Rating went up for mention of alcohol overdose and character death. You've been warned.
2. Rivalry
Before he had even begun to mount the stairs, John found his ears assaulted with such an offensive crescendo of soprano violin, in very rough harmony with a man's angry, raised voice that he almost didn't dare to go up. Mrs Hudson hovered anxiously at his elbow, patting his arm nervously and warbling things like, "They've been at it for an hour now," and, "wouldn't even come down for tea!"
"It's alright, Mrs H," said John, hoping fervently that his smile was more of the reassuring type, and less the Mycroft-Holmes-had-better-damn-well-hope-he-locked-my-gun-away-because-if-not-I-will-bloody-well-shoot-him variety he'd grown to know too well since taking the spare bedroom upstairs. "I'll sort them out."
They were worse than three-year-olds. John stomped up each step vindictively, like it had personally insulted him. Between the most powerful man in England and the cleverest man on Earth, one would think the two could have found a way to work around their "petty feud" by now.
Anthea sat at the top step with her back to the door, the only sign of her unprofessional frustration the sound-cancelling headphones stuffed into her ears. John glared at her as if to say, Why the hell aren't you helping anything? to which Anthea replied with a practised shrug and a masterful eye roll. She did scoot aside to give him room to pass through, and John was too distracted by the sudden volley of thumping from inside to remember to trod reproachfully on her fingers.
Once he crossed the threshold, the sitting room fell dead silent. Two pairs of wary eyes tracked his every step as he came slowly closer, taking in the scene. Mycroft stood in the centre of the carpet, his grip so tight on the umbrella that it didn't take Sherlock Holmes' brain to deduce where exactly the thumping had come from. Lestrade held Sherlock's bow, and was quite red in the face. Now that John thought of it, Lestrade was the most likely to be yelling, out of the two of them: between Sherlock and Mycroft, Sherlock would be the one raising his voice, but seeing as he'd been massacring the violin, that clearly wasn't the case today. Sherlock was folded sulkily into his armchair, cradling the violin to him, very carefully not meeting John's eyes.
"Do I want to know?" John made for the kitchen with the groceries, since the three of them were likely a knot too complicated for him to untangle right now. He didn't hear Mycroft creep in behind him until the umbrella was blocking his path to the refrigerator.
"Doctor Watson."
"Yeah." John contemplated the umbrella for a moment. "Can I help you?"
"He can't, John." Sherlock stood suddenly between the two of them, violin abandoned, the line of his body taut and tight like a bow. "Really, he can't."
John found himself eye-level with Sherlock's shoulder blades, and heaved a sigh. He would leave the two of them to it – keeping the ice cream from melting seemed like a much higher priority.
"Sherlock, I beg of you." The umbrella clicked anxiously on the tile floor. John ignored it, ignored the margarine tub full of what seemed to be small intestine, ignored the way Lestrade's entrance into the crowded room was like a stampede of rhinos in comparison to the two brothers. "It's a question of common decency –"
"And I agree with him, for once." Lestrade leaned in the door frame and leered at the rest of them.
"There's a difference between common decency and professionalism." Sherlock stood under the sharp overhead light, nearly cornered against the kitchen table full of ominous, glittering beakers and dangerous-looking equipment. He was rigid and erect, and lacked all his usual fluidity, and John thought wildly that it seemed Sherlock was the oddity on the lab table for once, under Lestrade and Mycroft's sceptical glares. The tall man avoided eye contact, and gently pushed a Petri dish full of liver out of the way of his elbow. "Please."
For a moment, the kitchen was so silent that they could clearly hear the grandfather clock Sherlock had dragged home one night, muttering something about "Payment," and, "Would have been rude to refuse," ticking away in the sitting room. John grudgingly slammed the fridge door shut – it would probably be for the best if Lestrade didn't see half of what was in there, in any case – and turned his gaze to Mycroft, who seemed likely to be the most reasonable of the three in these sorts of situation.
Reasonable being, here, a word used most lightly indeed.
"Maybe you'd like to share, for those of us who are less enlightened?"
Lestrade's walkie-talkie crackled to life, but they all ignored it.
"John, there's, ah." Mycroft scuffed the toe of his Very Expensive Loafers across the floor, looking genuinely uncomfortable instead of at John, or at Sherlock, who was pinching the bridge of his nose quite hard. The ring on his hand glinted shiny in the absolute mess of the kitchen.
"There's been an accident," said Lestrade, rubbing his jaw.
"So you... want Sherlock to go out and take a look," said John slowly.
Sherlock looked like he could have kissed him. Lestrade frowned and said, "No."
"No?"
"No!" Sherlock's eyes roamed the room as if searching for some sort of distraction. "G, please, I'm sorry, but a little discretion, please, given the circumstances?" His gaze paused on John, who thought that he looked like a bit of a madman, actually.
"Anderson was wrong about you," said Lestrade. "You were wrong about you, Sherlock: there's a heart in you after all –"
Which was exactly the wrong thing to say after Moriarty, but John bit back a clever retort because there was no way Lestrade could possibly have known. He turned to Mycroft, instead, and said, "Is it someone I know?" Words that he'd always hated in Afghanistan.
"I'm afraid so," said Mycroft gravely. The kitchen fell once again silent, then Sherlock groaned, and Mycroft twirled his umbrella, and added, "John, your sister Harriet –"
The walls may have started spinning a bit at that point, but if John gripped the handle of the fridge tightly to keep from sliding to the floor, the other three were tactful enough not to say anything.
"Harry?"
Three grim faces confirmed.
He could have been sick. "She was the one responsible, wasn't she? Had she been drinking?" When no one would answer: "Mycroft!"
Mycroft pulled out his slim diary and glanced down, his face twisted with distaste. "I believe her blood alcohol content was zero point two percent, Doctor Watson," he said dryly.
"Is – she –?"
"At the A&E, John," said Lestrade gently. "But they don't think that –"
Well, no. Of course they wouldn't. Sherlock looked very lost under the bright overhead light.
"I'm sorry, John," he said awkwardly. "I thought, if they didn't tell you, maybe –"
"I need to see her."
"But –"
This was panic, being unable to breathe, knots in his stomach, hands perfectly steady. This was the stuff of nightmares – not the horrid war nightmares, but the ones in which he'd let his parents down and let Harry out of his sight. He'd sworn to himself when he was seventeen never to let anything like this happen, and where had he been? Not talking to Harry, because they'd had a row.
This was not the time to explain human behaviour to Sherlock.
"Now."
"I have a car waiting outside," Mycroft said delicately.
..
The day of the funeral, it rained. Sherlock huddled close to John under the umbrella, under the pine trees, and they watched quietly together as the drops of water splashed off the shiny surface of the new headstone. Everyone else had gone, save Clara, who stood off to the distance on her own. She hadn't said a word to anyone all day, except to thank John for coming.
"Are you angry with me?" Sherlock said abruptly.
John watched Clara wipe the rain from her cheeks, and bit his lip. "No."
"We could have got to the hospital faster if I hadn't tried to –"
They hadn't made it to the hospital in time to say goodbye. Harry's last memory of John would be their row. John looked at the rain-slick headstone thoughtfully.
"Or are you still angry with her? I know you two didn't get along." Sherlock stood so close that he was practically murmuring in John's ear. John could feel Sherlock's breath on the back of his neck, and there was something warm and comfortable about it. He turned his face up to smile wanly at his flatmate
"Neither."
"I don't understand." Eyebrows scrunched over mother-of-pearl eyes, which were hazy with confusion. The words sounded so absurd out of Sherlock's mouth that John had to laugh. "You were furious with Harry for her drinking."
And if John was being honest, the touch of anger still wasn't quite gone from his heart, and it hurt, of course it hurt. But there was so much more to it than that. "She's still my sister."
Sherlock's brows hunched lower.
"If Mycroft were in an accident, you would want to know, wouldn't you?"
"Of course, I would. Don't be absurd, John."
"Well. There you have it."
"Have what?"
"You and Mycroft don't get on. Harry and me don't – didn't either. But there's a point, Sherlock, when you have to look beyond that."
"Blood is thicker than water."
"Exactly." John tried to smile encouragingly; it probably came out as more of a grimace.
"I had thought that you wouldn't want to know about the accident. I thought it would make you angrier."
It had been a very valiant, albeit misguided – it had been a very Sherlock thing to do. It even ended with his humans are strange face that John could not help but to find endearing.
"It was very thoughtful of you." He paused. "Are you sure it wasn't just to annoy Mycroft?"
Sherlock smirked and linked his arm through John's. "Let's go home, shall we?"
John let him lead him away.
..
Mycroft received an anonymous shipment of new umbrellas the following week. He sent the thank you note to John Watson.
Thanks to all of you for reading. Sorry for the delay. Should be faster next time.
~Lily