Author's note: Oops. This got quite angsty. I hope it isn't too emotionally traumatizing.

Sunday, March 2, 2014

Sherlock

"I take it you found out."

Sherlock grips the windowsill, trying to collect himself. Murdering Mycroft will not get him anywhere. He'll have to save that for later.

"I had to."

With enormous effort, Sherlock says tightly, "One favor. I asked you to abandon this. One favor, and you could not handle keeping your nose out of my affairs." He has never felt this angry before, angry at his brother, angry at John, angry at everything and everybody and marginally angry at himself.

"Didn't do much good, did it? He's still with..." Mycroft's voice peters out as he realizes what he's said.

Sherlock doesn't deign to respond. He's busy breathing rapidly through his nose, eyes squeezed shut. "You should never have –"

"He deserved to know about Mary."

"That is beside the point."

"Is it, though?"

Sherlock whirls around and snarls, "Yes." Contempt and rage infiltrate his brain, and he knows he is sneering, he knows he is in the process of exploding. He begins rapidly pacing, trying to find some sort of order, some sort of rhythm, but he is shaking too much and the pace of his feet hitting the carpet is a disjointed cadence. Just like everything. Tilted, twisted, backwards. "Coercing members of Parliament into your little games is one thing. Meddling with emotions is quite another. Decades, and you still haven't learned this lesson. Your puerile antics have gone too far." Mycroft is looking at him, pale and insipid. Sherlock wants to vomit, wants to scream and kick the walls and throw a tantrum, just to get a reaction. He knows it's self defense: Mycroft's poker face is a necessity. He doesn't care. He could vocalize this with a million cutting statements, his for the taking, but instead hisses, "Fix this."

"I cannot undo anything. Would that I could." The faintest trace of distress edges its way across Mycroft's whitish cheeks.

"You have taken a situation which was already frightfully out of control and fraught with chaos, and sought only to convolute it further. You are deranged if you believe that any of this ever helped me. Or him."

"He is being an imbecile!" cried Mycroft suddenly, looking quite mad.

He's my imbecile. Sherlock chokes down the thought. It is inappropriate, ludicrous, negligible at this point. "That is not your affair!"

"He was hurting you!"

"Which does not concern anyone but myself!"

"You deserve love!"

"Not misplaced love! Not forced love! Even if, by some miracle, your corrupted capers were to sway his decision or feelings one way or another – and I highly doubt this outcome – it would not be his decision, it would be tainted, it would not be pure –"

"Who are you to lecture me about purity? You get high on murders and the sight of a molding corpse gives your more pleasure than –"

"I AM AND ALWAYS WILL BE IN LOVE WITH JOHN HAMISH WATSON AND THAT IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!" bellows Sherlock, grabbing his brother and shaking him violently. "YOU SHOULD NEVER HAVE INTERFERED!"

Mycroft is looking over his shoulder, silent. Sherlock relinquishes his grip, dread pooling in his stomach. Fuck. He spins around slowly, rotating inch by inch, balls of his feet rocking against the floor.

John stands in the doorway.

"It's over," he says hoarsely. "I ended it."

Sherlock's mind palace is in a state of disrepair, red warning lights flashing every which way, exit signs upside down and tumbling through nonexistent hallways. He stares at John, at John's eyes, so painfully expressive, at John's lips, slightly chapped, at John's hands, crescent moon imprints of his own fingernails embedded in the palms. It's true, then.

Sherlock stares at John, and bolts.

—

Tuesday, March 3, 2014

John

Mycroft offers to find him a place to stay. John refuses. He's got enough money tucked into his bank account to run away, if he wanted to. And god, does he want to.

But there's Sherlock. There will always be Sherlock. Try as he might, John will never be able to leave the goddamn stubborn detective.

Mary calls him once. She asks him if he is alright, asks him if she ought to post his things to 221b. He hangs up on her.

The expression on Sherlock's face when John showed up at Mycroft's office was frightening. Not in and of itself; it was not a particularly menacing or homicidal look. It was the eyes.

John is used to Sherlock glaring at everyone. Smirking, sometimes, or giving the occasional snort of derision. It is only at the flat that Sherlock would laugh, really laugh, at John's jokes. His eyes softened, pupils dilated, brightened with something. Even during cases, Sherlock's furrowed brow never failed to recede in the split second he glanced in John's direction.

John has always been the exception, and he's been too daft to fully comprehend this.

And now it's too late.

"I've made a good and proper mess of this, haven't I," he mutters, and takes a sip of coffee. It's bitter, flavorless, and scalds his tongue.

"Sir, can I get you anything?"

He shakes his head. The waitress purses her lips pityingly, and retreats.

In Mycroft's office, Sherlock looked at John with hardened eyes. Brittle round the edges, but hard as lead. Sherlock wants nothing to do with John, this much is for certain. And John... John doesn't quite know what to do with himself.

His mobile buzzes. He contemplates chucking it out the window, but doesn't. It might be about Sherlock.

There's no "might" about it. Mycroft just can't keep his nose out of things, can he?

What are you doing at a cafe?

Having a grand old time.

Sarcasm doesn't suit you.

Being a dick doesn't suit you. Immature response, John knows, and he does not give a flying fuck.

Ah, feisty. You feel guilty. And rightfully so.

I don't need you to tell me that I messed up.

I am not, as a matter of fact, here to guilt trip you. I am conveying a message. You need to return to the flat.

Says who?

Mrs. Hudson.

John lets out a maniacal laugh. People at the surrounding tables turn to stare at him.

What does she know?

Believe it or not, she cares about you and Sherlock. She contacted me out of concern. Apparently Sherlock's been curled up in a fetal position, staring at your chair, for the past thirty-six hours. I am of the conviction that he needs you.

Sherlock hates me.

'Hate', not at all. He is angry with you. Angry with me.

Are there any reasons beside the obvious that he's mad at me?

That is for you to find out. I honestly know nothing. Since Sherlock voiced very specific plans to ensure my slow and painful death, I've opted to skirt the topic with him. Mrs. Hudson voluntarily pulled me back into the situation. I plan to disengage once you have chosen your course of action.

What does he think?

You are an intelligent man. Surely you have concluded by now that I am not a mind reader. In fact, I am rather tragically misguided in my attempts to assume what my brother wants.

Should I frame that so he can hang it up on a wall?

I said 'want'. I know what he needs. I am in no way admitting that I was wrong.

Jesus Christ. If I go to the flat, he's going to either ignore me, or yell at me.

Let him.

Why?

Sometimes couples need to fight.

WE ARE NOT A BLOODY COUPLE

Details. You are the emotional equivalent of a couple.

If I talk to him I hope you don't mind me getting in on the whole "slow and painful death" situation.

'If'?

I'll talk to him. And he will break my heart.

Good.

You sadistic bastard.

You need to be on equal footing. As soon as he's rejected you, you two can start from scratch.

It's not that simple, you dimwit.

Perhaps. At any rate. You must be able to take what you dish out.

I didn't intentionally...I was getting married!

The car is on its way to pick you up. Two minutes. Wait outside.

He's going to yell at me, isn't he?

One minute and forty-five seconds.

John groans and asks for the check.

—

The first person he sees is Mrs. Hudson, who promptly smacks him across the face, pointing a duster ominously in his direction. "John Watson!" she cries. "It's about time, you've completely –"

"I know," he snaps. "I'm going upstairs."

"If you make one more idiotic mistake, I swear to god –"

"I know, Mrs. Hudson," he all but screams. "I know I fucked up, I'm trying to fix it –"

"It doesn't need fixing! Sherlock needs you, even if he won't admit it."

"I KNOW!" yells John. "Just – let me – please –"

"If you break his heart again, wrecking the both of you, I will never tidy up your disaster zone of a room ever again."

"Fine," he spits.

She pauses, then pats his cheek fondly. "Welcome home, dear."

"Oh for Christ's sake," he grumbles, and opens the door.

—

Sherlock is standing with his back to John.

"I know you heard me coming."

Silence. He isn't really surprised.

"What, was it my cane? My gait? The shoes I'm wearing?"

Nothing.

"You and your fucking deductions..." He pinches the bridge of his nose and tries to collect himself.

"Maybe," says Sherlock quietly, "I just saw you pacing for four minutes in front of the flat. They're called windows, you know."

John wants to laugh and cry and fuck, this is an absurd situation. "What do I say now?" he asks. "I don't know..."

"You disappoint me."

"Excuse me?"

"First of all, I expected you to barge in here shaking your cane and shouting."

"I already shouted."

"At Mrs. Hudson. That didn't count."

He wishes Sherlock would turn around.

"Secondly," the detective continues, still refusing to face John, "I thought you were braver, stronger than that."

"I know. I know I messed up, I'm so sorry." Empty words. They drop from his mouth like blank bingo balls falling from a steel cage.

"You left Mary."

"I'm signing the paperwork next Monday."

"Let me finish. You left Mary, John. Why? Because Mycroft got involved."

"I'm as peeved about that as you are –"

"You are completely missing the point!" Sherlock barks. "You didn't leave Mary for me, you left her only when there was no alternative!"

"I left her because I love you!"

If this proclamation affects Sherlock, it doesn't show. "We both know that's a blatant lie."

What? "I may be weak, I may have fucked us over, but I wouldn't lie about my feelings."

"I don't mean that. I mean that your reason is invalid. You cared for me before. Yet you would not leave her, not until Mycroft's involvement."

"You're mad because I split with her for the 'wrong' reasons?"

"Is that so deluded? John, think about it! If you were to leave her, a decision against which I have been from the start, it should have been because of me!"

Sherlock has a point. John feels like utter shit.

"If you were simply divorcing her of your own accord, that's one thing," Sherlock says, and his voice is tinged with sadness. "But if the goal in leaving her was to be... with me, well, then. I can't in good conscience endorse that."

"You don't... you don't want to...?"

"Not like this. Not when the only reason you abandoned someone else for me was because other parties engaged."

"Do you..." John gulps, feeling pathetic. He is pathetic.

"I do," Sherlock says simply, and turns around. John catches a transitory glimmer of something – no longer hard, definitely not soft – in his eyes, and looks away because good lord he cannot face this beautiful man. John is dumb, he's stupid, he's an idiot, this is irreparable. He squeezes his lids shut, puffs out a breath, and when he opens them, Sherlock is gone.