OH MY GOSH. Guys, I am SO SORRY this is so horribly late! I had some major writer's block and just couldn't get past it, plus a lot of Senior stuff I've had to deal with this past week. Ultimately, I have no excuse, however, for it being two weeks since my last post. Fortunately, this chapter ended up being a bit longer, so I hope that helps make amends. :)

ALSO: I'm not sure how long this fic is going to be. I have the next chapter or two planned out, but after that I have no ideas. SO. If anybody has ideas for prompts on how to keep this going, BY ALL MEANS please throw them my way! I can't guarantee I'll use them, but I'll most definitely look at them and take them into consideration, as well as give you credit for the idea (of course!).

Okay, I've gone on enough now.

Chapter 13 – Razor Blades and What-Are-We-Doings

There are good and bad ways of waking up in the morning.

There are mornings where your alarm clock goes off hours too early for you to be ready after you just spent the entire night chasing bad guys around the streets of London with a madman.

There are mornings when a certain DI barges into your flat telling you that your flatmate has, once again, gotten himself into a shit-load of trouble.

There are mornings that begin in the middle of the night after a horrifying nightmare of that same flatmate falling onto the concrete and shattering into thousands of tiny, bloody pieces.

And then there is that new type of morning that starts slowly, warmth enveloping you when you open your eyes to see that face you adore to the tips of your toes.

It's extremely early and the sun isn't even up yet. I've only been asleep for a couple of hours, but waking up to the sight of Sherlock curled on his side, face slack with sleep, makes the lack of rest worth it. Those bow lips are plump and pouty, pale skin nearly translucent in the delicate light making its way from the fading moon. The fingers of one hand are barely brushing my side, just his fingertips pressing against my skin, and that's all the contact we have. It seems like Sherlock. Not one to cuddle, but in need of maintaining contact. It's rather lovely.

Being the one lying here, getting the privilege of actually watching Sherlock Holmes at his most vulnerable state, is overwhelming. It starts in the pit of my stomach and grows until my entire body is infused with warmth.

Reaching out a fingertip, I brush a loose curl from his smooth forehead. His nose scrunches up momentarily at the contact and he shifts his feet so that one is pressed against the bottoms of mine. I smile.

It's wonderful, this lazy, unpressured moment, but I feel sticky and I'm sure Sherlock would as well if he was awake. Leaning forward and cupping the back of his brilliant head, I press my lips to his forehead. He inhales deeply, releasing a breath that skitters against my collarbone.

"John."

"Let's get cleaned up, shall we?" I whisper, rubbing a thumb over one sharp cheekbone.

"I just woke up," he complains, eyes still screwed shut as he rolls onto his back.

I poke a finger into his side and he flinches. "Come on. Nice warm shower. Yes?"

"Fine." He starts rolling, ending up on top of me before I can get out of the way.

Chuckling, I push him off before climbing from the bed. He blinks his eyes open, wide and sleepy as he follows me.

I've got the water going by the time he shuffles in, hugging himself.

"Cold?"
He nods.

Old pipes rattle and squeal as hot water fills them while I help him out of his splint.

I hold out a hand for Sherlock before stepping into the warm shower, pulling him in behind me. I position him so he's getting the majority of the heat, never letting go of his hand. After a few moments, I reach for his shampoo.

"Lean down," I murmur.

He does, and I begin massaging the shampoo into his riotous curls, careful not to let any get into his eyes. Those pale irises are hidden by his eyelids as he lets them fall shut, and he tentatively brings his hands up to grip my biceps.

I rinse his hair, but before I can move on to cleaning that gorgeous skin, he leans his head forward and buries his face in the crook of my neck. I feel shy lips press tiny kisses to the skin there, and the blinding innocence of this man cripples me. Wrapping my arms firmly around his waist, I simply hold him as he trails sweet, sleepy kisses across my shoulder.

It has the potential to be more than just this, but there's no need and it doesn't go any farther than gentle kisses as we take turns soaping each other's skin.

After we're rinsed and I've shut the water off, I wrap a sleepy and shivering Sherlock in a towel and lead him back to his room.

We fall asleep again, this time our legs entangled and my arms wrapped around the lithe man to keep him warm.

"I need to shave."

I force my eyes open, blinking to see Sherlock sitting up in the bed beside me. He looks as though he's been awake awhile, propped against the headboard and staring at the opposite wall. Afternoon sunlight is bathing the room in warm tones, making his skin glow with orange light.

"Go shave, then," I mumble, barely awake.

He holds up his once-again splinted arm. "I may be intellectually superior to most—if not all—of society, but I am yet to be ambidextrous."

I sigh, realizing our lie-in has probably been thwarted by the pale scarecrow beside me. "Right now?"

He looks down, our eyes meeting for the first time since our shower, and I can see the stubble beginning to peek through his skin.

"I didn't even know you could grow facial hair."

He rolls his eyes and crawls out of bed, starkers and flaunting it.

"At least put on some bloody pants," I grumble, falling out of the other side of the bed. Belatedly, I realize I'm in Sherlock's room, so I stumble my way to the stairs and up to my own room, where I throw on a fresh pair of pants and a pair of pyjama bottoms.

By the time I've made it to the bathroom, Sherlock has done what I've asked and is wearing a loose pair of pyjama pants, slung so low on his hips that a slight V is visible. Where the man's muscle comes from, I've no clue.

"Do you mind?" I ask, gesturing to the toilet.

He leaves and I relieve myself before letting him back in. Silently, he moves about, collecting his straight razor, cream, brush, and a flannel, which he soaks with hot water and squeezes out before wrapping it against his face.

I stand for a moment, a disposable razor man myself, going over all the steps to this process. I've had to do this before, shave another man's face, in the army, and I worked in a small barber's shop as a teenager, so I know what I'm doing. Sherlock probably deduced all that before selecting me for the task.

Still holding the warm towel to his face with his injured hand, Sherlock crouches and opens the cupboard below the sink and retrieves a mug, handing it to me. I fill it with hot water and place the brush in it to soak.

"Hold on, isn't that my—"

"It's a perfectly proportioned mug for what I require of it, John."

I shake my head slightly and walk out of the room. "I'm going to make some tea. Be back shortly."

He follows me, holding that towel to his face and looking absolutely ridiculous in an endearing, boyish way. He sits at the table and watches me move about the kitchen. The man's skin is probably well enough prepared to go under the blade, no matter how gruesome that sounds, but he doesn't say anything. I don't make him a cup, and only take two sips of mine before setting it back on the counter.

"Alright, lets get this over with."

I trail behind him this time, watching as he unwraps his face like an Egyptian mummy.

Back in the loo, I study the room we have to work with. The toilet lid was destroyed in one of Sherlock's less…successful experiments, so that's out as a location for him to perch. The sink is low and has a small counter, so I gesture towards it. The angle's a bit awkward, but I think we'll survive.

"I guess you'd better hop up there, then."

He does, but it's not so much a hop-up as it is a sit-down.

I get the brush and cream ready, tapping the brush lightly on the edge of my (notice: my) mug before I swirl it onto Sherlock's face. Setting that down, I pick up the blade and step closer.

Sherlock's legs part to allow me to move between them so I can reach his face better, and I immediately realize that this entire situation is going to get really hot, really quickly if I'm not careful. The last thing we need is for me to get all hot and bothered while holding a blade to my flatmate[insert term "lover" here?]'s throat.

His hands are braced on the edge of the counter, and he's leaning forward slightly, head tilted. It hits me how much trust he's putting in my hands. Literally. This is an extremely vulnerable position for him to be in, and if Sherlock is careful about one thing, it's vulnerability.

Pulling his skin taut with my right hand, I begin the tedious task of removing facial hair with a blade.

It's incredibly intimate, which in turn, quickly becomes erotic. Sherlock tilts his head each direction without instruction from me, and about halfway through the second half of his face, his eyes fall shut. Creating a smooth expanse of skin below those sharp cheekbones is gorgeous in and of itself, but when I lean closer to do the space between his nose and mouth, he draws his full upper lip between his teeth and I falter before touching the sharp metal to his delicate skin. I quickly finish that and his chin, leaving only the vulnerable throat to go. Gently, I tilt his head up with a finger below his chin before carefully, slowly, make my way across the alabaster skin. The final swipe reveals the mark I'd given him the night before.

"Sherlock," I whisper, my breath skittering across his damp flesh.

His entire upper body immediately flushes as goose bumps form.

My eyes drift down, and—oh dear god—he's getting hard.

The man has been remarkably stoic this morning, my tired mind just now deciding to remind me of that fact. Not at all the way he was during our clandestine shower.

"Sherlock?"

"Hm?" It's low, almost guttural. His eyes are still shut.

"What we did last night… That was okay, wasn't it?"

Now he looks at me, those eyes—god, those eyes—piercing me with curious precision. "Why wouldn't it be?"

I wave a hand at him in the air between us. "You've just been very passive this morning, is all."

His eyes narrow slightly. "Unlike your past lovers, I'm afraid I do not possess the knowledge of how one is to act the 'morning after.'" The air quotes are heavily implied.

I look at him a moment, then, instead of responding, I reach behind him and wet the same flannel he used before with cool water before patting his face with it. Aftershave is next, and the man smells heavenly, no matter how female that makes me sound. The silk of his skin glides under the roughness of my palms as I unnecessarily skim my hands over his shoulders.

I'm closer now, pressed firmly between the other man's thighs, and I can feel his breath dancing across my own skin. A hand comes to rest on the side of my neck.

John, everything's fine.

I nod, understanding what he cannot say as I bump our noses together and he leans forward. My hands come to a rest on his thighs, moving upward against the fabric until my fingers barely brush the most intimate part of the man. Sherlock gasps my name and wraps his legs around my waist in one quick movement. His arms are next, tugging me impossibly closer and clinging to my shoulders as his face nudges into my neck.

"You do know I can't carry you, right?" I whisper, his soft hair tickling my upper lip.

"We'll make do," he pants, moving his hands all along my upper chest now, cataloging and categorizing despite the splint, pausing only slightly when his thumb brushes my scar. His eyes lift back up. They would be sad if he decided to show the emotions behind that flushed face. "Is it not good of me to be grateful for the bullet that did this?" he murmurs.

The atmosphere changes. The intensity that had been building evaporates, leaving a soft and unhurried longing curling around us.

It aches. I want to crawl right into that fragile ribcage beneath my hands and never leave. I've never had an addictive personality, but I will never stop craving Sherlock: his brain, his body, his bloody abrasive self.

"Oh god, Sherlock," I choke out, pulling his face to mine so I can kiss him, breathe him in, absorb as much of him as I possibly can. I don't know how long I have with him, or how long he'll be able to put up with the monotony that I am, but I'll be damned if I don't make the most of it now.

His hand clenches down on my shoulder as our lips crash together, thumb digging almost painfully into the scar there. I'm beyond caring as I bring an unsteady hand to cup his smooth jaw.

My lips tug at his bottom one and his mouth opens, a hot tongue tentatively brushing against my own mouth. He whimpers and moves closer on the counter, long legs still firmly linked behind my back, but amidst the wiggling he had scooted to the edge of the sink bowl itself, and, with one misplaced move, he falls into it.

His eyes are so comically large when he looks up at me, shocked, that I let out a roar of laughter Mrs. Hudson could probably hear.

"Not funny," he glowers. "Help me up."

With arms weak from amusement, I slide them around his waist and drag his arse out of the sink, still chuckling as I bury my face in the crook of his neck.

Firm hands grip the sides of my face and pull me back so that insistent lips can latch onto mine. I know Sherlock is trying to distract from his rather ungraceful moment, but no complaint comes from me as he determinedly forces my mouth open with his tongue.

Within a few short moments of rather intense snogging, I'm more than ready to make this encounter horizontal.

But Sherlock pulls away.

"John." I try to shut him up, but he just turns his head. "John, what are we doing?"

Shooting our friendship to hell.

Instead of that, I choose to say the line that could have come straight out of some corny romantic comedy: "What we always do. Risking everything."

Sherlock's nose scrunches. "That was hideous."

I grin brokenly. "I know." I'm slightly distracted by the little wrinkles between his brows. "You're adorable."

He glares. "I am not adorable."

"Yes you are."

"'Adorable' is for children, John. I am not a child."

My grin widens. "Are you sure?"

He rolls his eyes. "If that is the case, then you have some very disturbing kinks that we need to discuss."

Chuckling lightly, I look up and meet his gaze. His eyes are barely crinkling around the edges with amusement. "Wanker," I say fondly.

I did all my research about shaving with a straight razor online since I am, in fact, a girl and don't know anybody that uses one. So once again, any errors in that department are the internet's fault.

Thanks for reading! Reviews appreciated. :) -C

P.S. Did anybody see that live chat thing that Benedict did? That man, I swear.