Sherlock was perched, sullen faced, on the very edge of Lestrade's couch. His back was ramrod straight, and he looked like a wooden doll that had been forced to relax on the sofa, but was refusing to cooperate. Or like someone ready to spring up and race to the nearest exit at any moment. His fingers drummed an agitated tattoo on the arm of the couch he was sat on, his eyes darted around the room, and his breathing was slightly faster than usual.
Lestrade had practically dragged him there that night. Kicking and screaming. Greg had wanted to make sure Sherlock was in good company on New Year's Eve after visiting him on Boxing Day.
Sherlock's flat had looked exactly the same as always, the detective obviously ignoring the holiday completely, apart from the tiny improvement that Sherlock's room had been a lot messier than a few days earlier when Lestrade had last dropped by. Strewn over the table had been case files and papers, which had left Sherlock no room to eat. He'd made do with the floor though, and hadn't bothered to clear the accumulating dirty dishes for a few days.
"Good to know you've been enjoying the festivities," Lestrade had commented drily.
And that was how Sherlock had ended up in his own personal hell: settled uncomfortably on the very comfortable couch with a loud and raucous party assaulting his senses. In vain, he tried to block it out. Sherlock had already tried most of Mycroft's methods for him: reciting pi to 10,000 decimal places, counting the first 1000 prime numbers, and reorganising the rows and rows of shelves in the room of the Mind Palace entitled "Carbon and its forms".
Now he was making words using symbols from the periodic table. GeNiUS. OBVIOUS. ThInK. Irritatingly, he noted, he could make SHErLaCK, or SHErLuCK – but nowhere was there an "L" or "Lo". Sherlock made a mental note to discover a new element and assign it the symbol "Lo". "Sherlockium". That would give him one up on Mycroft, he thought smugly.
After 2 hours and 21 minutes of torture, and with only 1 hour and 52 minutes until Sherlock was allowed to leave the party – Lestrade wasn't letting him go until after the fireworks – Greg came and plonked himself next to Sherlock on the couch. With the sudden weight added, the cushions bounced up and down, bobbing the stiff consulting detective along with them. Greg tried not to laugh; however amusing the sight was.
"So," Greg said, trying to make conversation. "All right?"
He was met with no response, so he tried again.
"Why don't you come and join the party?"
Once again, Sherlock didn't answer, but when Lestrade looked down at Sherlock's hands he noticed the fingers flexing, tensing, and clenching fistfuls of the sofa cushions. He saw Sherlock's sweating brow, his slight discomforted wriggling.
"Hey," he said, and Sherlock whipped his eyes around to look at Greg, "let's pop out onto the balcony. No one's outside yet, not until the fireworks."
Gingerly, Sherlock straightened out to stand. He ducked his head while pushing past loud and raucous party-goers so he couldn't see them, couldn't make eye contact or feel too intruded by them. Finally, he broke through the sweating air into the sharp, biting night.
He breathed deeply. In, out. In, out. It felt good to be able to breathe again; he hadn't been able to properly in the thick air inside the house. In, out. Alone on the balcony with just Greg there, Sherlock could block out the party; the noise, the smell, the heat. He straightened his back and let the air nip his face. His taut shoulders slackened.
"Hey, if you were uncomfortable, you should've just said so and come out here originally!"
Typically, Greg again was met with no reply. He decided to look over the neighbourhood instead. He and Carolyn always hosted the New Year's Eve party; from their balcony they had a wonderful view of the patch of sky where the fireworks would erupt above the Thames. Greg decided to try at conversation again.
"What's your New Year's Resolution going to be?"
"Why on earth would I make a New Year's Resolution?" Sherlock scoffed after a moment of incredulous silence.
"Well, I dunno…to be a better person?"
"It's not going to get much better than it already is, Lestrade."
"Sure it will!"
"Tell me how, pray," Sherlock asked scornfully.
"Well, for a start, you could actually try to get on with the other officers at the Yard."
"I only try to get on with people who are worthy of my attention."
Greg looked at Sherlock again.
"Do you try to get on with me?" Lestrade asked slowly, trying to keep his tone neutral and the hopefulness out.
Sherlock shrugged: "Yes, I guess so."
Lestrade was flattered into a momentary silence. A small smile played on his lips, and he suddenly felt a lot more let-in by the man standing next to him. He was much more aware of Sherlock's presence, and in that instant he saw the detective in a new light. Greg shifted ever so lightly towards Sherlock more.
"Well, why not the others? Donovan, say? And Anderson – you didn't even give him a chance the other day!"
Sherlock's eyes darkened ever so slightly; and Lestrade wasn't even sure if they really did, or whether it was just the dim light playing tricks on him.
"I don't need to give him a chance."
"Well, I think you do."
"Inspector, if you've known and worked with me for this long, and you still haven't realised that 20 seconds with someone is ample time for me to deduce whether or not they are worthy of attention, then your IQ might actually be lower than Anderson's."
"But really, why on earth isn't he 'worthy' of your attention?"
"His wedding ring."
"Sherlock, that may be enough of an explanation for you, but you have to remember that the rest of humanity don't keep up with your thinking when you're saying things like this. What about his wedding ring?"
"Oh, surely you saw it! Old – he's been married for some time. It's worn-down, but it's worn out from being twisted off a finger – I could gauge the condition of the underside because it was loose on him. Now, Anderson doesn't take off his wedding ring to polish it, because it obviously hasn't been cleaned in years. He frequently takes off his ring to be unfaithful to his wife. Also, the skin around the ring bears marks of not having a ring there very often. And we've already established that it isn't a new marriage – so he simply doesn't wear it. I do not tolerate people practising infidelity. This is why most people in the world are unworthy of my attention. And did you even see the look he gave Donovan?
"Ah, now, Donovan. Same problem. She can never find herself anyone steady, she isn't trustful to have a steady, established partner; but she craves love and attention. She's what is known as the 'other woman'. Many married men cheat on their wives, and they use Sgt Sally Donovan as the object of their desires. A link in the ruin of many families, that woman."
"It's very noble of you to be intolerant of unfaithfulness," Greg was slightly surprised; it didn't strike him as being very Sherlock. "You don't seem the type to care."
"You don't seem the type to listen to Led Zeppelin, or the Smiths much for that matter, but there you go – defying the odds."
"But I've heard you being flippant about people's affairs, so why –"
"Oh, I have to explain everything. I am intolerant of them, but I don't care for listening to other people whinging about them either. I don't want to hear everyone else's petty issues. It's not my problem that's it's happening, it's theirs. I can silently dislike."
"You're not very silent about it."
"Well, I've learnt not to trust humanity. You have a way to go in that respect. Too must confidence in other people, Lestrade. It's dangerous."
"What's dangerous is being alone. Doing cocaine."
"You've brought that up again."
"Yes, I have."
"Well don't."
Greg knew better than to ask Sherlock about the reason behind this sudden hatred of people who cheated on their husbands and wives, but his mind kept drifting back to it. He imagined that he had Sherlock's deducing powers, and wished he could just look at Sherlock and know the reason. He wished that he knew more about Sherlock in general. Lestrade knew that the detective knew infinitely more about Greg than Greg knew about him. And that bothered him. He wanted to see right into Sherlock. To really know the other man on the balcony.
"I'm serious though Sherlock."
"About anything in particular?"
"Don't play dumb, it doesn't work on you," Sherlock gave a half-suppressed laugh in agreement. "About the cocaine. The new year starts in under an hour, so you can turn over a new leaf. Start again."
Sherlock snorted, and muttered something about "being cliché".
"I won't let you on any cases Sherlock, if you don't get off the drugs. I'll refuse to consult you."
Sherlock bristled indignantly beside him: "You don't understand."
"Enlighten me."
Sherlock gave the typical answer that he always gave to the question: "I get bored."
"That's not it Sherlock. That may be part of the reason, but I know that's not all. Are you going to tell me the whole truth?"
Sherlock stared Greg off in a stalemate. Both waited for the other to crack. Greg finally broke the silence with something he knew that Sherlock would contest; something that he knew would drag the truth out of him.
"Because you're stupid. You're stupid, you did the wrong thing, and now you can't confess to your mista –"
"Because it dulls my senses! I didn't mean to ever do drugs, it wasn't stupid – it just started with the morphine when they gave it to me in hospital, and it took away the pain, it numbed my oversensitive sensory input, and for once I felt normal! It was wonderful! And then it – escalated."
Greg was slightly shocked; he hadn't expected that kind of truth. Especially coming out of the mouth of Sherlock – cold, unfeeling and hard. But Sherlock was in fact none of those things; Lestrade had always sensed that, but now he knew. Sherlock suddenly seemed to realise what he said, that he'd let out too much, and his face hardened. Cursing himself internally. But the muscles loosened again once he seemed to realise he was now in too deep, and backtracked to explain.
"I'm not normal Lestrade. Well, you know that, but it's not just my superior brain that is abnormal. I have excellent senses – too excellent. My sense receptors are hypersensitive. I see things that others don't, I hear things that others don't, smell things, feel things, and it gets overwhelming. It gets…too much to handle. My brain becomes overloaded with data.
"The only time I don't feel like that is when I'm either working on a problem, or I'm drowning out the world by playing my violin, or I'm removed from everything in my Mind Palace. Or, I'm taking drugs. At first, that's what it was about. I was given morphine in hospital and it dulled everything, and that was just wonderful. Then I was introduced to cocaine…and here I am."
Lestrade felt slightly stunned by Sherlock's openness, and sighed sadly. He was overcome with a feeling of pity for Sherlock. He could feel the younger man squirming beside him, so Greg quickly though up another line of conversation.
"How's William?"
Sherlock jumped on the change of topic: "Improving steadily. Lung and heart function back to normal, blood levels clear, wound on the mend, strength returning. He should be released soon."
"That's wonderful news!" Lestrade was very pleased; he'd been in to interview William after the shooting, and the boy had been delightful. Lestrade would never forget the way his heart constricted when the vulnerable teenager, lying wan helpless in a sterile hospital bed, had admitted to his running away from home, preferring a life on the streets to his unstable and volatile home.
William had looked up at him with tired eyes and thanked him. It was really nothing William, Lestrade had been able to muster, though he thought he deserved no thanks whatsoever. Children were always Greg's weakness. Being a senior police officer, Lestrade saw the darkest sides of humanity every day. But if he could name the worst thing in the world that he'd seen, it would be the mistreating of children in any form.
Suddenly, the Greg and Sherlock were interrupted by delighted cries from inside the house, and the balcony was stormed by the partygoers. Some called over to Greg, waved at him, and he responded. Sherlock checked his watch: one minute to midnight.
Soon the entire party began a countdown, at the same time as crowds of millions who could be very distantly heard on the banks of the Thames, voices carrying on the wind. Caroline shouted along with the others, pushing her way to Greg. Steadying her glass of champagne, a count of "one" sounded through the air, and Caroline kissed Greg in delight while the black backdrop of sky was painted with splashes of colour.
While Caroline turned to wish her guests a happy new year, Greg said the same to Sherlock. He nodded, and muttered the same.
Lestrade watched the consulting detective's enraptured gaze on the fireworks as Sherlock leaned his crossed arms against the balcony rail, the wind making the coat flutter. Something about the fact that Sherlock was enjoying he lights so much made Greg very satisfied. Fireworks weren't completely beneath the great Sherlock Holmes. He could see the colours reflected in Sherlock's pale irises: blue, red, purple, green, orange, yellow, dancing through Sherlock's vision.
"Cruel," Sherlock muttered.
"Cruel?" Greg asked.
"That you should give me a taste of utopia, a little snippet, and then take it away, threaten me with such excellent blackmail material."
"You'll do it? You'll try this year? I'll help you. And then you can work your way through the Yard's case files to your heart's content."
"No promises."
Knowing that was the best he'd get, Lestrade was satisfied. They would work on it this year. Lestrade could hear Sherlock begin to hum Auld Lang Syne.
A/N: I'm still here! Sorry about the long wait, I have no excuse. I have however, finished the next few chapters, and I'll try not to have massive gaps in between uploading again! However, having said that, in about a week I'm going away, so during that time I'll not be posting for about three weeks. But I'll try to post a couple more chapters before I leave!
A massive thank you to everyone who's still reading and has stuck with this story, you guys are brilliant! And everyone who's followed, reviewed and favourited, as always, a special thanks to you! You make my day. :)