Don't Touch
Sherlock Holmes was sobbing. Head bowed, hand over his eyes, tears leaking through his fingers, shoulders gently shaking. It took John Watson some minutes to realise what was happening. He had not seen the melt down begin.
And then he had to watch, silent, aghast, and fascinated. Feeling he should do something, something to help. Anything! But what? They had been flatmates for only a few weeks, and John was increasingly aware of feeling his way into a relationship that was proving strange, scary, quite unlike anything he had ever experienced before…but something totally Sherlock.
So here was his strange and distinctly unpredictable flatmate, incongruously slumped down in a floral chintzy armchair in the elegant but homely sitting room of a five bedroom detached bungalow in highly desirable Chislehurst, sobbing his heart out.
"I'm sorry…I….I…can't seem to stop myself," Sherlock said, His voice was ragged, low. He opened his fingers and peered out. Those opal eyes were shining with tears and red rimmed. He dragged in a deep breath.
"Sherlock….!" Watson did not know what to do for the best. He had never seen his friend exhibit naked emotion like this. Had never seen Holmes cry. It was not something the consulting detective did. Watson was rendered speechless. He put a hand out to grasp his friend's shoulder, but Holmes flinched away as if he had been burnt.
John Watson was at a loss. Having been away from Baker Street for a medical conference over a long weekend, he had returned home to find Sherlock rushing away to a new case.
Rebecca Broadhurst, a thirty two year old unmarried primary school teacher had been shot in the head at her father's home with her father's pistol. Neighbours had heard raised voices, and then a single shot.
The father, a competitive shooter for many years, owned several hand guns, and the killing weapon had been one of them. James Broadhurst, widowed, sixty seven years old, had recently being diagnosed as being in the early stages of dementia. He had been found, by a curious and very brave neighbour who had heard the shot, standing over his daughter's body with the gun in his hand.
When Sherlock had explained the case to John, his blogger frowned.
"Pretty obvious, isn't it, Sherlock? Why are you getting involved?"
"I knew her, John. Years ago, I remembered her name. And I have nothing else on….."
Sentiment? A fondly remembered past? John Watson had frowned. Such a connection was a rare one for Holmes. John Watson did not think it would normally rate above a three on the Sherlock Scale of Interest, but here they were, investigating.
Sherlock had been on his best behaviour; discussing the case with Lestrade and the local CID, appearing on James Broadhurst's doorstep with soft speech and good manners, even sitting with him on the sofa as James took him through family photograph albums. He had even been polite to the psychiatric social worker who had been pressed into service as James's responsible adult to oversee his welfare.
James and Sherlock talked about school trips, family holidays, aunties and uncles and sports days until John thought he would scream with boredom. He did not know why Sherlock was not doing the same. And yet he knew his colleague could be infinitely patient when the situation required it. It required it now.
For James this was not a good day. He was a tall, well built man, with thick dark hair - despite his age - and a ready smile. But there was that telltale emptiness starting behind his eyes, sentences that never quite reached their end, and the regular turn of the head and a plaintive "Where's Becky? Has anyone seen Becky?"
Her had seemed not to recognise the thing removed from the hearth rug by two uniformed men as his daughter.
And every time he spoke his daughter's name Lestrade flinched and John turned away. Sherlock reassured and James's son Steven tutted quietly, patience taxed.
The police, social services and the psychologist from the local mental care trust all agreed that nothing would be achieved by arresting James Broadhurst until proper investigations had been made. They simply took the guns away while Steven - who had arrived on the doorstep before police officers had been able to take the gun from his father's hand - simply sat and watched the proceedings as if stunned.
James had been happily lost in his own world since officialdom arrived, watching quietly with bemused eyes, now waffling about a holiday twenty five years ago on the east coast as if it had happened yesterday. But then suddenly the whole man was back with them.
"Becky's dead," he said quickly, emphatically, turning to Sherlock and grasping his arm fiercely.
"That's right, Mr Broadhurst," Sherlock agreed softly.
"She was shot." Very firmly.
"That's right," Sherlock agreed, smiling encouragement. "Do you remember what happened? Did you shoot her, James?"
James Broadhurst frowned, looking between Sherlock, John, Lestrade and Steven as if one of them held the answer.
"I remember her washing up after breakfast," he said." I remember standing over her where she lay on the hearthrug. Holding my gun. So….I suppose….I remember shooting her."
"Dad! Please don't upset yourself!" Steven Broadhurst cried, as if tested beyond endurance.
"It's all right….er…..who….oh! Stevie! Is it Stevie? Hello Stevie! What are you doing here? Have you come to help Becky? That's nice of you…." and they had lost him again.
Dementia comes in peaks and troughs, John Watson remembered. In the early stages, periods of lucidity contrasting with periods of absence, until the absences became more frequent and more final.
"This is pointless, Inspector Lestrade, Mr Holmes. All that is happening is that you are upsetting him. Upsetting us both."
Steven Broadhurst crossed the room, knelt down, detached his father's hand from Sherlock's. And then sat on the arm of his father's chair, still holding the hand. James looked at his only son blankly.
"How long has your father been like this?" Sherlock asked quietly.
"Not sure," Steven replied. " Mum died two years ago, We thought at first it was grief making him fuddled. We made allowances, like you do. Becky was always Dad's favourite. She decided to move back home three months ago when the diagnosis was finally made."
"And how did you feel about that?" Sherlock asked.
"Devastated," was the sincere reply. "All of us. But we agreed this was the sensible thing to do."
"How did you get on with your sister?"
"Like brother and sister," Steven Broadhurst said, frowning.
"How did you get on with your father?"
"Oh, you know; father and son stuff."
"No. I don't know," Sherlock said firmly.
"He has family issues," interjected Lestrade to the son helpfully. "You should meet his brother!"
Sherlock smiled tightly at that, and Steven Broadhurst grinned at him in return.
"Well, they do say you choose your friends but you can't choose your family," he joked.
"Very true," Sherlock said with a quirk of his eyebrow. Steven Broadhurst laughed.
"Well this is all very pleasant, and I daresay we will start discussing the weather soon, Mr Holmes. But what are you doing here? Surely this is a simple case brought about by my father's illness? Why are you interested?"
And that was when something crumpled in Sherlock's face and he started to cry. Just sniffles at first. Then his face fell and he dipped his head. Scraped away a telltale tear that blossomed down his right cheek.
John Watson felt his jaw drop open. Saw the horror in his face mirrored in Lestrade's. The mildly embarrassed interest from Steven Broadhurst.
Hey,.mate…." began Lestrade. "What is it?"
John reached out a comforting hand, but Sherlock flinched away from his touch.
"Don't give me sympathy!" he exclaimed. "Please don't!"
"Sherlock! Let me help…."
"No! No-one can help me, no-one!" The voice was raw, the sob in it pathetic. "I'm so sorry. The shock of finding out Becky was dead…the grief…I can't stand it….I knew her years ago. And I loved her you see….worshipped from afar….have always loved her."
He was looking intently at Steven Broadhurst, and John Watson had to look away when he saw the hurt in Sherlock's eyes.
This was it, then, John realised. This explained a lot. Sherlock's emotionless and sexless persona, his cynicism in the face of all human feelings. He had had his fingers burnt, been damaged by love; had vowed never to feel again or let himself be hurt again…...and now here was his only love, heading cold and dead into a mortuary drawer, shot by her own father. No wonder he had wanted this case and was now broken by it.
"Oh, please!"
The cynical interjection silenced the room.
Stephen Broadhurst looked from one to the other with a sneer in his voice. He was a handsome man, slim, blond, carefully groomed. The only sign that he was suffering from news of the murder of his younger sister Rebecca was a thumbnail twitching softly against a forefinger. Otherwise he was impassive. But watching Sherlock be so upset and broken, there was now also a sneer on his face.
Sherlock reached out a trembling hand to him, and Broadhurst dashed it away.
"Don't be pathetic!" he said. "Grown men don't cry. And you are supposed to be a professional."
"Pathetic? I'm not…." Sherlock's voice trailed away as he shuddered and swallowed his tears, wiping them away with the back of his hand.
"She was beautiful. I adored her from afar. For years. For God's sake, man, she was your sister! You above all people should know how lovely she is. Was."
Steven Broadhurst held tightly to his father's hand.
"Oh yes. I know. I have spent my entire life hearing people telling me how lovely my sister is. How pretty, how sweet, how special."
"She was," Sherlock whispered.
"Oh, she could be," Steven Broadhurst said, looking at his father. "Becky was sweet, wasn't she, Dad?"
"A real sweetie," James said, smiling and nodding vigorously.
"…and so charming…" Sherlock prompted.
"When she wanted something," Steven replied, his eyes miles away in memories. "And she always wanted something."
"She wanted to be top sibling, did she?" Sherlock asked softly, and almost imperceptibly his voice changed from trembling emotion to quiet calculation. "She always wanted to be top, resented you being older, the boy everyone looked to. She wanted the power in the family. Was she the strong one?"
Steven Broadhurst did not answer or deny the quiet words, so Sherlock continued:
"So when your father started to become ill, she saw it before you did. She got him to grant her power of attorney over his affairs and finances before he lost his grip, leave this big expensive family home to her and to her alone. In gratitude for coming home to look after him. And you didn't know a thing about it. Or did you only know what she told you….until you found she told you lies?"
Everyone looked at Sherlock as he spoke. Voice firm, tears gone as if they had never been.
"After being wiped across the floor by her all your life, something finally snapped, did it?"
Steven Broadhurst sighed and clutched his father's hand even tighter.
"What makes you think you know?"
"I would love to say 'instinct'" explained Sherlock with a wry smile, "But I checked. When I saw the details of the murder of your sister and that your father was a champion shot, I suspected. It looked far too obvious - the depleted shooter shooting his daughter.
"After a lifetime with guns I knew your father could never kill someone with a gun. Shooters of your father's calibre do no think of a gun as a weapon, but as a precision instrument, like an engineer's micrometer or a surgeon's scalpel. And his illness would compound his care and attitude, not alter it.
"He was also due his annual firearms inspection soon. So whoever wanted to killed your sister was running out of time to be able to get their hands on a weapon. Because he would never be able to keep his licence and his guns with his dementia.
"And it struck me that it would seem so easy to turn a murder into a tragedy just because the solution would seem so obvious.
"Then when I examined your sister's body two things were clear: that for someone to shoot her at point blank range from the front it had to be someone she knew. And yet the angle of shot had to be by someone shorter than your father. You are considerably shorter than your father."
"But I wasn't even here when Becky died!"
"No? Yet you were on the front doorstep in minutes. The old trick of doing the job, slipping out of the back door - after you had put the gun into your father's hand - round the side and in again at the front. Too obvious."
Sherlock was dismissive.
"Admit it Steven, I know the truth. I knew when I saw those family photos. Always Becky smiling out to the photographer. Always you looking sideways at her, as if she was a monster you hated. Because you did hate her but never had the strength to stand up to her before."
"She was a monster," cam the whisper, finally, in reply. "But no-one ever saw….She treated me like rubbish, always. I never did anything right, she never did anything wrong. And I was always being told to be good, be gallant, look after my little sister."
"So she took advantage of that and used you."
"Yes."
"The final straw was when you found your father had forgotten your name altogether. Yet remembered Becky's. And that's when she make the mistake of starting to relish her victory - and told you what she had done, wasn't it? Cheated you out of sharing control and your inheritance? Because you needed that money to keep your business afloat….but Becky just thought it poetic justice your father no longer knew who you were. Just as she was also pushing you out."
Steven Broadhurst put his arms around his father and his chin down on the top of his father's head. He had still admitted nothing. Until now.
"What else could I do, Mr Holmes?"
"Walked away. It was only money - and the man is dying. You should have waited. But emotions are messy. They always leave a mess in their wake. Did no-one ever tell you that?"
Sherlock Holmes stood up, shook his head.
"You might have gotten away with manslaughter if the jury sympathised with you as doormat and were given the idea that you finally just snapped.
"But you should not have tried to put the blame onto your father. That was too calculated. Vindictive."
"What do you know?" Steven Broadhurst clutched his father's hand. "He hasn't a clue who or where he is, now. Who I am. But he still remembered the sainted Becky. It made me sick to my soul. My dad's life is over. But the money from selling this house would give me a proper life. Let me shine for a change."
" You could have done that without killing your sister or destroying your father. It was just quicker and easier for you to be selfish," continued Sherlock.
"But then there was the report from the first officer on the scene - just a young community volunteer no-one took seriously. She reported the back door was locked when she arrived, no key to be found. No-one else mentioned that - because by the time everyone else arrived the door was unlocked, the key in it's usual place. No-one but me noticed that tiny detail.
"And that was you, too, wasn't it? You killed Becky, put the gun in your father's hand, went out, locked the door, pocketed the key, came round to the front door pretending to have just arrived."
"You're mad! Letting your imagination run away with you! Why would I do that?" shouted Steven Broadhurst.
"Noooo…." the voice was a low thoughtful burr, yet the grey eyes were intent upon the younger man's like a laser light. "Your intent was to 'discover' you father standing over your sister's body having apparently just shot her. Then to wrestle the gun off him. Shoot him in the struggle. You in fact shot Becky, locked the back door behind you as you left so your father could not escape; then you came back in through the front to kill him too. As you apparently grappled with the gun on your apparent arrival
"He had no clue about what you were doing. Becky's murder. Then would come the second murder in apparent self defence. A perfect family tragedy. Poor orphaned Steven. Who would then inherit everything alone - and much more quickly with them both dead, after all."
Steven Broadhurst stood up, stalked across the room and stared into Sherlock's face, his face twisted in anger and emotion. Sherlock looked through and past him.
"But the nosy neighbour turned up and ruined your plan. It took ages to get the key back into the kitchen door again without being noticed, didn't it? Tthe door you had locked so your father was not able to escape the fate you had determined for him. Pretty nasty, Steven.
"But I have no doubts. And forensics will prove that out by the layering of fingerprints on the gun….and your fingerprints on the back door knob and the key. The very top layer of fingerprints. Obvious really."
And that was when Steven Broadhust lunged for Sherlock's throat and Sherlock drove him back with a single punch to the heart before sniffing dismissively, tossing his head and stepping back.
"Game over, Mr Broadhurst." He pulled on his gloves with a look of deep distaste.
"Over to you, Lestrade."
And swept out of the room, a rueful John Watson in his wake.
o00o
"So did you ever meet Becky Broadhurst? Like you said?"
Back in 221B Baker Street, afternoon television's highlight was The Jeremy Kyle Show which they were both pointing their faces at whilst clutching mugs of tea with their minds elsewhere.
"Of course not! Don't tell me you believed that emotional twaddle?" Sherlock's voice was scathing and his face scornful.
"Well…..you were very convincing. You convinced me. And Steven Broadhurst."
"Of course I did. That's what I do and how I do it. It's the work, John."
John Watson shook his head, unable to decide if he was discomforted or impressed.
"But how do you do that?" he demanded. "How? Turn all that feeling on and off like a tap? You are so scathing about emotion, so bloodless most of the time, Sherlock. A machine…."
"A thinking machine…." corrected Sherlock, smiling.
"A machine…" Watson repeated with a hard glare in his flatmate's direction, "You can be horrible. Bloody horrible, Sherlock! And then you pour out tears, manipulate people - just like that. No embarrassment, nothing., You suckered me, and you suckered Lestrade too."
"I should hope so. I am a loss to British theatre." He smirked and looked away as if bored with the conversation.
"Sherlock!" John Watson half rose from his chair and thought twice about punching the man sitting opposite him.
" No, really, that was the right thing for you to do, John. Believe me. I didn't think Broadhurst would be so easy to break. But the fact that both you and Lestrade were convinced by my outpourings and looking stricken was a great help. Broadhurst needed to feel superior. Especially as he felt he had done something remarkably clever in killing his sister and framing his father.
"As I am always telling you, John. Emotion. Sentiment. Both destructive and a waste of time. You see what I mean, now?"
Sherlock's reassuring face wasn't very reassuring, John Watson decided. And felt completely out of his depth.
"So thank you for that reflection of my emotion," Sherlock continued "Because it was clear to me that Becky and Steven were siblings always at loggerheads…."
"Like you and Mycroft? Oh, brilliant! There's your insight. Why didn't I see that?"
"You didn't see that. Mycroft and I have never been like that," Sherlock corrected pragmatically. "Steven and Becky never got on. Because both were as greedy as each other. That's why he ended up killing her.
"Mycroft and I….were never like that. When we were children we idolised each other."
"So what happened?"
"Nothing of any consequence," Sherlock's eyes were suddenly shuttered and blank, and John realised yet again that his flatmate was never going to exchange confidences or tell his family history.
"Let's just say that Mycroft created me in his own image. And now he does not like to have to deal with that reflection of himself. So let's leave that now, shall we?"
"Well; if you have another emotional - ah - episode like that again on a case, what do I do?"
"Don't you know me at all, John?" Sherlock looked at him sharply, allowed a thin smile that was the spit of his brother's favourite superior rearrangement of his lower face "You don't believe a word of it, naturally. But you act as if you do. Because that brings emotional and psychological pressure upon the perpetrator which helps me solve the problem. Easy, isn't it?"
"Yes….no….hmn…."
"Don't tax yourself with it, John. You know who I am, you know my methods."
"I'm not sure I do. They are a bit beyond me most of the time."
Sherlock sighed, sipped his tea.
"It's perfectly simple. Recognise what you do so well - friendliness, helpfulness, women, sex, love, attraction, touchy-feely stuff. And then realise I don't do any of that. Think of us as ying and yang. If you must." His nose wrinkled in distaste at the very phrase, and John Watson almost laughed.
"But Sherlock, I don't understand how you do it. What made you like this?"
"Like what?"
"You are a grown man with a lot of life experience. Don't tell me you have never…don't ever….erm….touch people? Connect?"
"John, I have no idea what you are talking about. No-one made me. I made me. Being alone is my choice. "
"Sherlock! Don't. I can't get my head round this. Are you telling me you don't…." he struggled for words. "You don't let people in? Ever? You don't need love and kindness like the rest of us? A gentle touch? Hasn't anyone? Ever…?"
Sherlock sighed and rolled his eyes.
"John, stop being hopelessly sentimental. You only need emotion if you expect it, or are given it. I do not and am not. Simple."
Love and compassion are not hopeless sentiment, Sherlock."
"Really? Sounds dull. And utterly predictable."
"And what's wrong with that? It just means you are normal."
"But I am not normal, John. You have said as much yourself."
"I didn't mean it. I was….hassled."
Sherlock gave a dry laugh.
"Yes you did. Stop trying to make me feel …."
"Feel? You mean you are admitting actually feeling something? Well, that's a first."
"Irony, John? Good. "
John Watson suddenly felt as if he was being mocked, but had no idea what to do about it, or what to say. He flashed an angry look up at Sherlock Holmes from under his brows, and was surprised to find Sherlock smiling gently at him. For the smile disturbed him more than he could say.
"So…what am I doing here in 221b, then? Being part of your life?"
Sherlock Holmes looked up and his expression was unreadable. He looked across at John Watson for a long moment. Then looked puzzled, put his head slightly to one side.
"You want…." he paused, thoughtful and with an expression on his face impossible to identify. He looked so puzzled John Watson wanted to laugh and pour his mug of tea over his head. "….you want….justification? Qualification? Admiration? "
"No, of course not, you idiot. For a genius you are remarkably dim sometimes. I just want the truth, Sherlock. Because I have no idea what in hell I am doing here! And why you seem to need me."
"OK, John. You want the truth. I'll give you the truth." He paused and took a deep breath. "You make a very fine cup of tea."
John Watson looked at him incredulously and thought of seven different replies but couldn't manage to say any of them.
"There you are, you see. Silenced by the truth."
Sherlock Holmes nodded, a little smugly, and gave John Watson his most special fake mega smile as he slipped down the settee cushions until propped in his usual pose of steepled fingers, closed eyes, deep thinking.
And only then did John Watson allow himself to smile too. When he knew Sherlock could not see him.
He was a patient man. He would get to the bottom of this. He would find where Sherlock Holmes had left his heart. And why he had left it behind. Because whatever Sherlock Holmes might say, he had a heart - which was somewhere around, and not too far away. John was sure of it.
END
Author's note:
A story that popped up out of nowhere as a reflection of Benedict Cumberbatch's supreme technical ability to be able to cry at will and on cue. And not just on the rooftop at Bart's. The fire tender scene in Parade's End gets me every time. And also impressive in Star Trek. Third Star. And so on. But now I am waffling!