It had been four weeks.

Everything was empty, her stomach of its food, or lack thereof, and her mind rid of her thoughts. She was numb, the world around her just an endless motion of taunting and screaming. Her chest coiled, replaying the scene in her head over and over, again and again. His fleeting words and the crushing image of his lifeless frame on the cement floor. She shakes her head, the image not leaving her until she does so. She can't help but soak in a sob, the energy too much and she find's tears already streaming down her cheeks, dropping from her chin with exasperated elegance.

She store at his empty chair, sitting in her own and tucking her legs in tight with her chest, breathing heavily. She hadn't been in this much pain since her father and his passing. Though it was slow it was there and after the third week of his absence it hit her with wave after crashing wave, turmoil creviced the small cracks that had etched into her form, each wave disrupting her family, it ripping like wet paper, torn apart as her sister wreaked havoc on herself. Her mother expecting just too much from the two of them, and she sighs, regret suddenly piercing her tightly in the abdomen.

She ran away after things got to difficult, leaving her sister and mother to join the army. She thought that would protect her, keep her away from the daily signature of pain that her mother dosed her with nonstop. And endless loop of 'Do better.' And 'It's not enough.'

For a time, she believed her mother was mentally ill, emotions in a spiral cage that had no exits. All doors gone and window's smashed; blocked with theoretical brick. It hit her it wasn't just a mental illness, her mother, a kind and nice woman had turned to ice due to the loss of their father. She just didn't know how to deal with it, how to center her gravity on life and found that pushing others to do something she wished she had done had somehow made her feel better about herself.

June's eyes grow into a blur and she flinches, her breath hitching as she attempts to inhale the now toxic air, in taking all the oxygen she could possibly maintain without hurting her lungs. As she did so, she felt all the water from her iris sting inexplicably and tremble down her cheeks as a river does its rocky path. His chair growing musky, just a blob that sat there with nothing but hate and sorrow.

She leans forward, inhaling and exhaling, counting as she does this. She was a mess. The kitchen was a mess, the living room was, her bedroom had tasseled sheets and pillows. She didn't know about his, though, she was sure that maybe it was clean. But she had yet to go in there, afraid she might suffocate on her own tears, die drowning in them. And that was just, how should she put it? A ridiculous way to die, nothing really leading up to it, just stupid and painfully so.

A knock on the door established her attention away from his chair, cleaning her eyes of the salty water that had made a home there, she stood from the less than comfortable chair and headed for the door. Before she could open it, Ms. Hudson inched in with a sad smile on her face. But upon recognition of June's tears, she put on a frown, brows furrowing into the steep of her forehead, her lips pursing.

"Oh, dear, it's late." She voiced, stumbling over to June in a fret. "Nearly three in the morning and you're awake?" She tried to scold June, but finds her words are too soft and soaked with melancholy that she can't contain a soft whimper between breaths. June eyes her, and sighs, nodding hesitantly.

She couldn't stand being in this flat anymore. She realized that she was just apart of it, when he left her, left everyone, that everything that had been placed as decoration was his.

She had only brought a trunk full of items for her bedroom and a small wardrobe that she had had for three years. Nothing of importance, nothing she held sentiment of, nothing to take absolute note of. But Sher- But him, he had a decapitated arm in the fridge she had yet to touch. Scopes and tubes on the kitchen table, a skull on the fire place and his neatly placed violin. Hell, even both the chairs, couch and T.V where his.

She was his.

And as much as she was akin to staying here, it didn't feel like home. It only brought a wrath of dismal, so much as breathing in the flat's air was as charming as the smell of death. And she hated that scent, the citrus of oranges and spice that was placid in his collarbones, and the tremor of tobacco that was ever slightly present in the small little corner near the fire place. Because that's where she had hid it, his smokes, and he always pretended not to know, but one night she had caught him and—and—

She stumbles over her thoughts, lost, and nearly breaks down into another sob as shivers wrack her body tightly. Her arms simultaneously clinching around herself, in attempt to make herself feel better, to not feel so empty and barren. But it was no means to an end and she cracked, Ms. Hudson dropping whatever she had in hand and coming over to her set place, bringing her into a warm hug.

"I know, I know…" She says soothingly, kind of her, really. But June just can't stop the tremors that snap her in two fold. "I miss him too." She voices selectively, and June can only feel the rush of more water lapse over her nose and mouth, scratching at her chin as she cages in the desperate wails that want to reach all four corners of the flat.

His flat.

It's his flat and she can't stand to stay here, not any longer. Four weeks and she was throwing everything away. What was the point of staying if he wasn't there? None. There was no one there to shriek about his boredom, about how simple some people are and that she was somehow something close to special.

She closes her eyes, the scene playing out delicately in her memory. His baritone theme, dark curls and hues that changes color when the east wind blew. Both of them, standing outside a recent crime scene, the cold capturing her foggy oxygen as it was his, and they're silent.

He's never this silent, and she grows wary of what's going on in that big mind of his. She takes a chance glance at him, his eyes narrowing down on a specific spot, but she finds it means nothing. Other than his thoughts had run ramped. She looks away, steeling her eyes on the park bench covered in fresh paint. Bad day, she takes note of, the sky covered from land to ocean in grey.

"June?"

His voice captures her in his question, his eyes stuck on her small little frame as she glances up with big hazel hues, and he sucks in a breath. She focuses on that for a moment, before answering his query.

"Yes?" he heaves in another breath, thinking something over, June notes. Seemingly content with the decision he made in his head, he tails out his scarf, the cobalt threads whipping in the frosty gusts of wind. He brings it down to her, wrapping it about her neck with care.

"You're cold." He states a matter of fact, and June realizes she had been shivering. She gives him a soft smile, bringing up the fabric to cover her chin and lower lip. It smells like him, citrus and spice, and a thin coat of tobacco. Damn him, he wasn't supposed to be smoking, little wretch.

"Thank you, Sherlock" at her words he does this weird thing with his lips, his eyes scanning her as she takes in another breath of his scent, though she's sure he didn't see that. But she can see that weird thing, the small turn of his lips before he turns back to stare off in the distance. And in moments like these she can't help but feel her body warm up on its own. The whole conversation as mundane as it gets between the two, and she loves it.

"Chinese?" she nods, and they both leave before Lestrade can bother them with the paper work.

She squeezes her eyes shut, and she can't control the simper weep that dances from out of her mouth. She bites her tongue and Ms. Hudson leads her back to her chair, sitting her down with a small but sad smile, as if she's biting down her urge to cry with her.

"I'll go make some tea, dear." She walks off, messing about in the kitchen and all June can do is begin to gawk back at the chair, like it had done something to her, and her eyes go dark as she breaches the center of the mantle lividly. She suddenly hated the chair, despised it; why? She didn't know, didn't want to; because she was afraid of what might be the outcome of her inexplicable spite.

Ms. Hudson comes back wandering in, tea in hand as she places it down next to June, eyes seemingly searching for her. But found nothing but a sterile glower that was pointed down at Sherlock's empty seat. She rubs June's arm and places the tea cup on a nearby surface, taking pause as June huffs.

"I can't stay here." She murmurs and Ms. Hudson, about to leave halts. Hauntingly, she bites down on her cheek as the old but endearing woman looks at her in minor disbelief and more over doleful tones. "I'm sorry, I can't I just can't." June manages to keep in her striking wails, and keeps her voice shaky instead, trading one for the other. "Not while he's gone, I can't do it I can't—" June breaks down on herself, tumbling and shattering.

Not that she wasn't already. But somehow, just somehow, she had managed to break herself more. Her voice cracks, what's left of it and her shoulders tremble gravely as she clutches as her chest. Her sobs interrupting her own foul comments, bringing her to hold herself once more, desperately so. And Ms. Hudson holds back her own, her sorrowed and hallowed out whimpers as she slowly marches over to June, eyes wide and disbelieving.

"No, don't say that—"

"I can't." She states, nearly snapping at the kind woman and she holds her tongue, sucking back in the sobs with what dignity—you know what, fuck dignity. She ducks her head into her now folded arms, wails of crestfallen composure as the world around her crumbles. Her world being this flat, that stupid blog, the cases she took up with her mad man. It had all fallen and she was sure there was no possible way she'd be able to pick up the pieces. Ms. Hudson wobbles over, bringing June into an extremely tight hug, and all June can inhale is the smell of honey. And she feels the guilt wrap around her heart with the thorns of a rose.

"I'm sorry." June manages between sobs, her salty liquid of distress soaking Ms. Hudson's blouse. "I'm so sorry, I just can't, I can't" Ms. Hudson nods into the crevice of her navel, a long contempt whimper seeping out of her. They sit there, she doesn't know for how long, but enough for the tears to stop running a muck on June's face and she pulls back.

She sits up right and leaves Ms. Hudson at the chair for a moment, before turning to her. "I'll be gone in a few days, I just—" She takes a breath, her eyes stinging in her moments of calm. "I just need to find a place…" Ms. Hudson nods, understanding in her features and slumped shoulders. Giving her one last hug Ms. Hudson wanders down the stairs and into her flat, leaving June alone.

She silence is overwhelming, and she can't but help feel it sweep her under her feet and tear her apart at the edges. She about leaves, ready to retire in her bed when she pauses, her eyes following down the hall to his bedroom door and she finds herself inching over to it, like a child does candy, with sweaty palms and tired eyes she enters.

And the crisp scent of spice and citrus runs into her, bashing her chest in as she breathes in his all too well known scent, and she feels like crying again. Nothing has been touched, not his bed, wardrobe, the clothes on his floor…she urches in the doorway like she had just invaded his privacy, and she had, in a way.

Eyeing the room she moves without thinking, and sits at the edge of his bed. Lying down she brings herself to her side, sliding one arm underneath his pillows, still atop his blankets with a shiver. She breathes him in, the fragrance all but calming her down, second by second, minute by minute. And temporarily she feels as if he's there with her, and feels her faded mind begin to roam.

She closes her eyes hesitantly. Falling asleep to the comforting aroma that is- was Sherlock Holmes. This is all she had, and it's what she'd take before she'd left.