Chapter Ten: The Road I Must Choose
"John, it's for you!" Sherlock calls in John's direction from his thinking position that somehow involves the complicated physics of being completely prone on the sofa with his impossibly long legs and lanky bare feet draped over the arm. John's mobile sits buzzing away on the coffee table not an arm's reach away from him, but Sherlock will not move. He hasn't moved from that spot since Mycroft left. He's been so still that Phoenix climbed up and is lying stretched across his lean belly. One of Sherlock's hands in curled around the tiny body and the other is hooked over the back of the couch. He is still dressed, at least.
"Seriously, Sherlock?" John sighs. He knows better, but some days…John lays his book and glasses down on the little café table and steps in through the doorway from the balcony. He grabs one set of long toes in one hand and his phone in the other. He looks down at the screen and almost tosses it back to the table. He's finally been able to get into the book and has managed to keep it out of Sherlock's reach so he won't spoil the ending for John.
"It's your brother, Sherlock." John says crossly.
"John, you really should read non-fiction. It was the…" Sherlock helpfully provides.
John cuts him off by answering his phone. "Yes, Mycroft." He allows his irritation to show through his voice as he rubs Sherlock's foot with his hand. Sherlock has closed his eyes and is stretching his foot out in a silent plea for more. In the instant before Mycroft tells John why he's calling, John's world is a perfect little cocoon that somehow involves two purring felines, well one purring feline and one purring lanky git really.
Mycroft is strangely controlled. John, however, being quite the expert in Holmes-ese can hear the strain and shock in the other man's voice. He listens carefully and disconnects. His hand stills on Sherlock's foot and Sherlock's eyes fly open.
"I am actually a bit unsure what to do, Sherlock." John puts a hand to his forehead and kneads the skin there. Sherlock is now sitting up and Phoenix has crawled to the back of the sofa and curled up. He is idly stroking her, but his full attention is now on John.
"Apparently Evie was involved in an accident a ways from here. Somehow, Mycroft saw what happened. He is at the hospital with her." Sherlock nods. John sits down next to him and takes his hand. "There's more, Sherlock." Another nod. "He's asking if I will come down and give him an expert opinion on her chances." John swallows hard against the lump in his throat. He has known the young woman less than a day and he is already thinking of her as a friend.
Sherlock can see the pain as his lover's playful blue eyes have become cloudy. John always makes friends quickly. Mycroft, though? This is almost unprecedented. He casts around in his mind for the answer to a question he wasn't even aware existed until that moment.
Oh.
Sherlock thinks back to that strange pause that happened in the kitchen when Mycroft first entered. Though Sherlock was busy goofing around with Evie and his attention was split between the young woman and John, his mind still took in the entire scene. He closes his eyes and watches Mycroft enter the kitchen; he sees as Evie looks up to him…Freeze. He's captured the moment like a photograph: Evie is smiling, John is actually staring at Mycroft with his eyes popping out of his head…and Sherlock is smiling…that is not important. His eyes open and his eyebrows do their best to crawl up into his hairline. He wrinkles his nose and crinkles his eyes.
"Oh god, John. Don't tell me. Mycroft and Evie?" Sherlock feels sick. There are some things one just doesn't like to think about one's brother. He covers his face with both hands.
"Grow up, Sherlock. You just replayed the whole scene in your head. What do you think?" John gets up and grabs his shoes from their place by the door. He tosses Sherlock's in to him and gets a little satisfaction from the way that they thump against the side of the sofa.
"I don't have any socks, John!" Sherlock calls. John just shakes his head.
~o~o~o~
Mycroft is torn between the heavy weight of guilt and the burning pain of rage. There is a terrible twisting sensation in his gut from allowing this to happen; he let his heart overrule his coolly logical mind and someone got hurt, yet again. He accepts the horrible lighting and hard plastic chair of the hospital as if it were a punishment; truly he deserves more.
The private suite is silent save for the beeping of machines and the low hum of the heater in the corner. Evie lies on the bed, one side of her face bruised darkly beneath a row of stitches that runs from her temple to the bottom of her jaw. The deep cut was caused by the way her body was dragged across the asphalt, her face rubbing against the inside of her helmet. He imagines that she is pretty fairly covered with bruises. Her leg is not only broken, but the ankle is also sprained from the twisting that occurred during her forced dismount. Her brain is safe and she will have no long-lasting internal injuries.
All of these things, Mycroft understands on a rational level. He comprehends the majority of what is written on her chart; he checked it with his personal contacts by hacking into the hospital's records fifteen minutes after settling into the room to wait on the staff to bring her in from having X-rays, blood tests, and the stitches put in. The room décor is a sickly industrial light yellow and white paint scheme. He can't understand for a moment how those colors are supposed to be comforting; how fluorescent lights are supposed to aid in healing. He accepts that sometimes he makes mistakes, rationally. He made quite the big one thinking that Evie is only fifteen years younger than Sherlock. According to the hospital records, she is in fact thirty-three years old, fourteen years younger than he is; seven years younger than Sherlock and eleven years John's junior. None of that information is important at this juncture. Why are his thoughts tripping over themselves and filling his head with useless information?
He knows why, but he doesn't want to admit it.
Two mistakes in one day: unforgivable. He will find a way to do penance over the accident, perhaps in time he will write off the mistake on her age.
How could he have been so ignorant?
He closes his eyes and recreates the whole scene in the kitchen before the accident all over again. In a technique reminiscent of Sherlock's, which only makes sense since he taught his younger brother one of the skills that enables the detective to recall crime scenes with unerring accuracy, Mycroft studies Evie's face. In his recall, Sherlock and John are no more than blurs. Evie is a crisply detailed impression; he can even make out the faint laugh lines around her eyes. Those eyes will haunt him for the rest of his life if he can never see them so bright and full of life again. He opens his eyes as he stomach gives another lurch, shooting sparks into his brain, scattering his thoughts and turning everything bright white. He has still completely failed to see what upset her so much that she fled.
Well then, that makes three mistakes in one day. How could he allow that to happen?
Irrationally, he is falling to pieces over a woman whom he has known a few scant hours, and for what? Because he recognized something in her willingness to speak to him, even after a sleight, however real or imagined? The cigarette was fantastic. He turns his head in the direction of a soft whimper and knows that he wants to do something. He is completely lost.
For the second time in his life, Mycroft Holmes is in a situation where he doesn't know what to do. He isn't sure if staying is the right thing, but he is conflicted on where to go if he leaves. Should he just go home, write a check to the NHS to cover her expenses and be done with the whole thing? He knows that his brother and the Captain are on their way, they are more than capable of handling this again, what if she wakes up alone?
For an instant, Mycroft is back at Sherlock's bedside the first time his little brother wakes up from an overdose. Sherlock's eyes are wide, terrified and lonely. He remembers the way that the jade green orbs had lost so much of their luster until they found his own. He understands that the physical pain of an injury or illness is hard enough to cope with; adding the psychic pain of being completely alone can literally crush a person from the inside out. He understands from his careful snooping that Evie has no one. Once her grandfather passed on, she had no other living relatives. In the hours since she was brought in, not a single person has even phoned to inquire on her condition. He would have been notified immediately.
Mycroft makes to stand when the door swings open. John comes into the room first, not quite pulling Sherlock by the hand. Sherlock stands next to John and Mycroft takes in their twined fingers. Everything comes into complete focus while he studies them, the dark of midnight and the light of midday, as if he's never seen them before this second. His mind slows down and the urge to run away and never look back dissipates.
John notes the still figure in the hospital bed; his intelligent eyes scan the machinery, automatically checking the readouts in his head. All seems as it should be, Evie doesn't appear to be in any added distress. Sherlock waits quietly for John to complete the assessment that he understands enough about to stay out of the way. He never lets go of John's hand, even to the point that when John moves, he does, too. In turn, he studies his brother: the lack of a tie, crumpled clothing, the mobile lying on the chair next to him, forgotten. There is a slight ring of dirt at the bottom of his trousers above his shoes. Something akin to empathy for his sibling starts crying out in a tiny corner of his chest. He gives Mycroft what he hopes is a comforting nod over John's head and the thing closes goes back into its normal dormant state.
The green-eyed monster rears in Mycroft's chest again, but this time it's different: it seems to have lost some of its bite. Now he wonders if he could learn something from these two: after all, John accepted Sherlock back into his life after what many would assume the largest betrayal of all time. Perhaps Evie can forgive Mycroft his transgressions. He follows the line of Sherlock's gaze and notes the dirt on the hems of his trousers; obviously he is not himself. How long will he allow this to continue? He weighs the pros and cons so quickly that they simply come to him as a list of words.
Right then and there, Mycroft Holmes decides that even if he doesn't gain anything else from it, he will make Evie's future as comfortable as he is able and that she will allow. He is no fool, he knows the scent of pride and the strength of making your own way in the world. Even if she refuses to have anything to do with him, he at least made the effort. He admits that he learned that from his brother. It will be difficult to integrate another person into his life, even if she is willing, he knows. Perhaps it will be worth the trouble in the end. Perhaps.
"Mycroft, why are we here?" John asks, keeping his voice respectably low. Mycroft starts but then the expression on his face changes from haunted to the confident one that he wears day in and day out. He actually forgot about them being in the room with him.
"Thank you, John. You helped me make an important decision." Mycroft answers firmly, never taking his eyes off of Evie.