==Chapter 2==

Baptism By Fire

Tears and loss and broken dreams
May find your heart at dusk.
– Carl Sandburg, "Dreams in the Dusk"

"Try not to be too gentle with him, Beth. We can't tiptoe around him when he's sulking." John's parting advice to Beth echoed in her head that evening as she watched over her husband, drifting in and out of sleep. Like you're doing right now, her mind supplied helpfully. She sighed. She'd walked on eggshells around Sherlock and confronted him head-on, and she'd done the latter enough times to shy away from it by now. John was right, of course, but that didn't make it any easier.

Another bout of coughing jolted Holmes out of his doze. He reached for the glass of lemon and barley water on the bedside table, trying not to spill it as the coughs continued to tear from him, airway and throat feeling completely raw.

"Aw, honey." Beth set her book down and went to the bed, taking the glass from Sherlock and holding it steady so he could drink. Poor darling, he looked completely miserable.

He gulped thirstily, though it was hard to swallow, and let his aching head fall back onto the pillow with a groan. Why had he gone out, again?

She set down the glass and, on an impulse, reached out and started to stroke his hair. "Try not to be too gentle with him" — but he looks so miserable, I can't stand it.

Holmes stiffened for a moment in surprise, but her touch did feel very nice... He smiled up at her wanly, gratitude warring with guilt. "...I'm sorry..."

She smiled faintly in return. "Me too."

Without the voice or strength just then to contradict her, he settled for shaking his head gently. And if he wanted her to not feel bad about taking breaks, he ought to at least express an interest in what she'd been doing. "You saw Miss Pemberton, then?" he whispered to save his throat. "How is she?"

"She's okay. Ish." The fire hadn't gone out of her, at any rate, and that was a relief to see! "She's starting a women's shelter; that's what she wanted me and Sally to witness, her signing for the building."

"Good heavens..." But after the first moment of surprise, the notion did make a lot of sense. "Which building?"

Beth shrugged. "Just a run-down old boardinghouse. She's going to try and repair it, keep tearing it down as a last resort." She winced as she remembered the sagging ceiling and moldy walls. "It's gonna need a lot of work, though."

"It probably would be –" Another bout of coughing interrupted; "better to build it new. Less costly, for one."

"No, she wants something the locals already know, that they're familiar with. People wouldn't be as likely to trust a brand-new building—nobody likes too much change." Having grown up in 'Small Town USA,' she could certainly attest to that.

Holmes nodded slowly, struck by the wisdom of this. Adelaide's baptism by fire, tragic as it was, did seem to have been the making of her!

"I suggested that Harriet Granville might be able to help her get things started — oh my gosh, I forgot! I promised to write to her about that!" Beth hesitated. "Um, I don't suppose... you could help me with it a little bit? I mean, I've got that book on etiquette Sally gave me, but if you could just check the wording when I'm done..." She really did want to make sure that she could write a decent letter — after all, she'd only ever sent texts and emails her whole life!

"My pleasure," he smiled, flattered to be asked. At least it would be something to do while stuck in bed.

In the middle of the night, Beth roused in the chair she'd fallen asleep in, and frowned blearily. Something was off but she didn't know what. After a few more seconds, she realised it: Sherlock's breathing didn't sound right.

Her heart jumped into her throat as she went over to him. "Honey?" She shook him gently; he stirred but didn't wake, his breathing still too labored. When she touched his forehead, it was dry and much too hot — even as bundled-up as he was, he shouldn't have been that hot.

No no no no no no… Shaking, Beth ran upstairs and moved as quietly as she could to the Watsons' bed, not wanting to wake the baby or Sally. "John?"

Watson had only been sleeping lightly, and sat up as Beth entered, already alarmed – she wouldn't be waking anyone at this time of night if it wasn't urgent! "Holmes?"

"Yes!" Poor girl, she looked terrified. He threw on dressing gown and slippers over his nightshirt and hurried back down with her. "He's really hot, and he's not breathing right."

Damn... "Is my Gladstone still in the bedroom? I'll need the stethoscope."

"Yeahstillthere—" Beth was tripping over her words now; "I'll get it." She all but burst back into the room, diving for the bag and handing it over.

"Thank you." Watson put the stethoscope diaphragm against Holmes's chest, then his back, frowning at the tell-tale noises coming through the ear pieces, while Beth stood close by, silent and trembling. Damn, damn, damn... "Well, it's pneumonia, all right," he said, trying to keep his voice matter-of-fact, and gave Beth a determined smile. "It looks like we're in for the long haul, my dear." Briskly, "Now, if you empty the bed while I take his temperature..." He put the thermometer in Holmes's mouth while Beth hastily removed the hot water bottles and bricks.

"Hm, one hundred and three, better than I expected. The important thing just now is to try to keep him down below one hundred and seven. Sponge baths, cold compresses, plenty of liquids, and if we can't persuade him to drink, there's always ice chips."

Beth groaned softly, already sounding exhausted. "And just a few hours ago we were trying to get him warmed up..."

Watson nodded ruefully. "It's all about balance, I'm afraid. The fever will break once the infection has burned out, but until then, it's up to us to keep him from getting too hot." He reached out and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "We'll see him through it, Beth, I promise." The bloody idiot was going to pull through this, he simply had to.

For two days the fever stretched on with no sign of breaking, and with Holmes constantly coughing up mucus, they had to be extremely vigilant about hygiene. Watson hadn't any idea if Kathy could get sick from human diseases, but the rest of them certainly could! He would have preferred to send Sally and Kathy away altogether, but Sally flatly refused – even with Kathy to look after, she could be of far more use at home. Watson reluctantly gave in, on condition that she and Kathy moved downstairs, switching bedrooms with Mrs. Hudson. Mrs. Hudson made face masks for everyone, and a large supply of soft flannel cloths, to be burned in the sitting room fireplace once used, and everyone upstairs had to wash their hands with carbolic soap every hour while on duty.

"We have to tell Mycroft," Beth decided early on. "I know he's got a lot on his mind already, but... I'd wanna know, if it was one of my brothers!"

"All right," Watson nodded, "though we'll have to keep him informed by telegram, with the house under quarantine."

Downstairs, Sally took over laundering Holmes's bedlinen, and trying her hand at a liquid diet with occasional guidance from Mrs. Hudson: soup, broth, herbal tea, lemon and barley water, and hacking away at a large block of ice to make chips. A length of rubber tube became a straw, which made getting fluids into Holmes a good deal easier while semi-conscious. Watson was also keeping a careful record of all sickroom activity in a ledger: fluid intake, examinations, doses of medicine, linen changes, rises in temperature and what had been done to lower it, and how much sleep everyone was getting. The three sick nurses had overlapping shifts so there were two on duty at all times, and one reasonably fresh; even so, it didn't take Watson long to notice that Beth hardly seemed to be getting any rest at all.

Late on the third day, Watson came out into the sitting room with a basin of cloths for burning, leaving Mrs. Hudson on watch. He smiled at the sight of Beth curled up on the settee under a blanket, head drooping, eyes closed – it was high time she got some proper sleep!

Beth jerked herself awake with a soft gasp, heart beating rapidly. Can't go to sleep, not yet, it's too soon...

Watson frowned, putting down the basin and coming nearer. "Beth?" he asked softly, trying not to startle her further. "Are you all right?"

She flinched at his voice but nodded. "Yeah." She pulled her blanket closer around her, shivering. It is not the cold which makes me shiver... "Just not ready to sleep yet."

"But you went off duty..." His frown deepened as he looked at the mantel clock. "Good heavens, almost an hour ago!"

Beth shrugged. If she tried to explain, it was going to sound stupid and he was going to think she was stupid. Her eyelids drooped again, and she forced them back open. Not zedding yet!

His eyes narrowed, sitting down on the edge of the settee. "How long have you been doing that?"

Beth seemed to shrink in on herself, refusing to meet his gaze.

"Listen," Watson said, gently but firmly, "I know how worried you are about Holmes... but your being on high alert at all hours isn't helping him – in fact, those shadows under your eyes are likely to make him think he's in more danger than he actually is! I would be very sorry to have to take you off nursing duty altogether, but I will if necessary."

She flinched, but didn't have the energy to glare at him, despite the fact that he seemed to have an uncanny knack for making her feel ten years old. And oh, if only her self-imposed sleep-deprivation was as noble as being on high alert 24/7... She opened her mouth, and had to swallow a sudden lump in her throat. "It's not... it's not that."

Watson kicked himself – as if he hadn't seen that haunted look often enough on Holmes! "How bad?" he asked softly.

She frowned up at him, confused. "Huh?"

"The nightmares."

Her eyes widened, not having expected that. "Oh." She looked down again. "Most of them... aren't... nightmares..." She shuddered and pulled her blanket tighter around herself again. Most of the dreams were memories, and the few that weren't were no less horrible for it.

"Oh, Beth..." If only he could let her sleep beside her husband again, that couldn't be helping!

She chewed at her lip for a moment. "But last night I stayed awake so long that when I finally fell asleep, I didn't really dream—or, almost didn't at all—so..." She shrugged again. You gotta do what you gotta do.

Rarely had he felt so helpless – or wished so much that he could play the violin like Holmes! But he did have other strengths... and Beth had recently admitted that 'The Copper Beeches' was one of her favourite stories. Watson rose and crossed to the bookshelf where he kept his collection of Strand magazines.

Beth frowned blearily — what was he up to? "John?"

Watson merely smiled mysteriously as he returned, grabbing a spare cushion. Sitting on the floor beside the settee, he turned to the right page, putting on his best 'Holmes' voice. " 'To the man who loves art for its own sake," remarked Sherlock Holmes, tossing aside the advertisement sheet of the Daily Telegraph, "it is frequently in its least important and lowliest manifestations that the keenest pleasure is to be derived...' "

Oh my gosh... Beth snorted softly, tickled by the mental image of Sherlock talking like that, while feeling something inside her unclench at John reading her one of his stories. "What did he really say?"

"Nothing very memorable, I'm afraid," he smiled, glad to see her spirits lifting. "Just the usual moaning about the deplorable lack of interesting crime."

She giggled softly — she could certainly picture that. "Big baby."

" 'It is pleasant to me to observe, Watson, that you have so far grasped this truth that in these little records of our cases which you have been good enough to draw up, and, I am bound to say, occasionally to embellish..." ' He had to silently chuckle himself at 'occasionally', but kept reading.

Beth settled in beneath her blanket as she listened. Of course, no one had read her a whole story like this since she was a little girl — and even then, Daddy had almost certainly been editing! Despite her tiredness, she lasted through the whole story, however, smiling wistfully as John got to the end, describing how well Violet Hunter was now doing after her ordeal. "I would have liked to meet her," Beth murmured. "I always thought she was great." Smart, gutsy...

"You still could, you know." It was funny how things worked out – he had certainly predicted what kind of woman Holmes would lose his heart to!

Beth looked down and shrugged — possible but not likely. And now that the story was over, tension was returning to her shoulders: there was no guarantee that the memories wouldn't come back. "Thanks for the story," she said quietly.

Rising, about to leave, Watson hesitated at the look on her face. "...Are you going to be all right?"

Beth nodded, but her vision was blurry. At this point, she was afraid of letting herself relax, letting down her guard. "I think so... I just... I don't wanna see them again..."

He knelt and hugged her, a lump in his throat. It was all so bloody unfair...

She hugged him back, crying silently now, but the hug was so nice, she hadn't known how much she needed it.

"It will get better..."

And coming from John Watson, who survived the bloodbath of Maiwand, she kind of believed it. "Promise?" She looked up with a watery smile. "Cross your heart and hope to cry?"

Watson couldn't help a faint chuckle, even as his own eyes grew moist. "Promise." He hoped to God it was true.

She relaxed enough to rest her head on his shoulder, her "thanks" trailing off into a yawn.

"You're very welcome." He tightened the hug for a moment, then let her lay back down. "Good night, Beth."

"Night-night," she murmured, already half asleep. "Love you..."

Watson had to blink hard, completely overwhelmed. Ought he to say it back, had she even been awake enough to know what she'd said? But by the time he'd decided, Beth was already fast asleep. He gently smoothed a stray hair away from her face, and whispered, "I love you, too."