Sherlock's Medicine

Mrs Hudson ushered Mary into the upstairs flat of 221B early one afternoon and quickly disappeared downstairs once again. Inwardly she was happy that Sherlock Holmes was still alive, but she was still angry with him, and he could tell had not yet completely forgiven him for what he'd put them all through throughout the two long years he'd been away. He'd been back in London for almost a month now, and things were still fraught between John and he. Even John Watson however had had to admit that his best friend had been uncharacteristically quiet since his return. Even Mycroft - evidently troubled by his concern for his brother - had finally persuaded him to prescribe some mild anti-depressants for Sherlock – not that judging by the state of the flat, Mary now observed, he'd been taking them. It wasn't that the world's only consulting Detective was depressed in the clinical sense, but he'd been having a rather hard time readjusting to life back in London since his return, and his brother had been under the impression that the medication might in some way help.

Secretly the doctor knew that Mycroft's only reason for contacting him had been his concern that if left to his own devices Sherlock might once again turn to other, illegal substances. Nobody had seen him now for several days, and finally, unable to ignore his own mounting anxieties any longer, John had asked Mary to pay Sherlock a visit at home during her afternoon off.

As she stepped through the threshold into the darkened space which had once been at the centre of Sherlock and John's world, even she hadn't quite prepared herself for the sight which met her eyes. Sherlock had obviously seen fit to unpack since his return – the empty cardboard boxes which had once contained what had remained of his belongings after Mrs Hudson had got rid of what she could – were piled up in the corner of the room, but the rest of the flat was in disarray, and it looked as though the curtains hadn't been opened in days.

"Don't tell me," A small voice emanated from somewhere on the other side of the room, and Mary jumped as her eyes readjusted to the unnatural gloom of her surroundings, "he's got you checking up on me now has he? But he still doesn't have the grit to come and see me for himself?"

Her eyes quickly settled upon the source of the disembodied voice, and she smiled in his general direction as he waited for her racing heart to slow. Sherlock Holmes was lying on the sofa in a darkened corner of the room, buried underneath a pile of blankets.

"He's worried about you." She explained.

"He hates me." Sherlock declared. His voice was still strong, but he sounded tired – as though he hadn't slept in days.

"He doesn't hate you Sherlock," She sighed as she stepped over to the window in order to open the curtains and inject some much needed light into the darkened room, "he loves you. If he hated you he wouldn't care if you were still alive or not. He was a broken man when he thought that you were dead," she explained, "he's just hurt now that he's found out you've been alive all this time and yet you never even attempted to let him know."

As she threw the curtains open she disturbed a large plume of dust which had settled upon the surface of the fabric and was sent mushrooming out into the atmosphere, making her cough.

"I couldn't," Sherlock muttered sadly under his breath – and once Mary had sufficiently recovered herself she turned to look at him properly. She couldn't figure out whether the melancholic expression upon his face was born of an intense sadness, or whether he was simply brooding, but it was becoming increasingly apparent that one way or the other Sherlock had spent the best part of the past few days wallowing in self-pity, "they would have killed him if I had." He declared.

"I know." She smiled in sympathy.

"He doesn't need me anymore anyway Mary." He sighed, and there was a slightly bitter undertone in his voice as he spat, "He's got you!"

"He hasn't replaced you Sherlock," She tried to reassure him and began to busy herself with tidying away the empty cardboard boxes, piles of dust covered books, and what remained of Sherlock's chemistry set - the pieces of which had been carelessly discarded all over the room, "no one could ever do that. I might be his lover, but you're still his best friend. It's a completely different type of love." She explained.

"Can I just ask?" He snapped, throwing the blankets aside in a tempestuous display of his exasperation, and swinging his too-thin body over the side of the sofa as he tried to sit up. "Why do you even care? You don't know me!" He looked at her with venom in his eyes.

"Because you're a good man Sherlock." Mary sighed - sorting through a set of leather bound books in her hand, before deciding that the best place for them would be the empty bookcase pushed up against the wall in the furthest corner of the room. "Beneath that hard, cold, hard to reach exterior you hide behind you have a good heart. Only someone who cared for John very deeply would have done what you did, and made the sacrifices you made – and because you have a great mind, too beautiful a brain to waist it all moping around here." She said, gesturing at the state of the room in which he appeared to have been living.

"I'm not the man I used to be." He snarled. "I'm not the man I was when John first met me."

"But you could be." She urged him. Sherlock Holmes could be an awkward man to deal with at the best of times, let alone when he was in a fragile frame of mind. It had seemed to Mary from what John had told her of his best friend that he'd been the only one Sherlock had really listened to during the comparatively short time they'd known each other – he could calm him when he was angry, cheer him when he was low, and pull him up when he was unintentionally abrupt or rood without suffering too much reproach from the consulting detective. Mary too, just like her lover, could prove just as much a match for Sherlock Holmes, and was not so easily swayed by his display of temper. "You could have everything the two of you had before, and so much more. You've got a second chance Sherlock. Most people would give anything for that. Don't waist it."

"What do I do?" He asked her.

"You're home now Sherlock. You're not alone anymore, and believe it or not there are still people out there who care about you, people who never stopped loving you, and certainly never for a moment stopped believing in you."

"Yes, but what do I do?" He asked her again.

"You salvage what you can of the past," She told him, "you pick up the pieces and you start again. You get up out of that seat, you wash, you get changed, you go downstairs, you walk out of that front door and you face the world with your head held high. You prove to all those people who never gave up on you that their faith wasn't misplaced in Sherlock Holmes. From what I have hears you have nothing to admonish yourself for."

"And if I don't?" Sherlock looked at her, defiance in his eyes. "What then?"

"Well," She shrugged, "you could stay here, lie there for the rest of your life whilst the rest of the world carries on around you, and never look another person in the eyes or take a single case again. John and I would get married, and you might see each other occasionally but nowhere near befitting enough for the strength of the friendship I know you to both have… but somehow though Sherlock I don't think that's really your style. You're a fighter."

She rose to leave, feeling his eyes upon her as she made a move towards the door.

But before she left Mary turned to look back at the man one last time - still donned in dressing gown and wrapped in blankets upon the sofa. She saw the life return to that emaciated form and the sparkle to those cold, dead eyes, and she realised – there was no need for anti-depressants, this talk had been all the medicine Sherlock Holmes had really needed.