CHAPTER 10: MEMENTOS IN A TIME OF HEALING
AUGUST 2013
If it's not inconvenient.
JW
I promise, it's not.
Be there at 4.
MM
They met again at Vivian's Café shortly after John's shift ended, and once again, Mary arrived first, restless and in a state of anticipation. Before leaving the flat, she had foolishly spent twenty minutes changing tops and another twenty in the bathroom fighting the mascara tube and trying to get her hair to fall just right. She didn't often bother with makeup. Now she regretted her lack of practise. She hoped she looked casually thrown together—though admirably so—and by the time John joined her, she had already ordered their drinks.
'Any luck?' she asked, once he had settled and sipped from his steaming mug. He looked a little tired, having just come from work, but the grin he offered her belied any fatigue.
'Let's just say that quicker minds than mine probably would have cracked it by now,' he said.
'I've had those letters for months, and you can see how far I got,' she replied. 'Can't expect you to have made much more of them in a single evening.'
With an ingratiating but self-defeatist kind of smile, he produced one of the envelopes from the inside pocket of his jacket and showed her his discovery. 'Any idea what it means?'
But she had never heard of A.G.R.A., and was a little embarrassed that the faint watermark had escaped her attention all these months. She supposed it was a company. A manufacturer or business.
He explained how he had spent hours already searching those initials online but had come up with very little. A Sussex-based insurance company (Automotive General Retail Agency), a brewery in Soho (Aggie Red Ales), a recycling plant in Romford (All-Green Recycling Action), landscaping business in Bristol (Allen's Garden-Ready Artistry), and a dozen others besides. But nothing that pointed them to a bank or loan service.
'Could just be the logo of a stationery company out of China or something,' said John, conceding that he may have been off the mark from the start. 'You can probably pick up a box of them at the Paperchase.'
'These came from Mumbai.'
'The first one, maybe. But the thing is, Mary,' he said, 'I don't think they all did. Only, someone wanted you to think they did.'
And he showed her how the postage didn't add up to international rates, and one of the envelopes didn't carry an Air Mail stamp at all—like someone had forgotten to include it. A mistake.
'Houston, we have a mistake,' he said jokingly, a small smile lighting his face.
'If not from India, then where? Who's sending me the letters? What does it all mean?'
'I'm working on it.'
He texted her next day from the Chiswick Post Office to confirm: the letters had almost definitely originated in London, and a storm had just rolled through, and had it reached her in East London yet? and for the next twenty minutes they texted back and forth about a time Mary had been renting a sub-level apartment and it had flooded in torrential rains, and John returned a story about a water main bursting in the dead of winter just under his parents' flat when he was a kid, and before long, they were typing out jokes about dog owners who dressed their pets in raincoats and boots to walk them in a downpour.
The day after that, he phoned to ask if she had wired any money at all to the account number provided to her with the first invoice. Embarrassed, she admitted that yes, she had: two hundred pounds, as a gesture of good faith, when she had still believed it was she who was in the wrong.
'Do you have evidence of that transaction? Bank receipts or confirmation email?'
'My bank should.'
They met up again at NatWest Bank on Shoreditch High Street where Mary had maintained an account since she was fourteen years old, her father having co-signed, and where she had closed her father's account upon his death and consolidated it with her own, inheriting all thirty-two pounds and fourteen pence of what he had left behind. There, they talked to the bank manager and got copies of the money wiring transaction.
'It's not a bank,' the manager said, directing their attention to the routing number. 'It's a brokerage firm.'
'Out of London?' asked John.
'No, Mumbai.'
They exchanged meaningful, troubled glances.
It was late by the time they left the bank, and a tandoori restaurant conveniently located just across the street tempted them both. 'You've been more than generous with the coffees,' said John. 'Let me get this one.'
And so it went. Over the next few days, Mary could scarcely be parted from her phone for two minutes and had even taken to bringing it with her into the bathroom while she showered, in anticipation of John's phone calls. And call he did. There was always a reason, of course. A question regarding her father, or a point of clarification regarding the timeline, or a request for writing samples and old receipts and emails. But inevitably, the business aspect of their conversation melted away, freeing them to talk of the quotidian and inconsequential, and it was these conversations that highlighted her day. She hated hanging up. She looked for excuses to accompany him to wherever he was headed next as he chipped away at her case—a case she was guiltily hoping would prove unsolvable, at least for the foreseeable future. Once it was resolved, for good or ill, what excuse would she then have to talk to and see and think about John Watson?
But on the sixth day since their first meeting when John had agreed to serve as her very own private detective, her phone didn't ring. She watched it all day and carried it around in her pocket, waiting for it to sound and vibrate, but nothing. Night fell, and she found herself on the sofa, the telly blaring in the background, holding and staring at her silent phone as the clock turned midnight.
She debated, next day, whether to call for an update or choose the more mature and dignified route of acting the adult who did not regard hired services with girlish fancy, no matter how charming or attractive. (Though lord, he really was just so charming and attractive.) It was silly of her, really, that she was so taken with him. She barely knew him. Not properly. Reading his blog and cornering him at work and sharing a few cups of coffee and some evening strolls hardly qualified as knowing someone.
And as for him getting to know her? Well, that's just what detectives did. Wasn't it? He had been gathering information on his client, that was all. For God's sake, Mary worked at a florist's and greenhouse, and seasonally as a reserve ballet instructor for five- to eight-year-olds. She barely made rent every month and had, more than once, had her power turned off for late payments. John was a doctor. He probably dated other doctors and nurses, if he dated at all, if he was not already committed to someone, which, Mary realised with deep chagrin, she had no way of knowing. It hadn't exactly come up in polite conversation. He probably lived in a posh flat and never even thought about his bills. At least she hadn't confessed her fancy to Samantha. As yet, she hadn't even told her sister she had followed through with hiring a detective at all. And so, chiding herself, she resolved to put John Watson out of her head once this was all over, and to stop imagining their interactions as flirtations or their coffee dates as dates.
That was, until nine o'clock that evening, when her phone sounded and John's number lit up the screen. In that moment, all the suppressed feelings returned to flood her system, and her stomach did a cartwheel.
She cleared her throat and affected a tone of professional disinterest. 'Hello?'
'Mary!'
She sat up to the edge of the sofa. On the other end of the line, John was panting. 'John?'
'It's—it's done! It's over. The letters, the debts, A.G.R.A., it all came together, like—pow!—and there were maybe a dozen of them, by my count, maybe more, all over southern England, and I put in an anonymous call to the NFIB, and—fronts, Mary, all fronts, the brewery and the traveller's insurance, every single one of them, thousands, no, millions of pounds—'scuse me, mate—and you're not the only one, there are hundreds of victims, hundreds, but these people got greedy, they made themselves vulnerable, and, and, and it's done!'
'John, slow down!' she said. She was on her feet now, charged with energy and turning in circles. His euphoria was so palpable her whole body tingled with it, but she didn't understand a word he was saying. In the background, she thought she heard the blare of a horn. 'I can barely understand you!'
'I'm on the street. Trying to catch a taxi. Can I . . . can I pop over? Only for a minute.'
'Yes!' she shouted, then clamped a hand across her mouth, wincing. Professional disinterest indeed. Dropping the hand, she said in a much more measured tone, 'Yes, of course. Please do!'
She gave him her address, and before twenty minutes had gone by, he was ringing her buzzer, every bit as excited as he had been on the phone. Coming into her flat, he positively glowed. The air was so electrified, she thought he might sweep her off her feet, and she was ready to throw her arms around his neck. But nothing such as that happened. She needed to calm herself down.
'Bad news and good,' he said as she pressed a cup of tea into his hands and ushered him to the sofa. His face was flush with excitement, his hair a little wind-tossed. She wanted to touch it.
'Bad first, then.'
She didn't touch it.
'You'll probably never see that two hundred pounds ever again.'
'I thought not.' But she was grinning, because he was grinning. His happiness was a contagion. 'And the good?'
'Let's just say, your debts have been cleared. Every pound and penny.'
She gasped and clapped her hands, so happy she could kiss him but glad she had more restraint. 'Tell me everything!'
The day before, when he hadn't called, John had taken a personal day from work to continue his investigation, which up until then bore every sign of fruitlessness. His search for the brokerage firm in Mumbai had been a dead end, as were his amateur attempts to detect the forgery in the handwritten letters. Desperate, he decided to follow what he was sure would prove to be another useless lead: the envelopes.
That is, A.G.R.A.
It was pointless; he knew it was pointless. Nevertheless, he walked into Aggie Red Ales, a run-down brewery in Soho. Walking up to the bar, John asked to see the person in charge, the manager or the owner, and the young barkeeper disappeared for a moment to the back room, returning with a man of an age with John. He showed him the letter, the watermark. 'Know anything about it?' It was subtle, the tick in the man's left eye, almost too quick to catch. Then the question. 'Who sent you? Who are you with?' For John's rather innocent question, the reaction was a hostile one, and he had to be quick on his feet.
'Just an interested party.' He didn't know what made him say what he said next. 'Interested, that is, in a loan.'
The man signalled him to the little office in the back. John's heart was pounding, knowing he had just tapped into an oil field, though he had no way of knowing just how rich that field really was. 'You one of Wilcox's? Ashton's?'
'Ashton's,' John said smoothly.
'Bring the dosh?'
Thinking quickly, he fell into playing the part. 'No. I wanted to make sure this thing was, you know. Legit.'
'You shoulda brought the dosh.'
'I thought this was a loan.'
'Yeah, it is. But I need a good faith payment. Didn't Ashton explain it to you? Two grand in the pot and a signature on the dotted line, you get your twenty, and we put your two toward initial interest.'
It sounded like a swindle. At best.
'I'll be back tomorrow,' said John.
'Not before five,' said the man. 'You come in before, I won't be here. Got me?'
'Got you.'
He left quickly, mind reeling and aided by the adrenaline in his system. He felt alive in a way he hadn't for a long time. Thrilled with the chase, the blood pumping through his veins. So what did he know? He knew the Soho brewery was a front for an illegal business. Maybe money laundering. Maybe extortion. He wasn't sure, and he also wasn't sure whether Mary and those letters were necessarily connected to Aggie Red Ales. He needed more information, more data.
So he went next to the All-Green Recycling Action in Romford, and he played the same game, and nearly the very same script followed: two grand in, twenty out, no interest for the first few months. And again, a phone call to Allen's Garden-Ready Artistry in Bristol. The woman on the other end was less inclined to talk to him on the phone, but the impression she gave him was the same. Something fishy was going on. And John, looking at the growing list he had compiled of businesses in southern England containing the initials A.G.R.A., knew he was in over his head. If he only had a partner, someone to talk through it with, someone to give him direction, someone to have his back if he found himself in a dangerous situation, it might have been different. But as it was, he was alone. He had come so far, and could go no further.
Deciding it was in his best interest—and Mary's—he gathered together the evidence Mary had given him and all of his notes, and in the privacy of his bedsit, with the paper work spread out on the floor around him, he called the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau to report his suspicions.
The news would later name him 'an anonymous tipster', after the spout of raids on sixteen illegal money laundering businesses throughout the South. The police had already caught the scent of something criminal in the air, but they had had no idea they were dealing with a sort of conglomerate. They were thin on evidence, had no witnesses, and had not discerned the connective tissue shared among the fraudsters: essential components to solving the case. John provided them with all three, enough to set them on the right trail and bring down a network of blackmailers.
'Hundreds of victims', the news reported, and 'millions of pounds in alleged debt'. Mary hadn't been the only victim. She hadn't been the only one receiving letter after letter with a debt that mounted exponentially with each renewal. Like Mary, others had panicked, but unlike Mary, many of them had begun to pay it back, whatever they could in whatever amount, some to the tune of tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of pounds. It was uncertain whether any of that money would ever be reclaimed. Criminal charges were filed, court proceedings commenced.
But what no one would answer—or possibly even could answer—is where all the victims' names had come from. Not everyone had wandered into a laundrette or computer repair shop or deli looking for a loan.
It was a matter for the police. As far as Mary Morstan was concerned, the nightmare was over. Something else had begun.
SEPTEMBER 2013
Samantha teased her sister about dating a doctor. 'Lucky girl. Doctors, they know their anatomy,' she said impishly. 'They know all the pleasure centres.'
'Sam!'
'Oh, listen to you, acting all prudish. Don't tell me this Dr Watson hasn't yet given you'—her voice went sultry—'a thorough examination.'
'I'll hang up this phone, I swear to God.'
Samantha just laughed.
In truth, Mary was pleased that Samantha was so happy for her, and that for once she had no critique of her choice. She didn't confess the full details of how they met, not even that John had been her detective and the man who had instigated the raids on the A.G.R.A. that brought her year-long worries to an end. 'We met at a café,' she said, 'not far from where he works.' That was true enough.
Though Samantha pressed for more details (the simple and the saucy), Mary was disinclined to satisfy her. She wasn't sure why that was, exactly. In the past, she had been plenty forthcoming about things like that, with her sister at least: so-and-so was a good kisser, but oof, the body odour had been unbearable; or what's-his-name was a selfish lover, and let me tell you exactly how. With John, though, she wanted to keep things more private. Maybe it was because he himself was such a private soul, and giving away too many of the details of their intimate moments felt like something of a betrayal. Maybe it was that they were moving so slowly and there wasn't really that much to tell yet. But more likely, Mary thought, it was because there was something about John, about their relationship, that was different from all those that had come before. From the very beginning, she felt the difference like it was something tangible, something warm and all-encompassing, like a new jumper that would one day become a favourite—worn often and in all seasons—and she had the presence of mind to know it from the start, and so treat it with great care.
So yes, they started slowly, but with exclusive attention. Coffees at Vivian's Café soon added sandwiches and hours-long conversations, which led to long walks in Kennington Park. At first, John walked close but with his hands in his pockets. But after three days of this polite distance, Mary grew bolder and slid her arm through his. A short while later, he extracted his left hand from his pocket and reached for her hand. He twined his fingers with hers, and Mary felt like they had walked together like this a thousand times before. It wasn't a matter of figuring out how to fit together. They just fit.
They spoke easily, like old friends with a lifetime of catching up to do. John was warm and honest, but Mary discovered early on that there were certain subjects—details from his past—that he would gloss over, step around, or outright avoid. The war was one. The recent death of his sister was another. Sherlock Holmes was the third.
Only once did she get more than two words out of him about the mysterious detective, and it was in the early days of their courtship, when she didn't yet understand the delicate nature of their friendship, or how exactly it had ended.
The weather was still lovely and the trees a mixture of golds and reds. They walked hand in hand through the park on their favourite paths. John had an hour free between shifts, and he was choosing to spend it with her. Conversation flowed easily as they continued to learn the details of one another's lives. Mary found herself doing the majority of the talking, but that wasn't to say John wasn't reciprocal, just less verbose. This particular afternoon, they had been talking about places they had lived in the city, and the times they had spent away from it. She spoke of coming to London with her father at eight years old after her parents' divorce and moving house frequently until she went off to university. John, she learnt, had been born in London, had gone to uni and studied at Bart's and found work, all in London. The only period of his life spent away from the city he loved, he said, was during his deployment to Afghanistan. 'After that, I lived in a miserable little bedsit for a stint, then on Baker Street for a spell, and I've been on Maude Street for just about two years now.'
'This was after your friend died?'
Though he didn't stop short, she felt the hitch in his step, and watching the side of his face, saw his features change from relaxed to guarded. A smile was forced to his lips, the kind (she would learn over time) he donned to mask whatever true emotion lay beneath.
'Erm, yes. Not long after.'
'I'm so sorry,' she said. 'Losing my father was the hardest thing I've ever gone through. Getting that phone call, you know?'
'Yeah.' He looked straight ahead, the smile gone. 'The phone call.'
'Why did he do it?' She regretted the question at once and tried to retract it. 'I'm sorry. I shouldn't ask.'
But he answered: 'Someone convinced him that his life was over. He believed it.' Then, more softly, almost like he was talking to himself, he added, 'Some days, I understand that feeling.'
It wasn't the first time she had sensed a profound sadness in him, but it was like he had finally opened a window and let her peek inside. Still, it wasn't an invitation to walk through the front door. She tightened her hand around his, rested his head on his shoulder, and squeezed his arm. They walked on in silence.
NOVEMBER 2013
Mary couldn't say when it was she fell in love with John Watson. It happened over time, a course of days and nights and sunset walks before shifts and early mornings over coffee, fingers touching across the table, shy smiles from across rooms or in close proximity. She knew it was real, one night, when he stood in her doorway to bid her goodnight, but she wanted him to stay, and not just for the night, but for always.
His hand held her hand, lingering, his skin warming hers at the point of contact and beyond. The words were on his lips, just there, ready to be spoken—Goodnight, Mary—but he didn't say them. She didn't want to hear them. In the soft evening light, his blue eyes never fell from hers but once, to graze her lips, and with gentle invitation, she stepped back into the flat. He followed. The door closed. He touched her cheek. She brushed fingers through his gold-and-silver hair. Slowly, he cupped the back of her head, and she tilted her chin up to meet him. They closed their eyes, guided now by bodies in sync—limb, breath, and heartbeat. He kissed her. Tentatively, at first, as though he thought she might push him away, or that the ground might fall out from under their feet. As far as she was concerned, it had. So she held on, that they might fall together. That night, he stayed, and in the morning, as the sun peeked through the curtains and she lay in his arms, she knew it for certain. She was hopelessly, irrevocably in love with John Watson. Perhaps the sentiment was saccharine, but she couldn't deny it to herself: it was the kind of love people died for.
Though they saw each other nearly every day, and sometimes through the night, it was weeks and weeks before she ever set foot in his flat. It was too small, he said, and not worth the visit. The Bolt Hole of John Watson, she started calling it, and John's Mystery Flat, and she teased him that it was where he kept the bodies, that it was a shrine to his unspoken brony obsession, or that it housed his secret second family. He joked back that it was haunted: 'The ghosts don't take well to visitors.' She laughed.
When he at last relented to letting her come by, just for a spell before they went to the ballet, she prepared herself for a flat worthy of Britain's Biggest Hoarders or some other secret shame. What she saw was quite the opposite. It was a bedsit, less a flat and more a storage locker with a bed, immaculate and tidy, less so because of any great organisation but more for lack of property. A single bed, a desk and chair, and a tiny kitchenette with a small fridge but no oven. A wardrobe stood next to the door leading to what must have been the bathroom, though the door was closed. A small bookshelf, only half filled, stood beside the bed. There weren't even curtains in the window. It didn't seem right, that a doctor should live like this. Or anyone, for that matter.
'No TV?' she asked.
He smiled, closed-lipped. 'I don't much like the news.'
This was not a home. It barely qualified as a place to live. In fact—and she was loath to admit it, even privately—the flat put her in mind of a prison cell. She hated it.
John walked to the desk, where the two tickets to the ballet lay waiting for them, and Mary spotted something else. Besides the books, there seemed to be little by way of personal affects. No pictures, no daily clutter of mail or keepsakes. But on the desk, beside a white RAMC mug, was a crystal ashtray.
'I didn't know you smoke,' she said, pointing to it.
He looked confused, then saw her indicating the ashtray. 'Oh,' he said. 'I don't.' He picked up the ashtray, turning it over in his hands like he didn't know what to do with it; all the same, he handled it with care. 'It's just, erm, it was a gift. Kind of a jokey gift from a friend. Just haven't got 'round to chucking it out yet.'
She sensed some of his discomfort. Embarrassment? What for? So she tried to ease it. 'Best keep it then,' she said. 'When those kinds of friends pop over, it's best to have it out, yeah?'
Mary had not actually met any of John's friends, though she'd introduced him to a few of her own. He had mentioned a name or two in passing, old friends or current colleagues, but he didn't seem particularly close to any of them.
John set the ashtray back on the desk and picked up the tickets, giving them a bit of a wave. 'Shall we?'
She was happy to leave the dreary place behind. And all the way to the theatre, she plotted how to get him out of it, to emancipate him from a life that wasn't a life. She hated to be presumptuous, and she would be appalled to be thought of as vain or self-serving, but Mary believed that John's best chance of escape rested with her.
DECEMBER 2013
He was kind. He was gentle. He was quiet. Sometimes, she thought, it was because he was sombre by nature, calm and reflective, but there were moments, when he didn't know she was looking, that he just seemed a little, well, sad. Then she would catch his eye or say his name, and the sadness would crack, crumble, replaced by the smile he wore only for her. It lit his whole face and warmed her down to her stomach. God, she was so in love.
John was like no one she had ever been with before. Intelligent without pretension, considerate without any expectation of reprisal, funny without being brash. He wasn't classically attractive any more than she was classically beautiful. Tall, dark, and handsome were not his descriptors; in fact, they were almost the very opposite. For a man, he was short (though taller than she), his features were fair, and his face was plain. He was something of an every-man, one that could easily get lost in a crowd or overlooked at a party.
In fact, he seemed almost to prefer anonymity. When she convinced him to go to a Christmas party hosted by her friend Freddie from the florist's, he spent most of the evening holding a glass of wine but not drinking, arm wrapped around her waist as they stood in a circle of her friends. He said little. He seemed to prefer to listen, to smile at the right moments and laugh when appropriate, but she caught him stealing glances at the digital clock on the Blu-ray player. She had a choice: be annoyed that he wasn't being more social, ignore his discomfort, or alleviate it.
'Bored,' she whispered into his ear. His eyebrows rose in surprise. 'Let's get out of here.'
'We don't have to—'
Touching her lips lightly to his, she forestalled him. 'Just the two of us tonight.'
With fingers hooked together, they slowly made their way around the room until they reached their host to offer their compliments and excuses, then slipped out the front door and onto the street. The air was crisp. Light flakes floated on the air, seeming never to reach the ground. As they walked in silence, they kept their inside hands joined for warmth. The outside hands were dug into pockets. For her, it was a moment of perfection.
'I'm sorry,' he said.
She pulled herself out of reverie. 'What for?'
His answer came slowly, like he had given it careful thought, the way he gave everything careful thought. 'I'm something of a stick in the mud, aren't I? That's not fair. Not to you.'
She gave him a gentle shove with her shoulder as rebuke. 'You're not a stick in the mud!' she said with a laugh.
'I think I might be.'
'Then you're my stick in the mud.'
He glanced down at her, half smiling, but looking concerned. 'I worry I'm not enough for you, Mary.'
The words felt ominous, like he was trying to say something, something she didn't want to hear. She stopped walking and pulled him around to face her. For a few seconds, she searched his eyes and found in them a shadow of fear. Of what? Staying? Or leaving?
'I'm a mess,' he said, casting his eyes to the pavement between their feet and shaking his head. 'In so many ways, you don't even know. You deserve someone who—'
'Stop, stop,' she said, unable to bear hearing anymore. Mary dropped his hand, but only to reach for his face and guide his gaze back on her. 'Do you love me, John?'
'What?' He seemed startled.
'Because I love you. I do. You are exactly enough for me. You are exactly what I have been looking for, waiting for, my whole life. I thought I would never find you. Please don't ask me to give you up.'
'I would hate for you to regret me.'
She smiled kindly, pushing her fingernails through his hair to brush away the flakes. 'Not in a thousand years. I love you,' she repeated.
John shook his head, like he couldn't believe it.
'Do you love me?' she asked again.
He closed his eyes and swallowed hard, and for a heart-stopping moment, she thought he was going to deny it. But he lifted his hand to the back of her head and held it there, then stepped closer. His forehead rested against hers. When he spoke, his words were strangled by emotion. 'More than anything left in this world.'
She smiled, the cold entirely forgotten. 'Then kiss me.'
John laughed and sniffed, still emotional, in a way she had never seen him before. She didn't entirely understand. The history that fed why he feared to love her was still hidden from her, and she wouldn't press for it. Not until he was ready to share it with her. For now, this was enough. He brought their lips together and kissed her tenderly, the way only he could, because he did love her, and she knew it.
John had no family. He had lost his mother and father when he was a teenager, and his only sister just a couple of years before they had met. And because neither of his parents had had any siblings, John had no first cousins.
But there was someone he wanted Mary to meet, someone he described as 'practically family', even though he called her, rather formally, Mrs Hudson.
'And you must be Mary!'
They met her on a corner, and the woman was still several paces away when she opened her arms to Mary, giving her plenty of time to prepare for the embrace. She was an old woman, probably in her later seventies, with short, feathery hair she most likely dyed and apple-round cheekbones in a thin face. Her smile was instantly contagious, and she hugged Mary like they were old friends.
'Well, aren't you a pretty thing,' Mrs Hudson said when she stepped back, but still held Mary by the arms to get the proper measure of her. 'Oh, she's lovely, John. Just lovely.' Then she hugged John, and Mary smiled as he kissed her on the cheek in welcome.
The three of them walked together to the restaurant where John had made reservations. Mrs Hudson walked slowly, linking arms with John on one side; on the other, he sought out Mary's hand. When they were seated and John had ordered them the house red (Mary had noticed, over the weeks of their burgeoning courtship, that he was only a social drinker, and never had more than one glass of wine or one bottle of beer), Mrs Hudson—positively beaming—began to pepper them with questions, from how they had met to what plans they had made for Christmas. Every answer they gave made her eyes shine.
'You know,' she said at one juncture, 'if you two are ever looking for a place to live—'
John suddenly started laughing, though to Mary's ears it sounded a bit forced, and he changed the topic of conversation quite abruptly. 'How's your niece and her family? The one with the twins? Will you be visiting for Christmas?'
Halfway through the meal, John's phone sounded in his pocket. He checked the screen. 'Work,' he said apologetically. 'Just a minute, this won't take long.' And he excused himself from the table.
Not five seconds after John stepped away, Mrs Hudson reached across the table and squeezed Mary's hand. 'It's so lovely to meet you, Mary. I can't tell you.'
'It's wonderful to meet you, too, Mrs Hudson. John speaks so fondly of you.'
'He seems so happy. Just so happy.' Mrs Hudson sat back and rested her hands in her lap. Her smile was one of the brightest and friendliest Mary had ever seen. 'It warms my heart to see him like that.'
Mary cocked her head, curious. She wasn't exactly sure what Mrs Hudson was saying. In fact, since first learning of her, Mary had been trying to understand the relationship between John and his former landlady. It wasn't usual—as far as she was aware—for a grown man, a professional, to be so close with the person he paid rent to every month. But he spoke about her with unqualified praise, and now seeing them together, interacting with, not only ease and familiarity, but affection, too, she knew it was much more than that. If she hadn't been told otherwise, she would have mistaken them for mother and son.
'I worry about him, sometimes,' said Mrs Hudson, confidentially. But she winked. 'I don't think I'll have to, anymore.'
Mary glanced quickly to the window. Outside, John was pacing slowly on the pavement while talking on his phone. She realised, suddenly, that she had an opportunity here. It wasn't a betrayal of trust, was it, just to ask a few questions?
'Why do you worry?' she asked.
'Oh, he's just not himself these days. He's had a rough time of things. Since . . .'
'Since his sister passed?'
'Since Sherlock.'
The same sadness that hid in the back corners of John's eyes now reflected in hers.
'He won't talk about it with me,' said Mary.
'Nor with me.'
'I read about it online.' The words coming out of her mouth sounded so callous, and she feared she had crossed a line, having no business treading on what seemed like family affairs.
But Mrs Hudson was not offended. 'It was awful when it happened, just awful.'
Mary worried the cloth napkin between her fingers, wondering how far she dared query. 'I read that he jumped.'
Mrs Hudson nodded soberly. 'I couldn't believe it, when I learnt of it. I knew a detective inspector, came by the flat a lot, back then. He told me. I knew something was wrong the moment he stepped through my door. I saw it on his face. And we cried together, but still, I couldn't believe it, I just couldn't. Not until John told me himself. John—he saw it happen.'
Gasping, Mary covered her mouth. She hadn't known John had been witness to such a horrible thing. After her own father's death, she had struggled not to imagine how it had happened and was glad not to have seen it for herself. Any time she came close, she made concerted effort to push the image away.
'They were close, Sherlock and John,' Mrs Hudson said, as their food cooled on the table and John continued with his phone call outside. A fond, though melancholic smile lifted her rosy cheeks. 'They bickered so much it made their milk curdle, but you should have heard them laughing. A couple of overgrown schoolboys, really, making noise and messes, having adventures and solving crimes. You wouldn't believe the things they got up to. Well, Sherlock especially. John kept him civil. But Sherlock kept John young.'
Mrs Hudson looked wistfully out of the window to the man they both loved.
'Sometimes, late at night, when the floorboards creak above me, I think it's him. Sherlock, I mean. Some nights, I still hear him playing his violin. He composed, you know. He wrote me a piece, just for me, on my birthday one year. A light-hearted, wild thing with his fingers flying all over the place. He thought it would drive me crazy, but it made me laugh. I've . . . forgotten it. The tune. I wish I'd made him record it. But even now, there are days I hear him playing, like it's just for me.' She laughed. 'It's just my fussy old memory playing tricks on me. It tells me, he's still here! He's so impatient for John to come home!' She laughed again at herself, but Mary wanted to cry. 'I'm just a silly old thing. Even though someone else is living there now, my house is too quiet. John knows he's welcome back any time. One word, and I'd kick out the current tenants before he could finish asking! But I understand. He needs to move on. He needs to put that life behind him and find something new.' Again, she reached across the table to pat Mary's hand. 'He looks at you, and it's like he's breathing again. His whole face just shines.'
'That was St E's.' John reappeared suddenly at the table. Mary controlled a jump. As he slid the phone back into his pocket, he pulled out his chair and sat again.
'Do you have to leave?' asked Mary. She didn't want him to go. At the same time, it wouldn't be so bad, just her and Mrs Hudson for one evening.
'Oh no. Just pushing back a surgery tomorrow by a couple of hours, that's all.' He flashed another apologetic smile at them both. 'What are we talking about?'
'Never you mind,' said Mrs Hudson deftly. 'You wouldn't want me to spoil your Christmas present, now would you?'
They continued the meal, and conversation flowed like a river. At some point, Mary reached under the table and gave John's thigh a gentle squeeze. He placed his hand atop hers and kept it there.
John and Mary didn't talk about milestones in their relationship, and they never defined it. Mary never heard John refer to her as his girlfriend, and the only time the word 'boyfriend' came up was in conversations Mary had with Samantha. But saying it aloud like that made her feel like a teenager, and it made John seem like an impermanent figure in her life. He was John, he was hers, and she was his. That's really all there was to it.
Nevertheless, meeting Mrs Hudson felt like a milestone, and a significant one. John was opening his world to her. In a more traditional setting, it was the equivalent of meeting the family. So she wanted John to meet hers.
Flying to Calgary was prohibitively expensive, but over the holidays they set up a video chat session, and that's how she finally fulfilled Samantha's wish to meet John face to face.
'He's cute,' said Sam, later, when it was just the two of them again. 'Kind of soft-spoken, isn't he?'
'I've dated enough loud-mouths to know they're not my cuppa,' Mary countered. She wasn't sure if it was a criticism, but she would defend John to the hilt.
'Going on . . . four months now?'
'And a half.'
'You are sleeping together, then.'
Mary was glad they were talking on the phone and not by video, to hide her colouring cheeks. 'That's all you ever ask me!'
'Well, you've never been shy about talking about it before! What's different now?'
'What's different is, it's none of your business.'
She was no longer the girl who needed to vent about her sex life, or solicit feedback from her wiser, older sister. What she and John shared privately, she cherished privately. Besides, John seemed classier than that, and she respected him too much to gossip about what they got up to beneath the covers. Together, they had talked about past girlfriends, boyfriends, even laughed about their past mistakes and bad dates. But when it was just the two of them, undressing, touching, holding, giving into the raw need of each other, no one else had a place there. She left the rest of it behind. She imagined he did, too.
So she wouldn't tell Sam about how tenderly he knew her or how beautiful she felt when he looked at her naked body with desire. The sweetness of his mouth and the passion of his touch was hers and hers alone to treasure.
'Has he moved in?'
'One step at a time,' said Mary, vaguely.
She wanted him to, and had even broached the subject—delicately—on more than one occasion. She mentioned how much time he spent at hers and away from his; she casually calculated the fiscal advantages of sharing one front door; she even got so bold as to tell him what she really thought of the bedsit ('It's a hovel, John.'). But something was holding him back. She couldn't name it. It wasn't a lack of commitment or needing an exit strategy. It was like he was trying to cross a gulf on a rickety bridge, and one wrong move might plunge him to the ravine below.
'You'll bring him out sometime so I can meet him properly, I hope,' Sam continued.
'What, to Canada?'
'You haven't been home in ages, Mare-bear.'
'London is home. Why do you never come to see me? You didn't even come for Dad's funeral.'
There was a long pause, and for one exciting moment, Mary believed her sister was actually considering a visit. Then Sam said, 'I don't like flying.'
Mary rolled her eyes, this time wishing Sam could see her. 'Well, John and I love it here.'
'Maybe you would both love it here, if you gave it a chance.'
'Dad's buried here, Sam.'
'And Mum's grave is in Calgary.'
She sighed, aching that she couldn't have it both ways. But her family had always been split down the middle, so she supposed her heart must be, too. 'Maybe next Christmas, we'll come visit,' she said. There was no doubt in her mind about the we. As far as she was concerned, it would be we for the next fifty Christmases. 'But I'm telling you, Samantha, darling, this is home. London is where I'll die.'
On Christmas morning, they woke together, and in the tradition of both their families exchanged Christmas stockings. It seemed they both were making up for past Christmases spent alone. John had stuffed hers full, and included in her haul were the latest Jodi Picoult novel, tickets to see Giselle performed by the English National Ballet, an oven thermometer (she laughed when she saw it—she had burnt both a lasagne and meat pie due to faulty settings on the flat's old oven), a dozen of her favourite multi-coloured macarons, a purple-and-blue cashmere scarf, and a silver bird hanging in flight on the end of silver chain.
To John, she had gifted three things: First, a gift certificate to his favourite bakery, near the hospital ('Now you can get a currant scone every morning for a solid month,' she said, and he laughed and kissed her). Second, an updated phone.
'Yours is so old, it can't hold a charge more than a couple hours,' she said, thinking it was quite the thoughtful gift. 'So I thought it was time. I mean, I know your old phone was from your sister, but . . .' And suddenly, she doubted her choice. Maybe she shouldn't have forced this one on him.
'I've been meaning to update,' said John, staring at the box, caught somewhere between yesterday and today. She had seen that expression before. 'They can transfer information, though, right? My address book, and, um, old texts?'
'Of course.'
He smiled and thanked her, complimenting the new phone, and then lifted the final small box. Mary's heart was racing, a little fearful of his reaction to her final gift, which she had placed in an old black jewellery box.
John lifted the lid. His eyebrows lifted, too.
She hastened to put him at ease and said softly, 'For when you're ready.'
He picked up the small silver key, a replica of her own. His eyes met hers.
'I love you,' she said. Again, that look of disbelief, like he wanted to trust this was true but didn't know his way forward. She wanted more than anything to erase that look.
'I love you,' he said. 'I just . . . Don't give up on me, Mary. I just need a little more time.'
'I know.'
FEBRUARY 2014
On the anniversary of Harry Watson's death, John made plans to visit her.
'May I come?' Mary asked.
At first, John was nonplussed, obviously expecting her to accept his excuse for why he would be away the night before Valentine's, with the promise that they would spend the holiday together. Then, his face softened. 'I'd like that,' he said.
The next day, hand in hand, they crunched through the thin crust of snow on the ground, John bearing a small bouquet of lilies from Rosemary and Thyme, which had been provided free of charge, as a favour to Mary. He laid the flowers at the base of the headstone.
'We couldn't afford a plot for Mum,' he said, 'or Dad. They were cremated. But I wanted Harry to have a spot in the earth.'
It was all he said.
That night, Mary found him in the kitchen, standing at the sink with a glass of water in his hand. He heard her come up behind him but didn't turn. Hoping she wasn't intruding, she stepped beside him and lay a hand between his shoulder blades where she felt the heat and damp of his shirt. Another nightmare then.
He had them, from time to time. That's what he said. But in all the nights he had stayed over, she had been witness to them only twice. Tonight was the third.
She rubbed his back gently, mindful not to touch the left shoulder and bullet wound scar, which ached at times like these. 'Acted up' were his words, but she could see in his face that it was worse than that. When she asked whether he preferred that she never touch it, he said it was fine, he didn't mind, but she saw that was a lie, too. So she never did.
'Do you want to talk about it?' she asked, her voice nearly a whisper to match the night's solemnity.
He drank slowly, lowered the glass. 'I don't remember it.'
John was not in the habit of lying to her. That's why it was so easy to tell when he did.
She rested her head on his shoulder, not ceasing to rub circles into his back until he was ready to go back to bed.
MARCH 2014
On her birthday, Mary went to work, where Freddie and Janelle sang to her and had her blow out the candle on an oversized cupcake with frosting that mimicked succulent flowers in a fondant terra cotta pot. Sam called during her break, and they talked and laughed for two hours (Janelle was kindly indulgent).
John joked that he would send her a bouquet from a competing flower shop. Instead, she was delivered chocolate truffles and a pair of pearl earrings.
When she returned home to get ready for her date that night, she was taken by surprise when she stepped through her front door and found John already there, standing beside an antique rocking chair she had admired several months ago—October, was it?—and adorned with a large red bow. Despite having her permission—nay, her blessing; nay, her explicit encouragement—he had never let himself in before with the key she had gifted him for Christmas. But he was there now, wearing a dark suit and tie, and a sheepish smile on his face. He showed her the key.
'This okay?'
She dropped her purse by the door. It was more than okay. It was the most wonderful sight in the world, the way her world should be: coming home to find that man she loved in the place he belonged.
'Does this mean . . . ?' She almost didn't dare hope.
'I was thinking,' he said, coming toward her with slow, measured steps as he slipped the key into his front pocket. 'Well, let's face it. Your bed is softer than mine. Your shower has better water pressure. And I'm over here all the time anyway . . .'
'Oh John!' She flung her arms around his neck. He laughed and squeezed her tightly, lifting her off her feet to twirl her. With her feet back on the ground, she held his face in her hands and kissed him joyfully.
They moved him in the following weekend. It didn't take long. John had some boxes and suitcases but no furniture to call his own. They ordered a pizza, turned on the radio, and unpacked his life, mingling it comfortably with hers. They also planned additional improvements to the flat: a new book case, new coffee tables, new rugs. 'I'll make curtains,' she added. 'You don't know it yet, but I'm quite handy with a sewing machine.'
Joining their lives together was easy—the emotional work had already been done, so the physical was just a matter of practicality: making space in the wardrobe and in the bathroom cupboards, downsizing from two electric kettles to one and tossing the spare, figuring who got first go at the shower or who picked up the mail. Neither made heavy demands, and both made easy concessions. It was no work at all.
For Mary, is was a happy change, having another body to move around and lean against and welcome home. For John, it was a transformation. He seemed lighter, somehow. Mary couldn't explain it, couldn't quite even describe it. Maybe it was the way he walked, like he wasn't carrying so much weight on his back anymore; or the way he laughed, like it was easier than it had been before. He certainly smiled more. And he became more playful, too, singing while stirring a pot, or dancing with her on their new rugs just for the hell of it, or planning holidays to the country. It wasn't like he had become a new man. He was the same man she had fallen in love with. But a veil she didn't know overlaid him had been lifted, and he shone brighter. Perhaps it was the delusion of biased mind, but she thought him more beautiful, in every respect.
The new shelves were assembled. The new curtains were hung. She had just affixed a picture to the wall, one of the two of them standing on the Millennium Bridge, arms around each other and posing for the camera and an indulgent tourist. From the kitchen, John returned with two glasses of red wine.
She met him en route, surprising him, but she didn't take the proffered glass. Instead, she brushed her fingers along his jaw, along the rim of his ear, and behind his head, pulling his head toward her. She kissed him with need, unrepentant in her desire. He opened his mouth and inclined his head, kissing her in return. His back fell against the wall. His arms came up and around her. The cool wine glass touched her skin. He started, fumbling a little, but she stepped back, took the glasses away and set them on a table, then wasted not a second more throwing herself into his arms. The wine could wait.
They slid down the walls toward the bedroom, laughing and kissing and moaning, drunk on something quite apart from wine, and stumbled into the bedroom and upon the bed. She would never tire of this, his fingers in her hair, his mouth on her skin, the way he said her name and then couldn't, could only sigh and pant and give himself to her, all of himself.
Afterwards, returning for the wine, they saw their little mishap: a small splash of red on the floorboards. After a short period of scrubbing and giggling, Mary said, 'Just don't tell the landlord!'
'Ah, it's not so bad. At least we're not shooting holes in the walls.'
'Hm?'
'Nothing.' John sat back on his heels and said, 'Hell with it. Let's put a standing lamp right here.'
APRIL 2014
Mary cracked open the door to the bathroom, but only a little; she didn't want too much steam to escape. 'John, it's work. Should I answer?'
He shouted over the sound of the shower. 'Text and say I'll be there in forty!'
She closed the door and picked up his phone from the nightstand, unplugging the charger. Then she tapped in his code and responded quickly to the text. The inbox, though, remained opened, and Mary saw, at the bottom of the screen, that John had over three hundred saved texts. She shook her head with amusement. Did he not know these took up storage space? With a quick swipe of her finger, she scrolled through the topmost texts and saw that they were all from her. Texts from colleagues had evidently been deleted, but—if she was reading this right—he had saved every text she had ever sent him.
Smiling, she hopped onto the bed, sat cross-legged, and journeyed back, back to Valentine's and New Year's and Christmas, reliving the days of their relationship in reverse. She wasn't one to snoop, but this wasn't snooping, she reasoned. He had given her his password, after all, and this was a history they shared. But she did see, from time to time, that some of Mrs Hudson's texts were saved, too. She opened only one ('John, dear, give me a ring when you have a moment'), and she moved on with her own. December, November, October . . . It was no wonder John had wanted to transfer these from his old phone. They should have them printed, she thought, to keep them safe, just in case the technology failed them one day. September, August, and their very first texts, back and forth, when they were practically strangers who still did not know what they would become.
A little egocentrically, perhaps, Mary assumed that the saved texts would stop with hers, the very first one she ever sent. But her heart stopped when she saw a time jump, from August 2014 to January 2013, a text from someone named Stamford. Curiosity drove her before guilt could stop her, and she read:
John, fancy a pint? It's
been too long.
That was it. But Mary didn't think she had ever heard John speak of someone with the surname Stamford before and wondered who it was. And that wasn't all. Another large jump in time to the next text, October 2011, from Harry. Oh my God, Mary mouthed as the shower kept running in the distance. This was from John's sister. Guilt now squeezing at her heart, she ventured to open this one, too:
Thx. Luv u. Don't make
me say it again.
Mary knew that John's relationship with his sister had been rocky, to put it mildly, and he had mentioned the circumstances of her death, in general terms. He still carried the pain of it with him, the things left unsaid, the anger he had felt toward her up to the last. And here, like a token of whatever good feeling they had shared between them, a saved text, maybe the last she had ever sent him. Nine words from two-and-a-half years ago.
But there were still three more. The shower twisted off just as Mary clicked texts from January 30, 2010, in the order they had been received.
Baker Street.
Come at once
if convenient.
SH
If inconvenient,
come anyway.
SH
Could be dangerous.
SH
She heard the shower curtain being pulled back and John, humming to himself, drying off. Hastily, Mary closed the inbox, set the phone back on the nightstand, and padded quickly from the room, wiping her eyes and recovering herself before John should see her again.
APRIL 2014
They were not a contentious couple, and they almost never fought. Their disagreements boiled down to the best way to cook eggs, the cultural significance of James Bond (Mary just didn't get it), how often to wash the bathroom towels ('Every week?' said John), and, more seriously, how to manage the bills: John's earning was higher, so he argued he should shoulder the greater burden of rent and utilities; Mary had her pride and wanted to split all financial obligations they shared fifty-fifty. They settled on sixty-forty for the rent, fifty-fifty for the utilities, Mary would take the grocery bills, John would pay whenever they went out (taxis and meals), mobiles, telly, and internet, and each would handle their own transportation to and from work.
But they didn't have any serious dispute until Mary found the gun.
She was hunting for stationery, needing a card for a friend's upcoming wedding, and she couldn't remember where she had tucked them away. Maybe John had moved them when he moved in. So she reached for the shoebox under John's side of the bed and slid it toward her. It was bound with rubber bands and felt heavy, and she doubted the cards were in there, but she had to check anyway. And there she saw it, heavy and black, alongside an empty magazine and a full box reading 9mm automatic pistol.
Her heart began to pound in earnest. She had never seen a gun before, not close up, not in real life. And though she didn't pick it up, its weight surprised her as she lifted the shoebox. In fact, it upset her a little, in part because there was a lethal weapon in her home, but more especially because John hadn't told her he was bringing it. It seemed like the sort of thing she ought to have known.
Yes, he had been a soldier. She knew that. But he didn't talk about it, so she hadn't spent much time imagining what that really meant. Now, though, she couldn't help it. This gun was John's, his service weapon. But had he ever had to use it? Surely he had been trained, but he was a doctor, first and foremost. He had said that. His prerogative was to save lives, not . . . take them. The thought chilled her. Had he? In war, she knew, it was justified, and to save his own life and those of his fellow soldiers, of course, he might have had to. But she just couldn't imagine it: John, aiming, firing, taking a life. Had this gun, this gun, resting in a box below their beds, been instrumental in killing another man?
'I don't want it in the flat,' Mary said, more boldly than she felt. She hated making demands, but this was one matter where she could see no acceptable compromise.
'Mary, it's not even loaded,' John responded.
'But it's against the law! How is it you even have a gun?'
'I know, I know,' said John, not answering the question. 'But it's a matter of safety.'
'Safety!'
'London is . . . Well, it's not as a safe as one might think. It's good to be prepared.'
'In our house, John? What do you imagine will happen?'
His jaw grew tight, and he glared. The look startled her, frightened her. He must have seen it on her face, because he half turned away, rubbing a hand down his face as though to straighten it out.
'What if,' she said, trying to articulate her fears more carefully, 'what if the landlord found it? I don't know why he would, but what if? We would not only lose the flat. If you're found in possession of a gun, that could mean prison time.' She couldn't bear the thought, and a hand covered her mouth as she fought to stabilise her emotions.
'Getting rid of something like this isn't so easy,' he murmured.
'Find a way. Please. Please. John, if we have children—' She stopped, surprised by herself. They had never broached the subject of children before, not in any serious context. She didn't know what John thought about the possibility, aside from the fact that they had always been careful and taken measures to prevent it. More truthfully, she wasn't positive how she felt about it either. Though still relatively young, she wasn't that young, and she assumed the window was closing. Then, she met him.
John looked equally surprised, and she almost expected him to laugh. Instead, in a voice choked with emotion, he said, 'All the more reason to be able to protect them.'
'Or harm them.' Why would he think they need protecting? Did he really see the world as such a dark and dangerous place? But there was so much good in it, too! People were good. She had always believed that. 'God, John. Please. I don't understand completely, and I know you've been hurt. But please. Don't bring the war into our home.'
He dropped his head to hide his eyes, because they were glistening with tears. And here was something else she had never seen: John Watson crying.
'I never—' It was a false start. His voice caught, and he had to try again. 'I'm sorry, Mary. I would never put you through that. You're right. I'll take care of it.'
He was as good as his word. Mary never saw the gun again.
MAY 2014
Shirking off Sam's needling insistence that they take a spring holiday to Calgary, Mary and John instead kept it closer to home. They visited Stonehenge because, although John had once been on a school trip, Mary had been too busy with youth ballet. But she had always wanted to see it, despite John's warning that they wouldn't be able to get very close. Then they took another Saturday to visit Hampton Court Palace, where Mary made John wear a green velvet cape while she herself donned a red velvet robe and begged a jester to take their photograph.
'This one is not going on the wall,' John said through an indulgent but pained smile, just before the jester counted to three.
'You goon, of course not.'
She turned and kissed his cheek, just as the photo was snapped.
'This one is going in the bedroom,' she said in her best sultry voice.
John threw his head back and laughed. The jester caught that one, too.
JUNE 2014
It was a wet, grey, gloomy June. London went long stretches of days without sunlight, and one didn't leave the flat without a brolly and a heavy sense of resignation.
Mary felt it first in her throat: thickness, at the start, then pain when swallowing. But she tried to ignore it, even as her muscles began to ache and her heavy head begged to find a pillow in the middle of the day. She fought it with lozenges, tomato soup, and honey tea, but the virus had taken hold, and, according to her new doctor, would just have to wear itself out.
'Sleep and fluids,' said John, holding the backs of his fingers to the side of her face, though he had already taken her temperature. 'No better remedy. But let me know if your muscle ache worsens or chest feels tight when you breathe, and I'll get you a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory or analgesic.'
'Mm, sexy,' she murmured through a stuffy nose. She rubbed her nose with a wadded tissue.
'It's all I can do to keep myself from snogging you senseless,' he quipped.
She laughed, but it hurt too much to continue. 'I'm not faking this time,' she said.
'What's that?'
'To get an appointment with you and trick you into being my boyfriend. This is all real, sweetie.' She gestured to her duvet-swaddled body with the snotty tissue.
John chuckled and kissed her forehead, promising to bring back menthol for her tea when he returned home from work. 'Anything else you might need, text me.'
She was down for four days, sleeping mostly, but also bingeing on the DVD box sets John brought home for her. He was perfectly attentive, but there was something melancholic about him, a slight distraction of the brain, perhaps. Maybe the cold was playing tricks on her. When her own brain wasn't foggy with fatigue, she asked about work, and he shared little anecdotes from throughout his day. She asked if he thought he was coming down with it, too, but he said, no, he felt perfectly healthy. Perhaps, then, it was the weather, which was dour enough to affect even the cheeriest of dispositions, let alone John, who was, it had to be admitted, was a little more prone to introspection and sobriety than most.
But she couldn't shake the suspicion that she was missing something. For three nights, he slept on the sofa—so she wouldn't feel guilty about sneezing and hacking and keeping him awake, of course—but she also caught him in the evening at his desk, staring at his medical journals without actually reading them, seemingly lost in thought. Whatever he was thinking about, whatever he seemed to be dealing with, he was dealing with it on his own.
Eventually, with the month nearly gone but the skies still sulky, Mary's illness broke. John, too, seemed to be rising from his funk, and when he got home that evening, he didn't remove his jacket but said, 'How about we go out tonight? Get you out of this flat.'
'Oh, thank God,' said Mary. She threw off the blanket, stood from the sofa, and grabbed her purse from the hook by the door. She didn't care how she looked and didn't bother with the mirror, not even to comb fingers through her hair. 'You choose. I'll go anywhere.'
He caught her arm before she had fully passed through the door. 'Sweetheart,' he said, 'perhaps some proper shoes?'
She looked down and saw she was still wearing her house slippers. And, for that matter, a dressing gown. She threw back her head and laughed, and John with her. 'Five minutes,' she promised.
They went to a nearby pub—quick drinks, cheap starters, and exactly the kind of noise and bustle Mary had been missing while cooped up in bed. It was crowded, but they found a table and shouted at one another over the music while a football match played on a telly in the corner, occasionally eliciting cheers from those crowded together to watch. A server brought them two beers.
John drank slowly, as he always did, and Mary followed suit. She had never been a heavy drinker, but she did tend to adopt the drinking habits of her mates when going out, which meant she'd had very little by way of alcohol since meeting John, and she found herself happier for it. Or maybe that was just John. All the same, after half an hour they had drained their glasses, and Mary was in need of the loo. 'I'll get us another round on my way back,' she said into his ear, the better for him to hear.
As she was waiting at the bar for her drinks to be served up, she glanced at the score (though she cared little for football), fixed her hair in the mirror behind the bottles lining the back wall, and looked down the long bar to see if there was anyone she happened to know. Nobody. But . . . there was one man angled not forward, and not toward the telly, but to the side, the only one to the side, with an intent stare. Mary followed it, and it seemed to her, despite the throng, that he was staring at John.
'Your drinks,' said the barkeeper. She picked up the two glasses and returned to the table, intending to ask John whether he knew the man at the bar.
'Ah, Mary,' said John, taking his drink from her but setting it aside. He was handing his phone over to another patron. 'This lovely woman here has agreed to take our photo.'
'What? Why?' said Mary, sliding into her chair, which John pulled around to sit right alongside his. 'I look a mess!'
'You look stunning. And because, I was just thinking.' He draped an arm around the back of her chair, covered her other hand with his on the table, and looked directly into her eyes as he said, 'You're the best thing that could have possibly happened to me.'
Touched, delighted, she smiled, and nudged his nose with hers. 'I agree,' she joked. 'Oh go on, then.' She turned to the camera, keeping John's face close to hers.
His hand moved to her back, and she was filled with wonder and warmth that after so many months, she could still feel herself melting at his touch. Love shouldn't be this desperate, she thought. Love should flare then grow temperate, a steady pulse, an untroubled melody. But with John, she knew only a racing heart and songbirds going wild with joy. So after the picture had been taken and the phone returned, she looked at him and, with her eyes, begged him for a kiss. Graciously, he obliged.
She had by then entirely forgotten about the man at the bar.