Chapter Fourteen.

"Look Sherlock, I'm sorry about that, back there," John Watson spoke with genuine regret in his voice and a sincere look of genuine embarrassment on his face as he settled in to the back of the cab besides Holmes.

"I was just trying to get your attention," he explained when Holmes did not offer any acceptance of his apology. "You were miles away."

"It's forgotten John," Holmes intoned, turning his head to face Watson. "Although I note that you forgot to ask who the father might be."

Holmes forced a weak smile to his lips.

He had never been very good at humour.

Sarcasm, yes.

Flippancy, yes.

Humour, no.

However, since making acquaintance with John Watson he had tried to make something of an effort to understand his friend's constant need to use humour to deal with awkward situations, and to try to emulate him, but he knew that he was lousy at it.

"And I dare say I can't expect you to step in and do the right thing, can I? What would Mary make of that?"

"Sherlock," Watson ignored the attempt at humour, remaining serious, somehow sensing that his friend was in a very difficult spot at the moment and didn't quite know how to share. "You know that I will always stand by you. You might be a bit of a tit at times, but you're still my friend."

"I know."

"So, what's wrong? Are you in some kind of trouble?"

"No."

"Right then ..."

"At least, not with the law."

"Blimey, I was only joking, you know, Sherlock ..."

Watson stared open mouthed at his friend and Holmes frowned back at him.

"About being pregnant," Watson clarified. "You didn't get some girl into trouble, did you?"

"Me?" Holmes drawled sarcastically. "The virgin?" he added with a snort of derision.

"Sorry. Yes. I forgot who I was talking to for a minute. Mr I don't have a sex drive ..."

"Exactly."

"So, where are we going?"

Holmes began to withdraw, carefully moving away from Watson, pretending to focus his attention out of the window on his side of the cab as he drew in a deep breath and then expelled it on a shoulder raising sigh.

"Sherlock?"

"Harley Street," Holmes spoke, but he refused to look at Watson as he did so.

The last thing he needed right now was to see sympathy in his friend's eyes.

He was only just holding it together as it was, and that would be his undoing.

Emotions!

Damn!

Why did he have to find out that he had damned emotions after all this time?

Why now?

This was hard enough to deal with as it was.

Where was his cold, clinical detachment when he really needed it?

"John" he continued before his friend could ask the obvious question. "There is no easy way to do this, so, I would prefer it if you would just let me speak and not interrupt. All will become clear in the fullness of time ..."

"Sherlock, you're really starting to put the wind up me ..."

"John, please!"

Holmes turned to face him now, and it was clear to see that he was uncomfortable and struggling to find the right words.

Watson nodded silently, somehow sensing the seriousness of the moment for Holmes.

Holmes took another deep breath, grateful for a moment to organize his thoughts.

Holmes had known that it was never going to be easy to break the news, but Watson was such a compassionate and caring man, and such a loyal and devoted friend, he was bound to react strongly.

He was also a fine doctor, who would instantly understand the condition, and its implications.

Best to just spit it out then.

No point sugar coating the pill.

"I have a brain tumour."

"What? Jesus, Sherlock! You don't just drop something like that on a bloke, in the back of a ruddy cab!"

Watson's eyes grew wide in his suddenly pale face and he looked like he had been hit with a sledge hammer or a bolt of lightning.

"Did you say brain tumour?"

Holmes nodded almost imperceptibly.

"Bloody hell ..."

His voice was weaker now and he swallowed hard as the true meaning behind Holmes words suddenly hit home.

"How long have you known?"

"John, please," Holmes implored softly. "Don't make this any harder on both of us. Let me talk. I promise you will have answers to your questions soon enough."

However, John Watson was not listening.

Gone was the shock at the revelation, only to be replaced by a much stronger, more primal emotion.

He was starting to see red.

Holmes was doing it again, damn him, shutting him out, scheming behind his back, hiding things from him.

Mr Independent!

The iceman cometh!

What the hell had happened to trust?

"Christ, Sherlock, why the hell didn't you say something!"

"Watson!" Holmes hissed through clenched teeth, turning his head to glower at his friend.

"It's just like you, isn't it!"

"Watson, you know how I am," Holmes tried to reason calmly, for once able to understand his friend's genuine hurt and anger. "I don't find it easy to share my troubles. I'm just not used to doing that. I have always been on my own, only ever had myself to rely on and I have always had to deal with these kinds of things alone."

"Well you're not on your own any more, clot."

"I know."

"You bloody control freak! Always have to have everything your own way! And I really hate it when you do that, when you shut me out."

"I know that too, John."

The softness in Holmes voice, and the fact that he was continuing to regard Watson with big, sorrowful eyes, the fear and uncertainty in his face plain for his friend to see, suddenly halted the medical man in his tracks.

He shouldn't be angry with Holmes.

He should be thinking of ways to help him, to reassure him.

"I do know all that, John, but it doesn't make it any easier for me. I am trying."

"Oh yes, you certainly are, you pillock," Watson muttered darkly by way of disguising his own fears for his friend's future.

A brain tumour.

Oh God ...

Why now?

Just when he was getting used to the idea that Holmes was actually still alive!

Just when everything seemed to be getting back on track ...

"You'd try the patience of a ruddy saint."

"So I've been told. On numerous occasions. May I continue?"

"Yes."

"Thank you. We are off to Harley Street to see the old family quack, Sir Frederick Penrose Gill."

And naturally, because it was Holmes, the old man would have a title.

"Never heard of him."

"I did not suppose for one moment that you would have."

"Not on the NHS then."

There was sarcasm in Watson's voice now.

"He practically delivered me, Watson, or as near as. He knows me well enough, and I trust him."

There was a hint of the usual impatience and disdain in Holmes voice now, as though he resented having to explain.

"Anyway, I came to see him last week, after I noticed a distinct tremor in my right hand," Holmes continued, returning to his usual matter of fact tone and focusing his eyes directly ahead of him, wanting to concentrate on explaining the facts, not the emotion in Watson's eyes and voice.

If this was what it was like to have friends, this tight knot of emotion clenching in his chest and deep in the pit of his stomach, Holmes wished he could go back to the days when he did not have any, could not feel anything.

How much easier would this have been back then?

Before he had died.

Nothing had been the same since his resurrection, including his relationships with those around him.

He had seen all too clearly how they felt about him.

Especially Watson, standing there at his graveside, so obviously distraught, alone and adrift.

Something else Cassia Ingram had been right about.

Now he knew how much they cared, how hurt they had been by his death, and how easy it was for them to be used against him.

The genie was out of the bottle and he couldn't go back.

His very life suddenly had a new impact.

His actions affected those close to him and could put them in danger.

It made him feel guilty.

Guilty, that they could be used in such a way, and that that could make him weak.

Guilty that he was incapable of feeling the same way about them.

Or was he?

He certainly had a strong desire to protect them, to keep them safe and out of harm's way.

Wasn't that caring of a kind?

Meanwhile, Watson waited for Holmes to continue, understanding his friend's attitude, suspecting that it was the only way that he was going to get through the next few minutes and decided to remain silent and let him get on with it.

"There have been other symptoms. A persistent headache, nausea, disrupted sleep, some episodes of minor clumsiness, and a blackout, but that day, I cut myself shaving because my vision had become blurred, momentarily, and that was also when I noticed the tremor."

Watson remembered that morning, and how he had teased Holmes about having an argument with his razor.

So much for the dental appointment!

"Penrose Gill sent me for tests, to the top Neurology man he knows, Sir Roger Witty, FRCS. They have both been very thorough, John. And the verdict came down last night."

How typical of Holmes to make it sound like a ruddy legal judgement.

Prisoner at the bar, you have been found guilty and I sentence you to death ...

"Sir Frederick telephoned to give me the news. Thought he'd better put me out of my misery."

"And you went through all of that on your own, without saying a ruddy word. You prat!"

Watson was incredulous.

He purposely made himself draw in a deep breath before continuing

"So, what did he say?"

"Apparently, it is small and it's operable, and there should be no permanent damage."

"Thank God. You lucky bastard."

Lucky?

Why couldn't it have been the transport, and not the brain?

Holmes found himself thinking sourly.

"That remains to be seen. However, Penrose Gill wanted to see me this morning to discuss the diagnosis in more detail, and to propose a plan of action, surgery and post operative care, that sort of thing."

"Sounds like they have it covered."

"And I wanted you with me, John, because you are my friend. I value your opinion and I trust your medical knowledge. You will be able to translate the medical stuff that goes over my head and advise me if what they are proposing is right or not."

Finally Sherlock turned his head and looked at Watson once more.

"I am going to need your help, and your support, and I trust your judgement. I know that if things do not work out as they should, you will take the best course of action for me, knowing my wishes and how I feel about not having my faculties. Most of all, John, I am going to need your strength and your friendship."

Watson was touched.

Deeply moved actually.

For Holmes it was quite a speech.

And for once there was no sarcasm or haughtiness in his tone.

Holmes was being perfectly sincere.

"You already have that, Sherlock. You always did."

"And you have mine. Always. I can't help being the way I am, John. I don't handle things like this very well, and my instinct has always been to deal with my problems alone. They are my burden to carry, no-one else's."

"But you don't have to do that now, Sherlock."

"I know."

"Did you think I'd lose it if you told me straight?"

"No. I just didn't want to put you through that again. You have already had to watch me die once. I didn't want you to have to go through that again. I couldn't be that cruel. I needed to be sure first, so that I could give you the facts."

"You're not going to die!" Watson declared fiercely.

"No. I'm not." Holmes spoke with more confidence now. "I am reliably informed that I will live to a ripe old age."

"Penrose Gill said that?"

There was a hint of surprise and disapproval in Watson's voice.

The prognosis was good, but there were still risks involved and it was irresponsible of him to give Holmes the impression that there was nothing to it and he would sail through it unscathed.

"No. Cassia Ingram."

"Oh."

"Hmmm."

"So, all this time you've been struggling with your mortality, keeping quiet, just to spare my feelings?"

"Something like that."

"You plonker! I can't believe you, Sherlock. How much harder do you think it would have been for me, if you've suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth, and then I found out by reading your obituary in The Times?"

Watson glared at his friend, who suddenly had the grace to look somewhat shamefaced.

"I've already done that too, remember?" Watson reminded. "That would have been cruel, Sherlock. I would always have had some lingering,nagging doubt in the back of my mind that you might pop up again somewhere, some day in the future. I'd always be looking over my shoulder, waiting, hoping. That would have been harder to bear than being with you, making the best of the time we are granted and then saying goodbye properly at the end."

Holmes suddenly looked genuinely moved by Watson's words, and swallowed involuntarily.

"Friends are there for each other, through the good times and the bad, Sherlock. Do you really think I am so emotionally fragile? Do you really think that I would let you die alone?"

"No."

"Good. I'm glad we got that sorted out. Now, let's hear no more talk of dying. We'll see what this Penrose Gill fella has to say, and then you can tell me about Cassia Ingram and what she said that finally made you accept that she is genuine."

"That's not important, John. The important thing is that she may have a case for us."

"Sod the ruddy case!" Watson erupted.

Holmes opened his mouth to protest, but did not get the chance as Watson cut him off.

"No, Sherlock, I mean it. Forget it. The most important thing is getting you through this and well again!"

"Are you asking me to ignore the possibility that there is a child killer out there on a rampage, just because I am off colour?"

"Off colour! It's a freaking brain tumour! Do you have any idea of the risk you could be taking if you don't get it treated straight away!"

"I am aware of all the facts, John. It does not alter the situation."

"No. No, Sherlock. We don't know that there is a killer out there. We don't. We do know that you need surgery, and that has to be our priority right now. I'm sure Cassia Ingram will understand."

"But will the children?"

"Sherlock! You just told me that you trusted my medical judgement and that I would have your best interests at heart!" Watson railed, but he could see from Holmes expression that it was a complete waste of breath. "You do not screw around with a sodding brain tumour, Sherlock, you just don't!"

Even now there was no reasoning with the annoying little berk!

"I will decide what my priority is, once I've heard what Cassia Ingram has to say, and that is an end to it John."

And as if to underline the statement, the cab came to a halt at the curb and Holmes added: "We're here."