The room was deathly quiet, he knew that for a fact, but it felt to him like the silence was screaming at him, pressing into his mind with force enough to crush him if he didn't push it back. He lay unmoving on the couch, his wide eyes fixed on the ceiling as he struggled to draw in deep breaths through flared nostrils. For the first time in his life, he felt like he wasn't in complete control of himself, a situation he had failed to consider when contemplating recreational use of cocaine, and the thought terrified him through to his bones. His mind raced faster than he had ever experienced before, flashing through every possible way that something could go horribly wrong with him in the state he was in, and his hands were clenched tight enough to drain the skin to white around his knuckles. Not once in his research had he encountered the possibility of extreme paranoia, and the more he tried to understand why it was happening to him, the more paranoid he became.
Had he overdosed? Was he having an allergic reaction? Was his body rejecting the drug? Was it even cocaine he had injected, or had he been dealt something completely different? What would happen if someone was to call on him like this? What if Mycroft was angry about him hanging up so suddenly and was on his way over to chew him out about it? How would he explain this? Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck.
A strangled choke of laughter forced its way from his throat as he caught up with his wild thoughts. He snapped upright, swinging his legs down and tapping his feet on the ground, feeling the unfamiliar energy boiling just underneath his skin. He couldn't sit still as he gazed around the room with fresh perspective; the effects of the drug causing his vision to focus just slightly after his eyes moved on, giving the room a surreal sense of displacement that Sherlock felt oddly caught between. The more he gazed around the familiar room, the more he realised how much he had missed in his time living there.
"All those years…" he whispered aloud. "All those years… I've been so blind! So sodding blind! Ha! HA!" With a cry he sprung up from the couch, gliding around the room as tiny little details he had overlooked while sober jumped out at him like they were the most obvious things in the world. He noted the slightest of variations in the grain of the wooden mantel, the minutely misplaced thread on the corner of the rug. His hands wandered everywhere, touching, feeling, exploring nooks and crevices that seem to have materialised out of nowhere, and the more he discovered, the higher his confidence grew.
"This is fucking fantastic!" He laughed incredulously as he turned a circle in the centre of the room, flexing his hands out in front of himself, feeling more alive than he had for far too long. But the apartment wasn't enough. He felt trapped, like a bee in a jar, knowing he was bursting with potential and greatness, but unable to utilise it. He needed to put his racing mind to work.
Sherlock felt powerful, so very powerful, and every doubt he had ever had about his abilities evaporated. His head spun with the overwhelming sensation of entitlement that came with the new and unfamiliar territory of a cocaine high, and the room spun around him at dizzying speeds. He needed to get out of there, he needed air, but most importantly he needed to go to his pompous, egotistical brother and tell him where to stick it, just like he had imagined on so many occasions. Today was finally going to be his day, and damn anyone who got in his way.
Muttering to himself, he made for the door, stumbling over his feet and tumbling against the wall. He blindly felt his way along til he reached the arch of the doorway, clutching the wood to hold himself up. Anger flared within him at his body's incompetence and slow reaction. His mind was racing at a million miles an hour, and the fact that his body couldn't keep up was an inconvenience he just couldn't accept. Breathing deeply, he straightened up and stumbled into the kitchen, his vision unfocused and dizzying, causing him to lean on the kitchen table as sweat started to bead on his forehead. Panic rose up in him again at the idea that maybe he had taken a bit too much, and maybe he was in more trouble than he thought, and his knuckles grew white around the tables edge.
"Breathe, Sherlock." He said the words out loud, closing his eyes in concentration. "Breathe, and you'll be fine." Fuck I'm going to throw up. Just in time he dragged himself over to the sink and emptied his stomach into the drain. His body shook violently as he wiped the back of his hand across his face, clenching his jaw against the twist in his gut.
"It's just the comedown." He slid to the floor, his knees buckling beneath him. "It's just the comedown. It's just the comedown." Within moments, his vision had blacked out, and he succumbed to the cold clutches of unconsciousness.