Fade Into You
Rating: R
Note: Thanks for reading! (and reviewing!) This is a slow build novel, and we're obviously in for a lot of chapters (some slow and some extremely active). I decided to switch this from the crossover section to the regular Sherlock section since as of right now the crossover is mostly in the background.
Chapter One: Deliveries
John Watson was having a busy week, no wait-two weeks. Late autumn always seemed to have an influx of people needing to be seen at work, and when he wasn't at work he was right next to Sherlock trying to solve the newest case. A serial killer had been on the loose for awhile, tonight was the night they solved the case. Sherlock had been keeping secrets again, thoughts about who may be the killer without telling John. The excuse was, 'well I wasn't absolutely sure and didn't want to be wrong after getting Lestrade involved'. That was always the excuse when Sherlock didn't share information. In the end though, he was happy the case was over and he could have a break...for a few days at least.
Sherlock chose to stay in the lab with Molly, running samples and probably ignoring her general existence (John was slightly positive Sherlock had no idea he left as well). John was in need of food and sleep. A lot of sleep, the only good thing about solving the case (well outside of the fact there was no longer a murderer on the loose) was the fact that he had the day off tomorrow. He enjoyed working with Sherlock, but even he needed a break from the excitement every so often.
Entering Baker street he was met with the new neighbor, who was currently (as it seemed) trying to decide which box to take down first. There were quite a few of them of all shapes or sizes, and it looked as if she was testing to see which were heavy. "Hello Maddie." He greeted, unsure if she had even heard him come into the foyer.
She jumped at his voice, so that would be a no-she hadn't heard him. She pressed a hand to her chest and her pale complexion turned an interesting shade of red. "H..hi, hello, um...John. How are you tonight?"
They had been in and out so often that he hadn't spoken to her but the few times he saw her when she was leaving her flat. It was strange-even Sherlock seemed to forget about the girl who lived in the basement. She was pretty, but young. John and Sherlock had rushed away after meeting her for the first time and all Sherlock would say on the subject of having a new neighbor in Baker street was that 'she doesn't seem the type that will last all by herself' followed by, 'seems a bit...insignificant.'
He simply told Sherlock not to be a jerk.
"Oh, I'm well-we finally solved the case." He started, already hanging up his coat. Sometimes he brought it to the flat with him, other times-and usually when Sherlock stayed out he hung it down on the coat rack in the foyer-a good indicator to his room-mate that he was home (not that it mattered). "This the last of your stuff from America?" He asked, remembering the last time they hurriedly spoke she was already apologizing in advance for any boxes they would have to stumble over in the next few days.
She nodded, happily. "Finally, I was starting to worry that it was dropped in the ocean." She said, tugging on her sweater a little. He wondered if part of what Sherlock had said previously was true of her being hurt, but he blocked it out of his mind as soon as the thought came. Sherlock had nearly been spot on with John's life but, wasn't that way with everyone, and he didn't want to take it at face value. At least not with someone living so close, he would make his own judgments.
"Would you like some help carrying some of this stuff down? It looks like a lot for one person to manage." He offered, even with as tired as he was he couldn't stand the idea of leaving her to all those boxes by herself.
"How about this, if you help me I'll make you dinner sometime this week. I would tonight but I have a weekly phone call with my Dad planned." She explained.
He nodded, how could he say no to a free meal? "Sounds like a deal, here I'll grab this one it looks like it weighs a ton…" And it felt like it was made out of bricks.
He followed her down the stairs to her flat, the first time he would see it, and he took the moment to glance around after setting the box down. It was nice, very cozy. A lot like upstairs but, different. It wasn't what he was expecting, all rich and deep colors, a scent of cinnamon in the air (a nice change from the formaldehyde). There were books on nearly every surface, books and notebooks, and she suddenly became very curious to him. Never judge a book by its cover...data entry...yeah right Sherlock.
John Watson was a gentleman though, and it would come up naturally-instead he continued the conversation as he followed her up the stairs to retrieve more boxes. "Close with your family then?"
She shrugged, a thoughtful expression on her face, "I guess. My Dad is great, and we are really close, but we're also too much alike-so lately we had been fighting a lot. It's better now though that I've moved." It was an honest answer, she grabbed two of the lighter looking boxes, and he followed suit. "Do you have family around John?"
"Just my sister, not that close though." He explained, watching the steps as best he could while handling the boxes.
"No siblings for me, although I guess that's for the best." It was a sad tone, followed by an 'I shouldn't have said that' look. "I mean, I just...um...couldn't imagine more of us around, we'd probably end the world."
"Are you liking London so far?" A complete change of subject, John could take the social cue that anymore family talk would probably get sad fast for her or end the conversation altogether. Back up the stairs, and there were only a few more boxes left to grab.
"It's great so far, I haven't been able to see a lot of it. I wanted to get myself really settled before I embark on adventures. Mr. Holmes was right, I do work from home-just not data entry-so I wanted to have everything I needed put together before I start. Some of these boxes are for work, so it looks like I'll be able to see a bit of London soon."
"What do you do?"
Only two more boxes left now, thank goodness-quite a few of them were heavy.
"What do you think I do?" She asked back with a smile, peering back at him as she grabbed her last box to follow him down the stairs.
"Honestly I'm afraid to even suggest something, your flat has put a wrench in my general idea of you-not in a bad way, I...i mean it's just that, well with Sherlock…" He stumbled over his words, not wanting to offend her.
She just laughed, "It's okay John. For some reason people who don't know me, tend not to expect a lot out of me." She shrugged it off, but in that moment he could see it was something that bothered her. "I translate old texts from a lot of different languages, my boss can't trust a computer to scan and translate, so I'm doing it all by hand."
"History then?" He couldn't imagine any other reason to translate old texts to English.
"Kind of. It's a lot of things all wrapped into one, sometimes the books are about way of life for Egyptians, and that can be important because we might learn something about their culture we thought lost-or something that benefits us today. For the time they were heavily advanced and we still don't know how they did half of what they did. Other times it's religious text and spooky superstition. It just depends the book."
"Your smart." He said.
She smiled, "Very."
"Sherlock was wrong about you."
"To be fair, Mrs. Hudson cut him off-I'm sure if we allowed him to continue on he would have figured it out."
Music rang through her flat, it was some kind of rock song that he could have sworn he had heard before. "That must be my Dad, on time for once." A smile. "I have to take this, but I really appreciate your help. How about I come up sometime tomorrow and we can schedule dinner?"
He nodded, "That would be lovely." He said, giving a small wave. She smiled, and he turned heading up the stairs. He could already hear her voice answering the phone, a happy sounding 'Hi Dad!' and before he could hear more he shut her front door and headed up to his flat.
As much as she had wanted to get away and have her own life, she was also slightly homesick. The homesickness only struck during her conversations with her Dad. After John had left her flat, she had grabbed her phone quickly and darted to her bedroom. She trusted that John would shut her front door and even if he didn't it wasn't like her door led to the outside world.
"Hi Dad!" She answered right away as she dove into her bed, it wasn't that late-and she'd probably get up and unpack when the phone call was over, but the only way to concentrate on conversation was to be in a dark room absent from things that would distract her.
"Hey Mads, tell me about your week...ow, that's not what I wanted you to do!" She knew where he was immediately-in his workshop with the robots. Unlike her, he could tinker while he talked. She figured after weeks of repetitive phone calls his attention on the conversation would drop while he messed around with his suits and his robots, but for now even while he was tinkering she knew that his full attention.
"Same as last week, just catching up on work while the last of my boxes came. I should have sent them sooner. I've been lost without some of that stuff." She paused for a moment as she made her way under her blankets-the downside to a basement flat, it was cold. "I joined a book club this week."
"Riveting."
"I like books."
"I've noticed."
"I thought it would be a nice way to meet some new people over here, they meet on Wednesday nights. Only discussing new books, so I'll actually be reading fiction for once."
"To be fair most of those religions texts are fiction."
"Dad."
"Okay, okay. Well you're right at least you'll be reading for something other than work and maybe you'll make that best friend forever you've been dreaming about. I still don't understand why Jarvis couldn't have been your best friend, or me."
"Well, one is an bodiless AI and the other is my Dad-I wouldn't mind branching out…"
"Speaking of, I have you scheduled to continue your self defense."
She sighed and rolled her eyes, of course he would schedule it without talking to her first. "When is it?"
"Tuesday morning from 4AM to 10AM."
"What!?" She sat up, blankets flying off. That was way too early for physical activity. It wasn't that she didn't like it, she did-she was actually doing well at it while she was home. It was just the idea of getting up so early when her body was still half asleep that irked her.
"It's the only time that could fit in her schedule." He explained.
"Oh, she's still going to be training me? Isn't that going to be hard since y'know I'm in London now?"
"She's doing something over there now anyway, and when she can't attend I'll send someone else. Be ready."
"Fine."
And they continued to talk, a lot of back and forth, and mostly just playing catch up. Over the years they had a fairly decent relationship even with how traumatic it seemed to start for both of them. At home they didn't spend a lot of time talking, mostly it was spent side by side in his workshop with him teaching her robotics. She didn't look like him, you could see it in the eyes sometimes, but other than that she was the spitting image of her mother. While looks differed they were on the same level of intelligence, in different areas. His intelligence leaned towards science and mathematics, and hers was devoted to music and language, after tests they also concluded that she had the better memory as well (he defended that was simply due to youth).
"How's Pepper?"
"Same old, she's stuck on the last move in your chess game still."
"Are you helping her?"
"Of course not."
Maddie felt her chest grow tight for a moment, a deep longing to be home grew. It's silly, no matter how much you wanted to get away...you can still miss home-badly. In her silence, her Dad kept up the conversation.
"Have you played yet?" She knew exactly what he meant.
"I just got it today in the boxes that arrived-I haven't even unpacked it yet. I might tomorrow morning sometime. I don't know exactly how thin the walls are and don't want to disturb the neighbors too much, I didn't think to buy headphones for it" Her keyboard; grand piano sound in a smaller form-better than trying to fit an actual piano in her flat.
They first met after he heard her play, the teen prodigy traveling around playing concerts thrown together by her mother and step-father. Mostly they were religious affairs with her step-father preaching before and after her playing, using her music to lure donations in. It wasn't the kind of concert Tony Stark would go to on his own, but her mother invited him.
He knew right away when they met, she didn't know for quite sometime after that that he was actually her real dad.
"Well make sure you keep it up, your neighbors will appreciate it-I know I did."
She smiled at that, ending on sentimental, what would people say about him now.
"I will, I'll pick it up tomorrow Dad I promise." She had known him for less than ten years now, and there was something special about that, and it did make it hard to be apart-sometimes being with him made her feel like the kid she never got to be. It was that alone that made it so hard to go, to grow up-but she knew if she didn't leave-she would be a thirty year old living at home with her dad.
"Good, well it looks like Dummy is about to set something on fire, so I got to go."
"Well, be careful. It was good catching up." a pause, "I love you Dad."
"Love you too kiddo."
And then there was the silence. Her room was dim, only a little illumination filtered in through the living room where lights were still on. Her body was warm under the blankets but she didn't want to get up yet. She actually wanted to cry. The new place was lovely, what she had seen of the city (even limited as it was) had been amazing, and she was starting to make some friends. She had everything she had wanted, everything. She had come so far.
She wasn't that terrified teenager anymore dammit! She was here by herself and proud. So what if she missed home a little bit, everyone did-even Pepper admitted having pangs of homesickness even years and years out of the house.
In the dim light she couldn't help but to succumb. It was better to cry in her room, instead of breaking down later and crying somewhere public. She cried for her past, cried for home, cried for her mother, cried just to cry, and cried because she was crying.
Curled up in a ball, alone, with no one to listen to her torment.
Sherlock hadn't spent long at the lab, while he tried to deny his body on a case, now that the murders had been solved there was no way spending a night working in the lab testing rotting skin samples would be pleasurable (and of course when well rested he would find that to be quite pleasurable). He was tired.
When he had managed to make it to Baker street, John was only just heading up the stairs to their flat. "You left an hour before me." He stated (he had noticed when John left this time), clear that John only just getting to the flat was strange. In night traffic it took less than twenty minutes to get to the flat from St. Barts, and he wasn't aware of any traffic jams. John certainly didn't look like he had stopped anywhere, no dirt or mud on his feet, no bags of take-away, there was no reason for him to be just getting in.
"I helped Maddie bring some boxes down to her flat, took a bit."
Ah, that explained it. John, always helpful with women.
As John was unlocking the door to their flat, he turned slightly, "You didn't stay long."
"Tired." Was all he said, no issues with saying such after working so long and hard on a single case.
"Me too." Door to the flat was opened, and John was already yawning. "Y'know…" it took a moment for him to stop, with Sherlock just watching-reminding himself to take in deep breaths of oxygen to avoid yawning himself.
"I know a lot of things John." Cheeky.
John gave a roll of his eyes at that, but he was amused. Sometimes it was easy to fall into that friendship when he wasn't careful (or was tired), but Sherlock knew deep down that he had no friends...no...that he shouldn't have friends. It was just a bad idea, like a grenade waiting to explode.
"I was going to say, Maddie is a lot different than you think she is."
"Sweater girl? Different? Oh please, do go on."
"She's smart Sherlock, smarter than you think."
"Sure." He said, a roll of his eyes-if John Watson thinks someone is smart that could mean anything. To be fair, they had been in a hurry the day he met her. He didn't read everything about her, just the obvious, and the obvious didn't shout smart. Maybe somewhat smart, most people were, but not smart smart. That night he met her he had even looked up her name, did research, and he came up blank. Leading him to believe that this girl was simply a quite insignificant woman who would live under them for a spell.
"Well I'm going to bed, good night Sherlock."
"Good night John."
If he had dropped himself on the sofa he would have fallen asleep there, instead he chose to go to his bedroom. It was better for him to sleep in a bed after a case. Better rest meant less sleep needed for him later.
In a few minutes he was settled in bed, his head hitting the pillow. It was bliss to actually relax for a moment. He could just fall asleep so...wait...what was that? He lifted his head up and looked around his dark room, crying-he was hearing crying.
Bedside lamp turned on again, a glance around with a frown on his face, hands through his hair. Frustration, he just wanted to sleep. It only took him moments to find the vent under his bed, open, linked up with the rest of the house-and someone was crying. It wasn't the cry of someone having a bad day, it was something that sounded like a full body sob, the kind that ached in your bones. The kind of crying that had been done over Redbeard. Don't think of that now, he scolded himself.
It wasn't Mrs. Hudson, she had nothing to cry about-and even if she did she wouldn't be able to make that much noise. It was the girl, the basement girl, crying. Their vents must have been linked somehow-something unnoticed previously due to the basement being empty.
"Great."
She was probably homesick, right on track if he was to be honest. He figured she wouldn't last long before giving up. He might not be all that compassionate but he still felt bad hearing her tears (or maybe he was just tired), he contemplated all the possible outcomes of the night, from ignoring it to going straight down to her flat to tell her to knock it off.
The one that won though, would be a comfort to him as well and help him drift off into sleep.
If he could hear her loud and clear, then she would be able to hear him. Instead of flat out telling her to stop (thus ruining the advantage of being able to hear directly into someplace in her flat-he assumed the bedroom-and while he didn't think she was important there were always things to learn about someone if they didn't know you could hear them) he moved to the living room and came back with his violin. She would hear him loud and clear, but just think the walls were thin, and it would hopefully sooth her and allow her to at least fall asleep without making anymore blubbering noises.
He started to play, and his music replaced the sound of her tears. Drowning them out completely for the moment as his hands plucked away at his instrument, playing awkwardly on his bed.
He hoped this wouldn't become repetitive, only so many allowances could be made for a crying women.
She had been crying for awhile, amazed at how long she was able to keep going. Everything seemed to be pouring out, all the stress over the move, being alone the last few weeks, all the new experiences. She cried over that now more than her past. Her face was red and hot, and her head was pounding.
She felt like she was a water park by the amount of liquid leaking out of her eyes and nose. It just wouldn't stop. She stayed in her room, not wanting to turn every room into a crying room. She didn't know how much time had passed by the time she first heard the music.
It wasn't as muffled as most noises in the flat, she wondered if it had anything to do from where it was coming from. She dried her tears with the back of her hand, curiosity won over the tears as she listened to the music.
Violin.
It was long sorrow filled notes, as if the music had been fueled by her emotion. It wasn't a recording, she could tell that right away. She didn't think John was a violin player, his fingers were too short to be so skilled. Mrs. Hudson had arthritis and wouldn't be able to play this well. It left only one person.
Sherlock Holmes was a violinist.
She laid there and listened, trying to breath out her stuffed up from crying nose (and failing). The music kept her tears away, it was easy to focus on the sound. It was beautiful.
He gave her a gift that night, the gift of sleeping or crying more. The gift of feeling like she made the right choice after all, as she fell asleep to the wonderful music of her neighbor.
It wouldn't all be that bad here.