It took Sherlock several minutes before he was willing to let go of John, and another minute before his conscience, unused to considering another, prodded him into response.
"Can I give you something in return?" Sherlock asked.
John pondered that.
"Are you saying that because you just had an amazing orgasm and now you feel the need to reciprocate?"
"Yes."
John sighed and rolled over onto his back.
"Sherlock, sex doesn't have to be tit for tat."
"You're aroused, John."
"So? It's morning."
"You're aroused and you're leaking."
John shot Sherlock a dirty look. "Watch your language," he said in a warning tone.
"I'm just observing. You are a very unusual man, John Watson."
"Am I?" John asked, feeling pleased despite his irritation.
"Yes. You are clearly aroused and desirous of intercourse, yet you are refusing it. Why? I have three hypothe-"
"Intercourse, Sherlock?"
"Intercourse," Sherlock repeated brusquely.
"Can we use a different term, at least?" John said.
"Is 'intercourse' not euphemistic enough for you? What shall it be, then? I could have said love-making but as we have already established, all of this is love-making. Touching stroking kissing sobbing rubbing screaming sodding – did I leave anything out? – love-making. And I specifically meant intercourse. As per the archaic meaning—"
"You and your obscure words," John muttered.
"Intercourse, as it was once used, referred to commerce or trade between nations—"
"No shit, Sherlock. I do have a university education. And I hope that you're not saying that I wish to engage in 'trade with other nations.' "
"I was merely using that as a point of comparison. Intercourse is not an adequate word to describe what you are looking for. There are too many possible meanings to the term."
"Care to deduce me, then? Tell me what I'm looking for if not intercourse?"
Sherlock climbed on top of John, pressing his chest against the smaller man's torso. He examined John's face, gently brushing his bangs away from his forehead.
"You want to fuck me," Sherlock said, his eyes scanning John's countenance. "But you are too nervous to say so."
John closed his eyes briefly before looking back at Sherlock.
"And so what if that's the case? Wanting something is one thing. Asking for it is another."
"You can ask me," Sherlock said in a low voice. "I don't mind you asking."
John let out a jagged breath. Sherlock's long thighs had pushed their way between his legs, spreading his knees wide and exposing his very erect cock to the detective's wandering hands.
"Sherlock, I—"
"Shhh, John. You don't have to say anything. Just – let me do this. For you."
John rested his head back against the mattress, acutely attuned to the soft touch of Sherlock's fingers rubbing finger-eights around his balls.
John remembered how, in his youth, a girlfriend of his had once complained that he 'cut straight to the chase,' because of his particular predilection for touching her clitoris before she had even had time to fully remove her clothing. He had resisted her advice that he take a more roundabout route to pleasure, an oversight which, no doubt, had contributed to her breaking up with him shortly afterwards. There should not have been anything about this love-making with Sherlock to remind him of Regina, but the urgency of Sherlock's actions reminded John of his erstwhile self, a young man who wanted sex and wanted it now.
With Sherlock, things had been different. John had sometimes felt that urgency with the detective, but just as often he had wanted the luxury of making love slowly and deliberately. He loved it when Sherlock took his sweet time working his mouth down John's body. He loved it when, as he had just done, he was able to wring every last drop of ejaculate out of Sherlock's body. He had loved the other morning's adventure in the shower, and he loved, perhaps most of all, the anticipatory glances that Sherlock gave him in public, glances that said, I may look like I'm aloof and uncaring, but I assure you that when we get back to the hotel you are going to see me as no one else has ever seen me. He was struck by how, since they had commenced their relationship a week earlier (had it only been a week?), there was scarcely anything that Sherlock did that John failed to find arousing. Their love-making had been, by turns, frantic, tender, rough, and hesitant. And John loved it all.
Yet it was odd to John how, even as Sherlock was undoubtedly the most extraordinary partner that he had ever had, their love-making was still underlain by recollections of other lovers, other times. In Sherlock's kisses John might feel, for example, the texture of other lips, just as, when Sherlock cried out John's name at the height of orgasm, John would be startled into recalling another's voice, the memory of it unbidden and unwanted. It was as if, by making love with Sherlock, all of John's former lovers were called up out of the recesses of his memory. Their scents, their voices, even the smooth surfaces of their limbs, appeared to John like a series of superimposed images, palimpsests of his former self. He was John Watson in New York City, shagging Sherlock Holmes, and then at once he was John Watson, last year at uni, kissing another man for the first time. It was disorienting, to say the least. Where had he stored these memories, all of these years? Why had they not bothered him before, when he was having sex with Sarah, for instance? It was absurd that they would come to him just now, when more than anything he wished to begin things afresh with Sherlock.
For the first time in his life, he wished that he had not been quite so profligate in his sexual explorations. He wished that he was the proverbial blank slate and not, as he was, an experienced veteran of sexual games.
"Stop thinking," Sherlock interrupted. "You need to stop thinking so that you can enjoy this."
"Arggg," John sputtered. "How do you know what I'm thinking?"
"I don't know what you are thinking, John. I only know that I am putting all of my attention into the underside of your balls, and you have gone somewhere else. Not here."
John reached down and pulled at Sherlock's shoulders, bringing the other man to lie on top of him again. He wrapped his legs around Sherlock's hips, hugging him close.
"How can I be right here, then?" he asked softly.
"You still don't believe that this is real," Sherlock said. "So you've gone out, gone somewhere else, and left me in charge of your body."
"When did you ever learn about a thing like that?" John was startled by Sherlock's acumen.
Sherlock shook his head. "John, John, John. It's me. You know how I think. And I think that you are thinking too much. Come back here. Come back to me." He paused. "It's too much, isn't it? I'm too much for you."
"God—no. Sherlock, I never meant it like that. I never wanted you to stop. I just—yes. No. Yes, I suppose you're right."
The detective raised an eyebrow. "Explicate," he demanded.
"Yes, I went 'elsewhere' for a little while. Lost in a reverie, I guess. But not because you're too much. In fact, rather the opposite."
"I hate to admit it, but I do not understand."
John released his legs from around Sherlock's waist and flipped them both over so that he was now on top of Sherlock, pressing into the younger man's chest and looking down into his glassy eyes.
"I want to get lost in you, Sherlock. I want you to completely fill me." He paused as Sherlock raised his eyebrow even higher than before. "No, I don't mean in that way," he backtracked. "Well, maybe I do mean in that way. But not yet. What I mean is—" John took a deep breath "—I want it to be just the two of us, here and now and forever. And don't go and get all frightened because I've said 'forever,' Sherlock. Just listen to me."
"You want us to exist outside of time," Sherlock said enigmatically.
"I wasn't going to be so metaphysical about it, but maybe that's right. I want to just be here with you. And I know this can't last. I know that this perfect week, here in New York, can't last forever."
"Tempus fugit," Sherlock murmured.
"Right. Before we know it, we'll be back in London, solving cases and bickering as usual about the mess around the flat, and this—this peaceful interlude—will be a thing of the past."
"It has been rather peaceful here," Sherlock admitted. "Barring the museum heist and the terrorist plot, it has been a veritable pax americana."
"Leave it to you to compare our sex lives to international politics."
"Affaires politiques, affaires de cœur..."
"Can we please return to discussing intercourse, Sherlock?" John moved his hips suggestively against Sherlock's.
The detective smiled. "It will never be peaceful in our lives, John. You know that. And this week is no exception, however much you want to believe otherwise. There were any number of instances when you or I could have been—or in fact were—in danger."
"And so what do we do? How can we do this if we know that, at any moment, one or the other of us could be killed?"
"Isn't that the risk that we take? The risk everyone takes?" Sherlock blinked. "John, I wouldn't have thought that I would be the one to remind you of this. You, the retired solider. I'm just an armchair detective."
"You are not. You take as many risks—or more—than I do."
"So why don't you want to take this risk, John?"
"Which risk are you referring to now?"
"Love is a risk. So is sex. Take your pick. I'm offering both of them to you."
"Intercourse?"
"Intercourse, as well as an affaire de cœur."
"You mad, mad man," John said dreamily, brushing his lips over Sherlock's. "Why do I love you so much?"
Sherlock responded by opening his mouth to John's kiss, his lips tugging at John's tongue, urging him closer.
They kissed for several minutes, then. Sherlock's body was still oversensitive from his orgasm, and when John moved his mouth down to the younger man's nipples, Sherlock arched his back off of the bed and protested with a whimper.
"Shhh," John reassured him. "I won't go any further."
"You had better go further," Sherlock retorted. "Just—forgive me if it takes me a few more minutes to get my bearings. Oh, yes, John, that's it, right there—" For John's mouth was on Sherlock's sternum now, passing over the sparse hairs that marked the centre of Sherlock's rib cage, and then he moved his mouth lower, following the line of hair down to Sherlock's navel, where he paused to insert his slippery tongue.
"I can't-John!" Sherlock said. His cock was still limp; he didn't want John to go any further, for then the sensation really would be too much. But John's head had descended and now he was licking at the damp curls approaching Sherlock's groin, and Sherlock couldn't help letting out a moan. It's impossible, he can't—Ican't—God, John, don't—stop. Don't—stop. Donotstopdonotstop.
John's mouth had found Sherlock's balls for a second time that morning. A tremor ran through Sherlock's body when John's tongue lapped at the groove between them, and he found himself clawing at John's head, at his neck, at his shoulders—anything to prevent himself from being lost in the overblown sensations. John purposefully avoided Sherlock's cock, concentrating entirely on the low-lying heft of Sherlock's testicles, which he circled with his tongue in the same figure-eight pattern that Sherlock had performed on him earlier.
"Are you going to let me do this?" John asked. He spit on his hands and moved a finger down to rest between Sherlock's buttocks.
"Lube," Sherlock blurted out, wrenching himself out of John's grasp and dragging himself over to the bedside table. He opened the drawer and pulled out the bottle of lube and one condom, handing both to John.
Sherlock lay back again against the mattress. "It will be easier if I am on my stomach," he told John. "Missionary style isn't, um, the traditional way in this instance."
"I want to see your face for now," John said, as he flipped open the tube of lube. "Don't worry, I'll turn you over when you're ready."
His hands between Sherlock's legs were wet and slick, now grazing over his anus, now skipping the area entirely to focus on the firm notch of Sherlock's perineum.
"How does this feel?" John asked, watching Sherlock's face for any change in expression. But Sherlock, with his eyes shut and his mouth slightly parted in anticipation, appeared only expectant—not disturbed, not distracted.
"Fine," Sherlock murmured. "Fine—fine—fine."
"Is it too much, too soon?" John asked.
"Not too much. That—there—yes," Sherlock moaned, as John's finger returned again to his opening. It's always that first touch that is the most shocking, the most unbelievable, Sherlock thought.
"I'm a virgin in this regard," John joked nervously.
"You do know how to do a prostate exam, don't you?" Sherlock managed to joke. "Just work it in gently. I'll tell you if it's too much."
"You will tell me, won't you? I don't think I can trust you, Sherlock. Your level of pain tolerance is unusually high, even for a sociopath."
It shouldn't have sounded sexy to Sherlock, to hear John jokingly call him a sociopath, but despite himself he let out a sharp exhale. John's finger was rubbing circles against the entrance to his arse, and then his finger slipped inside Sherlock a second time, all slippery and smooth and trustworthy, Yes, trustworthy, you dependable man, you. John. You won't fuck this up.
John was still hard himself, and grew even more aroused at the sight of Sherlock squirming underneath him, rhythmically moving his arse against John's finger.
"Is this alright?" John asked.
"Quite," Sherlock managed to say.
"I'm going to try another finger, OK?" Sherlock nodded, and then he felt another finger against the first, and he willed himself to relax his muscle so that John could enter more easily.
"What does this feel like?" John asked.
You and your obsession with knowing what it's like, Sherlock thought.
"Different," he said curtly.
"Different from what?" It occurred to John that Sherlock might be thinking of the other times that he had let someone do this to him.
"Different from anything else. Not like your mouth around my cock. Not like my mouth around yours. Not like sex with a woman. It's like—there's nothing to compare. We don't have the right anatomy to make that comparison."
John laughed, reassured by Sherlock's honesty.
"Epistemology, again, Sherlock? How can you think and feel at the same time?"
"How can you not?" Sherlock asked. And then he understood what John meant, for John was now moving two fingers quickly in and out of Sherlock's opening in a delightfully predictable rhythm, and Sherlock did not want to think anymore, he did not want to analyse or parse or pun. He did not want the words. He only wanted the sensation of John's fingers inside of him, just like that, so perfect and so striking.
Sherlock watched John watching him. There was an expression on John's face that Sherlock could not read—Vulnerability? Awe?—and he wondered if his lover's face reflected his own, if in fact it was his face and his longing that he beheld in John.
"Now would be the appropriate moment to change positions," Sherlock whispered, as he slowly pushed back at John so that he could turn himself over. John pulled the condom out of its wrapper and onto his penis, never letting his eyes wander from Sherlock's lanky body.
And then Sherlock was kneeling on his knees and forearms, exposing his pale, curved arse to John's gaze. John was reminded, not of another lover this time, but of the way that he had held this exact position the day before, and how Sherlock had come up from behind, then, to press his penis against the groove in John's buttocks. And suddenly John sensed the superimposition of those two roles—the receiver and the giver—and he was Sherlock, then, as much as he was John. John was offering himself up, eager arse in the air, and he was also kneeling in front of Sherlock, in this original moment, today the 29th of December, when he was Doctor John Watson, lining his cock up with Sherlock's opening, using his fingers to urge apart the fragile sphincter.
And then they were breathing together, duplicates in breath and body; double negatives and blurred edges and a hall of reflecting mirrors. Sherlock fell open to John's fingers, and then to his cock, and John was in Sherlock, and Sherlock was in John, and the image contained only the two of them, this brief instant a fractal that emanated outwards and promised to repeat itself, again and again, urging itself towards infinity.
It was not strange to be inside Sherlock; exciting, potent, sexy, yes, but not strange. What was strange was to be inside Sherlock and to have Sherlock be inside him, all at once. What was strange was this uncanny merging of self and other, and then the unusual realisation—unusual for John—that he at last understood the expression flesh of my flesh, and why Narcissus fell in love with his own image, and why men loved men and women loved women, and how terrible it was that the tendency towards repetition in this kind of love could only ever be a tendency, and never made actual flesh. As John pulled out of Sherlock, to push back in again, he wished fervently that making love with Sherlock could lead to making something, or someone, and that this kind of love would not always be isolate and perfect, but that it would pass through the looking glass and come out on the other side, the side of cracked tea cups and worn jumpers and soiled nappies and first words and first steps. On the side of imperfection, that is; on the side of the fallen and the good.
He did not know if Sherlock would understand any of these sentiments, or if he would balk at John's sudden paternality, but in this week Sherlock had demonstrated a hitherto unknown capacity for empathy, at least when directed at John, and he might understand even more, given time. With this comforting thought, John continued to move in Sherlock, willing his lover to sense the meaning behind his motions. I love you, I have you, you have me. His thoughts became simple, linear, once the orgasm broke upon him, and he could only think of Sherlock.
Afterwards, when they were lying together, John thought about how strange it was that an orgasm should feel at once so timeless and yet so brief. It was as if, when he climaxed inside Sherlock, he touched eternity, and yet he knew rationally that that could not be, because as soon as he was there, hovering outside of time, the boundless horizon retreated from him and he was pulled back to earth and back to the hard friction of their bodies and the hard breaths of his lover and the hard clench of Sherlock's body, now separate and far away, though still encircling him. He returned to Time and to the isolation of his own body, which after all was so very different from Sherlock's, so small and brown and almost stocky, when compared with Sherlock's long limbs and pale skin—and how could he have thought otherwise?
John's orgasm had arrived unexpectedly quickly, as if even his deep retreat into thought was not enough to contain the flow of his body and the impulse towards completion. He had gripped Sherlock's hips as he gave one final push before he was overcome by the sensation of floating, and timelessness, and oneness with Sherlock and with some future tiny creature who might be theirs too, one day.
"John," Sherlock said, repeating his name in response to the older man's groans: "John, John, John." It was a comfort, this act of comforting John through their bodies. Odd, thought Sherlock, how I want more from this, more from him. Odd, how I feel that we could expend ourselves in thousands upon thousands of orgasms, and never be as close to each other as we desire. I want more of you, John Watson, and I say that even knowing that 'more' is not enough; that we will never find the completion that we are seeking. And still I will look for it, in you, and hope that you will keep looking for it in me.
"John." Sherlock said.
"Yes?"
"I just want to say your name. John."
"Sherlock."
"This is it, isn't it?"
John mumbled a quiet 'yes' before collapsing onto Sherlock.
They lay in a jumbled heap for several minutes, listening to the heartbeats and the breaths and the rustling of legs on sheets and lips brushing against each other. And it was very, very good, and not at all perfect, and they liked it best that way.