They'd finished the surgery, it had gone fine, the bleeding had been stopped with less blood loss than anticipated. They hadn't extubated him yet, but the surgeon reassured Sherlock there was no need to rush. John had been through a traumatic experience, and his body needed to rest.
Sherlock sat by his bed, half conscious, slipping in and out of dreams and reality, neither of which contained a conscious John Watson, each just different versions of the other, one far more worse, and Sherlock couldn't tell what was real.
He could hear quiet sobbing, the crying of someone who didn't want to be heard, and yet couldn't keep the tears from spilling out, their breath coming in quick hot blasts.
He curled tighter into his ball, hoping to block it all out. Didn't people know he was busy?
Sherlock had stopped slipping, entirely on the floor now. He had missed the moment when he went from the chair to the ground, the split second when he was on neither, but both.