A Day Once Dawned, and It Was Beautiful
Light. Granted, John's windows faced east. But he hardly felt he had slept before the black behind his eyelids faded to grey. Morning? Really? John turned over, away from the windows, pulling the blanket over his head. He had maths at nine, but why did it feel so damn early? The blankets were warm, the pillow was soft. Maybe, just this once, he would lie abed, just this once to skip class. Just this once. Why was he so tired?
Oh.
The night came flooding back to him in a relentless wave - the dark front hall, the collapsing cups, Sherlock appearing out of the dark. Harcourt. Promises. And...a kiss?
He flung the blankets back as he sat up in the sunlight. Bloody hell, Harcourt had kissed him.
"Oh, you're awake. I brought you some tea. Would you like it?"
John's head whipped around to find a tall, dark-haired boy in his easy chair. Two cups sat steaming on his desk. "Sherlock? Good Christ, what are you doing at this hour? In my room?" John brought his hands up to rub his eyes, thinking to smear the vision away as he came more awake. But the apparition remained, all amused blue eyes and chaotic curls. "What time is it?"
"Just after seven. I thought perhaps we could have some tea before you headed down to the dining hall. Harcourt will be there, and I sense perhaps he would be less than delighted about us, if he saw us coming down together."
"Us?" John ran his hands through his hair, another effort to bring the world into sharper clarity.
"Yes. I think 'us' is appropriate," Sherlock picked one teacup from the desk and brought it to the bed, settling himself on the edge and offering the tea to John. "Here, take this. Maybe you need to wake up a bit."
John took the proffered cup and sipped, making a face. "There's sugar in." He sipped again. "Quite a bit of sugar. And it tastes like you brewed it through a sock. Good Lord, you weren't lying when you said you couldn't make tea!" He glanced up to see what his words might have done to Sherlock - and was not surprised to see him grinning happily.
"You'll observe I'm not drinking mine. But you love it."
John grinned back. "I do. I admit, I love you that made me tea. Or something tea-ish, at least. Though," he sipped the foul brew, grimacing, "I'm wondering how long you've been sitting there...watching me sleep?" He set the cup on his bedside table and adjusted his pillows against the wall so he could sit up comfortably.
Sherlock waited until John was settled then scooted over his outstretched legs, leaning against the side wall, his long legs perpendicular over John's. He tipped his head back and closed his eyes. "For just a little while - the tea...ish...beverage is still hot after all."
John picked up his cup and drank again. "It'll wake me up, anyway. I was having a bit of a struggle with getting my eyes open this morning - I think we were up too late last night. DId you sleep well?"
"I'm not much for sleeping, really." Sherlock opened his eyes, turning to the other boy with a slight smile.
"But your light was out when I came up."
"I was just thinking. You were right about the desk chair - it's more like an implement of torture. I almost missed the easy chair."
John smiled at the memory of the bits of chair scattered along the wall below Sherlock's window. "I assume Mrs. Hudson gave you an earful for that one!"
"Oh, yes, she did. She went quite up one side of me and down the other. But she's used to me doing things like that - I wouldn't like to disappoint her by behaving myself too much. I think it makes her feel better when she can scold me for little things like that, like somehow that'll prevent me from getting into worse trouble." He pushed his hands into his hair, making the wild curls stick up in every direction, then brought them together in front of his lips, contemplating his fingertips.
John tore his thoughts away from the activities of Sherlock's long white hands. "You know Mrs. Hudson? From before now? Before she was the Matron?"
"Oh, yes, since I was small. She was our housekeeper for years. I spent more time with Mrs. Hudson than I spent with my father, or my mother when she was alive. She left when I did, when I went off to my first school. I didn't come home much, and neither did my brother and she didn't feel like there was enough for her to do with just my father to attend. 'I miss having children around,' is what she said. I think she was a bit lonely, so she came here so she could be surrounded by unruly boys all the time. I don't see the attraction, myself." Sherlock turned his blue-grey eyes to meet John's. "Well, mostly I don't." He brought his hands down to either side, resting on the bedclothes. "One of the reasons I've been sent to Harrow is because she's here. Mycroft thinks she'll be able to keep me in line."
"Mycroft?" John was intensely aware of Sherlock's hand, so close to his blanketed leg, looking pale and cool as marble. He wanted to reach out and touch it.
"My older brother. He works for the government, which is helpful in placing me in yet another school when I bollux things up. He's brilliant at pulling strings." Sherlock drew his knees up under his chin and wrapped his arms around them, his stockinged feet resting against the outside of John's knee.
"Your brother arranges for your schooling? What about your father?" John could feel the back of his neck getting warm. Too much contact. He considered pulling his own legs in, trapped tightly as they were between the other boy's feet and bottom.
Sherlock spoke right into his knees. "He's often busy with his work. He prefers to leave those things to Mycroft. I haven't seen my father in...oh, I don't know. A year?" His eyes were focused on a spot on John's rug.
John's attention snapped away from his trapped legs. "A year? You haven't seen you father in a year?"
"He's got a government job. Travels a lot." Sherlock leaned his cheek against his knee so he was facing John, but his eyes were closed. "After Mummy died he traveled a lot more."
"But what about holidays? What do you do?"
"Oh, I go to the estate, sometimes. My brother stops in to check on me, make sure I haven't gotten up to anything or burnt the house down. The staff is there. Sometimes I stay at school. Another benefit of having a family of string-pullers."
John thought of his own family at holidays. His sister was difficult, surely. Harriet - or Harry, as she liked to be called - drank a bit more than was good for her on occasion and could get angry and belligerent. John never understood why, but there it was. He and his father enjoyed each other's company, though, spending their time hiking through the woods near the house, or sitting by the fire reading in companionable silence on cold winter nights. They had never talked much, but they never had to. His mother had been the lively one in the family. John smiled to himself thinking of her on holidays when he was a small boy, stretching up to hang yet another sparkly bauble on the already full tree, gleefully teasing the children about the delights Father Christmas had in store for them, making the whole family come to the door when carolers came by. She was full of life and joy. It still confused him, trying to understand how someone like her could have died, not just so young, but at all. She had enough life in her, he remembered, for ten people.
"You're thinking of your family." John looked up to find blue eyes lasered in on his face.
"When did your mother die?" John wanted to know, and sensed Sherlock would prefer the direct question.
"When I was small, maybe five. I don't remember much about it. No one told me there was anything wrong. She spent most of her time in her room - she'd never been any other way and I didn't spend much time at anyone else's house to realize that wasn't normal. I didn't know she was dead until Mrs. Hudson put me in my best suit and took me to the funeral." He tucked his chin back between his knees. "She killed herself, but I didn't find that out for years."
John was stunned. No one bothered to tell a small child that his mother was dead? His parents, granted, had waited until they knew Mum was going to die before telling the children - Harry still resented that, but it made sense to John. There was no point in creating more distress than needed. And once they knew she wasn't going to survive, his mother and father sat John and Harry down and explained everything clearly and gently. John remembered feeling confused and frightened, but he never questioned that his parents loved him and would do their best to keep him safe, no matter what happened. When his mother did die, he was as ready as any child could be for that kind of thing. He couldn't even imagine not knowing she was dead until days later. "How did you find out?" He pulled his legs free of Sherlock and the blankets, then scooted closer, the knees of his crossed legs touching the other boy. He twined his fingers together in his lap, resisting the urge to lay them on the curly-haired head, the drawn-up legs.
"I went through my father's desk when I was home alone for hols last year. There was a file in the bottom drawer of his desk full of papers, reports from doctors. Apparently she was very depressed. Nothing was done about it, as far as I could tell. Wouldn't have looked good for the family. They probably just tried to keep it hidden. You know - people will talk." His voice was bitter.
John slipped forward a bit more. "Last year? You didn't find out until last year?" It all got more unbelievable by the moment. Granted, John new that moneyed families sometimes dealt with things differently - so he had learned in the years being friends with Harcourt and the other boys. Children didn't always go home for holidays - they went skiing in Switzerland or boating in Jamaica with friends. They were sometimes closer to their nannies and cooks than their busily working and networking parents, closer to their friends than their siblings. Harcourt's was the closest he had seen to familiar - his parents were affectionate, loving and attentive. But Mr. Harcourt hadn't come from money, he'd married it. John had heard the story, told by both Mr. and Mrs. Harcourt in smiling tandem, with their son adding details they forgot. Mrs. Harcourt had married Mr. Harcourt against her parents' wishes, having fallen in love with him, a fisherman's son, on a holiday to the coast. In the following years, Mr. Harcourt had done everything he could to repair that rift, being kind and polite in the face of their chilly manners, loving their daughter unconditionally even when they cut off her funds, assisting in the creation of a wonderful grandchild, who her parents, no matter how chilly, found irresistible. He showed them how important family was, and they came around. "Eventually," he would say, laughing. It only took a decade for them to reinstate their daughter's inheritance and allow her husband into their house, but they did.
Harcourt. Oh, God. Harcourt. John's thoughts shifted to the night before, and warm lips pressed against his in a dark hallway.
"Your face is getting very pink."
"I'm - " the blonde boy hesitated, not sure what he was ready to say. "I'm happy to be here. Talking to you." Which was true. He was happy, no matter how sad the conversation, to be close to Sherlock, to listen to him talk. John felt that, maybe, this wasn't a normal behavior for this solitary boy, that maybe he was releasing things that had been held tight in his head for much too long.
"I don't normally - " now it was Sherlock who paused. "I don't like to talk about this kind of thing. But I just want to tell you everything, and God help me - " he tipped his head back til it thudded dully against the wall, " - who knew there was so much to say? It must be tedious. I'd think it was tedious. I do think it's tedious and I'm the one doing all the talking. Families are boring. I don't know why people bother with them. I don't know why I'm even talking about it."
John gave up the struggle to maintain his distacne, leaned forward and wrapped his arms around Sherlock's knees, resting his cheek on the near one so he could look at the tall pale boy next to him. "You haven't even had a family. How would you know?"
"I've observed families." Sherlock's head moved forward until his brow was resting against John's.
"It's not the same as having one. Observing and experiencing are very different things, you should know that." The heat of Sherlock's breath on his face was making his head spin. "Maybe you need to experience family before coming to conclusions."
"Maybe." John felt Sherlock's hand come to rest on his side and squeeze, gently. It was almost unbearable, the closeness, and not just of the body next to him. His heart was pounding furiously, threatening to explode. It seemed he was privy to the deepest recesses of Sherlock's mind, and he had a feeling that didn't happen often for this particular young man. "Maybe you're right, John."
His name from those lips was too much. He slipped his hand around the back of that long, white neck and pulled, gently. "I want to be your family, Sherlock. Would that be alright?"
