A/N: I decided to go ahead and post my three-shot to this story as it ties in. Apologies for any misrepresentation of medical matters. I'm lucky enough to have never to broken a bone and had to go off research alone. TW for inexplicit mentions of past child abuse.

BROKEN BONES

It had been a long night. A fast-paced three day case that had involved so little sleep that John had taken to falling into bouts of microsleep, and as such, he had missed a very crucial deduction of Sherlock's. In the end, it was Sherlock that ended up suffering for it. The murderer was the groundskeeper in the park they were currently sprinting through, and had led them directly into a pitfall. Sherlock, with his exceptionally long legs was four paces in front of him. He'd noticed the shift of the ground in front of him and had stopped suddenly a foot away. John had frantically tried to stop in time but had been distracted when the sprinklers had suddenly cut on and had ploughed into him, sending him careening into the hole. Cat-like as he was, he'd still managed to land unsteadily on his ankle seven feet down and the murderer had gotten away.

He was actually quite shocked that Sherlock hadn't immediately jumped down his throat for his clumsiness. In fact, he had yet to blame him at all. John wondered if he was doing it on purpose. Having no reason to defend himself against an onslaught of insults, guilt and self-deprecation took over and made him feel infinitely worse seeing the grimace on the detective's face as he helped him hobble off on one leg towards the nearest street they could catch a cab on.

"Are you really such a poor doctor that you can't even set my ankle at home?" Sherlock moaned as they sat on inflexible plastic chairs of the A&E waiting for triage to get to them. Looking up from filling out his best friend's medical information, he could tell immediately that it would be at least another fifteen minute wait with the number of bleeding and critical patients. Sherlock may have been a master of deductions, but John could diagnose almost everyone in the waiting area without ever seeing a chart. That was the nature of the A&E though.

"I know you're in pain, but be reasonable. We don't know what's broken."

"Reasonable? Are unbroken bones supposed to jut out at this angle?" It was obvious that the bone was broken, but without x-rays he couldn't tell if it was just his fibula or if his talus or any of his metatarsals had also suffered any damage as well. It was hard to tell through the swelling and without palpating the area, but if he had to guess, it looked like a pilon fracture, and likely would take surgery to correct. These next 6 to 8 weeks were going to be hell on earth; he didn't need anyone to tell him that.

"I can't believe I have to ask you this after so much time, but you're going to need to give me a full medical history." Most of the injuries he'd been able to handle at home, even when it went against his better judgment. This was the first time they'd made it to the A&E in a cab. Mainly it was a formality; all the hospitals in the area had his records on file.

More frequently it was John that was injured. He couldn't count how many times he'd ended up needing stitches, or had to be fished out of the Thames or had his shoulder popped back into place. His ligaments had weakened so that he had to do this much more frequently with his damaged shoulder. It had gotten to the point where he had simply taught Sherlock how to do it for him to spare the trouble of waiting in the A&E.

Sherlock gave a long, agitated sigh, and John tried his very hardest not to roll his eyes. There was pain lurking behind them, even if he wouldn't let on.

"You won't have enough room in that little box there."

"Alright, fine, why don't we stick with what's relevant. Broken bones and allergies for now, I'll decide if anything else is relevant."

"You'll still not have enough room. Aside from amoxicillin, no relevant allergies, but I've broken nearly every bone in my body at one time or another. It's hell getting through airport security."

"You're exaggerating…" Odd, Sherlock rarely exaggerated facts.

"True, I have broken at least 14, though. Or had them broken for me."

"14!?"

"Shall we begin? Or would you like to continue gaping at me so?"

"Fine, bone and age please."

"In chronological order: Right ulna, age 3. Left clavicle age 5. Right radial fracture, age 6. Forth, fifth and sixth ribs on the left side, age 6. Skull fracture, age 8. Nasal bone, age 9. Left scapula, age 10. Left humerus, age 10. Coccyx, age 11. Ninth and tenth ribs on the right side, age 12. Ah, and left third metacarpal, age 29."

Sherlock didn't seem to notice that John had stopped writing after he listed his scapula. His vision had gone blurry and he couldn't quite cease the tremor in his left hand, nor swallow around the dessert dryness in his throat.

"Sorry, was that too vague? Did you need me to give proximity as well?"

John was still trying his best to get his bearings and sort the situation out, and didn't respond. Didn't even meet Sherlock's eyes.

"Sherlock Holmes," a bored nurse called, and Sherlock finally looked at him and began attempting to get up onto his good foot.

John sat in stunned silence, not even noticing the difficult time the man beside him was having until he heard Sherlock call his name. "I don't normally ask for help, doctor, but do you think you could you lend me a shoulder?"

He snapped to attention and gently guided Sherlock back into his seat and went and found a wheelchair for his injured best friend. The next three hours passed in a blur, and Sherlock was mercifully spared surgery to repair the ankle and given the order of bed rest for two weeks.

Sherlock crashed on the way back to the flat in the cab, either because of the pain meds or the exhaustion, and after many unsuccessful attempts to rouse him, John was forced to slap him awake on the steps of Baker Street after dragging him out of the cab. "Mnn, no! Stop!" His horror filled words, and the way he seemed to shrink into himself as he came to were enough to freeze John's blood and he felt like every last paradigm that he'd ever had concerning Sherlock suddenly turned on its ear. Irrefutable proof of something that, four hours previous, he never would have dreamt up in his wildest nightmares.

After the five minutes it took getting Sherlock up the stairs into their flat and the twenty minutes it took getting him undressed and settled with his ankle iced and elevated, John was so utterly exhausted he was on the verge of falling asleep, tipped forward on Sherlock's bed.

"Could you get the light before you fall unconscious? Also, you'll likely appreciate arranging yourself in a supine position come morning, John."

Without speaking, he got up to get the light and fell back into Sherlock's bed, too tired to make it to his own. "Listen to me, John…" he said, John rallied all of his strength to turn and glance at his best friend. "There are things about my past that I've never told anybody. Things you won't like hearing. I suspect you'll probably see me in a different light once you know… But I would never burden you with them unless it were something you would choose to hear."

John let out a breath. He really ought to awaken himself more and weigh this carefully, but honestly, he didn't need to think this through. Nothing Sherlock could say was capable of scaring him off. "I'm in, 'Lock," he slurred out as though drunk. Too tired to do anything but kick off his trainers. He was out before the second shoe could drop.

Waking up that next morning, filled with horror and sickening dread, he knew without a shadow of a doubt, it would.

He lay there for a while, simply staring at the ceiling, watching Sherlock texting in his peripheral vision. "Do you want breakfast then? You've not had more than biscuits in over two days…"

"I texted in an order for delivery. Procured a guy at Benji's his proper inheritance after proving his stepmother killed his father. I'll call Mrs Hudson and ask her to bring it up for us."

"Don't bother her, I'll get it."

They lay in silence for nearly ten minutes, neither even moving. John got up when the bell sounded and got their breakfast and didn't even bother to get plates. He grabbed an ice pack from the freezer and dug the pain killers from his coat pocket and placed the supplies between them on the bed. They ate out of containers with plastic utensils in Sherlock's bed, both ravenous enough that there were no leftovers.

"Go on, then. You've been trying to figure out an opening. I'll admit I've got all day, but your thinking is becoming quite circular," Sherlock said a few minutes after they had resumed lying in bed, hardly moving.

It had, and for once, John didn't bother feeling astounded or disturbed by Sherlock's ability. "Your father?" he murmured. He knew startlingly little of Sherlock's life prior to his reaching adulthood, but no step parents had ever been mentioned and he doubted a woman was capable of inflicting those kinds of injuries on someone as old as twelve.

"Yes."

"What, um…" he drifted off into silence. Discussing this with someone with typical human emotions would be delicate and difficult, but he'd know exactly what to expect; what barriers to respect, what comfort to give. This was uncharted territory, and for a selfish moment, he wished he could unlearn the information that his best friend was abused as a child, but how the hell did he expect to do that?

"I'm so sorry, Sherlock." The words poured out of his lips unchecked and he wished he could recall them almost immediately.

"I forgive you." The detective finally glanced at him with a wan smile.

John didn't smile back. "Do you want to-"

"If you really would like to hear the details, I could recount them for you, but I doubt they would do anything but horrify you, and certainly wouldn't offer any catharsis for me…"

"Sherlock," the tone of compassion was genuine, but he could feel just how unwanted it was.

"I don't know why people think that talking about traumatic moments makes them any less difficult to cope with. Telling Mycroft only resulted in being beaten within an inch of my life. That certainly didn't make me feel any better."

John was struck with an almost unbearably strong desire to touch Sherlock, offer some sort of tactile support. He couldn't possibly know what kind of response it would provoke, but then his best friend turned towards him and it was all written out clear as day in his eyes and he stopped thinking and squeezed the man's arm.

"What happened at age 12?" John asked in hardly a whisper.

Sherlock sat up slowly and leaned backwards against the wall and after a moment, John joined him, lacing a hand through his.

"Car crash. He was an alcoholic you see – terribly clichéd," Sherlock clicked his tongue as though disappointed. "He was paralysed from the neck down. I want to say that I felt like justice had been served, but mother, she blamed me for it. Said my freakishness drove him to the bottle. I didn't know him before I was alive, so it very well could be true. After that, I was schooled full time and stayed with Mycroft over the summer. I only saw them occasionally on holidays. He was placed in a facility and she rarely spoke to me or Mycroft after that."

The coldness that was descending through his body, along with a sensation of pins and needles, was almost welcome. He hadn't noticed placing the other hand in front of his mouth until he found it difficult to breathe in a gasping breath.

He wrapped an arm around the other man's shoulders, but it felt stiff and hollow and he removed it, settling for squeezing a tense shoulder.

"I can't really blame the alcohol too much. He wasn't always drunk when he did it. Mycroft admitted he'd never hit him before, and it only ever occurred when he was away at school. Mother didn't seem to care. I had to wonder if maybe she was right."

"Oh God, stop, please… please stop, Sherlock." John easily and gracelessly threw his arms around him, the tenseness forgotten. Sherlock responded reluctantly, turning to allow him to embrace him but not returning the hug. "She absolutely was not right. You have to believe me."

"Whether it was warranted or not-"

"Shut up! Surely… surely you don't believe that. By God, I don't care if you were the spawn of Satan! Nothing could ever possess someone to hurt a child except a psychological deficiency. Your behaviour, your personality, it wouldn't have… it couldn't have changed that."

"Don't act as though you know for certain. You weren't there…"

"I'd have killed him, had I been. It wasn't your bloody fault. No amount of brattiness or stubbornness could ever have made it your-"

"Then why the hell did he?" John knew it to be a trick of the light, but he would swear on a bible a thunderstorm was taking place behind those beautiful eyes. "Mental deficiency, emotional problems… None of it explains anything, John! Why the hell did he pick me? I was no weaker, no more selfish than my brother was. I wasn't fat or lazy or stupid. I was stubborn, but what child isn't? I may not be adept with human emotions, but the rationalization that takes place in justifying actions is something that I can grasp, at least on a basic level. But this!" Sherlock pulled away, burying his face in his hands. "I can't fucking rationalise this!"

"That's what makes you different than him, don't you see? That's what makes you better than him, or Moriarty or any other criminal that we chase through the streets of London. You can't understand it, and by God, you wouldn't want to, Sherlock! Because you aren't fucking evil. You've got a heart, a soul! I've seen it in you. You're better than he is, mate!"

He'd never heard Sherlock's voice so broken as he spoke. "What made me so unlovable that not even my parents could bring themselves…" He never wanted to hear it again.

"Sod them. Sod both of them, Sherlock. I don't think either of them could love anyone. I love you! Perhaps it doesn't much matter now in the grand scheme of things, but I do. You mean more to me than anyone else alive, and I thank God every day that I met you." He doesn't realise the truth of the words until they're leaving his mouth, knowing he's never meant anything more in his life.

There were tears streaming down both of their faces and Sherlock looked at him with a vulnerability that sent John gasping through sobs. He took his best friend's stricken face in his hands, kissing his cheeks, his nose, his forehead, his chin. Kissing him like it could somehow stop him from hurting, like a parent kisses a child that had skinned his knee. He could almost feel something physically breaking in his best friend as he finally lost his composure, slumping against John's chest boneless and sobbing like he'd been waiting his entire life for the opportunity to.

He knew there weren't words to alleviate this kind of pain, so he settled for nonsense whispered in a soothing voice, practically crushing the other man in his embrace and stroking his hair. He knew he should be surprised; moved by such a show of emotion from such a typically stoic man, but he couldn't conjure anything other than sadness and compassion, and an odd regret. Disappointment that he lived in a world that had allowed his best friend to go through something like this for years without intervening; had left him to put the pieces back together alone, and had brought him a friend too late in life to be of any real help.

John held him for hours; long after he'd stopped crying. Neither of them spoke for a long while. Sherlock seemed a mixture of shell-shocked and mortified, lying prone against John who wordlessly ran a hand through his curly hair.

He could sense the shame and embarrassment coming off him in waves, but he remained silent and unwilling to move away, his cheek against John's chest. "You're acting like you've just been kegged in the school yard. You don't have anything to be ashamed of, mate…I don't think any less of you. Not in the least." Except for a twitch of his lips, he didn't react to John's words, nor did he focus his eyes, but he could feel him relax just the slightest bit. John stroked his back, rubbed his head and squeezed him tight, but nothing seemed to get any response out of him.

Lunchtime came and went. John dozed off and on, and still Sherlock laid there, his ear resting against John's sternum, as though hypnotised by his heartbeat. John was content to lay there and wait for him to say something, despite the protests his bladder was sending him.

Even now, Sherlock seemed to be able to read his body language, despite not looking directly at his face. "Go on," he said, rolling over onto his back.

John didn't need to be told twice, and nearly stumbled over his shoes on his way to the loo. He came back a minute later and laid down, wondering if the spell had been broken.

"John?" the whispered vulnerability was still there, and if John hadn't known exactly what put it there it might have been endearing to hear.

Sherlock placed his head back down on John's chest, wrapping his arms around him and burying his face in his shirt.

"Yeah?"

"I don't know if it's at all possible for me to love someone… But if I can, it's you, John."

John had never really though it needed it to be said aloud; had thought Sherlock hadn't either (and couldn't believe it was possible for him to have been more wrong). He knew Sherlock cared. In some ways all the nonsense he had to put up with from him had always seemed like Sherlock's way of testing how far he could push before John left. He recognized it now as a defence mechanism to see how much John cared. Somehow, the idea that Sherlock trusted him… Loved him, after every other person in his life had failed him was awe-inspiring.

In his own way, they had both said it hundreds of times. Not in as many words, but with all the intent. In his own mind, he'd come to accept that the words "You're an idiot" loosely translated to "I love you." Now he wished he'd voiced the thought out loud.

He opened his mouth to say something, anything, but his throat felt like it was caving in.

"John?" Sherlock sat up, his expression worried and guarded.

He cleared his throat, joining him in sitting up and blinking away the moisture in his eyes. "Of course it's possible for you to love. I'm…" John had no idea what to say, embarrassed and flustered that he'd been moved to point of tears. "I always hoped you might…"

"Will you…" Sherlock was trembling slightly, and John was fairly sure that whatever it was, he would happily comply. "Would you say it again?"

This was unprecedented. So out of character for his best friend that John nearly doubted he understood correctly. He found himself smiling. "I love you."

He could make out the conflicting emotions in those eyes, which, after so many years stills managed to dazzle him every day. After such a big reveal, he couldn't blame him for the slight guardedness, but with it he knew there was a bittersweet delight. And hope that John prayed would one day be overtaken by trust. "If you wanted me to, I would say it every day."

He knew the moment they left his lips they had been the exact right words.