Sherlock walked John down the stairs. It was agony to not touch his hand in the cab until they were clear of London. Wordless, he laced their fingers together.
"What do you tell Mary? For your excuses?"
John looked down. He didn't like thinking about Mary when he was with Sherlock. "Well," He said slowly. "I uh, I say that we are working cases and sometimes there will be lots of research that takes all night. I figured it is believable. We did stay up many nights working cases in the past."
"And for the lunch today, another case?" Sherlock's voice trembled. "Okay." He replied "Okay, okay fine just..." He sighed "Just make sure you're kind when you're with her."
"I am." John said flatly. "You seem upset with me, is there something you would rather me say for an excuse?"
"It's the perfect logical excuse why would I be upset." Sherlock shrugged "You love her, don't you?" John froze a minute. Even a week ago he would have said yes without thinking. He knew that Sherlock was reading him, and that made him feel even worse. Things had changed quite a bit in John's mind. Since being with Sherlock, he has felt happier, more at peace, and his nightmares have stopped. Even when home with Mary, all he can thing about are the days he and Sherlock spend together.
"Y-yes." He said finally. He swallowed hard hoping beyond hoping that Sherlock wouldn't read into it. Sherlock snatched his hand away, eyeing John carefully.
"We're going to Mary's and you're going to apologize to her and fix this."
"No." John said plainly.
"You love her." He repeated firmly. "Yes you do. Don't try and convince yourself you don't because you like the escape more than reality. You're supposed to, that's why it's the escape, but you can't stay there. You can't just pick something else because you found out reality is hard."
"One, it is my life and I will do as I see fit. Two, I am not leaving her so calm down." John said, voice taking a slightly angry tone. "One day, just one day with you, out in the world, being like a couple is all I wanted, but no. You had to bring up something you knew would either lead to a fight, or one of us getting very upset."
"We're not a couple." Sherlock snapped "We're a lonely broken detective and a married man seeking some escapism by indulging in memories."
"Don't profile me." John spat. "You are the one who started all this."
"It's not profiling if it's written plainly on your face, honestly you haven't even lied to Mary as much as you have lied to yourself." He glared "You're the one who acts like I mean the world to you, then leaves, who wants to act like a couple, then will leave at the end of the day, who asked me to speak at his wedding, a wedding which physically pained me to see, it was like having my chest ripped out, and then shags me in the shower." Sherlock's voice cracked. "Just because you can reduce me to a memory, doesn't mean you have to try and make me reduce you to one. That's what's been bothering me!"
"You think I want to leave?" John asked harshly. "I hate it. You are so much more than a memory to me, but you are too thick to see that. I think you just can't accept the fact that someone can love you for you. Not for memories or ideas."
"Well why would they, you can't! I'm not allowed to 'read you' and shove the truth in your face because it breaks the little bubble you build yourself in when you see me, and you don't care what happens to me in that bubble once you leave. You say don't wait but you want everything to be exactly the same as when you left!" His voice was reaching hysterical now. "And I'll never have you properly, I didn't move from that bed for weeks because I was waiting for you." He choked. "You've ruined me. You've smashed up my whole life."
"I go home every day and I have trouble looking my wife in the eyes. You made it to damn easy! I came, just to check on you. Try and help you. Then you go on about how you LOVE me?! What were you even thinking? Now, I am living this double life, torn between my wife and you, and you are stupid if you think that I don't love you for you. I am not in love with some daft memory or escape that I don't even need! The only reason I come to you is because I love you. I don't need escape Sherlock! I need you, and you are too thick to get that. So yes, I might have ruined you and smashed your life to small pieces, but you did the same damn thing to me!" John shouted out. His face was bright red with anger, and he was trembling violently.
"I was fine I didn't need you to check on me! I never asked you too! I was doing just fine I was okay I was fine!"
"If you were fine, Lestrade never would have asked me to come help you. I was just trying to help you!" John hissed.
"I didn't need help." He snarled back "He was over reacting and so were you. I was just sitting on the floor of the flat." And you were sobbing, SHUT UP
"Sobbing. You were sitting there sobbing hysterically with voices shouting in your head. Yeah, you were just fine!" John said sarcastically.
Sherlock's lip curled. "If I could get them to stop I would! You act as though I'm not allowed to be able to cry, for god sake I've seen you do it. I'm so happy your nightmares have stopped again, really it's wonderful one of us is benefiting from this."
"Have you not gained anything from this? Has this really ONLY made your life worse?" John asked seriously.
Sherlock turned his head away refusing to answer the question. "I shouldn't have told you I loved you in the first place, it wasn't fair to do that to you."
"No you really shouldn't have." John agreed. "But you did, and now it is too late. Answer my damn question now, Sherlock."
"I needed to tell you, it was painful to not I...everything I was doing to suppress telling you wasn't working anymore." His mouth felt dry. "I shouldn't have I just...I never even told Victor he looked nice. I was worried you'd go forever before I told you." His hands were shaking by this point. "John, we're going to the country so we can have a day as a couple, that alone kills me because we'll never be a couple, but you haven't even...you didn't think to take off your ring for today, and then you're going to go back to her and I'll just wait again."
"This just isn't right or fair." John said sadly. His whole body felt hallow and he felt so sorrowful he was having trouble speaking. "This... this..." John choked out. He couldn't force himself to finish his sentence.
"You didn't take your ring off John, don't try and tell me you don't love her. You're just enjoying the freedom you have with me."
"That's not true. I didn't take the ring off because you had asked me not to so that you don't get carried away with your fantasy." John said defensively.
"I asked you not to when we were having sex so I can get a glimpse of it during and remind myself to not get too invested or carried away."
"You didn't say to me 'just during sex'. You just said to not take it off."
"Couldn't bring myself to ask you of that, thought you'd find it too cruel. I didn't realize how much it was bothering me till today. Every time you said couple I looked at it. My fault, I should have said, but I'm still right."
John grabbed his ring, tugged it off of his finger, and shoved it into his coat pocket. "There."
Sherlock stared at him for a moment, dumbfounded, before regaining his speech.
"You haven't fallen out of love with her, you've just started to relax properly in to this...thing, this coping mechanism that you have. That's what we are." Sherlock sucked in his breath. "You didn't say it the first time I said I love you John, it took a few tries before you did, it was an accident when you said it and you weren't sure what you meant when you said it and that's okay. I'm not going to be responsible for ruining your life anymore.
"We-this-" John took a deep shuddering breath. "I love you more than you will ever be able to accept, but... I don't think we can continue like this." John choked out. "Our lives are falling apart, and while I-" John gulped painfully. "While I would even be... willing to leave Mary for you, you wouldn't accept that. You have gotten one idea in your head that you cannot let go of..." John turned to look out the window. "I can't keep hurting you."
"When I said, at the start, when I told you to not pretend you'd leave her and that you'd forget all the discontent you felt when you saw your child, you said I was right." Sherlock whispered. "I'm just trying to hold you to what you said before all of this messed with your head, so I'm not responsible for your misery if you make a choice without thinking."
"Whatever Sherlock..." John leaned against the door, feeling too dejected to fight anymore.
"Oh don't do that, I'm trying to not do to you what I did to Victor."
"I am doing to you what you did to victor..." John mumbled. "Playing your emotions for no good reason."
Sherlock said nothing in response; the thought had crossed his mind a few times. "Well maybe it's what I deserve."
"No, it's not. No one deserves it." John said, words coming out monotone.
"You said you had no good reason..." Sherlock frowned. "Do you have a reason?"
"The reason is because I love you. That is not a good reason, but a very selfish one." John stated.
"And you're doing this to Mary because you love her and I'm doing this to you because I love you." Sherlock completed for him. "We're both awful."
"Absolutely terribly." John agreed.
"Did you mean it when you said I wasn't allowed to just wait in between for you?"
"Yes, of course I did. I am not some kind of sicko that wants to force you to wait for me." John grumbled.
"And you said if I found somebody I should..."
"Go for it. You should go for it and try to let me go." Uttering those words pained John to no end.
Sherlock scoffed. "You don't want that." His tone faded a little. "I don't. I had you and I spent half my energy pushing you away because I didn't think you could love me."
"Well I can, and I do, and I wish you would stop fighting me on it." John said, annoyed.
"If I could I would, I can't stop fighting myself on the notion I'm capable of being love."
"If it would be the best thing for you, then it is what I want. I just want you to be okay." John said pitifully.
Sherlock mumbled. "It probably is, but you don't think I'd be able to find someone surely."
John shrugged. "You are an acquired taste, but I love you so someone else out there will. You are smart, brave, sexy, beautiful, loving when you want to be. I am sure someone other than me can see all that..." John droned on.
Sherlock shook his head grimly. "You would have resented me if you left her. You know that right?"
"I know no such thing." John said, voice empty.
"John shut up, you would have and I would have felt guilty and mad at you."
"If you say so…" John sighed.
"John, are you planning on leaving her?" Sherlock asked timidly.
"I don't know. If you are very happy with one person, and that person has helped you in more ways than they can imagine, and you care about another person, but they just don't make you feel complete, but the other person does... It's all very complicated." John said emptily.
"Try." Sherlock encouraged, kissing John's cheek.
John felt a small amount of warmth fill him. "It hurts me every time I leave you, more than anything else. I love you so so much, but you won't let me say it without correcting me with a correction that isn't even true, and it kills me. When I am there with Mary, I only want to be with you, and when I am with you, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else." John talked quickly, not sure if Sherlock was understanding what he was saying.
"But would be able to- to leave her." Sherlock pressed with a heavy voice. "Would be able to do it or would you remember all the reasons you loved her the moment you tried?"
"That-that is what I have been thinking about for the last several days. I wanted to ask someone for advice, but the person who I normally ask is you, so I didn't know. That is why I asked you what it would be like if we were a proper couple." John said sadly.
Sherlock sighed. "It would be exactly like what you have with Mary now, only her quirks are replaced with my quirks. Couple being a couple it's the same thing for everybody it's the people who change. It just depends if you want to be a couple under such circumstances"
"Do you get how much I care about you yet?" John asked, finally turning to face Sherlock.
Sherlock's face fell. "I...I..."
"Do you understand what I am very much considering doing for you? Would some who didn't actually love you but love 'the memory/idea of you' want to do this to be with you?" John pushed.
"She's pregnant John. I'd never...never want children."
"You would be a god awful father." John stated plainly. "But again, you are avoiding the point."
"And you'd be a good one." Sherlock countered. "Short tempered but...caring. I understand what you're considering. I'm trying to let you know exactly what it is you are."
"All I really want right now is for you to understand that I love you for you and no other reason. I still have a bit more thinking to do when it comes to this whole situation." John mumbled.
Sherlock took a small breath. "I don't know how you could love me. How anyone could."
John gave in, and he laid his head down on Sherlock's shoulder. "Well I do, so very much. How can I convince you of this?" John asked desperately.
"I've been reliably told I am unlovable." Sherlock groaned.
"I am proof against that." John pressed. "How can I prove it to you?"
"John this isn't your problem, I believe you, I just can't stop mocking myself for the idea of somebody loving me." Sherlock mumbled.
"That makes me very upset." John whispered. "Just know that I love you. I really do."
"I don't want to make you sad." Sherlock moaned burying his head. "Useless, I'm so useless"
John grabbed Sherlock's head. "Stop, stop, stop." John said repeatedly, kissing the top of Sherlock's head. "You are not useless."
"Nobody loves me." He whispered helplessly. "Stop it. Stop lying."
"I am not lying, please believe me. Please...please... I love you, I love you so much... so much..." John whimpered into Sherlock's hair.
"No, stop it! Shut up!" Sherlock froze "No," He mumbled, holding John. "No, no I wasn't talking to you. No I was...voices not you."
John sighed, holding Sherlock tightly. "I am here, right here. Whatever the voices are saying, they are lying. I love you. I am here for you."
"Everybody who's ever said that said it to get something." Sherlock said pathetically.
"I don't want anything but you. Nothing from you, just you. It is okay... you are okay..." John said comfortingly.
Sherlock shook his head into John's arms. "No the last person who said that, they..."
"I am me, Sherlock. Not some other bloke." John said pleadingly. "I do love you, and I don't want a thing from you. Please... please..."
"John this is what I'm like now, since those two years, since coming back. I don't have control like I used to. I can't sleep, I can't think, I'm not me anymore."
"I am going to be here to help you. To help you get control back." John whispered, petting Sherlock. "And if I can't, and if you stay a bit broken, I will be here to hold you when it gets bad."
"You need some space to think about what you want though, that's only fair."
"Not yet, not until you are doing better." John said lovingly. "Just relax, I have you."
Sherlock wrinkled his nose, nodding slowly as the cab pulled outside. He palmed the cabbie some notes getting out slowly, looking at John uncertainly and making no move to hold or kiss him.