Chapter Nine

Though Elizabeth's death was a hard blow to all of us, most especially Sherlock, we at least had each other. In the days that followed her funeral, Mary and I turned to each other and Sherlock for comfort. Sherlock seemed almost to detach himself from us. The loss of his sister he felt most keenly. He had become so quiet and withdrawn that he hardly spoke for days on end. This striking resemblance to his namesake made me try all the harder to get through to him. Yet, those keen, green eyes sparkled with something I fancied was a sort of guilt and loneliness. The guilt I wished to keep rested firmly on my own shoulders.

In my attempts to draw him out and help Mary in her grief, several excursions were made to local parks. I think the remaining summer and early autumn were spent more outside than in. The weather obliged us by cooling without the incessant rain that plagues this city. As the first colors of autumn began to show on the leaves, Mary had regained some of her healthy glow and Sherlock had at last come to begin investigating his changing surroundings in earnest. More than hope, there was life again in our family, and in our home.

Unfortunately, it was not long lived. Once the weather had decided to turn, it did so with a vengeance. I cannot remember any autumn in years past where icy rain had fallen so early or so consistently. By early October the number of patients that passed through my consulting room had reached alarming levels. By late October emergency house calls were the practice of every man capable of tending the ill. Hospitals were overrun with injuries and illness on a level nothing short of what a mass disaster could have created. As weary in heart and soul as I was in body, I returned home unspeakably late wishing only for the comforting sight of my family. Not daring to wake them, I stopped first to check on Sherlock.

The rasping cough I heard from his bed shook me to the core. I had heard that cough from enough dying children in recent weeks to know this was not well. In an instant I had him in my arms. Not yet a year old, he still felt unusually fragile, but his unhappy squirming protest at having been so rudely awakened always reminded me how much strength lay beyond that fragile appearance. Much to my relief, there was no fever. But I also knew this was only the beginning.

The next morning I was forced to close my practice temporarily as I discovered Mary had not been spared either. She had developed a fever. While I struggled to combat Mary's illness, I called in a maid to help with Sherlock. Even as Mary began to recover, Sherlock declined steadily. His weak, exhausted cough had robbed him of his precious sleep that he so needed to recover. When his fever did develop, it was devastating in its swiftness. In the first days of November, he succumbed to fever and exhaustion in my arms as I sat helplessly rocking him by Mary's bedside.

Mary, still horribly weakened by her own recent illness, was little aware of the goings on around her as I made funeral preparations in those dark and cold days. It was for the sake of her recovery, I said nothing. My own grief I pushed aside to focus on her. I could not begin to imagine the impact on her already frail health. It wasn't until she was able to sit up in bed and ask for Sherlock that I at last told her.

My grief was nothing compared to hers.

I had known for many years how desperately she had wanted children. The loss of not one, but both of our children, was more than she could bear. In the weeks that followed, she regained only enough strength to move about the house, a hollow shattered woman.

As spring at last began to make an appearance, the sparkle of life had not yet returned to her. The warmth of the season seemed only to deepen her depression and sense of loss as she wandered through the blooming flowers of the park. Already frail, it wasn't very long before she once again confined herself to the house. Though I had reopened my practice, it was with the utmost reluctance that I left her alone. Even on the most beautiful day, there was little I could do to draw her out of her sorrow. I could not remember anymore what her smile even looked like.

Her decline continued steadily. She lay there helpless, so lost in her grief I could not reach her. For all that I had done to bring her back, she was lost to me. I cared for her body, even as she stared at me with empty eyes.

As a doctor, I failed both my children.

As a husband, I failed my wife.

Even as I sat there holding her frail hand in both of my useless ones, I watched her whisper her last breath as she went to join our children. Less than a week separated that night from what would have been our children's shared birthday. From where I sat on the floor, I lay my head down on the bed longing to join her.

I don't know how long I sat. But it was Lestrade who broke me out of my trance. I had already dismissed the maid for the night, knowing what was to come. Lestrade, having gotten no answer, knowing I was home, had no intention of leaving me alone.

Lestrade...

He had, on occasion, come to visit my practice with inquiries to which he thought I was more than suited to assist. When the police surgeons were left in confusion, I had been able to help in the past. I wonder what Holmes would think should he ever learn to what extent I owe Lestrade. Holmes never gave the man much credit, but he was a more than worthy friend and law enforcer in his own right. Even Holmes had, to some extent, recognized the man's tenacity. Little did he know how much tenacity the man possessed.

Lestrade had been an occasional visitor in the days following Holmes' death, but rarely. In the days following Elizabeth's death, he had developed a tendency to appear at the most random times; saying little, but very watchful. After Sherlock's death he was a quiet presence with growing frequency to offer support in his own roundabout way. Always he was there, counting himself as a friend I refused to acknowledge. As a friend, I had already failed in such a way as to ensure I would never make such a mistake again.

The day Mary passed away, there was no denying that Lestrade had become more than a professional acquaintance. I am ashamed to admit it, for many reasons, but the man deserved better than such a miserable excuse for a friend. I had long denied Lestrade as a friend, and yet there he stood never hesitating to put me in my place. He asked nothing in return for all those months he had watched and given what support he could. On that night, I remember little more than his rather forceful presence preventing me from what I wished. One phrase in particular during a more heated moment not only stuck with me, but took what little fight out of me that I had left.

"Well, at least you're alive to hate me, Doctor. If that's what it takes, then I can live with your ire."

The rest of the night passed in silence as I collapsed into a chair by the fire. Lestrade offered none of the empty platitudes one suffers in times like these. He said nothing, but only sat watching me in my almost catatonic state. Whether it was his watchfulness or his accepting silence, I cannot tell which I should be more thankful for.

For the second time, I set aside my overwhelming grief, and roused myself to do what I knew had to be done. Mary was laid to rest beside our children. I remember very little of those days, save for Lestrade's near constant, but silent presence. He said nothing as I closed my practice, but would not allow me to remain alone or idle for long. When I turned away the people I suspected had come at his recommendation as I had my own previous patients, he still said nothing.

As is the will of criminals, however, the needs of a friend do not stand in the way. I could still see the worry in Lestrade's eyes when he would drag me out of the house for a meal or two. He knew I had dismissed the maid and rarely lifted a hand for myself beyond the necessary to continue existing. Even my writing was gone. I had used it as a means of keeping Holmes alive and a part of my life. But I had known in my heart I would not long survive Mary. Thus I had finished and published the last adventure of my dear friend Sherlock Holmes before my wife succumbed to her grief.

Case after case Lestrade used to lure me out of my house. It wasn't long before I was standing in for the police surgeon and others of the medical field that surround themselves in activities of law enforcement. The days came and went, and I could not find it in myself to at last confront the grief or the sheer magnitude of my failure. I say this, because I know Lestrade had always seemed on edge during those darker times for me. Gentleman that he was, he never pried. But it seemed he always knew how closely I kept it contained.

And, for all his seemingly light-hearted teasing that I was beginning to look like Holmes, I had not the will to stop my own decline. Denied an easy, quick way out that night, it seemed I was still determined to defy that tenacious, stubborn man. Only once did he ever outright confront me about it, but he left disappointed. No harsh words could have hurt that man more than the quiet admittance that it no longer mattered to me. I could have stabbed him and caused less hurt.

And yet, he came back the next day as if nothing had happened. Nothing more was said. The months came and went as I meandered through my meaningless existence. I remember little of significance beyond the recognition that Lestrade was ever-watchful of my comings and goings.

~o~o~o~

Even as Holmes turned to the next page, he wondered at Watson's blindness. Did he not at all realize the similarity to his own behavior that had so caught Holmes' attention all those years ago?

Holmes frowned slightly, feeling as if he was missing something as his eyes scanned the next page. This one, like the part he had just finished, again had the feeling of having been written after some indeterminate amount of time in between.

~o~o~o~

Son.

Brother.

Friend.

Husband.

Father.

Doctor.

It has been said that work is good for grief. I can attest to that now, myself. I was alive, but so hollow during the time that followed Mary's death that even the warmth and goodwill of the Christmas season could not touch me. The snow was no colder than I felt inside. How I greeted the coming of spring was with an indifference I cannot ever remember having possessed even in the battlefield where detachment is necessary to survival.

Holmes.

His return was one of great joy. For all I had lost, there I was presented with a chance to redeem myself at least in one thing. The joy I felt at his return could not be dimmed even by my guilt at being so happy to have him back instead of Mary and our children. He seemed to reflect that joy himself. He had returned a changed man. In ways I cannot even put to words, he was more alive than I had ever seen him. Unaddressed guilt and grief were swiftly overshadowed in our next adventures. One after another cases came our way that filled the days and nights with something I could never have found to fill the gaps in my life on my own.

I could not begin to imagine the enormity of my folly.

Having denied myself time to grieve the losses of one of my children and my beloved wife, I had, instead, turned it into a dependency upon Holmes. I did not at the time realize what it was I was doing; but Holmes did, apparently. He has always been one to avoid emotional entanglements. Though he seemed warmer than he had in the past, I had no intention of dragging him through the burdens of my failure, my guilt, my grief, and my everlasting shame.

Holmes had often been accused in the past of being able to read minds. Even though I knew his methods, I could not deny how close those accusations were to the truth sometimes. I should have known I could not keep such things from him. As a gentleman, he could not bring himself to do more than question and hope for an answer. As a friend, he could not help but be frustrated by his lack of understanding and empathy. As a detective, he had no doubts where my thoughts and emotions were.

Thinking back on the last several months, I would like to say I saw this episode coming. Still clouded by my own emotional turmoil, I did not. Holmes was right, emotions cloud one's judgment and blind one to so many things. I did not understand the magnitude of his decline in humor until he was well into the drugs he used to escape. Much as I had failed my brother's friend and my brother himself, I saw a repeat now before me. I was in a position to act, but could not get Holmes to see reason.

How can I tell him that the flatmate he met so many years ago was himself a killer?

After all these years, I could not face it again. Coward that I am, I could not explain to him how I know where his addiction will end. Worst of all, he knew. He knew I had been holding on to him as a drowning man holds to a lifeline. In my weakness and cowardice, I had not yet dared to find a reason to live for myself.

All I have ever wanted was to be a healer. As a doctor, I could heal the body. As one who goes further to care for the patients as well as their families, I had the potential to be more. I've always interpreted a healer to be someone that cared for the wounds and illnesses of the body, but could at least inspire the emotional healing of unspoken wounds of the heart and mind; especially in the event of a tragedy. Doctors from all walks of life and all specialized fields stress that detachment is essential. To a point, I now agree. But there is a point where that emotional desperation to save a sick child is needed.

I am rambling now. I think this is the second time I've lost my place in my thoughts as I have begun to drift in and out of sleep. There is much for me to do, if I am to make any attempt to set things to rights. Perhaps some sleep will help me put these scattered thoughts where they belong.

Maybe tomorrow...