There was something about seeing the cheerful familiarity of 221 again that lightened some weight in John's chest that he hadn't even known had been lodged there. Allowing himself a quick smile, he opened the door.

Sherlock was already inside, his lean form bent over his trunk as he unpacked. The books that John had gotten him for Christmas had been placed with great care on his shelf.

John leaned against the doorframe, not moving any further into the room, not saying anything, just quietly observing Sherlock. There was something enthralling about the graceful yet slightly spastic way that he moved and John hadn't realized before how it was even possible to wholly miss any one person so much.

The relief of being back, of being with him was a bright warm thing in John's chest. He had missed this, the quiet, golden happiness of 221, the way that Sherlock looked when he was totally focused on something, Sherlock himself.

(God, he had missed Sherlock.)

He let out a quiet, huffed chuckle and Sherlock turned to face him.

"Hello, John." His voice was careful, cautious, steady.

John nodded, smiled, suddenly aware of both the lump in his throat and the crackling heaviness in the air between them. Neither he nor Sherlock had the gall to look directly at each other, but he could feel Sherlock's eyes upon him.

They moved towards each other, until they were close enough for it to be a question (What are we doing here? Is this it?) and every part of John hurt, even his teeth, but it was a good kind of hurt. Sherlock's face up close was pale and strangely fragile and John realized he was shaking.

But something broke the spell between them- Sherlock sneezed as John accidentally stamped on his foot and they sprung apart.

They went safely to their opposite sides of the room. The thrumming atmosphere was still there, electric underneath the uncomfortable tension, making John feel incredibly aware of himself and his body.

(What the hell had all that been about?)

"So," he said, his face flushed. "How were your holidays, then?"

"Good," Sherlock replied absentmindedly. "No actually, they were awful. Glad to be back.

"Same."

"By the way," Sherlock said as he continued unpacking. This was here when I got into the room." He held up a creamy white envelope with their names written on the front in small, neat writing. "It's from Mrs. Peck. She wants to thank us for helping her move by inviting us over for tea on Friday."

John raised an eyebrow.

"Surprised she wants you to come back after the things you said to her."

The words were out before he even properly thought about them, and he felt a sinking in his chest as something in Sherlock's face closed down.

"Sherlock, I'm sorry, I didn't mean-"

He waved him off with a hand.

"It's fine. But about that."

"Yeah, about that."

"I shouldn't have said those things."

"True, but I shouldn't have lost my temper like that either."

"Can we just…can we just agree to never do that again? Not bicker, obviously, because that's inevitable but not to simply leave it to fester for days on end? No more storming out." His voice was hardly more than a whisper and it trembled while he spoke.

"Of course. God, of course. Never, Sherlock, never."

And John wasn't quite sure who had initiated it, but suddenly their arms were wrapped around each other. Sherlock's head was resting carefully atop John's, his face buried in his hair. John's fingers brushed lightly against the back of Sherlock's neck, careful, gentle.

"Never again. I promise," he whispered where his face was pressed up against the bare intersection of Sherlock's shoulder and neck. "Never again."


In Biology, Molly was all too happy to have a captive audience to whom she could gush about Jim to.

From what John was able to catch, he'd transferred to Bart's sometime in November, but hadn't asked Molly out until the week before Christmas break. Their first date had been at Molly's house, watching Glee while her cat sat between them, and John gave a silent thanks that there was an even worst first date than his own.

"…And he's so kind and he listens to everything I say and tells me that I'm beautiful and…"

(John was happy for Molly. Honestly, he was. Which was why he was keeping his mouth shut about what Sherlock had deduced about Jim being gay after seeing him hanging awkwardly around their door that morning.)

Molly's face had gone a slight pink and she was waving her pen around with dangerous enthusiasm as she spoke.

"But enough about me. How were your holidays?"

"They were good. Fine. Dull."

Molly nodded, tapping her pen thoughtfully against the table.

"And how's Sherlock?"

(John really didn't like the way she smiled a bit when she said that, as if she knew something that he didn't.)

"He's…fine? Not really my business, is it? We're just roommates, that's all."

"Of course."

But the faint smile was still there and it made him itch with curiosity, with the need to know what Molly was dancing around.

And suddenly it fell into place; she thought they were together. Oh god. His face burned and he tried to avoid her eyes.

"Molly, you know that I'm not…you know, gay."

She laughed, knocking her pen so hard against the desk that the cap went flying across their classroom.

"I never said you were. But it's just him, isn't it? With you? I've seen the way you look at him. It's like you're coming alive or something."

John suddenly felt as if there wasn't enough air in the room and he struggled to find something to say in response.

"I'm not- we're not. No. He's not even inter- no. Christ no."

He grabbed his backpack before Molly could ask any more questions and slipped out of the room. In the bathroom, he washed his hands three times in a row and then looked at himself in the mirror.

Same sandy hair that never lay quite right, same blue eyes, same ears that stuck out too far. He was exactly the same as he'd been back in September. So why did it feel like he had changed so dramatically?

There was nothing going on between him and Sherlock. He knew that and Sherlock knew that and Molly had to know that. There couldn't be. John was straight and Sherlock was…well, Sherlock was whatever Sherlock was but it was certainly not interested in John. To be honest, John wasn't even sure if Sherlock cared about these sorts of things, if he at all noticed the way your mouth went dry and your stomach hurt in the best sort of way whenever you saw a particular person.

(And John's particular person was not Sherlock. He told himself this over and over as he watched himself in the mirror.)

Besides, even if Sherlock did notice these sorts of things, why the hell would someone like him be interested in someone like John? John was ordinary, worse than ordinary- he was broken and scarred, someone who needed a therapist and whose shoulder was gnarled mess of old wounds. Sherlock was a force of nature, someone that took up all the space in the room, someone whole and brilliant and glorious.

He could have anyone he wanted, so why on earth would he choose John?


The Pecks' house was small and cozy, with overstuffed armchairs and several incredibly fat cats curled up in sunny corners of their sitting room. John and Sherlock were wedged tight together on a plush green sofa staring uncomfortably at a picture of Mr. and Mrs. Peck and a young woman, their daughter most likely, during happier times as they waited for Mrs. Peck to return with their tea.

"This was a mistake," John hissed. "Complete waste of our time."

Sherlock laughed quietly, but said nothing in response.

Mrs. Peck emerged from the kitchen a moment later, bearing a tray with three mugs. One was already partially drunk from, the others filled practically to the brim. She handed the full ones to the boys.

"It was so very kind of you boys to come and help me pack up before I left town," she said as she settled into her armchair. One of the cats jumped up into her lap with a purr and she smiled down at it over the rim of her mug. "It'll be nice to get away from all the memories of my poor Alfie."

John looked at Sherlock to respond, but he was too busy carefully swirling sugar into his tea, so John nodded, giving a weak smile.

"Are you two from around here?" she asked, stroking the cat. There was a loud clatter as Sherlock dropped his spoon against the tray.

"London, in fact," John said. "About forty minutes away."

"It's a pity that you've got no family or anything in the area, then," she said softly. "Drink your tea before it gets cold, dear."

John raised the mug to his lips, but before he could take a sip, Sherlock stepped hard on his foot. He bit down around a curse. When he shot him a questioning glare, Sherlock stared at his mug, and then at John, his lips pressed in a tight line. The message was clear: do not drink. John put his mug back down, resting it carefully on the table as if he was dealing with a live bomb.

From the kitchen came the bright ding of the oven, and Mrs. Peck lifted the cat off her lap to scurry into the other room.

"That's just the biscuits! I'll be out in a minute! Enjoy your tea!"

"We are!" Sherlock shouted as he took his and John's mugs and dumped them into a potted plant.

"What the hell are you on about?" John whispered.

Sherlock held his now empty mug underneath John's nose. There was the scent of tea, but there was something else underneath it, something dark and bitter.

"Poison," he said, leaning in close so that his lips nearly brushed the shell of John's ear. "That's why she kept telling us to drink up."

John tried very hard to focus on the fact that they had just nearly been murdered instead of the close proximity of Sherlock's lips to his face.

(It wasn't particularly successful.)

"I suggest we leave now."

"That's the best idea you've had in ages."

They grabbed their coats off the rack and slipped out the door, careful to make as little noise as possible to avoid alerting Mrs. Peck to their escape.

They made it all the way back to school before either of them said anything.

"Did that really just happen?" John asked, sticking his hands in his pockets to guard them from the cold. "Did we really nearly just get murdered by a bloody retiree?"

Sherlock nodded.

"God, can you imagine how undignified of a death that would've been? Surrounded by doilies and cats?"

"Downright embarrassing, it would've been."

They were silent for a moment, and then they both caught each other's eye and erupted into laughs, long, infectious laughs that made their stomachs ache and their eyes water, until John's knees buckled and he nearly fell, sending them into a fit of laughter all over again.

John wiped the tears from his eyes as the last of his chuckles subsided. Sherlock was still at it, his shoulders shaking, his low, rumbling laugh making his eyes crinkle up around the corners.

And suddenly, as if a switch had been flipped on in a dark room, John knew.

He was in love with him.

He was head over heels in love with his best friend, his mad, brilliant, hilarious, (slightly hideously gorgeous) best friend who almost definitely did not feel the same.

And he could never tell him.

(It might've been sad if it also hadn't been so bloody hilarious.)

And John also knew that this wasn't some new change. He didn't know when he had fallen in love with Sherlock or why it had taken him so long to realize it. Maybe it had been when he had read the email where Sherlock had apologized, where he had bared his soul. Maybe it had been after their fight, when John's last view of him before storming out was the broken look on his face and he had realized how badly he screwed up, how close he was to losing something incredibly important, and how he needed to go back in there to make things right but couldn't, because of his pride.

Maybe it had been the very first night, when Sherlock had made John laugh the way he had just now, and John had slept without nightmares for the first time in ages.

He felt sure about Sherlock in a way that he had never felt about Sarah. Sherlock knew about the car accident. Sherlock had asked to see his scar. Sherlock had seen John at both his very best and his very worst and he trusted him and he protected him and for that John loved him.

Oh god. He loved him. John loved him and there was no turning back because this was terrifyingly real and loving someone like Sherlock Holmes wasn't something that you could easily erase or forget about.

He suddenly felt deeply uncomfortable and he reached in his pockets for his phone to have something to do with his hands before realizing it wasn't there.

Shit. Shit. He must've left it at Mrs. Peck's.

"Sherlock," he said, already stopped in his tracks. (And did his voice betray him? Could Sherlock tell when he spoke that John loved him?) "I've got to go back there. I left my phone behind."

Sherlock scowled.

"Really, John? Fine. I'll come with you."

But John held up a hand to stop him.

"It's fine. We'll attract more attention if we go together. I'll just sneak back in, grab it and run back up here. It'll be fine."

(Besides, he needed a minute away from Sherlock to process the fact that he'd just gone from John Watson to John Watson Who Loves Sherlock Holmes. It was a lot to take in at once.)

Sherlock frowned.

"Fine. Just…be careful?"

John grinned.

"Of course."


When John came to, his head throbbing and his vision fuzzy, he was in a dimly lit basement, his clothes caked with mud, his backpack in the corner of the room. Boxes and trunks were stacked in teetering piles throughout.

He sat on the dirt floor for a minute, his head in his hands, trying to remember what had happened for him to end up here.

When he'd gotten back into town, he'd very carefully opened the Pecks' front door, moving it slowly to keep it from creaking. His mobile phone was sitting where he'd left it on the table, their mugs still left out from tea. There was no sign of Mrs. Peck.

John had grabbed his phone quickly and was on his way out when suddenly there was a soft cough from behind him. He turned and found himself staring down the black, snub-nosed barrel of a gun.

"I'm glad you came back," said Mrs. Peck, keeping the gun trained on John. "It would've been much better if your boyfriend had come along too, but I'm sure he'll turn up sooner or later."

(There was a cold stab of fear in John's stomach, both from the gun pointed at his head and at the realization that Sherlock would come looking for him and that he was leading him straight into a trap. Images of Sherlock, bent and bloody and broken, came unwillingly into his head and he felt sick.)

(It was all his fault. Just like the accident, this was all his fault.)

"You're the one who killed those people then? It was you?" His voice shook slightly but it was clear.

Mrs. Peck laughed, a giggling sound that didn't seem like it should belong to a would-be murderer.

"Wasn't me, though whoever it was, I'd like to give them a hand. No, I didn't kill them. But I might kill you. And in advance, I'm very sorry about this, dear."

Her hand moved quickly and John braced himself for the iron burn of a bullet breaking into him, but instead there was only the sharp sting of a needle and then everything around him went black, black, black.

Which brought him here, to the basement of the Pecks' home with no idea as to what his fate would be and no visible ways to escape.

He realized that he was mouthing a silent prayer, a please god not him not Sherlock god no. Because if Sherlock came here to rescue him and got himself killed in the process, he'd never be able to forgive himself. Better that he be the one to die.

John realized then that his hands were shaking and he crossed the room to his backpack on quivering legs to find something to occupy himself with, to hold back the panicky waves of fear that threatened to overcome him at any given moment.

Mrs. Peck had taken his phone and his iPod, but all of his school supplies remained neatly lined up inside, and he gave a humorless laugh at the absurdity of it, of seeing his French notebook while he was facing imminent death.

He grabbed a pen from his bag and a half empty notebook and sat cross-legged underneath the light of the bare bulb. He stared at the blank page, trying to think of something, anything to keep his mind off of his situation.

And suddenly, he knew what he had to write.

Dear Sherlock,

If you're reading this, I'm probably dead, because I'd never let you see this while I'm alive. In fact the only reason why I'm writing this stupid letter at all is because I'm probably going to die soon and there's some things that you really need to know.

(Though if I am, in fact, alive through some strange miracle, put this down immediately and forget you've ever seen it.)

You've got to know, about how I feel when it comes to you. I mean, I didn't know until about an hour ago, but that's not the way you see things, is it? You've probably known for months.

By the way, don't feel guilty about it. I understand that you're not interested. Please don't beat yourself up over it or anything.

So yes, Sherlock Holmes, I'm in love with you. Madly, insanely desperately so, I'm afraid, against any sort of rationality or common sense. I think you're clever and funny and kind, even though you'll always try to deny that, and mad and beautiful and fantastic and oh god this letter is going to be so embarrassing but I don't care because everyone gets last words and these are mine.

Being in love with, even though I've only really known about it for all of an hour, is bloody terrifying. You'd know though, wouldn't you, you narcissistic bastard? But joking aside, it's terrifying because it's real in a way that's like nothing I've ever experienced before and because it feels permanent, lifelong, and because I know I'd do anything, literally anything for you.

And that's scary, Sherlock. It really is.

But it isn't enough to drive me away from you, because I really do love you and the fact that I didn't figure this out until my very last day is more than a little bit upsetting.

If I had the chance, Sherlock, I would've spent the rest of my life with you. Imagine how that would've been. We could've bickered and laughed together for a good sixty or seventy years. I would've loved that.

I also would've loved to have the chance to kiss you. Before I met you, I didn't even think I was anything but straight. And now I don't know what I am. I'm interested in you and that's good enough for me. (By the way, please tell Molly she was right about me. She saw through me from the start.)

I still would've liked the chance to kiss you though. You're beautiful, you really are, all that pale skin and dark hair and rapid-fire intelligence. You're a miracle.

(God, I sound like a sop.)

I can't even remember what I was like before you, because you brought color and life back into my world. You made me important to myself again. You saved me, you know that? When I first met you, I was barely clinging on and you pulled me back from the brink, and I owe you so much for that, so fucking much.

Oh god. There's footsteps coming down the stairs. Oh god oh god oh god I don't want to die. Please god let me live.

I love you I love you I love you.

-John

John tore the pages out of the notebook and shoved them into his pocket. He listened to the footsteps on the stairs grow closer and closer.

He was waiting for either death or salvation.

He just wasn't sure which.

Hi wow so I just wanted to give a massive massive thanks for all the reviews/favorites/everything! It really really means a lot and makes writing this even more fantastic and fun than it already is!