Chapter Ten

Slipping slowly down

It was the first time in quite a while that Sherlock's cauldron had exploded while in class. He had kept his experiments to his out of class sessions. There was a collective sigh from the students, as the ones closest to Sherlock moved out of the way, and the Professor walked over to berate the Slytherin boy.

John glanced over at Sherlock, wondering why he had decided this was a good time to go back to experimenting. It was Newt year. Then again, Sherlock could pass potions with his eyes shut. Though not literally, John did not want to see someone try and do potions with their eyes shut, that would end horrifically.

What struck him as odd, was not that Sherlock had disobeyed. That was nothing new or strange, but it was the look on his face. He was ignoring Slughorn completely, and staring down at the mess of his potion with such a look of confusion, as if he didn't understand what had happened.

From John's experience at watching Sherlock experiment, when his experiments blew up in his face, he just gave an annoyed sigh and started again. But this, it almost looked as if Sherlock hadn't been expecting it to go wrong.

"Keep blowing up the classroom till your own time," Sally said to Sherlock, when the class was dismissed and the students filed out.

"Maybe he's hoping to try and blow us all up with him," Anderson drawled.

"Wouldn't be surprised," said Sally. Sherlock ignored them, but he refused to speed up to get out of their presence. Refused to give them the satisfaction of chasing him off. "Wouldn't be that obvious about it though, after all these tricks these years, blowing us up would be too simple."

"I am not behind the attacks," Sherlock said through his teeth.

"What proof is there of that?" Sally asked, raising an eyebrow. "None."

He hissed. And some other time, John might have found that strange, that his composure was slipping. Remarks that previously would have bounced off him, seemed to be getting through his wall of not caring.

And so John did what many hurt, angry, people would do. He lashed out at the person that had made him hurt and angry. "Sally could be right," he said, and suddenly Sherlock stiffened and turned slowly to stare at him. Their conversations at the end of last year, echoing in both their minds. "What proof is there?" John tilted his head to the side.

The two houses all stopped, eyes flickering between the duo. While usually most people would not care if two best friends were having a fight, it was somehow different with Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. As if they were the exception to the rule. There was always one group of friends at Hogwarts that the students all paid attention to, whether or not they liked them, whether or not they were in the same house.

A couple of emotions flittered across Sherlock's face, and it was only because John knew him so well that he could catch some of them, anger, disbelief and something akin to disgust before Sherlock schooled them away to a blank expression. "Like you're clever enough to see any proof," he muttered. "Stop imaging things Watson, wouldn't be the first time."

John made an angry noise in the back of his throat, and Sherlock raised his eyebrow before turning to leave, this time he did speed up slightly to get away from the throng of students.

"John?"

"What?" John asked Carl, looking up from his mostly finished essay. He just had to finish reading over it, making sure there wasn't any blaring errors.

"You have to hand that essay in in ten minutes or it's late."

John glanced at his watch and swore. It had been meant to be due during class the day before, but as John hadn't been able to finish it the Professor had granted him an extension. "It'll have to do," he said, rolling it up frantically. "I'll be back," he called over his shoulder as he bolted out, and towards Professor Hudson's office.

Breathless, he knocked on the door, and pulled it open at the enter in reply. He then froze in the doorway. Professor Hudson sat behind her desk, nursing a cup on tea in her hand, and on the other side of the desk, also holding a cup of tea sat Sherlock Holmes. Who glanced around boredly at the opening of the door.

"Uh," John said eloquently, holding up the hastily rolled and somewhat dented roll of parchment. "My essay, Professor."

"Ah, thank you Mr Watson."

John crossed the room to pass it to her, noticing that Sherlock's eyes trailed him the whole way across. She took the parchment, and John gave an awkward nod, leaving the office. However, once he'd closed the door he did not move away and instead stood there, trying to listen.

"Don't start Professor," Sherlock said in a tired voice. There was a pause, and he made a noise that could have been amused but sounded somewhat off. "I'm fine."

"Sherlock," she started, in a voice that John could hardly here.

"I'm fine," he repeated, somewhat sharply and there was a clink as a cup was placed down and the sound of a chair being pushed against the floor. John started for a moment, and then realizing that it was likely Sherlock was about to walk out the door, sped off down the hallway, disappearing around the corner right in time for Sherlock to see.

In charms a few days later, John glanced over at Sherlock to see the Slytherin boy pulling a folded piece of paper out of his book, his brow pulling together as he read over it. John had a strong urge to get up out of his seat, and plop himself down next to Sherlock with a question, 'what does it say?' Instead he just twitched in his seat, and forced himself back to his classwork. Eyes continuously drifting to Sherlock, who was now ignoring his books completely and staring into space, his fingers pressed against each other, in front of his face.

Waiting, waiting, waiting, aren't you Sherlock? Never fear, you won't be waiting much longer.

John walked past the second floor in time to see Sherlock disappear in, a piece of paper furled in his hand. John stopped, hesitating out in the hallway. He missed it, he would never admit it to anyone, but he missed it. Missed running through hallways and up flights of stairs chasing after a person that could not be found, missed Sherlock appearing in the common room in the middle of the night and dragging him out of bed much to his dorm mate's bemusement. He missed Sherlock, and all that came with him. He missed the boy, so brilliant that he failed to understand simple things, even after a few years of astronomy Sherlock had still been hopeless at it, wasn't able to list half the public holidays, ("It's Christmas for god sake's Sherlock, how do you not know what day it is?" The boy had shrugged. "Knowing it's in December is close enough.") He could practically read your whole history based off your appearance, but struggled to understand feelings, muddled them within motives, and didn't stop ever to think that maybe some of the things he said were tactless, were hurtful. ("It's the truth," he would protest, as if being honest made up for being mean.)

John thought of Sherlock and it hurt, it hurt so much in a way that he had never thought it could hurt. He missed his best friend, and he hated him for doing this. For making John care, only to turn around and state that it had all been en elaborate trick.

John thought of Sherlock, glanced at the doorway and continued down the hallway to lunch.

Now really, of course I can't tell you, that would completely ruin the surprise. Wouldn't it?

"If everyone could please partner up…?" Professor Lestrade waved his wand, and the tables all moved to the side of the room as the students grabbed onto their friends arm or caught their eye.

"Could we be a three Professor?" Carl called over the room towards the defence teacher.

"Is there not enough for pairs?" he asked with a slight frown, wondering if he had miscounted the students, and then noticed Sherlock leaning back on the wall, watching the class. "If one of you could partner up with Mr Holmes…"

Carl, Mike and John all glanced at each other, waiting for somebody else to offer to go with Sherlock. The Professor watched them expectantly, as did Sherlock through half closed eyes. After a few moments Lestrade sighed. "Watson, Holmes," he said, and all four students stared at him and wondered if he was blind.

"I'll go," Carl said, putting an arm on John's hand.

"It's fine," John said back, and Sherlock hid an amused smile, he wasn't going to back out now, didn't want to seem weak.

"I don't care who does it, as long as someone does," Lestrade said tiredly. "I'd like to get this lesson started boys."

Rather defiantly, John crossed the room over to where Sherlock lolled on the wall, he jutted his chin up slightly, and Sherlock gave him an amused look. "Watson," he drawled. John made an involuntary jerk but said nothing.

"We should start," he said after a few uncomfortable minutes, where Sherlock just stared at him, having not been this close to him for this amount of time in quite a while, and seeing what he could pick up. (Toast for breakfast, been up late working, lost his tie –the one he was wearing was a spare of Carls-.)

"Indeed we should," Sherlock said, but he didn't move off of the wall.

John made an impatient sound, which sounded so familiar that it made Sherlock want to smile. He resisted the urge, as John moved a few feet back, and pulled out his wand.

Sherlock who already had his in his hand, flung a spell at John, who had been expecting Sherlock to meander for a little longer before starting, and winced when a sting of pain hit him in the chest. He turned to Sherlock, with an angry expression, and Sherlock simply raised his eyebrows.

A chance to further along the cover, Sherlock thought as he sidestepped away from a spell, keeping his eyes on his classmates so as not to walk into them, because he had duelled slightly fairer on John than he had ever done on anyone else. Because he respected John.

Keep an eye out Holmes, things are just starting to warm up.

The last few chapters have been mostly about Sherlock and John dealing with what has happened, but as I've planned it, Brooke and his plans should start to make an appearance in the next chapter, or the one after that at the very latest.

Hope you're enjoying the story!