Chapter 2
Cupboard. Mugs. Two of them.
Teabags. Kettle. Water. Teaspoon.
Sugarbowl.
Stop.
Pick up the second mug. Hurl it at the far wall.
The sound of broken crockery lost in a shout of rage.
The neighbours will hear. Mrs Hudson, downstairs. She's with her sister.
Did he plan it that way?
Of course he did.
A thought occurs; John whirls around and back into the living room:
"Did Mrs Hudson know?"
Sherlock has made no attempt to follow him. Recognised John's enforced time out. He still stands by the doorway, a little further into the room. Coat and cheekbones and collar. Hands in pockets. A red scarf.
"No."
It bothers John that he didn't know Sherlock owned a red scarf.
"Ok then,"
John retreats. Back to his tea on the countertop. Back to the broken shards of a mug across the floor. He realises that Sherlock didn't mention this. As if shouts and breakages and thoughts of Mrs Hudson are always linked.
Well they probably are. Sherlock can follow John's thought processes better than he can.
"If you're sticking around for a while we might need some new crockery," John says as he makes his way back into the sitting room, tea in hand.
"I thought we weren't making jokes?" Sherlock replies.
"You aren't."
"You aren't getting me a cup."
"It's on the floor."
"Oh."
John sits:
"I moved your chair."
"I'd noticed."
"If you want to sit you'll have to use the sofa."
"I'll stand."
"Planning your escape route?"
"The thought had occurred."
"That last mug was a practise shot," John raises his cup to Sherlock in a mockery of a toast.
"That one is full." Sherlock nods toward it.
"More damaging."
"Slower trajectory. Harder to aim." Sherlock's voice is smooth. "Still best to be prepared."
"I'm not going to hurt you."
"No, I didn't think you would."
"Though I think you have some explaining to do."
"I'm not sure where to start."
"Me either." John pauses "Except for the shouting obviously."
"Obviously."
"I'm not sure it's quite out of my system yet, just as a warning."
"I didn't presume for a moment that it was."
Another pause.
John speaks: "Where have you been?"
"Close" Sherlock answers cryptically. "Most of the time at least. At first, I was away. Germany. For a month or two. But that didn't take long. I came back as soon as I was able."
"Back to London, or back to…" He wants to say 'me' but the internal censors are having none of that "…here?"
"Both." If Sherlock notices the crude semantics of the question he doesn't mention it.
"So you've been in London."
"Yes."
"All this time?"
"Yes, close by as much as I could be."
"But it's been…"
"Too long." Sherlock cuts him off. "Longer than I'd hoped."
"Shorter than most people are dead for."
"Quite."
"So the homeless network?"
"Yes, among other people. Safehouses. Squats"
"Mycroft knew." John slots a few pieces together in his mind.
"Yes."
"So which of you was it that deemed this was necessary?"
"We both did."
"That might be the first time you've agreed on anything."
"I wasn't happy about it."
A loaded pause.
"About agreeing, or…?" John asks.
"Any of it."
This time the quiet lasts longer. Five feet of space between them. Books and papers and notes and Mrs Hudson's nice wood floor and secrets. Lies. Agreements.
"So how did you…?" John asks finally. Such an enormous question, asked in such little words.
"Misdirection John." Sherlock cuts in,
"I don't…"
"Seeing what your mind wants you to see."
"I didn't want to see that."
"No,"
"You were bleeding…"
"Not my blood." Sherlock's voice is impassive; tired with standing still he has begun to pace, slowly backward and forward. Not coming any closer, not retreating. Three steps toward the window, three steps away.
"Your pulse…"
"Not my body."
"Molly, she…"
"Counted." Sherlock finishes for him. Not what John was about to say.
"She knew?"
"She knew."
"That explains a lot."
Sherlock turns his pale gaze on him. Eyes narrowed in confusion. "But we've barely scratched the surface."
John, mug to lips, feels suddenly rooted to the spot. "I meant about Molly," He forces himself to sip.
"Oh."
"She's barely spoken a word to me since… well since… then."
"You've tried?" Sherlock asks, stilling again.
"Tried what?"
"Speaking to her?"
"Well," John hesitates. "No," Sets his mug down on the table. On papers this time. "But…"
"You've let people drift away."
"It's been hard." A pause, Sherlock's gaze. "Hard to keep up. With them. When…"
Sherlock's face urges him to go on.
"Well, it's been hard." John continues. "Everything has."
A weighted pause.
"How did you know? That I've let people…" John asks, swallowing. "Something in the way I hold my tea?"
Sherlock returns to his pacing.
"All I deduced from that tea is that it would be an ineffective weapon," He tosses over his shoulder.
"You underestimate my aim."
"I'll never underestimate your aim."
"You haven't answered my question." John.
Sherlock still isn't looking at him.
"You just told me you were close by." John clarifies,
"Yes,"
"How close by?"
The great Sherlock Holmes. Reduced to silence.
"You were watching me?" John continues.
"Yes."
A long pause. Again John doesn't know what to feel. Except his own disbelief. He heaves in a breath. Forcing a sloped smile.
"Well I'm not sure whether to be flattered, or…"
Another pause.
"You were there, at your funeral." John continues "You were there after. At your grave…"
"'The most human, human being'" Sherlock repeats.
John blinks at his own words spoken back to him in a velvet voice. The voice of his dreams. He stares for a moment.
"Like I said. Not a writer." John says haltingly.
"Sentiment."
"Yes."
And the great John Watson, reduced to one word answers. But if he had to say, if he had to describe, that one word of Sherlock's, normally spat out in disgust, somehow didn't seem that way.
"It's been hard." John continues. Doesn't expect an answer, Sherlock is in the "away" portion of his pace. "All of it. Watching you fall. Carrying on. Hearing what people said."
"You believed in me."
"You've been reading the papers."
"When do I not?"
"'I believe in Sherlock Holmes'"
"Ridiculous."
"You have a following."
"I've always had a following."
"Not like this. It's like a cult."
"I don't need a cult."
"No one needs a cult."
A stop.
"You believed in Sherlock Holmes." Sherlock wonders aloud.
"I believed in you."
"Believed in me." Sherlock clarifies, as if the two thoughts were separate.
"I always believed in you."
"Even after I said…"
"Even after you jumped off a building." John corrects.
Sherlock is in the "toward" section of his pace, John meets his gaze and holds it, continuing:
"Even when you came back."
They fall quiet.
The turn in Sherlock's pacing breaks the moment.
John speaks: "I don't need to believe in you anymore."
"Because I came back?"
"Because they cleared your name."
"Yes."
"Lestrade, and the yarders. Turns out that cracks appear in a story pretty quickly if the person telling it disappears rather spectacularly overnight."
"He's dead."
Sherlock's voice seems to suck all the air from the room.
"He's dead?" John clarifies.
"He died on the rooftop of Bart's,"
"You mean…?"
"He died, I lived."
"You…?"
"He killed himself." Sherlock answers the question John hadn't been able to answer. Hadn't known he was going to ask. "He made it necessary."
"That he should die?"
"That I should die." Sherlock's pacing seems to have stepped up a beat.
"But you didn't?"
"I didn't."
"He did?"
"Keep up John."
"So, he made it necessary that you die? But not him?"
"Yes."
"But the opposite happened."
"Only he and I knew that."
"You,"
"What?"
"Only you knew that. He was dead."
"Yes. I suppose"
"But because he was dead it was necessary that you died?"
"Yes." Sherlock's tone is finally relieved. John is catching on.
"And it was necessary that I watch?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"It was necessary that you believed."
"Believed in you?"
"No. Believed that I was dead."
"I definitely believed that."
"Did you?" Sherlock asks suddenly. Whirling to face him with a desperation that renders John speechless for a moment.
"Yes." John finally strangles out. Wanted it to be true: No. Understood it: No. Believed his own two eyes: Yes.
"You asked me." Sherlock has become very still, the nervous tension that fuelled his pacing suddenly lost. "That day. You asked me. Not to be."
"By your grave? Yes."
"Why?"
There's a pause as John's eyes widen against the question. Posed in innocence. Asking so much.
"Why?" John repeats. "Why did I ask you to stop being dead? Which is, by the way, the first and only time you've actually done what I said when I asked you to 'stop it'?"
"Yes," Velvet smooth. "Why?"
"Because I was hurting Sherlock." A sigh. John is feeling too much, "Because you were gone and I was hurting. It hurt. I didn't think you could hear me."
Silence.
Sherlock looks away. Out the window. Darkness has fallen. John can see it on his face. That bright London darkness, a tungsten glow across his features.
"You thought," John continues. "You thought I knew…"
"I thought you suspected." Sherlock says out toward the street.
"I didn't let myself believe. Not really. I saw you. You fell."
"Yes."
They fall quiet.