Shadow Child - Part 9
Author - Kourion
Summary: 'So you're not a robot. So they were wrong, Sherlock! So everyone who thought you were heartless and unfeeling was foolish and stupid and wrong.' / Warnings for past child abuse/ non-con issues. Eventual Johnlock (romance focus only/ issues with sexuality/ fear of sex). Protective!John/ Case-fic.
AN: this chapter contains a semi-graphic description of rape. It is veiled as occurring within a dream. The language use has changed somewhat to take on a more childlike tone. Please proceed carefully.
Additionally, this may be the last chapter for a week or two. I have two other WIP's that desperately need to be updated. I've left them hanging for way too long.
Reviews will be addressed in the next chapter, too. One of my new years resolutions is to try to respond to reviews.
Please note that this is likely to be the most graphic chapter of the fic.
Sherlock's POV
"I want to commit the murder I was imprisoned for."
- JK Rowling, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Damn it. Damnitdamnit.
What the hell is wrong with me? Divulging all that to John?
I admit, part of me wanted to put his mind at ease. Show him I'm not so destroyed as a person as to have never attempted anything considered normal or 'healthy' with another individual.
But my attempt was for nought. I have a rather prominent suspicion that somehow my words have made him all the more upset, for whatever reason. I could tell that he was angry, too. And he seemed to become angrier as the conversation continued, not less.
Which is why I ultimately decided to leave the room. Keep everything from escalating more so.
I swallow the ice water quickly, until my stomach aches with the weight of it, and wander back to my room.
I need to put some distance between myself and John. Perhaps in the morning, after we've both had rest, the situation won't seem so dire.
Finding an extra blanket in my closet, I re-make my bed. My room does get a lot colder than the rest of the house. That part wasn't a lie.
Next I change into silk pajamas. A gift two winters ago from Mycroft. They are grey-blue, with little flying geese all over. A gift skirting on being just odd enough, different enough for me to truly like it, but also lacking in any real masculine style. I don't know if that has any bearing on the fact that I rarely wear these garments or not.
Wandering over to the bathroom, I void the accumulated water from my bladder, and swish a good couple ounces of Orange Listerine around in my mouth, then haphazardly brush my teeth. I truly don't have the energy to do it properly tonight. All in all, I still look grubby: my hair is straighter than it normally is, matted down to my skin by sweat, and I feel foul. But I also don't want to mill about in the bathroom tonight, lest John suddenly needs to use the restroom. A shower will have to wait until the morning.
When my head hits the pillows - at slightly after 7:20 in the evening (how utterly pathetic is that?) - I already start to feel my eyes shut with the weight of sleep. Before I finally succumb, I can hear carnival music, and the sounds of a little boy laughing. I can smell candy apples, and caramel fudge.
I wake up abruptly, hearing the clock down the hall. I can hear the swaying of the pendulum, the mechanical click of the seconds as they pass. My eyes flitter about the room and take in the drapes near my window. Mummy has left them open again, which I don't like. Sometimes squirrels and ravens look into my bedroom and stare at me in the dark. Sometimes the ravens caw at me in the night, and tell me horrible things. That they are going to kill me. Gut me with their beaks.
I turn about in my bed, knowing something awful is coming, because I can see the trees and the trees are growling at me. Their branches are swaying 'run, run, RUN!'. But it is dark, and the moon is full, and I don't know where I could go. I could put my red sweater on, and my wool socks too, and my denims and my boots. But there is frost on the ground, and the estate is too far from the main road. My legs will freeze into leg icicles. I stare at the trees and whisper back, 'I don't know what to do.' The trees stop moving. They stop speaking to me. All they ever do is tell me to run. That's all they ever say.
I look across my bed, and look at the mound of sheets and blankets creating craters and ridges. Like being on Mars. And I, Sherlock Sherrinford Holmes, am a great explorer. An astronaut. I have come to help the Martians. To make a peace treaty. I cannot leave.
The Martians speak in my head - directly to my brain in a hiss. Another explorer is coming in for a landing. The door to my space compartment shuts with a loud click. The explorer has descended to the planet, and he's almost here now.
''Move over, Sherlock,'' the explorer says quietly, driving up to me in his little space car. It's a bright and flashing space car and the light is reflecting off the sun, and hitting my eyes. I close my eyes tightly, so I don't go blind from the light, but move my little car to the side so the new explorer can make way.
I suddenly realize that a stream of cold air from my oxygen tank is leaking out against my belly, and I press with my hands against it to get it to stop. I grasp my belly and try to keep the cold out. My spacesuit is damaged. It's open, and I'm cold.
'Let me help you with that,' the other explorer says into my brain. I keep my eyes closed because his helmet is too shiny. It still hurts my eyes. It always hurts my eyes.
Soon I can't breathe very much at all, and the explorer removes his helmet, and picks me up out of my space car. 'Come here, baby,' the explorer says, and I feel woozy. Because I can't breathe on Mars without my space helmet and oxygen tank. I shake my head back and forth. It's too far to go. I won't make it. I will die from not enough oxygen.
'Can't breathe,' I whisper, 'please don't.'
The explorer laughs softly.
'You're just getting yourself worked up.'
I shake my head back and forth and push at the Explorer with the shiny helmet.
'No, no. I can't!'
I'm going to die.
'Stop it, Sherlock!,' the explorer says. 'You'll wake mummy,' and the explorer is getting mad, and his words don't make sense, and I still can't breathe. Then I feel the explorers lips on mine, giving me oxygen from his oxygen tank. The air is warm, not cold. I start to shake and gasp because it's not right, it's not right!
My head is pulled back quickly, from my neck, from my hair. The explorer is holding my neck in his hands.
The explorer is not a nice explorer.
The explorer could snap my neck with his hands.
Snap. Like a twig. Snap.
I let out a whine, hoping the explorer will realize I'm ''more work than I'm worth,'' as mummy says.
'You stop it right now, Sherlock! I don't want to hear any more from you tonight, you hear me?'
I nod and open my eyes to look at the space explorer. He's not from my space fleet. In fact, I think he's a rouge Martian come to take me prisoner, and not a human being at all. That's why I can't breathe his oxygen. He's taken me hostage. He must have taken me hostage. So I must do as he tells me to do until my space fleet comes for me. Until then, I must absolutely not question the Martian, or he might hurt me worser. I must do what the Martian tells me to do.
'You're going to behave?'
''Yes, daddy,'' I whisper.
The Martian smiles at me.
'Good boy,' he whispers, his mouth turning into a growly bear mouth. His teeth becoming shark teeth. If I run, he will bite me. He will rip me to shreds and cut off my legs. Snap. Twig legs will break. That's what the Martian told me before. 'If you fight me, I will break your legs.' That's what the Martian said.
The Martian will gobble me up from my feet to my head.
'Take off your pajamas and your pants,' the Martian hisses at me, his tongue reaching out to lick my neck. He's licking me, tasting me. Maybe the Martian wants to eat me. I close my eyes and push down my space suit. I pull everything off as the Martian asks. I take off my wool socks, even though the Martian doesn't tell me to take off my wool socks. Mycroft made me the wool socks. He made them in a class called 'Home EC,' at his old school, and the Martian will get his slime on the socks. I want Mycroft's socks to be clean so I can put them back on again later.
I won't no way be able to run away now. I should have listened to the Trees. But where would I go? Even if I could get to the gate, the Martian would send others in space vehicles and they'd pick me up. And they'd take me back.
I'm never getting off this planet. I'm never going home again.
I look up and the Mars trees whisper to me, 'We're sorry. We told you to run. We told you to run home.'
'I know you did,' I think-speak to the Trees. 'But I don't know where home is from here. I don't know what to do.'
They are Martian Trees, and they are the only good beings on this Planet when Mycroft isn't here.
'We won't watch,' the Martian Trees whisper to me. They sound sad, and their eyes close until they are like Regular Trees. 'We're sorry, Sherlock,' the say to me before they go quiet.
'No, don't go please,' I think-speak to the Martian Trees. 'Stay with me. Please don't go!'
But they go anyway. Because they don't want to see, either.
Now I am all alone with the Martian.
'Turn over,' the Martian rasps. 'On your belly.'
I get an image of a fish with a split belly. Guts everywhere.
I hear the Martian remove his space suit. I feel the Martian's skin touch mine. His skin is slimy. It feels like snake skin. I keep my eyes shut tight and try not to scream.
'You're such a big boy, aren't you baby?,' the Martian speaks. His voice is buzzing in my brain, like an insect. Like an insect eating my brain. It makes it hard to think. 'Aren't you?'
I shake my head back and forth.
'Not. Mmnot big,' I plead with the Martian. He laughs against my neck. 'Mmm little,' I say. 'Too little.'
If I'm little, he may not want to eat me.
'You're not little,' the Martian replies, and his voice is like ice. 'How old did you turn today, my love?'
I push my face into the sand. It's soft and muffles my words.
'Eight,' I explain, hoping the Martian will know I'm not big at all. Eight is not big at all.
'Eiiight,' the Martian hisses. 'Eight is not little, is it? You're a big, big boy now. Aren't you Sherlock?'
The Martian likes to play games with me sometimes. I shouldn't have come back to Mars without Mycroft. He's the only space explorer I know I can trust. He always tell me when he's near. He tells me what to do to keep me safe. 'Stick by me, Sherlock. Stay by me tonight.' That's what Mycroft says.
Mycroft's face always darkens when he tells me to stay by him.
And Mycroft always looks like he's going to cry when he has to go away.
'I'm going to get a flat soon - the day I turn 18. I'm taking you then, okay? Just hold on a little longer. You'll be with me, and he'll never touch you again.'
I nod against Mycroft's throat. He puts his hands in my hair.
'It's only three more years, Sherlock,' he whispers, rubbing my back.
'That's a long time,' I whine, 'I might die first.'
Mycroft shakes me, his cheeks wet.
'You're not going to die. Not really. Just don't fight him. Don't make him angry.'
I grab Mycroft's back and press my fingertips into his spine.
'Take me with you now! Please Myco!'
Mycroft bites his lip. He looks miserable.
'I have to go back to school, Sherlock. And you're too little to go to boarding school.'
I grab his wrist and squeeze.
'I can hide. I can stay under your bed and be quiet! No one will know.'
Mycroft gives me a sad smile.
'They'll take you right back when they find you.'
I shake my head 'no,' and I grab Mycroft's hand.
'Please take me with you.'
Mycroft sighs, his form disintegrating. He loses height.
But he never says anything to the Martian.
Mycroft is an older space explorer, but he's scared of the Martian too.
I know he is.
'I'm still little. I'm little,' I start to cry against the sand when I feel the Martian climb on top of me.
'Are you?,' the Martian whispers again, then snickers against my neck. His snake fingers rub up and down my legs, making them slimy with his hands. His Martian hands are wet with Martian slime. 'No, I don't think you are.'
I press my face in the sand and want to scream. But I don't.
I don't because the Martian will rip my guts out if I do, and that'll be even worse.
'I want Mycroft,' I hiccough to the Martian, hoping he'll maybe be nice just once. 'It's my birthday, and I want my Mycroft.'
The Martians fingers are playing on my tummy. Stroking my legs where my pants usually cover.
'You think Mycroft is yours? Mycroft is mummy's, and mine - and you are no one's.'
I start to cry, but without any sound at all.
I start to scream in my head.
'MYCROFT, HELP ME!'
In my head. Always in my head.
I scream back all the way to Earth, hoping Mycroft will hear me and come.
'I want Myco,' I cry against the pillow. Daddy stops moving.
'Mycroft's not here. Mycroft's at school, isn't he?,' the Martian pushes my legs apart and I start to shake.
'Please don't. Please not,' I whisper into the sand. 'I don't want it, please. Please - I want to go back home.'
The Martian almost laughs. I can feel his Martian body rumble with amusement.
'It's okay, buddy. It's okay to be scared about getting big. But what sort of daddy would I be if I didn't help you to grow up?'
I stop talking to the Martian. He never listens to my pleading.
Then I feel the Martian put his hands on my body. I feel something cold against my backside. I play the numbers game because Myco is too far away. Maybe he can't hear me. He'd come if he could hear me. I hear Myco in my brain. Not the real Myco, the old Myco, from when I was very, very little.
'You think of a number, say 100 - and you subtract a number. Like seven. You keep going, whenever you are scared, and you won't be as scared. You never stop, okay Sherlock? Just keep counting until everything is okay again.'
Old Myco. I smile in my mind at him.
If Mycroft was here, he'd have helped me. But he's not here, so I start thinking of the numbers.
I start with 100 and detract by seven. 100.
93.
86.
79.
72.
65.
The pain comes at 65. Fast, hot pain. The Martian has skewered my body with his weapon. The Martian is killing me. I let out a holler.
Maybe mummy will hear me. Maybe she will come. She's never come before, but I'm always quiet.
Maybe if I scream...mummy will come. Like Myco.
'Be quiet, Sherlock!,' the Martian gasps out, then makes a sound like in my ear. 'Just relax. If you fight me it's just going to hurt more. Don't move.'
I stop fighting the Martian, but he's stabbed me so it still hurts.
After a few more seconds the Martian starts to move his sword around in my body.
'Please no more,' I beg the Martian. 'You are going to kill me!'
The Martian stops moving. Stops moving immediately.
Laughs. Low in his throat.
He finds it funny. He finds what I've said funny.
For a second.
Then he starts to move again. Starts to move the sword around in my intestines.
I hear him pant against my ear.
'Is that why you are scared?'
I nod my head.
'You'll be fine,' the Martian cackles. 'It won't kill you. You need to learn this, buddy. This is big boy stuff,' the Martian pants besides my head, moving again. 'In a few years you'll have to do this, but how will you know what to do if daddy doesn't show you first? How will you know how to love?'
I put my head into the sand and cry in my mind again.
His sword cuts up my belly and rips out my guts.
I want to scream out loud - through my mouth - but I know no one will hear me on Mars. Only the Martian. And the Martian will get angry.
The Martian might hurt me worser.
So I scream in my head, where the Martian will never hear.
'No Daddy. STOP!'
'STOP, STOP. NO! DADDY, PLEASE NO! NOO!'
The Martian will never hear if I scream in my head.
''Sherlock - oh God, please, fuck! - wake up, Sherlock!''
I'm being shaken. The Martian is shaking me.
''Sherlock!,'' and my eyes open quickly. I suddenly feel dizzy. There is no sand, there is no-
no. pleaseno.
Nonono.
''Sherlock?,'' and John's hands are to his mouth. He looks wrecked. His eyes are large and luminescent. Shimmering with tears. He looks incredibly ill. Like he's going to vomit all over.
I look away in shame. I make a sound. Or the sound plays me, like a bow running over a violin. It comes out of my mouth, like I wanted to do when I was a little boy. It's a screeching sound. I think there is a 'no' in there somewhere.
My throat is convulsing with a sob that I won't let escape.
I keep the sob down in my throat, low. I will not start with this.
I won't make everything worse than it already is.
''It's okay, Sherlock,'' he gets out. And all I can think of in my head is, 'LIAR!'
But I don't speak the words aloud.
''What happened?,'' I gasp. ''What did I do?,'' and the sound comes out in a moan.
My stomach hurts.
I shift on the bed.
Bad move.
I can feel wetness all over my lap.
I look down, and realize with horror that I've urinated all over myself. I turn around, slide out and come to rest on the other side of the bed, pressing my face against the wall. Willing myself not to hyperventilate.
nononono!
John quickly traverses the distance.
''Go away, John!,'' I almost scream. My voice is high pitched and frantic, and I know it is - but I can't change it right now. My voice is coming out on its own, like water pouring through cracked glass. I cover my face with my hands, mortified.
He doesn't go away, however.
A few moments later, he's at my side with my dressing gown tucked under one of his arms.
''Put this on, okay?,'' and his voice is wavering. The voice doesn't sound like John at all. If sounds gruff. ''Put this on, and we will go to the bathroom. Get you cleaned up.''
I take the dressing gown, and place it over my body, but don't get up off the ground.
''Please leave me alone,'' I get out, my voice sounding shredded. Like ribbons that have been torn from full sized to thin little pieces. Torn and falling apart.
If voices could bleed, my voice would be bleeding.
''I can't do that, Sherlock. Not tonight.''
I suddenly have an impulse to put my hand in a blender.
I suddenly have an impulse to drag a razor blade over my wrists.
The images come to me quickly. Unbidden.
Violent. Self-violent.
My child self whispers to me, 'there's always that. There's always that if you need it.'
I lean forward and try to stifle the need to retch, and as I move about I realize that I smell like warm piss and sweat.
''Go away and leave me alone!,'' I cry. ''I don't want you! I don't need you here!''
John shakes his head.
''Not going to happen,'' John wheezes. ''I'm not abandoning you when you feel like this.''
I cross my arms over my legs, and place my head in the pocket of space that remains.
''I don't want you here,'' I garble out, repeating the words I've just said. The thickness in my throat making it hard to speak cleanly. ''I want to be alone.''
But he doesn't leave me.
So I fold in upon myself, disgusted with what I've done, and scream at him to go.
To go away.
To please go away.
Please, I don't want you to see.
Can't you understand that?
John doesn't leave me.
He helps me to the washroom some time later.
I think I've yelled at him some more.
But he's still there.
I don't know if I am furious with him, or grateful.
My whole body is shaking.
I know I haven't cried, which is something.
I don't cry anymore. I can't.
I haven't actually cried in years.
But I've shouted and screamed at him and pushed at him.
And now he's helping me to the bathroom, because I feel faint and strange.
''I'll draw you a bath. Put some of those blue bath crystals in,'' and his voice trails off.
I stare at the ground. At my feet. At the long, lean line of the cut from the Horlick's container. It's gone pink instead of red. Was that only three nights ago? Four?
'Aren't you putting on a good show for your John?,' and that ugly, slimy voice of the Martian laughs in my skull.
''Fuck off,'' I hiss to the voice, keeping my eyes shut. ''Fuck off, you bastard.''
I hear John pad back to the bathroom. He's holding a canister of blue Epsom salts.
''Did you say something, Sherlock?,'' he asks carefully, looking even more concerned.
I turn away and shake my head.
John leaves the bathroom while I strip off my ruined pajamas.
I leave my underwear on, then lower myself into the hot water.
I'm surrounded by bright, blue water. Tinted blue bath crystals.
'Fit for a space explorer', I think with mockery. At myself.
For being so stupid.
I lower my head under the water and scream out my anger.
The water muffles the sound.
John is back in the washroom a few minutes later. Sitting on the toilet with the lid closed.
Watching me.
Probably to make sure I don't drown myself.
The thought makes me laugh.
I hiccough a laugh, and I hear him stir in surprise. Feel his gaze burn the back of my head like an intense laser beam.
The little voice in my head, chirrups - 'this isn't funny, young man.'
I laugh against the water again.
It's not really a laugh.
It's almost a cry of pain.
Mingled with a laugh.
It is several minutes later before I realize: I can't stop shaking. Even though the water is warm. Hot, maybe.
I bring my hands out of the water. My fingers are trembling.
I can't get my hands to stop shaking.
''It'll stop soon. You've had a shock,'' John says simply, his voice sounding oddly distant.
My head whips back and forth in denial.
''Just a nightmare. Just a weird dream.''
John ignores my comments.
''I've changed your sheets,'' he says simply. ''Everything else is in the wash.''
I ignore his words. Cup my hands in the blue water.
The water doesn't really look that blue in my hands. Not in such a small concentration of fluid.
''Can you pass me the shampoo?,'' I whisper.
John ambles over to the edge of the tub, not letting his line of sight come down further than my neck.
He passes me my pear shampoo. Then Rainbath shower cleanser. It says Neutrogena on it.
It's not mine.
I sniff it. It smells like John.
I dunk my head under the water again, then pour the shampoo out into my cupped palm. Work up a lather in my curls. Mentally count over the areas I still need to clean.
Fast. Faster.
Hair, face, neck, ears, teeth, chest, arms.
I stop, and repeat. Stop and repeat.
Repetitious words eventually take away the horror of the nightmare.
The memory.
I just say it faster and faster in my head, in my mind, until my traitorous brain causes me to think of something else.
65.
65.
I had counted to 65.
In the numbers game.
I was eight years old when I had lost my virginity.
And I had forgotten that.
How could I have forgotten that?
I turn away in the tub, and stare at the white porcelain - shivering against the heat.
I don't even feel the warmth.
John returns a second time. Back with fresh pajamas.
The silk ones are probably ruined. Probably stained and ruined.
Mycroft's flying geese pajamas. Those weirdly girly pajamas.
The ones John brings back are cotton, though. Striped blue and white.
I realize it's one of his sets. I don't have any cotton pajamas.
I only really had the one pair, because usually I don't sleep with anything, except for pants.
I hate the feeling of anything on my throat when I'm trying to sleep.
''Dry off. I'll be right outside, okay?''
His voice is very, very soft and very, very quiet.
I hate that.
''You don't have to talk like that to me,'' I bark.
John just stares at me, his mouth crumpled up.
Like he wants to say something, but can't.
''I'll be right outside.''
I nod despite myself.
I want John to leave.
I want John to stay.
I don't know what I want.
The pajamas are too short on me. The fit in at the waist, but they are about five inches too short at my ankle.
Not that it matters.
I change into a large t-shirt. It reads RAMC.
It's baggy on John.
It swims on me.
The knock jolts me from my musings, and I look up. My throat doesn't work.
I wonder if this is how it is for Toby.
The ease with which you can fall into not wanting to say a word is alarming.
John steers me to the living room. He's pulled out the chesterfield. Fitted the pull out with extra sheets, fresh blankets.
A sleeping bag has been rolled out on the floor.
The sleeping bag is too small for me.
I stare at it, not comprehending.
I stare at the chesterfield and walk over to it. Touch the sheets.
''I'll be over here,'' John says simply, touching the sleeping bag. His voice closed in upon itself. Like an echo of a voice.
''A sleepover?,'' I ask, my throat not working properly.
I want John to laugh. I want him to at least smile.
Or look irritated with me.
I want John to look like John.
He ignores my comment, and I see him plug a book light into the outlet near the bookshelf.
''Do you want this turned on?''
My brain doesn't seem to process his words.
Do I want it turned on? The light?
So he can see me? Read my expressions?
I stare at him in the relative dark, with only the moonlight streaming through the blinds to light the space.
''I don't need a night light,'' I snark.
John nods his head, and doesn't plug the light in.
''Tell me if you want it on at any time,'' he says softly.
This time I ignore his words.
The sheets are cold as I pull them back over my body.
Funny how I can feel how cold the sheets are, when I couldn't really feel how hot the water was.
The ceiling looks like a crater. Pock marks of white and grey in the darkness.
A Martian terrain.
''How did you know what was happening?,'' I whisper in the dark, wanting to know exactly how much of an idiot I've made of myself.
My voice still sounds loud in the room, even so.
I hear the crinkling of John's sleeping bag as he turns towards me.
He doesn't say anything for a few moments, and then: ''You were screaming, Sherlock.''
I suddenly feel John's warm hand envelope mine. I guess my hand had fallen down and away from the chesterfield. Dangling above the floor.
''I don't remember that,'' I admit.
John opens his mouth, and I hear some blended consonants, then: ''you were having a night terror, I think.''
My head shakes against my pillow.
''Just a nightmare. Not real.''
''Sherlock-''
''I was always quiet!,'' I hiss, a quick and irrepressible furor filling my cells. ''I never made any noise. I didn't even cry! I wasn't-,' and I stop because I'm saying too much. I'm saying way too much.
Then John is up, and at the side of the bed, straightening the blanket up and over my body. Hands in my hair. Brushing my hair out of my eyes, which I close at his touch.
''What else? What else, Sherlock?''
I turn away from John, stare at the wall. Feel his hands moving through my hair.
I don't know if I like the touch or not.
It's making me upset just as much as it's making me feel secure.
And I can smell his soap again. This time it's on my body.
It's spicy. But soothing.
Before I could smell sick, and urine.
That was me.
But John makes me clean.
''Hmm? What else happened?,'' his voice enters my mind.
I shake my head. Because John really won't want to hear the rest.
''Idoanknow,'' I cough into my pillow. My lungs are stinging now. Prickly heat, as if I've breathed in a noxious chemical. Something caustic. Something deadly.
''You can tell me. Come on,'' he says faintly, in the dark. ''It's okay to tell me.''
My face is hot, and my hair is wet. It smells like pear shampoo.
Candied pears.
It smells clean.
John got me clean.
''I used to imagine I was somewhere else when it happened.''
John barely even breaths.
''When you were a little boy?''
I nod against his hand, against the blanket. And against the darkness.
But I keep my eyes shut tight, like I did in the nightmare. If I can't see John, then it almost feels like he can't really hear me. Not really. Just sort of. Which isn't as bad.
''What else?''
''I was on Mars. And I got attacked. A Martian took my clothes off. Put a knife in my body. I was bleeding to death. I asked the Martian not to kill me.''
John's rapid intake of breath causes me to open my eyes. Causes the spell to break.
''Do you have these dreams a lot?''
I shake my head quickly. No. No.
No.
''Do you think you can get some sleep? If I'm right here?''
I nod gruffly, not meeting his gaze.
''Alright,'' he replies, sotto voice. ''It's okay. I'm not going anywhere.''
A soft susurrus of sounds causes me to rouse.
My body shifts against the chesterfield, and I open my eyes gently, rub the grit from them.
Stare at the venetian blinds, and the soft yellow glow of the early morning light.
A small plug in clock grants me the time.
7:38 am
I realize, abruptly, that I can hear the faint murmur of people talking.
Glancing towards the floor, I see that John is no longer resting in the sleeping bag, and fresh shame assaults me as I recall the previous nights events.
After a few seconds I am able to make out John's voice, and John's voice alone.
He must be talking to someone on the mobile.
''Yes. Yes, it was scary. He sounded like a child. Yes - out of touch. Mmm hmm.''
I feel my face flush with the realization that he's talking about *me.*
''No, he didn't say much. Said he went away when it happened. Yes, like depersonalization. Uh huh. I don't know, Mycroft! No, not that. No, nothing like that, no.''
I hear John sigh.
''No, he wasn't crying. He seemed fairly composed. More or less. Angry, yes,'' a pause then. ''Yes, he did,'' and John's voice in insistent and high, ''why? Oh, that doesn't make sense! No it doesn't! Why?! No? Then you get him to discuss it. No, he didn't want to!,'' John's voice drops down to a lower octave, and I can only hear the mumble of sounds then. None are discernible.
John's voice has taken on an edge, though. A tightness. I can hear the elevated frequency indicating upset.
''I think he may be up. Yes, right now,'' I can hear an exhale. Frustrated. ''I will if I need to Mycroft. No, no - I have to go now. Okay. Yes, later.''
He doesn't say goodbye. Just disconnects the call.
I put my head against the pillow, my heart rapidly beating. I can hear my pulse in my head.
John ambles back into the room a few seconds later. I hear him roll up the sleeping bag.
I barely breathe. I don't want to talk to him right now. I can hear his words repeat over and over in my mind.
'He sounded like a child. He sounded like a child. He sounded like a child...'
''Sherlock, you awake?''
I decide I'm angry at John, and glare at the wall.
''Sherlock?,'' he repeats again, his voice nothing but patience.
I suddenly feel enraged.
''Called Mycroft the first second you could, didn't you?,'' I hiss, turning around suddenly. Furious.
''Now wait a minute...,'' he starts.
''It's none of his business,'' I seethe. ''It's none of your business! It's my life! Those things happened to me! Not to Mycroft. Never to Mycroft, and never to YOU!''
John's mouth clicks shut. I like that it clicks shut.
I turn from my back and move up on the chesterfield. John continues to stand rigidly, unmoving.
Ever the solider.
''I don't want you to help me! Not with this! I never wanted you to even know about this. Look what's happened since I've started speaking about it! Everything is falling apart!''
My face is probably flushed, and I probably look wild. I know I do.
''I never have had anything like this happen before! Not ever! But it is now! I covered it all up for a reason, and all you're doing is ripping all the covers off and making me look at it. And I don't want to!''
John's breathing is ragged now. His hands have come up in a gesture of peace.
Even that makes me furious.
''Sherlock-''
''No! I'm not some wild animal! You don't need to talk to me like that! I hate it when people talk to me like that!''
''Talk to you like what? I'm just trying to treat you as I would anyone-''
''I'm not anyone!''
John takes a step closer.
''No, no of course you're not 'anyone'. Please c'mere.''
And my voice hitches.
I pick up a paper weight. Something else. I want to throw both.
''Sherlock, please put those down, and come over here.''
''No!,'' and my voice sounds strangled, even to my own ears. My words are childlike, just like he said. I know they are. But all the words flittering around my brain, available for picking, are the words I've always wanted to say and never have been able to get out.
''Come on, let's put those down now. You don't need those.''
''Don't talk to me like that!,'' I yell. I know I'm scaring John, but the anger is bubbling over. It's inflamed my entire body. If I keep having to look at his face - knowing that he saw everything - I'm going to lose it.
And it's yell, or it's cry.
And I'm not going to cry. Not in front of anyone else.
''Sherlock!,'' and his voice is louder then, but I don't feel scared. I just feel angrier.
How dare he try to tell me to stop. When I've begged him to leave me alone?
How dare he talk to me like I'm a scared little animal!
Doesn't he have any conception of how mortifying this is for me?
''Get out of here!,'' I scream, ''Go gossip to Mycroft about me, but leave me alone!''
My voice is garbled, and I know I'm a few breaths away from sobbing, and he can't see that.
I can't have him see that.
I hear another body pad into the flat.
Mrs. Hudson looks completely alarmed, her eyes large and full like twin moons in her skull.
''What in heaven's name is going on in here?,'' she demands, her voice wavering. ''I could hear you down the street, young man! All the way from Speedy's!''
I throw the glass paper weight across the floor. It remarkably doesn't smash. It just hits the fireplace with a terribly loud sound.
Mrs. Hudson flinches, takes a step back.
''Stop it right now, Sherlock!,'' John yells, his voice draining away as he continues. ''Stop it. You're scaring everyone.''
''Everyone?!,'' I mock, my voice loud and hateful.
''You're scaring *me*!,'' he pants, his eyes huge.
And then he's beside me. Pulling whatever else is in my other hand away from me. I don't even know what it is, but it clinks against the desk as he returns it to the table. My eyes catch a glint of metal.
I realize my hand is bleeding.
I had been grasping onto my paring knife.
The image of me, as a child, running a blade over my wrist, humming ''Mary had a Little Lamb'' comes to me immediately, and I step back from the table alarmed. Start at the pealing blood as if dribbles over my wrist. Over my radial artery.
One little nick, and it's over. You just tug on the wires in the forearms and expose them to air, and all this sadness would go away.
''John,'' Mrs. Hudson demands, ''What is going on?,'' and to me, equally confused, ''oh Sherlock, I think you've gone and got yourself a little worked up over-''
I rub my hands through my hair, pulling on the tendrils until my head stings.
''Get out-,'' I hiss. ''Get out! Get out! LEAVE ME ALONE! GO AWAY!''
Mrs. Hudson flees quickly. It takes a moment later for John to depart. But not before he picks up the paring knife, and deposits it into his jacket pocket.
''I am trusting you, Sherlock,'' he pants, sounding scared. And isn't that what he said he was? Scared? ''Don't go into the kitchen. Don't do anything rash. Just stay in here. Stay in here and calm down.''
He shuts the door behind him.
He doesn't return.
I pull the cold pillow off from the chesterfield.
The pillow from John's room.
It smells like his soap. Like his soap on a rope that Lestrade gave him for Christmas.
It smells like his aftershave.
I push it to my face to muffle the sounds, and then I finally do what I haven't done in years.
I finally begin to cry.
