When John woke up, he instinctively reached out for Rosie, but his hand didn't touch either her smooth skin or the cold wood of her crib. He looked up and saw Sherlock looming over him, a mixture of worry and relief evident on his face. He reached out and caught Sherlock's hand, while Sherlock clutched his just as hard - as if he was the one drowning.
"Rosie." John croaked, "Is she okay?"
"She's safe, but there's a very slight possibility of motor damage. They won't let me see her because I'm not immediate family." Sherlock replied.
John closed his eyes again, breathing deeply. He still felt woozy from the sedatives. Sherlock squeezed his hand and he squeezed back. Strangely enough, it felt perfectly natural that Sherlock should be at his side, holding his hand and comforting him. He had no idea what was going on in his head, but he knew that he would've been perfectly content to lie there, fingers intertwined with Sherlock's, if he hadn't been so worried about Rosie.
Eventually, a doctor came in and cleared his throat. Sherlock rose to leave, but the doctor smiled at him. "It's alright, you can stay here while I examine your boyfriend."
"He's not my boyfriend." John said automatically, and then a stroke of inspiration suddenly hit him. "He's my fiance."
Sherlock gave him an odd look, but it only lasted for a split second, and he quickly caught on to what John was doing. "It's set for next week." he said, beaming at the doctor, "But we might have to postpone it...it all depends on little Rosie." He pretended to sniffle, and John was sure that a significant part of it wasn't fake.
The doctor sighed. "All right." he mumbled, writing something on his notepad and giving it to Sherlock, "Take this pass." Sherlock snatched it and ran out of the room.
The waiting was agony, every minute of it. John answered the doctor's questions as well as he could while craning his neck to watch out for Sherlock and news of Rosie. The doctor told him that he should stay for the rest of the day, that they would release him in the evening. John just nodded along, barely listening. The doctor had just left when Sherlock's soft footfalls were heard and he entered.
"She doesn't look too bad." he informed John, "Small bandage on her forehead, that's it. She's sleeping, but it's natural, not drug-induced. Apparently your body absorbed most of the impact. They said there'll be more news by the evening."
John wasn't too relieved. What if she was permanently impaired in some way? He should've paid closer attention to where he was going, stopped the cabbie while they were still in the busy parts of London…
"She'll be fine." Sherlock said softly. John looked up to see Sherlock staring at him intently.
"Maybe not."
"Maybe." Sherlock agreed, "But whatever it is, we can all pull through. Humans are built to withstand much more pain than they give themselves credit for."
John closed his eyes again. His head throbbed painfully. "She's all I have left of Mary." he said, before slipping into deep slumber.
Sherlock spent the day alternating between Rosie and John's rooms, seeing to it that they were fed and watered. Rosie slept for the most part. The few times that she threw a tantrum, Sherlock was there to pick her up, and she would almost instantly cease her crying. As soon as she fell asleep, he would run to John's room. If John was asleep, Sherlock held his hand, not caring if anyone saw him. If he was awake, they talked about Sherlock's case, the missing cabbie and Rosie's condition. When John awoke, Sherlock would try to pull his hand away, but sometimes, he wasn't fast enough. On these occasions, John didn't try to disentangle his fingers. Sherlock put it down to the sedatives.
As the clock struck six, Sherlock tried to swallow the lump in his throat. On the cab ride to the hospital, he had thought about confessing his true emotions to John, but he couldn't do it. Firstly, he didn't know how to. Was he just supposed to say 'I love you' and leave it at that? Was he supposed to bring chocolates or roses or something? Secondly, if John didn't feel the same way, he would probably move out. The last time that had happened, Sherlock had hallucinated, almost overdosed and put himself in firing range of a serial killer - on purpose.
"I'mgladyouaren'tdead." he finally said.
John looked at him quizzically.
Sherlock cursed himself. "I'm glad you aren't dead." he repeated, more clearly this time.
John smiled. "Considering all the shenanigans we've gotten into, it would be a little disappointing if something as simple as a car crash killed me."
Their conversation was cut short by Molly Hooper, who didn't look the slightest bit unfazed to seem them holding hands. "Hello," she said brightly, "My shift is about to start and I just thought I'd drop by and talk to the doctors. Rosie's perfectly fine. The wound on her head could take a while to heal, but no lasting damage done. You can take her home with you." John took his hand away and buried his face in his hands.
Sherlock suddenly realized that he hadn't eaten for 22 hours.
John peered out of the window. It was already dark; the day sure had flown. Mrs Hudson was fussing over Rosie as she lay in her crib, kicking about. To his surprise, Sherlock was twisting and turning on the sofa, almost as restless as Rosie. "Sherlock, what on earth are you trying to do?"
"Ooh, he does that whenever you two have a little domestic." Mrs Hudson commented. On receiving strange looks from both men, she muttered something about tea and went out.
"You're sleeping in my room tonight." Sherlock said.
"What? Why?"
"Because you just had an accident and your back clearly hurts from sleeping on the couch for so long. No, don't ask me how I know. What you need is a good night's sleep on a proper bed. I can sleep right here on the couch and look after Rosie tonight."
"But your legs barely fit on the couch!" John protested, "You'll have to fold yourself up like an origami napkin if you don't want to fall off."
Their eyes met in a silent struggle. We both know what happened the last time we tried to share a bed, Sherlock's eyes seemed to say. Although John still didn't like the idea of making Sherlock camp on the sofa, he shrugged and nodded. After all, he had full faith in Sherlock's abilities to look after Rosie, and he really could use a good night's sleep. The drugged sleep in the hospital hadn't quite cut it.
Sherlock shifted to the armchair, and John made his way to the fridge. He opened it, swore profusely, and slammed it shut.
"Bloody hell, Sherlock," he said through gritted teeth, "There's a foot in the fridge. A human foot."
The rustling of newspaper was the only answer he got.
"First eyes, then a head, then thumbs, and now a foot. Shall I expect an ear next? A lung, perhaps?" asked John.
"I had an inkling that putting an entire corpse in there might rattle you. Besides, these body parts never bothered you before."
"Wha- yes, they did!" said John indignantly, "Besides, I don't want some malicious bacteria species ruining Rosie's milk. These chemicals must go, too."
Sherlock almost giggled. "'Malicious bacteria species'? Seriously, what kind of a doctor are you?"
John continued to glare at him until he finally relented. "Fine. I'll buy a mini-fridge and store my chemicals and body parts there."
"No, Sherlock." John said forcefully, "It's all very well now, but what about when Rosie starts to walk and explore and open cabinets? I don't want her growing up thinking that it's perfectly normal to find heads and eyes lying around the house."
"Normal's boring." Sherlock complained, "But if it really bothers Rosie that much, I'll shift everything downstairs to Mrs Hudson's fridge. There. Now she won't mistake a human thumb for her rattle."
"But you have to-" John stopped halfway through his sentence, surprised, "Wait, you'll do it? You're just going to...listen to me?"
Sherlock buried himself even deeper behind the newspaper. "I'm not doing this for you, I'm doing it for Rosie." he finally muttered. He peeked over the newspaper just in time to catch John's smile.
The soft turning of the doorknob awoke Sherlock. He fidgeted around in his blanket, trying to sit up, but the wrappings were too tight. He eventually ended up rolling off the couch and fell to the ground with a muffled thump.
"Ah, the great Sherlock Holmes," came his brother's voice from above, "Full-time consulting detective and part-time sausage roll."
Sherlock grunted as he disentangled himself from the blanket. "A very good morning to you too, Mycroft. I'm assuming Mrs Hudson let you in at the front door and you had a spare key made for this apartment some time ago."
Mycroft inspected his fingernails, clearly amused. "You must forgive me, brother mine. Ever since John Watson moved out, you weren't always very...trustworthy, to put it mildly. This was just a precaution, should you ever lock yourself in and have one of your little episodes."
John emerged from the kitchen and offered Mycroft a cup of tea. "Yea, you were off your tits almost all the time, Sherlock. Although now that I'm here, Mycroft can get rid of those keys."
"I take it that this is a permanent living arrangement, then." Mycroft said. Sherlock and John ignored him.
Rosie's trademark giggle broke the silence, and Mycroft peered at her, a mixture of curiosity and revulsion on his face. "Ah, you must be Rosamund Mary Watson. Pleased to meet you. Don't let my brother's eccentricity influence you too much."
"To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, Mycroft?" Sherlock asked.
"Eurus has been unnaturally communicative lately." Mycroft informed him, "She's actually started speaking to a few of the nurses. For the most part, she has large spells of silence, but it's a start."
"That's not all."
Mycroft shot him a nasty look. "Yes, I wanted to remind you about the East London murder. I've made arrangements for you to visit the crime scene in -" he checked his watch - "an hour. It's no use asking me why I'm so persistent about you taking this case, Sherlock, you'll have to figure it out on your own." He rose to leave. "Thank you for the tea."
Barely an hour later, Sherlock and John stepped out of their cab in front of a small two-storeyed house. Yardley Oliver, read the nameplate. Beyond the unkempt garden, yellow tape crisscrossed the front door. A giant red '5' was painted on it in something that looked suspiciously like blood, but on further examination was revealed to be paint. They entered, Sherlock looking about suspiciously, and followed the passageway into a large sitting room. A man sat crying on a plush white sofa, while policemen milled about the room. Lestrade made his way over to Sherlock.
"Glad you could come." he said, "Somebody broke into this house two nights ago and murdered the man's son. I'll let you hear the rest of it from him."
Yardley looked over as they approached, drying his tears on his soaked sleeve. "Ah, Sherlock Holmes," he croaked, "Pleased to meet you, sir. And you must be Dr Watson."
John shook his hand. "Mr Oliver, we're very sorry for your l-"
"Tell me everything from the beginning." Sherlock cut in. John glared at him, but gave up and settled on the sofa next to him, ready to hear the story.
Yardley Oliver took a few moments to compose himself. "My wife Susan passed away 3 weeks ago." he said, "Lung cancer. It was just James and I living here after that - until last night, that is." He sniffled. "It must've been around 2 AM or so. I couldn't sleep, and then I heard muffled noises from the room above, which is James'. I figured he was just being a teenager, you know, listening to heavy metal or something, but decided to go up and check on him anyway. I stepped out of my room - it's that one, right there-" he pointed at a door leading off from the sitting room, "And was barely out when I saw a shape moving towards me. I scrambled for the lights, but as you can see, the switchboard is on the opposite wall. The shape was walking slowly, and I realized it was a woman holding a candle. She lifted the candle to her face, and then -"
John and Sherlock stared at him expectantly.
"Mr. Holmes, it was Susan, my wife."