AN: ... There were some... difficulties with this chapter. My apologies for the wait. I suggest that Sam, Harlie, Olivia, and everyone else grab a tissue... Good luck. You'll need it.
Oh, and Harlie. I'm so so so sorry. May your feels rest in peace.
•••
John sat at the counter in the Vauxhall Bar and Club called 'Freedom', wishing that he could be as hopeful as its name. He stared at the drink in his hand until the bar's light shining through it made the image swim, and he tried to think back and count how many he'd had.
'Not enough,' was his initial thought, but he shook his head. More likely, it was too many, and as much as he'd like to keep going, he knew he had to monitor himself. He couldn't even try to get drunk anymore without thinking of Hamish, and God knew that was enough to slow him down.
Pushing the glass away, he turned his attention to the mass of people out on the club's dance floor. Well, one person in particular.
You'd never know it to see him during the day, but damn, could Sherlock dance. He wore black jeans and that purple shirt which had been just slightly loose-fitting a while ago, but now was just as ridiculously tight as it was normally meant to be.
John watched while a man walked up behind Sherlock, smiling. He spoke, and Sherlock laughed as he turned around to greet the other man, but John couldn't make out what exactly what had been said.
"Victor!" Sherlock exclaimed, laying a hand on the man's shoulder, "It's been a long time."
"Too long." Victor slipped an arm around Sherlock's waist, making him blush as John had possibly never seen before.
It occurred to John, suddenly frozen with an expression of poorly-contained anger on his face, that it was truly a fortunate decision to push his glass away, because otherwise it would be shattered now.
He watched as Sherlock clung to this other man and giggled like a schoolgirl at whatever was being whispered into his ear.
Thankfully, there was one miraculous corner of the club, in the far back, by the emergency exits, where the sound did not manage to reach ear-shattering decibels, and you could actually hear yourself think. John backed slowly towards that spot, making sure he kept his eyes on Sherlock and Victor the entire time, and pulled out his phone as soon as he reached it.
"John? What's – " Greg asked when he finally picked up the phone.
"Victor. Who is he?" John interrupted.
"Why – I don't – Victor Trevor?"
"Well, I don't know his last name, do I?" He tried to keep his temper, as Lestrade himself hadn't done anything to make him angry, but it was a struggle. "A Victor from some time in Sherlock's past."
"Ah. Yeah, that'd be Victor Trevor. He's, uh, pre-you." The DI sounded hesitant.
"The hell is that supposed to mean?"
"Oh, for God's sake, John, I know you're no him, but you ought to be able to understand some subtleties. Victor is Sherlock's ex. I don't know how much help I'll be, though, I mean, Sherlock's love life…" There was a slight pause. "Go ahead, you can say it."
"Not your division?" John couldn't help himself, even now.
"Great, so now you've gotten that out of your system, I'll get on with it." John could practically feel Lestrade rolling his eyes as he continued speaking, "They got together when they were at uni. Sherlock wouldn't exactly talk about it much, but it was pretty clear Victor was abusive. Mostly just using Sherlock for a good shag, anyway, and yet I don't think it even occurred to Sherlock to end things until he decided that Victor was, in fact, an idiot. You know how he is about – "
"I've got to go."
"John, what's going on? Is everything okay?"
But John wasn't listening. He was already making his way back, until he was close enough to hear them decently well again.
"I'm so very glad to see you, Sherly. Things didn't exactly end well last time." Victor purred.
The two of them were sitting alone at a booth. Sherlock was still wrapped around Victor, practically sitting in his lap.
"I know. I'm sorry, Victor, it's just that they wouldn't let me back to work on cases, and I had to – You know I love you."
John couldn't pretend those words weren't like a dagger in him.
Victor.
Victor, the abusive ex-boyfriend who had never loved actually him, was still in Sherlock's memory. He hadn't gotten deleted.
It wasn't fair.
"Let's just don't let it happen again, hm? You know what happens when you don't listen." Victor's smile was mockingly, deceptively sweet as he suddenly grabbed Sherlock's forearm so roughly that Sherlock cried out.
There was immediately no other thought in John's head than that he needed to protect Sherlock, and he rushed forward. Well, he tried to rush forward, but what with there being so many drunk-dancing morons in the way, it was more like a slow crawl.
By the time he had pushed through, Sherlock and Victor had clearly made up, and they were kissing much more passionately than John was comfortable with watching.
He turned away and sat down at an empty booth near them, trying and failing to make himself form a coherent thought.
In his peripheral vision, he saw a guy, not a bad-looking one either, coming towards him.
"Now, how does it come to happen that a man like you is here alone?" John heard him ask, but he held up his left hand without even looking over. "Oh," the guy said awkwardly, and he walked away.
He could still hear the apparently happy couple a few booths down, and he tried to take deep breaths, to calm himself. This wasn't his Sherlock, after all. The Sherlock he had lost wasn't the same Sherlock
that was in the club.
"John," he heard Sherlock say while Victor leaned in to kiss him again.
"John?" Victor parroted, pulling back and angrily sweeping the empty glasses sitting on the table to the floor, where they promptly shattered into dangerous-looking fragments.
"Who the fuck is that?" He pushed Sherlock strategically backwards, so that he landed on the glass.
"Victor!"
"You're a freak, Sherlock. A fucking freak... and no one in their right mind would even think about loving you."
"But – But I thought – "
"Oh, did you?" Victor snorted, "That's cute."
He grabbed his jacket from the seat beside him and marched through 'Freedom's' front doors, without a single glance back.
John was horrified that none of the people who'd been watching made the slightest move to help Sherlock. Sure, there were some clubs where this kind of thing happened two or three times every night, but this had never been one of them. He made his way over to Sherlock and knelt beside him.
"Are you alright?" he asked.
"I'm fine. Thanks. I just… My boyfriend…" John cleared his throat and raised an eyebrow at Sherlock.
"Ex-boyfriend," Sherlock corrected.
John gently lifted one of Sherlock's hands and turned it over. His palm was entirely red, blood running through the Lines of Head and Heart and Health and Fate and all that other nonsense like little rivers.
"Come with me," John said, helping Sherlock to stand.
"Where?"
"Back to my place," he responded bluntly.
Sherlock smirked.
"No! No, I didn't mean – I wasn't – I'm a doctor. Your hands don't look so good, that's all. I just want to help."
"Oh. Right." Sherlock tried not to let his teasing expression fall too much.
Together, the two of them walked to the curb outside, where the air had become the cold hostile air that Vauxhall Clubs had at night, and waited for a cab.
"221B Baker Street," John told the cabbie when they got inside.
Sherlock looked up at him abruptly.
"What?" John asked.
"Uh… Nothing. Never mind." He shook his head, but John continued watching him.
"Okay… Well, I think I probably shouldn't shake your hand, but I'm John. John Watson." He smiled.
"Sherlock Holmes."
They rode in silence for the rest of the trip. When, at last, they arrived at the flat and got out of the cab, Sherlock paused for a moment, in front of the stairs.
He saw something, rather like a memory, of being on those steps with John, kissing him. Not a memory, of course. Just what he would like to do. It was funny, though; he didn't tend to imagine things like that. John must have made a grander first impression than even Sherlock himself had realized.
"Alright?" John asked him, and he nodded.
Inside, Sherlock sat on the couch while John went to fetch his med kit.
"You know, I feel like we've met somewhere," Sherlock called to him in the other room.
"I think I've just got one of those faces," he dismissed, walking back in and sitting down beside Sherlock.
"No. No, wait a minute." Sherlock tried to remember, while John tended to his hands. "Oh. I, um, don't suppose you're that man I… saw, outside Doctor Milverton's office?"
"I'm rather afraid I am," John said, looking embarrassed, "Sorry about that. I thought you were someone else."
"You want to know something funny? I think I am, too."
"Sorry?"
Sherlock raised his eyes to John's, searching for some sign of trustworthiness, and dropped them again.
"This, uh, might sound strange, but… I feel sort of like the past few years are missing. People I don't remember dying are dead, and I've no idea what I was doing or where I was. I mean, I know I was somewhere, I know I didn't just cease to exist in 2010 and then reappear now, but... I don't know. Could be the drugs, I suppose, but I've never been susceptible to side effects like that before."
John blinked at his casual mention of drugs.
"Oh, no, it's – that's not – Doesn't matter." He gestured to the crook of his elbow, where a few puncture marks were still visible.
"Well," John began, "what do you remember doing – like, what were you? What did you do for a living?"
"A living? Ah, yes," Sherlock sighed, "That is what normal people do, isn't it? I guess you could sort of call it a job, if you like – I'm a consulting detective." He chuckled, fully expecting that John was lost at this point. "I'll bet you don't know what that means, though."
John suppressed a laugh.
"It means," he quoted, "whenever the police are out of their depth, which is always, they consult you."
Sherlock, looking rather stunned, grinned widely at John, and moved in to kiss him.
Though John did kiss him back, purely on instinct, he had to ask himself what he was really doing. This was not, after all, his Sherlock. Jumping into having a relationship again wasn't going to be good for either of them. He pulled away.
"Sorry," Sherlock said, staring at the ground.
"No." John gingerly touched Sherlock's bandaged hand. "No, just – let's take this slowly."
•••
John laid on the couch the next morning, staring at the door of Sherlock's old bedroom. And also, technically, Sherlock's new temporary bedroom. God, it was all so confusing. He couldn't deny, though, that it felt right to have them both on Baker Street again.
'Text Messages: Inbox - Greg'
'Listen, mate, when you asked if we're alright… Well, we aren't. JW'
He didn't have to wait long for a reply.
'What's wrong? GL'
'It's Sherlock. He, uh… Something happened during a private case we were working on, and he's lost quite a bit of memory – the past few years. JW'
He couldn't bring himself to tell the true story.
'Bloody hell. I'm so sorry. GL'
'Sorry? That's all you've got for me? I need some help, here! JW'
'Damn it, John, I'm a Detective Inspector, not a doctor. GL'
'You did not just. JW'
'I did, in fact, just. GL'
'Greg! JW'
'Okay, sorry. Look, why don't you go talk to Molly? Between the two of you, I'm sure you could figure out some of the medical specifics. GL'
'Alright, yeah. I will JW'
John left a note on the table, telling Sherlock that he had gone to see an old friend and should be back before too long, and then he headed to St. Bart's. It was strange, being there for the first time since Sherlock had been like this. There were just so many memories, good and bad alike, that it was overwhelming; the story of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson might as well have been carved into the walls.
Almost stranger still was walking up to the door of one of those labs. He nearly expected to see Sherlock bent over some microscope inside, and have this all start over again.
Instead, however, there was a striped jumper-wearing, high-ponytailed SpR.
"Knock, knock," John said, leaning in through the doorway, and immediately he heard Sherlock's voice chastising him: 'For God's sake, if you're going to knock, then knock. Don't just say 'knock knock', it sounds like you're about to tell a poor form of joke.'
"John!" Molly exclaimed, as she dropped everything she was doing to rush over and hug him. "How is everything? You two okay?"
"Not really, actually, that's kind of why I'm here. But what about you?"
Molly subconsciously rubbed the fingers of her left hand, and John noticed that she no longer wore a ring.
"Better," she said, "Now, what's wrong, and how can I help?"
John explained to her the same lie about Sherlock's memory loss that he'd given to Greg.
"Oh, but that's horrible!" she exclaimed, "God, I'm sorry. Just give me a minute."
John waited patiently while she pulled up, and then proceeded to scroll through, articles on her computer and flipped through shelved books with about a century's worth of dust coating them. Finally, she stopped and turned back to him, lowering her head to hide the fact that she was blushing.
"You know, John, um… Well, you shouldn't really mind this, but… sometimes…"
John furrowed his eyebrows and shook his head at Molly, utterly confused.
When she picked up her thought again, it was in a rush of words, pushed together and spoken so quickly that no one but those accustomed to hearing Sherlock Holmes rattle off facts could possibly have understood.
"Physical intimacy with someone who you share a strong mental and emotional bond can sometimes trigger memories to return."
John blinked in surprise, trying to process that properly.
"You're saying," he began, "that if I want to get my husband back, I have to shag my husband, who is not currently aware that he is my husband."
"That about sums it up."
"But how am I supposed to do that? He doesn't remember anything about us. He doesn't even know me."
Molly smirked at him.
"You caught him once, didn't you?"
"And will that really work?"
She shrugged. "I don't know, John. But it's all I've got, I'm sorry," she frowned, "You should go home."
•••
Back in the flat, John was greeted by Sherlock, sitting on the couch, wearing the same skinny jeans, along with John's own cable knit jumper.
"Hullo," Sherlock said pleasantly, "Hope you don't mind my borrowing this, it's just that my shirt kind of… had blood on it, so…"
"No, no, it's fine, but why didn't you take one of your – that is, one of the other shirts in the closet?"
John watched as the look in Sherlock's eye shifted over to deduction mode.
"The other shirts. Not yours. Boyfriend's? No, right. Husband's. Seems like you two are fighting, though. He's forgotten something. Something big. Wedding anniversary? He won't be back for a while, in any case. That's why you want me here, you're bored. I did see your ring at the bar last night. You made that man go away. Shame though. Judging by the state of his knees – "
"Okay, stop," John held a hand up, "Right there. Stop. I don't… I don't have a husband. I use the ring to make guys leave me alone, but... I used to be a relationship. It's over now, but some of his things are still here, and he's not coming back for them. You might as well take them, since you appear to be the right size for them."
Sherlock gave him that 'sizing someone up look' again, and smiled.
"So, you'd like me here for a while, then?" he asked, "Flat mate, even? Why would you ask me?"
"Come on," John laughed, "Who else would want me for a flat mate?"
•••
John was out buying groceries a few months later, reflecting on how things were beginning to feel okay.
They weren't how they used to be, but it least it was more or less how it had been in the very beginning.
Everyone essential had been informed that this was no longer the Sherlock they were used to, but rather Sherlock 2.0, and they were all treating him as such. It wasn't so hard, really, since he was almost the same. He was just… better.
Better, because he was happier.
There was no more pain. No more insufferable heartbreak and self-loathing, or any kind of memory of it.
That was not to say that Sherlock was normal, or necessarily in ideal health, but everyone agreed, in their hushed secret conversations, that they had never seen Sherlock in a better place. It was amazing.
•••
"And, milk," John said to himself as he grabbed some, "We get to have normal things in the fridge and pantry now. No more bloody heads or thumbs or microwaved eyeballs, thank God."
He was not exactly sure why Sherlock 2.0 was less inclined to insist upon conducting absurd experiments in their kitchen, but he was very grateful for it.
When John returned and opened the door to the flat, he immediately knocked over a stool that had been set not very far away.
"Jesus! What the – " As he looked down, he realized that a folded, place card-like paper had been resting on top of it: 'Dinner?'
John looked up and saw Sherlock, who was standing just inside the kitchen, smiling.
"Are you… asking me on a date?" John asked.
"Excellent deduction, Watson."
One thing that Sherlock had not lost along with his memory, John noted, was his very particular taste in dining venue; he found that they were eating at the same restaurant Sherlock had taken him to the last first time he had asked him to dinner.
This Sherlock may only have known him for a few months now, but their dinner conversation was still that of friends of years and years.
"What?" John asked at one point when their dialogue almost lulled, and Sherlock was grinning to himself about something.
"Nothing," he said jokingly, "So, have you ever gone out with a roommate before, then?"
"Ah, yes, in fact," John responded, "And let's hope that this goes better than that did. You?"
"I've no idea. Maybe, I suppose? Probably? Anything could have happened over the past few years, really, so… But Victor, that… that…"
"Please," John insisted, "Do call him a cunt. Because, in fact, he is, and he deserves it."
"Very well," he smiled, "Victor, that cunt who pushed me in a moment of anger that happily led me to you, roomed with me in college, but that was only after, and because, we got together. That really doesn't count."
Some time later, when the meal and the cab ride and the majority of the night were over, John and Sherlock found themselves standing in the middle of the main room in 221B, very awkwardly saying and doing nothing.
"Are you still insisting to take things slow?" Sherlock finally asked, to shatter the ice, "Because if you ask me, this has damn well been slow enough."
John laughed, took his hand, and walked to the upstairs bedroom that he had, for so long, been wishing not to sleep alone in any more.
•••
Late that night, after Sherlock had fallen asleep ages ago and even the moon had the sense to turn in, John still lay awake, mapping out a mental Venn Diagram of Sherlock vs Sherlock 2.0.
They were the same, really, but for one instrumental thing: the new Sherlock was the old, minus the drama.
It may have seemed a small thing, but drama was such a large amount of Sherlock's life.
He was an absolute drama queen. He thrived on drama, he created it, and it was drawn to him even when he attempted to avoid it. This new Sherlock had no issues of self-harm or depression, he'd given up smoking remarkably easily, and he had even gone clean when John voiced his issues about the drugs situation.
Still, there was no denying that there were two, distinctly different people, two personalities. The same body and the same ancient history did not make the same man.
Was John in love with two different people?
He shook the thought out of his mind. In the morning, Sherlock would be back. His Sherlock. It would all be over; he just had to wait.
In the morning, John opened his eyes and rolled over. Sherlock was looking at him, smiling.
"Thank you," he said.
"What for?" John teased back, incredibly relieved.
Part of him had doubted Molly's theory, but that doubt could be behind him now.
"Our first time together. I was starting to think it would never happen."
John's smile fell; their only hope, and it had not worked. He didn't know what he was supposed to do now.
"Did I do something wrong?" Sherlock asked, concerned, and John realized that there were tears in his eyes.
"Happy tears," he lied, not for the first time, as he wiped them away.
His Sherlock was gone, forever. This was not a reality he thought he would have to face. He could stand being without him, barely, when he had known they'd be together again, but this… There was nothing more to be done.
•••
Surely, if slowly, things began to revert back to what John recognized as 'normal'. Cases as bizarre as always, a partner as impossible to keep up with or understand at all, half the time, as always, and the people who had been there during everything, as always.
"This is the third, you know," Sherlock chirped to John as they walked into a crime scene one afternoon.
"Sorry?"
"Third murder with the same MO. They're officially a serial killer, now."
He sounded perhaps a bit more cheerful than was appropriate, but that was to be expected when it came to Sherlock and murder.
"Ah, yes. And those are always fun, right? Christmas?"
Sherlock made no attempt not to let out a joyful laugh.
"Just so."
They saw Sally Donovan from quite a ways away, and she them, and when they reached her, she lifted the crime scene tape with nothing more than a smile and a nod.
That was how it had been ever since the new Sherlock, except for a single remark John once heard her make under her breath in the very beginning, about how the freak was so much more bearable now.
Sherlock himself didn't remember, of course, but John was still having difficulty getting used to it. Even Anderson had turned from arch nemesis to tolerable acquaintance.
The house in which the murder had taken place was a beautiful, very new, and therefore very expensive, contemporary place.
A sign stuck into the grass of the front lawn said 'Open House: Three Bedroom – Two Bath'
"Which?" Sherlock asked Lestrade, as he joined them at the front door.
"Second floor, take a left."
And so they passed under the dining room's glass light fixtures and began climbing the stairs, which were lined along a wall of wood paneling and looking as if nothing supported them.
They found the body lying peacefully on the bed in the room Lestrade had directed them to.
Her ebony hair was perfectly curled, with a bow sitting on top of it that matched the color of her dress with layered skirts. Add on the round pink cheeks, long eyelashes, and glass blue eyes, and she looked exactly like a porcelain doll, sent to bed by the little girl who owned her so that she wouldn't be cracked during playtime. The two others had looked much the same; in fact, the young women could very well all have been related. Their dresses differed more than they had.
Everyone habitually took a step back, even if they were nowhere near the body, when Sherlock approached it.
After studying the fabric of the poor victim's outfit for no more than forty-five seconds, he clapped his hands together and muttered to himself, "Houston, we have a mistake."
"What's that?" Lestrade called, but when Sherlock went on, it was still to himself for about another thirty seconds.
"Serial killer's always hard, always tricky. You have to wait for them to…" He sighed, and apparently decided that Lestrade would become annoyed without an answer.
As he spoke, he grabbed a pen and paper out of the on-scene intern's hands and began to write. "The last two, the dresses were specific. Particular style, particular cut, particular brand. But they weren't store bought, you see, they just used bits and pieces of store bought ones. They're all homemade, this fabric and those stitches confirm it. Not by the killer, though; planning murders doesn't leave much time for the skills of Home Ec."
"I don't know, I hear Moriarty had a mean cross stitch," Anderson called from across the room.
"Shut up, Philip," Sherlock shouted, and he handed the paper he'd been scribbling on to Lestrade. "Run IP addresses that have made multiple purchases on those sites in the past month." And with that, he turned around and began to walk back downstairs.
"Oh, uh, is that it?" Asked John as he hurried to follow, "Are we done?"
"Well, I'm all finished, I don't know if you'd like to stick around to check out the house, maybe talk to the real estate agent or something – "
"Okay, okay, I get it. You can close your smart arse mouth now."
"Make me."
John took a breath and paused to consider something.
"Not here." It always made him glad to hear Sherlock laugh at something he'd said.
•••
The next truly memorable case came quite a while later, from a comic book artist's apartment in the city.
Lestrade had met them a short distance from the actual scene itself, this time, and he laid out the situation as they walked.
"Not the most usual cause of death I've ever seen, but then we don't call you for the usual ones, do we?" The DI said, "Top of his head's been cut open, like someone thought it was a jar lid and wanted to take it off."
"Like, Sylar-style?" Sherlock asked, drawing blank looks from John and Lestrade. "Sylar? From Heroes? Good God, and you used to pester me about never watching telly!"
"Heroes – wasn't that show, like, really bad?" John asked.
"Hey, the first season was good." Sherlock defensively pointed a finger in John's face.
"But, weren't there four seasons?"
"Yeah…" Sherlock seemed to concede, making a face at the thought as he lowered his finger. "I don't really understand how that happened. But in any case, that makes it boring. Copycat killers are always boring; there's no interesting motive, there's no original method. Boring."
"Oh, I'm sorry, would you like to go home and wait for someone to make you a better murder?" Lestrade spoke to Sherlock like a pouting child, and to be fair he did look very much like one.
"No," he sighed, "Since we're already here."
As he went over to the body that was sprawled on the center of the floor's mural, John and Lestrade hung back, searching for Molly in the crowd of doctors and detectives.
When they made eye contact, she nodded, and the three of them made their way to the breezeway outside.
"It's been a year and a half," she whispered, annoyed, "Don't you think we can stop having these little check-up-on-how-he's-doing meetings?"
"You don't have to whisper," John pointed out, "And don't worry, this is our last one unless something new happens."
"So, are we still agreeing to disagree?" Greg asked.
"I don't know," John replied, "Molly?"
"Look, I'm not going to argue with you, but I won't change my mind, either. This, the way things are now, it isn't right, and if Sherlock ever found out the truth about how it is – "
"But he won't," Greg objected, "And besides, what's the harm in how things are? Never in my life have I seen him this happy, even before things got really bad."
"Yeah, I second that," added John, "But even if I didn't, it's not like something can be done. We've tried any and everything that we could think of, no matter how strange the method that you found, Molly, but nothing has worked. If the old him isn't coming back, it's high time we all accepted the new him for who he is."
•••
"Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes," John sang quietly one day, as he walked around the house tidying up the random files that Sherlock had, once again, left everywhere.
"Are you actually singing Rent?" Sherlock asked as he entered the room carrying their one-year-old Dalmatian puppy, "That musical hasn't been on Broadway since '08."
"Yes, and it's been stuck in my head ever since then," John argued, "Haven't I said not to hold him like that? He's a dog, not a person. Don't baby him."
"Don't you listen to him, Domino," Sherlock said to the unknowing wide eyes of the pup, "You're more of a person than most people I know."
"Fair enough," John chuckled.
"Thank you. You know, if you were talking about us in that little song of yours, it's actually one million, fifty-one thousand, two hundred minutes. Well, almost that. It's not quite been two years."
"I actually can do elementary math, thanks very much. I wasn't singing about us, I was just living up to my dream of being Adam Pascal," he said sarcastically. He couldn't tell Sherlock, of course, that he did mean two years, and he was counting the days from the incident at Milverton's office, the days since this new Sherlock had existed.
Sherlock, after checking a message on his phone, suddenly set Domino down and headed for the door.
"Case?" John asked.
"Of course."
•••
When they arrived, however, John realized that there was no one there. No crime scene tape, no ME's or detectives, no sirens or police cars.
It was a safe bet to assume that there was also no body. John knew the building, though, and waited for the recognition of it to match up with a specific memory.
"Oh, I know this place," he said.
"Well, I should hope so. It was our first case." John turned to see Sherlock, on one knee beside him, "John Watson, the most amazing person I have ever known, you have changed my life forever. I can't imagine being without you. Will you – "
"Yes." John said, pulling Sherlock up so he could kiss him.
" – Marry me?" Sherlock finished, laughing.
"Oh. Yeah. Yes."
•••
"Beautiful," Sherlock commented, looking around at the interior of the log house in Sussex they were spending their honeymoon in.
"Very," John agreed, looking at his husband. One of his greatest joys now was the ability to call Sherlock his husband once more. Nothing had changed as far as the law was concerned, and the small ceremony they'd had was technically, unbeknownst to Sherlock, a renewal of vows, but it still made such a difference to have things back this way.
This time, it was Sherlock who pulled John to their bedroom and closed the door behind them.
That night, John stared up at the ceiling, listening to Sherlock's rhythmic breathing beside him. He was happy. For the first time in a long time, he was really and truly happy. This was not the life he had ever planned, and if he had known it would be this way in the past, he might not even have liked the idea, but now, in the moment, it was bliss. He fell asleep, content and thinking how very nice it was to do so.
A few hours later, he awoke again.
Nothing had particularly woken him, but for this slight nagging feeling in the back of his mind. When he looked over to the empty space on the bed, however, he suddenly realized.
Sherlock was sitting bolt upright on the edge of it, facing the wall. He did not make a single sound as John crawled over and lightly touched his arm.
"Sherlock?" He continued moving around the bed, until he was on the edge, too, and could see the look on Sherlock's face, his bloodshot eyes.
It had been so long since John had seen him looking as if he'd been crying.
"Sherlock."
This time, he did look up into John's eyes, and John knew before he spoke a word.
"I remember."
•••
AN: Please Review.