Sarah came on shift the next morning to find a very subdued Sherlock. Quiet, almost silent, and already awake and reading when she walked into his room after handover at eight.

'You okay?' she asked, frowning.

'Not sure yet,' he said, still reading, then looking up from his book, 'Why?'

'You're very quiet.'

'I'm often quiet,' he said, reading again.

'You haven't touched your breakfast.'

'No I haven't, have I?' he said, sounding distracted. 'I don't think that today is going to be a food day.'

'And you haven't turned a page on that book since I walked in here, which given the rate you normally read at is unusual in itself. So why don't you put that book down and talk to me?'

Sighing he complied and looked at her in that direct way that he had, the way that she knew was designed to make people feel slightly uncomfortable. It didn't work. 'I don't think that today is going to be a talking day either,' he said slowly.

'Every day is a talking day,' she said, pulling up a chair next to the bed. `So whats up?'

'Nothing is up, I'm fine.'

'No, you're not. You were okay yesterday, so either today is just a down day or more likely something has happened to make you like this. Since you've been asleep, I would guess more nightmares, although nobody said anything in report, so I presume that you couldn't wake yourself up. Am I right?'

'Something's happened to make me like what?'

'Oh I don't know - defensive, withdrawn,' she paused, 'avoiding the question.'

'Maybe I don't want to talk about it.'

'And maybe this is one of the times that you need to. Tell me about the nightmares.'

'Its the same, always the same,' he frowned and looked down at the book lying on the bed. 'I'm being chased through a wood. I can feel the monster behind me, so close, close enought to smell it and its claws keep catching me as I run, and no matter how hard I run now, it always catches me.'

'And what happens then?'

'I try to wake up, but I can't, and then, and then...'

He broke off, his voice shaking. Sarah squeezed his hand, but stayed silent, knowing that he needed to get the words out.

'And then its clawing at me, biting at me, attacking me, and I can't wake up, and I can't get away.'

Sarah nodded, then after a short silence asked, 'Is it your father.'

He nodded, then sat forward, knees drawn up, burying his face in his arms. Sarah rested a hand on his shoulder, letting him know that she was there.

When he finally sat up, wiping his eyes she asked, 'Why won't you talk about it, Sherlock? Its not going to get better until you talk about it.'

'Because its not real. I know that its not real.'

'Then why are you dreaming about it?'

'I don't know.' Then suddenly he said, 'Can I go to the music room this morning, now even? I need to get these pictures out of my head and thats the only way I can think of to do it.'

'Of course, or I can get you some lorazepam and you can sleep.'

He shook his head, 'No, sleep doesn't help. When I sleep the nightmares come. I can't cope with anymore of those, not at the moment.'

So Sarah took him to the music room, making a mental note to ensure that he wasn't given any more sleeping tablets if this was the effect that they had on him, and sat there as he played piece after piece. Then when he had played everything that he knew from memory he sat and worked through a new piece of Beethoven from the sheet music that he had found in the piano stool. It was nearly two hours before he finally stopped playing and closed the lid on the piano.

'Better?' she asked.

'Yes, much.'

'You play beautifully,' she told him as she walked him back to his room. 'I don't know much about these things, but I would say that you could play professionally.'

He shook his head, 'I wouldn't want to. I play for myself, not for anybody else.'

'So what do you want to do when you leave school?'

He shrugged. 'I don't know,' he said. 'To be honest, I can't see my way out of here, let alone anything else.'

Sarah chose her words carefully. 'Do you want to go home?' she asked finally.

'I don't know,' he said softly. 'It all seems so disconnected now. I don't really know what I want.'

And then he lapsed back into silence, and retreated back to his bed with a book, which he turned a few more pages on this time before he fell asleep.