"I was never your partner, when I should have been. You lied to me and left me behind, when you could have brought me," John listed, only to wonder why they were having this conversation again. Sherlock flopped back on the couch, apparently just as bored by it. John waited, wondering what more he was supposed to say or do.
"So Magnussen," Sherlock started and John exhaled in relief. They didn't have to deal with it, talk about their emotions and come to a great understanding. They never had before; they didn't need to know. "Did you notice the one extraordinary thing he did?" Sherlock asked, turning his face against the couch pillow to face him. John shoved his hands into his coat pockets.
"There was a moment that kind of stuck in the mind, yeah," John replied, deciding not to approach the fireplace in case he'd start to smell it.
"Exactly; when he showed us the letters," Sherlock said, pitching his fingers in front of his mouth and grinning to himself. John huffed out a breath. "So he's brought the letters to London - so no matter what he says, he's ready to make a deal. Now, Magnussen only makes a deal once he's established a person's weaknesses- the 'pressure point' he calls it."
Sherlock rubbed his hands in front of his mouth, his eyes glowing with energy. "So, clearly he believes I'm a drug addict and no serious threat. And, of course, because he's in town tonight, the letters will be in his safe in his London office while he's out to dinner with the Marketing Group of Great Britain from seven 'til ten."
John leaned back down on Sherlock's desk, brushing the man's papers aside.
"Hence the cocaine," he said tonelessly. Sherlock rolled his eyes dramatically. John shook his head, trying to accept that this time, it really wasn't his concern. "What are the letters for then?" he asked instead and Sherlock glanced at him, looking pleased with the question.
"We'll plant a GPS tracker on them, confirm the existence of Appledore, and we'll have a virtual road map into it," Sherlock explained, his lips almost brushing his fingers as he spoke. John nodded and ran a hand over the papers on the desk, all lists of names and drawings of shapes he didn't understand.
"How - how do you know Mangussen's schedule?" he asked and the excitement in Sherlock's eyes faded. John wanted to curse, realization coming too late. "Janine," he concluded aloud, his shoulders falling. Apparently that wasn't a subject they could ignore for long.
"Who cares if it was Janine?" Sherlock asked, throwing up his hands and standing up from the couch.
"I care," John replied stiffly, deciding that this time he wasn't backing down. Janine deserved more than that.
"You don't even know her," Sherlock dismissed, as if he'd read his mind. John sighed. He was deeply disappointed in the man. There was no getting around that. This was a lesson Sherlock should have learned before, when they'd lost all they'd had to it.
"She loves you," he said finally, and because he didn't at all know if that was true, pointed at Sherlock's pocket. "Or she'll think she might after you hand her that." Sherlock stood in front of the couch, his arms crossed and his eyes flashing.
"Human error," he repeated.
"And not yours to use," John replied, doing his best to keep the pain from his voice. Was this how little Sherlock had regarded his care? Human error, but fortunately a convenient one when it meant that John Watson would keep his eyes fixed on him and not the breakaway cable or landing board or whatever it was that'd fooled the world?
"Oh, don't try to make this personal," Sherlock drawled, walking over the coffee table like it wasn't there and starting toward the kitchen. "How does one clean urine from a fireplace anyway?" he mumbled on his way from the room.
Damn it all.
"I loved you and you used me!" John yelled after him, hating that he had to drawl the parallel himself. Sherlock spun around, hate drawn on his face.
"But not for my own purposes! Not for a case, not for Moriarty. To save you, because I would rather let Moriarty live to watch me die, would rather break every bone in my body and see you live to hate me, than see you shot in the skull. A mistake, I grant you, given your very twisted priorities, general desire for living on the edge of death and inability to move on from mine. A state of mind I was apparently supposed to deduce from the moment you grabbed Moriarty to your wired chest and told me to run, a year before and significantly before you ever felt you loved me," Sherlock shouted back, striding back into the living room.
"If you'd never lied-" John started before Sherlock had fully ended his sentence.
"I did not know you loved me!" Sherlock shouted, throwing his arms wide. "Congratulations, doctor, you remain the one man I consistently fail to predict."
John stopped, his heavy breathing breaking up the sudden quiet. Sherlock watched him and slowly let his arms fall back to his sides.
He didn't know. Of course he didn't know. John wanted to shrug back into their previous silent tension but he didn't know how. Sherlock glared at him, his blue eyes as bright as ever and just as unfathomable.
"Lift-brand cleaner," John said finally, shifting his feet, and Sherlock frowned. "For the fireplace. It says 'multipurpose'. Should do it," he clarified. Sherlock blinked. His mouth twitched in a small smile.
"Do we own that?" Sherlock asked and it was John's turn to blink in surprise. 'We'?
"Under the sink," he answered finally and Sherlock went to investigate. John followed him.
"I'll do it," he offered, doing his best to sound resigned to it as Sherlock pulled himself out of the lower cabinet, the cleaning spray in his hand. In reality, he wanted Sherlock to hand it over. He didn't want this to be Sherlock's home only. He wanted his bloody chair back. He'd wanted to piss in the hearth himself, seeing Janine wander about so comfortably here. Instead he took the spray from Sherlock, grabbed an entire roll of paper towels and the rubbish bin, and settled himself by the fireplace to start scooping out the wet coals.
Unsurprisingly, it smelled like urine and char. No doubt he'd smell the same, after this.
"We need to get a chip on those letters," Sherlock mused, lowering himself into his chair, apparently just as happy not to deal with that shouting match. John huffed out a breath and tossed out a soiled mass of paper towels.
He didn't know. John sighed to himself, trying to wrap his mind around a genius who could have missed how close they'd become, how dependent and how caring. But, it made sense. Sherlock had not used his love against him, hadn't even really betrayed their friendship, when in his mind there was very little relationship there at all. John scraped at the sides of the fireplace, not sure that made anything better. Except that Sherlock cared about him, he knew that. He could remember lying in the hospital room, when Sherlock held his hand, as if checking to see if he'd collapse into dust at the pressure.
I told you I'd lost everything!
"Janine," John suggested finally and Sherlock tilted his head, obviously lost.
"You just said-"
"We're not using Janine, I know. But have you ever thought of just asking her?" John asked, doing his best to spray half of the bottle of multi-purpose disinfectant into their fireplace.
"Ask her to risk her life and all of her secrets to a man who entirely outflanks her?" Sherlock clarified, sounding disgusted with his naivety. John sat back away from the reeking fumes.
"That man just urinated in our chimney. Do you really think he treats his secretary nicely?" John pointed out, careful not to touch his pants with his soiled hands. Sherlock raised his eyebrows, considering it.
"I'll call her back," he offered. John nodded sharply, grateful.
"Good," he said.
"Tonight then?" Sherlock offered, rubbing his hands together. John blinked, unsure what exactly had changed between them that made him now want to accept, want things to get better.
"Tonight?" John asked, surprised it'd be so soon. Sherlock always put things off, when he didn't want to do them. Poor Janine. Sherlock truly didn't care. Sherlock tented his fingers in front of his lips.
"Well, surely we should not call her at work. Magnussen would suspect," Sherlock replied, flickering his eyes between John and the peed-on fireplace. John tossed out another handful of wet towels and pushed himself up to his feet.
"Well, then. I should… bathe," John admitted, looking down at his damp hands. Sherlock smirked in understanding and gestured at the bathroom.
"Your towel is still there," he offered. John blew out a heavy breath, remembering the set up he had at home; the handheld shower head and the washcloths drying in the tub. He still woke up too often, dripping sweat and panting for breath. A month ago he'd been sitting on this flat's tile floor, surrounded by pubes and dust bunnies and wiping blood off his knuckles.
"No.. Erm." John cleared his throat. "I should get back. Go… get fired," he said and Sherlock smiled in good humor. "Tonight," John agreed and finally left. It wasn't until he got down the stairs that he realized his knees were soaked with urine.
~~/~~
Sherlock pushed himself back into his chair, listening to John make his way down the steps. He wasn't supporting himself with his arm against the wall, like he usually did, never trusting his knees. His arms hurt.
Something had changed. Progress, finally, and Sherlock had no idea why. He'd yelled at John, repeated what the doctor had clearly already known, that in their friendship there had been no mention of love at all, and in his faked death nothing but misplaced good intentions. That did nothing to change the consequences of what he'd done, it neither healed John's wounds nor erased his mourning. Sherlock despised such arguments when he saw them - needless repetition of facts in steadily increasing volumes - and he certainly did not grasp their function. But now John had smiled softly, when they'd agreed to meet, and he was coming back to 221B at least once more, and Sherlock's world was unquestioningly better for it. Perhaps he could earn John Watson's regard once more after all.
He had quite a bit to thank Charles Augustus Magnussen for, if that was so.
~~/~~
John had barely cracked open the door before the cameras were flashing off in his face and the paparazzi started screaming. Magnussen, of course, he thought. Showing off the damage he could do and making a side profit from it. And perhaps, showing off that he knew John's pressure point; all of the triggers of PTSD. John smirked, elbowing his way through the shouting crowd. Apparently Magnussen was missing a few facts. Crowds were hardly his problem. He couldn't be alone; not an easy thing for anyone to find out about him without being told. He'd never told his therapist. Magnussen might know everything about England but he wasn't inside their heads the way Moriarty had been.
He lost the press past the turnstiles for the tube; apparently his destination wasn't worth two pounds thirty. He went back to the clinic to get fired. It was only 1:30, after all that'd happened. He got to the clinic at the same time as a pizza delivery man. John greeted the man with an awkward smile, walking up the brick steps to the clinic's red front door with him. John opened it for the man, trying not to think too hard about Sarah, stuck at the clinic unable to take a real lunch break without anyone to hold down the office. The waiting room was packed with frustrated-looking patients, filling every chair and overflowing onto the bay windowsill. The pizza man glanced around the impatient crowd, looking for his customer, and rang the little bell at the front desk. A teenager in cut off jean shorts and a loose sweatshirt snorted at the action.
"Good luck," he snarked. The pizza man rang the bell again, looking worried. No one answered. John walked around to behind the desk and pulled out his wallet to pay for the pizza.
"Leave it there," he ordered, not trusting his arms to hold the box. He nodded at the desk beside him and delivery man scowled, apparently finding him rude. John tipped him better for it and scanned the appointment list to see who was still in the crowd.
"Mrs. Parsons?" he called, seeing the old lady still waiting, her purse clasped on her lap as always. Her appointment was two hours ago. Apparently he was staying, until his patients were seen to and Sarah had time to fire him.
~~/~~
That time came past closing, after John had seen the last of his patients that were still around and Sarah had dealt with her own. He waited at the front desk, knowing what was coming, and bid goodnight to the pregnant woman Sarah had seen last. The woman left, remarkably good-natured despite it all, and closed the door after her. As soon as the front entrance door latched, Sarah poked her head out of her office, her expression grim.
"John, could I talk to you for a few minutes in my office, please?" she called before disappearing behind her closed door, no doubt moving to hide behind her desk. John glanced at the cold, uneaten pizza, wondering if he should bring it in for her. He left it.
He knocked before he entered, though he wasn't fully sure why. He'd not gone back for his slings and his arms felt like they were pulling fully out of his sockets again. He wasn't doing his recovery any favors. But it felt polite to knock and he did, despite the pain. The English were domesticated. He entered without waiting and moved to sit in front of her desk, glad to rest his arms in his lap. Sarah straightened the folders on her desk, collecting herself.
"Today did not go well, John," she said. John sighed, hardly going to dispute it. Sarah met his gaze, her green eyes dim with sympathy for him. John wanted to snarl at her.
Feel bad for Moriarty and Mike; they lost the majority of their skulls from this whole thing.
He stayed quiet and Sarah blew out a heavy breath.
"You said you wanted boring, when you started here, but it's - that's just not true. You chose Sherlock and his antics every time. Now that he's back - and you have to believe, I'm so happy for you, I really am -" Sarah inhaled like she'd forgotten to. "You're not a good employee, when you're his friend." She let that sit. John took the time to formulate his last ditch protest.
I'm not his friend anymore. That era is over. He jumped and I broke and maybe Sherlock wants to put it all back together again but I can't.
He opened his mouth, only to hesitate. None of that rang true. Surely, they couldn't do it all again, running about at odd hours, solving crimes and skipping work.
Why not? Something whispered at him. He licked his lips, unsure what to say and Sarah clasped her hands on the desk between them.
"I have to think about my patients. I have to let you go, John," she said and John forced his breath to stay slow. "It's not about the panic attacks, it's really not," she assured him and instantly made the whole thing worse. John rubbed at his knee, embarrassed, and she leaned forward in her seat. "It's just that Sherlock's back and now that you're healthy again, well," Sarah stopped and collapsed back in her chair. "Today didn't go well."
John did his best to smile, knowing not to start thinking about how he was going to pay his bedsit's meagre rent until he was out of the clinic.
"I understand. Thanks for - well, thanks for everything," he said, shaking her hand. Her hand was soft and familiar in his, a reminder of another thing he'd lost to his love for Sherlock Holmes. Perhaps that was the answer to the niggling little doubt making him want to pick it all up again; he'd never been healthy in his life with Sherlock Holmes. But then, he thought, watching Sarah smile ruefully back at him, that had never stopped him before.
A/N: A light at the end of the tunnel. What do you think?