Cineri Gloria Sera Venit

Fame to the Dead Comes Too Late

Meet me at Blakes next Friday? I got us a reservation.

I closed the laptop, taking another sip from my coffee. My heart accelerated a little as I pressed "send." Part of me hoped Sarah would say she was busy, and part of me hoped not. I had a ring buried in the back of my closet at home. It was nice. Oh, God, what if she thought it was horrible?

I took another sip. You're worrying too much, I told myself sternly. Stop thinking about it. It'll work out.

I had the day off-it was a Thursday. Good thing, too. I've never been very good at Thursdays. I had taken a walk this morning to try to get my leg to behave properly. It had been hurting sporadically on and off since-

Right. That.

I had become, by necessity, a master of not thinking about things. Whether or not Sarah would say yes, Lestrade calling me up at five in the morning to ask, very politely, if I was depressed (yes, he worries, I get it, but if he could refrain from calling so early…), and certainly not Sherlock. Some days I missed him so much that it hurt, sometimes I wouldn't think about him for months. On and off. Much like the leg pain, in fact. The nightmares were gone, thankfully, but now I didn't dream at all.

Life had been normal since he died, but that's just it. I kept feeling like I should feel lucky, happy even, and I was. For the most part. But there was always something missing.

I knew, in the back of my head, that it would never go away. That night would haunt me for the rest of my life-I was never going to forget it. Moving on is different, though. And that's what I had done, what we had all done. Moved on. Thanked him for the ride and then gotten on with our lives. Business as usual for Lestrade and the Met. Last I heard Mycroft was off in Paris somewhere. Mrs. Hudson still made the best biscuits in existence.

That's what I think he would have wanted.

I got up, swinging the laptop case, and got into a cab. I wanted to go home. The empty seat next to me was like a presence.

Still not the same.

I hate Thursdays.