Hi all! This chap is really short (by my standards anyway) but I hope it satisifies. Let me know what you think!

Also I cannot believe this has over 200 reviews, how frigging unbelievable is that! I'm speechless, which is a first. Also huge thank you to Lock Nelms for all her help.

Hands On Education

Chapter 21

The Answer To All Your Fears

It crept all over him like a dull ache.

The fierce shooting pains erupted inside his chest as he ran; meanwhile, John's mind went haywire, buzzing inside of him to the extent where he thought it was going to leap out of his skull. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, all he could do was run. Here it was, the answer to all his fears. The answer to everything he had been afraid of.
Someone knew. His mind conjured up pictures of him being flashed over the evening news. 'Tonight's headline story shocker, teacher John Watson sleeps with student. But first, over to Ellen for the weather.'

John imagined being chased out of town by an angry mob. He looked over the road to find an old lady staring at him- oh God, did she know? Had she just been told what he had done? Had Lestrade told everyone he had come across? Had he run home to Kate and told her, or possibly worse, Sarah?

John stopped running, his chest heaving and his mind spinning as he placed his hands on bent knees. He briefly wondered if he was going to be sick. There was no going back now; his mother used to tell him a secret was something you told one person at a time, and now his secret was out, dragged into the cold light of day, no matter how desperately he wished he could turn back the clock.

Where was Greg? He had chased after him but someone he had slipped out of sight.
'Greg!' he shouted desperately. Nothing. Silence. John started to run again.
He had no plan.
He didn't know what he was going to do when he found Greg- he knew what he had with Sherlock was completely unexplainable, there was no point in even trying. All he could do was beg his friend to keep his secret. He couldn't just let his neighbour slip away before he had a chance to hear what he had to say…. but why would he? Greg was a police officer, he was Sarah's friend to, and Sherlock's.

His mother also used to say hindsight was a wonderful thing, and looking back, John couldn't help but agree. Of all the people who could have found them, Greg was perhaps the very worst. John Watson had no defence- he hadn't planned for this, he was so sure that no one would find out about them. He figured that, if they hadn't been found by now, what would change? In the early days they were so careful, at some point in the road they had got sloppy, complacent.

God why hadn't Sherlock locked the door! It would have taken a few seconds and then they wouldn't be in this mess. All it took was one tiny mistake… and then BANG! suddenly there consequences around every corner. He had seen it in Greg's eyes the moment he had walked into Sherlock's bedroom, the sheer shock and horror and finding him like that. Greg was still no-where to be seen, and John tried not to panic. God where had he gone? Had he gone to fetch the entire Bakerford police force to come get him?

John hated this, the feeling of complete loss of control. The house of cards had come crashing down and there was nothing he could do… and it all lay at Lestrade's door. He tried calling, he left a rambling message of Greg's voicemail begging him to ring. What if it was too late? What if it wall all too late? A few hours ago he was having mind blowing sex, and now he was facing a night in a jail cell. How did that happen so fast?

He had always spoken to Sherlock of the dangers of anyone finding out about them, and he had thought about it, sometimes, when he was alone, on a night where he couldn't sleep and all he could do was toss and turn it bed and let all his worries wash over him. But from the beginning he knew it was the skeleton in his closet; an eerie figure lying in the shadows, and now it was here, in all its twisted, ugly glory, and the true extent of what he had done finally hit him.
It was a taboo, perhaps the biggest taboo the teaching world had to offer.

During his teacher training someone had mentioned it, but John didn't really listen. After all no one would actually do that, would they? Who in their right mind would have sex with a student? It was something you read about it cheap trashy magazines; it was something that happened in films or on TV, but it never really happened. Except it had happened to him. What he had done was being brought to the light. He should have stopped this, he should have stopped it before it had even begun.

John went back to his car; he would go home and see if Lestrade was there. Or maybe not, maybe he should just go straight to the police station and hand himself in, cut out the middle man and just face the music like a proper man. (Though it was a bit late to be trying to act like a proper man, John thought. He didn't let it claw at his thoughts too much)
'John!' Sherlock's voice called out to him in the night.

John turned away, he couldn't look at Sherlock, not right now, not after what had just happened. The tight rope he had been walking on had snapped and he just wanted the world to swallow him whole, to take him deep down, right into the molten core and he would never have to see the cold light of day.

'John please, just listen to me!' The younger man pleaded as he caught up with the out-of-breath Watson. Sherlock's hair was sticky with sweat but quickly drying in the night air and his breath was streaming out of his mouth like silver steam.
It was obvious what he would want to say to him, that everything would be all right. That they would get through this, but he was wrong- Sherlock wasn't the one with everything to lose. John felt like throwing up, he felt like bending over and chucking everything up right over the pavement. His heart was going a mile a minute, and he was short of breath. Sherlock made a grab for his arm but John pulled away.

'Don't.' he hissed, 'Just don't… don't touch me.'

'But…I love you.' Sherlock whimpered.

John stood still, and shook his head. In seconds, he shoved Sherlock away with far more force then was necessary and sped off, as fast as his burning legs could carry him, as far away from Mrs Hudson's small cottage as he could.
Jon only turned once and saw Sherlock's figure, still numbly stood, as he ran off into the night.

Greg was grateful, for perhaps the first time in his marriage, to come home to an empty house. At least this way he could lose it all in peace. He stormed into the kitchen to pour himself a large glass of water to try and compose himself, but he couldn't; he took a few sips and found he couldn't taste anything, the water simply surged through his stomach and seemed to make everything worse. On top of that he felt his head throb, he rubbed his fingers against the temple but the pain lingered there like a knife.

Usually coming home and seeing his wife was the best part of his day, but now? No, he didn't know how he would manage if Kate had been there. He needed to stop and think, he needed to compose himself. If Kate had seen him like this he would have blurted it all out and made this sorry mess even worse. He had to be calm and rational. He had to hold himself together. There was something in his mind going insane, something alien and angry disrupting the peace, buzzing about in his brain like a bee caught in a jar.

Greg Lestrade saw it again, the image he was so desperately trying to forget, an image of two figures lying side by side curled up together, a symphony of milky white skin and twisted bed sheets.

John and Sherlock. Sherlock and John.

What the hell was going on? What the hell had he just seen?

It just wasn't possible. He refused to believe it could be possible. His friend, someone who was probably his best friend… and Sherlock. Sherlock! A kid half his age. It just could not be true. The image in his head did not match up with what he had seen, laid out on the bed.

John Watson was straight, John was married! John was...John, he was good and noble and kind, he would not have an affair, he wouldn't hurt his wife so. John couldn't have been having sex with Sherlock… but then what other explanation was there? They were naked, in a bed, together. What else could that possibly mean? There was no innocent explanation for that, the scene was the very archetype of post coital bliss. He couldn't help but picture them together, he pictured legs wrapped round each other, lips mashing together. Hips...he shook his head violently, and inwardly scolded himself. For god's sake man pull yourself together!

He couldn't make up his mind on what he should do next. Greg was torn- on the one hand he knew as police officer. He was duty bound to arrest John- in fact he should have done that as soon as he found them. Once he got dressed, of course.
But on the other hand John was his friend. A good friend, and he just couldn't picture his friend doing something like this. His friend John wouldn't have an affair, wouldn't betray Sarah, wouldn't sleep with a teenager, a male teenager, he just… wouldn't.He wanted to protect his friend, he wanted to shut his eyes and never speak of this again. But how could act oblivious, now he knew the truth.

The right part, the logical part of him told him he should ring St Barts, he should tell Sarah, he should arrest John, but could he? He needed to talk, he couldn't keep it in any longer. A loud knock interrupted things; Greg tried to lower his heart rate, but it still hammered away in his chest. After all, it didn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out who was on the other side of the door. Lestrade opened it quickly and saw John's face staring back, his skin deathly pale. One look at John was all it took. All he could think about was him with Sherlock; it made him feel sick, and as quickly as he had opened the door it he immediately tried to shut it again.

'No!' John shouted, holding his arm out to prevent Greg from slamming the door in his face. 'No, please, just…' he paused uncertainty, before continuing. 'I need to come in, we need to talk, I need to explain.'

'Explain? What possible explanation is there for what I just saw?' Lestrade hissed back. Explain? How could he possibly explain this? Him, and Sherlock, in bed together… it just wasn't explainable- hell, it wasn't even possible. He led John inside anyway, despite the overwhelming urge to run. He could smell Sherlock on him; the woody, earthy, slightly spicy smell invaded his nostrils, and again he found himself wanting to vomit.

Greg sat at the sparse table. (Kate was unbelievably house proud- everything had a place, and his house looked more like a show room then an actual home. It used to bug him, that Kate would moan at the slightest mess he left behind, she would freak out when he didn't use a coaster and left a ring behind on the coffee table, or left the lid off the toothpaste. It didn't bother him now, not one bit. Besides, she wasn't sleeping with a seventeen year old boy.)

Greg buried is head in his hands, running his fingers over his forehead. John didn't join him; he paced around the kitchen, holding onto the sides as if he was trying to stop himself from falling.

'Tell me I'm wrong, tell me it isn't what I think it is.' Greg pleaded. 'Tell me I'm wrong, tell me you're not sleeping with him.' The last part he didn't say, but he hoped it was evident. John sighed, and he finally sat down in a chair opposite Greg- he looked like he had aged years in mere seconds. He shook his head.

'I would love to say I'm not, but I-I… can't. You know I can't,'

There was still quite a sizeable part of Greg's brain that was still shocked by this, as if hearing it come directly from John's mouth was the real evidence he needed. He had seen them in bed together yet he still needed to hear the words- He couldn't trust his own sight any more.

'So what you are telling me is that you did have sex with him?' There was defining silence, it seemed to cut through the air. It seemed to take over everything. For a long time neither spoke, neither did anything, but after what felt like an age, John nodded.

'How long?' Greg asked; inwardly. he didn't want to know, of course not, he wanted John out of his house, he wanted him to just go, he wished they were not having this conversation, he wished he had never walked in on them, he wished he would never have to think of it again, but he had to, he had to know what the hell was going on.

'The afternoon when you offered him a job at the lab,' John whispered sadly 'I don't know what happened but we just kissed. We've been together ever since.'

'But that was months ago!' Greg proclaimed, he stared at his friend completely dumbstruck.

Lestrade couldn't believe what he was hearing. He thought it was just sex, a momentary lapse in judgement, but here was John telling him they had been in a relationship! A proper relationship, for months! 'You mean to tell me all this time you have been screwing him behind everyone else's backs?'

John flickered his eyes up to stare directly at Greg. The wild eyes had gone, what was left was a man in absolute despair, who knew what he had done was wrong, who would not fight or yell and scream, who would come quietly and just accept the fate they had been given. Greg had seen it on enough men he had arrested to know it instinctively.

'I love him.'

'He's a kid!' Greg snapped back, not even trying to keep his voice even.

John shook his head 'It's Sherlock, you know he's different.' John stared at the ground, while Greg looked away. It was as if actually looking at each other would cause the whole world to end. Greg wished he could pretend he was having conversation with someone else, that maybe, if he looked away long enough this wouldn't be John, his friend, his next door neighbour. It would just be some stranger he was interviewing at Bakerford police station.

Greg Lestade couldn't look at his face, he couldn't spoil the illusion.

'No it isn't, John; Sherlock is a child. A child! Do you really think a judge is going to see it differently?'

'I tried to resist, honestly. I tried so hard, but I couldn't. It was just a kiss and I know I should have walked away but I loved him.'

It was strangely voyeuristic, Greg thought, to watch on as a man's life imploded.

'He was seventeen, when we started having sex.' John mumbled. Greg raised an eyebrow at him (as if the age of consent would really make a difference in this case.)

'Why John, just… why?' Greg was trying to wrap his head around what he had just discovered, but every passing second it just seemed to get more and more jumbled, more horrifically twisted. 'You have a gorgeous wife, good home, a job, why would you risk everything?'

John shrugged. 'You don't know what it was like for me- I never wanted to move here. I felt so lonely, and so lost, and then I met him, and he just made me feel like me again.' His blue eyes had taken on a mist that showed he was far, far away from Bakerford, over the hills and the parks and the streams. He was in his head. 'When I'm around him life is exciting again, if he is close by I just know everything is going to be okay.'

Greg glared back. 'Is that it? That's the reason you betrayed Sarah? Do you honestly think you're the only person who ever felt lost? Who ever felt like they had screwed up? It's a mid-life crisis, John, I've had one myself, but you know what people do? They buy a sports car, or join a shit cover band- they don't go around shagging their seventeen year old students!'

John was silent; he had no words to come back with. He was rather taken aback with Greg's outburst, not that he hadn't been expecting it. But a mid-life crisis? Is that really all this was?

'It's not a mid-life crisis. I love him, I can't be without him.'

Greg threw his arms in the air in exasperation. 'You can't tell me you want to carry on like this?'

John nodded. 'You don't know what it's like for me.'

'And what about me?' Greg snapped back. 'What makes you think I'm not going to ring the school right now? Or Sarah? You know I should arrest you right now, don't you?'

'But your my friend, Greg. '

It was lame, they both knew it, they both knew it was no reason for Greg to keep quiet, but… it was true, and as soon as John said the words, Greg knew.

'And so is Sarah! And Sherlock, did you think about him? Think he will get into Oxford if they knew this?' John looked down, ashamed, but that only seemed to fuel the fire to Greg's anger. 'For God's sake John, did you think of anyone but yourself? You know if I keep quiet I could lose my job to? Is your stupid fling worth that?'

'Its not a stupid fling. How many more times do I need to tell you that I love him?'

'And how many more time do I need to tell you this is ridiculous, as well as illegal, and immoral.' Greg jumped up from his seat and paced the length of the kitchen, stopping at the window. He leant his arm against it and looked out over the garden.

'Please Greg, just please.' John sniffled, he wiped a stray tear that had run down his cheek.

'You know what you are asking me to do is illegal?' Greg said. He suddenly felt very, very tired, and old.

He didn't become a police officer for this, to lock up a man who had made a mistake. He knew what John had done was illegal, but he also knew the magnetism Sherlock had. He had joined the police to lock up the bad guys, he felt far too tired to face locking up his friend.

'I'll keep your secret, but only because I want Sherlock to succeed, his future is not worth wrecking simply because you can't keep it in your trousers.'

John did not allow himself to breathe a sigh of relief. Life wasn't like that, free passes did not exist- he had been on this earth long enough to know that.

'And the catch?'

Greg carried on staring; he still couldn't bear to look at John, not now, not knowing what he had done, so he carried on staring outside. The view was exactly the same as it had been this morning. Yet everything had changed since then. He closed his eyes, still picturing the neatly trimmed lawn, the small smattering of flower pots and the brown fence.

'End it John, please. Just… end it while you still can.'