"There are things you wanted to say… but never said them…" Ella watches me with sympathetic, dark eyes, and I feel a clenching in my heart at the pity I found there. I didn't want pity.
"Yeah." The single word is hard for me to grind out. A lump was gathering in my throat, and I was finding myself with lack of oxygen. I felt light headed, like I always do when thinking about the Fall.
"Say them now…"
I had loved him. I still do love him. At first, I didn't know how to place it. I had told Ella that nothing ever happened to me, and since I had been living outside of London, nothing had happened to me. Not until I met Sherlock. Sherlock had made me feel special, involved. I know that he hadn't meant it to be that way, he's, as he puts it, 'divorced from his emotions'. There I go again… He's gone, John. You have to start referring to him in the past. He's gone.
He was my friend. He is my friend… even now, there's only Sherlock even though he is gone. I go every day to make sure there's flowers on his grave, and sometimes I find fresh flowers in bunches, showing that other people had been there as well. Sherlock died thinking that he was alone, that he had no friends other than me.
And I wasn't there for him when he needed me most. That still tears me to shreds, the thought that I might have saved him… No, John… that was Moriarty… nobody can win against Jim Moriarty.
He could have. He was my best friend. I loved him. I needed him. I miss him….
"Sorry…" I say aloud. "I can't."