Please don't kill me.
We have a special guest in this chapter...
It's all the same process every time, yet every single time is different from the last. It depends too on the person, of course.
He kisses her neck, she sighs. It's rendition, and as he pushes her down onto the bed she comforts herself thinking that in just a year she'll be leaving this all behind.
He will run his hands over her in a similar manner, in similar patterns and in a similar context. But it will be different, because she won't feel nauseated as he rips off the fabric that separates them. He will kiss away the disgusting sensation of her husband's touch, and in his arms she'll be free... and just as much, she'll be trapped, but oh! Is it not the sweetest capture?
If only for that night she'll see eternity in his warmest of eyes and she'll smile just barely, knowing her future is safely guarded in there.
The next morning her strength will be renewed, and fresher than ever she'll return to her husband's side.
It pains her terribly that, in a matter of months, said man will erase all traces of him, whose frantic fingers she can still feel, whose rough lips she can still taste, whose olive eyes she can still see.
The routine is never ending, that's the way it was always meant to be, and she's sure he will one day come to terms with it, just like she had.
It's not so bad, after all, she can always go back next year...
But it strikes her with full-force, like a lighting breaking through a peaceful sky, that there will be no next year. She gasps, she would've rather had an actual lighting hit her, it would be a dull ray of sunshine compared to the crashing sound of her broken soul as she understands that she'll never be in his presence again...
...And god, she just loathes the way his cold hands grasp her waist. She winces, blinking back tears. She fixes her gaze on the ceiling and prays for it to be over soon.
She would eventually forget his lips on her face, on her neck, loving and fighting all at once. One day she would wake up to discover that she forgot the strength in his arms, both physical and emotional, as he pulls her closer and closer to him until they're one.
She's condemned, and she was the one to set the death sentence over herself.
She took his robe.
Any other day he'd be livid, whispering all kinds of curse words in many different languages. But that night he only smiled and shook his head sadly, fighting the unfamiliar obstruction inside his throat that made his eyes itch and prickle with an also unfamiliar liquid.
He should've noticed the peculiar way that green kimono hugged her body when she came rushing down the stairs. Maybe he was unable to think straight in her presence, maybe the years were catching up with him. Or maybe it was both, he didn't give it much thought as he crawled into his bed. His big, lonely bed where the smell of her signature perfume remained fresh, almost like she was still there and if he crashed a pillow to his chest and shut his eyes tightly enough, he could pretend so.
But she wasn't there, and when that dull, mocking morning light managed to slip into his purposefully darkened room, he would be reminded once again that nothing about him could ever keep her by his side.
The next morning he woke up, He had to. He got up, he had to. He dragged his feet down the stairs. He had to.
"Which member of her family has become ill now?"
Holmes gave the laziest chuckle, briefly thanking some greater power for putting Mrs. Hudson in his life...
Bloody woman with the bloody reactions she caused on him. Grateful for Mrs. Hudson? What was he becoming? He felt horrified, because in that new state of mind (and of soul, because he could now admit he had one) he couldn't bring himself to deny that he was indeed comforted by Mrs. Hudson's presence.
"I wouldn't be so quick to judge her" he answered, some of his energy returning. This was a good opportunity to engage into an argument.
"Oh, so you believe her?"
"I do" he managed to sound convinced. A little too convinced, in fact, for Mrs. Hudson didn't even try to start the fight he so desperately needed.
"Fool" murmured angrily Mrs. Hudson as she retreated to the kitchen.
"Indeed" he whispered to himself once she disappeared.
He lifted the newspaper, opened it and tried to concentrate. He couldn't.
Hadn't it been just yesterday when she was cooking for him?
It didn't help that he had to explain to his four-year-old daughter that the woman she had grown so attached to, had unexpectedly left.
The small, perfectly round tears running down her puffy cheeks and the "I don't want her to go" uttered in between sobs still haunted his memory.
He shuddered, clenched and unclenched his fists, bit his lips together and, at last, dropped the newspaper on the table and stood up. He needed his pipe...
Except he wasn't allowed to smoke anymore.
He ran a hand trough his hair. Fine, no smoking, he'll just go shoot something.
But he can't because the gunshot would scare Cleo.
He hissed and looked up towards the ceiling, asking the heavens for an outlet to all the anger and confusion that plagued his mind.
No outlet? Perfect, he'll just have to keep it all inside, as always.
Then his eyes landed on the newspaper. A day without finding out what's going on in London couldn't hurt so much, right? He sighed, picking it up again, this time with a different intention.
"Daddy, why are you mad at the newspaper?"
He froze. The announcement page he had been tearing apart dropped to the floor.
Cleo stood in the doorway of the dinning room, still wearing her nightgown and squinting her sleepy eyes at him.
Holmes took a deep breath and searched for an answer, but no result came out.
"Did you read something bad?" she innocently offered, Holmes couldn't help smiling.
"Yes, darling. I just read a bad thing" he repeated.
They ate breakfast in silence, as per usual. That was precisely what Holmes loved the most about his daughter; she had the ability to maintain a comfortable silence.
That little girl was his sunshine and his rainy cloud all at once. Just looking at her made him feel better, she was wonderful and he had her all to himself. And just looking at her made his heart ache. She was just so... her, it was painful, that nose, that hair... and just like her mother, Cleo would eventually leave him too. He felt light-headed to only think about it, he wasn't sure he would survive after it actually happened.
When he was calmer, he wondered why it took so long for the anger building inside of him to burst out. Two inner Sherlocks debated whether he was physically tired and needed some time off, or whether he was just growing old. They never came to an agreement.
But Irene would be back, of that, he was sure.
Christmas for Sherlock Holmes was never an eventful day.
Then Cleo came along and... well, paychecks weren't lasting as much as they used to, but every December 25th there would be a freshly cut tree, along with five or six toys waiting underneath it.
Watson and Mary were usually an irreplaceable part of that fine morning, but for Cleo's fourth Christmas the couple happened to be spending the holidays in the country with a recently discovered relative of Mary's (Had Holmes known, he would've never agreed to help Mary find that long lost aunt she remembered from her childhood). Mrs. Hudson followed their example, and so Holmes and Cleo found themselves alone in that chilly Christmas morning.
Holmes suppressed a sigh as he jumped out of bed; it was the only way not to give himself another five minutes to dwell in his misery. He slowly descended the staircase, the sound of paper being torn apart filled the lonely rooms of 221 Baker Street as Cleo –who was always up and about long before him- opened her gifts.
The shuffling sound of a slightly thicker paper told him Cleo was unwrapping a rag doll with blond curls and blue dress. He also heard that Gladstone –who hadn't been invited in his owner's trip- was getting a little too friendly with a poor chair's leg. That was something he'd have to take care of immediately.
Fortunately, Cleo was too engrossed by her new doll –which Holmes later learned, had been named Phos- to notice Gladstone's odd behavior.
Around midday a slightly dangerous idea landed in Holmes' mind, and as the hours passed he grew more and more convinced. By five o'clock he was helping Cleo inside a carriage. "Take us to Pall-Mall, down from the St. James end."
They knocked on the door of a relatively modest building, just beside The Carlton. Holmes told Cleo to be silent for a few minutes. Someone opened the door for them and they started walking down a hall, through a glass paneling could be seen a room filled with people that, Cleo thought, had to be very lonely at home if they decided to spend Christmas day reading.
She carefully walked on her toes, trying to get a better view, but it wasn't long before she lost interest. Even though she wasn't tall enough to look, something told her there would be no pretty drawings inside those books' pages.
They finally reached the end of the hall and her father knocked on a tall, dark brown door which -by the strong sound that her father's knuckles made as they met the wood- she could tell was considerably thicker than an average door.
The door opened to a tall, thick man who could've resembled the very door had he not been so pale. The man spread his long arms and hugged her father briefly, motioning for him to step inside. That was when the man's eyes fell on her.
He seemed to be unable to decide whether to stare at her or give her father quizzical looks. "Who is this?" he finally voiced.
Her father ushered them inside the little office before entering himself and closing the door.
"Dear Mycroft, let me introduce you to Cleopatra Holmes"
Cleo smiled and turned to the man her father called Mycroft, extending her little hand in front of him.
The man knelt in front of her and shook her hand hesitantly. He analyzed Cleo with wise, grayish-blue eyes.
"She's not yours" he sentenced.
Cleo didn't know what the man meant with those words, but her father's eyes grew large and he hurried to say "That's irrelevant..."
"She looks more like that woman whose photograph you keep locked inside the right drawer of your desk"
Before Holmes could curse himself for not seeing what a terrible idea this had been, Cleo chimed in.
"Where do photographs come from?"
And just like that, Mycroft Holmes became bewitched by the little girl.
"Well... I don't get that question very often" a soft smile threatened to appear in his face. Such a little girl asking such questions, she reminded Mycroft of his junior brother. "Let's see what the dictionary has to say about photographs." He took the 'P' tome of the dictionary from an upper shelve, sat behind his desk and started looking for the word. Cleo came to stand beside him, shyly trying to see the contents of the thick book. Mycroft noticed and unexpectedly decided to pick her up and seat her on his lap. They silently looked for the 'ph' segment together, and Holmes relaxed against the door, wondering if he looked like that when he was teaching Cleo how to read.
"I don't recall seeing a wedding invitation in the mail" Mycroft accused without looking up.
"That's because all of your friends are already married, dear brother"
Mycroft chuckled and shook his head amusedly, "You still can't take a hint, can you?"
"As matter of fact, I did understand the underlying meaning of your comment; I just didn't want to respond"
"Mmm... you're nervous, I can only assume there is a Mrs. Holmes I don't know about"
"There is not, nor will there ever be, a Mrs. Holmes. Unless, of course..."
"You know I wasn't made for marriage" interrupted Mycroft.
"Well, you know that neither was I"
"Yet here I have, sitting on my lap, the logical result of a marriage"
Holmes sighed. He was just getting more and more convinced that the cause of all his lost word-fights was his increasing age.
"Here it is!" Cleo squealed excitedly, pointing out the word "photograph" which was written in slightly bigger lyrics.
"Well done, dear. Now let's see: from the Greek phos "light" and graphe "drawing"... Louis Daguerre and Joseph Nicéphore Niépce... daguerreotype process... the amalgam of mercury and silver..."
Holmes smiled, satisfied. He knew Mycroft would find Cleo interesting, but he never imagined they could bond so fast and so easily over something as trivial as a definition.
Is this incomplete? Yes, but I didn't want to make you wait any longer
I'm not sure about the first part, i'm not thrilled with it, and is it worth a change of rating? I really don't know, I'm just more paranoid than usual. I'm going through one of those "I'm a good-for-nothing, why am I even still alive? I should just jump out the window and be over with it already" crisis, but don't worry, they never get as far as suicide... Well duh! would you still be here if they got that far? I know, how stupid, I'm sorry...
I hope I didn't offend anyone with my Mycroft... I only just read The Greek Interpreter and took the address description and a few details, but I also added I some things I pictured when I read the story. Again, little crisis over here, please forgive the low self-esteem.
I'm just overtired, i need some sleep.