Sherlock and a skinny girl named Sunshine who was very interested in gardening were having a rather stimulating conversation about the decomposition rates of animal bones when Lestrade interrupted. Sherlock had forgotten how much he enjoyed talking to strangers when he was high; cocaine made everyone else a little less boring. Then he looked up to see Lestrade picking his way across the room, cursing as he kicked piles of rotting food scraps and other trash out of his way. The building had undoubtedly started life as office space, but at some point in the last decade or so the part they were in must have served as a small church; there were still a half-dozen pews scattered throughout the space, unmoored from their intended positions. Sherlock and Sunshine had bypassed the wooden benches in favour of a couple of more comfortable chairs at the far end of the room, where there should've been an altar table. Probably someone had burned it for warmth in the winter; Sherlock was surprised there was anything flammable left here at all.

Sunshine noticed when Sherlock suddenly stopped talking. She took one look at Lestrade and bolted, knocking over her chair in her rush toward the closest door. None of the handful of others in the room seemed to notice; Sherlock was proud that he'd chosen the most observant junkie in the room to engage in dialogue.

Sherlock sighed and unfolded himself from the questionably upholstered chair he'd been sitting in. Lestrade couldn't have waited another quarter-hour to find me, could he? It had been 53 minutes since he'd snorted his first line and while he had been starting to come down for a while, he had at least 12 more minutes before he really crashed, based on his previous experiences. He'd really wanted to take advantage of every second. Inhaling powdered cocaine was not his preferred method of use, but it was the easiest and the high certainly lasted a lot longer than when he injected, even if it wasn't anywhere near as intense.

Lestrade grabbed Sherlock by the collar of his jacket and jerked him toward the exit.

"Hey! Watch the suit!"

"You wanker." Lestrade shoved him again. "Is that your thousand pound coat you left lying on the floor of a crack house? Get it."

"This is not a crack house. Have you ever known me to do crack?" Sherlock straightened his suit before bending to retrieve his Belstaff. He'd left it on the cleanest spot on the floor he could find, although in retrospect he probably should've kept it with him on the chair. He'd just been so hot wearing it in here. In his previous life as an addict he'd usually dressed down a bit more.

Lestrade grumbled and then opened his own jacket to pull out his Scotland Yard ID. "Oi, everyone here, party's over! You've got two minutes to clear out before I call for back-up and start arresting for possession."

The half-dozen or so junkies scattered around the room were suddenly fully alert, scrambling for the doors, even those whose drug of choice was not as stimulating as Sherlock's. Sherlock knew that Lestrade had no interest in having anyone arrested for possession. What's the point of driving everyone out of the building? He shook his head in disgust and draped his coat over his arm. It had been within his reach at all times; he wasn't foolish enough to believe that every person here wouldn't try to steal it in a heartbeat. He patted the pocket that held his phone and then slid it out, automatically checking for any new messages; it was possible he'd been too distracted to hear the alerts. "Oh. John texted me." A lot. The first inkling that he had done something he would greatly regret started to slither up Sherlock's spine.

"Of course he did, you git. He was worried about you."

Sherlock put a hand up to shield his eyes from the sunlight coming through the broken windows as he followed Lestrade across the room. "Don't tell him where I was, all right? He'd be really upset."

"Christ, Sherlock, are you kidding me? How do you think I knew to go looking for you? I knew where to find you but John's the one who knew you were gone. He's waiting for us in the car."

"No, he has two more hours at work." He knew he hadn't lost track of time; a glance at his watch confirmed it.

"Well, I guess he left early."

Sherlock froze, a hand on one of the abandoned and much-abused pews to steady himself.

Lestrade grabbed him just above the elbow and pulled. "Come on, he won't kill you in front of me."

Somehow all of the junkies who'd cleared out ahead of them were out of sight already when they got outside. Sherlock was impressed, though he saw signs that several had gone to ground in the building next door. Intrigued, he looked around for clues as to where the others might be, taking a step toward the alley between the buildings before Lestrade smacked him in the back of the head. "Oi, observe. My car's right there."

John was in the front seat. He didn't turn around as Sherlock climbed in behind him. His wheelchair was folded up behind the seat; Sherlock settled himself against it. "John, I—" He cut himself off, unsure of what to say. John didn't respond or even turn to look at him. Sherlock could only see the back of his head and a hint of his jaw, clenched and unyielding.

Lestrade slid in behind the steering wheel and frowned back at Sherlock. "Put your seat belt on. I think you've hit your limit of risky behaviour for the day."

Sherlock pulled absently at the belt; normally buckling it was a habit but everything seemed a little off right now and he'd forgotten. It felt like he had come down all at once. He had tried to delete his memory of this part of the high, the after-effects where he felt like either crying or running back for another hit. His heart was still racing from the cocaine but now the euphoria was gone, leaving only edginess and an enormous regret, both that he'd gotten high and that he couldn't go back inside and do it again.

He didn't really get a chance to dwell on that, though, because Lestrade put the car into gear and immediately started ranting. "What the hell were you thinking, Sherlock? I sent you home for a nap and instead you go out and get high?"

"You sent me away! What did you expect?" This was perfect, actually—a good shouting match could be a glorious distraction, exactly what he needed.

"Jesus Christ, Sherlock. Yes, all right, I shouldn't have sent you away, but how was I supposed to know how bad off you were? I thought you had the flu and needed a nap. I didn't know you were having a fucking relapse."

"I was not 'having a relapse'. I just decided to get high."

"Why?" Lestrade slowed the car to ease into traffic; his tone softened with it.

Sherlock wasn't in the mood to be tenderly psychoanalysed. He dropped his head back on the head rest and used the most bored tone he could muster. "I like cocaine."

"Why now? You haven't done this in years. What triggered it?"

"I was tired." He tried to keep his voice flat, but this conversation was a thousand times harder to have with John sitting wordless in the front seat, hearing everything but not giving any sort of clue as to what he thought. Sherlock was afraid he knew what John thought and it was breaking his heart. He shifted a bit in his seat and John's wheelchair pressed against his legs; the bite of the hard metal against his shins was a small comfort in light of John's refusal to even acknowledge him.

Lestrade seemed oblivious to any tension, he was so intent on berating Sherlock. "So take a sleeping pill like the rest of us."

"I didn't want to go to sleep. I wanted to wake up." He turned his head and looked out the window, away from Lestrade; his hand moved of its own accord to fidget with the upholstery on the back of John's chair. The cocaine had woken him up, for a little while, but now the exhaustion was once more seeping through, mixing again with unbearable anxiety. Only now with the added bonus of having pissed off John so much he won't even look at me.

Lestrade was on a roll. "You know, for being the smartest man I know you are such a bloody idiot sometimes. I thought we were past this, I really did. I know the last few months have been rough, but come on! I can't believe you thought getting high was an answer to anything, Sherlock. You—"

"Oh, come off it, Lestrade! Like you've never done anything ill-advised in your life. Has your girlfriend found out where you were the last time you told her you had an overnight shift?" Rather than being cathartic, threatening to spill Lestrade's secrets was exhausting; Sherlock collapsed back on the seat again, breathing heavily. This car ride was taking far too long; next time he got high he was going to do it closer to home. He closed his eyes.

"Sherlock. Sherlock!" John was actually talking to him; surely that merited a response.

He pried open his eyes. "What?" It was more curt than he intended, but as he was fairly certain John was not about to forgive him, it was the best he could do.

"Look at me." John was twisting around in his seat, trying to meet his eyes. "Are you having trouble breathing?"

Sherlock blinked at him and considered. It was a little hard to catch his breath, but he wouldn't call it trouble breathing. "No."

"You feel dizzy or light-headed, any nausea?"

"I've felt that way for days." Of course, he'd refrained from telling John that before now.

John narrowed his eyes. "Chest pain?"

"No." Sherlock let his head fall sideways against the cool glass of the window. The car was far too warm for comfort now that he was wearing his coat again; he could feel sweat dripping between his shoulder blades. If he's trying to induce a panic attack in me, he's doing a good job.

"Are you sure? Greg, do you have any aspirin?"

"What? But he's all right," Lestrade said. "You just haven't seen him like this before. He's just starting to come down."

"I've seen enough fucking junkies come down, Greg. Do you have any aspirin?"

"I don't know. There's a first aid kit in the glove box." Lestrade glanced back at Sherlock, tyres swerving out of his lane a bit.

"I'm fine," Sherlock said.

"Shut up," John replied, pawing through the mess in Lestrade's glove box. "I don't want to hear a word out of that stupid mouth of yours."

"I—"

"Shut up!" John turned and thrust an ancient-looking bottle of aspirin between the seats, toward Sherlock. "You have no right to say anything to me right now, you fucking idiot. Take one and chew it, it'll absorb faster. We don't have any water anyway. I can't believe you did this, Sherlock, I can't believe—" John turned away again, thumping his shoulders back against the seat.

Sherlock looked down at the bottle of aspirin and then back at John. "I'm not having a heart attack," he said. Yes, now it did feel like his chest was starting to squeeze a little, but that was psychological, obviously.

"Just take the fucking aspirin. Greg, A&E."

"Yeah, all right, I'm already headed that way. You really think he's—" Lestrade looked back over his shoulder again and Sherlock turned his face away.

"Focus on driving, please," Sherlock said. "We don't all need a trip to A&E." Yes, it was a little hard to get enough breath to speak full sentences, but that didn't mean anything. It just means I'm all the way down after snorting two lines of coke and I am so fucking tired I can't think straight. He could feel his heart beating very fast. That's not even a sign of a heart attack, just a side effect of the cocaine. He couldn't remember exactly how long it used to take for him to feel normal again; unfortunately, while he was always extremely clear-headed when high, the details tended to be difficult to retain afterwards.

"Jesus Christ, Sherlock." Lestrade cut across two lanes of traffic, picking up speed. "I really, I really didn't know when I sent you away this morning. You just looked sick and tired to me. I didn't mean—"

"No, Greg. This is not even remotely your fault." John's voice was hard and flat. "He's an adult. If he needed help he should've told one of us what was wrong, not made us play some guessing game where the winner gets to babysit Sherlock."

Sherlock closed his eyes again for a moment. I should defend myself. He couldn't really think of a good defence, and anything he said would make John yell more, though that was marginally better than being ignored. Instead he popped the cap on the aspirin and shook one out. "Just one?"

"Yeah. Shit, I'm not even sure if aspirin works when the MI's not caused by a clogged artery. Fuck. Just take it, Sherlock."

Sherlock took it. Uncoated, bitter and crumbling between his teeth, and probably too old to be effective even if he was having a heart attack. Which I'm not.

Lestrade managed to get them to the hospital without crashing; Sherlock couldn't decide if he was grateful or not. He reviewed his symptoms, trying to see if John might be right, but everything he was experiencing could be attributed to either the cocaine or was a continuation of the way he'd felt since he'd stopped sleeping after quitting the amitriptyline.

Lestrade pulled up to the entrance of the A&E department and Sherlock didn't move. Seeing the wide glass doors beneath the big red sign had made his heart rate jump again, completely out of his control. "Get out," Lestrade said, and then sighed. "John, take him in."

Sherlock wasn't looking, he was still staring at the doors, but John must have shook his head, because Lestrade said, "Christ, John, you know he's not going in there of his own free will. Just take him in while I park."

John grumbled but opened his door.

All right. So I guess this is unavoidable now. Sherlock exhaled, which did nothing to slow his heart, and opened his own door. He climbed out of the car and then pulled the wheelchair out and unfolded it for John, which was apparently not appreciated. At John's glare he let go of the chair and took a step back while John hoisted himself out of the car. Sherlock's limbs felt shaky and unsteady, but again, that was most likely from a combination of coming down from the high and listening to John's fears and letting them influence him psychosomatically.

John fixed his feet and legs into position on the leg rests, more haphazardly than usual, and then gestured at Sherlock without actually reaching out and touching him. "Come on, then."

Sherlock swallowed and followed John across the pavement to those sliding glass doors. He stumbled before they got there—the ground is flat—took another couple of steps and then had to reach out and grab John's shoulder to keep himself upright.

John tensed at the touch, but kept moving forward and didn't try to shrug away. The doors opened as they approached and Sherlock shivered as they passed through them; the whumping sound they made as they closed seemed to echo through his whole body.

Once inside, John pulled Sherlock's hand off his shoulder and pointed to a row of plastic seats. "Sit. I will check you in."

"I—" Sherlock raised his hand toward John again and John held up one finger.

"Don't. Not a word. Sit. Christ, you're drenched in sweat, Sherlock. That's not good." John's face betrayed a level of worry Sherlock had never seen on him before, though it didn't chase away the anger that was also there. "Take your coat off and sit."

Sherlock took his coat off and sat. He watched as John spoke to the woman at the reception desk, pointing over his shoulder but never once turning to make eye contact with Sherlock. Sherlock closed his own eyes and put his head in his hands. Yes, my chest hurts. But I don't think it's a heart attack, just heartache. He blinked his eyes open again; John was scribbling on a clipboard, his back still toward Sherlock. Ugh, I'm never so maudlin. Clearly something is wrong. He tried to steady his breathing and waited for someone to come get him, or for John to come back to his side.