Chapter 11: Guilty cry in the night
Like a last drop of light in the darkness, Sherlock set alone in a room surrounded by nothing. The emptiness felt right. He was empty, he was nothing except a tool that Moriarty had made and used to hurt and destroy. Sherlock Holmes was nothing. The boy Sherlock had died the day he was taken. The boy with a soul and pure conscience, with a future, didn't exist anymore. Everyone around him, every person wanted to give him back the future of that little boy. But he wasn't that person anymore. This person was dead.
John appeared next to him, soon Mycroft would follow. The dreams had changed and Sherlock was used to them. When taking the drugs it was a different kind of guilt that haunted him in his dreams.
John looked disappointedly at him. As if he regretted having saved him. As if Sherlock was a waste of space. He certainly felt like that. The John in his dreams never said a word. But Sherlock felt the words, the words of his friend that had tried to help. But Sherlock wasn't strong enough and he didn't know where to find that strength.
Mycroft, his brother, who had done everything in his life toward only one goal: to find him. To get his little brother back. But Sherlock wasn't that little boy anymore; he was no longer that small child who had held his big brother's hand so as to not get lost. This boy couldn't come home anymore.
Why was it so hard to understand? Sherlock Holmes wasn't that boy and would never be that person. Would never be the one who would finished his studies in chemistry. Would never be the one with a group of friends with whom he would go out, maybe even spend a weekend. He would never be that person who could sleep without the nightmares.
Behind John and Mycroft more people were waiting. More people who he had hurt or disappointed, more people who felt pain because of him. More ghosts that hated him for destroying their lives. They came closer and closer.
Sherlock wanted to scream, to cry. He wanted them to disappear to stop existing. He wanted to be alone and forget the pain he felt inside his chest. He wanted nothing more than the feeling as if his heart could be crushed with one hand to go away.
But he was never lucky enough. He started to scream and to cry without feeling embarrassed. Wherever he was, the people around him had their own worries. They didn't care about someone having a nightmare. They had their own to deal with.
Lestrade woke up and sat upright in his bed. Initially he wasn't sure what had woken him but then he heard someone scream and cry and trashing around. He jumped out of the bed and ran through the door and down the hall. But there was no one fighting, his guest, the young addict had, fallen from the sofa. Still sleeping and prisoner of his own nightmares. He knew that waking someone from a vivid nightmare like that could be dangerous but he couldn't watch the boy cry anymore.
Touching the boy's shoulders he shook him. "Wake up kiddo. It's a just a dream. Wake up." As this didn't help and the screaming continued, Lestrade slapped the boy on his left cheek. The hot pain pulled him out of the dream. Frightened eyes looked up at him and didn't know where they were.
When the boy realized where he was and with whom, his eyes closed and he started to cry like a small child. Lost as to what had happened, Lestrade pulled the boy into his arms and held him. He let him cry and wet his pajama top with big tears. He let him hold him with shaking hands which were entwined in the fabric of his clothes.
It took a long time for a lost child to cry himself back to sleep. The tears slowed down and stopped and the shaking shoulders started to relax and go limp. Careful not to wake the boy again, Lestrade lifted him up and placed him back on the sofa and covered the thin body with the blanket.
With a steady hand Lestrade pushed a few stray hairs away from the boy's forehead. "What happened to you?" He asked quietly.
Sherlock woke up to the smell of coffee and felt nauseous. His stomach clinched and hurt. The only thing he could do to not vomit over himself and suffocate on his own vomit was turn to the side and he did. He first noticed the hand that had helped him to turn around or the bucket that had caught everything Sherlock had let out of his body when he was finished and nothing more left that could come up.
"Are you feeling better?" Asked a familiar voice that Sherlock couldn't name. He couldn't remember where he was or how he had ended here. He was lying on a sofa. That much was clear. "Lay back down for a minute, I will bring you a glass of water." The hand and the voice disappeared and Sherlock took his first look at the stranger's home.
The living room was tidy, a huge book shelf in the corner and a TV in front of the sofa told the story of a man who liked to read and watch sports. There was also a woman living here or better had lived. Small signs of an ongoing divorce were everywhere. The service weapon on a table beside the front door finally told him where he was. He had somehow ended in the flat of the policeman he had met in the old theater.
The man came back into the living room from the other door that lead into the kitchen, holding a glass of water and wet tea towel in his hand. He gave the towel to Sherlock so he could clean his mouth and then exchanged it with the glass of water when he was finished.
"Thanks." Sherlock mumbled, not sure what to say. Why was he here?
"You're welcome. You look a bit confused, so you don't remember why you are in my flat?" Sherlock nodded. "I found you passed out in a dark alley and nearly fell over you. Next time don't choose a place like that to take your drugs if you want to go on living Anyway, I wanted to bring you to a hospital and you tried to run away, so I took you with me. You passed out on the sofa and woke with a nice gift. Glad I saw your green face before you could vomit on the carpet." He didn't sound angry only a bit disappointed by the drug part but the man didn't mind him in his flat.
"Can you get up? You need a bath and a few clean clothes before we can start the day." Sherlock tried and with a little bit of help the way to the bathroom was manageable.
"My name is Greg Lestrade, by the way. I think we can stick to first name basis after the night we had." Sherlock looked at him a bit puzzled, what did that mean? Did he do something he would regret later?
"Whatever you think, it's not that. You had a nightmare and cried yourself back to sleep in my arms after I finally got you out of it." Sherlock nodded. That made more sense than all the horrific things that had ghosted through his mind.
"…Sherlock. My name is Sherlock." He got a smile from Lestrade. He sat Sherlock down on the toilet lid and let warm water into the tub. The warm water felt heavenly as Sherlock put his hand in it.
"Do you think you can manage alone or do you need my help?" Lestrade asked. Sherlock thought about it. He had from the beginning had the feeling that the man was alright but he didn't want to push his luck.
"I think I can do this alone but I'll call if I need help. I won't lock the door." Lestrade nodded, placed a towel next to Sherlock and fresh pajama bottoms and an old t-shirt.
"Not the newest clothes but everything else would be too big for you." He turned off the tap and left Sherlock alone in the bathroom.
Sherlock got up slowly holding himself up by leaning with one hand against the wall. He took off his dirty clothes and let himself slowly down into the water. A warm feeling began to spread through his body. Something he hadn't felt in some time. He sank further down until his nose was one centimeter over the surface. It was relaxing.
He had no idea what would happen next. Apparently he had embarrassed himself already by crying like a baby and vomiting into a bucket. It couldn't get much worse. Lestrade couldn't have called his brother without a name or anything and he hadn't brought him to a hospital. He was safe. The withdrawal symptoms were already there but he didn't have enough money to buy more drugs and the last had been in his system when Lestrade had picked him up.
Sherlock needed to think of the future but that was the whole problem; he couldn't with all the shadows that were following him from his past. He was stuck and needed help.
"…maybe he is the one that can help me find a way." Sherlock whispered into the bathwater.
After the bath and a good five times using shampoo and soap Sherlock felt better. He hadn't had a bath in a long time. He dried himself with the towel and dressed with the clothes Lestrade had given him. After the long time in the water he felt tired and wanted to go back to bed. The only question here was, could he stay or did he have to leave?
He entered the kitchen where Lestrade had prepared breakfast and suddenly Sherlock felt hungry, more hungry then he could ever remember being. His stomach growled at him and let his savior turn around.
"So I was right: under all that dirt is a hungry young man. Sit down. I made toast, eggs and bacon." Sherlock sat down and looked at his full plate; tea was placed next to it. He couldn't wait. Took the toast in one hand taking the first bite and shoveling eggs and bacon with force into his mouth. "Slow down a bit or you will make yourself sick again." Lestrade laughed a bit and sipped on his coffee.
Lestrade wasn't sure what he wanted to do now. He hadn't thought about it when he had taken the boy in. "Sherlock, alright?" Sherlock nodded. "You can stay here, if you want. I don't know what happened or why you ended up in that alley but that shouldn't be the way you choose to live." Sherlock listened and slowed down his breathing and his food eating for a moment. "If you want to stay you can but only if you forget about the drugs. There will be no taking or keeping drugs in my home."
Sherlock liked his voice even if he didn't understand why. "Think about it. You have all the time you need." And Sherlock thought about it. After having spent one night on the sofa. Cared for and having something to eat, actually being hungry felt good, too good to lose it again. Yes the drugs kept his mind free of the shadows but in his dreams they were still there.
"I would like to stay for a while, if I'm not in the way." Sherlock said with a weak voice. He could go back home to Mycroft and John's letters but for that he didn't feel ready yet. He wasn't sure he would ever feel ready again. This place was like a break. A break from his old life and from the one as an addict. This police officer was offering him help. Help he had asked for. Sherlock had learned early in life to take what was given and keep what was important tucked away. He could stay here and wait until he knew what to do next.
"Sherlock can you look at me? I need to ask you something and I want you to see that I'm not lying." Sherlock looked up, waiting. "I know you are probably hiding from something but I would like to have a number or address, at least a name of a person you consider family or friend I can contact if something happens. I won't call or look for that person without your permission, just in case, you know." Sherlock watched Lestrade, he was still good in detecting lies but he couldn't find one this time. Lestrade was telling the truth.
Sherlock took a piece of paper and a pencil that was lying in the corner of the table, probably to use for shopping lists or short messages to someone and wrote down Mycroft's name, number and address. He gave the paper to Lestrade who put the contact data into his phone and secured the paper in his note book.
Lestrade wouldn't call the man on the paper. He didn't even know who this person was for Sherlock. Until now everything was working out. The man he had picked up wasn't dangerous or anything. Of course that could change when the withdrawal symptoms started, when they would be all he could think about, when the pain and the need were in each of his cells. The first symptoms were already there and Lestrade had to decide what to do next with Sherlock.
After breakfast Sherlock started to feel restless. He knew what would come next and he didn't like the feeling. He had seen many people suffer after they couldn't get their drugs anymore. He had never wanted to be one of them but this had changed after he had had the first taste of blissful quietness in his head. The voices came back slowly. Like a tiny hole in your shoe that lets the wetness creep inside during the rain and drenches your socks.
Lestrade didn't mind having him in his flat. The man did his laundry, tidied up the kitchen and ironed his shirts for work. It was Sunday. Sherlock hadn't thought about the different days of the week for over a month. He couldn't remember the date on which he had left the life he had tried to build up forcefully. A life John and Mycroft and probably his parents too, if they would were alive, had wished for him to live. A life where he was still taking and giving nothing back. A life where he couldn't do anything for the victims of his crimes or the people they had left behind. A selfish life.
He didn't care about the reasons and that John and Mycroft had told him that he was a victim too. He had done things he regretted. He had regretted them before he had done them and still did. He had to do something for them. He couldn't just live and forget. He had tried that and it didn't work. Sherlock thought about it the whole day and most parts of the night without sleeping.
When Lestrade came into the living room in the morning, dressed and ready for work, he found Sherlock in the same position he had left him the night before.
"Did you sleep at all?" He had to ask, although he knew the answer. He at least received a head shake in reply. Sherlock wasn't much of a talker. He hadn't spoken after the breakfast while Lestrade did his Sunday routine.
"Sherlock, I'm off to work. There is food in the fridge, just put it in the microwave; and we have bread. Do you need anything else?" Head shake. "Good, see you in the evening."
Sherlock discovered Lestrade's absence only an hour later. He had answered the questions directed at him while on autopilot. He hadn't found the answer to his problem and got bored. Dangerous.
He got up and walked alone to the book shelf. Not many interesting things, mostly novels and Sherlock wasn't interested in the fictional lives of unreal people. Passing something like a desk he found files. Case files, real police investigations with real people, both victims and perpetrators. His hand touched one of the files; he opened it without thinking and started to read.
When Lestrade came home that evening he had nearly forgotten about his guest, but the light in the living room sparkled his memory. The key turned in its lock. He liked Sherlock. He was nice companion and he didn't felt as alone as he had before. Without his wife and only his job. The picture that greeted him was surprising and uninspected.
The whole room was covered in papers and pictures. He recognized the case files. Half empty folders and their content spilled across the room. In the middle Sherlock, reading a medical report of one of the unsolved cases Lestrade had taken home to pass the time during his boring evenings.
"Sherlock what are you doing? You can't just read those." He should have been angrier but he was tired after a long shift and one of his colleague's mistakes that he had had to fix.
Sherlock looked up. "Oh you are back." He took the notes from the floor (his own?) and walked over to Lestrade smiling. The first smile Lestrade had seen on his face.
"I solved a few cases for you. They are really easy if you know how and where to look. I wrote it down." Sherlock gave him the papers he was holding in his hand and Lestrade had to close his mouth that had fallen open.
He looked down on the scribbled words. They had on the top the case number, name or description of a suspect and the evidence or conclusion that had led to only that person. Lestrade looked up to Sherlock again after reading it. It sounded so easy.
"You solved all the cold cases?" Sherlock nodded. "All of them without leaving the house?" Another nod. He had to sit down. He couldn't believe that and sat down to think.
'If Sherlock was right, he had solved a dozen cases in the course of just one day. Of course he would have to check it first, but if he had solved them so easily without any training then either there was something wrong with the boy or the whole police force was incompetent.
"How?" He looked Sherlock in the eye and found something he hadn't expected. Shame.
"I… I have some experience and knowledge about crime and I'm sort of a genius according to my teacher. I'm sorry I didn't think about it, I just picked it up. I didn't know I wasn't supposed to look at them. But after I read the first page I wanted to help solve it. So the people could continue to live their lives and the bad people get punished." He sounded like a child, a child that was trying to justify his actions. Sherlock's eyes who had been filled with shame turned to another expression, one Lestrade could easily read: fear. Fear of punishment. Serious, painful and deadly punishment.