell, if only slightly.
"When we take on the case, I will probably be ..."
He desperately searched for words, and John obediently jumped in, "Yourself?"
That got him a frown, combined with a wrinkled nose. John smiled at him, and took him into his arms once more. "That's perfectly fine, Sherlock. I like you when you are yourself."
"You are an idiot," Sherlock tutted happily, and John contemplated pressing a kiss on this lovely wrinkled nose. Then he realised how high he would have to tiptoe to reach it.
"Lucky you", he simply answered instead, and they both smiled.
"So, our agreement is that I'll love you even when you're on a case?" John asked, shortly before coming into hearing range of the cottage.
Sherlock nodded, and then added thoughtfully, "Should I agree on something else in return?" Suddenly a field of opportunities lay wide open in front of John. But then he looked into Sherlock's eyes. He was serious and ready to agree to anything if only John would always love him.
"No," John said, and gently kissed his cheek.
When they approached the cottage, Sherlock easily switched into his client treating mode, upright and with a casual business-like air around him, radiating the general idea of natural superiority. Incredible that he could do so while still pulling John in on him.
"Mr Gibson," he greeted their guest, "I suppose you are here to ask us to prove Mrs Dunbar's innocence."
"I know beyond doubt that Grace is innocent," Neil started without preamble once they were inside. "That woman has a heart that wouldn't let her kill a fly." John watched them as he made tea. Sherlock had quickly placed himself at the dining table, his back facing the window. That way Neil was forced to sit down on the other side of the table, where he was blinded by the low evening sun. From the look on his urbane face, he was not used to such a treatment.
"I've been told by the local officer that the evidence against Mrs. Dunbar is overwhelming, to put it mildly," Sherlock stated coldly. If John hadn't known that he was already on the case, he would have believed that Sherlock was not interested at all.
Neil seemed to think the same. "Please, Mr. Holmes," he said intensely, "if ever in your life you have shown your powers, put them now into this case." Sherlock studied him carefully, or so it must appear to Neil. John was sure that in reality Sherlock had read him within the first two minutes. "Let me tell you everything I know, maybe I have a clue and don't know it."
"All right, tell me, Mr. Gibson, what were the exact relations between you and Miss Dunbar?" Neil blinked nervously, one hand absent-mindedly stroking his short black hair. Ah.
"I … she is our home tutor. I'm her boss. That's all." He looked from Sherlock to John who couldn't help but feel a little pity for him. That was clearly a lie, and Sherlock was not exactly kind towards liars.
And indeed, Sherlock rose with a disappointed expression, "I'm sorry, Mr. Gibson, there is nothing I can do for you. Goodbye!"
Neil just stared at him for a moment. Then he jumped to his feet, his cheeks flushed red with anger: "What do you want, money? That's not the problem. Name your figure. Money is nothing to me in this case. You can burn it if it's any use in lighting you to the truth."
He only met an unreadable expression. "This is not about money, Mr. Gibson. You wanted to leave, I think." John felt a bit like he was watching a very mean reality TV show.
Neil still was not giving up. "If it's not money you want, what about fame? I'm in charge of TV networks all over the world. I could make you famous in twenty-eight nations over night."
Yes, idiot, exactly what we need after the whole Reichenbach affair. "Thank you, Mr. Gibson," he heard Sherlock say coldly, "but I do not think that I am in need of booming." He saw Neil clenching his hands angrily, moving closer towards Sherlock. So did John.
"You are not doing yourself a favour, Mr. Holmes," he spit out, "I have broken stronger men than you."
"Right," Sherlock agreed, a little smile playing on his lips, "and how many of them would have been willing to prove your love's innocence afterwards?" The two tall men were standing so close now that they must have felt each other's breath in their face.
Too close for John to interfere should Neil lose the rest of his composure. Still, he swiftly moved to Sherlock's side, ready to demonstrate a superiority in numbers at least. To his surprise, Neil's anger subsided as quickly as it had risen. His body slacked, his face fell. From one second to the next, he gave the impression of a broken man.
"So you do love her," Sherlock stated surprisingly softly.
The other man nodded, and quickly added, "But we did not have an affair, please, you must believe me. Grace would hear nothing of it. She said she would never be the other woman, and that her friendship with Maria was too important to her than to ruin it for man like … a man like me."
His eyes lost focus for a moment, a whirl of emotions crossing his face. John caught Sherlock's gaze, smug and triumphant. John smiled at him, and instantly a flash of pride showed up on Sherlock's features. Another topic for John's "stuff that does funny things to my stomach" list.
"Tell me more about your marriage," Sherlock said then, dragging both Neil and John out of their thoughts.
He sighed, pondered the order for a moment and then explained, "I met her in Brazil twenty years ago, when making preparations to expand my network to South America. I fell for her head over heels, and we stumbled into a relationship almost instantly. It was passionate, whole-hearted, tropical, ill-balanced. Well, to make a long story short, I loved her and I married her. It was only a few years ago when the romance had passed, that I realised that we had nothing, absolutely nothing in common."
His voice trailed off, and he shook his head sadly before he continued: "My love faded. If hers had faded too it might have been easier, but it did not. Do what I might, nothing could turn her from me."
"Is that why you've been so rude to Maria?" John chimed in now, "To make her stop loving you?"
That made Sherlock regard him in a peculiar fashion. He moved closer to John, standing so close to him that their shoulders touched, and placed his hand on John's back. Unexpected, but nice. Neil nodded, "Yes, but with no effect. I never understood how her love for me could have been so absolute." John felt the pressure of Sherlock's hand increase, and gave him a reassuring gaze.
"And did your wife know about your feelings for Mrs. Dunbar?" Sherlock went on, sounding distant, unimpressed. As if he did not feel the need to touch John simply to remind himself that they were happily in love with each other.
"Yes, unfortunately she did. Though nothing, nothing ever happened between me and Grace." Neil looked at both of them pleadingly.
"But Maria was bitterly jealous. She ended her friendship with Grace instantly after realising I had feelings for her. Poor Grace, Maria had always been so important to her." And yet you had no scruples to mess it up by asking Grace to become your lover, John thought. He caught Sherlock's eyes and read a silent agreement there.
"She was so … passionate," Neil went on, and suddenly his face crumpled. "Could it be … could it be that Maria tried to kill Grace? And that it went so wrong that Maria herself got killed instead?"
Sherlock looked at him, allowing himself to show some sympathy now. "That possibility had already occurred to me. Indeed it seems to be the only obvious alternative to deliberate murder."
John frowned. That thought had never occurred to him. He did not want to admit that, but of course Sherlock had already read it from his face. He gave John a wry half-smile. "It would explain the fact that there were only the two women's footprints at the mouth of the bridge," Sherlock explained, looking at Neil, but surely aiming the explanation at John. " Apart from those of the little threesome that went looking after the gun-shot, but as they all have a sound alibi, we can ignore them. It could also explain why the weapon was found in Mrs Dunbar's wardrobe."
"But when she was questioned afterwards, why did she not say so?" John pointed out, and to his surprise that somehow made Sherlock smile.
"Perfect question. The message on the mobile, John", he said happily and turned back to Neil. "Mr. Gibson, I trust you will see to it that we will be brought to Ullapool tomorrow at ten. It is about time that we talk to Mrs Dunbar."
When Neil left, John watched Sherlock's body sag a little. The dark circles underneath his eyes were back, his face pale. "Exhausted?" John asked softly, a hand on Sherlock's back.
Sherlock nodded thoughtfully, "Is it all right to be?"
They looked at each other for a while. Of course, the real question was not if it was all right that Sherlock was tired after talking to a potential client. The question was if it was all right that Sherlock still felt the impact of the depression even after their kiss.
John pulled him in, and nodded into the embrace, "Of course it is."
The rest of the evening was spent in comfortable silence. After another reasonable amount of kissing, that is. And after ending up on the sofa, huddled against each other, Sherlock telling John that they were not actually cuddling, because Sherlock Holmes did not cuddle. "I'm merely stimulating my thought process by maximizing physical contact with you. And I love that thing you are doing to my head right now which is not ruffling my hair, but activating my temporal lobe." Yes, sure.
Later, Sherlock started to research something for the case on the internet, his feet tucked in under John's thighs. Every now and then he would go "Ha" or "Um", and whenever he did, he looked up and met John's eyes. A smile always attended that gaze, and John grinned back, having no idea what exactly Sherlock was doing.
Whenever John's eyes closed of their own accord Sherlock moved his feet slightly, always just enough to prevent him from falling asleep right there. "Think of your back, you're not thirty-six any longer," Sherlock finally said and hushed him to bed.
When lying down, John imagined Sherlock would follow him a few hours later. He could literally see him standing in the middle of the bedroom, unsure of what to do, torn between his own bed and John's. Well, there was an easy way to prevent that scenario.
He got up again, grabbed Sherlock's pillow and duvet and simply placed it on the left side of his own bed. He rolled to the right side and fell asleep almost instantly.
John had no idea how long he had been asleep when a movement on the mattress woke him up. "Hey," he said drowsily and smiled, but it did not take him long to realise something was wrong. Sherlock was lying on the very edge of the bed, completely stiff. John sat up, and something stopped him from simply reaching over.
"Tell me what's wrong", he said instead, trying to put as much gentleness in his voice as possible. He felt Sherlock move a little.
"Nothing that's your fault," was the mysterious answer.
John waited for a moment. When Sherlock did not elaborate, he said, "Well, tell me anyway."
He heard him sigh, and finally he said, quietly, "You are not the first person I have had a relationship with. The first one ever I've fallen in love with, yes, but not the first one I shared a bed with."
Oh. So much for that virgin thing then. "And sharing a bed wasn't a good idea back then?" John guessed, and the silence that followed confirmed his assumption.
It took Sherlock half an eternity to go on, "A nice understatement. I hated it. Most likely because ..." John mentally braced himself. After all he had learned about Sherlock's past it no longer surprised him that he had had an atypical depression. In fact, it was rather marvellous that he had been able to go on like this on his own all those years.
"That relationship wasn't about love. It was about power, and about showing off with your possession and about finally being part of a peer group." John tugged his knees underneath his chin. Easy to tell which of that had been Sherlock's part of the deal.
"At the time, I granted myself even less sleep than now, but the few hours I turned in with him, I would sleep like a log." He fell silent again, and the need to reach out for him and touch him grew so intense that John could barely stand it.
"What did he do to you in those nights?" he asked instead, not able to keep the disdain from his voice. Another deep sigh.
"He knew I did not like the whole sexual aspect of our relationship, at least not the way he was presenting it to me. Asking me to have sex often led to rejection. Hence, he used to wait for me to be asleep before he … " John drew in a sharp breath, before Sherlock continued, "Not that he had done things we hadn't agreed upon. He just always … I hated waking up like that. That's why I've always avoided sleeping in the same bed with the person I've had sex with later in life." Finally some of the anger John was feeling was to be heard in Sherlock's voice. Good!
"Well," John said angrily, "whoever it was can be glad that I don't know him. Because I can tell you, I really would like show him what I think of his harassments." Eloquent silence. Not good. "I know him?" he realised, and the fact that Sherlock still was not answering nearly made him lose it. "I know him? Who is he? I barely know anyone from your ..." Lord, no. "That banker guy? Wilkes? Sherlock, talk to me, was it Wilkes?"
More silence. And a hand that grabbed his. "I'm not proud of it", Sherlock said calmly, but John knew him well enough to hear all the things resonating in that sentence.
He thought about it for a moment, and then made a quick decision. He knew if he let Sherlock return to his own bed, this would become an issue between them for a very long time.
"I'll tell you what we'll do," he explained, squeezing Sherlock's hand reassuringly. "I usually fall asleep lying on my side anyway. I'll move over as far as I can, and you'll stay right there, where you are now." He felt the pressure on his hand increasing. "The rest is completely up to you. If you wish it, we'll stay exactly like that. If you feel like snuggling up later, it's fine with me, too. All right?"
"It's ridiculous that something like this is necessary," Sherlock huffed, but John cut him short before he could go on with his self-directed tirade.
"That's just how it is. I do insist on a good night kiss, though." Slowly he leaned forward and searched for Sherlock's face with his free hand. When he found it, he placed an innocent kiss on his head. Then he rolled up on his side of his bed and waited for sleep to come, hoping he was handling this correctly.
When he woke up at dawn, Sherlock was lying with his cheek on John's outstretched hand, a little smile on his rested face.